#there's people studying for their intensive degrees for high paying jobs who are doing better at art than me bc they dont waste time

[skunkes]

How much time in a day do you think you do art? Personally do you think that's a good amount?

i couldn't say, my days are unstructured. i sleep very late because i can only get in the zone when everyone's asleep and wont bother me, but im prone to distraction when I get to do whatever i want, too.

i wake up late without enough sleep and end up loafed and in bed for a good chunk of the day (and night) trying to regain energy (and daydreaming)... cant draw much during the day regardless of being left alone or not bc i get frustrated having to anticipate things like eating....i just want to get in the zone for hrs and not have to care abt such things...

whatever the amount is its definitely not enough and i was going to try to actually calculate it before i realized itd just make me sad. all i do is waste time

[4ce-of-2pades-inkwell]

I’ve been watching/listening to those SCP videos on YouTube while I draw Cuphead stuff, so it was only a matter of time before I came up with a crossover AU:

Dr. Manuel Animi is a young but talented scientist rising up through the SCP Foundation. He has a particular interest, fascination, obsession even, with SCPs that break the laws of reality, or that are beyond comprehension. Merely out of scientific curiosity, of course, nothing more... He spent many years working with eldritch beings such as… well, I can’t remember any off the top of my head, but things along the lines of what Cthulhu was expected to be, not his SCP reality. Dr. Animi had a better capacity than most for withstanding the dangerously incomprehensible, a mental tolerance for things that would drive an average person to insanity, but he was still human, and many times was affected to the degree of needing prolonged therapy or even intense medical treatment to recover. He would always return to his work with a passion as soon as possible, but eventually he was banned from working with any SCP classified as a significant mental hazard. His superiors claimed he had reached the lifetime exposure limit that was protocol (similarly to scientists working with radiation), and they cited his hair, which had changed from red to pure white as a result of the horrors he had seen, as proof he had been at this long enough to be at risk of permanent mental damage. They claimed his relocation to other SCPs was for his own safety, and that they did not want to lose such a bright scientist, but this was a lie. In truth, Dr. Animi’s obsession with these eldritch beings and mind-breaking ideas concerned them. They saw a high probability that Dr. Animi would not stay content with his permitted research, and would attempt to use the anomalies for his own purposes, becoming a threat. In short, he liked his work too much. If he had refused the ban on his area of study, he would have been deemed too far under its thrall, and would have been terminated. So Dr. Animi now works with other anomalies, though is not satisfied with his current work, and is biding his time for an opportunity to reenter his preferred field.

Chase Animi is a gambler. Addicted to it. This has caused him to go deep into debt, and in and out of prison. Any attempt to keep a job or build any kind of stable life is sabotaged by this addiction. He’s miserable, but he can’t stop. He falls in with shady crowds trying to pay back the money he owes, starts conning people for their cash, gets caught and put in jail again. He is not having a great time. One night, a bar fight gets a little too heated, and results in three men dead by Chase’s hand. If this isn’t enough of a crime to earn a death penalty, then he somehow does something else to earn his sentence. He ends up a D-class at the SCP Foundation. He is given cleaning duty for The Sculpture for several months, and as all goes to plan during that time, he survives without incident. Soon though, he is sent in to observe an SCP that affects a person’s mind—though he doesn’t know that yet. This is where he first interacts with Dr. Animi, who has just convinced the higher-ups that he should be allowed to study mind-altering SCPs again, if only ones of significantly less power and danger to himself. Chase doesn’t recognize the scientist that happens to share his name. But Dr. Animi recognizes him.

They’re twin brothers.

The two had parted ways years ago after an argument. Manuel had just joined the SCP Foundation as a scientist, and tried to convince Chase to apply as well, so they could stick together. Chase was furious with Manuel for wanting to retreat from society into a group of crazy all-powerful scientists, and for not telling him sooner that he was planning this. Chase wanted nothing to do with the Foundation or any organization like it. Manuel warned Chase that if he didn’t join the Foundation in some way, he would have to be given amnestics to forget its existence. Chase said that was fine by him, and that if Manuel wanted to leave him so badly, then he would be more than happy to forget his brother entirely. So Manuel, also caught up in anger, did exactly as he asked, erasing any trace of himself from Chase’s mind and leaving his brother for good, devoting his life entirely to the Foundation. Chase’s life, meanwhile, fell into disarray. It is possible that the careful amputation of such a constant presence in every single one of Chase’s memories negatively altered his mind in such a way that predisposed him to his addiction. With the sudden lack of something he had depended on all his life, he needed to depend on something else…

Dr. Animi recalled Chase from his current assignment before its effects could take a stronger hold, and through application of his recent research, was able to produce a near-total recovery. Dr. Animi then told Chase that they were brothers, and explained what had happened to cause his amnesia about their shared past. Chase was furious with Dr. Animi for destroying his memories of him, and disgusted that he would not only commit unethical experimentation, but do it to his own brother. Chase refused to speak to Dr. Animi further, but Dr. Animi still wanted to help Chase. He knew there were a few rare cases of D-class not only surviving their ordeals, but being allowed to reenter society and live ordinary lives. Only a handful of cases, out of innumerable casualties, but if Dr. Animi played his cards right, he could save Chase.

There was an SCP that had been discovered earlier that year (let’s say this takes place in 1973 I guess), SCP-666. That one that tempts people with addictions. Very few D-class had been tested with it so far, and all had died as a result of succumbing to their addictions, but Dr. Animi had a theory about the nature of SCP-666, and he was going to bet his brother’s life on it. He contacted the team studying SCP-666 and recommended Chase as a test subject, highlighting the strong gambling addiction that had been the root cause of every crime Chase had ever committed. The team had tested subjects with substance addictions, but had yet to try addictions of any other nature. They accepted Chase as their next subject.

Dr. Animi insisted on being the one to deliver the D-class to his destination. Chase refused to speak to him, but Dr. Animi whispered that he was doing everything he could to save Chase’s life. This was his best chance at not only survival, but escape. If Dr. Animi was right, SCP-666 was not a death sentence, but a test. Any D-class subjected to it who was not already an addict had seen no ill effects—666 did not compel a person to act against their will, at behaviors that were not their own, but merely encouraged existing addiction until it reached the point of death. If Chase could resist 666’s temptations, he may be released alive, and in order to study the long-term effects on his addiction, Chase would need to be introduced back into the wider world, where he could be monitored in his natural environment with its usual available temptations. Dr. Animi would convince the Foundation, somehow, that Chase could not be exposed to any other SCP without destroying a valuable research subject. All Chase needed to do was not die from SCP-666. An even more difficult task, as there was not much opportunity to gamble in containment, and Chase was feeling withdrawal. Dr. Animi had a theory, but the facts (which Chase was not supposed to be told) said that everyone who had faced this SCP had died. So why not live it up one last time before he went? What did he have to lose? What did he have to go back to? And yet, this addiction had destroyed his entire life. If he was going to meet his end… what if he could win, just once, over that all-consuming force? Win something not through luck, but through skill, through willpower?

Well, he’s going to try. He doesn’t anticipate an outcome where he survives. He’s not doing this because he believes he’ll be freed, in any sense of the word. He’s doing this to spit in the face of 666-1, and prove to himself that he has control in his life, even if that life is about to end.

Also, there’s one last thing you should know about Chase. See, that mind-altering SCP he did a brief stint with? Well, I looked pretty unassuming. Just a plain white cup sitting on a table. Chase didn’t know what he was supposed to be looking for. And he certainly didn’t realize when he started talking about me in the first person. My effects can end pretty badly for those exposed. Usually, they end up drowning themselves, often with tea. But Dr. Animi caught Chase’s symptoms early, and managed to talk him out of being a danger to himself. He was unable to be convinced that he was not, in fact, a cup like me, but Dr. Animi twisted this belief into something safer. Chase had arms and legs, right? And eyes and a nose and a mouth? He repeated this often, making Chase locate these attributes on himself, until he finally believed it to be true. He was a person, who had different needs than a cup. But he was also a cup, there was no talking him out of that. Dr. Animi could only do so much. Instead, he worked with Chase to develop a persona that became his new self-image, a persona that was, of course, still a cup, but functioned a lot more like a human. Chase once again understood himself to need sleep and food and air, and to be susceptible to death under many conditions that an average non-person cup would thrive in. And despite an insistence that his hair be constantly damp with tea or milk or coffee, Chase was deemed able to live normally again, thanks to a little outside-the-box thinking on Dr. Animi’s part. After all, Dr. Animi understood that you don’t necessarily have to see the world in a way that makes sense to anyone else to live a good life. You don’t have to be one hundred percent “sane.” Sometimes your life can even be better if you let yourself go a little crazy…

[boxoffice-psych532]

UNIT 8: Motivation and the Internet

Motivation is defined as an influence of needs and desires on the intensity and direction of behavior. Huitt identified 7 motivations:

Stimulus-Response: respond to an external stimulus or obtain a conditioned response.

Social: Achieve or maintain social affiliation or a sense of social belonging.

Biological: Activate senses or maintain homeostasis

Cognitive: Maintain attention, develop understanding, solve a problem or make a decision.

Affective: Increase feeling good and decrease feeling bad.

Conative: Meet a goal, obtain personal achievement, develop self efficacy.

Spiritual: Increase understanding of purpose in one's life.

These motivations underlie all of our interactions on the internet.

Student Behavior

Professors have often worried that laptops are nothing but a distraction to students, and many ban them in the classroom based on that belief. Professors believe that students aren't paying attention, are going off-task, and are being disruptive to other students. However, many of their worries are unfounded.

DeLucia and Lasenza's 1995 article shows that student disruption has existed since before the internet became popular, and the professors don't know how to handle it. They suggested that professors understand the high external stimulus needs of students which aren't typically met in the classroom, which leads to restlessness and distractibility. Carbone's 1999 article showed that students will talk to friends show up late and leave early, watch portable TVs, and even nap in large lectures. 

Student boredom has also been a problem long before the internet. Fisher's 1987 article stated that a common cause of boredom was being constrained to a low stimulation setting with limited opportunities to relieve boredom, like sitting in a lecture class. Aldridge and DeLucia's 1989 article echoes this sentiment by saying that student's boredom is related to both the need for a high degree of stimulation and the conflict between student's expectations and reality. 

Students may be motivated to use their laptops for notetaking becuase it works best for their studying methods or it is simply easier for them to type instead of handwriting notes. According to Professor Gernsbacher's paper, they found that students who take notes on laptops DO NOT perform significantly different from students who use pen and paper. Students may also be motivated to go off task with their laptops becuase they need a quick mental break to help them maintain their focus and attention. Professor Gernsbacher's paper described how students who were randomly assigned to check their Facebook at a random interval maintained their attention significantly better than students who's break activity was not internet related. 

Students’ motivations for not wanting to sit in a faraway or separate location can be related to their optimal location for learning, and being forced into a back corner may inhibit their ability to learn. Professor Gernsbacher's paper described how some professors believe that laptop users distract both other students and themselves, but they found that neither of these beliefs are empirically supported. Forcing laptop users to sit in certain areas can just inhibit their ability to learn. 

Professors’ motivations for not wanting to see students with their heads in their laptops are related to their self-efficacy and job satisfaction. Mottett et. al.'s 2004 study showed that student nonverbal responsiveness has a greater effect on teacher self-efficacy and job satisfaction than verbal responsiveness. Essentially, professors like to see eye contact and head nods to make sure students are actually listening. 

Binge Watching

Binge-watching has become as common as getting lost in a book. There are multiple reasons people say they binge watch television:

Becuase it's fun

Becuase it's available

Becuase it allows developing deeper connections with the characters

Because it's already paid for

Becuase it's usually commercial free

Becuase it's what they did as children

Because it's what everyone else is doing

Becuase it provides community

Becuase it enables a shared culture

Becuase it's becoming culturally acceptable

To note be left out (FOMO)

To find out what happens next

[fatbottombucky]

Three’s Company *Ransom Drysdale x Reader*

Summary: M!Reader’s girlfriend, Ella, wants a threesome. After discovering it’s going to be with another dude you set some ground rules, a clear rule being “no gay shit!”. Despite not being gay, yourself and Ransom find yourselves intently wanting Ella to be gone throughout the fucking. 

Pairings: Male!Reader x Female Original Character/ Ransom Drysdale x Male!Reader / Ransom Drysdale x Female Original Character

Rating: [+18] Explicit 

Warnings: Internal homophobia. Threesome shenanigans, female and male oral-giving and receiving. degrading talk. Swear words. Two men wanting to fuck one another, but they can’t cause of their internal homophobia. 

Word Count: 2854

Note: There’s nothing against gays in this, lmao I am gay. It’s just mostly reader and ransom wanting to fuck but being like “we shouldn’t cause we’re straight! But I am going to look directly into his eyes as this girl sits on my dick!” 

“When you said threesome I expected another female to be joining us,” you exasperated. 

It was only a week ago when your girlfriend of eight months had propositioned you with the idea of a threesome. It had caught you off guard, nonetheless you agreed wholeheartedly. You weren’t a guy to shy away from sex adventures, you’ve seen and done plenty with women. 

It’s what made Daniella, or Ella to you, so interested in you. You aren’t exactly in her social class, she comes from old money and has a trust fund, whereas you come from- well, no money and you work everyday of your life just to scrape by. You’ve often had the thought she’s only with you to rebel against her family, bringing you along to social gatherings to cause a fuss. It’s whatever. She’s beautiful and nice, so you’re willing to go along because, hey, you’re not alone then. 

What caught you off guard was the third member she wanted, a male. You expected one of her high-class girlfriends, they’ve always had a keen interest in your relationship with Ella. Wondering why she’d be with you and for so long. 

“Hell, no.” Ella grimaces like the thought of kissing another girl is repulsive, “I’d prefer to have another guy having their way with me.” 

There’s a glint in her eyes, a playfulness. Her fluttering lashes normally work on you but not this time. 

You’re apprehensive. The photo of the man in question serves him well; sharp jawline, piercing blue eyes and a wicked smirk, he oozes some sinful confidence that you severely lack. Who even is this guy? Where did she even meet him? Had this guy been the reason all along for the threesome to be brought up? 

“Ransom Drysdale,” Ella smirks and flicks her eyes back to her phone, the picture still blindly on display. You almost snap the steering wheel off, deciding to focus on driving her Audi through the bustling New York streets. “He’s in New York right now, our families know one another and I’ve always wondered if the rumours are true about him.” 

Great. 

This guy has a reputation and she’s been thinking about it. 

“I don’t know how I feel about another guy fucking you,” you somehow get out and the way she snaps her head to you, well this is going to be a big L in your books. “Or being with a guy in this setting, so what? I thought threesomes are where we all participate but I don’t wanna be with some guy like that.” 

Ella snorts, she’s laughing at you. “How would a girl be any different?” 

“I don’t know, Ella, it just would be different.” 

“That’s so pathetic,” you roll your eyes and just stare at the road ahead, “You don’t have to do anything with him and anything I do with him you’ll be there. In fact, you can say right now if there’s anything you don’t want to happen. I just want two dicks, that’s all.” 

There’s a beat of silence. “Besides Ransom isn’t gay, so he won’t even go near you like that.” 

**

“This is so bizarre,” you muttered and shifted in your seat beside Ella. The restaurant was fancy, super expensive and elite. You had already downed half a glass of red wine-of which you expected cost more than the suit you were wearing. “Why are we getting dinner with him?” 

Ella snickered and rolled her eyes. “Good manners, babe,” voice sweet as she looks at you. 

You’d done some Googling on Drysdale when you got back to the hotel earlier. Whole family is filthy rich due to his grandfather, Harlan, famous murder-mystery writer. You haven’t read any of his books because books are commitments, more so than relationships. 

Ransom’s name pops up in headlines every few weeks; new girls hanging off his arms or some outlandish story being featured on tabloids. 

He’s not the type you’d personally hang out with, then again, Ella isn’t the usual company you keep. 

“Sorry I’m late, Ellie.” You snap your head up as Ella stands up, embracing the well-dressed man. “Traffic was shit. You guys haven’t been here long, right?” 

Yourself and Ella both speak at the same time. “No, of course not.”- “Twenty minutes, actually.” 

You’re gifted a bitchy glare from Ella as you stand up, you’ve never been one to shy away from speaking up. Rich people aren’t an exception to your patience. This makes Ransom smirk at you though, clearly not offended or peeved off by your remark. 

He shakes your hand firmly. “Ransom Drysdale, sure you’ve heard from me.”

“Y/N Y/L/N, honestly, only just learnt who you are today.” The three of you sit down and then you go silent, staring blankly at your glass of wine because what are the rules here? 

Ella had told you she had asked Ransom. So, he knows why the three of you are here. But now what? You order food and eat, wine and dine, then fuck back at the hotel and that’s it. Of course, that’s it. There’s nothing else to do, but you can’t help but think there must be more steps. Some kind of conversation that needs to happen. 

If there is a conversation that needs to happen, it doesn’t happen. Ella and Ransom are deep into conversation about ‘old times’. You sit just drinking and listening, usually how it is in your relationship. You never really have anything interesting to say to the wealthy, mostly because they wouldn’t listen anyway. 

“So Y/N, what do you do?” Ransom’s voice is smooth and deep, his face is illuminated by the candles in the centre of the table. You raise an eyebrow at the causal question, “what? I think it’s better than me asking, why did you agree to let me fuck your girlfriend?” 

You dryly chuckle and take another sip of wine, able to hold off on the question as your meals are placed before you. You contemplate and mull over his questions, either Ella hasn’t told him that you aren’t rich or he knows but wants to goad you into it anyway. 

“Well, I work a lousy job as an accountant and I’m mostly paying off my student loans from university.” Better to be truthful than stupid in front of the rich. “Before you ask, no, I’m not using my degree at this job. I studied for five years to use it for nothing. I’m also agreeing because I’m no prude, done a few things and whilst I’d prefer you be another female, I can sort of see the appeal of two dicks.” 

There’s a few seconds of just silence. Ella is volleying her eyes between you both. Ransom chews his steak slowly, eyes intently watching you and looking you over. It’s intense. You want him to stop, but you don’t look away. 

A smirk spreads across his face and he nods. “We’re going to have fun tonight.” 

**

“Splurged on the room then,” Ransom smirks as he unties his scarf, pulling it off of his neck and throwing it carelessly on the back of the armchair. “Must be nice to have the finer things,” he pats your shoulder roughly and gives you a knowing smile. 

You shrugged, the nerves being knocked away from the liquid courage you guys have consumed. “Can’t complain about the nice rooms we stay in.” You walk over to the minibar and nod, Ransom gives a curt nod. 

Ella scurries off towards the bedroom, a sultry smile of her ‘freshening up’ for the both of you. 

“She’s told you the rules, right?” You asked and poured yourself another drink, Ransom let’s out a light chuckle as he sauntered over to you. You lift an eyebrow in question, “It’s just for… boundaries really, I’m sure you understand.” 

The corner of Ransom’s mouth curls up, bringing the bourbon to his lips and taking a thoughtful sip, he’s standing close to you. Rubbing his shoulder against yours, he smells earthy and expensive, like spicy leather and musky mornings.

“I got your rules, don’t worry.” Placing the tumbler glass down. “More rules about us not doing stuff than me fucking your girl, though.” 

You looked at him hesitantly and quickly looked away, downing your own drink hurriedly. Before you can defend yourself, not that you need to, Ella calls for you both. Standing in the bedroom doorway, hip leaning against the frame and her arms crossed. 

Ella is dressed in nothing but simply lacy lingerie, that you know cost more than your rent. She looks beautiful, the lilac set matches her skin perfectly, hair is styled into a relaxed mused style- so you can play with it, you imagine. 

“Are you boys coming to join me or not?” 

That’s all the invitation you need before you’re walking around Ransom, placing your hands on her hips and pressing your lips to hers softly, she whimpers into your mouth before pulling away. Taking your hand and then extending her other towards Ransom, you chance a glance at the taller man. 

His cock sure smirks makes you look away, taking Ella’s other hand and she pulls you both into the bedroom. The big, soft, luxurious bed would do fine at handling your three bodies. 

You glance stiffly at the white sheets, well, now what? You know what to do when with just Ella but now you’re left in uncharted territory. Turning to look at the both of them once you’re stood in front of the bed, hands getting clammy for some reason. 

“Well, undressed yourselves.” Ella smirks as she sits on the end of the bed with a bounce, crossing one leg over her other, leaning back on her elbows as she looks at them. 

You start to unbutton your shirt, looking over at Ransom to see he was doing the same. You don’t take your eyes off of Ransom as you remove the shirt, letting the pale blue fabric to fall to the floor and then starting on your belt. Ransom begins to do the same, the clanging of his expensive Gucci belt is enough to numb your other senses. 

You're both down to your boxers, both black Calvin Klines. Ella raises an amused eyebrow and allows her legs to fall open. Lifting a hand and crooking a finger in a come hither motion, you follow with little relcultance. Falling to her side and pressing open mouth kisses to her soft neck. One of your hands sneaking up and cupping one of her lacy breasts, squeezing the flesh harshly as you suck at her neck. 

Ella let out a breathy moan, a sharp gasp escaping her at Ransom running his fingers over her clothed pussy. You help her sit up and unclasp her bra, allowing her perky breasts to slip free of the confines. Ransom slips the panties down her long legs before pushing her thighs apart, slotting himself between them. 

For a brief moment you are captivated by him, watching as he languidly licked up her core and wrapped his plump, pink lips wrap around his clit. The moans Ella whines out are white noise, your brows furrow together and you wet your lips. You’re about to look away but Ransom looks up, capturing your eyes in with his deep blue ones. His left eye drops down into a playful wink. 

You break out of his spell and look back at Ella, her eyes are screwed shut and her mouth is open wide, moans and groans leaving her wildly. You’re quick to attach your mouth to her nipples, already pebbled and peaked into hard nubs, lavishing her nipple with your tongue. 

“God, your mouths,” she breathes harshly. 

Time seems to meld as yourself and Ransom tease Ella with your tongues. You tease her nipples and softly bite on them as Ransom pushes two fingers into her and sucks on her clit. You both work in tandem, almost competitively, trying to see who can draw the most noises from her. 

“You sure I’m not allowed to fuck this hole?” Ransom asked punctuating the question with a forceful thrust of his fingers. 

His crude words make you shiver, a smirk pulling up on your mouth as your eyes narrow in delight. He’s asking permission, he certainly seems like the type to just take what he wants, save the consequence for whenever. 

“You think you’ve earned it?” That question throws Ransom off, it even has Ella raising her eyebrows at you but you don’t spare her a glance. Your eyes bore into Ransom’s, unable to look away like the previous times. 

Ransom grabs Ella’s ankle and flips her onto her stomach, tapping her hip and she raises them wordlessly, he gives you a questioning glare. 

“She likes it hard and deep,” you sit up on your knees, a hand softly running through her hair and gripping it tightly, “don’t hold back, Ran. I won’t be,” you pull down your boxers with your other hand and free your straining cock. 

You haven’t felt this hard in a while; you put it down to the fact this is new and exciting. You push the leaking tip into Ella’s waiting mouth, she hums approvingly around your girth. A low groan falls from your lips and you look up in time to see Ransom rid himself of his own underwear. 

A large hand is wrapped around his own cock, rubbing it lazily and, for some reason, you can’t take your eyes off of his member. Seeing him naked has stolen your air away; his whole body is immaculate and strong, truly a vision. 

You shake your head when Ella gags around your length, slowly pulling it out of her before looking up. Ransom had caught you staring at him, but instead of a disgusted look like you thought he’s wearing a curious look. An unreadable look. 

As he pushes in his impressive length he gives you a look, his hands gripping Ella’s hips tightly. The warm caven of Ella’s mouth envelopes you again, you moan loudly but you’re unable to look away from Ransom and he seems to not be able to look away from you either. 

“That’s it,” Ransom grunts as he starts to pound Ella from behind causing her body to jolt, pushing her further onto your cock. 

The force of his thrusting hips and yours into her mouth, using Ella to reach your peaks. Finding a hard and rough rhythm together. A pushing and pulling rhythm. You’re both grunting and groaning, looking into one another's eyes intensely. 

Ella’s whimpers and gagging sounds are numb to your ears, only focused on Ransom. His eyebrows are drawn together, jaw is clenched and his eyes are hard; dark and lust filled. 

“You like that?” The question momentarily makes you stutter, Ransom locked on you but Ella hums in admission. 

It wasn’t directed at her, though. 

You nod once, careful to only groan loudly and not make it seem that it’s going to be Ransom that’ll make you cum. 

“Of course, you do!” Ransom chuckles darkly, thrusting into Ella harder and grinding his cock deep into her, “fucking filthy. Dirty little whore for me, aren’t you?” Again Ella answers in whimpers and spit slicked sounds, but you have Ransom’s attention. 

“Going to cum, I can feel it. Go ahead, fuckin’ cum for me.” 

Your hips stutter deep in Ella’s throat, she gags but groans at the feeling. You cum down her tight throat, copious amounts of cum spurting out of you, a strained growl is yelled from you. Eyes being forced shut at the suddenness of your orgasm. 

Ella greedily swallows every drop, licking your cock clean as you slowly drag it out of her mouth and fall back against the bed. Beads of sweat across your forehead and chest, Ella looks at you and smiles before whining again. Ransom keeps going ramming into her harder and faster, his eyes still scorned onto you. 

You watch as Ella reaches her peak rather quickly after you, trembling under Ransom and whimpering, you sit up and cup her face in your hands. Kissing her softly before pulling away, looking up at Ransom who has his eyes shut before looking down at you. 

“Cum inside of her.” You demand without hesitation and Ransom seems to take it. 

His whole body becoming rigid and spasming, hips stilling inside of Ella as he cums deep within her walls. It’s a few silent seconds of heavy breathing. Till he pulls out and sinks back on his hunches, chest heaving and hair stuck to his forehead. 

Despite the fact you both had such an intimate moment during this, you can’t bring yourself to look at him in the eye now. Knowing you orgasmed because of him, that you likely got hard because of him. 

It’s weird. It’s odd. Ella stretches out on the bed, a low hum of approval to what just happened coming from her. 

“Give me a few minutes and we can change positions and one of you can stick it in my ass.” 

A deep part of you wished she’d fall asleep and it was just yourself and Ransom.

(Let me know what you think!!! So, yeah... I am writing a part 2 where Ransom and Male Reader get some alone time and get to... do some activities ;) but I wanted it to be like this whole weird sexual competitiveness between them with little moments of mxm - Rosalie) 

[sansugar]

An ultimate secret

Pairing: Wooyoung x Female Reader

Word count: 4.2k

Genre: Smut

Warnings: rough sex..?, fingering, maybe something else I’m forgetting

--Finally sharing one of my first writings. This is potentially a 3 part series, let me know if you want to read more. Hope you enjoy!--

The train pulled to a halt and your suitcase knocked against your knees, startling you out of an upright doze where your head had been falling forward and jerking back for 45 minutes. A voice over announced the next station and you realised you were already in Seoul. After signing up for a 3 month, intensive course right in the middle of the city, you were excited to be given a second chance at your getting dream job, especially since the end of high school hadn’t worked out because you had been terribly sick. Luckily for you, your brother Seonghwa lived in a dorm just twenty minutes from your new school. With your small savings pot from years of working late nights at the convenience store and not having to pay rent, you would be able to focus all of your time on your studies. Or so you thought.

Exiting the confined tunnels of the station you emerged onto the street, squinting over the blurred, buzzing crowd. Though you recognised the faint smell of tobacco and deep fried chicken, and the clopping of heels across the pavement, you had to take a moment to get your bearings. As you hesitated in the middle of the path, a man leaning casually against a tree caught your eye. He reminded you of a cardboard cut out, slender with hard features, dark hair hanging across one eye. His navy blazer hung open, revealing a band t-shirt underneath, jeans and a belt buckle that caught the sun. You barely recognised your own brother.

“Seonghwa?!”

His face softened with a genuine smile as he strode towards you, arms out. He smelt expensive, like a brand name you’d seen on a billboard, but his enveloping hug was the same as it always had been, like he could wrap his arms around you twice.

“Was your train delayed? I thought maybe I’d missed you.”

“No I don’t think so” you replied, distracted by the of rainbow of advertisements flapping in the street above every shop.

You let him pull your backpack off your shoulders and take the handle of your suitcase before leading you out of the crowds.

“Are you hungry?”

You hadn’t realised until that moment that you had been starving.

“Yes please let’s get something good” you whined, pulling on his arm.

He chuckled, taking you down a maze of side streets to a tiny, hidden restaurant.

The food was delicious and you couldn’t stop yourself from ordering way more than you could eat, especially because you knew Seonghwa would pay. You talked with him more than you had in years. He told you all about his experiences as part of a rookie idol group and you told him all about life back home with your parents. You were lucky that he had just finished album promotions and had some time off to spend with you between training sessions.

When you arrived at the dorms you were quickly introduced to the other members of ATEEZ in a whirl of handshakes and tentative hugs before Seonghwa ushered you to his room to get you unpacked. It had all gone so fast that your mind began to replay Yunho’s warm touch, Mingi’s toothy grin, Wooyoungs constant chatter and San’s smouldering stare. Somewhere in the pit of your stomach you felt excited. How were you going to get any studying done with that around you 24/7?

You placed your suitcase on the bed and began to rummage around in your disorganised mess of clothes when you heard a knock at the doorframe. It was Hongjoong.

“Y/N. Do you mind if I quickly grab something? I left my charger in here” He pointed past you to the bedside table.

“Not at all, go for it”

He knelt down to pull his charger plug out of the wall when it clicked in your head that this was his room.

“Did Seonghwa kick you out of your room? Am I stealing your bed?”

Hongjoong chuckled and shook his head.

“It’s yours for the next three months. I’m happy to bunk with Yunho and Yeosang. A girl needs her privacy. Well, you will be in here with Seonghwa but…you’ll be comfortable”

He smiled at you as he swung his hands around his sides, unsure what to do with them.

“Hongjoong, haven’t you got somewhere to be?” Seonghwa said, appearing at your side.

He gave him a look that you couldn’t quite see and Hongjoong slipped out of the room without a word.

Seonghwa pulled a handful of clothes from your suitcase and began to fold them carefully. You crawled up onto the bed and sat with your back against the wall. The room was small and mostly bare but cosy. Seonghwa’s immaculately made bed was opposite yours and you were reminded of when you had shared a room with him when you were younger. You closed your eyes, feeling content in your new home. But that relaxation was short lived.

“Have you studied today?” Seonghwa asked, brow furrowed as he tried to match your socks.

“No? Classes haven’t started yet”

“But surely you have some work to do? To get a head start?”

“I guess…”

“Y/N. I hope you’re taking this seriously. You’re not always going to have a second chance”

You scowled at your brother, starting to remember why you had celebrated when he decided to become an idol and moved out in the first place.

A few weeks later, classes had started and you had settled into life at the dorm. Like you, the boys were in and out constantly but once a week you all had dinner together, and soon enough you were just a regular member of the team. You played mobile games with Wooyoung, watched dramas with Mingi and had regular arm wrestles with Jongho who was sometimes kind enough to let you win. Yunho would ask you about what you were learning while San tried to teach you to do pull ups and Yeosang would send you song recommendations every other day. Seonghwa had been overbearing and wary at first of the boys stealing too much of your attention but over time he relaxed, appreciative that there were 7 other people looking out for you.

It was a Sunday evening and you were sitting on your bed after a few hours of actual studying to watch a movie on your laptop, the room shadowed as the sun set behind the other buildings. You were snuggled in your blanket, completely engrossed when Seonghwa thumped into the room, flicked on the blinding light and yanked your headphones off your head.

“Hey!”

“What are you doing? Why aren’t you studying?” He scolded.

“I have been studying! Get off my back.”

This had been such a regular argument over the past few weeks, you felt like your responses were scripted. But today, he seemed to have had enough.

“You seem to think you can just get through life with a pretty face and no work Y/N but it doesn’t work that way. I won’t let you laze around here and waste our parents money on a course you don’t even seem to care about”

“What are you talking about? I already studied today. I’ve done all my homework”

Seonghwa grabbed your laptop out of your lap and closed it forcefully.

“This look likes you’re working really hard. Really practising well” he chided.

You glared at him.

“Look Seonghwa, I don’t know what your problem is…”

“My problem? I’m just trying to look out for you. You sit around here all day, wasting time on your phone, watching TV. This isn’t a holiday Y/N. Anyone would think you don’t even want to be successful and employed. If you’re not careful, you’re going to fail this course just like you failed high-school.”

You threw your blanket off your knees, stood up and shoved him. A painful lump rose in your throat, which you held in place, determined not to let him see you cry.

“I had pneumonia you asshole. You were there. How dare you stand there all high and mighty when you did absolutely fuck all with your high-school degree. I’m so sick of you pretending like you’re better than me when all you do is prance around in tight pants on stage.”

His face was like stone as he stood motionless in front of you.

“I know the real you Park Seonghwa and I can see straight through this facade you put up for your fans. You and your fake superiority can get fucked”

You stormed out and slammed the front door behind you with one goal in your mind. You had to get away from him. The lump in your throat became suffocating and tears peeked at the corners of your eyes. Your face felt hot but the hairs on your arms prickled and in that moment you wished you had had enough sense to grab your phone or a jacket on the way out. You walked aimlessly down the road, staring up at the dusty sky, willing your tears to suck back in so the passersby with their dogs would stop looking at you. You replayed his words in your head and saw his constant disapproving face, wondering what had happened to that soft and kind brother that had taken you for lunch those weeks ago. Your brother had always been a bit criticising, but never this cruel. You felt the sudden urge to hurt him, the need to see his face in shock, for once unable to predict you. But how? He had always been the stronger one, the smarter one, always two steps ahead.

You found yourself outside the dance practise building the boys often visited after hours. The lights were still on so you let yourself in, shivering and rubbing your arms. You wandered down the hallway, looking in each of the little square windows when you noticed a familiar brunette in a practise room by himself, music blaring. You slipped past the door and sat on the couch to watch Wooyoung dance, still oblivious to your presence. You had never seen him like this before; wearing a tank top and grey sweatpants, leg muscles straining against the fabric. You watched wide eyed as the bass of the music surged through your chest, playing your heart like a drum, captivated by his lunges that shook the floorboards, the intricate patterns he drew with his body and facial expressions that made you feel all kinds of things in your lower half. He almost jumped out of his skin when he noticed you.

“Fuck Y/N!” He said, running to pause the music on his phone. “You scared me half to death”

“I’m sorry. I just saw you dancing and I…” you trailed off, acutely aware of how flustered and tearful you must still look, trying to hide your face with your hair.

The smile on his face fell as he approached you.

“What happened? Are you ok?” He dipped his head to look into your eyes, softly touching your shoulders, so close you could feel the heat radiating from his body. “Was it Seonghwa again? I swear to god if he’s been on at you again I’ll…” he paused and reconsidered. “I mean I probably won’t do anything…but I will if you want me to”

“I really don’t want to talk about it”

Wooyoung wrapped his arms around you, pulling you close to his chest. He smelt like sweat and deodorant which you inhaled deeply, leaning into his embrace.

“Do you want to get some food?” He asked, stroking your hair.

“No, I’m not hungry.”

“What do you want to do?”

A momentary idea popped into your head. “Could you teach me to dance?”

Wooyoung pulled away far enough to look at your face, a hint of concern and uncertainty in his eyes.

“To dance?”

“It would take my mind off things…teach me the part you were practising”

He laughed nervously but when he saw you were serious, he nodded. You followed him to the middle of the dance floor and he stood just in front of you, legs in a wide stance.

“Okay, so first you go like this…”

Wooyoung showed you sequence and then broke it down into steps. You were shaky at first, but with his help you started to get it, dancing the choreography almost to speed once he turned the music on. You quickly forgot the fight, laughing whenever you got it wrong and Wooyoung playfully yelled at you for not listening to him.

“You’re not low enough. Squat lower! Yes like that. Now thrust your hips. More. Make it bigger. You’re still not doing it right!”

Wooyoung ran over to pause the music and you sighed loudly.

“The hip thrusts are embarrassing” you whined, fanning your hot skin with your hands.

“They are not. Confidence is sexy. You are sexy. Now come on, your form isn’t right”

You caught your breath as he came behind you and ran his fingertips lightly down your sides before settling them on your hips. You felt your body stiffen and skin prickle in anticipation, desperate for him to either slide his hands lower or to put a metre of distance between you.

He did neither, instead putting pressure on the juncture of your thighs to make you squat lower and lean slightly right, his chest flush against your back, sweaty shirt pressing against you. You could feel his hair tickling your neck as his hands slid down your arms to grab your hands and raise them above your head. It took everything you had to stop your thighs from shaking, body completely new to such a low squat position. You didn’t dare move as he analysed you in the mirror, brushing a strand of hair out of your face.

“Just like that” he said dryly as his hands came back to rest on your waist, dark eyes fixed on yours, unconsciously licking his bottom lip

You looked away, at anything other than his intense stare. Were you reading this right? Or did all dancers guide each other with such alluring invasion of personal space? His body shifted and you felt the light press of his bulge against your ass, shattering any notions that this was a normal dance lesson. His breath fanned your shoulder and you thought you should move away, pull his hands off of you, tell him off, anything to remove yourself from the precipice of turning your relationship into something else.

But your hips took a mind of their own and you felt yourself gently grind back against him, drawing an involuntary groan from deep in his throat. You craned your neck to look at him over your shoulder, frozen in the painful squat your mind paid no more attention to. Time stood still as his gaze flicked to your parted lips and you slightly inclined your head in a permissive nod. Before you realised you had moved, he had flipped you around and pressed you hard up against the mirror, licking into your mouth and hands roaming over every inch of your clothed chest. His hips bucked against yours and you reached down to the outside of his sweatpants to palm him, drawing a another long groan from him against your lips.

“Please don’t stop” he panted, planting breathy kisses along your jaw to your collarbone, pausing to inhale your scent and pulling down your t-shirt collar to grant him further access to your skin.

“Can I…” he started to ask, but his hands were way ahead of him, travelling up your shirt, kneading your breasts through the fabric of your bra, forehead pressed into the crux of your neck.

You fingers played on the edge of his pants as you briefly questioned yourself again before diving down to take hold of his hot length, earning a simultaneous groan from both of you. You held tightly but didn’t move, causing him to shamelessly buck up into your hand, his touch abandoning your chest in search of your core, which at this point was embarrassingly wet.

You knew there would be no going back the moment his hand slid down the front of your panties. His middle finger swiped up your slit, flooding warmth into you and you instinctively clenched your walls to feel some friction.

“Holy shit” he breathed, mostly to himself as he inched two fingers deep inside you to curl against your spot, causing you to shudder helplessly beneath him. You were insatiable, weeks of pent up curiosity, fantasises and late night masturbation in the shower caused by living in a house of 7 gorgeous men. It was wrong, it was forbidden and you were intent on riding it straight to hell.

“Please fuck me Wooyoung” you whimpered to the ceiling, shaking at the intensity of which he fingered you, tongue pressing into your neck, drinking you in.

He growled into your skin and captured your lips again with both hands holding your face, the fingers which he had just had inside of you rubbing your own juices on your cheek. You suppressed a laugh at his eagerness and pulled his sweatpants down to his thighs as he pulled your shirt over your head, unclasping your bra and burying his head between your breasts, sucking and grabbing at your flesh.

“Fuck I want you so bad” he said, muffled into your nipple, pulling it between his teeth.

In the space of a breath, he hoisted your leg onto his hip, bunched your skirt up around your waist, pulled your panties to the side and entered you in one swift motion that had you both gasping out.

Time stopped again as he bottomed out, pausing with his forehead pushed against yours, inhaling deeply, fingers digging into your thigh. Your walls were screaming with the sudden stretch and you suppressed a painful sound when he tentatively pulled all the way out and pressed back in. You wrapped your arms around his neck to keep yourself upright and balanced on your one standing leg. He tested a few more erratic thrusts and the pain began to mix with pleasure and an overwhelming desire to be pounded into the mirror but Wooyoung paused his movements.

“I don’t know if I can control myself” he mumbled with shuddering breaths, hair hanging in his eyes.

“Then don’t”

He snaked his arm around the small of your back and jerked your hips closer to his, your head leaning on back the mirror like a rag doll in his hold. He drew his cock back again and you felt every ridge of him before he thrust up into you, setting a bruising pace that made you gasp for air.

“Fuck, I’ve imagined this so many times” he kissed below your ear, bouncing your body with every thrust and your hands fell back flat onto the mirror to hold on for dear life. “You walking around the dorm in your cute sundresses like you don’t know what you do to me.”

Pleasure started to rise from your core to your stomach and you wrapped your leg tighter around his hips, chasing the promise of your release. You leaned back in to capture his lips in a kiss, deeper than you had all night. He held you in that kiss until the pleasure became too much and you had to pull away, sucking in a desperate breath.

“God you’re so fucking perfect. Tell me-ugh…tell me how good it feels”

You moan as the pressure builds, pleasure sparking in multiple directions, but the pain of your wobbly standing leg starts to pull you away. As if reading your mind, Wooyoung pulls out and turns you to face the mirror, spreading your legs with his feet and pulling your hips back onto his cock. You cry out as he reaches deep inside you, igniting a fire as your walls clamp down on him and your hand automatically drops to rub your clit.

“I’m not going to last” he says, inhaling your hair. “Are you close?”

You moan again as if that is a response and rub your clit faster, knowing your release was within reach, just over that figurative hill, if he could just…

“There, a-ah fuck Y/N, I’m there. God-fucking-yesyesyes”

Wooyoung stands on his toes, boosting the angle of his cock to rub directly on your back wall and pound erratically into your spot. Like the crack of a whip, you inhale suddenly, almost choking on air as he hurtles you towards your orgasm, cock twitching as he cums deep inside you.

“Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop” you pleaded, reaching back to hold the back of his thighs in case he dared to pull away from you or reduce his blinding pace.

Your torso was almost completely horizontal now, back arching, thrusting yourself back onto his cock, his cum dripping down your thighs. Your release hit you like a series of waves breaking, eyes squeezed shut, mouth open in a silent scream as your walls convulsed erratically, spreading a wet warmth throughout your core. Wooyoung continued to pound you, fingers coming down to press on your own, rubbing harder into your clit.

Riding you down from heaven, stars and colours swirling behind your eyes, Wooyoung began to slow. Your knees gave way and you threw your hands out in front of you to stop yourself hitting the wooden floor too hard. Wooyoung wrapped his arms around your stomach and dropped to his knees with you in an attempt to keep his softening cock buried inside of you. His chest heaved against your back but you were both quiet, letting the sound of the squeaky fan and creaks of the building fill the silence.

“Fuck, Y/N I should have asked if I could come in you”

“It’s fine, I’m on the pill”

“Even so” he mumbled, pressing a kiss between your shoulder blades and slowly removing himself from you.

You remained awkwardly on your hands and knees, panting at the floor as your senses returned and the reality of what you had done clicked from blurry to sharp in your mind. Wooyoung handed you a towel and you wiped the cum from your thighs, gazing in disbelief up at your smudged handprints on the mirror. Wooyoung was speaking, possibly to you, but you couldn’t focus on his words, caught in a state of ecstasy that wasn’t just post orgasm bliss. As you both got dressed, he tried to catch your gaze, but you barely noticed him, focused on the incredible feeling rising in your chest.

“Hey-where are you going?”

You were halfway out the door when you turned to look at him and forced a smile.

“I have to go back”

You left Wooyoung dumbfounded behind you, revelling in the complete elation of having just done something that would make Seonghwa burst a blood vessel if he knew. You emerged into the night air again, cold wind soothing your red, sweaty face. You felt bulletproof, like there was nothing more Seonghwa could hold over you. Not when you had such an ultimate secret over him.

You heard low voices when you reached the dorm and opened the door to find Hongjoong and Seonghwa sitting at the table, several empty bottles of Soju between them. Something about the way your brother looked at you, eyes glazed over and swaying slightly, told you that the drinking had been one sided.

“There you…I was so…worry” Seonghwa mumbled, standing up to give you a hug though he ended up almost pushing you over and Hongjoong had to step in and hold him up.

“It’s ok, I’m fine” you said, patting him on the back and mouthing a thank you to Hongjoong, who shrugged a smile. You looked up at your brothers’ flushed and puffy face and in this moment you pitied him, a pang of guilt stabbing you somewhere in the gut.

“I wish I…I shouldn’t have-“ he started but you cut him off.

“Let’s get you to bed”

It was a short but slow stumble from the kitchen to your shared room.

“I’m such a screw up” Seonghwa whined, head lolling backwards before you and Hongjoong dropped him on his bed.

“Go to sleep now” you said, smiling to yourself at your brothers complete inability to hold his liquor.

“You’re my sister and I…always…” he trailed off, squeezing your hand, eyes fluttering shut. Hongjoong turned off the light, leaving you sitting on top of Seonghwas quilt in the dark room, listening to his breathing as he started to drift off. You bit your bottom lip, wondering if maybe you had gone too far with Wooyoung tonight.

But your guilt was fleeting as the next morning, a hungover and humiliated Seonghwa berated you over breakfast for leaving the house without your phone.

“What the hell is wrong with you Y/N? What if something had happened to you? It just baffles me how you can be so damn stupid sometimes”

You sat at the table, staring ahead and calmly eating your cereal as he brought up more reasons and memories where you had been what he considered irresponsible. But you didn’t take the bait this time. You felt above that now, addicted to the power of what Seonghwa didn’t know, of how Wooyoung had melted at your touch, and how mere centimetres from your brothers disapproving face, you plotted your next pursuit.

[mirrorballls]

* lili reinhart, female + she/her  | you know evan cahill, right? they’re twenty-four, and they’ve lived in irving for, like, their whole life? well, their spotify wrapped says they listened to whatta bitch by the regrettes like, a million times this year, which makes sense ‘cause they’ve got that whole heirloom leather jacket, worn down soft and cracked at the elbows, hard, biting scoff that comes from deep in the chest, and driving home in the dead of the night, having to deny the call of the nearest interstate exit thing going on. i just checked and their birthday is june 24, so they’re a cancer, which is unsurprising, all things considered.

hi.

hehe ooc intro first. my name is liz (she/they, 23, est) and i’m just simply cheesed to meet you.... i’m playing three muses after a hiatus so please forgive me when these are all unintelligible drivel. i would love to plot with everyone after i force myself to finish these. i have a little Pinterest especially for this group here and if it tickles your fancy i would love to make plot at auld liz syne#2288 on discord.com :D without further ado here’s queen bitch.... gorgest baby who can do no wrong and Him coming soon.

basics.

full name:  evangeline rae cahill. answers exclusively to evan. birthday:  june 24, 1996. big three:  cancer sun, capricorn moon, aries rising. sexuality:  bisexual. occupation:  bartender. student (nursing). neighborhood: grew up in lilac ridge, now has an apartment in delphinus heights.

bio.

evan’s parents got married as if to prove a point. they were young and barely knew each other, but they thought they’d be the perfect match, a classic opposites attract. her father was a business student and her mother was studying holistic healing when they met in charlotte. he got her to take her life seriously and she got him to let loose. they moved to irving together after three months of dating because with them, everything always had to be hard and fast (they’re where evan learned it). it felt like a nice middle ground for them and it wasn’t long before they got married and had evan, before her father got involved in local business, before her mother took up a handful of odd jobs to pass the time ---- and something of an affair.

her parents divorce was messy. she was barely three at the time, so she doesn’t remember the moment itself, but the aftershocks of it have rang through her entire life. her father didn’t take the news well, her mother claimed it was all his fault for ignoring her for work anyway, and evan became a casualty of the whole thing. even now, twenty some-odd years later, they can barely stand each other and evan’s always been acutely aware of it. on the one hand, their open vitriol towards one another always made sure she knew she wasn’t the cause of their misery. but it did often times make her wonder if she was just a symptom of it, some reminder of the other person and the fact that they would never truly be able to shake one another.

she grew up living full time with her mother and step-father (her former lover, who she’d surprisingly go on to be married to til this day) and splitting time with her father, who’d go on to remarry and start a new family when she was ten. her home with her mother and step-father and their motley crew began to feel like the family she would willingly claim, as her father made less time for her and she began to feel less at home with his picture perfect family. her real home was messy and chaotic, but it’s where she felt she belonged.

because at her home, in lilac ridge, things weren’t normal, but they were never boring. her mother remained a free spirit and her step-dad much better matched that about her. things got volatile from time to time, but somehow, they always pulled it together. evan almost thought it was cute, in a kind of messed up way.

but regardless of how she felt about her family, there was something about it that set her aside. word travels fast in a town like irving, and while it never brought her ill in lilac ridge, her mother’s reputation and affair didn’t do her much well with her father’s new suburban friends, or the children of the more gossipy pta parents. it made her feel like something of an outsider: not only was she a bit of a weird kid, but her family’s drama was on display for the whole town to give their point of view on. but rather than shrink away from the judgement, she decided to lean into it. if half the town was ready to believe she was the rowdy daughter of this family so far gone, she’d show them just how much that she could be. because sometimes it’s easier embrace what they want you to be than try and rage against it. if you can convince yourself that reputation is all of your doing, in your control, it’s not a weapon that can be used against you anymore. it’s one you can harness to raise a little hell.

so evan made herself an outsider in middle and high school, by design. her plan had worked, she’d gone from weird girl who cared about people understanding her to fully written off and free to live her life as she wanted. it was lonely, but she convinced herself it was freeing. she spent a lot of time reading, heckling her classmates, starting her fair share of fights, and really digging deep into music. it started with rifling through the old vinyls her mom and step-dad had stowed away, then progressed to scribbled lyrics in the margins of her notes, to really and truly getting invested in writing and performing. she burned through her fair share of bands back in the day, because she knows what sound she wants and believes in it so strongly and is literally unwilling to compromise because something inside of her is broken. but music really was the thing that got her through being irving’s little lone wolf.

she had big plans her senior year. she was going to move to nashville, get close to music, and make it big, obviously. she was gonna make it solo and submit herself to stand among the greats: the pattis and nicos and sister rosettas. she was gonna shake whatever preconceived notions irving had for her, even if they were ones she had come to embrace, and get to make a life for herself that wasn’t tainted by her mother’s actions.

but life gets in the way. after she graduated, she worked some odd jobs before she settled into bartending for a quick buck while she tried to get her music career off the ground, but it never clicked like she wanted it to. and she knows that giving up after a few years at it isn’t the way to make it work, but she had bills to pay and a real life to start living. so she decided to go back to school and get a degree in nursing, something she’s genuinely proud of, but it doesn’t keep it from feel like settling. she tries to balance it all: music, school, work, being a menace to the kind folk of irving, but she feels like she’s losing her edge, losing what makes her feel like herself, and always served as a protective shell.

plotting ideas.

step-siblings via her dad!

enemies!

ex band mates, from all the bands she was apart of before being a mean control freak about the music they played got her ass kicked out!

other rowdy girls that she does actually like!

frequent patrons of fannie’s!

hookups!

maybe an almost relationship, from when she let herself not be hateful for 20 minutes and then changed her mind.

maybe someone she dated way too intensely for a little bit, in a way only weird kids can, but since they’ve broken up they’ve kept a decent friendship.

anything literally anything! 

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #427

“don’t pray for me when you’re the one enslaved”

Your ex taps you on the shoulder and says, “I still love you.” You say? I wouldn't say anything, I'm pretty sure I'd just break down. Do you play video games? Not really anymore. :/ I probably would, though, if I had the appropriate consoles for games I want. You can only replay PS2 games but so many times before you're tired of them. Do you spend a lot of time with family? No, honestly. Is your house more than two stories tall? It only has one floor. Have you ever hit your significant other? Has he/she ever hit you? I'm not in a relationship, but I have most certainly never hit an s/o, and they've never hit me. I wouldn't tolerate that shit. What makes you an attractive person? (Talk about your personality too!) I'm not. What color is your hairbrush/comb? White. What snacks do you have available in your household atm? Hm. Just some fruity grain and oats bars, as well as cashew ones. We try to keep sweets out of the house. Has anyone recently told you that they like you, or find you attractive? No. Are you attracted to the last person you Facebook messaged? Holy fuck yes, she's drop-dead gorgeous. Do you care about anyone that doesn’t care about you? Ha, I'm sure. Was your last Facebook friend requests from a male or female? Some random middle-aged man, like who are you sir. Which one of your relatives is most likely to embarrass you? My dad. He can be so rude to people sometimes. When was the last time you ate a bar of chocolate? Not sure. It's been quite a while. Do you play any games on Facebook? No. What would you like to get a degree in? It'd be nice to get a degree in Arts, but yeah... I'm never going back to school. Do you wake up a lot in the middle of the night? Pretty much every night. Would you prefer to read a book, watch a movie or TV show, or play a video game? Play a video game. Do you usually get popcorn or soda at the movie theater? Almost without fail. You've got to, it's part of the experience. What genre of films do you like the best? Horror. How many bank accounts do you have? None, actually. Have you ever had the flu? No, thankfully. What is your goal for the next few months? To start getting in shape/losing weight. I seriously hope this gym routine works out. Have you ever had some kind of sleep-disorder? How did it affect your life? I have seveeeere sleep apnea. It's shocking, I never would've guessed it, though, so the diagnosis (I had a sleep study, so yes, it's legit) was an extreme surprise. I don't snore at all, nor do I like pass out in the middle of something, but I stop breathing A LOT. For a year or two (no, that is not an exaggeration), it caused consistent, horrible, and violent nightmares/terrors. It made sleep frightening to me, and I was never getting a truly restful sleep. Now, I have an APAP mask (like a less extreme version of a CPAP mask) that helps me greatly. I only very rarely am surprised by a more subtle nightmare now. Have you ever had food poisoning before? Describe the experience. No, thankfully. What are two things that you have no problem paying full price for? Quality tattoos, for one. And maybe uhhh... idk. We're the kind of family that buys off-brand foods and drinks all the time because it's cheaper, so I can't say that. Maybe health care? Like I wouldn't want service from a sketchy dentist or something. Funny, charming, cute, romantic, smart - choose only 2 for the opposite sex. Charming and romantic. Have you ever let somebody use you? Why did you do it? No. You can go back in time & change something in your mom’s past - what is it? That's hard for me to say. She doesn't seem to like talking about her past very much, because I know it's turbulent with her mother. I would say her being disowned, but I don't know how that *actually* affected her. Maybe it was for the better she wasn't under her mom's authority anymore. Do you know anybody who is around the exact same size as you? Who? I guess my mom, but she's actually smaller than me now. She's lost a lot of weight and is still going at it. Ever been to a haunted house? How scared were you? Not a house, but rather hay rides and those places you just walk through and experience different stuff. They don't scare me at all; I love 'em. Been on any websites today you wouldn’t want your parents to see? No. Which is worse: dusting or mopping? Ugh, mopping. I don't mind dusting. Would you marry somebody who was intensely religious? No. Did you pull a senior prank? No. That shit is so dumb. Did you graduate? High school, yes. Have you ever been unfaithful in a serious relationship? No, and I never would. What was the last song you listened to? I'm listening to Lauren Babic and Halocene's cover of "Bleed It Out" by Linkin Park right now. It's great. Are you one of those lucky people with 20/20 vision? Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeell no. Is fashion one of your interests? No. Do you think you’ll eventually find that special someone? Hell if I know. Do you care what people think? Way, way more than I should. Is acting something you enjoy? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. I feel so stupid. What was the last thing you broke/sprained? I tore a ligament badly in my foot maybe a year and a half ago. I was SO sure it was broken. My mom had to help me walk everywhere, and even when she did, I'd be whimpering and seething. Have you ever fought with a friend because of their boyfriend/girlfriend? Because of yours? No. Has a stranger ever yelled at you for your language? No. Whose house, other than yours and your families', are you most comfortable at? If we're excluding all family, I suppose Sara's? Has any of your friends’ family ever yelled at you? Probably at some point as a kid. Did you ever play a sport as a little kid? Did you enjoy it? I played a lot. The only two I really didn't like were soccer and cheerleading. Did you ever watch the show Full House? Hell yeah, I loved it as a kid. Is there a celebrity you are just DETERMINED to marry? Ha ha y'all know I joke about it, but no, not legitimately. It's not like I know him personally at all, and I'm not chasing him to California either. Just let me dream still lmao. Have you ever burned someone’s picture? No, but I've actually heard it's truly therapeutic and not just for dramatic effect, so I wouldn't be opposed to doing so if you handed me a picture of him and a lighter. What’s the longest hike you’ve ever been on? I've never hiked before. Would you ever get a lip tattoo? Uh, no. Who is the first person of the opposite sex that pops into your head? Jason. Do your parents smoke cigarettes? My dad smokes like a chimney and is 100% going to end up with cancer because of it. You should hear his cough. Mom smoked for a very, very brief period before I was born. What does one of your T-shirts have written on it? "Equal in our bones" is on my favorite shirt. Name a pet you definitely wouldn’t want. Certain inverts people are wild enough to get, like giant African centipedes in particular. Would you prefer your partner smaller or taller? Can't say I care. do you enjoy going through old pictures? Sometimes. Other times, it's too painful. It also depends on the era of the pictures. Do you believe people when they say they don’t judge people? Ha, no. We all have natural first impressions and things like that that just... happen. What did you love the most about the town you grew up in? Nothing, really... besides just childhood memories that inevitably came. My hometown was dangerous. What’s a movie that you laughed the hardest during? I'm not sure. What’s a movie you cried the hardest during? I want to say Old Yeller, but I'm not sure. What’s your favorite restaurant? Olive Garden and The Cheesecake Factory. Is there a dessert you don’t like? Yeah; I don't like pie, strawberry shortcake, and I know there're others. Favorite album? Ozzy's Black Rain. It was my introduction to metal, so there's nostalgic value there, but I also just LOVE every single song. What’s a book that you read because everyone else was reading it? None. I don't read books for that reason. Underwater or outer space? Both kinda frighten me to a degree, but I find outer space to be way cooler. So many colorrrrrrs. Dogs or cats? Cats. Kittens or puppies? Ugh, both are so cute, but I gotta hand it to kittens. Bird watching or whale watching? Whale watching would blow me away. Whales are such magnificent, awe-inspiring animals. What is your spirit animal? Probably a deer. Skittish, shy, and quiet. What was your best subject in school? English. What was your worst subject in school? Math. What is one thing you wish you knew in high school? You and Jason aren't going to last, hunty. Who is your fashion icon? I don't have one. I wear what I want/what's comfortable. Diamonds or pearls? I think diamonds are a lot prettier. What color dress did you wear to prom? First one was maroon, last one was black. What’s your favorite plot-twist? Silent Hill: Shattered Memories. My jaw actually dropped. Honestly, are you jealous of someone right now? Yes. Honestly, what’s the worst thing you’ve done when you were mad? Said things I shouldn't. Honestly, ever made anyone cry when you were mad? Yes. Honestly, when was the last time you REALLY cried your heart out? Two weeks ago or something like that. Ever pop someone else’s pimple? OH MY GOD NO alskdfa;wekrwer; Do you need to return anyone’s phone call? No. Who are you closest to? My mom. Have you ever had a bad concert experience? No. Are you currently sad about anything? A number of things. Have you had any form of exercise today? No, but tomorrow is day #2 at the gym! Can you handle blood? Yeah, np. Has any place hired you underage for a job? No. Have you ever carried a concealed weapon? No sir=ee. Are you currently searching for a job? Not anymore, at least not actively. I was going to after TMS, but I'm just... still not ready. Right now, I'm focusing on the gym and getting healthy again, but if the seemingly perfect job comes along, I'm not opposed to taking it up. Does eating breakfast make you sick? No, I've got to have breakfast or else THEN I feel awful.

[spookymultimedia]

ITS MY BLOG AND I GET TO INFODUMP ABOUT MY CHARACTERS >:D

Disability and gender experience

CW for ptsd, panic attacks, su*c*de [I will talk about at the end if you still want to read this and will add another warning] , gender dysphoria, mild transpobia and abelism both internal and external

Disability

Lyla has osteoarthritis that is due to Burns' pretty fucky genes. She found this out when one evening they literally couldn't get out of bed for anything due to intense pain in the knees. Waylon had to come and get them and when he got there Lyla was pretty much on the brink of tears. Lyla then got a diagnosis. At first she was frustrated because it changed everything about his daily life. He was prescribed pain medication that dulls the pain to a manageable degree and was recommended to use a cane to get around during mild flare ups. It initially upset her. He thought she was too young to be going through something like that and hated having to limit how much they work. They later realized that stigma was ableist and bullshit and eventually sucked it up and decided to just embrace his new way of life and let her Grandfather help him learn how to cope due to experience with chronic pain [which means its lifelong] . On some days they get around just fine with pain meds but on bad flare up days they have to use a cane or chair to get around. She eventually mastered working with the aids and can even pop a sick wheelie on his chair. The pain still gets to them and it really sucks but he does swallow his pride and allow themselves to rest and be supported by others.

Sometimes with her partner Ashley he'll get snuggled and taken care of by her. Lyla is pretty dang light like his grandfather and Ashley has no problem carrying him around. Lyla secretly loves being carried. He's pretty fucking privileged to have Mr.Burns allow her disability support. Lyla is very privileged. Sometimes they like to make his cane/chair look cool with spray paint and whatnot. Very cripplepunk. Lyla probably found a disabled community of people his age to help her feel less alone.

Abbey has undiagnosed innatentive type adhd and ptsd that she gets full on panic attacks from. Neurodiversity was something taboo and not talked about in her childhood and didn't even realize she was struggling more than she should be. As a child she struggled paying attention to long boring sermons/lectures and was shamed alot for it. She didn't understand how she occasionally made people uncomfortable with very weird and unconventional topics she talks about. Loud sudden stimuli and intense buzzing overwhelms her and can make her cry. She didn't do very well in school and barely graduated high school. She prefered watching her favorite movies and playing dolls with her sister over studying. She's extremely sensitive to fabric and only has certain types of blankets and clothes that she can stand. She absolutely hates the feeling of fabric draping against her legs too much so sometimes she either wears tight-ish pants and avoids skirts/dresses. She hates sitting and walking in dresses. She never wanted to wear them lol they feel bad to her. She refuses to sit up straight and will cross her legs. Abbey hyperfixates on animation, cinema, and dollhouses. She likes binging movies and making doll projects. She tends to bond with people through movies and model making. She struggled to make friends outside of her circle and just stayed friends with people she grew up with at her church. They all escaped that mormon hell. Abbey struggles with her emotions and usually gets overwhelmed too much which can often leave her drained and tired. She has an intense oral fixation and uses stim necklaces to chew on, before she would chew on her sleeves, pen caps, pens, her hair, her shirt, her sleeves, bottle caps, ect. She was a very curious kid and tried to eat playdough, dirt and grass lol. None of them where good. She is decent at working at the video store and feels happy with her job being related to her interests. Because hrt therapy is so expensive she doesn't feel she can afford any kind of therapy or medication and it's very overwhelming for her to have to prioritize one aspect of her health over another. But with financial support from close friends and her boyfriend Tim she gets by ok.

Gender

Lyla assumed that it was completely normal to have a fuzzy fluid gender due to believing gender is a lose concept for most people. He didn't realize most people have static genders that don't change at all. It wasn't something they never questioned. Later in Lyla's 20s they started to learn more on gender and realized she wasn't as cis as he thought they where. The term genderfluid fit his experiences perfectly. They never felt still in their gender. Even if they felt more towards one gender over another it wasn't a firm feeling. It felt fluid and lose. As a teen they dressed in goth fashion and was a self proclaimed tomboy. But they realized tomboys or most gnc women didn't dress up very feminine on somedays or even wear dresses. She loves wearing dresses and she loves wearing lose jeans and a lose men's tee.

Lyla's gender tends to shift weekly but it may present or change depending on who they're with or what media/environment they're exposed too. For example he might feel more feminine with certain friends and more masculine with strangers. Sometimes they feel more comfortable being agender or a nonbinary genders with certain people such as their partner. Sometimes they only use certain pronouns with certain people. He/she/they at work, she/he with parents, she/he/they/it with siblings, she/he with some friends, and she/he/moths/rots, rats, its with their partner. Lyla will either tell people upfront on pronouns for the week or use a pin.

Most of the time clothes don't dictate their gender that week but there are some key differences. Lyla will not wear dresses on more masculine days and may draw on facial hair with a mascara brush. On more feminine days they dress more like a nature witch and loves floral stuff. They are more likely to have fun with makeup on those days.

Lyla doesn't want to undergo any kind of surgery or hormone therapy. Lyla may bind a bit with a sports bra but doesn't really feel uncomfortable with his chest and mostly doesn't mind having visibile tits on masc days.

Abbey always felt different from her birth sex and felt very frustrated learning she wouldn't just naturally grow into the chest and genitals she wants growing up. It was an extremely taboo and forbidden subject but despite that something inside her soul knew she was a girl. Her parents pushed very strict gender roles on her growing up and causes her to struggle with her femininity as an infertile woman who could not stand dresses. It made her feel a bit lost but she later felt better knowing other women cis and trans who don't conform to gender roles.

Abbey gets intense physical dysphoria from her crotch and for a long time she had to just deal with it until surgery was an option. Some days she could tolerate it but some days [especially when she got on estrogen and felt very hormonal] it was unbearable and a wet dream or boner would trigger a depressive episode that consists of cacooning a cover, watching her favorite movies and long naps. It was a toll on her mental health that was already pretty bad. But emotional support, understanding and patience from her friends and boyfriend helped her carry on though it. She eventually does get bottom surgery and it's a HUGE weight off her chest.

Abbey usually dresses in sweatshirts, graphic tees and cute jeans. Whatever's comfortable on the skin. She wore tank tops more when her tits grew in. And they grew in pretty dang fast and big and ah it hurt. She's a c cup which she loves but God they where tender for awhile. Double puberty isn't fun. Her transition was a bit rough and long being low middle class but she pulled through.

TW for su*cide. Leave the post now if this triggers you.

Abbey is a suicide attempt survivor. She suffers ptsd from her own husband taking his life leaving her a widow. She felt trapped and tired in her unbalanced emotions and uncertainty of ever feeling okay or getting the medical attention she needed and attempted to OD. Fortunately she was with Timothy who immediately called an ambulance. She was very tired and at first a bit disappointed she was still alive but also a bit relieved. She then had to cope with feeling suicidal.

[adrenaline-roulette]

Four Eighths

Pairing: Four x Eight (Reader) Word count: 2K+ Warnings: Swearing, that’s really the only one for this chapter, I’ll change the warnings as necessary for each part. 

*Disclaimer, I really don’t know anything about the world of computer hacking and such, but I tried my best! 

Chapter one: Finding yourself

                                                  Well hello there! Look, I’m embarrassed and ashamed to admit this, but it’s taken me up until this past weekend to finally getting around to watching 6 Underground.

Now let me tell you, that shit was intense, hilarious, amazing, and my golly gosh, Ben Hardy has stolen my heart once again! There I was, thinking that he couldn’t get any more attractive after playing Roger, but no! I was oh so very wrong!

So basically, I fell down a rabbit hole of Four x Reader fics, and then while I was driving to work the other morning, I had an idea of my own for a story, and now here we are! I’ll let you all know now, this first chapter is basically just introducing Eight, but as of chapter 2 (Which will likely either be out tonight or at the very least by the end of this week), we will begin to get into the actual plot, and lets be honest, the smut. (We all want it, don’t pretend you don’t!)

I’m hoping you all enjoy this, and I would love to hear from you if you do!

@everything-isfucked, my sister from another mister, this goes out to you (You had better like it!)

Anyways, on with the show!!!

⫷⫷⫸⫸

Chapter one: Finding yourself

When your friends had asked you to join them for a night out on Friday, you had lied and said you had already made other plans. It wasn’t entirely a lie, however to most people, by saying you had plans, one would think they would involve you going out, and interacting with other people. This however, was not the case. To an extent you were interacting with people, actually no, let’s rephrase that, you were interacting with other people’s money.

Technology was your forte, everyone knew this, whether they understood the extent of your knowledge in the field, that was another question entirely. During school, all your subjects revolved around computer sciences, and it was to no one’s surprise when you had selected a degree in this exact field. Though you quickly found your assignments to be mundane and repetitive, designing a fully functioning website? You did that in your free time when you were seventeen! Create an app which allowed users to stream Netflix onto two screens at the same time? You had one upped that assignment with ease, your app allowed people to stream Netflix on one screen, YouTube on another screen, Or you could split screen, and have both playing at the same time on the same screen. Needless to say, while you professors were impressed with your abilities, your classmates were often found to be leering at you, snarky comments about how ‘because of you getting such a high grade, everyone else’s got dropped lower because they couldn’t compete.’ To you though, this wasn’t a competition, it was just something you loved to do! Of course, after years of doing the same sort of thing, your interests inevitably began to change. You knew the ins and outs of most apps and websites by now, you had studied them relentlessly when in the process of developing your own. So really, how hard would it be to use their coding against them, wreak a little havoc from the inside?

You had started off innocently enough, getting into your friend’s social media accounts, tweaking things in their settings just to get on their nerves. Slowly you built up to larger scale hacking, such as remotely logging into your professor’s laptop, not only finding the answers to the next five tests your class had, (Which you promptly made several copies of, selling them to your classmates online for $100 each) but also retrieving a few passwords that could have been far stronger than they were, (There’s a reason why most websites tell you if your password is weak, it’s to try and stop people like you from figuring it out!) With the passwords at hand, you were able to grant yourself access to anything you wanted in relation to your professor.  His bank account details? You had them. The password to access his bank account?  Well that just so happened to be the same password he used for his emails, which, oh look, you had that too! You had the ability to transfer all of his money from his account and into yours, something which you found yourself unable to do, despite his flawed internet security, you had no issue with the Professor, and although your moral compass was severely lacking by now, it was still strong enough to sway you away from robbing the man.

Your moral compass could only last for so long though, bills were piling up, your tuition fee was astronomical, add on top of that, your rent for the small apartment you had decided to stay in, to both escape your parents, and to avoid student housing, well the landlord had just upped the cost by $150 per week. You had a part time job, but the shifts had been dwindling as of late, and your savings account had reached dangerously low levels. Anyone else in your situation would do the same if they knew how, you told yourself as you found yourself diving deeper into a list of names you had found after weeks of searching. The list played host to the names of multi-millionaires  who were so called, ‘off the grid’. The people who were in hiding for one reason or another, the people who even the government didn’t know about, and definitely the kind of people that you, a broke student, should have nothing to do with, or know they exist.

All you had to do was select a name, just any name, then came the hard part, snoop around and find everything you need to grant yourself access to their bank. It was one thing to find the details needed when it was your Professor, but a totally other thing when it came the people on this list. These were the kind of people who had passwords to protect their passwords, passwords! Your eyes scan over the list one final time, before stopping on a somewhat familiar name. “What are you doing here?” You hum out, cocking your head to the side as you make up your mind, this is the person.

It took close to three weeks before you had retrieved all the information you required, and in that time, your savings were now obsolete, but that didn’t matter, it was Friday night, and you were about to make yourself filthy rich! “Sorry mate, it’s either this or I move back home.” You smirk, spinning back and forth on the black leather computer chair, your eyes sparkling as you look over the enormous number which was the balance of this strangers account. You knew what you were doing with this part, quickly you entered in  the necessary details, answering each and every security question with ease, before it finally came time to transfer the money to your account. “Just a bit to start with.” You decide, removing a few of the 0’s you had added for the amount you would transfer, “Can’t have the banks getting suspicious.”

                                                                               ********

The man stared at his phone, eyes narrowing into slits as he glared at the ever-changing bank balance. He hadn’t noticed it at first, I mean there was always so much money in there, how was he supposed to remember exactly how much he had? But the balance was dropping rapidly now, not by enough to cause him any concern, but surely enough to get on his nerves. There was nothing he could do to stop this though; he could hardly walk into his bank and demand they track down whoever had somehow gained access to his account.

No, he would have to solve this problem himself, surely it couldn’t be that hard to track them down, right?

                                                                              ********

Hacking was one hell of a slippery slope. One minute you were stealing someone’s money, and the next, you were assisting a group thieves who were robbing an exhibition which had come to the City’s largest museum. The exhibition was a collection of Georgian era clothes, and jewellery, which had been travelling across the globe, displaying some of the most exquisite pieces of fashion the world had ever seen. So far, the collection had made it three quarters of the way through its journey, and it was set to remain in your city for two months, before being packed up and moving on once again.

You don’t know whose idea it was for you all to use walkie talkies to communicate, but you felt like a child playing spies when you were handed yours that night. You didn’t give yourself the chance to think about that for too long though, as you quickly logged on to your set up, having situated yourself in a hotel which stood right across from the museum.  Usually it was packed with tourists, though after offering to pay triple the price for a room with a view of the museum for the night, miraculously the staff had found you an empty room. You had spent the entire afternoon lugging your bags up to the room, all your computer components securely housed in each bag. None of the hotel staff had paid you any mind as you brought up you twelfth and final bag, simply turning a blind eye to the oddity of the situation.

“Okay, I have eyes on the security guards.” You announce through your walkie talkie, eyes trained on one of the monitors which mirrored what the security cameras inside the museum saw. “Foxtrot, you need to go left up ahead. Romeo, stand still, don’t move until I say so, there’s a guard right near you.  Lima, you are getting way too close to a camera up ahead, either turn right now and go another way, or wait a few moments for it to pan back the way it came.”

This situation was stressful as hell, but the adrenaline which pumped through your veins kept you going, igniting a fire within you which begged for more. The trio in the museum listened to your every word, obeying each command as they crept closer to their target. An oval room near the far left of the museum, in this room there sat twenty pedestals, each playing host to necklaces, earrings, rings, and bracelets. Glass boxes encasing each item to keep them safe and protected. Not for much longer. “I can hear footsteps Quebec.” Lima whispers to you, and you frown, looking back to your monitors, scanning for anyone who may be approaching. At first you missed it, your eyes moving on to the next screen, but quickly they dart back, landing on a guard who had been up until a few minutes ago, permanently positioned near the bathrooms.

���Fuck, yes I see him. Foxtrot, Romeo, your path is clear for the rest of the way, but stop when you get to the doors of the oval room, don’t go in until I say so.” You watch the two figures nod their heads in understanding, before making their way as instructed. “Lima, go back the way you came, see if you can get into the storage closet at the end of the hall, I’ll tell you when to come out.”

“Quebec, we’re here and ready to go in.” Foxtrot announces, as you watch Lima close the closet door behind him, the guard who had been closing in on him none the wiser.

“Okay, here’s where it’s going to get loud.” You announce, turning to a new computer, fingers gliding across the keyboard at lighting speed. Delving deep into the security system for the museum, you finally stop when a window pops open, requesting an override password.  You had three chances to get this right, and you had four theories of what the password was. ‘Incorrect password’ the window reads, before you enter your second attempt. You hold your breath, waiting for the same message to appear, though this time it doesn’t. “Thank fuck.” You mumble, typing in the code needed for your distraction.

The fire alarms blares to life, a loud siren sounding throughout the entire museum. The security guards do just as you had expected, they all leave their posts and make their way to the front desk, all trying to find out what had caused the alarm to begin. It wouldn’t take them long to come to the conclusion that the alarm had tripped itself, but it would give your team long enough to smash and grab what they could. The sound of three hammers simultaneously smashing glass in the oval room is obscured by the alarm, and you watch as your masked teammates snatch up jewellery left, right and centre, shoving the items into their backpacks “That’s the last of it.” Foxtrot informs you, throwing the bag back over his shoulder.

“Okay, this is where we go blind, I’m cutting the cameras now, anyone who looks through them will see you arrive, but will never see you leave.” This is the tricky part, not only for your team who have to navigate their way out of the museum through the back entrance without your eyes to guide them. But also for you, who must now cut the security cameras for the entire museum, and then for the street cameras from the buildings out the back of the museum. You don’t have to do all the cameras outside, just enough to give your team room to make a clean getaway, leaving no trace of them to be found. You swipe your phone unlocked, resting it on the desk beside you, hitting shuffle on your playlist, Nutbush city limits playing at full volume. Smiling, you get to work, the song adding to the exhilaration of what you had just done.  Sure, not many people would be proud of robbing priceless artefacts from a museum, but hey, each to their own.

As you finish with the last building, its cameras shut off, your music drowns out the sound of the hotel door clicking shut softly. “Alright, you have a camera free street ahead of you. I’ll see you back at the rendezvous point for my cut.” You sign off on the walkie talkie, switching it off, after hearing an affirmative from your team on the ground. “Fuck yeah!” You cry happily, clapping your hands together three times, taking a moment to congratulate yourself on pulling off something that was this large scale.

“I wouldn’t say fuck yeah, in fact, I was leaning more towards fuck you.” Comes a voice from behind you, causing you to leap to your feet in surprise, spinning on the spot to face the stranger in your room.

“Who the hell are you?” You shriek, hands grabbing blindly at the desk behind you, searching for something you could use to defend yourself with.

“I’m the man you’ve been robbing for the past few months. I’m also the man who is going to kill you for doing so.”

Your fingers wrap around a solid object, and you lift it before you, holding it up in self-defence. You realise too late, that the hotel provided paper weight you were wielding, was nothing against the gun that was pointed directly at your chest.

Chapter Two My Masterlist

[ofpeachez]

task 001: character introduction.

(admin tangerine, 21, est) ☼ who’s that hottie, standing outside the love hotel? it’s VERONICA LOMBARDI, a BISEXUAL CISFEMALE, who looks a lot like LEA MICHELE! NIKKI’s insta bio says SHE is an INFLUENCER and is looking for a fun time this summer. SHE is into DADDY/MOMMY KINK & GROUP SEX, but not into SCAT & BLOOD PLAY. by the way, SHE reminds me of TIGHT YOGA PANTS & COLORFUL SUNSETS.

quick infos:

full name: veronica eleanor rosemary lombardi

dob: august 23rd 1988 (she’ll turn 31 this year)

pob: las vegas, nevada.

kinks: daddy***/mommy kink, mild roughness,  group sex, public sex, receiving oral (eat her out good and she’ll marry you... too soon) although she enjoys giving oral to girls and/or strap-ons/dildos, mutual masturbation, nipple play, hair pulling squirting, spanking, consensual somnophilia.

anti kinks: blood play, wax play, electric stimulation, bondage, very rough sex, scat, foot play, humiliation & extreme anal (fingering and butt plugs are fine, but there will be very rare anal sex).

3 favorite things: dancing naked at 2am to some electronic music or old rock songs, italian gelato (she’d give you a handjob for a raspberry gelato) & puppies videos on instagram.

3 things she hates: spiders or bugs of any sorts (excluding spider man or ant man or black widow wink wink), people who lack of respect & compassion, bad hair days.

+2 positive traits: easygoing & compassionate

-2 negative traits: gullible & jealous

wanted connections:

TAKEN BY LINCOLN LEWIS & HIGHLY WANTED! ex-husband: idk where i’m going with this, but i have a feeling this would be so interesting if he’d come back to the hotel and they’d reconnect after a few years of being apart and not speaking. bonus points for high sexual tension and cute stuff! suggested fcs: chris hemsworth, jamie dornan, tom hiddleston, john stamos, nick jonas or darren criss.

daddy and/or mommy: just that “caring, loving but also can please all your needs” vibe. spoiler alert, she won’t be the mommy, she’s too much of a sub for that (usually). keanu reeves, bradley cooper, jeremy renner, joel kinnaman / natalie dormer, amy adams, jessica chastain, priyanka chopra, gal gadot, olivia munn, anna hathaway.

TAKEN BY GABRIELLA PEREZ femme fatale: just a woman, preferably younger whom nikki just can’t resist. someone with dominant tendencies. or someone around her age too! suggested fcs: dianna agron, ana de armas, margot robbie, gal gadot.

friends with benefits: GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS no suggested fcs, i just want girls.

sexual tension: it says it all. all fcs! 

headcanons

childhood + teenage years:

only child of a loving family of restaurant owners, veronica inherited the best conditions to become a typical italian girl from a just as typical italian family. she was loved by her parents, she loved them. she learned to cook at a very young age and had a noticeable talent. she was the preppy girl from the picture perfect family. she had a dog, alfredo, that she rescued from the streets and who became her only friend for most of her childhood.

in high school, she bonded with a pair of twin siblings who came from a completely different background. from what she knew, their parents were big gamblers and lost most of their savings in casino nights. these people had that edge and gave that down to earth vibe nikki admired yet could not completely comprehend. they were a dynamic trio that balanced one another perfectly. jack (npc) was a total artist who encouraged nikki to express herself, valerie (npc) was very analytical and had a talent at reading through nikki while nikki herself was that sweet figure who was easy to please and could easily please everyone.

when they graduated, valerie confessed she had no idea what she would be doing with her future with no money at all. they were sitting in nikki’s family restaurant and drinking beer in cask with nostalgia and a part of sadness. jack had big plans, he found an apartment in san francisco and wanted to become a graphic designer. nikki, however, was torn between taking over the family business or making a living of her own. that was when valerie drunkenly suggested to work at one of the newly opened strip clubs nearby their neighborhood.

so she did.

twenties:

she turned 18 when she realized she had lost so many years to living in a mold she no longer fit in. she was more than just preppy church outfits and cooking sundays with her mother, she was more than a daddy’s girl who washed tables when the restaurant was closed. what did adults always say? a good education promised a good future, so, veronica applied to the college of southern nevada for a degree in communications with a minor in women’s studies. she had no idea where she was heading, but it was a start.

her parents contributed by driving from class to home every day, they paid her more adult looking clothing and they finally gave her the freedom she never knew she needed until she reached majority.

although jack disappeared from her life, valerie remained very present. they did as they agreed and found a job at a high end strip club in vegas. they made good money instantly without having to do nasty stuff nikki had never been introduced to. within a few months, they saved enough to get matching tattoos, new jewelry and pay for valerie’s apartment. the club provided a living area a few blocks away, but valerie felt better living on her own. nikki tried to mingle and fit in with the other girls, but they were too different. maybe it was the education, maybe it was the background, but the trashy side of this job did not interest the italian girl more than that.

veronica worked as a stripper during college until she graduated with a degree that would soon become irrelevant and useless. with contribution from her parents who never even judged her for her job (it was true nikki did tell them it was just a dancing studio) and with her savings, veronica moved out of nevada and headed to california. she found a small place and joined a community business that organized all kinds of social and sport activities. she became a pro at all yoga, zumba, meditation and dancing activities. she loved to work with the kids, the families and the older people who were just searching for a fun time.

while she was working there, nikki started to get active on social media. she would most dance choreographies to massive songs, making hundreds of thousands of views on youtube. she liked the attention she was getting, but she still preferred her real job the most. 

mid-twenties

so she met someone. randomly. they hooked up with no after thoughts, then hooked up again and again and again... it felt like love to them. everything escalated so quickly, but it felt like she was finally meeting her parents’ expectations so nikki went with it. LINCOLN  proposed only a couple of months in the relationship, and they got married soon after that. he was smart, attractive, perfect, almost too good to be true. she never thought she would deserve someone like him. they lived together, and their love became very intense. marriage was not about dealing with every issues by fucking all over the place. she loved it, of course, but something was off between them. maybe they were falling out of love, maybe they did not take the time to evaluate their future together, maybe they were not made to be together. or maybe they were, just not at that moment.

they divorced a couple of years later like a couple who noticed they were better off as friends, the thing was they did not remain friends and decided to live life on their own. there was no fighting, plate throwing on the ground, ugly crying and couch sleeping. there were just goodbye kisses and passionate love making for the last time, or so they believed.

after divorce, she decided to quit her job and focused entirely on social medias. 

now:

she has been an influencer and youtuber for the past 2-3 years. she posts about cooking, relaxing, fashion, and does a ton of vlogs.

she loves the sun, the vibes and the people of los angeles. 

she also decided to open her own yoga and lifestyle studio, where she teaches for all ages and all kinds of people. from yoga to the basics of dancing, she loved to be surrounded with people. her well-developped flexibility from dancing served her beautifully. she hired other instructors but still runs the business while focusing on her instagram, which has 900 000 followers.

she has been divorced for the same amount of time without being able to quite erase LINCOLN from her mind. the truth is she never really dated or hooked up for the fun of it. she focused on work and on discovering new hobbies.

she heard about the love hotel through her friend, valerie, who joked about this being exactly what newly divorced nikki needed as a way to spice up her life. on a just as drunken night as the one that brought them to work as strippers, nikki called and reserved a room. it is taking her completely out of her comfort zone, but she has a feeling that this is for the best.

headcanons:

she is more of a receiver than a giver. she rarely decides to take the lead unless she really wants to or feel comfortable with the other person. she crushes and gets attracted very easily but nothing leads to serious relationships. she enjoys threesomes and being the center of attention in them. she is very comfortable in her body and would walk around naked all the time if it was socially accepted, so she does not mind having an audience too much.

outside of kinky stuff, she’s a romantic at heart. she LOVES to be treated with kindness and to be treated like a princess. she is also willing to do that for her partner, because if marriage taught her one thing, it’s that it takes two to tango. nikki’s at a point in her life when she wants to meet new people and have fun. she had plenty of it when she was stripping and dancing, but being rushed into marriage kind of made her lose herself into a world she was not completely ready to enter back then.

she volunteers at animal shelters and helps playing and socializing pets. she has a few scars here and there of times when it did not go that well with an animal. chances are she might be distracted at all times if she sees a cute puppy or kitty.

her instagram and youtube are filled with dancing videos, cooking videos, song covers, general vlogs and thirst traps. there’s a reason she got so famous from doing almost nothing at all and said reason is her perfect peach butt she just loves to show off.  

she’s italian so yeah she’s all about sharing and loving and eating pasta all the time because that is her own definition of a dolce vita. she is kinda close to her parents, but their relationship became a bit rocky when a) she moved out and b) ended her perfect marriage and broke the traditional dream of building a family of her own before she hit thirty. 

[fameplagued]

❛ harry styles, 21, cismale, he/him ❜ was that EZRA WARD i just saw hurrying across the quad? you’d think they would know what happens when a JUNIOR is late to class. then again, the MUSIC MAJOR has been known to be pretty HEDONISTIC. maybe being so CHARISMATIC helps keep them out of trouble. i heard they aren’t an angel, though, and that they are BISEXUAL and love RISKY/PUBLIC SEX + MAKING AMATEUR PORN. 

ayyye friends, i’m happy to be here! i’m g, here to introduce my ugly son, he’s a mix of a few different characters i’ve played before but never quite like this so i’m hype :~) 

VISAGE: HARRY STYLES (MOSTLY CIRCA LATE 2014 & 2015 bc long hair)

VOICE-CLAIM (SPEAKING ACCENT & SINGING): HARRY STYLES

OTHER KINKS: CHOKING, ORGASM CONTROL/DENIAL, BEGGING, WORSHIP (REC)(GIV), PUNISHMENT + REWARD, ANAL, SPANKING, MARKING, BITING, HAIR PULLING, RIMMING (REC)(GIV), DADDY KINK, SIZE DIFFERENCE, VOYEURISM,  CLOTHES ON, GROUP SEX, SEXUAL PAIN, ORDERS (REC)(GIV), 

(ASK ABOUT OTHERS)

CANON TATTOOS (*MOSTLY)

born / raised just outside of manchester, england. comes from a wealthy yet extremely neglectful upbringing. his mother is english, his father is american, meaning since he was born in england, he’s of of dual citizenship. his family moved to his father’s home state of pennsylvania when he was 14, which is when he first starter his youtube channel

ok so a big thing is that ezra’s slow but currently steady rise to fame within the music industry has been alarmingly quick and that fact has shaped a lot of his personality; think justin bieber or shawn mendes with their gaining an initial fanbase and then a loyal following via starting out on youtube / other social media outlets as a young teenager, only with a much messier, Rockstar™ persona and you have ezra ward

there’s a pretty distinct difference between the version of himself that much of his dedicated fanbase perceptions are based on, and the Real Him. in the media he’s gradually becoming more of a household name for being a musician with a mostly positive message, an inclusive fanbase, a charming personality and being an all around humble, approachable, likable young guy

in his personal life, things are a bit,, different. he’s a hedonist, through and through, in that his pursuit of pleasure ranks far above everything else on his priority list. he’s also extremely sybaritic meaning crazy self indulgent when it comes to luxury, and in his late teens when he had the world at his fingertips, it was all about having the Best everything (mini bars, expensive cars, the good champagne, n private planes- ok i’ll shut up now no one needs my bad 1d references rn)

so basically he spent ages 17-19 as a touring musician after forming a backing band built of some his closest friends from high school, all the while earning his associates in arts in music through an online program; balancing social media as a full time job, getting to perform live in any kind of larger capacity, and still doing well in college posed quite a challenge, especially as he became more focused on the rockstar lifestyle and less on school

still, he never stopped wanting to learn as much as he possibly could about music, determined to become a master of his craft, so he earned his degree and kept hungry for knowledge. after a near-overdose the summer after he turned 19 however, his parents and their what felt to him like faux-concern at the time eventually talked him into putting touring and gaining celebrity status on the back burner for a while

in exchange for a proposed change in habits and lifestyle, they offered to pay for him to apply for and attend the prestigious university of his choice so he could get his bachelor’s degree in music theory, something he agreed to after heavy deliberation, and only after he had a personal realization about just how much the limelight was getting to him, the brighter it became did he decide it was for the best that he stepped back from it to focus on school

choosing college over touring /  growing the band’s popularity cost him a few members of his backing band / friends who had no interest in ‘waiting around for him to finish getting some stupid degree’ and went on to pursue other projects, which meant he no longer had the same support system in that group of friends that he’d become so used to, and that lead him to seek out a new one almost as soon as he was enrolled at northridge as a freshman: he immediately pledged omega pi  (bc we all know what a frat boy harry looked like at 19, hello, i’m not passing that up), finding that he fit right in with its reputation for being full of guys who were heavily focused on partying, and now that he’s a junior he’s in charge of marketing & recruitment :~)

his appetite for pleasure & luxury coupled with still considering himself a rich, successful musician and just being an incredibly sexually fueled person in general makes for a really delicious and dangerous mix ngl and so far in his 21 short years he’s lived a pretty Wildt life, even while at college

he hasn’t released anything music-wise for the couple of years he’s been at university, but he wants 22 (he turns that soon hi he’s an aquarius ass bitch) to be the year that changes, where he delves back into it and truly becomes the artist he was ~destined to be~ or whateva

frequently considers whether or not he made the right choice in essentially choosing college over being an artist / celebrity for the time being, and wonders if dropping out would be the better option (esp bc he thinks he only has so much Time anyway, more info below), but always talks himself out of it

is Firmly Set on the idea he’s going to be part of the 27 club (my boi is already almost 22 like :/ excuse u sir, snap out of that? someone give him a reason to live lmfao no i’m kidding i promise)

has an underlying hopelessly romantic side / has had a lot of either toxic or very intense relationships / has hurt & been hurt by a lot of people, so he has an extreme aversion to emotional attachment and falling in love / prefers casual sex / thinks he’ll never have a long term relationship again (yikes ik like hi get some therapy babe)

he’s reckless, impulsive, can be incredibly domineering, drinks too much, fucks too much (if that’s possible), and (drugs tw) does way too much coke for fun and too much adderall for studying, definitely every bit the ~tortured artist~ even though most of his issues are rooted in like, mommy/daddy issues and (homophobia tw) knowing his parents wouldn’t accept or support him any longer if they knew that he was bisexual

to sum it all up, he’s here for a good time, not a long time, and while he is here, he wants to learn all that he possibly can about music because to him it’s basically the meaning of life ok

that’s?? pretty much all i have for now, i will probably update this again at some point but i don’t want to make it too long because i definitely want to develop him within this group as i go along and besides it was just TIME for me to get something up

i’ll have a connections page up soon but some ideas off the top of my head are: best friends (platonic or otherwise), fwb, exes on good or bad terms, someone who also grew up in pennsylvania / maybe knows him from high school?, enemies w/ benefits, hookups via sorority/frat parties, professors he’s earned ~extra credit~ with or whateva, someone who was a fan before he came to northridge but now they lowkey hate him, someone who’s still a fan, fwb ft. one-sided crush, classmates, etc ! 

[calorieworkouts]

27 Tips To Improve Your Workout

These days we're more busy than ever before, so performance has actually come to be rather vital to us. It's risk-free to say that we've obtained a significant love affair going on. And also if you read this after that I recognize you're a hectic person as well. Let's encounter it, it's difficult enough suitable everything in, work, gym, intimate relationships, your social life ... as well as still being a delighted, rational person at the exact same time!

The secret to suitable all of it in is discovering a way to obtain much better outcomes in less time. If you spend the moment, you can find means to do this in every facet of your life. Think of it, if you were able to liberate just 30 minutes a day to invest in getting in touch with loved ones, or in your intimate partnerships, or on progressing right into your dream job, or developing yourself personally or emotionally ... over a year, that will make an incredible difference to your quality of life.

Your workout is no different, so we've created the best means to boost your exercise, so you can invest more time doing all the various other points which are very important to you too.

The Litmus Test

Like most points in life, appearing is a good start, yet it's inadequate. If you don't perspire or aren't seeing outcomes, you may require to commit more to your workout. You have actually reached bring it every single time. Don't simply go with the movements thus lots of people, get concentrated, be present and bring it!

27 Tips to Enhance Your Workout

Start with a vision.

Every success starts with a vision, so if you intend to enhance your exercise, to take it to the following degree, after that you need to have a compelling vision of what you desire your life to be like when you have actually done it. This vision of exactly how you desire your wellness, vigor and also body to be is what is going to provide the emotional fuel to get you revved up for activity. You desire to spend a long time coming back to this vision on a daily basis, even if it's simply for 1 min, the fee it brings you is worth it.

Set goals.

Based on your fitness vision, what are the specific goals you have? Create them down and keep them secure due to the fact that you'll be coming back to them later on. The planning you do up-front will certainly conserve you a great deal of time down the roadway since you will not simply be undergoing the motions, you'll be headed to a destination, so you understand when you're on track or not.

Get a proven workout plan.

If you desire impressive outcomes you require to comply with a tried and tested strategy. If you turn up and simply do your very own point it's going to be hit-or-miss. Anything is better than nothing, but if you're going to make the initiative, you may too obtain the outcomes you desire from it. Following a tested workout plan secures the uncertainty, as soon as you've got it down, after that you can readjust it to make it more effective.

Get a proven nutrition plan.

The right nourishment can suggest the distinction in between ordinary outcomes to exceptional results. Like your workout: exclude the guesswork, follow a tried and tested strategy, after that change it to make it better.

Get amped up.

Before you hit your exercise, you wish to enter into the ideal mood of mind, so that you can give it your outright ideal. If you're feeling kind of 'meh' after that you need to change that: produce a little pre-workout routine which gets you right into an energized state of mind, even if it's just singing out loud to your exercise songs on your way to the fitness center. Rinse and also repeat prior to every workout.

Keep your playlist pepped.

If you don't pay attention to songs while working out then start doing it. Countless research studies have actually shown that listening to songs boosts athletic performance, see to it it's fast tempo for you exercises and you'll increase your result by up to 15%. Concentrating on the music while you're exercising also assists you enter that treasured flow state.

Bite-sized workouts.

Rather than doing marathon workouts, aim to get your exercise performed in 30 - 45 minutes. Research study has actually shown that after about 45 minutes of exercise cortisol (the hormone released in reaction to tension) boosts while growth hormonal agent as well as testosterone start to go down rapidly. Keep your exercise bite-sized to increase the results of your workout.

Hit the high intensity.

If you intend to do bite-sized workouts, then you might also intend to attempt a high-intensity interval training protocol to obtain the maximum results for the time you place in. We love the Tabata procedure, and also just like all the protocols, you can use them with toughness training and also cardio.

Be a workout assassin.

Go in, eliminate your exercise, get out. No diversions. Make your workouts concentrated, don't invest 10 minutes socializing between sets, or resting for too long, just focus and get it done. If you desire to mingle, do it when you're finished.

Kaizen.

Time to get a bit philosophical. Among the most exceptionally valuable concepts we have actually discovered is the Japanese viewpoint of Kaizen or constant, incremental enhancement. You can apply this philosophy to any location of your life including your physical fitness as well as wellness. What you concentrate on tends to occur, so by concentrating on exactly how to make small improvements to your workout you will find ways to make that happen.

Get a coach / trainer.

One of the most effective means to take your wellness as well as fitness to the next level is to employ someone who recognizes a whole lot extra regarding it than you do. Making the financial investment in an individual instructor or a dietary instructor, can be the one of the best financial investments you can make in terms of results. Also simply a couple of sessions can make a substantial difference to your performance. Simply bear in mind, you obtain what you pay for (love is cost-free though) so ensure you discover someone that has a tested track record.

Fuel your exercise and also recovery.

Your body is one of the most innovative car in the well-known cosmos, so you require to see to it you give it the right fuel as well as the right structure blocks for recuperation, and also that all boils down to your nourishment. See to it you have superior nourishment if you wish to have the best outcomes possible. See to it you have a pre-workout and also post-workout protein shake to sustain your exercise as well as provide the nutrients for healing. And also remember your carbs! Bananas are a terrific source of energy for exercise.

Limit alcohol.

One glass of alcohol during the day is enough to nearly eliminate the entire day of growth hormone in your body. That's bad news because growth hormone aids us keep muscular tissue, reduction body fat and live longer. It's additionally called the 'hormonal agent of young people' so we want as much of it as we can obtain. Alcohol additionally affects you obtaining an excellent nights' rest adversely, which is when your body does the majority of it's repair.

Hit the protein sweet spot.

It does not matter if you're a person or a woman, you require to obtain sufficient healthy protein. Obtaining adequate healthy protein is vital for muscular tissue development and body repair, for the women, it doesn't make you big, it provides you a limited, toned body when combined with regular stamina training. Just how to calculate your daily protein needs.

Compound your workouts.

Compound workouts are the very best way to obtain the most compensate for your effort due to the fact that they target several muscular tissue groups per exercise. Rather of doing isolation exercises stick to the compounds (like squats and also deadlifts) to get the most out of your workout.

Superset it.

Want to be much more reliable? Try using supersets. Supersets are when you do 2 or even more workouts in a row without remainder. Remove the rest and boom: more carried out in much less time.

Quality not quantity.

To obtain the most out of every set you do, make certain each rep you do is a high quality rep. Make it a 5 celebrity associate by concentrating on obtaining perfect form, it's far better to do less premium associates, where you concentrate on regulated motions, than to bang out extra, yet sloppier reps.

Focus on the contraction.

One of the tricks to an effective exercise is to concentrate on the muscle mass you're using during the tightening. It might seem like it doesn't make that much of a distinction yet it truly does. Try this examination, do a problem typically and also then concentrate on getting your abdominal muscles as you relocate up, can you feel what a significant difference it makes? Now bear in mind to do that with all your exercises.

Lift heavy.

One of the keys to getting one of the most out of your toughness training is to lift the heaviest weights you can while keeping rigorous and proper form. Leave your ego at the door, best your form, after that slowly increment the weight you're raising. Correct type is additionally among the finest ways to stop injury.

Beat the mundane, make it fun.

If you don't appreciate your workout after that it's going to seem like a duty to do it. The secret is to find something you do take pleasure in - if you dislike the treadmill, then discover some cardio which you do delight in, there are a lots of options available, from dancing to windsurfing. If you do not enjoy lifting weights then attempt bodyweight exercises like rock-climbing. Don't skip something even if it's hard, discover a method to make it enjoyable, do whatever it takes to encourage yourself.

Hydrate.

Studies have actually revealed that you do much better when you're adequately moisturized, so remember to consume water throughout the day, consisting of with your exercise (perhaps with some branch-chained amino acids). Consume 400 - 600 ml 2 hours before your exercise to guarantee that you are correctly hydrated.

Progressive overload.

The trick to toughness training is modern overload. In other words, you wish to gradually enhance the weight you lift, by a percentage, each time you work out. This is one of the reasons that it is very important to track your development: so you know how much you were raising last week!

Fail on the last set.

Force out 2 or 3 even more representatives on your last collection to make certain you really do not have anymore left in the tank. As always, remember proper form.

Hills and steps.

Running hillsides as well as steps is just one of the most effective conditioning exercises you can do. Ignore your common long term, throw in a few sessions of action running each week and you'll soon really feel the difference. To get even more take advantage of this, use an HIIT protocol with it, however bear in mind: add the stairways, yet walk down. We want you to be safe!

Caffeinate.

Great information for coffee-lovers, researches have shown that obtaining caffeine prior to an exercise can enhance your performance by concerning 12%. Not only that, but more current research studies have also revealed that caffeine reduces the intensity of muscle mass pain you really feel. Having a coffee prior to your exercise could be a case of no discomfort, all gain.

Review workouts honestly.

If you desire to ensure you're making the many of your exercise time, after that you must assess your workouts truthfully. Among the significant secrets to improving anything in your life is to gauge it. Try to make every exercise a 5-star workout, however be honest, if it was just a 2-star workout that's great, goal to make the following one much better. If you monitor these scores, over-time you'll see the development you're making.

Cherry juice.

Want to recover faster? Studies have actually shown that alcohol consumption tart cherry juice before or after your exercise, assists your muscular tissues recuperate quicker.

Phase these tips right into your workout as well as soon you'll discover yourself obtaining far better cause less time. The only inquiry you'll require to ask on your own is: 'What am I going to perform with the downtime?'

Your turn: Which pointers are you going to make use of? Have we missed any kind of? If you had extra leisure time, what would you perform with it?

[disregardcanon]

OH MY GOD! i wrote this thing back in like, last february and never posted it. so. here have the bnha characters in the good place au! 

featuring ochako as eleanor, iida as chidi, kirishima as jason, bakugo as tahani, and deku as a whole host of things including kamilah and janet XD 

relationships include: past tsuchako 

this is disjointed and rambly but there’s some good stuff so i hope you enjoy it 

ochako uraraka dies. then, she wakes up in an office building starring at “everything is fine!” in glaring, yellow letters. some weird old white man in a suit with a polka dotted die explains things to her. you know, how she died. how it was unpleasant and embarrassing. but now she’s in the afterlife, apparently, and things are hunky dory. this is the good place. 

there was backstory before this happened, of course. in order to die, someone had to live. 

before ochako was dead, she was alive. she was a little girl who wanted to grow up to become a hero to support her parents, but they tell her that she should be a hero to help other people, not them. 

they die in a tragic car incident, ochako gets shuffled through the foster system, and grabs tightly onto that idea of becoming a hero to make her parents proud and be able to support herself and give herself a good life. 

in american society, people cannot get provisional hero licenses until they graduate from high school and they cannot become licensed heroes until completing a bachelors degree. kids who can get provisional licenses right out of high school are much preferred for hero courses at colleges, and it’s nearly impossible to get a provisional license right out of high school unless you were able to attend a specialized hero prep school. 

ochako is a foster kid in arizona. ofc she can’t afford prep school, does not get a provisional license, and cannot make it into a hero course. she studies her ass off for the next year, taking a gap year, and she’s able to pass the entrance exams and agrees to sign away her soul in student loans. but the program so heavily favors kids that had prep school experience and already had their provisional licenses. while working and trying to put herself through school, she just can’t keep up with the rigorous schedule and the bias against her. 

ochako drops out of the hero program after a year of failing to stay afloat, and she just wants a god damn stable job. so, she goes into sales. not exactly sales that are on the up and up either. think. selling fake drugs to old people. 

she gets into a relationship with tsuyu asui and they bond over failed attempts at hero careers. tsuyu decided to go into counseling instead and is still trying to make her best effort to be A Good Person TM and ochako gives it a try for awhile, but it starts making her feel inadequate pretty quickly and she gets defensive. 

tsuyu psycho-analyzes ochako more than ochako’s ready to deal with and easily figures out her issues and tries to like, solve them. ew, and ochako ends the relationship and falls back into her selling fake drugs to old people ways before dying in a blaze of shopping cart related glory. it was apparently, hilarious, because after the shopping carts hit her she subconsciously used her quirk to send them up in a shopping cart mushroom cloud. which crushed her again. 

yeah ochako’s really glad that she can’t remember any of that.

“so,” michael the architect says, “would you like to meet your soulmate?” she’s had a lot of casual flings and hookups, but never anything serious other than tsuyu. so. yeah she’s pretty interested in meeting her soulmate. 

he’s kind of hot, in a nerdy as shirt way. 

“this is your soulmate, iida tenya.” 

“is that first name first or first name last?” ochako asks. she’s japanese american and knows enough japanese to be able to puzzle out that his name IS japanese, but she can’t for the life of her tell what order that’s in. 

“she’s american,” michael says. 

“ah,” he says, “then i’m tenya iida.” 

he gives her a little rundown of his life, and apparently, the life of a moral philosophy professor is actually... pretty intense. at least it is when you started off life wanting to be a pro hero. 

“you mean you almost killed the hero killer?” admittedly, ochako doesn’t pay all that much attention to world events, but the hero killer fiasco was sort of a big deal. a serial killer only targeting professional heroes? and for reasons he thought were completely justified? that was the biggest news story for at least a week, even in america. 

“he paralyzed my brother,” tenya says, “i’d never been so angry before in my life. i truly think that if he hadn’t beaten me, i would have.” 

“wow,” ochako says, “that’s dark.” tenya nods. 

“i was lucky my friends pulled me out of it.” he talks about his friends saving him, friends that apparently include PRO HERO DEKU. which, like, ochako’s not that invested in the japanese hero scene, but everyone knows about pro hero deku. 

the dude worked his way onto the hero scene with a quirk that hurt him whenever he used it, took over all might’s position, and admitted to being quirkless until he was fifteen. he used almost all of the immense amount of money that he made as a hero building up his own charities, doing work for community organizations, and trying to support disabled and quirkless organizations around his country. he’s the kiss babies save people then go home and continue doing favors for people when he gets there type. 

deku was a good guy. like, a REALLY good one. he was one of the most famous heroes in the entire world when ochako died, and she’s pretty sure that he was going to take the number one spot from that explosive asshole any day. hell, he was even always NICE to the guy, acted like they were friends even though the explosive shitstick always treated him like dirt. 

ochako might have had a little bit of a hero worship crush on the guy, okay. it’s not that big of a deal. 

“so then how did you become a professor of moral philosophy? sounds like you had a good gig going at that hero school of yours.” U.A. is the best known hero high school in the entire world. she’d sort of dreamt of going to U.A. herself as a kid.

“i realized that morality is... a lot more complicated than i thought it was before. i made a rash decision and it almost cost me my soul. hero work is complicated and muddy and i didn’t want to be left running around in circles doing it, never knowing what was right. instead i dedicated my life to studying what’s right. now i always try to make the most ethical possible decision. at all times.” 

“that sounds forking exhausting,” ochako says. tenya looks shocked. 

“forking. FORKING,” ochako glares, “you know i don’t mean forking right?” 

“yes,” he says, “i do. the good place does not let you curse. many of us do not like it.” well. that’s good to know that he looks like a nerd and he IS one. 

“well i forking do dumbash,” she says, “do you think that’s going to darn me to heck?” 

“dark impulses aren’t what make people good or bad,” tenya says, “acting on them does.” 

tenya iida, ochako soon realizes, talks a big game for someone who can’t decide on a flavor of yogurt because of the possible ethical ramifications. 

kirishima opens his eyes and sees a smiling, old white man. that’s generally not a good sign. normally smiling white people are either attorneys or librarians who are about to scold him for falling asleep on the library couch again. 

“you, jianyu li, are dead.” kirishima almost says “dope” but then he realizes that it is not, in fact dope. the guy asks if he wants to not talk because of some taiwanese monk thing, and seeing that kirishima is most definitely NOT a taiwanese monk he decides to go with it and not give anything away. 

he goes a couple of weeks before he finally talks to the girl with the big eyes and the auburn hair who wasn’t supposed to here in the good place either. 

“oh god,” she says, “please tell me that you’re smart enough to get us out of this. please” 

“um, maybe? i’m from florida” 

her eyes widen and she whispers “no” 

“my name’s kirishima,” he tells her, “or some of my boys call me ‘ro. it’s short for eijiro. no biggie tho.” 

“we are so forked,” ochako says. 

he’s american dawg. if you really get into, japanese american, but he’s not taiwanese. that’s probably racist. weird, racist algorithm 

“you, bakugo katsuki, are dead” 

“dead?” 

“yes, dead.” 

“i forking died?” bakugo demands. 

“yes, but you were the number one pro hero at the time of your death and now you’re in the good place. i think you can think of that as a victory.” well, that does make him feel a little better. at least deku never succeeded him in the rankings, even if he’s number one hero now. 

“forking,” he says, glaring at the air, “forking! you know i don’t forking mean forking, right?” 

“i’m aware,” michael says. 

michael goes onto explain all the rules of the good place, including the not a robot not a boy assistant that can cater to their every whim. an assistant who just so happens to look exactly like someone bakugo would prefer to never see again. 

“FORK!” bakugo screams. 

“i am deku,” he says, smiling and tilting his head like a curious owl, “how can i help you?” 

“wait,” ochako says, eyes widening with glee, “he looks just like deku.” 

“uraraka!” bakugo shouts. ochako shrugs. 

“if you had a sex robot of your celebrity crush are you saying you wouldn’t go to town? come on, ground zero. i’m only human.” bakugo looks horrified. 

“not a sex robot.” 

“but are you a robot not for sex?” she asks. 

“not a robot,” he chirps, “also i am sentient but do not consent to sex with you.” 

“oh,” ochako says.  

“that’s called rape, and you know where rapists go?” 

not a sex robot smiles as he chirps, “the bad place!” ochako shudders. 

“uh,” she asks, “what exactly... happens in the bad place?” deku opens his mouth and the screams of a thousand tortured souls come out.��

“that is what happens in the bad place,” he says, “but you do not need to worry about that. the good place’s algorithm put you here.” ochako giggles nervously. 

“IT SURE DID” 

“i can’t get away from forking deku,” bakugo says, “even in heaven.” deku smiles at him. 

“actually, you can get away from the original, pro hero deku. i am only a source of all the knowledge in the universe.” not-deku smiles widely but it doesn’t reach his eyes. it’s damn creepy. 

“why the fork do you look like him?” 

“they chose pro hero deku because he’s the most popular figure currently on earth. they thought this face would set the residents at ease.” 

“well it forking doesn’t,” bakugo says. 

“i am sorry that you feel that way. is there anyway that i can help you?” not-deku asks. 

“change!” bakugo demands, grabbing not-deku roughly by the arms. 

“i cannot do that,” not-deku says, “now that i’ve been programmed with this face, i am stuck with it. it literally will not come off.” then he grins again. 

“fork you,” bakugo says. deku just smiles again. if he thought that the thing had feelings he’d be sure it was trying to piss him off. 

bakugo slams his palm into his face. 

“my soulmate is a forking idiot,” he says. 

“you just figured that out?” ochako asks, snorting. 

“holy motherforking shirtballs,” ochako says, “we’re in the bad place.” 

“that can’t be true,” bakugo says, “i wouldn’t go to the bad place.” he was a pro hero. despite his flaws, he did a lot of good. 

“you think that you belonged in the good place?” michael says, and he laughs so hard he almost cries, “you- bakugo katsuki? you were just a hero so that you could be the best at something and try to pound deku into the ground. you never even used your platform to try to help people. it was never about helping people. it was always about your ego and your need to destroy deku.” bakugo feels an uneasiness in his stomach as he realizes that michael is right. he doesn’t deserve to go to the good place. he was always a shitty person. 

“what about me? what did i do to deserve to be here?” iida asks. then a horrified realization shows on his face. 

“oh no,” iida says, “the almond milk.” michael glares at him. 

“it wasn’t the almond milk, iida. it was everything you ever did after you tried to kill the herokiller. you made a mistake, and then you over-corrected in the worst possible way. you went from trying to help people to doing nothing but thinking about your own ego-centric view of morality. you could never make a decision, and that hurt the people around you.” 

michael snaps his fingers and the world goes white. 

“doug forcette? melissa shield? midoriya izuku?” shaun laughs, “you think any of them are going to the good place?” shaun laughs and laughs as they send him through the portal back to the bad place. 

“you all stay here,” michael orders. 

“don’t poof anything,” not-deku orders, “my void feels weird with all these people in here.” 

“what do you mean? deku’s not going to the good place?” 

“oh no,” the accountant says, “there’s a negative 10,000 point value for becoming a pro hero. deku’s doing well, all things considering, but he can’t overcome that handicap.” 

“what about all might?” 

“oh he’s in the bad place,” the accountant says, like saying that the symbol of peace is burning in hell is just a normal bit of trivia. 

“not even ALL MIGHT went to the good place?” michael asks, his eyes widening. 

“oh no no no,” the accountant says, “pro heroes are too messy and selfish. for every good action that they take, they cause so much harm. their wealth is a drain on society. even the most virtuous end up doing more harm than good.” 

“there were some bets going around that bakugo katsuki might surpass endeavor’s record for highest negative score a pro hero ever racked up, but he died too quickly. it was a real shame.” 

“tsuyu asui?” michael asks. from ochako’s memories of the woman, she seems like a fine specimen of humanity. 

“no,” the accountant says, “therapists often end up messing up more than they fix.” 

“well, is midoriya inko headed for the good place?” 

“no,” the accountant says, “motherhood is messy business, michael.” 

“malala yousafzai?” 

“activism is even messier.” 

“how many people got into the good place this year?” 

“none” 

“last year?” 

“none?” 

“ten years ago” 

“none.” 

“when was the last time that anyone went to the good place?” michael asks, his voice rising in fear. the accountant does some typing, some searching. then he comes up with his answer. 

“571 years ago,” the accountant says blithely. 

“oh shirt,” michael says. 

“do you want to save people or not?” bakugo demands. 

“of course i do, kacchan,” deku says, “that’s what i’ve always wanted.” 

DON’T REMEMBER WHERE I WAS GOING WITH THAT ENDING BUT HERE YOU GO 

[uncivilengineering]

What Kind of Two Years Has it Been

At the end of an experience, and therefore a blog, I usually write a reflection on the experience. The Master's programme ended six years ago and due to life and procrastination and other excuses, I'm finishing this blog only now. But this delay has its advantages, because I know how the story ends and I can tell you what happened to the characters. So maybe, for the first time, this is truly an epilogue.

The journey to this program started in 2012. I was living in Germany and working as a consultant. I always knew I wanted to work first before continuing with any kind of education, because toward the end of undergrad, I had classes with grad students and the ones who had work experience before going back to school seemed to bring more to the experience from applying what they learned from the real world. As I researched Master's programmes, I focused my search in Europe because I was still paying off the loans for my Bachelor's degree. I Googled another program when the MIND programme turned up in the results. After a process of applying, obtaining references, phone interviews and traveling to Munich from Stuttgart to take the GRE in Germany (really), even though this is Europe, the choice came down to Humboldt University in Berlin, with a scholarship from the DAAD, and the MIND programme, with a scholarship from the European Commission. (Lappeenranta University of Technology in Finland takes a close third because I had a really, really pleasant scholarship interview with a very pleasant young man and sometimes I think about how my life might be different if I went there and studied Innovation Management instead.)

I'm sure there was a long decision process and I'm sure I spent a lot of time thinking about it, like most decisions. This all took place eight years ago and I cannot remember the salient details. But I can imagine that I felt like it was time to leave Germany, even though I love (LOVE) Berlin, and the appeal of having an adventure in two countries (I didn't yet know that Asia was on the table) was great. So I gave notice at the consulting firm, said goodbye to my friends in Stuttgart, (wrapped up my last performances as a roller skating Greek muse in the local military base's production of Xanadu - that's real) and moved to Sweden.

In the two years that ensued, I met the best people, took wild risks, had the best time, made my dreams come true and had the adventure I sought. I lived.

I lived in Sweden for a year and was inspired by their example of how to treat guests in your country. I had a job interview in a sauna in the winter and learned what gender equality in society might actually look like. After an application process, I had the opportunity to spend a semester in Thailand. In Thailand I learned how to get from the university to town (Bangkok) and back again. I hosted a cultural show that lasted for eight (or more?) hours. I felt closer to my mom than I had ever understood before. C pointed out that after the midterm exams, I have sat for exams on three continents. I celebrated my birthday at a German brewery in Bangkok. I saw Angkor Wat after the semester ended. I went to all the Disneylands in the world (at the time...back then, there were only 11 parks). I didn't stay long in Austria, but I was there long enough to experience a Buschenschank and run into visa problems. I also saw Carousel and Cabaret in German, and puzzled as to why it was an hour longer than Cabaret in English, which I saw soon after on Broadway. In Glendale I lived in a conference room turned into an ad hoc intern bullpen for four and a half months writing my thesis. I saw things I had been nearby my entire life but never dreamed of seeing in reality.

Blogs are cheesy and navel-gazey but I am glad I did it. I am glad that this and the Germany Part I blogs exist. Sometimes I will look at an old post because someone asked for a travel recommendation (for example), and I will discover something that I forgot. I didn't remember that I was contacted by Swedish public radio to talk about the 2012 United States election. I forgot I had this conversation at NASA JPL about living in Germany. So what's the moral of this paragraph? If you can't blog, at least journal. You think you will remember the exciting things that happen in your day to day life but the truth is, you won't. I am proof!

What happened to everyone? Some stayed in Europe. Some went home. Some went home in Europe. Some got married. Some had babies. Some moved to Amsterdam. Many stayed in Sweden. When I left C, she wanted to stay in Italy. She has since worked her way up to an awesome job at a major company and had a baby! A has moved and is engaged to be married! I was happy to attend C's wedding in Ankara in 2015. I was happy to attend Z's wedding in Czechia last year, and to see my friends again at both.

What happened to me? I accepted an internship in Florida where I spent about five years (and made a bunch of new friends and had a bunch of good times) before moving back to the country where I left when this all started. To be honest, I never expected to be back. Not in this country. In 2017, I was fortunate to attend my class reunion in Leiden; it was also the celebration of the closing of the program. They invited all alumni back to watch the last class graudate. I met the newest generations of the program and saw a lot of old friends. It was just like old times. I came to the first afternoon of the organized program. I thought we would observe the new kids doing their work. No. We kicked off with a case exercise and divided into groups to discuss and then present our results. Our groups consisted of current students, alumni, professors and mentors. In Europe, we are all equal. It was just like old times.

The rest of the program consisted of lectures, discussions and watching the final presentations of the graduating class. Before I left for this trip, I joked that my master programme was ending because it lost funding (truth) from the European Commission because of Brexit (also true but I didn't realize it until I got there and they confirmed that Brexit was one of the factors that cut funding to the programme). There was a party the final evening. In the way that we do. I remember telling all my friends that it would be a very long time before I will see them again. I couldn't foresee an immediate excuse to get to Europe and hang out with them. The day I returned to work in Florida from the trip, I received an email about joining a project that is based in Germany. If I chose to accept this mission, I would have to move to Germany for a period of time. What.

I learned later that, basically, someone found out that I know German. (I promise that I have other skills.) When I was in high school, if you told me I was going to move to Germany, I would have said that you're crazy. I was just this nerd who went to Space Camp and really liked The West Wing and Saturday Night Live. If you told me I was going to move to Germany twice, I would have said, "Then why did I spend all this time learning Spanish?" (among other questions) I know that's true, because I did ask myself that in the first two months of intensive language school in 2010. But the truth is, Germany made things happen for me. When I talk to young people who (for some reason) ask for my advice, in addition to telling them to "follow your dreams," I also tell them the story of how moving to Germany (the first time) changed my life. (And then I tell them why so they know I'm not exaggerating.)

I couldn't refuse. I'm back in Germany. I'm working on getting better at German.

I should have seen this coming. The fall I moved to Sweden in 2012, I came back to Germany to celebrate Thanksgiving. During my Swedish spring, the squad from Germany came to visit Sweden and I put in my tea and hairspray requests (from dm, of course). After my thesis defense in 2014, my first destination was Nuremberg to see E, then on to Quakenbrück to wait with C who was finishing her defense. I attended S's wedding in Leipzig in 2015. I went to Oktoberfest in Munich in 2016. The point is, I cannot stay away from Germany. This is evident and not a surprise.

So far, I have been fortunate that this opportunity has allowed me to meet up with so many friends. A and M are in Amsterdam and have introduced me to Y and T, who are also in the MIND network. S is back in Oslo from Thailand. A is in London. S has moved from Stuttgart to Berlin. A and P and B and K and E are in New York. I still cite the meal in Haarlem (note that's Haarlem in the Netherlands, not Harlem, but I can see why you might be confused because I just mentioned New York) as the best I've ever had and J told me that the restaurant has received a Michelin star since 2014 when we were there so now it's overpriced and overrated. So funny! At Z's wedding in Czechia last year I was happy to reconnect with A, B and M. Everyone else, I'm coming for you! (And I mean that in the creepy way!)

What's going to happen next? Let's find out! Thank you for reading and joining the adventure.

Good night, have a pleasant tomorrow and see you in the future!

Lauren

[undertaleowl]

The kitten ask was so cute!! Thank you so much! You said you could do little one-shot? What about some soulmate Au first meeting with UF sans? It could be: not seeing color til our eyes meet or "our first word are written on each other" or "first time we touch" etc. Not everyone like soulmate au so no problem if you dont want to do it!! ^^

Ahhhh, thank you so much! I’m glad you liked it. Sorry for the hold up, but I hope you like this one just as much. One-shot is under the cut. Thank you again!

Note: I went a little overboard on this ask, so instead of the max of 1,500 words, it’s 2,525. Sorry! I hope reader-insert format is okay.

Budding Relationships

When you were born, you and your family received a bundle of flowers from the hospital. The supposed “mages” from back in the day had started the tradition, saying that the type of flowers you were given at birth determined your future; roses, of course, meant true love was in your future, but what type of true love was dependent on the color. Red for lover’s love, pink for admiring or revering love, or white for love between friends. Lilies meant prosperity and a fruitful future. Sweet William flowers represented fraternity and strength in friendships. However, when the hospital sent your family home with flowers, they were flowers that no one recognized.

“Because you’re completely unique,” your parents had joked.

The petals were reminiscent of the first pattern of petals on a lotus flower, but the flowers were a cyan-turquoise color that almost seemed to glow. Over the years, you and your parents had tried researching the flowers, but no dice.

You couldn’t help but feel disheartened. There was another part of the flower legend, one that had significantly more weight than just a vague sense of the future. Many people in this region said that your flower wouldn’t decay until you had met the person you were supposed to be with for the rest of your life. Supposedly, some random person somewhere had another flower that represented their soulmate, and it was the same deal. You were supposed to carry your birth flower with you in your pocket, but there was only a handful of people that did that anymore. The flowers didn’t decay, but for most people, they never decayed. Ever.

If this flower represented anyone, you would throw away all of your high school science textbooks into a fire, because each one said that the legend couldn’t be possible because your flower just did not exist. So, no soulmate for you. Even if it was just a dumb legend, it was still disappointing.  

As the years went by, you became even more determined to figure out what this mystery flower was. Not even for the sake of finding your supposed soulmate, just finding out why you had gotten the flowers you did when they weren’t supposed to exist. You went to the hospital where you had been born, and asked if they remembered when they got the luminescent turquoise flowers. The good news was that the lady who worked there as the hospital florist still worked there, and she remembered your flowers. However, she said that the flowers had been an anonymous donation, meaning they couldn’t be traced back at all.

You threw everything you had into researching flowers after that, seeing if you could find other flowers that looked somewhat similar as a comparison point. Finally, you broke some ground. Apparently, the Ebottian Golden Flower had a similar structure to your mystery flowers. Eventually, you became actually interested in your research, so naturally, you went to college to further study plants and got yourself a botany degree at Ebbot City University, where this Ebottian Golden Flower was common. On the night before your graduation, you whispered to your flower that you hoped that your degree helped you discover its secrets.

Was it just you, or did those words seem to echo around your room that night?

After studying it on your own time after graduation as a research assistant, you finally checked the DNA on the flower. The DNA comparison of the glowing flowers was an almost exact match to the Ebottian Golden Flowers. Only the size, color, and of course the glowing were different. Related species? Or the exact same species that happened to differ in appearance, like breeds of dogs? You didn’t have an answer, so you stuck with your studies as you quit your job as an assistant and opened up a flower shop that had a flower identification lab space in back. It was mostly for the struggling grad students who needed help acing their exams. Your own mystery flower was back there on a shelf, and watched over you as you worked.

When the monsters re-integrated into society, you weren’t all that affected, except for one isolated incident when the Monster King had come in and demanded flowers for trying to win back a loved one. Well-versed in flower iconography and color coordination, you put together an arrangement of purple hyacinths (regret), pink roses (admiration), and white mayflowers (a new beginning). He gruffly threw too much money on the counter and stormed out, the bouquet in his hands. Two days later, the monster queen stormed in, threw the flowers on the counter, said she appreciated your hard work, but paid you an equal amount of money to take them back.

Other than that, both monsters and humans frequented your store, but nothing had happened that was as dramatic as that.

Until one day, a skeleton with red eye lights strode into the store, looking a bit lost in the forest of foliage. You were finishing up a bouquet, so you called from the back.

“Be there in just a second! Feel free to look around!”

You could have sworn that you heard him mumbling about how coming here was a waste of time, but if he truly felt that way, then why was he here? You didn’t pay any attention to your customer’s grumpy demeanor as you tied a silver bow around the neck of the vase. You put the flower arrangement into a preservation fridge.

“So what are you in for today?” you chirped as you took your gloves off and put them behind the register. When you looked up, you tried to contain your surprise. You had seen this skeleton before, along with who you assumed was his brother, but they just seemed like they wanted to be left alone whenever you saw them strolling on the streets. The skeleton looked up from examining the yellow flowers. He looked a little shocked himself.

“You’re a damn human,” he said. You crossed your arms, trying not to look defensive.

“And you’re a skeleton. What’s your point?” you asked. He rolled his eyelights.

“I’m not here to talk politics of species differences, sweet cheeks. Tori-I mean the Queen, said your arrangements are good and that you know tons of shit about flowers. Usually, she doesn’t take a shine to adult humans easy,” he explained. You hummed in acknowledgement.

“Alright, fair enough.” You straightened, ready to get back to business, but your chest had grown tight for some reason. It felt almost…warm? You mentally pushed to observation aside. You were probably catching a cold or something. “What are you looking for today, Mr. Skeleton?”

Instead of answering, he nodded his head towards the “take one flower” vases. “What are these flowers?”

You walked over and looked at the vase he was pointing to. “These are buttercups. They’re smaller, so if you’re wanting to give them to someone, you’d be better off getting one of the buttercup bouquets,” you said, pointing to the other side of the store where all of the generic bouquets were kept. He nodded, looking at the buttercups intensely. “If you were wanting to give them to someone, you’d better be trying to ask that someone out. Unless they’re a baby. ”

He looked at you like you had grown two heads. “What?” he asked.

You shrugged. “Buttercups represent childhood or childishness. Many people give buttercups as gifts to new parents, for their baby’s room. Or, it’s because they are courting someone you just started seeing. Like, your relationship is in the childhood stage,” you explained. The skeleton blinked before he started snickering. You straightened again, more than ready to go on the offensive. “What?”

“It’s nothin’,” he chortled. “Jus’ sounds like a load of crap, is all.” You felt your face redden.

“It’s not crap! It’s history!” You pointed a finger at the skeleton’s chest. “I’ll have you know that some people have studied this ‘crap’ and have documented it for years, centuries, even millennia! The Greeks and the Egyptians thought certain flowers were supposed to represent the afterlife, or some flowers were known for their healing properties. And hell, a lot of the flower meanings today remain unchanged. It’s a sign of human culture, not just silly superstition,” you asserted. He opened his mouth to speak before you cut him off. “I did my Capstone on this so called ‘crap’ do NOT try to contradict me.”

He snickered again before raising his hands in an “I surrender” gesture. “I get it, I get it. You know your stuff. I jus’ needed to check.” You blinked and sighed.

“Fine. I guess if you’re really looking for a professional, then you have every right to test them,” you grumbled. “Got anymore tests for me before you tell me what you want?”

The guy’s cocky smirk decreased and for the first time since walking in here, he looked serious.  “I need you to identify a flower and tell me what it means. Like, the flower history and symbology an’ shit.”

“Iconography,” you corrected. “Symbology tends to represent more historical contexts. Iconography studies images and interpretations of more abstract concepts, like concepts in certain religious texts or emotions.”

Sans quirked a bone brow. “You really do know what you’re talkin’ about. Good.” He took out a plastic baggy from his leather jacket pocket and put it in your hand. “What is it?”  

You had a pretty good idea of what it could be, so you nudged your head to the back of the store. “Follow me.” He did, and you put on a new pair of latex gloves. You gently plucked the flower from his grip with a pair of forceps. You already had a good idea of what it was, considering you had lived in Ebott City most of your adult life. You grabbed a magnifying glass and examined the vein structure in the leaves. Nodding to yourself quietly, you went over to the computer and input the data. You did the same thing with petal pattern and the pattern of the stigma. You smiled to yourself when the search narrowed down to a few geological locations, all of which you knew very well. Your hunch had been right, especially when you were studying this flower for a long while to understand your own birth flower.

“Well?” the skeleton asked, obviously impatient. “Do you know what the flower is, or don’tcha?”

You held up a pacifying hand. He calmed down and waited for your explanation. “It’s an Ebottian Golden Flower. Super common, especially on the outskirts of Ebott City. The plains around Mount Ebott are full of them. I’m surprised you didn’t see them when you got out from under the mountain.” Just as his skeletal hand touched yours as he took the flower back, the flower withered into nothing but a black stem. You yelped as he looked down at it in shock. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry! I…I-I-I don’t know what happened! I’m even wearing gloves!”

While you fretted, the skeleton looked over your shoulder and his eye sockets widened. Suddenly, everything made sense as he saw a potted bundle of Echo Flowers was on your shelf. He grabbed the pot off your shelf and shoved them into your hands. You stopped freaking out and stared at him quizzically, though you felt your cheeks growing hotter with how intensely he was looking at you. “Where did you get these flowers?” he asked. You stammered for a little bit before answering.

“They’re my birth flowers,” you answered. “The hospital gives them to you when you’re born and they’re supposed to be with you the rest of your life.”

Sans nodded. “I know. Monsters have the same thing. I guess we did take some things from the Surface after all.” He went to touch one of the flower petals when he froze. “Do you have the legend too? About soulmates an’ shit?”

You nodded, taken aback. Why was he bringing this up?

Sans nodded back. “Sorry for this.” He gripped the stems. Just like his Ebottian Golden Flower, the Echo Flowers shriveled up, turned black, and gradually disappeared. You blinked.

“What…?”

It didn’t make sense. It seemed super unlikely that both of you had the same chemical on your hands that completely destroyed the innocent, beautiful flowers, but it still happened! What was the explanation?! What…?

You stopped short, the words of the legend coming up in your head for no reason. “The flower will not decay until you meet the one with whom you’ll share your days,” you breathed. You looked at Sans and realized that maybe the chest tightening was…attraction? “Oh, wow.” The skeleton let out a snort.

“That’s all ya have to say? You just found out your soulmate is a literal monster. And you’re a damn human!” He let out a an uneasy laugh. “I mean I came here to find out if I even had a soulmate but to actually find my soulmate? Like, what the fuck?”

You stood there, gobsmacked as your heart raced a million miles an hour. His smirk was kind of attractive in a “come closer, and I’ll bite you somewhere pleasant” type of way, if you thought about it. Fuck, you were already in so deep and you had met only ten minutes ago!

He smiled, but the smile seemed more cautious now. “Heya, I know this is sudden, but wanna come with me to Grillby’s? Even if we don’t get…ya know…together, we should at least get to know each other or some shit’ right?” Before you could even gather your wits, he ran a hand down his face. “What am I sayin’? I’m a skeleton with fuckin’ demon teeth and I’m asking a tiny human stranger to have lunch with me!” He looked at you one more time. “Sorry. Fuck everything I just said, yeah? Forget it.” He moved to run out of the room, but you grabbed his wrist before you even knew what you were doing.

“Hush. I’m coming whether you want me to or not.” He looked at you like you were crazy, so you cleared your throat. “T-to learn about the flower, I mean! I’m the only person who ever got those flowers as far as I know, and you seem to know what they are.”

He smirked. “That so?” You nodded, hoping that you weren’t red-faced. He shrugged. “Eh. Don’t see why not. Close up, toots.”

You did as he said, and he nodded at you to follow him. “Name’s Sans, by the way,” he said. “Sans the Skeleton.” You smiled and gave him your name. You both walked in silence for a few minutes before he spoke again. “By the way, you never told me what my flower means. It’s supposed to represent you or some other sentimental shit, yeah?”

Your face went bright red. There was no way in Hell you were telling him that it meant everlasting devotion and was indicative of a successful marriage. You wanted to see where your budding relationship with the snarky, sort of assholish skeleton led.

[iampikachuhearmeroar]

okay, y’all, i’ve gotta back on my tl;dr bullshit soapbox about something:

so, the other day, i was just mindlessly scrolling through my corporate & capitalist hellscape facebook™️ (i.e. LinkedIn) and came across this totally trite mostly bullshit meme that was shared by some corporate executive search man (whose name i decided to crop out bc eh):

so i obviously agree with the last three points on this list, bc god yes my life would’ve been a bit better if I didn’t get all my dialogue about mental health only from teen mags and horrible portrayals in teen tv shows (and also this hellsite). and hell yeah everyone, and I mean EVERYONE needs to learn that failure is okay many situations (like failing a class in uni or school) bc everyone fails at something sometimes. and dealing with failure is HARD. and time management is something that I’m pretty sure everyone lies to fuckin hell about on their resume, bc lots of people really suck at it, myself included. so yeah. that needs to be taught. and i also agree with the “how to manage your health” point. bc thats becoming ever more prevalent and important with career burn out etc.

but entrepreneurship? people management? conflict resolution? creativity? how to manage money? public speaking? like y’all. three of those ARE taught/learned in school, who the fuck wrote this meme? 

for anyone who actually paid attention in maths class, (which is probably very few people outside of the top performing classes), there WAS A WHOLE FUCKING UNIT that focuses on financial maths (in australia anyway). I ignored this unit as well as maths in general at school, bc I generally hated maths and was convinced that I was somehow never going to get a job. but i remember the gist of the overall topic and its subtopics. one subtopic teaches you how to calculate your wages in various contexts (overtime, double-time and a half, holiday payments, im pretty sure maternity leave pay was jammed in somewhere? idk if other countries would have double time & a 1/2 like australia though). another subtopic teaches you how to calculate interest on bank loans and credit rates on credit cards. a third subtopic teaches you how to calculate savings (obvs in terms of discounts in shops)....im sure there was a bit about budgeting in there somewhere? im pretty sure there were some questions were about tax payments somewhere as a subtopic enrichment exercise? but you get my gist. are these not money management skills? in some sense? like if i could find one of my old maths textbooks or old maths books i’d give an example of a question, to make my point stronger. but the problem, like i said before, is that a load of people (myself included) just zone out in maths in high school and stop trying with it. they forget what they’ve learnt, and just remember how much they hated algebra and how they’ll never use it again. maths was one hell of a fucking strong bitch, guys. but maybe i’m wrong.

creativity? excuse me? have people forgotten about art classes? drama classes? english classes? music classes? need i go on? okay don’t get me wrong, most of these classes did focus a lot on memorising quotes or facts about people (artists/writers/poets/composers/dramatists etc) or specific  periods/movements in art or theatre or literature for example.... but the amazing sculptures/paintings etc people created in art for their final projects in year 12, or even in year 10 were works of their imagination. the scripts people write in drama or maybe english (if you had a fun teacher who did a screenwriting unit, for example) are creative asf. especially in year 12 when they do their major projects, where they may produce a monologue or a short movie, and then there’s a group piece. drama students might even make their own costumes for these performances. LIKE AIN’T THAT A LOT OF CREATIVITY RIGHT THERE Y’ALL????? and english. lowly old english. THEY HAVE A WHOLE FUCKING TOPIC ON CREATIVE WRITING FOR FUCKS SAKE. the original music people might create for their final projects too in year 12? does that not count as creativity? like yes, i know a lot of these things do still have to meet bs assessment criteria (especially in catholic schools, where the main things are you don’t offend the catholic education office and jesus/god lmao) to be considered worthy of a mark for your year 12 exams. but FUCK. HOW THE FUCK AREN’T ANY OF THESE SUBJECTS COUNTED TOWARDS BEING CREATIVE???????? like fuck your corporate creative ideation or w/e bullshit, Callum. drama and english even lend themselves to improvisation in some instances, like public speaking, which is examined further, below.

next, we move on to public speaking. this shit is basically taught from the first goddamn day of “show & tell” in kindy/kindergarten, and this fucker has the gall to say that it’s not fucking taught in schools? someone call in miley cyrus/hannah montana to throw the fuck down in this motherfucking hoedown BC THIS STUPID-ASS MEME-FUCKER HAS NERVE. i hated public speaking. absolutely hated it. even though it was ironically one of the places i ended up excelling in in english classes. even when i fucked up in my english speeches with like “oh, fuck.... said nelson mandela,  i’ve seem to’ve lost my palm card. wait, shit! there it is... excuse me while i pull it out of my ass. whoops, sorry miss” *bats eyes and finger guns at my year 9 english teacher who has her head in her hands and is done with my shit, while the class laughs at my gaffe* i’d still end up with like 73% or like 26/30. it was baffling. but for people who weren’t the class clown/smart alec like i was from years 7-10 (and like i actually wasn’t once i moved schools).... public speaking is like the leading cause of anxiety, right? like by the time i got to doing speeches/presentations at uni i was having panic attacks... the thought of presenting to my classes made me fucking sick with fear and anxiety. nearly every subject i did at uni (even when i tried to avoid subs with public speaking assessments) and throughout school had some type of presentation/speech whatever you want to call it project/activity in it. even fucking SPORT/PDHPE at school and even philosophy at uni. and these fuckers are saying its not taught in schools. FUCK  OFF. like yeah, i get that they actually mean it in the professional sense.... where people can give the sappy bs motivational speeches or an insightful ted-talk worthy 20-minute presentation... or a great sales pitch. but like??? save that for mike “my dad phoned in to EY and i have a job waiting for me after uni” mcfuck in a business major or law degree? or for clubs like toastmasters? fuck. ok enough of the skills we learn in school. let’s move onto the businesslike-sounding ones of “people management”, “conflict management” and fucking “entrepreneurship”. like. what the fuck? okay in some sense people management and conflict management could potentially be used in managing friendships and relationships in your personal life. but like. i can feel the business underpinnings and i dont like it lmao. like why do you want fully functioning adults straight out of school, franklin? and there’s extra credit conflict management subjects at uni??? or at least my home uni had it... and i never did them bc they were intensive courses during summer break lol. but the one that pissed me off the most was entrepreneurship. LIKE ARE KIDS NOT FUCKING ALLOWED TO BE KIDS NOW????? well  apparently: “NO! YOU MUST ALWAYS THINK OF MONEY MAKING WAYS TO BE RICH! YOU MUST BE ENTREPRENEURIAL!!!!!! YOU MUST GENERATE BUSINESS IDEAS FROM THE TIME YOU CAN FUCKIN’ WALK!!!!! AND SPEAK!!! CHILDHOOD AND BEING A TEENAGER DON’T EXIST WORKER BEE!!!! CAPITALISM FOR ALL!!!! WORKER BEES!!! CAPITALISM IS YOUR FRIEND!!! OWN A BUSINESS BY THE TIME YOU’RE 8 YEARS OLD!” like it’s insidious asf. and it doesn’t acknowledge that most entrepreneurs are already privileged people anyway, who usually have some type of money to start off their venture (or that’s what it feels like anyway). and yeah throw all the “THIS BOY IS AN ENTREPRENEUR AT 18!!! 18!!!???? BY STARTING HIS OWN BUSINESS AT 12!!!! WHAT A CHAMP! 😁🙃” clickbait news stories at me, but i don’t fucking care. the concept and perceived over-importance and almost preaching mindset of entrepreneurship is slowly becoming insidious and toxic asf. call me paranoid. but that’s what it feels like.

but with those last three topics, i want to make a point that school curriculum’s (in australia at least, and probably worldwide) are so jam-packed already with sport (which is pointless and shitty), geography (ok how to read maps is important, but i never bothered to learned to do it properly), history, science, english etc etc etc..... that like.... where the actual fuck are the gonna jam the above bs (people management”, “conflict management” and entrepreneurship) into the curriculum???? and also teachers are already over-worked enough as it is, they don’t need another load of shitty subjects pushed onto them. and they sure asf don’t earn enough (especially in the states) to have this bs pushed into their subject schedules either. keep them at uni, where they should be. or just in the workplace/in the general public where they belong. and if people suggest that you could probably push these subjects into the year 11/12 business studies programs or elective commerce courses in years 9/10, save your goddamn breath. like i remember looking at business studies hsc papers in years 11/12 to see what they did.... and it was pretty chock-a-block anyway. and my experience of my year 9 commerce was horrible, to say the least. let kids be kids, for fucks sake. they shouldn’t have to be fully functioning adults in the workplace, by the end of high school, for fucks sake. AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP IS NOT AN ESSENTIAL SKILL????!!!! FUCK OFF WITH THAT SHIT, WILHELM. anyway. that’s my rant over about how i hate how corporate people are trying to be #relatablewiththeyouth🙃 with their shitty versions of “10 things i wish we learned in school” memes.... and failing.... without realising that this is why millennials are suspicious and cynical about meme usage by corporate people/corporations.