#those guys in their blue jumpsuits dont know him

[chetungwan]

When I was like twelve or something ridiculous like that, I got an omnibus of the first fantastic four comics, and now whenever I see them mentioned in a modern context I'm fucking Baffled. What are you talking about. They live in the sixties. Doctor Doom got shrunk to nothing and they're fighting the Mole Man and what do you mean Namor has backstory now

[mqole]

hbjhkgvhj ok here are uh. some character designs i did abt a year ago

these are all based on the incredible @kayzero's fic zero win game, which is a rewrite of ztd with akane as the protagonist, and it has possibly THE BEST characterization of akane ive ever read- listen just. just go read it you will be enriched i promise.

im not putting an image description bc i dont know where to start (sorry!!) BUT ill put a bunch of character design notes below the cut for people who are insane like me <3333

ok first of all. i know when i sent these to kay the other day they said there were some details canon to zwg that i missed (akane's lil hoodie pocket, aoi wearing white to contrast junpei's black (which is SO inspired btw.)) so just. PRETEND those are there bc i forgor <3

i spent the most time on sigma, phi, akane, junpei and aoi just because they've had multiple iterations of designs. it was fun to take bits and pieces from each version of them, so thats why they get a feature page

you can see a lot of my little pink notes with criticisms of the ztd designs there. in general, i really dont like the ztd designs, they all feel unnaturally bland to me (although thats probably also the artstyle).

most people whove looked into the colour symbolism in zero escape are probably familiar with the whole red/blue thing: that is, theyre colours representing the morphogenetic field. akane and aoi are the most obvious examples of this. 'aka' means red, and 'ao' means blue. in the first nonary game, akane and clover wear red - the colour for transmitters - and aoi and light wear blue, the colour for recievers. in 999 proper, akane wears purple, to symbolise how she can recieve AND transmit, while junpei wears red and blue by themselves. you can do a whole analysis of these colours and i will not put it here thats a whole SEPERATE post

anyway! the actual designs!! i'll start with sigma. i wanted to reconcile his vlr design with zero ii's design, and initially i planned on giving him a coat, but it didnt really have a nice silhouette, so i ditched that idea. instead, i turned his jumpsuit from vlr into a polo shirt - much like what he has in ztd - and gave him some zero-y accessories: the white turtleneck, the belt and the gloves all come from zero's design. once id included the white turtleneck, making the pants white felt really logical. in character design, its generally best to limit the palette of colours as much as you can, so it was a good excuse to reuse a colour while also paying homage to his ztd design. i also cut his hair bc hes a scientist and he'd do that.

phi's design is a lot more like her vlr one than her ztd design. the blue coat was her hallmark accessory, and im shocked that they ditched it for ztd, so i gave it back - along with her boots and hair accessory. i kept her pants and glasses from ztd, as well as the way the bottom of her shirt is tucked into her pants. they just have a much nicer silhouette to me. between my first pass of colours and my second pass, phi's colours changed the most - i realised i had too many blue guys in the lineup, and wanted to make the colours stand out individually. so i leaned into phi's orange-ness. giving her hair accessory, pants and boots an orange hue instead of a blue one, as well as shifting her coat to a more teal colour really helped make those colours pop.

AKANE MY BESTIE!!!! her design was probably the one i had the most fun with. i basically just took her ztd design and purpled it. I did want to include some more details though - her neck scarf was in both her 999 AND vlr design, so it felt wrong not to include it. i also added some gold highlights to her design, just to complement the purple - her boots are also toned yellow, so it felt fitting. the cut of her sleeves, as well as her hair, felt really natural: i gave her the side ponytail from ztd, while letting more of her hair fall to the side to retain her silhouette from 999. i stole the sleeves wholesale from vlr akane, but can you blame me. look at that robe. its so pretty.

overall i have mixed feelings on ztd junpei as a character, but i think his darker turn is at the very least a fun direction to take him. I do like the jacket he has in his concept art. IT SURE WOULD BE NICE IF THE MODEL ALSO HAD A JACKET. his design went relatively unchanged overall, i basically just retoned his hair, gave him a button-up instead of a t-shirt, and puffered his jacket. the red and blue from his vest in 999 is reused here, but in darker, more muted tones. you can see in the corner of the drawing i played around with swapping the red and blue, but the red focus felt too edgy for junpei. the blue also pops really nicely against his dark clothes, so i kept it.

anyone who has spoken to me for more than ten seconds will know how insane i am about aoi kurashiki i mean come on my name is santa. i think a lot about his two designs: that of the first nonary game and in 999. in the first nonary game he wears a blue scarf, harkening to his role as a reciever, but in 999 he wears monochrome. my personal interpretation of this is that his 999 fit was him purposefully disguising his connection to the morphogenetic field. so post-999, since he doesnt have to worry about that, i gave him his blue back!!! his general fit is the same- his pants and shoes are artistry so obviously i kept those, and i ended up making the rest of his look black to contrast his 999 design. if i were to redesign him now wearing white, id probably go a different direction altogether. that third little drawing ive included has some test outfits for him, carlos, and maria, but i never really went anywhere with them. also i gave him dark roots to show his relation to akane a bit more. and also because i like projecting my roots always grow back SO fast

that brings us to the 4 characters introduced after vlr: carlos, mira, diana, and... maria??? yeah like i said go read zero win game. do it. maria is such a fun character. she was, coincidentally, ALSO the only character where i had to design someone from scratch. you can see i fiddled a little with colour palettes, trying to figure out how to give every character a unique look. diana and carlos' designs actually go almost unchanged here- i think dianas design in particular is actually pretty great, and works as a nice foil to luna in vlr. carlos is just kind of normal. he can have his silly polo shirt.

miras ztd design is. ugh ok look its FINE but i hate the boobie designs in zero escape because they always feel like they were designed seperately from the character. mira in zwg is still a sussy baka, but she's a lot more cordial- i enjoyed seeing her more as a snake lying in the grass. I ended up giving her green because its a fun colour to give characters who youre meant to distrust. SO MANY TIMES reading zwg i was like "oh maybe mira's chill - oh wait maybe shes not - oh wait maybe shes chill again" and i love her for that honestly. she still gets boobies because i love women but i gave her a fun little long sleeved corset top. the amount of skin she shows directly correlates to the amount you should trust her (i am only half joking.)

i wont talk about diana because honestly the only change i made was giving her a little blue strip at the bottom of her skirt, but i'll talk about maria and carlos together. carlos i kept as a little pink boy because i love him and i love pink and listen its my character design ill do what i want. maria in ztd AND in zwg experiences reverie syndrome, which is connected to the morphogenetic field. her and carlos' designs both incorporate red and blue again- (just realised diana also has red and blue. pretend that was intentional) -to show their connection to the field. yes yes i know its pink but listen its red enough. like aoi, i gave maria and carlos both different iterations of their designs. i'm less sold on carlos', but i did actually like the baggier, heavy designs for maria. with those ones she looks more depressed than she does wearing overalls, so im calling that a win. maria's was the design i was least satisfied with overall, but hey i did these like a year and a half ago and ive gotten much better since then soo.

if youve read this far this is once again a reminder to read zero win game by kayzero on ao3

[krabmeat]

☊⏃⋏ ⟟ ⏚⟒ ⟒⋏⎅⟒⍀⋔⏃⋏ ⏃⋏⍜⋏? ⏃⋏⊬⍙⏃⊬⌇ ⋏⍜⍙ ⏁⊑⏃⏁'⌇ ⏃⌰⌰ ⍜⎍⏁ ⍜⎎ ⏁⊑⟒ ⍙⏃⊬. ☌⍜⎅ ⍀⟒⏃⎅⟒⍀ ☌⟒⏁⏁⟟⋏☌ ⍀⟒⎐⟟⎐⟒⎅ ⎍⋏⟒⌖⌿⟒☊⏁⟒⎅⌰⊬ ⏚⊬ ⎅⍀⟒⏃⋔? ⟟⏁'⌇ ⌰⟟☍⟒ - ⏃ ⍀⟒⏃⌰⌰⊬ ⏚⏃⎅⏃⌇⌇ ⏃⋏⏁⏃☌⍜⋏⟟⌇⏁ ☌⍜⎅ ⏁⊑⏃⏁ ☌⟒⏁⌇ ⌿⎍⌰⌰⟒⎅ ⍜⎍⏁ ⍜⎎ ⏁⊑⟒ ⎍⋏⎅⟒⍀⍙⍜⍀⌰⎅, ☊⏃⌰⌰⟟⋏☌ ⎅⍀⟒⏃⋔ ⏁⊑⟒⟟⍀ "⌇⏃⎐⟟⍜⎍⍀" (⏚⎍⏁ ⟟⋏ ⏃ ⋔⍜⍀⟒ ⌇⏃⏁⟟⍀⟟☊⏃⌰ ⍙⏃⊬ ⟟⋏⌇⏁⟒⏃⎅ ⍜⎎ ☌⟒⋏⎍⟟⋏⟒⌰⊬ ⌇⟒⟒⟟⋏☌ ⏁⊑⟒ ⋔⏃⌇☍⟒⎅ ⋔⏃⋏ ⏃⌇ ⏁⊑⟒⟟⍀ ⊑⟒⍀⍜ ☊⏃⎍⌇⟒ ⟟⋏ ⏁⊑⟒ ⌿⏃⌇⏁ ⏁⊑⟒⊬'⎐⟒ ⋔⍜⌇⏁ ⌰⟟☍⟒⌰⊬ ☊⏃⌰⌰⟒⎅ ⟒⎐⟒⍀⊬⍜⋏⟒ ⏁⊑⏃⏁ ⊑⟒⌰⌿⟒⎅ ⏁⊑⟒⋔ ⏁⊑⟒⟟⍀ ⋔⟟☌⊑⏁⊬ ⊑⟒⌰⌿⟒⍀ ⏁⍜ ⏁⊑⟒ ⌿⍜⟟⋏⏁ ⍙⊑⟒⍀⟒ ⏁⊑⟒ ⏁⟟⏁⌰⟒ ⎎⟒⟒⌰⌇ ⍜⎐⟒⍀⎍⌇⟒⎅ ⏃⋏⎅ ⎍⋏⎅⟒⌇⟟⍀⏃⏚⌰⟒). ⏁⊑⟒⊬ ⍀⍜⏃⋔⟒⎅ ⏁⊑⟒ ⌰⏃⋏⎅⌇ ⍜⎎ ⏁⊑⟒ ⌇⋔⌿, ⏚⍀⟟⋏☌⟟⋏☌ ⏁⟒⍀⍀⍜⍀ ⏃⋏⎅ ⊑⟒⌰⌰⎎⟟⍀⟒ ⏃☊⍀⍜⌇⌇ ⏁⊑⟒ ⍜⎐⟒⍀⍙⍜⍀⌰⎅, ⌰⟒⏁⏁⟟⋏☌ ⏁⊑⟒⟟⍀ ☍⟒⌿⏁ ⟟⋏ ⍀⏃☌⟒ ⌇⏁⍀⍜⌰⌰ ⎎⍀⟒⟒. ⏁⊑⟒⊬ ⟒⋏⎅ ⎍⌿ ⟟⋏ ⏁⊑⟒ ⏁⎍⋏⎅⍀⏃, ⏁⊑⟒ ⏚⎍⍀⋏⟟⋏☌ ⎎⌰⏃☍⟒⌇ ⍜⎎ ⏃⌇⊑⟒⌇ ☌⟒⏁⏁⟟⋏☌ ⌰⍜⌇⏁ ⟟⋏ ⏁⊑⟒ ⊑⏃⍀⌇⊑ ⌿⟟⌰⟒⌇ ⍜⎎ ⌇⋏⍜⍙. ⏁⊑⟒⊬ ⊑⏃⌿⌿⟒⋏⟒⎅ ⏁⍜ ⊑⏃⎐⟒ ⌇⏁⎍⋔⏚⌰⟒⎅ ⎍⌿⍜⋏ ⏁⊑⟒ ☊⍜⏁⏁⏃☌⟒⌇ ⍜⎎ ⏁⍙⍜ ⟟⋔⋔⍜⍀⏁⏃⌰ ☌⍜⎅⌇ ⏁⊑⏃⏁ ⏁⊑⟒⊬ ⋔⏃⊬ ⍜⍀ ⋔⏃⊬ ⋏⍜⏁ ⊑⏃⎐⟒ ⎍⌇⟒⎅ ⏁⍜ ☍⋏⍜⍙. ⍙⍜⋏⎅⟒⍀ ⍙⊑⏃⏁'⌰⌰ ⊑⏃⌿⌿⟒⋏? ⟟ ⍙⍜⎍⌰⎅ ⌰⟟☍⟒ ⏁⍜ ⌇⟒⟒ ⊬⍜⎍⍀ ⏁⏃☍⟒ ⟟⋏ ⏁⊑⟟⌇.

- ⟒⋏⎅⟒⍀⋔⏃⋏ ⏃⋏⍜⋏

𝚑𝚎𝚕𝚕𝚋𝚎𝚗𝚝

𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚛𝚊𝚌𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚜: philza, techno, Wilbur,(next few only mentioned)Mexican dream, schlatt, dream

𝚖𝚊𝚒𝚗 𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚛𝚊𝚌𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚗𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚜: they/them

𝚝𝚛𝚒𝚐𝚐𝚎𝚛 𝚠𝚊𝚛𝚗𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜: fire, death, arson, betrayal mention, being used, reference to drugs, slight cursing

𝚊𝚞𝚝𝚑𝚘𝚛𝚜 𝚗𝚘𝚝𝚎𝚜: translation vvvvv

Can i be enderman anon? anyways now that's all out of the way. God reader getting revived unexpectedly by dream? it's like - a really badass antagonist god that gets pulled out of the underworld, calling dream their "saviour" (but in a more satirical way instead of genuinely seeing the masked man as their hero cause in the past they've most likely called everyone that helped them their mighty helper to the point where the title feels overused and undesirable). They roamed the lands of the smp, bringing terror and hellfire across the overworld, letting their kept in rage stroll free. They end up in the tundra, the burning flakes of ashes getting lost in the harsh piles of snow. They happened to have stumbled upon the cottages of two immortal gods that they may or may not have used to know. Wonder what'll happen? i would like to see your take in this.

 - enderman anon

AHHH IM SO SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG I DONT KNOW IF YOULL EVEN READ THIS STILL BUT TY FOR THE REQUEST IT ISNT THE BEST QUALITY IM SORRY :[[[

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You almost don't recognize the sensation of grass against your calloused and rough hands. You were in the void playing solitaire with Schlatt and Mexican Dream, and the next thing you knew you were suddenly pulled harshly by the back of your collar, falling on your spine. The looming mask of Dream is what stood above you, but he looked different. Longer hair, smelly, wearing a stained lime green jumpsuit with ‘0001' sewn into it and covered in cuts, scars and bruises. But before you could even question why Dream was suddenly there, he stepped back into the void, the void slowly surrounding and consuming him the further he went backwards. His now bony hand is still tightly gripped onto the back of your shirt, so while struggling your body is also enveloped in darkness. All it took was one blink and there you were on a patch of grass, staring at the pale blue sky.

"Huh."

Was all that came out of your mouth. You were still shocked at the turn of events that just happened, but no longer grounded. A running river nearby stunned your senses. How long had you been dead? It felt like years, but when you look around at the familiar forest you died in, not much had changed except for a couple newly planted saplings here and there. The swirling ashes you remembered before you died had all settled and compressed into the soil.

The river showed a strange reflection of yourself- your features have clearly sunken into your skull and there's a streak of white hair coming from your scalp along with words in fancy gold letters on your arm reading,

"May thy woes and hurt of the past no longer eradicate the upwards of this lost souls future. Allow thine to be praised by Ender themselves and be granted another chance at mortality."

Scrubbing or picking at your arm did nothing, so onwards you went walking along the forest to what you remember being a bustling "community".

Each mound of dirt you saw only brought memories of your death, of the place and people who sought to treat you like you were disposable. And now that you’re alive, you hate that they technically ended up being right. Your death; alone in a forest. Running away from the unexpected attacker, ashamed and too prideful to die in the prying eyes of your enemies. It fills you with rage, all the lives taken by your hands and for what? You weren’t overreacting, you knew that for sure. And before you knew it, you stole some fresh flint and steel from a random chest and got to work. 

You had always wanted to touch the fires you set. The soothing feeling you got from watching wood burn to char and ashes satisfied you. And it made it all the more euphoric to know it was trees of your manipulator's land. Running across the land, with flames as far as you could see when you looked behind you. The heat swirled around your neck and went into your nose, but the feeling was muscle memory at that point. You were still riding your high when a voice reached out to you, luckily when you were finally calm.

"What- Y/n? Hold on, is that really you Y/n..?"

You spin on your heels to the familiar manipulative British voice of a person you haven't seen in a long time. 

"Wilbur?! Man, I haven't seen another person's face other than those two addicts in a while- you look different." 

His eyes much like yours are sunken deep into his skull, purple-pink bags under his eyes and dull skin. Wilburs shocked lips fade into an opened mouth smile when he walks up to you with his hands momentarily confused on what they should do. Eventually, his right hand settles on clasping your left shoulder, giving it a friendly squeeze.

“Y/n it is so good to see you! You look quite different yourself, wouldn’t you think-? Oh, look! We’re matching!”

The grey streak in your hair seems to make another appearance when Wilbur briefly smacks it with his middle and pointer finger. 

“Ay, it’s nice to see you too Wil, but back up for a second alright? I've got something to ask you by the way…”

Wilburs head peaks in interest, urging you to go on.

“I’m guessing that little streak in your hair wasn’t a fashion choice- and if it was it’s a bit strange- but how’d you get it? You died when you blew up L’manburg! I mean c'mon, people don’t just, well…REVIVE!”

He starts to walk. You aren’t quite sure where, but stumbling along with Wilbur while his arm is draped lazily atop your shoulders seems to suffice. 

“Ahh Y/n, you’d be surprised. The most WONDERFUL thing happened, actually! Years and years in my hell of a train station; do you know who was at the subway door when it finally opened, Y/n? Dream!”

“Wh- Dream?!”

Appalled, you try to stop in your tracks but fail when wilburs arm is still pushing forward. His storytelling voice dies down to curiosity and excitement.

“Wait, did he save you too? He did, didn’t he? Oh, this is wonderful!”

Wilbur emits eagerism and you suddenly realize what you could do with his desperacy to be socially accepted. Putting on the most exaggerated and animated voice, you speak. 

“Oh my god yeah! Gosh, that Dream guy is my hero! Thanks to him, I get to have another chance at living again, and isn’t that just…swell.”

In all honesty you didn’t really try hard to sound sincere but by the look of Wilbur, it seemed to work just fine. 

“Right?! I’ve been meaning to visit him in the prison if you’d like to tag along with me the day I go? I’m sure he’d love to see you, since he revived you and all.”

Oh, you were sure Dream wanted to see you. He wants a boon- a trade. Why else would he revive two of the most historically significant people on the server if not to make some sort of deal with them? Sure, Wilbur is as gullible and carefree as ever but you at least still had scraps of mental stability and level-headedness that made you all the more a force to be reckoned with. Not to mention Wilbur doesn’t know that Dream killed you, but telling him that now would blow your act. You decide to keep your thoughts to yourself.

“Yeahh, sure! I’d love to go, just tell me when.”

And that’s the end of that conversation. The two of you walk to wherever Wilbur is going. It honestly surprised you how he couldn’t see through your apathy. From what you remembered, he was keen on being wise about people and their intentions but you guess years and years in hell do things to a person.

Somehow, you’re stuck in your mind for long enough that only now do you feel the sharp winter air making the hairs on your arms and legs stand straight up. 

“Wait, snow?”

The tundra was a drastic contrast to the void you were once in with schlatt and Mexican Dream. Instead of black as far as you could see, it was a blinding powdery white. 

‘Mexican Dream would’ve liked it here, probably would have tried to snort the snow like coke.’

You weren’t built for the snow, though. Hell- you didn’t even have a memory of anyone living in a tundra when you were alive! Why was Wilbur even in the tundra? You didn’t have the energy to ask, still feeling brittle and tired, back aching from laying on the dry dirt longer than expected earlier. 

“Yeah, just figured I’d show you around! Plus I already need to grab a couple things from an ender chest and this was the closest by. I’m a very busy man, after all.”

But why were there so many footprints in the snow? As far as you knew, Wilbur was the only one who lived out in the tundra- and he didn’t seem like the active type at all. There were strange shapes as well, large hooved footprints. However, all thinking comes to a halt at the same time Wilbur does.

“We’re here! You might see some familiar faces cause I live with people.”

Well, that answers the footsteps as well as the tall red-caped piglin hybrid giving leftover bones and raw meat to a polar bear.

“TECHNO! TECHNO, HEY!”

He tenses up for a second, you could tell he wanted to be left alone but that didn’t really bother Wilbur. But you recognize him. The name and the apparel- that guy is Technoblade. The same Technoblade who stood by your side while the two of you blew L’manburg up for the last time, and now the Technoblade who resides in a cottage shrouded in snow.

“Technoblade?!”

Hearing your voice being carried by the crisp winter air, he turns around immediately to see you and Wilbur a few feet away. Techno stood there dumbfounded, but he didn’t know why. He wasn’t particularly joyed or ecstatic to see you, but he was at the very least happy to see an old ally back. 

“Y/n? Oh my god, now we’ve got TWO of you? We don’t have room for another one, alright?”

For some it might be hard to see the meaning behind his words. Luckily you’ve talked to him enough to where you can tell he’s being playful.

“Don’t worry, I’ll just build directly on top of your house. Besides, who WOULDN'T want to be near me 24-7?”

“Me-“

“Oh f*ck off.”

You would’ve thought that that was Wilbur due to the similar accent, but there was something off. The slight gruffness and age, yet still succeeding in sounding mellow.

“Phil! How’s my favorite old bird doing?”

He gives you a face. Not a happy one like you expected, rather a face that says ‘really?’ Probably because of the old comment. The two of you briefly hug, Phil’s tattered wings stretching out slightly.

“I’m doing alright, are you okay? Here, would you like to come in? It’s pretty cold outside, you probably haven’t seen snow in a couple years.”

He wasn’t wrong after all. You were freezing your toes off and were itching for lemon tea. The kind Phil used to make when he, Technoblade and Dream discussed plans on destroying L’manburg. Ah, the good ol days…

“Of course! We’ve got a lot to talk about- you still have that old chess board?”

“Yes, but first you have some explaining to do about the fire over in that tree, Y/n. You just got back and you’re already burning down forests?!”

“Did someone say fire?”

Techno has an eager stride in his step once he also looks back to see the raging lights of orange and red in the nearby forest.

“Don’t worry Phil! It’s just- ahh, a controlled burn..?”

Your tone of voice is unsure when a black crow shoots down from the sky into the snow in front of you. It’s left wing is charred and has smoke dancing from the burn. Philza looks at you with a stern glare.

“Oh my f*cking god…that’s it! We’re all going inside now, you too Techno. I don’t want you and Y/n going on a rampage.”

[ear]

PLEASE share your vld reboot ideas aja the show canon is garbage and your mind is so galaxy brain

OK OK ALRIGHT!!!!!!!!!! alright so idk what kind of. earth landscape this reboot occurs in…. like yallve got this retro 80s/90s neon future verse going on but i didnt think my reboot version would fit into that so yall go wild with whatever hc for this earth reboot thing u want cuz im not creative and i didnt really think that far ahead

ALRIGHT here we go. this is so long i HAVE to put this under the cut but i hope yall enjoy the creations of my MIND……

- akeno “KEITH” shirogane: (age: 19) [gay] hes japanese/black/galran. hes still half galra in this reboot bc i fuck with that honestly but hes got more visible galran traits. his bottom canines are larger than usual and poke out from his bottom lip so he wears a mask to cover his mouth and his eyes r still purple but instead of his sclera being yellow(tinted), hes just like. got some odd golden flecks in his eyes. he normally wears a dirty mechanics jumpsuit with the top half tied around his waist and a black or white tank top underneath (hes still a high school flunk out so he works full time at a car repair shop so hes able to buy food and shit at LEAST + hes still got his motorcycle to keep in shape). his casual clothes r just regular grey sweats, hoodies, and adidas or whatever brand is closest in their future lol. hes blood related to shiro who ill get to in a second.. shiros blood related to him as his uncle (brother of keiths dad) ALSO his hair isnt long in this reboot, hes got a short messy head of hair that he mostly just pulls back into a TINY little pony tail on his forehead (like in the game show ep) so it doesnt get in his face while hes working. he also has goggles bc thats the one thing from yalls reboot ideas i actually like (endgame lion: he momentarily pilots black during shiros disappearance but his permanent and stationary lion is red)

- fal’allura “fala, ALLURA” naguna’ephy: [lesbian] (age: 21 or close to that in alien standards) shes altean on her fathers side and teem (what we’re gonna call nymas race) on her mothers side. she bares more altean features except her eyes are solid yellow and shes only got four fingers on each hand. instead of crescent shaped facial markings, she has painted on red and golden lines across her nose and her upper lip. her hair (very dark purple with silver highlights and literal glowing, twinkling stars) is VERY long, brushing the floor as she walks except and (now bear with me cuz this might be hard to explain) her hair, the farther down u look kind of fades away? like it becomes semi to absolute transparent… idk how else to explain it but i hope u understand…. she does wear a crown but its more like a headdress.. (imagine beyonces headdress).. she doesnt wear it often, usually only on diplomatic missions to greet other worldly rulers bc its heavy and it makes her neck hurt :/.. her dress! looks like this! but a little more spiffy .. u know.. her casual/training clothes are just…. idk imagine a royal looking sports bra and leggings?? i guess … ALSO ALSO ALSO she can still shape shift but instead of limiting her shifting to just the changing of skin tone and height, she can completely mimic different alien species but only humanoid races.. like she can have those indented looking knees and huge ass horns and all that but she cant like. turn into an earth lizard u know what im saying. also also also also she still speaks with an accent just… not a british one….(endgame lion: no lion. she keeps leading and piloting the castle ship until destruction, where she leads and pilots the atlas)

- alejandro “LANCE, ale” reyes-leon: (age: 19 ½) [bi] hes cuban/black/vietnamese. his dad is black and vietnamese and his mom is cuban! hes got longish afro textured hair he keeps back in a pony tail most of the time like this or a bun when training bc hes too lazy to put any actual effort into styling it. hes got a couple moles/freckles scattered across his face and hes got sectoral heterochromiaaround his left pupil so theres a little bit of blue in one of his other wise dark brown eyes (like this).. i havent really figured out what his clothing style is.. i thought about keeping his clothes close to vld canon like his jacket (bc that was a really good jacket) but im gonna go a little wild here so hold on. he wears one of those surfer type looking skin tight turtleneck shirts underneath his heavy bomber jacket.. he wears just regular ripped jeans and hightops like in canon…….. hmm……. he wears a pink bead necklace under his shirt that was made by his little cousin just a couple weeks before he was shot off into space and he hasnt taken it off since…………. he also has a tiny stick and poke tattoo on his ankle he did when he was thirteen bc he thought it would look cool but it turned out kinda lop sided so he never takes his socks off in embarrassment (endgame lion: blue to red (during keiths reign as black paladin) then to black when shiro leaves voltron to lead the atlas alongside allura)

- takashi “SHIRO” shirogane: (age: 31) [gay] hes japanese/black. hes keiths uncle and the only family keith really has .. his design doesnt really change much except hes got long hair (like kuron) but its pulled up into a messy bun or pony tail.. in MY canon hes still gay and married to adam (whos name isnt adam i just cant think of a new name for him yet) (and adam lives dont worry) and theyre working on adopting a daughter before shiro has to leave for kerberos. shiro usually dresses in work out outfits so like. gym shorts… tank tops.. leggings.. imagine those white blonde dudes who always wear a man bun and only eat vegan and drink chai from starbucks bc thats exactly how shiro acts but ONLY ironically ……… when shiros abducted on the galra freighter and forced to fight in the ring, his hair streaks white but instead of just a clean scar across his nose, he has multiple long scars scattered across his face from a one x one between his face and some debris thrown at him by a gladiator. his prosthetic looks and remains kinda the same i guess but this time its decked out with claws on the finger tips so it looks a little more galran yeah? (endgame lion: no endgame lion. he pilots the atlas alongside allura)

- francesca “frannie, frankie, PIDGE” eleonora: (age: 15) [trans girl lesbian] shes . just italian i guess. so anyway shes not gonna be an asshole bitch like canon pidge.. shes gonna be the caring sweet but KINDA mean little sister we always wished we had.. the little sister who would tell u, with all honesty, that ur winged eyeliner was smudged before u hit the town with the girls and made a fool of urself……. ANYWAY shes still gonna be the ‘hacker’/computer geek techno girl but not as much ykno? shes JUST a little girl so she just kinda does her own thing. i rlly like all the fanart i see of her wearing overalls and stuff SO thats her canon design…… she wears faded overall jeans over a short sleeved pale pink tshirt w a dog one it and scuffed up chucks. she wears glasses but instead of just taking them from matt she has an actual prescription and is basically blind without them. i literally cannot stress this enough but shes such a nice girl like the team pretty much adopted her as their little sister the moment they boarded the castle ship. idk what else to add on to her!!!! i literally did not put any thought into pidge at all! (endgame lion: permanently green)

- opetaia“HUNK” tuitama: (age: 19 ¾) [bi] hes samoan/black. hunk was adopted and has two moms and three other siblings, all of who are younger than him. im not sure about his fashion other than i KNOW deep down in my heart that he would wear cargo shorts…. i cant find it in me to get rid of his bandana thing so i let him keep it except he uses it to tie his hair up instead of using it as a head band thing….. HUNK in my au is more of a tech freak/engineer than pidge so he handles most of that stuff with the occasional help from pidge (like wiring… she has tiny fingers that can grab the wires easier) hunk probably wears the crocs/sandals with socks combo but just because he loves hearing lance bitch about it whnever he struts into a room. hunk also looks good in his vest so im gonna let him keep that but it looks more modified… like it has a bunch of pockets and stuff to keep bolts and nuts and other stuff he needs to work with.. thats also why he wears cargo shorts; just for the pockets.. (endgame lion: permanently yellow)

also ur probably wondering “if lance is in black and keith is in red and allura doesnt pilot a lion, THEN WHOS PILOTING BLUE????” …….. heh… peep this………..

- ADAM elsammak-althani(thank u mal @fuckvld for ur gorgeous arabic adam hcs..): (age: 32) [gay] i dont have much to say about him other than read mals hc lists and that ADAM LIVES IN MY REBOOT and he also joins the voltron team and pilots the blue lion (i FIRMLY hc that hes a very free/wild spirit and just loves to make jokes and is just.. a really fun guy to be around and obviously blue would open up to him in a SECOND. dont even @ me) (endgame lion: BLUE!)

[lilietsblog]

GHOST TRICK: THE BIG FINALE

so I finished the game yesterday all on my lonesome without internet

why yes I am perfectly fine and not emotionally compromised in the slightest

enjoy my screaming

IT'S GHOST TRICKING TIME which is to say it's ghost tricking time without internet so I'm doing this in wordpad tumblr really needs an 'import rtf' function >_>

SO from what I remember, when last we left off I was about to try to figure out how the fuck a knitted cap and a helmet are going to help me stop a bullet LET'S DIVE RIGHT BACK INTO THIS FOLKS

I still love how Sissel just ignores the dog's little 'WHATS A HOSTAGE O NO' instead of digging into explaining it

oh thank god the game DOES remember ive read this text before

...oh, I forgot how I did this the last time O WELL

all right, so I remember swiveling the lamp and dropping the hard hat, then when the knitted cap is over here I can swap it with the book and get it on the hook but how did I get the knitted cap over here

aha, he looked away for a moment, the helmet part is done what the fuck do i do now

AHA okay, so now i very quickly cart the ladder back and forth, I think I remember this

fuck, he noticed me, okay don't swivel the lamp while he's watching, swivel it while he's still looking away

I gotta note the 'I don't know why you're wearing my face' part HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

fuck, nope, I can't swivel the lamp back at that moment because he notices it clattering and turns right around FUCK OKAY LET'S TRY TO DO IT WITH THE LAMP THERE

ugh, if only I could do shit during the cutscene while he rolls away >_>

OK I SHOULD HAVE HAD MORE TRUST IN MISSILE HE IS GREAT AND A VERY GOOD DOG AND CAN AIM FOR SPLIT SECOND TIMING OF A BULLET BEING IN THE AIR OKAY

haha, and the knitted hat still hit Cabanela with enough velocity to knock him over I love this and I particularly love his dramatic leg up in the air he doesn't evne know what's happening he just aims to be the most dramatic possible at all times and it's really helping us out <3

'i love knitted hats... so warm, and most of all, so SOFT' <3 <3 <3

god Missile is so good this is pain IS THE DAWN DEADLINE A LIE MAYBE DID RAY JUST SAY THAT TO GET SISSEL'S BUTT MOVING I DON'T KNOW

oh yeah Cabanela's still got broken bones all over I kind of forgot about that

oh ok, looks less like broken and more like just really fucking bruised, becuase in that movement he's put pressure on all limb bones and nothing bent out of shape, so that's good

lmao and Cabanela's just like 'BUT IF I WAS KILLED IN THAT EXPLOSION THE SITUATION WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER' I I don't think it would necessarily work out that way, considering how much difficulty our protagonist was having saving just the professor :x

oh hey we've got our next source of information! should be quite a wellspring if Sissel remembers everything he should ask

yeeep Cabanela you FUCKED UP

oh, the gun :x

HON IM PRETTY SURE THE FIRST PART IS MORE IMPORTANT THE PART WHERE YOU TRIED TO SCARE THE SHIT OUT OF HIM CORNERED RATS BITE THIS IS COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY YOUR FAULT, ALL OF IT

aha, those cases, okay

and Cabanela was doing the thing because of Jowd that makes sense -_- kind of

yep, that one little snag kind of puts a question mark on the whole thing alright, that almost makes sense? kind of? makes Cabanela kind of a selfish butt doing this for his own obsession rather than for personally Jowd but makes sense

ok, the bringing him to justice minister to buy time thing actually does make a lot of sense it wasn't A LOT of time that he bought but it was just enough and that's what counts

oh hey, this guy used to have the job that the blue fake stole? (and yeah sounds like blue guys are just foreigners -_- bc they couldnt find spies that didnt stand out visually or anything)

hum not a scratch, huh regenerating dead body, okay

oh come ON Sissel don't be surprised now that part was obvious from the moment he said the corpse disappeared the meteorite's radiation, okay, quite interesting :D

"it was like a meteorite had struck me on the head" so, has that been a cause of death today yet, because if it hasn't, this looks like foreshadowing -_-

hum, so the gun would have been loaded because he controlled Kamila, which she then wouldn't have a clear memory of makes sense

HI LYNNE JUST IN TIME

arrest her to keep her safe, that actually makes perfect sense IF ONLY IT HAD WORKED LMAO no wonder pigeon guy roasted him for that in the deleted timeline XD

"while he was at it" <3 <3 <3

awwww pigeon guy was friends with him too <3

hee right on top of his striped jumpsuit honestly he looked less escaped-from-prison-ish in the paint-splattered robe thing XD

a present, huh?

awww see Sissel you don't feel lonely and that's what counts

ALRIGHT THEN :D LET'S FUCKING GO :D AND, UH, DO SOMETHING, I GUESS I love how out of proportion Sissel's powers are rewind time, talk to dead people... and move small objects a little

so, uh, Sissel, are you sure there's answers for YOU over there or did you just get into habit of telling this to yourself to feel better

okay well how the fuck did Jowd infiltrate a fucking SUBMARINE like, I just want to know the physics of how this happened?

omfg the bullet had a radio transmitter well, I have a newfound respect for Cabanela, I gotta admit like I already respected him but I just figured he shot the guy out of a desperate 'can't do anything else might as well try this' urge to do SOMETHING but nope he had a plan (which would have worked even with him dead)

wow, and he actually gave the thing to Jowd beforehand n i c e

wow, okay, that's stealthy

aha, and he can totally leave his body and wander around freely I think that was already confirmed but it's nice to know for even surer

wow, okay, what the fuck re: that thing reaching up from below that definitely looked like... something else for a moment there 0.0

aand okay the meteorite is possible to extract from his body I wonder if evil!Sissel actually knew that... or if that actually did anything to him :D

okay, what the FUCK and how many more people are dead now

AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW MISSILE IS HERE TOOOOOOOO

the phone is ringing, how convenient :D

ooohkay this is tricky

so, why the fuck were there baseball and basketball balls hanging in nets under the ceiling on a submarine ... ... you know what I don't want to know

wait, Kamila can't hear him? oh, right, over the phone ghosts communicate by close range telepathy

aaand this makes the FIFTH time Lynne's dead tonight! or is it sixth? did i lose track somewhere?

AWWWW THIS SCENE IS LIKE AN OVERDOSE OF CUTE

'i wonder what happened THIS TIME' yep lmao

no actually 'i dont remember what happened after that' sounds like evil!Sissel to me, personally

but do you know what this wheel does Sissel are you sure turning it is a good idea

"I just sort of blacked out, the next thing I knew, I was dead" <3 <3 <3

"now it's all making even less sense than before" AND THAT'S SAYING *SOMETHING*

but actually okay yea this does kind of sound like an explosion that killed Lynne and knocked Kamila out

aaand nope I was absolutely correct )=

can this guy only puppet one body at a time? couldn't he have just possessed Lynne and had her slit her own throat or shoot herself or hang herself or something? that sounds a lot more productive than having a little girl fight her I mean, even if he only can puppet one body at a time, puppetting Lynne would have been a lot more productive overall, is there a reason he can't?...

or does he just love to do things in the most convoluted and roundabout manner typical to villains everywhere -_-

"nobody ever calls the dead" ARGUABLE a number of phone calls has been made this night specifically for the purpose of putting our!Sissel on the line

aand okay :D looks like the blue assholes saved Lynne just in time, sort of ...for a certain definition of 'saved'

so anyway this guy said something like 'you cannot possibly comprehend my suffering' so it would be funny if he was just a random dumbass that a bad thing hapened to one (1) time, which granted also killed him, but all the misery since then has been of his own making and he's put every single person involved in the events through worse just over the course of tonight, and simply has no sense of scale, perspective or proportion I think that would be great if the story went there XD EDITOR'S NOTE IN RETROSPECT: the story didn't go there and that was not fucking okay (it's dead women in the fridge again!)

and Sissel can't understand revenge as a concept SOUL TWINSIES WITH ME OR WHAT

lmao Lynne is starting to get touchy about how many times she's needed rescue lately XD

OH FOR FUCK'S SAKE WHY CAN'T I REACH FOR ANYTHING YET also, interesting to note that in the 4 minutes ago past, neither Lynne nor Kamila have a core looks like Sissel's interaction with this realm is limited after all, and not only by phones there's v interesting existential fuckery going on here, of the exact sort I ABSOLUTELY LOVE

oh THERE we go 'nobody ever calls the dead' ARGUABLE again and I love Lynne's signature instant-snap-into-hands-over-head animation + pose Good Reflexes

ALRIGHT, FIDDLING WITH RANDOM SHIT WITHOUT KNOWING WHAT IT MIGHT DO TIME ...and that sure worked fast

hum, a random mechanic, alright

oh hon that's a, um, what's the opposite of exaggeration I know this word in Russian >_> over...littlification? that 'restless ghosts onboard' THAT'S ONE WAY TO PUT THAT

lmao that was one odd fate change

alright, found the temsik fragment capsule, I see yay unexpectedly strong wastebucket lids (seriously, that's a whole freaking basketball, there's a reason the nets worked like that lmao)

alright, just watching the cutscene for now, that's fair this guy sure looks like he's going to abandon his entire crew and blow up the sub or something

"farewell, sir" WELL THAT DID NOT SOUND QUITE RIGHT

alright, and we're left in the capsule rather than the fragment which apparently did not have a core of its own for some reason

OMFG THERE'S A LITTLE RAT IN THE TORPEDO ARE WE GOING TO HAVE A RUBE GOLDBERG MACHINE INVOLVING A SMALL RODENT AGAIN BECAUSE THOSE ARE THE BEST KIND BUT ALSO THIS IS NOT HOW TORPEDOS WORK BUT ALSO HI RAT!!!

yeah exactly thanks Sissel! how the FUCK did it get here also I love that the characters DO pay attention to the wellbeing of innocent rats in this game <3

well, you COULD just try to get it to blow up earlier, in the water you'd be stuck but you'd be heroes, or something well, Lynne would go back to her body, Sissel would be stuck :D oh, and the rat would die, that's the bad news

YEAH LET'S SAVE THE RATTIE FIRST if this time the rat is going to be in the way rather than helping, well, I REALLY DO RESPECT THAT LET'S SAVE THE RAT

alright, after some trial and error I DID manage to get both weights in the same position (mostly by luck) and throw off the rat NOW TO SAFETY

alright, this looks promising OKAY IT ALSO LOOKS LIKE KAMILA AND LYNNE MIGHT BE SAFE FROM EVIL!SISSEL NOW THAT'S GOOD NEWS

yusss caring about rats ftw <3

that's what missiles do, huh they're unstoppable i dont know who it is i hear there but Missile is great yes

well, whatever this is, our!Sissel just turned it on maybe it's pumps to remove water!... not that they'll do much against an unplugged breach but

aha, okay, won't move for long

this movement through a machine's gears feels like the purest expression of the game's premise since the junkyard tricks at the very beginning <3

the way Kamila's speech kinda fades in from white? that worries me

...eeeyup

god but I love this game's animation. this little one of Lynne hoisting Kamila up on her back? it feels, like, PERFECTLY balanced with their weights and Lynne's strength and everything <3 <3 <3

oh my god Lynne why couldn't you just... be able to swim not that it would help much with Kamila unconscious but

oh my god Lynne is literally right here why do I still have trouble moving around freely???

oh, found it!

wow, she's climbing one-handed while carrying Kamila, that's some serious upper body strength <3

W E L P

YEP THAT'S SOME SERIOUS STRENGTH THAT SHE DIDNT JUST FUCKING FALL NOR DROP KAMILA

yeeep okay WOW

ARE YOU BOTH GOING TO DIE NOW OR WHAT okay, no, just fall, and not even in the water that's good news

LYNNE THIS IS NOT A POSE YOU WANT TO BE IN RIGHT NOW unless you're actually holding yourself against that shit in the background with your left hand and I just can't see it I guess

...nope, she was holding her chin LYNNE NO

MISSILE HURRAY

okay, the fan thing makes sense

now to swap around a bunch of broken pipes so they don't get in lynne's way, got it

FOR FUCK'S SAKE I REALLY DON'T SEE A WINNING COMBO HERE

aand I fucking lost but at least I got Sissel in position -_-

alright, now with one pipe turned off it actually works out easily it just... took me really long to realize I'd need Sissel for this one -_-

Lynne honey but have you considered: you have no fucking clue what's behind that door although presumably submarine has only been breached in one place and it's this room?

holy shit with the hook Sissel managed to hoist the combined weight of Lynne and Kamila now THAT's a nifty trick

SISSEL FOR FUCK'S SAKE SHE CAN'T MUSTER LEVERAGE FOR THIS BECAUSE SHE HAS TO HOLD HERSELF AND KAMILA UP AND SHE'S TIRED SHE CAN ASK FOR HELP EXCLUSIVELY IN SWAHILI SWEARS AND IT'D STILL BE A WAY THAT YOU HAVE TO PUT UP WITH

aww, someone's saving us!!!

someone who commented on unstoppable missiles earlier, perhaps?

right, the truth... that's still relevant. while on a sinking submarine. yep

haha sinking submaries i have just been playing oxenfree haha

oh wow that's an improvised mechanism made out of garbage sticking in a close range telekinetic field nifty shit

oh oh okay that explains absolutely nothing evil!Sissel is not evil now, or what?

lmao this is getting more confusing, but like... in a very satisfying way <3

evil!Sissel still seems to have SOME amount of powers, at least, though possibly not the manipulating humans ones? but this amount of telekinesis is still incredible

so okay our Sissel's name possibly IS Sissel, but this dude's isn't I'm more confused than ever before I doubt there are three of them, so...

ahh, Lynne making Kamila more comfortable <3 <3 <3 and again, animation is fucking excellent. just, the timing of everything? it's better than 90% of all 3D animation I've ever seen in games

power and time, okay, got it so the dawn deadline IS real, just not for him wait, possibly not for Sissel and Missile, either?

I see he still fell in his signature ridiculous pose it's less funny now, overall

ah, okay, so the time effect is different too it seems to have been the same for Sissel and Missile though? is this a personality powers deal?

I love that Missile is perfectly comfortable with weird shit because as a dog, that's about the amount of understanding he has of his everyday surroundings, too <3

oh, hum so the moment this guy actually 'died' is the moment that blue guy took out the fragment?

wipe out everybody, huh

okay, so the shooting is as we knew, kind of

the first shot missed the mark, huh? quite curious, quite curious stray bullets are known to be deadly :D

alright, so that's a conversation that mostly confirmed what we already knew we have a new ally though, sort of

aand Lynne's empathy saves the day -_- like I said earlier, this guy's feelings aren't like... unique or anything, he just sucks at theory of mind

Kamila!!! so hey kiddo this guy in front of you is the guy who killed your mom

anyway, I'm still pretty sure Sissel hadn't yet introduced himself to you when you started calling him "Sissy" so there's that lead

and Kamila makes herself comfortable <3 I love this Little Lady so much <3

AWWWW THE RADIO THING <3 <3 <3

'and what about a torpedo' WHAT ABOUT A TORPEDO LYNNE THIS SOUNDS EXTREMELY UNSAFE

KAMILA ARE YOU KIDDING ME YOU'RE TOUGH AS FUCK

OMG IT'S A GRAPE SERVING MACHINE I LOVE THE LUXURIOUS FUCK THIS WAS MADE FOR

alright, torpedo room, that works

swap  the switches to get them unstuck!!!

so I'm going to guess everyone there died, too, and Sissel's going to have to prevent that, too that makes perfect sense

that 'understand exactly how he feels' thing our!Sissel and evil!Sissel are really fucking different in this particular respect :D

awww and the girls convince the doggo <3 <3 <3

so, does Kamila know about the dawn deadline for all ghosts, or

oh thank god I didn't need to control that hop this game really has a policy of not having a permaloss option <3

Yomiel, huh so that's his name

alright, and 'Sissel' is an alias ...I'm just going to keep using it for the protag, just to make things slightly less confusing

ah, so this guy had access to national secrets, and that's how he did the singer thing

and he was proven innocent offscreen <3 <3 <3 stylish

stylish animation, nice

didn't help anybody? did you ever try? because our!Sissel sure figured that shit out quickly

welp, the blue guys are assholes but then, they were also kind of dealing with an asshole I can imagine why they didn't think he was reliable to deal with :x

awww, I like the leaflet guy so much <3 <3 <3

I love how Jowd's like 'well, I'm dead, are you happy now' and Sissel's like 'so anyway about that' FUCK death not tonight, not when Sissel's here <3 <3 <3

alright, and this guy's a robot that still doesn't quite he's pretty human-like >_> I am not a fan of the blue guy in charge is all I'm saying also lmao I nicknamed this one 'iron man dracula' i didn't mean it that way but

ah, remote-controlled, alright that 'farewell' was odd then

'your country's use of technology is just plain off' I LOVE THIS

could there have been two pieces of meteorite in this guy's body? okay, nope still!

OH WOW FOUR MINUTES BEFORE HIS DEATH THAT'S THAT'S ACTUALLY EXACTLY WHAT I WANTED FROM THE VERY BEGINNING EVEN THOUGH I THOUGHT THIS BODY BELONGED TO THE WRONG 'WHOM' THIS IS SOMEWHAT MORE AMBITIOUS THAN PLANNED BUT

...okay, no, his 'death' would actually be before the control room was launched, not all those years ago STILL THIS IS THE -EXACT- THING

alright anyway this is plenty of buildup WHO THE FUCK IS OUR PROTAGONIST it's funny how so far absolutely 0 of what we've seen has pointed to that I have plenty of odd thoughts in my mind ofc 'that guy from another point of time' being the prime one as a homestuck, the possibility of there being multiple ghosts of the same person doesn't faze me in the slightest in fact it seems like an intuitive conclusion BUT THEIR PERSONALITY SURE IS DIFFERENT

anyway, :D :D :D

Final Chapter

...aha! so it counted ten years ago after all! dang :D

aha, I see that mascot thing I see baby Lynne!!!

I note how for someone threatening to shoot the kid, Yomiel's gun sure is pointing in the wrong direction AND he's holding out the kid to the side, not between himself and Jowd SOMEONE sucks at hostage taking lmao

a kitty, huh

and then a meteorite, okay

I note the lamp

awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Yomiel is thinking 'so maybe I'll die in another way and all this will have not happened, that's a better outcome anyway' isn't he god his faces are Sissel faces and look this game knows EXACTLY what it's doing with its visuals exactly one facial exression of Yomiel's has not matched Sissel's I doubt it's because of lazy artists

alright, so a good plan would be swapping the mascot and the lamp

but seriously, WOW Yomiel sucks at taking hostages this game's animation is always stellar and brilliant, there's NO fucking coincidence there he was absolutely not willing in any way to put baby Lynne in actual danger, even if he pretended he did and it worked on Jowd

anyway how the fuck do we get to the lamp

'we can talk about all this later' ARGUABLE TBH the entire, like, THING is going to change oh man is everyone going to go back to their bodies 10 years ago with their new memories because that's fucking hardcore was Kamila even BORN yet

augh I DONT KNOW I CANT REACH I THINK I CANT REACH ANYTHING WHAT DO I DO MISSILE IS IN THE SWEET POTATO ON THE FOUNTAIN SISSEL IS IN THE NOZZLE BUT NOT THE CENTRAL ONE AND CANT REACH THE CENTRAL ONE WHAT DO I DO

okay sounds like I missed my chance let's try that again

ghhhh okay I think I have figured this sequence out even though I have to rewind again 1) rock the basket 2) jump into nozzle to launch the potato 3) Sissel jumps into the potato and then from the potato to the central nozzle 4) Missile jumps into the potato 5) launch the potato x2

okay, Mino fell into the fountain, not that I know how this can help because AGAIN, Missile can't reach Mino from the lantern :x and Sissel can't do absolutely fucking anything

annd the finale is a cutscene alas

alright, let's try that again...

hum we didn't get a FATE CHANGE registered after dropping Mino might this mean we have to do something right in the process?

AW YEAH THAT DEFINITELY JUST HAPPENED LMAO

are we going to kill everyone by dropping Mino on them instead XD

trick time, huh Sissel still can't reach anywhere Missile can swap two identical lanterns, not that this does anything he can talk to Sissel, for what THAT's worth

aha, the lantern dropped, Missile can move around now, that's good

Sissel still can't do shit though

well, that's the detective's LEG, not... anything else or anything

oh man, yeah... YOUNG JOWD IS A DUMBASS man, even Yomiel isn't aiming at him anymore, he's like 'hey dude are you okay' so the theory that Sissel is alternate!Yomiel is really gaining steam in my head not that it wasn't the primary one all along but

AW FUCK YEAH MISSILE THE BULLET CATCHING BADASS DOGGO!!!

anyway sweet potato?

BOO YAH um or not

OR YES ACTUALLY THAT WORKS

OH MY FUCKING GOD YEP THE LAMPPOST FUCKING MINO

awwwwww and finally the trauma of remembering your death is brought up!!!! Sissel cares <3 <3 <3 (and Yomiel doesn't at the moment NOT THAT I CAN'T UNDERSTAND THAT IN CONTEXT) (then again I'd understand it if Sissel didn't either but he's the purest being in existence so)

awwww Yomiel is finally going to contribute!!!

omfg lmao "Make it spray as if your life depended on it!" "Uh, I'm dead though" Yomiel is winning ALL the sensitivity awards tonight <3 <3 <3

I I think that Yomiel hasn't done anything yet oh, okay, we're still winning time

holy FUCK Yomiel that was definitely a thing you just did

dear Young Jowd, Yomiel is the one who saved her. Not gods

awwww and he gave baby Lynne a detective's badge <3 <3 <3 he's so good with children <3

so, can Yomiel be alive please :x ALRIGHT, HE IS THAT WORKS

THE KITTY DID THE METEORITE KILL THE KITTY

wait wait wait is is Sissel the kitty is that why he has no idea how guns work or anything else like that that that is truly fucking incredible f y'all's i AND I GUESS IT FITS WITH HIM AND MISSILE JUST GOING AROUND SAVING PEOPLE TOGETHER LIKE A BADASS DUO AND IT FITS WITH HIM GETTING KILLED BY LYNNE'S FIRST SHOT ON ACCIDENT I HONESTLY CONSIDERED A RAT OPTION FOR LIKE A SPLIT SECOND THERE

OMG OMG OMG OMG YE S AND HIS NAME REALLY IS SISSEL

god jesus fucking christ this this fucking game i just im howling this this definitely is a thing that just happened it owned me so hard im so fucking owned right now

yep hes the cat he's Yomiel's cat

aaaaaaaaaawwwwwwww there's a good reason he had identity confusion in all this they WERE confusable as one being for a while

'her' huh?

oh man wow THIS particular part of the story sucks

so Sissel was a girl's name all along? okay

but also, FUCK no wonder he went bonkers specifically about being unable to die

'his powers couldnt help anybody' more like they couldn't help ONE SPECIFIC PERSON

so that bag is a kitty carrier huh and Lynne's miss accidentally killed the kitty

LMAO THE PART WHERE WE ALL THOUGHT LYNNE HAD KILLED THE PROTAG WASN'T WRONG

I DAMN FUCKING REMEMBER THAT CAT JUST FOR YALLS I I ABSOLUTELY REMEMBERED THERE WAS A CAT THERE I JUST NEVER LINKED IT TO ANYTHING I JUST THOUGHT IT WAS A VERY PRETTY RANDOM STRAY

anyway Yomiel that's what you get for playing with guns they're deadly weapons and result in death you're fucking welcome

so anyway who the fuck is Ray

but anyway kitty Sissel saved everyone...

okay but hold on hold on hold on I didn't quite get the implications about the fiancee the first time around WHAT THE FUCK CAPCOM i was just recently thinking how fucked up it was that I remembered the last name of Polly Jenkins, just because of how much her brief story shook me

and uh I think is that also the implication here because that's not fucking okay

anyway so did Yomiel die as the result of that or nay bc that looked fucking deadly if not instantaneously so

god but this ffucking game

this fucking... game

oh Missile I'm pretty sure YOU are going to see HIM alright lmao wasn't Jowd taking him home

but also damn the original events of these ten years, as remembered by - a dog and a cat - Detective Jowd and Kamila (but not Alma, who never was brought back to life directly) - Lynne - Cabanela - the medical examiner - the minister of justice AND NO-ONE ELSE ...wait, no ALSO THE GUY FROM THE FUCKING PARK ...yep that's a thing we're doing

so another important thing is that the rock star kid is going to be okay and the curry guy, too nothing bad happened to them in this timeline, right?

ALRIGHT HI RAY WHAT/WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU

(right now my bet's on 'a rat')

oh, Sissel also killed two people tonight, that happened

lmao and in this version of evens Missile died in the presence of Temsik

omfg and Ray is alternate!Missile this is fucking amazing <3

lmao his ghost aged and lost its powers?

also the dawn deadline was a lie he just wanted to get Sissel's butt moving I FUCKING KNEW IT

I love how Sissel's just "I DID WHAT" even though he's been doing that all evening this time around too

yup doggie's a fucking liar the only real time limit is the lifetime they would have had if they were alive huh damn

but seriously I called that before I started this section of the liveblog even if I think I never actually made that post 'what are the odds Ray is a fucking liar' I don't think I ever wrote that I kept getting distracted but yep I fucking called this

THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF MY HEART GOD I AM ;U; THIS DOGGO

anyway one participant of the events who definitely wasn't born yet 10 years ago is indeed Missile 0.0 how's that... gonna work...

but I do love that just... the justice minister, of all people, is also going to be in possession of those 10 years

OH MY FUCKING GOD LYNNE IS ABOUT TO HAVE A FUCKING HEART ATTACK I KNOW THERE'S NO GUN BUT JESUS FUCKING CHRIST

KAMILA WHAT THE FUCK DON'T FUCKING DO THAT THAT'S ABSOLUTELY TERRIFYING

aawwwwwww IT WORKED THIS TIME AROUND

'nice to meet you' OH BOY OH BOY I GET HOW IT WORKS NOW I THINK ...uh, I'm not sure how Lynne knew to flee from the junkyard then, but either way it looks like they're only getting back their memories at the PRESENT and that's why Kamila didn't fUCKING KNOW AND REMEMBER WHAT THE FUCK WAS WRONG WITH DOING THAT JUST NOW

LMAO SOMETHING'S GOING TO EXPLODE TONIGHT

oh, nevermind, it's not that yet :D but it really does sound like it's going to :D right... about... dawn? :D

aww Jowd actually carries toy badges with him everywhere <3 <3 <3 'child handling tools'

still a kitten, huh yeah, that whole Temsik thing :D

aww, and here's her, all alive and everything

SO BIG MEMORYSPLOSION PLEASE

(at dawn) (it's fucking coming that's my headcanon and you can't beat it) (a bunch of people are going to become really fucking traumatized tonight)

hey!!! Missile!!! Cabanela brought him, huh

so, what's up with Yomiel, anyway

COME ON SISSEL MAKE NICE WITH MISSILE HE CAN'T CLIMB UP THERE

that guy's imitating Cabanela lmao

Memry <3 <3 <3

very best customer, huh

AWWW ITS THIS GUY HI GUY YOU'RE OKAY NOW WITHOUT YOMIEL TO RUIN EVERYTHING YOU'RE JUST FINE

hah, and these two

.............................................yup. they died

'the indescretions of a minister perhaps?' I LOVE THIS FUCKING LADY I LOVE HER I LOVE HER

ah, these two what deal is it this time

the little rock sinter guy!!! yeah!!!!

hi medical examiner guy <3 guess you're not doing medicine after all huh

HI LEAFLET PARK GUY YOU ARE STILL CUTE

HI BAILEY

oh man oh man Yomiel :D hey are talking about Yomiel :D

SHOW ME HIS FIANCEE YOU COWARDS

lmao he's the painter this time even the robe sits the same

SO SHOW ME

OH YEAH OH YEAH HE REMEMBERS THATS THE PICTURE OF THE FUCKING CAT AND NO MISTAKE ABOUT IT

YUP YUP THIS IS IT lmao that crane i sure do remember it well it murdered two people tonight <3 <3 <3 kitty <3 <3 <3

aw yeah! in that picture with Missile!!!

[victorluvsalice]

Merry Christmas, Bees!

@dont-offend-the-bees -- I’m pretty sure you can guess your ficlet is DGHDA-related. Even with -- certain things happening, I’m still all for the Holistic Coffee Shop. . .and I’m definitely for at least Victor and Alice being swept up by a certain concert happiness spell. . .want to see my vague idea of what would be the aftermath?

The first thing Victor was really conscious of was his legs being rather cold.

He frowned, still not quite out of sleep enough to open his eyes. His upper half was mostly okay, but his bottom was quite chilly. How could that be? If he'd kicked off his blanket, shouldn't his entire body be cold? Eh, he didn't have the brainpower yet to worry about it. He reached down, feeling about. Darn it -- no blanket.

. . .No pajamas either, actually, now that he thought about it.

In fact, no trousers in general.

"Unnnnh. . ."

Victor's eyes snapped open. Lying across from him, one arm draped possessively around his waist, was Alice. An Alice who happened to be in nothing more than her bra and panties, spread out across what seemed to be a nest of prisoner jumpsuits. She blinked open her eyes and looked up at him. "Hi."

"Hi," Victor managed, rubbing his eyes. His brain was spinning its wheels, trying to rev up but unable to kick itself out of neutral. This was -- he couldn't be seeing what he thought he was seeing. He and Alice were taking things slow. They'd agreed that with Blackwing and the case and everything hanging over their heads. . . And then they'd gone to the concert and -- what had happened at the concert? He remembered -- warm red light, and triangles, and suddenly feeling really good about the world and his friends and his girlfriend --

"My parents have never accepted me for who I am, unlike you guys! I can only imagine the horrors that would result if I told them I was bi!"

Oh Christ. Oh Christ, he'd come out. Victor gawked at his own hand in shock. He. . .he'd intended to come out, sure -- he felt safe around his friends, and he wanted them to know. But the plan had been to wait until the world went back to whatever passed as "normal" for them. When Blackwing was no longer a threat, when they could actually hope to return to their regular routine at the coffee shop. Not when he'd been high on some sort of magical drug, too thrilled with everything to care that he was making such a major revelation. . .or to care about crashing into the police station in a mass of bodies, laughing his arse off, happily trading kisses and cuddles and maybe a bit more and oh damn not all of those kisses had been with Alice and --

Was that blue glitter on his fingers?

Baffled, Victor rubbed his face again. He could feel a smudge of something under his eye -- makeup? But how had it gotten on him? Alice didn't have any on her. . .

Alice dragged herself up to a sitting position beside him. She looked down at herself, then over at him. "So. . .why do you have Dirk's jacket?"

"I what?" Victor managed to drag his gaze away from his fingers. Sure enough, the reason his top half was warm while the rest of him was cold was a familiar red jacket draped across his body. "I -- I don't quite remember. . ." Though he had a sneaking suspicion that it had to do with those kisses he'd been sharing. . . He winced and turned away from Alice's gaze. "I -- Alice, I'm so--"

She caught his chin, pulled him toward her and silenced him with a kiss. "I'm not entirely sure what happened last night myself," she said, pressing their foreheads together. "But I don't feel like you betrayed me at all." A blush rose on her cheeks. "In fact, I -- I think I kind of -- enjoyed watching you with some of the others?"

Victor blinked. His brain was never going to get out of neutral at this rate. "You -- huh?"

"I'm still figuring it out myself," Alice said, shaking her head. She glanced down at her bra again. "Do you mind if I borrow that jacket?"

"Not at all," Victor said, handing it over. "Probably fit you better than me." He scooted himself up, trying not to think about how he was in his undershirt and boxers in a very public place. "Where do you think--"

CRASH! tink tink tink. . . "Ooooooh man. I am so screwed!"

Well -- that was Tina accounted for, at least. Victor forced himself to his feet, giving Alice a hand up as she wrapped herself in the red leather. The entire police station was a wreck -- and populated with people in various states of undress, which made him feel a tiny bit better about things. Apparently no one at the party had escaped the power of "everything is awesome so let's have something that falls just short of an orgy." Even Todd and Farah were looking shockingly disheveled -- Farah with Cheetos in her hair, Todd with blue --

Blue glitter. All over his face.

And Dirk's glowsticks around his neck.

Their eyes met from across the room. Todd squinted at the glitter smudge, raised an eyebrow at Dirk's jacket on Alice's pale form, then looked down at the glowsticks. "Uh -- did we--" he started, looking up again.

Did we have a bisexual/gay smooching threesome while Alice apparently watched and maybe even cheered us on? "It's too early for that question," Victor declared, massaging his forehead. God, did he wish they were back at Sunny Brews. He could really use a green tea. "Have you seen Dirk?"

[kyskingdom]

Harmonize. (First book I ever wrote. age 9)

Its quite here. There is no noise, except Gala snoring next to me. A car pulls into the drive, Gala snaps awake and growls at the noise. The person in the car is Emily, my sister. She "accidently" left her wedding ring here last time she visited. I think she just wanted a reason to come home again. Just a few weeks ago, Emily married Tom, a semi-truck driver who treats her amazing. They go everywhere together, which is why Emily needed an excuse to come home. I hear the front door open, and I hear her shoes on the floor. She knocks on my door. But walks in immediately after. So the knock was pretty pointless. Why is she In my room though? I told her where the ring was when we were on the phone earlier. I tried to make it sound like I wasnt going to be home. Its not like I dont love my sister, I just dont want to talk to her right now. I dont know why. But I don't. She stands in the door way and stares at me, I stare at the floor. "Selina, what is it?" Said Emily making her way to my side. "Nothing." Emily started poking my arm, trying to get my attention. I pretended not to feel Emily, though it was getting very annoying. "What is it? You can tell me." Oh! Wow! Yes! I'm just gonna tell you everything! "I dont know,I guess I just want to be able to support myself." I cringe, that's the best my brain can come up with? Pathetic. "What? You already support yourself." Okay, I'm getting pretty annoyed, just play along! "No I'm mean, completely support myself, like, in my own house..." That part wasnt a lie, I do want my own place. "Well, just, I don't know, just dont rush yourself." I looked up at Emily, I know why she has someone and I dont, she is stunningly pretty. I have always thought she was beautiful, her freckles around her nose, the short wavy auburn hair that hang over her shoulders. Like our mom. I dont look like them. My features are plain. I'm sometimes feel invisible, like my face has been used too many times. "Well," I said "I've gotta get to work." "You know," said Emily ,"you shouldn't be working two jobs at 19." I work one, so I correct her. "I only work one." I try to say this as serious as possible, but its hard to when Mary is such a wonderful woman. "Oh right, 'taking care of Mary isn't a job' right?" Emily said in an awful, what I would guess to be an impression of me. "Well, it isn't." I turned and grabbed my purse from the dresser, as Emily was passing me to leave. I walked out after Emily, who turned for the door, after she said goodbye to mom. My mother is wearing a scowl, one she saved for a very specific person, this cant be good. Or it might be really good! "Mary Rogers called last night, Saphy got her driving license so she'll be taking care of her now." Saphy, that little...I decide not to discuss her right now, I already know my mom hates her as much I do, so I play it off as if I'm talking about someone pleasent. "I thought Saphy was in Florida? Remember, she thought she was too good for Louisiana?" I always thought Louisiana was a great place for everyone to live, turns out, pretty-in-pink barbie dolls hate it here. "She's coming back to town, Her friends and her got in an argument, well a 'life crisis' if you ask her." Mom smiled at the 'life crisis' part, I really dont know why though. Other then to, I dont know, add something interesting to the conversation. Her and Emily talk the same way, while smiling. "Right, I need to get to work." I hugged her and headed for the door. I think about Mary on my way to work, A 98 year old woman who always insisted on me calling her 'aunt'. The first time we met, I  had about 20 cats circling my feet, all meowing, Mary came down the stairs with a little furball kitten in her hand. It was the cutest thing I have ever seen! I smiled, remembering how sweet Mary was, but the smile quickly faded. Unfortunately, everyday I have to pass the road where my dad was killed by a drunk driver, I was around 8, sitting in the back seat, singing along to the radio, when a loud screeching sound rang in my ears, then glass reflected red and blue lights on the dashboard. I pulled into the small parking lot of the restaurant I work at, it was just me and Dolores, the cook, and like 5 people that wanted a coffee refill for the road. I normally just read, but I am fresh out of books, so I need to make a deal, I go around my school and ask people for their books, with the promise that I will do the book report, but its summer, and nobody has book reports in the summer. I was brought out of my day-dream feeling my phone buzz, my mom. "hey are you busy?" Nope, just busy with my book-dealer thoughts! "Its never busy here mom." I thinks thats less of a crazy answer, right? "Right, well, Someone just called, He needs a new caretaker." He? I specificaly put on my resume 'Woman Only!' But the resume only exists in my head, and as far as I know, people cant see into my brain place, not that theyd want to, my train of thought often crashes into the Great Wall of Stupid, and repairs take a while. "Do I know him?" That was a stupid question! No, of course you dont know, you have conversations in your head like this one to avoid talking to real people! "I don't think so,his name is Brian Elderson,He just dropped outta college." College?? How old is this guy? I should make friends with him, enough money to drop out of college! "College?How old is he?" "I'd guess about 18-20." Woah, what? Why? And how? "Okay, what is wrong with him?" That sounded insensitive, but mom knows what I mean, I hope. "He was paralyzed in a car crash, I dont think hes gonna be as easy, he was one of those hard-headed and strong-going kids, and now he thinks he useless." Hmm...did she Google him or something? "How do you know all this?" "Hes one of my co-workers son." Mom dosent care for her co-workers, but I've never heard the name 'Elderson' Before. "I've never heard you talk about anyone named Elderson." "I didn't even know he existed, but he over heard Elly and I talking about you and Mary." Elly was Mary's younger sister, though they didn't talk much, Elly was still acting like she was 20, Elly and Mary still cared about each others well being. A woman just walked in the door, and headed to the back corner table. "alright I've gotta go, an alien just walked in." Mom must have understood, because she hung up, or she was afraid it wasn't me talking and someone possessed me, either way I would be happy with. I went to take the woman's order, but before I could speak, the woman said "eggs and toast." I honestly dont know what I expect. We have menus glued under the glass tables. Do people know we serve other things then eggs? I relayed it to Dolores, who was dancing in the kitchen, but stopped immediately when she saw me. "Who is it?" Asked Dolores "Dunno, but she looks rich and official." " 'Rich and official' only you could come up with that." I rolled my eyes and went back to my barstool, and stare at the counter, it has a very interesting design, but not really. Rich and official. Those were the first words that came to my mind when I looked at her, She had blazing red hair and a black jumpsuit, she reminded me of a certain book charecter. I grab the plate of food Dolores slid on the counter in front of me, interupting my disecting of the counter design, and went back to the table and offered it to the woman. I handed it to the woman and went back to the barstool, the counter isnt as interesting anymore, but I continue to stare anyway. Me and Dolores spent the next half hour peeping around the corner at the woman like cannibals, but, she never came back, and we were back to the same few customers. This place is going to go bank-rupt soon, and there is nothing I can do about it, the helpless feeling is the worst, like theres a hole in my chest that little helpless bugs lay eggs. "Well, That kinda sucks." said Dolores "Yeah, What can we do about it though?" I say like wasn't just invisioning little mosquito like bugs laying eggs inside my heart. "What we need is a fundraiser." said Dolores. "Fundraiser? Like anyones gonna buy from our bakestand when they have way better food." I said pointing down the road at our rival restaurant rival. "Who said I was talking about a bakestand?" Oh, my brain just automatically guessed a bakestand since that's what most normal people do, my mistake. "Well what were you thinking?" "Dunno, Any ideas?" Well, then I guess we're going with the cookies and a wood stand! "No, not really." I say. "Do you know anyone who might be able to lend us some money even for a paint job?" Hmm...let me think, like anyone can afford paint around here, living in a poor town! Just peachy! "Everyone I know can't even afford their own paint." "That's what happens in a poor town, right?" Oh crap! She can read minds! Take cover! All my psycho thoughts hide under the tables! "Yeah." The door opens and coffee refills walk in the door, not literally, but that's all they ordered.                               “”“ "Well, I'm checkin' out for the day." said Dolores, she says it as if I dont know that she always leaves at the same time every day. "Yep, I'll just clean up and I'm leaving too." So I headed over to the one table that woman sat at and wiped it off, there really isnt anything else to do, so I head to my car. When I walked in the door, Gala greeted me by licking my face, she was tall enough when she stood on her back feet, as I am freakishly short for someone my age. Mom came out of her bedroom, carying her purse and her phone in the other, she looked disoriented about something. "Feeling alright mom?" Mom let out a sigh, this cant be good, she uselly only wears that face when somethings wrong, or she had a bad day at work, but thats pretty much the same thing. "Mary" She says. Mary what? Is she okay? "Is she okay?" "Kind of, she had a heart attack last night, the hospital just released her this morning to a nursing home." "They probably should have released her yet, right?" "No, they shouldn't have, but they dont think she has too much longer to live" Her voice wobbles at the end of her sentence, Even though Mary was old, she was still very close my mom and I, so losing her would be purely awful. "We're going to see her, right?" I dont know why I said that, we are obviously going to see her. "You think I'm gonna leave her by herself?" I feel worse with my mothers reply, it was rather harsh, so I know she is worried. "Your right,that was a stupid question" I followed her quietly to her car. She turned the key, it cranked and cranked, but didnt start. "We'll take my car." I say after mom gave up, the battery has been needing jumped every day for a while, and company's wont lower the flipping price of car batterys! It was a quiet and awkward ride, the home was about an hour away, sometimes its nice to just get in tje car and ride, with no plan as to where you re going, or what your even doing. But this is not a relaxing ride, Mary is laying in a hospital bed, probably not feeling too good, and she likes to talk to anyone and everyone, but shes probably by herself right now. Sometimes we can pull a radio signal, so I try, but I regret it. 'Deeper than The Holler' came on, it was mom and Dads song when they were in high school. Tears were swelling up in moms eyes, tears like a blade piercing my heart, slow and painful. I turned it off, I miss him too much, and its not safe to drive for my mom to drive with blurry vision. I clear my throat. "I'm sorry." Tears roll down my face as I choke on the words. "Sometimes," mom says "we need to let go, and get over the past, to be able to live in the present." She reached forward and turned the radio back up. I can't believe she just did that. The song that brought back so many memories, them dancing in the living room every time time it came on, their wedding song. She turned it back on. After my heart was drained of anything happy, she had the strength to turn it back on. She knew him better then I did. She went on trucking trips with him, he was a trucker. After Emily was born, Mom ha to stay home, every once in a while she would go with him. After I was born, she went with him even fewer places. Then Dylyla came along, Mom couldnt go at all. Dylyla doesnt even live with us anymore, she lives with Grandma. It really makes me mad when I think of it, mom wanted her to get her grades up, or she was going to make her take a break from cheerleading. Dylyla hated mom after that, but Grandma didnt help at all, she said Dylyla could live with her and not worry about education.                                “”“ One of the home workers led us to Mary's room. I followed mom and Alice, the worker, down a brown hallway, it smells like a Bingo room, anything that smelled nice before, was now overpowered by cheap perfume. Alice left us at the doorway, Mom headed in first. "How are you?" Mom asked, I just hovered around the end of the bed, like a bee unsure of itself, that is what I am, always unsure, of everything. Thats the thing about life, you may think its certain, but I've learned that it never is, its always changing, just like the tide, the whales are so sure they won't be beached, yet they still are. I realize mom and Mary are deep in conversation, I dont really hear it though. Finally, Mary looks away from Mom. "Well don't act like a stranger! Get over here!" I smile, makeing my way to hug her, she is always so happy. "Oh I missed you! That girl does nothing but chatter on her darn ol'phone!" I feel bad, I didn't realize that it had been so long since Saphy has been taking care of her, well, only two days, but still. I used to think your heart couldn't actually feel anything, it was just you telling yourself it could, but I was wrong. I walk over to chair in the corner of the room and sit down. I am not, will not, cry, not here, not for Mary to see. I feel the pain, the pain people talk about. The heartbreak. I didnt think it was possible, but it is. I dont want it to be, but it is, and there's nothing I can do. The door to the room is still open, I decide to close it, but as I do, I see a little girl, 10 maybe. She is crying. I can only imagine what for, but it can't be good. As quiet as I can, I make my way back to the chair, trying not to interupt the conversation they are back into. I can't feel anything. If I let any feelings in, they will all crumble. I straighten in my chair, put on a face, and push every feeling out, every last one. It worked, I have been trying it a lot lately, and it works now.                                ”“”“” I woke up at 4:00 the next morning. I dont need to be at work for another hour, but I decided to go in early. I dont think I can talk to Mom right now, she'll just try to comfort me, and words arent what I need right now, words are powerful, but not as powerful as a hug, or a day in the rain with a good book. I got out of bed and looked in the mirror, my cheeks are still blotchy from last night, I layed in bed and cried myself to sleep. It is very obvious now. I throw on some makeup, just concealer to cover up the redness. Very quietly let Gala outside, I dont want to wake mom, she has the day off. Once Gala is back in, I lead her back to moms room and close the door.                                  ”“”“ As I pull around the corner to the restaurant parking lot, I notice how bland it looks. It kind of hides. It definitely needs an update. I make a quick turn to the dollar store, I know they have like tablecloths and stuff, but I dont know what to do for the outside.                                ”“”“ There are now tablecloths for all the tables, curtains hanging on the outside of the windows, it actually looks really nice. I also bouhht one of those door frame floral tapestry things. Dolores pulls in as I put on some coffee. "Well, well, Somebody's been doing some shopping!" Said Dolores as she came in the door. "Do you like it?" I ask "Yes! It looks so much better, I thought the place had been demolished and rebuilt!" "It doesnt look that different." In fact, it hardly looks different at all. But it is more noticeable, which is what I was going for. Noticeable, but not in your face, like the place down the road. Dolores went back out to her car, she fumbled around for a long time, then re-entered with a bundle of wires and metal. "Its a radio." she announced like it was gold. "Where did you get that?" "I uh, acquired it." I smile. "You didnt steal it, did you?" I ask raising my eyebrows. "No! Well, maybe, my Ex's truck quit running so I ripped this thing out before we broke up." "And you kept it?" I ask. "Of course I kept it! I also kept his 50 inch TV he just had to have!" She scowls, I knew she hated him, but not that much. She looks at me and lifts a finger to point at me. "Dont you dare say 'I told you so'!" "Well, if you had listened-" I smile and bite my lip at her face, like A warning from an angry toddler. I'm trying so hard to hold in a laugh that I almost choke. "Stop! Its not funny!" Dolores exclaims. "You're right, its not funny. Not one bit." Then we both laugh. After a while, it turns into us doubled over with our mouths open like sick walruses. There no audible laughs. I can only imagine what we look like right now. Crap. Someone just came in the door, Dolores walks to the stove, hiding behind the wall, but I can still hear her laughing. I take a deep breath and walk over to the guys table. "What so funny?" He asks with a smile. "Actually," I say "I dont even know!" "One of those things, eh?" He says. "Yes. What would you like today?" "Eggs and coffee." He says. I walk to the coffee pot and pour a cup. When I go back to the table, he asks if I know his sister. "Whos your sister?" I ask, I already know I don't know her, but I dont what him to think I can read minds or do crazy crap like that. "Jane Brown" he says with a kind of longing in his eyes. "No, I don't think so." I know so, but he doesn't look too happy right now, nor does he look like he had a good relationship with her, since he hasnt looked up from his coffee. "Nah, I didn't figure, ain't nobody seen 'er." His eyes actually have tears in them. Should I sit down and comfort him? She I leave him to his feelings? I decide to pull out a chair and sit down, I still dont know if its a good call. "What does she look like?" I ask. "Hang on." he says as he fumbles in his pocket for his phone. He shows me a picture of a girl with short blonde hair and bright blue eyes. "We weren't very close when we were kids, but just as we worked out our issues, she was gone." he says, his eyes not really focused on anything. "And did she she say where she was going?" "Oh, I know where she went, but she aint in good shape." I feel like I shouldnt ask any more, so I dont but soon he is deep in his story of his sister, how she got in an unhealthy relationship, and the guy "poisened her brain" And that she wouldnt be coming back anytime soon. And that he was hoping she would come back home soon. As he talks, I notice green flecks in his blue eyes. I look away from his eyes as I realize that I shouldnt be looking at a stranger that way. But he does look to be around my age. Stop thinking like that! I tell myself, but I dont listen. After he was finished talking, I say "You know, my little sister is like that, expects to have the world handed to her. She lives with my grandma now" He looks at me and smiles, a smile he has probably practiced in the mirror. "Has anyone ever told you how pretty you are?" He asks, still smiling. Heat rushes through my cheeks. I tuck my hair behimd my ear, hoping he doesnt notice how red my cheeks are. "No, why?" I shift in my chair. Yes, sitting down was the right choice. He laughs, a small laugh, but it sends a chill through my stomach. "I think you know why." He says. Now, the chill turns into a sickening feeling. I'm being called pretty by a stranger. Kind of creepy, ain't it? Dolores hollers around the corner. "Eggs and coffee on the love boat." I look back at him as I walk to get the plate, surprised to see him looking at me. "Thanks for that." I hiss at Dolores, who looks very pleased with herself. As I set the plate at his table, he looks at me, I'm not sure what to do, and I'm getting a little uncomfortable, I've never had an experience like this before. "I'm John, by the way." "Selina." I say and walk back to the kitchen and hide behind the wall. Dolores is plugging in the radio. I walk up behind her. "Dont you dare turn that on!" She looks up and smiles. "Why not?" She asks innocently. "Because the only station we can pull in is a love song station, and I know what you'll do!" "Okay, you dont have to lecture me!" "Okay, just...don't do anything." I walk over to a cormer amd lean up against the wall, I close my eyes.                               ”“”“” When I hear the bell above the door ring, I walk to clean up the table. I find a napkin with a phone number on it. I look behind me to make sure Dolores isnt watching, and shove the napkin in my pocket. I try to fight my smile, but I can't, so I just bite my lip to try to conceal it. I carry the plate and bill back and set them on the counter. I'll deal with it later. "Did he leave his number on the bill?" Dolores asks. "No," it isn't a lie, because it wasnt on tje bill. "And never will, so will you just knock it off?" "Ha! Not a chance." She answers. "Besides," she says "you could use some pointers." "Pointers? From the girl that just stole her Ex's radio?" "Hey! After 5 years of dealing with his crap, I think I have a right to a radio that was going in the dump anyway." I roll my eyes at her. I really wish I had a book that I could hide behind right now. Sadly, I still dont have any deals. Dolores is pulling out a small bag from her other huge bag. "How many bags do you have in one bag?" I ask. "7." She answers like its not obscure to carry around more than one huge bag. "What is that one for?" I ask. She pulled out a glittery purple one and set it on the counter. "If you want to make a good impression," She says. "For who?" I interrupt, I know who, and what, she means, but I'm never gonna even see him again anyway. "You know. The one you were just swooning over." "No," I say "I'm am not participating in your little plan here. Besides, you know how many girls he probably leaves his number to? Too many for me to care." She scans me like a lie-detector. But I'm not lying, I dont really want to be seeing someone who goes into random resteraunts and talks about his personal life to some waitress. I feel like I'm lying. But I'm not. Am I? No. Really though, who goes and tells a stranger about their psycho sister? Probably someone who will tell anyone anything, even if its none of their business. "Fine," Dolores says. "If you dont want a little romamce in your life, that's your choice." She says as she puts all her bags back in her bag. "That wasnt romance," I say, "That was a guy complaining about his sister. What's 'Romantic' about that?" She shrugs her shoulders. "I dont know, maybe because he chose you to talk to." "He didnt 'choose' me! Besides, if you would have went over there, he would have talked to you." "Okay then! Tomorrow, when he comes back, I will go wait on him, see what he says then." "You just do that," I say, sitting down on the barstool. "And good luck, because he wont be back." "Right." Dolores mumbles. But, I dont know what shes planning, because he aint gonna be back. Chapter 2 I get back in my car, and let out a sigh. I had a meeting with the Eldersons, I guess they wanted to see how I was, no one has ever wanted a visit before. Its refreshing to finally smell fresh air. The air in the house was full of air fresheners, I would almost bet that it smelled better without all the fragrances. They were pretty nice, I guess. Emma, Brians mom, asked me things like what I have in mind for my future amd small-talk like that. But nothing really related to care-giver work. Maybe she was just testing me. She is leaving her son with me, after all.                                  “”“” When I get home, Mom is popping popcorn on the microwave. Gala is at her feet begging. "Gala! You user puppy!" I say as I bend down to pet her. "I figured we could use a movie night" Mom says as she piches the popcorn bag and puts it all in one big bowl. "We havent done that since Dylyla left." "No, we haven't, and since its just you and me, you can pick the movie." "You say that like you dont know what I will pick." My mom knows I have two favorite movies. That is one thing I told her. "Hm. Half-Blood Prince, or Divergent?" She asks. That is a hard choice, its been a while for both. "Which would you rather watch?" I ask "I cant make up my mind." She smiles, I already know what shes going to pick. "Harry Potter, Baby!" She says.                                 ““”“ I wake up tired. We ended up watching all 8 Harry Potter movies, and all 3 Divergent Movies. We probably should have gone to bed earlier, but, we you are handed movies like that, theres no telling how long you'll be awake. We probably should have waited for the weekend. We both have to work today, and Emma wants to meet "Privatly without the family." I don't know what that's about, but I imagine since Colin, her youngest son, was being pretty distracting, she wants a more focused setting. We are meeting at a park at 3:00, but I dont get off until 4:00, so I'll have to talk to Dolores. She'll probably cover for me, not that it matters, no one is ever there. I slept through my alarm, so I hurry and dress, then run through the house like a ninja finding food.                                 ”“” When I get there, Dolores is already there. Normally, I'm here way before she is. "Is everything alright?" She asks when I come in the door. "Yeah, Mom and I stayed up until 3:00 in the morning." I say as I tie on my apron. "Why in the world would you do that?" She asks. "Oh, you know, Harry Potter." I answer, smiling. "Ah, I see. I just wanted to make sure everything was alright. Did you get a call last night?" She asks. I look at her questoningly. "What do you mean?" I ask. I feel clueless, like I should known what shes talking about. "Wow, you really must have missed a lot of sleep." She says. "I'm sorry, I'm not following you." I say. "Obviously! I'm talking about flirty-pants." I roll my eyes at her. She needs to drop it. "Will you please stop! This isnt some Insta-romance story. So knock it off, I already told you, hes probably some creeper. I'm not even looking for a relationship." I say to clear things up. I guess she took the hint because she just shook her head, but didnt say anything. I stay on the barstool for a while, but after a little bit, these seats get really uncomfortable. I go over to a booth and lay down. Before I know it I'm asleep, not remembering my last thought. I'm awoken by music blaring from the kitchen. Dolores must have gotten the radio working. I sit up, involuntarily groaning. I walk over to the kitchen, rubbing sleep from my eyes, and turn off the radio. Dolores comes out of the bathroom. "Why did you shut it off? And why do you look like a zombie?" She asks, but all I can do is glare at here. My mouth wont form words right now. I go back to the booth, but don't lay down, instead I stare out the window, wondering if penguins have knees. Soon, cars and people and bikes going by are just blures of color. I dont even her Dolores when she walks over. I dont notice until she blocks my view. "Here." She throws my phone into my lap. I pick it up, there a million texts from my mom, and a few missed calls. 'are you ok?' 'why arent you answering?' 'seriously, reply!' I keep scrolling, more of the same. Her texts look panicky, I immediately think the worst. Then I see the first text. 'hey sweety, she passed away, I'm sorry.' I can't see anything. My vision is blurry with tears. I feel Dolores' hand on my arm. An attempt at comfort, but we both know shes not good at it. I stare at my hands, this time, I'm going to let my tears come. She's gone. She's gone. She's gone, and I was not there for her. I wasnt there. And now shes gone. Gone. The word repeats in my head, as if on a broken record. It won't leave. It wont stop. And neither will the tears. Maybe she is in a better place. Maybe shes up there with her Mom, her Dad, her brother. I lean forward and put my head in my hands. I feel Dolores rubbing my back. She met her. Once. I feel like a wimp. Sitting here, crying. Its not who I am. But then again, who am I? I don't know. Not anymore. We should have visited her last night. Instead of watching movies. We should have. I cant think straight right now. What did I do after Dad died? I don't know. I dont remember. Not now. But I went through it once before I look at Dolores. She has a small tear in her eyes. More from sympathy, it looks like. "You can go home." She says before I can even ask. I lean over and side hug her. Sniff, and shove my phone in my pocket. I take off my apron and hang it on the hook. I walk out to my car. Crank the engine, and pull out. I feel numb. Too numb. I feel like I should be feeling something. Other than a blade in my chest. That's it. That's all I can feel.                                ““”“ When I get home, Gala is ready to lick my tears away. I sit down on the floor, and Gala and I stare into each others eyes, for a long time. Sometimes, I think animals understand things better then humans. Animals will put aside everything they have wrong. Humans are wrapped up in their own problems, that they wont put aside. Animals are truly a blessing. I feel bad for the unfortunate souls that dont like animals. The wall phone rings. I get up and check my voice to make sure it will work. "Hello?" "Hello, this is Emma, are we still meeting?" "Yes! Yes, I'm sorry, I forgot, I'll be on my way! I'm so sorry." "Don't worry about it, I heard what happened." "Y-you did? From who?" I try to sound curious, not demanding. I dont know if it worked. "Oh, your mother told me this morning." "Oh, ok, I'm on my way." I hang up and run to the mirror. Blotches. Of course. I put on more makeup. Grab my purse. I'm out the door before I realize. Emma is already sitting on a park bench, holding a book, as gentle as if it could crumble in her finger tips. She looks beautiful with her hair blowing around. Her son definatly looks more like her than his dad. I step out of the car, Emma hears the car door shut, she carefully sets the book on top of her purse, when I get closer, I realize its a journal. "Hello!" She starts walking towards me, I'm walking toward her, I'm feeling very awkward, should I stop walking? I'm taken by surprise when she hugs me, as if we are long lost friends. Lost. The word rings in my head and I think of Mary. No. I wont think of her right now. Too late. My eyes are watery. "I'm so sorry to hear what happened." Emma says with a sorrowful look on her face. She's a nice woman. I've met her once, briefly. And she is already pitiful for me. I don't think that is normal. But maybe Ive never met a truly nice person before. Maybe I have. I dont remember them if I have, but I remember all the rude people who will shove me out of the way at the grocery store. Or flip me off in traffic. Or the man who killed my father. I will always remember his face. Permanently etched in my brain. People can't forget something when it affected them so badly. Thats not how the mind works, unfortunately. It would be wonderful if I could just tell myself to forget something. I would be much happier. Or would I? Maybe. Maybe not. "Well, at least shes in a better place now." I say. My eyes flick up to the sky. I hope thats where she is. I look down and stare at my shoes. Emma goes and sits on the bench. She moves her purse and beckons for me to sit. I walk over. Awkwardly. The bench is short, so we're only about a half an inch apart. I bring my shoulders forward to keep from brushing her. I dont know why though. I just feel uncomfortable. "I would like to ask you something." Emma says, "I hope these questions arent too annoying for you, I'm just a curious person." I look up at her and shake my head. "No, youre fine, I understand, I mean, you are leaving your son with me." I flash a quick smile at her. "Ok then!" She says. "Why did you choose to become a care giver at such a young age?" She lowers her voice towards the end of her sentence. I decide to give her the truth. Though I've never actually told anyone. They ask. But I just tell them I like helping people. "I watched both my Dad and my Grandpa die. It was hard. But I figured I could lie and wollow in my self pity, or I could help other people going through the same thing they did." I shrug. I want it to sound casual. But how casual is talking about your dead relatives to a stranger? She rubs my arm, like I'm her daughter, or younger sister. She seems like she could put aside her problems, or maybe she already has. I dont know. I dont know a lot these days. I dont know her, but shes nice. I dont know Brian, but he looks like her. I dont know Colin, but he's a good kid. I dont know my little sister, but I miss her. I dont know. I dont know. It rings over and over and over in my head. I want all of this to stop. I want everything to go black so I can curl up and forget everything. I want it to stop. How? How can it stop, when its real? "I know how youre feeling." Emma says. How? How could anyone know what I'm thinking, when we're all so different? Maybe we aren't different at all. Beating heart. Breathing lungs. Blinking eyes. Its all the same. Or is it? I'm questioning everything I know. Why? Because I'm not sure anyone knows for sure. Maybe they do. Right now, I vow to never think anything is certain. Even if I want to. "You do?" I ask. I'm still staring at the grass. I didnt even realize. But I dont look at something else. Maybe I'm being rude. "Yes. I went through the same thing when I lost my baby. I wanted to give up on everything. And everyone. I just wanted to curl up in a ditch and think of nothing. But I finally realized that there is so much around me. Everything is so much more then meets the eye." She looks around at the trees, the cars, and the children playing. Then I realize, the trees look like theyre swaying in the wind. But they're producing oxygen, they're housing insects amd lives smaller then we can see. The cars look like theyre driving themselves. There is someone inside, giving instructions to an engine that moves everything else. The children look like they're just sliding down slides. But theyre pretending to be superheroes, gliding through the sky like birds. How could I be so narrow-minded? There is too much worth remembering to just give up. I was focusing on the negative. When there is way more positive I could have been thinking of. "Yeah, sometimes I forget that." I say. "Not just you, I think everyone forgets it occasionally. Nothing to worry about, just something to be aware of." She reaches down and puts the journal back onto her purse, which just slid off. "Can I ask you something?" I ask. "You just did, didnt you?" She says smiling. I smile back. Like I'm with an old best friend. I feel comfortable enough to go ahead and ask. "Whos journal is that?" I ask pointing at the old book. The thread is fraying at the spine. It still smells like leather. Like its been in a box for years. "Its my moms. I found it a few years after she died. But I just now got the guts to read it. Im glad I did. I'm learning alot from my 14 year old mom." She looks at me quizingly. I feel like she is going to ask me something I wont know how to answer. "How is your relationship with your mom?" I knew it. I frickin foretold that! "Well, I mean. Its good, I guess." I feel like an idiot. I love my mom. But is that enough? I dont know. When I listen to music, they say love is the most powerful thing ever. But is love alone enough? It doesnt seem like it, but then again, what more could you give? I don't know. "I guess it isnt perfect. But I love her. Is love enough?" I ask. She seems wise and honest, I'm quickly comfortable around her. Even more then with Dolores. But Dolores seems always pre-occupied with her own thoughts, Emma isn't. I dont know how she does it. "Well, the feeling of love is enough, but just saying 'I love you' is not enough. You have to show that someone what they mean. You cant just tell them. They have to feel it. It sounds cliche. And probably overused, but its overused because its true. Why would anyone say it over and over if it isnt true? They wouldn't. Or theyre just good at acting." She says. Yes, very wise. But why use the word acting? Instead of lying? "Isnt acting and lying the same thing?" I ask. "No, not necessarily. Lying is making something up, just to see how it works. Acting is believing that something is false, but somewhere in them, they might just believe that its true, or vice-versa, depending on how you look at it." That answer is satisfying enough. But I have one more that is buzzing in the back of my head. "Do you believe that everyone is unique? Or that we are all the same?" I ask. I should be asking these questions to my mom, but I'm not. "Well, what I believe is very complex. Yes, I believe we are all unique. But I also believe we are connected by some invisible line. The same line that allows us to feel someone staring at us from yards away." She says. I wonder what school she went to that teaches this stuff. Or did she learn it on her own. "Where did you learn all this stuff?" I ask, calmly, not demanding, or insistent, just curiously. "That's the thing, I dont know any of this for sure, but its things I've thought about while sitting in silence." She looks at me quizingly again. "Do you listen to music, Selina?" She asks. Again, I'm going to answer honestly, I feel like I'm getting an honest overdose. This is the most honest I've been in years. "Yes, like when its quiet. I dont like to be alone with my own thoughts." I lean forward and pick up the blade of grass that I was staring at previously and start folding and ripping it. "Sometimes, we can learn from our thoughts. Sometimes, its better to be in quiet. Music is great too! But sometimes, say 15 minutes a day, we should be in silence." She says. We are again deep in conversations, about beliefs, wonders, and everything between. For a minute, I forget about my griefs. But grieving is useless. What good does it do anyway? Besides allow you to feel sorry for yourself? It does nothing besides that, at least in my experience with it. It might work for other people, to maybe let go of something. But is that really grief? I dont think so. Maybe it is. Who knows for certain? How many certain things are there really? I make a mental list. God. Family. Hope. Faith. Gravity. Oxygen. ?. Thats all I can think of. Maybe Love? No. Love could be a lie. This is a list of completely certain things. Yes, I love my mom, but thats what family is. So love is not included in this list. Is that a good or a bad thing?                                 ”“” I'm back home. Emma and I talked until sunset. I still don't know what the purpose was in her mind. But I'm glad we met. I feel like a veil has been lifted. One that was blurring my vision of the world. I dont think I should base my thoughts off of what one person says. But, its a start. I should ask what other people think of the world. I make another mental list. Mom. Dolores. Emily. Dylyla. Yes, I will ask Dylyla, I want her back home. I miss her. But I won't grieve. Its useless. Maybe I will. I'll count to 10, let the grieve come in. Then push it out. 1 2 3 Why? 4 How? 5 Why? 6 What is this pain? 7 Is it my fault? 8 Will I really see them again? 9 What if I don't? 10 I let out an internal scream. Then its gone. Its gone! I will do this every time. I feel light. Like a feather. A feather that attached to a bird. A bird that is very intelligent. A bird that is hungry, but full at the same time. That is a very conflicting idea. But it makes sense to me. And that's all that matters, right? As long as I understand what one person means, my life is not wasted. Even if that one person is myself, or Emma, or Mom, or Emily, or even a stranger on the street. Thats what I believe. Is it though? Is that what I really believe? Yes, it is. And I need to stop questioning myself so much. I need to stop a lot of things. But right now, I'm focusing on, well, focusing. I need to really look at the world. Then I will really look at myself. I will fix what I need to fix. But if its fine, why fix it? Why not improve it? Yes, that sounds good. That's what I will keep in the back of my mind. Like a sticky note on the walls of my mind, I will write it big enough to see from anywhere in my mind. I pretend I'm ripping all the other notes on the wall away. The notes that don't matter. "Grief" "Self-pitty" "Why?" I keep ripping. And I rip them all away. There are only a few left. "Famliy" "Hope" "Faith" "Learning" "Realizing" Those are the only good notes I made. I will add more to my mind-walls soon. As soon I learn more, as soon as I get my family back together, as soon as I find hope again, as soon as I find faith, as soon as I realize how amazing this world actually is. Until then, this is all that matters. I crawl into bed. I'm asleep immediately.

[kyskingdom]

Harmonize. (First book I ever wrote. age 9)

Its quite here. There is no noise, except Gala snoring next to me. A car pulls into the drive, Gala snaps awake and growls at the noise. The person in the car is Emily, my sister. She "accidently" left her wedding ring here last time she visited. I think she just wanted a reason to come home again. Just a few weeks ago, Emily married Tom, a semi-truck driver who treats her amazing. They go everywhere together, which is why Emily needed an excuse to come home. I hear the front door open, and I hear her shoes on the floor. She knocks on my door. But walks in immediately after. So the knock was pretty pointless. Why is she In my room though? I told her where the ring was when we were on the phone earlier. I tried to make it sound like I wasnt going to be home. Its not like I dont love my sister, I just dont want to talk to her right now. I dont know why. But I don't. She stands in the door way and stares at me, I stare at the floor. "Selina, what is it?" Said Emily making her way to my side. "Nothing." Emily started poking my arm, trying to get my attention. I pretended not to feel Emily, though it was getting very annoying. "What is it? You can tell me." Oh! Wow! Yes! I'm just gonna tell you everything! "I dont know,I guess I just want to be able to support myself." I cringe, that's the best my brain can come up with? Pathetic. "What? You already support yourself." Okay, I'm getting pretty annoyed, just play along! "No I'm mean, completely support myself, like, in my own house..." That part wasnt a lie, I do want my own place. "Well, just, I don't know, just dont rush yourself." I looked up at Emily, I know why she has someone and I dont, she is stunningly pretty. I have always thought she was beautiful, her freckles around her nose, the short wavy auburn hair that hang over her shoulders. Like our mom. I dont look like them. My features are plain. I'm sometimes feel invisible, like my face has been used too many times. "Well," I said "I've gotta get to work." "You know," said Emily ,"you shouldn't be working two jobs at 19." I work one, so I correct her. "I only work one." I try to say this as serious as possible, but its hard to when Mary is such a wonderful woman. "Oh right, 'taking care of Mary isn't a job' right?" Emily said in an awful, what I would guess to be an impression of me. "Well, it isn't." I turned and grabbed my purse from the dresser, as Emily was passing me to leave. I walked out after Emily, who turned for the door, after she said goodbye to mom. My mother is wearing a scowl, one she saved for a very specific person, this cant be good. Or it might be really good! "Mary Rogers called last night, Saphy got her driving license so she'll be taking care of her now." Saphy, that little...I decide not to discuss her right now, I already know my mom hates her as much I do, so I play it off as if I'm talking about someone pleasent. "I thought Saphy was in Florida? Remember, she thought she was too good for Louisiana?" I always thought Louisiana was a great place for everyone to live, turns out, pretty-in-pink barbie dolls hate it here. "She's coming back to town, Her friends and her got in an argument, well a 'life crisis' if you ask her." Mom smiled at the 'life crisis' part, I really dont know why though. Other then to, I dont know, add something interesting to the conversation. Her and Emily talk the same way, while smiling. "Right, I need to get to work." I hugged her and headed for the door. I think about Mary on my way to work, A 98 year old woman who always insisted on me calling her 'aunt'. The first time we met, I  had about 20 cats circling my feet, all meowing, Mary came down the stairs with a little furball kitten in her hand. It was the cutest thing I have ever seen! I smiled, remembering how sweet Mary was, but the smile quickly faded. Unfortunately, everyday I have to pass the road where my dad was killed by a drunk driver, I was around 8, sitting in the back seat, singing along to the radio, when a loud screeching sound rang in my ears, then glass reflected red and blue lights on the dashboard. I pulled into the small parking lot of the restaurant I work at, it was just me and Dolores, the cook, and like 5 people that wanted a coffee refill for the road. I normally just read, but I am fresh out of books, so I need to make a deal, I go around my school and ask people for their books, with the promise that I will do the book report, but its summer, and nobody has book reports in the summer. I was brought out of my day-dream feeling my phone buzz, my mom. "hey are you busy?" Nope, just busy with my book-dealer thoughts! "Its never busy here mom." I thinks thats less of a crazy answer, right? "Right, well, Someone just called, He needs a new caretaker." He? I specificaly put on my resume 'Woman Only!' But the resume only exists in my head, and as far as I know, people cant see into my brain place, not that theyd want to, my train of thought often crashes into the Great Wall of Stupid, and repairs take a while. "Do I know him?" That was a stupid question! No, of course you dont know, you have conversations in your head like this one to avoid talking to real people! "I don't think so,his name is Brian Elderson,He just dropped outta college." College?? How old is this guy? I should make friends with him, enough money to drop out of college! "College?How old is he?" "I'd guess about 18-20." Woah, what? Why? And how? "Okay, what is wrong with him?" That sounded insensitive, but mom knows what I mean, I hope. "He was paralyzed in a car crash, I dont think hes gonna be as easy, he was one of those hard-headed and strong-going kids, and now he thinks he useless." Hmm...did she Google him or something? "How do you know all this?" "Hes one of my co-workers son." Mom dosent care for her co-workers, but I've never heard the name 'Elderson' Before. "I've never heard you talk about anyone named Elderson." "I didn't even know he existed, but he over heard Elly and I talking about you and Mary." Elly was Mary's younger sister, though they didn't talk much, Elly was still acting like she was 20, Elly and Mary still cared about each others well being. A woman just walked in the door, and headed to the back corner table. "alright I've gotta go, an alien just walked in." Mom must have understood, because she hung up, or she was afraid it wasn't me talking and someone possessed me, either way I would be happy with. I went to take the woman's order, but before I could speak, the woman said "eggs and toast." I honestly dont know what I expect. We have menus glued under the glass tables. Do people know we serve other things then eggs? I relayed it to Dolores, who was dancing in the kitchen, but stopped immediately when she saw me. "Who is it?" Asked Dolores "Dunno, but she looks rich and official." " 'Rich and official' only you could come up with that." I rolled my eyes and went back to my barstool, and stare at the counter, it has a very interesting design, but not really. Rich and official. Those were the first words that came to my mind when I looked at her, She had blazing red hair and a black jumpsuit, she reminded me of a certain book charecter. I grab the plate of food Dolores slid on the counter in front of me, interupting my disecting of the counter design, and went back to the table and offered it to the woman. I handed it to the woman and went back to the barstool, the counter isnt as interesting anymore, but I continue to stare anyway. Me and Dolores spent the next half hour peeping around the corner at the woman like cannibals, but, she never came back, and we were back to the same few customers. This place is going to go bank-rupt soon, and there is nothing I can do about it, the helpless feeling is the worst, like theres a hole in my chest that little helpless bugs lay eggs. "Well, That kinda sucks." said Dolores "Yeah, What can we do about it though?" I say like wasn't just invisioning little mosquito like bugs laying eggs inside my heart. "What we need is a fundraiser." said Dolores. "Fundraiser? Like anyones gonna buy from our bakestand when they have way better food." I said pointing down the road at our rival restaurant rival. "Who said I was talking about a bakestand?" Oh, my brain just automatically guessed a bakestand since that's what most normal people do, my mistake. "Well what were you thinking?" "Dunno, Any ideas?" Well, then I guess we're going with the cookies and a wood stand! "No, not really." I say. "Do you know anyone who might be able to lend us some money even for a paint job?" Hmm...let me think, like anyone can afford paint around here, living in a poor town! Just peachy! "Everyone I know can't even afford their own paint." "That's what happens in a poor town, right?" Oh crap! She can read minds! Take cover! All my psycho thoughts hide under the tables! "Yeah." The door opens and coffee refills walk in the door, not literally, but that's all they ordered.                               “”“ "Well, I'm checkin' out for the day." said Dolores, she says it as if I dont know that she always leaves at the same time every day. "Yep, I'll just clean up and I'm leaving too." So I headed over to the one table that woman sat at and wiped it off, there really isnt anything else to do, so I head to my car. When I walked in the door, Gala greeted me by licking my face, she was tall enough when she stood on her back feet, as I am freakishly short for someone my age. Mom came out of her bedroom, carying her purse and her phone in the other, she looked disoriented about something. "Feeling alright mom?" Mom let out a sigh, this cant be good, she uselly only wears that face when somethings wrong, or she had a bad day at work, but thats pretty much the same thing. "Mary" She says. Mary what? Is she okay? "Is she okay?" "Kind of, she had a heart attack last night, the hospital just released her this morning to a nursing home." "They probably should have released her yet, right?" "No, they shouldn't have, but they dont think she has too much longer to live" Her voice wobbles at the end of her sentence, Even though Mary was old, she was still very close my mom and I, so losing her would be purely awful. "We're going to see her, right?" I dont know why I said that, we are obviously going to see her. "You think I'm gonna leave her by herself?" I feel worse with my mothers reply, it was rather harsh, so I know she is worried. "Your right,that was a stupid question" I followed her quietly to her car. She turned the key, it cranked and cranked, but didnt start. "We'll take my car." I say after mom gave up, the battery has been needing jumped every day for a while, and company's wont lower the flipping price of car batterys! It was a quiet and awkward ride, the home was about an hour away, sometimes its nice to just get in tje car and ride, with no plan as to where you re going, or what your even doing. But this is not a relaxing ride, Mary is laying in a hospital bed, probably not feeling too good, and she likes to talk to anyone and everyone, but shes probably by herself right now. Sometimes we can pull a radio signal, so I try, but I regret it. 'Deeper than The Holler' came on, it was mom and Dads song when they were in high school. Tears were swelling up in moms eyes, tears like a blade piercing my heart, slow and painful. I turned it off, I miss him too much, and its not safe to drive for my mom to drive with blurry vision. I clear my throat. "I'm sorry." Tears roll down my face as I choke on the words. "Sometimes," mom says "we need to let go, and get over the past, to be able to live in the present." She reached forward and turned the radio back up. I can't believe she just did that. The song that brought back so many memories, them dancing in the living room every time time it came on, their wedding song. She turned it back on. After my heart was drained of anything happy, she had the strength to turn it back on. She knew him better then I did. She went on trucking trips with him, he was a trucker. After Emily was born, Mom ha to stay home, every once in a while she would go with him. After I was born, she went with him even fewer places. Then Dylyla came along, Mom couldnt go at all. Dylyla doesnt even live with us anymore, she lives with Grandma. It really makes me mad when I think of it, mom wanted her to get her grades up, or she was going to make her take a break from cheerleading. Dylyla hated mom after that, but Grandma didnt help at all, she said Dylyla could live with her and not worry about education.                                “”“ One of the home workers led us to Mary's room. I followed mom and Alice, the worker, down a brown hallway, it smells like a Bingo room, anything that smelled nice before, was now overpowered by cheap perfume. Alice left us at the doorway, Mom headed in first. "How are you?" Mom asked, I just hovered around the end of the bed, like a bee unsure of itself, that is what I am, always unsure, of everything. Thats the thing about life, you may think its certain, but I've learned that it never is, its always changing, just like the tide, the whales are so sure they won't be beached, yet they still are. I realize mom and Mary are deep in conversation, I dont really hear it though. Finally, Mary looks away from Mom. "Well don't act like a stranger! Get over here!" I smile, makeing my way to hug her, she is always so happy. "Oh I missed you! That girl does nothing but chatter on her darn ol'phone!" I feel bad, I didn't realize that it had been so long since Saphy has been taking care of her, well, only two days, but still. I used to think your heart couldn't actually feel anything, it was just you telling yourself it could, but I was wrong. I walk over to chair in the corner of the room and sit down. I am not, will not, cry, not here, not for Mary to see. I feel the pain, the pain people talk about. The heartbreak. I didnt think it was possible, but it is. I dont want it to be, but it is, and there's nothing I can do. The door to the room is still open, I decide to close it, but as I do, I see a little girl, 10 maybe. She is crying. I can only imagine what for, but it can't be good. As quiet as I can, I make my way back to the chair, trying not to interupt the conversation they are back into. I can't feel anything. If I let any feelings in, they will all crumble. I straighten in my chair, put on a face, and push every feeling out, every last one. It worked, I have been trying it a lot lately, and it works now.                                ”“”“” I woke up at 4:00 the next morning. I dont need to be at work for another hour, but I decided to go in early. I dont think I can talk to Mom right now, she'll just try to comfort me, and words arent what I need right now, words are powerful, but not as powerful as a hug, or a day in the rain with a good book. I got out of bed and looked in the mirror, my cheeks are still blotchy from last night, I layed in bed and cried myself to sleep. It is very obvious now. I throw on some makeup, just concealer to cover up the redness. Very quietly let Gala outside, I dont want to wake mom, she has the day off. Once Gala is back in, I lead her back to moms room and close the door.                                  ”“”“ As I pull around the corner to the restaurant parking lot, I notice how bland it looks. It kind of hides. It definitely needs an update. I make a quick turn to the dollar store, I know they have like tablecloths and stuff, but I dont know what to do for the outside.                                ”“”“ There are now tablecloths for all the tables, curtains hanging on the outside of the windows, it actually looks really nice. I also bouhht one of those door frame floral tapestry things. Dolores pulls in as I put on some coffee. "Well, well, Somebody's been doing some shopping!" Said Dolores as she came in the door. "Do you like it?" I ask "Yes! It looks so much better, I thought the place had been demolished and rebuilt!" "It doesnt look that different." In fact, it hardly looks different at all. But it is more noticeable, which is what I was going for. Noticeable, but not in your face, like the place down the road. Dolores went back out to her car, she fumbled around for a long time, then re-entered with a bundle of wires and metal. "Its a radio." she announced like it was gold. "Where did you get that?" "I uh, acquired it." I smile. "You didnt steal it, did you?" I ask raising my eyebrows. "No! Well, maybe, my Ex's truck quit running so I ripped this thing out before we broke up." "And you kept it?" I ask. "Of course I kept it! I also kept his 50 inch TV he just had to have!" She scowls, I knew she hated him, but not that much. She looks at me and lifts a finger to point at me. "Dont you dare say 'I told you so'!" "Well, if you had listened-" I smile and bite my lip at her face, like A warning from an angry toddler. I'm trying so hard to hold in a laugh that I almost choke. "Stop! Its not funny!" Dolores exclaims. "You're right, its not funny. Not one bit." Then we both laugh. After a while, it turns into us doubled over with our mouths open like sick walruses. There no audible laughs. I can only imagine what we look like right now. Crap. Someone just came in the door, Dolores walks to the stove, hiding behind the wall, but I can still hear her laughing. I take a deep breath and walk over to the guys table. "What so funny?" He asks with a smile. "Actually," I say "I dont even know!" "One of those things, eh?" He says. "Yes. What would you like today?" "Eggs and coffee." He says. I walk to the coffee pot and pour a cup. When I go back to the table, he asks if I know his sister. "Whos your sister?" I ask, I already know I don't know her, but I dont what him to think I can read minds or do crazy crap like that. "Jane Brown" he says with a kind of longing in his eyes. "No, I don't think so." I know so, but he doesn't look too happy right now, nor does he look like he had a good relationship with her, since he hasnt looked up from his coffee. "Nah, I didn't figure, ain't nobody seen 'er." His eyes actually have tears in them. Should I sit down and comfort him? She I leave him to his feelings? I decide to pull out a chair and sit down, I still dont know if its a good call. "What does she look like?" I ask. "Hang on." he says as he fumbles in his pocket for his phone. He shows me a picture of a girl with short blonde hair and bright blue eyes. "We weren't very close when we were kids, but just as we worked out our issues, she was gone." he says, his eyes not really focused on anything. "And did she she say where she was going?" "Oh, I know where she went, but she aint in good shape." I feel like I shouldnt ask any more, so I dont but soon he is deep in his story of his sister, how she got in an unhealthy relationship, and the guy "poisened her brain" And that she wouldnt be coming back anytime soon. And that he was hoping she would come back home soon. As he talks, I notice green flecks in his blue eyes. I look away from his eyes as I realize that I shouldnt be looking at a stranger that way. But he does look to be around my age. Stop thinking like that! I tell myself, but I dont listen. After he was finished talking, I say "You know, my little sister is like that, expects to have the world handed to her. She lives with my grandma now" He looks at me and smiles, a smile he has probably practiced in the mirror. "Has anyone ever told you how pretty you are?" He asks, still smiling. Heat rushes through my cheeks. I tuck my hair behimd my ear, hoping he doesnt notice how red my cheeks are. "No, why?" I shift in my chair. Yes, sitting down was the right choice. He laughs, a small laugh, but it sends a chill through my stomach. "I think you know why." He says. Now, the chill turns into a sickening feeling. I'm being called pretty by a stranger. Kind of creepy, ain't it? Dolores hollers around the corner. "Eggs and coffee on the love boat." I look back at him as I walk to get the plate, surprised to see him looking at me. "Thanks for that." I hiss at Dolores, who looks very pleased with herself. As I set the plate at his table, he looks at me, I'm not sure what to do, and I'm getting a little uncomfortable, I've never had an experience like this before. "I'm John, by the way." "Selina." I say and walk back to the kitchen and hide behind the wall. Dolores is plugging in the radio. I walk up behind her. "Dont you dare turn that on!" She looks up and smiles. "Why not?" She asks innocently. "Because the only station we can pull in is a love song station, and I know what you'll do!" "Okay, you dont have to lecture me!" "Okay, just...don't do anything." I walk over to a cormer amd lean up against the wall, I close my eyes.                               ”“”“” When I hear the bell above the door ring, I walk to clean up the table. I find a napkin with a phone number on it. I look behind me to make sure Dolores isnt watching, and shove the napkin in my pocket. I try to fight my smile, but I can't, so I just bite my lip to try to conceal it. I carry the plate and bill back and set them on the counter. I'll deal with it later. "Did he leave his number on the bill?" Dolores asks. "No," it isn't a lie, because it wasnt on tje bill. "And never will, so will you just knock it off?" "Ha! Not a chance." She answers. "Besides," she says "you could use some pointers." "Pointers? From the girl that just stole her Ex's radio?" "Hey! After 5 years of dealing with his crap, I think I have a right to a radio that was going in the dump anyway." I roll my eyes at her. I really wish I had a book that I could hide behind right now. Sadly, I still dont have any deals. Dolores is pulling out a small bag from her other huge bag. "How many bags do you have in one bag?" I ask. "7." She answers like its not obscure to carry around more than one huge bag. "What is that one for?" I ask. She pulled out a glittery purple one and set it on the counter. "If you want to make a good impression," She says. "For who?" I interrupt, I know who, and what, she means, but I'm never gonna even see him again anyway. "You know. The one you were just swooning over." "No," I say "I'm am not participating in your little plan here. Besides, you know how many girls he probably leaves his number to? Too many for me to care." She scans me like a lie-detector. But I'm not lying, I dont really want to be seeing someone who goes into random resteraunts and talks about his personal life to some waitress. I feel like I'm lying. But I'm not. Am I? No. Really though, who goes and tells a stranger about their psycho sister? Probably someone who will tell anyone anything, even if its none of their business. "Fine," Dolores says. "If you dont want a little romamce in your life, that's your choice." She says as she puts all her bags back in her bag. "That wasnt romance," I say, "That was a guy complaining about his sister. What's 'Romantic' about that?" She shrugs her shoulders. "I dont know, maybe because he chose you to talk to." "He didnt 'choose' me! Besides, if you would have went over there, he would have talked to you." "Okay then! Tomorrow, when he comes back, I will go wait on him, see what he says then." "You just do that," I say, sitting down on the barstool. "And good luck, because he wont be back." "Right." Dolores mumbles. But, I dont know what shes planning, because he aint gonna be back. Chapter 2 I get back in my car, and let out a sigh. I had a meeting with the Eldersons, I guess they wanted to see how I was, no one has ever wanted a visit before. Its refreshing to finally smell fresh air. The air in the house was full of air fresheners, I would almost bet that it smelled better without all the fragrances. They were pretty nice, I guess. Emma, Brians mom, asked me things like what I have in mind for my future amd small-talk like that. But nothing really related to care-giver work. Maybe she was just testing me. She is leaving her son with me, after all.                                  “”“” When I get home, Mom is popping popcorn on the microwave. Gala is at her feet begging. "Gala! You user puppy!" I say as I bend down to pet her. "I figured we could use a movie night" Mom says as she piches the popcorn bag and puts it all in one big bowl. "We havent done that since Dylyla left." "No, we haven't, and since its just you and me, you can pick the movie." "You say that like you dont know what I will pick." My mom knows I have two favorite movies. That is one thing I told her. "Hm. Half-Blood Prince, or Divergent?" She asks. That is a hard choice, its been a while for both. "Which would you rather watch?" I ask "I cant make up my mind." She smiles, I already know what shes going to pick. "Harry Potter, Baby!" She says.                                 ““”“ I wake up tired. We ended up watching all 8 Harry Potter movies, and all 3 Divergent Movies. We probably should have gone to bed earlier, but, we you are handed movies like that, theres no telling how long you'll be awake. We probably should have waited for the weekend. We both have to work today, and Emma wants to meet "Privatly without the family." I don't know what that's about, but I imagine since Colin, her youngest son, was being pretty distracting, she wants a more focused setting. We are meeting at a park at 3:00, but I dont get off until 4:00, so I'll have to talk to Dolores. She'll probably cover for me, not that it matters, no one is ever there. I slept through my alarm, so I hurry and dress, then run through the house like a ninja finding food.                                 ”“” When I get there, Dolores is already there. Normally, I'm here way before she is. "Is everything alright?" She asks when I come in the door. "Yeah, Mom and I stayed up until 3:00 in the morning." I say as I tie on my apron. "Why in the world would you do that?" She asks. "Oh, you know, Harry Potter." I answer, smiling. "Ah, I see. I just wanted to make sure everything was alright. Did you get a call last night?" She asks. I look at her questoningly. "What do you mean?" I ask. I feel clueless, like I should known what shes talking about. "Wow, you really must have missed a lot of sleep." She says. "I'm sorry, I'm not following you." I say. "Obviously! I'm talking about flirty-pants." I roll my eyes at her. She needs to drop it. "Will you please stop! This isnt some Insta-romance story. So knock it off, I already told you, hes probably some creeper. I'm not even looking for a relationship." I say to clear things up. I guess she took the hint because she just shook her head, but didnt say anything. I stay on the barstool for a while, but after a little bit, these seats get really uncomfortable. I go over to a booth and lay down. Before I know it I'm asleep, not remembering my last thought. I'm awoken by music blaring from the kitchen. Dolores must have gotten the radio working. I sit up, involuntarily groaning. I walk over to the kitchen, rubbing sleep from my eyes, and turn off the radio. Dolores comes out of the bathroom. "Why did you shut it off? And why do you look like a zombie?" She asks, but all I can do is glare at here. My mouth wont form words right now. I go back to the booth, but don't lay down, instead I stare out the window, wondering if penguins have knees. Soon, cars and people and bikes going by are just blures of color. I dont even her Dolores when she walks over. I dont notice until she blocks my view. "Here." She throws my phone into my lap. I pick it up, there a million texts from my mom, and a few missed calls. 'are you ok?' 'why arent you answering?' 'seriously, reply!' I keep scrolling, more of the same. Her texts look panicky, I immediately think the worst. Then I see the first text. 'hey sweety, she passed away, I'm sorry.' I can't see anything. My vision is blurry with tears. I feel Dolores' hand on my arm. An attempt at comfort, but we both know shes not good at it. I stare at my hands, this time, I'm going to let my tears come. She's gone. She's gone. She's gone, and I was not there for her. I wasnt there. And now shes gone. Gone. The word repeats in my head, as if on a broken record. It won't leave. It wont stop. And neither will the tears. Maybe she is in a better place. Maybe shes up there with her Mom, her Dad, her brother. I lean forward and put my head in my hands. I feel Dolores rubbing my back. She met her. Once. I feel like a wimp. Sitting here, crying. Its not who I am. But then again, who am I? I don't know. Not anymore. We should have visited her last night. Instead of watching movies. We should have. I cant think straight right now. What did I do after Dad died? I don't know. I dont remember. Not now. But I went through it once before I look at Dolores. She has a small tear in her eyes. More from sympathy, it looks like. "You can go home." She says before I can even ask. I lean over and side hug her. Sniff, and shove my phone in my pocket. I take off my apron and hang it on the hook. I walk out to my car. Crank the engine, and pull out. I feel numb. Too numb. I feel like I should be feeling something. Other than a blade in my chest. That's it. That's all I can feel.                                ““”“ When I get home, Gala is ready to lick my tears away. I sit down on the floor, and Gala and I stare into each others eyes, for a long time. Sometimes, I think animals understand things better then humans. Animals will put aside everything they have wrong. Humans are wrapped up in their own problems, that they wont put aside. Animals are truly a blessing. I feel bad for the unfortunate souls that dont like animals. The wall phone rings. I get up and check my voice to make sure it will work. "Hello?" "Hello, this is Emma, are we still meeting?" "Yes! Yes, I'm sorry, I forgot, I'll be on my way! I'm so sorry." "Don't worry about it, I heard what happened." "Y-you did? From who?" I try to sound curious, not demanding. I dont know if it worked. "Oh, your mother told me this morning." "Oh, ok, I'm on my way." I hang up and run to the mirror. Blotches. Of course. I put on more makeup. Grab my purse. I'm out the door before I realize. Emma is already sitting on a park bench, holding a book, as gentle as if it could crumble in her finger tips. She looks beautiful with her hair blowing around. Her son definatly looks more like her than his dad. I step out of the car, Emma hears the car door shut, she carefully sets the book on top of her purse, when I get closer, I realize its a journal. "Hello!" She starts walking towards me, I'm walking toward her, I'm feeling very awkward, should I stop walking? I'm taken by surprise when she hugs me, as if we are long lost friends. Lost. The word rings in my head and I think of Mary. No. I wont think of her right now. Too late. My eyes are watery. "I'm so sorry to hear what happened." Emma says with a sorrowful look on her face. She's a nice woman. I've met her once, briefly. And she is already pitiful for me. I don't think that is normal. But maybe Ive never met a truly nice person before. Maybe I have. I dont remember them if I have, but I remember all the rude people who will shove me out of the way at the grocery store. Or flip me off in traffic. Or the man who killed my father. I will always remember his face. Permanently etched in my brain. People can't forget something when it affected them so badly. Thats not how the mind works, unfortunately. It would be wonderful if I could just tell myself to forget something. I would be much happier. Or would I? Maybe. Maybe not. "Well, at least shes in a better place now." I say. My eyes flick up to the sky. I hope thats where she is. I look down and stare at my shoes. Emma goes and sits on the bench. She moves her purse and beckons for me to sit. I walk over. Awkwardly. The bench is short, so we're only about a half an inch apart. I bring my shoulders forward to keep from brushing her. I dont know why though. I just feel uncomfortable. "I would like to ask you something." Emma says, "I hope these questions arent too annoying for you, I'm just a curious person." I look up at her and shake my head. "No, youre fine, I understand, I mean, you are leaving your son with me." I flash a quick smile at her. "Ok then!" She says. "Why did you choose to become a care giver at such a young age?" She lowers her voice towards the end of her sentence. I decide to give her the truth. Though I've never actually told anyone. They ask. But I just tell them I like helping people. "I watched both my Dad and my Grandpa die. It was hard. But I figured I could lie and wollow in my self pity, or I could help other people going through the same thing they did." I shrug. I want it to sound casual. But how casual is talking about your dead relatives to a stranger? She rubs my arm, like I'm her daughter, or younger sister. She seems like she could put aside her problems, or maybe she already has. I dont know. I dont know a lot these days. I dont know her, but shes nice. I dont know Brian, but he looks like her. I dont know Colin, but he's a good kid. I dont know my little sister, but I miss her. I dont know. I dont know. It rings over and over and over in my head. I want all of this to stop. I want everything to go black so I can curl up and forget everything. I want it to stop. How? How can it stop, when its real? "I know how youre feeling." Emma says. How? How could anyone know what I'm thinking, when we're all so different? Maybe we aren't different at all. Beating heart. Breathing lungs. Blinking eyes. Its all the same. Or is it? I'm questioning everything I know. Why? Because I'm not sure anyone knows for sure. Maybe they do. Right now, I vow to never think anything is certain. Even if I want to. "You do?" I ask. I'm still staring at the grass. I didnt even realize. But I dont look at something else. Maybe I'm being rude. "Yes. I went through the same thing when I lost my baby. I wanted to give up on everything. And everyone. I just wanted to curl up in a ditch and think of nothing. But I finally realized that there is so much around me. Everything is so much more then meets the eye." She looks around at the trees, the cars, and the children playing. Then I realize, the trees look like theyre swaying in the wind. But they're producing oxygen, they're housing insects amd lives smaller then we can see. The cars look like theyre driving themselves. There is someone inside, giving instructions to an engine that moves everything else. The children look like they're just sliding down slides. But theyre pretending to be superheroes, gliding through the sky like birds. How could I be so narrow-minded? There is too much worth remembering to just give up. I was focusing on the negative. When there is way more positive I could have been thinking of. "Yeah, sometimes I forget that." I say. "Not just you, I think everyone forgets it occasionally. Nothing to worry about, just something to be aware of." She reaches down and puts the journal back onto her purse, which just slid off. "Can I ask you something?" I ask. "You just did, didnt you?" She says smiling. I smile back. Like I'm with an old best friend. I feel comfortable enough to go ahead and ask. "Whos journal is that?" I ask pointing at the old book. The thread is fraying at the spine. It still smells like leather. Like its been in a box for years. "Its my moms. I found it a few years after she died. But I just now got the guts to read it. Im glad I did. I'm learning alot from my 14 year old mom." She looks at me quizingly. I feel like she is going to ask me something I wont know how to answer. "How is your relationship with your mom?" I knew it. I frickin foretold that! "Well, I mean. Its good, I guess." I feel like an idiot. I love my mom. But is that enough? I dont know. When I listen to music, they say love is the most powerful thing ever. But is love alone enough? It doesnt seem like it, but then again, what more could you give? I don't know. "I guess it isnt perfect. But I love her. Is love enough?" I ask. She seems wise and honest, I'm quickly comfortable around her. Even more then with Dolores. But Dolores seems always pre-occupied with her own thoughts, Emma isn't. I dont know how she does it. "Well, the feeling of love is enough, but just saying 'I love you' is not enough. You have to show that someone what they mean. You cant just tell them. They have to feel it. It sounds cliche. And probably overused, but its overused because its true. Why would anyone say it over and over if it isnt true? They wouldn't. Or theyre just good at acting." She says. Yes, very wise. But why use the word acting? Instead of lying? "Isnt acting and lying the same thing?" I ask. "No, not necessarily. Lying is making something up, just to see how it works. Acting is believing that something is false, but somewhere in them, they might just believe that its true, or vice-versa, depending on how you look at it." That answer is satisfying enough. But I have one more that is buzzing in the back of my head. "Do you believe that everyone is unique? Or that we are all the same?" I ask. I should be asking these questions to my mom, but I'm not. "Well, what I believe is very complex. Yes, I believe we are all unique. But I also believe we are connected by some invisible line. The same line that allows us to feel someone staring at us from yards away." She says. I wonder what school she went to that teaches this stuff. Or did she learn it on her own. "Where did you learn all this stuff?" I ask, calmly, not demanding, or insistent, just curiously. "That's the thing, I dont know any of this for sure, but its things I've thought about while sitting in silence." She looks at me quizingly again. "Do you listen to music, Selina?" She asks. Again, I'm going to answer honestly, I feel like I'm getting an honest overdose. This is the most honest I've been in years. "Yes, like when its quiet. I dont like to be alone with my own thoughts." I lean forward and pick up the blade of grass that I was staring at previously and start folding and ripping it. "Sometimes, we can learn from our thoughts. Sometimes, its better to be in quiet. Music is great too! But sometimes, say 15 minutes a day, we should be in silence." She says. We are again deep in conversations, about beliefs, wonders, and everything between. For a minute, I forget about my griefs. But grieving is useless. What good does it do anyway? Besides allow you to feel sorry for yourself? It does nothing besides that, at least in my experience with it. It might work for other people, to maybe let go of something. But is that really grief? I dont think so. Maybe it is. Who knows for certain? How many certain things are there really? I make a mental list. God. Family. Hope. Faith. Gravity. Oxygen. ?. Thats all I can think of. Maybe Love? No. Love could be a lie. This is a list of completely certain things. Yes, I love my mom, but thats what family is. So love is not included in this list. Is that a good or a bad thing?                                 ”“” I'm back home. Emma and I talked until sunset. I still don't know what the purpose was in her mind. But I'm glad we met. I feel like a veil has been lifted. One that was blurring my vision of the world. I dont think I should base my thoughts off of what one person says. But, its a start. I should ask what other people think of the world. I make another mental list. Mom. Dolores. Emily. Dylyla. Yes, I will ask Dylyla, I want her back home. I miss her. But I won't grieve. Its useless. Maybe I will. I'll count to 10, let the grieve come in. Then push it out. 1 2 3 Why? 4 How? 5 Why? 6 What is this pain? 7 Is it my fault? 8 Will I really see them again? 9 What if I don't? 10 I let out an internal scream. Then its gone. Its gone! I will do this every time. I feel light. Like a feather. A feather that attached to a bird. A bird that is very intelligent. A bird that is hungry, but full at the same time. That is a very conflicting idea. But it makes sense to me. And that's all that matters, right? As long as I understand what one person means, my life is not wasted. Even if that one person is myself, or Emma, or Mom, or Emily, or even a stranger on the street. Thats what I believe. Is it though? Is that what I really believe? Yes, it is. And I need to stop questioning myself so much. I need to stop a lot of things. But right now, I'm focusing on, well, focusing. I need to really look at the world. Then I will really look at myself. I will fix what I need to fix. But if its fine, why fix it? Why not improve it? Yes, that sounds good. That's what I will keep in the back of my mind. Like a sticky note on the walls of my mind, I will write it big enough to see from anywhere in my mind. I pretend I'm ripping all the other notes on the wall away. The notes that don't matter. "Grief" "Self-pitty" "Why?" I keep ripping. And I rip them all away. There are only a few left. "Famliy" "Hope" "Faith" "Learning" "Realizing" Those are the only good notes I made. I will add more to my mind-walls soon. As soon I learn more, as soon as I get my family back together, as soon as I find hope again, as soon as I find faith, as soon as I realize how amazing this world actually is. Until then, this is all that matters. I crawl into bed. I'm asleep immediately.