#if my weight were to fluctuate. more of it would fit. and so i hang onto it

[hannahchronism]

so mad all my friends don’t live here i can guarantee if i had someone to come body double and lay on my bed while i putter around i would do the keepit/tossit i’ve been meaning to do with my clothes for several months now

[blackcatonastring]

When the tape measure or scale triggers you

As someone that grew up a fat kid and then more fat thanks to medication, scales were the worst. I was retaining so much water bc of my condition at the time. I called my shins Temperpedic bc of the dents that would stay for a long time. Adema was not fun. I couldn’t feel anything in my legs for months before I could get that water out with water pills and low salt diets.

But then, once that was seen to, the fat remained. The stamina was still quite low so my activity remained that low as well. And that was the struggle I faced for years. The yo-yo life of gym to sick to just not caring bc I had no support group. I almost considered bariatric surgery. Not to knock it bc, for some, that may be the only way they can get the motivation to become a fitter version of themselves.

Part of my insurance’s coverage to doing that surgery was sitting in through a series of info sessions, then get the green light from my doctors and a psychologist or therapist. I sat through all the sessions and they’re mandatory that you sit through the required segments or you don’t get your surgery date. But what changed my mind the most was some of the people that attended the sessions. I never got to see the same people sometimes bc it’s all about when you can make them. But quite a few were there bc they fell off the wagon (for lack of a better way to say it). They already had the bariatric surgery then fell back into love with the foods that got them to where they were, at square one.

This is totally human bc we’re almost always thinking that healthy living means cutting out fats. And fats are where the flavors are. We love flavor, therefore we love fats. Chicharrones? Heck yea, sign me up! Now, I’ve never mentally bashed these people bc they had the surgery first. They had to have been doing well before something triggered them to go back to the comforts of what foods they knew before the surgery. They’re the lessons that I needed to see in order to realize where I could do better for myself. I wanted the challenge of doing better without the assistance of having a smaller stomach. I knew it was possible, but it took me years later to find my groove.

So, coming to today, it’s been a mental struggle with scales and tape measure bc I can feel the muscle developing under my skin. But the fluff is still there and, when you see yourself everyday, you can’t see the micro changes that are happening. Only when a coworker comments do I really know but it’s not often enough for me to have weight, in a way.

Trying to measure myself has become the same boat as weighing myself. Since muscle weights more than fat, I can’t say I will ever get to what many guidelines say I should weigh for my height. Just like weight, body size fluctuates with changes, how much water you take in, how much you’ve done in your workout. What I’ve been doing, and what I should have been doing ages ago, is use one piece of clothing that I really want to fit now that the weather is getting warmer.

I have this denim jacket who’s measurements should have fit my potato body. When I got it, my upper arms were too big to even get a sleeve on. I was miffed but I wasn’t about to give the jacket away bc I paid for that jacket. I got that jacket bc I liked it very much. It’s been about a month since I got that jacket and I finally am able to put it on. It’s snug and I can’t hug anyone in it. The fact I could even get it on made me feel so accomplished that I know that I’m doing something right for myself.

I feel like others have done the same. Hang up a dress or a pair of slacks they truly love and worked to get into it. As someone with health conditions, it shows it’s still possible. It just takes time and effort. I grew up wanting instant results. There’s no such thing as that with weight loss and I’m still figuring things out for myself. But I’m older and wiser and do research when I can to add to what I can do. Hang that garment you like but can’t wear. That is your target goal. How long it takes might be months, but be reasonable with your expectations.

The only person that needs to approve of your progress and success is you.

[mrsalwayswrite]

To Call Forth Love - Chapter 10

I’m sorry its taken me so long to update. I haven't had much time to write lately due to....well, life. But here we are and its long, so hopefully that makes up for the length. 

Side note- the Norwegian used is from Google translate so....

Warnings: swearing, mild sexual content, Lothbrok family dynamics (yes, its a warning), threats of violence

Words: 15,700 (yep, my longest chapter yet. I packed ALOT into this beast)

Tag List: @youbloodymadgenius @evelynshelby @pomegranates-and-blood @heavenly1927 @zuxiezendler @punkrocknpearls @love-all-things-writing @southernbe @ecarroll1978 @breezykpop @deans-ch-ch-cherrypie​

Series Masterlist

"Where are we going? I thought we were going to your flat?" 

 Gyda slyly smiled at Kari, sitting in the passenger seat of her bright yellow Porsche. "Change of plans."

 Kari stared at her friend. "I'm scared to ask."

 "Torvi asked for female reinforcement. So, we are going to keep her company."

 "Ok…. But where is that?" 

 "At the brothers' house." The blonde answered nonchalantly as she made a quick right-hand turn. "It's tradition. Kind of a last family summer party before it's too cold to swim anymore. They have a pool in their backyard."

 Kari felt her stomach drop. Ivar had told her he lived with his three other brothers. Gyda had her own flat while Bjorn and Torvi owned a house nearby. Whenever she tried to ask Ivar about his home, he would shrug off the question or ignore it completely. Eventually she just stopped asking. Curiosity certainly reared its head when she wondered what his home was like. For how much money meant nothing to him, she guessed it was massive and expensive. Maybe he knew she would not fit in and that was why he never brought her? Even through his speeches of wanting her to be his girlfriend, he knew she would not fit into his lifestyle. Why else would he keep her away? It was a valid truth that she had come to terms with. Even if she found herself secretly desperate to ease into his life, she never would. 

 "Of course, they do…." Kari rolled her eyes at the notion that obviously, there was a pool in their backyard. It fit the stereotype in her mind. Then she thought about what Gyda just said. "Wait. Do you have a swimsuit with you?"

 Gyda raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow at her while keeping her eyes on the road. "Don't worry, I've got you covered. Torvi brought an extra of hers for you."

 "You had this planned, didn't you? We never were going to your flat, were we?"

 "I don't kiss and tell."

 "Yes, you do. There was that guy you hooked up with two weeks ago that kept sending you dick pics after."

 "That guy was way too proud of his dick. I mean it wasn't even that big."

 "I don't want to hear this again." Kari groaned, tugging on her diamond earring. She enjoyed Gyda but she had learned far more about the woman's sex life than she had any desire to know. 

 "Okay, fine. And yes, Torvi and I planned this. Ivar doesn't know you're coming."

 "Why?"

 Gyda smirked. "Because he's been so secretive and only Hvitserk has seen you two together. Besides, the rest of the brothers want to meet you. We may be at each other's throats most of the time but we do care for one another."

 The brunette let her friend's words sink in. Hvitserk had mentioned the others wanting to meet her, but she had not fully believed it. Sure, she wanted to meet them and was curious after hearing Ivar talk about them, but why would they be interested in her? She glanced down at her clothes, the capri leggings and tank top that were practically a signature look for her. For once, she wished she dressed nicer regularly. "I wish you had said something before."

 "You wouldn't have come then. You'd have created some excuse why you couldn't come." Gyda pointed out the obviously painful truth without remorse. 

 Kari slouched in the passenger seat, butterflies doing somersaults in her belly. Slowly, she pulled her ponytail down, letting her hair hang loose past her shoulders, running her hand through it absent-mindedly in hopes it looked decent. 

 At a red light, Gyda looked over at her with a bright smile. "It'll be fun." 

 "I don't know…. isn’t it supposed to be just family?"

 "Ubbe sometimes brings his girlfriend but yeah, it's usually just family."

 There was another long silence before Kari spoke again, unable to fully conceal her nerves. "You should drop me off and just go. I don't want to intrude."

 "You're not. I'm bringing you because there is always way too much testosterone." Gyda groaned, then reached over and swatted Kari's leg. "What are you so worried about?"

 "What if they don't like me?" She whispered. The weight of her confession hung over her like a dark cloud. 

 "What?"

 She kept her gaze out the window. "The…. the others. What if they don't like me?"

 Gyda laughed. "Kari, don't worry. They will love you. I promise. And if they say anything fucking stupid, I'll slap them or Ivar will stab them. See? Simple."

 A smile grew on Kari's face. "That shouldn't make me feel better…. but for some reason it does." Maybe she had already spent too much time with various Lothbroks if the idea of people resorting to violence made her feel better. 

 "You aren't alone, if anything we'll steal Torvi and Asa away and have a girls' party."

 "Asa? That's her daughter, right?"

 "Right, and Hali is her son. I swear that boy is going to be a miniature version of Bjorn."

 "I've never been around kids much." 

 Gyda chuckled, waving a hand dismissively. "They are great, Asa is a sweetie who prefers to cuddle in someone's lap. It's Hali who is a bit wild but all his uncles love to play with him. He'll probably be swimming in the pool the whole time anyway."

 Still staring out the window, Kari thought about everything Gyda had said. Of course, she was still nervous about just showing up to a family event unannounced, even if she was sort of being kidnapped by Gyda. Some of her nerves faded away with the knowledge that Gyda and Torvi both wanted her there. She really would not be alone. She had friends. She had people that wanted to spend time with her. Hopefully Ivar would be pleased to see her. His potential reaction was the only real wrinkle in her fluctuating confidence. 

 "Okay. I can do this." She said aloud, wondering if she was trying to fully convince herself. 

 "Good, cause we're almost there."

 Kari stared out the window as they approached a gated community. Gyda showed her ID to a guard who chatted with her like they were old friends. As the yellow Porsche drove by the houses in the community, Kari just stared in awe. She had seen houses, mansions was a better term, like these before but it always amazed her that people lived in them. What did they do with all that space? All of the homes were set back from the road so Kari only caught glimpses of them but it was enough to remind her how out of her element she was. 

 Finally, they pulled up a long driveway to a massive two-story house. It was white with an insane number of windows, and a huge garage attached on the left side. On the right side looked like an expansive addition that made Kari wonder why they needed more space. The roof was made of some slate gray tiles, with a balcony above the front door and ivy draping elegantly over the corners. There were various sized potted plants and shrubbery around the front of the house and leading down the sides. Several European beech trees were strategically placed in the front yard to block most of the view from the road in an attempt at privacy. Whoever the grounds keeper was, for surely they had one, needed a raise. 

 Kari could only gape for a long moment, unable to move as she took in the immaculate, beautiful house. To think this was where Ivar lived and he always came over to her tiny townhouse. It was a struggle to tamper down the post embarrassment. 

 Gyda started talking as she parked in front of the house. The only other vehicle in sight was a silver four-door Audi, that Kari recognized as Torvi's. "Aslaug chose the house for them. When she isn't traveling for work or staying at their family home in Norway, this is where she stays. So, she insisted on this place. Something about the natural sunlight and old aesthetic blending with the new vibe. Or some other shit. I can't remember."

 "Huh." Kari said as she followed the blonde out of the car. She noticed there was no mention of the father, Ragnar, and wondered where he stayed but knew it was none of her business so she kept her question to herself. Maybe Ivar would explain it to her. 

 Gyda opened the solid, wood front door, waltzing in like she had done this a million times. Kari took two steps in and froze. The vaulted ceiling in the foyer was enough to stare at but it was the large chandelier that caused her to stare. The way it caught the afternoon light through the many windows and gently cast it about was truly gorgeous. This view was worth owning the house for itself, in her opinion. 

 A tugging on her arm made Kari squeak as she found herself suddenly being dragged along like a ragdoll. 

 "You can stare later, Torvi is waiting for us." Gyda stated, a large purse over her shoulder and her heeled boots clicking on the shiny, wood floor with each step. 

 Kari caught glimpses of other rooms as they passed down the long, straight hallway. A living room with a TV that took up most of the wall it was on. A kitchen that would make any celebrity chef drool. Pictures and awards displayed along the walls in the hallway that were obviously put up by their mother.  

 The two finally stepped out into a room with glass walls, where the pool and expansive backyard lay before them. Most likely what used to be a porch before being enclosed. Still being pulled along, Kari followed Gyda through a side door onto the stamped concrete that surrounded the pool and lounge area. A pool in a rectangle shape dominated the area, a diving board on the far end. A quick glance around showed a jacuzzi on the other side, closer to the house, the water bubbling like a cauldron. There was a large grill, several short tables and lounge chairs spread over the stamped concrete. At the far end was an adult size statue of the Buddha with two flowering pots on either side of him and some kind of cheap, plastic crown on his head. 

 The backyard was several acres wide and at least that many in length. Trees and large shrubs blocked the views of the neighbor's properties and made the place feel almost like a hidden oasis. Further down in a corner was a lovely gazebo with a cobbled stone path leading to it and gardens decorating the way. 

 "Gyda! What took you so long?!" A distinctly male voice called out. 

 "I had to pick up a package." She called back, pulling Kari into full view of the others. 

 The brunette gave a small, self-conscious smile at the many pairs of eyes that she could feel land on her. Before she could really get a good look at who was around, a shout of her name startled her. 

 "Kari!" Hvitserk jumped up from his lounge chair, wearing only dark green swim trunks, and walked over to her with a beaming smile. 

 "Hey…. OH!" She started to greet him only to be swallowed into a hug and spun in a circle. Unable to deny him, she hugged him back and laughed. It was funny since last time she saw him, he was in business attire, coming to check on her per Ivar's instructions. Now she could not help but notice his toned body. His form reminded her more of a runner, while she was used to seeing Ivar's muscular torso. A couple tattoos on Hvitserk caught her eye and she wondered if all the brothers had them. 

 When he finally set her back on her feet, he kept his hands on her shoulders, green eyes twinkling with a mischievous glint. "I didn't know you were coming here."

 "Yeah, I didn't know either until Gyda told me on the way."

 He chuckled, glancing over her head to his half-sister. "Yeah, not surprising."

 "Uh huh. Watch yourself, boy. I could still beat your ass if I wanted too." Gyda quipped. 

 "Maybe fifteen years ago. You don't have a chance now."

 "Keep telling yourself that, Hvitty." She teased, then yelled at Torvi. "You got it?"

 As soon as Kari was released by Hvitserk, she could sense a pair of sharp, blue eyes boring into her. Skin prickling under the sensation, she hesitantly looked up and immediately met Ivar's intense gaze right away, as if subconsciously her mind already knew where he was without having to search for him. 

 Reclined back on a cushioned, lounge beach chair, he wore loose black sweatpants, instead of swim trunks, under his leg braces, but without a shirt. His tattoos were a stark contrast on his skin and shamelessly on full display. Her fingers twitched with the urge to trace them again. It was his penetrating gaze though, the lack of emotion on his handsome face, that made her wonder if being here was a bad idea. 

 Before she could make a run for it, Gyda grabbed her arm as if sensing her desire to flee. "C'mon, let's get changed."

 With one last glance at Ivar, she followed behind Gyda and Torvi, who had joined them, back into the massive house. They headed to the kitchen and Gyda pointed out a bathroom across the way. 

 Placing the beach bag on the kitchen counter, Torvi dug in it for a moment before murmuring a quiet "here it is" and handed Kari something. "Here. I bought this forever ago but never wore it. Bjorn said he didn't like the colors."

 Kari took it, guessing it was the promised swimsuit, and peeked down at the two pieces of clothing in her hands. "Um…. where’s the rest of it?"

 Laughing, Gyda rolled her eyes. "Get in there and change or I'll do it for you."

 With a concerned look between the swimsuit in her hands and the two blondes staring at her expectantly, Kari finally conceded defeat and stepped into the bathroom. It was only a half bath, with a toilet and sink, but it was still roomy and felt fancy somehow. The mirror above the sink was large and there was a small, pretty flowering plant on the counter that upon inspection, turned out to be real. 

 Quickly, she changed out of her leggings and tank top and into the swimsuit, figuring it was best that way, like ripping off a band-aid. Plus, if she stopped moving, her nerves would get the better of her and she would somehow find a way to sneak home. Even if she had to crawl through a window. A smile grew on her face remembering Hvitserk's enthusiasm to see her. That had honestly surprised her but she found she did not mind. Hvitserk seemed like a good guy and the little bit of time they had spent together, she felt comfortable with him. He was funny and caring. 

 Then Ivar's blank face came to mind and all of her excitement slipped away like water down a drain. There had been no acknowledgement, not even the hint of a smile, only a hard stare that made her anxious and self-conscious.  

 Taking a deep breath, she tried to remind herself what Gyda said. At least the two Lothbrok women wanted her here, and apparently Hvitserk was happy to see her. That was what she needed to focus on and not Ivar's reaction.

 Once done changing, she finally took stock of what Torvi had leant her and gasped.  

 "Oh no. No, no, no. Hell no."

 She stared down at the wide-band bikini. The top and bottom both had alternating white and light pink stripes, strangely reminding her of cotton candy. The design was certainly something she would never pick out for herself but she did not hate it. The real problem was the way half her ass cheeks hung out of the bottoms and more of her breasts saw the light of day than they ever had before. Never had she been so exposed. Even swimsuits she bought in the past were never this revealing. Her gaze immediately zeroed in on her fuller hips and thighs, fully exposed. Faint whispers that sounded like her mother's taunts echoed in the recesses of her mind as she stared at herself. There was no way she could go out in this. She would rather wear her leggings and tank top than have anyone see her wearing this. They would all laugh at her. 

 "Kari? You done yet?" Torvi called through the door. 

 "I'm…. I’m not coming out in this!" 

 "Let us see it first!" Gyda shot back. 

 "But…." Kari tried once again, unsuccessfully, to tuck her breasts into the bikini top. "It's padded!" 

 "Open this door, Kari." Gyda demanded, suddenly sounding closer. 

 She took one more look at herself, feeling the embarrassed tears welling in her eyes. With a deep breath, knowing she could not escape Gyda just yet, she opened the door. Immediately her blue-green eyes scanned to make sure it was only Gyda and Torvi in the kitchen before she further opened the door so they could see. 

 "Shit, Kari, you look great." Gyda said after giving a wolf whistle. 

 "Half of my butt is hanging out and most of my boobs. I can't wear this out there." She said, almost panicking now. 

 "No, they aren't, you're overexaggerating."

 "Kari," Torvi said kindly, drawing the brunette's frenzied attention, "you're more curvy than I am and let's be honest, your ass and tits are bigger than mine. I'd kill to have a body like yours. You look beautiful. But if you're uncomfortable, I think I have a cover you can wear over it."

 "Please." She replied softly, hating how she sounded like a fearful child.  

 Torvi smiled at her. "I'll be right back."

 Swiftly, Kari stepped back into the bathroom before Gyda could say anything. Her nerves felt alight and not in a good way. Grabbing her phone, she scrolled through her Pinterest, anything to distract herself from this nightmare. If it was just Gyda and Torvi seeing her in this, she might have been uncomfortable but she could tolerate it. Even with Ivar she might have shied away some but he always made her feel so desirable that she doubted her nerves would have lasted long. It was the thought of prancing around in this in front of the other brothers, men she had never met, that made her stomach twist into knots and her breathing quicken painfully. 

 Finally, a gentle knock on the door and a quiet, "It's me," had Kari open it to take the cover from Torvi. It was a solid white oversized V-neck cover with a simple pattern around the neckline. Without wasting a moment, she slipped it on over the bikini, immediately feeling better. The hem of the cover touched the tops of her thighs, higher than she would have liked, but it was better than before. 

 She looked up, running her hands over the cover. "Thank you." 

 Torvi smiled softly with understanding. "I understand. I don't wear swimsuits that show my stomach anymore. Stretch marks." She shrugged casually, moving back to slip onto an island stool. 

 Kari trailed behind her with her bundle of clothes and purse. Without a word, Gyda slipped into the bathroom to change, leaving the other two waiting for her. It was now that Kari really took note of Torvi's swimsuit; it was a classy black and white one piece with thin crisscross straps across the back. The blonde could easily wear a bikini and look amazing in it, but it made Kari feel marginally better that she was not the only one self-conscious about her body. Perhaps that was why Torvi shared about her stretch marks?

 "Is it…." Kari started then stopped, leaning against the black marble countertop. Surveying the grand kitchen for a second, hoping to gather her thoughts, she took a deep breath before continuing. "Is it okay that I'm here? Gyda said this is a family event and I don't want to intrude."

 Torvi turned to face her fully, green eyes gazing at her before she shrugged again. "Normally we try to keep it just family, Ubbe sometimes brings Margrethe, but I doubt anyone will be upset you're here. Honestly, the brothers keep asking about you, so now maybe they will finally shut up and stop teasing Ivar."

 Kari fiddled with the hem of the swimsuit cover. "He didn't seem happy to see me."

 "Ivar?" At Kari's nod, Torvi snorted. "I don't think it's you he's upset with. He's a very private person, as I'm sure you know. If I took a guess, I'd say he was keeping you hidden."

 "But why?"

 "Look, I've known the Lothbroks for about ten years and during that time, I've seen Ivar go through some ups and downs…. well, as much as he lets anyone see. I mostly heard it from Bjorn. Point is, he's allowing you into his inner circle. Hell, you're probably at the center of his inner circle. I saw how he acted with you at the yoga studio. You mean something to him. It's no secret he wants you to be his girlfriend. Maybe he is worried that you'll meet his family and decide we're too much or that you find one of his brothers more attractive or easier to deal with? He pretends to be super confident but it wouldn't be the first time that a woman chose one of the others over him."

 Every time Kari heard that, her heart broke once again for Ivar. How many times had he been overlooked because of his legs? Or his harsh demeanor? Something that she was beginning to realize was just to protect himself, to keep others at arm's length. It made her want to hug him and never let him go, to remind him he was more than just his disability. That he was worth being cared about by more than just family. 

 Kari must have been lost in her thoughts for longer than she realized. Suddenly she was drawn out of her inner musings by Gyda coming out of the bathroom, having changed into a plant print cutout tankini. Of course, looking like she just stepped out of a magazine cover. There had to be something in the Lothbrok blood for everyone to be this damn attractive. 

 "Are we ready?" She asked, her large bag in hand, presumably with her clothes in it. "Kari, you can put your stuff in here for now."

 Torvi touched Kari's shoulder. "Don't worry. If anything, you are here to keep me and Gyda company, okay?"

 Kari smiled, finding herself reassured and grateful for the two women. "Thanks." She slipped her clothes and shoes into Gyda's bottomless bag. They stashed their bags in the glass room and then headed back out into the backyard. 

 Soon as they stepped out, a little girl came running over. Torvi swept her up into her arms gracefully. She turned to Kari with the little blonde girl on her hip. "This is Asa. How old are you, Asa?"

 The little girl stared at her mom before shyly tucking her face into the crook of Torvi's neck, while her blue eyes stayed on Kari. After a moment, she held up two fingers. 

 "You're two?" Kari asked. When the little girl shyly nodded, Kari's smile widened. "I wish I was that old. It's nice to meet you, Asa. I'm Kari."

 Torvi pressed a quick kiss to the top of her daughter's head. "Did daddy let you play in the pool yet?"

 Asa shook her head. 

 "Alright, let's go kick his butt. He did promise, didn't he?"

 That made the little girl giggle and Kari could feel her heart melting slightly. She was just too cute and most likely spoiled by all her uncles. Even her swimsuit was a purple halter top and green bottom with a little skirt that was very The Little Mermaid-esque.  

 A happy scream followed by a splash drew Kari's gaze to the pool. A young boy resurfaced laughing loudly. Bjorn, she recognized, was in the pool also, but turned to look up at Torvi as she approached with Asa on her hip. 

 "Let's go sit down." Gyda slipped her arm through Kari's and pulled her along to where there was a grouping of lounge chairs. Ivar, Hvitserk and a curly-haired blond reclined with beers in hand. 

 Kari could feel Ivar's gaze tracing over her form as she approached, like fingers trailing over her skin leaving a fire in its wake. She sneaked a peek at him, only to find his ardent gaze on her. She blushed and kept her eyes downward. At least he did not look impassive anymore, but she still felt hesitant. 

 "Hey boys. What are we drinking this time?" Gyda questioned. 

 Hvitserk turned the beer bottle to show the label. 

 "Ew. I don't why you drink that shit. I'm going to get some wine. Kari, you want some?"

 "Ah, sure." She murmured.

 "Good. You boys be nice to my friend, especially you Ivar." With that Gyda walked back towards the house but not before giving Kari a subtle wink.

 "Take a seat, Kari." Hvitserk gestured to an open chair next to him. 

 For a split second she considered slinking into the seat, anything for the attention to be taken off her, but realized that was not what she actually wanted. It had been two days since she had seen Ivar and the last time they hung out, it was when he returned from his trip to Italy. He had picked her up the next day to take her out to eat but he ended up spending the majority of the time on his phone, yelling into it in a foreign language and seeming on the verge of throwing his phone or punching a wall. She ended up ordering take-out for them that they ate at her townhouse but he was too wired to really relax and left soon after. The next two days he had been busy with work so they could only text. The one time they managed to Face-Time, she could not help but notice his bruised knuckles and when she asked him about them, he said he did some boxing to release stress. 

 With butterflies doing somersaults in her belly, she took a step closer to stand near Ivar's lounge chair. Tugging on the hem of her cover as she quietly spoke. "Hey, Ivar. Can I sit with you?"

 "Oh, you're acknowledging me now?" He snapped, never removing his severe blue eyes off of her.  

 She blinked owlishly, surprised by his sharp tone. Her stomach dropped to her feet and she could feel an embarrassed flush rising on her cheeks. "Yeah, I'm sorry." She whispered, dropping her chin, unable to meet his eyes anymore. This was all a mistake, she knew it. This only sealed her poor decision. 

 Shifting to look back at the house, she wondered if she should find Gyda and beg to drive her back home, or if she should find the closest bus stop. Before she could take a step away, a calloused hand snatched hers in a firm grip. Startled, she looked down to see Ivar holding her hand. Her eyes jumped up to stare at him in shock, confused by his conflicting actions. In those vivid, expressive eyes she could easily read the regret in them. Without her conscious decision, her heart softened. 

 "Sit." He said quietly, what most likely meant to come out commanding but sounded more as a plea. She nodded and allowed him to guide her onto the wide lounge chair next to him. 

 A furious blush warmed her cheeks when Ivar wrapped an arm around her waist, tucking her into his side and pressing a quick kiss to her temple. What she assumed was his nonverbal apology. 

 "Hey, this is Sigurd." Hvitserk said, gesturing to the unknown blond sitting with them. "I don't think you've met him yet. Ubbe had to take a call, so you'll meet him later."

 "Hi, it's nice to meet you." She said, looking at the other Lothbrok. He had light blond, curly hair in frazzled braids and brown eyes. At first glance she would not have guessed he was one of the brothers, but she figured genetics were always weird. He had a lean body similar to Hvitserk with a tribal tattoo sleeve and a Thor's hammer necklace laying on his bare chest like the other brothers wore.

 He silently raised his beer bottle at her, still stretched out in his chair like a lazy cat in the sun. 

 Thoughtfully she peered up at Ivar, keeping her voice low. "I'm sorry, I didn't know Gyda was bringing me here otherwise I'd have told you. She literally didn't tell me until we were pulling up."

 "It's fine." He murmured evenly, but Kari got the feeling that was not how he truly felt. 

 "Do….do you want me to leave?"

 He sighed, his grip around her tightening for a moment, before he seemed to relax. "No. I'm glad you're here. It won't be boring…." a wolfish grin grew as he slid his hand up her exposed thigh sensually, ".... especially if you take off this cover and let me see what's underneath." 

 "No!" She squeaked, grabbing his roving hand before it could migrate further. 

 He chuckled. "Come on, kitten…. just a peek?"

 "Ivar, no."

 "Why not?"

 "Its…. it’s scandalous."

 Hvitserk raised his hand, a devious smirk on his face. "I want to see."

 She covered her face with her hands, embarrassment flooding her. "Oh gods, this was such a bad idea." Then she had to rapidly grasp Ivar's hand as it slipped under the swimsuit cover to caress her hip and trace her bikini bottom. "Ivar…."

 "Fine." He slipped his hand back out but splayed it over her exposed thigh. "You can show me later."

 Thankfully, Gyda reappeared with a glass of white wine in each hand and another blond male in tow who carried the wine bottle. He had short, cropped hair and a muscular body that spoke of many hours in the gym. Kari wondered if this was the brother that Ivar regularly worked out with. 

 "Why are you sitting with Ivar? I brought you here! I'm even bringing you wine!" Gyda teased, handing a glass to Kari. 

 "You also dragged me here unknowingly. Wine is the least you could do." Kari said without thinking, making the others laugh. 

 "You know damn well you're happy to be here." Gyda winked then took the open lounge chair next to her. "Right, I'm guessing you've been introduced to Sigurd." She flicked a hand in the curly-haired Lothbrok's direction followed by vaguely gesturing to the last unknown brother. "Now this pain in my ass, over here, is Ubbe. Ubbe, this is Kari."

 Sitting between Hvitserk and Gyda, Ubbe rolled his blue eyes but leaned forward to shake Kari's hand. "It's nice to finally meet you."

 "Yeah, likewise."

 Ubbe sat back with an impish glint in his eyes. "So, you're Ivar's girl?"

 "Um…. we’re just..." She started, unsure what to say to his family. 

 Ivar broke in, his single word answer almost coming out in a growl. "Yes."

 She whipped her head to look at him, only for him to stare her down as if waiting to see if she could refute his claim. Logically, she knew she should say something, argue that they were only friends. Yet any rebuttal died on her tongue under his fierce gaze. Instead she chose to sip on her wine generously.  

 "Right." Ubbe finally said, watching the two with an amused look. 

 Sigurd scoffed loudly before taking a swig of his beer. 

 "Something you want to say, Sig?" Ivar turned narrowed eyes at his brother.

 The curly-haired brother smirked, seeming to debate saying anything. Finally, he sat up and his gaze zeroed in on Kari. "How much does he pay you to fuck him?"

 The reaction from those around was instantaneous. Next to her, Ivar tensed, ready to spring up and fight his brother. A sharp reprimand of "Sigurd!" came from both Gyda and Ubbe while Hvitserk pinched the bridge of his nose. 

 Something rose up inside Kari though. She understood enough to know about the animosity between Sigurd and Ivar. His comment felt more like a cruel jab at Ivar than her. She was just the pathway to try and cause torment between the brothers. But if no one else was going to stand up and defend the dark-haired Lothbrok, she would. 

 So instead of taking his words personally, she just smiled sweetly at Sigurd, placing a hand on Ivar's thigh as she responded. "He doesn't. I'm happy to do it for free. Besides, he has something you never will."

 "And what's that?"

 "A cock big enough to pleasure someone….is that why you go through girlfriends so quickly?"

 The rising tension evaporated in a flash. Gyda snorted so hard she almost dropped her wine glass. Hvitserk threw his head back laughing while Ubbe tried to cover his smile with his hand. Kari was sure her eyes were comically wide as what she said without thinking sunk in. Her face flushed and she pressed her face against Ivar's shoulder. Sure, she had meant to defend Ivar but she had not meant to be so crass. The statement seemed to fly out of her mouth before her brain could catch up. 

 Next to her, Ivar laughed as he nuzzled her. She squirmed under his onslaught but also at realizing she just insulted one of Ivar's brothers. Even if it was the one he liked least of all. For a fleeting moment, the idea she had just made herself an enemy crossed her mind. 

 When she sneaked a peek, Sigurd quickly drained the rest of his beer and walked away murmuring something about getting another one. 

 "I think you'll fit in, Kari." Ubbe stated, still trying unsuccessfully to hide his amusement. 

 Kari was unsure of that. She quickly took a large sip of the wine to settle her fraying nerves. What had she been thinking? It hurt to hear Ivar's brother being so blatantly cruel to him and if this was a regular occurrence, no wonder Ivar wanted to spend most of their time at her place. 

 "I didn't realize you liked my cock so much, kattungen." Ivar whispered salaciously into her ear, drawing her back to the present. His tongue flicked her earlobe, making her jolt. "I think I'll have to give you a reward later."

 She shivered at his tone, her core clenching without resistance. It was unfair how just at his husky tone alone, her body betrayed her desire. But they were in public though, in front of his family no less, so she willfully attempted to cool the heat warming her veins. With a smile, she tried to nudge him away from her but he was too strong, only tightening his grip on her and laying a quick kiss to her neck. 

 "I can't believe I said that." She whispered, hoping only he heard her. 

 He smirked, an unmistakable fire in his eyes. "It was sexy as fuck."

 Thankfully, Torvi came over to join the group, a welcome distraction for Kari as she was sure the fire in Ivar's gaze was enough to set her ablaze and further stoke her own heat. 

 Torvi settled into Sigurd's now absent spot. "What did I miss?" 

 "Kari said Ivar's cock is bigger than Sigurd's." Hvitserk stated smugly. 

 Torvi stared at Kari with a tilt of her head and an amused grin. "Really? And how did we get on the subject of dicks already?"

 Some of the group laughed as Kari covered her face once again, mortified that she was the center of attention because of what she thoughtlessly said. She had the sneaking suspicion none of them would ever let her live this down. 

 "Alright, enough. Come on, it's girl time now." Gyda grabbed Kari's hand and dragged her to her feet, much to Ivar's obvious chagrin. She scoffed, meeting her half-brother's gaze. "I'll give her back later."

 The three women wandered over to some open chairs further down from the guys and closer to the Buddha statue. Gyda carried the wine bottle and her glass while Kari carefully held her own glass. Torvi snatched a beer from a nearby cooler as they meandered over. Gyda settled on a single, lounge chair adjacent to a cushioned two-person seat which the other two sat on. 

 "Alright, we have a very serious matter to discuss. Your answer may or may not break our friendship." Gyda started, leaning forward as she pointed a single finger at the brunette. 

 Kari found herself straightening in her seat, hand clutching her wine glass tighter. 

 Eyes intent, Gyda's voice dropped conspiringly. "Who is sexier: Steve Rogers or Bucky Barnes?"

 Shock rendered Kari momentarily speechless. At Gyda's serious tone, she had imagined a topic that would involve confessing a secret, not…. not a movie franchise. "Um…. Bucky." She hesitantly answered. 

 "Yes!!" Gyda shouted, throwing her arms up and almost spilling her wine. "I knew I liked you! Ivar, she is mine now!"

 Kari laughed at her enthusiasm; all concern having vanished instantly. "I take it you like him too?"

 "Hell yeah. I would willingly choke on his cock or he could pound my pussy to pulp and I wouldn't complain either way."

 Torvi shook her head, a hint of a smile tilting the corners of her lips up. "Something's wrong with you."

 "You prefer Steve?" Kari inquired, once she recovered from choking on air at Gyda's blunt statement. Her friend always had a way of surprising her, and giving her second-hand embarrassment.

 Torvi shrugged. "A tall, handsome blond. That's my kind of man."

 Peeking over at Bjorn who was still playing in the pool with both kids, Kari hummed thoughtfully. "Huh. Makes sense."

 "No wonder you are with Ivar if you prefer Bucky Barnes."

 "But we aren't…. together." Kari fixed her eyes on her wine, knowing her answer sounded lame even to her own ears. 

 Gyda patted her leg. "You keep telling yourself that."

 "We're just friends."

 "No, you aren't."

 "Kari, it's fine." Torvi shot Gyda a look. "It's between you two, it's not really our business."

 "She's our friend!" Gyda whined, throwing herself back in her seat dramatically. 

 "And she will let us know if something changes. Including telling us if Ivar does something stupid and we need to kick his ass."

 Kari giggled as Torvi tapped her beer bottle against her wine glass. "I promise. Hvitserk already made me swear too."

 "Good. So is Ivar really that good in bed?" 

 "Gyda!" Kari exclaimed but laughed at how shameless her friend was. 

 Torvi thankfully changed the topic of conversation to Ubbe's birthday coming up next month. Asa wandered over, wrapped in a green and brown towel with long ears sticking out that made her look like baby Yoda. When Sigurd eventually appeared, Hali dragged him to the pool where they jumped in together. Not long after, Hvitserk joined them, doing a cannon-ball with the splash almost hitting the ladies. 

 Kari chatted with Torvi and Gyda for some time, enjoying herself immensely. The topics varied, but she never felt unincluded. More than once, she glanced over, only to find Ivar's gaze already on her. After the third time, he tipped his head to the side and patted the spot next to him. A not-so subtle invitation or demand, depending on how you looked at it. 

 A smile teased her lips and she nodded. She started to rise, with her second glass of wine in hand, when the sound of a loud "shit" from Gyda distracted her. 

 "What is she doing here?" Torvi quietly asked with an undertone of frustration. 

 Curious, Kari followed their gazes towards the door leading into the glassed-in porch. She was met with the sight of two blondes emerging in matching, white swimsuits that barely seemed to cover anything. Both strutted as if they were on a runway, while chatting with one another. 

 "Kari, go sit with Ivar." Gyda encouraged, snatching her hand and leading her back without a moment's hesitation towards where Ivar and Ubbe were still sitting. The wine was left forgotten on the side table. 

 "What's going on?" Kari asked in a hushed tone. 

 "Drama. I can't believe that bitch brought her. What was she thinking?"

 "Gyda?"

 She clicked her tongue but hurriedly whispered back. "That's Ivar's ex."

 Surprise made Kari almost stumble but she managed to catch herself at the last second. Further explanations had to wait because they came upon the brothers at the same time the two blondes did. Soon as Kari was close enough, Ivar held out his hand, a sweet gesture, but she could see the tension and anger in the set of his shoulders and the thin line of his lips. Silently, he guided her to sit between his spread legs, arms banding around her waist and pulling her indecently close. For once though, she did not complain. 

 "Hey, baby." One of the blondes said in a sickly-sweet voice as she pressed a kiss to Ubbe's cheek. "Sorry we're late."

 "It's fine." Ubbe slowly answered as he shifted his gaze to the other blonde. "I didn't know you were bringing someone."

 "This is supposed to be family only." Gyda snapped, having dropped into her seat next to Ivar and Kari. 

 The blonde, who stood next to Ubbe still, narrowed her eyes at Kari. "Then why is she here?" 

 "That's Ivar's girlfriend." Ubbe answered.

 "Uh, hi, I'm Kari." She decided to speak up, hoping introductions would somehow break the rising tension. At her words, Ivar momentarily dropped his head to kiss her shoulder. Unsure if his actions were encouraging or reprimanding, she laid her hands over his, which were still wrapped around her. 

 "Hmmm…. Margrethe." She replied flatly, with a pinched look, as if talking to Kari was beneath her. "I'm Ubbe's fiancé."

 The other blonde smiled pleasantly as she looked Kari in the eye. "I'm Freydis. It's lovely to meet you."

 "Yeah, nice to meet you too." Kari managed to say around the suddenly tightened grip around her waist. She would be a liar if she said she was not intimidated by Freydis. While both women were beautiful, something that seemed required to be in the presence of the Lothbrok family, Freydis was a step beyond that. With her doll-like features, lovely blue eyes and flawless skin, she was gorgeous. Kari could feel all her own insecurities screaming at her in the presence of Ivar's ex. How the youngest Lothbrok went from someone as stunning as Freydis to as girl-next-door as Kari, she had no idea….and it made her uncomfortable. 

 "What the fuck is she doing here?" Ivar demanded, ignoring Freydis' presence completely.  

 Margrethe rolled her eyes as her hand slowly stroked across Ubbe's shoulders. "I get bored and wanted to spend time with my best friend, so fuck off." She turned her head to look at Freydis beside her. "Come on, let's get something to drink." 

 After a quick kiss to Ubbe, the two headed back towards the house but not before Freydis glanced back at Ivar and Kari one last time. 

 Once they were far enough away, Gyda rounded on Ubbe, not even bothering to contain her ire. "Fiancé? Really, Ubbe?" She sneered. 

 "Hell no. I haven't proposed. I damn well don't plan to and she knows it."

 "Why are you still with her? She's a greedy bitch."

 "Gyda, I know you don't like her but she's still my girlfriend."

 "Who the fuck knows why." 

 Ubbe turned his attention to Ivar. "I swear I didn't know she was bringing Freydis. I'd have told her not to come then."

 "As long as she stays the fuck away from me, I don't give a shit." The dark-haired Lothbrok growled at his older brother. 

 The residual tension in the air was painful to abide in. It felt like a caged animal, pacing, waiting, ready for the moment to unleash a terrorizing attack. 

 "Hey, I have a question." Kari blurted out, unable to take the way the tension made her skin feel like it was being sunburned. Once Gyda and Ubbe shifted to watch her, she posed her question. "Ah, well, I've been wondering for a while but why don't you guys have bodyguards or something?"

 Ivar snorted, brushing her hair over her shoulder to press his face into the crook of her neck, making her squirm although he did not relent his position. 

 It was Ubbe that answered with a wide grin. "Eh, we don't need them. We can handle ourselves."

 "But you guys have drivers, isn't the next step to have bodyguards?"

 "You worried for us?" Ivar whispered, nipping at her skin, only to soothe the spot with his tongue. 

 "I'm serious."

 "Let's just say we know how to protect ourselves. Besides, no one is stupid enough to come after us." Ubbe concluded, raising his beer in a mock salute.

 Gyda snickered. "This is why I stay out of the family business."

 "You've no issue spending Father's money though." Ubbe retorted in a jovial way. 

 She shrugged and sent Kari a playful wink. 

 A minute later, Bjorn, Torvi and Asa came over, taking open seats with Asa sitting in Torvi's lap. Even though Kari had met Bjorn before, it still shocked her to see how much larger he was compared to the other brothers, both in size and physique. Now sitting next to Torvi, he appeared larger. With his long, braided ponytail and shaved sides, a short beard and sharp, blue eyes, he seemed quite formidable. Kari wondered briefly if that helped with the family business. 

 "See Kari there, she is the one who teaches yoga." Torvi softly said to Asa. 

 Asa peeked over at Kari, shyly smiling, still wrapped in her towel but with a juice box in hand. 

 "I bet if you ask nicely, she might show you something." Torvi said then looked up at Kari. "Lately she loves watching me do yoga at home. It's cute when she tries to do it with me."

 Bjorn chuckled, slinging an arm over the back of his wife's chair. "And usually falls down onto her face."

 "Hey, she's trying!" Torvi defended, elbowing Bjorn in the side.

 Looking at the little girl across the circle of seats, Kari smiled. "Want me to show you something I've been working on? I'm not very good at it though, so if I fall over, you can laugh at me. I'll be laughing at myself too."

 Asa nodded fervently, eyes wide in anticipation. 

 "What do you say?" Torvi tapped her daughter's nose. 

 Asa looked up at her mom then back to Kari. "Please." Even though it came out sounding more like "peas".

 "Sure. I need to stretch some first." Kari stood up and immediately had to slap Ivar's hand away that prowled down the curve of her ass. She tried to glare at him over her shoulder, only to be met with a mock innocence. Overly aware of the eyes on her, she chose a spot nearby in the plush, green grass, trying to keep her nerves to a minimum. Carefully, she warmed up her muscles, doing a few simple stretches so as not to hurt herself. Honestly, she was nervous since she never did advanced poses in front of others. It was not that she was unable to, for she did them frequently at home on her own time. It just felt like she was vying for attention or trying to show off when she did advanced poses in view of others. Conflicting memories of her grandmother's encouraging voice fought with her mother's reprimand in her mind as she stretched. 

 "What are you going to do?" Gyda called over, returning from retrieving her wine glass and bottle. 

 The question pulled her from her mind's internal war, bringing her back to the present. "Um, it's called the super soldier."

 "Oooo, I like it already."

 Once stretched, Kari stood frozen for a moment realizing she was going to need to take her cover off to do the pose. 

 "Kari, you look sexy as hell, now take the damn cover off." Gyda called out. 

 Kari hesitated, fears and insecurities rising afresh within her. 

 "Do it or Ivar will get his ass up and help you. I'm sure he wouldn't mind."

 "I hate you." She mumbled but gave in. Slowly, she walked back over to the circle of chairs, pulling the white cover off and dropped it on the lounge chair Ivar still sat on. Her eyes briefly flickered up only to meet Ivar's smoldering gaze. Instantly, she could feel herself flush. Hoping no one noticed, she moved back to her grassy spot. A loud wolf-whistle came from the direction of the pool, most likely from Hvitserk but Kari ignored it, knowing if she thought about it too much, she would make a run for it. Mentally preparing herself, she pulled her hair back into a bun on the nape of her neck, then faced the group but kept her gaze downward, too scared to look at them. 

 After taking a deep breath, she bent over to lay her hands flat on the grass without bending her knees. Next, she hooked her right shoulder behind her knee and extended her left arm for balance. She took a long, deep breath before continuing onward. Then she lifted her left foot and grabbed it with her right hand, still tucked behind her right leg. After another deep breath, she pulled her left leg up until her knee was pointed towards the sky. She held it there for three breaths before slowly releasing her leg back down and carefully straightening back up. 

 A small round of applause greeted her when she straightened. 

 "Another!"

 "You go, Kari!"

 "Do another one!"

 Blushing furiously at the cheers, she leaned forward into downward facing dog. Carefully, she slid her hands forward until her elbows touched the grass with her ass still in the air. Taking a deep breath and hoping she did not make a fool of herself, she engaged her core and kicked her legs up so she was doing a handstand but still on her elbows. Once she felt stable, she pressed her legs together and slowly bent her knees until they were almost parallel with her forearms on the ground. Feeling the burn in her core and arms, she hoped she could finish the pose without falling on her face. Next, she lowered her legs, knees apart now and big toes touching until her feet touched the top of her head. She could not help the smile that stretched across her face as she held the pose for a couple seconds, making sure to breathe slow. Scorpion pose was one she was still trying to master on her own, let alone in front of others. If anything, this felt like a victory for her. Methodically she unfurled, bringing her legs up and then back to the ground. 

 When she finally stood up, brushing the grass off her forearms, it was to another round of applause.

 "That was amazing!" Torvi said. 

 "I was thinking sexy as fuck!" Hvitserk exclaimed, a smile on his face from where he now stood, leaning against Ubbe's chair. 

 Self-consciously, Kari tugged on her swimsuit, making sure everything was tucked into place, as much as it could be, before pulling her hair out of the bun. She walked back over to the lounge chair quickly and yanked the cover back over her body. 

 "I'm going to wash my hands." She said without meeting anyone's eyes, skirting around the group and heading towards the glassed-in porch. 

 Laughter erupted behind her as she approached the door but she ignored it as she walked inside. She padded through the porch, stomach twisting in knots, and turned into the kitchen. Her feet stuttered to a halt as she noticed Margrethe and Freydis standing there with bottles of something in hand. For a split second she thought about turning and heading to the bathroom but it was too late as the two blondes noticed her intrusion. 

 "Hi, I just need to wash my hands." Kari explained. After a moment's hesitation, she walked around the opposite side of the massive island from them and towards the kitchen sink.

 "So, you're Ivar's girlfriend?" Margrethe stated with a mocking undertone. "I didn't think someone like you was his…. type."

 "Margrethe…." Freydis chided. 

 "What? Look at her. I mean she's got tits and an ass, and I guess she could be pretty but that's it."

 "I'm sorry." Freydis apologized kindly. After a long, awkward pause where the kitchen was silent besides Kari washing her hands, she asked, "How long have you and Ivar been together?"

 "Um, we aren't…. we’re just friends." Kari found herself admitting, as she finished drying her hands and turned around to see them both staring at her. Though Freydis had a gentle smile on her face, Margrethe looked nothing less than the cat that caught the canary and planned on lording it over everyone. 

 "Oh?" 

 "See. Told you, Dis. He is still single." Margrethe smugly said, flicking her hair over her shoulder. "He's just playing the game."

 "Game?" Kari muttered aloud. 

 Freydis set her glass down and came around the island to stand in front of Kari. Her blue eyes were bright as they met Kari's. "You seem like a nice girl and clearly the others like you too. So, I'll be honest because I don't want you to get caught up in the Lothbrok drama and get hurt. Okay?"

 "Okay."

 "Ivar and I are getting back together. We're just taking a break right now. Truly, I know we are destined for each other and he agrees. We had a bad fight and needed some space but he loves me just as much as I love him. So, I know he will come back to me when he is ready. I'm so sorry to tell you that you're just the rebound girl. I'm sure he likes you but that's as far as it will ever go. Gyda likes to try and mess with the brothers' love lives so I am sorry if she dragged you into this without telling you the whole truth. It's not your fault. I am sure Gyda lied to you and probably Ivar too. But it's good for you to know now. I don't hold it against you if you've have had sex with him but just know your time with him is limited, okay? How long have you two been 'friends'?"

 "We met last month." Kari whispered, dread and despair a writhing mess of snakes churning in her stomach. Air refused to fill her lungs, leaving her struggling for breath. 

 Freydis sighed. "It probably will be soon then. Just take advantage of the things he purchases for you, so when he leaves, you can have something to sell if you're in a pinch. Yeah?"

 "Ah…. sure."

 "Good. You seem like a nice girl. I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this."

 "It's…." Kari choked back a sudden sob. "It's alright. Thank you."

 "Of course, we girls need to look out for each other. Is there anything I can do for you?" She inquired, sounding so genuine in her desire to help, her gaze imploring and lips in a faint, comforting smile. 

 "No…. no. I just need to check my phone. Have you seen Gyda's bag?"

 "I think she left it on the porch." Margrethe helpfully added, never having lost the smug grin on her face as she watched Kari with a hawk-like intensity. 

 "Oh, right. Thank you." Kari shifted back and forth on her feet, body primed to run, to flee before anyone could see the tears that welled pathetically in her eyes. 

 Freydis reached out and squeezed her arm, a brief exchange of understanding, then strutted back around to grab her drink and follow Margrethe to the porch and outside. 

 Once alone, Kari pressed a hand over her mouth to try and stifle the sob that lodged itself in her throat. She knew it. Everything Freydis said made sense. 

 Without a second thought, she rushed around the island and onto the porch, quickly locating Gyda's bag. She scooped her purse and clothes out only to hurry back inside. A quick check of the time and she figured she might be able to catch a bus, but in this gated community, there was no way buses came through so she would end up walking somewhere. Feeling the sting of tears in her eyes, she sniffled, trying desperately to hold them back. She looked up the nearest bus stop on her phone, pleased it was only a few blocks away from the gated community. 

 Once positive she knew where she was going, she stared down at her clothes on the counter, wondering if she should change before leaving. It would certainly look odd for her to be walking down the street in the swimsuit cover and sandals in such an upscale neighborhood. Then she thought about any of the Lothbroks finding her trying to leave and pushed the potential oddity of her attire from her mind. It appeared there was a gas station nearby when she found the bus stop, it would be simple to change there quickly. Somehow she could give the swimsuit and cover back to Torvi…. but not today. Right now, she needed to leave. 

 She tried to shove her clothes into her purse, only succeeding by making it look like an over-inflated balloon but it worked. Lastly, she reached to grab her phone off the kitchen counter but froze. Ivar bought it for her. Freydis' words came back to her about taking advantage of the things he bought for her. Bile burned the back of her throat at the idea. She promised herself she would not be one of those girls to him. Slowly, she retracted her hand, forming it into a fist by her side. Ivar could give the phone to Freydis or throw it in the trash for all she cared. Even with the feeling of her heart being ripped in two, she refused to take advantage of him or his money. She was a better person than that. Or so she hoped. 

 Worried someone would come in soon, she tossed her purse over her shoulder and swiftly headed towards the front door. She passed through the hallway she entered in, but the pictures and awards blurred before her eyes as the repressed tears threatened to make an appearance. Hastily, she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand but knew it was ultimately futile. 

 "Kari?" 

 Her stride never faltered towards her escape, even after hearing Hvitserk call her name from what sounded like the porch. 

 "Kari? Where are you going?" His voice came from behind her, probably standing at the entrance of the hallway now. 

 "I have to go." Kari said, not bothering to turn around, unsure if he could even hear her. She could barely hear footsteps behind her over the sound of her sniffles and ragged breathing. It did not matter since she was close to her escape, just a couple more moments. Her hand touched the handle, just beginning to pull the door open when Hvitserk's hand appeared in her direct line of vision and slammed it closed. Although the sound was muffled, it echoed in her mind like a gunshot. 

 "What's going on?" Hvitserk stood directly behind her, his hand still firmly planted on the door as if to prevent her from even considering leaving without permission again. 

 "It's nothing." She murmured, staring down at her feet. 

 "I seriously doubt that if you are trying to sneak away while crying…. what happened?"

 "Nothing. I just…. I just want to go home."

 "Okay." He shifted to lean his shoulder against the door, ducking his head to try and catch her eyes. "Does this have to do with the yoga stuff?"

 "No. Just…. please, Hvitserk."

 "You need to tell me something. Look, I'll give you a ride, we can leave right now but you have to tell me what happened."

 She swallowed thickly, still refusing to look at him. It was taking all of her willpower to keep the tears at bay. At any moment she felt the tears would come forth with all the power of a hurricane, reducing her to a sniveling mess on the floor, nursing a broken heart. It was all her fault though. How could she have believed someone like Ivar Lothbrok would actually be interested in her for more than just a one-night stand. She was just a challenge for him, someone to pass the time. Then once she gave in, once they finally had sex, he would walk out of her life and back into Freydis' arms and bed…. where he apparently belonged. 

 "Kari?" Hvitserk softly prompted. 

 "It's…. I just have a better understanding now…. of where I stand…. of my purpose here."

 "Your purpose?"

 She sniffed, wiping her wet eyes once again before the tears fell. "I'm just a rebound girl….and that's alright. I get it. But I just want to go home now." 

 "Fuck. Freydis said that, didn't she?"

 "It doesn't matter. Can you please just take me to the bus stop, I can get home from there." She knew she was begging but she did not care anymore. 

 "Kari, give me that." He grabbed her purse from her and tossed it onto a wooden side table. His hands held hers in a manner that was comforting verse restraining. His thumbs rubbed along the back of her hands as he softly spoke. "Look at me, you know it's not like that."

 "It doesn't matter." She shook her head, even as her hands gripped his tighter, the feeling being the only thing keeping her from falling apart at the front door. "I shouldn't have let Gyda bring me here. I should have made her drop me off."

 "Kari…." He began but was interrupted. 

 "Hvitty?" Ivar's loud voice boomed from the kitchen. "You better not be trying to fuck Kari!"

 Kari flinched at the sound. The facade of strength she fought to maintain evaporated like smoke. The tears she had been trying so desperately to withhold slipped free, rolling down her cheeks like a cleansing rain.  

 "Over here!" Hvitserk called back, releasing her hands but not moving away. 

 Ivar's measured gait could be heard coming down the hallway like the footsteps of doom. 

 "What the fuck is going on? You disappear to find Kari and then…." His voice trailed off as he entered the foyer, piercing gaze zeroing in on her tear-stained face. What sense of jovial teasing transformed into enraged fury. When he spoke next, it came out in an animalistic growl that bespoke impending violence. "Who fucking hurt you?"

 "I'm fine." She mumbled, wrapping her arms around herself. Her chin rested on her chest, tears still streaming down her cheeks. "I just want to go home."

 "Freydis….and I'm betting Margrethe also said something to her." Hvitserk snitched, leaning fully against the door. He watched both Kari and his brother as if ready to intervene at a moment's notice. 

 Ivar snapped, stepping closer. "What did they say?"

 She was unsure who he directed his question to but she still shook her head, refusing to look at either brother. Hearing his wrath, it only made her heart ache more. All of this was a show, it had to be. Why would he truly care? The sound of his heavy gait coming closer brought a fresh wave of silent tears. 

 Moving to her other side, he cupped her cheek. When she resisted looking at him, he shifted his hand to grab the back of her neck, forcing her gaze to meet his. A tempest swirled in his icy blue eyes. "What. Did. They. Say?"

 "Why does it matter?" She questioned, bottom lip trembling as a sob rose from her chest. 

 "Because they hurt you."

 "But I'm no one. I don't matter." She shook her head, pressing a hand over her mouth to contain the cries bound to escape at any moment. "You're just going to get back together with Freydis when you get bored with me."

 His eyes widened as if she had sucker-punched him. His mouth dropped open for a moment before he collected himself, the maelstrom rippling under his skin on the verge of breaking free. "Did they say that?"

 "Freydis said…. she said you two were just taking a break….and I'm the rebound girl."

 "Fuck. Fuck!" Ivar stepped away, running his hands through his loose hair. In an instant, he grabbed the decorative bowl off the entrance table and threw it. The shattering against the wall reverberated in the foyer followed by Ivar's guttural shout. "FUCK!" 

 "Ivar." Hvitserk softly said, warily watching his younger brother. 

 "I'm going to kill her. Fuck! I can't believe she would fucking say that!" Ivar ran his hands through his hair again, looking on the verge of ripping the strands out. The ferocity in his eyes was unmatched as he glanced down the hallway, clearly wanting to go after his ex, then shifted back to Kari, who remained silent and unmoving. "What else did she say?" He barked at her. 

 "You're destined for each other." She confessed after a moment's hesitation. 

 Ivar stormed over to her, devouring the ground beneath his feet as he invaded her space. Standing before her, he cupped her face, eyes imploring her to believe him. "Freydis is a crazy, jealous bitch. She manipulates to get what she wants. Don't believe a word out of her fucking mouth. Fuck! Please, Kari, don't cry. I'm right here, kitten."

 His words seeped into her mind, slipping in through the cracks and delving deep into her soul. His words alone should not have reassured her like they did. Between his pleading eyes and his gentle touch, her few walls surrounding her heart crumbled, unable to fight him. She believed him, even before her mind fully recognized it. 

 She lightly placed her hands on his bare chest, one directly over his heart, feeling the rapid tempo under her fingers. "Promise?" She whispered wetly. "You're not just…. I’m not just a rebound girl?"

 Ivar groaned, pressing his forehead to Kari's. "I swear. I never thought that about you." 

 And she believed him again. The truth falling from his lips resounded in the very core of her being. It made no sense how she knew, but somehow, she did. 

 After a long second, Hvitserk pushed off the door from next to them. "I'm going to head back and keep an eye on them. Kari, if you still want a ride just text me, alright?" 

 "Thank you, Hvitty." She reached out and snagged his hand, giving it a quick squeeze. With a smile, he responded in kind before heading down the hallway towards the backyard. 

 Soon as Hvitserk started walking away, Ivar grabbed her hand and led her in the opposite direction. They hurried through a short hallway to arrive at a closed door. Impatiently, Ivar thrust the door open and pulled her into a room, slamming the door shut behind them. She had a brief moment to scan the new room and notice the two walls with floor to ceiling bookshelves packed full and the couple couches near a large window. 

 Before she could do anything, she shrieked as she found herself suddenly yanked back, her body colliding with the closed door. Immediately Ivar's mouth claimed hers in a hungry, feverish kiss. His body pinned her to the door, hands kneading her hips. It was all she could do to just breathe. Her hands clung to his broad shoulders, desperate to stay above the waves of passion-fueled desire that surged unchecked within her. 

 Ivar withdrew his mouth from hers, but only to place kisses over her cheeks, washing away her tears with his affections. "Don't listen to her. Her and I. We are through. I will never go back to her. She has been sniffing around but that ends tonight. I won't fucking let her talk to you again. I fucking swear it."

 "Ivar…." She whined, tilting her head. An open invitation which he took. 

 He swooped in, continuing to speak between leaving open-mouth kisses on her neck. "It's you. It's you I want. It's you I think about all the time. Fuck, kitten, you have no idea how much I want you. And seeing you do those yoga poses in that swimsuit…. fuck! You looked so goddamn sexy; I got a hard-on just watching." He grabbed her thigh, lifting it up and curling it behind him, pressing himself against her core. At the touch of his hardened length against her, she whimpered. "Do you feel that? That's for you, søte Kari."

 She could not help but roll her hips, grinding against his erection, body automatically seeking friction. 

 "Yes! Fuck." He growled against her neck. "Come here."

 She whined when he released her leg, letting it fall down to the floor. Her breathing was unsteady already, heart hammering away in her chest. A part of her knew she should stop this, open the door behind her and walk out to avoid the temptation. Yet when his hand latched onto hers once again, tugging her towards one of the couches, she followed willingly, unable to deny the sweet sin that was Ivar.

 He dropped onto the couch and settled her into his lap to straddle him. As she settled, he grabbed a handful of the cover over her and yanked it off, tossing it haphazardly onto the floor. Her first instinct was to cover her chest, but as her arms moved to do that, Ivar guided them behind his head. His gaze drunk in the curves of her body, an unashamed starved look in his eyes that made her shudder as it further ignited the fire in her belly. 

 "Kattungen min." He whispered reverently. "Fucking hell, so gorgeous. No one else gets to touch you like I do. Got it? You're mine." He started lavishing her chest and neck with his mouth, alternating between his lips and tongue. 

 She knew she should feel more self-conscious straddling Ivar's lap in only the swimsuit that barely covered all of her assets; but it was as if his touch banished the thoughts away. Instead she felt beautiful and cherished. 

 He palmed one of her breasts and the moan that escaped her was pure wanton. Hands tangled in his long locks as her hips ground harder against his erection in response. His leg braces were only an afterthought that did not impede her actions. 

 "Ivar, please."

 "That's it. Fuck, you're so beautiful. I can't wait to fuck you senseless."

 Suddenly he shifted under her, his hand fumbling between them. Her mind barely took notice as he sucked the skin between her breasts, something that would definitely leave a mark. Next thing she knew, his cock was freed, standing at attention between them. 

 Before she could protest, he spoke up. "I know you're not ready." He slid it under her, pulling her hips back down. At the sensation of his cock rubbing her slit with only the thin barrier of the bikini bottom between them, she threw her head back with a whine. Desire roared through her like a freight train as his cock rubbed against her soaking core. 

 "You like that, kitten?"

 "Yes." She sighed out, head tilted back as she rolled her hips. 

 "Good, my turn." He reached behind her and promptly untied the straps of the bikini top behind her back. 

 "Ivar!" She tried to cover herself but he swatted her hands away. 

 "Trust me."

 Once she relented, he laid a hard kiss to her lips then tugged the top over her head, the band behind her neck without a tie. She desperately wanted to cover herself, now before him feeling on full display. But it was the look on his face that stilled her movements. 

 "Guder. Du er utsøkt. Faen. Den vakreste kvinnen." He murmured with adoration and awe dripping off each word. 

 "What did you say?"

 Instead of answering her, he lowered his face to her chest and captured one of her perky nipples in his mouth. His other hand moved to grab one of her ass cheeks, encouraging her to keep riding him. 

 All breath vanished from her lungs. All thoughts and insecurities fled under his touch. Her hands tangled in his hair, keeping his mouth on her. All she could feel was him. All she wanted to feel was him. Gasps and moans slipped from her as she allowed herself to be overtaken and drawn into an ocean of pleasure. 

 She could feel herself rising higher and higher, riding the wave. Her mind was becoming delirious from fire in her veins and the motion of her hips rocking over his exposed cock. 

 To her surprise, Ivar grabbed a handful of hair at the back of her neck. "That's it, beautiful. Fuck. Let's see what that bendy spine can do." Carefully, he pulled on her hair, not in a painful way but as if to guide her. Willingly submitting herself, she bent her back, following his lead. When her chest was parallel to the ceiling, he stopped pulling, keeping her suspended with her back arched. 

 Ivar groaned loudly, thrusting against her. She met his action, too absorbed in the bliss to care about decency. 

 "All the dirty, fucking things this makes me want to do to you." He licked a scalding line up her sternum, only to swirl his tongue around one of her nipples, making her mewl as she continued to move her hips faster. "Come for me."

 "Yes, yes." She chanted. "Ivar, please."

 "Keep begging, kitten. Let me know how much you want my cock."

 As her climax hit, the tightening coil in her core sprung loose, her mouth dropped open in a silent scream. Wave after wave rolled over her. She could feel Ivar grunt and thrust a few more times beneath her before retracing his cock and spurting onto her exposed stomach. After he released her hair, letting her rise back up to face him. Their eyes fixated on one another, chests heaving as they struggled for breath. 

 Gently, she reached out and touched his cheek, a shy smile on her face. Then, when he made no move to pull away, she leaned forward, uncaring of his cum slipping down her stomach, and drew him into a lazy, slow kiss. He responded, lips melding to hers in a way that was full of softness and contentment. After a moment, she felt him reach behind him for the blanket laying on the back of the couch and wipe her stomach off, all the while never abandoning their kiss. 

 Once she was clean, he dropped the blanket to the floor and somehow managed to keep their lips locked as he guided them to lay down on the couch, their bare chests pressed together and his arm under her head, legs tangled. 

 "Do you believe me now?" He eventually asked, leaning back but only far enough so the tips of their noses almost touched. 

 "Mmmm?"

 "That it's you I want. Freydis and anyone else can go fuck themselves for all I care."

 She bit her bottom lip and dropped her gaze. "I don't understand why."

 "What are you talking about?"

 "I mean…. Margrethe said I'm not your…. type."

 He snorted and muttered under his breath, "fucking bitch".

 "But she's right." Kari pressed onward, her hand running up and down his side as if to ground herself. "I mean, I could never compare to Freydis…. or Torvi or Gyda or any of them. They are all beautiful and….and in perfect shape. I'm not. My thighs and butt are too big and I'm maybe pretty but that's it."

 "You're right. You're not my usual type. But those girls, I'd fuck them and then never look their way again. You though, fuck, I can barely take my eyes off you when you're around. And these," he reached down and grabbed a handful of one of her ass cheeks, making her squeak. "I love them. And these thighs, fucking hell, kitten, I want you to suffocate me with them when I finally eat you out."

 She gasped, a bolt of electricity shooting through her at the image. 

 A devilish grin grew on his face, his hand stroking her ass cheek. "You like that idea? My tongue teasing your folds before slipping inside of you. Your thighs wrapped around my head as I feast on your pussy."

 "Ivar." She whined, unable to stop the sudden roll of her hips. 

 "Soon, sweet Kari." He chuckled darkly, ceasing her movement by melding their hips together. "And your tits, gods, they are perfect. I could stare at them all day."

 She giggled even as she flushed under his praise. "I'm sorry for doubting you. I guess, I'm still just surprised you'd…. well, that you want me."

 "You are mine. You're my woman." He stated resolutely, gazing directly into her eyes so she could see how serious he was. 

 "But we aren't dating…."

 "Doesn't fucking matter. You're mine. And one of these days you'll change your mind and stop playing this game of trying to keep me away."

 She sighed, wishing it would be that easy. Before he could continue with that argument, she changed the subject. "You know, I think we exceeded our kiss quota for the day."

 He snorted. "I didn't see you complaining earlier."

 "That's true. Do you think we should head back out?"

 "If I see Freydis or Margrethe right now…." His voice trailed off, but the fury from earlier lingered in the unspoken threat. 

 "I know. We don't have too. I'm okay right here." 

 A grateful smile on his lips, he kissed her quickly then rolled her onto her back and laid his head on her chest. They relaxed like that for several minutes in silence, her hand running through his hair, just enjoying the feeling of complacency and peace between them now after their fight. If you could even call it that. 

 Finally, she spoke up in a hushed tone, a random question coming to mind. "Do you ever get in the pool?"

 "No."

 "Oh." Was all she could say after his sharp, barbed answer. Clearly it was a subject that was not open for discussion. Her mind wandered, wondering what happened to cause such a response from him. An uncomfortable tension hung over them after his response. Something she was not sure if she should try and dissipate or ignore for now. 

 After a minute of continued silence, he kissed her chest, letting his lips linger there as if using the extra time to mentally prepare himself. Before she could tell him it was none of her business, he spoke. His tone was quiet and, in anyone else, almost shaky. 

 "I…. I used to try when I was younger. They'd put me on one of those stupid floating things and pull me around or someone would hold me. Then, when I was about seven…. Sigurd and I got in a big fight earlier that day. He claimed I broke one of his toys. Fucking asshole. I was sitting by the pool, this in our childhood home in Kattegat, I liked to watch things float on the water. Sigurd walked by me and….and pushed me over the edge."

 She gasped. "Oh Ivar…."

 "Ubbe jumped in and pulled my half-drown ass out." He nuzzled against her skin; his tone having lost the insecurity as he reassured her. "I'm alright, Kari."

 She drew his face up and gave him a long kiss, their mouth connecting with a deeper need and alleviation. "Remind me to thank Ubbe when I see him next."

 He rolled his eyes. "Don't. He's never let me forget the fact."

 "Still."

 They laid there for some more time, wrapped up in one another and content in the peaceful stillness. She could not help but think about the memory Ivar shared with her. How far back did that resentment go between the brothers? Had there ever been a time where they cared for one another? And how bad was the animosity between them if one was willing to kill the other, even as children? If her arms tightened around him, neither one mentioned it as they continued to lay there. 

 A loud knock on the door followed by a yell through the door of "are you two done yet?" disturbed their peace. 

 "Hvits, fuck off!" Ivar called back, burrowing his face between her breasts. 

 "Do you have clothes on at least?!"

 "I do!" 

 Kari swatted the back of Ivar's head at his admission. Leaning up slightly, he gave her a cheeky wink before laying his head back down. 

 "Well cover up, I'm coming in!" Hvitserk yelled through the door. 

 "Ivar, get up." Kari softly said, a panic setting in at the brother coming in and seeing them in this suggestive position and her topless. 

 "No." He mumbled. 

 Before she could shove him off, he snatched the throw blanket off the floor and threw it over his head to cover her chest. As she began to protest, the door cautiously opened. In an instant, she tried to spread out the blanket over them as best as she could, keeping the blanket over her chest and spread it somewhat over their torsos. Although how much good it did was questionable. She peered over to see Hvitserk standing in the doorway with an amused look before shaking his head and stepping in, closing the door behind him. 

 "What the fuck do you want?" Ivar asked, muffled by the blanket and his face still pressed against her skin. 

 Kari raised her gaze to the ceiling for a moment then mouthed to Hvitserk, "I'm sorry."

 Hvitserk winked at her before answering. "Bjorn and Torvi want everyone together before they leave. Sounds like they have an announcement or something."

 "Are the bitches still here?"

 "Yeah." Hvitserk sighed. 

 "Then no."

 "I'll go." Kari softly said. "It must be important."

 "No, you aren't." Ivar nipped at the side of her breast, making her squirm. 

 "Well everyone is waiting on you two." Hvitserk pointed out as he watched, clearly entertained if his broad grin said anything. 

 "I'm coming."

 Ivar pulled the blanket back slightly to stare up at her. "Why the fuck do you want to see them?"

 "Is it….is it terrible I want to show Frey…. her that I'm still here. That no matter what they said, that I'm not going anywhere."

 A positively, feral grin spread over his face. He swooped in and pressed a devastating kiss to her mouth, not letting up until she thought she would suffocate from the intensity of it. "Let's go." 

 He started to rise up but when she squeaked and tried to clutch the blanket to her, he froze. 

 "Hvits, leave."

 "You sure I can't stay?" His smirk grew as he caught Kari's eye and watched her flush deepen. 

 "GO!" Ivar bellowed, glaring at his older brother. 

 "Fine. I'll wait out here for you. If you're not out in three minutes, I'm coming back in." Hvitserk stepped outside and closed the door behind him. 

 Ivar carefully slid off of her, standing up beside the couch, the blanket in hand. His predatory, blue eyes remained trained on her form, raking over her body like a sweet he wanted to devour completely. A familiar warmth awakened in her core, even as she shyly glanced away, covering her naked breasts with her hands. 

 "Fuck, you're gorgeous. On second thought, I think we should stay. I need another taste of you and to hear you moaning my name for everyone to fucking hear."

 She squealed, quickly skirting away from him before he could pounce on her. "Ivar, no!" Yet, miraculously, he managed to snag an arm around her waist and drag her back against his chest. 

 "Should we make an announcement of our own?" He asked, running his nose along the shell of her ear, chuckling under his breath when she shivered against him.

 "What do you mean?"

 "That you're my girlfriend. That this just-friends is shit."

 "I…." She balked, eyes wide and heart beating a painful staccato in her chest. “We…. we can't."

 "Why the fuck not?" He grasped her breasts, rolling her peaked nipples between his fingers. 

 She practically swallowed her tongue, biting back the moan lodged in her throat. When she was positive she could control her voice, she replied. "We've talked about this. I'm just…. I’m not ready."

 "But you'll practically let me fuck you?"

 At his harsh snap, she tried to push out of his embrace, unwilling to have this conversation in their current predicament or maybe have the conversation at all. The innate desire to flee rose up in her but she tried to force it down as she squirmed in his arms. He held her firm, not giving up an inch, her body flush against his own. 

 "Ivar!" 

 "What aren't you telling me?" 

 She hated both herself and him in the moment as she ceased her escape attempts. She hated him for continuously pushing her, for ignoring her words and trying to force her where he wanted her to be. Even more though, she hated herself. If she had kept away from him, however unlikely that was, if she did not have to hide, then none of this would matter. If she could be honest, truly honest, he would most likely reject her. And that was why she hated herself most. Because she was selfish and wanted his attention and affection, even knowing if he knew who she truly was, he would walk away. 

 Carefully, she turned her head to meet his stormy eyes. "I promise one day I will. I just…. can we please just enjoy this? What we have? I just need…. time."

 He stared down at her for a long time. She wondered what he read in her face when he finally gave a resigned sigh. "Fine. I'm telling people you are my girlfriend though."

 "You're unbelievable."

 "I think you like that about me." He matched her smile with his own before letting her go.  

 She quickly found her bikini top, noticing Ivar not-so-subtly adjusting his sweatpants. She slipped it over her head but when she went to tie the straps, a pair of calloused hands covered hers. Without a word, he tied it behind her back. Once done, his hand slowly prowled down her back to lightly smack her ass. 

 "Hey!" She whipped around, only to see a Cheshire grin on his face. 

 "That's my sexy ass."

 "Oh my god. Unbelievable." She muttered to herself as she snatched up the cover and pulled it over. She looked down at the blanket piled on the floor. 

 "Leave it. I'll deal with it later." He took her hand and walked with her towards the door. When they opened it, a still-shirtless Hvitserk stood leaning against the wall across from them. 

 "Took you two long enough. Damn. Almost came in and threw Kari over my shoulder to get you out." 

 Ivar spat something out in their language that made Hvitserk roll his eyes. Before they could move further down the hallway, Hvitserk reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder, freezing her in place.  

 "Hey, whatever they said. Just try to ignore it. We all want you here. Hell, all of us would kick them to the damn curb if Ubbe would let us. But Ubbe and Bjorn have already approved of you."

 Ivar scoffed but Hvitserk kept his gaze on hers, letting her know he was serious. 

 "Just know, we're on your side."

 "Thank you, Hvitty." She squeezed his hand, warmth blooming in her chest at his words.  

 "Either one of them tries to talk to her, I'll strangle them." Ivar growled, starting down the hallway, towing Kari behind him. 

 "You can't kill them, Ivar. Mother said murder is wrong."

 Ivar laughed, looking over his shoulder at his brother. "Mother still loves me."

 "Yeah, yeah, we all know you're her favorite."

 "Can you blame her? Look at me. I'm far superior and more interesting than the rest of you."

 "Keep telling yourself that."

 Kari could not help but smile at their teasing, a mock argument that sounded like it had been executed many times before until now it was said out of fondness and mock sibling rivalry. 

 The three walked back outside through the glassed-in porch. On the way, she noticed her purse back next to Gyda's bag and wondered if Hvitserk moved it there for her. Outside, everyone else sat on chairs or lounge chairs that were grouped in a haphazard circle, obviously waiting for the remainder of the group to join.  

 "What took you so long? Thought we'd have to send a search party to find you." Bjorn called out as the three approached. 

 "I got 'em. The library reeks of sex though." Hvitserk said, dodging Kari's swing. 

 Ivar guided her back to the lounge chair they had been sitting in earlier, tucking her into his side with a hand laying possessively on her hip. Hvitserk sat on her other side instead of pulling a new chair over. She tried to ignore Margrethe and Freydis who sat across from them, keeping her eyes trained on her lap, fiddling with the hem of her cover.  

 "Ok, now that we're finally all here." Bjorn said, standing up with Asa in his arms. "We just wanted to tell our family the good news in person."

 "Torvi is pregnant!" Gyda blurted, staring at her sister-in-law in shock. 

 "Fuck! Gyda!" Bjorn groaned. 

 "Daddy said a bad word." Hali looked over at his mother from his spot next to Sigurd. 

 "Yes, he did, thank you, Hali." Torvi replied smiling then addressed the group. "I'm about two months along. So right now, we are only telling family, so please don't share this with anyone else yet."

 "Wow! A third! Congrats!" Ubbe started, others immediately echoing their own congratulations and well-wishes. 

 Kari jumped up and moved to give Torvi a hug after Gyda. "I know we haven't known each other long but I'm so excited for you. You're an amazing mother."

 "Thank you, Kari. Maybe your own time will come soon." She shooting her eyes over to Ivar for a second then meeting Kari's again. 

 "Oh, I don't know." She blushed at the thought. After another brief hug, Kari returned to her seat. 

 "How old are you?" Hvitserk asked suddenly. 

 "Um, I turned twenty-five this summer."

 "Ha! Still the baby of the group." Sigurd laughed, pointing his beer bottle at Ivar.  

 "Hey, nothing is wrong with an older woman. We're in our sexual prime." Gyda defended. 

 "She's not that much older." Ivar retorted, his hand skimming up and down Kari's thigh. "Just a year."

 "And a few months. You're turning twenty-four after the new year." Ubbe helpfully added with a grin. 

 "Fuck off." 

 "Mommy, Uncle Ivar said a bad word now."

 "Yes, he did, Hali. I think it's time for us to go. Say goodbye to everyone." Torvi said. After a round of goodbyes and hugs to all the uncles and aunt, the small family headed back through the house to head to their own home.

 "Did you know Ivar is younger than you?" Hvitserk asked conspiringly, once conversation started around them again. 

 She tilted her head as she looked at him, slowly answering his question. “Yeah…. we talked about this a while ago."

 "Good. Do you want kids?"

 "Hvits, what is this?" Ivar butted in. 

 "Just testing the waters to see how she feels about having my babies. You know they'd be beautiful." Hvitserk chuckled when Ivar glared at him. 

 "Be nice you two or I'm moving." Kari chided. 

 "Yes, mom." Hvitserk said, sneaking a kiss to her cheek before jumping away. He turned around and pointed at her as he walked backwards. "One day you'll have my babies!" 

 She laughed, shaking her head. She could practically feel the smoke coming from Ivar's ears. Before he could burst a vein, she leaned closer to him and laid her head against his shoulder. "He knows I'm yours."

 "He fucking better or I'll beat his ass to remind him." Ivar murmured, nuzzling her temple. 

 She relaxed against him, looking around the backyard. Hvitserk and Ubbe had started some kind of wrestling competition in the pool, both looking like they were trying to drown each other. Gyda and Ivar called insults from their seats. Sigurd was texting on his phone but occasionally looking up and making a comment. At one point he caught her eye and gave her a brief nod, which she smiled back, hoping any animosity between the two of them from her earlier comment was gone. She purposefully ignored the whispering between Margrethe and Freydis, taking a note from Ivar's book and acting as if they did not exist. 

 Looking at the Lothbrok family around her, she smiled at the group, still amazed she found herself in their midst and how welcoming most of them were. For almost two years she had been alone in a new country, thinking that was what she wanted. Now though, she wondered if she had just been missing a group that accepted her without question. 

 She peered up at Ivar, heart swelling with gratitude and affection. Without second guessing herself, she kissed his cheek and leaned back against his shoulder. He hummed, placing his own kiss to the top of her head. 

 She wondered if she should just give up fighting this, whatever this was between them. Maybe it would work out. Maybe everything would not fall apart as soon as the truth fell from her lips. Maybe he could accept her past and who she was. 

 Silently, she shook the thoughts away. It was still too soon to tell and if she was honest, she did not want to lose this. 

 Or lose him. 

[twisted-imagines]

I really loved your headcannons for sfw and nsfw headcannons for savanaclaw!! I had to stop reading it a couple times bc things got steamy ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°). May I request a scenario of octavinelle with MC and and the guys taking a bath together, it can be both sfw and nsfw (*^ω^*)

Woohoo! Right, that's what I was counting on😋 Thank you very much! I hope I caught your intention the right way because I read it like a bath together will all the boys at the same time 😏 You shouldn't have been worried, because there's also a hc ask, but thank you anyway~ So here it is, the smuttiest scenario I've ever written and headcanons for each character separately. Those are mostly sfw, maybe not as fluffy as you wanted, but I tried;

Please remember to use protection, leave your comments and enjoy yourself💗

Bath time with Octavinelle trio 🐙🐬🦈

Deep breathe in and breathe out. Your heartbeat was slowly returning to its usual pace. Finally, the hunt was over, Bean's Day a total success, mostly. Maybe it would have been even better if the competitive atmosphere didn't get to you in the middle of it and rendered you a useless, anxious mess. You were glad Leech twins calmed you down then and took care of you for the end of the event. Perhaps those types of games weren't meant for you.

Resting in the pleasant shadow of the forest's margin while waiting for Azul, you could see how hard they have worked. The way Jade was frowning and sighing heavily from time to time with Floyd just lying near him on the ground whining, not on top of his game anymore. When the white-haired man finally separated from the crowd you got up to wave in hopes of him noticing you. He spotted you quite fast and strode into your direction.

"Good job today, all of you. You gave the monster team quite a challenge, isn't that right, guys?"

The Octavinelle dorm leader's speech was flawless as usual, not betraying the bitterness from his earlier encounters and the adrenaline still present in his system. It was obvious, the facade he was putting on. You learned to see past it, after spending so much time with the boys. To you, their inner selves were much more interesting. You couldn't help but smile to yourself. The year promised to be the most vivid you've had yet if they continued to be the constant presence in your everyday life, those boys.

"Oh, aren't you spacing out, [Name]?"

"Right, right~ Pay attention to meee~"

Voices from both of your sides belonged to none other than the two brothers. You snapped back to reality. Floyd was now hanging off of your right arm, a quite usual occurrence you had to note, and his twin was closely observing your face. A slightly annoyed sight escaped Azul. All the running around was finally taking its toll on him, he looked weary and tired. It seemed even talking was too much for him at the moment, something which was not like him at all.

"The main event is over, but the closing ceremony will be conducted in two hours. We have just enough time to wash up, change, and rest for a bit. We're going to the dorm right now, you're coming with us, aren't you?"

It didn't feel like a question or invitation if anything more like a concealed order, but you nodded anyway. Spending the time in their company was always bringing up your mood and did they love to see you smile happily like that.

"Yay! Bath with koebi-chan! So fun~"

Hm? What was that again? When you looked at Floyd he was already was ahead of you walking with Azul, and even Jade turned away from you when you tried to ask what was going on. Was there anything you were missing?

At the Octavinelle dormitory, you were led to a spacious room, one you had never visited before.

"It was previously used by the residents as one of the dorm's conveniences. It didn't suit us, so for doing a complete renovation of this place, only the dorm leader can now allow to use it."

"And of course Azul doesn't let anybody here, except for us, hehe~"

You listened to Azul's explanation with the occasional remarks from Floyd about how that enormous parlor with a hot tub of the size of the pool was now completely off the limits for regular Octavinelle students. The interior made you think that you entered some underwater cave, it gave off an otherworldly aura. It was a simply wonderful resort. You could only look around and once again realize just how cunning and inventive those boys could be. You felt a warm presence on your shoulder, only to find Jade standing close to you with a usual charming smile playing on his lips.

"I shall show you to the changing room. There's also a shower, but don't take long. After all the main attraction is right here."

The adjacent room wasn't as big, but it had enough place for the four you. The setting minimalistic, the only furniture was a sofa and hangers with few dressers. You could see the shower on your right. Jade's gentle grip remained on you for a fleeting moment you were observing the room before he moved away. While you were contemplating your disposition, Floyd was already casually ditching his sports clothes. You gaped at the sight unfolding.

"Hm? Is something wrong, my dear? If you have some problems, I'll be happy to assist you."

Azul's voice had the most genuine concern in it but you knew better than that. "It's all preplanned", - was reading in his eyes. Wrong? Of course, nothing was wrong in how he languidly unfastened the belts on his uniform, in the sinful grace with which he was doing it. His azure orbs were unmoving, hypnotizing you with their gaze.

"No need... I was just thinking about how fitting those clothes actually are."

Trying to escape from the whirlpool the man was trying to take you in, your eyes darted in the opposite direction, accidentally falling on Jade's rear, still clad in those skintight pants. The merman's cheeks turned pink, not missing your action, slightly misjudging it even. Daring not to make eye contact, you swiftly occupied yourself with the task of undressing.

You could finally let out a sigh of relief, having fully submerged yourself into the hot water of the pool, generosity of Azul, who prepared it. You closed your eyes and tried to enjoy the calming aroma, the steam curling, and caressing your face, but the unyielding ogling of pairs of eyes was unnerving. You were not escaping out of this, you understood.

You could feel him ripple through the water, his hands enveloping your waist. It was the sight of Floyd looking up at you with a placid smile that welcomed you. He was resting on your knees, drops of water cascading down his face. He was still. For now.

"So?~ Pretty sick, land's "jacuzzi", won'tcha say?"

His effervescent voice echoed in the room, disturbing the quiet noise of popping bubbles. You stretched your hand to place in on his face only for it to be immediately trapped in his grasp. His token toothy smile slowly returned to his face. The temperature was rising. More and more closer Floyd was moving to you until two strong hands finally trapped you between his body and pool's side. Red against your skin, his tongue traced a way from your neck to jaw. Your breathing was now much more rugged than before.

"Tasty little koebi-chan~ You have no right to look so delicious-"

A bite followed. Floyd had successfully learned all your most sensitive spots and played them smartly even now. You could no longer keep your moans to yourself. The sweet noise spurred into action two other occupants of the room, who too longed for some attention.

"How greedy of you to steal [Name] all to yourself, brother. I too want a taste."

"You guys are not the only ones in the room. How annoying..."

In your peripheral vision, you could see them move closer until you felt your arm and leg being seized on each side. You were rendered immobile, each boy molding your body into the desired pose.

"Tsch~You two can get lost, for all I care."

Saying that in low voice, almost dropping down to a growl, Floyd was relentless in his task of forcing moans out of you, your already heated body unable to resist the pleasure he was giving you. You whined when his hand dropped down to your core, aching for more stimulation. Teasing and gliding, tension fluctuating, it was driving you crazy. When he decided that it wasn't enough for him anymore, Floyd dragged you out and hoisted on the cold surface outside of the pool. The difference in temperatures and his moist fingers plunging into your hole made you wail on top of your lungs. Your body was burning up and shivering from cold at the same time, wringing in his firm grip was just spurring you further into an igneous frenzy. Your vision blurry with water dripping down your face, or were those tears of pleasure, you were no longer the master to your body. The man before you controlled your every breath, every moan, his own form partly morphing to merman's.

White bliss overtook your mind when he sharply thrust into you. It wasn't gentle, at all, but it was precisely what you wanted, what you accustomed to, and welcomed with your very own thrusts back. Floyd's fast tenacious jerks were working you into an even more nonsensical state, the weight of his body on top of yours was superseding all your thoughts with flaming hot want. The lack of free air in the steamy room was affecting you, making you light-headed. The man rocking into you with immense strength was now your only leverage in the hazy world you were residing in at that moment. Continuing to bite and mark you up, his movements became even more erratic hinting at how close your lover was. You felt it building, the imminent release, when it finally crashed down upon you. Your last scream Floyd too claimed as his own, capturing your lips in his in a messy kiss, continuing to languidly trust up into you, riding out your orgasms.

While you were regaining your consciousness, a cacophony of hisses and screams, clearly somebody bickering, was the only thing you could hear besides the low buzz in your head. They stopped abruptly, a moment of calmness took place. You could register a shadow looming over you. A warm, somewhat slippery hand caressed your hot cheek. You couldn't help but lean more into a comforting touch.

"Barbarian-! My dear, are you okay? He didn't hurt you, did he?"

"Just thoroughly fucked~♡"

The harsh smack ringed through the room, most likely not reaching its destination. Azul's attention returned to you, the man carefully cradled you to himself, when you felt some smooth appendages slithering around your body. You reasoned, that just like the eel merman, cecaelia had also accidentally sprouted some of his octopus-like features. While Azul most certainly still stood on his two legs before you, a few tentacles, deep purple and supple, coiled around you gently, but firmly. He won't be releasing you just like that, will he?

"I'm fine Azul, don't worry."

""... I'm ready to be fucked again, go for it~" Ahaha- Auch!"

Another smack and Floyd's yelp now following it. Serves him well, mocking you like that. You drew the octopus merman closer to you and kissed softly in a reassuring gesture.

"Everybody did a good job today, only fair to have some recreational moment together. Come here."

Azul's blush only deepened from your bold invitation. He was being seduced and he had no objections to that. How jealous he had been, observing how his friend was selfishly claiming you. He could now be the one to touch and explore your soft, heated body. The thought of it made him immensely happy. The dorm leader didn't get to spend some time with you today, given you were on the opposite teams, so right at that moment, he wanted nothing more than to have you close to him, sighing languorously.

When you finally regained control over your limbs, you made the man release you so you could sit on him instead. The ell's rough loving still panged in your rear duly, but Azul soft moans and the sight of his sweet red cheeks aroused you too hard to ignore your cravings. Strong tentacles once again twisted around you, the young man was drawing you closer still, skin to skin contact was putting him to a state akin to trance, the need to have more of you, of your scent, your taste, your love overwhelmed him. You placed open-mouthed kisses down his neck and jugular, moving lower with each kiss and hickey until you reached the soft flesh of his chest. Azul was practically melting under you, pleasure clouding his mind. It was so long you made love to him, he missed the tender moments so much and here you finally were, on his lap, teasing his hardened nipples, eliciting more sweet noises out of him.

A loud sob broke out of him when you descended down on his hard cock. Swiftly encompassing your legs in a vice-like grip, his tentacles vehemently squeezing you like ivy. You could feel his suckers sticking to you, sure to leave numerous marks for you to discover later. The faster you started to move, the more vocal Azul became, his pleasured noises reverberating in the room. Desperate for more, he started to thrust up into you from his position bellow, but too shallow from being completely bewildered by the tightness of your hole. While you were desperately chasing your high, relishing in Azul's sexy expressions, eagerly kissing them away, you felt two hands reach out for your chest from behind. Jade was there flushed and needy, but the man made no other moves except for lightly twisting your nipple, aiding your second orgasm for that day, while his other hand was busy with his jerking himself off. It took just a few more thrusts for both you and Azul to reach your climax, with each other's names on your lips. The hot liquid that stained both your walls and back, was the evidence of the two men's release. Satisfied, but completely worn out by your lovers, you slowly drifted away to a dark bottomless pit of unconsciousness.

When you woke up you found yourself on the same couch you saw in the changing room, this realization coming to you a few moments later that the memories of your previous activities.

"Oh, you're finally awake. How do feel? Does it hurt especially bad somewhere?"

Jade's questions nearly missed you as their addressee, for you were slowly coming back to your senses, which also meant facing the excruciating consequences of your supposed relaxation time.

"I can't feel my legs at all. Was I out for long?"

"Not that long. I had just enough time to carry you there and run for a few things, like a transformation potion, because those bumpkins got so excited they turned to their original form."

"I genuinely don't know how that happened. [Name], I'm deeply sorry."

Azul's remorseful voice drew your attention to him and Floyd standing near the door, in their human forms, already dressed in their uniforms. Jade was wiping your body with wet cloth in the meantime, carefully inspecting your body for marks and other "love confessions".

"You have nothing to feel sorry about, I enjoyed it very much. But it seems I won't go anywhere with you today anymore."

"Indeed, doesn't seem like [Name] will be able to visit the closing ceremony. Don't worry I'll stay here with you."

Jade addressed Azul and you in turns, gentle smile was playing on his lips. Reassuring you that you will be in caring hands the man lovingly pecked your cheek.

"Heeeeh~ You want just want some alone time with koebi-chan, don'tcha, Jade?“

Floyd who was silent before neared his brother with a mischievous grin.

"Not quite right, I surely exercise more control of myself than to prey on defenseless and fatigued [Name] like that. Not to mention, I already got my share earlier today. Motivational supplies were just the best."

Jade retorted with a wicked smile of his own, showing his razor-sharp teeth in this rare instance. His twin could only blink in confusion, not ready for such a twist.

"So you were ahead of us this whole time, Jade? It's also quite unexpected from you, my dear [Name], but I'm not in the position to complain. Please rest up and restore your power, we'll go and come back."

Azul came close to you and placed a soft kiss on your forehead.

"Love you very much."

He added in a quiet voice before he left the room to prepare for the last event of the day. Before Floyd could follow him out, he ran up to you to briskly kiss you on the lips and say his own goodbye:

"Koebi-chan is always so fun to play with, it's too hard to stop sometimes. Be a good little one and relax. Don't get lonely, I'll come soon, 'kay?~"

Bathing headcanons(SFW/slightly NSFW)

Azul Ashengrotto 🐙

• Very diligent about his bathing and grooming routine, Azul takes shower at least once a day. To be a successful businessman one needs to take care of himself and his looks and the dorm leader doesn't slack off on it. Not to mention, he loves water and misses the ocean and how freely he could move in it. The land's shower is just a small gateway to dull his nostalgia.

• His personal care products mostly smell of some fruit or flower. It's the type of smell that makes you want to just inhale it over and over, maybe just nibble on his skin a bit, flustering poor octopi.

• Maybe sweet smells don't exactly tie in with the image of the powerful, all-mighty magician he works hard to uphold, but practice shows different results. He smells pleasant, relaxing, like somebody who you would gladly entrust your unique magic or valuable possession. How can a guy with such a sincere smile and the air of the flower field in spring around him be threatening? Azul may have lost all of his contracts, but he steadily grows his collection anew, more determined than ever.

• It takes him a lifetime to confess that he wants to shower with you, much faster is just to invite him yourself. You can sense just how eager he is, but the thought of you seeing him naked, and vice versa makes him too shy. Just grab him and take with you, he won't protest much. He helps you to wash your back and hair, loving every second of it. And when you rub him back and massage his body, any and every insecure thought just evaporates, leaving only raw and vulnerable Azul starved for tender touches and appreciative words. When you stay with him, Azul always subtly suggests having a shower together, blushing profusely each and every time. He doesn't even think about doing anything sexual, just washing each other is already intimate enough practice for him.

• He took a habit to always rub and massage your back, be it in the bath or shower, he too finds enjoyment, especially when he hears you sigh in approval or relax into him. Azul would love to receive the same gentle treatment but to his head. With the amount of mental work he does daily he's not a stranger to migraines anymore. But somehow, when when you rub and massage his scalp the annoying pain goes away. He jokingly complains that you've never told him you could use a magic like that, but he's grateful nonetheless.

• Baths are a whole event for him. He's the type to place aroma candles everywhere, throw in a beautiful bath bomb and bring a glass of his preferred drink. And you, of course, his dear lover. Now everything is set for the perfect evening with you, his most favorite person, by his side.

•❗ No action in water unless it's a big enough place for you to safely attempt anything in there. And definitely not the shower, not in a lifetime. He's not strong enough to support you, and he's still adjusting to walking on legs. And it's much more exciting to tease him until he practically begs you to take him right away, only to make him wait for when you're out of dangerous grounds of the shower.

Jade Leech 🐬

• Not as disciplined as his dorm's leader, Jade still makes sure to take a shower once every few days, he has to look presentable and smart as a vice dorm leader himself.

• He smells like the sea breath, very fresh and subtle, not enough to make him stand out, but special enough to understand that this guy is not an ordinary one.

• it's somewhat of his fantasy to take a shower with you. You and water? The perfect combination. It would be a one morning when you stayed at his room, that Jade would tell you, blushing, that he was going to shower and wouldn't mind if you joined him. He would go ahead, not really hoping that you will follow him until he feels a kiss on his shoulder and hands enveloping. Didn't take him too long to understand who just decided to join him, Jade smiling happily at that.

• He wants to wash you, take care of your every body part. If you insist that you can do it yourself or shy away from him he'll tease you and still continue to do his thing. He pampers you to the fullest, just about everything is taken care of. He loves to feel your skin, to see how water streams down your body. If you two are in a rush, Jade won't relent, but he'll be grateful if you wash him in return.

• Baths are also nice in Jade's mind, but he'll take one exclusively if he is exhausted or is promised to have you with him in it. It'll take some bending and working around with it, this man is too tall for most baths. He'll casually hug you while you two relax and enjoy each other's company.

•❗He's pretty open to bathtub sex, Jade thinks that your wet, flushed body is one of the most erotic sights he's ever seen. There he was, thinking you couldn't get even hotter, but he can't keep his hands off of you now, please take responsibility. Still not safe to fool around in the shower, but at least you tried. It wasn't half bad, but Jade confessed later that it was too stressing - he's not willing to risk your health like that anymore.

Floyd Leech 🦈

• He's like a small child when it comes to bathing. It's too bothersome, he doesn't stink, what's the problem. It's a damn war, when Jade tries to stick him in a shower or a bathtub, because a certain furious octopus, hard bend on self-grooming, ordered to have Floyd showered one way or another. The catch is, as soon as he's in water, he's the calmest angel ever. He'll spend there as much time as his human body allows him. Generally, it's twice a week, but he goes to shower willingly after each PE class, he hates the stench of sweat even more.

• He doesn't smell like anything, at best you can smell a candy he ate just recently. He despises strong smells. If he's forced to shower with such shower gel or shampoo he'll be furious and snappy the whole time until it wears off. If he can smell it, it's bad and makes his skin crawl, annoying him to no end. He feels like biting himself, and he doesn't like it. On you, however, he prefers tasty, yummy smells, since he can take a bite no problem.

• The one who accidentally buys a juice-like bottle of some gel and gets a poisoning. "But it looked so edible~", he's banned by Jade and Azul now from any sections of the store, where there can be any chemicals in "misleading" covers.

• Actually baths are his favorite! Cue him clinging to you and just freeze there. He's enjoying it so much. At best you just sit there in his embrace, until the water becomes too cold for his liking, but other times he reverts back to his merman appearance and now he's all over you and you can't breathe properly. He's not oblivious thought, when he deems that he's teased you enough he'll release you. Your reactions are just the best, he can't get enough of them.

• One time he slipped into your shower and just grabbed a handful of your tight and thought it was the funniest thing ever, while you nearly went into cardiac arrest when somebody in all-boys dorm touched you out of nowhere. But who else could have it been, if not your capricious boyfriend. Now, Floyd is suddenly all about going to shower each day, of course dragging you with him. He doesn't even shower, he just stands under the water and squeezes you, ultimately not giving you the chance to clean neither you nor him. It takes colossal efforts, to make him scrub his body, but he still doesn't leave your side.

• ❗By far the most dangerous to have shower sex with, but also the most exciting. Does it stop you? Mostly. Him? Never. He always looks forward to when you inevitably get frisky. Floyd will edge you till the point of crying, have you begging for him to fuck you. He also has enough strength to pick you up and ram into you, or he'll just turn you around and press himself behind setting a fast pace right away.

[wornoutmouse]

Warnings: angst and close call pregnancy

Y'all with all the trama Shiggy got, you know damn well he aint gon be a good daddy right off the bat

Baby daddy shigaraki

You looked at the small pink stick in your hands shaking in fear. "I'm..pregnant." you whimper as the faint lines began to blur from your tears. If it were anyone, absolutely anyone else, then the leader of The Legue of Villains, you would have been fine with taking care of the child on your own. But there would not be a chance of that if he ever found out.

You stand up and run to your kitchen, tossing the pregnancy test into the trash sweating profusely as you glanced into the room your new baby daddy rested in. Different thoughts swirled in your mind about how you could hide this from him. The first few months would be fine but how were you to hide it afterward? Your hands trailed down to your now flat stomach. "I got this." you mutter as you walk to your kitchen pouring you a cup of tea.

An hour later, Shigaraki trails out of the bedroom groggily, hair hanging creepily in his face as he looked at you with piercing red eyes. "Why the hell are you looking at me like that?" he asks making your heart rate pick up ever so slightly. "N-No reason just didn't think you'd be up so early, that's all." Tomura comes behind you and wraps his hands around being careful of his fingers. Even that didn't stop you from feeling faint at how close his hands were to your stomach. 

The first month was easy, you showed little to no symptoms and your stomach remained a normal size. However, that didn't stop you from being paranoid whenever a diaper commercial came on screen. A few weeks after you took the test, you went to the doctors to confirm your fears. "Yes ma'am, it looks to me that you are indeed with child." the doctor said, signing off on a few papers glancing at you, briefly acknowledging your shaken state. "If you're anything to go by, I'd say, either the father doesn't know, or you don't want it." You shook your head, "He doesn't and I don't plan on letting him know." 

The doctor put the clipboard down, "Is this your way of telling me you want an abortion? If that is the route you want to go, I won't judge but this isn't a spur of the moment thing and I want you to be positive you won't be in any danger if someone finds out." You sigh sliding your hands over your scarf-covered hair. "N-No, I think I'll keep the baby, b-but, I don't know what to do." The doctor smiles at you patting your back. "You look like you have a strong head on your shoulders, I'm sure you'll figure it out."

The third month was harder as your bump was finally showing so you could no longer wear your normally form-fitting shirts. Shigaraki had luckily stopped coming around as often due to villain things, something you were grateful for since you could finally give in to your cravings. That plan was soon compromised when Komugiri suddenly materialized on your rather 'indulgent' days. And by indulgent you mean you were propped up on the couch, shirt up, with some ice cream, toast, and two large boxes of french fries. 

"I may have lost most of my human necessities, but I'm sure this amount of eating isn't necessary for normal human consumption." You jump at the sound of his voice, quickly looking around if Komogiri brought someone else with him. "You can't tell him please!" Komugiri looked at you, misty smoke unwavering before a deep sigh erupted from him. "I know not the reason you are keeping this from Tomura, but for now I shall indulge you." You sag slightly relieved. "However." You glared at the misty man. "Now that I know you're carrying the offspring of a sought after villain, I will be checking in on you a lot more. I shall also implement a healthy diet for you and the child."

You groaned at the downright disrespectful amount of joy showing through Komugiri's voice. 

The next 2 months were a game of cat and mouse as you were forced to sneak past Komugiri's watchful eyes to give in to your cravings. "Please! You don't understand, I need a cheese dipped pretzel!" you whined as you were dragged from the pretzel stan by a goon Komugiri had brought along to do the labor for your shopping trip. "Get ahold of yourself young lady, you're causing a scene!" Komugiri reprimanded, truly sounding like a disappointed mother scolding her child. For the rest of the day you pouted, "How the hell are you even sneaking away so much, shouldn't Tomura be suspicious?" 

You would later have to admit that the meals Komugiri prepared, did make up for the food he wrongfully withheld from you. Another good thing that came from the whole ordeal was the doctor visits Komugiri took with you. Although it was rather embarrassing as he stood over the doctor, arms cross watching his every move. "Komugiri, the doctor is washing his hands, I think it's okay." you sigh flipping through a magazine for couches. Komugiri huffed and left the doctor alone, of course after he checked the temperature of the water.

Late in month 8, you were so obviously pregnant that you had developed a large waddle. Something your mother exploited. "Hah! See that's what yo ass get for making fun of me when I was pregnant with your brother!" you'd roll your eyes as you looked at your mother who had now become red in the face with laughter. "That's not fair, this is my first time being pregnant you cant make fun of me!" Your mom scoffed leaning back in her chair, "Girl please. Anyways when am I gon meet yo baby daddy? What was his name? Ziggaraki or whatever?" 

You were quiet for a moment before bursting into tears. "Mommy!!" Your mom looked thoughtfully startled at the outburst. "Girl what the hell wrong with you!" You hiccup and wipe your face, whines increasing. "He doesn't know I'm pregnant, I'm too scared to tell him!" Your mother cooed consoling your the best she could through the screen. "Aw sweety, he does know your pregnant." You wipe your eyes humming in question. "What are you talking about?" 

Behind you, something heavy hit the floor making you quickly swivel around in your chair. There in all his glory stood the man in question staring at you with concealed rage. His eyes stayed at your face before trailing down your body, irises shaking at the sight of your perfectly round belly protruding from the tight confines of your shirt. You swivel back around in your chair cringing at the fear evidently showing on your face. You shiver at the questioning look your mother was giving you but before she could say anything you turn off the video call. 

You shook in your seat refusing to turn around as you heard heavy steps walking towards you. "Turn around." You shook your head squeezing your eyes closed wishing Komugiri was here to help you. You feel the back of the chair bending at the weight being put on it. "Turn the fuck back around Y/N your I will dust this chair." He growls lowly trying to keep some sort of self-control. You refused to move making Shigaraki sigh and do it himself. 

You couldn't bring yourself to look at him so you kept your head-trained down on the floor. 'You're pregnant." Shigaraki wheezed finally letting the realization overtake him. He drops down low to his knees becoming eye level with your belly. "And I wasn't even here for most of it?" Shigaraki became angry making you stiffen and reflexively place a hand over your stomach. Shigaraki doesn't miss this and get's even angrier. "Y-You, hide this from m-me and now you're insulting me b-by acti-ng like I'd actually h-hurt you?!" he screamed at you making your hormones fluctuate from anger to sadness as tears well up in your eyes. 

"This is why Tomura! I didn't know how you'd react! You're not mature enough to handle a baby!" You scream back equally as fears flinching at a strike of pain traveling up your spin at the strain. Tomura chuckled darkly taking a step back throwing his head back in laughter. Giggling as he cards his hands through his stringy white hair and looks at you with a sharp glare. You swallow shallowly, you knew for a fact that a Tomura with a crazed smile was better than a stone-faced Tomura. 

Shigaraki swayed towards you hunched as he took in your fearful features. "Since you're so scared, why don't I make your fears a reality?" The sight of Tomura's hand coming up to your stomach sent you into fight or flight mode. You stand up and grab his wrist, "Look here Lil nigga, I don't care who you are, of how you feel, you not touching my baby." At the moment, you felt on top of the world, until you didn't as you felt something slowly drip down your leg.

Looking down, there was a thick trail of red leaving your genital area. You wail loudly at the sight, legs buckling. Shigaraki stepped away and at that moment, Komugiri materialized next to you. "Y/N!" Shigaraki stumbled, as Komugiri makes a portal and carries your body through it. 'This must be what shock is." you thought to yourself were you layed in Komugiri's arms unable to move as you heard the world pass by you.

There were sounds of frantic yelling and bright lights erupting your vision as you travel from one white room to the next. You were settled on a rather uncomfortable bed as you hear the frantic movement and an incessant beeping noise coming from your right. "Move quickly you bastards or I'll kill you all!" You internally smiled starting to become loopy likely from sedatives. 'Just Tomura being Tomura.' You frowned, 'I hope my baby won't inherit murderous intent.'

'Baby'

'Baby'

'My baby'

You jerk in the bed finally getting a clear head, "MY baby!" you yelled trying to take the needles out of your arms. "Hold her down!" came a feminine voice and you felt a series of hands push down on your shoulders forcing you to lie down. Tears rolled down your face, "My baby!" Shigaraki came near your face, "Y/N it-it'll be fine just....just...just laydown." You had never heard Shigaraki sound unsure of himself and that just angered you more as you gripped the front of your shirt. "You better keep my baby safe your I will ream hell fire on you!" you growled making your quirk startup. "Sedate her!" is all that you hear before your grip was loosened.

The darkness enveloped you and you could only see the worse ahead of you.

You shiver awake breathing heavily before trying to raise yourself off the bed. You were halted by Komugiri's hand. "W-What?" you start off but Komugiri raised a smug finger to his lips before pointing over to the left side of the room. Turning your head you gape at the sight before you. 

Shiagarki, in all his villainous glory, was sleeping in a chair shirtless with a tiny bundle of a blanket over him. "Is that?" You ask looking at Komugiri who nods standing up and walking over to Tomura, carefully removing the bundle of blankets from his arms walking back to you. 

You hear small gurgles and your heart beats faster as Komugiri sets the small weight into your arms. Looking down at the small face of your child, all your problems went away. "Hi there little one." you cooed softly at the child in your arms. The baby had the same dark skin as you but its hair was light blue like its father. "Come on, let mommy see you." you whisper booping your nose against the baby's smaller one making its face scrunch up. 

"Look, Komu, I made this!" you said still sounding slightly loopy. Komugiri chuckled, "You and Tomura are so much alike I see now."

From the other side of the room, Shigaraki jerks in his place standing up and looking franticly around the room effectively disintegrating the armrest. When he makes eye contact with you, he instantly relaxes. Komugiri excuses himself from the room leaving the two of you to awkwardly stare at each other. "So, what happened." you started off not exactly wanting to talk but you knew you had to.

Shigaraki raised his hand to his neck but didn't scratch for some reason. "Preeclampsia, a reaction to stress making your blood pressure go up." You hummed looking down at your infant. "It's so cute." you mumble, "He... it's a boy." Shigaraki chimes in as he gazes at the baby with wide eyes. You smile feeling the waterworks return. "My baby boy."

Shigaraki shuffles awkwardly as he watched you cry silently. "You want..a tissue?" You glare at him nodding. "Can we name him Daku?" Shigaraki hesitantly asks as he brings a box of tissue. "Doesn't that mean Dark in Japanese?" you ask quirking your eyebrow. Shigaraki shrugged, "I mean look at him, he is dark." You look at Shagaraki for a painstakingly long time. "Keep playing with me and I'll name him Komugriri." Shigaraki frowns at that.

"The bastard didn't even tell me and he knew the whole time!" you rolled your eyes at your partner's grumbling. "If you want to call him dark so bad how about...Yami." Shigaraki shook his head, "That's too close to All Might's real name." "I'm not even going to ask how you know that."

You two sit in silence as you gaze at your new unnamed baby. "We can't ignore the elephant in the room Y/N." Shigaraki states putting a hesitant hand on your shoulder. "Ignore what Tomura? about how you caused me to go into labor early. Like threatening to kill both me and our child?!" you said voice raising a bit. Shigaraki looked at you, gears turning. 

There was nothing he could actually say to that for no matter how you could look at, nothing he did was okay. "I...I was scared." You sighed placing your head back on your pillow looking at the tiles above you, wishing that this never happened. "Well, you scared me Tomura." The silence was deafening as Tomura silently gasped, "You know that I would never-" you groan, "No I don't Tomura! I don't know what you would do! Why do you think I hid this from you in the first place!" 

There was no response just as you expected and for some strange reason, that broke you more than getting something half-assed. Small noises bubbled from your arms drawing both your attention to it. "Hey.." Shigaraki mumbled as you slowly watch small slanted eyes open, looking up at you. "His eyes are two different colors Shig." you respond shocked as a perfect little set of brown and red eyes looked up at you. "Cool...c-can I hold him." You playfully glared at Shigaraki, "You had him all while I was sleeping!" 

You name your new baby boy Daiki, Daiki Shigaraki. You of course picked the name since it seemed that all Tomura wanted was a child with a name that represents the darkness inside him, his words not yours. 

I KINDA WANNA CONTINUE THIS

[system76]

Behind the Scenes of System76: Industrial Design

Since moving into a factory space in 2018, System76 has delved deeper and deeper into manufacturing hardware in-house. Three years later, we’ve introduced five Thelio desktops, fine-tuned the hardware, developed our fully configurable Launch keyboard, and optimized our production processes. Helming the design process is Mechanical Engineer John Grano, who wears a number of different hats here. We sat down with John this week to discuss industrial design and the team behind our beautiful open source hardware.

How would you describe industrial design for people unfamiliar with the term?

To me, industrial design is basically the art of making something into a usable product. In industrial design, you have to balance looks and function, and that drives your form. It’s kind of like hardware UX in that it’s really important to have the right feel. If you can make the system connect better with people, they’ll like it more. Adding that softness we do with Thelio, like slightly rounded edges and darker wood, it makes it a little more approachable to have a semi-natural looking system and not something that’s blinking at you with red lights all the time.

System76 itself is a group of hardcore programmers and people that are really into Linux, but I think the idea of trying to democratize Linux is extremely important. If you can create something that doesn’t have that robotic aesthetic, it will provide people with something that feels more familiar and usable. No one really wants to go sit in a car that looks like a square with wheels on it. They want something that makes them feel something, maybe openness or comfort, when they’re in it.

What inspired you to get into mechanical engineering, and how did you end up at System76?

The way my brain works lends itself well to engineering, for better or for worse. There’s a lot of really solid engineers who don’t have much creativity, and then there are a lot of people who have great creative ability, but can’t do math. I kind of fluctuate in the middle; I wouldn’t say I’m the best at math or the most creative person in the entire world, but I have enough of each that the combination pushed me towards mechanical engineering. I like working with my hands, and it’s more of a study of how things work in the real world versus computer science, which is a purely digital and nontangible practice.

During school I worked mainly as a bike mechanic, and that helped me to think about how to build things better. That led me to my first internship at a bike company working in a wind tunnel, which was really fun. Realizing that I could probably never get a job there—or at least one that would pay me enough to live—I started working at an environmental engineering company, where I prototyped scientific sampling systems for R&D that would process materials with all these gasses at really high heat and tried not to die. It was kind of fun making these large-scale systems that were basically just gigantic science experiments, but I didn’t really have the creative outlet I wanted in terms of making something that looks good.

One of the main things that drew me to System76 was being able to have a solid influence on what tools we were able to use and how we were going to push the design. In the past three years, it’s pretty wild to see what we’ve been able to accomplish coming from a completely empty warehouse to being able to crank out parts.

I had also previously, while working at these scientific instrument companies, been working with a local company to design and develop a cargo bicycle, so I had that experience as well in terms of consumer product development with overseas manufacturing. I think that helped get me in the door here.

Let’s talk a bit about your team. Who do you collaborate with on a typical day?

It’s a very small team and everyone does a lot. I pretty much lead the mechanical engineering team slash design team...slash manufacturing team. Being a small company, we are all wearing a bunch of different hats. Aside from doing the initial design work on all of our Thelio desktops and the Launch keyboard, I also program our laser-punch machine and our brake press and run through all of the design for manufacturing hang ups that show up. Those changes tend to be a result of our current tools, and internal capabilities.

Crystal came on last August as our first CNC Machinist. She heads up all of the machining, trains our operators, makes sure our parts are coming out in a nice clean fashion, and has done a lot of work on minimizing machine time and maximizing the parts we can get out. She also provides really great feedback on what's possible and what kind of special fixtures or tools we'll need to make for a specific part. Around the same time we picked up our first Haas 3-axis CNC mill to start working on the Launch project. That led to some other opportunities to make parts for Thelio and improve the feel of some of the parts that we were pumping out.

We just hired Cary, who came from a similar background as me in consumer product development, as well as low-scale scientific machine development. He’s going to help build manufacturing tools for us, and he’s only been here now for two or three weeks. Going forward, Cary will be heading up the Thelio line long-term, and I’ll be moving to some interesting R&D work.

And Zooey?

Zooey doesn’t really do much. She just kind of sits there and waits for people to feed her their lunch. I take her out for walks during the day so she can get away from everyone petting her. She doesn’t like when they do that.

What was the R&D process like for Launch?

Launch is a less complicated product in that we don’t have to deal with things like cooling. Even dropping a PCB into aluminum housing deals with multiple processes, like using the laser and CNC machine. This was a start to looking at those processes to see how much time it takes to produce parts, the costs going into making them, and monitoring the cutting quality. You have to be familiar with the machines and know what you’re looking for when you see a tool going dull.

We first let the software experts do their thing and optimize a layout they wanted for their programming life. Then I was given that template, built a couple of sheet metal chassis that we wired up to test that layout, and made a bunch of little changes to that to get that right secret sauce for our keyboard-centric workflow in Pop!_OS. Once we got a sheet metal product that we were sure was going to be usable, we decided officially that we were going to pursue making a keyboard. That came with a whole new set of manufacturing requirements that we would have to look into.

We spent a ton of time working on pocket profile. When you look at a Launch, you’ll see that it’s not a perfect rectangle. That’s because when you’re using a mill, you have a round tool, so you can go through and get close to a pretty small radius on the corner, but you can never make it exact. If we wanted to get a very small, tight pocket, we’d have to use a very small cutter that takes an extremely long period of time.

We’re taking raw billet, which are these huge 12-foot-long sticks of aluminum that we cut down to get our final product. We went with a rounded rectangle so that we could use our cutter and decrease the overall time to machine that part. There was a lot of work in that and making sure the pockets were all 13.95mm versus 13.9mm versus 14.1mm.

We also did a lot of R&D on how we go about putting the angle bar on. Magnetic assembly seemed to be a good idea. We went from trying to glue magnets in to doing what's called press fitting. The bars come right out of powder coating while they’re nice and warm, when the aluminum is slightly larger than when it cools down. Those magnets aren’t actually adhered to anything in the bars; they’re squeezed in nice and tight from the aluminum cooling and contracting around them. That’s called a press fit, and doing that makes the process faster and less expensive.

It’s similar with the bottoms of Launch; we have steel plates that we press fit into that part as opposed to gluing or screwing, but that we do before powder coating; steel rusts, and we don’t want someone opening up their keyboard in a year and finding a little bit of rust floating underneath their super high-end PCB. So we do that, sand it down, use our media blaster to clean off the surface from the tool paths you see from the mill, and then we powder coat it through and through.

Word on the Denver streets is that Thelio Major is getting a redesign soon. What does that entail?

We’re bringing Thelio Major a lot more in line with Thelio Mega in terms of a different PCI mount for graphics cards, because we know that’s been a pain point for a lot of our users. We want to provide a little bit more robust installation for these graphics cards, which continue to increase in size and weight. The NVIDIA 3000-series cards are almost a pound heavier in some instances, and that’s a lot of weight to be shipping across the country.

We also want to continue to make Thelio Major cooler and quieter when it’s running with these new GPUs. Our new brake press allows us to make radius bends on parts, so we’re starting to run through R&D of a laser-welded external. It’s a wholesale departure from us using custom brackets and 3M VHB tape. That will provide a nicer finished product to our end user, and it’ll allow us to make our product faster with less material and less steps.

What qualities do you look for when adding someone to the team?

Creativity is extremely important. As a small manufacturing company, our priorities can shift on a day or in an afternoon where we don’t have the full line of product anymore. There are all sorts of examples in the past few years of times where you have to react pretty quickly. The motherboard’s been EOL’d, or we have to change our sheet metal design, build a new part, things like that. Making sure that someone can adapt to those changes on a moment’s notice is one of the key parts of the job.

We also want people who get excited about a new challenge and have the desire to keep improving something. I look for people who like to make things and go back in and refine it and not hold it up on this pillar. It’s good to not look at something like it’s perfect.

You have a lot of love for your Audi. What do you love about it over other options?

I like German cars. We have a family of them. They’re high-performance and not too expensive if you do all the work on it yourself. There’s a huge after-market community that tunes and changes these cars, which is pretty fun. Plus I prefer the metric system. Having a standard system drives me nuts, because what the [REDACTED] are fractions?

My real love, though, is bikes. I love tuning and riding bikes, and I love that more than I like to work on cars. It comes out of tinkering. I work with carbon fiber, I’ve done a lot of repairs on bikes over the years—there’s a certain sense of freedom you get from riding a bike that you can’t get from anything else. Not motorcycles, not cars.

[drabbles-of-writing]

First Class Mess

This is part of my Four Years AU

AO3

Masterpost

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Living with Edric and Emira had it’s ups and downs.

On one hand, Amity could finally get away from her parents. It wasn’t a permanent living space, and she always made sure to spend at least a few nights at her parents house, excusing her absence as being busy with the Emperor’s Coven. But it was far better than trying to hide at the Owl House where her anxiety spiked through the roof, no offence to the family.

On the other hand, her siblings were an absolute mess.

,

“Rule number five, I don’t wanna see any girlfriends here.”

“Wow, okay, no, I veto that rule.” Emira said immediately, leaning her head off the couch arm to look over at her brother, who was sitting on the kitchen counter.

“Yeah, what gives?” Amity agreed, sitting on her knees on the couch.

“Amity, is there something you’d like to share with the class?” Emira asked, glancing back at her with a raised brow.

“You and I both know he just means Viney and Luz,” Amity growled, crossing her arms. “He just prefers to use the term girlfriends.”

“I meant they can’t stay over for the night,” Edric said, raising his hands defensively. “This apartment can barely fit the three of us without falling apart.” He said, gesturing to the room around them, which, admittedly, did look pretty ghetto.

“I don’t need to be dealing with you two causing more damage with your little crushes. They’re kind of known for causing trouble.” He said matter-of-factly. “And yes, I’m spreading this to Emira because it’s rude to stick it only on Amity.”

“Wow, thanks,” Amity grumbled as Emira gave an offended gasp.

“Unless someone is dying, I don’t wanna see any dates in here, understand?” Edric said. “At least not until we’ve gotten everything together in some capacity.”

“I resent this rule,” Emira insisted stubbornly.

“Yeah? Well, I’m older, therefore I win.” Edric said smugly.

“Ed, it was by eleven minutes.” ,

And that’s how Amity came to the apartment in the middle of a thunderstorm to find Edric and Jerbo in the kitchen. Both a little too close to be casual.

The second they registered the door opening, Edric sprung back. Jerbo whirled around from where he was perched on the kitchen counter (seriously, that thing can only hold so much weight).

Both of them looked like King when he’d been caught stealing from the fridge for the fifth time that week.

Amity stared at them for a few moments, her brain a little fried from dealing with the pelting boiling rain earlier.

“You’re such a hypocrite, Ed.” She finally said, walking in and kicking the door shut behind her.

“It’s just Jerbo!” Edric defended frantically, looking wildly between Amity and a very perplexed Jerbo.

“The fact you immediately knew which rule I was talking about isn’t helping your situation,” Amity called back, throwing off her overly thick coat onto the hanger by the door, too lazy to take off her Emperor’s Coven cloak on underneath.

“And unless you want Emira to taunt you endlessly, I suggest Jerbo should leave soon. No offence,” She added, looking towards the upperclassmen.

“None taken,” Jerbo said with a wave of his hand. “Viney’s not much different.”

Edric groaned and slumped against the counter beside Jerbo, head hanging. Jerbo gave him a sympathetic pat on the back.

Amity kicked off her boots and flopped dramatically onto the couch, waving her hand above her where the boys could see.

“Either go make out downstairs or make up your mind, ‘kay? Cause I’m tired.”

Jerbo made a strangled wheezing-like noise that reminded Amity of a deflating squeaky toy. Edric sprung upwards, flushing brightly.

“We were not making out!” He exclaimed, voice strained. “We were doing nothing even remotely like that, even!”

Amity sat up on the couch, turning her head to look over at her brother with a deadpan stare. She looked like she wanted to say something, but resigned to just sighing and laying back down on the couch.

“Whatever. I’m blackmailing you with this later.”

“You suck,”

,

“Quick question,” Emira said, poking her head into Amity’s room. “I can still get away with doing something illegal here, right?”

Amity looked up from her book, giving her sister a look that said her question was the stupidest thing she’d ever heard.

“I’m only a cop when on the clock, Em.” Amity said. “Anything illegal you do when I’m not working is fair game. Legally speaking.”

“Nice,” Emira pumped a fist.

“Can I ask what you’re planning on doing?” Amity raised a brow.

“You gonna rat us out?”

“I’d be a hypocrite if I did. Like somebody in this house!” Amity added the last part notably louder.

“Amity, shut up!” Edric called back.

“...I’m gonna ask about that later.” Emira said, pointing a finger at Amity. “Anyway, Viney can’t afford the supplies she needs to help out some baby bearstripes she found. So we were just gonna steal it and stash the supplies here.”

“You’re whipped,” Edric’s voice floated from the main room.

“Shut it, Ed!” Emira snapped back.

“Yeah, sure, go steal some stuff.” Amity shrugged. “I’m not working till tomorrow.”

“So we can totally commit crimes now?” Edric asked, suddenly appearing being Emira, looking far too excited.

“I mean, yeah, but I wouldn’t recommend it.” Amity said.

“If it’s a bad enough crime I could be put on a mission to hunt the two of you down. Obviously I’m not going to raid this apartment but if I catch you on the streets it is on sight.” She warned.

“Oh, so your little Owl family gets a free pass, but we don’t?” Edric scoffed.

“I do not give them a free pass!” Amity protested. “I throw Eda in jail all the time. I’ve never even had to break her out!”

“Right, sorry,” Emira amended. “Ed meant that your hopeless crush gets a free pass, but we don’t?”

Amity growled and threw her book at the two of them. They quickly jumped back and swung the door shut, letting the book hit it instead.

“That’s a yes,” Edric snickered.

“I’m not the only one who gives crushes a free pass!” Amity shouted after them.

There were a few beats of silence.

“You have got to be kidding me, Ed.”

,

Emira knew the rules of the apartment. Which meant there were barely any and they fluctuated from day to day.

The two big ones were that anything that happened in the apartment was a safe zone, and to avoid bringing over anyone associated with the Owl House, which sadly, included Viney and Jerbo, seeing as they were friends with Luz.

They loved everyone in the Owl House, they really did. But everyone in that family was known to be very chaotic, and they’d probably break the shabby apartment or piss off the neighbors more than the siblings already had.

It was simply a precaution.

Emira, however, was a known rule-breaker.

So, it wasn’t a surprise to find Viney sitting in the living room, currently wrapping up Emira’s sprained wrist.

“You're a mess,” Viney sighed, slowly bandaging her arm. “Can’t you ask your parents to cover your medical bills?”

“Course I can, but at one in the morning?” Emira scoffed, keeping her voice low. “I’ll bug them about it later.”

“Only you would get a sprained wrist and say it’s not that big a deal,” Viney sighed, gently raising Emira’s hand and letting her hand glow, doing her best to ease the pain.

“Eh, I’d say it was worth it anyway,” Emira hissed, flinching as she felt a sharp pain in her wrist.

“Sorry, sorry,” Viney whispered, laying her free hand over Emira’s to hold her still as she slowly healed the sprain as best she could.

“I don’t have any healing glyphs, so you’ll just have to leave it be till morning. The splint should work for now, though.” She continued, looking up at Emira.

Emira was staring at where Viney was holding her hand, blushing with her ears lowered, eyes blown wide.

Though that last part might’ve been because the only light was the moon shining through the small window beside the two.

“Em?” Viney tilted her head, smiling.

“Huh?” Emira jerked her head up. “Sorry, did, uh, did you say something?” 

Viney giggled and removed her glowing hand from Emira’s wrist, though she kept holding up her arm with her other hand.

“You’re ridiculous,” She said, shaking her head.

“All the best people are,” Emira replied, dipping her head to properly meet the shorter witch’s eyes.

Viney smiled and lightly pressed her forehead against Emira’s causing the girl to freeze and stiffen up.

Emira’s face lit up and her eyes darted around, though she didn’t move away.

“S-so, sorry to hi-hide you out here,” She stuttered, shoulders hunched. “But Ed pre-pretty much broke...broke that rule s-so I’m sure it’s not...not that big a--”

“Em,”

Viney leaned forward more and squished their noses together, giving the Blight a rather amused look.

Emira quickly shut her mouth with an audible clack, meeting the witch’s gaze.

Viney slowly tilted her head forward, her eyes closing.

Emira did her best to calm her heart before leaning in as well.

Something clattered, loudly, on the kitchen floor.

Viney froze and jumped back, startled. Emira only slumped, thoroughly annoyed.

“It is one AM!” Emira snapped, leaning around the couch. “Ed, what are you doing--”

It wasn’t Ed.

Amity shut the fridge, a slice of bread in her mouth and a bag of snacks in her hands, along with the cup she had dropped.

She looked over, surprised to see Emira, before morphing into a look of understanding when she saw Viney peek out as well.

Amity took out the bread in her mouth, setting the cup down in it’s previous position by the sink.

“Carry on,” She said calmly, holding her snacks as she walked out of the kitchen and back to her room.

Emira glared in the direction where Amity left for a moment before she heard a snort behind her.

She looked back, seeing Viney was doing her best to smother a laugh.

“...what?” Emira demanded, raising a brow.

Viney broke into a fit of giggles then, barely able to smother a loud laugh that would definitely wake up Edric.

“I’m sorry, it’s just--I wasn’t expecting that!” She snickered. “What’s your sister even doing up this late?”

“I guess being up at ungodly hours just runs in the family,” Emira sighed, embarrassed as she picked up one of the pillows that had fallen off the couch with her uninjured hand and placed it in her lap.

“I take it that was probably my cue to leave,” Viney chuckled, standing up. “My dad will get worried if I’m not there in the morning.”

“Oh, yeah, right,” Emira said, visibly deflating.

“Keep off that hand, you hear me?” Viney said, gathering up her bandages and extra splints into her bag. “And go to the hospital to get it properly fixed in the morning.”

“I know, I know,” Emira muttered bitterly, looking up at Viney with puppy-dog eyes. “Do you have to go?”

“Sorry, Em. But I’d rather get at least some amounts of sleep.” Viney said. “I’ll check on you tomorrow, okay?” She said, leaning down and kissing Emira’s forehead.

Emira, somehow, lit up even brighter with her ears twitching downwards. She held her pillow tighter and buried her face in it.

“‘Kay,” She mumbled shlyly.

Viney giggled and stepped back, making her way towards the door. 

“Don’t lay on your hand too much,” She added, opening the door.

“‘Kay,” Emira repeated, lifting her head ever so slightly and watching Viney with one eye.

Viney gave a small wave before stepping out of the apartment, shutting the door behind her.

Emira only continued watching the door where Viney left, absolutely lovestruck.

“All I wanted to get was a drink,” Came a grumble behind her.

“Amity!” Emira gasped, sitting upright and looking around the couch again to see Amity had wandered back in to grab a drink. 

“I didn’t ask to see my sisters failing flirting attempts,” Amity muttered, pouring herself a cup of apple juice.

“Go back to bed!”

“I’d rather die,”

,

“Okay, okay, but what if instead of teeth, the worm had legs inside its mouth.”

“Ed, it’s like, ten. I’m not doing this right now,” Emira groaned, sitting on her bed as Edric sat on the floor beside her.

“Helps keep us awake, doesn’t it?” Edric shrugged. “Shouldn’t Amity have come back by now?”

“Maybe she just decided to sleep over and forgot to tell us,” Emira said, checking her scroll.

Sure enough, her last text from Amity, thirty minutes ago, only said ‘I’ll be back soon.’

“Doesn’t really seem like her, though.” Edric frowned.

The sound of a window opening caught their attention. Both of them scrambled out of Emira’s room and peered around the corner, curious.

Amity crawled in through the window, brushing herself off before turning back around.

Luz was outside the window, standing on her staff as it flew beside the open window. The staff lowered so Luz could learn her arms on the windowsill, giving Amity a smug look.

“See? I’m not that bad of a flier,” She said proudly.

“Uh huh, sure.” Amity said, sounding amused. “After the first couple of terrifying minutes,”

“You wound me,” Luz said with a dramatic sigh. “Why must I be cursed to be with such a cruel witch?”

“Oh hush,” Amity chuckled, batting at Luz’s arm. “You made me late!”

“Was it worth it, though?” Luz said, tilting her head with a grin.

“...yeah,” Amity admitted, turning her head away, a faint blush on her cheeks.

“That’s the Noceda charm for ya,” Luz winked.

“You’re impossible,” Amity grumbled bashfully.

“Yeah, but you like that.” Luz said, leaning forward through the window.

“Very much so,” Amity agreed, meeting Luz’s chaste kiss with a smile.

“Wha--”

Edric, who had been leaning too far out, fumbled and fell over with a loud thump. Much to Emira’s chagrin.

Amity broke the kiss and whirled around, face flushing even more when she spotted both of her siblings.

“When did you two get here?” She demanded, pressing back on the windowsill, where Luz was now staring in, startled.

“We live here, Amity.” Emira deadpanned, not bothering to help up Edric. “And you have some explaining to do, young lady!”

“I think I’m just gonna…” Luz slowly flew a few feet away from the window. “I think I’m gonna go…”

“Yeah, you probably should.” Amity sighed, looking back. “Bye, Luz.” “See you tomorrow,” Luz gave a shy smile before sitting appropriately on her staff and flying off in a flash, clearly embarrassed about the situation as well.

“Hold on!” Edric shot up from the floor. “Since when was this a thing?”

“It was recent,” Amity grumbled, shutting the window.

“Are you telling me our Mittens got herself a girlfriend?” Emira asked excitedly, spinning the girl around.

“I can’t believe she beat me,” Edric muttered, crossing his arms as he sat dramatically on the couch.

“Suck it,” Amity teased, sticking out her tongue. “And listen, I was planning on telling you, but it was pretty recent and we didn’t really--”

“How recent, exactly?” Emira raised a disbelieving brow.

Amity looked away, ears flicked back.

“Like a week and a half...?”

“...that’s reasonable.” Emira nodded, releasing her sister. “And it was about time, too!” She said, ruffling her hair.

Amity slapped away her sister's hands, embarrassed as Edric gave her a grin.

“Guess we gotta compete for second place, huh?” Edric teased.

“You and I both know you and Jerbo couldn’t ask the other on a date to save your sanities.”

“I never said it was Jerbo!” Edric squawked.

The sisters shared a knowing look but didn’t say anything.

“Anyway, I’m tired. I had a long day,” Amity said, walking by her siblings. “I’m gonna head to bed.”

“Try not to get lost dreaming about that heart-stealer of yours!” Emira called after her.

“Don’t make me come back out there!” Amity’s voice warned from around the corner.

“Whatever you say, Mittens!”

,

Amity wasn’t used to late-night shifts.

Coming to the apartment early in the morning was a pain. Her mask was pushed up on her head as she walked into the apartment on quiet feet, ready to collapse and sleep all day.

Edric was in the kitchen.

He was never up this early.

His elbows were leaning on the kitchen counter, and he was covering his face with one hand, his other clenched into a fist on the counter.

Amity blinked and took off her mask, setting it on the coat hanger and slowly walking over, worry evident on her face.

“Ed?” She asked quietly.

Edric jolted and jerked his head up, expression flashing to that of momentary fear.

He was crying.

“Mi-Mittens!” Edirc gasped, quickly wiping at his eyes. “I-I didn’t hear you come...come in,”

“Edric?” Amity rushed over around the counter, gently grabbing her older brother's arm. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” He said, giving her a sorrowfully forced smile. “Was, er, cutting some tear-peppers earlier and it hasn’t gone away yet.”

Amity sighed and looked up at her brother.

“Ed, that’s the worst lie I’ve ever heard.” She said bluntly. “What happened?” She asked again, her voice softer.

“You shouldn’t have to worry about it,” Edric insisted. “It’s my job to look after you, remember?”

“You're my brother, not my dad, thank Titan.” Amity muttered. “I’m not thirteen, Ed.” She continued. “You can tell me,”

Edric gazed down at his little sister for a moment. He swallowed before sighing and letting his shoulders slump.

“Just a little stressed,” He admitted, turning away to stare at the empty counter. “You know, what with trying to actually make a living without mom or dad's help.” He sighed.

“And then there’s the whole rebellion thing me and Em are working on. And that stupid tennant I hate. And trying to find a decent part of the Illusion Coven to join, since we definitely want to stick to that.” He continued.

“And…” He glanced down at Amity. “Well, let’s just say that fear of loneliness isn’t looking too irrational right now,” He said, sounding like he was seconds away from breaking down, hands shaking.

“Hey, that’s not true,” Amity said, squeezing Edric’s arm. “Me and Em aren’t gonna leave you.”

“Amity, you’re in the Emperor’s Coven. You're a spy. You're part of something big.” Edric shook his head. “You’ve got a lot ahead of you.”

“And Em…” He looked away. “Em’s got something going for her. You don’t become mom's favorite by being mediocre.”

“Who cares what mom thinks?” Amity demanded. “She isn’t worth either of our times. Last I checked, she was just as mean on Emira after you flunked the Emperor’s Coven tryouts as she was with you.”

“...she said a lot of things you didn’t hear,” Edric said quietly. “I’m grateful you were at the Owl House.” He murmured. “You deserve a place like that.”

Amity stared up at her brother, a sinking feeling in her stomach.

Just how long, she wondered, had Edric been hiding these things from her? From Em?

She leaned against his side, burying her head in the crook of his arm.

“You deserve it, too.” She said softly. “You were able to stand up to mom, you made your own choices and even let me live with you…I couldn’t do those on my own.” She shut her eyes.

“You never gave up, even after all that. That’s what I always liked about you, y’know?”

She felt Edric stiffen and shutter, trying to hold back cries as tears freely fell down his face. He drew an arm around his little sister, pulling her close and pressing his nose into her hair.

They stayed like that for a while. Holding each other in silent reassurances.

,

It was late in the afternoon, sunset fast approaching.

The three siblings were all at different places in the apartment, for once, having a moment of peace among them.

That was, until, the power cut out.

Amity raised her head from where she was reading on the couch. Edric paused making his sandwich and Emira poked her head out of her room.

None of them said a word for a few moments.

“Did you two seriously forget to pay the power bill?” Amity broke the silence.

“I swore I paid it!” Edric insisted. “They didn’t give a notice or anything!”

“You just keep forgetting to close the mailbox, you great idiot!” Emira growled, walking into the main room. “Maybe they just got lost or something.”

Amity got off the couch and opened the apartment door, peering out. 

There were no lights in the hallways, and she could see a few other tenants looking out in confusion as well.

“Nope, it’s a complex issue.” Amity said, looking back. “Whole place lost power.”

“Fantastic,” Emira grumbled. “In the beginning of winter!”

“At least there isn’t any snow yet,” Amity shrugged.

“We’re going to freeze to death in like half an hour.” Edric sighed, stepping out from behind the counter.

“I’m sure I could find some blankets,” Emira insisted.

“You guys know we could just like...go to the Owl House?” Amity raised a brow.

Both her siblings turned to stare at her, blinking dumbfoundedly.

“...right, you guys don’t go there as often.” Amity mumbled quietly. “Look, how about we just head on over? Eda will understand. This should only last for a day or so, anyway.”

“So long I’m not freezing, I’ll take it.” Edric said, already grabbing his coat.

“Isn’t it a bit late?” Emira worried.

“Someone in that house is always awake, no matter the hour.” Amity assured her. “They won’t mind.”

“Yeah, because you have special girlfriend status,” Edric teased.

“Jealous,” Amity shot back, a blush coming to her cheeks as she held the door open for her siblings. “The Owl House has its own power, anyway. So it should be fine.”

“And if not, you get to snuggle up to Luz,” Emira taunted.

“I’m going to let Fang bite both of you,” Amity threatened, walking out after her siblings and through the dark hallways of the apartment complex.

“Ha! Jokes on you, he already bit me.” Edric said proudly. “I’m immune.”

“That’s not how that works.” ,

“Hi, Amity!” Hooty greeted, well before the Blight siblings were at the front porch.

“Can it, Hooty.” Amity said with a sneer. “Tell Eda we’re here,”

“Oh, she already knows.” Hooty said cheerfully. “Luz saw you through the--”

The door was suddenly swung open, and Hooty’s face smashed against the side of the house, much to his complaints.

Eda stood there, looking over the two young-adults and teenager with a confused, but not unwelcome expression.

“Didja get kicked out of your apartment?” She inquired, flicking an ear.

“Power went out,” Emira explained. “Amity said you’d let us stay while it gets fixed?”

“What did I say about making decisions for me?” Eda scolded the girl. “I keep getting Luz’s friends showing up because you insist that I’ll let them in.”

“And yet, you never disappoint,” Amity said with a grin. “May we come in?”

Eda muttered under her breath about kids these days before stepping aside, allowing the three to wander on in.

“Amity,” Lilith greeted from where she was having a cup of tea on the couch. Amity swore that woman was addicted to the stuff.

“Amity!” Luz said at the same time, much more enthused as she rushed from the window and enveloped the witch in a hug. “What’s with the party?” She asked.

“Power problems,” Emira explained for her flustered sister. “We’re just gonna hang here for a bit. Don’t let us invade your mushy time,” She teased, stepping around them and looking at the house.

“Aw, come on!” King complained, crawling out from underneath the table in front of the couch. “Now I’ll never get sleep with a bunch of teenagers around.”

“Excuse you, we’re nineteen! Legal adults,” Edric corrected.

“Same difference,”

Lilith rolled her eyes and offered tea to the twins. Emira accepted it while Edric hung up their coats, watching as both his sisters seamlessly fit right into the discussions of the Owl family, despite their sudden intrusion.

He smiled to himself, slowly looking around the Owl House.

Yeah, they’d picked a good family.

,

It was late.

Amity hadn’t made it home.

Emira had called the Owl House to see if Amity was there. They said she’d left two hours earlier, and were surprised to hear she hadn’t made it back to the apartment yet.

They said Amity had left after getting a call from their mother.

It was nearly midnight.

Edric was beside himself with worry, pacing the living room.

They’d even called up Keene, the second-in-command of Amity’s Emperor’s Coven group. She had given his number to them for strict emergencies.

He hadn’t seen her either.

“I’m going to go look for her,” Edric said, breaking Emira out of her train of thought and storming towards the door. “Something must have happened with mom and dad.”

“I’ll wait for her here,” Emira nodded. “I’ll call you if she--”

Right as Edric was about to open the apartment door, it swung open very aggressively.

“Amity!” The twins exclaimed.

The seventeen-year-old stood hunched in the doorway, head hanging and bangs covering her eyes. She was shaking, violently. She was still in her Emperor’s Coven outfit, as she had visited the Owl House first and didn’t have a spare change of clothes.

“Where have you been?” Edric asked worriedly, crouching down. She was always shorter than them. “We were worried sick!”

“Did something happen?” Emira added, getting off the couch. “Mittens?”

The girl raised her head, and the twins gave a sharp intake of breath.

Amity’s face was stained with tears, her eyes red and swollen. She had a dark, angry purple bruise on her left cheek, and was rubbing at her left wrist.

“What happened?” Emira demanded, shutting the door as Edric pulled Amity into the apartment.

“I-I,” Amity stuttered, fresh tears already beginning to leak from her eyes as her siblings gently led her to the couch and sat on either side of her.

“I didn’t mean to,” Amity sniffled, shoulders trembling. “I didn’t mean to say it, I didn’t, I--”

“Hey, hey, shh,” Edric comforted, holding her hands to stop her messing with her wrist. “Just tell us what happened, Amity.”

Amity took in sharp, shaky breaths for a few moments, trying to calm herself down.

“M-mom wanted me to c-come home,” She explained, though the twins already knew. “She...she told me it was because I left something there. I-I went over and...and,”

She bit her lip, holding back a cry as Emira gently placed a hand on her back.

“She got mad,” Amity said, her voice rattly. “She...she said she talked to Keene and-and he said I wasn’t spending as much t-time at the Coven as I said...he...he didn’t know--”

“Hey, we know, we know,” Emira said softly. “What else?”

“Sh-she demanded to know where I-I’d been,” Amity sniffled, holding herself. “I did...didn’t want to tell her, so I,” She inhaled. “I got mad...I got mad, I told her it wasn’t...wasn’t her business…I didn’t even really li-live with her…”

The twins fearfully glanced at each other. Nobody talked back to their mother. Not unless they wanted a death sentence.

Edric raised his hand and Amity flinched, and he felt a stab of pain in his chest.

He slowly, and genty, brushed his hand by her shoulder, right below where her bruise was.

“It...it didn’t go well,” Amity murmured, pulling off her gloves and revealing she had a bruise around her left wrist, looking like she had been sharply grabbed.

“Did mom do this?” Emira demanded quietly, gesturing to the nasty mark on her face.

Amity didn’t answer.

“She said sorry right after,” Amity mumbled, almost inaudible.

The twins stared, horror striking them to the core. Edric wrapped his arm around Amity’s shoulders, pulling her closer. She let him, sniffling.

“...you’re not going back there.” Emira decided. “I don’t care how many laws we break. You won’t.”

“I already told them,” Amity murmured, glancing over at her. “I...I said I was a member of the Emperor’s Coven and they, they couldn’t tell me what to do anymore…”

She lifted her unhurt hand to her cloak and withdrew Fang, her palisman, who was curled around her fingers and looked up at the twins.

“Eda showed me a re-recording spell before I left. They know I can use it if, if they try to get me back.”

Neither of the twins wanted to know what that snake had seen.

“Good, because you were never going to go back there to begin with.” Edric said firmly. “Well, no, no, not good, that’s probably not--”

Emira punched his arm and he winced, but obediently went quiet.

“What if she finds out I live here?” Amity asked quietly, curling closer into Ed’s shoulder. “She-she’ll try to do something. What if she cuts you off?”

“We don’t want anything to do with her anymore, I assure you.” Emira growled.

“You-you need the money,” Amity sniffled. “I know you do.”

“We can start making our own--” “Please,” Amity turned her head, giving her sister a scared look. “Please don’t cut off mom. She’ll do something worse.” She said, voice going quieter. “Not yet. You need it now. I’ll be okay.”

Emira wanted to argue, she really did.

But she couldn’t.

Getting jobs in this time of the Boiling Isles, and in this region, was tough. Especially for illusionists. They’d made a bit of money here and there, but a lot of their support came from their mother and father, who grudgingly handed it out so to make their children at least look like they were surviving on their own, for the public.

And it wasn’t like any of them could go to the coven just yet. In a real court battle, they knew their parents would win. They always would.

It was their public image that worried them. And for now, the Blight children had the upper hand.

They’d have to let the spider come to them. As horrifying as the thought of waiting sounded.

“Alright,” Edric related, drawing circles on her arm. “But you aren’t going anywhere near them. Not ever again. Do you understand?”

Amity didn’t respond. She just pulled herself closer to Edric, shuttering with the strain to hold back sobs.

Edric pulled her into a real hug, and Emira wasn’t far behind. They both murmured words of comfort as Amity muffled her cries in Edric’s shoulder, tense with the effort.

If this was what the Blight name meant, they didn’t want it.

[harleyhua-archive]

it’s elle again! took me longer than I thought it would, but i’m here with the bio of my second son, harley. he’s my newest oc; i’ve had him for about a year, but i didn’t get to rp much during that time. i’m fluent in asl, so harley has a special place in my heart. usually my gifs that include him signing won’t actually match the signs up to what he’s saying, but this one does. he’s signing ‘hello, my name is....’ so it felt like an appropriate intro post.

[ chella man, genderqueer trans man, 21, he/him ] did you see who just walked in? it was that JUNIOR, the ╳ + HARDWORKING AND  - DISORGANIZED ╳  one? you know, the one who lives at SONTHENA HALL, HARLEY HUA! i heard they are majoring in ART and they can’t wait to get out of here to BECOME AN ILLUSTRATOR.  crap! stop staring, here they come!

name. harley hua hometown. detroit, mi major. art (illustration) birthday. may 27th, 2000 gender. trans man, genderqueer orientation. pansexual religion. jewish languages. english, asl, some cantonese and french hobbies. cheerleading, drawing, comic books

[ BIO ] [ tw. gender dysphoria ]

harley was born hard of hearing, although it wasn’t discovered until he was six. his audiologist discouraged his parents from teaching him sign, saying he would stop talking and stunt his language skills, so he grew up using his hearing aid and filling in the gaps with lipreading.

his yearly hearing tests showed he was gradually going deaf. he kept getting stronger hearing aids and being able to catch less and less of what was happening around him. the expectation was that he would get better at reading lips, but that only got him so far (only 30% of the English language is visible on the mouth!)

he had been a social kid, but he slowly withdrew into art. there, he could create anything he wanted. he often drew superheroes, or just ‘regular’ civilians (usually men). for a few years, harley took a sketch book and at least three graphic pencils everywhere he went.

in middle school, harley was eligible for a cochlear implant. his parents urged for him to get implanted, but decided to let him make the decision himself. he found a way to compromise with them; he agreed to get the surgery, but in exchange his parents agreed to pay for him and his brother to take ASL classes.

once activated, the implant was an immediate change. the world sounded different through it than what harley remembered, but he could understand his teachers and classmates better than he had in a very long time. he was able to join in again, and went from the kid scribbling in a notebook alone to being very outgoing. once he was able to use an ASL interpreter in classes, his confidence and grades shot up.

in high school, harley was very popular. it didn’t take long for his friends to give him a makeover, convincing him to throw out his baggy tshirts and most of his jeans, in favor of more feminine pieces. mini skirts, heels and crop tops (at least, when he could sneak them past his parents). he grew out his short hair to better hide his cochlear implants, smiling and nodding when he couldn’t keep up in conversations instead of drawing attention to his deafness. for the first time in his life he fit in, and he didn’t want to remind people that he was different.

(tw: dysphoria) but something was different, and it wasn’t his cochlear implants or the fact he was one of the only asian kids at his predominately white high school. something about the way he looked bothered him. he would often stare at himself in the mirror, and he knew the girl staring back at him in the mirror was pretty, but he couldn’t connect with ‘her’. she felt like a completely different person, almost like a mask he wore despite not understanding why he ‘needed’ to wear it or why he felt so numb to his own body.

the huas weren’t really hurting for money, but sending two teenagers to college only a year apart would be tough for any family. harley didn’t want to put that kind of stress on his parents, so he focused on cheerleading scholarships. he toured suffolk because it has one of the best cheer programs in the country. it was a dream school, but he doubted they’d want him on their team, let alone offer him enough money that he could afford to attend. yet that’s exactly what happened, so harley accepted and moved to boston.

during his freshman year of college, he realized nobody cared what he looked like in college. many of his classmates showed up to lectures in their pajamas. he started experimenting with his clothes, trading out the feminine pieces he’d been wearing for the past four years and wearing the things he wanted to; androgynous and masculine pieces. at first he wasn’t so sure why it made him happy, he just knew it did.

(tw: dysphoria) harley had never paid much attention to the trans community. he certainly never thought of himself as trans or genderqueer. sure, he often felt like an alien stuck in someone else’s body, but he assumed that was normal - something every girl secretly felt. after joining his college’s gsa and meeting trans people for the first time and hearing their stories, it began to click. harley came out towards the end of his freshman year of college, and started transitioning a few months later. his parents didn’t try to stop him, but it’s clear they don’t understand. a small part of harley is bothered by this, but he doesn’t let it get him down. it took a long time for them to accept he was deaf, too, but they eventually came around. they’re just slow to accept changes. between that and their refusal to learn ASL, harley isn’t on the best of terms with them, but he doesn’t stop to let this get to him. 

overall harley is a very happy kid. he’s at his dream college, living his best life and preparing for the future he’s wanted since he was a kid

[ HEADCANONS ]

not wanting to take much money from his parents, harley works as a bartender three days a week at a popular bar near campus

if he’s not at work or in class, he’s either practicing cheer, working out at the student rec center, or at one of two coffee shops (one being the starbucks in his building, the other being an independent mom-and-pop cafe not far from campus)

he’s basically a jock villager from animal crossing. as stated before, he’s really into cheerleading. since getting his top surgery last summer he’s fallen in love with swimming. he also lifts weights and goes running a couple times a week with nadia.

harley is very busy, and his schedule is constantly fluctuating between working late nights and practices at any time of day. he’s pretty much always sleep deprived, and lives on an insane amount of coffee (he doesn’t like energy drinks).

harley’s preferred method of communication is asl. he uses interpreters in class and is involved with the deaf community in boston. but since most people on the squad only know a limited amount of sign, and other people he knows on campus don’t know the language at all, he often relies on the combination of his cochlear implant and lipreading to communicate. if he can’t hear with his cochlear implant (dead battery, too much background noise, etc) he won’t be able to understand enough by reading lips. but on the other hand, if he’s using his implant to communicate, watching the other person’s mouth helps him fill in the blanks.

[ WANTED CONNECTION ]

teammate // they do cheer together, so they spend a lot of time with each other

asl friends // harley prefers asl, so it would be great for him to have people to sign with!

regular customer // your character hangs out at the bar harley works at. conversely, they’re a bariste at one of the cafes harley is at multiple times a day

workout buddies // they lift weights together

rainbow family // in the queer community, they say you make your own family. harley doesn’t have a great relationship with his parents, and his brother is attending school on the west coast, so harley could use some lgbtq+ family in boston

comic book nerds // harley loves comic books. they were a major escape for him growing up and how he got into drawing in the first place. so maybe your character is also really into comic books, or they just share a passion for the mcu movies

[ FINAL NOTES ]

That’s all I got, but I’m open to almost anything with him. Looking forward to getting to explore him more here!

[deliberatelyvague]

Spotlight (Asmodeus x fem!reader)

Started: April 5, 2020 at 7:42pm

Ended: April 5, 2020 at 8:50pm

Word Count: 2,030

Shipping: [Asmodeus x fem!reader]

Trigger Warning: cutting, eating disorder, (notes of) depression

Author’s Note: Uhh so here’s another one. I enjoy writing stories, so please, continue requesting!

Prompt/Request: OK SO IDK WHICH ONE I WANT TO REQUEST SO IM DOING BOTH. Can I request a mc x asmo scenario where mc is a super duper popular idol but it’s later revealed that in order to keep her beauty she develop an eating disorder and started to develop depression resulting in cutting her self?? Sorry for the weird ask!!

—————

You had always heard the saying ‘beauty is pain’. You didn’t realize how much pain it was, however, until you got down to the Devildom. Of course, you weren’t totally off Scott-free, your fans still expected some content, and you were in no place to deny them that.

Now, you loved the majority of your fans. They always backed you up, defended you and the link, but there was just somethings they couldn’t defend you from. Including yourself, unfortunately.

Getting famous started moderately fine, you went viral because of your singing videos, and you guess some modeling businesses enjoyed your looks and attitude enough that they asked if you could do some shoots. From then on, it was a whirlwind of sessions, meet and greets, starving yourself and self harming.

That last part was relatively new, and it was caused by some hate that you had received. Well, hate was to put it in modern terms. A tabloid had started rumors that you had gained weight, which wasn’t wrong (you were still growing and maturing, your body weight is going to fluctuate), but they stretched it beyond what it was and paired it with some terrible pictures taken with your guard down. It all mixed to create a terrible atmosphere, especially when other tabloids started to gossip about your weight as well.

Eventually it seemed that your weight was the only thing important. So, you started to cut down on food. You started to take walks and workout moderately regularly, and the results were almost instantaneous. You dropped a few pounds a week, your figure slimmed down and you had never felt better. But then, the opposite effect happened with the tabloids, talking about how much weight you had lost, but this time they were praising you. You loved that feeling, it’s why you continued singing and modeling anyway.

People called you beautiful and you thrived off the attention, which is probably why when you went to the Devildom you and Asmodeus hit it off so quickly.

You two were best friends within the first week you were there- and since he had a tendency of going partying after school and hanging out with other friends of his on some days, he never noticed how little you truly ate.

None of the other brother’s noticed, or you figured they didn’t.

But then something happened, you stopped losing weight as quickly as you had been. This sends you into spirals of anxiety, making you cut back more and more, exercise more. But it didn’t work. In fact, one week when you had weighed in, you had gained weight.

As you stared at that number flashing at you, the number that was only a pound above where it had been last week, you started sobbing.

Thoughts piled up in your mind about how you weren’t good enough anymore, about how your fans will leave you, about how Asmodeus would leave you. His friendship meant the world to you, and you would be lying if you told yourself that a friendship was all that you wanted from him.

But he was out partying with demons that were better than you, no doubt, ones that were skinnier, more confident, and yards better than you in everything.

In the back of your mind, you remembered the hater’s comments on some of your most popular songs, telling you about doing things to your body. You remember the tabloids gossiping about self-harm scars on popular actresses' bodies, and you thought about why they would do that. It’s said to be a pleasure source, something that makes the person doing it feel better.

You would do anything to feel actually, genuinely happy, for once, so before you even thought about it you had popped a blade out of the razor in the bathroom and pressed it to your hip. You almost never showed off your stomach, so it wouldn’t be that big of a deal.

You flinched away from the wound almost immediately, the pain coming in tiny spikes. But then, eventually, there was a bit of pleasure coming from it, watching little dots of blood pop up and drip down your hip and fall onto the ground. You cut yourself again, then once more.

You swallowed, breaking out of the trance the red lines had put you in before you realized that you needed to finish your homework. You cleaned up your cuts, sliding on a pair of loose-fitting joggers and a shirt you had taken from Asmodeus and padded over to your desk, sitting in the sodden chair, trying not to bother the cuts more than the pants would already. You quickly finished the homework, well as quickly as you could when every few minutes or so you would move slightly and the cuts would be agitated, and for a few quick moments you considered taking off your pants, but you didn’t know when Asmodeus would make his way to your room and come in without knocking like he usually did.

Though eventually you did change into some sleeping shorts, ones that almost fell off of your body, and that were practically bootie shorts.

“Doll, I’m coming in,” you heard Asmodeus’ voice through the door before he opened it. You were laying on your back on your bed, your head hanging off and your DDD in your hand.

“Asmo!” You called gleefully, his face immediately lightening your mood substantially. “How was the party?”

“It wasn’t as good as the one the other week, you remember that one, right doll? The one I forced you to come to.”

“Oh, yeah that one. I love that the first party you made me go to was also a rave. Go big or go home, right?”

“Of course! Now, Doll, what are we doing tonight? We could watch a movie and eat some unhealthy snacks?”

“Uh, we can watch movies, but I don’t really want to eat anything,” you told him, flipping around on your bed and sitting on your legs. He tilted his head and a frown formed between his two perfectly sculpted eyebrows.

“Oh? But Lucifer told me you didn’t eat tonight, you must be hungry?”

“No, I’m not really,” you assured him, but your stomach decided to betray you in that exact moment almost as if it was saying ‘don’t lie to him I am hungry’.

He looked from your stomach to your face with an unamused look on his face.

“[Y/N], he also told me that he’s never seen you eat, that you don’t eat dinner here at all. You know you don’t have to lie to me, right?”

The honesty in his voice and the look in his eyes almost broke you.

“I know,” he looked concerned, but didn’t push you. You knew you would tell him about your disorder when you were ready, hopefully if he had any idea about your disorder, he knew that too.

The two of you decided to do an at-home spa day, and he took you to his room. The two of you did face masks, hair masks, mani-pedis, and other things like that.

You had chosen each other’s nail colors, and you had picked an orange color to match his eyes, and he picked pink, using a holographic color on your ring figures. You liked that enough you did that on his ring figured too so you both would be matching.

While you waited for your nails to dry and picked out toenail polish, he asked you about any crushes.

“Oh, no, Asmo, I don’t really have my eyes on anyone,” you lied as you looked through the shades of blue he had. His eyes immediately lit up.

“Yes! Yes you do, I knew it! Who is it?” He said excitedly, and you shook your head.

“I knew you wouldn’t believe that. I’m not going to tell you because it’ll never happen, trust me.”

“Doll, how could you say that? I’m sure a lot of people would love to date you, to be able to call you theirs!” You shook your head, scoffing at him.

“Not this guy. I’m pretty sure he had his eyes on someone else, anyway.”

“Is it Lucifer? It does seem like he has his eyes on Diavolo, but I don’t know about that one, Doll. You still might have a chance.”

“No! It’s not Lucifer, I don’t have that big of daddy issues.”

“Who is it? Please, tell me,” he begged, and for the first time you actually looked at him. His eyes showed almost.. sadness. He seemed sad to be thinking about you with someone else.

You just shook your head.

“Asmo,” you let out, leaning back and looking at him. “It’ll ruin this.” He frowned.

“[Y/N], what do you mean?”

“Asmo,” here it comes, you just decided to let it out. “I like you. I really, really like you. But I understand if it weirds you out, if I’m not your type, I-”

You were interrupted when Asmo held the back of your head and brought your lips to his. You melted into his, and he put his hands on your hips and pulled you onto his lap. You let out a yelp when he pulled on you a little too hard, your cuts opening.

“Doll, what’s wrong?” He asks, before looking down at where his hands were, one of his hands having a little spot of blood on them and the shorts being stained with a little amount of blood. “[Y/N], what’s this?” You let his lift your shirt and pull down your shorts slightly, and he let out a small gasp, his face dropping as he took in your figure, one significantly smaller than it had been when you first came, and the multiple cuts you had on you.

“I, it’s just stress. The tabloids, the comment sections of almost anything when I post pictures, it’s all just a lot.”

“Doll, you could have come to me. Here, let’s fix you up a little bit,” he soothed, picking you up and making you wrap your legs around him, carrying you to his bathroom and dressing your wounds. You didn’t say anything to him. “When’s the last time you ate or drank anything?”

“I drank some water earlier today,” you tell him, and he smiles slightly and strokes your hair. “Good job on that, Doll. But we need to get some food in your stomach, okay?”

Your heartbeat sped up, and you shook your head, tears coming.

“No, Asmo, I can’t eat. Please, don’t make me.”

“I’m not asking you to eat much, please, I can’t have my girl dying on me. What about a piece of fruit and some more water?”

You looked at the floor for a few seconds.

“Can we watch something while I eat, and cuddle, please? It’ll help me take my mind off of it, I think.” He nods, and you both walk to the kitchen after fixing your clothes.

Grabbing your food and water you make your way to your room and turn on [TV show or movie] as Asmo sat on the floor, pulling you into his lap, his chest pressed against your back. He kissed underneath your ear.

Once you had finished the food, which took a bit, but it’s still down for now, he praised you.

“Good girl, Doll. Now finish the water and he can cuddle more.”

You finish the water and turn to him.

“Thank you, Asmo. For helping me.”

“Of course, Doll. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

————

This was written by me in no way trying to romanticize mental illnesses. I try to write what I feel would help me in the moment. I completely understand that mental illnesses don’t just ‘disappear’ when you’ve figured out that someone loves you or someone helps you once- that’s why I don’t write what happens after in most cases. If you are struggling, please reach out to anyone you trust, or call a hotline.

[youhadme-at-hella]

I'd thought I'd tell a little story during this quarantine, one that people might relate to, especially black women and girls.

I remember the exact moment in my life where I began to feel self-conscious about my body.

I was in 3rd grade, standing in line in the cafeteria, next to my crush, who at the moment was shorter than me. He pointed to my arms, told me they were hairy.

And I didn't really think much of it at time, I probably laughed it off and attempted to change the subject, but here we are, over a decade later, and I still look at my arms and think about how abnormal they are.

I started to develop at an early age - by 4th grade, I needed trainers because my chest "caused a disturbance" for some.

In 5th grade however, that was truly the turning point. Aware of my hairy arms, my developing body, I was standing in line (again with the lines), going into the classroom for the morning, and I was not only taller, I was bigger. All the children surrounding me were visibly smaller. My mind started spinning in that moment. That's all I could think about.

The teacher was at the front of the classroom, and I was looking around, wondering if any of these kids had started shopping in the juniors section already.

I know there were many factors at this point that were weighing on me, but of course at the time I didn't know what that could be. I didn't know that every time I turned on the Disney Channel and aspired to be a Disney Channel star that I was using the actors on this platform as the example I'd set for myself. I didn't know that the fashion magazines in the check-out lines encouraging me to "lose fat fast" was impacting me as I tagged along with my pops to the grocery store. Some might say "societal pressures" but I know better to characterize it as colonial pressures. Not being able to afford the latest trends, not being able to be white with bone straight hair and that photographic thigh gap.

Entering middle school was an entirely different type of hell. My economic situation became more pronounced to me. My dad's girlfriend at the time (not to put him on blast) had offered me some hand-me downs, which I was really excited about because I thought she had style.

One day at her house, she was giving me the clothes to try on, and one article of clothing after the other wasn't fitting. I was absolutely mortified. This was an adult, albeit a "petite" adult, but that didn't matter to me. My understanding was the grown ups were older, therefore they were bigger (not the best logic, I know now). I broke down in her bathroom. I said things about my body that I had never uttered before. I may have thought about saying those things, but I finally made them real.

She tried to console me as best she could, but there was nothing she could do. I was leaving her house empty handed. That was the greatest reminder.

Clearly all of this did nothing for my self-esteem. Horrible things happened in my mind. I started equating my importance and worth to the amount of attention that boys would give me. I became incredibly fixated on my look, in a really unhealthy way, worried about how I appeared to others 24/7. I would cry sometimes in the bathroom if I couldn't get my hair just right. I would avoid eating lunch in the cafeteria because that meant people would stare as I walked up to the line or threw away my trash. I traveled in crowds to blend in, so no one could point me out. My whole personality was based on feeling "pretty" and starving for people to like me. Because the moment that wasn't the case, I absolutely fell apart.

7th grade was a bad year. I hated school and most places where I was required to be in public. I started having panic attacks, anxiety attacks, sometimes in the bathroom at school. I think I lost a lot of friends because I went into a shell. My family experienced more obvious economic hardships, my uncle was taken to prison, interrupting our entire family dynamic. All of these played roles.

I was very good at hiding a lot of this though. I was a cheerleader, I mostly tried to display a sunny disposition to avoid being questioned. And I'm not saying there weren't things I enjoyed about life. My family was (is) incredible, my core friends made me laugh, I loved cheerleading, in fact, I would get so lost in it. I was the happiest when all I was doing was training, hanging with cheer mates, it was the best distraction. But at this point my life took an extremely dark turn.

In 7th grade I started to starve myself. There was no other way to describe what was wrong with me other than depression. I wasn't even familiar with the concept, but that's what it was. I was so distraught, not just by my appearance, but with everything happening in my life. I ate as little as possible, most of the time just to entertain my parents, who had noticed a significant change in my behavior. I didn't see that I was losing weight. I couldn't see the changes happening to my body. My brain still saw this person at a size I despised, so I continued to torture myself. It wasn't until about three months later, standing in the lobby of McDonald's with my mom, that my charade was over. She turned to me to ask what I'd be having, and I told her I wasn't hungry.

She looked at me sternly and spoke so only I could hear. "Why aren't you eating?" I shrugged my shoulders, "I'm just not that hungry." "I see you. You haven't been eating and now you look sick. You need to eat."

I wanted to break down in the lobby, but I didn't want noses prying into our discussion, so I ordered, picked at my food, then hid bits and pieces inside the wrappers in which they were packaged.

I knew it was wrong of me, but my mom telling me that I was in fact losing weight, made me feel good about myself for the first time in a while.

I got through my first battle with depression and tried to become more positive. When 8th grade came, I vowed that things would be different for me. I started to invest more in fashion, immersing myself with coordinating quirky fun looks on a budget. I didn't realize then that this had all become a coping mechanism.

In my new outfits that I'd put together, I began to feel more confident, like myself, happy with me. It was a much better year by far and these feelings lasted up until about 10th grade.

I had just switched to a majority white school. So my out of the box fashion choices with respect to my developing curves was quickly shot down by the laid back, by the beach Hollister shorts, flip flops and tee.

I was surrounded by girls my age that we tinier than me, once again. I remember these really cute pair of shorts I had designed myself. They were once high rise jeans that I cut up to hot pants, giving it a bit of fringe and sewing some fabric behind the parts that I'd deliberately distressed. I loved these shorts partly because I had designed them myself.

One day I wore them to school and these white girls who sat behind me snickered and whispered, "she is way too big to wear those shorts."

I threw them away when I got home, staring in the garbage bin, fighting everything in me to not retrieve them.

And I started to look at my body intensely again. Fashion was no longer a safe haven because it was now being used as a weapon against me. I had nothing to hide behind. My insecurities would be forced to take center stage in my brain again.

I hated the way I looked, every year I would look at photos from the previous year and say, "man I wish I could go back to that size" not realizing at that time that I hated who I was then too.

This is a long story but I promise I'm getting to the point.

This is hard for me to say, but at this point in my life, I'm the biggest I've ever been. I've done fad diets, tried all kinds of workout regimens, weight fluctuating over the years, to no avail. I eventually grew demoralized, feeling like no matter how hard I try, I lack the patience and discipline to reach my fitness goals.

But it's taken all of this time for me to realize this struggle hasn't been about my health and fitness goals. Up to now I've only had aspirations to "look good to attract positive attention", and I've carried on up to now not being able to look at myself and love what I see at any point of my young life.

I can't recall a time I looked at myself and said, "I'm beautiful, I'm worth it, I love the person that I am, I am happy with what I've accomplished, I am a good person." All this time I've repeatedly called myself all of those things I did that day in the bathroom of by dad's ex-girlfriend. And many more insults that I've learned over the years.

No matter the positive or negative changes my body has gone through, I haven't been able to see them. So to that extent, my goals are impossible to reach. I've never been satisfied with myself, ever.

So what now?

This struggle isn't rooted merely in some superficial beauty standards. How did these standards even get here? And why have I tried all my life to reach them? That question is far more easier to answer.

I just long for the day that I look at myself and say, "I accept you for who you are" just as I have done for others. I long for the day that I can consider my reflection beautiful, just because I think so, and not because of anyone else. I don't know when that day will come. There are moments when things are good, I feel like I'm almost there, only to be crushed by my unresolved reality of dangerously low self-esteem.

This isn't something I wrote for an outpouring of sympathy, a bunch of "you're beautiful just the way you are"'s. It won't make a difference. It's not the antidote. I wrote this because I know there are black women and girls like me, still trying to answer this question, heartbroken by their own reflection.

I will say this, though. I was inspired to write this because today I completed day eleven of a fourteen day workout challenge. For some that's no big deal, for others it won't count until all fourteen days are completed. But for me, it's a huge accomplishment. I have never in my life worked out consecutively for this amount of time. I know it's not long, but for someone who is not physically active or athletic, this is a huge step. I'm doing this thing at my own pace, even though I'm still not quite sure I'm doing it for the right reasons.

I know I'm not, but I'm partly hoping that at some point it will click for me, and I'll work out beyond the fourteen days, because I should have more to live for than just the opinions of others.

Stay tuned.

[marissasmoments91]

And so it begins…

The year 2010 my age 18.  I had gotten my first job working at a movie theatre, life was great; I was earning my own money and got discounted popcorn and candy whenever I wanted. What more could I want?!

I was always a petite child but carried all of my weight in my belly. I danced consistently all of my childhood so my weight stayed fairly static.

 Once I began working and the dance classes lessened my weight slowly crept up and I began to put on what is not so affectionately known as the “freshman 15” (even though I had taken a year off before I started university and wasn’t technically a freshman). My clothes still fit so what was the problem? Nothing in my eyes.

A little under 2 years later I needed a second job; so I got a job working for a chain restaurant.

Here I was again getting discounted food. My life was excellent. I moved my way up the ranks and eventually became a floor manager. Now my meals weren’t just discounted they were free.

You mean I could have free restaurant quality food whenever I wanted? And for free?! You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to know that chicken parmigiana, curly fries and Caesar salad every day is not a good diet. I only needed to utter the words “I feel like cake” and within 5 minutes I’d have a delicious chocolate cake brought to me by our well intentioned chefs. I got a little bit heavier.

Now you’re probably thinking well how big was she? Now let me just say I’ve never been huge and at this time I ranged between 55 – 60kg. To some that sounds like an ideal weight but a 5 kg fluctuation throughout the year was definitely noticeable in my clothes and on my 5 foot frame the change was always obvious.

In 2015 I got invisalign braces and anyone who has had braces knows how difficult it is to eat. Taking my braces in and out the first few months was painful so I would only take my braces out to eat twice a day. I ate my breakfast and my customary chicken parmigiana during my break at 2pm and then I wouldn’t eat again until the next day. It was with this method that I noticed a weight drop and so did other people. I felt good about myself but as the braces became less painful the more I took them out and started eating normally again and surprise! Surprise! The weight came back.

As an avid gym hater whenever it came up I’d brag that I flat out hated the gym. But it was around this time I thought that I should join one. I joined the local community gym. I’d go do 20 minutes on the treadmill a couple of bicep curls, some crunches and call it a day. This did not last long.

Early 2016 I started working at a hotel, I tried the best I could but let me tell you, having to resist eating the left over breakfast pastries every damn day was difficult and I didn’t often succeed (my personal fav the almond croissants) but then a family friend introduced me to myfitnesspal – a calorie tracking app to help people lose weight. This was perfect I could eat what I wanted and lose weight provided I kept within my assigned calories. It was hard at first but I slowly got the hang of it and dropped some kgs - the lowest I got to whilst using the app was 53.6kg. I was thrilled. I maintained the 53.5 – 55kg weight for the rest of the year.

2017 – I change jobs again moving to another hotel, over the Christmas break I had slowly stopped using myfitnesspal (I figured I didn’t need it) before I knew it I was back up to 59kg. 2 months into the new job and I was promoted to an office role. I was very paranoid about putting on weight as I was no longer moving around all day in the restaurant.

By April I had had enough of the constant fluctuation and began lite n easy. My cousin had started using it and had lost some weight so I thought why not. Coming from an Italian background the food was an adjustment but altogether not terrible. Did I stick to it 100%. NO. I figured since it was a calorie controlled diet if I wanted a piece of cake after dinner with my cup of tea (a weakness of mine) then I could.  It would only put me a little over my allocated calories so there was no harm. Right? The weight didn’t go anywhere. Becoming obsessed, I weighed myself every day in order to help control my eating throughout the day. If I was less than the day before I relaxed, if I wasn’t I was super strict.

 At June 2017 I was 60kg, I vowed to get my act together and take it seriously, after all what was the point of wasting my money on a product that I wasn’t using properly?

 I used events coming up in my life to set goals I wanted to reach. For a family christening in September I wanted to be 55kg and the morning of I weighed in at 55.1kg (I was a bit disappointed but it was pretty much close enough) by October for my cousins 18th I wanted to be 54kg I weighed in on the morning of at 54.1kg. The small goals I set myself seemed to work. I kept on this same trajectory and by 25th November after being super strict for 6 weeks straight I was at my lowest weight I could remember - 53.3kg.I was thin but still 3.3kg from my goal weight. People noticed and complimented me on my weight loss. I was 7kg down in 7 months. I was proud of myself. But was I completely happy, no not really. I hated being invited out anywhere – it stirred a panic in me. Where were we going? What was on the menu? What could I eat? How much would I weigh tomorrow? I managed to get through the silly season with minimal damage to my waistline.

 February 2018 I slowed down on the lite n easy I figured I had learnt enough about portion size and calorie controlling that I could do my own breakfasts and just get lite and easy lunch, dinner and snacks.  Towards the middle of the year I was fed up as I had hit a plateau and I started to give up.

 And then July 2018 I was invited to a black tie industry awards night.

 I bought my dress and whilst it fit, losing a couple of kilos wouldn’t go astray. “I know I’ll drop my calories as low as I can” I thought – after all losing weight is calories in vs calories out so the lower my calories means I would lose more weight right?!

 I dropped my calories to 700- 800 calories a day. For three weeks straight I did this and let me tell you it was not healthy or fun. I was tired, angry and moody. I snapped at anyone and refused to even look at any other food no matter how many times my mum tried to get me to eat more, but I was 26 so there wasn’t much she could do (I actually think that any time she prepped food for me she added more in than what I asked just so I would be eating more)

 I lost over 3kgs in 3 weeks. The day after the event I weighed myself and I had put on over 2kgs. I wasn’t happy.

If you have stuck with me this far into my story you can probably guess how the rest of the year went. I dropped down again to the 53’s and then back up to the 58’s each day weighing myself and being pissed off if my weight had gone up by even 100g.

Heading in to November I had a holiday booked to Hawaii. As it drew closer I kept telling myself I’d drop my calories again but just the mere thought of having to always be hungry and cranky was enough to convince me not to do it. I wanted to at least be 53kg when I left since I knew I’d put on weight over there. I figured if I’m really thin when I get there and put on 5kg I would only be 58kg when I came back and I could lose the weight again. After all I had before.

So about 3 weeks out I thought I better start prepping and again I dropped my calories to 700 – 800 by skipping lunch and went for a 30 min walk outside of the office instead. I dropped weight but only reached low 55’s. That would have to do and I vowed to myself I’d join a gym when I got back and lose the weight properly once and for all.

I went to Hawaii and I ate what I wanted – why the hell not I was on vacation!

 I came back early December, I was scared to get on the scale. I weighed 64kg. I had put on just under 9kg in 10 days. How was it possible? I was mortified, upset and angry. I got straight back to dieting and did join a gym. I managed to lose a couple of kilos but a family tragedy resulted in some comfort eating and my weight ballooned back up to 64kgs.

 This brings me to 24th December 2018 where the story really begins… 

[healthyfitprincess]

I’m 5’9 and i weight about 219 (it fluctuates bc of the binging I do) I’ve thought about starving myself but I never seem to be able to go through it and I think one of the main problems I have is the fact that I’m scared that once I lose the weight I’ll have all this loose skin hanging everywhere. I’m only 17, so it’s not like I’m gonna get skin surgery to get rid of t anytime soon. I don’t know what to do. I’m stuck.

So let me start out by saying that reading this was like a direct flashback to when I was 13-17. I went through the exact same thing that you’re going through now. I tried so hard to starve myself because I wanted nothing more than to be skinny. I would go days without eating then finally give in and eat everything in sight until I’d get sick. It was a vicious cycle that was difficult to get out of.

I’ve spent the last 10 years trying to repair the damage that I did to myself, both physically and mentally. It took me years of unhappiness and pain to finally realize that I was doing everything entirely wrong.

I know I probably wouldn’t have listened to someone’s advice at that time in my life, but here’s what I can tell you. Your health is the MOST important thing. And I’m talking your mental health just as much as your physical health. Physical health isn’t about being skinny. It’s about giving your body everything that it needs to thrive and function properly. Starving yourself slows down your metabolism and makes it that much harder to lose the weight in the long run. The best possible thing that you can do is eat a balanced, healthy diet that fits into your specific needs (using a food/fitness tracking app worked best for me. I currently use LifeSum). 

As far as the loose skin goes, I’d rather have loose skin than live a miserable life. However, slow/steady weight loss is the way to avoid having it. I’ve lost 60 lbs so far and have no loose skin. Drastic weight loss in a short time span is usually what leads to loose skin.

I know this response is probably longer than you were expecting. And also sorry for the late response, life has been hectic for me lately. But do know that you matter and deserve every good thing life has to offer. And if you ever need someone to talk to, I’m here. 

[raendown]

Pairing: MadaraTobirama + HashiramaIzuna Word count: 1720 Soulmate au: The one where everyone can shape shift to a unique animal form at will but if your soulmate demands you change form you are forced to

Follow the link or read it under the cut!

Chapter 180: Madara/Tobirama + Hashirama/Izuna

Izuna slipped one leg off the tree branch he was perched upon and let it dangle beneath him to counterbalance the weight he was leaning forward, abdominals twisting side to side as he tried to find a better angle to stare through the leaves.

“Are they even still fighting?” he asked. “They’re not making very much noise and that sort of worries me.” From the branch just above him Hashirama sighed that special long-suffering sigh that could only come from years of siblinghood.

“Tobi’s changed forms. Madara’s trying to stare him down but you know how stubborn he is.”

“You mean how stubborn they both are,” Izuna corrected him.

With one more twist he finally found a break in the leaves the peer through, spying on the two idiots across the field. Their brothers had been arguing for the better part of the afternoon and it was hard to keep up with exactly what they were butting heads over since the topic seemed to fluctuate by the minute. Izuna was at least somewhat sure they had started today’s bickering fit when Madara tried to find fault with Tobirama’s kata stance – which was, of course, as flawless as it had ever been. From there they had gone through faulty paperwork, clan deficiencies, general hygiene, and mental capabilities.

They were in top form, actually. Hashirama had remarked over an hour ago that he wished they could put half as much effort in to their lacking personal lives as they did in to these pointless bicker fests and Izuna was still snickering about it. It was a fairly common opinion that they fought so much because they enjoyed it.

“So.” With a sly grin that many would assume him incapable of, Hashirama leaned forward and placed a hand on Izuna’s shoulder. “Shall we take bets on who gives in first this time?”

“Aren’t you supposed to be laying off the gambling habit? Didn’t Mito say something to you last week about that?”

Hashirama drooped. “I regret letting her marry my cousin. They have been terrible influences on each other and all they do lately is gang up on me!” Grumbling inaudibly, he slid off his branch and came down to squat right in Izuna’s line of view, peering out through the same spot he had been while at the same time giving Izuna a delicious view of his backside.

“Now I can’t see,” Izuna grumbled for the sake of keeping up appearances. The words were half-hearted at best.

“You’re not missing much. Madara’s shaking one of his fingers at Tobi but – oh, no, now he’s waving them both around because Tobi yawned in his face. That has so much more attitude when he’s a cat; I think it’s the big tongue. Do you think all snow leopards have such big tongues?”

“How should I know?”

Nonplussed, Hashirama turned back to shrug at him. “Should we go separate them then?”

“I suppose so. Otherwise they’ll be out here all night and Madara promised he’d take a turn cooking dinner for once.”

The two of them swung down from the tree in synch and Izuna tried not to be obvious about how distracting it was watching the ease of grace with which Hashirama moved. For such a clumsy man he sure was beautiful in motion, especially on the battlefield. There wasn’t much need to search for a distraction, though, since the moment they started across the field was the moment Madara finally lost his temper and sank down to the level of childish demands.

“Change back!” he shouted, clearly not expecting any sort of actual response. All four of them were startled beyond belief when Tobirama’s form contracted and suddenly he was human again, half crouched in the spot he’d just been lounging and staring up at Madara with a gaping jaw. Madara stared back. “You…changed back?”

“I didn’t mean to,” Tobirama breathed. Knowing what those words implied, Madara swayed on the spot.

“But you…and I’m…so we–?”

“Yeah. Something like that.”

Madara nodded slowly, eyes so wide they were ready to fall out of his head despite the medical chakra that had secured them in place a year ago. If he lost those eyes after Izuna went to all the trouble of convincing him to swap then he was in for a temper tantrum the likes of which Konohagakure had not yet seen.

Eventually Madara seemed to gather himself enough to remember their surroundings – and the two spectators watching from the tree line. By the scowl on his face he clearly did not appreciate having such a precious moment witnessed by others. Tobirama still looked pretty dazed when Madara grabbed him by the arm and began to pull him away to somewhere a little more private, allowing himself to be led around and tripping over his own feet while he tried to force his brain to process what was happening. When they reached the far side of the field they stopped, murmuring to each other, regrettably too quiet to be overheard.

Somewhere in that conversation they must have forgotten the entire point of moving away. Or perhaps one of them decided that he was too impatient to wait for a more private venue to present itself. Whatever the case, Madara was grinning like a fool when he went in for a kiss without warning, turning and bolting away with a smug expression as he changed forms to leap up in to the trees.

“You can’t just do that without warning me!” Tobirama shouted at his back before slipping in to his own secondary form, snow leopard chasing after lion with his teeth bared playfully. Distant yowls and the sounds of snapping branched drifted from that direction for several minutes after they left until finally the forest fell suspiciously quiet. Tobirama, apparently, had made a successful catch.

Izuna blinked in the spot where they had both disappeared, murmuring under his breath, “Well I wasn’t expecting that.”

Before Hashirama could spew any nonsense about always knowing their brothers were meant to be – he could see it in the man’s eyes but surely not even someone like him could have predicted that two people who were at each other’s throats so much were destined for each other – Izuna cleared his throat and cast about for something to distract them both. As nosy as he usually was with his brother’s disastrous love life, he very much did not want to know how that conversation with Tobirama was going to end. Some things he just didn’t want to hear about.

“Wild, huh? You know I’m kind of surprised that neither of them tried that before.” As he spoke Izuna gently turned Hashirama around and set the man on a path back through the strip of forest that provided a natural barrier between trainings ground and village.

“You know, now that you mention it, me too.” Hashirama hummed and watched the sky as he walked, only half aware as he was steered away from waltzing straight in to a thick maple. “They both really like to yell. And Tobi does like to get out of arguments by just changing his form and going to sleep. It’s very surprising that it took this long for Madara to use those words.”

“He’s an idiot, what can I say?” Izuna snickered to himself and then dodged the fondly exasperated swipe of Hashirama’s hand.

In silence they wandered, following the path already worn through the loam by hundreds of shinobi taking the same route through the forest to get in their daily exercise. After a few minutes Izuna let his thoughts drift and he had already distracted himself watching a nest of newborn robins cheep cheeping for their dinner when Hashirama began to chuckle to himself.

“Did you see Tobi’s face?” he giggled.

“That dumb look of shock.” Izuna tried to imitate it without cracking a smile. “Gasp! How can it be you!?” Making Hashirama laugh felt a little like triumph.

“Yes! And then Madara’s face! He should be more careful of his words.” Hashirama looked over and pulled his face down in to his best approximation of Madara’s grumpy scowl, pitching his voice higher to try and match the other man’s irritated shriek. “Change!”

Izuna didn’t have time to laugh. Before he could do more than blink something in his gut pulled until he thought his very soul might come flying out of his mouth. When the feeling passed he shook his head violently and looked up at Hashirama, suddenly so much taller. Embarrassingly, it took a few moments for it to sink in what had just happened but when it did he was hopping around in small circles, unable to contain the massive wave of emotions in just this small body of a fan-tailed raven.

“Um…Izuna? You...did you mean to change?”

Falling still, Izuna shook his hard little beak from side to side. After a moment he realized that he was very free to change back to his other form despite Hashirama’s demand having forced him in to this one so he did that, flowing back in to human shape with barely a thought. Then he stood with both arms hanging loosely at his sides without a clue what to say. Luckily Hashirama had never been the sort of person who ran out of words.

“Are we soulmates too?” he asked in a breathy voice.

“I guess we are…” It was hard to believe despite the evidence of the change he had gone through involuntarily.

“Oh. Wow. Izuna, this is…this is amazing!”

Without any further warning Hashirama threw himself forward, catching Izuna around the middle to lift him up in the air for a tight bear hug and jabbering about how happy he was with the unexpected match. Getting swung back and forth through the air like a rag doll made him feel a little like a child but Izuna couldn’t bring himself to be all that upset about it. Not only had his secret crush turned out to be his soulmate. Not only did Hashirama actually seem excited that it was him.

But it looked as though Madara would be a bit too distracted over the next few days to interfere with the first few steps they took to figuring out their relationships. Life really was being kind to him lately.

[megatontiddies]

Alwine OC stuff 2

In order to flush out some ocs I'm gonna borrow this info sheet made by @willowiswriting!

The first one I post is gonna be Alwine but then later today, hopefully, I'm gonna introduce my second OC who will be a vital character in The Waters of March.

So anyways this is pretty long so under the cut it goes!

THE BASICS:

Name: Alwine Elenora Fries

Nick Names: Winnie (most common), Al, Allie

Age: 24 (234)

Gender identity: Female

Sexuality: Bisexual

Role in story: Sole Survivor

Hair color/texture: Dirty Brown, Long to Medium Shag Cut with Gentle Curls

Skin color/texture: #ccaf85, softer texture the woman was good on moisturizer and sunscreen prewar

Eye color: Green Hazel

Scars: Deeper scar that trails from left side of chin to upper right side of lip, long claw tracks from deathclaw encounter trailing from lower right torso to center/left of chest

Other notable features: Old Lines style tattoo in center of her back, Mole on right cheek

“Default” outfit: Pair of military green cargo pants and white tank top usually paired with combat boots and her old military holotags from prewar. In colder months she wears a leather bomber jacket.

EXTERNAL/OUTWARD PRESENCE:

How do they move and carry themselves? Pace, rhythm, gestures, energy?

Fairly proud. Alwines time in the military, despite being primarily a mechanic and not seeing much front line action, has trained her to walk with purpose and pride. Shoulder pinned back, high chin, legs shoulder length apart and ready to move at a moments notice. Although, she often moves her hands while she speaks and being quite quick on her feet make her appear energized and animated.

How much physical space do they use, active and at rest?

Alwine is fairly small in height, a modest 5"3, when she's resting she requires little to no space. She sleeps comfortably almost anywhere. In combat she similarly doesn't require too much room to maneuver although it's probably safest to give her space. She may be short but she's built like a rugby player. Double recommended for when she's in power armor.

How do they position themselves in a group? Do they like to be the center of attention, or do they hang back at the edges of a crowd?

Wallflower all the way. But she isn't afraid to take charge when necessary.

How does their size or build influence how they use their body, if it does?

As stated above Alwine will not hesitate to tackle you like its a game of rugby. She may be short but she is fast and built like a brick. Her small height, on the other hand, makes it easy for her to flank her enemies. It also helps for the element of surprise. More than once has she simply plowed into an overconfident raider. She has learnt to throw her weight around.

What are they like in motion -– in different environments, and in different activities? What causes the differences between these?

For most combat situations think bull in a china shop. In stealth missions, however, she is surprisingly nimble. She has a preference for long range combat but if pressed is equally confident in close combat. That 'in-between' area for long and short distance can be a weakness for her. Because of this once long-range is no longer suitable she will work quickly to close distance between herself and her foe(s). If she's in a domestic or civilian setting she is surprisingly quiet and quick. Likely due to her height she can easily slip out of a crowd if necessary. Unfortunately, Alwine is quite bumbly and clumsy. On several occasion she has bumped into someone, or something, she shouldn't have or tripped in combat.

How do they physically engage with other people, inanimate objects, and their environment? What causes the differences between these?

For human contact Alwine keeps her distance for the most part. She avoids touching/ physical contact unless she is completely comfortable with said person.

For inanimate/ environmental contact she will constantly explore through touch although not as much for wildlife.

Alwine is naturally touch sensitive and finds it easier to explore the natural world around her by touching. That being said because of this sensitivity she becomes uncomfortable making contact with other people as she finds it can be too intimate. Mostly she worries about making others uncomfortable through her own touch.

Where and when do they seem most and least at ease? Why? How can you tell?

Alwine is most at ease when she feels completely alone or in some cases alone with close friends.

She's least at ease when she senses that either herself of those she cares about are in danger. Alwine is also very uncomfortable in large groups of people as she finds it overwhelming. She is also very uncomfortable in water as she cannot swim.

It's fairly easy to tell when Alwine get's uncomfortable. She basically becomes almost completely mute save for a few choice words/ sounds. She will also position herself either beside/ behind whoever she is traveling with standing much more closely than she normally would if she were completely comfortable.

How are they vocally expressive? What kind of voice, accent, tones, inflections, volume, phrases and slang, and manner of speaking do they use?

Tonally, Alwines voice is a bit lower but still distinctly feminine think Jennifer Hale but with a very slight southern drawl. Her voice doesn't fluctuate much in pitch and can come off an monotone or flat which can be difficult to hear if one is not trained to it. To her benefit it comes in handy when dealing in precarious social situations. When necessary she can, and will, raise her voice but very rarely.

How are they bodily expressive? How do they use nonverbal cues such as their posture, stance, eyes, eyebrows, mouths, and hands?

Her posture is fairly stiff, again, military-esque. Alwines big on eye contact no matter the scenario. She's a big believer that the eyes are the windows to a persons, or creatures, soul. Her eyebrows are only really indicative of whether she is thinking or stressed in the form of a furrow. Her mouth is probably the most expressive of her facial features from smirks to snarls. Like stated above, she's very animated. If her hands stop moving while she's talking that's a very good indicator she's about to start swinging them.

INTERNAL:

What is their greatest fear?

Death. Not her own though. The deaths of those she loves and cares about terrify the daylights out of her. Close second is water.

What are some misbeliefs about the world?

That good is inherent in all people.

What is the best thing about their life?

Danse.

What is the worst thing about their life?

Her own child but she don't know that yet. Beyond this, probably the world blowing up in nuclear fire and her husband getting capped. Also giant bugs.

What do they most often look down on people for?

Lack of Honor. Alwine can even respect raiders who are capable of keeping their word but anyone who uses deceit to get what they want is abhorrent.

What makes their heart feel alive?

Action of all kinds. To be in movement or roughhousing is the peak of excitement for Alwine. Also, storms by the ocean. Alwine has a soft spot for Far-Harbor because of this. She is also in love with sunrises on the deck of the Prydwen.

What makes them feel loved, and who was the last person to make them feel that way?

Small actions that let her know she is thought about. Anything between trinkets that remind the person of Alwine to small personal actions based on what she's said in the past. (ie. sneaking extra snacks that she said she likes, books that she misses, mods that she's been looking for etc.). The last person to make her feel this way was Danse.

How do they manage their energy, exhaustion, tension, or other strong emotions?

If she's more energetic then she'll try to work it off either through workouts or hard labor that she can do around settlements or the Prydwen. Exhaustion is cured by coffee or Nuka Cola if they're available. If not available then the nearest hole to crawl in to sleep is the best cure. Alwine ignores tension hoping that more work will wear it off.

What energizes and drains them most?

Alwine finds stressful situations to be most draining (such as hostage situations or anything that could result in bystander/civilian death) as well as long periods of social interaction. Once the element of extreme danger has been removed, however, Alwine finds anything with the smallest hint of danger to be invigorating.

What kind of inner life do they have — rich and imaginative? Calculating and practical? Full of doubts and fears? Does it find any sort of outlet in their lives?

Definitely rich and imaginative. Alwine is naturally curious harboring a childlike wonder about this new world. She's practical but prefers optimism. Calculating but if she doesn't like the odds she'll pretend everything's fine. This can come off as overconfident but deep down she's screeching. Her inner turmoil are difficult to read and she's good at hiding them. Most have to pry it out of her.

Do they dream? What are those dreams like?

Alwine has always had lucid dreams. Fortunately for her they are still mostly 'dreamlike' and cryptically strange. On occasion they do take the form of realistic night terrors waking her up in a fit of action. Good or bad she remembers every dream. Prewar she used to keep a dream journal.

Are they more shaped by nature or nurture — who they are, or what has happened to them? How have these shaped who they’ve become as a person?

Nature and Nurture both affect how we develop psychologically especially during our early developmental stages. Generally, once a person develops a set concept of how the world works it can be very difficult to break that short of horrific trauma. That being said, when the bombs blew up and (almost) everyone died Alwine has surprisingly kept her moral and ethical standards. If anything she's become a bit more socially unhinged. So nurture? I think? This one was a bit too confusing for my overthinking little pea-brain.

(Potentially ignoring the plot if it wouldn’t normally play into their life,) what kind of person could they become in the future? What are some developmental paths that they could take, (best, worst, most likely?) what would cause them to come to pass, and what consequences might they have? What paths would you especially like to see, and why?

that would be spoiling ;)

Does their perception of who they are align with how other people see them? Why or why not?

Alwine see's herself as mostly just an average joe. A little awkward but trying her best. She thinks she's unassuming. When first meeting her, in a relatively safe space that the commonwealth can provide, you might think the same. But, if ever seen in combat or a life and death situation this perception is starkly contrasted. She appears almost graceful. At least up until she falls flat on her face or straight into you (or an enemy). Surprisingly light hearted/ always smiling she radiates a calm and happy energy yet is also dead serious when appropriate. She hates leading and doesn't see herself as a leader yet seems to always take charge and show exemplary coordination and tactic in the heat of combat.

Top three things they value most in life?

shaun, danse, friends, laser rifle

FUN:

What’s their favorite book, movie, and band? (Modernize them if it’s a fantasy setting)

A real fun gal at parties, Alwines favourite book was an outdated encyclopedia about dinosaurs.

Her favourite movie is The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. She loves old westerns.

Similarly she enjoys old western music. Johnny Western, Lorne Green, Marty Robbins, and Patsy Cline are just some of her many favourite singers.

Favorite color?

Juniper Green

Least favorite color?

Anything neon

Favorite food/cuisine?

Soups. Any soups and all soups from anywhere. Preference for spicy brothy soups but will not complain if its anything but.

What associations do they bring to mind? Words or phrases, images, metaphors or motifs? Why?

Rainy days. Rain on pavement and deep wood moss and dirt. Second hand cigarette smoke on a warm summer night. A warm house on a cold evening with the smell of hot supper wafting from the kitchen over a woodstove fire. Knowing eyes. Cedar bark and pine. Slivers on the hands. Drunk laughs. A dog at the foot of a bed. A firm grip. A cold rock in the hand. A hot breath on your neck. The tenderness of a bruise. Lilacs in the rain. Stiff shoulders and muscles. Bare feet in dewy grass. A heavy blanket. A warm smile.

Is there an object they can’t bear to part with and why?

Her Laser Rifle. It's quiet, strong, and deadly against almost everything in the commonwealth. She also carries an assortment of small gifts and trinkets on her person from various friends.

Describe three typical outfits for them, top to bottom.

1. Casual Gear: Black or White tank top, Green military grade cargo pants, Leather combat boots, and military heavy plate armor on top.

2. BOS Gear: BOS Jumpsuit (usually the top is zipped down and tied at the waist when in a 'safe' area or on the Prydwen), White or Black tank top, Leather combat boots, BOS grade heavy plate armor on top, BOS dogtags.

3. Casual wear (only when in 'safe' areas such as sanctuary or diamond city): Plaid overshirt, white tank top, heavy blue jeans, belt, leather combat boots.

What names or nicknames have they been called throughout their life?

Al or Winnie. In practice, Winnie is more commonly used than her own name.

Describe their daily routine.

Wake up early (around 4-6 am), eat breakfast, check over armor and weapons, do daily tasks/missions, eat dinner, modify/repair armor and weapons, go to bed (around 9pm-12am)

Their go-to cure for a bad day?

A quiet night in. Either relaxing in the arms of another or sleeping off her misery. If it's particularly aggravating she'll need some kind of physical activity to work out her anger.

[whoopsadiary]

I’m skinny right now. I’m skinny because I came to visit my family after I quit my job and two days later my oldest brother got sick and tested positive for COVID-19. He has a pregnant wife and a three-year-old and lives around the corner from my parents. His symptoms were mild and he’s already feeling better. I’m skinny because I’m quarantining with my mom, my dad, and my little brother, since we were all exposed two days before he tested positive.

One night before my brother tested positive, I wore tighter clothes to dinner, and my dad said I looked too skinny and hugged me. I told him I always look like this- which isn’t exactly true, I regularly fluctuate around 5-10 pounds depending on what’s happening in my life. The next day he reflected and said that maybe the idea of me he has in his head is just bigger, and that’s what he was comparing me against.

I’m taller than both my diminutive parents, which my mom always praised, as though she was contributing to the advancement of society through her children’s stature. In high school I played three sports a year, until senior year when they cut educational funding for Philadelphia public schools and we lost our swim team. I wasn’t bothered, I found swimming to be an especially uninspiring sport, since you can’t hang out with teammates while your head in underwater. But my mom seemed distressed and told me I had to find some way to exercise, though I didn’t see why. My last semester of senior year I was no longer a gangly pre-teen, I was by reasonable standards still skinny, but athletic, which the big butt and thighs I had inherited from my mom.

My mom paid some small attention to what I was packing myself for lunch, and my dad advised me, writ large, that men preferred slim women. And then I went to college. I went to a college that was 15 min from my house and that about 30% of my high school attended. But it was an Ivy League, and my parents thought I should go if I got in. For the first time in my life, I was not presented with a specific diet or sport to play, my acne got a lot worse, and I started on my road to the freshman 15.

By junior year I was about 160lbs and the summer before senior year I shaved my head. My mom told me she thought it was chic and then took me on a long walk to confront me about being fat and gay, which I told her I wasn’t (though I was wondering if I was). On a trip to San Francisco my mom had me try on a dress and then told me that if I lost weight I could maybe pull it off. They begged me to lose weight. As if it was a family tragedy, both my parents talked to me about it separately. I was inconsolable. I was doing my best to keep together a semblance of self confidence in a body that was changing in ways normal to someone leaving adolescence.

But for better or for worse they go through to me. Senior year I started trying to cut out carbs. I recognized that I was not made for academia, schoolwork put me in a cycle of procrastination, making me stay in my room for hours not doing my work, but not letting myself leave until I did my work. My best friend was losing weight at the same time, but for different reasons, and I always operated best in a competitive environment. I’m hyper-aware of my surroundings, while she’s the opposite, and by the time she noticed how much smaller I had become the damage was done. She cried when she asked me about it, intuiting rightly that her weight loss (which became uncontrollable in the following year) had triggered mine.

At that point I had been living away from my parents for four years. After graduating, I moved to DC for a short while, and that best friend got me dance classes, which I absolutely loved, and felt like I was moving towards a relationship towards my body that was working and at least garnered less negative attention from my parents. Though to this day they constantly ask me how often I exercise. I moved to NYC in the fall and started interning, baby-sitting, a part-time job. I didn’t have much time or money for classes or a gym, though I was always vigilant of weight gain. At that point I was essentially in the same spot I am now, hovering around 145lbs, sometimes closer to 150, sometimes closer to 140.

I don’t know how much I weight now- I don’t weigh myself that often, but usually gauge by look and how my pants fit. But I feel small, I haven’t been able to take Muay Thai classes since the pandemic, and I know I’ve lost my muscle. And so, without fat I have nothing, and I’m living with my mother again. We alternatively argue and laugh every day. She tells me not to order ice cream from Instacart, and I tell her it’s non-negotiable. She’s convinced my dad he’s overweight (he’s not and I told him so) but I’m worried she thinks the fear of being overweight keeps him skinny. I ordered sushi rice, which is not something we grew up with, but is something I live off of, and she asked me to google if rice or pasta has more carbs. I told her she can do her own dirty work.

I know it just comes from her own body-image issues. She will say she’s fat even though she’s as skinny as any 60yr old with 5 kids can be. But I’m stressed living like this. She works in the kitchen with her mask on, a dragon guarding the horde, and I my normal “eat every 2-3 hours” schedule is thrown into disarray. I’m stuck in my room, hungry, and mad at myself 3 months ago who was stressed about having gained weight. My mom is a runner, she runs miles every morning, and I knew it would pain her not being able to. The first few days she kept insisting we go on a brisk walk, even though I’m been trying to help her understand that we could be a danger to the people around us, even with double-masks.

My dad got sick around 4 days after my brother’s case was confirmed. He’s in his own part of the house, coughing, sleeping, and reading his Andy Kaufman book. We deliver his meals and scurry away. I hope I can leave soon. I love spending time with my family, but not like this. We’re all wearing masks in the house and hope we don’t get sick next. When I get home to my boyfriend and my apartment, I’ll probably self-correct, gaining the weight back in the next few cold pandemic winter months when there isn’t much to do except cook, eat, and sit around. And in January or February I might be jealous of what I have right now, the way my bones stick out and clothes hang off of me.

[baileymacias]

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