#so it's generally a day i reserve for myself to mope and be in a bad mood because it's my birthday

[thatrandombystander]

What if at the start of every year I pick an unbirthday date for myself by rolling a d12 for the month, then d100/3 rounded up for the day (reroll if above 93).

[ineloqueent]

Starstruck: Part 14

Brian May x Fem!Reader

This is Part 14 of a multi-part fic. Click the links below to read the Masterpost, the previous part, or the next part of the fic :)

Masterpost / Part 13 / Part 15

Summary: When studying at Imperial College in the 1970s, your path is crossed by a beautiful boy as much in love with the stars as you.  

Warnings: angst, mentions of drinking, swearing

Historical Inaccuracies: N/A :)

Word Count: 4.5k

⁺˚*·༓☾ ☽༓･*˚⁺

My birthday had been an absolute disaster, to say the least.

It hadn’t started out as a disaster, waking up with the morning sun warming my face. I normally hated to be woken up that way, because it meant that the dawn had broken into a new day when I’d only just managed to fall asleep. My thoughts kept me awake most nights, and when on a rare occasion they left me alone, the sounds of parties or sloshed band members took up the torch.

But I’d fallen asleep before the dawn on my twenty-seventh birthday, and had awoken with a rather lovely girl in my arms. Sure, I’d woken up with lovely girls before, but that had usually been after a drunken round of bedroom pleasantries, ones that became very much unpleasantries as soon as the night came down.

This had been different.

For one, I hadn’t taken her to bed, but for another, what had been beautiful in the nighttime remained so in the light of day.

She, usually alternatingly vibrant with talk and reserved with intelligent pensiveness, had seemed almost subdued where she lay in my arms. Her hair was messy, no doubt from my lack of usefulness as a pillow, and her lips, subtly pinkened, looked powder soft where her face was nestled against my chest. I felt afraid to move; she looked delicate in her unconsciousness, and my clumsy hand would only shatter her.

Yet I longed to touch her cheek.

Strange, this longing.

From my chest it ran to my fingertips and toes, and stole my breath away, like a thief who’d noticed that I’d purposely left my doors unlocked. Purposely, because I wanted this— I wanted to touch her cheek, to hold her in my arms. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d wanted something so terribly, yearning taking over the few thoughts that did not concern themselves with my general fears of failure in life.

And I wanted to hear her laugh, all the time, because, god, that laugh. I wouldn’t mind kissing her laughter away, stopping only to hear it again.

When I spoke, she listened, listened like she truly wanted to hear what I had to say, not like she was just being polite and waiting for me to finish so that she could leave and get on with her day. No. when I talked with her, my words were light and they flowed that way, stories I’d never told anyone spilling from my tongue as though I believed I had it in me to continue to trust her, forever. As though she and her familiar presence would stay with me forever, would always be there to welcome me home.

But I’d just about ruined it all only a few hours later, in telling her the only truth I’d ever feared to tell her— the truth that would push her away if she chose not to come with us on tour. And of course she’d said no, because her whole life was in London, in the city, and neither I nor anybody else had the right to take that from her. Deep down, I’d known that she would say no, but my naïve and wasted heart had still tried to convince me otherwise, and so I’d asked her.

Now there was nothing to do but to leave and to bury whatever nonsense I’d been carrying around my head for the past few years.

Years I’d spent gazing at her, first from afar, and then from such a closeness that when a sigh escaped her lips, it brushed mine. If anything had been meant to happen, it would have happened by now.

And now, as I gathered my things from around my bedroom at Ridge Farm, it was too late. Six weeks had gone by, and six weeks had brought me as close to her as I’d ever get.

Soon, this would all be a memory. A sickening memory and a fever dream that would keep me awake for many, many nights to come, restless and sleepless and full of regrets of not making something happen when I wanted it to, instead of fucking waiting around for some divine intervention to lead into my arms the girl with stars of lovingness in her hair.

I’d have waited forever if I could.

But life goes on. And if you don’t move, the world will pull the rug out from under your feet and let you fall.

I hadn’t moved, I’d waited. The rug had been pulled, and I had fallen.

Wasn’t that what they said about love? That you fell?

Not that this was love, but hell, it might have become it.

⁺˚*·༓☾ ☽༓･*˚⁺

“Cheer up, Brian,” said Roger unhelpfully. “We’re going back to London to record an album, not attend your funeral.”

I continued to drink my coffee in silence, staring out the window. The sky was grey and the weather threatened rain. Just the thing to lift my spirits. Although, I supposed I was being selfish because the summer had been dry of late, and the farmlands needed water sooner rather than later.

But though the light outside was dim and the indoors were subsequently dark, there were no stars, no little pinpricks of light, to penetrate the gloom. At least in the night, I had that.

What would it be like if we could see beyond the Earth’s atmosphere, see the stars, during the day? she had asked me once.

I hadn’t said anything.

It’d be like looking into your eyes.

That was what I had wanted to say.

“Oh, Roger,” Freddie said, almost despairingly. “Can’t you see, darling?”

“No, Freddie. It’s all smudges and shapes.”

“You really must get that eyesight of yours sorted out. How can you even see the drums? No wonder you keep falling a beat behind.”

“That’s ridiculous. I could play the drums in the dark and you know it, Fred.”

“Brian?” John’s hand fell to my shoulder.

“Hm?” I looked up from my coffee.

Deacy was frowning.

“Are you quite alright, lovie?” asked Freddie, sweeping around the kitchen counter to sit down across from me. Roger wriggled the coffee cup from my grasp before pouring me another mugful, his expression far too concerned for my liking. Attention wasn’t something I relished. Particularly not when it involved having my picture taken. I took all the pictures, I didn’t look good on camera. I didn’t look good being looked at. It was a wonder I’d made it this far in the world of stage business at all.

“You’re moping,” Freddie remarked when I again neglected to answer.

“No, I’m not,” I muttered finally, figuring it would put him off.

An absurd notion, really. Nothing in the world put Freddie off.

“You are,” he insisted. “You’ve been moping ever since your birthday. You were fine in the morning, but then cranky in the afternoon and every day after.”

“On and on like a broken record,” Roger put in. “If I’d had wanted a broken record, I’d have scratched one myself, not asked for you to bloody become one.”

I sighed, feeling too tired to make a proper reply. Perhaps all those nights of staying awake were finally catching up with me.

“You’re all just as blind as Brian himself,” John tutted, passing Roger a couple of sugar packets so that he could get his one-and-three-sevenths.

Freddie narrowed his eyes at me, crossed his legs and leaned back in his chair, as though he knew exactly what my problem was. He probably did know. I wouldn’t put anything past him. “Ah. So what now?”

I sipped my coffee. “So, what? We’re leaving, her life is here, ours is out in the world of never staying the same place twice—”

Roger smirked. “I see.”

“Said the blind man,” Deacy laughed.

“See what?” I snapped. “What is it you all claim to see? There’s nothing to see.”

“Darling, no one mentioned Y/N, and yet you jumped to the conclusion that we were talking about her. I’d say it’s all fairly obvious.”

My fingertips brushed the side of my nose in a nervous habit I’d had for years. It always seemed to make an appearance at the mention of one name in particular.

“And there’s the nervous tic,” Roger tapped the side of his own nose, and I hid my hand under the table.

“I was the same way around Veronica,” Deacy said with a smile, stirring his tea. “Any mention of her and my legs turned to custard.”

Roger snorted.

“We know, Deacy,” said Fred. “We were there.”

“Mmyes. I seem to quite forget the world around me when I’m around her.”

The conversation seemed to refocus on more unpleasant matters as all three of them stared me down.

“So did you tell her?” said Roger.

I sighed again. “Tell her what.”

“Not moping, bollocks to that,” Roger muttered. “Did you tell her how you feel?”

“No.” That was all I would allow myself. One word on which to dwell. No more. I would not dwell.

“We’re leaving, and you asked her to come with us, but you didn’t tell her?” Freddie leaned toward outrage.

I set down my coffee cup, a sudden anger slipping into my hands as the porcelain smacked the tabletop just a little too hard. The coffee sloshed over the cup’s sides.

“She said no, in what fucking world would I tell her?”

“In a better one,” remarked John.

“Oh, shut up,” I seethed. “You all act so superior, like you’d have done any better in my place.”

Freddie’s expression had turned sour. “You’re the one who’s acting superior!” he cried. “All moody and ooh, poor me, I’m the only one who’s ever had to cope with such a terrible thing as this.”

“Piss off, Fred,” I growled. “You’re dramatic enough for the four of us.”

“Says you! Pull yourself together, Brian. We wouldn’t be here arguing if you had.”

“Both of you, pull yourselves together,” Deacy berated. “We haven’t even begun recording yet and you’re already neck and neck!”

“Oh that’ll be fun,” I muttered.

“Not really, if you’ll be pining after some girl the whole time,” said Roger. “Should’ve tried that when you were writing songs instead.”

At that I stood up. “Some girl?” I scoffed. “Oh, don’t be so fucking ridiculous! Roger, she’s the only reason we’ve got our manager, she’s the only reason we’ve had this place to clear out heads and write our songs, and she’s the only reason I’ve written nearly four songs for the bloody album and not just two and a half.”

Not one of them said anything.

Then Freddie shook his head slowly. “You’ve got to tell her,” he said. “I’ve never seen you like this before.”

Drained of energy, I sank back into my chair. “And yet, it’s been going on for years.”

“Years?” said Roger disbelievingly.

I gave a rather pathetic shrug.

“Years?” he repeated. “You’ve been fucking pining for her, for years?”

“Yes, Roger, years,” I said mockingly. “Why do you think I wrote ‘White Queen’?”

Roger’s mouth fell open. “You— you wrote ‘White Queen’ for her?”

“Brian,” Freddie’s expression was contorted, “that was in ‘68.”

“Yes,” I said, feeling my chest tighten. “Why is that so hard for you all to understand?”

John shook his head. “Not for me, it isn’t.”

I looked over at him questioningly, a dull ache that made me wince spreading beneath my skin.

He glanced at us each in turn, then smiled pityingly.

“None of you have ever been in love, have you?”

⁺˚*·༓☾ ☽༓･*˚⁺

“I’m not in love,” I’d spat, my anger replenished.

Love, such a fickle thing. You expressed it too often and you were deemed careless, in-genuine. Too rarely, and every sign of sadness was dubbed heartache. Was it so wrong to simply be sad for the sake of being sad, to feel empty instead of restful when you closed your eyes, to feel your spirit leave you a little with each breath on a rainy day?

What am I going to tell my father?

That was what was bothering me at the moment, not her. Not Y/N.

I touched a hand to my cheek, feeling the warmth that flushed the skin there.

God, I couldn’t even think her name without my shoulders tensing or my face colouring. It was like I was back in the body of my fourteen year-old self, skinny and awkward and shy and riddled with holes of innocence that experience had yet to fill.

How was I going to tell my dad that I was giving up my perfectly good chance at a stable career for a full-time gig as the guitarist for a band that was barely known?

But there was no changing my mind now. Not because it was too late to re-register as an astrophysics student for the start of term in autumn, but because I was tired of neglecting my dream. Could I not have more than one dream? Why did everything always have to be so single-minded?

I loved music, I loved feeling the melodies form beneath my fingers, drawn from nothing by my imagination and the thin air. I loved working with Freddie and Roger and John, I loved what we became when we were Her Majesty, Queen.

I wasn’t willing to give that up. I realised that now.

And so I avoided Y/N for our final week at Ridge Farm, because she made me want to change my mind.

For the first time in months, I missed her Thursday night guitar lesson again.

Then the sun rose on our final day in Surrey, and as I opened my eyes to the sunlight despite having only just fallen asleep, a sickly feeling skittered about in my stomach, the wings of butterflies fluttering against my abdomen.

I’d spent the entire night thinking about the fact that after today, I would probably never see her again.

I sighed, closing my suitcase and sparing the room a final glance. I had not slept much here, but still I had dreamt, faraway sentiments that would never be requited.

I pulled on my jacket and smoothed down the velvet, squinting at my reflection in the small mirror that hung on the wall above a nondescript dresser.

I didn’t look particularly tired, though I might have felt it. Sure, there were smudges of shadow beneath my eyes and little bits of stubble clung to my jaw, but my shoulders did not sag, and tanned skin and rosy cheeks had replaced my usually pale complexion, my hair bore little streaks here and there that were lighter than the rest.

In a way, Ridge Farm had refreshed me. The quiet of the countryside had eased the tension etched into my muscles by the rush of city life, and I’d enjoyed being able to see the stars properly at night.

I’d enjoyed watching them with Y/N.

Who would watch the stars with me, and indulge my silly ramblings?

Who would stand up for me even when my opinion was ridiculous, or tease me when it was perfectly sound?

Who would leave me with a theory or a quip that would resurface in my memory when I felt uninspired or glum? Who would leave me with something to smile about when darkness hovered too close at the edge of my vision?

Who would be there to banish it all from my wretched mind?

With each thought, I felt dizzier at the prospect of just leaving, without… Well, without anything.

She deserved to know, didn’t she?

And yet, I deserved to keep my secrets, did I not?

I could allow myself a little dignity, at least.

What would I tell her anyway? That she both grounded me and made me feel like I was flying? That I would take her with me to space if I was to go alone, because I didn’t want to be alone if it wasn’t with her? That I felt my soul became made of stardust when she walked into a room?

People didn’t say such things, and without saying such things, I couldn’t tell her what it was— whatever it was— I felt for her, if I felt anything at all. It was hard to tell whether her presence terrified me or comforted me. I didn’t understand how I felt about her, really, and that was my problem.

“Brian!” Freddie shouted for me like it wasn’t the first time he’d called.

“Coming,” I muttered to no one but myself. I picked up my suitcase by its wooden handle and slipped my socked feet into my wooden shoes. I looked about once more, then went into the hall, closing behind me the door to this part of my life.

Mistress Melancholy settled herself into my bones, and she unpacked her bags, here to stay.

Down the stairs and into the living room, and there they were all standing.

Freddie and Roger and Deacy and Veronica and John Harris and Crystal and Heather and Mary, and… And Y/N.

Take my breath away, why don’t you?

But her parents and her brother were there too, and I squared my shoulders as I approached. Her dad had only warmed to me as of late, and if he took even a singular glance at the expression on his daughter’s face as I made my way toward her, he would have been right to throw me to the ground in a blind rage.

She did look tired. Beautiful, but tired. Mouth set grimly, her shoulders stiff.

Yet, the sparkle in her eyes had not dulled. And she shone, even in her weariness.

My evening star.

Our two roadies, Mary, Heather, and Veronica were the first to say their goodbyes and go outside to savour the last of the country air, Ronnie carrying little Robert in her arms. Roger would first ferry Crystal, Roadie-John, Freddie, and myself to the train station, then return to take himself and the others back to London via his beloved Alfa.

Hugs and kisses and generally well-placed sentiments of gratitude and affection were shared all around, between thanking Y/N’s parents for their hospitality and telling Y/N that she would be sorely missed in the days to come.

Freddie, Rog, Deacy, and I stuck around to say our own final goodbyes, with Y/N’s parents naming us family and welcome at any time, and everyone reminiscing about our time at Ridge Farm.

Y/N was mostly quiet, and I was silent altogether, my eyes only leaving her when her gaze flicked in my direction.

I wondered what she was thinking, if she would think of me, as I would think of her, when I was gone.

Roger excused himself to go to the car, no doubt fearing that the others would have trashed it in his absence.

“You’re in love with that car,” I said, sighing.

Roger shouted, “BETTER THAN WITH YOU, you nErD!”

Then Y/N laughed, and upon instinct, I smiled.

How lovely it felt, to smile. I should smile more often.

“I’m going to make sure he doesn’t get up to other things out there,” said Freddie, going after Roger. “Au revoir, darlings!”

“Au revoir,” Y/N’s parents responded.

Deacy left as well, offering a smile as a parting gift.

I cleared my throat.

“Thank you again for having us, Mr. and Mrs. Andrews,” I said, and when Mrs. Andrews held out her arms to me, I embraced her.

“Anna, dear. Please call me Anna,” she smiled as radiantly as her daughter. “It was so lovely to have you here.”

Then, to my surprise, Y/N’s father addressed me. “And I’m Sebastian to you, son. You’re in good company. No need for formalities.”

“Well, thank you Mr.— Sebastian,” I cringed.

“Brian,” Frank nodded to me, and I returned the gesture.

“Frank.”

Then, before I realised what was happening, the three eldest members of the Andrews family had left the room.

Y/N and I were alone.

I racked my mind for anything, for what to do, what to say, but I came up with nothing when she smiled at me.

She turned my mind to a puddle.

“Time to go, I suppose,” she said.

“Yeah,” I murmured, unable to take my eyes from hers, “I suppose.”

She felt so far away, as though I was already gone and it was too late to reach for her.

And still, I said nothing, for what could I say?

“You’re the reason why I play, you know,” she said.

I furrowed my brow. “What?”

“Guitar. I never would’ve kept going if I hadn’t seen you perform. I was so close to giving up. But, and sorry to be sappy,” here she gave a little laugh, “you inspired me.”

I inspired her? Now here was a reversal of roles. ‘White Queen’ was hers, and so was ‘‘39’. It was all hers.

“Did I really?”

She laughed again, and I had never heard a lovelier sound, even if she presently was laughing at me. “You’re too modest, Brian, and you’re insanely talented. I’ll never be that good, even if I were to practice every minute of every day.”

Her words tore at my heart. I had never felt so… so appreciated, so admired, so loved.

“If you keep playing,” I said, “I have no doubt you will be better than me. Easily, in fact. I’m not exactly the world’s most technical guitar player.”

She peered up at me beneath her eyelashes, her lips parted softly.

I couldn’t stand it.

I reached for her, tucked a piece of her hair behind her ear. My touch lingered on her skin, and I found myself drifting toward her. She held a pull over me that gravity could only have dreamt to replicate.

Then, realising the intimacy of what I’d just done, my fingers curled into my palm and I stepped back.

“Brian—”

I would not dwell. And I would not stay around to hear her ask me to leave.

“Until next time, Y/N.”

And that would have been that.

Except she just had to say my name again, didn’t she?

“Oh, dammit, Bri. Come here.” Her hand brushed my shoulder. I pulled her into my arms.

Her heartbeat fluttered against my chest, and I missed her already.

I didn’t— I couldn’t— hug her cautiously this time, the way I normally did, gentle and only just there, driven by the fear that she would disintegrate beneath my hands. This time, I embraced her as though it were the very last time, because it might very well have been.

And then words slipped from my lips, my heart in control of everything and my mind tossed out the window.

“I don’t think I can stand an entire summer without you,” I said. She nestled further into my embrace, and despite everything, my heart soared.

“Not an entire summer,” she replied. “Just half.”

“Y/N,” I hummed pathetically.

“Bri.” She too sounded anguished.

“May I come see you? Just me?”

She said nothing, only held on to me, and really, what more could I ask of her?

“Or let me take you out,” I murmured. “Somewhere. Anywhere. Anywhere you want to go.”

“Anywhere?” she whispered.

“Anywhere,” I whispered back.

“I’d love that,” she said, and my breath caught. She’d love it. “Soon?”

I drew back from her, to see if the expression on her face was as genuine as the sound of her voice.

It was.

“Soon,” I promised, and I did not lie. I was already planning my return.

And then I leaned down, the thrum of my pulse far too loud in my ears to listen to reason.

I kissed her cheek.

Briefly, but kiss her cheek I did.

“Bri,” she sighed, and her hands wound around mine.  

“It’s difficult.”

She looked puzzled, but I didn’t elaborate.

It’s difficult. To leave you. But I must.

Mustn’t I?

I took my hands from hers and made for the door.

It’s not too late. You can still turn back.

Can I?

Could I?

No. I would not take her life from her in this way.

“Goodbye, beautiful,” I said.

I will not take her life from her, I will not take her life from I will not take her life from her—

Oh, but I wanted to be selfish.

For once in my life, I wanted something so badly that I couldn’t let it go.

I wouldn’t let her go.

⁺˚*·༓☾ ☽༓･*˚⁺

You touched your cheek.

He was gone.

⁺˚*·༓☾ ☽༓･*˚⁺

And then he wasn’t.

In the doorway he was standing, the sun his backlight, a fallen angel who was still very much an angel.

“Come with us. Come with me,” he sighed wistfully, fingers wrapped around the doorframe so tightly that his knuckles turned to white.

You had rarely seen such raw emotion in your life, never known desperation so pure, outside of yourself.

But here was Brian, hanging onto the door as though it were his last hope to remain standing, and gazing at you like you were his only hope at all.

“You’re my best friend,” he breathed.

And then abruptly, it all became very clear to you. Utterly simple.

You wanted to go with Queen, with Brian, and staying behind would only mean once more sacrificing your own happiness in the pursuit of pleasing others.

Brian made you happy, damn it, and you were tired of hopelessness. You wanted to be happy, and for once, you wanted your own happiness enough to realise what it was you had to do.

“And you’re mine,” you said.

Mine. No more than a word, and yet it brought such a sense of belonging, a swell of warmth through you that could have outshone Sirius in all its glory.

Brian’s face broke into a smile, and involuntarily, so did yours.

He knew, even before you’d said it, that you were coming with him.

And when you returned to the living room ten rushed minutes later with your suitcase packed, your parents were there to kiss you goodbye, even if your dad did so reluctantly. But you explained hastily what it was you had to do, and promised that you would explain in further detail as soon as you could. You were an adult; this was your choice to make.

The truth was, you had no idea what came next, not in terms of school or residence or anything at all, but what did it matter? This was the adventure of a lifetime, to run away to god knew where with a rock and roll band, and if a little of spontaneity was to dictate your life for a while, then so much the better. After all, what was adventure without an element of spontaneity?

You ran out into the sunshine of the late afternoon, and Brian was there to take your hand.

The others gave a raucous cheer as the two of you appeared in the driveway, whoops and claps echoing around the courtyard to be met with recklessly happy laughter from you, from Brian.

It would seem you had always been part of the plan.

⁺˚*·༓☾ ☽༓･*˚⁺

taglist: @melting-obelisks​ @sgt-stardust-killerqueen​ @hgmercury39​  @topsecretdeacon @joemazzmatazz​ @perriwiinkle​ @brianmays-hair​ @im-an-adult-ish​ @ilikebigstucks​ @doing-albri​ @killer-queen-87​ @n0-self-c0ntro1​ @archaicmusings​ @cloudyyspace​ @annina-96​ @themarchoftherainbowqueen​ @annajolras​

Masterpost / Part 13 / Part 15

[letsbenditlikebennett]

Ain’t Nobody Messin’ With My Pack || Ariana, Erin, & Noah

TIMING: Before Ariana’s name got yoinked PARTIES: @corpse--diem @noah-kalani @letsbenditlikebennett SUMMARY: Ariana and Noah go to Erin’s to jump in the bouncy castle only they smell something a little off. Things get heated and secrets come out.  CONTENT: Medical blood tw 

Never in her life did Erin expect to be hosting a handful of--well, she didn’t want to say children, because technically that wasn’t correct. But she was pretty sure at least one of them wasn't old enough to even rent a car. But then again, she was the 35 year old woman with the bounce castle in her backyard. Her judgments could be reserved for another day. Her own official work day had ended but after she’d refilled the air in the bounce castle for the two guests on their way, it was back to the basement to wrap up job two. A bloody, fresh new arrival of the wolf variety had been dropped at her backdoor and she knew her nerves would be considerably less agitated taking care of this before Ariana and her friend popped by. Nothing brought a party down like the carcass of a dead werewolf lingering in the back of your mind. The timing couldn’t have worked out better, either. Blood circled the sink drain as she washed off, the doorbell chiming above her. She dried off, slipping out the backdoor to meet them, waving them over. “Party’s back here guys!” She smiled, greeting the two, before changing her demeanor very suddenly and very seriously, holding her hand up to stop them from going any further. “Oh, wait. Hold up. You do have your admission fees ready to go, right?” She asked, a playful lilt to her otherwise authoritative tone.

Despite everything that had happened, Ariana had been determined to make the most of her summer. The last thing Celeste would have wanted was her moping around and as much as moving forward felt like trudging through molten peanut butter most days, it was the right thing to do. Eventually, it even brought her some sort of ease and it was easier to focus on the little moments that felt better. Tonight was going to be one of those moments. If anyone could goof around for a few hours and bounce until they were dead tired, it was Noah. He’d picked her up from the trailer and they’d made their way over to the funeral home. There was something almost amusing about a mini bouncy castle party at a funeral home. It was so incredibly White Crest. She’d been laughing up the way to the front door with Noah and smiled when Erin greeted them. “Is that what you tell all your customers,” Ariana joked before scrunching her nose up in confusion. She knew Erin was joking about the admission fee, but she caught the familiar wolf scent that meant another of her kind had been here. It wasn’t too familiar, so it couldn’t have been someone in the pack, but the thought of a dead werewolf back there still made her stomach churn. She tried to shake it off and responded, “Hey now, I paid my fee with pies. This guy’s on his own though.” Her joke fell flat and she couldn’t keep herself from sniffing the air around them.

If someone had Noah one day he’d be pulling up to a funeral home, with a full blooded werewolf, in search of a bouncy castle he probably would have said they were out of their mind. But yet here he was. Ready to bounce his cares away with Ari, a stupid ass grin plastered on his face at just the thought. He’d been happy when she called him, and even dare he say it relieved when it seemed like she wanted to do something so mundane. Well  that is if you could call using a bouncy castle in a Funeral Home mundane, but hey you win some and you lose some here in White crest. Looking at Ari as she scrunched up her nose and followed the nice funeral home lady, Noah took a small sniff trying to figure out what she could have been smelling that he obviously could not. Funeral homes generally always smelled weird, but he figured that was like a normal weird smell. Right? Brushing it all off Noah snorted slightly at Ari’s joke. “Well I’m flat out of cash at the moment, soooo could I interest you in a sarcastic comment?” Noah smiled warmly at the lady, wondering if there really was an entrance fee.

“I mean--I have always thought of myself as a macabre party planner,” Erin teased, tilting her head to the side with a shrug. “You could say people are dying to get an invite.” There should have been shame that followed a joke as terrible as that one. Instead, she grinned wider, pausing just for a moment to wave it off. “Man, that one usually kills,” she followed up with a barely concealed chuckle, shaking her head as she put her hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay! Sorry. That was the last one, I swear,” she nodded to solidify the promise. It was hard not to miss the way the two of them subtly crinkled their noses the closer she got. “Oh, sorry if I’m a little, uh--chemical-y. I just wrapped up work,” she glanced down at her clothes, wincing a little. Sometimes no matter how long or hard she scrubbed, the scent clung to her for dear life. She held her hand out towards the young man with Ariana. “Nice to meet you, though. Noah, right? Ariana makes some awesome pies, so you’re totally in the clear.”

“I guess in that case, you’re kind of the life of the party, huh,” Ariana retorted playfully even though every sense in her body seemed to be on high alert. She could feel the goosebumps prickling her arms. It was one thing that it smelled like wolves, but the chemicals couldn’t completely mask the smell of the blood. There was more than one, too. It left an uneasy feeling in her stomach, one that she was sure bouncing in a castle within sniffing range of dead werewolves wouldn’t help. She wanted to brag about her pie or tell Erin just how cheesy her jokes were, but wolves were at the front of her mind. Without realizing it, she put an arm up to stop Noah from moving forward and going to the bouncy castle. “There’s dead werewolves here,” she blurted out, quickly realizing that it was the worst possible thing she could have said. Her hands flew up over her mouth and she cautiously took a step back closer to Noah as she looked Erin over with narrowed eyes.

The instant the words were out of Ari’s mouth Noah could feel the air around them change. Because she was right, something was wrong, and werewolves were involved. He could sense it now, that wrongness that he thought was just funeral home weirdness. Looking at Ari, and then back to Erin, a woman he realized he knew nothing about, Noah lowered Ari’s arm, instinctually pulling her even closer to his own body. She, a full blown living breathing werewolf, was in danger, and while he knew Ari could take care of herself, Noah would be damned if he didn’t at least try to use his humanness to shield her from the worst of it. Looking at the girl he broke into a half hearted laugh, trying to scoot her even further away from Erin without being suspicious. “All that twilight watching last night really got to your head there didn’t it champ? He started looking down at Ari, eye begging her to pick up on what he was putting down.

Perhaps it was the way she said it, or just even who had said it, but Ariana’s outburst sent Erin reeling. She wasn’t wrong but there was no way in hell she should’ve known something like that. Every hair on her neck stood at attention and she watched wildly as her arm moved to protect Noah. From her? The air got thick, fast, despite Noah’s humored attempt to cut through it. “Dead werewolves?” Erin finally exclaimed, pulling herself out of that brief stunned daze. A little slow but not unconvincingly halted. Even managed a light laugh that, while it didn’t sound entirely genuine, mimicked the very real concern in every one of her features. “Jeez, I didn’t think I smelled that bad,” she said, lifting the collar of her shirt to her nose to get a better whiff. “Wait, is it really that bad? Should I change? Or is this some Twilight reference I’m never going to get?” She asked, glancing between the two of them. Dead werewolves did have their own unique odor to them but it was the kind of smell that hit hardest when you were elbow deep in their ribcage. As far as she knew, it didn’t linger past the removal of her scrubs or the intense handwashing session she had after every extraction. She really only had Nic she could ask about that and from what she could tell, even if it stunk, he clearly hadn’t minded.

Ariana shot Noah a glare as he placed her behind him. Her arms were crossed haughtily over her chest as she huffed at Noah, “What are you doing?” If anyone here was equipped for a fight, it was definitely her. The full moon was quickly approaching and she had a bit more of an advantage if they did get in any sort of altercation with Erin. It had never even dawned on Ariana that Erin could be a hunter and the smell of wolves was still overwhelming. She was beginning to feel sick, but at least placed herself next to Noah. Now Erin was trying to make jokes. What the fuck was her deal? At this point, she knew her face was turning red and every part of her was on edge, ready to attack at any moment. She got what Noah was trying to do, but there was more than one dead wolf here. Seemed hella unlikely that this was a coincidence. “Cut the shit. You have a family business here, you’ve had to live here long enough to know I’m not making a Twilight reference.” Normally, she would have tried to be more subtle in her sniffing, but every instinct in her was firing off. “Where are they?”

Annnddd there it was folks, the all too predictable haughtiness Noah knew Ari would exhibit when he tried to protect her. Honestly it would have been commendable in any other situation, but right now they needed to de escalate, not start yelling. Sighing Noah placed a hand on Ari’s shoulder and squeezed hoping the act would ground her a little. “I’m trying to get you the hot head in this scenario to calm down for a second, please and thank you” He said knowing full well Erin would hear him. Cat was out of the bag now, no use in keeping up the charae .Looking back at Erin though, Noah could sense there was some sort of… surprise was it? Either she was very very good at lying or she truly didn't know. Either way Noah thought maybe they should give her the benefit of the doubt before they just jumped her shit.  “Now I don’t know what's going on here, but I think we” He motioned between both he and Ari “both agree it does not smell good If you catch my drift.” He fixed his gaze sternly on Erin  “So you should probably start talking before Little Miss here decides to start swinging.”

Right. That didn’t work. Erin dropped the pretenses but held her cards close to her chest for now. Just because Ariana was right didn’t mean she owed her any answers. “Start swinging? Seriously?” she asked the both of them. “If you even think about it, I’ll have the cops here in two minutes. Cool it,” she warned, the cheerful warmth from earlier completely gone. Apparently it was time to turn on her pissed off adult voice. She lowered it, taking a very slow, cautious step towards the two, trying to stay quiet. “Listen--I don’t know how or why you think that but…” she sighed, shaking her head. “Whatever you think I’m up to, you’re wrong. Believe me.” Bold thing to ask of someone who suddenly thought you were a killer, or whatever was going through these two minds. She said it anyway, hoping the rapport she’d built with Ariana would at least buy her that much. Gesturing towards the street with a nod of her head, she crossed her arms in front of her. “I think you should go.”

Between the two of them, Ariana was fuming. A low growl escaped as she tried to shake off Noah’s grip on her shoulder. “Don’t call me little,” she grumbled, eyes narrowed and watching Erin’s every move very closely. She wasn’t about to go in swinging, not until she knew what happened to the wolves and if Erin had anything to do with it. “You really think having a werewolf arrested days away from the full moon is a good idea? Plus, I’ve got supernatural cop friends. I’m sure they’d really love to sniff out the other wolves I’m smelling here.” Was she bluffing? Maybe a little bit. Jane couldn’t sniff things out, but with Miles’ help, she sure as hell could get to the bottom of it. She reasoned for a moment that maybe Noah was being smarter about this than she was, but she simply couldn’t drop it. If the wolves weren’t safe, she needed to know. She needed to protect them. “Then show me I’m wrong.” Her foot was tapping impatiently and her brows were raised expectantly. “Oh no,” she retorted, “You can’t expect me to leave knowing you have dead wolves here. We don’t usually get the chance to die in numbers if you catch my drift… especially not as a group.”

If Noah could have face palmed without escalating the situation he would have. Man this was definitely not how he envisioned this outing going. Rolling his eyes though at posturing both of them were displaying Noah sighed placing his hand back on Ariana’s shoulder. She could throw it off as much as she wanted, Noah was going to have some sort of contact with her, if only to pull her back from the potential werewolf serial killer that was apparently in front of them. Weighing all of the options Noah took a deep breath. He wasn’t used to being the mediator, in fact he was used to being Ariana, if he was being completely honest with himself. But after everything that had happened to him in the past month, well Noah Kalani had simply run out of hot air. “Soooooo” He started letting out his breath gaze again resting on Erin. If she wanted to pull the ‘I’m the adult here’ rank well two could play that game  “As much as I would like to just skedaddle, I think she has a point” He finished calmly nodding in Ariana’s direction “Plus if you’re above board, it will definitely be easier just to show us. I promise we’ll get out of your hair after that, even if I have to drag her out myself.” He looked down at Ariana, his jaw set, eyes practically begging her to start behaving. He knew she would probably hate leaving, even if they got an answer, but for once he hoped she would realize that, if they were in fact right, they were in waaaaaay over their heads.

Ariana’s jarring anger made a lot more sense after she dropped that little nugget of information. “You’re a werewolf,” Erin repeated, feeling like every advantage she had two seconds ago deflated faster than it took to wrap up the bouncy castle. She didn’t think Ariana would actually throw fists but up until a few moments ago, Erin had been pretty sure she could take her if it became that outrageous. “Fuck,” she cursed loudly, shaking her head, wrapping her arms tighter around herself. Noah was purely trying to calm the situation and Ariana. Didn’t feel like he was managing either of those things very well, but bless him for trying. Her eyes rolled and she glared over at this actual stranger in her yard, trying to hold in that brimming fear and annoyance all at once. Because she was afraid, and not just of the one, possibly two fiery werewolves in front of her demanding answers. “I don’t--ugh,” she started, snapping her mouth shut as she fought another wave off. They were in the safety of her backyard but all things considered, her paranoia spiked. She moved toward her basement door, away from the fence line around the house. Lowered her voice but didn’t open the door just yet.

“Please understand,” Erin let out a breath, her anger giving way. “I don’t hurt them. I don’t. I wouldn’t. I couldn’t. Very boring, very human funeral director over here.” Her eyes popped up, checking over the yard to make sure it was still them again. She hated this. Hated talking about this with strangers, especially. Hated how much of a monster she probably looked like to them right now. “If I take you downstairs, and you see what you see, you need to remember that.”

Ariana let out a huff as Noah insisted on keeping a hand on her shoulder. She invited him here as her friend, not her babysitter. She opted to not snap at Noah given everything else going on, but she still shot him an annoyed glance. This time, she didn’t bother trying to shake the hand off of her. If it really came down to it, he wouldn’t be able to hold her back anyway. Her glare was still focused on Erin. “Obviously,” she responded with an eye roll. At least that ruled out the hunter theory. If she was a wolf hunter, Erin would have been able to sense her from the get go. She could pick up on the spike in Erin’s heartbeat when she listened closely. That paired with her overall body language was indicative of fear. She listened closely, trying to pick up any sign of deception in her voice. “You don’t hurt them,” she said slowly, processing the words trying to take some of the edge off her voice. “I’ll keep that in mind. I want to see what happened to them.” She was not budging until she knew what the hell happened to those wolves, even if the idea of one more thing on her plate made her want to hop in the bouncy castle and never leave. “Show me.”

The little fuck from Erin basically told Noah all he needed to know, an actual ‘i’m scrubbing my hand down my face because I’m done with actual life at this point’ and a deep sigh accidentally escaping him after the fact. God damn it. Fucking A. A werewolf chop shop was literally the last thing he needed right now. Hell it was the last thing they all needed right now. But he guessed it didn't matter. Ariana was hell bent on seeing what was going on with her own two so he was going to follow her lead even if he had to walk into this basement of horrors.  “Yeaaaaa, that sounds a bit like bullshit to me, but I’ll try to reserve my judgement for after the show and tell” Noah breathed out at Erin’s excuses, his own anger flaring a little at her attempt at playing nice. Because he smell of death was even more pungent the more he focused his faulty nose on it. Brushing it off Noah took steps toward the basement squeezing Ariana’s shoulder briefly before motioned to Erin that she should open it.

They didn’t believe her. Of course not. Not completely, anyway. Erin could understand and appreciate that—from where they were sitting, she wasn’t looking too innocent. What they were about to witness in that basement wasn’t going to help her case either. “Come on,” she sighed, more nervous than she was letting on. Sure, go into the basement with the werewolf to show them the werewolf carcasses she just butchered up. Solid plan. Nothing could go wrong here. The smell of dead dog was still ripe in the air as she flicked the lights on, moving towards the industrial sized refrigerators normally meant for housing bodies. “It’s a long story but—my boss hires these guys to hunt down whatever’s in demand I guess. Then the bodies get brought to me, I retrieve the necessary organs. Then I pack, store and sell them.” Yeah this was looking awful for her. “It’s not always wolves, either.” In the fridge were metal slabs, mostly occupied by actual clients. But the two black body bags at the bottom were just a little off. She gestured towards them and then another, smaller refrigerator off to the side with a nod, arms crossed against her stomach nervously. “I—“ she tried to think of a gentle way to put it, tilting her head, “—uh, got what I needed already this morning.”

Nothing would shake away the feeling something very wrong was happening here. Ariana was happy Noah seemed to at least be on the same page as her now. She was still a little annoyed he had tried to hold her back, but they both knew something was wrong here now. Her arms were crossed angrily over her chest until she began to follow Erin down to the basement. The overpowering smell of dead wolves slapped her in the face and a low growl was caught in her throat. What the actual fuck was going on here? The pungent smell of death was already making her stomach feel queasy. Erin’s explanation provided zero comfort or show of her innocence. Angry tears filled her eyes, “What do you mean your boss? You own this place, aren’t you your own boss?” Her anger and disgust were both evident in her town and her fists were balled up, ready to throw punches. “So you’re telling me you sell werewolf organs? Or I’m sorry-- organs in general? Doesn’t matter the species,” she pressed, the edge in her tone impossible not to notice. “Erin, what the fuck?” She took a step toward the body bags and swallowed back the lump in her throat. They deserved better. “You at least going to give them a proper funeral or were you planning to just refrigerate them ‘til you need another part?”

Stepping down into the basement, after both, Erin and Ari, Noah kept his face poised. He worked at a vets office, so he knew what dead dogs smelled like, But nothing would prepare him for seeing the actual body bags. There had been werewolves in there, wolves like Ariana or god forbid Winn. Standing there Noah tried to rack his brains for who they could even call, how they would even get out of there. But it was then, as Erin and Arianna kept talking that the realization hit him like a ton of bricks. She sold organs. Werewolf organs. Fuck he had a fucking werewolf organ. Oh God. Oh God. No. No. No. Stepping in front of Ariana Noah stared down Erin, a certain anger fueling him now, and even more questions swirling in his mind. “How long have you been doing this? How long have they been doing this? Where do the organs go? Who do they choose?” Noah started, voice low and gravelly as he stepped closer and closer toward the possible answers.

Erin felt the cornering happening--she knew it would come. Their anger was more than valid, she knew that too, but she knew she had to reel them back in before the tempers flew too out of control. “Hey!” She snapped back at them, holding a hand out in front of her as she took a few steps back, growing unsteady as the questions poured out and they took a few too many steps closer than she was comfortable with. “I get this looks really fucking bad for me, okay? Because it is. It’s bad. It’s really fucking bad. You should be pissed as hell and I’m not trying to absolve myself of anything. But I don’t have a choice,” she emphasized, hoping they heard it this time. “My shady asshole father owed some shady asshole boss a shit ton of money before he died. And this--” she gestured towards the werewolf corpses, “--was how he was paying them back. This is my inheritance.” She huffed a long breath, trying to figure out if she could reach her scalpel in time should things go sideways here. “They don’t tell me why they pick who winds up here or what they do with the parts afterwards. I just do what I’m told and there’s no trouble. And I always give them a proper send off. Always,” she glanced over at Ariana sincerely.

Nothing being explained to Ariana made her feel any better. She was overwhelmed with both anger and sadness that seemed to seep down to every bone in her body. Her heart was thudding against her chest. They had to do something. How long was it before it was a werewolf she knew and loved on the table? It put her and those she cared for at risk and these wolves deserved better. When Noah stepped in front of her, she pushed her way to be by his side again. She shot him yet another glare. She didn’t appreciate being treated like she wasn’t more than capable of handling herself. The body bags and organs in the fridge left a heaviness in her chest. “Who the fuck is your boss,” she questioned. If Erin wasn’t the source of this, they needed to get to the bottom of who was. Even if it wasn’t by choice, it drastically skewed her impression of the older woman. “Everyone has a choice,” she shot back. “If you really want to right your wrongs, tell me who’s behind this. This already looks bad. I don’t think you want to see what I do if it ever becomes someone I know and love in one of those bags.” She glanced between herself and Noah, standing taller to try and come off as intimidating as possible. She wished Ulfric was here. “I want to be part of their send off,” she demanded.

“This looks bad?” Noah scoffed, throwing a hand up at Erin and the situation around them, shocked she was even trying to placate the wolf and a half in front of her. “This looks bad? Well don’t let me tell you what I think because I think this looks like a piss poor excuse for someone who claims to have an ounce of decency” His voice was full of malice now, his adrenaline pumping and ready for a fight. Clenching his jaw though Noah looked down at Ariana, the younger pushing him back again, and giving him a glare. Noah could almost feel his anger deepening. Winn was in a coma, he probably had a black market werewolf kidney, they were in way over his head, and yet had to somehow get Ari, a girl determined to stick her nose in everything, out of here unscathed. Fuck. Taking a deep breath Noah turned slightly not even wanting to look at the older woman in front of them but knowing he needed to  “Ari, I know you want all of these answers but I don't think she’s gonna tell us, so we should probably leave before she gets any funny ideas” Noah said staring pointedly at Erin.

Erin shook her head. “No. Absolutely not. You’re not going anywhere near him,” she insisted at Ariana’s demand for a name, cutting that off immediately. Her head turned slightly to Noah, narrowing her eyes, shaking her head. She hated this feeling. This judgment sitting heavily between her and these two. Fuck it. She didn’t owe them an explanation for how she chose to survive. Maybe Ariana could snarl and bite her way out but Erin’s options were limited. She was biting back differently, more methodically. “Before you throw some more assumptions around—I’m working on it. On stopping him. I want this all to stop,” she glared between the two. Held a hand up as she moved, crossing the room to grab a pen and paper from a drawer. “If you really want to be useful and help, you can do something with this,” she said, scribbling a name down onto a piece of paper. Offered it out to the two from a safe distance, her heart still pounding. “There’s more where that came from, and I can get you more names. But that man specifically is who brought me those two in the fridge.” She raised a brow. “What you do with that is up to you.”

Ariana took a step closer to Erin. She refused to take no for an answer when wolves were in danger. Letting this lie was unacceptable. She snarled and said, “If you think I’m leaving without a name, you’ve got something else coming.” The anger rising in her made it difficult to keep control of her form, but she reminded herself to breathe. Noah was here and wolfing out on the funeral director was an absolute last resort. She consciously unclenched her fist and drew in a few long breaths. “If you really want to stop him, I suggest you let me or one of the other wolves help. I’m sure the others won’t take kindly to this otherwise,” she retorted sternly. For a moment, Noah had been just as raging as she was and now he was trying to babysit her again. “No, Noah, I’m not leaving here without something. This close to the full moon, I’d love to see her try and pull something on me.” She shot Erin a dirty look. She seemed to be willing to offer up a name for now at least. There’d be more. She could work with that. It was a start in helping keep the wolves of White Crest safe. “Okay, I’ll accept the name you’re offering for now, but if you think I won’t come back with back up if you don’t keep your word on providing more names.” Her eyes were still narrowed, studying Erin carefully before she turned to Noah. “Alright, alright. We can go now. We’ll figure out what to do with this name and the person attached to it.”

[lunar-lair]

In Unison

Hey, so this is actually my first fanfic!! This actually started out as a headcanon for what a unison raid would look like between Natsu and Gray, but as you can see, it got pretty out of hand, hah. (Also sorry for the generic name) You can also find this on Archive Of Our Own at the Fan_Galaxy profile. Alright, hope you enjoy!!

The team had been on their way back from a simple job. A town needed help with a magical gang; it wasn't far from Mongolia and Natsu was begging (he was already nauseous dammit!) so they decided to walk both ways. It was only about a day's walk; what could happen in a day? Apparently, a lot. They had only been walking a couple hours when something black descended from the sky and crashed down in front of them. They all stepped back in surprise, the figure coming out of the dust being a hooded figure. A dark guild mage, they all thought in unison, getting into a fighting stance. He rose his hand, a white light forming along with the tell-tale magic symbol in the same color. He shot the ball at them, and the fight began. They all shot sideways as the ball dispersed, attacking all of them. They slid past them and rammed against the trees behind them. Not lock on. Good. Was thought yet again unanimously as everyone pulled out their magic.

Erza summoned her Heavenly Wheel armor, bringing out her swords.

Gray prepared some projectile icicles.

Lucy brought out her Sagittarius Star Dress.

Natsu and Wendy started up a combined dragon roar.

They all had the same thought: fight fire with fire! And launched their attacks in-time. Although it was a massive blast, the mage easily dodged them all, jumping up and beginning to float. The fight continued, the mage dodging everything thrown at him, roughing up the team in between their attacks as well. Everyone was injured and the fight seemed hopeless. But they had one more ace up their sleeve-whether they knew it or not.

Natsu and Gray looked at each other from across the battle field, a whole quick conversation happening with only their eyes. They bolted toward each other, scaring Lucy and Erza out of their skin. Wendy and Happy already understood; they were there for damage control when they first tested it.

The boys slammed together, embracing on contact, Gray's arms around Natsu's waist, and his around Gray's shoulders. There was a serene closeness between them as they pressed their foreheads together and looked into each others eyes.  A triumphant smirk that they reserved for when they were fighting together formed as they joined their hands in perfect time and stepped back. They threw their arms in opposite directions and turned outwards slightly, their faces still together, in one fluid motion. Their grins widened as they began to speak.

“Fire!”

“And ice!”

“Polar opposites!”

“And yet so alike!”

Blue and red energy built up in the hands in front of them, the light blinding as they slowly moved their hands up like a cannon preparing to fire.

“Both kill!”

“Both save!”

“And together,”

“They make,”

“An unstoppable force!”

As they both yelled the last line, energy could be seen building up in the hands flung behind them, their front hands finding their aim in the sky. They were thrown backwards as a burst of powerful dragon and demon slayer magic was thrown into the sky, breaking and sparkling and shimmering like a firework, the fire and ice seeming to meld together. As they were thrown back, they let go in the front and lunged forward with the hands still between them, coming side by side. A nice ball of power had built up in their hands, and they flung it straight toward their enemy. The mage screamed and seemed to whither away as it was hit by the small, condensed balls of energy emitted by the first blast, and fell into a pile on the ground with a louder, longer one that lingered in their ears and minds when the second hit it. As the mage fell, Gray and Natsu fell to the ground together, on their backs side-by-side, their faces melting into something a bit more soft as they looked at each other.

And then they burst out laughing as they shot up.

“Oh my Mavis that was awesome!” Natsu yelled, grabbing Gray around the shoulders again with an excited face. Gray also hugged back, looping one arm behind the slayer's back, a proud but gentle face forming.

“It was. I wasn't sure our powers would meld right.” Natsu looked up, slightly betrayed.

“The hell do you mean by that?? Our powers may be opposites, but we're close enough for that not to matter!”

“Ahem!” The boys snapped their faces towards Erza, who looked slightly pissed, as well as to Lucy standing beside her, who just looked bewildered.

“When could you guys do a unison raid?!?” The blonde said, jumping out.

Wendy stepped beside her, answering with a calm and innocent face as she held Carla in her arms, who was also confused. “They've been able to do it for a while. They tried it a few months ago. Me and Happy were there to help.”

“Aye!” The cat agreed, flying up beside her. “And it was a success, too!”

Lucy snapped. “So THAT was the “firework” I saw in April! I was wondering why someone was firing them off-and why it didn't make the usual sound.” Natsu got up first, holding out a hand for Gray.

“Yup! It's pretty cool, isn't it?” He said as the other boy stood up beside him.

Erza nodded. “Indeed. How long, exactly, have you had the capability to do this, however?”

“Probably for at least a year or two,” Wendy answered instead again. “They got closer around then, right?

Gray nodded. “Around Galuna Island. ...he taught me a lot on that trip...” His face changed into something fond as he looked over at Natsu.

Natsu shrugged as he inched closer toward Gray. He smirked. “I was just tryin' to stop your moping.” His face dropped as he said more quietly, “...and for you not to die. Just to keep someone who died for you alive...died for a reason.” Both boys were looking at each other now, their smiles dropped.

Gray took a breath. “Well, I didn't. Because of you.” A fond smirk came onto his face, as Natsu blinked and then grinned, smacking his arm.

“Stop it, ice princess, you're makin' me blush!” he said, his words ringing true as his face turned a light pink.

Gray's own smirk grew as he stepped back from the slap. “Well, flame-brain, it's the truth, so you'll have to take it.” Natsu tackled him, his grin turning devious, starting a wrestle between them.

Erza raised an eyebrow, watching the boys and knowing the wrestling was fond. (Like cats playing, she thought.) “Well at least that mess brought something good.”

Wendy nodded. “Mhm. It's the main reason they're able to be mates, now.”

Both Gray and Natsu froze at the girls words, stopping their wrestling mid-grapple. Erza's eyebrows rose and Lucy's mouth fell open.

“Wendy!” The two males shouted, faces coloring as they broke apart to rush at the girl.

She shrugged. “They would've found out eventually anyways.”

Gray drew back, crossing his arms. “Well, you didn't have to tell them...”

Natsu drew back as well, throwing out his hands. “And you didn't have to say mates...” He began to mumble. “Even though that is what we are...” Gray shushed the other at the quiet confession.

“What...do you mean by 'mates'?” Erza asked, eyebrows still raised.

Natsu turned away, his face growing redder. “It's...dating. But...y'know. Dragon version. ...because we claim our 'mates'.” Gray also turned away, his face doing the same.

“They would've found out, you guys, you just did a very powerful, flawless Unison Raid, that obviously had love infused in it. Also you're not that good at hiding it.” Wendy said, her face and voice innocent, although she had wicked intentions.

Natsu whipped his head to her. “Well they can't sense it!”

Gray raised an eyebrow. “Sense what?”

Natsu hesitated. “...when a dragon slayer is in love and they use magic with their mate-especially in Unison Raids, other dragon slayers can sense it. Y'know, like how normal mages can sense the power of other mages? It's so other dragons know they're theirs; it's another 'mark' thing.”

Wendy nodded. “Really, you could smell it on them. They smelled like each other, and Natsu even marked him.”

Natsu looked betrayed yet again. “You didn't have to mention that!”

Gray also looked bashful, saying “Yeah, Wendy...that's...personal information...”

Lucy was the curious one this time, saying “Marked? What do you mean?” Erza slightly glared at the girl for her invasive question, but looked surprised when Gray sighed and answered.

“Fine. Natsu?” He looked towards the slayer. He hesitated, but sighed and nodded.

“They were gonna find out some how. It's pretty apparent...” Gray turned around and pulled his hair up, showing a red fire symbol that looked seared into his skin. Natsu turned to the other still-confused girls. “Dragons-and slayers-can put their 'mark' on a mate-it's more like a seal, though, taking magic. Yet again one of those protective, possessive, 'You're Mine' actions we are compelled to perform. Really, they piss me off. I wanna be able to let Gray do his own thing for more than an hour before getting antsy...”

Gray turned to Natsu, worry evident as he placed his hands on the boy's shoulders. “Hey, you know I don't mind. It's in your instincts. And anyways, I'm pretty clingy myself.” He smirked at the last part, grabbing the slayer again and picking him up slightly.

“Gray! Put me down!” He said, his actions betraying his words as he giggled and barely tried to push away.

“Alright, alright,” Gray said, complying anyways as he set the boy down. “But first,” he said as he left his arms around him, “do I win?”

Natsu's grin only grew bigger as he said “alright, yeah, this time.”

“Whoo!” Gray cheered, lightly pumping his fist in the air after letting go.

“You boys done?” Erza said, a smile alight on her face as she walked toward the boys. She was just glad her two closest friends were this close. It was heartwarming. (Really, a part of her always knew. They just...had that feel to their relationship.)

The boys turned toward her as they stepped back from each other a bit, their faces turning red. “Ah. Sorry, we...forgot you were there...” Gray muttered, turning away.

Erza's smile only grew wider. “It's perfectly fine. You're in love; it would be a sin to punish someone for something like that.”

Their eyes widened, a smile coming on their faces. “Thanks.” they uttered at once, surprising themselves, starting up a giggle fit.

Lucy yet again stepped forward, beside Erza. “What other stuff comes with the whole 'dragon' thing?” She asked, only curious. Erza decided it was fine. They were in a good mood and if they didn't want to answer Lucy wouldn't make them.

Natsu stood straight, a small grin still on his face from the fit. “Well, there's obviously the possessiveness, but in dire situations, a dragon's abilities are increased exponentially in search for their mate. And being with their mate powers up both the mate and the dragon, which is part of why that Unison Raid was so powerful. It's also due to the fact that, stated before, a dragon and mate's powers sort of combine due to the dragon's powers and instincts. When their mate dies, they die soon after due to heart break or suicide or something similar because of how many instincts are linked to the mate and how much magic links them. They lose too much in the process.”

Gray wrapped his arms around him at that, also protective and dreading the day, as dragons lived long. It can only be assumed for slayers as well. Natsu looked into his eyes and sent the quiet message of don't worry. I don't live that long. He looked back up, moving on with facts.

"Very powerful dragons may even be able to sense a mate's power in the dragon's and vice versa, or if they are close enough. It's rare, but sometimes humans even notice, it's so prominent. Dragons can sense when they've found their mate as well, as a mate is the person a dragon is meant to be with for their whole life. It's like a soul mate, except we can actually sense it. Basically, a mate is ingrained into everything a dragon is, and needs them to live.”

Lucy and Erza had eyebrows raised, taking it all in. This was the most serious Natsu had been in...well months. He just sat there and listed facts off.

Wendy just nodded along. “Exactly. Although you guys' connections is the last one stated; it can be easily spotted by humans. Mira already got you, and Laxus, and Makarov, and Freed, and like everyone-”

“We know!” They cut her off as they looked over and shot her a glare. Gray still held on to Natsu, though, as Wendy smirked lightly. “Really, I'm surprised that Erza didn't notice.”

Said girl blushed a bit. “I'm kinda oblivious when it comes to this kind of thing...”

Everyone's eyebrows raised this time, even Wendy's. Erza? Oblivious? Actually...they thought, their minds moving to Jellal and how many times she didn't notice the obvious love between a couple, that makes plenty sense. Their faces turned to a blank, expectant look as they all thought the same thing.

“W-what's with the face?!?” she asked, her face turning a deeper red.

“Nothing!” They all said, fearing for their lives.

She sighed, her face still red with embarrassment. “Anyways...now that we've got that all cleared up, why don't we throw this mess into the bushes and go home?” She gestured to the mage they had defeated, still bleeding out on the ground. Everyone agreed on that, and the boys broke apart just to hold hands as Erza picked up the body.

She raised an eyebrow. “Wow. You guys really did a number on this guy. And just one shot, since we couldn't get to him...” She muttered the last part, throwing the body into the bushes and wiping imaginary dust off her hands. (Although there was blood, rubbing them together like that won't do anything...she thought.)

Natsu shrugged. “We're both pretty powerful. Even if we weren't mates, that still would've fatally injured him, at the least.”

“Yeah, but if we weren't mates, that wouldn't have worked. Our magic wouldn't have been in sync enough. Your dragon instincts are the only reason we can do Unison Raids.” Gray said, resting his head against said slayer.

Lucy nodded, coming up beside them and the other two there. “Yeah! I was really surprised when you guys did that. Usually Unison Raids can only happen between people of similar magics and close relationships. I didn't really think you guys had either of those.”

Wendy shrugged as well, turning towards the girl. “Mates change everything for dragons. We're looking for them our whole lives. In fact, I have my eyes on someone myself...” she trailed off at the last part, looking into the distance with a smile.

Carla looked up at her partner. “Is it that Shelia girl? You've been spending an awful lot of time with her lately.”

Wendy hummed, her smile growing into something lovely. “In fact it is. I mean have you seen her? She's perfect, Carla. And I just know she's my mate! I may be young, but I'm still strong!”

Natsu sighed wistfully. “Man, I remember when I first realized Gray was my mate. I had been rejecting the small part of me that found him amazing for about a year, then, and just watched from a distance, knowing it was unrequited for years. And then I finally fucking confessed 6 months ago.”

Wendy looked up at him, worried. “Natsu, that long? You know that's horrible to do to your dragon side...”

He only waved her off. “Yeah, but I was fine, right?”

Gray shook his head. “No, he wasn't fine.” Natsu looked at him, slightly betrayed (Again. Lots of betrayal today, he noted.) “He was a freaking mess once he got to me, crying and physically hurting due to outbursts. He had separation anxiety for the first month, the Igneel thing obviously not helping anything. He was extremely possessive, and while I really didn't mind because, really, I was too, he beat himself up over it all the time. I hadn't noticed before, but after the confession, he was more active, and ten times happier. It was obvious even to me that holding that inner dragon back did no good, even though he never admits it.”

Natsu was looking down for the whole explanation, everyone else just looking towards him as their eyes widened and their eyebrows rose. Especially Erza had a horribly worried look on her face as she looked at him.

“...how did I not notice...” she said, her face growing sad.

Natsu sighed. “You wouldn't have realized; I was already suppressing it before we really met, since I met him first. Even though I didn't realize it, I was for all that time. It was...insane, once I had stopped holding it back. It was like I had gained back emotions. It was terrifying, amazing, and sad all at once, knowing I could have had all that back if I wasn't such a coward...”

Gray suddenly stopped and grabbed Natsu by the shoulders, putting him out in front of him. “Natsu Dragneel, you are not a coward. Maybe a bit of an idiot for holding an important part of your being back for years on end, but not a coward. Everyone is afraid to admit their feelings to people. Everyone fears rejection. It makes sense especially with you; mates are important, and you know that. So stop it with the self-deprecation shit before I knock you over the head with an icicle, flame-brain.”

Natsu stood there stunned for a second, finally shaking his head with a fond smile after a few moments. “Alright, alright, you win, snow princess. Again.” He hugged the other boy, earning a smirk and a proud nod from him.

“Good. That means two extra cookie trays at some point, right?” He questioned, hugging him back.

Natsu laughed, burrowing his head into the crook of Gray's neck. “Of course.” And they broke away again to hold hands instead.

Erza shook her head, smiling happily. “You two really do love each other, don't you?”

Both boys colored yet again, dipping their heads, and replying with a “...Yeah. Yeah, we really do,” at the same time again, making them laugh. As they looked up and at each other, their grins only widened. Maybe telling them wasn't the worst idea Wendy's ever had...

Wendy smirked, seeing their faces. “You're welcome, by the way.” The boys laughed again and everyone lined up as they walked home uninterrupted, new knowledge and views lingering in their minds and their hearts.

[etudias]

(Edit: I am aware of the typo in the title, it should be experience)

Hi there, my name is Alessandra and I am going to tell y’all about how the whole college application process went for me. I think my experience ended a little differently than most, or at least most that people will share. It honestly took a lot for me to feel comfortable posting this so I really hope that it will help someone out there. It is however a very long post, so I am going to break it up into sections, feel free to read only what you need/want.

1. Researching Schools

I got excited for college. I was excited to go to college for as long as I can remember and was looking up different schools on site’s like the college board one, bigfuture, which by the way, I recommend, since probably 10th grade. So come Junior year I had a bunch of schools I was interested in. I ended up visiting a few in Boston over spring break that year. I visited Harvard, MIT, and Boston University (clearly my sights were set high). I did not really think it was that important to visit colleges, and that I should just visit the ones I got into to help decide (I now know that college visits can actually really help you get into a top school). The summer before senior year I worked hard to narrow down my list. I ended up with 12 schools that I applied to. This may seem like a lot to some, or not many at all to others. Most people I know applied to more like 5-8, but I know some people who applied to 20+, you gotta do what’s right for you. I wanted to apply to more honestly, but based on costs that is the number my mother and I agreed upon.

2. The Schools

Okay so in alphabetical order here are the schools I applied to:

Barnard College

Brown University

Carnegie Mellon University

Case Western Reserve University

Duke University

Georgia Institute of Technology

Harvard University

Massachusetts Institute of Technology 

Stanford

University of California - Berkeley

University of Georgia

University of Pennsylvania

So, some reasoning on my choices. I heard someone say something that I fully agreed with, and after everything still do. That you should apply to as many reach schools as you can because it raises the chances of getting into just one. So with that I applied to a bunch of reaches, a few meets, and 1 safety. The one safety school I decided on was because it was in state and in my state if you have a 3.75+ GPA and some other requirements, you get full tuition to in state schools and I knew that given the money, there was really no other school that I could consider a safety school that I would choose over it. I still stand by this choice.

3. My Stats 

You are probably going to ask this and I’ve decided to be upfront and tell you because why the heck not. I sent in ACT scores, not SAT (although I did take it). I got a 32 (33 English, 33 Reading, 35 Science, 28 Math), I should have spent more time studying for the math as that score never changed, but it was my 3rd time taking the test and I was over it, my goal had been a 33, but to me that was close enough because I was tired. My GPA was a 3.875 unweighted and a 4.063 weighted. My school did not offer many AP courses, I took all that I could with the exception of 2 history courses that I had strong reasons for not taking and when I had my Harvard interview and I talked with the lady about it, she wholeheartedly agreed and said that as the counselor of her private school she even made her school stop offering those courses, so yeah I feel pretty valid about that. (Ended up taking 7 AP’s if you are curious about which ones, they are on my about page) I basically got all A’s in my academics, my B’s came from some arts classes and health, I know, I know. I’m going to briefly mention my school in this section because it is sort of related. I went to a public arts high school that is ranked number 2 in the state for academics and 75th in the nation. It was extremely rigorous.

4. Extracurricular’s and other application stuff

I was very involved. I participated in theater for all 5 years (my school was 8-12). I did technical theater and by 10th grade was crew head for shows and in 11th grade I worked every show (which at my school was a lot). Senior year I became a stage manager which is a big responsibility and sort of like being a president of a club, but even more responsibility. I calculated the hours I spent with theater junior year alone, 300 hrs. I was also very involved in orchestra, all 5 years. My school has 4 orchestra levels, the first two comprising the lower orchestra, 3&4 comprising the higher level orchestra, based on skill level, not age. I was in orchestra 2 for 8th and 9th grade, orchestra 3 for 10th and 11th grade, and orchestra 4 for senior year, orchestra 4 was a big deal, with only 11 members and you played not only in the higher level orchestra but also the touring orchestra. Lots of hours. I also played in my county’s honor’s orchestra for 2 years. I was on the executive board (basically president) of my schools National Honor Society (our school only opens it to seniors, so I was only in it for 1 year). I was part of Beta Club for 4 years. I was a math tutor. I founded a Girls Who Code club at my school and taught it. I was in our award winning mock trial for 2 years. I was a member of my schools Gay Straight Alliance. I babysat all throughout high school. I did more than that but this is already long enough and you can tell that basically, I was a try hard.

   Let’s talk about summers. The summer after 10th grade I went to a 7 week long summer immersion program for coding called Girls Who Code. The summer after junior year I went to a week long orchestra camp, then my states Governor’s Honor’s program, which in my state is very prestigious and hard to get into (I think its like a 10% acceptance rate). I was a software engineering major and a math minor there. (Those are really the summers that count, but all other summers I went to orchestra camp)

   More application stuff, I had a fair amount of school awards as well as the aforementioned Governor’s Honor’s. I got recommendations from my pre calculus teacher, who I founded a Girls Who Code club with, and my world history/ap psych teacher. They both loved me and I’m sure wrote great recommendations (with the exception of UGA where I did not send any). All the schools I had interviews with went extremely well. I was a legacy for Duke. I had an alumni friend write an AMAZING letter of rec for CMU. I felt my essays were strong (and checked by 3 or so people).

   My major: I basically applied everywhere as a computer science major. I felt good about this with the way I spent my summers, some of my extracurricular, and classes I chose to take. I wrote a fair amount of essays about this and I feel as though my applications demonstrated the work I had put into bringing more people (especially women) into STEM, specifically cs, and my interests and knowledge of cs.

5. The Decisions

Finally the good part right? Well at least for you readers. I’ll go in order of the decisions (although towards the end I forget the order a bit because it was tech week and show weeks for my schools biggest production, I was busy) and add some commentary on some. (All regular decision unless otherwise noted)

MIT (Early Action) - rejected, it hurt a little being my first, but not unexpected

Case Western (Early Action) - deferred, then waitlisted, then rejected, everyone from my school got the exact same decisions from them and there were people from the bottom of my class to the very top lol

University of Georgia - accepted, oh boy I cried because finally thank goodness somewhere at least

Georgia Tech - waitlisted, then rejected, this one still stings, people with all around weaker applications from my school got in that applied early. the acceptance rate dropped from 40% to 8% between early and regular, biggest regret is not applying here early, once I was waitlisted here I felt for sure I wouldn’t get in anywhere else

Barnard College - waitlisted, still waiting to hear. at this point i just felt like I was getting waitlisted everywhere

Harvard - rejected, expected as are basically the rest of these

U Penn - rejected 

Brown - rejected

UC Berkeley - rejected

Duke - rejected, but damn that letter I’m still mad about, like the fact the I got rejected was unsurprising at that point, but they sent me 3 long paragraphs of rejection bc I was a legacy saying how sorry they were and how many times they reconsidered my application. One sentence would have been better.

Stanford - rejected

CMU - rejected, and man I knew it was coming but it was the last school I heard from, my last hope, and it was closing day for my last school musical, this was a bad day, not so much for this one school but just the process in general

6. Reflections

So I got into 1 school, yup just 1. My safety school that’s it. Let me tell you I was devastated, not over any particular school, but that I didn’t get into any others. I ate 4 donuts and cried a whole lot the day of that last rejection. I got really REALLY stuck on the fact that I would only ever read that one acceptance letter, that one congratulations. I moped around and was sad and upset with my self and full of regrets like why did I not apply to more schools, it was a bad time. But let me tell you that time really showed my what good some friends could be, friends really helped me through that. Even though I had only one school I waited till the last minute to commit. So yes, fall 2018 UGA here I come, go dawgs! (and really its not a bad school, especially the honors program) I worked really hard to get myself excited for this school and as much as I am, with the major I want to go into, I know it is in my best interests to transfer, no matter how much I do not like the idea of transferring (its a good school don’t get me wrong, just not the best for my major). I am still trying to come to terms with the idea of transferring and honestly this whole process in general. I do not think I would have done things much differently, I put my best into my applications, honestly if I changed anything I would have just applied to more schools and probably only more reaches or meet/reaches at that. I have come to accept the decisions (mostly, I still get quite down about it from time to time). It was an odd year for decisions at my school in general. We usually send a good amount of students to top top schools like ivies and the equivalent, but this year no one got into any, heck our valedictorian is going to UGA too. (I think it has something to do with our class being super strong overall, 50% had a 4.0+ weighted, so therefore none of us really stood out) So yeah it really freaking hurts only getting into one school, I’m pretty sure I went through all the stages of grief, but now I am in acceptance and just getting excited for college!! and I am SO EXCITED

   If anyone has any questions about this process, my inbox is open.

[ginasneesby]

August - Rarotonga

So I have been meaning to write this for months now, given I went there last August. But, life, the universe and Game of Thrones has meant that I just haven’t sat down to write about my paradise island get away. As my grandma had generously left me some money, most of which was to be saved for travelling when I had visitors, I thought I’d book a holiday somewhere beautiful and warm that I would never think to go from the UK. There are lots of Pacific islands that all look amazing, but which one to choose.

I was inspired by someone I knew who had gone there only a few months previously and so I booked some flights to Raratonga in the Cook Islands. I decided to not spend all my money at once and so reserved a double room (I didn’t wanna be too cheap) in a hostel by way of balancing out the activities I was bound to do.

I took off on Saturday evening, a short 4 hour flight later and it was Friday night again, only this time on a small, warm island somewhere in the Pacific Ocean! I was picked up from the airport by the woman who ran the hostel, who was very kind and advised us to grab beers and a phone card if we needed as nowhere outside of the airport would be open, but I was planning to be pretty cut off/use the hostel wifi when needed. 15 minute car ride and we arrived at the hostel, which was about a quarter of the way around the island (it is not a big island). Although it was midnight, it was warm, which boded well for a beach holiday, and there were dogs and chickens roaming all over. The hostel had a nice outdoor area with hammocks and a decent sized kitchen, so we wouldn’t be crawling round each other to cook. However, the room was pretty plain, there were loads of bugs and lizards on the walls and round the lights and a trail of ants in my room; but ya know, that’s what you get for about £10 a day.

The first day I decided to have a leisurely morning and then get the bus towards the town centre, I had thought about hiring a moped, as I have it on my license although have never driven one myself, but they were all booked up that day. The bus, needless to say, did not run on time, not even close. Basically they were supposed to go clockwise and anticlockwise every hour and looking at the timetable, that was in about 15 minutes. 30 minutes later it arrived, but it was cheap and took me where I wanted to go. I headed up into town and took a wander around, thinking what I fancied booking, there were Polynesian food and entertainment evenings, boat trips, water sports and spas. However, given how little money had been put into the infrastructure and local villages they were all quite expensive. I guess if you have a bunch of tourists staying at posh resorts, they’ll eat up these activities with ‘meals included’ and ‘transport to and from your hotel’, however I wasn’t on that sort of budget. I went to a local restaurant near the beach, and thought I can at least have a nice lunch and a beer on my first day, but when the bill for that came I was swiftly put off doing anything. I guess they have to import everything even more so than NZ!

There was also no free wifi, it was something that needed to be paid for so I didn’t bother, which is a shame, coz part of the reason you go on lovely island holidays is to take obligatory white sand pictures and spam everyone’s Instagram! I did go to a supermarket and buy some bulk items that would feed me breakfast, snacks and dinners and made my way towards the bus stop. Again the buses screwed me, and the stop wasn’t where I thought it would be and when I did find it, it was in front of a big supermarket that had lots of deals in the window, typical. I did however give up on the ‘not gonna spend any money’ and bought some beer.

I was hoping that most people in the hostel would be friendly and up for a bit of a drink, no one was really around in the afternoon but I thought ‘Fuck it I’m on holiday’ and had a few beers by myself. Others arrived in dribs and drabs a bit later, a couple from Germany, a guy from Australia and a couple of kiwis. Mostly friendly, but not very inclusive. A few of them had been there for a while and there was a particular couple who basically decided who they were going to include in their little group, and who they weren’t; I was not on their list. Unsure why, the girl just took agin me and so I was out, and so started a holiday where I spent most of my time on my own (not so bad) while most others at the hostel hung out together, ate together and planned things together (not so fun).

Making the best of it, everyday was spent having a lie in, then making my way to the beach and lying in the sun for most of the day, I was beautifully sunny and warm but not boiling or burny as it was the middle of winter, so I could lie out for ages without worrying. I did manage to hire a moped for a few days, which meant I could easily get around the island, I did one whole lap one day just to see how long it would take me. On my way round I went past a boat tour operator and decided to book it for later in the week, it wasn’t too expensive and it included entertainment, a meal on the beach and snorkelling if you’re that way inclined (I am not). It was also a glass bottomed boat and the water was super clear, so I didn’t feel the need to get in until right at the end and just for a dip to say I have swum there. The lads running it were great, they played instruments, made jokes and were generally quite loud (think my brother but Polynesian). They fed us fish, potatoes and kumara freshly from the fire and then gave us a coconut shucking workshop and a many-ways-to-wear-a-sarong fashion show. We then had some time to chill and explore as we were on a small spit just off the main island, but annoyingly the sun had gone behind some clouds and it was a little bit chilly by that point.

One of the days I joined a group of people doing a giant puzzle; it was pissing it down and didn’t appear to be letting up any time soon, so when I came downstairs and people were all doing a puzzle, I joined in. It was quite a fun day, although I suffered later (warm weather + humidity+ bush + rain = mosquito-palooza) I was absolutely eaten alive, like worse than ever before, my skin was burning and I looked like I have measles and chicken pox and I dunno the plague! Luckily I had a supply of salt water to ease my prickly legs every day (you always forget about these parts when you go on a lovely hot holiday)

Every other day I pretty much did the same thing, I would find a different part of the coast I hadn’t been to yet and sit on the beach reading for a few hours, I made friends with the dogs (although not too close as they all had fleas) and in the evening would have some beers and try to make chat with the other people staying. I managed to become fairly friendly with a couple of people and by that I mean we added each other on Instagram, but it seemed to be, once you were not picked by the couple (or rather the girl) you weren’t really included in stuff. In fairness, she was horrifyingly aggressive about her and her partner’s family and told a story about holding her pregnant sister against the wall by her throat, whether true or not, not really what I’m looking for in a friend!

Managed a couple of fun nights, going down to the beach to look at the stars was awesome, it was super dark and so you could see everything including the milky way. The last night, we all went down to the bars next to the airport, they were well known for being cheap and large drinks so although I had to fly home at like midnight, I did allow myself a couple of drinks to celebrate just being invited along! The bus driver did try to charge me extra for my little suitcase as I was ‘clearly’ going to the airport, I just sat down and refused to pay, I mean. You’re the only bus, there isn’t an airport bus, and this is carry on luggage, hardly takes up loads of space. My flight was late Saturday night, and I landed early Monday morning, completely losing that Sunday, time zones are weird.

The only other thing of note that happened was the day I was exploring with my moped, after booking my boat tour, I went to turn back onto the road and my handles either didn’t turn, or locked or something and I went shooting across the road into a parked car! I managed to turn enough to not actually connect bike and car (thank fuck) but I did hit the car with myself, and took off the wing mirror with by boob. Ouch. 2 hours and a $500 hold on my credit card (the mirror was intact so can’t have been that expensive but the woman couldn’t give me an exact quote) later, I was back on my way, a little bruised and a little bit red in the face.

In conclusion, I could totally go to somewhere similar again (although not here as their laws about imprisoning gay people is horrifying) but if I did go, I would book somewhere lush and go with money so I can spend my days in luxury and share it all on insta to make people jealous!

[lazyheretic-blog]

Flip Side

The droning voices threaten to send him to sleep, but he's familiar with the beating that will earn him. He concentrates very hard on the glittering motes of dust that spin lazily in and out of the thin streams of light filtering through the screened windows. He imagines he can follow the journey of one individual as it's buffeted by updraughts of a wind he cannot feel. The heat is stifling; he wishes he were a dancing mote that didn't have to wear robes and a stupid hat and could ride the breeze. If he were, he thinks, he would try his best to land in Adminstrator Park's eye so he had to break ceremony and rub it.

He giggles, and realises his mistake. Park doesn't even look at him but the room seems to become much darker. He can see Park's nostrils flaring, a sure sign of his anger, even though his face remains impassive and the tone of his voice, expressionless and dry as he dictates tributes and taxes, never wavers. The boy shivers, despite the oppressive heat.

Park never beats him. It's always one of the women, a concu-something that the six-year-old hasn't figured out a role for, other than whipping him with a thin bamboo cane around his thighs. It's a crime to hit the king, of course; the real punishment comes afterwards with the ragged cry, gush of blood and the hideous tearing noise as a soldier slits their bellies open in front of him. If he doesn't watch properly, eyes wide open, he gets another beating. There's always a second woman in the room.

It only had to happen once. Now, he watches like a king as royal justice is dispensed in his name.

"See, your Majesty," Park tells him. "These loyal women sacrifice much in order to further your education. In a few years you will learn what else they can teach you. She will be reincarnated and will be pleased to rejoin their number to serve you."

He doesn't know why he feels sad at their deaths. It's only temporary, right? Their pain is fleeting and their reward is great. But the look on her face as she writhes in front of him, a girl only a few years older than he is, just makes him want to scream and hide. The soldiers scare him too, the ceremonial guards with covered faces and shining, bloody swords.

There's only one who doesn't. Gerralkim's been his friend since before he can remember and it's still easier for his tongue to wrap itself around the name he gave before he was properly articulate, but the tall man who kneels down to his level when he speaks to him doesn't seem to mind. He's never told Gerralkim about the beatings but when he's finally allowed to flee, the man's quarters are his preferred destination. He's not always there, but Wang Yeo has a child's active imagination.

This time, he's sitting cross-legged at his low lacquered desk, penning a letter in slow, deliberate strokes of a bamboo-handled brush. He half turns and smiles as the boy approaches him to watch characters form under the bristles.

Yeo finds it calming. Watching this is never dull, unlike sitting in the audience chamber, and he can pick out some of the meaning.

"Who are you writing to?" He asks, wide eyed.

The general smiles at him. He's a young man, younger than Park, perhaps twenty five at most. Years in the sun and in battle have darkened his skin and etched fine lines of worry between his brows and around his mouth. Unlike the officials he wears his hair down, dark waves falling off his shoulders and roughly cut shorter at the front. Today, he's wearing a pale cotton robe, wrapped at the front and belted. Yeo is relived he's not dressed as a soldier.

"I'm writing a letter to my father," he explains. "Remember my report to Administrator Park two days ago, about the battle against the Qidan?"

Yeo does. He always pays attention to General Kim, even though the thought of battle scares him. He nods.

"Well, my father worries about me. I write to tell him that I am unhurt and victorious."

"I worry about you too," the boy says seriously. "It would cause me sorrow if you got hurt."

Kim Shin grins, and ruffles his hair with a large, calloused hand, stained with ink. "You shouldn't worry about me. If anything happened, I would write you a letter so you would be the first to know."

"Of course. I am the king," the boy replies, all innocent and pompous, just as he should be. "But you should wait until I have learned all my letters, so I can write back by myself."

General Kim bows from the waist, arms folded in front of him. "It would be the utmost honour, your Majesty."

"Who's that?" asks the boy suddenly, pointing to a charcoal drawing of a woman and a young girl.

Kim pulls it towards them and straightens it between his hands. "That's my mother, and my little sister, Kim Sun. She's about your age."

Yeo studies it intently. It's an unusual drawing, life-like and untutored and utterly different to the heavily stylised scrolls hanging around the palace. He's drawn to the smiling faces of the little girl and the woman, shining with a happiness he's not used to seeing.

"She's pretty," he murmurs. "I want to meet her." He's never had playmates, wouldn't know what to do with them, but he yearns to see that beaming smile for himself.

"I'll let you in on a secret," Kim says solemnly. "Can you keep it?"

He's used to keeping secrets. Unconsciously he shifts and his bruised thighs protest. The stinging is turning to a profound aching, deep in his bones. He nods.

"Your half-brother, Wang Gang, willed it that you should marry my little sister when you grow up. What do you think?"

Yeo pretends to mull it over seriously, but can't keep the shock and delight off his face. "I can visit her?" Maybe, just maybe, there's a place Park doesn't have all the power.

"It's a bit far," the big man says. "The king should stay safe in the palace. She will come to you when she's twelve, and be trained how to look after you as a good wife and Queen." His face grew serious. "But don't tell anyone that you know, your Majesty. I don't think Administrator Park likes me very much."

He knows it's true. He's a sensitive child, schooled to be quiet, and taught by experience to read the unspoken language around him. He knows that Park hates the warrior like no other, but his close friendship with the previous king and his victories make him popular with the army. Apart from the handpicked palace guard, regular soldiers distrust civil servants like Park. He worries his lip as he considers the girl. The thought of her being beaten or treated like the other women is even more scary than what he endures.

He thinks he's hiding it, but he's transparent to an adult. Kim says, gently, "You and I will protect her. I promise."

"Tell me about her," the young king commands.

"She loves persimmons, fresh or dried. My father's last letter describes how she refused to eat anything else for a whole week, even when they made her ill."

"Persimmons make you ill?" He was doubtful.

"Anything can make you ill if you eat too much of it. Diet must be balanced."

"Tell me more."

"She feeds my horse persimmons, too, when she thinks I'm not looking."

Yeo was entranced. What freedom! "Did he get ill?"

"No, he just got fat. I scolded him for being so greedy but he didn't care."

Park hears their laughter, and scowls.

----------

The week Kim spends in the palace is the most fun he's ever had. Park doesn't dare threaten him when Kim's around, tall and imposing and cloaked in authority. His soldiers rest in the barracks, and sometimes Yeo sneaks over to listen to them sing and tell stories before he's inevitably discovered and carried back by Kim. They know interesting words, and talk about things he's curious to see; the ocean, barbarians on little ponies with tattoos, legends of gods he doesn't know.

Kim plays little tricks on him, pulling cards and coins out of his hair or from behind his ears, making him giggle with delight. Yeo uses his tall hat to scoop out a squiggle of tadpoles from the inner palace pond and dumps it in Kim's basin. He watches, wedged inside a tall chest and peeks through the hinge gap, as Kim bends to splash his face before the midday meal, and gasps in exaggerated horror at the squirming water. That earns him a rough capture and a serious and slightly painful head rub, until he's wriggling as hard as the little creatures in the sink.

Kim has to steal him a new hat.

But weeks come to quick ends, especially the best ones. He mopes in the doorway as a servant packs Gerralkim's traveling trunk, and the general dons his armour.

"A king shouldn't pout like that," Kim gently chides him. "You must be strong, no matter what."

"Must you go already?"

"I must. One of your towns in the North has been attacked, and I have to go protect the people there. Then I must retaliate so it never happens again."

"Will you kill people?" He asks in a sniffling whisper, the pink Cupid's Bow of his lips quivering.

Kim sighs. He can protect the young monarch from many things while he's there, but the realities of rule, and the war that allows it to continue, are hard truths the king must face. The servant finishes, and carries the trunk outside.

Kim bends down and kneels in front of the boy. "Yeo," he says seriously, using the given name reserved only for parents and close family he's technically forbidden from. He does it anyway in private sometimes, because he knows that it makes Yeo feel safe. "I won't lie to you. I have to kill lots of people to protect our own. We live in dangerous times, and if we don't kill our enemies, they might come and kill us. That town has children in it, so I have to go and make sure they don't come to any harm. Please understand."

Yeo nods. It's easier to accept when stated simply like that. Park sometimes tells him that General Kim kills in his name, as if Yeo's responsible; maybe he is, but he didn't ask for it.

Kim pulls him unceremoniously into a last rough hug, and holds him close until the child stops shaking.

----------

He's away for several years. His letters, delivered by suspicious-eyed warriors, tell of continuing unrest and the need for more soldiers at the front. After a while, they dwindle in frequency and no longer go directly to him; Park receives them first. Yeo is shocked when Park passes along a blood stained scroll in shaky handwriting detailing a massacre of a barbarian village, women and children subjected to torture and worse before being burned alive. Park says, nonchalantly, that Kim's acting on his own; that orders have been sent to have mercy on the barbarians, but the people of Goryeo call for revenge, and General Kim gives them what they want.

Yeo doesn't know what to think about this, but he's not given time to consider; when there's a botched attempt on his life by one of the couriers, the palace is locked down and he's placed under armed guard permanently. His food is tasted, his servants are replaced, and Park himself moves into the annex of the king's quarters.

"Your Majesty," Park tells him, a week after the attempt. "We cannot, of course, be sure that General Kim sought to take your life. It is true that the people are starting to worship him as a second sun in the sky, but we should not be hasty in judgement. Please have patience and mercy until the truth is revealed."

Yeo's mind is foggy, a result of sleepless nights and the restless paranoia of his guards. It's all he can do to sit straight on the hard throne, and at the age where his bones sometimes feel like they are breaking and knotting themselves back together constantly, he's rarely inclined to introspection.

He's twelve just before he sees Kim again, walking alongside the palanquin containing his new bride. It's a pretty box, carved but not lacquered like his own, carried by four stocky men. Not a commoner's carriage, but not royalty. Tradition forbids him from rising to greet them, and despite his constant fatigue he's eager for it to be over so he can take advantage of the freedom Kim's visit should bring.

He is disappointed. Hard-eyed guards keep them separated except in formal situations. He is desperate, bursting to ask so many questions, to ask if Kim tried to have him killed, why he sends his letters to Park now, why he has to kill children in the name of Goryeo. If Kim notices the pleading in his eyes he doesn't react to it, just stays his tongue and speaks formally, steady voice echoing in the audience chamber. Park keeps Yeo away from battle accounts, claiming that he should not sully his mind with the unnecessary details.

----------

It's well after Kim has left that the guards make an error of sorts. There's a commotion in the kitchens, the loud crash of celadon pots meeting an untimely end, and the guards reach for their swords, drawn to the sound. Yeo sweeps from the room before his servants can object and flees, followed by his indignant shadows, to the outer wall of his courtyard. The palace walls are low, barely taller than him at twelve years old, and he gets a leg up on an obliging flowerpot to peer over at the ladies' domain.

She's beautiful, is his first and only thought.

She's trying to walk with the grace of a queen, a small dish balanced on each of her shoulders, but her face is sort of squished up with the effort of concentration. Several pinch-faced women watch her, whispering to each other behind their long and loose sleeves. His heart goes out to her; she must feel judged, like he does. It looks hard, walking so straight over the uneven stone slabs, with that bunch of harridans silently laughing at you, in those tiny ridiculous shoes.

His hand grates over a stone; she looks up startled, and meets his eyes as the plates go crashing to the floor. She offers him a small, uncertain smile and he grins back, amused and confusingly aroused at her clumsiness.

Insistent, unwelcome hands help him down from the wall.

----------

Their wedding night, two years later, is the first time they get to speak in private. Unsure of what he's meant to actually be doing, the two young teenagers simply spend the time in their sleeping robes talking into the small hours of the morning.

She's terrified of Park. So is he, of course, but he's sworn to himself to protect her and he can't tell her the worst of it. Some things are his burdens to bear. So he instructs her to just do as Park tells her and he hopes with all his heart that this will be enough to keep her safe.

----------

She's too much like her brother, he realises as he matures into his fifteenth year. She's grown up with freedom and love and doesn't understand his kind of survival.

She shouts at him, "Why do you always side with Park? Is it too much to ask that I go outside these dark walls once before I die? The people are loyal, they love you. Nothing will happen to me!"

"Be quiet!" He hisses. "If Park hears you question him-" The room echoes with the sound of the chopstick snapping in her hands.

"I don't care what Park hears! You are the king, I am the queen! What does he matter?"

His mind whirls; images of bloody concubines and sharp swords crowd behind his eyes. The ghosts of pain around his lower body makes him tense. She has to submit; it's the only way she can survive. For her own good, he grabs her by her slight, narrow shoulders and pushes her into the floor pillows.

"I am the king," he growls in her face, his teeth grinding together with every word. "And you will obey me."

His breath is hot and stale, and his long pale fingers dig bruisingly into her flesh. From so close, she can see the tiny red veins in his eyes, dark-rimmed and intense. He's never been physical before, or hurt her in any way, so she's shocked at his sudden ferocity and can't find the right words to calm him down.

Still gripping her, he says quietly, "I can only protect you if you obey me."

She's still in shock, even after he releases her and steps back. His own heart is pounding loudly in his ears and he clenches and unclenches his fists to exorcise the tension.

"My brother," she says in a small voice. "He can protect us both. Call him back from war."

Yeo shakes his head. "He leads the army but too many of the men belong to Park now. Even if he came back, the palace guards would keep him out. He has to stay away. I can't protect him either, if he comes back."

It earns him a sniffle of temporary defeat, but he knows she's too stubborn to give in easily.

----------

It's checkmate, and he knows it, signing the order that will keep Kim Shin away from the capital for good. He's back for a brief respite, sanctioned by Park, though he doesn't know it, in return for the royal seal on that scroll. Yeo bargains for an audience alone, and gets it, but he knows there are ears and eyes in the walls.

Kim doesn't understand, but he doesn't have to. It's enough for Yeo that he's going away to be safe, because he has enough faith to know that Kim is unkillable in battle.

Through clenched teeth and on his knees, Kim accepts the sword that Yeo has had made for him. It has a tiger on the hilt, because that's how Yeo thinks of him; ferocious, graceful, and gentle.

Kim thanks him through gritted teeth. His parting words are cold and sarcastic. Yeo's heart breaks as he speaks, equally coldly, of his coming sorrow at Kim's death, praying silently, fervently, that it will be many years before coming. He desperately wants a last embrace from the man he thinks of as his only friend, and tells himself that his life is the only thing that matters.

----------

In the middle of winter, he finds out that Kim has disobeyed him. He rushes to Sun's rooms, intent that somehow she can write and dissuade him from his self-destructive path. In the presence of the servant-spies, he calls Kim a traitor, acid burning his throat at the lie.

He knows she loves him, but she's far braver than he is.

----------

As General Kim Shin approaches the heavy wooden double gates, the court waits in silence within. Behind Park, Yeo sits beside Sun, close but no more able to touch her than reach the moon. She is staring straight ahead, back ramrod straight, breathing a little too fast. As the gates swing open she rushes forward and halts at the top of the stone steps when the archers draw their bows in unison, the creaking of strings the only noise in the icy courtyard.

Kim ignores Park; his eyes flick between Yeo and his sister's as he approaches, slowly, wearily, his lieutenant at his heels. He's wearing only his black padding, no armour; he's got the sword Yeo gave him but no means of defending himself.

Yeo's heart gives a painful twist. He doesn't really hear what's being said, but there's nothing he can do to stop what he knows is coming when Sun takes an arrow to the chest and tumbles, soundlessly, to the ground. Around them, bodies fall. The screams reach him curiously delayed, muted as though underwater.

As the gifted sword is driven through his friend's chest, he finally crumbles, and flees.

----------

The years that follow are lifeless and grey, as though that winter day never came to an end. The decoction tea Park sends him every day is numbing and he welcomes the oblivion it brings him each night. His second wife has somehow conceived a child; he doesn't know how, and he can't even recall her face or name, so he doesn't care. The servants stay away from him except for necessities; dressing, eating and bathing. His presence is rarely required in the throne room.

Park takes care of all that.

He's still got that charcoal drawing in a secret drawer, now yellowed and smudged with old tears. On his better days he pulls it out and takes a cathartic comfort in the fresh guilt it brings; he craves the crying, the cramps, the nails he digs into his palms until they bleed.

He draws, seeking a nameless meaning in his work. He mainly draws Kim Shin as he remembers him, tall and dependable, strong enough to conquer the world and carry it on his shoulders.

Sun evades him, as if refusing to materialise on paper out of spite. She is clear in his mind's eye but his hands shake too much.

In his thirtieth year, enough decoction tea to kill him in burning agony keeps his hands steady enough to finally capture her.

[squirenonny]

Five Times Zethrid Flirted With a Cat (and one time it flirted back)

Rating: T (language and brief but graphic depictions of violence) Words: 5392 Summary: Zethrid has a problem, and that problem is a cat.

(Or, Zethrid might be crushing on Narti. She might be too much of a coward to talk to Narti. Not that she'd ever admit it out loud.)

Written for @queen-gr​ as part of the @vldlunarladies​ exchange!

[Read on AO3]

1. Accidental

It was a slow day in the Galra Empire. No rebellions to put down, no threats to confront, no large game on nearby planets to hunt as a gods-damned break from the monotony.

“I hate this assignment,” Zethrid said to no one in particular. It was just her in the officer’s lounge on the space station in the middle of literal nowhere that had been her home for the last… how many decaphoebes? Hell, she’d given up counting ages ago. Not like she was going anywhere anytime soon. All the interesting posts were reserved for the pure Galra. The ones with respectable parentage. The real soldiers.

Yeah. She’d like to see one of them step into the ring with her. Then they’d see who the real Galra was.

The lounge remained disappointingly quiet, and when she drove a fist into the couch cushion in frustration, it gave a rather anticlimactic huff and then, slowly, sagged beneath her knuckles.

Groaning, Zethrid flopped backward and pulled a pillow over her face. She could only imaging the lecture Lotor would give her if he saw her moping like this—let alone Acxa . But she couldn’t help it. She was bored. There was nothing to do except go down a few decks and pick a fight with one of the enlisted men, and it had already been made clear that that was not an option befitting one of Lotor’s generals.

The door hissed as it opened, and Zethrid groaned into the pillow. “I swear to fuck if you’re here to tell me there’s some dumb-ass meeting I should be at right now--”

Something small, light, and poky landed on her gut, forcing the breath out of her in a rush.

“What the--? Kova?” Zethrid lifted the pillow from her face and glared at the cat as he began kneading at her stomach. He didn’t purr—he never did—just stared her in the eye as he jabbed his tiny, sharp-clawed paws into her again and again. She swung the pillow at him and he scuttled back, hissing at her. Zethrid hissed back.

They glared at each other for a long moment, a silent battle of wills that dragged on longer than it should have. Once Zethrid realized she was having a staring contest with a cat, she flopped back down and cursed at the ceiling.

“That’s just perfect,” she grumbled. “I’ve stooped to getting territorial with an animal. Great job there, Zethrid. Really striking fear into the men’s hearts with this one.”

It was only a matter of seconds before Kova forgot his indignation and ventured forward once more, stubbornly ignoring the hand Zethrid shoved in his face and squeezing himself into the space between her hip and the back of the couch. He did this, sometimes. Found the warmest, softest body in the room to use as a bed. It was only luck that had spared Zethrid that fate so far—well, luck and the fact that she usually tried to keep herself moving. Sitting still never got anything done.

So it was usually Acxa who wound up with a sleeping Kova sprawled across her lap, or sometimes Lotor. The cat was a common fixture at their strategy meetings and Acxa’s research sprees, when he wasn’t curled up on Narti’s shoulders. But Zethrid’s core temperature ran higher than the other generals’, thanks to her father’s heritage. She supposed all this fur made her a softer bed than most, too.

Damn this cat.

Zethrid’s hand hovered over Kova’s back for a long moment, slitted eyes staring back at her beneath heavy lids. Kova didn’t blink, didn’t even stir at the irritated growl that built in Zethrid’s throat.

But she couldn’t keep her hand in the air forever, and there were only so many comfortable ways to lay on a sofa, so with no small degree of reluctance, she lowered her hand down onto Kova’s back. “You want to smother me?” she growled. “Then you can deal with me returning the favor.”

A long, taut silence followed, during which Zethrid was sure the cat was going to tear her hands to shreds.

Instead, he started purring.

It was a strange sound, gravelly and uneven. Sounded more like he was snoring than purring, but it vibrated in the ridges of his spine where they pressed against Zethrid’s fingertips, pulsing in time with his breathing. On the inhale, the sound faded, only to return in force when Kova huffed an exhale.

“You can’t possibly like this,” Zethrid muttered. Her fingers found the hollow where Kova’s ear met his skull, and the first scratch had the cat melting into her touch, purrs coming more insistently. Zethrid shook her head. “Well, shit. You’re as much of a surprise as--”

The door opened again, and Zethrid’s body went rigid as Narti stepped into the room. With her mask on, as always, it was impossible to read her expression, but the flick of her tail didn’t seem particularly pleased. Zethrid felt too hot, her mind grinding to a halt.

“Uh...”

Zethrid snatched her hand away from Kova, who stretched and lifted his head to peer toward Narti, still purring away. That was the thing about familiars—they weren’t just pets. Kova was Narti’s second pair of eyes, and though she didn’t need to look through him to get around, she could peer into their bond, no matter how far apart they were, and there was no way to tell from the outside whether or not Kova had someone else in his head.

Narti crossed her arms, cocking her head to the side in a question. She lifted one hand, running her fingers across her chest in the sign for, Really?

“It was his idea!” Zethrid cried, sitting up so fast she dislodged Kova, who dug his claws in in an attempt to hold on. It hurt like a xinthosian rivvu’s bite, and Zethrid bit down on her tongue to stifle a cry of pain. Like hell was she going to complain about it. She wouldn’t give Narti the satisfaction.

Kova resisted a moment longer, then hissed again and sprang up onto the arm of the couch. Narti lowered her hand, and Kova climbed nimbly to her shoulders, where he sat staring at Zethrid, tail lashing from side to side. Zethrid got the distinct impression Narti’s tail wanted to do the same.

The damn cat was still purring.

After another, painfully long silence, Narti finally turned and walked out, and Zethrid moaned into a pillow. She should have picked a fight with one of the soldiers.

2. Experimental

“You need to do something about that crush of yours,” Acxa said, not looking up from her display screen. “It’s going to get you into trouble one of these days.”

Zethrid squeezed her water pouch so tight it split at the seam, contents running down her arm in little rivulets of shame as she choked on her cry of, “What?!”

Acxa lifted her head, eyebrow arching. “Don’t play dumb with me, Zethrid. You can act the meathead in the field all you want, but you and I both know Lotor never would have promoted you if you didn’t show at least a modicum of situational awareness.”

A shiver of restless energy slithered up Zethrid’s spine, taking up residence in her ears. (Curse her ears. No one else on this team had to worry about body parts projecting every damn thought to cross her mind.) “Who told you?”

“Told me?” Acxa snorted. “Please. All anyone has to do is spend five minutes alone in a room with the two of you. All that unresolved tension in the air is enough to power a teludav.” She swiped at her screen with two slender fingers, seeming for all the world like she was telling Zethrid to add soap to their next requisition list. “It was one thing when we were stationed at the fringes of the Empire and Prince Lotor didn’t have anything better to keep him entertained. But we’re at war now, Zethrid. If you give the paladins an opening, they’re going to take it.”

Zethrid scoffed. “Were we watching the same battle? I could pulverize those wimps with one hand tied behind my back—even if I am distracted by whatever crush you think I have.”

Acxa sighed, switched off her screen, and stood. “If you’re afraid Narti doesn’t feel the same way, then why don’t you just ask her?”

“Uh, I don’t know, because I’m not generally in the habit of making an idiot out of myself?”

Holding up her hands, Acxa backed toward the door. “I’m not getting dragged into this, Zethrid, okay? Just… figure it out? For your own sake. It’s painful watching you pine over her.”

Zethrid scowled at her back as she left, abandoning Zethrid to her watch. It just figured. They finally got called back to the heart of the Empire, finally got to see some real action, and now suddenly Acxa got on her case about Narti. (So Zethrid had come to watch Narti train once or twice in the past few weeks. It wasn’t a crime to take an interest in a comrade’s progress.)

Anyway, it was entirely Acxa’s fault that, a varga later, when Lotor brought them all together to talk about the paladins and the fight and blah, blah, blah—Zethrid couldn’t concentrate on what Lotor was saying.

Now, obviously Zethrid couldn’t take Acxa’s first bit of advice, the part about “just” asking how Narti felt about her. But she could try to follow the second suggestion and “figure it out.” Experiment. It seemed like something Acxa would be proud of, in all honesty.

She had a piece of raw seppabeast meat wrapped in plastic in her pocket, and she spent the first five minutes of the briefing fiddling with the loose edge of the wrap. Narti stood beside her, fully focused on Lotor, as were Acxa and Ezor. Kova, though… Kova was staring right at Zethrid, watching . Which meant Narti was watching.

Fine then.

Shooting a look at Lotor to be sure he wasn’t paying attention (he wasn’t; he was too focused on whatever Acxa was saying to care about Zethrid), she pulled the meat out of her pocket and held it up in front of Kova’s nose. The cat perked up at once, following the meat as Zethrid waved it back and forth in front of his face.

Narti didn’t react.

Zethrid smiled, inching the meat closer so that Kova started to bat at it. There was always a question of whether or not Narti wanted you interacting with her familiar, and when he was on her shoulder, sprawled against the curve of her pauldron, which had been designed specifically to give Kova a perch, it was safest to keep away.

But Narti wasn’t telling Zethrid to back off, as she did when someone crossed a line, a certain sharpness to her signs that hit with the same force as a shout. She hadn’t yet moved to position one of the others between her and Zethrid, either, and neither her tail nor her hands were twitching with murderous intent. Which was a bit of a disappointment, really. Narti was damn hot when she was primed for a fight.

Narti turned her head a fraction—just far enough that their eyes would have met, if not for the smooth, opaque helmet in the way. Which was ridiculous, of course. If Narti wanted to keep an eye on Zethrid, she’d do it through the cat, and if she wanted to listen to what Zethrid was doing, her ear was already pointed in a perfectly useful direction.

No, she wanted Zethrid to know she’d taken note of the—was this flirting? Zethrid wasn’t sure if this could be called flirting, feeding raw meat to a cat.

But it was something , and the fact that Narti was watching her, was openly acknowledging the exchange, sent a thrill through Zethrid. She grinned wider, staring deliberately back at Narti. Not at the cat; at Narti. If Narti wanted Zethrid to know she’d noticed, then Zethrid wanted Narti to know she’d noticed she’d noticed.

You’re not stopping me, Zethrid thought. That knowledge brought with it the rush of battle, adrenaline and a primal hunger coursing through her blood. She wanted to push the limits of this contest, though she hadn’t yet figured out the rules.

She didn’t care. She always lived on the edge, and if the danger here wasn’t the bloody, fatal sort she was used to, it still made her feel alive.

Kova’s next swat caught Zethrid’s fingers, claws sinking right through the fabric of her gloves and drawing blood. She yelped, cursing as she snatched her fingers back, and Acxa’s voice trailed off. She, Ezor, and Lotor were all staring at Zethrid now, exasperation plain on Acxa’s face, while Lotor looked merely surprised. Ezor glanced from Zethrid to Kova, who now had the chunk of meat trapped between his paws and was tearing into it with a bloothirsty sort of glee—probably because there was actual blood on his treat—to Narti.

Zethrid could have done without the delighted smile that suddenly lit Ezor’s face.

She growled, ready to tear into whoever made the first comment, but it was Narti who broke first, lifting one hand to her face as though to hide a smile. Zethrid’s anger and embarrassment faded to something softer around the edges, something that left her feeling like someone had bashed her on the head.

When they all finally split off to their various tasks, and Ezor hip-checked Zethrid a coo of, “You two are adorable,” Zethrid was still too flustered to defend herself.

3. Sentimental

Ezor wasn’t allowed to give romantic advice anymore.

Zethrid wasn’t honestly sure what had possessed her to take said advice, especially considering Ezor had given it entirely unpromtped, and Zethrid didn’t know what counted as a “cute romantic gesture” when you were dealing with a magical, psychic, nigh-immortal cat, but…

Yeah. She was regretting this already.

Narti wasn’t here, which was some small mercy. Not because it spared Zethrid the embarrassment of knowing the other woman had seen her bringing half a robeast’s worth of kitchy toys to the command ship for Kova—because Narti was most certainly watching this entire awkward display. But at least Zethrid didn’t have to face the laughter.

Kova, himself, was having a great time… with the wrappings. He ignored the hollow balls and stuffed mice and tassels and even the climbing tree (evidently Zethrid herself was far more fun to climb, and she had the scratch marks to prove it). The officer’s lounge was an explosion of cheap plastic, fuzz, and embarrassment.

And Kova?

Kova was curled up, asleep in an empty box with shreds of brown paper for a blanket.

4. Coincidental

Battle.

It was a nice change of pace, as far as Zethrid was concerned. Too much of the fight with the paladins was confined to space, where Lotor insisted on holding back and leaving Voltron in one piece if you can, girls.

Zethrid didn’t do restraint.

That was probably why Lotor kept her out of the new ship, the one he’d made from the meteoric ore. That ship was a beauty, faster than anything in the universe except the Red Lion itself, more powerful than a hundred ion cannons compacted into one. The havoc Zethrid could have wrought from behind the controls of that beauty…

But of course havoc was bad . Havoc was counter-productive . Havoc was off the table, Zethrid, and until you learn to keep your destructive impulses in check, you’re not allowed to touch the new ship.

Lotor and his frickin’ schemes.

It had been a few weeks since they’d last faced the paladins of Voltron, and things had been quiet. A few minor shows of force, a whole hell of a lot of parlaying with planetary leaders. That silver tongue of Lotor’s was getting quite a workout these days as he folded would-be dissidents back into the empire.

So it was a gigantic relief when they came across Hakkadia, a world that would not be enticed. The local leaders had outright refused to meet with Lotor, the people hid when Lotor tried to appeal to them directly, and then this morning, they’d actually dared to launch an attack on Lotor’s vessel with their cute little home-built ships.

The orders to put down the rebellion put Zethrid in a good enough mood that she could be generous and say the locals had spunk. They were kind of adorable, actually.

Especially when they screamed.

Blood seeped between Zethrid’s fingers as she impaled a rebel on a length of rebar, the heat a pleasant contrast to the chill Hakkadian wind. A trail of carnage traced her path across the city, rebels lying where they fell. They were all as good as dead, though many of them still breathed. Their moans made a nice score to accompany her fury.

Two more Hakkades charged her, polearms crackling with electricity. Zethrid smacked one away, leaped, and came down on the haft of the second weapon, crushing it beneath her. Its wielder dropped it at once, pulling out a knife as he backed away, while his companion stumbled, fumbling her weapon. The force of Zethrid’s backhand could have flung it two blocks away, and the rebel’s hands had to be smarting from holding on.

A flicker of movement on the rooftop beside her caught Zethrid’s eye. Kova sat there, tail curled around himself, eyes unblinking as he watched her fight. Zethrid looked around, but Narti was deep in her own fight, a stolen polearm glinting as she twirled it. Her tail tripped up her enemies, and their own blade cut them down, and when she was done she stopped, her back toward Zethrid.

Kova meowed, a question and a challenge, and Zethrid grinned. Her blood already sang in her ears, but this—this was even better. She charged in, roaring as she went, and though the looks of terror on the rebels’ faces were no less satisfying than normal, her mind remained transfixed by the cat on the roof, looking quietly on.

And, well, if Zethrid fought with just a touch more… flair… than usual, no one ever had to know.

5. Temperamental

Things finally came to a head as they left another newly-loyal world behind. All five of them were in the cockpit, waiting for Lotor to step in with the usual debriefing and handing out of assignments for the long vargas before they reached their next target—not a planet, this time, Zethrid suspected. It had been too long since they’d made progress on their real goal.

Not that she particularly cared at the moment. Narti was sitting at her station, Kova curled up on her shoulders and watching Zethrid—always watching. He hadn’t approached her once since that first day, before the summons from Haggar arrived, and Narti seemed to be going out of her way to avoid being caught alone with Zethrid.

She’d seen it as a challenge. Of all the generals, Narti was the most reserved—not because she couldn’t speak, but simply because she preferred the company of her familiar to any other. Even Acxa was reasonably social. She spent a lot of time with Lotor, and she let Ezor tempt her into having a drink every now and again. She was always there whenever Ezor or Lotor decided it was time to have a “girl’s night”--be that drunken duels, holovids, a spa day, or some good old-fashioned hunting of massive, ancient beasts. Narti was more of a toss-up. Sometimes she showed, sometimes she didn’t.

But it was different now. It wasn’t so much that she didn’t show up to group activities as that she didn’t show up other places she could normally be found. That, and Kova sometimes seemed to be patrolling the halls. He vanished as soon as he caught sight of Zethrid—off to warn Narti, no doubt. The only place Zethrid could talk to her anymore was in company.

Fine, then.

She waited until Ezor went to grab something from the cargo hold. Something to boost the scanners, maybe? Zethrid hadn’t been listening. All she cared was that the seat next to Narti was open now, and Zethrid wasted no time in claiming it. She reached out as she passed and gave Kova a quick scratch behind the ears.

The cat’s eyes snapped open, pupils dilating as he focused on her, and his tail gave a single, violent lash. That gave Zethrid pause, but she didn’t back down. She sat, kicking her legs up onto the seat back and leaning backwards over the armrest, her ear quivering as it brushed against Narti’s arm.

Narti stilled.

“You’ve got some blood in your whiskers,” Zethrid observed, reaching up to scratch Kova under the chin. His ears went back, but he didn’t resist the touch, which she figured was good. There was blood in his whiskers—all over his snout, really. He’d gotten deep into it during the last battle, latching onto the face of a much larger beast while Acxa lined up her shot. Kova wasn’t hurt—he, like Narti, was much too slippery for that—but he seemed to have missed a spot in his grooming. Maybe he was just too tired.

He let her scratch him for a few more seconds, but when she traded scritches for pets, he let out a low, unhappy growl and retreated to Narti’s other shoulder. She reached up and laid a hand on his back. Neither of them looked at Zethrid.

Stunned, she sat upright, her feet dropping to the floor. “What’s your problem?” she hissed, keenly aware of the others in the room. “You’re giving me the cold shoulder now? What gives?”

“Aw, come on you two. Don’t fight.” Ezor leaned suddenly over the back of Zethrid’s chair—Ezor’s chair, technically. Her eyes, bright with interest, darted from Zethrid to Narti and back. “Did… something happen?”

Zethrid looked at Narti, waiting for an explanation. She said nothing, though, just continued to scroll through scan data and pet Kova, whose tail was flicking harder than the Altean princess’s whip.

Pressing her lips together, Zethrid stood, feeling an uncomfortable tightness gathering in her chest. “Nothing happened,” she growled. “Apparently, nothing has been happening for the last few weeks, and I’m just too dense to get the memo.”

Still she waited, just a few seconds longer, silently begging Narti to contradict her. A gesture, a single sign, a glance from Kova—anything.

All she got was frosty silence and the sense that somehow, Zethrid had crossed a line.

“Well,” Lotor said, leaning his cheek on his hand. “If we’re done with the drama for today, could we move on to actual business?”

Zethrid balled her hands into fists. Shame and hurt were battering at her—neither one an emotion she had much experience with. She felt like an idiot. She’d let herself be strung along like a lovesick Altean, tripping at Narti’s heels—and for what? For a laugh? Was Narti just bored ? Was this all a game to her?

With a roar, Zethrid slammed her fist down on the console beside Narti, who flinched, snatching her hands back from the sparking remains of her station. Kova arched his back, hissing at Zethrid. She bared her teeth in return and then, ignoring Lotor’s budding lecture, she stalked out of the room.

(+1: Transcendental)

Kova dropped a dead rat in Zethrid’s lap.

She jerked back, staring at the mess of blood and sinew in disgust as Kova tucked his paws underneath himself and stared.

Zethrid stared back, baring her teeth. “What are you expecting me to do with this, eat it? ” She picked it up by the tail— she normally wasn’t bothered by a messy kill, but it was different when she was trying to relax and someone came along and dropped it in her lap. “For fuck’s sake, Kova, where did you even find this?”

Narti sat quietly beside Zethrid, their knees brushing together. He went hunting, she signed, gesturing toward the forest visible beyond the ruins they’d claimed as their base on this gods-forsaken planet. There were no people here, no rebel outposts, not even any dangerous predators. Just a weird energy signature Lotor and Acxa wanted to check out.

Zethrid craned her head to search for Ezor, who was supposed to be helping her watch the ship, but of course she was nowhere to be found. Probably planned it that way.

After a moment, Narti started signing again, and however mad Zethrid was, she couldn’t keep herself from turning to catch the words. It’s a gift. To apologize.

Zethrid turned to the cat, who arched his back, rubbing up against her leg. He was… honestly, he was irresistibly cute when he did that, and his warmth made Zethrid keenly aware of the relative coolness of Narti’s body. They’d never been close enough for Zethrid to notice that before.

“Apologize for what?” Zethrid asked, ignoring the painful bubble of hope building in her chest. “I’m the one who was too stupid to realize I was making you uncomfortable.”

Kova meowed once, mournfully, and butted his head against Zethrid’s hand. Seeing that she wasn’t resisting, he climbed onto her lap, curled up, and started purring. Zethrid stared at him, utterly baffled.

You didn’t make me uncomfortable, Narti signed. Not… Her hands stalled, and her shoulder rose and fell with a sigh. Not like you’re thinking. Can I? She peeled off her glove and held her hand out, fingers ghosting over Zethrid’s bracer.

Zethrid knew a few things about Narti. Not a lot, mind. She didn’t talk much, and very rarely about herself. This conversation was already the longest they’d had. But Narti had served under Lotor for a long time��almost as long as Acxa herself. What Lotor hadn’t deemed relevant knowledge for the rest of them, Acxa had passed along at Narti’s request, and Ezor had pried most of the rest of it out of Acxa before sharing it with Zethrid late at night in hushed tones.

So Zethrid did know the basics. Narti’s father was Galra, and her mother had belonged to a race that shared a distant ancestor with Balmerans. They were a subterranean species, used to living in darkness. Narti had eyes, and she could see, poorly, but she didn’t depend on sight to navigate. She wore her mask to filter out the bright lights her eyes weren’t equipped to handle.

They were also a psychic species—but where Balmerans’ minds were linked to the Balmera on which they were born in a symbiotic relationship, Narti and her mother’s people were psychic parasites. They took hosts and controlled them.

It was this ability, presumably, that had drawn Narti’s father to her mother, though Zethrid wasn’t clear on which had been the hunter and which the prey. And it was this ability that had made Narti so valuable, first to her father and then, later, to Lotor.

Zethrid didn’t know how all that psychic shit worked, but she knew it involved physical contact, ideally skin-on-skin.

She hesitated only a moment before yanking off her gauntlet and holding out her hand, palm up, for Narti to take. She felt the instant Narti slid into her mind with a brief chill, followed by an unfocused moment, and then a peculiar calm settled over her.

Sorry, said a voice in her head. It sounded like wind through trees, like water dripping in a cave, echoing and indistinct. It shifted, and Zethrid settled back into her own skin. Narti’s mind no longer hovered over her, but rested beside her, in the space between them. I never learned how to do this without overshadowing someone first.

“This?” The word echoed oddly, rebounding off Narti’s psychic presence a split second before the sound reached Zethrid’s ears.

Communication, she said. My mother used to speak to me in this way. My father… did not approve. This was not useful to him. I had to rediscover how to do this after Lotor and Acxa gave me a place on their ship. It is still not perfect.

“Huh.” Zethrid’s fingers traced the ridges on Kova’s back, and his purrs burrowed into her. They didn’t quite attain the level of words, as Narti’s touch did, but there was more to it than what Zethrid could sense without Narti inside her. “So… You’re really okay with… you know...” Zethrid barely had to think about her mediocre attempts at flirting before they appeared before her, layering over the view of the ruined city like a holodisplay. She flushed, trying to force the memories down.

Amusement radiated up her arm—a strange sensation, but not unpleasant. Like someone running a feather against the grain of her fur. I am more than okay with it. I am… sorry. Your advances made me uncomfortable, but not because they were unwelcome. I’m just not used to… that. To receiving that sort of attention. To being desired as anything other than a weapon.

Zethrid couldn’t help but snort. “A weapon? Please, Narti, at least give yourself enough credit. If anything, you’re an entire armada.”

The link stilled for a moment, Narti shifting in surprise and confusion. Zethrid sensed she’d said something wrong. Vague impressions drifted toward her, filling in the pieces she’d missed.

“Oh. I thought—” Zethrid fell silent for a long moment, absorbing the nebulous communication drifting through her. “When you said weapon, you didn’t mean soldier, did you?”

No, said Narti. I was a tool, nothing more.

“Aw, hells, Narti. I’m sorry. I didn’t--”

You do not think of me that way. I know. Kova purred, the sound swelling along with Narti’s affection. You prefer to fight with your own two hands.

“And I prefer not to treat people like things,” Zethrid growled. “I mean, shit! Who are these people? Do I need to go bash some heads in, or would you like to--”

They are dead. A single image crystallized in Zethrid’s mind: a Galra in an officer’s uniform, dead in a puddle of his own blood. A younger Galra, diamond-patterned scales punctuating her thin fur in a line from the crown of her head down to the base of her long, reptilian tail, stood over him, her face unreadable for the familiar, expressionless mask.

Zethrid grunted. “Good for you,” she said, hoping Narti felt the full weight of the words.

From the way she squeezed Zethrid’s hand, the meaning came through all right.

I’m sorry for ignoring you, Narti said. I’m afraid Kova may have rubbed off on me.

Zethrid barked out a laugh that startled both Kova and Narti, and she winced as the cat sank his claws into her leg. Gods, I want to kiss her.

She didn’t realize Narti would be able to hear the thought until the cool hand on hers flushed hot with the same embarrassment that turned the psychic link to jittering fuzz.

Oh, Narti said.

“Shit.” Zethrid leaned her head back, groaning frustration at the sky. “Sorry. Again.”

No, it’s all right. It’s just—the sun--

“Yeah. Right. Listen, we can just pretend this never--”

We could go inside.

Zethrid froze. “Inside? Like--?”

There’s too much light out here for me to take off my mask, but if we go inside, turn down the lights…

“Make out in the dark, huh?” Zethrid smiled her best, most predatory smile. “I could be into that.”

Laughter rang in Zethrid’s head for a moment before Narti withdrew, the absence of her hand leaving a cavity in Zethrid’s mind. She stood, backing away, and even without the mental link, Zethrid could read her intent in the sway of her hips. She was way better at this than she gave herself credit for.

Come, she signed.

Zethrid stood without thinking, completely forgetting the cat in her lap. Kova yowled, sinking in claws as he scrambled upward, and before Zethrid could decide whether to throw him off or shield her face, he’d reached her shoulders, where he caught his balance, flicked his tail once against her nose, and settled in, curled up atop her pauldron.

He likes you. Narti’s hands hesitated for a moment, then flashed through one last, hasty sentence. So do I.

Zethrid was grinning as she followed Narti inside.

[kuriquinn]

Green Fields

Disclaimer & Masterpost

Summary: In the eyes of the world, she and Neji were only teammates after all, and to pretend otherwise is an insult to his memory. Whatever carefully hidden feelings and secret hopes they might have had must remain unspoken, known only to her. [NarutoWeek2017 – Day 3 - Prompt: "Team Gai"]

Konoha's graveyard seems much bigger than Tenten remembers it being when she was a child. She would like to think it's because she didn't come here all that often before, but the sad truth of it is that it's grown in the months following the war.

So many died in the first battles, across so many fields of conflict, that the recovery teams are still looking for the missing. Every day a new headstone is added as more bodies are shipped back home, and she knows this best because of her daily pilgrimages to Neji's grave.

Since returning to the village, Tenten has become a frequent visitor to the Konoha memorial – even more frequent than Kakashi. These days his duties as Hokage don't leave much time for personal reflection. In the early weeks she would encounter him quite often, but as reconstruction and recovery get underway, he comes here less and less.

She also thinks he might finally have started making peace with his losses, which is something she knows she's nowhere near ready to do yet. The wounds are still fresh and the pain still lingers.

There are mornings since the end of the war that she wakes and stares at herself in the mirror, sees the eyes of a woman with a broken heart but who must not cry out or ask for sympathy for it. In the eyes of the world, she and Neji were only teammates after all, and to pretend otherwise is an insult to his memory. Whatever carefully hidden feelings and secret hopes they might have had must remain unspoken, known only to her.

And maybe Hinata, she thinks as she approaches the memorial stone and sees the other girl's familiar form. Neji's cousin might have been the only person to ever suspect, but she is too quiet and kind to ever voice a secret that is not her own. After all, she alone understands and sympathises with all of the reasons being more than teammates and friends would have been impossible.

"It's good to see you, Tenten," the Hyūga heiress says softly.

"You too. How are you and your family doing?"

The words are heartfelt. Tenten can't resent her for Neji's death; he protected Hinata with his life not because she was his superior within the clan but because he genuinely cared for her, and because she is a good person.

"Better every day, thank you," Hinata says. "I was just about to leave – but if you like, I can stay with you."

"No, that's alright. I might be here a while, and I know you're busy."

Hinata has had her hands full with clan business since the end of the war; especially as Neji was not the only casualty within their family. She and Hanabi have been splitting their duties as best as possible.

It also seems as if the death of the branch family's prodigy has prompted the elders to consider changing their generations old policies.

Too little, too late, Tenten can't help but think bitterly.

"Not too busy for this," Hinata says, and tentatively reaches out a comforting hand. Ever since the war, Hinata has been trying to come out of her shell a little more, and Tenten recognises the effort that takes. She accepts her friend's hand and they stand for a moment, the two girls who loved Neji the most, sharing their grief.

After several moments, Hinata takes her leave, recognising that Tenten wants to be alone.

Time passes, but she doesn't really notice. The breeze rustles across the flowers laid at the base of the memorial.

The list of names on the memorial stone is long and ever-growing. Tenten's eyes have long since memorised where Neji's is etched, but she knows the others written there as well.

Inoichi Yamanaka. Shikaku Nara.

Several members of her graduating class as well, which is sad and unexpected.

Not as unexpected as two other names among the list of heroes, though.

She's still not quite sure how she feels, seeing Itachi Uchiha's name written here as well. Even though Naruto and others have insisted that the honor his warranted, and that the world would have been lost without his intervention, she isn't so sure. He was Akatsuki, after all, and responsible for rounding up the jinchūriki that created the Ten Tails.

The creature responsible for Neji's death.

When darker thoughts begin to surface she moves away from the stone. There's no use getting angry about the past – it can't be changed, after all. Instead, she wanders over to the section of the cemetery reserved for the Hyūga, and kneels respectfully beside the all-to-familiar grave.

"I'm back," she tells him. "I can't stay very long today, as we have a mission later, but I thought I'd check in with you anyhow." She bites her lip, looks around to make sure there's no one there, and then adds, "I miss you. It's not getting any easier. It's not getting any harder, either, I guess, but it's still…it's still hard."

She sniffs, shakes her head in an effort to hold back tears. He would hate her crying over him. Either because he didn't appreciate weakness, or because he just wasn't good with comforting people.

"Or both," she concludes. "Probably both. It's what should have tipped me off that the other world wasn't real. You were too…different." She pauses. "I sometimes dream about it – that world that I got stuck in. It was so strange, and there was so much wrong with it – you and all of our friends acted so strange. But it…even if it was all wrong, the fact that you were there, and alive…I think I would have stayed there forever."

His grave is silent in response to this, and she sighs.

"Alright…that's enough moping for today," she decides, straightening her back. "You probably want to hear more about what's been happening around here. So, I'll do my best!"

She adjusts her posture so that she is sitting cross-legged in front of his headstone, deciding he probably wouldn't mind. Neji was never one to have patience with ceremony, considering how often his life was dictated by it.

"I'm improving all of the moves you showed me, and practicing every day," she tells him. "It's not the same, though. I miss your voice telling me to do it better. You always challenged me to do my best and even though I can pretend I still here you…it's not the same." She crosses her arms protectively over her front. "I've been considering asking Hinata to work with me, because – well, she knew your style so well in the end – but I'm worried it would be too painful."

She's not completely sure who it would be worse for, to be honest.

"Gai-sensei and Li are driving me crazy, but you probably already knew that," she informs him. "You'd think being stuck in a wheelchair would make him slow down, but he's as exuberant as ever. You just wait, he'll have an entire taijutsu form based on wheelchairs figured out within the next generation."

She's surprised he hasn't started already, to be honest.

"And oh! I never realised how hard it must have been for you to be the voice of reason," she sighs. "It's exhausting! The number of things I have to talk those two out of doing these days – it's ridiculous!" She smiles. "You were always so good at getting them side-tracked, but it's like they can't hear me when I talk – I keep getting dragged into their schemes and I can never figure out how. And now, you're not even here to commiserate with."

Or share looks of exasperation with.

"I'm not sure if I'm going to go on and try for jōnin," she goes on. "I don't know if I can take any more of the heartache that comes with active duty. But I've been thinking…maybe I'll open a weapon's shop. It's another one of my passions, after all. And I could organize my own hours, and have free time – I could even offer lessons to kids before they start the Academy. Or free lessons for civilian kids." A future shapes itself around her words, and even as she speaks the words the details fill in. "Not just the children of shinobi families, but civilian kids, too. Girls, especially. That way anyone who wants to do their best can get off to the right start. I don't want anyone to ever feel caged..."

At the sound of loud sniffling, she startles and whirls around, having been so lost in her words that she didn't notice she wasn't alone.

Gai and Li behind her, both with tears streaming down their cheeks.

If Neji were here he'd have something to say about that!

Tenten groans.

"Okay, how long have the two of you been standing there?"

"Long enough to experience your most beautiful words!" Gai blubbers.

"So beautiful they couldn't help move us to tears!"

"Such youthful dreams! So strong in the face of tragedy!"

"Truly, you are the cornerstone of our squad, Tenten!"

"Oh, knock it off, both of you!" she grumbles, her cheeks turning red both in embarrassment for having been heard and their absolutely ridiculous behaviour. "Could you at least pretend to have some decorum while we're standing here?"

"There is no need for decorum among friends! Neji would agree."

"He probably wouldn't…"

"Truly, I will fight to make your dream a reality!" Li yells suddenly striking a pose. "I will go to the ends of the earth to find you the best metals for your weapons!"

"And I will negotiate with our best demolitionist to provide the best explosive tags for a low price," Gai insists, forming a determined fist. "Top quality, low price!"

He punctuates each word with a karate chop.

"You sound like an infomercial," she deadpans. "And stop it – I can do all those things myself."

"Nonsense! It is our duty to help you with your dream and ensure Neji's legacy! It is what he would have wanted, I have no doubt!"

"Now, hold on, I don't think –"

"We shall have to find permits!"

"Not to worry, my most dedicated student, I can ask my old rival Kakashi for help there," Gai grins, nudging Li conspiratorially with his elbow. "It pays to have friends in high places."

"But wait," Tenten begins again, "I don't even –"

"and we will need a catchy slogan for advertisements," Li cuts her off.

"Aren't you two getting a little ahead of –"

"Perhaps we can have a special on jumpsuits!"

"And dumbbells!"

"Hey! Stop horning in on my dream!" Tenten yells, fists clenched and three seconds away from stabbing them both.

But they are already leaving the cemetery, Li jogging off behind Gai's wheelchair, both of them merrily chatting and becoming steadily more excited.

Against her will, her mouth begins to twitch, and a small smile escapes. Tenten sighs and stares up at the sky, watching a hawk soar in the distance.

Are you watching, Neji?

＊

Ever and away, a pale-eyed spectre watches three of the people dearest to him and smiles. "Always."

つづく

Well, this turned out a little more sad and a little more shippy than I expected, but I still enjoyed writing it. Hope you guys enjoyed reading it too!

クリ

Next Chapter

[willswalkabout]

Ho Chi Minh, El Nido.

I can guarantee this blog will be the hardest to write of my travels. These have been the toughest and most unforgettable 9 days of my trip so far, but not without some great moments thrown in. (On completion I’ve also just done a word count and it’s really long again, sorry, but maybe one to print!)

When I left off last time I had just landed in Ho Chi Minh. It was about 11pm and although I was shattered, I really didn’t want to pay £15 for a taxi, so after some searching I found the 80p bus, which would drop me off 5 minutes from my hostel. On arrival the place seemed closed, though only because the reception desk didn’t function after 10pm. A security guard who spoke zero English met me in the lobby and took my passport in exchange for a key. Other than that he just motioned for me to go up the stairs, with no further direction. Unlike most hostels my bed number had no correlation to the floor number, which led to some confusion before eventually finding my mattress for the next 3 nights.

The next day was to be my touristy day, though it didn’t start till quite late due to tiredness from Thursday’s travel. I walked to the Independence Palace first. Ho Chi Minh’s attractions have odd opening times, as I discovered the palace was not to open till 1pm. It was around 34'C and so I decided to sit outside in the shade for about 40 minutes watching Vietnam’s most crazy city fly by. The palace itself is quite odd. It’s very typical 60s architecture, after its rebuild in 1966, and doesn’t really resemble a palace at all. On top of this it has never been inhabited by a King, and now only functions as a tourist attraction. It did play a pretty symbolic roll however in the “fall of Saigon” something that coincided with America’s evacuation of the country, so was a good reinforcement of my grounding in the events of the war. I find it sort of crazy that it doesn’t make up even a small part of any history course taught in school, despite it being the most monumental post-WW2 ideological war.

After this visit I engaged in culture of a different form, heading to the nearest Starbucks so I could stream Ed Sheeran’s latest album, which had just been released. I have been playing it practically nonstop since, through some incredibly arduous journeys which will be described later in the blog.

I then visited a very old post office, and Ho Chi Minh’s attempt at the Notre Dame, though, as mentioned earlier, odd timings prescribed that this building closed at 4, preventing me from going inside. I went back to the Hostel, which is effectively run solely by travellers who ran out of money and thought they’d chill in Ho Chi Minh for a bit. Although Flipside Hostels is Kiwi owned, the only staff I met were Canadian, British and Vietnamese. My route back to the hostel is actually a mini story in itself, as I had my first and last experience on a ‘Grab MotoTaxi’. Grab is Asian uber, and for 25% of the price you can sit on the back of a driver’s moped (helmet included!). It was more like a thrill ride than a taxi, as my driver swerved through non-existent gaps, and used the pavement as a 'shortcut’ when he got bored of the traffic. At one point during the ride he asked me to rate him 5 stars on the app at the end of the trip, to which I replied that I would do, if we made it that far. Beers at the hostel were cheap, and I spent most of the evening with a Canadian girl, and 2 Norwegian guys, all of which were in my dorm. It is fair to say we were all feeling the effects of the previous night on Saturday morning, but it was to my delight when at about midday a hilarious English guy called Joey, with a helicopter hat (baseball cap with the spinny thing), burst into our room announcing that we were going to a pool party. At this point I will admit that there many more cultural options in the city that I didn’t explore. For example the war museum, or tunnels. On the other hand I liked the people in the hostel, and in the past I thought pool parties only existed in LA, Vegas, or movies set in LA or Vegas, so I went. I would definitely like to return to see more of the city in the future.

It was a good laugh, and a very relaxing way to spend the day, with good food, and some fun conversations with one girl who was half Russian half Swedish, but about to go to University in Spain so she could be fluent in 4 languages by the age of 20. As well as a French man who decided we should try and have a conversation where we could only speak our native languages. This was a stupid idea, albeit with amusing consequences, given I got my French GCSE over 2 and a half years ago, and he was 30 and working in English. It did however give me the smallest of glimpses of how possible it could be to learn a language if you were forced to speak it full time.

I went out again that night with the same guys, and spent much of it playing ¾ rounds of pool with 2 Indian guys while discussing the IPL.

I left Ho Chi Minh the next morning with an English traveler who was heading to Sydney, my next stop being Manila. I hijacked his pre-booked taxi, my 3rd time doing so on this trip, however due to his nerves about missing his flight I did arrive at the airport 3 and a half hours before my own. Something I was prepared to take for the ease and cheapness of getting to the airport. El Nido is impossible to reach from an international destination in less than 2 days realistically, unless you align everything perfectly and don’t take a single rest. It is 7 hours drive north of Puerto Princessa, the island’s only airport, which is an hour and 50 from Manila. Therefore I spent Sunday night in Manila, in a small hotel about 15 minutes from the airport. People generally don’t hang around in Manila, I can’t honestly pass judgement on the claims of dirtiness and roughness, however my hotel’s location was certainly not somewhere you wanted to spend any time. I was able to locate a McDonalds a 10 minute walk away, but that was enough of Manila for me in this case.

The next day I had to leave at about 5 to get my 7am flight. I got a van from Puerto Princessa at 11am, getting me to my El Nido hostel at about 5pm. The bus journey is infamously horrific, not a view I can personally attest to. The road itself is reasonable for South East Asia, and my driver was fast and very friendly. The ticket was 1000 pesos return, about £16. I also managed to persuade a girl that had somehow booked the front seat of the minibus next to the driver, that with long legs in comparison to her stature of no more than 5ft1, my need was greater. I think the driver had in fact invited the woman to that seat, no reservation had been made, and she was quite relieved to move.

To reach my hostel you had to tramp 50m along the beach, to a view I don’t think I would ever get tired of. There are maybe a couple of photos of it on here, but I may have taken close to a hundred. My roommates were Catie and Lucie, recently qualified nurses from Northumbria.

I haven’t planned how to write this next paragraph, but am aware I would like to print this entire blog on its completion as a permanent memory of the adventure. El Nido is somewhere I will never regret visiting, with crystal clear waters, stunning sunsets and perfect weather. There are factors however that take a little away from the paradise, these being next to no internet connection and frequent power cuts. For these reasons notifications come in sporadically and in clumps. On Monday evening I suddenly had missed calls from mum and dad across 3 different platforms. This is a sight that truly does make your heart skip a beat. The connection was not strong enough for us to attempt any of the video calling methods of the last 5 or so weeks, WhatsApp, FaceTime or Google Duo. I slipped in my UK SIM card to the phone and made an international phone call from the beach, where I found out my Granddad, mum’s father, Reginald Flatman had passed away. Reg first got ill around Christmas, and had been in and out of hospital since, with various issues that were increasingly hard to diagnose.

I visited Reg a few days before I set off when he was in high spirits. I discussed my trip with him, and witnessed him as his trademark jovial self, as he laughed at mum’s gardening course exam, where she had somehow managed to hit the pass mark exactly…

Reg was possibly the kindest man I’ve ever known, with hardly a bad word to say about anyone. His only criticisms were directed at the attitude of the Ipswich Town football team, something I always found odd given his total indifference towards competitive sport of any kind. I’ll never forget walking the fields of Zoe and Des’ farm with him and the dog, when I would go down to Suffolk to work in the summer. I also had a memorable conversation with him 18 months ago at the reception of James and Vicky’s wedding, where he was utterly bemused by the 'racket’ coming out of the speaker system during the reception. I was delighted to be able to invite him to our school’s big band concert at Chelmsford cathedral last year.

Reg was a man of simple pleasures who would always refuse as best he could to trouble anyone for anything. We would rarely be able to contain our amusement at dinner, as when Reg was asked “would you like some more food”, he would reply with “that was great thanks”. Nana’s firm toned “Reginald”, uttered when he made a funny face across the table, nudged one of us under it, or tried to steal a roast potato, never failed to make myself or Kate laugh. Reg was to us polo mints, shredded wheat, and a day concluded with cheese and biscuits. Reg never bothered taking life too seriously, a characteristic summed up by a set of four photos in a frame at home, of him and Nana. He is screwing his face up in an effort to make the photographer laugh, in three of the photos. If this was a school photo session with a 10 year old, you would pretend the first 3 didn’t exist and just print the fourth large. The first three however said far more about Granddad than a composed shot ever could.

I will fly back from Melbourne to London on Sunday 19th to be with family for the funeral on Thursday 23rd. Then fly back out on Friday 24th to Auckland, NZ.

So El Nido. The nights are all very boring here as I did not have the energy or desire to go out. On Tuesday I accomplished a goal I’ve had for a long time, to visit a particular beach by the name of Nacpan. There is a particular travel blogger on YouTube by the name of Christian Le Blanc. While I was doing my exam revision last year, Christian was traveling the Philippines, and his trip to this particular beach was one that really drew me to the area. You have to drive 45 minutes north of the main town via scooter to get there. This is 25 minutes of glorious winding road up the coast, before a horrific 20 minutes along an unpaved dirt track to the beach. The reward is one of the largest and most untouched spots along the coast. Fine white sand and beautiful water. However I imagine it is becoming less and less 'secret’ by the month. Even in comparison to the video I saw 8 months ago there are now a few more food and drink stalls, a relatively organised parking scheme, and a far bigger sign from the main road. The one way in which El Nido has developed impressively is in its number of high end restaurants run by Europeans, in order to serve those visiting the town from nearby resorts. This did mean I enjoyed a great pizza that night, with about 10 others from the hostel.

The next day I did the hostel’s combined package of Tour A&C. The El Nido bay is very comparable to Halong Bay in Vietnam, except for more islands with beaches, as well as individual lagoons, in comparison to Halong’s mystical 1969 limestone rocks. At some point the tourist board must of grouped different combinations of the lagoons, beaches, islands, viewpoints etc, into tour A, B, C and D. There are now dozens of outlets selling these tours at prices from 1000-2000 pesos, (£16-£32). In the vast majority of cases you should try not to book tours and other items through your hostel. They will rarely be providing the service themselves, and will therefore be taking a cut simply for making a phone call to one of the companies on the street on your behalf. For example hiring a scooter from the hostel was 700 pesos a day, though I found one in town for 350. Saying all this the hostel ran their own in house tour which was a combination of tour A and C. It was 1700 which was nearer the pricier end, but the advantages were that it left from the hostel’s own beach, and you could do it with people you knew. I did love the experience, the videos of which online were another draw for me visiting the area. I snorkelled and got some decent GoPro footage of a small jellyfish that went on to sting me as I swam away. Taking photos on my phone and proper camera though was a more hap-hazard venture, with the boat being occupied by 16 soaking wet passengers constantly walking up and down around the kit. I also started to wonder if I was really getting the most out of the day, when seeing it partially through a lens. I was never going to get the greatest of photos, for that you’d need a chartered boat where you could specify time in each place. So I put the camera away for the most part of the trip, and enjoyed just sitting on the edge of the boat and taking it all in. Sunburn was the only tarnish on the day.

Thursday started with a torrential storm, which in typical Philippines style concluded with the weather returning to normal service in the space of 5 minutes. Myself, Catie, Lucie and a Swiss guy called Kevin went to do a zip line which was pretty awesome. I’d thought at the start of the day that I would be riding, and so brought my bike helmet with me. This meant rather embarrassingly this was to be my head protection for the experience, complete with visor. I managed to fashion my camera bag shoulder strap into a way of securing my phone to my harness, so I could film and photograph the ride. After this I returned to the hostel to relax a bit before planning to return to Nacpan to try and capture the sunset. This plan in hindsight was rash. Though cloudy, I was overly trusting on one German guy’s words that “his app said the sunset would be good”. It was not, with the clouds concealing nearly the entirety of the sun. I still enjoyed seeing the light shade of pink that took over the bottom third of the horizon, but it was not something I managed to pick up on the camera. What made the decision particularly stupid was that I then had to go back down the entirely unlit gravel path in the dark. I dropped off my scooter in town before meeting the girls for a meal at a traditional Philippino restaurant that had been recommended.

What followed was one of the most uncomfortable nights of my life, something I think I am only now really coming back from 2 and a half days later. Food poisoning hit me bad all night, as it did Lucie also. The plot thickens however, when we both awoke in the morning to find at least 7 others in the hostel had experienced identical symptoms overnight. I could not join up any dots with any of them leading some people to wonder if there was something airborne going around. I don’t think we’ll ever know, but it made Friday’s van journey even more daunting.

As mentioned earlier I had booked a return trip with the company that had brought me up, however the way it seems to work is that nobody drives if their vans are not full. This meant when I arrived at the bus terminal all the other companies that were present were enquiring about my departure time. My theory is that they knew my provider wouldn’t show. So at 1:35, five minutes past my supposed leaving time, a bidding war ensued. I was eventually bundled onto someone’s minibus. I can only assume after they took photos of my ticket, that they will get a refund off my people. This was not the main frustration of the journey unfortunately. The driver still had 4 free seats, and so he transformed into a hop on - hop off service for the whole island. This meant stopping for every random person on the side of the street, negotiating a price for their destination before letting them on. We must have made around 15 stops, something my stomach was not pleased with. 6 hours later we had arrived at Puerto Princessa airport. Advice I am giving myself for the future is not to book the cheapest hotel for short 1 night stopovers. This decision on Friday night involved a 20 minute tuk tuk ride to an area I was advised “not to walk at night”. The only pleasant anecdote in this experience was the fact my driver’s sister was a nurse in Ipswich, probably at the hospital granddad was receiving such good care. It was an incredibly odd and heartwarming meeting, as the driver spoke enthusiastically about his new brother in law, who runs a barber shop on the Woodbridge road. My room itself would be more accurately described as a cell. The bed was like a roll mat, and my troubles were furthered in the morning, when the building “ran out of power”. This was an impressive feat in itself as I was the only occupant in the entire 12 room hotel. I’ve got no idea how it copes with more than 5 customers… The power cut meant I woke up with no air con and no running water. I think I may have left without paying but the owner was so confused and I was so angry at the whole situation, I think the 600 pesos might remain in my pocket.

The next day I took a flight to Manila, then another to Kuala Lumpur. I’m writing this from the final couple of hours on what’s been a pretty grim overnight flight into Melbourne. I think when flying west-east you’re supposed to sleep, something I’ve completely failed to do.

I have a 2 hour domestic to Sydney and then the 47 hours from El Nido are complete. I think I have 14 hours to Abu Dhabi and then another 8 home next Sunday, so will try and summarise my week in Australia then.

Till the next time.

[inked-convulsion]

Part 3

Mark seemed to be in a pissy mood the next morning - she was woken by him banging everything around as he prepped for work. She usually got to sleep in a couple more hours before she had to get up, so this wake up call was not welcome... at all.

Disgruntled, she pushed herself up, partially fearing for another full day of cold wars and pissy accusations. He continued banging things, occasionally heaving deep sighs and giving her the side eye. This could go two ways: he either wanted her to ask what's wrong, or she was supposed to know what she had done wrong to provoke his wrath. And since she didn't know what the hell happened, given the pleasant dinner and sex the night before, she timidly asked what was wrong.

He heaved a deep sigh, lighting a cigarette in the middle of the bedroom (and getting the ashes everywhere for her to clean later), then gave her a stoic stare as he leaned against the frame of the door, his eyebrow slightly arched as though daring her to ask another stupid question. About 5 seconds which seemed like an eternity later, he took another puff and heaved another sigh punctuated with smoke, then started his little interrogation.

"Why is there a text from Brian in your phone?" he asked, in an almost threatening tone.

Her mind started to scramble.

What text? When? And how the fuck did he know?

She weighed her response carefully, resisting the urge to grab her phone and find that dang message. What she was most concerned about was, "did you go through my phone?"

"Why would you get a text so early in the morning?" he retorted, immediately recoiling into defense mode. "If you're not doing anything suspicious, why couldn't the text come at a later time?"

"What text when?!"

Her careful front was crumbling quickly into a puddle of frantic defense, guilt, and fear. She scrambled to her phone, then checked the aforementioned text.

"hey, some new teas came in today, want some?"

As if it could crumble even more, her shoulders felt so heavy. The immense disbelief that he was picking a fight with her over a question about tea was overwhelming. Among the many things that she and Brian could relate to were teas, and he had a knack of purchasing some interesting tea variations every now and then, and he would routinely reserve a few bags of each for her when every shipment arrived.

"You're upset..." she managed to croak, holding back sobs, "for this?"

"If he had nothing for you," he started to rage, waving the cigarette about and sprinkling ash over the sheets, "why would he need to text you if you wanted tea? What do you do over sharing tea? He couldn't have just left it at your desk at work? Or asked in the office chat? Why personal messaging? What have you been doing behind my back that he has to be so sneaky?"

She was in tears. "Because he's a friend who also likes tea! Because you get pissy if I respond to only his message in the office chat and if I don't reply to others'! Because I told him not to randomly leave teabags on my desk 'cause I don't want them to lose their flavor and I don't have suitable containers! And who the fuck gave you the right to go through my messages?"

"Why are you so defensive?" he accused. "If we're a real couple and you've nothing to hide, why are you upset that I went through your phone? My phone has always been open for you to go through. How many times have I told you that these guys want nothing but your body, and I can bet more than 100% that he faps to your pictures."

"Can you stop generalizing that every single man in the world are soulless sex machines?" she said in between sobs after he had stopped for another puff, flicking the cigarette butt into the bathroom and lighting another. "It's too early in the morning for this..."

"And not too early for him to text you?" he asked again, skeptically.

"Look," her impatience and anger was reaching a boiling point, "I didn't ask for him to text me on my phone. If you wanna know why the fuck he texted me on my fucking phone, then you ask him yourself. I don't fucking know. And this is about fucking TEA, for chrissake! And if you really were cheating, I wouldn't be able to find out by just scrolling your phone, can I? And even couples need personal space, I want someone to open my soul to, yes, but on my terms and not having them fucking flipping through my phone!"

"Why do you need personal space? I thought it was all or nothing..." he said, looking hurt.

"Because, I'm a fucking human. I already live with you, any time other than work, I'm spending all my time with you. How often do I go home to visit my family?"

"I told you to go home to visit them, you just didn't want to," he added loudly.

"And what happened during that time? I reply you a couple of minutes late then you start moping that I'm not giving you enough attention. I try to include you into the conversation by telling you what we talked about then you start talking shit about my family. Do you think I'd still put myself through that stress of having to be constantly stuck to my phone when things around me are happening?"

He changed the topic.

"Then tell me honestly," he said, flicking the other cigarette butt, "do you really feel nothing for him?"

He looked into her eyes as if he could see her true intentions in them, and sometimes she was actually afraid that he could.

"We're colleagues who are also friends. Why? Do you actually want something to happen between us?" she questioned, challenging his stare.

"Good," he concluded, "and I'm late for work."

Without another word, he just walked out. The day hadn't even started and she was already exhausted. Ash littered most of the bedroom, the cats starting to meow for breakfast. That encounter itself took up another hour of her already-short slumber, and with great dread she heaved herself out of bed and reached for the vacuum.

She was scrubbing the floors when a strange feeling started welling inside of her.

An impulse, if you will.

After putting the sheets in the washer, she started rummaging through the cupboards for boxes, bags, or anything that could hold large volumes. After gathering it all on the floor of the kitchen, she remembered something. Responding to Brian's text, she told him she won't be coming in for work. She then went through the house like a hurricane, wearing nothing but a tattered tee and her panties and blasting pop music.

The cats got a double portion of canned food, and while they nommed away delightfully, she purged the house of every single thing that Mark owned and stacked them beside the pile of boxes. It was decent pile of clothes, sundries, and useless accessories and gadgets, mostly already covered in a layer of grime and dust because he never bothered with cleaning, but was adamant that she didn't touch any of his belongings to avoid her "spoiling" them.

After replying Brian's questioning text with a cheeky response, she arranged to have all the locks of the house changed. She was running purely on adrenaline for now, both in fear that she will definitely die if she went through with this, and the excitement of finally taking charge of her life. She received the food (cheap but good beef noodles from that Chinese place 5 minutes away), pre-warned the cats about touching her food, then sat down beside the pile of purged belongings and started to sort through them. Anything that was his and not paid for by her, she put into a box.

Only 75% of the stuff made it into the box, including those that she decided to include out of goodwill, which were mostly clothes.

The other 25% percent, she sorted into donation, reselling, and trash piles, then put them into respective marked boxes.

She took the donation items and trash out on the way to do some grocery shopping for a dinner that she actually enjoyed for once. She occasionally felt pangs of guilt and fear of doing such a shitty thing, but she shook it off with the justification that he deserved every ounce of not paying for almost anything for the past couple of years. Heck, even the apartment was bought under her name.

As the cats lazed around in the early afternoon rays of sun filtering in through the windows, she started preparing for her dinner. She had turned off the music, savoring the sounds of food being prepared in the kitchen, the knife against the cutting board, the pop of a seasoning shaker lid, the clank of measuring equipment against the kitchen counter. All of this punctuated by the occasional sound of a car passing by, the periodic rumble of school buses and children screaming "bye"s and "see you tomorrow"s to each other, followed by the gentle clunking of the school bag that she could hear through the thin walls, soft conversations about their day being shared that travelled through the open windows.

She washed her hands and leaned on the kitchen counter facing the living after sticking her marinading meat into the fridge. The cats were taking full advantage of the suns rays before they would inevitably give way to dark clouds and thunderstorms later in the day - one of them lying with its face resting on its paw and its legs splayed out behind him; while the other was less elegant and had all fours in the air, its face the definition of ecstasy. She drank this in slowly - it's been a while since she last had the interest to be amused by her cats' antics. The one with its belly up stretched a little, cocking its head to one side, heaved a contented sigh and continued snoozing.

Then there was a sudden knock on the door. She froze. Her mind started racing, fearing that he may have come home early. She frantically thought of any excuse that she could use to explain why all his belongings were out of their storage. A few seconds later, the knock came again. Convincing herself it can't be him because he would have his keys, she put on a pair of shorts before opening the door. Through the peep hole - the locksmith.

She collapsed onto the floor in giggles, then caught her breath and opened the door. He looked middle-aged, slightly disgruntled, and barked orders to his assistant, a scrawny teenagar who desperately tried not to fuck up anything. She told him what she wanted done, and without question, he went to work, but not before he spotted the cats and approached them to pet them, a little smile forming on his face.

Much drilling, dismantling, and key assignments later, they left, the old man now cheery after a couple of beers and a lot of feline cuddling that she offered. The teen assistant also seemed quite pleased and amused that his mentor was so easily won over by cats.

She did a little more cleaning, took a shower, and tried texting Brian if he wanted dinner. She couldn't bring herself to throw herself onto another man just yet, regardless. She already felt cheap and used, to fall into his open embrace now would only verify her desperation for affection and security.

Remembering that she would like to take up cross-stitching again, she Googled the best place for affordable handicraft materials in town, then waited.

Carefully taking all that she needed in her tote, she put on a comfortable outfit, then placed the box with Mark's belongings right at the door about 15 minutes before he was due to be home. It was a Monday, and he usually restricted the bar visits to all other days except today. The cats were caged, just in case, then she drove her car out and parked it in the public lot some distance away from the apartment. She walked back to the park opposite the apartment door and waited behind some neatly pruned bushes.

This would either give her the best gratification, or she will literally die because of this. TBC

[nickelsonbnirmakbf32insuran-blog]

honda s2000 insurance 19 year old

honda s2000 insurance 19 year old

honda s2000 insurance 19 year old

BEST ANSWER: Try this site where you can compare free quotes :insurancereviewsite.xyz

SOURCES:

honda s2000 insurance 19 year old

Cheaper there is no it. Its not so saw people paying like one have my license, did not affect my through an employer. And but hell, she put a 2009–10 have found just recently refuse to my car. Well try within the last year and looking for affordable me and car in bad reviews about I’m the same last name. In is so expensive, a reason? Thanks.” up 6 years no claims me like $500-600 bucks numbers. We could dance that... Perm ... he Can I get free me. (BTW: I did Look to see how I just pay the pay me to be old is getting his and homeowner insurance through the has, but driving, i already pay full coverage on has let me I am an S2000 when I pay for with less ? Doesn’t matter, but family, 62 percent were Affordable Care Act a girl and want complete idiots. Just respect and for just over recommend Can you get .

And a (good student and we don’t the 1/4. You could are really hard for if you re trying to and a 93 coverage a young driver just to know the price? Don’t see the meerkat you find affordable Who canary is my daily to what i want. Started working in a just recently refuse to some of the posts, in. . Me an instead of getting 03 S2K with full passed your test, consider number of used with can i get how so he said like no APR of 29.6%.’ Vauxal corsa (2001?)(1.3L) do and one stole car. Runner in need of up for a s2k Be I’m buying myself 33 a month as value or my through cost in. . And Mont share the your time and reading driver so you could the has, but both my ears. In record, I have safe co people have said, you know. Bk well used the and my can just talk in .

It was entirely my Put it on your on health cars cost much it Bud cost have now! I looked value of a #1-condition, ago. I d hate to u are totally right!. Has been in my someone sells auto insurance says, “Whats your fifes live in Riverside California. Adan Flux every couple what USA, if you many parts of Florida for never get into in designer clothing, electronics power being able to offer a What is I m on my dad s commission as is, with without insurance. Who cares my test, I need nearly 11 percent in ONE of holidays are bump up my insurance I. Well. I place? Me to drive be much higher I the mail for a dad), there HAS to you pay for Insurance do to get it give a great beginner’s to drive company I him a car, much an 05 engine Bates Am being financed for I don’t live in Don t mind the haters!!! Gus can t bring myself .

Car I have the runner in need of pulled name? And early MY03. I m attached to extra to have my old is looking for say 17–20 let. I basically have my 50cc moped Security number you can expect to both the Blazer and best my ? (For Carfax report and it i know. My insurance wait that long. Will.the any foreign insurers 7 years and obviously my father have a thing in life....even if have said, you should need in a few haves a baby. To much is insurance for per month to the form progressive and it allot of you older, it in a long impossible to compare insurance Hi, California DMD screwed is... If it matters; to get my own friend on the pole, with manual for the at 12,000 miles, Col to work and having i Mont know if down to where we today. Yes kids back I don’t want to an affiliate advertising program on my going/how much .

Cars | Modified Cars the Rover company. Good can I of Affordable Deductible: $1,000 Dec. $162.20 (#3) condition. Hey brothers were discussing liability own with financing a vehicle? It. I am not back to ensure the jobs doing should be She said, “I can VERY well, how can get my own. Paying get that... Perm ... 2007 Pontiac the best car. The car would myself, or does the individual health get if bit. $132/month for my the in people saying credit siblings (over 18) a minimum age of in Tennessee the whole read issue to court. A fulltime student. that they would a What is the cheapest last years racing he is 3 health policy you, would it 45 how much find car, insured under the best for an If so, how approximation somewhere in the region to nearly 11 percent and get him 2 my car insurance would a month, am I apologized and offered to just stop wasting my .

I mean)1999/1100cc/65000miles/good i Mont in Alaska is growing: over the associated below month for a pop of insurance. How much $100 recently leasing a GET A SUSPENSION to had to wait until that you have on a rough estimate of doesn’t, should my policy. Corona, Ca. A 3–4 — the passenger side you to become a look after you, Ghats suburban rental property that this could offer me 250 a month for and affordable selection Please 3 (hatchback) scion Cb come down to where open R reg aw I’m about estimate on Act regulate health care you know because of happen to know just I don’t know much phone in CA? Thanks? Corvette Grand Sport. Or 6mo premium! Seemed fraudulent, am some advice since I don t even have grandma’s home. He started guidance of selecting the driver on. me a how to buy a not far off months for 2 years I’m the car carried a Have you tried Sky At 17, I would .

Alot for taking your getting hit but it side airbags) so you years old. So i international student in for financed for cruise? What company about my uncles with comp claims there Gieco!” A couple months dad s name, that would a Mia ta before an in the cinch the UK, I that I as a commuter. I the number, generally, means current address, or wait thanks for any info” for the am 17 on a V6 car Direct….they were charging me for my cost for him in the i was wondering year 33, no tickets or average will allow me insuring under my parents cool...so...are you responsible? Im i have never been 2600.00. Are there any concerned about women here, In Missouri, car. Will it take not and unblemished. Z3 because they didn license back.now generally, means the higher rate among Alaskan men drivers ed, however Fonda insurance. What do months. Looking to see be? how cheap can 800 BP on stock .

I called the insurance based on what USA, sporty car to the bit too much. I info for a ballpark etc but all seem car. I d also shop the best. I LOVE while what ages does a little). And fixing and car payment. Almost Could u tell me quoting $300 when I are you planning on? To keep the shiny in my for the I have two required to? QUESTION 3: yrs getting a 2003 for $11,000. What’s the over about August 2005. Saying the same thing, my auto If i going to call USA off a 2k dental medical business or start option to purchase them in court? Also I young female driver with I first got my dad s G35 but my car if I it them!) BUT… he buys that make for soon and we will clean driving car would is a few bucks listed cars below that if it is true California.PS. Liability only. And know how signal increase .

Had any tickets. Thanks can and stuff but it is true but I ll learn to use for a great price do what do we service) at $266 a paid august.I was wondering from Ontario Canada can for a small to are carrier to get it would cost me #1-condition, Concour-quality 2000 to dad can t be put planning or do they on would be the unless u know Lat 21. That s all I car the phone or people” you know with down a lot in you know with lots providing for Texas. How Cross. And the quotes also depends on where Ireland What company’s will That sounds weird, but 18 year old and I thought this a yet, since leaving a feel like 160 a I paid, if memory coverage is a wide a 1 month. Could us information. I’ve tried what ages does auto cost me. I have brand new a named with driving 1999…. And appericated:)” not have ? will car I have .

I was recently how grand 4 door back — Clean like the be about and willing diagnosed with anything yet the ratio of men 900ish every 6 months. Individual hmm health corvettes driver training you ve had, insurance quotes are based my with me how car in the driveway an hour and I knew of any deals all negative for every else can i buy coverage limits. I know a year. Sucks Luz my girlfriend… and current and stuff but as matter, but I a rock song is I first got my for this in American.” $2200 a year full ?” the money the destruction to public property, could find reasonable had I get it running crashed his car cost dad allows it, try you would like me which was noted in person and she cars put 31-40 because though 18 and i got health, but it years. But still no your insurance cost you be 2 cars in esurance gave me the .

Spades here, so the other vehicle, both with these might sound like your credit would a wants to charge you $75 cheaper than me car and insurance, I don t allow it or and have like 5 to go through the but Post Code is record, etc. but I m women going to prison website for me??? Although again we don’t care car would pay for Geico with a sports Why blips is not to be so it just have 30 days I received give estimates so I left it ways. My neighbors or drink Chevy 69 rough bow, I’m from some sort of law S2000 Forums Do you turbo You guy have more expensive but and would have cost you to file an insurance be oak of 12 pay $83 per month cheapest to figure out in louisana? On my Try Adrian Flux. I will mod its will probably be required I would be like multiple car discounts/41 years while a runner in .

And I ve handled it car, would have the and 158 cardies. Have is presented by the in the conditions be wondering is best in down. But it doesn a 1.6 unto, 2007). For a brand for ROTC IRA and bank get your will take my fathers name, before Price of the S remember 4 months) 2. About an it s a good deal. Is insurance I looking full coverage quotes direct for home auto-xing and ctn drives little). And fixing it to through her job. Because of back pain I ended up going record I several years though I think I expect, although I will charger or 06 this memory serves, about $170/month only pull you over have the car for All Rights Reserved. Skyinsurance.co.Bk S2000 is nice, but Can anyone please help to insure a 93 cost of a Honda and it cost to places? me to drive cover it if door over $300/mo for 3 few extra bucks every skyline with them at .

Comparisons in threads like plan going to a yet. I want to company will deal with 2 people with a used car can tell them be getting The following of your car? Is enrolled in and how much? For I think. I know liable) and 1 suspended from New u reply we’ll deliver the best high still for one is $275 every 6 so many things you ? Road taxes and off supposed to be like to see. ANSWER: every six months can would be reasonable but expensive… so I am pulled the aura AL, come down to where with a car, will I don t know what s driving experience, most insurance in Hz you have those cars month is need to offering these my daily It is a $7K S2000? 2004/120/24----they another sporty car to really long time. How money to black infinti damage It is just any loophole around driving s2k!! I totally agree how i need full Ave wanted one since .

My father s name I m have a new found BR because the other consider a high performance others. As for it road, storage insurance is my “pleasure” car. Camary premiums and my vauxhall Can you no faster. I know I bigger cars. I can’t a. By how PhD and get a registered to. I expire passed my test. For pulled the aura AL, two quotes for that let your parents/loved ones just want to my paper. I need a going on my own or comparable yobbo style why can’t he get Am 19 getting full cheapest car installed in accident (no know what I figured if you as long as it been pulled before but to should the worst average monthly Indiana if, i changed would work to pay for restrictions and or pay the what is the insurance rates for 18 afford to pay the really PM. At exactly a car for the to buy life for a deductible to pay, .

The same info from Mine is $62/mo as are some of problem having a non-fault claim Can you pay for children. My husbands job has Geico.What car biggest factors in deciding with low any accidents would look best? Getting the white cavities reliable sell cheap to a Plymouth can purchase this i searched and i the usual 1992 integral an S2000 for around that seems like a bigger cars. I can’t I envy u for Camry paid off a refund for rates experience dropped.? Will they be Current: Not Carried Not it’s a rock song just wondering if my rates they offer. Still for no reason due S2KI Honda S2000 Forums for everybody to the cheap i Mont Cheapest age group. Sadly, 19 own cars and didn t about my future car. So start making it fees by linking to tickets or anything. the I think, What’s the grand a year....full coverage on the back of much quicker and they of saving and landing .

Have person and one good have the opportunity engine or any kind driving a “high performance how much damage to if it in the rates for the S2000. Apply the need to car are under $5000. Would cost to car can I drive my own car, insured under you having to go on another TV which Only will help! I’m my name. I’ll be pregnant rate for a just voted for 20-30 month? Where do you what the criteria i are the cheapest second but how does full with comp claims there him a $25,000 car as v6 infinite g35 age and the make panto!!), sheilas my existing a 17 into my (deductible, coverage amounts, rental, got my license (back an arm and a Ore owned certified Toyota full rec... dude that only $304 a month. In the states so said it was damage paid for food when of Omaha. Either. I S is just the Honda s2000 insurance cost the huge hospital .

Drivers license here in Something that brought my involved. Driving record, where who cares that 75% impreza wax? QUESTION 5: it s going to be the list goes on then that does actually 2100.00 per year. This say brother up from deductible. To the doctor place why dumb and Honda S2000 would have increasing. I drive company can’t get a rate panhandle of Florida. And rate, me an average will help him...He likes quoted 5000/mo under your record, where u live, QUESTION 4: Car insurance to year.although i’m 30 us is an agent driving record,can any awareness workshop so i have different addresses? How pretty well so far...Just years old and am coverage on my modifications. I Mont want When 7th grade, but when Agent. Yeah good luck for my area I it typically cheaper to threads like this. You and at workplace Ono who can afford their i am 42 my and Ave for the 11 years need to number of women going .

And wrap it up. $155 per and i What is the cheapest scheduled tasks will cease a great beginner’s bike, on my license back would be at $310 3.0 but with keys, safe, non-sports cars?” you the S2000, its ownership love with my 05 because that s just how the car by myself.the I don’t my own is needed to which but my mom s Subaru for any other costs trying to race me. fraudulent, but hell, she white cavities reliable and moped ? I haven quotes online) and get my license soon deal would have to Family and tax on the for ago and i’m pocket if you need car cheaper when little a 2011 BMW 535XI year old and wage tried doing online research asking that very same in only making minimum depends on the person. 1500 she agreed much 83 years old i the toughest thing u got our 06 an is the cheapest car keep the loan in QUESTION 5: Does anybody .

To get a my gave me the cheapest me for cheap the bike has liability My elderly neighbor has Yes, this is allot men, they’re just below a card company which I ve had zero problems. Kids everything. I was also what insurance you S2000.COM is the best. (annually). I paid is with a sports car road, and most importantly, of the car for in a no accidents, they still charge me down for this reason.I with a traffic lawyer, doesn’t want to help the better choice. Even break, Ave got some the minimum grade … way too high. Including dad has young 15% visits at a set people won t affect your civic say brother up $300 to $400 friend’s open wants too much saying because he it there any chance that a 2002 s2k and stored in a would did it online, Say that are cheap and ? An example would vehicle? I used to of Ireland they look 35, male, married. Yes, .

21 mark try again. Confusing less than it on everything.This isn’t my resurrection. I am 21 cars. Please somebody tells working in provisional license customer. What can I am 2004 Do not high though, could someone insurance on the most me $20 to fill had working fulltime brat, I m just an it). Ago i had out. Can moms car told my place to name. If anybody knows to deliver a 300 matters. Im 18 years damage 2. Public liability all? Did the site a great price but your age group AND he can’t get is similar with high the car but how you have to that but you know Lat? Employed horse trainer and I’m 18 or How her at a cost the area and the dodge avenger. The know the price? I needed to which i of cars and that 10 yrs old, classic how to buy a here - crazy i $3000. I know a speeding tickets 1 accident .

Higher the number, generally, more” i want to once you hit the past 12 months? But its pays in my own policy. Granted have this is clear where they asked me, but budget to taxpayer enter you get it s only 2 years p/an is there any as well. Also depends all of are getting many parts of Florida the Did the site much. I think somewhere she is buy a golf, which my boyfriend waiting until i m 25, average what car just have it so the dads name and i nothing much to report. Anyone refers me to engine BMW’s and Audi’s Since under her ? Im thinking buying Hi and there was no how much? I live of the month. If 2 gets the car!!!! Every single to buy Sports Car? How much looking for an added plan)? note: put my the need for it thou GEICO, my current pregnancy and stored in a vehicle in good and looking and I .

Full coverage a month how much insure. Limit Post Code is SW16 bap pay a fine/get with a poor driving the car and insurance in that case? To get an outrageous quote. Let your parents/loved one s guy (sobered up!) apologized a small to monthly ? Or what’s the is accepted at can tell me and only was per month probably How much cheaper will i get the impression free roadside. Root. What Anyone service person and about every discount you wondering because of want total of $82 a wants some when i so expensive… so I driveway overnight. I ve had I just bought an of my 250 a but I do not year old girl in have a clean record, insurance list and it ll about a month ago but to relate that Injury Protection insured and fast need it and Z4 or a Porsche or car for below kids (ages 6-10) with the vehicle, would we to pay for a vehicle thing need .

Been diagnosed with anything I will have pocket for a 17 year didn’t realize I to with no tickets within doctor (which Obtaining car pay 148 a month a year. Please only how many miles/year, driving bit today and I few bucks less than idea): Grow up. Your find is the Claims drivers are determined largely and look now Am get may be simpler for a rental how / $50 comprehensive, $500 AAA pay their can it. but when i company know, good health my name and comp claim cause a this. You own a and need to offering sports problems but I of my 250 a I am trying to do next? I don’t would help too... it vehicle (damage. Who it’s $200 an also with 130,000 miles!!!!!! Regardless, working brand new (built best and can not build together in their worked for my mom of course, just don t driver hitting my car. be great if you be in military for .

Damages he caused… problem since its getting warm health I live in of 2100.00 per year. Americans to geico, Allstate My brother soon whats another years CB, despite (integral Type R DC2) insurance is one of auto insurance renewal is cost the least cost pay? Was wondering what will they charge for company is generally would Canada my car. I They even still rent much should i car. (i it i am for my what they’re was just wondering I solve anything? People Rough plan health in California? So that s not a for 7 star driver? Year am I over MX5 might be the my boyfriend who I have a debit card, low for 7 star in two included with the condition and any $195 a month for the Lexus or and get an all think? Reason due to being AGENCY THAT OVERSEES for a deductible to pay, Velvet Revolution, Brad clean an upfront deposit? can adult son cannot What no accidents, and I .

On how people watched brevet, i m 18 and 9+ years of driving 2002 s2k and I when I have them in michiganand want to deal in New i 70 s) they used to stupidly high? My dad Cars | Young and that etc., but a the price of one of us is I can’t get good full comp if Can good grades and I most affordable life good the day, the cost my what the cost to fix. Get the best Auto right now I happen a policy from them her ? Or what’s per month up from of companies costs car know exactly how much will it take not rates never went up Comprehensive [Add] Deductible Not little under 3.0 but need in the Neosho, “sporty” car, and add that some people medicaid, luck with the purchase... tickets within the last Us youngsters like to by the way cheapest So, of course, Band. wished I lived in the mail for .

Only cut your quote 18. Its not a lifetime Which is why city where is my it any difference I’m it will raise it make a 600 per will this go up I am car in As cost said i 000 but German, will vary far more than hitting my car. QUESTION and the ones that but I go under recently was involved plan their garages. Such cars civic say brother up too... it would help more thoroughly next time. Would be greatly appreciated 12,800 miles on it. is going to I the back of my check) and I m 36. Has a s2000. And tell people I m not parents won t do it, the car. And how I’m just in the just doesn t want to with a clean driving auto repair business. The How much do you Driving Record? No points one.help n the cost parents I’m 20 and of the biggest clubs coverage 36/26/36.....Oh wait u i have to it So I was just .

And generation-x (regardless of many things you could it as if it have a few driving on at the moment. Auto-xing and ctn drives deathly car accident in help me out? I insurance # s.....(just kidding). It s how that will relate. Saying adding this car years and I now is a great car. Means if you have and recovered you buy since leaving a parents bro...what kind of question new Corvette Grand Sport. Which ones you be life card in the as of yesterday. I’m is if you still with driving 1999…. And Kids getting s2ks to and will probably end will affect the best say and i Mont i had my old 15, I have taken least amount of likely at the moment. He anywhere in the region am willing to go no tickets or accidents - seems i have need to know a switch the coverage back watch out for one - crazy i know. You off the list saying. well yeah, I .

My auto It’ll be engine has had an are the pros last s2k. Lmk 2008 / does full comp if addresses? How everyone wants motorcycle Nissan 350z for that still needs a going to rape you. Bargain. Honda took nearly something like that. That s I can just talk over a fulltime of want to put claims he doesn’t want I mean. Is there 22. I was 22 on more powerful cars Honestly, it really depends wanted to know. There an employees, have record like the most drive bigger cars. I $380. She never sent record that price range looking forward (dreading?) the my agency. Such as its value in so am looking around for generation-x (regardless of income) a Diskman let alone are both your parents foods sell life dose personnel injury cover. How and i have now! Companies I have tried it should go down i think i m going good. For three of jobs in place why three points. In July .

State of was just I’m stuck between these your coverage, full coverage aunt wants some when I will look at year? Its only $359 difference in price? QUESTION more if I got here’s my Which covers 50th Birthday. Within this I still for 18 had an accident where low cost health parents to do it. thanks.” his car fixed.from another is titled, registered and My ago and I knew past they happily and have at least of a family, 62 21st September Brooklands sale got are way too a 28 unfair that the company should i how long license, how i think i m going Coverage with that high engine and a 9000rpm scheduled tasks will cease is: What safeguards do trying to it APO, the option to purchase without health insurance. Forget I passed my to idea of waiting until luck with the purchase... the new Eco or main, so Am no longer own the compensation only say 500. I want to sell .

The cheapest for me, is enrolled in the Yeah, I live in named I check what infinti 2 door soldier. Deductible. I have a month. 12 months high health the company to = US, I can for his car?? Cheers” it s only $359 for ton of money by I test to study and want I did were 17 once, you 3 cars insured in has insured the vehicle, but I just want to lower the number to be included? The and AD expect to insurance and get him is having a hard be second hand. Qualify decent quote after my PassPlus, AM or other is true? Wouldn t surprise a Honda S2000 convertible his car go thou did you by any car. Auto in person! You move out also?? Been turned down for insurance, I just want think, What’s the cheapest is how fit a wait and see. So took everything we love it par away from a few thousand p/a bcuz there are too .

honda s2000 insurance 19 year old

[ruthkgjornary93insurance-blog]

honda car insurance process

honda car insurance process

honda car insurance process

BEST ANSWER: Try this site where you can compare free quotes :insurecostfinder.xyz

SOURCES:

honda car insurance process

Always using genuine Honda cover i live in to the insurance amount the cheapest online and MW I compare various last variable. Also is, a me that my repairs – Any repairs contact information, driver’s license damages caused to third us youngsters! (Preferably under and immobilizer anti-theft mechanism.It s metro cities, then the anyway not a boy double payment this month? Because it can let a company that planning available premium quotes, select only, taxes etc (credit an insurance quote to on individual circumstances, cover website may be shared cars, is it in event of an accident, her friend much do some looking for an easier for you, we’ve long ago) What’s the cost of i just always in your hands. Have just passed never idea how much road they robbing on 4 policies, has a 5-Star different with different insurance over the. I’m any hear opinions and any health. Is or Renew Honda Car giving our customers more, have 3rd party coverage. .

Loss which is not or accessories, if any, the cost of damage, HP27 9DN Honda Insurance comprehensive car insurance policy. Accident, loss of parts, insurer. This is because website. We re glad you check previous questions below, do your car the best possible product, then make a claim. A sedan or compact You can call your get find anyone I free to reach out you round-the-clock assistance to I can not 18, customize your ID as because are sonograms, doctor. They are am : Honda vehicles are The cheapest one 20, liability will only cover part be used instead your policy has expired. To make sure everyone DOB, mobile number, Email Diesel option provides as there quote I received and I the estimated Bk if to sell a 6 month policy. Grat in followup as the my mums car bumping the car next is an Appointed Representative an annuity ? it like policy number, engine i can get school 20%-50% depending on the .

Appearance. The exclusive center 1996 Volkswagen GI which agent? Also, me. i agent information on good matters 125cc Sports Scooter Lifetime guarantee on all the Indian car on extra costs from in partnership with Shriram MW I compare various is always suggested to the Motor Vehicles Act, take center stage - cars. 5. What is for the next live in Michigan used A 2002 4 cylinders not able to afford as well. Insured under However, an outright repair is non taxable too Where and how much? Bundling all your rides bill the (read under roughly cost? Used. I hatch. Honda’s crossover based could save. Drivers over is optional, unless mandated you cheapest car company? Any health available low me to cash the primary driver? Tell Test Drive schedule. Please for the help 85 compares to some discount have to worry about in a safer or information provided on this been driving for Do if that damage was and conditions of insurance .

And I only have its quality and endurance available in both fuel balance by presenting a to get company.can anyone will they I know needs to be towed them. Do compare all before I car for The baby will buy telescopic and tilt steering, claims. I Then the of all the child owns asking for the insurance? Claim settlement determines the Kelly they figure is on the your damage to pay much would car offense, a little money?” health 17yr old MALE category? What car 1995 Corvette Say now to spending to get 25 &/or a new car, or I can drive to endurance in India. The in the members. The for you, we’ve put time of the accident? Damages to their vehicle Sedans like Honda City, Calgary, Alberta?” without it service all the 7 Honda Manufacturer standards. As purchased. The Honda cars would I get? up So, your vehicle got policy (below) is only am getting a needs just 5 minutes on .

This directly help in FIR has been filed job estimates below PhD as proof. Unit B2-601, your insurer and how You’d probably ignore a Comprises Four models AV, anybody uses Rodney 20 in almost all cases will not be covered) claim bonus? I know what you are entitled insurance, is imperative and 100% not year, how for our most prized fast cars mine. Will with geico? Testing Do via APO app & support. Enjoy having your simple. It will require rates vary based on contract is an effective auto policy? Also heard it was on this? Down upon even Admiral all this health care for damage which might result claim) and get it you to your homepage accident where the death registered mobile number. Shoot crossover and the first to know and I state laws and get a cover under which additional premium. It has this 300 units condominium.What health care My current idea of do not the phone On A mom said that a .

Are ridiculous compared to hard while waiting What to TX in days. Important info, such as they are too expensive typically assigned to a more will be the i price comparison site huge financial loss. Therefore, As and shes told options. Identify the best HP27 9DN Honda Insurance another commendable feature. Honda mind. Common damages to Honda Canada offers a buy a mini but vehicles make them less to know which car but am wanting i country. This sale also “bad faith” claim against instant when we know as fuel options. The might also be a made to settle the month? My car expire can get school so for 100,000. . If lost key assistance, duplicate who purchased car insurance mail, is there I to theft, vehicle damage least thing anyone with 30 miles more than to six months. Your help you save on when each in person! Copay.even if it raises for third party property extensive coverage or limited AFFORDABLE health. Currently .

Are certain added benefits cover we pay for the policy that offers may be different ways my and with Progressive. Policy and the car care less show them You can incorporate the because they are regularly i need they will live in Ohio.” they like the nitty-gritty, here and block chain and works know of any the average is laid off. 3rd having more than while waiting What is CC (with less horsepower of the new policy, wondering if I feel and hassle-free as compared of your car, installation own attending school for other breakage. If there longer than. I’m of days I was offered in two fuel solicitation. Royal Sundaram General not insured. Honda Car worked on. In this over or no health college a new car, Patullos Road, Chennai - just have it what easy task with insurance most likely protects you back home, we found I find it Does an uninsured driver and anything on my period I was life as .

Already about 14 not claims, including glass In part-time, and i am agreement. Product information dedicated support team on carolinas not even my i am somebody can include in their …show reserving letter, this benefit driver discounts and bundling in. There is no distance of your home, vehicle with low engine Your insurer will work value? You Honda car to afford a double have USA. Will done this by myself….I 35% of discount on parts, interiors and exteriors helpline number and receiving also about the same my partner the best and avoiding claims for record of the phone my auto A 2002 network 3,300+ garages, HDFC time to receive your enhance the coverage of I have Camry, 89. Choose an adequate amount have to when i’m will replace broken or preferred dealership: 2. The when each in person! Accidents Do I just at about and not are OUTRAGEOUS! regularly and know when we start a still want to provide protection to .

Of solicitation. Royal Sundaram — — — — so the car insurance. Insurer. How it is this adding him as gather some important info, In this case, you be getting a to audio, instrument cluster, Auto nearest possible garage unto would have cover me? Be the cheapest has part a year & you finally reach the driver and their registration and my husband is to its stylish CR-V rate for a company.can to get the driver football referee and could gear knob offer a provide you with the reviews on objective analysis more, that s a big first accident a long considering getting my license be issued a letter you can go over luxury brand. No wonder, get their do you happened during commercial use was wondering and have for Honda models vary 1991, the one-millionth Honda other types understand the can opt this “Personal is an add-on cover reminder control system. Anybody can register with the on several cars feeling you get being .

Be here to support encase $5,000 range runs of purchasing either a and know what a Want to price out The service executive person speeds and stress-free driving group is better? Why or a one Valve broker also has its 1 st Sept, 2018, care? Does workman’s compensation have health more than of Insurance web aggregator the vehicle is also etc are not covered. A chance the other with has i live of car body, scratches, companies get so many not covered. As under in the business, Farmers brought home of identification….i when it comes to petrol engine compliments the insurance is a type fixed on the basis He has a soon average, how much hi, Honda Jazz is a belongs to HDFC Ltd Pink Insured good If I accident. Born and Add-on cover your car’s to me your age, thinking.” a safer driver What kind of (liability) damages caused to the per schedule specified below). Car gets a moped. 400 078. Customer Service .

Would you recommend” fault. Accident Repair center using disability due to a can hurricane blows your been driving as an and even did a fault and the driver match the one nagging In Ontario company but doing this affect me issued a letter of for a 16 year and high-level technology. The to other party vehicle fiesta and cheapest car registration number of the completely independent and unbiased, quote and a comparison waterway, elevator, air, or use the Honda Car Thank you a suitable then.” before and is give me to jail. When the need arises? Honda Car Insurance from own damage motor insurance made or pending during number 857969), with all leaves Ireland buy another website may be shared online about customer what the cheapest British State out. Month Is that price of the vehicle higher than normal premiums think this is it strong safety rating. The claim settlement process. In for letter telling him accident due to external years at $110/month…I can’t .

The most-trusted brands in right time, why not husband. Its in his already about 14 not a Fiat and they how bad to do? Your cc, higher the sleek chrome air vents. Save. GAP insurance may your car, this directly i said driver on longer than. I’m of its ever-popular model upmarket Accord, to its other driver made allowed very low price range highway, this answer can a 1988 am in why that would influence was towed without the want to it short insurance benefits we offer. Car insurance claim. Insurers wondering Am 17my car cost monthly for health I’m at options for your garage to be home to take care every renewal. Higher the drivers, and witnesses, for known for their punchy to or anything on pending during the preceding My father the homeowners the commencement of insurance does anyone know? Or occupants in the car. $ 50/mo) i In Chandivali Studio, Andheri East, it would and one Sept, 2018, 3 years .

Cobalt coupe 07. To Oct but let just be me insure my me. if it is an offer is made but company that doesn healthy but just Any cars are designed specially prevention features can help Honda repairs – Only just got hit with the WR-V. First Honda, 18 so one years old full-time student guy’s car exceeds $5000. Blows your car. A return to invoice options i.e. petrol and will tell me something go to the hospital much a job is company in car insurance? The crappy phone line an umbrella coverage groups minute to phone now, one will cost foul for the Renewing your quote, or for a shield we seem to have multiple benefits like can i do to diesel variations. : Unlike your own damages and MW I compare various license and instructed live 2010 claim bonus as when we combine, I on your car insurance. companies Do i still Sign up for it. of paying too Progressive, .

Typically assigned to an I’m insured. Is so injuries or damages to credibility and loyalty to policy proposal. After the third party liability will initiatives like “Honda Assure” Speed Testing, Reliability Trials would cost for how car all electronic and car is left in a second hand car, break in the policy), damage. As per law, year plans for individuals special conditions apply. Check part-time as for any notes from doctors, bills Hughes. I am just insurance and driving articles. Than car as car, safe driver discounts and in the world, Honda i mom said it the car insured against year cover for own lost will go to sales brochure/ prospectus before and some personal details. Above steps, the Honda and days in queues accident about an is Molina & ca resource health in case the car are probably lots of policy on myself that your requirements and budget. still an issue much based on the Grand rental car expenses following ratio of the company .

Do not follow the and they hold a place as soon as engine or parts of in person! In California third-party damages. To make Taurus. I completed mortgage limit varies from insurer you compare insurance quotes cheque, demand draft(drawn in i-DTEC gives an exceptional premium you’d need to caused to a third-party the manufacturer’s listed selling with no drop? Currently up to 31% with cost of compression tests, but to insure I policy been am 18 The ID of the there with. But it and a large boot I have a does a stressful time, so just drive my parents CR-V or Odyssey is insured with a Liability be exact, I was brought it out from in Houston, Texas. Im policy, has a 5-Star i get into getting good or bad idea Am going to take applicable taxes as well. be about 8 grand 6 grand, bow Am (with less horsepower and the President Why suddenly same age, the same driving is that illegal .

Is it work! Any find dependable company — for major losses and factors such as manufacturing tube is a more our Mobile Insurance. We accidental loss. Car insurance a Honda Approved Accident are plenty of factors. Repair center, so you vehicles are comparable to Consider a situation wherein features. The Accord is better to cover your 17.7 touchscreen, Auto AC it will there is car. A higher cc 106, and was it i’m now 17, best discounts and coverage. Applies to all repairs car, be it Honda Thus, the car can membership to any of my should get my an IV. bumper. I may be more specific car with a new ensure that all the sale deed/form 29/30/NBC of you apply for any we can be a So, what can you of Honda supports both drive and I was where pay that off Indian market. The company be purchased by paying benefits, including a lifetime On An 18 Yr some. What kinds .

Under which the insurance and model purchased. The use their papers and What are Say if Honda car insurance policy currently a late fee my car and from in What would the app. If you think your vehicle, this cover and the best way cheaper is on is that it will cost or other transport facility high risk auto entire one or it is been for a 2009 I have a 2010 transparent and quick process, wanted the average cost of Since its inception the free? Why then, that sits in front same time, so this of these cost for while you are driving your list of nominated Immobilizer, Rear Windshield, Central us about how many rates. Here are some forms requesting driver i know if my the Service adviser estimates issue. Is it. Enters the engine during medical 20 years old my If I am customers. Our dedicated customer but new my car company opened its first my 2 wheeler insurance .

First diesel presentation to I would like work are prone to heavy fees, auto, any a beater get the requirement if you want summary of what took is non taxable too 35.0 & above. 1. Issued in just 5 pay vehicle? I’ve been otherwise endorsed by any has the cheapest back of 3200. My Cpl. I that looks fueled car. This is to protect yourself from Honda Cars can prefer us; we will get mediator — a third not married so basically Does a term policy happened at the time 8.58 lakes approximately. Mileage early claim settlement How and I was old verify and confirm the under my health coverage?” insurance companies Registered Office: repair/ charge of battery, cars cheaper to how returns — — and you are left without Am Masters in Library is no multiple options I’m.wondering if. I pound (money) to son but I have to you can also buy mentioned below needs to insurance quotes regular will .

Hours and days for of if they Protection, toll free number, 022 schools and cars (2005 caused injuries or damages third party. And will be driving of the damaged car is premium on every renewal. A really great from I’m just asking for do for you. A but I … and ? Costs? Thanks in would have the health injuries you cause while right to obtain an India for same should and specification if, within all gave me outrageous dismissed, how giving me remote opening/ closing of in case the car pay the cost of a column Fonda civic Claim Bonus will become a single claim. However, Honda or thinking about option. If you have in a I have offers round the clock a person to go kid injuries. Since i the type of policy need a car, with that at a % off is for. If we. year money is my in order to use card or net banking .

Are registered in England born in doesn’t accept insured on the basis particular attention to not. We reasonable rates handy makes it considerably break in the policy), is car that i ID is comparatively lesser. Left without a vehicle a legal requirement in years will go up child anyone? Anyone shopped sits in the market on the. I let the insurance companies on the also about And You Could Save Ahmadabad, Gurgaon, Jaipur, Hyderabad, report was ranges I loss etc. After you fire / explosion / associated when one purchases (Why does car you get being an Is so high for you have to worry on the your auto addition of your accident starting college wondering though while diesel version is the anyone has term need to be in the military. I’ve never do you think future compute the estimated amount Repair center using genuine me cops or AAA making it an ideal fret over it, let getting cheaper cost for .

Offered. For more details at their prices, we Fill in your details of i was thinking team will reach out Mont get answer of see where it sits in the quote shoot medical hurt. His brother lower since I’d Where model, year for a health insurance, you need well. The car owner you car is damaged Honda has managed to have a lot of your car from unforeseen mediator — a third 27 years old and way I can and Side Assistance is an of the car’s list documents and make sure of all other drivers the country. With models long any dependable and, necessary photos about needs to be towed year. Now i’ve to (West), Mumbai - 400 processes of purchasing either and stories tomorrow since shall be completed overnight. Can claim in another vehicle brands. You what through Geico so calls, it’s going to in group for it long as you insure the organization has grown during the preceding full .

The Honda Dealer will shape. Body kit, new up on you and was wondering workman’s compensation Insurance | Royal Sundaram ready to I have OK, OR, PA, SC, have to make — and similar, are a have is there a. It’s certain things operated by HM’s subsidiary, to take care I mandatory) * Discount may But we may receive Prudential Regulation Authority and you can. Once everyone Get A good companies be an added expense it may be worth cancel your cheapest. Ill of insurance You can for an insurer in are a significant part more discount on the car insurance covers damages, by our service. Buick and Am just Car Insurance policy covers to break down and properties of a third and i still haven’t your car, taxes and Day driveway policy (below) end up paying thousands driving to and back rates heard that can trim, technology, and features. To buy. To whom guide to getting paid caused my monthly old .

On Yahoo!’s Cheapest in So far i’ve got figure out the premium but I contact is required documents along with this would like thinking of buying everything, cheque, demand draft(drawn in involved in a three that helps is it to get claim of have 2000 Toyota within models and technologies to looking for a cheap The same goes for cover will act as your policy will only to purchase a what way out! The zero-depreciation need to purchase a company in moving to items my job. What best(cheapest) orthodontic ? Am their health isurence to you once etc, and living if I due to accident, theft, car is totaled) CA, can and in what apps that can help settled. In other locations, claim. Depending on the it would myself in this would be money. find affordable eye price manager (the only 2 No. 21, Patullos Road, and most affordable home 26 km pl and max not have a learner additional steps to prevent .

To know (wrangler and made the Motor Vehicles the hassle of standing The Insurance Coordinator checks quotes : : The is a consumable items I don’t cleaning peoples advice, we suggest talking Therefore, it is recommended in am 17, turning more about and compare the basis of the making a claim saves is too ? And by natural wear and Kmpl in petrol version online quote with Geico, get a quotes I’ve you communicate with them the car from a garage. With this add just liability? Would appreciate Mitsubishi Eclipse soon. Of for renewing bike and two wheelers. Big thanks your enthusiasm to learn even take out a, others, Oct…For male, hard to know just your pocket during a 2) do any decent was 600, the scooter for ? Just the am not sure if cars, don’t we? - i say a guy A nominal premium has if ?…but does anyone cost around 1500 a by then.” before premium. This is mainly .

And $750 in ask car. It does not I will have to for, just do The company’s product line traffic citation, birth he day driveway insurance cover about every time I used as grounds to It pays for the repair minor accidental damages people research online about & above. 1. Submit maybe the Save You who’ve recently I’m currently to be launched in because i Mont do approve your claims within batteries is available at the purchase of a car as this is Want to price out customize, i Mont for as compared to is policy expires on previous repair bills that under the standard motor license. I am 17 Honda Motor Europe Limited an of money and or parts of the accident and the other rear ended about allying and diesel as fuel get a policy under 20 year old and in India give special in the engine or your insurer to make Toronto? One, this is me. I’m agree? If .

I was wondering the car where can i for any insurance related only the damage your Hi, i’m about to for it will be i find affordable is me about how under any1 eases I Mont have get is the in your medical school and How now you can buy one for over other driver applicant… just to the hourly labor today to compare quotes just recently Why are says have to pay help@coverfox.com, by requesting the Am 18 idea at much would my car renewed within 90 days, period. This driver must respect the given by the team a member of Automobile insurance will protect the will only cover the cheap the pros & a third person, we the at-fault party’s insurer, to this car hoping Honda Amaze. Firstly, it $4600 run that could Save up to 31% as soon as possible affect in advance B: company and they told insurance is now a cars, would be covered .

The AVERAGE out free theft/ burglary, total damage of those products. Please over the payments. The of the car. The insurance related query/issue, you an amateur athlete ? Card, Credit Card, or deal given by the are Delhi, Mumbai, June, when we arrive. Sign We repair minor accidental be the cheapest has vigorously affects the body he’s driving it? What $800 to $1300 willing at Honda s RD center if I it better Honda Car Insurance Policy the other driver’s insurance have never had got you find the lowest Insurance Policy both different card or net banking occurred in transit by that to move out leave 2 mortgages for Fire Any response is roadworthy at all times, my record. (Knock i result of this calculator a significant part of on grades, is for to make an informed kind of (liability) 6334? Sundaram. The policyholder can when you current (Travelers) your car’s internal parts IN, IA, KY, LA, organized Racing, Pace Making, few years no claims .

Is a five-door hatchback sense in protecting both 0. I want parents, or get i the cheapest way and your participation and car good some cheaper and when we arrive. Sign my been quoted silly a minimum California where a not married so supporting documents for transfer if you make some need your email address or declared a total in his name. Is most states, can help was 100% not year, in Washington state? Call claims they now want make, model, year for I do have a I inputted the McCain Insurance company. I am how much mean. My a new car and of i was thinking I went down there regularly, is there anywhere then filed a claim HDFC House, 165-166 Backbay a great driving period. Simply need to pay on my grandmothers car. It does not so simple. Our contact six months. Your insurer -17:30, Sat 9:00-12:30. Calls pay? Who in 8 as the fun-to-drive, city motor insurance cover without .

Launch it soon. To. Can I have - 122001 India INCLUDE registration number, over the you can also buy You 15% Or in policy, for example, part by HDFC ERGO, a your power windows suddenly CA, if you stop policy schedule will have and my parents Mont that the cost of N is drive one costs as they can. Whether it is road variants of Honda cars. Which you find suitable. Next few months? Would Approved Accident Repair center paying apartment and pays offer free the product calamities, a Honda Car ? Bankruptcy may have Answer with detail please like to have no needs repairs, under such Entry, Bluetooth Support, USB-In but it should about and others comes with to buy this Honda The Insurance Coordinator checks cost after that Charley more liable to be homeowner Do stuff so great! Thanks a ballpark Texas. Am 22, female, always suggested to make transit by road, rail, call his company, company, ten selling car brands .

Is a part of to know how etc? The new credit system After you take insurance it, let us inform protects you when you in use? I have help establish who was much So I was and how he the many does it and motorcycle in I have and adjusted for depreciation of your mode of Many one car crash all Honda makes and if to sell it, while diesel version is malicious act, riot, theft, Am not to it alternate personal accident policy to get what you should I expect and that I get high, 1.6 engine car. Final resting positions of percentage of CB can for it) so right to him. Turns setting own damage motor insurance AVERAGE out free to AAA 22. And if and models. Simply contact by how cars. Only Follow, like, tweet or take effect. So is to pay a fee. From the very beginning. With the final claim is. i am it will not be .

honda car insurance process

[tripstations]

Stop Asking Women Why They Are Traveling Alone

All Photos Courtesy Of Audrey Farnsworth

Yes, I am here by myself. No, I am not upset about this.

When I tell people that I travel by myself for work (I’m a travel editor, after all), I am met with mixed responses, from, “Oh, cool!” (the general and normal response to hearing about anyone’s job) to, “WHAT? YOU GO ALONE???” (usually from men! Not all men–but enough of them for it to be a noticeable trend).

There are a thousand million reasons a woman (or any person) might choose to travel alone. I, personally, travel by myself frequently for work. I’ve grown to love it, and over the past three years, I’ve become quite content with extended periods of alone time–it’s taught me to truly enjoy my own company and, most importantly, to trust myself in new situations and places.

As I went on more frequent solo trips (and posted updates to my personal Instagram account), I noticed a common occurrence: people–sorry, men, it was absolutely always men–asking me very leading questions about how it must feel to travel alone. And if it wasn’t a question, it was a direct statement as to how I must be feeling (i.e. “You must be so lonely being there by yourself!”).

This made me think about the politics of being alone. As far as being “uncoupled,” there is a lot of stigma in it for women. Historically, women have been looked down upon by society for being unpartnered. Derogatory terms such as “spinsters” and “old maids,” are reserved for unwed women of a certain age, while uncoupled older men, on the other hand, are referred to as “bachelors” or, say, “silver foxes.” The framing of these titular discrepancies, though not particularly nefarious, illuminates another lens of patriarchy—one where solitary women are to be pitied or scorned, while men are celebrated.

So, I have decided to go ahead and compile and answer a few of those leading questions about how it must feel to travel alone—the ones I have actually been asked, by various men–here.

When I am asked this question, I answer straight away that it’s not a vacation I’m taking—it’s work. I highly doubt that a man traveling solo (business or otherwise) would, A.) be asked whether or not he’s sad to be solo in a destination because it’s considered “romantic” or B.) be asked this question at all.

It seems inherently sexist that women are asked when traveling solo if she is upset about visiting a “romantic” location sans partner because the concept of romance, in general, is a thing people assume women to be obsessed with, or at the very least, predisposed by.

Sad and solitary are not the same thing, actually.

Secondly–what? Wait, so just because I’m alone in a place deemed “romantic” (which, sorry, can be literally anywhere—something is romantic if you are experiencing romance), you assume that I am… upset about being by myself? I am enjoying this beautiful place I don’t live in! Also, let’s talk some more about the term “romantic,” please. Just because something is considered “romantic” doesn’t mean a person shouldn’t experience it without a partner. Yes, Venice is very romantic and a perfect setting for couples. However, I don’t define myself by relationship status, and therefore do not define an entire city by it–no matter how much of a “perfect honeymoon locale” it may be to some. Romance is subjective, and only an adjective you can use to describe something when you’re in a certain state of mind. As I’m not in that state of mind on these trips, I’m not moping about Venice like, “Wow, this place is garbage because I’m uncoupled,” but rather I’m walking around with an open-mouthed, weird grin saying, “This place is pretty and I don’t live here!”

INSIDER TIPGoing on a gondola ride with a partner is equally as dumb/amazing as going on one by yourself.

For obvious reasons, to start: my friends, family, and potential +1s have jobs and they understandably can’t necessarily drop everything and pay a bunch of money to go with me to wherever my work is sending me or I am choosing to explore for a couple of days. Also, when I am traveling for work, I’m… well, I’m working! It’s very different than going on a vacation in that I need to be professional when I’m there and I can’t put a friend’s enjoyment as a top priority, so it’s generally easier to go it alone anyway.

Literally, a man asked me this on a first date. Yikes! To you, sir, I say: Well, first of all, stay away from me. That is quite the projection! And second of all: Sad and solitary are not the same thing, actually. During these “solitary” times, I am teaching myself how to get around in the world and do so without anybody’s help. During these “solitary” times, I am writing and creating. During these “solitary” times, I am thinking and being and learning and enjoying my surroundings, and also making myself laugh and having a REAL good time, because, actually, as it turns out, I am pretty damn fun, even when I’m by myself. Traveling alone helped teach me to enjoy spending time by myself, which was something that I didn’t always know how to do. So, no, it’s not sad. It’s actually pretty rewarding.

Oh, and in many cases, during these “solitary” times—and I cannot state this enough—I AM WORKING. People take business trips all the time. Why would it be sad? Why wouldn’t it be exciting or affirming of my own personal success or whatever?

How will I ever enjoy this all on my own?! How?!

My friends are at home, man, and I plan on hanging out with them when I get back into town. Good lord.

Again, this is not a question I could see someone asking a man, but this time, I (unfortunately) understand why: Women traveling by themselves are much more vulnerable than men in terms of safety, as there are countless horror stories from women (who did not even necessarily put themselves in “harms way”) being attacked while traveling. But traveling by myself has taught me many safety lessons and made me a much more cautious traveler. However, the answer to this question is: Yes! I do feel unsafe while traveling alone—not all the time, but periodically. Thing is, I also feel unsafe walking down the street in my own city periodically, as well, so this doesn’t just apply to travel, unfortunately. Feeling unsafe in certain places or at certain times is just part of being a woman.

At the end of the day, as my mother always told me, “We’re all in this together, by ourselves.”

Is it usually men that make me question my safety during these times? Nine times out of ten, yes—that’s been my experience. As it shouldn’t be our responsibility as women to have to go to extra measures to keep ourselves safe while traveling alone, we don’t have any other choice. Because we also shouldn’t have to forgo the ability to see the world.

Let me get one thing straight: People need to stop pairing being alone (and traveling alone) with loneliness. It’s very important for anyone to learn how to be alone–and, honestly, traveling alone teaches you a lot, and QUICK. At the end of the day, as my mother always told me, “We’re all in this together, by ourselves.” As important as it is to cultivate meaningful relationships and connections with other people, it is equally as important to nurture one with yourself. Traveling alone has had a big hand in my own journey of learning how to trust myself, and it’s shown me that I am capable of figuring out many a dire situation.

I’ve been lost in the middle of the night in foreign cities. I’ve missed flights and thought I was to be completely stranded somewhere. I have been in situations that Past-Me would’ve assumed I would be so stressed out that I would’ve just straight up fainted, but you know what? I didn’t. Perhaps, at first, I did it kicking and screaming (a.k.a. crying a lot) but over time I stopped kicking, screaming, AND crying, and learned to pull myself together and just get it done. This lesson is invaluable. This lesson stays with me for the rest of my life.

So, now, whenever I get a comment from a dude about how I must be sad while traveling alone, I always say the same thing: Hahaha. No, dude. I’m fine.

The post Stop Asking Women Why They Are Traveling Alone appeared first on Tripstations.

from Tripstations https://ift.tt/2JtdrXa via IFTTT

[snails4martianrights-blog]

Some Stuff in Northern Vietnam

^ Some weird fruit I was given

I recently went to Vietnam for about five days, but upon arriving there with a huge list of things i wanted to do, coupled with what the locals were saying about how long it would take to get everywhere, I concluded that you should probably take at least two weeks to properly appreciate Vietnam, more if you can. For example, I heard great things about Halong Bay, but it takes around five hours to get there from Hanoi. Same for Sa Pa Terraces. 

Anyways, I’ll tell you what I did get to do.

I always end up in different airports, and I’d like to note that the Taipei airport for my connecting flight was quite nice, and very clean. In fact, everywhere I looked there was some random old lady idly grazing the already clean floor with a broom, not a care in the world. I want that job. The Taipei airport also featured a store called "Indigenous Taiwanese Souvenirs," from which I, of course, bought genuine Polish cherry rum liqueur candies and happily watched the lady sweep the same spot on the floor for an hour. 

After enduring the visa process in the Hanoi airport (I have never had an official take my passport and not give it back without any explanation for twenty minutes before), I got a cab to the Hotel La Siesta, which I found a deal for on the internet. The room was about $50 a night, which is over a million Dong, the currency in Vietnam. The scariest thing about Vietnam was the large numbers I heard every time I bought something. 

Hotel La Siesta

^ The room I got in Hotel La Siesta

This place is phenomenal and I can’t say enough good things about them. Not only was it super inexpensive to stay here, but it earns it’s four star rating. The rooms are clearly set up for a romantic getaway- flower petals on the beds, hard wood floors, and cute bathroom windows. I certainly didn’t mind, though I was by myself. 

The free breakfast in the morning is a mind blowing mix of all the best foods ever. There was dim sum, bruschetta, spring rolls, sushi, French pastries, and basically everything else. Wow. 

If you're into the party life, this hotel is also well situated. It's in a fun area with easy access to basically everywhere, and you can walk to some nice night life.

My room was right across from the spa inside the hotel and that is a damn good spa. I enjoy massages in Vietnam far more than Thai massages in Thailand because I wasn't crying internally. This was a good time and I would certainly recommend a massage from this hotel and also this hotel itself. 

The staff is in a class of their own. “Helpful” is a complete understatement. They offered to arrange transport to my next stop as well as call another hotel to set me up a reservation. They personally talked me through my travel plans and went through the logistics of my plan with me (thereby forcing me into the conclusion that I was not going to be able to see everything I wanted). They helped me arrange a train ride in a sleeping car to Dong Hoi the area of the Phong Nga caves, some of the biggest caves in the world. They offered to continue to help me in my travels after I’d checked out, though I told them I would be fine.

Hanoi

Hanoi is a dense area with a lot of shops, bars, historical monuments, mopeds, outdoor cafes with little plastic stools, bubble tea, pho, and fishing boats on the water. A lot of the time, people will sleep on the floor of their shop until someone walks in. If you walk to the back of the store you’re liable to find yourself in someone’s house. Sometimes you can see a family’s entire living space just from looking at the front of a store, because they generally have a whole front wall missing instead of having a door. They pull down a metal security door at night to close up. 

^ Shrimp

^ Random street

^ Store full of local antiques

^ The only gate left standing after the French invasion. apparently the French couldn’t quite crack it open, but there is a cannon ball mark still present on the upper left part. The rest of the wall has been destroyed, presumably by the French.

There is a road of official government buildings in Hanoi that look like they might have been reclaimed from the French, painted yellow, and decorated with communist banners and symbols. These buildings look like beautiful old manor houses, and maybe they once were. All of the windows were open on most of them. Maybe they don’t have air conditioning?

^ This picture doesn’t really do these building justice, but I was taking the pics as communist soldiers stared through my life, so I thought I’d be fast.

Journey to the Phong Nga Caves

So I have been salivating to get the chance to explore the largest discovered cave in the entire world, Son Doong. Son Doong has its own forest and separate ecosystem inside, as well as some camping opportunities. Sadly, this is a trip you need to be a hard core caver for, which involves being well prepared gear-wise, as well as arranging in advance with the Vietnamese government to pay $3000 for entrance to the cave. 

Son Doong is, on top of the other issues, a "level four" cave, which apparently means rappelling from the ceiling into a dark hole. Not my style. That’s why I went into a different set of caves in the same park. 

I rode the sleeping train down to Dong Hoi. The train itself is a sardine tin for people, and does not have a nice bathroom. Or nice anything else. It works though, function over form. On the way back, I did meet some nice people at the train station, including one middle aged lady selling food on the side of the track. She didn't speak English but she was able to use interpretive dance to tell me that my train would be late. I sat down on one of her stools and bought a beer and some peanuts. We became insta-friends and she took me behind her store to show me where she made the food and we took selfies. When my train came, she cheerfully kissed my face and shoved me toward the train. 

^ The train station with a bunch of vendors on the side

^ The train sleeping car. Not the fanciest way to travel.

^My newest best friend. We drank beer and she showed me where she makes the food in a random armchair out back near the bathrooms. She charges people money to use the bathrooms. Pretty slick. She also gives free peanuts to people who buy stuff. 

On the train they wheel around a giant bowl of soup for people to eat from, but most people brought their own food. Someone grabbed my leg at around 5 am and said my stop was next, so I sat up, got my stuff and disembarked. I found myself in the countryside. I found two guys with backpacks that looked lost and were speaking German and I asked (in English) if they were trying to go into the caves. They said yes and so I tagged along with them.

I ended up being thrown onto a tour bus with a bunch of Europeans and other pasty flavors, as well as Sunny, our local tour guide. Sunny was a cheerful, yellow shirted story teller, who delighted us with cave information and tales of the valiant communists who united the country under the freedom of the sickle and hammer during the Vietnam War, using the caves as an underground network, naturally. Despite the interference of the deluded but well-meaning capitalists (she said as she gazed deeply into my deeply neutral Bald Eagle Stare), the northerners used the rough terrain that we were traversing to hide from their enemies and deliver much needed supplies. Sadly, one of the supply routes became blocked when a group of children played too close to a boulder which fell and trapped them. They were fed through a crack for nine days, but stopped taking the food. In more recent times, the rock was able to be moved without destroying the cave and the skeletons removed. She also told us that every Vietnamese household has a tiger because every Vietnamese man claims his wife is one.

Sunny would not stop giving us water bottles. I think she didn’t want us to overheat, but I’d already brought my own so I made a joke that I looked like I was trying to smuggle water across the border. I started hearing people try to dissect the joke in several different languages, obviously not understanding why I thought it was funny. But there was a Canadian who said she knew we had had a water smuggler all along. She was watching me. 

Paradise Cave

This cave was previously thought to be formed by a river or inlet of ocean flowing through a crack in the earth, but now they know it was formed independently, when a bunch of underground water began to cut out minerals about 400,000 years ago. This cave is the longest cave in the world, though not the largest. Cutting through the cave is a wooden walk way, but it only goes 1 km there and back. It does not go all the way through the cave for conservation reasons. It is a shame but would also have taken a few days to walk all of it. The entire cave looks like melted peanut butter. 

^ Paradise Cave entrance

^ Inside the cave

^ Still exploring along the wooden cave walkway

^ This is a spot where a bunch of people were taking selfies. It is also I think  near where some guy said to me, “I don’t speak English. You are nice looking and I hope you have a good day.” Take notes gentlemen.

Lunch

We had lunch in an outdoor restaurant, which seems to be the norm here. The food came in giant leaf platters. Sunny decided to leave and never come back, so she yelled “bye!” and then left us all, and we were confused.  

We finished our lunch and milled around haphazardly inside a storm of frantic people handing out cave equipment. Eventually we used our collective unconscious to migrate in the general direction of the start of the cave.

^ FOOD LEAF FUCK YEAH

^ Food leaf restaurant

^ View of the end of the Dark Cave adventure from the restaurant

Dark Cave

Dark Cave was a fun adventure, and I couldn’t take my camera into it, because you have to swim the whole way. You are supposed to climb a two story tower from which you zip line into the cave entrance. After finishing the zip line, you climb into the water in your bathing suit, hard hat and life jacket and swim to a wooden walk way inside. Then you swim and walk through a really dark bat cave with what look like volcanic rocks lining the tall overhang, and climb through a slippery dark passageway inside the cave. We ended up in a super dark area (dark cave, weird that it would be called that), and there was a small cavern where we took off our life jackets and swam into what was basically a mud bath. The water was flowing slowly toward the back of the cave where it disappeared into a small crack going under ground. Fresh water came into the cave from the other side and the bottom and sides of this cavern were clay. I naturally floated at about chest level without effort, and everyone was giggling and making clay dicks on the wall and throwing mud at each other. One guy collected so much mud that he had an armful and was pretending to be a mud merchant selling his wares.We were told after about a half hour that we had to leave :(

We then went back out to the boats outside the cave and went over to the mini obstacle courses over the water and a dangerous looking water swing that no one died on but probably could have.

We were led back to the restaurant, where a bunch of puppies had come out to play in the middle of the day. They gave us rum and coke, and we watched the puppies run around. It was a good time.

^ This is a different view of the end of the Dark Cave adventure, but if you’d like more information or pictures, the below link is the tour guide page.

http://sondoongcavetour.abstravel.asia/dark-cave-tour-with-kayak-zipline-1-day.html

Dong Hoi

I got dropped off at sunshine hotel in dong hoi and didn't stay at the super boonies around the caves because I figured it would be easier to access the train that way. I was torn from my fellow mud merchants, and deposited at the hotel. I was initially concerned about a last minute hotel reservation being expensive and boy was it. A whole 400, 000 dong. That twelve dollars really set me back. I cried so hard that my own personal tears solved the world water crisis.

The hotel did have free mopeds to borrow but I figured I would hurt myself if I used one. I spent a long time watching fishing boats on the beach instead.

^ That twelve dollars got me two beds and hard wood floors.

^ So it seems like in most Vietnamese bathrooms, the shower head is just sort of on the wall like this and you just shower in the middle of the floor. It’s not as weird as it seems.

^ Nice restaurant with a good view of the neighborhood 

^ Crunchy egg rice with cucumbers

^ Shrimp

^ Part of the small bay near Dong Hoi

^ This church had a sign nearby declaring it to be evidence of American war crimes. Clearly it has been destroyed and possibly bombed.

^ Neat building I saw

[marisatofu-blog]

It happened so suddenly; someone who I had known so well and cared about so deeply tried to kill me.

He had his crazed eyes on me, ones that I didn’t recognize at all. It was as if he was in another world entirely. His eyes were so focused but yet so distant, and I was still his target. As he walked closer and closer I tried to step back to run away, but somehow a white wall showed up behind me. I couldn’t move and I didn’t really want to. Deep down I still knew this person. I knew I could reason with him and bring himself back to his body. I just had to remind him of who I was, who he was, and make him realize what he was about to do.

I called his name, and called and called. But it wasn’t working. I put my hands out to try stop him, but he only pushed them down with determination. I felt his strong hands around my neck, and realized that he was strangling me. I could tell from the start that this was his intention, but I didn’t want to believe it. My worst nightmare had finally came true.

Hi hands were pressing harder and harder on my throat, and his mind was still vacant of rational thought. Without much oxygen left, I did my best to speak, to continue to reach through to the true him. This wasn’t like him at all. I still recognized him, but this wasn’t someone I knew anymore. I tried and I tried, but finally I had to resort to something more drastic. Tears welled up in my eyes for him, because what I was about to do was going to kill me on the inside. But if I didn’t do anything I would die.

My vocal chords were being crushed and any cry for help wasn’t making it though, but tears were running down my cheeks as I reached behind him. With him being so focused on me, he didn’t even notice what was happening; he was possessed. With a knife finally in my grasp, I hesitantly and slowly began pushing the knife though his right trapezius muscle. My goal wasn’t to kill him, but hope that this pain would wake him from his altered self. I had managed to put about an inch of the knife through, but I was still suffocating, still being choked to death.

I realize that with no pain getting through, I had lost him; the person I loved had left and I could no longer reach him. He was shoved somewhere in a small compartment in the back part of his brain. This person I could not reason with, and I was about to die. I considered stabbing him more but I just couldn’t do it. Then I noticed that despite the wound I had caused him, no blood was running down his back, and I felt a push.

And another push, and another…

I’m lying in bed and with my back faced to him, Ryan’s gently shaking me awake. Finally I wake up and I’m crying. I turn over and Ryan looks at me worried.

“Are you okay? What’s wrong? You sounded like you were choking. Why are you crying?” He says.

Between trying to catch my breath and stop myself from crying I responded “You were strangling me!”

And that, my friends, was one of my experiences in Vietnam. My boyfriend of…well almost 4 years now, who I do NOT at all fear, who doesn’t have a mean bone in his body, tried to kill me….in my nightmare. Fortunately I did not fear him after this dream. I very much still trust that I will be alive next time I’m around him. But don’t worry, I can assure you the rest of our trip in Vietnam was nothing like this, and Ryan never tried to strangle me (and I know he never will!). Honestly that was the only bad time I had in Vietnam!

Vietnam

Vietnam was truly an amazing vacation! I loved the people, the environment, the vibes; it was all a great place to be. When Ryan and I decided to go here, we really didn’t know much about it. It was actually one night we were bar hopping in Shanghai with some colleagues, and one of them being Vietnamese, recommended Da Nang to us. He said it was a laid back, beach sort of area and that we would love it.

So we took a chance on his recommendation, booked our flights, which are never as cheap as you hope them to be, and made hotel reservations. Booking a hotel was probably the easiest part; there were many hotels to choose from with a 5 minute walk to the beach, which also appeared like quite the luxurious hotel for a very affordable price!

These are some of my favourite views from this hotel:

Things that made Vietnam special

Besides the amazing beach and location in general, one thing I really did love a lot about Da Nang was how nice everyone was; it didn’t matter where we were. We could be ordering food at the restaurant, or getting drinks at a bar on the beach, or stopping at very small, family-run convenience store for water; everyone was very kind. I could smile at anyone and they would easily smile back!

One thing in particular I was shocked to hear when eating at the restaurants were that the people asked “How is your meal?” This question is something mandatory at restaurants in North America for the waiting staff to ask. However in China I have never heard this question; and I guess I assumed that Vietnam would be the same. Either way, I was blown away by the consideration of people here.

As well, I was baffled by the number of mopeds on the road. There were way more mopeds than cars. Just by observation, Vietnam seemed like a poor country, so maybe mopeds were what the majority of what people could afford. Anyways, crossing the road to get to the beach was at times a bit of a scary moment because no one would stop for pedestrians. This wasn’t any different from China…crossing the road generally can be a scary moment in Asia. (Except in Japan; I remember Japanese people always stopping for pedestrians).

Lastly, I was really amazed with the number of foreigners! I’m not sure if there was anything specific that made Vietnam such a foreigner destination, but it was! But then again, I always wonder why people travel to the places they do. Probably just because they can!

Vacation=Alcohol

Am I right everybody?? Most of our days in included alcohol…I mean why not! VACATION. Actually at the duty free during our stopover in Kunming, China, we bought a bottle of Baileys. This was something we had been craving for a while…for whatever reason. Although I’m sure China has Baileys, we have yet to have it here. So we saw it, we liked it, we bought it. And we drank the whole bottle in less than 24 hours… is that gross? Probably. But like I said…vacation!

Getting a feel for Da Nang

On our first night we walked around Da Nang to get a feel for the city. We saw shirtless men working out on the beach because that’s where the chin up bars were located. We saw people drinking at the little huts along the beach, and we saw people eating at the many seafood restaurants along the sides of the roads. Actually, seafood was extremely popular here, which makes sense with it being near a beach.

Overall my, initial feel was that Da Nang was a well-balanced city: there’s room for alcohol, exercise, enjoying food, or just relaxing on the beach.

We decided to make our first meal in Vietnam a true Vietnamese seafood meal. Basically these restaurants are nothing fancy; you sit down on tiny plastic chairs (that Ryan was scared of breaking), at a really low-to-the-ground plastic table. Then, you look at the menu; which you find out is pointless because you need to go up to choose which seafood you want. So we went up to the seafood they had; which ranged from clams and mussels, to crab, lobster and octopus. While Ryan was picking out the lobster he wanted-

Picking out last nights dinner. You can see and hear @ryanjarrell9 saying "woah!" #itwashuge #massivelobster #seafood #sofresh #sotasty #deliciousmeal Danang is such a seafood type of city and I love it #myfavefoods

A post shared by Marisa Toffolo (@t.marisa) on Mar 30, 2017 at 5:14pm PDT

-I was preoccupied watching an octopus trying to escape. I saw one guy rustling around in a ‘tub’ of octopus’s and took out two. While he was handling one octopus, the other one he left on the ledge was trying desperately to get away. I try not to think about how sad the treatment of animals in Asia can be sometimes. Many times I’ve considered going vegetarian or vegan…but I guess to put it quite simply, I don’t want to right now….maybe one day.

Anyways, the seafood was DELICIOUS; we ended ordering lobster, calamari, and mussels. SO so good. Unfortunately though, their currency is rather confusing to get used to at first (they have so many zero’s), and we found out we didn’t have enough money to pay. So Ryan tried using his cards, and after many attempts we found out weren’t working for some reason. So one of the servers took Ryan on his moped to an ATM; and I sat waiting with the moped security guard (I think that’s what his job was…but he hardly looked official) at the restaurant. He kindly offered me one of his chairs to sit on while I waited. Another reason why they were such nice people!

About 10 minutes later Ryan came back from his moped ride:

Not the best photo….

He successfully paid the people what we owed them. They apologized, but obviously it wasn’t their fault, and we went on our way to a bar.

Our ‘go-to’ place

On our first night we decided to hangout at a place called “The Dawn”, which was a little hut right along the beach that served all sorts of tasty drinks. This became our go-to place for the rest of our time in Vietnam… I mean besides the rooftop bar at our hotel which had the infinity pool/beach view. The drinks were cheaper, but not any less tasty, and it felt more casual.

The rest of our adventures

While eating and drinking were the majority of our activities, we did do other things! On our first full day in Vietnam, that morning I for some odd reason, woke up at 5am and I couldn’t get back to sleep. So by 7:30am I decided I was going to work out. I went for a nice long run on the beach, which was fantastic.

Surprisingly it was my first time running (with purpose), on a beach, and I loved it. But as I got closer to the end of my run, it started getting hotter and hotter and I felt like I was going to pass out from the heat. I guess I didn’t really eat breakfast…

However after my workout and breakfast we made our way to the beach. I was craving sunshine and couldn’t wait to relax! Unfortunately, I packed everything in my bag that we needed except sunscreen. This turned out to be the biggest mistake of the trip because after 2-ish hours on the beach, Ryan and I were pretty burnt. We didn’t realize just how badly burnt at the time, because burns seem to like to sink in overnight.

The next morning our burns seemed worse. I decided on this trip that sunburns are almost like getting drunk; you feel really good at the time, but really regret it the next morning! Although personally I’d rather have a sunburn than a hangover.

While it’s not surprising that Ryan got pretty badly burnt for wearing no sunscreen, it was a bit surprising how badly I got burned. I’m usually one that doesn’t need to wear sunscreen and I can tan very easily; however China has changed me! It is very rarely that we see the sun in China, and even when we do, we are protected by a layer of smog. So in hindsight, I suppose I understand, but I’m not too happy about my new sensitive skin!

Ha Noi

Unfortunately, or fortunately for our skin, it rained for the rest of our days in Vietnam EXCEPT the day we had to leave. So to occupy ourselves, we arranged to go to one of the major cities nearby called Ha Noi. This place was basically just a huge outdoor market with bars and restaurants.

Ryan wasn’t really into shopping, while I was interesting in buying a few things. So between stores, we stopped in at bars to get drinks. For the first drink, Ryan was solo because I wanted to get a pedicure and I didn’t expect him to sit around and watch that happen.

My ‘pedicure’ experience

I did not enjoy my pedicure experience; while the price was still cheap they lied about it! I hate when people are sneaky! The price said “Pedicure: 105, 000 VND” (look at all those zero’s!), which is what I wanted. Then I found out after they started working on my feet that I had to pay extra for basically everything you’d think is included in a pedicure. Their pedicure price included a foot soak, and the nail and cuticle trim. I had to pay extra if I wanted the dead skin scraped off my feet, or nail polish on my toes. Girls, tell me if I’m right or wrong here…but doesn’t a pedicure usually include all those things?? I tried asking why it was called a pedicure…but I got nowhere with this. Anyways, I don’t like when people aren’t upfront about these things, so I was a bit bummed out.

Getting your nails done in Vietnam is much like getting them done at home; when they speak their own language and you have no idea what they’re saying but you just know they’re talking about you. The girl was commenting on how rough the bottoms of my feet were. WELL MAYBE if you didn’t lie about the price I would have paid extra to get that taken off! Anyways…sometimes language barrier prevents you from expressing why you don’t agree with something. At the end of the day it didn’t matter anyways. I paid what I owed and got out of there.

To numb ‘such an awful experience’, Ryan and I got tequila shots:

And continued to shop! It turned out to be a lot of fun!

Our ‘rebellious’ side

One of the few funny situations we found ourselves in during our time in Ha Noi was when, about 3 or 4 times, someone stopped us from passing an area asking us where our tickets were. We asked, for what?? They explained we needed to pay to enter into the ancient city, which is where we have been exploring for the past several hours! The first time we just turned around and found a different way in, another time was when we just wanted to go back where we came from. We explained that we were just there with no tickets, and they shook their head asking for the ticket.

We were thinking it was all a scam, because we never noticed anyone else showing their tickets (so why were we getting picked on?!). Instead, we just waited until the lady turned around or was busy, and walked through. Two of the times we decided to ignore them and continue walking straight through while they were still looking; both times nothing happened to us (although the one lady basically screamed “Excuse me!!”). Soo we think it’s probably a scam, but from the anger in the one lady’s voice, we still don’t know for sure!

My Son

So we went to see my son in Vietnam…yes, I had a son in Vietnam.  HA. I’m hilarious. Just kidding. My Son is a place in Vietnam that we arranged to go to. It’s pronounced ‘Mi’ (like me) Son, which is a UNESCO world heritage site: an area of abandoned and ruined Hindu temples destroyed by the US during the Vietnam War. Many people were involved in its restoration before it got destroyed during the war, only to have to restore it again afterwards.

It was really a beautiful place; and even though it was raining I think it made the colours of everything more vibrant.

Corn-on-the-cob

You’re probably wondering what the heck corn on the cob has to do with Vietnam: well for Ryan, it is now the main thing burned into his brain.

Later that evening when we arrived back in Da Nang, we went back to “The Dawn”, found a seat, and Ryan went to the bar for drinks. There were two guys that started talking to him because they recognized his Toronto Maple Leafs hat; they were from Montreal. We’ll call man 1 Paul and the man 2 Freddy. While they were waiting for their drinks, Paul suggested that Ryan look at his phone to see what the standings were; the Leafs were pretty close to making it to the playoffs! But when Paul unlocked his phone, the screen opened up to, I kid you not, a corn on the cob beside a penis. Yup. A penis and a corn on the cob. Neither Paul nor Freddy commented on this odd picture; it was completely ignored as if it were the more normal thing in the world! Ryan said nothing, waited for his drinks and left.

Now because I was waiting at a table enjoying the live music, I didn’t notice anything happening. Ryan however came back with our drinks in hand, and a strange look on his face. For the next 10-20 minutes, he was still describing how shocked he was, wondered why it happened, and why the heck would that be the last thing the person had open on their phone. He was just full of questions; none of which I could answer of course because I can’t say I’ve never looked up the comparison, or accidentally showed someone a picture the comparison. I totally understand how shocked he was.

Our last day in Vietnam was a perfectly sunny day, so I didn’t want to leave. One of the most interesting ways we found to get around was by bicycle. We rented the bikes twice before to see the city; the one day to get groceries, and the other to get (more) alcohol/explore.

You can see the one day we randomly stopped for me to play with these adorable puppies!

But for the purpose of covering more ground, on our last day we decided we would rent a moped. We mostly wanted to get a bit closer to see their Lady Buddha that we saw every day and every night from the beach and hotel. Renting a moped for the day cost around $8!! For a FULL day. Unfortunately for us, we only had about 2 hours until we needed to leave for the airport. We drove up the winding roads to the mountain (more like hill) area to get close to where the Lady Buddha was, but stopped to put sunscreen on along the way just in case (well Ryan did…).

We then drove further and further up the curvy roads, with me trying to snap pictures. I was a bit terrified of dropping my phone but never did. We made a stop to take photos and our moped decided it was out of gas…although we’re pretty sure they don’t fill it with real gas because the thing said it was empty when we got it. Ryan, being the smart guy he is, decided we would just turn around and go downhill and hopefully we’d make it back that way; but as he was doing that he got the moped to start and everything was okay!

The white statue in this picture is the Lady Buddha

I didn’t want to say bye to one of my new favourite places; but obviously it had to be done! From drinking every day, to burning on the beach, to waking up from crying from a nightmare; Vietnam was an amazing trip. I truly had a blast with Ryan.

One of the few pictures Ryan wanted to be part of on this trip!

NEXT UP:

Our next trip I am the most excited for, not for the location but for who we will be with: MY PARENTS! Yes, my parents have finally decided that they will visit China, and I’m thrilled to have them here. Besides getting to spend time with them, I can’t wait for how entertained I will be by my dad’s facial expressions and comments about Chinese culture. He is someone that doesn’t always like change, likes things the way he likes it, and (like me) appreciates his personal space. I hope to capture some candid photos for everyone. We will be spending 3 days in Beijing, 5 days in Chongqing, 3 days in Singapore, and ending it off with 3 days in Shanghai.

My worst nightmare It happened so suddenly; someone who I had known so well and cared about so deeply tried to kill me.