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sedehaven · 5 years ago

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Saving Ophelia Grace’s Toe

Y’all seem to like my stories about being a witch in the Bible Belt, so here’s another one. This is a coming of age story about a young witch (me), a bunch of adults of various degrees of uselessness, and Ophelia Grace’s rotten toe.

This is not a happy story.

Names changed when necessary.

CW: Body squick, graphic injury, incompetent nurse, malevolent nurse, poisoning, bureaucratic nightmares, dark DARK shit ahead

So, in spite of the crushing poverty that I grew up in, I was given the opportunity to attend a very prestigious boarding school for Juniors and Seniors in Klan Kountry, LA. It’s a public school, so it takes kids from all over the state.

My school was run by a dude named Brother Dave.

Brother Dave was so awful that one of our senior pranks (I DID NOT DO THIS) involved a password-protected screensaver on every communal computer in the school (including, I think, Brother Dave’s office computer) of a bouncing, 3-D image of this:

Dude was NOT well-loved. It is important to know that he and I did not get along. When I was still a prospective student, he told us that our mascot was the mighty Eagle, because Eagles Flock Together.

Y’all. Someone watched himself too much Mighty Ducks.

I replied, loud enough for the whole auditorium to hear, “That’s not true, sir. Eaglettes push their smaller and weaker siblings out of the nest as soon as they can.”

He looked to the staff for support, red-faced and embarrassed by this ninety-pound child who stole his thunder.

The biology teacher (who left for greener pastures after my first year--rumored to have been forced out for being too fabulously dykey for the new administration) looked at him and stated, in her very particular and crisp fashion, “Well, she’s right.”

Safe to say, he hated me from the start. So, if you read this and you wonder, “Why didn’t this silly kid just go to the grown-up?” That’s why. He was our grown-up.

Brother Dave started at the school the year before I did. He was brought in by a local Senator, because said local Senator Fucked Up Colossally.

Senator Fuckup was running against Mr. Sketchy Businessman. Mr. Sketchy Businessman was backed by the Ku Klux Klan (a big deal in parts of the world, folks. My school was in David Duke country.)

Senator Fuckup had a fancy name--well-respected all around the state. Like, several statues of one of his relations decorate the state capital. Big name.

Problem is, Senator Fuckup is half-Black.

In Klan Kountry.

Y’all.

So he’s already at a disadvantage. As it turns out, it takes a village to start a magnet school. Senator Fuckup was one of the founding board members, and promised all kinds of benefits if they put the school in HIS district.

Their other offer was in my own hometown, the Hub City, where several of our major state highways cross with two Interstates.A place with art and history and culture. A place with one of the largest outdoor music festivals in the state--a multicultural, international music festival! With art walks and museums and Mardi Gras parades! With a three-story library, a library for French language and culture, and the second-largest university in Louisiana!

Senator Fuckup PROMISED that the school wouldn’t want for anything if they went to Klan Kountry.

So they did.

It was no great secret that this school was Senator Fuckup’s baby. At the time that I attended, the school was number one in the nation. Something to be proud of.

Except.

Except that in order to keep various forms of funding, the school was required to take in more melanin-blessed individuals than the locals liked.

Enter Mr. Sketchy Businessman, who ran a series of TV and radio ads claiming that our STATE funded school was stealing money from the local school district.

That’s right. He claimed that our school took money away from the poor Whites of Klan Kountry and gave to the diverse and metropolitan school for the gifted.

Senator Fuckup tried to deflect and dismiss, BUT did NOT rebut those claims. He didn’t believe that the school’s funding was THAT MUCH of an issue.

Any reasonable person would understand that the school was funded from the State taxes. Right?

As it turns out, Klan Kountry is not filled with reasonable people.

Senator Fuckup is a member of a particular subgroup in Klan Kounrty--a not-insignificant population of Catholic Creoles. So, after he wins his election--barely--he realizes that Something Must Be Done to help the image of the school that everybody knew as HIS baby.

Enter his old friend, Brother Dave. Brother Dave, who nearly bankrupted his previous school. His brother-in-law was a contractor who got a few really juicy contracts through him.

Protip: Nepotism only works if the person being nepotized is competent.

Spoiler: Brother Dave’s brother-in-law built schools about as well as Brother Dave ran them.

Brother Dave’s old school is attached to an order of monks who build cheap and simple caskets for people who are into that kind of thing.

They bake bread for the poor. These are good people.

Y’all, these people made it KNOWN--statewide--that they had a casket ready for ol’ Dave if he ever stepped foot in their town again.

Still, Senator Fuckup decided that THIS was the man who would lead my school into a glorious future.

Brother Dave took an aggressive stance on admissions. He wanted kids who didn’t have a lot of drama, and kids who looked (WHITE) good on the recruiting materials. He pulled hard from the local Catholic (Segregation) Academies.

Y’all.

Our Black kids were nearly White-passing mixed-race kids, one kid who was ACTUALLY from Africa, a couple of kids from Catholic schools, and one dark-skinned Baptist girl who is bombshell model-gorgeous. (For those glossy brochures.)

So as many White Catholic kids as possible.

Y’all.

I’ve competed with private school fuckwits in academic contests my whole life, up to that point. If it was something that required preparation (science fair, for example), they wiped the floor with us.

Because daddy the petroleum engineer did the project for them.

If it was a you-know-it-or-you-don’t thing (quiz bowl, for example), they lost so brutally that I might have felt bad for them. You know, if they had souls. Which they did not.

So Brother Dave populated our school with what he thought were “good kids”. White, Catholic kids.

Spoiler: My class started with 250 students. We graduated less than half of that, even after he backfilled our class with new kids between junior and senior year. The class after mine was worse.

Why is that?

White Catholic kids at segregation academies in the late 90′s basically did busy-work worksheet stuff all day. They were not ready for 10 page papers and 5 page lab reports and 100+ pages of reading and 20-50 math problems and projects, projects, projects!

Also, if all you do is worksheets and sit-down-and-shut-up, there has to be a certain...chemical element...to cope.

So, yeah. Drugs. So much drugs. And booze.

Brother Dave also hired Nurse Bitchy Fuckface. She was actually his first hire.

Nurse Bitchy was a walking disaster.

I was sixteen when I first met her, and because she didn’t smell like street drugs (I KNOW WHAT THAT SHIT IS), I missed a lot of signs.

Looking back, I think that she might have been a Prozac-and-wine kind of person. But, as the only drugs that I was familiar with came from street pharmacists, I thought she was just evil.

Hateful to the queers, pagans, Goths, and all assorted weirdos.

You know, all the kids who could actually handle the schoolwork and the pressure. *eyeroll*

I’m allergic to Sudafed. Weird, huh?

A senior at my school told me to be careful with Nurse Bitchy. She has a sensitivity to acetaminophen (Tylenol) and couldn’t have it. Nurse Bitchy had given it to her a couple of times.

It was on my senior’s medical chart. If you’re keeping score, that’s felony attempted murder.

Nurse Bitchy gave me Sudafed seventeen times (that I remember) while I was at that school. She very nearly killed me doing it. Some times I knew, and some times I did not.

“But why did you take it, if you knew?”

Well, you innocent dove, if I refused to take the medicine that the Nurse gave me, then I got written up. Enough write-ups and I got kicked out.

My home school in the Hub City? Eh...as bad as Klan Kountry was, I didn’t have someone assaulting me daily. I didn’t have a gang of girls who got away with attempting to rape me with a broom handle. I didn’t have a very big kid who was given liberties with me (BY THE STAFF) because he was special ed.

Or, as my guidance counselor liked to say (after my father was murdered and I was flunking chemistry--not because of dad’s death, but because the chemistry teacher put all the girls and Black boys in the back of the class--which had NO air conditioning on hundred-degree days--after Brother Dave’s brother-in-law “fixed” it that summer), “Stephanie, you know that you’re the poorest student here. Do you really want to go back to THAT?”

No. I did not.

Under pain of going home to poverty, rape, assault, and maybe death, I took her poison. She watched me do it. And she smiled.

I only went to Nurse Bitchy when I was forced to. This happened far more often my Junior year. The teachers would send me because I was sick (I come from a smoker’s home, and I’m an asthmatic who is allergic to tobacco. My family never quit, so I’d end up with smoker’s pneumonia most times that I went home. Thanks for the lung scars, fam.)

Eventually, when I was a Senior, my computer science teacher realized that I was unresponsive with a fever in her class. She was new that year, and didn’t know any better. So she woke me up and sent me along. Nurse Bitchy gave me the usual and sent me back to class.

Very few humans retain the ability to projectile vomit after age seven. Did you know that?

Lucky me, I did. I still can.

I hurled all over my keyboard. I hurled and hurled. My classmates screamed and ran.

My computer science teacher, an ice-cold woman of Indian descent with a very posh English accent, unplugged the vomit-soaked, ruined keyboard. She took it and me to the nurse.

She slammed the keyboard down on her desk and screamed at her to NEVER send a sick child to her class again.

Nurse Bitchy was (shocking, I know) a racist. She feared the angry Indian lady.

My computer science teacher, I believe, spread the word about Nurse Bitchy’s ineffectiveness. Teachers stopped sending students to her.

That left a vacuum. Nobody was being forced to get medical help. But medical help was still needed.

Before going to school in Klan Kountry, I was a veterinary technician. I worked under-the-table from too young. Illegal-child-labor-too-young.

But, I knew my stuff. I had a stocked medicine cabinet and a dissection kit.

I started doing everything up to and including prison surgery in my dorm room.

I could handle most anything. Which was better than worrying that the nurse was going to poison one of my friends into the ground.

I didn’t ask for money or food or anything (food was a commodity at that school because our cafeteria was infested). I worked for the goodwill of my classmates, which is the shiniest coin in the realm.

I’d gotten into witchcraft earlier that year. People trusted the witch over the nurse. That’s where my school was.

I only had one case that I really couldn’t treat.

Y’all.

It was traditional in the girls’ dorms that unless you were asleep or studying, you kept your door open. Mine was open that night. I was writing Sailor Moon fanfiction, procrastinating on one project or another. I don’t remember, it was twenty-two years ago.

Ophelia Grace (not her real name) came to my door in Doc Martens, favoring a foot. Her roommate or a suitemate or maybe another theatre kid was holding her up as she hobbled into my room.

I hadn’t heard that she’d been hurt, but apparently she had been. She was feverish and weak. Her face was bright red. She was babbling.

“I’m sorry,” she said over and over again. She apologized for coming late. She apologized for coming at all. She was shaking.

I sat her and her friend on my roommate’s bed (we’d bunked them, and I had the top bunk). My roommate was out, in the art lab working on a particularly tricky painting. Probably for the best. He was squeamish (my ex-roommate is a transman, so I’m using his preferred pronouns.)

I grabbed a large bowl and a mug, filled both with water (salted the bowl of water), and went down the hall to the microwave.

The water in Klan Kountry was filthy. It smelled bad and tasted worse. Remember Mr. Sketchy Businessman? He wanted to relax EPA regulations for himself and his sketchy business friends.

They were actively dumping into the city reservoir. But Mr. Sketchy Businessman promised to KKKeep KKKlan KKKountry Lily, so he got 49% of the votes.

Racist douche.

I boiled the water in the microwave--first the mug, then the bowl. It was a walk I’d make several times that evening.

Ophelia had a fever, holding steady at “fucking HOT” by the estimate of her friend. My thermometer pegged it at 102. Not good.

I put a teabag and two whole cloves in the cup and let it steep while I took her temperature. I asked her what happened. I don’t remember the specifics of the injury, but I believe that something got dropped on her toe. I think it happened in the theatre.

Ophelia thought she could walk it off. I remember that.

She kept apologizing. I honeyed the tea and shoved it in her hands. The tea helped. She was shivering--hard--from the wracking chills of her fever.

I remember how her febrile shivers made the bunk beds shake.

I remember thinking that I was in over my head.

I remember grabbing my oldest towels, and closing my door.

I remember praying.

And then I took her boot off.

Y’all.

I’ve smelled rot. Some people think that all rot smells the same.

It does not.

Corpse stink has its own bouquet. Blood rot has a distinct stench. Necrotic yeast infections almost smell good--like yeast rolls and something meatier.

I’d smelled Ophelia’s particular rot before.

I was fourteen. A momma dog was brought in, heavily pregnant. She’d been delivering, and the third pup got stuck. There were 11 left. The stuck pup was dead, but we managed to save 4 behind him, plus the first 2, born healthy.

The uterus had begun to rot inside, and several of the pups had been dead for some time.

The spaying that happened after the pups were removed was green and black, with the consistency of pudding. We pulled as much out as we could, but the rest had to be rinsed out.

Thankfully, I’ve smelled that smell very few times after. It smells pungent and strong. Like garlic. Like a cream of garlic stew.

I thought I’d gotten a whiff of THAT smell when Ophelia walked in, and again when she sat down. Pulling her boot off was like the first deep cut into momma dog. Garlic and blood.

The smell of something rotting in someone still alive.

She had on two socks. I peeled off the first one. There was a stain at the toe. The second sock was worse. The smell hung around.

Our windows were screwed shut. I couldn’t do anything about the smell.

Ophelia cried into her tea. She was still apologizing.

The toe was purple and black. There was a lot of yellow pus under the nail, which was leaking out on either side. Red streaks ran up her instep, tracing her veins.

The toe was swollen and needed a lance.

I had no idea how she climbed the stairs to get to me. (I was on the third floor, and she lived below. We had no elevator.)

She started to get loud (peeling those socks off HURT), so I asked her a question. I asked about her history paper. The ten-page history paper was a rite-of-passage at the school, and I knew it was coming due for her. I told her to tell me about her topic and her sources.

She did.

Thank the Lord and Lady.

I got my dissection kit and rubbing alcohol. I made things as sterile as I could.

I told her that it would probably hurt, but that I would work quickly.

Her friend left after the first cut. She didn’t stay gone long, but I heard her vomit in our suite’s toilet.

Ophelia kept talking about her paper. I led her around on that topic, asking questions and asking for clarification. Asking about the books she’d read, and offering a few that I was familiar with on the subject.

This is why doctors and dentists know so many things about so many subjects. Talking keeps the patient calm.

Meanwhile, pus and blood dripped from the slits that I made in her flesh, onto a towel that bore the stains until I donated it to the animal shelter, years later.

I soaked her toe in the bowl of water. The salt burned, but she couldn’t scream.

There was an adult who was supposed to be watching us. If she was alerted to my low-tech medical unit, she would have stopped me and sent Ophelia to the murder nurse.

I filled another bowl, salted it, and microwaved it.

Ophelia’s friend rejoined us, and watched as I squeezed the rest of the pus out of her. Her toenail slipped off in the third bowl. The toenail was cracked. Ophelia kept it.

I wonder if she still has it?

Triple antibiotic ointment and a sterile dressing later, I told her to tell the nurse that she needed a doctor. Nurse Bitchy couldn’t keep us from a doctor if we asked for one. She said that she would.

I gave her a few oral anti-inflammatory pills and some Benadryl to get a good night’s sleep.

She left, with her boot in her hand and a soft smile on her lips. I cleaned my tools, my bowls, the floor where her foot was, and had to do a load of laundry because that one rag smelled so awful.

My roommate came back in time for headcount, and asked if I’d made ramen. Said it smelled pretty good in there.

It did. Rot can do that.

It was hard to sleep that night. I cried quietly until sleep took me.

Ophelia recovered. She became a witch some time later. In college, I think. We’re still friends, in a Facebook kind of way.

Brother Dave is still alive. After working for my school, he ended up helping the Church cover up three decades of sex abuse at a diocese school. Not sure what he’s up to, but probably nothing good. He’s a garbage human.

Nurse Bitchy just retired. She lasted twenty years at that school. God knows how.

Senator Fuckup died in a car crash and the school is being renamed after him. So are the new dorms that are being built.

Klan Kountry cleaned up their water after I left. That’s really good news.

The school continues. Apparently, it got better with Brother Dave’s leavetaking. I hope that’s true.

And me?

I’m still a witch. I’m still here.

And I can still smell that rotten toe on the edge of nightmares half-remembered.

~*~

I don’t want my diploma revoked or to be sued, so disclaimer time.

This is fiction. Any resemblance to people living or dead is coincidental.

#witchcraft #prose #proseriot #kitchen witch #healing #writing #amwriting #autobiography #true story

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dogwooddivinity · 5 years ago

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"I'm sorry, I don't." Sirius scrunched his eyes closed and slowly opened them again. Yup, still three in the morning . "Okay, let's start again. What is it you needed?" Fucking Regulus. Trust him to list me instead of...okay, yeah, okay. What's he done now? He threw a stiff arm out in the direction of the dresser, groping blindly until he felt his fingers graze the bridge of his glasses.

"Thank you, Sir, what we need to do is confirm that you are the Sirius Black we have listed as emergency contact for a patient in our care. If you could just." He leaned just a little further in an effort to hook a finger around them. "Shit!"

"I'm sorry, Sir, are you alright?"

Obviously not, it's the middle of the night and I can't see a fucking thing, but "Yes, yes, I'm just, it's the middle of the night and I'm," stuck half off the bed because I fell while trying to get my glasses, like the idiot I am, "nevermind," he said instead. How do I prove I'm me?" Fuck it. As quietly as possible, he pulled his legs down after him and sat propped up against the side of his bed.

"The easiest way would be if you could confirm the information we have. Let me just pull up the address we have on file for you…" Oh, shit. Nope . It wasn't like he didn't know his own address, obviously he did, but specifics like postal codes never seemed to stick. Who writes letters anyway? And who needs to remember when you've got a Moony for that?

"Wait. Can I," he might be an idiot, but he's my idiot after all . Sirius stifled a wince when he stood to get his glasses. For real this time. Without falling. "Can I just come in?"

"Yes, yes of course. Just stop by the intake desk in the Emergency Department and let them know you're there." She sounds relieved. Who wouldn't be, it was three in the morning and she'd been given the job of calling a man who couldn't verify his own address. "Will do," Sirius replied, while reaching for his jeans. He was about to hang up then thought better of it. "I appreciate your patience."

"Of course."

Okay, clothes? Yes. Keys? Sirius moved through the room still bleary eyed and half asleep. He'd have to call in sick likely, but he could do that later. Call James too, he'd be worried obviously, no, better leave that until morning. Oh! Moony. Sirius double checked again for his wallet and keys before ducking into the washroom to brush his teeth. Remus had come in after him last night, was pulling that terrible late shift, regular shift back to back that always seemed to hit him more often than others. If I'm not going to be here to wake him up, I should let him know.

"Remus, hey, I know it's early, or late, or… Look I don't know, I just, come on wake up I think Regulus is." Sirius crossed the room, talking the whole time. "Moony, Moons, come on, I need…"

"Shit, shit, Moony."

"Oh my God, Remus," Sirius threw open the curtain around bed twelve with no regard for either Remus' privacy or the comfort of the other patients. "Are you okay!?"

"Yes. Holy shit, Sirius, close the curtain. I'm not even dressed." Remus sat up as best he could, pulling the blanket farther over his lap, and waved wildly in the direction of the rest of the room."Why are you so embarrassing? I could hear you yelling from down the hall."

"I was worried, okay? I get a call in the middle of the night, and I think it's Regulus so I'm grabbing all my things." He closed the curtains with just as much force. "...and then went to wake you up, you know, because of the late shift and then the normal one, but then you're not, I tried, but then you didn't answer, and..." And then you weren't there. And I thought you were hurt.

"Woah, Sirius. Stop. Just stop. Come here." Remus waved him over and patted the side of the bed. "It's okay. I'm fine."

"I didn't get a call in the night because you're fine," Sirius threw over his shoulder, while trying to unstick the curtain rings. "And I'm not calming down until you tell me what happened. I asked at the desk but they wouldn't say."

"I know, everyone knows, you were yelling. Oh my God, can you just sit down?" Remus pointed emphatically, with his whole arm, at the chair beside the bed. "You're making it worse."

"Fine." Sirius sat down and attempted to feign calm so pathetically that Remus had to choke back a laugh. "What happened?"

"I was coming home from work and a car turned into me. I was fine, I am fine, but the driver insisted on calling an ambulance and now I'm here." He spoke slowly, a clear attempt to diffuse the energy positively radiating from the chair next to him. "When I said I wanted to leave they asked if I had anyone to come pick me up and I told them to call you. I thought it would be faster to just tell them to get it from the file. I didn't think…"

"That it might scare me?" Sirius sat up, somehow finding a way look even more ready to spring. "That I might be worried about you?" That I might be worried that I lost you?

"Just shut up, would you?" Remus was yelling now too, his eyes darting to the gap in the curtains in expectation of someone coming to tell them to quiet down. He gripped the rail of the bed and took a long slow breath before coming back quieter. "I knew you'd be worried," he said, his jaw set tight. "Why the hell do you think I made you my emergency contact?"

Sirius could feel the fight go out of him at the sight of Remus angry. It happened so rarely. He hated to lose control. "I thought it was your mother?" Why isn't it your mother?

"Is she going to come from Wales to get me?" He was still agitated, still white knuckled against the metal. "I called you so I could go home. I'd like to go home now."

"Yeah, yeah, of course." Sirius shot up out of the chair, moving it aside to clear the way. "Is there anything you need? You're sure you're fine?" Please tell me you're okay.

"Just my pants." Sirius couldn't help but miss the reassurance he was hoping for. But are you okay?

"Sure. I'll meet you outside."

(protip: read the tags)

On ao3 here.

#you know that feeling when something matters so much more #because the person matters so much more #Sirius is going to drive home really slowly #and remus will complain #what are you doing i just want to go home #but Sirius can't stop thinking about Remus getting hit #and he's never been afraid of driving before #but tonight he's fucking terrified #later he'll think about being Remus' emergency contact #and hope it means i love you #and he'll change his #and leave the paperwork on the table #i love you too #remus lupin #sirius black #these could be the tall person keep away boys if you like #that tracks for me #wolfstar #late night musings

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wakasagayhime · 6 years ago

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very long, very personal post

tldr, im still not drawing but here’s a detailed account of everything that’s happened in case anyone is confused or misinformed

alright. let me start out by saying i’m not going back to art just yet. it still hurts to do anything art related and i’m still trying to find a way to heal from all of this. i need some kind of professional help first, and i don’t know how long it’ll take afterwards for me to begin feeling like myself again. i don’t even know if i’ll be able to get any kind of professional help at the moment; my university’s counseling center told me, in short, that i’m so mentally ill that their services would not be enough for me and i’d have to look elsewhere (which is reasonable, tbh, they’re almost always completely booked so it’s difficult to actually even talk to someone there in the first place, i only got to talk to them to begin with because i nearly killed myself one night after having the most intense panic attack of my life where i felt like i was actually in the process of dying) and as if that weren’t enough, if you follow me on twitter you’d know that my mom finally left my stepdad, but this means that we no longer really have a home to call our own and are now living with some of my mom’s friends. on the bright side, miso is a lot freer and gets to explore the house as he pleases, but on the downside money is tight and my mom is trying her best to find a place to live while working two jobs and trying to help pay for my tuition. long story short, i want some kind of professional help badly, but all the bullshit that’s been happening in my life makes that difficult.

anyway, i understand that i’ve worried a lot of people through all of this, and i’m sorry. i truly, genuinely am sorry for everything that’s been going on. i blame a lot of it on myself not being strong enough. if i were stronger, i wouldn’t care about some stupid internet trolls, or some random grown man in florida stalking all my social media. if i were stronger, i could take my life back. i wouldn’t feel the need to constantly contemplate suicide, or to torture my own body by starving because of my physical form feeling like the only thing i have left to be in control of. if i had only been stronger, like my old stupidly foolish overconfident 16 year old self who got into fucking STEVEN UNIVERSE DISCOURSE of all things, maybe i wouldn’t care. even when it first happened to me, after the initial shock and hiatus, i was pretty much back to normal almost instantly. but this kind of trauma is sneaky and will gradually eat away at you more and more while you pretend to be ok, and then eventually you reach a breaking point and it’s taken over your life. that’s why i’m still obsessing over that day two years later. that’s why i can’t be left alone on december 13th this year, or else i know for a fact i will harm myself in some way. (don’t worry about that though, burger is going to hang out with me that day and i’ll be fine.) still, even though i keep telling myself my past self was stronger, i do know that she really wasn’t. she was still struggling with depression, anxiety, and self harm issues. maybe it just manifested differently for a while. maybe she felt unstoppable at some point in time because she finally found a girlfriend and got a cat. i got into so many fights that weren’t worth my time or energy at all, and part of me wishes i could be that confident again, but i also know that was my downfall to begin with.

i have followers who haven’t been around for longer than a year or maybe less than two, so i might as well give everyone a true, thorough rundown of what happened leading up to that day, the day of, and after.

i’m sure a lot of you who are worried about me at the moment have seen the recent callout for colboh and his involvement in what happened. i’ll be honest--i don’t know the full extent of his involvement, and i want to believe his foolishness ends at not leaving artists who have blocked him alone and uploading their shit to booru sites when they explicitly state not to. so let’s just start there. i honestly don’t remember if it was before or after i first blocked him, but he uploaded one of my NSFW drawings to danbooru when i first shared my NSFW blog. (PROTIP: if you’re a minor, don’t share your NSFW art with anyone. don’t care if you’re 17, i was about to turn 17 myself. it will bite you in the ass. as such, some of this is my fault.) i quickly contacted danbooru asking them to delete it, and they did--but that artwork subsequently ended up on gelbooru as well, and i was unsuccessful in my efforts to remove my art from there.

fast forward to december 13th, 2016. it was a normal morning. i was getting ready for school, but also being dumb and lazing around in bed browsing tumblr. i saw a post from a blog that shares Funny 4chan Screencaps. my art was in it. the art was of a very muscular yuugi, a drawing i was proud of, especially in how much gay energy i thought it radiated--but this drawing was being used in one of those typical “here’s a touhou, i wanna fuck her! am i right guys? let’s talk about how badly we want to fuck her” threads. seeing my art used for this was appalling. my first mistake was reblogging the post and saying how it was wrong, and how my art shouldn’t ever be used for such a purpose. my second mistake was making a text post AND tweets expressing my disgust at the situation, thinking no one who frequented /jp/ would ever see, sure that it would be a big waste of their time to concern themselves with some random dumb “”sjw”” artist. i also probably shouldn’t have specifically called them “gross neckbeards,” in doing so i absolutely struck a nerve with basement dwellers everywhere. i got to school and during my second period class, suddenly felt a strange urge to look at /jp/. why i did that, i still don’t really know. maybe i was expecting hate. maybe i was trying to see if they used my art for something gross again. i don’t know. either way, that moment changed everything forever. i saw the screencap of my tweets posted for everyone in their circlejerk to see. even worse--i looked in the thread, and someone had also posted the NSFW art colboh had uploaded to danbooru, mocking it and calling me a hypocrite for drawing two girls having sex while also saying i don’t like my art being used for those kinds of threads. this is what truly ignited the amount of hate i saw directed towards me in the threads. i got called a bitch, a drama whore, got told to kill myself, and in one reply etched into my mind forever, someone said something along the lines of “we should all call her local gang and have them rape her, she just needs a good dicking.” there were multiple threads, too; i don’t know how many, but there was another one about me after the first one was deleted, in which someone edited a typical fat balding NTR hentai doujin style man into art i made of kagerou nosebleeding at wakasagihime. more disparaging comments were made. in both threads, people expressed their hatred and dislike of my art, some calling it garbage, some just saying it’s “bad,” etc. some people said the threads were unnecessary and rude, but they were a kind few in a cesspool of violence.

i don’t know who started these threads. i can’t assume anything about anyone, but whoever did this was definitely looking through all my social media out of bitterness and hatred, or perhaps even following me on both my tumblr and twitter considering the timing of the threads immediately after i complained. it eats at me that i most likely will never know who did this to me. i’ll never know who hated me so much that they decided to completely destroy my self esteem. if whoever it is who did all of this is reading this and feels any ounce of remorse, i’m begging them to reveal themselves and why they did it, but i know the chances of that happening are incredibly slim. someone, i can’t remember who, maybe it was queenly, told me they hope someday i reach a point where i don’t have to worry about that because i won’t care in general, but i still don’t know if i’ll ever reach a point where i stop caring about all of this.

like i mentioned earlier, after this all first happened, i was destroyed. the next day, my school’s GSA happened to have a vote for whose art would be on the club t-shirts, mine or someone else’s. mine lost. i broke down completely--anywhere i went, i wasn’t good enough, not for anyone. for days, there was a constant feeling of horror and fear in my chest, something i’ve only ever felt so intensely when one of these threads resurfaces or i suddenly relive my trauma due to other things triggering me. i took a hiatus that lasted a few weeks, i believe i came back sometime before the new year. i thought i was ok, and i pretended like i could go back to being myself. but as time went on, and i continued living with the weight of that day on my back, i became weaker and weaker. i stopped drawing as frequently as i used to. my final year of high school started and i ended up falling into such a deep depression that i constantly skipped school and eventually attempted suicide in november 2017. the suicide note i wrote cites that day as being one of the main things leading me to my decision, telling whoever did this to me that i hoped in my passing they’d have to live knowing what they did to me. my attempt only failed because i swore to take every pill left in the bottle and there were only four pills. had it been full, i’m not really sure what would have happened. i was sent to a mental institute afterwards for a week. being there was the absolute definition of hell. i was alone. i cried myself to sleep every night. they claimed to be a place where people were improved and got help, but i did not get any help at all. they basically imprisoned me for trying to kill myself. when i got out, i was only glad to be alive because i just wanted to be able to talk to my friends, my family, and my girlfriend again. it still shocks me that i was able to graduate from high school considering how much school i skipped before and after my suicide attempt.

sometime before that school year ended, i became extremely upset one afternoon and decided to run away from home. i had what happened to me and what was said about me that day running through my head. i tweeted that i hoped maybe in running away i’d end up being raped like they wanted, like how i deserved. someone who i considered a friend replied to this with, “fuck you.” after all of this was taken care of and i was safe at home, i responded that i was sorry, that i wasn’t thinking right when i made the tweet. she responded that i was, and blocked me. i tried to explain that i said what i did because of the threads about me on /jp/ and the one response threatening rape, but this was disregarded and, seemingly, ignored. a few days later, the former friend in question started sending me anon hate on tumblr, asking me why i want attention so badly, accusing me of making light of actual rape victims by saying such a thing. i explained myself, but to no avail. i blocked her on tumblr, and left it at that. but then, at the end of the school year, when i was proud of myself for finally getting through high school without killing myself or failing or anything, i stumbled upon the second thread. the date the thread was created lined up exactly with the time between me running away from home and me receiving anon hate. she can try to act like she didn’t make the thread all she wants, but i’m not an idiot. the replies were also eerily similar--people in the replies remembered me, a year and a half after the original thread. some replies mentioned me having attempted suicide months before. some mentioned my NSFW art again. i had a massive breakdown and nearly drowned myself in the pond down the road. it was a wet, rainy night, and i sat on a bench by the pond sobbing loudly, trying to find some way to want to keep living. but i couldn’t. i might have gone through with it if it hadn’t been for burger coming and talking to me and giving me a ride home.

entering college, i thought things would be easier. in a way, they are. i have more freedom with classes. this semester, i attended almost all of my classes, almost every day, just with the exception of me being sick some days and me accidentally oversleeping once, and then one day when i just didn’t feel like it. but things continued to get worse for me--i developed an eating disorder for many reasons, one being the time i spent a year prior depressed caused me to gain a significant amount of weight, and the other being i had sworn off self harm in the form of cutting. i found that i was able to get the same gratification from starving myself. at one point, it turned into a game of sorts, where i tried to see how long i could go without eating anything. my record was a little over 72 hours. being constantly hungry or in pain this way felt like something i deserved in a way, but also something to distract me from the pain of realizing i was losing my love for art. i was in denial about it for months. i tried to keep drawing, but everything i drew upset me, saddened me, and even angered me. i looked at anything i made and only felt disgust. it was the one thing i used to love doing more than anything, and now i only felt shame.

in november, i acknowledged this and decided to quit for good. recently, i discovered colboh had uploaded more of my NSFW art to gelbooru, even though i specifically stated on my blog to never upload my NSFW art to image sharing sites, specifically right after he uploaded my art the first time. by the time i found this, i had already sworn off art for good, but looking at the comments on my art on gelbooru (and rule 34--i guess they’re connected upload-wise like danbooru?) filled me with so much sadness and shame, not because they criticized my art, but because they said horrible things about my depiction of kagerou. for those who don’t know, i headcanon kagerou as a trans woman, and one thing i do not regret about my time as an artist is how that depiction has helped numerous trans women feel good about themselves and their bodies. seeing so many disgusting comments deliberately misgendering her and making other transphobic remarks hurt me on a completely new level. my trans friends have been such a source of strength for me through all of this and seeing that made me feel disgusted, especially with myself. i felt like i had failed them. i had made so many trans women happy, only to see a man i blocked two years ago had uploaded my art to porn sites, tagging it with dehumanizing words like “f*ta” that i specifically tell people never to refer to my art with, displaying that art for the exact same crowds of people that ruined everything december 13th 2016 to continue to pick apart. one comment even told me to kill myself, effectively bringing back every memory of that day.

speaking of that, another thing i want to touch on now that i’m up to speed with the details of everything that’s happened related to the original threads two years ago, is kagerou. i’m positive you all know that i really love kagerou imaizumi, and that she’s my favorite touhou character. it’s embarrassing to say, but she’s brought me so much comfort through all of this. sometimes if i’m sad, i’ll imagine her giving me a big hug, or i’ll look at cute pictures i have saved of her, or something along those lines. it’s pretty cringy for a fictional character to make me happy, i know, but i’ve grown so attached to her and she really means a lot to me. and another thing that made me want to swear off art is because she’s loved by so many others that i don’t think my depictions of her do her any good. i’m constantly compared to other artists, and it’s never good. even in the threads, i’m told i should be more like those other artists and these things wouldn’t happen to me. i am not allowed to love kagerou imaizumi. i draw her as a hairy trans lesbian, and that disgusts people. hell, the fact that i draw lesbians in general disgusts people, which sure fucking sucks because i constantly hate myself for not being attracted to men and being able to draw happy lesbians made me feel better about myself. but i’ve ruined kagerou for so many people, especially with my stupid kagewaka bullshit. maybe that’s why those artists unfollowed me. maybe it’s a combination of that and my constant breakdowns becoming far too annoying. i think all the popular artists who used to like me and then unfollowed/softblocked me are really glad to see that i’ve given up. and that’s something else that saddens me too--even as an artist, in my own community of touhou artists, i often feel like i’m lesser, and that i don’t belong. maybe it’s because i’m so foolishly outspoken about my opinions that they dislike me. maybe it’s because i’m a woman, and a lesbian at that. i don’t really know why they hate me so much. i wish i could belong somewhere.

and i think that’s what it all boils down to in the end. i’ve lost all sense of belonging. when i was 14 and people started noticing my art for the first time, i finally felt like i had something. like i belonged somewhere. after being bullied through middle school and having to deal with abusive friends and an abusive dad, it meant the world to me that i finally had something. but it didn’t last long at all. it all came crashing down, not just because of others, but because of me. i was the one who was cocky, getting into fights that weren’t worth it. i was the one who provoked people and made them hate me. i was the one who complained about /jp/ posting my art in their threads. i know people want to believe that i’m a saint, but i’m not. i have myself to blame too. i at least want everyone to understand this, above all else. there was so much i could have done differently to prevent this all from happening, but i didn’t. i was stupid and naive. i was a massive fucking idiot, and now look where i am. i lost everything. i thought i had friends, i lost them. i thought i loved art, i lost that. i thought other really talented nice people liked me, i even lost that. all i have now is an empty shell of my former self. i don’t know what to do with it. i don’t know how i’m going to rebuild myself. it’s so painful to have to keep living like this. i don’t know if there’s any fixing me at this point. i’ve lost so much, i feel permanently broken.

but despite all of that, despite everything i’ve been through, i still receive so much love and support from my followers and friends and it means so much to me. it means the world to me and has kept me going through all of this. knowing that people care about me and want to see me get better and improve makes me want to try to fix myself even if i am broken beyond repair. i just want to thank you all for being that source of strength for me. these past few years have been so hard for me and time and time again i still get love and encouragement from so many people. from the bottom of my heart, thank you. there is nothing more precious to me than those moments when i feel like i do truly belong, when i feel loved, when i feel like i’m not alone after all. for those moments, i’ll keep trying. even if these threads keep continuing and breaking me further, i’ll keep trying. even if every last artist in this fandom comes to hate me and my shitty art, i’ll keep trying. it’s still painful to draw right now and i have a long way to go before i can share art with anyone again, but for you all, i’m going to keep trying my best. at the end of the day, i know everyone’s encouragement and love is worth far more than hate threads urging me to kill myself.

i’m sorry how long and personal and unnecessary this is, but i felt like i had to set things straight. if you read all of this, i applaud you. if you just kinda skimmed through to read the last paragraph, i also appreciate it. again, thank you.

#glub glub #suicide //#self harm //#disordered eating //#rape //

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fancyfade · 6 years ago

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@bluestarsapphire replied to your post :

[image: a comic panel in the batcave. we are...

Your reading far to much into this. Maybe your also projecting someone in your own life into Bruce’s place? This story also has to many plot holes in it to make it cannon worthy. I’m not going to defend this story cause not worth defending, I’m more concerned about you, as I’ve said your over reading a failed attempt of a “mystery crime that tore the family apart” type of story. It’s a cringe fest of characters that are out of character.

a) this is so hilarious this is the most condescending comment i’ve gotten probably.

protip don’t try to psychoanlayze someone you’ve never spoken to based on one tumblr post. it’s not projection.

b) i don’t actually think that bruce’s flaws are OOC here, unless you’re just going to shoot of “oh any time he’s an asshole that’s OOC btw”

like they can be not your personal headcanon and thats fine, but this stuff pops up... a lot....

c) if it offends u so much that i was dissing batman, just blacklist batman negative and don’t try to psychoanalyze strangers.

#bluestarsapphire #reply #condescenion nation #tag 2 #tag 3 #tag 4 #batman negative

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michiigii-writes-mysme · 7 years ago

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A Day for Firsts

RFA Coffee House AU - Valentine’s Day

Pairing: Yoosung x MC

Summary: The RFA are baristas at Rika and V’s cafe. Contains fluff! …Not as dirty as the title sounds. <3

Word Count: Approx. 3000

Protip: The ever-so-generous @digitalscratch-arting bestowed upon me an illustration! Go check dat art out!

“Are you ready, Yoosung?”

The college student had never heard such a loaded question, before. He had spent hours studying the Coffee Shoppe’s 30 different menu drinks. He had practiced cute writing for the cups when he wrote each customer’s name. And the night before, he had stayed late with Zen, learning how the expresso machine worked.

But was he ready?

“I am ready...to throw up,” he offered, smiling weakly at the cafe manager.

Rika tried not to sigh at that, closing her eyes for a moment to collect herself, before smiling serenely at her younger cousin.

“How can you throw up if you did not have breakfast?” she asked sweetly.

“You didn’t eat breakfast?!” Seven asked, aghast. However, neither cousin heard him, so he continued doing his morning prep work.

“Maybe I shouldn’t start, today,” Yoosung suggested, tugging nervously at his uniform apron, “I should keep practicing drinks in the back room…”

“Last week, you made most of the drinks that we served,” Rika pointed out, reaching behind her cousin to adjust his collar, “You’re going to be fine. The twins will be here with you, all day.”

Yoosung still hesitated, glancing around the cafe. What had once been a quiet, comfortable study place for him, now felt like a battlefield. Saeran and Seven were still in the process of prepping the coffee house for the day, while Yoosung and Rika spoke behind the counter. Saeran was tidying up the flavoured syrups and milks, making sure they had enough for at least their morning rush. Seven was cheerfully drawing hearts on the windows, his red and pink markers squeaking on the windowpanes. The sun was barely up, and there were no customers, yet, but already, the coffee shop was buzzing.

The cafe that his cousin, Rika, managed with her fiance, V, had only been in business for a couple years, but it had already developed a strong standing within its community. It was within walking distance of Yoosung’s campus, SKY University, and was visible from the main road that most businessmen took towards work. The attractive, but generally genteel baristas were a hit with both students and workers alike, and within such a short time, there were already a good number of regulars frequenting Rika’s Coffee Shoppe. The humble cafe had become quite popular.

And, of course, the cafe made a point of decorating their building and customizing their drinks whenever a holiday rolled around. This was always attractive to trendy coffee-drinkers and new couples. It didn’t take a genius to know that they would be busy on Valentine’s Day.

Yoosung was beginning to regret that this was the day he would begin his part-time job.

“I don’t wanna do this, anymore,” Yoosung whimpered, giving Rika sad puppy eyes.

“Well, your mom will kill me if I let you quit now,” Rika said firmly, eyeing her cousin’s bangs, “You’re growing up and need to start earning your keep.”

“I thought doing well in school was ‘earning my keep’,” Yoosung whined, fresh tears appearing at the corners of his eyes.

“It was, until school got expensive,” Rika sighed, fumbling in her pockets for a moment.

With a happy smile, she pulled out two hairpins from her pocket. Cheerfully, she stuck them into Yoosung’s hair, effectively keeping his bangs out of his eyes.

“What’s that for?” Yoosung asked, frowning up at his forehead.

“We can’t let you shed your hair into the drinks,” Rika explained sunnily, “That would be gross.”

“There are little hearts on the pins!” he exclaimed irritably, not at all happy.

“It’s Valentine’s Day,” Rika shrugged.

“I’m a man,” Yoosung protested, balling his hands into fists, “Men do not wear heart hair pins to keep their bangs out of their eyes!”

Rika opened her mouth to argue, then stopped when the tinkling of a bell signalled that the cafe’s door was open. Turning to the entrance, she smiled when she saw who it was.

“V! You’re early!” she exclaimed, hurrying across the room to embrace her fiance.

“Happy Valentine’s Day!” V smiled, returning her hug with an affectionate peck on the cheek.

The two of them shared a cuddly moment, together. Yoosung could hear Seven pretending to gag, knowing that Saeran was pointedly ignoring the couple while he continued to work. V and Rika always had to be that gross PDA couple; this sort of behaviour was normal for them. But that wasn’t what had Yoosung annoyed, this time.

Even from across the room, he could see that V had heart hair pins holding some of his hair back.

“Oh, V, you look so festive with those pins!” Rika praised, touching them lightly.

They laughed together, then Rika gave Yoosung a pointed look.

“Look at my sexy man,” she purred, earning a warm smile from V.

“I hate you both a lot, right now,” the student said bluntly.

“His eyes look so dead,” Saeran muttered to his brother.

“I know,” V said lightly, responding to Yoosung. He knew Yoosung loved him, albeit deep, deep down.

With an air of finality, Rika hooked her arm with V’s and looked back at Yoosung.

“We’re going to head out. You’re going to be fine, Yoosung,” she said soothingly, all of her teasing gone. She liked to poke fun at her younger cousin, but she honestly wanted him to succeed, and she knew that being a barista in her shop was a good place to start. Even if he never got into business or food service, he would still gain things like social skills and personal confidence. She had high hopes for Yoosung.

“Don’t worry about him,” Seven said cheerfully, walking up to Yoosung and draping a friendly arm around his shoulders, “I’ll make sure he doesn’t take more than he can handle.”

“That worries me, a little,” V said softly, barely moving his lips so that only Rika could hear.

“Don’t go, noona,” Yoosung pouted.

“I’ll visit you at lunch,” she replied, letting V lead her towards the door, “Have fun! You’ll be fine!”

Longingly, Yoosung watched the couple leave the cafe; neither of them looked back. Yoosung guessed they already had all day planned out for the two of them. They had always been sweet to each other, but ever since they had gotten engaged, they had gotten worse.

“We’re gonna have fun, today, Yoosung!” Seven said optimistically, clapping his friend on the back, “C’mon! One of our regulars is gonna come right at opening time; we have to be ready for her.”

“Really?” Yoosung glanced at the clock. “...we open at 7am.”

The blond looked at his friend questioningly, then froze when something about the redhead’s appearance registered in his brain, “Um…”

“She likes to come to campus early so that she can get some last-minute reading done in the library,” Seven explained, leading his friend by the shoulders to the counter, “I bet she’ll order her usual!”

“Um...Seven? Did you always have your hair like that?”

Somewhere along the line, Seven had pulled his hair up into twin pigtails, held up in place with scrunchies that had been decorated in pink and red hearts. And the redhead managed to make it look good.

“Don’t I look fancy?” Seven chirped, framing his face with his hands to look as cute as possible, “Real men dress up for Valentine’s Day!”

“Am I the only one that didn’t plan for today?” Yoosung blurted out, frustrated, “...and is that why Saeran’s hair is white, today?” Saeran usually only dyes his hair white when he’s mad at Seven…

“...it was supposed to be pink,” Saeran sighed, touching his hair gently.

“It’s ok, little bro, it does look pink,” Seven said softly, patting his brother on the shoulder sympathetically, then turning and giving Yoosung a terse stage whisper, “Don’t point out his hair; he’s sensitive!”

“You know, I can hear you…”

Yoosung and Saeran shared a sigh. Seven was always well-behaved around Rika and V, but the second they left, he was back to his mischievous self.

Again, the storefront bell tinkled. With a start, Yoosung looked to the entrance eagerly; maybe Rika had come back for him. Instead, a girl about his age was there at the door, cautiously coming in. She was looking straight at him; with a gulp, he straightened his back. For some reason, instinctively, he did not want to disappoint her.

“Good morning…!” she said hesitantly, not recognizing the new barista at the register, “Um…”

The student cast her eyes across the counter, then relaxed when she saw that Seven and Saeran were also there.

“Hey!” she said warmly, smiling at the two of them, “Are you guys open, yet?”

“We can’t open without you,” Seven quipped smoothly, returning the smile as he hurried to join Yoosung’s side, “The usual?”

“Yes, please!” she answered, and, with a polite nod to Yoosung, she moved to the end where her drink would eventually be delivered. She leaned slightly onto the counter there, conspiratorially drawing close to Saeran. Yoosung could barely hear her whisper, “Did Seven do something bad, this morning?”

“It’s supposed to be pink...”

“Oh...”

“What’s her usual?” Yoosung asked Seven, already picking up a to-go cup.

“A mocha,” Seven answered, sagely nodding, “Her ‘hot chocolate with a kick,’ she calls it. Do you think you can handle it?”

Yoosung hesitated. This would be the first official drink that he would serve to a paying customer.

“...yes,” he finally answered, nodding firmly.

A mocha wasn’t hard...it was half hot chocolate and half coffee. It was a chocolate latte. He could handle this. This was not. Hard.

“If we observe the humble Yoosung in his natural habitat, watch how his hands shake as he prepares the espresso with extra vigor,” Seven said to the others in his best nature documentary voice.

Yoosung spared a moment to glare balefully at his friend before continuing with his work. She called it “hot chocolate with a kick” right? So...maybe he should put more hot chocolate, but with a stronger shot of espresso…

“Crikey, what a beaut’. Such adorable crinkles on his forehead. Really brings out the red in his hairpins.”

“First of all, your Australian accent needs work,” the girl said, chuckling lightly, “And second of all, be nicer to him! It’s his first day, right?”

“Thank you!” Yoosung said gratefully, giving her a relieved smile, “This is my first job and he’s being a jerk!”

“Brother’s always a jerk,” Saeran muttered, playing with one of the cardboard cozies.

“True...” Yoosung and the girl nodded at the same time.

Surprised at their synchronicity, the two of them looked at each other, again. The eye-contact they shared was...oddly poignant. Quickly, they both looked away. Saeran noticed the exchange; Seven, however, was too busy adjusting his hair.

“I think these scrunchies may have been a mistake,” Seven said, trying to tighten a pigtail.

“You were a mistake,” Saeran muttered.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“I have your mocha...” Yoosung picked up the drink, carefully walking it towards the end of the counter, “Right...he-”

“I can’t believe you would call me a mistake!” Seven declared dramatically, flinging his arms wide for emphasis.

In an attempt to walk around Seven before handing the girl her drink, Yoosung was in the perfect position for Seven to knock the cup out of his hand when he moved his arms. While nobody could do anything but watch, the cup was flung to the side, spinning rather majestically through the air, until it landed firmly against Saeran’s front. To everyone’s collective horror, the hot drink splashed up against his chest, then seeped slowly down his front, inescapably becoming one with the sturdy green fabric.

“GRAB A TOWEL!” Seven screeched, running into the back room, “A TOWEL!”

“OMG, Saeran, I am so sorry!” Yoosung cried, rushing to grab napkins from the counter.

“Saeran, are you okay!?” the girl exclaimed, handing Yoosung more towels, “Quick, take the apron off before you burn!”

“It’s okay…” Saeran said, too calmly, slowly taking off his uniform apron.

The article of clothing came off easily, revealing that Saeran had absolutely no brown liquid on his shirt front; the apron had suffered all the damage.

“Oh, you’re not hurt!” the girl was relieved.

“You’re okay!” Yoosung exclaimed, then quailed when he got a glimpse of Saeran’s expression, “U...um…”

“It’s not your fault…” Saeran said slowly, tilting his head to the side, “You didn’t flap your arms around a hot drink like a maniac...you’re okay...it’s okay...everything is o...kay…!”

The door to the back room started to swing open.

“I found some towels-” Seven started, sticking his head through the doorway.

Immediately, Yoosung slammed the door shut again, preventing Seven from coming back into the same room as his brother.

“His hair is white, Seven!” Yoosung yelled through the door, “His hair is white!”

A blood-curdling screech came through the door, and then all three of the remaining youths heard panicked footsteps running away. Momentarily, a back door slammed, and a car was heard starting and peeling away from the parking lot.

And then there was nothing but silence, and hot drink quietly drip-dripping onto the floor from the apron in Saeran’s arms. The girl stayed unmoving at the counter, her eyes trained on the two baristas. Saeran was completely still, staring at the ruined apron in his hands. And Yoosung was completely frozen, unable to look away at the silently enraged boy in front of him.

Neither the girl nor Yoosung had any idea what they should do. All they knew was that moving was not an option.

Tick…

Tick…!

Finally, Saeran shifted his weight. Smoothly, he leaned forward, and put a sticky, warm hand on Yoosung’s shoulder.

“You should make our beloved customer’s drink for her,” Saeran said silkily, an inscrutable smile on his face.

“But...but the mess-” Yoosung started.

“Just agree with him!” the girl hissed.

“Now, now...no reason to worry,” the white-haired boy shook his head unhurriedly, still smiling, “The apron is fine. It is only chocolate and coffee. And I shall wipe up the floors. I simply need a mop. From the back room. I am going to go to the back room...”

The hand on Yoosung’s shoulder suddenly turned into a vice; before he knew it, the blond was facing the other direction, holding a new cup and already part-way through pouring hot chocolate. Saeran, however, left the room, taking the dripping apron with him. Glancing at the floor, Yoosung saw a trail of brown droplets marking Saeran’s path along the floor.

He tried not to think of dead bodies.

He hoped Seven would be okay.

“...Ok...here’s your mocha,” Yoosung said, after a long, somewhat nervous silence, interrupted only by pouring sounds, “Oh! Do you like whipped cream?”

“I love whipped cream!” the girl answered, and all tension in the room was dispelled by her smile.

Heartened, Yoosung cheerfully swirled a generous amount of whipped cream onto the top of the cup, and placed it before his customer. She reached for it, but without thinking, he placed a hand on hers, stopping her.

There was something in that touch.

Reflexively, they both moved back. She cradled her hand against her chest for a moment, stunned. He felt his face flushing, but to cover it, he grabbed the thing that he had stopped her for: the chocolate syrup. With a bashful smile, he decorated the top of the whipped cream with a chocolate heart.

“There. For you,” he said, motioning to the cup with his free hand.

“Thank you!” she laughed lightly, and hurried to take a sip of the drink, “...oh! It’s really, really good! This is the best mocha I’ve ever had!”

“Really?” Yoosung leaned against the counter eagerly, “You mean it? You’re not just saying that?”

“I love it! It’s delicious!” she nodded, her smile brightening, “Thank you...oh...are you okay?”

She put the drink down and put her hands out towards Yoosung, not really sure what she should do with them.

Because suddenly, Yoosung was crying.

“You really like it?” he asked again, tears overflowing from his eyes.

“Yes! It’s really good! Why are you crying?!” she exclaimed, wondering if maybe she should hand him some napkins. Or one of the towels Seven had found.

“That was my first drink, ever!” Yoosung sobbed, vainly wiping away his tears with his hands, “And you liked it!”

“Yes, I love it!” the girl said, laughing a little incredulously before making herself stop, “You don’t have to cry! It’s good! ...Really! I love it!”

“Today is my first day, and I spilled a drink, and my coworkers both left me alone…!” Yoosung hiccuped, trying to get control of his tears, “And Rika’s marrying such a dweeeeeb…!”

“Aw...Ok, breathe! Just breathe!” the girl handed him some napkins, comfortingly patting his shoulder, “There, there...cheer up, Yoosung! Look on the bright side: You are never going to forget today!”

“Th-that’s a good way to look at it,” Yoosung sniffled, finally getting a hold of his emotions, “Oh...I’m so sorry...You must think I’m such a loser…”

“No, no...I think you’ve had a really trying first day on the job. But you’re not a loser!” the girl smiled sunnily, “Please, cheer up! You’re doing really well! Yaaay, Yoosung!”

Yoosung laughed shakily, at that.

“Are you my cheerleader, now?” he sniffed, looking bashfully at the girl.

“Sure! Look at Superman Yoosung, choosing Valentine’s Day as his first day on the job,” the girl grinned, “He’s so cute, and so tough! He saw a challenge, and he took it!”

“Aw…” Yoosung humbly waved the compliments off, “...Although, I am a bit cute!”

“Yeah, you are!”

There was a short, strained pause, then the two of them burst out laughing. They were both being ridiculous. So ridiculous. And she was being so sweet. And he was being so cute. So sweet, and so cute...

Finally, the air in the cafe seemed to relax. Yoosung knew that he was being ridiculous. The rest of day would go a lot smoother; he knew it.

“...So...you come here a lot?” he asked shyly.

“Every morning,” she nodded, blushing lightly, “Um...you’re going to work here, now?”

“Yup!” he replied, “Every...uh...every morning!”

Both of their faces reddened. They would be seeing a lot more of each other, they knew.

And both of them were 110% okay with that.

And that’s how Yoosung met his MC.

-fin-

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Also, a bonus image:

Check @digitalscratch-arting out!

#Mystic Messenger #Mystic Messenger Fanfic #Yoosung Kim #Yoosung x MC #MysMe Fanfic #Mystic Messenger fanfiction

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nycrunning · 6 years ago

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well, August is always a good month because of SUMMER STREETS, literally, I should be hired by the Summer Streets People because I feel like a community evangelizer. That is all I talk about to anyone all year long. You know it. Anyway, to recap: I like Summer Streets. A bit. If you just met me or this is the first time you read this blog, Summer Streets happens 3 weekends in August, on Saturdays: they close traffic on Park Avenue in the Upper East Side all the way to the Brooklyn Bridge, for 5 hours. It’s MAGIC.

If you missed it, shame on you (and, how are we friends???). If you never heard of it, pen it in for next year and don’t make vacation plans or don’t say yes to weddings. If you don’t live in NYC, get tickets now.

So, Summer Streets was awesome, even though it RAINED ALL THREE SATURDAYS as you can see in the pictures (ugh) and we have to chop one run short because there was lightning, thunderstorm and flash flooding (but mostly because with all that water I couldn’t keep my contacts inside my eyes…!). It was still awesome.

The day after the first Summer Streets, July something, a Sunday, I run the NYRR Manhattan Mile, a new race and a distance I’ve never run. So, automatic PR you say? Meh I don’t count those, but I WILL COUNT THE NEXT TIME I RUN THIS DISTANCE because I run it as slow AF. So, here we go: I have a bum knee. It’s not chondromalacia patellae, it’s not ITBS, I’ve ruled out a lot of things but it’s just weird because it hurts VERY randomly. AND, if I take time off, it hurts more. Go figure that one out. Good luck. Anyway, that day my knee was hurting so I struggled to finish. It was also like one hundred million degrees celsius/fahrenheit.

Luckily I had Jackie, Michael and Brian to not only keep me company but throw power boosts at me during the last mile where they all decided to pick it up and I was just not into it. Aw, friends that throw stuff at you while you want to curl and cry are the BEST! ❤ I guess.

HA.

The next weekend was another combo of Summer Streets and a race. This time I attempted to do two races on Sunday and it didn’t work out AT ALL. I wanted to do the France Run, a 5 miler in Central Park at 8, and then scoot out to Williamsburg (in Brooklyn, for all my international readers! This Wsburg is in BK, not Colonial Pennsylvania, as I had to be told a few times in my first years in NYC coming from Philly!!!) (where was I?) then scoot out to Williamsburg to race the Brooklyn Mile. My heat was at 9:30 am. Possible?? Not really. What was I thinking? Not only David and I run France Run as slow as we possibly could without bursting into a walk spider-crawl, BUT we then proceeded to be extra stooopid fun after we finished and pretend talk in French and rename everything. We then also decided, while it rained, to taste and eat all the French things they had… chocolate, financiers, it was good… oooops, it’s 9:30! CRAP. And the truth is, I wasn’t in any shape to race a mile. My knee agreed (probably).

The last weekend of August (am I missing one???) it was a doubleheader. I did the Percy Sutton 5K in Harlem on Saturday and the Henry Isola 4 Mile XC in Van Cortlandt, Bronx, on Sunday. Who knew I could handle it? The knee was stoopid all week so I run to the 5K with Kettia and David SUPER slow, like 11 pace and was thinking to maybe cheer. I felt 100% pain-free so I decided to race. It was slow (23:06 It think, 7:24 pace) well, yes, I haven’t done anything hard in 2 months so I couldn’t expect much more but I felt good and that is all I cared about. Plus it was fun. We met lots of people, Frankie run me in, we had an hour-long stop on the run back… it was all shit and giggles, the way a race morning should be (to me, don’t judge!).

We run back. I ended up with like 10 miles… then… the next day, cause I felt ok… (who feels ok the day after a 5k?) I decided to run to the Bronx to run the Henry Isola 4 miler. It’s in the trails and it’s cross country. Ummmmmmm I was an XC virgin and had NO IDEA what I was doing. I didn’t even know why my age and gender was on my bib! Or how we all run on the grass and not the path…? it was all so weird. So, I’ve done trail races, like ultras, or like Bear Mountain 50K, or stuff like that. But this was SOOO DIFFERENT. Fast but also trails, crazy. Anyway, I run to the Bronx, got there at 8 am, race was starting at 9 and it was SO BURNING HOT already… I started feeling all the heatnessticity before we even started. It’s a smaller race than the typical NYRR race, like a LOT smaller. 40% of it were we out of the trails and in THE SUN. The last loop was hard and I won’t admit this to myself but there’s a chance I didn’t negative split this race. It was still great though (if can call walking up Cemetery Hill twice because your legs can’t run up, then yes it was great).

I think you can tell how HOT it was. Maybe by the sun situation, or my sweat situation, or maybe becase my hair is fried. I didn’t run back home. At all. I tried. But no.

DATA DOWNLOAD

Total Miles: 157, biggest mileage month so far this year. Just checked and my biggest month was 187 miles in October 2016.

Races: Four. Two were miserable/slow. One was ok, one was awesome.

Ups: UM, HELLO, SUMMER STREETS. Did you forget already??? Also, that’s the most miles I run in a month this year. Catching up.

Downs: THIS STOOOOPID KNEE. Sorry, sorry, I still need love you knee, please don’t hurt me, anymore, prettyplease?

Balance: I wanna feel un-pain again and run hard, and do speedwork and I hate this crap.

July

I barely remember July already and it was just now. My parents were still visiting so we kept touristing around and we had an amazing Fourth of July with all the official NYC fireworks on the East River. Epic. I did two races, with meh performances. The first one was the NYRR

hair working hard for the picture, post-Retro 4 Miler

Retro 4 Miler, and I was really lame to not dress up, or back? I seriously will wear any costume but just like happens every single Thanksgiving Halloween, I don’t care enough to remember more than 1 minute ahead of time. Every year I tell myself I am totally going to dress up next year and then I forget. Then every year, when the costumey event happens, I tell myself I am gonna set a reminder in the calendar for a month BEFORE Halloween/race/etc so I can plan ahead… but I am a snooze-hitter with things I don’t really want to bother with (NOT the alarm, you KNOW I wake up before the alarm even goes off!), and I use my go-to motto: if I didn’t bother doing it so far, no chance in hell this is gonna get done ever. Just like with the emails at the bottom of my inbox. If it’s been 2-3 days, there’s a high chance they won’t get opened/read/replied to… AAAANYWAY, I didn’t wear a costume for the Retro Run because I am lame. But people do, and it’s SUPER fun and I really really really always wish I did. mooooving on. Ah, so, the race. Wasn’t feeling it. I met with Courtney to do about 4 or 5 miles before and I kept wanting to go home. I was THIS close. Does that ever happen to you?

Then, I also did the NYRR R U N 5K in Central Park last week. Also wasn’t fast or anything special. It was a bit like hell hot so I decided to hold it in a bit. I managed to not kill myself. It was meh, but I love that course, it’s pretty fast with just one hill. Saw like a million people I knew, which was fun as always to catch up and chit chat and all those things with lots of chs in them. cha cha cha.

If anything else exciting, fun, amazing happened, I either don’t remember or it’s totally private or NSFW! HAAA, got you thinking!!!

DATA DOWNLOAD

exciting huh? I am behind on my mileage… been behind since,… January??? I am lazy or having too much fun, you decide.

Total Miles: 152, not bad, not bad… not amazing but the most this year. July is a good month to run!

Races: 2. LAME!!!! Last month I had 6… so… AH THAT’S WHY MY MILEAGE IS UP!!!

Ups: I heart running in the summer. LOVE IT. JULY NEEDS TO BE 325 DAYS PLEASE.

Downs: omg my hair in the weather. HELP. Send the firemen or the paramedics or Paolo Puttanesca asap.

Balance: I have no idea. ALL I CARE ABOUT RIGHT NOW IS SUMMER STREETS. SUMMER STREETS STARTS IN TWO DAYS. SUMMER STREETS IS THE BEST. SUMMER STREETS HERE I COME. SUMMER STREETS IS THE BEST. DID I TELL YOU I LOVE SUMMER STREETS?

can you tell I am melting?

June

was a great month. Let me break it down before I forget it all (photos and a super organized calendar really do help!). I often wondered if I should do these weekly… there is so much to say but then I forget. Anyway, JUNE was BUSY, My parents came to visit from Argentina, which is awesome, they come every other year, for about a month and it was amazing. We did everything, we went everywhere, I got myself them so tired every single day…. it was awesome and rough at the same time. We literally did it all in a month. We even went to Miami for a few days of untamable hair and sticky skin. I forgot how insanely hot Miami is in the summer. #protip, don’t effing go to Miami in the summer, ever. or really, at any other time but definitely NO in the summer.

Anyway, the month started with the Italy Run NYC, a 5-mile race in Central Park, sponsored by Ferrero where I proceeded to smear Nutella all over me post-race, best celebration possible, correct? Before you ask, there are no pictures of that because it’s a LIE. Race was good; my performance… meh (actually, I don’t remember anymore!).

Literally 3 days later, I did another race, the Summer Series 5K in Prospect Park. It’s on Wednesdays at 7 pm, which REALLY messes up my sleep AND my Thursday morning run with my Flyers friends, BUT…I kinda love showing up because:

I see lots of friends I don’t see every day in Central Park

I cherish (and also hate) racing in a different course than the ones I did one million times in CP (though it’s also harder)

Love the small race ambiance

Also, don’t remember much I think (given there is a picture of my holding a medal, duh) that I placed and I got a medal. Oh, and I totally remember I got something like 71% AG. YEAH, nbd.

And… 3 days right after this one, I had the 3rd race in 6 days… can you imagine how that one is gonna go???? So, Saturday morning was a Mini10K, which is a mega party, so I wasn’t going to miss it. BUT, I also wasn’t going to miss the other mega party Friday night… So come Saturday morning I was a MESS… my feet hurt (from the heels or dancing, who knows!) and I was sleeeeeeepy, SO SLEEEEEPY. I have no idea why, NOT ONLY I SHOWED UP TO THE RACE, BUT I also met Elizabeth (she is real, I promise) to do 4 miles before the race. MENTAL.

But, it was all worth it. I run it, EASY, with 3 friends, and it was a frigging BLAST. I regret nothing. #noregerts.

Told you it was FUN! Yeah, I was physically miserable but no one remembers that… smh. So then my parents arrived and we started the daily tour of all the food and all the things we don’t tell the tourists about. AND the World Cup. June was literally mental. Somehow I managed to get to Queens the next weekend, early, to run the Queens 10K. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to make the trek because Argentina was playing at 9 am against Iceland and I’d miss the first half, but so happy I went… Not only I had tons of fun at the race, I SOMEHOW (…miraculously) managed to do OK. Noooo, not a PR or even close but I got up to 69% AG, I was just one minute off from my PR, which is from frigggggging 2013! Does that even count anymore? I say NO.

I am a sucker for high-fives!

Then, wait for this because the madness doesn’t stop there…. I did TWO races the next weekend!!!! YEAH, again, NBD! Crazy, right? I agree. It’s good that I am a biomechanics coach and I know what I am doing because otherwise my leggies would have fallen off by then… Saturday was the Pride Run and OMG I WAS NOT GONNA MISS THAT. I always race the Achilles Hope and Possibility race (which was going to the next day), so I decided to take the Pride Run easy and save my legs for Sunday. Only… I didn’t quite do that. I ended up with a lot of fun AND 12 miles… oooops. #mischiefmanaged (for you all PotterHeads!)

Jackie, Mary, Michael and I run the whole thing chatting from start to end. And the outfits were ON POINT.

Sunday I woke up to do a few miles before the Achilles Hope and Possibility race and I was wishing I had raced the day before… It was muggy, humid, gross and I was tired. You do what you can.

David and Patricia (and corrals B,C,D,E and F) smoked me but I was happy. My parents had come to spectate and it was AWESOME. They came both days. They LOVED IT. Those two races and really something. REALLY REALLY something.

The next weekend was a wash because I was out of town, and back just on July 1st to watch the husband race the NYC TRI, with the parents and my cheering crew along. TRIATHLETES ARE CRAZY, just saying. But he’s so cute, it evens out.

DATA DOWNLOAD

Total Miles: 139, eeeeeek. too much racing makes the mileage go puff!

Races: SIX. 6 races in month. That’s probably maybe a PR, at least this year… ha, I have 12 races this year, 6 in ONE MONTH.

Ups: All the fun things I did with the parents…!!! The Nutella at the Italy Run was HEAVEN. The Mini10K was SO FUN. Queens was a MEGA REVELATION. Pride and Achilles get me teary every time…

Downs: Mileage was yuk and I am behind my yearly goal. Tapering before races and how sore I am sometimes after…

Balance: ALL AWESOME!!!! I can’t believe I did all those races with all the other stuff I had going on…!

May

May was a whirlwind!! So much happened, and so many races also! I remember I started the month with something we had planned since September last year: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child!

Call me a Potterhead, That was awesome! Twelve hours later, I was up early for the Newport 10K, just over the Hudson, one of my favourite 10Ks, because 1, it’s flat, 2, the finish line bagels (and I don’t really like bagels!). The race was a blast as usual: I’ve run it a few times and it always delivers! It’s usually hot but I love the vibe and the views!

Of course, as usual, there were many runs and stairs workouts sprinkled through the month:

And then there was the Japan Run. I remembered being tired from something but then, at the start, I met with Brian and Nick and Jackie, and we all decided to run together and pace Jackie. Those are my favorite types of races!

Way too much fun was had!! The next weekend, just so I wouldn’t fall off the wagon, I run the NYPD Memorial Run 5K. It was HOT and humid but I rallied and for the first time in months, I did OK. I measure my race performances by AG and I feel I do ok when I get close or over the 70% AG mark. Lately, I had been around 64% to 69%, and in this race I went back up to 70% wohoooo. Also, it was super fun to run on the West Side Highway. I really like how wide it is there.

Then, three days later, after a brutal stairs workout and speedwork, we raced the Prospect Park Summer Series 5K: no biggie. The course was slower (as there is a hill in Prospect Park) but I managed very similar results! Just like 10 or 20 seconds off. I find it so weird to race at night (well, 7 pm), that I find it quite amusing to try to figure out what to eat, how much, when, etc. Of course, then I slept like crap after because I was so wired!

That was a lot of racing…!

DATA DOWNLOAD:

Total Miles: 147, coming back up, but it’s hard with those short races because I feel like I need a good taper before and then my legs are thrashed for a few days…

Races: FOUR, here we go. Racing season is upon us!

Ups: the NYPD and the Summer Series 5K were definitely a surprise! I wasn’t expecting to do so well (NOT IN PR SHAPE YET THOUGH, ok?) and even though I don’t feel as strong as I used to, feeling in control of the situation really helps! One more thing: Central Park blossoming is the BEST!

Downs: how tired my legs feel two days after any short race! YUK

Balance: VERY HAPPY

So, I need to race more. Even if I am not in fighting shape or without any kind of expectations, I really enjoy it. The fewer expectations I have, the more fun I have, and so I go out there controlled and just let the race happen. I’ve actually started measuring races and performance by the amount of time it takes me to get back home, aka “how much fun I have”. For example, the NYPD Memorial Run was at 9 am and I got home at 4 pm: THAT is a successful race in my eyes now. The truth is I am not always (or ever again!) be as fast as I used to be or as I would like to be or as I would expect to be, so what should I do? Stay home until I feel I am in shape? HECK NO. To me, races are not a test of my fitness or “what I get from the work I put in” but a chance to enjoy with the community of friends who like to get out and enjoy the park with one foot in front of another trying to stay healthy. Yes, I’ll push hard here and there, but if one day I don’t feel like it or I decide to stick with a friend, it’ll be no different: it just HAS to be fun.

April

We started the month in Argentina, which was great because it was WARM and hey, it was vacations. Got to see the fam and a few touristy things of course, and yeah, a few runs with Juan. Oh and of course I ate my face away. Lots of asado and steaks but also a lot of nikkei, my favourite non-native cuisine while in Argentina (my favourite non-native in the US is Japanese and French, you always gotta know where to get what!). I got back, I did a 4 miler in Central Park, the Run as One… it was so long ago, I can barely remember, or maybe it’s because I’ve been racing a lot the last two months! Oh yeah, I remember I got really hot (I was overdressed) and started way too fast or something, here is one picture!

I obviously spent some time running around, exhibit A:

or working:

or with Juan, usually eating crap:

and/or usually with friends, running or not!!!

DATA DOWNLOAD:

Total Miles: 119. Ooops. That’s low. I really vacationed in Argentina… IT HAPPENS, OKAY?

Races: just one but it was more like a tempo, wasn’t expecting to go all out.

Ups: the fun runs!

Downs: didn’t get a lot done!

Balance: it was good -> lots of blossoming happening all over NYC made it amazingly beautiful!

March

March is always a good month because it is my birthday!!! HA. I started the month with a race, the NYRR Washington Heights Salsa, Blues and Shamrocks 5K (there is a post there), which wasn’t great time wise but it was fun. See proof here:

There was a lot of running, maybe not tons of miles, because it was still cold as hell Alaska? ok Alaska, but it got done.

And the United NYC Half happened. I saw so many of you there. That was an intense week and I was REALLY just a bit jealous of everyone running the new course. I got to run parts of it last year and was on one of the Pro lead trucks on race day and it looked amazing!! and everyone looked SO happy at the finish line… Really jelly So happy for you all!!!

We then went to San Antonio for a few quiet days of pulled pork and warmer weather. For my bday. We ate a LOT. We run a bunch too:

DATA DOWNLOAD:

Total Miles: 151, it’s starting to pick up

Races: one. and I was so not wanting to race!

Ups: I did a lot of really great runs

Downs: still not feeling my best.

Balance: not letting it get to me. Let’s hope the nicer weather brings better running!

Also, one more thing I forgot to report on this whole year. A few friends and I have been doing monthly challenges. January was squats, February was pushups, March was planks. We usually just grab one from popsugar.com. Basically it tells you how many to do every day and each day is a bit more. It’s interesting. Maybe you’d want to try it with a few friends? we all text each other to make sure we’re all doing them EVERY DAY… Protip: it works better with a reward at the end of the month!!!!!!!!!!

February

was weird. I happened so quick I barely noticed. Instead of ice-fest, we had a few meltdowns (all kinds of meltdowns!) and even one day in the 70s… OH OH what are people going to use now to discredit “””global warming“””? I feel so bad for those polar bears, and hey, we won’t be moving to Venice anytime soon. Glad I live in a 2nd floor too, but I digress… Anyway, my body decided also to have a meltdown and I had a couple of stooopid issues (my hormones have decided they need more attention than any Kardashian!) and even some very very easy runs where my heart rate was about 50 over the usual… anyway, I was signed up for the NYRR Al Gordon Brooklyn 4M, and I was literally too tired to get up. Of course, I ended up running 11 miles in Central Park instead but my pace was 10:00 and my heart rate was at 82%. Insane. You just can’t win them all, can you? About two weeks ago, I spent the husband and I spent two hours shopping for half marathons for me… I came up with not a lot. If you have any ideas, let me know. Also, my running is so up and down I’ve started questioning if I should try to take some weeks/months off so my body doesn’t feel pressured and maybe that would help?

ha, I was just kidding! I’d be super hyper and way too annoying after just two days and waaaaay unhappy. So, let me just slow down, do it when my body is ok with it, and just enjoy it with no pressure. Deal?

So, I had a few awesome runs, still.

Plus it was Valentine’s Day and who thinks we’d let any reason to celebrate pass by? any excuse works!

Also, I got to spend some quality time at work (at NYRR) with some people you might know… Meb and Jenny. Do you even need last names? Don’t think so! Meb is now a Team for Kids Ambassador and Jenny is a Rising NYRR Ambassador and both were in town to run the Virtual For the Kids 5K race. If you haven’t check NYRR’s Virtual Races, you should.

Anyway, it all went waaay too fast!

DATA DOWNLOAD

Total Miles: 124, emmm, got lazy a bit!

Races: big old zero for the year

Ups: weather got surprisingly “hot”. 40s and some 50s even.

Downs: not feeling my best.

Balance: i am getting a bit frustrated. cause, wtf.

January

was really cold. The first two weeks we set cold weather records. It was awful. Running was awful. I started the year working at the midnight run and it was really really cold. I wore everything and it was still crazy cold. But it’s a super fun race!

It was so cold that the races on the second weekend of January got canceled. I managed to run both Saturday and Sunday but it was insanely cold. Everyone kept asking me what I was training for, as most people assumed I had to get the miles in for some marathon or something. I am not really training for anything, just trying to not let the winter win. I can’t say I loved it, but I got out there.

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As you can see there was a couple of blizzards in there, snow, ice, and all the layers. Luckily we had planned a trip to Mexico for mid-January to escape the cold. The vacation part was uneventful but we had a few epic runs with Juan (the husband!).

First night in the hotel, a guy who worked there came up to talk to Juan as he was wearing his 2017 TCS New York City Marathon shirt, to ask him if he had run the marathon. Turned out that Armando, our new friend at the hotel, was a runner too and invited us to his team’s workout the next morning. So, at 6:30 am we went out to meet up the Red Runners, who were having a special run as one of their teammates had passed that week. There was a half an hour of a warm-up, everyone in a circle, probably around 130 people, and the coach had a microphone and big speakers. Before we headed out, we all got one white rose to carry for the memorial. We all run together to a gorgeous lighthouse I never would have seen, we got there with the sunrise, there were speeches, even a triathlete pastor, there were prayers, and we run back with the boombox in tow. Everyone was together. It was very moving. And everyone was so welcome to this stranger. It was very special.

When I travel, to me, the best thing EVER is to hang with the locals. Nothing could have beat that run.

Juan and I did have a few osom runs. The day after the run with Red Runners, there was a race in town, which we didn’t sign up for because registration was miles and miles away but we run to the start and finish to cheer/spectate. Funnest part: Kukulcan road (the main drag) had no traffic for the race. Quite FUN!

The next few days we did great. We did a tempo together and we run back to the lighthouse so Juan could see it. We managed to get the sunrise too.

And like that, we were back and the month was over!

DATA DOWNLOAD!

Total Miles: 140

Races: not even one. But we spectated at one..!

Ups: the runs in Mexico!

Downs: running in the sub 10 temperatures (which is like minus 20 in Celsius). NOT FUN. WITH WIND!

Balance: can it be June now? I really miss racing a LOT.

August 2018 – the month that was well, August is always a good month because of SUMMER STREETS, literally, I should be hired by the Summer Streets People because I feel like a community evangelizer.

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fixomnia-scribble · 7 years ago

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Tagged again!

Because why not. I’m still waking up over a latte. Tagged by the lovely @bitter-stella. And tagging in turn @lissa612, @fearthefuzzy, @lizwontcry, @cincoflex @raevingcaskettiva, because they might just play along.

11 Questions. Answer the ones you get, and make up your own to pass along

Is there a particular country you know a lot about despite never having visited?

Well, India, but that’s a gimme. One day I’ll go on the epic meet-the-family trip.

What elements (to you) make for a fantastic or compelling story. Is it about the character interactions? The action or adventure? The over-arching plot line? What makes or breaks a story for you?

Believeabiity - in dialogue and action AND in narrative. I want to be able to hear the voices as I read, and be able to close my eyes and see the scene, even if it’s only hinted at in brief passages. That’s not to say that it has to fit into MY world. Not at all. Just make me believe it.

If you had to go back and re-do your degree, what would you choose instead? If you haven’t completed your degree, what are some areas you have considered pursuing?

Doing it now. I’d probably have switched to straight Crim long ago, and not taken Anth/Arch first, but the benefits are a) having two BA’s, and b) erasing the gutterball GPA of my first attempt at uni in 1993. Protip: if it is not the right time to attempt uni, or if you realize you’re not doing what you are called to do - save your time and money. It’s not going to run away.

What is your ideal breakfast and who would you share it with?

Oh! Either kedgeree (requires friends or family with a very specific palate) or good old Eggs Benny (just about anyone.)

Has there ever been a scene in a movie or television show that has stood out for you? (As in, it really made an impact for you.)

SO MANY that I cannot count. But this clip from Carl Sagan’s “Cosmos”, that I watched during its first broadcast on PBS as a small child, still sends creeping chills up my spine, as it did then. There was an electric moment when he spelled out “PTOLOMEOS” carved above the ruins of the Library of Alexandria, and I knew...I knew tragedy of the loss of that library, and felt the weight of the ages that it took to gather all that knowledge of the world, seas, skies and humanity in one place. Yes, I was a nerdling.

When do you feel happiest?

When I am so in flow with writing a scene that I am simply watching it develop on the screen with breath held.

What are your main hobbies, and how did you initially come across them?

Writing, because I couldn’t find any of the things I wanted to read. Crafts, because my mum is an artist and crafter.

What was your first fandom? First OTP?

Oh, X-Files, hands down. MSR 4EVR.

Name a character that everyone seems to love but you cannot stand. Explain what it is you dislike about this character.

I can’t think of any specifics that stand out, but I find myself looking on in horror as fans embrace utterly reprehensible, supposedly irredeemably awful characters because they find them “sassy” or “too bad’. I don’t mean badass. I love badass. I don’t love vindictive, self-serving, cruel and willingly ignorant.

Explain a situation when you knew you were in the wrong, and yet you refused to back down. Do you regret your actions?

Hmm. If I know I’m in the wrong, I can’t imagine not backing down if confronted. If I’m wrong, I’m wrong. I don’t recall any time in which I knew I was wrong but held the line. Unless it was maybe insisting that I hadn’t done something stupid that I actually had, as a kid...

Have you ever sent someone nasty hate mail? If so, why? What spurred you to do this? If not, have you ever been tempted to?

Oy. No. In fact I once mistakenly replied to an e-mail with a slightly raised-eyebrow response, intending it for someone else, and I was crying for days. I’ve been on the end of nasty notes written about me and would never, ever want anyone to feel like I did.

Well! On a nicer note, this has cleared my head for homework now. So here are my 11 questions for anyone else who wants to play along:

If you could get on a plane and go anywhere for an all-expenses paid two-week trip, where would you go and what would you do?

Summer or winter?

What is your earliest memory involving pizza?

What’s one thing on your “I’m never going to do THAT when I’m a grownup!” list that you have either stuck to, or believe you will?

Knitting or crochet?

Umbrella, hat, hood or nah? (Vancouver represent!)

Reading: sitting, lying on back, lying on side, on tummy, or what?

What’s one attribute of your mental or physical self that you’d like to be able to alter at whim?

Which continent are you writing from?

What are your favourite writing clothes?

What’s something you’re excited about today?

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str-spangled-banner · 8 years ago

Text

Born Under a Bad Sign - Bucky x Reader

TAKING REQUESTS

Summary: Inspired by the song Born Under a Bad Sign by Albert King

Warnings: Sexual hints. Alcohol consumption.

Words: 1 135

A/N: I don’t know what this is but I guess it’s possible to continue this story if anyone’s interested.

Also, I found this GIF after writing and it fit in too well not to use it.

PROTIP: Listen to the song whilst reading to get the mood I was trying to go for.

He tilted the glass back and forth, pondering its fullness in his swimming head, his body slowly submitting to the seven glasses of whiskey he had consumed during the night. The patrons around him all had a marry time whilst he sat in the solitude of his own company. He just wanted to get out of the Stark Tower and wanted a drink, so he had headed to the nearest bar that wasn’t too modern for his taste and sat down by the counter.

The door opened up and suddenly the cheering of the guests seemed to cease. Bucky, becoming curious, turned towards the entrance and took a deep breath as his eyes landed on the sexiest woman he had ever seen in his life. To say she was beautiful was a too sweet description. That woman reeked trouble from across the room.

She saw Bucky in an instant and a sly smirk spread across her plum lips, her shadowed eyes squinting as they observed him thoroughly. Slowly, she began to make her way towards the counter. Her hips swayed from side to side and her hair flowed down her back. She knew exactly what she was doing. The men of the bar howled and stared, but she had no plan to as much as look their way. She had her eyes on the prize, and Bucky was looking back at her.

“What he’s having, but make it a double.” She told the bartender she had also managed to stun with her looks. She took the seat beside Bucky’s and held her hand out as the bartender returned with her drink. She gulped the entire thing down in one go and Bucky swallowed dryly. She was unfazed by the burning liquor from the amount of times she had endured it. It was a familiar feeling she had came to love, and when she placed her empty glass down, she ordered another.

“I’m Bucky.” He made the first move although the look she had given him on the way in had been ten moves on its own.

“Y/N.” She replied cooly, glancing down to Bucky’s chest which obliviously moved drastically by his harsh breathing caused by her mere presence. He did the same to her but only as her cleavage was on an eye-pulling display with her thin and loose tank top hiding under her leather jacket. “Eyes up here, big guy.”

He felt his cheeks flush red as she had caught him, but she smirked boldly and proudly. “Sorry.”

She chuckled, causing his cheeks to turn even more pigmented. “Oh you’re too sweet, so innocent yet I can see the darkness in those magical eyes of yours, and that’s not innocence I see.”

“What is it then?” He questioned her, wanting her to figure it out.

She studied him with narrowed eyes, looking him up from head to toe. She recognized the darkness in him from herself, and she knew exactly what kind of life she had lived. She could only imagine what his had looked like.

“You lost someone, or something. Your entire life was changed after that and you’re no longer who you used to be.”

He found her reading of him eerily true, causing his eyebrows to furrow suspiciously. “How’d you know all that?”

She chuckled again. “I don’t know anything. For all I know you could have lost a t-shirt and you haven’t been the same since cause you’d never be seen wearing that shirt… They’re generic statements for people to relate to.”

“So you’re scam?”

“Daughter of a woman claiming to speak with ghosts… Taught me all I know about making people believe what you say. You know, things like I see someone kind and sweet… People will start yelling out thousands of names.”

“Sounds like a foul play, making profit of other people’s pain.”

“Well, my mother is dead and I let her foul play rot with her in her grave, so no profit here.”

He was taken back by her boldness. “Sounds like you didn’t like your mother very much?”

She huffed, smiling. “Not by a long shot. She left my father, devoted her entire life to her work and thought I’d still love her after all she had done, but enough about dead mothers… It’s not really a great subject for when you’re trying to get laid.”

The woman really had no boundaries. Never had he met someone with such confidence. It was admirable at the same time as he felt it was more of a façade than a personality trait.

“I don’t sleep with a girl I’ve just met.” He made clear, watching her eyes and trying to detect the darkness he could see in his. He couldn’t. She was as cold and hard as a statue, her surface as good as impenetrable by the looks of it.

“Look at you, going all nice-guy on me… What a gentleman.” She took a sip of her whiskey, the cube of ice leaning against her upper lip.

“I’m not joking. I’ve gotta get to know the gal before I do anything. It’s a rule I have.” He said honestly, watching her reaction, hoping she wouldn’t leave.

“Too bad. I was really in the mood.” She sighed, tempting his persistence. “I’d say rules are made for breaking, but you don’t seem like the type to fall for that.”

“Not even close.”

“Well, forgive a gal for trying.” She quoted his nickname. She tilted the glass back and forth against the counter in silence before taking another sip. Her lips curled around the rim of the low glass and her tongue darted out, causing Bucky’s heart to speed up for a moment. God was she attractive in every way. He wanted to throw her on the bar counter and make her forget her own name, but he had certain morals which he remained more true to than others. Not sleeping with a girl as soon as he met her was one of them.

“So?” She seemed to be asking, looking back to Bucky again. “Let’s get to know one another.”

It was an invitation he’d happily accept. A smile crept up on his face as he too took a sip of his whiskey. “Alright. What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?”

“Looking for work.” She answered, telling the truth.

“Can’t be honest work if you’re at this place, not anything you deserve at least.”

She pulled her head back, raising a brow. “What is it I deserve then?”

“Something honest at least… You seem like a good girl-”

She laughed to his surprise, rendering him speechless. “Good is the last thing I am, sweetheart. I’ve been cursed to raise hell wherever I go. Born under a bad sign, I guess.”

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fapangel · 7 years ago

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199 chars, I got cites. I'll stick to actions and militia/cult behavior. The sniper attack on power station citation is you missing my point. Antifa has no weapon stockpiles or military training. The groups law enforcement see as a threat are the militias: "Law Enforcement Assessment of the Violent Extremist Threat". PBS: "armed militia groups surging across nation" Cult stuff: Business Insider:"right-wing-militias-recruit-young-soldiers-on-4chan-2017-5" psychologytoday:"the mind the militias".

Firstoff, pastebin.com is definitely the go-to for things like this -there’s no way anyone can make a cohesive argument in that tiny askbox. Just say “pastebin: and it’ll get you past that “no URLs”filter tumblr imposes. But I can answer these points/sources here:

Have you heard of the John Brown club? They’rean antifa group - the usual insane anarchists - and they’re showingup at protests carrying loaded weapons. The Phoenix group inthat article made a video of themselves doingrange practice. I believe that qualifies as training, youknow, with those weapons you say they don’t have.What fucking training do you think the right-wingmilitias have besides target shooting and playing paintball in thewoods? In other words, exactly what these people are doing?

And what the fuck do you mean stockpiles? Bro,I don’t know if you’re aware, but we live in America - you know,that free country? If you want a gun, are over 21,and don’t have a felony conviction on your record, you can walkinto any store, do 5 minutes of paperwork, wait for them to call theFBI background-check database and walk out with a new long gun. It’sthat fuckin simple. And they’re not that expensive either, you canget a decentAR-15 pattern rifle for under $500, easily. Same for ammo -you can easily buy bulk, online. The only state where both of thoseare harder is California, and I imagine that suits the huge mobs ofclub-armed antifa cunts just fine, because semi-auto firearms with large reloadable magazines are the best way to counter thugs that badly outnumber you. Stockpiles? That crazy fuck that shot the hell out of a US Representative and two Capitol police officers was using an SKS, a fucking WWII era Soviet rifle that loads from the top with fucking stripper clips. And look how much damage he did - it’s only pure dumb luck that nobody was killed or mortally wounded.

... stockpiles? Just how much do you know about guns? Here’s what I found in literally five goddamned seconds on ammoseek.com - you got $290, a credit card, and a shipping address? There you go, a thousand goddamned rounds of .223 Remington. Want two thousand? Three? Change the number in the “quantity” box.

Stockpiles?

Anyway, I’m not surprised that PBS and pals are back at their fake news, doing their damnedest to gin up right-wing militias as the real threat even as they reply to attack after violent attack by radical Islamists with hey - not all Muslims! Yes, that is the trend; witness this Atlantic article trying to justify it. But that’s beside the point. For starters, if you haven’t read my 6,500 word post on left wing vs right wing violence and violent rhetoric, I go into some depth with the whole militia thing there. For all their LARPing in the woods, swaggering and shit-talking, there hasn’t been any significant violence committed by right-wing militias since... forever, considering that Timothy McVeigh was never really part of one - and his attack was twenty-two years ago. Moreover, I cover how his attack - and the attention it drew to the militia movement - sent anywhere from “2/3rds” to “80%” (according to two different militia-affiliated folks being interviewed) scrambling away from them at high speed. Protip - actual terrorist organizations tend to attract attention when they manage huge, spectacular attacks - you know, like how Black Lives Matter is still going strong after multiple ambush attacks on cops? Gee.

And that brings us to the essential point - if these militias are really dangerous, and not just a bunch of shit-talking LARPers playing soldier in the woods - then where’s the violence? Again, as I document in that post, the only “cells” they find are a few shitheads talking shit in a bar too close to an FBI informant that eggs them on - one of them even gave them free automatic rifles to shoot, to get them all excited.

As for this study, it’s a start, but this paper freely and breezily equates “anti-government extremism” with “right-wing extremism,” and that’s a false equivalency - because Antifa are anarcho-communists. Just read their handy-dandy guide to setting up an antifa group, where they call the state their enemy multiple times - as well as cops. Shit, they have a whole section on “state repression.” Also note the bit under “political orientation,” where they openly state - in case there was any doubt - that the majority of their membership in the US are anarchists. In case you weren’t aware, anarchists are, by definition, anti-government extremists. The list on page 4 covers “anti-capitalist violent extremism,” but considering that antifa are anarchists and anti-capitalists - where do they fall in the reporting? Did every agency report them the same? In light of antifa’s own literature (again, that guide) advocating strongly that they not even name their groups and keep their identities secret as long as possible, how accurate is each agencies accounting? Hell, where do right-wing terrorist groups fall on this scale, considering there’s several anti-immigration militias that focus on finding and reporting illegal immigrants? Doesn’t that qualify as racist? Or are they anti-government, considering that anti-government sentiments tend to run pretty strong in groups like that, especially with a black Democrat in office who personally did as much as he could to hamper border control efforts?

Shit, by their own admission on page 4, they defined “Al-Qaeda inspired violent extremism” as “violent extremism inspired by the radical Islamist ideas advocated by al-Qaeda and other like-minded extremist groups,” and every other category with one general example; “violent extremism motivated by any other political, social, or religious concerns, including, but not limited to, anti-government, racist, radical, environmentalist, or anti-capitalist views. Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, the Unabomber (Ted Kaczynski,) and the Sikh temple shooter, Wade Michael Page, are examples of ‘other violent extremists.” So they only define one category well, loosely define the others, and then they start standing around characterizing the results with terminology (right wing, left wing) they didn’t even use in the fucking survey? When all those other categories were lumped together into “other violent extremism” in other categories?

And then there’s other data-sets - one just adds up every every crime committed by “groups or individuals with far-right associations,” (which would include every skinhead robbing a gas station, which they do a lot, because skinheads are dime-store hoods almost by definition,) and the well defined report - focusing on premeditated plots by individuals or groups that rise to the level of attempted or actual domestic terrorism,” has a whopping total of... 34 incidents listed in 14 years, and is published by the Anti-Defamation League, which is a fucking activist group, not academics, or law enforcement. Wew lad. The Global Terrorism database is better - more data, and a good definition of qualifying incidents - but it’s only being compared to Islamic extremist terrorist attacks in the US, not left wing domestic terrorism, which is what we’re discussing here.

Bruh, this is some pretty rough shit, here - all twelve pages of it. Especially that bit at the end where they make a claim about how law enforcement agencies see “right wing terrorism” (a phrase used nowhere in their survey to said law enforcement agencies) as a bigger threat in the city than in rural areas. Yeah, dense urban areas, which overwhelmingly vote Democrat, as anyone who’s seen a county-by-county electoral map can tell you, are the hotbeds of right-wing militias?

Bruh. Bruh.

But, listen, you’re actually doing your fucking homework here, which is more than most assholes can say, so lemme help you. The FBI is a great resource here - not only do they publicly publish huge annual reports on all sorts of categories of violence, (law enforcement officers killed and assaulted, general crime stats, hate crime stats, etc,) but they watch fucking everyone. There is no group too big or too small for them to not worry about - they’re basically a domestic surveillance agency. That’s why you have agents going out of their way to hand out automatic rifles to a trio of knuckle-dragging rednecks to egg them on till they can arrest them - these guys have time and resources to spare, apparently. They watch everyone - and they cover them, too, with published reports. I’ve read their reports on motorcycle gangs, and in researching that big post on violence, I found (and used) their public information on the “Sovereign Citizen” movement, which is definitely right-wing. While we’re at it, here’s their page on anarchist extremism. Note that page is out of date, though:

For today’s generation of American anarchist extremists, the rioting that disrupted the 1999 World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle is the standard by which they measure “success”—it resulted in millions of dollars in property damage and economic loss and injuries to hundreds of law enforcement officers and bystanders. But fortunately, they haven’t been able to duplicate what happened in Seattle…

LOL HAMBURG. But you get my point - the FBI watches everyone, even esoteric groups like anti/pro abortion “activists” that get a little out of hand. So the FBI is an excellent primary source to go to - certainly better than another PBS hit piece which is also regurgitating data from the “Anti-Defamation League” and making claims of “thousands” of people flooding to the Sovereign Citizen movement, without citing any source at all. Especially when they started in on how dangerous sovereign citizens are! As I noted in my big effortpost (see that for the links,) Sovereign Citizens managed to kill six police officers since the year 2000 - but twenty officers have been ambushed and murdered in 2016 alone, with multiple attacks committed by black people acting on black separatist/revolutionary rhetoric, including the Dallas shooting (killing five and wounding nine) and the Baton Rouge shooting nobody seems to have heard about (killing three and wounding three.) The latest ambush murder of a police officer in New York was similarly motivated - I haven’t even counted the ambush killings of cops in 2017 yet. But yeah, man, the fuckin right wing millitias are the real threat! Hooooo boy, how fucking hard can they shill?

Anyway, here’s the FBI’s resources page, complete with all their copious reports in .pdf format, including several on terrorism related topics. I’ll bet $5 you can make a better argument than fuckin PBS with just what you find here. I’d also track down the sources cited in that 12 page “paper” you linked and read them yourself, see what you can get out of them. That should be a good start, at least.

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freedivetothefuture-remade · 7 years ago

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