#so not having to keep multiple tabs of these increases open while I test and re-(re-re-)test is very nice

[melchinafan]

More adventures in knitting! I just figured out how to remember whether to knit/purl normally or through the back loop for each type of lifted increase.

You insert the needle from the side of the origin stitch.

So if you're lifting from a stitch on the right needle, you come in from the right (either ktbl, or purl). If you're lifting from a stitch on the left needle, you come in from the left (so knit, or ptbl).

The lean of them I find easier to remember. If you lift before knitting the origin stitch, you're adding it on the right of that stitch, so it will lean right. If you're lifting it after knitting the origin stitch, you're adding it on the left of that stitch, so it'll lean left.

For remembering M1R/L, I combined the tip I saw on nimble-needles (about halfway down the page there's a big "how to remember" titled section) that the front leg of the stitch should lean in the desired direction--plus my personal observation/interpretation of "knit (or purl) through whichever side is harder/more annoying to get the needle into because that part of the leg is shorter and has less room." (The site does include a way to remember the second half of the tip, but it's easier for me to internalize "more annoying" than "closer to the next stitch.")

This is gonna save me SO many reference tabs.

[newstfionline]

Thursday, May 20, 2021

For Migrant Children in Federal Care, a ‘Sense of Desperation’ (NYT) In a federal shelter in Dallas, migrant children sleep in a windowless convention center room under fluorescent lights that never go dark. At a military base in El Paso, teenagers pile onto bunk cots, and some say they have gone days without bathing. And in Erie, Pa., problems began emerging within days of the shelter’s creation: “Fire safety system is a big concern,” an internal report noted. Some of the hot water heaters were not working, and lice was “a big issue and seems to be increasing.” Early this year, children crossing the southwestern border in record numbers were crammed into Customs and Border Protection’s cold-floored, jail-like detention facilities. They slept side by side on mats with foil blankets, almost always far longer than the legal limit of 72 hours. Republicans declared it a crisis. Democrats and immigration groups denounced the conditions, which erupted into an international embarrassment for President Biden, who had campaigned on a return to compassion in the immigration system. The administration responded by rapidly setting up temporary, emergency shelters, including some that could house thousands of children. But the next potential crisis is coming into view. “I know the administration wants to take a victory lap for moving children out of Border Patrol stations—and they deserve credit for doing that,” said Leecia Welch, a lawyer and the senior director of the legal advocacy and child welfare practice at the National Center for Youth Law, a nonprofit law firm focused on low-income children. “But the truth is, thousands of traumatized children are still lingering in massive detention sites on military bases or convention centers, and many have been relegated to unsafe and unsanitary conditions.”

Ceasefire calls and U.S. credibility (Foreign Policy) As the bombings [in Gaza] continue, the human toll is becoming clearer. More than 52,000 people in Gaza have been displaced by Israel’s aerial assault, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Tuesday, with most seeking refuge in U.N.-run schools. The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) confirmed that 11 of the more than 60 children killed so far by Israeli airstrikes were participants in an NRC program helping children deal with trauma. Even if hostilities soon end, the Biden administration’s resistance to a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for a cease-fire has tested U.S. credibility. “They pledged to come back and support the U.N. system and multilateralism,” one council diplomat said in a report by Foreign Policy’s Colum Lynch and Robbie Gramer. “We don’t see that happening now in the Security Council.” The episode also encouraged China to carve out a leadership role at the Security Council on Middle East issues, a topic where it usually takes a back seat, while at the same time allowing it to dodge questions on its actions in Xinjiang. Multiple reports appeared on Tuesday, attempting to shine light on Biden’s approach not to call publicly for a cease-fire. They depict an administration wary of getting on the bad side of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The tactic has been criticized as a misreading of U.S. leverage over an ally to which it provides significant military aid and political support. Shibley Telhami, writing in the Boston Globe, voiced some of that criticism on Tuesday. “If an American president cannot leverage this extraordinary and unprecedented support to advance core American values,” Telhami writes, “what hope is there for succeeding anywhere else?”

Spain Sends Troops to African Enclave After Migrant Crossings Jump (NYT) Spain deployed troops, military trucks and helicopters in its North African enclave of Ceuta on Tuesday after thousands of people crossed over from Morocco, one of the largest movements of migrants reported in the area in recent years. More than 8,000 migrants, including nearly 2,000 minors, arrived on the beaches of Ceuta on Monday and Tuesday, mostly swimming or aboard inflatable boats, according to the Spanish authorities, who said that Spain had already sent back 4,000 people. The sudden arrival of thousands of people in Ceuta—more than had attempted the crossing in all the rest of the year so far—comes amid a deepening diplomatic spat between Spain and Morocco over the hospitalization in Spain of the leader of a rebel group that has fought for the independence of Western Sahara from Morocco. Videos broadcast on Spanish television on Tuesday appeared to show Moroccan border guards opening fences to the Spanish enclave. While Morocco has warned of “consequences” for harboring the rebel leader, it was not immediately clear if the spike in migration was linked to the diplomatic dispute.

Grand day for the French: Cafe and bistro terraces reopen (AP) It’s a grand day for the French. Cafe and restaurant terraces reopened Wednesday after a six-month coronavirus shutdown deprived residents of the essence of French “joie de vivre”—sipping coffee and red wine with friends. The French government is lifting restrictions incrementally to stave off a resurgence of COVID-19 and to give citizens back some of their world famous lifestyle. As part of the plan’s first stage, France’s 7 p.m. nightly curfew was pushed back to 9 p.m. and museums, theaters and cinemas reopened along with outdoor cafe terraces. France is not the first European country to start getting back a semblance of social and cultural life. Italy, Belgium, Hungary and other nations already allow outdoor dining while drinking and eating indoors began Monday in Britain.

Indian navy searches for 78 missing from barge sunk by storm (AP) Indian navy ships and helicopters searched in rough weather and seas Wednesday for 78 people still missing from a barge that sank off Mumbai as a deadly cyclone blew ashore this week. Navy Cdr. Alok Anand said 183 people were rescued within 24 hours by three ships and helicopters engaged in the operation. Cyclone Tauktae, the most powerful storm to hit the region in more than two decades, packed sustained winds of up to 210 kilometers (130 miles) per hour when it came ashore in Gujarat state late Monday. The storm left at least 25 dead in Gujarat and Maharashtra states. The Hindu newspaper Wednesday tallied more than 16,000 houses damaged in Gujarat state and trees and power poles uprooted.

How Myanmar's military moved in on the telecoms sector to spy on citizens (Reuters) In the months before the Myanmar military's Feb. 1 coup, the country's telecom and internet service providers were ordered to install intercept spyware that would allow the army to eavesdrop on the communications of citizens, sources with direct knowledge of the plan told Reuters. The technology gives the military the power to listen in on calls, view text messages and web traffic including emails, and track the locations of users without the assistance of the telecom and internet firms, the sources said. The directives are part of a sweeping effort by the army to deploy electronic surveillance systems and exert control over the internet with the aim of keeping tabs on political opponents, squashing protests and cutting off channels for any future dissent, they added.

Restrictions reimposed as virus resurges in much of Asia (AP) Taxi drivers are starved for customers, weddings are suddenly canceled, schools are closed, and restaurant service is restricted across much of Asia as the coronavirus makes a resurgence in countries where it had seemed to be well under control. Sparsely populated Mongolia has seen its death toll soar from 15 to 233, while Taiwan, considered a major success in battling the virus, has recorded more than 1,000 cases since last week and placed over 600,000 people in two-week medical isolation. Hong Kong and Singapore have postponed a quarantine-free travel bubble for a second time after an outbreak in Singapore of uncertain origin. China, which has all but stamped out local infections, has seen new cases apparently linked to contact with people arriving from abroad. The resurgence hasn’t come close to the carnage wrought in India and parts of Europe, but it is a keen reminder that the virus remains resilient.

Immigration In Japan Under Pressure (NYT) For months Japanese jailers said they ‘thought’ the young migrant from Sri Lanka was faking her illness, even as she wasted away before their eyes before dying alone in her cell. Wishma Rathayake had a lifelong fascination with Japan. She entered the country in the summer of 2017 to study Japanese at a school in the Tokyo suburbs, hoping eventually to teach English. She met another Sri Lankan student in Japan who became her boyfriend. Sadly, after a series of unwise decisions, unfortunate events, and a now-expired residence permit, she found herself in a detention center a few hours south of Tokyo, awaiting deportation. It was August 2020. While in detention she was threatened by her ex-boyfriend, now back in Sri Lanka. She thought she’d be safer in Japan, and with the encouragement of advisers at START, a local nonprofit, she decided to try to stay. That move irritated officials at the detention center, who demanded she change her mind. In late December Wishma fell ill with a fever. Within weeks she was having trouble eating, standing, and speaking. In late January 2021 a doctor prescribed her vitamins and painkillers, but they made her even sicker, so she filed for a provisional release. Detention centers had already released hundreds of healthy detainees due to coronavirus concerns, but in mid-February Wishma’s request was denied without explanation. She submitted a second request on medical grounds; by this time she was so weak she could barely sign the form. Despite the severity of her symptoms, officials waited until March 4 to take her to a hospital. Two days later the 33-year-old was dead.      Japan has a long history of hostility toward immigration. Despite being the world’s third-largest economy, it settles less than 1% of asylum applicants—just 47 in 2020. Critics of the country’s immigration system say most decisions are made in secret; detainees who have overstayed their visas can be held indefinitely, with little access to courts. Detainees who apply for asylum, as Wishma did, are particularly unwelcome. Critics say Wishma was the victim of an opaque and capricious bureaucracy that has nearly unchecked power over foreigners who run afoul of it. And while there have been other instances of inhumane treatment of foreigners that ended in death, especially for people of color, the particularly egregious circumstances of Wishma’s death have driven national outrage to a whole new level. Protesters have gathered almost daily in front of Parliament, and objections by opposition lawmakers have been unusually fierce.

Experts warn shuttered Australia is becoming a ‘hermit nation’ (AFP) Prime Minister Scott Morrison defended his “Fortress Australia” Covid-19 restrictions Tuesday, as experts warned that plans to keep the borders closed for another year will create a “hermit nation”. Last March, Australia took the unprecedented step of closing its borders to foreign visitors and banning its globetrotting citizens from leaving. That prompted the first population decline since World War I, stranded tens of thousands of Australian citizens overseas and separated hundreds of thousands of residents from family members. But the country now has almost no community transmission and life for most is relatively normal. And the government’s recent suggestion that borders could remain closed for another year has sparked fierce debate. Australian Medical Association president Omar Khorshid on Tuesday warned: “Australia cannot keep its international borders closed indefinitely.” A University of Sydney task force examining how Australia can safely reopen this week went further, warning the country “cannot continue to lock itself off from the world as a hermit nation indefinitely”.

Powerless (NYT) Abeer Ghanem, like many Gazans, long struggled to work around the long blackouts that blighted the besieged Palestinian enclave along the Mediterranean Sea. But with the outbreak of hostilities a week ago between Israel and the Hamas militant group that governs the Gaza Strip, she said, she now gets at best four hours of electricity a day, intermittently. When it comes on, her family scrambles to charge their lights and batteries for the long, sleepless nights punctuated by outgoing Hamas rockets and the thunder of Israeli airstrikes. A combination of fuel shortages, damage to the electricity supply lines running from Israel and an aerial bombardment that has torn apart local power lines means that many families are receiving at most three to four hours of electricity a day, according to Gaza’s power company. “What we have now for fuel will last for two or three days,” said Mohammed Thabet, a spokesman for the Electricity Distribution Co. of Gaza. The power shortages are compounding the daily misery for Gazans and are also taking a toll on the provision of water, sewage treatment and the ability of hospitals, swamped with casualties, to function. Even if supplies resume, the crisis has caused millions of dollars in infrastructure damage.

Palestinians go on strike as Israel-Hamas fighting rages (AP) Palestinians across Israel and the occupied territories went on strike in a rare collective protest Tuesday as Israeli missiles toppled a building in Gaza and militants in the Hamas-ruled territory fired dozens of rockets that killed two people. The general strike was a sign that the war could widen again after a spasm of communal violence in Israel and protests across the occupied West Bank last week. Although the strike was peaceful in many places, with shops in Jerusalem’s usually bustling Old City markets shuttered, violence erupted in cities in the West Bank. Hundreds of Palestinians burned tires in Ramallah and hurled stones at an Israeli military checkpoint. Troops fired tear gas, and protesters picked up some of the canisters and threw them back. Three protesters were killed and more than 140 wounded in clashes with Israeli troops in Ramallah, Bethlehem, Hebron and other cities, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. The Israeli army said two soldiers were wounded by gunshots to the leg. The general strike was an uncommon show of unity by Palestinian citizens of Israel, who make up 20% of its population.

[almondharry]

you look so good : two

you look so good [9.1k]

“Let’s get some pasta, green beans, kidney beans, and some lentils.”

Genevieve’s nose scrunched. “I don’t even know what to do with lentils.”

“I have a great recipe for a dal curry. I’ll teach you, it’ll be perfect. We can make a whole day out of it.”

A whole day? For lentils? Genevieve opened and closed her mouth shut, no words came out. 

Arnold’s Singularity Theory

October 26, 2019

Her back was hunched over the wooden desk beside her bed. The high pitched ringing of her alarm snapped her eyes open at six in the morning. The sky was a navy blue; she could make out the few dog walkers on the street. It was her only day off, but the piled work on her table argued otherwise.

Genevieve was alone in her freezing apartment. The heating was broken and when she told Mr. Goldwin, her landlord, he didn’t have his hearing aid on. She had a routine for Sundays: Wake up. Do practice problems. Make a cup of tea. Sleep. 

A dull ache prodded between her shoulder blades, her spine was sorely unaligned. Her face was all sunken cheeks and shades of grey. The sweater bought last month suddenly became a few sizes too big. 

The sun created hues of orange and reds. The blue that slowly peeked out at the sides made it seem like a bowl of dirty paint water being stirred. The evening stillness in her flat was interrupted by the sudden roar of an engine. As she looked out the window, a car zoomed down the road with a blaring radio. An animated lightning bolt was left behind, its speed meant it was gone within a blink. An unsettling feeling made itself a home in the pit of her stomach. She pictured it as swirls, starting off as small slow circles, and eventually growing into sharp hurried edges. 

It was probably nothing, maybe university kids having a laugh, but she didn’t have the time to mull over it because the swinging of her front door and jingling of a bundle of keys sounded loudly. 

Meena opened the door to her refrigerator and the only thing there was a flickering light bulb and an empty box of orange juice. A high pitched shrill followed.

“Gen!” 

Genevieve was out of milk, eggs, and cereal.

She wouldn’t have given it another thought and might’ve ordered take out or popped in at the Smalls’ to split a pizza with Jonah, the neighbour’s kid who she tutored every once in a while. He was the only child of a single dad who worked too many hours at the construction site to make rent. He wasn’t home often and they had a silent understanding of popping in every couple days to keep an eye on him, much like Meena liked to keep tabs on Genevieve. Except, Genevieve wasn’t a scrawny teenage boy who needed to be looked after, something which Meena would refute without a shadow of doubt. At the current state of Genevieve’s flat, the jury would easily side with Meena Ahmed.

Meena had a hand on her hip, her lips pressed in a firm line. She took a deep breath, pinching the carton between her thumb and index finger. “Gen-e-vieve!” 

Meena put her foot down and opened the trash can only to find it overflowing. She held back a gag. 

“Genevieve!” 

After some rustling and movement on the other side of the wall, her feet stumbled out of her bedroom. An unimpressed snarl on her face, Genevieve’s body leaned against the doorway.

“I think by now everyone in this bloody building knows my name,” she said with a textbook in one hand and a pen in the other. She had not looked away from the pages. She hurriedly scratched an answer to her practice problems before it could float away from her brain. “That’s exactly the information they need to kick me out.”

Meena was in her work out clothes, a bright pink neon top with matching trainers. She looked straight out of a healthy living ad. She had glossy black hair, almond shaped eyes, and always smelled of fresh daisies. She had that all American smile and pearly whites that were blinding. She was into juicing, kale, and art history. 

“What is this?”

“What’s what?” Genevieve inquired, her eyes glued on the next problem.

When a moment of silence went by and no response was given, her head shot up.

Her eyes flickered from the trash can—she thought she saw something move in there— to the open door of her empty refrigerator. Her lips fell into an O shape. 

“When you told me you went to the shops on Tuesday, I didn’t know you were talking about two bloody weeks ago,” Meena huffed as she bent down to tie a knot on the black bag, her nose scrunched up. It was atypical to hear her accent try out British sayings, but amusing nonetheless. “Have you been eating?”

“Don’t be so dramatic. I do have instant noodles on the shelf. And I mainly eat at the diner.” Genevieve shrugged, her attention migrated back to her pages. What at first glance looked like to be ten simple problems turned out to be a mess of numbers and formulas that weren’t making any sense. 

“That God awful place serves nothing but heart disease! It takes a whole stack of napkins to soak up that grease!” Meena scoffed as she replaced the bin with a fresh bag. On multiple occasions, she had cornered a frightened Walter to discuss his technique and may have even manipulated him to add a vegan alternative to his infamous pancakes. Thanks to Meena, Flo’s now served gluten-free, vegetarian, and no sugar added options. Genevieve firmly believed Walter did it out of fear, but he won’t admit it. “And instant noodles are not a meal, we have talked about this.”

“‘Course they are! An efficient one too.”

“What happened to ‘We’re gonna change things this year, Meena! Real changes! You won’t recognize me by the time I’m done’?” 

If there was one thing Meena Ahmed took seriously, it was New Year’s resolutions. She kept every one ever since she was old enough to make them. She hadn’t missed a gym day for the past three years. When she said she would take on meditation, she actually did. When her mind became set on studying abroad in London, on January first, she was boarding a plane. 

So when the following December 31st hit and Genevieve was one too many drinks in with Meena, she found herself making empty promises of eating better and taking care of herself. Little did Meena know that to Genevieve, resolutions were much like a two-week free trial. As soon as that time frame was up, you could up and go. 

“I put in a solid effort for a week, and that’s what counts!”

“We need to go to the shops. You have nothing here. You need a list.” The pen between Genevieve’s fingers was swiped and the tearing of paper was quick from her notebook. She was also very much into being intrusive. “Let’s start off with the basics. Eggs, milk, bread. Do you want tea?”

“I can do my own groceries! I’m not a child, Meena!”

“Could’ve fooled me. By the looks of it, you’ve been living off frosted flakes. Do you even know where the closest store is?”

Genevieve scoffed and propped herself on the counter with the back of her elbows. “Of course I do, I am very much capable of taking care of myself.”

Meena paused. Her body turned towards Genevieve with her full, utmost attention. Her eyes scanned her from head to toe, Genevieve was being appraised.

She didn’t put effort to hide the worried crinkle forming between her brows. “Have you showered today? Changed your clothes?”

Genevieve wasn’t a slob, but she did let herself go at times. It was something that Meena, who religiously went to get fresh manicures every two weeks, couldn’t quite grasp.  

“Oh, sod off! I was just about to run myself a bath before you came barreling in.”

She wasn’t, but Meena didn’t need to know that.

“Hm, what type of tea?” Meena asked after rolling her eyes dismissively. 

“Green, please.”

“Let’s get some pasta, green beans, kidney beans, and some lentils.”

Genevieve’s nose scrunched. “I don’t even know what to do with lentils.”

“I have a great recipe for a dal curry. I’ll teach you, it’ll be perfect. We can make a whole day out of it.”

A whole day? For lentils? Genevieve opened and closed her mouth shut, no words came out. She sighed, getting Meena to budge was a faraway dream. She rubbed her strained eyes as Meena listed off something about the lack of vitamins in her diet. She was now on a tangent explaining how an increase in omega-3 and healthy fats in her diet could be beneficial when Genevieve's front door knob jiggled. There was a grunt and a strategic kick to the door, and it flew open.

“Gen!” he panted, his tongue slipped out unintentionally like a dog. His cheeks were flushed a cherry red, probably from the trek up the stairs. Jonah’s backpack was twice the size of him. He wore a shirt with his favourite comic book character, its armpits a shade darker than the rest of his shirt.

He had a ghost white face and his left eye twitched. “Hey, bud, you alright?” Genevieve raised a brow.

Little lungs took in a heavy breath, quite like pulling the handles of a bicycle air pump up.

“I don’t get the trigonometric equations! I have a test tomorrow! Mrs. Hansuld was going over the review in class and it looked like she was speaking Russian— and I know I should’ve been studying last week but they just released the new version of Triton Galaxy X and it was just so beyond cool, Gen. I am already on level twelve, and, well, now I have a test and I don’t know any of it. Nothing. Zero. I don’t think I can even add numbers anymore.”

Genevieve looked at Meena. Her mouth was parted from shock as she blinked at the frazzled boy in front of them. “You’re so tiny… but you, you speak so much and so fast.”

“Um, actually, you’re mistaken.” He raised an accusing finger. His height was a sensitive topic. He was at the stage where all his friends were getting growth spurts and growing like weeds, whereas he had yet to experience his own. “I am almost five foot and that is within the normal height range on WebMD, Docs4You and according to my pediatrician.” 

Genevieve found it amusing that his voice reached a higher pitch the more defensive he got. He was a whistle by the end of his sentence. It also didn’t help that his last name was Smalls and kids in school could be cruel. 

“‘Course, yeah, I’m sorry. My bad.” Meena nodded quickly. She knew she hit a nerve as she backed up slowly. She scratched the back of her neck. “Um, well, Gen and I were planning on picking up groceries, but I’ll go grab ‘em.”

“Great, I’ll go take my books out.” Jonah dragged his bag like a potato sack into the living room.  

“You really don’t have to, Meena.” 

“Gen, it’s no big deal,” she brushed off. “Anyway, I don’t think your pal wants me around much. I need an escape and maybe a magazine too.”

When Meena gulped uncomfortably, Genevieve shook her head. She pushed herself off the counter. 

“Here take my card.” Genevieve shoved the plastic rectangle into Meena’s hand. A comforting squeeze was given. “If you get him one of those milk chocolate bars, he will forgive you in ten minutes tops.”

“Right,” Meena laughed. “I’ll be back in no time.”

***

October 27, 2019

There was a buzzing.

The room was swallowed in darkness, the crescent moon that hung behind the window didn’t provide enough light to warrant a quick search. It was enough of a reason for Genevieve to shut her half opened lids.

Except that the buzzing began again. 

Genevieve groaned into her pillow until the nuisance came to a full stop. Whoever was beckoning her attention could do without it until the sun came up. There was an ache in her neck from the poor posture that her body folded in. To top it off, she had an 8:00 a.m. class. There were not enough hours in the night so she was clinging on to any thread of peace. She tossed and turned until she got the sheets pooled around her in just the right way.

Just when Genevieve was about to slip into the blissful state of unconsciousness, the aggravating buzz started once more. The less than pleased frown on her lips could surely make fresh flowers wilt. Her limbs were heavy with sleep as she moved her duvet to find the pesky device. Genevieve lived in a shithole. Labelling her room a shoe box would be bordering glamorous. Although, it did make it easier to find things. 

It took a couple of shuffles and twists to hear the thud of a screen colliding against the floorboard. The damn thing was still ringing. The brightness on the unknown caller screen made her face glow blue and the back of her eyes burn; she shut them while blindly hitting the green circle. 

“Hm?” Her voice croaked. 

“You know the time I got you out of a thing?”

Their words were slurred and the glowing digits on her windowsill read 5:26 a.m. This meant one thing only. “No, sorry. Wrong number.” 

Genevieve brought the phone away from her face, and just as her finger hovered over the red circle, a needy yelp cried out.

“Gen! Don’t hang up!”

Her eyes rolled with an aggravated sigh, fingers reluctantly pressing the device to the side of her head. There was sleep crusted in the corners of her eyes and she had to blink a couple of times to adjust to the darkness.“What do you want, Niall?”

“You see, I’m in this predicament… and I might need someone sober and with a car.”

“Then call a bloody Uber. Who do you think I am?”

“Look, I thought that. But—”

There was rustling on the other side. After some bickering, another voice spoke through the line. 

“Gen, come get this tosser or else he will pass out on my floor. I swear, I’ll lock up with him inside.” 

“How bad is he?” Genevieve was already pushing aside textbooks on her floor in search of a pair of trousers. With one leg inside and the receiver pressed between her cheek and shoulder, she hopped on her bedroom floor. 

“Not good. He is a right mess.”

“I’ll be there in ten. Just keep giving him water, please? Thanks for the ring, Ted.” She knew Niall well enough to know that this wasn’t his bright and shiny idea. If it were up to him, he would pass out on a park bench. 

“Got your number scratched on the wall for a reason.” The click sounded on the other side, then the line dropped afterwards.

It was true. If you looked hard enough you could make out the chicken scratched scribbles right under the faux payphone mounted inside The Cabinet, where the beers were cheap and Niall Horan was reachable at the slightest inconvenience that struck his life. Last week, it was because he had failed his mid-term. This week, the problem was blonde and walking across campus and shared one too many of his courses.

“No, Gen, she’s just too gorgeous, it’s unbelievable. I think I am in love.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not how it’s supposed to happen, but congrats.” 

Ted adored Niall immensely when he was bringing more business to the pub and getting the word out, not when he was a blubbering mess on the sticky countertops. He sipped his drinks like water to the point that Ted would morph into a psychiatrist. This happened so often that it had become a ritual. The day Niall stopped burdening him with his problems was a day that failed to exist. 

Much like her room, the small flat didn’t have the lights on. Genevieve didn’t need them to navigate her path, her fingers haphazardly pulled on her boots and plucked the bundle of keys from a mug. 

Her car, a well-loved hand-me-down, was nothing lavish. It got her from point A to B without much resistance on good days. Her foot eased on the gas, with the route was well versed and memorized. After a couple of stop signs, her destination would be reached. The streets were empty and not one car was spotted at any intersections. 

A light breeze roamed around and brought goosebumps to the surface of her skin. She should’ve brought a sweater, she thought, as her teeth began to chatter. Her dark hair was haphazardly twisted into a bun and rested on the top of her head. The car door shut behind her as she quickly jogged across the street to where the pub was located. 

The street was lonely. 

There were only a handful of people that would be up at this hour. This subgroup of people definitely did not include her. She thought she was still partly asleep when there was a familiar figure pacing down the sidewalk towards her. Maybe it was the dark, but even after she rubbed her eyes with the heel of her palms, the slope of the person remained familiar. As they got closer, the once blurred image sharpened, and she felt her stomach flip. 

A slight panic arose in Genevieve’s eyes. He was too close of a distance for her to dash through the doors, and it would’ve been clear that she was making a run from him. She doesn’t recall when exactly their encounters began to turn dreadful. But the reality of the situation wasn’t how, it was the fact that they had. This was the second time he stood across from her. The rate of their reunions was at an all time high after years spent apart. It made a heavy weight rest on her chest, her own personal Sisyphus boulder. 

Tiptoeing and maneuvering their way around each other was the hardest part. There wasn’t a book in the world that taught you how to stand across someone that you once spoke to every day. There was a time Genevieve could tell what each tilt, rise, and fall of Harry’s face meant. How do you go from sharing friends, laughter, a life, to becoming nothing short of hollow strangers? As they stood across from each other on an empty street, they only shared blank stares.

“Hi.” His breathing was a bit uneven, and Genevieve saw the beginnings of roses bloom on his cheek under the streetlights. His moose coloured hair was tucked under a beanie and there was a slight stubble on his chin.

“You are running?” Genevieve squinted at him. Navy gym shorts hung off his hips and a full sleeve athletic shirt was on top. “At five in the morning?” 

Genevieve hated how Harry looked brand new. In the midst of a mountain worth of chaos and hurt, how he managed to look shiny, pre-packaged, and unopened was well beyond her. She had to hold herself together with her bare arms when her seems unravelled. Harry was happier before Genevieve and it was something she had to be okay with. There was no specific reason why. It was just how reality worked. 

“By the time I’m done, it will be six. I’ll have to get up anyway.” His shoulders rose and fell in a mindless shrug. Genevieve brought her arms to fold across her chest, her fists cuddled under her armpits to trap heat.

“You’re insane.” Genevieve shook her head. The neon trainers he had on rivalled the brightness of the open sign hung on the doors of The Cabinet. When Genevieve thought she had made enough of an effort at a civil conversation, she turned around to push the heavy glass door. There was nothing else to say to him.

Conversation with Harry wasn’t always a chore. She was able to speak without having to think twice or second guess herself. Now, it seemed like every word led to a dead end of an inescapable maze.

Genevieve accepted that Harry was no longer the person she came to with her favourite songs, books and a cup of tea. She wondered if whatever reminiscent memoir she had in her memory of him served true till today. Her Harry was never the sober driver or the early bird runner. She did not expect him to stay the same. No, that would be cruel. But a small part of her wanted to know if she had known him at all. 

Before her weight gave to the door, his voice chimed up.

“You’re drinking?”

“God no, I’m, um—No. I’m here for a friend.” Genevieve paused, a deep breath circled her lungs and helped her string some words together. “He’s gone a bit over the top.” She chuckled. It wasn’t soft and light, but rather felt like sandpaper. 

“Oh, right. ‘Course.” Harry rubbed at the back of his neck with his fingers. He blinked to the ground, the cracked concrete suddenly became much more of an interest. “I wasn’t— it’s just, I run this route every morning and I never see you and maybe I thought—”

“It’s okay, Harry.” He began to run his fingers through his hair, the beanie scrunched in his left hand. “I really need to help my friend, yeah?” 

“Right, I’ll see you around?”

Genevieve left his question hung in the air like forgotten laundry on a washing line. She thought it was better than saying I hope not. She didn’t want to mention that she tried to avoid him to the best of her ability. Genevieve knew his habits, his patterns. She had knowledge about places he went to, so, naturally, she didn’t. It was a triumph for her to go without months of seeing him. But there was only so much she could do. Juggling probabilities of his whereabouts would never assign her a one hundred percent assurance of erasing him, even with a ninety-nine percent confidence interval.

“Genny?” he called out again. The rational part of her wanted to pretend she didn’t hear him and walk through the door. Instead, she took a breath through her nose and turned around slowly. She wrapped her arms tighter together as the temperature dropped by the second. “Um, do you think we could talk sometime?”

There was a frailness to his voice. He was nervous. Genevieve knew this because he had made a mess of his hair with the number of times his fingers combed it back. 

The next words off her tongue painted a sad smile on his raspberry chapped lips. He looked exhausted, the grey shadows under his eyes beckoned her to not beat around the bush.

“We are talking, Harry.”

Confrontation was a foreign concept to Genevieve. Brushing it under the rug and forgetting about it seemed the best way for her. If it is out of sight, it will be out of mind. But Harry had other plans. He wanted to strip the house down and uncover every corner Genevieve thought to be her hiding spot. It was an intrusion and she didn’t want him to come knocking down doors. 

“No, I mean—”

“It was nice seeing you,” she said, her mouth set into a thin, straight line as she held eye contact. They were still the same deep green with golden flecks. She had seen them angry, hopeful, teary, but right now they were desperate.

The slight tilt to her head told Harry not to push it. To leave things as they were. He served as a walking reminder of loss and all the things she wanted to forget. Their situation did not have to go back to a normal distribution; their data was skewed, and the standard deviation was large enough to wedge a significant distance from their past to present.

Change was good, even if it was different. Over time, the further apart she was from him the better it was for her. And she hoped it was the same for him.  

No one warned Genevieve that holding a grudge required discipline and so much energy. She felt drained, her bones became weak enough they could snap in half. There was no brochure that outlined the ins and out of the process. Your brain worked overtime to disguise clenched jaws and tight fists without any compensation.

On the surface, everything appeared smooth and stonelike. Beneath, lied the hot white anger. That type of anger was something no one wanted to intentionally claim; it was an orphan. It builds and builds and builds until you cannot see through it. You’re blinded, you’re revengeful. 

“Yeah.” Harry swallowed a lump in his throat. He teetered on the balls of his feet and toes with his bottom lip caged between his teeth. He was debating on what to say next, and Genevieve wished it would be something short and quick. She wanted him to say a casual goodbye that was heard between strangers in a coffee shop or book store. Something that didn’t make her want to burst into a river of tears. “One more thing.”

“Hm?”

“Nice shirt.” There was a quirk to one side of his mouth where a dimple had coined itself on his cheek. It was an innocent compliment. Something a friend might say to another. Before she could give a reply, he had turned around and broken into a light jog.

Genevieve watched his figure become muddy until the darkness hid him completely. It was an odd thing to say, her appearance was something she could give less of a shit about at five in the morning. She had literally gotten out in the clothes she slept in. 

Genevieve brushed his words off. She wanted a dry goodbye and he delivered. It was nothing more.

Without thinking twice, she pushed the doors open and warmth from inside greeted her. The pub remained looking the same since she had walked in with her two best mates three years before. It was a hole in the wall, fixed in between a thrifting and convenience store. It littered with mismatched chairs and alcohol stains, a pool table and dart boards lined the further corner, and a random sports channel glowed on the box TV. Niall’s blond hair was easily spotted; it laid on the century old cherry wood bar. The posture his back was slumped on the stool insured neck cramps.

The doors behind the bar came swinging open as the bells above chimed of her entrance. A rag rested on his shoulder and he wore a well loved band shirt from his touring days. For someone who was found frowning on most days, Ted beamed a smile at Genevieve. 

“Good! You’re here!” His shoulders dropped in relief as she made her way closer to her friend. “He’s been miserable.”

“Gen? Is that you?” Niall grumbled from his position. “Oh, shut it, Ted. You’re giving me no option but to take my money elsewhere,” Niall slurred as he lifted his head off the wood. There were lines indented on his cheek from his possible snooze. 

“Those are empty words.” Ted rolled his eyes easily and used his rag to clean up the surface that Niall previously occupied. 

“You know what else is empty, Theodore? This glass!” It rattled against the countertop when Niall dramatically set it down. 

Ted’s shoulders shook as he chuckled, crinkles lining the corners of his eyes. “I’m not pouring you another drop, mate.”

“Who said it was for me? Have you seen Gen? She looks proper in need of a few.”

With a deep sigh, Genevieve took the stool beside Niall. Her head slowly turned to scan the pub. A place that was the heart of loud laughter and cheers was dimmed down since they were the only ones. With her elbows propped up on the counter, she pressed her index fingers to her temples. 

“You do look a bit poorly. Under the weather?”

“No, not at the moment,” she sighed.

“Well, you look like shit,” Niall blurted.

“Thanks, Niall, really.” Genevieve glared with a frown. “Remind me to never do a kind thing for you ever again. Sorry I wasn’t in full glam when you called at ass crack of dawn.”

“Did you see a ghost or something? You look sick.” Niall squinted his eyes and pinched her cheek between his thumb and index finger. It was rather quickly slapped away with a snarl. “Ouch!”

“Nothing a pint can’t cure.” A tall glass slid in front of Genevieve. Condensation dripped and pooled on the counter. The frothy foam rested on top and sat at the rim without tipping over. “On the house.” 

A Stella didn’t sound like a bad idea to Genevieve. She felt like she deserved one. After all, two encounters with the person she disliked the most was beginning to become exhausting. The car keys weighed down in her pocket, her bones ached and her temples pulsed. A tired yawn stretched her face as the drink laid rested on the cherry wood. 

Niall scoffed as Genevieve stared at the drink for a moment too long. “If you don’t take it, I will!” 

His fingers crept to grasp the glass, and Genevieve batted his greedy hands away. “Paws off, Niall.”

A cold drink couldn’t hurt, she decided. The first sip eased the tense muscles in her shoulders. Niall found a basket of chips to pick at in the meantime. He probably ordered them to soak up his alcohol intake.

Genevieve could hear Ted in the kitchen. The shifting of pots and pans meant that he was officially closing up for the night. She thought the least she could do was flip the remaining barstools on the counter. 

In the two seconds that she had abandoned her glass, she had turned to see Niall gulping like fish.

“No more!” He made a strangled sound as the rim was pulled from his lips. “Don’t need your puke in my car.”

Genevieve threw back what was left of the drink. “You could just pull the window down and I’ll mind me business.”

Genevieve squinted her eyes to catch a better look at Niall and she noticed he was turning a few shades greener. He had on a dopey grin and his eyes were almost shut. Niall became whiny when he got sick, and if Genevieve were to let that happen in the pub there would be no chance of him leaving.

“How about we get you to an actual sink, yeah?”

With an arm thrown over her shoulder and Niall almost near collapsing on her, she yelled a farewell to Ted. He was more preoccupied with rubbing the stove clean but he got the message, yelling muffled goodbye of his own.

The car parked across the street never felt further away. Niall was in his own world, mumbling some drunk words into her hair. Genevieve caught some that thanked her for taking care of him. She took each step slowly. 

Getting Niall into the passenger seat was a process, one she thought she had got down pat. She had done everything as planned, put his head to the right, made sure he had enough room to stretch his legs and of course, double checked to see if he had his phone and wallet on him. Apparently, this was taking too long and Niall reached over to slam the door shut.

Genevieve had jumped back just in time that no fingers were caught between doors. She sighed in relief before shooting a glare at Niall. He looked at the fabric that stretched from her stomach. “Oops?” 

Genevieve rolled her eyes at Niall, who burst into giggles because it turned out everything was more hilarious at 5:00 a.m. She tugged at the material.

It was old and ratty. It was two sizes too big and hung off her frame, there were stains, holes, some she never remembered putting in herself. It took her a moment, with the fabric bunched between her digits, the gears in her brain set into place. The sharp intake of breath hit the back of her throat and the air on the street suddenly froze.

***

October 27, 2019

“It’s stupid, Gen.” The clicking of a game controller didn’t halt. The animated character on the screen ran towards a glowing torch. Jonah adjusted the headpiece he had on over his ears, probably muting himself so the other kids wouldn’t hear Genevieve lecture him. Beside him sat a bowl of finished popcorn on the sofa, like his player two, and unpopped kernels rattled every time he enthusiastically surged towards the TV screen.  

“This is due in two days, Jonah,” Genevieve emphasized. She had unzipped his backpack. His agenda was hard to read, his chicken scratch writing almost made Genevieve mistake a significant date for scribbles. It was for his English class, something that he had yet to mention, which Genevieve found odd because he always told her about his school work. Okay, it was more like Genevieve made sure he told her, but same thing regardless. “How are you planning on starting and editing and finishing it?”

She knew better than to talk to boys in the middle of a game. There was no use. Her experience regarding it only went one way, everything went in one ear and out the other. It was fascinating, really; their eyes would glaze over and for a short ten minutes the real world wouldn’t exist. They would become so immersed in whatever universe was in front of them. It had been once explained to Genevieve as almost the same thing as reading a good book, but with the exception that the player was put in charge of the main character’s decisions. 

His tongue poked out at the side and the Playstation keys were innocent victims to his quick jabs. His shoulders deflated when the message on the screen informed him of the scoreboard. He grumbled something under his breath before his miniature joystick highlighted the option to opt for another round. “I’ll edit it while I’m writing it.” He shrugged mindlessly. 

“I’m being serious.”

“I am too.” 

“What’s up with you? You usually love finishing your assignments for Mrs. Yu’s class.”

“Look how stupid the prompt is,” Jonah grumbled. Genevieve’s fingers were already pulling out a crumpled rubric and pressing it flat so it stayed without folding in on itself. Eyes scanned the short blurb of instructions which Jonah soon summarized. “Pick a month and personify it. What type of pretentious—”

“I think it’s very neat. Creative. Have you selected a month yet?” 

“Sure.” His flat tone said otherwise.

Genevieve rolled her eyes at his antics. “If you don’t spend enough time on this, she will give you an easy fifty. That will bring down your average and universities look at that. What will you do then?”

She reached over to the table to take a sip from her water bottle.

The Smalls residence was the same layout when compared to her flat, so it didn’t take long to get familiar to it. Granted, it was more furnished and had Jonah’s gaming consoles already hooked up to use. The latter being the deciding factor of Jonah’s executive decision to procrastinate his work for another week. Usually, Jonah would pop in after school to Genevieve’s, but she had just returned from a shift at the diner and his door was cracked ajar.

Like many days, his father left for the construction site and wouldn’t be back until after dinner, and the only appliance Jonah knew how to use was a microwave. Genevieve had some food which Walter packed for her and it was more than enough to share with a growing boy. His diet was worse than hers. He could go weeks on Pop Tarts and Twizzlers from his cafeteria vending machine. Plus, he wasn’t bad company to have around. 

“Easy. Play the dead mum card. Works like a charm.” 

Genevieve spluttered the water out, coughing since it had gone down the wrong tube. 

“Jonah!”

Her jaw went slack and her eyes widened, a slight worry arose. She wasn’t well versed on the ins and outs of parenting—she preferred to see him as a younger sibling— or child trauma, but even she had a hunch that there was something troubling and incredibly off about the way he had referred to the passing of his mother so nonchalantly. 

“What?” Jonah asked, dumbfounded. 

“You can’t just say stuff like that!”

“‘Course I can. You have no idea the amount of pity and sympathy they throw at your feet. At first, I despised it, because obviously I wasn’t a knocked over puppy like they were making me out to be.” His character on the screen jumped to deflect an obstacle. A triumph smile was the direct result. “But then, I was like what the hell, you know? Like if it’s there already, why not play my cards right and score some sort of advantage from it?”

Genevieve blinked. She tilted her head to attempt understanding his analogy. 

“Well, that sure is one way to look at it,” she said after a short pause. “But I am not gonna let you do that to Mrs. Yu. Something tells me you’ve already done it one too many times.”

He paused his game and finally turned to her, giving her more than his side profile at last. A hellish grin split his face. “How else do you think I got a month extension on that book report and a perfect score on our last quiz?”

“I don’t know… I had assumed hard work and honesty?”

“Wake up, Gen! This is the real world and the rules are different in this game!” 

“Alright, bud, you’re cut off from this game.” Genevieve pushed the power button on the TV remote that laid limply to her right. The screen became black with a click. Jonah’s back hit the backrest of the sofa, the bouncy cushion slightly propelled him further before absorbing his weight. “Let’s at least get started on a rough copy, how does that sound?”

He groaned with his head tilted back and eyes shut. “Excruciating, torturous, maybe illegal.”  

“I’m asking you to get a start on your project, not abducting you.” His pace to grab the rest of his belongings from the table two meters away from him could rival a snail. “Now, do you have a month in mind?”

“I was thinking maybe like February, December, or even October.” He opened an empty page in his notebook and clicked the top of his mechanical pencil to give away some lead. “Because, like, it will be easy to build a character off them because they all have some sort of festive holiday thing to them.”

“That’s a great start. But don’t you think it’s a bit expected? It is a creative piece, so let’s maybe brainstorm something out of the box. Try picking a month that doesn’t have a holiday attached to it.”

He sighed deeply through his nose. The thought of putting in a smidge bit of effort was like pulling teeth.

Jonah had started to doodle in the margins. He drew three tallies, evenly spread, and added another row of them. He then connected them in a way which Genevieve recognizes to be the symbol on a superhero’s chest. 

“August?” 

Genevieve swallowed a bug.

“Why did you pick that? What significance does it have to you?” Genevieve doesn’t miss a beat, it aided to mask her surprise. 

“Well, I don’t know!” He throws his hands up exasperatedly. “You said pick one, so I did.” He pointed out, his tone reminded Genevieve of how a middle schooler says “duh”. 

“Come on. Think a bit.” 

“It’s like... sort of like the last month of summer and it brings in fall. Which is the season where we witness life slip away, but barely because it happens so slowly.” 

Genevieve’s heart swells for two reasons. Jonah was a bright kid, well beyond his age. It was something he hid and purposefully tried his utmost best not to let shine through. Genevieve had guessed the reason behind his reluctance was mainly because Jonah was at that age where he just wanted to fit in and not stand out like a sore thumb. But every once in a blue moon, he would slip up. When he allowed himself to think out loud, his ideas lined in a way where it wasn’t just the tip of the iceberg anymore. The depth gave away his brilliance. 

The first time Genevieve was left speechless by him was when he analyzed one of his favourite comic book characters with an intensity that put the burning sun to shame. Then again when he asked her to edit his essay on a world issue. And once more when he asked her how to approach a girl in his science class that he clearly fancied. Genevieve tried to define this tendency of his as a recurring variable in Jonah’s equation. 

In many more ways than one, August held an importance like no other to Genevieve. It was a month that was easily overlooked because it was caught in a war for attention between the summer months and upcoming winter holidays. Its propinquity to strong competition was something that made it easy to forget. If it was a person, she was sure it would be a quiet boy around her age. Probably with a penchant for befriending girls and breaking hearts so slowly that you don’t even know it’s happening. 

Genevieve hummed in agreement with Jonah. 

“Go on.”

“Let’s say if I were to go with this month, I wouldn’t focus on death because that would be something colder, like December or January or like the first snowfall.” His pencil sounded against his notebook. A string of notes were effortlessly coming together as Jonah continued. He suddenly stopped writing and his face scrunched in thought as he stared at the blank TV screen with as much focus that could convince you it was on. “I think August is knowing you’re losing someone or something without the assurance of finding them again... and letting it deliberately happen.”

“Isn’t that almost death?” Genevieve raised a brow. 

“Almost, but not quite.” He tapped his pencil to the metal like coils that ran down the side. “August is loss, parting away. You know, something along the lines of donating old clothes, a friend becoming a stranger, even placing car keys somewhere different.”

Genevieve knew exactly what he was talking about. She couldn’t really describe the feeling of losing a friend in words with sharp precision. It was the same as repeating a word again and again until it came to the point you deluded yourself into thinking it belongs to another language completely.  

Jonah peered up, awaiting a response or another prompt to further his development. Instead, Genevieve smiled sadly and shakes her head. 

“What?!”

“Nothing.” She laughed softly, a bit winded.

There was just something about him that was light years ahead. Something so pure and good and applaudable that made you think about the character that so many adults lacked and how it was sitting in front of you in a corked up bottle of a preteen boy. He had lost his mother, his father wasn’t around, he didn’t have many friends at school, and he picked the month of August. He had hit the nail on what it was so eloquently that Genevieve could burst into tears. But she refrained, instead opted to narrow her eyes jokingly his way.

“You’re just too smart for your own good, is all.”

That night she went to sleep thinking about August.

How he probably wore wrinkled shirts so effortlessly, with his hair in a gentle disarray. People would make a note to comment on his ridiculously long eyelashes, but she favoured his eyes. They were round and shiny and reminded her of a cloudy marble, the colour of slate. He was charming but had an air of coyness about him that was inviting and deliberate. With skin the colour of oat and a smile like rain, it came or it didn't, he was a knockout. She hypothesized the variable that contributed to his allure had less to do with his looks and more with how he made you feel. 

He made you feel wanted, he made you feel like you were someone. 

***

October 31, 2016

It didn’t take long for Genevieve to spot him, his back was slouched against the red brick wall of a tall building. A pair of old wayfarers sat on the bridge of his nose and his arms pretzeled over his chest easily. His jaw went slack then tight, this pattern repeated like clockwork until Genevieve got close enough to notice he was working a piece of gum lazily. With his head tilted to the sky and one leg crossed over the other, he was imitating textbook boredom. 

“Do you have it?” Dried leaves crunched beneath the sole of his boots as he unravelled his legs and stood up straighter than before as Genevieve’s figure approached near. She could tell he was raising his brows, but they didn’t make an appearance, still hidden behind his frames.

“Yeah.” Genevieve dipped her index finger and thumb to the front right side pocket of her jeans. It took some wiggling to pluck out a piece of metal, smooth on one side and teeth jagged on the other. The metal was warm when dropped into his open palm. “Why the sudden need for it? Have you finally taken up my advice on actually locking your doors yet?”

It was natural for him to give Genevieve a spare key, a strategy that had served him well on multiple occasions. He had lost his more than once within the span of the first two months of getting his flat. This habit had come to a point that recovery was not an option; he preferred to keep his door unlocked anyway. Genevieve pointed out it was a safety hazard, but he liked to call it being efficient. In between locking himself out or forgetting his own key, Genevieve was a dependable solution.

“Not quite, don’t get too ahead of yourself.” She had seen his long black eyelashes hit the inside of his sunglasses, a clear indicator of him rolling his eyes. “I need it for a friend. He doesn’t have a place to stay for a while, and I offered the couch. Are you done with your lectures for the day?”

“I’m afraid not. Got one more and I’m free,” Genevieve sighed defeatedly. She shifted her bag from her right shoulder to the left. Today, she only had her laptop and one textbook, but the strap of her bag still created red dents on her shoulders from the weight. “Did you end up going to your tutorial?”

He gave her a look that was enough of an answer. His glasses rose on his face as a result of him scrunching his nose up in disgust. The tips of his mouth pulled downwards as sourness glazed his features. 

“If it’s before noon, I’m not going; you know this, Genny.” He rubbed his nose with the back of his finger. “Can I tempt you to skip by offering the first round at The Cabinet?”

“It’s like…” Genevieve glanced at her wrist watch. “One.”

“I’m not hearing a no.” He grinned, a smile pressed deeply into his face. “Come on, Gen! You’ll get to meet my pal too. I think you’ll get along really well. And Ted is offering half off today. It’s a win-win. What could be more important than good company?”

“Dynamic Systems Differential Equations, unfortunately.” The course name was a mouthful and her dull tone was enough insight into what it was like.

“That sounds like a migraine.”

“Oh, you don’t know the half of it.” She laughed sans humour already picturing the formulas needed for her practice problems. “Speaking of migraines, what are we doing as costumes for Hannah Morton’s party?”

He squinted his eyes and paused for a moment. Migraine Morton was a nickname that stuck onto the bottom of your sneaker like chewing gum. “Is that tonight?” 

“Well it is the thirty-first of October.” Her arms stretched to gesture towards the building she had exited from. “Do the carved pumpkins and the stick on ghost figures not make that obvious enough?”

“Fuck, I don’t know.” He winced in reply to her previous question. A fingernail scratched at the corner of his forehead. “I was thinking of piggybacking off whatever you’re dressed as.”

Genevieve’s brows creased and her head tilted. “What do you mean?” 

“If you’re Frankenstein, I’ll be the doctor.” He pointed to Genevieve and then to himself. “Bonnie, Clyde. Sherlock, Watson.” 

“You want to go coordinating? Isn’t that a bit…”

“What?” He prompted with a laugh spluttering from his lips. It was fresh and bright, and Genevieve didn’t know exactly when it would stop sounding like this. He had amusement glittering in his gaze, there was a youthfulness about him that was so prominent and bold. He leaned closer. “Are you too cool to go coordinating now? Don’t tell me you can’t sit beside me at the lunch table too.”

It was ironic because they both knew Genevieve had always chose him to split her fruit roll-up candy since pre-school. In return, he would never pick up the red smarties whenever they shared a pack because those were her favourite, despite the number of times you told her the colour doesn’t affect the taste. 

“I don’t know, a bit coupley? I mean, it worked well when we were eight. Would you think Hannah would mind?” 

To this, he scoffed.

“Of course not, don’t be ridiculous. Why would she?”

“She’s clearly into you, like a lot, and I don’t want to get in the middle of that. And I hear she’s going around saying that she’s your girlfriend.”

He closed his eyes gently and breathes out a sigh. “She’s not my—”

“I know that! You know that! But does she?” 

His phone buzzed and the question hung in the air until his fingers stopped their dance on the screen. He looked over her shoulder as if waiting for someone. 

“Doesn’t matter, she will soon enough.” He shrugged, his voice was distracted and far away. And that was one thing about him that Genevieve couldn’t shake off no matter how hard she tried. He broke hearts knowingly, and did it anyway. “What time do you want me to come pick you up?”

“I’m done with class at five. I’ll have to stop by Party City at six, then do my modules so that will take me till nine, then I—” Rolling tires sounded loudly against the pavement as they approached behind her. The closer they got, the less time she had to finish her train of thought. The radio was a few notches down from its max setting.

“Be ready at nine. No later.” He gripped her shoulders with both hands, brought her close and pressed a messy kiss against her hair. He smelled of cigarettes and toothpaste and beer. 

“No, I won’t be, I have to do my laundry and—”

“Great. Sounds good. I’ll see you then.” 

And he was gone. He opened and shut the passenger side of the beat up Honda Civic in two seconds. The driver was familiar to Genevieve, it was another blonde, not Hannah, with thick eyeliner. She was a regular turn up at every monotonous party thrown each weekend. She had seen her get too close to him on more than one instance. He convinced Genevieve to poke in at a few, but the scene was like a broken record and her lack of interest dwindled in them too quickly.

It once even prompted her to bring her textbook to do practice problems to keep her from falling asleep as drunk students lit up a joint around her. Every once in a while he would trap grey smoke in his cheeks and blow it directly on her face to elicit a scowl, something he found beyond hilarious when his inhibitions weren’t intact. 

The girl’s hair was knotted and she had a less than pleased demeanour, probably nursing a hangover of her own. She stomped her foot down on the gas. He didn’t even have his seatbelt done before their bodies lurched backwards and the car zoomed out from the parking lot of the mathematical sciences department building. The radio became only a faint sound away the longer Genevieve stood there. 

By the time she got to Party City, the student working behind the counter gave her an apologetic look. All the decent costumes were sold out. He led her to the back of the store where the remaining costumes were kept. Being a university student meant she couldn’t break the bank for something so trivial. In the plastic bin lied a pair of fangs and a deflated witches hat that had a tear near the rim. There were masks, but she would be better off by taking a paintbrush to her face. 

She sighed deeply, her lips pursing in thought. It was obvious her plans of coordinating were a dream far away. That was until she turned around. 

A long hat cowered in the corner. It had thick red and white stripes, she pictured it with eyeliner drawn whiskers and a cat ear headband from last year. Maybe even a red bow around her neck. What really sealed the deal for her was the red shirt hung on a hanger right above it. It had a white circle right in the dead centre. The font within the circle was a recognizable outfit from a famous children’s book character. Bonnie and Clyde, Sherlock and Watson, and now Cat in the Hat and Thing 1.

The relief that came along with not trying to maneuver creating an outfit at home was enough to get Genevieve to run to the till. Arts and crafts were not her strongest suits.

The same guy’s eyebrows shot up, surprised at her quick decision making. He shut his latest issue of Men’s Healthy Living and leaned his weight off his elbow. He scanned the items and Genevieve handed him the crisp bill. Before he could finalize the sale, Genevieve thought back to the couch friend that would be accompanying them tonight. Did he have a costume? Inferring from the fact that he didn’t have a roof of his own, a lousy Halloween costume was the least of his worries. But Genevieve found her feet trailing back towards the shop and grabbing the shirt that said Thing 2. The guy added it to her final bill and packed her belongings in a black plastic bag. 

He was late and Genevieve was thankful that her laundry was dry and folded neatly. 

---

© 2019 almondharry All Rights Reserved

Okay, I think I’m done introducing the main characters. We have quite the cast list, don’t we?

Let me know what u think! I’d love to hear your favourite parts and predictions!

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Thank you so much to my wonderful betas @adoremp3 @haaaaaaarrry @drivingmekiwi @at-least-im-1 Ayesha and Hamna! Without them, this would be a jumble of fucked up grammar bc I write at 3am. If you want to beta, shoot me a message!

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[hopelessromanticspoonie]

To Keep You Safe

Title: We wear red so they don’t see us bleed

Chapter: 5/?

Author:  hopeless_romantic_spoonie

Summary:  Life as the assistant to Tony Stark was busy, but boring. All of that changed when I touched something I shouldn’t have and woke up with strange new abilities. If I thought that trying to figure out my new place in life as an Avenger was tough, I had no idea what was in store for me once I ran into the frustrating God of Mischief, Loki.

Rating: E (later on)

Notes: Friendly reminder that this is un-Beta’d, so please excuse any typos or grammatical errors I no doubt missed during revisions.

Also on Ao3 here :)

Warnings for this chapter: Blood, language, and violence

~

After our talk, to his credit, Loki did give me a wide berth. For the next several weeks of life on the Compound, I trained and practiced with Natasha and Wanda, hung out with Thor and Sam, and watched TV with Steve without a single confrontation–let alone sighting. The Trickster God had to have been using whatever abilities he normally employed to keep tabs on everyone to steer clear of me. And that was one hundred percent peachy-keen in my book.

Tony and Bruce finally finished their extensive testing on all things me. It was decided that the only powers the mystery box gave me were geokinesis and an increased healing rate. When I asked for a reason why this happened, I was given some medical mumbo jumbo that instantly turned my brain to mush. Long story short, they didn’t know what the box had been, only what it had done to me, and it wasn’t going away. This was my new normal.

The knowledge that this wasn’t going away was one hell of a motivator to get a better handle on everything. And because of that, my grasp on my powers improved. I could control more than one object at a time, and it didn’t drain me physically nearly as much as it did in the beginning. Nor did it require such an emotional toll. I could draw on them without bringing forth the full scope of emotional upheaval as before, although that did seem to help. There was still so much work to do, but I was getting there. Slowly but surely.

As for my physical abilities, those lessons were kicking my ass just as much as I had anticipated. I wasn’t super strong like Steve or Thor, so I had to be more thoughtful and strategic when fighting. Brute force wasn’t going to work when I was only five and a half feet tall and preferred cookies to carrots. Natasha worked on teaching me various martial art techniques that relied more on striking effectively than hammering away at my opponent with my fists. It made sense but that didn’t mean it wasn’t hard as hell. I limped away from our training sessions covered in bruises and nursing strained muscles more often than not. Thank goodness for accelerated healing. I needed it to keep up with the grueling sparring sessions.

~~~

Flashing red lights and F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s voice echoing throughout the entire Compound jerked me out of my exhaustion-induced sleep. “All Avengers report to the Quinjet immediately. All Avengers, gather your gear and report to the Quinjet immediately.”

I lurched out of bed and ran to my closet, throwing on a pair of dark jeans and a thick long-sleeved t-shirt. I didn’t have a custom suit like everyone else, but this seemed like it would do for whatever I would tackle. I shoved a sturdy pair of boots on my feet and I was barreling out the door.

Natasha was just leaving her room, already fully dressed and ready to kick ass. We both sprinted down the stairs and through the building, crossing the lawn into the hangar. Thor, Bruce, and Captain were all running inside the jet, followed by Natasha. Tony was poised at the edge of the ramp to get inside, looking anxious as he waved people in. When I tried to rush passed him he put his arm across my chest, barring my entrance.

“No can do, Poison Ivy. You’re not ready,” he stated, leaving no room for argument.

Not that I wouldn’t try.

“But what if I-?

“Nope. You stay here with Rock of Ages. F.R.I.D.A.Y. will keep you updated. You’d be a liability. We can’t risk it.” The visor over his face retracted into the suit, allowing him to level me with a hard stare. He didn’t even glance at Vision flying into the jet while holding Wanda securely in his arms.

“Get back. You’ll get burned,” he said more softly, a paternal concern twisting his lips into a frown. He pushed me away from the ramp and jogged inside, closing it behind him.

I had no choice but to back away out of the hangar, watching uselessly as the Quinjet started up and flew through an invisible opening in the force field surrounding the Compound. Once it was gone I pulled out my phone, checking the time. At only four in the morning, it was going to be a long day if all I did was sit around and wait for them to come back.

After heading back into my room and changing from jeans and boots into athletic shorts and tennis shoes, I headed to the gym. If I wasn’t ready for this mission I was going to be ready for the next one. Even if I had to spend hours taking out my frustration and anxiety on a punching dummy until my knuckles bled.

During a break around noon, I chugged water and wiped the sweat from my brow. “F.R.I.D.A.Y., any news?” I panted.

“Sorry, Jen. All I can say is that they made it to their destination and everyone is still alive,” she responded, somehow managing to sound remorseful even as a computer program.

I snarled in frustration and threw down the now empty water bottle, punishing the practice dummy in front of me an elbow to the face. Several hours of doing my best to beat the living daylights out of the dummy and it was no worse for the wear, while the soreness and exhaustion in my limbs weighed them down considerably. But it was this or stare at the TV or wall in the living room distractedly as my mind raced with all the things that could go wrong for them on this sudden mission, and this at least wore me out enough so that I might be able to sleep later.

“Perimeter breach. Perimeter breach. One helicopter on the main lawn,” F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s voice rang out through the compound and my phone in my pocket as red lights flashed throughout the Compound.

Just as I did that morning, I dropped what I was doing and sprang into action--despite my protesting muscles.

“Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit,” I cursed, stopping short just outside the building. A sleek black helicopter was hovering over the middle of the Compound with four men dressed in black protective gear descending from the sides on ropes. As I watched in shock, two more helicopters came into view and began depositing their payloads of terrifying men as well.

As soon as their feet hit the ground, they raised impressive-looking guns into their sightlines and ran toward the main building. Right at me.

Ah hell.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y., I could use some backup,” I grunted, crouching down behind a bush and looking around to see what I had nearby I could use as weapons. Some trees, basketball sized rocks and a giant decorative boulder were all I could see. Awesome.

“The team is still off-base, Jen,” she replied, her voice muffled from my phone in my back pocket. Super awesome.

It was a long shot, but I had to ask her anyway. “What about Loki?”

“He is handling the intruders on the West side of the Compound, Jen. Several groups have come in on foot.”

Loki was helping? What in the world was that about? Maybe it was just a chance to do something, wreak some havoc, as he had to be bored as hell cooped up here without an outlet. If his boredom and need for mayhem was keeping more men off of my back, I’d take it.

But, that still left the group in front of me for me to handle on my own. I’d never fought anyone, not really. Sparring with Nat and training with Wanda did not live up to this experience at all in terms of preparedness. I was the end of the line, though, so I had to try my best. Gritting my teeth, I focused on the ground, lifting my arms and pulling up as much dirt and debris from the grass as I could. The men slowed their advance at the peculiar sight, but only just enough to look at one another briefly before continuing. With a shout I sent the debris flying at them, hoping to blind them temporarily while I figured out what the heck I was supposed to do next. My weak plan wasn’t the most effective. I was disheartened as they crept on even as they blinked dirt from their eyes.

Plan B. I curled my fingers inward and ripped several thin branches from the tree nearest to myself. Aiming the sharp, broken ends at the men, I flicked my fingers outward and sent them flying with as much oomph as I could muster. Only one went through the neck of a man and sent him bleeding and thrashing to the ground. The rest hit their helmets or thick kevlar vests like they were nothing.

“I’m so screwed,” I muttered. My aim still wasn’t the best with multiple projectiles, and that was without having spent the morning taking out my frustrations in the gym. The adrenaline rushing through me could only do so much to compensate, and that wasn’t going to last forever.

The closest to me grabbed something off of his belt and threw it at the building behind me. I whipped my head around, tracking the beeping with my eyes to get a better look at what had been thrown. Having never seen one in real life, my brain stuttered over what it was for half a second. They had grenades?!

My feet carried me away from the building before I had made the conscious decision to move, propelling me as fast as possible from the explosive. It just wasn’t quite fast enough. The shockwave battered against me, followed by tiny pricks of pain all over the back of my body as white-hot glass embedded itself in my unprotected skin. The cry that tore through my lips was almost silent to my ringing ears, but it was enough to draw the attention of the men, who rained bullets down on me.

No time to think or run, I brought a large, decorative stone in front of me like a shield. I saw dust particles and chunks of rock fall to the ground and I struggled to keep it between me and the men. My teeth ground together and all the muscles in my body strained as I directed all of the energy that constantly coursed through me at holding up the massive weight while also slowly backing away from them. I just needed to get inside the building. I could take them out one at a time if I could get more cover. Maybe.

As soon as I was close enough to the now blown-out glass wall, I shoved my hands and, consequently, the boulder at two of the men and dashed inside, slamming my back into a concrete wall for cover and ignoring the wave of pain it brought to the new wounds I had just gotten. Thank goodness for modern minimalist architecture and adrenaline.

I took a few deep breaths and got to my knees, turning around to poke my head out to see who was left. Two pairs of legs were still beneath the human-sized boulder I had thrown, so that just left nine baddies for me to deal with. Going for broke and hoping that this was something I could do, I reached out towards a tree near the back of the group. I could feel the glowing life-force of it, from the tips of the branches to the roots.

“Here goes nothing,” I growled, directing my energy to the roots, willing them to grow. I reached out and pulled hard, and for my efforts, I saw the thick dark roots burst from the ground and race toward one of the men. They tangled around his ankles as I twisted my fingers in a circle, pulling him down and wrapping around his body. He panicked and fired his weapon wildly, trying to shoot the roots off of him, but only succeeded in hitting the stomach of one of his buddies. I urged the roots to wrap around his chest and neck, and the shooting stopped abruptly.

In the distraction of flexing my newfound powers, I failed to notice the man coming up around the wall until just before he shot. I ducked my head and the bullet lodged itself into the concrete inches from my ear, sending grit flying into my eyes. I wildly turned, flailing desperately and pulling another stone from outside to slam into the back of his unprotected neck.

As the man fell, I saw the muzzle of his gun flash before white-hot agony exploded in my shoulder.

In the movies, when someone gets stabbed or shot, usually they'll fly back dramatically and scream. They have a few seconds to mutter some last words and then it's over. Turns out getting shot isn't like the movies. I didn't fly back several feet, soaring through the air to sprawl ungainly onto the floor. I sank to sit on my heels, blinking harshly as my brain attempted to process the worst pain I'd ever experienced as it radiated from my shoulder. My hand shot up to cover the wound, trying to stem the flow of blood as it pulsed out of my body in time with my staccato heartbeat. It took several tries to take a deep breath, the action seemingly doing more harm than good as the movement tugged on my shoulder.

Gotta focus. I had to get my head in the game. The remaining seven bad guys were still coming, and fast. It didn’t matter that I was injured to them. They weren’t going to stop to give me a time out to get patched up, so I just had to keep going. My best bet on stopping them relied on my being able to see them which unfortunately meant sticking my head out of cover. I clenched my teeth as I got to my feet and let out a guttural battle cry as I turned around to face them.

I was most definitely going to die today, but when my friends returned and watched the footage, I didn’t want them to see me cowering in fear until one of them put a bullet in my brain. That wasn’t what being an Avenger was about. It was about fighting until the last breath, and taking down as many of these bastards as I could along the way. Sorry, guys. Sorry, Tony.

Heads turned in my direction, guns following suit. With one hand busy gripping my bullet wound, the other curled into a fist as I focused on bringing every single stone on the Compound lawn levitating in the air.

“Get down!” Loki shouted, running from the opposite side of the building toward me, looking the battle-hardened warrior in his leather armor. An invisible force knocked me to the ground with such force that the back of my head bounced against the tile floor.

And then everything became a blur.

Loki screaming in rage.

Deafening tearing and ripping sounds.

Bullets flying and smashing into the wall.

Warm blood matting my hair and pooling in the hollows of my neck.

Blood-curdling screams cutting off suddenly.

A pale, unfocused face.

Excruciating pain as I was jostled into strong arms.

Is this what dying feels like?

The scent of iron and sweat and leather and spice.

“I am not allowing you to die, damn it!”

And then darkness swallowed me whole.

~~~

A flurry of voices pulled me from the blissful, painless darkness.

“It’s been three days.”

“I know that. Her vitals are stable. You gotta give her time.”

“That’s not good enough!”

“What else can we do?”

I took stock of my body with my eyes closed. My limbs were heavy on the soft surface that I rested on, probably a bed. Besides the voices, a steady beeping that matched the painful drumbeat in my head. Probably a heart monitor, which meant that I was in some sort of a hospital. Itching fire burned on my shoulder, and I blamed that for the real reason why I had woken up. It was impossible to ignore, just like the loud voices echoing around the room.

“You can stop shouting in my room, for starters,” I croaked, my voice dry and scratchy from disuse. God, I sounded weak.

I peeled my eyes open only to immediately close them against the bright lights above me. Trying again, I opened them just enough to squint at my surroundings. I’d landed myself in the infirmary of the Compound once again. Not a hospital, but I had been close enough. A frazzled Tony, Natasha, and Thor appeared to be the culprits for the shouting match I’d just heard.

“If you’re going to shout, at least give me some more pain meds so I can sleep through it,” I grumbled, hoping that the bad attempt at humor would ease some of the anxiety from their faces as I tried to sit up in the bed, only to fall back down with a gasp as soon as I put weight on my shoulder. The shock of pain was enough to tell me that that was a very bad idea right now.

All three rushed over to me at once. Thor took my right hand carefully, mindful of the IV connected to the back of it, and Natasha took the left. Tony moved behind my bed only to reappear with a syringe full of unknown liquid that he injected into the IV line. Within moments a weight smothered the pain and pulled a sigh of relief from deep within me. Ahh, pain meds.

“Milady, I am so glad to see you awake,” Thor said softly, his thumb lightly stroking the backs of my fingers as he smiled down at me.

“We gotta work on your observation skills,” Nat teased, gesturing to my shoulder and giving me a thin smile.

“Pebbles, I thought I told you not to scare me like this,” Tony chided me, standing at my feet. His hands rested on my blanket-covered ankles, clutching them like I was going to run out of the room and get shot up again. That wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. Once was enough for me.

“What happened?” I directed my quiet question at Tony, knowing he would have the most forthright answer of the bunch.

“We have been searching for these six rocks, called Infinity Stones. That’s what Vision has in his head, the Mind Stone. This guy called Thanos is trying to get all of them together. Reindeer Games says that he wants to rule the world with it, wipe out half of everything in existence. So, we’ve been trying to track them down,” he said, brow furrowed. “We’ve already destroyed one, well, Wanda did. The Mind Stone. Thor stole it from some nut job on another planet months ago. The Space Stone was in the Tesseract, which Loki had. When he and Thor escaped Ragnarok, Loki brought it back as a peace offering. So that’s one’s gone, too. F.R.I.D.A.Y. is programmed to look for certain… anomalies that might be one of the remaining stones being used. She’s found one in New York City, but the wizard that is currently using it won’t give it up. That’s a work in progress. Something sketchy was happening in New York City, and that was the alert that she gave us. It was Thanos, with the Soul Stone, trying to get the other stone from the wizard. We managed to get it from him. Took a few licks, Steve broke an arm and Wanda a leg, but it’s destroyed now. We’re still looking for the Power Stone and the Reality Stone,” he rambled, exhaustion lining his face as he recalled the events he had rattled off.

“That’s, um, a lot to take in,” I replied, my thoughts muddled by the glorious meds I had been given. That was a lot to unpack, and I wasn’t in any state to even try to do that. It could wait for another day.

“Yeah, so, anyway, we were off fighting Grimace when those assholes from Hydra attacked here. We didn’t even know about it until we got back onto the jet and F.R.I.D.A.Y. let us know. We booked it as fast as we could, but it had been almost a whole day since…” he trailed off, swallowing thickly and gripping my ankles just a little tighter as he shifted his gaze to my blanket-covered knees.

Natasha chimed in, “Tony was able to stream a live feed from F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s cameras. We saw everything.”

“You fought valiantly against the attackers. Loki took up the battle after you had fallen, finishing it in your stead,” Thor added, his voice clear and proud. Whether it was for me or his brother, that was to be determined. I was too exhausted to worry too much.

Tony nodded to Thor and Natasha in silent thanks. “Standing up like some action hero was a dumbass move, by the way,” he paused, staring me down until I felt thoroughly chewed out.

Only after I looked appropriately shamed for my actions did he continue, “Him knocking you on your ass gave you that nasty goose egg on the back of your head. He took out the rest of the Hydra men before getting you up here. I’m not sure what voodoo he did, but he got the bullet out of your shoulder and slowed the bleeding until the doctors I called could get here,” he finished, taking a deep breath.

“By the time we arrived, you were sound asleep and all patched up. Loki hadn’t left your side the whole time,” Nat added, her brow raised.

A yawn escaped from my mouth without warning and I nodded through it, pulling my hand away from her to at least cover my gaping maw. “Loki saved me?” I asked on the tail-end of the huge yawn.

“If it weren’t for Loki, you would be through the gates of Valhalla by now, Milady,” Thor whispered, his eyes grave as they met mine.

Tony let go of me and walked to my side, nudging Nat out of the way so he could rest the back of his hand on my forehead. “You feeling okay?” he asked, changing the subject abruptly.

The change of subject was not unwelcome. The pain meds seemed to spread like molasses throughout my brain, muddling my already scattered and confused thoughts. There were magical stones that some dude named Thanos wanted to use to destroy half of everything? And the Avengers had been going after them all of this time without my knowledge? How long had these missions been going on where I thought one thing was happening and it was something entirely different? And there was no way in Hell would Loki ever save my life. I was a thorn in his side that made his time stuck in this compound a thousand times worse. No one would’ve blamed him if he’d ‘forgotten’ in the heat of battle to push me into cover, letting Hydra riddle me with bullets.

“Uh, yeah, totally. I could go dancing I feel so great,” I muttered sarcastically, pulling myself out of my thoughts and into the room filled with my friends who watched me with concern.

“It’s on, Jen,” Nat said, winking at me from the edge of my bed.

“Let’s give her some space to rest up, guys,” Tony said, flipping his hand around on my forehead and rubbing it lightly with his thumb before stepping away.

Natasha and Thor both nodded to me with a smile before they left the room, the door whirring shut behind them. Tony gave me a final once-over and then left, calling out before the door closed, “The team left some flowers for you on the bedside table. Don’t kill anyone with them!”

After smiling at the expensive-looking glass vase of roses, I snuggled further into the soft sheets and fell into a deep, drug-induced sleep.

~~~

A cool hand on the side of my head woke me suddenly. My eyes tore open and my left hand shot out, grabbing the attacker before they could do me any harm.

“Loki,” I whispered, startled to see the Asgardian Prince at my bedside. What was he doing here?

“If you’d release my hand, I can resume checking your head wound,” he said flatly.

It was hard to grasp, the annoyed god at my bedside in casual black slacks and a white button-down shirt, waiting for me to let him go when he could easily remove himself from my grip. “Oh.” I sheepishly let go of him, my hand falling to rest at my side.

He maintained eye contact with me for a moment, his brow furrowed as he searched my eyes before looking back at the back of my head. His long fingers moved to my jaw, tugging it away from him so he could get a better look at the injury. I felt them move to probe it gently, pausing whenever I let out a hiss of pain.

“I need to change the bandage again.” His voice was firm but gentle. His tone alone threw me for a loop. It was so odd to hear him speaking cordially to me when I was used to him hissing like a snake or shouting up a storm.

As I busied himself behind me, I searched for the remote that typically accompanies a hospital bed. Finally finding it tucked beneath my leg, I used it to slowly move the automatic bed so I was sitting up. By the time I was finished Loki had come to the other side of the bed with a syringe filled with clear liquid. His piercing green eyes met mine once again as he hesitated only briefly before injecting it into my IV. Had he been waiting for me to stop him? The familiar weight of pain medication flooded my body, revealing what he had done moments before without my prompting.

He put down the syringe onto the table beside my flowers. Only now, instead of the single vase waiting for me, there was another. A single sunflower sat in a tall elegant black and gold vase. I looked back to Loki with a furrowed brow, watching him place bandages, gauze, and alcohol next to the new gift.

Finally, unable to hold back my confusion any longer, I blurted out, “Why are you helping me, Loki?”

“Because you are injured. I’ve taken over this aspect of your care since you arrived.” He said it so matter of factly it was almost an insult. As if there was no question that he wouldn’t be doing such a selfless act and he was offended that I would think he’d act differently.

“One of the others could handle this. Why are you helping me,” I pressed.

He sighed heavily and refused to reply, instead reaching out and placing his fingertips on either side of my face to tilt my head forwards off of the pillow. He moved out of my line of sight for a brief moment and I heard water running before he returned to lean over me, his chest inches from my face. This close, I was able to smell the strong spicy and masculine scent that I was quickly beginning to recognize as distinctly him. A warm, damp compress was pressed to the back of my head.

“Some blood soaked through the bandage into your hair. I need to cleanse it before I can remove the bandage.” He smoothed the damp cloth over my head again and again, the pain meds he had given me doing their job to take away the pain and leave only pressure in its wake.

The bloody rag was tossed unceremoniously into a hamper across the room, and then he grabbed the alcohol and gauze next. Some part of my mind screamed that I shouldn’t be letting him do this, that he was going to turn around any second and wrap those long fingers around my throat to finish me off, but a more rational part of me shut that down. If he was going to kill me, there would be no sense in saving my life in the first place.

And there wasn’t any hatred or malice in his gaze as I strained my eyes to look up to him without moving my head. To be completely honest, I couldn’t glean any emotion from his impassive face as he worked over me. Whatever he had to be feeling was currently locked away behind stony eyes and a firmly-set mouth.

“I’ve been watching you, Jennifer. As you train with the Witch and the Widow. Both will throw you to the ground repeatedly, besting you, and you stand right up and try again. You never give up. You clean up after the others when they forget without expecting gratitude or repayment. You set out the protein powder for the Widow and Captain each night. You explain the flavors of the food you’re eating to Vision. When they left you behind three days ago, instead of pouting like a child, you took to bettering yourself.” As he spoke he tended to the large gash on the back of my head, his soothing cool touch at odds with the confusion that littered his own words. As if I were some puzzle that he couldn’t piece together with just my odd actions as a guide.

How long had he been watching me to notice these things? And when had he noticed them? I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of him in weeks. He may as well have disappeared off the planet for all that I had encountered him. And had he taken the time to notice these behaviors, or had they simply been a byproduct of his observant nature? Was I a puzzle to him that he must observe to find out, or did he watch everybody that carefully? And how the hell had I not noticed him noticing this?

“And, I need to make amends,” he added, voice so low that I almost didn’t hear it through my scattered thoughts.

His deft fingers left my skin and he placed the remnants of the medical supplies on the table. I took it as a sign that I could move my head and search his face more comfortably, trying to figure out where all of this was coming from. This was not the Loki that I knew. The Loki that I knew would be mocking me for my injuries, possibly prodding my wound to watch me squirm, if he was even here at all. Was this him trying to make things right, to 'make amends' as he had called it? Surely I, the puny mortal, wasn't worth the effort. His actions said otherwise.

He clenched his jaw, meeting my curious gaze with his own. “You knew that you were no match for those men, but you fought them anyway. Why?” Another piece of the puzzle that he couldn’t find a place for.

I swallowed thickly, flashes of the encounters playing through my mind. I killed those men. My heart sped up and tears burned in my eyes despite my clenching them shut. My lungs were unable to hold onto the air from my quick, shallow breaths as their deaths flashed through my mind. Sending an improvised spear through a man’s neck. Crushing a man to death with tree roots. Doing the same to two more with the decorative boulder. Hitting the one who shot me with a rock at the base of his skull. I hadn’t seen him die, but it had hit too hard for him to survive that.

I killed them. I killed them. I’m a murderer.

“Breathe, little one. Breathe, " Loki soothed, his voice velvet as it washed over me.

The bed pitched as he perched himself on it by my hip, and I heard his fingers snapping to get my attention. But it wasn’t loud enough, wasn’t enough to get me to open my eyes and stop the flood of images that refused to leave my mind’s eye.

“If you hadn’t have done what you were forced to do, you would be dead,” he assured me, his voice steady and sure as he tried to pull me out of my ever-increasing panic attack.

I would’ve died either way, so was killing them something I should’ve done? I lowered my chin to my chest, feeling lightheaded as I struggled to take in enough air. My whole body trembled and I pulled my knees to my chest beneath the blankets, wrapping my good arm around them to hold them to me. The onslaught of death paraded through my mind unbidden and unrelenting.

“Look at me,” he commanded. His cool hand cupped my chin, lifting my face so that he could see me more clearly. His thumb brushed against my cheek, wiping away the tears that I hadn't even realized had escaped. But it was as if I lost the ability to open my eyes, his attempts be damned. I couldn’t do it even though I so desperately wanted to.

His other hand reached out and settled onto my knee, and it was so startling that I ripped open my eyes and looked at him. Concern softened his features, at odds the harshness of his tone. “They forced your hand. You are not a murderer."

I couldn’t think of anything to say to that, so I chose silence as I focused on him. He was breathing more forcefully than normal, in through his nose and out through his mouth, and I copied him. We stayed that way for several moments, him showing me how to breathe through my panic and me following his lead. Slowly, the lightheadedness lessened enough so that I could focus. The terrible visions in my head were replaced with the piercing green eyes that held me captive.

Satisfied that I was calming down, he asked again, “Now, answer me this: Why did you fight those men when you knew you were going to lose?”

I looked away to his hand on my knee, the long fingers completely covering it even beneath the thickness of several blankets. It was easier to gather my thoughts without having to watch his reaction to them.

What had I been thinking?

“I… I knew I was the last line of defense. F.R.I.D.A.Y. said I was on my own. Was I supposed to just let them do whatever shitty thing they came to do? Guys busting through Tony’s forcefield in battle gear and assault rifles aren’t showing up to ask for a cup of sugar. If I hadn’t have done anything, they would have found me and killed me anyway. I was dead either way, but maybe I could stop enough of them that you could take the rest out if you came to help.” I ran my hand over my face, dislodging his grip from my chin in the process. “I-I didn’t mean to kill them, but I did mean to stop them. And then after that asshole shot me, I was one hundred percent dead anyway. I was bleeding out. So I might as well take as many out as I could before I go,” I shrugged, wincing at the discomfort the movement brought to my shoulder, even with the haze of medication.

“That reeks of the same self-sacrificing hero act that my brother and his troupe of morons put on. That was foolish and unnecessary,” he scolded.

I offered him nothing more than another shrug, but only of my uninjured shoulder, for his reprimand. It probably was, in his mind, but that didn't mean that I agreed.

“Did you not think I would come to your aid?” Loki asked, the smallest expression of hurt registering on his face as he brought attention to its cause.

“The last time we talked you held a knife to my throat, and then I did the same to you. Kinda. It was a tree branch, but it still counts. Why would you help me? If they had finished the job then you’d have a much easier life here. You wouldn’t have to avoid me and constantly worry about Thor breaking your face whenever I throw a fit. You could skulk around at night or on the roof without running into me. I’m just in your way.”

A muscle in Loki’s jaw ticked at my words, but he didn’t say anything he as considered them. The silence was almost more painful than the hole in my shoulder. I idly reached up to scratch at the bandage and his hand reached up and slapped it away.

He frowned at me. “I need to redress that as well. Leave it be.”

The silence stretched on as he organized the supplies he’d need in front of him and then tugged the hem of my large hospital gown down my arm to expose my shoulder and better access the bullet wound. His spindly fingers were quick and efficient in their work of removing the bandage, cleansing the wound, and then replacing the dressings with clean ones. His steady touch coming and going from my bare skin sent my heart skittering in my chest. I didn’t allow myself to wonder why it was invoking that reaction in me, but I did allow for the luxury of watching him unnoticed.

I'd never taken the time to actually see the man tending to my wounds. Taking the time to really inspect him, I was surprised to find that he was very easy to look at. His skin was unblemished and smooth, no hint of age showing on it except for the wrinkles that appeared as he furrowed his brow or squinted his eyes to get a better look at his task. His jawline was sharp enough to cut glass, and I trailed my eyes downward to the small amount of pale chest that his unbuttoned collar revealed, not a single hair to be seen. His shirt didn't hide the lean muscles that rippled beneath his skin as he worked, and some strange part of me wondered what they would feel like if I reached out and closed the distance between us. For lack of a better, more eloquent word, he was beautiful. As if sculpted by the very gods that he proclaimed himself to be. His beauty was more delicate compared to the rugged masculinity of the men of the Avengers that I was used to associating with, but that didn't make it any less lovely to behold. Just different.

I pulled my wandering eyes back up to his, a blush betraying me and heating up my skin when I found that he had been watching me look at him. The intensity of his gaze knocked me back to my senses, and I quickly looked down at my hands as they twisted around themselves. He didn't say anything, however, keeping up the silence until he was finished and throwing away the soiled bandages in the trash across the room. With his overwhelming presence gone and his large hands off my skin, I felt the tension I had unknowingly been holding in my clenched muscles ease away and my mind clear a little more. Loki paused in front of the door with his back to me, one hand resting on the windowsill beside the door.

“One thing I’ve only recently learned from my brother is to never leave a warrior behind. Especially not one of such caliber.” He took a deep breath, his shoulders heaving with the movement. “And I’m not willing to lose anyone else.”

And then he was gone, leaving behind my favorite blood-stained rock on the windowsill.

[catalinacaraway-blog]

A Script To ConvertFlac ToMp3 W

FLAC stands for Free Lossless Audio Codec, an audio format just like MP3, but lossless, that means that audio is compressed in FLAC with none loss in quality. This group of formats records and compresses a sound in such a way as to permit preserving its precise original quality when decoding. The Tutorial presented here is obvious and really effectively completed, but for many who do not want to waste the time required for such an in depth instruction, I suggest Format Manufacturing facility, which is a free software, requiring just 2 or three clicks to function. It sounds like you've had some actually heated conversations with pretentious individuals, though, flac to mpc online sound converter I can't be certain how a lot that has coloured your opinion right here. There are vital elements that must be considered earlier than making blanket judgements in regards to the subjective quality of audio. Audio source quality, the type of music, increased availability and affordability of decent audio tools, personal listening to means ( hearing loss and many others,) and the standard of audio an individual is used to listening to. I've been accumulating numerous music tracks and OST's for some time. It is just last week that I downloaded some FLAC files that always used for preserving higher high quality. It's the first time that I encounter this type of file format and I am hesitant to play it, and when finally I do a pop out appeared telling me that the audio file is not supported. This additionally offers me an indication that it's practically impossible to play these information on different units, too. Can anybody help me discover a technique to convert FLAC to MP3? So that I could make use of the audio tracks that I've not too long ago downloaded. Any help from you is deeply appreciated. When you have an AMR file you need to open with an iPhone or different cellular device, convert it to a extra common audio format like MP3 using any of the converter packages we examined. As a result of AMR is a compressed audio format, you do not threat shedding constancy once you convert it to another lossy format. Nonetheless, don't count on the audio high quality to improve while you convert the file. For those who only have to convert a small variety of recordsdata which are less than one minute lengthy, we recommend a free program like Freemake Nevertheless, if you have multiple files that you want to convert and edit, we propose utilizing a more sturdy converter like Change or Audials as a result of they are considerably faster and make it simpler to batch convert a number of recordsdata at once. The perfect for-pay audio conversion software we tested additionally consists of simple enhancing instruments you employ to trim unwanted pauses and portions of the recording you don't need. To transform songs at the moment in your iTunes library, open the software program and discover the Preferences menu from the iTunes dropdown on a Mac or Edit dropdown on a Home windows laptop. Subsequent, click on the General tab, then discover the Import Settings in the lower part of the Preferences window. After that, http://www.audio-Transcoder.com click the dropdown next to Import Utilizing, select the format and click on OK to save that import format because the default setting. iTunes allows for batch changing, so the ultimate step is to pick out all the information you need to convert, click on the File menu, then select Convert and click on on Create MP3 Version. If you selected a different output format, it shows that format reasonably than MP3. I am actually making an attempt to playflac on iTunes to see if it wil assist multichannel rips from DTS or DVD-A. I do know you can play multichannel DTS rips ->alac on your ATV4 however I really want this to work with iTunes but I think the problem isn't just with the format, but a limitation with iTunes. Contemplating that it helps different surround formats passthrough like PCM it would not make sense to pay the licensing to be used on AppleTV but completely neglect iTunes for practically 20 years now. Equally, it's absurd that Apple still wont supportflac, a free format, presumably as a result of they need people usingalac becaus thats so bloody essential…flac is nice because it is a absolutely taggable format that performs on all platforms- except iTunes! Apple's deliberate only sport in town" schtick is de facto getting old. I then took my three flacs which were a number of track (in actual fact every was a CD recorded as one file). Audacity has a ‘detect silence' possibility which did a reasonably good job of detecting the begins of the various tracks. I had to change a number of, take away some spurious ones, and add one right firstly in two cases. I then advised audacity to export, splitting at markers. I now have particular person tracks in mp3 format. Freemake Audio Converter is far from the only Windows software The Mega Guide to Media File Conversion Instruments in Windows The Mega Information to Media File Conversion Tools in Home windows Questioning how one can best convert that media file? That is your information out of the media file jungle. We compiled the most relevant media file conversion instruments and show you easy methods to use them. Read Extra for this job, nevertheless it performs admirably, making it our primary decide. As soon as you've installed it, click the blue + Audio button within the high-left nook so as to add tracks. You possibly can choose a single track for one-off conversion, or add a complete folder for converting en masse.

SoundConverter aims to be easy to make use of, and really fast. Because of its multithreaded design, it would use as many cores as potential to hurry up the conversion. It could possibly also extract the audio from videos. is a free FLAC to MP3 converter on-line that has very good capabilities. The tool affords the conversion of a number of file formats with instant execution. The location can also be legit with a smart design. It's easy to make use of and supports each audio and video conversions. One can batch convert the information too.FLAC To MP3 Converter is a small software program product converts FLAC audio recordsdata to MP3 music shortly. You possibly can drag and drop FLAC files onto the program then simply click the Begin Changing button to start the conversion. All of the FLAC audio will likely be transformed to MP3 music within a couple of minutes, and keep the very best high quality. There are some choices that permit you to set the output MP3 bit price, price, and audio channel.

[longpatrol]

Transfer ibank to ifinance

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All of them are FDIC insured, so you don’t have to worry about safety. Here you can find the best high-yield accounts in 2022. Isolating savings, when you link your bank account to an external savings account, you can take advantage of higher interest rates and earn a higher return on capital. Why Should I Use Bank Transfers?Īs we outlined in our previous article, using multiple bank accounts is a great way to save money on fees or earn more on your investments. Keep in mind that transit time will likely delay the funds for several days. However, if your bank doesn’t allow mobile check deposits, you can also opt for direct mail. Since many traditional and online banks offer mobile check deposits, the process is actually easier than linking your accounts above. Write your name as the recipient, fill in the amount, the date, sign it – then deposit the check into your new account. Write a Personal CheckĪnother method to move money around is to write yourself a personal check. Within your banking app, look for a command that says ‘send money.’ Many users prefer this method because it is extremely user-friendly and offers a great way to move money from one bank to another. As such, in-app services like Zelle or Popmoney allow you to send money to friends, family, or external accounts without additional costs. Many traditional and online banks use third-party technology for their mobile apps.

#Transfer ibank to ifinance free

However, the process is free of charge and allows for increase privacy. Most external transfers take one or more business days to complete. If you have a PayPal account, it’s effortless to transfer money from one account to another. The process is the same as above, and you need the external accounts routing number and its username and password. If you prefer the mobile route, you can use either institution’s mobile app to set up an external transfer. While some banks charge fees to transfer money to outside institutions, many traditional and online banks allow you to move money without additional costs. Make sure you choose ‘one-time’ and not ‘recurring.’ If the test works as planned and the transfer goes smoothly, the funds should arrive in the external account within two to three business days.ĭoes Transferring Money From One Bank to Another Cost Money? Before declaring victory, send a small transfer – say $1 – to the external account to ensure everything is working fine. The point is to confirm that you actually own the external account.

#Transfer ibank to ifinance verification

The bank will ask you to input your username and password for the external account or ask verification questions to finalize the link.

Enter your username and password for the external account.

If you don’t have either, contact the external institution directly, providing the details. If using a check, it’s the first 9-digits at the bottom left. To set up the transfer, you need the ‘routing number’ for the external account.

Grab a recent bank statement or a check from the external account.

Once you find the right tab, click on ‘external transfers.’ This is used for transferring money within the bank itself.

Log into either account and look for a command that says ‘external transfers.’ You’ll also find a standard ‘transfer’ command, but that’s not what we’re looking for.

Transferring money from one account to another is as simple as linking the two bank accounts: one account acts as the sender and the receiver. We’ll break down the most effective ways to move money across institutions without incurring any fees along the way. Well, in this guide, we’ll explain just that. Once your accounts are up and running, how do you actually transfer funds from one bank to another? However, to incorporate the strategy, you have to open multiple bank accounts and use multiple institutions. The piece outlined how switching from traditional bank accounts to no-fee checking and high-yield savings accounts allows you to keep more of your money.

[xxenophanes-blog]

SEO Maturity: Evaluating Client Capabilities - Whiteboard Friday

Posted by HeatherPhysioc

Clients aren't always knowledgeable about SEO. That lack of understanding can result in roadblocks and delay the work you're trying to accomplish, but knowing your client's level of SEO maturity can help. In today's Whiteboard Friday, we welcome the brilliant Heather Physioc to expound upon the maturity models she's developed to help you diagnose your client's search maturity and remove blockers to your success.

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

What up, Moz fans? My name is Heather Physioc. I'm Director of the Discoverability Group at VML. We are in Kansas City. Global ad agency headquartered right in the middle of the map.

Today we're going to talk about how to diagnose the maturity of your SEO client. I don't mean emotional maturity. I mean maturity as it pertains to SEO capabilities, their ability to do the work, as well as their organizational search program maturity. Now a lot of times when a client signs a contract with us, we make the assumption that they're knowledgeable, they're motivated, they're bought in to do the search work.

So we go dumping all these recommendations in their lap, and we're trucking full speed ahead. But then we're surprised when we start hitting blockers and the work doesn't go live. I actually surveyed over 140 of our colleagues in the search industry, and they reported running into blockers, like low prioritization and buy-in for the work, limited technical resources for developers or budgeting for copywriters, low advocacy, high turnover, and any number of different things that stand in the way.

I didn't just ask about the problems. I asked about the solutions, and one of the tools that came out of that was the ability to diagnose the client's maturity. So a maturity model is intended to evaluate an organization's capability to continuously evolve in a practice. The point, the purpose of this is to understand where they stand today, where they want to go, and the steps it's going to take to get there.

The SEO Capabilities matrix

Let's talk about the SEO capabilities first, the technical ability to do the job.

Harmful

On the low end of the scale, a client may be engaging in spammy, outdated, or harmful SEO practices that are doing more harm than good.

Tactical

From there, they may be tactical. They're doing some super basic SEO, think title tags and meta description tags, but nothing earth-shattering is happening here, and it's not very strategic or aligned to brand goals.

Strategic

From there, the brand moves into the strategic phase. They're starting to align the work to goals. They're starting to become a little more search savvy. They're getting beyond the titles and metas, and they're more thorough with the work. While good stuff is happening here, it's not too advanced, and it still tends to be pretty siloed from the other disciplines.

Practice

From there, the organization might move into a practice. Search is starting to become a way of life here. They're getting significantly more advanced in their work. They're starting to connect the dots between those different channels. They're using data in smarter ways to drive their search strategy.

Culture

Then from there, maybe they're at a level of culture for their SEO capabilities. So search here is starting to become a part of their marketing DNA. They're integrating across practices. They're doing cutting edge. They're testing and innovating and improving their SEO implementation, and they're looking for the next big thing. But these groups know that they have to continually evolve as the industry evolves. So we don't just look at their whole SEO program and figure out where the client goes on the map.

✓ Data-driven

We actually break it down into a few pieces. First, data-driven. Is the organization using information and analytics and combining it with other sources even to make really smart marketing decisions?

✓ SEO for content

Next is content. Are they doing any SEO for content at all? Are they implementing some SEO basics, but only during and after publication? Or are they using search data to actually drive their editorial calendar alongside other data inputs, like social listening or web analytics?

✓ Mobility

From there, mobility. Do they have no mobile experience at all, or do they have a fully responsive and technically mobile friendly site, but they're not investing any more in that mobile optimization? Or are they a completely mobile-first mindset? Are they continuously iterating and improving in usability, speed, and content for their mobile users?

✓ Technical ability

Beyond that, we could look at how technically savvy they are. Do they have a lot of broken stuff, or are they on top of monitoring and maintaining their technical health and accessibility?

✓ On-page/off-page SEO

Then some standard SEO best practices here. Are they limited or advanced in on-page SEO, off-page SEO?

✓ Integrating across channels

Are they integrating across channels and not having search live in a silo?

✓ Adopting new technology

Are they adopting new technology as it pertains to search? Some clients have a very high appetite for this, but they chase after the shiny object.

Others have a high appetite and a high tolerance for risk, and they're making hard choices about which new technology to invest in as it pertains to their search program. You may also want to customize this maturity model and include things like local search or international search or e-commerce. But this is a great place to start. So this does a very good job of choosing which projects to begin with for a client, but it doesn't really get to the heart of why our work isn't getting implemented.

The Organizational Search Maturity matrix

I developed a second maturity model, and this one is more traditional and you see it across other industries as well. But this one focuses on the search program inside the organization. This is the squishy organizational stuff.

✓ People

This is people. Do they have the necessary talent within the organization or within their scope? That might not just mean SEOs. That means are they scoping appropriately for content and development needs?

✓ Process

What about process? Are they actually using a defined and continuously improving process for the inclusion of search? Now I don't mean step-by-step best practices for implementing a title tag. This isn't instructions or a tutorial. This is a process for including organic search experts at the right moments in the right projects.

✓ Planning

What about planning? A lot of times we find that clients are doing search very reactively and after the fact. We want to reach a point with an organization where it's preplanned, it's proactively included, and it's always aligned to brand, business, or campaign goals.

✓ Knowledge

Next is knowledge. We know that this industry is complicated. There are a lot of moving pieces. We want to know how knowledgeable is the organization about search. That doesn't necessarily mean how to do SEO, but perhaps the importance or the impact or the outcomes of it. How committed are they to learning more through reading or trainings or conferences? At the very least, the organization they're hiring to do search needs to be extraordinarily knowledgeable about it.

✓ Capacity

Then capacity. Do they have the prioritization within the organization? Are they budgeting appropriately? Do they have the resources and the means and the capacity to get the work done?

Initial

When we've evaluated a client against these criteria, we could find them in an initial phase where the program is very new, they're not doing any search at all...

Repeatable

...to repeatable, meaning they're starting to include it, but it's not super cohesive yet. They're not enforcing the process. They don't have super dedicated resources just yet.

Defined

Up into defined, where they actually are documenting their process. It's continuing to iterate and improve. They're becoming more knowledgeable. They're dedicating more resources. They're prioritizing it better.

Managed

We can move up into managed, where that's continuing to improve even further...

Optimized

...and into optimized. So again, this is where search programs are part of the organization's DNA. It's always included. They are always improving their process. They are maintaining or even increasing the talent that they have dedicated to the work. They're planning it smarter and better than ever before, and they have adequate capacity to keep iterating and growing in their search program.

With that, the steps to complete this process and figure out where your client falls on either of these maturity models, I want to be clear is not a one-sided exercise. This is not a situation where you're just punching numbers into a spreadsheet and the agency is grading the client and our job is done. This needs to be a conversation.

We need to invite stakeholders at multiple levels, both on the client side and on the agency side, or if you're in-house, just multiple levels within the organization, and we should ask for opinions from multiple perspectives to paint a more accurate picture of where the client stands today and agree on the steps that we need to take to move forward. When you do these maturity assessments, this isn't enough.

This is step one. This isn't a finish line. We need to be using this as a springboard for a dialogue to uncover their pain points or the obstacles that they run into, inside their organization, that are going to keep you from getting that work done. We need to have honest and frank conversations about the things we need to clear out of the way to do our best work. With that, I hope that you can try this out.

We've got a great article that we published on the Moz blog to get into more detail about how to implement this. But try it out in your organization or with your client and let us know. Peer review this and help us make it better, because this is intended to be a living process that evolves as our industry does.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[shysongnightmare]

Holding Control Key When Opening Dmg

Convert dmg to vmdk virtualbox. Jul 16, 2018  As DMG is the file format of Mac OS X, Windows OS can’t read the file. As we earlier mentioned in this guide, we need to convert the DMG to ISO, then use it on VirtualBox. This method will be useful to try and install any Hackintosh versions on Mac OS X on VirtualBox. Mar 09, 2016  Luckily with the tools from VirtualBox you’re able to move virtual disks between VMDK and VDI formats. The VBoxManage command is the Swis Army Knife of tools to manage all things VirtualBox. The VBoxManage command will need to be in your path to be able to use it. The easiest way is to navigate to your VirtualBox installation. Data conversion from.DMG to.VMDK is the conversion of computer data from Apple Mac Os X Disk Image to V Mware Virtual Disk File. Throughout a computer environment, data is encoded in a.

To use any of these key combinations, press and hold the keys immediately after pressing the power button to turn on your Mac, or immediately after your Mac begins to restart. Keep holding until the described behavior occurs.

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Control key acts as if it is stuck periodically. Ask Question Asked 4 years, 1 month ago. Though the previous one also had Window key getting 'stuck' as well so if I pressed D. Opening the on-screen keyboard from control panel can temporarily unlock the ctrl key. Zoom using Control key doesn't work. By Creative Media September 30, 2009 2. Make sure that the desired 'while holding' (control) key is showing. I believe that the option key is.

If your Mac is using a firmware password, all of these key combinations are disabled, except as noted below.

Command (⌘)-R: Start up from the built-in macOS Recovery system. Or use Option-Command-R or Shift-Option-Command-R to start up from macOS Recovery over the Internet. macOS Recovery installs different versions of macOS, depending on the key combination you use while starting up. If your Mac is using a firmware password, you're asked to enter the password.

Option (⌥): Secure mac cleaner reviews. Start up to Startup Manager, which allows you to choose other startup disks or volumes, if available. If your Mac is using a firmware password, you're asked to enter the password.

Option-Command-P-R:Reset NVRAM or PRAM. If your Mac is using a firmware password, it ignores this key combination or starts up from macOS Recovery.

Shift (⇧): Start up in safe mode.

D: Start up from the built-in Apple Hardware Test or Apple Diagnostics utility, depending on your Mac model. Or use Option-Dto start up from this utility over the Internet.

N: Start up from a NetBoot server, if your Mac supports network startup volumes. To use the default boot image on the server, hold down Option-N instead.

Command-S: Start up in single-user mode. This key combination requires macOS High Sierra or earlier.

T: Start up in target disk mode.

Command-V: Start up in verbose mode.

Eject (⏏) or F12 or mouse button or trackpad button: Eject removable media, such as an optical disc.

Learn more

Learn what to do if your Mac doesn't turn on.

Learn about Mac keyboard shortcuts that you can use after your Mac has started up.

Most computer users don't take full advantage of the computer mouse. Below are computer mouse tips and secrets that help you get the full potential of your computer mouse and increase your overall productivity while on the computer.

Shift key and mouse click

Many text editors and programs allow you to highlight all or portions of text using the Shift key and the mouse. For example, click at the beginning of the text in the below text box. Hold down the Shift key, scroll to the bottom, and click at the end of the text to highlight all of the text.

Tip

Holding down the Alt key while dragging and highlighting text in a text editor allows you to selectively highlight text. Highlighting text this way is useful if the paragraph or other text is in a column. Note: This tip does not work in the above box and has to be done in a text editor or word processor.

Take full advantage of the scroll wheel

Today, everyone is familiar with a mouse wheels ability to scroll up and down on a page. However, this wheel can also do so much more, below are a few examples.

Where do you live?. https://shysongnightmare.tumblr.com/post/645316263511523328/bose-dmg-canada. Perhaps you want to find a good DIYer that can build you a good cable. Hi, what a quick response, LOLGlad that the post is done 🙂I live in New Zealand at the moment.Wow!

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The mouse wheel is not only a wheel. It can also be used as a button. Pressing down on the wheel will acts like a third mouse button. The wheel button can be used to open a web page in a tab by clicking the wheel on any link and can also be used to close a tab by clicking the wheel on any open tab.

Zoom in and out on a web page, word document, excel spreadsheet, etc. by holding down the Ctrl key and scrolling up to zoom in and down to zoom out.

Hold down the Shift key and scroll down in most Internet browsers to go back to the previous web page.

Some mouse wheels can be pushed left or right to also move back and forward between web pages.

Select with double and triple click

Any word can be selected by double-clicking the word. If you want to highlight the whole paragraph or sentence, click the mouse button three times on any word. Try it now on this paragraph by clicking three times fast on any word in the paragraph.

Tip

If you double-click and then drag your mouse, it highlights one word at a time.

Use the right-click

Take full advantage of the right-click any time you highlight text or want to view the properties of an object. For example, if you highlight a file or text, you can right-click that highlighted item, copy it, and then right-click anywhere else to paste it.

Tip

If you highlight or select any file or text and then click and drag while holding the right mouse button, when you let go an option to move or copy that file is shown. This saves you the extra step of having to right-click where you want to paste the item.

Tip

While in a browser, pressing and holding Ctrl while clicking on any link opens a menu with options for that link.

Ctrl key and mouse click or highlight

While holding down the Ctrl key, you can left-click to select multiple objects or highlight multiple sections of text. For example, in the below selection box, if you wanted to highlight more than one of the items listed, you could hold down Ctrl and select each item you want highlighted.

Tip

Mozilla Firefox users can also hold down the Ctrl key and individually click on each cell in a table they want to copy. They can also hold down the Ctrl key and drag their mouse down a row to select that row or text without selecting any of the other text in that table.

Use the mouse side buttons

Many new computer mice also have buttons on the side of the mouse. These buttons can be programmed to do anything. However, by default, the left-thumb button can be used to go back on a web page. Using the thumb button makes browsing the Internet more efficient, because you do not need to move the mouse pointer to the browser's back arrow button to go back a page.

Use the Windows Snap To feature

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Take full advantage of the Windows mouse Snap To feature, which will automatically move your mouse to buttons that appear in a dialog box. For example, if you delete a file or close a window, you may get a prompt asking you if you are sure you want to perform the task. With the Snap To feature enabled, the mouse pointer automatically moves to the Ok button, so you only need to click the left mouse button if you agree. This saves you the time of having to move the mouse pointer to the Ok button and then click Ok.

To enable this feature, open the Mouse properties under the Windows Control Panel and check the Snap To check box under the Pointer Options tab.

Tip

While changing this feature, we also suggest looking at other available options in the Mouse properties. For example, increasing the Motion speed can also help increase your productivity while using the mouse.

Manage the open window with the mouse

Double-click the top title bar of any window to maximize a window or, if it is already maximized, resize it to a smaller window. You can also double-click the icon for the window in the top-left corner of the window to close that window.

Move the mouse with your keyboard

Instead of using the mouse that came with your computer, you can also enable Windows to use the number pad as a mouse.

Holding Control Key When Opening Dmg On Iphone

Customize your mouse

Holding Control Key When Opening Dmg Download

Finally, if you have a mouse with more than two buttons, installing the included mouse software allows you to customize the mouse even more. For example, if you don't use the side button to move back in a browser, change it to something you'd use, such as switching between open windows or opening the calculator.

Holding Control Key When Opening Dmg File

Additional information

Holding Control Key When Opening Dmg Windows 10

See our mouse definition for further information and related links on this term.

[crookedtacoluminary]

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The ASUS K50IJ notebook is designed to provide a no-frills computing experience to users while on the move. Boasting the muscle to provide cinematic audio and visual enjoyment, users can experience immersive entertainment anytime, anywhere in comfort and style.

ASUS recommends Windows 10 Pro for business. Products certified by the Federal Communications Commission and Industry Canada will be distributed in the United States and Canada. Please visit the ASUS USA and ASUS Canada websites for information about locally available products.

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DVD Drive Burner Rewriter.

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Description

𝗕𝗔𝗦𝗜𝗖 𝗗𝗘𝗧𝗔𝗜𝗟𝗦

Brand : Asus Type : Notebook Processor : Intel core 2 Storage Capacity : 250HDD RAM : 4GB Supported OS : 64-bit Windows 8 and 10 Battery : Minimum of 3 hours backup

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Screen Size : 15inch HD Display: Yes

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Asus K50ij Support

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[orbemnews]

The GameStop saga is captivating Wall Street — for good reason What’s happening: Shares of GameStop (GME), a legacy company whose stores are often located in struggling malls, have soared dramatically over the past two sessions as day traders push the stock with growing fervor. The stock, which closed out 2020 at $18.84 per share, finished the day at $76.79 after trading was halted multiple times due to volatility. At one point, it climbed to nearly $160, a record high. You read that correctly. GameStop, which is expected to lose money this year and next, has more than quadrupled in value in under a month because it’s effectively become a meme stock. Since the beginning of 2020, it’s jumped more than 1,100%, outpacing even Tesla’s gains. Shares are up another 20% in premarket trading. Investors on social media had been arguing that GameStop was seriously undervalued and cheered earlier this month when the company added Chewy founder Ryan Cohen, who has been pushing a digital overhaul, to its board. Now, the focus is on momentum, as small investors hope the hype can help the stock keep rising. It’s evident, however, that the saga has grown into much more than an argument over the future of a video game retailer, or the merits of different trading approaches. As no-fee apps like Robinhood democratize access to financial markets, some are reading it as a generational fight between the old and new guard of the investing world. Users on Reddit cheered when veteran short seller Citron Research said it would stop commenting on the stock, citing harassment from GameStop’s backers. Melvin Capital Management, which bet against GameStop’s rise, has had to accept an infusion of cash after suffering steep losses, the Wall Street Journal reports. “As someone who started trading stocks in the late ’90s in college, I would always remember watching when the small retail trading groups would get crushed by hedge funds and savvy short-sellers,” Oanda analyst Edward Moya said in a note to clients this week. “What happened with GameStop’s stock is a reminder of how times are changing.” David certainly now has Goliath’s attention. “Starts opening r/WSB with my usual morning tabs,” market strategist Michael Antonelli of R.W. Baird tweeted Monday, referring to the Reddit message board where much of the GameStop action has been coordinated. Traders on such platforms have been plugging other stocks with major results, too. BlackBerry shares, another fan favorite, are up more than 170% in 2021. They jumped 28% on Monday alone. Big picture: The wisdom of such trading decisions is certainly debatable. After all, it’s near impossible to argue that GameStop’s value has actually increased exponentially in a matter of weeks. Some gains are also attributable to a so-called “short squeeze,” as those who bet against the stock rush to buy in so they can cover some of their losses. But once the GameStop dust settles, expect Wall Street’s asset managers to watch where the retail trading hive mind wanders next. Clearly, it can have an impact. Janet Yellen has been confirmed. Now she gets to work Lawmakers confirmed Janet Yellen as Treasury secretary on Monday, making her the first woman in American history to hold the position. Now, she’s tasked with shepherding President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus package through Congress. And with former President Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial set to begin in the Senate in just two weeks, there’s pressure to act fast. That could be a problem, given opposition to parts of the package from Democrats and Republicans. The latest: Members of both parties expressed reservations about spending so much money on a Sunday call with Brian Deese, head of the National Economic Council, multiple aides told my CNN colleagues. “It seems premature to be considering a package of this size and scope,” Sen. Susan Collins, a moderate Republican from Maine, said in a statement. While lawmakers acknowledge more money for testing and vaccines is essential, billions in state and local funding, $1,400 stimulus checks and raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour are proving more controversial. Conversations in the coming days will test Biden’s commitment to promoting bipartisanship. Biden and Yellen are angling to get members of both parties on board. But Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, the incoming chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, said Sunday that Democrats would use a procedural tactic to pass major parts of the measure if Republicans don’t budge. Biden didn’t rule the method out on Monday. Investor insight: With Democrats in control of both houses of Congress and the White House, investors have been banking on the swift passage of additional stimulus measures. As the battle lines are drawn, some are getting nervous. Jim Reid of Deutsche Bank said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s remarks that a bill could take four to six weeks to pass were a wake-up call. “[This] seemed to remind markets of the underlying risks to a market trading at the highs,” he said in a note to clients Tuesday. Pfizer and AstraZeneca take heat in Europe Delays over delivering vaccines from AstraZeneca (AZN) and Pfizer (PFE) in Europe are a harsh reminder that successful vaccination campaigns remain dependent on output from the private sector. The latest: AstraZeneca has informed EU leaders that it will not be able to deliver as many doses of its vaccine as promised, putting government rollout plans at risk. The news comes after Pfizer delivered fewer doses of its vaccine than expected last week. Government leaders in Europe are furious, claiming the holdups will have serious consequences. “The European Union wants the ordered and pre-financed doses to be delivered as soon as possible,” EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides said in a statement. “And we want our contract to be fully fulfilled.” Big picture: The full consequences of the delays will become apparent in the coming weeks. Pfizer said it will resume deliveries as scheduled this week after upgrading its plant in Belgium so it can churn out more doses; problems at AstraZeneca, which pointed to lower-than-expected yield at a European site, are believed to be more severe. The situation highlights how fragile vaccine supply chains are as they get up to speed, and underscores the risks to estimates from economists and investors about when life will return to normal. “We will have more of these ups and downs until we get to a stable process,” Prashant Yadav, a medical supply chain expert and senior fellow at the Center for Global Development, told me. Up next 3M (MMM), Alaska Air (ALK), American Express (AXP), GE (GE), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Lockheed Martin (LMT), UBS, Verizon (VZ) and Xerox (XRX) report earnings before US markets open. Capital One, Microsoft (MSFT), Starbucks (SBUX) and Texas Instruments (TXN) follow after the close. Also today: US consumer confidence data for January posts at 10 a.m. ET. Coming tomorrow: A massive earnings week continues with Apple (AAPL), Facebook (FB) and Tesla (TSLA). Source link Orbem News #captivating #GameStop #Good #investing #Premarketstocks:TheGameStopsagaiscaptivatingWallStreet—forgoodreason-CNN #Reason #saga #Street #Wall

[volvera2008-blog]

Don't Make This Mistake With Your Photography Website

Your website is more important than ever. It is likely the first place potential clients look when they want to evaluate your work and if you are a good fit for them. So, to increase the chances of landing the job, make sure you do not make this mistake. 

Nowadays, most people turn to the internet when they want to find a Seattle Model Photographer , which means that often, they will wind up on your website. And undoubtedly, if we do not pay someone to do it, we design our websites on desktop or laptop computers and likely test them in desktop browsers. But the majority of users are likely not using desktop browsers to view your site; rather, they are using mobile browsers on their phone or tablet.

Here at Fstoppers, we see hundreds of thousands of users and several million pageviews every month. And you might think that a photo site is likely viewed in all its glory on a large, color-calibrated monitor, and there is probably some truth to that. But in actuality, the majority of our traffic comes from phones and tablets (even before the pandemic).

And that makes sense, if you think about it. The web has become as much a place of consumption as it has a repository of information, and as such, most people browse on their choice device for media consumption: their smartphone or tablet. I know I certainly do the majority of my casual consumption and Reddit perusal on my phone, only opting for my computer when I need to do serious work or absolutely need the larger display.

That is why it is so crucial that your website has a good mobile design. You can follow all the tips out there about SEO optimization, putting forth your best portfolio, etc., but if your mobile design is unwelcoming, bloated, or simply a pain to use, you will probably lose clients before they even get to your photos.

Thankfully, nowadays, many dedicated website design tools and platforms automatically create a separate mobile version for your site that is optimized for phones and tablets. For example, I use Rapidweaver for my site, and with just a few clicks, I can easily generate a clean, easy-to-navigate mobile version.

What Makes a Good Mobile Site? While the job is generally easier nowadays, it is still worth talking about some of the aspects of a good mobile site.

1. The Home Page and Navigation Are Intuitive and Uncluttered Screen space is precious on a phone. Don't waste it on a large splash screen with a call to action like "click here." Put everything the user needs to know front and center where it is easily found immediately. Similarly, make it easy to navigate the site. Nothing is more frustrating than watching nested menus bleed off the right side of my screen as I click onto the fifth level without an end in sight. It should be quick and obvious to the user to get around your site.

2. Check Those Load Times Sure, you want users to see your images at their best quality. But mobile data connections are often not particularly fast, especially away from urban areas, and if users have to wait a long time just for your images to load, you are going to start losing them. Generally, keeping everything at or below 2,000 pixels on the long side is a good rule to follow. I also run all my website images through JPEGmini before uploading them. It is a fantastic app that normally shaves about 60% off the file size of a JPEG with no discernible loss of quality. That adds up to major data savings and faster loading times when you are dealing with an entire photography portfolio.

3. Nothing Unnecessary It can be tempting to add flashy visuals to your site or the like. In fact, with the ease of modern design tools, it is more tempting than ever. But don't lose sight of why visitors have come to your site: to view your photos. No one ever made a sale because they had a cute animation on their site. Keep things as straightforward as possible. Cleanliness and simplicity are the formula for an elegant site.

4. Make Sure Image Galleries Are Responsive

This is a really crucial item. Phones and tablets come in all different sizes, resolutions, and aspect ratios, and a layout that looks great on one device might be totally wrong on another. Responsive galleries automatically detect the device the site is being used on and readjust the galleries to fit the screen, ensuring that your portfolio looks professional no matter what device it is viewed on. Most modern templates and design tools employ responsive galleries, but be sure to check to be safe.

5. Link to Instagram Many people also look to Instagram to find a photographer or to see more of your work, so make it easy for them to find yours. As you can see on my mobile site, there is a small but visible icon at the bottom of the site menu. Of course, working in the other direction, don't forget to link to your site in your Instagram bio.

6. Keep Users in One Tab No doubt, if you have spend any amount of time browsing the web on your phone, you know that managing multiple tabs in an annoying affair at best. Avoid using links that open a new tab; keep everything in one tab so users don't become disoriented by a new window popping open.

7. Make It Easy to Contact You Don't forget to make it straightforward to contact you. Make it easy to find a contact form or information on your site. Remember that typing on a phone is not something anyone wants to do for a long time, so don't ask for an abundance of information; just make it easy to get in touch with you and provide basic relevant details.

Conclusion Having a good mobile website is more important than ever. Be sure to take time to ensure that yours is in top shape to ensure that potential customers have the best possible experience and are more likely to select you.

[coopdigitalnewsletter]

8 July 2020: Goats on Zoom. Pubs can track and trace.

Hello, this is the Co-op Digital newsletter - it looks at what's happening in the internet/digital world and how it's relevant to the Co-op, to retail businesses, and most importantly to people, communities and society. Thank you for reading - send ideas and feedback to @rod on Twitter. Please tell a friend about it!

[Image: Goat-2-meeting]

Goats on Zoom and waving goodbye

Why we can't stop waving at the end of video calls - we’re over-performing the social cues of conversation closure because we feel that just closing a browser tab is ambiguous or abrupt. This is just one of many ways that video calling is uncomfortable:

It’s harder to pick up on social cues. You’re looking at your own face. Others are dropping in and out of the call. You’re doing the “Can you hear me? No I think your mic is off” dance. You can’t see if your boss agrees with what you’re saying because the video makes her look like an impressionist painting. All of this makes video calls exhausting. You could say that video calls come with an unexpectedly large “cost of communication”. 

If you’d like your calls to be more fun here’s an enterprising Lancashire farm that’ll have a goat participate in your Zoom call. The income has helped them keep staff on and will go toward renewable energy. “The goats are savvy in Microsoft teams, Webex, Blue Jeans, Skype, Google Hangouts, Jitsi, Go To Meeting and pretty much all other video platforms from which you can send a call invite link”, though the newsletter is confident that the goats don’t enjoy Webex. 

#startupidea: if you’d pay £6 to have a goat join your video call for a laugh, what would you pay to have an owl join it so you didn’t need to be in the meeting at all? More, surely! (In Silicon Valley a brief goat-2-meeting costs $100!)

Also: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan - "unprecedented flexibility" to 80,000 workers in Japan. Work is going remote-friendly if not quite remote-first.

If you miss the office, you can put its soothing tones on in the background: I miss the office.

Pubs will track and trace

Pubs are reopening in England. Fancy a pint? You might need an app for that. UKGov suggested that pubs should record personal details of customers to help track and trace efforts if there were any outbreaks. But there are obvious concerns around privacy and public health: you’d guess that record keeping, data accuracy and access to data are all going to be difficult or uncertain in a pub.

On the other hand, pubs seem to be doing a pretty good job running an informal track and trace service!: “Lighthouse had contacted about 100 customers before NHS Test and Trace had been in touch with management”.

Primark down 75%: retail winners and losers 

The virus lockdown has had uneven effects on retail. Obviously online has done well. Also “essential” sectors like supermarkets, though there increased sales offline have been counter balanced by increased virus costs (staffing, social distancing measures etc). And of course many businesses have raced to add online shopping: 85,000 businesses launch online shops as B2C and B2B ecommerce surge in lockdown.

Those who’ve struggled are “non-essential” sectors and those that rely on customer proximity: pubs, cafes, offline-only retail etc. Primark sales are down 75% in most recent quarter - this is the lockdown effect because Primark doesn’t sell online.

Ghost kitchens

“Ghost kitchens” have been around for a few years - these are restaurants with no seating: a smaller building in a cheaper location prepares the same number of meals, all for delivery. In 2018 Deliveroo was setting up delivery-only kitchens for restaurants:

A “ghost restaurant” is one that makes food solely for delivery customers - you can’t go to one and get a table. That’s the US term - in the UK they’re called “dark kitchens”. Deliveroo Editions is dark-kitchens-as-a-service: Deliveroo provides them to existing food brands. For larger restaurant operators, dark kitchens can load balance the peak times. For small ones, the kitchens can test demand in a new location without the capital investment in property: “The property requirement is data driven. Deliveroo know exactly where their customers are, the amount they spend, the frequency at which they order and the types of cuisine that are most popular in an area. From the fledgling operator’s perspective, this can lower the risk of venturing into uncharted territories and drive sales up as much as 400%.”

What if this idea was expanded out into high-street-as-a-service? Could you have a high street without a retail shopfront? Or a shopfront with no stock? The internet and logistics have made it possible to separate the point of product discovery from the purchase from the inventory from the delivery/handover. And these points can be recombined in many different ways. IKEA’s warehouse, Argos’s front/back of store, Deliveroo, Amazon’s many forms - all possible variations.

And in the virustimes of 2020, the ghost kitchens are doing well. They now look like "Ghost Kitchen Colonies" (or “commissary” kitchens): one site that hosts the kitchens for many restaurants. 

“This means sharing ingredients, equipment, and cooking staff to supply multiple restaurant brands. For customers, this provides the opportunity to order different types of food from the same address, and saves companies on overheads and wasting resources.” 

Uber: grocery delivery

Before the virus Uber was primarily a taxi company: it used cars to move people around. Once lockdowns started, the people weren’t moving, but the cars still could. So its Uber Eats cars-that-move-meals business overtook the cars-that-move-people business. In June it missed out on buying rival meal delivery platform Grubhub (Just Eat made a last minute order which won that one), so this week Uber has just bought US meal delivery service Postmates, and will run it alongside its existing Uber Eats. 

But if you have an on-demand network of cars you can move other things with it too. Uber also says it will be starting grocery delivery in Canada, Latin America and some US cities soon. It bought Cornershop (a grocery delivery startup a bit like Instacart) last year. It’s also a step towards the logistics space. The next step might be combining the car with ghost kitchens: on demand food truck delivery kitchens.

Various things

Nicki Sprinz at ustwo: “As a white person with privilege and relative influence, I invite people to hold me to account, and I must stay uncomfortable. We have to do the hard work to ensure we start to dismantle the structural racism we have benefited from for years.”

Climatestrike software licence: “developers can use to prohibit the use of their code by applications or companies that threaten to accelerate climate change through fossil fuel extraction”.

“Diversity & Inclusion at Conferences and Events (DICE) provides certification and guidance to help conferences and events deliver a representative and diverse set of speakers, perspectives, and attendees.”

Goldman Sachs bank designs its own typeface. It has to work with lots of small numbers, so it might be good for spreadsheet fans (hello).

“Find yourself an alternative pint while also supporting local independent pubs and bars” - Neverspoons.

Co-op Digital news and events

The government’s consultation response on violence and abuse toward shop staff and The Co-op’s report on it in Sep 2019: “Our latest research shows that retail crime has reached epidemic proportions, with 115 retail workers physically attacked every day in the UK, with many more verbally abused and threatened. This needs to change. We need the UK Government to urgently protect shop workers and send a clear message that violence and verbal aggression will not be tolerated in shops.”

The Federation House team is running weekly drop-in chats for the community every Wednesday at 10am: Join us here. See our online events. You can also see how The Federation is planning for a safe return to the co-working floor.  

Free of charge events: 

Andy’s Man Club – Gentleman's Peer to Peer Mental Health Meet Up – Mondays 7pm

Volunteer with Code Your Future – Online Meet Up – 8 July - 6pm  

Beginners Guide to Retrofit – Webinar – 8 July – 6pm  

Northern Azure User Group – Online Meet Up – 8 July - 6pm 

Building Resilience within your teams - Webinar – 9 July – 12.30pm 

Accessing Open Data through API’s – Webinar – 14 July – 6.30pm 

Python for Beginners – Online Workshop – 16 July - 4pm 

Paid for events: 

Invisible Cities - Online Tours of Manchester or Edinburgh – Various Dates & Times 

Thank you for reading

Thank you, beloved readers and contributors. Please continue to send ideas, questions, corrections, improvements, etc to @rod on Twitter. If you have enjoyed reading, please tell a friend! If you want to find out more about Co-op Digital, follow us @CoopDigital on Twitter and read the Co-op Digital Blog. Previous newsletters.

[hydrus]

Version 287

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tar.gz

I had a busy but great week.

Please note that I will be spending the next two weeks working on an important library update (I'll be trying to move from wxPython 3 to 4 for all platforms). There will be no release next week.

thumbnail DnD

The surprise Christmas present is the first prototype of thumbnail drag-and-drop! If you drag and drop some thumbnails to a page tab, the files will be moved to that page! If you drop them on a 'page of pages' tab, they'll go to the current media page beneath it, and if you drop on some empty tab area space, the thumbs will go into a new window. If you hold down control when you drop, the thumbs will copy instead of move.

I have been thinking about this for a long time. A lot of different little things went into its preparation, so bringing it together this week was a nice cap on it all. The thing in itself is a cool new tool that I expect to do more with in future.

This is a prototype. It has worked well in all my testing, but there may be unusual situations where some thumbnails get lost or do not render correctly or something. If this happens to you, please let me know the details. Something that did trip me up a couple of times is that if you drop thumbs onto a page that already has them, it may seem like they never landed, as the file count will not increase and they won't appear appended at the end--but really, they were merged into the ones already there.

I will add some options in a release soon to flip the control-to-copy behaviour and any other custom preferences we can think of for this.

new import presentation

All 'file import options' (and hence all import contexts) now have 'presentation' options. This first version has three choices:

show new files

show files already in inbox

show files already in archive

By unchecking one, the files that fit into that category will still be imported and everything, but they will not 'present' in the import context. For import pages, this means appending the thumbnail, and for subscriptions and import folders, this means appearing in the popup file button. So, if you uncheck all presentation options on a gallery download page, the queue will process but no thumbnails at all will appear!

Regular import and download pages default to presenting everything, just like before. Subscriptions and import folders only include 'new' files (i.e. ignoring all 'already in db' files in their popup button), which I think was the old behaviour, at least most of the time. In any case, if you would like to see all of the files of a sub or only see inbox files from a hard drive import, you can now do it simply.

This will also be useful for users running big (10k+ files) import pages. Adding new thumbs to already weighty pages is computationally expensive, and these big pages tend to make the gui pretty laggy. Now if you have a big import, you can scale back its thumbnail presentation however you like to keep things running smooth!

Please note that all existing import queues will be updated to the new system. Unfortunately, I could only choose one way for them to go, so I went safe and gave them all the 'quiet' subscription's 'only show new files' option. This means that any import pages or thread watchers you have in your gui sessions will only show thumbnails for new files unless you edit their file import options. This will only apply to queues you have open now--all new ones will go back to the old behaviour of showing everything by default. In any case, I apologise for the inconvenience. You will get a popup on update to remind you of this.

Like with the thumb drag and drop, I will add some preferences to set the defaults for these in a future release. Let me know what you think!

misc

Adding to the presentation options above, subscriptions will now fold all their queries' downloaded files into a single popup file button for the subscription. So if your subscription has five queries that each download 20 files, you will end up with one button with 100 files waiting for you. This should reduce some of the "Show 2 files" spam some people are seeing.

Also, popup file buttons now preserve file order! Your new sub buttons will present the combined query results in a neat order, least recently imported first.

For advanced users: The file import status button now lets you import and export all the 'sources' for that import cache to clipboard or png file from its right-click menu. If you want to share all of the urls in a subscription, for instance, this makes it easy. Give it a go, let me know how it works for you! Don't put urls in hard drive importers, or gelbooru urls in deviant art downloaders or anything!

full list

thumbnails can now be drag-and-dropped to other pages!

dragging and dropping thumbs to another page tab will remove them from the source and append them to the destination, maintaining file order!

DnDing thumbs to a 'page of pages' tab will put the files in the next lowest selected media page

DnDing thumbs to a blank notebook area (or a page of pages without a selected media page) will create a new page for the thumbs

holding down ctrl when you drop thumbnails will not remove them from the source

please forgive the thumbnail DnD cursor, which for now will be in the 'copy' state, despite the internal DnD being move by default

improved page tab drag and drop drop logic--dropping onto the page area itself will no longer send the page to the right-end of the current notebook

the 'file import options' object now supports three 'presentation' booleans--for new/already_in_inbox/already_in_archive files--so you can customise whether new thumbnails appear based on each state. page imports will by default show everything, while 'quieter' import queues like import folders and subscriptions will continue to just show only 'new' files in their files popup buttons. if you have a gui page with 10k+ items in its queue, try reducing the presentation to speed it up!

all existing import queues will be updated when they are next loaded--but please note that for simplicity and safety they will all initialise to the 'quiet' presentation method, so if you have ongoing download pages in any of your gui sessions (including thread watchers!), they will only add 'new' thumbnails unless you edit them. I apologise for the inconvenience

the regular hdd import now has a file import options button!

subscription query 'finished' file popups are now merged up to the subscription level--so, a sub with five queries that each get 20 new files in a run will now ultimately leave one popup with 100 files

file popups (as produced by subscriptions and a couple other places) now preserve their import order!

if a subscription with many queries runs out of bandwidth, it should now only give you one 'no more bandwidth to download files' message, rather than one for every outstanding query to sync

added a checkbox to turn on/off the new random subscription syncing to the options->downloading panel

the file import status button's menu now supports import/export of sources to clipboard/png! it _should_ also support unicode. be careful not to paste paths into a url cache, or urls from one gallery site to another, or you'll just get errors--this is prototype, so please keep like with like for now

the png import/export system now supports raw string payloads

the new listctrlpanel can now hang its buttons in multiple rows

the manage subscriptions panel now has an 'overwrite checker options' button to mass-set checker options

the manage subscriptions panel now has a 'select subs' button that selects subs based on a basic query text search

separating merged subscriptions now sets better new subscription names of 'old_sub_name: query_text'

saving a session from a page of pages with a custom name will no longer suggest a session name prepended by [USER]

doubled the subscription and downloader instance default bandwidth rules to 400 and 200 rqs/day

the 'load_images_with_pil' and 'disable_cv_for_gifs' options are now officially BUGFIX in the options--unless you know you need them on, turn them off!

added some safeguards to the new dialog-panel system's OK stuff, which sometimes catches a duplicate OK event

shuffled some db update status texts around

next week

Again, there will be no release next week while I work on the wx update. I will drop by the discord for a bit on Saturday, and if there is some big explosion in the next couple of days I'll push out a hotfix, but otherwise I will be a bit out of touch as I focus on the rewrite. I will post an update on Tuesday 26th on how it is going.

I will be back to the downloader stuff in the new year.

𝕸𝖊𝖗𝖗𝖞 𝕮𝖍𝖗𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖒𝖆𝖘!

[warmdevs]

New Post has been published on https://warmdevs.com/needy-design-patterns-please-dont-go-popups-get-back-to-me-tabs.html

Needy Design Patterns: Please-Don’t-Go Popups & Get-Back-to-Me Tabs

In UX design, “dark patterns” are deceptive strategies used by designers to trick users into doing potentially harmful things that support their organization’s goals. For example, sites that automatically add extra items into users’ shopping carts are using a dark pattern to increase their sales.

The two design patterns discussed in this article fall into a similar (if slightly less immoral) category, which we call “needy patterns.” These are design patterns aimed at grabbing users’ attention. They’re driven by goals like increasing email-newsletter signups or page views, but they slow users down or degrade their overall experience.

There are many patterns that could fall into this needy category. In this article we focus on two needy patterns that have recently become popular and that interfere with browser-tab usage.

There are two primary types of behavior involving the use of multiple browser tabs:

Parallel browsing, where a user alternates between tasks, generally using one tab per task

Page parking, where a user opens multiple pages into different tabs in support of one large task (such as comparing items to buy, or researching a topic)

Millennials in particular tend to rely on page parking as an information-seeking strategy. The two needy patterns we discuss here hurt people who use multiple tabs, whether for parallel browsing or page parking. We’ve named these needy patterns:

The please-don’t-go popup

The get-back-to-me browser tab

The Please-Don’t-Go Popup

This pattern is sometimes known as an “exit-intent popup,” an “exit popup,” or an “exit modal” (in an attempt to disassociate this pattern with the reviled word “popup,» which is tainted by being the #1 most-hated advertising technique). These popups lurk unseen until the user starts to move the mouse towards the top of the page. Panicking that the user is about to bounce, the exit popup triggers a desperate, final attempt to keep the user’s interest. These popups often contain content such as, “Before you go…!” or “Don’t miss…!” Sometimes they offer discounts, advertise an email newsletter, or suggest related content.

An exit popup from TNW News pushes the organization’s email newsletter.

The exact functionality of each exit popup differs. Sometimes the popup will appear as soon as the user starts moving towards the top of the page; in other cases, it will show up after a specific amount of time (5 seconds, 10 seconds, etc.). Sometimes the popup is combined with animation — for example, creating a shaking effect. Sometimes it works alongside cookies, so a user who sees an exit popup and stays on the site won’t see it again.

This exit popup on wpbeginner.com uses a shake animation, which has the effect of making a popup even more annoying.

The goal is to catch users before they abandon the site, to show them something they may have missed, or to provide one final appeal to capture their attention. And, according to the logic of exit popups, who cares if this appeal doesn’t work and users are annoyed? There’s nothing to lose, because they’re leaving anyway, right?

Wrong. When users engage in page parking, they systematically move between opened tabs, saving their place to return later. The code behind exit popups doesn’t know if a user is moving the mouse to:

close the tab,

temporarily move to another tab, or

open a new tab.

The exit popup can’t tell the difference. Imagine that a user is engaging in page parking to help her research a topic. She starts with a Google query, and then opens up several results into new tabs rapidly. The user begins moving through each tab, closing some that are irrelevant, but saving some to return to them later. Then, in the middle of this process, an exit popup suddenly appears, pressuring her to check out some different content or sign up for an email newsletter. The user thinks, “Wow, calm down! I was going to come back in two minutes!”

This exit popup on lifehack.org assumes users are leaving because they’re finished with the current piece of content, and makes a last-minute attempt to show related topics. Unfortunately, the popup is irritating if the user hasn’t finished reading the current piece of content.

Except when it’s in their best interest (preventing someone from closing a file without saving it, for example), we never recommend intentionally interrupting or annoying users.

The Get-Back-to-Me Browser Tab

This next pattern has nothing to do with what happens while you’re on the website, but instead it’s related to what happens when you’ve left. When a user navigates away from a website by visiting another browser tab, the site swaps the original page title with an attention-seeking message.

In this example, the Chrome browser has 7 open tabs. The last three tabs have replaced the tab title with a needy message.

Blog.invisionapp.com replaces the name of the blog post with a reminder to return to the tab. In this example, part of this reminder is cut off due the number of browser tabs open. (When users have many tabs open at once, page titles are often cut off.)

The website’s primary goal is to cleverly hijack users’ attention and bring them back to the site. Maybe there were some good intentions driving this design decision: perhaps the site truly hopes to be helpful and remind users to view the content on that page. However, this reminder isn’t helpful at all; in fact, it is problematic for two major reasons:

the loss of context caused by an unhelpful title, and

the likelihood that whatever effectiveness the tactic once held will be eroded as more sites adopt it

Loss of Context

Without the true page title, people are left with no clues for the content of the tab. Users often keep frequently visited pages such as Facebook or news websites open throughout the day in order to revisit them and check for updates. Users who are shopping or conducting research may be parked on many pages at once, using browser tabs to collect and manage product options and information

Page titles should begin with information-carrying words to give users context and help them differentiate among tabs. In addition, websites should utilize a well-designed favicon (the small 16×16 pixel icon used in tabs) to help users identify which tabs belong to which site.

In the previous example, Invisionapp would be better off keeping the title of the blog post on the tab at all times. For users conducting research on a particular topic, this tab may be one of many that they intend to read over time. The best reminder to return to the tab is the actual page title, which has meaning to the user and probably some appeal to them in the context of the current task (or the user wouldn’t have opened that page in the first place). With no context, it’s likely that users scanning their parked tabs will not recognize the unrelated title and dismiss the page altogether.

Ineffective when Commonly Used

Some designers might argue that this technique will delight users by catching their attention with something unique and unexpected. That delight (if it ever existed in the first place) will no doubt turn to frustration quickly if this pattern becomes widely used across the web. Page parking and parallel browsing will become quite difficult if your browser tabs resemble a bunch of journalists fighting for attention at a press conference.

Too many other sites already replicate the problematic get-back-to-me pattern.

When multiple browser tabs employ this technique, users have no indication of which tab contains what content. They will be forced to bounce in and out of each page to remember what the tab contains. And if these websites are really needy, these users may also be dealing with please-don’t-go popups slowing them down along the way.

Twitter prepends the page title with a numeric indicator to let users know how much additional content has been added to their feed since it was last checked. This tab-title update effectively reminds the user to return without removing the context of the page.

Think of your page tab as one of many nodes in a distinct and dynamic global navigation created by the user to meet their unique needs. Your page title serves as a label in this navigation and should provide the appropriate context and information scent, so that users can assess the content of the page.

Conclusion

Every website has a personality. The visual design, the interaction design, the copy, and tone of voice all contribute to how your users perceive your site and your brand. Needy patterns like the please-don’t-go popover and the get-back-to-me tab chip away at the presentation of a professional, confident website. They also damage users’ perceptions of credibility.

As a thought experiment, ask your brand manager whether “we’re desperate for attention” is one of the company’s stated brand values. If not, why signal such desperation to customers?

These kinds of tactics are often embraced and accepted based on better conversion performance in A/B tests. However, there’s a big tradeoff that comes with being needy and annoying — the degradation of your relationship with your users.

Prioritizing conversions or short-term metrics leads designers to pressure people into doing things they don’t actually want to do and can easily cross the ethical boundaries towards dark patterns. It’s time to reassess priorities and long-term goals: you may be getting a few extra clicks now, but in the long run you’re losing your users’ trust and respect. Nobody likes a needy website.

[magzoso-tech]

New Post has been published on https://magzoso.com/tech/3-tips-to-help-you-find-the-vendor-of-your-dreams/

3 Tips to Help You Find the Vendor of Your Dreams

Choosing one is a lot like picking a partner; keep these factors in mind to ensure the right fit.

December 9, 2019 6 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Early stage startups value efficiency above everything else. Businesses need to evolve quickly and flexibly in the face of an uncertain future, and they need the right tools to succeed. This often causes them to look beyond prepackaged apps. Okta’s 2019 Businesses @ Work report found that 76 percent of the company’s Office 365 customers used additional apps that served the same purpose as ones built into the Microsoft offering. And Expensify’s 2019 Spend Trends report showed that employees sought out the best collaboration tools if their IT team didn’t provide them.

Prematurely optimizing for scale or features is a startup sin that can harm a business in the long run. “Good enough” technology can save you time when technical platform decisions are needed in hours rather than weeks. Community advice on public and official forums provides faster insight than less timely responses from large enterprises, and early adopters can attract the most unique and progressive engineering talent while future-proofing their businesses. Still, it’s vital to prioritize tech that integrates with existing tools and complements other vendor and open-source packages — and that means planning before partnering with vendors. 

Related: 4 Keys to Choosing the Right Vendor

A tech leader’s first job is to say “yes” to the changing needs of his or her business. Tech should never be a roadblock to progress; it should be an enabler instead of a distraction. If an opportunity to increase traffic tenfold presents itself, then there needs to be a plan for scaling up. If a company needs 30 more developers, then communication and agile tools must be ready to accommodate them. Changes within a business are inevitable, but the technology landscape is also changing. Services will evolve or disappear, and tech upgrades will require downtime. Tech leaders need to adjust to these changes, and they need to work with vendors that understand the evolving environment. There are three things to consider when choosing those partners.

1. Prioritize developers’s happiness.

The output of its core developers drives a startup’s overall velocity in the early stages, and a happy developer is a productive one. A study by the Department of Economics at the University of Warwick found happy workers outperform their peers by 12 percent, and some studies put the effect of happiness even higher. To ensure developer happiness, choose tools that deliver a great developer experience, a good console, clear APIs, excellent documentation and a thriving user community that can offer support. Automate developer chores like testing and deployment, and invest more money in tools and cloud computing.

Twice in my startup career, I’ve had to “break a tie” on two technology options. The first was in 2004; a lead developer was so enthusiastic about the newly released Ruby on Rails framework that he rewrote the project over the weekend. His enthusiasm sold me, and the team’s excitement overcame the inefficiencies of a less mature project. I followed the same principle years later when choosing between Angular and Ember.js.

Developer happiness is crucial to startup success, so put it at the heart of the vendor decision-making process.

2. Don’t reinvent anything.

Undifferentiated heavy lifting is a waste of time. “Swiss Army knife” tools that try to solve every problem in one neat package will often be second-best in everything. It’s better to prioritize solutions that suit specific needs and use modular tools, frameworks and open-source libraries that provide flexibility when technical needs evolve.

Look at other companies that have faced and solved technical problems at a similar scale. Most startups do well with platform-as-a-service offerings like Google App Engine or Heroku, which do a great job of offloading common development tasks and allow for seamless scalability. But as a project increases in costs and complexity, it’s common to migrate to a platform that offers greater flexibility and control.

I supported a startup last year that worked on machine-learning models. Despite already having in-house experts, the company chose to build with TensorFlow, a flexible open-source framework, instead of its own solution. As it scaled, the startup leveraged TensorFlow’s broad ecosystem of tools. When the startup’s data sets became huge, it paid extra for Google’s dedicated TPU solution that cut its model training time by more than 90 percent.

Build the key differentiating tech that powers your innovation. Leverage open-source tools that accelerate your business, and pay for vendors that manage things like cloud hosting, continuous integration and deployment, email and SMS management and system monitoring and alerting.

Related: When Your Hire a Developer, Don’t Settle for ‘Cheap’

3. Employ ‘possibility-driven development.’

Test-driven and behavior-driven development are both established concepts, but possibility-driven development is another great way to achieve startup success. Top restaurateurs spend countless hours studying new ingredients, educating themselves on cutting-edge techniques and dining at other top restaurants for inspiration. Developers should adopt the same approach, i.e. explore amazing user experiences and new technology trends, keeping tabs on great startups and vendors that enter the tools space. Dissect amazing apps and web user experiences to understand how they work. Don’t chase every shiny object, but think about the opportunities that new technology products and services could offer. If a new technology could boost efficiency or help achieve product-market fit, then embrace it.

A classic example here is Mint.com (acquired by Intuit), which launched back in 2006 with an innovative user interface. In addition to thoughtful design, Mint engineers created one of the first mainstream “single-page applications” using cutting-edge techniques for Javascript updating elements without a full-page reload. They also embraced the early techniques of tokens and single sign-on to aggregate multiple financial data sources into one customer dashboard. These technical possibilities yielded an award-winning experience that defined Mint’s early success.

Choosing a technology vendor is a lot like picking a partner: The right fit is essential. Developers need to be happy, tools need to serve a purpose and a future together needs to create possibilities. Keep these three things in mind to choose the best tech solutions and vendors for your needs.

[toosicktoocare]

I fell in love with this prompt the second I read it. (Modern AU) 

Enjolras tries to ignore the chatters of his friends while reviewing meeting notes, but they are too loud, too persistent, too worried.

Grantaire has been the topic of conversation for the last three days. The latter has been fussed over by the rest of the Les Amis on multiple occasions for being “sick”. His excuse is always the same: I’m fine, just stressed with loads to do.

The rest of the group don’t push the brunet; though, Enjolras can tell how much it’s killing Combeferre to not perform a full examination.

But, while the others worry for Grantaire in secret, Enjolras isn’t quite convinced, so when Grantaire stumbles into tonight’s meeting mumbling his typical excuse, Enjolras replies with a scoff.

“As if you ever work hard at anything,” he spits out, ignoring the sharp stare from Combeferre.

To his surprise, Grantaire doesn’t react in the slightest. The brunet simply staggers over to his back table and flips his sketch book open to work on his drawings for class.

“Could you not be an asshole for two seconds?” Combeferre hisses into his ear seconds later. “He’s sick, yet he’s still coming to every meeting for you.”

Enjolras ignores his friend in favor of starting the meeting, and minutes later, he’s forgotten everything as he dives into another night of social justice.

*****

If anyone asks, Enjolras could confidently answer that he wasn’t expecting to spend the remainder of his night shifting from foot to foot outside of Grantaire’s apartment at eleven p.m., yet, here he is, waiting in the icy wind for the brunet to open the door.

He could have ignored it, but when he realized that Grantaire still had one his law books that he needs for a test this week, he shot a quick text to the brunet then drove over without waiting for a reply.

He raps his knuckles against the door for the fifth time, but still, he gets no reply. He huffs out a breath of annoyance and tries the doorknob, and he’s surprised to feel it twist with his wrist.

“Careless,” he mutters under his breath as he pushes the door open. The apartment is dark, but there’s a soft light filtering out from a crack behind one door: Grantaire’s bedroom.

Enjolras walks over to the door and knocks, but he’s met with silence. “Grantaire?” He tries, voice loud and firm, but still nothing.

He wraps his hand around the doorknob and twists, pushing the door open enough to slide in.

Grantaire is furiously drawing on a canvas propped up with an easel with his back to the door. There are headphones covering his ears, and multiple empty coffee mugs are littering his desk beside him.

His floor is scattered with sketchbook pages that have giant pencil marks slashed through them, and Enjolras studies a few as he makes his way toward the brunet.

When he gets closer, he freezes with furrowed brows. Grantaire is shaking hard. For a brief moment, Enjolras glances back to the empty coffee cups, but something tells him this may be more than a caffeine rush.

He closes the distance until he’s stopped right beside the brunet and taps gently on his shoulder.

Grantaire jumps under his touch and is quick to knock his headphones down and away from his ears while turning sharply toward Enjolras.

Enjolras sucks in a sharp gasp at the sight. Aside from the shivering, Grantaire is incredibly pale, but the brunet’s cheeks are a deep red that has Enjolras frowning.

Enjolras takes a quick glance around the room once more, zeroing in on the many failed pictures littering the floor, before snapping his attention back to Grantiare when the brunet clears his throat.

“Why are you here?”

“You’re sick,” Enjolras mutters as realization washes over him. Regret swells within his chest as he recalls his harsh words from earlier. It’s apparent, now, that his friends were right. Grantaire is sick, and he’s clearly overworking himself.

Grantaire sighs and turns back to his easel. “Did you need something? Because I have deadlines to meet.”

“You’re sick,” Enjolras repeats more confidently then before.

In seconds, Grantaire composure crumbles into a thousand pieces. His shaking increases as tears slip rapidly down his cheeks, and Enjolras is taken aback, unsure of what to do or say as the brunet breaks down in front of him.

“I know!” Grantaire shouts. “But this HAS to get finished!” He motions wildly to the painting. “I keep trying and trying, but nothing is working! Either the colors are wrong or it looks too textbook!”

Enjolras’s eyes are wide, and for the first time in a long time, he’s rendered speechless. He’s trying to find words, but his mind is blank. But when Grantaire groans loudly then turns toward his easel to start slapping paint messily across the black and white picture, Enjolras’s muscles react while his mind takes a while to catch up.

He grabs Grantaire’s wrist before the latter can ruin the painting. “R, stop!”

Grantaire freezes in his grip, and for a few moments, both boys are silent, with the only sound coming from Grantaire’s harsh, ragged panting.

“Sorry,” Grantaire mutters after a bit, and Enjolras replies by gently pulling the brunet to his feet. He keeps a tight grip around Grantaire’s wrist as he pulls him over to the bed.

He pulls the covers back with one hand before lightly pushing Grantaire onto the bed. To his surprise, Grantaire obliges without argument, which tells Enjolras just how poorly the brunet is feeling.

With Grantaire tucked in, Enjolras takes a spot on the edge of the bed and leans over to press his palm to Grantaire’s forehead. The heat that coats his hand is overwhelming, and his faces scrunches up in worry.

“You’re boiling,” he mutters under his breath, and Grantaire hums in response.

“Just sleep for right now,” Enjolras adds, but his words fall against deaf ears for Grantaire is already asleep.

Enjolras spends a few minutes just watching the brunet before he glances back to the painting with determined eyes.

*****

When Grantaire wakes up, he feels as if he’s suffering through a terrible hangover. His mouth is dry, his head is throbbing mercilessly, and his body aches as if he’s aged fifty years over night.

He sits up with a yawn but freezes halfway through when he spots Enjolras slumped over asleep at his desk. What the fuck?

He stumbles out bed and staggers towards Enjolras like a newborn deer. He opens his mouth to call out to the boy, but his words catch in his throat.

Enjolras has light paint streaks across his face, and once glance to his laptop shows multiple tabs on “How to paint.”

“What the fuck?” He breathes out before turning sharply toward his easel, and his eyes go wide just as his jaw goes slack.

His painting is colored with reds and golds that contrast against a deep swirl of blacks and greens. It’s almost ugly at a first glance, but the colors tell an entire story. There are gaps between the differing pairs of colors, but there’s one, small space in the center of the piece where the red mixes lightly with the green.

Grantaire is at a loss for words as he blinks back tears. He shifts his gaze to Enjolras and breathes out a soft “thank you” before turning his attention back to what, he believes, will be his best art piece.