#these thoughts were brought to you by today's vitamin D

[ayosdesignz-blog]

Rewatching ppg episodes is making me comprehend facts I already knew! Like the fact that Mojo& The Professor created the ppg while Mojo&Him created the rrb. Why is he technically big brother uncle daddy to both sets of these kids?!! 😭

Like I know in fandom the general acceptance had been he's the powerpuffgirls' adoptive elder brother while for the rowdyruffboys he's one half of a parental set unit after Him revives them anew.

But look at their family tree!

Nothing makes sense, no one is blood related, but they are all technically family...somehow!!

And if we bring up the fact that Him has been caught live and in person licking the Professor like a lollipop, the Professor only viewing Mojo as his son formerly known as Jojo when the monkey pled his case, the rrbs looking identical to the ppgs down to the color coordination, and Bubbles canonically having some kind of crush on her male lookalike for fake but actually cousin/brother doppleganger...

It's a lot.

[the-saltiest-saltine]

Feitan thought for the day:

It took months for you to earn the privilege of going out for a walk with him. The first step you took into the shoddy streets was nothing short of glorious (if not a bit overwhelming after your extended stays in the basement). It’s the best thing you’d had in a while, dodging the footpath’s cracks whilst Feitan trailed behind you, ensuring you didn’t get too far.

Of course, being Feitan, he had to come armed. Whilst he could easily take down most opponents single-handedly, he kept his umbrella tucked under his arm, sword safely hidden. An extra-safe precaution on the off chance one of his many Nen-wielding enemies decide to ruin what he’d you’d got.

You practically bounced as much as your weakened calves had allowed, an extra pep in your step from the much-needed vitamin D.

But then it started to rain.

As the first drizzle dampened your hair, your mood dampened with it. The quick switch to an assault of fat droplets only served to worsen your mood. Today? Of all days?

Then you remembered what your “companion” had brought with him. You really didn’t want to ask him, of all people, for any favours, but this was so overdue, and up until now had been so perfect…

“Feitan, could I borrow your umbrella?”

He stopped for a moment, staring at you with an unreadable expression. Angry? Amused? Bewildered?

He shook his head. “Tch. Just water. Such a baby.”

Something inspired you to push, despite knowing previous consequences for doing so. Maybe it was the fact that your once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for fresh air had turned stale within minutes. Maybe you’d gotten too bold with all the buttering up you’d done. Or maybe it was the fact that precipitation was pummeling your face, forcing you to blink every two seconds.

“Please, Feitan. Please. It’d mean so much to me.” Your voice honeyed to an excruciating degree.

He narrowed his eyes at you.

“You can hold it, if you’re afraid of me breaking it. I’ll stay right by your side.” You didn’t actually think he was worried you’ll break it. But you crossed you fingers that he’d take the second half of the bait.

Wordlessly, he handed it over. So he was letting you take control of it this time? How utterly generous.

He stepped under it with you as you awkwardly opened it up. “Didn’t know you were scared of rain. Weaker than I thought.” He stood patiently as you stared at him, momentarily dumbfounded before continuing on your journey without a destination. The water soaking through your socks was irritating, but made you feel utterly alive.

“And,” he patted the bottom of umbrella’s handle, “don’t touch. Unless you want to blow up.”

Whether he was joking or not, you had no idea.

[lokifan2]

Just a Little Bit Ticklish?

Rated: G

Language: None

Pairing: Loki and female reader

Tagline: “Uh!….He knows! (Sebastian from The Little Mermaid)

It was a beautiful spring day. The sun was shining and the birds were chirping. It was the perfect day to go outside and sit in the warm weather for a while. Loki was yet to come home from a mission, so you thought you’d soak up some much needed Vitamin D today. You spread out a blanket and laid in the grass for a while and you instantly felt better. It’s not that you were in a bad mood, you just needed a pick me up. The god of Mischief was also closer to home than you thought, as he undid his invisibility spell and watched you from the sliding glass door that lead to the back yard.

You lay on your stomach with your hand underneath your cheek as you slowly closed your eyes and breathed in the cool afternoon air. You exhaled and smiled as you finally heard your prince open and close the sliding glass door. “ Hello, my prince,” you said as your eyes were still closed but you were fully aware now. “Good afternoon, my princess. How are we feeling today?” You finally lifted your head and rested it in the palm of your hand as you looked at Loki. A smile still on your face. “Very well. I just needed an energy boost so I came out here to soak up a bit of sun.” By the time Loki arrived home, you had been outside for thirty minutes and decided to get up and greet your lover. You both smiled as you embraced and walked back inside the house hand in hand.

As Loki closed the door, he slyly smiled to himself. “You know, there is another way that I can make you feel more energized. Do you wish for me to tell you?” You giggled and shook your head. “Of course,” you replied. His wicked grin grew even bigger as he began to tell you. “ I know you have a little secret, darling. A little secret that, in the wrong hands, say, mine. Could be very detrimental to you.” You looked confused for a moment and then the pieces started to fall into place. Ticklish. You were ticklish, but Loki didn’t know to what extent. He thought you were just a little ticklish but he was about to find out that he was very wrong.

You both sat on the couch as he ordered you to then lay down. Your heart began to beat a little faster as he took both your hands and kissed them, raising them above your head, making them magically stay. “Be gentle,” you smiled. “Darling,” he gasped. “It’s like you don’t know me at all, as I cannot agree to your terms. Therefore, I will not be gentle. I will tickle you until you scream my name and beg for mercy! That’s why I brought you inside. So no one would misconstrue your screams of joy. Now that I have you alone my sweet dove, shall we begin?”

You nervously agreed as he traced his long thin fingers from your wrists to just above your armpit and stopped. His face turned even more maniacal as he hovered his fingers over the area and gaged your reaction. You trembled slightly as the soft pads of his fingers glided across your skin. You giggled cutely as Loki made an “aww” face, which made you laugh more. “S-stop t-teasing! Hehehe! That makes it w-worse!” He paused his playful torment for a second and replied, “oh, but darling, your face is absolutely adorable! How could I stop? You cute little mortal, you!”

He squished your cheeks as you continued to laugh. “Now…For the moment we’ve been waiting for…Your most ticklish spot…Where is it?” You gasped and replied, “I’m not telling the god of Mischief that! You have to find it!” That’s when Loki scrunched his nose up adorably and shook his head at you. He knew but not to what extent. The sides of your belly were your worst spot and he intended to play it up. Show some theatrics of sorts to really get you going. “How about here, darling?” He tickled your neck a little and you scrunched up, laughing harder. “Nope. Not my most ticklish,” you replied with a sly grin. “I see….,” he pondered. “Maybe, here.” He tickled your chest. You squeaked but no big laughter came out of your mouth. “Well, I know it’s your upper body, so….maybe….HERE!” He clamped his fingers around your belly and moved them wildly as you shrieked with laughter. “Th-hat’s i-hi-hit! Hahahah!” Loki’s eyes playfully brightened as he knowingly replied, “ oh, how did I know?! I don’t know how I could have found it, and so quickly! My! You’re even more ticklish there than I remember. This is very good information, darling. Now, I can focus on your “death spot” and have you howling within seconds!” All you could do at this point was laugh your heart out as he tormented your belly and its sides. You obviously couldn’t move your arms, so defending yourself was completely useless at this point.

“Stahahahap!” you laughed while also screaming. Your face red and stained with tears of joy. You thought your face would get stuck that way because it became sore but you couldn’t help but continue laughing. The pain was well worth it though. Finally, Loki showed you mercy and undid your trapped wrists. You two sat there smiling like a couple of idiots for a few seconds before you pecked each other on the lips and continued on with your day out in the warm sunshine. This was true bliss.

[finniestoncrane]

Your One True Nemesis

Chapter 12: also on AO3 Masterlist Here Arkham!Riddler x Female!Reader, word count: 1.7k we're rockin with mark because mark is rockin with us request info • prompt list • send me a request • kofi • masterlist minors DNI!! 🔞 cw: angst, love triangle kinda

“Where are you going this time?”

You appeared in the doorway to your bedroom, catching Eddie off guard clearly, as he jumped and turned to you.

“Sneaking away?”

“The transaction with Scarecrow. There’s more to it. I’m going out to meet his man, or men. Or woman, I suppose potentially.”

You raised your eyebrows, smiling incredulously as you brought your phone out, typing a message to Mark as you walked over to Eddie.

“Another drop off today?”

“Yep. See you soon?”

As you approached Eddie, you put your phone away, putting you hand out flat expectantly.

“What?”

“Gimme the stuff.”

“No.”

“I’ve just checked, it’s the same guy as last time. We have a rapport. Let me go.”

Irritated by your tone, the way you seemed to think you had any authority in the matter, Eddie held tight to the messenger bag. But he realised that he did indeed have better things to be doing, and so he gave in quickly, not without an insulting remark to put you in your place.

“Fine. Anyone who makes such a quick connection with someone like you is bound to be intolerable. Be back quickly though.”

Skipping out past him, you felt good, a sense of relief. It was difficult to be cooped up all the time, especially without windows or natural light. You were worried you had a vitamin D deficiency, and it was definitely impacting on your mental health. Wandering the streets of Gotham, as disgusting and terrifying as they were, was still a pleasant treat compared to being in the timeless pit with Eddie. How long had you been down there now? It was hard to tell when sleep schedules meant very little, and the days all blurred into one another. Wake, cook, be insulted, cry, sleep. In no particular order. And on repeat.

You were so engrossed in your thoughts and ruminations that you didn’t see the person approaching you until you were smacking into them, quickly rushing to apologise before you placed the face.

“Sorry, so sorry, I- Oh! It’s you!”

Mark smiled, raising his eyebrow.

“Oh, so I don’t get an apology?”

“No, that’s not what I meant, sorry. H-how… are you?”

“Couldn’t be better, babe. You got the stuff? I’ll go first this time, keep your trust in me up.”

He reached into his pockets and produced another three vials of the same liquid, as well as two small pouches filled with a deep green powder. You knew better than to ask what it was. As much as you were fine with the moral ambiguity around Edward’s work, sometimes the legal ramifications of what you were involved with still struck a panicked chord in your chest.

“Babe… the stuff?”

“Oh, shit, yeah.”

Handing over the contents of the messenger bag to Mark, you sighed.

“What’s up, buttercup?”

“Hmm… Eddie said to be back quick, but… coffee…”

You looked to your right, through the window of the coffee shop. You could smell the scent of the roasted beans wafting on the air. How long had it been since you’d had fresh coffee? Something that wasn’t brewed in the broken pot in your shabby kitchen.

“Oh, come on! Like he’s going to be that annoyed. Besides, we met almost in the middle, you still wouldn’t be at the meeting spot yet.”

“You’re right… why were you heading this way anyway?”

Mark shrugged as he stepped past you, opening the door to the café and holding it ajar for you.

“Dunno, thought it might be nice to walk with you a little bit of the way.”

Grinning, you pressed past him and took a seat by the window. Mark followed you in and leaned over the chair, elbows on the table.

“Lemme get this, what you after?”

“Uh… flat white. With three sugars.”

“Boring. I’ll be right back!”

You watched him jog to the counter, leaning against it, seeming to effortlessly charm the barista as he took the order and started work on your order. And you kept watching him, as he brought the coffees over and sat down, as he talked about his life, as he told you how he started working for Scarecrow. It was hard not to look at him. He kind of commanded your gaze. So charismatic. So friendly, and nice. Being around someone who didn’t seem to hate you and didn’t punctuate every sentence with something mean about you was refreshing, and once again, you hated to have to say goodbye. But if there was anything that would sour the mood that Mark had set, it would be Eddie’s interrogation if you were later than he expected you to be.

And right on queue, as soon as he heard you walking through the living space, he came out of his office and began his second round of questioning.

“Did you enjoy your date?”

“What? It wasn’t a date, I was doing an errand for you.”

“Yes. And the rest of the things I make you do put you in such a good mood, don’t they?”

“I take pride in my work.”

“Since when.”

“Always. But you’ve never cared to notice.”

Turning from him, you went to your room, closing the door behind you and leaning against it, shuddering as the adrenaline coursed through you. If you’d had the energy to let yourself be hurt, you would have allowed the fantastical idea that Eddie might be jealous of Mark to settle, see how it felt. But you couldn’t do that to yourself. Instead, you lay face down on your bed and forced yourself to nap.

You were wakened by a thumping on the door, jolting you out of the dream that was already fading, but which you knew involved Eddie and Mark. Opening the door, you sighed.

“What?”

“Why does it take you so long to meet with this Mark?”

“Again? Eddie, come on. It’s just… It’s nice to get out!”

Eddie narrowed his eyes, his mistrust etched onto the smouldering glare he gave you.

“Really? You would recommend it?”

“I would actually.”

“Perfect. Well, while you were in here doing nothing productive to anyone, I completed another part of Crane’s order. I think I’ll go this time then. I wonder if it’ll be so easy for him to charm his way into my heart, too?”

“Eddie, that’s…”

“That’s what? Entirely accurate? I feel like you might be a bit misguided here, in whatever you think your relationship with this goon is. You’re being manipulated. I can’t trust you not to fall idiotic head over clumsy heels for this enemy, and provide him with all of my secrets.”

“What? He can’t just enjoy my company? You think the only reason anyone would be nice to me is because they want something from me?”

“Why do you think you’re here?”

You clenched your jaw, teeth clamped together as you tried to avoid saying anything in return, choosing not to rise to his taunts. Instead, you reached for the messenger bag, which he quickly pulled back out of your reach.

“Uh, uh, uh. You can call your little friend and tell him you won’t be seeing him this evening.”

“Oh, like I’m grounded or something?”

Leaving him in his silence, crueller than any words he might have spat at you, you pushed past him, storming out and onto the dark streets of the city. It was dangerous, and stupid, but you were beyond caring. You just kept walking, and walking. Before you really thought of where you were going, you noticed you were at the park where you met Mark the first time, and you sat down on the bench to gather your thoughts before you headed back to the sewers, certain that Eddie would be gone by then.

“Ah, miserable as usual.”

At first, you thought you had imagined his voice, so desperate for something sweet in this sour moment, but it was definitely Mark, right there beside you, taking a seat on the bench.

“I thought it was Nigma himself who was meeting me.”

“It is… I… I didn’t know this was where he was meeting you, sorry. I just had to get out…”

“I see… y’know, I can only lighten your mood so much. I set you up, he knocks you down, huh?”

“I don’t know if you’re joking or not, but that’s really what it feels like.”

Mark sighed, resting his arms on the bench behind you.

“We’re not meeting here, we’re meeting in the alley just up there. I saw you though, alone. In the dark. I don’t know how tough you think you are babe, but not a good idea.”

Leaning back, you rested your head against his arm, letting out a soft groan.

“Wanna talk about it?”

“I think it would bore you to death.”

“Try me.”

“It’s just very hard. To be around him. And to deal with how I feel… about… things. I knew he would be difficult, I did. I didn’t go into this blindly, assuming that it would all work out wonderfully. But I just didn’t think I’d feel like this.”

“And how do you feel?”

You looked into the sky, no visible stars beyond the smog and the clouds. A dark, grey abyss that felt like the ceiling of a prison cell as you stared up at it.

“I’m just… tired. I think.”

“You think?”

“I don’t know.”

Looking to the side, you could see Mark’s face, his warm smile, lighting up his face and his eyes as he tried to silently comfort you, concern behind it, a genuine desire to see you happy. You turned away, but you leaned to the side, into him, resting your head on his shoulder when he brought his arm to yours. It was innocent enough. A friend comforting a friend. But it felt wrong, like a betrayal almost. Of who, you weren’t sure. But Eddie knew. And as he watched you both on the bench from the other side of the street, he clutched at the strap of the messenger bag, infuriated and confused.

[wolfprincesszola]

Echoes of 50 Chapter 4

As always, check the TWs and CWs in the masterlist. EEK, Prinxiety AND Logicality in one chapter? An absolute slay. Enjoy <3. ——————– Now Playing: COFFEE SHOP by RC AVENUE

<Masterlist>

<Previous Chapter> <Next Chapter> ——————–

“Come on, L. We’re going to be late!” Virgil groaned as he was jumping up and down anxiously, waiting for Logan to walk through the front door.

“To get some vitamin D?” Logan raised an eyebrow as he walked out of the door with his laptop bag hung on his shoulder. If Virgil was going to be so insistent to drag Logan out to the coffee shop early on a Saturday morning, Logan was going to at least spend the time he sat around researching.

“Exactly!” Virgil spoke up as he grabbed Logan’s wrist tightly, “Now pick up the pace for once in your life.”

“Alright, fine!” Logan sighed as he let Virgil drag him after locking the door to his apartment.

Once they had arrived at the coffee shop, Virgil hesitated.

“Just open the door. It’ll be fine. Calm your heart. It won’t be anything.”

Logan didn’t say anything to Virgil’s thoughts, just waiting for Virgil to overcome his social anxiety and open the door. After a deep breath, Virgil opened the door to pull both him and Logan in. As they came in, Logan was surprised to find a small crowd forming to the side of the front counter, chatting excitedly.

“It’s about to start. I can’t wait.”

“Do you think he’ll dedicate a song to me?”

“Oh, I hope he notices me today.”

“How many more minutes until it starts?”

In the mix of the voices, Logan heard Virgil’s thoughts loud and clear.

“Where is he?”

“Alright, come on. Let a Prince through. There are customers that are waiting for their orders! The show will start in a few minutes.” A familiar voice traveled through the crowd, causing the crowd to open up. There, Roman stood, grinning at everyone before turning to the two best friends. Immediately, the light in his eyes faltered for a second as he stared directly at Virgil.

“Oh god. He’s looking at me.” Virgil’s thoughts panicked.

“Virgil and Logan, huh?” Roman’s thoughts seemed to be more melancholic, as if he wasn’t expecting to see the two of them together. “Never thought they’d be together.”

Oh. Logan understood now.

“Hi, Ro.” Virgil waved to Roman.

“Vir, you came.” Roman finally managed to utter out as he mustered up a bright smile, the light in his eyes flickering the longer he stared at Logan and Virgil. “And what’s this? You’ve brought Logan. You don’t come in on Saturdays usually.”

“Why me? Why am I the unfortunate soul?” Roman’s thoughts spoke almost angrily. Logan wondered what Roman was talking about.

“Hello, Roman.” Logan nodded, “Unfortunately, I was forcefully coerced by Virgil to…remove myself from my apartment and come see what I can assume is a performance you will be doing.”

Roman cleared his throat, nodding, “Oh yes! Every Saturday, I come and perform for the regulars! I never expected you to be interested in it though, Logan.”

“I’m not.” Logan admitted.

“Why him? What does he have that I don’t?” Roman stared at Logan with an unreadable expression as his thoughts screamed.

“Well then, may I get the two of you something to drink before the performance starts? Hopefully, you two can stick around and watch.” Roman remarked as he started to walk behind the counter to grab two cups.

“Shit, shit, shit. He’s looking at me. I have to answer.” Virgil’s thoughts were completely opposite from Roman’s. While Roman’s were more upset, Virgil’s were more excited and panicked.

“That sounds awesome.” Virgil nodded, “Thank you.”

“Of course, Virgil.” Roman’s voice was soft as he began to pull up the menu for the register, “Just the usuals for you two?”

Virgil looked at Logan nervously. Logan could feel Virgil’s hand starting to clam up around Logan’s wrist, so Logan finally stepped in to help Virgil out.

“Yes. A caffè mocha for me and a hazelnut cold brew for Virgil.” Logan spoke.

“He even knows his coffee order. What chance do I even have? Did I even have a chance to begin with? Was I delusional?” Roman’s thoughts spoke in despair.

“That will be $10.37.” Roman spoke up as he began to write the two orders down for the two of them.

Virgil stumbled to grab his card to pay as Roman turned to make the drinks. And for the first time since Logan met Roman Prince, Roman had nothing to say to them. Roman stayed completely silent and fulfilled Logan’s request to not speak to him. And Logan hated every second of it.

It wasn’t like Roman. It wasn’t like Roman to miss up a chance to poke fun at Logan and it wasn’t like Roman to not be cheery upon seeing Logan because it was always that Roman wanted to mess with Logan. They were friends.

Logan hated to admit it, but Roman was no longer just a close acquaintance, but instead an actual friend.

“Just ask him. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe they’re not together. I should just say it. I’ll pretend like I was curious if I’m wrong. I just can’t keep thinking about this for eternity.” Roman’s thoughts obsessed over how to say it so loudly that it was completely overpowering all the other thoughts in the area.

Logan turned to Virgil to see Virgil shifting and playing with the sleeves of his hoodie. He could see Virgil’s flushed cheeks and he could practically hear how loud Virgil’s heart was pounding.

“To get some vitamin D, huh?” Logan raised an eyebrow unamused at Virgil, who broke out of his anxiety-ridden thoughts to glare at Logan.

“Shut up.” Virgil scowled quietly. “Get out of my head and don’t speak too loudly. He might hear you.”

“Oh, no. What a shame.” Logan’s voice dripped with sarcasm as he crossed his arms, grabbing Virgil’s hand from his wrist to put it down.

Before Virgil could retort, Roman turned to the two of them with their two newly-made drinks. The smile that Roman was forcing on was no longer happy, but now melancholic.

“Here you two go. Will you be staying for the performance?”

Logan gave a knowing look to Virgil and spoke for Virgil before the man could froth at the mouth over Roman talking to him. “Yes. We’ll be staying.”

“Great.” Roman nodded. “Excuse me. I’m going to get ready for my performance now that I’ve attended to the two of you.”

“Call out to him, dammit. Stop being such a coward and just tell him good luck. That’s all I can tell him.” Virgil was screaming in his head, trying to protest against his social anxiety, but it seemed no matter what he thought, nothing was changing. So Logan, unfortunately, had to step in once more and pushed Virgil. Physically.

“Logan, I’m going to kill you!”

Virgil yelped, which caused Roman to look back at him and manage to catch Virgil before he fell to the ground.

“Woah there, Marilyn Morose, you alright?”

“Uh, thank you.” Virgil cleared his throat as Roman helped Virgil back up. “Good luck out there.”

Roman’s eyes brightened at the words Virgil spoke and his smile widened, “Thank you. I hope you and your boyfriend enjoy the show.”

“Oh, uh…no, boyfriend?” Virgil cocked his head to the side in confusion towards Roman, “I don’t have a boyfriend.” Roman’s eyes widened as he looked from Virgil towards Logan back to Virgil back to Logan. “Oh, sorry, did I misread the situation? It’s just that you were holding his hand when you came in and-” “Oh jeez, no.” Virgil groaned, “Logan’s my best friend. He was refusing to come, so I had to drag him in. I’m sorry for giving you that impression and-”

“Oh thank the Broadway! My love story with Virgil is not quite lost yet.”

Finally. Logan hated being the wingman and he hated misunderstandings.

“Oh shit. Is that why Roman was acting so weird to us? Fuck, it was all my fault. Why did I have to pull Logan here?”

“Oh, no, it’s fine.” Roman let out an embarrassed laugh, “I was just surprised at first. Nothing else.”

“Nothing else?” Virgil raised an eyebrow, his face stricken with worry that Roman hated him.

“Nothing else.” Roman reassured Virgil, “I’ll be going back now. I hope you and Logan enjoy the show.”

“Thank you. You too!” Virgil smiled before turning to a reading Logan with an embarrassed face.

“You too? That was all I had to say? Fuck!”

“Can you quiet down? I have research to read before the show.” Logan remarked as he could see Virgil’s face shifting with multiple stages of embarrassment.

“You knew, didn’t you?” Virgil glared, “You knew Roman misunderstood the situation and you didn’t bother to clear it up?”

“If you’re ever thinking about being in a relationship with him, you need to learn how to assert yourself and speak to him without a middle man. Besides, you always complain I don’t have a sense of humor. I thought this was pretty humorous if you ask me.”

“You didn’t smile or laugh once.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know that was a requirement to think things are funny.” Logan rolled his eyes, “Last time I checked, you constantly thought things were funny without smiling or laughing. Hypocrite.”

The show began before Virgil could give his retort back and the two turned towards the person who had come into the middle of the crowd. The crowd had formed a semi-circle around what seemed to be a makeshift stage in the coffee shop.

“Bitch.” Virgil thought to get the last word. Logan just rolled his eyes at Virgil’s pettiness.

Roman smiled, “Thank you. Thank you. Today, I will be performing a couple of theater songs from The Greatest Showman. My friend, Patton, will be singing any duets with me. If you want any drinks throughout, Patton will also take your orders.” Patton walked through the crowd, shyly smiling around with a bright smile. Logan’s heart stopped at the sight of Patton. Just as the first time he saw Patton, Patton looked just as beautiful. He looked happier even. Logan blinked, trying to pry his eyes from the man, but found himself unable to. Patton, unlike before, was wearing a light blue t-shirt with no cardigan against his back. The same light blue as the polo he first saw Patton in. That must be Patton’s signature color because he seemed to love that color. It fit him, that was for sure.

A smug voice interrupted his entrancement.

“Who’s the hypocrite now, L?”

“Still you.” Logan whispered to Virgil as he continued to stare at Patton. There was something entrancing about the way that Patton was dancing around on stage with Roman. The two sang A Million Dreams and Rewrite the Stars together before Roman began to sing more solo songs like Tightrope and This is Me. Around the time of Roman’s solo singing, Patton had gone to take the orders of some customers that had entered the coffee shop. While Virgil was busy watching Roman sing, Logan observed Patton interacting with the different customers. Patton intrigued him. Despite the thousands of thoughts Logan could hear warping through his head, Logan couldn’t hear a single one that came from Patton.

Patton, himself, was intriguing. He always smiled and he seemed to enjoy social interaction with many of the other customers, but he wasn’t skilled the way Roman was. Roman took pride in the singing and the coffee he made. Patton, on the other hand, was clumsy. He fumbled with certain tools. He tripped with his feet. His singing was just as good at Roman, but his confidence was misplaced, letting Roman’s voice overpower his instead of keeping the same volume as Roman’s. Even when Roman tried to soften his voice to make way for Patton to have the spotlight, Patton’s voice was shaky, almost as if he was second-guessing the words he was singing. Patton wasn’t skilled in coffee by any means necessary, but the thing about Patton was that he continued to try. No matter how much struggle he got into, Patton kept trying. He would make a stupid coffee pun and waive off any concerns. That was certainly admirable.

As soon as Patton finished the last customer who had come in, Roman had called Patton.

“Patton! You know piano, right?” Roman asked excitingly.

Patton turned towards Roman, leaving his back facing towards the audience. “Well, sort of. I’m not the best at it, so I might mess up.”

There was something on Patton’s middle trapezius. Something that Logan could barely discern was a tattoo of some kind. It was barely visible with his t-shirt covering half of it, but Logan could see the top part. It seemed to be a long tattoo that panned the entirety of Patton’s t-shirt.

“Oh, nonsense, Padre. Come on up here. Everybody, give a round of applause to my friend Patton.”

Patton gave a smile as he walked on stage towards his friend. He turned towards the audience, leaving Logan unable to read what the tattoo was. Dammit, Patton. Logan knew how entrancing looking at Patton’s face was, but all Logan wanted in that moment was to see what had been written on Patton’s neck. Everyone began to applaud and Logan followed after, keeping his eyes trained on the man.

“Thank you?” Patton waved towards the audience before walking up onto the stage, “What song are we doing?”

“Never Enough!” Roman grinned.

“Ooo, I love that song! And lucky for you, I can definitely Handel that song.” Patton grinned and looked around the room for anyone that got the pun. There were a few laughs, but Logan couldn’t help the way he groaned at the joke.

“For those that got that joke, you must be pretty sharp.”

Another groan escaped from Logan.

“Alright, alright, I’ll stop. I’ll count you off, Roman?”

“You got it, Pat!” Roman grinned as he patted Patton’s back. Patton began to head down from the makeshift stage to go to the nearby keyboard that Roman had. Logan stared as Patton turned, quickly noting down what was on the tattoo. Roman’s pat on the back had allowed for the entire tattoo to be visible for just a second that Logan could read it.

50 61 74 74 6F 6E. There were spaces for every two characters. Six “words” overall. Where was that familiar? “Hey…what was on Patton’s neck?” Virgil whispered, turning towards Logan.

“Fifty, sixty-one-” Logan began before Virgil widened his eyes and Logan cut himself off to ask, “What?” “Patient 50.”

Logan’s eyes widened at the thought as he went to roll up his sleeve, analyzing his handwriting on his arm he had done the previous night.

Five. Zero. Fifty. Six. One. Sixty-one. Seven. Four. Seventy-four. Seven. Four. Seventy-four. Six. F. Six and an F. Six. E. Six and an E. Patient 50 61 74 74 6F 6E.

“There’s no way. Is there?” Virgil asked.

“I don’t know.” Logan admitted as he rolled his sleeve back down and grabbed the manila folder from his laptop bag. There had to be some correlation between Patton and Patient 50, at the very least.

Six groups of two characters. There were six letters in Patton. Logan could rule out each group of characters corresponding to a letter of the Phonecian alphabet, considering that there were letters and numbers more than 26.

Something about the arrangement of characters seemed familiar.

For someone who claimed he was so smart, Logan sure as hell was drawing a blank as to what correlation Patton and six groups could mean. It could be the letters of his name, but it didn’t make sense unless it was in a code.

Logan was a part of a tech company. Logan went to CalTech. He graduated a year early with his bachelors. He got his masters degree. He should be able to figure it out.

Should being the key word.

Before long, Roman had finished singing and the crowd erupted into applause. Logan jumped out of his thoughts to give applause to the two performers before turning to Virgil.

“May we go now?” Logan raised an eyebrow, “I have work to do and I’ve spent enough time not researching.” “Hold on. It’d be rude to leave without talking to Roman and Patton first.” Virgil stared at Logan’s cup, still untouched, “Besides, you didn’t finish your drink.”

Logan sighed as he stayed where he was, sipping his drink as he waited for the crowd to clear out. It took ten minutes before the crowd had finally dispersed, Roman and Patton turning their attention towards Logan and Virgil.

“My chemically imbalanced romance! How did you think my performance was?” Roman grinned, turning to Virgil.

“It was good.” Virgil nodded, his confidence to stay to congratulate Roman now disappearing the more he stood there in front of Roman. Logan could hear the exchanging thoughts that ran through each of their minds, trying to displace whether or not the next thing someone said would be the thing that got them to confess.

Instead, Logan moved off to the side to talk to Patton. Having put away the manila folder just moments before and set his laptop bag down on the table he was at, he spoke to Patton, “Congratulations, Patton, on your performance.”

“Oh, thank you.” Patton smiled, his eyes lighting up as he turned his full attention to Logan, instead of the conversation of the two men acting like high schoolers with a giddy crush. “I didn’t think that this would be your type of scene.”

“It isn’t. Virgil unfortunately brought me here.” Logan sighed. “I didn’t take you as the type to know piano.”

“Yeah.” Patton chuckled awkwardly, not sure what to really say, “I learned when I was really young. I learned a lot of things when I was young, but there weren’t that many good memories associated with them.”

“I see.” Logan nodded.

The more Logan talked to Patton, the more Logan was curious about the man Patton was. He wanted to pick apart Patton’s brain, especially since Logan hadn’t heard a single thought come out of Patton. He wanted to read the stories Patton had been a part of and he wanted to see the way Patton wrote the new ones he would be a part of. Logan craved the knowledge of who Patton was in the most surface level and in the deeper levels. He wanted to know Patton’s favorites and the little habits Patton did, but he also wanted to know Patton’s deepest darkest secret and the feelings Patton had when he was awake at 3 in the morning. He wanted to know the hopes, fears, childhood experiences, and goals that Patton had. He wanted to know how Patton was when the rest of the world was asleep and what Patton found beautiful in nature. Maybe Patton liked blue and space, just like Logan. Maybe Patton was scared of the dark and of true apathy, just like Logan. Or maybe, Patton preferred black and sunsets; maybe the two could spend hours arguing about which were subjectively and objectively better. Maybe Patton disliked olives, unlike Logan. Maybe Patton would pick off all the olives on combo pizzas and maybe if they knew each other better, Patton would give them to Logan to eat. Maybe, just maybe, Logan and Patton could work out together and Logan could truly get to know Patton in the same way that he knew himself.

“I wanted to say sorry again for spilling that coffee on you the first time we met.”

“Oh, Patton, it’s alright. I already got it back from the dry-cleaners, perfectly cleaned. I’m actually quite happy the way things turned out.” “Oh really? Why?”

“Because I got to meet you.”

Patton smiled, “Wow…that means a lot to me…”

Logan raised an eyebrow at the way Patton trailed off, almost as if he wanted to finish the sentence with a name, but couldn’t come up with it.

“I’m so sorry, affogato your name. Do you mind en-latte-ning me?”

“Two coffee-based puns? You must be really nervous.” Logan smirked.

“Roman told me you’re not someone that is easily pleased. I just feel awful for all the mistakes I’ve made around you.”

“It’s alright, Patton.” Logan chuckled, “I don’t mind. Logan Sanders.”

“Logan. Logan. Logan.” Patton nodded, repeating the name to try and brand it into his brain. “Got it. Thank you, Logan. For everything.” Logan just brushed it off as him being a normal human being doing normal societal things.

“You don’t seem too fond of my puns, Logan. I saw you groaning at the ones I made on stage.”

“I have a general distaste for them, but it does not mean you have to stop making them on my behalf.” Logan adjusted his glasses to try and read Patton’s expression. He didn’t seem too hurt by Logan’s statement and in fact, there seemed to be a mischievous glint that appeared in his smile.

“Oh, Logan. That just means I have to make more of them!” Patton giggled, “That way, you’ll get used to them and then maybe you’ll start making some of them too.”

“Truly a father figure.” Logan sighed before looking over to see that Virgil and Roman were still awkwardly talking to each other, trying to gain more hints from what the other could want. It looked like he was stuck conversing with Patton until it was over, not that Logan minded. “Do you normally wear this shade of blue? You were wearing the same color when I last saw you.”

“Oh, yes! Light blue is my favorite color. My cardigan got dirty yesterday though, so I couldn’t wear it and I just ran out of polo shirts, but what you saw me in that Thursday is what I usually am wearing!” Patton grinned. “Are you usually wearing formal clothing like this every day?”

“Yes. It’s clean-cut, precise, and serious.”

“Do you change the color of the ties you wear?”

“I like dark blue. It’s my favorite color.”

“We’re so similar! We have the same glasses and we like the same color!”

“That is true.” Logan nodded.

“You must be very smart with how hard you work. I mean, your laptop bag and the way you talk must hold some meaning. Your work must be happy to have someone like you helping them with your knowledge.”

“That’s very kind of you.” Logan adjusted his glasses, letting his arm cover his cheeks’ slight tint. That type of complement meant a lot more from Patton than anyone else he had talked to. For some reason. “I work at a tech company. I’m sure I am a valuable asset to the team, as I am the head chemical engineer. However, for some odd reason, I mainly work on their software.”

“You know software? Then you must know cool number systems like hexadecimal!”

Hexadecimal? That was a weird thing to bring up upon hearing about tech. Usually, Logan got a simple question like what type of electronic devices he worked with and if it was someone more knowledgeable in the field, they would ask what coding languages Logan used. Never in his life had he been asked about number systems. Although a fairly easy concept to get with practice, it was usually not the first number system that was brought up even when talked about. He was always asked about binary.

“I do. If you’re bringing up hexadecimal, then you must know software as well. After all, number systems is not something a beginner normally learns.”

“Ah, I’m not that good. I don’t know software at all, but I grew up around using different number systems. I think the people that raised me just wanted a way to communicate without me understanding, so they taught me all the ones except hexadecimal. I just recently managed to learn it, although I’m still a bit shaky on it.” Patton scratched the back of his neck, almost subconscious.

Now that Patton had brought it up, it began to click.

50 in hexadecimal was ‘P’. 61 was ‘a’. 74 and 74 were both ‘t’ and ‘t’ respectively. 6F was ‘o’ and 6E was ‘n’.

In regular text, Patient 50 61 74 74 6F 6E had become Patient Patton, shortened from Patient 50 to Patient P.

Whoever Patton was, he was the final piece of the puzzle that Logan was missing in solving what the government had planned. Logan didn’t know what to do with that information.

“That’s great, Patton.” Logan forced a small smile as he turned towards Virgil slightly to try to give him a sign that Patton was someone that he needed to learn more about. He just needed to figure out his plan before jumping right into it. Unfortunately for him, Virgil hadn’t seen the signal. Fortunately for him, Virgil and Roman were failing so badly at flirting that both were practically begging in their minds for Logan or Patton to step in.

“Logan, if you’re not too busy flirting with Patton over there, I need you to take the nearest sharp blade there is out there and stab me before I mess things up more with Roman. Or tell Patton to do so.”

“My sweet Patton, I understand that Logan can be so fun to mess with, but please pay attention to how desperately I am trying to talk to Virgil with no luck. He’s just as spooked by my presence as a bunny is to a wolf. I fear I have ruined everything.”

So Logan did exactly that.

“Virgil, you mentioned that you wanted to meet your mother in fifteen minutes. It is imperative that we stay on time to your appointments, so we should really wrap up here.”

“Thank you, Logan. I owe you another jar of Crofter’s.”

Logan was going to make sure Virgil lived up to his promise because nothing mattered to him more than Crofters. Virgil’s eyes lit up at the save as he nodded, “Yes! I have to go see my mother. I’m so sorry that I have to cut this short, Ro. I just-”

“Great save, Logan! You cut off our conversation and Virgil doesn’t hate me just yet because he still calls me a nickname! Thank the dragon witch! I must make you a celebratory coffee as thanks.”

Logan was also going to cash in that favor the next time he saw Roman.

“No, no, I get it. We must make sure to tend to all the women in our life and make sure that our mothers know how appreciative we are of them.” Roman grinned, “I hope you enjoyed today’s performance.”

“You were great, Sir Sing-a-Lot.”

“You should maybe think about coming to our next performance.”

“Definitely.” Virgil nodded as he turned to Logan, “You ready?” Logan nodded, “Thank you for the show today, Roman and Patton. I will see you back on Monday.”

“No, thank you, Logan.” Patton gave a small smile, “It was nice talking to you.”

Logan nodded as he began to follow Virgil out of the coffee shop. Once they were fully outside, Virgil turned to Logan, sucking his teeth in with a wince. “How bad was that?”

“Awful.” Logan gave his point of view.

“Okay, thanks.” Virgil rolled his eyes, “I mean, could you do any better? You say yourself that emotions are the bane of your existence.”

Logan gave a look, “You think I could do worse than standing there frozen?” Virgil glared at Logan, “Listen, I have anxiety.”

“I know.” Logan sighed, “It’s fine. I figured out Patient 50 is Patton.”

“Really? What are you going to do with that information?”

“I don’t know.”

“Oh wow, the three words Logan hates more than ‘I love you’.” Virgil snorted, “You seriously don’t know?” “Yet.” Logan emphasized.

“You should ask him about more things then. Get to know him as a friend and see if he could open up to you.”

“Like how Roman is attempting with you?” Logan raised an eyebrow, “No thanks, I saw how unsuccessful that attempt was.”

“Okay, yes! I’m awful at socializing and I hate people, but L, Pat seems like a nice guy. He’s served me a couple of times and he’s one of those people that are actually truly kind to me. If he’s the answer to all your problems, then maybe you should talk to him and become friends with him.”

“Wow, Virgil. I didn’t think you would ever support me so openly with my research.”

“I don’t. I’m just tired of this obsession. It’s been more than a year. If you can get closure about this and stop yapping, I will be grateful.” Virgil groaned.

Logan rolled his eyes, “Of course, Virge. The same as always.”

“Hey…where’s your laptop bag?”

“It’s right here…” Logan trailed off as he turned to see that his laptop bag was in fact not on his shoulder like he had originally thought it was.

“Must still be in the coffee shop. Want me to come help you get it?”

“No need. I can go in by myself.” Logan shook his head as he turned to go back into the coffee shop.

“Logan? What brings you back here?” Roman raised an eyebrow. “Didn’t you just leave with Virgil?”

“Virgil is going ahead to meet his mother. I seemed to have misplaced my laptop bag.”

“Logan Sanders? Forgetting something? I never thought I’d see the day.” Roman snorted as he motioned for Logan to look around, “Go ahead and look around for it. I asked Patton to clean up right after you left though, so it might be with him.”

One quick look at the table confirmed that it wasn’t in its place where Logan last set it down.

“It is not there.”

“We can wait for Patton then. He’s on his break right now.” Roman nodded.

“Is Patton employed here?”

“Yeah. I needed the extra help and Patton needed the extra money. It was a win-win.” Roman shrugged, “He’s been an old friend of mine, so I thought I’d help him out.”

“That’s very kind of you.”

“I know.” Roman grinned before turning to Logan with a serious expression, “You never told me you knew Virgil.”

“I didn’t think it was important.”

“I know you can read my thoughts. Why didn’t you correct my thinking when I first assumed you were together?”

“I believe you’ve mistaken me for someone else. Someone who cares.” Logan deadpanned, “What you deal with Virgil is strictly nothing I should be meddling in.”

“Meddle all you want! I want to know if he likes me or if he’s simply too intimidated by me. I’m going insane. I’ve never had to chase after anyone. I just smile and they come flocking towards me, even if I’m not into them. Virgil’s different. He didn’t immediately fall and he knows how to respond back to my quips. But he freezes up when I try to ask him about anything in his life, so I’m not even sure if he sees me as a friend.” Roman sighed.

For bitching’s sake, Logan could meddle so easily, but he also knew that it was not his place. So he had to go for the next best thing. Advice.

“For someone plays on his bravery, you sure are a coward.” Logan commented, “If you’re really that brave, you’d ask him out despite your fear of rejection. After all, the worst he could say is no. You move on and you find someone else that is worth your time and your affection. That’s all you can do.”

Roman raised an eyebrow, surprised, “Where did that come from, Mr. Info Dump? I thought you were a robot.”

“Unfortunately, they were unable to complete the process of turning me fully robotic.” Logan remarked before he saw Patton coming in and went to talk to him.

“Smart ass.”

Logan ignored Roman’s comment, instead turning his attention to Patton, “Hello, Patton.”

“Oh, hi, Logan! Are you here for your laptop bag? I noticed you left it in a hurry to push Virgil out.”

“Yes, I did. Do you think I could retrieve it?”

“Of course. It’s just in the back.” Patton nodded as he went to go get it. When he came back, he handed it to Logan. “There you go. And just so you’re not freaked out, I didn’t look. I don’t know what’s inside the bag.”

“Thank you, Patton.” Logan nodded as he slipped the bag over his shoulder.

“Of course. I’ll see you later, percolator.”

“Not your best.” Logan shook his head.

“I agree.” Patton winced.

Logan gave a smile to Patton, one very rare, before starting to leave. Patton was so intertwined with his research, more than Logan could even comprehend at the moment. He just needed to talk to Patton more, he knew that much. But what could he do? Patton was the prettiest man that Logan had ever seen and someone interesting that Logan wanted to know. The only option flickering through his mind was asking Patton on a date. That was ridiculous.

Logan didn’t date. He rarely even liked people. The only reason he found out he was gay was because he had developed a huge crush on Sherlock Holmes. Otherwise, he would’ve been completely content with being aromatic. But there was something so entrancing about Patton. Something that made Logan forget most of his senses and something that made Logan become so distracted that he’d miss work for the man or focus all his attention on watching him over researching.

So it was stupid. Irrational. Delusional, even. What made Logan think that Patton would even say yes? Still, it was Logan’s only option. So Logan stopped in his tracks and turned towards the man behind him.

“Patton?”

“Yes, Logan?” Patton looked at Logan earnestly.

“Would you maybe like to go on a date with me in the coming days to get to know each other? You’re an interesting character and I’d like to learn more about you.”

Logan’s heart pounded in his chest, his breath hitching as he waited for Patton’s answer. There was no possible way that Patton would say yes. It didn’t make sense. They only met each other a few weeks ago. Logan wasn’t that interesting as a person. He was robotic, professional, and apathetic. Patton was full of energy and happiness. There could be no possible scenario that Patton would say yes.

Except Patton smiled, tilted his head to the side excitedly, and replied back, “I’d like that a latte.”

Something rang in his ears. His heart stopped as soon as he heard the answer. He started to breathe a lot faster than he was before. He was dying. No. It was just his nerves starting to dissipate as he had gotten his answer. He didn’t even care about the pun Patton had made as his thoughts began to whirl around, trying to understand what it was that made Patton say yes. Why Patton would want to get to know Logan more. Or if there was some alternative motive. No, Patton was too sweet to have an alternative motive. It couldn’t have been that.

“Here. I’ll give you my number and you can text me about it. I’d like to get to know you too. You’re an interesting character, Logan.”

Logan exhaled, trying to regain his breathing without letting Patton know that he had been nervous over asking Patton out. As far as they knew it, it was a friend date. They were getting to know each other as friends. Not as lovers. That was all there was to it.

Logan grabbed the slip of paper that Patton handed to him and nodded, “Thank you. I’ll talk to you later?”

“Later.” Patton smiled, waving goodbye to Logan as Logan walked out of the coffee shop.

He was going to go on a date with Patton Morris, but it was not because Logan wanted to date Patton and it was definitely not because Logan was attracted to Patton. It was solely because Patton was the key factor to Logan’s research.

He just had to convince his dumb heart that was pounding so fast and his flushed cheeks so. He had to convince his stupid feelings that it was only because Patton was an important part of finding out what the government wanted with the Medeis.

That was all there was to it.

[jodilin65]

FRIDAY, JANUARY 31, 2014 Yesterday we had the time of our lives, even if today we’re paying for it with the sunburn from hell. Despite using waterproof sunscreen, neither of us can worry about a lack of vitamin D, that’s for sure!

I’m having so much fun and loving this climate so much that I don’t want to go home. I miss my bed, my rats and my stuff, but I don’t want to go home to have to go back to work, clean the house, and deal with a million doctor appointments.

I love that there are hardly any blacks here. I don’t think I’ve even heard anyone speaking Spanish. Crime is barely existent here without these degenerate scumbags everyone seems to worship, especially in the West and the Southeast.

We drove to a parking lot for Trilogy catamaran sailing tours, which normally cost $200 per person, and then walked a few blocks to the harbor where tons of boats for different companies were docked. There were tons of touristy shops along the way and an area with trees where I never heard so many birds at once. There had to be hundreds of them! They were in a huge tree given to Lahaina as a gift from Japan.

There were two catamarans, each able to hold 55 people, and each shorter than our house. Captain Jill, a deeply tanned blond, navigated the boat across to another island whose name I already forgot (Oahu?). There were 3 other crew members, two women, also blond and tanned, and a guy.

I thought it ridiculous that one of the passengers brought an infant onboard of all things. Wouldn’t it have been terrified? Well, if it was wailing its ass off I wouldn’t know it over the boat’s engine, the wind, and the fact that I wasn’t sitting near it. Overall there doesn’t seem to be many kids here. A reflection of the falling birthrate? Or maybe it’s cuz people without kids can barely afford such an expensive place let alone with them.

Anyway, it was a little warm in the direct sunlight, but once we got sailing full speed, the breeze was wonderful. They would stop every time someone would spot a whale and people would take pics like crazy. I hated it when people would get in the way and there was this one guy I practically wanted to pitch overboard, but hopefully when I check out the pics when we get home I will find I got some decent whale shots. It was hard to see what I was shooting at, so I would just point and shoot like crazy and hope for the best.

There was this area in front where you could sit on these thick nets and see straight down to the water, but we were content to just sit on the bench and stand at the rails.

The first thing we were served was cinnamon rolls, then assorted fruits like watermelon, honeydew melon and pineapple. The last thing we were served was wraps. There was tuna, chicken and turkey. Naturally, Tom hated everything but the cinnamon roll.

The people were young and old but mostly older folks. Some were thin and hot, others fat frumps like me. Gotta hand it to those with bellies bulging worse than mine who had the guts to wear bikinis. Some were as pale as I am, but most were tanned. Well, I’m a mix of white and lobster red right now, LOL.

We’ve had sunny weather most of the time, but they’re predicting rain for the weekend. That’s okay, we’ve had our share of sunshine, and submarines go underwater anyway.

According to the boat crew, the deepest waters we sailed over were 350 feet deep, and whales can go as shallow as 60 feet or less. Once the catamaran docked at the island, we were greeted with a shell necklace similar to the ones the hotel gave us, and then we took a long hot walk down to the beach. Diving into that ocean felt so damn good as hot as I was once they finally finished their safety speech and all that stuff.

Then came the best part of the trip – snorkeling! You know how I said this resort and the area is just like I’ve seen in pictures? Well, so was what I saw underwater! Now it’s the same people overseeing all the activities, mind you. The catamaran crew also takes you snorkeling or on a tour of the city, if that’s what you prefer instead, and they also cook your dinner. What a job, huh? Sailing, sunning, snorkeling and cooking all day long.

So one of the girls got me fitted in a thing you wrap around your waist that keeps you afloat, and my goggles, after she sprayed something in them to keep them from fogging up. They had prescription goggles, but since I’m still farsighted enough, I was okay with regular ones. She walked me out past the breakers (as I’ve learned, you can’t just walk into the ocean here anytime you want if you don’t want to get knocked down, and must go between swells) and once I was up to my chest in the water I put my flippers on.

Tom’s camera can go underwater, and he shot some pics and videos. He wishes he got the nicer camera for $200. We just didn’t think we’d use it enough.

So off I went and at first I was like, why is this so impressive to most people? There’s nothing to see but sand… then there they were! Clumps of coral and the most beautiful tropical fish of all kinds and colors! It was almost like swimming through a giant aquarium! I couldn’t help but think, from poverty to this?!?! Wow! We went out to where we were in 20-30 feet of water and words can’t describe just how spectacular it was!

After that and some regular swimming, we passed up the walk to the tide pool and just hung out till it was time for the barbecue. I was so pissed that I didn’t bring my other sandals since my new ones caused my feet to blister a bit, and putting on socks and sneakers is a bitch even after you’ve used the freshwater shower to get the sand off of you. Being humungous didn’t help either. I am utterly appalled and disgusted by how big I’ve gotten and how it’s hindering my mobility. I’m sick of it. I vowed to myself that if I can’t get the fucking weight off the healthy way once they’ve tweaked my new medication, then the unhealthy way it is! Gotta wonder, though, would I have gotten this fat if my thyroid hadn’t crapped out on me?

At one point I was about 6” too close to the shore when a wave had just begun to curl and smacked me real hard in the chest. That’s what I get for not paying attention.

The only annoyances at the beach were the same landscapers I have to deal with nearly every day at home blowing the grassy areas and walkways, and someone jackhammering in one of the buildings up at the summit of one of the hillsides surrounding the bay.

After a few hours of beach time, we walked back down the road to the pavilion where our boat was docked and gathered at picnic tables. A blond version of Marsha Gay Harding sat across from us as we were served a meal I wasn’t very impressed with at all. First up was a roll and salad. I didn’t eat all the salad, wanting to save room for dinner, but had I known it would be these boring noodles and veggies with peas, plus chicken marinated in something really weird tasting, I would’ve finished the damn salad like Marsha was smart enough to do. I was surprised Tom ate some of the chicken, but at that point, he was too hungry to care. So I drank down my grapefruit juice and then we waited on the grassy cliff while the crew bussed the tables.

Over the time we sailed back, I had pineapple juice, ice cream, and a white wine that tasted more like beer. Of course Tom laughed at that one and said I was crazy.

The wind tossed my pink sequined hat off onto the deck toward the end of the trip, but fortunately, I caught it before it could join the whales.

They unfurled the sails on the way back, but not for long since there wasn’t much wind. What wind there was felt so good, though coming back was a little chillier as the sun began to set. By the time we pulled into the harbor and Captain Jill docked our boat, the sun had just dipped below the island.

Later…

Was out on the patio whale watching earlier. The island may have many birds, but it sure doesn’t have as many bugs as you’d think it would have.

Also, I’m amazed at just how often people seem to be in their rooms here. Yes, they’re expensive but don’t they too, want to be off doing things? Every time we’re in our room, so are they. Or so it seems.

We were out all day yesterday and most of today. Sleeping hasn’t been too difficult, but I’m so drained from the sun and all the activity that I need to sleep forever. Plus I wake up a lot along the way, so I’m in bed a total of 10 hours some days. I’ll probably sleep for 12 once we get home. My schedule’s been okay so far, but the next few days will get harder. Monday actually may be hell on me, but we leave that day so being shorted one day won’t kill me. I always wished I were one of those who only needed 6 or 7 hours of sleep or less, but (shrugs) I am how I am, sleep-needy and all. Meanwhile, it’s early evening now and I really hope they stop banging by the time I’m ready to crash in an hour or two.

Until I do crash, let me cover today’s fun so I don’t get behind. We went to Lulu’s again and I got the steak, eggs and hash browns I liked a lot the last time and Tom got a ham and cheese omelet.

After breakfast, I bought stamps and mailed my postcards to Tammy, Andy, Paula, Eileen and my Italian Dad, and then we went to a mall with a dozen or so fun shops. Pricy, but nice. The boutiques had the things Hawaii’s famous for on their clothes, magnets and other things – plumeria and hibiscus flowers, as well as palm trees and pineapples. We also went to a strip of stores down by the harbor.

He grabbed a blizzard and me a soda at Dairy Queen, then later on we returned to the mall where I got a heaping container of pork fried rice at a Chinese place that is actually quite good. I just wish the container wasn’t so flimsy. I have the leftovers in the fridge for later.

From all the stores we went to we gathered 3 shirts for him, a black tank for me with “Maui, Hawaii” written in bright rainbow colors, a hot pink tank with “Maui” in silvery glitter, a black tee with colorful metallic studs, a black sleeveless dress with large pink hibiscus flowers on it, a colorful cover-up, a pink skirt with colored flowers along its hem, 4 pairs of panties in pink, purple and blue, a necklace with a pink-gemmed flip-flop, a pair of floral flip-flops that are more comfortable than the other ones, a pineapple sun catcher with crystals, and 4 magnets. The magnets consist of a sunset and palms, a hula dancer, a blue-gemmed dolphin, and a female figure’s upper body in a pink bikini top. That one has a bottle opener on it. I also got a 3D bookmark of a tropical scene cuz it was just so cool looking even though I don’t read regular books anymore.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 30, 2014 Slept both well and shitty. Woke up several times, had that lower back pain I sometimes wake up with at home, and of course Tom snores like hell. It doesn’t wake me up once I’ve fallen asleep, but trying to sleep to it isn’t easy.

The muscles in my calves are sore from climbing the sandy hills to get to the beach yesterday, but I will get to that later. I want to backtrack in order.

The rain was nice at first, especially since I live in such a deserty climate that rarely sees rain. But by the second day, I was ready for it to stop. It finally did just that in the afternoon so we could enjoy the beach and pool.

The weather, pool, beaches and the resort as a whole are absolutely gorgeous! Just like I’d see in pictures. I miss my bed and my rats, but a part of me never wants to return home either. If it weren’t so damn expensive I’d be mighty tempted to retire here someday. We decided we would definitely be back at least to visit and that we could do a comfortable trip with under 5K. Definitely want to live in Florida or some tropical climate if not Hawaii. I’m sick of cold places, dry places, and shit like that. My skin and ear love this climate. My bad ear hasn’t ached at all except for when we first arrived. That was probably due to the pressure on the plane.

They apparently searched our luggage at the airport because when we opened it there was a card saying so. Doesn’t look like they stole anything, but as Tom said, if they were going to take anything, why leave us a note?

The Wi-Fi is out now and the connection is slower than hell. That’s partly because we don’t want to pay the $17 a day they want to give us a faster connection and partly because this laptop is ancient. We don’t use the net often enough to be worth paying for a faster connection nor do we want to. Vacations should be about having fun and not about doing what you usually do at home. The only thing I’m doing that I usually do is documenting this trip. Writing is my passion, vacation or not.

The room comes with a microwave, mini-refrigerator/freezer, coffeemaker, safe, big screen TV, iron, makeup mirror, hairdryer, mouthwash, shampoo, conditioner, soap, shower gel and other vanity items. We get robes and slippers too, but can only take the slippers home. I like them even though they’re not plush. Our housekeeper is a lady from the Philippines and she’s only in once a day instead of the annoying 2 or 3 times a day the guy tended to us on the ship.

Yesterday morning we went to a restaurant called Lulu’s for breakfast. Their prices were comparable to Denny’s. It was nice that Tom could get something he liked since he hated almost everything they served on the plane. I got steak and eggs with hash browns and it was damn good.

We have a private patio with a 10-foot stretch of grass beyond it with a rocky cliff that drops off and down to the ocean. The water’s about 10-15 feet below us. Wish the chain link fence with the flower hedges wasn’t obstructing some of the view, but overall it’s a damn good view. We’ve seen whales here and there, too. I didn’t know they came here. I thought they stuck to colder areas up north, but they come here to breed.

After Lulu’s, we picked up some snacks and TV dinners from Safeway to take back to the room. That way we don’t have to pay their outrageous room service fees. They want 11 bucks just for a lousy bowl of cereal.

The rest of the day was spent at our leisure. We walked around the resort taking pics and we swam in both the ocean and pool.

I can’t believe how warm the ocean is, though it wasn’t like bathwater. The waves and undertow are certainly much fiercer than I remember the beach in Connecticut to be. A 3-foot wave knocked Tom off his feet a couple of times. We were laughing so hard! Even a lady who sat on the beach watching us laughed, too. The fact that they could knock a 250-pound man off his feet oughta prove how forceful they are, and those waves are supposedly nothing for Hawaii.

Once you get about 20 feet from shore you’re not in danger of being knocked over. I wasn’t dumb enough to let myself be swept off my feet, though the undertow almost took me down a few times. Tom, on the other hand, dove right into a big wave. I thought he lost our underwater camera at first, but he had it secured around his wrist. I used to sometimes sit where the waves break in Connecticut, but here they would go crashing over my head and sweep me away. It didn’t smell as salty as Connecticut but it tasted it and stung my eyes a bit.

It’s amazing how loud the waves crash upon the shore, almost like a big bang of thunder. It’s weird how some of the shorelines have no beaches too, but just a rocky area instead. Some people were paddling while standing on surfboards and from a distance, it looked like people were sweeping the ocean.

After a taste of the Pacific Ocean (I wouldn’t dare go in the water in SoCal in the 90s in April cuz it was too cold), it was off to sample their gorgeous pool. It was sort of round and normal looking in some spots, but in other parts, there were narrow canals that went under bridges and was really cool. There were waterfalls and slides in some sections and the water looked so incredibly blue. That was because of the color the pool was painted, but it still looked way cool.

There’s also a pond with huge goldfish in it winding through the area.

Then we returned our pool/beach towels and went back to the room where we lazed around for the rest of the day. It sucks that my new sandals gave me blisters, but you can walk around here barefoot, even though the pool and beach area is a ways away. For most other things you want to wear some type of rubber-soled shoes. We checked the ‘What to Bring’ section of the catamaran tours website. It’s an all-day thing filled with fun, food and drink. It takes an hour and a half to sail each way. We’re leaving for that in a few minutes and won’t be back till around 6pm.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 29, 2014 We’re in the midst of day 2 of our trip. We’re both loving it despite the few glitches we’ve encountered. Let me pick up from where I left off.

Using tongs, the flight attendant passed out hot wet washcloths for us to wash up with in the end, and once our plane finally began to descend it was more than obvious. It was almost like freefalling through the air. My ear began popping like crazy again. And then there it was. Hawaii as green as Cali is brown! I was practically squealing with delight!

Next thing I know ribbons of water are flying across the window. When we landed I almost felt like I was going to get tossed out of my seat. Upon arrival, it was rainy and humid, but the humidity didn’t feel stifling or oppressive in any way. In fact, in just one day my skin is amazingly softer.

Two native Pacific islanders held cards with a few people’s last names on them, including ours. They greeted us with leis of beautiful purple orchids and if I didn’t know any better I would think the natives were Mexican or Indian, LOL. Not everyone living here is a native, though. Some look like they could be from just about anywhere.

Then we caught a shuttle to the Hertz rental car company and through the downpour, we were given a green Ford Escape for the week.

I’ve taken tons of pics along the way and will create albums on Facebook and Photobucket once we get home.

Haha, a couple of white doves with matching white toenails are begging for some of Tom’s chips as he sits munching on the patio. We’re on the ground floor and I think this may actually be one of the $800 rooms and not $400. The one we were supposed to get was actually $500 a night unless you book by the week. Then it’s $400.

Anyway, the number of birds and the abundance of colorful flowers and tropical trees are amazing. Tons of coconut palms and banana trees. I want to return to the comfort of home, but I also want to stay here forever. The rain here is a warm pleasant rain, unlike when it rains – or at least used to rain – in the winter in Cali. The grass is so lush and green it almost seems like carpet. I love how the temperature doesn’t change much between day and night. In the winter in Cali, it’s cold at night. In the summer in Cali, it’s hot in the daytime.

“I can’t believe we’re in Hawaii,” I said to Tom once we took off in the Escape.

“Yeah, but we’re lost in Hawaii,” he said.

LOL, that was true. We did get lost for a while. Passed by some breathtaking views, but some surprisingly dumpy houses and buildings for such a fancy, expensive place.

Nonetheless, we picked up a few things at Kmart. We couldn’t find the Walmart, so we went to Kmart. I had this delicious cheesy garlic bread and Tom had a hotdog.

We picked up a couple of pink towels, one darker than the other, that say “Maui” on them. We also grabbed some sunscreen you spray on and some tuberose perfume that smells of gardenias. For souvenirs, I got a pink flip-flop magnet with multicolored gems around it, plus I got about 5 postcards.

So we arrived at the hotel at 3pm, which was check-in time. The room is nicer in person than it appeared to be online, but for this price, you would think we wouldn’t have had to wait an hour to get our toilet plunged as we did. Not a thrilling experience, though there are public restrooms scattered throughout the resort.

I got up at 3am, about a half-hour before Tom did, and found the shower to have wimpy pressure and myself glad I didn’t have long hair. Long hair would be a bitch on this type of vacation. Then I thought the coffeemaker was broken, but I just hit the wrong button was all. Their coffee sucks so I got my own. They have these 1.5-liter bottles of water and like an idiot, I opened one and got us charged 5 bucks for it. I’d have had tap water if I knew they didn’t come free with the room like the coffee and the gross orange tea I wouldn’t touch with a 10-foot pole.

Then we found that we were unable to Skype the rats. We tried calling in a few times, but all that setting up was for nothing, which kind of sucks. I miss my ratties.

The hotel is quiet overall, but in the early mornings and evenings, they love to slam doors and whatnot. I’m worried an elephant walker may’ve checked in above us, too. I heard half a dozen bangs during my 4am shower as it was, but the sound machine and earplug I brought helped me sleep through its bangy moments.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 28, 2014 Aloha! We are now on the plane as I write this in my paper journal! I’m guessing it’s about 8am now. The flight was on time and I will type up everything I write by hand later on. Might be a few days before I get to share it online, though.

Even though the sun is shining, we are flying over a sea of clouds, which is preventing any kind of interesting view.

Yesterday we got things ready for the trip and did a lot of waiting around at home. Tom was able to stop the mail online.

We went to KFC for lunch. The food was good but the service sucked. It was also just as cold in there as it was outside.

I crashed around 4pm. When I awoke at 10pm I was like, fuck! No! But I was eventually able to return to sleep till 1:30. So my schedule worked out perfectly. Not sure about my 10 million doctor appointments waiting for me when we return home, but I don’t have to worry about that till then.

Backed my doc files up on Amazon Cloud so I can access them from Maui. I also have them on the laptop, which is going with us after all.

We loaded the rats up with tons of food and water and set the webcam up, too. We also dropped the heat to 66 degrees and turned the water to the house off.

Once we had everything fully packed, we set out for the airport at 4:50. Parked the car in the economy lot (40G), and was able to catch the shuttle right away.

So we checked in, checked the luggage, went through security, then we were shuttled to Gate 9 where we waited for about an hour. The gate next to us was a flight to L.A. and next to that was one to Tacoma.

No screaming kids on this flight, as we were one of the first to board being first class. First they board handicapped people, then those with infants. The few kids that are flying with us aren’t that young and are way back in coach, of course.

Taking off was both exciting and emotional. As some of you know, we almost didn’t get to take this trip.

At first I was like, OMG! Look how brown everything is down below! At this time it’s still usually pretty green around here, but you can actually see the drought. Miles and miles of dead and barren farmlands with a few scattered houses mixed in.

In no time we flew over a bed of clouds and were only able to catch a quick glimpse of the Pacific. It looked like the water was dead still from up in the plane. No sign of movement at all.

We’re 4 seats away from the front of the plane. Most of the people flying first class seem to be older married couples. Tom thinks I’m the youngest one. Bet I’m the only one who won the trip, too!

Right away we were served drinks; water for both of us and coffee for me.

Then they gave us our toys. Dig-e-Players with music, games, movies, etc. Tom’s watching a movie and I’m playing mahjong when I’m not writing or doing word search puzzles.

Next we were served fruit and a Danish, most of which Tom hated. I ate his fruit, except for the orange, of course. The Danish had slivers of coconut in its center, so Tom only ate around the edges, LOL. I devoured that and the strawberries, grapes, honeydew melon and pineapple.

Lastly, we were served rice and pork stuffed omelets, and of course, Tom could only stand the egg. We both ate our sweet potatoes.

My hand is getting sore since I’m not used to writing by hand. Gotta go pee off my alcoholic drink anyway. Passion Guava, I think it’s called. It doesn’t seem to have much alcohol in it seeing that I don’t even have a buzz.

Later…

I guess it’s about 11:00 Cali time now. Couple more hours to go. My only complaint, besides the fact that my ass is getting sore, is that the seats are too high for my short legs. My toes reach the floor, but I can’t place the flat of my feet on the floor.

I also wish the table was a little closer to my body.

I see nothing but sky, clouds, and a little bit of sea right now.

I hope I can read my own handwriting when I go to digitize these words. When we hit turbulence it’s very hard to write legibly.

Our final alcoholic beverage will be served soon and that will be a Mai Tai. That’s a fruity drink mixed with rum.

Here we go! We’re dropping now so we must be getting closer! Oh, how my good ear pops up a storm.

Wish they had one of those flight navigators that shows the plane’s exact location, but to my surprise, they don’t.

I’m so, so glad, even though it would’ve been great meeting Nane, that we didn’t go to Italy after all. Sitting on a plane for 5 hours and 45 minutes is long enough! I won’t even get into how rough it would’ve been on my schedule. This way we get to fly straight through with no layovers.

Later…

Okay, just under 90 minutes to go now, so no, we probably aren’t dropping yet like I thought.

They served a snack of island trail mix with pineapple, macadamia nuts and honey-roasted sesame sticks.

Also, the second alcoholic drink I had definitely contained more alcohol, haha.

The plane seemed chilly when we first boarded it but now I’m a bit warm. The sun has been on my side all along. My cheeks feel flushed, but that’s probably more from my drink than the warmth.

There are 4 flight attendants; 2 women, 2 men. One of the guys stands at the head of our first-class section whenever the pilots get up to take a leak.

We had to fill out these forms, as mandated by the state of Hawaii, saying we’re not bringing any plants with us.

Later…

It’s now 10:20 local time and she says we’re going to begin our descent any minute now. Good. I’m getting tired of sitting on this plane as fun as it’s been so far. They really need to make planes for short people. I couldn’t even reach the fan overhead.

Again, I’m really glad we didn’t go to Italy as originally planned. I couldn’t even sleep on this thing if I wanted to. The wall of the plane is too far away to lean on and there’s nothing to lean against in the other direction either. The headrests bend inward at the sides to sort of cushion your neck, but when you’re this short it’s more like your cheeks.

Unless something exciting happens before we land, I guess this is it till we’re officially on Hawaiian soil!

MONDAY, JANUARY 27, 2014 We’re now about 25 hours from leaving the house and 27 from taking off! Since I’ll be sitting on a plane for over 5 hours, I want to wait and save most of my writing for then. I will have my rainbow journal with me.

I will say that my dear hubby surprised me with a nice new lightweight purple hairdryer, something I’ve been thinking of getting. I don’t blow dry my hair that often, but it will be nice having a modern dryer with special attachments for straightening, as opposed to his 50-year-old big clunky brown dryer.

Much of the day will be spent in preparation for the trip, though many things can’t be done till right before we go to leave the house. Things like dumping the trash, running a final load of dishes, stocking the rats up on food and water. They will have 3 water bottles and enough food to last them a month.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 26, 2014 Just two more days to go and then I can enjoy what will hopefully be a fun, hassle-free, stress-free vacation without wondering when God’s gonna throw us to the wolves again and into poverty and even possible homelessness. Without wondering if I’m going to need surgery that could set us back a lot more than a bunch of pills could possibly set us back. Without trying to decide if I should make one more attempt to lose weight once my blood tests start coming back with positive results, or if I should just keep the 25 extra pounds. I still might not be able to lose it because I’m still older, after all. If I did, it would take a long time but one definitely has a better chance of getting results from diet and exercise when they’ve fixed thyroids that have completely crapped out on them.

Tom and I are both surprised. We figured it had to be somewhat off. That was obvious by how much I’d diet and exercise and how little weight I’d lose from it. But we didn’t think it’d be this bad. TSH 32.40 is pretty darn extreme.

Anyway, today I’ll do more “combing.” Going through every drawer and closet to make sure I don’t forget to take anything we need or may at least want to have on the trip. The laptop is undergoing serious surgery and will probably go with us after all, but not on the plane. Meaning, not with us in our seats. I’ll write in my paper journal along the way. The laptop will be cushioned between our clothes in the biggest suitcase we’re taking. We’re stripping the laptop and reloading my pics, audio, docs and a word processor. I have to be careful if I go online with it cuz it’s a Windows computer and so it’s more dangerous than a Mac. I know that’s hard for a lot of people to accept and believe. Hey, even I fought going Mac for a while till I got fed up with all the fucking viruses, and even I miss Windows at times. Once you get used to using a Mac you see it really isn’t that much different than Windows. Instead of an X at the right-hand corner of the screen, you close things by clicking a red dot to the left. It’s worth the safety.

So along with my dangerous Windows laptop, I’m combing through closets, drawers, bathroom cabinets, etc. For now, though, this brand-new pill junkie has to go eat now and take her slew of vitamins. Yeah, I hate not being able to have my coffee as soon as I get up. Gotta wait a half hour.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 25, 2014 We just went over our itinerary. We’ll be leaving the house at around 5am and will need to catch a shuttle from the parking lot to the terminal. I thought you just parked and walked inside, but the parking area isn’t near the airport. Not near enough to walk, anyway. At least that won’t cost us anything extra. We checked online to see if we pick out what we want to eat on the plane or if they serve you whatever they feel like serving you, and I guess they’re going to serve a Hawaiian-style breakfast, plus snacks along the 5½–hour flight.

Also, it looks like where we’re going is 2 hours earlier and not 3. We don’t have plans for every single minute of every single day cuz part of the idea is to just have fun at our leisure with no plans or schedules. We won’t be able to check in as soon as we arrive, and it will probably take us an hour to drive through roads that wind through the mountains, so we’ll probably go straight to Walmart where we’ll pick up a couple of beach towels, sunscreen and other odds and ends like that.

Wednesday we probably won’t do anything major other than hanging out at the beach and the pool.

Thursday is when we’ll be sailing on the catamaran and they’ll have all kinds of food, drink and fun stuff to keep us occupied that day. We’ll be on the island we sail to for most of the day.

Friday we’ll probably head inland and check out one of the botanical gardens.

Saturday is the luau that’ll be held in the evening. That’s a traditional Hawaiian feast where they have cultural dances and they roast a pig. I guess wild pigs are all over Hawaii.

Sunday we just relax and Monday we leave.

Sure enough, we’re on for a 40% chance of rain here on the 31st, though we should definitely get to enjoy some rain in Hawaii. Some people Tom works with that have been to Hawaii and say it pretty much rains every day there at this time of year.

No adverse reactions to the meds, but I didn’t expect any. She said the cholesterol pills could cause severe muscle soreness, but there’s only a 1% chance for that. The thyroid pills can make your heart race, and it did race a little, but nothing serious.

I just hope all these appointments don’t really start adding up. It’s a $25 copay every time we see the doctor, and this plan of ours has a high deductible of $1500 per year.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 24, 2014 It really pisses me off when people equate abortion to murder. You can’t “murder” something with zero consciousness. If you can, then mowing the lawn is murder, too. It also pisses me off when people speak of how they’re “working” to take women’s rights to choose away. So the solution is to make all these women have kids they don’t want so they can maybe end up in foster care just like I eventually did just to be abused by others who also don’t want them? Brilliant. Real fucking brilliant.

Just a quick entry 4 hours before my appointment. I just hope to hell she doesn’t spring any nasty surprises on me! We’re going to Hawaii and I want to enjoy our first vacation in 7 years.

Where I had burning and itching downstairs yesterday, today I don’t feel a thing, so I don’t know what to think as far as that goes.

Was surprised to learn Nane’s also taken medication for cholesterol and thyroid issues, but in her case, it’s for fatigue.

I was amazed at how many thyroid symptoms I found I have – dry skin, low sex drive, messed up schedule, etc. I wrote the dry skin and low drive off to age and climate, but again I wonder just how long my thyroid has been fucked up. It probably started going downhill when I was around 40, but since 2009 was the last time I could lose more than just a few pounds, that’s probably when it started really escalating.

Later…

Just to let people know, I plan to be busy these next few days prior to the trip, so if I don’t respond to anyone right away, I’m not ignoring you. Also, even though we’re due back on the 3rd, give me a few days to unwind. I don’t expect to jump back online the instant I return.

Not sure I’ll be online at all during the trip because we’re having issues with the laptop. We’ll have Tom’s phone, but I won’t be able to blog. I’ll be writing by hand and will type up my notes when I get back if we don’t take the thing. Some of my blogs don’t allow backdating so I’ll be sure to include the date in the entries of what happened when.

Yesterday’s appointment was a little scary cuz I didn’t know if she was going to spring any nasty surprises on me that could delay the trip, but nope. We’re still on for Tuesday’s takeoff. My BP was up a bit but that’s probably cuz I was nervous.

I’ve got mixed emotions about the situation. I’m glad to finally know for sure I was right to suspect I had a busted thyroid and that was what was keeping the weight on no matter how hard I worked out and watched what I ate. I’m thankful as hell to this woman for catching the problems I have and for helping me deal with them, even if I may end up having to have surgery. I hope not, but needing the thyroid removed altogether is a possibility. She felt it and said it was a bit enlarged, so I will be having an ultrasound done when we return from the trip. But while I’m glad to have discovered the problem, I hate that I’m back to taking pills every day. The last time, about 15 years ago, was for asthma. Now it’s thyroid, cholesterol, and vitamin D pills, but the last two I shouldn’t be on forever. Still, we even got me a cute little pink pillbox, LOL, so I can take everything I need to Hawaii with me.

Will I lose weight in the future? I don’t know, but those skinny dreams I had sure made me wonder if the “dream people” were trying to warn me of my metabolism. I had like 3 or 4 of them, and any dream psychic knows that reoccurring ones are more likely to mean something.

After the vacation, I will weigh the pros and cons of losing weight. On one hand, if I stay the same, well, this is what I’m used to. It also keeps the perverts away and of course my clothes are set to fit my current size. It would cost money to get a new wardrobe and eventually one of those ring adjusters so I don’t lose my wedding band. It’s this thing you stick inside it to make it tighter.

On the other hand, I become healthier and it becomes easier to get around and to do certain exercises if I’m carrying 25 fewer pounds. It’s still hard work, but losing weight and being fit was something I was actually good at once upon a time, just like I’m good at writing and languages. It can be fun depending on how you see it. The body becomes a work of art and you the sculptor.

Or maybe I’ll lose nothing at all no matter what I decide. I mean look around you. How many slim middle-agers do you see?

Got a message from Paula, who’s still as crazy as ever. Don’t mail her a postcard from Hawaii, she said. Make sure I send it from California cuz that way she’ll know she’ll get it. rolls eyes Oh, and happy birthday since she knows I turned 46 or 47 this month. rolls eyes again It’s nice to know the fucktard is alive and thinking of me, but why I can’t get her to discuss her own health is beyond me.

It figures that it’s going to be 77° here the day after we leave, but it will be even nicer there and hopefully it’ll rain a little too, while we’re there. Too much rain is depressing, especially in the colder months, but I miss rain in general. It’s become such a rarity here. A good 98% of the year here is nothing but dry sunshine.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 23, 2014 Posted a status about what’s going on with me, not just to vent, but more because I was curious as to who would care to respond. Sure enough, my nieces haven’t, though one “liked” that we had a week as of yesterday till our Hawaiian vacation.

Andy had a “shitty” experience. Yeah, it’s both fascinating and creepy. He had a dream that a man disguised as a dog flipped up in the air several times and each time it did it would release shit from its ass.

Then he approves a new member to the Facebook page or group or whatever it is he runs, and the guy asks him, “Can I watch you take a shit?”

Then I send him a funny pic of an animated avatar with human figures flipping over a toilet and dumping shit into it along the way.

Something sure as shit is trying to tell him something.

Got our vacation package and times have changed since 2007, all right. No more paper tickets. We received what looks like a credit card instead for our air, hotel and ground transportation expenses. Too bad it doesn’t cover food, taxes and souvenirs, but hey, 7K is a huge chunk of it paid! And not even the shitster in the sky is going to stop me from going, infected or not.

Tom doesn’t think I’m infected downstairs cuz my white blood cell count is only slightly elevated and I have no fever. Also, every blood test I’ve ever had shows a slightly high count. IDK, I’m really burning down there so we’ll see. I just worry more about all the time and money these problems may add up to, not that I’m going to die or anything like that.

As for the cholesterol – where am I eating all these fatty and saturated fatty foods, I asked him – but then he explained that this is a hereditary thing.

Heart disease, cholesterol problems, diabetes… I may not have diabetes after all and my blood sugar may’ve been good, but why did my parents have kids if they knew they were going to pass on all this shit? Tom said they weren’t aware of these issues back then. Thank goodness we never had kids!

As worthless as placing blame may be (aside from making me feel a little better), I’ve got a few people to blame for that one. The assholes responsible for collapsing the recession so I could go so long without being insured. Myself for knowing I probably wouldn’t have gone for regular checkups anyway. God for letting me not have the insurance that He would’ve let me be dumb enough not to take regular advantage of. Why not use God to vent upon and as a whipping boy? He used me as a whipping boy. Only He let my mother do His dirty work for Him.

I asked Tom what could happen if my non-functioning thyroid which I’ll probably have to take medication for life for went untreated, and from what he read, I could develop a goiter in the future. The goiter would then make swallowing hard as it pressed upon my throat. That tissue may’ve eventually become cancerous, too.

Miss Perfect (my SIL Mary) had it even worse and it was no big deal for her in the end, so I’ll be all right. Just hope it doesn’t cost us much money. And oh, the appointments! I still have to deal with the ear specialist AND the dentist AND the eye doctor… But Mary’s thyroid was so bad they removed it. She even had lesions on her organs. They thought her thyroid was cancerous but once they removed it, they found that it wasn’t. Anyway, you can live without a thyroid, but it is important. Mine’s still bad enough that I can’t believe I’m not still gaining weight, and much faster than I did before. But I at least managed to stop that. Lack of exercise and overeating are to blame for some of the last round of weight gain, but not all of it. I don’t stuff myself like crazy and I only eat when I’m hungry. If I’m not hungry, I don’t eat. Unless you surprise me with a lobster, that is. Most days it takes me two hours to feel hungry after waking up and I don’t eat till then. I just have my coffee.

Mary lost weight after she got her thyroid dealt with and Tom thinks I will be able to, too. Even a fellow writer said the cholesterol thing is probably hereditary and that a medication called Synthroid will probably help me lose weight. Well, it’d certainly be nice to have a choice! Right now it’s not my top priority, but what if I change my mind in a year or so from now? What if I decide I’m sick of looking like shit? Well, I’d like to have the same option that most others have. A schedule and many other things that most people don’t even think twice about haven’t been or are not currently an option for me, so the less control I have over my own life and body, the shittier a feeling it is. If I can and do lose weight, though it will be for ME. Not so people can have a prettier person to look at when I’m out and about.

It’s too soon to say for sure but it’s looking like sleeping with an earplug in my good ear when I’m on nights is helping me sleep. I wake up fewer times and it seems to back the “dream people” off, too.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 22, 2014 Although I won’t have more details until early Friday morning, it turns out I have a whole boatload of problems. They should be manageable and I shouldn’t be going belly-up anytime soon, but I do worry and wonder just how much time and money this shit’s going to take up. I thought I’d have just one problem. Not 4 or 5!

After fighting with the MagicJack, which has once again crapped out on me, and dealing with a semi-shitty connection on the cell, which loves to drop calls, I managed to get someone to help walk me through the steps of retrieving my test results online. Apparently, when Tom set up the account he typed in the wrong 4 SS# digits.

So finally I’m in and I’m looking at the results. I slowly scroll down the page and by the time I reach the end I’m damn near ready to scream. I don’t know that I’m officially diabetic, but let’s see… I have a high white blood cell count, a low level of vitamin D, high cholesterol, and a seriously messed up thyroid. Yeah, no fucking wonder Miss Flat Abs and Muscular Arms turned into such a fat frump, huh?

Anyway, I’m pretty sure the infection, which would raise the white blood cell count, is coming from between the legs. I just don’t know if it’s a gynecological issue or a UT thing. My guess is it’s a bacterial infection that women get all the time. Too much moisture (like from sweaty workouts) and just a little bacteria can infect us even if we keep clean and shower regularly. I will find out at 7am on Friday. Right now I feel like someone’s holding one of my incense sticks to that area. It burns and itches. Many of these problems have probably been festering for months, even years, unbeknownst to me. However, several months back, like before the move, I noticed what felt like “zits” down there and thought the itching kind of went a little beyond the normal feminine discomfort that we all get at times.

For the most part, I didn’t have to be intuitive or psychic in my case as it was mostly common sense based on what’s been going on with me lately. Miss Healthy and Damn Proud of It. I’ve been pretty healthy with a few minor problems along the way ever since I quit smoking 16 years ago. I guess my healthy days are over, though what they can’t cure should at least be manageable. Still, I wasn’t looking forward to having to return to the days of regular appointments and prescriptions even if it’s for other things instead of asthma, allergies, bronchitis and shit like that.

Anyway, I first thought the “itchy zits” were from shaving down there, so I stopped shaving. But on it went and eventually, I resorted to getting medicated wipes that are no longer of much help. Definitely need antibiotics for that. I just worry about the trip. What if we can’t go? I won the trip but that doesn’t mean we haven’t invested hundreds of dollars in taxes and extras. I don’t want to lose the money OR the vacation. Worse, what if he gets laid off?

I’m both surprised and not surprised to find the elevated white blood cell count. I’m surprised because I didn’t have a fever and I have no discharge or funny odor down there. But I’m not surprised. It would explain the negative dreams and dizzy spells and the way things have felt a little off down there.

The biggest surprise was the cholesterol. Okay, so many older people get it. But I eat healthy most days! What we eat isn’t all that influences it, though, from what we read. It’s connected to thyroid issues. It’s amazing how many things are connected to that actually. Andy’s had issues with cholesterol and a lack of vitamin D.

My own lack of D is probably due to a lack of sunlight. I only go out when running or doing errands. Otherwise, I have no reason to go out and have never been a very outdoorsy person to begin with. Let me guess… some of you are “sad” for me, huh? Well, I’m happier in a bug-free, climate-controlled place, so cry on if you must. I once heard a glass of milk a day can replace the sunlight, but dairy products play on my stomach.

The most serious issue, but the least surprising was that I was right; I do have thyroid issues. According to our research, the numbers are high and potentially fatal if left untreated for years. It can cause all kinds of other complications. I’m hoping mine’s in the early stages so that if I can never lose another pound again I can at least not gain any more.

I kept telling myself to quit being obsessed with my weight – I didn’t give a shit how I looked anyway – but it wasn’t that easy cuz I knew deep down that something wasn’t kosher. I also knew that if I got any bigger I’d struggle just to tie my shoes. How frustrating it has been to watch people jog or walk by the place, trim and thin, and know that I’m busting my ass just as hard as they are just to stay the same damn weight, give or take a few pounds. I just knew no one would run a couple of miles every other day, eat sensibly, and NOT lose weight. I tried to tell myself it was just age, bad genes, simply how I was, but I wasn’t kidding myself.

I’m too wound up to focus right now, but I’ll just say that while things could be worse – damn the fucking bastard above to hell and back if there is one. I KNEW something like this would happen once we got settled. I knew it. I also told others and mentioned in my journal that I was afraid something like this would happen. I am, however, very grateful to Tom, Tammy, Andy and Nane for being there for me.

I asked Alison if all’s been quiet in Trollsville and she said yes. Really? Doesn’t she know Molly tweeted to her as if all is just fine and they’re still good buddies? Wanted to know how her weather was or something like that. Maybe she just doesn’t want to acknowledge her in public. Our tweets aren’t protected now. So if she found her newest name there, she’s probably found mine, too. The types of tweets, pics and other account info would pretty much give me away to a stalker no matter what name I went under.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 21, 2014 Sometimes the apple falls far from the tree, other times it falls very close to it. In my nieces’ case, it seems to be rather close. I see Tammy’s vengefulness shining through her daughters. Sarah said just when she was thinking of ways to seek revenge on her noisy neighbors, they surprise her by doing something nice, thus making her feel obligated to be nice back.

I wonder, though… am I the only one who would prefer to ignore those I dislike (though I understand noisy neighbors don’t always let us ignore them), or is it totally “normal” to seek revenge, maybe even become obsessed with, those who get on our bad side or dump us? Is getting even, stalking, pestering and harassing those that piss us off just “the thing to do?”

Well, I can’t stand Arabs and I can’t stand blacks with the shit they pull day in and day out on so many people. But forgive me if I’m too “abnormal” to want to spend my time actively making their lives miserable instead of just ignoring them unless any of them try to harm me or my husband and I’m forced to react in any way.

Later…

These doctors are really starting to piss me off what with the way they’re already going a little quacko on me. Even Tom is frustrated. He gave them permission to leave us detailed info, but what do they do? They go and leave a message at 3:30 asking if I could call in. No, I can’t call in when I’m sleeping, you dipshits! I can only multitask when I’m awake!

As some people pointed out to me, while they have laws and policies about how they go about communicating with patients, it does seem rather asinine that they can’t provide more info in messages. One friend had to drive an hour in traffic just to be told her cultures were negative. Now why couldn’t a simple “You’re fine” have been delivered by phone?

Whether it’s diabetes, an infection, a wacky thyroid, they could at least give me some hint instead of leaving me wondering. I don’t know that I’ll be up late enough to call them, but as Tom agrees, they work for us. Not the other way around. So, since it’s not a dire emergency seeing that they waited till 3:30 to call, I’ll call them when I can. I just don’t know that I have the time to deal with whatever shit I may have to deal with till after the trip. Or want to. Not unless it was life-threatening and obviously it’s not.

Whatever it is it’s probably easy enough to manage, though I’ve already resigned myself, like I said before, to the fact that the weight is never coming off. That’s fine, though. As long as I feel good and can function in life, appearance isn’t important to me. If anything, looking like shit keeps the pervies away, even if I always look a little better in person than in pictures. I think most of us do.

As that friend suggested, I’m not going to let it ruin my vacation. Tom is going to love having 12 whole days off (and still weeks of additional vacation time if he needed or wanted it), and while I may like routine, change is also nice. As some people forget, I work too, so we’re BOTH looking forward to this break.

Really miss the days, though, when it was simple to call a doctor. You may have gotten the doctor’s secretary, but that secretary would always patch you right through to the doctor. Now, if you get a live human being, you’re sent through a network of incompetent idiots that don’t know shit. Wish we had Cigna. They were the best. Everything was in one spot and set up so much simpler. 3 things went to hell starting in the 90s. The world of doctors and trying to get through to them, blacks and children. Blacks have always been trouble, but in the ’90s was when we started letting them get away with it and showering them with extra rights and privileges. Kids have always been kids too, but the 90s was when most parents threw discipline, respect, consideration, and manners right out the window.

No upset belly yesterday to have to wait out since prayer is useless to me. I wonder if prayer is like languages – some people have a knack for them, some don’t.

MONDAY, JANUARY 20, 2014 I’m on nights right now and as soon as I got up at 4:30, Tom was asking me about my dreams.

First, though, I would’ve fallen asleep earlier had I not gotten sick. I thought I was going to puke for a minute there. First my throat started burning, then I felt nauseous. Every now and then I like to reinforce my belief that yes, prayer is a joke if only for me, and no, it’s not my imagination - something up there really does NOT listen to Jodi S. And when it appears to listen to others it’s probably a coincidence seeing that none of us have it all, after all. Wishful thinking or not, I prayed anyway for it to stop so I could fall asleep.

Nothing.

I like to fall asleep on my stomach but that made me feel worse so I lay on my side. I even felt unusually cold, even under a heavy blanket and with a memory foam topper.

Anyway, as soon as I got up Tom was on me about my dreams. I actually slept better than usual and didn’t recall any dreams, though I wondered if the “dream people” puking on my feet the day before had to do with my feeling like I was going to puke.

“Nothing scary or anything like that?” he asks.

I shook my head and right away I knew something was up. The only thing they “told” me was that Nane’s pinky and ring fingernails grow faster than her index and middle fingers and she confirmed this to be in fact true, and that was the other day. Hey, they tell me everything from trivial things to life-threatening situations like what we were in a few years ago.

Next he tells me they found something bad with my blood tests. They wanted to see me today but Tom didn’t get the message till 4:30. They’re not allowed to get into it over the phone, so we don’t know what it could be about, but we have our theories. This is just what we fucking need now when we’re a week away from going to Hawaii! Again I wonder – and worry – just how much of these appointments could end up costing us a ton of time and money and maybe even delay the home improvements indefinitely.

Tom had a class the managers have at work. They called at 10:30, but he was too busy to pick up the message till later. He called them back, of course. The doctor is already aware of my sleep issues and all that, but since it was already so late in the day anyway, they said the next time they could see me was on the 3rd. But that’s the day we’re due back from Hawaii. Two more weeks won’t kill me and if it is what we think it is, I’ll just watch what I eat. Tom gave them permission to leave detailed messages, so hopefully they’ll give us a hint and either confirm or shoot down our suspicions. Still, it kind of has a way of taking the excitement out of finally being insured, you know?

We both agree it can’t be life-threatening or else they’d have been insisting I get into a specialist immediately. I also didn’t have any nightmares. Then again, and as I pointed out to Tom, neither did I before my Dad died. I was totally surprised and caught off guard, bad heart or not.

“That’s different,” he told me. “Anytime something bad has happened to us directly you’ve had nightmares.”

So since I haven’t gone falling from 20-foot shower stalls, been pitched overboard from speedboats, or caught on the top floor of a building where a riot has broken out, it should, at worst, be nothing more than a big old pain in the ass.

The first possibility we ruled out was hepatitis and AIDS. I don’t do drugs and I’ve never had sex with anyone other than Tom since we met. Unless we’ve reached a point where just looking at hotties and having crushes on them can cause these things (which would be Nane’s fault, LOL), this isn’t possible.

Wacky cholesterol seems unlike but a high white blood cell count could be in which case I may have a minor infection somewhere. But where? My teeth? Unlikely. I’m not in enough pain. Between the legs? Unlikely. I think that IF anything funny is going on down there it would most likely be warts caused by excessive moisture one can get from working out. I’ll find that out in April, but I think all will be fine down there.

So what is our guess? Diabetes. I have too many symptoms and it is hereditary, like it or not. I used to think only fat people got it, but you can actually be skinny and get it, too. Obese people, on the other hand, are more at risk of getting it. I’m fat but not obese. Not yet anyway. I read that type 1 can’t be prevented, but being active and at an ideal weight may prevent type 2. An active lifestyle is no problem, but an ideal weight is impossible. Another scarily familiar thing I read was “trouble seeing (especially at night), light sensitivity, blindness in the future.”

Wonder if the OH the eye doc caught last year is connected?

Of course the one symptom I don’t have is the best one, weight loss. I knew that PMS and pregnancy could cause hunger, but didn’t realize diabetes could, too. I knew of the other symptoms, though. Tired of worrying and obsessing over my weight I resigned myself to the fact that I would never lose weight since I can’t stand the hunger and fatigue that goes with dieting, and figured I’d always be at least 25 pounds overweight. I’m naturally hungry and with occasional bouts of fatigue, so that’s part of why I haven’t lost the weight. I don’t doubt that Nutrisystem works, but that’s only if you can actually STICK to it. I don’t see how I ever could, though, so I learned to look at the pros of being big and accepted that this would be how I would live the rest of my years.

Another thing I’ve experienced for a few years now is these mysterious head rushes. Sometimes I get them after eating sugar, other times they just seem to come on for no apparent reason, but feelings of lightheadedness would be consistent would diabetes. Also, Tom got a home testing kit for that and cholesterol and my sugar level numbers did once seem a bit high. But then we tested me again and I seemed fine.

Worst-case scenario I will have to watch what I eat. Most days I don’t have junk food, but sugar is found in more things than we realize. Even watermelon has tons of natural sugars in it. So a tweak of my menu is probably in order for me, but don’t ever expect me to get down to the 120s.

Later…

I realized that the symptoms of what we suspect may be diabetes, until I can get back to the doctor, have probably been festering for years. Like back when I was thin, though again, weight doesn’t seem to impact it so much as genes, unless you’re extremely heavy. Seems like it was 5 or more years ago when I noticed I seem to be thirsty a lot and a peeaholic. Then the dizzy spells started. I won’t even get into the hunger and how I have some days where nothing seems to fill me up, or when it does, it’s not for long and I end up having to stuff myself silly for half the day just to feel satiated for more than 5 minutes.

This is exactly what I feared would happen too; that God would “punish” me for finally getting what I wanted in life, a home of our own. I didn’t worry about it all the time on a conscious level, but it was a concern that was always at least in the back of my mind. While so many others can get something for nothing, I seem to have to pay dearly, even if it’s something I deserve. And hey, when He can’t beat us over the head with money, why not go after my health, right? I still don’t think it’ll amount to much more than a hassle and an inconvenience. Diabetes isn’t usually serious unless you’re dumb enough to scarf down tons of candy bars when you have type 2. Then you could be risking heart disease and strokes and shit like that.

I’m just trying not to think of the many, many appointments for various doctors that await me as I get caught up on things, or how the costs could really add up. Totally, totally something God would let happen, too.

Later…

I was thinking about how simple this trip should be compared to when I won the Caribbean cruise in 2007. Here we will just drive ourselves to the airport, hop on the plane in Sacramento, go straight through to our destination, then do the same coming home.

The cruise trip, though, was hectic as hell. We walked the 10-minute walk to the train station in Klamath Falls, OR, trained up to Portland, spent a night in a hotel, flew out of Portland the next day to the hub in Atlanta, Georgia, flew to Fort Lauderdale, FL, stayed overnight in a hotel, took a taxi the next day to the ship, then repeated the process coming home.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 19, 2014 “Why are you shoplifting now?” Tom asked me earlier. I looked at him with utter confusion. “Are you now sneaking things out of stores when we go shopping?” he asks.

Thinking he was saying that something somehow accidentally got added to our stuff or not rung up at Sam’s Club, he then holds up a pair of men’s dress pants still with its tags on.

I burst out laughing and said, “I remember when you went to Ross to get those.”

He was completely stumped as to how they appeared in his closet all of a sudden. Remember, his wife is the one who does the packing and unpacking whenever we move or travel. “You got those for job interviews when we first came to Cali,” I told him.

But back in those days, even an older white man could get a job in a couple of weeks tops and none of his interviews required anything that dressy. Especially with so many applications AND interviews being conducted online like what was starting to be a regular thing by then.

Still not sure if we’re going to go with flooring or carpeting or what but we’ll decide when we return from our vacation. We’re not interested in upping the value of the place, but the comfort of our home instead, and making it what we want it to be whether it ups the value or not. I’m leaning back towards carpet. It may be harder to clean, but it feels and looks nicer and the rats love it. It’s easier for them to grip their feet on it when running around.

The place I’d like to live our final few years in doesn’t exist and that would be at the top of a SOUNDPROOF highrise. That way I’d be away from the street/landscaping sounds and we would have no yard/property to maintain.

Little by little, we are making preparations for our trip and my schedule is now officially aimed for Hawaii. Luckily I haven’t had any nightmares, a bad thing for those of us whose bogeymen like to step out of our nightmares and into our reality, but oh my fucking goodness! The constant waking up with weird/negative dreams or just for the hell of it sure does get old! No wonder I’m so sleep-needy. Gotta sleep a little longer to make up for all that waking up. I must wake up 4-6 times during the night (or day). I usually go right back to sleep, but sleeping straight through is a long-ago memory for me at this point. Well, they don’t want to send me to a sleep clinic just for the fun of it, so we’ll see what they say, though I still can’t imagine learning anything new from them than what I’ve already been told.

I just hope to hell I get through the next 9 days without certain types of nightmares, which could only mean trouble ahead. Just like I knew the nightmare I had in Oregon before the cruise meant we were in for rough sailing, (pardon the pun). Plus we also got to return to frozen pipes. Fun. I don’t think anything will go seriously wrong, though, and if there are any serious annoyances at least it will be for a week and not for months or even years.

Tom trimmed some trees along the property line when they pulled in next door. Virginia said hi, but went straight into the house while Tom and Bob chatted a few minutes. Bob told him he could come down on their side to make trimming easier so he wouldn’t have to bend over since some of the leaves extended up and over to their side. That was nice of him and certainly made it easier since next door’s about 3’ lower than us. There’s a retaining wall dividing the properties.

The people here sure are much nicer and more considerate than any other place I’ve ever lived in, but hey, it’s a retirement community where people are older and they own their places. People help people here and no one disappears for a week without people getting concerned. That’s why we’ve let next door know and we’ll alert the office too, when we go to pay the rent, which will be a few days earlier than it’s due since we won’t be here on the first.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 18, 2014 10 more days till Hawaii! It’s so hard to believe, even though I’ve been all over the country and even to other countries.

We’re making all kinds of preparations. Setting up the cameras that are going to watch this house like a hawk right along with the park security. I didn’t realize this till today when I noticed this when we were returning from Sam’s Club, but the gated entrance videos its incoming traffic. Most of the parks definitely don’t have that added luxury, I’m sure.

I just can’t believe it, though! We didn’t think we’d live to escape that bummy old trailer much less to go sailing, swimming, shopping and sunning in Hawaii. With my shit luck, I’ll burn to a crisp, but that’s okay. Then my body can match my face for once, which is always red with what I think is rosacea.

This facts site I follow says the more intelligent you are, the more you dream. rolls eyes Gee, I must be a fucking genius then! The “dream people” weren’t very nice to me at all. I woke up a million times after they puked all over my shoes, blew me away in a severe storm, and then Nane spoke incorrect German to me when she took me to an outdoor restaurant in Germany. I’m sure she’ll love that one, too. We sat down to eat when I spaced out all of a sudden to gaze at all the sights and sounds around me. After a minute she told me to “Essen der Essen,” which should’ve been “Essen das Essen.”

At Sam’s, we got some groceries and I got the same light blue colored memory foam bath mat for the master bath that I’d gotten for the other bath. I wanted plum, but they were out, and I prefer light blue to apple, tan and ivory. The pink bath mats I had in there were fine, but the Robo vac can’t vacuum those as well as the memory foam one. The memory foam is stiffer so its corners don’t fold over when the Robo rolls onto it.

I moved one of the pink bath mats by the bed and the other will just be stored away for now. Then I gave Tom the large piece of tan carpet that was by the front door when we moved in for him to use in the workshop. I only got one memory foam mat for the bathroom figuring I could just drag it over when I use the tub, which isn’t very often. That reminds me, I should run water for a few seconds to keep the water in the trap from evaporating.

We’re considering doing what Andy did only in different rooms and only if it’s going to be significantly cheaper than carpet. The original plan was to carpet all the rooms except for the kitchen, baths and laundry room. Now, though, we’re thinking of flooring the bedrooms with a laminate like what Andy has that looks like hardwood floors. As Andy himself said, carpet is harder to clean than floors. My office chair sure would roll around easier and it would be easier to move furniture, too. I would, however, get a large area rug for the living room. I do still like to play on the floor with the rats, then there are my workouts, though I do have a mat for when I’m working my abs. It’s definitely something worth looking into. Carpet may feel nicer to walk on and flooring the place may seriously lower the value of our home, but carpet definitely isn’t necessary and it definitely is harder to clean. If it’s more than $500 cheaper than carpet, I’m interested.

My little office is set up in the corner of the living room and when I turn around and look at the living room and dining area and think that that was once all the space we had to live in for half a decade, I’m like, OMFG.

I also got a pack of 3 soft fuzzy socks. They almost keep my feet too warm, but I like them a lot.

Other than an occasional “like” on something I post, my nieces don’t seem eager to interact with me. I guess that may be a good thing, though, since they often seem to be in a bad mood. I see a lot of Tammy in them, unfortunately.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 17, 2014 Had a nice invigorating yet relaxing twilight run. That’s my true obsession (besides writing and languages). More so than what food I eat and what the numbers are on the scale. I can’t imagine not running at least every other day. I’m getting faster. What once took me 35 minutes now takes 25. Passed Hazel along the way, not surprisingly, sweeping away at nothing. Well, it looked like she may’ve had a little pile of dirt going. She was her usual friendly and chipper self, but not very talkative, so I didn’t push her. I hate to push people to chat cuz I hate it when they push me to chat when all I want to do is sit in silence, lost in my own thoughts or whatever it is I may be doing at the moment.

If most people believe something to be true, does that really make it true? Interesting question someone asked me. I suppose it could. But not necessarily. Most people believe gays are evil sinners, but does that make it true? I think sometimes we simply get brainwashed by society. Then again, just because most people may not believe in something doesn’t mean it’s not true either.

Seeing the majority of people believing in what I believe to be pure bullshit isn’t nearly as annoying as the dual standards society still holds for women and men. 50 years ago I would have been criticized for not having kids. Today I’m criticized for not having a job outside of the house. In 50 years it will be something else. But when is a MAN ever criticized for having kids and told, “You shouldn’t have done that. You should be focusing solely on your career.” Really, why can’t we laugh at a MAN who says he wants to marry and have a family and tell HIM he’s an old-fashioned prude? We criticize men for breaking the law and things like that but never for their lifestyle. Only women have a set of do’s and don’t’s hanging over their heads.

Later…

They recommend we get to the airport two hours before our flight is scheduled to take off, and I’m like, two hours?! Gee, why don’t we just go there now?

Tom read that some backaches aren’t due to something being wrong, but faulty signals instead. Something about the way the signal gets transferred to the brain or something like that. I still sometimes have lower back pain, but it’s been better lately.

I really feel for my nieces right now. They have 5 more months in the apartment they’re renting together and apparently the neighbors fight all night, the lazy landlord doesn’t fix shit, and like most places today what with all the cars people have, there aren’t enough parking spots and Sarah doesn’t always get one. So Becky’s way of preserving her one is to park on a line in the parking lot so she can get one that way, LOL.

Still, I really feel for them. I know how noisy apartments are and how much likely renters are to be rude and inconsiderate compared to owners. Maybe they can save to buy a house, though I don’t know if they could afford to or would even want to have to pay for anything that breaks.

It’s too bad everyone can’t live in a place like this (never thought I’d live to say that), but I realize that some people like the action of the mainstream and the city and that they want to hear their neighbors cuz then they can have fun eavesdropping and spying on them in a way that is socially acceptable.

Speaking of this place, I forgot to mention earlier that I saw a couple of fire trucks at someone’s house while out running. No smoke, pig cars or ambulances, though. Wonder if someone was having a heart attack. Or feeling like they were.

The turkeys held up traffic for a minute along the way, LOL. They seem to be getting to know me along with some of the people cuz they’re not as quick to hurry away. I can get within just a few feet of them and can hear their toenails tapping the road as they walk.

Been thinking of how Tammy and I talked about meeting up in Florida someday after Tom retires, but that’s still way too far into the future to know for sure. We may leave the country or we may just stay here. I doubt we’d live wherever they end up living if we did go because I don’t expect to ever have as much money as them. We’ll probably go for something like this place that is set up like co-op living where the cost of your actual place is lower but you pay a monthly fee for maintenance and amenities. Manufactured homes used to be cheaper than on-site houses, but once they started building them better and better and more like houses, they often cost about the same.

Had to switch to a different keyboard the other day as mine kept going out. I had to replug its cable every time I wanted to use it after not using it for a while. Then we downloaded a driver so this keyboard’s features can be used on a Mac. I like this keyboard better. It’s now been almost 6 years since I won us these Macs and we’ve never had a single virus yet.

My German hottie wished me a nice weekend. Aw, how sweet. :)

THURSDAY, JANUARY 16, 2014 Got up at 1:30. Been a little tired ever since, but not too bad. A half-hour later Tom got home from work, then about 15 minutes later we headed out for the lab. Turns out I only needed blood drawn. I didn’t need to pee in a cup. I slipped back into the 140s but that’s only cuz this test required 12 hours of fasting beforehand and I’d last eaten at around 2am.

I’m just worried that all these specialists and procedures not fully covered by our insurance are going to really add up and really delay the hell out of the home improvements.

My brother would’ve turned 60 yesterday if he hadn’t died in 2012 of liver cancer, and today’s the day my nephew died at age 16 in a trucking accident in 1997. First Sandy lost a child at 8 months pregnant, then her teenage son. God has been totally cruel and compassionless where her kids are concerned, but at least Jen seems to have made it through life unscathed so far.

After having 4 vials of blood drawn for the millions of tests they’re conducting, we went to Carl’s Jr. for a burger and fries. Then we browsed through another Goodwill store. I love checking them out every few weeks or so. You never know what awesome treasures you might find at awesome prices.

They had an awesome little black doll but with a hideously looking cartoonish face, so I didn’t get it. Another doll was just the opposite with a pleasant face, and hot pink hair, but a body that wasn’t very detailed or realistic so I didn’t get that one either. I know I shouldn’t accumulate more junk to have to dust, but what I did end up getting, for just a few bucks each, was a really nice fairy figurine. It’s kind of big and heavy and the kind you can put outdoors if you want. She’s got a dusting of fine gold glitter on her wings and sculpted dress and is sitting on the counter for now.

I also got one of those “breathable” Perfect Petzzz that normally goes for $40. This one is a cocker spaniel and it’s nicer than my golden retriever puppy. My golden pup has an on/off switch, but this one simply breathes till the battery dies. Don’t have a D battery right now, though.

Got Twinkle, my 22” doll, a new outfit also, since Hillary stole hers. She’s in a pale pink velvety top with a pink floral skirt. The waistband is a bit loose, but she’s posed lying on her tummy while propped on her elbows, so it doesn’t matter.

Since they started making nail polish with skinny brushes for doing designs it’s never been easier to do doll nails. I could even do the fairies. In the past, I would have to dab a toothpick in the polish and use that.

I know this is pure fantasy but it would be so nice to get a 3D printer, design and print 3D images, paint them, then sell them in my own little store. But I have a feeling this is something God would stop me from doing or at least from making any steady money at. Again, if He wanted me earning an income of my own He wouldn’t have cursed me with this type of sleep disorder. I’m sure the day I die will be the day you can get jobs online that pay at least minimum wage, though I would think most people would still want to work out of the house where they can be around other people. At this point, I wouldn’t care who was around so long as it was something I could do on my own schedule.

The rats are out playing now in their boxes. Again, they’d be absolutely heartbroken if they didn’t have those things to play in, haha. It’s their little play station or playground or whatever you want to call it. Let’s see these smarty rats knock my trash bin over now, though. I propped it up on a heavy jar.

While I have been enjoying a wonderfully trolless (I could get very used to this, too) poor Andy picked up a troll on Facebook. He’s the administrator of some pages there and I guess that when he had to ban someone they didn’t take it very well.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 15, 2014 We rebooted my computer while holding down the ‘alt’ key. It’s supposed to fix errors that accumulate on the drive and make things run faster. It seems to have helped a lot. Then I backed up on the Time Machine.

A few nights ago I had a dream Tom was going for a job interview somewhere but was still working his regular job. His bosses knew about the interview and didn’t seem to have a problem with it.

In my last dream, someone tried to rape me in a field, and as I told Andy, the good thing about being so fat and ugly is knowing this is so unlikely to happen for real. “You’re too obsessed with your weight,” he told me. Yeah, we all have our “rational” and silly fears and one of mine (besides Tom and I growing old with no one to help us) is getting so fat no matter what I eat and how much I exercise that I get so damn big I can barely wipe my own ass.

After the results of the lab testing come back I will then make a decision as far as what to do about my weight. I may not have much choice if this is truly how I naturally am meant to be. Just like we can’t always be taller just because we may want to be, well, we can’t always be thinner. If we could then so many of us wouldn’t be so big. Right now I only know I am NOT dieting before or during Hawaii.

I guess lipid profiling has to do with cholesterol, according to Andy. We may go to the lab tomorrow afternoon cuz the tests require 9 hours of fasting beforehand. I’ll be getting up around the time he gets in from work, so that would be a good time. Then we’ll go out to eat afterward. No guarantees, though. If something comes up then it will have to wait. Again, I don’t want to think about my health or weight till after the trip. I’m still pretty sure nothing’s wrong with me anyway. That would be my guess unless I am ever told otherwise.

We got our flight info and are going to be in the back row of 1st class on both flights – yes! No unruly kids to possibly be kicking the back of our chairs while its equally rude mother just sits there and allows it to do so.

The huge loud dog just outside the outskirts of the park makes me glad for once that my neighbors are always home, even if they aren’t exactly our immediate neighbors. On the rare occasion that its owners take off, the fucker is so damn loud that late at night you can hear it in certain parts of the house. It’s barely audible compared to how Jesse’s dogs used to be, but there’s no doubt what it is.

Got up just before 2pm today and heard the usual landscaping and traffic sounds till after 4:00. I stopped and briefly chatted with Hazel along the way when I was out running. Sweet but not all there Hazel, sweeping away on the common area that’s the park’s responsibility and virtually devoid of leaves because the park keeps up on it often enough. I should know. I hear them when I’m up and about.

rubs achy knees Sometimes I wonder if running is as overrated as racism.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14, 2014 The appointment with Dr. C went well. There was very little waiting time and the doctor was very nice. Blond, tall, and kind of dressed like a nun without the habit; black shoes, black hose, black baggy dress.

A male nurse took some basic info from me first, then the doctor and I discussed things. Tom was with me so I didn’t have to repeat everything to him afterward and he could add anything of importance I may forget. Really, my memory is NOT like it used to be and I can’t think as fast as I used to either. I wonder if that’s normal for 48, but anyway, all my vitals are fine and unless I flunk my upcoming tests and exams, I highly doubt anything is wrong with me. Nothing serious anyway.

I’m a little overwhelmed by the fact that I will undoubtedly have more appointments this year alone than in the last 15 years. I have not seen a primary care physician since the late 90s. Other than the dentist and a few specialists, I spent nearly a decade without insurance. So there is a lot to catch up on. It’s just that the last time I did this it was a little easier because I had good vision, I wasn’t fat, and I wasn’t deafer than deaf. When out in public where there are many sounds coming at me at once everything seems to blend into one big senseless noise.

She looked down my throat, in my eyes and ears, listened to my heart and lungs, which are crystal clear, felt the glands in my neck, felt my tummy and gave me a tetanus shot. Not sure what that was for, though, since it’s not like I stepped on a rusty nail or anything. I already feel like I’ve been punched in the arm, too. I’m looking at the paperwork on what they’ve done and are going to do and it actually says “tetanus and diphtheria vaccine,” whatever the hell that means. Medical stuff interests me about as much as it would to have to listen to someone talk about God while I watched a football game.

LOL, for the status of this and that she’s got “overdue, overdue, overdue.” You got that right!

We discussed my allergies and how I had asthma that has since gone dormant since quitting smoking. We discussed my ear, sleep issues and tardive dyskinesia, a condition caused by the quacks that gave me happy pills in my late teens to early 20s that kindly neglected to warn me of this permanent condition which causes sporadic twitching in the face and neck muscles. I wouldn’t have brought the TD up, but a doctor (another quack?) once told me it was important to do so.

It was nice to be able, for the first time in my life, to bring up my sleep issues now that it’s been a real and documented condition since 1999, without hearing that I’m a lazy excuse queen who doesn’t really want to work because she hates people and that if I just set my alarm every day, I will finally break this “nasty habit” I so stupidly and selfishly got myself into by “using” my husband to support me.

I also told her I hadn’t pursued treatment as everything we were told and read suggests there’s not much that can be done about it, and I can’t get my disability benefits reinstated anyway because I didn’t work enough years, as fucked as that sounds. I mean, that’s WHY I didn’t work enough years, duh, but the wording is everything and all that was listed on my initial round of benefits was stress and anxiety and PTSD, but this was back in the 80s. As far as everyone was concerned back then, non-24-hour sleep cycle didn’t exist.

She wants me to see a specialist anyway. I guess they treat it with light and melatonin but don’t know the details right now. Something about a special kind of light that “tricks” you into thinking it’s daylight when it’s not. I don’t know how effective this is, though, or if it means they can now cure me so I can go get a job cleaning rooms at a hotel. That’d be the first thing I’d look for anyway. It’s straightforward work that you mostly do by yourself. Shouldn’t be too hard to get even though I’m older, white, a native US citizen and female, right?

Sometime up in Oregon I first noticed I had an ingrown toenail. It’s in my big left toe. It’s been an annoyance ever since, but again, we were uninsured or broke or sometimes both, so it hasn’t been dealt with yet. She’s going to perform a little surgery by numbing the toe and cutting that part of the nail out. It could grow back the same way or it could not grow back at all. Don’t know yet, but she agrees it was probably caused by a fungus. I am NOT looking forward to having needles stuck in my toe, but… no pain, no gain.

The dates of all my upcoming appointments aren’t yet etched in stone, but I will have blood and urine work done to test my thyroid and metabolism as well as hormone levels, diabetes, hepatitis and the usual things they do routine testing for. There are other things listed for testing but I don’t know what they mean. Vitamin D 25 hydroxy? Lipid profile?

Let’s see… I’ve gone this far even though I shouldn’t have and it really makes me uncomfortable to discuss anything medical, but for whatever it’s worth…

BP: 118/80

Pulse: 76 (that’s low for me)

Respirations: 20

Temperature: 97.6 (brrr)

Weight: 151

Height: 4’ 10.75” (WTF? And people call this “fun” size? Tell that to me when I’m trying to reach something from the top shelf!)

What worries me is how much the surgery, ear and sleep specialists may cost thus slowing down the home improvements. I want new carpet! And I want it THIS year!

We were surprised she was going to be doing both the toe surgery and the female exam. We thought she’d send us to specialists for that, too. She admits she’s not comfortable dealing with my ear, though. Congenital atresia is for the specialists only. Still…appointments, appointments, appointments! Yes, it’s nice to get this shit out of the way, but it’s still no fun, ya know? I still have to deal with the eye doctor and dentist, too.

Really, really didn’t want to have to get a female exam. Yeah, I know it’s risky not having them, but still… what are the odds of anything serious erupting down there? That may be more uncomfortable than my toe. I haven’t had sex in ages!

I didn’t know cervical cancer crept on you so fast. I knew early detection of breast cancer was important, but I thought there’d be some kind of pain or warning with cervical cancer. Shit, they’ll probably want me to have a mamo, too.

MONDAY, JANUARY 13, 2014 A radio producer in NYC (no joke) wants to do a radio interview with me about a writing project I worked on for them, but they never once mentioned money. If you’re not a friend I’m helping out, well, money talks or else Miss Rainbow walks.

“I feel like I’m gaining weight like a mother fucker,” I said to Tom after returning home sweaty and panting, “but it was a damn good run anyway.”

“Mother fuckers must be really talented,” said Tom. “After all, you say you’re as tired as a mother fucker, bloated as a mother fucker, pissed as a mother fucker, happy as a mother fucker, hungry as a mother fucker, writing like a mother fucker, learning languages like a mother fucker… mother fuckers must be pretty amazing.”

After I burst out laughing it was his turn to let out a burst of laughter once he took a look at our Macs. I told him that after reading the book I was reading I’d taken the precautionary measures of taping our webcams in case they ever got hacked. He said, “You can’t use scotch tape, sweetie. It’s clear.”

So he took it upon himself to cover them with orange duct tape. :)

Finally got fed up enough to kick Sarah off my feed. I’m sick of her posting the same old shit, particularly about her asshole father and God.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 12, 2014 No rain today but the wind chimes are going off all around the house. It’s nice to hear, especially since it’s usually so calm out there.

Tom and I were chatting and we got on the subject of laws and porn after I was telling him about some crime documentaries I saw on YouTube and the rather interesting book I’m reading.

“I still don’t understand,” I said to Tom, “how one guy can get a fine and probation for beating the shit out of someone while another can go to prison for 4 years just for threatening someone. Doesn’t that seem totally backward? Anyone can make threats, but aren’t words just words unless you actually DO something?”

But then he pointed out that Charles Manson supposedly never killed anyone but he’s in jail for life. Would I want him released simply because all he’s done is make threats and encourage others to kill? NO!!! Absolutely not!

I guess it depends on the nature of the threats, the situation, the circumstances, and the people involved. Having someone say they’d like to strangle you for beating them at a game of chess is a far cry from being told you’re going to die by someone who’s got a rap sheet for assault.

I also still think it’s unfair as hell to give leniency to non-whites just as it was unfair when it used to be the other way around, and I don’t care how politically correct it may be to favor the previously oppressed. Make up the past by being fairer to them, not by favoring them, I say, because two wrongs never make a right.

As I told Tom, I’d rather not be attacked at all, of course, but if someone ever tried to hurt or kill me, I hope they’re white so they can’t play the race card, which we know would automatically work in their favor when they tried to say I tried to attack them for their color. I’d rather be attacked by a white person that got away with it, than by a black person that I went to jail for on assault charges that were really a case of self-defense.

The book I’m reading is called Malicious and is fast-paced and full of suspense. The “Slave Master” hacks webcams and spies on women that he sometimes blackmails, including a female cop who’s into porn. Like me, she’s fat and forties. And she too, has tried treadmilling off the weight but found that it just won’t budge.

Regardless of the fact that porn is becoming just as popular with women as it is with men, I envy her ability to find pleasure and variety in it, even if some of it is unrealistic. She’s 44 and has 3 orgasms in under an hour? By 40 our appetites begin to dwindle right along with our eyesight, so one can be challenging enough to achieve no matter how good your partner or vibrator may be, but 3???

Unlike her, I have someone who will service me (unless he’s busy, sleeping or working) whenever I want, but wouldn’t it add such fun and variety to my sex life if only I could get into porn too?! Sometimes there are things we wish we did like as much as there are things we wish we didn’t like. But porn does absolutely nothing for me. Nothing. Zip. Nada. It turns me on no easier than watching a video of someone jogging or a family of tigers bathing in the wild would turn me on. Thinking of a particular person I’m attracted to turns me on, but would I be any more turned on by watching that person participate in intimate acts with others? Hmm… not sure. But oh what fun it would be if I could get turned on watching a couple go at it while Tom was asleep, then by watching some hot chick do herself while he was at work. But unfortunately, it just doesn’t work that way for me and I don’t think I can make it work that way any more than someone can make themselves attracted to a particular gender or type of person that they just aren’t into.

Later…

We definitely have to get a new dishwasher when we return from Hawaii. There was a small puddle on the floor. I am NOT going back to the days of washing dishes any more than vacuuming. I refuse! Spoiled or not, I live in a lux manufactured home in a lux park and I’m not going back to my old ways now. So if it isn’t pots and pans, I’m not washing them!

Gotta carry on with the rest of the upgrades, too. We wanted to wait and see how much we’d spend in Hawaii first, which will probably be too damn much, knowing us.

We try to order things in bulk at Sam’s Club and on Amazon where they will be cheaper and save us a bit of money. For $160 we did an all-Prime Amazon order to save on shipping and he got a new hard drive for an old computer he’s using for special projects, a graphics card, and a drawer storage cabinet for tools. The rats got 20 pounds of food and some bedding. I got cinnamon K-cups, patchouli incense, and a few more of those realistic solid vinyl animals for my collection of farm and wildlife animals. To join the others will be a white-tailed fawn, a howling coyote, and a nursing German shepherd.

Funny how so many people are “excited” to start Nutrisystem. Ooh, I’m excited to feel like I’m starving my ass off! So excited to have hunger pangs wake me up! Woo-hoo, so excited to be positively hungry as hell and sluggish. Don’t forget how exciting that will be too! There’s no greater feeling on earth than being sluggish and hungry and it damn near excites me right into peeing my pants. :)

Nane wasn’t offended at all, luckily. That’s nice to know. It wouldn’t have been the end of the world had she flipped out and dumped me, but I’m glad she didn’t. Apparently, Facebook is different in Germany. Where they can disallow messages from strangers (wish we could too), they don’t see their friends’ activities unless they go to their walls. What the hell does she see in her newsfeed then???

I explained to her that that’s how I know when she’s “liked” or commented on something. I can go to her wall too, but she is on my ‘close friends’ list and that allows you to see the most activity. Still, “Why are you spying on me Miss Rainbow?” was a weird question. She’s not only on my friend list, but she has a public account.

Later…

When Andy made the comment about me not believing racism existed I was both stunned and dismayed. It made me realize I’m not the good writer I thought I was if I gave that impression. Everybody experiences discrimination to some degree. What I’ve been saying is that reverse discrimination is just as real. In some places and cases, it’s MORE real. But many people don’t seem to want to believe that any more than they want to believe there is no God or that God is evil.

I know some blacks still get shit on and that sucks. But I also know that many of today’s claims of racism are pure bullshit and not just because I was a victim of reverse discrimination myself. What happened to me wasn’t just about race, though. That was part of it. The other part was revenge for lodging a city complaint about noise and vandalism. Just because some of them are getting shit on doesn’t mean there isn’t even more of the shitting on us. Years ago society was afraid to address domestic violence and child abuse. Maybe someday people will be brave enough to address the fact that yes, many blacks do see playing the race card as a very hip thing to do. They are often favored in the courts and in the job market and often cry racism when someone pisses them off without caring who their false claims may hurt. So do I believe none get discriminated against? Absolutely not. Do I think many are exaggerating or making up bogus claims of discrimination to gain something or spite someone else? Absolutely.

For a group that can have black this and black that without being called racists, be exempt from being charged with hate crimes, and behave as they often do as a whole, I have a hard time feeling sorry for them. I’m fine with individuals who are fair, honest and real, but as a whole they suck and I don’t understand why so few people see this. Same goes for Arabs. As a whole, I have no sympathy for them. If you’re an individual who can live without killing someone that pisses you off, then I may talk to you. Meanwhile, I’m a bigot and a monster for not being politically hip, cool and correct by not loving every Arab that walks this earth same as blacks, right?

He said he wasn’t trying to piss me off but knew his posting an anti-racism pic would piss me off. Then why post it??? He said because he knew I thought it didn’t exist. Again, that’s not what I thought, but we also can’t make someone believe something they don’t believe either or like a certain person or group. Those who hate gays and lesbians aren’t going to suddenly like them just because I tell them to or want them to or go around posting anti-gay bashing pics. It’d be like someone trying to tell them Arabs are wonderfully loving, mellow, rational people who aren’t pro-violence. In other words, it’s not going to work. So we may as well not only accept who we hate/like/love, but who others hate/like/love as well. If anything, the more we try to rub something in people’s faces, not that he or anyone else is necessarily doing that, the more they tend to resist.

Meanwhile, it’s okay to take action against a black person who has been victimized in some way. What’s NOT okay is to sit back and allow them to do the same thing to whites that they don’t want whites doing to them. Dual standards. It has always pissed me off when women go down harder for the same crimes men commit or get less pay for the same jobs men have, so why should it be okay for blacks to discriminate against whites? Because of their history as slaves? But that’s just it… it’s history and that’s why they call it Black History Month because it’s HISTORY.

Nonetheless, and as I told Andy, I’m personally sick of hearing about the subject. I’m only writing this cuz I realize that if a close friend could’ve had me wrong all this time, so could others, and so I just wanted to say that no, I don’t think racism against blacks is totally a thing of the past. I think a lot of it is, but not all of it. Somebody’s always gonna hate somebody, right or wrong, like it or not.

I was in therapy for many months on account of what happened to me and while it may be therapeutic to write about our negative experiences the same as our positive ones, I’d really rather not be reminded of it so much anymore than I would think a rape victim wants to read books and watch movies involving rape. Not trying to bury my head in the sand like so many want to do instead of actually dealing with reverse discrimination, but there’s only so much time we can focus on the bad things in life. I want to focus more on happier things. I know discrimination, abuse, violence, disease, hunger, poverty and other horrible things exist and always will. But sometimes I just want to see the sunshine, you know? I don’t want to wonder what the hell my husband and I are going to do when we get too old to take care of ourselves. I don’t want to worry that I may one day end up severely obese. I don’t want to think about the possibility of getting cancer someday. I just want to see the sunshine, smell the roses, and enjoy knowing I have someone who truly loves me unconditionally and that I am healthy.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 11, 2014 Amazing! It’s actually raining out there! So I guess this will be our one rainy day for this month. We’ll probably experience more rain during our week in Hawaii than we do in half a year in Cali.

Tom said he read that adding salt doesn’t make water boil faster and that that’s just a myth. No wonder it seems to take forever no matter what.

Yesterday was the final day of the Fast Five Nutrisystem trial. Halfway through my day, I knew I had done it long enough to know what it was like, and started eating normally again. The next day (today) I awoke to find I’d gained the two pounds back I’d lost. All in less than half a day! So fuck NS. I don’t want to have to half-starve myself for life. Still having “skinny” dreams, though. Does this mean the doctor will find a thyroid problem and fix it? I doubt it. Seems too easy. I will mention my suspicions, though, as well as show off my beautiful ingrown toenail and ask what she recommends about that.

Can’t wait to find out if Nane dumps me come Monday after letting her know I took offense to her “question,” assuming she checks in that day. Guess it will depend on how busy she is. If she does I won’t be on Facebook that much at all. I’m sick of the glitches and could definitely do without having to hear about how much Sarah loves her asshole daddy. clenches fists Like a rape victim having to hear all kinds of praise for her rapist. I could block her from my newsfeed, but she is my niece and would rather not do that just yet. It’s weird, though. All this love and praise for her father and sister (the sister I can understand), but none for Mom? They always seemed to get along at least from what I can tell.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 10, 2014 We have now lived here for half a year! I can just imagine how many outdoor projects the Jes pest has completed in this 6-month period. How many decks has he hammered out? How many old mufflers has he beat on? How many engines has he built and gunned? How many trees has he sawed down? How many times has he roared in and out on his Harley? How many problems has the trailer had? How much barking has the new renters had to hear? How many firebreaks will his motorcycle-loud bulldozer have to create? A lot if I’m right about this drought being the new way, thanks to global warming.

Anyway, today is the last day of the Fast Five. I will decide next month if I want to go all out on it. It will surely prove or disprove my thyroid suspicions if I do. I’m just glad my period was on time so that’s one less thing I have to deal with when trying to enjoy my Hawaiian vacation! Now if my sleep issues and screaming kids could just keep out of it…

Today I got that head rush or lightheaded feeling or whatever it is for the first time in nearly a week, but it backed off after I ate. I don’t like to discuss medical problems anymore, but will just quickly say that I’ll be addressing my ingrown toenail which gets on my nerves at times to the new doctor I see in a few days and we’ll see what she recommends. I guess I’ll probably return after the trip for standard blood and urine work too, but I don’t know about a female exam. I’m the type that would prefer not to go to a doctor unless I have a problem, though I know some wouldn’t agree with that. Tom thinks I should have my heart listened to every now and then as heart disease is hereditary and is what killed my father, both grandfathers, and an uncle.

On the menu for my final trial day is a peanut butter granola bar for breakfast, potato soup for lunch, flatbread pizza for dinner, and a peppermint patty for dessert. I will, as always, mix in some fruits, veggies and dairy. Baby apples are a good thing. They’re cheap and easy to grab and eat whenever. I don’t hate them like I hate carrots, but I’m not overly fond of apples either. With baby ones, I can take just a few bites and not have to deal with eating a whole apple. Yesterday’s snack was popcorn and OMG! It was delicious! Very movie theater-like. Loved the chicken Alfredo, too.

Later…

Alison has not only continued to get emails from Molly and her mother, but mostly Molly, but she deleted that account. Apparently, Molly would send messages from a few accounts and they would go back and forth. In one she wanted to send her a belated Christmas present and in another, she’s accusing her of being a mean, heartless bitch. Don’t know that I’d go so far as to delete the account, but am glad they never got a hold of any of my email addies. Alison seems to change email addies regularly, though, which may have to do with work or something I don’t know about.

Molly is currently restricted from going online, but give it two months or so, and the “experts” will deem her cured and allow her to go back online to repeat her mistakes which mostly consists of contacting those who don’t want to be contacted. My tracker will tell me when she returns. She can’t see my blog, but she can still go to it. It’s like with Facebook. Anyone can go to my Facebook page, they just can’t see the posts. For now, I am enjoying a troll-free, drama-free cyber life! Still not sure if a year of going underground and making myself hard to access and my activity a total mystery will shake her or Kim completely, cuz there’s a difference between the mean troll and the crazy troll. A lot of crazy people out there seem to live in a time warp with absolutely no sense of time whatsoever. A year under radar to them could very well seem like a week. They simply have no perception of time.

Then I get another email from Alison today saying that Kim dumped her and she felt hurt, angry and sad, but figured all she could do was learn from it and move on. True, and as I told her, I can’t express the importance of going underground enough to her, and not contacting or responding to them in either way. Not if she wants the slightest chance in hell of forever escaping these loons.

In Aly’s email about Kim shutting her out, she said to please not tell her that I told her so. I told her no problem and that if anything SHE might soon be telling me that. Back when Nane dumped me in 2010 for 6 weeks, supposedly due to a misunderstanding, she said she felt she had been playing with me and might eventually dump me again.

But then Nane and I made up and things were fine. About 2-5 times a week we’d chat and she really seemed to care about me and what was going on in my life. She let me into her life as well and shared some interesting experiences with me, which I appreciated and enjoyed.

Now, though, I’m wondering if she’s on the verge of dumping me again. If she does I can tell you right now there will be no round two of kissing and making up. I fought to win her back over the first time, but this time I’m not going to care enough to fight for her. If she wants out of this friendship, fine. I will let her go because I know the frustration of what it’s like to try to disengage myself from those I no longer want to associate with who just can’t let go, and would never want to make anyone feel like they’re stuck with me or anything like that. If you want out… go!

Fortunately, Nane’s one of the few I can imagine ever stalking me if our friendship did end. Most people, though, will seek revenge on you and stalk the hell out of you. Sure seems that way anyway.

The last several weeks I’ve been hearing less and less from her and at first I wondered if it was because she saw a picture of me that shows the weight I gained. I didn’t regret sharing it with her, though, cuz that’s how you know your true friends. Also, I’m comfortable enough with how/who I am that I don’t need anyone’s approval either. If I ever do lose weight it will be for me and me only. Sorry, but trying to snuff that selfish side of me is like trying to snuff that side of me that loves rats as pets. That’s been my attitude for a long time now. Don’t like how I look; the simple solution is to just not look at me. :)

But I wasn’t sure that this had anything to do with it since we did have quite a bit of contact immediately afterward. Eventually, I started hearing less and less from her and began to wonder why and why she was ignoring or at least putting off my messages and not able to answer a simple little question like whether or not she got the email I sent her. I also reminded her to give me her address, which she said she would do so I could send her a postcard from Hawaii, and she hasn’t even done that. Finally, I messaged her this morning and told her I’d seen her online every day but wanted to give her space. Meanwhile, is everything okay?

Then I wake up today to find, “Why are you spying on me, Miss Rainbow?”

I blinked with confusion and said to myself, is this a joke? She IS on my friend list, duh, so I can see her likes, comments, and other activities without having to “spy.” But there was no smiley face she usually includes when she’s joking and I began to wonder if her heart was really in our friendship at this point.

As time went on and I had a chance to reflect on it, I realized I was kind of offended by this “question.” Anyone who feels “spied” on should not be on my friend list. Period. I even considered deleting her and seeking out a couple of friends’ advice but didn’t want to drag them into something that had nothing to do with them. But then when Alison shared her story with me I felt I could update her and ask what she thought she would do. She said she could be joking. It’s hard to say. She too, would probably feel insulted by that but I shouldn’t delete her without telling her how I feel. How she reacts will probably answer my question as to whether or not she really wants to remain friends. I agree. So I did tell her how I felt and asked if she still wanted to be friends. I have a feeling it’s going to piss her off and into dumping me, but that’s how I’ll know, and as I said before, the door is wide open if she wants to go. I don’t want to dump her just to end up wondering if I jumped the gun and made a mistake like I almost did with Adonis, thanks to fucking Kim and her impersonation games she just has to play. I’d rather let her dump me and spare me any guilt if that’s what she truly ends up doing.

Later…

Had a dream I wrote:

Dear God,

Someday you’re going to allow someone to fuck me over that even You can’t protect.

When I awoke my mind flashed back to all those who wronged me in both big ways and little ways as a child and as an adult - from family to friends, from authority figures to neighbors - and how no one has ever been made accountable for any of it. This still, and will always, bother me to know that I am so damn worthless in God’s eyes that I am deserving of whatever shit people want to dish at me and it’s okay. Again, I don’t believe in coincidences. Not when there are too many of them anyway. A few people getting away with things would’ve been one thing, but when so many have done so much that always, always happen to have a hold on me or are somehow out of reach and exempt from either the law or my fists, it’s obvious that a higher power of some kind is protecting them. I’ve known this for a while now.

What I realize is that I’m no different than others in some ways. I have made it a point for a long time now not to be vengeful in ways I can possibly be vengeful, but I also realize that just like everyone else, I am only human and I do have my limits. Everybody’s got a breaking point at which they could snap like a twig. Mine would be if someone tried to harm the person I love most – my husband.

Let the law handle anyone who did that?!?! Our often corrupt and unfair law?!?! My ass I would let them handle it and risk the perp walking on some lame technicality whose whereabouts I may not be able to trace!

Leave it to karma to get them? Nah, I don’t think so. Karma seems to forget an awful lot of people, and while karma may certainly be quick to visit me if I step out of line, karma visiting those who have wronged me (or my husband) is almost certainly pure wishful thinking. Remember, once you’ve met your soul mate, what happens to you happens to them. It was me the Phoenix people were after, but watching his wife get legally fucked over was victimizing him as well. So if my perps aren’t punished for their evil deeds, his probably wouldn’t be either, is my point.

After I was freed from jail and vindicated, I promised myself I would never ever again be held in captivity of any kind, and that doesn’t mean being held back by poverty like we were for many years. It means places like Valleyhead, Brattleboro, jails… anyplace I can’t open a door to and walk out of any time I want to. Cuz that’s another thing right there; if I’m ever framed and sent to jail ever again, the person(s) responsible better make damn sure I never get out alive, for sometimes we have to bypass doing what’s “right” to do what we feel is right in our hearts, legal or not, against society’s views or not.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 9, 2014 Woke to Day 4 and was glad to find myself not utterly famished for once. Not gonna update my weight on NS, though until next month, if I decide to dive into this full-time.

I was wrong yesterday in saying I was down 2.2 pounds. It was actually 1.2, duh, but now it’s 1.4.

Anyway, today I definitely have to get out for my 2-mile run as I don’t like to take more than 2 days off from that. It’s a serious, hard-core, heart-pounding, foot-stomping, sweat-pouring workout, though, so it’s not something I do every day. Tomorrow is arm and ab day.

The rats are out getting their own daily exercise, then it will be my turn.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 8, 2014 Down 2.2 pounds, hungry as hell, but still alive and well. Just a quick update for those considering or at least curious about the 5-day Nutrisystem trial I’ve been doing, then enough food talk for me! I’m staying offline more too, where I don’t have to see ad after ad about this restaurant or that restaurant, as well as posts and chats about what people ate for lunch and plan to eat for dinner. Tell me this shit on Saturday! I mean sure enough Andy’s got a pic up on how McDonald’s is out of “boy toys.” Sometimes I wonder if he likes to annoy/offend me or if he’s just that inconsiderate and lacking in common sense.

Unlike Andy, my sister and many others, I’ve never been good at cooking and nutrition and all that shit. Of course I know what’s healthy and what’s not, but I’ve never been good at balance, variety, measuring, cooking and that sort of thing. Part of it is probably due to my not being good with numbers. That’s why Tom takes care of the finances while I compose any important email (unless I’m not available when he needs it done) so he doesn’t have to spend 45 minutes doing what takes me just 5 minutes to do. Even though his spelling and grammar are pretty good, it takes him forever just to write a lousy paragraph about whatever. Every now and then I catch him in serious boo-boos like when he listed a sequined cap we sold on eBay back down in Arizona as “sequenced.” rolls eyes and laughs I’m sure he also thinks he “petals” his bike when he really pedals.

Anyway, I thought it’d be $300 a month to go all out on their program, and it is if you want to customize your menu. They have 3 plans, so I saw, but I would be fine on the basic plan for $230 where they choose your menu for you. There are only a few things I may not like in the plan, but I would still eat them. Hey, as hungry as you are on this thing you just might even consider dog shit! Nutrisystem’s food is still WAY better than most other diet foods like Weight Watchers. Their food is horribly spicy. Sometime in February I will sit down and write a list of pros and cons to both losing weight and NOT losing weight.

On today’s menu is a whole-wheat bagel with a touch of real honey for breakfast. Inside the package was this oxygen absorber that says DO NOT EAT. The bagel felt and tasted amazingly fresh, though a bit on the bland side.

Lunch will be a chocolate caramel bar, dinner will be a chicken pot pie, and dessert will be chocolate chip cookies.

I love having something different every day. Because I’m such a shitty cook, variety wasn’t easy for me. I’d often get things in bulk and have the same things too many days in a row. Tom would have to go for the more expensive customized plan if he ever wanted to do this cuz where I’ll eat almost anything, he’ll eat almost nothing. He’d hate about 75% of the stuff.

Yesterday was surprisingly worse hunger-wise. Some of that and the fatigue could be PMS-related, but I’m sure a great deal of it is the diet cuz that’s just what diets do. I’m hoping my stomach has now shrunk enough that it won’t feel like it’s been on empty for months. It’s too early in my day to say right now.

May skip my run for today, but haven’t decided yet. Maybe I’ll spend most of the day cleaning and proofreading.

The damn spiders are already back. When I walked through a break in the Cypress trees for yesterday’s run I felt a web cling to me – yuck!

The electric company was at the house across the street. I wonder if they found an electrical problem when they did the inspection cuz that seems to be when the deal fell through and it was put back on the market.

So what is it with my PMS being on time while my period is late???

Later…

My period is starting after all – yay, no period in Hawaii! – but I’m not sure that trying to avoid discussions and ads pertaining to food while on the Fast Five is right after all. Initially, I was hoping for a little more support (hint, hint), since after all, we wouldn’t wave a cigarette in front of someone’s face that was trying to quit, would we? I’d hope not anyway! But I also realize that the mentioning of food and ads related to it isn’t going to go away simply cuz I’m doing this trial run here.

NS recommends keeping a daily blog/journal about my dieting/exercising experiences to help me reflect on my progress and better reach my goals. This makes sense, but then some people will insist I’m obsessed with it and they’ve heard enough about it, blah, blah, blah.

Taps fingers thoughtfully What to do, what to do, what to do… I guess I should just do what I feel is best for me in this case and not worry so much about others. We all see/hear shit we’d rather not see/hear or that we don’t like and may not be interested in both online and offline. So… if you don’t want to read about my NS experience, don’t. Meanwhile, I’ll stay offline or at least be picky about where I go in cyberspace if I don’t want the food reminders.

That being said let me update Day 3. Well, it was terrible. I was hungry as hell and sluggish like you wouldn’t believe. I was really hoping today would be easier, but if this is the way it’s going to continue to be, then it’s not worth it at all. Hell, I’d rather GAIN weight than feel this yucky.

Two more days to go, though, so I’m not going to make any decisions just yet as to whether or not I’m going to go all out after the Hawaii trip.

Tomorrow’s menu is granola cereal for breakfast, red beans and rice for lunch, chicken Alfredo for dinner, and popcorn for dessert.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 7, 2014 After I write about Day 1 on Nutrisystem I’m going to stay offline as much as I can to avoid the food talk. You know how it is, people are always talking about food, ads are always talking about food, yet my hunger pangs are enough of a reminder. Screw trying to ask people (like Andy) to shut up about it when dealing with me directly. It ain’t their diet/suffering so what do they care? LOL, you want support, then get offline!

Anyway, I was what I expected to be throughout most of yesterday – hungry and tired. But I’ve already lost 1.8 pounds. I knew I would. It’s continuing to get results that I have a problem with, but we’ll find out if I can break that cycle in mid-February, and that’s only after finding out if 5 days of this shit is going to kill me or not, LOL. Today was off to a hungry start, but I expect that tomorrow will be when my tummy will have shrunk enough and gotten used to not taking in more than a couple hundred calories at once. It usually takes 72 hours to adjust to a diet. It will never be easy, but will be easier. Then after my trip, I can decide if I want to go all out or not. Yesterday I had:

Cinnamon streusel muffin Fudge Graham bar Lasagna Cheesecake bar 4 servings of veggies of my choosing Cheese Yogurt

Today, besides my veggies, cheese and smoothie, I’ll be having:

Double chocolate muffin Chicken noodle soup Chocolate covered pretzels Rotini and meatballs

The food is wonderful. It’s like being a kid again with having my meals prepared for me without actually being a kid again. Also without having to eat anything I don’t like, though the only item in this 5-day trial I might not like is the rice in a spicy sauce. Rice is fine, spicy sauce isn’t. The plan has a good variety of foods, including just enough sweetness that I don’t crave sweets or certain foods. No suddenly wanting to run out to KFC. No wanting to slam on a pint of coffee ice cream either.

Now Starbucks caramel K cups, on the other hand, is the most God-awful coffee I’ve ever had. It’s the weirdest shit. Tastes almost like it’s laced with pepper.

If I enroll in a plan online, then I can pick exactly what I want to eat and weed out anything that may be too spicy or too bland. Like I said, though, right now I just want to get a feel for what it’s like. No point in going all out with it now just to go stuff myself in Maui. If I feel it’s sustainable I’ll give it a shot in February, like I said, and see if I can lose more than the usual 3-5 pounds. My body will probably do what it usually does, though – drop a few pounds, then fight to hang onto the weight and slowly reset itself. I don’t have to get a whole month’s worth at first just in case history really does repeat itself, but then again, I like the food. So whether I lost a few pounds from it or more than just a few, I’m still gonna eat it.

Later…

Wish I knew exactly what time today they’ll mow and blow the gray house like they do every Tuesday, cuz that’s when I’d take off for my run and literally run away from the annoying buzzing sounds.

Andy and I used to tease “Nervous” about his tie collection and ask him if he showed his boss his collection of tacky ties from what seemed like the 50s. Well, if the geek was still alive and if there was such a thing as showing his boss his degree collection, he sure wouldn’t have much to show since it’s only 11° right now in Springfield, MA. LOL, that’s toasty warm compared to the -14° Andy said it was a few days ago. Makes me wanna scream just thinking about it!

Called Tammy yesterday and even got to talk to Sarah for the first time since she was 8 or 9 which was nice. She was there cleaning since Tammy can’t quite get around just yet.

I told Tammy the code to our lockbox and said that she, Mark and the girls could help themselves to our stuff if our plane went down and she asked if it was in writing. I reminded her I told her on Facebook, but as she pointed out, you really should take something like that to the bank and get it notarized with witnesses present. LOL, didn’t think about that, but she does have a point, cuz then anyone could say anyone told them to help themselves to their stuff if they died. Without a notarized note, the state would get our stuff and they’d be the ones to sell our house. Years ago I wouldn’t have given a shit what happened to our stuff if we died, but now I’d definitely prefer it if they got it.

A black car came in playing semi-loud music yesterday. Let me guess, it went right to the house the blacks are in, right?

Later…

I was skimming through my journals from the first apartment complex I lived at when I first moved to Arizona. Oh, the grief I could’ve spared myself if I’d just minded my own business and kept to myself!

They haven’t done the gray house yet, but the park was out blowing leaves, as usual. So much for taking off on my run to escape it, though, since there were others all along my running trail blowing the 20 or so leaves that were on the ground around each tree dotting the perimeters.

I only stayed out 15 minutes, as I didn’t want to make myself any hungrier than I already was. Sure got back just in time to hear Bob slam the shit out of the SUV door, though, and am really damn glad he doesn’t usually do that. Virginia must be there. The garage door is open and I only saw him behind the wheel.

Just 3 more weeks till Hawaii! Got that plus tons of appointments coming up, and the initial round of appointments isn’t it. I’ll probably have to go back to my primary doctor (or a specialist) to deal with my ingrown toe, back to the dentist to have fillings done, and back to the eye doctor hopefully only to pick up my new glasses.

Sometimes I’m not sure going to a doctor is right for me. Too many of them falsely diagnose people these days. Tammy had one doctor tell her she had a thyroid condition while another said she didn’t. I don’t expect any doctor to know it all, of course, but people’s lives and bodies shouldn’t be like one big fun guessing game to them either. How bad can they fuck up dealing with an ingrown toenail, though?

MONDAY, JANUARY 6, 2014 We didn’t get to re-potting the trees, this weekend, but we got other things done around here, plus ran the usual errands. Stopped at the closest Goodwill store yesterday and got a 24” black porcelain doll that’s actually kinda nice. Having once been a collector for many years, I knew I’d find out who she was once I got her home and studied the nape of her neck. She’s Hillary, a 1989 doll by Dianna Effner. I once had her smaller Sunshine and Lollipops doll but sold her years ago. I found Hillary, in a variety of skin colors and outfits, selling on eBay for around $80.

My Hillary has nice shiny black curls and dark curious eyes. She came in a nice, but old-fashioned dress. Her shoes are cute but need cleaning. I threw her in Twinkle’s outfit for now. Twinkle, who lays on her stomach propped up on her elbows, is now wearing her dress since you can’t see as much of it with the way she’s posed. I’ll eventually get her a new outfit from the newborn section next time I’m in a department store.

Tom got a great deal on an old computer he wants for its parts. The graphics card is good and the memory holds just as much as our Macs.

Goodwill also has good incense, so I grabbed about 8 98-cent packs of that and have vanilla, strawberry, cool water, obsession, peach, China rain, rainforest and cinnamon. The packaging is cheap, of course, and when you open the bags you tear away the labels. So I used Tom’s label printer and it’s awesome.

In about 20 minutes I’m going to have my Nutrisystem breakfast. I’ve got it set up so that I have one of their meals/snacks plus fruit and veggies of my own choosing every hour and a half. I’ll eat 9 or 10 times but most of it will be 100 calories or less.

A couple of hours from now and I gotta go out for my run. At that time I’ll let the robot vacuum. Then it’s back to proofreading and posting old journals to the tune of landscaping and car doors. Yesterday was great. There were no water outages, no show and tell at the house across the street, and no landscaping sounds. Wish every day could be like that!

SUNDAY, JANUARY 5, 2014 One of the things we got at Walmart was Plaster of Paris. We’re going to add this to the pots my artificial desert trees are in to make them weightier.

Gotta change the rats’ cage as well as do some other tasks around the house and run some errands as well.

Tomorrow starts my 5-day Nutrisystem trial. I’m sure I’ll be so damn hungry the first two days that the weekend will seem worlds away! I won’t even want to think of food. But if it is doable enough and if I do decide to go all out with it, it won’t be till mid-February. Why diet, go to Hawaii and pig out, then undo all my hard work? I picked mid-February cuz that’s when my eye appointment is and when I plan to visit the Chinese restaurant nearby for their fried rice which is to die for. Hell, I’ll probably consume 2500 calories alone that day!

At least with Nutrisystem, I won’t have to worry if I’ve fucked up counting calories since everything’s counted out for me. The only things that aren’t are my veggie servings and my 4 mini snacks, but that’s a lot easier to keep track of than a whole day’s worth of food. I need to do it for 2-3 weeks to really get a sense if anything could be wrong with me thyroid-wise or whatnot. Just about any diet will initially knock a few pounds off me. It’s continuing to get results that’s the problem. Yeah, I keep dieting but my body stops losing, haha. Maybe with something that is counted, measured and packaged for me, I will continue to get results for as long as I do it. How the hell I would maintain any significant loss, though, is totally beyond me. Like I said in my previous entry, it’s not “natural” for a 48-year-old woman to be thin, and so my body’s gonna fight it tooth and nail.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 4, 2014 Feeling kinda yucky today with the PMS from hell. Really hope I don’t skip a month and that my period is on time for once. My back aches like hell, and part of why I don’t go to a masseuse is because the PMS is going to return each month no matter what. Also, I’ll put Tom’s hands to work for 10 minutes or so and I’ll be fine. What’s not so easy to just massage away is the fucking water and fatigue. I’m just so glad I got out of the obese range so I can pick something up off the floor even when waterlogged. I swear if you stuck a fork in me, about 3 pounds of water would come gushing out like crazy!

I’m frustrated with Paula cuz no matter how many times I ask I can’t get her to tell me what’s going on with her in a message. We keep missing each other, I keep asking her to update me in a message, and she keeps telling me to call her. Fuck it. I’m not going to play phone tag games with her. Besides, nothing I dream is going to change what’s destined to come anyway.

Anyway, Tom and I are heading out soon to Walmart and then to have fun browsing through other stores as well.

Later…

Decided to just do Walmart today. We spent $200 there. Maybe tomorrow, though, we’ll go to Goodwill. You never know what bargains you may find there.

$45 of the Walmart run was that 5-day Nutrisystem trial thingy I mentioned before. I love how they make it simple and how everything is packaged, weighed, measured and cooked for you. It comes with 15 entrées and 5 desserts. Monday – Friday I will have 3 entrees, a dessert, 2 “Powerfuel” snacks of my choosing, and 2 “Smartcarb” snacks. So I will eat 10 times a day. While nothing in this package contains anything I wouldn’t eat, I’m sure the hunger will be insane cuz each item is barely more than a few bites.

This way I can tell the doctor when I see her on the 14th how my body reacted to it. If something’s wrong with my thyroid, I want to know about it and I need to know about it cuz it could be a serious problem for me later on down the road if I don’t deal with it now. There’s got to be some reason why my body gives up after losing just a few pounds. As I was telling someone else earlier, the reason I’ve probably had an easy enough time maintaining my weight is because it’s 25 pounds too much and we’re SUPPOSED to be fat when we’re older. Not obese, but fat. If I tried to maintain 120 pounds or lower there’d be no way I could do it like I could 25 years ago.

The point is that I’ve been wondering for a long time if something’s up with me or if this is how I naturally am. I don’t want to go all out on Nutrisystem and pay the $300 a month just to lose 5 pounds that’ll only return even if I keep on dieting and exercising. Or that can’t be maintained even if I did lose 20-30 pounds.

Would I do the Nutrisystem program if I knew it would work? sighs thoughtfully I don’t know. I just don’t know yet. We could afford it, but I’m not sure I’d want to get a new wardrobe either right now. It would definitely help with my mobility even more if I got some more bulk off and out of the way, but right now the home improvements are more important to me since it’s not like I’m 50-100 pounds overweight. So… one step at a time. First step is seeing what the trial is like. I’ve always been curious about how programs like Nutrisystem, Jenny Craig and Weight Watchers work. Well, not so much how they work (that much is obvious), but what it’s like to actually be on one of their programs. Once I see what it’s like and whether or not I lose weight, then I’ll decide if I want to just stay where I’m at or go all out with it. I’d also like to hear what the experts have to say about my thyroid and the results of any blood work they do. They won’t be doing much on the 14th, though. That’ll just be the initial getting-to-know-the-patient routine.

Got the dentist and eye doctor in February, and the eye doctor makes me a bit nervous. I suppose it shouldn’t, though, cuz glaucoma doesn’t fester to the point of being a serious problem overnight. It usually takes 10-15 years, so I should be years away from needing any drops if I ever do need any at all. Hopefully, the OH was just a one-time thing and the pressure will be back to normal next time around. Either way, I need stronger glasses.

One trip and 3 appointments in less than 2 months! Guess you could say I’m a little overwhelmed.

I also need this park to stop fucking with our water and stop the landscaping craze. Four times I had to hear it yesterday, and while it may’ve been short-lived, it was no less annoying. Today I hear something running that may be outside the park, but still, I hear this shit nearly every day and you would think I’d be used to it by now, but I’m not. Oh well. It’s better than 12 hours of barking.

Just when I was thinking how nice it was to have no pipes break in months, this is the third day in a row they shut our water off for about an hour.

Anyway, Tom got a label maker to create labels for his storage bins in the workshop, and I got my first paper journal since the 90s. It’s got a rainbow-colored leopard print on its hardcover and is going to be used mostly on the plane to and from Hawaii. Since I probably won’t fill up all 200 pages, I’ll probably write one here and there over the upcoming years and make my own “library” contribution along with the previous owner and all the books they left behind. I should do a page in Spanish, Italian and German, too. LOL

Okay, I’ve had enough of the mower or wood chipper or whatever the hell it is that’s been running toward the front end of the house. I’m going to crawl into bed in back with my Kindle and read to the hum of my air cleaner.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 3, 2014 Our new luggage arrived. The purple seems darker in person and I wonder if the suitcases are too small for two people for a week, but Tom says it’s plenty.

The rats’ new water bottle also arrived and that’s definitely small at 10 oz. It’s more suitable for one hamster or gerbil, but a couple of giant rats? It’s fine, though, cuz we want to add additional bottles while we’re gone in case one fails.

We got a few thumb drives as well. One’s going in the lockbox outside with all my docs, graphics and music backed up onto it. The chances of a break-in may be next to nothing, but this way they can get the electronics and other valuables, but I still have what’s most important to me in the lockbox as well as with me in Hawaii.

We’re going to do an inventory of everything that’s over $300 so our insurance can replace anything if worse came to worse, though when you think about it, we really don’t have that much of value. Only a few expensive dolls, computers, printer, TV, refrigerator and treadmill, and that’s pretty much it. We don’t have any expensive jewelry. Just our wedding bands which are always on our fingers. The car will be at the airport. It’s gonna be wonderful jumping into a car and driving home after the trip, instead of getting off a train in the middle of a cold, dark icy night where we had to walk a few blocks to the dump we rented when we returned from the Caribbean cruise I won in early 2007.

Later…

Paula left a message but wouldn’t say anything about her health. Instead, she said to call her at noon her time cuz she’s “really curious” to hear about the dream I had about her. Well, of course she is. She knows my accuracy rate is too good for comfort. If it weren’t for the grim circumstances that usually surround my dream premonitions I’d feel so blessed and so proud of just how “good” I am same as with how well I usually write and how fast I pick up languages. I’d be like, ooh, look what I can do! What a gift, huh?

Now fast forward to reality. She is A, not saying anything about her health, and B, wants to know about the dream. Kinda makes me wonder, alright, but like Tammy said, I gotta try to think positively till I talk to her.

I was thinking about a fellow writer/follower/friend who has been having lung issues. The doctors are still stumped. Sometimes I wonder if no news is better than bad news. I’m afraid that’s what I’ll get when I see my own doctor. The ingrown toenail is pretty straightforward, but other things? Not that all doctors are quacks but it seems a lot of them don’t know what the hell’s going on with their patients, and I worry about that at times. “I don’t know why you can’t lose more than 5 pounds on a sensible diet with exercise, Ms. S., or why you have to damn near starve yourself to lose more than that, and I don’t know why it all comes flying back as soon as you go back to eating SENSIBLY. Come back in some other life and maybe then I can tell you. Meanwhile, be glad you don’t mind looking like shit and have finally managed to stop gaining anymore and blowing your ass up wide enough to smother a whole army of people at once.”

THURSDAY, JANUARY 2, 2014 Can’t imagine trying to cram the 12 rolls of paper towels we got at Sam’s Club into the little old trailer that’s no doubt had numerous problems just in the nearly half a year we’ve been out of it. I’d also hate to think of just how many annoying outdoor projects Jesse, who lives for puttering around outdoors, has done by now. Either way, we won’t be buying paper towels till early 2015 and we still have a roll or two left from the last 6-pack we got.

I just wish that every time we went to Sam’s it wasn’t full of screaming kids. When are parents ever going to go back to the days of teaching their kids manners, respect and discipline? I totally dread all the screaming we’ll no doubt be in for on the plane, even in first class. Thank goodness for earbuds, though sometimes they’re loud enough to override even the loudest songs.

Speaking of things that are loud, the dog in back is the loudest one around here for sure. That’s why I thought it was next door. Where the hell did it come from all of a sudden? Gee, we must be between the 4-6-month marker where things get noisier for some strange reason. It’s not a real problem, though, so long as I don’t have to hear it more than once or twice a day. I am a little worried about open windows on that side of the house in warmer weather. If you leave a dog in an open window around here, not even 10 minutes will pass without something for it to bark at. Lots of traffic. Lots of people.

The landscaping, however, has dropped from being a daily thing now that the leaves are down on the trees that lose them, to the usual 2-3 times a week for 30-60 minutes.

Heard tons of firecrackers and some gunshots on New Year’s Eve, but none of it was in the park. It was coming from outside the park. Tom was asleep, but in my robe and slippers, I excitedly slipped out into the carport and then down the driveway to see if I could see anything. I saw flashes of light in the direction of the cemetery, but nothing else. Then I started shaking with tears like a little kid as I thought of Paula and the awful dream I had of her.

“It’s freezing out here,” I eventually thought to myself. “Get inside. This is the Sacramento area, not San Diego.”

I totally forgot, until Andy reminded me, that I also dreamed he told me he was dying of cancer and he’s fine, so that’s a good sign, too. More than likely the dream simply represents a rocky road ahead for her. Tom later pointed out that I didn’t attend her funeral in the dream. Now that we’ve fixed the MagicJack phone (it was plugged into a hub without enough juice to power it), I’ll try to call her later this morning and see what information I can get.

I’m a little disturbed by the fact that there’s a 4 in this year, as the number 4 has proven to be rather unlucky for me. Although… the years 2000, 2007, and 2011 were just as shitty, if not shittier than 2004 was.

I’ve also lived enough decades to say for sure that the first 2-3 years of each decade is significantly worse than the rest of it.

Uh-oh, just noticed another potential pattern of a scary kind. Our worst years were 2000, 2004, 2007 and 2011. 2004 is 4 years later than 2000. 2007 is 3 years later than 2004. 2011 is 4 years later than 2007. If we keep alternating 4…3…4…3… then 3 years after 2011 is… ugh! Nooooo!!!

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – damn the bastard above for siccing this sleep disorder on me! If He truly is the reason for what we are and for how we are, damn Him. Just damn Him to hell and back, though no, I’m not going to get into detail. I’m not in the mood of being accused of making excuses when in fact I don’t make “excuses.” Not at 48. As a minor under 18 when others had the power and authority to use the truth against me – you bet – but now I just tell it like it is. All I’ll say is that it’s going to be tough lining things up for my appointment on the 14th. A few days of lost sleep won’t kill me, though. It’s doing it day after day, week after week, month after month that my aging body can’t take. It was hard on me when I was young, but there’s no comparison between 25 ago and now, like it or not. It’s like comparing the effects of dieting then versus now. I could lose large amounts then. Now I’m lucky if I can lose more than 5 pounds.

Oh, that reminds me. I’ve been asked what I’m doing to maintain my weight. I work out at least a half-hour every other day and I only eat when I’m hungry. No eating just to be eating.

We are going to go ahead and take advantage of the fact that we get something like 15 days a year of rain here and let most of the plants die off. Might keep one of the rose bushes and the beautiful pink camellia tree which is blooming nicely now. Fewer plants means less work and less watering.

Sugar now has his own Skype account. LOL We’re going to install cameras indoors for two reasons. One is for the very slim chance this house is broken into while we’re gone, and two is so we can call the rats once a day and “see” how they’re doing and let them hear our voices so they don’t feel so alone or like we’ve abandoned them forever. Haha, when we get back that Sugar rat is going to be all over me like crazy. Somebody just grabbed my ankle. Romeo? Nah, he’d have bitten me. That rat’s obsessed with biting.

I asked Alison to quiz Kim on whether or not she knew of my “secret” blogs. She says Kim swears she doesn’t know where I’m blogging these days; just that she knows I’m on Blogger and MO but is staying away so she doesn’t get in trouble. Well, MO’s gone, but as Aly said, she could totally know the links but isn’t saying so. Yeah, that’s why I won’t be friends with her. Because everything that comes out of her mouth is hit or miss as far as whether or not it’s true.

Molly hasn’t tried to view my blogs, but IS allowed online. She tweeted Happy New Year to Aly, even though Aly changed names there. Did she discover the account on her own or was Aly dumb enough to give it to her? Aly swears that even though she still gets emails from Molly, she’s not reading them. Even Aly’s not totally trustworthy, though. She’s not the liar the other two are, but if she’s gone back to contacting Molly she’s not going to tell me about it, knowing how much I’ll tell her she’ll regret it and is making a huge mistake. Chances are Molly dug it up on her own. That’s what stalkers do.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 1, 2014 Age: 48

Martin Luther King had a dream. So did I. Only mine’s the one I hope to hell that, unlike his, doesn’t come true.

I don’t know why, but New Year’s Eve is a hot spot for psychics of various kinds. For some reason, we tend to get a glimpse of what lies ahead at this time, be it in our dreams or when we’re awake. But the “psychic window” didn’t open much for me the last few years and so I didn’t really think it would this year either.

Knowing the unknown has been a habit of mine for most of my life. It starts with that little feeling that says something wrong, which we’re all programmed with. Then around the time I quit smoking in my early 30s (coincidence?), it flourished into much more than just basic intuitiveness, mostly by way of dream premonitions of a negative kind. Almost all my negative dreams come true, sometimes even to a tee. I learned how to read various dreams and weed out the “spam” from potential signs/warnings in time. It was cool at first but by my 40s cool had turned to creepy.

I made the comment to Tom about how I’d probably be asleep this year, so I doubt I’d “see” anything while awake at least at midnight Eastern time. He said maybe the “dream people” would show me something about what’s coming up in the year ahead.

Oh, they showed me all right, in the form of a double nightmare involving suicide and death. Again, I wasn’t expecting anything unusual and figured the dream people were simply dormant and lying in wait for the next rough patch of life we go through since they prefer to be the bearer of bad news as opposed to good. Only none of it had anything to do with us and as selfish as it may sound, I am thankful for that much.

Unless my new gel and memory foam pillow I got at Sam’s Club is just hexed, barely two hours into my sleep I had the first nightmare. It involved a young girl I didn’t know that hung herself. My mother might’ve been one of the 5 or 6 people that knew her and discovered her. The girl, in her early 20s, hung from a rafter in a loft and landed sort of in a sitting position at the edge of it. We gazed up at her from down below. She was about 10’ up and there was this ramp-like ladder leading up to her. For some reason, everyone was more concerned with the small square pillow by her side than with the girl. They just had to have that pillow for some reason, but no one would dare get near her.

“It’s just a dead body,” I said. “I’ll climb up and get the damn pillow.” So I got on all fours and shimmied up the ramp/ladder. I was a few yards from the girl and pillow when the rope around her neck snapped, causing the body to flop back and then start rolling toward me. I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound came out.

I woke up sweating and had to turn the fan on. Since I don’t know who that was in that nightmare, I can’t say for sure what it means. Maybe some trouble ahead for an acquaintance? Maybe they won’t kill themselves, but maybe they’re still in for tough times.

It was the second dream that was critical because it’s not only the second time I’ve had a dream like this, but it’s about someone I do know very well, my friend Paula. She’s 46 and has been on disability all her life cuz the poor girl has the mentality of an 8-year-old. She’s the type that might be afraid to see a doctor for fear of it causing the FBI to steal her bathmat or something like that. It’s a wonder she can even drive.

In the letter I just got from her she says she’s sick again but will beat it, she said to make sure I send her a Hawaiian postcard from California so she “knows” she’ll get it. Yeah, that’s just Paula for you, LOL.

In real life, she told me she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and was going to undergo a hysterectomy. So when I had the first dream of her dying, I figured that’s all it was about and that she would be okay. I don’t know if she ever really did get the hysterectomy done, but I find it hard to believe that last night’s nightmare is just a reflection of my concern for her. It’s got to mean something. I’ve had numerous dreams and visions pertaining to her and I’ve never been wrong yet.

Anyway, I went to visit her in the dream and although I was shy about it and chose my words as carefully as I could, not wanting to put her on the spot but curious just the same, I asked if she’d be okay. A dubious expression crossed her face and she said, “Oh, no, this is a solid mass.”

Her phone then rang and clearly, she didn’t want to talk about it anymore, so I walked out of her apartment and closed the door, which had been open. I realized Tom was standing outside in the hall and had heard the whole thing. We walked silently for a few seconds, then he asked, “Do you really think she…”

“Yeah, I do, Tom,” I said before I woke up, wondering if her condition is a lot more serious than even she realizes. I’ve had death dreams pertaining to my sister and another friend yet they lived even though it wasn’t without a serious fight. But this is the second dream, and again, Paula’s not very bright and her insurance is probably a joke. Hopefully, at worst this just means she’s got a very rocky road ahead of her, though it’s got to mean something. It’s got to. I don’t “reflect” in dreams. I “see.”

Good news, Mr. King. Most people like blacks. I wish my own dreams weren’t as apt to be granted as yours was.

Later…

To back up to when Bob noticed we’d left the water on, I later went out to see if things had dried up. We’re going to turn the water off to the whole house when we leave for Hawaii. That way we don’t have to worry if a pipe bursts or anything. Like what apparently happened yesterday. I’m surprised we went this many months without a park pipe bursting, but I could tell by the way the pipes farted when I got up and peed that there had been another outage.

Like most people, the people next door are in and out a few times a day. This time the SUV was gone and Virginia wasn’t around, so she was obviously out somewhere. Bob was doing something in the garage. The garage is actually pretty empty, so he definitely doesn’t have any workshop set up in there, thank goodness.

I casually asked him if anyone had gotten a dog around here to see what he’d say, but he just shrugged. Then the next day when we were heading for Sam’s Club, Tom said he saw the dog I’ve been hearing in one of the houses behind us. At first he thought the dog was loose and thought that was weird in a retirement park of all places. It was taking a leak on a small strip of grass alongside the house and he next saw someone waiting at the door. I’ve only heard it a few times so far, but I really hope that thing isn’t going off at open windows in back come spring. This is an amazingly active park so it would have plenty to go off about. We were surprised just how many people were out walking yesterday and it was cold. We both wore our jackets to the store.

Anyway, the nightmares I had left me tired so I took a nap a while ago. That fucking loud-ass car or truck or whatever the hell it is that delivers the paper just had to wake me up, of course, because I drifted off without putting the sound machine on. If it weren’t for that I’d hear everything. Vehicles, planes, helicopters, sirens, people, dogs, and just about every sound imaginable. Still, no vehicle that insanely loud should be allowed to cruise around here at 5am! How do people sleep through it?

We hit Sam’s Club at 10am and like I said in my last entry, I got a new gel/memory foam pillow as mine, which I had for 8 or 9 years, finally started to really lose its shape. We also got a memory foam bathmat to replace the old one in the second bath. I don’t think I’d like memory foam padding under our future carpet. They do make it, though.

I wear bifocals in public so I can see both near and far, and being out and seeing just how much my eyes have worsened over the last year was a sad reminder of how I should’ve upgraded my prescription before the damn trip to Hawaii. So now the vast expanses of the Pacific will be a bit blurry. It just sucks that I have to travel with the damn things at all. The last time we went on vacation 7 years ago I only needed reading glasses.

[jasonlovecars]

Sunshine and Surprises: My Productive Day with a Vitamin D Discovery

Hello, everyone! I wanted to share a glimpse of my day, which was not only productive but also brought a surprising revelation about Vitamin D.

The day began with an early alarm, as I had a lot on my plate. After a quick stretch and a healthy breakfast, I was ready to tackle the tasks ahead. But it was during my morning routine that I stumbled upon an interesting article about Vitamin D. It was fascinating to learn how essential this 'sunshine vitamin' is for our overall health, especially for someone like me who spends most of the time indoors. This newfound knowledge made me ponder about adding a Vitamin D supplement to my diet.

With this thought in mind, I dove into my work. As a freelance writer, my days are usually packed with research, writing, and meeting deadlines. Today was no exception. I spent the morning hours immersed in writing an article about sustainable living, a topic I'm deeply passionate about.

Lunch was a brief affair – a quick salad and a fruit smoothie, as I had a webinar to attend. The webinar was on creative writing techniques, and it was incredibly enriching. I always find it invigorating to learn new skills and ideas that can enhance my craft.

In the afternoon, I decided to break the monotony and head out for a walk in the nearby park. The fresh air and the lush greenery were a much-needed respite. I even made a new friend – a fellow nature enthusiast who shared some interesting insights about local wildlife.

Returning home, I felt rejuvenated and ready to continue my work. The evening was spent editing a manuscript, a task that requires utmost concentration but is equally rewarding.

Dinner was an experiment tonight – I tried cooking a new Mediterranean recipe, and to my delight, it turned out great. Cooking is my way of unwinding, and experimenting with new recipes is always a joyous adventure.

As the day comes to a close, I’m reflecting on the productive and fulfilling day I've had. From learning about Vitamin D to the meaningful work and personal interactions, every bit of today was enriching. It’s days like these that remind me of the beauty of daily learning and the joy of small achievements.

Here's to more days of discovery, productivity, and little joys. Keep exploring, keep growing, and don’t forget to soak up some sunshine whenever you can! 🌞📚🌱

[harryspet]

cement walls | bucky barnes

[Warnings] dark!bucky barnes x reader, non/dubcon sex, fingering, kidnapping, forced pregnancy, confined spaces, Stockholm syndrome(?), post-blip bucky, bucky needs some therapy, forced gender roles

[A/N] uhm so this is what i’ve been working on and like usual i have no idea where i wanna take it :):) i haven’t posted in a long while so i figured i would put this out there for some feedback! this is pretty much inspired by Room if you’ve seen that movie. [gif credit to https://jamesbrnes.tumblr.com/]

In which the outside world is too dangerous for you and Bucky is the only one who can protect you. 

taglist: @cherienymphe @lovelynerdytraveler @buckysbunny @hollandsdream @micki-smiles @buckybarnesplumwhore @arts-ismything @saharzek @what-is-your-wish @brattypeony @hermayone @buckysugar @mischiefmanaged011 @visintaes  @watercoolerpaint @disaster-rose @slutforsebstan​ @doozywoozy​

main masterlist

word count: 3.3k

Within the cement walls that surrounded your home, you imagined that you had your own little planet. You spent hours of your days thinking about what surrounded you, if there were floating rings like Saturn had, the constellations you could make out only if you could only see the entire sky, and how the sun would really feel on your bare skin. You were beginning to forget what that felt like and you sat below the skylight trying to reach into your mind and remember.

Maybe you should be grateful that there was even a skylight at all and that there was enough room for a small kitchen and bathroom. You imagined that's what he thought. You could move around freely with no chains so you should be grateful. Almost three-hundred square feet of your new planet that you should be glad to have. Except you didn’t even own the ground you stood on, this planet wasn’t really yours, you were just an astronaut trapped in space. 

That morning, you scrubbed the floors, not only because the military man preferred organization but also because the small space got dirty quickly. After taking your vitamins, extra Vitamin D of course, and munching on a stale granola bar, you got to work. You made the twin bed up, making sure the sheets were tucked in tightly before organizing the small amount of clothes in the wardrobe. 

When you heard the beeping of the keypad outside the door, you stood up, shutting the wardrobe. You weren’t expecting him, not having gotten to the kitchen yet, but alas your moon man appeared. You couldn’t help it, you always looked past him to see what you could have of the outside world. You saw nothing, his figure was only surrounded in darkness as he shut it quickly, and it beeped as the metal door locked again. 

It was like he liked the idea of you not knowing where you were. He’d brought you into this room unconscious so you had no idea whether you were still in Louisiana or not. For all you knew, you could be floating in space and it wouldn’t matter. 

The tall man’s hair was cut short, like he’d just gotten a haircut, and you hated that the room was already beginning to smell like his cologne. He held a brown bag of what you assumed were groceries, “You haven’t been here in more than two weeks. I’ve been cleaning my clothes in the sink. I started rationing food t-thinking you weren’t going to come back.”

He set the bag down on the small kitchen table and you watched his eyes roam over the dirty dishes, “I wouldn’t leave you here, doll face,” Bucky assured you, “C’mere.” He waved you over and you stepped forward cautiously. 

“W-Where did you go?”

He reached up to hold your face, the leather brushing against your cheeks as he looked you over. You wore a green smock dress with a cardigan tightly over you, the box having been cold the past few days, “I had business. Far away business.”

“You’ve never been gone this long.”

“Did you miss me that much?” You wanted to roll your eyes. If Bucky didn’t come back, you’d die in probably the worst way possible and no one would know what happened to you, “I brought you back plenty of groceries, I even got you some oreos and that fancy bread you like.”

“Bucky …. I-I was so so scared. You don’t understand-” He leaned down to kiss you and when your lips didn’t move against his, he grabbed you roughly by your hair. You held in your yelp as you forced your lips to move against his. He held your hips, deepening the kiss and when he pulled away, his hands were still in your hair. 

“I’m here now, “ He looked at you sharply, tugging your hair a bit, “But it seems you can’t keep the kitchen clean, no matter how much time I give you.”

“I’m sorry,” You apologized, the words slipping out before you could even register them. 

He gestured his head over to the sink, “Get to it. And the groceries as well.” 

You moved past him, turning on the warm water before grabbing a sponge. You felt his eyes on your back as you began to clean all the pots and pans you’d been using. You heard the rattling of his belt, his jeans being pulled down, the sound of his boots being stacked to the side, and the grunt he let out when he tossed his jacket over the kitchen chair. 

When you placed everything in the drying rack, you moved onto the bag of groceries. He had gotten the bread you liked so you had something to look forward to that week, “I had to see that lady again.”

“You mean your therapist?”

“It’s court mandated bullshit,” You looked over and he was examining your desk and bookshelf. All the books you had were given to you by him and all the decorations were paper origami that you’d gotten good at making. 

“What did you guys talk about?” You asked hesitantly, putting things away in the cabinet. 

“She thinks I need more friends, more social interactions I suppose but that’s what she says every week,” You heard your bed creak as he sat down, “Hey, make me a cup of coffee, doll.”

“Oh,” It was clear that whatever that therapist was doing, wasn’t work, the biggest piece of evidence being the girl he was holding captive right now. You moved over to the coffee pot, pouring what was left into his favorite mug, “Do you … ever talk about me?”

You could feel his body stiffen even from across the room. 

“Why would I?” When you turned around, his eyebrows were furrowed, his hands on his knees. 

You crossed the small room with the cup in hand, “Well, you interact with me. I’m like your friend, right?” You handed him the drink, standing back as you watched him take a sip, hoping he’d be satisfied with it. 

“You know why I can’t tell her about you, Y/N.”

You shook your head, “Yeah, I was just thinking … “ You sat down a few feet away from him, “Does anyone else know about me?”

“You’re curious today.”

“It’s not like I have much entertainment in here,” You said a little more snarky than you intended. You felt his mechanical arm push into the mattress beside you as he turned his head, “Sorry … when do you think I’ll get to leave the room? Not outside, just out of the room. Maybe to where you sleep at night.”

“If you’re going to be like this today-”

“Forget I said anything,” You smiled weakly, “Please.”

Bucky set down his cup on the small nightstand before he urged you closer. You scooted closer and he gently pushed your head down until it was resting in his lap. You felt his cold hand through your sweater and the other through your hair, “I know what it’s like … feeling trapped,” You pulled your feet onto the bed and he continued to stroke your hair and you welcomed the comforting touch. 

“Then why …”

He shushed you, “Mind over matter, Y/N. It’s all about training your mind to adjust. You’re safer here, you’re taken care of here, and your mind is still trying to convince you that you don’t belong here.”

“I wouldn’t try to escape if I could just stay with you…”

He shushed you again, “I spent decades frozen and then, after that, I was trapped in my own mind. Now everyone’s trying to convince me that I have this new chance to survive in the world. They genuinely think of this new century as being so amazing, so much technology, and opportunities but it’s a lie, Y/N. This world is nothing but danger and death. You’re much better without it.”

You felt a tear roll down your cheeks. You felt like the chains around you were only getting heavier. He was so delusional that you thought it would be easier to start believing him, “Please don’t leave for that long again.”

Bucky sighed, “I’ll stay here for the night. How does that sound?”

You hiccuped, “T-Thank you.”

Later that night, you were lying beside bucky in the small bed. He was fast asleep but you were wide awake, looking up at the skylight. The full moon was lighting up the room. Carefully, you tossed your feet over the bed, doing your best not to disturb the soldier. You got onto the floor, crawling towards the carpet in the middle of the room. Oftentimes, when you couldn’t sleep, you’d lay down and stare up at the moon. 

You stayed like that for lord knows how long, drifting into a place where all your thoughts were silent. 

“What are you doing?” You sat up quickly, your heart racing as his gruff voice snapped you from your trance. 

He was shirtless, standing above you, and rubbing his tired eyes. You simply pointed up, “The moon.”

“Get back in bed,” He commanded groggily. 

You scooted over slightly, “I can’t sleep ... just come look with me. It’s beautiful.”

“You act like you’ve never seen the fucking moon before, Y/N,” His frustration caught you off guard as he reached down to grab you by your arm. You didn’t mean to but, on instinct, you flinched away. That only led him to grabbing your harder, and you stumbled as he pulled you up, “Get in the bed. You scare me to death when I wake up and can’t feel you.”

“If you care so much then why do you leave me in here for weeks on end.”

His eyes flickered with hurt for a moment, “I won’t … ever again. You need far too much discipline for me to let you be on your own for so long.” You rolled your eyes as you turned away, walking towards the bed. 

He grabbed you roughly by your waist, pushing you onto the bed. He pushed you further into the mattress, his hand on the back on your neck, and you were reminded just how cruel he could be. There was a point months ago when you stopped fighting it, knowing in the end he would overpower you, but sometimes your spark appeared. 

He lifted your nightgown easily, knowing he wouldn’t find any underwear to tear off, and his hand cupped between your legs. As you struggled beneath him, he felt you, rubbing and running his fingers over your lips, “Me being deep inside you seems to correct your mood. Is that what you need from me, doll face?”

Your spark appeared and went quickly, knowing he could feel your wetness, giving him the permission to sink two of fingers inside you. He moved slow, his knees pressed deep into the bed, as he watched your lips part with a gasp. 

“That’s it …”

This was his favorite, knowing he could get you off with just his fingers, his fingers curling against your most sensitive areas. He fastened his pace, pushing in and out of you as you lay there bent over. Knowing you were nearing an orgasm you were sure not to run away from, he moved his vibranium arm from your neck and underneath you where he stimulated your sensitive bud. 

“That’s my girl,” He coaxed you as he sent you into a shaking fit, “You finish so well on my fingers, so beautifully.” You came hard, Bucky enjoying the vulnerable view of your face. As he let you go, you pushed down your gown and laid down on your side. The bed dipped as he took a seat, rubbing your thighs as the post-orgasm regret filled you. 

“You ever think you have some control over me, I want you to remember this.”

8 months later … 

You flipped through the channels six channels that the old television would provide. The soldier thought buying you one would decrease your book intake which he was struggling to keep up with as you read several per week. He wasn’t a fan of technology but the two of you had a long argument about it and he eventually caved. 

You weren’t sure if he knew but the TV picked up a local news channel and you got a glimpse into what the world had been like over the past year. Every now and then, there’d be a mention of Sam Wilson and you figured that’s who he was disappearing with when he was gone for weeks at a time. 

As you neared closer and closer to your due date, he’d grown nicer than usual, though the way he’d gotten you pregnant wasn’t pleasant at all. “You complain so much about being lonely.” He had said when you’d missed your period, “This is what you wanted, right?” 

You weren’t sure if you were just nauseous from the pregnancy or if the idea of raising a baby in that room was making you sick to your stomach. Sometimes you caught yourself being selfish, thinking about having someone to take care of and take up your time. Having someone who could love you properly, in a way that Bucky didn’t quite understand. 

“How’s my girl? And how’s my mini me?” Bucky was an abnormally good move when he came down to visit you that night. He was carrying magazines in his hand and you crossed the room, curious to see the details, “I thought you might want to look at nursery stuff.”

“There’s gonna be a nursery,” Your lips pulled into a smile, “Where?”

“Here,” He gestured around and your smile fell, “You can’t be too far from the little tike. I was thinking we could put the crib where your desk is.”

You took the magazines from him, resting them on your protruding stomach, “Oh …” You tried not to sound sad, “You don’t think that maybe the space is too small? I mean, a mom and baby and sometimes you, that’s a lot of people for one room. And when they get older ….” You imagined having a happy little baby but you tried not to think about your child growing up in a box. 

“When he gets older, we’ll think about it then,” He stated, already gendering the baby without any actual knowledge. He refused to let you see a doctor, only brought you prenatal vitamins, expecting that you’d have a smooth delivery right here in the room, “For now, it’s plenty of room.”

You nodded, “When he gets older, will you take him outside the room? Kids need space to play and get fresh air.”

“I’ll think about it, Y/N,” Bucky’s lips pressed into a thin line. 

You didn’t want to push the issue further, not wanting to spoil his mood, “I think a light green will be a good, neutral color for everything. Maybe we can decorate his side of the room.”

He smiled, “Whatever you’d like, doll face.”

You crossed the room, setting the magazines down on your desk, and a scary idea crossed your mind. A scary idea and chance you might just have to take if it meant you could get help. You were getting nowhere screaming at the top of your lungs, hoping for someone to hear you, and asking Bucky over and over again just to let you have fresh air. He was suffocatingly protective and that didn’t seem like it was gonna change. You couldn’t let him do that to your child. 

You made dinner and he slept over that night, his vibranium hand holding your waist the entire night. 

You planned to catch him off guard the next morning, figuring you’d have the best chance of causing a panic while he was still tired. You got up, whispering that you had to use the restroom, and you slipped inside the room. You read somewhere that only a fourth cup of water comes out when your water breaks, so you fill a cup before drenching your underwear, legs and the bathroom floor. 

“Bucky!” You shouted, making sure you looked scared in the mirror, “Bucky!”

The door almost flew off its hinges as the soldier went into full alert. His eyes were wide, examining you, “What-What happened?”

“I-I think my water broke,” A tear slipped down your cheek. 

“It’s too early,” He shook his head, running his fingers through his hair, “A-Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure. All the books say it's a gushing feeling and that was definitely gushing.”

“Maybe we should wait … we can wait and see if contractions start-”

You shook your head furiously, cautiously stepping forward, “We have to see a Doctor. W-We have to … contractions are supposed to start before my water breaks a-and I’m only 29 weeks. I can’t have the baby naturally.”

“But-”

“We have to! Please, Bucky, a-all I care about is the baby. Please, I don’t want to lose them. Please don’t make me-”

“Okay, okay,” He nodded, grabbing your face as he wiped your tears, “Uhm …. let's get dressed. There’s a thirty minute drive to the hospital,” You nodded and his eyes narrowed at you, “This is for the baby, remember that. You pull anything and-”

“I know,” You placed your hand over your stomach, pulling away from his grasp. 

Your body was heavy when he led you out of that room. You felt your reality shifting as you entered the world again. What surprised you most was how normal the rest of the home was, not particularly homey, but it was nice and spacious. There was even a full front yard and, sadly, you imagined the happy family that could have lived here. You half-expected him to have a wife and kids that he was hiding you from. 

Now, sitting in the hospital bed, you watched him paced around, not paying attention to what the Doctor was saying. 

“So she’s not in labor? She felt her water breaking.”

“No, Sir. Based on the ultrasound, the amniotic fluid levels are normal. I’m not sure what happened, could be a multitude of things, but it was most likely a false alarm. But don’t worry, it happens all the time. And your baby looks very healthy.”

You opened your mouth to say something but Bucky’s eyes narrowed at you, a warning. 

“Okay, thank you, Doc.”

“Do you two have a primary obstetrician? One isn’t listed-”

“Are we free to leave?”

The Doctor took another look at you, as if he was trying to understand our relationship, but if he noticed anything, he didn’t say it, “Yes, you’re free to go. I would just make sure to keep a sharp eye out and give your obstetrician a call if you have a question-”

“Of course, thanks, Doc,” Bucky nodded as he forced a smile. With his dark jacket and black gloves, it was hard for him not to look intimidating. 

The Doctor looked down at you with a warm smile, “Let me know if you need anything, ma’am.”

Say something. 

Say something. 

If you were going to say something, this would be the time. Why did Bucky have such a hold on you even outside of the room?

As soon as the Doctor left the room, Bucky turned away, frustratedly packing up your bag, “Get up, get dressed, let’s go.”

“Bucky, I really did think-”

“If you don’t want someone in this hospital to get hurt, I’d get dressed and keep your mouth shut.”

You moved your legs to the side, real tears beginning to fall down your face, as you struggled to get your dress on. Bucky noticed your sniffling from the corner of his eye. He moved towards you, kneeling down beside the bed, “Hey, I’m sorry …. I’m just stressed out. I don’t like you being here ... but everything is going to be okay. Our baby is perfectly healthy and we’ll be home soon. There will be no more interruptions after this.”

You couldn’t even bring yourself to nod in agreement knowing that your own opinion didn’t matter. Bucky was god, enforcing his will on you, and claiming he knew best. You felt so small in comparison to him but there had to be something left within you that could keep fighting, that could keep you from going willingly back into that room-

“Y/N?”

You perked up, “Yes?”

“C’mon doll face, let’s go home.”

hope you enjoyed! not sure where i want to take this so feedback will be much appreciated!

[anonymous-dentist]

Truth in the Tales Minisode: Sir Billiam vs Drew P. Wiener- Class in the Gilded Age

This minisode of Truths is brought to you by my socialist ass reading through the Wiki and realizing that Sir Billiam probably kinned Andrew Carnegie.

Hi, I’m A.D., and I’m a history student. My area of study, more or less, is the last forty years of the 19th century. Specifically: the Gilded Age. So today I’m gonna talk about the one thing Tumblr loves to hate, class privilege. Briefly, mind, but I’m always open to questions! Most of the stuff in this post comes from my dirty little history student brain, so there’s that warning.

First comes the question, why the Gilded Age? Well, the term comes from famous American author Mark Twain and is used to describe about the 1870s through (in my opinion) the end of Roosevelt’s presidency in the early 20th century. It refers to how America was gilded with gold despite being completely fucking awful to live in. This was before unions and everything, and urban living conditions were hell, to say the least.

(Irma and Paul Milstein Division of United States History, Local History and Genealogy, The New York Public Library. "Man in kitchen—bedroom with dishes, clothes, irons (1904)." New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed February 16, 2022. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47e4-3217-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99)

(The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Photography Collection, The New York Public Library. "A rear tenement room, New York" New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed February 16, 2022. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47d9-a9f1-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99)

Like. That’s bad. Really bad. Rapid industrialization leads to more problems than rewards for a certain period of time, generally speaking. Too much urban growth can be a real problem if you’re a city with no infrastructure. Sickness and disease ran rampant. Most of these tenement houses didn’t have running water or bathrooms, so they used outhouses that were rarely cleaned. Rent was astronomical, especially when considering the average wage of the time. This was before minimum wage, long before it.

(Interior rooms.)

An apartment like that, for example, would be $10 a week if it was in 1892, just a bit after when the Masquerade would have taken place. Meanwhile at any given Carnegie steel mill, a day’s wages would be about $1.72.

Andrew Carnegie, meanwhile, made about $92,000 a day.

(Carnegie estate.)

Carnegie was one of the huge guys of the Gilded Age. As a native to Pennsylvania, I know entirely too much about that guy. But to make it brief, he was rich and worked his way up to being rich after years of work. He thought everybody could do that, but he never once provided the means to do so. He was an active enemy of workers unions and didn’t really care if people lost limbs or died working in his steel mills as long as they were replaced quickly.

But is that Sir Billiam? Not entirely. Sir Billiam gives me bigger Vanderbilt vibes.

You might recognize the name from the university, but the Vanderbilts are old money. While they did have a big hand in business, they are arguably more famous for their parties.

(Le Petit Chateau, which happened to take up an entire city block.)

There was once a huge costume ball thrown by Mrs. Alva Vanderbilt. She invited 1,200 people. It cost about $250,000 to throw. For reference, that’s $6,000,000 in modern money, if I’m doing my calculations correctly.

Now how does this go back to our lads Billiam and Drew?

“What does the B stand for?” (In Vitamin B)

“Broke!”

Billiam is obviously a rich motherfucker with little to no concern for the poor. That’s like. His whole thing. The only reason Drew is there is cause he broke in, basically. Drew is vitamin b-broke, ain’t got a nickel to his name. Compare that with Sir Billiam and his opulent estate.

The other thing to note is that The Masquerade does, is fact, take place during the Gilded Age. Not only is it similar to any given upper class party from the era, but it canonically takes place at around the same time as the Wild West, which would have taken place sometime in the 1870s or 1880s. So if we’re to take those two things together, we have approximately the year 1883 set for the Masquerade, the year Alva Vanderbilt’s party happened.

[k-comfyspace]

Half

Star: Loona

Idea: Yes

Love: Hi, I’ve been here for a while and got the confidence to request, though in anon, could I ask for a Loona 13th member experienced a loss in their family? And reader is super effected so she locks herself out and shuts everybody down? At first everyone understood but a few days later Haseul comes in with the others and comforts reader? Fluffy please thanks!

A/n: If you lost someone, know that you can always talk to anyone

You walked into Jiwoo’s room, seeing Heejin, Jiwoo, and Yerim bunched on the bed, a camera and a light in front of them as they all smiled when they saw you.

"Orbit, Y/n’s here," Heejin cheered, making you pad towards their direction, jumping on the bed so the camera could see you. An innocent expression on your face as you smiled, waving your hand as a small part of your fingers were visible due to the hoodie you were wearing,

"Everyone, you know Y/n has been acting so cute today!" Heejin added, the two nodding as they rubbed your head, "She’s been wearing Haseul unnie’s hoodie since this morning, and it’s so cute,"

You sat up properly, sitting between Jiwoo and Yerim, both of them clinging onto your arms. Jiwoo nuzzled her face on your shoulder, while Yerim rubbed her hand across the soft sleeve,

"It’s oversized, so it reaches all the way past her knees," Heejin explained, seeing the comments suddenly filled with white hearts and different variations of the word ‘cute.’

"You’re making everyone’s heart, flutter Y/n,"

You smiled at the comment, your face flushed a shade of pink, but you still felt happy,

"I’m very happy today, Orbit," your eye smile becoming apparent as your eyes disappeared from your face. While everybody, including the comments, squeals because of your cuteness.

It was a good day. You woke up bright and early, you had breakfast with all of your members, and throughout the day, you were all giggles because of them. You felt relaxed, having no worries, only focused on having fun with the people around you.

The rest of the night was spent doing the live, the four of you, enjoying yourself. Creating different games to play with your fans, and sharing some stories that orbits surely enjoyed.

It was in the middle of the night when your phone suddenly rang, taking it out of your pocket, you furrowed your eyebrows, seeing your mom on the phone.

It was unusual that she would call at this time, since you knew that she was on shift at the hospital.

You excused yourself, moving out to the hall as you answered the phone. It was probably nothing, you thought.

--

Heejin put the song on the speaker, singing along with Yerim and Jiwoo as they playfully put their hands up, acting like they were listening to a concert.

When the door opened, they saw you enter. Jiwoo was about to call you to join them, but when you raised your head, the smiles on their faces disappeared, seeing your tear-stricken face.

"Oh, well, orbit, I think we have to go. Yves unnie is calling us for dinner," Jiwoo faked, wanting to end the live immediately.

Heejin and Yerim looked at the older girl, but she nudged them, asking them to play along, which they did, and soon enough, after a lot of goodbyes, they ended the live.

The three of them quickly stood up to pull you into their arms.

"What’s wrong, Y/n?" they asked you, while you buried your face in Heejin’s chest, a sob finally leaving your lips.

"Hey mom," you greeted, partly confused, but it wasn’t any day that your mother would call you at this time, so you had no complaints.

"Y-Y/n, where are y-you?"

You suddenly grow concerned. You noticed how her voice broke, and the brokenness of her tone, "I’m at the dorms right now. Are you crying mom? What’s wrong?" you asked her, a sudden pit in your stomach made you grow uncomfortable.

"Y-your father, he c-called this morning--he said grandmother was brought to the hospital,"

You felt your heart stop, your breath hitching with the sudden news, "I-is--how is she now?" you asked, hoping for the best, your own eyes starting to sting, but the sound of your mother’s sobbing already gave you the answer you weren’t hoping for.

"The doctors managed to stabilize h-her, but this afternoon she suddenly had a s-stroke-- they called her d-dead a few hours a-ago,"

Everything suddenly went dead silent, not believing everything that you heard during this conversation. But you knew better that your mother wouldn’t make this kind of joke with you. Knowing just how much your grandmother meant to you.

"Honey, are you t-there? I--"

You dropped the line, leaning back against the wall as you held your phone in your hands, your mind not processing anything as you felt the tears streaming down your cheeks.

Yerim couldn’t help but hug you tighter, the three of them brought you to bed as they kept you in their hold. Not wanting to let go.

They kept you in their arms, cradling you, trying to prevent the tears that have yet to stop. Their hearts broke at the sight. Just a minute ago, you were happy, smiling whilst you interacted with the fans.

Now, you are crying your eyes out. All traces of happiness have drained away from your face. The others didn’t know what to do, they tried to call the other members, but you wouldn’t stop for anything.

Yerim tried to call their leader, however, due to the older woman’s schedule being held up, they couldn’t reach her either.

The members tried their best to help you, albeit only going as far to keep their arms around you and rub your back. At some point, you stopped crying, and they were relieved. Their shoulders got slightly lighter because they couldn’t hear you crying anymore.

When Heejin felt your shoulder slump, partnered with your breath evening out, she carefully pulled away, leaving you beside Yerim and Jiwoo, who were already asleep.

She tucked you in carefully, seeing the two other girls unconsciously wrapping their arms around you, cuddling closer before she left the room.

Heejin joined the rest in the living room, who glanced up, questions floating in their eyes, though Heejin just shook her head, combing her fingers through her hair as she sighed.

They let the silence linger in the living room, having no choice except to wait for their leader so they could figure out a solution.

--

While they waited, an hour passed by and you could feel your eyes opening, a small groan leaving your lips. You were confused about where you were for a second, until you saw Yerim and Jiwoo beside you. Each of their arms around your torso, keeping you close.

Then the sadness that seemed to pass by came back again, feeling your eyes sting you swiftly, but carefully pulled away. Laying their hands on top of each other which seemed to work, seeing them cuddling each other instead.

Leaving their room, you went into the hallway, hearing murmurs down the hall. You had assumed the girls were talking about you, which in turn left a deeper frown on your face. You didn’t want them to worry about you. It was your problem, yet you had to drag them into it.

With a sigh, you went down the hall towards your room. Locking the door and slumping on your bed, curling up on yourself as you clutched your knees. The first tear left your eyes once again, and you knew it wasn’t going to be the last.

Meanwhile, in the living room, the girls raised their heads when they heard the door open. Haseul walked in, her own distant look on her face when she read all the messages that the girls left her.

When she met their eyes, she had to pause, seeing the visible concern in each of their features. She placed her bag on the counter.

Giving the others a small smile before walking to the hall, opening Jiwoo’s room quietly in search of you.

She saw two figures and approached the bed, thinking that one of them was you, but when she got a better look, she grew confused when she only saw Yerim and Jiwoo, sound asleep.

Haseul looked around, walking to the bathroom if you were inside, the pitch black bathroom indicating you weren’t there.

She left the room quietly, thinking you were inside her room. However, you still weren’t there, she started to get worried, her mind running at the thought of you running away.

However, due to the quietness of the dorm, she heard a quiet sniffle come from the room beside hers, your room.

The leader padded down to the hall, holding the knob to open the door, which she found locked.

The older girl knocked, she got no answer. She tried again after a minute, and still you didn’t answer. She could hear you trying to muffle your sobs, though the faint sniffling could be heard through the door, so as softly as she could, she tried to reach you.

"Y/n? Are you there?" she called out, hearing the sobs cease before continuing again,

"Y/n, could you come out? It’s Haseul," she gave it her all, waiting for a few minutes to see if you would come out. Though she only went back to the living room, her shoulders slumped.

"She’s inside her room, I think it’s best to leave her for now. Y/n’s going through something, it’s best if we let her handle it on her own. She’ll open up when she’s ready," the leader announced, garnering nods from the others before they all separated, going inside their rooms.

It was true that some members could be the vitamin of the group, giving energy to the others.

Though, tonight, everything was silent. Everyone was solemn, as the person that could energize them was in the low herself.

--

The next day, the girls woke up differently. The usual fun, happy dorm was quiet, everyone doing their own things silently as they waited for Yves to call them to eat.

When breakfast was served, all of them gathered around the table, two seats were left unoccupied, until one of them wasn’t.

Haseul sat down, shaking her head when the others looked at her. You wouldn’t even answer the leader, so she wasn’t expecting more when she had knocked on your door.

"Will, Y/n unnie be alright?" Yeojin asked suddenly, making every pause to look at the youngest girl, they could only show her a smile, unsure of the answer until Yerim piped in,

"Of course, she’s gonna be alright, Y/n unnie’s strong, she just needs a little time."

The others could only silently agree, wanting to give you the space you needed, hoping you could recover faster.

The first day, they assumed that it would hit the hardest, so they did their best to give you the space you needed, although some were on the couch, waiting to see if you would go out, while the rest kept their doors a little open. Just in case you would call out.

The second day, they started to worry, since you hadn’t come out at all, you didn’t eat or drink, and they doubted that you were getting any sleep based on the occasional sobs and sniffling that they could hear when they went into their rooms.

However, on the third day, when they had enough, the girls started to worry. Their concerns were growing since they hadn’t seen you get out of your room in three days. The younger girls tried to cheer up the older girls, seeing as they were getting more antsy by the second.

Sooyoung and Jungeun wanted to use the spare key, but Haseul stopped them. Pushing that you needed more time,

"Haseul, I know you want to respect Y/n’s privacy, we do too. But she’s been inside her room for three days, without anything to eat or drink, not to mention sleep."

The leader bit her lip, she had to admit that she was concerned too. Her head was just telling her that she needed to give you space.

What she didn’t think about was whether you were coping or not. You needed someone, and all of them staying away wasn’t going to help you at all.

Haseul stood up, getting the dorm keys from the hooks and padding down the hall to your door. She quietly unlocked your door, peeking inside to see you curled up on the bed, slightly shaking.

She noticed that you were wearing her hoodie, but due to the minimal movements inside your room, the hoodie wasn’t much help with the cold surroundings.

She went in, closing the door behind her as she felt goosebumps along her arm, her body adjusting to the cold temperature. She walked around and crouched in front of you.

Seeing your sleeping face with a frown on your lips, partnered with the way your eyebrows were furrowed, she was disheartened seeing you like that.

Haseul couldn’t believe that she let you suffer for so long.

Carefully as she could, she climbed onto your bed, nudging you to the side before she lifted the covers on top of both of you.

Haseul wrapped her arms around your form, while you unconsciously inched closer to the source of warmth. She held your hands and frowned at the coldness.

She held your hands in her own, trying to transfer as much of her warmth to your body as she held you. A few minutes later, she saw the door open, followed by two heads peeking in.

Yeojin and Kahei looked at the leader before shifting their gaze towards the head that was peaking through the covers, the two came in.

Yeojin wasted no time as she went under the covers to hug you, her arms wrapping around your torso as she rested her cheek on top of your head, while the eldest approached the leader.

"She wanted to come inside. I couldn’t stop her," Kahei whispered, seeing the nod from Haseul before she rested her hand on your shoulder. Honestly, she also wanted to see you, her concern swimming in her eyes, which Haseul did take note of.

The older girl shifted slightly to the side, wanting to give the eldest room before she tugged at her wrist.

Kahei looked at Haseul, who only smiled, opening the blanket which she got into without much force, resting her head against the leader's shoulder, keeping one hand on your arm.

Throughout the day, more and more of the members would come inside the room, each of them choosing a place, until Hyunjin was the one who brought a comforter, pillows, and a blanket.

Then it became a collective decision for all of them to sleep inside your room for now.

Both sides of your bed were occupied by the others.

The girls let Kahei, Haseul, and Yeojin sleep in your bed with you. They didn’t question it more, knowing that they were the people that you approached when you had problems with something.

Seemingly, the air in the room grew lighter, their shoulders losing the weight that they had to carry. They were relieved that you were only a few feet beside them, easing the worries that they had.

The dorm was peaceful that night, not too sad, not overly happy.

--

You opened your eyes, waking up from your sleep.

You found your room dark. Glancing at the window, you noticed that it was already pitch black. The time on your wall said it was already past evening, a sigh left your lips.

You spent another day crying. Even if it’s been three days, you are still taking it hard.

You hadn’t touched your phone, left your room, or eaten a proper meal in so long. You were starting to feel bad for your members, knowing they must be worried, but being the nice people that they were, you knew they would let you have your space.

Another sigh left your lips before you tried to move your arms, but found it hard to do so.

Glancing down, it was then you realized the arms that wrapped around you, followed by the small body of the girl in front of you.

You blinked a few times, letting your eyes adjust to the darkness before you were stunned. Seeing Heejin, Hyunjin, and Yerim on the floor.

They were lying on the comforter, all three of them cuddling as they slept peacefully. You glanced down and saw Yeojin, resting her head against your chest as she kept her arms around your torso.

You turned, though, once again you paused when you saw the rest of the girls on the other side, your leader, and Kahei on your bed while the rest rested on the floor.

Then a small smile finally spread onto your face. Suddenly, you feel warm that they are already beside you. It was a good feeling to have somebody beside you, having your second family be by your side while you struggled.

Sure, you shut them out, grateful that they gave you your time. However, this was what you preferred, seeing them bunched around you showed just how much they cared for you.

You sighed, happily, as you closed your eyes. Sure, you might have lost another half of yourself, but you knew that your members would be here for you, ready to rebuild the broken side of yourself, little by little.

[stevenbasic]

“Knock-knock!” I heard at the door of my office, startling me. I was nearly - jesus - an hour into this video call with the Study Coordinator from Evolution, and had obviously lost track of time.  “Where’s my favorite patient?!?’ called the voice. It was Vida, my Nurse Practitioner, entering with a broad smile, a procedure tray and someone else and causing me to look up from my computer screen. “Time for your mediciiine…” In place of her usual white clinic jacket, she was wearing a tailored black jacket over a black, figure-hugging, dress, cut low.

Immediately I said my abrupt goodbyes to Gianna, over chat, and shut down the window right as she was, good lord, blowing me a kiss. At the same time I looked up and gave my wan smile of greeting to Vida and the generously curvy blond woman who’d entered with her…

“This is Morgan, if you two haven’t met yet,” Vida said, as she briskly approached my desk, high heels clacking. Trailing behind her a few steps was a woman in a white blouse and tan leggings - a big woman - broad of shoulder, wide of hip, huge of chest, standing taller than Vida by five or six inches...and myself even more, “She’s a Nurse Practitioner too, from Evolution until just yesterday, when she joined us.”

“It is very nice to meet you, Dr. J…” Morgan purred, in a voice deeper, richer than Vida’s. There was a queer smile on her face and a hint of a vaguely Eastern European accent in her words, one that she was obviously trying to hide. For now she was hanging back, taking her cues from Vida as the younger but more senior woman began to prepare her tray behind my desk to my left. “Nurse Vida is training me today how to take the care of you.”

“H-hi, uh, Morgan,” I replied, immediately sensing that that was not this woman’s given name, and remembering it was time again for my booster shot. The thought, for some reason, brought me a little thrill, remembering how it made me feel last week…but was it also responsible for the 8 pounds I’d lost since then? “But, um, what do you m-”

Interrupting my concerns, Vida chuckled. “Oh, don’t get worried, doc. I just figured that the more of us that know how to do this for you, the better,” she explained, opening the strange black box in which the vitamin B12/D/K booster vial was packaged. I noticed the familiar, strange blue tint of the liquid as Vida removed it along with the pre-packaged syringe. “And Morgan here has lots of experience.” At that, Vida nodded up at Morgan; the larger woman took that as a cue to move around the other side of my desk, to my right, and come to stand alongside me there. I was flanked.

“I-is that right, Morgan?” I asked, hearing the nerves starting to quiver in my voice. I hated needles, I hated them. But this single, combination shot was much better than three separate ones. “Wh-what did you do at Evolution?” I asked, not able to recall her resume as I looked up at her; she was gazing down at me, over the shelf of her formidable bosom. I was hoping that, if she had started seeing patients today, that she had been more buttoned up during the workday. The cleavage she was showing at this moment, over the neckline of her overmatched white blouse, was vast.

“At the Evolution Pharmaceuticals?” she replied, the accent in her voice unable to camouflage itself through the words, “There, I was with research team, taking care of study subjects. But before, I was in pediatrics ward, with preemies, the NICU.” She looked down on me with a crooked smile, and seemed to be resisting reaching out her hand to me. Instead, she ran her fingers through her shoulder-length blond hair. “I love holding little bodies.”

“Haha well, that’s exactly why we’re here, isn’t it, Dr. J?” Vida added, explaining to Morgan and pursing her full, plump, latin lips, “This young man has lost a few inches recently and we need to make sure he gets his vitamins.” With that, Vida beamed down at me and released  her thick mane of dark hair from the conservative bun she’d been wearing for the workday. A wave of the now-ubiquitous perfume in this place flowed over me, and I felt a stirring between my legs. I had been intermittently hard during my video call with Gianna - her tits were unbelievable - and I was afraid now that I might swell to some obvious, inappropriate monster of a boner with these women so close. “Lucky for him he has his girls to take care of him,” Vida concluded. The vial and syringe, for the moment, laid inert on the tray.

I tried to focus. ”I, heh heh, don’t know if I need someone to ‘take care of me’...” I spoke, trying to sound relaxed as Morgan’s left hand finally did come to rest on my right shoulder. I’d honestly just met this woman, but she was being very…familiar. Vida as well; she was generally a bit more aloof than she seemed today. It was like there was something weird in the air, something bringing them closer.

“That's silly,” Vida responded, “Even doctors need someone to look after them.” At that, she began to remove her black jacket, and laid it on my desk, as if preparing herself for her task. Underneath she wore a clingy black tube dress that hugged her hourglass figure and revealed her trim shoulders and the upper swells of her full chest; she watched as I struggled not to look at her body. “Who do you see for a PCP?”

“uh…” I began, trying to recall my last visit to a doctor’s office outside of this one, “…no one?”

“You mean…” Vida asked with exaggerated concern, as she herself put a hand on my other shoulder, leaning in to me and twirling a lock of thick, raven hair, “you don’t have a Primary??”

“N-no I, uh-“

”Well, that’s no good,” Vida concluded, standing straight and looking across me at her fellow nurse, “Don't you agree, Morgan?”

”Oh yes,” Morgan concurred, her dimpled smile betraying her amusement, stepping a touch closer, “You need the primary...care...provider.”

“That settles it,” Vida decided, removing her right hand from me to place both it and her left one on her broad hips, in determination, “I’m going to be your PCP from now on.” Her action had drawn my eyes to her remarkably tiny waist and shit this girl had some curves. “I’ll contact our insurance company, do all the paperwork. How does that sound?”

The big woman to my right was giggling, and her hand had begun to idly caress my shoulder.

“Uh, th-that’s fine…” I agreed.

“So,” Vida finally asked, with a wry smile, “does my patient have any questions before we get started?”

Ugh, right…the injection. “Well, um, honestly…” I began, knowing I should at least address the concerns I had over this combo B12/D/K formulation, “I’m not sure it’s working. I think I’ve lost weight since last week, and even maybe almost an inch…”

“That’s ridiculous. You must have measured wrong last time, used a bad scale,” Vida replied, trying to reassure me, “But…do you think you need to go out and get checked..?”

At that, Vida herself moved in closer, and I saw Morgan, to my right, turn her thick body more towards me. Both women looked down at me.

“Or do you want to let us take care of you..?” Vida finished. It felt like a challenge, and I sensed something, an inner struggle inside myself. The logical, intelligent practitioner who cared for his health wanted to answer one way, bring a halt to something that was dangerous, possibly ruining my life. But another part of me, the one that was feeling the cock growing once again down my right thigh in tribute to the ever-more enveloping warmth of these women, just wanted to say-

“n-no…I think I’m alright,” I answered, “let’s go ahead with the shot. I’ll be fine.”

If I had known then what I know now, that my mental capacity for rational thought in the face of arousal had been already crippled by foreign agents? If I had known that I was being purposefully enslaved, drowned more and more every day in the sea of pheromones and womanly curves in which I swam? WelI, I would have run screaming. Or, then again...would I?.

“I’m sure you’ll be fine,” Vida assured me. Her voice had dropped low, almost hypnotic, “You don’t need to go out and see any other specialists. We’ve got everything you need right here…” She was beginning to prepare the injection, now, drawing the blue liquid from the vial up into the syringe.

“Yes, everything,” Morgan agreed, looming over me now so close to my right, her hips and belly blocking out the world behind her. Her scent was warm, earthy. Between it and Vida’s reassuring tone, I felt powerless to do anything but trust these women.

“But,” Vida began again, inspecting the now-filled glass syringe, “if you are still shrinking, lots of guys would be jealous. Don’t you think, Morgan? Here, take this-” She handed a band-aid across me to her fellow nurse.

wh-what?

“Oh, yes,” Morgan concurred, her voice husky, unwrapping the band-aid, preparing it, “very jealous.”

”What…what do you mean?” I asked, confused, looking from one woman to the next, up at them. Without even being told, I had begun rolling up my sleeve.

Vida chuckled. “Oh, you know, the whole ‘vulni-chic’ thing,” she answered, holding the prepared injection now in her right hand, “you’d get very popular if you lost another-“

“One meter?” Morgan said, giggling in her deeper, richer tone, “Two?”

“haha I’d disappear…” I joked, feeling a wave of warmth coming from Morgan’s body to my right, “just like, haha…”

“It’s not a joke, Dr. J,” Vida said, her voice plain, suddenly, clinical, “it’s a thing. Here, get ready-“

“Ouch!!!”

She’d jabbed me, in the left shoulder, with the shot.

Vida spoke as she pressed the plunger, pushing the blue liquid into my deltoid. “It’s not just a fad for women, guys these days are admitting it, too…” she said as she drew the needle out of my arm. Immediately I’d felt it entering my body, like a milky warmth. “Good boy,” she praised, “Band aid?”

“Thanks,” I replied without thinking, watching as Morgan leaned her big torso across me as I turned in my chair towards her, presenting my left shoulder. She was nearly smothering me with her big breasts as she applied the bandage, and I did everything I could not to goggle at the wobbling flesh of her full, tan cleavage. My roving eyes made me realize that this generously endowed woman was wearing a very thin bra, or possibly none at all. Somehow, though, she was still so firm, with a natural buoyancy that kept her tits high and proud on her chest. My gaze could not get enough. But then eyes fluttered as I was assaulted by both an overwhelming breath of her perfume and the first rush of pleasure from the shot. I began to lower my sleeve, rubbing my arm as I looked up at her, smiling down at me as she finally stood up and away.

“I mean it, with the shrinking,” Vida started again, watching me with an appraising eye as I recovered from my shot, buttoned my sleeve, “have you seen Melissa’s new Instagram post?”

With the butterflies? I didn’t want to admit anything.

“The guys that follow her, the simps,” she continued, “they talk about wanting to be like bugs, crawling into her breasts.” She was replacing the syringe, carefully putting it and the vial back into the box. “It’s all over the place, everywhere, though no ones really talking about it yet,” she said, as she closed the black container, “guys wanting to be smaller, weaker than us. Wanting to become inferior, more passive, more submissive.”

She looked down at me and smiled, watching as the effects of the injection began to take hold. Even more strongly than last time, I was being gripped by a pleasant wave of lethargy, relaxation.

“Guys want to be small, these days,” Vida said, “and we’d like it that way too, wouldn’t we, Morgan?””

To my right I heard Morgan purr, a little grunt. “Yes, Nurse Vida,” she said, her voice low and struggling with arousal, “we would like it very much.” I had the feeling she was holding back her true feelings, in restrained understatement.

Vida laughed, casually. “It’s weird, all these changes in gender dynamics,” she continued, brushing a lock of my hair behind my left ear, “the new thing is bigger women, smaller men. Here, look at Morgan, perfect example…”

I turned, looked up at the smiling behemoth of a woman.

“She’s probably bigger than you ever were,” Vida continued, “taller, heavier, thicker everywhere.”

“Yes,” Morgan agreed, seeming to rise up, grow bigger, heavier, right in front of my eyes, “I weigh much, much more than the you.”

“And, you have to admit…” Vida asked, watching me look up at the huge, busty blond woman, who was now absolutely dwarfing me in my seat and could probably lift me like a child, “that’s kinda sexy, right?”

“I, uh….” I began, not knowing what to say. My erection was getting painful, now, contorted as it was in my pants, trying to stretch down my right thigh.

Vida spoke again, now holding my head in place by my cheek and jaw, so all I saw was Morgan. “So, even if you are getting smaller...lots of us would like that.”

I sat there, in the building afterglow of my injection, and looked at this woman’s body. It was, in all ways, so much bigger than my own. Thicker thighs, wider hips. Her arms were stronger than mine, her shoulders broader. Standing aside her, I would look puny. Even Vida - though she stood roughly my height, maybe an inch or two more - her hourglass figure and womanly hips made her body just that much more than mine.

”Dr. J,” Vida said, pulling me from my reverie, but not releasing my face from her hand’s gentle embrace, “You look like you need to go lay down. We’d take you up to bed ourselves but we have an important girl meeting to get to, don’t we Morgan?”

“Yes,” Morgan replied, though never taking her eyes or dimpled smile from me, “Very important.” I watched as she looked down on me, regarded me, considered me. “But I promise. Next time you can go to the sleep in my lap,” she said, “I have a very nice lap.” With that, Morgan bent at the waist a bit, to gently slap her prodigious thighs. My eyes watched them jiggle, and then her hands come up to the collar of her blouse, hoisting her breasts. “Or, if not on lap, we find somewhere else…”

“Haha okay,” Vida laughed, finally releasing my head but smiling as I didn’t turn away from the cleavage into which I was now dumbly gazing, in my vitamin-fueled haze imagining myself sinking into it like a caterpillar, cocooned in womanly warmth. “I’ll get a couple of the MA’s to get you upstairs…”

=========================================

more Vida & Morgan imagery, more posts, more more more at my Patreon.

Thanks for reading, everyone.

[imagines-by-a-typical-fangirl]

Stay With Me (Pt. 02 of 09)

Pairing: Daryl Dixon X Reader

Word count: 2.4 K

Summary: Daryl found you surrounded by the dead, stuck in the backseat of a car. You were wishing for death to take you away for quite a while now, but, as you slid back and forth into consciousness, there was only one thing keeping you alive. Him, the man with blue, worried eyes and kind voice. Your beaten up body was ready to give up, too wounded and broken to keep going. But this man, who went out of his way to save your life is the only thing in the world holding you up. And, because of him, you feel something you haven't felt in a very long time: hope. Wherever he's taking you, you want to get there, and not only to be buried. For what it feels like the very first time, you want to live. He takes you back to Alexandria, but even there, the nightmares and the terror from all the torture and pain you've been through keeps creeping closer, and Daryl, your hero, is the only one who can keep that all away.

Warnings: Mentions and description (not graphic) of past abuse; post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); some violence at the end of the story (a little bit graphic, but not so much); blood.

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{The Walking Dead Masterlist}

I want to thank my awesome friend @jodiereedus22 , who helped me (and still does) a lot to get this story done. She's also a writer and she's amazing so please go check her work!!

×

Fear

As much as you're trying to stay alive, to live, if there's still a life worth living, you have to admit it's hard. It's harder than dying. Death doesn't hurt this much, you think. It's been only a couple of days since Daryl brought you here, and if it wasn't for him, and also Carol, you wouldn't be able to do more than stay in bed.

Your body will take long to heal, says Denise, who comes every day to check on your wounds. The talking soon started. You often overhear Carol in the hall, muttering about how you don't talk. About what happened before. They know your wounds were inflicted. It's quite obvious. But you do talk, just not to her. You have exchanged some words with Daryl, not much though.

Today, after Carol helped you take a bath, you pull the blankets up, over your shoulders. You would like to wear pants, but the wound on your left leg is too deep, Denise said, bone-deep. So she doesn't want anything covering it, not wanting you to move in your sleep and cause the fabric to pull and squeeze it. You don't complain though. This wound is the worst, you soon realized. It doesn't mean the rest is any better, but the leg... It kills you. The painkillers only work for a couple of hours, and you have to endure the pain until you can have the next dose.

It's a nightmare.

It's only worse when you try to sleep.

Whenever you close your eyes, the memories overcome you. Keeping your eyes open in the darkness isn't much better. That's when you realized you don't have to be asleep to have nightmares.

“(Y/N).” Daryl's voice gets your attention, and you roll to lay on your back. He comes in, looking down at you, worried. As usual. “Carol told me ya don't wanna to go outside.”

That again. “No.” You mumble. Carol wants you to get some sunlight, on the porch. But you rather be in here, away from people's eyes.

“Why?”

Breathing heavily, you push yourself up, biting your tongue when pain takes over. Moving backward, you release the air you were holding when your back reaches the headrest.

“Ya need it. To soak in some vitamin D.” He furrows his eyebrows in the end, and you wonder if he's just repeating Carol's words. “Nobody here will hurt ya. Trust me.”

“Would you stay with me?” Your voice still sounds weak for not using it. Looking at your hands, you wonder if you should even ask this of him.

“Wouldn't ya feel more comfortable with Carol?”

Slowly, you shake your head no. Carol has been very kind, but still... You can't bring yourself to feel safe around her. Not completely.

“You don't have to.” Despite the constant need to be around Daryl, to feel safe, you can't force him to be around you. It's not fair. Clenching your hands into fists, you close your eyes. The thought of leaving this room without Daryl makes your whole body shake, tremble. “You don't have to. But I'll stay here. I-if someone out there sees me they will–”

“Hey, hey.” You feel the mattress moving, eyes opening, terror creeping over at the feeling of someone near you. But when you find Daryl's blue eyes, your whole body slows down, and you have to fight back the urge to touch him.

“I'm sorry.” The words come out, but not the sound.

There's a battle inside you. Maybe your mind is way too wrecked, as far as your body, and it's struggling to take a grip on reality. The only thing you know is that you can't go outside without Daryl. He will protect you, keep you safe from anyone who tries to hurt you. And without him... You're an easy prey. You always have been.

“That's not it. I just... I don't get why ya want me around.”

You don't understand him, why he sounds so... Sad. Desolated, even. You haven't noticed until now, but looking further, you recognize something in his eyes. Something you're sure people can see in you too. Pain. Suffering. A past that almost killed you, not only physically.

“You're my hero.” Whispering, you tell him, wondering if you've been looking for too long into his eyes. “I... I know you'll keep me safe.”

“C'mon then.” He finally says after almost a minute of silence.

You're starting to move, pushing your right leg to the floor with a groan when Daryl gestures for you to stop before picking you up. He's careful with the blanket, keeping it around you. A moan escapes your lips when a sharp pull makes your leg burn.

“Ya ok?” Eyes closed tightly, you nod. “Sorry.” He mutters before he starts walking. You finally get a look at the house. The walls are a light pale blue, with not much for decoration. Downstairs, the living room feels cozy, with two couches and a fireplace.

“You got her out!” Carol exclaims, causing you to cling more onto Daryl, heart racing suddenly. “It's good to see you down here, (Y/N).” She gets in your sight when Daryl turns a bit, coming from the kitchen with a smile on her face.

“Gonna stay out there with her.”

“That's good.” She happily nods. “The sun will warm you up.”

You know you should say something. Or smile. Somehow respond to her kindness, but you just can't. You just rest your head on Daryl's shoulder, a hand tugging on the collar of his shirt.

“Alright, let's go.” You're relieved when he starts moving again. Until you're outside.

The sunlight casts a soft, golden light on the street, and a cold wind messes with your hair. This is beautiful, peaceful if you consider the world you live in. But your eyes start looking for any signs of people, anxiety building up as Daryl puts you down on a wooden chair. When he let's go of you, your hands immediately grab the edge of the chair, so hard the muscles of your arms burn.

“Hey.” He calls, kneeling in front of you. “Relax.” Daryl takes both your hands, removing it from the chair. “I'll be right here with ya.” He then stands up, stepping back to lean against the white wooden railing.

With your eyes locked on his, you rest your back on the chair, taking a deep breath. It's good to be out, and the sunlight falling on your face and neck feels nice. You can't remember the last time you enjoyed it, the last time you even had the chance to just sit in the sun. Opening the blanket, you allow the sun to illuminate the skin of your arms. But your eyes start following the bruises, purple and greenish, the grazes and the scratches...

“Daryl.” An unknown voice gets your attention and you turn your head at the source. A man climbs the steps, and you start breathing fast. His beard reminds you of one of them. The one who smiled as he sliced your skin. “Is this (Y/N)?” His eyes fall on you.

How does he know your name?

When he steps in the porch, you look at Daryl, reaching out your hand. It takes a while until he understands, until his hand touches yours. Through the corner of your eyes, you see the man coming closer, and you need to hide, to run away.

In a jolt of adrenaline, you pull yourself up, almost stumbling down, your body finding no other way but to collide against Daryl's chest. A groan leaves your lips as you lose your breath and hide your face. Both your hands grab his shirt, all your weight on the right leg.

“Hey, ‘s alright.” His chest vibrates as he speaks, but you don't move, you just want to disappear, to stay away from whoever this man is.

“I don't get it.” The man says, making you flinch, tears already rolling down.

When your leg gives upholding you up, you almost fall, but Daryl is quick to hold you up. “ ‘S alright. C'mon.” He takes you in his arms again, and you hide your face on the crook of his neck, eyes tightly shut, as if it would make you disappear.

Your body shakes when a sob comes, the image of that bearded man filling your mind. ‘You'll beg me to do this to you in no time. You'll learn to enjoy the blade slicing your pretty skin open.’ He said, laughing, giggling. He holds you down, his body making it impossible for you to move.

“(Y/N).” Daryl's voice brings you back, and you notice you're in bed again, still holding on to him. “Look at me. Hey.” His hand comes to your face, but you can't open your eyes. “Ya need to listen to me. Yer safe here, I promise.”

“No.” You mumble, forcing yourself to look at him, his face close to yours, foreheads almost touching. “H-he looks like that man. He... He...” A hand comes to your side, to the cuts under your breast. “I need you to stay with me.” It comes out as a cry, voice cracking, sobs out of control. If he let's go of you, you'll break down. “Please. Please.”

“Slow down.” You feel his arms around you, and you curl up against his chest. “ ‘M right here with ya. Calm down.”

His arms are the only place you're safe. The only place you won't be hurt again.

“Daryl. Rick wants to speak to you.” Carol says, her voice low and soft, fading in the end.

“Tell him to wait,” Daryl mutters, a hand caressing your hair.

“I'll get her some water.”

“Alright.” He answers, pulling away. “(Y/N), look at me.” Blinking a few times to push the tears away, you meet his eyes. They look like the sky during summer, or like the ocean, steady and calm. “That was Rick. A friend of mine. He's been with us since the beginning, he would never hurt ya.”

“I... I...” Stuttering, you try to catch your breath. You don't know what to say, you just need to stay away from anyone who isn't Daryl. “Don't let him come here.”

“I won't. But I need ta’ see what he wants.” You immediately shake your head no, not wanting to be left alone. “I'll be right there.” He gestures at the door. “I'll be right there in the hall and then I'll come back ta’ stay with ya, 's that alright?”

No, it's not. “Ok.” You tell him, not hearing your own voice.

The cold creeps over your skin the moment he let go of you, so you pull the blankets closer, eyes on his back, on the wings... Until they disappear. Carol comes soon after with a glass of water, sitting on the bed and handing it over to you.

“Drink, (Y/N).” She urgers and you do as she says, hands shaking as you take a sip.

Daryl's low voice reaches you, along with another voice, from that man. Rick. He said he's name is Rick. You never learned the name of the one who cut you, they never allowed you to know anything about them. It was part of the torture, probably.

“She needs to be introduced to the group. They need to know who she is. Who she was before, you know that.” The man says, his voice coming from the hall outside the bedroom.

“She's wounded. Ya don't know how much.”

“I get it, but we take no exceptions. We can't. She's been here for days.”

“(Y/N) doesn't even talk yet.” Daryl raises his voice a little, annoyed. Your eyes are on the open door, waiting for him to return. “Something happened to her. People hurt her.”

“She speaks to you, doesn't she? I heard her–”

“She's not ready yet!” His thunder voice makes you shake a little, and you exchange a glance with Carol.

She gets up, moving to the door. “Could you take this downstairs?” She asks them, stepping back in and closing the door.

You start moving backward, a groan of pain escaping when your sore muscles complain. You wait for it, the noise of the door closing once again, soaking out the light, the click of the locks that imprison you in complete darkness. The cold that hovers over as you wait for the next day. The next one. The next torture.

“Don't.” Daryl's voice cuts in, a force of itself, pulling you away from the memory, back to reality. Daryl holds the door before it closes. “Keep it open.” You don't know how exactly he knows it, but you're happy he does.

Carol nods, returning to sit on the bed. “You two have something going on that I don't know about.” She mumbles, and you look down at your hands.

“She needs time and she'll have it. If Deanna wants to throw her out, tell her I'm out too.” Walking fast, he's soon back in the bedroom, gesturing for Rick to leave. Daryl's angry. You've never seen him angry. “Carol get out.” He mutters, not bothering with her eye roll. He stands beside the bed, and you reach for his hand.

“I'll talk to Rick. Put some sense into his head.”

He doesn't answer, sinking down on the mattress in front of you. His expression softens when you look into his eyes, the anger from seconds before vanishing. “Ya need to talk.” He begins, keeping his voice low. “Ya need to tell me what happened to ya. Who did this to ya.”

Blinking a few times to push the tears away, you look at your hands, clenching them into fists.

“If ya tell me, I will tell the group. Ya won't have to ever say it again.”

The last thing you want is to revisit all that happened. Your mind already does that, a lot, bringing you back to the place where you learned what real fear is. What pain and suffering are. The place where your worst nightmares had to flee. They were nothing compared to what happened there. And speaking of it is far worse. It brings it back to life all over again, make it happen all over again...

But it's better to tell Daryl then than to anyone else. This Rick or this group Daryl talks about. No, that you couldn't. If you tell Daryl, he'll understand. He'll keep you safe, keep you from ever going back there.

“Alright.” You mutter, taking a deep breath, feeling as your ribs ache when the air fills your lungs. Bracing yourself, you start.

×

@funeral-7 @heyyy-hey-babyyy @twdeadfanfic @soraitmnt @winchester-angel @bvbwestfall @shawtygonemad

[royallyprincesslilly]

Title: Crown For Two {3}

Henry Cavill AU x OFC Xari Thornton AU

Warning: Plot, Mild Cursing, Cheesy Christmas Themes, Slow Burn, Tease, PLENTY OF WORDS

Words: 7.2k

Summary: Xari Thornton is a travel photographer with a blog and social media that garners some heavy-duty traffic. People tune in to see where she is and what she’s doing there, all in hopes of either living vicariously through her or to plan their next vacation.  

Her slogan; “Traveling the path to the most off-beaten places, so you don’t have to.”  

Her next stop on her four destination travel itinerary of “Places You May Never Have Heard Of” is Sandvell, a small European country. When her plane makes an impromptu stop due to bad weather, she has no idea where she is. It feels like she’s stepped inside of a snow globe and back in time in a modern way. It leaves her fascinated.

This bad weather forces her to stay at an Inn, The Beaux, for the night. Rather than letting the hours tick by in her room, she explores and meets the friendly locals. While taking photographs, one local in particular captures her lens with eyes as blue as the ocean and a jaw that was chiseled from stone. They strike up conversation during their time drinking at one of the local bars, Ickles. Once they separate, she gets herself into a harrowing situation.  

As soon as she awakens, she realizes she’s not in some fever dream, but a palace and the owner of the palace is none other than the local she met before with the piercing blue eyes, His Royal Highness Henry Wellington Leopold Danglishton, First of his name, Crown Prince of Brexendor.

Note: All right, all right people, the ride continues. I really, really hope you enjoy this. As a reminder, it’s going to be fast-paced a bit, and I am gonna overload you with pictures because why the hell not, it’s a Christmas Fic. 😁 Feel free to come by and tell me what you guys think.

As always, thank you all for reading, I appreciate each and every one of you.

If you enjoyed this, please, LIKE, COMMENT, REBLOG!!! ❤️❤️

***Loosely Edited/Proofread***

***Slightly Interactive***

Previous Chapters: {1} | {2} | 

Chapter Three

-Y/N-

When you opened your eyes again, your head felt a lot different. It wasn’t spinning. It didn’t feel congested, heavy, or muddled. You saw everything with clear eyes, alert eyes. Glancing around the room, you took in your surroundings like it was your first time, though you were sure it wasn’t. Closing your eyes, you tried to remember everything that had happened. You remembered walking through the streets, taking pictures, and even watching the locals go about their business. You also remembered going into a bar and drinking that god awful drink.

 When you remembered seeing Henry’s face, you couldn’t help but smile. Your conversation played over and over in your head and how easy it was to talk to one another. Even his smile and goofy laugh had you snuggling deeper into the plush bedding. He was definitely attractive. All of a sudden, the accident flashed into mind. You’d been struggling with the wind and the snow and couldn’t see not even two inches in front of you. The pain of being hit was absent. It was like it happened so fast that you were out cold before your pain receptors could adequately translate it.

 You bolted up as the words “prince” and “your highness” echoed in your head.

 “Shit, he’s a prince.”

You rubbed your forehead, then pinched the bridge of your nose. Of course he is, you thought. Why would you meet some normal person in this clear fairytale country? Leaning against the headboard, you chewed your bottom lip, beginning to wonder about several other things. One of them was your exchange in the bar. He clearly knew who he was. You were not naïve when it came to the attention of men. There was evident flirting going on.

 “Was he trying to charm me into being some royal conquest?”

 Before you could think on the topic any further, there was a knock at the door. You sat up straighter while trying to figure out the right way to sit. You lied back casually but decided that was too casual. You then straightened your back and took note of how your breasts were accentuated thanks to the proper posture.

 “Too much,” you whispered, slouching again.

 The knock came again.

 “Ma’am?”

 Shaking your head, you sighed and said, forget it. You had no idea how to answer, so you said the first thing to come to mind.

 “You may enter.” You didn’t know why you decided to add an uppity British accent. Slapping your hand to your head, you shook it, already tired of your own shenanigans.

When you looked, it was the doctor you’d seen the night before.

 “Good morning, ma’am.”

 You gave him a polite smile as he approached with his black doctor’s bag.

 “How are you feeling today. Better, I hope.”

 “Much, thank you.”

 He nodded, then placed his bag on the bedside table.

 “How did you sleep? Any pain?”

 “No—well, not severe pain. I’m just mainly sore.”

 Dr. Alfonsi. nodded. “You can take aspirin for those aches. They should subside in another few days, as will the bruises.”

 You nodded again.

 “May I begin my examination?”

 Giving him a demure smile as permission, he approached and began doing all the things a doctor would at the beginning of any appointment. He took your blood pressure, checked your reflexes and your temperature. He examined your eyes, listened to your heart, followed along with your pulse and respiration, all the while taking diligent notes on his phone that he held in the breast pocket of his white coat.

 Ten or so minutes later, he closed his bag and then brought over one of the chairs in the room. Once he sat, he softly clapped his hands together.

 “And that is that. I am pleased your vitals are appearing better and better. Are you feeling the return of your strength?”

 “Not really,” you confessed.

 “As I explained yesterday, I had concerns from the results of a few blood tests I did. Did you know that you have several vitamin deficiencies?”

 Your eyebrows quirked. “Uh—n—no. I didn’t. What do you mean?”

 “Well, in an effort to provide a most comprehensive recovery plan for you, as I do with every patient I see in the royal family and elsewhere. I ran a full panel of tests and came back with several alarming finds. You have a deficiency of vitamin B12, Vitamins D, and E, you’re severely low in Iron and Folate. Have you ever been diagnosed with Anemia?”

 Your head swarmed with all the words and letters he’d just flung at you.

 “Uh—no. I don’t think so.”

 “I am diagnosing it now.”

 You watched his mouth move as he explained the dangers of the deficiencies and listed the symptoms one would expect, which all coincided with what you’d felt on and off for some time. The explanation seemed to go on and on. With every word Dr. Alfonsi. spoke, your breathing sped more and more. He must have seen the terror on your face because he reached out and took your hand.

 “It’s all right, dear. Though it is not as soon as I would have liked, we caught it. we now know that there is a serious problem.”

 “I—I didn’t know. I mean, I guess I’ve been busy these last few months and on the go, but—I never--,” you trailed off.

 “Calm down. It’s easy to fall behind on our health, but it is important we catch up. In order to do that, you’re going to have to make some changes.”

 “What kind of changes?”

 “Lifestyle and occupational. You’re going to need to change your diet, incorporate the therapies and medicines I will be prescribing, as well as taking it significantly easier than I suspect you have in the past,” Dr. Alfonsi explained.

 “Taking it easy? What exactly does that mean?”

 “Well, I mild cases I’ve seen in my years, I’ve recommended a month of strict relaxation along with what I’ve said before. That meant decreased hours at work, perhaps a sabbatical, bed rest until the patient begins to regain strength to prevent chances of falling and bone breakage.”

 “Bed rest?”

 “Yes, and that’s just for mild cases. Your case, I’m afraid, is a lot more serious. While I recommended it for others, for you, I would have to insist.”

 You sat up, giving him a look that said he was crazy.

 “I can’t go on bed rest. That’s not just decreased hours; that is complete incapacitation,” you protested.

 “I can understand your alarm, but that is how serious your situation is, ma’am.”

 “God, please stop calling me ma’am. My name is Xari.”

 “Ms. Xari,” he corrected.

 Several moments passed in silence. You couldn’t believe what you were hearing. Yeah, you hadn’t gone to the doctor in almost two years and didn’t take multivitamins and oftentimes forgot to eat, but you worked out, ate your greens—sometimes, and experienced plenty of holistic activities throughout the world. You had no idea you were in this bad shape.

 “Do you understand what I am saying, Ms. Xari? If you do not make drastic changes for the foreseeable future, you may not see the blooming of spring flowers.”

 Your jaw dropped. He was laying on pretty thick, but it was working. You were alarmed. Sighing, you rubbed your forehead.

 “What exactly do you suggest then?”

 “What you’re doing now, bed rest. I will communicate with the staff your dietary needs for the coming weeks as well as instructions for your medication--.”

 “Wait, hold up. What? You don’t mean for me to stay here, do you?”

 Dr. Alfonsi looked at you as if you were missing a few screws.

 “Yes.”

You flung your hands out. “Nope. Absolutely not. I can’t stay here.”

 “Why not? I am more than sure the prince would allow you to remain here until you are fully recovered, especially seeing it was his highness’ royal car that hit you for us to discover your ailments.”

 “No. I can’t stay here. I don’t—I’m a stranger to these people. I am—there’s no way. I can’t ask him or anyone here to wait on me.”

 Dr. Alfonsi smiled. “I understand your apprehension, believe me, I do, but it is unnecessary. I have known the prince since he was a child. He is a kind man and would never dare turn someone who is in need and sick away. You will be safe here.”

 Hearing how highly he spoke of his prince piqued your curiosity. It could have been one of those things where one’s subjects loved them so dearly they had not one bad word to say about them, or one’s subjects fears them so much that they didn’t dare utter one negative thing about them. You wondered which was the real story. Perhaps a little in the middle, you thought.

 Sighing, you leaned your head on the headboard, still adamant you didn’t want to stay here.

 “I have a life to get back to. I’ve already been here for two days too long.”

 “Two days?”

 The question in his voice had your head snapping to him. You cautiously opened your mouth to speak. “Yes,” you squeaked.

 “No. I’m afraid it’s been more than two days. It’s been a week since you’ve been here, Ms. Xari.”

 Your eyes bugged, and you instantly began searching for your phone.

 “What are you looking for?”

 “My things. Where are my things? My phone?”

 Dr. Alfonsi looked around the room then walked to a large wardrobe before he came back with your purse. You unintentionally snatched it from him, digging through it for the desired object. Once you had it, you discovered it was dead.

 “Fuck.”

 You began trying to get off the bed, but as soon as you stood, you dropped back to the bed, your legs unable to hold you.

 “I would caution against doing too much too soon. I’m impressed you were able to attempt an escape once. I doubt you’d be successful a second time.”

 “I need my charger. Where are my things? I’ve been off the grid for a week. I have family, people who will worry. I need—need--.”

 Your chest pounded so fast you could barely catch your breath. As you struggled to get a full breath, you began to panic. Dr. Alfonsi was to you on the other side of the bed in seconds, checking your pulse and instructing you to breathe slowly and deeply. You would if you could and wished you could shout that to him. Before you knew it, darkness was all you saw.

 ~~~~~~~~

When you opened your eyes, you were again tucked in the bed, but you were now hooked up to an IV. You took a deep breath and noted the heaviness that resided in your chest. Groaning, you slowly sat up. Once rested against the headboard, you remembered your mission. Your phone. Kicking off the covers, you used the rolling IV rod as if it were a cane and stood on wobbly legs. After a full minute, you began moving though every step you took felt like you’d fall to the floor.

 What should have taken you seconds took minutes. The steps proved to be more challenging to maneuver with the IV stand. You searched the room, but you didn’t see your luggage. That was when you saw your phone plugged into a charger on the nightstand to the left of the bed. You wobbled toward it then quickly unlocked it. Feeling yourself shake even more, you used the wall as your brace as you scrolled through. You saw the bounty of missed calls, unanswered messages, and emails of alarm. As expected, everyone was worried to death about you.

 “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

 You found your sister’s number and dialed it. It didn’t ring; instead, it went to voicemail. Your frustration was evident as you knocked over the small glass figurine on the bedside table. You ignored the shattered pieces and grabbed the IV pole, ready to walk out of the room in search of your things. Once you opened the door, your jaw dropped, seeing another luxurious room similar to the bedroom but decked in different colors.

 You took one then two steps, and your knees gave out. Before you tumbled to the floor, you heard a shriek and your name being shouted; then you were in someone’s arms. You looked up into blue eyes that were framed by long lashes and thick eyebrows.

 “Are you all right?”

 You snorted. “We have got to stop meeting like this,” you teased with a soft smile. It was a smile Henry returned.

“I cannot make any promises.”

 Henry then lifted you into his strong arms and carried you where you’d just come from. As he held you, you couldn’t help but glance over the side of his face that was perfectly in view. If you thought his jaw was chiseled to perfection before, now—you were certain there was not even one flaw about it. When he placed you back in the bed, he hovered over you for a few seconds. They were seconds that felt like minutes, especially with the intensity you saw in his eyes.

 “Xari.”

 Tearing your eyes from his, you glanced to your left to see Anika, your sister.

 “Nika!”

 She leaped onto the bed and scurried across to you, then threw her arms around you.

 “Oh my god. What’re you doing here!? How’d you get here?”

 “I’ve been so worried! I’m so glad you’re okay.”

 Relief filled you, and you found yourself relaxing a little more.

 “I don’t get it. How are you?”

 Anika pulled back with a wide smile on her face. She looked up, bringing your eyes to the man who still stood beside the bed. His arms were crossed across his chest, and a soft smile decorated his lips.

 “Him. He’s how I’m here.”

 You were still confused, and you knew your expression showed it.

 “I couldn’t reach you. I called and called and no answer. A few days ago, I got a call back, and it was the prince,” Anika began giving you a wide-eyed look when she said, “prince.”

 “Henry, please, I insist.”

 Anika smiled and actually giggled before she continued. “Henry. He explained everything and kept me in the loop with your condition. Because of that damn storm, I couldn’t get here. He ended up sending the royal jet for me once the storm passed enough to bring me here, so you’d have someone with you.”

 Wow, you thought, letting all she’d said register. He’d done a lot. You slipped your eyes to him and found them on you.

 “He’s been very kind, Ri,” Anika added.

 You were speechless. What were you supposed to say? Clearing your throat, you said the first thing you thought of.

 “Thank you.”

 Henry nodded and held your gaze. “It was done for you alone and with you in mind.”

 Well, shit, you thought, unable to take your eyes off of his. After a few moments, you heard Anika clear her throat, and it was Henry who looked away first.

 “Right. I was bringing your sister here for you to see. Now that you have her, I will give the staff instructions to see whatever the two of you will need for your stay.”

 “Uh—about that. It won’t be necessary,” you piped up.

 “Excuse me?”

 His intimidating aura increased, making you feel like a disobedient little whose daddy was about to punish her. At that comparison, you had a quick thought about whether or not he was a vanilla prince or one with plenty of shades of grey. Straightening your back, you held your head higher.

 “While I appreciate all you’ve done for me thus far, it won’t be necessary for you or your staff to fuss over my sister or me any longer. We’ll be leaving.”

 Henry cocked his head to the right, then tightly clenched his jaw.

 “Is that right?”

 “Why are we leaving?”

 Ignoring Anika’s question, you decided not to look away from Henry feeling a challenge in how he looked at you.

 “According to Dr. Alfonsi, you’re in no shape to be going anywhere.” He nodded to your IV pole for emphasis.

 “I will stay at the inn that is in town or a hotel.”

 “Nonsense. It was my fault you were hurt, and my responsibility to rectify the damage and harm I have caused.”

 “He’s right, Xari. It’s his fault, and you should let him accrue the expenses,” Anika voiced.

 “Nika!”

 “What! He’s a prince, Ri. He got it,” she replied a little under her breath but still loud enough for him to hear.

 “I must agree with Lady Anika.”

 Anika snorted and laughed. “I’m definitely not a lady.”

 Henry smirked at her then quickly looked back to you. “I must insist you remain here. At least until Dr. Alfonsi has given you the seal of good health. I am afraid if you were to go anywhere, something would happen to you, and I would not be able to forgive myself.”

 You studied him for a few moments, taking in the expression on his face as well as the tight clench of his jaws. Your eyes moved down to his still folded arms and the muscles that bulged because of his stance. He was definitely overwhelming like this, and though you hated to feel like a bother, you suspected that here was the best place for now. Glancing to Anika, she gave you a stern eye that said, “just give in already.”

 Rolling your eyes, you nodded. “Fine, but only until I’m well enough.”

 “If that is your wish, just know you are welcomed here for however long you wish.”

 “My goodness, such a gentleman. They sure breed them differently here, huh sis.”

 Henry smiled, then glanced at Anika. “Everything is different here in Brexendor.”

 “I bet,” Anika finished.

 “Since it is settled, I will proceed to advise the staff. Dr. Alfonsi has already given several strict dietary orders as well as health orders. If there is anything you require do not hesitate to speak it. Lady Anika, I have already instructed a bedroom be prepared for you, but I will instruct it be as close to your sister as possible.”

 “Thank you.”

 He nodded, then looked back at you. “I sincerely hope you feel better soon.”

 “Are you leaving?”

 “Unfortunately, yes. I am afraid I have quite a lot to do today. By all means, though, feel free to go where you please. My home is yours, ladies.”

 With that, he curtly bowed his head then walked toward the door. Before he walked out, he stopped.

 “Oh, Xari, try not to escape again. I cannot guarantee I will always be there to catch you.”

 You saw the hint of a smile on his lips and instantly knew he was teasing you.

 “Somehow, your highness, I suspect you will magically appear at the mere hint of a faint.”

 He chuckled to himself then walked out, closing the doors behind him. Once alone, Anika wasted no time.

 “Holy fucking shit, he is hot as fuck!”

 You snorted and laughed as you relaxed into the bed.

 “Wonderful censor you have there, Nika.”

 “Fuck censor.”

 “Well, that last time I said fuck here, I was looked at like I was the most uncouth Neanderthal. I suggest you keep your fucks to a minimum.”

 Anika bounced you. “Will you be able to keep your fucks to a minimum?”

 “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

 Anika rolled her eyes. “Whatever! The air hasn’t even gotten a chance to come back down from the sweltering levels your guys’ flirting raised it to.”

 Your jaw dropped. “Excuse me! There was no flirting.”

 “Yes, there was, and it was not on your side alone. He was flirting with you too. What in the world is going on? I need the whole story without even the smallest detail left out.”

 You sighed then proceeded to tell her the whole sordid tale. As instructed, you didn’t leave anything out. You even told her about that exchange between you and Henry before you walked out of the bar. At the end of story time, Anika had a huge grin on her face.

 “What are you grinning at?”

 “You. Leave it to you to get whisked away by a prince and have him fall; for you in record time.”

 “No, no, no. Falling? Nika, you’re imagining things. He hasn’t fallen for anyone. He’s a prince, for crying out loud. They don’t fall for anyone, let alone some commoner. Have you never watched The Crown?”

 Anika snorted and dropped to the bed at your feet.

 “First of all, The Crown is whack. Second of all, this is not England. This place is fantastic. It’s like some Hallmark country where everything is beautiful, quaint, and perfect. You smiled and bit your bottom lip, agreeing fully.

 “Third, I was sitting right here, listening to your banter. I think he could totally fall for you if he hasn’t already.”

 You rolled your eyes, ignoring everything she was saying. Anika loved to play matchmaker, though you hated every time she did it.

 “You’re practically in his bed. We just have to get you there.”

 You rolled your eyes again, shocked at how quickly she’d gotten there. “Okay, down, girl. According to this doctor, I’m falling apart, Nika. Any bed I’ll be in for a while is this one.”

 “Well, now you have me here to encourage you to lap up the luxury and hospitality of his highness the prince of Brexendor. Get the fuck outta here!”

 The two of you laughed loudly. This situation you’d found yourself into was the most ridiculous one either of you could have ever begun to imagine.

 A few hours later, you found yourself alone while Anika settled in her room. Another knock sounded at your door. Being unable to open it yourself, you instructed them to come in. Once the doors opened in walked a beautiful girl about your age with long black hair and features similar to Henry’s. In your head, you suspected she was a family member. She smiled sweetly as she approached you. When she was by your bedside, she dropped onto the mattress.

 “Hi.”

 You returned her warm smile. “Hi.”

 “My god, you are beautiful.”

 You snorted, then pinched your lips together, trying to suppress your laugh. She was insane. You looked the worst you’d ever looked.

 “You’re being kind. I haven’t showered in a week and only today got to comb my hair. You’re being very, very kind.”

 She giggled but still looked genuine.

 “I’m Jemma,” she said, holding her hand out to you. Once you took it, and instantly noted how soft they were.

 “It’s nice to meet you.”

 “I have been trying to get here to introduce myself, but Henry told me to stay away so you could acclimate. Otherwise, I would have been here much sooner.”

 You smiled and assured her it was fine.

 “How are you doing?”

 You shrugged. “I guess I’m okay.”

 She didn’t look convinced and took you in for a few moments. “I’m sure my brother has brought all the best doctors for your care and has thought of everything that would ensure your comfort. With that treatment, I expect you to make a full recovery in no time.”

 “Brother.”

 “Yes. Please tell me you did not think I was his girlfriend or something of the sort.”

 She looked disgusted, which made you laugh.

 “No. I suspected a family member. So you’re a princess.”

 Jemma rolled her eyes as she sighed out as if she was already tired of the conversation.

 “Yes, but I promise it is not nearly as glamourous as you’re thinking. The only nice thing about it is the diamonds, everything else, eh.”

 You smiled, already liking her. she gave off an air that said she didn’t take herself seriously and even liked to have a bit of fun more times than not.

 “The staff is all abuzz with news that you will be residing with us for the next few weeks. Henry has told them to cater to your every whim, and because it came from him, everyone is in a tizzy over it, prepping to ensure you are at your most comfortable,” Jemma explained.

 “What. No, that’s not what I want at all. They don’t have to go all out.”

 “It’s okay.”

 “No. then everyone will think I’m some prissy thing who likes to be waited on when that couldn’t be further from the truth.”

 Jemma took you for a little while, then took your hand and squeezed it gently.

 “Not to worry, Xari. I assure you no one will think that.”

 You sighed then tried to forget it because it was too late to change whether or not they thought it. You were sure everyone was already whispering about you and Anika, the two Americans who’d somehow found their way into the palace.

 “Also, we are not as gossip centered as other monarchies. I promise,” Jemma added, raising her hand as if to swear it.

 When she sensed you relaxed, she proceeded to ask a plethora of questions about you, ranging from where you were from to what you did and the all-important if you were single. You felt like you were on a modern-day “Who Wants to be Friends With a Princess” tv show. With every fact, you revealed she revealed a similar one and so on. After an hour, you found that you had plenty in common, something that was shocking for you.

 When Anika came back, the party really stated. Your laughter picked up, as did the stories that Jemma revealed about royal life. Those stories prompted Anika to tell stories of life as a commoner in America as she called it. The only thing was her stories we mainly all about partying, dating, and men. With each story, Jemma’s eyes widened, and you felt like slowly Anika would end up corrupting her.

 “Nika, stop. You’re going to have her on an episode of Princesses Gone Wild,” you joked, which had both of them in stitches on your bed.

 “I will have you know that I am not some innocent wallflower. I know things,” Jemma countered.

 You couldn’t help but laugh loudly. Just the way she said that told you she didn’t know very many things. That was when Jemma proceeded to list the names of the men she’d dated, a list of three men. Anika was the one to ask the nature of these relationships, to which Jemma said she knew in great detail the kind of underwear each man wore. You lost it right then and there, dropping onto the bed in a fit of laughter.

 Exhaustion caught you off guard, dampening the mood of the night. Jemma assured you that she’d keep Anika company and show her around to give you time to take a nap. After thanking her, the two women walked out of your room, leaving you to silence. Once the door closed, it opened again. this time it was the woman named Audrina.

 “Good evening, ma’am. Is there anything I can bring you?”

 “No. I’m all right.”

 She nodded, then closed the door leaving you again. You quickly drifted off to sleep.

  ~~~~~

 -Henry-

He’d never met anyone quite as beautiful as you. he remembered when you’d walked into the bar and sat down beside him like you were right where you were supposed to be. You had no idea that the bar was empty because it was closed for him to be there, had no idea that he was not some ordinary citizen. He liked being a no one, especially if it meant he could sit there with you all night. He remembered wanting just that. If his phone hadn’t run, if he’d had more time, he probably would have tried to hold your hand. If he’d had more time, he would have gotten himself into an even bigger predicament than he was now—attracted to a woman he knew better than to touch.

 Slowly he looked over the features of your face and took in each detail. He pressed the elements of your face to his memory so he could call on them when he was alone, buried in work. A sigh escaped him as a lite feeling filled him. It was an unfamiliar one. He wanted to touch you. It was an urge that was so strong he almost couldn’t overpower it—almost. He balled his fist and sat back in the settee beside your bed, trying to ignore the feelings that washed over him.

 “Remember yourself,” he whispered before he looked back to the work he’d brought with him when he’d decided to pay you a quick visit.

 This quick visit was an hour ago. When he found you asleep, he should have turned around and left, but he couldn’t. He intended to sit here for a few minutes, ten tops, but he still had yet to tear himself away. He mustered what was left of his control and focused on the screen before him and tried to write his speech for the new world bank’s upcoming opening.

 This was one of his father’s pet projects, and he was filled with pride to see it to fruition, but also it made him miss the man more. Sighing, he closed his eyes and began rubbing his temples. Every time he thought of his father in the last few months, it brought him added stress. It was this stress that prevented him from sleeping longer than four hours a night.

 “Christ,” he whispered.

 “Are you all right?”

 Jerking his head up, he saw you awake with your head still atop the pillow. You looked like a dream, or perhaps his best nightmare.

 “I am sorry. Was I too loud?”

 “No. I um—just happened to open my eyes.”

 You slowly sat up, allowing the blanket to fall from your chest to your lap. As you adjusted yourself, he moved his laptop to the other side of the settee.

 “You didn’t answer me, though. Are you all right?”

 A smile tugged at his lips, but he fought it. “Me? Should it not be me be asking you that?”

 “Can’t we ask each other?”

 He studied you for a few moments, then nodded. “I am fine.”

 “Liar.”

 His jaw dropped, half shocked you would go there. There weren’t many people in his life that would dare.

 “I take it no one calls his highness a liar,” you teased.

 “You take it right. Maybe Jemma or my mother on occasion and a few of my friends but not many.”

 You smiled, then shrugged. “I call em’ like I see em.’”

 He crossed his arms and leaned back. “Pray tell, what gave me away to make you insult me so?”

 Your smile widened before you sucked your bottom lip into your mouth, bringing his eyes right there. He adjusted in the seat he sat and waited for you to continue.

 “Your eyes are red, under your eyes puffy, and one doesn’t just say Christ to say Christ.”

 You had him there. He pushed his fist under his chin and continued to watch you.

 “So you are implying I look bad.”

 You smirked then, and he picked up the change in the air.

 “I mean, I’m sure I look the same as you. So take comfort in that.”

 A chuckle escaped him. “So that is a yes; I do look bad.”

 You looked at him but didn’t answer.

 “I will take that as a yes on my part. however, regarding you, you look far from bad.”

 You snorted then laughed, and it was the most shockingly endearing sound. It wasn’t a laugh he would hear from others in his company. Their laughs would be all dignified, but yours was genuine. It was also downright terrifying, but he preferred it.

 “Now I know you’re a liar. I look absolutely disgusting. I can’t believe I’m going to tell you this, but I haven't showered in a week.”

 He pinched his lips, hiding his smile. You looked so uncomfortable admitting that.

 “Oh my.” He placed his hand over his mouth as if the fact mortified him.

 You pinched your lips.

 “Please tell me you have at least brushed your teeth.”

 “Today was the first day in just as much time.”

 Again he put his hand over his mouth and widened his eyes for emphasis. “Appalling.”

 You snorted again, and the delightful laugh came back. This time the laugh looked to encompass your entire being, and you glowed. When your laughter subsided, you dabbed at your eyes as you tried to catch your breath. He held out his handkerchief to you. When you took it, you used it to replace your fingers.

 “Thank you.”

 When you finished, you inspected the fabric, then looked at him.

 “You must like your women disgusting to still be here.”

 He shrugged.

 “How are you feeling?”

 “After that nap, I’m feeling well.”

 That made him happy.

 “Are you feeling well enough for some dinner?”

 “Uh—I was told I’m to stay in bed.”

 “Yes, Dr. Alfonsi has informed me and the staff as well. That is why--,” he began before walking across the room to the door.

 Once he opened it, the staff rolled in three carts filled with platters, trays, and bowls of plenty. Once the carts were parked, he thanked the staff and let them see themselves out.

 “Dinner is served.”

 The look on your face said you didn’t know what to say, so he uncovered the treys finding the menu items he’d chosen for the meal.

 “I was not sure what you liked, so I had them bring all of it.”

 He took up a plate and brought it to you. It took a few moments for you to take it, but you did. That was when he went back for his to sit back on the settee.

 “Also, do not feel as if you have to eat ladylike for me,” he began.

 You took up your fork and shoved an overflowing fork full of mashed potatoes into your mouth, letting a small glob rest at the side of your mouth.

 “What was that, your highness?”

 That was all it took for his attraction to turn to yearning.

 The two of you ate in silence for the most part. He asked you questions to get to know you better, and every new piece of information he found out only made him like you more and more. When you spoke about your career, he heard the passion in your voice, and it spoke to something in him. It had been a long time since he’d been around anyone who was genuinely passionate about the things they enjoyed. It stirred something in him, something he wasn’t quite ready to uncover.

 “I am sorry that I did not tell you once we met who I was.”

 You paused with your fork in your mouth.

 “It’s okay. To be real, why would you reveal to a stranger your secret identity. That’s like Clark Kent walking around in his incognito glasses with an S on his chest. It defeats the purpose.”

 “Clark Kent. Superman.”

 “Yes, one of my favorite superheroes.”

 A soft smile spread across his face before he nodded.

 “What’s yours? Wonder Woman?”

 He scoffed, then shook his head as he stood and approached the carts, ready for dessert. It wasn’t the Strawberry Cheesecake he truly desired, but it would have to do. When he returned to his seat, he placed your plate in front of you and sat.

 “It’s Wonder Woman, huh, or maybe Poison Ivy, ooh, Catwoman.”

 He sat there patiently, letting you list them off. He couldn’t help but wonder why those were chosen.

 “Before I answer, can I ask why you chose them?”

 He saw the mischievous glint twinkle in your eye as your lips quirked up into a smirk.

 “Oh, this, I must hear.”

 “No reason. They’re just seen as the most desirable by fanboy standards,” you responded while rolling with your eyes.

 He suppressed a chuckle to put a piece of the cheesecake into his mouth.

 “So?”

 “None of those.”

 “Oh, please do enlighten me,” you quipped.

 Resting the fork on the side of the dish, he responded. “Nubia and Storm.”

 He sat there and thoroughly enjoyed watching the emotions wash over your face. Shock was the first, then disbelief, and finally awe. Now you sat there assessing him as if you thought he was pranking you. He was not. You opened your mouth to say something, and he stopped you before you did.

 “I suggest you do not repeat it. I assure you I am not.”

 Your eyes darkened right at the moment you sucked your bottom lip back into your mouth. Losing his train of thought and head for control, he put another piece of the cake into his mouth, licking the back of the fork. Your eyes lowered to his mouth and your teeth sunk into that delectable bottom lip. If he were a weaker man, he would have tossed the plate he held to the side and been on you in under five seconds, but he was not a weak man. As future King, weakness had no place in the monarchy.

 Weakness was not an option until he saw you put the fork in your mouth to mirror his actions, only your tongue swirled around the teeth of the fork in a way that made his pants instantly too tight. Christ, help him.

 He cleared his throat and changed his position on the couch to one that would hide your effect.

“Interesting. I didn’t expect those,” you stuttered.

 “What did—what did you expect?”

 You shrugged and toyed with the fork against your lips. “Something else, but I’m pleasantly surprised.”

 Your eyes met again, and the temptation he felt was somehow more than he’d ever felt. He wanted you. He’d wanted you since you cursed about how disgusting the drink was at the bar. The only thing was, this want had shifted.

 “I am happy it is pleasantly.”

 Again your eyes lingered, and he wanted nothing more than to give in to the heavy cloud of temptation that filled the room.

 “What’re you working on?”

 He cleared his throat again and straightened himself. “Uh—a speech. One of my father’s projects premiers in a few days, the first since his um—” he cleared his throat again. “Since his passing, and I am going to be the one to cut the ribbon on it.”

 “Oh, I’m so sorry for your loss.”

 Keeping his eyes turned downward, he nodded. The sincerity in your voice touched him. “Thank you.”

 The silence between you stretched for a few seconds before you spoke again.

 “What’s wrong with it?”

 “The speech, um—I do not know. It just does not feel right.”

 “Want me to take a look?”

 “Do you have an aptness for speeches?”

 You placed your place to the side and adjusted your posture.

 “Not speeches in general. I do have a knack for words. I’ve spent the last few years writing about the places I’ve gone in such a way that makes people want to go there themselves. I might know a little something, something.”

 He smiled, put the plate beside him, and leaned forward to hand you his laptop. He watched as you read through the few paragraphs he’d already written and wondered what you thought of it. Every lift of your brow or nibble of your lip had him more and more curious as to the thoughts in your head. After a few minutes, you nodded.

 “This isn’t bad. You sound like you’re on a good roll.”

 “No critique?”

 ��How about you leave me with it for a day or two, and I’ll have some notes. Or, you could give it to your royal speechwriter.”

 He chuckled. “What makes you think I have one of those?”

 You rolled your eyes and smiled. “Hello, this is a monarchy. I am sure the monarchy employs people to make sure their dear prince is always PC.”

 You were right.

 “I think I would rather leave it with you,” he replied, making you smile in the process.

 “Okay. I’ll knock your socks off then.”

 “You already have,” he said, standing to take your plate.

 He tried to arrange the empty plates, dishes, and classes on the carts in a way that wouldn’t have them falling once they were moved.

 “Is there anything else I can get for you?”

 He turned in time to see you wobbling toward him, clutching the IV pole with one hand and a plate with the other. He saw your knees buckle and wrapped you in his arms, taking you to the bed in the process. With you underneath him, he couldn't deny how right this felt. Your breathing was heavy, your eyes bright and chest heaving. The way you were looking at him made his next move the only possible one.

 He brought his lips toward yours but right before he claimed them, he hesitated. The tiny sliver of space between your lips made it easy to feel the literal electricity that sparked between you. He was so close, but so far, and he wanted to get closer. The fact that you didn’t look as if you objected to this made his blood bubble with desire even more than it had hours ago when he first walked in.

 “I apologize,” he whispered before he pulled away from you with whatever ounce of strength he had remaining. He stood before you then held his hands out to you.

 “Let me help you.”

 You placed your hands in his letting him hoist you up. He wrapped his arm around your waist and helped you back to the side of the bed you’d been this entire time.  When he eased you down, he spread the blanket over you and assured you were comfortable. Being sure to keep his eyes away from yours, he turned to his things and gathered them.

 “I will let you get some rest. If Dr. Alfonsi found out I were here preventing that, he would give me a stern talk.”

 “Thank you for this,” you said.

 He took his laptop from your bed and nodded. “I will email it to you.”

 “You have my email?”

 “I am head of this country; I have multiple resources at my disposal,” he replied, smirking at you. Your smile said you fully understood his meaning and knew he was teasing. You understood him. Yet another thing to like about you, he thought. He quickly averted his eyes then gave you a slight head bow.

 “Good night, Xari.”

 “Good night, your highness.”

  He walked toward the door and poked his head out to instruct the waiting staff to remove the carts. The walk back to his room was filled with several stops as he thought to go back, but when he realized he couldn’t, he carried on his way. He’d never been filled with so many conflicting wants and thoughts before, and he suspected as the coming weeks stretched, this would be just the tip of the iceberg.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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[superherotiger]

My Enemy, My Destiny (Villain Irondad AU) // Ongoing One-shot Series

Main Series (Chronological order):

Legacy of Ashes: (Tumblr) (Ao3)

Dragging his creation out of the water, the man gripped onto the cooled metal and stared into a set of hollowed, glaring eyes, burning with flames from the forge that raged behind it. There should have been a sense of pride, or at the very least relief. But instead all he felt was an inferno. A ferocious, hungry wildfire that wanted to burn everything to ashes, starting with the ones that had dragged him into this nightmare to begin with. The ones that had stolen his creations and tainted them beyond repair.

The ones that had taken innocent lives without care, without remorse…

Somebody had to right the injustices of their corrupted world, and settling his newest creation -a mask of hardened metal- over his face, Tony Stark knew deep down that he was the only one strong enough to do it…

Help Me Mend What I Broke: (Tumblr) (Ao3)

“It’s a little early in the day for you, isn’t it Tin Can?” the Spiderling teased with a sudden lightness in his voice.

“Well, I thought I might get a little bit of Vitamin D for once,” Tony mused as he paced towards the Spider with falsely casual steps. The street was empty at the moment after everyone had fled upon his initial arrival, the sight of the suit alone enough to send every citizen within a three-block radius packing for the hills. They, of course, were terrified, but Tony found it more entertaining than anything.

“I hope you’ve brought your A game today Bug, because I’ve been itching for a fight,” he said, lifting into the air to glare down at the mutant with his intimidating figure.

“Let’s see if you can keep up old man,” the Spider retorted as he shifted into a crouch. Ready. Ready for battle.

Tony smiled, and blasted forward without a second warning.

I’ve Got You, Little Bug: (Tumblr) (Ao3)

“Bug?” he asked into the darkness, his voice unusually coarse. “Hey Bug? You here?”

“M ‘n ara-hnid…”

Tony smirked at the slurred mumble from behind him, turning around so his arc reactor faced the bars and shone just brightly enough to outline the figure lying in the other cell. Deep brown eyes narrowed at the new source of light before blinking up at the man sluggishly. “Hey man…” he murmured with that same dorky smile of his. “Funny seein’ you here, am I right?”

Tony rolled his eyes dramatically. “You’re such a pest, you know that?”

~~~

Art:

Fake Disney+ Original

~~~

Villain Irondad AU tag

[tuiccim]

Terrigenisis (Part 1)

Pairing: Avengers X Inhuman!Reader

Words: 3870

Summary: Your life is torn apart after undergoing terrigenisis unwillingly your life is turned upside down when you are deemed too dangerous to return to civilian life. You are put with the Avengers team to train and rebuild your life.

—————————————

“Charlie, the car’s packed. Are you ready?” You called. Your first vacation in two years ahead. A rock climbing trip to Arizona. 

“Almost. Come here.” Charlie called from the apartment kitchen. 

“What’s up?” You smile as you walk into the kitchen and see Charlie holding out a small medicine cup. “What am I taking today?” You smile at your husband who is currently on a vitamin kick. 

“Magnesium, fish oil, vitamin d, and a multi.” He smiles as he picks up his own cup and clinks it together with yours. 

You both take the vitamins and then you lean in for a quick kiss. “Okay, good lookin’, vacation time.” 

You turn to head for the door but Charlie’s voice brings you back around, “What’s happening?” he says in a panicked voice, “(Y/N)!” You turn to see his body being covered by rocks. 

“Charlie!” You reach out for him. 

“Don’t touch me!” He yells, but then you feel something strange yourself. Looking down you see the rocks beginning to cover you, too. 

“Charlie!” You yell again. 

“I love you!” He says just before the rocks cover him completely. 

“I love you!” You cry and then are overtaken. 

Fourteen months later.

“So, you’re just gonna spring me on them?” You look at Nicky Fury as he drives to the Avenger’s compound. 

“Not like we had a lot of time. Coulson's team had to move. This will be the safest place for you and you can be trained as an Avenger here.” Fury states.

You roll your eyes. Not like you hadn’t been training for the last six months with Coulson’s  team, but apparently you can’t even tell anyone about them. Now, you’re supposed to join this team and everything will be all better. You put your earbuds in.

You’re brought into the conference room and face the Avengers team. Steve Rogers, Natasha Romanoff, Clint Barton, Tony Stark, Bruce Banner, Wanda Maximoff, Vision, Sam Wilson, and Bucky Barnes. 

“Avengers, meet your newest trainee.” Fury states. 

You keep your gaze down not wanting to see the anger on everyone’s faces. 

“What is this, Fury?” Captain Rogers is the first to speak. 

“Look, we need a place for her to train and become mission ready. Right now, here is the safest place for that. I’ll let you get acquainted.” With that, Fury leaves. 

You stare after him as he leaves you to the team’s mercy. You turn to look at Captain Rogers, apprehension clear on your face. He seems to take some pity on you. 

“You’re an agent?” He asks. 

“Fury didn’t give you my file?” You ask quietly. 

“What he just said is what he gave me on you.” Captain says, not unkindly. 

“Great.” Your quiet, sarcastic reply. 

“Why don’t you sit down and we can figure this all out?” Captain Rogers motions to the chair at the head of the table. You felt like you were sitting in front of a jury. 

You looked around the table slowly at each solemn face. Miss Maximoff offers you a small smile and it bolsters a bit of courage in you. 

“Okay. What’s your deal, then?” Mr. Stark questions. 

“I guess it’d just be best to lay it all out for you from the beginning, huh?” You look to Captain Rogers. 

“That would make things easier.” Agent Romanoff says. 

You look at her and nod. “Fourteen months ago, I underwent terrigenesis.”

“Where did you get a terrigen crystal?” Dr. Banner asks. 

“My husband, Charlie, handed me our morning vitamins. One was a new fish oil we were trying.” You say. 

“Oh my god. You were one of the accidentally exposed?” Miss Maximoff says sadly. 

“Yes.” You nod. 

“Your husband?” She asks.

“He was not an Inhuman.” You look away for a minute to compose yourself. The loss of Charlie was still painful. You swallow and continue, “I, however, am. I emerged from the chrysalis with the ability to understand any vocal communication.”

“You mean verbal communication?” Dr. Banner says. 

“No, I mean vocal. A dog barks and I know what it’s communicating, not exact words but the meaning. Eventually after hearing any human language for a time I can speak it also. I was fluent in English and Spanish before, but since I’ve become fluent in Mandarin and Cantonese, and I have working knowledge of a few others. I’m basically a universal translator.”

Agent Romanoff speaks then in Russian “You can understand anything said to you even if you don’t know the language?”

“That’s correct. I actually don’t know any Russian. If you could speak it to me when we talk I’ll pick it up eventually. If any of you know other languages, it would be helpful for me to learn to speak them.”

“I would be happy to help you with Sokovian.” Miss Maximoff says in her language. 

“Thank you. I’m grateful for whatever I can learn.” You smile at her. 

“And that’s it? You can’t go back to your life because you can understand what everyone says?” Mr. Stark snarks. 

“No. With being Inhuman comes additional strength and stamina, my gifts also include increased hearing and I can, um, warg for lack of a better term.” You give a half shrug. 

“Warg? Like embody animals?” Agent Barton says. 

“Yes. I can see, hear, feel through them. I have a Red-tailed Hawk who I’ve built a relationship with. I use her often to train.”

“Where is she?” Agent Barton asks. 

You warg into her for a moment turning your eyes yellow as the hawks. “She’s in a dogwood tree on the north side of the compound.”

“Did you just…?” Agent Barton raises his eyebrows.

“Yes.” Turning back to Mr. Stark you say, “To answer your questions, Mr. Stark, the combination of my Inhuman abilities with the fact that I am a black belt in Krav Maga and Karate, an expert level climber, and a computer programmer put me in the threat category.”

“Programmer?” Mr. Stark smirks, “You mean hacker?”

“No. I mean programmer. I was not a part of anything clandestine… Until SHIELD.” you roll your eyes and a few of the team chuckled. “I could already kill someone with my bare hands, add in extra strength.” You shrug again. “Anyway, I’ve spent the last six months training with another Inhuman to hone my skills. They needed the full team to be field ready and Fury decided to move me here.”

“What are you lacking for field readiness?” Captain Rogers asks. 

“Firearms training mostly.” You reply. “I have control of my abilities. My hand to hand is more than sufficient.”

“Do you have any experience with firearms?” Sergeant Barnes asks. 

“Kinda why I got a black belt in Krav Maga and Karate was hoping to never need one. And if I do, I’ll take one.”

“Family?” Captain Rogers asks.

You shake your head, “My mom died when I was three. My dad raised me. He was a Coast Guard pilot. Died five years ago in a helicopter crash.”

“I’m sorry.” He says sincerely. 

“Thanks. Any other questions? Anybody?” You look around the table. 

“I think you’ve given us enough for now. Do you have bags or boxes we can help you move into a room?” Captain Rogers asks. 

“Just those two. I’ve got them.” You pick up the large duffle and backpack. 

“Why don’t you take an hour to settle in and then we’ll meet to start training.” 

You nod, a little surprised he wants to start training so soon. 

“I’ll show you to your room.” Miss Maximoff says. “Where’s she going?” she asks the Captain. 

You see a cloud come over Captain Roger’s face for a moment before he says, “There’s a free room on my end.”

You realize he was trying to figure out where to put you and decided to keep the newbie nearby. You didn’t mind. 

“Thank you.” You say to Captain Rogers and you nod to the rest of the team before you follow Miss Maximoff. “Thank you for showing me to the room, Miss Maximoff.”

Wanda giggles, “You can call me Wanda.”

“Thanks. Please call me (Y/N). And I thought you were gonna speak Sokovian to me?” You give her a small smile as you walk to the elevator. 

“Oh, of course.” She says in Sokovian while hitting the elevator button. 

“I wonder how good her hearing is.” You hear the whisper in the conference room. 

“Good enough I can hear you from out here, Agent Barton.” You call back and grin at Wanda. 

“Thanks!” He calls back. 

“Not so loud! Geez” You and Wanda giggle together as you get on the elevator. 

“What did he say? I couldn’t hear anything from where we were.” Wanda asks. 

“Oh, he just wondered how good my hearing is.” 

“Is it really sensitive?” 

“Yeah. I have to sleep with earplugs and I wear headphones a lot to block some of it out. It’s taken a while to get used to it. At first, it was super overwhelming.”

“I understand. It was very brave the way you told everyone what happened to you.” 

“Seemed fair. I got the chance to read all of your files, so I know about everyone else.”

“Here we are. Do you want help unpacking? I can stick around for a little bit.”

“It’s okay. You don’t need to do that. I’ll see you at training?”

“Yes, I’ll be there. If you need anything ask FRIDAY she can direct you where you need to go and answer your questions.” Wanda waves as she leaves you alone in the room. 

The room is nicer than what you expected. A queen bed, desk, bookshelves, tv, walk in closet, and your own bathroom. You would definitely need to go to a store soon to pick up a few things. Hopefully, that wouldn’t be a problem with Captain Rogers. You empty your duffle bag, put your clothes away, and place your toiletries in the bathroom. You unwrap the two framed pictures and place them on your desk. One is you and Charlie smiling in a waterfall grotto after a long hike. The other is your wedding day, you in a short lace dress, him in a white button down and khaki pants, with the sun setting behind you on the beach just after you said your vows. You gently touch the photo, “Love you, Charlie.” you whisper. 

You decide to change and head to wherever training would be. You stop at the panel by your door, "Uh, FRI...FRIDAY?"

"How may I be of assistance, Ms. (L/N)?"

"Where would I go to meet the others for training?"

"The training room is located on the first floor." She says as she flashes a map up. 

"Thank you." You feel kind of sheepish talking to the AI. 

Once in the training room you look around at the well equipped room. Every type of weights, machines, a boxing ring, mats, weapon lockers, and even a rock climbing wall you saw with excitement. Looking up at the ceiling you see it's criss crossed with beams and you get a wicked idea. You grab a climbing rope hanging down at one end of the room and shimmy up it quickly. You're able to swing yourself to the beam fairly easily from there and then walk the beams towards the entrance to the room. You take a seat with your back to a joist and stretch your legs out in front of you. It's not long before Captain Rogers and Sergeant Barnes come in together.

"Wonder if she’s as skilled as it sounds.” Sergeant Barnes says. 

“Black belts in karate and krav maga? I’m sure she has some skills but getting her to Avenger status may be a challenge.” Captain Rogers says. 

“Guess the question is, is she up for it?” Sergeant Barnes scoffs. 

“I certainly plan to try, Sergeant.” You say from your perch. 

“What the hell?” Sergeant Barnes looks up at you and you give a little wave.

“What are you doing up there, (Y/N)?” Captain Rogers says. 

“Waiting.” You say simply. 

“You felt the need to do that twenty feet in the air?” Captain Rogers scoffs.

You shrug, “Felt like climbing.” Getting up, you walk along the beams. 

“Can you come down, please?” Sergeant Barnes says. 

“Sure.” You walk back towards the climbing rope, once close enough you jump to it, and slide down. 

Sergeant Barnes is right next to you when you turn around, “What would have happened if you’d fallen?” 

“It’d hurt,” you say and look up to the beams, “A lot.”

“Might want to reconsider using the beams as a waiting room.” He snarks. 

“Nah, I like being up high. I’m pretty sure-footed.” You look back to his face and he is scowling down at you. “What?”

“Nothing.”  He says, “I’ll take that to mean you're warmed up. Let’s do some sparring and see how you do.”

“Okay.” 

You follow him to the mat. Captain Rogers is standing to the side watching. You take stance and Sergeant Barnes begins. You can tell he is holding back and you go harder at him. After sparring with Melinda May for months you weren’t about to let him patronize you. You were holding your own and noticed the rest of the team filtering in and watching. He grabbed your arm and you used the leverage to jump up, throw your legs around his neck, and  throw him to the ground. He rolled to his feet immediately and came right back at you. After a few more minutes, Captain Rogers called out, “Alright. Let’s switch it up.” You stopped but kept your eyes on Sergeant Barnes until he retreated. 

“Not bad.” Sergeant Barnes says to Captain. 

“Natasha.” Captain Rogers looks at her and she nods. 

“Agent Romanoff.” You incline your head to her as she approaches. 

“Natasha’s fine.” She smiles. 

“(Y/N). Thanks.” You smile back and Natasha throws the first punch. You manage to hold your own for a while but in the end Natasha managed to pin you to the mat. 

“Well done.” Natasha says. 

“Not well enough.” You say with a mirthless chuckle. 

“Who or what is next, Captain?” You say looking at the super soldier. 

He looks over to Sergeant Barnes, “Bucky, can you take her to the range and gauge her abilities there?”

“Sure.” He eyes you and then makes a motion for you to follow. 

As you walk out of the training room and turn down a hallway towards the range, you say to him, “I don’t have a lot of experience with guns, Sergeant Barnes.”

“Bucky.”

“What?”

“Call me Bucky.”

“Okay. I don’t have a lot of experience with guns, Bucky. I’ve shot a few times, but the last year has really been about my abilities and honing hand to hand.”

“Well, we’ll see what we have to work with and go from there.” Bucky says as he holds the door to the range open for you. You slip in past him and watch as he goes to the locker and pulls out a Glock, a clip, and a box of ammo. He then sets it all down in front of you with protective gear and stands back with arms crossed. 

You reign in a smirk at his demeanor. He really is testing you. You pick up the clip, add the ammo, load and cock the gun. Clicking the safety into place, you put the protective gear on, pick the gun back up, and move to aim at the target. You take the safety off, aim, and fire. When you’ve emptied the clip, you set the gun down and turn to Bucky while removing the headphones. “It’s still loud even through these things.” 

Bucky actually chuckles and hits the button to bring the target up for inspection. “You at least know how to load and shoot, but your aim needs work.”

While you had hit the target with each bullet, the rounds were dispersed throughout the torso. Yeah, your aim was lacking. 

"Yup. Want me to go again?" 

"No, just trying to get an idea." He gives you a tight smile that you return. 

When you return to the training room, Captain Rogers takes you through a workout and then brings you a bottle of water. "Good work today."

"Thanks, Captain. I know it was awkward having me sprung on you." 

"You can call me Steve. We all go by first names around here." He says.

"My, uh, my dad always required I called people by their title until invited otherwise. Old habits." You shrug.

"Yeah, I get it. Go get some rest and I'll show you around later."

"That would be great. Thanks." 

An hour later you had showered and changed. You went to the common room to see if Captain Rogers, erm, Steve was around for the tour he had offered. Sam Wilson looked up from the couch. 

“Hey, newbie.” He smiles. 

“Hello.”

”I’m Sam. So, you have a hawk friend? What’s its name?”

“Doesn’t really have an English translation. It’s kind of a mix between a squawk and screech so I just call her Redtail.” You say. 

“I’m trying to figure out if you're kidding.” Sam eyes you. 

“The first part, yeah. But I really do call her Redtail.” You smirk.

“So, you can… what did you call it?”

“Warg. Warging.” You say. 

“You can warg into her anytime you want?”

“Generally. I try to be respectful of her. She’s not a pet. She’s a companion that has chosen to befriend me and allow me to use her. Would you like to meet her later?” 

“Yeah. That would be cool.” Sam smiles. 

“(Y/N).” Steve strides into the room. 

“Captain. Sorry. Steve.” You give him a small smile. 

“Ready to take a tour?” He asks. 

“Yes, thank you. Would you care to join us, Sam?”

“I’m good, but don’t forget about introducing me to Redtail.” Sam says from his spot on the couch. 

“You got it.” You say as you go to follow Steve. 

“Redtail?” Steve asks.

“The hawk I mentioned.” You say. 

Steve shows you around the compound, explains FRIDAY’s functions, and talks a little bit about the team. He’s very kind through the whole process but you can tell he has some concerns about you becoming part of the team. 

“Steve, can I ask you something?” You finally work up the courage to say.

“Yeah.”  He turns to look at you. 

“How does everyone feel about me being dropped on you? There’s bound to be some resentment.”

“I wouldn’t say resentment. Everyone’s just a bit guarded when it comes to new people. You must have done something right for Fury to put you here, though. Most of them know that.”

“Any helpful hints?”

“They’re all good people. Just give them time. They’ll warm up. And, seriously, don’t ever steal Natasha’s cookies.” He says. 

You laugh. “I’ll keep that in mind. Would you like to meet Redtail?”

“That’d be great.” 

“FRIDAY, will you let Sam know to meet us at the North entrance?” 

“Getting used to FRIDAY already, huh?” Steve smiles.

“I can see how useful she is.”

A few minutes later Sam appears with Bucky following behind. 

“Hey Buck.” Steve greets, “Wanted to meet Redtail, too?”

“Uh, yeah, if that’s okay, (Y/N)?” Bucky asks.

“Sure.” You give a small smile and head outside. “Gimme about 15 feet of space, guys. Don’t want to scare her.”

The guys move back as asked and you put your hands around your mouth and let out a loud “CAW CAW!” You look back at the bewildered expressions of the three and start laughing. “Just kidding. Sorry I couldn’t resist.” They all chuckle. 

You reach in your back pocket and pull out a falconry glove. Slipping it on, you warg into Redtail turning your eyes yellow and ask her to come to you. Redtail makes a graceful arc from the dogwood tree she had been resting in and landed on your upheld hand. “Hello there, sweet girl. How do you like your new spot?” Redtail looks at you tilting her head. 

“Does she understand you?” Sam asks.

“No, we can communicate when I warg, but it’s more like an exchange of images than it is talking.” You warg for a moment to ask Redtail if she can bring her closer to the three curious men and once you receive her consent you release the warg. “I’m going to bring her closer but please keep your hands down, okay?”

“Yeah, okay.” Steve says. 

“So, she’s your pet?” Bucky asks as you walk closer. 

“No, I don't take care of her. She’s not my pet. She’s my companion, my friend.” You say petting the bird's chest. “Would you like to pet her?”

Bucky nods and you take his right hand in yours and bring it up to Redtail’s chest allowing him to pet her. She makes a small chittering sound and you smile at Bucky, “She likes you.” He smiles sweetly. 

You move to Sam next and Redtail immediately starts chittering again. You take Sam’s hand and bring it up to her chest like you did with Bucky. Redtail leans into Sam’s hand and tilts her head back and forth studying him. She starts to reach a claw out to move to his hand but you warg to her and show her her talons tearing his skin. “Wow, she really likes you. I guess she sees a fellow bird.” You laugh.

“I do have a way with the ladies.” Sam grins. 

You move to Steve last and allow him to pet Redtail. When you look at him he’s grinning and you can’t help but smile at the reactions each of the guys had to her. You look at Redtail, “Thank you, my friend.” You lift your arm in the air and she takes flight. 

“She’s beautiful.” Steve says. 

“Yeah, she is. I’m so grateful for how she’s stuck with me. I try to always give her the respect she deserves.” You say. 

“So, you warg into her just whenever you want?” Bucky asks.

“I can. I usually warg into her and ask her permission. She’s rarely denied me. She was always curious about humans and she feels safe with me, but she’s still a wild animal and I don’t want her to lose that. I want her to always be free, ya know?”

“Yeah, I get it.” Bucky says with a smile. 

“Why don’t we head in and find some dinner?” Steve suggests. 

“Sounds good to me. I’m starving.” Sam says. 

As you walk in, you remember you have no food here and need to go to a store. “Hey Steve. Is there a vehicle I can use?”

“What for?” He asks. 

“My grand escape plan.” You deadpan, “I’d like to go to a store and pick up a few things. Or am I confined to the compound?”

“No, of course not. You can use the SUV in the garage. Keys are in the locker. Scan your thumb to access it.” Steve says. 

“Great. Thanks. You guys need anything?”

A round of no’s from them, you head to the store to pick up some essentials and food. The rest of the night is spent settling in.

Part 2

Masterlist

[girlgirlgirlnormal]

I want her to be mine Part 1

Kuina x OC (female OC)

TW: Death; Niragi (Yes, I’m including Niragi as a trigger now, even though he is very ooc here and OC’s best friend); harrasment, sexual harrasment mention, bullying

Word count: 3.8k

Ino was dancing her way through the crowd. She didn’t have to push through. People made room for her. She knew that they were not doing it out of the kindness of their hearts. She was known to be a gun wielding maniac and Niragis best friend. They didn’t want to be on her bad side, and she was known to be ill-tempered. Wearing short shorts that barely covered her butt and a green velvet camisole she would never be pointed out for her clothes. Everyone was clothed less in the beach. The things that made her stick out of the group where the two guns she had on her hipholsters and the knife strapped to her thigh.

“Finally.”, she muttered, as she spotted Niragi on the other side of the pool.

She grabbed the drink of a girl standing nearby and walked around the pool, watching how her best friend was talking – no threatening – Chishiya and Kuina.

“Niragi”, she said, as soon as she was within hearing distance, “Aguni wants to see you.”

She crossed her arms, the drink, a pink liquid in a tall glass, still in her hand. She hated being the message girl.

“I have business to do”, Niragi said, not turning back to look at her, “This little man is bothering me.”

“That little man is always bothering you”, she said sighing, “Come on. You know how Aguni gets when he has to wait.”

She wasn’t looking at Niragi. Her gaze was fixed on Kuina. She found that that woman was too beautiful to be real.

Niragi groaned, pushing the head of his sniper rifle into Chishiyas stomach. He still didn’t make any effort to move away from the man. Kuina was watching him with a worried expression on her face and Chishiya simply did not seem to care. Sighing she took a big gulp of the cocktail she was holding and smashed the rest on the floor.

“I demand attention!”, she almost shouted.

Niragi chuckeled, “Remined me. Why don’t I kill you?”

“Because I’m your best friend, idiot.”

Niragi seemed to accept that, turning and walking past her, to the hotel. She stayed for a moment, gifting Kuina a little smile, then she turned back, following Niragi inside.

“If you want her so much, why don’t you just take her?”, Niragi asked, as they were crossing the lobby.

“Are you asking why I’m not making a move or are you advising me to force myself onto her?”, Ino asked, laughing.

She knew Niragi since highschool. He had interned and later worked at her fathers indie gaming company and she had worked on the same team with him. She knew everything about him and he about her.

“Both”, he said, shrugging, “You’re not the one to wait around if you want something.”

“If you were not so precious to me, maybe I would be the one shooting you.”, she replied, bumping her shoulder in his arm, making him laugh.

After they reached Agunis room she waited outside. He had asked for Niragi. He didn’t say that he wanted to see her with him, so that meant that she was not invited. She was leaning against the wall, quietly humming the hanging trees melody and playing with her knive, starting to not only hum but sing, as she saw Kuina coming out of the elevator. She knew she looked kinda scary with her huge scar extending from her right eyebrow all the way down to her navel. Singing such an ominous song while staring at the beautiful women walking towards her must have made her look even scarier. Not to forget the throwing knive she was twirling between her fingers.

“You really shouldn’t hang with Chishiya”, she advised, as Kuina was walking past her, making her stop, “At least not then Niragi is around. I’m afraid that one day you might get caught in some enthusiastic friendly fire.”

She couldn’t believe that those there the first words she had spoken to the woman she had been watching since she got to the beach. She never had acknowledged her enough to talk to her before.

“I can do whatever I want.”, Kuina answered, “What is it to you if I die?”

She had caught the woman watching her, but her expression could never be read. Maybe she was just some transphobe who had identified her and was plotting her death. Maybe she just didn’t like her face, that seemed to be the problem between Niragi and Chishiya.

The woman smiled, “You’re too pretty to die because Niragi can’t stand that weirdos face.”

Kuina was silent for a moment. Did she just tell her that she was pretty? She turned to look the woman in the face. She was still not showing any emotions.

“Too pretty, huh?”, she asked, the woman was pretty herself, but Kuina never thought much of it. She was just another militant and if Niragi was not following her like a shadow she was dancing with some other militant. Kuina had noticed that those guys seemed to vanish after she had seen them with her.

Pushing herself of the wall she put the knife back in its strap and smiled. She walked up to Kuina. She was short compared to her, only reaching her chin, and smiled up to her, before turning around and vanishing in her rooms, a couple of doors next to Agunis. The door between her and Agunis door was leading into Niragis room and their rooms were interconnected. She put the chair against the doorknob. If Niragi wanted to see her, he would come through the middle door anyway. She deattached her holsters and wiggled out of her shorts. Tomorrow she would have to play a game, she thought, as she was pulling her camisole over her head. She just hoped it was one she could beat. She would have Niragi with her. She never went to a game without him. He was the only person in this place she trusted. She slipped into a silk nightdress, the kind she used to sleep in all the time and brushed her hair. Her life used to be so good. How did she and up here?

“What’s up, princess?”, she could see Niragi in the mirror, leaning on the frame of their connecting door.

“Cuddles tonight?”, she asked, placing the brush on the vanity, and turning to Niragi.

He laughed, but nodded, “I think you just need some Vitamin D.”

She rolled her eyes, “Maybe I would get some if you didn’t kill everyone who dared to touch me.”

Niragi was already getting undressed all the way down to his boxers and laid down, extending a hand to her. Sighing she stood up and walked up to the bed, laying down beside her best friend and letting him wrap his arms around her.

“They all didn’t deserve you”, he mumbled into her hair, “I only want the best for you.”

“You want me to die horny”, she answered, cuddling into his chest, “I miss being touched that way. I would be very grateful to you if you did not kill everyone who touched me.”

Niragi sighed, “Can’t you just abstain as long as we’re here?”

She playfully hit his arm, “I’m going to approach Kuina and I want her to stay alive to fuck me.”

“Stop thinking about sex”, Niragi scolded her with a bored voice, “Concentrate on the game tomorrow. We will have to play.”

Yawning she nodded, before falling asleep in her best friends’ arms.

The next day went by uneventful and as the signal for the start of the games sounded through the hotel, she and Niragi were already in the lobby. They would not draw a number. They already knew they would go to the game with the other militants. They had to take some civilians with them, though. Who they would take with them would be chosen by luck. Many did not consider themselves lucky then they drew the M instead of a number. Either they would have an easy game and the militants would fight their way free for them or it would be a deadly game and they would be killed by the same people who were sent to protect them.

She was watching Kuina and Chishiya argue.

“You have to find someone to switch with.”, he said.

“Who would switch with me?”, she asked, looking around.

Everyone who wanted to participate was already making their way out. Thinking that this was an opportunity to “bring order to the beach” she signaled Niragi to stay and made her way over to Kuina.

“What number did you draw?”, she asked, not even acknowledging Chishiya.

“We were about to switch”, he said, holding his own number, a 3 up.

She ripped the piece of paper out of Kuinas hand and unscrambled it.

“Looks like you’re with us”, she said grinning, “That’s the law. You go with the number you get. No more horsetrading.”

She grabbed Kuinas arm and pulled her with her to the two militant cars. Niragi opened the door to the front passenger seat, grabbed the young man already sitting there and pulled him out. Before he sat down, he turned to her and threw the keys to her, “You’re driving today.”, he said, getting in.

Catching the keys, she watched Kuina sit down and finally sat down herself. The drive took them about 15 minutes. The game arena looked like a normal apartment complex. She stopped for a moment, showing Niragi what had caught her attention. There were two different entrances. Both were limited to 10 people each. A sign told them to leave their weapons outside.

Niragi pointed his head to the second entrance and one of the militants peaked in, “Here are already six people”, he informed them.

“2 here”, Ino informed the group.

“Militants here”, Niragi pointed to the first entrance, “Weeklings there”, he pointed to the second door.

The people they had brought, only 4 including Kuina, were looking distraught. They were 7 militants.

“She’s with me”, Ino said, pulling Kuina by her arm to her side, “She’s coming with us.”

Kuina did not protest. This short before a game one should never put the militants in a bad mood.

The others nodded. She had the highest number after Niragi. If he didn’t say something to contradict her, they would listen. Niragi rolled his eyes about his best friends’ behavior, but she had told him that she wanted to fuck that girl, so she would.

After entering through the first entrance, they each picked up a phone and waited for the other group to be full. A couple of minutes of silence ensued. Niragi and Ino did not talk because there were others in the room. The others did not talk, because Niragi was in the room.

“Registration is closed”, the mechanic voice announced, after a while, the five of clubs card flashed on the screen, and a table was elevated from the ground with all kinds of sharp objects on it, “Game: Kill or be killed. Two teams with ten players each have been assembled. Players are free to choose weapons from the table. Clearing Conditions: The team with the most kills wins. Game over: If a player dies or is part of the team with the least kills it is game over for them. Time limit: 20 minutes”

Niragi laughed, walking over to the table and grabbed an axe and 2 machetes. He gave one of them to Ino and pointed to the throwing knives, “Take them.”

She took them. She didn’t mind small orders from Niragi. They had been a team for five years. That meant that they have been giving and taking orders to and from each other for half a decade.

“What are you good with, princess?”, Ino asked, turning to Kuina.

The other militants did not take anything yet. They were like a pack of wolves. They would not get anything until their “Alphas” were done. Considering that Aguni was not with them they had to do as Niragi pleased. Kuina looked over the table.

“Sword”, she said and watched as Ino grabbed one and handed it to her.

Ino caught Niragi staring at the screen.

“What’s the problem?”, she asked, looking up to his face and then to the screen.

Beneath the rules two columns had appeared. Group Right and Group Left. Both columns had a big black zero beneath their group names.

“It doesn’t specifically say that we have to kill people from the other team to win”, he said, thoughtfully, looking back to the two civilians standing in the back, they had not even chosen a weapon yet. Ino guessed the reason for that might be one of the militants standing by the table looking the girls up and down with a dirty look on his face.

She rolled her eyes. Men.

“Maybe we should look into it”, the man said, taking a knife and walking toward the women, who were already covering into the wall.

Niragi turned to watch him. Ino saw up to him again. His face didn’t betray any emotion but seeing those women in such fear had to remind him of his old life.

“Maybe we should”, Ino agreed, walking up to the girls, coming to a halt right next to the militant.

He smiled at her. She smiled back, swinging her machete into his neck. His eyes were widened in shock as he fell to the ground. Gurgling noises could be heard for a couple of moments, then they stopped. Ino looked back to the scoreboard. A point had appeared for the other group.

“I guess that means we protect the girls”, she concluded, walking back to Kuina and grabbing her hand, “Niragi?”

“You stay here”, he said looking to the women, “everyone else, the hunt is on!”

With that he hollered, swinging his ax and machete and opened the door to enter the playing field, abruptly stopping in his tracks.

“It’s a fucking labyrinth”, he muttered, “Come on. We need to split up.”

Ino sighed, that was a dumb idea. Everyone died in horror movies as soon as they split up.

Niragi looked at her for a moment, before nodding and walking off. They would survive. There was no way this game would get any of them killed.

“You’re with me.”, Ino said, grabbing Kuinas wrist and dragging her off, walking in the opposite direction of where Niragi disappeared.

“Why?”, Kuina asked.

The labyrinth was silent. She couldn’t hear anything beside her heart pounding.

“I don’t think this is a talkie talkie game”, Sakura said, her machete raised, slowly walking around the next corner.

Kuina huffed, following Ino. If she didn’t have to, she walked straight, not taking any turns. They had to hurry. They were already down to 15 Minutes and the only point given in the game was the militant Ino had killed. She started to consider it a bad idea. She had made a point for her rivals. If they didn’t find and kill someone soon, they would lose. She stopped. She thought she had heard something. Trying to concentrate on the sounds around them she closed her eyes, hearing Kuinas footsteps continue walking, walking past her.

She heard the sound again. It was coming from around the corner that Kuina was about to turn. Not even thinking she lunged forward, grabbing Kuinas waist and pushing her back, while swinging her machete. She was too late. She screamed as something made impact with her forearm, wildly swinging her machete she only stopped, as the man infront of her collapsed to the ground.

“Ino!”, she heard Niragi scream.

Examining her arm, she screamed back: “I’m fine.”

She was cut and bleeding, but it didn’t look too deep. An agonized moan escaped her mouth, as her phone beeped, signaling the point she had made.

“Are you ok?”, Kuina asked, automatically grabbing her arm to have a better look at her wound.

“I just said that I’m fine, didn’t I?”, Ino growled. This was so frustrating. It was her dominant hand.

“I’ll take the lead”, Kuina announced and wanted to continue walking, but Ino grabbed her wrist.

“Look”, she said shoving her arm in Kuinas face, “That happened because you took the lead. Stay the fuck behind me.”

With that she walked off, machete up in her left hand, cautiously walking around the next corner. Her phone beeped again. A quick look on it showed her that her team had gained another point. She grinned. Now it would be enough if no one else on their team got killed.

She heard a scream and started looking around, “Its ok”, she told Kuina, showing her the phone. They had gained another point. Kuina nodded.

She was just about to turn the next corner as she stopped, raising the machete over her head, and hacking down the second she turned the corner.

“I guess it really is a matter of time until one of us kills the other”, Niragi said laughing, as their machetes clashed.

Ino took down the machete that she was holding up with both hands, grasping her injury with her other hand.

“Fuck”, Niragi groaned, grabbing her arm, “That’s not fine.”

“It will be”, she said, taking her arm out of his grip, “Don’t worry. Made a kill yet?”

Niragi shook his head, “You are the first people I´ve seen since I got in the labyrinth.”

“Looks like I’m winning”, Ino said grinning, walking off.

She only heard one set of feet walking behind her, so she turned. Niragi was right behind her, Kuina was still standing where she had left her.

“Come on princess”, Ino said smiling, “I want to give Niragi a chance to beat me!”

Niragi had walked ahead and was now hollering. He found someone from the opposing team and was using his ax to cut the man down.

Niragi turned back to them, after the man he was axing down stopped moving. Blood had splattered all over his face and shirt, “It’s a tie, princess”, he screamed joyfully, turning back around and started walking away.

“No ties for you!”, Ino laughed, pushing past Niragi and running ahead.

“What the fuck, Ino”, Niragi laughed, following her.

“Kuina, move your sweet ass over here”, Ino ordered, laughing and ran off.

After a couple of moments, she could hear Kuinas footsteps behind her. She grinned. She was already listening to her.

She stopped in her tracks as she heard Kuina scream. She was lying on the ground, a big bulky man sitting on her stomach, fighting to put a knife to her throat. Ino ran back, trying to pull the man off the fighting girl. He backhanded her, causing Ino to fall back and hit her head on the floor.

She heard another scream and looked up to see Niragi swinging his ax one more time, making the man fall to his side and off Kuina. Ino scrambled to her knees and scooted over to Kuina, helping her up.

“Are you ok?”, she asked, one hand hovering over her neck, there are fine line of blood was glistening.

“I´m alright”, Kuina answered, standing up, “You must’ve hurt your head. You fell pretty hard.”

Ino wanted to say that she was ok, but she only hissed in pain, as Niragi touched the back of her head.

“You’re bleeding”, he informed her in a judging voice, “If you continue like that, you’ll die today.”

She punched his arm.

Four to one, we’re winning”, she said, taking Kuinas hand and dragging her along, “Only five minutes remaining.”

The last five minutes were uneventful. Noone else died until the time ran out and lasers killed everyone left in the losing team. As they got back to their base, the two civilian women were already gone and they were the last militants to arrive.

“Let’s go home”, Niragi said, not even stopping to look at his comrades.

The car ride was silent. They had split up to be able to take both cars to the beach and Niragi was driving. He was shooting concerned glances in her direction every once in a while, trying to ignore the feeling that he should’ve been able to protect her. Kuina was the only one they had taken with them. The poor girl was sitting in the back, staring at Inos bloody, matted hair. She was just trying to win the game, Kuina thought, it doesn’t mean anything that she saved you.

As soon as they arrived on the beach and the car was parked, Niragi got out and opened Inos door. She let him help her exit the car and walk her in the direction of the beach, before stopping and turning back.

Kuina had gotten out of the car and was walking at a safe distance. Ino smiled at her and pointed at her head, “You’ll have to pay me back for this”, she said, “tomorrow morning. I’ll find you.”

With that she turned and let Niragi lead her to the medical center. Kuina was still standing there, staring at the women as she disappeared in the beach.

Pay her back? How? She didn’t have much time to think about it, as Chishiya was already approaching her. Niragi was too busy supporting his best to pick a fight with the shorter man, he didn’t even look at him, as he walked past them.

Niragi had led her to the medical area and Ann had patched her up.

Laying in her bed, Niragi beside her, they were examining her bandaged arm.

“I thought only snitches get stitches”, she mumbled, poking around the edges of the bandage.

Sighing Niragi turned to her, extending his index finger and starting to draw the line of her scar. It was just a fine line on her face and throat, but it turned to an angry red convulsing scar at her collarbone. He knew that it extended in the same shape between her breasts, down to her stomach, before turning back to a fine line and stopping at her navel. It had been gruesome. They didn’t think she would survive it, but she did.

“You weren’t snitching back then, were you?”, he asked jokingly, finger resting on her collarbone.

“I´m just saying that I just once want to get stitches because I’ve been snitching”, she laughed.

“I would be happier if you stopped getting stitches”, Niragi argued, making Ino laugh, “Are you really going to meet that girl tomorrow?”, he asked, finger still on her scar, “Kuina?”

Ino nodded, “She is very pretty.”

“She’s always with Chishiya”, Niragi groaned, “You should not trust her.”

“I’m not saying that I trust her”, Ino finally turned to face Niragi, cupping his face with one hand, “I’m just saying that she’s verry pretty and I want her to be mine.”