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thefanficmonster · 4 years ago

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Just Two Sad Roommates

Corpse Husband x Reader(Female)

Warnings: Swearing (maybe)

Genre: Angst, Fluff

Summary: The power of medieval tavern music gets put to the test when Corpse’s roommate is having a rough day. SPOILER ALERT: it’s more powerful than anyone could assume.

Requested by Anon. You know who you are 😊😋 Wish I could tag you, I loved this idea so much and had such a fun time writing it. Hope you enjoy it just as much 🥰

The last twenty four hours haven’t been so great.

Last night I had a huge fight with my boyfriend over his flirty messages with several girls. It was not just witty banter, it was way more and way more hurtful to me. He obviously denied it and defended himself, at least in the beginning of the argument. Then he took on the accusatory stance, pointing fingers at me for living with another guy. That had me absolutely fuming. Not only was his statement fabricated and literally made up on the spot, but he also used some seriously horrible insults for him. I was having non of it. Corpse is a really great roommate, sweet guy and overall amazing person. I haven’t once argued with him since we’ve started living together. We’re actually quite good friends. So hearing my asshole boyfriend call him all those names was more than enough to chase him out of the apartment. Thankfully, Corpse wasn’t home to hear all that. He rarely leaves the apartment but by some miracle this was the time he was absent.

Then this morning my mom called me to have a chat. It started off decently enough but it only remained that way for so long. It didn’t take her long to start criticizing each and every element of my existence. From my job, my boyfriend, my living arrangement, the career I’ve decided to pursue, the fact I moved to a different state, my paycheck that’s lower than her friend’s daughter’s...…..You get the point.

Now I’m sitting here, contemplating what the two years I’ve been in a relationship with Marcus mean to me. I guess it is just like a phone call from my mother - starts off nice but slowly deteriorates. All things follow this pattern in my life, apparently. And just like the phone calls, I’ve considered ending things between me and him many times but never actually decided on it. Until now. The last part of this decision is executing it, which doesn’t look very promising. My thumbs are frozen, hovering over the keyboard.

I take a second to take a look at my life from a third person point of view, like an out of body experience. I am wrapped in a blanket, huddled on the couch like a burrito with a face. A really sad burrito with a face. I have a job where I work as much as three highly ranked workers and get paid a little over a secretary’s paycheck. I’m in a constant state of exhaustion and disinterest. I often forget I’m human and just assume I can live like a cactus - no food, no water. I have a boyfriend that’s cheating on me and most likely has been for quite some time now. And we’ve been dating for two fucking years. Man, that must be the longest cheat streak in history. Who knows with how many girls as well. And I still have trouble deciding weather to break up with him or not. Actually no, scratch that, I have already decided, but it feel so unnatural and so out of character that my body refuses to complete the task of delivering the final blow to the structure of this relationship which was already weak to begin with.

And it only got weaker when I started catching feelings for another guy. I know, I know, I’m a bad person for that, but I was never planning to act on those feelings. They have always just...lingered, loomed over me. They got stronger and stronger every time Marcus and I would fight, as though they were laughing at my mock of a relationship.

Speaking of laughter, I hear my roommate laughing in his recording room. I gave him the spare room for his recording equipment for a cheap add to his rent fee and it’s probably the second best decision I’ve ever made - first being picking him to be my roommate. He was among the first to reply to my online add and appeared the least sketchy over the phone. More hypnotizing if I’m honest. He could’ve told me he was a hitman and I wouldn’t have batted an eye, handing the keys to his room and the apartment without a second thought. All he had to do was keep talking. Again, SUE ME.

“Fuck, I’m so fucking pathetic!“ I drop my phone when all the strings inside me snap, releasing the sobs and tears I’ve been holding back for so long.

I bring my knees up to my chest, hiding my head in between them, desperately trying to shield myself from the plane crash that is my life at the moment. Crying makes me feel even sadder and more miserable but I have nothing left to do to get all the crap that’s piled up inside me out.

I’m on the verge of falling asleep, the tears have dried and the sobs have died somewhere in my chest, when I hear what sounds like music straight from Robin Hood’s time.

Holy shit, I’ve lost it

I lift my head from in-between my knees, looking around the living room for the source of the jolly, lighthearted tune which despite all the heaviness of my self-loathing makes me feel like the main character in an medieval adventure. Wait...Holy crap, it’s that medieval adventure, Robin Hood-ass music I hear from Corpse’s room!

I whip around to face the entrance from to the hallway where I see an arm sticking out, holding a phone which is where the music is coming from.

“Corpse?“ I call out to him in a questioning manner, shifting to a sitting position with my blanket kicked off of me and bunched up next to me.

“I can’t tell if you’re angry or sad...or both. Didn’t want to get attacked upon entering the room.“ I see the right side of his face peek out as well.

I break out into laughter, covering my mouth with one hand, “You’re such a dork.”

He takes this as a sign to come in, pausing the music as he does so. “What’s wrong?”

My laugh stops but a smile remains on my face as I look at him. He just has that effect on me. “A lot. What’s going on with you?”

He shrugs his shoulders, plopping down on the couch, “The usual, streaming Among Us. You should play with me and my friends some time.”

I scoff, “I can pull of a lie no problem. Maybe I really should.” I don’t actually consider it, it’s just funny to think about.

I have never watched any of Corpse’s content. Not his scary story videos, not his streams, not his animated compilations. Just his songs. And let me tell you...they are hella good. One song and I was hooked.

“Hey, I have a question.“ I tilt my head to look at him, “What’s with you and your love for medieval adventure music?“

“Medieval tavern music, and it’s not really love.“ He shakes his head with this dopey grin that is just. so. adorable. “More like a coping mechanism. Tell me, did you feel less sad I played it for you?“

I stop and think for a second. “Yeah, I think so.”

“Point made.“ He declares, leaving me to nod in amusement. “Now, tell me what that ‘a lot’ is.“

So, I do. I tell him everything, from how my boyfriend is cheating on me to how my mother thinks I’m a complete failure. He listens carefully, paying close attention to everything I’m saying. I catch myself laughing a few times while I retell the recent upsetting events.

Must be that music.

“So, you broke up?“ He asks once I end my monologue with a sigh

I shake my head disappointedly, “Not yet. I still haven’t pulled the plug. I don’t know what to say.”

He holds out his hand to me, “May I be of assistance?”

I look at his hand then at him and contemplate for only a second before deciding ‘what the hell’ and handing over my phone after unlocking it. The screen displays my boyfriend’s chat so Corpse just types away what he has in mind. Before pressing ‘send’, he hands the phone back to me. “Proofread it.”

‘Dear Marcus, this is one of your girlfriends speaking. Yes, one of them. You think I’m not onto what you’re doing, you little shit? Well, to your dismay, I am. And so, I discontinue this relation between us. That word might have been too long for your IQ so let me rephrase: We are over. Finished. Hope your other girlfriends wake up too, unless they are already in the know, of course. Love, but really hate, Y/N‘

I was never aware this level of sass even existed.

I add a smiling emoji and send the message, sighing in relief. “I can check that off my to-do list now.”

We both lean back on the couch, looking up at the ceiling. A moment of comfortable silence takes over, leaving us both wandering in our own heads.

“Hey, um, I wanted to do this when I first moved in, but then I met your boyfriend and I took the hint. Now that you’re single, would you want to...“ he sounds a bit uncertain but continues regardless, “It’s ridiculous cause I don’t really like the idea of going out, but maybe we could order take-out...“

“Are you circling around asking me on an at-home date?“ I am surprised by how unbothered I manage to sound while I’m squealing on the inside. It’s fascinating how quickly a person can flip someone’s day around. Turns out it wasn’t the music at all. It was him that had the positive effect on mine.

Out of the corner of my eye I catch his face turn red and have to contain my laughter. The grin can’t be tamed though, especially not when he says, “Yes.”

Internally squealing, I launch myself from the couch, standing up straight in front of him. “Thai. My usual order is on the sticky note on the fridge. But first,” I offer him my hand, “I need to find out if a person can even dance to that ridiculous music.” At his amusement, my grin widens, “May I have this dance?”

He laughs that adorable laugh of his I’ve only heard through the layer of a wooden door. It’s even cuter when there’s nothing between me and its source. The source is cute too, not gonna lie.

With a shake of his head which is most likely disbelief, he takes the hand I’ve offered him, saying: “And you call me a dork.”

@susceptible-but-siriusexual @simonsbluee @save-the-sky @hacker-ghost @itsminniekat @bi-andready-tocry @imtiredaffff @jazzkaurtheglorious @hereforbeebo @fandomgirl17 @chrysanthykios @maehemscorpyus @loraleiix @letsloveimagines @annshit @i-cant-choose-a-username-help @enigmaticmaze

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spooky-space-kook · 3 years ago

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Muay Thai Classes #8, 9, 10, 11… I'm a little behind!

Okay y'all. I haven't really talked much about my class lately. Mostly because I'm taking a break from most social media (It's... you know. It wears your soul down, y'all. Especially this one.)

So here's the deal. I've gone to four classes since I last updated.

8 was horrible. The absolute worst.

Not because of what anyone else was doing, but because of me. I had my confidence absolutely sucked out of me that day. I literally was a goop brain. I'd had a presentation with a client who essentially talked to me like I was a moron. Not in a mean way, but in that disappointed dad way. It was so frustrating because, well, you can't fight back with clients over that. You can't tell them that they are the ones who don't understand. So you just... take it. You capitulate.

I want to live on that island where people settle their differences by punching each other in the face once a year. I think it'd help.

But I can't so I learn Muay Thai.

So yeah. I went to that class absolutely physically drained because I was so emotionally drained. I realized I shouldn't have gone at all. You need to be present for your partner, and I wasn't that. I was dead weight, and all I had were excuses for it. I feel bad about that even now, weeks later.

8 sucked. 9 was better.

I had to skip two classes for travel, and by the time I got back I felt way better about things. But also, it was like I'd never fucking been to the class before! I told one partner that you'd think I'd never even learned to count with how I was goin'. Pff. Oh well, it went as well as it could and I felt better after. So there's that.

10 was great. It turns out I've basically been kicking wrong the whole time. And the thing is... I find out I've been kicking wrong every time I go to this damn class. But this time it actually clicked! It was awesome! I'm still shit, but I'm more on my game while being shit! I was so excited to really start getting it that I literally practiced at home and almost broke our kitchen table. Whoops!

AND. I MADE A FRIEND. His name is Tyrone. He was very nice to me. I remembered his name, but not his face. He remembered my name because his wife has the same name. Which I think is cheating at the name game because what the heck how dare you use tools to help you remember better :P! (kidding, of course. Kidding.)

Anyway, I made a friend! And I sparred with lots of people and was very proactive!

I did end up being paired with a lady who I've been scared of since I saw her on the first day. And damn I had every right to be. Gal is FAST. Not mean, just very capable and I'm a floppy noodle armed moron who could only do my best. She was pretty nice about it though so that's all I can reasonably ask for… well that and don't knock my ass out.

11 was the most recent. It went well. I was paired up with another very experienced person who told me I was thinking too hard about my kicks and to just go for it. I didn't have the hear to tell him I literally only just learned HOW to think too hard about my kicks so I did my best.

Also when people keep yelling "hit harder" and you're like "OH NO BUT WHAT IF I'M HITTING AS HARD AS I CAN???" that's a rough one.

Anyway he was also very nice and very patient. And taught me how to do a low kick better. I tried showing another new person I was paired up with but it didn't quite work as well coming from me. I don't really have the confidence to explain how to do things like other people do in my same experience range. How do you know??? I still do it wrong every time. Maybe I'm just a dummy. Oh well.

It went great. It's going great. It's hard as fuck. Not the fighting. I mean, yes the fighting. But not really that. Catching on to what's going on around me means paying close attention and being proactive. Proactive is not my nature. Waiting and watching are my nature. Analyzing is my nature. Being present, being forceful, giving direction in this kind of setting? I mean, I can have that energy, but it takes confidence. I don't feel safe or knowledgeable in this space. So stepping forward like that and risking being wrong or corrected is WAY outside a girl's comfort zone, lemme tell you. Way outside.

I was raised that you do it right or not at all. That wasn't really the right way to do things. It continues to fuck me up to this day. (Speaking of: Attachment theory. Did you know people with parents who reject their feelings rather than talking them through them when they're young tend to raise insecure, unsure, anxious children??? Guess who's a living anecdotal case of that little fact?) So yeah. I'm learning to be proactive and just risk being wrong. And letting that be fine.

#personal #muay thai

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puckinghell · 5 years ago

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Almost | Nathan MacKinnon

Summary: Every time Nate doesn’t tell you he loves you, he almost does. Until the clock suddenly starts ticking, and almost might not be enough. Words: 5.3k Note: I wrote this all at once and I couldn’t be bothered to read it after to make sure it made sense so excuse me if it doesn’t. We’re in the midst of a global crisis, I couldn’t buy potatoes in the supermarket cause it’s empty, and I don’t have my emotional support dumbass hockey boys, so you can imagine the emotional distress I’m under.

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Nate isn’t very good at flirting.

He knows that, and he’s known that for a long time. Not only because he’s got pretty good self-insight, but also because his teammates have been telling him for years.

In fact, the first time he went out with Tyson, back when he just came onto the Avs and going out was a big deal to him, Tys shook his head and said: “If you don’t learn how to flirt you’re gonna end up dying alone. With a Cup and enough gold to drown in, but alone.”

Nate loves Tys to death, but he still thinks about that night sometimes and wants to kick Tys in the shin.

Because as much as he’s bad at flirting, he never really thought it was a problem. Surely one day a girl would come into his life and she’d like him so much she would do the heavy lifting, and he could just kinda cruise along. Or maybe one day, when the right girl would come into his life, it would all be easy, suddenly.

Except.

He’s pretty sure that you are the right girl. He has been sure about that for the past two years, ever since you became friends. And yet, you’re still friends. Just friends.

Nate thinks he kinda accidentally put himself in the friend zone. At first he thought it was fine if you were just friends, because it would grow into something more naturally.

But one day Gabe turned to him solemnly and said: “Once she’s put you in the ‘Don’t go there’ part of her brain, you’re not coming out of there, bro.”

He’d waved Gabe off, but now he’s starting to think Gabe was right.

Because in the beginning, sometimes, you’d look at him a certain way, or you’d say something, and Nate was certain you meant it in a flirty way. Was sure he saw his own feelings reflected in your eyes. But those times became less and less frequent and now, he can’t remember the last time you looked at him like that. He only knows that you talk to him about dates you go on, like it doesn’t break his heart to think about you with someone else. And you wrap your arms around him so easy and comfortably, like the butterflies in his stomach when you touch him have no right o be there. And you ask to sleep in his bed with him after late movie nights like the thought of it ever being anything more than sleeping has never entered your mind. Nate thinks maybe he’s missed his window, but he also can’t imagine not ending up with you. So he starts his quest of getting you to notice him in a different way.

It’s shortly after he made that decision that he’s finding himself in Gabe’s backyard, a bottle of beer in his hand as he stands next to EJ who is grilling steaks on the barbecue. Gabe’s summer barbecue is somewhat of a staple, for the Avs, and if he thought that having a baby would mean Gabe’s parties would come to an end, Nate was wrong. Gabe flutters through the backyard with Linnea on his arm like he’s never done anything else. He switches his own beer bottle with Linnea’s bottle of milk – or whatever she’s drinking – between people he chats to, and before too long he shows up next to Nate and EJ. “Looking good,” Gabe whistles, looking at the grill. “Nate, are you staring at Y/N again?” Nate swirls around to face his captain; he hadn’t even noticed he was staring at you, but perhaps he was, because he knows you’ve been talking to Josty for the past 15 minutes and he’s not entirely happy about the way Josty leaned into you while he laughed at something you said. “It’s too late, bud,” EJ says, his signature toothless grin appearing. “You’ve waited too long and now she’s going to think you mean everything in a friendly way.” “That’s not true!” Nate starts protesting, even though he knows EJ is just trying to rile him up; but he can’t really make his point because you choose that moment to come over to them. “Are you still not done?” you tease EJ, playfully bumping against his shoulder. “I’m hungry, EJ, can you not grill a little faster?” “Grilling is like art,” EJ grumbles, “you can’t rush it.” “That’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever said,” you answer, your voice filled with fondness. “Ah, there’s Linnea! Can I hold her?” You make grabby hands at the baby and Gabe easily passes her to you, which, honestly, rude. “You never let me hold her!” Nate sputters, and Gabe shrugs. “That’s because Y/N is responsible and you killed the only succulent you had in your house.” “A succulent is not the same as a baby. I could take care of her.” Nate feels extremely offended, even more so when you giggle. “No offense, but if I had to pick someone to take care of Linnea, it would be Y/N, then Colin, then literally anyone else, before it would be you,” says Gabe. “Even Josty?” Nate whines, and at that moment, Mel steps in next to Gabe, putting her hand on his back. “Are we letting Tyson take care of Linnea?” she asks. “Absolutely no way,” Gabe is quick to answer, and you suppose it’s a good thing Josty isn’t here to hear that. “I was just saying I would let Y/N take care of our little girl.” “Oh, would you?” Mel excitedly grasps your shoulder. “Gabe and I haven’t had a date night in like, months! “Sure, I’d love to,” you answer truthfully. You slide your finger into Linnea’s hand, the baby making excited gurgling noises as she clasps down on it. She’s stronger than she looks. “Can I come?” Nate says suddenly. His cheeks are a little tinted, even though it’s not that warm outside anymore. “It could be like, a babysitting date.” “Oh, of course!” you answer. “That’s a perfect idea, Nate! Mel, we should set up a play date for Linnea with my sister’s baby!” You ignore EJ’s cackling laugh and what sounds like a low groan coming from Nate, instead follow Mel to the porch with Linnea in your hands to plan the play date. EJ slings his arm around Nate, grinning a little wickedly as he says: “So close, Nathan. Almost got her.”

Nate elbows him in the stomach loud enough to earn a disapproving tut from Gabe.

Nate tells Sid about his plan during their monthly FaceTime session. “Good luck with that, dude,” Sid says, and it doesn’t even sound that condescending, coming from him. “What do you think I should do?” Nate knows asking Sid for advice on flirting is like asking a blind man for advice on how to see, but he’s getting desperate and he really, really doesn’t want to have to ask Tys. He’d never live that one down. “Uh,” Sid answers, and that’s about as much as Nate was expecting from him, anyway. “Maybe ask her out to dinner, or something?” Actually, that’s more than Nate was expecting from Sid, because that’s actually not the worst idea. Sure, you’ve gone out to dinner together many times, but it was always very clearly not a date setting; either the other guys were there, or it was at a MacDonalds – Nate doesn’t like to go to junkfood places, but he supposes if Tys was gonna leave any imprint on him, it would be his love for McFlurry’s – or it was just dinner at his apartment, wearing sweatpants and ordering Chinese while watching some dumb Netflix show. His chance to ask you comes quicker than he thought, because he’s still talking to Sid – about hockey, this time, something Sid does actually have great advice on – when you come barreling into his apartment. Your hair is wet from the rain and you shrug off your rain coat with a wave in his direction. “It’s pouring,” you tell him, “and I walked to work, so.” To anyone else, it would be a bad explanation, but it’s not the first time you’ve showed up at Nate’s apartment like this. You like to walk to work when it’s not too cold but sometimes the weather surprises you and you don’t want to walk back in the rain or the wind. Nate’s apartment is a lot closer to your work than your apartment, so it’s become a habit of yours to go to Nate’s on days like that and just hang out in his apartment until you either fall asleep there or Nate offers to drive you home. “Is that Y/N?” Sid asks. “Hey, Y/N!” “Hi Sid!” you call back. “Nate, I’m gonna shower.” “Ask her,” Sid says, which is very pushy for Sid, who usually never tells Nate to do anything, instead just says “If I were you, I would consider” and let Nate figure out the underlying message. “Ask me what?” you ask Nate curiously, eyeing him up and down. He’s glaring at Sid as if Sid said something wrong, and when he looks at you, he doesn’t quite catch your eye. “I was wondering if you wanted to get dinner with me?” Nate asks. It’s a bit of a formal question for something you do at least once a week, but you shrug it off; Nate is a bit weird, sometimes, and you’re used to that. “Sure,” you say. “Let’s order Thai. Get my usual while I’m showering? I’m hungry.” Then you yell: “Bye Sid!” before making your way to the bathroom. Nate lets out a frustrated sigh and Sid sounds sympathetic when he says: “Almost there, dude. Just, next time, if I were you, I’d consider…” Nate is already not listening anymore.

Today is the day, Nate has decided. He bought roses, which EJ told him is lame and Gabe told him is great idea, and he cooked pasta, for which he used Sammy’s recipe. He’s not a good cook, but Sammy promised it’s impossible to mess up, and he thinks he did alright. He texted you this morning to ask you to come to his place for dinner. You replied with a sure :) and Nate takes that to be a good sign. He has a plan. When you walk in, he’ll take your coat, instantly changing the routine between you, because he normally stays on the couch when you open the door with your key. He won’t be wearing sweatpants, either, not even if he expects you might be; he’s wearing black jeans and a nice button up, and he’s even done his hair. Well, made an attempt to; it didn’t really work out and now it looks kinda the same as always, but hey, he’s really trying, here. Next, he’ll lead you to the table, which he’ll actually have set up, and at that point, surely you understand something different is happening, because a set up table is so different from his normal paper plates and Netflix. Then he’ll give you the roses and confess his feelings. He’s not really thought that part through too much, because every time he thinks about it he almost throws up. So. He’ll have to wing that. The problem, Nate finds out, with planning everything to perfection, is that when one thing goes wrong, the entire plan has to go out the window. Because half an hour after you were supposed to arrive, he gets a text saying sorry I’m late! Be there in 10 and he knows he’s gonna have to reheat the pasta, which Sammy said was not the point of pasta. But he’s not gonna kick off and cause a scene when you arrive, because he reasons it doesn’t really matter, in the grand scale of things. So he sits on the couch and waits. Finally, the door swings open and Nate jumps to his feet, ready to take your coat from you. Except, you’re not wearing a coat; you’re wearing his old hoodie and for some reason his breath hitches in his throat and suddenly he feels like his feet are nailed to the floor, unable to move. “Hey, sorry I’m late,” you call, basically running further into the apartment. “I came from the gym and let me tell you, I have got great news!” “News?” Nate echoes. You stop right in front of him, your eyes shining and a bright smile on your face. Suddenly, you lift an eyebrow, eyes catching on something. “Nathan MacKinnon, did you do something to your hair?” Before Nate can answer, you shrug and continue. “Well, it doesn’t matter anyway. Guess what happened at the gym!” “What?” Nate seems to only be able to repeat what you say, so he decides to stick with that. “I got asked on a date!” Nate thinks if he had one wish, he would wish for the floor to open up beneath his feet and for him to sink through the building, all 7 floors below his apartment, and then down into the ground, until he could bury himself in the dirt. “A date?” You’re so hyped you don’t even notice your best friend is simply repeating your words, barely reacting in any other way. “He’s so hot, this guy, Nate! He comes to the gym every Thursday, just like I do, and we never talk but sometimes I catch him looking, and like, I look back, you know? And today he came over and he asked if I wanted to get a drink, but obviously I had plans with you and I would never blow you off, so I said we could do it tomorrow. I have a date tomorrow, Nate!” In your excitement, you reach forward and wrap your arms around Nate, pressing your face into his chest. His heart is beating fast, and you notice that he kinda just remains frozen into place, so you look up at him with a frown. “Nate? You okay?” That seems to shake Nate from his trance, as he literally shakes himself out of it and slowly puts his arms around you. With a happy sigh, you allow yourself to sink into the embrace. “What are we eating, anyway? I’m hungry.” Nate praises any and every God there could possibly be that he decided to leave the door to the dining room closed. “Whatever you want, we can order,” he answers. “I’m just gonna, uh, get changed.” “I thought you looked fancy,” you grin, letting go of him and dropping onto the couch. “What about Italian?” Hours later, Nate throws away the empty pizza boxes and puts the roses in the bin with them, and then he goes to his bedroom to scream into a pillow. He wants to call you, wants to ask you to not go on a date with that guy. But then he thinks about how excited you looked and he doesn’t call. He doesn’t call, but he almost does, and he thinks that’s a pretty good way to describe how his life is going.

Nate has truly hit rock bottom, which is why he’s scrolling through his phone until he finds the familiar name. “Dogggg!” Tys yells into the phone, because he can never answer the phone like a normal person. “I’m baking chocolate chip cookies!” And Nate is suddenly a little overwhelmed with how much he misses his best friend. “Baking?” he teases. “What kinda mental breakdown are you going through this time?” “Hey, fuck you,” Tys says, but he sounds mellow and not bothered at all. “What’s up?” And Nate has been planning to ease into this conversation, have a little small talk, maybe talk about Toronto and how the coaching change has been working out for Tys, but Tys is his best friend – apart from you – and suddenly he can’t keep it to himself anymore. “I’m in love with Y/N,” he blurts out, and he hears a clank on the other side of the line that sounds suspiciously like Tyson dropping a spoon. “Well, yeah,” Tys comes back, a little too calmly for Nate’s liking. “But I meant like, what’s up with you that’s new, Dogg.” “I need to do something about it,” Nate says, and that seems to get Tyson’s attention, cause he suddenly sounds a lot more interested when he says: “Oh?” “Cause like,” Nate starts, and he knows he’s about to start rambling. “Cause I’m so into her, you know, and I have been for so long, but I don’t think she sees me that way? And maybe if I would’ve done something sooner, she would’ve thought of me as an option, and she wouldn’t be going out with that guy right now..” “Wow hold up,” Tyson interrupts. “Wait, she’s got a boyfriend?” “No!” The force with which that word erupts from Nate’s mouth is maybe a little too telling, cause Tyson immediately goes into ‘calm down Nate’ mode. “Hey, hey, it’s just a date or two, right?” he soothes. “It’s totally not serious yet. And you and her, you’ve got history, dude. She loves you! There’s still time!” “What if she doesn’t love me in that way, though?” Nate asks, and he hates how tiny his voice sounds. “Then she’s got no taste, Nate,” Tyson says, awfully genuine. “You’d be an awesome boyfriend. Hell, you’ve basically been her boyfriend, you two act like a couple all the time.” Nate hadn’t thought of it like that. “Cause like, you’re always hanging out together, right?” Tys continues. “And you bring her to all your events as your plus one. She cooks you dinner at least once a week. You pick her up and drop her off when it’s raining and she doesn’t wanna walk. You always get her a Christmas present. She even bakes your favorite cookies when you’ve had a tough game.” He sounds slightly jealous when he says: “Cookies, bro! That’s true love.” And, well, Nate had always thought that was just a friend thing, but when he thinks about it, he doesn’t really treat any of his other friends that way. Has never picked up his phone at 4 am because Sid was calling, never ran a bath for Tys after a long day. Maybe, in a way, he has been acting like your boyfriend. Except. “We don’t kiss and stuff, though.” Tyson laughs. “And stuff. I bet you want the stuff, huh, bro?” “Shut up,” Nate grumbles, but he’s too thankful for Tyson’s input to put much heat behind it. “Brutes, what do I do?” “You need to complete the package, Dogg,” Tys says, sounding confident. “You’re almost her boyfriend. Now go get that kiss and be it for real.”

Nate is not usually a big drinker, but this, he needs to be super, super drunk for. “Careful,” Burky says, as he watches Nate slam back another shot. “That’s a lot of alcohol, Nate.” “You gonna call Gabe on me?” Nate says, defiant, and Burky shrugs. “No, but if you need to be carried home, I’ll get Z to do it.” That’s enough for Nate to not order another shot right away. “He’s upset because Y/N is here with a guy.” It’s Comphy who speaks, in a dull tone like he’s talking about the weather. Josty, who is with them too, sits up a little straighter. “She came with a guy?” “Shut up,” Nate all but growls. “I didn’t know when I invited her the invitation would be extended.” He really hadn’t; he’d asked you to come out with the boys after the game because he found out you were bringing the guy – Nate purposely forgets his name every time – and he figured he was running out of time. At least if he kept you out all night you couldn’t go home with the guy, and he might find the courage to tell you how he feels. Except then you’d shown up with the guy in tow, and now he’s wondering if it’s possible to drown himself in tequila. He must’ve looked properly miserable for the guys to crowd around him like they are; Gabe went home because he’s a dad now, but Comph and Josty and Burky are all sitting with him, refusing to have fun now that their assistant captain looks ready to commit a crime, and Z and EJ both keep shooting worried glances his way. Nate really doesn’t care. What he cares about is that you’re with with a guy that’s not him, and you’ve barely paid attention to him. He’s just about drunk enough that that annoyance is starting to become unbearable, and just drunk enough that it seems like a good idea to do something about it. “Nate, no…” Burky starts, when Nate stands up, and Comphy reaches for him, but even drunk Nate is quicker than them and he starts pushing his way through the crowd, to where you’re standing with the guy and laughing at something he’s saying. You feel two strong arms wrap around your waist, the grip almost too tight as you’re pushed flat against a muscular chest. For a second, you freeze, ready to fight, but then you smell familiar cologne and you recognize the arms that are wrapped around you in iron grip. “Nate?” you say. “Everything okay?” Nate hums in your ear but it’s not really words; just a low hum that makes something tingle in the pit of your stomach. If only Tom knew the effect Nate has on you, he probably wouldn’t be here. As it is, Tom’s eyes are wide as he stares at Nate. You did tell him you knew people on the team and that’s why you could get tickets to the Avs game so last minute, but you’d forgone the mention that your “contact” is Nathan MacKinnon; for some reason, you didn’t really want those worlds to mix just yet. Maybe that’s why you’d been keeping your distance from Nate, tonight. Normally, Nate isn’t the kinda guy to come chasing you down, but you can smell the alcohol on his breathe and his words slur a little when he says: “Where have you been?” Your heart starts beating a little faster. “Here,” you say, trying to ignore the dark tone to Nate’s voice. To say you’re confused in an understatement: Nate sounds almost angry, but he’s clinging to you like he’s not ever letting you go, so surely he can’t be angry at you. You wish Tom wasn’t here. If you’d been alone, you would’ve dragged Nate outside and talked to your best friend, figured out what’s bothering him, because it’s clear there’s something and you don’t like knowing that he’s carrying it alone. Nate has a tendency to carry the entire world on his shoulders, on his own, even when there’s so many people who would share the burden with him. “Dude,” Tom says, “you’re Nathan MacKinnon!” You feel Nate tense behind you. You know he doesn’t like to be recognized in public spaces but honestly, Tom didn’t speak loudly, and he’s not making a scene, so you wiggle out of Nate’s hold and put your hand on his arm.

Usually, that calms him down. “Yeah, Tom, this is my friend Nate. Nate, this is Tom.” Nate’s face is schooled into perfect indifference as he shakes the hand Tom holds out to him; the only thing betraying that he’s annoyed is the fact that his other, free, hand is balled into a fist and his knuckles are white. “Good to meet you, man,” Tom says. “That was such a nice goal there in the 2nd, holy shit dude! I’m like, such a big fan of you!�� You cringe a little as Nate narrows his eyes. “Thanks,” he says, and he could not sound more bored if he tried. Even Tom shifts on his feet and nervously looks towards the floor. Then Nate’s hand finds its way to your lower back, his thumb dipping under your shirt. You feel like all the blood is rushing through your cheeks, and when Tom frowns, you feel like you could pass out. “Nice to meet you,” Nate says, in a tone that makes it clear he’d rather undergo a colonoscopy than ever speak to Tom again. “But can I borrow my girl for a second?” My girl? “Nate, what the…” you sputter, but you’re already being pushed through the crowd towards the exit, and before you know it you’re standing in a dark alley with your back to the brick wall of the club. Nate is standing close, so close you can feel his breath against your cheek when he exhales. His eyes are big and a bit wild, and you wonder if he can hear your heartbeat as clearly as you can. “Nate…” You mean to ask him what’s going on, but for some reason his name comes out of your mouth in a quiet rush of air, and it seems to do something to Nate, who inhales sharply and drops his head a little, his forehead nearly touching yours. “I hate it,” he mutters, the words soft enough that you can only make them out because it’s just the two of you in the silent outside air. “Hate what?” “Seeing you with him.” Those words hit you like a freight train, and all you manage to bring out is a soft “uhm”. “I can’t watch you with him,” Nate whispers. His hands are against the wall but his chest is pressed up against yours, and slowly but surely, he’s leaning in. And that’s when you realize, oh. Nate is going to kiss you. To your own surprise, that doesn’t shock you. It’s not some big thing that throws the world of its axis, that shakes the ground beneath your feet. It’s just a realization and then a soft, warm feeling of comfort spreading through your body. You want him to kiss you so badly, but it’s not like something is exploding, knowing that he wants it too. Instead, it’s like something finally falls into place.

“Y/N?” a voice goes, and you almost whine out loud. Nate jumps back like he’s been stung. He stares at you with wide eyes, the color drained from his face, and then he turns around and all but runs away. Tom watches him leave, then faces you, and in that moment you know four things absolutely certain. Nate was jealous. You’re never going to go on another date with Tom. Nate almost kissed you. And almost wasn’t enough.

Nate wakes up with a banging headache, the taste of dirt in his mouth and 20 missed text messages. Most of the messages are from Tyson, and there’s one from EJ, who is apparently the one that told Tyson about last night in the first place, because his text simply reads: Had to tell Brutes. You need help. Which is probably fair enough. There’s a text from Josty offering support, one from Burky asking if he got home safe, one from Gabe that Nate doesn’t read because he doesn’t want to see Gabe’s disappointed face every time he closes his eyes for the next few days, and then there’s a text from you. We have to talk. Well, fuck. Nate doesn’t have a lot of experience with relationships, but he knows that’s never a good sign. Nate knows that you know him well enough to have figured out that he was drunk last night, so you probably don’t expect him to be up yet. He takes advantage of that time by taking a shower and brushing his teeth at least four times until he can no longer taste the tequila in the back of his throat, making a cup of coffee and having a freak out at his kitchen counter because surely you’re going to tell him to never talk to you again. Not only did he not have the balls to tell you how he feels about you, he also acted like an asshole to a guy you apparently like – although Nate has no clue why, because he seemed boring as hell – and then he nearly kissed you but instead ran away. Not a great track record. It’s nearly noon when he finally gathers up the courage to call you. After all, you’ve given him two years of friendship, so that’s the least he can do. “Hey,” he says softly into the phone when the connection clicks through. “It’s Nate.” “I know,” you answer, and he’s surprised by how light your tone is. “I have caller ID, Nate. Have had it for years.” It throws him off, how normal you sound. There’s nothing in your voice to betray that you’re mad at him, or that you hate him. He almost forgets what he was going to say. Almost, but not quite. “I’m really sorry about last night,” he blurts out. “Do you mind if I come over so we can talk about it?” “Uhm,” you hesitate, and Nate’s heart sinks into the pit of his stomach. “Actually, I’m almost at your apartment.” “Oh.” Nate had not expected that. “Uhm, okay. I’ll be here, then.” You laugh. “Yeah, I hoped you would be. See you in a bit, Nate.” It takes you another 6 minutes to arrive; Nate knows it’s exactly 6 because he stares at the hands of the clock while he waits, while simultaneously thinking of all the possible scenarios in which you could break his heart. When you walk into the kitchen, he feels like he’s about to throw up. “You don’t look great,” is the first thing you say to him. “Have you had breakfast? You know hangovers get worse when you don’t eat.” And that’s... Not quite what Nate was expecting. “Yoohoo, Nate?” You wave your hand in front of his pale face, as Nate stares at you and doesn’t speak. “Are you okay?” “You hate me,” Nate blurts out then, and instantly his eyes fix on the floor in shame. “Or, you should.” You frown. “Why? Because you were a jealous dick last night?” Nate’s face turns from white to a bright shade of pink. You smile, walk to Nate who’s sitting on a barstool at the counter, and carefully push open his knees, so you can slide in between his legs. If Nate’s eyes go any wider, you worry they might fall out. “Last night,” you repeat, “you were jealous. Of Tom.” It’s not a question, but Nate still nods, avoiding your eyes as he does. “And then you were going to kiss me.” Not a question either, and this time Nate doesn’t respond. “Nate,” you say softly, and the warmth in your tone must be what finally gets Nate to look up at you, his eyes locking with yours. “Do you still want to kiss me?” “I do,” Nate says. His voice is a little shaky but he needs to get this out, because he needs you to know this. “I always want to kiss you.” “Why haven’t you?” you ask. The answer is not really an answer, but it means everything anyway. “I almost did,” Nate says. “So many times, Y/N. So many times I almost did.” “Almost, almost,” you repeat, rolling your eyes, and then you slide your hands behind Nate’s neck and kiss him. He almost stumbles, his hands gripping your waist as if he’s afraid he’ll fall right onto the floor if he doesn’t have something to hold onto. But he’s kissing you back right away, his mouth soft yet forceful at the same time. Like he’s never going to stop kissing you. You don’t think you ever want him to.

It’s late at night and the streets of Denver are quiet beneath Nate’s apartment. He’s laying on his back and you’re draped across his chest, naked bodies tangled together under the sheets. He’s not sure if you’re asleep; your breathing is shallow and even, but every now and then your fingers tighten around where they’re wrapped around his arm, and he wonders if you’re dreaming, or simply checking if he’s still there. As if he would ever leave. Nate can’t help himself; he lightly presses his lips against your hair, the ghost of a kiss against your skin. You hum softly. “Nate?” “Yeah,” he whispers. “It’s me.” A lazy giggle escapes your lips. “Thank God it’s not someone else.” The silence returns, but this time it’s heavy with something Nate knows you’re not saying. “What are you thinking about?” he mumbles, tracing circles on the naked skin of your back. Your answer shakes something inside of him. “That I almost didn’t get to have this.” He thinks of all the times he almost said something to you but didn’t, and curses himself for all the time lost. “Almost didn’t, but we did, and that’s what matters, right?” he speaks into the darkness.

You smile.

You know you’re not dreaming, but you almost can’t believe you aren’t.

Almost.

#nathan mackinnon #colorado avalanche #nhl fic #nhl one shot #nhl imagines

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gay-salt-amber · 3 years ago

Text

The phone call

Here's some notices or warnings before reading!

A trans man giving birth, Seungchuchu, Trans Phichit, Haikyuu x Yuri on Ice.

Seung-gil pov-

I entered the rink, sat down my bag and took a sip out of my thermos of coffee, "Hi coach." I greeted, tired and already done with my coach for the day.

"Greetings Seung-gil, sit down we need to figure out your skating routine for the next competition."

I nodded at my coach and sat down. I sat there, listening to my coach's instructions.. Well I wasn't really listening, I couldn't bring myself to focus... Phichit, my husband, had been really sick recently. I knew that he knew why but he wouldn't tell me, while some secrets were fine, it just felt to serious to be kept a secret. But if he wants to keep that stuff to himself, then I have no wish to pry into his business.

My coach, Min-so Park, must have noticed. She gave me a light flick on the ear and raised her voice by a inch, "Pay attention." She said.

I had to restraint myself from saying something else other then sorry, "Sorry, stuff has been happening at home."

"Don't carry that onto the ice, Seung-gil."

"..Sorry.." I said, trying to sound like I was actually sorry which I wasn't.

"Alright, now how about we do this song?" She said pointing to a list of songs she had written down.

"Sure, when are we going to figure out outfits though?"

"Probably tomorrow, we need to make sure this song is good for you before we figure out costumes."

She put the list down and walked over to the music-playing setup, "Lets start practice, Seung-gil."

I nodded as I re-tied my skates and went onto the ice, ready for a tiring day of practice. I just hope Phichit is doing alright.. I'm worried, so fucking worried.

Phichit pov-

I flushed the toilet, washed the disgusting taste out of my mouth out and exited the bathroom, I took my time walking down the stairs, holding onto the handle for dear life even though my feet were fine. I still don't wanna fall. Eventually after what felt like a lifetime, I made it to the couch where I flopped and grabbed my phone. As I massaged my headache, I hit Yuuri's contact, his nickname in my phone being 'bestie' I let out a silent swear as a sting of pain came but I hit the 'call' button and sucked up the pain.

Thankfully he picked up, even though he is at practice

"Hey Phichit, did you need something?"

I let out a small fake sob, "I feel like shit.."

"Oh, is Seung-gil with you?"

"No, he wanted to stay home but his coach made him come in.."

I could tell the Japanese skater was rolling his eyes, "Have I told you how much I hate his coach?"

"Yep."

After snickering I went back to the original topic, "But I wanted to ask you what you think I've come down with. Its been a week! I have never been sick for more then 2 days and I am scared!"

Yuuri clicked his tongue, "Ok.. Tell me more, I think I have an idea.."

"Well, I have been puking a lot.."

"That happens when you're sick typically.." Now that I think about it, yeah I do puke a bunch when I rarely get sick.

"Yeah.. And you know how I hate pickles?"

"Yes?"

"I now wanna dip those in chocolate and have it for breakfast."

"Any body pain?"

"Well my stomach and hurt like a bitch and my back wants to break."

"...." Yuuri went silent.

"Uh, Yuuri? Bestie? What's wrong?"

"Don't think I'm weird for saying this alright?"

"We've been friends for like 19 years, nothing you say will make me weirded out."

"You never got a bottom surgery when you transitioned right?"

"No, I still wanted kids so I never got much done, you know, minus getting my breasts removed."

"So, I think you should go get a pregnancy test.."

My eyes went wide, "Wha?! Why?!"

"I just think that you have a lot of the symptoms that pregnant people have. I may be wrong but its better now then later, right?"

I went quiet before speaking again, "...What will Seung-gil think?"

Yuuri went out a little chuckle, "Well, if he's as good a husband as you say, he'll stay there and help you."

I chuckled along, "Yeah.. I'll talk to you later."

When I hit the end call button, I threw my phone to the other side of a coach. Upon hearing that, Seung-gil's Siberian Husky came running over and hopped on the couch to try and make me feel better by rubbing his head against my hand.

I smiled bright "Hi buddy.."

"You may be getting a human friend in a few months if Yuuri was right.." I chuckled.

This made the dogs head perk up, his tail started wagging and he went out a bork of excitement.

"I know! so exciting!" I gave him head scratches before walking to the door and grabbing my keys

I turned back to Snow, "Dads gonna go out for a bit, don't cause too much havoc while I'm gone, ok?"

After hearing another bark from the grey-white dog, I left the large apartment and started to walk down the hallway. Even when I was in the lobby and out the front door to my car, I couldn't stop opening and closing my husbands contact.. 'Save it until you actually know..' After taking a breath and by that I mean about 10 breathes, I put the keys in and drove to the store to get the test.

When I pulled into the parking lot, I unbuckled slowly and got my hat and my mask. I did everything slowly, I was just nervous.. I then thought of how lucky I would be to have a kid.. All the happy moments, seeing Seung-gil falling asleep with a baby atop his chest, and that babies adorable face.. With those ideas in my head I opened my car door and practically ran into the store.

Once I entered, I walked to the pharmacy section and after scanning the shelf like 4 times, my eyes finally landed on the pregnancy test, "Damn I must have been staring at it for like 2 minutes." I joked, I grabbed it and walked to the counter to pay, I walked back out to my car and went about 9 miles over the speed limit to get home.

Seung gil pov-

It was coming to be the middle of practice, which was when I was allowed a really quick water break before starting practice again.

"Ok Seung-gil! You can have a water break!" Coach shouted

I nodded and walked over to the bench, right when I was about to grab my water, I heard my phone ringing. When I checked the name.. It was my husband, Phichit.

"I told you to not have your phone out during practice!"

"My husbands really sick so I couldn't really NOT have it on or out." I retorted

"Just answer it."

I rolled my eyes and answered, "Hello?"

Phichit's voice on the other line was nervous, "Uh.. Hey Seung-gil.. Can you come home? Like right now?"

"Why? Are you ok?"

"We just need to talk."

"Now?" I repeated

"Yeah, sorry for interrupting your practice dear.." He sighed

"No, no! It's ok, I don't wanna be here anyway."

Phichit laughed which made my heart glow, "Alright, see you soon."

"See you soon." And with that I ended the call, grabbed my stuff and walked to the exit.

"SEUNG GIL LEE WHERE THE WORLD ARE YOU GOING?! YOU STILL HAVE PRACTICE!" My coach yelled from the rink,

My voice went back to being cold instead of sweet like when I was on the phone, "Home."

The brown haired woman started running in my direction, "Oh hell no!" But by the time she said that the door was open and I was walking to my car and quickly on the road.

--When he got home--

Once I opened the door I hear the muffled tv in the background, I kicked off my shoes at the door gave the dog some love and went to sit on the couch next to my husband.

"Welcome home.." The Thai's boy was quiet.

"So what did you wanna talk about dear? You never call me back from practice...."

"Uh.. You know how I said I was trans? How I was born a girl not a male?"

"Yes?"

Phichit stood up and walked in the direction of the bedroom, "Its best I show you, wait here.."

I nodded and waited. he came back a minute later, holding a something that looked familiar to me, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Once he sat down he handed the long stick to me,

"Guess what.. You're a dad.." His voice was nervous

I looked at the pregnancy test.

Then back to him.

"I get it if you are mad if I didn't tell you sooner that this could happen but, I have always wanted to start a family with you so, please, help me parent our child."

I couldn't even speak, I just wrapped my arms tightly around Phichit, "There is no universe where I would pass up to take care of a child with you." I breathed before continuing to speak, "I love you so much. We are going to have a happy family here, ok? I will do whatever I can to support our family."

When I finally looked up at my husband, tears were streaming down his face, I panicked, "Why are you crying?! Did I say something?!"

He laughed, wiping his small tears away, "No, you're just fine. I'm just.. happy."

I gave him a kiss on the forehead, "Are you hungry? I was thinking of ordering pizza."

"Can you get me pineapple pizza..?"

I let out a snort, "Sure."

--After ordering pizza--

Once we sat down, we happily ate, I smiled as I watched Phichit devour his pizza and his cute little face have pizza sauce get dotted on the cheeks and his chin. After he chewed he started to speak

"Hey I have a question about your coach."

I put down my pizza and looked at the cute boy, "What of her?"

"Well, I think you either need to talk to her, or get a new coach."

"I mean I would love to, but why?" I asked

"She never lets you have any holidays off or anything, no special days, no calling in before hand, no calling in sick, nothing! The only way you get out of practice is just walking out. I feel like when the kid is born, that wont be an option anymore."

I nodded my head, taking a bite from my pizza, "Yeah, you're right. I wanted to find a new coach anyway, I just needed a reason."

Phichit chuckled before gasping, "Hold on! I need to go call some people!"

I rubbed my forehead, giving a small smile, "Who are you calling?"

"Y'know, Guang-Hong, Leo and Yuuri! Imma tell them they're uncles now!"

"Alright! Don't take too long!"

A few minutes later I could hear excited gasps and congratulations coming from the kitchen

---A few months later--

Phichit pov-

I was on the phone panicking, Seung-gil couldn't be here, his coach wouldn't let him leave no matter how hard he tried so I was on the phone with Yuuri.

"Stay calm till I get there! I'll get you to the hospital Phichit."

"It fucking hurts!"

"I know just hold on!"

A few minutes later of trying to talk to keep the pain away, the door swung open with Yuuri behind it, he came over, helped me up and we got into the car.

"You're going to be a dad.. Mom? What do you wanna be called anyway?" Yuuri asked

"Whatever the child prefers."

"Do you know the gender yet?"

"No we decided to wait till he's born, which I guess is soon!" I was excited but also nervous.

"..Seung-gil will find a way to get to the hospital to see you, even if he has to jump out a window or something."

I snorted, "Victor did that didn't he?"

"I mean, yeah~"

We finally made it to the hospital and after circling the parking spot a few times, we got out and walked through the entrance.

"When I come out my life's gonna be so different.."

"Mhm! But that's a good thing!" Yuuri reminded me

"Yeah."

--About 15 minutes later--

Seung gil pov-

Once I finally got away from my coach by jumping out the window of the boys locker room and was able to maneuver my ass through the rush hour traffic, I arrived at the hospital. When I entered I instantly spotted Yuuri Katsuki, my husbands best friend and ran over to him.

"How is he?!"

"Thank god you're here."

I sat down and panted, "Yeah, my coach forced me to stay at practice, I had to crawl out through a window."

"Knew it."

"Anyway, is Phichit doing ok?"

Yuuri nodded, "Yes, they have him back there now."

"Can I not go in?"

"Ok."

I started tapping my foot from nervousness I didn't notice Yuuri get up but when I did he was holding coffee in his hand, "Here. They had a coffee cart over there, I figured you would want something to drink."

I took it from his hand, "Thanks."

"So what are you hoping for?"

"Heh, Phichit was hoping for a boy and I would be dead if I said a girl." I laughed

"Do you have a name in mind?"

"Not really, we know we want to change his last name so he can live a normal life though."

"Any ideas for that?"

"We'll figure it out. Phichit is a spur of the moment person, y'know?"

"Oh I know that too well." Yuuri took a sip of his drink before speaking again

"So, you remember when I was watching your dog at my house?"

"Yes?"

"Our dogs cuddled."

My mouth went wide, "Do you have photos?!"

"Yep!"

about 4 hours later-

"Family and friends of Phichit Lee may come in now." The doctor called

I looked at Yuuri, "You go by yourself first Seung-Gil he wants to see you more then me."

I got up and walked to the room and sat on a chair next to the hospital bed,

"Say hello to your son!" Phichit said, a smile from ear to ear on his face.

"He's adorable." I said, reaching out my pointer finger, which the little boy grabbed and held onto with his tiny hands.

"Mhm."

The child blinked a bit, "He has your eyes." I pointed out

"Just as cute too." Phichit added

"Mhm."

"So, what are we thinking for names?"

"Uhh.. I was actually thinking about it in the car."

"Oh? What did you come up with?

"I was thinking of naming him Sakusa Kiyoomi."

"That sounds good."

"Do you want to hold him?"

"Sure."

I reached my hands out and Phichit handed me my son, "I'm really a father.."

"Mhm. I love you so much."

"I love you too dear," He reached out and booped Sakusa nose

"And I love you too, Sakusa."

-16 years later-

Sakusa pov-

I was texting Atsumu, my boyfriend about practice and such.

----

'Tsumu: Hey sweet, adorable love of my life ♥♥! I have a question

Omi: Please use normal pet-names

'Tsumu: Nah

Omi: 😶😑Yes, dear?

'Tsumu: When am I gonna meet your parents? 🤔

Omi: You can come over after practice, if you want.

'Tsumu: Woah! 😲 Really?!

Omi: Sure, I don't care.

'Tsumu: Wait, aren't you at practice too?

Omi: Yeah we're taking a water break

'Tsumu: Well, I'll leave you alone! Love you! See you later tonight Omi-Omi! 😍😘💗💓

Omi: See you then, 'Tsumu <3

----

When I turned off my phone I didn't realize my cousin, Kimori, was standing right over me reading my texts.

"So, hows the married life?

"CHRIST!" I yelped

I regained my composure as the rest of the team looked over, "Great, how are you and that snake boy?" I was referring to Suguru Daishou, who was the captain of the Nohebi Academy volleyball team.

Kimori let out a gasp of betrayal, "Rude!"

"Right.."

The coach called us back onto the court, I stood up and ran back to the court with my team.

--After practice--

I sat there at the train stations coffee shop and sipped on a thing of tea while working on my laptop. I wanted to finish up school work before 'Tsumu got here, after all. While I was typing away on a writing assignment, my phone buzzed, it was one of my dads, Phichit Lee. I finished typing the paragraph, I placed a period, picked up my phone and went to answer the message.

---

Pops: Hey Kiddo👋, me and your dad will be late coming home from practice. Stop by the rink ⛸⛸ if you need anything! ♥♥

Kiyoomi: Will do. Also I will be having my boyfriend over.

Pops: Oh! 😲 Me and your dad can stay out later if you need us to😁

Kiyoomi: No, he wanted to meet you and dad.

Pops: We'll try to get home early in that case!

Kiyoomi: Alright good luck with that pair skate practice

Pops: We're gonna need it 😗

After about 15 minutes I looked out of the store and saw that Tsumu's train was pulling in, I got in and waited closer to the train for him. Once he got out I called out for him.

"'Tsumu!" I called

When I did that he ran full speed at me and wrapped his hands around my neck, with my hands wrapping around his waist.

He started placing kisses on my cheeks, "Its been so long!"

I laughed, "Its been a week."

"Same difference!"

I gave a final smile before I grabbed the fake blondes hand and led him to my car.

"So, I'm meeting your parents today?"

I nodded, "They may be late home, but yes."

We got into the car and kept talking about what was going to happen tonight,

"I'm so nervous, y'know?"

"Heh, you don't need to be, don't worry."

I then remembered something, "Also my uncle is dropping by so you'll get to meet them."

"Oo! Cool!"

I plugged my aux cord and handed the phone to 'Tsumu, "Its your turn for music this weekend dear, please don't play The Bee Movie sound track the whole way home."

"Awh! You're lucky I love you Omi!"

He put on Shinedowns new album Amaryllis, so I was happy.

"Nice song choice."

Tsumu rested my hand on top of mine which was already resting on his thigh.

"Do you want me to stop and get coffee or something? Or do you wanna head straight to my place?"

"Meh I had coffee earlier, we can head to your place."

"Oh you haven't been to my place before have you? It's always me visiting you."

"Yeah! That just makes me more excited!"

I smiled.

"Wait.. I NEED TO ASK FOR YOUR BABY PHOTOS!"

"NO!"

We finally pulled into the garage of the apartment complex and exited the car. When we entered the lobby Atsumu spoke up, "This is a really nice looking place."

"Yeah my folks make good money so we have a good sized apartment." I explained as we walked to the elevator

I hit the '8' button and waited till the doors re-opened, we exited as an elderly couple entered and walked to the apartment as the numbers went up across the doors, 801, 802, 803, 804... Finally we reached the apartment, with the silver plaque reading 810. I twisted the key and was instantly greeted by Snow and Makkachin. Makkachin was staying here just because Victor and Yuuri were in Russia and Makkachin was getting too old to travel, y'know, being 15 and all.

Atsumu instantly got down on his knees to give Snow head scratches, "Oh my god! You have dogs! Why didn't you tell me?!"

"Snow is my parents and Makkachin," I said pointing to the dogs as I mentioned them, "Is just staying here till my uncle comes to get them today."

"They're so pretty!"

"Mhm."

Me and Atsumu took off our shoes, I went to the kitchen, filled up the dogs bowls, washed my hands and then crashed on the couch.

Once Atsumu noticed my presence he laid his head on my lap "Your place is nice, Omi-Omi."

"Thanks."

"..Can I change positions so we can both be comfy?" I asked

Atsumu nodded and sat up so I could lay down, Atsumu then laid onto my chest, listening to my breathing and heart beat.

"I love you."

"I love you too."

-10 minutes later-

After we laid there and watched tv for a bit, I heard a knock on the door, "That must be my uncle." Atsumu shot up, and followed me to the door.

When I opened it, I saw my uncle, Nikiforov-Katsuki Yuuri and his husband Victor standing to his left. Once they took a step in the door Makkachin came bolting towards them

"Makkachin! My baby!" Victor called out as he lifted Makkachin into his arms.

Atsumu stood in surprise for a minute while I talked to them. Does he know that they're famous figure skaters? No, I think his twin brother Osamu and his team captain Kita are into that stuff.

"So, before you go I want you to meet someone," I started, I gestured to my boyfriend as I spoke, "This is my boyfriend, Atsumu Miya."

Yuuri smiled and shook his hand, "Its a pleasure to meet you, Atsumu."

After Victor did the same they turned to leave before Atsumu spoke up, "Wait! Can I get your autographs? My captain and brother are big figure skating fans and they would kill me if I passed this up."

Victor and Yuuri laughed and nodded, "Sure! We'd love to!"

Victor and Yuuri signed the autograph to Osamu and wrote below it, "Your brothers cool!" and the one to Kita with "The best captain ever! Kita!"

"Thank you."

"Of course! Your family now after all!"

After we said our goodbyes, Yuuri and Victor left me and my boyfriend alone again. I looked at Atsumu, grabbed his hand and we walked back over to the couch to watch tv while Snow slept on her bed near us. Atsumu kept insisting that we watch Gilmore Girls until I finally gave in and we ended up binging to season 3.

"I'm telling you! Luke is the best!"

"Aand why do you think that?"

I shrugged, "Meh Lorelai is better."

"No!"

We kept bickering like children for a few minutes before I pulled my lover in for a kiss, that managed to shut him up. But his red face was too cute to not kiss over, and over, and over again. So that's exactly what I did.

"A kiss here." I said giving a kiss on his cheek, "And a kiss for the other side," "A kiss here," "And a kiss here,"

"Omiiiiiiii~"

I laughed, stopping my kissing spree after I kissed every spot on his face, "I love you."

"I love you more, baby dearest."

I smiled, "Just call me baby or dear. Baby dearest sounds weird."

"Awh but its cute!"

Snow barked as they awoke from their nap

"See? Even snow agrees that its cute!"

I looked over at Snow with a deadpan look, "Really? I know you like my boyfriend because he gave you belly rubs, but, really?"

--When Seung-gil and Phichit got home--

I was too focused on the snoring Atsumu on my chest to hear the clicking of the front door, the removal of shoes, or the hanging of keys. It was only when I was a flash off a camera did I know that my parents saw my boyfriend laying on my lap.

My dad started rapidly typing on his phone, "Seung-gil! Get in here! This is adorable!"

The black haired Korean walked into the room, "Phichit, lets let them relax and get dinner started ok?"

"OK!" After that, Seung-gil was walking to the kitchen and Phichit speed walking to keep up.

After a few more minutes Atsumu woke up from his nap with a yawn, "Hey Omi-kun."

"Good morning dear."

I started petting his head when spoke, "Did your parents come home?"

"Mhm."

"WAIT WHAT?!"

"Shh.. I just wanted you to sleep, its fine."

"..OK."

Then I heard a gasp from the kitchen

"SEUNG-GIL! SAKUSAS BOYFRIEND IS AWAKE!"

My dads had came peaking out from the corner 2 seconds later, "Atsumu, this is my dad."

The cheerful boy sat up and shook my dads hand, "Hi, I'm Atsumu Miya."

"Im Phichit Lee."

"Hold on im gonna go get your other dad." My dad said before leaving the room to go grab his husband.

"Wait... YOU HAVE TWO DADS AND YOU DIDNT TELL ME?!"

"You never asked."

"Humph." Atsumu huffed, turning his head.

"Oh come on.. Look at me dear."

"Nu!"

"I'll let you see baby pictures of me later." I offered.

"..."

I sighed and grabbed his hand, "We'll go get fatty tuna tomorrow with Kimori and his boyfriend."

Atsumu head perked up, "Yes! I love you!"

After that, my dad came in the room with my other dad, "My name is Seung-Gil Lee." He greeted before shaking Atsumu's hand.

After that we sat down at the dinner table, with me and Atsumu on one side and my parents on the other.

"So how long have you two been together?" Phichit asked

"Since our first year of Highschool." I answered

My dads smile grew, "Wait! Are we the first ones in the family to know?!"

"Nah, Uncle Leo and Guang-Hong know."

He gasped dramatically and put a hand on his chest, "My own squad betraying me like that, so tragic~"

"Also heres a question." Atsumu started

"Yes?"

"Whos your favorite character in Gilmore Girls?"

"Luke." Seung-Gil said

This caused my dad to look at him with bewilderment, "Am I just getting betrayed tonight?! Lorelai is SO much better!"

"Nope."

After we finished eating we went to the living room and chatted.

"So what happened at practice?"

"Oh I got a story," Seung-gil started, putting his cup down.

"So you know how me and your dad are skating on the same rink as the Russian team till our rink gets redone?"

"Yes?"

"So apparently Georgi is dating that one French skater."

"Which one?"

"Jean.. Douche? Y'know that Akaashi boys dad."

That comment made Atsumu nearly spit out his drink, Phichit's dark eyes went wide, "Are you ok?!"

"Yeah, my best friends just dating Akaashi so it was just surprising that he's part French."

"Wait, I thought Oikawa was your best friend?"

"I have multiple best friends, Omi."

"Anyway, so, I heard that Kimori got a boyfriend~"

"Phichit, dear, love of my life, please don't tell me your using your sisters kids life as blackmail."

"Why wouldn't I?"

"Yeah he does." I answered

"Do you have photos?!"

"Dad, I wouldn't be your child if I didn't have blackmail."

I quickly pulled up a photo and showed it to my dads,

(Here's the photo, credit to the artist)

And with that my dad started gushing over the photo, "Awh! Thats so cute!"

"Speaking of cute, do you have Sakusa's baby photos?"

"Oh you bet I do!"

For the next half an hour they looked at baby photos.

Once Atsumu got ready to leave, he asked for a final thing, "Can I get your autographs? My captain and twin brother love figure skating and you two are some of their favorites."

They nodded and signed the papers, and with that, I gave Atsumu a kiss on the cheek and he left.

"Sooo whens the wedding?"

#Sakusa #yuri on ice #haikyuu!!#Seungchuchu #phichit chulanont #seung gil lee #Trans #Child #sakuatsu #Gilmore girls #Anime #Gay

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rediscoveringmichelle · 3 years ago

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An Apple a day keeps the cravings away

January 2021, back in London after spending Christmas at home in Ireland with my family. This time had been a very different experience to the last. Freer, both mentally and physically. The last time I had been home was at the beginning of the global pandemic, restricted to the 2km radius of my home in Clontarf, North Dublin. However, on this occasion not only had restrictions been lifted by the Taoiseach for the Christmas period, I had lifted my own restrictions too. The beginning of the pandemic was the turning point of my recovery and now, 9 months later, I was no longer limiting myself to 3 healthy meals per day, with no snacks and a strict schedule of two 10km runs per week and a minimum 2 and half hours of walking per day. I felt happier and healthier than I had been in years, able to relax and enjoy late night glasses of wine and mince pies with my parents, meals out with friends and the odd day of rest and relaxation with nothing but a few hours of TV to pass the day. It didn’t matter how much weight I had put on; I had gained my life and laugh back, and I would be forever grateful for the lesson I had learnt thanks to this awful pandemic. That making myself thinner and fitter, didn’t make me any happier. And that being physically healthy is nothing if you destroy your mental and social health too.

January 2018 was really where it all began. Recently single and having spent a lot of my newfound freedom on nights out, eating takeaways and drinking large volumes of alcohol, I had understandably put on a bit of weight. The guy I had been seeing, suddenly stopped texting me and I felt rejected. My parents were back to living their lives after their run-ins with poor health. Dad back to smothering his toast in thick layers of butter and Mum loving her newfound ‘real-Mum’ life of Pilates and coffee catch ups since selling her practice for good. I was no longer needed. Mum didn’t need me to drive her to chemo or cook my Dad his no red meat, no oil, no salt dinners. I felt anxious as they went back to living their lives. No longer able to control them, especially my dad. I couldn’t force him into living a by-the-book healthy lifestyle. But I figured what I could control was myself. I could be the healthiest person I could possibly be. And with the added benefit of making that guy wish he’d never let me go. My perfectionist self would ensure that I would be the perfect picture of health. No cheating, no dieting, just a new lifestyle. A new me. One I could love.

I scoured the internet for all the advice on changing your lifestyle, getting fit and losing weight. Running apparently boosted your metabolism and was an efficient way to burn calories and fat. So, I started by running 5km, three times a week. Weights would help then to reduce my body fat and tone up so I coupled the running with strength training in the gym, also three times a week. I pounded out Kelsey Wells workout routines, while listening to ‘This is me’ from The Greatest Showman, a song about not being afraid to show the world exactly who you are, as I was ironically punishing my body into a shape that was not naturally me. I strictly followed Dad’s cardiologist’s advice and cooked everything from scratch, substituting beef mince for turkey mince and not using oil, butter or salt in my cooking. I cut out all snacks and limited myself to three meals per day. Social Media became my home ground for weight loss advice. ‘You’re not hungry, you’re thirsty. Drink some water.’ ‘No pain, no gain.’ ‘Ignore your cravings and they will eventually go away.’ ‘Craving sugar? Have an apple instead’. Each day would end with eating an apple to stave off the cravings and to quieten the rumbles in my stomach.

I started weighing my food, tracking everything from litres of water drunk and then steps walked and active minutes of exercise. I upped my runs gradually to 10km, twice a week because social media told me that after running for 35 minutes, you no longer just burn calories, but also fat. And yes, I do realise that anyone who has a degree in anything science related would quickly realise these were all completely made up and not based on fact, but I guess I wanted to believe them. I would believe anything that forced me to push (or punish) myself more. I stopped going out for drinks or dinner with friends. Too many calories and too worried that I wouldn’t be able to get up and run in the morning, unable to flex from the specific days I went running, for fear I would never run again. When I moved to London, I spent my weekends walking 40 thousand steps so that I could then earn a slice of banana bread from Deliciously Ella’s Vegan & Gluten Free Deli. I felt a rush of joy wash over me each time I saw the number on the scales or the minutes of my 10km runs decline, but like a drug, the high didn’t last long. I was addicted. I had no trust in myself. ‘You’re so controlled’, they complimented me. But deep down, I felt like there was a lazy, sugar and fat loving girl inside me. An imposter in a gradually reducing body. Fearing that just one biscuit and I would be back as that unhappy and overweight rejected girl.

I really believed that being thinner and looking like those girls I idolised on Instagram would make me happier. They were all smiling, surely that meant they were happy? As the compliments turned to concern, I felt that surely people were just jealous of how much weight I had managed to lose. Weight loss was something to be proud of, wasn’t it? The truth of it all didn’t hit me until the pandemic. As I sat up in my bed struggling to breathe on the night of the Taoiseach’s first lockdown announcement, I started to wonder what I was really fearing. During a time when people were dying, all I could fear was not being able to exercise enough and being locked up in a house full of food. I feared putting on weight and relinquishing control. I felt trapped with nothing to look forward to. Holidays cancelled and my boyfriend of two months at home with his family 167km away in Belfast. That was my rock bottom.

In an effort to cheer myself up I started to make a list of all the things I wanted to do post lockdown. Have date nights in with my boyfriend, making pizzas, ordering takeaways and eating breakfast in bed. Then the excitement of getting to do these things started to dwindle as the anxiety crept in, as I tried to count up how much exercise I would need to do in order to earn those nights. A day in bed with no exercise? Nope, that’s a no go. And that’s when it hit me. I had made myself thin, with the thought that then I would be lovable and that then I could enjoy my life. But I was thinner, thinner than I’d been since I was a preteen and I still wouldn’t let myself go enough to do the things I deeply wanted to do. To let myself enjoy life. How freeing it would be to just, let go!

My love for learning kicked in and I made the decision to start reading up and educating myself. I came across a book my mum had not so subtly left lying around the house. ‘Just Eat it – How Intuitive eating can help you get your shit together around food’ by Laura Thomas. I didn’t believe I had an eating disorder until I started reading her book. As she listed off the disorders, she then came to Orthorexia – defined as an unhealthy obsession with healthy eating or over exercising. ‘When was the last time you even asked yourself what you’d like instead of what you ‘can’ or ‘should’ eat?’ she queried. The sad reality was that I couldn’t remember. ‘We trust our phones more than we trust our bodies’. Well that was certainly true for me. She used science, showing that weight was in fact not a determinant of health but that by exercising, eating healthy and not smoking we could be healthy, regardless of our size. That eating a donut didn’t in fact negate the nutrients of the carrot we ate earlier. And that white flour was actually infused with calcium and that those carbs are what give us energy to move and enjoy life. My eyes gradually opened to all the lies diet culture had taught me and I felt empowered.

I moved on to more books and podcasts and started culling my social media feed of anyone that didn’t make me feel good. I started following intuitive eating dietitians and anti-diet advocates. Following people of all shapes and sizes and realising how biased our society is towards people in smaller bodies. Not just the size of airplane seats but assuming that all health issues experienced by fat people can be solved by weight loss. I learnt that the night sweats I had been experiencing, the pretty much non-existent sex drive and the inability to maintain body heat for any length of time were in fact all side effects of the restricted eating and over-exercising. Half the time I didn’t even look as thin as I had become because I was wearing so many layers of clothes in order to keep warm. Walking around the house with a hot water bottle strapped to my waist and wearing a fur coat indoors while out for dinner with friends. Only now can I laugh at the image of it. I started to make a list of all the things I would gain through gaining weight and glancing back over it now, I have gained all of these and more. My headspace, my laughter, my body heat and a fantastic relationship that I thankfully didn’t destroy because of my restrictive, anxious mind-set.

My recovery hasn’t been easy. The steps toward eating intuitively start with banishing your food rules and allowing yourself to eat what you want. A process that takes time before you can start tuning into your hunger and fullness cues again and introducing gentle nutrition. It involved allowing myself to devour entire tubs of Oatly chocolate fudge ice-cream, multiple evenings per week. Making my way through all the delicious Deliveroo takeaway options London had to offer – Honest Burgers red meat beef burgers with rosemary salted fries, Franco Manca pizzas, with all the toppings, and Kin & Deum Thai curries, with full fat coconut milk. Gradually I started being able to listen to my body and trust it. Whether it hungered for a salmon stir-fry or was seeking out a slice of chocolate cake. The interesting thing being, that months later it now craves nutritious food the majority of the time. And that by allowing it to have higher sugar or fat containing foods whenever it wants, I no longer feel out of control around them. I no longer find myself devouring three large sized bags of crisps in one sitting, overtaken by the fear that I will never let myself eat them again.

I have days where I find myself critiquing my larger thighs in the mirror but instead of allowing the thoughts consume me, I allow them float by with curiosity and continue about my day knowing that the way I look doesn’t define me and that the greatest things about me have nothing to do with my body shape or size. I am a thoughtful friend, who prides herself at remembering important moments in friends’ lives. A courageous girl who isn’t afraid to try new things, whether that be travelling solo across Vietnam or signing up to a surf and yoga retreat in Cornwall. A creative person who loves to draw and a lifelong learner that is open to new ideas and wants to challenge her way of thinking. My body will change a lot over the next 50 plus years of my life, but the great thing is that thanks to freeing myself from the disease, I get to look forward to the possibility of being alive for that long and to enjoying every waking moment, no longer postponing life for when I look or am a certain way.

#recovery #healing #dietculture #orthorexia #bodyimage #eatingdisorder #rediscoveringlife

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scapegrace74-blog · 5 years ago

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Gimme Sympathy

A/N One more fic in the Metric universe, and then I have to knuckle down and finish the second arc of Saorsa. This story takes place just after Lost Kitten, so after The Beginning and Breathing Underwater, but long before Lazy Dancer and Calculation Theme. Previous fics are available on my AO3 page.

Oh, and mild warning for foul language, if that’s not your thing.

The song by Metric that inspired the title and a few lines is here.

December 10, 2016, Bistrotheque, Bethnal Green, London

“Bloody feckin hell, this place is a madhouse!” Geillis yelled as she elbowed her way back to Claire’s side in the vestibule of the latest trendy East London eatery.

“Yes, well, this was all your idea. I was happy going out for pad thai and warm beer,” Claire retorted over the din. Truth be told, she was excited to be out past 8pm wearing something other than her scrubs and someone else’s bodily fluids. It had been a tough slog of a year.

“Are ye mad, woman? Bad enough ye wouldna let me throw ye a party fer gettin’ inta medical school. I wasna goin’ to settle for anything less than the hippest hipster joint in all o’ Bethnal Green tae celebrate yer success.”

They were eventually ushered into the cavernous main dining room, bedecked like a virginal bride with a long row of liquor bottles atop the massive central bar reflecting the pendant lights like gemstones. Claire felt conspicuous in her slim black skirt and tallest heels, the pressure of assessing eyes on her exposed back.

Ordering a bottle of ridiculously overpriced champagne, Geillis raised her flute in salute.

“Tae my hard-working, brilliant, an’ annoyingly beautiful friend, who will be the most kick-ass doctor the Royal London ‘as e’er seen. Dr. Claire Elizabeth Beauchamp.”

“Thank you, Geil. Though, I’m a long way from a doctor yet,” she demurred, letting the crisp liquid bite her tongue before swallowing.

“Ach, ‘tis no’ but a formality. Ye could pick up a scalpel now and still be a right sight better than most o’ those auld wankers we work wi’!”

“You’re a true friend, Geil. And you have excellent taste in hipster joints. This menu is amazing.”

The two women drank and ate and laughed and drank some more. Geillis was a bottomless well of off-colour stories, most involving her constantly changing stable of male companions.

“So you’re saying he, err, handcuffed you to the bed frame and then... passed out cold?” Claire asked, eyes alight with mischief.

“Aye. An’ before he could serve me, the bugger. Anyway, tha’ was why I couldna reply tae yer texts when ye lost yer keys.”

“I thought you were speaking metaphorically, when you said you’d been tied up!” Claire dissolved into giggles, the empty champagne bottle having been replaced by some top flight Scottish whisky. This meal was going to cost Geillis a fortune.

“Nah. Ye ken I would come tae yer rescue, nae matter how well I was bein’ rogered, Claire. Thas’ wha’ friends are for,” Geillis Scots grew more broad as she plumbed the depths of intoxication, a fact that Claire had always found endearing. “Come tae think o’ it, where did ye bed down tha’ night? The on-call room?”

Claire blushed and stared into her half-empty glass. She’d been hoping to avoid this particular conversation, but now she’d stumbled straight into it.

“No, I ran into an... acquaintance, when I was bumbling about in the rain. And they offered to let me stay in their spare room. So, will you be seeing this Norwegian personal trainer again? It’s hardly his fault he passed out. Knowing you, he probably drank enough liquor to pickle an elephant.”

Geillis might have been drunk, but she was still canny, and she could tell when her friend was hiding something.

“What acquaintance of yours has a spare room? Tha’ Hawkins girl, from Pediatrics?”

“No. No, it was... um, well, it was James Fraser,” she mumbled, hoping Geillis had forgotten his family name, or had never known it in the first place. Either was a distinct possibility, but luck was not with her.

“Jamie Fraser! The big ginger firefighter?! Ye slept at Jamie Fraser’s, an’ ye failed tae inform me immediately? Feckin hell, Claire!”

Claire glanced nervously at the tables close by either side of their own, hoping the general clamour prevented them from overhearing their conversation.

“It’s precisely because I knew you’d react like this that I didn’t tell you, Geil. It’s not a big deal. He happened upon me, I told him about my keys, and he offered for me to sleep in his spare room. His flatmate had just moved out,” she explained rationally.

“Nae big deal, she says. Alright, then. If it twas nae big deal, tell me everythin’. Seein’ as we’re no’ keepin’ secrets.”

Knowing there was no way to pull Geillis off the scent a juicy tale, Claire matter-of-factly described meeting Jamie in Brick Lane, the inside of his flat, and the quiet breakfast they’d shared the next morning before they’d gone their separate ways. Something kept her from sharing the story of their middle-of-the-night encounter and Jamie’s PTSD episode. She told herself she was merely maintaining the privacy of an informal patient, but there was something more possessive lying beneath her motivation. Jamie had revealed himself to her in a way she knew, instinctively, he’d never shared with Geillis. The secret was his, and now it was hers as well.

“Interesting,” her friend opined, nodding her head as though a theory had been confirmed. “So, the wee fox cub likes his damsels in distress, does he?”

“It wasn’t like that at all, Geil. Don’t make this about sex.”

“Hen, everythin’ is about sex. Jus’ because ye’ve sworn off men doesna make it untrue.”

“You would say that,” Claire retorted. “Especially since you and he...” she gestured with her hand.

“Aye. Aye, we did. Twas the night before ye left fer Afghanistan, if I recall,” Geillis confirmed, unrepentant.

“Just the once?” Claire asked, curious despite herself.

“Aye. Well, twice, if ye count the time in the shower after ye puked on me.”

“Oh my god. Geillis! You fucked him in our shower while I lay intoxicated in my bed? I can’t believe you!”

“We made certain ye were alright, first,” Geillis defended herself, batting her eyelashes innocently.

“Bloody hell. Well, and? Don’t hold back now. How was he?”

Geillis looked abstracted and Claire knew she was reliving the night in question, four years past. A lump formed in her throat, and she regretted asking for details. Now the two streams had crossed in her mind, and she’d never again be able to think of Jamie without also remembering the look Geil had on her face in that moment.

Reading her friend’s glass face with ease, Geillis took pity on her.

“Ye dinna really want tae know, love. I will say this. He’s a good lad. Far too lovely for the likes o’ me.”

“That’s it? I have to listen to the minutae of every other sexual adventure you have, but Jamie Fraser is ‘lovely’?”

“Aye. Ye do, and he is. Come, le’s get out o’ here a’fore I canna walk.”

Stumbling out into the cloudy night, the two leaned against each other and started the long trek back to their flat. Claire was silent, trying to muddle through her conflicted feelings through the haze of drink. It really shouldn’t matter that Geillis and Jamie had a history, albeit a very short-lived one. And yet somehow, it did.

“I will tell ye one thing,” Geillis began as though their earlier conversation hadn’t ended twenty minutes previous. “The lad has the trapezius of an Olympic deity. Ye could do far worse.”

“I could... Geil, I told you, it isn’t like that. You more than anyone should know I’m not in the market for a man, Olympian musculature or not. Especially now, with medical school looming.”

Geillis stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, forcing a couple to step around them, muttering angrily.

“Claire,” she said, trying to school her features into something approximating solemnity, “yer a brilliant lass, but ye’re also a damn fool. Just cause one man treated ye poorly doesna mean they all will. Ye’re gonna make mistakes, ye’re young. But dinna live in the dark because ye got too close tae the flame and got burned.”

Lecture over, Geillis steered them westward.

“Where are we going?”

“Tae the chippie. Hipster food is well an’ good, but it doesna soak up all the yummy alcohol like tatties an’ grease.”

#my writing #outlander

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yyxgin · 4 years ago

Note

no bar!! never fret about replying late. i know what it’s like to not want to talk to anyone. honestly. i won’t call it (my experience) a depressive episode bc one of my friends used to brush off me when i was saying things like i’m depressed and say ‘sad’ instead. like if i were to say ‘that made me/i am depressed’ she’d say something like ‘oh god same! like if it’s making you sad,, don’t do it.’ which is a v poor example of what she did but i never called it depressed after that bc she pissed me off n was disregarding of my feelings (even though she’s incredibly anxious herself) bc i didn’t get it officially diagnosed. idk if you’ve ever read about birth control pills but i always read on tumblr people calling them literal depression pills and i ignored it, thinking either 1) people were being dramatic / were over-dramatising it or 2) it wouldn’t happen to me anyway. it fucking happened and they were not being dramatic. i was never happy n always working on minimal sleep n making self depreciating jokes all the time bc it was the only way i could cope with my thoughts n constant mood swings. so what i’m trying to say is,, i know how it feels. if that’s any consolation. it’s not me trying to be ‘oh me too!’ or ‘mine was worse than you’ it’s just me being understanding n telling you it’s okay. also lemme at your friends!! i’ll stomp them out n get the barman to run them over for you!! they’re so mean to forget you!! i find that deciding i want to do something specific n then asking the appropriate people if they want to do saïd thing/place works for me. it can be a simple ‘we should do this, when are you free?’ helps. making it known that you want to do things helps. or aggressively remind them that it’s nice to be asked bc it means they thought of you even if you couldn’t go n tried to include you. or we can revisit me stomping them out w my beloved barman,,, whatever works best for you my dear <3

admittedly me and one of the girls were discussing that we are going to miss our manager. even though literally everyone moaned about her (i feel like it’s impossible to avoid in literally any job/situation) she did have her moments and she did a lot for the staff like after work-drinks, asking the chefs if we could order off of the customer menu instead of the staff menu or whatever they cook in bulk for everyone to take home in the evening. apparently she did this a lot more than the previous manager. she has a good heart but sometimes she ignored some of the girls when we ask for days off or our availability for the week which was very annoying of her. it could’ve been a lot worse, i suppose, but overall she wasn’t terrible.

thé lady who lives in my town and drops me given the chance, told me the other night that she used to be the duty manager. i asked her why she stopped and she explained that when they furloughed everyone they asked her to come back on like half pay or something? idk i just remember it being explained as they wanted her to come back sooner and take away her furlough so she said no and got demoted. but somehow she still gets some of the furlough? idk i have been taught that asking how much or discussing specifics of paychecks kind of thing is rude, growing up. she has been telling me they keep asking her to come back (now they’re asking her to be a supervisor since she declined the manager role) and she keeps saying no. i love her and want the best for her so i won’t say anything to anyone about the conversations me and her have had (i mean, apart from maybe my mum if i can remember, and you bc, let’s be real, you don’t know me and idk you) and she says they’re just difficult to work with as a management team. she even said our area manager isn’t impressed with our current assistant manager (who is currently the only person on an houred contract since our manager left) which shocked me since i personally think he is quite good considering he has a good relationship with the staff and kitchen (he’s thai so he can communicate with the kitchen better than most of the wait staff (some wait staff are thai but mostly not)) i think she doesn’t want to be the eldest person in management or she doesn’t want the age gap to be so big since she has a kid she can lecture at home, she doesn’t need to be looking after people at work, y’know?

also today, me and one of the girls were upstairs (two floors of the restaurant!) and it’s nearing 11pm and her brother (who also works there) comes up and asks us when we’re finishing (mostly her lol) but we had two tables just sitting talking amongst themselves so she just said idk. he was saying he wanted to go bc he’s tired etc n he’s driving n she was like it’s fine go home i’ll call an uber or something n he was refusing to leave her behind. (i feel like i brushed over the two tables sitting there but it must be noted they’re the only tables left in the entire restaurant and we were the only two wait staff still there, apart from her brother but he changed and was waiting downstairs). anyway, she was sweeping (i was cleaning the booth/sofa thingy chairs as it was a mundane task we could do to pass time and while she was sweeping by one of the tables thé boyfriend was whispering to his girlfriend saying ‘should we go?’ and the girlfriend said ‘why should i care?’ and the girl came over to tell me v quietly and i got so upset for her. bc she is literally the sweetest person on the earth and the only reason i didn’t go to ask the manager to see if i could go home with the lady who offers to take me (ex-duty manager lady!) was so she wasn’t alone up there. if i had been the one sweeping near that table i would’ve snapped so fucking hard at them. i mean, we’re 18 and have lives and sleep schedules, and we’re working until 11pm on a thursday before we even get home?? like i wouldn’t have minded staying if they were reasonable tables but after the gf said that i was like ‘shall i go get our stuff from the staff room?’ so i could split as fast as possible. in the end the temporary acting manager came up and told us we could finish and she kicked the tables out ten minutes later. i told her what the table saïd and she thought that was mean and unnecessary too. i was also worried about my sleep tonight since i have my first vaccine tomorrow morning. that’s why i was more pressed about what time i left work today. oh well.

im sorry for talking so much about work! sometimes i don’t have someone to talk to about it (at home) bc of my weird hours and sometimes i don’t like re-explaining things to my mum if she doesn’t get it the first seven times. sometimes it’s just a little too draining as she doesn’t understand since she’s a lifer at her job. it’s easier to explain to my dad but then i get a whole lecture on something that i ultimately have no control over n id rather just bitch w the girls at work but the problem is WE’RE AT WORK!!!

also i booked for my first tattoo!! i’m excited. it’s for next week,, which was super quick considering i was expecting to have to wait soooo much longer. i’ve been telling people about it and that it’s happening but i haven’t had the pleasure of telling people exactly where i got the idea from. bar, my dear, you know wheein’s new album, redd? well, it comes with loads of things, including these stickers (one for each song) and the one from springtime was just so perfect and when i saw it my first thought was, this would be a perfect tattoo. and so i am having it tattooed on my body. a subtle nod to kpop whilst also having something meaningful on my body. i also have just decided i want a small, minimalistic (or one-line art) rose on my sternum, kind of in the valley of my breasts, bc my nan was a rose. i like having her close to me. i recently got her necklace fixed which has left me feeling so incomplete after it broke in august last year. it’s been almost ten years and i think i’m long overdue something to remind me of her. i fiddle with my necklace when i’m nervous which is why i love it so much but incase it breaks again (i pray it doesn’t but i have a long life ahead of me) i would like her close still.

gosh there’s never enough space in my head to remember what i want to tell you so i’ll stop here for now since i should sleep to be able to wake up in time for my first jab. i’m scared but it’s whatever i’ll do it i suppose,, eeek 😨

ilyl ~ 🌻

thank you so much for opening up to me about this, it means a lot to me :( i am so sorry you had to go through this and honestly,, i really resonate with you. i feel like when i talk about my emotions and my sadness (dont know if its okay to call it depression either but yea), my friend either always either makes me feel like my emotions arent valid or she tells me she doesnt know how to help, which is frankly, why i dont talk about my emotions to people irl anymore. i dont open up and it takes me a long long time to do so if i ever do, because i tend to feel insecure/not safe :D so really, thank you for telling me and i hope you are doing better. your emotions are valid and i am always here for you

HAHAHA i mean i dont have many friends so theres not many to stomp on:( but i mean,, i get passive aggressive when i feel forgotten/left out so you best believe i told my friend how im feeling, but like uhhh it didnt do much. i spent the whole weekend at work and i was free on friday but my friend decided to ditch me and yeah. i havent been out in like two weeks now and i mean i am an introvert so i dont mind that much but even i want to socialise sometimes

aah i mean every manager has their flaws, no one’s perfect. my manager keeps calling me to go to work even though i was literally there for 11 hours on saturday AND sunday which means i worked for 20 hours in two days. and i work 20 hours a week at max. and i already worked some hours before the weekend so i think i have like 30 hours now and she keeps calling??? dude i need a break too,,i am so exhausted and tired of this shit :dd

oh i totally get what the lady that drops you off sometimes told you. i would feel a little iffy if i heard it too, but like,,,judge by your own experiences!! if you feel like something is off, you can always leave,, so i wouldn’t be so stressed about it.

why are people so rude ??? dude,,you should care, because we are all human. everyone has their needs and their lives and i bet he wouldnt like it if he was the one in your place. why should you stay there longer just because he didnt want to leave?? that was so unnecessary. people are weird beings and i learnt that after working with them this weekend,,,like i litereally got screamed at because i couldnt accept cash in different currency. like,,what tf do you want me to do?? i dont have every single currency with me so i could give u the change ?? tf ??

ALSO ITS OKAY TALK ABOUT YOUR WORK HOWEVER MUCH YOU WANT !!!! i also feel like i dont have anyone to talk to about work bc my parents dont listen to me as much as they used to these days and my friend unsurprisingly just doesnt care bc she doesnt work,, and i dont wanna talk to my internet friends abt it as much bc i feel annoying so i am glad us two can talk about these things together !!!!

YOUR FIRST TATTOOOO WHOAAAH thats so cool. i love tattoos hihi dfkja idk if u already had the appointment but tell me how it went after !! i wasnt able to find the sticker on the internet but im sure it looks hella pretty. also i love how it reminds you both of kpop and your grandma, its wonderful <3 i really want to get a tattoo one day,, and i also want something meaningful (not that i am hating on people that tattoo themselves just for fun and have no meaning behind their tattoos i just have commitment issues so i want something long lasting). alSO my crush (yes i have a crush now ew) has a tattoo and it looks like satan lowkey,,but apparently its a japanese something (i forgot the word oopsies) and it means jealousy, bad past and wisdom ?? i was like BOY IF U DONT??? fjdkla he has blue hair btw i am very much whipped but he also doesnt know me and i am older than him so this is embarrassing

ALSO I HOPE YOURE FEELING WELL AFTER GETTING THE VACCINE !!!

ily <333

#💌ask #🌻 anon

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defschoice · 4 years ago

Text

The Foreigner Part 1

Characters Got7, Stray Kids and Reader/fictional character

Genre: adoption, kidnapping, family reunion,

Words: 3255

Summary: One day she gets kidnapped and taken to South Korea and when she wakes up she's in a big room that looks like a dance practice room which it also is and it's located at the company called JYP. She's been stuck there for a few hours over night when a bunch of boys comes in to practice and finds her when they start to speak to her they find out she doesn't speak Korean that well so they can't communicate with her in any way until they find out that she's very similar to one of the boys but still different in a way

Crystal's POV

It's was now Monday the 21th of July and I have now been in this room for 20 hours without any food or drinks or anything. I don't even know what kind of place this is or where in the world I am.

I was sitting thinking to myself about how I could get out or when there would maybe come some when I heard footsteps and voices. It sounded like a bunch of male voices which I'm not a fan of at all.

As I crawled down to the nearest corner of the room the door opened and it stormed in with boys and the light also got turned on which hurt my eyes at first.

When they saw me all their talk stopped and they just stood there and looked at me.

"Hey, little one. What are you doing here?" He said but I didn't understand a word of what he was saying.

"Aish! I don't think she understands what you're saying Mark" a tall man with a brown mullet said.

"Try and let Jackson or Jinyoung speak to her, maybe she understands them" the mullet man continued to say.

The others stepped away when a semi-tall man came over and sat down in my level as he started to speak a language I actually understand.

"Hey how are you?" He asked and I slowly started to losen up a bit because of how soft his voice is.

"I'm afraid" I said to him as he took his arms around me.

"Do you understand me if I speak English to you?" He asked as he took a piece of hair behind my ear

"A little bit" I said as he nodded his head.

He stood and walked over to other boys.

"So what did you talk about with her?" A very tall man asked him as he looked at me.

"Well seems to be that she doesn't really speak but she understands a little Korean" The boy with glasses said to all of them as they nodded their heads.

"So if we s say something to her she won't reply with words? The tall boy asked.

"Basically yes unless we learn her some Korean." The The boy in glasses said as he looked at me.

As I sat there in the corner another of them came up to me and he was kinda pretty for a man being.

As he came closer I became more closer to him I ran up to The boy in glasses and hugged him tight as he took me up in his arms.

"Maybe we should introduce ourselves so you know our names. Wouldn't that be a good idea?" He asked me as I nodded my head and hurried it in his neck.

"Well I'm Bambam and I speak Thai sometimes" he said as I nodded.

"Hi, I'm Jinyoung"

"Hi, I'm Yugyeom"

"Hi, I'm Jaebum"

"Hello, I'm Jackson"

"Yo, I'm Youngjae"

"Hey, I'm Mark"

They all said one by one.

As I was sat in Jinyoung's lap he looked at me.

"What's your name sweetie?" He asked looking at me.

"3276" I said showing him my arm with the numbers on.

Jinyoung looked worried at the other boys and then at me "Sweetie, don't you have a real name?" He said as I just looked up at him with big tears eyes.

I just nodded my head as a no.

Crystal's pov

The boys looked worried at me when I nodded my head as a no. I hate attention especially when it's all on me and nothing else. I could feel how my eyes started to tear up as I thought of everything that had happened and my parents so I just yelled out "mummy!" As I hide in Jinyoung and started crying softly.

"Awe sweetie, I'm right here okay? I'm gonna protect you" he said as I started to calm more down while the boys just awed.

Soon after I was carried over to a couch as they all were starring me which I didn't like as I mentioned earlier.

"We're gonna have to do some dance practice now, so you can just sit here and watch us, for the time being, is that okay?" Jinyoung asked as I nodded my head and they started dancing.

A few hours later

Darkness. That's all I can see. Not again. Did the boys kick me out or throw me back to the bad guys? Please don't! Not that place again.

There's nothing I can hear. It's all quiet. Suddenly footsteps are coming towards me, ripping the darkness away from me. Looking at it, I all this time had a back over my head. Where the hell am I?!

"Well hello, sleeping beauty. Did you have a nice nap?" The man in front of me asked. I just sat shocked to answer him. Big mistake. Next, I knew was pain on my cheek. Where're the nice boys when I need them?

"Answer me, you little brat!" He yelled at me. I jumped in fear, causing him to smirk. Pain from my side always made him happy. A sick kind of happiness. Remember only for eomma.

"Y-yes, s-sir" I answered in fear.

Smirking he walked over to the dark side of the room. What does he even want from me anyway? I have nothing. I'm only here for eomma so she doesn't get the pain and has to suffer more.

Turning all the lights on, he revealed a woman. Tied up, just like me. Please don't be eomma!

"You see, 3276 I know I have never been able to break you. Yet. Do you know who I found walking around in the streets yelling your name? Your very own mother" He said ripping the bag away from her head too. No! Not her! He already killed appa. Not eomma too!

"Eomma!!" I screamed with tears in my eyes. She locked eyes with me. Crying too.

"You see 3276. She is going to suffer too. All because of you. I hate to do this to you. Wait, no. I don't. I know this is the only way to break you from the inside." He craped ommas neck hard caursing her to gasp for air.

"If your omma didn't fall in love with your coward of an appa. We wouldn't be here" He started. Punching omma in the face. Leaving a bloody nose. "YOU COULD HAVE BEEN MY DAUGHTER!!" He screamed, making both omma and me jump in fear. "But no! She chose Nick, you asshole of an appa!" Yelling again he begin to beat her up. Being more and more violent. Until I screamed he would never be my appa. That was the last drop he needed. He pulled out a gun shooting omma multiple times all over her body.

"EOMMA!!" I screamed, looking in the eyes of Jinyoung. Crying my eyes out I jumped down from the couch and in his arms. Holding tight onto him.

Jinyoungs POV

I don't know how long we had been practising but suddenly I heard small cries coming from the couch. I stopped the music and made my way to her. Is she okay was the only thing I could think of. When I saw her I immediately yelled the boys over. How the hell do we wake her? We started to yell her name. Nothing. Shaking her she sat up bright and screamed omma. We locked eyes and she soon was in my arms. Holding onto me like I was going to dissapair in front of her. I hold her tight. Calming her down. What did she go through to have this bad of a nightmare?

Jinyoung's POV

I looked up at the other boys as they all looked worried about what just happened. I hugged her tight as I could feel how she was crying and shaking.

"Guys I think we should end practice for today and just get home" I said with a sad and serious look on my face.

As we were walking down the hallways of the jyp building, Stray Kids came walking towards us.

"Are you guys done with practice?" Chan asked us.

"Yes we are, you can use it now if you want to" Jaebeom replied looking quick over at the girl and back to Chan again.

"Great thanks, mates" Chan said as he did the bro hug with Jaebeom.

Right before he left to be with the rest of SKZ he looked at me with a questioning look on his face.

"Who's that little princess?" He said as he lightly giggled at bit.

"I'll explain it you later bro" Bam said as Chan just nodded his head and went into to practice with the others.

A few hours later

Jaebeom's POV

As we arrived at our dorm, we all went over to the couch and sit with Jinyoung and the girl.

"How about you tell us a bit about yourself?" Mark asked with his soft voice. She slowly nodded her head as she was clinging on to Jinyoung after from what happened.

"I'm 10, idk my name, I have no family and I like music" She said with a cute little voice.

"We are your family now if you want to live with us?" Youngjae said as he smiled at her. She nodded her head and slowly got up from Jinyoung's chest and now just sat on his lap.

"What of kind of artist do you listen to?" Jackson asked her calmly.

"I really like listening to NCT, I think they have a really cool style in music" She said as she suddenly lighted more up in her mood and became more relaxed around us.

"Nice, do you have a favourite in the group?" I asked her whilst smiling at her.

"Yes, I really like Taeyong he's so cool and especially with his rapping" She said as she got all excited about it.

"How cute!" Yugyeom said as he laughed a little bit.

As we all started to clean up around the house, she came up to me and looked at me.

"Jaebeom oppa, when can I get a name like you guys?" I looked down at her big brown eyes who shined like diamonds and crystals as i lifted her up on the kitchen table to sit.

"What do you want to be called?" I asked her as she shrug her shoulders "I don't know, can't you choose something?" She asked looking tired.

"Sure I can. What do you say about we call you Crystal?" I asked where and her eyes lit up like stars in the night sky.

"I love it Jaebeom oppa, thank you!" She said as she hugged me quick and let go again.

"Where's Jinyoung?" She asked suddenly going back to being terrified as she grabbed on to my hand tight.

"I think he's in his room, come here let's go into him" I said to her as I lifted her up in my arms and placed her on my hips as she immediately gripped tight onto me like something was gonna happen.

"It's okay I'm right here, nothing is going to happen to you" I said trying to calm her down as we reacted Jinyoung's room.

"Jinyoung, there's someone here who wants you" I said when Jinyoung came up to take a tired and scared Crystal in his arms.

Jinyoung's POV

After Jabeom left I placed her on my bed and started to change into my pyjamas.

"Jaebeom has given me the name Crystal" She said shy.

I looked at her in awe.

"How nice, do you want him to be your dad?" I asked as she slowly nodded her head while she quick said "Pls don't hurt me for choosing him" I sat down beside her when she flinched a but.

"Crystal, look at me. I'm not going too hurt you, I would never do that. It's great that you find trust in him. I'm the mum of this group anyway, so you don't need to worry and if anyone ever hurts you, then we will take care of it" I said as she hugged me tight and stared crying as I tried to calm her down till we eventually fell asleep both us.

Next day...

Jinyoung's POV

I looked around in my room as I realised what happened yesterday and found a sleeping Crystal in my arms. I sat up and let her sleep as I went out in the kitchen and started cooking breakfast for the boys.

Soon the the kitchen was filled boys who clearly where hungry for the food.

"Hyung, this smells delicious!" Yugyeom said as he sat down at the table together with Bambam and followed by the rest of the boys except from Jaebeom who hasn't come out yet.

"Hey Jackson have you seen JB?" I asked looking at him as he just shrugged his shoulders a bit.

"Last time I saw him he went into your room to check on Crystal I think" He said as he filled his mouth with Rice.

Sooner than later JB came out in the kitchen with Crystal half asleep in his arms as he sat down at the table.

"Hey princess, did you sleep well?" I asked as I walked over to her taking her up in my arms so JB could eat.

She just nodded her head as she rubbed her eyes "Mmmm" she just said yawning a little bit while she rested her head on my shoulder.

"Hey Youngjae, could you and the other boys watch her for me and JB as we have some stuff we need to do" I asked winking at JB as he choked a bit on his rice.

"Sure Hyung, We can take her to the park. What do you say to that Crystal?" He asked as she just nodded her head slowly.

This is going to be interesting as she doesn't really speak to other than me and JB, but I can feel that she will connect fast with Youngjae.

Youngjae's POV

Me and boys decided to take Crystal to the park so we or she wouldn't disturbe JB and Jinyoung hyung.

"Crystal, don't want to go play with some of the other kids at the playground?" I asked her as she just nodded her head as a no.

Until Jackson got up and said "Come princess, I'll go with you" He said clearly more excited about this than Crystal but she agreed with going along with him in the end.

Before they left Mark yelled to Jackson "Yo Jackson you better not loose her, okay? Keep an eye on her and stay close to her" Jackson just nodded his head not really carrying about what Mark said I think.

Jackson's POV

As we walked to the playground I looked down at Crystal as she looked up at me.

"So what do you want to do?" I asked her as she pointed to the swings and we went over there. As we got closer and I started swinging her I noticed a really pretty girl like omg she is breathtaking. I looked at Crystal as I said.

"Sweetie, uncle need to go for a short time. I'll be back again soon I promise but you need to stay here okay?" I said as she nodded her head and continued to swing by herself.

15 minutes later...

As I went back to the swings where I left Crystal she was gone... shit the boys are going to kill me when they find out. I started looking for by slowly calling her name so the boys wouldn't notice that i literally just lost her until Mark came over and tapped my shoulder as i flinched a bit of nervousness.

"Hey Jackson, how's it going?" He asked smiling but I knew that smile and it wasn't a good one it was the I know you did something wrong but I'm trying to kill you right now smile.

"It's going great hyung don't worry" I said trying to play it a bit cool.

"Great then where is she?" He asked putting his arm on my shoulder.

"We're playing hide and seek so I can't tell you" I said trying to come up with a lie hoping he wouldn't find out the truth.

"Why don't you just tell me that you lost her instead of this?" He said looking straight at me.

"Fine... I got distracted and when I came back she was gone. I'm sorry" I said looking down at the ground.

"I'm disappointed in you cuz you didn't listen to me as I said but let's find her before it gets dark, wait here and I'll tell the other boys.

Crystal's POV

As I sat on the swing waiting for uncle Jackson to come back I saw a butterfly, it was so beautiful so I had to follow it not watching where I was walking or in which direction when suddenly i was lost and couldn't find back to where uncle Jackson and the others where.

I got really scared as I'm not used to be myself in a place i don't really know. I tripped over something and started to get an anxiety attack as to boys was walking up to me which made me even more scared.

Felix's POV

As me and Han were walking a little late night walk along Han River we saw a little girl who was sitting on the grass crying so we walked up to her but she started to flinch and get even more scared.

"Hey calm down we're not trying to hurt you, we just want to help you" I said as she looked up at us for the first time.

I took her up on my lap as we sat on a bench when Han whispered to me "Yo Felix doesn't she look a bit like Changbin?"

I looked at her once again and saw it a little bit but not much.

"What's your name?" I asked her while trying not to sound too scary with my deep voice.

"C-Crystal" she said sounding very shy and scared.

I looked at her trying to calm her down.

"Nice. My name is Felix and that is my friend Han Jisung" I said as she bowed shortly at him and he bowed back.

"What are you doing out here alone? Where's your parents?" I asked her as she became even more silent.

"I was with uncle Jackson at the swings and then I got distracted by something and got lost" she said as something hit me when she said Jackson

"Jackson as in Jackson Wang from GOT7?" I asked her as she just shrugged her shoulders.

"I just want JB appa and Jinyoung eomma" she said as she started crying into my chest.

"We know your appa and eomma" I said to her as she lifted her head once again.

"You do?" She said sniffling.

"Yeah they're in the same company as us, we talk to them a lot" I said as she calmed a lot more than she's ever been this whole time.

"Let's take you with us back to our dorm as it's getting late, okay?" I said as she nodded her head yawning a bit as I lifted her up and we started walking towards the dorm.

We sooner than later arrived at the dorm and as soon as we went in Changbin widened his eyes as soon as he saw her.

"Yoona???" Changbin said shocked...

#Spotify #got7 #jackson wang #jaebeom #jinyoung #youngjae #jaebeom fluff #stray kids #changbin #bang chan #hyunjin #jeongin

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theonlinemuse · 5 years ago

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So @lesbianmaxevans and I have been discussing how there’s very little backstory for Dani Powell on the show and we decided to contribute to the tags by coming up with our own headcanons for her:

Dani is a nickname obviously, but instead of Danielle or Danika, it’s short for Danys, a unisex Haitian Creole name. She only gets called Danys if she’s in trouble

Malcolm giggles whenever that happens and Dani threatens to put her cold hands on him if he tries calling her that

Malcolm learned her middle name the same day he met her middle sister, New York County Court Judge Naomie Powell, who barged into the precinct after an incident where Dani got hurt and went, “Danys Eliana Powell, if you’re going to give our family a heart attack, at least pick up your phone!”

Her dad is Haitian (I still say that episode 5 should’ve delved into this with Dani and her backstory) and her mom is Jewish. Dani and her sisters were all raised Jewish

Dani doesn’t regularly go the synagogue, but it’s tradition for the Powells to go to services during major holidays

Dani and JT explaining Jewish holidays to everyone

Powell wasn’t her dad’s original last name. Her dad and grandma came to New York from Port au Prince in the late 70s and their original last name was Poirot. Grandma Eliana kept the name, but her dad changed it to Powell when he started university

She’s the youngest of three girls in the family. Her oldest sister Mona is played by Meta Golding while middle sister Naomie is played by Sydney Tamiia Poitier

Naomie was the sister who suffered from night terrors after getting into a bad car accident as a teenager and Mona and Dani would often take turns looking after her. This is how Dani knew how to deal with Malcolm

Dani is bisexual. She and Edrisa went on a date before deciding to be friends and Edrisa likes to joke about them being exes much to Malcolm’s confusion

“When did you even break up?” “We didn’t, technically. We just went go karting and had lunch at Zabar’s before we realized Dani was wayyyy too much like an aloof little sister to me.”

And this is totally a crack headcanon, but after seeing Jurnee Smollett-Bell playing Black Canary in Birds of Prey, Dani and Dinah Lance are now cousins. Their moms, Zipporah and Dinah Senior were sisters

Dani and Dinah may be Jewish, but they don’t keep kosher all the time. They don’t eat pork, but they’re absolutely weak against shellfish, much to their moms’ dismay

Chaotic bi Dinah and distinguished bi Dani

Imagine Dani going undercover in Dinah’s band and them singing the Birds of Prey song from Batman: The Brave and the Bold

Dani can rock the punk rock aesthetic. Dinah makes her wear fishnet stockings, red lipstick, a corset over a dark lace shirt, and gold metallic temp tattoos. Malcolm has a heart attack

And then Dani starts singing and he’s a goner because he’s only ever hear her sing old songs from the 30s to 50s and there’s something powerful and sensual about her singing punk rock music. He’s not ready for it

JT teases the hell out of him, but he soon shuts up when Dani and Dinah bring Tally into the mix. Edrisa records the whole thing, as well as Malcolm and JT’s expressions. Gil ends up using it to keep Malcolm and JT from doing anything too outrageous

Grandma Eliana would sing old jazz and méringue songs to Dani and her sisters when they were little so Dani ended up with the habit of singing them absently whenever she’s focused on a task, usually when she’s doing her hair

Dani grew up listening to songs from the 30s, 40s, and 50s due to grandma Eliana always playing her extensive vinyl collection. She didn’t really get to listen to modern music until she was in middle school

In addition to jazz and swing, Dani’s surprisingly good at disco. It didn’t help that her dad often played Boney M and Earth Wind and Fire during her childhood

She used to joke that the Powell family is decades behind in their taste in music. Dani doesn’t listen to many modern songs, but she likes singing along to Yonce as well as Janelle Monae songs like Electric Lady and Sally Ride

Make Me Feel becomes Dani and Dinah’s bi anthem

Malcolm once caught her singing and he keeps trying to catch her again. He’s lucky to listen for five seconds before she kicks him out of the bathroom

Dani’s a bit of a tea expert thanks to grandma Eliana, who taught her many different ways of making tea. Other than Earl Grey, Dani’s favourites include grandma Eliana’s ginger tea and pomegranate tea

And I’m not just saying that last one because I saw tags about a Brightwell Hades and Persephone AU

She loves tea flavoured desserts as well. She often gets a glazed Earl Grey donut for breakfast on Monday mornings when she needs a little pick me up

She changes up the glaze depending on her mood. Lavender for when she’s stressed, balsamic and pomegranate for when she’s in a good mood, blueberry for when she’s irritated or stuck on a case, brown butter for when she’s tired, and caramel with blood orange zest for when she’s ready punch a dick

In the summer, she loves Thai iced tea popsicles and matcha green tea popsicles dipped in chocolate

Dani isn’t as big of a coffee drinker as she is a tea drinker, but if she has to have coffee, it’s always a cinnamon mocha with a shot of espresso

She can cook, but because of her schedule, she mostly sticks with quick to make dishes like grilled cheese and spaghetti. She likes spicing things up though, thanks to growing up with her dad and grandma’s cooking

Every Hanukkah, Dani always gets roped into preparing the desserts with Zipporah since her dad, grandma, and oldest sister are in charge of cooking. Dani’s the first to admit that she’s not a cook, but she’s gotten good at making sweets, even if she doesn’t always have the patience for it. Eight nights a year is her limit

Malcolm as a foodie bemoans this and his trying to broaden her food choices slowly becomes a thing

The look of horror on his face when he sees her chow down on a double beef bacon mushroom burger, poutine, chocolate pecan pie and a strawberry milkshake in one sitting is priceless

And Dani loves seafood, especially shellfish which Malcolm can’t have because it gives him hives

Dani was a bit of a trouble maker in elementary school, but for good reason. She stuck gum in a classmate’s hair because she stole her favourite scratch and sniff stickers and lied about it. And she once kicked a football player where the sun don’t shine because he was being a dick to her

She dressed like Kimberly Hart from the Power Rangers movie in high school, though she did have a goth phase for about two weeks in freshman year. She was trying to channel Wednesday Addams. She was definitely a bit of a rebel style wise. Malcolm was most definitely a nerd

Ironically, Dani’s the one with poor eyesight. She only wears glasses if there’s no more contacts and they’re a chunky pair that’s similar to Edrisa’s glasses

Dani does have some secret nerdy traits, she knows how to code thanks to her sister Naomie going to coding camp for five consecutive summers

And like Kay, Dani has some artistic tendencies too. She grew up with outdoor art programs that encouraged her to paint

She’s fluent in French. She, her sisters, and their paternal cousins went to a bilingual language school thanks to grandma Eliana’s influence

Dani also did competitive figure skating as a kid. She actually made it to the Junior Grand Prix finals. She got silver

There’s recordings of her competition routines on YouTube somewhere and she actually goes undercover as a figure skater for a case. Gil acts as her coach because he actually used to skate as well

She also did some cross training in ballet as well since her godmother is a well known ballerina turned dance teacher. There are a lot of pics of Dani in her early teens of her in a leotard and tights with curls escaping her ballet bun

She has an old injury that often acts up when the weather is cold. She broke her leg pretty badly in high school due to an accident in gym class. She got knocked off the balance beam when they were doing gymnastics and had to be rushed to the hospital for surgery

She prefers horror and thrillers to action movies, but she likes period pieces too. Belle is a recent favourite of hers

Dani likes Star Trek because her dad is the biggest sci-fi nerd and it was a big part of her childhood. She also grew up as a fan of Eartha Kitt because of him after he made her watch 1960s Batman reruns with him

As a result, she wanted to name her first kid after Eartha. She eventually nicknames her first daughter Kit because of this

Dani actually introduced Tally to JT. They were roommates in college (Dani majored in social work while Tally studied chemistry) and they went to the same synagogue

Tally designated Dani as godmother after she and JT had twin girls. She was the sandeket at Noa and Miri’s simchat bat

She practices Krav Maga, she and Dinah both learned it in high school, though Dani always says that Dinah had more of a natural talent for it

Dinah also did kickboxing and gymnastics and Dani ended up tagging along her lessons. She doubled as a coach and sparring partner

She and her sisters dressed up as magical girls for Halloween when they were little and the new Charm reboot is like reliving their childhood

She wraps her hair for sleep with funny and colourful scarves that Naomie always gives as gag gifts, a tradition that started when they were preteens

She’s dyslexic, but she wasn’t diagnosed until middle school. She had difficulty memorizing things so she got into a habit of carrying a recorder with her. She also has her phone and computer set to dyslexia friendly fonts and listens to a lot of audio books

It’s also the reason she sometimes makes mistakes when she’s dancing. She sometimes mixes up left and right

She also had trouble learning French at first because of this

Dani can hold her liquor, but after four drinks, she becomes a giggly drunk who randomly speaks French and sings 90s rock songs

She also suddenly gains a sweet tooth when sober Dani doesn’t usually go for sweets. Luckily Malcolm has a few lollipops stashed away for when this happens

Dani did a brief modelling stint back in college to help out her cousin, who was in fashion school at the time. She mostly modelled for women’s wear and book covers. She even posed for a couple of historical romance covers

Malcolm may have accidentally come across it thanks to his mom. Jessica might have been a little smug when she told him to fetch the book from where she left it. The look on his face was priceless

Dani ends up recreating a cover for a case. Edrisa makes Malcolm pose with her. She takes so many pictures

Given that Malcolm has Sunshine, it’s ironic that Dani owns a cat. It’s a mischievous black cat named Shuri and she loves climbing things, especially Malcolm

#Prodigal Son #Dani Powell

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allthingsmachinegunkelly · 6 years ago

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Imagine #7

You've been sleeping for about an hour. Kells comes through the door quietly and flicks on a lamp. He sees you laying on your stomach with your arms and legs sprawled out. The blanket he put on you, you must've kicked off. The shirt he gave you to wear has risen over your bum, exposing most of your ass cheeks. He walks towards you, wiping his lips with his fingers, almost drooling. He grabs a joint and lighter off the dresser and lights it up. He leans against it as he smokes, watching you sleep. Once he finishes the joint he makes his way to the bed. He changed out of his wet clothes after jumping into the pool. He's wearing baggy joggers and a hoodie now. He pulls the hoodie over his head and tosses it onto the floor. He sits on the bed next to you and places his hand on your back.

You must have been sleeping lightly despite all the alcohol, and you wake up to his touch. Your eyes flutter open. When you see him you smile. "What are you doing?" You ask quietly as he starts rubbing your back.

"How you feeling?"

"I'm still drunk," you say as you feel your head start to spin a little bit.

"Yeah? How's your hand?" He asks as lifts his hand from your back to grab your wrist.

"I'm fine." You insist as you push yourself up and roll onto your side towards him. You barely notice that your shirt's not covering your lower half anymore but your legs are together so they're hiding what's between your legs, but Kells has noticed. He leans over you to grab the blanket and pulls it over your waist. You look down your body, just as he pulls it over you to see how exposed you are. "What?" He looks at you.

"You need to sleep and sober up." He answers as he stands up.

You grab his wrist, "wait," you whine, "come here" you whisper quietly as you kick the blanket off, move up to your knees and stand up on the bed. You realize you're still a bit wobbly. He's so tall that you're eye level with him now. You grab both of his arms and place them around you. You wrap your arms around his neck and put your face into the crook of it. You start sucking and biting at his skin. "Mmm you're so fucking sexy, you know that?" You whisper in his ear.

He slides his hands down your back and up your shirt, grabbing and squeezing your bare ass. With a low breathy voice, "you're sexier," tickles your ear as he starts kissing your neck.

"Fuck me." You lightly moan into his ear.

"What?"

"Please fuck me. I want you." You plead as your hands make their way to the front of his breifs.

He pulls his hips away from you before you can reach your hand inside to feel him. "How bad?" He starts squeezing your ass harder.

"So bad daddy. Please." You whimper.

He lifts your legs up quickly and you wrap them around his waist. He kisses you hard, shoving his tongue inside to explore your mouth. He spins around and pushes your back against the wall next to the bed, forcing a small moan out of your mouth. He pulls your shirt over your head, making your hair messy, and throws it down. He begins sucking on your breast.

He pulls you off the wall and carries you to his dresser where he sets you down and pulls his joggers and briefs down. He pulls you to the end of the dresser and positions himself at your entrance. He rubs his dick along your wet folds.

"Ugh don't tease me," you whine as your legs squeeze his waist. "I need you inside me."

He starts flicking your clit with his boner. "What do you say?" He whispers.

"Please, baby please."

He quickly shoves himself inside you. You moan loudly. He thrusts into you as he lets out a groan. The dresser shakes and bangs against the wall as he pushes himself in and out of you. He grabs your ass and pulls you off the dresser, still inside you. He carries you over to the bed and sits down, swinging your legs behind him so that you are on your knees straddling him. You adjust yourself and start moving your hips back and forth while holding onto his neck. Your moans become louder and louder. His face is buried in your chest as you can hear him breathing heavy. Your head is still spinning but you grind faster, hitting your g-spot. He's so deep inside you.

"Ughh I love your dick inside me," you whimper.

Suddenly he flips you onto your back and starts thrusting into you on top. He reaches his hand down and starts rubbing your clit. You grab the sheets underneath you, as he makes you close. Your moaning becomes higher and you start to squirm.

"You like that baby?" He asks as he looks down on you.

"I'm close." You say between moans. He keeps thrusting and rubbing you. He has his other hand on your breast, squeezing it. Intense euphoria overcomes you as your toes curl and your legs start shaking. Your walls clench around him as you let out one last moan. Just as you do, Kells let's out a moan of release as he collapses onto you.

He lifts himself off and out of you as he rolls over onto his back next to you. He's breathing heavy.

"Babe,", he says as he turns his head to look at you.

You turn your head towards him. "What?"

"You're addictive." He says still breathing heavy.

You laugh, "Me? How?"

"Your pussy is so good." He says as he gets up.

You shake your head and say nothing, with a smile on your face.

-------------------------------------

"Ughhh," you groan as you roll out of Kells' bed. Tequila always gives you a massive hangover. You see that he's not there. You walk out of his room and just as you're about to make your way downstairs you see that Kells is standing in the kitchen with the guys. "Fuck," you whisper to yourself. You quickly rememeber that it's probably best that the guys don't figure out that you two are a thing. If you go downstairs, in his shirt especially, they will know. You freeze up not knowing what to do.

"You hungry?" You hear Kells yell. He must be proud of what he did last night. Why would he call up to you unless he doesn't care anymore thay they know?

You peek over the balcony down at them. "Umm I kind of don't have pants." You bury your face in your hands.

"I put your dress in the dryer last night, hold on."

"You put it in the dryer? Do you know how expensive that was?"

You see Kells at the bottom of the stairs, " do you want it or not?" He throws it up to you and you catch it.

You go back into his room, change it into your dress, and wipe your smudged makeup off with a washcloth. You tie your hair up into a messy bun and make your way downstairs. The guys look at you and you watch them all look at each other, not one says a word to each other.

After some awkward silence, "I'd ask you how your night was but it sounded pretty good to me." Slim says as he laughs. The guys laugh with him.

You can feel your face get red as you rub your temples. "Oh my God."

"Yeah loud and clear," Dub laughs.

You're horrified. "So do you guys not feel weird about this.. or are like.. against it?" You ask hesitantly.

"Nah," Slim shrugs his shoulders, " I mean, we all just want you two to be happy, and if that means y'all are together, then we good."

"And if anything, ya know, bad happens between y'all, we'll just cross that bridge when we get to it." Dub adds.

"There's not really much we can do anyway," Rook laughs, "we saw it coming." Kells knocks Rook in the chest with the back of his hand.

"What do you mean?" You ask curiously.

"Bruh, he told us you were hot as fuck the day we met you." Dub chuckles.

"Yeah plus he been asking us for a couple months now if we ever thought about getting with you." Slim adds.

You look at Kells and for probably the first time ever, he looks embarrassed. You smile, "Oh my gosh, Kells, you've had a little crush on me?" You see his face turn red as he looks down and crosses his arms. "I had a crush on you years before I met you, I obviously just didn't expect for anything to happen so I kept our relationship professional." He still says nothing. "It's cute Kells, don't be so embarrassed." You insist. You turn to the guys who are all sitting at the island bar. "So did any of you guys think about getting with me?" They all look at each other and giggle. "I wanna know", you plead.

"Baze thought you were pretty cute." Rook says with a big smile.

"What the fuck ever, that was you." Baze laughs in return to Rook.

Kells walks towards you and grabs you by the waist, "too late for that now", he says as he pushes his lips into yours. You're smiling, a little embarrassed, but kiss him through your smile, pressing your lips against his. The guys start hooting at you two, being immature as usual. You pull your lips from his to see that his face is still a little red, which is so unlike his usual cocky self.

----------------------------------------------

The guys have all left so it's just you and Kells. You're both sitting on the couch. His feet are propped up on the coffee table and you're leaning on the armrest next to him with your feet up beside you. You're watching t.v.

"What the fuck happened last night?" You ask him as you try to remember.

"Uhh, you got into a fight with a guy but you fucked his eye up and-"

"I remember that... How could I not?" You say as you look at your scabbed over knuckles.

"You uh, got pretty drunk, you were like falling all over the place and you called me daddy while we were fucking."

"No I did not!" You look at him smiling almost asking if you had. "Did I really?"

He laughs, "yeah, but I liked it."

You just laugh to yourself. "Oh yeah," you remember as you turn to him more, "you called me your girl in front of everyone. Or was that just in my head?"

"No I did," he doesn't look at you.

"Did you not mean to?" You ask as you sense a vibe change.

"I did. I don't care if people know about us," putting emphasis on the I. "But we haven't put a title on it yet, I don't want to cause I want to take things slow, but I get the feeling you don't want it out yet."

You bite your lip, unsure of what to say. "My thing is that I'm usually backstage and behind the scenes so being in the media is new for me. And... I don't really want to go through being in the media and have this just end up to be nothing. So I wanna take it slowly too and avoid this getting out for a while."

"Yeah I agree."

"Like we're not even official or anything so I don't want the media getting ahold of it and putting out there that we're getting married or that like we were an affair you had while you were with Halsey, cause shit gets so twisted nowadays." You didn't mean to bring up Halsey. Fuck. You just hope he agrees.

"You're right, we should just keep it low-key. I'll tell the guys not to say anything. For right now though, I'm happy which is something I didn't think I'd be again."

You smile at him, "I'm happy too...daddy," you insert sarcastically.

He smiles, "fuck, don't do that to me."

You look at him, "soo," he turns to look at you, "talking to the guys earlier made me realize that all we do is have sex." You crack a small smile. "Like we've had one night where we talked each other's heads off otherwise we've had sex everytime we see each other," you explain.

"What's wrong with that?"

"I mean, as good as it is, I don't want that to be everything, ya know?" He says nothing. "So I was just thinking that maybe we could go a while without it and see if we still feel the same."

"Okay," he says reluctantly. "How long?"

"I don't know, we could start with like a week."

"A week?" He asks surprised.

"Yeah I'm sure you haven't gone that long for a while, being who you are, but we've gotta do it. Plus it's better the longer you wait," you tease.

"For you, fine."

You smile and hold your hand out, "deal?"

He shakes it. "Deal." You lean in and kiss him on the cheek. "Hey but can we just have a quickie please I-"

"Noo!" You exclaim with a smile, "The deal starts now."

"Please," he says as he picks his body up and starts climbing on top of you.

You scoot your way out from under him and stand up. "Noo. And no teasing either."

"What if I can't go that long?"

"Then... Um." You think for a few seconds and smile when you come up with an idea. "You love to buy new clothes yeah? Well if you can't keep your hands off of me for a week, then we get to go shopping except you can't buy one thing for yourself.. but you have to buy me everything I want... and I'm expensive." You joke.

"Are you serious? Noo," he whines. "Come on something else."

"You don't like it?"

"No!" He shouts.

"Good, then it's perfect." You smile as you walk to the kitchen.

"Wait what if you slip up?" He asks. "I am Machine Gun Kelly." He teases through his smile as he gets up to follow you.

"You tell me."

"If you fuck up, I get to fuck you wherever and whenever I want to... For a week."

"You think that's a punishment?" You joke.

"Baby I'll fuck you on a plane, in an elevator, or on the kitchen fuckin table," he smiles. "We definitely getting public indencentcy, you better count on that." He chuckles.

"The hell we are. I will not be the one to give in." You slap your hand down onto the counter.

"Mhm, we'll see."

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nezzfiction · 6 years ago

Text

ENMY Chapter 86 - Learning Curve

Chapter Synopsis: With the threat of a Grimm army looming on the edges of Vacuo, the Kingdom faces even more adversity with Salem’s personal arrival to see the war’s end. Meanwhile, Team ENMY must develop the skills they need to combat the Witch the only way they know how. Trial by Fire.

Series Synopsis: Team RWBY is disbanded, and Yang must find herself new allies. For her, that might very well be yesterday’s enemies. Joining up with the likes of Emerald, Mercury, and Neo, the four will comprise Team Enemy(ENMY).

Links to read the series: Ao3 or FF.net

Or hit the jump below

Learning Curve

Proper teaching is recognized with ease.

You can know it without fail,

Because it awakens within you that sensation,

Which tells you this is something you have always known.

“I know I have a rep for being my team’s punching bag,” Mercury started, “but this end of the deal feels rawer than usual.”

“Heh heh, feeling intimidated, boy?”

“That’s an understatement.”

Temujin regarded the young man with a keen eye.

The two were alone, in the middle of the desert. The soft lapping of Vacuo’s beach cascaded just a mile to the east. Nothing but gold sands and hot winds around to keep them company.

“Why me?”

“Reasons,” Temujin shrugged. “Mostly due to the similarities of our style.”

“Yeah, I don’t see it.”

“Enough talk! You must learn with your body!”

“Wait, what?! Is that all the—”

Before Mercury could raise anymore protests, he felt the atmosphere around him collapse. The space he inhabited started to close on him. He couldn’t even fill the air in his lungs, as he inhaled desperately.

“Finished already? True to rumors, you are very quick,” Temujin frowned. “—at dying.”

Mercury instinctively activated his Semblance.

The winds collected at his heels, and then expelled his immediate proximity. But he could feel Temujin’s enclosure pressing in once more. With no other option, he propelled himself back through the air, out of his opponent’s territory.

“Running away, are we?”

“CRAZY OLD BAT!”

“I’m afraid you won’t get very far.”

Temujin dug her cane into the ground, and slashed it upwards. What started as a small whisk of the sand, became a miniature sandstorm in the from of a blade. Mercury could only kick a wave of compressed air to match.

The two forces collided. Equal was their strength, but when the resulting impact settled, Temujin reappeared at a closer range.

She used it as cover to close the distance?!

“Much to learn…” the elder shook her head.

Mercury noticed sand clogging the turbines in his prosthetic. The jets of his legs sputtered, before shutting down. Though, he landed on his feet, he was well within Temujin’s zone of influence once more.

“You brats really lack some formal training, but that’s alright.”

The young man felt the sun beat down harder than he had ever felt it. It was like he was being roast alive. The sand underneath him mimicked the sting and burn of a million fire ants.

“We were all practically self-taught as well. That alone, might be the reason we are most suited to teaching you brats.”

“S-top…!”

“Don’t you worry. Myself and the others will cram a whole lifetime’s worth of experience into your little bodies.”

“I can’t…breathe…!” he rasped dryly.

“We can’t afford to waste any time. So, we’ll go with the method your team is so very adept at,” Temujin commentated with a wicked grin.

Mercury’s conscience was now fading. He was clearly dying.

“I might be going too far, but it should be alright. Even if you experience some memory loss, the body always remembers!” the old woman said, like it was someone else’s problem.

“Trial by fire really is the best way.”

X X X X X

“This is a joke, right?” Emerald asked.

“Do I appear to be in a joking mood?” Minerva Calico returned the question.

The two stood within a landscape that was ever-changing. Their environment was continuously built, and then demolished with rapid course. Time and space obscured beyond recognition. Reality and imagination intertwined.

It was the Never Realm.

“You know, Temujin’s plan to get rid of the Cuckoos is insane,” Emerald said.

“Quite so.”

“Even if we could possibly pull off what she’s suggesting, don’t you think this is the wrong way to go about it?”

“Possibly.”

Emerald threw the Headmaster a narrow look.

“But you’re going through with it, anyway.”

“Temujin’s judgment has rarely proven wrong. If she believes you are capable, then so shall I.”

“That trick with the hallucinated dream was something I developed over a year! It’s a bit more than just a leap going from that, to what she needs for Operation Gun Dog!”

“Then, we shall endeavor to make several leaps over the next few days. The foundation is already there, dear. We need only build on it.”

The mint-haired girl could only stare back slack-jawed.

“I thought you were the level-headed one in Vacuo! How come you’re buying into this plan?”

“Hm. It is my experience, some of the most troublesome students exhibit the most potential.”

“I don’t think anybody has as much potential as what you guys need.”

“Maybe, so. But If anyone is capable of attaining such an impossible standard in a short amount of time, it will be you four.”

For the first time Emerald could see, a fleeting expression of cat-like mischief traced the Headmaster’s expression.

“There are no greater troublemakers than Team ENMY, after all.”

“……Ah, fuck.”

With one wave of her wand, Minerva caused their whole reality to slant ninety-degrees. The sudden change in incline practically threw Emerald off into freefall.

Emerald stretched her mind out into the Never Realm. Trying to right herself physically would only backfire. What used to be the floor, was now a full-on avalanche. She needed to rewrite reality like she did hallucinated dreams. In this world, they were similar concepts.

But the sensation of freefall just wouldn’t go away. If she corrected the angle, she might die from the impact, or buried under all the debris.

Think fast, think fast, think-fast, thinkfast, thinkfastthinkfast!!!

She braced her body and crossed her legs. Emerald conjured her reality with desperate haste. A moment later, her body jack-knifed into the water below.

Once buoyancy negated her fall, Emerald made her way towards the surface. She avoided the giant, sinking boulders that followed her. For a brief moment, she enjoyed the feeling of cool water against her skin. But that relief ended instantly at seeing Minerva standing on the ocean’s surface—or more accurately, the ocean’s surface frozen over.

“You can do better.”

Emerald felt the underwater prison seize her, as she became trapped in ice as well.

The gap in skill was too much. Their masteries over the Never Realm was apparent in the scales of their conjurations.

Just as Emerald was panicking to come up with a new counter to the threat, Minerva continued to brandish a teacher’s bemused smile.

“Remember, dear—”

“There is no spoon.”

X X X X X

Yang barely strafed away from the fist that threatened to cave her nose into her skull. Safety was a word that did not exist in front of her opponent. The next attack was coming before the previous one even ended.

Nai bound after her, his large hands wrapped the back of her neck in a Muay Thai plum clinch. Using his momentum, he pulled his lead knee into her stomach—then, another and another.

Yang felt her abdomen pummeled into soft meat. Not only that, but she could feel venom coursing through her skin. Nai’s Semblance was nastier than she expected.

She tried to break away, and for a brief moment, she succeeded. One of Nai’s hands freed from the clinch. But what followed was the fighter using the space to deliver an enclosed elbow-strike.

The downward slash made Yang see stars. A deep cut opened just above her right eyebrow, painting red into half her vision.

This isn’t a spar!

I need to use my Inheritance!

Yang’s Aura surged. The crystalline crown signifying her newfound power took form around her head. Fire rushed out from her Ember Celica, as she aimed for a close-range uppercut.

But Nai already read the move. He deeply inhaled a moment before, and with a great huff, exhaled a thick cloud of poisonous gas. Yang’s punch whiffed, and she rocketed out of the smog after.

*Cough! Cough!*

Yang hacked uncontrollably, before falling to her knees. The contents of her stomach emptied out onto the arena’s grounds. Whether it was due to the poison, or the repeated knee strikes to her gut, or both, she did not know.

Was he holding back before?

Yang turned her single clear eye to see Nai, waiting patiently not a foot from her. Her iris was dyed a slight pink. A faint signature of Neo’s Aura lingered there, granting her keener sight. But for all the good it did.

Their current fight was a far cry from when Nai attempted to capture her the other day.

He’s fighting to kill...

I can’t believe he’s forcing me to use the powers of a Maiden.

“Is that all the strength you can muster?” Nai’s voice rumbled down like rain.

“HELL NO!”

Yang pulled one foot under her, and kicked off with it. The blistering right hook missed, as Nai swung his body back. An immediate counter was incoming, when the Spring Maiden backpedaled out of the way.

The punch missed, but as the arm stopped short, the numerous chains wrapped around it gave way. The glove of metal links whipped about like barbed tentacles. Each lashed at Yang with the strength of countless limbs. The blue rings on Nai’s skin glowed with a fervor, lending his Venomous Semblance to his whips.

Yang assembled the shambled remains of her consciousness. She remembered her discipline. Her gauntlets went up, blocking the onslaught imparted on her. Once she was used to the rhythm and the feel, she started to parry the attacks one after another.

Finally, the rain of blows let up, and she took a much needed breather.

Damn it…

Damn it…!

DAMN IT!

Yang didn’t have to look to know. Nai was still standing just ahead of her. He stopped his attacks on purpose—watching, waiting, measuring.

She grit her teeth in frustration. At the corner of her eye, she watched the crackling veins in Nai’s body shift like broken glass. Her Semblance showed her the flaws and strengths of her opponent’s Life. But it meant nothing, if she couldn’t actually capitalize on it.

With all the miraculous feats Yang was capable of, none were compatible with dealing with the threat that was Nai’s simple strength. She could perform grand forces of nature that verged on being labeled catastrophes, powerful enough to level a city and countless Grimm. But the lone individual standing before her was a harsh awakening.

Nai didn’t allow her any space to breathe. The second she tried to muster any sort of defense or offense, the man was already crushing it. He truly outclassed her in three simple ways—mind, body, and technique.

Nai exemplified something she had been gradually straying away from. The warrior was the very personification of a weapon.

No.

A fighter.

Yang winced down at her own fists with a bitterness.

Right.

Before I’m a Maiden, I’m a fighter too.

She forced her glare ahead to her opponent. Yang felt unnecessary things shed away like deadweight. Her stray thoughts, her preconceptions, all of it would only hinder her. She needed to return to her basics, her origins as a fighter.

What the future held, whatever complicated situation she was in,

Nothing else but victory should be sought beyond her fists.

And the fire in her heart stoked once more.

“Come on!” Yang roared. “I’m not dead yet!”

She could have sworn she saw Nai’s lip curl ever so slightly.

“Very, well. I will grant you the mercy of warriors.”

Yang could already feel the venom eating away at her insides. In all honesty, Nai didn’t have to attack. He could simply wait for her to collapse on her own.

But the Fist of Vacuo hurdled towards her. At the same time, Yang braced her gauntlets under her chin, making her own dash towards the center of the ring.

…

There was only a single exchange.

He’s got a good straight-right.

Was all Yang could think of, before her body crumpled into the middle of the Gladiatorial Arena.

“Now, you will taste death,” Nai muttered to the corpse in front of him.

“And, you will rise again.”

X X X X X

In a humble training room, the tip of Raven’s katana dragged across its polished floor. A threatening ring played across the stone surface.

“Time to see those pearly whites.”

Neo obediently put two fingers on the inside edges of her lips, and pushed them into an exaggerated smile.

“…You know which ones I mean. Are you forgetting I saw it the first time we met on that train?”

“…?”

“You wanna keep playing dumb? I’ll kill you, brat.”

“…”

“Your swordplay needs a lot of work and you’re not using all the tools you have. After exchanging your Aura with Yang, that should have gotten stronger, too. It’s not as dormant as it was before, right?”

Neo’s empty grin turned into a bitter frown.

“Like I said, I know what I saw that day. There’s no way you would’ve lived through it, if you didn’t. So, I’ll say it again. Show it to me,” Raven commanded with a deadly tone.

Neo still made no moves to answer. She only continued to refuse meeting the swordswoman’s eyes uncomfortably.

“Fine, have it your way. I’ll pull it out of you, whether you’re willing or not.”

Raven coolly returned her sword to its sheath, while hovering her hand over the hilt. Her form dropped low into an Iaido-drawing stance. Her irises gleamed with the red of her Reaper’s Semblance.

Neo was getting ready to pull her own weapon, when Raven’s quick-draw cut just above her cheek. A move that could have easily severed her head, if the swordswoman didn’t purposely aim elsewhere.

The sound of Raven returning her blade to its scabbard resounded with a piercing clink.

“That was a warning, you won’t get a second. You’re making a mistake if you think this is a spar.”

Neo traced a trembling hand to the blood trickling down.

“Next one, I’m aiming to kill. Do your best now. I wouldn’t want to explain to my little girl, why her newly-wedded bride was too weak.”

Raven performed a flurry of blows that encompassed a range wider than the length of her blade. Neo parried what she could, but the sheer speed and accuracy of her opponent knocked her back with each step. She was blinking the color of her eyes, when Raven disappeared through a quickly-opened portal.

She’s right.

I have to use it.

Raven appeared just to Neo’s left, midway through another Iaido-draw. The swordswoman made a vicious, horizontal slash. The motion mimicked an artisan’s practiced pen stroke. Less than a figure of a sword, it became the imitation of a paintbrush.

Neo brought her parasol up in time to block it. In her irises, glinted a pale silver.

“About time you got serious. But what happened to the evasiveness you’re so specialized in?”

Neo could only glare back in frustration.

“Well, at least we’re finally taking steps in the right direction. I hope you’re ready, brat. I’m going to pound the training in you that took Summer years to learn.”

Without waiting another moment, Raven dashed at Neo again. While the petite girl tried to predict her opponent’s motions, something eerie played across her senses. Something abnormal-no, impossible unfolded before her enhanced vision.

Two arcs of Raven’s katana split the air. One cut downward, while the other tore in its opposite. Rather than consecutive strikes, it appeared that two afterimages of Raven diverged at once. The result being, Neo’s mirror clone being cut open by a narrow X.

“Your usual tricks have limits, Blake and Adam should have already shown you that.”

The petite girl was still blinking her eyes repeatedly in disbelief. Her brain worked desperately to figure exactly what was the feat she just witnessed.

“You’re wondering how I did that?” Raven lorded over the girl’s confusion with a deadly smile.

…You attacked twice at the same time.

Not fast.

At the same time.

How?

“You and Yang aren’t the only ones who’ve ever exchanged Auras, you know. I have my own gift from Summer.”

The Never Realm?

“Sorry, but there’s no point in explaining it. It’s better to just experience it yourself. Don’t worry, though. By the time I’m through with you, you should be able to do something similar.”

Raven sunk into her stance once more.

“Try not to die, before then.”

X X X X X

In the dense vegetation of the Grimm’s Black Oasis, Salem hummed a gentle tune to the sleeping creature above.

Connected between two great cliffs like a bridge, was a colossal cocoon. Its outer shell was crusted in the bone so closely associated with the Grimm, while the sinew holding it up was a viscous black. At the center of its mass, a dark-orange orb could be seen pulsating.

“Magic wand, make my monster grow~♪”

Salem let out a small laugh at the end.

“Just kidding.”

*Ahem* “Salem?”

The Witch turned around with a feigned smile of surprise.

“Bean. What can I do for you?”

Standing there with a slight uncomfortableness was Bean and his partner, Inna.

“Yes. Report update on army’s status. Everyone is ready. Continuing to maintain standby on your orders.”

“Good. I thank you for your exceptional work.”

“…”

Salem smiled pleasantly, while slightly titling her head.

“Is there something on your mind, Bean?”

“I…” he paused. “We wonder the reason why our host delays making another siege attempt on Vacuo. Are we awaiting the birth of that Grimm?”

The three looked to the massive cocoon hanging from the sky.

“No,” Salem answered. “She will awaken when the time is right. Have no worries, Bean. We will march on Vacuo very soon.”

“And what time will that be?”

The Witch gave a sharp stare at him from the side. It made the boy gulp under the pressure.

“Wish to know estimated time for our attack,” he resumed. “Optimum conditions, crucial—dictated by various war doctrines. Atlesian Fleet due to arrive. Attacking Vacuo before reinforcements arrive, ideal.”

“Ah,” Salem’s expression softened with understanding. “You make a very capable general. Rest assured, our attack will commence before Atlas has chance to interfere. As to the exact moment of our battle, I cannot say for sure.”

“…”

“Believe in the assignment entrusted to you. Command our forces when the time comes. That will be well enough. Leave it to me to set the stage of our victory.”

“…”

Bean continued to stare down at his feet sheepishly.

“Is there another matter that bears discussion?” Salem asked.

“We’re not used to bein’ kept outta the loop like this,” Inna answered for her partner. “We usually have at least a rough timeline to work with.”

“I see. I can certainly empathize with your dissatisfaction. But it is times like these one must, ‘keep one’s cards close to the chest’. Even if the chances are unlikely, I’d like to keep my intentions from being discovered as sure as possible. Where is Raven, by the way?”

“She’s…” Inna stopped herself.

“Oh, do not fret. I’m quite aware of her frequent visits home.”

Both Inna and Bean froze stiff.

“She is allowed to assist Temujin as much as she likes, but she cannot stand against me. There are strict stipulations of such regarded in our contract.”

More silence pervaded the other two, which caused Salem to relent just a little.

“Oh, to be young and restless. For you children, I know the initiative is something to be seized and acted upon at first sign. To make the first move is to assure certain victory.” The Witch chuckled lightly. “Believe me, I have seized the first move since before any of you were born. This is planned patience, not idle waiting, my children. There is a purpose in all of it, predetermined ahead of time.”

“So… you are aware of Vacuo’s next course of action?”

“Oh, yes. In one form or another. Either they will continue to minimize the amount the Cuckoos sap away at their strength, or drastic measures will be taken.”

“And, then?”

“We shall commence our siege,” Salem answered simply. “Regardless of what Vacuo intends to do—”

“Heads, I win. Tails, they lose.”

X X X X X

“…”

“Are we dead?” Yang asked, breaking the silence between her teammates.

“The last thing I remember is Temujin killing me for the eightieth time,” Mercury shrugged. “Dying and getting resuscitated so many times—maybe, I’m finally experiencing permanent brain damage.”

“More or less the same on my end. Without the Maiden’s inheritance, I would’ve been pushing daises after my second round with Nai.”

As the two conversed in their dreamlike state, Emerald stayed silent. Her attention was taken away by their immediate surroundings.

They stood on the massive roots of what appeared to be an enormous tree. Its girth was too large to fathom, but at the same time, they were granted a certain insight. The Never Realm broadened their senses to an unnatural degree, and even gave them hints to where they currently resided.

“So, this is the Tree of Balance,” Emerald muttered, while touching the tree’s trunk.

She could feel the opposite elements at war. A violent flux of light and dark transmuted from the surface to her touch. It stirred something within her.

The girl then, remembered a distinct part of Temujin’s memories.

My body and soul sunk into the deepest depths. I don’t know what it was, but I swear, to this day—I grasped something at the core of our world. Some form of enlightenment, perhaps?

Emerald had to rip her hand away in order to stop herself from getting caught in the Tree’s grasp. It was only then, she noticed little roots and branches twined around her body. They only receded when she mentally rejected their embrace.

Did they all experience this?

Emerald’s thoughts went to Nai, Minerva, Raven, and finally, Temujin.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the old lady made her Khans go through the same thing she did.

“This is totally a dream, right?” Yang asked the question that was on all their minds. “We won’t remember, when we wake up?”

“I’m getting a headache,” Mercury added.

“It probably has something to do with Vacuo.”

“What, like this place isn’t harsh enough, it’s the place where dreams are shitty, too?”

“I mean, think about it. Besides the mines in Atlas, Vacuo has the highest concentration of Dust and Bane in all of Remnant. And let’s not forget the Grimm are practically a different breed here.”

“…I get it,” Emerald muttered. “This place is probably really close to both the Never Realm and the Tree of Balance. But, why would—” she paused at a realization, and touched the base of the trunk again.

Memories flowed into her, ancient stories of times long forgotten. Enormous creatures waging endless battle against Fairies. And then, a meteor shower that laid waste to both armies.

“Fragments of the moon are embedded here. Vacuo used to be a base for Titan’s army, before the Witch dropped Oberon’s world on top of it. Ground zero.”

Yang pressed her palm against the tree, as well. She viewed the same recollections Emerald was having.

In the whirling flux of the Cataclysm, a spark created between the frictions of two warring elements. From the ruin, an existence stepped out from the ashes. It had two feet and stood upright. Within it, shined a substance of boundless potential.

“The first soul was born in Vacuo,” Yang said with a reverent tone. The moment carved an impression on her that would not fade upon waking.

Her eyes opened and widened at the sight unfolding around her. Threads of light coursed the “sky”. An immeasurable amount of energy flowed in their environment. Life surrounded them.

“The birthplace of Aura…” she awed.

“It explains a lot,” Emerald commented.

“Huh.” Was the only thing Mercury managed to say.

“Oh, come on,” Yang exasperated. “I know history usually puts you to sleep, but you’re saying this is not just a little bit cool?”

“No, I’m wondering where Neo is.”

“…”

Yang and Emerald glanced at each other.

““Huh.””

…

“WAAAHHHH~!!! YOU’RE SO CUTE!!!”

Neo, who currently resided on a different side of the Tree’s roots, was being hugged tightly by a mysterious stranger.

“I can’t believe I have another cute daughter~♪!” the woman’s voice rung excitedly. “Seriously! Raven could’ve gone easier with her teaching. But I can’t blame her, I guess. Everything she learned was taught by Temujin and Athos. And they weren’t the most gentlest of teachers either. You might have to just forgive her for that. Ehehe…”

If any other person had done such a thing on their first meeting, Neo would have stabbed them without hesitation. But being embraced so tightly with such transparent affection threw her off. There was an overwhelming calm to the strange woman, who was only slightly taller than Neo. She found the smell of the stranger’s scent very mellowing. The pitch of her voice pleasant.

“…?”

“Who am I? Oh! Yeah, I guess I should’ve started with that,” the woman released her with a soft cough of composure. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Neo. I’m Summer Rose, Yang and Ruby’s mother.”

Neo’s lips pursed with uncertainty.

“I’m not like Raven, I promise! I’m really happy for you and Yang! You’re both really cute together!”

“…?!”

“Yeah! You have my approval! Yup! One hundred percent!”

Mommy!

Neo threw herself into Summer’s embrace once more.

“There, there. Ahaha~ Awww, it’s too bad you won’t remember much after this. Just means I have to give you my blessings in person, when we finally meet.”

“…?”

“But, enough of that,” Summer separated Neo from herself, and moved back a few steps. “There isn’t much time, so I’ll give you your wedding present now.”

Neo smiled excitedly.

With a sharp ring, a pair of blinding chakrams appeared from under the woman’s cloak.

“Summer Rose’s Super Special Training Session will now commence!”

Neo’s expression immediately became distraught. Without any communication at all, her face could only read, “worst wedding present ever”.

“Despite how I come off, I’m not actually a really gentle teacher either! Just so you know, in advance!”

“…?!?!?!”

Why are you so fired up about this?!?!

Summer ignored her, and her figure faded into the ether like a ghost.

Only a haughty voice rung from all around Neo.

“PREPARE YOURSELF!!! Convince me you’re worthy of my daughter!!!”

#rwby #yang xiao long #emerald sustrai #neopolitian (rwby)#mercury black #ENMY

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mycazus-blog · 6 years ago

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Between Science and Religion:The Illegal Trade of Black Magic

Everyone always has something they want

Love, wealth, health, you name it. And it’s true that, at the end of the day, all we can really do is rely on ourselves to get what we want. But what if there’s something more? What if we could get extra help from The Great Beyond?

A Place Of Mystery

Turning to the heavens and consulting the stars has often been our go-to approach when we are in need of some otherworldly guidance; just think of all the people who still casually check their horoscope advice regularly.

Still A Business… Sorta

Contrary to the scepticism surrounding fortune-telling or amulet-renting businesses, Siam Arts keeps up with the times with their website and clearly categorised online store. Visitors can even make appointments with resident astrologer, Master Tham, online.

Talking to Master Tham only reinforced this image of modern mysticism. With a dark blazer over a t-shirt, the fengshui consultant looked slightly out of place amongst the occult trinkets and symbols.

The Agonising Aftermath

You know how in horror films, after a spooky encounter, the protagonist always has a lingering sense of unease that kick-starts the whole chain of events? That was me.

Picture this: 1am, me, and my glowing laptop screen. The Siam Arts website. And a slow, growing case of the creeps as I read the ingredients list for the recommended Archan Odd See Pueng Mae Namfon Cream. Cue frantic Googling to find out what the %$@! “prai oil” is.

Followed by the instant recoil of terror upon the realisation that it is oil extracted from corpses. A thorough description of this oil can be found here https://liewsp1-magicsea.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-making-of-nam-man-prai-oil-minyak.html

https://ourmagicalrealm.wordpress.com/namman-prai/

GONG TAU OIL（降头油) – Corpse Oil

This Oil is collected by using the fire of a candle to burn the skin of the chin of a dead woman. The oil collected is known as Gong Tau Oil. It is mainly used to make someone fall in love or lust. Women usually use Gong Tau Oil for relationship matter and Men usually used it to make girls/women want to have sex with him.Today it is comes mainly in the form of Nam Man Prai Oil (Thai) or “Minyak Dagu” as it is known in Malay. This falls under the providence of Thai magic. Nam Man Prai Oil can also be purchased from on the net. The price of this oil ranges from USD200~USD1200. Much info can be found on the Practice here : http://liewsp1-magicsea.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-making-of-nam-man-prai-oil-minyak.html

There are also many Facebook profiles that serve to promote these practises. One that I have come across is this: https://www.facebook.com/PhraPirabOccultSpecialist/posts/nam-man-prai-q-a-this-post-is-dedicated-to-answer-some-of-the-most-common-questi/930901950351546/

Menstrual Blood Gong Tau (经血降)

Menstrual Blood of a Girl/Woman is added to the food and consumed by the intended Victim. The intention of Menstrual Blood Magic is often to tie or bind a lover or sexual attraction. It is also often used by Maids from South East Asia to make the employers nicer or even listen to them. This makes the perfect taglock, or magical link.

In hoodoo and some folk magic customs, a woman’s menstrual blood is considered vital to some types of magic. Jim Haskins says in his book Voodoo and Hoodoo that “to keep a man crazy about her and uninterested in wandering, a woman simply has to mix some of her menstrual blood into his food or drink.”

The first kind of magical oil is the oil made from dead body such as singe magical oil from the chin or the hairs of woman corpse that died while pregnancy. We call the magical oil which is made from woman corpse is “Namman Prai”.

“Namman Prai” has great supernatural power about love, sex appeal and charm. Especially, use this magical oil about love.

Whoever wants to worship and use magical oil, should know the right way to worship and use because the magical oil has advantages and disadvantages in itself. If you anoint “Namman Prai” on someone who you fancy, It will make that someone be crazy about you. You should think twice before using the magical oil and should not use with a woman or man, who has a couple or family as it can break their relationship.

Moreover, don’t forget the spirit who lives in the magical oil, you should offer offerings and make merit to the spirit. If you don’t or abandon the spirit, your spell will break and it can reverse the situation. The spirit will instead bring bad things and problems to the worshipper. On the other hand, if you offer the offerings and make merit to the spirit, The spirit will fulfill and help you with everything.

Educated & religious people don't believe in Black Magic .

Religious people are immune or so what they might believe and when they are attacked by Black Magic or as known in Chinese community as Gong Tau (降头), their own father / pastor cannot cure them and yet the Christian victims still cannot seek help from a Spirit Medium practitioner, due to their pride and also their churches , fathers / pastors do not allow their Christians members to approach other religions for help.

Most Traditionalist Witchcraft or Black Magic of different Cultures East and West look almost the same, but the rules are different and must be followed for the best results. They are just called by different names and different rituals are performed due to their unique religious influence, and yet, the land knows the rituals that have been worked upon it, and by working with the spirits of the land, you can learn much.

GONG TAU is often executed for the purpose of revenge or relationship matters and money issues.

Yet some things, once learned, cannot be unlearned. And I suspect my knowledge of what exactly goes into these mystical remedies will haunt my thoughts, figuratively. Hopefully, it fades as soon as I get the lingering scent of incense and ointment out of my hair – perhaps in a few days’ time.

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blurrybethny · 6 years ago

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Diary entry #8

So I’m gonna start this entry the same way I did in the last post.

So. MUCH. has. happened. like so much

okey, so since the last post, it’s almost been 2 years. Isn’t that crazy, 2 years. Well, the main reason for that has been F. So let’s just start where we left of.

So we’re in May or something now, and I finally finished my finals and got my results which where incredibly great. So with that result I had the chance to apply to the University of my dreams for the major Online-Media-Management. I thought that it would be great to make Instagram and Facebook to your Job. So meanwhile, I was still hanging out with F everyday, and since I already finished my finals, F was allowed to sleep at my place.

Now we are at the end of June and it is my high school prom which I have been exited about, I had a beautiful long, blue dress and F was wearing a really handsome suit. The funny thing was the next morning at 6am we had to catch out flight to Tenerife. So F was drinking kind of a bit of alcohol at my prom and at like 1 or 2am we drove back to my place and slept for like an hour and then headed to the airport.

We’re in July now, for 10 days we had the greatest vacation ever. The whole time we did what we wanted, the explored the whole city with a scooter und took many pictures. On one of the days we went up to the biggest mountain of Tenerife and then WALKED down it. We were almost on the ground again, when we lost track of the path and kinda got lost. But at the end we came back home safely. On another day we drove to this cool looking beach, it was really windy tho and the sand was hurting so much when it hit you skin. On one of the last days we drove to an animal park, which was also a great experience.

Just 2 weeks later, me and my mom flew to Los Angeles for kind of a road trip with a bigger group of tourists. The trip was really great because we explored LA, Hollywood, Las Vegas, San Francisco and other nice towns and sights. That was really one of my biggest dreams to travel through a part of the US. Honestly, at the beginning of the trip I missed F so much, and we talked everyday on the phone. I also was getting really angry at him, because at the beginning he seemed like he didn’t miss me at all and he went to two parties where he was having fun and getting drunk. And I also got quite jealous, because I was scared he would make a mistake with another girl.

So we’re in August now, and I came back home from the US trip and F and my dad picked us up from the air port and I was so excited so see him again. Also btw during the trip I got the message that they accepted me at the university I wanted to go to. So I was really happy about that. And because of that, now it was the time to search for a flat near the university, because it is actually 300km away from my hometown. The question that was upcoming now was, if F would move with me or not. And he said to me that he would move to anywhere I was. Which was really sweet of him and I was so happy about that. Now we had to search for a flat with at least 2 rooms. The search was kinda difficult because the flats where really expensive up there and especially in the middle of the city. However, my mom finally found one that was having a visitors day, so we drove up to the city and visited the flat. The flat already had furniture in it and it was not the prettiest. After that we kind of spontaneously drove to another flat that was also having a visitor day the same day, but there were no pictures on the internet. So we got there and the landlord was really nice, the little town was pretty and quiet and the flat was light and had no furniture in it. So we drove back home and the same day, the landlord from the first flat denied our request. However, the one from the second flat, sent my mom an email the next day, that the flat was ours!! So the renovating began. We drove up there on the weekends again to paint the walls and buy furniture. It was a lot of fun.

September. Not a lot happened in September, at least I can’t remember it. The only thing was, that it was my 19th birthday and I really wanted to go to a club, so we went to the club. I was wearing a really sexy dress obviously. Then we only stayed until 1am and left again because it was kinda boring and I felt a little sick. So, surprise surprise, on my birthday I was sick.

October. At the beginning of October, a week before Uni officially started my major had a kick-off to get to know the other students and teachers. I was really confident in myself and ambitious to meet new people and hopefully make some friends. The first day, started not that bad, I picked up 3 other girls to drive to the meeting place. There I got to know other girls as well. I actually talked with almost everybody - which is not common for me - and still groups were already forming and I was left behind. I kind of thought that I was getting closer to some girls, but they always left and did other stuff and I’m just not the type of girl to run after everybody. So even there I was sitting alone sometime. And I was turning into an outsider more and more because me and another girl were the only ones not drinking. It was also annoying for me because they played all kinds of drinking games and that’s just not my thing. The next day was not so great because I just felt uncomfortable and left out. The evening was even worse, I felt even more left out, and I felt so sad because I missed F so much and I just wanted to be home. I was really glad when the 3 days were over. Overall, the start of the major was not bad, I kind of liked the subjects - however, I was still the odd one out all the time, because everybody already had a friends group and everybody is just shallow - I also started to get better friends with the other girl that was not drinking alcohol and we actually had quite a few things in common. I even invited her for a sleepover once and we initially wanted to watch Riverdale but we ended up talking about all kinds of stuff. Since then she is like the only one I really talk to.

The following months until February were not really exciting. It was a really hard time for me because during the week I was all alone in my flat and I only saw F on the weekends and holidays. I literally cried every time we had to say goodbye. Also during that time, we had a lot of fights because when we talked over video call he usually fell a sleep which made me angry. And also when we saw each other on the weekends, he still had stuff to do or met up with people or even had to work Saturday and Sunday. This things always made me really angry and frustrated because I was all alone the whole time, I just wanted to spend time with him on the weekends and then he would have even less time. Sometimes we had really heavy fights where he really hurt me with his words. I know that I was not always fair to him and how I reacted, but he also never understood me. What I maybe have to add here is that, since F this one fight between me, S and F after the theatre the friendship between the two guys and between me and S was kind of over. So in August F told me that S was diagnosed with cancer. In the following months F and S started to talk again and meet up, which I was happy about because they have been friends for a long time and I felt really guilty that I was the reason for the breakup of this friendship. Also for new years eve we planned a bigger party because S wanted it to. It was not too bad, and I was really glad about the fact that S was talking to me again, because I missed being friends with him. In the following months there were ups and downs with his health.

February. Most of this month F and me spent in Thailand because his mom is from Thailand. However, this vacation was probably the worst one I have ever had. First, everything was just new to me and I met a lot of new people I could not talk to because they only spoke Thai, then another thing was that F did not really keep me in mind because this was his second home and everything was just normal for him but not for me. Especially the missing hygiene and the weird food. Also I got pretty sick with fever and everything and I had to go to the hospital for two days. After that I still stayed home a bit and F always wanted to go fishing at night. And I was just so frustrated about him because I was still exhausted from the sickness and he did not really pay attention to me and always got angry at me because I didn’t want to leave the house and I always started crying. So I basically did not leave the house for two days, when we finally got together again. The last few days were the best of the whole holiday because he finally adapted his actions to my needs.

March. F finally moved in with me because his education for his job finally ended, so he had to find a job up here. It took quite a while but he finally found a job which he likes. Also I got the results of my first semester’s tests and they were all really great actually.

April. We finally had our one year anniversary for which we went out on a date.

May. F, me and his family drove to Hungary for a weekend trip which was also okey. But I prefer the alone time between F and me. In Uni, I finally started to become kind of friends with two other girls, and we also formed a group for a school project, however, one of the girls quite uni during that.

June. This is the month of S’s death day. I was so sorry for F, because they were finally best friends again and it seemed to get better. I was also in shock because I just couldn’t image S not being here anymore, to never see him again.

July. Not much happened in this month, except that I had my finals and I applied for a job that I could do over the summer break, and I actually got one in a cafe not far from my flat. Also the other girl I was talking about, that I thought I was also kinda getting friends with, switched to another major at the end of the semester. So again, I had no friends.

August. I worked the whole month in this cafe, and it was actually so much fun, because I did not have to think about school and it was just something different for me. Also my coworkers were really nice and funny.

September. I had my last week to work, and everybody was telling me how much they would miss me and that I was the best worker here for the summer and why I can't stay, and honestly this makes me so proud, because I never thought I would be so good in this job. After the last week in work, F and me drove to Hungary again because we wanted to have some vacation and also work on the house his parents have there. After we got back home, F and his friend B planned a kind of funeral for S, because since his death there has not been a funeral. The “party” was really nice and emotionally. For me it was really hard because until then I always tried to ignore my thoughts and feelings about this topic because I had to be strong for F. But at this day everything was just coming up. A few days later we drove back to our flat.

October. The 3rd semester of my university was starting. After only the first week, I knew there was a lot a head of me. - short cut, because I have to tell a backstory to what's following, so I’ve always wanted a dog since I have been a kid and F also always wanted a dog, for the past year I was pretty obsessed with pugs, then I was obsessed with french bulldogs because they’re just cute. Back in January we already talked about this topic with my mom and she just said that me and F have not been together for so long and that we would talk about this another time. So until October we were kinda over this topic already.- But on one day where we both were home, he brought the topic back up and just for information purposes he searched for people, that were selling french bulldog puppies. On the same day, we were driving to there place - keep in mind we just wanted to ask them how much space the puppies would need, how much affection and just general stuff. - But oh my god, the puppies were so cute and adorable. When they said the dogs only need around 50-60 square meters, I was initially in the mode of picking my favorite puppy (our flat has 56 square meters). On the way home we both knew that we would be getting a dog. When we drove home, F called our landlord and asked him, if it would be okey if we would get a dog and I called my mom to tell her all the facts, because against that she would not be able to say something against it. She was not impressed but also not angry, so I was like okey let’s get a dog. The next day, we drove to the breeders again to pick our puppy. I originally said that I would either want a grey or spotted one - they had both - however, the spotted ones were not that pretty. So we had to make the decision between a lazy fat black one or a quirky playful grey one. Characteristically, we would more be like the black one, but I wanted to have the grey one so we could play a lot. So there you have it, within two days, we made the decision to get a dog and already picked out a puppy. Four weeks later, we would be able to pick him up.

November. The time has finally come, and we were able to pick up our puppy and bring him home. He was really, great. He was not scared of anything and he was also not crying a lot. It was so funny to watch him run around and play and jump. Back then he was so little, you can't even imagine. But he’s also a lot of work, at the beginning he peed and pooped into the flat which was not so great. Another topic: Uni. During October and November I did not have the best time in uni, because there were so many things I did not understand and I was exhausted and it was just so much that I was not even interested in. I was so stressed out, I had a break down almost everyday because of the tasks we had to do. I was also considering, switching to another major that was about marketing and advertisement. Because I was way more interested in that kind of stuff. However, the problem was the timing, because the semester had just started, so I either had to finish this semester anyways or I would stop right now and then do nothing until March, which my mom would not allow. And if it was the first option, I would already been done with 3 Semesters, and if I would switch to another major I would have to start at zero again. I also saw, that the major I wanted to switch to had really shity times to be at uni, and with our puppy it was better if I was the most time at home. So it was a really shit time for me, because I wanted to switch but then I would be even longer in Uni. But also a reason, why I wanted to switch was that in my major I did not really have any friends and I was just hoping that I would maybe gain some new friends in the other major. So it was the first weekend that we drove home with the puppy because also my grandpa had died and the funeral was on a Friday. When we got home I noticed that my mom was annoyed the whole time. - my dad was in love with the puppy tho - so the funeral was pretty sad and I could not believe that my grandpa was gone now. It was for the better tho, because his health got worse, sometimes he would not even remember me and his body was just shutting down. At the funeral I also had to think of S, and that I lost two people this year. The day after, me and my parents talked about a lot of things. First, me and my dad about the houses and some stuff and that I would get one of the houses. And then all together about why my mom was so angry about the dog and yea. Then I told her the situation about the decision I would want to make considering the major and obviously she was not happy about it. Like she's paying my rent and everything. So her condition was that, if I would switch, I would have to find a mini-job during the semester. So that was not really optional because I would have to do so much for uni itself. So I got over the idea and said to myself that I just have to live through it.

December. I’m still here in my original major and I finally found peace with it because now I’m almost done with everything and the things don’t seem impossible anymore. But I’m really glad that this semester is over soon, because I hate everything about it. I also feel really uncomfortable in the lessons again, because I always sit next to the girl - from the very beginning I’m still friends with her - but she always wants to sit in the front which means that it is always just me and her in the front and everybody else is always behind us. Which I feel so uncomfortable about. It is also always really awkward when we have to build groups of 4 or something because then it always us two outsiders and usually two other outsiders. - Just so you know, I have nothing against foreign people, like my boyfriend is half Thai - but these other two outsiders are from russia I think, and they have this strong accent and because I already worked together with them and I sit with them, I think I am also considered an outsider and I feel so uncomfortable with that. Also another thing that’s been on my mind lately is, that the relationship between me and F is getting quite dry and boring because we just have our routine and there is nothing exciting anymore. It’s also really difficult to change this, because our routines are fixed because of work and uni but also because every time I talked with F about our relationship and that I want more love and affection, he does it for like two days and then it’s just like how it was before that. And this is so frustrating. I just want the feelings from the start again, where everything was exciting and new. Like he is still my favorite person and I prefer spending time with him over being alone or with someone else, but this is probably the problem why it is so boring. I just need a friend or an activity without him, so when I come back I’m excited to see him. Or we need a new routine, I just don’t know honestly. Last but not least, on Saturday we are finally driving home for the christmas break which I’m excited for because I don’t have uni for two weeks and yea. Also we maybe celebrate New Years Eve at my place which is also exciting, because I never really had a party at my place. Also another thing, in February and March next year I will be working at the coffee shop again which I am very excited for. I am also really excited for the next semester because then we will do a lot of marketing stuff and media production which I’m really interested in. - One last thing, last weekend F, two of his friends and I drove over 1000km on one day to look at a car F wanted to buy and guess what he bought it. But it is a crash car so he has to work on it still before he can drive it. Also our puppy is getting bigger and bigger and I am such a proud mommy.

- See you probably in 4 years

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itmeansfreeman · 6 years ago

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23 and me

Well! I already have a smile on my face. It’s my last days being this young, very young, twenty-three. The youngest I’ll ever be.

It’s 9-something PM, I think. I’m not even looking at the clock. I just know I’m fresh out of the shower with clean, cold, wet hair down my back. Sitting here in this silky black nightgown that used to be Moriah’s-- that is way too big for me because I don’t have the boobs to fill it out the way she did-- but that still makes me feel sexy every time. Sexy, not in the sense that I’m not seducing someone, but in the sense that I simply feel like a woman, just the way I am. Which is important to me after looking down at my chest a few times this year and contemplating how they’d look with implants.

I stopped by the liquor store before coming home to shower. The first liquor store was closed. I thought maybe it was a sign that I shouldn’t be having a glass of wine while I write tonight. Maybe I should get kombucha instead, being that it sometimes makes me feel tipsy anyways? But no, I looked up a second liquor store that was open, and made an intentional 8-minute drive there to pick up wine. I wanted wine for one main reason: I wanted to keep myself honest as I wrote this. But the second reason was to feel “my age” and “YOLO” to enjoying a glass alone tonight.

I picked up two bottles, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, because I couldn’t remember which one I like better. I found that this was the perfect opportunity to find out which wine I preferred by the time I turn age 24, damn it. So I begin YOLO writing with a 5-oz pour of Merlot. Measured meticulously on a food scale and logged into my FitBit food diary. I guess I can’t escape all my weird ways. And maybe I just don’t want to... I don’t need to.

Recently I’ve been wishing for myself that I’d live a life whose own biography I would want to read. That didn’t mean a successful life (whatever that means) or even a happy life, necessarily. I think it really just means a life pressed in. And all that means, according to Jinnie, is focused. Twenty-three has been the best year of my life. I have been focused. I didn’t go through things that I wanted to go through or would have chosen to go through, but when I did go through them, I went through them with focus. I have been pressed indeed and I want to let the blood of it dry and preserve as these words.

During twenty-three, I started my first corporate job and took all four parts of the CPA exams. Passed one. The most beautiful relationship I’ve ever had the honor of being in came to a swift end. I stood up and chose my faith in times where it meant that I’d lose some things I cherish, namely, Brian. I also let myself be human in the face of faith, and deliberately chose sin and indulgence. I became in the best of shape of my life. I finally pulled the trigger on wanting to learn mixed martial arts. I also pulled the trigger on saying enough to that very first corporate job that I started and screw it to the CPAs too. I used pantiliners every day (how did I ever go without?). I let myself experience myself.

There’s about 1 oz of Merlot left in my glass. I like it.

Now the question is, how to break up this entry?

Brian Kim

I’ve always been attracted to older men. Daddy issues or not, it’s just the way it’s been. I surprised myself for being able to fall in love with somebody my age. I was surprised to have looked up to somebody my age, the way I had with Brian. Though I don’t hold that same sentiment towards him now, I was surprised that I ever did-- and very genuinely I did.

Time to try to the Cab.

I am a hundred times grateful that this relationship ever happened. I am forever thankful to God. I’m thankful I got to find out just what I needed and didn’t need. I think a lot of people say that when coming out of a relationship, but those things are all very private and true. I was really thankful to find out that God had made me a stronger woman than I believed I was. I was astonished to find that that weren’t many tears that I thought were worthy to cry after it all ended. I was astonished to find that I was able to fall asleep, just like a baby, every night. Before our break-up, when I felt it coming, I mostly feared that my post break-up experience would be like that of Joe, my ex in college, who I literally lost my shit over. All. My shit. But this time, wow. I was, and still am, surprised.

I like Merlot better. Carol, on the cusp of 24, realizes that Merlot is the red she prefers. Is it “good” Merlot? I don’t know, and I’m happy that I don’t know the difference.

When we said goodbye to our love at Blaze Pizza, sitting in that back booth, I will never forget the peace and gratitude in my heart. Precisely to God who saw all my tears months prior to the relationship ending. The one to whom I prayed that prayer on a night in October 2017 with my forehead surrendered to a rug-- that I would not be the one to leave this relationship, but if it so is Your will, make him break up with me. And he did. Those words. “A relationship is just not what I need right now.” An immediate warmth in my heart, I looked up at You. And I felt you wink at me, and lovingly hush my heart that would have otherwise skipped a beat. But I remember it. It didn’t even skip a beat. I remember my inner person smiling when Brian said that. I remember nodding my head at him. I remember that this was something worth losing. That I could not, and would not, beg for a human’s love. And that I was finally happy to let him go. This friend that I had gotten to know so intimately for over two years, I was happy to let him go. I wished to see him smile again, the way a friend would want to see a friend laugh and smile. I think that was what really made me want him to break up with me. I knew I wouldn’t do, but I wanted to see him smile.

I drove home that night calling Pastor Julie. “We’re over,” I laughed with a big grin and tear droplets truly as big as marbles rolling off my face. I came home to my mom sitting on the family room couch. I put my bag on the floor, sat close next to her, held her hands and in Korean said “We broke up. I might be sad sometimes, but I am happy. I am happy this happened, but please don’t worry about me when I’m sad.”

I cannot say that today, I look at Brian with the same kind of love in my heart the way I did that night in March when we broke up. I cannot say that I do not resent the way he made me feel utterly foolish a few months later at Monica and Leo’s wedding when, I will not say what, but only that he truly made me feel stepped on. The way friends wouldn’t even make friends feel. However, when I look back at our relationship, I can only feel pure gratitude. When I see videos of us and friends, my heart gets cheerful. And I am thankful that God would protect these memories in such a way that I could still smile about it. To be clear, I would never choose this person again. Not in a million lifetimes. But I am happy to, at one point in my life, have chosen this person.

Dan Ahn

Dan, one of the most influential people to me this year, from near and far. He is one who I think is truly living a happier life in reality than on social media platforms. I think his instagram doesn’t do his life justice, and that’s rare for our generation. With myself and I think the rest of us, Instagram is the inflated, happier version... and our lives simply don’t match up.

Dan connected me to a guy named James who opened a cafe called Fahrenheit 180 in El Paso, TX. After speaking to James on the phone, who had abandoned his opportunities at Wall Street to open a cafe, I decided I needed to pursue my cafe dream and forget about the CPAs. The CPA was a goal, I was beginning to realize, that I was never meant to achieve.

The day before Dan left for his bike-across-America trip, we met at Stuff Yer Face, where he confessed to me that it did make him quite nervous that I’d made such a decision to quit my CPAs and begin working on my business after I had a conversation with the dude he linked me up with. I’ll recall more of how I arrived to this decision later, but I hope Dan knows that he’s not responsible for my actions.

No one will ever be responsible for my actions. And furthermore, this year I learned that all people, no matter their brilliance or track record, are just people with opinions from their experiences. I’ve talked to so many businesspeople this year about cafes, discussing their big wins and shameful failures. They offer convincing advice. But at the end of the day, it’s my choice to give weight to a person’s message. It’s my choice in how much I’m going to believe them.

Jeff from Kudo Society, said to me, “Be decisive. You can make up for your mistakes later. But more costly than mistakes is not being decisive.” So watching Dan and speaking to James, I have decided to be decisive. I will not be an accountant.

Listening to Her

After the breakup, I got to ask this girl, myself, what she wanted to do. She wanted a dog of course. A warm, happy Golden. But more realistically, I wanted to learn Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. Something that I had yearned to practice deep inside ever since Julius and I rolled as kids. I never tried it earlier because of the money. Then I had the money, but not the time. But suddenly I was a working woman and single. I had both the money and time. So there I found myself on Google at work, searching MMA gyms around me.

I visited three: Driven Gym, Diesel, and Fight & Fitness, before I ultimately chose Fight & Fitness. What a perfectly hand picked place from God Him-very-self. Not necessarily for the training style, but for the people. Oh dear God, the people. Thank you God.

I think I ended up liking Muay Thai better than BJJ. I’ve been going to Muay Thai classes twice as often as BJJ. I honestly think that it’s because the punching, kneeing, and kicking is so much more releasing than strategically finding ways to strangle someone. But also, the eye candy is a little better in Muay Thai.

To that point, do I want to date? Hell to the no. I hate to say it because it makes me feel weak when I just said above how I was surprised to find how strong I am. But I think I am pretty scarred from my relationship and from learning about men, in general. I’m not sure that I really ever want to get married, and it doesn’t make me feel sad to think or say that. I’m truly at a place of so much freedom to not need the thought of ending up with a partner to make my life feel complete. My workplace has people cheating on their spouses with one another. Men who are now married, and even with children, are flirting with me and asking me on dates. My close male coworker, who is recently married and also a new father, told me that “Men are as faithful as their options-- including myself.”

I ponder what a sacred thing marriage is. My girlfriend said that over a decade later, her mom still thinks longingly over her ex-husband. “I don’t think you can really get over a failed marriage. Especially someone you have children with.” I wonder if it’s better to abstain from marriage if the divorce rate is so high.

Divorce lawyer and author of If You’re In My Office, It’s Already Too Late, James Sexton, says that Americans do more car research than research on marriage. If he were to tell someone that there’s over a 50% chance that they’ll get hit by a car when they walk across the street, most people wouldn't even take the chance. They’d stay inside. And if they did go to cross the street, they’d at least wear a helmet. His point was that divorce rates are higher than 50% and people don’t even inquire of what they should be prepared for in marriage. They just walk into it hoping that they will beat the odds and won’t get hit with divorce someday, like getting hit by a car. It leaves me wondering if it’s better that I don’t get married at all. And I’m okay with that. I’m satisfied enough-- or scared enough-- to be okay with that.

This is not to say I don’t believe in love. For the people who have found true, vibrating, deep, knowing love-- I celebrate that love. It truly ignites my heart on fire and I cheer always for you. I know it exists. I know that it is possible.

After Brian and I broke up, I heard that someone had told another friend of mine, “I don’t believe in love. If Brian and Carol broke up, there’s no hope for any of us.” But I do. I still believe in love. I still believe in lasting, sacred marriage. It is simply for those who, with all their might, will dedicate themselves to it. I personally don’t know if it’s for me, but I see other people that have it written in their DNAs and whose love I believe in.

Anyways, both Muay Thai and BJJ have been a wonderful sport for me. I remember one night, my head was being squeezed in between someone’s legs and my face was nuzzled in their crotch. We froze in this twisted contortion while our instructor critiqued our position. “Only in MMA would it be totally normal for my face to be held against a stranger’s crotch as someone teaches them how to do it better” I thought. MMA is a weird place for weird people, and I love it.

I heard the guys talking in the men’s locker room, “When it comes being a fighter, you need to have somewhat of an ego. But not in jiu jitsu. All of that goes out the door. You never know what’s gonna happen. Some days you just get fucked up and tossed around. And you just gotta let yourself be humbled.” I don’t know why that stuck with me the way it did when I heard it through the thin walls while changing alone in the girl’s locker room. But I just remember knowing that it was true not only on the mats, but in the fight of life. Sometimes, no matter how much you’ve trained, you will still get humbled by a force from left-field. A force you can’t control, anticipate, or mitigate.

Tim Ferriss

I just finished the 5-oz of Cab. It was definitely Merlot that I enjoyed better. 5 more ounces of Merlot, coming up. This is 360 calories so far, FYI.

Well, soon after I had turned twenty-three, I read the 4-Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris. There’s a concept called “batching” that he teaches on. Basically, the idea is that we can save a whole lot of time if we simply batch tasks together instead of doing them continually throughout the day. We batch our laundry and wait for it to build up to the top of the basket, sometimes overflowing, before actually throwing it in the washing machine. We ought to do that with our e-mails. We ought to do that with a lot of things instead of letting them seem like productive tasks to tackle throughout the day, which actually do the opposite and steal productivity from the very things we wish to accomplish.

After reading about it, I put it to the test. I batched my tasks. I got off of social media. And suddenly, what I had was a whole lot of time. A whole sack of available time just looking me in the eye. All the clocks in the world were slow. All these months and even years, I’d been saying that I was going to get working on my coffee shop once I got the time-- but right now, “I was too busy.” Man. The batching did away with all my bullshit. I saw all that time right before me. And to my utter horror, I was choosing to not work on my cafe. I was paralyzed. Must I now face the very thing that I have said was my dream? Where are my excuses? What if I fail?

So I bought books on coffee shops. I listened to podcasts on business. I made phone calls to entrepreneurs to inquire and learn. I bought a 4” binder to collect all my data. A four-inch binder. I’ve never even bought such a binder for all my years of school. Then I stumbled across Babes in Business NJ, a group of female entrepreneurs who champion each other in their business pursuits. So I said to myself that I’m going to their next event. I’m going to get out of my comfort zone and launch myself in. When I went to this event, I learned about myself through the panel of speakers that I was yet again making excuses that I must acquire enough research before beginning to attempt this business. As if the 4” binder must be packed with paper before I’m qualified to try. The human brain is crazy with its excuses.

So I said I’m not going to let my life be ruled by excuses anymore.

1465 Irving St. Rahway, NJ.

It was the first location that I seriously looked at and considered to become the cafe. It was the beautiful and airy vacant spot across the street from the train station with exposed white brick walls. That location convinced me enough that I would stand with my neon green clipboard on the corner of Irving & East Cherry on a Friday morning to host market surveys with pedestrians. A spot so sparkly that I woke up early in the mornings to drive to it and tally all the foot-bike-and-car traffic from 6 AM to 8:50 AM, leaving me just enough time to get to work by 9. To be hanging around the spot long enough to where two different cops asked me what I was doing. I told one of them that I was looking to open a coffee shop at this site, as I pointed behind me. He gave me a thumbs up and said “Good for you, dear!” and drove on.

I got involved in a small downtown city with new strangers the way I never imagined I could. I went to Chamber of Commerce meetings. I had drinks with locals. I sat with city officials in their office to discuss planning and zoning. I got into the cars of strangers. I collected business cards by the handfuls. I researched with joy and madness. I thought this was it. E-mails and phone calls filled my days and nights.

Whenever there was news about potential competition in the area, I remembered what Karl, my accounting friend from college, said to me. “Good. Competition is good. It leaves no room for complacency.” That was right. I feared no competition. I would do it better. I would always improve and serve people the best coffee that was around.

The guy who owns The Coffee Box in Plainfield, Jeff, also was looking at 1465 Irving St. He knew that there was another person looking at the same spot for the same coffee shop purpose-- which was secretly me. He eventually ended up leasing the spot less than 24 hours before I was scheduled to go to the spot with an architect. We were both racing against time and against one another. I remember a couple weeks earlier, going to his coffee shop incognito to see what kind of place he runs anyways. I was disappointed to find out that he does an intimidatingly excellent job. The day that I visited, I was just an ordinary, unrecognizable, customer. But he was so damn friendly to me that I hated it. I had asked him if The Coffee Box was their only location, to which he responded, “We’re looking at a second spot in Rahway.” It was the spot I was looking at. “Aw best of luck,” I smiled. He did indeed catch that luck.

Though I know it wasn’t luck. It was favor. Not favor on him, but favor on me-- that it didn’t work out for me. There was Jesse, the owner of The Irving Inn, a restaurant next to 1465 Irving. He was 1461 Irving. A charming restaurant. Jesse’s a white man in his early 40’s who I became friends with during this research period. He took me to Restaurant Depot and to other coffee shops like The Coffee Mill. He gave me advice. I used to think “Wow, he must really believe in my dream to give me so much of his time to help me.” Then there was a drive home one day from his restaurant when I said out loud behind the steering wheel, “Don’t be so stupid, Carol. He has other intentions.” He ended up confessing his crush on me and asking me if he can take me out. Although that ended there, he confessed another thing: that it was good that the spot didn’t work out for me. “The rent was much too high, especially for someone like you who doesn’t have coffee experience.” Though it hurt, I knew that he was right. It was time for me to learn coffee. So I went home, took a long shower, and went online to apply to coffee shops.

Chris Brown

I have to write about this new friend Christian.

But first, I have to ask. Do you ever wonder how things happen in such a timely manner that you cannot help but believe that someone is handing you the pieces in that particular order? It’s like you were given all the pieces to build an IKEA desk, in its proper sequence, which you would have never known without ever seeing the manual. You cannot say you earned the pieces yourself. You cannot say that you purchased them either. You know that feeling, and you know it can’t just be the universe? It cannot be some vast, unknowable, outerspace energy. Instead, it is all so intentional and loving that you cannot help but believe that it is a God, a person, who loves you, individually. With eyes fixed on you like you are the only person whose life He is concerned about of over the seven billion around you.

So I met Christian at the MMA gym. He joined about two weeks after me back in July. He was immediately friendly to everyone, giving people fist bumps at the beginning of every class. He was already very obviously fit, but new to MMA. I can’t say that I was ever attracted to him, but at the very least, curious. Not romantically curious. Curious about his character. Something about him-- I already knew there was something in me that knew something in him. I just didn’t know what that common something was.

A couple of us at the gym exchanged numbers at the gym last week. When Christian told me his last name was Brown as I saved his number into my phone, I said “Your name sounds like you should be a celebrity or something.” He said, “It’s like one.” I replied, “Oh yeah?” and laughed. “Yeah. Chris Brown.” I really laughed. I laughed a lot. Oh, that’s why he sounds like he should be a celebrity.

At Thursday’s class, Christian and I were stretching on the blue mats. Some anterior hip stretches. I don’t remember how we got to the conversation, but I shared with him how I was hoping to get fired at my job but unfortunately I got promoted instead. So in return, I would be quitting in a month to start working at a coffee shop. His eyes lit up. Yup, there it is. I think I found that common understanding. The thing in me that knew the thing in him. We linked up over coffee and yoga two days later.

So there we were sharing coffee at 9:15 AM on a Sunday. I didn’t know many people who would meet with me on a Sunday morning at 9:15. We were strangers really. The only thing I knew about him was that he was my age, and how his punches to my face feel when we spar in class. Or how his kick feels to my ass. But there we were in early morning window seating at an empty coffee shop, talking about philosophy, love, time, deception, the vanity and sacredness of life, and spirituality. Christian isn’t Christian. But he asked me to share about my Christianity. And I, for the first time in several years, was able to share with a non-believer in complete comfort-- my faith in its full, passionate, flawed, form.

He brought a book for me that he had just finished. Wrapped in a yellow-brown Barnes & Noble plastic bag. It was a tiny book. On The Shortness of Life: Life is Long If You Know How to Use It, by Seneca.

Seneca. Seneca-- the stoic that I listen to Tim Ferris talk about so often. Like Tim Ferris, that batching author.

I held the corner of the book and let the pages quickly flip through my thumb nail. I saw yellow highlights and penciled in comments that Christian had written. That’s exactly what I do with all my books. I wondered if Christian was me in male form. I’m sure many people highlight and write. But I let myself have this moment of knowing the thing in me that knew the thing in him.

“A lot of the things you’re talking about are actually in the book,” he said to me. So I couldn’t wait to get home to read this damn thing. I remember very consciously being happy that I would have something better to read than my Instagram feed.

“And a lot of the ways you are, Tim Ferris is,” I told Christian. He went home and downloaded Tim Ferris’ podcasts.

Seneca

I think Seneca knew I was an accountant. I think God knew. Or Christian knew. Or something. Because today while reading this passage from his book, I had to take several pauses to remember to breathe and wonder if Seneca, God, and Christian were altogether watching me read. It was confirming everything I had concluded in my journey this year.

“Indeed, you are managing the accounts of the world as scrupulously as you would another person’s, as carefully as your own, as conscientiously as the state’s. You are winning affection in a job in which it is hard to avoid ill-will; but believe me it is better to understand the balance-sheet of one’s own life than of the corn trade. You must recall that vigorous mind of yours, supremely capable of dealing with the greatest responsibilities, from a task which is certainly honourable but scarcely suited to the happy life; and you must consider that all your youthful training in the liberal studies was not directed to this end, that many thousands of measures of corn might safely be entrusted to you. You had promised higher and greater things of yourself.

You must retire to these pursuits which are quieter, safer and more important. Do you think it is the same thing whether you are overseeing the transfer of corn into granaries, unspoilt by the dishonesty and carelessness of the shippers, and taking care that it does not get damp and then ruined through heat, and that it tallies in measure and weight?

Indeed the state of all who are preoccupied is wretched, but the most wretched are those who are toiling not even at their own preoccupations, but must regulate their sleep by another’s, and their walk by another’s pace, and obey orders in those freest of things, loving and hating. If such people want to know how short their lives are, let them reflect how small a portion is their own.

So, when you see a man repeatedly wearing the robe of office, or one whose name is often spoken in the Forum, do not envy him: these things are won at the cost of life.”

I was promoted and praised at my job for my hard work. A percentage of raise that I haven’t heard anybody in my level be given before. Yet, I remember coming back to my desk that day of my promotion, not very happy. In fact, pretty sad. I didn’t tell anybody for a while, not even my family. I felt that I was working so hard at fulfilling a firm’s dreams, not mine. I felt like this promotion meant more responsibility and commitment to a thing which I do not want to do.

When Seneca talks about observing the transfer of corn, I get flashbacks of all the inventory observations I had to perform throughout the year as an auditor; taking note of all the damaged goods in various warehouses and making sure company balance sheets were accurate. But now, I’m auditing my own life. I’m taking inventory of my bookshelf, of all the books I bought and haven’t read because social media damned my soul.

I am given the permission to understand the balance sheet of my own life, instead of the balance sheets of a multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical company filing for IPO. I was tempted many times this year to believe that I couldn’t amount to anything. That I will always be this accounting firm’s bottom bitch. But I am prompted now to remember again that I have been given the ability to execute the things-- any things-- that I affix my determination to. I’ve witnessed it myself. And I know again that it is in me. It has always been in me.

So I am thankful because I know I was meant to read this book, this passage, at the end of this year, today, at this time.

OJ Simpson

You always end up on that weird place on YouTube. This year, I listened to a psychologist on YouTube talk about the characteristics of narcissists, psychopaths, and sociopaths. That same day, I also randomly watched an interview with Kris Jenner where she unashamedly admitted that her regret in life was divorcing Rob Kardashian. I was fascinated by that. That she could firstly be so open about regretting a divorce with somebody. How refreshing it was to watch somebody have no problem saying that they regret something. The ownership of Kris’ regret is so admirable. It reminded me of how I regret not having been a better friend to Richard before he committed suicide this year and how I never want to not regret it. I was secondly fascinated that Kris’ regret was not over marrying Bruce, a man who would later become trans, but rather that it was for simply losing her marriage with Rob.

I wanted to learn about Rob. What about this man could leave a woman with such riches and success in regret? All I knew about Rob was that he was OJ Simpson’s attorney during his murder trial.

Then from there, I got curious about OJ’s trial. I ended up binge-researching the murder and binge-watching The People vs. OJ Simpson. I saw something in me that I knew in OJ Simpson. Just like I knew there was something in me that I knew in Christian. It was alluring and addictive. My heart sank when I recognized it. It was OJ’s narcissism. I had just learned of all the characteristics of narcissism from that psychologist on YouTube. I sneered at OJ on the television and pointed out how he was such a narcissist in this way and that, but then I realized it was me. It was me. It was me on Instagram, it was me on Facebook, it was me in real life. It was a part of me too.

I can’t imagine myself being able to “balance” social media. I don’t think social media is a battle that humans are fit to defeat. It wasn’t designed for humans to be able to tame it and use it in moderation. It was designed by people who design slot machines for casinos. How am I supposed to win something that was designed to get me addicted? I think that so long as I am on it, I will always be playing with the fire and being burned by it. I think it will forever fuel my narcissism. I hate when I’m posting. I hate that I’m so involved in other people’s daily lives who I would otherwise have no business with. And it is nobody’s business to know what I am eating at any given time, yet because of my narcissism, I think people should know what Carol Sohn is eating, singing, doing, every day.

I have a laundry list of books that I bought but I don’t read because I am pulling this slot machine from the moment I wake up to the moment I go to bed.

I am really not that important. And in another sense, I am so important that I should be feeding myself with books and knowledge instead of feeding on pictures of other people’s lives. I wish for my 24th birthday to gift myself with the severance of social media. I hope I can do it. I have less than 24 hours to say yes to denying myself.

I am learning that to go after the things I really want will mean saying no to things I also do actually want. I really want to respect myself, so I have to say no to hooking up with that hot 38-year old guy that I also want. I really want to open my own coffee shop, so I have to say no to the accounting salary that I also want. The person I am becoming is asking me to sacrifice some things for her. I want to honor this woman.

Moments of Declaration

I remember deciding to quit the pursuit of my CPAs. My mom said that it felt like such a waste of time and money that I had exhausted up until that point if I was just going to give up. I remember thinking that I was just so glad that I’m saving so much time and money by deciding to quit now instead of dedicating more of my life to it. The day of my exam, I didn’t even go. I went to HomeGoods instead. I was in the lamp section as I thought to myself, “Wow, I really don’t give a care about the CPAs. I’m really out here right now looking at lamps and letting a $200 exam fee flutter away. I am really happy.” It was a declaration to myself. A $200 memorial.

Tomorrow is my birthday. For the past several birthdays since I was 19, I had best friends or a significant other planning an extravagant party. This is the first birthday in a while that I don’t really have anything. I’m camping out in my own home in solitude these last few days leading up to my birthday. My own birthday slumber party if you will. The only thing I have planned is to go to orientation at the coffee shop I will soon be working at full-time. At first when I was told that orientation would be on my birthday, I thought, “Do I really want to be at orientation on my birthday? Should I ask them to reschedule it for a different date?” And then I realized, “I would love to do just that on my birthday. There’s no better way I want to spend it.” So tomorrow, from 5-7 PM, I will be at a work orientation to become a barista. It is a declaration to myself that this year, I am doing what I dreamed. No excuses.

Notes to Self for 24

I do not have to be anybody but myself. This past year, I confused myself because I didn’t know if I was feminine, masculine, uptight, relaxed, religious, rebellious, milennial, or old. I am realizing that I am all of this. Some people bring certain sides out of me that other people don’t. I thought I was a phony but I’m not. I’m simply all of this at different times. And it is better to live my own life authentically and imperfectly than to perfectly imitate another’s. There has never been and never will be anybody made exactly like me and it would be a shame to force this life to conform to some other person’s life for the sake of familiarity. I cannot be replicated, and nor can anybody else.

When I finally quit this month and go from that hunky salary to making $8.65 an hour, I will remember what Sue said. “You’re going back to school. People go back to school to learn what they really want and they take out student loans to do it. You’re going back to school, and you’re actually getting paid $8.65 an hour.” Going to work is like going to school. My homework is working on the business and learning to love God, myself, and people.

Jinnie Rhee said this twice to me this year. I think she said it a second time because she forgot that she already said it once before. I’m pretty forgetful, but I know she said this twice because it alarmed me the first time, let alone the second. She said, “I don’t think you realize this, but you’re really really hard on yourself. The way nobody else is.” This was true when I thought about it. This year, I don’t want to be so hard on myself. The inevitable fluctuations in weight, money, faith, and all. Don’t be so hard.

Lastly, as Pastor Julie looked me in the eye and said, “Carol, you don’t need to explain yourself-- not to me, not to anyone.”

This post took me two days and two bottles of wine to write. This year was made so successful, in my eyes, because of a common thread-- people. I am thankful to everyone for sharing their time, a thing no one can ever get back, with me. I thank you, I celebrate you, and I celebrate me.

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