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cirrus-grey · 1 year ago

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I have now finished watching Good Omens Season 2

If you haven't already, please block the tag "good omens spoilers" - I won't post anything else until Friday night at the earliest, but after that all bets are off.

@albertinesimonet, I did not manage a full liveblog but I did jot down my reactions after watching each episode, and those are compiled under the cut :)

(SPOILERS!)

Episode 1:

Holy flipping fuck are they actually making the ineffable husbands canon???

Okay.

Look.

I saw that it was trending alongside Supernatural and OFMD. I suspected it was going this way, and the season had ended with some sort of confession/immediate separation.

That did not prepare me for the season to open with Crowley saying "hello gorgeous" to a nebula and Aziraphale being disappointed that Crowley wasn't talking to him. Or for Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy to be playing while Crowley rushed to Aziraphale's aid, like-

This is a fanfic. This is a motherfucking fanfic, and I am pleased to say that my brain is processing it as such, a well-written but ultimately non-canon fanfic (*puts on my "I still have book!omens brainrot" shirt*) that just so happens to have been written by one of the original authors.

Anyway, outside of my snorting disbelief that the first ship that I ever shipped is apparently going canon in one 'verse, I do actually have some legitimate theories, which run as follows:

A. I know this season is the plot-bridge between the original novel and what would have been the sequel, and B. I know the sequel was going to involve the second coming of Christ, therefore C. I suspect this Resurrectionist group that kept getting hinted at in the promos is trying to bring Jesus back, Gabriel found out and tried to stop it, and that's why he lost his memories. I'm a tad bit surprised Heaven as a whole doesn't seem to be involved in the return of their special boy, but I guess we'll see how that plays out as the season goes along.

Episode 2:

Oh hey, I've read this one before! "It's ancient Biblical times and Crowley and Aziraphale are angsting about their orders and finding solace in each other's company" may have never gotten its own tag, but there are certainly enough fics about it that it could.

"Can I be a blue one?" Weird kids are the best.

So the Resurrectionist is a pub, not a group. Still think they have something to do with the second coming, but I'm open to being proven wrong.

Gotta say, I didn't expect Every Day to be plot-relevant. I knew they had it for the soundtrack, but I'm really liking this sort of spooky-mystery-music-mixup they've got going with it - love the way its incorporated into the end credits, too.

Totally down for master-thief Jane Austen, btw.

How many people are writing fics about Crowley and Aziraphale getting caught in a rainstorm and hiding under an awning even as I type...

Episode 3:

How to run a bookshop, a guide by A.J. Crowley: Carry large stacks of books around aimlessly and then toss them on the floor when you get bored.

I'm honestly surprised his awning plan nearly worked. Curses be upon weak awnings, I suppose.

I do like that the Bentley recognizes that it has to play nice with whichever one of its dads is in the driver's seat lol

Okay so they keep drawing attention to the fact that there's flies in the bookshop, and now Beelzebub is acting off. Are the flies like... telepathically communicating Gabriel's worldviews to them? Is that how they figured out he was there?

That bit he said when Crowley mentioned tempests is definitely from the Revelations. I unfortunately don't know enough about the Revelations to draw any new conclusions from this. I know they deal with the apocalypse and the antichrist, but that was S1 stuff so there must be something else...

(That bit definitely sounded like Rapture stuff though, just saying)

Lotta talk about people coming back from the dead, here. It's doing little to dissuade me from my idea that this is all related to the second coming. Their "little" miracle was strong enough to bring 25 people back? Okay. How did Gabriel add his own power to it... and who did he bring back? (Does 1 Jesus = 25 normal people?)

...Okay yeah I just googled it and the second coming (and the rapture) is definitely in Revelations. Apparently the appearance of the antichrist is its herald. *insert 'oh yeah it's all coming together' gif here*

...

Several-hours later addition: When they were talking about gravity Gabriel seemed upset that the book didn't stay where it was put, "it goes down." And that flies go up.

...did he "go down," turning into a human, and is Beelzebub "going up," and that's why they're so worried about finding Gabriel? Figure out what happened to him, so it doesn't happen to them as well? Hmm...

Episode 4:

"The rumors that you two are an item..." Yeah holy fuck they're actually doing this. I don't know why it keeps catching me by surprise??? I guess it's not like, the forefront of the plot, so every time it comes to the front it feels a bit like a new thing, but still.

Aziraphale's smug fucking little eyebrow raise at that "I didn't think you were his type." He's like yeah, and what do you know, hm?

Did not expect the entire episode to be backstory, but that was very cute, especially given how much people fixated on the church scene in S1. That little showcase of their trust, both of them worried it'll go wrong but still willing to try because they feel safe with each other. I like that they managed to keep the tension of the setting, that "I'm pointing a gun at my best friend and this could go horribly wrong" feeling, even when it's well-established that the worst that could happen is paperwork.

Also, Crowley trying really, really hard to give Aziraphale positive feedback on his magic tricks even when he knows they suck. That's true love, right there.

Another showcase of people coming back from the dead. We've had the kids getting "brought back" from shape-shifting, the "resurrectionists" digging up dead bodies, and now actual honest-to-god zombies. I am Sensing A Theme.

...are the zombies still around? What's-is-face the demon did say eternal undeath...

Aaaaaand there's going to be an army of demons dropping in on the local business association meeting. I hope Aziraphale has enough tea cakes for everyone.

Episode 5:

SEAMSTRESSES SHOUTOUT ITS A FUCKING DISCWORLD REFERENCE

I know most people are probably going wild over the Dr. Who references but. It's the seamstresses guild...

I'm sure Mrs. Sandwich and Rosie Palm would get along famously.

In other news wow they're just being blatant about the ineffableness of these husbands now, aren't they? The great thing about that is I'm watching it with my parents and I don't think either of them have clicked that it's going canon - like, they're just interpreting it as a running bit, 'haha isn't it funny that everyone keeps mistaking them as a couple' kind of thing. The same thing happened when I showed them OFMD, neither of them realized Ed and Stede were actually going to be a real canon thing until the kiss. I mean, maybe they've worked out that this is going somewhere by now? But I don't want to ask in case they haven't, because I'd love to see their reaction if it blindsides them.

I am Not Normal about the dancing. Aziraphale's giddy little grin when he drags Crowley to the floor? The fucking. Hand presses. I've probably read too much Jane Austen if I'm going this insane about them just pressing their palms together.

And just... that whole fucking scene. The amount of queer people - either queercoded or just flat-out obviously queer - is making my heart feel full. When Aziraphale referred to the magic shop owner's partner using 'they' before we met them I thought it was just, you know, being polite, he'd never met them and didn't want to assume, but then they showed up in person and folks were still using they and they were so obviously giving a huge middle finger to gender norms I just-

Man I need to watch more queer shows I love this feeling.

And the army of demons is more of a large crowd but, well, still threatening. I like the use of masks to hide demonic traits, clever costuming detail there.

But. My dudes. Don't split up, what the fuck are you doing? You've been here for all of human history, you know how stories go, surely you know things always go wrong when you split the party??? I love protective!crowley, I do, but my dude taking off to bring this mess to heaven's attention is not the way to go about saving your angel. And Aziraphale, buddy, I don't know what you're planning to summon there but I really don't think it's going to go well.

...Maybe he's planning to teleport himself, Gabriel, and the humans up to heaven, too, to get them away from the demon crowd. It would be funny if Crowley and what's their name, Muriel, step out of the elevator and Aziraphale is just. There already.

(I don't think that's gonna happen though. I think everything is just gonna get Worse)

Anyway sidenote Lottie if you've read this far, when Gabriel started talking about feeling like a house I immediately thought of you, I know that's a theme you like ♡

Episode 6:

Jesus Christ!

(Called it!)

So I got a lot of the details wrong, but I was spot on with my two big predictions from the beginning. (Hey that ending reminded me of OFMD and Supernatural, I've got a great idea, why don't we all blog about the three of them and get them trending together-)

Gotta say, I'd only given a passing thought to Gabriel and Beelzebub being a Thing, their shippers must be going wild.

I knew there was a reason they kept drawing attention to that fly.

*Spots fire extinguishers* "Hey is that a Magnus Archives ref-" *Is brutally murdered with a lead pipe before I can finish*

I actually kind of love that Nina and Maggie didn't get together at the end of it all? I had felt like it was all going a bit too fast for them and I'm so glad they acknowledged that. They've got time, now, to work things out, and I love that they left it with the certainty that they'd be there for each other in the future... but not quite yet.

Oh! Oh! Oh! And they fit in the halos-used-as-lethal-frisbees-sequence! That was fabulous, I want to see more exploding headgear.

...anyway I think that's all the little bits I wanted to mention before getting to the Main Event.

I'm actually... not all that devastated about that ending? Like, okay, my heart was breaking watching it, the miscommunication and assumptions leading to a dramatic separation, it's tragic and angsty and oh my god my ship kissed my first ever ship kissed they did it they did the thing-

But. Two seconds after the credits started rolling my mind was already flying to, "oh thank goodness, they've got a Source On The Inside now and they might actually have a shot at stopping the end of the world instead of, you know, being blindsided by it because no one in heaven or hell is talking to them"

Like, sure, major breakup here, Crowley's gonna be pissed and Aziraphale might have to do their silly little "I'm sorry" dance three or four times before they can actually get down to business, but I don't think there's a question that both of them still trust each other immensely and know they can rely on each other to help out in a pinch. They'll be walking on eggshells for a bit, but it's pretty obvious that Aziraphale wouldn't have taken the promotion if he'd known Crowley wasn't going to come with him and as soon as he manages to properly communicate that fact they'll be fine.

(Sidenote, this, right here, exemplifies the difference between Book!Aziraphale and TV!Aziraphale. Book!Aziraphale is way more cynical about the whole heaven-and-hell system, he'd never say "heaven's still the good guys," and he'd be very, very suspicious of a sudden promotion landing in his lap after such a tumultuous sequence of events. TV!Aziraphale might not be the sweet little innocent bean fandom makes him out to be, but damn is he naive compared to his book counterpart. Makes me wonder how much of the hypothetical sequel has to change to work with this plotline - I'd bet my ass he wasn’t an archangel in that one.)

Can Crowley... hear the soundtrack? "No nightingales" like how does he know that's significant? Sir you are breaking the fourth wall-

(And how powerful is he? He's a nobody in hell but he keeps stopping time and could access classified documents up in heaven, something made his and Aziraphale's miracle blow up and apparently it wasn't Gabriel, and he also just brought a whole ass dude back from the dead??? Maybe those "Crowley is Raphael" theorists from S1 had a point)

Anyway, to cap it all off: my current predictions for S3 are the aforementioned ineffable husbands makeup and subsequent spy shenanigans as they scramble to try to stop Apocalypse 2: Jesus Boogaloo; they fail and Jesus comes back, but instead of following the Great Plan he instead chooses to side with "all of humanity against all of heaven and hell" (maybe Adam shows up too to help out?); and Crowley, despite his repeated protests, actually does end up running a bookshop because he doesn't trust Muriel to do it properly.

I summation, yes I am still alive, and very excited for the next season, whenever it happens. Also I need gifsets of the dance scene and that kiss ASAP please and thank you.

#im posting this and then going to bed so ill answer any comments in the morning ♡#good omens tv #good omens spoilers #ineffable husbands #aziraphale #crowley #original post #my good omens stuff #<- good god i need to back-tag a lot of posts into that group

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exec-proton · 8 months ago

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Headcanon question: what do you think Proton would had pursued as a career, had he never joined Rocket?

That's a good question!

I somewhat explored this idea before with the whole "Normal-guy-Proton" mixup thing, but I never really went in-depth about it.

It's a hard question, because the answer is a solid it-depends.

A simple answer is, probably something to do with either cooking or engineering. I ramble for quite a bit under the cut about the specifics of his potential "Non-rocket" paths, however!

Proton was, in a way, forced into Rocket. He had a violent father as a young kid, and took odd-jobs from Rocket to have enough money to feed himself. Eventually, his father got much more physically violent, which ended up with Proton killing the man.

In short, he panicked. He had nowhere to go, other than the gang. He wouldn't be persecuted there, so that's where he went.

What he would do as a job, if it weren't for that really depends on what happens after he kills his father, or if we're going with a sort of AU where he isn't pushed to do that, whether because he managed to leave with his mother before the abuse becomes really bad (Normal-Guy-Proton), or because someone else notices the situation and calls the Pokemon equivalent of CPS.

Let's say that he does still kill is father, but instead of running to Rocket, he calls the police and confesses. He's sixteen at the time.

What happens next depends on what exactly he's charged with, and whether or not he's prosecuted as an adult. If the court agrees that it's self-defense, then Proton presumably gets sent somewhere better equipped to take care of him, which at this point is practically anywhere. This is the best case scenario. He gets to actually acquire life skills he wouldn't have a chance too otherwise.

If he's charged with murder, it would probably be second-degree. The killing wasn't premeditated, and it could certainly be argued that his intent wasn't to actually kill his father. In this case, I presume he would either be prosecuted as an adult, and sent to jail, or sent to a juvenile center. In this case, once he gets out, he probably struggles a bit, again, because of the lack of life skills. Not only that, but a criminal record would make it hard for him to find a job. In this scenario, he would probably end up falling in with Rocket anyways.

Now, if he doesn't kill his father, his prospects are far better.

What I affectionately call Normal-Guy-Proton is the scenario where his mother leaves his father, taking baby Proton with. She returns to her family, or otherwise finds a way to provide for herself and her child that isn't an abusive, alcoholic man, and Proton ends up with a fairly normal childhood. He goes to school, gets a job, and all of that. This is the one where I think he'd get a job in engineering. He enjoys tinkering with things, and he'd actually be able to pursue that. This is the overall best case scenario, and one I explored a bit for one of the Muse Mixup things that happened.

The other situation is where someone else actually decides to do something, and Proton is removed from his father. Again, this could go either way, depending on whether or not he's screwed by the system, but I'm going to go ahead and say that he manages to come out of it without much trouble. He's still troubled, but it's not quite as bad as the "I just killed my own father oh shit" trauma. This is where I think he'd go more into cooking, as he would still have some of the childhood experiences of having to fend for himself, making use of whatever he can have to eat.

#OOC ask

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gear-project · 6 months ago

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Fighting Games and Growing Old Part 3

So, I'm fully aware of the fact that some games just do not click with me or mesh well with my sense of taste. I've been aware of this for some time.

I've gotten in to debates with people over exactly "why" I don't like certain games, or just plain why I can't get as involved towards them as other people do.

That's not to say I don't appreciate them by themselves, it's just very difficult for me to break in to a "groove" when it comes to playing certain characters.

It's definitely a dream of mine to master every character in every fighting game I've come across, but it's still a bit of a pipe dream. And I sincerely doubt I'll be anything like the guys on Twitter/X who post their elite combos and mixups that destroy whatever poor kids they happened to come across online.

I've been sincerely feeling somewhat "guilty" (excuse the pun) that I haven't played Strive as often as I play other games lately.

It's not that I don't play Strive, but it's more along the lines of that I haven't found a sincere motive to pick up on just yet.

I see all these players playing high level and it's amazing and all, but to me that's not part of what's fun about the game.

To ME, what's part of what's fun is the interactions I have with the friends I've made, the game features that previous games have let me tinker with and explore. Boss Characters, Unlimited Tension, Roman Cancel shenanigans, Instant Kill setups, Danger Time... the spices and herbs of what made GG so appealing to me when I was younger.

When I see guys like Demonseth999 posting videos of his character mods, I know he's livin' the dream. He's making characters the way they're supposed to be: fun. No limitations on imagination, no limits on rules, certainly no BALANCE, but at the same token, who wants balance when the rules are boring?

And it's not just his character mods that people find appealing about the guy: he posts RPG-maker-esque videos of a game he's working on... he posts streams of unique games and makes the effort to goof around and interact with his fanbase and even sets up rooms for people to come hang out with him on the weekends.

He could do a little less involving drinking alcohol, but that's just MY OPINION.

No, see, when you've played games for as long as I have, you start to see that it isn't the games themselves that are fun... it's the people you're having fun WITH.

I used to spend the better part of 10 years playing Accent Core by myself... do you have ANY IDEA how unfun it was to train alone by myself? Nobody knew GG existed, it was niche... nobody knew I existed... I had nobody to play a multiplayer game with, FOR YEARS.

It would've been simple if no netplay was the only problem, but only a select few amounts of people even LIKE FIGHTING GAMES to begin with... so that struggle has always been in the back of my mind.

Like everyone wants to play sports games or Street Fighter, and they always bash "anime games" like it's some kind of curse.

Nowadays, I take to grinding and forging weapons in Soul Calibur's Libra of Souls mode... it's like a gacha, but at the same time, making good weapons turns me in to an unkillable monster on the battlefield.

I used to mess with Game Genie a lot when I was a kid... Code Breaker, GameShark, Hex Editors, Game Mods in general... Infinite Lives, Infinite Health, Immortality, games with those kind of rules in them were so much more relaxed and FUN when I didn't have to worry about time limits or dying for fast Game Overs.

I wish more game developers thought about what makes a game fun instead of making it all "hard mode" all the time... yeah okay the elitists enjoy their challenges... but what about the rest of us who just want to relax and kill things?

I just want more games that let me make my own characters and make my own rules... is that so difficult a task to achieve?

It also wouldn't hurt to be able to share my experiences of these games with my friends, too.

Even if I currently "suck at some games", if they give me enough of a reason to play them, I'll come back... Strive included.

#Long Post #Personal Musings #GP talks shop

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meancaroline · 7 months ago

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All I Wanted Was Sushi But I Got Abducted By Aliens Instead, by Petra Palerno

Ratings:

GoodReads Rating: 3.60 ⭐️

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Spice: 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Purchasing:

On Kindle Unlimited?: Yes

Kindle E-book: $6.99

Paperback: $16.99

Length:

184 pages

Review:

When Opal is abducted by the Deenz, a hive mind alien race, she learns that she is expected to dance for the erotic enjoyment of aliens across the cosmos. Opal, though appalled, finds she has no choice as the Deenz give her a shot of "go-go juice", an aphrodisiac, to ensure her "enthusiasm" for dancing. She gets extra for trying to deny her captors.

Her desires piqued, she looks out the window of their transport bus to find inspiration. She finds it in one of the other cars. The car of Ke'ain, the crown prince of the Fi'len of Sontafrul 6. He returns her attraction.

Little does Opal know, their mutual cross-lane masturbation session will change both of their lives for the better...and the worse.

All I Wanted Was Sushi But I Got Abducted By Aliens Instead was a fun, quick read to round out my month. I really enjoyed the aspect of miscommunication that Palerno worked into the story.

But, if you think this miscommunication leads to angst and heartbreak, think again! It really only serves to highlight the differences between Opal, a human, and her Fi'len beau and these often funny mixups serve to reinforce Opal is not a fish in these unfamiliar waters. In fact, most of the miscommunication worked with the plot to help move the smut forward.

While I would not normally say it, Palerno's story is one in which the plot served the smut instead of the other way around. And while the sex scenes were well written, I would have liked to see more of the plot.

Without getting too much into spoilers, there were certain things that I would have liked to see from certain character’s points of view later on in the story. And perhaps those conversations and bits of world building and story progression will be present in the next books in the series. I certainly hope they are as I would like to see these difficult, uncomfortable, and perhaps funny conversations happen.

Overall, All I Wanted Was Sushi But I Got Abducted By Aliens Instead was a fun, sexy, and good foundation to start a series on. If you are looking for fated alien mates who built for her pleasure, you will certainly enjoy this book!

Originally posted on Lemon8 01/30/2024

#book review #bookblr #tumblr book club #kindle #kindle unlimited #kindle unlimited romance #alien romance #alien x human

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fanfoolishness · 2 years ago

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under a new morning sun (6/?)

Turns out, being trapped in the Fade isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Rogue Min Hawke learned this at Adamant. Luckily for her, her lover Varric Tethras refused to believe that she was really gone.

Varric rescued Hawke from the Fade with the help of the Inquisition, but there were consequences. Spending time in the physical Fade has left them Fade-touched: Varric is now a dwarf who can dream, and Hawke has developed mage abilities. Together, they’ve returned to Kirkwall for a well-deserved rest.

Old estrangements, new powers, and ghosts from the past make for a homecoming that doesn’t exactly go as planned, even as the Inquisition’s mission marches on and Kirkwall struggles to rebuild. Hawke must find a way to master her newfound magic and strike a path forward with family, friends and Varric at her side.

Chapter 1: Rearranged | Chapter 2: Making the Rounds | Chapter 3: In the Evening Hour | Chapter 4: The Message | Chapter 5: This Is Fine

Chapter 6: Between the Lines

Dear Sparrow:

Traveling’s really not all it’s cracked up to be. Which isn’t much, if you ask this dwarf. If it’s not the less than stellar accommodations, it’s the shitty weather (dumping rain? In mid-summer? Shit, why not add on hail? …no, dammit, that wasn’t an invitation).

Not to mention, the company leaves an awful lot to be desired. It’s just me and this nag of a pony rented out from some toothless farmer. Dennet, the Inquisition’s horsemaster, is never going to let me live this down. Pony’s name is Buttercup but his disposition is more along the lines of Deathroot or Ghoul’s Beard. I’ll probably be black and blue by the time I get to Skyhold.

Hope you’re doing all right, Min. I miss you, and while I’m sure it doesn’t come as a surprise, I just wanted to say it.

Also, I love you.

Also hopefully not a surprise by now.

Send my best to Bethany and Merrill. Send my apologies to Aveline, as usual.

Until tomorrow,

Varric

Dear Varric,

You must have written this letter on the back of your horrible steed just outside the city walls, or else you’ve cracked near-instantaneous message-sending. Some secret of the Inquisition, perhaps? Hopefully you won’t mind my letters getting to you a bit slower. I imagine we’ll get a few in various states of mixup, though that only adds to their charm.

I’m doing well! As well as can be imagined, I expect. Now that you’re gone and I’ve got no dwarven snuggling to keep me busy with, Bethany’s taken the opportunity to work me day and night on my magical education. It’s odd, certainly, trying to pack in a decade’s worth of training into the next few months, but when haven’t I enjoyed a challenge?

Be careful, Varric. Don’t think I didn’t notice your hangdog expression as you got yourself packed up. I know you’d rather be here right now, but I’m proud of you for doing this work. I hope you’ll be back soon. But only because you make rather an excellent bed-warmer.

Joking, of course.

Love you dearly, my Varric.

Cheers,

Min

Dear Min,

Have I told you how much I hate sea travel? Rescue me. You’ve never seen a greener dwarf in your life.

I’d write more, but I’m busily hunting down a bucket. Ugh.

Hope your day is going better.

Love,

Varric

(Also, you might want to check the back of your wardrobe. Something to cheer you up.)

Dear Sparrow,

You’ve found it! You’re always joking about how comfortable and stylish my tunics are. Dwarves have always had the Orlesians beat on fashion. Figured I would leave you one with a little note, just something to remind you of while I’m away.

And if you happened to wear it with nothing else, alone in your bed, dreaming of a certain trusty dwarf pressing warm, languid kisses along your thighs… I mean, that would be perfectly fine. Let’s just say imagining your taste, your sighs, the way you squirm might get me through some long, hard nights.

Fuck. It’s going to be a damn long road to Skyhold, isn’t it?

Love you. Can’t wait to taste you, to fuck you, to hold you close again.

Yours in debauchery,

Varric

Dear Varric,

Well, that was a surprise. Your tunic fit me perfectly, especially once I pulled off my trousers and smallclothes. I did have to make do with only my imagination and my own hand, but rest assured, had you been here you would have seen quite the show!

Thank you for this. Wearing this is a lovely balm against long and lonely nights. Feel free to imagine me wearing it in all sorts of scenarios - on my knees with my mouth around you, spread beneath you in my bed, bent over on the floor of our tent in the Approach - why, the possibilities are endless!

Do hurry up and come back when you can. I miss you, you know -- all of you, if you catch my meaning.

Love,

Your now very frustrated and dreadfully horny Hawke

Sparrow,

Hope Kirkwall is treating you better than whatever random-ass town I’m in now. This inn makes the Hanged Man look like the Winter Palace. The smell alone -- Phew. Not only that, but the whole place is so flammable they don’t even have hearths in the rooms. I’m writing this by moonlight, for crap’s sake.

Are you sleeping all right? Dreams or not, I hope you’re getting some well-deserved rest. I’m working on that part myself.

I always forget just how far away Skyhold is from everything decent and warm. Buttercup and I are getting closer, but there’s still a ways to go. He’s bitten me about three or four times, but he’s only crapped on my bedroll the once. I think he’s getting fond of me.

Found a demon outside this crummy little town, harassing some villagers. A nasty one. Despair. Bianca and I handled it, but it was tough seeing what it had done to the people there. I’ll have to let Doodles know there’s rifts out here, too. Seems there’s nowhere Corypheus hasn’t fucked up, at least a little bit.

I’m gonna fix this, Min. Promise.

But never mind me. How’s Kirkwall life? Aside from your no doubt very dramatic pining for me, I hope you’re on an even keel, Sparrow.

I love you more than I’ve got words for, and you know that’s saying something.

Varric

Dear Varric,

No letters recently. I know you’re probably getting into some backwoods parts of Thedas by now. Don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll get them in the end! Always do.

Kirkwall is, improbably, surviving without you. I know it’s difficult to believe, but we are managing to cope despite the lack of your charm and chest hair. It’s a dreadful burden to bear, but we’ll make do.

It is… peculiar to be back, though. Things are the same, but they aren’t. I’m sure I’ll get used to it. Merrill says it’ll take time. I hope she knows what she’s talking about.

Bethany makes me feel a bit better in that she’s adjusting, too. I don’t know if she’ll go back to the Wardens after all’s said and done. Seven years in Kirkwall and they never seriously came for Anders… perhaps Bethany’ll be able to make an escape herself. The false Calling’s gotten quieter, she says, after everything that happened at Adamant. But there are times she goes quiet in the middle of a conversation, and I don’t know how to ask if she’s all right.

Magic is… well I’d rather not talk about that. It’ll be fine, eventually. I’m not really sure I’m getting the hang of it, but I think I’m going to talk to Bethany about trying something different. I’ve been mulling it over for a few days. I need… more.

Love you, dear Varric. Do be careful.

Love,

Your Sparrow

Varric,

Wish you were here. Wish the old me was here, too. I’m rattled. I keep pretending that I’m not, that everything can just be laughed off with a joke or a quip, and I’m so tired of it.

I used to know how to do that.

But that was before the Fade and its awful green light and everything so empty and cold and false, and what if I’ve come back wrong, Varric, what if it isn’t just recovering but instead it’s possession?

I’d know, right?

Right?

Argh. I probably shouldn’t send this. This one might be better stuffed inside of one of Molossus’ chew toys. IGNORE THIS if I accidentally send it along. It’s very late, and I’ve had a lot of wine.

Hawke

Dear Min,

Buttercup and I should be reaching Skyhold late tomorrow. Maybe some of your letters will beat me there. Assuming you’re writing me, of course, and haven’t run off with a distant and hairier-chested cousin of mine. Though if you do, I understand. Cousin Torgold has a pelt that could put a druffalo to shame.

Up here in the mountains, shit’s awfully quiet, unless you count the winds stirring in the rocky valleys, or the wolves howling far in the distance. The stars are closer here, and the scar from the Breach, too. It’s almost pretty when you really look at it, greens and blues shifting, dancing, overhead.

I wish some things had been different, Sparrow.

I should have learned my lesson back in Kirkwall. Remember that spell of Marethari’s? I should have realized that me and you and the Fade don’t make for anything but badness. I could have kept hiding you. Even the Inquisition’s spymaster hadn’t found you until I lifted my pen and spilled ink to paper.

… but I’m a selfish dwarf.

I don’t know if I would’ve had the guts to finally tell you the truth if it wasn’t for that night in Crestwood. That’s something I’ll never regret. Never.

I love you, Min.

No matter what.

Love,

Your Varric.

Buttercup’s hooves clomped over the threshold of Skyhold’s gates, just as slow and steady as they had been the rest of the journey. Varric sighed, leading the old nag to the stables. He ought to make sure the pony was all right. He dismounted once they reached their destination, groaning and rubbing his aching back.

One of the Inquisition stable lasses yawned, greeting him. “Serah Tethras! You’re back. It’s good to see you. Though this is a sorry beast if ever there was one.”

“Buttercup’s not so bad,” said Varric begrudgingly, patting his jacket pockets. He came up with a few wrinkled mint sprigs and a piece of a sugar cube, which he offered to the pony. Buttercup’s whiskers tickled his gloved hand as he took the proffered treat. “He got the job done.”

“We’ll sort him out, don’t you worry.” She patted Buttercup on the neck, and the pony snorted, flicking his ears back. “The Inquisitor returned a few days ago,” said the lass, stepping away from him for a moment. “I imagine she’ll be glad to see you back! Especially after all the trouble in the Approach.”

“Oh, I’m sure of it,” Varric sighed. He handed the girl a few silvers. “Thanks for looking out for him. Careful, though. He does bite.”

He made his way up to the great hall, dread growing with every step. He regretted not stopping at the Herald’s Rest first — maybe some of Bull’s awful qunari liquor might have been a good idea, or hiding out in the attic with Cole — but he’d delayed this long enough.

The hall had begun to clear out, this late at night. At first Varric was gratified to see that his spot by the fire seemed safe. Clear. But a small silhouette at the other end of the hall, studying the golden plates they’d found out on the Inquisitor’s journeys, looked far too familiar.

He sighed, rubbing his forehead. His head kept hurting, but then, clenching his jaw would do that. “Here goes nothing,” he muttered.

He settled his things down by the fire, sat in his least favorite chair, and waited for Bianca to find him.

#hawke x varric #dragon age #dragon age: inquisition #varric x hawke #min hawke #varric tethras #under a new morning sun

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blorbologist · 2 years ago

Note

Kittens AU bc of course

and then two Wild Card AUs of Your Choice

Hmmm to find things I haven't shared with you:

A lot of the inspiration for the more benign aspects of this AU is going to come from my experience with two litters: the one that resulted in Jolie, my lil bastard runt, and Miss Thing + Pam, my Gorls my Criturs

However, a lot of the more dramatic beats are just... inspired by how hard life is for abandoned cats and kittens in general. Because as cute as kittens are, unwanted cats are a real problem and everyone loses when unplanned litters happen :c

I figure Percy actually named Curio - he noticed this pretty cat started hanging around the workshop a month or so before the events of the story. He built her some shelters to keep her warm in the worst of the chill - she was very curious but terrified of him, and he had never seen a stray cat with her colors: hence, Curio. (I asked @insyndiar for name ideas SO nkjgrtn <3)

My backstory for Curio is that she was someone's pet, a kitten taken home by a family who never had cats before. She didn't get spayed before her first heat and got out, and when her owners realized she was pregnant they just... dumped her because they couldn't afford to get her spayed, let alone feed and house a litter of kittens. She's very lost, scared and confused, and hardly more than a kitten herself. :C I figure if she got inside, with consistent meals and care, she'd be quite the sweetheart.

There are plenty of other options for housing the kittens: most sensibly, Percy can just take them on and bring them to his house (ok bourgeoisie boy) instead of practically moving in with Vex. It's just that his place is 40 minutes away, so they first bring the kittens to Vex's to warm them up, and from there it's just... too much of a bother to move them. (Also Vex knows Percy has little experience with animals so she'd rather be on standby in case he calls in a panic because one of them is dreaming and twitching in its sleep and Vex is this normal??)

And for some more AUs!

Let's start with some One for sorrow / Two for joy HCs I'm not sure I'll squeeze into the sequel fic or not:

Allura has PTSD now :D yay :D I'm not sure how much I can devote to it, but being Feebleminded for several days with little food and water, with a dragon and his army actively hunting you? Yeah that'll fuck a girl up. Still unsure if she'll keep her position on the Council or retire as a result.

OOC, the same mixup as canon happens when Grog has Kaylie draw a card from the Deck: Matt initially thinks it's the card for the random magic item, but later retcons it to be the curse. So Kaylie's cursed now! Make of that what you will. :)

I had thought up a scene were Percy and Cass visit some graveless gravestones placed in their parents' and siblings' names before the Thordak fight - however, given how long the chapter was getting + the fact neither Vex nor Vax would see it, I kept it to myself. It would have really made it obvious Percy had decided to leave VM once the world was safe. The remaining de Rolos really just ended up talking about what they remembered of their family, how their people would remember them, and what to do going forward. Cass absolutely made a comment about Vex being nobility as soon as she got the paperwork filed, so, y'know, perfectly suitable to court (they certainly have room in their little family for her), which made Percy Unusually Solemn instead of blushy.

As soon as VM left, Cass cornered Percy in his workshop and absolutely fucking chewed him out. He has friends, he has freedom, things she's absolutely dreamed of having these last five years, and he just - he just threw that all away? She eventually quiets when she realizes he's not responding, he's just so drained and focused on his project. They eventually settle for a hug and some quiet support.

Trinket is actually pretty happy with Cass! He misses Vex of course, but trusts Vax to protect her. Galdric? Verdict's out on Galdric - bears and wolves don't get along as a rule, but this one smells of power and ancient magics.

Oh god this is getting so long erfkneknger uhhh one more AU, let's sayyyy Bashter 2/3 Vampire AU:

Yasha was turned by Obann, which caused her whole Orphanmaker thing and is why she easily get swayed under his control under Bazzoxan despite, yknow, being a vampire in this AU.

I think Jester almost dies, for good, in the final fight against Lucien. Somehow Yasha turns her into a vampire to avoid this, which - severely miffs half the party. But Yasha was just forced to help kill this thing who still is, deep down, her best friend. She's not thinking straight and she can't lose anyone else.

Beau and Yasha help Jester adapt to the whole creature of the night thing. It's a weird irony, that adventurous Jester is forced to become more sedentary like her mom and dad as a result of the whole 'burning in the sunlight' thing. Yasha, being a nomad, has some helpful tips for handling it, but it's definitely a harsh learning curve.

I feel Bad about excluding Fjord from this after watching the M9 reunited, given he and Jester are so fucking cute together there. So? I guess it's Bashter + Fjester. Tusks and fangs look very cute together when they're smiling earnestly at eachother. Fjord was very conflicted about Jes being a vampire initially, given he's familiar with being beholden to terrible power, and keeps gently prodding her to be honest about her feelings about the less pleasant sides to it. So like Polynein with only half the Nein while Cad, Caleb, Veth, Essek and Kingsley all just watch this with varying levels of confusion.

Essek whips up a simple cousin to the light-blocking spell of Rosohna he enchants to the Bashter home, so they don't need to worry quite as much about carefully keeping the windows drawn. He makes a Very Specific Face when Jester makes jokes about him totally being a vampire too.

#critical role #cat's cradle au #vex is the raven queen's champion au #vampire!bashter #bashter #perc'ahlia #percahlia #my writing #ask #holy shit that's a lot

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bluemanedhawk · 11 months ago

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There are a lot of songs that have gunshots in them. I think i remember one being parodied in a video where the gunshot was unexpected instead of being plan. Of course, there's also that one orchestral piece that has cannons in it. I think i remember hearing that it was created to be played at a specific event, but that event wouldn't allow the cannons, so the display of its true form was postponed. I have to wonder what they used instead of cannons that first time. I have to assume that when cannons are used, they use whatever the cannon equivalent to blanks is, although if they used real ammo (i was going to say balls, but then i remembered that grapeshot exists) and put it to good use in some way (old building demolition, maybe?), well i think that that would be pretty cool. Although that makes me think: would using actual ammo change the acoustics of a cannon as an instrument? Surely it would in some way, but would it be significant, or even noticeäble? Anyway, on the topic of music having distinctly nonmusical audio in it, i know that there's that one xkcd about the idea of having a perfectly generic song ripe for radio airplay except that right in the middle of it it has tire squealing sounds. If that got played on an area's popular station (perhaps the still-manages-to-be-locally-posessed-instead-of-bought-out-by-a-conglomerate station, or if it's a university town's student radio station), then i think it would be interesting to see what that would look like from above when everyone suddenly started panicking about it. (Actually, come to think of it, the examples of possible radio stations i gave are exactly the kind of stations people would use to _escape_ from normal radio stations, and would probably be the least likely to play that song.) Y'know, i know that there's a song by the band Black Sabbath called “War Pigs” that has a siren sound in it. But that's an airraid siren, not e.g. a fire brigade or ambulance or police siren, and the song is mixed in such a way that it's pretty clear that the sirens are a part of the song, not a part of reality. (An airraid siren makes more sense given what the song is about anyway.) That said, i do wonder if they ended up having to put out a radio mix of the song that didn't include the sirens. I do find the image of somebody getting confused, pulling over into the hard shoulder, and shortly thereäfter feeling extraordinarily silly very funny. Although on the topic of the mixing, apparently the band members never planned for the sirens to be there. It was the mixers that put them in there, and though the band was never informed about it they ended up liking it anyway. It's a pretty interesting story, and it's certainly one of the happier instances of executive meddling. There are some more unfortunate ones, like how the album that “War Pigs” came out on was _meant_ to be itself called _War Pigs_, and in fact the cover art was _designed_ with that title in mind, but the executives meddled and it ended up being named after the second song on the album, “Paranoid”, a song that was slapped together in twenty minutes to fill up space and ended up becoming the lead single of the album, meaning that the cover art ended up being a complete nonsequiteur. In fairness, “Paranoid” is a pretty damn good song. But the title of the song is weird, because if you listen to the lyrics it's pretty clear that it's about depression, not paranoia. Even weirder is that this isn't the only instance of this exact nomenclative mixup happening, because in the _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ series, Marvin is referred to as ‘the paranoid android’, despite clearly showing symptoms of depression instead. Perhaps it's a spatiotemporal dialectal difference. Anyway, Black Sabbath also had executive meddling happen with their fourth album, which was going to be named _Snowblind_, again after one of the songs on the album, but that was rejected for the metaphor being too blunt, meaning that the album ended up being given the very boring name of _Vol. 4_.

Oh, for goodness's sake: [tumblr] is now giving me a warning about exceeding the 4096-characters-per-text-block limit. Is there such thing as a non-entering newline, a bit like there's such a thing as a nonbreaking space? I tried everything that Wikipedia's list of whitespace characters lists as being a newline, but none of them seemed to work. I suppose that that makes some amount of sense: i can't see any reason for there to intentionally be such a character, because unlike, say, the zero-width space, it's not like there's a…hmm, actually, i've thought of a potential use for such a character: when a document is rendered in multiple pages, it's often preferrable for there to not be single lines of a whole paragraph on a page. Therefore, a newline character that doesn't render a new line could be used to help eliminate things like that by explicitly stating “hey, if this paragraph needs to be split into multiple pages, you should prefer doing it here”. <sub>ha</sub> ha Ha HA HAAA! I've bullshat my way into getting a character into unicode that will allow me to get around an arbitrary limitation of a website! But even though there's a good reason for a character like this to exist, it doesn't. Even so, i was hoping that of the halfdozen newlines that _do_ exist in unicode, one of them would have happened to have been overlooked in such a way that it would behave that way for the purposes of just this post. But anyway, what i was going to say before i was so rudely interrupted was that i don't really like the song “War Pigs” that much because the lyrics seem to me to be conveying a message of “You don't actually need to fight for the world to be fixed—just wait for god to come down and fix everything!”, which is complete and utter bullshit. It's not their only song that does this: on that same album, the song “Electric Funeral” is conveying pretty much exactly the same message. That said, that album does have some good songs on it: i mentioned “Paranoid” earlier, but “Planet Caravan” and “Iron Man” are also both good songs. But compare “War Pigs” and “Electric Funeral” with their song “Children of the Grave” from their album _Master of Reality_: that's a song that conveys a message of “Nothing will stop humanity from destroying itself except for itself, so you need to fight to stop that from happening! (Just please don't lose sight of what you're fighting for.)”, which is one i'm much more inclined to get behind. That said, _Master of Reality_ is an album with its own imperfections: for example, it has a song on it called “After Forever” that is blatant fearmongering christian propaganda. It's also got a song on it called “Lord of This World” that i totally didn't need to look up to make sure that i was capitalizing it correctly and which is a somewhat strange case, because it could _maybe possibly_ be interpreted as not being christian if you really stretched it—maybe it's not narrated from the perspective of the christian satan, but from the perspective of some other embodiment of evil—maybe the line “Your world was made from you by someone above” doesn't refer to god creating the world, but instead to the spoken-to's parents literally being physically above them because e.g. the spoken-to is underground or the spoken-to's parents are living in a floating city or are constantly traveling by plane or something—maybe the multiple mentions of a ‘soul’ don't refer to the christian idea of a soul, but some other idea of a soul. But that said, i don't think that this is the intended interpretation of the song, and while death of the author means that it _could_ be interpreted in this way i think that it's too much of a stretch to be a healthy way to consume the song. There might be other instances of songs like this—i've only really heavily listened to Black Sabbath's first three albums. But you want to know what really sucks about all of these songs i just criticized? If one ignores the lyrics, they're really great pieces of music, so it's a real shame that the lyrics are so shit!

[gunshot]

that damned song is the only thing playing in my head right now

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clatterbane · 2 years ago

Text

Welp, that is certainly one way to keep a fairly flat blood sugar graph! Just starting on the way down from my first "meal" in around 24 hours. 😑

On the plus side, looks like I have got the long-acting insulin dialed in pretty well for now. I also thankfully dodged the need to seek any kind of urgent medical attention, which I was trying to hold off on at least until the morning.

But, overall? -5/10, would not recommend.

Yeah, my throat decided to go totally blocked again, to the point that not even water would go down. There seems to have been some scheduling mixup with the GI endocopy people, and it's been like 5 weeks since the last treatment when they've been aiming for about every 2 weeks which has been keeping things in reasonably decent shape.

This makes me even more nervous after dealing with the NHS, where they kept leaving me hanging for like 3-4 months at a time and honestly seemed to have zero fucks to give as to whether patients could swallow at all. (Seriously, I got shut down whenever I tried to mention not even consistently being able to drink. While T1 diabetic, with the added danger factor there.) But, this was the first time anything like this has happened on this end. The folks in Lund have actually been trying to keep me consistently able to handle a decent variety of solid food, and this is by far the worst it's managed to get since I started getting treatement for it through the system here. Hopefully this was the last time, too. 😒

He forgot to call them before the weekend, because we're sharing maybe half a household executive function between us. But, hopefully this little incident will provide a mental jog during their limited phone office hours in the morning!

In the meantime, I'm feeling MUCH better hydrated. About to grab another glass of viramin electrolyte drink, just to be safe. I also decided to play it safe, and went for a protein shake and a cup of drinkably smooth soup.

May brave some mashed potatoes and quick gravy in a little while. Still playing it cautious today, because jfc.

#personal #i get so tired #medical stuff #esophageal stricture #hiatal hernia #ganging up again #swallowing bs #diabetes #t1 diabetes #my shit's fucked up

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elsanna-shenanigans · 2 years ago

Text

June Contest Submission #5: Everything to Everyone

Words: ca. 10,000 Setting: Modern AU/Crisis Center AU Lemon: no Content: Angst, mentions of suicide, panic attack, unhealthy relationship dynamics, depression, anxiety, mentions of drunk driving and car accidents, swearing

January 25, 2022

Anna steps out of her car tugging on her backpack, somehow not spilling her large cup of iced coffee in the process. It feels weird to still be using a backpack five years after graduating college, but she’s never been one for purses and the penguin pin on the strap makes her smile. She takes a moment to get a good look at the sun coming up through the clouds and takes a whiff of the frosty air. It’s the only taste she’ll get out of the outside world for the next eight hours.

But that’s okay. The Arendelle Mental Health Services and Crisis Center is her home away from home.

Anna adjusts the straps on her backpack before stepping through the sliding glass doors of the moderately-sized office building. Dolly, the receptionist, is currently redirecting a lost-looking woman. “It’s alright, honey, this kind of mixup happens all the time,” she tells her. “Counseling will be in the other building. Just walk out the doors and make a left, you can’t miss it.”

“O-okay,” the woman says. “Thank you. Sorry.”

“No need to apologize,” Dolly says in her soothing southern accent. “You’re doing just fine. Have a good day, alright?”

“I’ll try,” the woman says somberly. She puts her hands in the front pocket of her dirty gray hoodie and turns around, locking eyes for a moment with Anna. Her face is sunken and tired, her nearly white hair is thin and unkempt, and the faint smile she gives is one Anna’s seen far too much. A smile that says she’s holding on to her last thread of hope.

Anna’s instincts kick in as the woman steps through the open door. She turns to her with a smile that she hopes will strengthen that thread and says, “Hey.”

The woman flinches, but she turns to look at Anna anyway. “Y-yes?”

“You’re doing the right thing. I’m glad you’re here.”

The woman nods, her eyes snapping to the floor before she turns back around and makes her way to the mental health building.

“And how are you today, Ms. Goulden?” Dolly asks, grabbing Anna’s attention.

Anna smirks and leans on the receptionist table. “Better now that I get to see your beautiful face again, Mrs. Heid. How was the honeymoon?”

Dolly looks at her with dreamy eyes like she’s back on the streets of Venice. “Oh honey, it was beautiful. I’ll tell you all about it during your break.”

“I can’t wait!” Anna exclaims before heading further into the office. The middle-aged woman from Tennessee- with a personality as big and vibrant as her blonde hair and blue eyes- has been her friend since her very first day here. For months, Dolly’s been a shoulder to lean on and a mind to glean from. She doesn’t know how she’ll ever repay Dolly for her hospitality, but she’ll certainly try.

She takes a long sip of her iced coffee while walking to her cubicle, waving at her fellow coworkers along the way. Some match her enthusiasm, but most of them are preoccupied with whoever’s on the other end of their call. When she makes it to her desk, she puts her hands on her hips triumphantly and says, “Ah good, you’re right where I left you.”

“You need to get better jokes, Anna.”

Anna peeks over her wall in order to greet Honeymaren, her ‘cubicle neighbor’ with a sweet, soothing voice that contrasts with her prickly personality. “Maybe you need to get a better sense of humor, Ren.”

Honeymaren glares up at her and takes off her headset. “That’s two. Call me 'Ren’ one more time and I’ll-”

“You’ll hit my kneecaps with a baseball bat, I know.” Anna sighs, “When are you going to accept me as your friend?”

“Never.” Honeymaren puts her headset back on and returns to typing into her logbook, declaring their conversation over. This interaction looked hopeless, but Anna believes she’s wearing her coworker down little by little. Last week, she complimented the brownies Anna brought in.

She slips her backpack off her shoulders and places her notebook, water bottle, and iced coffee on her desk. As she waits for her computer to turn on, she glances at the themed decorations around her walls. Since it’s so close to February, she’s put up cute pink and red paper hearts, quotes promoting self-love, and on her desk is a stuffed bear holding a heart that says Be Mine. The only year-round decorations for her cubicle are her two college degrees and pictures of her family. She holds the small portrait of her parents posing proudly with her at her college graduation, next month will mark five years since they died.

The sound of her desktop’s login screen pulls her out of her thoughts before she can dwell on them too much. She inputs her password and officially clocks in right at 8 AM. “Perfect,” she says to herself before opening up her logbook and starting a fresh page for the day. “Now…”

Anna closes her eyes and takes a few deep breaths, calming any racing thoughts left in her head and settling into the right personality she’ll need for the next eight hours. She’s always been a generally upbeat and optimistic person, but this job requires more than just a cheerful voice and a positive attitude. The clients deserve more than that too, and she’ll give them everything she has until the clock strikes 4 PM.

With one last deep breath, Anna slowly opens her eyes, relaxes her shoulders, and puts her headset on. Five minutes later, she gets her first call. With a light, calming voice, she answers, “Arendelle Crisis Center, thank you for calling. How can I help you?”

February 14, 2022

Anna writes the details of her last call into her logbook, taking a little longer than usual to get the words out. People call the hotline for so many reasons and she’s listened to nearly hundreds of difficult experiences. But when someone calls about losing someone they loved, well, those haven’t gotten any easier for her.

This time it was a young girl that called the hotline: Delilah, fourteen years old, her mother was killed by a drunk driver exactly one year ago. It was difficult for Anna to stay composed as Delilah cried about how much she wanted her mother back.

After typing the last sentence of her report, she quickly minimizes her logbook and leans forward, pressing her fingers to her temple. The call keeps replaying in her head but she forces herself to only think about the end of it, when Anna got Delilah to laugh at a corny impression of a scene from one of the girl’s favorite shows. The result is what matters, getting these people to at least a small sense of peace is what matters. In the darkness, a small flicker of flame is better than nothing at all.

And, no matter how much it takes out of her, she loves being the one to ignite that flame.

Slowly, she stands up and stretches out her back, thankful that it’s her lunch break now. After five hours of sitting on her office chair, she finally gets to spend an hour sitting on a break room chair. She peers over her cubicle to see Honeymaren already on break, eating chicken masala and watching Netflix from her laptop, sporting the classic 'one earbud in, one earbud out’ look. “I’m heading to lunch!” Anna exclaims.

“You don’t need to tell me, I’m not your boss,” Honeymaren replies without looking at her.

Anna giggles and pulls her food container out of her backpack before making her way to the break room. It’s half-empty when she gets there, everyone inside the teal-colored walls greets her with smiles and nods of various sincerity. In return, she broadly greets them with open arms and a goofy reference, “Good morning, Krusty crew!”

Daniel, a coworker leaning over one of their microwaves, responds annoyed, “It’s one in the afternoon, Patrick.”

Ryder, another coworker and also Honeymaren’s brother, replies, “Don’t be such a Squidward, bro.”

“Yeah Daniel, don’t be such a fucking Squidward,” Anna repeats before sticking her tongue out.

She walks over to the other microwave to heat up the leftover lasagna she made last night. Afterwards, she takes a seat right next to Dolly, letting out what she feels is a content sigh. But apparently it isn’t.

“Hang in there, honey,” Dolly says. “Just a couple more hours.”

“Hmm? Oh I’m okay, don’t worry,” she replies. Looking at her friend, she notices a gorgeous silver chain around her neck. “Well that’s new.”

Dolly perks up and unveils the rest of the necklace, showing off a beautiful, ocean wave pendant with amethyst-colored accents. “Isn’t it gorgeous? George bought it for me as a combination birthday and Valentine’s Day gift.”

“It’s beautiful, Dolly. You and your husband are so lucky to have each other,” Anna remarks. Though, as happy as she is for them, a harsh thought rings in the back of her head reminding Anna of her crippling singleness. Hopefully, Dolly won’t-

“Certainly you have someone in your life right now like my George, right? I’m sure you’re fixin’ to do something wonderful with them tonight.”

Anna laughs like it’s pulled out of her by a ghost of awkwardness. “N-no, not really. I was actually…I wasn’t planning on doing anything special tonight. With anyone. I’m still-” She laughs again, just as involuntary. “I’m still single.”

Dolly puts a hand over her heart and frowns. “Oh darling, that just ain’t right. There’s gotta be some sweet girl in town that’s taken a liking to the wonderful Anna Goulden. You've at least got your eye on someone, right?”

“Nope, there’s no one.” Each confession feels like an icicle to the heart. “I mean I guess I haven’t had the time to look around that much either.” She also won’t entertain the thought of using a dating app. Ever.

“Sounds like you need to make time.” Dolly’s words sound accusatory, but Anna knows she has her best interests at heart. “Have you thought about cutting back your hours?”

Anna grumbles, “You know I can’t do that.”

“You work fifty hours a week with only one day off. If money’s the issue, you could always ask Mr. Talford if he’ll give you a raise. Anyone in this office will vouch for you, especially me.”

“It’s not about the money, it’s about the responsibility. My responsibility,” Anna reasons. “It doesn’t feel right for me to sit around and do nothing while someone out there is in need of help. If all that stands between life or death is me picking up the phone, then I want to be here for that.”

“Taking time for yourself isn’t 'sitting around and doing nothing’. Honey, if you keep lighting the candle at both ends, pretty soon you’re going to burn out,” Dolly warns.

Irritation starts prickling at the back of Anna’s head; this isn’t the first time someone’s told her this. “I can handle myself just fine,” Anna says, slowing her words down to keep from sounding upset. Adding more finality to the topic, she adds, “And I’m not worried all that much about dating. Someday, the right person will come along and I don’t want to force that chance.”

Dolly gives her a sympathetic smile but thankfully chooses not to force the issue. “I’m sure that person is right around the corner,” she says.

April 5, 2022

Anna sits at one of the wooden tables at Jitterbugs, a corner coffee shop half a mile from the office. Her eyes wander aimlessly while she waits for her order. The 10 AM crowd is nothing like the 7:30 AM crowd and the change is aggravating her already irritated mind. Mr. Talford, her boss, called Anna into his office last week and basically said that he was reducing her hours. Not because of anything she did, but because she was 'doing too much’.

Anna tried protesting his decision, but his mind was already made up. Now she only works five days a week, and on one of those days she comes in at 10:30 AM instead of 8 AM. Today is the first of those days.

Perhaps she should have seen this coming. Two weeks ago, Honeymaren caught her asleep at her desk and woke her up by placing an ice cube on the back of her neck. Thankfully she wasn’t on a call with anyone or else she would never forgive herself.

She doesn’t know why she’s even getting coffee, she’s far too awake for her own good already. But it’s a part of her routine, and sticking to it could help ease her irritation.

“Iced caramel mocha for…Anna?” she hears the barista say with the wrong pronunciation. Anna steps out of her chair with a bit too much force and walks up to the counter to grab her caffeinated savior.

“Thanks,” she says to the barista holding out her drink. Unable to help herself, however, she adds, “Also, it’s pronounced Anna. Not Anna.”

The barista’s sky blue eyes widen in horror. “Oh no, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to…can I do something to make it up to you?”

“No, you’re fine. Trust me, it happens all the time,” Anna assures. She’s always merciful to people who make this mistake, but she’s doubly forgiving towards cute girls in aprons.

The barista’s aforementioned blue eyes give her a naturally soft vibe, her nearly white hair looks lovely in a ponytail tucked behind her black visor, and there’s an air of familiarity to her. But Anna’s certain they’ve never met before. Unless they met in a dream or in a past life, which would be pretty cool.

Anna glances down at her name tag and says, “Elsa. That’s a pretty name.”

The woman blinks in surprise, “How did you…”

Anna points at her nametag. “It’s Elsa, right? Or is that someone else’s name tag?”

She looks down and says, “Oh, my name tag! I forgot that was…I’m sorry, It’s my first day. I’m not usually this nervous. I mean I am but not like…not like this.” She gestures around her head with spastic hands. “Usually, I’m better at saying words. From my mouth…face. Mouth face.”

“Mouth face,” Anna repeats and then chuckles. “I like it.”

Elsa pouts, “You don’t have to be so nice.”

“But that’s who I am.” Anna can’t help the admiration and attraction she feels for Elsa, from her appearance down to her endearingly shy demeanor. So she steps forward. “That’d be like me asking you to not be so pretty.”

Elsa’s pale cheeks turn a bright shade of pink and she tries to look at anything else but Anna. “O-oh. Wow. You…wow, you just said that. That's…wow. Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.” Anna would have flirted with her more, but she didn’t want to be late for work and she didn’t want to get Elsa into trouble for focusing on one customer for too long. She begrudgingly steps away from the counter, but gives the flustered barista a wink and says, “I’ll see you around, Elsa.”

The last thing she sees before turning around is Elsa biting her lip and walking back into the kitchen. Maybe this 10:30 AM shift won’t be so bad.

May 9, 2022

Much to her disappointment, Anna doesn’t see Elsa at the coffee shop the week after. But she does see her a few days later. And a couple of days after that. And a couple of days after that. Their conversations are short and fleeting, with Anna letting her intentions known bit-by-bit and Elsa seemingly reciprocating her advances.

Things seem to be going in the right direction, but then they reach what Anna likes to call the 'point of no return’. It’s that gap between casual flirting and a chance at something real, and right now she and Elsa are at the edge of that gap. Anna’s always been a little impatient with her feelings, but she’s also been terrible at crossing that point of no return. It’s one of the reasons she’s been single for…yeesh, almost five years now.

But right now she has a heavier concern. Mr. Talford called her in for a meeting today, and Anna’s assuming the worst even though he specifically said in his email that she’s not in trouble. It’s the end of the workday, most of the regular staff have gone home and the night volunteers have taken their place. As she tries to sit still in front of his office, her leg bouncing almost involuntarily, she thinks back on anything she did that might warrant this meeting.

Has she been misreading her schedule and clocking in at the wrong times? Did a client file a complaint about the tone she used? Oh crap, yesterday before she turned off her line she could have sworn that a call was coming in. She knew she should have waited.

The door in front of her opens and Anna straightens up. Mr. Talford looks at her and smiles, “Anna, good to see you.”

She stands up and straightens out her denim skirt, shaking his hand and replying, “Good to see you too, Mr. Talford.” Maybe she’s being called in because of her skirt. She had a bad feeling about it when she saw it at the thrift store, but the chance to dress up as a side character in a 2000s Disney Channel sitcom was too exciting to pass up.

They walk inside and Anna slowly settles into one of the leather seats in front of Mr. Talford’s desk. He sits, of course, in his office chair and leans forward casually with his arms folded on the table. “So, how have you been lately?”

Anna shrugs stiffly, “Fine. I’ve been doing fine. I’m getting a haircut this weekend so that’s nice.”

Mr. Talford raises an eyebrow, making her think she should cancel her appointment. “No concerns with the job? Nothing that you’d like to discuss?”

“Uh…nothing that I know of,” Anna responds. “Why?”

He straightens up and Anna mimics him instinctively. “Well, I…okay first of all, I just want you to know that I value how much you bring to this company and to the clients. I value you. Policy dictates that I have to say 'we’, but I want you to know my personal opinion of you.”

Anna gives him a small smile as a piece of her anxiety breaks free and fades. “I appreciate that. Sincerely.”

Mr. Talford nods. “With that being said…I’ve been looking through your logbook and I’ve noticed things in your reports that make me concerned.”

“What do you mean?”

He turns on his computer screen to look at the document pulled up. Though the text is hard to read from here, Anna knows without a doubt it’s a page from her logbook. He recites an excerpt from last Tuesday, a call she remembers all too well.

John, male, age twenty-four. He recently lost what he considered to be his dream job and is struggling to find a sense of purpose once again. Spoke to him until he felt assured that his purpose and this job were not completely intertwined. Set a plan with him that includes finding enjoyment of life outside of a job but also ensuring he updates his resume and looks for better employment. I wish there was more I could do for him, I feel like there was more I could have said. If I had more time, maybe I could have pointed him to specific companies that were hiring. Maybe that would have been better.

Mr. Talford scrolls down to another excerpt, this one from two weeks ago. Another call she can’t get out of her mind.

Courtney, female, age nineteen, freshman in college. Very nervous and apologetic on the phone, said she probably shouldn’t have called and that there are other people I could be helping. She didn’t know how to describe how she was feeling other than she was 'really, really sad and didn’t know why’. Ensured she had no plans to harm herself and would make plans with some friends for the night so she wouldn’t be alone. Pointed her towards the counselors on campus, told her that sessions were included in her tuition and assured her that she did the right thing by reaching out. I was silent a couple of times and there are things I know in hindsight that I wish I could have told her. Silence is never a good thing, I should have known better than to give her nothing in the moments she needed something.

He scrolls down once more, but Anna interrupts him before he can speak, “I’m sorry, I just…don’t see what the problem is here? I know the writing’s a little informal, but you encourage us to be as truthful as possible with our comments.”

He takes a deep breath and turns his attention away from the computer, clasping his hands together on the desk. “I have no problems with how you’re writing, Anna, it's what you’re writing that concerns me.”

Anna raises an eyebrow, “What’s there to be concerned about?”

Mr. Talford looks away for a moment to gather his words. Turning his attention back to Anna, he replies, “In any job that requires you to help with the emotional and mental wellbeing of people, you need to ensure a certain disconnect. You need to keep yourself at a distance and remember that you’re here to help them get to a point of stability, not to solve their problems entirely.”

“I don’t do that. I don’t try to solve anyone’s problems,” Anna argues.

“But you want to. Anna, you are a deeply compassionate person and I admire that about you- everyone here admires that. But with every call you answer, you pile on too much of the client’s burden on yourself. That’s not healthy.”

A familiar prickling feeling manifests, this time trailing from the back of Anna’s head all the way down her spine. She squirms a little bit and looks away from Mr. Talford with a bitter frown creeping across her lips. “So…what? You’re asking me to not be myself? Well sorry for being so damn empathetic.”

“I’m asking you to take care of yourself,” he corrects. “Just like you do your best to take care of each one of your clients. We care about you, and if you reach out to us then we will help you. But if you keep taking on so much grief and pain, it’s only a matter of time until you’re on the other end of the call.”

Anna can’t take any more of this. She stands up, her entire body buzzing with bitterness, and she says, “Thank you for your concern, Mr. Talford. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Anna…” he says, but she’s already out the door.

She paces back to her desk and stuffs her things into her backpack recklessly. In a rare moment of role reversal, Honeymaren peeks over her cubicle and asks, “You alright?”

“I’m fine,” Anna says coldly. “What are you still doing there?”

“Working overtime. Need to train one of the new volunteers.”

“Fun.” She violently slings her backpack onto her shoulders and takes a sharp breath. “See you tomorrow.”

Honeymaren raises an eyebrow, “Are you sure you’re okay?” This is the first time she’s ever initiated a conversation before, and under different circumstances Anna would relish this change.

But right now she just wants to leave before this building suffocates her even more. “Don’t worry about it,” she replies. “Don’t worry about me.”

She rushes out the front doors and starts her car, resisting the sudden urge to scream her head off right here in the parking lot. After all, that wouldn’t be the best way to 'take care of herself’. The car roars as she turns the key and quickly pulls out of her parking spot with thoughts of home. But she changes her mind at the last second.

The emotions from that meeting are getting to her too much and she needs to calm down. Eating something sweet always calms her down. Jitterbugs has pastries. She gets to the coffee shop in record time and walks inside. As she’s wishing that her skirt had pockets she could bunch her fists into, she’s greeted by a familiar sight behind the cash register.

“Elsa,” she says, the name and face already easing the tension in her. “I didn’t see you this morning.”

“Hey Anna!” she says, looking genuinely happy to see her. “I know. I actually wasn’t even supposed to come in this morning, but someone needed a shift covered, and I wasn’t doing anything at my apartment anyway so…here I am.” She puts her arms out, presenting herself in all her aproned glory.

“Well, I’m actually…” Anna hesitates for a moment, and then decides to dangle a foot over the edge of the gap. “I’m really happy to see you. I had kind of a crappy day at work.”

Elsa frowns, and she seems to follow in step with her. “Do you…want to talk about it?”

Anna pulls back. “No, not really. Besides, you’re working, I don’t want to take up your time. I just want to head home, unwind, and get out of this silly skirt.”

But Elsa doesn’t pull back. “I think the skirt looks cute, it’s very Hannah Montana-esque.”

Anna never blushes, but this woman does things that make her want to try new things. She stammers out, “Y-yeah so…what kind of pastries do you have left? I need something sweet. Do you have anything?”

“We have a couple of apple fritters left,” Elsa answers. “Or if you want something a bit more fluffy, we also have some caramel crunch muffins too.”

“What do you recommend? What’s your favorite?”

Elsa grins playfully, “Well, my favorite is our dark chocolate brownies, but we’re out of those. As for what we have left, I’d definitely recommend the muffin.”

“Then I’ll take it,” Anna says. “Thank you.”

Elsa rings her up and, since there aren’t that many people in the coffee shop right now, they get to know each other a little more. Anna tells her the crazy story about the day she first moved to Arendelle and everything she misses about her hometown. Elsa tells her what it’s like being an Arendelle native and how she started working at Jitterbugs in order to get 'a fresh start’. Anna doesn’t pry about that, much like Elsa doesn’t ask her any work-related questions. Both are conversations they can only have if they’re willing to cross that point of no return.

The muffin arrives in a cute little box, and that warm caramel smell combined with her conversation with Elsa is already lifting her spirits. “So, I guess I should head out,” Anna says tentatively.

“Yeah, I guess so,” Elsa replies. “I mean-”

“Hmm?”

“Uh…,” Elsa lets out a content sigh. “I just wanted to say that I’m glad I got to see you. When we talk, it’s the highlight of my shift. I honestly think I would have gone crazy if we never met.”

Anna feels emboldened by her unexpected comment. She bites her lip and grants Elsa the same amount of honesty, “I’m glad I got to see you too. It was a nice ending to a crappy day, so…thank you. Don’t work yourself too hard, okay?”

Elsa giggles, “I’ll try not to.”

“Good. Uh, I…alright, I’ll see you. Maybe tomorrow or whenever.”

“Or whenever.”

Anna turns to walk away, holding the muffin in both of her hands like it’s an offering to a god for a bountiful harvest. She takes a step. Steps again. And then she turns around, walks back to Elsa, and takes the leap.

“Go out with me.”

Elsa’s eyes widen and she blinks as if she’s trying to wake up from a dream. But this isn’t a dream, it’s a reality they should have been living in a lot sooner. She stutters, trying to look uncertain as a smile tugs at the corner of her lips. “W-with me? I mean with you? Us? Going out on a date?”

Anna nods, amused at how flustered she’s getting. “That’s what I’m saying.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yup. In fact, I’ve been sure for a while now. I just didn’t know when or how to say it until…now.”

Elsa presses her palms against the counter to steady herself. “Gosh, I knew…I mean I guess I thought that maybe there was something here. Or there could have been. I always thought you were flirting with me, a-and I tried flirting back. Kind of. I don’t really know how to flirt, so I just keep telling you how pretty you are.”

Anna giggles and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “I appreciate that.”

“I never thought it would go any further than us talking,” Elsa confesses.

“Well now that you know I want things to go further than that…” She leans on the counter as well, her grin feigning confidence while her mind is practically begging for Elsa to say yes.

Elsa laughs a little bit to herself and then takes a breath. A couple of seconds pass and she asks, “When’s your next day off?”

August 13, 2022

That’s how it starts for Anna and Elsa. One brave leap leads to a cute picnic date, which leads to an hours-long conversation in Anna’s apartment, which leads to their first kiss. And now, three months later, they’re moving in together.

It feels like the right move. They spend all their free time at each other’s apartments anyway, and that initial attraction has blossomed into something Anna’s only heard about but never experienced for herself.

When she tells Dolly this at work, she asks, “I’m happy for you both, but don’t you think this is a little too soon?”

“I don’t think so, and neither does Elsa,” Anna responds. “We found this cute apartment twenty minutes away from here, it’s on the east side of town and the rent isn’t too bad. I honestly can’t wait.”

“I’m sure you two care a great deal about each other, but…oh you know me, I worry. You’ve been under a lot of stress lately and I’m afraid of the toll this move can take on you.”

Anna frowns, “I’m not stressed, I’m doing just fine. Yesterday was…things just got a little intense, that’s all.”

“Honeymaren said she heard you crying.”

“Well, Ren should mind her own damn business,” Anna snaps.

Dolly gasps, “Anna Goulden!”

That…that shouldn’t have happened; Anna’s not sure where that came from. She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. And I’ll apologize to Ren too, I-I’m sure she means well. But that’s why this move will be good for me, I’ve been under a lot of- I mean things are just…there’s a lot of pressure right now. And Elsa helps with that pressure. She gets me, she helps me out, I don’t know what I’d do without her.”

Not wanting to aggravate her friend any more than she visibly is, Dolly smiles and pats her on the back of her hand, “Then at least let me have the honor of being your first visitor.”

Anna returns the gesture and answers, “I can’t think of anyone better, Dolly.”

After her lunch break, it’s back to business as usual. Anna walks back to her cubicle and is surprised to see Honeymaren leaning against her desk. Her brooding, dark-haired cubicle neighbor has her signature frown on, but she looks less annoyed and more concerned. “Hey,” Honeymaren says.

“Hey!” Anna replies. “What’s the matter? Did you get lost?”

Honeymaren doesn’t roll her eyes, which isn’t a good sign. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

Anna tilts her head, “Is everything okay?”

“You tell me,” Honeymaren replies. “On your last call before you went to lunch, you sounded like you were, I don’t know, taking the whole thing personally. Did you know the person who called?”

“No. I mean now I know Henry but I didn’t before he called. Wait, what do you mean I was 'taking it personally’?”

Honeymaren looks at Anna’s dormant headset. “You just sounded a little intense, that’s all. At one point, it kind of felt like you were going to ask him where he was so you could rush out the door and help him personally.”

If only.

“The kid was in trouble. I had to literally talk him off the ledge of a roof,” Anna reasons, her skin starting to prickle. “Of course I had to be intense!”

Honeymaren raises her hands in defense. “I get that, trust me, but that’s why we contact the police when someone’s in danger. You shouldn’t have to-”

“Stop. Just stop, alright?” Anna interrupts. “I’m doing fine and I know how to do my job. I don’t even know why you’re talking to me like we’re friends, you don’t like me anyway.”

Her coworker’s eyes narrow, “Is that what you really think?”

Anna shrugs, “That’s how I feel.”

“If I didn’t like you, I would have asked Mr. Talford to let me move my shit a longtime ago.” She crosses her arms. “Aside from my brother, you’re the only one here I can tolerate.”

“Why do I have a hard time believing that?”

“Probably because you’re burning yourself out so bad from being everything to everyone that you’re beginning to resent the people around you for not living up to the impossible standard of compassion you’ve imposed on yourself.” Honeymaren takes a breath and walks back to her cubicle. When she gets there, she peeks over the wall and adds, “I mean that’s my theory anyway.”

Anna doesn’t remember what happens for the rest of the day, her mind is too consumed with trying to disprove Honeymaren’s theory. It’s only until her cubicle neighbor leaves that she remembers she was supposed to apologize to her.

After work, she goes to Elsa’s apartment instead of her own. When Elsa opens the door, Anna rests her head against her shoulder and feels her girlfriend’s fingers gently stroke the back of her neck. All day long she’s been deprived of oxygen, and now she can finally breathe again.

The inside of Elsa’s apartment is half-empty, non-necessities and certain bits of furniture have either been donated or are already at their new apartment. Thankfully, the couch is still here which gives Anna a chance to lie down and use Elsa’s lap as a pillow. “Rough day at work again?” Elsa asks.

Anna groans, “I…I love what I do. I love my job, I do love going to work and the people there- most of the people, anyway- but it’s like all it takes is one thing to set me off. I don’t get it.”

Elsa hums sympathetically and wipes the errant strands of hair away from Anna’s face. “Well you’re here now. With me. You don’t have to talk about work anymore if you don’t want to.”

Anna hears her and she’s almost convinced Elsa believes her own words, but in her eyes she can see that growing weariness from not knowing the whole truth. She’s never talked about her career, and Elsa’s never asked. Perhaps it’s time to change that.

She reaches up and places a hand on Elsa’s cheek, lightly grazing her skin with her fingers. “No. I think I should finally tell you…everything.”

And she does. She tells Elsa all about her journey to becoming a crisis counselor and what she does forty-five hours out of her week. She tells her about the calls she gets, the things she writes in her logbook, the coworkers that are both supportive yet irritating at times, and why she truly does love everything about what she gets to do. And she expects Elsa to listen like she always does, she expects to hear gentle hums and cute little laughs when Anna makes a dumb joke, but that doesn’t happen.

Instead, her eyes show a tough inner turmoil, like she’s piecing together an abstract puzzle. “Elsa? What’s wrong?”

And she hits Anna with a confession of her own. “I…know you.”

Anna raises an eyebrow, “Well duh, we’re dating.”

Elsa shakes her head quickly, “That’s not what I mean. I- the first time you came to Jitterbugs and I heard your voice, there was a…I don’t know, my mind was telling me you were familiar but I didn’t think I’d ever seen you before. But I had.”

Anna pushes herself off of Elsa’s lap and sits cross-legged facing her. “What are you talking about?”

Elsa looks away, seemingly ashamed, and then confesses, “Last Christmas…I was all alone. My family disowned me when I was sixteen so I couldn’t go to them, and my girlfriend broke up with me after Thanksgiving. I was sitting in the dark, on my bed in an apartment I could barely afford, and I started to realize that this was it. This was all I had left. And I asked myself if it was worth it to keep going, and my answer was…no.”

Anna’s heard this story maybe a hundred times, but it never gets any easier to hear. And it’s even worse hearing it from someone she cares so deeply for. She holds out her hand as a sign of support and Elsa takes it and squeezes it.

“I called the hotline, they redirected me to some crisis center. You never said your name, I never said mine, but you helped me. Now I know for sure it was you. And you listened to me even when I thought I was complaining too much or I was being overdramatic. You talked to me like I mattered.” Elsa’s voice trails off into a whimper as her eyes start to water. She takes a shaky breath and continues, “I just w-wanted to keep talking to you so you could get me through the night. I’ll never forget when you…you said that who I am is…”

“More than enough,” Anna finishes.

Elsa took both her hands into her own. “Anna, you saved me.”

Anything else they could have said wouldn’t have meant any more than the embrace they shared. They kept each other afloat in a never ending ocean.

October 24, 2022

After they realized how intertwined their lives truly were, that should have ushered in some kind of happily ever after. Anna saved Elsa, and Elsa saved Anna; they looked out for each other on a level neither of them had ever felt from anyone else before. But things didn’t get better, they got worse.

Anna arrives at the front door of their apartment but doesn’t open it right away. When she left this morning, Elsa was moody and distant, so chances are when she opens the door her girlfriend will finally unload everything she was thinking about earlier. Which means this will be the last moment of solitude she’ll have left until tonight, and work sucked so she really needs this time alone.

Of course, if Elsa doesn’t vent to her today, that finally gives Anna her chance to get this mess off her. But she doubts that will happen, Elsa hasn’t been feeling like herself for a while now.

A few seconds later, she feels ready to face her girlfriend and she opens the door. “I’m back!” she shouts into a cramped, empty loft. For a moment, Anna thinks that maybe Elsa went somewhere and she has the place to herself for a little bit. But then she hears Elsa’s feet hurriedly approaching from their bedroom.

When Elsa rounds the corner, Anna can see that she’s still wearing her clothes from this morning. When Elsa attacks her with a hug, she can tell she hasn’t showered yet either. “I missed you,” Elsa mutters against her shoulder.

“I missed you too,” Anna says, patting her back. “You didn’t go to work today?”

She feels Elsa shake her head. “I didn’t think I could make it in, so I called in sick.” They both know that’s a lie. The more likely truth is that her mind was 'being mean to her’ and she didn’t want to get out of bed and face anyone.

Despite wanting nothing more than for it to be her turn to have someone to lean on this time, Anna reminds herself to be a good girlfriend asks, “Do you want to talk?”

She doesn’t feel or hear a response at first, and then Elsa mutters, “I don’t know.”

Anna contains her defeated sigh and turns it into an innocent breath. She knows that 'I don’t know’ really means 'I want to talk but I don’t want to feel like a burden, so I’ll let you decide’. She scratches the back of her girlfriend’s head and says, “Okay. Let me get changed first.”

Twenty minutes later, they’re sitting on their couch with Anna leaning against an armrest and Elsa leaning against her, nestled in between her tired legs. They’re holding each other’s hands and haven’t said a word just yet, and then Elsa asks, “How was your day?”

Anna wants to tell her about how she almost snapped at someone on the phone because it didn’t feel like they were listening to her, but it isn’t her turn to be taken care of. So she says, “It…it happened.”

She hopes Elsa will pick up on the vagueness of her reply and ask what’s wrong, but all Elsa does is give a noncommittal hum. “Okay…”

Anna’s skin prickles, she pretends it doesn’t. “How was your day?”

“I didn’t go to work today. I called in sick.”

“Yeah, you told me that earlier.”

“Oh.” There’s a long pause. “Sorry.”

They love each other, Anna reminds herself. If there’s something on Elsa’s mind, she shouldn’t feel weary about telling her. But ever since Elsa stopped going to therapy (“I have you, and that’s more than I could ever need.”), her decision-making has gotten worse. Everything’s gotten worse. But Anna can’t tell her that because she vowed to be there for Elsa just like she’s there for all of her clients. If she can’t help her own girlfriend, how can she claim to help anyone else? “If there’s something on your mind, just tell me,” Anna says instead, trying to push away those nagging, intrusive thoughts.

Elsa moves in her embrace and Anna’s breath catches when she thinks she’s going to leave her. But no, she just moves onto her side, facing the couch and gripping Anna’s arm. “I just don’t know what to say.”

Anna lets out a slow breath, thinking of all the times she’s heard that line before. “Fine.”

“…are you mad at me?”

“Of course not,” Anna replies, running her fingers through her hair. “Why would I be?”

Elsa shrugs but doesn’t say anything back.

“If I was mad at you, I’d tell you,” Anna elaborates. “Don’t assume that I…forget it.”

Elsa grips her arm tighter. “You are mad at me. I’m sorry.”

“Goddamn it, I'm not mad at you. I’m just…” Anna sighs, letting a bit of her guard down. “I’m just tired, okay? And Dolly’s coming over in an hour, so we should probably get ready. I need to make something- I don’t know- whatever we have in the fridge.”

She thinks this time Elsa will get up, but then she feels her body start shaking. The bad kind of shaking. The panic kind of shaking. “I’m sorry,” Elsa strains to say as she begins soaking Anna’s sleeve with tears. “Please don’t be mad at me.”

Anna has two conflicting thoughts. She hates herself for making Elsa feel this bad, but she’s relieved because this reaction is familiar. It’s something she knows how to deal with. She shifts onto her side, pressing her body against Elsa’s and holding her tight. “You’re okay,” she says softly yet stiffly. “I’ve got you.”

November 11, 2022

“I just think…I don’t know. I don’t know what to think. I thought we could fix things, or that she’d wait for me to fix myself, but I saw them together and Beth she-she looked so happy. Maybe I was right, maybe she’s better off without me.”

“Her happiness isn’t linked to your happiness, Dwayne,” Anna says gently, despite the massive headache that’s leaving her palm bolted to the side of her head. “Is your happiness linked to hers?”

Dwayne takes a shaky breath, “No, I-I don’t think it is. But then why does it hurt seeing her so happy?”

“Why do you think it hurts?” It feels like she’s been getting an influx of relationship-type calls lately, which is so great considering how rough it’s been for her and Elsa lately.

“Because I love her, I guess. I mean it’s stupid that I do- we broke up six months ago- but if I’m not the one making her happy-”

“Then what good are you, right?”

“Uh…no? I was gonna say that if I’m not the one making her happy, then that means someone else has to be.”

Anna winces after once again trying to finish a client’s thought. She turns around, feeling a pair of eyes behind her, but there’s no one there. She turns again quickly to look up above her cubicle, but there’s no one there either. She shakes her head and says, “Sorry about that…I…continue. Please.”

“I don’t know what else I can say.”

“Then what are you going to do?” It’s so hot all of a sudden, even though it’s snow white and frozen outside. The back of her neck feels hot, her hands feel hot, her headset is burning her ear.

“I…I don’t know that either.”

“Dwayne, come on. Help yourself.” What is she doing?! She knows better than to be this callous to a client. She needs to calm down, compose herself. But it’s hard to do that when her cubicle is getting smaller, her body is on fire, and her muscles are seizing up.

“I'm trying.I just…every time I think of a way out, it’s-”

And then it happens, something snaps inside of Anna. She throws her headset off and stumbles out of her cubicle as she feels the walls about to close in on her. She takes a breath, but it comes out short and shallow. She takes another one, hoping that was an isolated incident, but it’s just as harsh. Honeymaren appears from out of nowhere and says, “Whoa, hey there. You’re not looking too good. Come over here and sit down.”

She feels hands take her by the arm and she bats them away. “Sorry, I need to get out of here,” is what she wants to say, but she can only find it in herself to repeat the word “Sorry”. And she keeps saying it as she walks away. Somewhere. Anywhere. Outside, she needs to go outside.

Anna. She hears someone call her name. Anna. She hears it again. Come back. Come back? Where is she going? She’s going outside. Because it’s so hot, and outside it’s cold. Outside. She needs to go outside.

What is she doing? What is going on? The door. Where’s the door? Her face is numb, her lips are tingling. It’s so fucking hot. The door is here. She pushes open the door.

The air is freezing. The sidewalk has ice. Where’s her car? She has to get out of here. The snow. Her feet are in the snow. Her hands are in her pockets. Her mind is blank. No it’s not. It’s here. It’s everywhere. All at once. Thoughts burning, like her face. Warmth. Cold. Elsa. She needs Elsa right now. She needs to go to Elsa. Elsa will fix this. She wants Elsa. Elsa will know what to do. She can call Elsa.

Where’s her phone? Where’s her car? Where are her keys? Where is she? Why can’t anyone hear her?

She screams. Her throat hurts. Lips hurt. Heart hurts. Breath gone, but she screams again. Someone has to hear her. Someone does hear her. Someone is holding her. Elsa? No, Elsa’s not here. Why isn’t she fucking here?!

“I’ve got you, sweetheart. It’s okay.”

Voice. It’s familiar. Dolly’s holding her. She says it’s okay. Anna wants to feel okay. Anna cries because she’s not okay. Elsa’s not here, and she’s not okay. And she falls. The snow catches her, Dolly catches her. She can breathe again, she can see again, she can’t think.

When did she start crying?

There’s a meeting afterwards in Mr. Talford’s office. He gives her a cup of hot chocolate and an ice pack for her neck. He says something about a panic attack…did she have a panic attack? She must have. He’s putting her on paid leave for two weeks, she needs to come in for a session in two days.

“We’re going to help you, Anna. I’ll make sure of it.”

Dolly drives her home afterwards. They don’t talk about what happened, they don’t talk about work at all. She puts on soft country music and tells Anna, once again, that everything will be okay. But Anna tunes her out, she just wants to go home and see Elsa. Fall in Elsa’s arms. Have Elsa tell her everything will be okay.

“I’ll come pick you up for your session, okay? And if you’re up for it, we can grab lunch afterwards. Whatever you need, Anna, I’m only going to be one call away,” Dolly says when they get to her apartment.

Anna nods. She wants to say thank you but is afraid to speak. Dolly gives her a big hug before driving away, and Anna walks inside her apartment to find Elsa.

Elsa’s eyes widen, shocked to see her so early and in whatever state she must be in. “Oh my gosh! Anna, what happened?”

Anna wants to tell her everything, but all she remembers is that…Elsa wasn’t there when she needed her. “Where were you?” she asks hoarsely.

Elsa’s eyes narrow with concern, “What do you mean? I-I was here, you didn’t call me or tell me to meet you somewhere-”

“I needed you…” In a pained, venomous tone, she shouts, “I needed you!”

Elsa winces, tears forming in her eyes. “I didn’t know! I couldn’t have! Anna, please tell me what happened. I’m here now, you can tell me anything. I love you, I can help you now.”

“I was scared! I was afraid! I-I was dying and you weren’t there when I fucking needed you! You’re never there when I need you, but if you need me I'm always there. Why can’t you see how much I’m doing for you?! For everyone?! When will it be my turn to feel hurt? When will it be my turn to be taken care of? I need help, I need someone there for me, and I thought it was supposed to be you but all you care about is-”

Anna stops when she sees something in Elsa’s eyes that she’s never seen before. It’s a pain unimaginable, the kind of pain that comes from the blindsided betrayal of someone who you thought loved you. The pain from knowing that the love you gave was never enough.

And when she comes back down to Earth to see the damage she’s done, Anna falls to her knees and begins to sob once more. “I’m sorry.” She wraps her arms around Elsa’s hips and pulls her in close so she won’t leave. “Please don’t leave me.”

“Anna…”

“Please.”

December 25, 2022

Honeymaren: Arendelle Crisis Hotline, thank you for reaching out. How can I help you?

Anna: …Honeymaren?

Honeymaren: …oh my god. Anna? How are…I haven't…no one’s heard from you in a month! Are you okay?

Anna: Ha. No, of course not. I wouldn’t be calling here if I was.

Honeymaren: Right. Sorry. Listen, you know our procedures but if you’re in trouble, I can send someone over. Dolly’s here, she can-

Anna: I fucked up. A lot.

Honeymaren: Then…then talk to me. Tell me what happened.

Anna: That panic attack was a long time coming, you and I both know that. And I just made things worse after that. My girlfriend broke up with me, I lost my job, I’m going to get evicted soon. The landlord had the decency to let me stay until the end of the year but after that…well I’m not looking that far ahead.

Honeymaren: Anna, I’m so sorry this happened to you.

Anna: It’s fine. I mean it’s not fine, but there’s no one to blame but myself. I tried so hard to hold on to everything that it was only a matter of time until I let everything fall.

Honeymaren: You have a good heart. Don’t blame yourself for caring so much about people. Just…I mean, who was taking care of you?

Anna: No one. Especially not me. I tried thinking it would be Elsa, but it was unfair of me to put that on her. We tried to help each other, but we shouldn’t have. We were just…broken people trying to fix each other’s broken parts.

Honeymaren: Neither of you are broken.

Anna: That’s kind of you to say, but I know who I am. I know I am. I’m a problem, and I don’t want to be a problem anymore.

Honeymaren: Anna, are you somewhere safe? Where are you? Just keep talking to me, okay?

Anna: You don’t need to use the script on me.

Honeymaren: I’m not using the script. Fuck the script. This is me talking to you as your- I don’t know- as your friend.

Anna: …I really appreciate that.

Honeymaren: Anna, you were the nicest, most caring person here. I miss you, you know? I miss my cubicle neighbor.

Anna: Hey, you said the thing.

Honeymaren: You mean so much to so many people. To everyone in this office, to all the people you ever talked to on the phone, to Elsa.

Anna: …I doubt Elsa wants anything to do with me anymore.

Honeymaren: Do you know that for certain?

Anna: No. I- we haven’t talked to each other in a long time. But I broke her heart, her mind, I did so much damage on someone I was supposed to love.

Honeymaren: But you did love her…right?

Anna: More than anything.

Honeymaren: Maybe she was just the right girl at the wrong time.

Anna: That can’t be a thing.

Honeymaren: It can be if you want it to be.

Anna: Ha. Gosh, where was this Honeymaren when we were working together? Imagine all the fun we could have had if we talked like this regularly.

Honeymaren: It would have been fun. Sorry for always being such a moody bitch.

Anna: Sorry for being such an overbearing one.

Honeymaren: So it’s agreed then? We’re both bitches.

Anna: Yup. Just a couple of bitches all alone on Christmas.

Honeymaren: Yeah tell me about it. By the way, this might be the wrong thing to say but…Merry Christmas, Anna.

Anna: Merry Christmas…bitch.

Honeymaren: Hilarious.

Anna: I can be. Sometimes.

Honeymaren: So…are you going to be okay? I can still send someone over if you want. Or, if you’re up for it, the Christmas party here’s still going. I’m sure everyone would love to see you.

Anna: No, I-I think I need this time. Alone. But I’ll be okay.

Honeymaren: Okay…so what are you gonna do now?

Anna: I don’t know yet. I just know I need to…get better. You know?

Honeymaren: I’ll contact you regularly to see how you’re doing. Don’t ever hesitate to ask for anything.

Anna: Yeah. Thanks Honeymaren. I'm…I’m glad it was you who picked up. I needed the perspective.

Honeymaren: Anytime.

August 23, 2024

It’s weird being back.

Anna avoided this stretch of Arendelle like the plague for almost two years, but the second she pulled into the parking lot it was like she’d never left. She takes a deep breath and, for the first time in forever, pushes open the doors of Jitterbugs.

After scouring dozens of other coffee shops in Arendelle, she came to the conclusion that no one makes a better iced caramel mocha like this place does. It feels good seeing the corner coffee shop still going strong, though the new overhead logo might take some time to get used to.

And if her re-interview at the newly renamed Arendelle Mental Wellness Center goes well, she’ll have all the time in the world to get used to it.

There’s an entirely brand new staff when she enters, so she can’t ask them to give her 'the usual’, but aside from that the interior is unchanged as well. Even the corkboard is still standing, albeit with new posters and flyers attached to it. She takes a seat at her old table while she waits, passing the time by opening her phone and adding a new entry into her mood journal. She doesn’t feel a spike coming along, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.

“Iced caramel macchiato for Anna?” the barista exclaims as Anna finishes up her entry.

Anna snickers at the wrong pronunciation, but all she says when she takes the cup from her is “Thank you.” She was called Anna both ways while in group therapy, and by now she’s learned to embrace it. There’s no reason she has to leave just yet- her interview isn’t for another half an hour- but she promised Dolly and Honeymaren that she’d stop by early to say hi to everyone. The bell above the front door jingles as she turns to leave.

And she locks eyes with someone else she hasn’t seen in nearly two years.

Though her hair is a darker blonde and cut right above her shoulders, and she now has a tattoo etched below her collarbone, there’s no denying that Anna’s looking into the sky blue eyes of the only person she’s ever truly loved.

Anna goes to speak but she finds that her mouth is frozen shut just like the rest of her body when Elsa starts moving towards her. She fears the worst, like Elsa moving past her as if she’s no one. But instead, Elsa stops a couple of feet in front of her. “Hi.”

Hearing her voice is like hearing a recovered fragment of a once lost memory. It thaws Anna enough that she’s able to move her lips again. “H-Hi. I didn’t-”

Elsa shakes her head quickly, “Let's…let’s talk outside.”

They rejourn in the parking lot. Anna leans on the passenger door of her car while Elsa leans on the driver side of her own. Elsa parked next to her, Anna tries to keep from thinking that means something. Apparently, Elsa wears tank tops now. She never used to wear them before. It looks good on her. “You look good,” she blurts out into the tense silence.

Elsa looks down at the asphalt. “Thanks. You too.”

“Thanks,” Anna repeats, wondering if she’s already messed this up. Wondering when Elsa will decide this is a waste of time and leave…again.

“It’s been a long time,” Elsa states. “I-I know that’s obvious, I just…”

“I don’t know what to say either,” Anna says, watching as Elsa nods slowly in agreement.

“Are you…did…what brings you here?”

“I have an interview at the Wellness Center. My old boss called me the other day and asked if I wanted to talk about a therapist position. We both agreed that it would probably be better for me mentally if I was doing something less…intensive.” The irony of that statement isn’t lost on her.

Elsa’s eyes widen a little. “That-that’s good. I’m happy for you. Really.”

“Thanks.” An inevitable silence falls on them once more as they find themselves once again at an impasse. Creeping ever so closely to a different point of no return. If they ended the conversation here, then they could complete their drift apart from each other. But if they kept talking, if they said what was really on their minds, then they’d be risking the inevitable pain and the promise of hope. The promise of something stronger.

Anna thinks of the pain she caused Elsa and knows that this wonderful, beautiful person deserves so much better than that. If there’s even a one-percent chance that she can put Elsa through even more pain, then she’s not taking it. But as she’s about to leave and force herself to let go of the past…

Elsa takes the leap.

#elsanna #june 2022 contest #prompt: point of no return #submission #cw: angst #cw: mentions of suicide #cw: panic attack #cw: depression #cw: drunk driving

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