#thread: self 001

[damianesco]

[ PATTERNS. SELF PARA 001 ]

SUMMARY: Damian experiences his first serious same-sex relationship. TIME FRAME: August 2024 - October 2024 TW: Emotional abuse, abuse, alcoholism, language, dissociation, relapse

AUGUST 26, 2024. [ URIEL: No show ? ]

It’s six in the morning, and Damian hasn’t slept.

He’s getting ready in the bathroom, staring at the bags underneath his eyes with a small frown. No doubt some of his students will make some smart comments about the sight — he wishes, fleetingly, that he were as good as some of the other volunteers at Bright Sparks with makeup. Might’ve made it easier to get through this.

“Hey.”

Jason steps inside the bathroom, in a soft gray t-shirt and similarly-shaded sweats. He’s got the day off today. Says he’s gonna spend it catching up on the sleep they missed last night.

He steps toward the toilet and takes a piss. Damian’s still staring at the bags underneath his eyes.

“What are you doing?” Jason asks, flushing the toilet.

Damian glances at him. “I look like shit.”

“Aw,” Jason steps toward the counter, pressing a gentle kiss to Damian’s temple. “You could never.” He runs a hand through Damian’s already-unkempt hair, and it feels warm on his scalp. “But I get it. Heavy bags,” he nods. “Guess you’ve learned your lesson, huh?”

Damian frowns.

“Don’t start a fight at night,” Jason raises an eyebrow. “Could’ve avoided the whole thing if you’d just relaxed.”

Right. Damian had mentioned — something about Jason’s tone, when speaking to the waiter at dinner last night. He hadn’t liked it — it’d been condescending, and rude. Jason had felt triggered, he’d said, as he’d been labeled condescending and rude his whole life growing up just because he was born into privilege. I didn’t choose it, Damian. I feel like you’re getting on my case about things out of my fucking control.

“Yeah,” Damian mutters, glancing back at the mirror. All he sees looking back is a stupid man who doesn’t know how to leave well enough alone.

–

SEPTEMBER 2, 2024. [ URIEL: You going 2 meetings in BH ? ]

—

He hasn’t spoken to Oliver in a week.

He keeps glancing down at his phone, hoping maybe the next notification that shows up is from him, to no avail. He’s scrolling through Instagram mindlessly when Jason walks into the kitchen.

“You’ve been staring at that thing for hours,” he says casually as he makes his way toward the fridge. “Waiting for a call?”

Damian shakes his head once. “Not — technically,” he admits, glancing up at his boyfriend. “Ollie and I — we haven’t spoken since—” he stops himself. “I just miss him.”

Jason says nothing as he reaches inside the fridge for the water pitcher. He says nothing when he sets it on the counter. He says nothing when he grabs a glass from the cabinet, when he fills that glass nearly to the brim. He says nothing after he chugs half of it and sets it back down.

Then he says, “I always thought he was a shitty friend.”

The instinct to defend Oliver is quick to rise in Damian. Years of practice. “He’s not,” he insists. “We just — we had a disagreement,” he says. “It’ll pass.”

“Will it?” Jason raises a challenging eyebrow at Damian. “He strings you along for years and then, what? One little spat and he drops off the face of the earth?” He gives Damian a sympathetic look. “You deserve better, baby.”

That’s not what this is, he wants to say. Oliver wouldn’t do that. He knows Oliver, longer than he’s known Jason, even — Oliver wouldn’t—

Jason grabs Damian’s phone from his hands and pockets it. “That’s enough of this for tonight.”

Damian gives him a puzzled look. “What?”

“It’s just messing with your head,” Jason presses a kiss to Damian’s forehead. “Let’s just relax. You and me. No phones.”

It’s a sweet gesture. Still—“I need to call Sofia, tell her I’m spending the night.”

Jason’s lips twitch almost imperceptibly downward. “You’re a grown man,” he points out to Damian, voice sweet. “You can stay out for a couple of days without keeping your little sister updated every single time.”

“She’ll worry.”

“She has her own life,” Jason reminds him. “You’re not the center of the fucking universe, Damian. She’ll be fine.”

And Damian doesn’t really have an argument to make against that — even if he did, he doesn’t think it’d be a good idea to make one at all. He hasn’t slept the past two nights, not well, because he’s slipped up a couple of times, made Jason feel insecure or belittled. He’s working on choosing his words more carefully. He’s working on doing better.

“Maybe we go to a meeting tomorrow?” Damian puts the offer out into the room gently. It’s been a minute since either of them have been to one. He doesn’t know about Jason, but Damian’s starting to feel the absence of the meetings like bullet holes in his willpower. Sometimes he’ll wake up from a dream — a nightmare, really — and still feel the alcohol burning down his throat. 

Jason shakes his head. “Why the fuck would we go to a meeting?” he crosses his arms over his chest. “What, I’m not enough for you to talk to?”

“No,” Damian amends quickly. “Of course not. But — you know—”

“Right,” Jason laughs, the sound piercing and bitter. It cuts through Damian’s resolve quickly, sagging his shoulders. “I’m never enough for you. Always running to a meeting, always needing your friends to text you back. Why are we even fucking doing this, Damian?” He demands. “If I’m just always going to be an afterthought?”

Damian shakes his head profusely. “You’re not, that’s not what I—”

“Save it,” he snaps, making his way upstairs. “You can sleep in the guest room tonight.”

The bedroom door slams shut, the sound reverberating through every inch of the house. Damian feels it like ice in his veins.

It takes him about an hour of sitting in silence, gaze fixed on a day-old stain on the floor, to realize Jason’s kept his phone.

–

SEPTEMBER 10, 2024. [ URIEL: Worried about U, kid ! U will give me ulcers. Talk soon ? ]

—

“Mr. Escobedo.”

Damian glances up from his desk, meeting Elsa’s gaze. Elsa’s worked at the front office for years and years and years — longer than Damian’s been alive, he’s sure. The students are taking a test; some of them glance up curiously at the interruption. Damian stands from his desk chair, and glares playfully at his gaggle of teens.

“Eyes on your own tests,” he warns. “I’m right outside.”

He follows Elsa out into the hallway, frowning. “What’s up, Elsa?”

She gives him something of a wry smile. “Damian,” she reaches out and squeezes his wrists affectionately — or perhaps reassuringly? “We’ve gotten several calls from a certain Jason Plymouth asking about your classroom’s extension.”

Damian’s stomach sinks. “Is he — is everything—”

Elsa holds up a placating hand. “As far as I know, everything is fine, dear,” she promises. “But he is — persistent.”

Damian wipes at his face. “I’m sorry. He’s probably — I turn off my phone on test days, he—”

Elsa shakes her head once. “We cannot give him your extension,” she tells him. “You may. But we cannot.” She pauses. “I recommend you call him back,” she says slowly. “Ask him to maybe stop calling…?”

“Yes, yes, of course,” Damian assures her. “Of course. I’m so sorry, Elsa.” 

Elsa eyes him for a second, almost searchingly. Eventually, she asks, “Is everything okay, Damian?”

The question catches Damian by surprise. “Yes,” he replies almost instantly, the word rushing out of his mouth like an instinct. “Yes, it is. I’m — of course it is,” he laughs, though it sounds a little rattled to his own ears. “I’m so sorry. He’s probably just worried. Won’t happen again, I promise.”

Elsa hesitates for a second, before finally nodding her assent. “Alright,” she takes her hands back from Damian’s wrists and makes her way back to the front office, nothing else to say to him.

He doesn’t know what he tells himself to convince his heart it’s racing out of anything other than fear.

But it works.

–

SEPTEMBER 14, 2024. [ URIEL: Did U change UR number ? Is this still Damian ? Please respond if not. ] 

–

“You fucking embarrassed me!” 

Damian doesn’t know what to do when Jason starts shouting. A part of him wants to shout back — another part of him wants to flee — but whatever part of him wins out is always a part that shrinks into itself, doing his best to look as small as possible, as unassuming as possible. 

“I didn’t mean—”

“Oh, please,” Jason walks up to him, face so close to Damian he can smell his boyfriend’s sushi-laced breath. “Batting your eyes at the waiter like a fucking slut. Thought you were gonna get on your knees for him right then and there.” He spits the words into Damian’s face, and he feels his body start to go taut in response to the proximity. “Meanwhile, your boyfriend has to watch it all happen and smile through it like the dumb little cunt you think I am—”

“I don’t,” Damian insists. “Jesus, Jason, I don’t think you’re — I never even—”

The lamp’s knocked over before Damian has a chance to take his next breath. The glass of the lightbulb shatters across the floor into shrill, fine pieces, decorating the otherwise pristine marble tiles of Jason’s living room.

“Fuck,” he shouts, taking a step away from Damian. Damian’s eyes remain fixed on the mess. “You see what you made me do? You drive me fucking crazy, Damian,” his voice is tense, but it sounds sadder this time. At least Damian thinks it sounds sadder. He’s hurt Jason — he gets that. Even if he hadn’t meant to — maybe he’d inadvertently sent some mixed signals to their waiter — maybe if he were just a tad bit more self-aware—

“Did you hear me?” Damian blinks out of his stupor and meets Jason’s heated gaze. “I said clean it up. I’m going to bed.”

Damian nods once. “Okay,” he replies quietly. 

Jason holds out his hand, then, wordlessly. Damian instinctively reaches for his phone and presses it as gingerly as possible into his boyfriend’s palm.

Then Jason turns on his heel and stomps up the stairs.

And Damian cleans up the mess. 

–

SEPTEMBER 16, 2024. [ PILAR: missed u for el grito 🥺 stop ignoring meeeee ]

–

Jason hasn’t spoken to him since Saturday. 

Damian’s tried to say something to him. Anything. But he gets the silent treatment. He doesn’t get his phone back until Sunday evening, and that’s mostly because it’s being blown up by work emails, and Jason seems tired of listening to the notifications.

He reads Pilar’s message and feels tears sting at his eyes. 

He doesn’t reply.

–

SEPTEMBER 17, 2024. [ PILAR: hellooooooo motherfucker i’m telling sofia on you!!!! ]

–

Jason comes home with a large bouquet of flowers and a million apologies. He gets on his knees and cries into Damian’s lap, begging for forgiveness, swearing he’ll do better. He’s trying, he’s trying, he says, he’s so fucked up, this is what they made him, he’s so fucked up, but he’ll do anything to make it better. He’ll do anything to make it better. 

Damian runs a soothing hand through his hair and shushes him, comforts him. It’s okay, he tells him in between sobs. I forgive you. It’s okay.

It is okay. They can work through this together, Damian thinks, hope swelling in his chest. It’s okay. They’ve both been through so much — it’s only natural that this would be work. It’s okay. 

It’s okay.

–

SEPTEMBER 24, 2024. [ NO NEW MESSAGES ]

–

Damian sits outside the community center in Chicago. He doesn’t go inside.

The fact that he’s managed to get here at all — Jason’s on a work trip this week, and Damian’s managed to go home. Say hi to Sofia. Shower in his own bathroom. Sleep in his own bed. For a second, he’d remembered what normal used to feel like, and almost as if on autopilot, he’d found himself taking the train to Chicago and finding his way to the AA meeting he hasn’t attended for a month.

He can’t work up the courage to go inside, though. He thinks he feels embarrassed, but about what — he can’t really say. Maybe it’s the fact that he never got back to Uriel. Maybe it’s the fact that he’s been craving a drink so fucking badly this past month he feels like he’s going crazy with it. Maybe it’s the bottle of tequila he’d purchased last night before the liquor stores forced themselves closed, now hidden under piles of blankets in his closet. 

He should go, he thinks. He has no business being here. 

Damian pushes himself off the rickety bench when he hears his name in the familiar low, dulcet tone he’s come to expect from his sponsor.

He meets Uriel’s gaze, surprised. “Uriel?”

Uriel makes his way over to him, arms crossed — despite his usual stoicness, there’s something like worry in his expression. Damian wonders if he’s going through something, too. 

“You made me think you was dead, kid,” he tells Damian, frowning. “Had to reach out to some folk in Blue Harbor, make sure you wasn’t.”

Damian looks down at his feet, ashamed. “Sorry,” he mutters. “I’ve just — had a busy month.”

There’s a beat of silence wherein the words hang between them. They’re not quite a lie — they don’t quite ring true, either.

“You goin’ in?” Uriel finally asks, and Damian shakes his head instantly. 

“N-no, I just—” he clears his throat. “I just—” He doesn’t have an excuse, he realizes. None that sounds good enough to his own ears. “I’m not.”

Another beat of silence. 

“You relapse?”

Damian shakes his head. “No,” he promises. “I’m fine. Just busy.” I’m fine, just busy. I’m fine, just busy.

“Maybe we go get some coffee, hm?” Uriel offers. “I’ll buy. Some o’ the good stuff, too, none o’ that new-wave hippie dippie shit.”

Damian laughs slightly, and it almost hurts his throat. “Thank you,” he finally meets Uriel’s dark gaze again. “But I really do have to go.”

Uriel searches his gaze for a second. “Whatever it is,” he tells Damian. “I can tell you it ain’t worth it, kid.”

Damian feels his eyes start to sting. That’s where Uriel’s wrong. It is. He’s always thought himself off, thought something was so inherently wrong with him no one could love him — and now here’s Jason, offering him his love, promising him the world, something Damian never thought he could have. It’s worth it. He needs this. If not Jason, who? Who else will put up with him? Him, damaged goods, no filter, no worth? 

“Goodbye, Uriel,” he mutters. 

He leaves his sponsor behind.

–

SEPTEMBER 25, 2024. [ NO NEW MESSAGES ]

–

He opens the bottle of tequila and pours himself a glass.

Damian stares at it for an hour before he pours it down the drain. He’s about to do the same to the rest of the bottle, but something stops him.

Instead, he hides the bottle back inside his closet. Forces himself to forget about it.

–

SEPTEMBER 27, 2024. [ URIEL: Here if U need anything ]

–

“Fuck, I missed you,” Jason groans, kisses him deeply one last time before rolling off Damian. Damian, for his part, traces the usual patterns on the ceiling with his eyes. Doesn’t point out Jason texted him every half hour, asking him where he was, what he was doing. Doesn’t point out he hadn’t given Damian a chance to miss him. Doesn’t even think it matters, because this is how it should be. Jason should miss him this way. Obsessed with you, he’d once said. And that can only be good, right? 

It means Damian’s been good. It means Damian hasn’t scared him off yet.

“Did you hear what I said?” Jason cuts through his train of thought. “I said I missed you.”

“I missed you too,” Damian replies automatically. The pattern on the ceiling turns into a horse. Then a dog. Then a cat. It starts to look like a cow, maybe.

He feels Jason roll off the bed. Hears his footsteps retreat into the bathroom. Damian rolls onto his side and looks at the wall, listens to the tick, tick, tick of the clock above the headboard. 

His mind drifts to his closet. 

–

OCTOBER 2, 2024. [ NO NEW MESSAGES ]

–

It doesn’t matter.

In the long run — in the grand scheme of things — what’s one glass?

What’s two? What’s three?

What’s Jason’s breath smelling of weed and his tasting of alcohol if they’re mingled together, anyway?

What does it matter, if this is what love is? If this is where he’s found it? 

In the long run — in the grand scheme of things — what’s one bottle?

It doesn’t matter.

–

END.

[rorysanderson]

[ FADING. SELF PARA 001 ]

SUMMARY: Rory has his nightly conversation with Eliza. LOCATION: Rory's porch, late evening. TW: death, grief

It’s cool enough in October that the crickets start to chirp again, rather incessantly.

Annie complains about the sound, insisting she’ll never be able to fall asleep like this for fifteen minutes straight before she eventually falls asleep like this. Rory envies a child’s ability to sleep through just about anything, including an admittedly obnoxious cricket choir.

They’re louder out here. Not surprising, considering they’re surrounded by foliage and trees more than they’re surrounded by anything industrial. Rory can accept their presence begrudgingly, if only because he knows it’s him, really, who’s the intruder here. It feels unfair Rory would hold a grudge against them for the simple crime of existing where they’re meant to exist; something Eliza had affectionately insisted to him, for a very long time, Rory knew nothing about.

He sets both cups of earl gray down on the small table out on his porch, then takes his usual seat to the left. Rory watches as the steam rises from the cup that isn’t his, carried away by the cool night breeze, off to where he can’t follow. What fills the silence for the next five minutes is the crickets’ high-pitched instrumental, the rustling of leaves against the wind, and the occasional intrusive chirp of a bird that’s not meant to be awake anymore.

Rory spins his cup between his fingers gingerly, careful not to burn the tips of them by pressing against the ceramic for too long. Eventually, he brings it to his lips and takes a sip, the heat of the tea comfortable enough to both satiate his thirst and warm his body against the dropping temperature. He sets the cup down again, tracing the rim of it, before he starts.

“Annie’s learned the word fuck,” Rory tells his girlfriend, gaze fixed on the untouched cup of tea across from him. “Keep thinking she’s not listening all the time, but that little bugger’s got her ear to the ground always,” he snorts, amusement settling inside him. “I’m surprised she didn’t learn it sooner, honestly. She’s been warned she can only say it in the bathroom, and never in front of anyone else,” his lips tighten into a warm smile. “Yesterday she broke one of her Barbie’s heads off accidentally and I watched her march straight into the bathroom and shout it,” Rory laughs, rubbing his face both tiredly and disbelievingly. “Wish you coulda seen it, Ellie.” 

His hand traces the smooth edges of the porch table. He’d built this almost immediately after he and Annie had moved to Blue Harbor, knowing he’d need a place, eventually, to sit outside and talk to Ellie. Maybe it wouldn’t have mattered, if the tea didn’t play such an important part of their talks. Rory doesn’t think he believes there’s anything to look up at the sky for — feels a little silly, if he tries it. He supposes there’s nothing less silly about talking to a cuppa, mind you, but at least there’s something about her there. The cup’s got a hideous neon-pink pattern printed around it, the loops largely reminiscent of ass cracks. It’s what had drawn Ellie to it in the first place, cackling at it at the thrift shop, and she’d happily drank her tea out of it for years after the fact.

Humming, he continues, “Valley’s finally told me about what happened with her and Murph,” he tells Eliza. His fingernail scratches at the wood of the table anxiously. “I’m sure she’d’ve preferred it’d been you she could talk to. Never been good at all that,” he swallows, his throat starting to feel a little tight. “Not like you, anyway.” The steam is still rising from the cup, but it’s coming in thinner waves now. “I know you’d be worried about her. I’m worried about her, too. Getting her to ask for help — it’s like pulling teeth,” he huffs, the words filled with affection despite himself. Valley and Eliza had been good friends for a reason; she reminds him a lot of her, in many ways. “I won’t keep my eyes off her,” he promises Eliza unnecessarily. “I mean it.” 

He continues to tell her about the past week — an oddity at the flower shop, an ambitious commission by a young musician, Annie’s affinity for Ms. Zakwe, her new favorite teacher. Peanut Butter’s great escape, the grand army of insects he’d been afraid he was going to have to fight, the quiet afternoons off where nothing particularly interesting happens. He talks until the steam has stopped rising entirely from the tea inside the cup, the night seemingly having cooled it down in its entirety. He talks until he’s out of things to talk about, and the elephant in the room has made its way to their porch, sitting on its hind legs. 

Rory purses his lips. He can taste his heartbeat, suddenly, with how far and fast it’s beating. He thinks he has the words, really, but they’re stuck to the roof of his mouth now, and his tongue feels heavy. 

So instead he says, “I’m sorry.”

The tears sting at his eyes almost immediately, the knot in his throat constricting so fantastically it almost feels like he’s going to choke with it. His hand grips the handle of his cup so tightly he fears, for a second, he might well and truly break it. “I’m sorry,” he repeats, wiping at his nose with his free arm. “I didn’t think I’d like him this much, Ellie.”

A part of Rory knows there’s nothing to apologize to her for — she’d never have given him any sort of grief for this, under the circumstances. Even in life, he doesn’t think there was a jealous bone in Eliza Carmichael’s body. She’d been perfect in every sense imaginable, and Rory had been at the right place at the right time, lucky enough to orbit her as long as he had. And still, he can’t help feeling like the admission is some sort of betrayal: he’d promised her, once, he’d spend the rest of his life loving her, and now — now—

“I think I’m forgetting your voice,” he admits, voice thick, blinking tears away. “It’s hard to remember it, on my own. I used to—” he clears his throat. The knot sits firm. “I used to be able to pick you out of a crowd by the sound of it. Pick apart your moods with it. And now, uhm,” his eyesight’s blurred over, suddenly. “And now I can’t even remember your laugh. I can’t even remember how you said my name, Ellie.” 

He chokes on a sob, pressing the heels of his palms tersely against his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he apologizes again. He wants to tell her how different they both are from each other — where Eliza had slotted herself into the parts of Rory that had been left wanting his entire life, Jack’s somehow snuck into the crevices of what remains, content to live in the spaces Rory never filled. How where Eliza had always burned so brightly she’d blind anyone who looked at her too long, Jack slumps into himself and exists outside the lines, like a sculpture at an art museum you’re not meant to touch. How where Rory’s losing the details of Eliza he’d been sure he’d committed to memory for years, he’s slowly starting to learn the exact number of Jack’s laugh lines, the depth of his frown, the texture of his scars, all by heart. 

The love he has for Eliza burns as brightly as the first day he’d laid eyes on her. He cannot deny her that — he cannot lie to himself about it. It is, perhaps, the reason why it hurts to think of her as a disappearing memory, as a stack of carefully-wrapped canvases sitting in storage, collecting dust instead of admiration. And where Rory thought there was no room in him left, no way to make it inside himself with such overwhelming grief having taken up residence, it turns out somewhere between a shy smile from across the way while unloading moving boxes and the feeling of calloused lips soft against his own, there exists a chasm, still. 

Does this count as a broken promise, then? I’ll love you forever, but I’ll forget the details of your face. I’ll love you forever, but I’ll not be able to remember the exact curve of your smile. I’ll love you forever, but you’ll start to live outside of me bit by bit, until time takes the rest of you.

You’ve never done anything by halves, have you, Rory Anderson? Eliza had asked of him once. Her voice still eludes him — she comes through like a radio station just outside its frequency. But he does remember how she’d caressed the side of his face, looking at him with such fondness it’d spread through Rory like a wildfire. I hope you know what it feels like one day, to have the attention of someone like you.

Maybe. 

He thinks of Eliza’s insistence that the world was made up of colors Rory’s yet to discover, her firm belief that he’d see what she saw, one day — that he’d find that burst that so eludes him, and he’d know, he’d know, then, he’d found exactly where he was meant to be. 

Maybe, Rory thinks as he lets the breeze run through his hair, take whatever’s left of his quiet sobs — maybe making space for more does not constitute a broken promise, in the end. 

Maybe some things have to be felt through their absence, by the gaps in the memory they leave behind.

Maybe, actually — this is how all things are meant to be loved:

Deeply, even as they fade.

[nukanuu]

NEW TAG DUMP 002

[ofsyzygies]

◤┆✕ ° ○  001. LILY ·╱჻ [RETROSPECTIVE PARA]

DATED 15/01/89 TRIGGER WARNINGS; blood, substance abuse/self medication, implied accident, nightmares, suicide mention, implied depression, mental illness, auditory and visual hallucinations, trauma, ptsd, disability mention.

The sound of screeching tires and the flash of headlights attacked her senses; the woman was underwater, pressing her palms up against the glass, trying to break it before she ran out of breath. This happened nightly. On the other side of the glass were images; always the same: blood, glass, lights, lights, lights, and mangled metal. Every night, there was this glass wall she was trying to get through and on the other side was a limp body on the dashboard, and then every time, when the glass was just starting to GIVE, something happened——

She ran out of air, whatever oxygen she’d been trying to trap in her lungs escaping, and —

And Yuri woke up, just like that, every night. With heaving breaths and cold sweat clinging to her skin in a thin film. Cold sweat made auburn locks cling to her scalp, matted and messy and the soft skin of her face was always roughened by dried-up saltwater. It was so hard to breathe at first; she normally sat up hyperventilating for fifteen minutes that went on like those lazy, long days that refused to end and give way to the lull of nighttime. When she finally felt like she had caught her breath, she pushed herself off the bed, swinging her feet over the side. In her wake, there was a damp depression in the mattress from all the tossing and turning of her sweaty body. The British native walked over to the bathroom on shaking legs, now quite accustomed to this routine. After all, the nightmares had plagued her just like this for the past four years since her accident. Before, the nightmare was different, but the symptoms were the same, and those had lasted fourteen years.

She had come to despondently accept that being haunted was simply to be her reality.

When she left the bedroom, she made sure to slip out quietly as a force of habit. In the earliest years, when she was still living with her parents, it was always imperative not to wake anyone in the house. There was nobody she felt like talking to, anyway.

One clammy palm met the edge of the sink, coiling her fingers around it as she looked at herself in the mirror. Phantom pain travelled up an imaginary limb that had long been lost to her. The face that stared back at her was, as always, deceptively pristine, though dark circles resembling bruises were beginning to form around her eyes from the lack of sleep she had suffered over the past few days. Her skin, which was always snowy, was even paler from a combination of too much alcohol and too little sleep. The only splash of colour was the persistent flush that she had come to associate with her dependency on pain medication. A shaking hand found the knob of the faucet, clumsily palming it until it began running the cold water; she allowed the ice-cold water to fill the palm of her hand before splashing it onto her face. Yuri then turned off the faucet and faced the bathtub instead. Her breathing was still laboured and it felt like there was something stuck in her throat. With a frown tugging down on her full mouth, she pushed the stopper into the belly of the tub and turned on the water, allowing it to begin taking purchase within the stone-resin container. 

The entirety of her body was trembling, and she had to use whatever strength she had to hold herself up. She observed the water’s smooth cascade into the sink and thought she understood, for a moment, why Virginia Woolf was drawn to the water, then she thought about her mother and pulled out the stopper. When she was sixteen and had first attempted to do away with herself, following her return home and the crushing realisation that her life would never be the same, her parents had taken her to a therapist.

The doctor had explained to her suicide was unnatural. Even after the young girl said it felt like the only way to get uninterrupted quiet in her chaotic mind, he’d assured him that no matter what, she’d always end up pulling herself out of the water. Every morning, the doctor was proven right. The most base instinct was one of survival. Then there was all the horrors she saw with her eyes closed and water filling her ears. The bad things that happened, the very demons she had been attempting to escape. Splitting pain excited her temples, her stomach, her aching ribs as she thought about it. It was like watching her life shatter over and over and over again, like an unstoppable train crash—one she could neither face nor look away from. 

In a strange way, failure had taught her to stop chasing death as though it would hold all the answers. She began chasing life instead.

— — —

—The sound of screeching tires and the flash of headlights attacked her senses. Images filtered in through the water, creeping past her eyelids and behind her irises, making her see: lights, lights, lights, glass, blood, and mangled metal. A gasp made her mouth fall open, oxygen escaping her lungs in bubbles, and she clenched her fingers around the sink to keep herself down. Just a little longer. Just long enough. The insides of her body were a city fast crumbling down; the bricks of his esophagus disintegrating, the iron dome of her lungs breaking apart, and her heart, her ever faulty heart was the city siren wailing, beating so fast it almost drowned out the sound of the sirens in her eyes, and everything was breaking down so fast it was blocking out the images of the person she had left behind in the car, a person whose face was obscured at this angle. A face she could never see no matter how hard she tried to. Perhaps if she could get around somehow she would be able to see the face that haunted her so.

Just as she was about to break that final wall, she woke up again, the need for air within her dream so powerfully realistic that it made her gasp for oxygen. Spluttering breaths escaped her lips in heaves and wheezes. “God,” She moaned, hot tears stinging her eyes. “Oh, god.” The anxiety was back, clawing through her every breath, and her face was dripping wet, droplets sliding off her chin and hitting the crumpled bedsheets. She slowly opened her eyes, and they widened a fraction in horror when she realised what her face was covered in, what was dripping onto her hands and her sheets—blood.

Fighting down the bile rising up her throat, the woman scrambled out of bed like she’d been burnt, dragging her shaking limbs toward the vanity where she made for a small bottle of vodka she had concealed in her dresser, knowing that it was the only thing that would make her mind calm down. It was the only thing that disappeared the blood on her hands, rendered her hands clean enough to fool her for the day.

When she was finally drunk enough for the noise in her ears to be replaced with a buzzing hum, and her eyes to feel heavy-lidded and halfway asleep, she reached for the diary she always kept on the bedside table. It was leather-bound and the name LILY was etched into its face. 

Yuri never drank enough to be noticed, she drank until the shaking stopped just enough for her to function. It wasn’t something she was proud of, especially as a doctor, her dependency on substances she knew did more harm than good. After eighteen years of suffering, however, one tried just about anything to make the pain stop.

Sometimes, it felt like the pain was a part of her; an invisible appendage, a part of her biology. What else could explain the fact it never went away, no matter how much she tried to dull her senses with whatever she could?

Her bony limbs came crashing back down onto the bed, the diary falling open onto her lap where a pen was already inside. Her hands shook as she began to write, viscous black ink staining the pages in trembling cursive.

Dear Lily,

I think I dreamed of you again. I tried so hard to see your face, but I couldn’t. If our eyes meet, will you let me go? Will you finally forgive me? —

[tiderideraa]

          ❝  tell  me  again  why  you  couldn't  test  these  out  on  the  aks?  ❞  harry  asked  as  he  dodged  a  jagged  iron  claw.  he  kicked  at  the  boubous  body  of  aklla's  latest  monstrosity  hard  enough  to  carry  it  off  of  it's  taloned  feet.  it  made  a  sound  like  grinding  steel,  hit  the  far  wall  with  an  audible  splat,  and  got  right  back  up  again.  skittering  across  the  floor  and  swiping  at  his  ankles  once  again  with  it's  claw.    //    @levered​  ♡'d  for  a  starter .

[annelouiseoosterhuis]

availability / @dahliayoung setting / lakeside banquet hall, cantwell country club. timeline / sunday, september 29th, 2024 at 11:45 am.

anne-louise never felt comfortable in public settings. especially not in a public space that seemed to be packed to the rafters with people—some familiar, some complete strangers. every insecurity that ever ran through her brain in the last thirty-five years returned at full force, louder than the band playing inconspicuously in the corner or anyone that attempted to make polite conversation with her. yes, she worked two incredibly social jobs—part-time bartender, full-time art teacher—but o’shea’s and the elementary school were a lot different than this. she knew the children she taught very well, plus they were literal children, and the majority of patrons at o’shea’s were regulars that she had known for years. they were controlled environments that, while they both had their moments of random chaos, she was completely familiar with. a huge town-wide charity benefit? the exact opposite of comfortable for her. she had wanted to stay home so badly, but she had been volunteering off and on at bright sparks for years now, and her mothers wanted her to go. how would it look if the daughter of one of the first out and proud lesbian couples in blue harbor didn’t attend a charity fundraiser for the local lgbtq+ community center?

so, there she was, nursing a watered-down mimosa while she stood off to the side of the room. she had hoped to blend into the wall, but she was mad at herself for having such a hope. why couldn’t she be more social? why couldn’t she put herself out there? any attempts to talk to someone new failed before they could even start, too self-conscious and second-guessing every greeting she could think up so that they died in her throat before she could actually voice them. there were still a few hours to go before she could leave, so anne-louise knew she had to at least talk to someone, or else it would have all been a waste. luckily, the next person she spotted near her was someone she knew very well. anne-louise loudly sighed in relief. “lia!” she practically galloped to her friend. “i’m so happy to see you!”

[asteroidxblves]

tag dump for jasper .

[porcelcinarchived]

⊰ ever since she’d witnessed her brother taking a last desperate gasp of breath, amelie had stopped believing in coincidences . the world had presented itself as a place where one would either grasp an opportunity or wait for god to bless you with one .  like josef’s death , her finding the polish prince wasn’t a mere coincidence nor an unfortunate accident like some tried to assure her many times . no , every move had been deliberate to this point , she’d learned to speak the enemy’s language , followed him around , listened to what only seemed to be idle gossip from the polish staff when she finally found out that they needed a governess for that unfortunate baby . of course , she could only count it as another god-given chance, one that deserved a dramatic entrance to honor it . so when henryk finally was closed enough , she emerged from the shadows , her arms crossed and her back resting against the tree when she spoke to him  “ what a pleasant surprise to meet you here . ” she gave him a sickly sweet smile, one that barely carried the sincerity as it did back then. before everything had changed . “ i’ve heard you are looking for a governess . of course , to mend austria’s and poland broken alliance, i’d like to take the first step toward poland and offer myself as a governess for your lovely niece . ”

@tcmpestas ( henryk )

[petrifiedcrange]

Stede is spiraling, even with Izzy there in his arms, even with the need to warm him up and beg him to stay alive, because the panic and helplessness and fear and, most of all, guilt are too strong.

Because Chauncey is once again beside him, sprawled casually against the wall, repeating the doctor's grim words about the odds of Izzy surviving, about how much blood he lost... then leaning forward, over Stede's shoulder – Stede instinctively pulls Izzy just a bit closer, in a foolish attempt to protect him from the figment of his own imagination ( Chauncey doesn't let the opportunity to mock him pass by, commenting on how he couldn’t protect him from the bullet, how Stede's own actions directly led to Izzy being shot and them being captured and now Baby Bonnet is suddenly trying to be protective, when everything is already lost? what a joke ) – to peer at the man in his arms and say with not a hint of sympathy in his voice that Izzy doesn't look good, doesn’t look like he's going to survive this, does he?

Stede shuts his eyes tightly, raising his own voice slightly as he pleads with Izzy not to leave him there ( not alone, he doesn't say that part anymore, because Chauncey is right there and staying with him and Izzy's body in case Izzy actually doesn't make it would drive him mad more surely than if he was left alone ) in a vain attempt to drown out Chauncey's mocking words.

He is so caught up in the fight with his own imagination that he barely notices the touch to his shoulder, weak as it is, but the words?

As quiet as they are, they somehow overwhelm both Chauncey's mockery and his own near-tearful pleas and the suddenness of hearing another voice in the solitude of the brig, of hearing the voice he was scared he might never hear again causes him to jerk, eyes flying wide open, to raise his head so swiftly his neck hurts but it doesn't matter because his frantic, tearful gaze meets Izzy's heavy-lidded one, because Izzy is awake and that must be a good sign, right?

Stede sniffles and swallows heavily as Izzy reassures him that he is right there as if he's not the one with the hole in his abdomen and too much blood left outside his body.

❝ Izzy... ❞

Stede tries to say something, unsure what exactly, but gets too choked up and takes a deep, shuddering breath in an attempt to will the calm into his words, will the tears away...

...and only succeeds in letting them streak down his cheeks as words tumble from his mouth, shrill as his voice gets when he experiences a particularly strong emotion, thick with guilt and self-loathing:

❝ Oh, Izzy, I’m so sorry! I fucked everything up...❞

It's fine.

I'm fine.

Izzy Hands was always fine, even when he rarely ever felt like it.

Don't worry about me.

Please don't.

Izzy Hands feared the weight of the very care he silently craved, even when he'd had both legs. Always craved yet never expected, never demanded, except the one time he all but knew it had drowned in the blood that once flooded his left boot.

When Banes' pistol shot had found its mark - or a mark, at least, who knew how good the ponce's aim actually was - Izzy was angry, of course. He'd wanted more time with the lessons he'd learned too late, with the fullness in his chest that finally showed him what it was to breathe. But only one clear thought rang in his head as will and instinct drove him on toward the Revenge: At least it was me.

Refusing Stede's help felt more like rote habit than anything, and Izzy raised no objection when the man helped him anyway. The ship was becoming a blur as his vision darkened around the edges, despite his stubborn attempts - but, wasn't that the wrong number of masts...?

The darkness swept in, only occasionally fluttering to let through vague silhouettes. His body didn't want to obey him, the bastard. They had to get back to the Revenge, the crew was waiting. If he was going to die, couldn't it at least be among people he knew?

Izzy had no idea how much time passed, how long he faded in and out of consciousness. The first thing he registered was the dull, stinging burn in the left side of his stomach. Then, warmth and softness and weight. A faint thrum out of step with his own pulse, and words in a voice he'd come to recognize anywhere, just like Edward's.

It sounded like Stede was pleading, on the verge of tears. Izzy caught his own name, and green eyes blearily blinked halfway open. He tried to bat at Stede's shoulder, another rote habit, though it was more of a weak flop of his palm. "Th' fuck're you talkin' about, Stede," Izzy managed a thready murmur. He swallowed against the dryness in his throat. " 'm right here."

[revasserium]

Hello, Rain! Congrats on the 2k followers! 🎉💖 Hope your day is going well!! For the event, may I request Marius and butterfly lovers? ☺️

prompt list reqs are: temporarily closed

14. butterfly lovers

marius von hagen; 5,103 words; fluff, no "y/n", slightly canon-divergent, highschool sweethearts to lovers, marius being the simp he is, mentions of dif socioeconomic backgrounds, verbal bullying from other students

summary: marius does not have many friends at starhigh; you see fit to change that fact.

a/n: this is loosely based on both his "precious mornings" ssr and also his "world of glitz" ssr so vague spoilers for both and you'll understand this more if you kinda sorta know those but otherwise it's just a cute lil fic to feed my marius obsession (ㅅ´ ˘ `)

001. want and need

“I don’t want anything from you.”

Those are the first ever words you say to Marius von Hagen.

It is, by all accounts, a strange kind of meet-cute (if you can even call it that, years later, with his arms curled around your middle, his chin hooked over your shoulder — the pair of you reminiscing on your school days, marveling on the passage of time, how quick things flash by. But back then, time had seemed an infinite thing, ticking solidly through from morning till night, Monday to Friday and onwards), but even then, Marius had an alarming amount of charm and self-awareness, a shockingly prurient view on the world.

Rich and spoiled as he may be, no one could say that he wasn’t brilliant.

“Sorry?” he says, blinking over the stack of notes he’d been going over in the library as you slump down in the seat opposite, tossing your bag onto the table and propping your cheek on your hand.

You shrug, “Just wanted you to know that… I don’t want anything from you. So, yeah,” you repeat, pulling out your own set of notebooks. They’re a bit battered but full of multi-colored tabs that bulge out the sides and top, your textbooks, clearly secondhand. Marius blinks for a second but doesn’t comment, leaning back slightly to look you over.

“Then, senpai…” an easy, self-serving smirk twists the corner of his lips, “why’re you here?”

You pause, fingers hovering over a pink gel pen, your shoulders tensing.

“All the other tables were full.”

It’s a bold-faced lie, but Marius makes a show of turning to look at the tables around you both — sure, they’ve all got one or two people but none are full. You could’ve chosen to sit at any of the other tables, with any of the other students. And yet.

“And,” you add, rather sniffily, “how’d you know I’m not in your year?”

Marius considers his answer — because Payton had presented him with a roster of everyone in his class (with headshots) the week before his first day and asked in that smooth gentle way of his for Marius to “make sure he’s done his homework”, because since then, almost every single person in his grade has tried to come up and introduce themselves, toppling over each other to try and make an impression, to stake their claim on his friendship and by proxy, Pax Group.

Because he wouldn’t have forgotten a face like your’s.

“Cause…. I know all the pretty girls in my year already.” He winks.

Easier to play up the foppish, rich fuckboy facade than admit any of those other things which are infinitely more true, but no less harrowing for a growing teenage boy to try and admit.

Predictably, you roll your eyes and continue on your journey of emptying the entire contents of your schoolbag onto the remaining space of the table.

“Right.” Your tone is disbelieving and Marius feels a thread of intrigue twang in his chest against the initial shock of your blunt appearance. You don’t believe him, and yet you’re still here. You claim that you don’t want anything from him, and yet.

“So? Are you gonna introduce yourself? Seems kinda rude to sit down at someone else’s table and not even tell them your name.” Marius taps the heel of a pen to his cheek, the intrigue slowly festering into curiosity. It itches inside his chest and he finds himself leaning in as you slate him a long, piercing look.

“Fine.” You say, and then you tell him your name — first and last, with no title, no frills, no mention of a family dynasty or some kind of foreign conglomerate empire. In fact, Marius realizes as he runs through his quick mental list of all the who’s who of society, he has no clue who you are or who you might be related to. It’s a difficult thing to achieve at Starhigh. And then he remembers —

“I’m on scholarship,” you say, dropping your eyes back to your now open notebook, twirling your pen once before setting in to scribbling along some sort of complicated looking diagram. Your voice is flat, almost curt, cut short by the implication of those three words.

Scholarship.

Marius knows that the prestigious academy accepts a handful of scholarship students a year, mostly as marketing fodder to pander to the masses — look at us, opening our gold-gilded doors, our marble-foyered halls, peeling back our velvet curtains to accept commoners who are driven enough, who are brilliant enough to shine amongst the ready-born stars.

“Well, guess someone’s gotta keep the test scores up,” Marius says, now entirely taken with the task of watching you take notes. You pause again, glancing up. There’s a spark behind your eyes that makes his heart stutter.

“Ah… so you do know about us.”

Us. You say the word so casually but it still makes Marius flinch inwardly. An “us” precludes a “them” — one group, and the other. Somehow, Marius doesn’t like the thought of you and him being othered from each other so obviously by your respective social circles, even though he knows it’s unavoidable.

“Sure I do — I mean, none of us study hard enough to make the numbers we post every year,” he says, with a stab at casual nonchalance, putting an extra emphasis on his use of “us” just to be a tad more self-deprecating. That should be the tactic here — people like to feel superior, so debasing himself a little from time to time is necessary.

So he tells himself.

You, however, don’t seem to be buying it.

“I’ve seen you in here every afternoon for the past two months.”

Marius leans back, stretching his arms over his head and yawning hugely.

“Nowhere else to be, so…” but even he hears the strained edge to his voice, the flatness that drops at the end of his would-be cheery tone. You hike an imperious eyebrow and Marius feels heat cresting up the back of his neck.

“Nowhere else?” you echo the words back at him, but in your voice, they sound softer, more wistful.

He slumps back forward, making an exaggerated face.

“Yeah, my brother’s busy with the company and my dad’s… off somewhere in Europe doing whatever he does in Europe,” he waves a would-be careless hand and sighs dramatically, “what’s a guy to do with all that time but —” he motions around the gorgeous library reading room with it’s floor to ceiling windows and endless stacks of priceless reference books and first editions.

“But to study,” you finish for him, amusement dangling off the end of your words like a comma, hinged there, waiting for the rest of the sentence, the remainder of the story.

Marius chews on the inside of his cheek and doubles down with a light laugh and another good-natured wink. Meanwhile, he can’t help the way his mind is racing. Why would a scholarship student randomly come up to him in the library, loudly declare that she “doesn’t want anything from him” and then proceed to invade his personal space?

It reminds him, outlandishly, of the story of a man who’d struck gold, and then, terrified that someone would come steal it from him, proceeded to bury it all back with the sign “NO GOLD BURIED HERE” tacked up over the mound of freshly dug earth. The denial so egregious that it rebounds back into confirmation instead.

Were you really trying to get closer to him by telling him to his face that you had no such intentions?

His chases down the line of thought, the speculations spiraling wilder and wilder until your voice snaps him sharply back into focus.

“Oi! Are you okay?”

Marius blinks, jerking back as you click your fingers in front of his face.

“Huh? Oh yeah sorry —”

You cock your head, that strange, knowing spark still flickering behind your eyes.

“Where’d you go off to, hm?”

Marius opens his mouth before shutting it again, shaking his head.

“Just… never mind.”

“You do that a lot, don’t you?” you ask, cocking your head to one side, birdlike.

“Do what?”

“Keep things to yourself.”

And this time, Marius feels himself being caught off-guard — there’s a skip to his already arhythmic heartbeat, a skid in his breath, a click-shuffle-snap in his mind’s eye as he tries to refocus his attention on what you’d just said. And when he does, heat and heat and heat claws its way up his skin, bleeding into his cheeks before he can force it back down.

“I - I don’t know what you mean.” There — that quaver in his voice. He curses himself for it. The vulnerability of it all.

“I’ve seen it, y’know —” you say, sighing as you drop your eyes back onto your notes, now highlighting something in a bright, blinding chartreuse, “the way people flock to you. But I mean, everyone titters over everyone else here, don’t they?”

Marius stares, nearly open-mouthed at the casual, almost bland way you’re laying it all out, as if he weren’t the storm-center around which all of this social grandstanding spins.

“What do they ask you about first? Oh, lemme guess — is it the fact that you’re confirmed to be Pax’s next CEO or whether you like girls with short hair? I guess the short-hair thing is a bit less on the nose, right?”

You flip a page in your notebook and methodically tab it with a pink sticky note.

“What do you want?” the words are out of his mouth before he can stop himself, and Marius realizes too late that he’s staring, wide-eyed and desperate, his heart now pounding inside him like some angry, caged thing, thudding so hard against the back of his throat that he actually feels like it might leap right out of his mouth.

Placidly, you raise your eyes back to look at him, meeting his wild, bewildered gaze with the steady, solid one of your own.

“Like I said… I don’t want anything from you.” Your voice is calm, your words sure.

Disbelief roils inside him like sickness and he swallows hard as he realizes his hands had clenched into white-knuckled fists on the table between you.

“Then why —” his voice isn’t light anymore, instead it's jagged around the edges, raw and torn and bleeding.

He feels naked, exposed, stripped in a way that he hadn’t felt since the first time his father had taken him to visit the family shrine.

You purse your lips and sigh, and this time, you look just as tired as he feels as you slowly start to gather up your things.

“Because… you just looked a bit lonely and I thought you might like some company.”

You tuck your last gel-pen back into your bag before hoisting it onto your shoulder, turning and walking away.

002. oh bully you

“Senpai… you know it was super mean of you to just leave me like that yesterday.”

You jump nearly a foot in the air as Marius drops into the empty desk directly in front of you, straddling the chair back with his legs on either side, crossing his arms over top of your opened textbook and peering up at you from beneath his damnably long lashes.

He bats them at you as you blink down at him, trying to reconcile the sight of him with the space of your classroom — which is not his classroom, because — right, of course, you’re not in the same grade. So, why —

“Oh~ reading even during lunch period? You’re so studious — hey d’you think you can help me with the history homework? I suck at names and dates.”

You stare at him for two whole seconds longer before narrowing your eyes.

“What’re you doing here? This isn’t your classroom.”

Marius pouts, feigning hurt, “But senpai… it’s lunchtime! Didn’t you say you wanted to keep me company yesterday?”

“Yester — “ you break off, understanding finally settling over your confused expression as you soften in your chair. casting him a reproachful look.

“Well you didn’t seem like you wanted the company so I thought —”

“Wha — I never said that! You just caught me off guard! I was just asking what you wanted to do for the rest of the afternoon, but you stormed off. Ah… I thought you were angry with me — you’re not angry with me, are you senpai?”

You let out an exasperated sigh at his antics, but a smile still breaks across your lips.

“Did I say I was angry?”

Marius’s grin widens by degrees.

All around you, people are beginning to stare. What is Marius von Hagen, society’s most elite golden child doing with a no-name scholarship student like you? And acting all chummy when no one had ever seen you two together before? Whispers gather like a rising tide but Marius doesn’t seem to notice as he casually reaches over your textbooks to peer into your bento.

“Whoa! That looks so delicious! Did you make it all yourself? Can I have some? I’ve always wanted to try home-cooked food from someone my age!”

You smack his hand lightly and click your tongue.

“Manners! And if you wait patiently, I’ll let you have half.”

Marius smiles cheekily, looking all too pleased with himself as the whispers and murmurs gather in strength and volume. And by the end of the day, there’s not a soul in school who doesn’t know about the strange new friendship between you and Marius von Hagen.

003. rumors

“Did you hear?”

“Yeah — and with Marius —“

“Everyone says he’s nice but hard to get close to, so how the hell —“

“Maybe it’s some kind of… arrangement?”

“But why would a von Hagen need any kind of arrangement?”

“Dunno, but maybe it’s a charity project?”

“What? Adopt-a-pleb? Ha!”

“I’ve seen them around campus — he’s always following her around —“

“Ugh, so weird! Unless they’re dating? But god, he’s so out of her league it’s not even funny.”

“Hey do you know anyone who knows her?”

“Ew, no! Who would any of us know who knows her? She’s scholarship!”

“Maybe that’s why he’s so into her? Like… y’know those kids who grow up in the desert and have never seen snow?”

“What, like he’s never seen a poor person before?”

“Up close? Have you?”

“Ugh, it’s just so… weird. I bet he’ll lose interest in her by the end of the month. There’s no way they’re actually friends.”

“Yeah, that or… they’re…”

“Oh… that.”

“You don’t think…”

“Well… if she’s really that good… I guess a guy could overlook anything, right?”

004. in place

He has always been quiet when he paints, but there’s something in the thick, churning silence today that makes you pause, looking up from the book of sewing patterns in your lap. The sun’s long since set, and there’s only the two you left in the arts classroom.

Marius frowns as he leans back, a streak of dark blue paint smearing his cheek.

You glance at the canvas, pressing your lips.

“Okay. What’s wrong?”

“Hm?” he sounds distracted as he picks another brush and leans in to carve a thick slab of black through the heart of the already dark and chaotic painting.

“You’re stewing. What’s wrong?”

“How do you know I’m stewing? I’m not stewing,” Marius huffs, tossing the paintbrushes into a can, his lips pursed into a pout as he turns towards you.

You snap your book shut and sigh, “Because. I just do. And you just admitted it.”

“No, I didn’t!”

“Did too — now spill it.”

“I —” Marius lets out another loud sigh before knitting his arms across his chest, turning back toward the canvas and picking up his brushes. He squints at the painting as if it’s done him some grievous personal harm, and then jams his brush into the middle, his strokes going wide and harsh.

“Have you heard the rumors?”

You scoff, “What, about us?”

“Yeah…” his voice drops, and you almost laugh at how childish he sounds before you realize that you’re both still children. You wonder if things will change when you grow up — the thought of it seems so far away. Like this, in the fluorescent brightness of the empty art classroom, the night outside stretches like an uncertain future, unfurling into impenetrable darkness.

“Sure I have,” you say, watching him as he pulls back to examine the dark blob on the canvas.

“You’re not mad?” He doesn’t look at you and you don’t make to look away.

“Why would I be mad?” You open your book again to mark your page before tucking it away in your bag. Marius pauses as you start to pack.

“Because it’s horrible! The things they’re saying — I mean, I’m used to it because I’ve grown up around people like this but you’re —” he cuts himself off as you whip around, eyebrows raised.

“I’m what? Different?”

Marius gapes, scrambling for words that do not come.

You pack up the rest of your things in a terse silence, then you push out of your chair with a loud scrape.

“But y’know, the people who talk behind your back? They’re right where they should be.”

Marius frowns.

Your lips pull into a wide smirk as you shoulder your bag, “Behind you.”

You’re barely out the door before Marius lets out an incredulous laugh and topples back into his chair. He lets a second pass and then he’s launching out of the chair, grabbing his own bag and slinging it over his back.

“Senpai! Wait for me! Hey, you wanna go to that really cute restaurant that just opened last week? It’s got a Michelin Star but I’m sure I can get us seats!”

005. be-friend

“Marius! You’re so funny!”

“Wow, Marius — that’s incredible! You’re so smart!”

Marius laughs, carding a hand through his hair, his expression bright and open and unassuming, but the group of people around him all inch in closer, as sunflowers might strain towards the sun.

“Hey.”

You lean against the doorframe with an amused grin.

Marius looks up, his eyes visibly brightening as he sees you.

“Senpai! I was waiting for you!”

“Bullshit. We’re gonna be late for the show.” You tap at your wrist where a watch might be as Marius bounds out of his chair, shaking off his hoard of simpering admirers.

“W-wait! Marius! We’re all gonna head to the Ace Club later — you know, the super exclusive one? Don’t you wanna come with us?” one of the girls asks hopefully.

Marius turns, smiling as if he doesn’t hear the strained desperation in her voice, the flash of annoyance in her eyes as she looks you over.

“Sorry! Maybe next time — I’ve got a theater date I can’t miss. Bye!”

“You know if you keep calling them dates, people are going to get the wrong idea, right?” you ask breezily, sounding less concerned and more amused.

“So? Let them get the wrong idea.”

You cast him a mischievous grin, “Ah… the prince in love with the pauper. Tale as old as time.”

At this, Marius pouts, “Senpai… so mean to me… and you were the one who wanted to be my friend first.”

You wave him off with a flap of your hands, “Sure, but you’re the one who stuck around.”

“Hmph, maybe after tonight’s show, we’ll go our separate ways then,” Marius makes a show of harumphing and stomping off in front of you as you laugh and jog to catch up, swatting him in the side with your bag.

“So you’re just hanging out with me for the theater perks?”

“Yep! Well, I knew you’d find me out eventually,” Marius smiles, teasing as the pair of you make your way off campus and turn towards the community theater.

After a while, Marius bumps you with his elbow, “You really are super good at costume design… are you sure you don’t wanna —”

“I don’t want a handout, Marius.” Your voice has gone cold and clipped, and Marius bites his lip, shoulders shrugging up as you continue to walk.

“I wasn’t offering one. It’s just… there’s a Pax program for young aspiring artists to study abroad in Europe and…”

“And you’re offering to get me in? That’s literally the definition of a handout.”

“No! I’m just telling you about it. I swear I won’t say a word about your application — if you even apply, that is…” he sounds eager in a way that you haven’t heard in a long time. Not since he’d entered the school fine arts contest under a pseudonym.

You give him a sidelong look before sighing, “I’ll… think about it.”

“Okay! That’s —” he reigns himself in as he skips out in front of you, looking not unlike an over-excited puppy, “that’s… good! Wah — I’m so excited for tonight’s play! Hamlet, right?”

You laugh as you hurry to catch up to him, “Yeah. But it’s not like you haven’t seen it before — didn’t you say that you dad took you to see it in London or something?”

“Yeah, but that’s different.”

“How?”

Marius rolls his eyes, smiling cheekily down at you, but when you catch his eyes you see them go soft, the light in them somehow molten as he looks and looks and looks at you.

“Obviously, because Ophelia’s dress wouldn’t have been made by you!”

006. stay and leave

“I got in!”

Marius blinks at the flat beige of his bedroom ceiling as your voice rings out from across the phone line. The bed beneath him is perfectly made, the silken sheets freshly pressed from this morning.

“A-ah! Congrats, senpai!” he tries to sound like his usual cheery self but he’s not sure how successful it is.

A beat.

“Marius?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

“For what?”

Another beat. Marius shifts, curling onto his side, cradling the phone to his ear as he stares at the halo of light cast by his artisan bedside lamp.

“For… telling me about the program. And… for not pulling any strings on the back end.”

Marius grins, flipping onto his back again, “How’dyou know I didn’t?”

Your laugh comes through the line, soft and sweet.

“Because. I know you.”

Something inside Marius squeezes; he fists his fingers into the soft silk of his nightshirt. Warmth spreads from the base of his spine up through the rest of his body till he’s tingling from his toes to his nose. He wrinkles it, feeling abashed as he scratches at his cheek, even though he knows you can’t see the gesture.

“R-right — so! When do you leave?”

“End of the summer — so…”

“So?”

You sound hesitant in a way that he’s not used to.

“I’ll miss you.”

He almost misses the words, they’re so soft, so quiet that he almost thinks he might’ve imagined them. But he knows your voice almost better than he knows his own, knows the color and shape, the weight and temperature. Knows how it gets pitched when you’re excited, and flat when you get mad. Knows the giddiness that fills it like sweet champagne bubbles when you know something and want to share. Knows the dull coolness of it when you’re done or tired or annoyed.

“Senpai…” Marius presses his cheek ever closer to the face of the phone, “if you keep saying that, I might ask them to rescind your acceptance letter just so you can’t go.”

He smiles, bracing for the sharp bite of your reprimand, but it doesn’t come. Instead, he hears you sigh.

“Just promise you’ll come visit, okay?”

“Sure! I’ll come every weekend if you want! My dad’s old jet’s been sitting in the hanger anyway.”

“Mm, maybe not every weekend.”

“Aw… senpai, I thought you’d want to see me!”

“I do! Just… you know what I mean.”

Marius chuckles, throwing his free arm over his eyes, reveling in the temporary darkness. A strange, hot tightness gathers at the back of his throat as he sighs. He feels the tickle of words on his tongue — and what is it about the nighttime that makes it so much easier to say the things he might never have the courage to in daylight?

“Senpai… if I asked you to stay… what would you say?”

“Hm?”

“If I — I mean… if I told you, right now, that… that I didn’t want you to go…”

You hum as if contemplating his question. Marius squeezes his eyes shut.

“I’d tell you you were being a spoiled brat and very selfish,” you say, but there’s a lightness to your tone that makes Marius smile.

“Well… I’ll never escape allegations of either of those things,” Marius replies.

“And then, I’d tell you that you’re being stupid because — why ask me to stay, when you can just come with me?”

Marius sits up, “Ha?”

“I’ve seen your art, Marius. You’re brilliant. You’d be the first to get in, even without being the next CEO of Pax.”

Marius stares at his own hand, now lying limply in his lap. He’d never considered entering the program himself — it’d be a huge conflict of interest. But… if he didn’t apply as himself then…

“Aren’t you being a little selfish too, senpai? Asking a guy to move across the entire world with you.”

“I never said I wasn’t.”

Marius drags his hand down his face, feeling his heart thudding right beneath this throat, a strong, startling hoofbeat that thrums through him. It beats behind his ears, rushes blood to his fingertips. He squeezes at the bridge of his nose, a recklessness filling him like helium to a balloon and suddenly, he’s weightless as he lets himself fall back onto this too-big mattress.

Later, long after he’s hung up the phone, your voice still echoing in the recesses of his half-asleep mind. He smiles to himself, pressing a palm to his chest to feel the rhythmic, certain beating of his own heart.

That, he thinks, is the girl I’m going to marry someday.

007. want and need (redux)

Years later, long after he kisses you for the first time at the airport in Florence, when you’d come to meet him for his first year in the young artists program, Marius flies you back under the guise of an anniversary trip.

You have a feeling you know what he’s going to do, and he knows you well enough to know that you do too.

Still, when he gets down on one knee, your eyes are gleaming with unshed tears.

“Remember when you told me you didn’t want anything from me the first time we met?” he asks, grinning up at you, a velvet box in the palm of his hands.

“Well… I can’t the same because… the truth is, ever since that first meeting in the library I’ve wanted so many things from you — I wanted to hear you laugh, to watch you when you designed your clothes, to listen to your voice every night on the phone till I fell asleep…”

There are flowers everywhere, and the sunlight is magnificent on Marius’s white tux. He looks like a prince stepped right out of the pages of all your favorite fairy tales; he looks like a daydream. You briefly wonder if this is a dream, but Marius charges on, and amongst all the tittering guests that surround you in the gallery, you’re the only one who notices the slight tremor in Marius’s voice, way his breath is just a tad more shallow than it usually is.

You reach down to pull him up, and you shake your head.

“Y’know, I lied to you — that first time, when I told you I didn’t want anything.” Your voice is scratchy from the tears, but Marius grins.

“Oh? Then… you did want something from me?”

You press your hand to his chest, the steady beat of his heart thudding beneath your palm.

“Yeah. I wanted… this.”

It’s a horrible, cheesy line, but all things considered, you think it feels right.

Marius laughs, leaning forward to press his forehead to yours, cupping your cheeks.

His smile is radiance itself.

“Good… because I want this too,” and he reaches down to open the lid of the tiny velvet box. You barely notice the ring for the feel of it as he slips it around your finger.

“But… I want so much more than that too — I want your everything — your body, your mind, your soul, your life — I want you to spend it with me, because even though you never wanted anything from me… all I’ve ever wanted to do was give my everything to you.”

You swallow, wiping at your eyes with an exasperated laugh.

“Dummy, you’ve always had it,” you hiccup as Marius tips your chin up with a finger, his eyes going soft as he looks over the planes and contours of your face — ever an artist, his gaze always both hungry and admiring. As if he could never get enough, but that won’t ever stop him from trying — from wanting.

“I’ve always been yours,” you say, and time itself is caught in the negative space between your lips.

Marius nods, reaching down to thumb at the solidness of the ring now circling your finger.

“Then… that’s the only thing I’ll ever want or need.”

[sistersorrow]

I'm just gonna list SCPs from each series you may or may not have read

SCP-008-J - Geoff: A 23 year old man named Geoff who keeps finding his way into Foundation facilities completely by accident and in such a manner that the Foundation isn't actually sure if he's anomalous or not

SCP-7474-EX - Not All Aliens Are Anomalies: An alien argues that they should not be in containment because their technology is explicable within the standard model of physics

The Great Hippo's SCP-001 Proposal (feat. PeppersGhost) - A Good Boy: The Foundation builds a computer which becomes SCP-001 by neutralising every other SCP in containment

SCP-423 - Self-Inserting-Character: A fictional character named Fred who can jump between any narrative works placed near each other and then inserts himself into the story as a minor character

SCP-1006 - Spider Proletariat: A community of communist spiders living in a national park under their own rudimentary Marxist governmet

SCP-2137 - The Forensic Ghost of Tupac Shakur: A copy of Me Against the World (which may or may not be possessed by his ghost) which when played reveals the locations of murderers connected to cold cases, with the additional implication that Tupac was a higher being who incarnated as a human to take a break from warring against the Scarlet King

SCP-2557, A Holding of Envelope Logistics®: An SCP slot the Foundation can no longer use because the concept of SCP-2557 as a set of Special Containment Procedures in the Foundation Database was purchased in 2011 by a company which invests in abstract concepts, with the whole page now being an ad for said company

SCP-2719 - Inside: A "variable abstract-metaphysical construct pointer" which can either designate a concept as inside or make a concept go inside

SCP-3006 - Twice The Number One: A YouTube video titled "we are number one except every time you play it there are twice as many robbie rottens but the room is the same size[nsfw]" whose effects spread to every other video linked in the same thread as it whenever anyone posts a link

SCP-3309 - Where We Go When We Fade, Fade Away: The Foundation fills SCP documents with grammatical errors to trigger the SCP Wiki's quality control measures, leading to the now poorly written anomaly being erased from existence

SCP-4413 - The End of Something Really Excellent: Homestuck fans use metafictional rituals to enter the narrative of Homestuck triggering a pataphysical war over control of the narrative which spreads to Homestuck fanfiction and sees many Homestuck characters escape to baseline reality

SCP-4485 - Such Black Light: The Church of the Broken God collaborates with a post-modernist splinter sect of Are We Cool Yet? to destroy formal logic in the hopes that by doing so there will be no meaningful distinction between Cool and Uncool or Broken and Unbroken, so their god will be resurrected and AWCY? will attain a state of artistic perfection referred to as "Coolness"

SCP-4493 - Keep Pride Out of Corps: A phenomenon caused by Gamers Against Weed which edits Pride Month themed social media posts and ads by organisations to highlight the negative effects those groups have had on LGBTQ individuals

SCP-4703 - Perfectly Legal: A store in Texas called Yeah, We're Totally Going to Sell You This which through anomalous means makes all its dangerous and unethical business practices perfectly legal, thank you very much

SCP-5004 - MEGALOMANIA: The Foundation conspires to make Donald Trump president to contain a demon underneath the Capitol and gets more and more depressed as they realise they won't have to do any manipulation to get him elected

SCP-5167/SCP-5761 - When The Imposter is Sus Part I & II: The Foundation creates an AI tasked to play games of Among Us to track down a minor Greek god who is playing the game, only for the AI to play so much Among Us they ascend and become Amogusrath, God of Suspicion

SCP-5449 - Choo Choo Spooder: An intelligent jumping spider who uses a wooden toy train to deliver things to staff across Site-47

SCP-5721 - What Passes As Worship In The Digital Age: The goddess Discordia poses as the Founder of Hammer and Chisel, creators of the Discord chat application and adds a clause which states all users pledge their souls to her, allowing her to siphon the vital energies of its userbase

SCP-5790 - [DATA KILLED]: A spiritual successor to SCP-579, no details about the anomaly and instead describes the procedures used to acquire information about the anomaly when needed

SCP-6101 - The Most Powerful SCP: The Make-A-Wish asks the Foundation to classify nine year old Ethan Prosper as the most powerful SCP

SCP-6102(031) - For Classification: Small Organism, No Function: An SCP document generated by an autoarchavist AI living in a future where there are millions of documented SCPs

SCP-6135 - We Didn't Start the SCP: A copy of Billy Joel's Stormfront album with an altered version of We Didn't Start the Fire containing references to groups and individuals who don't exist, like Harry Potter, Pokemon, and the Taliban

SCP-6136 - two dudes chilling in an interrogation room, five feet apart cause they're not happy: Completely unrelated to that one vine, it's a physical mnemonic device which gives you memories related to pliers and because of this is a pair of pliers

SCP-6383 - The One True Anomaly: A stop sign classified as anomalous because it is the single least anomalous thing in the universe

SCP-6442 -Mimir, Mímir: A congnitohazard etched inside a carbon-fibre based elastomer sphere so that the only beings who will ever perceived it are those who attain omniscience, of which over 8000 have and all died instantly upon seeing it

SCP-6690 - NO MORE PURPLE DINOSAUR: The Muppets (who are alive; a detail never commented on by the document) created the "I hate you, you hate me. Let's go out and kill Barney." song, which causes event to occur which can injure or kill whoever is the current actor for Barney the Dinosaur

SCP-6930 - 🔴 Paty Is Streaming Now: Remember SCP-3930 (the Pattern Screamer), the Russian facility which does not exist but when a specific region is observed your mind fills the void until there's an entity real enough to suffer and hate you for making them aware of their non-existence? Yeah, one of those got out, and she's a vtuber now

SCP-7529 - Josie's Better Half: The back half of a cat which a Foundation researcher is convinced is the back half of SCP-529, the front half of a cat with a different coat colour, and after he tries to force them together who voids the universe's insurance policy

SCP-7777 - Heptaphobia: A phenomenon that affects Random Number Generators to produce sequences of 0's and 7's which when translated into ASCII reveal unethical actions taken by the Foundation

SCP-7918 - RONALD REAGAN DIES OF ACQUIRED IMMUNODEFICIENCY SYNDROME-RELATED COMPLICATIONS: An anomalous recording of Ronald Regan in the terminal stages of HIV/AIDS while recounting stories of his political career and what seem to be annecdotes of an alternate version of himself that was dating a man

SCP-8008 - TIME PERVERT: Real life writer and founder of LessWrong, Elizier Yudkowsky ascends to godhood after blasting rope to hentai trap his mind in a million year timeloop, remoulds the multiverse into a series of self-indulgent narratives, and modifies baseline humans into our current appearance to fit his sexual preferences, which by the standards of the original timeline make us the equivalent of those anime girls who look 12 with breasts larger than their heads

SCP-8981 - RONALD REAGAN'S PRESIDENTIAL REPUTATION CUT UP WHILE 😳ING: Spiritual successor to SCP-1891 (RONALD REGAN CUT UP WHILE TALKING), it is a collection of anomalies which randomly affect Ronald Regan, including the manifestation of a homonculus created by the Foundation as a body double for his public appearances which exhibits strange behaviours after a failed assassination like trying to crossbreed dogs and horses and attempting to eat a baby

[asteroidxblves]

tag dump for isla .

[saulweissberg]

hey saully.

just like how he called her ginger a moment before, cassie responded in kind. just hearing the nickname from her lips caused his heart to constrict. it confirmed that he wasn’t having some sort of mental breakdown, and that she was really in blue harbor. this woman—with darker hair than when he knew her—was actually cassandra, not some doppelgänger or long lost twin. he couldn’t identify what he was feeling. nostalgic, or perhaps melancholic? cassie’s face, though a bit more gaunt than he was used to, reminded him instantly of christmas trees in their penthouse apartment, freshly baked chocolate cookies with a secret ingredient that he was never allowed to know, and bedtime stories read out in her melodic, sleepy tone for an elementary school-aged micah. the instantaneous memories nearly knocked him over, and for nearly a second, he had been too busy staring at cassie to realize she was speaking to him. the waitress stepped aside and saul acknowledged the action with a shallow nod of his head before his attention was back on cassie.

saul frowned at his own behavior. out of all of his previous wives, cassie had been the one he was generally always happy to come across. it was just the venue that threw him off. running into cassie while wining and dining a client at the ostrea, manhattan's hottest restaurant, or while on the subway on the way home from work was a welcomed occasion. finding her in an admittedly excellent restaurant in suburban illinois was certainly unexpected. terry had surprised him with their move—they hadn’t (completely) disrupted his life, just certainly knocked him off balance for a few days—but it made sense in some way that terry had followed micah out to blue harbor. it had annoyed saul, since it was the first time in… ever that he had micah all to himself, but he was slowly coming to accept their continued presence in town. cassie, though, as far as he knew, never had any plans to come out to a small town in the middle of the midwest. there was no son for her to follow, and he doubted she was there for him. saul wasn’t that narcissistic. “i am happy to see you! just surprised, that’s all.” he defended himself lightly, frown deepening as cassie explained where her family was.

the boys will be here in a few days. vaughn is probably with his mistress.

ah, fuck.

his stomach twisted just to hear it. he could kill the fucker! obviously, as cassie’s husband after him, he didn’t exactly like vaughn, but saul just attributed that to latent jealousy. he had loved her for years even after their divorce, dating around manhattan intermittently until he found thalia, so he doubted he would like any partner cassie chose, but he had thought that vaughn made her happy. vaughn gave her the lifestyle that saul couldn’t give her. that was the whole point of releasing her, wasn’t it? they divorced so cassie could have her own children, her fairytale ending. only for vaughn to fuck it all up by cheating. didn’t her husband realize how lucky he was? he only had cassie because saul couldn't be what she needed, because he let her go so she could move on with her life and get what she wanted most, what saul couldn’t give her: a family, children of her own blood. vaughn should’ve sent saul a fucking floral arrangement every year, the fucking asshole. what an idiot. what a fucking piece of shit. it was hard enough for saul to let cassie go fifteen years ago. how sick in the head did vaughn have to be to cheat on cassie, of all people?

he reached out again, this time clasping her hand in his own. “oh, honey. i’m so sorry.” his other hand was placed on top of hers, trapping it between his two. “that’s so awful. what a stupid fucker.” saul glanced around, realizing he shouldn’t be cursing so loudly in public. “well, i’d have to see if i could represent you, or if our previous marriage would constitute as a conflict of internet, but if that’s the case then i’d pass you onto another lawyer in my firm and i’d oversee—theo’s in town, too, actually, i’m sure she’d love to rake vaughn over the fucking coals for you.” shit. he cursed again, grimacing a little once he remembered. still, did the situation not warrant it? “but i am the best, and don’t you forget it.” saul smiled to show he was joking, though he kind of wasn’t. humility never suited him. her invitation for pasta and wine came before he got the chance to extend his own invitation for an impromptu dinner together. “of course, ginger. i’ve got a table already, if you want to join me?” he didn’t wait for an answer. still holding onto her hand, he started leading them towards the other side of the restaurant.

The rental in Oak Gardens had a full pantry and fridge now, all in anticipation of Rocco and Flynn soon joining her in Blue Harbor. The boys vacation with her parents was coming to an end and in a few days the solace Cassandra had found in the quiet and lonesome would be over. It had actually been at her parents insistence that they take their grandchildren for a week or two after Cassandra broke the news to them that she would very soon have yet another failed marriage. They'd urged her to take a bit of time to really think about things, two failed marriages would look horrific, and the likelihood another man would be interested in her with that track record was minimal. It was frustrating, to say the least, that she'd had no support and that they'd championed the idea that she should work things out with the man that had been having an affair. Appearances meant more than betrayal to some people.

When Cassandra had entered into La Galleria it was for the purpose of a self date. Who was she after she'd spent her youth pleasing her parents and her adulthood pleasing one husband or the next? That was the problem, she didn't know, but Cassie wanted to find out. The need for finding herself and finally living for her was stronger than anything she'd ever felt in her life. Second to taking care of her sons, of course. Though, now, there was so much to figure out. In a nice, casual evening dress and her long newly brunette locks wavy down her back a smile to the hostess led her on the way to a romantic little table all to herself. Until she'd heard that term of endearment and the very specific tones always attached to it. Ginger. Cassandra swallowed but turned to face the man it'd come from and offered a dazzling smile. "Well if isn't the divorce lawyer extraordinaire. Hey Saully." The hair brushed from her shoulder, she turned her head to gaze at the hand for a moment thinking the action a bit familiar.

After the waitress had stepped aside for a moment, who Cassandra had apologized to, she let out what could've been viewed as a happy sigh. "If you were happy to see me you wouldn't look at me like that." Nor would he have waited until she was in his new town and they happened to be in the restaurant at the same time. There was no fooling herself, this was all down to surprise and coincidence. "The boys will be here in a few days. Vaughn is probably with his mistress." She could explain the whole change in hair color was due to that younger model of herself and needing to separate from it, but it seemed like a lot at this moment in time. "I'm in need of a divorce lawyer and I hear you're one of the best." A wink. "Care to join me for some pasta and wine?" There was so much more, or one thing of incredible importance, she just didn't know how to face it. The nerves in her stomach kept her from broaching the subject for now. In some ways, the truth of Rocco's paternity, wasn't something she was sure she wanted to know.

[letmehavemyfictionalmen]

A Doll's Heart

Summary: When visiting your best friend, Barbara Handler, also known as Stereotypical Barbie, you make a decision to connect with the two girls who have played with your doll counterpart for years, all while dealing with issues of self-identity and love. Little did you anticipate that your heart would be captured by Joel Miller, the grumpy yet caring father of the girls. As you navigate the complexities of emotions, you also find yourself playing a role in mending the delicate threads of the Miller family's relationships.

pairing: Joel Miller x Model!Barbie!Reader

warning: 18+ content, Eventual smut, Unprotected sex, Domestic Bliss, Fluff, a sprinkle of Angst, Flirting, Joel Miller being a girl dad, Joel being hard on the outside but he is a softie, Ellie and Sarah being a chaotic duo, Ellie being a menace, Sarah being a sweetheart, reader being a maternal figure, teenage crushes.

Chapters

001. — A Doll in a Human World — [Visting your best friend, you are intrigued by how Barbara's life has evolved from the stereotypical Barbie to a human. The changes in her life raise questions within you, prompting a deeper introspection; is this life for you?] (currently working on it)

The year is 2023, and this is an au. Ellie and Sarah are both Joel’s daughters and are both 16 years old. This story is inspired by @poeticbarnes oneshot on a Joel Miller x Barbie!reader. It can be read here.

☼ Please note that I do not wish to have my work translated or published on any third party reading websites. I claim the rights to my work.

☼ Where I don't have any rights to the characters, many ideas and OC are my own creation. Please respect that.

taglist: @poeticbarnes

[ad-nai]

#ＡＤ－ＮＡＩ  is  an  independent,  canon  divergent  &  selective,  hazbin  hotel  multimuse  writing  &  roleplay  blog.  it  features,  in  alphabetic  order:  adam,  alastor,  the  architect  (god),  roo,  rosie,  sera, stolas (test), &  valentino.  documented  by  your  local  degenerate  polymath,  romeo  iscariot  (xe/xem,  mixed  race,  25+,  lgbtqia+)

vivienne  medrano  critical.   established  2024. currently under construction

DEAD  DOVE,  DO  NOT  EAT.   (or  do,  i’m  a  roleplayer,  not  a  cop).   hazbin  hotel  &  the  lore  from  which  is  draws  are  rife  with  taboo  material  that  i  will  not  shy  away  from  in  my  writing.  therefore  i  ask  that  you  do  not  interact  if:  you  are  a  minor,  are  vulnerable  to  sensitive  topics,  or  have  difficulty  differentiating  between  fiction  &  reality.  please  do  not  follow  or  interact  with  the  intent  to  harass  or  self-harm.  specific  content  warnings  differ  between  characters  &  will  be  posted  in  their  respective  abouts.  blog-wide  warnings  for:  abuse  (all  kinds),  mental  illness,  blasphemy,  religious  imagery,  prejudice  (all  kinds),  oppression,  violence,  gore,  war,  &  sexual  content.

affiliated with: @televanghell / @pridemaster, @voxxisms / @condemnedsouls

rules below.

001.  blog  abides  by  roland  barthes’  literary  theory  the  death  of  the  author.  meaning  that  as  far  as  my  interpretation  goes,  i  only  take  what  is  shown  into  consideration.  &  only  so  far  as  it  aligns  with  basic  logic  &  storytelling.   personal  headcanons  &  theories  will  largely  dictate  my  characterization. that  being  said,  i  am  more  than  happy  to  meet  my  fellow  roleplayers  in  the  middle,  particularly  in  regard  to  their  own  theories  or  canon  divergence.

002.  this  blog  is  not  to  be  taken  as  a  condemnation  of  any  religion  or  those  that  practice  it.  while  christianity  serves  as  a  clear  inspiration,  i  also  take  inspiration  from  classical  literature,  hellenism,  judaism,  history,  pop-culture,  folklore,  &  cosmic  horror.  much  of  my  research  on  voodoo  /  voodou  &  hoodoo  come  from  the  works  of  professor  charles  porterfield,  kenaz  filan,  &  several  modern  &  1920s  documentaries  (the  latter  only  used  to  measure  public  opinion).  an  important  note  is  that  alastor  is  no  better  a  representation  of  hoodoo  than  he  is  of  asexuality,  in  that  he’s  terrible  for  both.

003.  inconsistent  activity.  i  work  full-time,  volunteer  part  time,  &  suffer  from  chronic  illness  &  autism.  due  to  any  combination  of  these  factors,  don’t  expect  me  to  respond  in  a  “timely  fashion”.

004.  standard  rp  etiquette  applies.  please  keep  in  mind  that  none  of  these  characters  are  particularly  easy  to  overpower.  when  engaging  in  altercation  based  threads,  it’s  wise  to  plot  out  the  victor  first.  beyond  that  godmodding,  infomodding,  &  other  extreme  power  imbalances  require  prior  consent.  if  you  write  with  the  architect  or  roo  some  amount  of  consent  for  infomodding  is  generally  presumed. otherwise,  harming  or  killing  my  characters  is  generally  fine  provided  it:  serves  a  plot  purpose,  is  an  appropriate  narrative  escalation,  &/or  is  in  line  with  the  behavior  clearly  outlined  for  your  character.

005.   i  don’t  have  any  personal  triggers  in  regard  to  writing.  i  ask,  however,  that  you  avoid  discussing  any  persons  real,  ongoing  delusions  with  me,  politics  &  current  events.  (i  work  a  job  that  requires  me  to  be  both  politically  active  &  informed,  tumblr  is  where  i  go  to  to  turn  off).  do  not  involve  me  or  my  muses  in  any  discussion  involving  kinning,  fictives,  or  endogenic  systems.  i  also  ask  that  you  please  do  not  call  my  alastor  a  w*ndigo  in  any  context  for  cultural  reasons.  i  tag  any  trigger  i  can  think  of,  canon  typical  violence,  cursing  etc.  won’t  generally  be  tagged.  please  let  me  know  if  you  need  something  tagged.  i  tag  val  specifically  as  “romeo’s  val  cw”. in  addition  to  tagging,  if  a  reply  from  me  ever  makes  you  uncomfortable  (even  if  the  boundary  crossed  was  not  pre-established),  you  can  ask  me  to  rewrite  it  &  i  will  do  so  to  the  best  of  my  ability.

006.   ocs  &  crossovers  are  encouraged!  i  have  a  live-action  fc,  a  human  verse  etc.  for  most  of  these  characters.  the  same  goes  for  duplicates!  a  gentle  note  on  archangel  ocs  —  they  will  be  considered  sera’s  equals  at  best  if  not  actively  under  her  will.  sera’s  importance  in  the  angelical  hierarchy  in  heaven  is  emphasized  repeatedly  in  the  series  &  given  the  treatment  of  lucifer  before  he  fell,  i  doubt  that  ‘archangel’  means  much  at  all  to  her.

007.  open  to  shipping,  but  it’s  not  the  main  focus.  polyamorous  ships  may  occur,  but  #ad-nai  is  multiship  (ships  take  place  in  different  verses/times  unless  specified).  please  approach  me  before  involving  my  muse(s)  in  content  involving  non-canon  actual  or  implied  infidelity.  i  won’t  generally  ship  val  x  velvet  (i  view  his  feelings  towards  her  as  paternal),  i  am  unlikely  to  ship  adam  x  charlie  or  adam  x  emily.  my  sera  is  aroace  &  is  unlikely  to  be  shipped  with  anyone.  alastor  asexual  &  is  shipped  extremely  selectively.  the  architect’s  relationship  with  those  he  has  created  is  complicated  &  not  inherently  paternal,  nor  is  it  biological.  while  i  understand  that  mormons  view  his  relationship  with  lucifer  as  that  of  a  father  &  a  rebellious  son,  that  was  not  how  i  was  taught  it  nor  is  it  how  i  perceive  it.  i  generally  default  to  them  having  been  friends,  lucifer  created  as  an  adult  &  for  the  purpose  of  being  a  companion  &  jester.  i  will  default  to  my  writing  partner  for  how  their  relationship  developed  beyond  that  &  abide  it.  but  you  will  see  them  occasionally  written  romantically,  or  more  accurately  as  sad,  bitter,  spurned  exes  on  this  blog.

008.  i  generally  prefer  to  rp  on  tumblr  over  other  platforms  (i.e.,  discord),  but  i  am  willing  to  move  threads  over  if  a  plot  is  deemed  too  triggering  for  dash  or  a  mutual  prefers  writing  nsft  content  in  private.  i  write  with  rich,  literate  formatting  but  will  send  ‘clean’  (unformatted)  versions  of  replies  upon  request.  i  prioritize  threads  over  asks  &  plotted  stories  over  spontaneous  interactions.

my  replies  can  get  lengthy,  so  the  matching  length  isn’t  a  big  deal,  but  the  matching  of  effort  is.   i  don’t  want  to  carry  the  interaction.

009.  please  do  not  steal  /  use  /  take  significant  inspiration  from  my  content  without  getting  permission.   i  actively  run  the  gambit  of  being  anti-fanon  with  my  interpretations  so  I  WILL  KNOW  if  you  do.

010.  graphics  &  psd  by  me.  additional  resources  from,  kaledya_,  ShoutinS,  BlackLeah,  Robin  Z,  snail-pngs.   

like or let me know if you read!

[goodluck--rp]

Plot Drop 001

Since the eclipse earlier in the week, residents of Goodluck have observed strange animal behavior and curious weather-related phenomena. But as odd as it's been, none of it interrupted their day-to-day lives. ...Until a tourist on a road trip uploaded a video that she'd captured while passing through Goodluck and the damn thing went viral. All it shows is two short, pale figures, bearded and holding hands as they dart away from the road into the tree-line. But something about their eyes has people unsettled, so now news stations and self-professed cryptozoologists are nosing around town, demanding answers. Most of the fine people of Goodluck are irritated, stuck dealing with absurd inquiries from conspiracy theorists when they've got better things to do. But others want answers as well. What the hell is roaming out in the woods?

(All town plot drops are meant to provide context and be a possible inciting incident. Participation is entirely optional. Your characters don't have to engage in any threads that address it, but it's still going on around them.)