#okay last one for today probably

[cricketnationrise]

Shitty and Jack, 4:15 PM, Jack's room in the Haus

MY BOYS (sobs in hockey bro friendship) thank you thank you thank you for this prompt - i loved the excuse to write for them for the first time in a while! 💜🦗

want your own ficlet? TWO DAYS LEFT rules here.

🏒🏒🏒🏒

jack's room, 4:15pm

When Jack frowns his forehead goes all scrunchy and Shitty has a hard time not reaching out and smoothing the lines out like a human iron. Jack has a lot of frowns, from Frown #1: Get Your Shit Together On The Ice I Swear To Gretzky to Frown #46: I Do Not Understand That Reference And I’m Not Sure I Want To and everything in between and beyond. He’s currently wearing Frown #34: That’s Not OSHA Compliant. 

It’s fucking adorable. What a goober.

“Seriously, Shitty, that can’t be safe,” Jack says, all earnest concern. 

“Jack. Jackabelle. Jackabaloo,” Shitty says, throwing an arm over his shoulder. “Let me paint you word picture, okay? After classes and practice, you and me, snacks, a drink if we feel like, out on the roof, surveying our new domain. You could even study like the giant fucking nerd that you are. We’d be kings of all the light touches, et cetera. You feel me? Plus, generations of SMH team members have been out on the Reading Room before us, and many will after us. It’s tradition.”

Jack crosses his arms. “The fact that so many people have been out there only worries me more, honestly.”

“It looks fine to me,” Shitty shrugs. “And Johnson says it’s structurally sound.”

Jack snorts. “Oh well if Johnson says it’s safe—”

“His dad’s an engineer or something. He checks the Haus over every summer.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh, now get that big beautiful but of yours in gear and help me get it set up.”

Frown #12: I Think I Missed A Pertinent Segue

“Set up?”

“Chairs, lights, cooler, blankets, tarp – for a start. We’re gonna trick this place out.”

Jack sighs, frowning down at the pile of gear Shitty gathered earlier. (Frown #19: I’m Thinking So Hard It Hurts Sometimes.) “You’re going to keep badgering me about this until I say yes, aren’t you.” 

It’s not a question.

Shitty beams at the hint of acquiescence in his tone. “You know it brah! It wouldn’t be the same without you out there with me. What kind of a kickass hang out spot could it be without my kickass best friend?”

Jack freezes in shock. It breaks Shitty’s heart how Jack still doesn’t think of himself as important to other people sometimes.

“We should get this ready before dark, then, eh?”

And that— That’s not a frown. That’s a fucking smile. 

Jack has fewer smiles than frowns, but the number of smiles that he lets Shitty (and sometimes the team) see are slowly but steadily increasing. Smile #1: Gooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaal, but it doesn’t matter if Jack is the one to score it or not.

This one is Smile #4: Shitty Called Me His Best Friend – unsurprisingly, it’s Shitty’s favorite.

[hinamie]

binding vow

[foxett]

Holy flip!! Fully colored suntan post?? Decently done grass??? Someone pinch me (day 10 suntan)

[lynxfrost13]

Workout update !! Damn the schedule >:(

[knifegremliin]

! it's woodpecker!!

[james-spooky]

this is a test

[camgoloud]

look it’s not really that i wish i was in a relationship because the last couple of years which i have spent firmly and resolutely single after finally getting over the All That which went down between me and the last person i had any serious romantic interest in have been without question the happiest years of my life. and it’s also not really that i wish all of my friends WEREN’T in relationships because i want them to be happy et cetera et cetera. but this whole thing where both situations are happening at the same time (i.e. me: single; literally every one of them: not) does have me feeling a little. weird i guess.

[gynandromorph]

these four beloathed scenes, tormenting me

[flufflecat]

Feeling stressed? Here's one surefire trick to make any difficult day a little easier to cope with:

experience a murder threat

[cuteniarose]

who's lien-hua??

Short answer: My absolute child and the only OC I have cried genuine, REAL tears over. And not tearing up or sniffling a little, full on SOBS. Kat still owes me emotional compensation for that one 😤😤

Long answer: She's one of @katkastrofa’s OCs that I now have partial custody of. P'Li's little sister, born in 136 AG, a sweet cinnamon roll too good for this world, too pure, no matter how damn overused that phrase is, it still fits her 🥺🥺🥺 When drawing her last year I accidentally made her look a lot like my friend's little sister so now I am always extra soft about her. But considering what happens, you can imagine the level of emotional devastation this is causing me and just how much this has affected my ability to look at Katya the same way ever again. Doesn't help that her older sister has an annoying tendency to wear her waist length hair in a brushed back braid...

Anyway, for reference, the baby girl, sweet girl herself, from about July 2023:

And now that you have been fully taken with this precious thing's cuteness, it is imperative I let you know that she is killed at age 7 by the warlord who tried to turn P'Li into a living weapon 😐

She's the living embodiment of a tragedy, a child born to be collateral damage, the one who could not be saved no matter what was done, the "it was always going to end this way" half of the tragedy dichotomy. A little girl unjustly killed as punishment for her sister not wanting to become a warlord's weapon, forever remaining as nothing more but a hazy memory of someone to protect. And I'm gonna stop now because I will start crying again, istg–

(There is a verse where she lives, though that is part of a much larger AU that can basically be summed up as "completely self indulgent mishmash of ideas, everybody lives/nobody dies, sunshine and rainbows and peace on earth, unless you're a world leader, then RIP", or as we like to call it, the Ultimate AU, because we never came up with a better name :P But getting into it would take too long and there really isn't too much to explain since it lacks a cohesive plot and is more a bunch of family shenanigans thrown together, so... moving on)

In Kat's fic Lost and Found the memory of Lien-Hua is the driving force behind all of P'Li's decisions, and she constantly blames herself for not having been able to save her (despite the fact she was a child herself, no older than 13), right up until the very end where she.. doesn't really get closure, per se, but is able to let Lien go, in the scene which I have affectionately dubbed "F.C. Yee owes Kat major royalties for this one, holy hell" #ifyouknowyouknow. But also Lien is a point of some interpersonal conflict since no one else can quite relate to P'Li in this case. Ming-Hua (while not present in LaF) is an only child, Zaheer is the youngest of three and was never close with his sisters, and Ghazan... well, his sister is two separate cans of worms depending on whether you're talking about Haya or Zada. Some pretty interesting stuff overall, really scratches my soft spot for family related dealings in fics, and I can't believe I just realised that P'Li's the only non-youngest child in the RL foursome, huh. It's oddly fitting, in a way, at least in my opinion

Oh, and also, Midori is a reincarnation of Lien-Hua :)

[tardis--dreams]

I can't decide what's more frustrating. Job applications and communication with people there or trying to contact the doctor's office.

[shima-draws]

Work was reeeeeal stressful today and my anxiety’s suuuper high rn lmao. Send some asks?

[therosevest]

i dont wanna be a dick and act like i have no responsibility in this but after a point dont u think if all you ever say to ur friend is Omg you never make it out why dont you ever come out with us you bail all the time youre such a flake etc. dont u think that person (me) is like. not gonna feel so inclined to. be there

[corvid-language-library]

How is it that I've been back at work for ONE day and it was an EASY day and yet today I already feel ready for the weekend??

[orcelito]

God I don't wanna go to therapy tomorrow. Sick of talking about my feelings in a clinical setting. I do enough psychoanalysis just by myself, and now I gotta sit through it with someone else??? Come on.

[zishu-arts]

can’t believe i made a poll asking you guys what fic to write next and i suddenly got another idea for my chodark dragon au,,,,,, smh i’m just putting more work on myself