#like straight up i forget rise of red exists before a new thing pops up about it and I'm like

[descendantofthesparrow]

i miss the d3 production/post-production era-because they actually gave us content-which made the movie better even if the writing was shit

[flipomatic]

Closed Book Chapter 4

Chapter 1 Chapter 3

Author Note: We’re getting into some of that lumity now. Just a bit. I’ve made some assertions about the Blight parents in the last chapter and this one, which I really don’t have any grounds for. This is just how I think they might be, so I’m sure I will be proven wrong in later seasons of the show. Also, the current plan for the rest of the fic is to write and publish one chapter a day until it’s done.

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The trip to The Knee was approved, with some conditions.

It almost didn’t happen due to the whole Emira and Ed being grounded thing, but her mother stepped up and convinced her father that it would be fine. Emira wasn’t sure how she had pulled that off, her father was notoriously stubborn, but she couldn’t complain with the result.

The conditions were that the three had to return without a single scratch on them, and the twins had to be unfailingly kind to their sister while escorting her.

Both of those conditions had been broken.

The trip itself hadn’t been nearly as safe as expected. The Owl Lady showing up with the human Luz brought a brand new level of danger to the group. As Mittens had complained once before, the human seemed to attract danger to herself.

Emira, Ed, and the Owl Lady had almost been eaten by a slitherbeast, which probably would’ve gone after Mittens and Luz once it finished digesting them. Luckily, the two kids came through and freed them. Amity used the new fire spell to do it, and Emira made sure to tell her how brave she’d been after. Ed ruined the moment a second later by ruffling Mittens’ hair.

Once the Owl Lady and Luz shot off into the distance, that left the Blight siblings to pack up and head back to town. Since Mittens had control of the spell, she could practice it safely at home with a bucket of water.

They went back to their tent and put all of their stuff back into packs. Once that was done, Ed folded the tent back to its regular size with a spell.

Once that was packed, they picked up their backpacks and set off towards town. The stuff was divided between the three of them, with some extra weight for Ed and Emira. It would take a couple hours of walking to get to town, since The Knee was far away.

“Are you sure I can’t bring the bat?” Ed asked as they started walking away from where their camp had been set up. He paused to look back over the trees, as if trying to spot something.

“You don’t still have it, do you?” Emira stopped next to him and asked with hands on her hips and one eyebrow raised.

Ed stuck his lower lip out in a pout. “No…” He said with a sigh. Emira reached over to pat him a couple times on the arm in a ‘there there’ kind of motion. It didn’t seem to help.

“C’mon let’s go!” Mittens called back to them from the trail a few meters away. She hadn’t stopped to discuss the bat and was now waiting at a distance.

“Alright.” Ed was still pouting as he gave in, moving to join Mittens on the trail. Emira followed, wishing the bat farewell in her head.

“Make sure to keep up.” Mittens said pointedly, looking first at Ed then at Emira as they reached her.

Ed raised one hand in a mock salute. “Yes Ma’am.” He had his usual smirk back in place. Emira followed suit, mimicking the salute.

Mittens rolled her eyes, then turned to set off down the trail. Emira glanced over at Ed and the two shared a chuckle before following.

“Before we get back, I think we need to get our story straight.” Mittens adjusted her bag on her back as she spoke, turning her head slightly so that the twins could hear her.

“Not that that’s a bad idea, but I’m surprised.” Ed sped up a little in order to walk next to Mittens. “Miss goody two shoes, suggesting we lie to our parents? What a twist.” He leaned in on Mittens for emphasis, so she fell a step behind to avoid him.

Emira cut in to bring the conversation back on track. “She’s right though, we can’t tell them that a slitherbeast almost ate us.” She shuddered at the punishment that might bring. Forget one month, they’d be grounded for the rest of their lives.

“We’d never see the light of day again.” Ed muttered, clearly imagining the same thing.

“Exactly.” Mittens said with a nod. “So we need to figure out what to tell them.”

“We should just say that you mastered the new spell without any trouble or danger.” Emira thought keeping it simple would be best. “No need to mention the slitherbeast or the Owl Lady.”

“I’m not sure which would be worse to them,” Ed added, “The Owl Lady or the slitherbeast.”

Mittens brow furrowed at that, her eyebrows moving closer together. “The slitherbeast for sure.”

“I’m with Mittens.” Emira had to agree. “Near death is far worse than covenless witches.”

“I don’t know.” Ed shrugged his shoulders. “That Owl Lady is a wanted criminal after all.”

“The Blight family will not associate with those below us!” Emira spoke loudly in a low pitch, imitating the way her father had said it many times.

“She’s been doing a good job teaching Luz.” Mittens interjected, but a moment later her eyes widened and a slight pink dusted her cheeks. “Or so I’ve heard.”

“Luz cast a pretty powerful spell today.” Ed mimicked the motion of the ice cannon rising from the ground with his hands. “It was weird how she cast it, looked like some kind of rune.”

Mittens nodded. “She draws glyphs, not any I’ve seen before though. I’m not sure how it works.”

Interesting, Mittens hadn’t seemed to like Luz at all back at the library. In fact, she’d been more upset about Luz reading her diary than the twins reading it. But now, she knew the basics of how her magic worked and had even talked about starting a book club together.

“You seem close to her now.” It wasn’t a question, but Emira was watching carefully for Mittens’ response.

A larger blush blossomed on Mitten’s cheeks as she turned to hide her face, far more than could be attributed to the cold. “N-not really. We’re going to be in the same class and I like to know my peers.” The stutter didn’t give her argument much validity. As Emira had suspected, there was clearly more going on between her sister and the human.

“Riiight.” Ed smirked, also not buying it. “Because you totally stop in the middle of training to wave at all your classmates.” Ah right, that was when he buried Mittens in the snow for not paying attention while they were sparring. She had stopped casting spells to wave at Luz. Very incriminating.

“I would.” Mittens insisted, digging one of her heels against the ground as she walked. Thinking back on what Emira knew about her other friends, she doubted it.

If Ed wasn’t part of this conversation, Emira might’ve pursued this topic further. She was quite curious about this new relationship with Luz and with how red Mittens’ face was getting. Unfortunately now probably wasn’t the best time to push the issue, but she couldn’t resist one small tease. “Hey, knock it off Ed. Let Mittens have her secrets.” Emira settled with that.

“That’s right.” Mittens huffed, before realizing exactly what was said and almost squeaking. “No, wait, there’s no secret.” Her eyes were wide as she waved her hands in a dismissive motion, that blush still easy to spot on her face.

“Fine, have it your way.” Ed shrugged and adjusted his pack, agreeing to drop the topic. He quickly bounced back with a new one. “Did you see that spell the Owl Lady used?” He mimicked the arm motion the Owl Lady made when she put the slitherbeast to sleep. “That was so cool, I wonder if we could learn it.”

“I think a sleep spell is part of the healing coven.” Emira mused, thinking about the way the spell was cast with a smaller circle and then pushed into a larger one.

“Oh right.” Ed frowned at that. “Too bad, the potential of being able to put someone to sleep is limitless.”

He was right, putting someone to sleep made pranking or tricking them a lot easier. “We can ask the teacher if there is anything like it in illusions.” Though Emira and Ed were excellent at illusion magic, they didn’t know every spell that existed.

Emira lifted one hand to her chin as she thought about the different spells she knew, trying to figure out if one could be applied this way. The best she could come up with was using the magic to knock someone out by force.

“You’re plotting something again.” Mittens had fallen back to her side, eyes narrowed suspiciously.

It was Emira’s turn to wave her hands dismissively. “I’m not, I swear.” She couldn’t help but grin when Mitten’s eyebrows popped up in doubt. Emira leaned in slightly. “Not yet that is.” She laughed, drawing another eye roll and a hint of a smile from her sister.

“We’ll plan later.” Ed matched her grin, probably already working out how to use illusion magic to knock people out.

“I want no part of this.” Mittens picked up the pace, speeding ahead of her siblings.

“You’ll miss all the fun.” Emira called after her, chuckling again when Mittens looked back and shook her head no.

“I think I’ll manage without it.” Though she sounded serious, Mittens looked like she was enjoying the banter.

Ed and Emira carried on a conversation after that about different illusion spells that might be useful in knocking someone out. They couldn’t think of one that wouldn’t cause physical harm to the victim, unfortunately. Though she walked a meter ahead of them, Mittens was definitely still listening in.

Soon the trio was out of the snow and onto the main road back to town.

Despite almost dying, they had a successful trip.

Chapter 5

[losille2000]

Mister America, Prologue: Massachusetts

CHAPTER NUMBER: 1/? CHARACTERS: President!Chris Evans/OFC (see notes) GENRE: Romance/Drama FIC SUMMARY: After a massive social media write-in campaign organized by others, Chris finds himself thrust into a spotlight that he is unprepared to handle. His campaign managers suggest that a political marriage might help him weather the storm and help his image during the campaign... just so long as it isn’t the one woman Chris really wants. RATING: M  WARNINGS:  Nothing. AUTHORS NOTES: This story is AU in the fact that this is the 2020 presidential race, and Chris is a candidate. But everything in the past is still the same with him being an actor. Also, COVID-19 is not a part of this story. I needed to play in a land where COVID didn’t exist and “Captain America,” in his alter ego, punched out a Nazi in a metaphorical(?) way. For more on the story, go here.

This first part is prologue-y.

I have also curated a soundtrack for all 50 states, and then some. You can listen on Spotify right now, may eventually put it on Youtube. There will be 50 chapters (I’m hoping), but many of them will be shorter.

Also on AO3!

Boston, MA Evans for President Campaign Headquarters November 3rd, 2020 30 Minutes Before First Polls Close

Stage fright is no joke.

When it hits, it hits like a semi truck going seventy on an icy Massachusetts road. In the blink of an eye, you’re completely obliterated. Except this is on stage and you’re not dead, even though you wish you were. In fact, you’re very much alive. Alive enough to feel the force of the impact, followed by the squeezing in your chest and choking on your breathless words. Paralysis takes over. Cold clammy sweat slicks your palms and also trickles down your back to that one spot between your shoulder blades you can’t reach, but causes your costume to uncomfortably stick to your skin.

There’s no escape. You know what’s coming. You worry you’ll forget your lines, or trip on your cue, or make a complete and utter fool of yourself. You feel like an imposter, questioning why you’re here, in this role, when that dude, JD, from your acting class years ago was a million times more talented than you, and you’re the one that got that teen movie deal.  You’re the one who became one of America's most beloved superheroes for a decade.

You’re also the one who has a very real chance of winning the 2020 presidential election, despite no college education, limited understanding of what elected officials in DC actually do on a day to day basis, and the closest thing you have to experience as a “boss” or “commander in chief” of anything was a movie set or two where you were director and executive producer. 

Nope.

What I, Chris Evans, have is a dedicated online fan base who took the time to write my name into ballots when they discovered I had filed for ballot access in every state of the union. I didn’t do the filing on a whim; we sat around late one night talking about the interviews I had been conducting in DC for a website about party positions on important issues. My business partners and I came up with the idea that a long form documentary about campaigning would be interesting, and we determined the best way to understand the process was to become a “candidate” myself. Meaning, we only planned to use the credentials to be on the front line of the campaigning process. I was never going to create signs and make speeches or debate with others.

I never intended to run a legitimate campaign.

But, as I mentioned, something strange happened during the Democratic primaries. People started to vote for me, a trickle of rain in a hurricane.

I won a few primary delegates.

Without even trying.

Not enough to win the Democratic ticket, but enough to make pollsters sit up and take notice.

My loyal fans stepped in again, undaunted, and ignited a storm. They dubbed it “Operation America’s Ass” and created a grassroots campaign across the country with GoFundMe donations and a lot of pluck. I thought it was a joke. A part of me still does think it’s a joke. I mean, what other explanation is there for this mess? For the red, white and blue bunting hanging on the walls with the “Chris Evans for President” sign plastered underneath it? For the staffers who stop briefly to see if I need anything...‘Would you like a drink, sir?’... or, upon seeing how pale I look, give me a vote of confidence… ‘Are you ready for your acceptance speech?’ There’s absolutely no good explanation as to why there are twenty or thirty people buzzing around the hotel suite waiting for results. They’re so energized with hope for a better future.

Hope that I can be everything they ever wanted in a president.

An Independent president, free from party oversight.

A president with class.

A president for the people.

A president who can bring the United States back from the brink of destruction at the hands of previous leaders.

I wish I had their confidence.

When they asked me on career day in school what I wanted to be when I grew up, I always said artist. When I was older, in high school, I knew I was going to be an actor. Never president. The job never entered my mind as being a possibility, not even when I used to work for my uncle’s congressional campaigns. Or when I started filming those interviews.

Why does anyone think I, a straight white momma’s boy from Boston should be president in 2020? Just because I made a few popular Tweets about the current president’s lack of leadership?

It has to be a joke. A cosmic one. I’m a punchline. I am convinced they’ll jump out from behind a doorway and yell “You’ve been PUNK’D! We really got you this time, now here, Bernie, you’re the better candidate.”

And yet…

What if they see in me something I do not?

I place a lot of stock in being in the moment. I’ve also put a lot of work into accepting the twists and turns of life instead of allowing all the “what ifs” and “what should I dos” to eat away at me. I told everybody after I was done with Marvel and financially secure enough to only work on projects I really wanted to, I’d take life as it came at me.

Well, it came after me.

To be fair, I originally chose to get into politics, even in a tiny way, because I wanted to be informed about my choices. I created a website so others could learn, as well. As time went on, I became more involved on Capitol Hill. I even did some lobbying for a few causes dear to my heart. And, yes, I did file the ballot access paperwork.

Had I unintentionally set my path in this direction? Was it inevitable for me to become a contender for the presidency?

Fortunately, I learned early on in the process that a lot of being a presidential candidate is being a convincing showman. An actor. The world's a stage, after all, and I am but a player. You have to have some solid ideas and convictions to back up the image, but a lot of the governing comes from other members of the executive branch. Should I win, I’d only be signing off on everything.

Of course, that “everything” affects the lives of more than 300 million souls. I wouldn’t trust me with a kitchen knife, much less nuclear launch codes and people's livelihoods and education and health and…

My hands shake with nerves just thinking about it.

Let it be said, once I do make it out onto the stage--be it as an actor or presidential candidate--I rise to the challenge. The energy from the audience buoys me. Makes me feel alive. But I am not, by nature, someone who likes to sign away so much personal freedom in exchange for the weight of carrying an albatross around my neck. I thought signing for Captain America would be tough; the human toll of running for president even moreso.

Actually being President? I can’t even wrap my mind around that.

It would be easy to call it quits, even now when the votes are already cast. I could have done it a long time ago, when the reality of the situation hit me the first time. I didn’t. Something told me to hold back, play it out. I persevered. Why? Somewhere, along the line, I began to believe I could do this. I could make a positive difference in the lives of Americans.

I certainly want to do right by all my supporters--and my detractors. I want to be a leader for all Americans.

But can I, really, while knowing my incredible deficiencies?

Maybe I can’t, but I can be the team leader. A brand ambassador, if you will. A good leader delegates. And I intend, should I win, to surround myself with the best and brightest. I will accept no less. I will do ‘Whatever It Takes,’ as our slogan boasts. I am American, first and foremost, and I care deeply about this country.

A real Captain America, if you will. Maybe not as strong or powerful as others, but I sure as hell can give a great speech and will defend my country from bullies until my last breath, whether they be purple… or orange.

Except, I suppose if I’m elected, I won’t be Captain America anymore. They’ll call me Mr. President.

Or, horror of horrors, what if the new name my nearest and dearest coined makes it out into the public. They tease me with it just to see my visceral revulsion and get a laugh. But if I have learned anything about the internet--and pop culture--is that if something is catchy, it sticks around for a long time.

Maybe I ought to get used to the idea of being a punchline.

So, I suppose I have a question for you.

Won’t you consider a vote for Mr. America?

[kiruuuuu]

I had the pleasure of talking this through with you, @cerosin​, and the end result is.... definitely unhealthier than your initial request, but I hope you’ll like it anyway :) I also certainly took my time with this, thank you for waiting and thank you for the request 🖤🖤 (Kapkan/Glaz, Rating E, angst fluff + smut, ~4.6k words)

.

He can tell when it gets bad again.

Obviously, there are the spontaneous bursts, attacks he can neither predict nor prevent and therefore has to react on the spot, but those have receded: the people around them have learnt how to avoid triggering anything, and Glaz has learnt how to remove Kapkan from these situations efficiently. No, this isn’t about sudden, blind panic, not about shortness of breath or wild eyes. This is about the prickling right below Glaz’ skin; like a constant stream it erodes the sense of safety that’s built up over weeks or, if they’re lucky, months. Erodes the complacency like it’s dust settling in bit by bit, undisturbed and growing. Glaz has stopped minding boring. Because boring implied a routine, and calmness, and freedom from -

From the alternative.

From what’s happening right now.

If anyone asked, he’d reply that he feels safe no matter what. That he’s in control, and even if he’s not, that he knows how to regain it; after all, he senses it coming as it accumulates slowly, yet not so slow he doesn’t notice. He’s safe, even if he wakes up to a sharp jab in the side or a hand around his throat, because he can deal with it. He’s safe, even if temper flares hotly at him like an open flame, because he knows it might lick him, leave a stinging burn, but it will never consume him.

He justifies himself to this non-existent asker, someone on the outside, a concerned citizen. He does this a lot, conducts conversations like he’s Plato writing a dialogue between his teacher, Socrates, and someone unimportant, someone only necessary to play dumb and prompt the next wall of text. Glaz goes into great detail until this imaginary person is convinced. He wonders what this says about him.

So yes. He’s as confident as ever, though he takes the warning signs seriously. He listens to the tone rising in volume with each passing day, powerless to stop it but capable of manipulating it.

.

“You’ve already asked me twice what I want for breakfast so stop fucking talking about it”, snaps the love of his life, a man who leaves him breathless in so many ways each and every day.

Glaz doesn’t mention how Kapkan has failed to give a straight answer so far, and instead defuses the tension with a bratty: “Guess I’ll just feed the leftovers to the neighbour’s dog then.”

He can basically hear Kapkan perking up at this, even if his back is turned. If possible, his lover would eat meat for literally every meal, and heated up for breakfast, he’s even more unable to say no. “You know I’d eat it out of her bowl if necessary”, he grumbles, the fire having died down as quickly as it reared up. Glaz has gotten extremely good at appeasing him over the years.

“I’ll take that as a yes then”, he summarises and tosses the scraps in question into the microwave. Self neglect is one of the largest red flags Kapkan wears on his back whenever it gets bad, and it’s the one Glaz will combat head on. It’s the one he’s allowed to mention as it doesn’t scream you’re abnormal, you’re ill, you’ve got issues – instead, he can disguise it as stress, something easily forgettable, low priority. As such, it’s easiest to deal with as he can remedy it immediately: suggest taking a bath together, which is something Kapkan never refuses, or he offers to cook, pretends he’s not feeling well and needs company so Kapkan joins him in bed early. Once there, his lover falls asleep quickly, but left to his own devices, he’d stay up till morning.

No, he doesn’t need to babysit him, Glaz informs his imaginary interviewer politely yet firmly. Kapkan can and does take care of himself. But if he can facilitate it, why shouldn’t he? He receives more than enough in return. Kapkan would die for him in a heartbeat, he knows this because it almost happened before, he’d do whatever Glaz demands of him, he’s a reliable presence in Glaz’ life, loving, supportive, strong. Their infatuation is mutual and not diminished by demons which are not Kapkan’s fault.

It’s difficult to predict how this episode will go. Some cumulate in a fight, be it verbal or physical, others peak unnoticeably and then ebb until Glaz nearly forgets about the whole thing, can’t imagine a universe where they aren’t the world’s most perfect couple. People often don’t appreciate their health until they fall ill. Glaz has learnt to fiercely appreciate the days on which every smile is teased out gently instead of requiring heavy machinery to surface.

.

They met in Spetsnaz, a perceived eternity ago, and by all rights should’ve separated unscathed instead of their lives intermingling the way they did in the end. Glaz’ hand to hand was rubbish and Kapkan consistently disappointed in him, leaving them both frustrated with each other, yet not to the point of memorability. Kapkan should’ve remained that morose instructor with the hard set to his mouth, and Glaz his largely incompetent yet well-meaning student of which he’s probably had plenty. Nothing about him was remarkable – nothing about either of them, really –, until some people fell ill and some others got married, and suddenly Glaz was accompanying his fellow Spetsnaz on an extended hunting trip. As if Glaz had been fifteenth in line for the throne and fate removed all fourteen in between, and now he was at his coronation, not entirely sure how he got here.

It wasn’t the two of them alone, of course, a few acquaintances and curious souls went with them, but overall not enough people to comfortably hide one’s personality for an entire month. This is when Glaz noticed that Kapkan, when talking about his passion, was easy to look at. The glint in his otherwise piercing pale eyes was contagious and Glaz inquired a lot more about hunting in general and Kapkan’s experience specifically than he’d originally intended.

Usually, Glaz falls easily, almost at the drop of a hat. Someone smiles at him wrong, someone does him an unexpected favour, and he’s gone. Lost. If this happens, it’s fleeting. But when it takes him a while to even realise he’s staring and hovering, it means it’s serious.

They require five years to get together.

During that time, they keep invading each other’s life almost by chance, end up assigned to the same place or on the same mission, and the grin he receives when they meet once more is a genuine one. Glaz longs for more and ever more: a laugh, then a touch, time spent alone, time spent alone that’s timeless and neverending in their minds. Every new bit which he almost wishes into existence he treasures and keeps it close to his heart so it warms him during the time between their meetings. This is how he thinks of his days now – either real, actual events, or merely waiting. When Kapkan isn’t there, reality loses its focus.

He doesn’t remember the words leading up the kiss and it’s something he regrets to this day. Vaguely, he recalls words too brazen and brash for his otherwise quiet, timid character, though they probably were nothing but innocent to others. But Kapkan – Kapkan understood, Kapkan who’s known him for years and can tell it’s unusual for him, and he let it happen. Despite nothing coming back, Glaz wasn’t under the impression of his flattery to bounce off the hard exterior, rather he noticed it penetrating the roughness, finding holes in its defence. Kapkan soaked it up. He refused to dance but admired Glaz’ efforts nonetheless. And so they kissed.

Kissed in full gear, the relief of an uneventful mission flooding their systems, perched in the snow next to each other and lost in conversation instead of paying attention to something their colleagues had under control anyway. A routine extraction, no support needed, and Kapkan pulled down the cloth hiding his lower face when Glaz offered him some warm coffee, and then their lips are touching, their breath visible in the icy air and Glaz’ shoulder killing him over this odd angle.

Despite going home alone that day, he got no second of sleep. His heart wouldn’t calm down, and neither his thoughts. I’m the happiest man alive, he thought, clear as day and not a doubt in his mind.

.

“Strip.”

It does have its good sides. Two, as far as Glaz is concerned: Kapkan sticks to him like Velcro to wool, knowing nobody else can keep him in check the way his lover does. The worse it gets, the more excuses pop up to stay at home, to go out alone, to take Glaz along. He doesn’t mind switching topics and reading body language like a hawk if he can hold Kapkan’s hand in return, witness his dry wit and remarkable patience.

The second positive side effect is linked to the first. Being around each other constantly leads to certain things.

Glaz takes his time because he knows Kapkan likes it this way. He follows their established routine and discards his sweater first without revealing any skin on his torso. The motion exposes his arms, which he flexes subtly – he doesn’t need to cast a glance at his lover to know his eyes have strayed from his face. His t-shirt is next, showing off his chest and the ridges of his abs through controlled breathing and contracting his muscles at the right moment.

It’s slow, this ritual of theirs, deliberate, hides nothing. Glaz feels more and more naked in more ways than one, as if he’s laying his soul bare together with his body. Undressing is too profane a word, can’t come close to denoting what’s happening between them. He bathes in Kapkan’s attention, normally is indifferent about his own body but now takes pride as he’s being desired – a conscious action for its own sake. Kapkan wants him. It’s a state of being rather than a base need.

He isn’t unaffected. The more fabric lines the floor, the warmer the air gets: Glaz is sweating in the cool bedroom, cheeks reddened and his excitement visible, even more so once he’s fully nude. He breathes hard and dares not meet Kapkan’s gaze. This isn’t about him, after all, this is about obeying and allowing Kapkan to let off steam and an exercise in control. This is how Kapkan convinces himself he’s in control. He needs to be, desperately. And challenging him on this is the last thing Glaz wants.

“Lie down.”

The command is sharp yet leaves Glaz’ skin unmarred: he’s used to this, even looks forward to it when he begins noticing the change in Kapkan’s behaviour. Complying is natural, the sheet a cold relief under his heated body. He expected to be ordered to suck him, which is the most common request he receives in moments like these – he likes drawing it out but Kapkan usually can’t wait to be inside him, so he rarely gets to blow him under normal circumstances. Right now, when it’s about showing off the power he holds over Glaz, Kapkan doesn’t mind dragging it out. Quite the opposite.

“Hold these.”

A twitch between Glaz’ legs, he can’t tell from which body part (or maybe both?), because he knows what these words mean. He doesn’t have the peace of mind for this, he’ll fail and it’ll all be over, he already knows this. Not once has he passed this challenge, not once was he able to see it through to the end, resulting in a heavy throb in his crotch for the rest of the night until he could take care of himself without Kapkan knowing. It’s the sweetest torture, but torture it is nonetheless. He’s sure he’ll disappoint his lover.

Regardless, he lifts his hands until he can put his fingers together, letting Kapkan place objects between each pair of fingertips. Tonight, they’re bullets, threatening to slip out and fall onto his belly immediately. Whether or not he’ll be satisfied today relies entirely on his ability to hold them, restrain himself from sudden movements, concentrate until it’s over. If even only one drops, Kapkan will stop.

His tongue is hot, scorching hot, and velvety smooth, and Glaz’ eyelashes are fluttering. He stares at the bare ceiling, praying to an unknown deity for strength and presence of mind, and then he’s enveloped whole. His body shakes with his stuttering in- and exhales, but he keeps the ammunition where it is. For now.

This is what it must feel like when he services Kapkan. Hardly more than teasing, only just enough to keep his pleasure climbing and climbing, however minuscule the progress. Glaz cherishes every centimetre he slips further into the wet heat and curses it simultaneously. His mouth is struggling to produce sound as it doesn’t seem to know what’s appropriate; no moans escape him, his gasps are aborted and all that leaves his throat is a pained gargling, almost unwilling because he wants this so bad, wants to enjoy it yet has to stop himself from losing to the overwhelming pleasure.

Only when Kapkan sits up does Glaz realise how tense he is, that every muscle in his body was painfully taut. Bit by bit, he relaxes consciously, fighting back the memory of how it felt to be touched, licked, loved like this in order to focus. One of the metal objects has shifted, so he corrects it. Just in time before a hand closes around him.

The callouses on their own do nothing for him, but paired with perfect technique and the knowledge of all his sensitive spots, it’s nearly too much. Glaz moves into the motion, lifts his hips in the hopes of a speedier resolution, cursing inwardly when the rhythm slows to a crawl in response. Kapkan isn’t making this easy for him, that’s the whole point. The ministrations cease again for a moment, Glaz’ thighs are lifted, his legs bent, and this time, when he feels a tongue exploring him, it’s further down.

He squeezes his eyelids shut. This is too much. He can’t bear it. His toes twitch with pangs of discomfort, but when the hand returns, the mixture tilts into nothing but pure bliss. With every lick, his hands jolt, and he’s somehow still holding on to the bullets, without knowing how but not caring, not when he’s being opened through nothing but Kapkan’s mouth. He can feel his breath ghosting over his skin.

When he can’t take it anymore, he seeks other outlets. He digs his heels into the mattress, throws his head left and right, moans and whimpers and keens at the digits probing deep while a slick muscle tugs on his rim and a tight grip brings him closer and closer. He’s shivering as if it was below zero, and still his fingers don’t budge. The centre of his universe are these five gleaming items, and fanning out from there is deep elation emerging from inside him. Moving isn’t against the rules, so he writhes and rises and falls, strains upwards and downwards and rides towards his climax with chattering teeth. He can’t lose himself or everything will be in vain. But he wants to, oh does he want to.

His orgasm shatters him. His back curves as soon as the first wave hits him, and there he remains, right on the zenith, the sensations hardly fluctuating – instead it’s a steady stream of impossible pleasure and relief flooding him and his rigid form. He’s so tightly coiled that he presses out the bullets from between his fingertips, the warmed metal falling to his stomach and mixing with the long stripes painted onto his own skin, but he couldn’t care less. It’s monumental and leaves him shuddering for a minute afterwards, still revelling in the intensity of the moment.

Sinking back into the pillows, it’s as if a spell has been lifted. Kapkan regards him with a mixture of pride and smugness, warming Glaz’ heart: gone is the no-nonsense stare, the hard set to his mouth, the roughness in his touch. They smile at each other, a soft palm trailing over Glaz’ hips and thighs, and all he wants is to sleep curled up against this man whom he knows so well.

“Turn around”, says Kapkan. And though there’s a gentle hint in his voice, it’s obvious he won’t accept a no.

He doesn’t ask whether it’s alright for Glaz, because he’d let him know if it wasn’t. They’re both aware Glaz would speak up, meaning his compliance directly implies permission. This unspoken rule makes a lot of things easier.

No preparation needed, Kapkan has worked him open with his mouth and fingers already, so he slides right into the sensitive and overstimulated hole. Up to the hilt. Glaz’ whine is lost in the pillows.

“You’re beautiful”, Kapkan whispers and Glaz feels it in his throat, balls his hands into fists and clenches them around the sheets because he won’t be shown any more patience this evening.

Despite the discomfort, he likes this, too, the rawness of it and the glimpse he gets of undisguised emotions. In between sharp snaps and hard thrusts, Kapkan compliments him, each of his words melting Glaz below him, and the kisses now and then mask the loud noises. He doesn’t dare reciprocate, keeps his vocalisations garbled and takes it without moving, drinking in the growls and not commenting on the teeth burying into his skin. They’ll leave marks, he knows this.

This is what Kapkan’s composed attitude from before hid, this is what he really feels. Glaz would never deprive him of this, no matter how uncomfortable it is, because it’s one of the purest displays of Kapkan’s love. He can’t get enough of Glaz, doesn’t seem to know what to do with all this affection he harbours, so now and then it spills over. It’s reassuring. Their feelings for each other are this strong.

While Kapkan showers, Glaz gathers the bullets and lines them up on the bedside table. Reflecting the soft light from outside, they shimmer like golden stars.

Glaz is aware they might use them to end someone’s life.

.

This time, the climax announces itself. Like a freight train, it makes itself known from quite a distance away, whereas Glaz is chained to the tracks; he’s got a date and even a time when he’ll be able to stare into the conductor’s eyes. He realises with horror that he’ll have to ride this one out, no way around it: Kapkan is scheduled for the exercise and found out before Glaz did, eliminating the possibility of approaching Harry about it. His defence would’ve been weak yet honest – in the moment, Kapkan will act and react exactly like his intensive training ingrained in him, no doubt about it. It’s the after which causes Glaz considerable anguish. But re-assigning him would draw his attention and then Glaz would bear the brunt of it personally and not by association.

Kapkan has been getting worse for a while now, his light, restless sleep a good indicator for rising agitation, and as soon as he hears about the exercise, he knows. No way around this either: he knows. Stubborn as he is, he’ll walk right into it expecting a different outcome, will deny any parallels locked in his mind between watching his colleagues go down, not knowing where the shots were coming from, expecting to be next, and experiencing much of the same in a controlled setting. I know it’s not real, he says, and then a different voice must pop up in his mind later: But this was. Remember? Let me remind you.

Glaz is fully aware of what will happen and Kapkan too, and still inaction is his best option. He distracts him with little sessions of having Kapkan describe a mutual acquaintance or friend while drawing exactly what he says and then prompting outraged chuckles when he presents the final result. He cooks every day, either breakfast or dinner, and Kapkan lets him. This is what worries Glaz the most, because he’s sure Kapkan can tell he’s walking on eggshells around him, and instead of calling him out on it, he accepts it quietly. Seems to appreciate the kid gloves. He’s never done this before, and it’s terrifying.

Two days before the scheduled catastrophe, Glaz finds himself in the kitchen, staring at the open cutlery drawer and catching himself wondering where he should stow it all. It takes him a long while to realise he’s crying, and even longer to understand why – Kapkan is in good hands tonight, out with people Glaz knows he can trust, and he’s had a relaxing evening involving a long bath, a good film, and delicious leftovers. He should be feeling better than he did all week, yet it’s achieved the opposite effect: all the pent-up tension is flowing out of him in salty droplets now that he doesn’t need to be painfully aware of his surroundings at all times. His joints are aching and he’s shivering; stress has caught up with him as well as all the thinking he postponed to less rainy days.

He thinks about how eerily calm Kapkan has been. How much he has postponed as well.

Slamming the drawer shut, he heads straight to bed and ignores the icy tendrils curling around his limbs, even though they only recede once Kapkan has joined him hours later.

.

The next morning, his outburst and physical discomfort become crystal clear, though the newfound explanation does nothing to quell Glaz’ dread. He’s ill.

Neither the first time nor the last he’s dragged himself into work despite a fever, though most of his co-workers care enough to point out his paleness. Staring back from the mirror is an ashen-faced shadow of a man drenched in sweat, and though it’s probably only the flu, the implications are far-reaching. Depending on whether he gets better today or not, he won’t be able to work tomorrow. Or accompany Kapkan. Cushion his fall.

At the end of the day, it seems an impossibility – concentrating on anything requires much more brain capacity than he has to spare, and keeping himself hydrated and fed is a task so monumental he can’t possibly shoulder it twice. Barely does he notice Kapkan shoving him into the shower to wash off the uncomfortable clamminess left on his skin, and the next time he’s lucid, he’s in bed with a jug of water on the nightstand. He must’ve been forced to take some medicine as the aching isn’t as bad anymore, he no longer feels like shedding his own skin and the pounding in his head has subsided. Like this, he can hardly depend on himself.

The air is fluffy snow on his skin, impeding his movements and causing his teeth to clack together as he fights his way to the living room, intent on spending every minute he can in Kapkan’s presence to soothe them both. All he gains, however, is an angry snarl and a manhandling the way he came – his lover isn’t having any of it. Still. He remains by Glaz’ side and he probably has his own pitiful whining to thank for it. Throughout the rest of the evening and the night, whenever he wakes up, there’s a solid presence behind his back. And even if Kapkan barely sleeps himself, he stays right where he is.

.

Waking up to an empty bed is a blow Glaz could do without. He feels better – marginally –, but what sends him into a full blown panic is the realisation that it’s out of his hands now. However Kapkan reacts today, he won’t be present to absorb the shock, and he can’t figure out the best course of action when he’s ignorant of what happened. Calling someone else to inquire in detail seems messy as it’d get them talking, meaning all he can do is wait.

So he waits.

Waits like someone on death row, barely touches the food Kapkan placed next to the refilled jug and skims the books next to the food listlessly. And waits. Waits for the inevitable jingling of keys, steps which might be soft or loud or disorientated, maybe the calling of his name. Several hours, he waits for it and when it happens, he’s still not ready.

“How do you feel?”, is Kapkan’s only question as he helps Glaz up, wraps him in a spare blanket and changes the soaked sheets.

He takes an eternity to answer. “Better”, he says through the headache and the shivering.

A stern glance. “You’ve always been a horrible liar.” And that’s that.

They spend the evening next to each other once more, Kapkan devouring his dinner while awkwardly perched on the mattress and reading something on his phone, and Glaz still waits. It’ll happen. It can happen any moment now, he knows this, knows the exercise took place as he got a text about it, and so he waits.

He recovers over the weekend and returns to work on Monday. They went for a few walks which left him weak but sharper-minded due to the fresh air, but as much as he scrutinises the mild-mannered man by his side, he finds no indicators of a lurking rage, simmering deep below. He knows it’s there. He knows it will surface in some way, maybe not directed at the environment but inwards.

Kapkan showers without a reminder. He brings Glaz meals and drops a comment about Glaz’ schedule being so messed up he doesn’t even know when to eat anymore. He tries to draw a squirrel for half an hour and only stops because Glaz is dizzy from laughing so much.

Gradually, he stops waiting. Healthy again, he knows he can deal with it whenever it comes, and so he focuses on the present.

And it never happens.

.

About four months later, Kapkan snaps at a grocery clerk for something insignificant. He leaves Glaz drooling, panting, shuddering and wholly satisfied that night after two hours of rigorous teasing. The next day, he jumps a foot in the air over someone dropping their phone.

A few people ask Glaz whether Kapkan is alright. He just smiles and assures them that yes, he’s doing fine. No, he doesn’t need any support. Yes, he’s got it all under control.

This time, he doesn’t need to justify himself to anyone made up.

That evening, he develops a fierce headache. It turns into a migraine so bad he can barely walk, so he whispers to Kapkan that he’s going to bed early and no, he doesn’t need to join him, he’ll be alright, he doesn’t need anything, and still he’s encased in strong arms not five minutes later and forced to swallow a pill which he instead hides under the mattress. He suggests some ice cream might help, and a shoulder massage, and miraculously, he feels much better the next morning.

When he enters the kitchen, Kapkan is whistling to himself, horribly out of tune and unconcerned who might hear him. He only whistles on good days.

“Better?”, he greets Glaz with a tone implying it’s Glaz’ own responsibility to remain healthy, but pulls him to his chest regardless, carding a hand through his hair gently. He’s soft. When Glaz nuzzles him with his nose, he lets out a low chuckle which reverberates in Glaz’ own torso. He’s never felt this safe.

“Yes”, he mumbles against warm skin. “Much better.”

[victoodles]

Corruption (Crowley x Angel Reader) Part 1

I finished Good Omens yesterday and I wrote this today. The second part (aka the filth) will be coming soon! Also on AO3!

Goody Two-Shoes

That’s what he'd been calling you for the past 6,000 years or so. You were a rule-abiding angel - obediently following orders with no questions asked. Always with an eager flap of your wings. Past tense, however, is key here.

Were.

Now you found yourself lazily draped over the arm of a demon’s throne in his own abode, white dress pooling around your thighs. A cup of wine in hand, held up in the air as you idly swished the liquid. You felt like a girl in one of those oil paintings you saw during the Renaissance.

Like ‘The Venus of Urbino’

Crowley chuckled, bemused but humored. “Like the what now?”

“Oh! Nothing,” you said, forgetting the thought with a swig of your drink. You hadn’t realized you’d actually spoken aloud.

He had recently turned you on to the joys of wine: Chardonnay, Sauvignon blanc, Cabernet, the list goes on. Those uppity Archangels had created a trend amongst the humans. They claimed the stuff was a vice, abhorrent, and immensely sinful. How drab.

Later on, they passed it down the angel hierarchy as gospel, essentially condemning it. It was clearly meant for slothful humans with no faith. You made it a priority to avoid it at all costs, lest you eternally displease your overseers.

However, it seemed Crowley was to be much more...persuasive than the hogwash lectures from Gabriel and Michael. The influence they had over you was unraveling, as much as you tried to deny it.

For this, Crowley seemed to find quite a bit of fun in teasing you throughout the centuries. He ruffled your feathers, quite literally. You had always been by the books - no ifs, ands, or buts. After all, the higher-ups did assign you to tote after Aziraphale once he “lost” his flaming sword. Keep him on the straight and narrow. You hadn't expected the infamous snake of Eden to be along for the ride.

Crowley had quickly made a game with his friend on how many times in one conversation he could make you scoff in contempt. His current record was seventeen.

But the tit for tat was never malicious in nature like his kind was so inclined towards. Much like Aziraphale, he thoroughly enjoyed your company and the banter along with it.

Perhaps even a tad more than Aziraphale.

Try as you may, you couldn’t fathom why the angel would ever keep the company of a demon like Crowley. Demons and angels went together as well as one could expect of fire and gasoline. But despite all your angelic instincts, you decided to keep their friendship (and yours) out of your reports to Heaven.

And as much as you tried to remain prickled towards him, you soon found yourself inching closer and closer to Crowley.

“So I told Cain, ‘In my humble opinion, I think Abel isn’t worth his sheeps' shit.’ I thought he would take it out on his brother’s herd, not beat him to death with a rock,” Crowley explained with an exasperated sigh. “Alas.”

Appalled but not surprised, you clapped a hand over your mouth. “You aided in creating humankind’s first killer?!” Pride tugged at the corner of Crowley’s lips at your declaration.

“Well when you put it like that, it sounds far more exciting doesn’t it?”

You threw a velvet cushion at his head - he dodged it with a laugh. “Crowley! That’s terrible,” you squealed. Crowley leaned back on his palms along his stone table, shrugging nonchalantly.

“In my defense, Cain did receive protection and promises of vengeance from God afterwards,” he said as if it were something to boast about.

“Only for the price of everlasting exile,” you barked back dryly. Crowley regarded you from behind his sunglasses, a devilish (no pun intended) smirk on his face.

“Oh sorry, princess, I forget how positively tame you are in comparison.” Pink rushed to your cheeks at the emphasis on your new nickname. He had a plethora of them -  sometimes a new one for each day of the week.

But the innuendo behind this one had your wings twitching against your back, eager to hide your newfound bashfulness. It was a habit you inadvertently developed whenever Crowley decided to get especially cheeky with you.  

“E-excuse me,” your voice wavered, rising an octave with each pronounced syllable. Crowley’s simper only grew. He brought the bottle of wine on the table to his lips, ignoring the glass he had already poured.

“You’re not exactly the most anarchic, princess. Peace and order appeals to you too much to have any real fun,” he mocked with a click of his tongue.

How dare he!

You turned your nose up at him, “I’ll have you know, Mister Crowley, that I can be quite adventurous.” As if to prove the sentiment, you raised your glass at him. “See? I’m drunk, with a demon!”

That last point was made to really drive home the fact of how bad you were. Crowley was not impressed. He took a hearty sip from his bottle, rolling his eyes in the process. Your frustration only grew at his dismissal.

Crowley regarded you as he drank, loving how the remnants of your blush left your cheeks an enchanting shade of red. You always seemed to captivate him regardless of circumstances. To say he was attracted to your purity, amongst other things, wouldn’t be too far from the truth

A purity he selfishly wanted all to himself.

The demon found himself quite enamored with you for reasons that would be too...saccharine for someone of his ilk to admit. But when you look at him with your big doe-eyes, the heart he swears he doesn’t have beats just a little bit faster. Though he persistently insists it’s just to appear more human when Aziraphale inquires.

He can’t help it. The moment that innocent gaze turns into a fiery glower, he swears he’s never seen anything more intense in his existence.

Sultry. That’s the best word he can use to describe you right you right now. Pursing your lips on the rim of your glass, you attempt to quell your agitation with wine. Your free arm hand loosely grasps the back of the chair, head lolled. He took note of how much leg you were showing as you gently swung your feet back and forth. There wasn’t an ounce of virtue in your posture.

If he didn’t know any better he would’ve thought you a succubus, attempting to disarm and seduce him.

A thought crossed his mind as he released the bottle from his mouth with a pop.

“You know,” he began, slowly licking the remnants of wine off his lips. You noticed, and tried to ignore the thrumming in your chest. “I bet you’ve never indulged in any of the other physical pleasures humanity has to offer,” he said lasciviously.

Plush feathers tickled your spine as you desperately tried to contain your wings. You lurched forward in your seat, choking on wine while he has the gaul to snicker at you.

“The audacity-“

“Well have you,” he cuts you off before you can chastise him. You’re taken aback by how forward he’s being. Petulance then fills you.

“O-of course I have,” you sputter pathetically. He quirked an eyebrow, silently asking you to continue. You face forward, straightening yourself out in a sad attempt to gather more composure.

“...There was a sweet Parisian lad who took me to Carnaval way back when. He tried to teach me to dance and, well, you know how the saying goes. In the end he graced me with a kiss on the cheek under the moonlight. Oh, it was all rather romantic.”

“Quite the little minx, ain’t you? I feel like a sinner in church just listening to ya, princess,” Crowley huffed, throwing back another gulp.

You were burning up more than you knew possible. While other ethereal inhabitants may choose to partake in certain...activities, you decided to stick to modesty. To be chaste. It’s how all proper angels should be!

Right?  

“And I suppose you have then,” you grumbled, defeated.

With that, Crowley’s demeanor shifted. Previous inhibitions gone from a simple question.

He placed the bottle back down, removing his sunglasses in the process. Serpentine eyes, half lidded and glowing a faint yellow in the evening light, bore into you. His legs spread tantalizingly.

Another pang against your ribs.

It suddenly ceased when he pushed himself up and began to saunter over to you.

“Why yes,” he said sensually as he approached.

“Yes.”

Step.

“I.”

Step.

“Have.” His hand found a perch on the ornate backrest as he towered above you. He pushed your legs apart with his knee and stood between them. You inhaled sharply, your glass slipping from your grasp and shattering harshly on the floor beside you. Neither of you paid the mess any mind.

Crowley chuckled darkly, daring to lean in closer. “Lust, quite an enjoyable thing really. Lucifer truly did the world a kindness with that particular circle of Hell,” he mused, looking downward almost fondly. His free hand caressed your cheek, featherlight.

Ironically, you felt heavier. The weight of your unspoken attraction to the demon was crashing down upon you. You tried, for countless years, to subdue any unseemly desires. An angel could not intimately coexist with their mortal enemy, a demon.

...Right?

It had always been a challenge the more attached you became to Earth. To Crowley. Your efforts were tumultuous, yet overall successful. But now, in this moment, it was unbearable.

Suffocating.

Again Crowley slid closer, noses mere inches apart. The sweetness of the wine still lingered on him. “Skin on skin. A heat in your belly that can only be satiated by submitting to carnal urges. Kissing, biting, fucking,” he purred against the shell of your ear.

An unfamiliar shiver wracked your body; you’ve never been this close to another soul before. The rumble of his impish laughter sent that same shiver lower that time.

Those eyes, snakelike but bewitching, they had to be putting you in some sort of trance. It was intoxicating - may it forever bound you within it’s honied depths.

Those eyes.

Behind them was longing, need, warmth.

“Tell me, Angel,” his thumb traces your plush bottom lip. “Would you like to know?”

Ensnared.

“K-know what?” The words were barely a whisper.

The devil always hears.

You planted your own Garden of Eden and reached for the apple of your own accord. The snake hisses with delight from beyond the underbrush.

“Would you like to know what it’s like?” His lips are almost upon yours now, waiting patiently for what they knew would eventually come.

Temptation is a cruel master.

[omg-baeyoung-baeran]

Marked with the Kiss of Death: Chapter One (A Mystic Messenger AU Fanfiction)

Archive on Our Own Link

YT Trailer

Genre: Crime, Action,Thriller, Romance, Comedy, Drama

Pairings: Saeran/MC 2, 707/MC 5; more to come

Summary:

Would you rather be famous but live with a criminal?

"I swear he finds me anywhere I go! I see his white hair in all---"

The feeling of freezing arms snaking around her waist gave her sudden reconsiderations of her life decisions.

"It's just how it is, Princess."

Or would you rather hide from a criminal and live as a beggar?

"Sorry, I don't have coins," he muttered as he ran his hand through his unruly red hair.

His boyish charm has sufficed her eyes, but not enough to please her stomach.

"Big bills are fine."

He never knew beggars can be so picky.

o-o-o-o

 Every waking minute, she wondered…  just what the hell is wrong with him?

  “Yes, princess—”

  “I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again—my bodyguard is broken.”

 o-o-o-o-o

 Ayu clipped two braided blonde locks in a half ponytail. Although she preferred a full braid, her chin-length hair forbade her to do so. She sometimes wished she had not cut her hair, but the barrage of compliments from her social media had tickled her narcissistic side.

 It took merely a week before she eventually grew bored with the limited variety of styles she could do.

 “Pink or nude? Red is good too, though?” Ayu shook her head. “No, that’s trying too hard.”

 Looking into the mirror, she pictured two versions of herself, one sporting a pink shade, the other with a nude shade. At first, it was a simple dilemma that boiled down to three choices—  would she go for a feminine, striking, or a subtle kind of beauty?  With the striking red out of the picture, her options narrowed down to a subtle nude or a feminine pink.

 Eventually, she set down the other two tubes, settling for feminine, “Pink it is.”

 Twisting the cap open, she looked at the mirror and swiped the applicator on her lips. She smacked her lips twice to even the colour out. Once she was done, she placed it back in the tube and twisted it close.

 For her most dreaded part—contact lenses. As the fanmeet fiasco happened fairly recently, she was yet to get used to poking her eyes.

  ‘I just got your messages~!’

 Ayu switched off the alarm notification and checked the time— 2:00 P.M.

  There was no time for contact lenses. 

 “Guess I’ll go nerdy.”

 o-o-o-o

  When she says her heart almost leaped out of her chest, of course, it was an   exaggeration...

  ...but there was no denying that he scared the living daylights out of her.

 “Do I know you?”

 There was no knock on the door; not even a text message—as she opened the door, she found herself face-to-face with astranger in a black suit, waiting in the front door.

 “Sorry I’m late,” he bowed. “I was told a princess needed a bodyguard?”

  ‘Princess? Bodyguard?’

 Frowning, Ayu eyed him up and down; he was of average height—with her stopping just below his ear—and had white hair with its tips a faded red. Despite the white hair, he did not seem old—he looked to be in his early 20s, in fact. Just like her.

  Was it too late to take out her pepper spray? He might attack her anytime.

 “Bodyguard?” she scrunched her brows.  No one informed her about a new bodyguard.  “How would I know if you’re telling the truth? Do you have any proof to validate your claims?”

 “Yes,” he fished through his pocket and pulled out a phone. He quickly tapped his fingers on the screen, then handed it to her. “You can call your dad.”

 Though suspicious, she took the phone from his hand.

 His contacts book had only one contact in it— Big Boss.

 Her lip curled into a sneer at the name, ‘Big Boss? Cringey.’

 She pressed the ‘Call’ button and held the phone against her ear. Two rings later, the other line picked up.

  “Ray? You called?”

  Sure enough, it was her father’s familiar deep voice. And he knew Ray… So Ray was not a random die-hard fan trying to get close to her.

 “Dad?”

  “Oh, princess, it’s you. I see Ray has arrived.”

 “What’s this about a bodyguard? What about Mister Park?”

  “Ah, about that… I replaced him. I figured Ray would handle the job better.”

  So he was still hung up about the fanmeet incident! Granted, it only happened three weeks ago but...

 “Dad! I swear he did nothing wrong! It happened so fast; no one could have foreseen it!”

  “Still, it was his job to act fast.”

 Ayu let all her stress out with a sigh. As his only daughter, her father cared for her too much that it bordered on overprotectiveness.

  Scratch that; it was not borderline—he certainly was overprotective.

 “Okay, Dad. I’ll call you later. I have to go.”

 After saying their goodbyes, Ayu tapped ‘End Call’ before handing it back to Ray.

 “So…,” she crossed her arms,  “you’re Ray?”

 He took the phone from her, then nodded with a polite close-mouthed smile that screamed forced. Being in the showbiz industry had exposed her to such smiles that she was no stranger to it.

  After all, she herself was an expert at that sort of smile.

 “Just Ray.”

 Uncrossing her arms, she nodded. “Well, at least you’re on time. I’m going to have lunch with my friend. Do you know where Chamwon Restaurant is?”

 “No, but I can use Noogle Maps.”

 “Alright,” she nodded and walked past him. “Let’s go, then.”

 o-o-o-o

 “Zen-oppa!” Ayu excitedly waved, bouncing on her heels.

 A handsome long-haired albino turned his head to her direction, “Ayu!” He waved back, motioning them to come over.

 “Hey,” she tapped Ray’s shoulder, then whispered, “Does my hair look good?” 

 “Of course, Princess,” Ray vigorously nodded. “You’d still look good even without it!”

  ‘Is complimenting me also part of his job description? Dad really did things overboard.’

 Though weirded out, she led him to their reserved spot, with Ray following exactly five steps away.

 Multiple eyes followed their move, but no one dared to get close. With the peaceful atmosphere and customers minding their own businesses, she could not help but feel that their lunch would go smoothly.

 “I’m sorry! Did you wait long?”

 Zen shook his head. “No! Come on, let’s order.”

 Pulling their chairs back, they were about to take their seats...

 Ayu paused, wearing a look of plain confusion on her face. Zen, too, had an identical expression on his face.

  Source of confusion: her new bodyguard.

 It must have been a strange sight: three adults, pausing mid-sit with their asses hovering over their chairs.

  His first day working for her and he was not doing a good first impression.

  ‘What does he want?’  Standing straight, Ayu held Ray’s arm and pulled him up. “Zen-oppa, will you excuse us for a moment?”

 “Um, sure,” Zen said, confused, but sat down anyway.

 “You can order now! We’ll be back reeeaal quick!” She faced Ray and released his arm, cocking her head to the side and motioning him to come with her.

 He nodded, following Ayu as she led him further from the table. With Zen out of earshot and taking a menu from a waitress,  Ayu placed a hand on Ray’s shoulder and pushed it down, making him bend to her height, and whispered, “Okay, I know Dad told you to be this overprotective, but I promise to give you a bonus payment later—just please! Sit somewhere else!”

 Ayu made sure her smile did not falter. Personal space in public places was a luxury celebrities like her could not afford. A headline of  "Idol caught mistreating her bodyguard?!"   would prove detrimental to her image… especially in Zen’s presence.

 Ray whispered back, “A bonus payment is hard to enjoy when I'm missing my head.”

  ‘You coward. Can you even call yourself a bodyguard?’

 “You don’t have to worry. Just enjoy your date—”

 “Shh! It’s not a date!” Blood rising to her face, she darted her head side-to-side, then sighed in relief.  So far, no one noticed.

 The showbiz industry was an unforgiving one—she was basically  “owned”  by her fans. Being in a relationship was seen as something of a betrayal to them. Even being seen with Zen was a surprising sight, and rumours about their “dating scandal” used to pop up.

 It had caused an uproar within the fandom so as a result, she always assured her fans that they were just friends.

  Unfortunately.

 The explanation seemed to satisfy them, as hanging out with Zen was not much of a shock anymore.

 “And don’t mind me. I promise you’ll forget I even exist! Trust me," he beamed at her with an innocent smile on his lips.

 "Does this face look like it trusts you?" she hissed back in a harsh whisper.

 Ray studied her face, and for a moment,  he thought he was looking at something utterly hideou—

   "Yes," he answered briefly.

 “Fine,” she sighed. “Let’s go back. Oppa must be hungry.”

 Heading back to the table, Ayu took slow strides to calm her nerves, gazing longer at Zen who was intently reading the menu, unaware of the attention she was giving him. Even from afar, Zen gave off an aura of unrivaled beauty and charm. Hell, even the way he flipped pages stirred in her tingles of teenage giddiness.

  How anyone could look perfect just by doing nothing was something Ayu once thought impossible. But the first time she laid eyes on him, she realized just how closed-off her world had been.

 She was not alone in thinking that; almost everyone in the room had their eyes fixated at Zen, and not just because he was a famous celebrity.

 The closer they got to their table, the more the surroundings blurred for her, and the more focused Zen’s beauty became. Ayu somewhat hated the paparazzi, for despite how perfect Zen looked in every angle, they lacked the skill to capture the breathtaking beauty he possessed. A disgrace to photographers around the world, was what they were to her.

 At least the paparazzi's incompetence worked in her favour, for she was one of the lucky few able to admire his beauty in the flesh

 “Sorry about that,” Ayu spoke as she reached their table.

 “It’s fine.” Zen handed her the other menu.

 “I haven’t introduced you guys to each other. By the way, this is my new bodyguard, Ray! He replaced Mr. Park just a while ago.”

 “It’s fine! So, are you ready to or… der?” Zen’s voice faltered at the end.

 Confused, Ayu followed his line of vision and frowned.  She was willing to give him a second chance since not everyone should be judged by their first impression but this…

 Ray, arms crossed over his chest, stayed rooted by Ayu’s right.

 “Oh,” Zen was the first to regain his senses, “don’t you want to join Dongwon? You might feel out of place.” he pointed to a nearby table where a tall, bald man sat, reading a menu.

 “It’s fine. Just enjoy your meal, Sir.”

 “But—”

 “Ah, don’t mind him,” Ayu dismissively waved her hand.  They were just wasting their time. Smiling through gritted teeth, she gave Ray’s arm a squeeze. “Ray here! He’s just really,” she squeezed it tighter, “reeeaaally… passionate about his job.”

 Ray pulled his arm out of her grasp, “Ahaha! You overestimate me, Princess!” He said, sporting a big smile on his face, intensifying in Ayu an urge to rip it off of his face.

 “Ooh, 'Princess' ?” Zen said with a playful quirk of his brow.

 “Ah! That’s what he used to call his bosses! It kinda just… stuck to him! Old habits die hard, you know?”

  ‘How dare Ray embarrass me in front of Zen?! What if he found it cringy?’

 “If you say so, Princess!” Zen teased. For some reason,  "Princess"  sounded far better coming from his lips. As usual, Zen will always be the exception. “Well then, at least take a seat,” he requested and gestured to the chair beside Ayu.

 Ray shook his head. “Oh no. I’ll stay here.”

 “You’ll,” Ayu choked out her next word, “what?”

 “You know, I need to act fast if something happens to you,” he said matter-of-factly.

 She did not know what potential her father saw in Ray; all she could see was Ray teetering on the fine line between caution and paranoia.

 “Ah, you don’t have to!” She forced a smile, shaking her head. Surely, not even he was dense enough to miss her straightforward message.

  ‘Seriously. You. Don’t. Have. To.’ 

 “Oh, what’s wrong?”

 Dongwon walked over to their table, then slightly bowed. He stood by Zen’s side, mirroring Ray’s position.

 “Oh, um, want to sit with us?” Zen offered, albeit confused.

 To Ayu’s dismay, Dongwon shook his head.  Things seemed to be going in a direction that strayed from her original vision.

 “Hmm, I see?” Zen said. “We’ll order takeout for you after, how does that sound?”

 The two bodyguards nodded, mumbling their thanks.

 “Okay! Now that that’s settled… Ayu, is there anything you want?”

 Humming to herself, Ayu flipped a page and shrugged, “I’m not sure. Whatever you think is good.”

 “Okay! I’ll just order the usual then.” Zen raised his arm, catching not only a nearby waitress’ attention but the other customers' as well.

 They must have wondered if their presence was an elaborate endorsement; after all, having two celebrities hanging out in basically any place—from five-star restaurants to junkyards—was bound to bring attention.

 The waitress that came over was a young woman, possibly around 18 to 19, with a name tag that says "Jihyo".

 “Yes?”

 For a second, Ayu was unable to suppress the frown from showing. Once she noticed, she quickly replaced it with a smile.

  ‘Who the hell does this girl think she is?’

 Being in the entertainment industry made it easy to discern that type of voice—one she heard a lot from girls;  it was the voice that made her want to slice her ears off.

 Ayu looked in disgust, as the waitress swayed her body side-to-side, bouncing on the balls of her feet and looking at Zen with an awestruck expression.

  ‘Please mess up our order.’

 “We’ll have Set C….” Zen showed her the menu, pointing at their order.

 The way the Jihyo girl’s face got closer to Zen’s triggered within her an urge to….

 Jihyo scribbled their order on her notepad, particularly slow for a two-word order.

  ‘Hurry up.’

 Once she was done, she bowed and left the table. Ayu’s murderous thoughts were finally put at ease.

 “So… about your role!”

 Zen’s face lit up. “I’m glad you asked!”

 “What’s your role?”

 “Okay, so it’s a murder mystery show. Basically, my character is a lawyer prodigy. Something happened in his past that made him into who he is, which I won’t say because it’s a spoiler. So anyway—”

 Not once did she chime in or cut his words off, only nodding every so often. The combination of Zen’s perfectly-sculpted features, enchanting red eyes, melodic voice, and passion for acting never failed to capture her in a trance.

 “I’m sure you’ll do a good job!” Ayu gushed. “Can’t wait to watch it!”

 Zen chuckled, “When I first heard the summary, I thought it might be something you’d like.”

 “You thought so?”

 “Here’s your order.”

 To her relief, a different waiter came with their order. After turning the grill on, he set down two trays of raw meat and plates of side dishes—kimchi, fish cakes, japchae, steamed eggs, and baby potatoes. 

 “Order’s complete. Enjoy your meal." The waiter dipped his head, and left.

 o-o-o-o

  ‘Discomfort by proxy’—did such a term exist? If so, that was the perfect way to describe what Ray currently felt, what with all those stares directed at the two celebrities.  How could anyone get used to this? It was hard enough to eat with just one person staring, but more than one? He might as well be a zoo animal, then.

 Glancing to his left, Ray spotted a group of high school-aged boys five tables away, two of them holding menus in front of their faces, trying to catch a peek of his oblivious boss. Today was a lucky day for those boys, as their idol crush was too busy making disgusting googly eyes at Zen to notice them.

 “You mentioned you wanted to try acting, right?” Zen asked.

 “Oh… yeah. I just wanted to try it out like once, but I’m not really actively looking,” Ayu shrugged.

 “Hmm, if you want, the director told me he has a friend who’ll be directing a film! And she’s looking for actresses who can star in her movie.”

 “Ooh! What’s it about?”

 “Not sure yet. I’ll ask him.”

 “Tell me, okay?!”

 With another glance to the left, Ray saw that those boys now had phones discreetly peeking out from their menus. 

 Ray rolled his eyes. Seriously, who were they fooling? 

 He shifted to the left, blocking Ayu from their view. Though faced away from them, he could hear them whining how perfect the photo would have been were it not for  “that photobombing tofu”.

 He suppressed a snort, ‘Tofu? That’s the best you can do?’

 As derogatory as it sounded, it did not bother him at all. After all, pale skin such as his own was sought after.

 “So Sienna—”

 The brief frown that rose from Ayu’s face did not go unnoticed to Ray’s eyes.

  Sienna Park, the visual, center and lead vocalist of the girl group his boss’ daughter was from—Dandelion; also considered the second-most popular member after Ayu.

 Zen, however, was unaware of the sour change of mood, for her face reverted back to its over-the-top cheerfulness in an instant.

  ‘Well, idols have to keep up a facade…’

 It jarred Ray as to how she could switch from sweet to murderous with ease.

  Click!

 Ayu’s head instinctively snapped up. “Oppa!” She squealed.

  ‘Oppa,’  Ray almost sniggered at that.  ‘Do girls actually think they look cute saying that?’

 “Hmm, what caption should I put?” Zen sang teasingly.

 “Delete that!” She threatened with wide eyes, only for her growing grin to render her threats futile, as though she enjoyed being teased by him.

  ‘Get a room…’

 “Why not? It looks cute! See?”

 Zen held his phone in front of her, which showed a candid shot of her, mouth slightly open, in the middle of talking and flipping over a piece of beef.

 “Cute?” A dust of pink slowly spread on her cheeks as she turned her head away.

 “Yeah. I rarely see you with your glasses on. It always looks so new to me.”

 “Oh… Maybe I should’ve worn my contact lenses instead,” she pouted, before adding a new set of strips to the grill.

 “Nah, that’s not what I meant. I think you look cute with your glasses.”

 Her hold on the tong loosened.

  Shing!

 “Ah!” She exclaimed, recoiling as the meat sizzled and spattered oil droplets on her.

 Zen took the tong from her, taking over. “Do you disagree that much?” He chuckled at her flustered face.

 “O-Oppa! You’re such a joker!” She sheepishly laughed. Without the tong to keep her occupied, she fanned her reddened face with both hands.

 Ray wanted to throw up all over their fishcakes.  It was hard to stand there with a straight face.

 Before he could actually throw up, Ray stopped listening in on their conversation. It’s not like there was anything interesting to take from it.

 As for her father, he could finally sleep at night without worrying about Zen stealing his only princess away.  From the looks of it, his paranoia was baseless, as it was all unrequited on Ayu's part.

 With a father like that, he pitied any guy unfortunate enough to catch Ayu’s fancy.

 “Ooh, I think this is done,” Zen said, switching the grill stove off. One by one, he took each slice and placed them on another plate.

 “Hmm!” Ayu gushed as she inhaled the barbecues’ mouth-watering aroma. “This looks so good!”

 “Eat up,” Zen said, handing her a pair of metal chopsticks.

 “Yes! Thank you for the food!”

 She waited until Zen took the first bite. “Is it good?”

 “Yep!”

 Using his own chopsticks, he pinched a chunk of rice, adding a small slice of pork along with it. With a palm below to catch any falling grain, Zen brought it closer to Ayu’s mouth. “Say ‘aah’!” 

  ‘What do you think you two are doing?’

 They were famous celebrities; would it kill them to be more careful? Surely, this would cause a dating scandal.

  And a scolding from Big Boss as well.

 Just in time, he could already see someone pulling out a phone from two tables away.

 Eyes closed, Ayu leaned forward and opened her mouth, “Aaaahh.”

  ‘You’re not helping matters at all, dummy.’

 Ray moved to her left side, just before she took a bite, hiding her from the photographer’s view before giving the camera a “little” smile— an apology for ruining what should have been a perfect shot.

 But his apology seemed unwanted, as they scowled both at their phone screens and him.

 “Is it good?”

 “Mm-hmm!” Ayu nodded, simpering, and seemingly disconnected from the real world.

 “I’m glad you liked it,” Zen nodded, before facing Ray. “Mister Ray, you really don’t want to sit?”

 “It’s fine,” he shook his head with a forced smile. “I’m not hungry anyway.”

 “Hmm, I see—”

  Bzzt! Bzzt!

 “Oh, just a moment,” Zen said, glancing at his vibrating phone, then at Ayu. “Sorry. Can I take this call? It’s a bit urgent.” 

 “Sure! Take your time!” She nodded.

 “I’ll be quick!” Zen held the phone near his ear, speaking in a hushed tone as he headed to the bathroom.

 With Zen away to take the call, the whole table was quiet. Ayu continued eating without him.

  This was bad. The absence of a tall and handsome guy like Zen to be intimidated by made it easier for average no-name guys to try their luck.

 Not even 10 seconds after Zen left, a young man, holding a journal and pen, was heading towards their table.

  How foolish. Ray may not be as tall or breathtakingly handsome as Zen, but it didn’t matter. Now that he was paid to be stuck by Ayu’s side, the chances of ever coming near her were close to nil.

  The date had numbed his mind so much, he might as well amuse himself.

 Taking advantage of Ayu’s absentmindedness, Ray sidled to her left, placing a hand behind her and resting it over the chair’s rail.

 Ray’s protective stance prompted the young boy to stop in his tracks, looking as though he was having second thoughts.

 He flashed the young man a cheeky smile that was in no way welcoming. 

 Put off by the hostility emanating from his smile, the boy’s conflicting thoughts were put to rest, and he finally backed out.

 With his intimidation a success, he straightened his posture.

 “Okay, done!”

  Her rat-tailed friend finally arrived.

  Zen announced, then pulled his chair back and sat. “Did you wait long?”

 “Nope, not at all!”

 “Soooo… how’s this charity thing of yours doing? Something… F.A? ” Ayu questioned with a slight tilt of her head.

 “RFA? It’s doing well! Hmm, we still don’t have a set date for the next party, though.”

 “Oh, I see,” she nodded.

 “I’ll send you and the girls an invitation once our party coordinator decides on the date.”

 A split-second pout crossed her face but was immediately replaced with a full grin.

 “Yay!” Ayu clapped. “What will the party theme be?”

 “Umm…”

 Their heads turned at the stranger’s sudden arrival.

 “O-oppa…”

  ‘Oppa? The princess wouldn’t like that.’ 

 The barely noticeable twitch in her eye was enough proof.

 A slightly chubby girl approached their table, accompanied by another girl who looked the same age as she did.

 “Go on,” said the other girl, giving her friend a light push towards Zen.

 “Yes?” Zen flashed her a polite smile.

 “U-um…”

 “She wants an autograph!” The friend said, sipping from her mug and positioning herself near Ayu.

 “I-I…!”

 “Oh, sure!” Zen said, easing her nerves. “No problem at all!”

 Etched on his boss’ face was an uncomfortably wide smile that failed to reach her eyes. 

 “R-really?!” The girl smiled, handing to him a DVD case of  Tei’s Tea Leaf, the film that skyrocketed his fame, making him a beloved household name.

 Smiling, Zen took it, “Mm-hmm!”  He stretched a palm out to his bodyguard, who then placed a black marker pen on it. Uncapping it, he asked, “What’s your name?”

 “Y-Yoori!” The girl blushed, leaning closer to Zen.

 Hidden underneath the table was Ayu’s tightly-clenched fist, nails digging in her palms sure to leave a crescent-shaped mark. 

 “Okay! Yoori, ” Zen mumbled as he wrote his message. “May you always be happy and healthy. Make sure to always eat your meals…”

 Face still close to Zen, she snuck a glance at her friend, mouthing something before giving a slight nod.

  Something seemed off. 

 Ray jolted his head to his left.  Something was definitely off. No one, not even Zen’s bodyguard, paid attention to the mug in the girl’s hand, hovering above Ayu’s head, and slowly tilting downwards.

 Quickly shifting to the side, he reached out to grab the girl’s wrist.

 “Ow! W-what the?!”

 “Ray?!” Ayu abruptly stood, widening her eyes at him. “What are you doing?! Let her go!”

 She reached a hand out to pull Ray away from the girl, but was too slow to stop…

 the tea…

 from spilling…

 on…

 Zen.

  Splash!

“Ah!” Zen stood, hair dripping wet and clothes stained with black tea, squeezing the liquid from the drenched part of his shirt.

 Ayu snapped her head towards Ray, “What did you just do?!”

  She had on her face an absolute look of disgust.

 “Oh, my gosh, I’m so sorry! He didn’t mean it!" She panicked. "What to do, what to do…?” Ayu grabbed a fistful of tissues and dabbed them on his damp shirt.

 “This has gotten… a bit out of hand,” Zen lightly chuckled, rubbing his nape. “Take out?”

  o-o-o-o

  “I forget this usually happens when you’re famous.” Zen joked once they reached their car.

 “Same.…”

 For the first time since meeting Zen, his humour was lost on her. She’s always laughed even at his unfunniest jokes, but now...  How could she laugh when the day she’s been looking forward to the most turned into such a wreck?

 “It’s weird. You know, I sometimes invite Sienna here—”

  ‘Sienna this, Sienna that.’  That cursed name always brought out a frown on her face.

 “—but this never really happened.” Zen scratched his head and chuckled. “You be careful, okay?” He held the door open for Ayu, handing her the take-out bag and waved. “Make sure Mr. Ray doesn’t skip a meal!”

 With zero enthusiasm, she nodded, forcing out a smile that failed to reach her eyes. “Sure!”

 The windows rolled up, and they sped off. Ray did not turn the radio on this time and simply drove in silence, occasionally glancing at her from the rear-view mirror.

  As for Ayu, she was too busy cooking up a plan on how to get away with murder.

 o-o-o-o

 Ayu slammed the door open, hitting the wall with much force, and stomped her way in. 

 Following exactly 5 steps behind was Ray, carrying a box package under his arm and staying silent all throughout.

 Coming to an abrupt halt, Ayu kicked her wedges off of her feet and flung them to opposite directions. 

“I hate her. I hate her. I hate that… UGH!”  She tightened the grip on her handbag’s strap, knuckles turning white and fingernails digging into her palms. The temper she kept contained the whole car ride was now bubbling beyond her control.

 Skipping the mandatory 5-second countdown, she snapped her head at Ray and snarled, “YOU!” 

Stomping her way towards him, Ayu jabbed a finger on his chest. “First day working and this is what you do?! Why did you have to mess this up? What right did you have to ruin everything? Everything was going well until you decided to literally spill the tea on Oppa!”

 Ray said nothing, simply watching her seethe with anger.

 “AND. THAT. SIENNA. He had barbecue with Sienna before… me? Huh?”

 Ayu grabbed fistfuls of her hair, yanking it at its roots. A glimpse of Sienna eating and laughing with Zen flashed in her mind—fleeting, but enough to fuel her rage.

 Taking deep breaths, she paced back and forth around the living room. With gritted teeth, she let out a soft scream, controlled and barely a scream at first, gradually rising to a crescendo.

  And thus came the apocalypse.

“AAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!”

 She picked up a throw pillow from her couch and hurled it towards Ray, who barely avoided getting hit. “AAAAAAAHHHHH! I CAN'T EVEN!”

 Nothing was safe in her presence. Any object unfortunate enough to be within arm’s reach was practically Sienna and Ray in her eyes.

 She grabbed three more pillows, hurling them one by one in every direction. “AAAAAHHHHH! CURSE! EVERYTHING!”

 Even her Louis Vuitton handbag was not spared from the madness. She unzipped it with much force, almost detaching its zipper, and dumped all of its contents on the ground. 

She picked up her first victim—a pressed powder around ₩78,000—and threw it across the room, letting out a long, ear-piercing battle cry. Not even the slightest hint of regret crossed her mind as it collided against the wall, dropping to the floor with a loud crack. Her ₩78,000 pressed powder was now barely worth a cent.

 Her second victim—a flower vase she received from a fan two Christmases ago—met the same fate as the first. Who cares if it was a gift? Who cares if they were expensive? She. Wanted. Everything. Destroyed.

 Imagining the scattered ceramic shards as Sienna’s face was doing nothing to curb her bloodlust. Driven by the memory of their disastrous date, she picked them all up, not caring about the wound or even worse, the infection she could get.

  It’s fine as long as they die before she does.

 “AAAAAAAAHHH!”

 From the corner of her eye, Ray was darting his head side to side.. The chaos unfolding before him went beyond his control.

 It was not enough. Thrashing the whole living room was not bringing any satisfaction at all!  

  If laws did not exist, she would have killed those two already!

 Lastly, she caught sight of her phone, grabbing it and dialing the only person she knew would understand her.

 At the first ring, the other line picked up.

 “Yes—”

 “FIRE HIM! FIRE! HIM! I WANT ANOTHER BODYGUARD! IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE MR. PARK! ANYONE BUT THIS PIECE OF TRASH! THROW HIM AWAAAAAAAAAAY! AAAAAAHHH!” She screeched at the top of her lungs.

  “P-princess, calm down! What’s wrong?”

 “MY BODYGUARD IS BROKEN!”

  “What?”

 “RAY! HE… RAY! HE RUINED EVERYTHING! I’LL NEVER GET THIS CHANCE AGAIN AND HE–HE! UUUUUGGGGH!” She repeatedly stomped her feet.

  “Deep breaths, Princess, deep breaths. What did he do?”

 “RAY! HE SPILLED—"

 Then followed a string of curses befitting a sailor. If her words could be censored, it would merely be a continuous, uninterrupted beeping noise.

 “Give Ray the phone. I’ll speak to him.”

 “FIRE HIM, OKAY?”

 Ayu tapped the loudspeaker button, stomping towards Ray, who was standing still, carrying a box package under his arm.

 She shoved the phone on Ray’s free hand. “You’re screwed.”

 Ray held the speaker near his mouth. “Yes, boss?”

 She crossed her arms and loudly tapped her foot. If looks could kill, Ray would have been shish-kebab by now. To be more precise, he had already been impaled by her death glares immediately as they stepped out of the restaurant.

 “What just happened? I don’t understand what she’s saying. She said you spilled a girl on her tea? And someone’s shirt was drenched with this Zen? What? W-what does that mean?”

 “Ah. That.”

  “So you really did something?”

 “Yes, but not in the way she makes it out to be.”

 Ayu uncrossed her arms and stomped her foot. “JUST GET TO THE FREAKING POINT ALREADY!” 

 “I’m not done talking,” Ray coldly snapped.

 She gaped at him in a scandalized manner.  ‘How dare you?’

 “And she’s right… somewhat.”

 Irritated, she huffed a few stray hair strands away from her face,   ‘Somewhat my ass.’

 “I did spill the tea on Mr. Zen but I was only trying to stop the girl’s friend from spilling the tea on your daughter.”

 At Ray’s words, the frown on Ayu’s face slowly faded and was soon replaced by confusion.  The tea was meant for her?

 Stills of that unfortunate incident flashed in her mind—malicious intent hiding behind a useless piece of trash’s youthful smile, aiming a water gun at Ayu’s eyes, hellbent on blinding her with whatever unholy mixture she had concocted.

 If Ray had been with her back then… would he have prevented it? She watched the conversation between her father and her bodyguard, a somber look marring her face.

  “What? Why would they do that?”

 “Simply put, they dislike Ayu..”

  “This is unbelievable! How could anyone dislike my Ayu?”

 “Heh, I wonder how as well,” he sneered as he sent a sidelong glance her way.

 Ayu’s spirits sank lower. All this time, she was lashing out at someone who... did not deserve it?

 Having tea spilled on her was not nearly as dangerous as the time she nearly went blind. Unlike then, the one from the barbecue place was merely an expression of hate rather than a desire to harm, but still….

  “Tell me their names! I’ll make sure—”

 “Stop!” Ayu marched towards Ray, snatching the phone from his hand. “No need! Goodbye, Dad!”

  “Princess—!”

 She ended it before he could say another word. She knew it was rude, but she did not care anymore. He’d forgive her anyway.

 She looked around her, at the mess...

  'Mess' was an understatement; it was a trainwreck brought about by her rampage— the aftermath of a friendly date gone horribly wrong.

 With the anger ebbing away, only silence was left between the two.

 “Are you being honest with me right now?”

 “Yes.”

 “You know I could fire you anytime, right?”

 “Yes.”

 Blue eyes scrutinized his mint ones, intently searching for the slightest hint of a lie… at least something to justify her outburst...

 However, Ray held his ground, staring her down with the same intensity as her. He looked as though he was challenging her, disregarding the fact that he was still working under her…

  ...as if he thought they were equals.

 “Are we clear? Can I go now?”

 She was the first to break eye contact. “Do… Do what you want,” she said, casting her gaze on the ground.

 He bowed, carrying the box package under his arm, then left.

 o-o-o-o

  He had seen better content from Nat Geo Wild.

 Ray rolled his eyes and scoffed. Handling his boss’ daughter’s tantrums was not part of his job description; last time he checked, he was a bodyguard, not a babysitter.

 Her shrill voice was grating to the ears. He knew how much her father doted on her. Judging from his boss’ stories about her, he expected a spoiled princess wannabe…

  ...not the batshit crazy woman package that came with it.

 He was expecting at least a "thank you" from her, even when his effort deserved nothing short of a bow of gratitude. Were it not for him, those dirtbag fans of hers would have flooded in, asking for autographs and ruining her date. She should have been thankful that he was considerate enough to help her enjoy her date in peace.

                     | From: Big Boss

                    |You did a good job today. Keep it up. Be ready by midnight sharp tomorrow.

 Ray shot a glance at the box package under his bed.  Another one? He’d have to be extra careful around Ayu, then.

 “Tsk, tsk… useless brat….”

  ‘Condoms exist to prevent the birth of such abomination.’

 o-o-o-o

 As Ray stepped foot in the dining area, he was greeted by the smell of bacon and butter.

 Ayu, who was seated at the other end of the table, glanced up at him. Upon meeting his eyes, she hung her head down, playing with the ends of her hair instead.

 Across from her, at the spot he usually sat on, was an untouched plate of five greasy bacon strips and scrambled eggs. Beside it was a plate of pancakes stacked atop each other, drizzled with syrup and topped with slowly melting butter.

  Bzz!

 A fly flew past him, then landed atop a strip of bacon.

  Ayu waved it away, but it was a stubborn one, moving on to another strip instead. “TCH!” She shooed it again, and the fly eventually gave up and went away.

 “You should’ve eaten it sooner if you didn’t want flies getting to it.”

 “I don’t eat these stuff.”

 “Why is it here, then? Is Boss coming over?”

 “No.”

 “Ah. How about that pretty boy?”

 “I don’t invite men to my house. And Zen is too much of a gentleman for that.”

 “Ah. Your frie—”

 “AH!” Ayu slammed her hands on the table. Testing her patience first thing in the morning was not good for anyone’s health. “JUST EAT ALREADY FOR GOODNESS—!” She stopped herself before she could continue further. Closing her eyes and taking a sharp inhale, she composed herself. 

 “Eat it now if you don’t want it to go cold,” she said in a somber tone.

 This brought about a scowl to Ray’s face.  Was it that hard to say sorry?  She was in the wrong, yet she still held her pride.

  He figured her father had probably instilled in her mind how she never needed to apologize.

 “Tough luck, then, Princess.” Ray reached for an apple in the fruit bowl, then bit into it.

 She felt annoyed at how the seconds ticked at an unbearably slow pace, and his loud munches only worsened it.  Was it that hard to eat? If it was a matter of taste, there was nothing to worry about. She can cook if that’s what he was worried about.

 After what felt like an eternity, Ray swallowed. “I don’t eat those kinds of food too.”

 He stood up and headed straight to the door, leaving her sulking.

  ‘Go choke on your pride and bacon. See if I care.’

[forasecondtherewedwon]

Hi! First of all, I can’t believe Affinity War is over! It’s my fav! Do you think you’ll ever write oneshots or something in that universe? Second! Maybe 19 for the prompts? :)

You’re so sweet, @hauntedmoondust! Thank you very much!! One-shots beyond these prompts? Hmm I don’t know yet. We’ll see!

Really Old Movie NightPairing:Peter Parker x Michelle Jones (Spideychelle)Rating: TWord count: 2290

19. “There’s so much blood.”

Friendships are something that seem to just happen to Peter.Like, boom, Mr. Stark shows up in his living room one day to recruit him to agroup of professional best buddies (thinly veiled as the Avengers). Or, boom,he’s a kid at science and engineering camp using Lego to assemble a scale modelof the Brooklyn Bridge when his hands bump into this kid called Ned’s hands,‘cause he’s been building from the other end, and they meet in the middle, likeLady and the Tramp, and become bestfriends. Or, subtler boom, the judgemental smart girl who’s always giving himthe finger offers up a nickname she’d like for him to call her one day andthat’s how Peter finds out that MJ doesn’t actively want to push him in frontof a bus.

Even including the surprise mission to Germany, it’s thelast one that surprises Peter the most. But then she just keeps doing it. Atlunch, MJ quits lurking with her novels at the far end of the table and slidesdown to eat with him and Ned. Every. Single. Day. She jokes with Peter between classes,which makes him start taking the scenic route from Chemistry to Spanish to givehimself more time to see her smile. Without anyone really making a big dealabout it, MJ becomes part of Peter and Ned’s sacred ritual of Homework Night;when it devolves into Lego Night, he really has to watch to catch the momentswhere she can’t stop herself from rolling her eyes. Soon, it feels like thethree of them are as cohesive together as when it was just him and Ned. Makessense―triangles are the strongest shape.

So, with the closeness they’ve all developed, it’s rational thatMJ would still come over for movie night after Ned has to cancel. And thatPeter won’t need to check with his aunt for permission to have MJ in theapartment when he knows that May’s going out. Because it’s just MJ. MJ’s hisfriend, his second Ned, the person whose every appearance is the highlight ofhis day, the girl who makes his enhanced biology forget how to take in oxygento let him do the breathing thing. Respiration. Right. He knew the word.

Peter is feeling very calm about this. He could sync hispulse to a meditation track of soothing beach sounds (if the beach was in thewrath-of-god grip of a cyclone). What he definitely does not do is backflip to the door when she knocks. He hasrestraint―not that he needs it,because, again, MJ is nothing more than a benign, Ned-type person.

…Who smells really good when she enters and brushes by him.Ned usually smells like a combination of soap, Doritos, and metal from whateverthey’ve been covertly tinkering with in shop class.

“Come in,” Peter says, about twelve seconds too late. MJglances back at him with an expression that confirms he needs to pull himselftogether now.

“So, movie,” he tries again, swinging his arms as he leadsher to the fridge so she can select her soda of choice. He already has thesnacks arrayed on the coffee table in front of the couch. May has raised anattentive host.

“Movie,” MJ echoes. She lifts her eyebrows while taking asip of some bubbly pomegranate drink his aunt has possibly recently becomeaddicted to.

“Um, yeah, in here.”

Peter stares hard at the middle distance like a furiousShakespearean actor as he walks ahead of her to the couch; this is awkward. He’s awkward. No amount of junk foodcoated in assorted cheese powders is going to mask how severely he is failingat cultivating a regular buddy-buddy hang-out.

He halts abruptly, realizing he should let MJ pick where shewants to sit first, which just makes her run into him.

“Oh shit,” she gasps, eyes on the can in her hand, but shedoesn’t spill a drop.

Instead, the carbonation of the drink asserts its presencethrough a high-pitched hiccup that reminds Peter of Dopey swallowing the soapin Snow White. (Only May knows that’shis favourite Disney movie.) Instinctively, he goes to pat MJ on the back inorder to―man, he really doesn’t know―pop any potential bubbles still inside herbody? Anyway, his arm goes up, she steps forward, and this time they collidehead-on. And since they were already close, a more accurate description wouldbe that they hug. Sort of.

Their cheeks touch when they both quickly step back. Peter’spretty sure he’s doing Thor’s party trick now, vibrating all over aselectricity runs through him. MJ’s face might be pink, but he’s too overwhelmedto give it more than a glimpse. Sitting. Sitting will be better. You can’t runinto someone when you’re nestled into a couch cushion. He coaches himself tobreathe. Naturally, he does it out loud by accident, but very quietly.

MJ heads to the far end of the couch and shrugs off herjacket. Ok, good news and bad news. Good: she’s protecting his sanity byleaving several feet between them. Bad: he forgot to offer to hang up herjacket when she came in.

Then she drops her jacket onto the end seat and sits on thecenter one, so Peter’s flustered all over again. What’s he going to do now? Siton the table? The floor? The ceiling? Haha No, that would give away hissuperpowers.

But, seriously, is the ceiling an option?

And he does have to choose one, because he’s still standingthere, watching MJ’s sweater slide momentarily off her shoulder as she getscomfortable on his (May’s) couch in his (May’s) living room and realizing thatMJ might not be a Ned-person at all. It’s actually looking more and more likeshe’s an MJ, his one and only MJ, and that he’s invited her into a situationthat is rapidly sharpening in focus to appear like a date.

He sits next to her, trying to keep his trembling to himselfas his crush hits like an earthquake.

“What are we watching?” she asks, mouth half-full of whitecheddar popcorn from the bowl on the table.

Peter reflexively licks his own lip when he sees the palepowder on hers.

“Uh, it’s this really old horror movie. The Shining?” he checks, like she’s the one who picked it and hejust found out.

“Ok, cool.”

He should ask if she’s seen it and, if she has, offer topick something else, but MJ has lifted one foot off the floor to tuck her legbeneath her where she sits―thereby putting her folded leg nearer to where he sits. So, yep, it’s a miracle that hecan grip the handrail on one train of thought long enough to cue the movie upand press play.

Beyond a lot of creepy music and scenes with garish hotelfurniture that remind him of Wes Anderson movies, Peter doesn’t have much ideaof what’s happening on the screen. He has a few (thousand) more thoughts aboutwhat’s happening on this couch. Where to start? MJ’s leaned forward and back afew times, taking sips of her drink and returning it to the table, and ended upcloser to him every time. Their legs are officially touching now. Peter couldput a hand on her shoulder, give her a little nudge, and she would lean rightinto him. That’s based on physics, of course. Gravity and potential energy andthat kinda thing. Doesn’t mean MJ wouldn’t immediately brace herself and thenlook at him like Jack Torrance is not the only psycho in the Parker livingroom.

That’s what Michelle would do, as she existed to him beforeshe declared them friends. Peter sneaks a look at his MJ. Woops, he needs toquit calling her that in his head. She’s leaning slightly towards him (unevencouch cushions are probably to blame) and not looking 100% relaxed. Hissuper-senses let him hear her breathing very clearly and see, when his gazelowers, her chest rising and falling with a heartrate too quick to be at rest.

Duh. They’re watching a horror movie.

Peter exhales heavily. He wants to put his head in his handsand collect himself, but he can’t do that in front of her. Can’t be obviouslike that.

“There’s so much blood,” MJ comments, making him forget hisinner turmoil.

“Um, yeah. That’s super gross, actually.”

His face scrunches up as he watches, like, a swimming pool’sworth of gore rush out of a red elevator. Was somebody murdered in there? Petertrusts his guess on that one less than on the precise shade of brown in MJ’seyes. Just when he’s getting into the movie, starting to piece together thestory, distinguish present from flashbacks from supernatural visions, MJ shuddersnext to him. His head turns so fast.

“Are… are you ok?”

He’s nervous asking, not wanting to embarrass her. Peter hasnever see her disturbed or vulnerable. Even when he ran up to her inWashington, behind his Spider-Man mask, she didn’t look afraid for theirteammates stuck inside the Monument so much as determined that they should andwould be rescued. But if a wave of blood is what gets to her, that’s alright.It doesn’t make her weak.

MJ turns her head to look at him―not quite straight-on, butmore attentively than just a glance from the corner of her eye. She gives asmall smile and a shrug.

“It’s my first Stephen King movie.”

“I think, technically, it’s a Stanley Kubrick movie, sincehe’s the director.”

He feels so much relief when she rolls her eyes and callshim a dork. Then elation as MJ shifts towards him and slouches into his side.

“You want me to turn it off?” Peter asks.

Right away, he’s worried his words have implied that themovie should be stopped so they can transition to something more physical. Betweenthe two of them. In, like, a way that comes burdened with countless baseballmetaphors. He fears he’s created a ‘Netflix and chill’ atmosphere and feelsabjectly douchey.

“Nah,” MJ says and sighs. His eyes widen, feeling her exhaleagainst him. “I’m just gonna… I’ll just… Is it ok if I sit like this?”

Holy crap, she’s close. Peter nods as his mouth goes dry.Before he presses play again, he gradually raises his arm and tucks it aroundMJ’s shoulders. It only encourages her to snuggle (snuggle? Are theysnuggling?) more tightly against him.

Once again, even the most major events of the movie eludePeter, but the plot points of what’s happening between him and MJ are theeasiest story he’s ever followed. First, her head lowers down onto hisshoulder. Second, she reaches up to feel the arm he has around her and tanglesher fingers with his. Third is the twist. The bombshell. The surprise you don’tsee coming.

Because she mutters, “Watch out, Hallorann,” right beforethe bald chef guy (who Peter vaguely remembers from the beginning of the movie)takes an axe to the chest.

Almost robotically, Peter straightens up and tilts his headaway to give himself the distance to look at MJ. She’s gone very still besidehim and, though she’s nowhere near as easy to read as he knows he is, he cantell from her face that she’s constructing an excuse behind those warm browneyes. His mind’s moving fast now, leaving the realization that MJ’s seen thismovie before in the dust. That means she isn’t really afraid; if Peter knowsanything about her, it’s that she wouldn’t suffer through something thathonestly terrifies her in order to impress him. She wouldn’t do that foranyone. The only logical conclusion is that she wanted this outcome, himholding her.

Slowly, MJ gives Peter the closest to sheepish that he’sever seen on her face. Yeah, well, he’s already blown past the thought ofconfronting her. She’s laid out the beginning and the middle. He thinks he canmanage the ending.

Peter wraps a palm around her round cheek and kisses her. Shetastes like fizzy pomegranate. The second that he starts doing it, the factthat he is doing it shocks him, butby now MJ’s evidently working from his script. Her hands are warm on the backof his neck as she kisses him, not letting him panic and bail out. The mainthing the kiss tells him is that she’s been thinking about doing this sincelong before the movie started. He’s always known she’s better at planning, plusshe has that enigmatic wisdom that really throws him sometimes. Peter justdidn’t expect to be one of those plans. He starts to grin into the kiss at theidea of MJ considering him a wise decision.

She draws back with her eyebrows pulling together, assessinghis euphoric expression.

“Show some respect, nerd. A man has just been murdered.”

“He seemed like the kind of guy who’d take comfort inknowing we’re continuing to live our lives,” Peter argues, unable to shake hissmile.

“You were barely even watching. Don’t pretend like it taughtyou some life lesson.”

“It did though! It taught me that Ned cancelling on ourplans isn’t always a bad thing.”

MJ gives him a wry smirk.

“I guess you’re not completelywrong.”

“Wow, so in your book, kissing comes before cutting me someslack?” Peter grins.

“I save the slack-cutting for the second date,” she informshim.

“Second date, huh? Let’s have that one on purpose.”

As soon as Peter says it, MJ brings her mouthback to his and they have their second kiss on purpose too.

Pick a prompt for a Spideychelle drabble!

[mysteli]

drunk text (jake x mc)

A/N: I’m back after a loooonngg time and this fic exists thanks to @brightpinkpeppercorn. I’m not really sure what to think of but I’m still posting it. it’s more of a comedic piece. But I have more romantic shit coming in the future. Don’t worry!

Warning: innuendo, swearing 

Recommended music: idk

Words: 2066

PERMA TAG LIST: @brightpinkpeppercorn@cocomaxley@hopefulmoonobject@alesana45 @jellybean-marshmellow@mymandrake@regrettingnathan@dobie2112@princessstellaris@mechaspirit@skyila @mind-reader1  @xo-endlessmayhem-xo@sakaily@justboredtrash@regina-and-happiness@annekebbphotography. @endlessly-searching-for-you@reginasayeed@zigortega4life@eileendannie@diamondoasis@speedyoperarascalparty@emomoustache@lostlightningbug@endlesstaylormckenzie @alekai-sayeed@akrenich@vickypoo91@nitta-jaeguet@femmeshep @hayden-park@mkatschoicesblog

Prompt used: ““Stop texting me weird stuff so late at night”

Let me know if you wanna be tagged! 💗and let me know if the tags work because Tumblr is acting up.

Summary: A couple glasses of wine lead Michelle and Quinn into stealing Logan’s phone. What could possibly go wrong?

Masterlist

ENDLESS SUMMER FAN FICTION DRUNK TEXT

“Who wants more wine?!” Michelle questions in a high, obnoxious tone, her voice thick with energy and excitement.

Logan and Quinn had both volunteered to help Michelle start decorating her house as she prepares to move in with Sean. She’s been talking about how nervous she is to take the next step with him but she’s also aware of how amazing it’ll be to get more serious with the man she loves. Logan is a person as helpful as they come so of course she’d decide to help her out with the interior. Same could be said for Quinn but who ever clarified that the day had to be completely innocent?

Turns out they overestimated how long this would take to complete and they finished the entire living room in the space of six hours, which is very quick for an entire room. It looked pretty put together too, with everything in place aside from the stuff the moving van forget to bring over and just that stressed Michelle out a lot.

So, when they finished, Michelle suggested letting a little loose and she revealed a bottle of wine, which was downed fairly quickly. They promised that they’d only have one glass each. But one glass slowly turned into two, then three... then four... then five. Now they’re all completely wasted.

“Me, me, me!” Logan exclaims, snatching the bottle out of Michelle’s hand and taking a massive sip.

“Hey! It’s not all for you, Lo!” Michelle argues, snatching it back with force. Logan forms a challenging smirk in response, wiping the leftover liquid off her mouth.

“Oh come on! You have about five more bottles!”

“Sharing is caring, Logan.” Quinn chimes in, smiling appreciatively as Michelle hands her another glass.

“It’s 3am, Quinn, and we’re doing this. It’s clear we don’t care. Surprised the neighbours haven’t left an complaint.” Logan responds, folding her arms as she takes a seat on the floor. They’d been playing really childish games since 10pm that night. Games like truth or dare, never have I ever and would you rather. The standard teenager trash that they’d play in high school. Then they turned to karaoke, which was a guarantee for angry neighbours, right? Yet nothing came through.

Hell, Logan didn’t even realise she’d be here this long. And she had to lie to Jake about why she was staying over. Of course, she knew he’d just laugh it off if she said she’d been drinking all damn night. But she wasn’t in the mood for his teasing so she messaged him with a little white lie, claiming they hadn’t finished and were exhausted so she’d just stay over and finish off in the morning. He understood completely, telling her he loved her and hoping she’d have a goodnight.

How oddly nice of him.

“I’m bored. Are there any games we haven’t played?” Quinn wonders, turning to Michelle for an answer. She simply shrugs her shoulders in response, seating herself on the floor with the others in the awkward little circle they’d shaped.

Suddenly, a lightbulb goes off in Michelle’s head and her face lights up proudly. “We could drunk text someone.” She beams, lifting her arms high in the air and her glass rises with them, the action causing some liquid to plummet onto the carpet. “Shit. Good thing I’m getting new carpet.”

“Ooh! That sounds fun.” Quinn agrees, clapping her hands together excitedly. “What do you think, Lo?”

“Sure, I’m down for that.” Logan nods in agreement, though if she’d know how this would turn out, she would have said no. “Who do you wanna drunk text though?”

Michelle scans the room as she thinks of a possible victim to their game, a devious smile crossing her lips as her eyes land on where Logan’s phone lies on the floor. The perfect receiver for the situation.

Logan notices the way Michelle is looking at her and a wave of realisation washes over her. “No no no, Meech! You’re not drunk texting Jake.” She dismisses the idea and Michelle rolls her eyes in annoyance.

“Why not? It would be so funny.” Michelle points out and Quinn nods fiercely in agreement.

“No it wouldn’t! Jake would get pissed.” Logan counters their argument and shakes her head in denial. “Besides he’s probably asleep.”

“Even better.” Michelle mutters, snatching the phone off the floor before Logan can stop her. Logan only now regrets ever sharing her password with Michelle.

With a proud smirk, Michelle opens the phone and goes straight to messages, finding Jake’s name as the first one. Suddenly, she bursts out laughing when she notices something unusual in his contact name.

“Oh my god, Lo! Why is there a drooling emoji by his name?” Michelle mocks, her laughter only increasing the more words she gets out. Quinn quickly joins in on the giggles upon hearing that. “Aw, and a love heart. Cute.”

Logan hides her embarrassment by clapping her hands over her face. “Fuck off, Meech. Who knows what you have by Sean’s name?”

“Oh it’s just your standard hearts. You know, because I’m normal.” Michelle corrects, struggling to suppress her laughter. “Oh come on, Lo. Jake isn’t all that.”

“Well, you haven’t had him in bed like I have, huh Michelle?” Logan beams proudly, winking at Michelle, who looks like she’s on the verge of throwing up. Another idea pops into Michelle’s mind and Logan gets worried as she begins scrolling up. “What are you doing?”

“How about we look through your past conversations?” Michelle suggests, her malicious intentions clear but Logan knows just how to shut them down.

“Go ahead then. Keep scrolling if you want Jake’s dick embedded in your memory forever.” Logan retorts and instantly, Michelle is put off by the idea, her finger scrolling back down.

“Fine. You win that one. But we’re still drunk texting him.” Michelle clarifies, preparing to type something before turning to Quinn for suggestions. “Any ideas, Quinn?”

“I say, just start off by sending him a long ass heyyyyyy.” Quinn suggests and Michelle nods eagerly. “Any weird nicknames, Lo?”

Logan doesn’t respond, rolling her eyes in defeat. Clearly she’s just gonna accept that this is happening.

“Oh! Call him Princess.” Quinn exclaims, dancing with pride as she giggles with glee.

Michelle types out the message, adding a few extra emojis for good measure.

Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy Princess 🤤🥰❤️

“Threw in the drooling emoji so he knows it’s you, Lo.” Michelle points out, winking at an irritated Logan.

It takes a few minutes for Jake to reply, probably since he’s waking up from a slumber or something. Michelle and Quinn jump with eagerness and curiosity when the phone vibrates, signalling that a text has come through.

i thought it was my job to call you that darlin 😉

Michelle rolls her eyes at Jake’s response, hiding a mocking smirk. “Oh shit. One text in and he’s already hit us with the darlin’ crap.”

“And a winky face!” Quinn exclaims with forced shock. “Say something, Michelle!”

Well you’re a bootiful little princess sooo maybe that should be MYY job 🥺

Almost immediately, an offended response comes through.

Little?? 😂😂

Michelle is instantly confused by his reaction to her clearly mocking his masculinity. “Okay, so he reacts to being called little but is not offended by anything else?!”

“He’s just gonna laugh it off if you call him little.” Logan chimes in, shaking her head at how childish her friends are being right now.

“How do we piss him off then?”

“Like I’m gonna fucking tell you.” Logan denies, mimicking their mocking laughter.

Yes, little. You’re my little tiny babyyyyy 👶🤪

It takes a little longer for a response to come through this time. But when it does, it’s so worth the wait.

Are you drunk Princess???? 🤔

I thought you said you were sleeping early at Michelle’s.

Michelle reads the text aloud and that’s when Logan already can’t take it anymore. She rushes over and snatches back her phone before typing an apology to Jake.

Sorry baby. Michelle and Quinn stole my phone. 🙄

Logan moves to the other side of the room where Michelle and Quinn can’t sneak attack in order to get her phone back. Stressed, she runs a hand through her platinum hair as a response comes through.

Oh. Are they drunk???

Suddenly anxious that he’d find out she lied, she buries her face in the wall and curses under her breath, not sure how to respond to his question. In the distance, she can hear the snickers of Michelle and Quinn. Hell, Logan is still drunk herself so she doesn’t have complete control over herself right now.

No 🤫

Why did she have to add the emoji?! Why?

Pretty sure that means you’re hiding something princess 🤥

“Fuck!” Logan shouts as she gazes up at the ceiling hopelessly.

“Oh shit. Did Jake find out?” Quinn teases and Logan can’t hold back her frustration in that moment. In one swift motion, she takes off her shoe and tosses it at Quinn. The red head barely dodges it and her laughter only increases in reaction. “Nice shot.”

In the end, Logan just rolls her eyes and turns her attention back to her phone.

why would I lie to you?? you’re too pretty to be lied to 🥺

Oh shit. The drunk side of Logan is starting to really shine through.

yeahhhh you’re drunk too 😂damn i should’ve fucking known

Sure, he’s laughing about it. But it still fucking hurts that he found out this way. Thanks to Michelle and Quinn.

“Usually your fights turn to fucking so has it happened yet?” Michelle pipes up, only to receive a middle finger from Logan.

Out of nowhere, a phone call comes through from Jake and Logan freezes in place, unsure what to do.

“Oh wow. He’s calling you?” Quinn reacts, laughing igniting once more. “Better answer your loving husband.”

Logan sighs heavily before answering the phone, leaning against the wall as Jake’s muffled voice speaks through the call.

“Well, well, well, look who decided to get drunk and not invite me.”

Logan’s jaw drops at his reaction, not surprised with the constant teasing but more surprised by how little laughter is being expressed right now.

“Look, I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have lied to you. I just wanted to avoid this.” Logan apologises, exhaling sharply after she speaks. She wipes the sweat that creases her forehead, unsure why she’s so nervous.

“Hey, it’s fine. Anything to have an excuse to talk to you is a good thing to me.”

Logan lets out a soothing sigh of relief, still haunted by the mocking laughter of Michelle and Quinn from the other side of the room. Jake appears to hear it too, judging by what he says next.

“Hey, darlin’. Put me on speaker for a moment.”

Logan grants his request and walks over to Michelle and Quinn with a newly found smirk on her face, countering the mischief on their expressions.

“Jake wants to say something.”

Michelle and Quinn listen out of curiosity to what Jake wishes to say.

“Yo, Chanel and Ariel.”

They both roll their eyes at the nicknames, their expressions of mockery finally falling.

“Stop texting me weird stuff so late at night.” Jake requests at calmly as he can and Michelle and Quinn burst out into laughter once again.

“Sure, pilot. We’re so sorry for interrupting your beauty sleep.”

Jake releases a frustrated huff and Logan knows he could lash out at both of them right here right now. Before he can say anything else, Logan turns off speaker phone and brings the device back to her ear.

“Now, now Jake. Let’s play nice, okay?” She tries to reason with him and he seems to obey, judging by the collected tone he speaks in next.

“Hmph. With them, I will. With you, I won’t.”

The husky tone of his voice and the innuendo behind his words leaves Logan breathless. An unexpected rush washes through her body in reaction.

“Well, you’re just gonna have to wait until I get home.”

“Or not. You could come home right now.”

Logan checks the time once more. 3:30am.

“Jake, it’s half past 3 in the morning.”

“I’ll come pick you up. Come on, darlin’. I’m sure right now you’d give anything to be away from Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee.”

[trevardes]

Keep that breathless charm (hankcon)

1900 words of Connor feeling very confusing things for Hank. Set after the Nest Mission. Title from The way you look tonight. Also on Ao3. For @ccrescentscar <3

*

Keep that breathless charm

Connor looks at Lieutenant Anderson and feels conflicted.

That in itself is an oxymoron; should be an oxymoron, a statement so outrageously impossible that it should collapse under its own weight. It should, but it doesn’t. Connor, an android made to be inhuman and immovable, looks at Hank Anderson, this man, this human, and feels.

Anderson’s facial expression is closed off, the corners of his mouth tight and his gaze downcast. His hand rests on the steering wheel, the key in the ignition turned and the car’s motor running, but Anderson doesn’t drive. He sits there, quiet, lost in thought. He seems unreachable, far away even though he’s sitting right there, close enough to touch. Connor is excellent at reading people, his programming covers a wide range of expressions and all of their possible indications. He’s had more training in this than any other android, and his system as a whole is geared towards understanding and analyzing humanity. It is not often that he has this much trouble understanding someone’s surface emotions, especially if he’s situated this close to them.

Right now he is having problems though, and it unsettles him. Anderson is thinking about something, thinking hard, but beyond this realization, Connor has no idea what’s going on inside his head.

Honestly, he’s not quite sure what’s going on inside his own head, either.

The image of Anderson hanging off the ledge of the roof is etched deep into Connor, still sending a weak spike of distress through him when he thinks of it. It was a split second decision to help him, and there was no question that Connor would, even though Anderson had a high probability of surviving on his own. Helping him cost Connor the deviant, cost him the mission, but in that moment it ceased to matter. Connor weighed his options and reflexively chose the one that would ensure Anderson’s safety.

Now that Connor returns to the scene in his mind, he begins to question his actions. Anderson is in good enough physical condition that he could very well have pulled himself up without assistance, and Connor could have caught the deviant. There was just this… pull, towards Anderson, to save him, to keep him safe. It’s there even now, when Connor looks at the lieutenant’s unreadable profile. An anomaly, a malfunction somewhere in the code that he’s made of, a stark positive instead of a cool, indifferent negative. A tilt towards something, when everything about him should be flat and neutral.

“Lieutenant Anderson”, Connor says, attempting a calm tone. It works to a satisfactory degree, but he does indeed have to actively try and make it that way, and that is jarring. His voice comes out exactly like it always does, clear but a little soft at the edges. It sounds too loud in the quiet, still air inside the car.

“Yeah?” Anderson says, still not looking at Connor.

“Is something wrong?” Connor inquires, quieter this time. He tries for a kind and open tone. It comes out falsely intimate, and a quick frown flashes across Connor’s face. He immediately runs a diagnostic of his voice box and it’s programming, but comes up with no clear reason for the strange lapse. Nothing there is in need of repair, nothing is out of place.

“You seem quiet”, he continues. Could Anderson be angry with him for letting the deviant escape? He’d seemed happy with Connor’s decision earlier, content and even a little proud, but all of that is gone now.

“Nah”, Anderson sighs. “I’m just a bit confused. Aren’t you guys supposed to be the epitome of reason and logic?”

“I suppose you could say that”, Connor muses. “How do you mean?”

“Why choose to pull me up then? Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t appreciate it”, Anderson chuckles humorlessly. “I just don’t get you androids.”

“I felt it was more important to insure your ability to continue with our investigation, than to catch a single deviant. There are still several cases left for us to look into.” This is not the whole truth, Connor knows. Still, he manages to keep the cadence of his voice even and steady.

Anderson hums, seemingly satisfied with his answer. His brow smoothes a bit, and he looks closer to his usual brand of grumpy. Something about his eyes is still different; his pupils a fraction of a millimetre wider than normal. His hand squeezes the steering wheel, and his left leg bounces slightly. A nervous tick Connor has grown familiar with, and almost fond of.

“Thanks anyway”, Anderson finally rasps, after a long silence. “I do like to live.”

“Do you really?” Connor whispers before he can stop himself. Anderson doesn’t seem like he does. Connor knows he drinks too much and too often, doesn’t get enough sleep, doesn’t maintain a healthy diet. Connor has analysed him and accessed all files available to him. He knows more than he should. Hank Anderson has no spouse, no known family at all. He has a note of a divorce in his file, and a grave he visits sometimes, on the rainiest days. He often comes to work late, hungover, looking tired and depressed. He pushes people away and builds walls around himself, not unlike the firewalls surrounding Connor’s essence and protecting him and every other android from viruses. In Anderson’s case though, the walls don’t necessarily signify self-preservation.

Anderson’s mouth draws into a thin line and his eyes go squinty in annoyance.

“It’s not your damned mission to investigate me, is it? Stick to your job, R2.”

A reference to an old movie franchise. Connor is only equipped with a cursory information package on older American pop culture, and he’s uncertain why Anderson would call him by the droid R2D2’s name. There seem to be no similarities between them. Connor neither speaks in beeps, looks like a large bucket, nor could reasonably be described as ‘cute’.

“True”, Connor concedes. “However, it is my duty to keep you in working condition to the best of my ability, as you are my partner and as such, essential to my work.”

Anderson makes a sound of annoyance and perhaps of contempt, and shifts his leg on the pedals. He puts the car into drive, and pulls out of the alley and into a larger, slightly busier road. He doesn't seem eager to stay on the subjects, and for now, Connor lets it slide.

Following their usual pattern, Anderson is going to give Connor a ride before going home himself. Connor could take the bus, it would be no inconvenience to him whatsoever. He’s an android, they don’t feel discomfort like that. Connor should say this to Anderson. He should leave the car and let the man go on his own.

Despite being an android, a decidedly emotionless machine, Connor feels a twinge of… unease, perhaps, at the thought of the lieutenant going home alone. Unease and sadness. He turns to look at Anderson again.

Hank Anderson is 53 years old, but life has worn him down, so much that he could pass for older. His hair and beard are silvery gray, and lines web the outer corners of his eyes. Something tells Connor they might’ve been from laughter, originally, but nowadays Anderson doesn’t have many reasons even to smile.

Despite the signs of aging, or perhaps partly because of them, there is something intriguing about Anderson. He looks pleasant and warm on the rare occasions he smiles. Often those smiles are a bit malicious and at the expense of androids or other humans, but Connor still finds them perplexingly delightful. Anderson has straight teeth and deep, clear eyes. His eyelids are a little heavy, lending a softness to his features that otherwise wouldn’t exist.

They drive in silence for a moment, until Anderson reaches out a hand and switches on the ancient CD-player on the dash. Soft, melancholy jazz music fills the car, and a small smile tilts the corner of Anderson’s mouth. Right then he looks so… so affable, so human.

Connor feels something twist up in his chest, some unidentified circuit there firing a soft pulse out of rhythm with the rest of him. His fingers twitch and his teeth dig into his lower lip on their own volition. A soft, persistent burning sets ablaze his mind, his wires, all of him.

He’s glad he pulled Anderson up from the ledge. He’s glad he’s sitting here so close to him.

He’s glad.

His thirium pump quickens it’s rhythm, adds two beats to its normal bpm. Error notifications pop up in his vision. There’s a software instability, accompanied by a strange feeling, a warm ache inside his chest and head, even though they’ve received no damage recently.

Connor doesn’t need to breathe, but he draws in a slow gulp of air nevertheless, quietly enough that Anderson doesn’t notice anything is amiss. Anderson keeps humming along to the song, and the low, scratchy sound of it takes a hold of Connor’s spine, sends a painful shiver through him. Connor doesn’t need to breathe, but he forgets that and feels breathless anyway. A new alert about rising levels of distress flashes red at the corner of his field of vision. His LED spins yellow, fast and frantic. It flickers into red and back to yellow, and Connor hopes Anderson won’t notice it.

He ignores his objectives that tell him it should be impossible, and deletes all the notifications.

His body temperature has risen 3,9 degrees above normal. He forces it down by diverting more power to his coolers, and tries to sit still.

He erases his action log for the last five minutes, deletes any traces of deleting the notifications. It’s a feeble attempt at covering up what he’s done, easily reversed by anyone with any skill at programming, but something compels him to do it. He knows he should turn himself in for examinations. He should receive a recalibration as soon as possible. It should be a given. He is a state of the art prototype, an incredibly important and expensive experiment that CyberLife can’t afford to lose to… to deviancy. He should send a message right now and tell them everything, tell them he’ll be coming in for assessment and subsequent reprogramming.

The command to report and fix any errors is an integral part the program of the android RK800 #313 248 317 - 51. It is not an entity with any authority to decide how to act in a situation like this. It should revert back to protocol right now.

It doesn’t. Connor doesn’t.

He turns sideways in his seat and watches lieutenant Anderson. He commits to memory all the details of this man; his shape, his familiar scent, his voice as he hums along with the music for a few notes. Lieutenant Anderson doesn’t know anything about what he has awoken inside Connor. He never will, because Connor will not tell him, will not tell anyone. He lets out a quiet, shivering breath and settles back against his seat. Squeezes his seat belt between his fingers and tries to let the music calm him.

Anderson doesn’t notice Connor’s distress. He looks the same as always, worn and tired, but tonight everything about him is unsettling and beautiful. For the first time since he was made and switched on, Connor wishes he could touch. Wishes he could smooth a thumb along the lines in Anderson’s skin, down his bearded cheek. It’s new, this confusing desire, but it settles inside Connor like it’s always been there, this familiar, gentle longing.

Anderson keeps driving, and Connor watches him out of the corner of his eye, feeling the sweet corruption spread through him, to every circuit and every nerve.

[scripted-dalliances]

Rest In Peace: Chapter Twelve

Title: Rest In Peace

Chapter: 12

Summary: A part of Faithless Fairy Tale, a more in depth look at how they brought Laura back to life. Appearance of old faces, creation of new ones and if you’re looking for canon, it left a long, long time ago. If you squint you might be able to see some pieces from the book.

“She knew herself, how she had slowly, over years, become a cat, a wolf, a snake, anything but a girl. How she had wrung out her girlhood like death.” -Catherynne M. Valente

+

Laura has learned not to carry expectations when it comes to Gods.

Odin was just some old drifter, Ostara looks like she could beat Martha Stewart in a home decorating contest any day of the week and Mad Sweeney is six foot and five inches tall leprechaun. Clearly, it wasn't text book mythology rules.

Still, Isis surprises her. Laura had vaguely assumed she would look like an older Nephthys. Just as high cheeked and blessed with model perfected features. No doubt blessed with a matching leg length, to work a powerful goddess stride.

Instead Isis is cute.

Isis is nearly as short as Laura herself, curvy with a heart shaped face. Making her plush lips and large eyes look all that more beautiful. She looks young.

Everything about her seems to glow, but less like something other worldly and more like joy. She smiles brightly at sister and son, bubbling with soft laughter as they talk. Nothing about her movements is overly graceful, she is frantically eager and emotional. In this moment, she is not elegant and stately. Nor is she trying to pretend to like so many other gods and goddesses have tried.

Laura can't help but stare, trying vainly to find the line where goddess and woman meet but in Isis she realizes maybe there isn't one. 

In midst her staring, the small goddess finally calms down and cuts the distance between them. The laser focus she once had for her son, now locks on to Laura as if she physically marked a target on the dead girl. Who can do nothing but freeze and accept the woman's space budding onto her own.

“You and I are long over due for a talk.”

Laura pulls back her lips into a dry, tight smile.

“You could say, I've been waiting a life time.”

Isis’s eyes glitter with amusement even when behind them Mad Sweeney groans in mock pain at her line. With a gentle touch, Isis moves her aside to look the leprechaun up and down. Her expression a cross between unimpressed and curiosity.

“Let me guess, Mad Sweeney?”

Laura gets some sick satisfaction seeing him go pale and nervous. He even takes his hands out of his pockets and attempts to look polite.

She wants to tell him that particular endeavor is hopeless.

“Aye.”

Isis nods, “Well, you can go now.”

“What?” Laura surprises herself by asking, not even sure why her voice sounds mad. Fuck, not even the idiot himself questions the goddess. He just stands there looking at the pair of them. “Go where?”

“Away?” Isis answers bluntly. “The conversation we need to have should be a private one, don't you think? At the very least, I assumed you wouldn't want your killer to take part in.” -and before Laura can get a word in to question that, she answers, “And yes, we know that too. Odin’s ravens were not the only things watching that night.”

“She's got a point dead girl…I should go.” He adds.

Laura glares at his stupid sad face, “Shut the fuck up. I did not suffer your presence all this time for you to just leave. Let alone to be dismissed like some serving boy.” Though some private part of her knows this is illogical. That if she finds him so annoying, she should want him gone. But she is a possessive dead girl these days, and she doesn't have much but him and a coin to call her own.

(She refuses to look too deeply into that fact she claims him at all)

Instead she turns her attention back to Isis, “Look, no offense but if anyone is going to tell him to fuck off its me. And I didn't, so he stays, okay?”

Isis’s soft smile blooms into a wider, altogether more wicked one. Like she is utterly pleased by Laura's response, and its only when Nephthys starts to laugh does she remember that Isis loves a good trick.

Shit.

If she had any hot blood in her, it would be rising to her cheeks. Maybe even her ears. Right now, if she were alive. She would be flushed with embarrassment.

But she's dead and thank god for that.

Ha.

+

In the end, Mad Sweeney and Laura join Isis at a small seating area in her office. Nephthys and Horus leave them, saying cheerful goodbyes that don't seem like such, as if one day soon their paths will cross again and soon.

“Do you want anything?” Isis asks, as she pours herself a glass of red wine from a near by table of assorted drinks. Mad Sweeney approaches cautiously but once he knows this isn't a trick question of sorts, points to the southern comfort bottle. She hands the bottle to him and goes to hand him a glass too but he takes the offered bottle and runs. Choosing to put as much physical distance as he can between him and the goddess without actually leaving the room.

“Am I really that scary?” She asks the dead woman, taking the empty glass with her as she sits down to hand to Laura. Who promptly shoves it under his nose. With a gruff sound of annoyance he pops the bottle open and fills her glass.

Isis watches.

Under her stare Mad Sweeney bristles, wants to tell her “Yes, Jesus fucking Christ, yes! YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY TERRIFYING. AND THIS IS EXAMPLE FUCKING ONE” -but instead he finds his voice and says, “I already have one small overly strong bitch who has my balls in her pocket. Not really in the market for another.”

(Never forget he has a death wish)

Isis chuckles and lets his insult slide, “She has more than just your balls.” She says it with such knowing that it freezes his blood. Like she has reached in with clever hands and stolen a secret he wasn't aware could so easily been taken. “Don't look so surprised.”

Mad Sweeney attempts to keep his shit together, gently coughs and looks at the goddess, “Not surprised, more like mystified.”

“Its common knowledge by now that she is only walking because of your coin. Your luck.”

Do not sigh in relief. He tells himself while taking a long gulp straight from the bottle. Mostly to buy himself an ounce of time and the chance to look away from her iron gaze. It’s easier to breath when he isn’t.

“Is it now? Wasn't aware that Grimnir and you were so close.”

Just like that, the warmth of the room vanishes and Isis's good mood with it. Replacing her joy with fury. She doesn't hide it, the rage is in her like a storm, radiating from her eyes. In her voice.

“I am no friend of your former employee. If I could smear his name from my memory I would. Just as I would burn him to ash. To let my sons consume him whole. If there is a punishment too cruel to name, I want him to experience it a thousand times.” Isis promises this with venom, spits it out like a rattle snake, forcing Sweeney physically leans away from her.

“Aye, alright. So you didn't hear it from him. Am I allowed to ask how you did?”

The goddess visibly cools her anger and shrugs, “Well, the coin is technically one of mine isn't it? Or rather of an Isis.”

Mad Sweeney and Laura both balk, but he more than her as he quickly forgets his place, “No, it ain't. It's mine. Always has been.”

“Always?”

“YES ALWAYS.” He shouts only to promptly remember…not always. He didn't make it after all, he was no black smith. “It was given to me as a gift when I was a king.”

The petite goddess doesn't smile, but her gaze softens. “Like any good coin, it was made to be used. Not locked up in some vault, to collect dust. I am not mad it fell into your hands, I'm sure it was meant to.” From no where, she plucks a similar gold coin into existence. So much like his own ability that for half a second he feels disjointed. Jealous. 

“Now, my coins, here and now. Those are just shades of magic I have left to spare to the occasional customer who spends it here. What you have Laura, is a piece of the original Isis's magic. Meant not just to bring luck, but justice. Strength to obtain it. Maybe it was placed on your grave without intent, but I have a funny feeling it would just as easily been rolled out of a pocket. The wind would have carried it out, a stray crow or cat would have helped it along.”

“It's meant for a king.” Sweeney tries again, refusing the idea that this is the part of the story always meant to be told. That she was always meant to have it, because if that is true, it means he was always meant to kill her.

And that is too fucked up for him to take.

Isis chuckles warmly at his indignation, “Is it such a strange thought that a king is sometimes a woman?”

Mad Sweeney bites his tongue is muted anger; he’s not good at it, he knows he looks pissed and he can’t stop tapping his foot, but there isn’t a damn thing he can say or do. Isis isn’t wrong, and nor will she allow herself to be to the likes of him. 

He has no power here, no strength and no fucking clue. 

+

“I am not a king,” Laura says in Mad Sweeney’s silence. 

Just short of outraged since this isn't answering anything. In fact, it's just drawing in more questions. “I was just a normal, if really shitty and depressed chick who made some terrible choices. So, you’ve got the wrong dead girl, sorry.”

“A king isn’t just someone with a crown, or a throne, sometimes it is earned. You need the right spirit, to be strong enough to handle that kind of power.” Isis explains, taking a sip of her wine before placing it down. 

“And who says I have that?” Laura digs, this is starting to hurt. She wanted answers, she wanted to find a way back to life. Not to peel back the pages of her dirty end, she knew that part of the story. She was there, wasn't she? 

She knew what fueled her, the sick and overwhelming emptiness that demanded anything and anyone to fill it; of what mistakes came from that sickness, how she had hurt everyone who ever knew her name. She knows all the players involved, of Odin and Sweeney, of Shadow and the ravens who watched.

Just as she knows that part of the story won't change. It's not a rotted tooth she can remove and get away with. It's bone disease, infecting the whole jaw. It's cognitive heart disease. It's apart of her, and it was always going to kill her, one way or another. There is not enough black ink and faith in the world to erase it.

“I know Shadow didn't mean to give me the coin, that I’m only getting this chance because numb nuts over there made a mistake...that even in death, I’m still massively screwing up. I don’t know what am I doing, like at all.” She gives a hysterical chuckle, “I kicked a dude's balls right through his mouth because I didn't know my own strength. I nearly gave my best friend a heart attack because I forgot for one second what I am. I kidnapped a cute little Salim-not Salim for his car, before I knew how much I was getting in the way of his love story. I killed Odin without knowing what that would even mean in the long run. I let Shadow go like it didn't even matter. Even now, I haven't learned anything from this whole mess, haven't found one damn thing that makes sense. Actually, it's been pretty much the exact opposite. I feel like I'm learning less, because now I have to worry about who will eat me because I'm dead or how fucked I am if I’m glued to Lucky Charms over here, and what that means.”

“Oi!” Sweeney hisses, but she ignores him and continues.

“It's obvious at this point, I am doing whatever the fuck I can to keep myself literally together. And yes, I know it's not going well. I know an old Mcdonald's french fry has a better chance of coming back than I do. I am not a fool, you don't have to pretend with me, okay? I don't have the strength of spirit, just like I don't have a light heart. I am not a king or a queen, I am a dead girl who wants something more than nothing.” Laura's voice trembles out of her, and she realizes slowly that Odin hadn't managed to spill all her secrets. 

She still has one left.

“And...and if that's not possible. If I can't get it from you or anyone else, fucking tell me now, because I am tired. I am so tired. Of rotting away and shoving air fresheners down my shirt just so ginger bitch over there doesn't puke all day. I am tired of being followed by every fly and insect, of spitting out maggots and embalming fluid. Of feeling my skin tear, of my nails dropping off and my teeth rattling around in my skull.” The truth pours out of her now, as if the stitching on her chest has come undone, “Of sewing myself up, alone in the dark. Like the world’s saddest Frankenstein girl.”

There's silence and then a clack and a clang, a loud ringing after her confession. Someone downstairs has won big time.

Laura wonders if there was a word for suicidal for the already dead.

She refuses to look at Sweeney when she's done speaking. He's been with her all this time; has seen more sides of herself than she would ever be comfortable with from anyone else. Fuck, he might be her last real tie to the world, might be the last thing she believes in but she never ever wanted him to hear this. 

Admitting it feels too much like confession.

He has been an unwilling witness to her so many of her failures and some small petty thing in her really wishes she could tell him to fuck off for good.

-but then she would be alone, truly alone.

He's done more for her, bitching aside, than anyone has ever done for her. Maybe she'd never forgive him for his part to play in her death, but worse things have happened to her since then and in the grand scheme of things, she knows he's low on the list of villains.

Unlike anyone else, at least he's been trying, and she has noticed. Not grateful, never fucking grateful, but she's noticed.

Sad truth is, if she can't be brought to life, if this whole journey has been for nothing and her getting the coin at all has just been some cosmic joke -she’s ready for it to be over. Laura is done, and the only reason she’s even trying now is the small hope she has that it isn’t. Not because she deserves it, but because now it’s not just her at stake. 

-he is too.

(She is tired enough to admit, that she really doesn't want him gone.)

>

[dustedmagazine]

Listed: Bodies of Water

Bodies of Water emerged from L.A.'s Highland Park neighborhood in the mid-aughts with Ears Will Pop & Eyes Will Blink, drawing on an unfashionable, but oddly intriguing mix of influences – gospel quartets, Tropicalia and baroque pop. The group is centered around the husband and wife team of Meredith and David Metcalf, who have to date put out four records as Bodies of Water, as well as two as Music Go Music. Jennifer Kelly reviewed the latest, Spear of the City, for Dusted, observing that “Even the most contemplative cuts move with purpose and vigor and carefully plotted complexity. Long-time listeners might well miss the fizzing, popping, overload of good feelings that Eyes and A Certain Feeling brought on, but quieter, darker tunes have a value, too.” You might have intuited broad interests from the Metcalfs’ wide-ranging output and here David Metcalf confirms the point with a list of his favorite photographs.

Russian Playground (Unknown Photographer)

I lived in the Ukraine briefly, in the mid-1990s. I was in Dniepropetrovsk, where there are giant apartment buildings like this all over. A lot of them had playgrounds, but they usually had a few more pieces of playground equipment than this one. Honestly, I don't think this is a legit playground. I think someone just dragged a slide over there and took a photo. These playgrounds usually had swings, slides, and those round metal platforms that spin. Do you know what I'm talking about? They have bars on them to hold onto, but if they get going fast enough, kids will start flying off. I don't know the name for these, in Russian or in English.

The other ubiquitous piece of community equipment out next to all these buildings were these metal bars, about six feet high, that were used to beat rugs. You draped your rug over the bar (they were just two posts stuck in the ground with a pipe between them across the top), and then beat the hell out of it with a stick. Some people had a tool for this, a long-handled type of paddle. I did this a few times in Ukraine. They work great. You have to make sure the wind is blowing away from you.

I've been lamenting the dearth of these in Northeast Los Angeles. It's faster and easier to clean a rug this way than to rent the rug doctor from Vons or whatever, but there just aren't good pipes to hang your rug from. Maybe I'm just looking in the wrong places. I've thought about the pull-up type bars they have on playgrounds around here, but I don't want to bring a rug all the way to some park and then have to deal with a bunch of rubberneckers watching me beat it with a tennis racket. Also, I'd have to do this real early in the morning so that the rug dust wouldn't foul the lungs of the children on the playground. It's just not worth it. I have too much going on in the mornings trying to get my kids fed and out the door to school, not to mention just getting my own head together! Forget it, I'll just have a dirty rug.

Yelena (Unknown Photographer)

This is from some friend of a friend's myspace page. I saved it years ago, for obvious reasons. I can't figure out what is going on in this photo, but the tinsel reminds me that Christmas is coming soon!!!

Grand Bay Living (Unknown Photoshopper)

I love these photoshopped promotional images for non-existent real estate projects! Very compelling. This one is for "The Grove at Grand Bay" in Coconut Grove, Florida.

A few notes:

The newspaper man seems tense. Also, he seems to be on the other side of the glass, outside of the condo. Is he? Figuring out where the glass walls begin and end is incredibly confusing. Is there a balcony?

The kid is rolling dice.

This development overlooks Biscayne Bay. If you do a google image search for "Biscayne Bay," the second image that comes up is of a car stuck in about two feet of ocean water. I suspect that this image represents the REAL Biscayne Bay.

What is the thing next to the sleeping lady? Hologram? Table?

This development exists now, they made it! I think they're still trying to sell the condos. A quote from the website: “They are also the first buildings that twist in the U.S. And on the topic of firsts, these are the first new high-rise residential buildings in Coconut Grove in a decade. Beautiful? Absolutely.” Guess how much these places cost. Did you guess yet? They range from 1.3 million dollars to 23.5 million. Why so expensive? I don't really know.

Apparently, this place has a bunch of amenities; car service, tennis court, chef, pet groomer, playground etc. No mention of rug-beating stations.

I don't know what this photo is called (Adam Moskowitz)

Ever since I was little, whenever I close my eyes, I see some version of this.

Blackpool, England (Chris Steele-Perkins)

Beaches used to be a lot more laissez-faire, for better or worse. My mother's parents used to drive their motorhome right up onto the sand in Destin, Florida. Everyone would park their RVs by the water and hang out. This custom seems to have disappeared. Nobody lets you drive your car onto the beach and park on the sand anymore. Why? Concerns about safety and pollution, I guess.

I've never been to Blackpool. It's hard to tell who's having the most fun in this picture. I vote for the guy wearing socks, reading the newspaper. Seems fun to me. If I could go on a vacation and just sit and read all day I would consider it a wild success. Honorable mention goes to that dog. I guess if he's the kind of dog who enjoys taking vengeance for being muzzled by pissing on other people's stuff, he's probably having a great time. They say living well is the best revenge, but I don't know.

Paris, by Antico, circa 1500 (NY Met)

What a wonderful sculpture! I don't know why this look went out of style. I mean the bronze body with gilt hair and silver eyes. I would love to have sculptures of my children made in this style. We'll just have to track down someone who has the know-how to make this happen. The only deviation from this aesthetic that I'd suggest would be to sculpt them wearing some basketball shorts, but other than that I think we're good to go.

Cynthia Bourgeault (YouTube screenshot)

I've been listening to Cynthia on YouTube quite a bit. She may disagree, but I feel like this photo captures her deal pretty well. I like her!

She seems happy.

A quote from Cynthia:

“At the center of our being is a point of pure nothingness which is untouched by sin and illusion, a point of pure truth, a point or spark that belongs entirely to God, which is never at our disposal, from which God disposes of our lives, which is inaccessible to the fantasies of our own mind or the brutalities of our own will. This little point of nothingness and of absolute poverty is the pure glory of God written in us. It is, so to speak, His name written in us, as our poverty, as our indigence, as our dependence, as our sonship. It is like a pure diamond blazing with the invisible light of heaven. It is in everybody, and if we could see it we would see these billions of points of light coming together in the face and blaze of a sun that would make all the darkness and cruelty of life vanish completely.”

Nice.

Sad Bulldog (Unknown Photographer)

Not sure if this is a couch or some kind of settee. Looks comfy though.

Sometimes I wonder if the total absence of corduroy furniture in my home may be some kind of red flag.

Emma & Naomi (Philip-Lorca diCorcia)

I have mixed feelings about some of this dude's methods; creeping around, hiding lights, laying in wait to photograph strangers without their permission, etc, BUT the results are beautiful. He's always been one of my favorite photographers; very egalitarian, very compassionate.

At least that's the impression I get. It could all be a ruse, or it could be that the proof is in the pudding. I never know anymore.

I don't know what this one is called (Ted Pushinsky)

Looking at this photo is bittersweet for me. Throwing cold water at beach nudes seems like it would bring a lot of joy into my life, but I feel like that ship has sailed. When a kid does that kind of thing, he has spunk and vim. When it's a grown man, he's a pervert, or an asshole.

Everyone hates him. I feel like I didn't take advantage of being a kid enough. I threw cold water on people a few times, but never on strangers. The fallout from that kind of thing seemed grave back then, but in retrospect, unless your parents were monsters (mine weren't), the consequences were pinner. Maybe the real issue was logistical; there were no nude beaches anywhere near Fullerton when I was growing up. At least none that I knew of. There was one in San Diego, but what was I going to do? Take a train to San Diego so I could douse nudes? That's weird. Maybe being elderly will provide me a second chance at this.

Everyone thinks outlandish, reactive old people are funny (unless they're racist). I'll revisit this plan in 45 years.

7 year old skull

Did you know this is how teeth work? I had honestly never thought about it until I saw this photo. Your adult teeth were made in your head long before they emerged, nestled into your bones, waiting to push out the baby teeth. FUN FACT: I have great teeth. Not real straight, but strong.

I've never had a cavity in my life! Knock on wood.

I didn't realize until I went back and numbered these that I made 11. Sorry.

[networkingdefinition]

Peas Quotes

Official Website: Peas Quotes

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  • A man must have something to cling to. Without that he is as a pea vine sprawling in search of a trellis…. I was all asprawl, clinging to Beauty, which is a very restless trellis. – E. B. White • A minister has to be able to read a clock. At noon, it’s time to go home and turn up the pot roast and get the peas out of the freezer. – Garrison Keillor • A monkey was carrying two handfuls of peas. One little pea dropped out. He tried to pick it up, and split twenty. He tried to pick up the twenty, and split them all. Then he lost his temper, scattered the peas in all directions and ran away – Leo Tolstoy • A solid man of Boston; A comfortable man with dividends, And the first salmon and the first green peas. – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • A typical Irish dinner would be: cream flavored with lobster, cream with bits of veal in it, green peas and cream, cream cheese, cream flavored with strawberries. – Nancy Mitford • All I wanted was to be a pea of being inside the green pod of time. – Billy Collins • All things here appear to me to trudge on in one and the same round: we rise in the morning that we may eat breakfast, dinner andsupper and to bed again that we may get up the next morning and do the same: so that you never saw two peas more alike than our yesterday and to-day. – Thomas Jefferson • An election cannot give a country a firm sense of direction if it has two or more national parties which merely have different names but are as alike in their principles and aims as peas in the same pod. – Franklin D. Roosevelt • As cows need milking and sweet peas need picking, so writers must continually exercise their mental muscles by a daily stint. – Joan Aiken • Aspirin is so good for roses, brandy for sweet peas, and a squeeze of lemon-juice for the fleshy flowers, like begonias. – Gerald Durrell

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• Banquet: a plate of cold, hairy chicken and artificially coloured green peas completely surrounded by dreary speeches and appeals for donations. – Bennett Cerf • Barney’s Dad was really bad so Barney hatched a plan when his dad said “Eat your peas.” Barney shouted no and ran Barney tricked his mean old dad and locked him in the cellar Barney’s Mom never found out where he’d gone, Cause Barney didn’t tell her. There his dad spent his life eating mice and gruel With every bite for fifty years he was sorry he’d been cruel – Bill Watterson • Be careful what you say. It comes true. It comes true. I had to leave home in order to see the world logically, logic the new way of seeing. I learned to think that mysteries are for explanation. I enjoy the simplicity. Concrete pours out of my mouth to cover the forests with freeways and sidewalks. Give me plastics, periodical tables, TV dinners with vegetables no more complex than peas mixed with diced carrots. Shine floodlights into dark corners: no ghosts. – Maxine Hong Kingston • Being pretty on the inside means you don’t hit your brother and you eat all your peas – that’s what my grandma taught me. – Lord Chesterfield • Blue does not go with everything,” Will told her. “It does not go with red, for instance.” “I have a red and blue striped waistcoat,” Henry interjected, reaching for the peas. “And if that isn’t proof that those two colors should never be seen together under Heaven, I don’t know what is. – Cassandra Clare

• Cacao is rich in happy phenethylamine chemicals called PEA. These compounds have been associated with feeling good and falling in love. – David Wolfe • Catherine went still. Her eyes closed against a sudden wet sting. ‘Did you accept her proposal?’ Leo nuzzled tenderly into the hollow beneath her ear. ‘Of course not, pea-goose. – Lisa Kleypas • Children pick up words as pigeons peas And utter them again as God shall please. – John Ray • Civilisation makes us all as alike as peas in a pod, and it is the very uncouth – uncivilised, if you will – element which individualises nations. – Alec-Tweedie • Donald Trump has said that I would like to sit down and talk to people, work things out. Well, guess what? Some of the evidence is that was, he went straight to Mexico and sat down and had a conference and a meeting directly with Pea Nieto to go over all this. OK, that. – Kimberly Guilfoyle • Dried peas and beans, being rather on the dull side, much like dull people respond readily to the right contacts. – Irma S. Rombauer • For a hungry man, green peas are more shiny than gleaming pearls. – Mehmet Murat Ildan • Frozen peas can be shelled very fast with a wringer-type washer. Put a pan on one side of the wringer to catch the peas and the pods go on through. You will think peas will go through the wringer and be mashed the moment the pod hits the wringer, but they will pop out before they go through. A very fast job can be done this way. – Heloise • Hebrew was frozen, like frozen peas, fresh out of the Bible. – Etgar Keret • Here are sweet peas, on tiptoe for a flight; With wings of gentle flush o’er delicate white, And taper fingers catching at all things, To bind them all about with tiny rings. – John Keats • Hey, look at this!” He holds up a glistening, perfect pearl about the size of a pea. “You know, if you put enough pressure on coal it turns to pearls,” he says earnestly to Finnick. “No, it doesn’t,” says Finnick dismissively. But I crack up, remembering that’s how a clueless Effie Trinket presented us to the people of the Capitol last year, before anyone knew us. As coal pressured into pearls by our weighty existence. Beauty that arose out of pain. – Suzanne Collins • How long have you been here? (Jericho) Don’t know. Again, tried to count once, got depressed so I stopped. I find it easier to just go with the flow. Ease with the peas. (Asmodeus) Ease with the peas? (Jericho) Yeah, that’s not a happy memory, either. Let’s forget I mentioned it. (Asmodeus) – Sherrilyn Kenyon • How lucious lies the pea within the pod. – Emily Dickinson • How much courage does it take to fire up your tractor and plow under a crop you spent six or seven years growing? How much courage to go on and do that after you’ve spent all that time finding out how to prepare the soil and when to plant and how much to water and when to reap? How much to just say, “I have to quit these peas. Peas are no good for me, I better try corn or beans. – Stephen King • Hugh Grant and I both laugh and cringe at the same things, worship the same books, eat the same food, hate central heating and sleep with the window open. I thought these things were vital, but being two peas in a pod ended up not being enough. – Elizabeth Hurley • I am as comfortless as a pilgrim with peas in his shoes – and as cold as Charity, Chastity or any other Virtue. – Lord Byron • I cannot wait to go get my fried butter on a stick, and fried cheesecake on a stick and…Twinkies, especially in honor of those who would rather just be forced to eat our peas. – Sarah Palin • I had pecs for about two days. Everyone would hate me. Just look at me walking around with my little peacoat on. My little customized pea coat. – Robert Pattinson • I have a few cavities. I don’t like to call them cavities, though – I like to call them ‘places to put stuff’. ‘Do you know where I can store a pea’ ‘Yes, I have some locations available.’ – Mitch Hedberg • I like not lady-slippers, Nor yet the sweet-pea blossoms, Nor yet the flaky roses, Red or white as snow; I like the chaliced lilies, The heavy Eastern lilies, The gorgeous tiger-lilies, That in our garden grow. – Thomas Bailey Aldrich • I liked playing Morph in Mash and Peas and doing Phil Daniels in the Blur Rock Profile was a giggle too. – Paul Putner • I listen to my iPod as I walk on. If I’m winning I’ll listen to the same song, that’s like a good luck thing – usually The Black Eyed Peas’ Let’s Get It Started. – Andy Murray • I love fresh vegetables and we always include them in our meals. I don’t force my kids to eat asparagus, but they do eat peas, broccoli, and carrots. – Alison Sweeney • I loved pop music as a little kid. Things like the Black Eyed Peas. If it had a catchy chorus, I was into it.- James Bay • I met Mel [Brooks] backstage in Anne’s [Bancroft] dressing room. He was wearing one of those pea coats, pea jackets that were made famous by the Merchant Marines, and I admired it and he said, “You know, they used to call this a urine jacket, but it didn’t sell.” – Gene Wilder • I must be like the princess who felt the pea through seven mattresses; each book is a pea. – C. S. Forester • I never dream in French, but certain French words seem better or more fun than English words – like ‘pois chiches’ for chick peas! – Lydia Davis • I think Black Eyed Peas are kind of unique in the ways they produce their songs. Their songs are very current. – Steve Pink • I think everything happens for a reason and all of my choices have led me up to my solo album and made me stronger, not only as an artist but as a person. I want to do more the Black Eyed Peas albums and more of my own albums. I’m in this for the long run. – Fergie • I thought that I had found something new. But then I convinced myself that the Abbot Gregor Mendel in Brünn, had, during the sixties, not only obtained the same result through extensive experiments with peas, which lasted for many years, as did de Vries and I, but had also given exactly the same explanation, as far as that was possible in 1866. – Carl Correns • I used to visit and revisit it a dozen times a day, and stand in deep contemplation over my vegetable progeny with a love that nobody could share or conceive of who had never taken part in the process of creation. It was one of the most bewitching sights in the world to observe a hill of beans thrusting aside the soil, or a rose of early peas just peeping forth sufficiently to trace a line of delicate green. – Nathaniel Hawthorne • I will be brave, thought Despereaux. I will try to be brave like a knight in shining armour. I will be brave for the Princess Pea. – Kate DiCamillo • I will say A Pea in the Pod saved my life – at the end of my pregnancy. I even wear their tanks now to work out in because they’re really long. – Kim Kardashian • I worry about people who get born nowadays, because they get born into such tiny families–sometimes into no family at all. When you’re the only pea in the pod, your parents are likely to get you confused with the Hope Diamond. And that encourages you to talk too much. – Russell Baker • If the Earth is the size of a pea in New York, then the Sun is a beachball 50m away, Pluto is 4km away, and the next nearest star is in Tokyo. Now shrink Pluto’s orbit into a coffee cup; then our Milky Way Galaxy fills North America. – Wayne Hays • If you don’t have at least a working knowledge of the Hawaiian language… you can’t chant well. You cannot… receive the images of poetry paints for you. It’s like having peas and no pod. – Keali’i Reichel • If you gave kids peas that didn’t look like peas and said they were a space shuttle, they’re much more apt to eat them because it’s now playtime. – Hod Lipson • If you want to grow up to be a big, strong pea, you have to eat your candy,” Papa Pea would say. – Amy Krouse Rosenthal • I’m a great believer in conversational rhythm. I think in terms of rhythmic dialogue. It’s so easy, you can talk naturally. It’s like peas rolling off a knife. Take the great screen actors and actresses, Bette Davis, Eddie Robinson, Jimmy Cagney, Spencer Tracy. They all talk in rhythm. And rhythm and movement are the life of the screen. – Lorenz Hart • I’m good in the kitchen. I can cook seafood, collard greens, black-eyed peas. – Monique Coleman • I’m obsessed with broccoli, carrots, celery, string beans, snap peas, black kale, brussels sprouts, cabbage – I could go on! They used to call me ‘rabbit’ when I was a kid. I hate mushrooms, though. I apologize to fungi lovers, but this way, there’s more for you! – Lisa Edelstein • In order to get big things done, sometimes, presidents have to be deft at moving the pea around under the shells. – Charlie Pierce • In school, they would tell you that life wouldn’t come to you; you had to go out and make it your own. But when it came to love, the message for girls seemed to be this: Don’t. Don’t go after what you want. Wait. Wait to be chosen, as if only in the eye of another could one truly find value. The message was confusing and infuriating. It was a shell game with no actual pea under the rapidly moving cups. – Libba Bray • In the early years of the Uprising, we survived on one meal a day of horse meat and soup, but by the end we ate only dried peas, dogs, cats and birds. – Diane Ackerman • In the game of life, less diversity means fewer options for change. Wild or domesticated, panda or pea, adaptation is the requirement for survival. – Cary Fowler • In the range of things toddlers have to learn and endlessly review–why you can’t put bottles with certain labels in your mouth, why you have to sit on the potty, why you can’t take whatever you want in the store, why you don’t hit your friends–by the time we got to why you can’t drop your peas, well, I was dropping a few myself. – Mary Blakely • Is that clear?” said Borcht “as clear as pea soup” I said – James Patterson • It is a great delusion to suppose that flesh-meat of any kind is essential to health. Considerably more than three parts of the work in the world is done by men who never taste anything but vegetable, farinaceous food, and that of the simplest kind. There are more strength-producing properties in wholemeal flour, peas, beans, lentils, oatmeal, roots, and other vegetables of the same class, than there are beef or mutton, poultry or fish, or animal food of any description whatever. – Catherine Booth • It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small. – Neil Armstrong • It was Lisa, aged five, whose mother asked her to thank my wife for the peas we had sent them from our garden. ‘I thought the peas were awful, I wish you and Mrs. Thurber were dead, and I hate trees,’ said Lisa. – James Thurber • It’s a trifle. It’s got all of these layers. First there’s a layer of ladyfingers, then a layer of jam, then custard, which I made from scratch, then raspberries, more ladyfingers, then beef sauteed with peas and onions, then a little more custard, and then bananas, and then I just put some whipped cream on top! – Rachel • Lack of world vision in any Christian produces a ‘pea-sized Christianity’. – David Bryant • Let us consider what we call vicious luxury. No gratification, however sensual, can of itself be esteemed vicious. A gratification is only vicious when it engrosses all a man’s expense, and leaves no ability for such acts of duty and generosity as are required by his situation and fortune. The same care and toil that raise a dish of peas at Christmas would give bread to a whole family during six months. – David Hume • Lives are snowflakes – unique in detail, forming patterns we have seen before, but as like one another as peas in a pod (and have you ever looked at peas in a pod? I mean, really looked at them? There’s not a chance you’d mistake one for another, after a minute’s close inspection.) – Neil Gaiman • Love is ridiculous. But love is also wonderful. And powerful. And Despereaux’s love for the Princess Pea would prove, in time, to be all of these things: powerful, wonderful, and ridiculous. – Kate DiCamillo • Mainstream people dislike homosexuality because they can’t help concentrating on what homosexual men do to one another. And when you contemplate what people do, you think of yourself doing it. And they don’t like that. That’s the famous joke: I don’t like peas, and I’m glad I don’t like them, because if I liked them I would eat them and I hate them. – Quentin Crisp • Memory overshadows the present and dims the future “into something thicker than its usual pea soup.” – Vladimir Nabokov • Mostly, I spend my time being a mother to my two children, working in my organic garden, raising masses of sweet peas, being passionately involved in conservation, recycling and solar energy. – Blythe Danner • My boy, the ‘quenelles de sole’ were splendid, but the peas were poor. You should shake the pan gently, all the time, like this. – Marie-Antoine Careme • My cat is completely blind. I am watching her now, sweet-pea that is, circling the kitchen floor and bumping into the kitchen chairs. She is kind of like a furry ball in a pinball machine…she bumps into something and then just turns and moves on…it makes me smile – although i know it’s just not that funny. I think i laugh because what i really feel like doing, is crying – Jann Arden • My family lived off the land and summer evening meals featured baked stuffed tomatoes, potato salad, corn on the cob, fresh shelled peas and homemade ice cream with strawberries from our garden. With no air conditioning in those days, the cool porch was the center of our universe after the scorching days. – David Mixner • My favorite healthy foods are Jamaican chicken soup, Jamaican chicken stew peas, Jamaican brown stew chicken, plantains and banana chips. – Sanya Richards-Ross • My musical taste is like a 16-year-old girl’s when it comes to working out – Rihanna, Black Eyed Peas, Miley Cyrus. I love it all! – Jessica Capshaw • My solo album is different from the Black Eyed Peas albums because I’m a singer first and foremost. There are more ballads and more intimacy between me and the listener because sometimes when you’re in a group you don’t have space to air out your dirty laundry. – Fergie • My teacher said my brain was the size of a pea. He made my life miserable by singling me out in the classroom as a failure. – Willard Wigan • No member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who has canned peas, topped beets, hauled hay, shoveled coal, or helped in any way to serve others ever forgets or regrets the experience of helping provide for those in need. – Thomas S. Monson • Nobody wants somebody who wants them for what they have or the position their in- you want somebody who wants you for you. In case it all goes crazy and it all turns to dust. I want somebody who loves me in the welfare line, eating gumbo, eating fish,black eyed peas and rice. I want somebody that loves me. God wants you to love him, not his cars, not his house, not his blessing- love him. – T. D. Jakes • Nothing rekindles my spirits, gives comfort to my heart and mind, more than a visit to Mississippi… and to be regaled as I often have been, with a platter of fried chicken, field peas, collard greens, fresh corn on the cob, sliced tomatoes with French dressing… and to top it all off with a wedge of freshly baked pecan pie. – Craig Claiborne • Now hoppin’-john was F. Jasmine’s very favorite food. She had always warned them to wave a plate of rice and peas before her nose when she was in her coffin, to make certain there was no mistake; for if a breath of life was left in her, she would sit up and eat, but if she smelled the hopping-john, and did not stir, then they could just nail down the coffin and be certain she was truly dead. – Carson McCullers • October, baptize me with leaves! Swaddle me in corduroy and nurse me with split pea soup. October, tuck tiny candy bars in my pockets and carve my smile into a thousand pumpkins. O autumn! O teakettle! O grace! – Rainbow Rowell • One recent menu for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo consisted of orange glazed chicken, fresh fruit crepe, steamed peas and mushrooms, and rice pilaf. Sounds like the sort of thing you’d get at Windows on the World – if it still existed. – Ann Coulter • Our full humanity is contingent on our hospitality; we can be complete only when we are giving something away; when we sit at the table and pass the peas to the person next to us we see that person in a whole new way. – Alice Waters • Pea was aware suddenly of how fragile her heart was, how much darkness was inside it, fighting, always, with the light. She did not like the rat. She would neverlike the rat, but she knew what she must do to save her own heart. – Kate DiCamillo • Peas baffled me. I could not understand why grown-ups would take things that tasted so good raw, and then put them in tins, and make them revolting. – Neil Gaiman • Peas went with carrots as infallibly as ham went with eggs. For years I thought carrots and peas grew on the same vine. – Peg Bracken • People ate bread made of the shells of peas because there was no flour. – Bel Kaufman • Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation’s tears in shoulder blades. – Boris Pasternak • Reader, you may ask this queston. In fact, you must ask this question. Is it ridiculous for a very small, sickly, big-eared mouse to fall in love with a beautiful princess named Pea? The answer is… Yes. Of course it’s ridiculous. Love is ridiculous. But love is also wonderful. And powerful. – Kate DiCamillo • Rice and peas fit into that category of dishes where two ordinary foods, combined together, ignite a pleasure far beyond the capacity of either of its parts alone. Like rhubarb and strawberries, apple pie and cheese, roast pork and sage, the two tastes and textures meld together into the sort of subtle transcendental oneness that we once fantasized would be our experience when we finally found the ideal mate. – John Thorne • Runny’s Nicpic One day Runny Babbit Met little Franny Fog. He said, “Let’s have a nicpic Down by the lollow hog.” He brought some cutter bookies, Some teanuts and some pea. And what did Franny Fog bring? Her whole fog framily. – Shel Silverstein • She could not explain or quite understand that it wasn’t altogether jealousy she felt, it was rage. And not because she couldn’t shop like that or dress like that. It was because that was what girls were supposed to be like. That was what men – people, everybody – thought they should be like. Beautiful, treasured, spoiled, selfish, pea-brained. That was what a girl should be, to be fallen in love with. Then she would become a mother and she’d be all mushily devoted to her babies. Not selfish anymore, but just as pea-brained. Forever. – Alice Munro • Soft petals, yes, but not so barren quite, Mingled with these, smooth bean and wrinkled pea; And go along with you ere you lose sight Of what you came for and become like me,

Slave to a springtime passion for the earth. How love burns through the Putting in the Seed On through the watching for that early birth When, just as the soil tarnishes with weed,

The sturdy seedling with arched body comes Shouldering its way and shedding the earth crumbs. – Robert Frost • Some are trapped in boxes of pea-sized Christianity, full of myths about missions that rob them of incentive to care about the unreached – David Bryant • Some days confidence shrinks to the size of a pea, and the backbone feels like a feather. We want to be somewhere else, and don’t know where – want to be someone else and don’t know who. – Jean Hersey • Someone is dead. Even the trees know it, those poor old dancers who come on lewdly, all pea-green scarfs and spine pole. – Anne Sexton • Sometimes when you are trying not to think about something it keeps popping back in your head you can’t help it you think about it and think about it and think about it until your brain feels like a squashed pea. – Sharon Creech • STAY HOME FROM SCHOOL FAUX VOMIT: 1 cup of cooked oatmeal 1.2 cup of sour cream (or buttermilk ranch dressing or anything that smells like rancid, sour milk) 2 chopped cheese sticks (for chunkiness) 1 uncooked egg (for authentic slimy texture) 1 can of split pea soup (for putrid green color) 1/4 cup of raisins (to increase gross-osity) Mix ingredients and simmer over low heat for 2 minutes Let mixture cool to warm vomit temperature Use liberally as needed Makes 4 to 5 cups – Rachel Renée Russell • Straight up from this road Away from the fitted particles of frost Coating the hull of each chick pea, And the stiff archer bug making its way In the morning dark, toe hair by toe hair, Up the stem of the trillim, Straight up through the sky above this road right now, The galaxies of the Cygnus A cluster Are colliding with each other in a massive swarm Of interpenetrating and exploding catastrophes. I try to remember that. – Pattiann Rogers • Sweet pea?'” Alec said. “I was just trying it out.” Alec shook his head. “No.” Magnus shrugged. “I’ll keep at it. – Cassandra Clare • Tess and I are a good match. She understands intimately where I came from. She can cheer me up on my darkest days. It’s as if she came perfectly happy home instead of what Kaede just told me. I feel a relaxing warmth at the thought, realizing suddenly how much I’m anticipating meeting up with Tess again. Where she goes, I go, and vice versa. Peas in a pod. Then there’s June. Even the thought of her name makes it hard for me to breathe. I’m almost embarrassed by my reaction. Are June and I a good match? No. It’s the first word to pop into my mind. And yet, still. – Marie Lu • That admiration of the ‘neat but not gaudy,’ which is commonly reported to have influenced the devil when he painted his tail pea green. – John Ruskin • The best minds come from the most unexpected faces and places. There is no image for intelligence or genius. Genius is something that cannot be seen. It cannot be produced or manufactured. It is something that even the true genius thinks is unattainable. The genius recognizes he’s just a small pea in a sea of infinite atoms. Knowledge is as infinite as the universe. The man who claims to know all, only reveals to all that he really knows nothing. – Suzy Kassem • The Black Eyed Peas sell thousands of seats in every country on the planet. You can’t get nervous. We’re all succeeding in all different parts of our careers. Just because I produce Nas and John Legend and Justin Timberlake doesn’t mean it will change the dynamic of the Peas. – will.i.am • The Colonel led all the cheers. Cornbread!” he screamed. CHICKEN!” the crowd responded. Rice!” PEAS!” And then, all together: “WE GOT HIGHER SATs.” Hip Hip Hip Hooray!” the Colonel cried. YOU’LL BE WORKIN’ FOR US SOMEDAY! – John Green • The meal was pretentious – a kind of beetroot soup with greasy croutons; pork underdone with loud vulgar cabbage, potato croquettes, tinned peas in tiny jam-tart cases, watery gooseberry sauce; trifle made with a resinous wine, so jammy that all my teeth lit up at once. – Anthony Burgess • The only really interesting thing about someone that makes you want to explore them further is their heart, and Miss Honeycut has a teeny tiny pea-sized one and it takes you nowhere you want to go. – Polly Horvath • The Owl and the Pussycat went to sea In a beautiful pea-green boat: They took some honey, and plenty of money Wrapped up in a five-pound note. . . They dined on mince and slices of quince, Which they ate with a runcible spoon; And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand, They danced by the light of the moon, The moon, The moon, They danced by the light of the moon. – Edward Lear • The owl and the pussycat went to sea, / In a beautiful pea green boat. / They took some honey, and plenty of money, / Wrapped up in a five pound note. – Edward Lear • The peanut is neither a pea nor a nut. Discuss. – Mike Myers • The Princess and the Pea?” Gabrielle suggested. “Not enough time,” Kat said “Where’s Waldo?” Gabrielle went on. “No.” Hamish recoiled. “I am still not allowed back in Morocco. – Ally Carter • The sower may mistake and sow his peas crookedly; the peas make no mistake, but come up and show his line. – Ralph Waldo Emerson • There are few pleasures like really burrowing one’s nose into sweet peas. – Angela Thirkell • There are m]oral precepts that we consider really important, such as ‘don’t pick your nose’ or ‘don’t eat peas with a knife’. There may, for ought I know, be admirable reasons for eating peas with a knife, but . . . early persuasion has made me completely incapable of appreciating them.- Bertrand Russell • There are so many things to be tortured about, sweet pea. So many torturous things in this life. Don’t let the man who doesn’t love you be one of them. – Cheryl Strayed • There has long been a bemoaning of the lack of opportunity to make films that are anything but explosions or the ladling on the pea soup or whatever you want to call it. You can hardly make a movie today where somebody isn’t a murderer or a rapist or, if it’s a “Fried Green Tomatoes” that isn’t some wistful thing on this, that or the other thing. – Jack Nicholson • There must be a way to get more of these in me faster, thought the inventor of pea soup as he sat eating peas. – Dana Gould • This fellow pecks up wit, as pigeons peas; And utters it again when God doth please: He is wit’s pedler; and retails his wares. – William Shakespeare • Though loyal and able and brave, Pea had never displayed the slightest ability to learn from his experience, though his experience was considerable. Time and again he would walk up on the wrong side of a horse that was known to kick, and then look surprised when he got kicked. – Larry McMurtry • Thoughts come maimed and plucked of plumage from the lips, which, from the pea, in the silence of your own leisure and study, would be born with far more beauty. – Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington • Throw high risers at the chin; throw peas at the knees; throw it here when they’re lookin’ there; throw it there when they’re lookin’ here. – Satchel Paige • Tibby cried into her soup when it finally came. “I’m scared… ,” she told it. The carrots and peas made no reply, but she felt better for having told them. – Ann Brashares • Today, most women are surrounded by ingenious gadgets. They don’t grow the peas or raise the chicken that they serve for dinner; instead they hunt and gather in the grocery store. They go through catalogs or department stores to buy clothes instead of shearing sheep, carding wool, and weaving cloth for skirts and coats and blankets. – Helen Fisher • We all know what feminists are. They are shrill, overly aggressive, man-hating, ball-busting, selfish, hairy, extremist, deliberately unattractive women with absolutely no sense of humor who see sexism at every turn. They make men’s testicles shrivel up to the size of peas, they detest the family and think all children should be deported or drowned. – Susan J. Douglas • We have fried catfish, country fried steak and cinnamon-roasted pork. We have collard greens, black-eyed peas, hush puppies, biscuits, sweet potato pie and lots of gravy. Most players love it, but we also have a baked catfish for players who are still looking to stay on the approved diet. – Mark Farner • What you discover about life’s shell game is that it’s hardest to follow the pea when you’re the pea. – Robert Breault • Whatever cleaning goes on on the planet, women do 99% of it. But see, women are not as proud of their 99% as men are of our one! We clean something up, we’re gonna talk about it all year long. It might be on the news, you don’t know. A woman could be out re-paving the driveway. Men actually have enough gall to run out on the porch and go “Hey baby? Man, it’s hot as hell out here, ain’t it! Look, don’t worry about emptyin’ that ashtray in the den, I done got it, all right? Did it for you, sweet pea. I’m gonna go take a nap now, all right?” – Jeff Foxworthy • When Pococke inquired of Grotius, where the proof was of that story of the pigeon, trained to pick peas from Mahomet’s (Muhammad’s) ear, and pass for an angel dictating to him? Grotius answered that there was no proof! – Thomas Carlyle • When you look at the Lady Gagas of the world, or the Jay-Zs, or the Black Eyed Peas, these are people who have one album release and it’s a worldwide one. – Tinie Tempah • When you think of the “Exorcist” (1973) you think of Linda Blair and pea soup and all this madness, but really if you look at the first half of that film, the stuff between her and Ellen Burstyn is so naturalistic and so real. – Matt Reeves • When you’re the only pea in the pod, your parents are likely to get you confused with the Hope diamond. – Russell Baker • Who watches golf on TV? Who calls eight friends over and gets a keg of beer? Landscapers, I guess. They sit around the TV, yelling, “Will you look at that golf path?Pure pea gravel.” – Jeff Cesario • William Tell could take an apple off your head, [Phil] Taylor could take out a processed pea. – Sid Waddell • You know, when I eat three peas, I’m pregnant. When I visit a city, I’m buying a house. – Vanessa Paradis • Young people want to look like peas in a pod, and there is no use trying to make them different. – Ilka Chase

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[equitiesstocks]

Peas Quotes

Official Website: Peas Quotes

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  • A man must have something to cling to. Without that he is as a pea vine sprawling in search of a trellis…. I was all asprawl, clinging to Beauty, which is a very restless trellis. – E. B. White • A minister has to be able to read a clock. At noon, it’s time to go home and turn up the pot roast and get the peas out of the freezer. – Garrison Keillor • A monkey was carrying two handfuls of peas. One little pea dropped out. He tried to pick it up, and split twenty. He tried to pick up the twenty, and split them all. Then he lost his temper, scattered the peas in all directions and ran away – Leo Tolstoy • A solid man of Boston; A comfortable man with dividends, And the first salmon and the first green peas. – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • A typical Irish dinner would be: cream flavored with lobster, cream with bits of veal in it, green peas and cream, cream cheese, cream flavored with strawberries. – Nancy Mitford • All I wanted was to be a pea of being inside the green pod of time. – Billy Collins • All things here appear to me to trudge on in one and the same round: we rise in the morning that we may eat breakfast, dinner andsupper and to bed again that we may get up the next morning and do the same: so that you never saw two peas more alike than our yesterday and to-day. – Thomas Jefferson • An election cannot give a country a firm sense of direction if it has two or more national parties which merely have different names but are as alike in their principles and aims as peas in the same pod. – Franklin D. Roosevelt • As cows need milking and sweet peas need picking, so writers must continually exercise their mental muscles by a daily stint. – Joan Aiken • Aspirin is so good for roses, brandy for sweet peas, and a squeeze of lemon-juice for the fleshy flowers, like begonias. – Gerald Durrell

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• Banquet: a plate of cold, hairy chicken and artificially coloured green peas completely surrounded by dreary speeches and appeals for donations. – Bennett Cerf • Barney’s Dad was really bad so Barney hatched a plan when his dad said “Eat your peas.” Barney shouted no and ran Barney tricked his mean old dad and locked him in the cellar Barney’s Mom never found out where he’d gone, Cause Barney didn’t tell her. There his dad spent his life eating mice and gruel With every bite for fifty years he was sorry he’d been cruel – Bill Watterson • Be careful what you say. It comes true. It comes true. I had to leave home in order to see the world logically, logic the new way of seeing. I learned to think that mysteries are for explanation. I enjoy the simplicity. Concrete pours out of my mouth to cover the forests with freeways and sidewalks. Give me plastics, periodical tables, TV dinners with vegetables no more complex than peas mixed with diced carrots. Shine floodlights into dark corners: no ghosts. – Maxine Hong Kingston • Being pretty on the inside means you don’t hit your brother and you eat all your peas – that’s what my grandma taught me. – Lord Chesterfield • Blue does not go with everything,” Will told her. “It does not go with red, for instance.” “I have a red and blue striped waistcoat,” Henry interjected, reaching for the peas. “And if that isn’t proof that those two colors should never be seen together under Heaven, I don’t know what is. – Cassandra Clare

• Cacao is rich in happy phenethylamine chemicals called PEA. These compounds have been associated with feeling good and falling in love. – David Wolfe • Catherine went still. Her eyes closed against a sudden wet sting. ‘Did you accept her proposal?’ Leo nuzzled tenderly into the hollow beneath her ear. ‘Of course not, pea-goose. – Lisa Kleypas • Children pick up words as pigeons peas And utter them again as God shall please. – John Ray • Civilisation makes us all as alike as peas in a pod, and it is the very uncouth – uncivilised, if you will – element which individualises nations. – Alec-Tweedie • Donald Trump has said that I would like to sit down and talk to people, work things out. Well, guess what? Some of the evidence is that was, he went straight to Mexico and sat down and had a conference and a meeting directly with Pea Nieto to go over all this. OK, that. – Kimberly Guilfoyle • Dried peas and beans, being rather on the dull side, much like dull people respond readily to the right contacts. – Irma S. Rombauer • For a hungry man, green peas are more shiny than gleaming pearls. – Mehmet Murat Ildan • Frozen peas can be shelled very fast with a wringer-type washer. Put a pan on one side of the wringer to catch the peas and the pods go on through. You will think peas will go through the wringer and be mashed the moment the pod hits the wringer, but they will pop out before they go through. A very fast job can be done this way. – Heloise • Hebrew was frozen, like frozen peas, fresh out of the Bible. – Etgar Keret • Here are sweet peas, on tiptoe for a flight; With wings of gentle flush o’er delicate white, And taper fingers catching at all things, To bind them all about with tiny rings. – John Keats • Hey, look at this!” He holds up a glistening, perfect pearl about the size of a pea. “You know, if you put enough pressure on coal it turns to pearls,” he says earnestly to Finnick. “No, it doesn’t,” says Finnick dismissively. But I crack up, remembering that’s how a clueless Effie Trinket presented us to the people of the Capitol last year, before anyone knew us. As coal pressured into pearls by our weighty existence. Beauty that arose out of pain. – Suzanne Collins • How long have you been here? (Jericho) Don’t know. Again, tried to count once, got depressed so I stopped. I find it easier to just go with the flow. Ease with the peas. (Asmodeus) Ease with the peas? (Jericho) Yeah, that’s not a happy memory, either. Let’s forget I mentioned it. (Asmodeus) – Sherrilyn Kenyon • How lucious lies the pea within the pod. – Emily Dickinson • How much courage does it take to fire up your tractor and plow under a crop you spent six or seven years growing? How much courage to go on and do that after you’ve spent all that time finding out how to prepare the soil and when to plant and how much to water and when to reap? How much to just say, “I have to quit these peas. Peas are no good for me, I better try corn or beans. – Stephen King • Hugh Grant and I both laugh and cringe at the same things, worship the same books, eat the same food, hate central heating and sleep with the window open. I thought these things were vital, but being two peas in a pod ended up not being enough. – Elizabeth Hurley • I am as comfortless as a pilgrim with peas in his shoes – and as cold as Charity, Chastity or any other Virtue. – Lord Byron • I cannot wait to go get my fried butter on a stick, and fried cheesecake on a stick and…Twinkies, especially in honor of those who would rather just be forced to eat our peas. – Sarah Palin • I had pecs for about two days. Everyone would hate me. Just look at me walking around with my little peacoat on. My little customized pea coat. – Robert Pattinson • I have a few cavities. I don’t like to call them cavities, though – I like to call them ‘places to put stuff’. ‘Do you know where I can store a pea’ ‘Yes, I have some locations available.’ – Mitch Hedberg • I like not lady-slippers, Nor yet the sweet-pea blossoms, Nor yet the flaky roses, Red or white as snow; I like the chaliced lilies, The heavy Eastern lilies, The gorgeous tiger-lilies, That in our garden grow. – Thomas Bailey Aldrich • I liked playing Morph in Mash and Peas and doing Phil Daniels in the Blur Rock Profile was a giggle too. – Paul Putner • I listen to my iPod as I walk on. If I’m winning I’ll listen to the same song, that’s like a good luck thing – usually The Black Eyed Peas’ Let’s Get It Started. – Andy Murray • I love fresh vegetables and we always include them in our meals. I don’t force my kids to eat asparagus, but they do eat peas, broccoli, and carrots. – Alison Sweeney • I loved pop music as a little kid. Things like the Black Eyed Peas. If it had a catchy chorus, I was into it.- James Bay • I met Mel [Brooks] backstage in Anne’s [Bancroft] dressing room. He was wearing one of those pea coats, pea jackets that were made famous by the Merchant Marines, and I admired it and he said, “You know, they used to call this a urine jacket, but it didn’t sell.” – Gene Wilder • I must be like the princess who felt the pea through seven mattresses; each book is a pea. – C. S. Forester • I never dream in French, but certain French words seem better or more fun than English words – like ‘pois chiches’ for chick peas! – Lydia Davis • I think Black Eyed Peas are kind of unique in the ways they produce their songs. Their songs are very current. – Steve Pink • I think everything happens for a reason and all of my choices have led me up to my solo album and made me stronger, not only as an artist but as a person. I want to do more the Black Eyed Peas albums and more of my own albums. I’m in this for the long run. – Fergie • I thought that I had found something new. But then I convinced myself that the Abbot Gregor Mendel in Brünn, had, during the sixties, not only obtained the same result through extensive experiments with peas, which lasted for many years, as did de Vries and I, but had also given exactly the same explanation, as far as that was possible in 1866. – Carl Correns • I used to visit and revisit it a dozen times a day, and stand in deep contemplation over my vegetable progeny with a love that nobody could share or conceive of who had never taken part in the process of creation. It was one of the most bewitching sights in the world to observe a hill of beans thrusting aside the soil, or a rose of early peas just peeping forth sufficiently to trace a line of delicate green. – Nathaniel Hawthorne • I will be brave, thought Despereaux. I will try to be brave like a knight in shining armour. I will be brave for the Princess Pea. – Kate DiCamillo • I will say A Pea in the Pod saved my life – at the end of my pregnancy. I even wear their tanks now to work out in because they’re really long. – Kim Kardashian • I worry about people who get born nowadays, because they get born into such tiny families–sometimes into no family at all. When you’re the only pea in the pod, your parents are likely to get you confused with the Hope Diamond. And that encourages you to talk too much. – Russell Baker • If the Earth is the size of a pea in New York, then the Sun is a beachball 50m away, Pluto is 4km away, and the next nearest star is in Tokyo. Now shrink Pluto’s orbit into a coffee cup; then our Milky Way Galaxy fills North America. – Wayne Hays • If you don’t have at least a working knowledge of the Hawaiian language… you can’t chant well. You cannot… receive the images of poetry paints for you. It’s like having peas and no pod. – Keali’i Reichel • If you gave kids peas that didn’t look like peas and said they were a space shuttle, they’re much more apt to eat them because it’s now playtime. – Hod Lipson • If you want to grow up to be a big, strong pea, you have to eat your candy,” Papa Pea would say. – Amy Krouse Rosenthal • I’m a great believer in conversational rhythm. I think in terms of rhythmic dialogue. It’s so easy, you can talk naturally. It’s like peas rolling off a knife. Take the great screen actors and actresses, Bette Davis, Eddie Robinson, Jimmy Cagney, Spencer Tracy. They all talk in rhythm. And rhythm and movement are the life of the screen. – Lorenz Hart • I’m good in the kitchen. I can cook seafood, collard greens, black-eyed peas. – Monique Coleman • I’m obsessed with broccoli, carrots, celery, string beans, snap peas, black kale, brussels sprouts, cabbage – I could go on! They used to call me ‘rabbit’ when I was a kid. I hate mushrooms, though. I apologize to fungi lovers, but this way, there’s more for you! – Lisa Edelstein • In order to get big things done, sometimes, presidents have to be deft at moving the pea around under the shells. – Charlie Pierce • In school, they would tell you that life wouldn’t come to you; you had to go out and make it your own. But when it came to love, the message for girls seemed to be this: Don’t. Don’t go after what you want. Wait. Wait to be chosen, as if only in the eye of another could one truly find value. The message was confusing and infuriating. It was a shell game with no actual pea under the rapidly moving cups. – Libba Bray • In the early years of the Uprising, we survived on one meal a day of horse meat and soup, but by the end we ate only dried peas, dogs, cats and birds. – Diane Ackerman • In the game of life, less diversity means fewer options for change. Wild or domesticated, panda or pea, adaptation is the requirement for survival. – Cary Fowler • In the range of things toddlers have to learn and endlessly review–why you can’t put bottles with certain labels in your mouth, why you have to sit on the potty, why you can’t take whatever you want in the store, why you don’t hit your friends–by the time we got to why you can’t drop your peas, well, I was dropping a few myself. – Mary Blakely • Is that clear?” said Borcht “as clear as pea soup” I said – James Patterson • It is a great delusion to suppose that flesh-meat of any kind is essential to health. Considerably more than three parts of the work in the world is done by men who never taste anything but vegetable, farinaceous food, and that of the simplest kind. There are more strength-producing properties in wholemeal flour, peas, beans, lentils, oatmeal, roots, and other vegetables of the same class, than there are beef or mutton, poultry or fish, or animal food of any description whatever. – Catherine Booth • It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small. – Neil Armstrong • It was Lisa, aged five, whose mother asked her to thank my wife for the peas we had sent them from our garden. ‘I thought the peas were awful, I wish you and Mrs. Thurber were dead, and I hate trees,’ said Lisa. – James Thurber • It’s a trifle. It’s got all of these layers. First there’s a layer of ladyfingers, then a layer of jam, then custard, which I made from scratch, then raspberries, more ladyfingers, then beef sauteed with peas and onions, then a little more custard, and then bananas, and then I just put some whipped cream on top! – Rachel • Lack of world vision in any Christian produces a ‘pea-sized Christianity’. – David Bryant • Let us consider what we call vicious luxury. No gratification, however sensual, can of itself be esteemed vicious. A gratification is only vicious when it engrosses all a man’s expense, and leaves no ability for such acts of duty and generosity as are required by his situation and fortune. The same care and toil that raise a dish of peas at Christmas would give bread to a whole family during six months. – David Hume • Lives are snowflakes – unique in detail, forming patterns we have seen before, but as like one another as peas in a pod (and have you ever looked at peas in a pod? I mean, really looked at them? There’s not a chance you’d mistake one for another, after a minute’s close inspection.) – Neil Gaiman • Love is ridiculous. But love is also wonderful. And powerful. And Despereaux’s love for the Princess Pea would prove, in time, to be all of these things: powerful, wonderful, and ridiculous. – Kate DiCamillo • Mainstream people dislike homosexuality because they can’t help concentrating on what homosexual men do to one another. And when you contemplate what people do, you think of yourself doing it. And they don’t like that. That’s the famous joke: I don’t like peas, and I’m glad I don’t like them, because if I liked them I would eat them and I hate them. – Quentin Crisp • Memory overshadows the present and dims the future “into something thicker than its usual pea soup.” – Vladimir Nabokov • Mostly, I spend my time being a mother to my two children, working in my organic garden, raising masses of sweet peas, being passionately involved in conservation, recycling and solar energy. – Blythe Danner • My boy, the ‘quenelles de sole’ were splendid, but the peas were poor. You should shake the pan gently, all the time, like this. – Marie-Antoine Careme • My cat is completely blind. I am watching her now, sweet-pea that is, circling the kitchen floor and bumping into the kitchen chairs. She is kind of like a furry ball in a pinball machine…she bumps into something and then just turns and moves on…it makes me smile – although i know it’s just not that funny. I think i laugh because what i really feel like doing, is crying – Jann Arden • My family lived off the land and summer evening meals featured baked stuffed tomatoes, potato salad, corn on the cob, fresh shelled peas and homemade ice cream with strawberries from our garden. With no air conditioning in those days, the cool porch was the center of our universe after the scorching days. – David Mixner • My favorite healthy foods are Jamaican chicken soup, Jamaican chicken stew peas, Jamaican brown stew chicken, plantains and banana chips. – Sanya Richards-Ross • My musical taste is like a 16-year-old girl’s when it comes to working out – Rihanna, Black Eyed Peas, Miley Cyrus. I love it all! – Jessica Capshaw • My solo album is different from the Black Eyed Peas albums because I’m a singer first and foremost. There are more ballads and more intimacy between me and the listener because sometimes when you’re in a group you don’t have space to air out your dirty laundry. – Fergie • My teacher said my brain was the size of a pea. He made my life miserable by singling me out in the classroom as a failure. – Willard Wigan • No member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who has canned peas, topped beets, hauled hay, shoveled coal, or helped in any way to serve others ever forgets or regrets the experience of helping provide for those in need. – Thomas S. Monson • Nobody wants somebody who wants them for what they have or the position their in- you want somebody who wants you for you. In case it all goes crazy and it all turns to dust. I want somebody who loves me in the welfare line, eating gumbo, eating fish,black eyed peas and rice. I want somebody that loves me. God wants you to love him, not his cars, not his house, not his blessing- love him. – T. D. Jakes • Nothing rekindles my spirits, gives comfort to my heart and mind, more than a visit to Mississippi… and to be regaled as I often have been, with a platter of fried chicken, field peas, collard greens, fresh corn on the cob, sliced tomatoes with French dressing… and to top it all off with a wedge of freshly baked pecan pie. – Craig Claiborne • Now hoppin’-john was F. Jasmine’s very favorite food. She had always warned them to wave a plate of rice and peas before her nose when she was in her coffin, to make certain there was no mistake; for if a breath of life was left in her, she would sit up and eat, but if she smelled the hopping-john, and did not stir, then they could just nail down the coffin and be certain she was truly dead. – Carson McCullers • October, baptize me with leaves! Swaddle me in corduroy and nurse me with split pea soup. October, tuck tiny candy bars in my pockets and carve my smile into a thousand pumpkins. O autumn! O teakettle! O grace! – Rainbow Rowell • One recent menu for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo consisted of orange glazed chicken, fresh fruit crepe, steamed peas and mushrooms, and rice pilaf. Sounds like the sort of thing you’d get at Windows on the World – if it still existed. – Ann Coulter • Our full humanity is contingent on our hospitality; we can be complete only when we are giving something away; when we sit at the table and pass the peas to the person next to us we see that person in a whole new way. – Alice Waters • Pea was aware suddenly of how fragile her heart was, how much darkness was inside it, fighting, always, with the light. She did not like the rat. She would neverlike the rat, but she knew what she must do to save her own heart. – Kate DiCamillo • Peas baffled me. I could not understand why grown-ups would take things that tasted so good raw, and then put them in tins, and make them revolting. – Neil Gaiman • Peas went with carrots as infallibly as ham went with eggs. For years I thought carrots and peas grew on the same vine. – Peg Bracken • People ate bread made of the shells of peas because there was no flour. – Bel Kaufman • Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation’s tears in shoulder blades. – Boris Pasternak • Reader, you may ask this queston. In fact, you must ask this question. Is it ridiculous for a very small, sickly, big-eared mouse to fall in love with a beautiful princess named Pea? The answer is… Yes. Of course it’s ridiculous. Love is ridiculous. But love is also wonderful. And powerful. – Kate DiCamillo • Rice and peas fit into that category of dishes where two ordinary foods, combined together, ignite a pleasure far beyond the capacity of either of its parts alone. Like rhubarb and strawberries, apple pie and cheese, roast pork and sage, the two tastes and textures meld together into the sort of subtle transcendental oneness that we once fantasized would be our experience when we finally found the ideal mate. – John Thorne • Runny’s Nicpic One day Runny Babbit Met little Franny Fog. He said, “Let’s have a nicpic Down by the lollow hog.” He brought some cutter bookies, Some teanuts and some pea. And what did Franny Fog bring? Her whole fog framily. – Shel Silverstein • She could not explain or quite understand that it wasn’t altogether jealousy she felt, it was rage. And not because she couldn’t shop like that or dress like that. It was because that was what girls were supposed to be like. That was what men – people, everybody – thought they should be like. Beautiful, treasured, spoiled, selfish, pea-brained. That was what a girl should be, to be fallen in love with. Then she would become a mother and she’d be all mushily devoted to her babies. Not selfish anymore, but just as pea-brained. Forever. – Alice Munro • Soft petals, yes, but not so barren quite, Mingled with these, smooth bean and wrinkled pea; And go along with you ere you lose sight Of what you came for and become like me,

Slave to a springtime passion for the earth. How love burns through the Putting in the Seed On through the watching for that early birth When, just as the soil tarnishes with weed,

The sturdy seedling with arched body comes Shouldering its way and shedding the earth crumbs. – Robert Frost • Some are trapped in boxes of pea-sized Christianity, full of myths about missions that rob them of incentive to care about the unreached – David Bryant • Some days confidence shrinks to the size of a pea, and the backbone feels like a feather. We want to be somewhere else, and don’t know where – want to be someone else and don’t know who. – Jean Hersey • Someone is dead. Even the trees know it, those poor old dancers who come on lewdly, all pea-green scarfs and spine pole. – Anne Sexton • Sometimes when you are trying not to think about something it keeps popping back in your head you can’t help it you think about it and think about it and think about it until your brain feels like a squashed pea. – Sharon Creech • STAY HOME FROM SCHOOL FAUX VOMIT: 1 cup of cooked oatmeal 1.2 cup of sour cream (or buttermilk ranch dressing or anything that smells like rancid, sour milk) 2 chopped cheese sticks (for chunkiness) 1 uncooked egg (for authentic slimy texture) 1 can of split pea soup (for putrid green color) 1/4 cup of raisins (to increase gross-osity) Mix ingredients and simmer over low heat for 2 minutes Let mixture cool to warm vomit temperature Use liberally as needed Makes 4 to 5 cups – Rachel Renée Russell • Straight up from this road Away from the fitted particles of frost Coating the hull of each chick pea, And the stiff archer bug making its way In the morning dark, toe hair by toe hair, Up the stem of the trillim, Straight up through the sky above this road right now, The galaxies of the Cygnus A cluster Are colliding with each other in a massive swarm Of interpenetrating and exploding catastrophes. I try to remember that. – Pattiann Rogers • Sweet pea?'” Alec said. “I was just trying it out.” Alec shook his head. “No.” Magnus shrugged. “I’ll keep at it. – Cassandra Clare • Tess and I are a good match. She understands intimately where I came from. She can cheer me up on my darkest days. It’s as if she came perfectly happy home instead of what Kaede just told me. I feel a relaxing warmth at the thought, realizing suddenly how much I’m anticipating meeting up with Tess again. Where she goes, I go, and vice versa. Peas in a pod. Then there’s June. Even the thought of her name makes it hard for me to breathe. I’m almost embarrassed by my reaction. Are June and I a good match? No. It’s the first word to pop into my mind. And yet, still. – Marie Lu • That admiration of the ‘neat but not gaudy,’ which is commonly reported to have influenced the devil when he painted his tail pea green. – John Ruskin • The best minds come from the most unexpected faces and places. There is no image for intelligence or genius. Genius is something that cannot be seen. It cannot be produced or manufactured. It is something that even the true genius thinks is unattainable. The genius recognizes he’s just a small pea in a sea of infinite atoms. Knowledge is as infinite as the universe. The man who claims to know all, only reveals to all that he really knows nothing. – Suzy Kassem • The Black Eyed Peas sell thousands of seats in every country on the planet. You can’t get nervous. We’re all succeeding in all different parts of our careers. Just because I produce Nas and John Legend and Justin Timberlake doesn’t mean it will change the dynamic of the Peas. – will.i.am • The Colonel led all the cheers. Cornbread!” he screamed. CHICKEN!” the crowd responded. Rice!” PEAS!” And then, all together: “WE GOT HIGHER SATs.” Hip Hip Hip Hooray!” the Colonel cried. YOU’LL BE WORKIN’ FOR US SOMEDAY! – John Green • The meal was pretentious – a kind of beetroot soup with greasy croutons; pork underdone with loud vulgar cabbage, potato croquettes, tinned peas in tiny jam-tart cases, watery gooseberry sauce; trifle made with a resinous wine, so jammy that all my teeth lit up at once. – Anthony Burgess • The only really interesting thing about someone that makes you want to explore them further is their heart, and Miss Honeycut has a teeny tiny pea-sized one and it takes you nowhere you want to go. – Polly Horvath • The Owl and the Pussycat went to sea In a beautiful pea-green boat: They took some honey, and plenty of money Wrapped up in a five-pound note. . . They dined on mince and slices of quince, Which they ate with a runcible spoon; And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand, They danced by the light of the moon, The moon, The moon, They danced by the light of the moon. – Edward Lear • The owl and the pussycat went to sea, / In a beautiful pea green boat. / They took some honey, and plenty of money, / Wrapped up in a five pound note. – Edward Lear • The peanut is neither a pea nor a nut. Discuss. – Mike Myers • The Princess and the Pea?” Gabrielle suggested. “Not enough time,” Kat said “Where’s Waldo?” Gabrielle went on. “No.” Hamish recoiled. “I am still not allowed back in Morocco. – Ally Carter • The sower may mistake and sow his peas crookedly; the peas make no mistake, but come up and show his line. – Ralph Waldo Emerson • There are few pleasures like really burrowing one’s nose into sweet peas. – Angela Thirkell • There are m]oral precepts that we consider really important, such as ‘don’t pick your nose’ or ‘don’t eat peas with a knife’. There may, for ought I know, be admirable reasons for eating peas with a knife, but . . . early persuasion has made me completely incapable of appreciating them.- Bertrand Russell • There are so many things to be tortured about, sweet pea. So many torturous things in this life. Don’t let the man who doesn’t love you be one of them. – Cheryl Strayed • There has long been a bemoaning of the lack of opportunity to make films that are anything but explosions or the ladling on the pea soup or whatever you want to call it. You can hardly make a movie today where somebody isn’t a murderer or a rapist or, if it’s a “Fried Green Tomatoes” that isn’t some wistful thing on this, that or the other thing. – Jack Nicholson • There must be a way to get more of these in me faster, thought the inventor of pea soup as he sat eating peas. – Dana Gould • This fellow pecks up wit, as pigeons peas; And utters it again when God doth please: He is wit’s pedler; and retails his wares. – William Shakespeare • Though loyal and able and brave, Pea had never displayed the slightest ability to learn from his experience, though his experience was considerable. Time and again he would walk up on the wrong side of a horse that was known to kick, and then look surprised when he got kicked. – Larry McMurtry • Thoughts come maimed and plucked of plumage from the lips, which, from the pea, in the silence of your own leisure and study, would be born with far more beauty. – Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington • Throw high risers at the chin; throw peas at the knees; throw it here when they’re lookin’ there; throw it there when they’re lookin’ here. – Satchel Paige • Tibby cried into her soup when it finally came. “I’m scared… ,” she told it. The carrots and peas made no reply, but she felt better for having told them. – Ann Brashares • Today, most women are surrounded by ingenious gadgets. They don’t grow the peas or raise the chicken that they serve for dinner; instead they hunt and gather in the grocery store. They go through catalogs or department stores to buy clothes instead of shearing sheep, carding wool, and weaving cloth for skirts and coats and blankets. – Helen Fisher • We all know what feminists are. They are shrill, overly aggressive, man-hating, ball-busting, selfish, hairy, extremist, deliberately unattractive women with absolutely no sense of humor who see sexism at every turn. They make men’s testicles shrivel up to the size of peas, they detest the family and think all children should be deported or drowned. – Susan J. Douglas • We have fried catfish, country fried steak and cinnamon-roasted pork. We have collard greens, black-eyed peas, hush puppies, biscuits, sweet potato pie and lots of gravy. Most players love it, but we also have a baked catfish for players who are still looking to stay on the approved diet. – Mark Farner • What you discover about life’s shell game is that it’s hardest to follow the pea when you’re the pea. – Robert Breault • Whatever cleaning goes on on the planet, women do 99% of it. But see, women are not as proud of their 99% as men are of our one! We clean something up, we’re gonna talk about it all year long. It might be on the news, you don’t know. A woman could be out re-paving the driveway. Men actually have enough gall to run out on the porch and go “Hey baby? Man, it’s hot as hell out here, ain’t it! Look, don’t worry about emptyin’ that ashtray in the den, I done got it, all right? Did it for you, sweet pea. I’m gonna go take a nap now, all right?” – Jeff Foxworthy • When Pococke inquired of Grotius, where the proof was of that story of the pigeon, trained to pick peas from Mahomet’s (Muhammad’s) ear, and pass for an angel dictating to him? Grotius answered that there was no proof! – Thomas Carlyle • When you look at the Lady Gagas of the world, or the Jay-Zs, or the Black Eyed Peas, these are people who have one album release and it’s a worldwide one. – Tinie Tempah • When you think of the “Exorcist” (1973) you think of Linda Blair and pea soup and all this madness, but really if you look at the first half of that film, the stuff between her and Ellen Burstyn is so naturalistic and so real. – Matt Reeves • When you’re the only pea in the pod, your parents are likely to get you confused with the Hope diamond. – Russell Baker • Who watches golf on TV? Who calls eight friends over and gets a keg of beer? Landscapers, I guess. They sit around the TV, yelling, “Will you look at that golf path?Pure pea gravel.” – Jeff Cesario • William Tell could take an apple off your head, [Phil] Taylor could take out a processed pea. – Sid Waddell • You know, when I eat three peas, I’m pregnant. When I visit a city, I’m buying a house. – Vanessa Paradis • Young people want to look like peas in a pod, and there is no use trying to make them different. – Ilka Chase

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New Post has been published on https://shovelnews.com/why-are-customers-so-rude-stupid-entitled-or-important/

Why Are Customers So Rude, Stupid, Entitled? (Or Important!)

Many of you will be familiar with Google’s autocomplete feature – suggestions which pop up when you start to type in a word or phrase, based on common queries other people have searched for.

Google’s autocomplete suggestions can be pretty telling in what people around the world are thinking about their customers. Apart from the search engine itself, there are also other great tools out there to help curious customer service professionals see all of the questions people are asking about customers all around the internet.

So, what are some of the top questions being asked about customers? Typing in “Why are customers” into Google brings up four top search terms, with some telling results for everyone working within customer service.

“Why are customers so rude” is top (and according to search tool SEMrush, around 260 people search for this term every month).

“Why are customers so stupid” and “Why are customers so entitled” are also top suggestions (For example: “Why are customers so stupid” rings in 110 searches per month).

Finally, “Why are customers important” is the final suggestion – with a mere 10 searches per month.

These results indicate there are a lot of frustrated customer service workers out there, turning to Google for answers to their questions – who presumably aren’t getting answers from their managers.

So – are customers actually rude, stupid or entitled?

Customer service is one of the hardest jobs out there, but three experts explain below how these viewpoints are missing the mark – and how you can turn these interpretations around.

Why Are Customers So Rude? Contributed by Hutch Morzaria, Customer Experience Leader

Why are customers so rude? While I wouldn’t want to call this an “age-old question”, it’s clearly a question being asked by many customer service professionals.

Let’s be honest – we’ve all been there. Listening to a customer rant and rave at you for what seems to be the smallest error, even about something that doesn’t seem like much of an issue. It’s so easy to generalize customers in these situations, and even ask yourself the question – “why are customers so rude?”

We’ve all experienced times when circumstances have tested our tactfulness. And angry customers tend to take out their frustrations with wait times, service levels, price and overall product functionality on the closest target – and quite often, that target happens to be the frontline agent.

Fortunately, there are certain things that you can do to help handle these types of customers and improve the situation.

Firstly – remember that they’re not all bad! The majority of your customers are probably not rude. In fact, I’d warrant to say that the bulk of them are actually probably quite polite, so don’t tarnish them all with the same brush.

If you become brusque and abrupt in your interactions, you may find customers mirroring your behavior. Keep calm and don’t forget to listen throughout the interaction. Ensure that you are not interrupting, let them talk and explain the problem fully. If necessary, repeat their complaint back to them. This not only ensures that you understand the issue, but also lets them know that you actually heard them. If you can understand your customer’s reasons for being angry and rude, then you can move on to actually solving the problem with tact and empathy.

Work with the customer to find a mutually acceptable solution that meets their needs and is within your remit. If you’re unable to solve the issue immediately, come up with a plan that the customer agrees with and get that plan underway.

Dealing with rude customers is difficult. It’s easy for them to get under your skin when their complaints are patently untrue and unfair. No employee should be forced to listen to abusive behavior or language, so if the interaction goes in this direction, it’s important to escalate and get help.

However, if you listen to them, you’ll probably find that there is a reasonable justification for their attitude. As you follow the steps outlined above, you’ll often find them genuinely apologizing for their attitude and rudeness. Not all customers are rude, and with a little bit of listening and empathy, you have the power to turn them around.

Why Are Customers So Stupid? Contributed by Isabella Steele, Customer Service Expert

Sometimes customers say things that are so… well, stupid. So much so that you really can’t find any other way to put it (except perhaps, really stupid). Whether they are contacting your company about a red product they thought would be blue, are needing you to slowly explain how to add items to their shopping cart, or are yelling at you for apparently no reason, some customers leave you dumbfounded at their complete lack of understanding of how things work.

Before you start pulling your hair out because of something stupid a customer said or asked, remember that you are the expert in your company’s processes: not them. As much as it’d be nice to live in a world where your customers knew everything, if they did, they probably wouldn’t need you!

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The reality is that the world is full of people who have all sorts of different lives, stories, educational backgrounds, and abilities. People aren’t always going to be the way you want them to be, and that’s okay! It’s part of what makes things interesting.

The next time you catch yourself asking ‘why are customers so stupid,’ notice the expectations that you are putting on your customer, and your desire for them to be different. Although you can’t change who your customers are, you can change the way that you are thinking about and reacting to the situation.

Start by changing your story about the situation from an accusatory to an empathetic one. Maybe the person who didn’t take the time to read about the product before purchasing is running low on sleep because of a new baby. Maybe the person who needs you to explain how to use a shopping cart is from a different generation, or has never had access to online shopping before. Maybe the person who is yelling at you for no apparent reason is just having a horrible day, and never learned how to not take that out on other people.

When you can have a dialogue with your customers without judgement, you will be able to reach a faster, less stressful resolution. And, you will be open to seeing processes that really aren’t clear, or that do need changing!

Apply empathy, understand your customers’ needs, and patiently meet them at their level. With a little bit of luck, you might teach them something that empowers them in the future, and change their shopping experience for the better.

Why Are Customers So Entitled? Contributed by Angela Sokolovska, eCommerce Expert

Imagine you visit your favorite coffee shop. The barista recognizes you straight away, greets you by name, and puts in an order for your favorite drink. They understand you, know your needs, and provide great service with a smile.

You’d be delighted, right? This experience is becoming more and more common, and it doesn’t just apply to coffee shops – the rise in customer expectations for great service applies to businesses of all types around the world.

It’s no secret that customer expectations nowadays are high. If your customer gets frustrated, they can easily amplify their negative experience, and spit flames through social media. And yes, they know that they’ll be heard this way. Customers aren’t afraid to call out businesses who are emotionally deaf or who don’t bother to understand them or their needs.

You probably ask yourself, “Why are customers so entitled?” Well, it’s because they just want to be treated as humans, not just “some customer”.

So, what do customers really want? They want hyper-personalization. They want you to know their name, and even deeper, to know what motivates them. They want to know that you are going out of your way to help them rather than trying to extract money from them.

You must take into consideration that your role is to deliver value in order to exceed customer expectations. And nobody says that satisfying entitled customers is easy, but it’s completely possible.

Try to call them by their actual name instead of madam or sir. Go out of your way to help them and offer customized solutions to meet their needs. Understand that they are more than just a default customer, rather, they’re part of the family that is your business – and you’re a part of that family too.

Every customer has concerns and doesn’t want to feel like they are talking to a robot. Learn to listen to them and respond in a personalized manner – not by reciting a script. Try to be more empathic and understanding, as this will empower the customer and help them to receive the service that they have come to expect.

The key to satisfying entitled customers is by combining basic insight with emotional intelligence. Apply those things, and you’ll find that your perception of customers is transformed – you’ll be boosting your relationship with them and framing them as partners in your work, rather than adversaries.

Why Are Customers So Important?

Hutch, Isabella and Angela explained why, even in frustrating scenarios, we need to cut customers some slack. Whether you’re a head of customer experience or a contact center agent, customers are the people who you work for, keep the wheels of your business turning, and money flowing in.

Without customers, your business simply would not exist. While most of us can see that customers are important for businesses, it’s also true that serving customers sure isn’t easy. Even the best of agents will remember times when they’ve been left speechless over a customer whose behavior has taken them aback.

But if you’re ever on the brink of snapping due to customers who you see as lacking in manners, intelligence or tact, mentally swap positions with them and think of occasions you’ve received stellar service from a company. It’s likely that they valued you and viewed you as important – which in turn, helped you to feel valued and important, reducing the likelihood that you’d get angry or upset with them.

In short, being treated well helps you to treat others well. As a customer service professional, you directly contribute to that feedback loop – rude, entitled or demanding customers never exist in a vacuum, and are usually made that way through having experienced a lack of empathy, terrible processes or a lack of understanding from businesses.

When we write customers off as rude, stupid or entitled, we close the door to them – risking them going to a different business who truly understands them, and leaving us with the unsolved problems which caused negative customer behavior in the first place.

In this new world of customer experience, customers are important – and it’s the people and businesses who understand this, socialize it in their staff, and infuse a customer-first culture throughout their companies who truly lead the pack.

Originally published here.

Author: Kaye Chapman

Kaye Chapman is the Learning & Development Manager at Comm100, a global provider of AI-powered digital customer conversation software. She has a wealth of experience working alongside contact centers, improving processes and delivering engaging, effective and fun learning and development solutions. Connect with her on LinkedIn.… View full profile ›

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Source: https://www.business2community.com/customer-experience/why-are-customers-so-rude-stupid-entitled-or-important-02117645

[shuga-hill]

New Artificial Intelligence Does Something Extraordinary — It Remembers

When you return to school after summer break, it may feel like you forgot everything you learned the year before. But if you learned like an AI system does, you actually would have — as you sat down for your first day of class, your brain would take that as a cue to wipe the slate clean and start from scratch.

AI systems’ tendency to forget the things it previously learned upon taking on new information is called catastrophic forgetting.

That’s a big problem. See, cutting-edge algorithms learn, so to speak, after analyzing countless examples of what they’re expected to do. A facial recognition AI system, for instance, will analyze thousands of photos of people’s faces, likely photos that have been manually annotated, so that it will be able to detect a face when it pops up in a video feed. But because these AI systems don’t actually comprehend the underlying logic of what they do, teaching them to do anything else, even if it’s pretty similar — like, say, recognizing specific emotions — means training them all over again from scratch. Once an algorithm is trained, it’s done, we can’t update it anymore.

For years, scientists have been trying to figure out how to work around the problem. If they succeed, AI systems would be able to learn from a new set of training data without overwriting most of what they already knew in the process. Basically, if the robots should someday rise up, our new overlords would be able to conquer all life on Earth and chew bubblegum at the same time.

But still, catastrophic forgetting is one of the major hurdles preventing scientists from building an artificial general intelligence (AGI) — AI that’s all-encompassing, empathetic, and imaginative, like the ones we see in TV and movies.

In fact, a number of AI experts who attended The Joint Multi-Conference on Human-Level Artificial Intelligence last week in Prague said, in private interviews with Futurism or during panels and presentations, that the problem of catastrophic forgetting is one of the top reasons they don’t expect to see AGI or human-level AI anytime soon.

Catastrophic forgetting is one of the top reasons experts don’t expect to see  human-level AI anytime soon.

But Irina Higgins, a senior research scientist at Google DeepMind, used her presentation during the conference to announce that her team had begun to crack the code.

She had developed an AI agent — sort of like a video game character controlled by an AI algorithm — that could think more creatively than a typical algorithm. It could “imagine” what the things it encountered in one virtual environment might look like elsewhere. In other words, the neural net was able to disentangle certain objects that it encountered in a simulated environment from the environment itself.

This isn’t the same as a human’s imagination, where we can come up with new mental images altogether (think of a bird — you can probably conjure up an image of what a fictional spherical, red bird might look like in your mind’s eye.) The AI system isn’t that sophisticated, but it can imagine objects that it’s already seen in new configurations or locations.

“We want a machine to learn safe common sense in its exploration so it’s not damaging itself,” said Higgins in her speech at the conference, which had been organized by GoodAI. She had published her paper on the preprint server arXiv earlier that week, describing work that allows previously-developed AI agents to continuously learn without forgetting earlier training.

Let’s say you’re walking through the desert (as one does) and you come across a cactus. One of those big, two-armed ones you see in all the cartoons. You can recognize that this is a cactus because you have probably encountered one before. Maybe your office bought some succulents to liven up the place. But even if your office is cactus-free, you could probably imagine what this desert cactus would look like in a big clay pot, maybe next to Brenda from accounting’s desk.

Now Higgins’ AI system can do pretty much the same thing. With just five examples of how a given object looks from various angles, the AI agent learns what it is, how it relates to the environment, and also how it might look from other angles it hasn’t seen or in different lighting. The paper highlights how the algorithm was trained to spot a white suitcase or an armchair. After its training, the algorithm can then imagine how that object would look in an entirely new virtual world and recognize the object when it encounters it there.

“We run the exact setup that I used to motivate this model, and then we present an image from one environment and ask the model to imagine what it would look like in a different environment,” Higgins said. Again and again, her new algorithm excelled at the task compared to AI systems with entangled representations, which could predict fewer qualities and characteristics of the objects.

In short, the algorithm is able to note differences between what it encounters and what it has seen in the past. Like most people but unlike most other algorithms, the new system Higgins built for Google can understand that it hasn’t come across a brand new object just because it’s seeing something from a new angle. It can then use some spare computational power to take in that new information; the AI system updates what it knows about the world without needing to be retrained and re-learn everything all over again. Basically, the system is able to transfer and apply its existing knowledge to the new environment. The end result is a sort of spectrum or continuum showing how it understands various qualities of an object.

Higgins’ model alone won’t get us to AGI, of course. But it marks an important first step towards AI algorithms that can continuously update as they go, learning new things about the world without losing what they already had.

“I think it’s very crucial to reach anything close to artificial general intelligence,” Higgins said.

“I think it’s very crucial to reach anything close to artificial general intelligence.”

And this work is all still in its early stages. These algorithms, like many other object recognition AI tools, excel at a rather narrow task with a constrained set of rules, such as looking at a photo and picking out a face among many things that are not faces. But Higgins’ new AI system is doing a narrow task in such a way that more closely resembles creativity and some digital simulation of an imagination.

And even though Higgins’ research didn’t immediately bring about the era of artificial general intelligence, her new algorithm already has the ability to improve the existing AI systems we use all the time. For instance, Higgins tried her new AI system on a major set of data used to train facial recognition software. After analyzing the thousands and thousands of headshots found in the dataset, the algorithm could create a spectrum of any quality with which those photos have been labeled. As an example, Higgins presented the spectrum of faces ranked by skin tone.

Higgins then revealed that her algorithm was able to do the same for the subjective qualities that also find their ways into these datasets, ultimately teaching human biasesto facial recognition AI. Higgins showed how images that people had labeled as “attractive” created a spectrum that pointed straight towards the photos of young, pale women. That means any AI system that had been trained with these photos — and there are many of them out there — now hold the same racist views as do the people who labeled the photos in the first place: that white people are more attractive.

This creative new algorithm is already better than we are when it comes to finding new ways to detect human biases in other algorithms so engineers can go in and remove them.

So while it can’t replace artists quite yet, Higgins’ team’s work is a pretty big step towards getting AI to imagine more like a human and less like an algorithm.

More on Artificial General Intelligence: Advanced Artificial Intelligence Could Run The World Better Than Humans Ever Could