#looked at their reference sheets after and realized the hair and wings colour is off but oh well

[ruffoverthinksthings]

Thank you so much, it's so so sweet. What's wrong with Freddie? Depression? I can see that after living in the Isle with the darkness as well as all the other anxieties and abuses of the aisle kids. Chad's over-dramatics are hilarious as they are endearing. I love those two. Can you do the other questions (any that you want) with Cheddie or Benxjordan. Thank you! Have a good day!

Depression likely, yes, but also trust issues and the generalphysical fatigue and stress that comes with having to rely completelyon yourself, always watching your back, and never having someone toconfide in.

She’s lost all of that by the time she reaches Auradon and getstogether with Chad, but now she’s suffering from the “This is NotNormal” syndrome, where a person who came from an abusivechildhood/background subconsciously longs for the normalcy ofproblems and suffering, because not having them is so strange andalien it’s actually causing problems and suffering, even iflogically speaking they shouldn’t have them anymore.

Think of how people who are used to getting into fightsconstantly, aggressively pick on and inflame people for the sole sakeof being in conflict with someone, feel that their life is going“normally” because they it isn’t “a normal day” if theyhaven’t punched someone’s lights out at least once.

In short: recovery from abuse is complicated and confusing.

Onto questions 10-16of 30, as this is getting WAY longer than Ithought it would:

10.Who remembers what the other one always orders at arestaurant?:

“The Silver Surfer” was a diner, one of the manyformica-and-vinyl relics of a bygone era that had benefited greatlyfrom the influx of working class citizens looking for a place to getsome grub and hang out at the end of the day, without the presence ofbooze.

Freddie always wondered why Chad was always so cool with going tothese places, instead of the many, much more upscale establishmentsthey could have gone to, and that he could easily afford. Even if thefare was lovingly prepared and genuinely delicious, the place wasstill as greasy, smelling of burgers and fries of years past, andstained and scarred as you would expect it to be.

His explanation was “No one makes milkshakes quite like the kindyou can get from here,” but she knew there was more to it thanthat.

Interrogating him could wait until after lunch, however.

They stepped in right in the middle of the rush, Chad going firstand taking the brunt of people bumping into him, and the bits of foodand condiments flying from mouths and malfunctioning condimentbottles, until they managed to get lucky and found a recently vacatedand cleaned corner booth.

With a flourish, he gestured to the side of the seating thatwasn’t patched up with duct tape, Freddie chuckled and slid intofaux-leather cushions like it was a seat beside the head of the tableat the annual Feast of the Great Uniting.

He was about to take the seat across her when Freddie noticed thebottom of her purse was stained dark and wet. “Aw, fuck!” shesaid as she opened it up.

“What’s wrong?” Chad asked.

“Something broke, is what!” Freddie said as she got back up.“I need to go clean up in the bathroom before something in herestarts moving all on its own.”

“Then go,” Chad said. “I’ll hold down the fort here.”

“Let me go find something to write with first...”

“What for?”

“So you’ll know exactly what I want,” Freddie said as shescanned the contents, hoped that the pen she’d left in there hadn’tgotten caught in the goop.

Chad smirked. “Bet you 50 bucks from me, or a kiss from you thatI’ll guess it right.”

“You’re on,” Freddie said, smiling at him for a momentbefore she hurried on off to the bathroom.

Twenty minutes later, the spill was cleaned up, glass vials wererinsed out, and broken stoppers thrown into the trash. Just in time,too, as a waitress was already at their table, getting ready to serveup their orders.

“Better pucker up, Fred!” Chad said as she sat back down.

“And you better get your wallet ready,” Freddie replied cooly.

The waitress playfully rolled her eyes before she started servingup Freddie’s order: “One plate of Cajun hot wings, paprika fries,side of green beans in mayo, and beignets with raspberry ice cream.”

Freddie paused. “Wow. You actually got it right. Colour meimpressed!”

Chad chuckled. “Thank my excellent memory...” he said, beaminglike a victorious knight atop the highest peak of a mountain.

“Or maybe thank his saving all the receipts from all the othertimes you two were here, and him figuring out which stuff you alwaysorder,” the waitress said as she served up Chad’s food.

Freddie chuckled as Chad suddenly looked like a victorious knightwho’d just had the ground beneath his feet crumble, and send himtumbling down the side of the mountain he was just standing atop of.

He smiled sheepishly at her. “Does this mean I still get mykiss?”

Freddie scooted around to him seats and planted a quick peck onhis cheek. “Not on the lips because you had a cheat sheet.”

“Fair enough.”

11.Who tops?:

“Best just lay back, wait till it’s all over, and try yourdamnedest to look interested,” was the most common thread of adviceFreddie had gotten from everyone who’d cared to answer herquestions about sex.

And for the most part, it was true: most every boy or girl she’dever had sex with was positively terrible at it, too clumsyand inexperienced, too focused on getting there themselves, or hadtwisted ideas about how they wanted to do so.

She’d made do with it, just like everyone else on the Isle.

Sex was something you might do for fun, but for the most part itwas business like everything else, something you offer up in exchangefor a warm place to sleep at night, food, or something to make theirshitty lives slightly less shitty.

And if ever you did stumble upon the rare individual that wasblessed with experience and skill, you’d best expect that youwouldn’t have them for long, as they’d soon enough find someonewho could offer more than you did.

“Sweaty, gross, uncomfortable grinding with a lot of gruntingand cursing,” was how Freddie described her experience with sex.“And the guys always demanded to be on top, something about beingon bottom offended them too much—or probably reminded them of allthe times they were there and didn’t like it.”

“What about the guys that liked being on bottom?” Chad asked.

“I stayed away from them,” Freddie replied. “If what Eviesays is even half-true, those guys demand literally gettingstepped on, at the least, and that’s really not my thing,”she said with a shudder.

Chad frowned. “Now that’s not right: sex should be somethingamazing for everyone involved.”

Freddie looked away. “Not for me it isn’t.”

Chad reached out, and put his hand atop hers. “How about I proveyou wrong? Just name a time and a place.”

Freddie looked at him slyly. “How about right here and rightnow?”

Chad grinned. “Give me an hour.”

And in that hour, he’d showered, cleaned up his bedroom, and setup actual scented candles and soft music; he flirted with her, hekissed her, he touched her, doing everything in his power to convinceher to say “Yes,” all while repeatedly telling her she could say“No,” whether that was now while she was still on the fence, whenthey were already making out in his bed, or even when they had bothstripped naked and Chad was definitely raring and ready to go.

Freddie had often wondered why the adults referred to sex as“making love” when in her experience, there was nothing romanticabout it.

Now, as she lay beneath him, wrapped up in his strong, lovingarms, both of them sweaty, exhausted, and satisfied, she realizedthat it wasn’t the act, it was who she was doing it with.

12.Who initiates kisses?:

Crowds and Freddie never got along.

The relationship was either the former ganging up on her, tohumiliate her, mug her, or “convince” her to go along with theirmob, or her weaving about silently picking pockets and fishing foruseful bits of information leaked by loose lips.

To have hordes of people swarming in on her, not to jeer andtaunt, not to rob her, not to hurt her, but to cheer her on, deliverher boyfriend (and that game’s MVP) to her, encourage her to kisshim simply for the sake of it…

It was surreal.

Chad had already taken off his helmet—there was no way he wasever going to let himself be photographed post-game-winning scorewith it still on. His face was sweaty, his hair was mussed up andsticking to his skin, but his grin was as radiant and cocky as ever.

The crowds circled around them, one mind, one goal, one word ontheir lips: “Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!”

Chad held out a hand to the crowds and gestured for them to calmdown. (The other was securely holding his helmet, to avoid anotherpotential theft.) “Come on, people, it’s the Post-Uniting Era!It’s all up to her if she wants to!”

Freddie chuckled as she reached out and grabbed his jersey, pulledhis face down so she could reach his face. “And just so we’re allclear here, I do,” she said, before she did just that.

In her winter years, she was pretty sure that a good deal of herhearing loss had been to all those times where she’d given Chad akiss after every game she’d been to, win or lose, with or without acrowd to watch and maybe a reporter to get some professional gradefootage of the act.

And always, she would say it was well worth it.

13.Who reaches for the other’s hand first?:

Whatever jealousy Freddie had for the people that were invited tothese grand balls, societal soirees, and “must attend” partiesquickly disappeared during her first two hours in one.

Now it was replaced with jealousy, for all the people that wereout there enjoying great music, delicious food, and pleasant companywithout all the rigid rules and customs, the demanding schedules, andhaving to make pleasant talk with people you didn’t know, didn’tlike, and had to listen attentively to for the full ten-fifteenseconds it took for them to introduce their name, their titles, andwhere Freddie might have heard of them.

(Outside of her circle of close friends and all of the iconicRoyals and personalities, she never had, and probably never would.)

She hated these events, and told Chad and anyone else she couldtell as much. There were so many of them, and unlike going out withher friends on a fun, alcohol-and-recreational-drug fueled bender,this one couldn’t be rescheduled, and rarely was it ever her choiceto go and give it her increasingly few free days.

There was a bright side, however:

Chad introducing himself back, reaching out for Freddie’s hand,and making sure whoever they were talking to had noticed before hesaid, “And this is Frederica, also known as Freddie, mygirlfriend.”

Watching the older and more close-minded of them look in surpriseand struggle to stay polite was always great fun, and the ones thatnodded like they were any other couple or gave her knowing smilesalways felt damn good.

She had to admit she was kind of sad all that was going away nowthat she was his wife, the old guard was beginning to die off, andthe new one was so hyper-connected they probably had the informationbeamed straight into their brains via the fancy chips they hadimplanted in their skulls.

But still, Chad held her hand as firmly and lovingly as ever, soit was all good.

14.Who kisses the hardest?:

In the Isle you learned how to make the most of what you had, asyou didn’t have much to begin with, and even that was constantly atrisk of getting taken away from you, lost, or just breaking apart inyour hands.

You needed to know the myriad uses something as mundane as athree-quarter empty tube of toothpaste. You needed to know exactlyhow much something would be going for in the Trade, Barter, and PettyTheft economy of the Isle. You needed to know exactly what you wantedor planned to do with something the moment you got it, as it was onlya matter of time till you lost it, one way or the other.

Things were different now.

There was always going to be food in the fridge, a place to sleepin, assurance that she could sleep at night in peace without the fearof someone robbing or attacking her. She couldn’t lose her jobwithout at least two weeks notice, she had numerous protections andsafety nets beside, and she wasn’t about to lose all of her moneyunless she got particularly stupid with it. And despite her initialdoubts, Chad was in it for the long haul, and it didn’t look likehe was planning on getting off any time soon, nor had the thoughtever seemed to cross his mind.

But as they say, old habits die hard.

“Goodness, Fred!” Chad cried as he literally pulled her off ofhim once again. “You make-out like there’s no tomorrow!”

Freddie chuckled, her cheeks burning, her breath shallow, herheart racing. “Is that a bad thing?”

“Well, no, but did you ever think of maybe taking it slow foronce?”

“I’ll think about it,” Freddie replied, for all of twoseconds, before she was on Chad once more, kissing those wonderfullips of his, feeling his soft skin and his hard muscles, inhaling hisscent of sweat, expensive soaps, and “rich guy” perfumes,”feeling the strength, the desire, the love he had for her.

She could enjoy his company most any time.

She didn’t need to constantly act like there was some invisibleclock ticking down before this fairy tale of a romance ended.

But she damn well wanted to.

15: Who wakes up first? + 16: Who wants to stay in bed a littlelonger?

She was up well before dawn, as always.

It never really mattered when she had fallen asleep, whether itwas sometime after sunset yesterday, somewhere around midnight, orlittle less than an hour ago, somehow her body clock was permanentlyjammed and set to go off at 4 AM, never fail.

It was a different world, this space in between the darkest nightand the break of dawn.

It was quiet—not the ominous quiet of impending doom, or thepeaceful quiet of a lazy day. Just ‘quiet,’ as the night crowdwas winding down and the earliest of the early birds were juststarting to get up.

Back on the Isle, this was prime time to get moving, to make yourway to the harbour and try to stake a claim to fight and scavenge forthe best (relatively speaking) that the trash barges had to offer,the perfect time to ambush someone or otherwise catch them at theirmost unprepared, to move around freely and quickly without fear ofsurveillance or danger, lest you be that rare person that managed toattract the ire of the most persistent, vengeful, and well-funded ofthe Isle.

But here in Auradon, there was nothing going on, nothing thatneeded to be doing until at least 7 be it school, festivals, orworld-threatening terrors, and nothing she wanted to do, as she hadan aversion to 24-hour convenience stores, there were no parties orevents worth going to at this hour, and the infinitely scrolling pitthat was social media never seemed to be able to get a good grip onher.

Back when she slept alone, this was a problem.

Two hours of her day everyday wasted doing little of anything,with none of the Isle’s constant pressure to keep moving or riskbeing left bleeding in the gutter, and not enough fucks to give aboutgetting a headstart on the day’s schoolwork or all her otherprojects, until after her teachers and her group mates had begun tomake it clear that she finally needed to put some work in.

She just shuffled her shadow cards about, studied the facesalready long burned into memory, or thought about what she needed todo for the day while never actually making any concrete plans torestock her alchemical ingredients or finally go investigate thatculture in the corner before it started to spread further, than she’dlike it to.

All that was a thing of the past, though, because now she hadsomething to look forward to doing most every morning: listening toChad sleep.

She thought it creepy initially. Wasn’t it one of the pillars ofa psycho stalker’s confessing their “love” that they hadwatched their “beloved” sleep?

But as the nights passed by, and she did far nastier, morequestionable things to Chad, sleeping or waking, she was starting torealize it was all a matter of consent: Chad wanted her herewith him, and it wasn’t just for her body heat, or to keep her fromleaving.

(And painfully cliché and cheesy as it sounded, she was startingto experience herself all that mushy, lovey dovey talk about being soridiculously in love with all the little, innocuous details aboutyour lover was all too true.)

She felt him shifting awake behind her, let out a yawn that madeher heart go a-flutter (which was a phrase she never thought she’dever seriously use), before he lovingly nuzzled his face into herhair.

“Morning, Freddie,” Chad hummed. “Been awake for a whilealready?”

“As usual,” Freddie replied.

“You know you don’t have to stay with me in bed so I don’twake up, I sleep like a log.”

Freddie chuckled. “You’re more like a buff, blonde kraken,actually. And besides, I like staying in bed and listening to yousleep, as creepy and stalkerish as that sounds.”

Chad chuckled. “Whatever makes you happy, Fred,” he said as hebegan to unwrap his arms from around her.

Freddie frowned. “Getting up already?”

“Yep,” Chad said as he sat up, “season’s on the horizon,gotta get shit done before it’s training, media blitzes, andactually playing Tourney here and there all over again.”

“Can’t you stay a little longer? Like a minute? Five? Sixty,tops?”

Chad chuckled. “Sure, but it’ll have to be cuddles with a sideof morning breath.”

Freddie smiled. “I’ll take it.”