#sjgadd

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“Promise me you’re not going to overreact” for the prompts ;)

“Promise me--promise me you’re not going to overact,” she says. 

She hates the tremble in her voice--the fear. She’s holed up in the bathroom with the door locked, her back to the mirror. Her hands are braced against the counter behind her, gripping it like a lifeline. She can hear him on the other side of the door, the impatient way he shifts his weight from one foot to the other, the scrape of his knuckles when he curls them against the door. 

“You have--” he pauses for effect, the nasally pitch of his voice cranking up an octave, all strung up and high, “--five seconds,” he says, “to open this door and get out here.” 

She flinches when he growls the last bit, the hairs on her arms standing at attention as fear ricochets all up and down her spine. 

“Or--or what?” 

“Or I’m gonna huff, and puff, and burn down this house with you in it.” 

She sinks her teeth into her lower lip--frightened by his threat--but is still too afraid to unlock the door. 

“Mr. J, just--please, please don’t be mad.” 

She yelps when the entire door rattles in its frame from how angrily he slams his fists against it. 

“Open the door,” he growls. 

She has no choice but to obey. She bites her lip as she takes two steps forward to flip the little lock inside the doorknob, and as soon as she does, she’s stumbling back as the door as is shoved wide open, with enough force to send it slamming against the wall. 

He’s suddenly there, filling up the doorway, and his eyes are full of fire as he looks at her, and then at all the red smeared over the counter and sink. The floor. She realizes suddenly how much it looks like blood, and her eyes widen in alarm. 

“It’s not what it looks like!” she hastily supplies. 

She watches the furrow between his brows deepen--so confused, at first--and then watches further as his eyes drift back towards her, and a smirk slowly hooks itself inside the one corner of his mouth, like he’s amused. She tries to relax a little. Maybe he won’t be as mad as she initially thought? 

“It’s just--” she huffs out a big breath, and then it comes spilling out all at once. “Some of the girls were doing it at school and it looked really pretty, and I watched this video online for instructions but I think I missed a step and now I can’t wash it out and it’s stuck,” she whines. 

The ‘stuck’ she is referring to is the bright pink streak in her hair. It’s a fat, bold stripe--stretching from her scalp to the very ends of her hair. She’d spent hours trying to scrub it out, but all she succeeded in doing was taking the stripe from candy apple red to cotton candy pink.

She searches his eyes carefully when he takes a step towards her, closing the distance between them, where she’s pinned up against the counter. She tries not to flinch when he reaches out and takes the pink strand between his fingers. It frustrates her that she can’t read his expression. 

“Do... do you hate it?” she asks.

He’s quiet for a moment--contemplative--and she feels like she’s practically vibrating with impatience as she waits for his response.

“Tell you what, princess.” He’s still looking at her hair, slowly winding the pink strip of it around a finger. “Next time you feel like doing a little, uh, extreme home makeover, you come see me about it first, hm?” 

She nods, slowly, biting her lip as she looks up at him. She’s so relieved he’s not more angry about it. She curls her fingers into her palms, where her hands dangle at her sides, itching to reach out and hug him. Show him how much she appreciates him. 

“Oh, and uh, for the record...” He unwinds her hair from around his finger, snakes his hand around the back of her neck instead, where he cups her spine. His fingers clamp down painfully, and her mouth parts a little as she looks up at him. “I like my girl juuust the way she is,” he says, her heart fluttering excitedly from his words, “and if you do something like this to your hair again, I’m gonna shave it all off.” 

Taylor blinks up at him--the happy butterflies in her heart gone--and she nods gravely. Something about the way he is looking at her tells her he isn’t kidding. 

“Good,” he says, brightening suddenly. With his other hand, he touches the tip of her nose with his finger, just for a second. Boop. “You’re a smart girl,” he says, very seriously. His lowers his head closer to hers, so their faces are only inches apart. “I knew you’d understand.” 

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Omg happy birthday!! And sharing it with Margot you lucky duck🥺🥳🥳🥳

Thank you so much, bb!!!

And yes, it is an honor and a privilege to be born on the same day as Margot. Omg.

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Me reading Taylor sassing the Joker🤩

and me reading THE WHOLE END SCENE

no lie this chapter was biblical i don’t even know what to DO IM PACING AROUND MY ROOM BECAUSE I DONT KNOW WHICH PART TO REREAD FIRST

@sjgadd​ I’m SCREAMING 

KJSFKLSJFKJSLJFLSKJDLKASJD

THANK YOU FOR THESE REACTION GIFS omgggg

“this chapter is Biblical” has me DECEASED. 

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OKAY BUT DID YOU HEAR HIS LAUGH IN THE TRAILER IM HOOKED

GIRL I DID!!!

It looks like we’re going the “Joker was born crazy” route and the Joker is a direct result of a system that failed him(?)--which is super intriguing. 

BUT YES I HEARD THE LAUGH, AND WHAT A LAUGH IT WAS. 

girl to be honest I can't stop watching the final scene where you see him talk and he's in full Joker regalia--the lilt to his voice at the end is so Heath Ledger!Joker it's driving me crazy. LOVE these little nuances!

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:( you’ve made me SOB. 100/10 writing is all I can say right now, I need to go back and analyse because there’s so much to go over and my stomach is flipped 😭😭

Man, thank you so much. This is so satisfying given that I also sobbed like a baby when I was writing the final scene. I’m glad/relieved that it resonates. 

I know there is so much to digest given that it’s such a massive chapter, but I hope the reading experience was an immersive one and that it’s something you’ll be able to go back and re-read over and over again. 

Thank you so much for all of your enthusiasm and support for this story! :’)

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wowowowowow I can’t stop reading the JK update! Like literally over and over again. So excited for part 3.

YEEES. Thank you so much!!!!!!!

I love this because I, too, cannot stop reading it. I’ve never felt this way about my writing before, but I honestly keep finding myself coming back to it in my quiet moments to read it over  again, and again, and again. It’s one of those pieces where I love almost every single word on the page. I feel like that’s an incredibly hard feeling to come by as a writer. 

So, yeah, thank you so much for sharing that with me. I’m thrilled you loved it. And I’m also anxious about part lll and how it will be received, but I also can’t wait to share it. 

Thank you for reading, love!

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halfway through JK and absolutely loving it btw I take breaks every like 2 minutes to reflect and then reread 🤪😬😬

@sjgadd 

YES! Thank you for letting me know of your progress! I am so excited for you to keep reading.

And also, I understand needing to take rest breaks, I do that  all the time when I’m reading, especially if it’s something suspenseful. I FEEL YA.

Can’t wait for you to finish. Let me know what you think!

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sjgadd replied to your post: To my readers…  Blackout is undergoing huge...

I am FLOORED. This was amazing!! And you wouldn’t believe how hard my stomach dropped when Taylor actually REMEMBERED the Joker talking!!! There is so much to say about the new chapters but I literally can’t even. I had to stop reading about 10 times because I was grinning that much omg I can’t wait for chapter 5, I hope it’s uploaded soon! :)

I AM BEAMING AT THIS MESSAGE, THANK YOU SO MUCH. I’m so flattered that you love the updated chapters. And thank you for pointing out that one bit because even though she doesn’t know whose voice those words belong to, she still remembers the words being said and it gives me goose bumps just to think about the thought of her recalling something that he said to her when she was little girl, even after all these years. 

Chapter five is being edited right now and will be posted soon!

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tagged by @rosydruidess

thank u bb, i love your blog so much!!

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Tagging @tangentasilem, @ineedanicedcoffee, @wastedwander, @nuclear-chemistry, @sjgadd, @januaryicemoon

if you want to :)

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Woo so excited to hear your continuing! I agree with that anon's ideas, they sound pretty interesting, especially the one about the joker finding out about Austin. A good scene could be him seeing like a wedding photo of them both and getting wound up over it. Also you could maybe recreate a situation from clockwork to make the joker have like a de ja vu. OR OR OR you could somehow have Taylor and the joker find that picture of them where he is carrying her. Can't wait for more chapters!

Ooooh, nice! 

Trust me, the Joker IS going to find out about Austin, and it’s all going to go so south as soon as he does. I just.. yeah. It will. Take my word for it. :D

THE PHOTO. I can’t believe you remember that. Wow.  

Thanks for the ideas!