#it must be stated I am bad at math this may be wrong

[dollarstoreartsupplies]

something I think we as a fandom don't talk about enough is the fact that during his first guide mission grover was 14. And satyrs age half the rate of humans.

grover was emotionally and mentally seven years old. seven. of course he couldn't save everyone he was seven years old!!!!

[archivalofsins]

I'm so late but- I can't believe they just made Amane bad at math canon?!

This was inspired by a conversation I was having with a friend for the most part. Didn't want to get too carried away but love the subtle changes in the minigrams and how they play on the timelines.

That's a D, and even though that's an average percentage in Japan, there's a chance it's not meant to be read that way. Like it can still be average. Average grades are fine but like the difference between this and the timelibe interests Mr.

Because this Minigram comes directly off of the last one with Shidou. A minigram that they also took some creative liberties with for comedic reasons. Yet that one ended with Amane searching for a new teacher not going to find Kotoko like in the original timeline interaction,

20/06/13

Amane: ……what’s wrong, Shidou-san? Your hand has stopped marking. This is mathematics, so there’s no questions about the answers. If I got something wrong, please mark it with an X.

Shidou: I…… I just don’t understand. If everything about MILGRAM is true…… why did a child like you have to become a murderer? Just imagining what sort of circumstances must have led to that, it makes me so sad……

Amane: ……*sigh*. Is that right. I don’t think I’m going to get along with you, Shidou-san. I don’t agree with the fact you refuse to acknowledge that I have my own free will, and that I should be held accountable for my actions, just because I’m a child. I may have only been alive for 12 years, but all the choices I’ve made, even if they weren’t the best ones, were entirely my own. What point is there in you getting sad when I have no regrets myself? ……please give me back my test. It seems you don’t have the concentration levels required to be my teacher. I’m going to get Kotoko-san to teach me instead.

Shidou: Amane…… I don’t think that’s true. However smart you may be…… you’re still just a child.

In the original timeline convo Shidou states the things he was thinking in the minigram aloud causing Amane to leave. In the Minigram Amane is just left baffled and confused as Shidou seems to fail to understand what her test even says and leaves on her own.

Like we said before, she doesn't state she's looking for Kotoko, just a teacher who seems capable. She immediately disregards Futa as an option. Something also done for comedic purposes.

So the test Amane gives Kotoko to grade in this Minigram is still the mathematics one. Unlike in the portal timeline when the interaction between her and Kotoko is several days after her one with Shidou,

20/06/18

Amane: Thank you very much for teaching me. ……but, though I realise it’s strange me saying this after I asked you, I must admit it’s kind of unexpected. You give off the impression of someone who wouldn’t want to get involved in things like this.

Kotoko: ……well, you’re not wrong. I’m surrounded by people who could all be murderers, so I don’t plan on going out of my way to talk and make friends. I can’t let my guard down. But I like ambitious people like you. If you want to study more, then I’m happy to teach.

Amane: I see…… You look scary at first impression, but I quite like the way you treat everyone equally regardless of whether they’re older or younger than you. You don’t just treat me like a child or anything like that.

Kotoko: Treat you like a child? Hah, you’ve got to be kidding. Back when I was your age, I was already the person I am today. I don’t have any plans to let you get away with something just “because you’re a child.” ……remember that. There, I’ve finished marking. 83%. How do I put it… Even though you act like this, it’s not like you’re super brilliant at studying or anything, huh.

In contrast to the timelibe interactions that happeb a good bit away from each other, the Minigram is more meant to document her starting out bring tutored by Kotoko. Not her falling out with tutors like we see in the timeline. This right here is all about timing.

First, do you notice how in the minigram they stay away from the treat you like a child conversation entirely? Only focusing on how Kotoko likes ambitious people like Amane, the grades, and the need to improve them in this area. That's a stark difference from the original timeline.

Plus, notice how the timeline has Mikoto and Kazui there. Two people she asks for help at different points in the timeline. Well, more so take note of how this minigram uses Mikoto specifically. The Minigram uses him to emphasize and announce to everyone that right now, this isn't about language.

The topic that he and Amane excel in or have a good grasp of,

Q.01 What’s your speciality skill?

Amane: I don’t think I have a particular skill. Would studying count? I’m good at Japanese language.

It's about math. It's still about the math test from the previous Minigram. You know what's not the timeline interaction that takes place five days after she did that test and ended the conversation stating she was going to Kotoko. From how Kotoko and Amane are speaking in the June 18th timeline, it's implied she's been helping her for a minute. She's probably been helping her since what occurred on the 13th with Shidou.

Does anyone here think it would take Kotoko five days to grade a math test? No probably not. So she's more than likely grading a different exam all together.

I believe Kotoko's wording is important in this timeline. Because she says, "Even though you act like this, it's not like you're super brilliant at studying or anything, huh?"

What about the way Amane behaves would imply she'd be good at math or studying?

They even change this in the minigram instead having Kotoko state,

"How do I say this... For the way you act, you aren't a good student, are you..."

Along with the visual, which implies that Kotoko isn't just saying this based of Amane's grade but how Amane reacted to it. She wasn't surorised or upset in fact she seemed like she expected it.

In the timeline, while Kotoko still attempts to find the right words, she's more matter of fact. Even though it's still a question she flat out forgoes saying she's not a good student and states she's not brilliant at studying or anything. Just point blank you're not amazing at this.

If the thing she was discussing here was in fact Japanese language, the thing that Amane says she's good at. That would hurt a lot more than saying it about math something she doesn't state she's good at it. Plus it's be easy to assume she's excel at that based on how she speaks or being like that.

So yeah, that's why I think this is probably a case of two different things being graded. Not her grade being changed. I want to hope for a part three since she took note of what Mikoto said about being able to help with debate and discussion, but who knows.

[koreanbibliophilegirl]

(Part 2 of incorrect quotes for my dsmp superpower AU ig)

Also forgot to mention last time, I got half the quotes on this post & ALL of the ones on the post you're currently reading from ScatterPatter's Incorrect Quotes Generator!

Welp yeah that's all, uhhhhhhh enjoy??

-

Punz: Where are you going?

Purpled: To get ice cream or commit a felony, I’ll decide on the way there.

-

Tommy: What the f*ck is wrong with you?!

Wilbur: Wow, you could start with a 'good morning'.

Tommy: Good morning. What the f*ck is wrong with you?!

-

Tommy: Must be hard not being able to laugh.

Techno: I do have a sense of humor you know.

Tommy: I've never heard you laugh before.

Techno: I've never heard you say anything funny.

-

Eret: Go to Hell.

Ant, tearing up: I wish I could.

-

(A younger Phil and teenage Techno talking)

Phil: Jail is no fun. I'll tell you that much.

Techno: Oh, you've been?

Phil: Once. In Monopoly.

-

Eret: God, give me patience.

Ant: I think you mean 'give me strength'.

Eret: If God gave me strength, you'd be dead.

-

Skeppy: You're the love of my life and my best friend, I would do anything for you.

Bad: I want you to eat three meals a day and have a decent sleep schedule.

Skeppy: Absolutely not.

-

Eret: Don’t worry, I have a few knives up my sleeve.

Tina: ?? I think you mean cards?

Foolish: No, she does not.

Eret, pulling out knives: I do not.

-

Purpled: Oh just so you know, it's very muggy outside.

Quackity:

Quackity: Purpled, I swear, if I step outside and all of our mugs are on the front gate entrance path...

Purpled: (Sips coffee from bowl)

-

Wilbur: Am I going too far?

Techno: No, no, no. You went too far about seven years ago. Now you're going to prison.

-

Tommy: You f*ckers don’t know about my knife stick. It’s a knife taped to a stick and it’s the ultimate weapon.

Techno, not looking up from his book: Spear.

Tommy: BLOCKED.

-

Wilbur: You're right.

Techno: That's... That's an unusual phrase for you. Did you just learn it?

-

Purpled: In light of what you did for me, you can hug me for four to five seconds.

Tommy: FORTY FIVE SECONDS?!?

Purpled: No! Four to five seconds!

Tommy: Too late!!!

-

Techno: If there's going to be a big dramatic scene, wait until I get back.

Phil: Of course. I can't flip this table by myself.

-

Dream: Someone will die.

Sapnap: Of fun!

-

Niki: How many kids do you have?

Phil: Biologically, emotionally, or legally?

-

Hannah: I'm 10 times funnier and sexier than you.

Sam: 10 times 0 is still 0 though.

Hannah: Joke's on you, I can't do math.

-

Ranboo: Do you take constructive criticism?

Purpled: I only take cash or credit.

-

Wilbur: So that's my plan.

Kristin: Are you alright with constructive criticism? I don't want to sound mean.

Wilbur: No, go ahead, I want to hear it.

Kristin: It f*cking sucks.

Wilbur: That's not constructive criticism.

-

Niki: I prevented a murder today.

Puffy: Really? How'd you do that?

Niki: self control.

-

Hannah: Look. I may not be a saint, but it's not like I've killed anybody. I'm not an arsonist. I've never found a wallet outside of an IHOP and thought about returning it but saw the owner lived out of state so just took the cash and dropped the wallet back on the ground.

Sam: Okay, that's really specific, and that makes me think that you definitely did do that.

-

Techno: We need a distraction.

Phil: Is anyone here good at jumping up and down and making weird noises?

Clingyduo, whispering: Our time has come.

-

Ranboo: What time is it?

Tommy: I don't know, pass me that saxophone and we’ll find out.

Tommy: (Plays sax loudly and extremely out of tune)

Jack: WHO THE F*CK IS PLAYING THE SAXOPHONE AT TWO IN THE MORNING?!

Ranboo:

Tommy: It’s 2 A.M.

-

Tubbo: What do you think Eryn and Aimsey will do for a distraction?

Ranboo: They'll probably, like, make a noise or throw a rock. That’s what I would do.

(Building explodes and several car alarms go off)

Ranboo: ... Or they could do that.

-

Hannah, trying to ask Tina out: Would you like to stay for dinner?

Connor, hanging upside down from the ceiling: WOULD YOU LIKE TO STAY FOREVER?

-

[Part 1] [Part 3]

[quirklessidiot]

title : cigarettes and parfaits [1] pairing : older!nanami kento x younger!reader [13 year age gap, ft toji fushiguro] Genre: romance, fluff, super duper mild angst, slice of life, josei, bad comedy, strangers to lovers au

Summary: you’re pretty sure you’d remember marrying a man 13 years older than you, right?

Warnings: alcohol, smoking, very,very mild smut, y/n making stupid decisions, everyones a human-au so yeh non-canon stuff and everyone’s happy (periODT BECAUSE NANAMI DESERVES HAPPINESS)

Notes: after repeatedly giving you jjk angst, i have been very happy to announce that i am able to write something fluffy now. Yay! (Anyways this is based on the manga sesame salt and pudding, yall better read that. It’s just *chefs kiss*) also this may or may not be written ebcause of the amount of smoll nanami content i’m seeing around this site hmPH 

masterlist  || taglist || [next  ; updates every friday]

The sound of your alarm blared at the crack of dawn, making you immediately jerk up in an unfashionable manner, you shouldn’t drink on Sunday nights. Good lord,  why did you even do that?-

Your thoughts are cut short though when you feel something, better yet, someone, next to you. It’s dark but you could definitely tell that whoever this stranger is, had settled himself quite comfortably by your side. You blink once then twice then slowly reached out to switch your lamp open to get a good look on who was next to you.

Thankfully, you’re still in your clothes from last night.

Also, who the fuck is this?

Your brows are furrowed together as you try to remember who this person was. Blonde hair and jaw so sharp that it could probably cut the vegetables on your kitchen counter, some fine lines littered his face as he wrinkled his forehead in his sleep.

The tie on his neck is loose as you slowly peered to observe him even more and for some odd reason that made your ears turn bright red as you check out his rather lean figure (he wasn’t overly muscular, he was just right)

“Oh shit.” You mumbled, snapping out of your daze, you had to focus! This was a stranger for crying out loud, “Who the-”

Before you could even say anything more, his eyes shot open and you’re greeted by chocolate brown eyes. You try to stutter out a reply, clearly in your frazzled state the only thing you could let out was, “What the fuck?”

“Oh, you’re awake.” his voice was deep and quite raspy, and daresay, it suited his rather sharp appearance.

Was this stranger awake this whole time that you were gawking at him under the dim light? Your ears turn even a brighter shade of pink. Was it just the heater or was this room getting hotter than it should be?

Yet despite your flustered state though, he thankfully remains oblivious, “Are you feeling any better?” he asks.

Despite his bland facial expression, there was a certain warmth in his tone and that made your heart beat quicken. It wasn’t everyday that you’d wake up to find a good looking older gentleman next to you after all, “I’m good…” You shyly replied, the confidence you had moments ago while you were cursing him was gone when you heard his soft tone, “I- sorry but who are you? What happened?”

He stares at you for a moment and purses his lips, “Nanami Kento.” he introduces himself briefly. From the likes of it, he seemed like a professional, “To be honest, I don’t have much recollection from last night due to the alcohol. When I woke up a few moments ago, you wouldn’t let go and I had no choice but to lay there and wait for you to wake up.”

You paled just a bit at his explanation and turned bright red right after, how embarrassing! Not only did you just embarrass yourself in front of this older gentleman awhile ago, you did something so unlike you last night! Thank god this ojisan was a lot more calmer than you. He didn’t even look that perplexed or annoyed by your state at all.

He runs his hands through his soft blonde hair after and lets out a low groan.

“D-Does your head hurt, Nanami-san?”

“Yes.”

“I-would you-” you tried to stammer a few words out yet you're immediately cut off by his phone ringing.

Right, boundaries. You shouldn’t overstep them since you already did so much last night to disturb him despite you two being so out of it. You watch him as he answers his cell phone in a quick and suave manner, all traces of hungover gone, “Nanami speaking.” He greets as soon as he answers the call, “I understand. Please try to help them out and I apologize for the inconvenience.”

He ends the call and stands up, tightening his tie. Despite him spending the night here, he still looked orderly and it’s so unfair because right now, you knew you looked like absolute shit with the alcohol and booze in your system.

“I have to take my leave now. I apologize for intruding.” he bows down formally.

You’re pretty sure you were the one who intruded, his actions makes you immediately stand up despite the throbbing headache which was definitely a wrong move because the moment you did, you felt your legs giving out.

Great.

“I-sorry, I would bow…” You tried to stammer out an apology, ears bright red once again, just how much could you embarrass yourself in front of this gentleman?  “Sorry for the intrusion too Nanami-san.”

He leaves without saying anything much to your relief and as soon as you hear your front door close, you scream right at the pillow.

“Stupid, stupid, stupid!” You muffled at the pillow.

Thank God you wouldn’t be seeing him ever again!

“L/N-sensei.”

You turn to find Maki and Megumi standing there, they were members of a rather elite family in Tokyo, Most often you avoided bumping shoulders with Megumi’s father since he was, well, quite a tease and although you do admit that Toji Zen’in is a very good-looking and fine man from a very good background, you couldn’t look past the fact that you taught his kids mathematics and there was a good fifteen year age gap between you two, “Hi there.” A warm smile dances on your lips, “Is this about the earlier math problem again?”

The question was directed to Maki, Megumi wasn’t one to ask questions about his lessons since he wasn’t fond of academics.

“Actually, it isn’t. Toji-ojisan says you should come to his birthday.” Maki shrugged, “He says his 40th birthday wouldn’t be complete if you weren’t there.”

Ah, that’s why Megumi didn’t want to go alone. The young boy’s cheeks are painted pink, clearly embarrassed by his father’s antics, “Ah,” You laughed, trying to play it cool. Despite his father’s relentless teasing, he had never made you feel uncomfortable. If he hadn’t been asking you out a few times, you’d consider him a friend, “Your otosan does love to joke around a lot doesn’t he, Megumi-kun?”

“I could deck him for you if you’d like, sensei. I swear that old man needs to realize that you’re way too young and good for him.” He mumbles the last part, clearly annoyed.

“Oh have you gotten married, L/N-sensei?” Maki cuts her younger cousin off suddenly, clearly surprised, “I thought you never had a boyfriend..or girlfriend...or a lover…”

“I- excuse me?” You sweatdrop, “Married, where?”

“Am I mistaken? You have a silver band on your ring finger at your left hand.” Maki points out, “Congrats sensei! It seems like Toji-ojisan won’t be bothering you anymore!”

You were too much in a frazzled state this morning that you hadn’t even noticed the ring band on your finger. You weren’t married, heck, you haven’t dated since college but where in the hell did you get this ring?

“L/N-san?” You’re snapped back to reality by a coworker, “We have two new enrollees, would you mind handling them since they’ll be added to your section?”

“Right,” You smile, “That’s my cue to leave. I’ll get going now. Enjoy your snack time.”

Before Maki could say anything more about the silverband on your ring finger, you scurried away to the faculty room, shaking that weird feeling off since you had to get back to work. 

Job first, ring later.

As you went in, two abnormally bleached pink hair stood out and you could immediately tell that they were going to be the new kids that you’d be teaching. You walk closer, realizing how much they looked alike despite the markings on the other.

“Hi, Good morning.” You greeted kindly, “You must be the new kids.”

“Ah,” the one with tattoo markings on his face gloated, “Aren’t you too bright?”

“Sukuna, shut up.” his twin frowned, “Sorry Sensei, My brother isn’t feeling so well since our ojisan had told us off before going to school.”

It seemed like the other twin would be a handful, nevertheless, you were still going to be his teacher so you let out a small smile, “It’s fine.” You waved off, “We all have bad days, don’t we? I’m L/N-sensei and I’ll be your homeroom and math teacher.”

“Hai.” The one without tattoos replied, enthusiasm leaking on his tone, “Itadori Yuuji and this is Itadori Sukuna, please take care of us.”

You watch Yuuji force his twin to bow down to show a sign of respect. For a high schooler, Sukuna and Yuuji’s parents seemed so lax, bleached hair and tattoos? That was definitely a first one on your list. You take a look at the data they passed and a small frown settles on your lips, it seemed like you had to take back the words you said earlier.

Both their parents had died a few years ago.

You cleared your throat and tried to put on the smile and enthusiasm from earlier, “I’ll be sure to introduce you to the class right after break and since it’s your first day I’ll be lax but please try not to go in late again.”

Yuuji’s grin remains the same as he agrees enthusiastically while Sukuna still looks mildly uninterested, something that you realize oh-so quickly that you’ll have to get used to.

After introducing the twins to the class, you settle on your desk at the faculty and peer at the ring on your finger. The only conclusion you could come up with was that this was from the older gentleman from the night before but why would he even give you a ring?

It didn’t even look cheap and it was surprisingly just your size, meaning it was definitely for you.

You inwardly let out a groan as you placed your hand on top of your eyes. God, you definitely needed to lay off the alcohol next time. You feel the phone in your pocket start to ring, peerlessly glancing at the unknown number. People really need to lay off the scam calls.

“Hello, I’m sorry I’m not-”

“Yo-ho, is this Y/N-chan?” The voice on the other line is so unfamiliar yet familiar at the same time.

“Uh, who is this?”

“Is your husband with you?” the voice sounds so playful and teasing that you almost ignore what he had just said earlier.

“E-Excuse me?” You sputtered out, cheeks turning red, “I don’t have a husband.”

“Huh…” the playful voice switches to disappointment, “Don’t tell me you forgot what happened with us last night, L/N-chan.”

You feel something bubbling on your stomach, oh no, this definitely didn’t sound good!

“I- wait, what? who are you? What do you mean? what happened?” countless of questions started to pile up in your head and out of your mouth, panic immediately engulfing you because for a prank call this guy sounded way too legit, confirming your irresponsibility the night before. 

“Silly Y/N-chan. How could you ever forget me? I’m such an important person! I’m Gojo Satoru, your witness from your wedding!” 

taglist (if crossed out, i cant tag u im so sorry ack ;-;)

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@Kurok1717 ;  @hcn421 ;  @shinhiromi ;  @airybnb ;    ; ​

[myfandomchangesalot]

Am I Dreaming - Chapter Four

Introduction, Chapter One , Chapter Two, Chapter Three

Chapter four

I woke up the next morning at 7:00 to get ready and get to school by 8:15. I was not the type of girl to get up at 6 just to make myself all pretty for school. I like my sleep so I get as much as I can! My morning routine consists of me getting up, showering, picking out clothes, doing very basic makeup, letting my hair air dry, and then going downstairs to have breakfast with my dad. Neither of my parents were really good cooks, so we have always just eaten cereal for breakfast, and that still hasn’t changed even after my mom died. On special occasions my dad will get up early and make a butter braid. Luckily, today is a special occasion since it's my last first day of high school, so he made one, my favorite of course, strawberry cream cheese.

“Hi dad.”

“Hi sweetheart. You look nice today.”

“Ha thanks. I’m just in my normal clothes though.”

“I know, but you always look a bit nicer on the first day of school.” I guess that's true. Usually I wear leggings, but today I’m in mustard wide legged pants and a black long sleeve top.

“Hey, do you need a ride today or is Matt coming to get you.”

“Matt should be getting me. I’ll make sure to bring him a piece of the butter braid.” Just as I said that Matt texted me saying he was here.

“Bye dad! Matt’s here, love you.”

“Bye princess! Have a good day and I love you too.”

My parents have always called me their princess, and it's such a special nickname to me. I walked out to Matt’s truck and jumped in. We did some small talk about how we are excited to start senior year. Once we got to the school I gave him a quick kiss and walked away to see my friends. Matt was acting really weird today. Usually he tries to walk me to my locker, but today he just sat in the truck looking like a kicked puppy. He’s probably thinking about Vicki since she’s not here with him. I’ve tried to get him to open up to me about it, but he refuses to say anything, so I just let him sulk now.

After leaving him to sulk I go do my own thing. Matt may be my boyfriend, but I am not one of those girls that always hangs out with her significant other. We honestly only have two classes together, English and Math, so at school we barely see each other. I say hi to my friends, go to my locker and get ready for one of my least favorite classes of the day, history. Don’t get me wrong, history fascinates me, but Dr. Saltzman obviously has his favorites, and it is totally unfair. I actually know a lot about history, but he never wants to listen to what I have to say, only the scooby gang. Augh let’s get this class over with.

I found my seat and just people watched. Stefan was acting like a first class douche, so he and Elena must have broken up. Elena, Caroline, and Tyler were acting super tense and like they didn’t expect to see him. He goes to our school, he’s not going to switch schools just because of a bad breakup. I swear they are so weird.

“Welcome back seniors. Let’s, uh, turn our brains back on, starting with, uh, this country’s original founders, the Native Americans.”

“What about the Vikings?” That voice made me snap up. Thank god Rebekah is in this class! I really want to become friends with her. I feel like we have a very similar don’t give a shit attitude.

“Well, there’s no evidence that Viking explorers actually settled in the United States. “ See this is what I was talking about. Mr. Saltzman just shoots people down when they speak up about anything.

“Who are you?” He asked.

“My name’s Rebekah. I’m new and history’s my favorite subject.” Girl good luck, because unless your name is Elena Gilbert you are no longer going to like history.

After History was over I had English which I love because actor dah! Then science which I hate with every fiber of my being. Followed by favorite classes math, lunch, choir, study hall and ending the day with theatre! I don't have to take any Phys Ed class, because I already completed that requirement. THANK GOD! At lunch I invited Rebekah to sit with my friends and I.

“Hey Bekah come sit with us”

“Oh hey V!”

“Everyone, this is Rebekah. Rebekah, this is Claire, Stevie, Nicole, Jack, Jules, and Charlie.” Everyone replied with a hi or hello

“Did you bring any food today?” I asked Rebekah

“I was just planning on buying some from the cafeteria.”

“Don’t do that. The food here is nasty. Here you can have part of my sandwich. I can’t eat it all anyways I’m to nervous”

“Thank you. What are you nervous for?”

“It's audition day for the school play. No matter how many times I audition I still get nervous, and can’t eat a lot.”

Charlie piped in “Come on V you are going to kill it. Which role are you hoping to get?”

“Thanks Charlie. I’m stuck between wanting the lead part, because people say I am too fat to be a leading lady. You know, I need to prove people wrong, but I also love the part of Charlotte! We love a bad bitch who has a secret heart.”

“What play are you guys doing?” Rebekah asked.

“We are doing These Shining Lives, it’s about the women who worked in the radium dial factories in the 20’s in Chicago and their journey through radium poisoning and suing the companies,” Jack told Rebekah

Rebekah seemed surprised at what the play is about. “I didn’t know that the dial workers got radium poisoning. Radium was in everything in the 20's, everyone used it.”

“Yeah Beks, it's like super deadly. I thought you loved history,” I replied.

“I do, I just must’ve ignored anything about radium.” Rebekah did a small chuckle and shrugged it off, so I decided to change the subject.

“So Rebekah, are you going to join any clubs or anything since it's your first day?” I asked.

“I am thinking of trying out for the cheer team.”

This caused me to let out a groan. “Augh just please don’t turn into another Caroline Forbes.”

That caused Rebekah to laugh. “I won’t promise.”

After she said that the bell rang and then it was time to go to my next class. After school I went to the auditions for the play, and I think I absolutely crushed it! Now I just have to see if I got through to callbacks. After my audition football practice was over and Matt drove me home.

“Hey I’ll pick you up later for the bonfire. I need to go home, shower and change,” Matt said.

“I completely forgot about the bonfire, sigh, I’ll go get ready. See you later Matty,” and with that he drove away.

Great, now I need to find an outfit to wear for the bonfire. I want something that says I’m not trying to hard, but also says hey Matt maybe we should have sex since my dad works nights and I have the house to myself. Great now i sound like the only thing I care about is sex. That’s not true at all actually. I just feel like maybe sleeping with Matt will help me feel less guilty, and maybe help me stop thinking about my night with Nik. I quickly made myself some ramen for supper and went upstairs to pick my outfit.

After modeling for myself and trying to find an outfit, I finally decided on a black dress with an open back and combat boots. I went downstairs waiting for Matt to pick me up… and I waited… and waited. I sent him I don’t even know how many texts, and I heard nothing from him. I decided that Matt obviously blew me off, and I looked hella cute so I need to take some photos for Instagram. If no one in person can see how I look, the internet can.

After my photo session I put on my jammies, turned on my comfort movie - Bohemian Rhapsody, made some coco, cuddled with my cats Alpine and Goose and texted Matt that ‘I will be getting a ride with my dad tomorrow morning.’ I sat, watched my movie, and cried. From the movie or Matt I don’t know. I just know that I don’t deserve to be ignored. I decided that I was going to go to bed to dream about my mysterious stranger who has disappeared. Right before I went upstairs I heard a noise in my parents room. I grabbed my taser and pepper spray from my bag to check it out. I opened their door and…

“Mom?”

___________

Word Count - 1,507

Chapter four is done! I am hoping for around 50 chapters total. I know V seems like a bitch about the scooby gang, but there’s a reason for it. No Klaus in the next chapter either, but he’ll be back for homecoming!! Please enjoy the pictures of my cats - Goose (Orange) and Alpine (Black)

Next Part

[thewidowsghost]

Daughter of the Sea - Chapter 1

So, I started this on my Wattpad, and if figured I'd just put it on here! Just tell me if you want me to add you to the taglist!

Percy's POV

My name is Percy Jackson.

I am twelve years old. I'm a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York, and my sister, (Y/n), taking online schooling at home.

Am I a troubled kid?

Yeah. You could say that.

I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan—twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.

I know—it sounds like torture. Most Yancy field trips were.

But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.

Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.

I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.

See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course, I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that...Well, you get the idea.

On this trip, I was determined to be good.

All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.

Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.

Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwiches that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.

"I'm going to kill her," I mumble.

Grover tries to calm me down. "I'm okay. I like peanut butter -" He dodges another piece of Nancy's lunch.

"That's it." I start to get up, but Grover pulls me back to my seat.

"You're already on probation," he reminds me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."

Mr. Brunner leads the museum tour.

He rides up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.

It blows my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.

He gathers us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and starts telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.

Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.

From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.

One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."

Mr. Brunner keeps talking about Greek funeral art.

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickers something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turn around and say, "Will you shut up?"

It comes out louder than I meant it to.

The whole group laughs. Mr. Brunner stops his story. "Mr. Jackson," he says, "did you have a comment?"

My face is totally red, I think. I answer, "No, sir."

Mr. Brunner points to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

I look at the carving, and feel a flush of relief, because I actually recognize it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"

"Yes," Mr. Brunner says, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because..."

"Well..." I rack my brain to remember. (Y/n) would have known the answer. She was nuts for this kind of stuff. "Kronos was the king god, and —"

"God?" Mr. Brunner asks.

"Titan," I correct myself. "And...he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters—"

"Eeew!" says one of the girls behind me.

"—and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continue, "and the gods won."

Some snickers from the group.

Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbles to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"

"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner says, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," Grover mutters.

"Shut up," Nancy hisses, her face even brighter red than her hair.

At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.

I think about his question, and shrug. "I don't know, sir."

"I see." Mr. Brunner looks disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"

The class drifts off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.

Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."

I knew that was coming.

I tell Grover to keep going; then I turn toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?" Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go—intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything. "You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner tells me.

"About the Titans?"

'"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."

"Oh."

"What you learn from me," he says, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."

I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!" and challenged us, swordpoint against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C– in my life. No—he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.

I mumble something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner takes one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.

He tells me to go outside and eat my lunch.

The class gathers on the front steps of the museum, where we can watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.

Overhead, a huge storm is brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figure maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.

Nobody else seems to notice, though. Some of the guys are pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit is trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds isn't seeing a thing.

Grover and I sit on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school—the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.

"Detention?" Grover asked.

"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean—I'm not a genius, not like (Y/n). She seems to know everything."

Grover doesn't say anything for a while. Then, when I think he is going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he asks, "Can I have your apple?"

I don't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.

I watch the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and think about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sit. I hadn't seen her or my sister since Christmas. I want so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. Mom and (Y/n) would hug me and be glad to see me, but Mom would be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I couldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.

Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized café table.

I am about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appears in front of me with her ugly friends—I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists—and dumps her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.

"Oops." She grins at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles are orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.

I try to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I am so mad my mind went blank. A wave roars in my ears.

I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy is sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see—"

"—the water—"

"—like it grabbed her—"

I don't know what they were talking about. All I know is that I was in trouble again.

As soon as Mrs. Dodds is sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turns on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey—"

"I know," I grumble. "A month erasing workbooks." That wasn't the right thing to say.

"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds says.

"Wait!" Grover yelps. "It was me. I pushed her."

I stare at him, stunned. I can't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.

She glares at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.

"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she says.

"But—"

"You—will—stay—here."

Grover looks at me desperately.

"It's okay, man," I tell him. "Thanks for trying."

"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barks at me. "Now."

Nancy Bobofit smirks. I give her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare. Then I turn to face Mrs. Dodds, but she isn't there. She is standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.

How'd she get there so fast?

I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.

I wasn't so sure. I go after Mrs. Dodds.

Halfway up the steps, I glance back at Grover. He is looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner is absorbed in his novel.

I look back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She is now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.

Okay, I think. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.

But apparently, that wasn't the plan.

I follow her deeper into the museum. When I finally catch up to her, we are back in the Greek and Roman section.

Except for us, the gallery is empty.

Mrs. Dodds stands with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She is making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.

Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze as if she wanted to pulverize it...

"You've been giving us problems, honey," she says.

I do the safe thing. I reply, "Yes, ma'am."

She tugs on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"

The look in her eyes is beyond mad. It was evil.

She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me. I say, "I'll—I'll try harder, ma'am."

Thunder shakes the building.

"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."

I didn't know what she's talking about.

All I can think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.

"Well?" she demands.

"Ma'am, I don't..."

"Your time is up," she hisses.

Then the weirdest thing happens. Her eyes begin to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretch, turning into talons. Her jacket melts into large, leathery wings. She isn't human. She is a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.

Then things got even stranger.

Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheels his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.

"What ho, Percy!" he shouts and tosses the pen through the air.

Mrs. Dodds lunges at me.

With a yelp, I dodge and feel talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatch the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hits my hand, it isn;t a pen anymore. It is a sword—Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always uses on tournament day.

Mrs. Dodds spins towards me with a murderous look in her eyes.

My knees are jelly. My hands are shaking so bad I almost drop the sword.

She snarl, "Die, honey!" And she flies straight at me.

Absolute terror runs through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swing the sword.

The metal blade hits her shoulder and passes clean through her body as if she was made of water. Hisss!

Mrs. Dodds was a sandcastle in a power fan. She explodes into yellow powder, vaporizing on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes are still watching me.

I'm alone.

There is a ballpoint pen in my hand.

Mr. Brunner isn't there. Nobody is there but me.

My hands are still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.

Had I imagined the whole thing?

I walk back outside.

It had started to rain.

Grover is sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit is still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she sees me, she says, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."

I answer, "Who?"

"Our teacher. Duh!"

I blink. We don't have a teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I ask Nancy what she is talking about.

She just rolls her eyes and turns away.

I ask Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.

"Who?" he asks, but he pauses first and he wouldn't look at me, so I figure he was messing with me.

"Not funny, man," I tell him. "This is serious."

Thunder booms overhead.

I see Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book as if he'd never moved.

I go over to him.

He looks up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."

I had Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.

"Sir," I ask, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"

He stares blankly at me, "Who?"

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."

He frowns and sits forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"

Word Count: 3159 words

So yeah, this is the first chapter of this book.

Not much (Y/n) yet, but we'll get there.

Love y'all!              Kaitlynn ❤️😍

[study-or-perish]

Things I wish I knew before freshman year of college

After being in college for a year, I’ve learned that some things that people told me were true and others were false. Now this is purely in my own experience so maybe I will prove to be wrong when you attend. Also, I am a commuter student so I don’t have any advice on dorms/apartments and how to deal with them. 

So seeing as half of my classes are in person this semester, I thought other people may be in the same situation as I am. 

emails will either be “Good Afternoon Professor Smith,” or “hey john” — whatever it is keep it short and to the point

the only profs that I actually call “Professor” are from gen eds/100 level courses. everyone else I address by their first name and none of them have a problem with it.

first day of class nerves are real here’s how to lessen it- scout out classes before hand, eat as you normally would on that day to avoid feeling sick, if it’s that bad just leave five minutes into class (chances are it’s not) you’re a college student you can leave, it’s not as bad as what you may think

KEEP THE SYLLABUS  it is your guide

8am classes will become hell as progress through the semester bc you won’t want to get up

your MWF classes may know about your TTH classes. Just so you know

don’t sit near the windows and look up to find the AC unit and don’t sit under it. You will be cold.

ice breakers are horrible and no one likes them, find a fact about yourself that you can expand on and use it for every class.

some classes will put you through your paces, go to office hours if needed

some profs are just unhelpful. Find another prof that would be willing to help

student tutors are not helpful at all

start studying for an exam at least a week early and get into that habit

raising your hand in class to ask a question is powerful because that means you’ve gotten far enough to actually understand what is going on

some profs won’t let you use a graphing calculator on an exam, bring a less complicated one with you as well.

some profs won’t let you use a calculator at all. sharpen up those basic math skills

if you have a genuinely bad prof, report them to the head prof of that department. If there is enough students who say the same thing they can take care of things :) (exception- tenured profs)

take public speaking your first semester and take it seriously. It really does help.

time between classes can be used for watching YouTube, studying, or taking a nap. Use it wisely.

always bring a water bottle and a granola bar with you anywhere you go

first semester may be exactly like high school but second semester won’t be as you will get harder classes

all nighters are not necessary if you study a little everyday

no one cares what you wear. HOWEVER if you want to be easily identified as a freshman on the first day, dress up really nicely. I just wore a school shirt and jeans, but I saw hoards of freshman girls with dresses and heels walking to class

speaking of clothes, I wouldn’t recommend wearing short sleeve shirts and shorts until you know the climate of the rooms you’ll be in. But that’s your preference

hand sanitizer. even after covid please continue to use it. There are sick people all the time on campus without covid

I believe an electronic writing device to be better than any paper or pens. You’ll have everything with you at all times without worrying about losing things

PDF scanner app

FIND A RELIABLE BACKPACK not a trendy one, a nice reliable comfy backpack with plenty of room

you don’t have to meet your best friends within the first day, week, month, or semester into college. They’ll come, it will be okay

you may make a friend that you later find out that they are horrible. End it quickly, ghost if you have to

if you feel lonely bc you have no friends bc you went to college on your own, please talk to someone about it. it does help even if it is a prof who asked you how your day is in private (not in front of the whole class)

everyone will think you know what you’re doing if you look confident. Doesn’t matter if you’re walking to class, doing work, or even asking questions. They’ll assume you’re higher in your education than you really are. I’ve had profs come up to me asking if I was a sophomore or a junior (I was a freshman in my first semester)

everyone and their mother will talk to you during the first week

no one will tell you about specific things (such as expenses, scheduling, etc.) seek it out if you find something you don’t understand

profs will tell you about due dates and exam dates, it may be brief but they’ll tell you

noise cancelling headphones are a must

group work is hell even if you know the members. my engineering prof says to make a contract that every one signs stating what they will do. present it to the prof if someone fails to do something.

stay away from populated areas that most people will go to such as libraries/tables/cafe. (covid related)

meal plans can be useless but sometimes you’re required to have one

Online classes:

a desk is best but sitting on the floor is a nice change of scenery

it is true that you should have a separate area for studying/classes but not everyone can do that. Try to angle where you sit either out of a window or face a wall opposite to where you sleep.

getting another monitor for my desk has been really helpful

tip from my computer science prof- look away from your screen periodically, humans are adapted to see far distances better and it relaxes the muscles. hang something up across your room to read every now and then to reduce eye strain. 

blue light blocking glasses can help reduce headaches 

you can do classes in bed if you want, I have and it hasn’t caused any problems

PDF scanner app

a planner is a must in this case to track when assignments are due

emails, emails, emails. All day.

my school has told me they can’t require us to turn on our cameras, so I don’t. even during exams. (It’s an invasion of privacy)

if you have to turn on your camera, don’t have a distracting background

turn in assignments one day early just incase something should happen where you have to email a prof saying that you’re unable to turn it in.

I’ll probably add to this as I think of things but for now… here is all I know

[rpmemesbyarat]

A few tips on writing geniuses, prodigies, and “gifted” people

- Geniuses are not geniuses at everything: Being extraordinarily good at one field is not going to make anyone an automatic expert at anything else. It may give them a better understanding of related fields, if the two fields share a lot of the same terminology and concepts, but there’s no reason to think that an expert in nuclear physics is going to have an advanced knowledge of philosophy and history as well. Indeed, genius is typically just limited to one thing, or several related things. I’ve always been considered “gifted” in terms of language arts/literature, but I can’t understand math to save my life, and my aptitude in other school subjects was pretty normal. I did well on my tests for everything BUT math because the science and social studies quizzes were mostly based on remembering information that I had read, so it worked on the same premise as taking a test about a book—processing and recalling the written word. Math was a whole other animal, one I had to wrestle with. I’ve found that this story is pretty common with people who were good at language arts, and that a great many people good at math couldn’t stand language arts. This is because being mentally specialized in one way doesn’t translate to everything else being easy by extension. Of course, just because your character is a genius at one field doesn’t mean they have to be a dunce at everything else. Someone can be good at language arts and math. A brilliant astronomer may also quote Paradise Lost, a mechanical inventor may also have a very astute appreciation for sculpture, and so on. Just, they don’t HAVE to just because they are a “genius”. - Geniuses are not automatically more moral or “woke”: Oftentimes in media, the writers will have the “genius” espouse support of the moral or political stance that we, the reader/viewer, are supposed to be in support of as well. They may make an intelligent argument for it, or they may just simply say it’s right, and we’re supposed to take this as implicit proof that it is because, well, they’re a genius so it must be. In reality, much as we would like to believe that only “stupid” people can hold “bad” views, geniuses can also hold beliefs that are ignorant, absurd, or downright repulsive. This is especially true if the belief has nothing to do with their area of aptitude. Geniuses are also just as vulnerable to absorbing toxic aspects of their culture as anyone else; they may still be sexist, racist, homophobic, or anything else. Indeed, a great deal of science and literature in history was used to support the bigotry of its own time, and was probably written by some very smart people who nonetheless believed these awful things. If you’re writing about a society from when people still believed that the sun went around the earth and not vice versa, then odds are your “genius” character should probably believe that as well unless their specific area of study has given them reason to think otherwise. Geniuses do not “just know” that things are wrong simply because they are geniuses. They have to have a way to get there, just like everyone else, they’re just better at finding that way if it’s a way that they’re specialized for. - Child geniuses may not be adult geniuses: I won a state writing contest when I was seven. My mother holds it as  the proof that I am a talented writer. I am currently 31. Do you see the problem in her thinking? If I were to re-enter such a contest for my current age group, I doubt that I would come out the winner, because my competition is no longer a bunch of seven year olds. I may have been gifted for my age then, but everyone else has now had time to catch up to me, and surpass me. This is the story for a lot of people who were “gifted” at something as children. We had a running start due to our innate talent, but it only took us so far. It did not grow proportionately with us, and thus we did not stay ahead forever. What’s more, the longer that we were able to do amazing things with ease due to sheer talent, the harder it was when that talent couldn’t take us any further and we had to learn to actually work at things like our peers had been doing for years. You can talk to a lot of people who were “gifted” during their childhood or teen years, who suddenly went from the top of the class to struggling to get by during high school or college, because they had no idea how to study. They’d never needed to before. It sounds obnoxious to complain about “boo hoo, now I have to work hard just like everyone else!” and it certainly is a little, but for a lot of us, it was a real blow to our identity and self-worth. When you’ve always been the “smart kid” what are you once you’re not anymore? I spent my childhood amazing my classmates, my teachers, my parents, everyone, because I was so advanced in terms of reading, writing, and vocabulary, as well as recalling things like animal facts. When you’re praised for something constantly, it becomes a big part of who you are, and you often feel an expectation to keep being that. So when it goes away, you feel like you’ve failed and you’re no longer valuable or valued, even though you’re just now where everyone else was all along. You don’t know who you are now, or what you’re good at, if anything at all. Basically, genius comes in degrees. It can take a lucky few of us to the stars. But for some of us, it only takes us so far. Some of us will work the rest of our way somewhere. Some of us don’t bother or can’t. A child prodigy may not become anything more than another mediocre adult. And that actually can be just as interesting a character concept as someone who went on to be the greatest in their respective field. - Geniuses still must learn from somewhere: Despite how it may appear to outsiders, a mathematical genius isn’t born automatically knowing advanced calculations. They still have to learn what a number is, how to count, all of that, just like the rest of us. And in order to do those wonderful advanced calculations, they have to learn what they are first. They may learn so swiftly that it does indeed seem like they were born with the knowledge, but they still need, at the least, a math book to look at or another source to show them what, say, a division sign is. If someone has a natural talent for horses and riding, they may well become an excellent equestrian if just left alone with the horse…but without a trainer or other resource to educate them on proper riding style, they’ll probably just come up with their own way of doing it. Which may work wonderfully, but would never be admitted into any horse show. And what if they’re a city kid who never has an opportunity to meet a horse? They’d never know about their talent at all! The opportunity to be detected and recognized as “gifted” and to be given the resources to develop those gifts is something that people may take for granted if they had those things available to them, but consider: How many incredible potential artists and writers and scientists and so on, might there have been among slaves who never got a chance to be anything but slaves? How many people born in Ancient Rome might have had, if they’d been born today, an aptitude for computer programming? How many potential astrophysicists and brain surgeons have we never known existed because they were born female in the wrong time? My point is, as magically innate as genius may seem to an outsider who hears a toddler reciting the periodic table and actually understanding it (rather than just parroting) genius is ultimately just potential. That potential still needs an opportunity in order to bloom into something. So resist the urge to portray your muse as babbling famous poetry in the cradle when it’s unlikely they’ve ever heard it anywhere before, and think more along the lines of a baby that is learning to talk extremely fast and is able to repeat even very large words it hears from adults. One may seem the more “impressive” mental image, but the other one is actually just as impressive in reality, and doesn’t come off as absurd. For more reading on this topic and related ones, here are some links! Basic Tips To Write Better Geniuses, Scientists, & Intellectuals On Writing & Roleplaying Smart Characters Limyaael’s Rant on Genius Characters

[bizlawgal]

I got a prompt I would like to share 😊. Emma flirts with norman everyday. From the smallest ways to the most cheesy pick up lines. Then, why he doesn't understand? Most of the time he just blushes looks to other side and then changes the subject. She feels really stupid and embarrassed and now she has to explain it to norman. EXPLAIN SOMETHING TO NORMAN omg.

I’m bad at pick-up lines, so I hope I somehow had given justice to this prompt HAHA.

I.

It’s been a week since she last visited. 

But instead of the friendly blonde she’s come to know, her eyes immediately fall on someone’s silver hair from the counter.

He looks up from his desk, and she can already see in his eyes the wonder in the form of azure and carnation.

"Good morning, miss," he casually greets with that ever-endearing soft smile he serves his guests. "What can I do for you today?"

She comfortably presses her elbows on top of the counter, instantaneously taken by him. 

Just calling him handsome is an understatement.

"Oh, nothing. Just glad to see a friendly face in the morning."

He looks surprised with the comment, but hedges forward with what he's trained and paid to do. "This library certainly has a lot of friendly faces."

"Oh, I wasn't talking about the others," she implies without a second thought, "I was talking about you. You must be new here."

"Y-yes," he stutters, something he's not proud of, especially when he's talking to a rather lovely guest that he's seen for the first time.

"Whenever I check out a book, it's always that pretty blonde who always assists me. Have you seen Anna?"

There's a joyous vibrato to how she says it like she's telling a story to a friend, heightening the glistening of her eyes.

He blushes at the sight of her, so he offers an explanation to her question to keep his expression neutral. "I'm sorry. Anna resigned a week ago, so I’ll be solely in charge of everyone’s accounts. Is there anything I can help you with now?"

"Oh, I see.” She nods her head in understanding. “Anyway, I'm Emma, and the only thing you can help me with now is telling me your name."

She's interesting, he thinks. "I'm Norman. Do you have any questions I can help you with?"

Satisfaction crosses her face and he instantly ponders as to why her smile feels like the sun radiating on him.

"Okay, Norman. I have one question," she says with her playful eyes that implies to be too endearing at the same time. "Do you believe in love at first sight or should I come again?"

II.

"You're early today, Emma," Norman says as soon as he catches wind of her from the corner of his eye.

She merely whistles a tune, faint sounds of footsteps making their way towards him. "I'm always right on time, you know."

"It has only been seven minutes since we opened up the library." He raises an eyebrow, skepticism covering his face. "Don't tell me you're here to lounge around? Did you always do this when Anna was around?"

"And if I did? I'm bored, Norman," she remarks in the tone of a whine. "Is there anything I could do while I wait for you to finish?"

He draws an exhaustive sigh at the dilemma in front of him. She's been visiting for straight days over the last two weeks, and all she's ever checked out was a single book. Norman can't decipher what has gotten this young lady visiting the library so often.

But he won’t deny the exhilarating feeling of knowing that his company is something that she’s keen on having.

She may just be a lost soul looking for ways to entertain herself in the vastness of this city's library.

"If you have no plans to check out a book, at least take a seat in one of the available couches. I'll attend to you shortly."

Emma seems satisfied with the idea. She merrily makes her way to the nearest couch and comfortably settles herself with its backrest.

Not even a minute longer, Norman feels the piercing stare emanating from his back. His keen senses are to thank for, and clearly, it was sharp as a dagger since he instantly comes in contact with her eyes.

"You're staring," he simply reckons.

"No, I'm not." She doesn’t even deny it.

It's taking everything in him not to blush and be conscious of her gaze that is enough to question a man of his current stature.

"Yes, you are."

"Hmm, really?” She rubs out both of her eyes and blinks excessively at the ceiling. “I think there's just something wrong with my eyes."

Norman places the book he has on hand in its proper place and goes ahead to check on her condition. He moves closer to get a good view of her face when he asks, "What's wrong with your eyes?"

And when he's close enough that she moves her lips to his ear and whispers, "I just can’t take them off of you."

III.

It's been a month since Emma started invading his professional space of employment. He has no qualms about it, yet her presence has been, in more ways, confusing than comforting.

Aside from her lack of tact and overwhelming recklessness, he has nothing to complain about.

Except for her outrageous pick-up lines.

Some are cheesy. Others are funny, and most of the time, it ridiculously just takes his breath away.

"How much does a penalty cost when I fail to return a book after its deadline?" she asks him from the counter on a Saturday.

He shakes his head in amusement. "Are we talking about that engineering book that you've failed to return even after my countless reminders?"

"Maaaaaybeeee," she chimes back.

"It'll be a dollar if we're counting for nearly a month of its overdue fine."

"I see you’re good with Math," she ponders for a moment, the side of her lips twitching for a smile.

"I’m fairly good with numbers," he informs back while encoding the newly-released textbook on his laptop.

"I’m no mathematician, but I’m pretty good with numbers, too! " she points a finger at him, "Tell you what, give me yours and watch what I can do with it."

Norman nearly chokes on his own saliva.

IV.

He likes her.

He likes her enough to the point that his head immediately sways to the door the moment it opens; to the point that her laughter brings him an immeasurable amount of joy by just hearing it; and, to the point that he wishes time would stop so that he'd get to hear more of her little pick-up lines.

So when she steps foot inside the library for today, all his attention is remotely diverted to her.

"Good morning, Norman," she greets enthusiastically from the door, a bright mop of orange hair blossoming from her back and a grin to match the glee in her eyes.

Norman instantly sprints to meet her halfway, but loses his balance and falls flat on the wooden floors.

Emma quickens her pace to assist his sorry state. "Norman! Norman! Are you okay?"

"I-It's nothing," he groans the words out, "The floor must've been slippery."

Emma gives out a peal of low laughter before placing his right arm over her shoulders and supporting him to stand up. "You know, you should be careful where you fall."

Norman senses that it's going to be another one of her pick-up lines so he listens attentively, despite the searing pain on his chin. "And where do you suppose I should fall?"

"You may fall from the sky, you may fall from a tree, but the best way to fall… is in love with me," she ardently chants as they walk side by side to a vacant seat.

He bites the insides of his cheeks because this is the best one he's heard from her yet.

V.

It's closing time and Emma has taken it upon herself to help him return every borrowed book to its proper placement on the shelf. She’s been awfully quiet, Norman internally infers, with the way she shoves the books back with less delicacy than the previous ones. Her eyebrows are knitted into a frown and her lips are sullen into a pout. 

If she doesn’t appear to be vindictive about something, he thinks it’s an adorable expression out of her.

"Norman." Her voice is stern and less cheerful than the usual, and it makes him pause for a moment. "You look smart enough to me."

"So I've been told."

"But, why are you dumb?"

This statement makes him stop altogether. "I am... what?"

"I think you're dumb," she emphasizes without averting her gaze.

He doesn't even take offense since this is the first time she used such a tone against him. "How am I dumb?"

"Because!" she crosses her hands to her chest in an offensive stance, "I've been flirting with you for over a month, and you always seem to brush me off. My brother said that saying pick-up lines are a good way to go! Is it not working or are you just dumb not to notice?"

Emma is too free and direct — unbound to any chain from halting herself from freely speaking her mind. Her intentions are too pure for his sake and it's taken him more than a month to come up with a response.

"I'm not dumb, Emma," his voice is low and raspy against the stammering of his heart.

She appears taken aback. "So, do you know I'm flirting with you?"

So blunt, yet so efficient. "Yes, I know."

"Do you... not like me?" The will to look at him is gone, only replaced by uneasiness and dejection. “I can stop if you don’t —”

His grin won't falter back, so he allows it to creep into his lips. She's been making too many obvious attempts for him not to notice for over a month and it's high time he returns the favor.

"I like you. It’s just that... I’ve never liked a girl before. I’m sorry if it looked like I wasn’t interested. But — " he takes a step closer to reach for her braid, “I really like you, Emma. You and your silly pick-up lines.”

Her eyes blow wide open with hope. Her hands are balled into a fist with evident shaking from elation. "You do?! You really do?!"

“Do you want proof of it?” he asks coolly as he possibly can.

She nods like a little child that is about to be handed a candy.

He closes a bit of the gap between them, with one hand snaking for support at her back, and the other raising her chin to meet his lips.

If she’s good with swooning him with words, then he may as well do the same. "Can I borrow a kiss? I promise I'll give it back."

[mushykat]

i am failing 4 classes

I’m sick and I don’t like it. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, and I don’t like how it hurts to wake up. I don’t like how the feeling of hearing damage is the only thing grounding me to a plain of nothing but heartache and tragedy. I hate how much I’ve let myself spiral. I’m tumbling down a black spire that I’ve built for myself. What lays at the bottom will hopefully kill me when I connect with the waters below. 

Sometimes I want to draw. The picture I want to use to express the swirling mass of razors and burnt scraps of thoughts that plague my consciousness never turns out how I want them to. I don’t want to sit down and put time into something that I cannot love. It’s why I refuse to try and dig myself from the pit laden with the shreds of memories I hold on to in order to justify the horrible things I see. 

I don’t want to write as a career. A career path means choosing a secondary school, and it means going and applying myself to something. I can’t put the effort into keeping myself afloat in the sea of that of which troubles me, and yet I’m expected to weigh myself down with books full of repeated sentences that will suffocate me with a bad credit score and the inability to apply for a loan. 

I don’t want money to be spent on me for college. I’m going to do bad and eventually give up, like I always do. I never apply myself to anything like I should. I know better. As I sit and write, and let the crisp feeling of the screen sear the exhaustion ridden pupils I’ve tormented as such the night prior, I have assignments I haven’t turned in. If I can’t bother to not fail an 11th grade math class over my own impotence, then how am I supposed to swallow down the poison that is higher education. 

What’s the point of using flowery language to cover the corpse of what I write? What will the sprouts of tulips and daisies do against the rot of myself. Why must I try and work every word into an intricate tapestry to illustrate the images my hands refuse to draw. Why do I try to form the pictures my mind refuses to accept of what I see of myself. Why am I fucking sick? 

I can feel the rise and fall of my chest, and yet my lungs always feel empty. I can feel the beat of a heart cradled behind the intertwined digits of marrow that tuck it away in a forest of fleshy fat, and yet I wonder if I am truly living. Is this all life is to be? Am I expected to carry on in the future. Carry on and carrion are easy to mix up, I presume. But what a simple mistake for such a bloated carcass such as myself.

I feel like if I try to chase after the fleeting ideological wisps of smoke that arise from the coals I smother, and do in fact explore writing as a career, I fear I will run out. I think the only mirrors I can truly accept are the ones others have pointed towards me. The only thing I can see anymore is warped and distorted by the heat of a long burnt-out inferno that ate away at the only thing I could hold dear to myself. 

These little mirrors sit behind my eyes, and reflex off of each other. They shine beams of light to one another, as some sick paradox that I am too shaded to partake in. I want to see the light, but I fear what I may see if I allow illumination into the crevices of where I hide. The dark is cold and safe, and lets me shelter away from that which wishes to harm me. 

The world isn’t out to get you, after all. The only mantra I can remember clearer than the burning gazes of reflected disdain directed towards me. Are the shattered mirrors that try to piece my reality together warped from the heat of myself or others? I think I know who ignited me, but I would rather let the coals die away as I wish for myself. I envy the carbon lumps sitting in the sludge pooled at my feet. 

I am one of the ants that get burned alive under a child’s magnifying glass. I can still feel the heat enveloping me, and can taste the smoke as it hangs around my throat in a familiar noose. I welcome it, even. Why else would letting the smog from burning leaves powder kisses of slime and tar across my lungs? I relish the taste I’m left with. It is impure.

Impurity is the only state I know. Disgrace and dissidence is the only way for me to view myself through the shattered lenses that have been scratched and dulled with age. I wish I could pry them out of my skull with the screwdriver that sits in the drawer on my desk. Maybe if I slipped them out of my head and gave them a good rinse, I could have a clean look at the world around me. Maybe I could be happy. 

What’s to say they aren’t responsible? Holding tender orbs with a sheen of slime from the crevice they reside, smeared with the crimson shame that comes with self mutilation. I wonder if I could view myself with such an event. Could I get a good look? Could I watch myself desecrate the corpse that I walk in? 

Maybe my eyes aren’t the problem. The ants nibbling behind my eyes made my sight throb, as if what I’m viewing of the world is wrong. It’s never right, though. Maybe the ants are just more noticeable when I decide to grace them with acknowledgement. But they’re not real, of course. The idea of something being out of place would require something to be wrong, which there isn’t. I know because you told me. :)

I hate writing. It’s horrible and I’m disgusted with anything I read from myself. I do not approve of the venom that drips from my lips, and yet I refuse to pull my fangs. Maybe I could shatter the rest of my teeth while I’m at it. I could run my tongue over the raw indents where the abused shards of enamel I refused to care for would be. But since when do I care about taking care of myself? I’m scared of what I write. Every word is a little sliver of the mirrors that have cracked behind my eyes. The tears that fall hold shards of the reflective glass, and lands upon the scarred hands with which I type. I’m scared that the mirrors will be gone, and I’ll be forced to see the reality of what is before me in its entirety. And yet, I’m more scared of running out of escaping sorrow.

Why would I pursue a career in writing when I don’t know of what I write? Why would I try to make money off of a skill I do not have? What’s the point of humoring the idea that I can write? The illness that lets the steady drip of sickly ichor flow through me is the only reason I can type as I do. It’s the one who puppeteers this horrid poppet of flesh bound sinew and bone. If I am not sick, then how will I write? 

I cannot write. There is nothing to write about. Any of the scorch marks sitting heavy in my chest, and any of the burns lingering against my face from the reflected magnitude of the heat of the abhorrence of the mirrors others hold are from fault of my own. I am the reason I am sick, and I am the reason I refuse to get better. The feeling of the keys popping under my fingers is proof enough that I am not dead, and yet I let myself make allusions as to why I can only experience a dullness in place of stimulations. 

Every time I try to sit down and write like this, I try to crack a piece off of the mirrors. They’re melted into a grotesque putty, and it’s not delicate work to try and pry shards of it apart. I can swing and shatter the mass of heathenry, but then I would have to stare into the space between the shards. The spaces where I can see. 

How long can I chisel at a deformity before it is gone? Doesn’t the idea of writing to clear my mind imply that there's an end goal. That perhaps I can someday empty myself of the acid that eats away at the tissue behind my eyes. Doesn’t that mean that I’m the reason I’m ‘sick’? I don’t have the right to be upset. I know this. It’s my fault. 

The way others see me is the same, even if they claimed to have shifted their realities. Is it so easy? Why haven’t I done it for myself? I know why. I am lazy and prefer the glorification of necrophagous fantasies over the reality that the only rot in me is my own. The only poison that reaches me comes from inside. The bed of soil I rest in is free from mites and grubs, and yet I wrote. The only desecration is my own. 

As I write and try to put these pathetic ideas against a sickly backdrop of a fake shade of white, I can’t help but yawn., It seems to be tiring to do the most basic of tasks. Sometimes I wish that I could lay amongst the blankets marred with the imbecility of myself and not be roused. I want to slumber for the rest of time, and let the roots overtake me. Maybe as my flesh is eaten away and my bones are dissolved by a hundred rains, I could finally rest. 

I wish that I could bash my head against the wall and shatter everything going on inside of me. If it was in pieces, maybe it would be easier to weep under the rug. I want to hide it from myself. I don’t have anything wrong with me, I am just a hypochondriac that has done too much research. I know seven people who could agree with me. I live with three of them. Even if stories change, the words that linger are the ones that left bruises. Lying can’t fix the purple and yellow that litters my mind. 

Sometimes I wish I wasn’t like this. Sometimes I wished I was loved. But why would it change anything? I would be loved and broken. I would be shattered and adored. I would be coddled and ruined. What difference would circumstances make when I’m the one who sets the table against me? I’m the reason the betting is so low. I picked the numbers, and I knew what I was doing. I’m aware of the horrible things I do, and yet I do them. I know I’m failing classes, and yet I write with blurry vision to try and alleviate a fake weight keeping me from breathing. 

I don’t like school. I wish I didn’t have to go. But what else would I do with my day? I’m stupid. I’m tired of being told I’m not. I don't know the things people think I do. I only know things I can remember, and things that I care about. Neither of those apply to much. My mind’s empty enough that the few thoughts I can hold are the only thing keeping me from falling back into the static burning the edges of my subconscious. 

My neck hurts.

[blueboxesandtrafficcones]

The Magic of Las Vegas

Day 9 of 2020′s 31 Days of Ficmas.  Thanks to @doctorroseprompts for the list!

Prompt: Snowflake

Rating: T for sexual situations; nothing explicit

Pairing: 11xRose AU

Summary: A snowstorm in the US Midwest delays eastbound flights just before Christmas, leaving rival children’s novelists stranded in Las Vegas for the night.  A single, shared drink leads to far more than the intended one-night stand.

2020 31 Days of Ficmas masterlist

AO3

---

Standing in the ladies restroom at McCarran International Airport, Rose blinked rapidly as she waited for the eyedrops to take effect.  She’d had a full day in Las Vegas, and not the kind that made for good telly.  The last stop on her book tour, she’d soon be on her way towards home and Christmas - provided her flight could stop getting delayed.  The tree was up, presents wrapped neatly beneath it, and if the loved one waiting anxiously by the door was her mother rather than a boyfriend… so be it.  If nothing else, Jackie made the eggnog strong.

Gathering her things she returned to the gate, hopes falling - it was even emptier than it had been five minutes before, and in fact, only one potential passenger remained, arguing with one of the attendants at the counter.  I must have missed an announcement.  Shit.  Hurrying up to the check-in desk herself, she gave the unoccupied woman her best, kindest smile.  “Hi, sorry, is there any update?”

“Cancelled.”  The woman, Madison according to her nametag, didn’t look up, typing away at her computer.  “The storm in the Midwest is just getting worse, so they’ve decided to try again tomorrow.”

She tried not to groan.  Fucking snow.  All she wanted was to sleep in her own bed.  “Ohkay…  Can I get a seat on that flight?  Or the next one to London, really.  I’m not picky.”

“Boarding pass.”

Rose handed it over, trying not to be irritated; the woman was just trying to do her job, and while her customer service could use some work, it was after one in the morning.  Everyone was exhausted.

“Oh!” Madison let out, scanning Rose’s boarding pass.  “I’m sorry Miss Tyler, let me find you the next available flight.”  Attitude doing a one-eighty, she gave Rose a smile.  “My niece is a huge fan of your books. I’m actually the one who introduced her to them.”

Rose merely gave a polite smile in reply; while such a sentiment usually warmed her heart, she’d heard some variation of it from nearly everyone she’d met over her fifteen-day book tour throughout the States.  Now, though, she just wanted to go home.  I should be halfway to New York by now.

“All set, same seat, leaves at 4:30 tomorrow afternoon with a layover in LA.”

“LA?”  Her brow furrowed, trying to picture a map of the country.  “Isn’t that the wrong direction?”

Madison nodded, already printing off the new boarding pass.  “Yeah, but it’s that with a one-hour layover or Miami, with an eight-hour layover and a plane change.  It’ll be fine, and actually does save you time.”

It only took another minute to finalize the transaction, and soon enough Rose was headed for the airport exit, lugging her carry-on with her and so, so glad she’d taken her mother’s advice to keep a set of clothes with her and not check it all.  She hadn’t liked the idea of keeping the small rolling suitcase with her when she checked in, wanting to be less bogged down, but now, she was glad to have resisted the urge.  Thanks, Mum.

Footsteps behind her caught her attention, and a moment later, the man who’d been talking to the agent next to her pulled astride.  “Terribly unlucky, aren’t we?” he lamented in a slightly posher version of her own accent. “Best case is home for Christmas Eve.”

“The storm should be over tomorrow, so it’ll be fine,” she replied politely, taking him in out of the corner of her eye.  Roughly her age, he nonetheless had the distinct look of a sixty-something maths professor, complete with tweed jacket and elbow patches.  But his eyes were kind, and he was attractive in that tall, lanky sort of way, with floppy brown hair and a bowtie.

“Hope so.  I promised my niece I’d be there.”  He seemed to deflate slightly, before rallying.  “Listen, this may be terribly forward of me, but- would you like to get a drink?  I realize it’s ‘Las Vegas’, but the idea of drinking alone at Christmas just seems… sad.”

They reached the escalator then, and Rose took the opportunity of the ride down to consider the idea.  And the likely outcome.  He was reasonably handsome, if in a dorky way, and certainly seemed kind enough.  She could use the release of an anonymous shag – if nothing else, it would probably make for a good story once home.

“Sure.  Why not?”

-

Beep. Beep.  Beep.

The bleating of the alarm startled Rose awake, her head feeling as though it had been split open, her mouth dry and fuzzy.  A lucky swat silenced the alarm, none too soon.  “Oh, fuck,” she moaned, sinking back into the mattress and squeezing her eyes shut against the brightness.  “Ow.”

A pitiful sound of agreement came from her right, reminding her of how she’d gotten into such a sorry state.  As she’d predicted, one drink had turned to two, then three, then…  Damn. I actually take the chance on a one-night stand, and don’t remember the actual sex?  Just my luck.

“Why is it making that noise,” her bedpartner mumbled, sheets rustling as he shuffled around; a moment later, the heavy weight of his head settled on the dip in her bare back.  “Wanna sleep.”

“Flight home.  Miss it, and won’t be home ‘til Christmas.”  She took another chance at opening her eyes, managing to keep them that way this time despite having to squint.  “Better get ready.”

He grunted in reply, instead pressing kisses to her lower back.  “I can think of much more enjoyable things we could be doing.”

Rose merely swatted him away, rolling out of bed and managing to land on her feet, if somewhat shaky.  I hope I remember his name soon.  This might get awkward.  “Lovely as that sounds, ‘m not missing Christmas for it.”  She stretched her arms overhead, pleased at the lingering ache in certain muscles as her body started to wake up.  She might not remember their escapades, but it appeared she’d more than enjoyed them.  “Shower.”

He didn’t try to join her, which she was equally happy and disappointed with; she needed some time to let the warm water bring her back to vaguely-human levels of processing ability, but a quickie sounded good too.

This sent her mind down a warm and steamy path, and by the time she’d toweled off and donned a dressing gown, she was very much interested in a morning shag, strolling out to the bedroom to tell John- his name had come to her in the shower, thankfully- about her change of opinion, only to find him standing naked at the desk, hands on his hips.

Taking a moment to let her eyes linger on his generous assets, she didn’t immediately recognize his tense posture. “Something wrong?”

He jumped, turning to face her, eyes going wide and one hand scrambling to cover his package.  “NO!”  His gaze darted down to the desktop, expression growing a bit more fearful. “Well…”

“What?”  Concerned now, Rose stepped up to his side, distracted at first by how good he smelled.  How’s that possible, after a night of sex and drinking and hours spent at the airport?  Then she looked down, and her heart stopped.  “Please tell me that marriage license doesn’t belong to us.”

“Uh…  I dunno about you, but, yeah… that’s me.”

Rose read it over again, unable to comprehend what her eyes were telling her.  Certificate of Marriage… 22nd of December… Rose Marion Tyler…  John Matthew Smith…  “I don’t believe it,” she said faintly, looking up at him. “This isn’t- I don’t do this sort of thing.”

“Neither do I!” John protested. “Erm, is that- are you- the Rose Tyler, of the Bad Wolf books?”

Hesitantly, she nodded.

“Ah.”  He shifted uncomfortably.  “I didn’t know.  It’s just- well- I’m…” He took a deep breath, anxiety clawing at Rose’s stomach as she waited.  “I’m J.M. Smith.  I write the ‘The Doctor’ series.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Oh, fuck me.”  Rose closed her eyes, groaning.  Of all the people in the world, I hook up with my closest competitor.  They’d spent the last three years dueling on the bestseller’s lists, fighting for first in children’s fiction.  It was infuriating, and now here they were, post-coital, and married.  This cannot be real.  “How?”  Then, realizing what she said, her eyes snapped open.  “Don’t answer that.”

He nodded.  “What… do you want to do?”

“You’re on the same flight I am, right?”

Another nod.

“Let’s just… get ready and go back to the airport.  I can’t even begin to think about dealing with this yet.”

-

Upon arrival at the airport Rose was able to slip away from him, pulling a beanie on and parking herself at the next gate over; close enough to hear the announcements, but hopefully harder to spot.  When he rolled up to the gate several minutes after her, obviously looking around, she just sank lower in her chair; thankfully he seemed to overlook her, choosing a seat that put his back to her, and she relaxed marginally.

Pulling out her mobile she connected to the airport wifi, a quick search confirming that marriages in Las Vegas were legal, and worse, were recognized by the British government.  Shit.  An annulment appeared to be reasonably possible, thankfully not requiring Nevada residency.

Right.  So.  Once we get home, file for annulment, and if we’re lucky, no one ever needs to know. Including Mum.

-

Still stowing her carryon bag under the seat in front of her, Rose paid no attention to the person who plopped into the seat beside her, resettling herself before turning to look at who it was – and sighing heavily.

“I’m starting to think you’re stalking me.”

John arched a paper-thin eyebrow in response.  “I’m starting to think you’re avoiding me.”

“Oh, gee, what gave you that idea?” Huffing, she turned away from him, lifting the window shade to peer out the window.  There wasn’t much to see other than the plane at the next gate and blue skies, but she’d spend every second of the flight staring out if it meant avoiding her seatmate.  Husband.

Thankfully, he left her alone until take-off, but the reprieve was short-lived.  As she pulled out her laptop to keep working on the next draft of her story, John made a noise beside her.

“Don’t you think we should talk?”

“No.”  With more force than necessary, she pecked out her password one-handed, using the other to hide the keys.  “What’s to talk about?  We go home, we file for annulment, and with any luck, by New Year’s this will be a distant memory, and someday, perhaps even a funny story.  But today- today, this is nothing.”

Opening her manuscript, she glanced over to find him staring at her, and angled her body- and the screen- away from him. “Now you’re being creepy.”

“But aren’t you curious?”

“About what?”

“What happened?  And why?”

Rose looked at him blankly.  “We got drunk.  In Las Vegas.  And apparently have watched too many movies with that very premise.  End of story.”

“I don’t believe that,” John shook his head, fringe falling across his brow.  “What if there’s more?  What if it was fate bringing us together?”

“God, do you hear yourself? It was a terrible coincidence.  We’re competitors.  End of story.”  She glared at the screen.  “It was nothing, it meant nothing, and it will be nothing once we’re home and able to call a lawyer.  Now piss off, I have a deadline due.”  Shoving earbuds into her ears and cranking some music, she did what she could to drown him – and herself- out.

Focus on work. That’s all that matters right now.

-

The flight to LA was short, and given that she didn’t need to change planes, she didn’t have to move, though she was given the option to deplane.  Out of the corner of her eye she noticed John leave, which relaxed her somewhat; by the time passengers started boarding she’d put the earbuds away and was sitting back with her eyes closed.

A small voice chattering away caught her attention, particularly at the words “and that’s why I like the Bad Wolf books more!  Sorry.” Opening one eye to see, she found to her amusement the child, a girl around eleven, was talking to John, settling herself across the aisle from him as he reclaimed his seat.

Her eyes snapped shut, and she kept her breathing deep and even, curious as to his response.

“Can I tell you a secret?”

Rose squinted, and was positioned in such a way she could see the girl nod.

“I like the Bad Wolf books too.”

“You do?”  For being a pre-teen, the girl had skepticism down pat, and Rose had to hold in giggles.

“Oh, very much so,” John said seriously. “There are lots of books out there like mine for boys- though I try to write so anyone would enjoy- but the Bad Wolf books are special.  I think it’s so cool to see a character like that – when I was your age, pretty much all the books of the genre were about boys.  But the Bad Wolf books… anyone can connect with Thorn, and see themselves in her- she’s so real.  She’s not perfect, and she doesn’t always get it right, but who does?  In Book 3- did you read Book 3?  Good, I don’t want to spoil it- but at the end… I had almost the same thing happen to me, only it was both of my parents, and Thorn reacted exactly as I did.  And above all – never apologize for liking something more than something else.  Your opinion is exactly that – so as long as you’re not trying to hurt someone, then don’t be ashamed of what you like. Okay?”

The girl nodded, staring at John in fascination.  “You really like the books then, huh?”

“I really do.”

“What’s your favorite part?”

John inhaled through his teeth. “Ooh, that’s a difficult one.  I think- the one scene I keep coming back to is when Thorn realizes she’s grown apart from her childhood friends.  It’s really sad, yeah?  But that’s life- nearly everyone experiences that at some point, everyone drifts away from people they loved.  I’ve never read of another series or character that makes that moment so visceral.  But what about you?  What’s your favorite part?”

Turning over so her back was to them, Rose half-listened to the conversation as her mind raced.  The scene he’d referenced was fairly small, and by its nature, would only be known by someone who had read the book.

Does John Smith read my books?

-

Once they were underway and the conversation between her seatmate and the girl had long since stopped, Rose started moving around as if just waking up, complete with yawning and stretching.

“Hi.”

“Oh!”  His yelp drew her gaze; he’d been reading, the book snapping shut and quickly tucked out of view, but not before she recognized her own artwork for her most recent release; in fact, the very book she’d been crossing the country to promote.  “Hello.”

“Hi,” she repeated, sitting up and looking at him curiously.  “Were you reading my book?”

His cheeks flushed, and after a moment, he returned the book to the tray table; based on the bookmark, he’d started it before they’d met, as he hadn’t done much (or any) reading since.  “Erm, yeah.”  He gave her a sheepish smile.  “You’re a fantastic writer.”

“Thank you.”  She’d had time to think, about what he’d said about her books, how willing he’d been to discuss them- and not his own- with the young girl who appeared to be flying solo.  It had softened her approach towards him- somewhat.  “I think there’s a chance we got off on the wrong foot.”

“I agree.”

When he just stared at her, she knew she’d have to make the first move.  I was kind of a bitch to him, wasn’t I?  “Hi, I’m Rose.”

“John.”

They shook hands, Rose’s skin tingling where they touched.

“So, tell me about yourself.”

He arched a skeptical eyebrow.  “I thought you didn’t care, that we’ll just pretend none of this happened.  Harder to do knowing things about the other.”

Rose bit her lip, eyes darting down to her lap.  “Like Thorn, my dad died, only when I was a baby.  Mum always said to hold on to precious moments.  And… I don’t trust easy, so clearly, something about you made me give you the benefit of the doubt.” Taking a deep breath, she met his gaze again.  “You’ve got until we land in London to convince me to- to extend that faith.  If you want to.  We’ll see from there.  What do you say?”

Green eyes searched hers, and she kept her expression soft, nervous despite her words.  They would both be interviewing the other for position of spouse, and suddenly, it was one she wanted to pass with flying colors.

“All right,” he agreed slowly. “Let’s see what happens.”

-

The next book in each series was a cross-over, where secret agent Thorn, codenamed Bad Wolf, is rescued by an unlikely hero, The Doctor, and his strange-looking timeship, and it is only through a combination of their unique skillsets they’re able to save the day. With cover-art by Rose Tyler and a foreword from John Smith, the book was an overachieving best-seller, outdoing the previous books in each series and earning an armful of awards.

The picture on the back featured the authors with their arms around each other, he in a suit, and she in a white dress.

Both bios, at the end of the book, ended with the same phrase.

And they lived happily ever after.

[flowapuddle]

Haikyuu x Athletic! FEMALE Reader

okay so enjoy this book and the chapters, please don’t copy or take credit of it - Puddle ❤️

Chapter 2- Volleyball Practice pt. 1

“(Y/n) get up...sis you gotta get up” You heard a voice said slightly waking you up outta your sleep

You opened your eyes slightly and began rubbing them as you sat up slowly yawning “

“Oh, goodmorning Aaliyah” You said softly as you yawned a bit stretching you notice once you woke up Aaliyah was already in her uniform as she rose a eyebrow

“I am surprised your not even up, mom and dad told to come and get you” Aaliyah said slowly backing away from your bed making you look at her in question as she opened your door leading out into the hallway

“We have 10 minutes to get to school” She said looking at you with a smirk before shutting the door

“Oh 10 minutes that’s nice to know” You said with your eyes shut still sitting up and smiling

.

.

.

.

“10 MINUTES!!!!!” You yelled out as you immediately jumped out of the bed and started to get ready, you

You patted yourself on the back because you left your clothes out on your desk to use you quickly placed on your clothes and looked in the mirror trying to smooth out any rinkles in the shirt and skirt

You rushed outta your room wearing your school uniform having your backpack and of course of change of clothes for volleyball practice

You ran down the stairs almost tripping multiple times and into the dinning area as you saw Aaliyah, your father and mother sitting down at the table eating breakfast

“NO TIME FOR EATING WE HAVE TO LEAVE—why are you guys just eating...” You questioned looking at each one of them

“Sweetheart sit down, and have breakfast. School doesn’t start for another hour” Your mom hummed out smiling as she started to cut up her egg

“Your father and I wanted to have breakfast with you both, Aaliyah went to grab you to tell you breakfast was done” She said bitting into her egg

“...She was waking me up f-for breakfast....” you said as your eyebrow twitched as your eyes shifted towards Aaliyah as she had a smirk on her face

“Oh for breakfast I thought it was for letting us go to school early” Aaliyah said bitting into some jammed toast humming “Sorry (Y/n)” She said in her usual tone of voice looking back at you

You grumbled under your breathe as you took a seat next to your sister and began to eat your breakfast

After the morning shenanigan with your sister you both started to make your way outta the house

“Okay my little Pooh Bears make sure to get to school safe the car is waiting outside for you” You mom said smiling at you both and patting your heads

“Your lunches should already be in your backpacks the servants should have made you something, if you have trouble call me or your father. Goodluck at both of your practices today, I know you will make me and your father proud” She conclude as she walked both of you

“Speaking of practices Aayliah after you get done with your basketball practice, you have another one at the house for weights and ball handling drills to get you prepared. I already got a look at your schedule and you have games coming up for this school” You dad said as he looked at Aaliyah

Aaliyah only nodded making a humming noise “Okay”

“Games already?” You said as the front doors were pulled open by the servants

“Yes sweetheart, the games are already coming up I guess there two days away” You father said smiling at you

“Who are they going against?” You questioned wanting to know more information

“Apparently they are going against this school Fukurōdani Academy, it’s something big in girls basketball for the most part it’s the crows vs the owls” You father said

“But it’s nothing that Aaliyah can’t handle and I am sure with a crowd she’ll even play better, besides if your there she will make sure to do good” Your mom added as you started to step into the limo

“Bye loves see you later on tonight” Your dad said as he shut the limo door once you both were inside he waved at you both as you waved at him back and you heard two thumps ontop of the limo signaling the driver to go, as he immediately started to drive

You and Aaliyah sat in quietness

“You think your going to make friends” You said starting the conversation “Like are you nervous” you added on

Aaliyah only looked at you for a bit as her attention went outside the window “No, I have no reason to be nervous for one I hate people, and two you out all people know I get social anxiety easily” She huffed out a bit “but I guess one friend that’s my age, wouldn’t be so bad..” she mumbled out the last part and clearing her throat at bit “What about you? Are you nervous?”

You chuckled a bit “For the most part yeah, I just want people to like me and really want everyone to be my friend” You said as you saw the school slowly approaching

“I wouldn’t worry too much about people not wanting to be your friend” Aaliyah said catching your attention “Your a very umm interesting fun person to be around. You know how to put smiles on people’s faces and you know how to encourage people really well” Aaliyah said sighing out “If I were you I would have everyone like me, but sadly I am my own person and due too what happens to me when I interact with people most people take it the wrong way. So my main point is just be yourself, and don’t try to be anybody your not” Aaliyah concluded as she looked at you with the same bored face her eyes slightly soft as she ruffled your hair

“Also get out of the limo we are at school” She said with a frown

After you little conversation with Aaliyah you felt less anxious about school and headed to your first class of the day math

You were flying grades in everything expect for the subject math and you despised it

You made your way down to the classroom and seeing a young women with blonde hair and blue eyes, you could only assume this was the teacher

“Ahh you must be Ms. lmaah” The teacher said smiling looking at you, you nodded your head

“Yes that’s me!” You said with a chuckle looking at her

“It pleasure to meet someone with your status at this school you may call me Sensei or Ms. Al since I know your from the states and all I know this can be something hard to adjust to” She said with a smile readjusting her glasses as she kept her smile

You nodded at her “Of course, thank you Ms. Al”

“You can stay out here, once I settle down the class and what not, I will call you inside. Goodluck honey” She said before walking into the classroom

You stood outside the door and waited patiently for the teacher to call you in as you leaned agasint the wall

A few minutes went by until you heard

“Ms. Imaah please come in” You heard the teacher said as you leaned off the wall and walked inside the classroom shutting the sliding door behind you

You entered the class standing infront of everyone as you held your other arm slightly embarrassed as you looked down

“Go ahead and introduce yourself” The teacher encouraged happily

“Umm hello...my name is Imaah, (Y/n) I am from the states. You can call me (Y/n), uhh I play volleyball I am setter and sometime the ace of the team.” You said as you looked at everyone in class slowly getting comfortable with your setting “I hope to be your friend” You said with a smile

“Lovely job Imaah you can seat in next to Tsukishima, please raise your hand Tsukishima” The teacher asked politely

You saw the hand in the air as you slowly approached the hand, the boy named Tsukishima had blonde hair with piercing bright brown eyes and his dollar earbuds around his neck. Along with the earbuds he had black plain glasses

‘Why does he look so familiar to me?’

You questioned yourself as you seat next to him pulling out a piece of paper and a pencil. As you slowly started to take notes on the subject at hand.

TIME SKIP

As you got done with your last class before lunch you slowly started to pack up your things

“Excuse me” You heard someone said as you looked up seeing the blonde boy you were so desperately trying to figure out the name of

“Uh yes?” You questioned with a raised eyebrow

“Are you the younger sister of Aaliyah?” He questioned as you nodded your head

“Yes why?” You questioned as you raised a eyebrow a bit

“Ahh so this is shortest family member of Imaah, how does it feel to have to look up to your sister, mom and dad everyday?” He said with a smirk

A tick visable formed on your forehead, yes your the shortest in your family so what. He doesn’t have  patronize you about being the shortest.

You frowned looking up to him visable annoyed

“What’s a matter don’t tell me you have a short fuse” He said getting closer to your face holding a slick smirk

You felt your face getting red not because of embarrassment no no no because you were generally annoyed at him in a spam of a couple of minutes , why on earth is he trying to pick a fight with you?

“Interesting from what I have seen, you were a quick fuse person” He commented obviously knowing he was getting a rise outta you

Your eyebrow slowly started to twitch as you huffed out trying to keep yourself calm

‘If this is what I have to deal with then I rather have Aaliyah be blunt with me’

You thought to yourself as you kept hearing this Tsukishima person keep on at it and talking what seemed forever

He had been making remarks about you for a good 2 minutes to get a rise outta you until you had completely blocked him out

“Can you shut up for two seconds, or do you have to keep making remarks to try and get a rise outta me?” You questioned looking at him finally since you shut your eyes you held a frown on your face as he was visable shocked in a way

“Oh the short one has something to finally say—“ you interrupted him as you sighed loudly

“Obviously I would expect someone like you to take a hint since you have glasses that should make you twice as smarter but sadly you can’t take social ques even with glasses” You started out as you notice the door open since it was lunch and Aaliyah with your her stuff looking for you obviously

You thanked yourself as you stood up “Unlike you uhh Tsukishima I think your name was...I don’t have time and enegry to waste on insluting you or whatever the heck is going on” You started to grab your stuff as you looked down at him “See ya later four eye freak” You said mockingly waving at him as you grabbed your lunch and walked towards Aaliyah and left the classroom before a little green head walked in

“Tsukki!! Guess what! Uhh tsukki? Are you okay?” He questioned his friend obviously concerned and confused on why he was smirking while looking at the door

“Oh I am fine, I just have some competition I have to deal with” He said smoothly as he looked at his green haired friend

......

“Yeah Aaliyah and then he said I was the shortest in the family!” You shouted as you two sat down outside she looked at you tilting her head

“But are you not? Your only 167.64 (5ft, 6) and I am 182.88 (6’0)” Aaliyah said bitting into her food with her chopsticks

“Okay so maybe I am! But I didn’t have to be remind of it...jerk” You mumbled as you bite into your octopus shaped hotdog

“Personally I think your taking it too personal it’s obvious he is just trying to get into your head don’t let it mess with you so much, so what your the shortest in the family; your still the #1 best girls volleyball player” She said taking another bite of her cherry tomato

“Yeah I guess it’s true” You said eating another hotdog “How has class been with you so far? Are the college prep class hard?”

“No, in all honesty it’s the same back in the states, very basic and straight forward. In fashion designing class since I am a teachers assistant, there was guy their trying to talk to me. Uhhh he had a manbun he looks very imitating but he is very” A frown visable shown on her face along with her eyebrow twitch as she blinked “Oh great here they come now” She mumbled sighing out

“Who comes?” You questioned looking where her eyes were and seeing Sugawara, Daichi and the person she was just describing with them “The people we meet yesterday?” You questioned

“Yes.” Is all she said as they approached the two of you

“Hi (Y/n) and Aaliyah!” “Hey” “uhh hi” they all said

You smiled at waved at them “Hi senpais, glad to see you again what’s up?” You said eating a bit of your rice as you looked to them

“We were wondering if we could seat with you both” Sugawara said smiling happily looking down at you two

“I am leaving.” Aaliyah said immediately standing up not even finishing her food her usual stoic aura came back as she looked at you and then the three boys bowing her head a bit “I have gym, and I attend to get in their early to work on a few moves” She said before walking off

The three boys sweatdropped as they still sat down and started to eat their lunch as you finished up your lunch, the atmosphere was kinda tense a bit after Aaliyah left you cleared your thoart and looked at them “So how have your classes been going?”

“For me their going good” Sugawara replied bitting into some food

“Nothing to crazy, since finals are coming up. All of us have to score good. I dobut any of us will have trouble but we are concerned about the first years. Also Fukurōdani Academy is hosting a volleyball camp, in three weeks from now are your sister and you able to make it?” Daichi questioned

“Ahh I assume yes, that’s funny to think about though” You said mumbling as you placed your hand under your chin

“What’s fun?” Said the man bun person as he was eating

“Aaliyah has a game at Fukurōdani Academy for basketball” You said shrugging your shoulders

“When is it? Maybe we can get the team to come out and support her” Daichi said finishing up his meal

“It’s three days from now” You said slowly starting to put your things away as you wiped your mouth with a napkin

“Ah, I see maybe we can go out. We just need to convince coach and find rides” Sugawara said mumbling

“Well rides I can do, so don’t worry about that the only thing we need to worry about is how to get out there” You mumbled “And do we want to surprise her, she doesn’t do well with surprises though” You said sweatdropping

“I think surprising her will be fun” The man bun said finishing up his food

“Your right Asahi it would be fun to surprise” Daichi said smiling

“Okay surprise it is, but down blame me when she gets in a mood swing” You said rubbing the back of your head

(ANOTHER TIME SKIP)

As school let out for the day you made your way out of the classroom getting your notes into your backpack as you slowly started to make your way to the gym

Your sister Aaliyah was waiting for you leaning against the wall with a leg slightly up and her eyes shut as it looked like some random dude was walking to her and her being her wasn’t obviously interested

She heard footsteps as she looked up and started to walk towards you obviously not noticing the presence of the dude next to her as her hair swished back and fourth as she looked down to you with blue piercing eyes “I am walking you to the bathroom so we both can change then to the volleyball gym and meeting you there after my practice is finish” She said bluntly

You nodded your head “Okay sounds good” You said following behind her as you hummed making your way to the bathrooms, once getting inside you both started to change

“Oi (y/n)” You heard Aaliyah called out

“Yes” You hummed out putting on your black spandex and (f/c) sports bra while you put on a plain white compressed shirt as your turned around

“They won’t say anything to me if I have a belly button piercing right?” She questioned as she was putting all of her hair up into a bun barely managing it as she was wearing a gray blackish compressed shirt with rolled up red shorts

Silence hit you

“YOUR HAVE A BELLY BUTTON PIERCING!!!!?”

“You act surprise” She mumbled out as she rolled down her compressed shirt and looked at you “Well is it noticeable?”

You still in shock over the belly button piercing “n-no” you stuttered out

“Cool” She said getting to finally get all her hair up as you could finally see her face and her figure very well

“Let’s go” She said noticing you were done

“Ahh okay okay hold on” You said placing your things in your backpack and started to walk out with her

You both got many looks from both boys and girls as some would whistle at you or both of you

You both made it to the gym as you opened the door placing your things down

As you walked in almost immediately Noya and Tanka started to praise you

“The goddess have returned—AND THEY ARE SHOWING SKIN!!!” Tanka yelled visable making your sister flinch at the loud noise

“Here take my sweater and cover yourselves” Noya said tossing his sweater at you and standing infront of you both

“Can it you too and shut the hell up” Aaliyah said

“Yes Ma’am” They both said making her sigh and roll her eyes

“Please calm down you down” You mumbled out as you gave back Noya sweater and notice the boys starting to come towards you guys

“Ahh hello boys” You said waving at them some waved back and others said hi while a lot Where blushing

“Can i leave” Aaliyah said with a frown not liking the attention at all

“Please Stay” Tanka said whining as he got on his knees

“no, i have my own sport to tend to” Aaliyah hissed out

“What sport is that?” One of the taller boys asked in the black having all black hair he kinda looked like a blueberry

“basketball, like my sister. i play a sport and that’s basketball, I ranked #1 best female basketball player” Aaliyah said bluntly looking at everyone

A bit were taken back not even knowing about your ranking

“Volleyball is obviously the better sport you should’ve done it instead” the blonde boy with glasses—WAIT TSUKISHIMA how did you not notice him, he was in volleyball SON OF A BITC—

“I am fine, unlike you I like psychically things that actual acquire you actual move around and get physical with other people. Unlike volleyball your team is separated from two sides of the court and you don’t touch anybody. With basketball you have to be mentally and physically strong” Aaliyah said looking at him with a frown “That’s something you probably would be able to handle, you’ll just get thrown around the court like a rag doll” She said with a shrug “On that note I am leaving” Aaliyah said turning around to leave

Visable everyone was shocked and some in awe “Whoa so cool!” You heard hinata yelled out after she was gone

You chuckled with a sweatdropped “Lets just get practicing”

“Yeah sure that’s fine” Daichi said clearing his thoart “Coach should be here soon, we wanted to go over a couple of sets if you don’t mind. We need to practice can you be on the mock team going against us?” Daichi questioned

“Yeah of course, sure let me get to plumpt all of you in volleyball!!!” You said cocky as you brought your fist to you hand cracking it “You guys are going to loose!” You added on with a smirk

Everyone in the gym sweatdropped and all at once they all thought

“I need to be on (y/n) team”

——————————————————————————

A/n: Dam hella mf words, sorry I will try to limit it but it’s like 2k or 3k I am honestly not sure

Are you guys enjoying the book so far, y’all have any notes or special requests?

Chapter 3 is here!!!

Chapter Story Board

[slumberinglabyrinth]

People paint Rudolf as the primary reason why Berkut mcfreaking lost it and murdered Rinea, and while it’s not wrong to state that they were both casualties of his grand ambitions towards deicide, I think that it’s still worth noting that his relationship with his nephew wasn’t anywhere near as ‘you’re just a backup ruler for Rigel in case The Prophecy does not come to pass and my son doesn’t succeed’ as people make it out to be.

Massena in particular spells parts of this (and Rudolf’s motivations) out near the start of Act 5, but does it actually manifest in-game or is this just an informed trait?

“A moment, Prince Albein? I ask that you show Lord Berkut compassion. He weighed heavy on Emperor Rudolf’s mind for many years. The emperor knew that keeping the boy in ignorance could only bring him pain. And yet, the prospect of your being discovered was too great a risk. Still, Berkut was his nephew, and the same age as the son he parted with. So I beg leniency of you, if only to respect Emperor Rudolf’s wishes.”

There are two interactions (that we see) between Rudolf and Berkut which help us answer that question; near the ends of Act 3 and of Act 4.

The first scene is after Berkut returns to the castle after he “challenged the Deliverance for sport and lost”. Rudolf asks him if he had fought Alm and lost, Berkut says yes and gets all mopey. Jedah takes the chance to mock Berkut, they argue for a bit, and Berkut begs Rudolf for a second chance. Rudolf says sure, go ahead and defend the border, and Berkut sulks off to be accosted by Nuibaba.

At no point in this scene does Rudolf reprimand Berkut. His silence as Jedah’s harsh words cut into Berkut must have stung, but from our perspective, where Rudolf is silent from when he learned that the Deliverance is no pushover to when Berkut gets his attention later on in that scene, it should be clear that Rudolf’s mind is elsewhere (no doubt thinking about his son) instead of deliberately sitting by idly, watching his nemesis berate his nephew.

This also serves to establish, in retrospect, that Rudolf is clearly preoccupied with his 17-year-long godslayer plan finally beginning to bear fruit. His son, who he had to give away in order to give him a chance to survive to adulthood, has grown into a fine young man; his plan for the future of Valentia is in go-mode and the actions of his nephew weren’t something he needed to be concerned with at the time. He had a son to traumatize and a god to kill by proxy, after all!

This ends up being a mistake, because... uhhhhhh yeah we all know how Echoes ends.

Near the beginning of Act 4, Berkut has a short scene where he says some incredibly unkind things to Rinea and spills the beans on why he’s so whiny his tragic, sympathetic backstory, and then we learn that the mirror Nuibaba gave Berkut probably created a hotline into Berkut’s brain for Duma’s personal use. The relevant part of that scene is this:

“From childhood, all that’s ever been asked of me is strength. It is my duty as one born to stand above others. To rule. I’ve been taught that all my life. By my father, my mother… How am I to remain calm in the face of defeat at the hands of peasants?! I even debased myself by making use of that deviant’s powers… And it’s still not enough?!”

So Berkut has some problems with self-worth that were instilled by his parents, but what’s that? There’s absolutely no mention of his uncle! This is Berkut at the lowest point in his life (so far); if the king of Rigel had placed unfair expectations on him, when would he voice his grievances but now?

It’s not particularly strong evidence, but wouldn’t this at least suggest that Rudolf didn’t do things to make Berkut’s life a living hell? At least until the whole surprise! secret true heir stuff came to light?

Of course that probably made the betrayal even worse, but, as Massena mentioned above, Rudolf couldn’t really say “hey don’t get comfy expecting to be king, I’ve got a son who’s gonna kill duma and unite the whole continent in a few years” either.

The second scene between the two is as Ruldof is preparing to face the Deliverance. Rudolf tells Massena to ‘handle things’ (read: be the exposition device he was born to be), and is about to set off when Berkut flags him down.

“Your Excellency, wait!”

“Berkut.”

“Sire, why have you not given me leave to join the front lines? I know I failed you at the border, but all the more reason I beg for this chance!”

"A merciful leader may grant a second chance. Only a fool allows a third.”

"Your Excellency!”

"My army has no place for the weak. You’ll remain here and watch in quiet.”

"No… Please! Have mercy, sire! …Your Excellency! …Uncle!”

Harsh, huh? At first glance it seems like Rudolf is punishing him, but his very next line paints it in a completely different light.

“Brave warriors of Rigel. You have fought with courage and skill at my side these long years. But the hour of reckoning is upon us. Our empire’s light is guttering. Now heed my words well! If I should fall, my final order is that you lay down your arms and surrender. I hear the young Zofian general is a man of mercy. If you have any love and loyalty for me, you’ll not waste your lives this day.”

Berkut wouldn’t have stood down when Alm prevailed and Rudolf knew that. Keeping Berkut off the battlefield was a calculated move with the intent of having Berkut live long enough to learn that the conflict was over and that he had no reason to throw his life away. But man, Rudolf was bad at math.

My goal with this post wasn’t to exonerate Rudolf from his role in Berkut’s fall to darkness because the end result nonetheless remains, but isn’t there a clear difference between the actions Rudolf took and those of the Duma Faithful’s? Between him choosing to put the safety of his best friend and own son over (what he thought was just going to be) the pride of his nephew, and a bunch of people who deliberately try to goad Berkut into committing the most heinous of acts in order to ensure the eternal reign of their decaying, mad god?

[writeanapocalae]

Deviant Killer

Read on AO3 | Warnings: Android body horror/murder and I don’t like Detroit Become Human so there will be inaccuracies. 

Three weeks since the revolution and everything was hanging by a thread. People like him were no longer acceptable so he’d had to go to sensitivity training and all sorts of seminars, corporate and HR trying to break the cycle before hate crimes grew rampant. Gavin had never been one for seminars and he wasn’t one for treating a toaster like anything other than a toaster. He wouldn’t change just because someone told him to.

But he could see the difference between a toaster and a person and the androids, well, they were acting more like people every day. Some of them were still toasters and they seemed to be proud of being toasters but others were like Connor, where they were never quite just machines to begin with. He still gave them the cold shoulder, didn’t want anyone to think that he was wrong, or that he had a bigger heart than he did, but he could see that they were hurting and that they were trying to be better than they were made to be.

Someone must have noticed because he’d been assigned to aid in the raid on Cyberlife. It was lead by Markus and his team but the DPD was the majority of the firepower. When the doors were pried open it didn’t seem that they needed much in terms of that though. All of the humans were out of there or dead, it was hard to tell. Any evidence was well taken care of. Gavin decided that they’d all escaped, since there were no bodies and there was no way to guess which of the androids would have killed their oppressors.

They were split into teams, Gavin going alongside Hank and Connor while Tina, Chris, and Kyle, a recently deviated police officer, went down to a lower floor. Markus, North, Simon, and Josh were heading straight forward and up, all the way to the top.

Most of the androids were safe, happy to see them, already deviated, either by the revolution or by each other. Connor helped deviate the ones that hadn’t yet before directing them downstairs and out. There were retainers out there, people from Jericho, people to help. Gavin snarled whenever one of them got too close or he caught one of the others looking at him. There were too many of them to have been all active before the revolution was over, so they must have been activating one another as well.

Then they started to find the broken.

There were a lot of them, some just sitting in rooms, hooked up to thirium pumps. Some of them were sporting arms or legs that didn’t fit them right. Some of them looked like they’d been cut into, with weapons. Connor frowned and Gavin knew what that meant. These were too many, in the wrong part of the building, for them all to have just been in for repairs.

Connor took them down a hall, to one of the security towers. There was a wall of monitors and a remote that looked like it was more modern than anything in Gavin’s apartment. Connor was silent as he went through the tapes, rewinding, changing cameras, searching. Hank just gave Gavin a look and shrugged. He was as much out of the loop as Gavin was.

“There!” Connor exclaimed, rewinding just a bit more before replaying the scene.

It was just a blur, something black and white and blue smearing through the hall, leaving splatters of blue in its wake.

“The hell is that?” Hank grumbled, pushing his hair back from his face.

“I’ll show it again, at 25% speed,” Connor explained as he did just that. He could have just done it, he didn’t have to explain it when he did. Gavin crossed his arms and watched.

There was a person, an android, and it was still moving too fast to be normal. It was stiff too and, while it had Connor’s face, it looked much less human. It had a piece of sharp metal in one hand and was chasing down an android before slicing into it and pulling back, ripping out it’s pump and letting thirium spill out around it as it did.

“The phck?” Gavin breathed.

Hank was leaning closer to the monitor too, “Is this some sort of joke?”

“This is not a joke,” Connor placidly stated, That is an RK900 model android and he is killing lower level models, all of which seem to be deviants.”

Gavin wasn’t stupid, he could figure out the basic math there, “So a 900? That makes him the next level from you. Why can’t you move like that?”

Connor shook his head as if to clear it. “I was designed to hunt down deviants, to find Jericho, and neutralize it. The RK900 appears to have been designed to destroy deviants without learning more about them or solving cases. It looks more like a killing machine.”

“You think we’ve been coming across its victims?” Hank put a hand on Connor’s shoulder. Connor actually looked like he relaxed into the touch, shoulders drooping slightly. A truly human response. Gavin took his gaze away, back to the screen, where it had been paused on RK900’s blurred features.

“Yes, but I believe that they are the quote lucky ones.”

“Then we shouldn’t waste our time in here,” Gavin grumbled. “We got more more of you plastic pricks to round up. The longer we stall the more of them that thing can get.”

“Correct,” Connor nodded to him, ignoring the insult. He pushed his way into the lead and they went deeper into the building.

More androids, a whole room of the same face, cowering, shivering, as if they were cold. In the middle of them were the pieces of another, and even Gavin could recognize the skinless remains to be another of the rest of them. They startled at Connor’s face then calmed at his demeanor and serial number. They were damaged in the end, because Gavin didn’t want to associate the word ‘trauma’ with androids, and some of them were frozen and glitching. Still, they got them out of the room and towards the front of the building. There would be people ready to take care of them.

The last one to leave was missing fingers and half of its jaw, but it had been wrapped well enough to keep the thirium from spilling out. It reached out and grabbed Connor, hard, and both Gavin and Hank shot forward to stop it. They didn’t though, seeing it was just an interface. They had both been told to not separate two androids during an interface, as it could lead to stress levels jumping and the death of one or both parties.

Connor stilled, letting it happen, LED blinking yellow in time with the other’s. There were a few flickers of red in there as well. Gavin may not have known much about androids, but he could see that Connor was being stressed regardless.

Before he’d decided whether or not to ignore his training, the damaged android released Connor and he breathed a copy of a deep breath before standing up straighter and fixing his tie. The damaged android walked off, leaving them, and Connor looked like he was getting ready for his first day at the office. His LED was circling yellow with a few blinks of red in it.

“What did she tell you?” Hank asked and Gavin curled his lip at the way that Hank ran a hand along Connor’s jaw. It was too intimate.

“We were correct in our assumption that the damage here was caused by the RK900,” he stated plainly, even as his eyes flickered to he ground. “It is a masterpiece in its design, the next step in android evolution. It is less human than it predecessors, less emotions, mistakes, or deviations. It can calculate and react faster than other androids in its own class, designed to wipe out the menace of deviancy.” he sounded like an advertisement. When he looked back up at Hank his eyebrows tied into a knot of concern and there was a small flash of fear in his features. “He was designed, not as the next in the RK line but as my replacement. The revolution was expected to fail and he would have been sent out to clean up the mess.”

“They worked fast if they got something like that up and running before the revolution was over,” Gavin realized.

Connor shook his head, “No. They started to build me before deviancy started and they started on him as soon as I was released onto the field.”

Hank looked at him and then at Gavin. “Wait, but that means that they were expecting deviancy.”

Gavin ran his hand through his hair, “What you’re telling me is that these assholes knew that they fucked up so bad with you eggheads that they started to clean up their mess before the press knew about it? And then they made the phcking terminator to finish it up?”

“I do not understand their reasoning behind it yet but that does appear to be what they were hoping to accomplish, yes.”

“Phcking Cyberlife.”

“Indeed.”

Gavin started to walk off, only to stop a few steps later to let the other two catch up. They went through their work as best they could but now they were all looking for it, listening for it, in every room and corridor. They didn’t find any more corpses, though they did find plenty of unfinished androids. It was strange to see them, laid bare and with their guts out, their skin not yet put on. It made them even more obviously not human.

“This floor is 98% clear of android life,” Connor stated as they headed towards the cafeteria.

“Is that including you?” Gavin scoffed, “Or does your lack of a life exclude you?”

“I assure you,” Connor’s LED spun but even then he failed to catch the joke, “I am very much alive.”

The cafeteria was supposed to be a human only space but it, as with the rest of the building, had been taken over by the androids that had been left behind. A few of them were in here, huddling together awkwardly. When the three of them entered they turned, weapons at the ready. They raised their hands in surrender, both humans looking to Connor to explain.

“We are here to aid all of the androids in escaping Cyberlife,” Connor explained, voice calm and collected, only betrayed by his yellow LED. “We do not mean you harm.”

It was strange to see Connor interact with another RK800, wearing the same uniform and posture. They did look different though, Gaving had spent enough time glaring at their resident tin can to recognize that his expression was a tad bit softer, his eyes roaming more. Connor had been alive longer and he showed it more.

“We are here to protect all of the androids still residing in Cyberlife from the RK900 unit,” the RK800 explained, pointing with his gun. Hank whistled at the pile of corpses that he’d gestured at and Gavin felt a cold sinking feeling in his gut. “It is not allowed to harm any other androids while we live.”

The corpses and pieces of corpses, were all dead androids, all plastic and metal, shoved into the gaps in the barricade made out of benches and desks. They were terrified of RK900 and, from what they’d seen they had every right to be.

“Understood,” Connor stated. “Please take a scan of the Cyberlife building.”

The RK800 did as he was told and, when his LED returned to blue he seemed to sigh a bit, relaxing. The other two androids, a WR600 and a PJ500, just looked to him, obviously their leader. “The building is primarily empty.” There was obvious relief in his voice, “You have been aiding our siblings in finding freedom of this place.”

“Correct.”

The conversation didn’t progress. The three of them stood there and Connor and the detectives stood on the other side. No one was moving.

“This is bullshit,” Gavin rolled his eyes. “Look, can you just go, maybe leave the weapons, so we can do our job?”

“We cannot leave,” The PJ500 explained, “Not while that thing is still alive! Some of us tried to make it deviant, but it wouldn’t take and we were killed or disfigured for it! Either we will stay here or it will be killed and nothing we have done has been able to take it down yet.”

Gavin rolled his eyes. These things were supposed to be smarter than humans, weren’t they? “Look, dipshit, that thing is designed to kill deviants! What do you think it’s going to do if there aren’t any deviants around?”

LEDs were whirling. At least he got them thinking.

“Don’t you think that, just maybe, you should leave the stupid humans you’re built to replace take the lead for once?”

They looked at one another, obviously communicating between themselves. Slowly the guns came down. Their hands came down after.

“Connor, you want to escort them to safety?” Hank indirectly ordered, giving him a familiar smile.

“No,” Connor stated, “I need to remain here and help you deal with the RK900.”

“No, you really don’t,” Gavin explained through his teeth. “You’re kind of a deviant, if you didn’t forget.”

“But I want to keep you safe.” Not to Gavin, never to Gavin, his eyes were just for Hank right then.”

“We’ll be fine,” Hank nodded and Gavin didn’t know how good androids were at reading human emotions but Gavin could easily tell that Hank was lying. “You go out there, get everyone a cozy blanket. We’ll be right behind you.”

“Contact the other teams,” Gavin corrected, “Let them know that to finish up and get out of here. I know the big dude’s got some technical shit he wants to do at the top but he might want to come back later.”

Only then did Connor obey, leading the other three out of there. Gavin and Hank got to work, tearing the barricade apart. They didn’t have to touch too many of the cold plastic things, the benches that they pulled out of the way made most of them spill out of the way. The floor and walls were dyed blue, though it was fading. Gavin felt like he was going to throw up. Hank was either unfazed or pretending to be and he was doing a very good job at pretending.

How long had it been, since Gavin stopped thinking of them as toasters? He thought that he’d be able to handle this, dead androids were no worse than dead computers but at some point his own wires must have gotten crossed because he didn’t want to touch the bodies, even without skin he couldn’t think of them as just empty shells. Somewhere along the line androids had become people. He hated it.

Removing the barricade should have taken enough time for the rest of the androids to get out of there. Gavin and Hank both took out their firearms, holding them in front of themselves, before Hank put his hand on the door.

“Anyone in there?” He called out before moving, “We’re going to come in. We don’t want any trouble.”

There was no answer. Hank pushed the door open.

[fearofflamingos]

Alright, it’s a date!

Summary/AN: This takes place during the hiatus we’re currently on (before Jan. 18th) so everything as far as ‘New Girls’ is the context. This is also supposed to take place before the events of Season 3 Episode 8. This honestly ended up being complete different than what my goal was but I’m fine with that. Enjoy a very soft Tyrus date with an okay-ish ending.

Includes: POV!cyrus, crushing!cyrus, anxious!cyrus, (somewhat) jealous!cyrus, soft!TJ, Tyrus, (this is suggested, not stated) Amber + TJ Kippen siblings! (but cyrus thinks it’s flirting between them), this is basically a date but actually plausible

Warnings: I poked at dead jyrus (sorry not sorry), cyrus thinks TJis flirting with Amber (according to me, the writer, that is not true), realization of feelings

Word count: 1,368

Genre: fluff/oneshot (I may continue this tho so tbd)

——-

“Goodman!”

I heard that familiar voice call out and I couldn’t help but smile as he jogged over to me.

“You’re allowed to call me by one name you know?” I teased.

He began to scratch the back of his neck with an awkward smile

“You don’t like that?”

I snorted at his immediate change of demeanor. Confident and smiley to an awkward mess, who would’ve thought of all people the once infamous “scary-basketball-guy” would be like this?

“I’m messing with you, Kippen.”

I was trying to give his last name a shot but it came out weird and I added

“I can’t pull that off, can I?”

He smiled widely and shook his head.

It was the kind of smile that made his eyes squint, his laugh lines be defined, and his chin lift a bit.... not that I thought about his smile much.

“Anyways, what’d you want to tell me?” I asked trying to force myself back to reality.

“Right, sorry. I was wondering if you wanted to go the Spoon after school.”

The Spoon? We hadn’t hung out their before except for that one incident with Andi and her Jonah drama.

“Just us?” I questioned probably just a little too happily.

“Considering the last time we hung out with my friends it didn’t go so well and your friends aren’t my hugest fans I figured just us would be fine... unless you already have plans?”

Correct me if my wrong but did he look a little disappointed at that thought?

“No, no! No plans here I’m as planless as... something that... doesn’t have plans. Only one question, why the Spoon?”

Luckily TJ didn’t mind my lame failed attempts at jokes and just general speaking but it didn’t stop me from internally scolding myself.

“Well it’s inside and it’s not where I work which knocks out a couple of our hang out places. Also I could really use something to eat and they happen to have food there.”

His explanation was so good I almost felt bad about asking in the first place? Why did I ask exactly? Oh... i was trying to recover from the plan thing. Don’t remind me. Still, come on Cyrus, you’re usually awkward so you’re better than this!

“Yea, that’s cool. I’ll let my mom know right now.”

I couldn’t help but smile. I was going to the Spoon with just TJ. TJ and babytaters and fingers crossed no drama and babytaters in the same place. Did I say babytaters twice? Yea, I did!

“I’ll meet you by your locker after school then, see you later.” He said saluting to me.

“Alright, it’s a date.”

The sentence left my mouth before I could possibly think.

I swear I felt my hear stop. I stood their quietly with wide eyes. Maybe if I freeze long enough I’ll disappear. He’s gonna cancel plans. Oh geez he’s gonna awkwardly laugh and say no. He’s gonna hate me, why did I come to school today? Why am I allowed to speak?

It was quiet for a moment.

He didn’t do any of that.

With an unreadable expression he just ruffled my hair and walked away.

I let out a huge breath I hadn’t know I’d been keeping in after a couple of seconds.

A hair ruffle? A hair ruffle. Maybe he didn’t notice? I do joke a lot so he probably took it as one. I mean.. it was one, it was a joke.

I facepalmed internally, what just happened?

...

After the last bell rang and I started collecting my things I could help a small smile to myself. As I walked I couldn’t help but think about the situation I was currently in. No interruptions just me and TJ hanging out at the Spoon.

Wait.

I walked over to a wall briskly and leaned against it while searching through the contents of my backpack. I don’t have any money. I’m gonna ruin a good day because I decided to clean my backpack last night. Why is the universe so cruel? No, it’s fine I just won’t get anything.

I zipped up my things and continued walking over to my locker, waving when I finally saw him stood next to it.

“All set?” He asked when we were finally within mere feet of each other.

“Yea, let’s go.”

Our walk was spent mostly talking about our interests which were always surprisingly more similar than I expected.

We liked similar music and shows, we had our personally dreaded classes (mine being PE and his being math), and our senses of humor lined up pretty well.

Even when we talked about differences neither of us mocked or got upset with the other which is my favorite part.

He talked about Basketball-which I had no clue about- and even if I was lost, hearing him speak so passionately made me want to hear even more.

When I made a self-deprecating joke or when I almost tripped crossing the street all he would do was hold my shoulder comfortingly, sending little shocks of electricity through me.

I never experienced that before. It was a strange, scientific phenomena.

When we approached the Spoon’s entrance he grabbed the door and gestured me inside with a warm smile.

After I entered, he followed suit and we sat at a nearby booth.

“So what do you think you’re gonna get?” He asked as Amber walked over and gave us two menus.

When he grabbed it from her he directed his smile her way and I felt a little funny.

She rose her eyebrow and glanced over at me before patting his shoulder.

I was probably staring oddly and I was only shaken from my trance when TJ waved a hand in front of my eyes.

“Earth to Underdog?”

I shook my head and let out an awkward laugh.

“Sorry I was gone for a couple seconds there. So Underdogs back then? Good, I like that one.”

He retreated his hand and spoke confidently.

“It’s some of my best work.”

He put his chin on his hand and continued “You still didnt answer my question though, what are you getting?”

Weirdly enough he seemed extremely interested in my nonexistent order.

“I’m not all that hungry. Big lunch, big big lunch. Nothing for me.”

I maybe said that a little too suspiciously because he leaned back and studied me. After a couple seconds of staring he inquired

“What do you usually get here?”

I leant forward and pointed at the menu

“Babytaters and a milkshake, the most iconic of their options.”

He laughed looking at the food names

“Wouldn’t expect anything less from you.”

Amber made her way over notebook already in hand

“Ready to order?” She said taking the pencil from behind her ear.

I looked over at TJ who was studying the menu before speaking up

“Yea, I’ll have two orders of baby taters, one chocolate milkshake, and one strawberry shake.”

My jaw dropped and I blinked a couple times as TJ grabbed our menus and hand them to Amber.

“Wow, you must be thirsty.”

I finally decided to say something, anything, hoping he just wanted both flavors.

“The chocolate shake is for you.” He answered with a shrug.

I opened my mouth but no words came out.

Seeing my expression he added “unless you want strawberry?”

He’s such a dork.

“I really didn’t want to get anything.” I lied.

He’s gonna think I’m cheap for not paying, why did I clean my backpack. Damn Buffy and her pestering. Why did he order for me? Freaking mind reading TJ

“Today’s lunch was disgusting so hopefully a shake will redeem your palate. Besides, I’m paying so if you’re not lying to me right now I will take it for myself. I promise you, I’m willing to make that sacrifice.”

He’s paying? This does seems a lot like a date... and that idea sounds strangely nice to me. Hold on, what am I thinking? Have I gone insane?

I looked up to see he had put on that adorable faux pout and then I realized it was happening.

For the first time since Jonah I noticed my heart did that thing where it quickly went badoom, badoom, badoom, badoom.

Oh. Wait.

I looked up at him and he straightened up.

“Did you see a ghost? You’re even more pale than usual and your eyes are doing that scared thing.”

“I must’ve.” I said in a monotone voice.

because I am so dead!

You like TJ? I couldn’t help but my ask myself to see if it was real.

I looked at his now genuinely concerned expression. His features look so much softer when he’s not being mean.

Yeah, I do. I told myself without another thought

——

Send prompts or feedback to my inbox <3

[lillianduo]

To Grid or not to Grid

Grids and graphics. Graphics and no grids. Do you see a correlation? Does it mean anything to you? At first I didn’t even know there was a concept of a grid that existed in the design world. In this lecture conducted by Jess Baines and JP, I was introduced to the debate of whether graphics needed a grid to be considered good or bad design. I guess it would be a good idea to tell you the definition of the grid, and no, it’s not the grid you would find in a maths test! 

Grid System  – the systematic formatting of layout and organisation of type and image from post war 20th century.

Sounds fancy right? Well, JP gave a very convincing argument explaining how the use of a grid can help bring order and organise text and images to make it more eligible. Apparently it’s through method, order, creativity and universality which makes the grid so adaptable to any design. It’s universal! Of course, for it to be universal it has to be understood by everyone. Grids can allow things to happen, it can make people around the world unite and understand one universal language. I know you love the Olympics so this is a perfect example. For the Munich Olympics, Otl Aicher and his design team created pictograms that just consisted of images alone. They had to get rid of the bad image of how Germany was viewed initially due to the war, so they used a grid system to send this message to everybody. It was very successful I must say, the pictograms are very aesthetically pleasing and I immediately understand what the design is trying to communicate.

Google Images - OTL Munich Olympics 1972

You remember one of my favourite designers Josef Brockmann right? Did you know that he was one of the main producers of the grid system? He thinks that “the designer’s work should have the clearly intelligible, functional and aesthetic quality of mathematical thinking.” (Muller. J, 2011) So all design should be objective and the main focus should be the content of the information. Sticking to his words, most of his works follow a very simplistic design and you can tell he used a grid. 

Google Images - Josef Brockmann Grid 

I looked through his book, ‘Grid Systems’ and came across a lot of information talking about grids. He believes it’s a reflection of designers to use their “knowledge, ability and mentality” to create design. It revolves around the idea of the grid offering a systematic and mathematical format which is a means for a solution for any problems a designer may come across. It’s human nature to desire to create order where we live, thus grids serve this purpose for us perfectly. 

The concept of a grid is a very good idea. It sounds perfect on paper: it provides clarity, it’s simplistic and easy to the eye. They’re all good reasons yet I don’t think grids are for me personally. It seems to rigid and robotic. 

So where’s the freedom?!

I guess it was perfect timing when Jess, fought back with her views of how restrictive grids were. She argued that the thought of having a grid limits the thinking and the design process. There are an abundance of limitations to what grids can be applied to. For example, having rules and order to something that is considered creative is wrong right?! It should be both subjective and objective, giving the designer the freedom to experiment with various ideas to find the most suitable design for the content at hand. 

An alternative idea to present information are collages which have a free spirited vibe and aren’t as restrictive as grids. Remember the way we use to make mood boards all the time to reflect on what we were feeling? Those were the good times. I feel that collages embrace space, creativity and feel which are elements that work on bringing chaos together.

There was this designer we saw, what was his name again? It was David Carson! Well, he’s anti-grid and very well known to use a chaotic approach to his art. He states “I never learned all the things you’re not supposed to do, I just do what makes the most sense…” “There’s no grid, no format. I think it ends up in a more interesting place than if I just applied formal design rules”. You know I am someone who enjoys work that portrays someone's personality. I want to be able to relate to the artist through their work, so Carson is definitely someone I vibe with. His work is exciting and very distinctive and to me, it allows more of a story to be told. 

Google Images - David Carson 

Personally, I am someone who enjoys my freedom and likes to be spontaneous, well you already know that, but I like to be able to let my imagination run wild. To be restricted to using a grid won’t be my style, on the other hand, I do understand the advantages of using a grid. There are many pros to using a grid, however, I feel that the use of a grid should not be considered a must, it should depend on the designer and the content which should be the defining factor. The most important factor should be the designers own view with what they feel will work best.

Let me know what you think and get back to me when you can. 

Maybe you’ll consider using a grid next time?