#rare diseases pictures

[homosekularnost]

system collapse

[1977-1981-the-era-of-music]

Now Playing...

Artist: Legionaire's Disease Band

Title: Rather See You Dead (Than With Wool On Your Head)

Album: Rather See You Dead (Than With Wool On Your Head) Single

Played on: Fri Nov 22 2024 14:09:23 GMT-0600 (Central Standard Time)

#Legionaire's Disease Band #1977 to 1981 ERA OF MUSIC

[kagehisanotsu]

living vicariously thru my sisters first year drama

[darkbluekies]

Make things right? Or make them worse?

Yandere!doctor husband (platonic to his children) x twin daughters ocs x female!reader

Summary: Dr Kry’s children finds out their fathers dark secret, and he's determined to silence them.

Warnings: toxic household, yandere, favoritism, guilt, poison, mentions of murder (things along this way)

A/N: I have created my own poison for this story, so I choose the effects. Lol.

Word count: 6.2k

“Bye, dad”, Lydia says and closes the car door.

Her twin follows out of the car, almost hides behind her like a shadow. Lydia frowns confusedly. She’s been more silent than usual this morning. They turn to walk into school.

“Girls”, Dr Kry says through the open car window, catching their attention. “I want you here at three sharp, okay? I’m not in the mood for waiting.”

“Yes, sir”, Lydia answers. 

“Good. Have a good day, girls, I’ll see you later.”

With that said, he drives off. Lydia turns to Nadia who finally raises her gaze from her feet. 

“What’s wrong?” Lydia asks and fixes her backpack. “You’ve been acting off all morning.”

“I have to talk to you about something”, Nadia says hesitantly and looks at her with uneasy eyes. 

Lydia blinked and frowned. “What?”

“I was meaning to talk to you earlier, but I didn’t want to do it when dad was around.” Nadia glanced at the other students swarming around the school grounds. “It’s about mom … and her sickness.”

For as long as they can remember, their mother has been bound to her bed by a rare disease. Thankfully, their father is a remarkable doctor and has been caring for her ever since the twins' birth. He works at a hospital in the city and travels forty minutes back and forth every day, dropping the twins off at school on the way there, and picking them up on the wayback. When they were young, they were put in a private school carefully chosen by their father — who has been very active in the administration.

Their father is a complex person. Although they’ve been by him their entire life, they still feel like they don’t know him. He rarely talks about himself, and seem to have a human side for their mother only. Very rarely, there’s a soft side for the girls … often they’re met by a doctor, rather than a parent. Despite that, Lydia has always been a daddy’s girl, while Nadia has clung to their mom for love and comfort. 

“What about it?” Lydia asks carefully. 

“I heard something …”, Nadia starts and licks her lips nervously. “I heard these noises, from mom and dad’s room-”

“Don’t tell me you heard them have sex”, Lydia grimaces. 

“No …” Nadia shakes her head, eyes shaking. “They were talking. Mom was crying and daad was standing by the bed, holding her cheeks in his hands like this …” She cups her sisters cheeks in demonstration, “...while saying: ‘you’re never going back there, I’ll never share you like that again’.” She shivers. “I-I don’t know what that was, but it made me feel really weird.”

Lydia frowns, trying to picture the scene in front of her. 

“Are you sure that it wasn’t just dad’s weird love language?” she asks carefully. 

“I don’t know”, Nadia sighs defeatedly. “Mom seemed … scared. She looked up at him with eyes full of terror. She could have had a nightmare or something, but dad’s voice- … it was awful. I don’t know how to describe it, but it sounded extremely dark.”

“We could try to ask her.”

“What if dad hears?”

“I could distract him while you ask, if that helps you ease your worry.”

Nadia smiles gratefully. “Thank you, Lyd.”

Lydia gives her an unsure smile and grabs her hand and they walk into school. 

Like Dr Kry had asked them to, they stand by the gates at three sharp. His white car rolls over and the two of them jumps in, Lydia in the front seat and Nadia in the backseat.

“How has your day been?” he asks and drives off. 

He always asks about their classes, teachers and friends. If there’s a small detail he doesn’t like, he makes sure to contact the school and let them know his thoughts. More than one friendship has ended thanks to his overprotectiveness and the twins has learned to dilute the truth enough for him to be able to swallow it. So once again, they answer in the way he wants to hear it. 

The car drives from the city, gets off the highway and enters a countryside road. The dirt road is divided in the middle with grass, creating enough space for the wheels of his white car to roll forward. Here, nothing can be heard except the sounds of distant birds. Their white, edwardian villa is surrounded by a deep, dark forest, close to a gigantic sparkly lake with the closest neighbor being a kilometer away. Despite the isolating upbringing the twins have had, getting away from the noisy, stressful city to the empty forest always cleanse their brains. 

The white, Scandinavian, edwardian aged, wooden villa appears behind the trees like a castle. The house has two floors with a green atticroof, and a bushy, blooming garden in the same color, two glass verandahs on either side of the house and a white fence around the garden.

The twins get out of the car. Nadia gives her a look and Lydia nods. 

“Dad”, she says. “I’ve been feeling a bit weird these last days … I think I’m going to be sick.”

“Really?” Dr Kry asks and frowns. He closes the trunk of the car. “Who have you been around? Are any of the other students sick?”

“A few.”

“Nadia, are you feeling bad too?”

“No”, Nadia replies.

“Could you please give me a check up?” Lydia asks. 

“Alright, come with me”, Dr Kry says and nods at her to follow him. 

While they walk inside, their father and Lydia walks to the living room and Nadia sneaks off upstairs. She moves carefully to their parents’ room and knock gently on the door before entering. Their mother, you, is lying in bed with a book in her hand. You look as weak as ever. Nadia shivers. 

“Hi, sweetheart”, you smile and puts down your book on your chest. “Did you have a good day in school?”

“Yes …”, Nadia mumbles and sits down on the side of the bed, unsure on how to start this absurd conversation. 

“What’s wrong, Nadia?”

“What happened yesterday? WIth you and dad?”

You flinch. Your smile disappears for a moment for it to appear quickly again, but this time in a fake manner. 

“Why did he say that?” Nadia asks carefully. “Why did he say that he wasn’t going to share you again?”

“O-Oh, that …”, you mumble with an embarrassed smile. “It was nothing, don’t worry about it. It was just some adult stuff that me and your dad were talking about.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, honey. Why? Did it make you worry?”

Nadia nods slightly. Y/N gives her a smile and takes her hand. 

“It’s okay, sweetheart, there’s nothing to be afraid of”, you reassure Nadia. “Whatever happens between me and your dad is nothing you have to be afraid of. We will always put you and your sister first, okay? There’s nothing you have to be worried about. I love you, darling.”

“I love you too, mom …”

You hug her, and Nadia hugs back, but she can’t help but feel that her heart sinks. Something isn’t right. 

The very next day when they’re left off at school, Nadia grabs Lydia’s arm. 

“Let’s go to the hospital”, she says the second their father’s car disappears behind the corner. She holds up a metallic key. “I have the key to mom’s old room.”

“What?” Lydia asks in confusion. “Why?”

“I have a feeling that mom isn’t really sick and I have to take a look around in her old hospital room. Something isn’t right!” She clears her throat and lowers her voice. “Mom and dad met at the hospital and that he was her doctor, that much we know, right?”

Lydia nods, trying to follow along. 

“Isn’t it weird that a doctor as professional as our dad decided to start a relationship with a patient like that?” Nadia asks, sounding unsure. “And wouldn’t he have done everything he could to make mom feel better? Shouldn’t she be better now? I just … I want to know if he has done something.”

“Do you really think he has?”

“I don’t know. I really don’t know. But something isn’t right, and I feel that. Mom seemed to be put on the spot when I asked her about the interaction I had overheard. She seemed scared.” Nadia grabbed her hand in hers. “Please, Lyd, can we go there and just take a look?”

Lydia hesitates and glances at the private school behind them, contemplating the consequences. 

“Please”, Nadia repeats. “If mom is getting hurt, I want to help her.”

“Okay”, Lydia nods. 

With that said, they hurry past the school gates before a teacher has the time to catch them. They take the first bus to the state hospital their father works at and hope that he’s with a patient while they sneak around. 

They hurry inside the hospital and keep their heads down to make sure that none of the working receptionists would recognise them and report to their father right away. They stay silent until they get into the elevator. 

Once out, they sneak over to the door. Lydia stands guard as Nadia presses the key into its lock. The click from the key opening echoes in the empty corridor. Nadia’s hand hovers above the door handle. Her heart twirls around uncomfortably. In a moment, she will be in the room where their parents met, where something happened that made their dad take the decision of stepping over the professional line. If that was good or bad is yet to be known, but she can’t help but feel worried. 

The room is empty, in more than one way. The spirits of old memories haunt the room and they leave a sour taste in the twins’ mouths. Lydia looks towards the bed. Their mother has been lying here for months with a sickness that has kept her bed bound for years. But what happened while she was here?

“What are we looking for?” Lydia wonders. 

“Anything”, Nadia shrugs and looks around. “Whatever that can help us is fine. Journals, reports, notes — anything.”

They start to rummage through drawers, in binders and notepads. Lydia finds herself holding a yellow paper binder with their mother’s name written on it, in their father’s handwriting. 

“Nad, look at this”, Lydia says and holds up the binder. 

They put the binder on the desk and start to pull out papers. Every paper is written from the top to the bottom in ink.

“He has documented her every day …”, Lydia says, perplexed. She shakes her head in denial. “Every single day, every single hour. Obsessively. Look, every little detail is written down. ‘12:35, eaten an apple’, ‘16:52, took a shower’, ‘22:30, called for me on the telephone’. What is this?”

Nadia picks up another paper, a smaller, clearly supposed to be hidden between the other sides. She puts her hand over her mouth as her eyes widens. 

“Oh no”, she gasps and drops the paper. “No, no, no, no …”

Lydia frowns, bends down and picks up the paper. Her heart sinks as she reads the note. It’s a single word, but they’re familiar with it. They’ve found bottles of it in the cellar and the attic multiple times, and when they asked Dr Kry about it, he answered that it was a substance to kill vermin.

“He’s poisoning mom”, Nadia whispers in horror and looks at her twin with wide, terrified eyes. 

Lydia feels the air disappear from her lungs. Suddenly, she feels nauseous. She sits down on the rolling stool and tries to control her breathing. Nadia sinks down on the bed with her head in her hands. 

“What the fuck do we do?” Lydia breathes out with her eyes staring dimly in front of her. She has never felt this empty before, this helpless. “What the fuck do we do now, Nadia?”

“W-We have to call the cops”, Nadia gulps. 

“The cops? Nad, he’s our dad!”

“But if he hurts mom …” Her voice dies out. “We can’t let him take more years from her.”

Lydia nods and wipes the few tears that have begun to run down her cheeks. With shaking hands, she unzips her backpack and shoves the binder down. They will need evidence if they have to prove to the cops. 

The door behind them opens. Both girls fly up from their positions and scurry over to each other. Dr Kry walks in and stops abruptly in the door. 

“What are you doing here?” he asks quickly. 

He’s trying to force a smile, but the red eyes of his daughters and the trembling bodies of theirs are all he needs to see, to know that they know. 

“How fucking could you?!” Nadia screams. 

Dr Kry hurries to close the door as she continues to shout through sobs. 

“What’s your deal with mom?!” she screams. “How can you keep her like this?! Where’s your fucking conscience?!”

She thinks that she’s going to explode in pure fear, anger and sorrow. Dr Kry clenches his jaw and sighs heavily. 

“Your mother is a very, very special person”, he says slowly, as if he is talking to a ticking bomb. “It is all a misunderstanding, girls, I will tell you everything at home. Come, we’re going home now.”

“We’re not going anywhere with you”, Nadia spits and stands in front of her frozen sister. 

“You don’t have to be afraid of me.” Dr Kry rolls his eyes when they don’t answer. “You’re my daughters, and you are not yet of age, you have to come with me.”

Nadia wants to refuse again, but she doesn’t want to leave her mother alone with him, not when he knows that they know. 

“Now”, Dr Kry decides. 

Nadia picks up Lydia’s bag and gives it to her sister. It looks like Lydia is going to throw up any second now. Nadia takes her hand and they follow their father out of the room, and out through a back door. For the first time, Lydia sits down in the backseat together with her twin. They hold each others hands tightly and keep silent the entire car ride home. 

“Girls, I never wanted you to see that”, Dr Kry sighs and tries to meet their eyes in the rear view mirror. “I- … It’s hard to explain. Your mother is a very special person who I’m very lucky to have met.”

Lydia squeezes her eyes shut, but she can’t keep him out of her head. 

When they come home, Nadia drags her sister into the house. 

“Girls, don’t go upstairs”, Dr Kry says in that same dark voice Nadia had heard him talk in a few days ago. “I want you to stay down here.”

They halt, suddenly too scared to move. 

“I want you to help me with dinner”, Dr Kry says. “Come on.”

The twins glance at each other. Lydia starts to drag her sister to the kitchen. They help in complete silence. Lydia’s hands are trembling while she cuts cucumber and it slips, cutting a slit in her finger. She yelps and drops the knife. 

“Oh, honey”, Dr Kry breathes out and grabs her hand. “You have to be careful.”

She doesn’t look at him as he washes her hand under the kitchen sink and puts on a bandaid. Her entire body is in fight or flight mode. 

When Dr Kry takes care of the final touches, the twins scurry up to their mother. Your face drops when you see them. 

“Why is he doing this to you?” Nadia asks thickly as she tries not to cry. “We found out.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry, girls”, you say sorrowfully. “I wish that you never had to know.”

“Why do you let it happen?” Lydia asks quietly. 

“I have no choice … I can’t do anything.” You lower your gaze and voice to an ashamed whisper. “I don’t have the energy to run away, and if I managed to, you’d be in danger and I’d be dead. Your father has the only antidote to his self made poison. It’s safer for everyone if I stay here.”

“But mom …”, Nadia whimpers, “... he’s hurting you.”

“I … I know, dear.” 

The door opens behind them. 

“Girls, dinner”, Dr Kry says shortly and nods towards the corridor. “Go downstairs.”

The twins turn to you, wanting you to make their decision. You give them a reassuring smile and they leave. You look at the man who has become your husband, much to your dismay. 

“Why did you let them find out?” you whisper with tears in your eyes. “You promised that they would never know!”

“I didn't think that they would.” He wipes the tears that roll down your cheeks. “I’ll fix this mess. Don’t worry, darling.”

With that said, he tucks you in and leaves to go downstairs. The twins have sat down by the dining table with their blank, staring eyes turned down into the table. Dr Kry sits down and start to eat, without seeming to care at all about the incidents that happened earlier. Nadia stares down into her plate with disgust roaring in her stomach. If she eats, she’s going to throw it all up in a matter of thirty minutes. She closes her eyes and sighs sadly. Lydia tries to eat a bite, forcing it down her throat. 

“Nadia, eat a little”, Dr Kry says. 

“I’m not hungry”, she mumbles. 

“You need to eat a bit. I won’t allow you to leave the table before you have eaten. Look at Lydia, she’s eating.”

Lydia feels her cheeks heat up as the attention turns to her. She’s suddenly embarrassed over obeying. Feeling exposed and naked under Nadia’s look of disbelief, as if she’s just broken a silent pact. But instead of saying anything, Nadia picks up her fork and takes a bite of the white rice. The twins can agree that this might have been the worst dinner they have ever experienced. 

Nadia puts her hand over her heart and clears her throat. There's a heavy feeling over her chest, something almost suffocating. She looks to the side, seeing how Lydia is frowning as well, trying to clear her throat. Nadia think that she looks like she’s going to faint. She wants to ask her how she’s feeling, but doesn’t dare talk in front of their father, afraid to start a conversation. 

After dinner, the twins decide to go upstairs, but their legs suddenly feel weak enough to break apart. 

“What’s going on?” Lydia whispers and grips the staircase railing. 

“I think that he put something in the food”, Nadia whispers back. 

“I feel really sick …”

She falls down on her knees in the middle of the staircase, still holding onto the railing. Nadia hurries to pull her up again and drags her over to her bedroom, lazily tucking her in. 

“Don’t leave me”, Lydia whimpers and grabs her hand before she can leave the room. “Stay … please. Don’t go. I'm scared.”

Nadia agrees, not wanting to leave. She climbs down under the covers of Lydia’s bed. They lay in silence and look up at the tilted, wooden ceiling. For every minute passes by, they’re growing more and more sick. Every muscle in their bodies seem to ache, twist and turn. 

“He’s doing it to us too”, Nadia whispers. 

They hear the lock on the door click and give each other terrified looks. Nadia stumbles out of the bed and feel the handle. She gulps in horror and turns back to the bed. 

“It’s locked!” she says and breathes out in shock. “He actually locked it …”

“Come back …”, Lydia begs and reaches for her. 

Nadia returns to the bed, crawls down under the covers and hugs her. She wraps her arms around her sister and rests Lydia’s head on her shoulder. 

“I’m scared”, Lydia whispers. 

“It’s going to be okay”, Nadia replies, although she doesn’t believe it herself. “We’re going to be okay.”

Dr Kry removes his tie, about to go to sleep. 

“I can’t believe you …”, you whisper from the bed, with her eyes down at her trembling hands. 

“Darling …”, Dr Kry sighs and turns around. 

You raise your tone, but keep it hushed enough not to exceed the bedroom walls. “You promised that they would never get hurt! You promised that they would never get exposed to this fucking substance!”

“They haven’t … yet.”

“Yet?! Don’t fucking tell me-”

“They figured it out, okay? They heard our conversation and decided to check out the hospital for themselves. I underestimated their intelligence … and their love for you.” He sighs annoyedly. “I’m not going to let their lack of understanding break apart our family — that I have fought so hard for. I put something in their food to keep them still for a while. It’s nothing dangerous, little one. I promise you that.”

“If I knew that you were going to break your promise-”

“I had to.”

He is about to caress your cheek, but hears sounds coming from next door. One of the girls is banging on the locked bedroom door, and calling for him. Dr Kry excuses himself and gets out of the room. He walks over to Lydia’s room, where the noise is coming from. Quickly, he unlocks, finding Nadia leaning on the wall right next to the door. Her eyes are full with tears. 

“What’s going on?” Dr Kry asks. 

“Lydia isn’t waking up!” Nadia cries.

Dr Kry feels his body turn cold. He runs over to the bed where his other daughter is lying on her side, and he soon finds out that Nadia is right — she isn’t waking up. He shakes her, gives her gentle taps on her cheeks and lifts her up. Nothing wakes her. He has to take her to the hospital. 

“Wait, where are you going?!” Nadia screams after him as Dr Kry carries her sister down the stairs. “She doesn’t want to be alone!”

“You have to stay here with mom”, Dr Kry says over his shoulder. “I’m taking care of Lydia.”

He hurries out of the house and quickly places her down in the back seat. Dr Kry’s usual forty minute drive to the hospital took only twenty five minutes this time. He picked her up in her arms and ran inside through the backdoor, and didn’t stop until their reach the room you have spent many, many months in. Dr Kry places his daughter down on the very same bed you have laid in. He placed an oxygen over Lydia’s mouth and nose, turning on the machine. He hasn’t felt this scared in a long time. 

Finally, after an hour, Lydia opens her eyes with a small moan. Dr Kry hurries over to the bed and removes the mask. 

“How are you feeling?” he asks her and brushes the hair out of her face. 

“I feel really sick”, she whimpers. 

“Do you need to throw up?” 

Lydia nods. Dr Kry picks her up again and moves her into the bathroom where she hovers over the toilet for ten minutes. Dr Kry holds her hair back and grimaces sadly. He does feel bad for putting her through this, but he has to. 

“There you go”, he says and puts her down on the bed again. 

“Why am I here?” Lydia asks weakly.

“You weren’t responding when anyone tried to wake you up. I got worried, so I decided to take you here.”

“Am I going to die?”

Dr Kry scoffs out a smile in a weird sensation of deja-vu. He has heard that question a lot, in the exact same tone and manner, but from the generation before her.  

“You’re not”, he reassures her and strokes her hair. “You know that I would never let anything happen to you.”

“Why am I feeling like this?”

“I put something in your food to make you and Nadia calm down, but you seem to have reacted badly to the substance … weirdly enough. Since you’re identical twins, i thought you’d react the same, but it seems like you are a bit more sensitive than your sister.”

“Nadia ate less than me.”

“Yeah, you might have gotten more substance in your body, which is why you feel worse. It’s going to be okay, I will not let anything happen to you.”

“But you hurt me.”

His smile drops and his hand stops stroking her hair. He knows that Lydia shares half of her mothers genetics, but he didn’t know that she would sound exactly like you. She has never heard you use these phrases, and yet Lydia has chosen the exact same wording that you have tortured Dr Kry with years ago. 

“I didn’t mean for you to end up here”, Dr Kry sighs and continues to stroke her hair. “That was my fault, I admit that. However, I had to keep you and Nadia a bit sedated because of how scared you were.”

“Why did you use so much?” she whimpers. 

“I was a bit shaky myself, I wasn’t meant to hurt you, Lydia.”

Lydia sighs shakily and sinks down in the mattress. She wants nothing more than to go back home, to Nadia, but at the same time she knows that if she goes back home, she will be locked in her room again. Continuing with life now that they know their father’s secret will be difficult. 

“How long do I have to stay here?” she asks quietly. 

“Until you’re feeling better”, Dr Kry replies and stands up. “For now, I think that you need to sleep. It’s late.”

That’s the last thing she wants to do. She has always been Dr Kry’s (not so subtle) favorite, and she has always had a preference for her father … but for the very first time, she’s afraid of him. She can’t trust him anymore, especially about her health. Being unconscious is the last thing she wants to do. 

“I don’t want to”, Lydia says pleadingly. “I’m not tired … please don’t make me sleep, dad.”

Please don’t make me sleep. Your voice echoes in his head, in the exact same tone. Dr Kry knows that he did a million things wrong when he kept you here, and now he has a second chance to fix things. 

“Okay”, he breathes out and sits down on his stool. “You don’t have to sleep, darling.”

Lydia gulps and looks around in the room, trying to imagine how you had felt while being here. She feels a heavy sensation over her chest, like a heavy stone. She couldn’t see the poisoned air purifier that was mentioned in the journal. 

“Did mom lay here?” Lydia whispers. 

“Yes”, he answers quietly. 

“How long?”

Dr Kry looks down at his nails, eyes faltering. “A, uh … very long time. Many, many months.”

She starts to look around again. “Where is the air purifier?”

“It’s not here … it broke, a long time ago. I had to throw it away.”

“Do you still use that kind of thing on mom?”

“No, I don’t. Not often.”

But he has his new way to make sure you stay.

Nadia runs her hand through her hair. Her poor sister. What should she do? Dr Kry left the rooms unlocked, which means that she can move around. She drags herself into your bedroom. You look at her with wide, nervous eyes. 

“Is she okay?” you ask and take Nadia in your arms. 

“I-I don’t know”, Nadia responds shakily while shaking her head desperately. “She wasn’t waking up and …”

“She’s going to be okay. I know your father can all of those medical stuff … maybe a little too well.” You sigh and caress the seventeen-year old girl’s face. “It’s going to be okay.”

Nadia shakes her head. “No fucking way things are going to be okay! He’s a madman, mom.”

“I … I know.”

“We can’t stay here.”

“Where are we supposed to go, Nad? We have no car, nearest neighbor is a kilometer away and we have poison in our blood. Sweetheart, we can’t walk far.”

“Mom, we have to leave. We can’t stay here with this psychopath!”

“Nadia …”

Nadia sighs frustratedly and hides her face in her hands. Something has to work. The farthest she has seen you walk is out to the garden when they’ve had picnic evenings. You take her hand, removing it.

“Sweetheart … you know dad loves you, right?” you ask carefully. You don’t want her to hate her him, after all he is her father … but you have to let her know the truth, no more living in the shadow.

“Fucking doubt it”, Nadia mutters. 

“He does. In his … own little way. But I need you to understand that he has sides that he hasn’t shown you … a-and I don’t want you to see those sides.”

Nadia’s face goes blank. You’re trying your best not to get swindled back into old memories, but thinking about that murderous side of Dr Kry brings you back to a time you much rather would want to forget. 

“Mom?” Nadia asks blankly and almost shouts in panic. “Mom! What sides?”

“He … He is a very patient man, but he can't take as much as possible, so please, whatever you do … cooperate.”

“What does that mean? Mom?”

Nadia goes cold. That’s it, she thinks, they have to leave. 

“Mom, get up”, she says and grabs the blanket before ripping it off. “Now. Before he returns.”

“Nad-”

“We have to try, at least. Please.”

You hesitate before getting out of bed. Nadia grabs your hand and try to pull you out of the bedroom, but everything around you seem to spin. Your entire body is heavy and aching in all the wrong places. 

“Nadia, wait”, you groan. “If I’m going to move, I have to move slowly.”

“Alright”, Nadia agrees. “I’ll go get some stuff and then meet you by the stairs.”

Nadia runs to her room to collect her wallet and hoodies for herself and her sister, then runs to get your jacket. She meets you by the stairs, helps you put your jacker on and then start to lead you down. You’re terrified of falling. 

“Nadia, I don’t think that this is a good idea”, you mumble and think back of your numerous escape attempts, all ending with someone losing their life. 

“We have to, mom”, Nadia pleads. “I can’t leave you here.”

“What about Lydia?”

“I’ll figure something out afterwards.”

Nadia unlocks the front door and leads you out on the glass verandah. You’re filled with fear. What if you can’t walk? What if you hurt yourself? What if Dr Kry finds out? Your body won’t be able to take his anger. Besides, you have barely left the house in eighteen years — apart from a few car rides here and there — what if the world has changed to something you don’t like?

“Mom”, Nadia says slowly. “It’s going to be okay.”

“I’m terrified”, you admit. 

“We will be okay.”

They start to walk along the dark countryside road. There are no streetlight this far out in the forest, but the moon lights up enough for them to see where the road is heading. 

“It’s been years since I was outside last”, you say. “I think the last time I was out walking was in the garden, last summer when we had that picnic.”

“Have you ever tried to run away from dad before?” Nadia asks. 

“I have”, you answer quietly. “A few times.”

“Did you ever succeed?”

“That depends on what you mean by ‘succeeding’, because I’m still here, aren’t I? But I got away a few times … the only problem was that he found me again.” You sigh, realizing that perhaps you shouldn’t have this conversation with your underage daughter. “Forget that. Where are we going?”

“We need to go to our neighbors. They have to help us.”

Nadia has only spoken to the neighbors a few times, because of how rarely they run into each other. 

They only manage to walk a hundred meters before bright, beaming headlights light up in front of them. Nadia wants to flee into the forest — in case it happens to be her father behind the wheel — but can’t seem to pull you with her. The car stops and to Nadia’s horror, her father gets out. 

“What the Hell are you doing?!” he shouts, sounding both angry and terrified. “Y/N!”

You freeze in your spot and seem to crawl together like a hurt dog, sounding like one too. Dr Kry runs over to you. Nadia watches in horror and starts to panic, wondering what she should do. Stay here with you and get caught in Dr Kry’s claws … or make a run for it to try to get help. 

“I’m sorry”, you shriek in fear. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry-”

Dr Kry hugs your shaking body in his arms and strokes your back, hushing softly.

“I know you didn’t come up with this stupid idea”, he reassures you. “Don’t cry, my dear, I'm here now. I know this wasn't your fault. I'm not mad at you. I’ll get you back home and I'll take care of you. It’s going to be okay.”

He helps you into the front seat. You don’t fight back in the slightest. Nadia looks back at the dark forest and gulps. Her eyes glues onto something in the backseat and realizes that he has come back with her sister! 

“Nadia, get in, we've had enough of these childish outbursts”, her father tells her. “Get in. Now.”

“Is she okay?” Nadia almost stutters and points at her sleeping sister. 

“She’s okay. If you don’t get in now, Nadia, I’m taking them both with me and you’ll never see them again.”

His favoritism has never been clearer, Nadia thinks. She can’t leave her sister … so she gets into the backseat. Nadia wakes her sister up and caresses her cheek. 

“Are you okay?” she whispers quickly. “Did he hurt you?”

“I feel okay”, Lydia whispers back. “Just … tired. I had tro throw up a lot and I think that he gave me some sleeping pills or something. I insisted on going home … so he let me.”

Nadia breathes out. She glances over at the front seat. Their father holds the steering wheel with one hand and yours with the other. 

“Please don’t cry”, he wishes. 

Nadia watches on in disgust. 

When they get back to the white villah, Nadia pulls her sister up to her own room and lays her down on the bed while Dr Kry takes you into the master bedroom. 

“Here you go”, Nadia says and tucks her in. “Are you okay? Do you need anything?”

“Some water”, Lydia says quietly. 

Nadia disappears downstairs to get a glass of water. She meets her father in the stairs. 

“Nadia, I’m not sure your sister will be able to leave her bed for a while”, he says warningly. “I wouldn’t try to leave, if i were you. If you do, I will take both of them with me, and you’ll never see them again.”

“Do you like to hurt your family?” she spits back. “What kind of sadist are you?”

“One to make sure my family stays with me. If you don’t want to end up in the same physical state as your sister and mother, you’re going to continue living as if everything is normal, got that? Go to school, come home, study, continue everything. No talking to anyone about this. Is that clear?”

“So everything as normal … but without Lydia?”

“Exactly.”

“Why aren’t you healing her?”

“Because I’m not going to let you, or anyone, take my family from me. Be glad that I’m still letting you live normally.”

Nadia glares at him and continues up the stairs. She holds the glass to Lydia’s mouth, watching her sip. 

“What now?” she whispers. 

“I’m allowed to continue living like normally … and you don’t”, Nadia says quietly. “I’m sorry.”

“But … but I don’t want to live like mom!”

“I know. I’m sorry, Lyd.”

The girl in the bed sighs sadly. Naida takes her hand and gulps. 

The coming weeks seem normal. Nadia goes to school, studies, returns to the villah, but nothing is the same. Without Lydia, there’s no use in being on top. She has no one to impress anymore. Her father is dead to her, and sucking up to him makes her sick. She barely talks to her friends anymore. They’re always asking her about Lydia, and why she’s not in school anymore. Nadia can’t come up with countless excuses … it’s easier to distance herself. 

Life doesn’t seem that bright and colorful anymore. Nadia can’t bring herself to be excited about things that used to interest her badly. Now, every day is a chore, something she wants to get done, until something happens … but she doesn’t know what it is. A death in the family? Someone saving them? Someone killing someone? 

Nadia walks out of school, seeing her fathers white car parked outside the gates, and him inside … waiting for her. 

[brights-place]

HAII WOULD IT BE FINE IF I ASKED FOR BOTH NSFW OR SFW HCS OF FLOYD (AFTER THE EVENTS OF TBT)?? BASICALLY THE READER REUNITES WITH FLOYD AFTER WHAT HAPPENED BECAUSE THEY HAD NO IDEA 😣

Floyd and his S/O after the events of TBT

Pairings: Floyd X Reader

Warnings: Floyd being an cutie patootie, Fluff, slight angst

A/N: NGL I WANNA MAKE THIS AS AN FULL COMIC NEHEHEH but also Yall are married

- Floyd literally had to tell the group to go to your shared pod from where you two where staying before he got taken away. He was focusing on you the whole time before he got captured it was two days before your wedding together

- “Wait! John Dory take an turn here! We need to get to my place” John Dory raised an brow the others confused but did as Floyd instructed - When they arrived to the f/c and pink pod, and floyd noticed the messed up pod broken items around the main area of the pod - Floyd had an look of worry on his face as he rushd to your bedroom brozone confused as they hear loud sobbing from the bedroom - Floyd opened the door to see an f/c troll shaking while crying on the floor holding an picture against their chest he walked over to you quickly as you turned to look up at him to see the others staring at the scene of Floyd walking over “Honey?” You stared up at him - the sadness washed away as you stood up walking towards him dropping the photo and stared up at Floyd before punching him as he sighed - The others where gonna start being overprotective as Floyd chuckled rubbing his cheek before you hugged him crying “Y-You asshole!” You sobbed into his chest “I’m sorry I’ll explain everything okay? Please don’t be mad” void looked up sniffling “How am I not mad! You left me for two months! It was two days before our wedding Floyd you think I wouldn’t be mad!” All brozone members jaws drop

- Floyd introduced you as his fiancé and future spouse while you glared up at him wiping your tears cursing Floyd out as he frowned hugging your waist.

- Bruce literally had to give Floyd tips about being an good husband since the man is married himself

- when driving back to pop village Floyd and the others explained everything to you. You sobbed more clinging to Floyd “those idiotic teenagers! They deserved to go to jail! What they did to Floyd! I should of been there to beat them up and teach them an lesson!” “Honey your scaring my brothers…” “How?” Floyd motioned towards the snapped crowbar in your hands “Oh… Sorry JD I’ll get you an new one”

- You explained to poppy about you and Floyd’s wedding before he got taken away as poppy bawled saying that it was depressing that it was just you two

- she begged to be the bridesmaid… and make you guys the best wedding

- You did get married later on but after what happened to Floyd he was more aware of his surroundings

- flinched out loud noises and makes sure to quickly grab your hand to make sure that he isn’t separated from you

- Late night random talks like always while cuddling and he would hold onto you more then he usually did after the effects of what velvet and veneer did to him.

- please soothe him with kisses and words of affirmation

- Has to be around you or hold you whenever he can to be at ease scared that if he lets go he’d be taken away from you again

- definitely developed anemia or like Ménière’s disease which is an rare inner ear condition that can affect your balance and hearing it can’t be cure but treatment can help symptoms of it.

- when he gets episodes and he loses balance you have to rush over and hold him comfort this man please!

- cries in your arms as he clings onto you for dear life whispering many apologises for making you wait for him for 2 months

- Would beg you to please understand how he didn’t mean for that to happen to him and you’d have to cry as-well holding him close telling him it’s alright.

- you moving his hair out of his face makes him melt as you pepper his face with kisses telling him he’s safe and your there.

reblogs + comments are appreciated ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝♡

©brights-place 2024 — do not repost on another platform, copy, translate or edit my works! if you fit my DNI list please don't interact!

[jenomi]

Boyfriend!Jeno A-Z Headcanons

prompt list by @snk-warriors

Activities - What do they like to do with their s/o? How do they spend their free time with them?

jeno would either plan really simple but cute dates like going to the movies and dinner or he'd do something at home like making charms or painting. anything just to spend some quality time with you <3 jeno's also so thoughtful and creative, i feel like once in a while he'd plan a more extravagant date based on something you mentioned once or if he saw you watching a lot of videos about a certain activity on insta or tiktok, he'd plan it for you guys to do together.

Beauty - What do they admire about their s/o? What do they think is beautiful about them?

it's corny but jeno just thinks you're beautiful inside and out. he gets a little bitter when strangers call you pretty cuz they just don't get you like he does! of course he thinks you're the most beautiful person he's ever laid eyes on, but he also loves your humor, personality, habits, and everything.

Comfort - How would they help their s/o when they feel down/have a panic attack etc.?

jeno is literally your rock, unwavering support and love even when you feel like pushing him away. he'll just be there for you and make sure you know that he's always there if you want to talk or just want to cuddle. he'll always lend a listening ear and a shoulder to cry on.

Dreams - How do they picture their future with their s/o?

marriage, duh. altho he doesn't imagine himself having kids like the other dreamies imagine having children. jeno just dreams of a comfortable life with you, where you go to each other's annual family vacations, family dinners, friend gatherings and vacations where everyone gets along and he feels comfortable and in love. also, he definitely dreams of traveling the world with you.

Equal - Are they the dominant one in the relationship, or rather passive?

jeno can definitely be both, depending on the situation. he was more passive when he was upset about something at the beginning of your relationship, and he's continuing to work on it to express himself, he just doesn't like starting arguments/confrontations :( dominant in everything else tho hehe

Fight - Would they be easy to forgive their s/o? How are they fighting?

very rarely will jeno shout during an argument, he tends to stay quiet which makes you even more angry cuz you wish he would just fight back. but he's very easy to forgive you because he really really hates fighting with you and he does try to see things from your pov. and ofc you do the same when he expresses himself too.

Gratitude - How grateful are they in general? Are they aware of what their s/o is doing for them?

jeno is incredibly grateful. grateful to have you by his side thru thick and thin, grateful that you choose each other each and every day. even the smallest things he's grateful for, like you tidying his clothes in the closet when he was rushing that morning.

Honesty - Do they have secrets they hide from their s/o? Or do they share everything?

any secrets jeno has, they're unintentional. they'll be things he just never thought to bring up but they're usually not that big of a secret that would impact your relationship. you'll just pout at him for not sharing it ahead of time.

Inspiration - Did their s/o change them somehow, or the other way around? Like trying out new things or helped them overcome personal problems?

jeno's not lying when he says he became a better person after meeting you. he's become more understanding and empathetic towards others and wants to try new things all the time with you and do the things that you like. in return, jeno's inspired you to be more hard working and patient with others.

Jealousy - Do they get jealous easily? How do they deal with it?

yes, jealousy is a disease and jeno has it. again, he doesn't always express it because he feels like he's overreacting in most situations. if you talk about your male coworker a lot, he'll get jealous and if it persists, his pent up jealousy will just become anger and you'll fight it out. but you try to never give him a reason to be jealous, he's your one and only afterall.

Kiss - Are they a good kisser? What was the first kiss like?

yes, duh. the first kiss was nothing crazy, you were laughing together on one of the dates at the beginning of your talking phase. you were really close together and it honestly just happened naturally. you both initiated it, it couldn't be helped! but since then, jeno's been obsessed with kissing you, he'll just do it whenever he wants.

Love Confession - How would they confess to their s/o?

cutie jeno would prob be kinda awkward about it >.< it would be on a regular night in and he would start to dance around his confession but you wouldn't pick up on it, you just thought he was tired and saying things. then he would properly sit up and grab your hand, "y/n, i'm trying to tell you i love you." you would be so shocked by that, but his calm yet sudden outburst to you would fill your heart with love and joy and you'd reply, "i love you too, jeno."

Marriage - Do they want to get married? How do they propose? What would the marriage be like?

jeno would propose to you after one of your special dates with a intimate night at home. it would be set up full of candles leading up to the bed where there's a small but luxurious bouquet with your favorite flowers. when you turn around, you see jeno kneeled onto one knee, "y/n, make me the happiest man to walk this earth and be my beautiful wife for always and forever. will you marry me?" you guys would lead a simple, yet unwavering loving marriage full of happiness and adventures together just the two of you.

Nicknames - What do they call their s/o?

babe, baby, jagiya, a quirky nickname derived from your real name cuz that's just jeno

On Cloud Nine - What are they like when they are in love? Is it obvious for others? How do they express their feelings?

jeno is constantly close to you or paying attention to you when you're out together. when you're with friends, it's obvious that you're together when you meet new people. he often expresses his feelings to you through his actions rather than his words, which is one of the reasons why people know you're together cuz jeno is always touching you in some way shape or form when you're out together.

PDA - Are they upfront about their relationship? Do they brag with their s/o in front of others? Or are they rather shy to kiss etc. when others are watching?

jeno doesn't necessarily brag, but he does talk about you all the time. "oh, y/n and i went there last week" "oh y/n told me..." "y/n is waiting for me" it's always you you you, haechan def teases him about it. and again, jeno's obsessed w kissing you, if you show up to a team dinner jeno will just kiss you out of habit and get shy after lol

Quirk - Some random ability they have that's beneficial in a relationship.

you know how jeno always comes up with creative solutions in content? that would happen a lot in your relationship with jeno. he would always find solutions that require less work but create the same results. or if you were missing a tool, he would find an alternative tool that would get the job done (and if it's something that just requires strength, he does it for you very easily).

Romance - How romantic are they? What would they do to make their s/o happy? Cliché or rather creative?

i wouldn't say jeno is super romantic, but he's appropriately romantic to leave you happy and satiated. jeno doesn't like being cliche, but when he does show his romantic side, it's very romantic and tailored for especially you that you have no choice but to feel touched and love your boyfriend even more than you did the day before.

Support - Are they helping their s/o achieve their goals? Do they believe in them?

of course - jeno is so supportive of your goals and always encourages you to take steps towards them even as you encounter setbacks. he believes in you and trusts that you can do anything you set your mind to. he will try to help in any way he can, like setting up meetings with certain people that can help guide and mentor you in achieving your goals in better ways than he ever could.

Thrill - Do they need to try out new things to spice out your relationship? Or do they prefer a certain routine?

jeno likes feeling comfortable, but he does need some spice to keep himself stimulated. if there's certain things that you both already know you love (like a restaurant), he's happy to just stick with that and not try something new. but if you both feel like you're missing a certain something (like a specific cuisine or dish), you'll go out to explore it until you find something you both love and just add it to your routine. [things are def frequently spiced up in bed ofc]

Understanding - How good do they know their partner? Are they empathetic?

since the beginning of your relationship with jeno, he's always tried to be as empathetic as possible. he always knew he wanted to know you inside and out, so he made it his mission to know every little thing about you. what you like and don't like, your habits, your pet peeves, your favorite things, everything.

Value - How important is the relationship to them? What is it’s worth in comparison to other things in their life?

your relationship definitely lies within his top 3 priorities in his life, next to his job and his family. you are his everything and he genuinely can't imagine what his life would look like without you there, so he makes sure to take care of you and your relationship.

Wild Card - A random Fluff Headcanon.

jeno's favorite mundane thing to watch you do is eat. sure, you don't think you look very flattering when you eat, but jeno thinks you look so cute munching away at your food and humming when it's really good. you think jeno's a slow eater, but really he just gets distracted watching you eat, feeling happy that he gets to do these simple, beautiful things with you and feeling proud that he's taking good care of you.

XOXO - Are they very affectionate? Do they love to kiss and cuddle?

jeno is subtly very affectionate towards you. he will always be touching you when you're out together, typically its thru holding hands cuz we know how much he loves holding hands :( he doesn't really like to kiss in public, but behind closed doors, TRUST he's kissing you all over all the time and cuddling you wherever you lay or stand.

Yearning - How will they cope when they're missing their partner?

jeno feels like he's going absolutely insane when he doesn't see you for 2 or more days. two days is his limit. afterwards, he gets kinda cranky and extra pouty and sad cuz he misses you so much :( he'll spam your phone with messages until you reply, and when you do he'll just call you so he can see your face and hear your voice. but it's simply not enough because he wants to touch you and kiss you. he'll do anything to be able to see you again as soon as possible.

Zeal - Are they willing to go to great lenghts for the relationship? If so, what kind of?

he is, but only to a certain degree as he has boundaries just like you do. if you asked him to move into your place instead of the other way around, he would do it no problem. he would book getaways for you when you were feeling down without you having to ask for them. but if you asked him to cut off his friends/family for no reason, he wouldn't do it. again, jeno would do a lot of things for your relationship, but only if they're reasonable.

⁺˚⋆｡°✩₊✩°｡⋆˚⁺

if you read this far, i seriously love you

[sleepymccoy]

Per one single request (and that is all I need to carry on) here is an expansion of my tags on this post

What even is dementia?

Basically, it's an umbrella term. It describes a set of common symptoms, primarily worsening cognitive loss.

It's kind of like saying you have a cold. A cold is not a diagnosis, it's a grouping of different illnesses, like rhino virus (the most common), influenza, covid, the list goes on.

So, you can have dementia and Alzheimer's, but you wouldn't describe yourself as having both. You'd say "I have a type of dementia, Alzheimer's disease." In the same way you'd say, "I have a cold, I think it's just a rhino virus but it's a whopping my ass."

So why'd you pick Alzheimer's for that example?

Well, Alzheimer's disease is the most common type of dementia. It's where all the stereotypes you'd know about it come from. This is gonna be a text heavy post, so have a graph

University of Queensland

Before I talk about them in more detail though, what's a brain?

Your brain is made up of segments that control different specific bits of your body.

I always knew that if you hit the back of your head you might go blind, cos the eye and sight stuff happens at the back of the head. This is true.

I love a copyright warning on a photo. This post constitutes personal use

Alright! An important thing about dementia is that it moves through the brain steadily, going piece by piece. It doesn't do it all at once. So you have a starting spot, and a progressive loss of cognition as it kills your neurons. We figure out the dementia type by the symptoms, cos the brain is so defined

So if you hit the back of your head, the green occipital lobe in that picture, you mess with your sight. If you lose cognition in the back of your head your eyes are seeing fine, but your cognition loss makes you process that sight incorrectly. What you see can be completely different to what other people see. This is posterior cortical atrophy, and I bring it up because we know someone who died from it, this is Terry Pratchett's dementia subtype

It's not on the above graph cos it's quite a rare type

Where's Alzheimer's start?

In the kinda middle bit, the temporal lobe. Memory, ya know. And once it takes your memory it'll move on, but it's not always the same, so people living with Alzheimer's disease will developed varying symptoms as the disease progresses, which takes many years. Sometimes people get a diagnosis of mixed dementia cos it's doing a few lobes at once. Or they have another quite different type of dementia at the some time

I'm not gonna talk about Alzheimer's much cos if you know anything about how dementia goes, you probably know it from Alzheimer's disease.

Let's go through a few others

Vascular dementia is the next biggie!

It's a curious one, this is stroke related. So, when you get a stroke you often lose cognition in the affected area of the brain. That's not dementia, that's a stroke!

But if you get lots and lots of strokes, constantly, that's a type of dementia. Cos you're getting steadily cognitively worse

(this is a good time to remind people that dementia is not a diagnosis or even a type of illness like cancer, it is a descriptive umbrella of common symptoms. The underlying causes can be wildly different)

Vascular dementia doesn't follow our moves steadily though the brain model, cos the strokes can and do happen anywhere. It's rough

What am I talking about, they're all rough. It'll get rougher

Lewy bodies dementia

Often cross diagnosed with Parkinson's disease dementia, it just depends if you get the physical or cognitive symptoms first.

Lewy bodies doesn't tend to have any memory loss. I know, no one thinks that's possible! But this is a dementia without memory loss! Cognitive loss is not the same thing as memory loss, theres other cognitive thing you can lose. That's why they're different words I guess

Of course, in all dementias eventually everything goes. Cos it's progressive, it keeps progressing

Lewy bodies is more likely to cause physical impacts like shaking and shuffling gait. You'll also hallucinate, have delusion, sleep badly, and experience mood swings.

From a care perspective, the people living with Lewy bodies disease are vastly more likely to be violent than any other person living with dementia

Robin Williams had this one, but he never knew. They confirmed via autopsy. So I'm gonna add a fun gif of him cos he was lovely

There's a lot of other disease/illness induced dementias

Huntington's turns into dementia eventually. HIV too. If you have down syndrome you have an extra gene that will always turn into dementia if you live long enough (that's one of our few 100% rates). Alcohol related dementia. So on and so forth. There's a shit tonne of types

Anyway, thats enough about disease progression. I'll talk out a few more common misunderstandings and then post

Is dementia fatal?

Sure is. Most people will die of something else while they have dementia, cos age often comes with comorbidities, but if the only thing you have is Alzheimer's disease it will still kill you. It's taking out your brain cells, eventually you'll forget how to swallow and choke.

Honestly tho it's more likely you'll die 'by accident' due to doing something you didn't realise was dangerous, like going for a walk wearing nothing at night and developing hypothermia. That is a dementia-caused death, I think we can all see that, but it'll be written down as hypothermia. So reported deaths are lower than what's true

Alzheimer's takes 10 - 30 years for the neuron loss to be extreme enough to kill you outright. Lewy bodies is more like 5 - 7 years. There's a range and the ranges are poorly defined, quiz your GP if this ever comes up in your life

It's an old person disease, right?

Overwhelmingly yes. It's considered younger onset if you're less than 65. But from the graph above you can see that's a big enough proportion to get its own slot

But kids don't get it

Sure they do, childhood dementia is a whole thing. It's awful. People are born with it. Again, dementia isn't an illness type, it's a symptom grouping. Kids can be born with progressive, worsening cognitive loss. So while it's not Alzheimer's disease, it is dementia. It's like 1 in 3000 kids have some kind of childhood dementia, and most die before they reach adulthood.

It's untreatable

It is incurable (but they keep researching!) but we have treatments for the early stages. If you or a loved one is experiencing confusion and memory loss, get moving early and you might be able to delay the worsening of symptoms for a few years. It's not a cure, but it's better than nothing. And it's all we've got

How do you, op, know?

I have a master's degree in dementia, and I work in the field. Not naming my job cos I'm not speaking for them rn, I'm just presenting what I know personally

Gonna end the post there. Send me asks or questions or whatever, I'll try and answer. If I get enough asking the same thing I'll do another post expanding on that ❤️❤️❤️

[canichangemyblogname]

I see a lot of posts about how to potentially identify breast cancer on here, but most of them circulate much of the same information: a list of things to look out for without corresponding pictures for things that may be vague except to those who already know due to personal experience. So, I would like to provide people some pictures (of oranges and balloons) to help them recognize some symptoms.

“Dimpled Skin” — these are deep divots in the skin of your breast that may look like an orange peel

“Wrinkled skin” — the skin around your nipple starts to look like the texture of a deflating balloon

“Scaling” — this will be reminiscent of eczema or psoriasis. The majority of the time, if you have dry and flaky skin, it is eczema. Even if it is on your breast, as Paget disease is a rare form of breast cancer. Go to your doctor regardless. Your skin will thank you.

You will want to note whether this “rash” affects the nipple and if the “scaling” is also accompanied by ulcers, which often look raw and open, almost as if your skin popped the largest zit and a crater was left behind (but, crucially, you were not picking at skin).

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Why Millennials aren’t leaving Tiktok

I'm on tour with my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me TOMORROW NIGHT (Mar 22) in TORONTO, then SUNDAY (Mar 24) with LAURA POITRAS in NYC, then Anaheim, and more!

The news that Gen Z users have abandoned Tiktok in such numbers that the median Tiktoker is a Millennial (or someone even older) prompted commentators to dunk on Tiktok as uncool by dint of having lost its youthful sheen:

https://www.garbageday.email/p/tiktok-millennials-turns

But "why are Gen Z kids leaving Tiktok?" is the wrong question. The right question is, why aren't Millennials leaving Tiktok? After all, we are living through the enshittocene, the great enshittening, in which every platform gets monotonically, irreversibly worse over time, and Tiktok is no exception:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys

To understand why older users are stuck to Tiktok, we need to start with why younger users relentlessly seek out new platforms. To some extent, it's just down to youth's appetite for novelty, but that's only part of the story. To really understand why people come to – and leave – platforms, you have to understand switching costs.

"Switching costs" is the economists' term for everything you have to give up when you change products or services. Switching from Ios to Android probably means giving up a bunch of your apps and purchased media. Switching from an airline where you're a high-status frequent flier to another carrier means giving up on free checked bags and early boarding.

In an open market, rivals have lots of ways to lower these switching costs (it's an open secret that you can call an airline and say, "Hi, I'm a 33rd Order Mason on American Airlines, will you make me a Triple Platinum Diamond Sky-Baron if I switch to Delta?"). Of course, big incumbents hate this, and do everything they can to increase their switching costs, finding ways to impose high switching costs that punish disloyal consumers who have the temerity to go elsewhere.

With social media, lock-in comes for free, thanks to the "collective action problem." Getting people to agree on a given course of action is hard, and as you add more people to the picture, the problem gets harder. It's hard enough to get half a dozen people in your group-chat to agree on where to go for dinner or what board-game to play. But once you're reliant on a social media service to stay in touch with friends, relatives around the world, customers, communities (say, rare disease support groups), and coordination (like organizing your kid's little league car-pool), the problem becomes nearly insoluble. Maybe you can convince your overseas relatives to switch to a Signal group, but can you do the same for your small business's customers, or your old high-school pals?

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/29/how-to-leave-dying-social-media-platforms/

Taken together, switching costs and collective action problems make platforms "sticky," and sticky platforms inevitably enshittify.

Platforms, after all, generate value. They connect end-users with each other (say, little league parents) and they connect end-users to business customers (you and your small business's customers). That value needs to be parceled out among end users, business customers, and the platform's shareholders. A platform can make life better for business customers at its end users' expense by increasing the number of ads (hello, Youtube!), and it can make life better for its shareholders at its business customers' expense by decreasing the share of ad revenue given to publishers or performers (oh, hello again, Youtube!).

From a platform's perspective, the ideal state is one in which end users and business customers get no value from the platform, because it's all being captured by the platform's shareholders. But if Youtube interrupted every 30 seconds of video for ten minutes of ads and paid the video creators nothing, both users and creators would ditch the platform – and advertisers would follow:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dab8sKg8Ko8

So platforms seek an equilibrium: "what is the least value we apportion to end-users and business customers without triggering their departure?" Maybe that means giving more value to end-users (for example, keeping Uber fares low by suppressing wages), or to business-customers (crowding more ads into your social media feed).

Every business – including brick-and-mortar, non-digitized ones – wants to find some kind of equilibrium between the value going to its suppliers, its customers and its owners, but digital businesses have an advantage here: digital systems are flexible in ways that analog, hard-goods businesses are not. Digital businesses can alter pricing, payouts and other dynamics from moment to moment – second to second – and make a different offer to every supplier and customer. They have a bunch of knobs, and they can twiddle them at will:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

Well, not quite at will. Businesses face constraints on their twiddling. If they get too greedy, users or business customers might weigh the cost of staying against the switching costs and decide it's not worth it. But the more expensive – the more painful – a platform can make leaving, the more pain they can inflict on the people who stay.

In other words, there's two ways to keep a customer or supplier's business: you can make a better service so they won't want to leave, or you can make leaving the service so painful that they stay even if you mistreat them.

There's three ways a digital company can make things worse for their customers and users without losing their business.

First, they can eliminate competition (think of Mark Zuckerberg buying Instagram to recapture the users who'd fled Facebook to escape his poor management):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/03/big-tech-cant-stop-telling-on-itself/

Second, they can capture their regulators and avoid punishment for trampling their suppliers' or users' legal rights (think of how Amazon has raised the price of everything we buy, both on- and off Amazon, through its "most favored nation" deals):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/greedflation/#commissar-bezos

Third, they can use IP law to prevent competitors from modifying their services to claw back some of that value (think of how Apple used legal threats to block an Android version of Imessage, blocking Apple customers from having private conversations that included non-Apple customers:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/12/youre-holding-it-wrong/#if-dishwashers-were-iphones

Companies can't just use this tricks at will, of course. Antitrust laws can block companies from making anticompetitve acquisitions or mergers. Regulators can punish companies for cheating their customers, workers and users. Technologists can come up with clever ways of modding or reconfiguring existing services with "interoperable" add-ons that let users bargain for better treatment by refusing to accept worse:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/07/adblocking-how-about-nah

Day in, day out, the decision-makers at tech companies test these constraints, twisting the knobs that shift value away from users to shareholders. Their bosses and boards motivate them with "KPIs" that dangle the promise of huge bonuses and promotions for any manager who successfully enshittifies part of the company's products:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/microincentives-and-enshittification/

Decades of pro-corporate, pro-monopoly policy has loosened those knobs. 40 years of lax antitrust meant that companies had a lot of leeway to buy or merge with rivals – that's changing today, but it's tough sledding:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/14/making-good-trouble/#the-peoples-champion

As sectors grew more concentrated, they found it easier to capture their regulators, so that they no longer fear punishment for price-gouging, spying, or wage-theft, so applying the same amount of torque to the "break the law" knob cranks it a lot further:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/05/regulatory-capture/

Once you've captured your regulators, you can aim them at your competitors. A monopoly-friendly policy environment has transformed IP law into a bully's charter, allowing powerful companies to strangle would-be competitors who dare to offer their customers tools to shield themselves from enshittification, like scrapers, ad-blockers and alternative clients. Big companies can crank the enshittification knob all the way over and know that smaller rivals knobs won't turn at all:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/20/benevolent-dictators/#felony-contempt-of-business-model

At one point, bosses faced one more constraint on knob-twiddling: their workforce. Many tech workers genuinely cared about their users' welfare, something bosses encouraged as a sneaky trick to get techies to put in long hours without exercising their leverage by quitting rather than destroying their lives to meet arbitrary deadlines. These workers would fearlessly slap their bosses' hands when they reached for the enshittification knob, threatening to quit rather than allowing the products they'd given so much for to be enshittified. Today, after hundreds of thousands of tech layoffs, tech workers are far less like to challenge their bosses' right to twiddle, and far more likely to get fired if they try:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/10/the-proletarianization-of-tech-workers/

All this means that tech bosses don't have to change their approach at all, and yet, their services will grow steadily worse. The boss who twiddles the enshittification knob in exactly the same way as he did a year or a decade ago will find it turning much further, because his customers are locked into his platform, his regulators won't protect them, the same regulators will stop his competitors' attempts at countertwiddling, and his workers fear losing their jobs too much to speak up for their users.

That's the contagion that produced the enshittocene: the forces that constrained companies (competition, regulation, self-help and labor – all melted away, allowing every company's MBA-poisoned knob-twiddling leaders to shamelessly caress their knobs with every hour that God sends:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/30/go-nuts-meine-kerle/#ich-bin-ein-bratapfel

Which is why people want to leave platforms. When a platform loses its users, those users have weighed the switching costs against the pain of staying and decided that it's better to bear those costs than to stay.

So why have Tiktok's younger users found the costs too high to bear, and why have their elders remained stuck to the platform?

For that, we have to look at the unique characteristics of young people – characteristics that transcend the lazy cliche that kids are easily bored, fickle novelty-seekers who hop from one service to another with unquenchable restlessness.

Whether or not kids are novelty-seekers, they are, fundamentally, a disfavored minority. They want to do things that the platforms don't want them to do – like converse without being overheard by authority figures, including their parents and their schools (also: cops and future employers, though kids may not be thinking about them as much).

In other words, kids pay intrinsically lower switching costs than adults, because a platform will always do less for them than it will for grownups. This is a characteristic kids share with other supposedly technophilic, novelty-seeking "early adopters," from sex-workers to terrorists, from sexual minorities to trolls, from political dissidents to fascists. For those groups, the cost of mastering a new technology and assembling a community around it is always more likely to be worth bearing than it would be for people who are well-served by existing tools:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/21/early-adopters/#sex-tech

Pornographers didn't jump on home video because of its superiority as a medium for capturing flesh-tones. Home video was a good porn medium because it was easier to discreetly get into the hands of porn consumers, who could, in turn, discreetly view it. The audience for porn in the privacy of your living room is larger than the audience for porn that you can only watch if you're willing to be seen marching into a dirty movie theater.

Every new technology is popularized by a mix of disfavored groups and neophiles, who normalize and refine it – and yes, infuse it with their countercultural coolth – until it becomes easy enough to use to become mainstream. As more normies drift into the new system, the switching costs associated with leaving the old system declines. It gets easier and easier to find the people and services you want in the new realm, and harder and harder to find them in the old one.

This is why tech platforms have historically experienced sudden collapse: the platform that gets more valuable and harder to leave as it accumulates users gets less valuable and easier to leave as users depart:

https://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2022/12/05/what-if-failure-is-the-plan.html

If you're a Gen Z kid on Tiktok, you experience the same enshittification as your Millennial elders. But you also experience an additional cost to staying: as late-arriving adult authority figures become more fluent in the platform, they are more able to observe your use of it, and punish you for conduct that you used to get away with.

And if you're a Millennial who isn't leaving Tiktok, it's not just that you experience the same enshittification as those departing Gen Z kids – you also face higher switching costs if you go. The older you get, the more complex your social connections grow. A Gen Z kid in middle school doesn't have to worry about losing touch with their high-school buddies if they switch platforms (they haven't gone to high school yet – and they see their middle school friends in person all the time, giving them a side-channel to share information about who's leaving Tiktok and where they're headed to next). Middle-schoolers don't have to worry about coordinating little league car-pools or losing access to a rare disease support group.

In other words: younger people leave old platforms earlier because they have more to gain by leaving; and older people leave old platforms later because they have more to lose by leaving.

This is why Facebook is filled with Boomers. Yes, their kids bolted for the exits to avoid having their parents (or grandparents) wading into their sexual, social and professional lives. But the reason the Boomers were late joining younger users' Facebook exodus – or the reason they never joined it – is that they stand to lose more by going. Facebook deliberately cultivated this dynamic, for example, by creating a photo hosting service designed to entice users into uploading their family photos while disguising how hard it would be to take those photos with them if they left:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/facebooks-secret-war-switching-costs

The irony here is that tech has intrinsically low switching costs. All other things being equal, a new platform can always build a bridge to ease the passage of users from the old one. There's no (technical) reason that moving to Mastodon, or Bluesky, or any other platform should mean cutting ties with the people who stayed behind.

A combination of voluntary interoperability (where old platforms offer APIs to allow new services to connect with them), mandatory interop (where governments force tech companies to offer APIs) and adversarial interop (where new companies hack together their own API with reverse-engineering, scraping, bots, and other guerrilla tactics) would hypothetically allow users to hop between networks as easily as you change phone carriers:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/19/better-failure/#let-my-tweeters-go

Tech platforms tend to offer APIs when they're getting started (to ease the inward passage of new users) then shut them down after they attain dominance (locking the door behind those users). The EU is tinkering with mandatory APIs through the Digital Markets Act (though bafflingly, they're starting with encrypted messaging rather than social media). Restoring adversarial interoperability will require extensive legal reform, which is getting started through Right to Repair laws:

https://www.techdirt.com/2024/03/13/oregon-passes-right-to-repair-law-apple-lobbied-to-kill/

The people who are stranded on social media platforms shouldn't be mistaken for uncool, aging technophobes. They're not stubborn, they're stranded. Like the elders who can't afford to leave a dying town after the factory shuts down and the young people move away, these people are locked in. They need help evacuating – a place to go and a path to get there.

Name your price for 18 of my DRM-free ebooks and support the Electronic Frontier Foundation with the Humble Cory Doctorow Bundle.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/21/involuntary-die-hards/#evacuate-the-platformsr

[f1byjessie]

A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS ━━ LN4.

sometimes the right words are hard to come across, and sometimes everything you need to say can be captured in an image.

( lando norris x photographer!reader )

━━ part three.

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yourusername is it time for bahrain yet?! can’t wait to see these two back in action again soon! 🧡

view all 4,981 comments

mclaren We keep asking ourselves the same thing! Our engines are ready and we’re raring to go! 🧡

↳ yourusername you truly understand me mclaren admin

↳ mclaren we think you’re the one who truly understands us y/n

↳ user y/n x mclaren admin?? 🤯 the plot twist none of us saw coming

user missing these lads so much lately

user THE RADIO SILENCE ON OSCAR’S SOCIALS WAS KILLING ME I DEPEND ON THESE MEN TOO MUCH THEY KEEP ME ALIVE 😭😭

user the f1 drought is real rn

user MCLAREN SUPREMACY 2024

↳ user i’m trying to be delulu but we all know it’s just gonna be the mv33 and redbull show again this year 🫤

user soooo are we all just gonna pretend like we didn’t see the pics of her with garrett ward orrrrr?

↳ user no bc i was just thinking the same thing 👀

↳ user wait that was actually her??? cuz you can like barely see her face so i thought it was just a joke???

user what a fake ass bitch

user she only posts other ppl on her acc cuz she knows her ugly ass face would scare everyone else away

user homegirl needs to stay tf away from my man fr 😤😤

user god what a hoe 😒 she already has these two that she could fuck with idk why she needed to go after garrett

user SLUT SLUT SLUT

user if she tries anything with anyone else on the city team i’m gonna lose my shit fr

↳ user same omg

↳ user honestly i’m just glad she didn’t go after grealish or haaland 🙌

↳ user she probably would’ve tried if they weren’t taken already 🙄

↳ user nah i bet she’s totally a homewrecker garrett’s probably just the first on her list

user oh… these comments… 😰

↳ user right???

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yourusername the city boys know how it’s done! and looking pretty good in orange too 😉

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mancity The lads are looking good indeed! This weekend’s match against Newcastle should be an exciting one! ⚽️🩵

mclaren ✍️ Jeremy ✍️ Doku ✍️ and ✍️ Ruben ✍️ Dias ✍️ McLaren ✍️ 2025

↳ mancity Do you think Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri would look good in sky blue? 🤔

user funny how she posts every city man BUT garrett

user god when does she go back to f1??

↳ user march iirc

↳ user well it can’t get here soon enough jfc

user FUCK OFF WE DON’T WANT YOU

user you’re a slag and should accept the fact that any guy would only want you bc of how easy you are

user i’ll bet my left leg that the only reason the f1 boys haven’t shacked up with her yet is cuz they know she’s probably riddled with disease since she drools over every guy that comes near her 😒 like girl needs to bffr and realize that throwing herself at every male in her vicinity isn’t gonna land her a husband and it just making her even more of a slut

↳ user nah i’ll bet they’ve all already done her over in f1 but nobody will touch her now that they’ve passed her round so she had to come over to football just to try and get someone to touch her again 🙄🙄🙄

user i hope garrett realizes how much of a slut she is and breaks up with her

user sick and tired of bitches like this getting with footballers and being all controlling. like i’ll bet she’s gonna tell garrett he can’t go out and party with his mates anymore bc he has to spend time in with her and then she’ll get all pissy about him having female fans bc she’s insecure and knows that if garrett got to meet a REAL fan he’d jump ship immediately. those of us who ACTUALLY care about footballers know their fans are super important to them and we wouldn’t hinder their relationship with them just bc we’re jealous or insecure. garrett needs to be with someone who actually supports him and is willing to let him do what he wants instead of controlling him like he’s a dog on a leash.

user kys like genuinely

user god i can’t wait for this skank to die 😒

“Hey Lando, it’s me. Your best friend. Again,” you give a humorless chuckle. “I could seriously use some of your wizened advice right about now, so, uh, please just give me a call back when you can. Thanks.”

It seems poetic in a cruel sort of way that less than a week ago you were walking Etihad Campus and feeling like you were on top of the world━ working a new albeit temporary gig, adding the Manchester City name to your list of clients, having photos of world-renowned footballers in your portfolio━ and now you’ve resigned yourself to hiding away in the women’s restroom, locked in a stall because it’s the only place you could think of where nobody would be able to find you.

You’re on the verge of tears and feeling rather stupid for it.

It’s the third time today alone that your call has gone straight to voicemail, and with the dozens of unread texts you’ve sent in the last week added to the mix, it’s starting to paint a picture you’re not very happy with. Lando is ignoring you. Or he’s blocked you. Or he’s blocked you because he’s ignoring you━

You bite down on your lip, hard, to keep back the sob crawling its way up your throat.

You’re not a PR officer, you hadn’t been lying when you told Garrett that, but you’ve spent enough time around the McLaren PR teams that you’ve picked up enough tips and tricks to know, at the very least, that the best thing you can do is just ignore the comments.

That’s what they tell all the athletes.

What they don’t tell the athletes is that ignoring the comments is much easier said than done, especially when your career requires you to have such a significant online presence. And the thing is, despite all of these strangers hounding you with every name under the sun and criticizing your capabilities, qualifications, and very existence, the thing that hurts the most is the radio silence from the only person you know could make it all better.

Now, more than ever, you need your best friend. But he isn’t here.

You tuck your phone into your jacket pocket and unlock the stall with great reluctance. You know better than to be hiding away, shirking your responsibilities while crying over a few missed phone calls. You have a job to do, and a real professional wouldn’t let something as simple as a handful of tasteless comments get in the way of that.

You should be used to them. It’s nothing you haven’t seen before.

Your first month at McLaren wasn’t entirely different.

When you were first hired on, Carlos had been in Formula One for a handful of years already and had built up a devotedly loyal fanbase with a decently large percentage of possessive fangirls who had come for your head the moment your existence had been announced.

The McLaren Instagram account had posted a picture of you standing between their two grinning drivers, your camera strung around your neck, with a very nice caption welcoming you to the team, and despite no indication that you were by any means involved with either of them in a way that went beyond professional, the comments had been taken over by feral teenage girls who saw the act of you simply standing near Carlos to be a direct threat against their “chances.”

Though it had been frustrating being met with childish threats and petty insults in your comments, you hadn’t really held it against any of them. You remember being a teenage girl and crushing on a celebrity. Deep down you knew you never had a chance with them, but that hadn’t stopped you from hanging posters in your bedroom and doodling their name beneath yours inside of scribbled hearts in your diary.

Regardless, it had taken close to a month for the negativity to die down, and you hadn’t had Lando then, either, so now shouldn’t be much different.

In fact, everyone on the Manchester City team━ trainers, physios, media coordinatiors, and anyone inbetween━ has been very polite about everything between you and Garrett. A lot of them have just avoided saying anything about it, which you’re very grateful for because you don’t think you’d be able to hold back your grimace while thanking them for their well wishes, and the few who have mentioned it typically only say something vague like a wishing you the best of luck or hoping you’re happy.

An intern gave you a sympathetic smile the other day, and you’d nearly burst into tears in the middle of the office of the Director of Communications, so you know you aren’t truly alone in this.

You just feel alone.

Exiting the bathroom is a simple affair. There’s no one standing post outside ready to give you any shit for being hidden away, and nobody comes sprinting around the corner as you make your way down the hall to the press conference room that’s been temporarily turned into your base of operations.

You think you’ll probably be able to go the rest of the afternoon without running into anyone, when you open your door and find━ sitting in the front row of the seats typically saved for journalists and the press, scrolling across his phone with a disinterested look painted across his face━ Jack Grealish.

“Jack,” you greet, a bit shocked. You close the door to the room gently behind you, and cross the distance to your desk. “Did we have a meeting scheduled? It must’ve completely slipped my mind, I sincerely apologize.”

He offers you a polite smile. “No, we didn’t, so no need to be sorry. I actually just wanted to check in. See how things are going with everything.”

You blink at him in surprise. Apart from Garrett, you haven’t really had much time to speak with the other players. They wish you good morning and good afternoon when they see you, and if a ball goes astray they always call out for you to watch your head, but between their morning training and their afternoon training, their strategy reviews at lunch, and the frequent in between meetings with physios, nutritionists, and trainers, they don’t get much time to chit chat with a simple photographer.

You clear your throat, “Erm, it’s going well. I’ve gotten some really good shots these past few days. There’s one with Rodrigo that I’m particularly proud of. It should do well with the fans.”

“And things with Ward?”

You purse your lips.

“Figured.” Jack sighs. “Look, nearly everyone you run into here knows or has at least some inkling into what he’s like. He’s a prick. None of the lads on the team like him, it’s why the managers are trying to get him out of here.”

You lower yourself down into your chair. “He told me they were planning to trade him off because of his reputation.”

Jack scoffs, “Yeah, ‘cause that’s the ‘official’ reason. They can’t cut his contract early for legal reasons, so they’re waiting for it to expire and coming up with an excuse for why they ain’t re-signing him. It’s really just ‘cause the rest of us can’t keep dealing with his massive ego and the fact that he’s a misogynistic fuck who doesn’t know the first thing about respect.”

“Fucking tell me about it,” you mutter with a sigh.

If he expected you to defend Garrett and is surprised by the fact that you haven’t, Jack doesn’t show it. He looks relaxed sitting across from you, like you’re having a casual conversation and not actively shit talking a member of his team. It gives you the impression that he knows significantly more about Garrett than you do, and that because of what he knows he probably figured out that one party in the relationship is not the most willing of participants.

“How’d you get all wrapped up it in then? Didn’t figure you to be the type to go after pricks like Ward.”

You debate over whether you should tell him or not. There isn’t much Jack can do about the situation regardless, but it would at least get things off your chest and if someone else knew then maybe you wouldn’t feel so alone anymore.

There’s only so many days you can spend hiding out in the women’s restroom trying not to bawl your eyes out, and you’ve already reached your limit.

You heave a sigh, “It’s kind of fucked up really.” A pen on your desk catches your attention and you start to fiddle with it, avoiding Jack’s eyes which have focused directly onto you. “He asked if I would help him fix up his reputation by pretending to be his girlfriend so he could show everyone that he’s matured and can hold down a steady relationship. When I told him no, he threatened to make up a lie about inappropriate conduct to get me fired and blacklisted from the industry, so for the sake of preserving my career I agreed.”

“Bloody fucking hell,” Jack murmurs, shaking his head. “I’m real sorry he did that, Y/N.”

You shrug. “It’s happened, so, there’s nothing I can really do except wait it out at this point.”

When you look up and meet his gaze, Jack looks murderous. His hands are clenched into fists on the armrests, knuckles white with the strength of his grip. His brows are furrowed, and his lips are twisted downward in a scowl.

“If you need anything,” he starts, “let me know. And I mean it. We all know how Ward can be. He’s a knobhead. So if you need anything━” his emphasis on the word and what that implies makes you feel more comforted than anything has since the whole fiasco started, “━then you let me know, or you tell one of the other boys and they’ll find me, alright?”

All you can do is nod.

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yourusername there’s no place like home

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━━ tags: @maih23 @urfavnoirette @leclercsluv @f1luvur @formulaal @a-disturbing-self-reflection @starlightpierre @chezmardybum @marshmummy @405rry

━━ a/n: no lando yet, but we've got a cutesy little grealish scene to make up for it because i couldn't have a story with manchester city and not include him! lowkey writing this part made me wanna write for a footballer too... anyways! hope you all enjoy!

[ahhhwomen]

How did R’s react when he ate sweets for the first time and how did Natasha and Wanda react?

a/n: I am very close to calling this its own chapter given the fact that it is 4.5k and I lost my mind trying to write it. Is it good? I don't know. Did I proff read it? Fuck no, I'm over this shit. Anyway, enjoy the girlie's first kiss ig.

Contains slight spoilers for unreleased chapters of Vampire Empire

Warning: Implied force-feeding, talk of vomit, food anxiety, gay simps

The goop inside your bowl is scarcely edible.

At least that’s what you think, not that it matters, you don’t have opinions.

Half of it clings to the sides of your bowl, strangely solid yet somehow entirely liquid, the other half of the sustenance is spilled and hanging off the bent metal´s side. The closer it gets to midnight, the worse it looks.

A whimper echoes against hollow walls and joins the wails of fellow prisoners as the shattering pain inside your jaw bares its ugly teeth at the thought of creaking itself open for the sludge that could be mistaken for concrete.

In the first few hours, it had a color close to desirable. Now, the color reminds you more of the ground stained with your bodily fluids, because much like your blood, dried grab slathers itself against the cold outside of your bowl.

Picture perfect representation of your life story: desired, if only for a moment.

The scarce portion left on the inside is like a heap of coagulated blood, it jiggles and splatters against the metal beside your cracked hands. You could almost swear it has a pulse of its own. Gasping for the same chilled air that burns your lungs, the traumatizing, grey, something, moves up and down- breathing.

Footsteps of a handler emit in the empty air, heavy like the raging rain, the clash of his boots forces you to move faster. Much like a hurt deer, you drag your body across the ground until you are close enough to grasp the cool metal and force its insides down your closing throat.

Your broken jaw shrieks and cracks as you use both your hands to split it open with a sickening crunch.

If only they cut away your sense of smell too, that way you might not gag as much while the thick liquid, with the stench of a dead body, gurgles itself down your throat. It's like swallowing a handful of sand mixed with the guts of a diseased fish.

At this point, starving yourself would be the better option, but there was no point. Unless you wanted a tube stuck down your throat tonight, you would have to stomach it yet another day.

Manicured nails wrap around the delicate throat of a wine glass. Red liquid, which will never quench her thirst, swirls gently as she rotates her wrist in a circular motion. The glass is chilled and smooth against her fingertips, a soothing distraction from her twisting thoughts.

It's almost humorous, most would be concerned if their pet didn’t eat, yet here she was, concerned that you did.

A frustrated sigh builds within her, crawling up her stomach until she has to fight the air she breathes, in an attempt to not startle you as you rest beside her outstretched feet. It's not that she wasn’t happy you ate her food, or that your lack of pickiness angered her, it was just weird.

No matter what she put in front of you, you would eat it but rarely look like you enjoyed it. Even the most lavish of meals would be regarded with horribly hidden cringing. With a sigh, Wanda leans forward slightly, being extra careful not to disturb you as she changes her position, she rests her elbow on the plush cushion to her left and mulls it over.

There had been multiple instances where you would end up serving the food right back up again after finally getting it down, a clear sign that you either didn’t like it or ate too much of it.

A frown settles over stern features at the memories.

Even after you would throw up, you would attempt to consume it again with a grim expression adoring your pale features. Luckily Wanda was always there to remove it before you could try a second time, but then you would look like a scolded child and hide yourself away for the rest of the day.

It's as if the very idea of leaving the damn food alone gave you a whole crisis.

So, that’s how she finds herself now, in dire need of a solution as your weight has been dropping rapidly due to the reverse your stomach so often does. She needs to find a way to make you understand that it's okay to dislike something and that it's also okay to express pleasure for certain foods.

With a huff, Wanda continues to swirl her wine gently, it swishes against the sides and glides into thick droplets before merging itself back into its voluminous state. The irony isn’t lost on the older redhead, she supposes it’s slightly amusing that the only drink she deems worthy of her time resembles her most addictive poison.

Drifting her gaze over to your sleeping form she can’t help but admire your neck for a moment, the smooth skin jumping up and down with the quirk of your sensitive pulse. Your vein is so close to her, ready at her disposal. Of course, she would never bite you, not until you were ready, yet she couldn’t help but fantasize every now and then…

Your heady taste coating her tongue and throat, Wanda inhales deeply as she watches you sleep, your scent burns like sweet bourbon. Much like your smell, she imagines your taste would be similar; rich, and sweet… Sweet.

Wanda almost has to refrain from an incredulous laugh as the thought strikes her like lightning, the most obvious choice of them all; sweets.

However, even with such a lethal weapon up her sleeve, there were still certain challenges that would follow.

Due to her preference for keeping your diet strict and healthy, she imagined you were quite unfamiliar with the concept of anything remotely sweet. She would have to do this carefully, not wanting food to become a point of stress for you, more than it already was, she needed to introduce the new taste with something you are familiar with.

Twirling the glass around Wanda stared down at the deep red in thought, her knitted sweater irked her slightly as it slid across her skin, following her motions. With a huff, she took a sip of her fruity wine, as it lathered itself against her tastebuds, a bolt struck her for the second time that night.

Fruits.

Wanda had seen Natasha attempt to introduce you to the foreign concept before. And though it ended with a rather grumpy you after Natasha tricked you into trying a lemon, you had seemed… happier with the simplicity of it rather than your dinners.

To be fair Natasha had only managed to convince you to try the simplest and most universal fruits, such as bananas and apples, and of course, that lemon- but that one also set Natasha’s progress back by a week as you refused to try anything else she offered you.

Wanda’s eyebrows knit as she thinks it over… so you do know how to deny food?

Then how come every time Wanda served you breakfast or dinner you would eat until you threw up?

Amid her deep loophole of theories, a cramp hit Wanda’s leg, unconsciously she moved it slightly to the left, toward you. It wasn’t until she watched your sleeping form arch away from her by instinct that she realized you truly don’t trust Wanda. At least not the way you do Natasha.

She really shouldn’t be surprised.. she had seen it endless times by now, but the idea that you would push your body to such lengths because of her was more devastating than she could ever imagine.

It pained her to think that you deemed force-feeding yourself the lesser evil of the situation.

Yet, that would have to be a problem to punish her mind with at a later date, the important thing now was to help bring stability to your life and diet. Even if you don’t trust her, you do seem to have some resemblance of trust toward Natasha, or well, at least after she swore never to trick you again, you do.

And though she can use that to her advantage, it doesn’t give an immediate resolution; Natasha was scarcely home before your bedtime and wouldn’t be able to serve you your breakfast or dinner, and it was important to Wanda that the routine they had built for you stayed solid as sudden change had caused quite a few mishaps in the past.

So, as the businesswoman Wanda is, she starts mentally preparing a game plan for tonight and sends a quick text to Natasha, asking her to pick up a little something before returning home.

If this worked in her favor, it could strengthen your trust in her, which would in return at least start the path to recover some of your weight.

A few hours later, you and Wanda had long since abandoned your napping spots on the couch in favor of slipping into your own corners of the house. The older woman in her office and you, most likely, under a piece of tucked away furniture where you knew you wouldn’t be disturbed.

The door opens with a silent twist of the expensive, vintage, handle. Natasha cringes as her boots drag across the carpet, she had warned Wanda against installing it right next to the main door, but her wife wasn’t easily persuaded. Sure enough, as soil splatters itself in distinctive Natasha-pressed footprints, Natasha knows she will be in trouble in about ten seconds.

1…

Nat discards her dirty work shoes on the little shelf to her left, leaving another muddy print on the metal.

2…

Fixing the grocery bag around her shoulder Natasha wonders what wicked plan Wanda has planned for the three of you tonight.

3…

The older redhead didn’t have to tell her wife that she was hashing out a plan, Natasha could figure it out just due to one of the items she was instructed to buy.

4…

It’s not as if her wife doesn’t like this item, it’s just that she never really requests it, and least of all so late and out of the blue.

5… 6… 7…

As the seconds tick by without a single sound from her wife, Natasha gets a little confused. Usually, Wanda would always be there to welcome her home and reprimand her for bringing in her dirty shoes.

8… 9…

Today, however, it seems her wife must be preoccupied with her little plan.

10.

“What have I told you about bringing your dirty shoes inside?”

Natasha almost jumps out of her skin when she feels the words breathe down her neck. Turning around in a millisecond, she sees Wanda smirk at her while she leans against the door.

“Jesus Wanda, you really have to stop doing that! One day I am going to have a heart attack!” Rich laughter travels through Natasha’s ears as Wanda sinks deeper against the door in her fit of indulgent giggles while she shakes her head at her wife’s spooked expression.  

Pushing herself away from the expensive oak, she slides her hands around her wife’s waist and nuzzles into Natasha’s neck, mouthing the words against her, “Darling, you don’t have a heart.” Natasha huffs but leans her head more to the left, giving Wanda space to kiss and bite as she sees fit.

“Not true…” The younger redhead mumbles it mostly to herself and Wanda simply hums against her as she drags the point of her canines slowly down from beneath Nat´s ear and down to her thoracic outlet.

Red, angry, lines form as she can’t help but add a little pressure behind the drag, feeling Nat’s pulse jump and hammer right beneath her tongue. Barley refraining from sinking her teeth in, Wanda releases Natasha with a sigh and one last kiss to the junction between her neck and shoulder.

Natasha attempts to lean back in hopes of gaining contact again, but there is no point. Before she can even blink, Wanda is halfway across the hallway, holding the bag Nat just had within her grasp.

“Not fair.” The younger woman whispers to herself and pretends not to see the smirk her wife sends her way.

Dark red heels click against the marble flooring as the rustle of plastic echoes within their space, “Find kitten and bring her to the living room, please.” The plea is more for show than anything, Wanda is more than aware that her wife can’t say no to her.

The grumbled, “Yes, ma’am”, is ignored as Wanda has already made her way out of sight before Natasha can get the words out.

With a huff and a quick check of her watch, Natasha makes her way upstairs to find the little culprit.

If anyone were to ask you, you would say Natasha Romanoff was a witch.

It’s the only palpable explanation as to how she always knows where you are, at least that’s what you think as you can hear her knock on the dresser you were napping under.

The bone knocks against the wood in a ticking manner, one knock, two knocks, and at last a rasp against the oak as she lets her hand drag across the dresser. It’s a heavy yet light sound that calls out to you as you are tempted to peek your head out and question her on her witch-like abilities.

You refrain from doing so and for a moment your body is unsure whether to be impressed or panicked at how easily she can predict you.

The cold floor beneath the dresser is tempting to melt into and never return from as you can hear her light steps drag across the floor beside you, any second now you know you will see her eyes look right through the darkness and find their resting place on you.  

Facing the world wasn’t something you wanted to do at this moment.

And yet, it never comes…

When you turn your head and expect to see cat-like eyes staring back at you from outside the dark corners surrounding you, you are surprised to instead see her sock-clad feet with strange plastic eyes plastered onto them.

The little black pupils rattle against her movements as she curls her feet in a manner that makes the strange sock creature look as if it’s been caught and feels guilty. It looks a little silly and you honestly don’t know how to react to the absurdity of it, so without realizing it a sweet giggle slips out before you can stop it.

Oh no…

When the realization of what you have just done settles within your storming thoughts you have half the mind to slap your hand across your mouth and pray that the older woman didn’t hear it, but as you hear a pleased huff of breath above you, you know you have been caught.

Natasha kneels down until she can peek under the dresser to where your scared eyes study her. She knew to keep her reactions to a minimum, but as soon as she heard your gleeful expression, Natasha had to use every ounce of willpower not to coo.

“Hey baby,” Nat smiles at you as you bite your lip, unsure of her reaction to your slip of judgment, you hold back the pleased grumble building within your chest at her smooth tone.

It ends up being one hell of a task to get you out of there, Natasha has to swear up and down that, your little slip-up didn’t anger her, and then she has to spend the next ten minutes waiting for you to peak your head out.

But, after a bit of coaxing, Natasha can hear your palms lightly slap against the flooring as you follow her a few steps behind. The dig of the wood beneath her feet lets her know that they should invest in some more carpets, or perhaps mats, as this could surely not be good for your weak joints.

The redhead walks in a leisurely stroll, letting you stay close yet still have the desired distance as you pitter-patter behind her.

When the plush carpet molds itself to her stance, Natasha’s movements come to a halt. She stops short of the couch, watching her wife sit in a rather relaxed pose. With her hands stretched out at the top of the cushions, she sits with her chin held high and her rump sunken low.

Natasha almost snickers at her wife’s overly dominant presence, but something about the look in Wanda’s eyes tells her to sit this one out and wait for further instructions.

Wanda observes the both of you as you present yourselves before her watchful eyes. You stay low, crawling forward just enough to satisfy the scary lady. The older redhead’s skin itches with the need to smirk as you crawl toward the both of them, something primal within her, pleased.

Humming, to soothe both her wife and you, Wanda directs her attention to Natasha as her wife waits for an explanation.

She wants to drag it out and make Nat guess as much as you will have to.

This will be a game of trust after all. The need to tease her wife is strong, so, Wanda does as she pleases.

Lifting her pointer, she waves it around in the air for a moment, building a little suspense as the whirlwind swirls around her aura, and then she points over to the living room table.

Atop the table is a plate of sliced apples covered in chocolate, placed deliberately outside of your view.

As Natasha directs her sight to whatever it is Wanda is showing off, you can’t help but try and sneak in a peak yourself. However, much to your disappointment, the item, or whatever it is, is sat just high enough on the table to where you can’t see from your kneeled-down position.

Someone may call you paranoid, but to you, it all seems awfully intentional on the clan leader’s end.

The waving pointer is redirected to you as Natasha smirks for whatever reason while she turns back toward her wife. With a pleasant, and a little scary, smile, Wanda eases your tension as she tilts her head to the side in adoration before ordering her wife to, “Give her a taste, darling.”

Your eyes travel up to the redhead beside you as she moves away for a moment only to return with a platter with some sort of brown rocks on top of it. They make a strange crackling noise as Natasha places it down on the small table in front of the both of you.

Then, a hand comes into view as Natasha heeds her wife’s commands.

Pale, cold, fingertips are wrapped around the strange item that you figure must be some sort of food given the clan leader’s figure of speech, but you aren’t entirely convinced as you view it with uncertainty.

However, the fight is futile as you look up to the tall redhead in questioning hesitance, she smiles gently and as much as it annoys you, you are what the two older women have previously referred to as a “goner”.

Taking a hesitant bite, the crunch of the apple is slightly muted by the strange crackling layer of chocolate. It takes a few bites before the flavor hits you. Chewing slowly, it lies bare for your raw tastebuds to reap, gliding and emerging with your senses.

As your jaw creaks in displeasure, you focus on the heaviness of the treat.

It’s rich at first, almost overwhelming you with its sweetness. It reminds you of wintertime when the bakery just a few streets down from the shelter would emit the most beautiful of smells. It brings you back to the cold nights when you would lay, naked and bruised, beneath your red lamp and envision yourself inside the bakery. Stuffing your face with whatever you might desire.

Weak bones fight themselves as you gorge on the sugary addiction, it sticks to your gums and sneaks its way into the most stubborn corners of your teeth, making a distinctive smacking noise as you bite down repeatedly.

Then the flavor settles, it’s a more muted and pleasantly balanced mix of delightful, creamy, sugar and slightly sour apple. Your jaw works deftly, moving up and down in an unsure manner.

It tastes… good.

It tastes wonderful.

Amazing even.

Perhaps the best thing you have ever eaten. Which all makes you feel like a fool…

It tastes like everything you were ever denied.

Therefore, you sit and wait.

While Natasha and Wanda sit before you with bated breaths, slightly confused by your lack of reaction, you just look at them with beady eyes filled with… betrayal?

It cuts deep, as if your emotions slice through any physical or emotional armor that may surround the two not-so-human creatures. Pain oozes inside their slowly beating hearts as the ice perishes and hot molten burns through their veins until horror takes place.

Wanda is on the ground in front of you before you can even blink.

“Oh, baby…” She leans forward, shifting her weight onto her palms as she rests them beside her bent knees, lowering her torso toward the wooden floor as she crawls toward you. Her shirt rolls up at the action, untucking itself and riding up her back until a sliver of pale flesh showcases itself, but she doesn’t care, instead, she keeps going, slowly.

You tense at the movement, unsure of yourself, you cower away from her, for every inch she advances, you slither back. Deep down you know Wanda would never hurt you, but you also know that if she ever were to desire your misery; she would be far worse than Master.

Calm eyes track your motions as you crawl away from her in a rather desperate fashion, the fact that it does not seem to deter her from getting any closer makes the panic, creeping up your throat, raw and painful as the taste of acid coats itself over sensitive tastebuds.

Sensing your oncoming panic, Wanda stops, for the time being, sitting back on her heels, she makes a show of resting her hands on top of her thighs. Her fingers glide over the material of her fancy-dress pants silently, the ruffles and stretching of the material calm you for a reason you cannot explain.

Little confused, wooden tiles burrow into you as you settle your rump down against them, letting the anxiety simmer and calm before seeking eye contact in an uncertain question. Your head tilting slightly to the left, you wait for her to illuminate her sudden display of surrender and levelheaded dominance.

Perhaps she just wanted first-row seats to your pathetic reaction.

Whatever they put in the dessert is sure to kick in soon.

“Ah…” Wanda hums as she views your saddened eyes up close.

“Natasha. Hand me that would you?” Natasha, who had been sitting rather shell-shocked for the past few moments as her wife hunted you down, shakes it off and tilts her head in confusion for a moment before realization settles in.

With a huff, something mixed with relief and disbelief, Natasha hands over the half-eaten chocolate-covered apple slice that had just been fed to you.

The half-melted chocolate covers the expanses of Wanda’s fingertips as she holds it out for you to see. Then, before you can get nervous about having to eat another piece, it disappears as Wanda puts it in her own mouth instead.

For a moment after you just stare.

Watching as her jaw works before your very eyes, you still can’t help but wait for a sudden change, a frown to deepen, or a foul sound as the flavor takes over the older woman’s senses.

Yet, it never comes.

Small crinkles form around Wanda’s eyes as she chews, they move up and down, changing together with her muscle’s expansion and retraction. They stay consistent with every motion, never faltering in its path.

Like tiny wrinkles on a sheet of paper, it smoothens once she finishes her piece. Letting out a pleased sigh as she does so, clearly delighted by the sweet treat.

And like the snapping apple piece.

You break.

It’s like raindrops against a windshield, almost a question of what tears will win as riveting streams trickle down your chin at an alarming rate. It’s nothing like the few traitorous tears that the redheads have been privy to, no it’s like a raging storm as you hiccup in sorrow at the prospect of respect.

At the sight, Natasha draws in a weary hiss, yet Wanda doesn’t seem to change much at all.

There is no pity in her eyes while she closes in, only determination as she slides another apple piece halfway inside her own mouth and lessens the distance. Too distracted by your own sudden outburst, you don’t even realize what is happening until chocolate grazes your lips as the redhead waits for permission while resting her lips only a few centimeters from your own.

The sudden action shocks you to such degree that you have nodded consent before you understand what that may mean.

Smooth, soft, lips press against your chapped ones, a sweet delight getting slid into your mouth and mixing with the rose that invades your nostrils. A slight string of spit is split between the two of you as Wanda uses her hot tongue to push the piece all the way into your mouth. You both stay like that for a moment, Wanda gazing into your eyes while you stare bashfully into hers.

Yet, just as quick as it happened, it’s gone again… And much to your own surprise, that may be the saddest part of the entire day.

But you can’t be sad for too long as gentle fingers wipe your tears away and a deeper voice asks if you want another piece.

So, this is why the two redheads like kissing so much. You think to yourself as Natasha kisses you with just as much worship as her wife had while the chocolaty goodness seems irrelevant.

They continue it like that back and forth. Wanda gives you one piece, then Natasha, then they share a piece, and so on. It still takes you a while for the tenseness inside your muscles to loosen, but toward the end, you are eager for each piece and wait with impatient eyes as the redheads share some.

It may not have been an immediate fix, but Wanda is more than happy with the result of her little test. For now, Wanda will lessen your portions until you seem happier, and she will have to look out for signs of your dislikes, but if all goes according to plan, with a little help from a secret sugary treat, and maybe a kiss here and there, your trust in her should build to be strong.

Even stronger than Natasha’s if Wanda gets her way.

Which she always does.

[cripplecharacters]

Hi, do you have any good resources explaining common types of facial differences (preferably with pictures)? I already have a character with a port wine birthmark, but I want to incorporate a variety of facial differences in my body of work.

Hi! I'm glad you're interested in learning more about facial differences :) (smile) ! Especially with having more than one character.

My main recommendation would be "Types Of Visible Difference" by ChangingFaces. You can read it here. There are other pages linked there (the "see our page on X") that break specific types of facial differences further with pictures and/or descriptions, either way giving you basic information on what to google search for further research. A big category that this page is missing are facial differences caused by chromosomal conditions, which are extremely common (for example Down Syndrome).

There is also "Defining Facial Differences" by AboutFace that has way more entries, but there are no photos and it has a lot of medical language. If you're just looking for ideas it can be great to just read the little blurb written about the condition and then search for actual pictures if that's something you're looking for. It also allows you to filter for congenital and acquired conditions which is pretty cool (and also see that a huge portion of facial differences is congenital!).

The third (worst) option is just going through Wikipedia pages in the "skin-related conditions" or "craniofacial syndromes" categories but a lot of these are very rare/obscure and a lot of them don't have images attached. The first two options are much better in my opinion but it's still something (?).

My personal recommendations for common but unrepresented facial differences to incorporate would be craniofacial conditions (e.g., Treacher Collins or Apert Syndromes), chromosomal disorders (e.g., Wolf–Hirschhorn or Down Syndromes), cranial nerve diseases (they're mostly just differentiated by numbers unfortunately, but there's a couple of them), and cancers of the head and/or neck. It would be nice to see them shown more, especially in a positive light :) (smile) !

I hope this helps!! Thank you for your ask

mod Sasza

[thinking-emoji]

I'm seeing your 2024 predictions and they're so fun, I wanted to join in! Here's what I absolutely believe will happen in 2024:

- Both Dan and Phil expand their presence here on Tumblr. Tumblr phannies panic.

- Twitter phannies cancel dnp for being on Tumblr. After all, people on Tumblr are all problematic!

- Dnp let us decide via a poll which game should become a series on dnpg. Dragon City wins unexpectedly.

- Tier list video on dnpg: Ranking Phan Conspiracy Theories! It turns out that the theories are mostly post-hiatus, and we do not recognise the majority of them.

- Dating app sponsorship with similar levels of credibility as the old tinder sponsorships, just gay this time

- Phil posts about another medical experience and gets armchair diagnosed by phannies with some rare disease. Further research shows that this "disease" does not actually exist in the medical literature.

- Cornelia/Martyn break up rumours

- They take a 4 month summer break and we lose our fucking minds

- WAD is released for streaming. Shortly after, the streaming platform it's released on is exposed to have very unfortunate political affiliations.

- Phil changes his hair again. And again. And again! He's discovered that he can change his hair after all these years with the fringe. Now he's unstoppable!

- Dan announces a live show - in Mexico City! In order to, his words, "make up for the II clusterfuck". At last minute, the show is cancelled.

- Conversely, dnp go on a holiday to Iceland, where the one Icelandic person who watches them meets them by pure chance at a bar in Reykjavik.

- The Christmas tree delivery guy finally wears a kilt this year! Phil takes a celebratory selfie with him (and the tree) at their front door, posts it, a casual new viewer submits the picture to one of those geoguessr youtubers, who then outs dnp's address to their surprisingly large audience.

[cpvnksabm]

@ rtc fic writers

you really do have to research neuromuscular disabilities if ricky significantly appears in your fics. few to no exceptions. sorry.

ricky potts is important disability representation and, more specifically, he has a rare degenerative neuromuscular disease. this specific representation is important and therefore it's important to depict his neuromuscular disorder accurately. all disabilities are different and it's a huge problem when people, not understanding and/or not wanting to research neuromuscular disorders specifically, just give him any disability while erasing the one he canonically has, and think it's fine just because "well he's still disabled isn't he?".

i think canon (as in 2015-2018 scripts) is a good starting reference point for depicting ricky accurately because again, the specific disability he has in canon is important to represent. but canon also only seriously depicts him as disabled very briefly on-stage and spends most of the musical doing singing and dancing that he wouldn't be physically capable of if he was alive. if you're depicting ricky realistically for longer than canon does then you will have to do outside research to see how his disability would likely impact him, because you're definitely not getting a full picture from him using crutches for 2 minutes onstage.

i think sometimes people assume they don't have to worry about researching to write ricky, because they don't think he's a major enough character for his disability to become relevant - or, more upsettingly, i think sometimes people make ricky a more minor character so that his disability won't become relevant, because that way they don't have to do research.

unfortunately there's one big issue here, which is that if you haven't done the research, how can you know when his disability will be relevant?

ricky has a complex disability that would realistically affect his whole life in varying ways and what we see in canon is only a surface level view. let's say you're writing a fic where you don't need to bother researching for ricky because his only appearance is going out for lunch with the choir - did you know that neuromuscular disorders, especially ones that cause difficulty speaking or an inability to speak (which ricky has!), often cause difficulty swallowing? this would affect his diet and in fact potentially imply that he uses a feeding tube (which is also implied by one of ocean's lines in WTWN), making it very relevant when getting lunch with the choir!

of course that lunch idea is just a hypothetical example, and it's just one example. what i'm saying here is that there are many activities that seem simple, that you wouldn't even think twice about in relation to ricky, that would realistically be complicated by his disability.

of course not every fic has to tackle disability in detail, or even has time to do so, but it's noticeable when something happens where ricky's disability would impact him and it just isn't mentioned. it's something that can accidentally slide into disability erasure, which is a problem, and it also just makes it really obvious when the writer wasn't aware of something or didn't think very hard about it. heck this post is mainly directed at fic writers but i've even seen headcanon posts where it's been obvious the OP needed to do a little more research.

so basically, when i say you need to research to write ricky accurately & understand his disability, i don't just mean that if you're planning on writing a fic that significantly involves his disability you should research for that fic specifically. i think that you should do some basic research before you plan on writing anything, just to make sure you understand his disability when you're active in the fandom. and then if his disability becomes more relevant in a fic - which you will be able to recognise due to the basic research you've already done - you can do more research as needed.

besides, even if it turns out you never write anything where this is relevant, there's no harm in learning more about neuromuscular disease and disability in general! it might become useful information in real life at some point, or it might just be good to know.

[deepspace-mens-socialarchives]

A list of Zayne's Moment posts archived here so far

There will be drastic change in the pinned section as it no longer can hold anymore links . i appreciate your involvement throughout . its been a journey in this acc

❄️the snow stopped

❄️Traffic jam

❄️Dusk or Dawn

❄️Cat's blessing

❄️Rabbit escaped

❄️it's fun and easy (first plushie)

❄️let's go home (3 plushie)

❄️angry mc obtained (No plushie)

❄️goodluck (1st SSR meow badge)

❄️has anyone seen my socks

❄️haggle through Language barrier

❄️Queueing [aff 62]

❄️Trial and error

❄️Diseased Mind

❄️Drink Plenty of water

❄️Stroll on the road

❄️surprise

❄️someone said we were only taking picture-

❄️Earbuds are broken[snapshot same pose]

❄️Reminders

❄️Philosophers[snapshot specific duo pose]

❄️I'm now accustomed to [snapshot follow up]

❄️Squirrel brought a friend[related to feed the squirrel chat]

❄️Power suddenly went out

❄️Medium rare

❄️Three notification for light meal

❄️Captchas aren't scientific

❄️between the results of medical exam and theoretical exam-

❄️learned a lot of weird trivia

❄️ Fun thing [aff 77]

❄️ paper penguin [aff 58]

❄️ blankets power

❄️waiting at the concert

❄️Mild myopia

❄️100% sugar latte to go

❄️recent chat fills up Doctor patient joke collection

❄️Refrigerator turned into magnet display case

❄️crab roe soup dumpling

❄️special gift 💞41

❄️A game of Ring toss at the fair

❄️wrong size of cup ended up with water tank

❄️Rock cake from creative cuisine market

❄️Expressions are more captivating than magic

❄️Hospital's Downstair Neighbour

❄️Best award[cuteness crush]

❄️Too chatty while riding bicycle

❄️who's being teased[MeowsTime]

❄️Moment of leisure[Meow's Time]

❄️Meeting effects~White Noise playlist

❄️posting about summit on moments

❄️Strange thought during photoshoots [Glint]

❄️A Sense of Ceremony 💞81 ❄️Zoo 💞88 ❄️orange peels trick

❄️some people vow to make lunch

[unabashegirl]

Bella Hadid || Instagram Blurb

Author's note: Hello everyone! Here is a new instagram blurb. I hope all of you enjoy it. Also let me be clear my inbox is open so leave your request!

masterlist

liked by harrysfan98, yourbestfriend and 70,496 others

yourinstagram I really wish we could have been everything I dreamed we would be

view all 5039 comments

harryfan304 did they break up?

harrysfa928 why does she look like she has been crying?

yourfan20 he doesn't deserve you! You are too good for you.

yourbestfriend I'm coming over.

liked by harryfan398, harryfan294 and 50,083 others

tmz_tv Harry Styles seen with a mystery woman only days after alleged breakup with super model Y/N Y/L/N. Multiple sources close to the couple say that the breakup ended in good terms and that it was Y/N who ended things with Harry. What do you think?

view all 10,487 comments

harrysfan20 I doubt it. She is nothing without him

yourfan12 she was a model before him.

yourfan376 good for her. we all know that he would enventually cheat. Look how quickly he moved on. and he was in love with her?

harryfan194 he is allowed to move on

liked by jacobelordi, neymar and 15,285 others

yourinstagram back at Vogue's headquarters 📍

view all 2958 comments

jacobelordi 👀

yourfan48 stop cause they would be the hottest couple ever

yourbestfriend how the hell can you manage to look like that? 🙄

sabrinacarpenter hott 🔥

liked by harrystyles, harrysfan56 and 8948 others

yourbestfriend wish I could take your place and give you a second without pain. I love you. 💕

view all 2406 comments

yourinstagram having you here gives me enough strength💜

yourfan48 so worried abt her

yourfan295 pls tell her that we are here for her

harryfan395 what's going on with her? is she sick?

yourfan184 she suffers from a cronic disease

liked by yourbestfriend, harrys948 and 40,294 others

enews Harry Styles has been seen flying back from England to New York. Close sources have reported that he is in New York to see Y/N Y/L/N due to the delicate state that she is currently on. The model has been fighting with a rare chronic disease that hasn't been disclosed to the public. Last week, her best friend posted a picture of her state which concerned the majority of her fans. We hope the model recovers soon and send our best wishes.

view all 20,857 comments

harryfan398 pls leave them alone.

y/nismyfavorite stop following him. only you people would take advantage of the situation.

liked by harrystyles, ariannagrande and 70,396 others

yourinstagram There has been of speculation about my health online lately. I just wanted to come on here and let everyone know that I am doing well and slowly recovering. I also wanted to clarify that I won't be disclosing any details about my disease and I would appreciate some privacy in the matter. Please stop calling my family and interrogating them. Thank you for all your messages. I will hopefully be back soon. 💖

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ariannagrande love you! I can't wait to see you 💜

niallhoran stay strong 🥹

kendalljenner we miss you terribly ✨

harrystyles ❤️

yourfan he is definitely checking up on her and with her.

liked by jeffzoffs, pillowpersonpp and 2,583, 958 others

harrystyles Your blue-green eyes are driving me insane.

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yourinstagram ♥️

harryfan937 finally 🙏🏼

harrys092 so she isn't sick anymore?

pillowpersonpp cute 🥰

liked by niallhoran, yourbestfriend and 108,485 others

yourinstagram educating this man. spicing up that dresscode 💁🏻‍♀️

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harrystyles i'll admit they are comfortable…

birkenstock ITS HAPPENING!! CALM DOWN PEOPLE!

yourbestfriend spicing up? ugly. 👎🏼

yourinstagram shut up. i've seen you wear them.

yourbestfriend aren’t they the same ones that make the Jesus chanclas?

niallhoran you are late to the trend mate 🤦🏻‍♂️

liked by yourinstagram, mitchrowland and 4,693,385 others

harrystyles educating her. zero sense of fashion. I am the model.

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yourinstagram get off the internet dofus! 🛑

harrystyles no. make me.

yourinstagram i dressed you last night

harryfan20 isn't she the model?

yourfan38 cute shoesss

adidas we love you both 🥹

mitchrowland harry doesn't know how to dress himself. he always calls y/n for her opinion.

harrystyles shut up mitch! 😡

yourinstagram I told you!