#it's hard holding a job in this economy

[jackalopenecropsy]

ok i'll indulge myself....

part 1(?) of biker gang!141 and an interesting fem grunge!reader... if u want more

cw; slight mentions of blood

The streets were pretty quiet this time of night. The only sounds to be heard were barking dogs or tires occasionally skidding in the distance. And the teenagers were never out this late in the fall, as school just started or they were working their dead jobs at the gas station or high school graduates pouring the same 5 drinks at a bar.

You liked walking around- even though it was maybe 1 or 2 in the morning- mainly because you had your scary guard dog with you, (who wasn't even a bit scary, he was just a police academy dropout with a fear of cotton swabs and squirrels) but also because the air this time of year smelled the best. It did wonders for your skin and sinuses, so why not? Walking around in the daytime was a lot more of a chore anyways, teenagers skating sporradically with fruity vapes on necklaces or older men just leaving their blue collar jobs for lunch while staring at you with unreadable expressions.

The northwoods, sigh. You'd told yourself that you'd leave it all the time when you were a kid. Over the years, a mix of the economy making that absolutely impossible and an aquirement of taste for small-town life made it a lot easier to accept the impossibility of it. Bartending and eventually being remote in editorial work kept you afloat in the small house you'd been able to buy flat out in the south side of town.

That part of town was just cemeteries and neighborhoods, neighborhoods and railroads, and gas stations and bars. As most south sides were. Another luxury of living where you lived was the copious amounts of streets and drag-worthy strips of old highway that laid for miles in one direction or another.

You used to work as a freelance flag girl for drag racers on some shitty craigslist copy, but quit l because the only racers that wanted you were full of white-claw drunk young assholes rooting for douchebag car modders who compensated for their dick sizes by throttling so hard that the pop of their exhausts sounded like gunfights. It was too loud and to risky and too tasteless.

But in the ends of the summer, it was taken over by the bikers. Not bicycle-bikers, but motorcyclists.

You were absolutely terrible at hiding your drooling depraved stares at every single one of them. The young women in skin-clad leather and red lipstick with matching sleek bikes, the finer-aged older men in their lean-back harleys with bandanas, the cute guys your age in their blackout helmets and their modestly-modded bikes. Oh, the variety, oh the taste. You had once thought about picking up biking yourself, but when you told your friends they all cackled at the idea. You were too absent minded at times; definitely from all the weed you smoked. Only half embarassed, you agreed.

Tonight was no different than the other nights of early Septembers before. Your dog lapped his tongue in the air catching stray dew drops falling from leaves overhead as you took your time walking accross the street. He swayed his tail so hard that you almost got knocked over a few times. The sound of a motorcyle revving in the distance made you slow your speed to a halt, listening intently, shamefully to see if you could get any bit of eye candy while out.

You recognized the sound of the engine, which soon became engines as the sounds came closer.

'Oh... a group of Kawaskis?? No... that's at least two more different motorcyles, but a few Kawaskis.. Do I hear a Harley?'

You blinked to yourself before shaking your head.

'God fucking damnit, you geek. You should NOT be able to tell what motorcyle model someone's riding from the fucking engine.'

Before you can shamefully walk back towards your house, you feel your dog tug harshly at his leash. You try to hold him back, but he yanks with one solid push of his back paws on the blacktop, and before you know it, you're hands and knees down on the hard ground as he's running full speed towards the sound of the motorcycles.

You groan in frustration as you stand up in a small bit of pain, your fishnets torn to shit as your palms and knees are scraped just enough to bleed a reasonable amount for getting launched by a 90 lb dog of muscle.

"Riley!" You shout and run at him, dodging a few trash cans along the street's edge as you do so. "Riley, goddamnit! Come back! Here boy!" Your converse were broken in enough to give you good ground as you chased him, and you almost grab his loose leash dragging behind him- until you trip over your own feet again just before you do.

You stay on the ground this time, unworried for your dog, as he's a big boy who knows how to not get hit by a car or get lost. More focused on the soul-eating embarassment of being outrun by a dog with more anxiety than a war veteran, and tripping twice in the process. You ignore the growing and stalling sound of engines beside- or in front, you can't tell being face down in the gravel- you as you're grovelling.

"Eh... excuse me miss? Are you alright?" You hear a gruff, dark voice mumble from just above you. You whip your head up to look at 5 people in bikers helmets just in front of you, their motorcyles off or stalling as they stand looking down at you on the ground.

"Oh- oh my- uh yeah- don't worry about me I'm great. I just tripped- nothing serious." You wave them off as you try and cover the growing fluster on your face. You stand and shake the dirt off your hands before swiping it off of your zip up, shaking it out of your gloves too. You look up to see none other than Riley, sitting contently behind the man in front of you, eagerly being pet by one of the bikers with a skull design painted onto his helmet and visor.

"Riley!" The biker looks up and your dog wags his tail hard enough to knock the bikers over too, and barks at you. "You are so not going to get any treats when we get home." He whines and continues barking, then twirls in a circle.

"You're dog's name is Riley?" The man in the skull helmet asks- and you suddenly become hyperaware of how all of the bikers are staring so intently at you. And those that have spoken so far have sickeningly thick English accents.

"Ah- yes, yeah. I was just on a walk and I heard you guys from the other street- but he just loves motorcylists so much, he took off on me. Usually he just waits until they pass us by. I'm so so sorry if he got in your way or anything." You scramble to try and seem somewhat normal as you switch between standing like a deer in their headlights, and holding your arms as the wind blew against your back.

"Ain't that a funny coincidence." The biker next to him stated, his accent thicker, and different. Possibly scottish.

"You watch it- It is a good name for a dog like this." The skull-helmet points an authoritative finger at the scot before patting Riley's head again. The man in front of you laughs heartily and takes his helmet off, revealing an older- FINELY aged man with hair in a short, short pulled back light brown and gray spotted ponytail. His mustache pulled down into a scruffy beard by mutton chops, giving him a real grizzly harley-rider look. You swore your jaw dropped when he took it off, and you were quick to cover your mouth when he smiled at you.

"I'm sorry about that miss- You've got a good dog protecting you. My names John Price." He walked up and took your hand from your face, squeezing it lightly. "My boys back there are harmless. You seem to have roughed yourself up a bit." He tilts his head as he leans back and looks you up and down, still holding your hand. Oh how deeply thankful you were that he was blocking the headlights from illuminating your red face.

"Yeah- I'm fine though, really! I just, can't keep up with Riley if I tried." You laugh and tremble a little as the cold air catches up to you. He raises an eyebrow- and fuck it gets to you because it makes him smirk a little bit too.

"Well, no offense but you look like you're in no condition to walk home like that!" A woman's voice comes up from behind Price's. You squint at the light when she comes up, and you see a blonde woman about his age with smile lines and blue eyes that could knock you down to your knees yet again. "My name's Kate, don't let John here scare you, he's just an old man." They banter a bit as you stare into space, begging any ethreal being to show you a sign that this is real life.

'Fuck being bisexual, god hates me.' You curse to yourself as you smile shyly at her.

"We can give you a ride home if you'd want! I wouldn't feel right letting you have to get yourself home with blood down your legs." Price motions with his free hand at your torn fishnets, rocks littering the cuts on your leg.

"Oh- I don't want to impose or anything, and I'll have Riley!" You struggle to keep yourself still as the wind continually stings.

"Lass, you're shakin' like a leaf in this wind." The scottish man shakes his head in his helmet, leaning back against the flat of his bike.

"You ain't getting home with just a dog draggin' you forward." The gruff voice of the skull-head from beside him made you look away in embarassment. They were all right, you were blocks away from home, and you didn't have your phone on you either.

"Um.. If you're sure you don't mind... but what about Riley?"

"He can ride wi' me!" The scott excitedly patted the flat he was leaning on, shuffling a few top panels to show a compartment on the back of it that had a hooking mechanism for leashes. Assumedly he had dogs too, and how greatful you were for it.

You sigh in relief that you wont have to limp home in your misery, as strong as you are, the chunk of you lost twice to the blacktop actually hurt more than you'd ever want to admit.

Before you can take a step forward, you're lifted off your feet and holding the shoulders of Kate. She laughs as you gasp and sets you on the back of skull-head's bike so you can backpack him, right next to Riley in the odd formation their bikes created.

"I promise he's not as scary as he looks- right Simon?"

"I don't bite." He chuckles deeply and you tense against his back as he does so. "You might want to hold on tho', I'm not exactly the easiest ride." You blush, hard as he says it, and the group laughs loudly as they start their bikes.

"Oi, treat her nice Si." A soft voice jeered from the last bike to Kate's right. "Or else I'll have to take her off your hands."

"Nice try Gaz."

"Boys! Quit scarin' her." Price chuckles and lights a cigar as he revs his engine. "Or else she wont wanna see us again. Now where do you need us to take you, love?"

'Ah.' Was all that crossed your mind as you locked your arms around Simon's waist, and you all shot off down the street.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Antitrust is a labor issue

I'm touring my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me SATURDAY (Apr 27) in MARIN COUNTY, then Winnipeg (May 2), Calgary (May 3), Vancouver (May 4), and beyond!

This is huge: yesterday, the FTC finalized a rule banning noncompete agreements for every American worker. That means that the person working the register at a Wendy's can switch to the fry-trap at McD's for an extra $0.25/hour, without their boss suing them:

https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/04/ftc-announces-rule-banning-noncompetes

The median worker laboring under a noncompete is a fast-food worker making close to minimum wage. You know who doesn't have to worry about noncompetes? High tech workers in Silicon Valley, because California already banned noncompetes, as did Colorado, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, Virginia and Washington.

The fact that the country's largest economies, encompassing the most "knowledge-intensive" industries, could operate without shitty bosses being able to shackle their best workers to their stupid workplaces for years after those workers told them to shove it shows you what a goddamned lie noncompetes are based on. The idea that companies can't raise capital or thrive if their know-how can walk out the door, secreted away in the skulls of their ungrateful workers, is bullshit:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/02/its-the-economy-stupid/#neofeudal

Remember when OpenAI's board briefly fired founder Sam Altman and Microsoft offered to hire him and 700 of his techies? If "noncompetes block investments" was true, you'd think they'd have a hard time raising money, but no, they're still pulling in billions in investor capital (primarily from Microsoft itself!). This is likewise true of Anthropic, the company's major rival, which was founded by (wait for it), two former OpenAI employees.

Indeed, Silicon Valley couldn't have come into existence without California's ban on noncompetes – the first silicon company, Shockley Semiconductors, was founded by a malignant, delusional eugenicist who also couldn't manage a lemonade stand. His eight most senior employees (the "Traitorous Eight") quit his shitty company to found Fairchild Semiconductor, a rather successful chip shop – but not nearly so successful as the company that two of Fairchild's top employees founded after they quit: Intel:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/10/24/the-traitorous-eight-and-the-battle-of-germanium-valley/

Likewise a lie: the tale that noncompetes raise wages. This theory – beloved of people whose skulls are so filled with Efficient Market Hypothesis Brain-Worms that they've got worms dangling out of their nostrils and eye-sockets – holds that the right to sign a noncompete is an asset that workers can trade to their employers in exchange for better pay. This is absolutely true, provided you ignore reality.

Remember: the median noncompete-bound worker is a fast food employee making near minimum wage. The major application of noncompetes is preventing that worker from getting a raise from a rival fast-food franchisee. Those workers are losing wages due to noncompetes. Meanwhile, the highest paid workers in the country are all clustered in a a couple of cities in northern California, pulling down sky-high salaries in a state where noncompetes have been illegal since the gold rush.

If a capitalist wants to retain their workers, they can compete. Offer your workers get better treatment and better wages. That's how capitalism's alchemy is supposed to work: competition transmogrifies the base metal of a capitalist's greed into the noble gold of public benefit by making success contingent on offering better products to your customers than your rivals – and better jobs to your workers than those rivals are willing to pay. However, capitalists hate capitalism:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/18/in-extremis-veritas/#the-winnah

Capitalists hate capitalism so much that they're suing the FTC, in MAGA's beloved Fifth Circuit, before a Trump-appointed judge. The case was brought by Trump's financial advisors, Ryan LLC, who are using it to drum up business from corporations that hate Biden's new taxes on the wealthy and stepped up IRS enforcement on rich tax-cheats.

Will they win? It's hard to say. Despite what you may have heard, the case against the FTC order is very weak, as Matt Stoller explains here:

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/ftc-enrages-corporate-america-by

The FTC's statutory authority to block noncompetes comes from Section 5 of the FTC Act, which bans "unfair methods of competition" (hard to imagine a less fair method than indenturing your workers). Section 6(g) of the Act lets the FTC make rules to enforce Section 5's ban on unfairness. Both are good law – 6(g) has been used many times (26 times in the five years from 1968-73 alone!).

The DC Circuit court upheld the FTC's right to "promulgate rules defining the meaning of the statutory standards of the illegality the Commission is empowered to prevent" in 1973, and in 1974, Congress changed the FTC Act, but left this rulemaking power intact.

The lawyer suing the FTC – Anton Scalia's larvum, a pismire named Eugene Scalia – has some wild theories as to why none of this matters. He says that because the law hasn't been enforced since the ancient days of the (checks notes) 1970s, it no longer applies. He says that the mountain of precedent supporting the FTC's authority "hasn't aged well." He says that other antitrust statutes don't work the same as the FTC Act. Finally, he says that this rule is a big economic move and that it should be up to Congress to make it.

Stoller makes short work of these arguments. The thing that tells you whether a law is good is its text and precedent, "not whether a lawyer thinks a precedent is old and bad." Likewise, the fact that other antitrust laws is irrelevant "because, well, they are other antitrust laws, not this antitrust law." And as to whether this is Congress's job because it's economically significant, "so what?" Congress gave the FTC this power.

Now, none of this matters if the Supreme Court strikes down the rule, and what's more, if they do, they might also neuter the FTC's rulemaking power in the bargain. But again: so what? How is it better for the FTC to do nothing, and preserve a power that it never uses, than it is for the Commission to free the 35-40 million American workers whose bosses get to use the US court system to force them to do a job they hate?

The FTC's rule doesn't just ban noncompetes – it also bans TRAPs ("training repayment agreement provisions"), which require employees to pay their bosses thousands of dollars if they quit, get laid off, or are fired:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/04/its-a-trap/#a-little-on-the-nose

The FTC's job is to protect Americans from businesses that cheat. This is them, doing their job. If the Supreme Court strikes this down, it further delegitimizes the court, and spells out exactly who the GOP works for.

This is part of the long history of antitrust and labor. From its earliest days, antitrust law was "aimed at dollars, not men" – in other words, antitrust law was always designed to smash corporate power in order to protect workers. But over and over again, the courts refused to believe that Congress truly wanted American workers to get legal protection from the wealthy predators who had fastened their mouth-parts on those workers' throats. So over and over – and over and over – Congress passed new antitrust laws that clarified the purpose of antitrust, using words so small that even federal judges could understand them:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/14/aiming-at-dollars/#not-men

After decades of comatose inaction, Biden's FTC has restored its role as a protector of labor, explicitly tackling competition through a worker protection lens. This week, the Commission blocked the merger of Capri Holdings and Tapestry Inc, a pair of giant conglomerates that have, between them, bought up nearly every "affordable luxury" brand (Versace, Jimmy Choo, Michael Kors, Kate Spade, Coach, Stuart Weitzman, etc).

You may not care about "affordable luxury" handbags, but you should care about the basis on which the FTC blocked this merger. As David Dayen explains for The American Prospect: 33,000 workers employed by these two companies would lose the wage-competition that drives them to pay skilled sales-clerks more to cross the mall floor and switch stores:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-04-24-challenge-fashion-merger-new-antitrust-philosophy/

In other words, the FTC is blocking a $8.5b merger that would turn an oligopoly into a monopoly explicitly to protect workers from the power of bosses to suppress their wages. What's more, the vote was unanimous, include the Commission's freshly appointed (and frankly, pretty terrible) Republican commissioners:

https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/04/ftc-moves-block-tapestrys-acquisition-capri

A lot of people are (understandably) worried that if Biden doesn't survive the coming election that the raft of excellent rules enacted by his agencies will die along with his presidency. Here we have evidence that the Biden administration's anti-corporate agenda has become institutionalized, acquiring a bipartisan durability.

And while there hasn't been a lot of press about that anti-corporate agenda, it's pretty goddamned huge. Back in 2021, Tim Wu (then working in the White wrote an executive order on competition that identified 72 actions the agencies could take to blunt the power of corporations to harm everyday Americans:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/party-its-1979-og-antitrust-back-baby

Biden's agency heads took that plan and ran with it, demonstrating the revolutionary power of technical administrative competence and proving that being good at your job is praxis:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/18/administrative-competence/#i-know-stuff

In just the past week, there's been a storm of astoundingly good new rules finalized by the agencies:

A minimum staffing ratio for nursing homes;

The founding of the American Climate Corps;

A guarantee of overtime benefits;

A ban on financial advisors cheating retirement savers;

Medical privacy rules that protect out-of-state abortions;

A ban on junk fees in mortgage servicing;

Conservation for 13m Arctic acres in Alaska;

Classifying "forever chemicals" as hazardous substances;

A requirement for federal agencies to buy sustainable products;

Closing the gun-show loophole.

That's just a partial list, and it's only Thursday.

Why the rush? As Gerard Edic writes for The American Prospect, finalizing these rules now protects them from the Congressional Review Act, a gimmick created by Newt Gingrich in 1996 that lets the next Senate wipe out administrative rules created in the months before a federal election:

https://prospect.org/politics/2024-04-23-biden-administration-regulations-congressional-review-act/

In other words, this is more dazzling administrative competence from the technically brilliant agencies that have labored quietly and effectively since 2020. Even laggards like Pete Buttigieg have gotten in on the act, despite a very poor showing in the early years of the Biden administration:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/11/dinah-wont-you-blow/#ecp

Despite those unpromising beginnings, the DOT has gotten onboard the trains it regulates, and passed a great rule that forces airlines to refund your money if they charge you for services they don't deliver:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/04/24/fact-sheet-biden-harris-administration-announces-rules-to-deliver-automatic-refunds-and-protect-consumers-from-surprise-junk-fees-in-air-travel/

The rule also bans junk fees and forces airlines to compensate you for late flights, finally giving American travelers the same rights their European cousins have enjoyed for two decades.

It's the latest in a string of muscular actions taken by the DOT, a period that coincides with the transfer of Jen Howard from her role as chief of staff to FTC chair Lina Khan to a new gig as the DOT's chief of competition enforcement:

https://prospect.org/infrastructure/transportation/2024-04-25-transportation-departments-new-path/

Under Howard's stewardship, the DOT blocked the merger of Spirit and Jetblue, and presided over the lowest flight cancellation rate in more than decade:

https://www.transportation.gov/briefing-room/2023-numbers-more-flights-fewer-cancellations-more-consumer-protections

All that, along with a suite of protections for fliers, mark a huge turning point in the US aviation industry's long and worsening abusive relationship with the American public. There's more in the offing, too including a ban on charging families extra for adjacent seats, rules to make flying with wheelchairs easier, and a ban on airlines selling passenger's private information to data brokers.

There's plenty going on in the world – and in the Biden administration – that you have every right to be furious and/or depressed about. But these expert agencies, staffed by experts, have brought on a tsunami of rules that will make every working American better off in a myriad of ways. Those material improvements in our lives will, in turn, free us up to fight the bigger, existential fights for a livable planet, free from genocide.

It may not be a good time to be alive, but it's a much better time than it was just last week.

And it's only Thursday.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/25/capri-v-tapestry/#aiming-at-dollars-not-men

[windcarvedlyre]

Thinking about Venti's role as an archon and how he might be doing his job- as Celestia intended- better than we think.

Archons, in Gnosticism, rule over the material realm and prevent souls from leaving it. Barbatos, in the Ars Goetia, "reconciles disputes between friends and those who hold power".

Everything we know about Venti implies that he hates Celestia and opposes all forms of tyranny, but if their goal is to keep humanity from advancing, realising the truth of the world and taking actions that could threaten the status quo...

...isn't the best way to prevent rebellions and slow progress to make the people you rule content with what they have?

Venti is all about making his people's lives leisurely and seemingly free (I'll get to that in a second). It's in his gemstone quote, the thing which summarises his approach as an archon:

"Still, the winds change direction. "Someday, they will blow towards a brighter future… "Take my blessings and live leisurely from this day onward."

We see this reflected in Mondstadt's culture and economy. There are still hardworking individuals in the Knights of Favonius, the Church of Favonius and the Adventurer's Guild, but this attitude isn't universal even within those organisations and the rest of Mondstadt's people generally have a slow, relaxed approach to life relative to other nations. They haven't produced any internationally notable industries outside of alcohol, and why would they? They have everything they need, graciously provided by the anemo archon himself*, so why strive for more?

This has already left them vulnerable to the whims of more powerful nations, incapable of meaningfully opposing the Fatui without inviting consequences they can't handle.

*Also see Jean's story quest for a scaled-down version of this. Mondstadt's general population relies on her hard work a bit too much and she enables them.

We also see Mondstadt have a softening effect on outsiders multiple times in-game. There are at least three cases of people questioning their life choices because its people and/or scenery are that nice. Two are branches of hangout events, one is a soon-to-be-ex treasure hoarder chilling on Cider Lake's coast. I've joked that Mond is a lotus eater hotel scaled up to a nation based on this, but what if that's somewhat intentional?

But why would he do this?

It could be an unintended side effect of efforts to improve people's quality of life. He was allegedly naive enough not to forsee the aristocracy situation, after all. But at the same time... he's a god of freedom and hope in a world where his people have no hope of freedom.

-Harmost's Notes (II), Remuria.

He knows what happens to human civilisations that advance too far and attempt to rebel against this world. He likely knows a god much like him, themed around music and desperate to free his people from fate, tried and failed horribly. He lives in the shadow of a celestial needle. The Cataclysm would only reinforce this perceived futility of resistance. He still hopes for a brighter future, but he may be pinning all of his hopes on a descender taking pity on Teyvat's people and choosing to help them. To quote the description of Mondstadt Statues of the Seven:

A monumental stone statue that watches over Mondstadt. Legends say that it was sculpted in the image of the Anemo Archon. "Seeds brought by the wind will grow over time." The statue silently anticipates the arrival of a noble soul to arrive, while thousand winds of time will soon unfold a new story...

Apart from that, what else can he do besides be passive and complacent? Besides make his people comfortable and hope they don't rock the boat too much before liberation is actually possible?

And the thing about resolving disputes with those in power worries me. It could just translate into his pacifism, but it could also mean he's less willing to act against Celestia than we'd hope. Why did the Tsaritsa, the only archon named after a saint and willing to take a stand against Celestia, fall out with him? He has reasons to be pissed at her methods but I suspect that won't be the only factor.

All we can do is wait and see.

[robertreich]

5 Crises Republicans Made up to Distract You

Here are five totally made-up “crises” Republicans have invented to distract from the real crises facing Americans today: the growing concentration of wealth, the worsening climate crisis, and the undermining of our democracy.

Fake crisis #1:  Anything they claim is “woke.”

Although Republicans struggle to define what “woke” even means, they’re constantly using it as a weapon to combat anything that seeks to foster tolerance and acceptance.

Pride flags? Woke!

Books about Rosa Parks? Woke!

Green M&M’s? The wokest!

Fortunately, most Americans think being informed and aware of social injustice…which is what being “woke” really means... is a good thing.

Fake crisis #2: The panic over trans people.

Trans people just want the right to exist safely as their true selves, like everyone else. And despite the lies spewed by some Republicans, there’s not a shred of evidence that they are a threat to anyone. But they’ve become easy scapegoats for the GOP, who vilify them and threaten to criminalize their very existence.

Fake crisis #3: Critical race theory

In reality, critical race theory is mostly taught in universities — like quantum physics or philosophy. It's really not taught in K-12, nor is it dangerous.

It’s merely a framework to understand the role that race and racism have played in shaping America’s laws and institutions. But Republicans have deliberately turned this obscure academic phrase into a weapon to silence any discussion of race they don't like.

Unfortunately, this includes teaching many basic historical facts.

Fake crisis #4: “Couch potatoes.”

Republicans are whipping up anger over welfare recipients supposedly abusing the system.

The reality is most people who collect benefits already hold jobs and work exceedingly hard.

Like Ronald Reagan’s claim about so-called “welfare queens”, the “couch potato” myth is a cruel racial dog whistle. In fact, the vast majority of Americans who receive government benefits are white.

We should be asking why so many jobs pay such low wages that workers need government help to get by?

Fake crisis #5: “Out of control government spending.”

Another lie. Apart from mandatory spending like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, government spending has actually fallen more than 30% in the past 50 years as a percentage of our total economy.

[9.6% in 1973  vs. 6.6% in 2022, a decrease of  31.25%]

Yes, the national debt is a problem, but in recent years, among its biggest drivers have been the Bush and Trump tax cuts, which have added nearly $10 trillion to the debt since their enactment.

All five of these so-called crises have been manufactured by the GOP. They’re entirely made up.

Why? To deflect attention from the near record share of the nation’s income and wealth now going to the richest Americans.

As the wealthy pour money into politics — largely into the GOP — they don’t want the rest of America to notice they’re rigging the economy for their own benefit, that their greed is worsening the climate crisis, and they’re undermining our democracy.

So the game of the Republican Party and their major donors is to deflect attention — to use fake crises to disguise what’s really going on.

Don’t let them get away with it.

[ceasarslegion]

By the wishes of a few people, here's my advice post about living alone. Keep in mind I'm speaking from the perspective of a canadian urbanite, so this will not apply to absolutely everybody in every kind of culture, economy, living situation, those in rural areas, etc. This also is not assuming wealth disparities are a matter of personal attitude, i KNOW it's complicated. Get back with that shit right now, you know damn well this advice assumes you are able to achieve the financial means to live on your own and is not disparaging anyone who legitimately can't.

Let's cover the basics first.

Source of income:

This seems rather obvious, but your income should be regular and reliably the same or similar on a monthly basis. The most obvious way to achieve this is with a job, and I'm sorry but minimum wage is not going to cut it on your own anymore, which means you're going to have to swallow your pride and accept that you'll likely have to work for some industry or corporation with a dodgy moral record. Get used to it. There is no point in self-flagellation, the world is complicated, just take the 50-60k a year office job, no one actually expects you not to and nobody will hold it against you when the "moral" option is soul-crushing retail. The real world really doesn't give a shit what you have to do to afford a comfortable lifestyle as long as you do what good you can within your abilities, no one in the real world expects you to sacrifice your own wellbeing for a cause.

Salaried positions are your most reliable because you'll always pull the same amount, while hourly pay comes with the ability to pull overtime pay in exchange for more shifts, but if you run out of sick days you'll have to spend the rest of the year taking unpaid time off when you need to call in. Whichever one you choose depends on what's available to you and what's right for you physically and mentally, I can't make that call for you.

You also need a credit card. That is non-negotiable. If you don't have a credit score, you can't sign a lease. Bad credit is better than no credit. We can argue until the cows come home whether or not credit scores are good or bad, but it's just reality that you're going to need one. The good news is it's fairly easy to build credit from no credit: you just have to pay off your credit card in full on time every time. The bad news is it's equally as easy to tank your credit score, you just have to miss one or pay it too late, and it's very hard to build good credit back from bad credit. So don't see it as free money, only spend as much as you can pay back, and if you don't have credit right now, start with small things like lunch and little treats that you immediately pay off.

Looking for a place to live:

Once you have your regular and reliable source of income, you can start looking for your place. There's a few things you should keep in mind:

-Draw up a budget for how much you can spend on rent and bills. That includes all basic living expenses: rent, utilities, food, internet, phone, hygiene. Compare how much you make per month to what you can spend. 1/3 to 1/2 of your salary is a bit more realistic to expect to spend on rent alone nowadays, so work within that range when you apartment hunt. Think of everything when you're budgeting, like how much do you spend on haircuts per month? You probably didn't think of that, because I didn't either at first.

-Apartment buildings with some/all utilities included often have higher base rents. You have to keep in mind that this is so the landlord can balance out the utility bills of the whole building, which are unpredictable expenses and on them to pay every month. If you don't know how to budget yet or don't know how to do so with unpredictable bills, I highly recommend trying to find a place with utilities included so you know EXACTLY how much you'll need to pay every month and can plan in advance

-Older buildings tend to be both cheaper and more likely to have centralized utility systems, which means they have to include it in the price of rent because there's no way to tell who used how much of something. If it's your first place alone, you'll probably be tempted to get the brand new, expensive building down the road, but it won't actually make much of a difference when you move in. You will love it regardless.

-Never ever sign a lease until you've either seen THE unit you're considering, or one of the show units that is exactly the same layout. The last thing you want is to go off online photos only to move in and find out the building has a mold problem. You can arrange personal tours by contacting the building manager or the landlord directly. Phone calls are the best way to do this.

-If you want the unit after seeing it, you know you can afford it, there's nothing funny about the place, apply IMMEDIATELY. Places are usually on the market for a few days before they're snapped up by a new tenant, you have to strike while the iron's hot.

-If you've decided on the place you want and had your application accepted, read the lease carefully before you sign. Many places require tenant insurance that meet specific policy requirements, have registration rules about long-term guests, outline how the parking works, quiet hours, smoking rules, mail, laundry, all the way down to what kind of barbecues are allowed on your deck in the case of mine (I am in a wildfire danger zone, so any types that produce embers are strictly prohibited for fire safety reasons). Ask any question that comes to mind about the lease. Not everything in a lease is some human rights violation just because you don't like landlords, keep in mind you're living in the same building as dozens of other people, so there has to be ground rules established for everyone's sanity.

-Internet is often not considered a utility so you'll have a hard time finding any place that includes it. You can arrange to have your wifi set up in advance of a moving date on a specific time and date, do this right after you sign a lease so you don't forget. They won't charge you until you're actually hooked up to the network.

-If your utilities are NOT included, get those set up in advance too. The main ones are HVAC, water, and electricity. The companies that do this vary depending on where you live and what's available, so shop around online once you've signed your lease and sign up as soon as possible. The last thing you want is to forget this and then move into a dark freezing apartment with no water.

Budgeting:

After your living expenses are covered, you should have a comfortable amount of financial wiggle room leftover. If you wouldn't, the place you're looking at is either too expensive, or you're being overcharged elsewhere. It's completely normal for living expenses to take up most of your budget these days, you're doing just fine in the same boat as everybody else if that's the case, so don't panic yet. If you have absolutely NOTHING leftover though, then you're out of your price range.

You also need to set money aside for fun and saving. Do not forego fun money, your brain will try to kill you with hammers and knives if you never get or do things for yourself. And if you're on your own, you're the only one providing that for yourself now. And a solid building base of savings will only help you in the future, whether you lose your job, have an emergency, or even need a down payment on a house later in life. Don't be a doomer about your circumstances or the socioeconomic and generational cards that were dealt to you, chip away at it a little at a time. And don't fall for social media's insistence that anybody with anything at all is some bourgeois degenerate or that being fortunate enough to be able to have upward mobility makes you some ultra wealthy shithead, working towards a comfortable standard of living for yourself does not make you a rich elite or a bad person. You're working towards the standard we should all live as, not exploiting the poor or being a class traitor. I feel the need to add that last part since we're on the website of "struggling art students in NYC are bourgeois that are just bad with money and having a gaming computer makes you upper middle class." Don't listen to a word any of those people say, I know it comes from a place of very real hurt and pain for them but that doesn't make it grounded in absolute reality for absolutely everybody.

Social needs:

If you're by yourself, there's gonna be a lot more work you have to put in for your social and entertainment needs. I can not stress enough how important it is to give this the time and work it needs, do not neglect this.

Lots of libraries have clubs you can join that will get you out of the house and meeting new people regularly. They're either free or very inexpensive. This is a great place to start.

Take advantage of technology we have now. Hop on discord calls more frequently, make sure you're talking to your friends on the regular and try to make plans as much as you can.

Also, I advise finding lots of things you can do by yourself. You will be spending way more time alone than you ever have before, so find single-person hobbies. Go thrifting, get into knitting, go explore the city, read lots of books, do puzzles, just don't lock yourself inside all day in your free time. Even if you're doing it alone, going out and seeing that the world is bigger than your apartment and your workplace is very good for you.

Misc advice:

You don't need a conventional coffee pot maker. Single serving will suit you just fine.

Cleaning is easier when you have a routine. It doesn't all have to be done on the same day of the week, but having a regular schedule of what gets cleaned when for non-daily chores will help you keep on top of it. And please, god, don't neglect your cleaning and hygiene just because no one lives with you to see it. On that note, spray bottle all purpose cleaners are your best friend for daily spot cleaning and you should deep clean your washroom around every 2 weeks in my experience since that's where you'll be doing most of your personal hygiene. Also make your damn bed, yes you'll just get back into it at the end of the day but having a major part of your space neat and tidy will do wonders for your mental health.

Don't buy the cheap garbage bags. Some things you really do want the expensive shit for.

If you don't have a car, delivery service/rideshare subscriptions ARE worth it and legitimately economical in the long run. I do wanna circle back to square one and say that yes, most of them like prime and uber do have dodgy moral records, but sometimes you just gotta swallow your pride and accept that. Once again, no one in the real world expects you to spend your entire day on public transit looking for toilet paper that isnt 30 dollars a pack or lugging 50 pounds of groceries back on a bus just for a cause. It's not the fault of someone who needs these services for their quality of life that they do the things they do, don't put that responsibility on your or other's shoulders when the fault lies at the top of the corporate ladder.

When you're budgeting for living expenses, expect your income to be at the lowest and your expenses to be at the highest. I expect 2 call ins per month and to need to spend the max amount i have on groceries every time, that way I never fall short and never have to cut into my savings that I've dubbed my "oh shit, I'm broke" money. Your emergency reserve may look tempting to you, but as someone who has been in a position where they had to drain it to nothing in the past because of an unforeseen financial emergency, you REALLY are gonna want that untouched if and when shit hits the fan. Life is unpredictable, prepare to roll with the punches so they don't knock you out.

A few people wanted to be tagged in this, so here you go @lilsnatch and @kisstheashes <3

[gothhabiba]

The immediate impact of the Israeli occupation was to exacerbate unemployment: service jobs for the Egyptian army and UN forces vanished, trade with Egypt halted, and the port was closed. Moreover, since the combined GNP of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip was only 2.6 percent of the Israeli GNP in 1967, they faced inevitable integration into the Israeli economy as the occuption continued. Furthermore, Israeli policies increased the Strip's dependency. These practices included permitting only certain Gaza products to be sold within Israel, flooding the Gaza market with Israeli goods, restructuring Gaza's agriculture, and encouraging Arab laborers to work in Israel.

The Balance and Composition of Trade. After only one year of occupation, 72 percent of Gaza's imports came from Israel; no imports were allowed from Egypt, and 1 percent of its imports came from Jordan (the balance came from Europe). This represented a dramatic shift, since all the prewar trade had been either directly with Egypt or with Europe and Asia through the Gaza port. [...]

A decade later the shift in trading patterns was even more pronounced. [...] 91 percent of imports came from Israel, and nothing was imported from Jordan or Egypt. [...] Dates, strawberries, and vegetables were also sold to Israel, and local industries engaged in subcontracting for Israeli firms.

Agriculture and industry were both hard hit by Israeli competition. Israeli eggs, poultry, and even vegetables sell at lower prices than local produce, and virtually all canned and bottled goods come from Israel. [...]

A 15 percent excise tax and soaring inflation erode the profits of merchants and factory owners. Gazans have no way to hedge against inflation, since the Israeli shekel is the only legal tender on the Strip.

Restructuring Agriculture. Israel has prevented farmers from exporting to Israel any items that compete with Israeli produce and has imposed restrictions on the planting of certain crops. As a result, the output of melons, onions, grapes, almonds, olives, and fish has decreased. Farmers need permits to plant trees and vegetables.

[...] The government has encouraged production of some specialized crops, such as strawberries and dates. Farmers in Beit Lahiya village say that they were ordered to grow strawberries and would otherwise have been prevented from using their land and well. These strawberries are marketed exclusively through Ashkelon port by the Israeli export firm Agrexco. No permits, however, have been given to farmers to plant such crops as mangoes and avocados, which are also grown in Israel.

Arab Labor in Israel. In 1970, 10 percent of the Gaza labor force was employed in Israel, but at present approximately 40 percent (35,000 persons) work there. This includes 25,000 workers who are registered with the official labor exchange and another 10,000 who work illegally. The high unemployment within the Strip and the fact that wages inside Israel were five times those in the Strip made such employment irresistible.

[...] Even those holding regular jobs face difficult conditions. For example, it is illegal for them to remain inside Israel from 1:00 a.m. to 5:00 a.m. But employers and workers collude in circumventing the law so that the workers will not have to spend several hours every day commuting. Farmers let laborers sleep in huts, abandoned buses, or even in the open under the orange trees. In town, workers jam into hostels, sleep on construction sites, or spread out on the floor in restaurants. There have been cases of disasters when workers locked into factories at night were unable to escape when fires broke out. [...]

The overall impact of Israeli economic policy is to turn the Gaza Strip into a large labor camp. The Strip is a source of cheap labor for Israel and its internal economic base is continually eroded.

– 1985. Ann M. Lesch, "Gaza: Forgotten Corner of Palestine." Journal of Palestine Studies 15.1, pp. 43-61. Emphasis mine.

[chilli-talks-a-lot]

How Prevent Gifted Kid Burnout From a Gifted Silly whose Fire is still Blazing with Rage

1. EVERYTHING IS STUPID.

School is stupid, parents with unrealistically high expectations of you are stupid, teachers who overwork you are stupid.

You don't need their approval. You don't need to impress authority to have worth.

You don't need to be perfect, especially not in a broken system.

Test scores aren't a measure of intelligence. You are smart, even if the material was difficult to grasp.

You're not "wasting your potential" if you decide to pursue a career you love. Create art, write music, perform, you're contributing to the beauty of the world. There's more value in that than most people see.

You're not "wasting your potential" if you're an adult who isn't busting their butt in college or a fancy job. The economy is fucked right now, and being an adult is hard. You're doing your best.

And sometimes, you can't be at your best all the time, but you're trying, and that's all that matters.

2. Don't let school ruin a passion for learning.

Just learn. Learn and love learning. Learn without school holding you down. Find your passions, and run after them. Pursue knowledge because it's fucking fun.

Research something you care about for fun, challenge yourself to learn how to complete that math problem, learn, not because you feel like you have to, but because you want to.

Never let school make you lose a love for learning.

3. They explain it more effectively than I can lol

I made a video game metaphor but, when I was finding the video that made me realize this I read another video game metaphor that explained it better, "So basically, as a gifted kid, I skipped the tutorial because it felt too easy. Then the actual game threw curveballs at me" (adorablehoe, 2nd top comment).

HealthyGamerGG's entire channel has great information

[ajokeformur-ray]

If this is triggering pls skip I don't wanna make you uncomfortable in anyway 🩷, but how would J feel if he found out his S/O has an abusive boss? Ik he would be angry and stuff but what would he do?

Hey nonnie🫂I totally get it, I work in an abusive workplace myself so I understand. I hope this offers you & anyone else who can relate some comfort. We deserve better.💖

J would definitely be angry.

However, and this is the bit you might not like - he'd be angry at your boss and at you.

Angry at your boss for abusing their staff rather than adhering to the duty of care which employers legally have towards their employees, and angry at you for staying there for as long as you do once the red flags starts to stack up.

He wonders what the straw will be which breaks the camel's back - what will it take for you to leave?

J's highly intelligent, he understands the dynamics of any kind of abusive relationship. He knows it's hard to spot the signs, more so if the abuse is happening at work. He knows that once you're in an abusive relationship, it's even harder to leave. He knows the logistics; you need the money, the economy doesn't have many jobs going right now so you need to stay where you are... on and on the reasons go as to why you can't - won't - leave your workplace.

But that doesn't mean he has to like it. J doesn't have to like it, not one bit.

He's watched you come home in tears on multiple occasions, and he's heard from some of his men that you've cried on your way home in the streets, too, though that's subtler than how you cry in the shower when you think he isn't home. He's home more than you think he is. J takes good care of what's his and how can he take care of you if he isn't home?

J is angry at you for not leaving, but he understands that it's easier said than done, he's seen it time and again in the people who walk the streets with their shoulders curled inwards and their heads down, like the weight of the world is slowly settling on their shoulders, hammering them closer to the ground as they get stomped on each and every day.

Your boss is the hammer, and you're the nail.

One more good swing, J reckons, and you're done for.

Except it doesn't seem to be, as you take swing after swing after swing, and still you go to work, still you try your best, still you kill yourself to live. And J's frustration grows and grows; you don't have to live like this, but you want to work, you don't want to live solely off of J's lucrative crimes. It's tempting sometimes, and you'd be a liar if you said it wasn't.

But you're too proud for that, and so you take the hits without leaving your abusive boss.

Realising after some months that you're not going to do anything about your situation of your own accord - it's been years - J starts to intervene in his own ways. Making sure there's an accident on the road your boss takes to work so that they are delayed for some time, making sure that they can't get the coffee they want first thing in the morning due to some kind of supplying issue even though they had it in abundance yesterday morning... on and on the inconveniences go, and their severity depends on how much you were abused the last time you were at work.

J holds you when you cry, he listens to you rant, he gives you sage advice only when you ask for it, and he only listens when you don't. He supports you, in his own ways, but he's very angry, make no mistake. His tone is especially biting when you make threats to quit, and he thinks finally, and then you don't. You stay. That same nail in the same wall with that same hammer.

How much more can you take, J wonders? He's proud of you, he's angry at you, he cares and he is curious about what you're going to do. All of these things at once, his thoughts like trains with no final destinations, but he knows that one day you will leave, and he will celebrate with you when you do.

[askchilchuck]

Mr. Tims (Or Mr. Chuck?),

In my job we are often paid in a shift-based structure by the hour. However, when responsibilities for the moment or day are taken care of we cannot simply leave as we are required to stay for the entire shift. Nor would I want to, as we must take what pay we can get. This incentivises those in charge of payment to hound us to do sonething to justify our remaining time. While this is understandable, it is rather stressful to not have that unscheduled downtime when it presents itself in addition to looking busy but not so busy that your ass is lit aflame by management.

Should I seek a new job with a different pay structure or more fulfilling productivity? In my economy, it is not so easy though...

Yeah, that's a hard one. I would say finding a job that better suits your needs and abilities, while also treating you with respect is the way to go. That being said, it sounds like for your situation, it might be a good idea to hold onto the job you have now while you're looking for the better one.

[yourtoradorasextendedwarranty]

Your countries are being invaded and your too blinded by accusations of "Bigotry" and "Racism" to actually do anything about it. What am I talking about?

-

Let me explain something to the left and any moderate that might have an issue with my framing. These are not people seeking asylum because of persecution. These are economic migrants trying to extract from our countries while their first act in flooding here is economic instability and eventual collapse. It has nothing to do with cultural dislike, or racism of any kind.

Fact is most people in most places hate how their governments are run. The US Gov I can actually weigh in on, because we have sent billions in tax dollars to Ukraine and foreign interests. We have spent millions if not billions on homelessness yet still have a huge homeless issue in places that claim to care about it more than anywhere else.

But what's the issue. 80%-90% of the people coming are military age men. In some cases that percentage is north of 98%. Meaning there are almost never any women or children coming here. And at least in the US they are coming here with their fist act as breaking US law. I live in Texas. This state is heavily affected by illegal immigration. Hard part is, most people don't tend to see the effects until it's too late. The more people that flood your country, the worse the economy in your country will be. Slow trickle can be handled. What we are experiencing can't be. Why?

So not to be the "THER TAKN OUR JUBS", but in reality they are. They will work for lower wages. They don't care if they get healthcare. And the employer does not have to care about the red tape hiring them. They get the profit with almost none of the other complexities that come from hiring a legal citizen. What's more, we barely have enough jobs for the people that live here and yet we flood millions in through the southern border every single year. Functionally, this is an issue. We might be a melting pot, but what happens when our cultures are deleted outright because the flood gets too big?

And this is a real risk. Cultural decimation. These people don't care about their own countries. What makes you think they care about yours? They will extract. Destroy. And they will move on. They don't realize they are doing it have the time but consider the fact that the UN has not helped in this at all. Consider the fact that the WEF has not at all helped in this. The US can hold the population of the world sure, but fact of the matter is that should not be our goal. There are too many cultures, and there are too many offset forms of belief.

We can barely keep our own country working properly and inflation is the worst it's been in almost ever. We can't take care of our own and yet the bleeding heart class in the US just expects us to take in everyone from everywhere at all times. Economically we can't handle this. Socially and culturally we can't handle this. People need to go to countries through the proper sources. They need to do it legally. But what's more, these countries are losing their working age and military age men. IN THE THOUSANDS and MILLIONS. What is the result to the country these people are leaving? What of the women and children left behind?

No one wants to have this conversation because they are scared of being called a xenophobe or a racist. But having love for your country and wanting it to continue to function, and not have your culture crushed under the weight of actual invaders, isn't either of those things. And before you go, "Oh well how dare you call them invaders ~" here is the definition for you.

Look at the second listing. I understand the idea behind wanting others to be happy. I understand the idea behind wanting people from other places to not suffer. But these people are leaving their countries, rather than fighting for them. They have abandoned their mothers, daughters, wives, sisters, aunts, and grandmothers in most cases.

Most of you need to face the reality that the real world is not a fair place. But if you want your country to thrive and survive there needs to be a process in which it functions. These people are ignoring that entire process. If Italy can't deport the people that just arrived on that ship, outnumbering the entire population of the island they just landed on, there will be consequences. And they will not be good. The language will start to shift. The religions in the area will change. The entire culture will change. Then at some point, they will decide, "This is our land now, and it's always been ours". It's objectively conquest by sheer numbers. And while they might not individually have any ill intent. That won't matter in the long term.

This isn't a conspiracy. It's not bigotry. Open a history book and read. I'm pro immigration. 100% I'm for it. But how long are the lines for the people coming here legally? How many people have been denied citizenship over BS reasons? And not only are we allowing illegals in at a more than alarming rate (specifically in the US), but we are spending tax dollars on giving them roofs over their heads, and handouts, and in some places they are even getting monthly allowances.

Explain to me how we are doing this for people with no respect for the country, or it's laws, and yet you can't solve homelessness? You can't make a VA that actually functions properly? You can't get out out of inflation? So to the people cheering on illegal immigration, you are voting for your own demise. And every penny spent on them, is not one spent on a legal immigrant. Every penny spent on them is not spend helping the homeless. Every penny spent on them is not spent on healthcare.

This might be a controversial post and some people may even block, mute or unfollow me for it and that's fine. But history speaks for itself. And every country that has dealt with this for too long has collapsed over time. Pretty much every single time.

You should be concerned. Before you end up as the one who's displaced, and is fleeing.

[artificial-transmutations]

Big Dick

Richard hated moving. That meant both the concept of living in a new place as well as the process itself. Still, it was a necessity sometimes, such as this.

His employer had been hit hard by the different crises of his time and was forced to shut down the place where Richard worked. Thankfully, rather than just firing everyone there, they offered their employees another job at another office.

The downside? That other office was half way across the country. Many of his colleagues had naturally turned down the offer, but Richard had had a hard time to decide. Sure, he would lose his social circle, but there wasn't too much of that anyway. It did however beat looking for a new job, which was a nightmare in the current economy.

So, Richard accepted. His company helped him find a place to live in the new city, but didn't pay for a moving company, which was understandable considering the distance. Sadly, that was the same reason, Richard couldn't afford one either, which left him with the both sides of moving that he hated.

Luckily, his new apartment already had furniture, so all he had to do was pack his belongings into boxes and drive over there.

The first part of his moving project went surprisingly smoothly. He managed to pack everything he wanted to take into one van that he rented for the occasion and drove over to his new home. He arrived at the apartment in the early evening after a long but uneventful drive.

However, once he opened the door to his new place, he almost dropped the box he was holding. Did he get lost on the way here? No, impossible, the key fit and the address was right. This was his new apartment.

Richard carefully set down his box and went into the place, rubbing his eyes. This had to be some kind of a joke!

Inside, the apartment was stuffed full of furniture. However, it wasn't modern, concrete-look or faux wood stuff he would have expected. It was old and wooden: Lots of cabinets, wardrobes, a wardrobe, chests, bed frames, tables, chairs and so forth. The place looked like a set from some seventies movies. All rooms had a beige carpet in them, and furniture that looked like it belonged to his grandmother. Even the lights were old-fashioned stained glass lamps that produced a dim light.

Richard was a modern man. He loved a minimalistic style when it came to his own apartment, and he always chose modern furniture for it. Now, this place looked like a dump. He couldn't imagine what kind of weirdo would choose to live in such an awful place, especially since he knew the rent would be higher than it was for the simple fact that his new landlord must have made the place look so hideous. He looked at the colorful curtains with disgust.

Richard let out a long sigh. Great. He would either need to redecorate the whole place or look for another apartment first thing tomorrow. There was no way he was going to live like this. However, as it was already quite late, he had no choice but to sleep in this nightmare of a home and do his research in the morning. He picked up the box from the entrance and went to his new bedroom.

It was already late when he finished moving in boxes and sat down in a dusty armchair, immediately coughing from the dust it produced. Just. Great.

However, when the dust settled, he had to take a double look. At first, he thought his plain and white t-shirt was all dusty now, but in fact, he found it changed! In place of the modern style clothing, he was wearing a colorful shirt now, something that went well with the hideous pictures on the wall. What the fuck was happening?

He needed to get out of this right away. He went to the bedroom at once, where he put box with his clothes earlier and got out of the shirt on the way. Before he could search for a replacement however, he noticed his chest.

It looked like it was supposed to look like - mostly. However, instead of being cleanly shaven, as Richard always was, it was covered in curly hair!

Richard's head was swimming. He was sure he had shaved this morning, as he did every morning. However, the chest hair was here, and without a doubt the product of more than one day without shaving his chest.

Shaking his head, he opened the box, only to be surprised once more. Instead of his Jeans and t-shirts, he was looking at colorful shirts and corduroy pants. This wasn't his stuff!

There had to be a rational explanation for all of this. Perhaps he had somehow taken someone else’s box. The next one would surely contain his stuff.

With shaking hands, he opened the next box, only to find it full of... magazines. Colorful printed magazines. Porn magazines from the look of it. But that wasn't all! When he opened a random one, he found a nearly naked man, in a seductive pose. Another magazine, another man in another pose, with an impressive moustache.

Richard went through a few more magazines, just to be sure, but there was no doubt: It weren't only old-fashioned porn magazines, it was old-fashioned gay porn magazines.

Richard was feeling dizzy. What was going on? Just then he noticed a stirring in his pants. When he looked down, he saw that his cock had reacted to all the pictures of men he just looked at and had grown stiff in the confines of his pants. Why?! Richard wasn't gay!

However, when he looked back at the printed men, his cock twitched in need, as if to prove him wrong.

Absentmindedly, he touched his member through the fabric and let out a moan.

Something very weird was going on, and he needed to think clearly. However, he couldn't do so with an erection like that. He would need to do something about it first, before figuring this out.

Richard carefully reached into his pants and grabbed his member, stroking it slowly. His moans grew louder. With one hand, he started playing with his nuts, squeezing the testes carefully before massaging them with his fingers.

Meanwhile, he couldn't stop looking at the men in the pictures, which caused his dick to swell even more. It quickly became bigger and harder as even more blood rushed into it, making it look obscene.

However, even the full hardness of his cock wasn't enough to distract him from the pictures he looked at. He needed more and stroked his member faster and rougher while he watched the men on the pages.

Just as his mind drifted off to images of kissing the men and feeling their bodies, he felt a powerful orgasm wash over him, causing him to tense up and moan loudly, pumping his seed into his hand while watching the magazines.

After it was all done, he let out a sigh and wiped the remaining sperm off his hand and pants with a dirty looking towel before flopping to his bed and drifting to sleep eventually.

The birds were singing, and the sun was shining when Richard woke up the next morning. He yawned and stretched before scratching his hairy chest. Apparently, he had fallen asleep after jerking off last night. He wiped off his tight black leather pants that accentuated his bulge nicely and went into the bathroom.

As he urinated into the toilet and watched the busy life and newspaper vendors on the streets through the window, Richard smiled. Life really was good for him. Being one of the most prolific gay porn stars of the seventies certainly had its perks. For example, he was able to afford this great place to live.

He finished up and washed his hands while smiling for his reflection and twirled his thick moustache. He was really looking for today's shoot; his co-star was positively hot, and he would show him why he was called "Big Dick". As Dick left his apartment, Richard was screaming internally, unable to escape this new reality as a seventies gay porn star.

[mariacallous]

Ever since the televised debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump on Sept. 10, Springfield, Ohio, has become an epicenter for ferocious anti-immigrant attacks. As he struggled to regain his footing against the vice president, Trump dredged up disproved claims promoted by his running mate, J.D. Vance, who said that Haitian immigrants in Springfield were eating dogs and cats.

The false allegation, as New York Times columnist Lydia Polgreen argued, tapped into some of the worst nativist sentiment. “There is a long and grim tradition of demonizing Haitians in the United States,” Polgreen wrote, pointing to how the claim revolved around two cherished elements of life, food and pets. Polgreen argued that the situation is a reminder of the threat a second Trump term would pose. “In his elevation of something akin to blood libel against a group of blameless legal immigrants who came to America from their strife-torn nation in search of a better life through hard work… he has proved himself a dangerous and malevolent figure.” Indeed, anti-Haitian sentiment is deeply rooted in American culture, dating back to the Haitian revolution of 1791-1804, when there was a strong reaction against the overthrow of French rule. This rhetoric has frequently included accusations of animal consumption, as well as cannabalism.

As polls demonstrate that immigration remains a top concern for many American voters, Trump’s rhetoric in recent weeks has only become more toxic. At a rally on Long Island, New York, he warned his adoring crowd: “They’re coming from the Congo. They’re coming from Africa. They’re coming from the Middle East. They’re coming from all over the world—Asia. A lot of it coming from Asia. What’s happening to our country is we’re just destroying the fabric of life in our country. We’re not going to take it any longer. You got to get rid of these people. Give me a shot.”

Besides circulating a dangerous and toxic set of illiberal ideas that has caused Ohio officials to station guards at the Springfield schools and prompted two local colleges to go remote, Trump’s narrative erases the city’s real lesson for the United States: how immigrants are revitalizing decaying economic areas that have been left behind for decades.

Like places in many other so-called Rust Belt states, Springfield had been a city that struggled as the new high tech, financial service-centered economy took hold in the 1990s. But now, Springfield is booming. The recent history of the city shows not why immigrants are a threat to existing populations, but why they are part of the solution to economic decline and malaise.

This has been the history of immigration in the United States since the founding, and it remains just as important today as ever before.

For much of the 20th century, Springfield, Ohio, located about 45 miles from Columbus, was one of the thriving small cities of the Midwestern United States. Manufacturing had been at the heart of the economy since the late 19th century. In 1902, when the companies that produced Champion harvesters joined with several other brands in the merger that created International Harvester Co., more jobs and money came to the community with the production of agricultural machinery.

In addition to International Harvester, the local economy benefited from the presence of the Kelly-Springfield Tire Company, Crowell-Collier Publishing Company, and several other businesses. Though it was certainly not New York, Chicago, or Columbus, Springfield embodied the kind of bustling small city that was at heart of the American Century.

But like many of these cities, the area suffered greatly in the late 20th and early 21st centuries as factories closed and jobs went overseas. Between 1970 and 2020, the population fell from more than 80,000 to less than 60,000.

When  Newsweek magazine sought in 1983 to capture for readers what was happening in this increasingly economically desolate section of the country, it zeroed in on Springfield; the editors said it had once been a “dream city.” The magazine published a lengthy special that used the city to tell a bigger story about national decline, and its findings were bleak. Crowell-Collier had closed its plant decades earlier, while International Harvester was reeling amid the recession. Concluding with a pessimistic message, the authors wrote: “The times have not been hospitable to dreaming.”

As he campaigned in 2015, Trump’s anti-immigration and pro-tariff agenda seemed to promise relief.

But while help finally arrived, it came from a very different direction. In 2016, through various incentives, state officials persuaded Topre, a major Japanese company that produced auto parts, to invest millions of dollars to construct a manufacturing plant that would eventually create hundreds of local jobs. In the coming years, numerous other companies followed Topre’s lead.

Attracted by the low cost of living and thriving community, somewhere between 12,000 and 20,000 Haitian immigrants would move to Springfield in the following years. The pace picked up after the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, when there were not enough workers in many industries. Employers lured Haitians by advertising good jobs and a decent standard of living. Companies paid for immigration lawyers, translators, and set up online portals to smooth the transition.

The Haitian immigrants, who arrived legally with temporary protected status or humanitarian parole, settled in. They quickly proved to be a valued workforce that allowed the economy to continue prospering. They boosted the once thinned-out population and brought new cultural energy to the community.

McGregor Metal plant’s CEO told NPR that he had depended on about three dozen immigrants to fill the jobs at his factory, which produces steel parts, to make the shop floor work. At the Dole Foods factory, Haitian labor has also been vital. Earning paychecks also means taxes.

The false allegations swerving around Haitian immigrants ignore all of this demand. The fearmongering grows out of a common “they keep coming” myth about immigration, as Harvard University historian Erika Lee argued in Myth America, that wipes away the nation’s own role in “coercing, recruiting, cajoling, and incentivizing foreigners to come to the country to serve its own economic needs.”

Legal immigrants didn’t only provide labor in Springfield, but also boosted the vitality of downtown. Caribbean food trucks and restaurants brought new energy to sleepy streets. Haitian Flag Day became a popular annual event. On Sundays, the prayers and song from the St. Raphael Church, where there has been a regular afternoon Haitian Creole Mass, filled the air. Until recent months, immigrants were understood locally to be integral to the fact that Springfield was standing strong once again. CultureFest, recently canceled because of safety threats, has been a well-attended annual two-day celebration of the city’s vibrant and diverse cultural offerings.

During an interview with NBC News, one Springfield pastor said, “The real story is that for 80 years we were a shrinking city, and now we’re growing.”

With growing populations come problems. These are not imagined and have received ample coverage. As the population climbed back to previous numbers as a result of immigration and a more prosperous economy, emergency services, health care centers, schools, and city services were strained. As the housing stock declined, rent increased. It often became more difficult to secure appointments to key government offices and schools, which—once under threat of shutting down when the population was disappearing—were now trying to keep up with growing student bodies.

Tensions spilled over last year when an 11-year-old boy was killed in a school bus crash that involved a Haitian immigrant. The tragic death unleashed the type of nativist vitriol that Trump has helped to elevate to the highest levels of political power.

These kinds of problems, however, grew out of success, not crisis. They require commonsense, rational government solutions—not the kind of wall-building and deportation measures that would rob the city of a Haitian population that has brought it back to life. Federal support, for instance, could help shore up basic services. New measures to assist with affordable housing could bring down costs for homeowners and renters.

None of these policies would be easy to achieve, and they require spending, but they are well worth it. Rather than offering elixirs that would end up hurting the very communities they promise to save, including the white working-class residents who the Republican Party has depended on, rational policies that address the actual issues can strengthen the infrastructure of cities such as Springfield and allow them to remain great.

One of the most striking developments of recent years has been the way that a far-right nativist rhetoric has taken over the way that Americans discuss immigration.

While Republicans champion the imperative of exclusion and warn of the dangers of replacement, too many Democrats have responded in a defensive fashion by accepting the conservative terms of the debate. During that Sept. 10 debate, Harris’s main response to a question on the topic was to remind voters that Trump had convinced congressional Republicans to vote against a harsh bipartisan border bill. Harris promised that if she was president, she would sign the bill. Trump vacillated. This fit a recent pattern where Democrats have been scrambling to the center, if not to the right of center, to try to win back support on this issue.

Nathan Clark, the father of the 11-year-old who died in the crash in Springfield, recently blasted the Republicans trying to capitalize on his son’s death, which he reminded a Springfield City Commission was an “accident” rather than a “murder.”

Begging the GOP to stop, Clark said: “They can vomit all the hate they want about illegal immigrants, the border crisis, and even untrue claims about fluffy pets being ravaged and eaten by community members. However, they are not allowed, nor have they ever been allowed, to mention Aiden Clark from Springfield, Ohio.”

Regardless of the politics, Americans need politicians to also keep reminding the electorate of what great things immigration has done and continues to do for the nation. And there is no better place to start than Springfield, Ohio.

Writing in the New York Times, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican who was born in the city, put pen to paper to remind readers that “the city hit tough times in the 1980s and 1990s, falling into serious decline as manufacturing, rail commerce and good-paying jobs dwindled. Now, however, Springfield is having a resurgence in manufacturing and job creation. Some of that is thanks to the dramatic influx of Haitian migrants who have arrived in the city over the past three years to fill jobs. They are there legally. They are there to work.”

After praising the immigrants for their character and value, DeWine reported how one business owner in the city had informed the governor that “his business would not have been able to stay open after the pandemic but for the Haitians who filled the jobs.”

There is a lesson here for all other communities seeking to do the same. Rather than villainizing newcomers, it might be better—as so many Republicans have done until recent years—to concentrate on policies that would help to integrate legal immigrants who arrive to blighted areas seeking to work, spend, and play. Not long ago, when George W. Bush was president, a substantial number of Republicans and Democrats worked together on a grand bargain that would combine rationalizing the immigration system, including creating a legal path to citizenship for millions of people already in the United States, with tougher border and deportation policies.

Over the past decade, the first part of that bargain has disappeared. Most Republicans focused on the second part of the deal, while many Democrats abandoned hope for the first. Springfield is an important reminder that the politics of exclusion will erode the very people who have been a backbone to the nation’s economy and culture.

[robertreich]

Debunking “No One Wants To Work Anymore” 

I keep hearing "no one wants to work anymore."

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, corporate America’s biggest lobbying group, claims there are over 10 million job openings right now in the US for which employers can’t find workers.

Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell says the U.S. is dealing with a “structural labor shortage” that won’t be resolved anytime soon.

But here’s the truth: there is no labor shortage.

There is a shortage of jobs paying sufficient wages to attract workers to fill them.

When a problem is wrongly described, the solutions posed often turn out to be equally wrong.

For most Americans, real inflation-adjusted wages continue to drop. Any pay increases workers may have earned in the past few years have actually been pay cuts, because wages have lagged behind the rising costs of basic necessities — like housing, food, childcare, and healthcare.

You don’t have to be a financial wizard to see why some workers might say the hell with it.

So, what should be done about the difficulty employers are having finding workers?

Simple. If employers want more workers, they should pay them more.

Many corporations are raking it in right now, they can clearly afford to.

Of course Jerome Powell and his colleagues at the Fed don’t want to hear this. They’re aiming to deal with the so-called “labor shortage” by slowing the economy so much that employers can find all the workers they need without raising wages.

But the Fed increasing interest rates to slow the economy will prevent millions of people from getting desperately-needed raises and cause millions more to lose their jobs — disproportionately low-wage workers, women and people of color.

Meanwhile, Republicans and some corporate economists blame the “labor shortage” on overly generous unemployment benefits. They say the way to get more people into jobs is to make their lives outside jobs less tolerable.

Rubbish. Most unemployed people are already hard up.

Pandemic benefits are long over, and even before COVID, America’s unemployment system was already the least generous of any rich nation.

Taken to its logical extreme, the corporate Republican argument holds water only if you don’t give a damn about workers.

Sure…you could eliminate all safety nets and at some point people without jobs will hurt so much they’ll have to take any available job, at any wage, whatever it demands.

But do this, and we’ll end up with an economy that’s even crueler than today’s economy.

Look: If we want more people to take jobs — AND we wish to live in a moral society where people can maintain decent lives — the answer is to pay people more.

Instead of saying “no one wants to work anymore,” we should be saying, “no one wants to be exploited anymore.”

[hybbart]

Heya! I was wondering how medication and medical devices work in the ranchers au. Most devices need replacing quite often and after five years, many medications would be out of date and useless or even dangerous.

I definitely get if it's just a case of, they don't go off, since medicine is confusing but I was curious since it could lead to plot.

I should say that I specifically don't get into this stuff much just because I don't know much about it and I would rather keep things vague than accidentally impart incorrect information. As well as the fact that it is ultimately a biopunk setting with differences to our world. That said, have more rambles than I expected.

Right you are, there's in fact not a lot of medication left. People hoard anything they find but most is long expired. The hospital is lucky to have two doctors and Scar who know a bit more about medicine than the average person, but a lot of whats kept is just praying it still works.

Cleo thanks to being a gorgon is also in the drug development business, though she specialized in developing antivenom, but she not only knows but can help develop certain medicines. She and Scott have made quite a thing of their inn and I kinda wanna touch on it in the future.

Shubble, Katherine, Gem, Impulse, and Pearl know home remidies for a lot of things and have specifically been growing and creating them. These aren't going to replace complex modern drugs for specific conditions obviously, but they work and its easy to pass it around with the help of the radio station.

Overall, on bad days, Tango generally has to grin and bear it with homemade pain killers at most. It's rough and it contributed to the second wave of population decline after the first wave of zombie deaths. It's Scar's goal to specifically help survivors with this sort of thing, though.

As for medical equipment, it's a bit grim but since there's such a small population now and the hospitals were the first to go there was a lot of spare equipment from storage and patients left behind. In part because of Scar's own medical needs and in part for their desire to help others, Scar and Cub, and later Grian, collected what they could from abandoned hospitals and care homes.

It's obviously not going to cover everything, materials break down and as far as replacing them or things that need customization there isn't a factory just down the road that makes it all in house.

This is where I take the most artistic liberties, but Tango, with Doc and Zed, is the one to maintain Jimmy and Scar's equipment as well as his arm. Whether that's patching the existing, altering replacement, or crafting new parts. He knew a good bit from his job and hobbies but he's spent the past 5 years learning specifically how to diy for Jimmy and himself. It's not perfect but it's the best they have.

This is still a bit of a soft biopunk setting at the end of the day with mutliple species and genetic modification, I imagine it might be a little bit easier to get hold of certain things than it would be in real life. I also think they live in a very different economy, and its probably easier to find sturdier and custom made items due to the variety of their society making mass production more difficult. This leaves the problem of certain species not responding to certain medicines though and needing more specialized treatment.

The degredation of materials is something I do try to take into account, which is the reason gas power is nearly nonexistent, but it's hard to take everything into account and sometimes I would rather not, simply because it allows more stories to be told if something is available but difficult to get rather than impossible. I'm not great with drawing or knowing technology so it's easier to just say something is jerryrigged than it is to actively illustrate how they did it. If it seems it might be possible I allow it.

The important thing to me is to consider the types of people who would think about these things first and if anyone might be that person. You know, someone with asthma is going to think of medication and figure out how to get it, a truck driver might know where to go for storages of specific supplies instead of raiding malls, and a historical reenactor might think of how to get and create sustainable materials. Everyone leads a life that puts certain things at the forefront of their mind that other people probably wouldn't think of at all. Especially going from a modern specialist society collapsing into a society that requires generalized knowledge. And the saved knowledge of these things didn't turn to dust the second the apocalypse hit.

Life's not as rough as it might be in other apocalypse media, just because I guess I generally don't really care for the unrralistically cynical outlook a lot of american apocalypse stories are made in for drama's sake. This is a story about people caring about and helping one another, and developing a new life for themselves. If they don't have access to something, people work together to make due with what they have.

[bumblebeehug]

New Years Kiss

Summary: Lucy and Natsu being nostalgic for 60% of the story with only 40% actually being about the New Years. Notes: My first real yapper-fic! Ao3 - FF.net

***

It was the most festive time of the year in Fiore. The old year was getting left behind and everyone looked forward to all the adventures the coming year would have for them. The Fairy Tail guild was certainly no exception.

It had been a few years since the war against the Alvarez Empire. While the economy still was unstable in the continent, people had slowly been able to build up their normal life again. Just this autumn Magnolia could hold their harvest festival again after too many years on standstill, and the market had finally reopened up for locals and visitors. Team Natsu was back from the 100 years quest since a year back, and the days were passing slowly and uneventfully - not that anyone minded, even the rowdiest wizards found blissfulness in the calmer weekdays.

The mages and wizards in Fairy Tail took their missions one at a time. Most were still tame jobs about rebuilding and helping non-magical beings, while the tougher jobs had toned down. To the town’s surprise, the famous Team Natsu was not complaining either. Of course, they did not know about the sabbatical year they had been forced to take, but they were indeed thriving in the newfound peace that blessed their hometown.

Yes, you heard that right. Guild master Makarov Dreyar had made the group take a year off to heal and get a chance to live a normal civilised life before running off into danger again. Normally Natsu would protest greatly, and do not get it wrong, he did in the beginning, but soon the Fairy Tail guild was faced with great grief. Makarov passed away after years of stress, magical impact and a weak body. He was praised across the continent for his courageous soul and fatherly instinct, and even though everyone in the guild mourned, they agreed that he had lived a worthy and long life, and that he would live on in their hearts. This occasion made it hard for Team Natsu to not follow his last order, and they finally caved in to the home vacation.

This year was indeed a bittersweet year. While Makarov’s death brought devastation to the guild, it also brought them together. They cried together, laughed about fond memories together and loved together. And so the year came to an end. Naturally they would hold a big party for the guild to get together and celebrate what the next year would bring, because whatever they would be faced with, they were in it together.

The same line of thought went through Lucy’s, Levy’s and Juvia’s heads when they heard that the dress code to the party would be formal. Now, Lucy wouldn’t say there was anyone special she wanted to impress with her dress, but as a woman who grew up in a wealthy family she couldn’t bring herself to go against the party invitation’s order. Of course she would do her best to make herself presentable in the crowd.

Now, Levy and Juvia could actually admit that they wanted to impress a certain someone. There was no shame in it for them - Levy had twins with Fairy Tail’s own iron dragon slayer Gajeel Redfox. She even had another baby brewing in her belly right now! So yes, she was in an official relationship with Gajeel, and she found no shame in wanting to dress up for the occasion. Even if it usually was quite the hassle to make yourself presentable when raising toddlers, she still wanted to put in the effort to pamper herself once in a while.

Juvia has never been shy when it comes to confessing her love to Gray Fullbuster, but after the 100 years quest they had obviously developed into something more. Lucy knew from before that Gray had a certain eye for the water mage, and she knew that their encounter with Tartaros and Spriggan 12 had affected them deeply, so seeing them happy and content together was pure bliss according to the celestial mage. There had also been quite the reduction of flooding in the guild hall - something that was appreciated by everyone, including the new master.

The new master post had once again been assigned to Erza. No one in Fairy Tail even batted an eye when it came to it, aside from Macao who still wanted to redeem himself from those seven years when half the guild were on Tenrou Island. While Erza still had some difficulties with the paperwork, everyone had trust in her ability to defend and lead the guild no matter the situation. Recent unofficial guild activities with Crime Sorcière had also made her mood a lot better, Lucy was always ahead with the gossip - don’t mind that she heard this from Mira Jane.

Now, when it came to the New Years party, Lucy, Levy and Juvia had decided to come to Lucy’s place to get themselves ready. The most ideal place would have been one of the dorms at Fairy Hills since no boys were allowed, but Levy had since long moved in with Gajeel and Juvia and Gray had recently moved together. None of them had the guts to interfere with Erza’s planning, and Cana would most likely try to get them drunk before even leaving her dorm, so Lucy’s place it was. Lucy had taken time off earlier just to specifically tell Natsu to not come there while they were getting ready - she wanted them to be comfortable to change, plus they wanted to chat without a dragon slayer’s hearing in the way. To their surprise, Natsu actually agreed to it, saying something about finding that rental place for suits before they closed.

So, they had the place from lunch to the time they wanted to leave. Lucy gave them alcohol-free drinks due to Levy’s pregnancy, but also since she knew that Juvia had a growing foetus inside her belly. Juvia didn’t know this though, and Lucy was not going to be the one who took away her joy of learning it by herself - you see, Wendy made Lucy keep it a secret that she had smelled and sensed a child brewing in Juvia's stomach for almost 3 weeks now - Juvia wasn’t gonna keep it a secret the second she knew about it, and Wendy wanted her to have the joy of discovering it herself. Lucy kept her word and hadn’t told anyone, not even Natsu, Levy or Happy, and certainly not Gray. And because of this unknown child, Lucy was gonna have to tell Mira not to give her any alcohol tonight.

Levy, who still was insecure about her once again growing postpartum belly and didn’t want anything tight, had decided on a dress that would be on the shorter side, one that would reach just below her behind.The dress was sewn in an A-line format, one of her favourite forms on dresses. After doing her makeup and throwing a cute and neat headband on, she would be done - but not after Lucy had convinced her to wear a few jewellery pieces of course.

Juvia wanted to keep her modest style in her dress, while also of course showing off a little bit of skin - just enough for her Gray-sama to notice. She had chosen a dark blue, long dress that fit tight on her body. On her left side there was a slit, much resembling the skirt she wore daily. That way her Fairy Tail emblem would show through, which she of course had much pride in. The dress had long sleeves and a surprisingly low cut around her neck. She had chosen that cut to show off the necklace she got from Gray - yes, it was in fact his usual cross. That necklace was almost as important to him as Natsu’s scarf was important to Natsu, so there was no wonder Juvia wanted to show it off. She decided to put her blue locks in a bun and accompany the necklace with more silver jewellery.

Lucy however was stumped. She had no idea what to wear. Her favourite colour was blue, but she usually wore a bright blue that wasn’t really fit for new years eve. She liked the colour pink, but again, it wasn’t really working with the theme. Juvia and Levy wore dark blue and black, so she couldn’t work with that either. She ended up glancing at a red tight dress that Virgo presented from the Celestial world - it was daring, but not in a way that would be too much of a disaster. She ended up trying it on. The silhouette of the skirt was similar to Juvia's - long with a high slit that reached almost up to her hip. She would have to rule out panties if she chose this dress - a risky move when alcohol and her guild mates were involved. The upper body had a classic heart shape cut. Simple, but never a bad choice. What made this dress so special however wasn’t just the daring colour - it was the shimmering glitter in the fabric that made her buy it. To her it resembled the stars, while also fitting in with the glamorous theme of new years. She decided to just wear black heels and some gold jewelry to it, and also got Cancer to fix her hair in a half up-do and curling the ends. Her earrings and her rings had red stones that matched the dress perfectly, and with some eyeliner, mascara and more pampering of her face, she had her look.

Now, these three weren’t the best at keeping track on time. Levy had taken ages to decide on which shoes she was going to wear, and Juvia kept going back and forth on deciding her hair style - Cancer even popped up once to share his opinion which finally made it stick. Lucy couldn’t help but worry that Natsu would storm in and ruin their dresses by throwing in a sack of dead fish through her window. Still though, the girls were weary of sweating in the small apartment so they couldn’t close it.

Well, they came 30 minutes late. As three much proper ladies they didn’t want to be too hasty on their way to the newly decorated guild since the risk of dirtying their clothes would be too big. When they finally arrived they immediately got split up - Levy rushed off to her kids and Juvia was escorted away by Gray. Lucy just made her way to the bar to chat with Wendy and Carla who were sipping on one milkshake each.

“Mira! Could I get a glass of champagne please?” Lucy really wanted to have some fun tonight, but she also had to remember to at least make it to 12am. While she waited for her drink she took a look around.

The guild was of course making a big deal out of the party - it was a celebration where they could get away with drinking and having fun while also being dressed up all fancy and nice. The girls liked it more than the boys, but it was truly a pleasure to everyone. Fairy Tail might not be the guild that was best cut out for a ball in the castle, but having their own little fancy party was always nice.

Evergreen, Gray and Juvia were the stars when it came to decorating the place. Ever used her fairy magic to lit up the place as if small fireflies and stars were floating above them. Lucy couldn’t help but admire them - they truly replicated the heavens perfectly. She could even point out multiple constellations. Evergreen had also combined her powers with Gray and made the most beautiful fairy lights surrounding the edges of the walls. With this being the only source of light, the guildhall became just as magical as you could imagine it being in a book. Juvia had chipped in by managing to get Gray to agree to do a moving ice sculpture with water falling. That way it could be used for decoration and refill at the same time - if anyone got thirsty on water that is. The sculpture was quite abstract, but the flickering lights made Lucy interpret it as the feeling of bittersweetness - there were soft lines and harsh lines combined and the warm light gave the originally cool sculpture a highly impressive format.

Continuing her gaze across the guildhall her eyes stuck on Gajeel and Levy. Their children were born two years ago, and everyone in the guild is starstruck. Everyone wants for it to be their turn to hold one of the twins for a few minutes, and despite it being two entire years since they were born, everyone still gushes over them as if they were the most valuable diamonds in the whole universe. Levy and Gajeel insist that they are, of course.

As Lucy’s eyes continue over the guild hall they find Erza who is standing in the corner of the guild hall. Lucy knows that the death of Makarov was hard on Erza. She had already seen him almost die once, and when he took his final breath she was with him. Despite her hard armour and fierce look in her eyes, Lucy knew that her heart is soft and vulnerable. In some incredible way though, Erza had been leading the guild in an uttermost professional way. She was incredibly diplomatic and had good relations with the other guild masters. Everyone knew better than to underestimate the woman who could slay 100 monsters without barely batting an eye. Lucy could only admire the woman Erza had become. And what a woman she became! Moving on to more of the gossip Lucy had heard of, apparently Erza had invited Jellal into Fairy Tail some time during the 100 year quest. She was still unsure if Jellal was a member or not at the moment, but that part wasn’t really important to her. What was important was the fact that Erza had a happier aura, and after asking Natsu about it he had confirmed that they do in fact meet up occasionally.

Not far away from Erza sat Bisca, Alzach and Azuka at a table. Azuka had grown like a vine during their time away from the guild - Lucy would always be sad that she missed the upbringing of the cheery girl, and she couldnät believe that it was already time for her to start school. Not many people had received much of an education, but with Anna-sensei’s school not too far off, young people could finally be taught world history and much else that easily went by when growing up as an orphan. Too many guildmates had difficulties reading and writing, and it was frankly sad and according to Lucy unfair that she would receive education only because her family was rich, and not anyone else.

Continuing the line of thought, her eyes wandered over to Romeo. Romeo had finally grown into a boy who could take on solo missions - even if he still tries to group up with others in order to get the higher paying rewards. Lucy had recently learnt that Romeo actually had a lot of fire accidents in his room at home, considering he’s a fire mage after all. He really doesn’t want to burden his father with extra bills, so the jobs he takes are really in order to make up for that. Lucy let out a slight sight. Romeo’s growth from the Tenrou incident was heartbreaking. She had seen him so recently as a young boy who worried when his father didn’t come home from his missions. After the missed seven years, plus the year after the war against Tartarus, she had missed out on more than half of his life. Romeo was a boy who had to grow up too quickly, and there is nothing Lucy could do to change that.

Evergreen and Elfman enter Lucy’s field of sight, and they immediately bring a smile to her face. Lucy could basically be writing a gossip magazine, because here she knew even more secrets. According to a little blue bird, Elfman has plans on proposing to Evergreen in March. Lucy knew better than to spread the word to Mira though, she would probably get three heart attacks, do a flip and then pass out. At least in her mind, because the poker face that woman carried was impressive. Lucy did actually accidentally tell Freed about the upcoming proposal, and his poker face was not as good. He freaked out at first, muttering about babies and godfathers and uncles, but when he calmed down Lucy could tell that he was genuinely happy for Evergreen. The Thunder Legion had an admirable bond.

Lucy’s absent mind suddenly got abruptly disturbed.

“Oi Lucy!” The fire dragon slayer made his way up to her, flashing a big grin on his face. Lucy had been too lost in thoughts to notice that Mira already had come with her drink.

She carefully watched his figure while he made his way over to her. Natsu was dressed for the occasion in a black tuxedo, and he sported a normal white dress shirt underneath. It wasn’t buttoned all the way up, and the red tie he tried to put on hung around his neck like a scarf. Talking about the scarf, today he didn't seem to be wearing it. He was already ordering a drink of his own after eyeing Lucy’s champagne.

Lucy could only sigh with a slight smile on her lips.

“Come on Natsu, it’s a special occasion! Can’t you at least use all the buttons?” She didn’t even greet him properly, but they had only been away from each other for a couple of hours. Instead she stood up to button his shirt and properly tie the tie. It would be such a waste to not make sure he wore the tuxedo properly when he finally wore one.

“Meh, you know I’m not good at this stuff!” He just grinned at her concentrating, slightly pouting face.

The relationship between Natsu and Lucy was unusual. Not for them, but probably for everyone else who saw how they acted around each other. Since the 100 year quest Natsu had basically moved in with Lucy. Of course nothing official, but it was an unspoken rule that they always hang around each other. When they leave the guild, they make sure the other comes with them, and when they arrive at the guild all the members expect to see them both there. At home they share Lucy’s bed more often than Lucy would like to admit, and they eat meals and do chores with shared responsibility. Lucy knew that they’ve been through a lot of hardships, and she knew that they calmed each other with their presence. All the wars and near-death experiences gave them their share of emotional scars, so instead of acting insensitive Lucy had slowly accepted the way Natsu made his way into her everyday life. It could easily pass as a neverending sleepover with the way they mostly just hung out and had fun all the time. Though Happy probably missed his fishing lake that was so close to his and Natsu’s house.

Natsu and Lucy have grown closer in more ways than emotionally though. In many aspects they’ve craved more physical contact than previously. Natsu seems to use almost any excuse to lift or carry away Lucy somewhere, even if it ends up with her smacking his head and dragging them both back to the guild. He also tends to use his motion sickness as an excuse to be close to her, and that’s something that everyone always lets slide since they feel bad for him.

Lucy actually does the more coupley touching though - the most prominent one being holding hands. She wasn’t sure exactly how she gathered the courage, but somewhere along the way she had found out that she got away with holding Natsu’s hand almost whenever she wanted. At first she tried it when they were about 200m away from her apartment - in the worst case scenario she could just lock him out and hide in embarrassment, and in the best case scenario he allowed it and she could live on happily. While she was mid-sentence of something unimportant she softly slipped her hand into his, making it easy for him to pull away but also clearly showing that she indeed meant to hold hands. By doing this she even got the pleasure of him freezing up for a second before confirming the hand-holding by giving her a soft smile and squeeze. From that moment it was rather easy to continue that habit. She held his hand when going to the market, when she was reading books in her room and when they just chatted at the tables in the guild.

Holding hands wasn’t her only speciality though. More often than not she actually allowed herself to occasionally hug him from the back, interlock her arm with his and even something as simple as just sitting close enough for their shoulders and knees to touch.

If the guild saw these kinds of actions two years ago they would have flipped out, teasing them day in and day out about their relationship, but somehow they had found themselves maturing during the years of babies and official romantical partners.

Natsu had even found the habit of holding Lucy around her waist or around her shoulders. When they were alone in her apartment it wasn't even too uncommon for him to cop a feel at her ass once in a while. It usually ended up with her squealing and giving him a half-hearted scowl about how he “should stop doing that!”, even if they just laughed it off afterwards.

But indeed, some may still say that their relationship lacked a little. Lacked in confession and kisses. But given the non-stop danger and/or other dramatic events, those moments hadn’t really come through. The confession has always been postponed to a later date, when they didn’t have to worry about their or other’s lives.

But back to the party. While Lucy was, according to Natsu, strangling him, he finally got a chance to look at her outfit. The red sparkling dress hugged her curves perfectly in his opinion, enhancing her beautiful figure. The lights in the room lit up her hair in the most beautiful way, and he couldn’t help but smile at the sight. His best friend was absolutely beautiful. He also couldn’t help noticing the slit that went up almost above her hip, and the milky soft skin showing through. He also couldn’t help touching her there, running his fingertips along the exposed skin. He could hear Lucy gasp and her heartbeat speed up, but she didn’t scold him.

“You look beautiful.” Lucy could swear that the colour of her cheeks was rivalling her dress. First he touches her bare skin on her hip and then he compliments her? She met his eyes and gave him a sheepish smile back.

“You too.” She wasn’t lying either. Natsu looked like a hot body-guard in that suit with his muscles straining against the fabric everytime he moved. Of course Mira saw all this, as she just came with Lucy’s drink.

“Oh my, you two are looking good!” She complimented. Lucy thanked her for both the drink and the compliment, and Natsu was delighted to receive his glass of whiskey.

The pair chatted for a bit while finishing their drinks, enjoying some smalltalk. The guild was less rowdy than usual and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. Cana came up once and challenged Natsu to a drinking contest, and since he knew he rarely got drunk he was up for the challenge. Lucy wasn’t too worried either since she figured out a while back that his natural heat usually burnt away the alcohol before it got into his system.

Still, to their surprise Cana actually lost, making Natsu lift Lucy up in a hug to celebrate. Some of that alcohol had definitely gotten to his brain, but Lucy couldn’t complain - she wasn’t exactly completely sober herself.

And finally some dance music started playing. To everyone’s fortune Gajeel hadn’t been assigned DJ, and with some genuinely good music Lucy pulled Natsu to the dance floor. Both having liquor in their systems, started dancing as if they were 17 again, jumping around to the upbeat songs and singing along to lyrics they didn’t know. The rest of the guild joined their happy-go-lucky dances and everyone was having the most fun this year.

Natsu was enchanted by Lucy’s moves. Well, he would never admit that of course, but the way she moved her body made him dizzy in a very good way. Evergreen must have done something to her fairy lights, because right now it looked as if stardust was snowing on Lucy, making her dress glimmer with every tiny movement. Natsu felt the need to compliment her again, but the music was loud and Lucy didn’t seem to be paying any attention to him right now. Her golden locks went sailing in the air around her as she bopped her head along with the beat. If she had looked like an angel before, she probably looked like a Goddess right now. Right now, Natsu could only let himself get catched in the moment, allowing his body to dance away all worries that had been weighing on his shoulders.

Then, as time went by and the clock got closer and closer to midnight, slower songs started playing through the speakers. Lucy, feeling hot and sweaty from all the dancing, decided to take a breather outside for a few minutes. There was still an hour until midnight, so she didn’t feel so rushed. Soon enough Natsu found her and joined her on the balcony. The air felt chilly and he couldn’t imagine that dress being very warm.

“Ya tired?” He grinned. Lucy turned her head slightly, inviting him to get closer.

“Not really, just taking a few breaths. You can join the others if you want to, I’ll be back in a minute.” The loud music and the multiple shots she had taken on the dance floor had been messing with her head, but being outside seemed to clear her mind a little.

“Nah, I’ll pass. They’re all too coupley in there. Even Erza is acting all secretive. It’s boring without you there.” This time it was Lucy’s turn to smile.

“Well, you’re welcome to stay.” The air was silent when Natsu carefully grabbed her right hand. Lucy was already sobering up and couldn’t help but blush from Natsu’s move. She would like to blame his chummy behaviour on the liquor, but she knew very well that it had been out of his system for a good while now. She didn’t complain though, and decided to lean her heavy head against Natsu’s safe and warm shoulder. When Natsu looked around he almost immediately noticed the stars that were shining brightly in the night sky above them. A soft smile graced his lips. Even if Evergreen’s magic was beautiful, nothing could compare to the real thing.

“Lucy, look up”

Lucy opened her eyes and tilted her face upwards to face the sky. While the stars weren't as visible as they were back when they fought the dragon cry, they still looked amazing. She could immediately point out a number of collestations.

“They’re beautiful…” Natsu could only agree. He didn’t usually care for such trivial things as the stars in the night sky, but whenever Lucy was near they seemed to shine ten times brighter.

They stood there for another five minutes before they decided to head back in. Inside the Guild there were still a few people slow dancing, however several of them had sat down to chat and sober up before the clock hit 12. Lucy made her way over to Levy, Gajeel, Max and Warren who were all making funny faces at the twins, trying to make them laugh. Natsu followed her eagerly. The birth of those kids had struck him hard, and he had grown fond of them from the very beginning. Gajeel usually didn’t like having Natsu around his children though, mainly due to being a worrisome father but also since Natsu was known for his irresponsible tendencies. Gajeel would never admit that Natsu was surprisingly careful around youngsters, and he would definitely never admit that he even felt a bit comfortable with them in Natsu’s care. Never ever.

“Hey Levy-chan! How’s it going?” Lucy had found her way up to the crowded area. Levy let out a groan.

“They’re not gonna ever fall asleep until they’re 15 years old. Oh well, at least they’re having fun I guess.” Levy’s lips turned upwards slightly, even if her eyes were screaming that she needed either a 3 month break, 5 cups of coffee or 8 shots of Mira’s strongest vodka - all options that were out of mind, given her pregnancy.

Lucy and Levy took this chance to stay and chat for a while, even if Natsu and Gajeel were having a hard time to not get into a brawl. With the occasional glances from Lucy and Levy they still managed to keep their mouths shut though.

While Levy and Lucy tried to calm the children down with hope to maybe also lull them to sleep, Natsu couldn’t help himself to ask Gajeel a question that had been bugging him for a while.

“Oi, metal head. Why is marriage such a big deal?” Gajeel fought the strong urge to face palm himself. Or Natsu, whatever came first.

“Are you serious? I knew you were dense, but that skull is so thick that I’m surprised your brain has room in there.” He quickly glanced at his wife and her best friend, hoping Lucy didn’t hear the stupidity Natsu was spitting out.

“Just answer the question dumbass,” growled Natsu, his temper really taking a toll. He wanted to hear a genuine answer, not insults.

Gajeel took his time before answering. The fire mage probably didn’t want to hear about the traditional use of marriage, he knew about that too well after Lucy’s many encounters with her father’s acquaintances. But there was something that he could say that Natsu actually might understand. He cleared his throat.

“Well, it’s because I love her and I want to spend the rest of my life with her.” A slight blush hid behind his grumpy face. He may be high on the list of Fairy Tail’s strongest wizards, but even Gajeel would feel a little embarrassed to confess his love to someone - even if he already had done it to the person in question multiple times. But Natsu’s answer shocked him.

“Is that it?”

“What do you mean ‘is that it’? It’s pretty big of a deal if you ask me.” Natsu was quiet for a minute before he answered.

“Well, I’ve already done all that basically.” Gajeel couldn’t believe his ears. If they already had confessed and almost proposed, how were they still not together?

“WHAT?”

Natsu looked away with a grumpy pout. His guild mates doubted him too much in his opinion. “Maybe not exactly said I love her or anything, but I told her we’d be together forever.”

“When??” Gajeel was almost scared to ask, knowing that whatever Natsu would answer with would not be the ideal situation.

“The day we went on the hundred years quest.”

“That was ages ago? Literally two years ago! How long have you been secretly dating?”

“We’re not dating. We’re just normal.”

“You’re telling me you haven’t even KISSED?”

“We were close to that day, but she seemed nervous so I didn’t. The time before that she made me kiss Happy and I didn’t wanna risk anything.” Natsu’s forehead had a sheen of sweat. That kiss with Happy must have been traumatising. Gajeel could somehow understand him, knowing that he would never want to kiss Panther Lily on the lips.

“Then do it tonight,” Gajeel came up with. It was a great idea in his opinion, as long as the dense fire dragon slayer would follow his reasoning.

“Why tonight?” He could have predicted that question.

“Because everyone kisses someone on New Years. It’s common knowledge. I’m gonna kiss Levy. Ice pants is going to kiss Juvia. Even Erza has someone tonight. Just play it off as a normal New Years Kiss, then you’ll see how she reacts. If she seems to like it, then great! You can confess and finally put the guild out of our misery. And if she doesn’t like it, well, then you were only following tradition.”

Natsu couldn’t believe his ears. Gajeel came with good advice for once? Who was this man and what had he made with the Gajeel Redfox he thought he knew? But he was right, imposter or not.

“I… I might just do that. Thanks ugly! Never thought the day would come when you actually were useful!” That was the last straw for Gajeel. No one insulted a Redfox after being given the best advice of the century.

You don’t need to be a genius to figure out that they started fighting after that. But there were still 45 minutes to midnight, and a few guild mates must have been longing for a friendly brawl because they soon joined in on the fighting, relying on Wendy as their healing source if they got hurt too bad.

Lucy and Levy could only sigh as they watched their friends throw light punches randomly in the air in hope that someone might get hit. The two had never been the ones to take part in these fights, so as the years went by they had found the noise easy to lock out. Right now though, Lucy could feel a headache creeping up on her, so she decided to pull away Levy and the twins to the infirmary in hope of finding some magical cure for headache.

“What’s the matter Lu?” They had already closed the doors behind them.

“Nothing really, it’s just that I can feel a headache on its way and I was hoping for some magical cure, or at least some aspirin. The kids might be able to sleep in here too.”

“Hey, I haven’t been drinking in quite some time, but I’m pretty sure the aspirin won’t have an effect. The only instant cure is more drinking” Levy was joking at the last part, but there was some truth in it.

“I might just do that to be honest… Are you staying here or do you want to come with me?”

Levy looked at the stirring children. “I might try to get them to sleep before midnight, you go ahead though!”

“Alright.”

When Lucy stepped outside she was almost immediately met with Wendy doing her healing magic on Natsu.

“What’s going on?”

“Gray joined in and Natsu said something he didn’t like so he got punched in the face,” Wendy smiled, letting out a slight giggle.

“You’ve never cared about a punch or two in your face before, what’s the occasion?” Lucy teased, nudging Natsu’s shoulder slightly.

A slight blush appeared on Natsu’s cheeks as he remembered what he and Gajeel were talking about. However he was sober now so there was no way he was going to reveal his plan to Lucy yet.

“Well it’s new years, that counts for something ya know,” he defended himself. But it was true what Lucy was saying - suddenly caring about his appearance wasn’t very much like him. Lucy just giggled.

“Well I want another drink! Come join me when you’re all healed up!”

Wendy smiled at her. “Don’t worry, I’m done here so you can go together.” Lucy could swear that the wind dragon slayer blinked at her, but without her magic lighting up the space, she couldn’t really see clearly.

With 15 minutes left until midnight they met Lisanna at the bar.

“Give me something sweet but strong, would you?”

“And I’ll have a beer.”

“I’ll be right up,” Lisanna said with a smile before she disappeared under the bar.

“So you’re drinking tonight, huh?” Natsu commented. Back in the day things easily got a bit awkward when alcohol was involved, especially since the girls usually drank until they were blacked out, but at an event like this he knew he could trust her to drink moderately. None of them were reckless teenagers any longer after all.

“Well I started getting a headache, so I’m going for the instant cure: more drinking.” Lucy had a glimmer in her eye as she said it.

“Smart move,” he grinned.

“Well, you can’t expect any less from Fairy Tail’s brain. Levy gave me the tip.”

“Huh… That’s weird… I’d call you Fairy Tail’s brain. Aren’t you the one who solves all our problems during missions?” Natsu had a mischevious glimt in his eye.

“Only during Team Natsu missions. You can call me Team Natsu’s brain, but you know Levy still holds the big title.” Lucy giggled.

Lisanna politely interrupted by delivering their orders. The conversation died down as they started sipping on their drinks, but started up again when Natsu scrunched his nose.

“Jellal’s here,” he revealed.

“Really? I thought Erza was looking giddy, now I understand why.” Lucy smiled. Natsu huffed at her.

“I still haven’t forgiven him completely though.” Lucy understood that he was referring to that time when he was brain washed in the Tower of Heaven.

“That’s understandable. Jellal hasn’t forgiven himself either, but I think they deserve to be happy after all this time. No one but themselves can understand what they’ve been through, so I hope they find peace with each other.” Lucy looked out over the crowd with kindness in her eyes.

Natsu really liked this about her. She never held grudges, and she always looked at things from different perspectives. Her analytic skills were also sharp, and with her author title she always found the right words to say.

“I guess that’s right. ‘S just that Erza’s been through things that Jellal can’t relate to, and I don’t know if I can trust him to protect her. Erza’s a lot more fragile than she allows herself to show.”

“That’s true. I’m not going to lie, I also feel that way sometimes. But I believe in Erza’s judgement. She knows Jellal better than anyone. It’s like how I’m still with you after all the things we’ve experienced with each other. Any sane person would tell me to run away and live peacefully instead of tagging along on your dangerous and crazy adventures, but since they don’t know how I personally feel about it, they don’t really have the whole picture, you know? I believe it’s like that for Erza and Jellal too.” Natsu nodded.

“I think so too.” What else could he do but agree when she said such great things? Sometimes he wanted to write it down and show the whole world, because a great mind like that can’t be hidden from the world.

After finishing their drinks Natsu realised that there was only 3 minutes to midnight. A slow, romantic song was playing through the sound lacrimas, so Natsu stood up and reached out his arm.

“May I have this dance?” Lucy giggled.

“Why, of course.”

She gracefully locked arms with the fire mage who now led her out on the dance floor. The room was filling up with mages who wanted to have the year’s last dance with someone special, and Natsu and Lucy were no exception of that. As Lucy looked up she was met with a wholesome sight. Natsu Dragneel was shyly placing his right hand on Lucy’s waist, just over the part of the dress where her slit ended, and his left hand carefully grabbed her right. His concentrated face that he made when positioning his feet correctly looked so silly that Lucy had to laugh. She took the left hand off it’s spot on his shoulder, and flicked him between the eyes.

“You’re concentrating too much. Try to relax a little.” Lucy’s eyes were soft and kind as she gave him the biggest grin she could imagine. When she felt Natsu’s shoulders soften she slowly took a small step back, and then another, and suddenly, without Natsu even noticing, they were slowly moving across the dance floor.

Lucy was captured by those onyx eyes of his. The lighting made it look like the entire universe was hiding within them, and her heart had never felt so filled before. Her eyes wandered over to his nose, his cute nose that got freckles in the summer. And then she looked at his pink hair, the mane that never failed to make her smile when she saw it in a crowd. The hair that she knew was softer than any conditioner could make hers, and his bangs that were slightly damaged from heat. And then those lips. The lips that always said whatever they wanted, that always made her laugh and that always managed to carry that amazing smile of his. Oh how she loved this man. Natsu Dragneel. Her Natsu.

Natsu was looking at an angel. Brown, soft eyes that told held secrets that the human world could never understand, but that still were open and welcoming. He could look at those eyes forever and never tire of it. Her soft golden hair confirmed that yes, she was an angel. She was a star, plucked right off of the starry night sky, shining of confidence and love for humans. Her perky nose that crooked a little to the left and her soft cheeks that always bubbled up with laughter whenever he and Happy did something stupid. And that lovely smile, the one he thought of whenever he felt like giving up. Nothing could end this moment between them, not even when Natsu accidentally stepped on her toes - she just laughed and urged him to keep going.

“10!”

Oh crap. Natsu had been so focused on dancing that he had almost forgotten about the task he was meant to do when the clock strikes 12.

“9!”

Could time go a little bit slower? Natsu really wanted more time to prepare himself.

“8!”

Lucy had stopped moving, and was now counting down with everybody, resting both her hands on Natsu’s shoulders. Natsu brought his empty hand to her face. He was really going to do this.

“7!”

What if she pulled away? Slapped him? Started crying? Maybe this was a bad idea after all…

“6!”

Lucy noticed Natsu’s shallow breathing. She could honestly predict something was up with him - usually he bottomed a beer at New Years, not standing around touching her face and running his fingers along her waist.

“5!”

Natsu felt Lucy’s hands slightly massaging his shoulders. They were tenser than he thought they were.

“4!”

This was just ridiculous. How could the famous fire dragon slayer Natsu Dragneel, who defeated endless of enemies, be so nervous at a moment like this? Lucy was his best friend - even if she didn’t like the kiss they would stay friends! He felt stupid for doubting their friendship, even though it was just for a split second.

“3!”

It was now. The next number would be 2 and then he would kiss her. Were his lips dry? Did he have bad breath? It was only going to be a 5 second kiss, so why did he worry so much?

Lucy had figured it out. She honestly did know from before that Levy and Juvia were going to kiss Gajeel and Gray at midnight, and truth to be told - she was increadibly envious of them. It wouldn’t surprise her if Levy had told Gajeel to give Natsu a push tonight - but that didn’t really matter. What she noticed right now was how hard he was preparing for this, constantly licking his lips and looking her up and down between her eyes and her mouth. It was sweet, according to Lucy. But if she knew Natsu well enough, she knew that he was planning to kiss her as the clock was 1 second away from midnight. So she did the only logical thing she could think of.

“2!”

Bringing her hands up from his shoulders to his neck, she carefully closed her eyes and pulled him in. To say this moment was magical was an understatement. Their lips slowly molded together, Natsu tasting slightly of beer. He stood still for a moment before he too closed her in and pulled her as close as he possibly could. Somewhere in the background the crowd was cheering, but that didn’t matter right now. All that exsists is Natsu and Lucy. Lucy and Natsu. Their lips and hands caressing the untouched parts of their faces, Natsu’s hand pulling her closer in the waist, grabbing her slightly in the soft parts above her hips.

Soon enough though, ameteurs like these had to stop to breathe. While panting softly in each other’s air, they slowly opened their eyes. Lucy giggled. Natsu giggled too. Soon they broke out in a silly laughter, filling the air with sickening sweet merriment. Lucy grabbed his arm to stabilisise herself before knocking her head into his chest. Natsu couldn’t stop his arms from pulling her in to a tight hug, still chuckling slightly. They were so, so happy right now.

“Oh my god I love you…” Lucy breathed out, knowing only a dragon slayer could make out those words in a noisy room like this. Natsu pulled her in closer, ducking in his head as he whispered back.

“I love you so much more.” He even gave her a peck on her head to emphasise, but Lucy didn’t doubt him at all. The safe feeling she felt in these arms made her almost feel like he had scared away all doubt to ever exist inside of her. He made her so complete.

But of course they couldn’t keep standing in the middle of the dance floor just hugging each other - the other guild mates wanted to party all night, and Lucy couldn’t say she didn’t want to be a part of that. Today was a day of celebrating after all. So she grabbed his hand, still being tender.

“Let’s go for another drink.” Her smile was the happiest in the world and Natsu could almost not believe that he was the cause of that smile. So he followed her lead, like he had done so many times before. The start of this year had been amazing, and he could feel it in his soul that the rest of it would be just as giving with Lucy by his side.

[catslvrr]

heaven sent — 03. ice skating + arcade

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You drummed your fingers on the steering wheel, glancing at Danielle who was humming to whatever song was currently playing on the radio.

“So,” you said, shifting your attention back to the road as the light turned green. “What’s on for today?”

“Ice skating!” She declared enthusiastically, pausing Subway Surfers to see your reaction.

“Ice skating?” You repeated, baffled. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m not the athletic type. That’s Minji’s job.”

“I know,” she grinned, tapping back into the game. “But there’s a first time for everything.”

You’d never felt so out of place as you entered the ice rink. On one side of the spectrum, there were kids shakily walking forward while holding their parents’ hands. On the other side, there were professional figure skaters showing off their skills. 

Danielle was part of the latter.

You scoffed as you leaned against the rails, watching her gracefully glide across the ice. “Of course you’d be good at this. God’s messenger and all.”

“I think you’re just jealous,” she smirked. She slid to a stop right in front of you, holding out her hand. “Come here. You look like a loser.”

“I’m gonna look like an even bigger loser when I slip and fall on my ass.” You clutched her hand tightly as you clumsily walked on the ice.

“You look constipated,” Danielle laughed. “Relax, I’ve got you. Just bend your knees slightly and imagine you’re drawing a V with your legs.”

You were too focused on not falling to retort back, but slowly and surely, you started to get the hang of it. She was still holding on to you, skating backward, leading the way.

You looked up from your feet, only to see her already staring at you.

“You’re doing it,” she smiled softly. You quickly averted your gaze, trying to ignore the goosebumps on your skin. It’s the air conditioning. And the ice.

“Thanks,” you murmured.

“Race you a lap around the rink?”

Out of all the parallel universes, none existed where you would win. You knew this. But it was hard to resist her eyes that were glimmering with anticipation.

You responded by pushing off your feet, rushing forward, not giving her time to react. It was barely five seconds before you felt a gust of wind brush against you, and you saw her already lightyears ahead of you.

It was a while before you caught up.

“I can already feel blisters forming,” you winced as you finally reached Danielle, who was slowly skating towards you. 

Just as she opened her mouth, you saw a kid in your peripheral vision zoom past you, slamming right into her. They both fell on the ice with a loud thud, but the kid swiftly recovered and got up, not even sparing a glance or offering an apology as they skated away.

You looked at Danielle, who was still on her ass, absolutely flabbergasted, and you couldn’t contain your laughter. You expected her to be embarrassed, or angry, but your laughter died down as she just stared at you, a satisfied smile on her face.

“Did you hit your head?” You frowned. “Why are you smiling like an idiot?”

She shook her head, her smile only widening as she stood up. “Nothing, let’s go to the arcade.”

Both of you made your way to the arcade next to the rink, and you stared at the machine that traded coins for tokens. You sent a knowing glance to Danielle.

“No,” she folded her arms, looking away. “Absolutely not.”

“Spawning in some arcade tokens won’t collapse our economy,” you said. “Just do it.”

“...Fine.” She bit her cheek anxiously as she fished out a handful of tokens out of her pocket.

“Excellent,” you grinned, dragging her to the claw machine. “We are going all out today.”

(You were eventually kicked out after winning too many prizes. You hoped the staff didn’t check the surveillance recordings. Or maybe God would somehow edit it and make it seem like the two of you were just incredibly lucky.)

The two of you struggled to enter the apartment, arms full of plushies and toys. You threw them all on the couch, but picked the puppy one back up, handing it to Danielle. You made a note to yourself to leave the bear one in Minji’s room.

“Is this a thanks for today? You shouldn’t have,” she cooed, hugging the plushie tightly. 

“As if,” you clicked your tongue to hide your smile. “It’s a consolation prize for losing to me in DDR.”

“You chose that one on purpose,” she whined. “You didn’t tell me that you had a DDR phase.”

You stuck your tongue out. “In your own words: I think you’re just jealous.”

You both chuckled lightly, before Danielle spoke again.

“How was today?”

You leaned the small of your back on the counter.

“It was more fun than expected,” you confessed begrudgingly. “I haven’t been to the arcade in a while.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” she said, reaching out to squeeze your arm. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

You nodded. “Yeah, I’ll see you.”

Again, she spun and disappeared, leaving behind nothing but dust and an uncomfortable flutter that settled in between your ribs.

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