#or attempting to read online and getting bored of staring at my screen after maybe a chapter

[bootyful-seventeen]

So I was rewatching vampire knight cuz it was leaving Netflix in a few more days and I’ve only got 4 more episodes left and I know I’m gonna be confused with the ending since I remembered it had many loose ends

[stickyy]

I loved what you wrote about student! college! aizawa,if it's not too much trouble,I would like to read a second part but it contains a sub!aizawa,dom!reader,mommy kink and pegging please. I have to take advantage of the fact that you are the first blog with dark content that I see that accepts pegging,an opportunity that I will not miss,but if it gets complicated for you oh you don't like it,you can reject my request.

DISCLAIMER: always ask for consent first!

warnings: DUBCON, sub!aizawa, edging, verbal abuse, bondage, pegging, gn!reader but light mommy kink is used in reference to, praise kink if you squint?, slightly unrealistic depictions of pegging, reader is fed up but that doesnt excuse their actions :P

word count: 3489

notes: sorry for the delay, i hope u like anon! :D there should always be more pegging fic out there

part 1 here

EXAM SEASON

Finals season is quickly approaching, sending the entire campus into a frenzy, students scrambling like displaced ants trying to finish last minute assignments, novel-esque essays, merciful extra credit projects. The workload takes its toll on everyone, even the star students. You found Aizawa in even worse moods more frequently; a schedule consisting of all nighters spent studying old material followed by early classes and a job on the side, he was absolutely exhausted. You sometimes sneak a peek over at him during class to see his head bobbing slightly, bloodshot eyes struggling to stay open as he fights sleep. A small part of you feels bad for him; he’s a diligent student, and you were sympathetic to his exhaustion.

You still hate the asshole, though.

You found yourself snagged in a twisted sort of arrangement with Aizawa after midterms. There was always a half-assed attempt at tutoring you before giving up and cramming his cock down your throat or deep inside your cunt, leaving you sore and dripping with his cum, all the while spewing insults targeted at your intelligence (or lack thereof). In exchange, he’d complete your assignments and allow you to copy his answers on exam days. Ignoring the situation is where you make peace with yourself; you feel used, but you also have no other option if you want to pass this class.

What you hate the most is the way you roll over and take it. You’re more than just a hole to fuck, you know that, but you’re helpless against his searing abuse and venomous scowls. Even when you try to be nice, it only makes him crueler, your soft pleas and offers of peace an invitation to tear you down and make you cry. You want to fight, to claw and tear into him out of spite. You don’t want to feel so weak anymore.

So, you decide to do something about it.

It’s late, campus illuminated by street lamps and headlights of cars passing by as you make your way into the dorms. After your first encounter, Aizawa began inviting you back to his room instead of the library, deciding to “study” in his personal space as opposed to possibly getting caught in the library with his cock down your throat. You didn’t complain, but it’s especially convenient today, with what you have planned. Knocking on the door softly, you worry your bottom lip between your teeth, anxious for what’s to come.

“Open,” he calls out from inside, prompting you to enter. You pass through the messy common room he shares with his roommate and enter his bedroom, opening the door quietly. Aizawa’s room is tidy compared to the outside, bed made, tousled only where he sits with his laptop, typing.

“You’re late,” he squints at you from behind the screen, shutting the device. “Not surprising.”

“Sorry,” you mutter, placing your book bag on the floor and taking out the very heavy law textbook (that you hadn’t bothered to open since midterms). You take your seat next to him and open to the most recent chapter you read over. He’s silent, only speaking to answer your questions as you focus on the text. You can tell he’s sleepy, his responses slurred and delayed, and you glance over to see him dozing off. Late study sessions and Aizawa’s recent exhaustion meant more often than not that he fell asleep before tormenting you. The first time was startling, but you learned that it was a regular occurrence. 

You prefer Aizawa when he’s drowsy. His usually hard features were softened, quiet snores rumbling from his chest. His dark hair messily framing his face as he leans back against the headboard of his bed, arms folded over his chest. He’s good-looking, no doubt. If his personality matched, you could see yourself falling for him.

His eyes open, shooting you a questioning look, and you duck your head back into your textbook, embarrassed at being caught staring.

You keep quiet for another 20 or so minutes, waiting until he’s truthfully asleep and not just resting. You have to be careful not to wake him, as you aren’t keen on being reprimanded for what you're about to do.

Once you’ve deemed it safe, you stealthily open your bag and retrieve the small plastic bag stored inside. With the help of online shopping, you bought some handcuffs, lube, a dildo, and a harness. You aren’t all into pegging, but this was less about the sex and more about proving yourself, forcing him to respect you, in some perverse way. You retrieve the cuffs, gripping them carefully as to not make any sounds. This is the most crucial part; as long as you could get him restrained, you’d could dish out any revenge you desire. You slip off of the bed and tip-toe, almost comically, around the other side of the bed. You test the waters, snapping your fingers near Aizawa. He doesn’t stir, chest rising and falling with his deep breathing.

You steel yourself with a deep breath; this was your chance. You make quick work with the handcuffs, gently yet hastily clicking the metal around one wrist and looping the cuffs through the headboard before securing his other wrist. A grin spreads across your face; you’re thankful he’s such a deep sleeper.

Now that you had him where you wanted him, you were paralyzed by the sheer amount of possibilities. You climb over him apprehensively, hovering over the unconscious man, who only shifts minutely. The peaceful look on his face puts a small pit in your stomach; this was wrong… right? Technically, this was assault. You frown, a small chill running down your spine. Is this what you had become? It was almost enough to convince you to stop, but you force yourself to remember the first time Aizawa had his way with you, the way you choked and gagged and had to hide your face until you could find a bathroom to wipe off the dried cum that adhered to your skin.

This was his fault; he made you like this.

“Fuck it,” you say aloud, bracing yourself before grabbing a handful of his hair and yanking, hard. He awakes with a surprised gasp, wrenching his head away from the assault.

“The fuck?” He bites, eyes drowsily scouring the situation. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“Just waking you up,” you smile, releasing your grip. “It’s kind of boring watching you sleep. I thought we were supposed to be studying.”

Aizawa gives you an agitated look, disoriented as he tries to move, only to find his range of motion limited. “You fucking handcuffed me?”

“Yeah, I can’t believe you didn’t wake up,” you chuckle, sliding your hands under his shirt and running your hands over his taut stomach. He keeps his eyes on you with an expectant expression, waiting for an explanation.

“You know, I like you so much more when you're asleep,” you continue, idly tracing patterns on the skin of his abdomen. “No insults, no curses, no glaring. You’re pretty handsome when you’re not being a total douchebag.”

“Let me go,” he ignores you, yanking the handcuffs. “This isn’t funny.”

“I think it’s pretty funny, actually. You’ve spent all semester treating me like shit, and for what? All I’ve done is be nice to you, even after you call me names and abuse me. It hurts my feelings, you know? It’s not like I’m trying to fail this class, I just needed a little extra help, and you take advantage of that every week. So I do think this is pretty fucking hilarious. Maybe you’ll see just how great I feel when you bully me.”

If looks could kill, your heart would have stopped right then and there. Rage burns behind his glare when he meets your eyes, still struggling to break the cuffs. You’d never seen him like this; at his worst, he seems moderately annoyed in your day to day. Despite being an insufferable asshole, he always manages to keep a cool air about him. Never giving anyone much of a reaction, he’s only nasty when he desires. Watching his face take a red tint and his eyes narrow in frustration send waves of satisfaction rippling through your chest. 

“You don’t know what you’re doing,” he grits out, “If you let me go now, I’ll forget all about this. I promise that you don’t want what’s coming for you once I get out of these cuffs.”

He did have a point; you had no idea what you were doing. That wasn’t going to stop you, though.

“Aw, it’s not so fun now, isn’t it?” You coo at him in a demeaning tone, pouting dramatically. Your wandering hands slid to his crotch, where you could feel his length stirring curiously. You bark out a laugh.

Pulling down his sweats and boxers, your mouth waters at his hardening length. Normally, your stomach would drop at the sight in anticipation for physical abuse you were about to receive. But this? This was different; knowing that you’re the one in control is absolutely captivating. You take his cock in your hands, slowly working your hand up and down. He stays silent in defiance, steady in his glare in an attempt to intimidate you. It would work, usually, but with his hands bound there was nothing he could do to you. He’s betrayed by a pleased noise that slips from his throat.

“Don’t tell me you like this? You want to be taken advantage of, is that it?” you taunt, basking in his agitation as you speed your hand up, thumbing the pre gathering on the slit.

“Watch it,” is his only response, voice dangerously low. He keeps quiet, not willing to surrender to the reactions you’re trying to draw from him. It’s a challenge, if anything, and you weren’t going to back down..

He’s fully erect in no time- you’ve spent enough time as his cocksleeve to know exactly what he likes and responds to. His eyes fall shut as you squeeze tighter, hips canting up into your hand, chasing his own release. You keep it up until he gets a little louder, close to release, and you pull your hand away, watching his dick twitch helplessly.

“Fuck- why’d you stop?” he asks groggily, opening his eyes.

“You didn’t think that I was just going to let you cum that easily, did you? I thought you were supposed to be the smart one,” you shuffle off of the bed, smiling over your shoulder as you hook your thumbs in the band of your leggings. You make a show of sliding the material down over your ass, purposefully leaning over and arching your back. You hear a pleased growl from the bed, causing you to giggle as you pull your underwear down as well.

“You could still let me go,” he offers, giving you a once over as you climb back over him, “I could forget about this if you let me fuck you.”

“Nice try, but I’ll be the one doing the fucking tonight,” you grab your bag from the floor, retrieving the lube but leaving the dildo and harness obscured in the bag. You squeeze a generous amount onto your fingers, causing Aizawa to give you a puzzled look.

“You don’t need lube, you’re always so wet for me,” it’s more of a question than an observation, since your previous trysts never included anything but his spit and your own juices. You just give him a smile before nudging his thighs open with your own, trailing your hand slowly beneath his balls, settling in between his ass and your lubed fingers circle the muscle there. The look on his face is priceless, absolutely shocked at the prospect of you inside of him. He thrashes in protest but you’re steadfast, pinning his hips down with your other hand.

“You can’t be serious,” his voice is alarmed, almost erring on the side of anxious, “you’re dumber than I thought if you think you’re just going to get away with any of this shit.”

“And what are you gonna do about it?” you sing-song, using your dry hand to tug playfully on the cuffs, “You’re a little tied up at the moment.”

“I’m going to beat your cunt up when I get out of these,” it’s a threat, and you ignore the way your stomach flutters at the words, eyes trained on his as you push two fingers inside.

He grunts, his face scrunching up, almost cutely, at the burn of the stretch. You expected him to be tight, but given how tense he is, it’s difficult to push all the way inside. You take it slow, savoring the pained expression on his face; it’s a stark contrast to his cocky demeanor when you’re being subjugated to his abuse. His chest is heaving, a lovely red flush spreading across his skin, eyebrows knit tight, lips bitten red- you’re obsessed. You move your fingers in and out slowly, scissoring just gently enough not to seriously hurt him, but enough to watch him writhe. His dick twitches despite (or maybe due to?) the pain, still red and dripping.

“This is priceless,” you laugh, “if you wanted to get fucked so badly, all you had to do was ask, you know? Mommy would’ve taken care of it for you.”

“Mommy?” he scoffs, rolling his eyes, “you’re insane.”

Any further insult is cut off with a sharp gasp, eyes shooting open in shock, and you know you’ve found it.

You stroke his prostate with a heavy hand, grinding your fingers into the spongy spot inside of him as he struggles to breathe, back arching deliciously. You can’t help but smirk; you kind of get it now. If this is how tormenting you makes Aizawa feel, then you understand why he was so cruel.

“Fuck,” he chokes on a whine that sends heat down your spine, . Your wrist is beginning to strain, but you can’t bring yourself to care. It’s cute; he’s writhing, his hips seeking the stimulation he was previously avoiding as he moans openly, loudly. His cock is an angry purple, pre pooling on his stomach from where it’s leaking. He looks like he’s close, eyes beginning to roll back when you pull your fingers out, laughing as you ruin his orgasm for the second time.

“Please,” he’s breathless, a betrayed look on his face as his hips rock on nothing, desperate to cum.

“Begging already? We haven’t even gotten started yet!”

You reach over into the plastic bag, pulling out the dildo and harness. You can clearly see the fear on his face this time as he moves to sit up, the fog of pleasure clearing quickly.

“Wait,” panic sets in his voice yet again. If you were him, you would be scared too; the toy is thicker than the two fingers you used, something you chose purposefully. You stand and slip on the harness, ignoring his attempts to reason with you.

“What’s wrong? I thought I didn’t know what I was doing?” you ask innocently, forcing your hips between his legs and drizzling some lube on the toy, warming it up with your palm.

“That’s the fucking problem, you idiot, you don’t,” he seethes, pulling on the restraints again, “It won’t fit, and you’re not sending me to the hospital.”

“Exactly, I won’t send you to the hospital. Mommy’s gonna take good care of you,” you coo, settling between his legs.

“Just let me go,” it’s the first genuine plea you’ve heard from him, the sincerity pulling your attention to his eyes where you see a look you can’t quite place. He looks… afraid? Remorseful? It’s enough to give you pause, equal parts consideration and schadenfreude. You settle for leaning forward and placing an uncharacteristically saccharine kiss on his forehead, your humanity getting the best of you.

“All you have to do is relax, okay?” you whisper, resting the tip of the toy against his entrance. He shuts his eyes in anticipation, resigned to his fate, and you push in gently, watching his hole swallow the silicone. The way Aizawa contorts, back bowed to scoot away from the pressure of the toy is salacious, drawing a moan from deep within your chest. He can’t get far due to the restraints, and he lets out a soft sob at the stretch of the toy, face scrunched tight. You push slowly until you bottom out, your hips pressed firmly against his, grinding in small circles to alleviate your own ache. He exhales shakily, unaware that he was holding his breath.

“See, it’s not so bad right?” you soothe, rubbing your thumb against his hip soothingly. “You should be grateful; I’m so much nicer than you are.”

“Fuck you,” it comes out weaker than intended, his voice strained as he tries to adjust to the girth of the toy. 

You pull out slowly, experimentally, watching his stomach clench from the sensation of silicone caressing his insides. His dick gives an interested twitch, despite his demeanor, and that’s the invitation you need to start moving. It’s a little awkward at first, but your enthusiasm combined with the size of the toy more than makes up for your inexperience. He’s breathless, still uncomfortable, but you can see his body slowly relax as he tries to make sense of the sensations coursing through his body.

“You like this, don’t you?” you dig, eyes transfixed on his face, “Is that why you're so mean to me? You strut around like an asshole, just to hide the fact that you’re just a little bitch?”

You focus on angling your hips, searching for his prostate again, and when you find it, you commit to fucking him. He’s loud, stray tears sliding down his face as his body struggles to comprehend both the pain of the stretch and pleasure of the abuse.

“Fuck, you’re cute like this,” you sigh, “you’re meant for this, aren’t you? Meant to get your ass bred by your Mommy? You’d be so much more tolerable if you were sweet like this all of the time.”

His dick jerks violently but he shakes his head with a weak ‘no’, too lost in the sensation to retort any further. You’re soaked by now, the pressure of the toy on your end combined with the power trip pushing you to the edge. It takes all of your self-control, but you suddenly stop, unwilling to let yourself finish so quickly; there’s still unfinished business here.

“Tell me I’m pretty,” it comes out before you can even really think about it, but the words hang heavily in the air.

“Huh?”

“You’re never nice to me, so if you want me to even consider letting you cum, you better start kissing up.”

He hesitates, but when you shift slightly and the blunt head of the toy rubs against his prostate, he changes his tune very quickly.

“Fuck- you’re cute, ‘s the reason why I’m mean to you. So cute when you’re about to cry-” you give him a particularly hard slap on his ass and he winces, muttering a quick apology.

“You’re pretty even when I’m not fucking you, too,” is all you get, but it’s the first genuine compliment you’ve gotten out of the asshole since you’ve met him, and your heart soars. He’s awful and mean and evil but the simple statement is enough for you.

“I’ll let you cum if you beg for it,” you grunt, rutting your hips enthusiastically. You’re close, but you refuse to finish first. He’s needy, thanks to being edged twice, and he’s unable to resist your promise.

“Please, fuck, please let me cum,” he whimpers, voice wet and eyes watery.

“Please what?”

“Mommy! Fuck, please mommy, just let me cum, it hurts, fuck, please,” he babbles, and it’s enough for you. You wrap your hand around his cock and stroke it firmly, hips speeding up as you chase your own release. It’s quick- he finishes almost embarrassingly fast, and the whorish wail that rips from his throat sends you right over the edge, your vision blurring at the corners as you stay trained on his face, obscene and submissive.

It’s quiet after you stop, both of you catching your breath. You pull out slowly, watching the way his hole flutters and you giggle, your body and ego fully satiated. You look back to his face; he looks more fucked out than you’ve ever seen him, almost like he’s about to fall back asleep.

“Can we call it a truce?” You break the silence, grinning as he cracks open an eye to give you a scalding look.

“Fuck. You.”

[asterroidd]

cotton sweatshirt

↬  College AU

↬  Pairing: Levi Ackerman/Reader

↬  Word count: 2.6k

↬  Synopsis:  Fatigue was slowly consuming you, luckily your roommate is there to save the day

↬  Notes: Thank you so much for the request anon! I apologize it took so long before I wrote it. Anw, I hope you enjoy it!

↬  no proofread whatsoever, capn’

5th and 12th prompts: “Give me back my keys! I’m fine!” and “Did you know that you talk in your sleep?”

    It was too much. All too much; the endless tasks, the studying, and numerous all-nighters that you had pulled by now.

    It was so taxing that your body couldn't keep up; eyes blood shot red from restless staring at the laptop screen, sunken cheeks due to the insufficient meal you are getting, and dark bags under your eyes that are evidently visible even from afar. If one would see you in such a state, one would assume you are a zombie or the living dead.

    Chewing your bottom lip, fingers anxiously taped against the wooden desk. Drained yes boring into the laptop screen as you tried your best to understand the text displayed in it. Your professor just had to be missing in action that week due to health reasons and as such couldn't attend most of the classroom session to teach. The replacement is just as worse—having no mastery over the lesson at hand that it only made it more confusing than before. So, you had to self-study for the sole sake of having a passing grade this semester. Finals weeks is looming around the corner and it's best that you understands the lessons beforehand so that you wouldn't have difficulty in studying once again later on.

    Your study session was supposed to be done before noon, yet here you are still hunched over the desk. A pencil at hand in attempt to take notes in the filler notebook. Your other hand curled up a fist full of hair, then ever so often tugging it in frustration. True, you did try to search online for other readings and videos that could potentially help you in your dilemma. Alas, you find yourself scratching your scalp and pulling your hair in frustration as you failed, yet again, to grasp the concept of the topic.

    Perhaps a book, you thought to yourself. There is a local library nearby—suppose a ten minute walk, could be even seven if you walked fast enough. For sure there are a handful of books there that could finally help you in understanding the lesson. And so with a drained sigh, you closed the lid of the laptop and stood up.

    You took in your surroundings; which was an utter mess. Eraser shards littered on top of your desk that some even fell to the floor due to you hastily sweeping them off. Mountains of books scattered around—some opened with a random item on top to act as a makeshift paper weight. Sticky notes plastered all over the walls and stacks upon stacks of paper everywhere. In short, your room looks like a battleground.

     Which it is; an academic battleground, that is.

    That said, you swiftly stuffed a handful of notebooks and pens into a small backpack so you could continue the study session at the library. Perhaps a change in environment would ease you off and clear your mind. When you exited from your room, you were surprised to see Levi lounging off the living room. A bowl of popcorn on his lap whilst lazily popping one in his mouth every so often. His eyes glued to the TV screen as it played a series, The Confession Tapes you presumed. Ever since you showed him the first episode a few days ago, he was so intrigued and thus became so hook with the story line.

    Oh, to have freedom and time for leisure activities like Levi. You would willingly kill just to have that.

    "I'll be heading off to the library for a while," you uttered under your breath. Levi turned his head towards your direction, slowly munching on the popcorn. "I might come home late so I'll bring the keys with me."

    He paused the movie momentarily to narrow his eyes at you. Levi looked at you from top to bottom, assessing and processing the current state you are in. Which was hell. You looked like a vampire that crawled out of your coffin after decades of isolation. Of all the years he and you had been roommate, Levi had practically memorised most of your mannerism and behaviour so much. And at the moment, he knew all to well that you would be, yet again, working yourself to the grave.

    With a sigh, Levi placed the bowl of popcorn on top of the coffee table before approaching you. "Can't you see yourself, idiot?"

    You scrunched up your nose in confusion. What does he mean by that?

    "When was the last time you ate?"

    You racked your brain for answers. When was it truly that last time you had a proper meal besides energy bars that you bought from the convenience store. You went silent for a moment, eyes cascading down.

    "I had instant noodles I think? Last night," you answered after a pregnant pause.

    "Then that means you have not eaten anything since this morning?"

    You only nodded in response, all too tired to argue back with him. All you wanted to do was to finally leave the apartment and resume your study session in the library. Where, in hopes, you could finally progress in.

    Levi clicked his tongue. No wonder you look like a living dead. You are barely getting any nutrition in your body at all! Being studious is a great thing—but being all too unforgiving and torturing one's body too much is an unacceptable habit.

    As swift as a fox, he snagged the keys from your hands. You, in your drained state, reacted poorly and sluggishly. Though, you gave him one ferocious glare.

    "Give it back, Levi." You held out your hand.

    "No. You should rest. You look like shit."

    "Give me back my keys. I'm fine!"

    Levi, much to your surprise, had a hint of worry in his eyes. Silence fell between you and him, eyes focused on each other. You thought of kicking him on the shin, then took the chance to grab the keys. But you find yourself unable to as your body slowly slumped over.

    You let out one tired sigh, eyes closing every now and then in drowsiness, but you can't give in. Not now. Not at least you'd finally understand and finish writing your notes. Still, exams is a couple of weeks away. Surely a brief break wouldn't hurt?

   You groaned, the floor beneath your feet swaying as you struggled to keep yourself upright. It was only then did you notice the ever growing itch in your throat which signifies tonsillitis, mucus flooding your nasal passages, and increased body temperature.

     "I'm fine. . ." you inhaled sharply. "Just—" you continued but was caught short when your knees buckled under your weight, causing you to lean forward. Luckily enough, Levi caught you just in the nick of time before you fell face first into the wooden floor.

     "Tch. Look at what you got yourself into," he huffed, palm pressing against your forehead. "You also have a fever, dumbass."

    Did you now? You let your head rest into his touch, relishing his cool touch against your flushed ones. Maybe you really need a rest.

   "How about you take a seat on the couch while I brew you a cup of tea?"

    "Sounds good. . ." you uttered under your breath.

    That said, Levi practically dragged your body towards the couch and helped you settle on it. Making sure that you are comfortable enough by placing pillows behind your head. The male crouched down to your level, bringing a hand up once again to your forehead to properly estimate your temperature this time.

    "Looks like a bad one. . ." he muttered.

    "You tell me. I feel like shit," you've managed to crack a joke despite your conditions. Levi rose his brow at you, shaking his head at your idiocy. Then you watched him as he removed his cotton sweatshirt that hung loosely on his figure. Suffice to say, you were beyond perplexed when Levi placed the article of clothing on top of your lap.

    "You're cold aren't you?" he shrugged his shoulders. "Wear that for the time being to keep you warm."

    That said, he soon disappeared inside the kitchen to perhaps brew you a cup of tea much to your delight. It is practically known that the male had an immense skill in brewing and perfecting the art of tea. And as his roommate, Levi practically forced you to learn how to brew yourself; mainly because he doesn't want you wasting precious tea leaves that are far too expensive to be wasted. You recalled the time spent with him, hours upon hours inside the kitchen while trying your best to not burn your hands as you, yet again, try to perfect boiling tea. Levi stood beside you, a scowl present on his face as he frowned at your blend.

    Do it again, he snarled. The temperature is not right.

    It was little moments such as those reminds you of how much of a stuck up bitch Levi is. Nonetheless, the male still have a special place in your heart as your roommate and perhaps crush.

    Gingerly holding his sweater in your hands, you took one deep whiff of his scent—despite mucus flooding your nose—relishing the soft floral scent of the detergent that he bought about a week ago. Yet, Levi's natural aroma gradually overflows your nasal cavity; refreshing and clean with a hint of musky scent. It was pure heaven.

    Blood rushed to your cheeks as you let his sweatshirt hug your body, encompassing you more with his scent. Truth to be told, it was your long time dream to wear one of Levi's clothing. Suppose it was the thought of you in his clothes that brings butterflies to your stomachs, or the pure concept of his smell flooding your senses. Either way, you liked it.

    "Hey. . ." Levi's voice boomed which slightly startled you. The male placed a mug full of tea on the coffee table before kneeling down and opening a pack of fever patch.

    "What flavor did you brew?" you mumbled.

    "Chamomile," Levi replied, brushing your hair away from your forehead. For a brief moment, he stopped to stare at your glossy eyes due to the fever. Small patches of sweat that peppered your skin that glistened slightly under the light. Not to mention your lips that he oh so long to get a taste of for months—but he wouldn't tell you that out loud. Red dusted his cheeks ever so lightly that you would've missed if it weren't for your keen attention to detail.

    Levi bit the insides of his cheeks, slapping himself internally to focus at the task at hand which it to place a fever patch on your forehead. That said, he carefully set it against your temples. Making sure that it is adhered on firmly as to not fall in case you tossed and turn in your sleep. A smile adorned your features as soon as the cool hydrogel rested against your skin. You mumbled a quick gratitude towards the male before snuggling deep into his sweatshirt.

    "Levi. . ." you started to which he hummed in response, helping you sit up. Then, the male gave you the mug with hot tea. Its heavenly aroma making you sigh in relax. "Come sit with me?" you asked, patting the space next to you.

    The male opened his mouth to argue; to refuse your request because he doesn't want to catch your germs and be sick himself. Though, with one look at your puppy-dog eyes and pouting lips, Levi knew that he wouldn't be able to resist you. "Fine. . ." he begrudgingly replied.

    You let out a small cheer of victory. Placing your head on top of his shoulder the minute he sat beside you. Even for just a moment—just for this day—you want to delve into your fantasies and revel in the company of the male. Levi looked at you from the corner of his eye, admiring how his sweatshirt that embraces your form. Due to him being quite short in stature, his clothes were not too big. So, naturally, most of his wardrobe would probably fit you. Which he has no complaints about.

    "Can we watch Kitchen nightmares?" you asked, taking one small sip of tea as to not burn your tongue.

    Levi shrugged, "Why not?" That said, he adhered to your request. Playing that one episode in the series that he knew you enjoyed watching despite the countless times you've already seen it.

    You relaxed back into the couch, letting more of your weight press against Levi as your hands cupped the warm mug in between. The brutal and fierce howls of criticism of Gordon Ramsey brings a small smile to your lips, and oddly enough, as well as Levi's. Watching Kitchen's Nightmares (as well as other shows that the iconic chef starred in) was a guilty pleasure, so to say, of both yours and the male's. There is just something so satisfying how the chef makes people humble down and admit their mistakes.

    One great thing that comes from watching his series was that Levi could learn a thing or two in cooking. Even though he was already great from the start. The male picks up a recipe or two just by watching the series, much to your satisfaction. Between you and Levi, he is the mother of the household, if you will. While you're just one lazy couch potato who would receive an ear full of scolding every now and then.

    Soon enough, you felt your eyelids closing involuntarily, yet you fought to keep them open. It was getting into the good part—the climax—of the episode and you didn't want to sleep through it. Though, you find yourself giving in and finally letting your eyes rest for once. You exhaled, rubbing your cheeks against Levi's shoulder blades in attempts to get more comfortable. The male shifted on the couch, allowing you to be cozy and warm with him beside you.

    In your dazed state, you swore that Levi slowly rest his head on top of yours. Nevertheless, you couldn't conclude if it was true since the sweet embrace of sleep consumed you. For the first time in that week, you finally had a good night's rest.

    Levi relaxed under your touch, finally relieved that you gave in and let your body get the rest it deserves after days upon days of continuous work. He contemplated whether to turn off the television so that the noise wouldn't bother you in your sleep, or keep it open since a part of him wants to finish the episode. Though, his thoughts were caught short when you murmured.

    "Levi. . ." you mumbled in your sleep, hands gripping his sweatshirt.

    "What?" he humored, despite knowing that you are in deep slumber and is probably sleep-talking.

    Then to his surprise, you whispered a phrase that he never anticipated would slip past your lips.

    "I love you. . ."

    He was taken a back, eyes wide while his mouth slightly hung open. Levi blinked once, then twice, trying to process if what he heard was real or was his imagination deceiving him.

    "Did you know you talk in your sleep?" Levi said, testing to see if you were truly asleep or was just toying with him. When he concluded that you were—in fact—knocked out and catching some Z's, he breathed lowly the three words he oh so wanted to tell you for months.

    "I love you, too. Brat." He snaked his hand around yours, intertwining his fingers around your hand.

    Little did Levi know, you were half-awake during his confession.

[7uminous]

▹ …   𝐉𝐀𝐘𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐑 𝐈𝐒 𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌𝐈𝐍𝐆 ‘ 𝐉𝐔𝐒𝐓 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐓𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 ’ ! birthday stream | i play childhood games while answering questions and more. 20220716 | 2:30AM - LIVE NOW! CLICK TO VIEW.

jr: good evening, polaris... or well, morning. sorry for coming online so late. i did come on here after celebrating for a bit with the members, and i couldn’t sleep after drinking so here i am. i thought it would be a good idea to celebrate it with polaris too by doing a gaming stream. it’s been a while since i did one, right? 

[stares in silence and awkwardly into the camera]

jr: it’s been so long that i feel awkward doing this now. how about some childhood games for the nostalgia while i answer some of your questions so it'll feel less like i’m talking to myself? everyone, what kind of games did you use to play in your childhood? [more silence as he scrolls through the web] i have no clue how to play it all, i’ll be honest i only ever played games like habbo hotel and runescape... with some pokémon on the side. [squints while he reads a chat] you played among us when you were little? were you perhaps... just born yesterday?!

[screen shows that’s he’s opened up a web game called ‘barbie fashion’]

jr: this one looks manageable! my noona used to play a game similar to this one, but she’d never let me play it, said it was for girls. i’m old enough now so i can play whatever i want and no one can stop me. that’s one of the best things about being a grown adult. i keep seeing comments saying ‘among us’. look, i know a lot of you like among us, that’s why i’m playing this instead. you’re just going to have to deal with it ‘cause it’s my birthday. okay? deal with it [😎]

[5 minutes later...]

jr: i’m bored now. what other games should i play? [reads chat] thanks for the birthday wishes and nice comments, everyone. i never know how to respond to compliments so i’ve been pretending i don’t see them but i do, and i appreciate them! just don’t expect me to read it out loud ‘cause it’s kind of awkward for me [ㅋㅋ] you know that feeling right? 

jr: ‘would you ever start your own fashion line or work for your family’s business?’ i mean, i like fashion but i’m not all into it or high fashion brands, i have no desire to get my name up there if you get what i mean. i could see myself doing games or music for a long time but not fashion.

[two hours into the stream and he’s played different other childhood games including super mario, neopets and space cadet. now he’s onto ‘need for madness’]

jr: ah, so this is what it feels like to be a racer! i didn’t understand why people were into games like this before... but i kinda get it now. it’s so satisfying to waste the other cars, but getting my own wasted makes me want to pull my hair- NO! [instictively throws keyboard away as a reflex from losing, leans back in his chair as he stares at nothing for a long silent moment before finally picking his keyboard back up and closing the tab]

jr: i’ll stick to answering your questions. [turns on some dmca-free lofi music in an attempt to seem ‘chill’] ‘what variety show would you want to appear in?’ variety isn’t my strongest suit but if i really have to pick one, maybe ‘law of the jungle’...? i want to challenge my survival skills and learn about surviving in most extreme cases. ‘what’s your comfort food when you feel upset?’ anything home-made and made out of love is my comfort food. don’t mean to be a cliché, that’s just how it is. ‘with a headset like that, you would think he’s playing some cool action video game’ you sound disappointed... good. ‘what's the best birthday gift you've ever received from the members?’ i can’t think of a physical gift to be honest. mostly because i’m not about the birthday fanfare for myself that is. i do however love having my members all make a fuss. cake. candles. singing. that does it for me on my birthday.

jr: alright, polaris~ it’s already almost 5am and i have a schedule in the late afternoon, i should probably try to get some sleep. you should too! sorry for keeping you up if it’s late for you. on the bright side it’s the weekend so i hope you get to sleep in and rest well through the day. thanks for keeping me company and again thanks for the wishes. i will enjoy the rest of the day. until next time!

■ …   𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌 𝐄𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐃 - 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐊𝐒 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐖𝐀𝐓𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 !

[smutkuna]

Paralyzed in Lust | Sukuna x F-Reader

Part 1

Urban legends always seemed to intrigue you, but that’s all they were. Just legends. You’ve seen enough horror movies to know that practicing those rituals never ended well. Your college friends seemed to have the opposite idea, however.

 They loved to go to abandoned areas and attempt some of the rituals posted online. Safely, of course, but how safe is it? They talked about salt circles, protection wards, sigils, and protection amulets or crystals but is that enough?

 They would mention that attempting to summon a demon is dangerous, but here they are in your studio apartment, talking about calling forth a demon from an urban legend that seemed to pop out of nowhere.

 The urban legend about Ryomen Sukuna, a four-armed demon that no one could seem to invite. You didn’t understand why anyone would want to summon a demon, but you guess curiosity killed that cat.

 You sat on your twin-sized bed lined up against the wall while your friends sat on a two-seater bench situated in front of your bed, underneath the long window. Your studio apartment held all the essentials for a financially struggling college student.

 Entering the apartment, you would be met with a small hallway. On your immediate left is the door to the bathroom, while on your immediate right is a small storage space. Farther in, you’re met with the small space for your bed on the left with a walk-in closet that shares the wall with the bathroom.

 Facing the entrance is the bench underneath a horizontal window with a view of the busy street, covered by some window shutters to give you some privacy. These shutters were currently open, letting in the remaining light from the sunset, but were slightly blocked by your friends.

 To the right of the hallway entrance behind the storage, is your kitchen. It had enough space to fit a bit of counter space, fridge, sink, and dishwasher. Adjacent to your kitchen, across your bed, and near the bench was an L-shaped divider hiding a portable washer and dryer.

 “[Y/n]!” your friend, Nobara, exclaimed. “Will you finally join us for this ritual? I know you’re not really into these things, but it’s safe, I swear. We even have our protection spells and everything.”

 You hummed in apprehension. “I’m not sure I’m ready to do those yet.”

 Megumi, your other friend, nodded his head. “Okay, but just let us know whenever you want to join us or if you end up doing it on your own...” he grabbed some of Nobara’s amulets and his salt bags. “Here, I’ll lend some to you in case you change your mind.”

 He placed the items in your bag.

 “Thank you. When are you both planning on doing the ritual?” you asked them.

 “Ah, maybe tonight? We have nothing else planned, and we’ve been itching to try this ritual out ever since we saw it on a forum.” Nobara replied. She pulled out her phone and scrolled for a while before handing it to you. “Everyone’s been talking about it, but no one’s been able to pull it off.”

 Megumi then spoke. “Yeah and no one’s sure about where this urban legend came from anyway so we don’t know if it’s real or not. That’s why we want to see for ourselves.”

 You took a peek at Nobara’s phone and read parts of the forum out loud.

 “Ryomen Sukuna... Four-armed demon… To begin the ritual, cut the pads of all your fingers until blood oozes out. Bro what?” You looked at your friends in confusion. They simply shrugged and told you to continue reading.

 “Soak your bloody fingers in a large bowl of water until the water is stained dark red. Remove your hands from the bowl and do this hand sign by connecting your thumb, middle, and ring finger pads while your index and pinky fingers are bent towards your palms. What in the summoning-jutsu is this?”

 You attempted the hand signs after you had placed her phone on your bed. Megumi lightly laughed and showed you how to do it properly.

 “Girl, you watch too much Naruto.” Nobara snickered.

 You rolled your eyes and smirked. “I’m not the only one simping over Kakashi and Itachi. You’re just as guilty.”

 “Here [y/n], continue reading the rules.’ Megumi said, handing you the phone.

 “Say ‘Domain Expansion: Malevolent Shrine’ after performing the hand sign and dunk your face into the bowl of water and blood. After this, Sukuna will appear. To properly end the ritual, thank him for his time and say ‘Cleave.’ This is critical. Failure to do so will leave you with cursed energy around you. **For extra protection, perform an exorcism.”

 You sighed after reading the rules of the forum. It seemed easy enough but you weren’t sure whether it was worth the risk to have cursed energy if it failed and did you need to perform an exorcism?? Wasn’t that a bit too much? Plus, you wanted all the luck you could get since you just applied for an internship for the fall quarter.

 “Well, if you both decide to do this, please be safe,” you told your friends.

 Nobara smiled and grabbed her small backpack. “Don’t worry, we’ll text you what happens. We were thinking of recording it anyway, so we’ll send that to you later tonight after we try it.”

 She hugged you and started walking to the door followed by Megumi.

 “You can keep the rest of the pizza. It’s not easy for me to digest,” he said, as he double-checked to make sure you had the amulets and salt bags. You smiled at him, eyes showing appreciation because you had very little food left in your fridge.

 “Thank you, Megumi. Good night, you two. I’ll see you both tomorrow after work.” you said, waving to them as they left your apartment complex. Once they were out of your sight, you closed and locked your entrance door.

 You grabbed your laptop and made your way toward the kitchen, putting it on top of the small counter space you had. You sighed as you put away the leftover pizza in the fridge. Being an avid horror fan, you enjoyed the paranormal, but partaking in anything of the sort in real life made you nervous.

 The urban legend of Sukuna intrigued you, even if the ritual was slightly strange. Wouldn’t you faint from losing so much blood? Plus, who the fuck is Sukuna anyway? What made him so special for people to want to do this sort of thing?

 Facepalming, you opened a web browser on your laptop and did a simple search. Who is Ryomen Sukuna?

 You scrolled through countless forums, talking about the ritual and how it didn’t work. No one seemed to be able to conjure Ryomen Sukuna. The problem was that no one knew who he was. Only that he was a strong demonic entity that holds a lot of cursed energy and has two faces and two sets of arms.

 Two sets, huh? What, does he have two dicks too? You laughed to yourself, but then rolled your eyes and groaned. You needed to get laid.

 Further throughout your research, you decided to take a break and looked over to the clock on the wall above your washer and dryer. It was 11:56 PM, indicating that your friends left three hours ago.

 You took a glance at your phone that was charging next to your laptop and noticed that Megumi and Nobara had sent an attachment to your group chat. Unplugging your phone from the charger, you unlocked it and strode over to the bathroom.

 Your group chat read:

 “Hey [y/n], we finished the ritual but nothing happened. Bummer, I was looking forward to summoning one of the most difficult demons to conjure up.” Nobara sent at midnight.

 “Oi, here’s the video,” Megumi replied, with a black screen video attached after his message.

 Oh wow, they actually recorded it. You thought, adding some toothpaste to your toothbrush. You pressed on the video and let it play while you brushed your teeth.

 You watched as both your friends performed the finger-bleeding step and you couldn’t help but gag a little. That’s a shit ton of blood. It took a while considering each of their fingers had a small cut, and the bowls were large. After a couple of minutes, Megumi and Nobara removed their hands from the bowl and performed the hand sign.

 “Domain Expansion: Malevolent Shrine.” You heard them chant once and then watched them dunk their head into the bloody water as you spit out your toothpaste and rinse your mouth.

Standing in front of the mirror and sink, you stared at the video, watching your friends and waiting for something to happen.

 In the video, you saw Nobara and Megumi look at each other and shrug. You fast-forwarded the video a bit, looking for any sign that the ritual worked but the video ended with them thanking Sukuna and saying “Cleave” before anything appeared.

 Exiting out of the video, you sent a response to the group chat.

 “I’m sorry nothing happened, guys. I know you were excited for something to happen.”

 “It’ll make us feel better if you tried it yourself hehe” Nobara replied with a smirk emoji.

 You stared at her message for a while, contemplating what you should do. Preparing for your night routine, you stripped and stepped into the shower, letting the hot water run down your back, massaging your aching muscles.

 You had a long day at work, and now you were stuck on whether you should do this ritual or not. Nothing has been happening to anyone anyway, so most likely nothing will happen to you. This ritual was probably a hoax, just a trend since people were bored. Right?

 Please conscience, what do I do? AH FUCK IT.

 After you had finished your shower, you hastily applied your lotions and pajamas which consisted of a tank top and lace underwear. You grabbed your phone from the bathroom and reread the forum on what to do, sending another reply to Nobara saying that you’ll do the ritual.

 You grabbed the essential items you needed: salt, amulet, a large basin of water, and a pocket knife. You released a large breath you seemed to be holding and read the text you just received from the group chat.

 “AYE, that’s my girl!!” Nobara sent with a grinning gif.

 “Be safe [y/n]. Text us if anything happens and don’t forget to use the salt and amulets.” Megumi responded.

 “I’ll record myself and send it to both of you once I finish” 

 You balanced your phone on the foot of your bed, pressed record, and placed the ritual items on the floor beside you, grabbing the amulet first and placing the tie around your neck. 

 Please protect me. You thought as you gripped the amulet and placed some salt in a circle, trapping yourself within it. 

 You steadied your breathing and positioned the bowl in front of you. 

 All right. Let’s get this over with.

 Slicing the pads of your fingertips with the pocket knife, you held your fingers over the large basin, watching the blood drip into the water. 

 God, I should’ve played some music in the background. The silence is killing me. I swear to God if that fucking Tip Toe Through the Meadow song from Insidious plays on a radio, I’m going to burn this building down.

 The water rippled as each blood drop collided with it. Your nerves were on high alert, but you were too scared to glance around your room. What if there was a shadow at your doorway or a ghost in the mirror? WHAT IF it was right behind you?!

 You cried internally and tried to rid your thoughts of anything horrific. After what seemed to be forever, waiting in agony, the bowl was painted crimson. You released another breath and tried to remember the next step of the ritual.

 Ah right, the jutsu sign.

 You formed the hand sign and said out loud, “DOMAIN EXPANSION: MALEVOLENT SHRINE.” 

 Cringing, you dipped your head into the bowl and stayed there until you needed a gulp of air. 

 This is disgusting, why am I doing this again?

 Your face was tinted with blood and you carefully looked around your room without the blood dripping onto your laminated floors. Your hearing was heightened due to the lack of light in the room, but you heard nothing. You felt nothing. 

 It probably didn’t work. Thank you, God. I can live to see another day.

 “Ryomen Sukuna, if you’re there, thank you for your time. Let’s not do this again, please and thank youuu.” you sang. “CLEAVE.”

 You grabbed your phone from the footrest of your bed, ended the recording, and texted the group chat.

 “I just finished. Nothing happened to me either. I guess it is just a hoax.”

 “Damn. What if we did something wrong? Let’s try it again.” Nobara said.

 “My face has my blood dripping from it, no thank you.” 

 “You said ‘Cleave,’ right [y/n]?” Megumi questioned.

 “Yup. I’m gonna go clean up and try to sleep. I’ll see you both tomorrow. Good night!” 

 Bidding each other good night, you swept the salt circle and drained the bloody water into the bathroom sink. You rinsed your face of any remnants of the ritual and reapplied your moisturizer. 

 Plopping onto your bed and hiding under the covers, you glanced once more at the clock. It read 2 AM. 

 Damn, I have class in 6 hours. Note to self: stop registering for 8 AM classes in case you decide to do rituals late into the night.

 You closed your eyes and attempted to sleep, but you couldn’t stop tossing and turning. Something didn’t feel right. You felt suffocated like something was watching you. You were too scared to open your eyes and hid further into your covers.

 Sure, [y/n]. They’ll never know I’m under here.

 You kept tossing and turning for thirty minutes because you just couldn’t find that comfortable spot. Suddenly, you felt a sensation on your limbs. 

 What the fuck?

 You froze. You felt like each of your limbs were grabbed by one… two… FOUR HANDS?! You didn’t want to believe it. You couldn’t believe it. No fucking way the ritual worked. Counting to three, you screamed and punched into the air. 

 Nothing was there. No one was there. You were alone.

Part 2: https://smutkuna.tumblr.com/post/655579886704017408/paralyzed-in-lust-sukuna-x-f-reader

[moosoobi]

Bon Appetit, darlin’

~T.Jeff : Hamilton the Musical

First time writing lol. I mean don’t be so harsh because my confidence is made of glass but please let me know what you think. Here’s a few things that you can expect while reading:

fluff

good boyfriend Thomas that we wished existed

Y/N lowkey being a top LMAO

word count: 1359 (?) dunno how this works

probably a few spelling errors because now that school is online I resort to autocorrect 

A/N: I do nOT SUPPORT REAL LIFE THOMAS JEFFERSON >:( . Stan Daveed Diggs who plays Thomas in Hamilton the musical.

Y/N sat on the tiny sofa in her grandma’s room. Out of all 6 of her cousins, she was the chosen one to watch over her grandma for a few days. She was surrounded by textbooks which she deemed unimportant, her collection of expensive Japanese stationary placed on top where her last sentence had ended. The room was filled with Christmas music that was a few months too early. Unable to drown out the carols, Y/N crocheted a cozy magenta cardigan for her boyfriend to wear, when the Christmas music WAS appropriate.

Loop by loop, Y/N inserted and pulled her crochet hook to create new loops. Of course she was no where near finished. Every now and then she would feel the remorse for her text books and continue to work on her doomed English work, this was very rare of course. The sound of a car pulling into a drive way seemed to help drown out the cries of winter music, but Y/N thought nothing of it. Perhaps her neighbors went out and about the city of New York, unlike Y/N who hasn’t left the house in what felt like days.

Her hands ached from writing and crocheting. Finally giving up, Y/N set down the labyrinth of yarn and adjusted her position next to her frail grandma, who was fast asleep. She glanced up at the clock. 11:30 pm.

“Great.”

She groaned with annoyance. Bored, scrappy, and hungry, and the pain of guilt for her lonely textbook was just what she needed on a Thursday night.

Sticking one leg out her blanket in attempt to cool down her body, Y/N covered her eyes with her arm in attempt to find her happy place. Exhausted from her long days of school work. Just when Y/N felt like the luxury of sleep was in her grasp, her phones dreadful ding went off.

Ah yes, that sound when you get a text message. It’s either your savior or your worse nightmare, but you’ll never know unless you choose to pick up your phone. If Y/N wasn’t next to her grandma during her slumber, she might’ve screamed in agony when she heard that dreadful tone, but she managed to keep her cool. When she glanced at her screen her annoyance faded away and was replaced with a smile.

1 message from: Tommy 💕😼🥐

Now she had no choice but open it, I mean why wouldn’t she?

Tommy 💕😼🥐: come outside

Y/N tilted her head. Really Thomas? Not a good time

Y/N: excuse me what?

Tommy💕😼🥐: you know I don’t like to repeat myself, sweetheart <3

Y/N: I already told you that I’m on grandma duty tonight

Tommy💕😼🥐: c'mon darlin’ a few minutes won’t hurt

Tommy💕😼🥐 : I promise you won’t regret it ;)

Y/N sighed. Of course she wouldn’t throw away an opportunity to see him. Arising slowly from the firm mattress, Y/N tried her best not to shake the bed in fear of waking up her grandma.

Her hips and knees cracked at the pressure of standing up. She slid on her fuzzy slippers and made her way to the hallway, acting like a spy on a secret mission. Her steps echoed throughout the still house.

 After making it to her living room, she could see a bright rays shining through her window. Y/N couldn’t help but feel the butterflies rise in her stomach when she opened the front door.

Thomas’s black car was idle in her drive way. Her eyes felt relief as his car lights turned off as he exited the car. Thomas was stunning in his striped turtleneck, paired with a coat to accommodate the cold fall weather. He pranced over to the front door with a smile plastered on his face, holding a plastic bag in his left hand, a series of ‘THANK YOU’s printed in red ink covering the front of the bag. 

“So you were the car annoying the neighborhood at 11:30 at night?” Y/N asked sarcastically, a smirk forming on her face. Thomas rolled his eyes while he placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. “And here I thought you’d be happy to see me, darlin’”. Y/N enlaced her fingers with his as she led him to the table

“Of course I am, but why are you here? I know you didn’t come to help me take my grandma to the bathroom” Y/N pulled a chair for him to sit, pulling an reverse card on Thomas’ chivalry. “I know how busy you are when you’re here, so I just wanted to get something for you” Thomas stuck his hand into the crinkling bag and pulled out two cups. Both were various shades of swirling brown tea accompanied with tiny tapioca pearls that drifted to the bottom of the cup.

“I got you some tea.” Thomas said proudly “never tried it before but I remember you got some with Angie last month so I assumed-” Y/N cut him off with a hug. She smiled into the crook of his neck while he wrapped his arms around her, cups still in hand.

“Have I ever told you that you’re amazing, Jefferson?” Y/N held back her excitement.

“All the time sweetheart.” Thomas smirked as he felt his ego grow just a little bit bigger. Even Y/N wasn’t sure that was possible with how big Thomas’ ego was when they first started talking. Pulling away from the hug, Thomas set the cups on the table.

“I ALSO got you some noodles while I was at the shop” Thomas turned to Y/N as she gazed up at him in amazement. “What? They were cheap, I couldn’t resist seeing your smile” he teased, setting down two boxes of noodles onto the lace table cloth. Thomas finally sat down on his chair and rubbed his hands together. Y/N’s smile remained present on her face as she pulled and sat on her own chair.

“Bon appetite, darlin’”

——————————————————————

After the couple ate, they relaxed on her couch, Thomas laying comfortably in Y/N’s lap, comforted by the warmth of her arms. Y/N’s phone let off a ding. Knowing it wasn’t Thomas texting her, she deemed it unimportant. Thomas was evidently eyeing the phone every time that sound rung, growing more anxious every time. Who would text her at this time? Besides Thomas of course.

“How was work?” Y/N attempted to change the attention, her fingers tangled in Thomas’ majestic hair. Let’s be real, who could resist his hair? Thomas opened his eyes, staring up at Y/N from her lap and shrugged. “ ‘nother argument with Hamilton” he scoffed. Y/N giggled at his response. “Tommy, Hamilton’s not so bad, maybe-” Y/N was cut off by Thomas’ disbelief “I know I did not just come all the way over here Y/N for you to side with that dipshit”

Y/N laughed as she removed her hand from Thomas’ head to retrieve her tea. Whining, Thomas pouted and waited for her hand to come back, but it never did. Thomas shot up to see Y/N’s eyes glued to her phone. “Hello! I’m right here y’know!” Y/N’s gaze landed on Thomas’ for only a moment, and eventually fell back on her phone “Yeah hold on, Lafayette wont stop texting me after he discovered what a GIF is” she laughed, taking sips of the swirling tea in her shiny, plastic cup. Thomas could feel his jealousy begin to rise.  

“c’mon Thomas, you know how close Laf and I are, don’t give me all these jealous vibes from you.” her eyes were piercing straight through Thomas. She could look through him as if he were glass. The pout was still evident on his face, unable to maintain eye contact with her powerful glare. Ironic isn’t it? Y/N huffed out a short laugh and set down her drink. “Fine, let me prove it to you then.” 

5 minutes had passed.

Of course they spent it aggressively teasing each other, who wouldn't? Just when things began to get a little too heated, the baby monitor next to the couch, which she used to listen for her grandma, flashed on. 

“Y/nnnnn, can you help me to the bathroom?” it blasted

Y/N pulled back from Thomas’s grasp, “Well that’s my signal” 

fin.

[uwua3]

therapist.

❄️📚 tsukioka tsumugi

summary: you don’t need a boyfriend, you really just need a therapist

warnings: cheating, exhaustion, heartbreak, jealousy, lack of communication, passing out, toxic relationships

author’s note: this is a song fic! it’d be cool to listen to the song as you read, obviously the lyrics won’t match up to the pace of the passage! i recently went through something like this and thought it would be important to address in a healthy manner ♡

sometimes, you can’t expect your s/o to be the person who “fixes everything”. remember to establish mental health boundaries + ask someone if they’re in the right headspace to emotionally support someone!

word count: 3,352

music: therapist – mae muller

YOU DON’T BRING HOME ROSES, YOU JUST BRING HOME STRESS

YOU NEVER SAY I LOOK GOOD, WHEN I’M LOOKING MY BEST

Tsumugi anxiously fixed his hair as he shifted around his phone’s camera angle facing him. It was so late, he had so much work on top of his tutoring shifts, but you kept putting off this call for so long. Said you were busy, but Tsumugi knew you were nervous to talk to him face to face. You pretended to have family errands even though he saw you active online, but he wanted to see you (even if it cost him another sleepless night and missed assignments).

It was ten minutes past the allocated time frame you had suggested to call, but you weren’t responding to his constant texts. Tsumugi straightened his sweater (lucky sweater, actually) and saw his face frown as the clock kept ticking against his will. You were late, that’s not new, but you would have at least notified him. Tsumugi flipped through your texts, trying to find something that would justify your absence. No matter, Tsumugi figured, knowing you wouldn’t be too long. After all, you guys were just taking it slow, maybe scheduled FaceTime calls weren’t that serious?

As Tsumugi leaned back and felt the weight of the day on his shoulders, he released a sigh of disappointment as he stared up at his room’s ceiling. Tsumugi was looking forward to this call all week now, feeling jittery to see his potential partner because he really, really liked you, it honestly scared him.

It was the first time in a while he got back into the love scene as other than the resident wingman, so putting himself out there was new. As a joke (and moment of desparation), Tsumugi tweeted how much he wanted a significant other and hit send before going to sleep. Yes, social distancing and quarantine were getting to him, bad. But, waking up and receiving a message at 4am was exhilarating.

You guys met online. First, it was you liking his tweets back and forth before you DMed Tsumugi. It was out of character for him to even consider responding to a stranger, but it was quarantine... and maybe this could have been some fun! It was a childish thought for someone his age, but as soon as Tsumugi sent a laughing emoji back, the two of you hit it off.

There was instant chemistry, spending hours everyday (time he didn’t have) to have engaging conversations together that made his heart jump every time you instinuated something flirty. Tsumugi’s last relationship was years ago, it had been so long, he didn’t know how to respond as well as you did. But, one thing led to another, and it was barely a week before Tsumugi confessed he liked you, embarrassingly enough. It was after you put out a Google Form application to get suitors to make him purposely jealous, and Tsumugi definitely hadn’t felt that jealous in a long, long time.

But, you wanted to take it slow. Talking about how you never had such a cute partner before, that Tsumugi was so considerate so you didn’t want to rush anything and ruin the potential. Tsumugi agreed immediately, he knew you weren’t ready for commitment and that was okay. Maybe, he could change your mind?

That night, you two talked over the phone for six hours. It was the highlight of his entire romantic life, it was his first date! Tsumugi remembered there was little to no awkwardness the first time around, and fell asleep at 6am just to wake up one hour later. Although he was exhausted and his sleep schedule was destroyed, Tsumugi never felt happier and more comfortable with someone else.

Again, Tsumugi felt himself dozing off before he heard his ringtone blaring. He jumped up and quickly accepted it despite his bedhead. Hopefully the entire dorm didn’t hear it (they did) and Tasuku actually believed he was going steady with someone. (“Seriously, this is the fourth night I’m kicked out of my own room.” Tasuku complained, but didn’t bother fighting it when he saw Tsumugi’s pleading eyes). There you were, on screen, and Tsumugi instantly flushed.

First of all, you were drawing as you sketched something out with your headphones in. Secondly, Tsumugi self consciously covered his sweater, he was way, way too overdressed when you were dressed casually. Third, you only smiled at him before resuming your activity. Not even a greeting? Maybe a compliment that he looked nice (it was the best Tsumugi looked all quarantine)?

Tsumugi didn’t see it coming. For the rest of the short hour they had together, you guys barely talked as you seemed distracted. When the call ended with the first thing you said all night, Tsumugi dropped back into his bed and shoved his face into his pillow. You didn’t even say anything? Were you busy? Was he inconveniencing you? The FaceTime call felt nothing like the voice call, it was so awkward. It felt like there was nothing there at all.

But, maybe he was being hasty? It can’t be love at first sight, they were both adults with jobs—right, a job. Tsumugi pushed himself up as he rolled out of bed, returning back to the stack of papers balancing his phone. Grabbing his red pen and keeping the desk lamp on, Tsumugi prepared himself for a very long rest of the night. After all, these papers weren’t going to grade themselves.

AND IF WE’RE STAYING UP ALL NIGHT,

IT’S CAUSE YOU’RE MOANING

(AND NOT THE GOOD KIND)

Tsumugi forced his eyes open as he glanced at the alarm clock between him and Tasuku’s beds. It was 5am, weren’t you tired? Tsumugi attempted to read the tens of large texts that detailed everything that went wrong that day, just endless complaining. Tsumugi tried his best to console you at first, but he was so, so tired. You two had been awake talking about the issue at hand for nearly six hours. How can someone even talk about themselves for that long? Tsumugi increased his screen brightness, he needed all the reminders to stay up as possible.

If Tasuku caught him still up, he’d be in for a scolding for sure. But, no one suspected a thing. Tsumugi always had low–energy, this wasn’t any different. Except, he was messing up the entire order of his day. Tsumugi was missing appointments despite being known as a punctual teacher, skipping out on chores in the garden, even avoiding the other company members altogether to prevent creating plans. It was taking a toll on Tsumugi’s mental state, but he had you... right?

Tsumugi didn’t want to burden you with his problems, though. You were going through much worse and needed an outlet to rant about it. There was nothing wrong with that, of course! He just wished, it was at a different time. Tsumugi did everything in his power to make you feel better from the predicament, but you didn’t change. You were just as frustrated as before, maybe even more.

Was Tsumugi really that bad at being a good “taking–it–slow” boyfriend? Tsumugi sank into his sheets, furrowing his eyebrows as he watched you leave without a warning. What could he had done different? Were you getting bored?

Tsumugi tossed and turned, unable to sleep as he turned on his phone to reread the conversation every thirty minutes or so. What went wrong? Why did you open up and suddenly disappear without thanking him? Maybe, it wasn’t his business anymore. Did you trust him?

Tsumugi fell asleep at 7am. He slept past his alarm, again.

WANT YOU TO BE HAPPY,

BUT NOT AT MY EXPENSE

You hadn’t responded to his texts asking about your day in forever. Your read directs were off anyways, so it’s not like he knew. But, Tsumugi started pacing his room as he kept refreshing your account. Were you okay? Did something happen? Could he have prevented this? What could he have—oh.

You tweeted on your private account. You were talking with someone else (Tsumugi scrolled back to the beginning of the thread), starting two hours ago. Huh. He hadn’t heard that you got a new friend, that was good! Tsumugi felt proud seeing you overcome your nervousness to interact with others, before he his heart dropped reading the tweets.

Was it normal for friends to talk like this? Tsumugi read the entire conversation despite his head telling him to respect your privacy, but how could he when you put it on his timeline? They were calling you your favorite endearment, and it stung when Tsumugi realized he wasn’t the only one who called you that. Ouch. Not only that, but it seemed exactly like the way you two started talking. It was flirty, to say the least.

Tsumugi heard everyone get called down to dinner and the rapid herd of footsteps running past his door. Tsumugi pocketed his phone, wanting to hear your specific chime as he joined the group to eat. He needed a distraction, but even Omi’s food couldn’t keep his mind off you and that new friend of yours.

Could this count as “cheating”? Was there even cheating in unofficial relationships? What stage were you guys at? Could Tsumugi ask you out right now and have it not be weird? Why were you, crushes so confusing? Tsumugi unintentionally sighed, eating slowly as he sensed multiple sets of eyes glance at him.

“You okay, Tsumugi? You look so tired~ even more than Hisoka!” Homare asked, a dramatic tone with his words but his eyes were concerned about the thin figure of his already skinny friend. Hisoka even nodded to strengthen the argument, poking at the egg white omelete with his fork. Tsumugi forced a casual chuckle, placing his utensils down to hide his shaking hands. Damn, caffeine.

“Sorry to worry you guys, I’m just getting more students, recently.” Tsumugi mentioned, awkwardly laughing to seal the deal. The other boys nodded, not trying to press Tsumugi for more information as they turned their attention back to the delicious meal. Only Tasuku kept his eye on Tsumugi, taking in the way his spine was slouched and focus seemed elsewhere.

Ducking his head, Tsumugi gripped the base of the kitchen chair, trying to keep the tears in as he thought of you. You who was probably messaging your friend instead of him. Leaving him on read for days.

This was the happiest he’s been... right?

THE MORE I LISTEN AND I LISTEN,

THE MORE I’M THINKING

Tsumugi was about to text you. He hated hiding these feelings from you, he wanted to be your boyfriend. He liked you so damn much.

As he was about to type a message explicitly stating how he thought you two were ready to pursue a serious, committed relationship, you texted him first (for once).

Tsumugi couldn’t even finish reading the message before running out of dorm room to the bathroom. Bumping into Azuma on the way out, Tsumugi dropped his phone in the corridor before disappearing behind the door to gag. Tsumugi tried to stop himself from throwing up but it was too late, he held himself over the toilet as he choked over his own spit. He couldn’t see anything, his vision was so blurry.

Tsumugi was so, so sick. Sick of all of this.

Azuma picked up Tsumugi’s smartphone and looked at the screen, seeing it was open to a number he had never seen before.

You: I don’t like you anymore, Tsumugi. I don’t want a relationship right now... I don’t think I even ever liked you as a crush.

YOU DON’T NEED A BOYFRIEND,

YOU JUST NEED A THERAPIST

Tsumugi: That’s okay! We can still be friends, right?

Life went on. At least, for you. You two still chatted every once in a while, and Tsumugi still put all his attention and effort despite knowing there was no possibility you liked him back anymore. It stung, to say the least. To know you ran circles around his mind all day and Tsumugi wasn’t even worth your time, it killed him. His attention span was limited to only reacting immediately when hearing your text tone.

Tasuku had to carry him back to the dorms after the whole bile episode. Azuma refused to say anything, locking his lips when Tasuku demanded to know what happened. Azuma casually suggested Tsumugi might have just had a bad case of food poisoning, much to the Mankai chef’s distaste. No one in Winter Troupe bought it but still took shifts checking Tsumugi’s health levels, acting like he had food poisoning when his puffy red eyes suggested otherwise.

When it was Azuma’s turn, he sat beside Tsumugi as he prepared the food. Tsumugi ate in silence and Azuma accepted that, knowing talking could ruin the mood. It was the first time Tsumugi was at least making an attempt to eat something. Without even looking, Azuma hummed as he gathered the plates after Tsumugi finished. As he rose, Azuma couldn’t help but turn back and rest a gentle hand on Tsumugi’s shaking form.

“I’m sorry.” Azuma quietly whispered and it was enough to make Tsumugi cry. Blinking rapidly, Tsumugi leaned into Azuma’s open arms as he hid his face in the latter’s chest. Azuma hoped no one heard Tsumugi’s sobs as he released all the pain you put him through.

There wasn’t much said, but it was enough.

Tsumugi slept that night. He woke up to his alarm and started the day without delay.

YOU GOT TOO MUCH DRAMA, I’M NOT QUALIFIED TO FIX

I WOULD HOLD YOUR BODY, BUT YOU WANT SOMEBODY THAT WILL HOLD YOUR SHIT TOGETHER

Tsumugi was going back to normal. He was arriving on time again (he muted your contact), taking care of the plants in the courtyard again (much to manager Matsukawa’s relief), and even actively went out with the other members daily. Homare stopped questioning him senselessly every moment, Hisoka offered him a marshmallow every once in a while, Azuma still suggested free cuddles at night, and Tasuku gave up on trying to find out whatever happened. Life went on.

Until, that night.

Tsumugi tried to avoid checking your texts, knowing he would be sucked in into the void if he did. But, you were sending multiple, which was strange. Tsumugi checked his surroundings, seeing Tasuku was out playing soccer with his friends. He had the room to himself for a while.

With no one to watch his every move, Tsumugi carefully opened your chat room and his heart soared.

You admitted you always liked him so much. You wanted to be in a relationship with him. You only lied to protect your own feelings. You wanted him back. You... liked him. Tsumugi didn’t see all the progress he made moving on get thrown out the window as he quickly sent a reply, agreeing to take things slow again to see how it would go.

Tsumugi wanted you to earn his trust again, even though he knew damn well he wanted to take you back in a heartbeat. Would you put in the effort? He was so curious. You two spent the entire night catching up and texting.

Tsumugi went to bed at 4am. He slept past his alarm again, again, and again.

I WANNA MAKE YOU FEEL GOOD, AND PUT YOUR MIND AT EASE

BUT I’M JUST WHERE YOU POUR OUT THE NEGATIVITY, I’LL GET YOU EXCITED

Tsumugi had high expectations for someone who didn’t change. You tried at first, checking in on him multiple times and even offering to help him out with anything. It was so nice being in the honeymoon phase, and Tsumugi was considering finally taking you back. But then, you slipped from his grasp. You stopped trying. You texted one–liners. You didn’t change.

This week was exams season. Tsumugi was overwhelmed with work and texted you his updated schedule so you weren’t upset every time he didn’t respond. No one noticed his unhealthy behavior starting to come back since he was always out tutoring students for their finals. Life seemed to stop, even though everything but you changed.

Tsumugi was on the train home, scrolling through his Twitter timeline to see you were active again. You were talking to that friend again. Tsumugi suddenly noticed how exhausted he was, holding onto the train pole as he rested his face against the cold metal. He needed a break, a long nap for eternity. He didn’t even know why.

Tsumugi didn’t eat dinner for the first time in a month. Azuma frowned when Tsumugi simply walked to his room, turning to see Tasuku doing the same concerned, parental expression. Azuma was about to open his mouth but stopped, instead exhaling sharply through his nose before volunteering to wash dishes. Tasuku assisted, forgetting all about Tsumugi’s lack of appetite.

Tsumugi didn’t sleep at all that night. At least, he didn’t miss his alarm, this time.

BUT IT’S SO ONE–SIDED

AND I’M GETTING TIRED OF FIGHTING FOR SOMEBODY, WHO AIN’T FIGHTING FOR ME

Tasuku had to drive his car to the student’s house after one of Tsumugi’s student’s parent quickly phoned the most recent contact.

“Tsumugi?” Tasuku answered, putting his phone between his ear and shoulder as he was supervising Winter Troupe’s street act on Veludo Way. Homare was pretending to be the equivalent of William Shakespeare, which didn’t require much acting to begin with. People loved it, though! Tsumugi couldn’t contribute since he had a study session. Maybe academics were really wearing him down, he looked more tired than ever.

“Hi, is this a friend of Tsumugi’s?” A woman with a worried voice asked. Tasuku put the flyers down as he held the phone, concerned, as he caught Azuma’s eyes staring intently. Had he always besn this curious? He usually minded his business.

“Yes, is everything okay?” Tasuku questioned, watching as Azuma made a graceful exit from the act as he made his way to Tasuku’s side. Tilting his head to the side, Azuma caught Tasuku’s face pale. Muttering a quick thanks and asking to be texted some address, Tasuku immediately started his car parked on the side without wasting a moment. Before he could run off, Azuma gripped Tasuku’s forearm and narrowed his eyes.

“What just happened?” Azuma inquired, his gut feeling proving him right when Tasuku shook his head. Stepping back, Azuma sighed as he notified Homare and Hisoka of their departure. When Azuma shuffled into the passenger seat, there was no time to put on his seatbelt as Tasuku punched in the address into the GPS and sped off.

“It’s Tsumugi, isn’t it?” Azuma cursed, holding onto the armrest as Tasuku’s grip on the wheel tightened. Tasuku didn’t take his eyes off the road.

“How’d you know?” Tasuku questioned, his voice carrying for miles. It sounded like an order, but Azuma fell silent and focused on the cars driving by. Tasuku swore before hitting the dashboard, making Azuma jump in his seat.

“How did you know?” Tasuku demanded again, even louder, as Azuma whipped his head to face him angrily.

“It’s not my place to say!” Azuma countered, immediately covering his mouth with his hand when he revealed there was something going on. Tasuku flinched, knowing it was the first time Azuma even raised his voice in fear of straining his vocal chords.

The rest of the car ride was silently tense. Azuma couldn’t help but shudder when he saw Tasuku carry a passed–out Tsumugi to lay in the back seat.

Tsumugi slept for the first time in a while. He woke up to something else other than his alarm.

Your text tone sounded. Tasuku checked the message, this time.

YOU DON’T NEED A BOYFRIEND,

TRUTH IS, YOU NEED A THERAPIST

You: I’m so sorry, Tsumugi. I like someone else, I’m sorry.

You started dating that friend of yours two days after Tsumugi officially called it quits on your friendship.

Tsumugi couldn’t sleep, all he could dream about was you. Tsumugi stopped setting alarms. Tasuku always turned them back on.

Life went on, for you.

[academiadaisies]

my struggles with studying

I don’t expect a lot of people to read this, and I’ll probably end up embarrassed to have typed this all up and posted it by tomorrow, but I think it’s important for me to get this out and away from myself.

I appreciate anyone who reads this, and welcome completely anyone who is/has been in a similar situation to me and wants to talk about it or has some tips. I don’t have a lot of people to talk to about it, I definitely feel like anyone I’m close to will not be a lot of help, and I don’t want to be a mental burden, with them knowing my problem, wanting to help, but not knowing what to do, and blah blah blah... Just know, anyone is completely welcome to reach out to me. I know a lot of people say that online, but I’m just a little cancer moon, cancer rising ;). I’ve got ears and struggles too. Sometimes things are difficult. :)) <3

School has always been my demise. I was basically a corpse just going class to class, making little contribution and writing down what the powerpoint said. I would zone out - not realising at all, come back to myself and suddenly the whole class was doing work, and I would have to swallow my pride, interrupt the person next to me and ask what we were supposed to do.

But my nights were wasted too. I guess I was never really taught to study, and everything I had tried for myself never seemed to work. But I didn’t try often. I remember coming home and turning on my computer to watch the next episodes of my show of the week, my mind in a dull and empty buzz, and next thing I knew it was midnight.

Growing up there was no schedule or routine. No one was really checking I had done my homework, no one checking I was showered or that I had brushed hair. There were no rules either. No specific screen time, no food rules, no bedtime. I know why, my mum was a very hard worker, having a daughter, a job, and university, and I am so grateful for her. She was busy. But it just meant I never knew much discipline. There was no structure, but I wasn’t forgotten. There was no food in the house, but there was money, and I - having no sense of diet - would spend more than was good for me on junk; a six pack of crisps a day, frozen pizza... and today that has never ended, it’s something of an addiction now. The lack of restraint and discipline is apparent everywhere in my life.

In school is where it is at it’s absolute worst. It’s not even an issue of my intelligence. The absolute last thing I want to come across as is conceited, but I did better than I deserved my first two years of high school exams having never studied for them, except maybe a bit of rereading and desperate attempts to memorise the night before. I passed everything, bar one, and sometimes with A’s.

But last year was inarguably my worst year ever, and it has bled into this year too. My attendance was below 50%, I came in maybe two or three days a week, sometimes only finally getting the motivation to show up in the afternoon, and even then I would hide away in pupil support classes, still not doing any work. My mum phoning me and screaming down the line as soon as she got the absent text. Me not knowing how to explain that I just couldn’t physically force myself to get up and ready. I started with 5 subjects and finished with 2, both of which I initially failed, but those grades were redacted because people argued the SQA were not grading fairly, basing grades on location instead of merit, and so I scraped by with two C’s. I absolutely would not have passed if not for the pandemic.

This year is hard to tell where I would be in a normal situation. I like to believe it was going to be so much better. The idea of leaving high school and entering college*. It was a fresh start. I was supposed to get my work done the day it was handed out, I was supposed to be more extroverted, and become a leader like I always wanted. But, of course, it’s all online. I think a major benefit of it is I don’t have much excuse not to be in class anymore. I can (and usually do) wake up minutes before the class starts, and do it all from bed, so if I was left to my own devices to get myself there and back, I’d bet my attendance has skyrocketed from what I it would have been. Though, my college is quite far, and I think my mum seeing to that I was on a bus, or even not in the house when she has to leave, would have been enough to ensure I was there too. If it was in person I would have no where to hide too. I wouldn’t get to have my camera off and play games during classes and not take notes, the lecturers would see. I’d have to take notes and I don’t usually do that. I wish I had. But then that just begs the question of would it be a repeat of high school? Would I be a corpse that goes through college classes blankly instead of high school ones? I really don’t know what to think. But today my college work is suffering. I have seven vital pieces of work long overdue, and I think the weight of all of them on my brain stops me from doing even one.

*If you’re not familiar with the system here, college is basically a stage after high school but below university in Scotland, that not everybody goes to. I’m not sure the school systems everywhere in the world but it’s not the equivalent of sixth form college in England, or what’s called college in the US, which would be university here. I’m sorry if this sounds dumb because there’s probably this everywhere in the world but I just want to clarify what stage I’m at exactly. I’m taking a HNC which is kind of the equivalent of first year university.

And so it leads me to believe I have ADD/ADHD. I really am not about to self diagnose. Although it might be enough for some, I often worry I’m a bit of a paranoid person, and that I like to jump to the most “extreme” conclusions, but I don’t think my livelihood makes it totally unlikely.

I find myself devoting my time and what motivation I have to things that just don’t matter. I’ve memorised maps of the US, Europe, Scotland and Ireland. I took up interests in religion and astrology, buying crystals as if they were coming to save me like all the TikToks say. I’ve taught myself bits of piano, British Sign Language, chess, Teeline shorthand and Morse code, just to give up. I even made it to 100 days on Duolingo learning Scottish Gaelic before I stopped that too. Engrossed in wide varieties of things that I’d love to be great at, abandoning it because I’ve decided I’m bored.

But the worst waste of my time is always spent on my phone. I am a huge advocate for downtime, not every single second has to be productive. But it’s never good to have a 12 hour daily screen time average.

I can never concentrate either. I can’t force myself to. As I write this I have an essay due I’ve had for a month, and I’m going to have to do it all tomorrow. I don’t understand why I can’t physically force myself to get it done. I always think, “why am I on TikTok when I have an essay due?” And I never really have a reason. Even my driving instructor told me to get tested because, especially nearing the end of the lessons, my attention starts to waver, and I find her having to change gears for me sometimes, and warning me to stop looking at whatever might pass by.

I have a little list of priorities in my mind too. I keep reminding myself that I have this essay and this assignment to do, but I also have ideas of starting a blog or reading a book. The school work is first in the list of priorities, I know it needs to be done first and so I take it to the extreme and can’t seem to do anything meaningful at all until it’s gone. Of course, it never is gone, I never do it, and I find myself scrolling social medias all day, a perfectly anodyne time waster. No substance and no thoughts.

But I’m a perfectionist too, with very little confidence. I can tell part of me puts it off because it needs to be as good as it possibly can be, and another part tells me I’ll start it later, I’ll feel better about it later. I have big ideas, that if only I could force myself to do, would be great, but the idea of it not being good enough only puts me off. I’d not do the work until it’s at the point where the excuse is “it’s only bad because I didn’t give myself enough time to do it,” because of the fear of the possibility “it’s bad because I’m bad at it.”

Part of my inability to really do anything I think also had to do with depression. ADD/ADHD makes my life chaos. My room is a mess, there is no organisation or structure in my day, there is no motivation to fix it, no understanding of how to fix it. I’m a very intuitive person, because I have to be. Any decision I make is unknown to me until it’s happening really. I can’t plan when I’m starting work, sometimes I just have to hope I get the motivation to open my laptop. I think depression feeds off the ADD/ADHD symptoms. My room is messy because I can’t be organised, then my mindset worsens because I have such a terrible, unlivable space with no motivation to do anything about it, and it just stays that way. I can’t concentrate long enough to do work, then my mindset worsens because it means I have work overdue, that will have bad consequences, people disappointed in me, and etc, etc. I’m sorry, I don’t think I’m articulating myself well here. I’m intuitive in decisions but I’m also an overthinker. Or maybe just more of a worrier. I don’t do the work and so, every time my phone pings I jump and check cautiously because I fear it’s my lecturer messaging me that I’m off the course. The depression really took a terrible toll on my life. I won’t get too into it but I can hardly talk to friends, find the motivation to shower, or even go outside. All I find myself doing is lying in bed staring at a screen. I don’t know what else I can really do about it.

And the worst part is, in my mind, I have myself convinced that it’s not even that bad. That it’ll be okay tomorrow, I’ll change tomorrow, as if I’m not long past the point of this just being a little off day.

But one thing I do I know is a symptom of ADD/ADHD, which consumes my whole mind, is my hyperfixation. I won’t go too deep but basically for just over a year it’s been an honestly unsubstantial book I read. Loved by many, but nothing special, in comparison. I’ve only read it maybe twice all the way through but it never leaves my mind. I relish in any and all fan works, stalking the ao3 works, refreshing the tumblr tag. I can just stand and jump and pace, while listening to one song on repeat, thinking about the characters in all kinds of scenarios for hours on end. I can imagine the main character as me in everything I do; as I pick up a book from my bookshelf, as I walk my dog, as I lay down at night. I constantly compare myself to him too, feeling bad that I’m not as similar or good. I hate it. I don’t know if I even like the book anymore, I don’t think it’s possible to tell, I’m just obsessed with it.

I don’t know what I’m supposed to do about it really. The NHS don’t diagnose ADHD in adults, and I’m only 18. I’ve been this way my whole life but no one ever paid much attention to it. When I told my mum I think I have depression, she laughed at me, then got really angry, saying I’m not depressed just lazy, before buying me flowers and telling me she was worried I was going to hurt myself. Now I feel like I can’t speak about anything serious like this rationally because she looks for every reason that there is no problem, and if there is it’s the worst possible case, and “oh I’ve been a terrible mum.”

I don’t understand my problem. I have big dreams and goals for my life, I know what I am doing now will never get me anywhere but still that knowledge is not enough to get me to do what I need to. I’ve even written this post over eight days, for all the distractions and lack of motivation I’ve had to finish it. It’s a never ending cycle, but I really hope having this out there now will spark something in me. I’m sure this will make someone feel better about their situation now too, and that’s totally okay! If it can help someone, right? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I’m sorry I probably brought up a lot of completely irrelevant stuff, and went into tangents at times, but I just wanted to stress how it all plays into each other. They’re all connected, which brings a lack of motivation and discipline to my life and my work. I just want to let it all go.

Again, I really don’t think many people will read this but anyone is completely welcome to message. If anyone has some tips for people who can just never concentrate, or also anyone who is in social sciencey type courses (psychology, sociology, politics esp) and has some tips for doing that too I’d be so grateful. :) <3 (also this is a repost because I tried posting last night but it wouldn’t go to the tag, hope it works this time)

[sennextheassasinkingoflight]

Red Pens and Keyboards

For those of you who prefer this format to having to click a link and go to Ao3.  Cursed Coffee Shop AU. Lancewain Rated T for minor swearing and suggestive themes.  Summary: Lancelot is a new writer. Gawain is his editor. They meet outside the office for once at a nook in the wall coffee shop. A little bit of chaos ensues. Percival is the the one with the relationship knowledge in this one. His dad needs to ask Lancelot out already. 

Lancelot ran. He was fucked. This was the third time in as many weeks he had been late for meeting his editor. It hadn’t been a common occurrence until lately. For months he had been on time, but the last few weeks he’d been feeling increasingly more inspired and had been staying up later and later to write. That was in his opinion a valid reason for being late of course. He had overslept. Again. He was currently working fulltime and then some during the day and when he returned home at night he wrote. Last night he had been especially inspired, the same way he had been the last three times he’d been meant to meet with Gawain. He didn’t think too deeply as to why the inspiration was linked to these nights, but he certainly would not push it away. 

He jumped over a large puddle in the middle of the sidewalk and nearly slipped. Righting himself he carried on, satchel thrown over his shoulder and nose tucked into his greying scarf. Grimacing he hoped that the rain wouldn't ruin the manuscript and his laptop. He’d forgotten his umbrella because of course he did. He ducked around the corner and, avoiding the drip edge of the shop roofs, bolted towards the coffee shop at the end of the block. The problem, he mused, with being a brand new and unknown author is that it didn’t provide an income that was live able. He had self published and had a meager following. Then one day a man had called and offered to take him on Pro Bono. It was a risky move for Gawain to have taken and Lancelot was certain this would be the last straw. Stopping outside Nemos he gathered himself, rain splashing on his face. He looked through the water speckled window for the brown haired man. He couldn't help but smile to himself when he saw him tucked in the back corner table. Gawain was well put together and wearing that green sweater that absolutely did not highlight his eyes or make him look a hundred times more attractive. Lancelot blushed to himself and shook his head. He was half an hour late and looked like shit in comparison. He had thrown his hair hastily into a bun, and knew he had circles that rivaled a raccoon's mask ringing his eyes. Taking a breath and setting his features to polite indifference he entered the store with his shoulders squared. If he was going to lose this gig, better do it with dignity. He approached the table where Gawain was tapping away on his laptop. Swallowing he opened his mouth to speak. Gawain, of course, chose that moment to make eye contact with him and smile. The words died in his suddenly very dry throat. His composure breaks just a touch with it. “Over sleep again?” “Uhm.” He sounded very dumb but Gawain just laughed. “The writing bug got you last night, then?” “Definitely.” He said sitting in the adjacent chair. Why wasn’t he getting his ass chewed?  “I apologize. I’ve wasted your time.” “Nonsense. It happens when one works in our business. I can edit just as well here as my office so I’ve been working. Besides, you're my only meeting today.” The editor said putting his laptop aside. “Did you bring the printed version for me?” “Just like you asked.” “Very good, go grab some coffee so you look like you could use it.”  Lancelot nodded and left the table as Gawain set to work with his pen. He wondered if the man knew how adorable he was with his face screwed up in concentration, pen resting idly against his very kissable lips. Lancelot rubbed his face. He really needed some caffeine. That was his editor. Nothing more. Despite his serious caffeine addiction, Lancelot did not drink coffee. Tea and energy drinks were his go to, and this being a coffee shop changed nothing. He ordered a hot extra strong, meaning very bitter, black tea. He couldn’t be bothered to care what kind, or brand, only that it was strong. He rubbed his numb fingers together in a poor attempt to regain blood flow. It stung when he was handed the almost too hot cup of tea. He lifted it to his lips and thought better of it. He did not need to scald his tongue and make a fool of himself. The embarrassment of being late was enough. Turning back towards the table he stopped. There was a young boy engaged in conversation with Gawain. He recognized him from the photos in his office. The office that they currently were not meeting in. He brushed the thought aside to be evaluated at a later time and worked his way back to the couple. “How much longer?” The boy asks as though it’s an innocent question. “You’ve got somewhere to be?” Gawain is far from moved by the question, eyes barely leaving the papers in front of him. “No, but I'm bored.” He stretches the “r” and lands hard on the “d”as if to emphasize his point. “You asked to come with me Percival.” And that must be Gawain's dad voice, because the man sounds about as done as done can be with this line of conversation. At least he assumes he's the boy's father. “I know. But really this place is bloody awful, it smells like burnt coffee.” If one's voice could sound like an eye roll that was definitely it. “Percival!” Even Lancelot straightens his spine at the stern tone. “Sorry.” He wants to laugh, the boy isn’t wrong so he bites his lip and smiles, tucking his nose back into his scarf. Quietly so as not to interrupt the conversation, but definitely noticed he sets his drink down and pulls his laptop out. They have a system, Gawain edits, he writes, then he makes those edits on the digital copy. But Gawain likes him to be present for the editing, which is why they go chapter by chapter. He promises that he will read it all at once when it's finished as a final edit and continuity check and that's good enough for Lance. He isn’t the editor after all.  Gawain sighs and it brings him from his thoughts. He looks up from the login screen he's been staring at. He should do that eventually. “Lancelot, this is Percival, Percival meet Lancelot.” “Nice to meet you.” He holds out his hand and the boy takes it politely. “You're sure this isn’t a date? Because you never meet people outside your office.”  Lancelot feels his face burn and pointedly doesn’t look at Gawain. That is definitely interesting knowledge to possess. The silence that follows lasts a beat or three to long. “I am technically working. And for the record Percival, dates don’t always occur by going out .  Now, we have work to do, so here is my laptop, you know the rules, fix your boredom.” The boy rolls his eyes and takes the offered electronic. “Sorry about that.” Gawain murmurs halfheartedly, eyes cast at the manuscript before him, pen twirling in his fingers, and face unmistakably flushed. “That's alright. He’s your son, right?” “Adopted, yes. His parents were good friends of mine.” “I’m sorry.” “Thank you. He seems to be adjusting well.” He tracks Gawain's gaze to the dirty blond boy and smiles. “He seems like a spit fire.” “He is. With a foul tongue at that.”  They share a laugh over it. Lancelot changes the subject after. He’s a little unsure where the boundaries are and decides to play it safe by speaking about work. “There's two chapters there… I managed a full chapter last night, and then some.” “That's impressive. How much sleep did you end up getting then?” “Uhm… I think four hours or so.”  He squirms under the scrutiny of Gawain's gaze, and withers at the deadpan admonishment that he receives. “It's a wonder your heart doesn’t give out, between your caffeine addiction and lack of sleep.” He nods. There isn’t an argument in his favor. Swallowing he starts again, “If we don’t get through it all that's fine. I just figured I would bring it since I have it.” “I’m grateful you did. One chapter never seems quiet enough. Reminds me of some of the stories I read online. I may be an editor, but I am highly impatient when it comes to stories I enjoy.” “Online, as in self published stuff? Or… fanfiction?”  Gawain tilts his head and smirks, “Both.” “Oh my god. Is that how you found me?”  He panics, heart racing in his chest as he thinks about everything he's ever posted. Maybe his pseudonyms hadn’t been different enough if Gawain had found him. Or maybe he hadn’t put it together that the Weeping Monk and The Gray Monk were the same writer. Even when he had self published he hadn’t had the courage to do so under his real name, more accustomed to running around with usernames and gamer tags. “You did self publish via Amazon. And I am always looking for good writers, Monk.” He wants to die. He can feel the burn of embarrassment spread up his neck and slither across his cheeks. He doesn’t know if Gawain knows but that doesn’t stop his brain from running down every possibility in 10 seconds flat. And if he didn’t put it together he sure as hell could now. He’d as good as admitted that he writes for fandoms. Gawain takes mercy on him and chuckles lightly before turning back to his work. Horrified, Lancelot takes a long drink from his still too hot, very bitter tea. Today has been insane and it's only 9:56. He needs to go back to bed. He licks his lips and turns to his laptop. He needs to write. He’s certain that if he can just bury himself in the world he has created for long enough the embarrassment and stray thoughts about asking Gawain out will leave him alone. With some effort he manages to zone out of the coffee shop around them, the sounds and smells fading into the background. His tea goes cold while he works. Patrons have begun flooding the shop for the lunch rush and he doesn't notice it, nor does he notice the muffin that's sitting beside him now. What he does notice is that his character's love interest is starting to resemble his own quiet vividly. Angrily he highlights the section and deletes it with a growl. Can’t have that. What would Gawain think? He has no idea what Gawain's preference is, and the other man hasn’t given much in the way of indication in the matter… not that Lancelot is great at picking up on it anyways. He starts the section over. He focuses on the click clack of his keyboard and writes Gavin slightly differently. It’s not working and he sighs defeated. He should really change the name too. This is his introduction chapter. Gawain hasn’t seen it. There's still time. He’s about to stand and stretch, take a drink of his tea and ask about Gawain's progress when all movement in Nemos stops. “ Why do they have a magic portal in the bathtub? ” Gawain's shocked tone is loud enough that he recoils away from it. He makes eye contact and sucks in a breath. Have Gawain's eyes always been this green? They are shiny with water. Was he going to cry? Laugh? Wait there was a question he was probably supposed to answer. “Uh, comedy? Magic?”  Gawain actually glares at him, and he takes a slow measured drink from very cold tea. That was apparently very much not the right answer. He swallows with difficulty, because how can those eyes be this distracting right now. He ignores the spike of arousal it sends down his spine. Nope. This is very much not the correct environment for this. He looks around the room casually. “Lancelot?” “I wrote myself into a corner and needed a convenient way for my protagonist to escape. It seemed clever when I wrote it. Apparently not.” He shrugs and turns back to his laptop. “I can fix it later, when I have more sleep in my system.” “I, no. I,” Gawain reaches across the table and grabs his wrist. He looks up at the man, hurt must be written on his face, because Gawain frowns at him. “I think it’s brilliant and very funny. I just was so unprepared for it. The rest of the book has been so serious and the magic has been all designed for the purposes of combat. I’m concerned you’ll need to go back and fix that or offer an explanation in the following chapters.— “ Gawain's hand is surprisingly calloused and very warm against his own inherently cool skin. He tries not to focus on the point of contact but can't help it. He desperately wants to turn his hand over and hold the others more correctly. He knows Gawain is telling him something important but he can't seem to get his mind to follow what's being said. The contact is a bit much, more than he has had in some time and he is loath to do anything that might break it; so, he nods hoping that it's sufficient for whatever Gawain has just asked. He knows his throat won't push out the air required for speech, even if he willed it with all his being. He tilts his head and licks his lips and gets lost in Gawain's gaze. He has no idea at all what is being said now and can’t seem to get his mind to focus. Percivals' voice is what finally gets his attention. The boy is all attitude when he speaks. “Not a date? You two look like you should be kissing each other senseless. Holding hands and all. You're so embarrassing Gawain. Can I have the power cord, it's been hours and the damn thing is going to die.” Slowly he comes back to himself and glances down at his arm. Gawain rubs his thumb over the skin on the back of his wrist, exposed from removing his jacket at some point, and then pulls away. “If you ask politely.”  Gawain says, unfazed save for the slight pink tinging his neck. “Fine, Can I please have the power cord for the laptop, Gawain?” The boy says rolling his eyes and giving a full body shrug. It’s not polite but Gawain's eyes are full of amusement as he digs in his bag for the cord. “Alright, here.” Gawain hands it over, from the depths of his bag. Gawain watches the boy go, and turns back ready to say something but Lancelot is quicker. “Whose muffin?” “Oh, huh, uh  yours if you want it. I got one for Percival and I a bit ago and figured you hadn’t eaten.” Gawain laughs out sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “Oh, uh, you guessed correctly. Thank you.” He pulls the muffin closer with an awkward smile. “Don’t mention it. I was happy too. Though I wasn’t sure what kind you liked, so I went with lemon. I thought it might compliment the tea.”  He follows the casual gesture with his eyes, and flicks them back to the others face. “It’s one of my preferences. You guessed correctly. You seem to be on a streak for that today.” “That’s good.” Gawain says with a wry smile, all his confidence seeming to leave in an instant. Lancelot frowns. He doesn’t think anything he said should have that kind of effect. He tears a piece off of the muffin and chews it slowly, noting the way Gawain tracks the movement. Feeling a little like prey under the others gaze he manages a weak, “You didn’t poison it did you. I mean if my writing is that bad…” He trails off as the other snorts. Good, this is better. He doesn’t like it when Gawain frowns; it doesn’t suit him at all, and he definitely has too many lines from doing it too often. Gawain shakes his head and smiles at him. “Nothing of the sort. I enjoy the eccentricities of it. I was just thinking…” “About?” He takes another bite to fill the silence, and again Gawain tracks the movement and suddenly Lancelot thinks that he wasn’t wrong about the times he glanced up and thought he’d been being watched. It had happened a lot in the office, but more today. “If I’m three for three.” “That depends on what you're guessing.”  He shrugs and takes a drink of tea, grimaces from the bitterness. Cold tea always seems more bitter to him than it does when it's hot. He waits patiently for Gawain to supply his guess. The man's face changes emotions several times in the process. He opens his mouth and closes it several times, frowning and then focusing, like a fish out of water. He’s finished both his muffin and his tea by the time Gawain finally say’s what it is he wants to say. “I’m guessing that if I asked you out you’d say yes.”  Gawain stares him down, and Lancelot for his part does not let his emotions get the better of him. He keeps his face stoic and posture rigid. “That depends.”  Gawain swallows and he follows the bob of his Adam's apple with hungry eyes. Lets them linger at Gawain's collar for a moment and then brings them slowly back to his eyes, lingering on his lips momentarily; predatory where before he had been prey. “On?” Gawain asks a waver in his voice. “If you’ll make me breakfast.”  No one said he was good at flirting. “I think I can arrange that. Someone has to make sure you eat more than caffeine and sugar.” Amusement sparkles in his eyes. “Hmmm…. I think that depends on if you like me as a member of the undead or not.” “Being dead could have some, how shall we say, negative effects.” The suggestively raised eyebrow does it for Lancelot. He feels his composure fracture as he hangs his head and laughs. Any chance of continuing their work is gone with it, lost in the early afternoon chaos of their favorite coffee shop.

[andaleduardo]

How to Break Your Heart and Make Sure It Stays Broken

2. Send them your favorite songs through Bluetooth    

- Read on ao3

Summary:  12:28 a.m.

Spaghetti: It’s not gonna be weird today

Richie: absolutely

Spaghetti: We’re not gonna make it awkward

Richie: definitely not

Spaghetti: Yeah we got this

Everything is just fucking fine.

7th January 2011, Friday

10:30 a.m.

“Congratulations, you just called the best family in town. What can I help you with?”

“Hu-hey Richie.”

“Billy boy! Happy birthday, man!”

The sound of Bill’s chuckles turn into wind over the phone. “Thanks.”

“So, what’s up?”

“I wanted to check if you’re s-ss-still coming today?”

“Course I am, what time do you want me there?”

“Come around 3. It’s t-too cold to go out so we’re just guh-gonna stay in the attic.”

“Well alright, chap. I’ll be there.”

“And don’t forget my dad’s driving everyone home.”

Richie did, in fact, forget about that.

“Oh yeah, right.”

There’s a second of silence before Bill speaks again. “Are you okay? You huh-haven’t been online lately.”

“Just peachy. You know how it gets, holiday season, kinda busy ‘round here.”

Although Bill knows Richie usually spends the holidays with just his parents (small family’s downside) he doesn’t say anything.

“We’ll have s-some fun today, don’t worry.”

“Indeed we will. See you at 3, birthday boy.”

“See you, Rich.”

And he hangs up.

  12:28 a.m.

Spaghetti: It’s not gonna be weird today

Richie: absolutely

Spaghetti: We’re not gonna make it awkward

Richie: definitely not

Spaghetti: Yeah we got this

  Richie is absolutely exhausted.

The entire week was a failed attempt at learning how to deal with the situation.

Sleep is an utter joke with a mind that runs as if it’s training for a marathon. Looking at food makes him nauseous, not eating food makes him nauseous, but eating it makes it worse.

Perhaps it would help if he could untie the knot in his throat, but then again he can’t cry properly when his parents are always around and poking a head through his bedroom door.

He wants school to start, he doesn’t want school to start. He wants them to go back to work, he doesn’t want to be left alone with his feelings.

And on top of it all he knows he’s overreacting. Absolutely over-the-top reacting. He’s fifteen. It’s not like he knows love.

But doesn’t he?

It hurts and it’s love. It burns as it makes its way up his throat and it’s love. It was amazing while he kept his mouth shut and now everything seems to be falling on him and his chest is heavy and caving and hungrier than his stomach and he caused it and it’s love.

Unrequited love, if you will. A fancy word for a fucked up thing.

To top it off, Eddie doesn’t stop.

 January 1st, 3:45 p.m.

Spaghetti: I hate you

Spaghetti: No wait I don’t hate hate you

Spaghetti: But

Spaghetti: Ugh

Spaghetti: I’m gonna be thinking about this now!

Spaghetti: And I don’t want us to change

Spaghetti: Like, I said “I hate you” and I would never second guess that before but now I feel like I need to tell you “I don’t actually hate you” because

Spaghetti: Well

Spaghetti: I don’t know why

Richie: sorry

Spaghetti: !

Spaghetti: Stop apologizing

Richie: … i really wanna say sorry again

Spaghetti: I don’t blame you

Spaghetti: It’s not like we control our feelings

 Damn right, they don’t. Richie isn’t sure how to answer that, so he doesn’t. But Eddie brings it up again one day later.

 January 2nd, 9:10 p.m.

Spaghetti: I think I kinda knew

Richie: ??? are u serious

Spaghetti: Well yeah

Richie: am I that predictable?

Spaghetti: You’re the least predictable person in the whole world Richie

Spaghetti: Except with the mom jokes

Spaghetti: I can always see those coming

Richie: yet you walk right onto them every time

Spaghetti: Fuck you.

Spaghetti: It’s just that the others aren’t that subtle

Richie: the losers?

Spaghetti: Yeah they try too hard

Spaghetti: Tease us a lot for being close and saying things and leaving us alone everywhere

Spaghetti: Guess I kinda wondered why they did that if they didn’t know something I didn’t

Richie: uh, they kinda don’t tho

Richie: at least I never told them

Spaghetti: Wait really?

Richie: maybe they’re just bored?

Spaghetti: Oh

Spaghetti: Maybe

 It’s only been a week so far (the longest week of Richie’s life) and Eddie texts him every day with the same topic. This, as predicted, isn’t helping the situation much.

It’s Tuesday. There’s Richie, staring at his cereal while Maggie studies him from the other side of the table and surprise, a brand new text from Eddie.

It’s Wednesday. There’s Richie, staring at the news channel because he forgot to press the button on the tv remote when he sat down on the couch 6 minutes ago. And then there’s his dad, looking at him from his vintage recliner and coming up with ten different ways to start a conversation without actually starting one. The phone’s screen lights up with against his leg with a new notification. Yes, from Eddie.

Finally, it’s Friday. Out of habit, Richie leaves the phone on the bathroom countertop as he showers. It takes a lot of self-control not to pull all his hair out while washing it when the phone vibrates against the counter. Once, then twice, then thrice. And so on to make up the total of 9 new messages.

Thank God he doesn’t walk out of the shower right then to check them out of curiosity, because 10 minutes later he’s sitting on the toilet seat and staring at “I hate you” for so long his mom actually knocks on the door and asks if he died in there.

He didn’t die in there, he’s just crying. Buy hey, mom, that’s the dream!

All the messages fall in the same lines. Eddie doesn’t want this to be awkward. He doesn’t want this to be weird. He doesn’t want anything to change.

Logically, Richie draws conclusions. He fucked up big, ruined them forever and now everything is inconvenient for Eddie. It’s not that hard to get it after six variations of:

 ‘You’re not gonna be different around me now right?’

 How can he not be different around Eddie now?

What if their knees touch and Eddie thinks it’s on purpose? What if Richie smiles in his direction and Eddie takes it as flirting? Christ. Richie doesn’t even know how to flirt! Should he sit far away from him now? Should he sit by his side like always and have Eddie think he’s doing it out of interest?

Richie didn’t just make everything inconvenient for Eddie, he made everything inconvenient for himself, too.

However, it’s Bill’s birthday, and that’s more important than a broken heart.

  5:48 p.m.

 “You’re cheating!” Everyone jumps on their seats when Stan shouts and slams his hand on the coffee table. It sends all the plastic houses on the monopoly board in different directions.

“What? No I’m not!” Bev defends herself.

“Nah.” Mike crosses his arms. “I don’t believe that.”

“You don’t believe she’s cheating?” Stan angrily inquires.

“I don’t believe she’s not cheating.” Says Mike.

“I am not fucking cheating, you guys are just awful at managing money.”

Stan’s chin drops in her direction. “You- I manage money wonderfully, thank you very much-”

While the arguing continues, Ben takes his time putting all the houses back on their places. Bill tries to make them stop fighting while Mike destroys all those attempts by teaming up with Bev and Stan alternately. Eddie furiously counts and recounts his money, being the one closest to bankrupt. And Richie silently organizes the contents of the bank. He doesn’t like monopoly that much.

“Maybe our bank over there has something to do with this?” Richie feels everyone’s eyes on him so he looks up at Mike from above his glasses.

“How could you ever think such things about me, Mikey?” He dramatically puts down the stack of property cards he had been sorting. “I do nothing but humble work for this community and this is how I’m treated. Unbelievable.”

“Richie, I swear.” Stan glares at him. “You won’t make me lose, even if you cheat.”

“How can I be cheating? I’m not even playing.”

“You’re passing Bev extra money!”

“Geez.” Eddie moans in annoyance. “We forgot Stan gets off on Monopoly.”

At that, Richie barks out a laugh, unable to keep it in but still trying to by slapping a hand over his mouth.

“Okay, fine.” Stan crosses his arms. “I wasn’t even the one suggesting this game, I voted for scrabble.”

“Oh, so the only other game you get off on?” Surprisingly, it slips from Richie’s mouth. He wasn’t at all expecting jokes to be coming from him today.

It’s just wonderfully entertaining to piss off Stan. At this point, the boy’s gotten himself so worked up that his whole face is pink.

“I’m going to shove birthday cake up your a-”

“-Wow! Okay let’s all chill.” Ben kindly tries to stop them.

Richie lifts up a hand full of fake-cash and makes a jerking off motion with the other, which finally triggers Stan into motion. He manages to jump away from the table on the exact moment Stan reaches over to try and jam his hand on his weakest spot, the armpits. But in the process, his knees collide with the bottom of the coffee table and all the board pieces end up flying everywhere. Again.

Ben throws his hands up. “Thank you so very much for that.”

“We will never f-ffinish a monopoly game…”

  6:23 p.m.

“How about Uno?” Ben suggests. “You can’t cheat at Uno, right?”

After being chased by Stan around the attic everyone ended up scattered around, staring at the ceiling and discussing which game to play next. So far it’s been twenty minutes of quiet chatting.

“You can grab three cards when you get a plus four.” Richie offers. “You can also slide in a six while playing some nines, might get lucky.”

There’s a brief second of silence and contemplation.

“How you can turn Uno into a sex joke still amazes me.” Eddie frowns at the ceiling.

Richie shrugs. “I’m pretty amazing overall.” Sweat pools up on the back of his neck with the effort of trying to sound so nonchalant. Richie wants to scream at the normality of his afternoon. Why does life keep going when you’re dealing with heartache? Isn’t the world supposed to stop spinning after you get friendzoned? Show a little compassion, earth.

“I still can’t believe your mom let you keep the phone.”

At Mike’s words, Eddie flops around on his bean bag, looking like a hanged potato sack. “Right? Didn’t see that coming, either.”

“Does she really go through it, though?”

Recently, Eddie’s contact list was updated to include everyone. His mom complained that he didn’t need to be in contact with “those friends” of his any more than he already does. She’s obviously wrong.

Eddie groans in agreement. “She keeps finding the lamest excuses until I give it to her. Then she checks whatever it is she wants and gives it back.”

A wave of fear passes through Richie. Almost on cue, Eddie steals a glance at him and adds. “But I archive the stuff she doesn’t need to read. And I keep Facebook as a hidden app.” Proud of his schemes, he smirks to himself.

Richie sinks back on his bean bag, slightly relieved. The past week of awful sleep is weighting him down, tying him to his worst and holding him back from pretending to be okay a little better. With time, he hopes to learn how to put this behind his back, but right now, Eddie is right in front of him.

“Hey, by the way. Can any of you tell me how to download songs?” The boy at matter asks.

“You know thu-that’s illegal, r-right?”

“Oh.” For a moment, he stares at Bill with a conflicted expression. “Well, I still want my music.”

“Richie, don’t you have a fuck ton of songs downloaded?”

“Yup. Illegal downloads are my number one occupation, Marsh.” Then, he gets it. “Oh, you’re right. Eds, turn Bluetooth on.”

He regrets saying ‘Eds’ oh so quickly, overly nervous that he isn’t allowed to say it anymore. Not that he was ever allowed to say it before, if the way Eddie complains about it 90% of the time means anything. Quickly, Richie spirals into thoughts of their bickering coming to an end, or even worse, becoming one sided and sad if one of them doesn’t feed into it. That would leave the other one hanging, and Richie was already left hanging, Richie is still hanging and he will be hanging on these feelings, on this rejection, for life. That’s what he has to accept, that he loves the only person in the world he could ever love and they don’t love him back. That his future seems sad from the present. That Eddie might drift away when he realizes they can’t mess around like best friends anymore, even if he had said he wouldn’t do that and it wouldn’t happen. But what if he does? What if it happens? Where does that leave him? What is he supposed to-

“Don’t call me that, asshole. And how the fuck do I do that?”

Oh.

The way Eddie speaks drips of familiarity. Just the way it always was with them, just the way it will always be. Richie can’t decide if that’s good or bad, but it pulls him together enough to talk.

“See that weird looking B icon up there?” He waits for Eddie’s answer but the other boy is looking at his phone as if he could catch it on fire with just his eyes.

Richie bites the inside of his cheek, breathes in some bravery and pushes himself up from the bean bag.

“Here,” he walks over and crouches down at Eddie’s side, quickly opening the Bluetooth settings and pairing up their phones while paying too much attention to the space between their hands. Just to make sure they don’t touch. “Do you wanna pick out the songs you want?” He starts giving his phone to Eddie but gets a headshake in return.

“Uh no, that’s fine.” Eddie says, turning his head and therefore putting their faces incredibly close. Richie barely catches himself from falling on his butt right there, and Eddie leans away quickly, obviously not meaning to cause any of this. “I- uh, just chose the ones you think I’d like.”

Richie nods stupidly and rushes back to his seat. While he goes through his music library and picks off songs, all he can think about is ‘This is so hard, too hard, way more difficult than I could possibly imagine and I don’t know if I can go about my life pretending everything is fine when it all feels anything but that.’

“How about Ludo? There’s no way you can cheat at that…”

Simply as if a switch was flipped, Richie multitasks and answers Ben by listing off all the possible ways to cheat at Ludo.

And to the outsider eyes, everything is just fine.

Everything is fine as they order pizza and Richie and Eddie have to ask each other if they can still share their regular favorite, olive and pepperoni. Everything is fine while conversation flows at dinner, except Richie puts his half of the pizza on a plate instead of sharing the box between their laps, and Eddie doesn’t question it. Everything is fine as everyone watches a movie after, and there’s no one to lean his head on Richie’s shoulder, or jab an elbow in his arm when they itch to comment certain scenes.

Then Bill’s dad comes upstairs to remind them it’s time to drive everyone home. And for the first time in his life, Richie is thrilled to hear those words.

On their way home, Eddie sits in the back, earphones plugging his ears deaf to his surroundings. Richie wonders if he should have left out all the love songs, now it’s too late for that. But it’s fine, right?

Everything is just fucking fine.

 perma taglist: @constantreaderfool   @mrs-vh  @eds-trashmouth @girasol-eddie  @reddieforlove @madi-personal  @cheekaspbrak

[kjmhj0429995486]

Perhaps a small winwin and kun college au?

okay this took me forever to get around to oops! hahahha this is honestly way too many words for nothing to really happen but I had fun writing it. would love to maybe continue this eventually!

tinder!au i guess??

kun despised the idea of dating apps. absolutely hated it. he always criticized the vanity and impermanence of meeting people online and stood by his ground that you could only find the perfect match in person. when kun created a tinder account under the influence of a few drinks and some very resilient friends on a friday night in, he still hated dating apps, but he’d admit now that maybe he was being a little early to judge.

kun wasn’t like his friends. ten lived for nights out and meeting new people and kissing boys he’d only just met. in a similar vein, lucas was always in a relationship, whether it being a fling that lasts a few weeks before he gets bored or one of his longer, more emotional engagements, kun has never known the man without someone on his arm. but kun was different. since they started college over three years ago now, he’d only kissed a handful of boys, maybe a girl or two in the beginning, and he’d only been in two relationships, both pretty long term relative to his friends. with the last one ending nearly a year ago, he couldn’t help but feel a little lonely; however, it wasn’t until the alcohol settled into his veins as he listened to stories of his friends’ most recent passionate endeavors during their guys’ night that he expressed this to anyone else.

“oh my god and then afterwards, he literally just, left me there. on the couch, naked. he didn’t even leave a blanket for me,” ten was a few shots in, speaking dramatically and drawing the most genuine reactions from his tipsy bestfriends as he spoke. “but oh my GOD did I even care after what that man had just done to me.”

kun never understood the hookup culture that his friends subscribed to, but he was happy for them; and they knew that, even if his snide remarks came off a little judgy. “i really can’t believe the situations you get yourself into sometimes,” kun laughed, shaking his head in disbelief. “like you really can’t tell me it was worth getting treated that way to have sex with someone you’ll never see again.”

“kun,” ten began, placing his hands on kun’s shoulders and looking him in the eye, feigning as much seriousness as he could muster in his current state. “you really really need to get laid already,” this made kun immediately roll his eyes and laugh softly in ten’s face. “actually you don’t even have to fuck him right away, but like you could really use a cute boy in your life, man,” he ended with a slight seriousness that hit home more than he would’ve expected. kun knew exactly why ten was saying what he was saying. obvious to his friends, he’d been really stressed lately with midterms and club activities and whatever else he managed to find to keep himself busy enough to not have time to worry about how he felt so incomplete; about how much better all the stressful things in his life would be if someone else was there to experience them with him.

“wait wait wait,” lucas intergected, his normal deep voice even more boisterous with the drinks in his system. “you should make a tinder.”

at this, ten’s eyes widened and he immediately perked up with the biggest smile on his face.

“absolutely not.” kun intended to shut this conversation down before the boys got any stupid ideas in their heads. he was a little late.

“kun pleaseeeee?” ten begged with full on puppy dog eyes. “you never know, the love of your life might be on there right now.”

kun pulled away from the grip ten still had on his shoulders and raised his eyebrows at his friends in an attempt to get his seriousness through their heads. “no way. you guys know how i feel about dating apps. i will happily wait a thousand years for the right man to meet me face to face if that’s what it takes.”

lucas was not convinced. “dude you haven’t had a boyfriend in months. literally all you do when you’re not with us is study. obviously that’s not making you any progress soulmate wise so like.. what’s the harm in giving it a go?”

neither was ten. “exactly. kun you deserve to find someone, you really do. worst case scenario you go on a couple of bad dates and we have something to laugh about, best case scenario you find someone you think you can fall in love with,” kun softens, just a bit, at the sincerity of ten’s words. for a second that is. “and yeah most of them suck but i promise there’s some high quality, top notch men on there if you look hard enough. trust me, i’ve found a couple myself,” he adds with a quick wink. when kun’s scowl returns to his face ten reverts to his previous tactic: puppy dog eyes. “pleassssse kun. you know we really just want the best for you.”

kun sighs, rolling his eyes begrudgingly at his defeat. “i can’t believe i’m saying this out loud but i guess i have been kind of lonely lately,” he begins, catching his friends’ hopeful attention. “not in like a sad kind of way but maybe in a ‘this would be better with someone else’ kind of way.”

that was enough for lucas to grab kun’s phone from its place on the coffee table and download the app before kun even had time to protest.

-

“awww he’s kinda cute.” ten said, clicking to view the full profile of a boy just a year younger than kun.

“he’s holding a dead fish.”

“you know what they say, the bigger the dead fish the bigger his...”

“literally no one has ever said that.”

“ugh fine. next.”

kun went to bed that night disappointed about to his expectations, if not a little more.

-

it wasn’t until three days later when kun was laying in bed after a busy school day that he even remembered he had downloaded the stupid app a few nights prior. after a brief battle between his strong opinions towards the dumb application sitting almost mockingly on his home screen and his skeptical curiosity, he unlocked his phone and opened the neglected app, the latter obviously winning out.

kun spent a few minutes swiping. he clicked each individual profile to get as solid of a read as he could on each guy before making his decision with a careful consideration, something he had definitely never seen either of friends apply to their tinder boy sprees. left. left. left. kun was growing ever more frustrated, none of the boys striking a chord with him. perhaps he was being a bit harsh with his standards but he really truly felt that he couldn’t see himself in a relationship with any of these men. left. left. left again. and that’s when he stopped. almost instinctively swiping on the next boy before a picture loaded before his eyes that made him rethink every criticism he had ever given his friends or their dumb app. this one was cute. more than cute. kun never really understood what the phrase “boyish charm” meant, but he knew this boy had it. he was beautiful in such an understated way. not aggressively attractive by conventional standards, but gorgeous and delicate and handsome in a way that kun thinks he could stare at for hours.

with a breath of fresh air, kun finally swiped right. he felt a brief wave of something akin to panic, or maybe excitement, wash over him when a screen he had yet to see appeared. “it’s a match! sicheng likes you too,” the screen read. kun couldn’t help the small smile that appeared on his face for a split second before he forced it into a scowl, unhappy that he had fallen into the trap of these dumb apps. soon after, kun put his phone down and went to bed. he hated the lingering curiosity about the boy that he knew nothing about, but let himself indulge in his own imagination for just a little while before falling asleep to the thought of having someone to call his.

-

the next day was busy for kun. between his four classes and studying for his upcoming midterms, he hadn’t even had a second to consider swiping mindlessly through tinder or messaging the single boy he had deemed worthy of his swipe. that was, until he was sat outside the dining hall, letting himself enjoy a few free minutes to eat dinner with ten and lucas. amidst lucas’ downward spiral into the stress of his classes and how much work he has to do, kun’s phone buzzes. he doesn’t want to be as distracted as he is from his friends’ problems by the notification his phone lights up with, but he can’t seem to fight the curiosity of what the tiny words that read “sicheng sent you a new message.” would reveal. kun decides to wait until he can give his full attention to the weird little crush that’s already begun brewing on the total stranger living in his phone. he locks his phone and puts it in his pocket before returning his attention to the people in his life he knows are actually real.

-

back in his dorm, kun immediately flops onto his bed. he scrolls aimlessly through twitter and instagram before finally landing back where he was last night. knowing that he has a ton of studying to do before bed, he clicks on the messages tab and indulges himself, maybe for a little longer than he means to.

kun: hmmm maybe if i deem you worthy

sicheng: and how do i obtain your approval oh great magician?

kun: well for starters

kun: you’re really cute so that gets your foot in the door

sicheng: 😳

kun: but it’s gonna take a little more than that unfortunately

sicheng: i can dance

sicheng: does that help?

sicheng: ooh and i have a dog

sicheng: but he lives with my parents :(

sicheng: or i can show you my anime figurine collection it’s pretty impressive

kun: haha honestly?

kun: i think you just might be worthy of two magic tricks😂

sicheng: you mean to tell me you know more than one magic trick????

sicheng: wait

sicheng: are you a wizard?

kun: not last i checked

kun: but i guess you’ll be happy to know that i actually know like

kun: 10 magic tricks

sicheng: whaaaaaat

sicheng: lol what point in your life did you not have any friends?

kun: middle school😔

kun: but it’s okay i came out stronger

sicheng: so now you have friends AND know magic?

sicheng: AND you’re hot??

sicheng: sounds kinda op to me

kun: well i’d say all of those are only kind of true

sicheng: i’m still impressed

kun: thank you

sicheng: ✌︎('ω'✌︎ )

kun absolutely hated the stupid smile that wouldn’t leave has face as he read back the boy’s replies. but, as he continued to slowly learn bits and pieces of the boy that didn’t exist to him until last night through conversation that came way more easily than he ever would’ve imagined, kun decides that maybe something special really could come from this after all.

[booksandgalore]

Mirrors of Pride [Yandere!BTS]

Foreword:

Taehyung's company is enjoyable when he isn't contemplating about the different shades of black-and-white filters. Sure, he cares too much about the number of likes he has on social media.

And, yes, maybe you have to reject taking pictures of him everytime he hands you his phone, but true friends stay with each other no matter what. You just need to overlook his growing vanity, and ignore all the warning signs when he starts talking about someone non-existent.

Author’s Note:

It’s my first time posting (cross-posting) a story on Tumblr! Bear with me as I navigate how to link, edit my layout, etc. Though if you do have an tips and/or pointers on how I can make my blog look more appealing, haha, then I’ll take them. Do leave a comment if you enjoyed it!

1

The blueberry gelato you purchased was going to melt soon, but you couldn’t even taste it until Taehyung had some pictures of himself with your gelato and his. Currently, you had snapped over fifty pictures, in different angles, too, and you got out of your seat to take more. The sweltering heat made your baby hairs stick on your forehead and all over your cheeks.

”Okay,” you said, handing his phone back. “What do you think?”

You stood behind his chair as you watched him scroll through the photos one-by-one. Taehyung kept zooming in on his face, only to pinch his fingers back out and focus on a minuscule detail like a wrinkle on the right sleeve of his clothing.

“Can you take more on your phone? Maybe it’ll be different,” he requested, peering up from his device to look at you, his neck craned back.

You ran your fingers through your hair and felt the sweat of your scalp through your fingertips. Although you took a shower this morning, you were going to have to shower again later.

Breathing deeply, you brought your phone out of your back pocket and snapped a picture of him in this position. Taehyung immediately took a scoop of his strawberry gelato and held the spoon to his lips. You took a picture, and another when he closed his eyes but still had the uneaten gelato close to his lips.

Then, a drop fell onto his chin. It dribbled down. You were about to grab a tissue off of the table to give it to him until he mumbled that you should continue. You did as he asked. The sound of the camera shuttering was all you guys heard for the next three minutes as Taehyung continued posing in different positions.  

“You’re welcome,” you said, plopping down onto your chair. You reached for your dessert and found that it was half liquid. You looked over at Taehyung’s gelato; it was in the same state as yours, and you sighed.

Opening up Instagram on your phone, you started to slouch. Posts about vacations in California, Rome, and Beijing filled your timeline. Or was it feed? You were confused by the verbiage ever since Facebook bought Instagram and honestly where was the FAFSA police when you needed them? These "broke" college students shouldn't be out there living it up. And why were they on vacation when you still had two weeks of spring semester left? Did they take their finals early? When you were done, you handed your phone to Taehyung, who took it eagerly.

“Appreciate it,” he said. After browsing through the photos you took of him, he placed your phone down on his lap as he smiled at you. “I mean it. Thank you.”

You observed the silver rings on his fingers as he tapped on the table in a seemingly rhythmic beat. The rings were pretty. Maybe you should copy some of his style.

“You’re going to Korea soon, right?” You leaned back against your chair and splayed out your legs. A trickle of sweat ran past your neck.

It was really hot outside, but Taehyung wore a dark blue dress shirt, rolled up to his elbows, and had a black t-shirt inside that was revealed when the first two buttons of his dress shirt were unbuttoned. He also wore black ripped jeans. Wasn’t it hotter when you wore darker colors? Beauty was pain, you guessed.

“Only for one month in July.” Taehyung leaned back in his chair as well. “Why? Are you going to miss me?”

“No,” You shook your head, “you’re going to miss me.”

At this, Taehyung laughed loudly, his eyes crinkling. “Get KakaoTalk so I can text you without getting charged there.”

”Why? So you can spam my phone with pictures of yourself? You already have a mirror.” You narrowed your eyes playfully. “Also, how can I get KakaoTalk if you have my phone?”

”You mean this?” Taehyung showed your device in his hand, but he made no attempt to give it back to you. “I can just figure out your password.” He was typing in a random combination of numbers until he unlocked your phone successfully.

Startled, you rose up from your seat as he shielded the phone away from you.

“Relax, I’m transferring the photos you took of me to my phone!” he said, huddling himself into a ball. The people around you stared at him briefly before chatting to themselves.

With the slit of your screen showing through the opening in his posture, you glanced down, realizing he was going through your Snapchat messages and replying back with a selfie of himself. How typical.

“Taehyung...” You grasped his shoulder. “I’m not getting Kakao if you’re being like this.” It was a fake threat, but he didn’t need to know that. Honestly, you wanted him to stop because Hoseok was in your contacts and you knew Taehyung wasn’t fond of his step-brother. If Taehyung found out, when he already confessed these deep feelings of disdain about Hoseok to you, then you weren’t sure what he would do. He had a vanity problem already, and some slight possessive attachment in his friendship with you.

However, Taehyung continued mass replying to your friends.

”Taehyung,” you tried again, shaking his shoulder roughly. He didn’t budge. “Alright, I guess I’m gonna get your phone.”

He straightened up and stared at you. “I don’t have anything to hide, (Name). You know me. Do you have something you want to hide?”

“No.” You swore your heart skipped a beat when the lie rolled out your tongue.

“Then we’ll look at my phone together. It’s only fair, right?” There were moments where Taehyung sounded peculiar, and this was one of them. Was it something in his tone, or was it this… aura that he emitted? Either one led you–dare you spoke of it lest you became a bad friend who misinterpreted things and blew them out of proportion–to be cautious of him.

”Here.” Swiping his phone off the table, Taehyung placed it on your palm. ”The password is two, five, six, eight.” He wasn’t taking his hand away from yours, so you inputted with your free hand the code he gave you. The rings on his fingers provided a cool sensation on your skin despite the ongoing heat from the sun.

“You can check my texts," Taehyung suggested. "You can read through them."

You bit the inside of your cheek while you hesitantly tapped on his conversation with Taeyong, a mutual friend. There were Korean characters you couldn't decipher. The words were too advanced, and you only learned the language when Hoseok taught you sporadically. However, you did catch onto these English memes Taehyung and Taeyong shared with each other. You thought you were invading Taeyong's privacy somewhat as Taehyung encouraged you to keep scrolling.

"See, (Name)?" His eyes bore into your own. "I've got nothing to hide."

"Yeah, me too," you blurted back, letting him keep his phone and yours for now. You returned back to your seat.

Friends need to accept all the aspects that come with a person whether good or bad, you reminded yourself of this as Taehyung scrutinized the photos in your camera roll, eyes trained on his appearance and whatever it meant to him as he explored the saturations and color schemes he could use.

You observed your friend for a few more minutes before redirecting your thoughts to the final exams coming up. The stress to think about the exams rather than on the behavior of your friend had eased your mind considerably. Soon, you began to daydream off-topic about fast cars and towering mansions as Taehyung continued to edit his pictures.

Smiling unconsciously, you then remembered how you were a bit vain yourself. You had three thousand, one-hundred-seventy-five dollars and thirty cents to your name before. The rest of the money was in your latest Fila shoes, and in the latest iPad Pro that you cradled to sleep every night. When your three thousand, one-hundred-seventy-five dollars and thirty cents to your name dropped to a staggering fifty-dollars, you had promised for a new year, new you, and you made a resolution to curb your materialistic tendencies in the middle of sweet old July of last year.

“I’m going to change,” you declared to yourself, browsing through self-improvement articles online. You had another tab open, but you swore on your mother’s grave that you were just living vicariously through a YouTuber’s shopping haul and nothing more.

“I’m going to change,” you said to Taeyong and Jimin, your two closest friends, as you all painted random animals on a canvas. Hoping it will restrain the temptations of eating out and watching movies, you tried to love your newest hobby.

But people didn't change easily.

After all, we make money to enjoy money, you would say as you received your paycheck, the thickness of the envelope sending a familiar rush of adrenaline through the palms of your hands.

Soon summer break had ended and you were left daydreaming in your classes about the salary you'd get from becoming a doctor. You’ll have a stable job and a stable life, your mother would remind you in the living room every so often. You would doodle on the edges of your notes and wish that time could past by faster because you were stuck in a world where you were just you and the you then needed to step up from a measly five hundred bucks. Your fingers couldn't sprint against the piano keys as well as Jill, nor could you code websites in your free-time like Mr. Full-Ride classmate Jaehyun, but you did have money and it was what kept you going.

Money was entertainment. Money was activities. Money was the awe-struck gaze your parents looked at you with when you paid for the restaurant bill at a family outing. Money was whatever you wanted it to be, and it was breathtaking, inspiring, motivating, and, damn, your eyes were bleeding green, huh?

“How do you do it?” you had asked. “How are you so happy the majority of the time?”

“I’ll show you how,” Taehyung replied, one hand holding the strap of his backpack. He took out a hand-held mirror from the first zipper and gave it to you. “You have to love yourself.“

"And how do I do this...loving myself thing?”

“(Name), it’s simple.” He sighed, leaning closer to you to observe himself through his own mirror, a light red tint on his cheeks. “You think to yourself, you are everything you ever wanted.” Almost reluctantly, he peered up from the mirror to look at you, but you felt as if he never truly looked away, as if he was still tracing the contours of his nose and the outlines of his eyes, his lips, through the glare of the glasses perched on your nose.

“Beauty is on the inside.” He sighed again, placing a hand over his chest. “But it can also be made.”

You noticed the slight pout on his lips as he stashed the mirror away. He had never changed since high school. Always staring at himself as he walked past anything reflective, anything that resembled him, and you––

You had been snapped out of your memory when Taehyung voiced out a question.

"Should we go now? We have class tomorrow with Professor Smith at nine in the morning."

"Hm?" You blinked. "Ah, yeah, we should."

You threw your gelato in the trash and bidded a goodbye, heading off to your home. Developing a friendship with Taehyung was a journey, to say the least.

[next chapter]

[possiblyimbiassed]

The Science of Reduction

In my view, John’s blog and Sherlock’s website both represent a more realistic version of what might actually have happened in the BBC Sherlock narrative; a believable kind of ‘reality’ that doesn’t need extraordinary explanations or complicated assumptions to make sense. As opposed to the big Drama we see in the actual show, these online versions - slightly childish as they may be - tell a kind of story that appears to be at least plausible. But maybe they’re also a bit more limited and therefore boring?

It goes to show, I think, that “Poetry or Truth”, which Lestrade claims are the same thing in TAB, indeed are very different concepts. As an enhanced version of reality, enriched by human creativity and emotion, Poetry can give far more interesting results than any attempt at approaching Truth ‘scientifically’. But it can also derail into absurdity, as shown by S4. 

Sherlock’s website is, in a sense, ‘scientific’; very logically constructed and categorized, brief and minimalistic. No superfluous information to be found, no dramatic embroidery of the facts. Occam’s razor. 

On the surface, the only hints of emotion being involved are Sherlock’s whining about people being stupid, predictable and boring, showing us how lonely that makes him feel. The contrast to how he comes across in the show, and its display of his ‘inner life’, is striking. But now the website has - unlike John’s blog - been taken down, which I suspect might reflect the fact that Sherlock has left ‘reality’ and chosen to go deeper into himself.

But after realising from this post that The Science of Deduction is actually still there, saved on the Way Back Machine (thanks for that, @khanhizon1999!), I took to look a little further into it, and noticed several interesting things:

1. Sherlock seems to be a very lazy ‘blogger’, who has reduced the info on his own website to a minimum, since he has only written down one single case for his readers to look at: The Green Ladder. Not even his analyses of tobacco (referred to in ASiB, dismissed by John) or perfume (referred to in THoB, when he encourages Mrs Hudson to look it up) are actually posted. For the rest of the ‘new’ cases - The Blind Banker and ‘The Serial Suicides’ (A Study in Pink) - he simply refers to John’s blog. And for The Aluminium Crutch and The Great Game he doesn’t even bother to do that. 

TBC under the cut. 

2. So, what was so special about The Green Ladder for Sherlock to both do the effort of writing it down, and then not erase it like he did with the tobacco analysis? I mean, since this case is about a guy who actually gets killed for being both superstitious and predictable (a bit like Lord Carmichael’s idiocy in TAB, perhaps), what could possibly raise Sherlock’s interest about it to the point of discussing details on his website? I bet it’s out of nostalgic Sentiment. ;) It definitely seems like this was the case Sherlock was working on when he first met John. Which we can deduce by the text message he left on John’s phone:

I’ll also speculate that he deleted the tobacco study because John didn’t like it, while he kept this one because it just might impress John. 

3. It also strikes me, however, that nowhere on this website can we read about how Sherlock can identify “a software designer by his tie” or "a retired plumber by his left hand” (PILOT) or “an airline pilot by his left thumb” (ASiP). Did Sherlock delete that as well, just because John seemed incredulous? :) Or were these claims parts of the now archived cases, for example ‘The Laughing Pilot’? 

4. The names of the cases. I used to believe that all the fanciful titles of John’s blog posts were due to his own creativity. But here we have a whole bunch of inspiring case names created by Sherlock himself:

Some of these titles definitely seem to be little nods to canon: 

The Man With Four Legs - The Man With the Twisted Lip (TWIS)

The Crooked House - The Crooked Man (CROO)

The Missing Jars - The Missing Three-Quarter (MISS)

The Abernetty Family - The Abbey Grange (ABBE)

The Purple Woman - The Red Circle (CIRC)

The Confusion of Isadora Persano is reduced to a mere title, but it’s actually taken directly from canon’s The Problem of Thor Bridge (THOR), where Watson tells us: “A third case worthy of note is that of Isadora Persano, the wellknown journalist and duellist, who was found stark staring mad with a matchbox in front of him which contained a remarkable worm, said to be unknown to science.”  

Which immediately makes me think of John’s blog post The Inexplicable Matchbox: “The situation with Isaac Persano hit the headlines, obviously. He was found, in a hotel room, surrounded by matchboxes. And he couldn't speak”. A case which Sherlock included in his Best Man speech in TSoT: “A French decathlete found completely out of his mind, surrounded by one thousand, eight hundred and twelve matchboxes – all empty except this one”. 

We never got to know what this matchbox contained, though. In the show, there’s only one worm I can think of (and no - I don’t count the maggots Sherlock shows Archie in TSoT, or the ones crawling out of Emelia Ricoletti’s dead body in TAB; they’re larvae, not worms, and they’re not new to science :) ). The one I’m thinking of is the ‘earworm’ of Eurus’ suggestions that drives Doctor Taylor mad enough to kill his family, according to the Governor of Sherrinford in TFP. I don’t know if such a thing is ‘unknown to science’, but it’s certainly quite unlikely, isn’t it?

But what about the rest of the cases? What’s with, for example, the Subdivided Crooner? :))) It’s also interesting to know that there’s a ghost at Barts’ hospital. Is that supposed to be a premonition about Sherlock? :)

5. There’s also a (supposedly) ongoing case called The Major's Cat. How many majors do we meet in the show? Well, there’s Major Barrymore in THoB, Major Reed in TSoT and Major Sholto, also in TSoT. But none of them comes across as a cat lover, though, do they? :) And this case happens before we get to know either of these majors. An interesting piece in this puzzle is a client, a poster called T Thompson who wants help with a missing cat.

OK, so this is the major - a famous boxer named T. ‘The Major’ Thompson! Clearly something more than a missing cat is going on in this case. Sherlock deduces brilliantly that his client is secretive because he wants to avoid a scandal; thus, he’s probably famous. Cats are also linked to Greenwich in the title The Killer Cats of Greenwich, which in turn makes me think of “the bloody Greenwich pips” in TGG - the episode in which the naked cat Sekhmet figures. Lots of cats here. ;)

Eventually, Sherlock posts a new comment  - possibly having to do with the case of the Major’s missing cat:

“Ha! Brilliant! Oh, very very clever! I love it when a criminal knows what he's doing. The cat was in the television! Fake screen. Brilliant.” I’d love to know what this case was actually about (apart from cat abuse) - it’s not often we see Sherlock expressing that kind of emotion :) But, anyway: more cats?! I can’t find a single dog on Sherlock’s website, which surprises me, since the show is full of them, and there’s also a few on John’s blog.

It’s also interesting to see Mike Stanford tell Sherlock about John’s blog, shortly after he’s moved in to 221B. Pretty soon Sherlock also starts to get anonymous threats on his website, combined with some ciphers, which Sherlock uses to entertain his readers. 

6. The three encrypted messages sent to Sherlock’s website by an anonymous reader - *cough* Moriarty *cough* - bring rather scarce information. I’ve tried to apply all three of the ciphers to seemingly meaningless words like “UMQRA” or “AGRA”, but of no result this far. Just like Sherlock’s declarations of the case solutions to Moriarty in TGG about Carl Powers, Ian Monkford and Raoul de Santos, I think these ciphers are the least interesting items on the website. But I might be proven very wrong of course! :)

7. Then, finally, we have the Forum, where the most substantial message is from little Kirsty Stapleton who lost her glowing rabbit to science (fully investigated in THoB). One thing that strikes me is that Kirsty asks about John “Is he a real Dr?”. Which very much reminds me of TLD, where Culverton asks John: “Are you really a doctor?”  

Also the rest of the Forum’s old comments do have some interest, even if they’re usually reduced to exchanges of a few words between Sherlock and the people who knows him: John, Lestrade, Molly, Mike Stanford, Sarah Sawyer, the fan Jacob Sowersby and long-term poster Moriarty ‘theimprobableone’. First of all we learn that Sherlock moved out from Montague street due to “disagreement with landlord”. Very strange indeed, seeing as Sherlock must be such a lovely tenant. ;)) 

We also learn that Moriarty ‘theimprobableone’ is flirting with Sherlock via his website from start; he tries to ask him out and even offers Sherlock to move in with him! In this context maybe we should remember that the last time we heard from Moriarty ‘theimprobableone’ was after John’s wedding, when Sherlock had hacked into his blog and tried to find some company online. The answer was: “i am interested but I am going out on a date”.

And - back to Sherlock’s website - there’s also Molly, trying to get Sherlock’s attention by claiming she found a tie at Barts that might be his. We also see Lestrade getting desperate over the serial ‘suicides’ and wanting Sherlock’s help, which the latter deflects. Hard to see how Sherlock is ‘married to his job’ here. :)

Sherlock’s reaction to the ‘Bond night’ is also quite entertaining:

He calls Bond ‘ridiculous’ until ‘theimprobableone’ butts in, then he suddenly begins to appreciate it more. ;)

And we do get a possible explanation as to why Sherlock takes on the dubious Belarus case of Barry Berwick: John needs the money! :)

Finally, I think an interesting little detail is that, once again, an ambassador is mentioned in BBC Sherlock - a recurring theme! ;)

Tagging some people who might be interested:

@ebaeschnbliah @sarahthecoat @raggedyblue @gosherlocked @the-signs-of-two @loveismyrevolution @sagestreet 

[hailing-stars]

like a lullaby 

Read on AO3

Trope: Hair Playing 

Summary 

Peter didn’t know how much time passed before Tony’s dad reflexes kicked in.

He didn’t know how long he was sitting there, hunched over a picnic table, with his head cradled in his hands, but he knew it wasn’t long.  Pain made time move slowly, and Tony found him fast.

His and Morgan’s arrival was announced by a soft poke to his side.

“Pete? Are you okay?” asked Morgan. He didn’t respond, didn’t know if he was still capable of producing words. “You were right, dad. Homework ate Peter.”

OR 

Peter gets a migraine and Tony takes care of him

like a lullaby 

Peter wiped sweat off his forehead and tried to ignore the aching at the back of his eyes.

Usually he regretted ignoring it. Usually it was a sure sign a migraine was coming, but he clung to denial and continued to glare at his laptop screen, trying to see the words on the screen out in the blinding sun.

That probably wasn’t helping him fight off the incoming migraine, but it couldn’t be helped. It was a nice day, and if he was stuck studying and doing homework on a day like that, he could at least do it outside.

He’d set up a study station with his laptop, notebooks, highlights and textbooks outside, on a picnic table, under a tree, next to the lake. It was that spot exactly that made Tony’s lake house his favorite place to study. It was quiet, where the city was loud with sirens and arguing and the temptation to ditch school work in favor of swinging through the streets as Spider-Man.

He’d rather be doing that.

He was good at being Spider-Man, good at helping people, and once he’d been good at school, too. Not anymore. He’d come back from the dead, rematerialized, but not all of him. He lost something, he just wasn’t sure what it was.

Peter liked to say part of his brain got jumbled and wires were crisscrossed when they were being pulled back together. Tony liked telling him he was wrong.

“It’s anxiety,” he’d told him. The boat under them had rocked, and Tony cast his line out into the lake.

Peter remembered watching it as it soared through the air, and landed off in the distance, the orange bobber moving with the water. He still didn’t know why they were fishing. They had never been before, and haven’t been since, but ever since Peter came back from the dead, Tony had gone crazy doing those types of things.

He was all fun and games, all the time. Peter supposed that was a privilege well earned by the man who saved the world.

“I can’t focus on anything,” Peter had told him, as if to say it wasn’t anxiety. It couldn’t be. “I’m behind in all my classes.”

Tony had taken his eyes off his bobber and shot him a look of concern. “Let me set you up with a therapist.”

He had refused.

He didn’t need to sit around and talk about his problems with a stranger who wouldn’t understand. It wouldn’t help. He had Spider-Man to help relieve tension and stress. He’d made a decision that day on the boat. He’d just have to work harder and study more hours.

And that was what he did or at least, that’s what he tried to do.  

The ache in his eyes was tightening into something like a band around his entire skull. He glared at his computer screen, scratched at the back of his hand, then copied down what he thought were the important chunks of text, only to cross them out and write something else in their place.

It didn’t matter, though. Just seconds later, after crossing out even more of his notes and aggressively carving an x through the page, he was blasted in the side of the head with water. He whipped his head around, and his eyes narrowed in on Tony. He stood nearby and wore a sling around his arm that supported a giant, Tony-Stark-upgraded water gun.

All fun, all games, all the time.

“Watch where you’re shooting that thing,” said Peter. He smoothed down the area of his hair that’d taken the blast. “You’re going to get my books wet.”

“Guess that means it’s time for a break, then.”

“I can’t,” said Peter. He tapped his pen against this notebook. He had so much work to do, so much catching up, and Tony knew this, because Peter explained it to him just about a million times.

“Play water wars with me and Morgan,” said Tony. He leveled the gun at him in a threatening manner, then patted the tank that held the ammunition. “Or face the consequences.”

Peter stared down the barrel of the gun. “You know it’s supposed to be the kid distracting the adults away from work, right? Where did all the adults go, by the way?”

His response earned him another blast from the water gun. The water felt good on a day like that, and he didn’t mind it, even it did splash off him and sunk into the pages of his notebook. It made him wish he could go play with Tony and Morgan, that he wasn’t stuck at a picnic table doing homework on the first day of his three-day weekend.

“Being a grown up is overrated,” said Tony. “Ask Rhodey. But okay, fine, be boring and responsible while Morgan and I have fun.”

Peter watched him go, then tried to return his focus back on his classes.

It wasn’t the easiest feat to pull.

It was hot. There were beads of sweat prickling down the back of his neck, and the glare from the sun hitting his computer screen tightened the invisible band around his skull. He shut the computer and switched to his textbook. It didn’t help much.

The words on the page were scrambled just like Peter’s brain, his mind wandered, his knee started to bounce. He was suffocating.

Any second he was going to stop breathing, he was going to disintegrate there at that table. Any second, the end was coming. His breath hitched. He gripped the edges of the picnic table with both hands to keep himself tethered to the earth and took a deep breath.

Out and in, like he read online. He was fine. Thanos was dead. The infinity stones were back where they belonged, and Tony had saved the universe.

Fine. Everything was fine.

He was fine.

A swan swooped down out of the sky and landed in the lake. He stared at it, took another deep breath, and for a second time, returned his eyes back to his books.

It hit him all at once. A sudden explosion of pain in the back of his neck and his forehead. He couldn’t attempt to plow through it, so he gave up instead. He rubbed his eyes with the back of his hands and held them there as he let his upper body fall over the picnic table, all top of all his books.

*

Peter didn’t know how much time passed before Tony’s dad reflexes kicked in.

He didn’t know how long he was sitting there, hunched over a picnic table, with his head cradled in his hands, but he knew it wasn’t long.  Pain made time move slowly, and Tony found him fast.

His and Morgan’s arrival was announced by a soft poke to his side.

“Pete? Are you okay?” asked Morgan. He didn’t respond, didn’t know if he was still capable of producing words. “You were right, dad. Homework ate Peter.”

She grumbled another wordy sentence about never wanting to go to school, and Tony laughed.

“He’s not been eaten,” said Tony. He put a soothing hand on Peter’s back and started rubbing circles. “Right, Pete? Please don’t tell us the books won, or Morgan will be traumatized.”

Peter groaned and tried to focus on the comfort Tony’s hand brought, on the circles, instead the pain in his head.

“I need actual words, bud. Confirmation that you’re still in there.”

“Head ‘urts.”

“Just like dad, huh?” asked Tony, with a sigh. “Tried to work through a headache only to make it worse.”

It was hard for Peter to think back and remember the times when Tony was work obsessed.

That time seemed so far away. Ever since the snap, ever since Morgan was born, and Peter was brought back, Tony didn’t work. He created, but that was different from work. Creating was for fun, and usually resulted upgraded water guns or other fancy toys to entertain Morgan.

“Ok come on, you’re done.”

“But –“said Peter. It was just the beginning of a protest, and it was one he couldn’t finish, so he didn’t even try. Instead he let Tony coax him up from the picnic table and into the house, where he was hit with cool air and shelter from the sun.

“Lights to 20, Fri,” said Tony, as they walked into the living room.

Tony grabbed some pillows, sunk into the couch and kicked his feet up on the coffee table. He put the pillows against his lap and made a gesture with his arm for Peter to come and lay down.

Once his head hit the pillow, Tony put his cool, metal, prosthetic hand against Peter’s forehead. It was instant relief. It didn’t take all the pain away, but it let Peter close his eyes and imagine he might feel normal again someday.

“Dad, is Peter dying?” asked Morgan.

“No honey, he’s okay, his head just hurts a little bit, so we’re going to keep the lights low and our voices quiet, alright?” said Tony. He put his fingers, his real fingers, through Peter’s hair, again and again. “Hey Morgunna, want to do us a favor?”

“Yeah.” She reduced her voice to a whisper.

“Go find mom and tell her we need a water bottle, the cold pack from the freezer and the migraine medicine, the strong stuff. Think you can remember all that?”

“Mmhmm,” said Morgan, and Peter listened as her tiny footsteps got further and further away until they were gone, and all he wanted to focus on was Tony’s hand running through his hair and his other planted on his forehead. If he could just get lost in that, and the comfort it provided, maybe he could at least pretend his head wasn’t about to explode.  

When Pepper came into the living room, and brought all the items Tony requested, he made him sit up, just long enough to take a few sips of water and wash the pills down. He collapsed back down on the pillow immediately afterward, but when Tony’s hand didn’t come back to rest on his forehead, Peter grabbed it and moved it there himself.

Tony took it back, and Peter made a disgruntled sound until it returned, that time, to press the cold pack against his forehead instead of just the metal.

Like a soothing lullaby, the kind with rhythm, but also the kind that didn’t need words, his fingers started working their way through his hair again. It was relaxing. It lured him to sleep, and he drifted in and out as the medicine took effect and the pain ebbed away.

He stayed half-conscious, listening but not really comprehending Tony and Pepper as they chatted. The TV had been set to low, and at some point, Peter had gotten jostled when Morgan climbed on Tony to give him goodnight kisses. Sometime after that, someone had tossed a blanket over him.  

His headache was reduced to just something dull, just leftovers from what it was before, so, slowly, he sat up. Tony was still there with him on the couch, and he watched Peter as he rubbed his eyes and took a drink from the water bottle on the coffee table.

“Better?” asked Tony, as Peter screwed the cap back on the water and set it down on the table.

“Yeah,” said Peter, and his words came out like a breath of relief.

“Does that happen a lot?” asked Tony. Peter stared back at him. “Do you get headaches like that a lot?”

“I mean, I wouldn’t say a lot.”

“How many times in a week?”

He shouldn’t have sat up. He should have pretended that he was still asleep, or that his homework really had eaten him. Either of those options were preferable to this interrogation. He knew it was an interrogation. Tony was using the Dad Voice, and it demanded his answer.

“Maybe like two or three times,” said Peter. He sunk back into the couch cushions, wishing he could disappear inside them.

Tony let out a tired, weary sigh. “That’s too many, Pete. You don’t have to live like that.”

Peter didn’t say anything. He didn’t know how not to live like that.

“I want you to see a therapist,” said Tony. He was still using the Dad Voice, and Peter knew giving his complaints a voice wouldn’t matter if Tony had already made up his mind, so he went with logical instead.

“I should be seeing a neurologist.”

“May’s told me you’ve already been,” said Tony. “But I thought it had been resolved since I hadn’t heard anything else about it for months.”

Peter wondered when May had told Tony about the headaches, how often they discuss him with him knowing anything about it.

“She also told me she’s been trying to get you to go to therapy, too,” said Tony. Apparently a lot. They talked about him a lot. “She says you’ve been stressed out and anxious, and so this isn’t your choice anymore, I’m making an executive decision.”

He stared at him and guessed that was that. Whatever Tony decided, May would go along with. They both just really took the whole co-parenting idea too far.

“No shame in getting help,” he continued. “I wish I would’ve started therapy a lot sooner than I did.”

“I’m going to bed,” said Peter, standing up from the couch. He left the dark living room and Tony as cold, as fast, as he could.

He regretted it as soon as he was in his own bed, under the covers, with his head on a different pillow. Without Tony’s hand singing lullabies through his hair, he tossed and turned the rest of the night.

*

“It’s time to get up! It’s time to get up!”

Peter blinked his eyes open, but absolutely refused to move. He was stubborn and wanted to hang onto sleep as long as possible. His bed was moving, though. It was shaking under him, because Morgan Stark was jumping up and down somewhere near his feet

“It’s time to plllayyyy!”

A few drops of water hit the back of his head, and he sat up quickly. Morgan wore shorts, a t-shirt, and had a bandana tied in her hair. She had war paint on her face, and a tiny plastic water gun in her hand.

Like father, like daughter.

Peter imagined himself jumping out of bed and finding his own water gun, imagine chasing her and Tony around the yard, and wished he had the time for it. Thanks to his migraine yesterday, he missed a whole day of work and now had to play catch up instead of water guns.

“I’m sorry, Morgan,” said Peter. “I can’t. I’m too busy today.”

She finally stopped jumping and titled her head at him. “Dad said that you’d say that, and he also told me to tell you he’s taking all your school stuff hostage and the only way to get it back is by force.”

“Of course he did.” He threw his legs over the side of the bed, and his feet hit the carpet. “Where is he?”

“Outside,” said Morgan. She jumped off his bed and followed him out into the hallway. “You should probably get a shield or something because he still has the super soaker 3000.”

“I’ll be okay.”

“But there’s this really cool one in the garage. We used to use it all the time.”

“Pretty sure dad gave that one back,” said Peter, as they both made it to the bottom of the staircase.

Peter marched out of the house, fueled by anger he was too spent to feel last night. It wasn’t fair Tony was forcing him to go to therapy. It wasn’t fair that he didn’t seem to understand how important school was to him, and that he insisted on playing games instead of getting work done.

He spotted Tony on the dock, with the super soaker 3000 strapped around his chest, but that didn’t stop him. He continued his march towards him, and Morgan continued following him, up until the grass became wood. He went on without her, and with Tony watching him with a raised eyebrow.

He shouldn’t look so surprised. The genius had to know what was coming.

“Where’d you put my school stuff?” demanded Peter.

“Oh,” said Tony. “Did Morgan not tell you my terms?”

Peter wanted to roll his eyes but resisted in attempt to look less like a teenager, and more like someone to fear. He wondered if it was what happened when superheroes got old and retired. They had to play out their battles with children and water guns.

“Really?”

“Really,” said Tony. He pumped the gun a few times. “And you came all the way out here without a weapon.”

A drop of sweat dripped across the back of Peter’s neck. It was so hot, just like it had been the day before. The sunlight gleamed against the lake, and an idea came like a spark, one that must’ve lit up his eyes.

“Parker don’t you dare – “

He did dare.

Peter shoved Tony off the dock but hadn’t been considering that his reflexes were so incredibly sharp. He put all the blame on the prosthetic. The same hand that cooled off his forehead the night before locked around his arm, and they both fell into the lake, plunging into the water at the exact same time.

Underwater, Peter yanked his arm free from Tony’s grip and breached the surface. Between earfuls of water he could hear Morgan laughing from the shore and Tony splashing around next to him.

“That’s cheating,” said Tony. He sent a splash Peter’s way, and he failed to dodge it.

Peter spat out lake water. It drizzled down his chin. “No it’s not. It’s winning.”

“It’s a draw, smartass.” He swam closer and dunked him under with the prosthetic arm. Peter came back up just in time to hear Tony finish with, “That’s winning.”

He spat out more lake water, except that time, he aimed it at Tony, then shook his head back and forth, trying to air out his hair. They splashed each other a few more times while they treaded water, until Tony got clobbered in the eyes with water, and Peter laughed. The sound was like a slap in the face for both of them. Tony stopped rubbing his eyes, stared, blinked.

It was a sound that had been missing, but not discovered as missing until it was found again.

His muscles were looser, when he hadn’t even realized they’d been tight, and when he met Tony’s stare, the idea that he’d been right along wafted around in the air. The snap hadn’t fried his IQ, it broke something in his spirit.

“Dad!” Morgan shouted. “Can I come swim, too?”

“Uh, yeah, stay right there,” said Tony. He blinked at Peter a couple of times, as if seeing him for the first time, then started his swim over to her. “I have to go find your water wings.”

“Awww dad I know how to swim.”

“Too bad. You’re wearing floaties until you bring home a few gold medals.”

Peter followed Tony to shore, but only to go inside and switch his soaking pajamas out for his swim trunks.

He spent the rest of the day doing backflips off the dock to impress Morgan and laughing at Tony when he tried to pull of the same moves. His mocking got him a few blasts of water from the super soaker 3000, but he didn’t mind.  

They had dinner outside, once Tony put his water guns down long enough to man the grill, and after the sun went down behind the lake, Peter was just as burnt as the marshmallow on the end of his stick. They sat around the fire, eating smores, chatting, laughing for hours, and Peter didn’t want it to end.

It had too, though, and the ending to that night was signified by Tony standing from his chair.

“Alright, time for bed, Morgan.”

She didn’t answer. She was already asleep, faceup in the grass, and holding a half-eaten s’more in one hand.

“Out like a light,” laughed Pepper. She was the one to pick her up off the ground, while Tony took the s’more out of her hand and tossed it into the fire for the flames to eat. “I’ll take her to bed. You guys should… talk.”

Peter waited until Pepper disappeared inside the house with Morgan before he stared at Tony. Just the fire sat between them. He didn’t have any of the anger he’d had before. He knew Tony was right, but he wasn’t ready to admit it.

“I don’t want to talk,” said Peter, but he didn’t want to be alone, either. “I just… do you wanna watch a movie?”

“Sure, buddy,” said Tony. “I’m picking though. I’m not watching another Star Wars or Harry Potter movie for as long as I live.”

Peter didn’t care what movie went on the TV. He didn’t plan on watching it. He was tried from swimming but didn’t trust himself to fall asleep on his own. When they both plopped down on the couch, Peter used Tony as a pillow and waited for him to start playing with his hair, waited for the lullaby to start, so he could drift off, and actually get some rest.

*

Rain pounding against the house woke Peter up the next morning.

He blinked his eyes open, and crawled out from under Tony’s arm, careful not to wake him up. Tony was still snoring as Peter stepped out of the living room, so he figured he’d been successful.

His feet took him out to the porch automatically. He needed to watch it, and hear it more clearly, the way the rain hit the lake, the way it made everything new and fresh. Besides that, the mist that blew on the porch with the breeze felt good on his sunburnt face.

It was relaxing, and he couldn’t remember the last time he felt that relaxed, that rested, and that was sort of the problem. He hadn’t realized something was wrong until he had a day that felt right. He didn’t know there was another way to live, the way he used to live, until Tony forced him to see it.

But his realization came a little bit too late. It was Sunday, and later on he’d have to drive back to the city. The next morning, he’d have to return to school.

The front door opened with a squeak, and Peter turned just in time to see a tube of Aloe flying at his head. He caught it with one hand and tried to make a face at Tony. It turned into a grimace, into regret, as the sunburn crinkled with pain.

“You’re a lobster,” said Tony, as he walked across the porch to stand next to him. “Ever heard of sunscreen? It’s this magical stuff that keeps us all from getting skin cancer.” He put his hands on the wooden handrail, then looked at Peter. “What are you doing out here, anyway?”

“I was just – I was watching – “

“-We have a lot of work to do.”

Peter frowned again. “But you- “

“I figured I could help you knock out some of that studying before you leave today,” said Tony. He gestured beyond the porch. “What else are rainy days for?”

“I was thinking about that,” said Peter. “Maybe I don’t go back today. Maybe I stay an extra night.”

“That’s an awful long way to drive first thing in the morning, right before school, Pete.”

“Maybe I take the day off school.”

“A day off, huh?” asked Tony. He swiped the aloe from Peter’s hand, and popped open the cap. “And what would you do on this day off?”

“Maybe we can take Morgan to the zoo,” Peter suggested, with a shrug. “And there’s this new ice cream shop she’d love near central park.”

“She does love ice cream,” said Tony. He squeezed some aloe into his hands. “And it’s been awhile since we’ve been to the zoo.”

Peter closed his eyes and cringed, waited for his face to hurt as Tony attacked him with aloe, but the gel felt cool as it was spread over his forehead and both his cheeks. Once he was done, Peter opened his eyes, seeing Tony as he set the tube down on the handrail.

“Then maybe after we can see if we can find any therapy, uh, places, in my area,” said Peter. He swallowed a lump in his throat. It was harder to admit than he wanted it to be, but once it was out, it was a breath of fresh air.  

Tony grinned at him, pulled him into a hug before Peter had a chance to react, and kissed the top of his head through his hair. They broke out of the hug, only for Tony to aggressively mess up his hair.

“I’m proud of you, kid,” said Tony. He was still grinning as he turned and walked back towards the front door. He paused, with his hand on the door frame. “I gotta go fabricate an email to your school about you having the flu.”

Peter looked back out towards the lake, where the rain was still beating into it. It was fine. Everything was fine, the universe, the world, his world, and someday, he would be fine, too.

[itsmyusualphannie]

something wrong in the village

Chapter 4/5: numbers Beta: @candanandphilnot Rating: T Warnings: Read on ao3

Summary: Fiona Lester has a secret. Dan Howell thinks they hate each other. Dan meets an online friend and comes to realize something important about himself while juggling a changing relationship with his parents, friends, and Fiona.

~~~ previous chapter ~~~ next chapter ~~~

The first thing Dan did upon waking up the next morning, after slapping the alarm on his phone, was to crawl out of bed and blearily stagger his way to his desk. He felt a bit like death warmed over. He’d stayed up late last night - or early in the morning, depending on how he looked at it - even though he knew it was a bad idea. That one message to Phil had sparked an entire conversation, though. The deepest one they had had so far. Dan felt like his most repressed emotions had been scooped out of him and laid bare before an empathetic almost-stranger sort-of-best-friend.

Upon sprawling sleepily in his desk chair, Dan typed in his computer password and brought up the chat on the cheesy ‘FRIENDS’ website. He could see the last few messages exchanged between him and Phil, but scrolled up further to glance over some of the others. 2 a.m. sleep-drunk messages were terrifying to look back on, but these didn’t seem so horrible.

it’s not like a solid thing, read one of Phil’s messages, and below it, Dan’s reply.

yeah but i’ve only ever felt like that toward guys and like one or two girls. idk. is there even a label for that? 

You don’t have to have a label unless it feels right. i mean I say i’m gay because i want to but you don’t have to

idk, Dan had simply replied, and even now, in the sun-glare of early morning, he still didn’t know. He scrolled back to the bottom of the chat, to the most recent messages.

i’m so tired i should probably sleep lol, Dan had typed.

Yeah it’s a school night! rip to us. There had been a long wait between that and his next message, where Dan had just stared at the laptop screen and been unable to think of anything original to say, but then Phil had added going to sleep now i guess lol. gn!

night, Dan had somehow managed to type without any spelling mistakes induced by his tired fingers, and then he had staggered to bed.

There was a new message waiting from Phil, time-stamped only a few minutes earlier. He’d probably just gotten up for school too.

hey i just thought it’d be cool to text if you want? so we can message when we’re not just home :) you don’t have to if you don’t want! but if you do, my number is 01184 80222.

Dan rubbed his eyes, trying to smear out the sleep, before reading it again. cool, he replied. He read it one more time. “Oh,” he said out loud.

He reacted instinctively, crossing the room to find his phone again and unlocking it. It took him less than a minute to save the number under a new contact that he called “phil the fellow nerd.” He looked between his phone and the open webpage on his computer, and then he closed out the browser on his laptop. It would be easier this way, now.

He tapped on the message icon by Phil’s new contact and hesitated before slowly typing out a message. hey it’s me, internet stalker dan :)

With that, Dan shoved his phone deep into his pocket, tugged on his shoes, and headed out. He made it halfway outside before he realized he was still wearing his pyjamas. Today was going to be just...great.

~~~

“Hey, dude! What’s up!” To emphasize the greeting, Sam offered Dan a hearty punch.

“Ow,” said Dan mildly. He rubbed his shoulder and took another bite of his sandwich. “It’s...not up.”

Sam laughed and threw himself into the seat next to Dan, digging into his own lacklustre cafeteria meal. “Ready for that test today?”

Dan and Sam did not have any classes together. Dan also had no test today.

“Sure,” Dan agreed.

The clatter of the lunchroom was almost a dull roar today. It still felt heavy, oppressive noise pressing into Dan’s ears and against the mild headache that he was once again nursing. He probably should have grabbed a painkiller from his bathroom this morning, but he’d been a little rushed after his attempt at heading to school in his nightclothes. Now that would have been a nightmare.

Another guy seated himself across from Dan, briefly glancing up and giving Dan a cursory nod. Dan chewed a bite of his sandwich and returned the nod.

“So, had a cool ride here this morning,” said Sam around an open mouthful of something that looked like mashed potatoes or glue. It looked more like the latter. “My board’s got a loose wheel though, gotta get that fixed.”

Dan took a loud slurp from his water bottle. “Yep,” he said.

“Talked to Johnathan too,” continued Sam, undeterred by Dan’s clear disinterest. “He went out with that girl Sam or whatever her name was and they hooked up in the…”

Dan set down his sandwich, tuned out Sam, and pulled his phone from his pocket. A new message from “phil the fellow nerd” was waiting for him, and a subconscious smile pulled at his lips as he clicked on it. This was his first message from Phil.

hi, internet stalker dan. This is pretty convenient, totally not messaging in class right now

Dan huffed a laugh and wiped his fingers on his trousers to remove any extra sandwich crumbs before replying. don’t message in class you nutter, you’ll get caught and then who will i talk to?

my teacher :D  replied Phil instantly. i’m sure you’ll get along great.

ew.

“Ooh,” said Sam. He leaned toward Dan, eyes bright as he tried to sneak a glimpse of Dan’s phone. Nonplussed, Dan tilted the phone away from him, waiting for a response. “Who’re you texting, Danny boy? Finally got a bird to talk to you?”

“Yeah, it’s your mum,” Dan retorted. The boy across from him slapped the table and laughed.

Sam snorted. “Sure, mate, have your secrets.” He chomped into another bite of the glue-like substance that coated his spoon.

dw class is almost over anyway, about to head to my next class, popped up a new message from Phil, and as if on cue, the bell on the wall of the lunchroom shrilled loudly with its obnoxious warning to head to class.

Dan climbed to his feet, shrugging his backpack over his shoulder. He collected his trash with one hand, typing out a reply to Phil with the other. omw to class right now. english, gross.

Somehow, this felt easier than anything Dan had ever done before. Messaging Phil wasn’t something that he dreaded, unlike literally any time Sam the self-proclaimed surfer tried to strike up a “bro” conversation. Even that nod with the guy sitting across from him had wearied Dan. These brief messages from Phil seemed to somehow have the opposite effect. Reading them felt more like a breath of fresh air or a sip of cold, soothing water than the draining outcome of most conversations. Maybe it was that they were just words on a screen, but Dan didn’t think so. Dan thought he might feel the same if Phil was standing in front of him right now.

He dumped his trash in the bin by the doors and headed to class, fingers rapid on his screen as he walked. Sam went with him, but Dan ignored the stream of chatter that was directed toward him. He navigated around other students with ease, making his way to the door of his class within a few minutes of leaving the lunchroom.

i have english now too lol, read the last message from Phil. gtg now though, talk to you l8er

the fact that you actually just typed ‘l8er’ disgusts me, Dan informed Phil. No reply came, but Dan had a feeling that Phil had seen the message anyway. good luck in class, Dan added, then slipped his phone into his pocket.

“ - so I gave her my least favourite banana,” Sam was saying, and he laughed uproariously at his own uninteresting story he had just been relating to Dan.

Dan was about ninety-five percent sure that he had heard this story before. He hadn’t listened those times, either. He stepped out of the way of a passing student and gazed through the open door to his English classroom. A few people were still milling inside, so Dan resolved to wait until they left. He had no interest in starting a class before he actually had to join.

“Yeah, so guess I’ll see you later!” said Sam. He socked Dan in the shoulder again, which Dan did nothing but wince against. He had probably developed actual muscles from the daily punches.

“See you,” he said, more apathetically than he had even planned to be.

“Cool, I’ll - oh damn,” breathed Sam, and Dan’s attention was snagged. He hadn’t heard that tone since last month when Johnathan’s wealthy grandfather had bought him a cherry red sports car for his sixteenth birthday and Johnathan had driven it up in front of school to show it off to the groups of girls that hung outside after school. He had gotten a flat tyre the next day and hadn’t driven it to school since, but the appreciation from his friends had been enormously gratifying so he gave quite a few of them rides to and from his oversized house and the ice cream parlour down the road. Dan had not been one of those friends.

“Dude,” said Sam, still in that same voice. He punched Dan in the shoulder again, but it was half-hearted as he stared down the hallway. “Look.”

Dan was already following his gaze. He felt his own jaw fall slack as he took in the sight moving down the hallway toward him.

It was Fiona. She was different, though. She moved with rare ease through the sparse crowd in the hallway. Her shoulders were square, confidence evident in her posture as she strode toward Dan and their shared classroom. This clear self-assurance wasn’t the only change, though. There was an obvious change from only yesterday, where her disdainful stare had bored through Dan in the bathroom encounter. Her long, flowing dark locks were shorn. Instead of the usual cascading hair toppling past her shoulders, she had shaved the sides of her head and the top was styled only a few inches short, ruffled into a playful quiff.

Something burned hot in Dan’s chest. He swallowed harshly, unable to tear his gaze from the new hairstyle. It suited her almost unfairly, the short sides of the cut highlighting her sharp cheekbones and sloped jawline. Her eyebrows were still that pale brown hue, arched evenly over her cool blue eyes. Said eyebrows narrowed harshly as her gaze snagged on Dan. Her lip curled as she drew closer, but she didn’t speak a word to him.

“Hey,” said Sam, unaware or uncaring of the crystal contempt obvious in her expression. “Cool cut, my dude. You look hot!” He nudged Dan, elbow digging harshly into Dan’s ribs. Dan didn’t notice, still staring unblinkingly at Fiona. “Doesn’t she look hot?”

“Hot,” Dan repeated without really thinking about it. Fiona didn’t seem to hear him, as she cast Sam a slightly less contemptuous look. 

“Thanks,” she said.

Sam beamed. “Sure!” he said. “So you’re a lesbian now?” 

Sam was a fucking dumbass.

Fiona’s gaze slid back to Dan, scalding him with obvious scorn as if he was the one who had asked the question. “No,” she said, gaze boring into him, “I definitely like guys,” and with that, she swept past both of them and into the classroom, ignoring the other students still inside. Dan dreaded having to follow her inside.

“She’s totally gay,” Sam confidently informed Dan.

Dan punched Sam in the shoulder.

~~~

Dan was drawing a random person. He was definitely drawing someone random. The quick strokes of his pencil over the sketching pad were casual and brief, etching out nothing more than the portrait of a sharp-cheekboned, slope-jawed, dark-haired, narrow-eyed person - “Fuck,” said Dan aloud, his pencil pausing over the paper.

“I’m sorry?” asked his teacher.

Dan blinked and glanced up. Ah, yes. He was in English class. His teacher stared him down, the marker in her hand hovering above the board. “Um,” he said. “I just...remembered an assignment I need to work on.” He offered a tight-lipped smile, which was returned with obvious gritted teeth by his teacher. For as much as she cared about him talking in class, she never paid attention to what he was constantly drawing.

“Like I was saying,” she said, turning back to the board, “we’re going to be going over these lines of poetry and…”

Sighing, but quietly, Dan frowned down at his sketchbook. He flipped to a new piece of paper and lowered the pencil to it, but hesitated to start. He could hear a scoff from Fiona in the seat behind him, and yet no kick was offered to his seat. She hadn’t started anything since their suspension, but she’d at least slipped him some cutting insults when the teacher’s back was turned. Now, he got nothing but huffs.

Dan tried again, this time an ambiguous sketch of a teenager sprawled across a bench. He grew the outlines of long, lanky limbs, a very male torso and lower appendages, and slender calves and feet. Once he got to the face, his pencil moved without his permission, detailing the long nose, sharp eyes, and arched eyebrows of - Fiona.

Motherfucker.

Dan was tempted to rip out the page, but that would draw too much attention, so he just angrily folded over the page to a fresh paper and dropped his pencil on his desk.

Bzzz. His phone vibrated briefly with a notification, warm against his leg where he’d tucked it when he sat down. Dan tried to ignore it, but it buzzed again a moment later. And then again. At least it wasn’t loud enough for anyone to hear, not even Fiona, who had keen ears and was right behind him.

Well. He couldn’t draw anything, if Fiona’s face was going to invade everything he worked on, so he might as well. He watched the teacher, but her back was still turned as he slipped careful fingers beneath his thigh to slip his phone out. He placed it atop his sketchbook and half-closed the book over it. It was extremely unsubtle, but at least his teacher wouldn’t immediately be able to tell what he was doing. He still kept an eye on her as he swiped at his phone, though.

Three messages from Phil were waiting for him.

Bored

booored

dan entertain me

Dan had to physically force himself not to laugh as he painstakingly typed out a reply. what, i’m in class. i can’t just leave to talk to you

Only a few seconds passed before a reply popped up. Lame. don’t you know that’s your sole purpose for existence, to talk to me?

This was terrifying, Dan decided, but it was fantastic. He and Phil had talked so much before and after school, whenever Dan could get his hands on his computer, but now they could actually talk in class. 

besides, I’m in class too, came in another message from Phil. living life on the edge, that’s me

if you get caught i’m going to laugh at you

I am the sneak master I would never get caught, Phil replied confidently.

“Excuse me!” barked their teacher from the front of the room. “Are you on your phone in class?”

Dan carefully did not react, letting his fingers slip away from his phone and slowly lifting his eyes to stare at her with a level gaze. He could still see the glare of the phone out of the corner of his eye, lighting up the pale pages of his sketchbook that were drooping over it.

But she wasn’t looking at him. She crossed the length of the room in a quick dozen strides, pausing next to Dan’s desk to stare behind him. “Miss Fiona,” she said sternly. “You know the rules.”

“Sorry,” said Fiona, in the most insincere tone Dan had ever heard in his life. The teacher apparently accepted it though, as she just nodded.

“Put it away. If I see it again, I’ll confiscate it until the rest of class.” With that, she turned and made her way back to the board.

Dan finally breathed. He couldn’t dare keep texting Phil now, since his teacher would be on high alert for the rest of class. He spared a quick glance at his phone, though, but didn’t see anything from Phil. Maybe the other boy had finally realized the danger of texting in class. Dan snuck the phone from his sketchbook to its original place beneath his thigh.

Although he waited for it, no other messages buzzed the phone against his leg for the rest of class.

~~~

Dan’s morning had been rushed, obviously, but there were four items he had not let himself forget. They were currently crammed into the bottom of his backpack. He’d left his English textbook - it hadn’t even been needed this class, anyway - at home so they could fit. They rattled together, quietly but still noticeable, as he slowly climbed to his feet.

He’d been sitting on this toilet for the past thirty minutes after his last class. Dozens of other students had come in and out of the bathroom since then, but the rush had slowed to a trickle and now it was finally empty as everyone left school for the day.

Dan’s ass was fully numb at this point, so he kicked his legs out in ways that probably would have looked hilarious if anyone had seen him as he ducked out of the stall and made his way across the room. He locked the door and reached high above one of the sinks to crack open the tiny window that led outside, and then he took a moment to take a breath and glance around the room. It still smelled heavily of piss and the five stalls, three sinks, and two urinals were still varying shades of ugly grey, matching the walls.

His phone chirped in his pocket. He’d taken it off vibrate once he left class, and had spent most of his time hiding in the stall earlier by texting Phil. Just the usual, mundane, hilarious, witty messages that left Dan feeling like a weight had been dragged from his chest. But that was beside the point.

Just got home, said Phil’s most recent text when Dan dug his phone from his pocket and glanced at it. time for homework :(

ha, good luck, Dan replied. He put the phone back and then shook out his arms, brushing his thumbs over his fingers anxiously. He was going to do this.

Hoisting his backpack into one of the sinks, he unzipped it and rifled briefly to the bottom before he found what he was looking for. It was a cold metal can, decorated with bright smears of colour and a solid grey lid. It rattled when he shook it. He placed it on the floor next to the wall that was violent with marker sketches, then dug a few more similar cans from his backpack. Each one had a differently coloured lid, one with pink, one blue, and the last one white.

Dan took a step back and glanced over the wall. The cans before it were full of potential, something fierce and proud inside of them ready to be released. The wall was ugly now, black scars of marker marrings its dull grey paint, the occasional splash of colour where someone had discovered a coloured marker in their bag. And there was that tiny trans flag, its bright colours muted by the slurs and graphic art scrawled around it.

If Dan was caught once he picked up one of those cans, he wouldn’t be suspended. He’d be expelled. The danger of it felt valuable. Adrenaline already sang through his veins, although he had yet to start.

Hauling in another deep breath, he let his chest expand and relax with the strength of it, and then he reached down and snagged the grey can of paint.

He began.

~~~ previous chapter ~~~ next chapter ~~~

[diningpageantry]

No Wait Unblock Me

Archive Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18215168/chapters/43133210

Chapter 2/10 of It’s A Handheld Disaster

Word Count: 1580

Chapter Summary: Simon and Baz finally get to "mutuals" status.

BAZ

For the third time today, I see a similar notification slide through my drop down.

bi-sammy sent you a picture

Part of me initially wants to sigh, roll my eyes, and swipe it away, because apparently part of me wishes to be alone for the rest of my life. Thankfully, the reasonable, tiny sliver of my mind makes sure I don’t make such a mistake.

Given the situation, one would think we’d parted ways. He makes a post, we stop the argument, all is fair in fandom and war. Except, now I believe Snow has grown under an impression that after one exchange, it qualifies us for somewhat of a friendship, and therefore reason to send me memes. Don’t get me wrong, memes are a fantastic waste of time and barely a waste of energy, but it’s strange that he’s not fucking off like most people.

Maybe I’m used to others being scared of me.

Maybe I’m used to others following my tactics of scaring them away.

Whatever I’ve done hasn’t worked, since this arse is immune to my attempts at coldness and mild animosity. I’m starting to suspect there’s something genuinely wrong with him, like he doesn’t get enough love and attention.

Guess that makes two of us.

I guess I somewhat crave this friendship. I’ll speak the truth to that and say yes, I smile when his memes pop up. They’re almost always fandom, and definitely made on Photoshop. This one, I see as I tap and let it load, is the crudely drawn Kirby graphic shoving burgers into his mouth, but over Kirby is photoshopped a picture of Huxley’s face and the burgers are Sam's ass.

It’s all poorly done and, sadly, extremely endearing.

My thumbs hover over my keyboard, cheeks creasing as I stare down at the picture. I lay back against my pillows, the curtains drawn and my hair pulled out of my face. It’s quite lonely; my life’s a sterile mixture of quarantined education and age old settled dust in my ancient room. It’s nice to have his somewhat obnoxious messages pop onto my screen, but it feels so odd. So foreign, and barely understood.

I want to understand.

gaystrell: why are you still messaging me?

I get an answer not even a minute later.

bi-sammy: do you want me to stop?

I don’t even hesitate to send out a reply, feeling a steadily growing lump in my throat, choking me mindless.

gaystrell: no.

bi-sammy: then why did you ask?

gaystrell: i just

gaystrell: don’t get it

bi-sammy: get what?

gaystrell: why you’d want to talk to me

bi-sammy: because youre cool

gaystrell: vexing me won’t get you “street cred”, if that’s what you’re after

bi-sammy: shit no wait that’s not what i meant

bi-sammy: dont block me fukc wait

bi-sammy: id just meant that you wrote all that shit and i thought it was really cool and

bi-sammy: i dont know

bi-sammy: i thought we could be friends since you did all that

bi-sammy: ill stop if you want me to

gaystrell: calm down you’re clogging my notifs

gaystrell: do that again and i /will/ block you

gaystrell: but………. if you actually do want to be friends i suppose i’m willing to give forth a little attention

bi-sammy: im osrry i dont speak posh cunt

gaystrell: too bad, blocked

bi-sammy: no wait unblock me

gaystrell: fine last chance

bi-sammy: bitch

gaystrell: b l o c k e d

bi-sammy: no but,,,,,,, i do want to be friends

I’m smiling like a fucking loon, scrolling through our brief exchange. It’s strange. Most people aren’t upfront about wanting to talk, or wanting someone to talk with. Wanting a friend, even. I have the people follow me and ask me questions, and of that only a small handful of those who actually interact eith me (and even in that, we usually only speak to give each other a helping hand).

And despite that, here’s someone who wants to try.

I suck my lower lip into my mouth, trying to think of my course of actions.

There’s a simple one I can take now (and probably should’ve taken as an initiative). I click his icon, and click “Follow” on his page.

It doesn’t take very long before I get a notification come through, starting that he mentioned me in a post.

It isn’t very long, but it gets its point across in the best way possible. It’s just a mobile screenshot, reading “gaystrell started following bi-sammy” with a quick caption.

god himself entered the groupchat. how do i block him?

SIMON

I wonder what it’d be like to see me in the moment. It’s a real shame Penn wasn’t around to capture it, since I’m in the middle of French class, but I must’ve smiled so stupidly that it caught the attention of the professor. He gave me a stern look until I set down my mobile.

The moment he turned away, I opened it back up and grinned.

At first, I didn’t believe what I was seeing. Him. Following me.

Us. Mutuals. Mutuals.

Of course I had to screenshot and post as a brag (barely humble, more metaphorically sucking my own knob for all my followers to see). Nobody really cares, as expected.

Well, nobody except the single message from none other than Mr. Bitch.

gaystrell: blocked. unfollowed. reported. waste of space.

My smile creases back my cheeks as they flush pink. I send back a quick message before turning my mobile over, foot tapping double the speed of the analogue on the wall.

bi-sammy: ;)

BAZ

He winked. Interesting.

I’m out of breath.

Fuck?

I lay my phone flat away from me, face down as I squint at my wall. I should respond in a composed fashion. I have to be clever, and not one-upping him is never an option. After all, does this qualify as flirting? Friendly banter? What am I doing with this random fucking bloke that I don’t even have a face to put to?

He’s my age. Roughly. Yes?

I check his tumblr again, as if I hadn’t just read his bio earlier.

simon // he/him // 17 // hold my fucking hand (please)

Maybe he’s just straight and I’m misreading it. Yes. Probably. Aren’t most people straight? Is that still a fact? (I highly doubt it, given how boring that must be.) But he winked at me. Somewhat prompted, I’ll give him that, but it was still a fucking wink.

I wink in texts to Dev and Niall too, though, but that’s different, isn’t it? I’d never snog either of them (especially fucking Dev), but hey. If unfaced internet boy asked for a snog, would I?

I’m too wrapped up and starved for human interaction to properly deal with this.

gaystrell: i will carry on with my threats, snow

There it is. Perfectly biting, while not being entirely rejecting. Maybe I’m better at this than I thought.

Or, perhaps, I’m worse, because even an hour and a half after sending the text, he’s silent.

I remind myself every few minutes that he most likely attends an actual school and has classes, but it makes my chest ache in the most unfair way every time my mobile tempts me with an unrelated notification.

I work myself to the point of moping down in the kitchen, slumping against the fridge whilst watching Vera make tea. She’s relatively silent, knowing better than anybody to leave me to sulk.

“You’re a drama queen,” she tuts, looking over me. Granted, I dress like a slob and borderline haunt this godforsaken mansion, but I feel as though that makes me entitled to being the way I am.

“I’m lonely,” I sigh, head resting against the fridge. It hums beside me, the chromed metal cooling my cheek. “Am I not granted a dramatic spell every now and then?”

“Not unprovoked.”

I set a hand against the handle, then let it drop. I’m not hungry. “What if it was provoked?”

“Is it?”

Instinctively, I pull out my phone and click it on. Nothing. “Perhaps.”

Vera frowns at me, walking over and setting a hand on my arm. “What’s wrong? Are you feeling okay?”

My eyes slowly roll as I push myself off the appliance, standing upright. “Physically, yes. Don’t fuss. It’s just… online shit.”

“You spend too much time on the phone,” she sighs, letting go and going back to the tea as she fixes me a mug. “Don’t you think you’d be happier to disconnect from social media for a day or two? Go on a walk, see nature?”

I snort, looking outside. “And what? Trip and bust open my knee? That’d wind me back up in care for at least a few days.”

“You act like you’re made of paper and glass.” She offers over my mug, letting my fingers wind around the handle before she shakes her head.

“I might as well be,” I huff down before thanking her and blowing on my tea.

Once I leave back up to my room, I realise it's somehow more depressing in here over the kitchen with Vera’s disapproval of technology rantings. At least she’s some sort of company.

As I’m sipping my tea, I go back to scrolling on my laptop as a notif pops up, jarring me with the sound but letting me breathe again.

bi-sammy: why do you know my last name smh

I exhale slowly, smiling to myself.

gaystrell: you commented on my google doc, you idiot