#school bus repair long island
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raptorsaurusmelain ¡ 1 year ago
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Let me show you... Youtube - chapte 16
Guess who's bored at work and wrote a full chapter at noon ? Me.
Warning : no proof reading, English is not my mother tongue.
If you are interested in reading this fic, the tag "#twst lmsyy" will give you all the chapters.
─── ・ 。゚☆: .☽ . :☆゚. ───
Victoria came back that afternoon with ice creams for Yuu, Grim and her.
She called them loudly from the lobby, saying that she had a good loot from Sam’s shop.
Both of them came quickly. The woman laid the different flavors of ice cream on the table (they were 500mL) and told them to choose one while she set up the TV on a cheesy movie.
While they were eating their ice cream -chocolate for Yuu, strawberry shortcake for Grim and banoffee cake for Victoria-, the older one asked. “What do you wanna do now ?”
Yuu was surprised. “Uh ? What do you mean ?”
Victoria ate her scoop. “Do you want to stay in school ? Do you want to go away to another school ? Do you want some time ? We can do what we want, I can cover the expenses.”
Yuu thought deeply for a few minutes. They had time, there was no rush.
Grim was the one who spoke first. “I want to stay here and be the best archmage in the world !”
Yuu said timidly. “I want to stay here, I just… need some time off. I am a little bit scared of going outside right now.”
Victoria nodded. “Understandable. Do you want to repair this old building with me ? It would occupy you  a little, you could learn a lot with me.”
Yuu nodded. “Yes, I would love to ! It seems very entertaining.”
Victoria laughed. “It is very interesting, we can also do little videos like dancing, doing jokes, giving advices… It would be fun.”
Yuu's eyes sparkled. “YES !”
Victoria thought. “How about we do an introduction video of ourself ? I already showed the dorm.”
And so, the evening was spent doing silly videos to occupy Yuu’s mind until the weekend where Victoria would begin the repairs. She posted everything on Giktok, with captions and cute music. She did one per person.
The videos were well received by the public, everyone gushing about how cute the almighty Grim was. The public were also stunned by Yuu’s smile and loved Victoria’s hair, since it was so long and jet black. Some people even asked her what her hair care routine was.
They had a few subscribers thanks to those videos.
When Friday afternoon came, the woman went to the store with her list of tools. Sam whistled. “Those are not in stock, you will need to go to the mall to get those…”
Victoria was dejected. “I don’t have a car, that’s going to be hard…”
Sam smiled. “You can ask them to deliver it to the dorm no worries. Say that you are here on my advice.”
Victoria thought hard while the man took care of customers. She could only imagine the ruckus it would cause to have Grim in the store. Unless…
“Sam, do you have those leashes linked to a cute backpack ?”
Sam smiled while looking her right in the eyes. “IN STOCK !”
Saturday came and Victoria gifted a tuna shaped backpack to Grim, innocently. She strapped Grim so he was secured inside and not having any trouble breathing. Then.. *click*
Grim yelled. “WHY DID YOU PUT A LEASH ON ME???”
Victoria reassured him. “It is so kidnappers won’t try to take you away. Imagine the almighty Grim not being able to attend NRC because of some fool.”
Her sentence immediately calmed the cat. “Ok… But !”
Victoria caressed Grim’s head. “I promise you will have premium tuna after this, But for the moment endure it please.”
Grim mumbled that it was unfair buuut for tuna ?
Victoria prepared her own backpack with her money, her phone, some snacks and water in case they were hungry.
Once they were done packing, they took the bus to the city and went to the mall.
Grim was astonished. “It’s… So… BIG !!”
Even Victoria and Yuu were flabbergasted. Victoria said “Indeed, I wasn’t expecting this on such a small island.”
Once they were in the building, Grim wanted to see everything. And by everything, I mean EVERYTHING. He wanted to go into every shop, trying clothes, grabbing toys, looking at books… Victoria had to pull the leash multiple times while Yuu was laughing at how hard the woman tried to control the fur demon.
And oh boy, in the hardware section of the store was another story. Grim AND Yuu wanted to play with everything.
Victoria had to say multiple times. “Noooo it is dangerous !”, “Do not touch that !”, “This is a saw !! Do not even think about it !!”
Victoria suddenly had respect for all the parents in the world.
She grabbed a little bit of everything they needed, nails, hammer, paints, sanding paper, tapes, glues… Then came the moment where she needed to ship everything to the dorm. While she was finishing the paperwork, she had given the leash to Yuu. But when Grim proposed to play hooky, Yuu said ‘Yes of course ! Let’s wander in this danger zone!’, from what Victoria deduced since she lost them.
She searched the entire store frantically. How could she lose her babies ? Was she a bad mom ? Was she not fun to be around ?
All those questions plagued her mind until an announcement was made.
“*Tudumdu* The young Grim and Yuu are waiting for their mother at the reception. I repeat Grim and Yuu are waiting for their mother at the reception.”
Victoria ran like a mad woman to the welcome desk. Her heart was beating so hard in her chest. What if they were hurt ?
When she arrived, she found them crying every tear in their body. From what she understood when she checked every aspect of their body, they came to the realization that maybe they would have to live alone in the store forever without her and someone found them bawling their eyes out in the middle of the paint aisle.
The woman  at the desk looked at her weirdly. Victoria was particularly well conserved for her woman her age and it brought many questions in the poor lady mind. Before she could ask anything, Victoria said “I got both of them from a teen pregnancy.”
The welcome lady was clearly having a brain freeze after that. Both of them ? Did she infanted a demon too ??
Once Victoria was assured that they were in one piece and healthy, they got to the general store to get some food.
When Grim was in front of the tuna section, he was in Heaven. “Oh ! I wanna try this one ! And this one ! Oh no, this one !!”
Victoria laughed. “You can only take five. Choose wisely.”
The demon exclaimed. “Five ? Yippee !!”
Victoria turned to face Yuu. “You can take some candies or chocolate too, Baby.”
The Child was in deep thought. Victoria asked “Are you alright ?”
They answered. “I was just thinking that it was odd for us to be this dear for each other when we only know each other for one week.”
Victoria paused. “… Those who are lost tends to stick to each others.”
Tag : @boba-tea-fish @hipsterteller
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obscurecurse ¡ 5 days ago
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I'm impressed by the range in your stories! Makes me curious about your writing process; do you often do a lot of research?
anon, idk if u know that this is a compliment 2 me. i've been asking myself lately if i just write the same thing over and over (and like, if it is true, it's ok. writing is how i manage a lot of ugly feelings/stress. it brings me peace. but) you asking this has kinda quieted that notion.
long answer soooo im gonna put it below the cut.
i am like not capable of short answers lmfao.
its kinda always a blend of my real life/relationships and yeah research. sometimes research i've already had to do for work or grad school just gets funneled into the "boys kissing boys" machine.
im just gonna take a specific example. i wrote a kinda longish biker gang au this year. my bf has been a mechanic/managed bike shops for like almost a decade atp? since he bikes to/from work and i work from home, if it's raining really hard, i'll drive over and pick him up so he doesn't have to ride in the rain. so i'm loitering in the back of a mechanic shop for like 20 minutes (while he packs up) on the regular. we go out drinking with the mechanics - they all have really cool girlfriends that are interesting to talk to. and we do engage in illegal nighttime back alley races (which isnt as badass as it sounds imo - theyre just not cleared with the city for crowd control/street closure, everyone is drinking so open container laws, etc.) so shop dynamics, extracurricular dynamics, bf coming home with hands that are black with road grime/wanting a hand massage? those are my life. but i don't know shit about motorcycles. (im interested in them. i'm buying myself a 90s yamaha when i finish grad school, as a present to myself.) even when my bf explains bicycle repairs to me i zone out. so while i was writing that au i just went to youtube and listened to repair how-tos while i wrote, enough to fill in the gaps and make it feel real.
making it feel ~real is important to me. theres a sweet-spot for "level of detail" for sure. i am driven to madness by it. (since i started writing KPTS i'm constantly having to check "wait, do they have [x] in thailand? is [x] illegal in thailand? what do their gas stations look like? do people walk to get around the city or does everyone drive? what are thai desserts like? what are their funerals like?")
i can share two thoughts about process that have never failed me. one - when developing plot i always ask myself if i can throw it in a weird direction/add another layer. i have a wip where kim is a space werewolf. i'd been itching to write him as a werewolf (kinda The Thing I'm Known For) but i was like "ok but what if he was in space so it was impossible to run away from him when he turns?"
chay gets a job working the docks so he can wistfully gaze out at the islands? ok but what if he gets it by randomly applying to shit online? what if the Call Back he gets is for a serious government job in a field he didn't know existed?
two - when i get stuck or want to add something extra, i go to the bookshelf. my bf makes comics, and used to want to illustrate for textbooks so that colors our collection. we both like fantasy genre and now have quite a collection of architecture reference books too. the goal is not to find a book relevant to what you're writing about, its about freeing your mind. i pull whatever speaks to me and i just start leafing through until something gets my attention. sometimes it'll be a comic panel, oh look an abandoned bus station. oh look a [profession/role i could give that one character who's underdeveloped]. free association Always gets me unstuck.
(do not be afraid to leave side characters uncooked. you dont even have to NAME THEM.)
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(i know we need another Big Shelf - this isn't even all of them.)
i have a virtual library too but scanning file names isnt the same as running my fingers over actual books. i recommend the physical. but if you don't have a partner with a book-buying habit, i recommend going to museum digital collections and scanning their free databases of art images. i do that sometimes. song lyrics also an excellent resource for harnessing the power of vibes - i'm always looking up what they're About
lastly, i have a few people in my life (online and IRL) who i trust with ideas. i try not to bounce ideas off them too much or too early. but these people are invaluable to me, because they also help to push concepts in directions i never would have considered. (cough cough Grimm, cough cough Miles, cough cough Emily, cough cough Ren, cough cough Trav) i know this was anon but literally my DMs are open. we can spiral together whenever you want
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wapat ¡ 4 months ago
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Swastikas on the Rez
161.08.12. - 161 survived Si7mt (winter solstice) since the start of Nuxalk genocide in 1862, 8th moon, 12th day.
5390XXXXX1, a number I have had to memorize. What does this 10 digit number hold? Represent? Embody? It could be many things, for now I’ll tell you it’s the number I carry to say that I am an Indian, not human.
I met a German woman a while ago, her first time to turtle island, her first time in my hometown. Coming to a place like Nuxalk territory, she really wanted to experience the culture, see the sites + wildlife. We frequently went on rides, hikes, even attended an event/gathering, from our local language it translates to “building up a village”. It was held where a family has been building on their ancestral lands through ceremonial and ancestral rights. My friend had a cool opportunity to do her first cedar weaving. As we shared our philosophies, laughed at cultural differences, talked stories through the valley, I had noticed I never took her through our Indian Reserve. In all honesty it’s not much to see. There is beauty, and lots of great people, many that have so much to offer society that may have not gotten that opportunity in the face of oppression and overwhelming odds stacked against the people. When you go through, there’s garbage everywhere, tattered houses still lived in, derelict masses of cars + appliances + furniture beyond repair, and the hateful graffiti and vandalism to decorate the vibe. I didn’t feel pride driving through the Rez with her, especially after passing a bus stop that had a swastika scorched into it, probably with some handheld torch kids use to numb their thoughts with dabs or hot-knifing. I noticed it, I knew she did, we drove in silence for a bit. I eventually got into the conversation of how nice things haven’t lasted long, the bus stops were out in that summer and have already been graffitied- to paraphrase her reply “yes, I seen a swastika on one of them. I wonder why? We’re the ones that know the implications, we’ve been taught the shame of it all.” All I could force out was “.. yeah, I wonder too”.
As I carry this with me over a time, I think about the history I’ve heard growing up of the Nazi’s victims, reading the Diary of Anne Frank in the 8th grade, the various movies documentaries and depictions of World War 2 and the Holocaust I’ve seen up until now. It’s been awhile since I’ve met my German friend, and I have been trying to educate myself more on the subject. No doubt a majority of my peers and those I’ve crossed paths with heard of how bad it was during World War 2, the atrocities and inhumane actions. One documentary series I got to watch titled “Hitler’s circle of evil”, and with a quick internet search it says “The story of the rise and fall of the Third Reich told like the drama it really was: through the personal relationships of the movers and shakers of the Nazi Party.”. It followed Adolf Hitler and how all of the Nazi party came together post World War 1. Adolf Hitler, Joseph Goebbels (Propaganda master), and Heinrich Himmler (leader of the genocidal programs) are 3 people that stick out to me when it comes to the rise and promotion of antisemitism in that era. When Nazi’s were thinking of “The Final Solution” to the “Jew problem”, they were looking on how they should get rid of them all for good, “purifying the lands of them and keeping the Aryan people strong.” For inspiration for the “Final Solution” they had actually looked to the West on how the Indians in Canada and the United States have been treated, genocide en masse, Canadian Residential Schools and American Indian Boarding Schools, the tactics to kill and assimilate. It was Duncan Campbell Scott, the Canadian Deputy Superintendent General of Indian Affairs (that’s a fvcking mouthful, which he held title from 1913-1932) coined the term “The Final Solution” in regards to the “Indian Problem” to kill the Indians through residential school. It’s worth mentioning Sir John A. Macdonald, Canada’s first Prime Minister, was the one who implemented Resedential Schools and was a main contributor in forcing the removal of the Indians of their land to reserves. Forcing the Indians to reserves was a tactic to make way for industry and to starve the Indians, stripping them of everything they had, considered “wards of the state” because we were “savages” who were “incapable of taking care of themselves”. We couldn’t leave, while the land and resources were being depleted, we were dependant on the food supply in the small grasp of us. The Resedential schools they stripped the children of their native names and given numbers or names of royalty of the colonizing countries, not being able to talk their native language, beaten + raped or killed to conform to the western society. A lot of the stories I’ve heard are from family, chosen family I’ve met over the years, and stories from books and documentaries over the years. This Macdonald mother fucker is on our $10 bill for creator knows how long? Not only was he a disgusting human, us NDN’s are reminded every time we want to buy food of the guy who brought so much pain and suffering to our people? In 1883 he told the House of Commons “When the school is on the reserve the child lives with its parents, who are savages; he is surrounded by savages, and though he may learn to read and write his habits, and training and mode of thought are Indian. He is simply a savage who can read and write. It has been strongly pressed on myself, as the head of the Department, that Indian children should be withdrawn as much as possible from the parental influence, and the only way to do that would be to put them in central training industrial schools where they will acquire the habits and modes of thought of white men.”.
Back to the Nazi’s. When they created concentration camps, a lot of holocaust victims were subject to starvation, their properties stripped of them, given numbers instead of names, not allowed to speak Hebrew, couldn’t practice their culture, beaten and killed. Are you seeing a connection?
Post World War 2, I hear the Hebrew language was pretty scarce. I also hear they were able to make a come back, getting fluent speakers in homes + families to live with and speak with. That is amazing, a true inspiration to hope. How come we as a people haven’t been able to do the same for our entirety? Maybe because the last Residential school closed in 1996? Maybe because of the ongoing oppression we face daily? Is Hitler or swastika’s on the German currency I wonder? Us NDN’s have so many stories, and culture, ways in the language, that are a huge asset to society. One of the set of dances in my home is a correlation to the values we must keep to society as a whole, the raw fish eater- the destruction of resources, the dog eater- the destruction of responsibility, the person eater- the destruction of community, the corpse eater- the destruction of everything sacred, and the self eater, the destruction of self. All of these would be told and shown during ceremony, to express the need of what we must not become. You know how in movies nations, or the human race unite to face a common enemy? What a triumph. In this sense, I would like to think the common enemy is shown to be within one’s own accountability. We all unite ourselves to overcome ourselves, and then leave the world better than we came, for those not yet born. The teaching of the animals and creatures on the land being our ancestors is a great one I hold dear. If it’s a pet, the ones before knew the human experience is a trying one and we need companionship. If it’s a one we eat, the love of the ancestors is pushed forward, becoming sustenance for the people. If it becomes one who wanders and lives in the land, the ancestor is living its best, unburdened with human worries, just existing to exist. It’s hard to deal with intergenerational trauma, to kick ourselves up as a collective. One inch and one step at a time. The oral traditions and practices of the NDN’s is very strong. My nation can pinpoint the day smallpox was deliberately introduced and spread to the people. We can also recount the beginning of time for the land being inhabited by our ancestors coming down in cloaks from creator himself down the eyelashes of the sun. We have the collective knowledge to co exist with the land, to flourish as one. Creator knows we need it. Be patient with us. Help us, help you, help earth, help each other.
It is a big journey we are on, trying to reclaim ourselves. Many are doing it well, and there is hope. I know there is.
I can’t condone the behaviour of a swastika on a bus stop, for all children and parents, locals to see, I can only speculate the meaning. Maybe it was just an ill informed kid vandalizing a bus stop. Maybe it’s the ghosts of an NDN spirit that is trying to say “This society isn’t safe for us NDN’s. Take care of yourselves.” One day there won’t be swastikas on the Rez anymore.
5390XXXXX1
My name is Wapat. I am of the first beings descended from the eyelashes of the sun, coming from the Stuwicmc. We have messages from the beginning of time. I am not human. I am supernatural.
P.S.
Conversations with others after sharing: I wanted to add somewhere in there “Yet we aren’t recognized the same way within the world view. We are told “get over it, it was a long time ago”, “you Indians should be grateful for modern conveniences, better go back to living in tipi’s then”. We have a high pain tolerance. Physical and mental. There is a lot that don’t respond in anger, but a loving anger to try and educate. I once read about an NDN in an airport being asked by a white man if he was native, which he confirmed and the white man said “so I pay your living then hey?” Hinting at the untrue idea that natives don’t pay taxes= we aren’t contributing to society, and that a lot of tax dollars go to natives making us not having to worry about basic necessities. Then the NDN reminded him of economics. How industry, how people live, how capitalism has integrated within the world to extract and pillage the land. And whose land is the system doing that to? NDN land. This economy is built around the injustices, a grave undoing to “be grateful for”.”
One friend said it was good to frame it as “Nazi’s” and not just “Germans”, which I did off the bat, making sure to have the distinction and not lump an entire people together- if I have slipped anywhere please tell me.
I tried to use the term Indian when talking from a colonial perspective and NDN from an indigenous perspective.
It’s a debatable question, what is justice in this sense? What is reconciliation? After WW2, the allies kicked up the Nuremberg trials- to put at least some accountability on those who had done so much wrong. Almost 200 Axis were put on trial, 161 convicted with 37 put to death. Some saying they “weren’t aware” of the atrocities happening in the Holocaust. The NDN’s never had a trial, it being our own government with the help of the Catholic Church, the ones who said “you are wards of the state, incapable of taking care of yourselves”, fewer than 50 people have been convicted in crimes regarding residential school, if then it was just a slap on the wrist. Sure survivors have a right to build a case for “compensation”, reliving the broken bones, deaths, beatings, rapes and inhumane treatment endured- of which some are just told “you don’t have a big enough case for this compensation”, a big FvCK YOU and a spit in the face. A dear friend of mine, was told exactly that. We know who the people are, how does one forget their oppressors? Aside from Native Allies, there is no shame in the countrymen in so called Canada as there was post WW2 Europe. It’s a hard thing. I don’t know what exactly the “Agenda” is for us NDN’s, I mean in the general population we are told to “forget” which isn’t something the world should do. “Reconciliation by land acknowledgment” still doesn’t sit right. Also reconciliation is when two parties did wrong and are trying to come together, which another local leader always tells us “I don’t think we did anything wrong”. Are we after forgiveness? I can’t tell you because I don’t know. I do know we are after co-existence, I do know we want to heal, “land back” isn’t just physical, it’s spiritual + emotional + conscience awareness of one another + our Mother Earth of which we share. It’s a hard thing. But here we are ❤️
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allovertheworldblog ¡ 9 months ago
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Riding the rails in Indonesia
There are three classes of train in Indonesia, Business Class, Executive Class and Economy.
The Business Class train is more expensive than the Executive one but they're indistinguishable. 
The Economy train on the other hand is neither like Business or Executive Class.
Having made my way from the island of Bali to the island of Java on an overnight bus that broke down and had to be repaired in the middle of the night in a roadside repair shop.
I ended up in the very un-touristy city of Surabaya, whose tourist attractions include a parked retired submarine
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and a visit to the local cigarette factory which specialises in clove cigarettes. 
After a couple of days I bought a ticket for the Economic train to Yogyakarta.
I bought the ticket for the same day so all seats were sold. 
When I boarded the train I was able to sit down on a vacant seat for a half an hour.
Then the ticket holders boarded and I had to stand for the remaining seven hours of the trip. 
I had to stand in the carriage close to the space between two carriages which were open unto each other to let people move between carriages.
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All through the length of the trip people would come and down the packed carriages to sell everything from cigarettes to fruit,
food, snacks, clothes, children’s school books, wooden toys, coffee, which sounds like ‘gopi, gopi, gopi’.  
There’s even a man renting out cushions to those sitting on the floor. 
I was glad when the trip was over after having to stand for so long.
The other train trips I made in Java on Business and Executive class trains where I had a seat each time weren’t near as interesting as my seven and a half hour trip on the Economy train. 
The times I rode the other trains though I was able to get a glimpse at what we were passing by, the fields of Java.
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awanderingcanadian ¡ 2 years ago
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Winter Madness Gulf Island Style!
November ended with a snowstorm on the 30th, followed by a wind storm on December 1st that resulted in our little island having a 24-48 hour power outage, (depending on which part of the island you live on), but even worse…the fibre optic cable snapped that spans a short waterway from another island to ours. This meant that we had: no phone, (landline or mobile), including no 911 emergency service calls, no cable tv, no internet, no data services…so no bank machines, no debit or credit card readers. Because a helicopter is required to put the new cable back in place, we had to wait for weather conditions to be right. In addition, there was work to do at either end of the span prior to the cable being reinstalled. We were without services for 5 days, but in fairness, the crews worked around the clock to get us back on track as quickly as they could. Big thanks to B.C. Hydro and the speciality cable repair companies.
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Everyone had to resort to cash. We became a financial circular economy: we all paid cash everywhere we went, the stores returned the cash to the bank at the end of the business day, and it was given out again the next day so we could purchase things again! Meanwhile at the bank, the tellers were sitting by windows at regular desks, so they could get a sight line to a temporary cell tower set up at the nearby fire hall. They used mobile phones to stay online with colleagues at other branches on Vancouver Island to confirm you had the funds in your account before a person sitting behind a very secure, (irony here), office divider dispensed funds. It was quite ingenious really, and thanks to Coastal Community Credit Union for going the extra mile.
All was going well until B.C. Ferries yet again cancelled sailings. For almost 20 years we’ve lived here but the past year has been horrific in terms of reliability, and before you say, “well you chose to live on an island”, I will remind you that perhaps you chose to live across a bridge from where you work: how would you feel if the bridge was intermittently closed on a regular basis with no or little warning? In this case it was particularly bad, as the corporation sent out the usual disruption in service email…but none of us could get it. And for those people who went to Nanaimo to work, they couldn’t reach their ride at the other side, either because they were parked at the ferry parking lot, (and the emergency passenger service docked 1/2 way down the island from there because the emergency dock was damaged in a high tide event in the summer and frankly there seemed no sense of urgency to fix it), or they couldn’t reach anyone to pick them up because…yes we had no phone/wifi/data service. I particularly ‘enjoyed’ the part where BC Ferries said you could “submit your taxi receipt” for reimbursement: we have 2 taxis on our island. Then they put on a bus service, but you had to walk 700metres, (think 700+yds here American readers), up hill on a gravel road, in the dark, to meet the bus. I don’t think B.C. Ferries management has a clue what it all looks like.
Lest you think I’m capping on our ferry workers, or the terminal staff, rest assured I am not. I appreciate them coming to work. I appreciate the extra work they do cleaning the lots after it snows. I appreciate them a lot. However, I do not appreciate the B.C. Ferry Corporation. They have a work culture problem and they need to solve it. Often sailing are cancelled because they cannot get the crew, particularly the ones with tickets/licenses needed to operate. That’s because they’ve been unable to attract and retain staff. That’s a work culture issue: is it not feeling valued, not being fairly compensated, or something else? I don’t know, but it’s past time to solve it. As an educator I go to, if I closed the school with very little notice, and said, “come pick up your children. We may or may not be open tomorrow, or we may just offer every second class”, how long would people accept it?
So just as things were returning to normal, another record snowfall came, and brought with it record breaking cold temperatures. In a rare event, we were able to go snowshoeing on a Gulf Island: go figure! The temperature in the photo below is in Celsius/Centigrade.
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And again…B.C. Ferries made a “scheduling error” and at 10:06pm they announced they were cancelling the last sailings of the night starting with the 9:40 pm sailing. Yes…there was no way home. This time they couldn’t get a last minute passenger boat, so people were stranded on Vancouver Island.
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This time people were out of pocket for hotel rooms, (if they didn’t have friends or family to stay with, or if they could afford a hotel, and if there was availability). People were out Christmas shopping or socializing, kids were over in town, seniors on fixed incomes. This really was a horrific situation: shame on you B.C. Ferries.
So, that’s been December and the run up to Christmas. Here’s hoping for less extreme weather and more reliable ferry service for 2023.
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Now I’ve got all of that off of my chest, I can move on in a more positive fashion. From my home to yours, Merry Christmas.
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coachbusrepair-blog ¡ 7 years ago
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Get coach bus repair and Repaint Service at LimoBusTruckFleet . Limo Bus Truck Fleet is expert in limo and coach bus Interiors and exteriors work. Contact Today!
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joezworld ¡ 3 years ago
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Traintober Day 21
Today's Prompt: Off the rails... again!
I don't know what it says about me when I see a prompt called off the rails and immediately do 1,800 words about Bulgy before a train is even mentioned.
(Also, this happens just before the events of Day 14's story)
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Smashing!
Bulgy is a rather disagreeable old bus on the Island of Sodor. Many years ago, he had gotten stuck underneath a bridge on Duck’s branch line, causing damage to both it and himself. As a result, his owners abandoned him in a field next to the line and the farmer who owned it used Bulgy as a henhouse!
However, this was not the end of Bulgy. Farmer Drury, his new owner, was a very successful man who owned several farms across the Island. As his business grew, he repaired Bulgy and put him back on the road as a farm transport vehicle and rolling storage bin - a duty that Bulgy hated even more than being a henhouse!
He complained bitterly about his treatment for many years, often irritating Farmer Drury in the process, and thus ensuring that he would never be anything more than a dirty work vehicle for as long as Farmer Drury owned him!
Eventually, Bulgy’s fortunes improved - although his attitude didn’t - when Farmer Drury retired and handed the business over to his son David.
David Drury had gone to school on the mainland, and unlike most Sudrians, was rather obsessed with old cars instead of old trains. He owned several classic race cars and the Island’s only Ferrari, so when he discovered Bulgy in the back of his father’s barn he was immediately taken with him. Almost before Bulgy knew what was happening, David Drury had restored him to ‘concours condition’, and he went from a dirty, dusty, and creaking work van to a pristine ‘show bus’ so fast that his eyes spun!
Now Bulgy was more or less permanently retired, living inside a nice warm garage on the outskirts of Marthwaite village. He never had to work, or get dirty, or even go out in the rain!
Except for one time…
April 13, 2015
Bulgy was startled awake by the door to his garage being thrown open. “Whassat?!” He groaned, trying to blink the sleep from his eyes.
“Come on Bulgy!” It was David, his owner. “We’ve got a sticky situation down in Hackenbeck. Let’s go!”
Far, far too quickly for Bulgy’s liking, he was started up, put into gear, and driven away. “What’s wrong?” He asked. “Where’re we going?”
“Those moro-” David started angrily, before calming himself. “I have been trying to rebuild the roof on one of the storage barns in the Hackenbeck farm for a month, and when the roofers finally show up, they didn’t check the weather, tore off the roof with no plan to finish it, and it’s going to rain this afternoon, so we need to finish the roof today or the entire harvest will be ruined!”
“Whaddya need me for?”
“The van broke down! You’re the only other big vehicle I’ve got that’s road legal!”
“You’re gonna make me work?!”
“I’m sorry Bulgy, but it’s only for today - look, I’ll make it up to you later, okay?”
Bulgy acquiesced, but grumbled all the way to Hackenbeck.
The barn was located near the railroad line, accessible by a dusty and rutted tractor path that crossed the line at one point. Bulgy grimaced as he bounced down the “road” - this was no place for a show bus - even the four wheel drive pickup trucks were complaining about the potholes, and he could feel his paintwork getting dirtier with each passing second.
It didn’t get any better after that - his owner was serious about him working, and Bulgy made five trips into town for supplies like wood planks, nails, lunch, scaffolding, and even huge buckets of tar. It was disgusting and dirty work, and he hated every minute of it - at one point, men had to stand on his roof to do work, and after that he was quite literally dirty from top to bottom.
Then the rain came.
According to the weather forecast, the real downpour wasn’t to start until later that night, but the broken clouds started to knit themselves back together as the clock struck four. The men had just enough time to hang tarpaulins over the unfinished sections of roof before the deluge started, so the grain harvest wasn’t spoiled, but everything else was soaked. Anyone who couldn’t hide in the barn took refuge inside Bulgy, and he growled as muddy boots clomped across his floors, sweaty clothes fouled his seats and dirty water dripped off of his bonnet and into his eyes. “I thought I was done with this sort o’ nonsense…”
Fortunately for Bulgy, the rain shower was short-lived, and everyone resumed work after it passed, leaving him alone for the first time since the morning.
“Oi! Mate!” Evidently he couldn’t be alone for too long, could he?
Cracking an eye open, he found a big Volvo HGV with Irish registration plates idling next to him. “Can you please bother someone else?” He asked, doing his best to be polite.
“Rude.” The lorry said before continuing on anyway. “But I’m in a bit of a pickle - ya see, I’m supposed to be in someplace called “Wellsworth”, but my GPS conked out me, see? So now I’m lost.”
“Have your driver talk to Mister Drury - it’s his farm you’re on.” Bulgy said dismissively.
“Driver?” The lorry said, before looking at Bulgy more closely. “Oh, this is one of those places.”
Then the lorry drove away, leaving Bulgy confused and feeling vaguely insulted. “Well I never...!” He said, before realizing that he probably had at some point.
“Well, s’not my problem anymore.” He said after a moment. Seeing as everyone else was occupied, he closed his eyes and tried to take a nap.
“Come on Bulgy, no rest for the weary!” David Drury said as he hopped into the driver’s seat.
“What now?”
“That lorry has gotten himself good and lost, so we’re going to show him the road into town.”
“Why’ve I got to do it? I’ll sink into the mud!”
“You’ll do it because everyone else is busy.” David said. Looking over at the other quad bikes, four-by-fours, and Land Rovers, Bulgy was forced to admit that he was the only vehicle not in use at the moment and so he bounced and juddered and sloshed along the now-muddy path towards the road.
Then there was trouble.
The railway line was on a slightly raised embankment to allow for drainage. This hadn’t been an issue before, but now the small hill leading to the tracks was nothing but slippery mud. Furthermore, the path itself was narrow, with only enough room for one vehicle to go through at a time - if two were coming in opposite directions, one of them would have to pull off to the side of the road. As they approached the crossing, an orange tractor with caterpillar treads was pulling a trailer over the line, so Bulgy and the lorry pulled over at the bottom of the hill to let him pass. As they set off, neither Bulgy, David, nor the lorry realized that the road up to the tracks was nothing but mud - the tractor had made it look easy with his treads, and didn’t say anything more than “Hello!” as he passed them. Not realizing what was about to happen, David drove Bulgy up the hill from a standing stop.
If they’d been traveling at speed, they might have made it, but when Bulgy’s front wheels bumped over the rails, his back wheels weren’t going fast enough to push him over, and he stuck fast on top of the tracks, his rear wheels spinning furiously but unable to gain any traction in the slick mud.
“Oi!” Yelled the lorry as mud pelted him. “Stoppit! Yer stuck there! Get a chain and I’ll pull ya free!”
A rummage through storage compartments in both Bulgy and the Lorry revealed that neither of them had a chain strong enough. David called back for one of his employees to send a thicker chain - they arrived on a quad bike, along with the orange tractor - who introduced himself as Terrance - and his driver.
“I say,” Terrance observed idly as the men tried to figure out where they could attach the chain without damaging Bulgy. “You picked a most inopportune time to do this - Thomas will be most upset if his passengers are delayed.”
David, Bulgy, and the lorry went very still and very pale.
“You did call the railway, didn’t you?”
“Jus’ hook that chain to anything!” Bulgy bellowed. “Get me off of here!”
“Now let’s… let’s be calm.” David sounded anything but as he poked his mobile phone urgently. “We still have time to call - all we need to do is find out what the bleeding number is!”
As it turned out, they didn’t have time.
A steam whistle sounded in the distance, putting everyone into a panic. David’s employee tore off on the quad bike, trying to stop the train before it arrived, while David and Terrance’s driver tried desperately to mount the chain. “It’s not going on! There’s no hook on this end!” They yelled.
“Get in, put him in low gear, and when I say, step on it!” The lorry ordered. David scrambled into the driver’s seat, and frantically engaged first gear.
The whistle sounded again - the noise echoing off the surrounding hills to the point where its location couldn’t be determined.
The lorry grimaced. “This is gonna suck.” He muttered, before revving his own engine. “Now!”
Bulgy’s engine roared, and mud flew everywhere. Black exhaust poured from the lorry as he engaged his low-range gearbox and charged up the incline.
With a thunderous CRUNCH he slammed into Bulgy’s rear bumper.
The whistle sounded again, this time much longer and more urgent. The quad bike must not have gotten very far, which meant that the train was close indeed.
The lorry’s wheels spun, but he revved his engine well past the red line on his tachometer as he put all of his considerable strength against Bulgy.
The train appeared from behind the trees. Terrance noted with some detached portion of his mind that it wasn’t Thomas pulling the train, but rather a big engine he’d never seen before. As soon as the engine saw Bulgy, they yelled in panic and put on their brakes, but it wasn’t going to be enough…
The lorry’s wheel dug deep enough into the thick mud to find dry dirt. With a lurch and a roar he surged forward, shoving Bulgy off of the line and onto the downhill on the other side. Seconds later, the lorry followed, his back wheels clearing the tracks in just a few seconds.
But there was still his trailer. It was a long canvas sided box trailer, fully loaded with cargo, and its wheels sank into the mud a few inches as it rolled up the hill. Those few inches were the differences between safety and disaster, and the trailer’s low-hanging side underride guards caught between the rails with a screech that brought the lorry to a standstill.
“Go!” He shouted to Bulgy as he roared his engine, trying to break free.
Bulgy needed no encouragement, and raced forwards as the train got closer and closer.
The lorry pulled so hard that the trailer’s king pin snapped in half, and he shot forwards, leaving the trailer sitting astride the train tracks.
Terrance and his driver could only watch in horror as the train got closer and closer, before…
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Later
Stephen Hatt arrived at the crash site to find a much more colourful scene than he’d been expecting. “Is that… paint?” He asked the Hackenbeck stationmaster, who was acting as the incident commander.
“Yes sir. The lorry was full - over thirty tons worth.” The man said as he strategically stepped over puddles of silver and yellow that were soaking into the ground despite the best efforts of the cleanup crew. Tornado had still been going at well over thirty miles an hour when she impacted the lorry, and paint had been fired in every which way as the trailer had more or less exploded on impact. Following that, there was a two hundred foot long streak of Dulux-coated destruction leading down the trackbed as the mangled trailer had been dragged along before it came apart at the seams and was deposited along the lineside.
Then there was Tornado herself, who had collided with the trailer before it started to come apart, and had therefore been impacted by individual cans of paint, instead of a fine spray of liquid colour. As a result, her LNER green was covered from buffer to cab in huge blotches of dull green, bright yellow, metallic blue, glossy red, vibrant purple, and flat white from individual cans smashing against her. In some spots, the colors had mixed together, forming steaks of orange, brown, black, and gray that ran down her boiler in a way vaguely reminiscent of a Jackson Pollock painting.
Fortunately, no one was hurt. Tornado was pulling a goods train, and despite some minor damage to her buffers and front end - miraculously, her smoke deflectors hadn’t been damaged thanks to the trailer having canvas walls - she had only derailed her leading bogie, and was actually smiling as gold paint dripped down her nose. “Well, I think I caused some confusion and delay, didn’t I?”
“Now, now,” Stephen said as he inspected her himself - the Trust was going to have a conniption as it was, so he’d better make damn sure that there was nothing seriously wrong. “I wouldn’t say you were responsible for this,” His eyes sparkled mischievously as he looked over her damaged front end. Nothing seemed to be too amiss other than the obvious, thankfully. “But I would say that you have busted your buffers.”
Tornado laughed as the rest of the breakdown crew sighed deeply.
--
It never did rain that night, (“Whaddya mean it didn’t rain?! I almost died for nuthin?” “Calm down Bulgy.” “Calm down?! Mister Drury, those blasted trains almost turned me into scrap! See, I was right! We need to rip up all the rails and turn them into nice smooth Boulevards!” “Not this again…”) and with the dry conditions, it only took Wendell and the breakdown train until midnight to finally get Tornado to the works. It was very late, and everyone was very tired, so Tornado and the cranes were already asleep when Wendell shunted them away.
Wendell was himself exhausted, and rolled into his berth at the works intent on sleeping until someone came to wake him up.
“Oi - wha’s the score with the mystery one?” Bloomer hissed from where the men had been working on him.
“I think she was at a heritage railroad for a while.” Wendell groaned as his crew set his brakes and left. “She definitely knows more about BR than any other engine I’ve met.”
“How so?”
“She knew the firing order of my engine - I think it’s safe to say that she was someplace with an archive, or the NRM has gotten very loose with their records department.”
“Huh,” Snorted Bloomer, who, like any engine that had been within earshot of Gordon in the last few years, was well aware of the NRM’s fall from grace. “Mebbe she’s just a smart egg.”
“Easter egg, more like…” Wendell yawned. “Hard boiled and painted and all; She just took a lorry’s worth of paint to the face and thought it was the highlight of her day.”
“Paint?” Bloomer peered outside of the shed doors. “Mercy me! Look at her! She’s coated!”
Wendell didn’t respond, and when Bloomer looked over, he found the diesel already fast asleep.
“Ugh, young engines these days!”
----
Several days later
The men had had their work cut out for them. The paint was latex and enamel based house paint, and it didn’t want to come off without strong solvents, the use of which also stripped off Tornado’s paint and undercoat. It took two whole days for the men to find all of the paint - it had worked its way into every crease and crevice in Tornado’s body, and if the Fat Controller hadn’t authorized copious amounts of overtime, it likely would have taken far longer.
This process was not helped by the fact that removing Tornado’s plating revealed the numerous modifications she’d received from her time in Germany - while they were safe from the paint, they weren’t safe from the deeply curious mechanical staff, who swarmed over her with cameras and notebooks, trying to determine what everything was. If it weren’t for the works manager telling them to get back to their jobs, they likely would have stayed there all day!
Eventually, the mechanical staff were shooed away, the paint was stripped off, a spot of rust on her running board was found and cleaned, the workers were able to finish, and Tornado was finally reassembled and rolled into the paint shop to be repainted into LNER green.
Except…
“We don’t have any green? On this railway?” The foreman stared at the head painter disbelievingly.
“Not this shade.” The woman said. “And somebody didn’t clear it with me before they started stripping, which means there’s none to sample, so we can’t make more.” In anticipation of a new coat, they’d decided to strip the paint off of Tornado’s tender as well. At the time it had seemed like a good idea.
“Don’t we have other greens?”
“Yes. Great Western green.” A long pause followed this. “Do you want to be the one who painted the pride of the LNER in GWR colours?”
“BR Blue?”
“Only the diesel shade of Rail Blue.”
“Henry’s Green?”
“On backorder.”
“... James' Red?”
“No.”
“Well, what do we have?”
“In sufficient quantities?” A tin of paint was produced. “This.”
“We can’t use that! They’ll think we’ve bought her!”
“Well it’s either this, or we ask the Skarloey Railway if they’ve got any of their red going spare, but considering she's bigger than all of their engines put together...”
“Okay… point made, but we’re going to have to make sure that we don’t do any of the striping or numbers - I don’t want the rest of the engines to think that we’ve bought her or anything.”
-
Tornado was actually hyperventilating as the paint shop workers buffed and polished the freshly-applied numbers and striping. She’d caught a few glimpses of herself in the mirror mounted on the far wall, and had been unable to contain herself since. “You’ve got the pictures?” She asked the head painter.
“Of course we have,” She said genially. “Now let’s get you outside for some more in the sun. Maybe we’ll even get everyone for a posed shot like they did in the twenties.”
They’d done a pressure test to make sure that nothing had been damaged in the collision, and Tornado had just enough steam left to roll into the yard under her own power.
In the yard, the midday sun was shining, the air was clear, and there were many pictures to be taken of her new paintwork. It took over an hour, and when the workers finally retreated into the sheds to work on “other jobs”, she was left alone.
“I still can’t believe it.” She said to herself quietly. “It’s like I’m really one of them.”
When the paint crew had told her they only had the NWR’s blue paint on hand, she’d been a little excited. Now that it was applied and dry, she was much more so. The red lining and gold numbers on her tender and frame completed the look, and if one ignored the smoke deflectors and squinted slightly, she could almost pass as a copy of Gordon.
Even without any steam, she could feel the excitement bubbling up through her boiler. “I’m a really useful engine you know,” She sang to herself, not really caring if anyone was listening.
“All the other engines they tell me so,
I huff and puff and whistle, rushing to and fro,
I’m the really useful engine we adore!”
She’d found the instrumentals of the song somewhere, and it quietly began playing.
“I’m the one! I’m the Really Useful Engine that we adore
I’m the one, I’m the Number One
Torna-”
“Peep Peep! Hello Fatfac- oh you’re not Gordon!” A blue tank engine had pulled alongside her.
He had six small wheels.
A short stumpy funnel.
A short stumpy boiler.
And a short stumpy dome.
“EEEP!”
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gumnut-logic ¡ 4 years ago
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Piano keys were his defence.
He came home with memories he could not handle. Thoughts and emotions that were just too much.
His heart led him to save people. But saving those people broke him.
Each time he went out he had to be prepared to see and experience things that he wasn’t built to process. Horrors that scarred his mind and tore his soul.
The piano was his saviour.
Gloves cast aside, he would sit covered in grime, desperate to shed what had happened, to repair the unrepairable.
The notes his fingers found were sometimes sour, sometimes dark. The comms room echoed with screams, ran with blood and cried so many tears.
Often his brothers would join him, often fighting their own demons. Scott desperate to help, to ease his pain, to ease his own. A shoulder if it all became too much.
John occasionally would be there to meet him, having watched everything unfold, knowing his brother was hurting. His care was quiet, loving and gentle, felt from afar even if he wasn’t there.
Gordon was a bright spark that would bounce into the room and literally light everything on fire. Where John was quiet, Gordon was loud...and much younger. Virgil’s resources had to be very poor for him to let go in front of his younger two brothers. Gordon at least was the older of the two, and often Virgil had no choice as the man would poke him until he exploded all over the room.
Alan would sit. He understood the age gap issue. He had it with all his brothers and he knew Virgil couldn’t express himself fully, bar smashing piano keys in the disguise of composition. So he would sit quietly and just listen. Let his brother know that at least he could hear what Virgil had to say through his fingers. Be there so Virgil knew he was being heard.
Virgil was the only one who could play the piano. All four of his brothers had learnt, but let the knowledge slip away in preference to more exciting things. Virgil clung to it like a buoy in a storm. Their lives were often chaos, and that piano his saviour. So, in turn, he became the provider of release as well. Where he wasn’t the one in pain, he could coax it out of another brother with the right keys.
The day Scott broke down and sobbed on his shoulder hurt as much, if not more, than if he had been the one who had lost the school bus full of children.
John had to be coaxed and occasionally kicked out of his ‘bird by his daughter. The right music became the order, the command, the wish, the promise, the knowledge that his brother was waiting for him.
Gordon didn’t cry, he exploded. It took a lot to break through the aquanaut’s shell, but Virgil had the keys to his heart and he was strong enough to catch him when he broke.
Alan was soft music, not unlike the stars that drew him into the sky. Subtle background noise that eroded at his defences until he would turn and seek his big brothers.
The piano keys were Virgil’s defence, for both himself and his brothers. While they could play happy moments, mild moments, and moving moments, it was for the desperate moments that they were needed the most. And his brothers understood it well.
The worst was when the keys fell silent. When Virgil was too injured or too absent to play. Then the family floundered. Recordings were found and lamented. Anger existed in the roving bear of Virgil himself, longing for the keys, but denied the release.
It was usually Scott, occasionally Grandma, who cornered the desperate musician and talked him down from his virtual ledge. Calmed him, held him, reassured both him and themselves that the music would return.
It had to.
That the time of silence would end.
Visitors to the Island, the few there were, would encounter the piano music almost as a background to the wind, sea and birds and wonder why. When asked, Virgil would declare it a hobby, an amusement to pass the time between rescues.
None would know its power.
The power of the keys.
-o-o-o-
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geosfeel ¡ 3 years ago
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Six Greek Weeks
Week 4: Ikaria, my favorite island - Ικαρία, το αγαπημένο μου νησί
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To get to Ikaria, you must go to the Port of Piraeus to get the ferry. Actually you can fly there these days, but it feels wrong. The departure from Piraeus and the long ferry ride is the right way to begin your island adventure. Piraeus itself has interesting neighborhoods and museums.
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The ferry I usually take arrives on the south side of the island at the port of Agios Kyricos, but I stay at Therma, a small town about 10 minutes walk with a nice beach and hot springs, both free and organized. This is a view of Therma from the eastern end The sandy beach in the back is nicer than this one.
There are actually 4 ways to get from Agios Kyricos (most people just call it 'Agios') to Therma: walk, car, bus and this water taxi, which is by far the coolest. I think it's like 2 or 3€, and takes 5 minutes. No schedule, the guys just go back and forth, calling out when they're ready to leave.
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Here's kind of a long story. Maria is the reason I even go to Ikaria. She and I were neighbors when we were kids in school but over the many years we lost touch. Her family is from Ikaria, and when I started to go to Greece again when I was older and had more money, I remembered how cool they were, and figured that Ikaria must be a cool island to produce such excellent people... and it was true!
A few years later, someone put us in touch again, and she told me she would be on Ikaria same time as me, so we arranged to meet - after like 40 years, no kidding. It was great. She is very cool. This is her husband George, and she has 2 sons.
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This house in the village of Perdiki is where Maria's dad and Uncle Triandafilo grew up. It has a terrific view of the coast and sea beyond.
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Ikaria has several other hot springs by the sea besides at Therma. This one is near Perdiki and it's called Agia Kyriaki. It used to be organized with tubs and other facilities, but all that's left is this cast iron lamp post. The day I went there was no one there - not one person, not even sounds of people, or the usual goat bells... just the soft sounds of surf.
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Also at that end of the island is a major archaeological site: the Tower of Dracano.
"It is a great work of art from a manufacturing point of view and is considered as one of the best preserved towers in the Aegean. The construction of the tower is dated back to Alexandrian times and its repair during the reign of Demetrius the Conqueror, from the 3rd century BC to the 4th BC century, according to recent studies. The tower is three storeys, built with massive white marble plinths. The blocks are not held together with metal links, but by their own weight." -- from Visit Ikaria website (visitikaria.gr)
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From here you can see the Fourni Islands and Samos (where I went this year for the first time - more on Samos later...)
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A cemetery on a cliff on the way back to Therma. The water is really that blue.
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ezbedbug ¡ 4 years ago
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Can Bed Bugs Go Away On Their Own?
It is never a good feeling when you discover that you are dealing with bed bugs. While these critters are not known for carrying or transmitting any diseases, some of the symptoms can be troublesome. They will include anything from constant itching to unsightly welts. And, this is not to even mention all the mental implications. If the symptoms weren’t enough to worry you, you also have to worry about property costs. That’s right, bed bugs can be detrimental to the residence as well. To make the entire situation even worse, you need to understand that these critters will not go away on their own.
Where Did The Infestation Come From?
One of the good things about bed bugs is that they are seasonal critters. Another good and bad thing, depending on how you look at it, is that these bugs look similar to other bugs. So, it might be entirely possible that you aren’t dealing with an infestation at all. You are more than likely dealing with something, but if it isn’t bed bugs, you might be able to get off cheaper. All that aside, it is crucial to understand where this infestation came from so that you can prevent one from happening again. Here are some places that bed bug commonly come from:
Hotels or Motels – Always inspect the sheets and furniture of any hotel or motel that you spend the night in.
City Transportation – Always check the seats of a bus or cab if you commonly use city transportation.
Your Children – Unfortunately, there won’t be much that you can do about preventing your children from bringing home bed bugs. They can bring them home from their friends or even school.
Neighbors – You can contract bed bugs from a neighbor just as easily as your children can bring them home. This is even truer for individuals that live in condos or apartments.
Used Furniture – Always make sure that you are thoroughly checking used furniture before bringing it into the home. It might even be a good idea to clean and wash it with warm or hot water before bringing the items into the home.
Who To Call For Help
You can look up all the information you want about bed bug treatment Long Island NY, but you are always going to get varying answers and information. While the Internet is a wealth of knowledge, that knowledge can vary greatly. This can make it incredibly hard to know which road to go down. That being said, when it comes to bed bugs, you always want to opt for a professional. And, being that you are located in the Long Island area, you will have a ton of excellent providers right at your fingertips.
Why Call The Pros?
Yes, there are tons of DIY bed bug treatments available, but bed bugs are extremely resilient. Not only do they reproduce at alarming rates, but they can cause physical damage to the home. The longer you wait, not only will the infestation potentially spread, but you might end up holding a much larger repair bill than you imagined. A professional can help you eliminate the problem and provide you with information as to how to prevent another infestation.
The post Can Bed Bugs Go Away On Their Own? appeared first on EZ Pest Exterminating - New York's Best Pest Control Company!.
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thestraggletag ¡ 5 years ago
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Human Nature, Part One
AN: Happy Birthday to me! Here’s a fic I wrote to commemorate the day. Part two needs editing but will be along shortly. Enjoy!
Also can someone please write a better summary? This is an honest request. It can be my birthday present.
Rating: R
Summary: Warm Bodies AU. After the zombie apocalypse is averted it’s up to Belle French to rehabilitate a mostly-dead Mr Gold, against advice of the experts and the wishes of the entire town. As she struggles to fan the spark of humanity back into Mr Gold she fails to notice something else kindling between them.
It took months to get back to Storybrooke after the beginning of what was known as "the treatment" by which most of who'd been affected by the zombie-like virus slowly regained their humanity. It was slow-going, the process done with an overabundance of caution that nobody begrudged, taking into account what the years before had been like. The outbreak had lasted a little under five years, but it had seemed like months, and so much had changed in that time that life before seemed like a distant memory. The idea of just picking up where everyone left off was an impossible fantasy.
When Brisbane had been hit Belle, who'd been visiting relatives at the time, had been lucky enough to get evacuated to Hamilton Island, where the only undead she'd been close to where relatives of locals, who could not bear to put them down and so kept them locked away in the basement of the local pet shelter. Once word of the treatment reached them most of them had been successfully rehabilitated, and soon after that she'd made her way back to the mainland, to be of help where she could and find out news about her family and friends.
She'd first heard news of Storybrooke from Ruby, when internet access was restored. The town had taken a hit, like most, but efforts were underway to rehabilitate as many people as possible. She cried with her friend when she called her to tell her Granny had called her by her name. Speech was a big step in the treatment, and it was then that they both knew that Mrs Lucas was going to make it.
She had to wait a long time for flights to be restored, and by then things were mostly under control. She'd heard from Ruby and others that Storybrooke was a sort of success story unlike any other, with all services restored, schools open and a rehabilitation rate that defied expectations, and a lot of it was attributed to the iron will of Madam Mayor and the security efforts of the Town Sheriff. Quite the formidable power couple, according to Ruby. She thought their love story surrounding their shared son was very cute, as far as apocalyptic tales went.
And though she had thought at first that Ruby's boundless optimism in the face of Granny's recovery was prompting her to paint a rather misleading picture of how things were back home when she finally made it back to town she had to admit it looked as good as she'd described. There were some signs of destruction, some roadblocks that were still only half-cleared and half the buildings seemed to be in the process of repair but there was an air of orderly normality that she hadn't seen in other places. Ruby had been there to pick her up from the bus stop, squealing and hugging her for the longest time before commenting on her silver-streaked hair, telling her she loved it.
"You can totally get hair dye, the pharmacy is up and running again- no idea how Mayor Mills did it but it's almost completely restocked, she must have made some interesting calls to well-connected people- but I kinda dig the look. Goes with your more angular features."
It was a nice spin on things, as if her thinner body and grey hair were audacious fashion choices and not the product of hunger and stress. The upbeat attitude was decidedly contagious, specially once she saw that her beloved library was mostly undamaged. Boarded up still, and a little worse for wear on the outside, but the inside was just as she had left it. She commented on it to Granny as the woman forced a second helping of pie on her. For someone who had undergone the treatment she didn't really look it, with the exception of a slight stiffness to her movements.
"I'm glad the town council moved so quickly to board it up."
"They had nothing to do with it. It was Gold and his crew, mainly that huge mammoth of a man that worked for him, Dove. Did it by themselves, with the help of Marco."
Though Granny's tone was as gruff and as acid as it always was when she talked of the pawnbroker Belle felt a pleasant warmth bloom in her. She'd always had a soft spot for the Scotsman, something she knew was a bit of an unpopular opinion in Storybrooke. He had always had a smile and a polite comment or two for her whenever she saw her, was a staunch ally of the library in town council meetings and was keen on chatting about a book when he returned it, which he always did in person. Once or twice they’d sat together when Granny’s was too full and his was the only table with spare seats. People had warned her after the first time they’d shared a cup of tea in public that she was better off staying as far away from possible from him, but she had refused to comply, specially when she caught the bias in a lot of the stories, like the one Ashley Boyd spun, about Mr Gold cruelly charging interest for the rent of a meager little flat after having been “a little bit late” on the rent. She was never specific about how late till Belle asked, and she reluctantly admitted it was over two months, even past the grace period contemplated on the rental agreement.
“Still, who threatens to evict a young couple with a newborn baby and nowhere to go?”
Ashley was also always careful not to mention her father-in-law, well-off and with more than enough room in his house to host his only son and his wife for a lengthy period of time. Belle could see how her tale of woe lost a little of the dramatic edge with the addition of those pesky details. So she had carried on being friendly with the pawnbroker, even if it made people look at her funny and sometimes whisper behind her back. Just one of the many things that made her strange in the little town, along with her accent and habit of reading in the strangest of moments and places. She hadn’t cared.
“That was so kind of him. I must go over to his house and thank him.”
She hadn’t seen the Scotsman around since her return, but she’d assumed he was busy either with repairs to his home or perhaps the shop, or even trying to restore order to his many properties. He was a fastidious landlord and considering his nature she imagined he’d be one of those people eager to set the world to rights, to restore order.
“You haven’t told her?”
Granny looked at Ruby reproachfully, though she tried to shrug it off. The old woman sighed, not-quite managing to roll her eyes.
“He was amongst the people infected during a breach a couple of years ago. We’ve been told he’s in treatment, but not responding well. It doesn’t quite work on everyone, as you know.”
It felt impossible, at first. Mr Gold was such a vital part of Storybrooke that it made no sense for the town to be still standing without him. He was also so strong, despite his short stature and his reliance on a cane to walk, that it made no sense to think that even the outbreak could’ve gotten to him. He was the sort of man she would expect to survive the apocalypse, if not thrive in it.
It wasn’t until a couple of days later, when she overheard Katherine Knight talk about “visiting Freddie” that she gave more thought about Mr Gold’s situation. Frederick Knight, Katherine’s husband, was amongst the people still being treated and it had not occurred to her that visits to those infected were not only possible, but desirable. It was human contact, after all, the key to guide those afflicted back to their humanity. Contact and communication with loved ones, with people near and dear, was even better, capable of speeding up the process. And she was sure that, though not close, Mr Gold had considered her a friend. She certainly knew him enough to be of help, and she couldn’t imagine people would much object to her taking him off their hands for a couple of hours a day.
It was with a sinking heart that she learned that, though the treatment of the infected was officially managed by the local hospital, the actual efforts were overseen by Mother Superior and her gaggle of nuns, all of which had survived the apocalyptic events. They had done so mostly because the good Mother had ordered the convent’s doors to be bolted at the first sign of trouble. The sisters had spent the entire apocalypse safe behind the tall walls of the convent, living off the produce from the gardens and closing their ears to the pleas for help from outside.
It was no wonder Mother Superior had decided to offer the services of her little lambs when hands were needed to treat the infected once it was discovered this could be done. It was a way to change the narrative, to erase whatever ill-feelings there remained in town regarding the nuns. It was also a way to position herself in a place of power and relevance, one she relished with little subtlety, it seemed to her. She was practically goading when she turned Belle away, telling her Mr Gold was unfit to receive visits of any kind, and that she could give her no further information.
The rumours she heard were not encouraging. People whispered about Mr Gold lashing out against anybody that dared approach him, about him savagely attacking orderlies and snapping out of restraints with a brute force surprising even in an infected. Too violent to be cured, people said, a beast on the outside as he’d always been on the inside. So thin and haggard, in such a state of rot, that he was practically a boney. The town seemed quite content to do nothing about it, so she decided in the end to take the matter to the mayor. Regina Mills was the closest thing Mr Gold had to family. They’d known each other since she was a baby- there were some unsavoury stories about the pawnbroker and Regina’s mother, but nothing anyone could corroborate- and though they usually bickered they seemed to have a certain respect and fondness for each other, at least from what she’d been able to see.
To her credit Regina did seem to share her concerns regarding Mr Gold- Hell, even Sheriff Swan, not his biggest fan, seemed sympathetic- but didn’t think much could be done about it.
“I wish I could tell you Mother Superior or the orderlies at the hospital were exaggerating, Miss French, but I’ve been to see Mr Gold. Even restrained he was quite violent, and my presence seemed to agitate him more than help him. I believe everything that could be done for him is being done. He’s simply… not responding as he should. I am told it happens.”
She seemed to be honestly contrite, which gave her the opening she needed to convince her to demand the hospital let her visit. It took a while, and some back and forth, but she was finally given permission, though begrudgingly, by Dr Whale and Mother Superior. She was full of cautious optimism that morning, joining Mary Margaret Nolan in the hospital entrance lobby to wait for visiting hours to start, listening intently as the schoolteacher told her that she was hopeful her husband would be released soon, given his progress.
Her enthusiasm waned somewhat when Mary Margaret was ushered along a brightly-lit corridor and she in turn was escorted to a key-coded door that led to the basement, and taken down a flight of stairs into a dark hall, where a clearly-recovering orderly was mopping the floors. She was told to go to the “cell at the end”, a phrase that did away with the rest of her cheerfulness. The air down there was damp and stale, and mold grew on certain areas along the walls and in corners. The floor was solid concrete, with an abundance of thin, spidery cracks, and there were heavy metal doors to her left, with small covered windows slots further down that remained shut, but likely was meant for trays.
She found him when she peered into the third door, though it was difficult to see him at first because the cell was unlit but for the light that shone from a small barred window high above and he was in a shadowy corner, standing still. It was only when her eyes adjusted to the darkness that she began to make out his silhouette, and later more and more details. In many ways it was easy to recognise him: custom suit, slightly-uneven gait, favouring one leg clearly over the other, and shaggy hair a tad too long to be respectable. At the same time, however, the man in the cell looked like a complete stranger: rail-thin, with his trousers torn and his suit jacket in tatters. He wasn’t even wearing a tie, something she’d never seen Mr Gold without. The eyes, however, were the most striking difference: clouded over, almost milky-white, dull and unfocused.
“Oh, Mr Gold…”
The living corpse seemed to shudder, head tilting back to sniff the air. She braced herself for anything, any sudden movement or anything that could remotely be construed as violent, but nothing happened. There was definitely something different, though, an awareness that hadn’t been there before. He could certainly smell her, she knew that, and had likely heard her loud and clear- infected tended to have their sense of smell and hearing heightened, even while their organs and muscles deteriorated. So he knew she was there, but did not attack her, did not seem interesting in doing her harm. The way it seemed there wasn’t anything inherently aggressive or incurable about him, he simply had been left alone to rot.
If no one was gonna do anything about it she would.
She decided the best way to establish any sort of relationship was through something she knew Mr Gold enjoyed. She set aside several afternoons a week to sit down on the hard concrete floor next to Mr Gold’s door and read him, choosing books from his favourite authors and genres. She started with Borges, which he had often checked out, and Irvine Welsh, along with some Cortázar and Verne. She would sneak in, unsure whether Mother Superior wouldn’t try to stop her if she knew what she was trying to do, and spend hours reading and drinking tea. Sometimes Ruby would sneak her something to eat- she had decided early on that she needed at least one person who knew where she was going and what she was doing just in case, specially when it became clear no one went to the basement except her. No nuns, no doctors, no one. People were literally waiting for Mr Gold to turn to dust, too squeamish to outright put a bullet in his brain and be done with it but in no real rush to see him recover either.
Spite became a motivator during those afternoons were things didn’t seem to be progressing and it looked like she was wasting her time. Mr Gold would like that, she thought privately. She felt an odd sort of camaraderie when she thought about sticking it to the nuns, about the expression on Mother Superior’s face if she succeeded. She told him about that, and about the progress being made around town. At some point she started calling him by his first name- Ramsay, a confession he made when she’d playfully teased him about having “R. Gold” as the name on his library card- thinking it might spark something.
She would feed him too, whatever large chunks of raw meat she could get from Granny, who she suspected was well aware of what she was doing but said nothing. She was fully cured, herself, with minimal sequels, but her experience seemed to have made her empathetic to Mr Gold’s plight. She had retained some of the incredible sense of hearing she’d enjoyed while undead. It wasn’t unheard of for people to keep a trait or two from their sickness, though it was rare. In some cases the infection had cause certain irreparable changes to their physiognomy, specially in those further gone.
Fortunately for Belle Mr Gold enjoyed the raw meat, though she never saw him eat it. She’d leave it before heading back to the library and it’d be gone in the morning, tray licked clean but Mr Gold back in his corner. It was a relief, somewhat, to see him lose some of his boney appearance, though he was still rail-thin, little more than skin and bones.
Her first big break happened during an ordinary afternoon, while she sat and read to him something by Horacio Quiroga. Mr Gold rather liked the dark short stories, and though some people might have thought them inappropriate reading material for a recovering zombie Belle disagreed, thinking that anything that might elicit a response from Mr Gold, any response at all, was worth trying.
It was while she was nearing the end of The Feather Pillow that she heard a shuffling and later a thump right on the other side of the door. Tentatively she knocked on the metal door, barely containing a happy laugh when something on the other side knocked back, slow but surely. It was the first time that Mr Gold acknowledged her at all and thought it was a small thing it felt like something monumental. It put a smile on her face so bright Ruby teased her about it for weeks, and prompted her to take a leap of faith one afternoon and open the latch that kept the small window on the door covered. There was no glass to further separate them so she was able to tentatively slip her hand through the opening.
“Come here, Ramsay. Come on, you know me. It’s okay.”
Mr Gold did perk up somewhat, and later dragged himself across the room. She forced herself not to flinch as he leaned forward, his nose almost brushing her skin as he breathed in deeply, hesitantly at first but pressing closer when something about the scent seemed to catch his attention or spark something in him. He never made a move to bite so for the longest time Belle just stood there, on her tippy-toes to be able to pass most of her arm through the opening, fighting the urge to pull back. Her fear gave way to cautionary optimism and later awe at the way Mr Gold practically rubbed his entire face against her hand, as if the notion of skin to skin contact was some sort of miracle. He breathed her deeply now, big lungfuls of her scent, nose pressed tightly against her palm or the underside of her wrist, his expression almost desperate. He made a sort of whining noise when she was forced to pull her arm back, and followed her hand until he physically couldn’t anymore.
She cried later that night, back in the safety of her library, away from prying eyes, part out of sheer relief and part out of anger and sadness at the thought that Mr Gold had been left to rot not because he was beyond help, but rather because it was so convenient. So many people had been given second chances once the rebuilding had started, people who had committed questionable or even downright despicable acts during the apocalypse. Ruby had warned her at the beginning about some, like Keith Nott and Greg Aston, who had taken to the chaos of the past years like ducks to water, had grown unruly and dangerous. She had heard only half-stories, mostly from Ruby, mostly things no one could prove or cared to now that the human race had another chance and the population was in dire need of able-bodied men to rebuild and reproduce. If Storybrooke was ready to embrace lowlifes like those they would have to get used to having Mr Gold back, and she’d call out anyone who dared fight her on that on their hypocrisy.
From then on it became routine to let him smell her. Mr Gold seemed to look forward to it, being sure to stay close to the door and letting out a growly sort of purr when she reached out to him. He was also eager to let himself be stroked and his hair petted, which took a bit of getting used to but to her made sense. Mr Gold had always avoided contact as a rule. Though he sometimes tended to invade people’s personal space as a tactic to put them ill at ease, he usually skirted human touch. She’d had occasion to make a study of it,  back before the apocalypse, down to how Mr Gold almost always wore gloves on rent day and avoided passing anything hand to hand. She had noticed that once he got familiar with her he let his guard down a bit and sometimes allowed casual touches, fingers brushing over a book exchanging hands, things of that nature. But he’d always shied away from further contact.
Belle had long ago come to the conclusion that he must have been very touch-starved, given how little actual skin to skin contact he seemed to experience day to day. She had seen him flex his fingers often, his hands and entire body full of nervous energy, of a sort of yearning for what he denied himself. Now, stripped of all human pretenses, without the need to protect himself from others, he was seeking out that which he needed like he hadn’t allowed himself before. She told him over and over that it was alright, that he was allowed to want and seek affection, that she would never use it against him or otherwise harm him with the knowledge. She hoped it would stick on the back of his mind, so he wouldn’t be embarrassed when he was himself again, or wary of her.
She hadn’t expected it to feel so… powerful. So heady, to have someone like Mr Gold, who always seemed larger-than-life, lean on her so trustingly, so eagerly. To have a creature capable of immense feats of strength, of untold violence, purr under her touch like a kitten. She’d always wanted to do it, to reach out and give some sort of comfort to Mr Gold, a little bit of the affection he was sorely missing. It was precisely why she told herself to be cautious and not rush into things, given her impulsive nature. If she botched things now, if she lost her progress or got into a situation she couldn’t handle, Mr Gold might never recover. She was sure any excuse would be enough for people to demand he be “put out of his misery”. She couldn’t afford mistakes or miscalculations.
So she took things slow, and kept things close to the chest. Best no one knew of her progress until she could get Mr Gold talking a little, enough to prove without a shadow of a doubt that he was on the mend, and that killing him would be killing a human being and not some well-dressed boney. So she went about her day as normal as possible, helping set the town to rights, cleaning the library, helping Dove with the community garden that grew on some land belonging to Mr Gold and that was still a vital source of a lot of produce the town consumed, though the normal flow of goods and services was slowly being re established across the estate. Dove was an attentive gardener and the work was strangely soothing. She set her afternoons aside for Mr Gold, though, reluctant to miss a day and cause a potential regression. And it helped her too, helped her deal with what she’d lived through, the peace and companionship she found in the basement of the hospital, with Mr Gold. In the hope that sparked in her every time she caught a glimpse of his eyes and they looked less cloudy and more focused, more alive.
She was so focused on those things, so eager to escape to her afternoon trysts, that she forgot to pay proper attention to her surroundings. It was night when she left the hospital, later than she’d realised, but nothing seemed amiss at first. Even after she heard something she didn’t immediately panic. The Rabbit Hole was close to the hospital, and people were still getting celebratory drunk in honour of the ending of the apocalypse. Sheriff Swan was good about keeping things controlled, all things considered. 
It wasn’t until they were almost upon her that she noticed them, staggering around shouting at her, some slurred lewd proposition that made her walk faster, but nothing else. When she chanced a glance back she felt the first true jolt of fear, recognising easily the tall, lanky man as Gregory Aston, which made the other man following her his buddy Keith. Greg had made some advances before the apocalypse, which she hadn’t returned, much to his displeasure. But back then they had both lived in a society with strict rules that limited whatever he might have wanted to do when he was rejected. Now he strutted around Storybrooke getting into fights and using his brute strength to get whatever he wanted, having grown used to the more violent times of the apocalypse, when his fighting ability had given him a position of prominence. Keith, on the other hand, had thrived in the smuggling business, specially of drugs, and was still active. Emma was a competent sheriff but the problems of a town like Storybrooke in the post-apocalypse were many, and the resources of the sheriff’s office were limited.
Being the stupid sort of drug dealer one would’ve expected from Keith he often tested his merchandise and shared it with close pals, which included Greg. Belle could see it the closer they got to her, the tell-tale signs of a person under the influence of more than just alcohol.
“Hey, Belle, wait up, we wanna talk to you!”
She began to seriously consider her options. The library was too far away, and it was too late for Granny’s to be open. The station was close by, but the sheriff was doing rounds so no one would be there. It seemed safer to go back to the hospital, where there was bound to be at least a couple of nurses on their night shift.
“Hey, you frigid bitch, I know you can hear us!”
Running probably was ill-advised, but at some point Belle couldn’t fight her instincts anymore. The relief she felt when she burst through the doors of the hospital was short-lived. The reception area was deserted, and access to the rest of the hospital seemed to be blocked, a precaution typical of the days of the apocalypse that people seemed to still be keeping. Frantically she went to the one door she knew the combination to, but when she tried to close it behind her it was wrenched from her grasp, either by Greg or Keith, she didn’t bother to look. Someone grabbed her arm when she raced down the stairs, but years of surviving in a high-stress environment had given her sharp reflexes that helped her pull herself free.
“There’s nowhere to run, sweetheart. We promise we’ll be nice, we just want to be nice to you, Belle.”
She didn’t know when she made the decision. It was in a split second, more instinctual than anything else. Mr Gold’s cell was bolted from the outside but not locked, she’d noticed that from the beginning. She’d been tempted to open the door so many times, but she’d restrained herself. But now adrenaline was rushing through her and the survival instinct that had kept her alive through hell on Earth moved her to make a quick decision, to seek out safety. Without pausing to second-guess herself she unbolted the door, pushing her way inside and closing it behind her.
“Got ourselves a room, how nice.”
“Hope there’s a bed inside!”
It was dark inside the cell. The only light came from the corridor and was too faint to reach inside. Belle knew she was not alone in the room but she could not hear or see Mr Gold. The infected got very good at being quiet and staying out of sight, like the best of predators, which wasn’t an altogether-reassuring thought. Greg and Keith stumbled inside the room, uncoordinated and sluggish from drink and whatever else they’d consumed, and Belle stepped back, seeking who she knew was there.
“Now, Belle, this doesn’t need to be bad. Ugly. We can… can treat you right. Make it good. We’re nice guys.”
Greg had always said that. Belle was sure that, against all odds, he believed it. Even as he clamped a hand around her arm, with enough force to make her wrist hurt, to make her cry out in pain and fight to wrench herself free. Even as Keith laughed next to him, clumsily pawing at his belt. There was a second of all-consuming fear, the kind that paralysed the muscles and made it difficult to breathe. Then there was a growl and she felt rather than saw an arm wrap around her waist and pull her backwards. Another arm went across her chest, securing her against something solid behind her.
“Holy fuck, what the-?”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!”
The sheer terror in both men’s eyes was almost amusing, if it weren’t for the fact that Belle felt the same. Mr Gold’s face was next to hers, snarling, teeth bared in a clear warning. She wanted to say something, so that he’d recognise her as a friend, let himself be soothed, perhaps, but nothing came out. Greg and Keith scrambled backwards, fighting to be the first ones out the door, bolting it behind them for good measure before running away, the sound of their footsteps eventually fading into nothing. They weren’t going to look for help, she knew it. Too messy for them, too dangerous. They’d left her alone, perhaps even hoping Mr Gold would take care of her so she wouldn’t go telling tales and for a moment her anger overcame her fear, so thoroughly that she didn’t notice Gold’s head move, his nose coming to press against her neck. He took a deep, audible breath and Belle froze again, part of her bracing herself for a bite. But none came, Mr Gold seemingly content to scent her. Slowly Belle felt fear drain out of her, allowing her to somewhat compose herself.
“It’s just me, Ramsay, Belle. You know  me, don’t you?”
He made a purring sound, the one  she’d grown so used to, and loosened his hold on her, not a drop of aggression on him. Belle tentatively petted his hair, excited now to be able to look at him so closely, to notice the very slight tint of pink on his cheeks and the slight warmth of his skin, signs of his recovering humanity. He, likewise, seemed curious about her, hands hovering near her, as if asking for permission to touch, to explore. And though he didn’t dare grab her again he had no problems pressing his nose close to whatever part of her he could reach. He spent long minutes scenting her hair, fingers ghosting over it, as if delighted by the feel of it. Fascinated and intrigued she let him proceed, allowing him to sniff at her forehead, down her neck and over her torso. It was strangely endearing, or at least until he pressed firmly against the juncture of her thighs, taking a deep breath in an attempt to scent her through her underwear and cotton shorts. 
“No!”
She pushed against his shoulders and he scrambled away, clearly feeling chastised by her tone and actions. He looked confused, as if unaware of whatever he’d done wrong, and whatever offence she might have felt a moment ago went up in smoke. Slowly, so as to not spook him, she sat down in the cot next to him and turned his face so they’d make eye-contact.
“Hey, Ramsey, I’m sorry. You didn’t know. It’s okay, Ramsey, I’m not mad.”
Something sparked in his eyes, and he tilted his head to the side, brow furrowing.
“R-r-r-r…” With a jolt, Belle realised he was trying to speak. It was more of a growl than anything else, but there seemed to be a purpose to it, a desire to shape it into something. “R-r-rum.”
He splayed a hand against his chest and repeated the word. Belle understood at once what he was trying to say.
“Yes, yes, that’s right. You’re Ramsay, that’s your name. Ramsay.”
She said it slowly, over and over again, delighting in the way he focused on her lips as they shaped out the word. He couldn’t quite repeat it, not entirely at least, but he recognised it without a doubt as his name, the first concrete proof that he could not only understand speech but that he had also recovered a sense of self, and at least partial access to his memories. He also seemed to realise it was a momentous occasion, his lips curling up into a shadow of a smile, looking more like Mr Gold than ever.
Knowing that certainly Ruby or Dove would report her missing tomorrow and that this would be an obvious place to check out, seeing as to how Emma and Regina suspected of her near-constant visits, she settled down to wait, lying down on the cot so her face was close to Mr Gold- Rum, now, in her mind- who was still on the floor, looking at her. She talked to him as one of her hands combed through his tangled hair, told him about Dove and how he was taking care of everything for him, about how the Library was ready for re-opening and how things were slowly returning to normal. There was an understanding in his eyes that hadn’t been there before, as if one more of many veiled had been lifted and he could see the world more clear now than before.
She didn’t recall falling asleep, but she must have at some point. When she awoke there was no panic, even when she registered the grey walls of the cell and the thin, hospital-issue mattress beneath her. Rum was next to her, sitting on the floor leaning against the cot and watching her from beneath a curtain of shaggy hair. It was, she was sure, longer than it had been weeks ago, another sign of his blossoming humanity to add to her list.
“Good morning, Rum.”
She pulled herself to a sitting position, looking around her. Now that there was slight coming into the room from the small window in a corner she could see the room properly, and winced at the signs of decay and disrepair. Surely it couldn’t be conductive to his recovery for him to be locked up in a place like that. She would need to try and convince Regina to do something about it, if she could somehow get the woman to the cell so she could see with her own eyes that Rum was on the mend, and certainly not a danger to anyone.
It was while she contemplated how to go about it all that she heard faint sounds, and later the murmur of voices. Someone shouted her name, desperately- Ruby, it sounded like- followed by others. Rum tensed up beside her, scrambling to stand between her and the door. She was about to try and calm him down when she was startled by the cell door being violently yanked open, Sheriff Swan stepping into the room with her revolver up and aimed squarely at the Scotsman’s head. Behind her Belle could see Ruby, David Nolan- who acted sometimes as Deputy Sheriff, and the major herself.
“No, wait!”
Thankfully for her Rum was a short man, so getting in front of him guaranteed Emma would be unable to shoot him in the head. It didn’t make her drop her stance, though, specially when she saw Rum grab her from behind and snarl. 
“Belle, what the fuck? Get out of the way!”
“No, you don’t understand. It’s okay. I’m okay. He’s not gonna hurt me. He’s not aggressive.”
She knew how ridiculous she sounded like, with Rum behind her, teeth bared and hands digging into her skin to the point where she had to admit hurt a little, but it was important that they understood.
“He… he’s on the mend. He just thinks you’re threatening me. Just… just stand down. He’ll relax.”
She wasn’t sure he would, but it was worth a try. Emma, to her credit, didn’t dismiss her words, and obviously noticed Rum was making no move to bite or otherwise attack her. She lowered her firearm and relaxed her posture, and little by little Belle felt Rum do the same behind her, though he kept one of his hands curled protectively on her shoulder, as if ready to yank her back at the first sign of trouble. She took advantage of the tentative peace to recount the events of last night, trying to be as detailed as possible. Though she got some sceptic looks she could see that at least Emma and Regina were considering part of what she was saying, particularly regarding Keith and Greg. When it came to Rum, however, the general consensus seemed to be that Belle was likely being a bit too optimistic, and there weren’t enough grounds to challenge the authority of Mother Superior regarding Mr Gold’s situation.
“No, you’re not listening to me. He’s on the mend. He knows who he is, he has memories. Look at him. At the colour of his skin, at his eyes. He’s better. He knows who I am, I’m sure.”
She stared at Emma, hard, as if daring the blonde to contradict her, to pat her on the head and tell her she was mistaken, confused, seeing things that weren’t there. To her surprise she felt Rum’s hand on her shoulder tighten.
“B-B-B-Be-Belle.”
It was more of a croak than anything, but there was no mistaking what he’d just said. Everyone froze in place and things were deadly quiet for a second or two. Belle could have sworn that when she chanced a glance at Rum there was something of the familiar Mr Gold smirk about him, the satisfied, smug look he often got after striking a deal or getting the better of people. Finally, after what felt like forever, Regina spoke.
“I can’t wait to see the look on Mother Superior’s face when I tell her this.”
Rum’s progress seemed to accelerate after that, though his vocabulary remained reduced. But his understanding of speech and his communication skills evolved immensely, and there was a constant awareness now of what was going on around him and a spark of intelligence that hadn’t been there before.. The major, likewise, was determined to make her own progress and before the week was out she managed to arrange a review of Mr Gold’s case with Dr Whale and Dr Hopper, against the express wishes of Mother Superior. Both reports were as positive as Belle could’ve hoped for, with Dr Hopper encouraging Mr Gold be moved to his own house for the remainder of his recovery, which was usually the next step once patients had developed enough understanding of the world around them.
Belle and Dove worked tirelessly to put Mr Gold’s house to rights, or as close to it as possible. Dove had boarded it up after Mr Gold had been infected, so it was quite the job to open it up again and clean it, but the inside was mostly well-preserved. All around Storybrooke news of the imminent release of the pawnbroker spread around fast, and the reception was more than a little chilly. No one dare take it up personally with Belle- apparently the first idiot to even insinuate something like that had had a pickaxe nearly flung at them by Leroy- but people definitely gave her hostile looks and were otherwise very vocal about how much better things would’ve been if Mr Gold had simply… faded away. It was disgusting and she was grateful that those closest to her seemed to be on the same page.
It was nighttime when Rum was officially discharged. He’d been already moved to a regular hospital room a day before in preparation and to administer any final tests and such. Afterwards they left him sitting in the hallway, which was where she found him. He visibly perked when he saw her, lips curling into that adorable half-smile that she remembered from years ago. He lurched forward towards her, which made her notice his limp was more pronounced than before. Infected people gained strength and agility due to the changes in their bodies, which could also strengthen injured bones and muscle. The more Rum’s body returned to its natural state the more his old injury reasserted itself. It was a strange sort of positive sign.
Thankfully the streets were deserted, like she’d hoped when she’d suggested Rum be released at night. They walked slowly, him leaning slightly against her for balance, looking around with unabashed hunger. He breathed in deeply, scenting the air, silently reveling in his freedom. Certain buildings and sights seemed to catch his attention, his eyes lingering on the diner, the library and specially on his pawnshop. When they finally got to the edge of town and he spotted his house he visibly moved faster, tugging her along and paying little attention to his dragging right leg as he all but sprinted towards it. His movements were still very wooden and stiff but the progress was astounding. 
The house was dimly lit, electricity still being strictly rationed, but Rum seemed to want to explore everything at once, at least until something seemed to occur to him and he darted awkwardly up the stairs. When she followed him she found him in his ensuite bathroom, shower already on. He was struggling to take his tattered clothes off, which was no easy feat given his current lack of dexterity. Belle helped him take his jacket off, trying not to smile at his slightly abashed look. What was left of his shirt was partly stuck to his undershirt and skin by grime and blood. It took ten minutes and a pair of scissors to peel the fabric off him safely. His torso was littered in half-healing bite marks and scratches and when she gently touched a couple of them he sighed, pressing his forehead against hers.
“I’m-m-m okay.” She didn’t realise until he tried to console her that she was crying. “Ev-v-v-very-thing is o-k-k-ay.”
His brogue was so thick it was difficult to understand him, and his voice was still raspy and harsh form disuse but the gentleness with which he sought to reassure her made his words soft as butter. She helped him out of the rest of his clothing, leaving his boxers on when it became clear he was not keen on the idea of having her remove them. She rummaged his walk-in closet for a pair of pants, fresh underwear and a t-shirt and left him to shower in peace. Afterwards- thankfully, dressing up had been easier for him than stripping down- she sat him down in front of a mirror and trimmed his hair at his request, pleased at the results. Showered and properly groomed Rum was looking more like himself than ever.
When she brought up the idea that she might stay the night- Dove had prepared a room for her just in case- he looked painfully relieved and agreed vigorously, not letting her out of his sight until she slipped into her own room, leaving the door ajar behind her. He shuffled into the room that she’d pointed out was his and laid on the bed, feeling a strange burning in his eyes, and a heaviness that he didn’t recognise at first. Minutes later he was asleep.
45 notes ¡ View notes
mrfog5 ¡ 5 years ago
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kat09me ¡ 5 years ago
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Life of a single mom.
My story begins when I was just 18,…
I am the youngest daughter of four daughters, yet I am the one who is really independent and wanted to have a job and live on my own.
I remember when I was in high school i argued with my teacher in Values Education Subject regarding how the western people live compare to us Filipino people. Because the way most Filipino lives, even if they have their own jobs and family we still live with our parents’ house “extended family living”. It’s not that I don’t want to live with my parents, but I feel like i am more successful when I live my own, have a carrier and can buy things out of my own pocket.
So when I turned 17, my parents asked me to quit college because they’re unable to pay for my tuition. Nor have enough funds for travelling back and forth from our house to school, vice versa ‘cause by the way I live from a different city which is 40 minutes to an hour away from school.
When I turned 18, I was really eager to work so I can help my family. Then, there was this open position in a small beauty store. I applied and was able to get hired as an assistant secretary. I was happy and proud even if my pay that time is only fifty pesos per day ($1 USD). Each day my father would come and visit me at the store and sit in front of my table smiling. He looks so proud of me. Cause even if I am unable to finish my college he can see that I am happy and contented with what I have.
But things changed. A year after i worked there, my father past away due to Heart Enlargement. My heart was really broken and my life changed. I quit working because each time i go to work I remember each day he visits me at work and smile at me. It’s like i can still see him in front of me smiling and my tears just wont go away. Then a friend of my father offered me a good deal. He asked me if I would like to pursue my college. And I was thinking, I am still in first year college and first semester when i quit. It would take me a long time before I can get a job help my family and have my own place. So I have decided to take to take a short cut. I took up a vocational or just a training course for a call center training. I took it for only a month. I was happy and feel ready to take a step in applying. But unfortunately some of the call centers I applied for they require at least 72 units subject taken in college which means i should have taken up to 2 years in college. I was discouraged. I begin to go out all night, come home the next day being drunk, sleep all day and go out at night. That was my daily routine for a year. I was really devastated that the only man I really love and the only person that really makes me special left me. (It was a sudden heart attack and he was in the mountains when it happened.) I keep drinking, hang out with friends and my mom and I always had a fight because of what I am doing with my life.
But after a year, I started to feel tired in going out. I began to realize that i needed to get a job and get my goal. I then made a decision to go to my eldest sister place in Manila and work there. I worked as a sales representative for a huge clothing line in a mall. But it didn’t work out for me for some reason. So I quit and went back home. Then worked as a secretary for a water refilling station for more than a year, then quit and tried my luck in call center industry this time. I was very happy I got hired. It was a sales account and I was able to pass the interview. I worked in that call center in my city for like a year. Then got an opportunity offered in a bigger city from a friend of mine. I took advantage of it but it didn’t work out, i met someone in Bacolod and he helped me in applying to a bigger Call center in that city.
So there it is, I worked there for almost two years. But I keep coming back home and visit my mom twice a month. Even if it will take me 4-5 hours bus ride. Then I met the love of my life. I was really happy and feel so ready to settle down and have kids. (Even if i was told by the doctor when I was nineteen that i won’t get pregnant because I have problem with my uterus).
We were so in love and I even told myself that he will be the one I am going to marry and spend the rest of my life with. So I have decided to quit my job and move back home since he is from my home town. I started working in another call center in a neighbouring city where I studied high school and college. But I keep getting sick and the decided to quit and find opportunities in my home town. My boyfriend and I were living together for a year when my mom noticed something. My hips are getting bigger, I started craving some foods. Specially apple-mango. That was the time we realized I was 3 months pregnant. We were so stress because that time i don’t have job, my boyfriend doesn’t have job either. We were so contented with what we had and were not even ready of having a child.
But then I wanted to keep it. I was twenty five then and I know I am emotionally ready to become a mother, even if I am not financially ready. We decided to keep our baby.
Our daughter was born September 11, 2012. I started working again in a call center in our home town when our daughter was just four months old. We were so happy together, contented with what we had. I started working at home when our daughter turned nine months old. But when our baby turned two years old, it seems that everything changed. We always had a fight, to the extend he would hurt me physically and mentally. Even if we had fights years ago,.. those fights we had were not that physical. But things changed this time. It’s like almost every day we have fight. He even just sleep downstairs of the apartment where we rented out because we want to have a family of our own. Live life of our own as a family. But then everything seems hell each day. December of 2015, after his birthday. When we had a very huge fight and we called it quits.
Me and daughter lived in the same apartment after he left for like a year or two. When my mom wanted me to move back in with them so it’ll be easier for her to watch over my daughter. And so I moved back in. Things are really tough being a single mother. You pay your own bills, take care of my baby’s needs, cook for the both of us, feed her, work for the both of us. I was really used of having her father with us cause even though he was not working, he can just look after our baby and cook for us even if we eat pretty late because he was too lousy and just laying down all the time.
I know I had to be strong for us to survive. Luckily I had jobs that was able to cover our expenses and can let me but things that we need for the both of us. My daughter is in a private school, I was able to give her a good education and helped my family at the same time.
I was happy and felt contented with our lives. Fast forward 2019 of February, I was able to start a small business while I was working.
But tragedy happened, due to the fact that it is really expensive to get a franchise for a rental van here in our country, I was not able to get a franchise but my rental van is already is business. It happened when my driver got caught near the airport and my van got impounded. I was really short of funds because I have no savings at all, since I paid it to serve as a down payment for my van. I was running errands from one city to another city, from island to another island trying to process the release of my van and I was not able to work because I kept on travelling and I had to make loans and more loans. 2 months pass, I found a job where I thought I could earn more because I managed a team of agents working at home for a credit repair company based in the US. At first it was all good. Seems everything was working fine. They paid our first week of work that was included in the cut off pay. But when the next invoice was sent to them, they told us that there funds has been frozen from the bank due to sending funds here in the Philippines. And they promised that after a week it’ll be released, they just need to send some documents to prove that they employed us outsourcely.
We’ve been waiting for six weeks, no pay at all. And they decided to cut as off. They said that they will have to settle those three invoices for six weeks of work we sent them before we continue working. But then days and weeks pass, they didn’t pay us. All of the teams working for them were not paid. And bills keeps filling up, loan sharks have been in our doorsteps almost every day and still nothing. I have been crying almost every day because the person that I owed money from posted me on social media to defame me.
I even thought that if killing myself would make everything silent cause I think my insurance would be enough to cover for my loans, then I’ll do it. But I just can’t afford to leave my daughter. She’s the reason why i work hard, she’s the reason why i am contented not having someone in my life, she’s the reason why all these years I have survived.
So instead of crying and crying, i opened my bible and read;
October 11, 2019, I ready Colossians 3:1-25. What catches my attention was really the first part.
Colossians 3:1-3 ”If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
I began to realize that I was too busy with getting my goal. Looking at those earthly things that I wanted to have for me and my child. For me to help my family. And I forgot to even thank Him each day, asked for His guidance and even pray.
Life is full of trials, it doesn’t matter if your single, married, single parent, or divorced. But it is up to us on how we handle those things that tried to pull us down. I know I am in the midst of trouble now, but i know He is by my side throughout this situation…
God has prepared a price after this dark and rough road I am now,…
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romantic-witch ¡ 6 years ago
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All You Had To Do Was Stay // David [Pt. 2]
imagine: david confessing about everything
please please read the first chapter first, it's right: here
inspired: you are in love (taylor swift)
warning: english is not my first language. please correct me if I have any grammar mistakes.
Tumblr media
Zane, thanks to god, was really understanding of me editing the video by myself. I finished his last vlog and while uploading, he texted me, saying:
"I just filmed a quick bonus video, it's a brand deal don't worry. I'm gonna drive to San Diego to shoot some stuff so I'll drop off the memory card."
Zane making my life easier once again. I had no intention of going back to LA. At least maybe for a thousand years. I can’t, after that night. David tried to call me four times but I ignored two of them and missed the other two.
At least my beliefs didn't change. God sent me another so called "clue" and it failed so back to being an atheist, I guess.
The whole week passed really quicker than I thought. I went to some classes, learned I got an A from my multimedia storytelling class, and ditched some classes, for example that boring ass class named principles of public relations. Of course it's my worst class since I'm not a social butterfly.
I was out, doing some paper work for one of my classes when a text from Zane appeared on my phone.
"Babyy, we decided to shoot in Santa Barbara, so can you pick up the memo card from Scott?"
I responded:
"What was he doing with your memo card lmao?"
"He ran out of storage in his card."
"He says hi btw."
I sent a waving hand emoji and then texted:
"I'll call Scott when I arrive in his place."
He sent an okay emoji.
I handed my work from Google Classroom and started packing my stuff. It was 3.34 pm. It was exactly the time I would start my hour and a half road trip to LA, like every other Friday. I head back to my dorm, dropped off my textbooks and laptop, and with that I began my road trip to the one place I said I wouldn’t go for the rest of my life, with my Subaru SUV.
When it’s the decision of the boss, who literally pays for my student loans, I had to do it.
-
LA traffic is the worst. We literally had zero traffic back in the island. Guam, with over 100k citizens still managed to be the most amazing thing that ever happened to USA while people are praising the City of Angels with it's unbearable traffic and horrible pizza.
I was jamming to some '80s music and then my car, since it's connected to my phone, alarmed me saying:
"You got a new message from..."
The car lady waited a split second and then added:
"David. Do you want me to read it?"
I responded no and got my phone just to see the notification.
"Hey! Heard you were coming to LA? Can we talk?"
I literally threw my phone back to its place, the shotgun seat, and focused more to the road and Madonna.
Maybe if I stop talking to him, he'll think I'm just a piece of ass and stop liking me.
That was my mind set for this past week. Yes, I ignored some of my friends when we got into an argument, but maybe for 10 minutes. I have been ignoring David for the past week, and if he did the same thing to me, I would be pretty pissed. 
He loves Liza. I am just trying to help him see the truth, or the bigger picture. Every single person believes they are going to get married, have 3 kids and two dogs in a huge ass mansion by the time they are 30. Okay, maybe not that early, but still.
The traffic finally gotten better and I started to drive a little bit faster. At least I was not in the highway anymore. Highways give me anxiety and that is no good considering I will have another one just about 25 minutes, when I arrive at the house. But my car, most certainly, was not feeling too great. Some noises started to came from the back which I specifically turned off the radio to hear it.
I pulled over and saw a little hole in my tire, which let the air come out of it. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck! Why do all of these things happen to me in very specific times? I called someone that could help and waited for them in a nearby cafe for almost an hour.
Scott, Matt and David texted me, saying: in order,
"Hey, I'm going out to see a film with Kristen, text me when you come."
"Heard you were coming to LA, wanna binge the new Titans on Netflix and talk how bad it is?"
"Are you okay?"
"Are you okay?"
The message was continued with two other messages saying:
"You were suppose to come 30 minutes ago."
"I mean you are not suppose to, you usually come around that time."
I wanted to say something. At least tell him that my car broke. But I know for a fact that he will come up here and pick me up. So I texted Scotty.
"Hey, my car broke in Moorpark Street, I'll probably be around when you guys finish the movie. Just wanted to let you know."
"Oh god, are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. No worries."
"Our film is about to start, should I sent anybody?"
"Noooo, but thank you anyways."
"Okay, I'll get to you after the film."
After about an hour and three minutes, the employee came and started to look at my tire. She explained that she needed to take it back to the repair shop since it looked like something looks like it stuck between my tire and my car.
She jokingly added:
"Hope, it's not a squirrel or anything!" and started laughing.
I just wished it wasn't and nervously smiled.
My car was starting to get it's place in the truck the lady came with and all I did was to stare at it and think of all the money this was going to take, I didn't realise I was silently crying until the truck started moving and I saw my car in the back of it.
The lady offered me a ride but her place was so off where I was heading, I politely refused.
I started to walk, the house was about 30 minutes away from where I was at. A quick nice walk, Pearl. That's good for your body.
I was walking for almost 5 minutes when a car honk behind me, gave me the chills.
It was the white Tesla.
David looked at me from the open window and said:
"Hop on!"
At this point all I wanted was to edit Zane's video so I did get into his car.
"Hi"
"Hey, Scott texted me but I had to look through the whole Avenue to find you."
"You didn't have to David."
"It's fine, it's fine."
We drove back to the house and didn't have a word.
I can feel his little glances from time to time, but I tried so hard not to look at him. Even once. The city lights were catching my eye, not him.
How can silence be this loud?
It was getting dark and after 20 minutes of driving, we finally came.
David stopped the car, which led the Tesla to open the car lights inside.
David immediately turn the lights off and started to stare at me. And I couldn't help myself but look deeply at him as well.
I got out of the car.
I felt a little tear in my right eyeball falling down, I immediately wiped it off with my hand.
I knocked the door. This was something nobody did in this house. I heard come in from, I'm assuming Jason, and went in.
I pull out my phone and texted Scott that I made it home and then asked Jason where the memo card is.
He said: "You should check the kitchen, it's where Scott edits the most."
I head to the kitchen and Scott's computer, with the memo card plugged in, was on the counter.
Me, being the bad bitch I am, pulled the memo card out of the computer which led to his computer warning me with the notification. 
David was nowhere to be seen. This was my time to escape LA and go back to Long Beach. I’ll catch a bus provided by my lovely school. The MTA Express bus station is not far away. 
The second I opened the house’s main door, Jason from the other side of the room, said:
“Are you leaving?”
“Yeah, gotta edit some stuff.”
“Well, David said he is waiting for you in Todd’s room.”
“Why can’t he, tell that to my face?”
Jason sighed and continued:
“Look Pearl, David might look like a 22 year old adult but he is a literal child. But you are an adult. I know what you are trying to do and I totally understand. But my only advise would be talk to him. Tell your feeling to him, whether it is positive or not.”
These were the only wise words I have heard from Jason. And he looked very sincere. 
“Okay.” I said and walked to Todd’s room.
Jason shouted from the living room:
“You are doing the right thing!”
Todd’s room door was closed. Before heading in, I took a deep breath and leaned my forehead beside the door. 
I opened the door. 
I actually never been in Todd’s room, for obvious reasons. First being, I am just an editor and that was the only reason actually.
A “Hi” came from David but it was quite like mice.
“Hi.” I said.
He was sitting on the bed. I don’t want to be near him so I just stood next to the door.
“So what you wanna talk about?” I said.
I knew what was about to happen but I asked him anyway.
“You know what I wanna talk about.”
“Enlighten me then.” I said jokingly, while sitting in front of David on the bed. 
With his classic laugh, David fell to his back and hit the head of the bed.
I giggled and asked if he was okay.
“Yeah, yeah I’m fine.” 
We stared at each other for awhile.   
“I gotta go David, what were you gonna tell me?” I said.
I loved breaking the mood. David’s face went down.
“You don’t think I like you.”
“I don’t think about it, I know it for a fact.”
“How can you know something this personal about me? Think about that then!”
“David, I am just trying for you to see the bigger picture. I see how you look at Liza every single day. I see how you talk about her, those things are not the things you say about a friend.”
“Because she is not my friend.”
“Exactl-”
“She is one of my best friends. We shared a lot of great memories together but the conclusion not only Liza came, but me as well, we are better off as friends.” David bursted.
“I just can’t think of a single reasonable solution why aren’t we together.” he continued.
“I like you and you like me, but you are sitting here stuck in my past relationship more than I am. It might not show it that well but I really really like you Pearl. And I can’t think of-”
I kissed him. I, Pearl Manglona, kissed my dream boy. Well, he kissed me back as well. That was the big shocker.
The kiss became a little steamy when he let me sit on his lap.
And a little more steamy when he pulled his shirt off.
Which let me take off mine as well.
We kissed for maybe a solid forty seconds, after he started kissing my neck. 
He made some solid points about me while he literally confronted me just 5 minutes ago, but he did not knew about my sweet spot. 
I immediately started to giggle, which let me laughing.
David’s face lighten up and said: “I did not taught you were ticklish.” 
“Well I didn’t think I would be confronted by a 22 year old with the mental age of 8.”
“I really like you, wow.”
I went for another kiss.
-
Well thank you for reading!
Also very sorry that I couldn’t upload it sooner. Believe me, I was creatively exhausted.
lots and lots of love <3
zayn :)
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kinetic-elaboration ¡ 6 years ago
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Fic Rec Tag Game
I was tagged by @dylanobrienisbatman​, @thelittlefanpire​, and @eyessharpweaponshot​ -- thank you for the tags!
Post your fics you are most proud of! No limit on how many, just the ones you look at and just feel so pleased that you wrote something so great! Tag as many people as you like to get them to share their own fics! 2k19 is the year we love our own fics babes!
This is probably going to get long because I love my own writing and I’m not going to lie about it. But I’m mostly only going through my T100 fic because that’s simpler and I’m full of self-love but also lazy. (Bonus HP at the end though!)
Since There’s No Place to Go - Bellarke, 2.5k, Modern AU
West Virginia 2009. Clarke visits the Blakes and brings them a post-Christmas gift.
A fave because: I think I really nailed the style and tone I was going for: simple and clean and soft; imo it’s just pleasant to read.
This Night is Wild, So Calm and Dull - Bellarke, 1.7k, S1
Clarke is so sure that Bellamy isn't the boyfriend type that when he kisses her, and it's sweet and gentle and soft, she's more taken aback by the careful way he lets his palm rest against her cheek than by the kiss itself. 
A fave because: This one sat unfinished for a long time, and I was pleased with the final outcome and glad I bothered to finish it instead of just letting the first few paragraphs grow dusty in a wip folder. Also: this could have been S1. We could have had it all!
if you yell like that, you’ll wake the dead - Jonty, 1.1k, canon-divergent S4
I woke up with the taste of metal in my mouth back from the dead
A fave because: Jonty angst is my secret favorite thing in this fandom, tbh. Also I wrote this all in one go after getting the idea on the bus and it helped me resolve at least some feelings from the trauma of Jasper’s canon death. Bonus: finally got to use that Naked Lunch quote that haunts me.
My Whole Expanse I Cannot See - Mackson, 3.5k, S4
Miller and Jackson share a room on Science Island and start to grow closer as they contemplate the end of the world. 
A fave because: Classic Me style. And the only full length Mackson I’ve yet written.
Pause; Rewind - Monty & Bryan, 12k, S3 / canon-divergent
Monty and Bryan take a trip to the former dropship camp; Monty reminisces about the past and considers an alternate life not lived. 
A fave because: I enjoy getting into Monty’s head. I know gen fic, especially long gen fic, has no readership, but I personally love how this turned out. (I like the fic to which it is a sequel, too, though I decided not to include it on this list.)
oh well, you’ve got me under your spell - Bellarke, 8.7k, high school au
Clarke is sophomore class president, assistant copy editor on the school paper, and a member of the debate team.
Bellamy is her best friend's tough, troublesome, protective older brother.
They barely even know each other. And yet for some reason he keeps showing up at her house.
A favorite because: I love this universe and think about it all the time, but I have such major writer’s block on chapter two that I haven’t even touched it in months. So in that sense this story makes me sad. But the first chapter at least is the kind of high school aesthetic that I’m allowed to be nostalgic for, now that it’s so far in the past that I never have to think of all the crappy parts of hs again.
We’re Home at Last - Bellarke, 4.5k, S1 (rated E on AO3 but more like M tbqh)
“The King fell in love with his Queen.”
A favorite because: I hated this while I was writing it, but now that it’s done and I have distance, I’m very proud of it. Pretty vague-smut and Earth-lovin’ scenery porn.
Iridescent - Jonty, 10k, Modern AU
Jasper takes up photography in the wake of Maya's death, and in the process makes a new friend. 
A favorite because: Writing recovery arcs for Jasper makes me feel calm inside, and I had fun with the plant aesthetic of Monty’s apartment.
Bring It On Home  - Bellarke & Miller, 10k, Modern AU
While working his summer job, helping with the repairs to Police Chief Miller’s house, Bellamy meets the Police Chief’s son and his best friend, with whom he becomes increasingly entangled in the last weeks before he leaves for college. 
A favorite because: I worked super hard on this fic and it was sort of an experiment for me, but what I ended up with was a universe I think about semi-often and feel nostalgia for. I miss this fic a lot.
The Oasis - Gen, 2.2k, Apocalypse AU
Four survivors of the nuclear apocalypse find refuge in a farmhouse and receive aid from its two inhabitants. 
A favorite because: I had a ridiculous amount of fun writing this series of Halloween fics and the aesthetic of this one worked out especially well imo.
The Sea - Lincoln/Luna, 2k, Canon-divergent (?)
Lincoln follows Luna to their new home on the sea. But on the oil rig at night, strange sounds can be heard from the water.
A favorite because: Another Halloween fic. The last one I did, and I almost skipped it because I was getting burned out, but I’m glad I didn’t because it’s a unique little story by my standards, both in terms of pairing and plot.
Anchored in the Ground - Bellarke, 9k, Canon-divergent
As they approach a relationship milestone, Bellamy and Clarke consider their personal futures, and the future of Arkadia.
A favorite because: This could have been their future! No, seriously, this is a pretty succinct summary of my ideal Bellarke/T100 endgame. Bellamy is Chancellor, Clarke is an Ambassador, the community is thriving and open, and there is peace. Also Bellarke are married. Obviously.
Bonus: Harry Potter Favorites
Words Like Smoke - Sirius/Remus, 6k, MWPP / AU
It's almost Christmas, and Sirius is missing again.  James and Remus come up with a brilliant plan to keep track of him.  
Or, a 1920's/post-WWI AU in which the wizarding community rejects magic, Remus makes maps in his spare time, and Sirius suffers from invisible scars.
Or, a love story.
A favorite because: I wrote this in college after reading Mrs. Dalloway and honestly I feel like that’s pretty much all I have to say about that. (Seriously this is probably one of the best things I’ve ever written though.)
Elegy - Sirius/Remus, 2.3k, OotP-era
Remus wrote poetry.  Sirius finds it.  Dinner is burned, dishes are rattled, the ceiling has mysterious stains, and Remus quotes John Donne.
A favorite because: I miss my favorite dysfunctional wizards. I reread this yesterday and legitimately got teary at the end.
Burning Straight Down - Sirius/Remus, 2.1k, First War Era
Sirius, sleepless and twisted inside; and Remus, feeling down on himself again; and the summer, heat waves and Death Eater attacks and letters from home.
A favorite because: I mean, as above, pretty much. An experiment in style that I think, with 10+ years of hindsight, worked.
...So I’m pretty sure everyone has already been tagged in this so if you haven’t and want to do it, do it and tag me! I always need more lists of fics to someday get around to reading... (That sounds sarcastic but it is not. I really do love seeing everyone’s favorite works floating around.)
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justanoutlawfic ¡ 6 years ago
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Life Unexpected: Chapt. 4
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Story Summary: 15 years after the events of Why Did It Have To Be Me? and much has changed. Mary Margaret and David are back living in Storybrooke, but don’t speak to one another. One day, David gets a knock on his door from the daughter they gave up all those years ago. She wants to get emancipated from the foster system, but they can’t let themselves sign the papers. As they split custody and try to help her heal from a lifetime of pain, will they find their way to each other?
Chapter Summary: Emma starts a new school, where she meets a cast of interesting characters. Meanwhile, she gets a better glimpse into David’s life.
Also on AO3
Emma was used to first days of school, to being the new kid. Boston was such a huge city and whenever she would be moved to a new home, there was a chance that she’d be brought to a new school district. Once all of her files had been sent to Storybrooke Academy, she was expected to start. She didn’t even mind.
 That was until she found out that there were uniforms.
 “I thought this was a public school,” she told Mary Margaret on their shopping trip the day after their lunch with Regina. She was letting Mary Margaret buy her whatever she wanted, though she kept staring at the ever growing pile. At least there was no pink.
“No. It’s private. There is a public high school, but it’s honestly not the best and it’s further away from the loft,” Mary Margaret explained as she looked through the button up shirts. She could see the look on her daughter’s face. “It’s not going to be that bad. Only 5 days a week and you can change as soon as you’re done.”
“I’m not wearing a skirt.”
“You don’t have to. There’s khakis or the navy pants. I ordered you a few vests with the logos as well.”
“You really don’t have to get me so much stuff.”
“You’re going to need it.”
“I don’t think I could wear all of this in a lifetime.”
“Well, you’re going to be living with David, too.” Emma tried to ignore the look that fell across Mary Margaret’s face at the mention of him. “This way, you won’t have to bring clothes back and forth.”
“How long are you going to hate him?”
“Hate who?”
“David.”
 Mary Margaret paused, her hands hovering above the pants she had been looking at. Emma knew that David had broke her heart, but it had been 15 years, hadn’t it? He had been 18 years old. How bad could it have really been? Maybe a part of her didn’t want to know that.
 “I don’t hate David,” Mary Margaret said, finally, pulling the khakis off the rack. “I forgave him a long time ago.”
“It doesn’t seem like it.”
Mary Margaret sighed. “It’s just a really complicated thing.”
“He was young when he made the choices he did.”
“It doesn’t make them hurt any less. Look, we’re going to get along so we can best take care of you.” Before Emma could say anything else, she put the pants in the cart. “Let’s go look at shoes and then you can come try all of this on.”
The uniform wasn’t that bad, Emma supposed. The shirts were comfortable and were blue, she liked blue. She had chosen to go with the darker pants rather than the khakis and paired with the sweater, she did look like something out of an 80s rock video. She let her hair hang loose and pulled a black beanie over her head, Mary Margaret said she could accessorize after all.
 She headed down the stairs and was instantly hit by a flash. She blinked a few times before finding Mary Margaret standing there, a polaroid camera in one hand, fanning out a picture with the other. She was smiling brightly.
 “You look so beautiful,” she said.
Emma rolled her eyes. “It’s just a school uniform.”
“I’ve never gotten to send you off to your first day of school, let me have my fun.”
 Emma honestly couldn’t remember the last time anyone had been this excited for her to start school. She walked over to the island, plopping down and taking a spoonful from the bowl of Cheerios that had been left out for her. That was something she was still adjusting to in a bit. Ed had food in the house-most of the time-but he’d never prepare any actual meals for Emma. Ever since she moved in with Mary Margaret, her mom had either cooked for her or they had gone to Granny’s.
 “So, I put together some lunch for you,” Mary Margaret said, walking around to the other side of the island. She held up a lunchbox that she had packed, it was a simple red one that Emma had picked out and seemed so much more sturdy than the brown paper bags she had carried around Boston. Her backpack was just as strong, if not more so. It definitely wouldn’t rip and need to be repaired with duct tape anytime soon. “I have to head to the studio in a bit, so you’ll have to take the bus. Do you remember where it is?”
Emma did her best to hold back an eyeroll. “You only showed me half a dozen times.”
Mary Margaret held back a sigh. “I’m sorry. I’m just…nervous, I guess. Here, I want to give you this.”
 She grabbed a box from under the counter and pushed it towards her daughter. Emma moved off the bow and lifted the lid, finding a cell phone inside. It was the latest version of the iPhone, with a red protective case over it. She tilted her head.
 “Mary Margaret…”
“I’ve put you on my plan. It’s got unlimited text, call and internet. I’ve programmed my number, David’s as well. You can text or call us anytime.”
“You didn’t have to do this.”
“Of course I did, you’re my daughter.”
 Daughter. That word still sounded so damn foreign to her.
 A quick knock at the door interrupted the sweet moment between the two of them. Mary Margaret walked around the island and over to it, finding David on the other side.
 “What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to take Emma to school.”
“Oh. Well, the bus is coming…”
“Can I not take my own kid to school?”
 Mary Margaret thought about what Emma had said at the store over the weekend. She had to try, she wanted to try. It was what was best for their daughter, she needed them to get along.
 “Of course you can. Come in.”
Once Mary Margaret stepped to the side, David walked in and grinned at Emma. “Hey kiddo,” he said.
“David.” Emma smiled. “What are you doing here?”
“Taking you to school, if that’s okay with you.”
“Better than the bus.”
“Finish your breakfast and then we can go.”
 Emma wolfed down the rest of her food, not noticing the looks that her parents were giving her. Once she was done, she grabbed her backpack, shoving her lunchbox inside before throwing the bag over her shoulder and hopping off the stool. She noticed that David was staring at her for a minute.
 “What? Do I have milk on my mouth?”
“No, it’s just uh…you look like your mother did when she was in high school with that uniform.”
“She’s got your coloring,” Mary Margaret pointed out.
“True, but…still.” He shook it off. “Come on, let’s go.”
 Emma headed to the door, but then paused at Mary Margaret. She wasn’t sure if she should hug her or kiss her cheek, they were still trying to set up boundaries between the two of them.
 “So um, I’ll see you later?”
Mary Margaret nodded. “Yeah, see you later.” She quickly kissed the top of her head. “Have a good day.”
“You too.”
 David opened the door to lead her out and Emma followed him out to his car. Classic rock played over the radio and Emma looked around it, noting a briefcase in the back. It took her a moment to realize that David was dressed in a suit, it was the first time she had seen him so dressed up since they met.
 “You working today?”
David nodded. “Yes, I’ve got to go to court.”
“What’s the case?”
“Standard custody hearing. Luckily the parents agree on what needs to be done, so it should be easy.”
“Lucky,” Emma murmured. She noticed the odd look he was giving her and forced a smile. “So…I’ve met some of Mary Margaret’s family. When do I get to meet yours?”
“Well, I could take you by my place to meet my roommate’s daughter and everything this afternoon.”
“I meant like your mom, your step-mom and siblings.”
David gripped the wheel, gnawing on his lip. “That may take a bit.”
“Why?”
 He sighed, scratching the back of his neck once they approached a red light.
 “Emma, I was really young when Mary Margaret got pregnant with you. I was scared…”
“I got that from all the fighting you two have been doing.”
“It’s just that…at the time…I didn’t tell too many people about you. I had a girlfriend at the time…”
“Whoa wait, you cheated on your girlfriend with Mary Margaret?”
“No, no. My girlfriend and I were on a break, seeing other people when I got together with your mom. Anyway, I told her when I broke up with her for good, but I…I never told my mom or my brother.”
“Why?”
“I was scared. Scared of how they’d look at me, scared that they’d hate me or think less of me, that they’d be disappointed. James and I were the first people in our family to go to college.”
“Were you ashamed of me?”
 David looked over and saw the shock in Emma’s eyes. She looked so vulnerable and it broke his heart. He pulled to the side of the road, putting his car in park.
 “No,” he said. He saw the doubt in her eyes. “Emma, no. It had nothing to do with you and everything to do with me. I was a coward back then, I couldn’t stand the thought that people would think differently of me. I loved you, from the moment I knew you were coming.”
“Right.”
“I did. Look.”
 David reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He flipped past a picture of Ruth and Eudora and another of Belle, James and Gideon to get to the sonogram. Emma studied it, confused.
 “What’s that?”
“This is the sonogram your mother gave me when she was pregnant. It was the only picture I had of you for 15 years.”
“And you held onto it?”
“I never could let it go. You were apart of me and I thought of you every single day. I might not have carried you or been there when you were born, but you never left my mind or my heart. You were my daughter and if I knew that you were struggling as much as you were, I would’ve been there in a heartbeat.”
 Emma stared at the sonogram for a moment, a frown on her face. Eventually, it slowly formed into a tiny smile. David couldn’t help but match it as she looked back up at him.
 “You should probably replace it.”
“I will.” He put the car back into drive and continued to head towards the school. “So, I did tell my mom about you and she was upset. Not at you, at me. She missed out on 15 years of your life and it’s my fault.”
“Do you think she wants to meet me?”
“Oh, of course. My brother, step-mom and step-sister do too. I’m sure they’ll even see you before they’ve forgiven me for all of it.”
“What are they like?”
 David spent the rest of the ride telling Emma about his parents and siblings. He told her about James and how Emma had nearly two cousins. He explained the big hoopla that was going around Tiana and Drew’s wedding-which Tiana had texted him that he wanted to talk to Emma about. He hoped that deep down, no matter how mad they were at him, they wouldn’t wait to get to know Emma.
 After another 10 minutes of driving, David pulled up in front of Storybrooke Academy. It was like being pulled into a time warp, nothing had changed. The sprawling campus had several stone buildings, all named for dead white guys that had contributed something to the town or the school. A part of him had always hated going there, but Ruth had insisted. He was now splitting tuition with Mary Margaret and knew that it was the best option for Emma, he just hoped that she enjoyed it more than he had.
 “Do you want me to come in with you?” He asked.
Emma laughed, as if that was the most ridiculous thing she had ever heard. “This isn’t my first school.”
“Well, I’ll pick you up once classes are done. Like I said, I’ll take you back to my place for a bit.”
“Mary Margaret knows?”
“Yes.”
“Well…okay.”
“Have a great day. She gave you a phone, right? Call me if you need anything.”
“I will.”
 He kissed her cheek and she blushed a bit before hopping out of the car. He watched as she walked into the administration building, before pulling out of the lot. He had a kid in high school, how the hell had that happened?
Storybrooke Academy was a tad more intimidating than Emma had imagined. She had never gone to a private school before. The closest thing had probably been the Catholic charter school that Bill and Katie had forced her to go to during her 6 months with them. As strict as that dress code was, at least they didn’t have a uniform and it was all in one small building. The secretary gave her a map of the school along with her classes and she looked around, wondering if she got lost enough, she’d find a dragon to slay or something.
 She was able to find the building that her first class was in easy enough, but the numbering systems of the classroom weren’t as clear. Emma realized she’d be hard pressed to find anyone t willingly help her, most of them were staring and whispering. Storybrooke really was that small, a new student stuck out like a sore thumb.
 Before she could give up and find a teacher, two girls walked in front of her. One was wearing a navy dress with the school’s logo in the corner and had a blonde braid going down her back. The other was wearing the typical plaid skirt but the button up shirt was tied above her belly button, revealing a piercing. Her raven hair went wild and she was grinning from ear to ear.
 “You look lost.”
“That obvious, huh?”
“I was the new girl last year,” the blonde noted, her voice a bit softer than her friend. “I’m Elsa. That’s Lily.”
“Emma. Emma Swan.”
Lily studied her for a moment, before snapping her fingers. “You’re Mary Margaret’s long lost kid.”
“You know about me?”
“My mom works with Regina, we run in similar circles.”
“Think you could help me find my class then?”
Lily’s grin widened. “We’d be more than happy to.”
 She grabbed hold of Emma’s schedule and they compared it with their own. As it turned out, most of her classes had at least one of them in it. Lily was with her in first period English, so she allowed her to take her by the arm and lead her off. By the time they got to the classroom, Emma felt like she knew everything she needed to about Lily. She was an only child, her mom was a single parent by choice. Elsa was pretty much her only friend, though she got along with some boys in the older grades.
 As soon as they walked into the classroom, the teacher stopped writing on the board and turned to them. He tilted his eyes up to the ceiling before, looking back down at Lily.
“Lilith, you know the rules.”
“That you have to have a stick up your…”
“Do you want detention, again?”
 Lily rolled her eyes, but untied her shirt, allowing it to fall down. She took her seat towards the back of the class and Emma went to follow, when the teacher cleared his throat.
 “And you are?”
“Emma Swan,” she said. “I’m new.” She handed over the form that the secretary had told her to get signed by all her teachers that day and he quickly scribbled on it before consulting his roster.
“Ah yes, Miss Swan. Welcome, where are you from?”
“Boston.”
“Well, I hope they taught you well there. We have a heavy course load and a test on Wednesday, but I’ll allow you to study and make up for it next week. Sound good?”
“Um, yes.”
“Great. Now, go take a seat.”
 Emma went towards the back, settling down next to Lily.
 “Ignore Forrester,” Lily whispered. “Everyone does. I swear, he’s like the town grump.”
“This school is the most serious one I’ve ever been in,” Emma mumbled. “And I once went to Catholic school.”
“You’re Catholic?”
“No. Foster parents were.”
“You were in the system?”
Emma nodded. “12 years.”
“Miss Page, Miss Swan,” Mr. Forrester interrupted their conversation. “Anything you want to share with the class?”
“F. Scott Fitzgerald plagiarized his wife’s work,” Lily replied, without missing a beat.
 Emma couldn’t help but giggle, as did most of the people around them. Mr. Forrester rolled his eyes before moving onto discussing the book at hand.
The rest of the day was a lot of fun with Lily and Elsa by her side. They knew how to joke around and despite most of the school looking at them weirdly, they just didn’t care. For once, Emma felt like she could actually feel herself making friends outside of August. He had gone back to Boston and she hadn’t realized how lonely she was. Sure, maybe they weren’t the best influences, but they were what she needed. Elsa even offered to help her catch up with the work.
 It was officially one of the best first days of her life.
 She actually left the school with a smile on her face, Elsa and Lily on either side of her. David’s car was in front of the car pool lane and Emma couldn’t help but feel her smile grow. She wasn’t used to people keeping their promises, but there he was.
 “I gotta go.”
“Is that your dad?” Elsa asked.
“Um, yeah. I guess.”
“David Nolan.” Lily let out a low whistle. “You’re lucky.”
“I am?”
“He’s one of the nicest guys in town.”
“If you say so. I better go, but I’ll text you guys later.”
 She got in the car and David pulled out of the lot.
 “How was your day?” He asked.
“It was actually pretty good.”
“It seemed like it. Those friends of yours?”
“We hung out pretty much all day.”
“Sounds like friends to me.”
“Maybe. And your day?”
“Good. My client got the custody schedule they wanted, that’s all I can ask for.”
 David’s house was closer to the school than Mary Margaret’s loft so they were there in no time. Once they got inside, Emma found herself being attacked in a hug. Her eyes widened and she sort of planked in place, looking over the stranger’s shoulder at David.
 “Who is this?” She asked.
“I’m Alice!” The stranger pulled away and allowed Emma to get a good look at her. She had wild blonde curls that bounced down her shoulders and big blue eyes that were filled with wonder. She didn’t look to be much older than she was. “I’m Killian’s daughter. I’ve heard so much about you. I mean, not until today, Papa said you were coming over. I had no clue that David had a daughter, but that is so awesome. I think he’d make a great dad and…”
“Starfish.” Killian appeared behind his daughter and placed a hand on her shoulder. “Breathe.”
Alice let out a deep breath before a smile returned to her lips. “Sorry, I’m just…I get a bit excited is all.”
“A bit?” Emma asked.
She giggled. “You’re funny, cute too. You look so much like David…” Alice must have realized she was rambling again, because she stopped. “Anyway, like I said, I’m Alice. I don’t live here anymore, but I visit.”
“Emma.” Though, she had a feeling that Alice already knew that. “So…David’s lived with you guys awhile?”
“Going on what, 7 years now?” Alice looked back at her father for confirmation and he nodded. “I can show you your room, I know Papa and David have been working hard on it. It used to be mine, but like I said, I’ve got my own place now.”
 Alice stilled for once, clearly understanding that she might be a bit too much for Emma to handle. After a moment, Emma nodded and adjusted her backpack, following Alice up the stairs and to the right. The room was painted red and had lots of different murals done throughout, clearly done by different artists. The bedspread was a lot more her style than the one at Mary Margaret’s was, it was red with bits of blacks throughout it.
 Emma listened to Alice talk a bit, as she took in the room. She laid her backpack down and picked up various accessories, like a mirror on the desk or ran her fingers along the spines of some of the books on the shelves. Eventually, Alice went downstairs to grab them a snack and Emma decided to look around more of the house. A quick peak into Killian and David’s rooms didn’t tell her too much. They were so unlike Alice’s, void of any real personality.
 She headed back down the stairs and started looking around the living room. There were pictures and degrees everywhere. She noticed that in a lot of them, David, Killian and Alice all looked like a happy family. There were ones of them on vacations, at birthday parties.
 Emma couldn’t help but pause at a series of three frames by yet another bookshelf. Alice’s high school diploma was proudly framed, with a picture of her accepting her degree on one side. On the other was one of her in her gown standing between David and Killian. Both men had their arms around her, beaming proudly. They were a little family. Even if they weren’t a couple, David had helped his friend raise his daughter for the past 7 years. He was there for her, when he wasn’t there for Emma. Despite him having his reasons, Emma felt a bit of jealousy creep up in the pit of her stomach.
 Sure, he’d probably be at her own high school graduation, where had he been for the rest of the big moments? Where had both he and Mary Margaret been?
 The jealousy only grew and the tears built up in her eyes.
 Emma wouldn’t remember what happened next. One minute, she was just going to hold the picture and the next moment…it was on the floor, glass everywhere. She bolted up the stairs to grab her backpack, before running out the door. David was calling after her, but she didn’t care. It wasn’t until she was back near the school that she pulled out her phone and texted Mary Margaret to come pick her up.
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