#pictures not too pretty because its hard to take them on mobile

[cmentary-drive]

Cute fit dare I say

[ancientgoddessofegypt]

VIRGO MOONS : THE DELICATE SOUL 🌙💕

Virgo moons have an analytical mind whose gift is seeing the smaller picture and turning it bigger. Their emotional weight holds no bounds as they carry the burdens of others on their backs. Their empathetic nature keeps them away from the soulless , and away to an underground where souls can meet. They aren’t interested in the ordinary, their imaginations can take them to new heights if their environment isn’t too controlled. For these babes, they need an outlet to control their emotions, so things like cleaning, writing, dancing, or anything that completely challenges the brain is up for grabs. To heal their emotions, they have to connect to their thoughts and utilize them in acts of brainstorming and using their natural gifts in psychology to get to the bottom of something. Like the Scorpios, they are pretty good at piecing together hidden messages.

They understand the use of the subconscious mind well enough to operate with a certain thinking skill that propels them over their peers. They are often times challenging themselves to do more, because their brains are at the peek of doing something genius and it must be used to its highest mobility.

The angels sanged to them, and sent them otherly worldly messages to show them the ways to the promise land. These angels sent to earth from the astral planes have a lot of work to do when it comes to the healing of themselves and nature. Quiet places suit them, giving their minds a place to let go.

Virgo moons think a lot. Aloooot. This is a Virgo problem but with the moon it’s hard to let go. It’s hard for them to really say what they need to in words, so they overly clean, organize, shapeshift and damn near destroy everything to fix their brains. Sometimes the brain can have so much going on it’s overwhelming. They don’t know what to do when it becomes too much.

As the sign that has it all together, these people can go through internal crises that most will never see. Because they got their poker face game down to a t.Their skills in the mind are impeccable and it is always constantly growing. The gift is in the details, that’s why they’re so good at what they do. Crafters at the heart, their ability to turn something small into something bigger with time is crazy. These mini universes are capable of creating their dreams into reality because the visions they have start off with a blueprint before their given to final piece.

Virgo moons have a delicate sensual nature and it is expressed through cute little tea parties, the way they decorate their space, the way the sun connects to them and how their bodies looks good in the grass. The expression of their sensual nature is enhanced when the aromas are perfectly entwined with theirs. Their space needs to be a walking temple or else their energy isn’t going to work it’s magic like it should. Amazing creatures of the imagination when they know how to bring their vision to life.

Hope this helps !!

[adamwatchesmovies]

The Sound of Music (1965)

I was shocked to learn that The Sound of Music received mixed reviews upon its release in 1965. I can sort of understand someone criticizing the liberties it takes with the story it's based on (though of course, someone who does this should realize that real life is not particularly cinematic) but how can you not fall in love with this musical? Unabashedly sweet, it effortlessly charms you. This is exactly the kind of movie you’d love to watch on a miserable day when you’re sick. No matter how foul your mood is, it’ll lift your spirits.

In 1938 Austria, Maria (Julie Andrews, magnificent) studies to become a nun but doesn't fit in with her peers. She’s always humming a tune and constantly finds her spirit whisked away by music. To help her decide where she belongs, Maria is sent to help care for the seven children of Captain von Trapp (Christopher Plummer). As the family bonds, everything seems blissful, until neighbouring Nazi Germany begins mobilizing its troops…

If you’ve never seen The Sound of Music before, you’ll feel a little foolish once it’s over. You haven't sat down with this movie, but you’ve heard several of the songs before, you’ve seen parodies of the most memorable scenes and you may have even seen clips out of context. It makes you go "Oh! That's from THIS movie!" There’s no way to forget My Favorite Things, Do-Re-Mi, Sixteen Going on Seventeen or So Long, Farewell and you won’t want to. Much credit belongs to Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, who wrote the stage musical but if that was all the movie had going for it, you could watch a stage version. What elevates this production is the cast. Julie Andrews, best known for her role in Mary Poppins is unsurprisingly excellent as Maria. What she does almost seems easy because - like the children she cares for - you instantly fall for her. She’s so sweet, gentle and kind it’s hard to imagine even the iciest hearts - like the one beating inside Captain von Trapp - staying cold in her presence. What’s surprising is Christopher Plummer. Turns out, he can sing. I don’t know if you’d be as excited at the idea of them becoming romantically entangled if the children weren’t there, but that’s the point. If Maria does fall in love, it won’t be with just the father, it will be with the family.

The film’s best scenes often involve dance numbers. Not the big kind of dances that suddenly has everyone in the country expertly coordinated; playful, childlike dances as the young Von Trapps perform for a crowd or tender scenes between two people who tell us how they feel through lyrics and body language. Though the children are only given limited screen time and character development, they all get enough for you to understand them as people. It helps that the young actors portraying Liesl, Louisa, Friedrich, Kurt, Brigitta, Marta and Gretl are terrific.

One of my favorite things about The Sound of Music is that while it’s light, happy, romantic and carefree - maybe even corny - it has this tiny bit of tension and a smidge of fear in it too. As we approach the second act, a looming shadow in the distance keeps you wondering. When Germany annexes Austria, it’s a cold bucket of reality dumped onto this musical. Things were so sweet and light before; surely this means the family will be alright? You’re pretty sure they will be, but there’s a part of you that doubts. It’s just enough to give this movie stakes and compels you to keep watching. As nice as the film is, it might’ve been too much without that little bit of vinegar.

The Sound of Music has melted the ice around my heart and rekindled my appetite for musicals. It's the kind of picture that introduces itself to you by handing you a bouquet. You fall in love with the songs, the story and the dance numbers too. There's even a puppet show so darling it'll make your every worry and fear vanish. I can't wait to see it again. (December 13, 2023)

[lovediives]

hi diamond ! handing u 🎈and 🐇 for the ask meme with whoever ud like to answer for (tho id love to hear ur thoughts with either seteth / grusha / balor if u want me to be specific 👀) [@dmclr]

I will be specific since you name dropped!!

hiii claraa thank you so much for the ask <333

🎈— what is your most precious memory with them?

non-self insert wise? i shit you not, its when i realized how important flayn was to him. was it love at first sight? not really. but the more i learned about him, the more i was like, ah. i like him. i found out with lore with flayn and that was the day i was like. "yup, thats pookie." i appreciate the tea time too. so, every time i like to imagine that tea time is a very precious memory lore wise. (i have so many screenshots.)

CASTOR AND SETETH. ooh boy. I genuinely like to imagine that castor was annoying as shit to seteth. every day it was something but one day seteth finally accepted his invitation to tea and castor is rather shocked over it but he's so excited and happy that he smiles and rushes the two of them over. seteth is just listening to castor ramble on and on and when he smiles. castor thought he was going to have a heart attack and die. castor has that smile ingrained in his head because why does a man who seems so mean and strict have a smile so pretty? he makes me sick. /pos. ─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ───

GRUSHAA... ahhh i thought about this a lot even though its new. but one day dahlia decided they wanted to snowboard with him and made this huge plan to be able to without him getting hurt or making him uncomfortable. so after dragging grusha somewhere private, dahlia looks at him with big ol' eyes because he set it up that they could snowboard together and grusha is just silent. like the mobility aid, the pokemon, the safety precautions. like sure its not the "exact same" but it makes him pause and he looks like he's about to cry. but they're able to snowboard together and he's so happy and he's smiling and laughing again after so long!! when its over. HE is the one to hug them and then mutters "im going to marry you." and dahlias like "what i can't hear you." and he tells them to shut up before they ruin the moment. ─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ─── BALOR okay. i wont lie. i really only have it for when they first meet! this is mad corny but im kinda gay. but my s/i (i need to name them so badly) is there at mistria and they need help crossing so balor picks them up and jumps over the bridge with them. thats when my s/i falls in love and becomes a whole ass simp!! bitch if you dont get the fuck up?! /lhj.

🐇 — what kind of pet do you think you could raise together with them?

i cannot imagine seteth with a pet sadly.. but if thought long and hard about it. castor forces them to take care of a tiny little cat for a while until they can find it a new home. flayn almost looks sad but then they realized the owner was a small child who lost her cat so they don't feel as sad anymore........!

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ─── grusha and dahlia both take care of cetoddle. dahlia acts sorta like a mother figure to the pokemon and grusha thinks its really cute? i would say less of a pet and more of a "this is lowkey our child" kinda thing. dont tell anyone, but grusha has multiple pictures of dahlia and cetoddle saved in his phone.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ───

FROGS!! balor grows to like them... he was terrified and kinda disgusted at first but the more he realized how much my s/i liked them, the more he was like "if it makes you happy..." he then went on to give all the frogs on my s/i's farm a personal name. he has a favorite. its a frog named emerald. hes so funny for that.

[taones]

𝐓𝐚𝐧𝐚𝐤𝐚 𝐍𝐒//𝐅𝐖 𝐀𝐥𝐩𝐡𝐚𝐛𝐞𝐭

Pairing: tanka x gender neutral!reader (afab)

Note: Its 1am this probably sucks

Warnings: Smut (duh), mentions of public sex

A = Aftercare (What they’re like after sex)

tanaka is the sweetest and you cannot change my mind that he is touch starved. therefore, aftercare is the perfect opportunity for him to cuddle you and tell you how good you did or the other way round, depending on your preferred dynamics. If he's doing the aftercare, he always has a sports drink next to the bed for you and makes sure you drink it and have come down from your high before he drags you into the shower with him.

B = Body part (Their favourite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

It's his abs. Not to be predictable but they're something he worked hard on and it definitely payed off, so what if he likes seeing the look on your face when you see them?

Ryu is an ass man through and through, he matter the size his hands are all over that thing. Even when you're making out his hands are squeezing and rubbing your ass like it's his personal treasure.

C = Cum (Anything to do with cum basically… I’m a disgusting person)

He is lowkey a messy person when it comes to cum, yours or his. He likes yours all over his face and in his mouth sk he can taste you. However, he prefers his to be over your ass or the back of your thighs if he isn't allowed to come inside you (his first choice).

D = Dirty Secret (Pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

He kinda likes pain. It isnt really a dirty secret cause it takes him a while to notice but he can't help but shiver and moan when you scratch your nails down his back or bite his neck to muffle your moans. Tanaka even likes pressing down on them to feel some pain when he gets off.

E = Experience (How experienced are they? Do they know what they’re doing?)

I feel like he has a decent amount of experience maybe a couple of other people but he does research this kinda stuff and tries his best to adhere to any feedback you give him.

F = Favourite Position (This goes without saying. Will probably include a visual)

Any position he can see your ass in. Just the visual of his hips hitting your ass and it jiggling could make him come so he prefers reverse cowgirl etc. Not picky though, hes Tanaka.

G = Goofy (Are they more serious in the moment, or are they humorous, etc)

I feel like its 50/50 with Ryu. He could totally go for giggly sex and a lot of the time it is. If you start laughing about something he'll join in and he even laughs at himself a lot during it too. However, if hes super worked up then it's all about ramming you/getting rammed into the mattress and giggles can come during aftercare thanks.

H = Hair (How well groomed are they, does the carpet match the drapes, etc.)

He probably shaves. If it's not almost completely hairless then it's very well groomed and kept short. Couldn't care less about your body hair, he just doesn't like it on him.

I = Intimacy (How are they during the moment, romantic aspect…)

When he really gets into it, especially when hes about to finish, he gives out more and more praise. This can range from complimenting your body and making lewd comments to straight up repeating goes much he loves you. Apart from that, hes fairly romantic but not really if you get me. He'll praise you but he isnt exactly laying out verbal rose petals.

J = Jerk Off (How often, what are they thinking about, …)

Hes a horny bastard, he jerks off a lot. With your permission, he probably has some photos saved of you that he uses to get off and if not he has plenty of memories of you that he can use as inspiration.

K = Kink (One or more of their kinks)

I firmly believe he is up to trying anything at least once. However, does have a thing for quite literally fucking you stupid. The whole eyes unfocused, drooling and unable to say anything but his name makes him hard just at the thought.

L = Location (Favourite places to do the do)

Anywhere and everywhere. Has literally no shame but hes a little possessive so, if you're doing in in public, he's making sure nobody can see you because that's his and his only to look at. This being said, he has a thing for shower sex. The way the water flows down your body makes sure that he is at least a little hard and you can't really take a shower together without it ended with probably a blow job.

M = Motivation (What turns them on, gets them going)

When you wear certain clothes. For example if you're wearing something tight or short he can't help but oggle a lot. God forbid you decided to wear some of his clothes or walk around in nothing but his tshirt and underwear. Tanaka really won't be able to control himself.

N = NO (Something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

Like nasty degradation. He doesn't like anything that could potentially emotionally hurt you, even if you like it. Insulting you, sexual or not, will always leave him with a feeling of guilt and he just can't carry on with whatever you guys were doing

O = Oral (Preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc)

Now, he likes getting his dick sucked cause duh. However, he lives for giving you oral. Tanaka can and will be between your legs all day if he could and this means face sitting is an amazing experience. His skills are nothing to blink at either, be can get you to be a moaning mess within seconds and he probably gets a couple of piercings just to make that experience better for you.

P = Pace (Are they fast and rough? Slow and sensual? etc.)

With the exception of when you're upset, Tanaka is usually fast and rough. He cant help himself, sometimes you're just too hot and he always fucks you like there's no tomorrow.

Q = Quickie (Their opinions on quickies rather than proper sex, how often, etc.)

He is up for anything, like I said earlier. Plus he's very easily turned on so quickies are a fairly normal thing for you guys, they're not his favourite though because he tends to prefer a lot of rounds.

R = Risk (Are they game to experiment, do they take risks, etc.)

Like I said before, hes up for anything once. If you want him to do it, he'll probably give it a go! Risks are a thing he's willing to take as long as you're comfortable with it.

S = Stamina (How many rounds can they go for, how long do they last…)

His stamina is no joke. Seriously, he can go for a good 3 rounds before he even starts getting tired. Most of the time, you come more times than him cause you're the main focus so he tries to limit the amount of rounds for you two.

T = Toy (Do they own toys? Do they use them? On a partner or themselves?)

Very basic toys like a vibrator and a pair of handcuffs for either of you. Most of your guys sex isnt actually pre planned so the handcuffs are more common than other toys but he enjoys when he gets to bring them out.

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

Little shit thinks it's funny to pull away to 'stretch' just when you're about to come. He is in this mainly for your pleasure but he can't help but rile you up sometimes and get you whining.

V = Volume (How loud they are, what sounds they make)

I'd say hes relitavely loud. Loud enough that public sex isn't often but not loud enough for that many noise complaints from the neighbours. He can't help but get caught up and start spewing dirty talk in your ear between grunts and low pitched moans and your response usually increases his volume a little.

W = Wild Card (Get a random headcanon for the character of your choice)

Let him leave hickey hearts on you! Seriously, he has a thing for it and likes seeing them when you get changed in front of him. It's like a weird possession thing or maybe he just thinks it's cute, who knows.

X = X-Ray (Let’s see what’s going on in those pants, picture or words)

I'd say he's slightly bigger than average in length and has a good girth for him. His dick has a few prominent veins that are sensitive.

Y = Yearning (How high is their sex drive?)

Higher than average, definitely. Can and will have you every single night if you let him, even after a long day.

Z = ZZZ (… how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

I feel like he gets kinda hungry after sex and his aftercare is kinda long. After your shower, he probably makes a sandwich or something, eats it and comes back to bed after. Might spend a little time talking to you before he's out like a light.

Tumblr mobile likes to be annoying so sorry for any spelling mistakes! Requests are open and enjoy

[lyjikyu]

KISS YOU ✧ 박정우

lowercase intended! and this one's pretty long aswell. I couldn't put a "keep reading" button since Im using my phone (and I don't know how to put one in mobile) so please bare with this until I could use my laptop !! (ಡ ͜ ʖ ಡ)

"It took a lot of confidence for me to say this, though It seems like you don't feel the same, so if you could ..maybe just... kiss me once?"

jeongwoo, your best friend since your start of junior high (and your crush since junior high) asked you to have a date with him near the beach on your neighborhood. well technically he originally said if it would be okay for you two to take a stroll on the side of the beach, since he wanted to tell you something important. but it still sounded like a date to you.

also, what did he want to tell you? was he switching schools and leaving you by yourself from now on? no no no it can't be that bad. ignoring all the thoughts and physically shaking your head you chose to just forget about it, you didn't want to stress yourself before your date!

"jeongwoo hey!" you wave your hands at the boy standing infront of you. "o..oh y/n hey! Im sorry about that. I was just thinking about some things ... in school" he laughs awkwardly. he sure is acting a bit weird..

"alriight. so what did you want to tell me?" you smile and started walking to anywhere at this point. the beach was very beautiful this afternoon so you couldn't help but just want to admire it from everywhere.

"well, its pretty....embarassing" he sighs. what is this "embarassing important" thing he wants to tell you? did he get a girlfriend and you just assumed this whole date thing?? you couldn't stop overthinking, you just wanted him to spill it all. "I uh y/n?" jeongwoo looks away, biting his lower lip. he looked really nervous and you were too aswell.

your heart was beating so fast, it wasn't because you were excited, you were actually feeling really anxious. never in your years of friendship you would think that jeongwoo could make you feel this anxious. it was quite scary.

"uhm.. this is all of a sudden but I originally wanted to tell you this last valentines day. but I chickened out. so before I do it again, I would just want to tell you that... I like you" you stopped walking. he likes you? he likes..you. your heart dropped as his words repeat in your mind. he actually likes you back!

"It took me a lot of confidence for me to say that, though It seems like you don't feel the same, so if you could ..maybe just... k..kiss me once?" he stutters. what is he saying? you thought to yourself. you sigh – to contain your laughter and walked back to him.

did he really think you didn't like him back? "huh? jeongwoo what are you saying? I like you back idiot!" you laugh, you couldn't see his reaction since you were laughing too hard but you did hear him say "oh my gosh" quietly. "I can't believe I just made a fool of myself by saying that. can I just erase my whole existence" he covers his face with both his hands.

you've seen flustered jeongwoo before but it felt different knowing you caused this whole thing. then suddenly – without thinking, you grab both his hands and removed them from his face. leaving him confused and still flustered. "w..what are you doing? y/n?" he looks at you – feeling so many emotions as you lean in close to his face, giving him a quick peck on his lips.

apparently that caused you two to go insane inside. and now your both looking away from each other. if anyone was ever at the beach at the same time as you two were, this whole thing would be such a scene to look at.

"why did you that!?" jeongwoo whines. "Im sorry, I didn't know what I was doing???" you whine back. well you two were stubborn. "..I thought you wanted..me to kiss you" you spoke, looking down. "Y..yeah! I did say that but.. I wasn't expecting you to actually...kiss me" he was speaking so quietly you almost didn't hear him. you sighed, defeated by his stuborness. "It was just a peck but.. If it makes you feel better ..that was my first kiss..if it counts as one" he – finally turns to look at you and says "same"

your smile finally came back and so was his. this day was definitely chaotic but atleast you got yourself a boyfriend now! a goofy and shy one.

AAAA!! Its finished, my bestfriend @tigeryoshii helped me with this one so credits to her aswell! hopefully everyone found this great, and wasn't cringy ㅠㅠ. have a nice time everybody ! 'till next timee ( ꈍᴗꈍ) <3

og post for jeongwoo's picture

TREASURE MASTERLIST

[genevievemd]

It's that time again, Miss Sara! Newlyweds questions: photos edition!

Notes: Answer the following with pictures (dialogue from your characters is optional!). Collages are highly encouraged if you want to answer a question with multiple pictures because tumblr mobile only allows 10 total pics (there are 10 questions). Otherwise, tumblr on a desktop lets you add multiple pictures!

Also, don’t worry about picking pictures of your face claim (if any) to answer these! Any picture of the outfit/place, no matter who is wearing it, makes absolute sense! Have fun!

For MC

Favorite picture of Ethan at your wedding?

Favorite picture on your honeymoon (of him or otherwise)?

Favorite outfit(s) on him?

What does your home look like?

Picture of your spouse's last purchase.

For Ethan

Favorite picture of your wife at your wedding?

Favorite picture on your honeymoon (of her or otherwise)?

Favorite outfit(s) on him/her?

Picture of a dream getaway or date you would surprise her with?

Last picture she sent you.

P.S. Thank you so much for sending me some newlywed Qs for Ethan x Lilac. I am working on them and hope to post them soon!

MY FAVORITE TIME OF WEEK. You're an icon for doing these, a legend, a queen.

Also, I couldn't resist putting dialogue.

For MC:

1. Favorite picture of Ethan at your wedding?

Gen: Aside from the one of our first dance, it's the photo Henry posted of Ethan, when he was getting ready for the ceremony. I sent him this super long text about how excited I was to marry him and how much I love him, and Henry took a picture of Ethan reading it. Ethan: Because I sat there for a good ten minutes reading it over a handful of times. I had one of the many moments where I find it hard to believe that you agreed to marry me.

2. Favorite picture on your honeymoon (of him or otherwise)?

Gen: *snickers* Ethan: It's one of the million -- Gen: Yes. It is. If you don't want me to take a million photos of you, stop being so freaking hot.

Gen: Look at him, he's a freakin greek god. Unreal.

3. Favorite outfit(s) on him?

Ethan: I know the answer to this one. Gen: As you should. His all black suit, I don't know what it is about that freakin outfit but it makes him hotter, which seems impossible, but it does.

4. What does your home look like?

Gen: Less like a unwelcoming dungeon of solitude since I moved in. Ethan: Did you just insult my taste? Gen: Yes. *leans over and kisses his cheek*

(Oh Hey, it's me I'm breaking character to show you the floor plan that I envision for their/Ethan's apartment - because I'm extra)

5. Picture of your spouse's last purchase.

Gen: He bought a boujee new office chair. Ethan: It was necessary. Gen: It was expensive. Ethan: But necessary. I spend more time in my office as chief than I do seeing patients, I needed a new chair. Gen: *whispers* also because we may have broken the last one... Ethan: *clears throat* that too.

For Ethan

1. Favorite picture of your wife at your wedding? 

Ethan: It’s technically a photo of the two of us, but I only see her.  Gen: Such a smooth talker Ethan: I’m being honest, G. The only thing I see is your smile, how happy you are.

2. Favorite picture on your honeymoon (of her or otherwise?)

Ethan: I don’t think I can show that one. Gen: Ethan! Ethan: It’s my favorite picture from our honeymoon! That was the question. Gen: Pick a different one. You can’t show that one. 

Gen: Where’s that from?  Ethan: The boat tour.  Gen: Oh yeah, one of the few times we left the resort... and our room. Ethan: And you wonder why the other is my favorite. 

3. Favorite outfit(s) on him/her?

Gen: Why? Ethan: It’s distracting.  Gen: I’m not showing anything... Ethan: Oh, trust me, that skirt is showing enough.

4. Picture of a dream getaway or date you would surprise her with?

Ethan: St. Lucia. We almost chose it for our honeymoon, but decided to go to The Maldives instead. So her dream getaway, is St. Lucia.  Gen: Its so pretty. And tropical. 

5. Last picture she sent you.

Ethan: Can I... am I allowed? Gen: Why not. 

Gen: During a meeting to. I got yelled at. Ethan: I was with Leland and the board! Gen: I was trying to entice you to come home sooner.  Ethan: And it worked. 

(I love this new game so much, please keep sending me things. Also I totally forgot that I sent you questions 😂)

[myhoneststudyblr]

I often get asked for tips on various aspects of creating a studyblr and then how to grow it! It can be really daunting before you start if you don’t know how to go about it or what to post - I remember really wanting to create one for months before I actually built up the courage to make one.

This post is hopefully going to make this easier for you and give you the tips you need to get the best out of your blog!

Disclaimer: this is quite long! i wanted to make it as detailed as possible and it kinda got away from me XD

What is a studyblr?

study + tumblr = studyblr

A studyblr is a tumblr blog that posts anything associated with studying.

These blogs are part of the ‘studyblr community’, which is an online community of students who share their love for studying, stationery and their current lessons and study tips.

Why should you create a studyblr?

There are honestly so many reasons why i think that studyblrs are an amazing thing and why i can’t see myself leaving this community any time soon! here are some of my personal experiences:

1. i want to study! i have always been a very conscientious student and i have always worked very hard but i’m going to be completely honest with you and say that a lot of the time, particularly as i’ve been getting older, it has been a real struggle to get the motivation to do work. since i’ve started my studyblr, i’ve noticed a real increase in my desire to work because i want to have new things to post and talk about. it acts as a sort of outside external motivator!

2. my studying has got more interesting! when i say this, i don't mean the content. i’ve learnt so many new techniques and ways to organise my work that each set of notes that i do is different and i don’t feel like i’m doing the same thing every day!

3. my notes and handwriting have got neater! if you follow me, you might have seen a post from me a while back where i talked about my insecurity about my handwriting because i was *always* the person with the messy handwriting™. unfortunately, i am a perfectionist and i really wanted to have neat handwriting and notes. so my studyblr - because i wanted my posts to look good - made me spend more time focusing on the appearance of my notes and forcing me to slow down (this had been my main problem). now i can see a huge difference and i’ve reached a place where, even though my handwriting will never be the perfect font-like handwriting, it is noticeably neater and more consistent and i now love my pretty and unique handwriting

4. incredible advice about everything studying related! no matter where you are from, or what you study, it is possible to find advice about something that is relevant to you! people in studyblr are going through or have gone through everything you have and they give incredible advice on some many different things, from college applications and how to study a certain subject, to book recommendations and notetaking tips. but there are also plenty of tips on lifestyle and self-care, which are invaluable. even if you can’t find a post that helps you, you can always send someone an ask or a message and they’ll always try to help you out!

5. my mental health has got better and the community has helped me through so tough times! being a student today is hard and keeping your mental health in a good place can seem even harder. but i personally have found the studyblr community really helpful with this because i don’t feel so i alone. i know that there are so many mutuals and blogs that i follow that are going through similar things and i know i could always reach out to them for anything. i’ve also become less hard on myself and give myself significantly less impossible goals since i started studyblr

6. you will meet some incredible people. this was something that i wasn’t really expecting because when i started my blog i thought i would get 100 followers *max*. instead, i have been completely embraced by the community and have had some amazing conversations with people i know genuinely consider to be my friends. it is so easy to meet like-minded people who just want to support each other!

these are just the most important benefits that I've experienced with my own studyblr journey and there are so many more!!!

The 5 Basic First Steps

1. create a blog

if you are seeing this post i assume that you already have a blog! maybe you don't but luckily for you its very easy to create one. the main think you need to think about is whether you want to create a primary or secondary blog! you can find the differences between these here!

2. choose a URL/blog name

your username can be pretty much anything and can be a good way to show your personality, your likes or dislikes, or your goal for your studyblr! you can get really creative with your username and though most are, it doesn't have to be study/studyblr related.

here’s are some ideas that you could use when coming up with a username:

Your name or nickname

Favourite subject or your degree

Your dream job

Role models or fictional characters

Stationery

Brand names

Study utilities

Your favourite study snacks

COFFEE (this is very popular with many studyblrs... i wonder why?)

Your favourite animal

Basically, it can be anything! and don’t worry, if you decide later that you don’t like the name or you come up with soemthing better, you can always change it

3. choose a theme

this can seem like a very daunting task if you are completely new to tumblr but don’t worry! there are plenty of options and you can play around with this until you get what you want!

mobile theme: this is usually just changing the colours to fit with what you like and the mood of your blog

desktop theme: this is where it gets interesting! your desktop blog usually looks much more unique compared to mobile and you can add various different pages and really get it to look professional. there are so many different incredible themes that you can find that are free to use and can be customised slightly to fit your blog (there are also paid themes). you can also make your own theme (but i know nothing about this so i can’t really offer advice for that!)

4. find an avatar/icon

i personally think icons are really important because they can often be how people begin to recognise your blog when they see it on their dashboard and it can be a glimpse into what people expect

you can just use a normal picture for this: for example of your notes or something that relates to your URL or blog (eg a coffee cup)

however, you can also make your own from scratch! you can create your own icon using applications like Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Canva or Word/Pages. i personally used canva to make my icon (as well as all my banners for posts) and it is really easy to use and best of all is free! there are also people who have made icons for you to use (as long as you give credit) or will make them for you (sometimes for a small fee)

5. find some studyblrs to follow

this is probably the easiest step! if you know about studyblr, you probably already know a few blogs! just go through their blogs and see who they reblog or you can search through the #studyblr tag. i am also always happy to give recommendations of my favourites blogs (of which there are too many to count) or can try to recommend blogs that i know who study the same thing as you/are at the same level of study or are from the same country

Introduction Posts

i am a big believer in studyblr introduction posts! i think they are the best way to meet people when you are just starting and are the way that you get people to notice and interact with your blog.

what should you put in a studyblr introduction post?

your name or a nickname so people know what to call you

your pronouns

where you are from

your age

what you study

what level of study are you at (high school, uni etc.)

your hobbies and passions

why you made your studyblrs

what your goals are

tag some of your studyblr inspirations! (this is quite important because they will probably reblog the post and more people can discover your blog

these are just some suggestions and you don't have to include all of them if you are comfortable with sharing certain things!

if you want some examples of these posts, have a look through the #studyblr introduction tag! on my blog you can find that here!

What to Post

the beauty of studyblr is that you can pretty much post whatever you want and you will find a place in the community!

i love reblogging posts that come on my dashboard that i love or stuff from my mutuals! however, it is also really important to post your own original content because this allows people to get to know you and is probably the best way to grow your blog!

here are some ideas for what to post:

pictures of your notes

pictures of your current book

pictures of your annotations

pictures of your desk/study space

pictures of your food/ study snack

pictures of your drink/coffee

pictures of your favourite cafe

pictures of nature

pictures of your handwriting

text posts about something funny that happened in school/class/uni/your life

text posts about what is going on in your life

text posts about what is on your mind

texts posts where you share your journey completing a particular goal

text posts where you share your plan for the day

study guides

advice posts

self-care and lifestyle tips

essentially, it is whatever you want and whatever works for you!

When to Post

you should post whenever works for you! i know for a lot of people (myself included) most of the time you do not have time to post every day because that is a big commitment and that is absolutely ok!

when i first started, i thought that i had to post every day and it was a lot fo pressure! it was basically impossible to keep up because not only was it taking up a decent amount of my evening editing and posting my notes but also i didn't actually have enough material available to post! a studyblr should never get in the way of your schoolwork so try to fit it around this! post when you have time!

if you do want to have a more consistent posting schedule, there is a feature that allows you to schedule posts! so, say you have a bunch of free time on the weekend, you could schedule all the posts for the week ahead of time!

i would also recommend building up a queue for reblogs because this means that you again have some consistency in posts and you have new stuff quite regularly! (i personally always have a huge queue)

How to Grow Your Studyblr

the main thing i want to stay is that you should not be too worried about how many followers you have or how many notes your posts get because it really is unpredictable! i’ve had posts that have got crazy amounts of notes and i literally expected them to get hardly any and vice versa! i have no idea how the tumblr algorithm works so you just have to try and post for yourself!

that said, i know that it is really nice to have people interact and appreciate your posts so here are 3 quick tips:

use popular studyblr tags. these include #studyblr, #notes, #studyspo. you could also tag the stationery that you used, what subject it is and what level you at are (eg #high school or #uni)

tag other studyblrs. many studyblrs track certain tags and if you want them to see what you've posted and they will often reblog your post! i personally track the tag #myhoneststudyblr. you can find a post i made a while ago with some studyblr’s and their tags here! (note: this may be slightly out of date)

try and have a relatively consistent ‘look’ to your posts. you don’t have to follow a specific aesthetic but having some consistency in your posts can help people recognise your stuff. i personally keep my pictures of my notes very clutter-free (often just the notes and the pen i used) and bright. however, you can definitely switch things up if you want!

How to Get Involved in the Community

There are so many different ways that you can do this! Here are some of the best ways in my opinion!

send asks and messages to people!

i highly recommend sending asks to people, for example, if they reblog an ask game post or even just asking for some advice because they will start to recognise you as someone who is engaged with their blog and you could also learn something new about one of your favourite studyblrs!

messages are also a great, slightly more personal, way to interact with people. it can be as simple as messaging people to tell them you love their blog, or again asking them for some advice. if they do a post about a test or exam that they have coming up, you could even message them good luck or ask how it went. i have had some amazing conversations with people through messages and it is a great way to meet new people

just a reminder: always be respectful and polite in messages and asks to ensure that the community remains positive

reblog posts with a comment on their posts!

(or just add a comment, although this could be confusing if your studyblr is a side blog so just be warned)

this is a really nice way to let people know you’ve seen their post and it is always nice to give feedback. a comment can be as simple as: i love your handwriting! or good luck in that test! but that simple message reaching out it so nice to get! also, reblogging is really helpful to blogs because it means more people see the post

join a challenge!

ok, so i’ve had this blog for about a year and a half now and i had a pretty decent amount of followers (which i seriously do not understand XD) but i never got the same amount of interaction and involvement in the studyblr community until i created my #2020 quarantine challenge (click here if you wanna find out about this). i would get reblogs and likes on posts but i don’t think that i used to get nearly as much interaction with my posts with people leaving comments and stuff. furthermore, although i had blogs where we were technically mutuals, i didn’t really have mutuals like i do know where we actively keep in touch and check out each other’s posts all the time and stuff and that is honestly the nicest thing

challenges mean that you are most likely posting every day (or at the very least pretty regularly if you cannot manage every day) and this is good because you post lots of new content for people to discover. another great thing is that there is usually a tag that you can search for and scroll through and find others who are doing the challenge alongside you. the person who created the challenge also probably checks the tag out every few days and reblogs the posts

for these reasons, i cannot highlight how amazing challenges are for interaction and getting involved in the community!

The Golden Rule of Studyblr

🚨 ALWAYS BE POLITE AND FRIENDLY 🚨

probably my favourite thing about the studyblr community - and i know many others share this opinion - is that is such a friendly and welcoming place. it of course has its problems but this is a place whose ultimate aim is to support each other through our studying journeys! we are all here because we wanted to find likeminded people who we can make friends with and share our lives! therefore it is really important that we always try and lift each other up because you never know what someone is going through

Summary

there are lots of benefits to starting a studyblr so you definitely should!

it’s good to make your blog look nice and clean!

studyblr introductions are very important to start your blog off!

post what you like when you like!

tagging can be a great way to grow your blog!

don't focus too much on the number of notes you get or how many followers you have!

send asks and messaging, reblogging and commenting on other people’s posts and joining challenges are all great ways to get involved in the community!

we are all here to support one another so always be polite and friendly!

Other Resources

From Me

here is an answer to an ask i received about starting a studyblr (here is another one)

here is an answer to an ask i received about editing photos

From others

A Beginner’s Guide to Starting a Studyblr by @eintsein​

12 Step Guide to Starting and Running a Studyblr by @emmastudies​

How to Start a Studyblr by @caffeineandcoding​

Advice for New Studyblrs by @studyquill​

Starting a Studygram by @studyrellablr​ (many of the tips are the same for studyblr)

I hope this was helpful to any new studyblrs and even existing ones! As always i am always happy to answer asks and messages about and give any advice! If anyone else has any tips or tricks, please add them below!!!

[soundofseventeen]

Miracle (Lee Jihoon)

Happy birthday @peachy-hoon​! A million thank yous will never suffice but I can always give you this! I’m sorry for any mistakes; I literally uploaded this as I finished. And you know, it’s not my best work, but alas.

Word count: 2645

Inspo

“And that’s a wrap!” Jihoon spoke into the mic to let Wonwoo know he was done for the day and without waiting for him to leave the recording studio, removed his headphones and stuffed his sweater and whatever he could fit into his backpack and ran out of Universe Factory, the door wide open and leaving his confused, but amused friend to tidy up the small room. In his rush he literally ran into Jeonghan, who ended up throwing all the papers in his hands, and Jihoon, although didn’t like running behind schedule, stayed to help pick up the mess he made.

“Where are you going in such a rush?” The older boy teased, checking the papers he had in his hand to make sure they were all in order and ready for presentation.

“Home.” Not bothering to check the pages, Jihoon handed them over and let Jeonghan sort them out.

“It’s still early, don’t you think? Soonyoung said he still has to go through the choreography and Seungcheol wanted everyone present for the meeting.” The impish smile had formed on Jeonghan’s face before he finished his sentence.

“Soonyoung said he’d record it for me and Seungcheol already told me everything I need to know.” Jihoon searched for his cellphone, groaning internally when he realized that he had left it in the practice room when he dropped the towels off for his clingy friend.

“Aren’t you gonna help me put these back in order?” Jeonghan asked when he saw him walking away.

“You have that handled well enough.”

“I’m missing the first page, and I had it before you knocked me over.” 

“Don't do this to me right now Jeonghan.” This time, the groan he let out was external. “I have plans that I can’t break.” Well, he could if he wanted to, but he wasn’t gonna.

“You’re not going anywhere until I find it.”

“It’s under your shoe. I’ll grab it for-move Jeonghan. I need all the time I can get.” Jihoon crouched to pick up the piece of paper.

“Why not just invite Y/N over so you stay a little longer and then you can leave together.” Jeonghan not so subtly moved his foot along with the paper so he wouldn’t take it so easily.

“I don’t think so.” He pushed his older friend, momentarily making him lose his balance and successfully retrieved the paper, squinting his eyes to read it and looking confused. “How is this our fault?”

“It’s not. The CEO is already talking to Jun about it and we’re supposed to see what measures we can take from happening again.”

“Then shouldn’t we talk to Yanan about it? I don’t know why they thought squawking every time their ringtones went off and unnecessarily texting each other throughout the day is our fault.” And both of them were messaging both groups, but he didn’t need to add that part. Instinctively, his hand went to his pockets, ready to make sure his phone stayed on silent, but he remembered he didn’t have it.

“If it gets the CEO off our backs, I don’t care what we have to do.” Jeonghan took out his own mobile device, shutting the noise off as a safety precaution. “I dreamt Yanan was part parrot twice already.” He shuddered at some memory.

“Okay, so I’ll see you tomorrow then. Bright and early and not a minute more. I have a song for you and Mingyu to go through.” He was ready to step past him when Jeonghan grabbed him by the collar and pulled him back slightly.

“Do you really have to go though? This hyung hasn’t eaten lunch and it’s your turn to buy.”

Woozi let out a deep sigh, took out his wallet, smiled briefly at the picture he had of you, and pulled out his debit card, along with the loose change he had. “You know my pin number and this is literally for anything else. ‘Bye.”

“Will Y/N be okay with you staying longer?” 

“Yes, but I won’t be.” He turned the other way to head over to the practice room, only instead of seeing Soonyoung, he found Chan in the middle of a choreo practice. “Sorry, I’m just here for my phone.”

Chan hit the pause button on the remote, and gratefully took the towel Jihoon provided. “Oh, uh, I haven’t seen it. Maybe Hoshi hyung took it when he left?”

“Okay, I’ll see you guys tomorrow then.” Although he wasn’t thrilled to be phoneless the rest of the day, he figured that no one important would try to get a hold of him and if he managed to convince you to turn it off, then it’d be foolproof. 

“Hyung, what are you today with Y/N that you’re not staying here with us?” Chan wadded up the towel and threw at him when Jihoon shook his head.

“Nothing, for real. I just wanna go home and take a nap on the couch.”

“I don’t believe you, but go ahead and leave us to suffer with our evil CEO and Joshua hyung.”

“I don’t know what you did but I’m glad you did it. Now Bumzu is in charge of getting the chorus done before you leave ton-stop looking at me like that. I’m not abandoning you.”

“You’re leaving us for Y/N.”

“I already had these plans.” And not even his best friends would hold him up. 

“Okay fine, don’t tell me what super fun, cool thing you’re gonna do while we just slave away here.”

Jihoon began walking away, backwards and slowly. However, he couldn’t hold back the smirk on his face. “We aren’t doing anything or going anywhere. I’d ask you guys to come over after work to see for yourself, but I don’t wanna.”

“Ever since you and Y/N started dating, you’ve changed.” The fake sniffle Chan let out almost sent Jihoon to the floor but he managed to reach the door and once he took a bow, walked out.

*

Jihoon let himself in quietly, just in case you were asleep or on the phone with someone important to you, but he was greeted with a Stray Kids song coming from the living room. He smiled while he watched “Back Door”, nodding to himself when he saw Bang Chan. He admired the leader, and respected his choices regarding his group, but if anything, it was how much you fawned over him that made him petty. (Not in the sense that whenever you argued, he’d tell you to be with him, but rather he thrived on the idea that if he was with you in public and you came across Chan, Jihoon could always be satisfied in knowing that you were on his arm, and bragging about him.) 

He did make a note to remind himself to tell the boys  that your friend wanted Seventeen to do the choreo and if he could just remember it one day, it’d be great. 

“Jagi?” He called out so he’d know where you were.

“I’m not home,” was your response and with that, followed the sound of your voice that led him into the kitchen. “You’re early.”

He placed a kiss on your hair and let you finish the dishes while he checked the mail you left on the table. Bills, spam, a few unknown addresses written to you and he could only assume you found more photocards and you’d show them to him later. “How was work?”

“They wanted me to stay a little longer but I told them I couldn’t.”

“So just about the same as me.” He tore up the junk mail, and threw it in the trash. “What’s that smell?” He asked, wrinkling his nose.

“I might have burned the first batch of cookies, while I was in the shower. But don’t worry, thes ones in the oven are almost done and they’ll be good for dinner.” You turned around to wave at him, but he stood up, opened a pack of peach gummies for you and fed you one. “Speaking of, what sounds good?”

He wrapped his arms around you, back hugging you while you resumed your chores. “I’m not hungry right now. How about you throw these in the dishwasher and we can just watch movies and we’ll make food later?”

“Vacuum the living room first and then I’ll go meet you there. I have to clean the bathroom after this and dust my shelves and-” you sighed, “-so much to do.”

“But you’re not working tomorrow. Can’t you do that?”

“I have plans tomorrow and I won’t be home until late.”

“Fine, I’ll help you do our chores so you can finish and then we’ll watch something that Wonwoo swore was good.” 

He kissed your cheek, only to jump slightly when you yelled out, “Ateez present!”, followed by, “Turn the TV up. I love this song!”

He nodded but didn’t say anything else, instead running around the apartment with the vacuum cleaner and you occasionally scolding him because you couldn’t hear your favorite songs, and after that, collecting all the trash to throw out so you wouldn’t have to go outside and lose whatever motivation you had. He liked when you had energy like that; it usually made him wonder what other things you had done, like the fact you changed the bedsheets this time, washed his clothes, and baked some dessert. You worked extra hard today and he couldn’t wait to have you sit next to him and watch something that you wouldn’t focus on, but you’d have a good night’s sleep if that happened. He wished he could do what you did in the short amount you’ve been home.

You somehow managed to finish at around the same time, but he could see you weren’t tired because you were teasing the cat with all its toys. (The cat he said he didn’t want when you bought the apartment, but for some reason couldn’t bear parting with the stray so now, he was an active member of the family, but he wasn’t complaining. The feline kept you company when he was gone and it strangely put Jihoon at ease.) “Haha, you’re too slow. Come grab it now.” You picked him up, trying not to wince when one of the claws came out. “Come on pretty boy. You’re gonna watch a movie with us tonight.”

Jihoon was already waiting for you, your favorite blanket ready to be claimed and the snacks ready to be eaten. “Come on Jagi. You don’t know how long I was waiting to do this with you.” He extended his arms wide enough for you to fall into them, and when you did, wrapped them around you, sighing contentedly. “You know I can stay like this forever, right?”

He kissed your forehead when you nodded, and you could feel the tiredness creeping in. He always made your long days a little better and you often wished you could be the beacon of energy he needed, and you tried really hard to be that. Your work’s complaints could wait for another day, but this couldn’t. “Thank you for coming home early.”

You could feel yourself falling asleep a little into the movie, not because you were bored, but because you were so warm and comfortable and you didn;t wanna break your little bubble. Jihoon played with your hair, further lulling you into a slumber and when he placed random kisses on you, you just silently asked for more. So it surprised you when the doorbell rang and you looked at him. “Did you order dinner?”

“No. Did you?” Then came the hard knocking and you recognized it immediately, and you let out a laugh.

“They didn’t,” Jihoon groaned. “I told them no. Just ignore them and they’ll go away.”

“Is that why you turned my phone off earlier?”

“Yes. I don’t always get this time with you.”

“Should I just let them in? You know they won’t stop until we open the door.” You didn’t know how long you stayed liked, but you reluctantly got off of Jihoon and opened the door, him muttering profanities and threatening to put them through hell the next time they were due to record.

“Y/N, you’re here!” Seungkwan pushed through everyone to hug you. “How come you don’t visit us? Don’t you love us anymore?”

“Dude, I’ve been so busy lately. I’m sorry.”

“WAIT!” Chan cried loud enough to wake your neighbors so you put a finger to your lips to quiet him down. “So Hyung was telling the truth when he said you weren;t doing anything?”

“We literally just cleaned the house and we were gonna watch a movie until bed.”

“Wow, you’re not fun.”

You counted all the heads, multiple times, frowning a little when you counted the 12. “I haven’t made dinner and we were just gonna have noodles.”

“Oh good! We’re starving.” Someone pushed Wonwoo and they all rushed inside, quickly making themselves at home. Jihoon shot you an apologetic look and you smiled at him. You enjoyed Seventeen’s company, but Jihoon shook his head, trying to look annoyed at their presence, but the smile he tried to hide was confirmation enough to have them here for a little. 

“Everyone is having ramen form the packet and if you don’t like it, then you can go and get your own food.” Your eyes widened when you saw the time on the stove. It felt so much later than it actually was.

“I just wanna know why you guys are here and not at home.”

“Hyung, you invited me earlier, remember? While I was working on the choreo and you were looking for your phone.”

“That reminds me. Catch Woozi!” Soonyoung fished the phone out of his pocket and threw it at his best friend, snickering when he failed to catch it.

“I didn’t invite you. I said I wish I could, but I don’t want to.”

“Well, we’re already here and Y/N said we could stay.”

“But please not so late; I’m working tomorrow. But later this weekend, you can go nuts.”

*

“I thought you weren’t working,” Jihoon asked after the unexpected guests left.

“I’m not, but like you said, we don’t always have time to do this.”

“You’re the best. Go play the movie; I can finish right here. Thank you.”

“For what?”

“Not kicking them out. You could’ve done that.”

“They were already here.” You shrugged. “I guess you guys still need each other sometimes.”

“Still, I appreciate that.” He lightly pushed you to the living room, though you couldn’t actually sit down. There was a small mess you could’ve ignored, but you were already up and you didn’t know how long it’d be until Jihoon finished. Plus it wouldn’t take long, especially since your favorite boy was sound asleep on his tower after Jun and Vernon chased him around. 

And you also also had to change Netflix accounts so no one would be confused about anything. Luckily, no one touched your stuff, so you were able to find your spot fairly quickly and Jihoon came by just in time, with two of your cookies in his hand, and handed one to you.

“I love you, you know that?”

He nodded. “Let’s finish watching this, so we can go to sleep.” He flopped on the couch, once again extending his arms to you, where you met him with small pecks and flushed cheeks. 

You finally pressed play again, hoping for no more interruptions until the next day, quickly falling into your previous state of almost falling asleep right then and there. “I love you Jihoon,” you mumbled to him again.

He shut his eyes in his euphoric state, letting your words warm him up before he responded to you, quietly enough that not even your favorite boy could hear.

“You are my miracle.”

[cosplayinamerica]

Oracle (Batgirl) & Jason Todd (Prince of Gotham) // Cosplayer: smiley_hayleyy & @jay_pines / photo: @catmonkeyphotography

Batgirl has always been my favorite DC character, she's a total badass and I've always admired her intelligence and strength, not to mention her character development and the amount of hardship shes had to overcome in her lifetime. Even after she was disabled she continued to be a hero, and honestly its just inspiring. I've also always wanted to be a redhead and loved dying my hair/ wearing a wig for the part! I have cosplayed a few different versions of her and love playing around with different looks.

Since the version of oracle I cosplayed was specifically from the Arkham Knight games, not a whole lot of people knew who I was, but the seasoned batman and DC fans recognized me instantly. I got compliments on how I even included the backpack on the back of the chair and the buttons on the sweater. I think my favorite response was this one lady who was absolutely nerding out on the skytrain ride to the convention, she didn't even know there was a convention on that day but she came up to me and was like "I know this sounds weird but you seriously look like Barbara Gordon" and then when I told her I was cosplaying she got so excited haha

EDS is a rare connective tissue disorder caused by a mutation in the gene that codes for collagen, which is an important protein your body needs to hold together, joints, blood vessels, organs and skin. There are several different types of this condition, and it varies in symptoms and severity from person to person. I was born with the condition, but my symptoms were pretty random and unable to be diagnosed growing up. I discovered I had the condition a few years ago when I started to have severe organ issues, and my joints spontaneously started dislocating everytime I moved. My skin is extremely fragile too and I have to have a doctor for every one of my body parts to keep an eye out for complications.

EDS definitely affects my cosplaying, some days I need a wheelchair to move around or a cane, or a lot of supportive braces, and I try and incorporate my mobility aids into my cosplays. I get fatigued very easily and I have chronic pain all the time so I need to take a lot of breaks, and my costume has to be able to come off easily for when it gets too much or too heavy.

The fabric is very important too because my skin tears, bruises and gets irritated very easily, so I have to make sure that the fabrics I choose agree with me! As well as my spine is very unstable, so I have to be careful with helmets or anything heavy on my head, or anything irritating my neck or shoulders. My joints dislocate with light touches so I have to make sure I am very careful with what positions I pose in, and the kind of stress I put on my joints.

I think I've learned that you can't take your life for granted. I went from being fearful about trying new experiences and going outside my comfort zone, to now being unable to do 50% of the things I could do before and missing out on a lot of things. If you have the health, and the ability to do something, just do it, because you never know when that chance might be taken away.

I've now learned that I should do everything that I can to find joy and enjoy myself while I still have that capacity. I've also learnt that there isn't a doctor who can teach you how to put your own joints back in, and that's been super isolating and terrifying, staring at yourself with a dislocated shoulder, or knee, or hip and having to YouTube how to put them back in, because the hospital turns you away to go see a chiropractor. I've had to learn how to navigate my life by myself, and in a new way. 

I wish people would know that its insanely hard for people with disabilities, especially "invisible" ones to get adequate care and services in their communities. I've had to fight with all my strength even to get disability services because I'm considered "young" and "healthy enough" or because I can minimally function on some days.

Getting chewed out by old people when I sit in a disability spot on the bus, or park in a disabled parking spot. You constantly have to prove that you are disabled enough to doctors, the government, people around you, in order to qualify for services or even receive basic medical care. You never know what's going on behind the scenes for a person.

I've always been a little shy and awkward, I'd say cosplay has been a neat experience, having people come up to me ask ask for pictures, nobody had ever really asked for my photo before and it feels pretty awesome! I think its brought me out of my shell a little, and I've met some pretty talented people through it.

I started going to conventions with my dad about 7 years ago, because we both enjoyed nerding out over collectables and other peoples amazing costumes. Twice we dressed up but it was like the absolute worst home made costumes haha. Then we stopped going, but after I met my boyfriend a few years later, he introduced me to the world of cosplay, as he was already a pretty seasoned cosplayer. He started making me costumes so we could do cool photo shoots together, and I really loved doing it as a hobby with him. We've gone to conventions every year together since we've dated. Since then I've been slowly getting better at starting to make my own costumes, but have him to thank for getting me into the hobby.

https://www.instagram.com/chronicallybendy/

[random-thought-depository]

It occurs to me that one relatively sympathetic aspect of these people might be that, their founding population having been abducted as small children and raised by an inhuman monster, they might lack a lot of the stupid prejudices that regular humans in a low-tech setting are likely to have if real history is any guide.

Think about what’s going to happen with that first generation. It sounds to me like the dragon abducts them when they’re very young, the better to brainwash them. The dragon is probably both ignorant of and uninterested in a lot of human culture, it just wants to raise up some dragon-worshipping brainwashed thralls. Which is probably going to be bad in a lot of ways, but it also means the transmission chains of a lot of stupid prejudices get broken. There’s no-one around to tell those kids that darker-skinned people are inferior. There’s no-one around to stigmatize left-handedness and force the left-handed ones to hide being left-handed. There’s no-one around to socialize them into complicated and rigid gender roles and tell them men should be in charge. There’s no-one around to tell them they shouldn’t share a washing bowl with a Cagot. There’s no-one around to tell them some people are Untouchables and karmically deserving of low status and suffering and you should take a ritual bath if one of them touches you. The dragon probably doesn’t even know about half that stuff and doesn’t care about most of the other half. The dragon might actually actively discourage a lot of prejudices like this if they do show up, because they’d interfere with its human stock being efficient thralls (“You’re telling me you want to reduce the military effectiveness and productivity of my dragon cult because you don’t want to share tools with people who have a particular surname? Yeah, no, we’re not doing that; any tool that is not personal property belongs to me and will be used by any of my thralls who is doing work that requires it”).

What happens when these kids reach puberty? The dragon probably wants its dragon cult making babies, so it’s probably going to tell them how baby-making works and make it clear it expects them to make some new thralls for it sooner or later, but as long as the thralls are making approximately the right number of babies and aren’t killing each other it probably won’t care much about the details. So... These people are going to start experiencing attraction to each other and sometimes falling in love with each other, and... Some of them are going to fall in love with people of the same sex, and there’s no-one around to tell them homosexuality is wrong. Some of them are going to fall in love with more than one person, and there’s no-one around to tell them they aren’t allowed to have multiple partners, and there’s no-one around to tell them that people who already have a partner are “taken” and off-limits, and there’s no-one around to tell them that if you’re a man another man having sex with your female partner is a huge deadly insult to your honor. The original write-up talks about dragons selectively breeding their human thralls, so there might be significant reproductive control and coercion happening, but it’s probably pretty orthogonal to the sort that happens in patriarchal societies.

This is simplifying in ways that might paint an over-optimistic picture. Even small children may have picked up some prejudices from the societies they spent their first years in. And some of that stuff might get reinvented. Children often detect and react with hostility to difference even without much or any prompting from adults, and I suspect some prejudices of this sort are ultimately rooted in that sort of reflexive xenophobia. And I think at least a rough “men do more of the fighting and heavy labor, women do more of the child-care and less strength-intensive work” division of labor is probably going to emerge, because it’s a natural and logical reaction to physical sex differences in a low-tech context. Though on that note, I can think of a few factors that might work to keep dragon cults more gender-equal than regular human societies:

Dragons likely won’t want their cults getting too numerous. A numerous cult would be harder to control and more likely to develop power centers independent of the dragon. Dragon cults would also be more secure against external threats than other human groups of their size, because they’ve got a giant fire-breathing monster on their side, so they wouldn’t have as much pressure to make sure they’ve got lots of fighters to defend their land (though the dragon would likely be a “tall poppy,” it’s likely that lots of people will want to kill it to stop its depredations and plunder its hoard and have the glory of defeating it, so that’ll partly cancel that out). Put this together, dragon cults might be at least a little less pro-natalist than their regular human neighbors. I mean, they’ll probably still have big families by modern standards because of how many people die young in low-tech societies, they’ll probably still need to have 3-5 children per couple just for replacement rate, but this might make at least a little difference. And high birth rates, large families, and pro-natalism are an important load-bearing pillar of strong gender roles; it’s not an accident that we started treating women a lot better after we invented or popularized vaccination, antibiotics, indoor plumbing, and birth control pills (the first three things made high birth rates unnecessary and even undesirable, the last thing made low birth rates easier to maintain). Compared to other human women, dragon cult women might have more time and energy to devote to things that aren’t making and raising babies.

I think dragon cults are also likely to be socially hierarchical but economically communalistic, with little private property and relatively high social mobility. From the original write-up it sounds like dragons want totalitarian control over their cults, so they won’t want their cults to have power centers independent of the dragon. Dynastic families and sizeable accumulations of private property are power centers independent of the dragon, so the dragon will discourage their formation. In low-tech male privilege societies powerful families and stable inherited property are major bulwarks of patriarchy; they make it important who your father is, and they make it important to avoid family instability that may result in division of the property or otherwise endanger the family’s claim to the property. If patrilineal descent chains don’t matter much, women are likely to have more sexual freedom and by knock-on effects of that more freedom in general and are under less pressure to marry early and produce lots of potential heirs for their husbands.

Finally, the write-up mentioned dragons selectively breeding their human thralls for size and strength, and maybe implied also selectively breeding them for precocious physical maturity. If they’re doing that, dragons might also selectively breed their thralls for reduced sexual dimorphism. From the dragon’s point of view, why wouldn’t you want to double your pool of potential strong fighters? So after two or twenty centuries of selective breeding dragon cult women might have size and upper body strength a lot closer to males. Dragon cults would probably still have some kind of “men do more of the fighting and women do more of the work compatible with having a baby or child in close proximity” gendered division of labor, but reducing sexual dimorphism would tend to weaken gendered divisions of labor and hence gender roles in general.

I mean, we’re talking about a creepy high-control cult here. And “nobody was there to tell them...” would definitely have potential dark sides, like “nobody was there to tell them rape and incest are wrong” and “nobody was there to tell them that an adult shouldn’t casually slap around or beat up a child when they’re angry at them.” They’d probably develop some taboos on that sort of stuff just to keep their society somewhat functional, and the dragon would probably give them rules against the aspects of that sort of behavior that might lower their efficiency as thralls or endanger the viability of the dragon cult, but “basically functional levels of rape, incest, and casual physical abuse of children” might look pretty horrifying (though given what a lot of actual historical societies looked like I’m not sure they’d really be worse on the rape and casually beating up their children fronts than their non-dragon cult neighbors). So this isn’t going to be any kind of utopia. If dragon cultists showed up in a story they’d probably be bad guys. But, like:

“And because they serve dragons, they sometimes get the good stuff. Picture a 15- year-old kid with the physique of Conan, wearing the golden armor of ancient kings and armed with magic spears. The kid is also illiterate, covered in fleas, and thinks that humans were created by dragons.”

I suggest that this kid might be a girl, who has a girlfriend and a boyfriend, in a world where a female person being a warrior and interacting on a footing of easy familiarity and equality with rough violent men and having multiple partners is very much not a regular thing in most human societies. And while from one point of view this person is a brainwashed slave of a giant fire-breathing mammal-like reptile, she can look forward to having a lot more personal freedom than most non-dragon cult women (e.g. the 15 year old farmer’s daughter whose father and older brother she just eviscerated). Would fit into: “And its not hard fascism either.  Their barbarian tribes don't chafe at the collar.  They've believe in their dragon.  And when you stand in front of a dragon, you can see why.” If that girl has some idea of how much less freedom and power she’d probably have if she’d been born into one of the surrounding more normal human societies, that knowledge surely cements her loyalty to her dragon. It’d make the whole thing more insidious in a way.

-----

Aside: the one thing that kind of bugged me about the Goblin Punch post is where it says dragon cultists “never build cities or roofs.” So what do they do when it rains, or is freezing cold, or burning hot? I’m interpreting this as they live in tent-like structures and don’t build permanent houses with thick walls, cause otherwise that bit is just grimderp.

[knuffled]

Just Practice - Chapter 14

here’s the latest chapter! hope you all enjoy it! if you could leave a comment, it would mean the world to me! not that many people commented last chapter sadly. 

ao3 link for people on mobile

Out of all of Annabeth’s friends, Piper undoubtedly had the largest house. It was a beautiful three story house with a modern minimalist aesthetic, but it somehow also managed to retain a homely atmosphere. As an aspiring architect, Annabeth thought that it was a feast for the eyes, but Piper had never liked it, mainly because her father was hardly ever home. That was ideal for someone like Annabeth, but Piper was a huge extrovert so she found it unbearable having such a huge house to herself. Piper did her best to circumvent that by having friends over whenever possible, a role that usually fell on Jason’s shoulders, but Annabeth had dropped by after school instead to work on a partner project that they had been assigned for their history class.

Piper greeted her at the front door, practically half-asleep. She was wearing pajamas that had smiling cartoon cupcakes printed on them, her choppy hair was thoroughly disheveled, and her eyes were dazed and unfocused. Annabeth was particularly amused by the impression left on her face from sleeping with her cheek pressed against the seams of two sofa cushions.

“You look positively glamorous, darling.”

Piper half-heartedly rolled her eyes and led her to the living room. “Shut up, I was doing hot girl shit.”

“I didn’t know napping qualified as ‘hot girl shit’,” Annabeth said, making air quotes.

“There’s a reason they call it beauty sleep, babe,” Piper said.

They stopped at the living room, and the sight there only made Annabeth’s smirk widen. It was a complete mess, strewn about with empty bags of cheetos, bottles of kombucha, and half-empty oreo trays. Annabeth crossed her arms over her chest and gave Piper a significant look, wondering what sort of excuse she would come up with, but Piper just flipped her off and dove belly first onto the sofa.

“Before you ask, I was too busy to clean,” Piper said, voice muffled by a sofa cushion.

“Busy doing hot girl shit?” Annabeth prompted innocently.

Piper turned her head to glower at her. “You’re such a bitch sometimes.”

Annabeth bit back a smile and lifted a half-empty bottle of kombucha from the coffee table. She gave it a ginger sniff and gagged at the fermented smell.

“I don’t know how you can drink this stuff.”

“It’s good for your digestive system,” Piper said, sighing.

“I hate to break it to you, but I don’t think it’ll be enough to offset the fact that your diet consists solely of flaming hot cheetos and oreos.”

“I’m seriously like ten seconds away from kicking you out of my house,” Piper warned.

Annabeth laughed and said, “Alright, alright, I assume that means you’re ready to start working on the project then?”

Piper groaned into the sofa and forced herself to sit upright. “You’re an absolute menace.”

Annabeth rummaged through her backpack for her laptop and the project rubric instead of looking at her. “I love you, too.”

Piper sighed melodramatically and cleared the coffee table of its aforementioned debris so that they had a place to work. They spent nearly two hours researching content for their project, and Annabeth was happy with the amount of work they were able to get done. For all their bickering, she and Piper had always made an excellent team, and this project was no exception. That being said, by the end of the two hour mark, Piper was beginning to burn on fumes.

“God, why on fucking earth did I ever think taking AP Euro my senior year was a good idea,” Piper groaned, burying her face in her hands. “Spring break can’t come soon enough.”

“It’s still over a month away,” Annabeth laughed. “We could take a break if you’d like.”

Piper looked up at her abruptly with wide eyes. “Who are you and what have you done with Annabeth?”

Annabeth rolled her eyes and said, “We got a lot of work done, so it’s fine if we chill a bit.”

Piper pressed a kiss to Annabeth’s cheek before she could react and beamed at her. “Want something to eat? I’m getting hungry.”

Annabeth scowled and rubbed her cheek. “Uh, do you still have Oreos?”

“Of course, I do,” Piper grinned. “I’m not a heathen.”

“Milk?”

Piper pretended to wipe a tear from her eye. “Oh, Annabeth, I am so proud of you.”

“Oh my god, shut up,” Annabeth laughed, shoving her.

Piper danced to the kitchen and came back a short while later with a fresh box of oreos and two glasses of milk. Annabeth’s step-mother was a health nut, so they never had junk food at home. She also had to adhere to a strict-ish diet because she was an athlete, so this was the first time in literal years that Annabeth had had the chance to eat an oreo.

“These are a lot better than I remember,” Annabeth said.

“You’re goddamn right. Oreos are gods gift to humanity,” Piper said.

Annabeth smiled. “Now, I wouldn’t go that far.”

“So ungrateful,” Piper sniffed. “You can get sent to hell for that sort of thing you know?”

“For not being obsessed with oreos?” Annabeth laughed.

“For having bad taste,” Piper said, giving her a significant look.

“Guilty as charged,” Annabeth sighed. “I mean, I’m friends with you after all.”

Piper groaned and shoved her. “Bitch.”

“You started it,” Annabeth laughed. “I was just enjoying my oreos in peace.”

“I have been nothing but a gracious host, and yet you come into my house and insult me and my all time favorite snack for good measure,” Piper said, shaking her head. “This is why whites don’t deserve rights.”

Annabeth raised her glass of milk. “I’ll drink to that.”

“Sometimes, I honestly wonder how Percy puts up with you.”

“Easy, he’s a lot nicer than you, so I don’t feel the need to sass him,” Annabeth said, shrugging.

“Sounds fake, but okay.”

“You’re just in denial,” Annabeth teased.

Piper rolled her eyes and said, “How is he doing by the way? I haven’t talked to him lately, but I know State is around the corner.”

“He’s doing okay, I think,” Annabeth said. “I haven’t really asked him about it.”

“No Valentine’s Day plans, I’m assuming?” Piper asked, wiggling her eyebrows.

“Nah, I don’t want to break his concentration,” Annabeth said, shaking her head. “How about you and Jason? Got a hot date lined up or something?”

“We were just thinking of getting dinner some place nice,” Piper said, shrugging.

“So that means Taco Bell is a no, then?” Annabeth asked, grinning.

“Very funny,” Piper said, narrowing her eyes. “I think we’re going to some Japanese place downtown or something.”

“Hmm, sushi sounds nice.”

Piper shook her head and said, “It’s honestly impressive how you somehow always forget that I’m vegetarian, even after all these years.”

Annabeth’s face turned pink. “Oh, right, sorry.”

Piper knocked elbows with her instead of saying anything and reached for another cookie. Annabeth watched her dunk the cookie in her glass of milk a little too vigorously, causing some of it to spill onto her pajama bottoms, and couldn’t help imagining how Jason would have chided her for it if he had been here. It was still endlessly bemusing to her how two people so diametrically unlike one another had so much romantic chemistry together.

“You ever think about how wild it is that you and Jason have been together for four years now?” Annabeth asked.

Piper laughed and said, “Definitely have a lot more since graduation is coming up soon. It’s pretty insane to me too.”

“What’s your secret, oh wise one,” Annabeth asked teasingly.

Piper rolled her eyes and said, “We just communicate really well, ever since day one. Neither of us hide anything from each other. If we are bothered by something, we talk about it. Sometimes that means we get into fights, but it’s still better than bottling everything up.”

Annabeth’s heart squeezed a little in her chest. In contrast, she and Percy hardly ever spoke openly anymore. The weight of all the things they had both left unsaid had snowballed and taken on a line of its own. She didn’t think it had brewed into bitterness, but it felt like ice on the surface of a pond. Shallow and liable to break at any moment.

“We also just genuinely like each other too,” Piper said. “There’s no way we would have lasted if we hated each other’s guts or got bored of each other. Kind of the opposite honestly. The more I got to know him, the harder I fell for him.”

“How could you tell?” Annabeth asked. “Was there a specific moment you realized or something?”

Piper hummed under her breath and stared up at the ceiling. “Hard to say. It wasn’t anything big or dramatic, just little things piling on top of each other, until one day, I just knew. Kind of like getting taller or falling asleep. You don’t notice it when it happens only when you look back.”

When Annabeth was silent, Piper continued and said, “I will say that the first time I can remember consciously thinking it was after a meet sophomore year. Don’t remember how it went, but I can still picture how he looked after the race. He was all gross and sweaty and caked with mud, but his cheeks were pink from all the running and it just made him glow. And at that moment, I just remember thinking ‘Wow, I’m actually in love with this guy.’”

There was something about the way Piper spoke that even Annabeth could hear how much she loved him just by her tone, that it made a lump form in Annabeth’s throat.

“I’m so happy for you two,” Annabeth said softly. “You are both two of the most amazing people I have ever met, so I’m glad you are together.”

Piper laughed and said, “It’s weird to hear you pay me a compliment, but thanks.”

“After that shameless display of ungratefulness, I would suggest you don’t get used to it,” Annabeth said, crossing her arms over her chest.

Piper rolled her eyes and sank back into the sofa. “Is there something going on with you?”

Annabeth furrowed her brow. “What do you mean?”

“You tend to ask lots of questions when you’re upset about something,” Piper said, shrugging.

Annabeth blinked. She had no idea that she did that.

“Nothing in particular,” Annabeth said carefully. “Just wanted to hear from someone that’s been in a relationship for four years. I’m still new to it, and I don’t want to fuck everything up.”

“Learn anything useful then?” Piper asked, raising an eyebrow.

Annabeth was quiet for a while and tried to choose her words carefully. “The part about communicating was helpful.”

Piper gave her a knowing smile. “Really? Well, I’m glad to hear that.”

“I feel like it was easier when we were only friends,” Annabeth said.

“Hmm, Percy was just doing a lot of work behind the scenes for you to make you feel that way. Now that you’re in a relationship, it’s harder for him to do that, so it’s only exposing issues that were already there,” Piper said.

Annabeth frowned. “What do you mean?”

Piper shrugged and said, “Well, part of it is that Percy is stupidly empathetic, so he would anticipate your emotional needs and provide for them with you having to do much. The bigger problem is that you don’t really understand the way he thinks, so you are incapable of doing the same for him.”

A spark of anger lit in Annabeth’s chest. “Well, why don’t you spell it out for me since I’m apparently so ignorant?”

“Annabeth, chill. I’m not saying you’re a bad friend or that I know more about him than you do,” Piper said, holding her hands up in surrender.

“Then what are you saying?” Annabeth hissed.

Piper sighed again and said, “Look, I love you and everything, but you don’t fully understand that other people don’t think or see the world in the same way you do. I’ll give you an example. What do you usually do when you’re really upset about something?”

After a moment, Annabeth said, “I give myself some space until I am ready to talk about it.”

“Exactly,” Piper said, nodding. “Percy is not like that. When he’s upset, he wants someone to press him about it, like really press him. There are a lot of reasons for it, but one huge reason is that he doesn’t feel like his problems are worth anyone else’s attention, so you have to convince him otherwise.”

Annabeth was stunned. That had legitimately never occurred to her. She had always assumed that Percy would come to her if he needed to because that’s what she did whenever she was upset. She whenever she had given him space in the past, thinking it would help, it had looked like callous silence to him instead, a sign that she didn’t care enough to hear what was going on.

Her mind raced. How many times in the past had she fucked up monumentally because this had never occurred to her?

“Do you get what I mean now?” Piper prompted.

Annabeth nodded slowly and said, “I- I had no idea. I just sort of assumed he was like me.”

“That’s a perfectly normal thing to do,” Piper said. “Like I said earlier, I’m not telling you this because I think you’re a shitty human being or whatever. I’m telling you because the way that you and Percy communicate has some really deep, fundamental issues, and that it has been that way for years now.”

“Then why didn’t you say anything sooner?” Annabeth asked, trying not to let anger creep in her voice. “I could have done so much more to avoid hurting him.”

“Because you wouldn’t have listened to me,” Piper said, crossing her arms over her chest. “Your relationship with Percy is something sacred to you. You take pride in being close to him and knowing him really well. If I had said something contrary to that, you would have gone ballistic. You getting mad earlier was more than enough proof of that. I can only tell you now because you’re finally starting to notice issues for yourself.”

Annabeth grit her teeth and stared down at her lap. Piper was right. She was right, but it was so crippling to hear that Annabeth had been such a god-awful friend. Annabeth did take great pride in how well she thought she knew Percy, but ever since they had started fake-dating, she had started realizing she had deluded herself the entire time. It was incredibly jarring for her to realize that her vision of him compared to reality was so off, especially when she prided herself in the keenness of her judgment and intellect.

Piper squeezed her shoulder and said, “Look, I know this must have been a lot for you to hear, but you’re not alone. Almost everyone has trouble seeing people distinctly, as they are. People like Percy who do it naturally are the rare ones.”

“Then what should I do?” Annabeth asked tersely. “I feel so stuck.”

“Don’t assume so much. If you’re upset, tell him. If you want him to open up, ask him to. The only way to know what’s on his mind is to ask him. You don’t have to try so hard to read his mind for him,” Piper explained.

Annabeth nodded curtly and said, “I’m just so mad at myself.”

“I get it, but it’s not all on you. Percy also shoulders some responsibility, but it’s hard to blame him. Lord knows how much he has done for us,” Piper mused. “Besides, he has his own issues that he needs to deal with.”

“I-I’ll do what I can,” Annabeth said.

“If it’s you, I think you can do it,” Piper said, smiling softly.

As nice as it was to hear that, Annabeth had no self-confidence in her ability to be a good friend, not anymore. Still, Piper was right. Percy had done so much for her. If this could help him somehow, then she was determined to do her best.

After a few more minutes of silence, Piper said, “We should probably get back to the project.”

Annabeth smiled despite herself and feigned wiping a tear from her eye. “I never thought I’d live to hear the day you’d say that.”

:::

In keeping with tradition, Annabeth still somehow managed to find a way to be late to the State Swimming Championship. It was held at a neighboring high school not far from Westwood, but she had stayed up all night the day before painting a sign for Percy, which led to her sleeping through her alarm. She had brushed her teeth and taken as quick a shower as she possibly could before dashing out of her house, sign tucked beneath her arm.

By the time she made it inside, the first heat was already over. Annabeth scanned the bleachers and found all her friends sitting next to Sally. She took the steps three at a time and took a moment to catch her breath before she took a seat between Sally and Piper.

“Where’s Estelle?” Annabeth asked.

“Paul took her to go back some snacks at the concession stand. How have you been, dear?” Sally asked.

“I’m good. School is getting busy, but I’m getting by,” Annabeth said. “How’s Percy doing?”

“He seemed ready. Cautious, but focused,” Sally said.

“That’s good to hear,” Annabeth said.

Estelle and Paul returned with bags of snacks for everyone. They passed them around to all of Percy’s friends and squeezed past to sit next to Sally. Estelle was thrilled to see Annabeth and threw her arms around her neck.

“Annabeth!” Estelle squealed.

Annabeth laughed and hugged her back. “How have you been, Stella?”

“Good! I just lost a tooth last night. See?” Estelle said, giving Annabeth a toothy smile.

“Wow, did you get a visit from the tooth fairy?” Annabeth asked.

Estelle nodded vigorously. “I got five whole dollars!”

“What are you going to spend it on?”

“She used her money to buy snacks for everyone,” Paul interjected.

“Daddy!” Estelle huffed.

Paul held his palms up in surrender. “Oh, sorry, she told me not to tell anyone about that.”

“Thanks, Stella!” Annabeth said, smiling. “She’s a good kid.”

“She is,” Paul said proudly. “It’s the Jackson genes, I’m telling you.”

“Oh, hush,” Sally said, though she looked pleased anyways.

Paul grinned at her and turned to Annabeth. “It’s been a while since we have had time to catch up, Annabeth. I heard you got into Berkeley! That’s amazing!”

“Yeah, thank you,” Annabeth said, hiding a smile.

“It’s a wonderful school. I’m sure you’ll love it,” Paul said.

Annabeth was about to thank him, but they were interrupted by an announcement that the next heat was to begin for men’s free style. The State tournament was different compared to other tournaments held during the regular season. There would be a preliminary round of ten heats of six swimmers each, and then the top six swimmers would be selected based off their times to participate in a final round. The winner of the final would win the entire competition. It was therefore possible to have the best time in the prelims and still lose if someone placed higher than you in the last round. Annabeth had never been a fan of the way the tournament was run, but there was nothing anyone could do about it.

Percy was going to be in the penultimate heat, so there was still time before he participated. In fact, he wasn’t even out of the locker room yet. Annabeth knew that he was staying inside to maintain his focus until the start of his heat. She recognized one of his teammates that was in the next heat, so she paid attention to him even though it was hard to feel interested.

After the heat began, Annabeth was once again reminded of how much fiercer the competition was at State compared to the other meets. Percy hadn’t competed against many of the swimmers here because they lived on the other side of the state. It might have been a function of the fact that it was her first time seeing some of them, but the competition looked stronger this year than it had in previous ones. They were so skilled that Annabeth wasn’t sure Percy was a shoe-in for first like she had initially thought.

There was one swimmer in particular from the sixth heat, Castellan, that was particularly scary. The effortless, graceful way he swam reminded her a lot of Percy’s form, and he managed to win his heat by a wide margin. She had never seen him before in any of the other meets or from previous years either. He must have moved to the State sometime this season. Nevertheless, it sowed a seed of worry in her mind that continued to take deeper root even after his heat ended.

Eventually, Percy finally made his way out when his heat was announced. Annabeth was relieved to see the familiar cold intensity on his face that she was accustomed to. After the last meet, she had been afraid that his focus would still be shaky when State finally rolled around, but instead Percy looked more focussed now than she had ever seen him before. Everything about him gave off the impression that he was going to win.

When his heat finally began, Percy dove into the water clinically and quickly pulled ahead of the competition. Annabeth and the rest of their friends cheered loudly for him as he touched off the other side of the pool, almost a full body’s length ahead of the person in second. The rest of the race only solidified Percy’s lead as he pulled further and further ahead.

Once he touched the opposite wall, Percy burst out of the water and took a moment to catch his breath, but then he looked over to the opposite end of the pool and pressed his lips in a thin line. Annabeth was confused at first because his time was fantastic, and he had done so well in his heat, but then she realized his time had been slower than that swimmer from the sixth heat. Although it wasn’t an indication of how the finals would go, it was still damaging to realize that someone had done better than you in the prelims.

Annabeth worried her lip and turned to Piper when she felt her hand on her shoulder. “Why does he look so annoyed?” Piper whispered.

“That guy from the sixth heat, Castellan, had a better time than he did,” Annabeth muttered.

Piper blinked and looked back down at Percy. “Wait, really?”

Annabeth nodded. “Yeah. It’s not the end of the world or anything, but it’s gonna pile some extra pressure onto his shoulders.”

“He’ll be fine,” Jason ventured, from beside Piper. “If he keeps his cool, he can put up a good fight. Besides, I don’t think their times were off by a lot.”

“True,” Annabeth agreed. “It would have been a lot worse if it was a blowout.”

“There’s a break before the finals start right?” Hazel asked, speaking across from Jason.

Piper looked at the meet schedule and nodded. “Yeah, there’s a half hour to give the competitors from the later heats time to rest before the finals.”

“Should we go see him or something?” Hazel asked.

Jason shook his head and said, “No, there’s a chance that we just make him lose focus. Besides, there nothing we can really say to help him.”

“Well, that fucking sucks,” Rachel huffed.

Hazel nudged Rachel with her elbow and whispered, “Don’t swear! Estelle is here.”

Rachel winced and said to Sally, “Sorry, Mrs. Jackson.”

Sally gave her a mischievous smile and said, “You should be, dear.”

That got a laugh out of all of them, much to Estelle’s confusion. They talked amongst themselves during the break before Annabeth realized she needed to run to the bathroom. Annabeth wasn’t gone long, but on her way back, she ran into someone walking the other way.

“Ouch.”

Annabeth stumbled back and rubbed her shoulder. “Sorry, are you okay?”

“Oh, hey, look who it is,” Percy said, smiling down at her.

“Oh, hey,” Annabeth said, blinking. “I was just coming back from the bathroom.”

Percy laughed and said, “Yeah, I kind of figured.”

There was an awkward pause where Annabeth debated if she should continue talking to him or if that would break his focus. His body language was relaxed, but Annabeth could tell that there was some tension in his shoulders. The way he lingered there gave her the impression that he wanted to talk to her, so she figured it was alright to say something.

“How are you doing?”

Percy coughed and looked away surreptitiously. “Fine.”

Annabeth crossed her arms over her chest. “You don’t look fine to me.”

Percy blinked like he was surprised she had called him out. In the past, Annabeth would have ignored the signs under the assumption that he didn’t want to talk about it, but after her conversation with Piper, she didn’t want to keep making those mistakes anymore.

Eventually, Percy sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Did you get a chance to see that Castellan guy from the sixth heat?”

Annabeth nodded and said, “Yeah, he seemed pretty good.”

“His time was pretty insane,” Percy said slowly. “Better than my PR.”

“It wasn’t that far off though,” Annabeth said, leaning against the wall.

Percy rubbed his chin. “That’s true.”

“If I didn’t know any better, I would say you don’t think you can beat him,” Annabeth said softly.

Percy looked up at her abruptly with wide eyes. “Uh...”

“Guilty as charged, huh?”

There was a pause before Percy laughed humorlessly and ran his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know. Usually, I never think about that sort of thing at meets. I’m only focused on doing my best. But now, I can’t help wondering if my best would even be enough.”

“I wish I could be super peppy and say that it definitely is, but I’ve had those thoughts too many times to say that to you. It would feel fake and you’d know it,” Annabeth started.

“That’s not exactly making me feel better,” Percy joked half-heartedly.

“Shut up, I was getting to it,” Annabeth said, knocking elbows with him.

Percy made a show of rubbing his elbows, which made her roll her eyes before she continued.

“Remember how you told me after the invitational that I had to believe that I hadn’t hit my limit yet, that I could still do better? I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately, and I’m realizing that you were right. I’m killing any chance of improving if I believe it can’t be done. At the end of the day, I still want to keep competing, so I might as well believe in myself and keep trying.”

Percy was silent at this, so Annabeth continued. “My point is, you’ve gotta have faith in yourself. If that guy is better than you, make him prove it. Don’t do that work for him. You’re an insanely good swimmer. I know you can beat him. That’s not me saying that as a friend, but as another athlete. I know you have what it takes. Only question is: do you?”

“It’s not that I don’t think I’m good,” Percy said. “If it was just me, I wouldn’t be so worried, but so many people have put so much effort and faith in me that I can’t let them down. Like, I’ve always disappointed people, all my life, and there’s a voice in my head that tells me this time won’t be any different.”

“Fuck everyone else,” Annabeth said vehemently. “The people that care about you just want you to try your best.”

When Percy remained silent, Annabeth framed his face with her hands and forced him to meet her eyes. “Listen to me: all you have to do is go out there and swim. Nothing else matters. Okay?”

Percy was quiet for a while before he nodded slowly. “Okay.”

“You got this,” Annabeth said, squeezing his shoulders. “Give ‘em hell, Perce.”

“I will. Thanks, Annabeth,” Percy said, smiling. “I’ll see you after the finals are over?”

“I thought that went without saying,” Annabeth grinned. “There’s a chocolate milkshake from Martha’s with your name on it, after all.”

“Finally, something worth fighting for,” Percy sighed melodramatically.

Annabeth laughed and pushed him towards the locker room. “Alright, get going, champ. I’ll see you on the other side.”

Percy took a deep breath to steel himself and gave her one final nod before he made for the locker rooms. Annabeth waited for him to leave before she headed back to the bleachers. Piper gave her a questioning look as she sat down, as if to ask what took her so long, but Annabeth shrugged and remained silent.

The participants of the final heat left the locker room shortly after and stood in front of the pool. Percy’s lane was in the middle, right next to Castellan, from the sixth heat, but he looked composed and concentrated.

The swimmers stepped onto the diving boards and took their starting positions, bodies taut with anticipation. At the official’s whistle, they all dove into the water in unison. Percy and the other boy both quickly pulled ahead of the other four swimmers, but Percy lagged behind him ever so slightly. Annabeth leaned forward, forgetting to cheer, and worried her lower lip. She could tell Percy was trying to surge ahead of Castellan, but no matter what he did, the distance continued to remain unclosed for the first hundred meters.

Before they both touched off the wall for the final fifty meters, Percy seemed to lag further behind than he had all race. Annabeth’s heart sank, but somehow Percy surged forward on the last twenty meters and managed to pull alongside Castellan. At the end of the race, it was too close to tell who had won because they both appeared to finish at the same time.

Annabeth whipped towards the board on the far end of the pool and waited for the times to show, heart thundering in her chest. The subsequent seconds stretched like an eternity, but then numbers suddenly flickered on the board. It took Annabeth a second to process the results, but once she did, her heart soared in her chest.

Percy had won, but it had been unbelievably close.

Immediately, she looked back down for Percy and noticed the incredulous look on his face. It took his teammates tackling him for him to realize that he had won, a dumbfounded smile blossoming across his face. Annabeth clasped her hands in front of her mouth and tried to ignore the way her face hurt from smiling so hard. She could hear Piper and the rest of her friends going crazy beside her, but the noise felt distant like sound traveling through water.

They all made their way down to him, and Estelle and Paul were the first to speak to him before Sally pulled him into a fierce hug with misty eyes. After that, Piper jumped on his back and cheered while Jason congratulated him. Rachel and Hazel went next, followed by Frank and Leo, and through it all, Annabeth watched off to the side and tried not to tear up.

She felt so incredibly proud of him. All those years of grueling practice, nights spent staying late to get in extra laps at the pool, managing the pressure of his captaincy - all of it had paid off in the end, and she was so happy it had. He deserved all of it.

Finally, Percy locked eyes with her and slipped out of the arms of their other friends and wordlessly opened his arms. Annabeth didn’t even realize she was moving until she tackled him in a hug. He was still sopping wet from the race, so her shirt got wet but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Annabeth buried her face in the crook of his neck and squeezed Percy as tightly as she could.

It was hard to say how long they stayed like that, but eventually, she pulled away from his arms and looked up at him with a stupid grin on her face. “You did it! I’m so happy for you!”

Percy offered her an incredulous smile. “Somehow.”

“Shut up, you deserved to win. One hundred percent,” Annabeth said, poking his chest.

Percy’s ears turned red, and he tried to look away from her. “It was all thanks to a certain someone’s pep talk.”

“You’re giving me too much credit,” Annabeth said, but her heart felt ten times larger in her chest anyways.

“Seriously, I was really freaking out,” Percy said earnestly. “So thank you. Seriously.”

Annabeth bit back a smile. “You’re welcome. Seriously.”

“You never make things easy for me, do you,” Percy said, sighing melodramatically.

“Of course not,” Annabeth said. “I thought you would have figured that out after all these years.”

Percy shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a slow learner.”

“At least you’re not a slow swimmer,” Annabeth teased.

Percy rolled his eyes and said, “So what next? Martha’s?”

“You sure you want to celebrate with me and not your family?” Annabeth asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Oh don’t worry about that,” Percy laughed. “I know they’ll monopolize me later today. But first, I want that chocolate milkshake you promised me.”

Annabeth bit the inside of her cheek and tried not to get carried away by what he was saying. Still, she couldn’t help the feeling of exhilaration washing over her.

“Alright, Martha’s it is,” Annabeth said. “Go finish your shower and get dressed. I’ll be waiting for you.”

Percy nodded and left to tell his family their plans and to say goodbye to the rest of their friends, who were getting ready to leave. Piper gave her a knowing look on her way out, but Annabeth made a show of pointedly ignoring her.

A short while later, Percy met her at the entrance to the parking lot, his hair still wet from the shower. They drove to Martha’s in silence, only accompanied by the feeble radio in her dad’s car. The sun was just beginning to set, diffusing pink and blue across the spread of the horizon. At that proximity, Percy smelled distractingly of body wash, making Annabeth’s face prickle.

“I meant what I said earlier, you know?” Percy said, breaking the silence.

Annabeth glanced at him. “Hmm?”

“What you told me really helped,” Percy said.

“You’re being too nice,” Annabeth said.

“No, seriously, I was pretty sure I was gonna lose. Like on the last hundred meters, I kept thinking that it was only natural that I would let everyone down again, but then I heard your voice in my head, saying ‘All you have to do is go out there and swim’. I don’t know how or why, but that got me out of my own head and helped me win,” Percy explained.

Annabeth’s throat was dry. “I’m, uh, glad it helped.”

She caught his soft smile in the mirror. “Yeah, me too.”

“It’ll be your turn in April,” he said. “You’ll win State too, and then I’ll have to be the one buying milkshakes next time around.”

“Damn straight,” Annabeth said. “I can’t rest until I kick Reyna’s ass.”

“I can’t tell if you hate her or adore her,” Percy said, smirking.

“A little of both,” Annabeth admitted. “People that have never lost once in their lives piss me off, but Reyna’s a good person and fun to be around.”

“I did beat her at the batting cages,” Percy pointed out.

“Doesn’t count unless I’m the one doing it,” Annabeth said, shaking her head.

Percy’s grin grew wider before he turned away from her, making Annabeth scowl. “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing, I just thought that was a very ‘Annabeth’ thing to say,” Percy said, shrugging.

“Is that a good or a bad thing?”

“Hmm, I wonder,” Percy said, still grinning.

“Asshole,” Annabeth huffed.

There was a lull in the conversation while Annabeth began to turn something over in her mind. At first, it had seemed like a stupid idea, but the more that she thought about it, the more she wanted to go for it.

“H-Hey, I know you said you’d get me a milkshake if I won and all, but is it cool if I ask for something else instead?” Annabeth asked, fingers curling tighter around the steering wheel.

“Your wish is my command, your majesty.”

“Shut up, I’m being serious,” Annabeth laughed.

“Sure, I don’t see why not,” Percy said, shrugging. “What did you want instead?”

Annabeth swallowed and said, “I’ll let it be a surprise for now. Just promise not to chicken out when the time comes.”

“You’re not gonna ask me to like run around school naked or something right?” Percy asked, raising an eyebrow.

Annabeth barked a laugh. “Tempting, but no.”

Percy hummed to himself for a while before he sighed and said, “Well, I suppose I’ll just have to trust you not to make me do something embarrassing.”

“Don’t worry so much. I promise it’s not that bad. Just wanted to ask you something. Besides, there’s no guarantee that I’ll even win, after all,” Annabeth said.

Percy yawned and curled up in his seat and closed his eyes. “I don’t know, I’m pretty certain you’ll win.”

Annabeth glanced at him. “Yeah? What makes you say that?”

“Dunno, I just believe in you,” Percy said simply.

Annabeth bit the inside of her cheek and resisted the urge to tell him that he was making a mistake. Honestly, she didn’t think she had a snowball’s chance in hell of beating Reyna at State, but she would still try her best to repay Percy’s faith in her. As a fellow athlete, he wouldn’t say something like that just to be nice. If he thought she had a shot, then maybe he was seeing something in her that she couldn’t.

The sky continued to darken, and Annabeth found herself thinking that even if she couldn’t believe in herself, maybe she could believe in how much Percy believed in her instead.

[freebooter4ever]

A fic inspired by @kanhatomame 's Lovely Drawing of Eugene dreaming about Snafu ^_^ Set in Mobile after the war, Eugene deals with pining and memories, and that wordless connection to another person that never really leaves you. (angst ish with happy ending)

__________

There are so many ghosts in Eugene's head it's quite crowded there. But the only one he clings to is Snafu's. Naturally, this also means it's the one that feels most nebulous and impossible to chase down. Sometimes, when Eugene sees other couples together, touching each other, looking at each other, the connections to his own vivid memories feel stronger.

But he and Snafu were never a couple, should never have been a couple. Their few kisses were stolen behind doors and in the shadows. They could never have danced hand in hand like the boys and girls are doing now at the OMM ball.

Eugene stares at the dancers, himself half hidden behind a potted plant. A silly form of camouflage, and one that wouldn't even work if someone looked his way. It certainly fails to hide him from his brother. He can see Edward eyeing him disapprovingly from across the room. Edward's arm is wrapped lovingly around his wife's waist. She leans into his shoulder slightly - Martha is small and petite and fits perfectly.

Eugene takes a deep breath and refocuses his eyes to the center of the dance floor. He slowly allows himself to relax, concentrating on one memory of a touch. Snafu was never one to lovingly cradle Eugene, but whenever they would sit down around camp - at the slop shoot, or the movies, or when naked on the beach after a swim - Snafu would sling his arm behind Gene's back and angle his whole body in Gene's direction. He kept it casual, usually joking and laughing as if using humor to distract the rest of the guys from this habit of his. Except there were always times when Snaf would make a particularly ridiculous wisecrack and Eugene would feel compelled to turn his neck to roll his eyes at Snafu, and the minute his eyes would meet Snafu's, the other guy's face would be glowing with joy. Joy reserved only for one person - Eugene.

There's a specific shine in Snafu's eyes that he saves solely for Gene. And those delicate bits of eye contact were more intimate than all the loving touches in the world. And often they preceded Snafu pulling Eugene into some dark hideaway, and pressing his full body up against Gene, still teasing him, tempting him with no kisses, no gentle lover's touch until Eugene finally got fed up and molded their mouths together.

Eugene will never forget the shape of Snafu's hands.

"Eugene? Baby brother?" Edward is snapping his fingers in front of Eugene's face.

Eugene blinks rapidly, comes back to himself, completely loses the relaxation in his body, and glares at Edward.

"Thought you were in a trance or something," Edward grins lopsided.

"I was thinking," Eugene sighs.

"No duh," Edward says, "You do too much of that, little brother."

"What else is there to do?" Eugene sighs continuously. He shouldn't have opened his mouth because the next thing he knows Edward tells him 'don't move' and disappears further into the house to find some poor victim to foist awkwardly on Gene.

It's been like this all evening. Eugene's talked to more girls in the past hour than he ever has in his life. All of them brought to him by Edward, eagerly introducing the girls to his younger, naive brother.

This latest one is named Victoria, and she's got long curly brown hair that looks soft to touch, and a porcelain face like a doll.

"She's very pretty," Eugene says truthfully when Edward corners him and demands to know what he thought after Victoria is called away by friends.

"Gene, I don't understand you," Edward shakes his head, "You're the son of the city's best doctor, you've got all your limbs intact, you're a war hero… why I'll bet you're the most eligible bachelor here. If you just learn to play it up a little bit…"

"I'm going outside to smoke," Eugene interrupts flatly, "Come get me when it's time to leave."

His voice brooks no argument, and he promptly ducks out of the house with only one direction in mind. He fills his pipe, lights it, and slowly lets the smoke start to relax him again. His lips suck on the wood between them, and the ghost of Snafu seeps in with the nicotine. The memory of the first time when Eugene sucked Snafu's finger clean (of mashed potatoes) - after Snafu tried (and failed) to start a food fight. It pairs well with the memory of sucking off other parts of Snafu too… certain parts he doesn't have a clear picture of in his mind. He sort of blurred the image as it happened, out of embarrassment or sheer awkwardness. If he ever got the chance to do it again, he'd memorize every square inch.

"Eugene, your brother asked me to come find you," his mother breaks his reverie, "Your father is having the car brought around."

Eugene nods, his shame from his thoughts bright red on his face, but luckily hidden in the dark. He follows his mother to the driveway and wordlessly climbs into the backseat. Martha and Edward are taking their own car. So Eugene has plenty of room to forego seatbelts and lie down across the back. His head is swimming a little bit, from that punch he kept drinking. He couldn't taste it, but he suspects it was spiked.

The car starts up, and starts rumbling, shaking his entire body. The seat is warm - the heat from the engine flows through the entire undercarriage. Eugene closes his eyes. He listens to the sound of the road under the wheels, a smooth wash like constantly crashing waves.

Waves lapping at the toes of his feet, and bathing half of Snafu's entire leg in water up to his knees. Snafu lying naked on his back in the sand, with Eugene straddled on top of him bouncing vigorously. All Eugene remembers is the intensity, the sounds, and the feeling. Half weird gritty discomfort, half absolute pleasure.

The car turns and rolls Eugene against the back of the car. He turns his face to the smooth leather, seeking that pressure of something - anything - against his skin.

Eugene recognizes when they reach their house's street because he can feel the jittering rumble as the car crosses the wooden bridge. The jitter shakes him to his bones, and he shivers although the night is hot and sticky. He closes his eyes and counts the streetlights behind his eyelids until they reach the driveway.

Had Eugene been paying attention at all, looking out the window of the car instead of losing himself to ghosts, he might have noticed the beat-up rusted brown truck parked just outside his family's gate at the end of Georgia House's long private drive. Though truthfully, even if Eugene had been looking he might not have seen it. The cloud cover darkens the sky until the only light source is the single lamp marking the start of the Sledge's driveway. And the truck is parked under a tree, throwing even more shadow over it. The only hint that someone is there is the soft glow of a cigarette luminating a haunted face and skinny legs dangling over the truck bed where he sits.

Snafu arrived in town hours ago - just in time to watch Eugene leave. He's been sitting on top his parked truck ever since. Judging from their fancy clothes, Snafu knew they'd likely return that night from an outing and sure enough. Here they are. He wedges the cigarette tighter in his mouth and jumps down from the truck bed.

Eugene's window is on the first floor, so it shouldn't be hard to reach except for the damn kudzu covering a mass of bushes and thorny plants underneath. Snafu suspects they might have been roses at one point. They're dead now. There's live ones elsewhere in the garden, but the ones under Eugene's window are long gone.

Fucking symbolic maybe.

Snafu shoves the window open unceremoniously and throws his leg in. He sits on the sil and stares down at Gene in the bed. Eugene didn't bother to change, he's still in that same expensive looking suit, his tie askew and his shoes kicked off with one sock missing. Snafu settles himself comfortably against the window frame, puffs on his cigarette, and watches Eugene sleep.

He doesn't get to watch for long - Eugene sleeps fitfully, just as Snafu remembers, and ends up kicking and thrashing in his bed. Snafu watches him with intense regret. When Eugene fell asleep peacefully on the train, for the first time since that initial week on Pavuvu, Snafu thought maybe civilization had kicked Eugene's nightmares. That maybe Eugene was gonna be able to go back to 'normal'. Clearly Snafu was wrong.

He waits a few more seconds, till Eugene's fit is at its peak, and whispers sharply, "Sledgehammer."

Gene sits bolt upright immediately and silently. He stares blankly for a split second, till his eyes snap to Snafu's. Then he stares silently at Snafu.

Snafu takes his half finished cigarette and grinds it into the wood of Eugene's window. It leaves a mark. Eugene watches this without expression.

"You're real," Eugene whispers.

Snafu shrugs.

"I mean you're not a dream… for once," Eugene says.

"You've been dreaming about me?" Snafu grins.

Eugene lunges forward, grabs Snafu's forearms and drags him onto the bed. Snafu falls awkwardly on top of Eugene, but it's easy to shift their positions and overpower Eugene to pin him to the bed. "I really hope those nightmares of yours wasn't you dreaming of me, cause if they were we might have to figure out a way to give you better ones."

"My dreams of you only come during the day," Eugene says, much more serious in tone than Snafu.

"Good ones?"

Eugene nods.

"It isn't enough… is it?" Snafu asks. He already knows the correct answer. That's why he's here.

In response Eugene pulls him down into a kiss.

[jean-does-not-have-a-horseface]

Before Dawn (Levi x Reader)

So, I wrote this mostly in one sitting because I longed to post it on Archive of our own but I'm sure not all people read stories there, so if I can make someone's day brighter with some not so slow slow burn and eventual fluff then I'm in. I hope you enjoy, also I don't know how to add the read more option on mobile

Your face meets the hard, cold pillow of your bed with a loud but somewhat muffled thud. Your room turns darker and darker by each passing second as the sun slowly disappears behind the mountains. When you can't feel any stream of light entering the room you peak outside of your dormitory's window. Another exhausting day has finally come to an end.

Being the youngest member of Erwin's team isn't always as good as many of your comrades picture to be. Most of them believe you're babied, treated softly and specially, which is untrue to any possible extend. If anything, you're practically silenced by your other team members, who are much older and far more experienced than you. You do errands for everyone most the time and you're even assigned paperwork concerning fallen soldiers. You humph quietly. Soldiers can talk and gossip as much as they want, you're used to having to hear a new rumor about every one every passing week anyway.

Time seems to pass slowly as you're laying there, not moving a single inch of your body. In fact you contemplate on weather to even bat an eye to the direction of whoever's poking you. You have been satisfied with not having to talk to anyone for that little time you had to yourself.

"(Y/n) come on, we're just finished forming new squads."

Your much necessary time to relax seems to have to come to an end. It's almost never your choice, whether you get to rest or not that is, but you only sense it's going to get worse now that Erwin has been ranked as the new survey corps commander. A loud groan makes its way out of your barely parted lips. It only takes one second to storm out of your bed and another one to be able to stand still on your feet.

"Uhgh Hange, I hate that they have to do this right now. I was about to go shower." You mumble under your breath, solely with the intention of whining your way out of this situation. There's no such thing as convincing Hange out of pretty much anything anyway though, you scold yourself for believing it's worth the time.

The walk down the corridor is dull and silent and the only noise that can be heard comes from inside the dining hall that you pass without missing a heart beat. It's been a while since you started skipping dinner because your appetite was going down hill. In addition, it's not that Hange even brought up dinner at the sight of the dining hall.

Upon arriving at Erwin's door Hange lifts her hand and steadily knocks twice. You're not even standing on the spot for a second before the familiar word of approval is spoken from inside. Hange practically drags you inside, instantly adding tones of despair into your misery for the night.

Despite your best wishes, everyone in the room has fixed their eyes on you after the squeal you let out due to Hange's rushing movements. "Welcome (y/n)" Erwin speaks and you nod in response before saluting boringly. He urges you to take a stand between Levi and Mike and you comply without even trying to give it a second thought. Even though it's frantically silent in the room in a way you think that a single sound carrying breath could break it while Erwin speaks, you witness as Mike decides to tresspass that.

"You're squad Mike girl!" He whispers to you in a prideful way. His smirk betrays the happiness that has swelled on him by receiving this rank.

"Any questions?" Erwin asks before he forces his voice to come to an halt. Seeing that no one requests to know a thing from him he proceeds to call new squad leaders, one by one to pick members for their teams. Surprisingly enough, Levi gets called after Mike, speculating a peculiar reaction by the remaining veterans, even you, someone who has no place in voicing any object to Erwin's commands.

"Levi's not to doubt, I believe you all know that, and he will be running the new special operations team."

It occurred to you that no one was actually doubting Levi's abilities; most of them had probably been jealous to having to work that hard to receive a rank when he was only in the regiment for a year. However had they known Levi even in the tiniest bit though they'd never have an ounce of jealousy for him. Not that you knew much to beging with. What you had managed to gather from him about his past were a few broken sentences a night he accepted to come and hang out with your squad mates that he only spoke to you as he accompanied you to your barrack upon being forced by Mike.

You sit there, between the two men quietly for the rest of the long meeting and once you're dismissed you practically sprint to the showers. You know the water ought to be freezing cold by now but you preferre to endure this rather than having to wash alongside your female comrades. Growing up, your little given time in the shower was your only rightful privacy and you intend to keep it that way.

The water stops with a twist of your hand at the handle. You search for your towel in the dark and as you set your hands on it you rapidly begin to pat your body dry. Throwing your long nightgown on, you begin stomping out. Momentarily you seem to be in a haze of meaningless thoughts that pass your mind so fast, you can't even get a grip of them, many things seem to occupy your mind lately. New formations, improved harness gear, the news of your mother's death. You can't seem to put your thoughts in order, not for tonight at least. It's only when a deep, monotone voice rings in your ears that you jump and leave a little squeak come out of the depths of your throat.

"Oii"

"Shit! Don't sneak up on me like that" you wonder if you have to address him but in the end you do; in the end of the day you are one of formalities and everyone who knows you can confirm that. "sir.."

Levi simply clicks his tongue in response. You're the first person to address him as a commanding officer as of now, probably because every one else would need a moment to take it in, including himself.

"Thanks for making Isabel feel welcome back then." Levi's voice is barely louder than a whisper yet it never cracks, not even a little but that isn't what's taking you aback. The statement, in fact, sends you literally a few steps back and shoots your hand to your forehead in an act of despair. The cruel scene still plays in your head from time to time and you wonder how many times it must do so in his. You find your heart stopping for a moment before you feel a teeny flicker that sends your pulse running through your veins.

It's natural for someone not to be able to comprehend trauma in ways they are expected or rather forced to. Levi in particular is introverted and moody, if not most, then all of the time but this statement shines a different light on your understanding of his character. He's as emotionally drained and traumatized as someone can be. In fact, everyone is but this doesn't mean ones personal pain is lessened, in your opinion it makes it even worse.

"Not everyone is taught mannerisms I guess. The girls who made her feel unwanted can eat shit anyways."

It's obvious that Levi doesn't want to utter another word of the matter and you're not the one to push him out of his comfort zone. An uptight upbringing and the misfortunus chance of interacting with superficial assholes for equal parts of your life have taught you how to have temperament. To be patient even when you physically can't take it anymore.

"Tch.. Go to your barracks you're dismissed." It's time to bid eachother goodnight and of course Levi's eager to be the one to remind you of it. Tomorrow's a big day with everything you have to take care of after today's events. No cadet should be unable or not in position to assist by command.

"Sweating the chair already I see."

____

The next day starts with Nanaba waking you up. You take some time to adjust your eyes to the semi lit room. It strikes you how some people have always talked about how they missed feeling the magic of watching an eventual sunrise and even if you can see where they're coming from you're reminded every day of how much you despise every single aspect of it. Starting off with the runny nose it always bears for you as a hatred gift.

"I know it's kind of first thing in the morning but we have to help squad leader clean the office he was given.

Then again maybe you're just envying anyone who got to be woken up by sun's glowly warmth once it was already up in the sky.

"Hey, psst, don't zone out, get dressed."

Erratically, you skip breakfast. You fail to be in the mood for food lately most likely due to exhaustion or general disgust of whatever soup dish you are to be served. Your stomach has stopped trying to object to you since a young age. The only thing that ever makes it groan nowadays is guilt. With that devil of mother dead though it's not like you have anything to feel guilty for anyways.

"So here's your mop." Mike forces the object into your hands before you even get a chance to greet him. "Okay I repeat. Nanaba scrubs, (y/n) mops, Henning waxes. Lynne and Tomas you dust everything off. Understood?" All of you salute him with a 'yessir' before you watch him exit the room.

You spend most of your morning scolding Nanaba to go faster before you ultimately decide to switch places with her. You want to be over with cleaning, although you have no idea as to why but you do find yourself imagining that Levi sees you cleaning and thinks you're amazing at it and asks you to help him far too many times to count. You end up scolding yourself for that too. Nevertheless, it takes almost half an hour to finish with scrubbing, something you guess would have taken Nanaba eternity and a day.

Any sweat that's falling down your forehead you rub it off with the back of hand before you excuse yourself to a break. Seeing that no one will follow you stroll swiftly down the wooden hallway, with the restrooms in mind. You walk past Mike on the way, whom you greet cheerfully while fast informing him about your break. You're positive he practically smell your bladder is about to burst.

______

Tonight Hange draggs your unwilling piece of meat to dinner. She takes you to her usual table and sits you down amongst higher ranks. Some part of your brain fights you about not taking a stand against it. Your mother has always pressed for you to not enjoy what other in higher hierarchies have. But that's just a wooden fucking table with a stall. The voice in your head can shut it.

"Eat." Hange looks at you with a toothy grin, head tilted in your direction as she a eats a spoonful of her vegetable soup. You still feel an excessive amount of absurd guilt about raising objections so you smile back and stuff a portion of the food in your mouth with the intention of gulping it down as fast as possible. And of course Levi doesn't fail to notice the look of disgust in your face from across the table.

"Eat" Mike orders from Levi's left, gesturing to your plate with his spoon, an awkwardly soft smile plastered on his face. It beats you as to why they've decided to be persistent tonight out of all nights.

"Tch, show some respect to the people who work on your daily food. Drop that disgusted face or take cooking duty for the week."

With a pout in your lips you avert Levi's gaze in anger and overall shame. You lift the bowl containing the soup and you gulp it down as you try to ignore the knot at the back of your throat that threatenes to push back everything if you continue forcing your body to endure this.

Mike seems to be physically scolded to look at you because you see him jump in shock due to the unexpected action towards him for a fragment of a second. He takes no real interest in scolding you however, something that puts pressure on Levi for the matter.

"You just earned yourself cooking duty for the week, keep this up and Mike won't be as lenient as me." He talks sternly as he bores his eyes into yours. The unreadable lack of expression in his face remains intact, as always, but once again you choose to look away.

"Can I be dismissed?" You simply utter while your orbs take turns to look between Hange and Mike.

"Shoo shoo, I'm not pushing you girl" Mike pays little attention to you as he chunks on his bread with his eyes shut. If looks could kill you swear he would have been slashed to death by both Hange and Levi. To your luck of course, they can't, so you sit up from the stall in the most discreet way possible. Hange observes in silence as Levi's eyes follow your form across the room until you take a turn to get lost in the barracks. He then averts his gaze to the bowl of soup in front him for the remaining of his time in the dining hall.

It's one of those nights that you decide not to throw your whole body, face first, onto your bed; you've abused it very much in this way, the last thing you need to is for it to break apart and take down the twin bed on top of it. You sigh deeply before you bring your hands to cover your face in hopes that it will soothe your tingling skin.

Why was that silly little scenario of Levi watching you clean still stuck in your head all day long and why did it keep repeating over and over. To be clear with yourself, you didn't really know.

Your other roommates start flooding the room in a matter of seconds. It's always like that; the come back from dining and they chit chat for a few minutes before some of them go to sleep while others decide on showering before taking their given amount of rest for the night.

"(Y/n) lift your fucking head up you look like a corpse." Nifa, the girl who sleeps on the bed on top yours speaks.

"Not in the mood Nif. I'm sorry."

"You could try and talk to us!" Petra says on response, cutting Nifa off.

"I just don't want to cook for everyone. That's all." You spit a lie that's debatably believable. The girls that starts probing the walls of your stomach almost feels like liquid fire.

Did they really want to know the truth, or would they be disgusted by whatever came out of your mouth. Almost every one in the survey corps had a rough backstory and a purpose, and though you didn't lack of tragic and despair your purpose was pathetic and delusional.

"Look, I hate to see you like that and well you've been that moody way that before that punishment tonight. So spill."

"I don't want to be a burden!"

"Cut the crap." Lynne rhetored as she sat at the end of your bed, pinching your calf.

Well, you're probably annoying them by not letting any one of them in. "My mother died."

A few apologies and condolences are heard in response by the girls around you as they stare at you with oggly pitiful eyes.

"She was horrible and old no need to be sorry, I'm just conflicted on whether I loved her or not. I'm just unfazed but my mind guilt trips me on it." Your words are soft and your gaze fixed on the wooden floor underneath your legs. "I don't want to go into much abusive details, I'm sorry."

"Don't apologise!" Petra exclaims from her kneeling position next to you. "It's fine if you don't tell us anything. We shouldn't have pushed you." The girls all nod in response and the mood seems to darken the rooms aura with each silently passing second.

"I thought it was like boy problems" Lynne says as she wraps her right arm around your shoulder and squeezes you on her. Her palms quickly travel straight to your cheeks to poke and squish them in the most humorus way. "Tomas likes me and I avoid him, give me a breeak!"

You can't help but give a muffled giggle out to her. It's almost as if you approve of her little impression of you, and you do, mostly because laughing helps you take a weight off your chest. All girls around you are giggling in their turns with closed eyes, happily narrowed brows and scrunched up noses.

You shouldn't even let yourself be that moody anywayy.

___

To say that Levi is merely perplexing would be an understatement. Because here's the deal; no one could maintain such a straight face while pinning someone down. You're basically a lost cause as you maniacally move your head on the grass to avoid his gaze. Mentally you try to recall what brought you in this position in the first place. Was it because you challenged him to engage in combat or because he was a complete show off, it's beyond you at this point.

"I have your knife."

"What?" Levi looks at you with the tinniest bit of a puzzled impression plastered all over his face. Yet he doesn't get up from you. In the end he can't even know that you feel your skin burning with rage.

"I have your knife, sir. I won" you remark in a tiny little voice from the back of your throat.

"Tch, just because you have the knife doesn't mean your opponent won't attack you or even use that against you." Levi's voice is also calm and steady and even matching your tone in volume. You watch with anticipation as he opens his mouth to speak and when words begin to form he's interrupted.

"Ah sir, I want to spare with you as well!" Petra smiles as she fixes some lose strands of hair behind her ears.

Deciding to spend anymore time on this position on top of you, Levi pushes your wrists on the ground once again before completely getting off of you. You realise he's taken the dummy knife him, something he probably did in the blink of an eye. Of course he'd make his point whatever it took.

Training has stripped your stomach of the fullness that breakfast has secured you with and now you can hear the organ growl angrily inside your body. Having spent a week as the survey corps cook as a punishment has also worked wonders for your little appetite, because it physically drained you to the bone. You don't even know where to start about that unexpected shenanigan.

Unbeknownst to you, Nanaba and Lynne roll their eyes at your blanked expression. "Wall Maria to (y/n)? Hello? Is anyone in there?" An inpatient Lynne knocks a little too loud at the side of your head. Nifa laughs at the sight as well.

"Ohhh, I am." You whine. "Also ouch! I'm just not in my right head!"

"You uhm... mean piece of mind?" A few pieces of bread fall out of Nanaba's hand as she stuffs her mouth. It only takes a while to come up with a line to say to excuse your absurdness.

It's not that you want to feel that way about Levi or that you choose to either. It's probably an outcome of fatigue and a tiny infatuation that rule your mind like an empire that's about to fall. Levi's handsome, there's no denying in that, you've thought so ever since you set your eyes on him but he was ten years older than you and pretty much uninterested to almost everything. Maybe it's that you hoped he could look at you with the same enthusiasm that made you feel like you had a crush.

In reality you believe that these are pretty much lame reasons and Nanaba especially will laugh at you. 'Do you even have a reason to have a crush on someone?' Ugh, you can literally listen to her.

"Hmm, sorry I can't seem to communicate today. Might as well share." You decide it's not polite to keep things to yourself when others are trying to care for you. "Well it's that-"

"Do you guys find the Captain handsome?"

As always thanks for reading 👉❤️👈 if you have any request you can pop one in my askbox. Feedback is always appreciated, I really love seeing your opinions, they keep me motivated. I adore you guys

[violetnotez]

How about Tamaki Amajiki with a shy, introvert, nerdy S/O who's studying to become a entomologist (someone who studies butterflies and moths?)

Tamaki x reader

⤷ Genre: Fluff

⤷ Word Count: 2300+

⤷ Warnings: mild cursing

⤷ Synopsis: Tamaki is more than happy spend the day with his s/o at butterfly conservatory, since butterflies and moths are their passion. It’s just such a strange world to him, and he’s pretty nervous about it-especially when the bugs seem to take a liking to his hair

This fic is for the @bnhabookclub Bingo Event! Here’s my masterlist to see all my work for this event!

Bingo Slot: Hair Playing

This is my first one shot with little Amajiki, so sorry if it’s not very good! I lowkey wrote all this at 1 in the morning, so I honestly have no idea what sleep deprived me came up with 😂💀

Also I’m in mobile and at work so I can’t add a “Read More” 😭 I’ll try to get to it when I’m at home!

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ:

You gasped, your eyes blown out of sockets as you looked around at the garden. The smile you were sporting in your cheeks was uncontainable-there we’re just so many butterflies.

They fluttered to and fro like little fairies, each one having a different wing design and a different color. They were so beautiful, so delicate, their wings creating a symphony of small sounds as they fluttered on to the available flowers and trees.

You mind instantly began to pinpoint the different species, the little bodies so used to humans that they were zooming across your own as if you were apart of the forest yourself.

There was a monarch, a painted lady, red admiral, orange sulphur-

“Do-do you like it?”

Tamaki was watching you nervously, his voice nervous as his eyes trained on your shocked face.

He knew how much you loved butterflies and moths, something he had learned about you very early on in your relationship. You had a special bond with the creatures, always researching and learning about new species each day.

After he had learned about this conservatory after you had talked about wanting to go, he knew instantly he had to buy tickets for you to go. He had made a surprise until now, your complete silence making him nervous.

Maybe you didn’t want to go here? Maybe he heard you wrong?

“Oh Tama, it’s-it’s amazing,” you breathed out, your smile evident in your voice, “its perfect,”

You grabbed his hand tenderly, your digits softly gracing the pads of his flesh. Tamaki gulped, a blush evident in his face-he still wasn’t used to this whole relationship, it was honestly scary to him, but-it felt nice. He loved having your skin against his, almost a reminder that none of this was a dream and in fact real.

Now that he could breathe a sigh of relief, he let himself melt into your touch, a nervous smile gracing his lips.

He had to admit it, this place was really breathtaking. The trees were incredibly tall, almost as tall as a whole house, the canopies dropping down as if protecting the butterflies from the outside world. The flowers decorating the floor were bright and colorful like confetti, matching the multiple colors of the butterflies. The damp dirt was sweet, making the whole conservatory smell like the earth after a rainstorm. Everything about this place felt pure and peaceful, making Tamaki feel more at ease.

You squeezed your nervous boyfriend’s hand, turning to look at his adorably shy expression.

“Cmon Tama,” you cooed sweetly, “lets go explore-“

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ:

Now you were sitting on the floor with Amajiki, both your legs crossed casually. You had your phone out, giggling softly as you took pictures of the shy boy.

“Geez Tamaki, I didn’t know you were such a butterfly whisperer,” you giggled, taking another round of pictures of him.

He arms were stretched out along his body, a squirming expression on his face as he tried not to move. Amajiki had to have at least 10 butterflies on each of his arm, not including the ones fluttering on his chest and head, the butterflies somehow all crowding on to him.

“I-I didn’t know-either,” he stuttered out.

He looked so sweet like this, trying hard not to disturb the little creatures on his body.

You smiled again at the boy, settling into the floor as you peered into his indigo blue eyes.

“Do you know what it means when a butterfly lands on you?” You asked quietly, a small smile on your lips.

“No-I dont,” Tamaki stared at you, his eyes wide. “What does it mean?”

You leaned in to him, looking at each butterfly with warmth and affection.

“Well honestly, there’s a lot of interpretations-some say it means transformation and growth, a sign you're discovering your inner wisdom. In dreams, it can mean you're on the right track about a decision, or just good luck.”

You smiled, giving him an embarrassed look.

“Sorry, you probably don’t want to hear me ramble-“

“It’s okay, you can talk about them,”” he interjected, taking care to not move his jaw too much in order to not scare the butterflies. “I think its-it’s....sweet, that you know so much,”

Tamaki was blushing, his cheeks tinged with red. He would be completely embarrased to admit it out loud but-he absolutely loved to hear you talk. You were usually shy and kept to yourself, but when ever you got passionate about something and just rambled, it was-well-nice. He could almost get a glimpse into your mind, seeing how the ideas just flowed through you and created such interesting thoughts. It was intoxicating to Tamaki, and he could never get enough of it.

“Do-do you know what this one is?” he asked timidly, his eyes trained on a beautiful red butterfly with an inky black trim.

“Oh, that one?” you cooed, leaning in slightly towards the little bug. “Thats a red admiral- red butterflies usually symbolize intense love and passion, so sometimes its associated with lovers,”

“Do-do you like those ones? The red?” he asked. His arms were beginning to feel tired frm keeping the butterflies up comfortably, but the ticklish feeling of their beatiing wings took some of the sting off his aching limbs.

You shrugged your shoulders, a carefree smile on your lips.

“I think they’re beautiful,” you said, “but they have alot of bad associated with them. Like some myths from Scotland say a red butterfly is a witch in disguise. Or from Korea, they say that if you touch a red butterfly and then touch your eye, you’ll evetnually go blind.”

Tamaki gulped, his inky blue eyes wide.

“Well thats a little-intense,” he stammered.

You giggled at his obivous shock, your nose scrunched so so adorably Tamaki felt his heart squeeze.

“Yeah just a litle,” you smiled softly.

Your hand reached out, Tamaki watching your every move as you delictely picked up an orange butterfly, its design swirling with black an white.

“This one- is one of my favorites,” you mused, your eyes drinking in lovingly the little orange creature.

Tamaki sucked in a deep breath, letting it out slowly.

“It-its beautiful,”

You simply nodded, a sweet smile on your face as you watched the butterfly flutter on your pointer.

“This is a monarch-I pretty sure you’ve seen it before,”

Tamaki hummed in agreement-come to think of it, he had learned about his butterfly. He had only vaguely seen it in grade school, maybe in one of the science books he had read in class, but he had never seen it up close.

It was so beautiful, the orange so vibrant yet gentle, the black design looing almost handpainted-perfectly and imperfectly created by Nature’s own hands.

“I think these are absolutely beautiful, but what I really like is the folklore behind them.”

“In Mexico, many pople believe that the monarch migration are actually souls from the Land of the Dead that visit each year during the Fall season. They decorate their altars, and even sometimes dress up as them to help the souls come back to earth and visit their loved ones.”

You gazes at the little creature, your eyes full of admiration aad affection.

“It just-sounds so sweet ya know? That all these people wait for these little guys, and feel so mucch hope and love for them, because they’re a promise that their love never truly dies,”

Tamakki smiled timiidly at the little monarch-how could he tell you that thats exactly how he felt aout you?

You were his little monarch- he had waiting for someone like you to come into his life, to be a promise that everything was going to be okay. That any insecurity or problem he felt he had with himself wasnt so bad as he thought it was- to give him hope that in the future things would turn out okay. He was terrfied some days that your love was all just a fantasy, that maybe, for some reason, you didnt truly love him like he did and you were just dating him out of pity. It was hard for him to get out of those very low stupors, when he felt like he had no worth, but rememebring your smile and your voice and they way you said “I love you” to him made him realize it was all in his head- that your love for each other was real. You were his promose that love was true and never just went away.

You looked up at Tamaki, your soft smile turning into a surpressed chuckle. Somehow when you had been talking about the monarchs, even more butterflies had landed on Tamaki, making hard to even see the color of his shirt now.

“Tama, do you need some help?” you giggled, looking att he doting man with wide innocent eyes.

Tamaki blinked a few times, waking himself up frm his daze-did that many butterflies land on him?

The ache on his arms seemed to get even worse, making his muscles quiver from the effort.

He gulped, a shy grin on his face.

“Y-yes, thatd be nice,” he said, loving how sweet your giggles sounded.

You began to gently help Tamaki say goodbye to his new found friends, tapping gently on his arm to send vibrations that would make the butterflies stutter away. Some were a little more determined, making you have to take it off his shirt by placing it on your finger and gently blowing on it to make it fly off.

All your gentle prodding was making Tamaki blush intensely- he honestly loved your touches, but he was always too nervous to say so.

He simply sat there, relishing the feeling of your skin against his clothing as the dull ache in his arms began to wash away.

Afer a few minutes of prodding, you finally gave a sigh.

“Alright, I think thats the most of them-just now for your hair…”

There were a few butterflies perched in his inky locks, making their colorful wings stand out even more in the almost black landscape of his tresses.

You reached out, your hands beginning to rack against his hair, lifting the strands gently in order to get the butterflies to melt away from his body.

Poor Tamaki’s face began to heat up intensely- this was something he absolutely adored. Whenever you burshed, combed, or even just touched his hair, he instantly felt at ease. His whole body felt warmed up with a bubbly sensation, and butterflies filled his stomach (no pun intended).

He sighed in content, his long black lashes fluttering downward- he could honestly sleep right here, with you touching his hair so soothingly as the butterflies beat their gentle wings in the background.

You definitely noticed that little sigh, a small chuckle escaping your lips.

“You like it when I touch your hair Tama?” you asked sweetly, your heart swelling when you see Tamaki’s cheeks look so warm.

God-why was your boyfriend so adorably cute?

I-uh-uh yes I do,” he stuttered out,clearly sheepish, “could-could you keep touching me-like that?”

You grinned softly, your hands wracking into his hair even more,

God, you could scream with joy right now. Your boyfriend rarey asked for touches, unless he was extremely tired or distraught- it took alot for him to admit he wanted any type of touches, and in public too. He must feel so calm in this moment, and you couldnt be more happy for him. Your heart swelled,a strange sensation of wanting to just kiss him taking over your body.

“Sure thing,” you whispered, your digits caressing his locks. You two sat in complete and comfortable silence, Tamaki focusing on your every touch while you simply relished playing through his har, twisting and brushing the inky black locks.

Amaki felt so at peace it was almost nervewracking-all of this felt like a dream, and he was scared that if he opened his eyes, he would wake up to nothignness. You wouldnt be there, the butterflies would disapperear, and his whole world would no longer be decorated in colors but in meek grays. You were his eveything to him, and he couldnt let you go.

Tamaki gulped, his brows knitted downi n conflict.

“Y/n I-is this a dream?”

You gave a short giggle, finding the comment quite adorable.

“No, sweetie, it isnt-why do you ask?”

“Because-this feels-it feels to good to be real.”

You faltered slightly from touching his hair, your fingers stopping in their tracks.

Too good to be real?

“Tama, I-” you tried to ask gently, but Amajiki beat you to your words. His eyes fluttered open, his hand reaching for your wrist and bringing it downwards, holding it close to his chest.

Y/n, youre-youre my marposa,” he stated, his voice almost forceful, as if he was trying to convince you of his words. “Youre my promise of love. Please-I know it doesnt make much sense but-but you mean everything to me, and I, terrified that of this is-”

Tamaki words were muffled against your lips, your flesh pressed up gently against his own. He tensed up slightly, his body full of shock until he finally succumbed to it, his cheeks on fire as he melted into you.

You pulled away from the stuttering boy, a blissful smile on your lips.

“-fake?” you finished his sentence, “Did that feel fake to you Tamaki?”

The boy didnt know what to do-his whole body felt like it was on overdrive, his skin feeling tingly and warm and shivers crawling deliciously down his back.

Only you could make his nervousness feel exhelirating, and he drank up every minute of being so intimate with you.

N-no,” he stammered, his eyes watching as you smiled at him, your head cocked towards your shoulder.

“You have nothing to worry about-Ill always be right here with you,” you tenderly grabbed for the boy’s hand, your fingers dancing lazily against his digits.

“Youre my promise too”

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧･ﾟ:

[chrisjake-cp]

History 3 Trapped Filming Diary (full English translation) - Days 41-50

Masterpost here. 

I don’t own the book so I can’t post my scans of the pictures that came with it. So I included some other pictures of the scenes that were being filmed. These pics belong to LINE TV or Choco Media, or I’ve taken screenshots from the episodes or the behind-the-scenes.

Read days 41-50 under the cut. 

Day 41

On this day of shooting it happened to be Christmas, and the crew, waiting for the evening shooting process, enjoyed a Christmas gift exchange. Shaofei gave out a book; according to him it was a very inspirational book. A crew member who does hair and make-overs nearby opened it and laughed jokingly: “What kind of ‘inspiration’ do you mean?”, causing Shaofei’s thoughts to immediately go into another direction to the point of him not even being able to say it out loud (I can tell you: he was very bashful!). The whole crew also acknowledged that the most creative gift was a big bunch of green onions⁕ from Sanxing. When this present was opened the whole crew burst out in crazy laughter, but it need also be said that this was a most memorable gift. 

⁕ Sanxing is famous for its spring onions! They even have a little museum dedicated to green onions there. 

Also, what kind of book did Jake gift someone? 👀

Day 42

The day after Christmas, Boss Tang arrived at work, and the first thing he did was accept his gift from the Christmas gift exchange from the day before. So what did Boss Tang receive? 

*ding ding* The answer is 20 Christmas trees and a bottle of “Indian Spiritual Oil”⁕ At the appearance of this gift, everyone nearby immediately laughed loudly, and I also silently expressed my heartfelt wishes for Tang Yi’s and Meng Shaofei’s happiness. 

For today’s scenes, basically the whole ‘world’ had to be there: Unit 3, Tang Yi, A De, Hong Ye, Daoyi and Jingtang were all present, so the set was really lively. What was shot that day were the scenes after Hongye and Shaofei were injured in the parking lot. In order to increase the conflictual character of these scenes, the director assigned each actor their own, individual combination. What was interesting is that during rehearsals, the cameramen all quickly approached the actors like a large quantity of reporters. A De said smiling that the group of people was so large that it looked like an oncoming tank and he could only silently take the ‘card position’⁕ each time. 

⁕ This oil is basically like viagra...but topical instead of taking a pill....It’s a natural plant oil but it contains some anaesthetics which will irritate the skin a bit (making your you-know-what more erect as it grows hot) and the anaesthetics will also cause you to last longer. Ahem. Let’s all imagine Chris receiving this gift. 😂

⁕ The card position comes from a basketball or football game. It means that during the game, when the ball is in the air, the player accurately judges the effective landing point of the ball, takes the lead in the opponent's position, and blocks the opponent out of the best position to gain control. Here it means that Stanley just chose the best position to gain control/the upper hand in the scene. 

Day 43

Today we continued to shoot the hospital scenes. Shaofei said smiling that today was another aptly-named day of “earning money while lying down,” as he was lying down from the first scene in the morning to the last scene in the evening. After several consecutive days of intensive shooting, the hospital scenes were back in Taoyuan. Shaofei said he had been getting out of bed at 4am in the morning for several days in a row, and that day was no exception. So during the moments when he wasn’t in the shots, he could openly but stealthily catch up on some sleep in the bed, which made everyone present pretty envious. 

Zhaozi just gets better the more he acts. Just look at his slightly wrinkled brows.

Day 44

In the last episode, Zhaozi took Tang Yi to see Shaofei [in the hospital] for the last time. Tang Yi, who had carelessly pulled the trigger and accidentally shot Shaofei was already handcuffed. He told Shaofei he would hand He Hang as well as Zhou Guanzhi over to the police. Zhou Guanzhi was the enemy who killed his father. In these past four years, Tang Yi’s biggest goal was to single-handedly murder his father’s killer. For Tang Yi to now agree to let Zhou Guanzhi live and to hand him over to the police, meant Tang Yi had made the ultimate concession.

Because he had persisted in his revenge, he had caused his lover to be hospitalized with a gunshot. Since meeting Tang Yi, Shaofei had been assaulted in big and small ways,  and suffered injuries because of him. Tang Yi discovered that his stubbornly insisting on having his own way was a big factor in Shaofei getting hurt. If this continued, Shaofei would one day be ‘killed’ by Tang Yi. Kept apart by handcuffs, kissing your lover like that; what kind of plot could be more cruel than that?

Tang Yi, even while being handcuffed, was very witty/playful. He didn’t forget to stick his tongue out to the camera. 

Day 45

Long time no see! I believe that people who have watched <Right Or Wrong< should not be too unfamiliar with Dr. Jintang’s “uncle-in-law” Jiang Zhaopeng. He is Qiu Zhiyu whom we haven’t seen for a while. Before filming, these two cultivated their understanding of their lines by videochatting [i.e. they practiced their lines] (and also cultivated the signals between both of their phones). One of the most frightening things in filming is the screen of a cellphone. Apart from this scene, the drama shows many different mobile phone screens; every time a call had to be made, or when a LINE conversation happened, etc. Only, whether or not the signal would be good, is an element that no one can control. If the signal is not good, phone calls won’t go through, or the moment when the phone rings doesn’t match the plot. Sometimes it can take a good number of takes, not to mention that this scene needed a video call. If the signal would not be good, the video and the sound might have been chopped. But we had a close call and the signal in the hospital was very stable, allowing us to be able to smoothly complete the take.  

Zijian, who portrays Jiang Jintang, has a lively and witty personality. He would often say crazy things that amused the crew. In the evening, we filmed that Shaofei followed Tang Yi to the hospital to see Jintang [the massage scene]. Jintang wanted to angrily quarrel with Meng Shaofei, because he didn’t expect them to arrive together. His red face, his hard breathing and his stammering made all the staff on the scene instantly almost collapse from laughter. Even Shaofei, who was doing the scene with him, and Tang Yi, who was lying down behind them, couldn’t keep in their laughter. 

At another rehearsal, Jintang was planning to jump on Tang Yi’s back, but because he hadn’t well coordinated his position, Boss Tang’s knees hit Jintang straight in his ‘important parts’. The staff who were on the scene jokingly told him to jump on the spot, and he actually did it. This was also a ‘pain in the balls.’⁕

⁕ Same expression was used in day 37. It’s more literal here. You can see this happening in the behind-the-scenes. 

Day 46

Today we filmed father and son Chen Wenhao and Tang Yi meeting in front of Lizhen’s grave. The weather at the cemetery site was very unstable. Sometimes an uninterrupted drizzle floated by, and at other times wind and rain became quite strong. Occasionally, the sun would stealthily sneak out from the clouds to join in on the fun, adding many changes to the shooting. But the two actors were not in the slightest affected by these elements. As if their surroundings were all congealed together, the two looked at each other and cried really heart-wrenchingly. Afterwards, Chengyang [Chris] also frankly admitted that for this scene his mood was very complex, and it was very hard on him. Tang Yi stood in front of his biological mother’s tomb, and his biological father, whom he once thought to be her killer, walked up to him. At that moment, that kind of “crying” already wasn't just tears simply shed from sadness anymore. 

When he heard the gunshot as he exited the graveyard without even looking back, Chris said that his heart was really hurting so much that he almost couldn’t go on.

A big thank you to teacher Jiakui, who plays Wenhao, to give [Chris] ample ability, and to push him beyond the limits of what he could do. What is even more special, is that today was, coincidentally, also Chris’ birthday. To shoot such a meaningful scene on his birthday and falling apart crying like that, really must have left a deep impression on him.

Day 47

The day when the entire Unit 3 team got together, happened to be the very last day of 2018. Today’s MVP was Junwei [played by Ethan Liu]. Everyone most likely knows about the meeting between Unit 3 and the international criminal police division where Junwei was tasked with reporting duties. 

That day Junwei was constantly drilling and rehearsing, because all his lines needed to be correctly and fluently spoken for that role to be acted out well. One of the biggest causes for stress is that when you start failing takes, the whole crew and all the actors are just waiting. One can imagine that that is a very big pressure. 

Originally everyone joked and said that before noon they would surely be able to go home to celebrate the New Year, but in the end, it took until in the afternoon for the first scene to finish smoothly and everyone on Unit 3 could begin to plan how they would spend New Year’s Eve. But our poor Captain and Shaofei had to stay behind to continue the next scene. Shaofei felt wronged and said to Zhaozi: “Where is the morality in him [the captain] being so happy?” 

Day 48

Outside it was drizzling, but inside, the room was brimming with nervous energy as Tang Yi took Jack to negotiate with Old Ke, while Shaofei from his side and Unit 3 rushed inside as an important step and wiped out the place.⁕

While waiting for their scenes, each of the Unit 3 were doing their own activities. First Shaofei looked for a quiet place in the room and silently sat reading the script for the future scenes. With his usual style, he would use differently coloured pens to write down dialogue that belongs to Jake and Shaofei.⁕ Zhaozi, in turn, would be lying on the very big bed inside the room, and would both be talking to Junwei, having a pillow fight with Jack and taking selfies with his cellphone. 

And how did Tang Yi spend the time waiting for his next scene? The answer is that he had rolled himself up in a quilt and fell into a deep sleep. No matter if Shaofei would loudly yell, “Where is Tang Yi?” outside the room, Tang Yi slept through it all.

⁕ The very first scenes of the whole show, when Shaofei and his team barges through the door! Some of the very first words we ever hear coming out of Shaofei’s mouth are “Where is Tang Yi?” MY HEART. This show is so well-made. 

⁕ There’s an example of what Jake’s script looked like in the “HIStory 3: Trapped The Making of...” book. ankdlgdndkgn it’s the hospital balcony scene. The thing that he writes in black, between the two red exclamation marks... “This is the show’s first kiss!!! (Vixen Andy doesn’t count).” WHY IS HE SO CUTE? 

Day 49

For shooting the scenes at the exterior of the police station, we borrowed the Xizhi branch police building. That Xizhi branch building which only opened in 2017, is very new and very beautiful. The interior was also very spacious, so we had plenty of room to use.

On that day there happened to be a major traffic incident in that jurisdiction area, and both clerical and field police officers were busy bustling about. Even news reporting vehicles were driving in and out. We were able to witness the police officers' work that we usually don’t have opportunity to see. Thanks to all the protectors of the people for their hard work. 

Today’s Xizhi police station was bustling and lively. Thanks as well to the fans of Director Qingrong who, during the afternoon tea time, came to visit the set and brought snacks like donuts and coffee. In the afternoon the weather turned cold and it started to drizzle. But the fans braved the wind and the rain and came anyway, and even gave handwritten cards to the actors and the director, which was really sweet.

Day 50

Day 2 at the police station. Today’s weather was nothing like yesterday’s “sunny and cloudy with an occasional shower”. Today the sun was shining very brightly, and the temperatures soared straight to 30 degrees. It was the perfect weather to play a song called “I love summer.” 

We shot the scene where three members of Unit 3 talked with Jack at the door. They had to walk outside from inside the police station and each time they had to redo the take, everyone went back into the building with a look of total unwillingness. They opened their eyes widely and took a very deep breath, and with a blank look in their eyes they wiped their sweat and used a small fan to keep cool. Phew, foreheads were filled with beads of sweat, and everyone’s clothes were also soaked with sweat.

In the afternoon we filmed the scene from the last episode when Boss Tang goes to the police station to wait for Shaofei to get off work, when Jack also happened to ride his motorbike to pick up Zhaozi from work.  At that time, the weather was still very sunny. Boss Tang, who wanted to sit on his car’s hood to wait for Shaofei, suddenly yelled out. Apparently the vicious sun had rendered the hood burning hot, which made boss Tang jump up in sudden fright.