#they both drop out of high school they both get tattoos and abuse substances and get into fights

[microchive]

has anyone considered the quite frankly astounding number of similarities between chloe price and ronan lynch... formerly happy kids with dead fathers who shield their soft underbellies through anger and rebellion and drastic hair decisions?? i could make connections for hours

[gaucheried]

INTRODUCING — * SASHA GRIMM !

faceclaim: aaron taylor-johnson

full name: sasha leon grimm

nickname: sash, sashi, sushi, baby grimm

date of birth & age: november 12, 1993 ( 31 years old )

zodiac sign: scorpio

gender & pronouns: cis man, he / him

sexual orientation: bisexual

occupation: cook at antonio's pizzeria

neighborhood: lakeside

length of residency: 8 years

3 positive traits: adaptable, sociable, loyal

3 negative traits: frivolous, easily distracted, passive

family: robin grimm ( father, deceased ), stella grimm ( mother ), geneva grimm-saxon ( older sister ), nicola grimm ( older sister ), teddy grimm ( nephew, npc )

character inspos: horry ( this is where i leave you ), patrick zweig ( challengers ), angus tully ( the holdovers ), jonah simms ( superstore ), jake peralta ( brooklyn nine-nine ), eggsy unwin ( kingsman ).

— * HISTORY !

Trigger warnings: substance abuse, injury

sasha was born in rochester, minnesota to two hard-working and loving parents and the best big sisters in the world. his family has always been supportive of each other; their mother, especially, had been hands-on in raising her three children despite having a full-time job. as the youngest and the only son, sasha was closest to their mother and was (and still is!) very much a mama’s boy.

he does also share a strong bond with both his sisters; he loved having tea parties and being the dress-up doll for his girly girl eldest sister while also being the guinea pig and frankenstein’s monster for his middle sister nicola’s science experiments.

he was a hyperactive kid from the get-go, had energy reserve upon energy reserve, bouncing off the walls and relentlessly pestering his sisters. this gave his parents the idea to get him into sports, and he fell in love with baseball from the moment he was handed a bat on his first tee-ball practice. he would play other sports as well, as he grew older, like football and soccer, but baseball had proved, in time, to be his one true love.

sasha is dyslexic and was also diagnosed with apd and adhd when he was eight, which was a great source of insecurity for him and rendered academics difficult to navigate. his athleticism became his only saving grace—that and after-school tutorial sessions with his sister nicola—and with continuous hard work, he was able to get an athletic scholarship to north carolina state university in raleigh to play for the wolfpack baseball team. like most college kids, it was his first time ever truly being away from home when he’d been so dependent on his mother and sisters for the first 18 years of his life, which was probably the biggest adjustment besides keeping up with the demands of college academics so he can keep his baseball scholarship.

it was sometime during the early part of his junior year, however, that sasha would slowly start to lose a little bit of himself. he would enter a relationship with a girl a couple of years his senior named gracie, an nc state dropout who worked at the local dive bar his team took him to on his 21st birthday. gracie was something of an enigmatic, if not deeply troubled soul who had sasha wrapped around her dagger-tattooed finger. soon, he’d start missing practice more often and when he did show up, he was either drunk or high or severely hungover. he’d even started neglecting his classes which put his scholarship in serious risk. when his mother was contacted about his performance, stella had chalked it up to his grieving his father’s recent death and had cut him some slack, though she knew that it had his son’s green-haired girlfriend written all over it. things would then only start to get worse.

he’d injured his knee during a game, forcing him out of the team and consequently losing his scholarship. baseball was the only thing he had going for him, having no other plans for his future that now unfortunately started to look bleak. he dropped out at the end of his junior year but remained in raleigh where he moved in with gracie. he hadn’t told his family about dropping out, had only lied to them and said that he would be spending the summer in los angeles with his teammates for training (which was a thing that was really supposed to happen before shit hit the fan). it was after rejecting the invitations of his oldest sister, who had been living in LA at the time, to meet up that she started to become suspicious of his true whereabouts. a quick call at the school would reveal that sasha was, in fact, no longer enrolled.

his mother, who had already moved back to her hometown in michigan at the time, wanted to come and get him, but he resisted, instead latching on to gracie and putting his future on her incapable shoulders. the pair would decide to leave raleigh. or, a more accurate way to put it: gracie had wanted to break up with him and leave raleigh to find her 'true passion and life’s purpose’ but he’d insisted on them staying together as he was afraid to be alone and return to his family with his tail tucked between his legs.

for half a year, he and gracie would travel from state to state with both of them working the odd job here and there, living in motels until gracie would get bored and decide it was time to move. sasha had started drinking more, even developing a bit of a pill habit to manage the pain in his knee, which put even more of a strain on their already loose-threaded relationship. and then, gracie left.

quite literally, one morning, with her bags already packed and her mind already made. she wanted to do more with her life and put herself back on the right path and when he’d made it apparent that he was making no effort on his end to get better, she decided that it was best they part ways.

alone for the first time in his life, sasha continued what gracie started, on his own now, until he’d woken up on a motel bed that might as well have been made out of cardboard on his 23rd birthday, stinking of piss and vomit that he knew he needed to swallow his pride and call his mom.

starting his life all over again in woodside, michigan, living with his mother at 23 years old with no degree and definitely no future in the sport he’d spent nearly his whole life playing, wasn’t where he’d envisioned himself four years prior. but the town had forced him to slow down and perhaps think more about what he was going to do with his life next.

unfortunately, it’s been eight years and he isn’t any closer to figuring out the answer but at least he’s got more meaningful things to fill his days with. like taking care of his mother, for instance, and helping host her book club meetings at home, or coaching the local little league team on the weekends, or watching brain-rotting tv with his nephew when his sister isn’t around but also teaching him things his own father taught him that nicola’s good-for-nothing ex-husband never could. he might not be no baseball star but maybe, in the end, he’s a better person because of it.

— * MORE INFO !

when stella, his mother was pregnant with him, their family hosted a ukrainian business associate of his father's and his his wife for the holidays. the man's wife was named sasha and, at the time, both stella and her husband thought they were going to have a baby girl and wanted to give her the same name. when they ended up having a son, they chose to keep the name. 'leon' is from sasha's paternal grandfather.

sasha enjoyed quite a popular status in both middle school and high school as a jock, even dubbed by the faculty as the boy version of his eldest sister who, during her time, was your typical ‘it girl’ as head cheerleader and prom queen, hence the nickname 'baby grimm'.

has been clean from a painkiller addiction for two years after previous attempts that would intermittently last for a year to a couple of months in the last eight years since moving to woodside with his mother. he's also one year sober.

smokes a lot of weed to manage his knee pain but it's also sometimes recreational.

apart from his dyslexia and adhd, sasha has auditory processing disorder, which often makes people think he's hard of hearing, but he really just has trouble processing auditory signals and can easily get lost in conversations. he's always been a visual learner because of this and most days you'll find him with a pair of earphones that constantly play classical music to give himself something to lock into and block out unwanted signals. he constantly wears these earphones at work and his boss ( who was a childhood friend of his mother's and......former boyfriend ) and coworkers have been supportive and, thanks to his best friend who used to work at the pizzeria with him at the time, have taken to using picture cards and even adapted a visual code system for orders inspired by the waffle house for customizations. he has also asked not to be spoken to during his shifts unless he's on a break which has made new hires think that he's some scary dude that everyone is trying to avoid but rly he's just neurodivergent and wants to get thru the goddamn day.

apart from classical music, he does also enjoy listening to regular music and is a fan of billie eilish, remi wolf, brockhampton, and tyler the creator but he's soooo so bad at lyrics so he just makes most of them up. some of his friends and family have even taken to singing his lyrics instead of the real ones as a lighthearted joke but most of the time they end up forgetting the real words.

loves to play video games with his nephew, teddy. they're both obsessed with all things mario but also enjoy the occasional pvp on the pc ( catch them playing cod warzone on a school night.....sorry nicola ! )

never really 'properly' came out as bi to his family ( perhaps his mother and sisters might argue that they'd somehow assumed all along with the way he used to talk about his high school best friend ) as he still has some internalized homophobia due to growing up around the toxic masculinity surrounding sports culture. his family has only met the girls he's dated, though, to be fair he's only ever had one official boyfriend during his sophomore year of college but that relationship didn't last very long so he was less inclined to tell his family about it. for a time, he and gracie had even entered a throuple with a guy from gracie's work but that fizzled out pretty quickly as well.

a cat dad, sasha and his mother have three cats at home: hash ( because he looks like a giant hash brown ), toad ( from super mario ), and very recently a tiny fluff ball named berlin that his eldest sister had given him for his 31st birthday after just having arrived from a vacation in germany. they also have a senior dog named maggie ( after joe dimaggio ). he also used to have a goofy lil bearded dragon named kevin up until last year but it creeped his mother out. his best friend, however, loved kevin to bits so he decided to give kevin to her and to this day they both happily coparent him.

[phqmysteries-backup]

WRITER INFORMATION —

Name/alias: frankie

Age: 28

Time zone: gmt+8

Pronouns: any

Triggers: n/a

CHARACTER INFORMATION —

Faceclaim: aaron taylor-johnson

Full name: sasha leon grimm

DOB & age: november 12 ( 31 years old )

Zodiac sign: scorpio

Gender & pronouns: cis man, he / him

Occupation: cook at a local pizzeria ( can i submit a location for this? if not i can totally just choose another resto, i just enjoyed the idea of him working at a chuck e. cheese-coded establishment fdjhsd )

Neighborhood:

Length of residency: 9 years

3 positive traits: adaptable, sociable, loyal

3 negative traits: frivolous, easily distracted, passive

INTRODUCTION —

Trigger warnings: substance abuse, injury

sasha was born in rochester, new york to two hard-working and loving parents and the best big sisters in the world. his family has always been supportive of each other; their mother, especially, had been hands-on in raising her three children despite having a full-time job. as the youngest and the only son, sasha was closest to their mother and was (and still is!) very much a mama's boy.

he does also share a strong bond with both his sisters; he loved having tea parties and being the dress-up doll for his girly girl eldest sister while also being the guinea pig and frankenstein's monster for his middle sister nicola's science experiments.

he was a hyperactive kid from the get-go, had energy reserve upon energy reserve, bouncing off the walls and relentlessly pestering his sisters. this gave his parents the idea to get him into sports, and he fell in love with baseball from the moment he was handed a bat on his first tee-ball practice. he would play other sports as well, as he grew older, like football and soccer, but baseball had proved, in time, to be his one true love.

sasha is dyslexic and was also diagnosed with apd and adhd when he was eight, which was a great source of insecurity for him and rendered academics difficult to navigate. despite this, he enjoyed quite a popular status in both middle school and high school as a jock, even dubbed by the faculty as the boy version of his eldest sister who, during her time, was your typical 'it girl' as head cheerleader and prom queen.

his athleticism was his only saving grace—that and after-school tutorial sessions—and with continuous hard work, he was able to get an athletic scholarship to north carolina state university in raleigh to play for the wolfpack baseball team. like most college kids, it was his first time ever truly being away from home when he'd been so dependent on his mother and sisters for the first 18 years of his life, which was probably the biggest adjustment besides keeping up with the demands of college academics so he can keep his baseball scholarship.

it was sometime during the early part of his junior year, however, that sasha would slowly start to lose a little bit of himself. he would enter a relationship with a girl a couple of years his senior named gracie, an nc state dropout who worked at the local dive bar his team took him to on his 21st birthday. gracie was something of an enigmatic, if not deeply troubled soul who had sasha wrapped around her dagger-tattooed finger. soon, he'd start missing practice more often and when he did show up, he was either drunk or high or severely hungover. he'd even started neglecting his classes which put his scholarship in serious risk. when his mother was contacted about his performance, stella had chalked it up to his grieving his father's recent death and had cut him some slack, though she knew that it had his son's green-haired girlfriend written all over it. things would then only start to get worse.

he'd injured his knee during a game, forcing him out of the team and consequently losing his scholarship. baseball was the only thing he had going for him, having no other plans for his future that now unfortunately started to look bleak. he dropped out at the end of his junior year but remained in raleigh where he moved in with gracie. he hadn't told his family about dropping out, had only lied to them and said that he would be spending the summer in los angeles with his teammates for training (which was a thing that was really supposed to happen before shit hit the fan). it was after rejecting the invitations of his oldest sister, who had been living in LA at the time, to meet up that she started to become suspicious of his true whereabouts. a quick call at the school would reveal that sasha was, in fact, no longer enrolled.

his mother, who had already moved back to her hometown in michigan at the time, wanted to come and get him, but he resisted, instead latching on to gracie and putting his future on her incapable shoulders. the pair would decide to leave raleigh. or, a more accurate way to put it: gracie had wanted to break up with him and leave raleigh to find her 'true passion and life's purpose' but he'd insisted on them staying together as he was afraid to be alone and return to his family with his tail tucked between his legs.

for half a year, he and gracie would travel from state to state with both of them working the odd job here and there, living in motels until gracie would get bored and decide it was time to move. sasha had started drinking more, even developing a bit of a pill habit to manage the pain in his knee, which put even more of a strain on their already loose-threaded relationship. and then, gracie left.

quite literally, one morning, with her bags already packed and her mind already made. she wanted to do more with her life and put herself back on the right path and when he'd made it apparent that he was making no effort on his end to get better, she decided that it was best they part ways.

alone for the first time in his life, sasha continued what gracie started, on his own now, until he'd woken up on a motel bed that might as well have been made out of cardboard on his 22nd birthday, stinking of piss and vomit that he knew he needed to swallow his pride and call his mom.

starting his life all over again in woodside, michigan, living with his mother at 22 years old with no degree and definitely no future in the sport he'd spent nearly his whole life playing, wasn't where he'd envisioned himself four years prior. but the town had forced him to slow down and perhaps think more about what he was going to do with his life next.

unfortunately, it's been nine years and he isn't any closer to figuring out the answer but at least he's got more meaningful things to fill his days with. like taking care of his mother, for instance, and helping host her book club meetings at home, or coaching the local little league team on the weekends, or watching brain-rotting tv with his nephew when his sister isn't around but also teaching him things his own father taught him that nicola's good-for-nothing ex-husband never could. he might not be no baseball star but maybe, in the end, he's a better person because of it.

[everly--yours]

(debby ryan, 26, cis woman) you’re looking for EVERLY SLOAN? last i knew they live in GOLDEN OAKS. i heard they can be both KIND and FREE SPIRITED, but still INSECURE and SARCASTIC. You know they kinda remind me of THE TASTE OF FRESH COFFEE, CONVERSE WITH UNTIED LACES, THE CLICKS OF A SHUTTER. better hurry, before SHE has to head to work as A BARISTA at THE BEAN. 

tw: domestic abuse & substance abuse

Full Name: Everly LeAnne Sloan

Nickname(s): Ev

Age: 26

Birthdate: September 12th

Aesthetics: The taste of fresh coffee, converse with untied laces, the clicks of a shutter, rolls of film, darkrooms that smell of vinegar, little blue pills, perfectly worn jeans, soft sweaters sliding off shoulders, and one song on repeat.

Zodiac: Virgo.

Sexuality: Bisexual

Occupation: barista

Traits: Sarcastic, kind, insecure, strong willed, free spirited

THE DETAILS ;  

tw: Domestic Abuse & substance abuse

Everly had a fairly normal upbringing, she was the middle child and only girl, and her childhood was less then eventful. Which could explain her thirst for adventure that developed when she was in high school. Though she loved growing up in Detroit, the girl thrived for more. Wanting to push the limits that defined normal and make a name for herself. So as soon as she graduated high school Ev packed her bags and headed for the west coast. Seattle to be exact. That was where she met the love of her life, or so she thought.

Jason Daniels was everything her little nonconformist heart desired. He was older, had gauges and tattoos, was in a band, and had a criminal record. Jason was everything she wasn’t, and it only made her want him even more. Things were good for the first year, but things began to crumble about six months into them living together. Arguments turned violent, and though Everly never gave him any reason to believe she was unfaithful Jason began to become controlling.

Even though things were going from bad to worse, the girl stayed. Clinging to the beginning as justification for staying. It wasn’t until he came home completely stoned out of his mind that the last straw was broken. Though Jason was absolutely gone, he still managed to over power the twenty four year old and beat her so severely that she was hospitalized. Jason was arrested but as luck would have it, he went free that night. Ev had managed to keep the abuse a secret for the most part, but with her hospitalization she had little choice but to reach out to her best friend. Who in turn alerted her family. To say that everyone was livid was an understatement, but despite their disapproval Everly decided to drop the charges. This put a strain on all of her relationships. But they never saw the good times they had had, all they saw was this one incident.

For the next year, Everly and Jason went round and round, much to the disapproval of her family and friends. They were off and on most of the year, but for the most part Jason seemed to be a reformed man just as he promised to be. Then, just like everyone had said, Jason snapped once again. This time her injuries were no where near as bad, still, they made the girl realize that the only way out was to sever all ties. With her head hung low, Everly didn’t see much of an option other then to run away.

Since her first hospitalization Ev has become dependent on prescriptions drugs like Vicodin and Xanax to get her through the nights, and Adderall to get her through the days. So far, Everly has managed to keep her chemical dependence under wraps from her family and friends, and she intends to keep it that way.

[lgraves]

                        𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚜𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍'𝚟𝚎 𝚗𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚛 𝚝𝚛𝚞𝚜𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚑𝚘𝚕𝚕𝚢𝚠𝚘𝚘𝚍 .

QUICK LINK ACCESS.

visage / aesthetics / sound / media / starter tag / interaction tag / connections

BASIC INFORMATION.

full name: Leland Warner Graves nicknames: Lee age: Thirty-six birthdate: November 12th, 1985 zodiac: ☀ Scorpio  | ☾ Scorpio  | ↑ Cancer birth place: London, England hometown: Portland, Oregon current residence: Eureka, California how long have they been living here for: 1 year ethnicity: Caucasian nationality: British / American gender & pronouns: Cis-Male — He/Him/His orientation: Heterosexual

positive traits: Driven, Passionate, Loyal, Flexible negative traits: Impulsive, Stubborn, Guarded, Indecisive

PHYSICAL APPEARANCE.

weight: 167 lbs height: 6′1″ body build: Slim eye color: Dark Brown hair color: Brown hair texture: Straight hairstyle: Short & tapered facial hair: Full scruff glasses or contacts: Glasses when reading predominant features: Eyes - so dark that they’re practically black. usual fashion: Plain t-shirts, neutrals, occasional flannels, exclusively wears converse. jewelry or accessories: a single silver necklace that he rarely takes off. piercings: Spacers - 0 gauge plugs. 

tattoos:

Rose bud w/ stem - left side of neck

The Creation of Man - upper left bicep

‘Attached to Nothing, Connected to everything.’ - upper left tricep

Tombstone - right tricep

Florence in cursive - upper left ribcage 

scars:

Hole from a lip ring - on bottom lip, left side

A horizontal line across his forearm from falling off a fence as a child - right arm

BREAKDOWN.

tw: death mention, & substance abuse / addiction

Born in London, England — lived there until the age of ten.

TW death — His mother decided to move their family to Portland, Oregon ( being her hometown ), due to the unexpected passing of her husband.

Was inspired to further his musical interest, wanting to be more like his father. He vowed to himself that he would do whatever it took to achieve his dreams.

Started a garage band in high school; the band went through many variations, and truly didn’t settle on a stable group until his early twenties.

They played many local gigs, but after a while, it just wasn’t cutting it anymore.

The group made a collective decision to move to Hollywood, California ( age 25 ).

They all lived in a shitty apartment, and got whatever part-time job was good enough to pay the bills.

It seemed like they couldn’t catch a break; no true interest from any agent.

Age 27 — the band slowly started to get a little bit of traction with the locals, forming a small following. Quite literally tiny. But the support was well appreciated.

Leland knew something had to be done. He would work on potential new songs for hours on end. Decided to revamp their sound/style.

Everything took close to a year to finalize, but an EP was the result. And from that, one of their songs took off.

Age 29 — Contacted by a record label a few months afterwards, signed a contract, and then were pushed through the process of getting their brand out there.

Completely relied on his team — his first mistake.

TW drugs — introduced to drugs, and the Hollywood afterlife; constant late nights filled with partying and mingling.

Met @flohastings at an after party, and was absolutely smitten. The two started to date shortly after, the main connection between the two being that their industry had turned them both into products.

After 3 years of dating, Leland returned home from a tour ( upon the news of Flo getting let go ), only to notice that neither her — or her stuff — was anywhere to be found.

TW addiction — Cue the spiral of confusion, and addiction. Leland decided to self-medicate the only way he knew how. This set him up for a continued disaster. He missed gigs, and had to cancel shows due to his lack of stability. His record label choosing to drop him as a result; not being able to handle such a liability.

Being separated for a year, Leland needed answers— closure was something of high importance to him, and maybe there was even a larger ounce of selfishness that just craved seeing her again. 

He never had intentions of staying in Eureka for the long haul, but the longer he was here, the more it just became a routine. His addictions were still getting the best of him, and it wasn’t until a few months ago that he even considered getting help. But after having a few rough events take place, he leaned on Flo for support— finally accompanying her to a meeting. 

So, he bit his tongue, and made the choice to sign up for a 90 day treatment. Which he recently finished up, and is slowly beginning his journey once again.

ADD-ONS.

Leland was gifted his father’s stratocaster; it’s his baby, and it’s pretty much the only guitar he used when recording.

His band, whilst still together, had a similar sound to that of: Arctic Monkeys, Catfish and the Bottlemen, COIN, & The Hunna — very indie, alt rock vibes.

His accent hasn’t exactly stuck around, since moving at such a young age, though Leland had a tendency to force it out more when he sung; his record label thought it gave the sound a little extra kick.

Whilst he was in Hollywood, Leland had a part-time job at some diner. It wasn’t much, and he had to work his way into the kitchen, but it was all he could do to help pay for his music career. Luckily enough for him, that one skill is now his saving grace.

WANTED CONNECTIONS.

NEIGHBOURS — he lives in an apartment in old town! above, below, or adjacent!!!

ROOMMATE — idk i feel like he could potentially have one cuz living is expensive???

FRIENDS/FREQUENT ACQUAINTANCES — he’s been here for a year and a hot second; this could also include REGULARS to where he works

NA meeting peeps??

SPONSOR — he’s still very new to navigating this whole sober thing

MUSIC INDUSTRY — ppl that he could have met, toured with, etc, etc AND/OR ppl that knew of his band maybe idk

im bad at these

more to come later

[jbrozen]

𝕀𝕟𝕥𝕣𝕠 

Hey! I swear I saw [Ronen Rubinstein] last night but it was just [JB Rozen]. The [25] year old [he/him] is a [firefighter] living in central Chicago. I hear most people associate them with [tight shirts and worn hoodies, ray bans, flamingo pool floats and the smell of sunscreen, tall americano, superhero complex with a side of irresistible puppy eyes]. **Pau / 23 / she/her / EST / 4/10

Trigger Warnings: Parental Death; Substance Abuse; Overdose

Full name: Jude Benjamin. Rozen Nickname: JB Place of birth: Chicago, IL Date of Birth/Age: July 31, 1996 / 25 Sexuality: Bisexual, Homoromantic 

𝔹𝕚𝕠

Born and raised in CHICAGO

His father is a DISTRICT ATTORNEY and his mother was a TEACHER

In school, JB was in TRACK AND FIELD teams, winning National Relay Championship his Junior year

Received a full scholarship to UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO 

He got into a bad CAR ACCIDENT Senior year driving under the influence

His MOM passed away Senior year when they were driving back home and having an argument — he still feels like his father blames him for her death.

To cope with the guilt, JB became ADDICTED to prescription drugs like codeine, Vicodin and Oxycontin which were first prescribed to him to manage pain from the accident, and later Valium, Xanax, Diazepam and Klonopin to help him with anxiety and stress in the aftermath

Although he was granted an extension to his scholarship due to the circumstances, JB DROPPED OUT after his first semester

He was 20 when he OVERDOSED intentionally 

His father sent him to a private REHABILITATION CENTER for 3 months

Road to RECOVERY hasn’t been easy or smooth but JB is now 3 years clean 

He decided to join CHICAGO FIRE DEPARTMENT as a way of paying it forward — the Fire Department was the first to respond both to the accident with his mom and his overdose

Has an 8-year-old PIT BULL named LUCY (seen [X] [X] [X]) after The Beatle’s song Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds 

Has a series of TATTOOS (seen [X] [X]) and EARRINGS (seen [X] [X]) though he seldom wears them during the week for work

ℙ𝕖𝕣𝕤𝕠𝕟𝕒𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕪

JB was very popular and overconfident in High School. He was very outgoing, funny and spontaneous.

After his mother’s accident, JB isolated himself. He grew distant, quiet, anxious, nervous, and paranoid. He strongly believed he would hurt anyone close to him. Even if he wasn’t violent, he was very defensive.

Sober JB is a hybrid of his past. He’s slowly regaining back his confidence. Although still dealing with anxiety and guilt, he is working on rebuilding relationships. He is genuinely good-hearted and often doesn’t put his own safety first at work which has earn him a reckless reputation. He keeps a tiny black notebook in which he is keeping track of the people he saved. 

𝕎𝕒𝕟𝕥𝕖𝕕 ℂ𝕠𝕟𝕟𝕖𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟𝕤

Extended Family/Cousins Message for Plotting Childhood/High School Friends They could’ve remained friends all this time or are just reuniting now again — think of Ride or Dies, teammates, neighbors, family friends, classmates Exes/Flings JB was in a long-distance relationship most through High School and hasn’t really been in a serious relationship since — think of unrequited, one night stands, fwb Other First Responders Paramedics, Law enforcement, etc.  Roommate Looking for a potential roommate! JB could definitely afford his own place but I feel like he would prefer having some company — they’re young and wild and free! Ok. Not so wild anymore but still! Must at least like pups tho.  Sounding Board, Mentor or Sponsor Someone who’s helped him get through his addiction as a role model, big brother/sister figure

[1-800-sunset]



Okay I got a college Dabihawks quirkless AU ft. Trans Keigo

Keigo is just another broke college student who made it in on a scholarship. Even though he was on a scholarship, living in an apartment with his best friend Rumi was hard. Not to mention Testerone shots weren’t cheap. Thankfully Rumi’s family has always had his back. When they were still in high school, it was thanks to them that he was able to get top surgery and get his name changed. His home life was pretty tough; his mom and dad were both terrible people. His dad was always in and out of jail and when he was home he would hurt his mom and him. But his mom wasn’t any better; she also took out her anger on him and would abuse substances. In eighth grade he was kicked out of the house when his mom went through his phone and found out he was Trans. Rumi’s family swooped in so quickly to take him under their custody. It’s not like either of his parents cared enough to fight them in a custody battle. Rumi had always been there for him. The Usagiyamas offered to pay for his college tuition but Keigo couldn’t let them do that so in High School he worked his butt off to go on a scholarship. Sure he was intelligent but he also put in the wok to earn what he wanted. The college he attended had one of those student program jobs which he gladly accepted the one where he got to work in the library. It just made sense to him since he was an English major. 

His favorite class had to be poetry. Sure he loved to read novels and add little notes in the margins but he has always felt comfort in poetry. Poetry was what kept him alive on those dark days in his parents’ old trailer. But it was sometimes hard to focus in that class because there was a guy who sat behind him in the next aisle that was always staring at him. He went by the name Dabi, whenever the teacher tried to say his name he would always cut her off. Dabi dressed like your stereotypical delinquent, always sporting ripped jeans and leather jacket. His nose, ears, and mouth pierced, tattoos that ran down his neck and arms and not to mention his hair was obviously dyed black. On the days Keigo really wasn’t having it he would turn around and send him a death glare as a way to tell him to cut it out. Dabi unfazed would just smirk back at him, earning an eye roll from Keigo who clearly gave up. 

If the staring in class wasn’t enough Dabi eventually found out that Keigo’s worked in the library and soon started to show up there to the dismay of Keigo. This guy sure did like to bother him. Rumi after telling her what was going on, laughed and said Dabi was probably trying to get with him. Keigo only laughed and threw his pillow at her. No way a guy like him was trying to get with Keigo. One day Keigo got sick and couldn’t make it to his job. But Rumi needed to meet up with a partner to work on a project in the library. There she found Dabi who seemed like he was looking for someone. Just from the description that Keigo gave her, she was able to figure out that he was Dabi. So she decided to help the guy out a little. She sat across from him, and he looked up at her in a way that told her to scram. She just smirked.

“Keigo’s not here today. He got sick yesterday and it’s taken him awhile to recover.”

His blue eyes widened in surprise because he didn’t expect her to know why he was here.

“The name’s Rumi. I’m his sister.” She said while extending her hand to him which he reluctantly shook. She knew that he was questioning their relation  since they looked nothing alike.

“Dabi. Now why are you telling me this?”

“Look Dabi, Keigo may be obvious but I am not. I know what you are trying to do.” 

Her suspicions were correct in the way that his cheeks flushed and diverted his eyes.

“Normally I would threaten to rip you apart but I decided I was gonna take pity on you and give you a hand.” His eyes lit up in a way that reminded her of a puppy. Oh yes he may be just what Keigo needs. 

“Keigo loves sweets. Sugar is his favorite thing in the world.That bastard has the fastest metabolism I have ever seen; he could eat desserts for days without gaining a single pound. If you want to get to his heart go through his stomach. Bring him poetry god he loves poetry more than life itself.” Rumi said with a soft look in her eye. She got up from her seat and before walking away Dabi spoke.

“How do you know if you can trust me.”

“I don’t.”

“.... thank you” was all Dabi could mutter, earning a smile from Rumi.

Dabi decided to take Rumi’s advice and started to bring Keigo sweets before their class started. Keigo was surprised to say the least that Dabi was giving him food but he wasn’t going to turn away sugar and would accept it. Making Dabi smile at him. He sure was confused to why he was doing this but hey free food is free food. On the days he worked. Dabi would stop with the whole staring at him from afar and snarky remarks when checking out books. Instead he would lean over and talk to him about their class and discuss their different analyses. Turns out Dabi had some pretty solid points. Dabi would sometimes even slide a poetry book over to him and every time he would try and return it he would refuse insisting Keigo keep it. Keigo’s reaction would always be to smile and look down at the floor as he hugged the book. Dabi’s heart would flutter at his smile only making him want to bring it out even more. One night when Keigo was leaving work Dabi decided to ask him if he would want to go to a local cafe. Keigo originally said no but his stomach eventually gave in. Dabi was ecstatic and they ate together. It was during this time that Dabi realized how much smaller Keigo was compared to him.This became their routine. Keigo would always try to fight him on paying the bill but Dabi would always win. He used his card so damn often that Keigo was definitely worried for his credit score. Dabi would only give him a lopsided smile and assure him that it was fine.

Rumi one night asks him how was his date with Dabi in which he denies it is a date. But the thought stays in his head and he can’t help but think were all those trips to eat were dates. The next day he doesn’t even look at Dabi; he's too caught up in his own mind. This stresses Dabi the fuck out because he doesn’t know if he accidentally did something to make the blond mad at him. So at Keigo’s job he asks if he did something wrong. Keigo really can’t bring himself to lie to the guy he really grew to like.

“Dabi… were all those trips to go eat together dates?” He asked not to look at him jut in case he was wrong he wouldn’t have to see the rejection.

Dabi sheepishly rubbed his neck debating whether or not to tell the truth.

“Well um uh yes…”

“Oh…” blush rising on both their faces. 

“Look Keigo, I really like you and I want to continue to go on those kinds of dates. But if you don’t I um… understand.” He was able to push out laying it all on the line.

“ I want to.. I mean yes I will go on more dates with you.” Keigo was able to say as the blush on his face grew darker. Dabi’s entire face lit up in happiness.

They start to date each other doing normal things aside from eating out. Dabi goes out of his way to shower Keigo with both gifts. Dabi really liked to show his affection physically in the forms of hugging and kissing. But sometimes they would start to get frisky which would always freak him out because he hasn’t told Dabi he was trans. He was mostly afraid. He really liked Dabi but he was so afraid of him breaking up with him. Dabi never pushed him to tell him what was wrong and would drop it, opting to hold him instead. One instance he decides to tell him the truth, he expected him to maybe yell at him in betrayal but instead he got a kiss. Dabi reassured him that he still liked him even if he was trans. Things start to get easier after that and Dabi even begins to help buy his testosterone shots, even bringing him cookies as a treat to make him feel better.

Eventually they talk about their childhoods. When Keigo tells him, he has to physically stop Dabi from getting up to try and hunt his garbage parents down. He explains how he doesn’t care about them anymore and the Usagiyamas are his true family. Dabi reveals that he is actually Touya Todoroki, son of Enji Todoroki, a well known billionaire. His dad was a terrible person, Dabi told Keigo of all the things he did to his family like the physical, emotional and mental abuse they had to endure. This drove them apart.  After his mom finally divorced his dad, he was legally obligated to give all members of his family a generous amount of money per month. Dabi used his on his college tuition and then later used it to shower his boyfriend with sweets and gifts. Dabi found it hard to talk with his family without feeling overwhelmed with bitter resentment for his dad. That night they just hold each other not wanting to let go.

During winter break Keigo decides to invite Dabi to celebrate Christmas with him and Rumi’s family. Dabi was reluctant but eventually gave in. The Usagiyamas were one of the nicest people Dabi has ever met and he was glad that they were able to care for Keigo for all these years. Rumi’s parents take a liking to him and unofficially make him a part of their family. It’s after this trip that Dabi realizes he misses his family. With Keigo by his side he reaches out to them and they decide to get together for New Year’s. Keigo offers him a gentle squeeze  of his hand when that day arrives and they are in front of his sister’s door.  He looks into Keigo’s golden eyes and gives him a nervous smile. Everything was going to be okay.

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #344

“my whole existence is flawed”

Have you ever thought about becoming a crime scene investigator? No. Do you think you could win on Jeopardy? Not at all. What do you normally call your mother? (mommy, mom, mother, mum, etc.) Usually "Mom" or "Ma," sometimes "Mama." Does your significant other complain about the way you dress? I'm single, but I would never tolerate an s/o who complained about/told me how to dress. Like bye, fuck you. Have you ever been in an abusive relationship? Are you right now? No, thankfully. What would you do if a stranger smacked your ass and whistled? They're getting fucking punched. In the face. Do you know anyone who has died from cancer? Multiple people. Ever have to call the cops on someone? Not me personally, but my sister did while I was in the car with her due to a clearly drunk as fuck driver. Are you comfortable enough around your friends to change in front of them? Hell no, I avoid changing even in front of my mother. Have you ever dated someone in secret? Dated, no. But Joel and I were a secret. What’s something you really want right now, be honest? What I really want right now is a job. What are you listening to right now? A slowed-down with reverb version of "Closer" by In This Moment. It's p hot. Do you still have your tonsils? Yes. What confuses you most? Why terrible things can happen to the most undeserving of people. Have you ever been called a bad influence? Yes. Not like she was a good one whatsoever. What's the weirdest compliment you've ever received? I don't know, really. Have you ever thought you could 'save' someone? No. It's funny, apparently Jason thought I could "save" him, and would'ja look at that, he scarred me for life. Do you prefer weed or cigs? I've never smoked either, but at least weed has benefits, so. What do your parents say about smoking? Well, my dad smokes like a chimney, but he does tell my sisters and me to absolutely never start it. Mom is very firm about us not smoking. She'd probably be heartbroken if any of us started. Do like kissing with tongue or without? I mean, that depends on the mood as well as how serious we are. What show is hilarious to you? That '70s Show absolutely cracks me up. Who last made you upset? My Dad and stepmom, ranting about how the Covid vaccine is being forced on us and is dangerous. I'm very much for it and am getting it myself soon, so I was just like... shut the fuck up. I just kept my lips zipped, but by god did I want to say something. Does he/she usually upset you? I sometimes regret having my stepmom on Facebook because of her shitty political views, but she in general doesn't upset me. I love her, really. Dad doesn't upset me, really. What would your parents do if you got a tattoo? They don't care, especially knowing how much I love them. What is your favorite musical? None. Do you have any interest in visiting Japan? Yeah, though I don't think it's something I'd go out of my way to do. If I had the opportunity though, I'd surely go. I would love to take photos there, and it's this odd desire of mine to visit Aokigahara Forest and just walk along the "safe" paths and just... feel it. I don't want to find any bodies because I think that would shatter me, I just want to allow myself to like, drown in empathy for all those that left their lives in those trees. I feel like I'd cry a LOT, because I'd prefer to do it alone and just talk to whoever may be able to hear from wherever they are now, and just let them know they're not forgotten or abandoned and that they were never alone. This is honestly getting me really emotional so I'm moving onto the next question. But in summary, I feel like it could honestly be a life-changing experience. What is your favorite Japanese name? I like A LOT of Japanese names I've heard, but they're all evading me now. Do you ever listen to Jpop? No. Who do you go to for advice? Mom or Sara. Have you ever ran a cash register? Yeah, when I worked at the dollar store. Have you ever worked as a server? No. Did you collect Bratz dolls when you were younger? I didn't collect them, no, but I shared a few with my sister. Do you think your mom is attractive? I think my mom's beautiful. Her smile especially puts gold to shame. She actually kinda broke down the other day because she thought she was ugly, and it just broke my damn heart. Do you like the feeling in your stomach on a big drop on a roller coaster? I've never been on a roller coaster and don't plan to try one, but I reeeaaally don't like that feeling in any situation. What is your most severe allergy? Pollen. How and when were you baptized, if applicable? I was baptized as a baby the traditional Catholic way. Would you rather paint or carve a pumpkin? I think carving is more fun. Have you ever walked through a haunted house? One that was part of a Halloween attraction, yeah. What computer game did you used to play all the time? I played lots as a kid, but my favorite had to be I Spy: Spooky Mansion. My lil sis and I were obsessed. How do you feel about Motorhead? I don't love them, but I do enjoy some of their songs. I never thought Lemmy was that great of a vocalist, but I respect him as an artist and hope he rests in peace. What’s the weirdest way you’ve ever pulled a muscle? *shrugs* What’s your favorite symbol? (i.e. the pentagram, the cross, etc.) If we're talking only real-world symbols and not ones that only exist in fantasy media, I actually think the Satanic (no, not inverted) cross is a cool design. It has nothing to do with my stance on Satanism, I just think it's an appealing look. What methods are most effective for you when you’re trying to relax? If I REALLY need relaxation, just leave me alone and let my put on earplugs and just like, disappear from the real world for a bit. Would you rather date your opposite, your ‘twin’, or someone in between? Someone in-between, I think. More similar to me though would be preferred versus someone that's my opposite. How many videos do you have favorited on your YouTube account? I think I'm actually at the max? I think they just get replaced with newer ones by now. Do you know anyone who has carpal tunnel syndrome? Me, actually. My older sister does, too, and actually had surgery for it. Which do you prefer: M&M’s, Skittles, or Reese’s Pieces? Reese's Pieces, but I love all three. If you could be the sidekick of a superhero which superhero would you pick? If I was Spiderman's sidekick, could I throw webs and zing around like a monkey too? ;_; I think being Batman's sidekick would be pretty cool too, seeing as to my knowledge he's more about stealth, which would be fun to go along with. Do you think that you could ever win a food eating contest? No fucking way. They gross me the hell out. What is your favorite thing about the country you live in? How much freedom we have here. Although, it can definitely be abused, and some people do abuse it... Have you ever snuck somebody into your house? No. Have you ever snuck into somebody else’s house? No. Honestly, have you ever thrown garbage out of the window of a car? No, and you fucking repulse me if you do. It is not that challenging to hold onto your shit until you get out of the car and find a trashcan. Honestly, have you ever stuck gum under a table or desk? No, that shit is disgusting. Just get your lazy ass up and spit it out. Which would you find more menacing: dinosaurs or dragons? Well, considering dragons can, you know, breathe fire... Can you name three different kinds of dinosaurs? Spinosaurus, allosaurus, stegosaurus. What’s the name of the last person you kissed? Sara. Is your heart broken at the moment? Nah. Who’s the last guy you argued with? I don't know. I avoid arguing with guys to the absolute best of my ability because I'm terrified of making them mad. What about the last girl? My mom. Would you marry the last person you kissed? Not at this current time, but later down the road of us both building ourselves up, I possibly would. Who’s the last person that asked you out? Girt. Out of all of your exes, who treated you the best? Sara. Who is the person you have hurt the most? My damn self. Who is the person that has hurt you the most? Jason. Do you hate the person you fell hardest for? It feels like it sometimes, but when it really comes down to it, no, I don't. Who was the last baby you held? My niece Emerson. Who’s the last guy to give you roses? Tyler. Did your parents do drugs when they were younger? My dad did quite a lot before us kids were born, apparently. I can guess pretty damn easily that Mom made him cut that shit out before having my sisters and me. Mom, to my knowledge, has never tried anything at all. Do you still talk to the person you lost your virginity to? No. Did you cry at your high school graduation? I remember I teared up slightly. What was the last non-papery substance you drew on? I have no idea. Do you ever name objects? (i.e. mp3 players, guitars, cars, etc.) No. What do you beat yourself up about the most? I'm 25 fucking years old and have never had a stable job or just felt "adult" in general. Which has hurt you more: friendship break-ups or bf/gf break-ups? The breakup with Jason, who was my boyfriend, so. What’s the most terrifying thing you’ve ever done? Gone to a mental hospital. The first time was so, so scary. What’s the highest fever you’ve ever had? I don't know. Have you ever been to the ER? Many times. Have you ever been mistreated by a cop? No. Have you ever experimented with any sort of witchcraft? No. Which animals are you afraid of? Some bugs and spiders, and whale sharks are a phobia of mine. I also find giant squid to be terrifying, but also very intriguing. Oh yeah, then there's my extreme aversion to maggots and similar larvae. Did you pray to God when you were a child? Usually. Mom raised us to, but some nights I slacked with it and just wanted to sleep. What is your favorite flavor of frosting? Maaan, don't make me choose. What color is your skin naturally? Very pale. Do you own a pocketknife, or any other kind of multi-tool? No. What was the last thing you took a video of? I have no idea. I have no recordings on my phone, so. Have you ever been somewhere where you didn’t fluently speak the local language? No. Have you ever had famous neighbors? No. Do you have any medication that you keep with you at all times? Yeah, one of my anxiety meds. What are some things a house would need to have for you to purchase it? Besides the very obvious, mine has to have a dishwasher. I. HATE. Washing dishes by hand. Do you own a pet spider? No, but I DESPERATELY want some tarantulas. :( I've tried convincing her, but Mom's very adamant about the fact I will NOT own one so long as I live with her. I also love jumping spiders and attempted to convince her about one of those versus a tarantula, but still, answer's a firm no, haha. Do you call your animals “baby names”? Well duh. Have you ever been stood up? No. Do you own a fishtank? No. Do you like the song “Barbie Girl”? God no. I'll sing it jokingly, though, because y'know, childhood and all. Do you own a feather boa? No. We did at one point, though. A hot pink one. Are you allergic to peanuts? No. Do you wear ribbons in your hair? No, my hair's too short for that. I never did, though. Do you use cheat codes on video games? I generally only use codes that you can actually earn in the game for like, new outfits or weapons in subsequent playthroughs. I won't use the kinds of codes that make you invulnerable and stuff, but rather just fun little cosmetics and such. Have you ever gone mudding on a fourwheeler? Ugh, no. I don't like getting dirty, so that is NOT my kind of fun. What is your favorite flavor Jolly Rancher? Watermelon. Have you ever played Dance Dance Revolution? Of course! We had the dance mat as kids and loved to play the games. What is the last thing you dropped? I don't really remember. Have you ever done the “Cupid Shuffle?” Yeah, at school dances and such. Do you know how to do the Soulja Boy dance? Haha omg, I did as a kid. My friend, sister, and I all learned it. How long has it been since you’ve eaten a Reese’s? My mom actually got me a Reese's egg for Easter, so not long ago at all.

[anaheraimaaka]

Jet Away

17 left school booked a 1-way flight to Gold Coast, Australia.

Fake ID, grow up, glow up, party, drugs, sex. 18 in love, the game, the game, play, have fun, be free, wild out, friendship, heartbreak, pain, inescapable hurt, get me out.

Shifting and shaping, exploring the surrounding, interacting, observing and indulging in new culture, people, drama, mind broadening and life altering substances, lifestyle.

The chaos drew me in and away I went, curious and hungry, I had a lust for life and all the drama it brought with it.

You

No good from the start but when a lesson is ignored it only becomes reoccurring and ongoing.

My flat, back yard, party.

Tattoos, all over, it’s you, eyes, eyes, smile, first moment, your laugh, just dropped, coming up, I feel you, steps closer, heart faster.

The introduction.

Quick hi, phone out ignore you.

The pull strong from the start. Lure, chase, dance floor, hello, next moment, you know, the bathroom we go.

It was thrill from the start, perhaps the perfect balance of excitement, growth and heartbreak in one. A love that held my hand through the reflection of damaged love from way back.

This relationship was the beginning of understanding the true impacts of my childhood trauma.

Trying to figure out the correlation between childhood and relationships in adulthood?

Third ingredient: BELIEF SYSTEMS

Your perception of the most impactful, reinforced and reoccurring events that have taken place throughout your childhood are the template you download for your future interactions.

The way you were treated and spoken to as a child are the creation, the moulding of your belief systems in how you are taught you deserve to be treated, spoken to and interacted with.

The way your whānau dealt with and handled conflict and confrontation The way your whānau celebrated their wins, their high moments

Once having these standards, morals and values modelled to you throughout childhood by your guardians, community, peers, toward one another and toward you, we then go out in to the big world and create interactions that affirm our belief systems we have downloaded through observation of interaction and surrounding.

I learned everyone you interact with, you do because you believe they are worthy of your time. Whether that is consciously or not, willingly or begrudgingly, you make the choice to interact with these people. Once your belief systems is upgraded through consciously redesigning and setting intention and laws of interaction to protect your energy and space, you will notice people shift in to and out of your life to appropriately reflect your belief system.

Your way of being starts to shift, you begin reinforcing laws of interaction and standard of yourself, toward yourself. You are moving from a space where you respect others and require others to respect you. Building the ability to trust yourself to reinforce your new belief systems of how you deserve to be treated and interacted with. Once you can trust yourself to reinforce your laws, you release the need to move from a space of survival, habit and fear - to trust, instinctual and knowledge of self - I am the creator of my reality knowledge.

In this sense, you attract those who reflect you. (Me:) Who naturally abide and carry themselves with pride through their flow of morals and value, the slick, intelligent, well gathered, leader type. Bumping paths, tangled in telepathy I hear you thinking of me, I feel your intentions, I see what I do to you.

Gaylord

The confusion caused by the friction of craving someone who is loud and clear no good for me, took over me, altered me, it overwhelmed me.

My first heartbreak, my first love

You stimulated growth, a shift in perception, deeper understanding of life, stronger sense of self, resilience and a big fuck off blue print to what I don’t want my future relationships to look like

We grew, we crashed, we burned. You were the first man to have me close, and I was the first lady to get that close

Head on the highway, dropping molly swimming with dolphins, motorbikes, speed, adventure, drama, thrill, sex, love, lust, sex, sex, tears, laughs, drugs, party, growing, crash, fall, get up, understand me, help me, save me, love me.

We both entered the relationship unknowingly broken and bruised from life before the night you walked in and we changed everything – butterfly effect

The more I needed you by my side, the more my curiosity grew as to what it was you had, that I couldn’t provide myself, why did I compromise my self- worth, break my own vows to keep you around?

My subconscious mind weighed up the impact of pain, having you near or far? The lesser pain was enduring your causal pain toward me, the after effects of that, whilst having you close – a love suicide if you will.

I shifted in to a new space of self-awareness shining focus on my self- sabotaging choices and how I was putting myself in harms way to keep you near. As I type this section, I hear my past disappointment and judgment echoing to the forefront of my mind over the desperation and weakness I held for you.. I felt weak and desperate for your love, forever in efforts to escape the emptiness that became apparent when your distraction separated from my space for the brief moments of time. We turned to the game of distraction, the game of promiscuity, and what a fun game that was – we played that quite well didn’t we, together and solo.. very raunchy baby.

DISCLAIMER: I do not encourage, nor do I condone the following behaviour.

I was out for the evening with the ladies; Edward and I had recently separated. I was drunk and had been calling him; he wouldn’t answer and kept hanging his line up. I decided to take off home, I was far too intoxicated and the alcohol enhanced my desire to be with Edward again (perhaps the following decision will indicate the level of intoxication or crazy, you decide), I get a taxi to Edward’s apartment and pay the driver $20 to lift me up on to the apartments first story roof, telling him “I’ve lost my keys and need help getting through the side sliding door” – I’m convinced at this point Edward was with someone else, so I’m mentally and drunkenly preparing myself to confront a lady to leave the house so I can get some sleep. I do remember saying aloud “you know what, I won’t be a dick – she can get on the couch..” laughing out loud at my generosity and consideration.

I flip and fall over the rail, get to the side sliding door, fling that shit open – the rooms empty. I vomit in the toilet, have a shower, get in to bed and crash out.

Couple hours later..

I rise, it’s daylight, my eyes open, groggy as shit, head is pounding, I realize where the fuck I am, get out of bed, still drunk, in full fucking panic mode, calling a taxi, making the bed, cleaning his space before he rocks on home and asks wtf I’m doing and how.. so I rax an outfit and his slippers and away I go.

An example of ‘where there is a will, there is a way’.

A few weeks later we were texting I told him the above, he didn’t believe me – I asked, “where are your slippers?”

The pain, the emptiness you feel when someone’s position within your life is no longer, is not the absence of themselves from your life, but the reflection of space within that is requiring your awareness, your time, your focus, attention, empathy, it’s a space that requires your nurturing care.

Can one really take away from you? Or is that an illusion? Maybe the idea that anything is missing from you at any point in time is an illusion.

I believed you were my one, my other half, always asking myself how much bullshit must a couple go through before they both submitted to the comfort and safety of together forever – an idea inconceivable to the broken and uncommitted – us.

Still 4 years in to our love tornado of bullshit, you asked and I screamed “yes”

Both knowing deep within - it’s never going to work we packed our lives up in Gold Coast and flew to Melbourne.

Trapped in my mind were the events of you fucking around leaving me the unwanted gift of Chlamydia

Trapped in your mind was Anahera on her knees loving on batman in her workplace changerooms

We’d damaged the sacred waters between you and I long before you asked “Baby will you marry me”.

3 weeks in to Melbourne, life brought us to a crossroad and we decided lets escape this horror of confusion – you cheated.. again – I thought fuck this.. again. Packed my shit and embarked seriously (this time) on a journey of letting you go and finding myself entirely. Honestly, a path I had been preparing myself for since months in to us dating – never gathering the courage to leave on my own terms I awaited your last fuck up knowing that would excuse me from this relationshit

And that was that

I drove away from 4 years of bullshit and innocent love of two brokens trying to fix and distract the pain that became more apparent when we were separate – when we were alone. I had to figure this shit out – life without the love of my life.. so far

I start this book off with my first heartbreak because life up until that point was about not feeling the hurt I had endured prior to life with Edward

Never did I want to look at or think about the emotional and mental effects of the sexual abuse, physical violence, drug and alcohol abuse that unveiled itself throughout childhood

My heartbreak was the first force of feeling, an inescapable hurting I needed to cure in order to stop. Edward broke my heart at the start of our relationship – the following 4 years consisted of me running back and forth between myself and Edward. Could I do this? Could I not?

I did it, and in feeling this heartbreak was a gateway opened for me to feel the rest of mamae I had buried within, never having had the safe space within to unpack my hurt. I had a new found knowledge of self that allowed me the emotional intelligence to navigate myself through life and the shit it had put in my path to cultivate the strong, brave, courageous and intelligent lady I am today.

[hot-boy-jimin]

Bullet wound |stranger things 2|

Two-



October 31st 1984 ~ a Halloween party in Hawkins, Indiana.

•third person•

Billy was the kind of guy your mother would tell you to stay away from, clad in leather, with the harsh smell of nicotine and cheap booze.

In reality however, he was just a vulnerable, abused boy who just wanted some attention.

That's why he did the things he did even though they were wrong, he knew that but hurting people and himself was all he knew how to do.

That's why he was currently at some stupid high school party with even stupider people doing a keg stand just to tick off some kid name Harrington.

"That's how ya do Hawkins." His voice was deeper than usual because of the shitty beer that was forced into his system.

As he started to exit the party with two dumb jocks at both of his sides, he crossed paths with Steve Harrington, who was with his girlfriend Nancy Wheeler

"Looks like we got ourselves a new keg king, Harrington." Tommy H said smugly to the 'King of Hawkins high'.

Billy and Steve had a staring match for a few moments and Nancy moved away from the males she couldn't stand the testosterone.

~

Billy was now making his way back to his car. The party was pretty lame in his opinion, and all he wanted to do now was take a drive around this shitty town he was forced to live in.

When his hands touched the door handle he was confused as to why it was wet. He raised his hand and he felt a sliver of fear ran down his spine when he saw the red substance.

Blood.

He opened the door and was surprised to a body lying across the seats.

"Holy shit." He whispered in shock.

He couldn't tell if the girl was alive or not. The first thing he noticed about the girl was the blood on her cheek and hand.

He knew he had to check if she was still breathing and then he would figure out what to do with her.

The moment he touched the girl's calf he was met with a barrel of a gun pointed directly at his face.

He flinched, and raised his hands up slightly as an act of surrender.

"Who are you?" He was surprised at how soft her voice was. It was a heavy contrast to her hard expression and the way she skillfully pulled out that gun.

Billy being the idiot he was decided to have a smart mouth.

"I'm the owner of this car. I believe I should be asking you

that question."

~

"I'm the owner of this car. I believe I should be asking you

that question." The man in front if her was scared. She could tell but he was putting on a façade in order to look tough.

That alone told her that he was just a harmless bystander. She lowered gun with a wince as a sharp pain racked through her body.

She was losing a lot of blood and she needed to stitch the wound.

Billy watched her wince in pain as she lowered the gun. He wondered who injured her and how she ended up in his car.

He felt slight pity, but he also wanted to drop her off at the front of the hospital, without even getting her name.

"What happened to you?"

Seven looked at him with hooded eyes, she wasn't going to be awake for much longer, and this man was her only chance.

"I- I was shot."

Billy's eyes widened and wondered who would do that to a seemingly harmless girl.

"You need a doctor. I'm taking you to a hospital." He got into his car and sat down as he spoke, ready to drive her to the hospital.

"No!" Seven shouted, startling the man. "No doctors. No hospitals." Her voice was as firm as it could get.

Billy started the car and closed the door and looked at her as if she was crazy.

"You need help, from a doctor."

Seven turned her body slightly and looked at the man and pointed the gun to his head again.

"No hospitals."

Billy looked at her fearfully and considered just throwing her out, but his conscience would eat him alive.

"Okay. No hospitals." He said calmly as he started driving.

Seven lowered the gun again, and instructed the man on what he needed to do.

"I need first aid supplies, a lighter and a needle and some thread, can you get that for me?"

Billy glanced at her briefly and nodded his head know he had no choice.

"Thank you." He heard her whisper softly.

"Do you have a name?" He asked her as he drove towards his house.

"No. You?" Seven answered honestly.

She knew she couldn't tell him the only name she knew was 'Seven'.

Billy started wondering what he had gotten  himself into.

"My name's Billy." He said emotionlessly.

"Billy." She repeated the man's name and he actually liked the way it sounded coming from her.

~

He pulled up in front if his house and he looked at the girl and saw that she was fighting to stay awake.

"Hey, we're here."

Seven blinked a few times and looked at the house.

"Pretty."

Billy was already out of the car when she spoke. She didn't realize until she heard her door open.

Billy grabbed the girl as gently as possible and lifted her bridal style.

She was so small, he would fell how tiny she was and he was more intrigued now.

He was lucky his dad and step mom weren't home at the moment, only his step sister max, who was locked in her room.

This made it easy for him to carry the girl into his room. He lied her down on his bed gently.

"Okay."  He said to himself.

She was barely keeping her eyes open and Billy knew he had to move fast.

He got the supplies she told him before and made it back to his room.

Seven was weakly removing her gear and black turtle neck that was now soaking with her blood when Billy walked back in.

"Hurry."

He quickly put the supplies on the bed.

"What now?" He asked her.

"You need to take the bullet out."

"What?" He asked dumbfounded.

"I'll guide you, but you need to be quick."

She was serious.

He let out a shaky breath and she started instructing him.

"You need to sterilize the tweezers in alcohol."

While she spoke he followed.

"Take the bullet out with those tweezers, gently."

With a few grunts if pain he managed to get out the bullet.

"Clean the wound." Her voice was ten times weaker now.

Billy moved quickly and he saw that she was about to become unconscious. He tapped her face lightly to wake her up.

"Keep your eyes open."

She pitched up her head and continued.

"You're gonna get the knife from my boot and heat the blade."

Billy got the knife and was not expecting to see a hunting knife.

"You need to burn the wound with the knife to stop the bleeding completely."

He looked at her as if she was crazy, but complied when he saw she was about to pass out.

She grunted out a little louder and he felt a little bad.

He removed the blade from her flesh and saw that it did stop the bleeding but it let a few blister marks around the edges of the original wound.

"You need to stitch it and wrap the wound with some gauze."

He finished and was actually proud that he had done something right.

He looked at the girl now and saw that she had fallen asleep. He cleaned up the mess from the night. As he was reaching for the gauze wrapper, he noticed a small tattoo on her right wrist.

It read "007", who are you?

________

1325 words......

Unedited......

I hope you guys enjoy......

[deathcvrse]

 intro : sol caliente 

◟ * ◊ ─  ester expósito + cis female+ she/her » * believe it or not sol caliente is working for the lothario family . they are 21 years of age and are known to usually spend their time around victora court. the spy, who has been a part of the alliance for 1 month, has been living in victoria for 1 month. the people closest to them describe the bisexual scorpio to be flirty and charismatic as well as hot headed and careless◝

        so here i am again , introducing you guys to my third character !! she’s too far up her own ass , thinks everything revolves around her , and won’t ever take a no for an answer .

GENERAL BACKGROUND + A FEW FACTS . TRIGGER WARNING: DRUGS , DEATH , AGE GAP , CANCER . - born to aitor and amaia caliente , sol and her twin sister grew up in bilbao , spain .  - her father , aitor , continued to abuse of illegal substances throughout the years , engaging in the illegal distribution of heroine , cocaine , and others . this would lead to aitor spending most of the money the family had left , making the family struggle financially . - with the public health care system , and the long waiting list to start treatment , at the age of 3 the caliente sisters lost their mother to breast cancer . amaia’s sister izar blames aitor for the death of his wife , believing that if he hadn’t wasted all the family’s savings they would’ve been able to find a cure sooner , this being - through private health care . - after two years , aitor caliente eventually lost custody of his two children due to several incidents in regards to the illegal trafficking of drugs . his arrest at the barajas airport , madrid for attempting to sneak in 5 kilograms of cocaine into spain was the breaking point . - their aunt izar would gain custody over the children , raising both girls on her own . izar is their motherly figure . with no memory of her mother and little to no from her father , to sol her aunt was all family she had left . the fatherly figure , being one that was always missing in their lives . teaching them everything she knew , moral and value wise , sol adored her aunt just as much as her sister , seeing her aunt in many ways as her own mother . - sol and her sister grew up witnessing the many failed attempts their aunt had at keeping a stable relationship . with izar experiencing commitment issues , sol quickly developed the wrong idea of what a relationship was . control , became a priority in her high school years , and commitment issues were something the blonde experienced too , reflected by how she had cheating on her first two boyfriends throughout both college and high school . - after graduation high school and achieving top grades during her selectividad , sol moved to madrid to study both fashion design and international business relations at the universidad complutense de madrid . her thirst to experience a more glamorous lifestyle , and little time to get a part time job - sol decided to sign up for a sugar baby website . being paid 4000 euros a month to meet a 80 year old millionaire of the name homero lápida on a regular basis , the blonde took a risk and agreed to marry said man a few months into meeting him . two years later homero lápida would pass away , and with him having no children , sol would be the one to inherit the entire fortune . - during her time in university , sol slowly became a more frequent user of illegal drugs . abusing of cocaine on a frequent basis , and dropping acid once in a while - these substances served as an escape for her .  - two weeks before the marriage , sol’s aunt izar would find out about her nieces endeavours , which would lead to the two falling out . currently , they aren’t on speaking terms . - with a large sum of money on her bank account , sol caliente eventually told her sister she would be leaving to the states to purse a career in fashion design with or without her , and after getting in contact with the alliance - she eventually would work there as a spy . - both sisters would drop out of college , and move to victoria in the span of a year . currently they are residing in the west side . - sol opened up a store in victoria court , not only to carry out her dream as a fashon designer , but using said career choice as a façade to cover up the fact that she is also working as a spy for the lothario family .

GENERAL STATS . - name : sol caliente . - nicknames : /  - age : 21 . - sexuality : bisexual . - birthday : november 11 . - position within the alliance : the spy . - languages : spanish , euskera , english , italian . - other info : her name sol caliente literally translates to , warm sun . her sister’s luna caliente to , warm moon , and her aunt’s izar caliente , translates into warm star . - scars : her forearm , she burnt herself during a bbq once . - piercings : ears , nose ring , nipples , tongue , belly button . - tattoos : a small moon that features a few smaller stars on her left wrist representing her sister luna and her aunt izar , a rose on the middle finger of her left hand , ‘fingías’ tattooed on the side of her left forearm , a snake on her right hand , ‘ángel’ inked onto her hip bone , dolce on the back of her left arm right above her elbow , vtita on the back of her right arm right above her elbow .  ‘caliente’ in thick bold letters , with flames , inked on her right forearm  . ‘11’ on the back of her neck , roses from her hip to her thigh . sol also has a small heart inked between her collarbones , which features ‘art’ written in small font right underneath it . a sun behind her ear .

WANTED CONNECTIONS . - friendships 0/? - hook ups 0/? - enemies 0/? - someone she does cocaine with on a reg 0/3 - party / drinking friends 0/3 - people she first met when she got here 0/3 - neighbours 0/3

[howlingmoonrise]

Dear Yuletide Author

hello and thank you for signing up for yuletide, i hope you have fun during the challenge!

i ramble a lot so my letter is under a readmore (i put everything in one post so you don’t have to juggle links around). obviously you don’t have to follow any of the things i put in here, but hopefully this will help you out!

general things i like

PINING. I’M SUCH A SLUT FOR PINING ALL THE PINING ULTRA PINING SUPER PINING. i have SO MUCH FUN reading about idiots in love who aren’t together yet and i far prefer it to fics with already established relationships. this is also applicable to when they know the other is in love with them but they can’t act on it for some reason.

i’m down for either gen or romantic!! what really does it for me is the developing relationship, platonic or otherwise, and the character dynamics and interactions and all the little moments in between. stuff like developing trust and finding kinship and growing respect for the other and subconsciously learning to lean on the other over anyone else is far more important for me than any kissing will ever be (though kissing is also nice if you wanna go down that route lmao)

i love love LOVE enemies/rivals-?to-friends?-to-lovers and bickering pairs in general, as you can probably tell by my choice in character! it’s so much fun and it gives us so many opportunities for character and relationship developments :D

continuing from the above points, nothing kills me as much as characters that bicker all the time but in the end they rely on the other and go to each other before they go to anyone else, whether they realize it or not

i REALLY like the canon and characters for all the fandoms i picked, so sticking at least to their characterizations and the overall “tone” of canon is a huge plus!! “missing scenes” and “what if” canon-divergent situations are excellent, as are continuations from where canon left us! that being said, i also enjoy more conceptual AUs and i’ve put more details about those a little further below. rule of thumb is that i enjoy AUs where the focus remains more on the relationship itself and how it works on such a setting than on the worldbuilding for it.

fun tropes i enjoy (sorry, these are a bit romance-leaning but if you’re not into that they can probably be adapted somehow): fake dating, accidentally got roped into x and shenanigans of all sorts keep happening, misunderstood confessions, groundhog day au, one or both the characters having stupid levels of denial while technically in a relationship and just not realizing it like What Do You Mean We’re Dating??, that sorta thing.

TROPE SUBVERSION ALL THE WAY!

general things i dislike

kidfics. babyfics. next gen fics. pregnancy fics, or even pregnancy discussed in the fic is a major squick of mine. the one exception i make for kidfics is for petshop of horrors when it comes to chris and the pets, as they already belong in canon, but no babies or children otherwise please.

future fics in general, actually. what i enjoy is the relationship development, so huge time skips make me feel like we missed way too much. one exception to this is post-canon petshop of horrors, for obvious reasons.

i usually don’t like most angst stuff since it feels a bit gratuitous to me when it comes to most fandoms and characters. the one exception for this is psoh (see below if you’re picking this fandom - and wow psoh seems to be the exception to everything huh) or when it’s a more introspective sort of fic. as a result of this, i’d pass on most content with major character death, sexual abuse, self-harm, the like, though of course there are always exceptions to the rule and you’re free to write as you wish!

hard AUs are a bit ugh to me. by this i mean AUs that rely heavily on setting, such as high school AUs, harry potter AUs, that sort of thing. i DO however enjoy stuff like siren AUs and soulmate AUs, depending on the concept and on the fandom. more details in their own sections if you enjoy writing those!

i heavily dislike things involving cheating/infidelity, sickfics, and genderbending of any kind is a bit ehhhh for me, as are concepts such as ABO. hard pass on stuff like dysphoria and deep diving into most mental illnesses, too (with a possible exception for depression when it comes to psoh). 

script-based or roleplay fic is not really my preferred format, i really enjoy prose instead of nearly all dialogue!

if you’re going for nsfw

kinks

moderate sadomasochism, uncommon forms of bondage (plants, stuck with strange substance or in awkward position, the shadows from p&tf as restraints, etc), choking/breathplay, xenophilia and tentacles/alien genitals (shadowplay in p&tf, non-human genitals for the staryk lord, etc), moderate degradation, edging/desperation play, ladies topping and calling the shots, bloodplay/knifeplay, long hair/hair pulling (staryk lord, leon orcot), sharp nails/claws (staryk lord, charlotte la bouff, count d; miryem mandelstam having them is actually preferable to the staryk lord now that i think of it), lowkey cannibalism imagery (count d re:leon orcot)

squicks

scat, vomit, praise kink, daddy or baby kink, vore, forced feminization, pet play, gore, abuse, abo, anything involving pregnancy at all

--

PETSHOP OF HORRORS

i’m usually not very partial to angst but GODS does psoh throw that out of the window, so feel more than free to run with it if you wanna go down that route.  psoh is RIPE for angst. we got two people with abandonment and inadequacy issues: leon who decided to leave his whole life behind to chase someone who gave him life and then left and initially didn’t even bother to do it with any sort of goodbyes, and d who is supremely fucked up by his upbringing and had to push leon off the ark to continue his family’s mission and let drop one (1) single tear that he was not supposed to cry over a human. those fuckers. those idiots. i love them so much.

THAT BEING SAID, i also!!!! love slice of life shit for them!!!!!!!! GODS i love how much they bicker but then they turn around and the other is the person they rely on the most and who they trust implicitly above all others and how they keep roping each other into ridiculous shenanigans. neither of them are particularly communicative with a few rare exceptions, so there’s also a lot of room there for introspection and unspoken affection on both sides, which i LOVE. my son leon in particular is also super underestimated when it comes to his intelligence and tolerance for gay shit both in canon and fandom, and he performs ridiculous leaps of logic and instinct that somehow turn out to be right but that are super ???? for everyone else involved, and that’s always fun to see. hell, just another missing scene where leon brings d some cake and they banter fondly over tea is A++++ to me!!

nsfw???? bring it!!! this is the one fandom where you’re more than free to go super dark and kinky if you wanna, or if you wanna write tender loving reunion sex where d cries a little while leon is loving and disbelieving and so very careful that’s also excellent! i don’t have a particular preference on who tops either, it’s fun either way, but i tend to see leon more as a sub/masochist >u> i can also see it going a bit dark with those two, especially considering d and his kind (implied to eat human flesh and being predators more than once) so bloodplay and cannibalistic thoughts could be fun. re: d’s genitals (as are hotly debated in the fandom), i usually prefer either a dick or triple threat d, though some fun plant-man shenanigans also have their place here.

all in all, psoh is the most excellent genre triangle where i’d be super happy to receive anything on the slice-of-life/angst/smut corners! (also, slash is 3249823% acceptable if you couldn’t tell by my ranting, as is a hint of crack)

if you’re thinking going AU on this one, my suggestions are of slight universe alterations instead of major world AUs. examples could be soulmate AUs (trope subversion would be GREAT here, aka foreign script they didn’t initially recognize, or only Ds having soulmates while humans do not, or the same scenario as the last but leon DOES have it on his skin and just keeps it hidden because Normal Humans Don’t Have Birth Tattoos, or d never expected to have one because his kind is dead and yet when he pushes leon from the ark the soulmate bond is forged, etc), a different first meeting, or even missed connections when they did not know each other yet; something like papa being alive and brady bunch-ing it up with them and chris would also be both excellent and hilarious. epistolary form for those two is also fun! if you wanna go full universe AU, something like a vampire hunter leon could be very interesting >u>

--

SPINNING SILVER

WHERE DO I EVEN START. miryem and the staryk lord were my favourite part of the book; if the book was only their story i would have already been more than satisfied. the rest of the book is also excellent, but those two???? that story was far too great. enemies to allies to lovers is one of my favourite tropes, and this is one of the examples that just keeps proving me right. the slowly growing respect, the wariness when they both know what the other is capable of, the staryk lord getting hit with the hots for his wife when she manages the impossible and then miryem being unable to just let it go when he’s imprisoned and defeated. ACTUALLY lemme just grab that line of thought and bring up that moment when he was sorrowful and resigned when miryem didn’t argue further for the three rooms full of gold and he thought she would not succeed and that she would have to die for it. that, right there? those moments of renewed respect, those moments sudden longing for something they did not know they wanted? those are the things that kill me.

tonally, i love the sort of writing in canon too much to ask for anything different, though you’re by no means obliged to keep to it or to 1st person pov (i have a love-hate relationship with 1st person pov, ngl). missing moments from the novel or moments from the period of time they spent either courting or apart would be GREAT. for those two i actually don’t mind it too much if they’re already established, if it’s early on in the relationship when they’re still learning how to step around one another. the staryk lord flabbergasted or in awe of miryem is always Excellent(TM). bits of worldbuilding and staryk culture would be fun as applied to their relationship (such as the names thing, or courting habits, etc) as are AUs such as soulmates or alternate meetings and the like. if you’re wanting to go full universe AU, keeping some fairytale elements would be great!

if you’re going for nsfw? the name kink, holy shit that would be so goooood. the staryk lord being a bit of a masochist under miryem’s hands would also be great, and inhuman staryk genitals and erogenous zones/acts would be great to play with such as human body heat affecting them in different ways from normal, etc. bringing in his long hair would be a major plus. the build-up for the actual act is the best, so miryem and the staryk lord being super hot for each other while either denying it internally pre-relationship or being unable to go through with it post-relationship due to several factors (busy dealing with their people, no privacy, etc) would be EXCELLENT. so much fun can be had here!

--

PRINCESS AND THE FROG

i am 100% aware this is a weird-ass pairing but gods, the possibilities. it has so much potential. there are few things i like quite as much as a villain and a good person developing a strange sort of kinship with each other. this doesn’t have to mean in a romantic way, obviously! as i said, for me it’s the building understanding and reluctant respect that i really love, far more than the actual romance. 

ideas, ideas, ideas. i’m aware this is a rare relationship to either portray or ask for, so i’m gonna try to give some more concrete-ish ones for you to build up on if you have no clue as to how to approach this. we could have canonverse with charlotte dealing with the shadowman in some other matter while the main plot is occurring, making him feel somewhat guilty about the whole marriage plot with laurence-turned-naveen; cue introspection or an entirely different outcome. or a post-canon sort of hades&persephone plot, with charlotte curious despite herself and tempted to listen to a shadow/dead/whatever!dr facilier when she’s the only one that can hear him, or her being dragged Beneath as well in a freak accident and then charming him into helping her back to the surface/living world (very, veeeeery reluctantly on his part, at least at the start, he might have even be thinking of tricking her but then change his mind when the time comes to do it). i think dr facilier wouldn’t be sure how to deal with charlotte’s particular brand of personality and good humour, and it’d throw him off his rhythm a lot - that sort of thing is always super fun to write. 

soulmate au in canon would work pretty well, but with this pairing? FULL WORLD AU IS YOURS FOR THE TAKING. keeping to the shadowman sort of thing to her normal bougie self would be a major plus; it’s one of her charms. also, charlotte thinking that she wants one thing (her prince, for example) while keeping getting drawn to him time and time again could work on pretty much any era or setting. vice-versa for him, thinking he wants to be rid of her but coming to realize he’d actually miss her if she were to be gone. OR, charlotte deciding she wants this sullen manipulative bastard and manipulating HIM into taking her out and hanging out with her would be hilarious.

if you wanna do nsfw, i have only one major request: charlotte calling the shots/topping. i think this arrangement would be entirely in character for both of them (dr facilier would prob also enjoy having someone else do all the work lol) considering her go-getter attitude, but keeping in mind his manipulative personality i’d be more comfortable if she had some control over what was happening. ASIDE FROM THAT, dyou know what would be fun? a little darkness, and by that i mean consider dr facilier’s shadow joining in on the fun. shadows would also be an interesting sort of constraint. also i know i said charlotte calling the shots, but she can be constrained by the shadows while being amused by it or being used for it to happen (the latter case implying it’s not the first time that they’ve used it in bed play), or charlotte could team up with Shadow to do it to facilier instead. charlotte using her nails and facilier being a bit of a sub/masochist would also be pretty good!

(actually in general it’d be really fun if there was some complicity between charlotte and facilier’s shadow in general, regardless of nsfw or not. the shadow being wrapped around her little finger is an excellent concept, especially if facilier isn’t too fond of her just yet lmfao.) 

thank you for reading all my rambling, and i hope you have fun!

[zoyamathur]

Introducing Zoya Mathur !

...

T H E   B A S I C S

NAME :  Zoya Mathur

AGE :  23 Years Old

BIRTHDATE :  October 28th, 1996

OCCUPATION :  Yoga Instructor at the Renegade Gym & Exotic Dancer at Mayhem Maidens

OREIENTATION :  Heterosexual

MOTHER :  Sunaina Mathur

FATHER :  Unknown

SIBLINGS :  None

PARTNER :  None

HEIGHT :  5′5″

EYE COLOR : Chocolate Brown

HAIR COLOR :  Dark Brown

RECOGNIZABLE FEATURES :  Bright smile, big eyes

TATTOOS :  None

B A C K G R O U N D

TW : DRUG ABUSE, CHILD NEGLECT, MENTIONS OF MENTAL HEALTH DISORDERS

It is often said children are a reflection of their parents, shaped and scarred by their handling. Her mother would say Zoya got all the best of her, and Zoya has always prayed it wouldn’t become the worst of her. In the 80s Sunaina Mathur lived the life of a quintessential 70s hippie, living a nomadic life believing in everything and nothing, forever romanticizing and wandering aimlessly. When she was young her indecision and lack of responsibility harmed no one but herself, she was in love with nothing and everything all the time, going wherever her next whim might take her.

Though all that changed when she fell pregnant without the faintest clue from whom, and suddenly she found herself solely responsible for a tiny human, having been cut off and estranged from her own parents for years at that point she had no one to turn to. California just happened to be where she’d ended up around that time and for the first time she found herself having to permanently settling somewhere. Zoya was an extremely well tempered child to her relief, never fussy, and never needing more than she could provide. Everything was okay for a little while, they got by on limited means on her diner paycheck. Though that quiet life was so far removed from the life she led before Zoya, going wherever she wanted, making the best worst decisions, indulging on drugs, alcohol, men, woman, and the more she thought of it the further she began to fall into patterns of depressions and manic episodes.

Her patterns of restlessness and self destruction uprooted their lives in three different towns until they ended up in Charming, by far the smallest town they’d settled in thus far though definitely the easiest to get by in as well. Zoya was twelve by this time and slowly beginning to understand her mother’s quirks and patterns. Before she knew it she was not only looking after herself but her mother as well. Keeping her from making some of her worser decisions and falling back into the same holes as in the past. Zoya didn’t want to move somewhere new again, she didn’t want to have to keep readjusting to new surroundings only to leave when things were finally looking up.

She had nearly as much agency as an adult in their little family unit and she was able to keep them both afloat that way for sometime. Though Zoya never quite resented her mother up until that point, quite the contrary she made herself believe her mothers quirks were endearing. The good days always outweighed the bad, her mother when she was in her highs was so incredibly fun and full of life, most day her childhood was the sort most kids dreamed of ice cream for dinner, random late night adventures, paint parties, gorging on snacks with movies on a school night. All the things that made her mom the coolest among her friends. They did yoga together, binge watched bollywood movies and danced all night, she grew up romanticizing life in the way she saw in those very movies, choosing to see the best in her mother while laughing off the worst.

In high school it was especially easy since Zoya had a social life of her own, between her friends, the dance team, and rigorous gymnastics involvement her schedule was plenty busy. It was so easy for her to believe that her mother had finally settled down as well, she was dating someone for the first time instead of the random hook ups she knew little about, and with his help her mother even took the plunge and opened up her own ‘medical’ cannabis dispensary in town, having always been a bit of an expert in all things marijuana. What she hadn’t known at the time was the loan she had gotten for the business was not from any legal entity but from the local gang whom her boyfriend was a member of, and over time she became loosely involved in some of their drug operations herself. 

The whole matter became the first thing her mother well and truly hid from her completely, keeping her away from it all. Having no real interest in weed herself her moms business of growing and selling wasn’t all that interesting to her, and her mother encouraged her to stay away on account that she was a minor and she didn’t want to get in trouble over the fact. Two years later Zoya was graduating from highschool and had gotten a gymnastics scholarship to attend San Jose University a few short hours away. Her plans for what she wanted to do with her future were fluid at the time, as she explored her options and stuck to her love and commitment to gymnastics, any plans she was formulating came to a halting stop when she went home for the summer after her sophomore year to find out her mother was in shambles. Frantic, worried, and using god knows what concoction of substances again.

Things had gone south with the dispensary and she’d closed shop four months prior and was under investigation by local authorities. And if that wasn’t bad enough she also owed the gang upwards of a hundred thousand grand. Her solution? To drop everything and leave, and for Zoya to go with her so she could avoid any fallback of the whole mess. Zoya was confused, and more than a little concerned but refused to entertain any ideas of running from the problem before her mother told her the whole truth, thus learning for the first time about all the money she’d ‘burrowed’ from the wolves and just how much of a mess she’d gotten herself in. Zoya didn’t know what to do but she also didn’t want to run because she knew if they ran then, they’d always be running and her life would forever be derailed.

They argued about this for days as her mother’s paranoia and skittishness grew, then one  morning she woke to find the small one bedroom apartment empty, no trace of her mother other than a piss poor note saying little else other than sorry. Zoya was stunned and didn’t know what to do, or where to go from there. She was an adult but suddenly realized how little she actually knew about what meant, when her mother had taught her little to nothing about how to handle your shit. All she knew was she would not do what her mother did, she would never run from her problems but rather do what she needed to do to take care of things.

Her mother’s debt became her debt since she was no where to be found, what else was she supposed to say to them? The first job she found was working at the local gym as a yoga instructor, and another working night shifts at the diner. Even working as a babysitter wherever she had the time off. The online classes she was trying to keep up with had to be dropped, she couldn’t afford the apartment on her own and moved into a shared space. A year went by that way though she was buckling under the stress of it all never able to make substantial enough payments towards the debt and manage her expenses as well, and never wanting to be in the position where she couldn’t carry her own weight in the apartment or even admit to her roommates just how much she was struggling. Finally a couple months ago she hashed out a new arrangement with the wolves. She would start dancing at the Mayhem Maidens and they would keep nearly all her wages earned including tips and cut back on the accumulating interest so she can actually start to make a dent in the debt.

While she still finds herself struggling with the new gig, she’s not bad at it by any stretch. She’s always loved to dance, with her years of gymnastics and yoga she’s more than flexible enough to put on a good show. It’s just everything beyond the stage that gives her pause. All she wants is for this phase of her life to be over so she can go back to figuring out how she actually wants to live her life, and what she wants to do to make her mark on the world. And most of all she knows she doesn’t ever want to wake up one day, and realize her life is turning out to be just like her mother’s.

W A N T E D   C O N N E C T I O N S

Best Friend - 

Close Friends - 

Ex Boyfriend - 

Potential Crush -

Parents she babysits for -

Literally anything, just hmu and we can work something out!

@charmingintro​

[fangcria]

GENERAL BACKGROUND + A FEW FACTS . TRIGGER WARNING: ABUSE, MURDER, SUBSTANCE ABUSE. - at the age of eight , rodrik witnessed a murder for the first time . watching the way his father , emele auva’a , killed that innocent woman was something that would scar rodrik forever , but it would only be the beginning to what would become his life . - by the age of ten , rodrik had witnessed over fifty murders . the sight of heads rolling off to the side , being one he’d grown accustomed to . if the young boy dared to flinch , look away , or feel sorry for them , it would be guaranteed that he’d receive a beating from his father . - by the age of eleven , he’d killed someone for the first time . his father’s words “  we are different  ,  we are the gifted  ” kept ringing in his ears . rage , a thirst for blood . he’s grown accustomed to stabbing someone to death , to watching the life leave someone’s eyes as they took their last breath . it’s fucked up , and truth is it’s not even his fault . he’s simply a victim , his father being the one who’d trained him into who he was today , a monster . - sixteen years of age and he’d become the perfect killer in his father’s eyes . there’s voices in his head , telling him to do shit he’s not proud of . every death , every murder only feeds them  .   .   .  makes them become LOUDER . - at the age of eighteen, rodrik began to date one of his class mates , luciana benedict - and for once , he felt normal . it’s a year where rodrik attempted his best at being normal , going against his father’s wishes - he slowly refused to kill anyone else . while he feels like he has won against emelee auva’a , TRUTH IS HE HAS LOST . - it’s prom night & . he’s gone to pick up luciana , only to find the front door of her place open , the members of her family dead on the floor . she’s dead too , and there was only someone that could be behind the atrocious murder of the one he loved , his father . - same night , rodrik killed his own father , murdering him in cold blood & getting rid of any evidence there was . after the incident , his father had been found both guilty of the murders & missing , which lead to rodrik dropping out of high school & eventually moving to the states to be with the remaining members of his family in seattle , washington .

GENERAL STATS . - name : rodrik auva’a . - nicknames : rodri , rod , rik . - age : 22. - sexuality : bi - curious . - birthday : january 15. - birthplace : auckland , new zealand. - occupation : supermarket cashier & serial killer . - scar : scar between eyebrows , a scar left from a deep cut on his abdomen  -  he was stabbed by one of his victims - piercings : earlobes & right ear cartilage . - tattoos : canon kj apa tattoos + carpe diem on his collarbone .

ALIVE CONNECTIONS . - enrique lothario , enemy . played by ME , you can find him ON MY BLOG . - mason giordano , frenemy . played by ME , you can find him ON MY BLOG . - carina lombardi , past hook up / enemy . played by ME , you can find her ON MY BLOG .

* DISCLAIMER : the status of some connections may vary depending on verse  & . thread . all muses featured on my blog are multiship & . multiverse .

[amorremanet]

Seb: 07, 43, 48; Pete: 02, 29, 38; Margot: 22, 35; Lucy: 08, 40?

“get to know my characters” meme — and after a day that got unexpectedly stressful, I fell asleep on my keyboard while finishing this last night, but here we are.

02. What is one of your character’s biggest insecurities? Are they able to hide it easily or can others easily exploit this weakness?

Long story short: Pete’s biggest insecurity changes constantly, but the underlying fear is whether or not he’s completely unlovable, or if he’s only going to be loved if he changes literally everything about himself or massively censors his entire personality and spends the rest of his life pretending to be someone he’s not, the way he’s done for most of his life, in all kinds of contexts, from, “Playing up certain parts of his personality to the point of borderline distortion because it made people like him in high school”

…to, “Developing a problem with substance abuse for several reasons, many of which are at best complicated and messy, but one of them was that faking for other people’s benefit/approval felt a lot less awful and soul-destroying when he was sufficiently intoxicated, and if he got into what he called the, ‘Golden Zone’ of intoxication, then he could effectively pretend that some other, ‘better’ Pete who everybody likes better had come in and taken his place”

From, “Faking for his abusive shit paternal Grandmother because she was one of the few family members who didn’t compare Pete to his older brother constantly, so if he had to lie about everything and hate himself to keep her love, then so be it”

…to, “Lying to his parents about most things as a kid, because his dad was a nasty piece of work who berated his children for most of their interests and passions, berated them when they didn’t do well enough by his impossible, unreachable standards, punished them for some of their interests (meaning that he did things like destroying Salt n Pepa CDs that Pete had saved money for himself because Dad Arden didn’t approve of rap music), and punished them for lying but at least you could buy a bit of a lull in everything by faking like you were the model child he thought he wanted”

All of which can zero in on all kinds of different parts of Pete’s overall being, from his hair to his low tolerance for frustration to his dislike of being emotionally vulnerable to his weight or how his body looks

The mutability of his insecurities is actually one of the biggest things that gives Pete some protection here, which is a good thing because it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that he totally does care what people think of him. It takes paying more attention than his brother does, but even that isn’t especially hard because Jimmy and Pete are both guilty of taking each other at face-value. But have fun trying to pick out which specific part of himself Pete doesn’t like today.

07. Is there a catchphrase or sound that they tend to make a lot (likely without being aware of it)?

I don’t know that I’d call it a catchphrase exactly, but Sebastian says, “I don’t know” an awful lot. Which is sometimes fair enough, because he often doesn’t know things, but at the same time, he also says it by way of devaluing his own feelings on a not-irregular basis, so. There’s that.

He also says, “What’s the point?” and, “What’s the use of [fill in the blank]?” rather often, which is equally reflective of his problems, just different ones. In this case, the pervasive sense of helplessness and hopelessness that he hasn’t pegged as a symptom of depression until mid-morning of the day when he first turns into a nine-foot-tall wolf-man because of, tl;dr, internalized ableism.

08. What is, perhaps, their biggest flaw? Are they aware of this or oblivious to it?

Lucy’s biggest flaw is probably her habit of putting her ideas, ideals, and desires before those of other people, even when she’s trying to help.

Like, when I said that her Deadly Sin would be Gluttony, I had to clarify that I don’t mean Gluttony solely in the sense of eating all the things (which is a reductive understanding of the Deadly Sin that completely misses why it’s supposed to be a Deadly Sin, from a theological standpoint, and is pretty fucked up, from a humanistic standpoint, because it tries to make blanket statements about what all people should or shouldn’t eat, based on presumptions that can’t and don’t apply to everyone, which isn’t fair to anyone or actually going to help).

(Plus, historically speaking, the Catholic Church and some of the different Protestant denominations have used that definition of Gluttony to essentially shame poor people for wanting to eat because ~lmao if u were meant to have food, God would have given you food, duh doi!!~)

So, yeah, Lucy’s Deadly Sin is Gluttony because of how she willfully doesn’t listen in situations where she should, because she has such a strong moral compass and such strong commitment to her ideals that it can overwhelm her better judgment and lead to her doing shit that might work out in the short-term but that could create more of a mess down the line (and sometimes only doesn’t create that mess because she doesn’t get caught breaking the rules, or she manages to contain the mess before it spreads, or similar), because she goes, “DON’T WORRY, I TOTALLY GOT THIS!!” when she totally does not have this because she’s so determined to save everyone on her own or to at least play a major role in the saving people thing, because she wants to be a hero and doesn’t usually stop to think about what that means until after she’s already done something, because she’s doesn’t usually interrogate her ideas about The Greater Good or ask the right kinds of questions about what that means, and so on.

TL;DR: a lot of the less-than-positive aspects of why she’s such a little Gryffindor are why her Deadly Sin is Gluttony, and collectively, they make up her biggest flaw. She could stand to be more aware of this, but she’s also 23 and relatively sheltered, so she has a lot to learn in general

22. What kind of tattoos, piercings, birthmarks, freckles, and other such unique physical features do they have?

Piercings: Two in each ear, a “snakebite” set of lip piercings (option number four on this chart, the “two rings in the lower lip, around the locations of your canine teeth” one), and one in her left nipple.

She used to have nose ring and a septum piercing for a while, but she got sick of turning her septum ring up into her nostrils while at work and didn’t like any of the, “more professional” options for the side-of-the-nose piercing, so those holes closed up a while ago.

Strictly speaking, Margot isn’t entirely fond of the, “more professional” options for her lip piercings, either, but she’s a bit happier with wearing small, classy-looking studs on her lips than she was with wearing them in the fold of her nose, where it gets hard for people to tell if you have something on your nose or just a piercing.

Tattoos: She’s not quite as inked up as Sebastian, but yes, she does have tattoos.

Around her right ear and dropping onto her neck, she has a noose where the loop in the rope is shaped like a heart

On her left bicep, she has a Winnie the Pooh (Disney version, as opposed to the version from EH Shepard illustrations) that matches Seb’s tattoo of Tigger

“The two of you do quote-unquote, ‘extralegal imports’ — read: playing middleman to various smuggling operations — because you [*pointing at Margot*] won’t just let him (or really his parents) pay your tuition, and you [*pointing at Seb*] just nearly died six weeks ago because you took PCP and decided to fight five fucking skinheads at once — yes! I know you intervened to save the kids they jumped outside the bar but you got shot and you’ll understand why I might be a bit upset about that still! — and you just…… Neither of you notices any kind of oddity or disconnect here? Like, both of you can just shift, without missing a beat, from all that to making Todd take dorky pictures of you so you can show off your matching Winnie the Pooh and Tigger tattoos on Myspace and Facebook?” — Pete, right after Seb and Margot did that thing exactly, c. mid-September 2006.

She has a lower back tattoo of Judith beheading Holofernes, based on Artemesia Gentileschi’s painting of that scene

She has a clutch of violets on the inside of her left wrist (she’s thought about adding a line or two from Sappho to it, to make it more obvious why she has this tattoo, but she hasn’t been able to pick which lines, and as Pete’s pointed out, it might not be more obvious to most people)

And on her left ankle, she has the, “Darwin fish” variant of the Ichthys symbol (but without the word, “Darwin” in the center of it), with the subtitle, “this is not a ghoti” (the idea for which she totally and knowingly ripped off from René Magritte’s La Trahison des Images — the, “this is not a pipe” painting — and mashed it up with an alternate spelling of, “fish” that is only possible because English is a bullshit language)

Freckles, etc.: She does freckle in the sun, but they’re mostly faded at present because she doesn’t get a lot of sunlight. More noticeable is the mole on her left cheek, and the mole on her back, by her right shoulderblade.

29. What is one of the most courageous things your character has ever done for a loved one?

If asked, Pete would probably tell you that he is a grade-A selfish bitch who has never done a single courageous thing for anybody ever in his entire life and he is offended that you would even suggest such a thing

This is absolute nonsense, and the general response that he gets to it (at least from Seb, Stephen, and Margot) is, “*nods* Of course not, honey. Do you want your eggs sunny-side up today or something else?” or, “*nods* Of course, Pete. I’m sure that the people you’ve ever helped just imagined that” — so, deadpan at him and let him get it out of his system until he’s calmed down

Because he’ll be fine if you just let him get this shit out of his system and calm down, instead of trying to argue with him like Todd does

In fairness to Pete, though, this isn’t entirely coming out of him trying to overcompensate for his messy feelings re: self-worth. Part of this comes out of how his particular approach to being courageous isn’t always one that’s easily understood as such, because of how people tend to devalue things like emotional labor and more understated visions of bravery and being there for someone. So, it’s not right, but he’s working based on the ideas he’s been raised around

But some examples of Pete’s brand of courageousness for his loved ones include, but are not limited to:

Deliberately breaking one of his Dad’s old trophies in order to draw attention off of his big sister Cora, because she was sixteen and she’d just gotten dumped and the last thing that she needed was Dad Arden digging at her about everyone, and Pete was willing to be the scapegoat instead

Standing by Seb during the fiasco that ensued after he took the fall, outed himself at Catholic school, and made it sound like he’d seduced an unwilling Damian, rather than how they were actually dating on the sly — and more than just giving up most of his own popularity to stand by his friend, Pete did it without outing Damian, which was a lot of effort for him because he really wanted to do the “spiteful but satisfying” thing instead of the, “probably less wrong” thing

(Granted, Pete doing the right thing in this situation was less out of any moral or ethical objections to outing people, because he’s generally against it, yeah, and these days, he would probably smack his 18-year-old self for even thinking about it doing it.

But if you’d asked Pete for his opinion at the time, Damian threw his right to ask for consideration out the window when he decided to help spread it around the grapevine that he’d been totally unwilling in all of this when he’d usually been the one going, “Oh, who cares that we could get caught, just kiss me already” while they dated.

Really, Pete didn’t out Damian mostly out of loyalty to Seb — because it was important to him not to out Damian, since his parents were bad enough and his uncle was their school’s priest — and knowing that he wouldn’t want to get outed at Catholic school either)

Going with Margot during the one incident where Seb dropped off the radar and Todd eventually found him in the vicinity of a gutter, because she was enough of a mess that she really shouldn’t have been out looking on her own. After Todd found Seb and middle brother Ambrose dragged him up to their parents’ place, Pete then went to Seb’s place with Margot, again so she wouldn’t need to be alone.

Granted, he was high himself, and drinking from a hip flask while talking about how Seb had a problem, and she eventually kind of lost it and chewed him out for that, but:

1. Pete still tried to be there for her during a Really Bad stretch, when he really needed someone to be there for him too and unfortunately, the person he most wanted to be there for him was Seb, so…… that was a mess;

and 2. high and drinking though he was, Pete was also trying to moderate it and only get intoxicated enough to not start detoxing or be non-functional, which was a hard balance to find and something he only would’ve done for a handful of people

and going to rehab. Also, admitting that he needed help more generally, but going to an inpatient rehab took a lot of courage for Pete because there were a lot of reasons why it sounded like Hell on Earth to him.

35. Is your character afraid of death? If they got to choose how to die, how would they want to go?

Margot…… has a messy relationship with her fear of death. Like, she is afraid of death, and when she tries to sound tough, she says that her only fears are fear itself, “the crushing inevitability of death,” hypothetically being rejected by any of Seb’s dogs, and the possibility that the Loch Ness Monster might be real.

Which are, in order: a lie (Margot thinks fear is useful and valuable, its entire purpose is to help keep you from dying, so shut up and be grateful that your ancestral beings developed the capacity to feel fear) (which, context, she says as someone with an undiagnosed anxiety disorder); messy; a true fear for her, but none of Seb’s dogs has ever disliked her and Angel, his incredibly skittish “mutt with strong shades of Labrador Retriever and German Shepherd,” likes Margot better than she likes most other people, which is a big deal; and a straight up lie because Margot thinks Nessie being real would be cool.

If pressed to be honest, she would claim that that her fear of death doesn’t count as, “a real fear” because she allegedly only fears it in an abstract and primal way that she shares with most other animal organisms on the planet, because on a very deep level, right down to our genes, living things generally want to continue being alive and generally fight tooth-and-nail against death.

The biggest linchpin in her argument here is, “Well, but I haven’t been confronted with the reality of my own potential death” — which is a big lie. Margot has definitely been confronted with that. She just hasn’t had any experiences that ended in her nearly dying herself, in part because some of her confrontations with it were not actually that dangerous but they seemed to be at the moment, and largely because most of these experiences, for her, have involved her 6’3” best friend, who dives into harm’s way for her, gets her out of the way with the full intent to take a literal bullet, and otherwise lets the harm fall on him so it won’t fall on Margot.

So, ultimately, Margot’s, “I only fear death in a primal, instinctual way that is shared by most if not all living things” nonsense is something she tells herself to try and distance herself from how visceral the fear actually is here, and to try and get out of dealing with the fact that her fear of death applies more to someone else than to herself

(which, in fairness, it probably wouldn’t if her best friend had fewer near-death experiences and fewer self-destructive tendencies, but as it stands, Seb has racked up sixteen brushes with death, two of which did involve him briefly dying, and has a habit of putting his fingers in his ears and going, “La la la, I can’t hear you, this is normal and fine” when confronted with how this is neither fine nor normal)

If given the choice in how she dies, Margot would pick, “I don’t want to die, fuck you”

If she had to pick, then…… Nah, she’s fine dying at an advanced age, while asleep in bed but not after a prolonged painful struggle with cancer or something. You can keep your cool, heroic deaths, she wants to live and accomplish shit before she kicks it, thanks

38. What kind of weather does your character like? Cloudy skies, rainy days, sunshine, etc?

Sunshine, but not too warm. Pete likes spring, basically. He doesn’t actually mind the heat as much as he says he does, but he does mind that summer makes it harder for him to wear some of his most favorite pieces of clothing, like the longer and heavier and more dramatic pieces, and his, “totally not a hipster scarf because Cora made it for him, it’s not some fake pashmina bullshit like Todd wore for way too long a few years back” scarf

He won’t argue with a free excuse to wear some of his hot pants or booty shorts, though, even if he can usually only do that on the weekends because if he wore them to the theatre: A. he might end up getting hurt; and B. his boss, Mitch, would object because he could get hurt

40. Does your OC have any guilty pleasures they enjoy? Hobbies, past times, music, etc that they wouldn’t want known by others?

Long story short: yes, she does, but she also insists to most people that she doesn’t believe in guilty pleasures, and she also doesn’t really have any semblance of secrecy about any of these things

Like, she may not appreciate you finding out that she likes to binge watch Scooby Doo cartoons when she feels stressed out and sad, because she doesn’t want to be teased about it like her big brother sometimes does, but Lucy also doesn’t go out of her way to hide any of this

She’s way more likely to #Nope out of a situation where she really just can’t with this anymore by going, “Okay, I can’t do this right now, I’m gonna go play Final Fantasy 7 for a few hours until I either finish the game again or regain my ability to do this”

43. Does your character have a switch that changes aspects of their personality whether they are around friends, family, etc. Is there someone who gets to see their true self?

Eh, it’s less that Seb changes anything about his personality for the benefit of other people, and more that he emphasizes some parts of it with some folks while downplaying others, which makes him about as out of the ordinary as oxygen (which is to say, “Not at all”)

—I mean, think about it: do most people act the same around their parents as they do around their friends? their coworkers? friends of their friends whom they don’t know very well? random strangers on the bus? etc.

Like, I’m not trying to be an edgy mcedgelord and say that all people are lying bastards, or trying to channel Holden fucking Caulfield to call everyone ever a phony.

I’m just saying, as a human person who likes to make up stories about other human persons and write them down, that most people have different patterns of behavior around the different people in their lives, and it doesn’t make them fakes or liars or whatever. It means that people are, in general, affected by their environments and choose how to behave based on who they’re with, what’s going on, etc.

Someone doesn’t become a wholly different person just because they try not to cuss around their younger cousins or because they’re more comfortable with their friends so they can be less high-strung — but as I was saying.

This behavior on Seb’s part only gets to be any different from most people’s habit of doing the exact same thing because some of the contexts in his life make his patterns of doing this more unhealthy — not because the underlying behavior is inherently unhealthy, but because of how he uses these behaviors to hide things from people, including himself

One of the worst ways in which this comes out is with regard to Seb’s extroversion. Strictly speaking, he’s an extrovert less because he’s super-social and wants to be where the people are (though those things are also true), and more because he’s more attuned to the world outside of himself than to his inner life. This can be a problem because he ends up being hypersensitive to other people’s feelings (hyper-empathy, if not to the same extent as genuine mutant superpowered empaths like Josie and Julian), and he misconstrues a lot of things as potential rejections.

Between that, how much he does genuinely want to be where the people are and wants for people to like him, and how much he wants to make people feel better and avoid hurting them, he gets super high-strung when he’s talking to people. He used to be even worse about that, like back in high school, when it was easier for him to try and escape his undiagnosed depression

—and it led into one of the biggest reasons why he started drinking in earnest and liked it so much. Namely: when he was drunk, he was less high-strung and other people thought that he was fun to have around, instead of regarding him as, like, “well, he’s in the theatre club so we have to tolerate him, and he got matched up with Pete in Sister Mary Ignatius’s weird ass peer mentorship thing, and Pete kinda likes him, so we have to be nice”

—and because Seb was fourteen and already pretty down on himself as a general rule, and prone to assuming that there is nothing good or worthwhile about him, he concluded not that people liked him because he loosened up and stopped trying so hard to fit in and be just like them and doing a really bad job of it because, in that situation, he WAS legitimately trying to be someone he wasn’t (and he wasn’t as good at it as Pete)

Instead, he concluded that alcohol was a magical potion that made him cool and made people like him

(In retrospect, he is definitely ashamed of how he did exactly what he was warned not to do in all of the, “drink responsibly, here is how you do that, here is what alcohol is and isn’t, here is what it does and doesn’t, ffs don’t drink to make people like you, it doesn’t really work, etc.” talks he got from his parents, but he would also rather not talk about it, please and thanks)

Likewise, Seb doesn’t mean to be a manipulative little shit and often doesn’t even notice that he’s doing it, or think he’s manipulating any of his loved ones, but his attitude toward a lot of this is, “Well, okay, I didn’t tell the whole truth, but I didn’t lie” or, “Maybe I stretched the truth a little bit, but it’s still technically true, right” or, “Okay, I left out a lot of shit just now, but I didn’t say anything that wasn’t true, so it’s not the same as lying”

Unfortunately, he usually justifies that behavior with rationale like, “But I only told them what they wanted to hear and what would make them happy. Telling them the whole truth wouldn’t make them happy; it’d just make them get upset and worried about things that aren’t their problems and that they can’t help with. Isn’t it better to let them be happy? Isn’t that what they deserve?”

Which makes it really hard for him to break this habit, for a lot of reasons, which include but are not limited to:

1. His rationale largely lets him get out of acknowledging and dealing with the “understandable but still selfish and potentially very Not Good” aspects of his behaviors (e.g., how his habit of letting people believe things are better than they are lets him off the hook for dealing with things that actually need to be dealt with; how he wants to connect with people, so he tells them what he thinks they want to hear, which doesn’t always reflect reality or allow a genuine connection to develop, so if and/or when things fall apart, he takes it as confirmation that he was right about being broken and unlovable, etc.)

—Like, there are a lot of reasons why he didn’t forge that many meaningful connections with anyone during the years that he would call his, “downward spiral” period (which ranges from either age 15 to age 28, or age 18 to age 28, depending on who’s asking and how Seb feels about it today).

Some of them are due to circumstances beyond his control and/or can’t really be termed, “his fault” without getting into victim-blaming territory.

For example, Seb didn’t make a lot of friends in his last two years of high school because he spent them at his Dad’s, Max’s, and Addie’s old boarding school, where he almost immediately got outed (thanks to some other students overhearing the faculty talking about it, because Seb was from a legacy family and his abrupt transfer at the start of junior year was a big deal)

……and where he spent a lot of time getting bullied for being gay and “imperfectly” masculine (not that his bullies used that term, but they also had a hard time trying to accuse him of being exactly feminine, and usually went more for the insults like, “sissy,” “queer,” and the homophobic slur that starts with F), accused of being a predator for not outing himself (which he really wasn’t keen on doing because he came to Saxon fresh off of getting outed at Catholic school), and most looking forward to the weekends when he could get on a train and fuck off down to Pete’s campus and spend time with someone who actually liked him

Or for another example: while Seb hasn’t handled the fallout from some of his abusive relationships well (which is to say that he largely hasn’t handled it and would rather act like these relationships had no lasting effects on him whatsoever), you can’t exactly fault him for not keeping in touch with any of those guys after the respective breakups (or after three of them wound up in prison for various reasons)

But otoh, some of the reasons why Seb didn’t forge a lot of lasting and meaningful connections go back to his bad habit of telling people what they want to hear in order to make them like him, not because he’s consciously being a manipulative little shit but because he wants to connect with people and feel like he belongs somewhere and have friends

Seriously, that is the biggest difference between him and Jeff, “I would say anything to get what I want and I want you to like me” Winger, when it comes to telling people what they want to hear. Both of them do it on purpose. Both of them do it because they care an inordinate amount about what people think of them.

But Jeff wants to control what people think of him so he can use it to his advantage, and even after being with the Study Group starts to open him up, he has a habit of devaluing interpersonal connections (largely because he’s terrified of them, yes, but still) and kind of continuing to see them as tools, rather than as relationships.

For Seb, those interpersonal connections are pretty much everything. He loves love, he loves friendship, he loves community and connecting with people and making people feel good by being friendly and kind, he just loves people in general. At heart, he is a big sap, a hopeless romantic, a marshmallow made of affection and rainbows, and a kids TV show platitude about the power of friendship given human form.

But because he hates himself and loves all of those things and probably venerates all of them more than is good for him, he feels like he doesn’t deserve any of them and like he has to constantly tailor how he presents himself until it perfectly fits what he thinks everybody else wants from him

Which makes it sort of hard to form connections with someone, especially when Seb was pretty good at deflecting suspicion, distracting people, and caring about them, but less than good at sharing himself enough to make the connections last, which often works for a little bit, but ultimately runs afoul of that Perks of Being A Wallflower, “you can’t just just sit there and put everyone's lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love” problem

Like, you have to at least share something with other people so they feel like they’re getting something out of the relationship (aside from you always catering to them and to their needs, expecting them to be open when they have little to no reason to feel like you’re reciprocating)

You can even share something that is some kind of untrue, like Conrad (who mostly shares lies but doesn’t see them as lies because they have some basis in reality, they’re just ““enhanced reality””), Pete (who’s spent a lot of his life playing different versions of himself to get people’s approval, which is different from Seb’s approach because when Pete does this, it has the appearance of being open and sharing, rather than a lot of deflecting and hiding)

But Seb’s approach was more, “bury everything and pretend it isn’t there and try to make it look like I am exactly what these people think I am”

It doesn’t help that he has a lot of trouble knowing who he is without someone helping him, and easily slips into a way of thinking where he feels like he’s a blank slate and nothing more so why is it a bad thing for him to just let people project what they want him to be onto him

which is partly a depression thing for him, and partly the result of how Seb has spent most of his life denying, repressing, refusing, and trying to erase or ignore huge parts of his own identity and his own sense of personhood because he feels like he’d be better and everyone would like him more if he were someone else

which…… is a mess. Like, he figured out early enough that he’s not very good at being other people outside the context of the theatre club — the classic example for him is how much he’s hurt himself by trying to be Max and fit the exact same standards as Max, which has never worked because they’re different people, and they can do and need very different things

—but Seb’s still wound up with very little stable sense of his own identity and who he is, and a lot of his questioning tends to end up back at, “I’m a broken mess, I’m kinda like God spilled a person but considering how many things I’ve lived though, I’m too amusing for Him to let me die, I guess”

He’s working on it. But it’s still a mess.

This mess of shit is one of aspect of the bag of emotional and psychological wet cats that makes up, “La Bête” — i.e., the part of his mind that is vaguely analogous to the Hulk, except that La Bête isn’t really a separate personality inside of Seb like the Hulk is often portrayed with Bruce Banner, and superpowered though she is, La Bête isn’t fueled by anger and destruction so much as protective impulses, the desire to live, love and the desire to form connections and defend those connections, the pack-building impulse

Basically, La Bête is more like actual irl wolves than most ideas of how wolves are that you find in werewolf or werewolf-themed fiction. Destruction isn’t really her endgame goal or a thing she particularly enjoys, so much as a side-effect of some of her other impulses since, once she decides to go and do something, she is admittedly not quite so good at being 100% careful

If she ever seems to be fueled by anger (which, in fairness, she is going to do, early on), it’s less about actual anger and more about either that protective impulse again (such as when Seb’s first full transformation gets triggered by one of Conrad’s lackeys inducing three simultaneous heart attacks, which would manage to kill him if La Bête didn’t take over, so she wanted to save him, and then their immediate impulse was to run and get Margot out of harm’s way)

……or it’s like the story of St. Francis of Assisi and the Wolf of Gubbio, where the titular wolf only looks angry and violent and dangerous to the villagers he’s been in conflict with because he is starving and they’ve been treating him like a monster

Or, in other words, the whole, “hey, maybe your superpowered transformation is triggered by anger and fear, so maybe you need to do more work on controlling that” idea leads to Seb trying to muzzle La Bête, which goes Not Well, largely because it means he’s not learning how to control his transformations, while also being a complete dick to himself and her, which makes her feel threatened and then makes her lash out

Not that I have any particular issues with the literal millennia of misrepresentation that wolves have had to suffer in Western literature, art, and culture, or with how all of those gross caricatures have affected werewolf fiction, or with how different layers of sociopolitical nuance, usually involving shades of misogyny, homophobia, and/or ableism, have been more explicitly woven into the figure of the werewolf in recent decades, only to come up with deeply mixed messages, like JKR casting lycanthropy as an HIV/AIDS metaphor and making Remus Lupin a sympathetic character but also keeping up this idea that the thing that subtextually ties him GBQ men… has an uncontrollable appetite for destruction, makes him a complete monster one night a month and must be repressed and controlled, and otherwise perpetuating a bunch of homophobic bullshit (to say nothing of how she did that even worse with Fenrir Greyback)

……Except, y’know. I totally have issues with all of that stuff I just said, and a big part of the struggle in working out La Bête and writing her has been trying to keep it from getting too preachy and pedantic, whoops

(also, for the record: La Bête gets called, “she” and “her” because:

1. the French noun is feminine, and Seb starts calling her, “La Bête” because he decides to take, “Gévaudan” as his nom de spandex, so he figures, “La Bête” would be a thematically consistent name;

2. Josie gets assigned to help guide Seb through the, “how to have mutant superpowers and not kill people or break the law or anything” stuff, and they try to approach the issue of how to understand and control Seb’s transformation with a bit of a Jungian-influenced approach, so they try to examine La Bête through the lens of the Shadow and the Anima

—which Josie does admit is sort of a mess with regard to gender roles and ideas about how gender even works, since Jung was a product of his culture and his time period like that, but since the Anima is talked about in she/her terms, Josie slips into doing the same to La Bête, and neither Seb nor La Bête particularly object to this;

(personally, Seb doesn’t see it as being any different from Pete’s nickname for him being, “[my] Princess,” and to him, it’s all like…… okay, La Bête is a part of his mind and psyche that’s been rather abruptly crystallized into a more cohesive entity by sudden onset superpowers — though she hasn’t been rendered separate from him, the way that a lot of depictions of Bruce Banner like to imagine the Hulk being more or less entirely separate from him, just cursed to inhabit the same body — and we’re apparently going to call La Bête with she/her pronouns now, okay cool)

3. “I don’t know? She-wolves usually get a bit more sympathy when you look at how they’re depicted in art and stories, like? Yeah, okay, you can easily find them being just as maligned as he-wolves, if not more so, but you also have stories like the she-wolf who suckled Romulus and Remus, or stories of she-wolves adopting abandoned babies of other species, so like? I don’t know, it just feels nicer to call La Bête a she-wolf?” — Seb, before he’s completely put it together how his transformations work, but when he’s at the middling point of realizing that the overwhelming emotion that La Bête brings with her is never anger)

But anyway, I was saying something about him and his patterns of connecting with others

Like, seriously, here are the meaningful and lasting connections he’s made from ages 15 to 28(ish): Margot, Todd, Fr. Teddy (one of the priests at Seb’s cool, socially progressive LGBTQ church, who technically isn’t a priest in the Vatican’s eyes because he dropped out of seminary and hasn’t actually gone through the ordination process, but he serves at a church that the Vatican kinda doesn’t acknowledge anyway, so… yeah, that’s a thing), and Julian kinda (if you stretch your definition of “meaningful and lasting” a bit)

If you expand a bit, you could add Pete (though they got to be friends before Seb’s “downward spiral” period, i.e. most of his adult life and all of his late adolescence), Nick (his and Pete’s sponsor, who Seb technically met after the “downward spiral” period), Stephen (who Seb met after he met Nick, so…… yeah), and Genevieve (his and Pete’s therapist, who they didn’t start seeing until after both of them had been to rehab, so hey)

—apparently, before I went off on that tangent about how La Bête fits into all of this, I was working on a better organized list of reasons why it’s hard for Seb to break his habit of playing up the parts of situations that he thinks people want to hear while hiding all the stuff that actually needs to get dealt with

The other reasons I was going to go into sort of got danced around in that huge tirade, but to make them a bit more explicit here: despite the selfish parts of this behavior, Seb genuinely does want to protect the people who he loves and make them happy, and getting him to understand that it would make them happy for him to be well, which means he needs to stop hiding things like he does…… well, that’s been an uphill struggle for a lot of reasons, including Seb’s assumption that he’s too broken to ever be well and he’s probably never going to get better so the best he can do is keep the people he loves from realizing it and blaming themselves for his problems;

(which he has decent enough reason to be afraid of them doing, since everyone he loves has had at least one big moment of what I call, “acknowledging how they might have shaped circumstances here and didn’t exactly help, but are still not actually responsible for shit anything in this because Sebastian made his own choices” but Seb feels like it’s more, “blaming themselves for his problems, and unfairly so because he made his own choices and the burden of responsibility shouldn’t fall on them”

—the major difference between the two approaches here being that Seb wants to blame himself for everything, and feels like it’s justified because of the, “he made his own bad choices and now he’s accepting responsibility” thing, but he doesn’t entirely get the difference between, “really accepting responsibility” and, “using acknowledgment of his fuck-ups as an excuse to be an overly self-punishing dick to himself and cut himself off from most things”

and there are some circumstances that he legitimately can’t take responsibility for.

They’re largely situations that had problems but that aren’t anyone’s “fault” — like, how his parents tried their best with him and were unconditionally loving, supportive, and accepting, but they’re still only human and didn’t always know what the best approach was. So, they did things like overly praise him so he wouldn’t feel overshadowed by his three older siblings, or like he was terrible and they were all awesome — but instead of feeling reassured and self-confident, Seb noticed the disparity and felt like his parents were lying to spare his feelings because he was actually terrible, and then felt like he couldn’t tell them so because they loved him enough to try and make him feel better about being probably worthless, and it’d be super ungrateful of him to

Or they had situations where Abe and Marceline didn’t know that some of the things they accepted as, “just odd little Sebastian things” were really how depression can manifest in children — and frankly, given that it was the late 1980’s to early/mid 1990’s, they couldn’t have known this. Hell, juvenile/adolescent depression is still not understood very well and still faced with a lot of nonsense about how it’s not possible for kids to have depression because we don’t want that to happen to kids. (The same goes for pretty much all juvenile/adolescent presentations of mental illnesses, too.)

All of this was even less understood when Seb was a kid, and it would have taken a lot of ridiculously implausible shit for Abe and Marceline to even think that, “Maybe our youngest has a mental illness” was on the table as a potential explanation for some of Seb’s behaviors, most of which seemed different from other kids but nothing to call a doctor about.

Like, okay, he was very emotionally sensitive and he cried easily and did things like insist that they could only adopt dogs from the ASPCA anymore because he saw different news specials about how shitty puppy mills are and how some people abuse their dogs, who end up getting put up for adoption — big deal, some kids are just more sensitive than others, shaming him for having emotions would be a bad idea, and shaming him for caring about the welfare of other living beings just doesn’t make sense, doesn’t that mean they’re doing a good job of raising a kid who cares about others

(Well, yes, but the problem there wasn’t actually the caring so much as how distressed Seb got about this, but unfortunately, by that point in his early life, Abe and Marceline were already pretty used to him being sensitive and maybe a little bit dramatic, and his level of distress about abused animals who really needed loving homes didn’t actually register as odd by his standards)

So, yeah. Ultimately, Abe and Marceline could have done a lot of things differently while raising Seb, and they could have put his depression together sooner, and so on — but nobody can be faulted for the situation because based on the circumstances and the knowledge that they actually had available to him at the time, they tried to make what they thought were the best choices in raising their son, like not shaming him for having emotions or putting him in therapy that they weren’t sure he needed — since, to be fair, any of his early self-destructive patterns of behavior looked either like he was a curious, energetic kid who was just being a curious, energetic kid, or like he was a good kid who, being more sensitive than his siblings, needed a bit more approval, and worked hard at school because he wanted his Mom and Dad to be proud of him — which, if he hadn’t needed it, might have made him feel like having feelings was some kind of pathology, which would also be pretty bad

Either way, they can’t be blamed for that situation, and Seb can’t be blamed for it either, but this does not stop him from trying to blame himself for, “being ungrateful” or, “being too broken,” when the actual problem is that no one has gotten to the root cause of a lot of his issues until recently, so they’ve been throwing different solutions at all of this and cobbling together different ideas for how to help that don’t fully address the cause and will, as such, always end up being incomplete)

—also, there is the problem of how Seb doesn’t really have the best idea of who he actually is, and trying to make him reflect on that… has a history of ending badly.

Like, if he doesn’t end up going down a rabbit hole wherein he starts feeling like he might not be anybody and might not even be real, and then goes and does something self-destructive in the name of remembering if he’s real or not

……then he’s liable to hit the point of going like, “Do I like this thing because I really do enjoy it or because everybody else does? Do I act this way because it’s true to being me or is it because I’m trying to fit into this or that idea about how gay men [or any other identity marker he might apply to himself; it’s usually either gay men or, something like, “the best friend Pete deserves,” “the uncle Marie deserves,” “the son my parents deserve,” etc.] act, or because I realize that I can’t ever be that for them and do the exact opposite? How much of me is really me and how much of it is dictated by culture and other people’s expectations of me? Who?? Am??? I, really???? Who are ANY of us????? Are any of us real or are we all just ideas of each other interacting in a void onto which we project meaning that might not actually mean fuck anything??????”

And if he gets there, he is going to short-circuit

Personally, Pete doesn’t like it when Seb goes and does any of his old self-destructive shit, but in a way, it’s preferable to the latter option, because trying to talk Seb down or trying to clean it up if he punched out a window or cut himself? Sucks. And Pete isn’t going to deny that it sucks. Arguing about whether or not he should go to the ER sucks, picking glass out of his hand with tweezers sucks, all of it really fucking sucks.

But trying to get Seb out of an existential crisis that usually ends with him flopped out on his sofa, or in his bed, staring at the ceiling in abject terror, probably with music or the TV on but not really listening to it, and where any answer could potentially have really unpleasant effects, either now or at some point down the line, because this has gone beyond the realm of Seb’s own issues and his own demons, and while it is still really about those things, it’s gotten into debates about very the nature of existence, and before you can do literally anything else, you first have to drag him out of the ontological and/or metaphysical rabbit hole?

………Yeah, that’s way more stressful, if you ask Pete. Not that he feels he can really talk, considering how many times Seb’s ever talked him down from something, or pulled him out of one of his own rabbit holes, or at least come with Pete while he was doing something stupid and self-destructive so he wouldn’t be alone — and at least these existential crises have been getting much less frequent and less severe since Seb started going to therapy — but still.

Okay, I’ve lost the plot of this way too many times, I’m going to shut up now

TL;DR: Yes, Seb does kind of do the personality switching thing with the people he loves, but at the same time: 1. If not for all of the other pieces of context here about why him doing this is really Not Good, it would be no different from the typical amount of switching that most people do based on who they’re with and what situations they find themselves in;

2. In a way, it’s even less of a complete personality-switch thing — e.g., acting reserved and polite around your parents, but then being rowdy and snarky and party-happy with your friends — and more of a situation where he shows more or less the same behaviors and personality traits to everyone he loves, including the same pattern of “I’m not technically lying, I’m just not being 100% truthful either and that’s different,” and the variance comes from what he chooses to hide or not (e.g., he’s more willing to admit to his friends than to his parents that he’d really like to have a drink instead of dealing with any given stressful situation)

And even given that variance, very few people will hear him say something like, “Is, ‘I want to down six shots of tequila at once and go 90 MPH down an open stretch of highway’ a feeling? Because I think I feel that.”

A large part of why he does that is to make other people happy, but an equally large part of why he does it is so he can get out of dealing with shit that is scary and complicated and ew, how about no, why can’t he just repress it and fake a smile and act like everything is fine

and 3. He’s trying to hide his behaviors, feelings, and impulses, yes, but it would technically be inaccurate to say that Seb is trying to hide his true self from people, because in order to deliberately hide his true self, he would need to know who the fuck that is, and he is not entirely sure (which is one of the many bones that La Bête has to pick with him, but that’s another rant entirely)

Either way, Pete is consistently the best at getting Seb to be honest with himself and, consequentially, with everyone else.

True, Max, Adelaide, Ambrose, and their parents have known Seb longest and arguably seen his more of his tricks than Pete has…… but the funny thing about that idea is how it assumes that blood family will always trump found family, and how it assumes that, “We’ve known him for longer” is automatically going to mean they know him better when… uh, no.

Max and Seb prove that pretty well, given that they’ve spent most of their lives not knowing how to best communicate and deal with each other, which totally spilled over into Max kinda developing a resentment toward cousin Jeremy for a while, because Jeremy was between Max and Adelaide, age-wise, and he got on Seb’s level better than Max ever did, apparently without even trying, so from Max’s perspective, it felt a lot like he was getting stuck with all the crappy parts of being Seb’s big brother while Jeremy got promoted to Replacement Max and got all of the good parts

Bad parts meaning, like, having to take him to the ER because he didn’t listen about being told not to climb one of the trellises at their grandparents’ place and he fell off, and getting the, “why didn’t you keep a closer eye on him” talk when Abe got there — to which the appropriate answer was apparently not, “Have you EVER tried to tell Sebastian NOT to do something? Has he EVER listened to you when you did?” — until Seb backed him up and agreed that Max had done everything he was supposed to do and Seb climbed the trellis anyway

While good parts meant, like, having Seb confide in you. Having him trust you. Having him look up to you, but not in a way that turns you into some unreachable ideal that he uses to be a jerk to himself (though at the time, Max would’ve just said, “Having him look up to you” because he didn’t really get that Seb did look up to him, just… not in a good way).

And yeah, Seb was a weirdly honest teenager who asked permission to take some of his parents’ booze to theatre club cast parties, and who knew he was loved and supported enough at home to come out when he was twelve, but he also didn’t tell his parents about the shit that fell on him after he outed himself to spare Damian because he didn’t want them to think he couldn’t handle it on his own, and had it not been for Pete and Ambrose telling them some of it (though not all of it, out of respect for Seb’s wishes), Abe and Marceline might have remained ignorant of what was going on, beyond, “He says that he’s stressed about final exams, and for some reason, he doesn’t talk about Damian or Allison anymore, but won’t talk about why”

So, it’s not for nothing, because Pete does realize that Seb’s family is actually pretty tight with each other and that, for all they’re a bunch of human beings and thus messy by nature and prone to screwing up, they all actually love each other and try to more or less do right by each other — which he is totally jealous of, by the way, though he would be more so if not for how Seb considers him basically a brother and he’s pretty much always invited to Moncrieff family gatherings or parties, since the family inexplicably (in Pete’s mind) likes him

—but at the same time, he’s pretty sure that he knows more about his Princess and in more contexts than the blood family does.

And he’s right.

Not that this means Pete’s awareness and his powers of Seb-related deduction are literally ever perfect, but…… y’know. He’s working with a more comprehensive playbook than Seb’s blood family.

This was a really pathetic excuse for, “I’m going to shut up now, TL;DR summary time”

Whoops

48. Is there anything in particular that would ignite your character’s jealousy? Or does your character not get envious?

Yes, but also no?

I mean, I feel like saying that any character never gets envious is at best disingenuous, though I’m biased because I’ve literally never met anyone who doesn’t experience jealousy, whether it dominates them like it does with Todd or not, and like…… The fact that Seb isn’t as overwhelmed by jealousy as Todd doesn’t mean much

He definitely experiences jealousy; it’s just that he doesn’t really focus on it or do that much with it beyond let it simmer and possibly use it as an excuse to be a jerk to himself

(—which is also a bit because he usually doesn’t feel it strongly enough to do much with it, but that’s not really a, “Seb is a good person who doesn’t let his jealousy consume him” thing; it’s a, “Seb is seriously depressed and doesn’t feel most things strongly enough to do much with them, which is going to change somewhat when he gets medicated and his brain chemistry starts getting evened out, but that’s another matter”)

His biggest envy buttons tend to be things like:

“Pete and Todd have had it easier than I have at staying sober, why can’t I do that, what is wrong with me that makes it so much harder for me than it is them”

(To answer his question: neither Pete nor Todd has actually had it easy with their sobriety — which Seb does know and he feels bad about even remotely feeling like they’ve had it, “easier,” but asking emotions to be rational is a losing game for everybody — but they’ve had more success than he has because they haven’t been doing the psychological equivalent of trying to fight Ganondorf with a butter knife)

“My dumb older brother has a good relationship with his wife, who is a good person and loves him, and I’m never going to have anything like that”

“My sponsor and his husband are so in love with each other even after so long together and it’s so beautiful and I wish I could have something like that, but it’s never going to happen for me because why would it”

and so on.

And here we see one of the reasons why he’s spent the past year and a half doing the psychological equivalent of fighting Ganondorf with a butter knife: he looks at these patterns of thought and doesn’t see them as indicative of anything beyond him being, “broken,” so he hasn’t been entirely open with them, and his loved ones and therapist haven’t had all the knowledge that they need to figure out how to help him

Some of them have put it together that all involved parties have been missing something that means all of their approaches aren’t working as well as they could do, but most of them don’t know what that is. Pete has the best idea (because Seb’s too attached to all his denial to have an accurate idea and he pretty much stops at, “I am broken, that explains everything”), and even he isn’t entirely right

Right about Seb being a mutant, right about thinking like, “Maybe he’s depressed? I mean, we keep overlooking that option for all kinds of reasons, but maybe that’s part of it all,” right about thinking that Seb is more affected by some of the shit he’s been through than he wants to be, right about Seb needing to try something new since a lot of his previously attempted ideas haven’t helped in the ways he needs, right about going, “You’re flatbacked on the sofa, staring at the ceiling like it just threatened to kill your dogs, and listening to ‘Last Christmas’ in the middle of June. It’s not hard to figure out that something’s wrong”

—but Pete is somewhat less than right about, for example: Seb’s emotional trigger for kicking into Beast Mode probably being fear and/or anger (but in fairness to Pete, he hears, “my best friend can hulk out into a nine-foot-tall wolf-man” and concludes that it’s most likely going to work like the Incredible Hulk or in-universe heroes like The Myrmidon of the All-Stars and Dr. Lydia “Promethia” Yates of the Wardens); reacting to sudden-onset superpowers by going, “HI OMG I’M YOUR SIDEKICK NOW FUCK YEAH LET’S ROCK THIS BITCH”; Seb’s confused feelings after his date with Stephen (because Seb ends up genuinely unsure what he wants to do about his situation with Todd vs. starting something new with Stephen, and Pete’s initial reaction is, “Oh, bullshit, you’re just trying to chicken out on this because you’re actually interested someone NICE for once, you just learned that he likes you back, and now, you’re SCARED”)

……Granted, he’s also not entirely wrong on that last point, but Seb being scared doesn’t negate the fact that he’s also confused about his feelings

[whysosirius-james]

James Sirius Potter + Questionnaire (1/??)

trigger warning ; alcoholism

ORIGINS & FAMILY

Name:

James Sirius Potter (adopted name)

Bernard Vernon Dursley (birth name)

Nickname(s): James, Jimmy, Jim-Jam, Bernard (sarcastically)

Reason for name:

James is his adopted grandfather and Sirius is his adopted father’s godfather. They were two men Harry looked up to and loved and in turn, James aspires to be them.

Bernard is a Dursley family name and Vernon is his biological grandfather’s name. He has not used this name since he was adopted and has no intention of changing it back in the future.

Birthday: Thirteenth of November, 2003

Gender: Male

Place of birth: Somewhere in England, exact location unknown.

Places lived since: 

In the unknown location for a few weeks with his mother

With his biological father in Little Whinging for nearly six months

With his adopted parents and siblings in Godric’s Hollow following his adoption

Hogwarts from age eleven to eighteen for most of the year

With Mackenzie in a house they bought together in Hogsmeade following his graduation

Parents’ names, backgrounds, occupations:

Dudley Dursley - Biological Father - He is the son of Vernon Dursley and Petunia Dursley (nee Evans, deceased as of 2020) and maternal cousin of Harry Potter. He is a muggle and was a bully as a child, especially towards Harry, which he has since come to regret. He had an affair with Samoan witch - unaware of her heritage at the time - and Bernard was the result. Dudley asked his cousin to take Bernard, to be named James, as his own when he started showing signs of magic so that he would not receive the same treatment Harry did growing up. He currently works as a salesman in the position Vernon held before he retired. He had another affair which resulted in James’ muggleborn half-brother, Fletcher (who he does not know about). Dudley got married in 2007 and has no other children.

Talia Leapei - Biological Mother - She is a pureblood, Samoan witch. James does not know who her parents are. She had an affair with Dudley Dursley early 2003, resulting in her pregnancy. She kept him for a few weeks before leaving him at Dudley’s doorstep. In 2021, she wrote to her son to get in touch and they have since been in contact. She is currently a florist in Samoa, is unmarried and has no other children. James met her in 2023.

Harry Potter - Adopted Father - He is the son of James Potter and Lily Potter (nee Evans) - both are deceased - and the maternal cousin of Dudley Dursley. He is a halfblood wizard, Gryffindor alumni and was the captain and seeker on his school’s Quidditch team. He led Dumbledore’s Army and defeated Voldemort at seventeen. As a favor to Dudley and to keep a child from abuse for being magic, Harry agreed to adopt James - then Bernard - and pretended that he was his and his new wife’s biological son.  He is the current Head of Auror Office and occasionally guest lectures for Defense Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts. He is married to Ginny Weasley-Potter and is the father of two other children, Albus Severus and Lily Luna.

Ginevra “Ginny” Weasley - Adopted Mother - She is the daughter of Arthur Weasley and Molly Weasley (nee Prewett). She is a pureblood witch, Gryffindor alumni and the chaser - and at one point seeker - on her school’s Quidditch team. She fought in the Battle of Hogwarts alongside Harry, Ron (her older brother) and Hermione (friend, now sister-in-law). She agreed without hesitation to adopt James with her husband, Harry, and used her sabbatical from her career to hide her “pregnancy” and maternity leave. She is the former chaser for the Holyhead Harpies and former senior Quidditch reporter for the Daily Prophet. She currently works as the Sports Editor for the Daily Prophet . She is married to Harry Potter and is the mother of two other children, Albus Severus and Lily Luna.

Number of siblings: Two

Albus Severus Potter (adopted, younger brother)

Lily Luna Potter (adopted, younger sister)

Edward “Teddy” Lupin (god-brother / “adopted” brother)

Fletcher Duke (younger paternal half-brother)

Relationship with family (close? estranged?):

James loves his adopted family; parents, siblings and numerous cousins. There is nothing more important to him than them and he would take a bullet for each and every one of them. He has a unique relationship with each of them. Their bond has only grown strong since they found out he was adopted and accepted him for he knew that they would love him no matter what and vice versa.

Before knowing that he was his biological father, James’ relationship with Dudley wasn’t much to talk about. Harry always insisted on his three children visiting his cousin. James never understood why and was always reluctant to go until he received the letter with the truth when he was eleven. After that, he made much more of an effort and writes to him frequently.

Up until 2021, Talia Leapei and James had no contact. All he knew was her name. She wrote to him out of the blue which had a major impact on him. It took him months to respond and they’ve exchanged only a few letters. They met in 2023 and she was invited to his wedding, even organising the flowers for it.

James does get along with Fletcher despite not knowing they are related. They are not close but if James ever did find out, there is no doubt that he would want them to be.

Happiest memory:

The day Lucy was born. It was the best birthday present ever. 

As of 2024, his marriage to Mackenzie Finnigan-Thomas

Childhood trauma: Most of James’ trauma occurred in his teens / young adulthood when he became an alcoholic in his sixth year - since recovered - and when his girlfriend Mackenzie and cousin Lucy were kidnapped by Death Eaters in 2022.

Children of his/her own?: N/A

PHYSICAL

Height: 5′ 11″ /  1.8 m 

Weight: 161 lbs / 73 kg 

Build: Athletic

Nationality: English & Samoan

Disabilities (physical or mental, including mental illnesses): Alcoholism (in recover)

Complexion (freckles, acne, skin tone, birth marks): Two small moles on his left cheek close to his jawline, otherwise totally clear complexion

Hair color: Ginger

Usual hair style: Messy

Eye color: Dark Brown

Glasses? Contacts?: N/A

Style of dress/typical outfit(s): James’ style is very casual and comfortable (i.e. jeans, t-shirts and sneakers). He generally wears very plain shirts with the occasional logo or slogan written across it. He is also prone to wearing plaid shirts or bomber jackets over said t-shirts.

Health: James is rarely sick. He keeps in good shape for Quidditch, eating well and working out frequently, especially since finishing rehab. When he does get sick, he’s quite stubborn about it and lives in denial until someone literally forces him to rest.

Grooming: James showers every morning after his jog and again in the evenings after Quidditch practice. He tends to wear clean clothes. He does not wear makeup or pluck his eyebrows (although every now and then one of his female cousins plucks them for him but he never asks). 

Tattoos? Piercings?:

James has a tattoo that represents each of his siblings and cousins:

A teddy bear for Teddy on the top of his right arm.

Lightning bolt on left ring finger for Albus.

An orange lily on the back of his left shoulder for Lily.

On the back of his right shin he has a rose for Rose.

A flame on the back of his right shoulder for Hugo.

A laurel wreath for Victoire on the outside of his left forearm.

A blue shell on the inside of his left forearm for Dominique.

For Louis, there is an anchor on the inside of his right ankle.

To represent Fred, there is a tattoo of a crown on the inside of his right wrist.

There is a joker’s hat on the inside his left ankle for Roxanne.

For Molly, there is a tattoo of a sun below Lily’s on the back of his left shoulder.

There is a pinky promise tattoo on the outside of his right upper arm. This is a a matching tattoo he has with Lucy.

James has ‘adventure’ tattooed on his inner upper arm.

A golden snitch can be found on the front of his right shoulder.

No piercings.

Accent?: British

Unique mannerisms/physical habits (bites nails, talks with hands, taps feet when restless):  He gets twitchy / shaky - especially his hands - when he feels like he needs a drink and also tends to tap his feet and fingers against surfaces.

INTELLECT

Level of education (high school drop out, undergrad BA/BS, PhD, MD, etc.): Hogwarts graduate

Gifts/talents/skills:

James is a very talented Quidditch player. He was the chaser on the Gryffindor Quidditch team and later became captain. He currently plays a a chaser for the Montrose Magpies.

James is a very gifted prankster. As a Wotter, albeit adopted, he has access to the best pranking tools and ideas from his Uncle George and his shop.

James started to play the guitar at age twelve and his knack for it has only developed.

Alongside his guitar playing, James can sing and has written songs. His most significant example is the song he wrote for Mackenzie right before they got together. He spent a year working on and perfecting it.

Shortcomings: 

James has addictive tendencies, shown through his year of alcoholism. During that time he also smoked and did the occasional drug. Now he stays away from anything addictive substances, including caffeine.

He can be overly protective of his loved ones to the point of annoying them but he means well.

Despite not having Weasley blood, James certainly has their temper. He can get so angry especially when someone hurts the ones he cares about. 

Style of speech:

James usually speaks in a loud and confident voice. His tell when he’s upset or anxious is when he speaks quieter than usual.

Religious stance: Atheist (was not raised with any religion)

Cautious or daring?: Daring

Most sensitive about/vulnerable to: His adoption and his former alcohol addiction

Optimist or pessimist?: Optimist

Extrovert or introvert?: Extrovert

RELATIONSHIPS

Current marital/relationship status: Married to Mackenzie Finnigan Thomas

Sexual orientation: Heterosexual

Past relationships:

Penelope Hawthorne - This relationship was a bit of a roller coaster. They were together when his alcohol addition developed and when he went into rehab, he broke up with her and shut her out. At the time, he believed that she was the root cause of his addiction and thought it was best to stay away from her. They have recently made amends due to a mutual friend dealing with addiction and are trying to be friends.

Level of sexual experience: 

Normally, James only sleeps with people he has an emotional connection with. Altogether he has slept with four people, including his wife Mackenzie.

Most comfortable around (person): Mackenzie Finnigan-Thomas & Lucy Weasley

Oldest friend: Lucy Weasley

Pets?: Barn Owl named Hedwig II

VOCATION

Profession: Chaser for the Montrose Magpies

Past occupations:

Student

James worked three summers in Weasley Wizard Wheezes.

Passions:

Quidditch

Music

Pranking

Attitude towards current job:

Quidditch is James’ passion and there is nothing he would rather be doing.

Attitude towards current coworkers, bosses, employees:

James’ team is like his family and gets along with all of them.

SECRETS

Phobias:

Thanatophobia - fear of dying and losing a loved one

Atychiphobia - fear of failure

Life goals:

James’ main goal in life was to play for a professional Quidditch team, either the Montrose Magpies or the Wimbourne Wasps. He has achieved this goal.

He would also like to work his way up to team captain of the quidditch team he plays for.

His only other goal is to find the perfect woman and settle down and have a large family. His wife, Mackenzie has been told that she may not have children but he has no doubt that they will have kids one way or another.

Greatest fears: 

James is afraid of losing his family in any way, physically or emotionally, above all else.

Most ashamed of:

James’ biggest shame is lying for seven years about his adoption.

His year of alcoholism and partying was a shameful time for him especially when he started lashing out at his family.

Compulsions:

Alcohol Addiction (formerly)

Crimes committed: N/A

What he/she most wants to change about his/her self/life?:

Despite the flaws he knows he has, James would not change much. If he had to say anything, it would be to have more control over his temper sometimes.

DETAILS/QUIRKS

Daily routine:

On weekdays, James wakes up at six for a run and follows that with a shower. He eats breakfast with Mackenzie normally, which they take turns making. He then goes to practice for most, if not all, of the day, only taking a break for lunch and water. When he gets home, he eats dinner with Mackenzie if she’s home. They might watch a movie or he’ll write to his relatives before going to bed. He tends to go to sleep fairly early especially if he has practice early the next day.

On weekends, he still wakes up at six for a run and eats breakfast, occasionally he’ll make breakfast in bed for Mackenzie. If he has practice on weekends, his routine is similar to the weekdays or he will spend his day relaxing or hanging out with his friends and family. For a while after graduation, James would spend a lot of his day’s off unpacking and renovating the house that he and Mackenzie live in together. His weekend evenings are similar to that of the weekdays.

James will always spend his holidays with his family. He will likely go back to the Burrow, bringing Mackenzie with him if she’s available. This is still the case after graduation.

Night owl or early bird?: Early Bird

Light or heavy sleeper?: Heavy Sleeper

Favorite food: Anything Grandma Molly cooks

Favorite book: Quidditch Through the Ages by Kennilworthy Whisp

Favorite movie: Citizen Kane

Favorite song: Do The Hippogriff by the Weird Sisters

Favorite color: Dark Green

Coffee or tea?: Tea

Crunchy or smooth peanut butter?: Crunchy

Type of car he/she drives (or wishes he/she drove): James doesn’t plan on learning to drive. He thinks that apparating works better and more efficiently.

Lefty or righty?: Righty

Cusser?: Definitely

Smoker? Drinker? Drug user?: No / Formerly an Alcoholic / Formerly Though Recreational