#to be clear I never had an eating disorder I had a different illness

[asyouwlsh]

sigh. love when strangers comment on my chronically underweight state and imply they’re fat by comparison. not awkward or uncomfortable at all. thanks, it was the nearly starving to death as a child! but it’s easy to maintain because I have a bunch of other chronic illnesses! I would recommend it if you’re looking to nearly get denied surgery you need because you’re too light :) don’t forget you’ll probably die younger, though!

[growing-home]

i spent nearly two decades of my life severely depressed and suicidal and for so long i believed wholeheartedly that it was my fault. i believed that the reason no medication or therapy had ever worked for my depression was because i wasn’t ACTUALLY depressed— i believed i was just lazy, bad, manipulative, and just using depression as an excuse for the inherent badness i thought was inside me. this was a story that was told to me and reinforced over and over again by treatment providers.

this past summer, i tried my 30th+ psychiatric medication, not expecting to see any results. the day i realized it was working was the day i realized that i was…planning my future???suddenly i no longer wanted to stay in bed all day and never go outside. i no longer wanted to isolate. i wanted to see people, talk to people! i started spending more time with friends and facetiming people and talking on the phone, things that i rarely did in the past. when i had been depressed, the only movies/tv shows i could focus on were super intense, fast paced, and scary or disturbing because that was the only way to hold my attention. after starting this medication, i started enjoying SITCOMS! i no longer felt like i was fighting to just get through every single day of my life.

there was such a clear and measurable difference in the quality of my life that i started to question why i believed that my depression had been my fault. it became very clear to me that a large part of my depression had been biological. i had not been lazy or bad. i had been sick. my brain was sick the same way other organs get sick sometimes. this brought up a lot of grief for me— grief for all the lost time that i’d spent trying to find something that worked, grief for how much pain i had been in for so long. but it also brought up sheer FURY at all of the therapists and psychiatrists who had treated me like i just wasn’t trying hard enough to get better.

i had been labeled treatment resistant, of course, and the only recommendations i had received after being given that label were TMS, Ketamine, and ECT. once i had tried all three with no success, i believed i was just a lost cause. i thought i was out of options. i was made to feel that way by so many treatment professionals. i was told that nothing was working because of my complex trauma and that once i healed from that then i would stop being depressed (as if it’s that easy to just fully recover from CPTSD!) i was told that i just needed to do more DBT, i just needed to live and breathe DBT skills and then i would get better, even though i’d done intensive DBT programs for years with no improvement to my depression. (yes, it helped me to change my behavior and quit self harm, but behavior change isn’t necessarily indicative of a change in mood. i could do all the right things all the time and still be in excruciating mental pain.)

i was told that i just wasn’t trying hard enough, or that i must have a personality disorder, or that i just needed to exercise more, or eat less, or eat MORE, or eat differently, or get a job, or get a dog, or do yoga, or acupuncture, or biofeedback, or find purpose in my life— psychiatrist after psychiatrist looked for something to blame everywhere but in the mirror. instead of admitting that they weren’t equipped to help me, they made me believe that it was MY fault i wasn’t getting better. and i believed them. for SO long, i believed them.

and now after finding a medication that works for me, i see everything so much more clearly. psychiatrists need to put their enormous egos aside and actually treat patients with treatment resistant depression instead of blaming us for suffering from a (partially at least) biological illness. if you’re a doctor and you know that a patients illness is outside of the scope of your abilities, either do more research and get more training to help them or refer them to someone who specializes in what they need. don’t keep them around letting them pay you thousands of dollars while you make them try the same thing over and over and over again and expect to get a different result. people act like things like ECT are a last resort option, and in doing so make people believe that if it doesn’t help then you’re out of options. but nobody ever tried me on tricyclics. nobody tried me on MAOIs. nobody told me about how some dopamine agonists like Pramipexole have had some success in treating treatment resident depression. instead i was made to feel like asking to not be suicidal daily was asking for too much. if you’re a clinician who thinks that’s asking for too much, you’re in the wrong profession. we can do better than that. we NEED to do better than that.

in my experience, out of every profession, doctors have some of the biggest egos i’ve ever seen. i say this as someone who is both mentally ill as well as physically disabled. many doctors HATE it when you do your own research. they HATE it when you have suggestions, or when you ask for what you need. it’s almost as if they feel threatened by it, like they need to believe that they are superior to their patients because of how much time and money and energy they put into going to med school— they need to believe they hate their hard work was worth it so they have a tendency to dismiss any ideas their patients might have. i don’t care how many years you’ve been in school. you do not get to tell your sick patients that it’s their fault they’re sick to justify your laziness and refusal to learn new things. put away your god complex and actually listen to your patients.

and the strangest part to me is that the longer you have been suicidal for, the less seriously they take it. the same way that the more chronically ill you are the less people believe you. it’s bizarre— when people see pain that is beyond what they can fathom, instead of feeling empathy, they tell you you must be faking it or that you must be looking for attention. i’ll never understand this. it’s as if they think that suicidality doesn’t need to be taken seriously unless the patient has successfully completed suicide. and i think it’s very clear how that logic is flawed. i was treated like i just wanted attention whenever i asked for help with my chronic suicidality and it made me terrified to ask for help with ANYTHING. i still constantly am afraid that if i’m too honest with clinicians then they’ll think i just want attention. attention isn’t a bad thing to want, all human beings need some degree of attention, but regardless that doesn’t negate the severity of a person’s suicidality. i wasn’t attention seeking by asking for help. i was STRONG. i was really fucking strong, far stronger than i should’ve had to be. i fought for my life every single day and i am lucky to still be here but it’s not luck that got me here. it’s ME that got me here.

i don’t want to make it sound like i speak for everyone who has suffered from TRD, because i don’t think that would be fair. i can’t tell you if there’s a med out there that’ll work for you. all i can tell you is that most psychiatrists prematurely tell chronically suicidal patients that there is nothing they can do to help them or that they’re out of medication options. if you’re a psychiatrist or doctor and you feel yourself getting defensive while reading this, i invite you to get curious about where that activation is coming from.

and if you are someone with treatment resident depression or chronic suicidality reading this, i am telling you now: your illness is not your fault. i don’t know if it’s going to get better or not, but i can promise you— it is not your fault and it never has been.

[beegoould]

Recently my therapist dropped something on me that is hard for me to wrap my head around. We’ve started talking through my issues with food and eating, and after a couple sessions she said “I think you may have a form of anorexia” And I’m like “You may not have noticed this but I weigh 250 pounds” and she was like “nah dog, you don’t have to be underweight to have it” and this made NO SENSE to me. And I said “I don’t have the willpower or the strength to be anorexic” which made me stop and think, and made her raise an eyebrow.

I realized in that moment that there had been times in my life when I was jealous of people with this devastating, potentially deadly illness. I felt like they had an ability I knew I would never have. And that’s a super fucked up way to think about it.

We talked through it and she told me that my periods of obsessive calorie counting, punishing myself for eating foods I felt were off limits, measuring things to the ounce, and thinking about food pretty much all the time was the issue. The first time she brought this up was when I told her I used to berate myself for eating something I shouldn’t have when I actually hadn’t eaten it, I’d just thought about eating it. Also when I was drinking too much I would plan my day around it, making sure I had an empty stomach and weighing what I drank on a kitchen scale. And I did research to find out what alcohol had the least calories with the highest abv.

So she tells me she thinks I have atypical anorexia. I still have the obsessive thoughts, but I don’t follow any self imposed restrictions. I still think about them, I just got too tired to keep following them. I still punish myself for eating “bad” foods.

We’re going to continue talking through this and navigate it, hopefully find ways to change some of my thoughts and behaviors. I’m still surprised at myself for my initial knee jerk response of thinking that it’s just like me to have this disorder but still be overweight. That’s not me anymore. I felt that way when I was a kid up to my 30’s, that being overweight made me useless and less than. I don’t feel that way now, but I guess it’s hardwired into my brain at a subconscious level.

To be clear, I have never had negative thoughts about people I knew or met who were overweight. They were different. I was the problem, no one else.

I wanted to share this because I’d never heard of it before, and while it’s not life changing to know this is a thing, it is helping me understand myself and some of my behaviors in a way that I haven’t before. It is also helping me be kinder to myself, at least a little.

I hope this post wasn’t upsetting or painful for anyone. This is just me sharing my experience and thoughts, I don’t know much about this topic and I’m probably shitty in a lot of ways as I’m writing about this since I don’t know what I’m talking about. I’m sorry about that. I’m going to tag the fuck out of this.

Anyway. My wish for all of you is that you can be kind to yourself however you can in whatever way you need to be. ☀️☀️☀️

[jihyoruri]

okay I NEED to talk abt this bc richgirlyn is literally me FORREAL 

so uhh not the analysis I thought I’d be doing but I need to. the other one will be later 

ok tw for eds I guess like this is the entire analysis 

disclaimer. this is all my interpretation as well as my experience. I’ve had an issues w eating since 8 (almost twins!) and it’s been literal years. this is just what I think based on what I’VE seen and done as a girl. I know men can have ed’s but I will be talking abt it from my standpoint, which is hashtag girl. everyone’s experience is different.

key: ana=anorexia, ed=eating disorder 

Ive never dealt with real bulimia so take whatever I say with a grain of salt

okay. here’s why richgirlyn having an ed, specifically how she develops ana as she gets older makes a lot of sense (Ive had a fixation on eds and the way they affect the mind for so long..)

i feel like people forget just how genuinely maddening have an eating disorder is.

most of the time in movies they’re there for laughs and portrayed as “oh she just kinda throws up!”  (heathers, the musical) or “oh she wants to be skinny so bad she js doesn’t eat!” (mean girls) (I love both of them btw they’re just what come to mind)

like that is not what they are like AT ALL

eating disorders are some of the most deadly mental illness there is and because it mostly affects teenage girls and women people literally treat it like something not that serious or a joke it’s actually insane how people do not gaf about it

so anyway.

I feel like if children have issues with food they always start out thinking of purging

it makes sense! if you don’t want calories, just get rid of them.

obviously, it doesn’t work that way, and purging doesn’t even actually work well LMAO most of the calories are absorbed unless u throw up like the second food enters ur mouth like it is not foolproof at all.

but to a child it makes sense. the food is gone so you can’t gain weight

and when you’re a kid your gag reflex is way more sensitive so it’s way easier to vomit. when you get older it’s so much harder

bulimia is not really possible long term for idols because of its side effects which are:

erosion of tooth enamel making them appear clear other than white

sunken in, bulging eyes

swollen cheeks

hair loss 

GERD

also for the fact it doesn’t really help much with not absorbing the calories + the fact that it affects the appearance, which idols need to be perfect, + the fact that it affects your voice, which idols need, and also throwing up is difficult 

much more common in idols is anorexia.

so! actually the side effects of ana aren’t as noticeable if you’re not restricting a lot! at about 700-800 calories max a day I didn’t experience hair loss or getting spots on my skin

It was mostly that I was just tired all the time and kind of irritable. i never experienced any physical effects other than losing weight (didn’t lose much muscle bc most of the cals were protein and I worked out everyday)

anyway

richgirlyn definitely likes control.

we can see how control has been taken from her time and time again— mostly by her dad, making all the decisions while she doesn’t get a say, and later, how her members and the people around her treat her.

eds are about control more than looks. It’s the one safety net, the one thing you can always be good at.

when everything around you is falling apart— you can control what you eat. it’s like an accomplishment. look how low I got the number! I’m so good at this! I’m so disciplined!

It’s like. “no one could ever get as low as me”. It makes you weirdly competitive 

and obviously there’s pressure to be skinny as a trainee. It’s what half of your self worth is based on. so if you can control that? and punish yourself (because as we’ve discussed richgirlyn does NAWT like herself that much) while you’re at it? It’s literally gold

she practices and practices, trying to be good enough, the best, and she doesn’t want to eat. eating is kind of like admitting defeat and saying you’re weak and giving in to the need to have food. 

oh and y’all don’t KNOW what mommy issues do with an ed like.

if losing weight makes someone PROUD? oh you KNOW you’re dropping to size 0 trust like it’s actually insane. I can’t even explain the real insanity that comes with an ed it makes you actually crazy. you start becoming afraid of certain numbers because they look bigger even if it’s not how it works. ex: it’s better to eat 98 cal than 50 because 98 feels “smaller” like it’s CRAZY. the state of mind you have when you’re doing that is really seriously not normal like I know it’s obvious but people don’t GET IT. you become very obsessive and cagey over it like if you eat over a certain limit you will literally either break down or get up and go work out until you think you’re back under and the guilt eats you up inside. richgirlyn is SAUR MEEEE FOR REAL

so ANYWAY richgirlyn having an ed makes sense. specifically ana.

she likes control, she wants something to feel proud about (along with her singing and dancing and rapping abilities), it’s something her mom’s PRAISED HER FOR so you already KNOW when her mom is like “wowww you’ve lost weight!” she is like I’m gonna get so much worse.

and also there has to be a part of her that wants someone to worry. i know she hates being seen as weak but I just know minjeong saying smth like “oh I wondered how u stay thin it’s cause u js don’t eat” made her feel so validated because it’s proof that she’s sick and she’s not okay and she’s not making it up.

I’m very sure her being well off has completely fucked with the idea of her being “allowed” to feel negative emotions. like “I’m rich, I shouldn’t be sad” but with any negative emotion.

and I know she was getting better until she got put in le sserafim I just KNOW especially CURRENTLY?

the stress of her members disliking her makes her feel worse abt her self making her want more control and also there’s this very fucked up part of it where it’s like. the less I eat and the less space I take up the more they’ll like me, they won’t hurt me if they think I’m sick and fragile and GODDD that’s so her. she wants to be strong so bad but sometimes.

anyway it’s 1 am this isn’t a great analysis maybe I’ll circle back to this but I needed to talk about it

I love richgirlyn she’s witerwally me 

-🎏

It’s crazy that everything you just said is so correct like completely correct when it comes to richgirl!yn’s problems.

and because this has been going on since she was ten it’s just a normal routine for her all that girl does is try her best to become better, and because she knows that her image is something that her mother actually pays attention about her, so it’s rlly important to her.

even now that she’s an idol she doesn’t talk to her mom but there’s times when her mom will call her and be like “you look a little different.” and then she’s completely back in that cycle

[augment-techs]

Question Game. What does self-care look like for you? What makes you cry? (If anything lol) What's your pet peeve? Do you have any insight into your mental bullshit? + Lord Drakkon

....Okay, I am taking this moment to bitch out and maneuver this over to All Our Injuries Rhyme! Drakkon. Because it sparks more with him. *A-hem.*

What does self-care look like for you?:

Strength exercises. Especially for his hands after Skull cut the tendons in his wrists.

Smoothing his fingers over the tether stones--green serpentine and rough jade--Jason brought him on a lark.

Cooking different variations of eggs--sometimes even managing to make ramen to go along with them.

What makes you cry?:

Before? When he was in bed with Jason and tried to enter him, but no matter if Jason gave actual true consent, he'd always go limp. Same thing with his Ranger Slayer in the very beginning of his thinking her being by his side could fix him. It was so humiliating and made it clear that the only thing out of his control was himself.

After...

Well, basically everything After fell under the umbrella of breaking down to cry. The pain in his head from his skull being split open, the way his hands couldn't stop shaking from the Grid withdrawal, how he pissed the hospital bed after they took the catheter out, how the consciousness he'd thought dead roared to life and screamed at him about all the years wasted...

Not being to eat or drink by himself for over a week, having to re-learn how to read.

Seeing Adam in Green with a far more noble and protective disposition than he'd ever had.

See Skull in a wheelchair come to see him by himself with all the files containing the history Drakkon never knew were as important as they turned out to be.

Seeing Kimberly made him cry in under three seconds on first meeting after his surgery.

Seeing Jason the first time after he was wearing White didn't even allow him to blink before the tears and convulsions and throwing up.

What's your pet peeve?:

Being called 'Tommy' when the Prime Rangers drop in on the aftermath of his losing the Battle for the Grid. True, he's not Drakkon anymore and--if Adam and Skull were to be believed--the name might have only been taken up in an effort to distance himself from humanity; but that name holds something inside of it that he can't name.

'Tommy' is the White Ranger. Tommy is trusted and loved and believed in by all worlds.

'Tommy' is not him.

Even during Jason and his little games in the bedroom, when he asked to be called such, it wasn't him.

Maybe his pet peeve is hearing any address towards him when he's still so uncomfortable in his own skin.

Do you have any insight into your mental bullshit?:

As well as can be expected, which is to say...not until the end.

Given that when he was on the throne, he never had any scans or basic check-ups because he believed himself incapable of becoming ill while using the Dragon and Tiger Coins in tandem every single day, only really relinquishing their power when he was asleep or needed skin to skin contact with his favorite toys. In decades, he was rarely injured, and when he was it never involved his head, just deep cuts or gashes that could be healed by the Grid.

To imagine that he had a mental disorder perpetuated by a genetic predisposition for an illness that killed off the mother he never knew and the brother he'd long forgotten...it never crossed his mind.

Getting his head cracked open because Jason asked for confirmation on notes Adam had found under Skull's floorboards; getting surgery where he went to sleep spitting expletives and woke up feeling hollowed out like a pumpkin; getting to see the reason for everything that went wrong could fit inside the kind of medical cup people pissed in for a drug test.

Once he stopped trying to kill himself, and his hands stopped shaking long enough that he could review his school and medical and foster records with Jason--yes, it did give him some insight.

[jowrites]

When the Dahlia sings Her Song - 2. Dahlia's mean a lot of nice things.

TW: Mentions of death, physical abuse, mental illness, depression, anxiety, parental death, verbal abuse, mute disorder, mentions of sex, some smut(in future), cursing

Strangers to Lovers. Lee Heeseung x F!OC(I like giving names).

Masterlist Here. Prev. Next. Jo's Masterlist Here.

To say Heeseung was furious was an understatement. Why did Beomgyu have him come all the way out here to this strange place to break up with someone who already has nothing to do with him? And why did he do it? He couldn’t tell if he should be more angry at himself or Beomgyu at this point. His headache was suddenly coming back and he frowned, pinching the bridge of his nose in pain. 

“I’ll be on my way. I apologize for the misunderstanding,” he quickly bowed and the girl Gyuri waved him off.

“I should be apologizing to you, I feel bad that man’s your brother,” she laughed. “Have a good one!”

He was turning around when he felt a tug on his arm and looked down at the girl who couldn’t talk. She began writing something down and held it to him.

Are you okay to drive? You don’t look too well.

“I’m fine, I’ve just had a headache. Thank you. I’ll see myself out now,” As much as he knew he had to leave, he felt bad for leaving this girl and wanted to just stay and talk. Learn more about her. But he left, walked right out the door and stopped in place when he heard the thunder in the sky. Suddenly it began to rain hard and heavy and he sighed. Just his luck.

The bell behind him alarmed and stood there motioning him to come back inside, probably to wait out the storm. He wanted nothing more than to be in the comfort of his own home, but he too knew he also should not be driving out into a storm when his mind isn’t clear anymore. So he followed her back inside, noticed Gyuri left to whatever duties she had and the girl motioned for him to take a look around. 

Any flower you can think of is here, your favorites of all time. Trust me. Take a look.

He read on her little pad before she turned around and started arranging some flowers she was doing earlier. He did as she told him and he found all sorts from different kinds of Roses to even black Tulips, ones he’s never seen in real life. He read up on some he has never even heard of before, seeing flowers like Bee Balm flowers to an array of bright flowers called Statice. He was surrounded by endless of them. Suddenly, he stumbled upon a Dahlia section, he didn’t realize how pretty they seemed in all their arrangement of colors. For some reason, he was drawn to its pointy and elegant nature, very beautiful and kind of comforting.

Dahlia’s are some of my favorite flowers.

The girl held the pad up and he smiled.

“Why’s that?” he asked.

They mean kindness, elegance, internal strength, and lasting love. I think it’s very beautiful.

“That is very beautiful. I never gave much thought to flowers nor have heard of half the ones in this shop.”

Well, I’m glad you stopped in so you can get educated. We have cinnamon rolls too!

Heeseung chuckled and noticed how excited she seemed to get.

I’m Kai. Thank you for coming into our shop!

“Kai, nice to meet you. I’m Heeseung.”

Yeah, Gyuri gave me the honors of telling me who you were. Big company man found his way to our magic land. I hope you like it!

“Magic? Are you telling me this place is magic?”

Of course! All your dreams come true here, nobody ever has to hide. 

“I don’t believe in magic.”

That’s your loss, magic is so fun! 

“I wouldn’t know, and what makes this place so magical?”

Don’t you feel that?

“Feel what?”

Suddenly, Kai took his hand and placed it on his heart.

It starts within the heart. You just have to believe and then anything is magic. Now, are you thirsty? Hungry? You should eat something, it might be why you have a headache.

Kai turned around and suddenly went towards the back leaving Heeseung stunned in place. Why was his heart beating so fast? This pretty girl could not have this much of an effect on him already, can she? He saw a few tables on the other side of the counter where there was a sunroom that overlooked what to be a courtyard of some sort out back. He sat down and just watched the rain drip from the windows before coming back to the present and Kai placed a cinnamon roll and a cup of coffee down in front of him. It actually looked delicious and he realized he really had not eaten all day.

Enjoy!

“Uhm, thank you,” he said. He removed his jacket and rolled up his sleeves. 

Kai went back to whatever she was doing with her flowers and he noticed her humming quietly to herself. He then took a bite and he had never tasted anything so delicious in his life. Maybe she was onto something when she claimed this place was magic. He looked over as he heard her giggling and he blushed, looking down to hide it from her. He hoped she thought he’s never had a cinnamon roll before, not all rich chaebols are snobby.

The coffee was just right to help balance the sweetness. Suddenly, he remembered why he was there in the first place and started frowning to himself. He stared out the window, his fists clenched up as he thought about Beomgyu and what he was doing at that moment. He was sure his brother noticed by now and was probably doing nothing but laughing to himself at home. Why did he have to give him such a hard time? And why did he let him?

Suddenly, he was kicked out of his thoughts as he felt a slap on his forehead. Shocked and quite annoyed, he didn’t have time to react as Kai stood over him with her hands on her hips. She began to write down on her pad and slapped it down in front of him.

No frowning here, it’s forbidden!

“I-I wasn’t! Ow! That actually hurt, you know!”

Good. No frowning. 

She then pointed to a sign behind her that read: “Rules. 1. No frowning. 2. No crying unless happy. 3. No being sad. 4. Make sure if you see George you say hi to George or else he’ll get sad. Thank you!”

“W-who’s George?”

There was a meow and a jingle noise and this black cat jumped up on the counter as this other man walked in from the back carrying some boxes. He placed them on the counter next to the cat and Kai began to pet the cat.

“Oh man, I think we got more Forget-Me-Nots this time!” The man behind the counter said. “Oh! We have a visitor?”

Kai began to sign him something and he seemed to understand her just fine.

“Well, pretty girl, you could have warned me. Hello, welcome to the shop. Enjoy anything here and if you need anything just ask for Kai or Jake,” the man introduced himself as he placed a kiss on Kai’s cheek, petting the cat and walking off.

Heeseung could feel his gut drop at the sight. He didn’t know why the sight angered him so much but it did and he couldn’t help but feel angry and disappointed. 

“I think it’s okay to drive now, how much do I owe you?” Heeseung stood up looking through his wallet and Kai began to shake her head.

Don’t worry about it.

“No, I can’t. Here. Thanks again.”

It’s my pleasure. Oh, take this! It’s still raining a bit

She took his hand and placed a pink flower umbrella in his hand and waved.

He stood there in a trance, he knew eventually he needed to move but he just wanted to stay. Jake came back, snapping him from his thoughts and Heeseung quickly took out a $20 bill and placed it on the table. He cleared his throat and quickly ran out of the shop. He needed to get out of there. He quickly got to his car and placed the umbrella on the seat, he never even used it but he kept it. He looked back at the girl in the shop, watched as she smiled along with the man next to her and he felt his jealousy rise inside. 

She probably just sees him as some rich chaebol, nothing more, but Heeseung knew she was going to be in his dreams.

[sunspira]

i often feel like the male socialization claim against trans women is bullshit but also has some "passing privilege" discourse aspects to it to unpack. and yet the specific damage and suffering of someone forced to pass and hide is sometimes HARDER to put into words and eats her from the inside out more insidiously and with less support systems for it or even Words for it just having words for misogyny can help us cope with the oppression be heard and validated and fight it when when youre a cis woman and have always be sure and assured that you are. that's why so many trans women are facing material oppression like poverty and mental illness (like actual mental illness caused by lifelong pain and trauma not the transphobic idea). tho even then there are such insidious, invisible aspects of misogyny that all women even we as cis girls are still trying to identify unpack and uplift each other out of so it's still a concern that runs deep. for me a lack of girls in stem is still so insidious and i would even give priority to helping more cis girls into stem because that pipeline to arts and humanities (and domestication) vs stem is pushed on kids and adolescents more subtly than the more obvious blantant misogyny. they don't outright say "oh you look like a boy to me you should work on computers" it comes in the form of subtle praise for one academic or life skill and subtle discouragement for another academic or life skill from adults who assigned your gender. so we say ya ok cool :) they're so proud of me :) not even cis women have put good words to it yet or figured out a good fight for it so we aren't really better off than trans girls in this aspect as we are on like more well established fights like autonomy in reproductive health or the right to vote or work

the passing privilege discourse thing to me isvery similar to a white passing person of color or a person with an invisible illness or disability or a gay guy who has a traditionally masculine personality. like a fem gay guy who was considered obviously gay since birth have problems that people who can kinda hide it don't and their childhood homophobia experiences were so different. tho still homophobia. but the people who can hide it are also forced to hide it, even from themselves!!?!. trans girls in childhood aren't visible girls until they come out. being closeted isn't a privilege but we know that invisibility vs hyper visibility are different kinds of pain that don't really counteract each other. also to be clear it's the aspect of being a GIRL that is invisible. often a trans girl is very visibly marginalized for not conforming to whatever a boy ks supposed to be. tho feminine boys and girls still have different experiences under misogyny where someone seen as a feminine boy is the indirect target. and how horrific that must be to homophobically / patriachically marginalized for not being the right kind of boy and on top of that like IM NOT EVEN A BOY LEAVE ME ALONE. it must be hell. it's not supposed to be about how easy it was for trans girls for fucks sake that's so deluded or that trans girls had the same experiences as cis het boys. it is usually just helpful to look at like opportunities and protections afforded to you by not being a visible girl like Mulan being encouraged and taken more seriously as Ping stuff like that is actually very healing to go over in your mind and process.

for me it was the dichotomy of having a serious but invisible childhood neurological disorder or difference but never being diagnosed until late in life early adulthood because i had atypical symptoms and was good in school. and i can't tell you how important it is formatively to be good in school and be able to blend in well enough to not get called out of class for extra help and not get bullied. but also the lack of help and slow invisible descent into madness and detachment from myself and denial of my own emotions and stressors and detachment from my soul while 24/7 masking and confusion every time i felt differently from what was expected like averse and avoidant and anxious or overwhelmed over "abnormal" things, or struggled with something that should be easy for "someone like me", i would just self gaslight and self deny and self blame. culminating in complete and total nervous mental breakdown at like 21 and at least a decade of recovery. with all that of COURSE i am sometimes gripped by envy of people who were diagnosed as young children as intended and spent their whole life knowing the most simple neurodivergent stuff about themselves like sensory overload because without that label when experiencing sensory overload i'm telling you it just seems like random bipolar mood swings, no wonder they put me on lithium. it was hell. and yet when i look at neurdivergent people who are so much more openly and obviously impaired than me and that increased NEED and severity is part of the reason they were dx'd in the first place, who are forced into abusive aba therapy and go nonverbal and want a relationship but struggle to connect with people irl or even go out or be allowed to go out. well i would never pretend like i have it harder in that regard even tho the experience of being undiagnosed were awful. not the cleanest comparison tho but

that hypervisibility vs invisibility thing. and the ramifications of being abused or controlled and silenced for a visible marginalization vs the life long debilitating scars and damage done by suppressed repressed and gaslighted marginalization is how i look at cis girls childhoods vs trans girls childhoods. cis hypervisible girlhood vs trans invisible girlhood. is this anything

[anxiously-going]

This is a vent about my personal experience. Experience which has been repeatedly invalidated to my face by actual people in real life. Me validating myself does not invalidate anyone else.

This is for me. I am validating myself after years of facing invalidating from other people. My experience is valid. And my experience being valid does not invalidate anyone else's personal experience. I want to make that abundantly clear because I've been on this platform for a while now and have never received anon hate, but I have a feeling that this may do it. So again.

Me validating myself does not invalidate other people's experiences. It is not my fault if anyone takes my personal, lived experience personally.

I am very tired of implications of things like clothes finding should be easy for me on the grounds that I am thin.

This is something I have dealt with my entire life and I am tired.

Things some people do not consider in this topic is that many clothes for thin people are also made for tall people, which I have never been. These clothes are also often made for people with narrow shoulders. Which I also do not have. The proportions of many clothes are unflatting or ill fitting for these reasons.

Another issue I find is that the clothing industry seems to be of the belief that if a person is thin, they must want to show off their body. While this is true for some and that's fine for them, I am not comfortable in clothing that has sheer waist bands or deep cut necklines or has very short hemlines.

I do not have a great excess of money and I never have. It was when I was younger and still is today, hard for me to find clothing that is affordable for me while still meeting my comfort level of modesty and fitting my short body.

There have been assumptions made to my face that I must not have any issue with clothing on the very simple grounds of my thinness. These assumptions have not factored in my height or my scoliosis. I have received comments about being able to shop in the children's section and how nice that must be. It is not nice. It is, in fact, humiliating.

I have been called gross and disgusting for my thinness. I have been questioned by doctors and other people in my life about my eating habits and eating disorders.

I have been told time and time again that I should be grateful for my thinness because of how much easier it is assumed to make my life and have felt silenced and in validated time and time again because my experiences are vastly different than what they are assumed to be and have been cut off or ignored when I tried to bring this up.

I did not ask for any of this.

From the time I was very little the thinness of the body that I was born into without choice has been forcibly made part of my identity. There have been many assumptions made about me and my experiences based on my thinness and when I have tried to say those assumptions are incorrect I have been met with pushback, with shock, with disbelief, with denial, and with flat out being told I am wrong about my experiences, and that I couldn't possibly have had any issues with my body image or with shopping because I am thin.

I have had the concepts of thin and pretty privilege shoved down my throat without any consideration of there being any other possible experiences. And I am very tired.

[weabooweedwitch]

I mean I guess from my perspective I've already explained myself pretty well, but I've had so many conversations with so many different people at this point that maybe some of it is blurring together. We ARE discussing the possibility of personality disorders that somewhat warp my perception of the truth and as I've said, I've pretty much lost the ability to empathize wirh her at all because, again, I'm constantly expected to put myself on the line for her bssicslly by obligation but when I need some emotional understanding or support, well, I get talked over, I get invalidated, I get mocked.

Oh text Miranda from across the house for a glass of water because you have a headache and emotionally badger her until she does it, but when she's so congested she can barely eat or breathe, let the litterbox literally start molding waiting for her to recover because 'I just don't like how it smells'. Oh, your super depressed daughter who's been physically abused by the husband you barely knew before getting married to is depressed and isn't going to school/doesn't have a job? Better make sure that any time you ask her for anything, if she doesn't feel like it, shove down her throat that she sits at home all day anyways while you're at work, but don't worry, when your daughter is the one working manual labor jobs and you're unemployed sitting on the couch all day, you'll just use AGE as an excuse and still badger and insult her when she's too sore to get out of bed! When I was A CHILD literally falling apart from clear mental illness and literal actual disability, I'm told I need to exercise more, im told "oh you're like a self fulfilling prophecy, it's like you WANT to be this way, it's like you give up and MAKE bad things happen to you" but when she wastes DECADES going to doctors trying to investigate issues that are just symptoms of things she already diagnosed with I'm just the absolute fucking devil for implying the reason why her body aches is because she's been overweight and physically sedentary fir big portions of her life and she barely gets any vitamin D let alone exercise

Oh, I need to apply myself more, oh, I need to have more confidence in myself, oh I need to buy things for myself if I want them, but then I start buying things for my hair and my skin and makeup because I like those things and there are also problems I am legitimately trying to fix and then it's "oh you're overdoing it, oh you're wasting money, oh you're making it worse, oh are you even researching any of this" when she's the one telling me stupid bullshit like "when you shave it grows back thicker, I had a friend in my younger days that was a dermatologist and that was what she said" 🙄

All the times she lost jobs because she just kept oversleeping and oversleeping or quit just because she lost her temper and suddenly we're on foodstamps and going to pantries again. Having to get cars every few years because she treats them poorly and they keep breaking down and then she has to take out loans or make payments to get another shitty car and then she'll forget about older payments until they're being sent to collections and they're coming after her (she literally doesn't answer her phone unless she's expecting a call because she's gotten collections calls for YEARS) and now there's stuff on my credit report because she put shit in my name and forgot about them

I literally keep turning around and there are LISTS of mistakes she had made that have significant and often financial consequences and she does them over and over and over! There were times she was taking out loans to try and get degrees and literally finished none of them. Cosmetology school, TWICE. A community college for idk a computer degree or something, never finished. Something for university of Phoenix, never finished

My public school education was DESTROYED by the constant moving. I had problems brushing my teeth as a kid ao she LIED TO ME and said I had cavities and never told me the truth until YEARS later and by that point I had stopped brushing my teeth BECAUSE OF HER LIE because it made me more depressed and told me everything was pointless.

I guess I'm just a shitty person and I'll never change, idk, I dunno what im supposed to do to fix things. I think I'm beginning to realize I'm just a shitty person who was born wrong and maybe its time I stop burning myself out for everyone else when i still have to fix my ken problems, or, something. I get talked over and invalidated at home, in the past at school, and now as an adult it's at work. It's draining. If no one wants to listen to me then I'll just keep being bitter and shitty on my own terms and just marinate innit until I finally get the stones to take some sort of action, whatever that may be, positive, negative, hopefully a positive change obviously but you never know

I'm so exhausted at this point that sometimes it really is just "shrug shrug guess I don't care anymore". It's not like I want to be this way. I'm trying. To be better. I'm trying to be perfect. And it's just never going to happen.

[probono10]

I created a secret account so no one can find me, but here’s my story.

When I was 12, I was raped and molested by my step father. This caused me to do SH and developed an ED. I struggled with this for a long time until I had kids in high school. It didn’t last long with the recovering period. I gained a lot of weight from my starting weight at 123. I was up to 212. Lucky, I breast fed and I lost most of the weight and got down to 140. When my youngest was 10 months, I started back up again. My kids are 17 months apart, so that kind of tells you how long the briefing period was. But I started back up again.

I became so unhappy with my body, being a teenager, and having loose skin and deep stretch marks, I lost my mind. I unintentionally stopped when I thought I found the one after my divorce. My family made me get married at 16 when I was pregnant because it was a super religious household, we separated when I hit 20. At 24, my boyfriend at the time had been lying to me for years, he cheated and the girl was pregnant. He told me it was his and he left me. I was so devised. I lost myself and attempted to take everything away. I survived, after my heart stopped and the hospital resuscitated me after the OD. I willingly went to the hospital because I regretted my decision 2 days later from the pain and sickness. But it doesn’t stop here..

Close to a year later, my boyfriend and I still lived with each other. He confessed that he lied about the whole thing because he started to hate me. I still don’t believe anything he said. I had the photos of her and him together, kicker she is married. But denied any sex. Even though I cleaned show car and I found the stains in the back. To this day he won’t tell me or talk about it even though it eats me alive. During that year, I had to get an abortion because I didn’t want him to have too much pressure on him raising kid number 6. I was just so broken, and so lost myself, but faked a smile so he wouldn’t see the pain I felt every moment of my life. In that year he changed. He became nicer to me, and made me feel loved. I begged for that for months, and I was always rejected. When I stopped loving him he started to love me. It took a while before I could say I love you back.

We just started dating after asking me out that April. But it took so much to even start to forgive. I was just so broken and betrayed.

Two years later, I thought I was cleared of my ED, after fighting it through the OD and heartbreak. But I started getting sick. I thought this had to be my ED again. But it never stopped, I wasn’t vomiting myself anymore, I wasn’t starving myself anymore. I was diagnosed with gastroparesis. My stomach doesn’t work anymore, and doctors say it’s from an unknown cause. I think it’s because I’ve had Ana and Mia in my life for over 15 years now.

I can no longer eat without vomiting, and I don’t have an appetite. I have a port for the past couple of years for TPN, hydrationand medication due to not being able to hold anything in my stomach. Last year this illness put me in a coma, and it’s so hard to stay a float for myself or my family.

I feel like I’m in the same boat as I was when it took over my life. Mentally I have an eating disorder now, because my body can’t tolerate anything going in my body. I have a new outlook on relationship with food. I feel so lost and I don’t have anyone to turn to after this. Because now both illness have taken over my life. I don’t want to lose weight and I don’t want to gain it, I don’t want to be where I’m at today because I’m no longer normal. But will never be the same.

So I downloaded this app to watch from both stand points of handling eating disorders and chronic medical conditions, because now they’re a grey area. If anyone needs to talk or wants to know more, I’m an open book. I don’t have anything to hide. We all fight our own battles. We all have different stories, but we all need someone to listen and understand with no judgment attached.

[dandelioncasey]

So this little rant/vent/whatever was inspired by a great post by @scientia-rex which I will link below

It gave me a lot of thoughts but due to the topic I didn't feel right putting them in the comments or tags, so they're going here under the cut

TW FOR EATING DISORDER, EATING DISORDER RECOVERY, FATPHOBIA, MEDICAL BULLSHIT, AND ANYTHING ELSE YOU CAN THINK OF THAT GOES ALONG WITH THAT

Between the summer of 2021 and the spring of 2022 I dropped from 23st to just above 17st. For those who don't feel up to converting numbers right now, that's a loss of around 38 kilos.

I did this after endless comments from my doctor and my mother and people around me that my weight was unhealthy and that I needed to be skinnier. Essentially, all I heard from everyone was that Fat Is Bad and it was a Problem. I internalised a lot of those messages and I was determined to 'fix' it.

I was also determined to 'not be like those other people' who develop unhealthy habits...yeah, that didn't happen. I won't go into incredible detail, but I was working out for an hour or two of intense calorie burning exercise every single day, and I was tracking every single thing I ate on a spreadsheet which measured the fat, the sugar, the salt, anything you can find on a nutrition label.

I don't remember much of how it started but I believe the thought process was that I couldn't under or overeat if I was tracking what I ate and planned it all out. I even told my doctor I was exercising more and planning my meals in advance (although not quite the extent to which I was doing it) and he was thrilled, because my weight was, and to some extent still is, the first and only thing medical professionals see about me.

In case it isn't clear, I was never diagnosed with anorexia or bulimia or BED, but I very much still had an eating disorder. If my doctor had asked more questions, if my mother hadn't pushed me so hard, maybe things would be different...but that's not what happened.

By the early spring of 2022 I had already lost five stone...I had also lost most of my enjoyment in food, quite a lot of my motivation, and any desire to carry on. I was exhausted and dizzy all of the time. I couldn't concentrate, I was sick all the time... essentially, I had most of the symptoms of malnutrition.

Every time my family would get a 'treat day', for my birthday, for Christmas, whatever the occasion was, I planned into my spreadsheet how many meals I would need to skip to make up for the unexpected calories I was taking in, and the breaks from my workout that I was taking as it got more and more difficult to carry on.

Just because I was writing it all down doesn't mean that I was being healthy, and just because my doctor approved (from what he knew of it) doesn't mean I should have carried on. I looked at the numbers on the scale and I was proud of myself, but my body was eating itself alive because at the worst of it I was consuming not even 1/5 of what I was burning in a day.

By the end of spring last year, my sister sat me down for a reality check. She'd been away for a while and she'd come home to find me sitting on the kitchen floor crying, because my mother had bought herself a cake for her birthday and the smell of it was making me ill.

I won't elaborate on what we discussed, but the upshot ofnthe whole thing is I stopped (or at least tried to stop) being so restrictive of everything - I let myself have days off and tried to not feel guilty, I ate when I was hungry and not when the alarm went off to tell me to defrost and reheat my turkey wholewheat pasta with no sauce or cheese. And I absolutely hated myself for it.

Don't get me wrong, looking back I can see that that was a very dangerous way to try and lose weight, but I had internalised the words of the people around me so much that I hated every single part of my body, every movement, every shift or wobble or jiggle that I saw in the mirror - because Fat Is Bad.

I haven't weighed myself since last summer, when I looked at the scales and burst into tears because the number had gone back up. My doctors have to record my weight because of the medication I take but I refuse to look because I don't want to know anymore.

Despite my best efforts, sometimes I still compulsively check the nutrition of the foods I buy, even down to a jar of curry sauce or a premixed salad. I have to get other people to order for me when we get treat days, because I can't eat if I look at the calorie information on the menus. And I still feel compelled to 'make up' for workouts that I skip by doing double the next day.

I don't really know what the point of this was, I just needed to get it out I guess, because that post brought up a LOT of feelings that I needed to let out. If you're still reading, thank you I guess?? But please don't take anything in this post as being advice - I cannot stress enough that I could have died if my sister didn't give me that reality check and I will be dealing with this for probably years if not the rest of my life.

[anyoneseenadam]

hi! I was wondering if you could do an azriel x reader where you both are best friends but the mating bond between you both snaps into place after he falls in love with elain? You can take it ahead from there, make it super angsty or with a happy ending, it’s up to you!

pairing: azriel x reader (acotar)

warnings: really fucking angsty but a kinda happy ending, eating disorders and depression and self harm so big TW

a/n: i made this archeron!reader cause i’ve had this idea for ages and as a youngest sibling it kinda speaks to me lol, also it’s very long cause I have no chill so I hope you enjoy!! <33

——————————————————————————

When you were younger you had grown up jealous of your older sister. Beautiful Elain.

She had everything you wanted, clear skin and shining hair, she had a polite smile and never embarrassed herself while getting excited. You were the youngest of your family, and coincidently the smartest, but you never had the grace your elder sisters carried.

Your childhood was different as well, you would steal books from stalls, your hands quick and unnoticeable, much alike the rest of you. You became the mother in the house, where Feyre protected the three of you and kept you fed, you kept them smiling, pushing your sisters needs above your own and letting their problems weigh on your shoulders instead of theirs.

You would make handmade ointments with plants when they got ill. You would sit and let them rant to you. You calmed Nesta down and helped Feyre keep the house running, always ensuring it was clean and as warm as you could make it. And you really tried.

You tried not to despise them for allowing so many burdens to fall on your shoulders. You tried not to hate Nesta for never uttering a word of thanks when you cleaned up after her, and you tried not to let Elain’s careless words about your figure get to you. But a child can only take so much, so when you were forced into the cauldron, crying out for your elder sisters, you decided you wouldn’t allow yourself to be walked all over again.

But alas, after the war things carried on as usual.

You were cleaning up after them again. Tidying Nesta’s apartment in silence while she partied, helping Feyre through her trauma with comforting words, braiding Elain’s hair back and trying to ignore her pointed glances at the dinner table.

Not everything was the same though. A major difference stood in the form of the spymaster for the night court, Azriel. Soon after you had changed you had realised. He was your mate.

At first you were elated, finally having something to yourself, someone you didn’t have to share, someone who was wholly yours. You imagined your life with him; dates and flowers, picnics and falling asleep under the stars, soft declarations of love and most importantly, someone to finally defend you, someone on your side.

But in the horrible pattern that was your life, nothing turned out that way. You went to speak to him a couple weeks after you realised, steeling your nerves, and trying to quell the nausea in your stomach. But when you mustered the courage to mutter a small “hi,” he barely responded, his gaze trained on Elain.

And then you realised, a realisation that shuddered through your entire body and broke your heart so badly you knew it would never fully heal.

He was in love with Elain. Your mate was in love with your sister.

You cried all night, a hand over your mouth to keep the sobs quiet, never wanting to burden anyone the way you were sure you already did. But the next morning, you rose. You washed your face, wiping away any stray tears and you plastered on the perfectly taught smile, hiding any signs of your struggle.

You truly thought no one had noticed but Mor knew acting when she saw it, and you were a master. She saw the way your smile drooped slightly, the way your eyes would darken, loosing the light that often danced in them. She heard your words lose character as people stopped listening, and she watched as you allowed yourself to be talked over, corrected, changed, with no fight.

At first she just thought that you had gone through such a traumatising experience that it was sticking but when even after the war you never truly smiled the way you used to, hiding in your room and spending your days at a piano, or with your head buried in a book, she knew it had to be more than that.

Then she noticed the way you started dressing primarily in an oversized hoodie you had stolen from Cassian, the jumper swallowing you whole. The one time she saw you out of it she understood why. She was walking past your door and saw it cracked open, watching as you stood in front of the mirror, crying as you examined your changed, body and the dried blood on the inside of your wrists. You were thin, too thin.

She confronted you the next day, your body feeling too hot as she asked you if you were okay, holding you when you broke down in tears. She stayed with you for hours, stroking your back gently when you whispered to her.

“He’s my mate.”

That confused her and she hummed, pushing you to elaborate when you spoke.

“Azriel. He’s my mate and he’s in love with Elain.” Mor looked in your eyes then as you sat up and her heart clenched painfully as she realised the extent of the pain you were in. “I think I could survive if it were just you he was still in love with. Or Amren, or anyone else. But it’s always her, they always choose her.”

“(Y/n)” she whispered, no idea what to say.

“The first guy I ever dated broke up with me after months because he was just trying to get closer to Elain all along. And I try so hard, I try to be pretty like her, and I try to be polite and different. But I can’t.”

“You don’t have to different sweetie, you’re an incredible woman.” Mor stroked your hair as you huffed out a bitter laugh.

“Men don’t usually want women with opinions, women who are smarter than them. They want pets, docile pets who will sit and look pretty while they impress everyone.” You knew you were being unfair, that Azriel was nothing like that, but you couldn’t help yourself.

“I know, but men like that aren’t worth your time. Have you told him?”

“He doesn’t speak to me.” You shook your head, “I tried, a bit after I first found out. But he couldn’t take his eyes off her for long enough to have a conversation like that. And I don’t want to tell him only to see the disappointment.”

Mor wanted to throttle Azriel for hurting you so much. You were so kind, putting everyone’s needs above your own, always offering to do the jobs no one wanted, or to help someone with anything. But this time she decided you would have to put yourself first.

“You need to tell him, I think he likes you more than you think,” she smiled softly, remembering all the times she had caught him laughing at your jokes, or the subtle expressions of awe when they watched you explain complicated theories and ideas to them.

But you shook your head again, looking down sadly. “He’s too good, and he’s been through so much. He deserves to be happy, and I will not take that from him.”

Mor wanted to say more, but instead just squeezed your hand before standing to go get you some food. You and Rhysand really should form a club she thought as she left the room, not missing the way your stare turned blank as the emotions drained out of you.

--

When Nesta started her training, Mor suggested you went. She had become your best friend and desperately wanted to see you get better, so after much pleading you had conceded.

Nesta and you had started getting along better which also helped. Shared dark humour and a knack for dragging men’s ego through the mud giving you much to laugh about. She had looked at you differently since the day you took your hoodie off during training, revealing your body which was building itself back into shape, but also the thin, white scars that littered your forearms.

Cassian and Azriel also noticed, but while Cassian pulled you into a bone crushing hug after training when you were alone, Azriel simply pondered how he hadn’t noticed.

The truth was he really liked you. Elain was beautiful and the perfect distraction form Mor, she also fuelled the perfect image in his head of his own Archeron mate. But you were so funny, sending jabs Cassian’s way to ensure he stayed grounded, and you were so smart, always having a plan, and seemingly knowing the perfect quote for every occasion. And as the youngest, sometimes they all got glimpses of your childlike joy, your innocence astounding when you spoke about the things you loved, your hands moving so quickly as you explained complicated things no one else could make heads or tails off.

His crush on you grew as he got to know you better, and he started wishing he had noticed you first. But you didn’t often speak to him, shying away and tucking your arms around yourself, almost shielding yourself from him.

Once, when you were searching for paper, needing a list to organise your thoughts and to fully plan your day, your brain so loud that you couldn’t decipher it, her had pulled a notebook and pen out of his pocket. He had begun noticing the way you scribbled on whatever you could find and when he heard you joke about getting ink poisoning from the amount of writing on your hands and legs he had gone and bought you a notebook.

You had thanked him and gone to hand it back when you were finished but he insisted you keep it, blushing when you looked up at him with an unreadable expression in your eyes. Scrambling for an excuse he had mentioned something about Elain mentioning you needed one, growing even more confused when your face fell, your unreadable mask slipping back on as you thanked him again and excused yourself.

You had cried again that night, new marks joining the old scars as you tore out the page of your diary counting your days clean.

The next day at training your hoodie was back on.

--

Your relationship with Elain was worse than ever. You kept snapping at her, no longer helping her with all her problems. Mor insisted that you needed to learn how to say no, but Elain was looking at you like you were someone completely new. And in a way you were.

But that didn’t stop the backhanded compliments she gave. You knew she never meant them in a mean way, but everyone was like another dagger being plunged into your heart.

How could she not know, how was she so oblivious to how you compared yourself to her, the childhood jealously never leaving. You had grown into your figure and had become an impressive woman yourself but old insecurities were never going to leave you and so you continued hiding, seeing your family less and less.

Feyre had started joining Mor when she came to see you. The three of you sitting together and talking about anything, they would take you shopping, you would sing to them, laughing when Mor joined in horribly off-key. Feyre and Rhysand had found out about Azriel being your mate. You struggled keeping things from Feyre, her motherly tone always managing to pull secrets from you and of course she struggled even more with her mate.

She had apologised profusely when it slipped out, Rhys joining you shopping. But you had assured it was okay, not without a million threats directed Rhys’ way, swearing him into silence.

You had also started training more with Azriel, much to your dismay and his delight. He had noticed your quick fingers and talent when it came to sleight of hand, laughing when he asked and found out how you used to steal books, never getting caught by simply pretending you were illiterate. That had confused him and led to you explaining how you would wander off and explore as a child, only to be mistaken for a pupil in a local school you couldn’t afford. By the time the mistake was realised you could already read, and a kind teacher tutored you until you could write as well.

He had smiled at you then, joking that you could probably have his job and you had truly laughed, leaning into him slightly making his heart warm. But as silence fell again and you remembered the truth you excused yourself, desperate to get away and the frail relationship you had formed with him during training turning back to ice.

--

It was a regular afternoon when it all came to climax.

You had ventured out of the comfort of your room, the sarcastic comments about it only making your anxiety skyrocket as you wondered why you bothered at all. But you just laughed lightly and sat down, pulling your knees to your chest as you buried yourself in your favourite book.

“Are you ever going to put a different bit of clothing on?” Elain asked suddenly and you felt the heat spread through your cheeks as everyone looked over, Mor’s eyes panicked.

“I-I like this one,” you tried to explain, already on the verge of tears, your emotional state so fragile that a couple harsh words would send you spiralling.

“I get that, but sometimes don’t you want to dress more ladylike?” her tone was still gentle but your hands shook as you moved to explain yourself.

“Well gender isn’t real so what I wear doesn’t determine that at all and I figured I should wear something I’m more comfortable in,” your words were rushed, and you could feel your face getting unbearably hot, your knee tapping to release some of the nervous energy.

“What do you mean gender isn’t real?” Cassian asked, tone incredulous.

“Well it’s a social construct, nothing about it actually determines how you should act, dress or, anything like that.” You explained, hating all the eyes being trained on you as Cassian nodded.

“You could still try I mean,” Elain tried to explain, “Ladylike was poor choice of words but I mean dress well, look after yourself.”

“I have been!” you tried to defend yourself, but your voice was getting smaller as you shrunk into yourself.

“Oh please explain how,” she sounded angrier now and Feyre said her name in warning. Elain was unbelievably sweet, but Feyre and Nesta had noticed her habit of picking on you as a child, just little things, the only person she ever truly argued with was you.

“I ate today,” you stated, and she frowned.

“That’s not what I meant,” she tried to explain but you could feel the anger building in you.

“Then what did you mean?!” you shouted, emotions tumbling over, “What do I have to put on a pretty dress every day? Wash my face?  Get something productive done? Is it not enough that some days I get out of bed when I think I can’t? Or that I eat a full meal? Or how about the fact that I’ve gone two weeks without cutting my fucking wrists?!”

Elain physically stumbled back when you stood up, your rage growing with in you. “Everything I do is to make you or someone else happy, but I have been trying so hard to make myself happier and I can only do so much at once, so don’t you dare try tell me I’m not trying because you have no idea how much fucking effort I am putting in to staying alive every day!”

The tears that had grown in your eyes were spilling over as Feyre stood and went to take your arm, but you wrenched out of her grip. “You ruined me! I did everything for you, I helped with everything, and you act as if I am this fucking spoiled brat, as if I didn’t practically raise you!” you whirled around then, pointing a finger at Nesta too. “I was the youngest, yet I had to deal with everything and then I finally take some time to deal with my own problems and suddenly I’m this monster who isn’t even trying to be presentable!”

You huffed a laugh as you looked around the room at the shocked faces, “Well surprise everyone! This is what I’m actually like, and you wonder why I fucking act around you all.” You were so full of self-loathing that each words made more tears flow over.

Then Azriel said your name softly, moving to stand and you moved away so fast, flinching as if he was going to strike you. “NO, you- you don’t get to,” you choked on your words and Feyre grabbed your arm again as he looked at you, confusion written all over his face.

“(y/n) I deal with this stuff too, lets just go talk about it,” he begged. He wasn’t sure why he hated seeing you hurt so much but t was tearing at him and all he wanted was to pull you into his chest and protect you from the world.

Instead of replying however you just turned into your sisters’ arms, allowing her to lead you away from the room as they all sat in silence, Elain wiping stray tears from her face.

“How did none of you notice,” Mor asked quietly and Azriel felt guilt sear through him.

“We did, but when we spoke to her she promised us she was better,” Cassian explained, nodding in Azriel’s direction.

Nesta huffed a laugh at that, “She was a natural born liar.”

--

When Elain came to speak to you, you had both cried as you apologised to each other, frail arms being wrapped around shoulders. You had both been lying together in silence afterword’s, your older sister stroking your hair lightly when you told her.

“He’s my mate,” she looked down in confusion when you spoke, but you continued. “He’s my mate but either he doesn’t know, or he knows and doesn’t care, because either way he’s in love with you not me.”

Elain didn’t know what to say as she realised who you meant, “How long have you known?” she asked, and you laughed bitterly.

“Since we got turned, I tried to tell him, but it was pointless, he doesn’t want me.” You whispered, eyes filling with tears you thought you must have cried out by now.

Elain felt guilt seize her and leant down, pressing a kiss into your hair, “I’m sorry.”

“S’not your fault,” you shook your head, “No its no one’s fault just bad fucking luck.”

She sighed, stroking a hand over your head as she let you cry to her, finally paying you back for all the times you had done this for her.

--

Azriel wasn’t in a much better state. The bond had clicked, and you were nowhere to be seen.

It seemed like he was being kept away from you. You weren’t coming to training anymore, instead working out with Mor in the evenings. You also were eating separately, from him at least, and every time he asked to see you someone came up with a half assed excuse.

He wasn’t stupid, he had realised what had happened. But he was aching as he desperately wanted to fine you and apologise over and over again. He would fall to his knees and beg your forgiveness, offer you his entire heart willingly. He trusted you could look after it.

But whenever he thought of you, of his smart little mate, the smile that came at the thought of you was always wiped away quickly as he remembered that you had similarly tried to give him your heart, only for him to drop it onto the floor as he chased another. And when he had come back to see it again, it was no surprise that you would lock it away, protect its broken shape, only allowing yourself near it not realising you were doing most of the abusing.

“I need your help,” he had finally said to Rhysand, his brother looking up slightly shocked. “She’s my mate, and I’m pretty sure knows, and I’ve really fucked up.”

“I know,” Rhys said and Azriel’s heart clenched.

“How long has she known?” he asked, fearing the answer.

“Since they were turned, Feyre told me that she tried to tell you but…” he trailed of and Azriel slumped forward in his seat.

“What do I do?” he asked, desperation lacing his words and Rhys sighed.

“You need to speak to her,”

“I’ve tried, were you aware that the Archeron’s are a rather stubborn family,”

Rhys laughed at that, “I’ve noticed, what if we found away to draw her out, official ceremony?”

“No, too many people, she doesn’t like crowds,” Azriel was looking out the window as he came up with ideas, not noticing the soft look his brother gave him.

“You seem to know her well,” he commented and Azriel laughed,

“I’m not very good at showing my feelings, and to be honest I didn’t know what my feelings for her were. I’d never felt anything like it.”

Rhys nodded, “I have no idea then, I’m sorry.”

Azriel shook his head with a laugh, “you know who’d come up with the perfect plan for this.”

Rhys laughed at the irony, “Good thing in her place you have Cass and I, we’re both experts in romantic gestures,”

“Yeah you tell yourself that.”

“Well we’re experts in distracting Archeron women then.” That Azriel couldn’t disagree with.

--

The next morning Azriel sat down at his desk, pen in hand. He needed a plan and you always got one by writing down your thoughts so he thought, since you were mates, maybe the same could help him.

He put a bullet point list down, writing down everything he needed to do in neat, perfect handwriting, then he added small boxes next to it. He smiled when he was done, the list looking similar to the ones he found scribbled around the house. He had often picked them up, smiling at the notes you had written saying things such as ‘go drink some water u dehydrated bitch’ or his personal favourite ‘punch a misogynist’ though sadly that one hadn’t been ticked off.

He then set off, heading to the local library where he found what he had been looking for. It was the original copy of your favourite book, the pages yellowed and creased but he new you would adore it. He picked up a coffee and some sweets for you on the way home, steeling his nerves as he wandered up to your bedroom.

He rapped his knuckles against the door gently, unable to help the smile that came across his face when he heard your soft steps cross the room. You opened the door, peaking out with wary, red eyes and his heart panged when he realised you had been crying.

“Can I come in?” he asked gently, showing you the coffee and you nodded, opening the door further to allow him to step into your room, closing the door behind him as he took in your primary living space.

The room was incredible. You had incredibly lifelike, black, and white pictures on your walls, ones of the family but also ones of parties, and beautiful landscapes. There was also a considerable amount of art on the walls, some in Feyre’s style, but the others he presumed you had done yourself, considering the paint-stained desk.

He reached a hand to one of the black and white pictures in awe as you came up besides him. “They’re called photographs, I read about the concept and figured it out. They take a while to develop, and I can’t get colour but it’s a work in progress.”

He turned to you in shock, “How does it work?”

You picked up a funny looking, roughly made object and tapped a glass lens on it, “This takes all the light rays bouncing around and redirects them to a single point, creating a sharp image. From there it can be transferred onto this,” she picked up a flimsy looking material, “Then the memory exists in physical form.”

“You figured all that out yourself?” he stared at her in wonder as she shrugged.

“As I said, I read a theory about it in one of Rhysands books, I just had to figure out glass density and to find a light sensitive material.” You were blushing under his stare, embarrassment flooding through you. “It’s really just a work in progress.”

“You’re incredible,” he muttered, and you turned away, hurt clear in your eyes.

“What do you want Azriel?” he bit down on his tongue as disappointment and regret flooded through him.

“I found this at the library, and I knew it was your favourite, and then I was stopping by anyway,” he gestured to the sweets and coffee he laid on your desk and you smiled at him softly, muttering a small ‘thank you’.

You sat down on the edge of your bed, holding the coffee that you noticed was your exact order, and trying not to let his acts of kindness get to you.

“I’m so sorry.” His words cut through the silence, and you inhaled sharply, moving to take a sip to avoid having to speak, or look up for that matter. “I know that doesn’t nearly cut it and I’ve been such a jerk and treated you like shit, but I need you to know that I love you. I have for a while.”

You were crying again and Azriel hated himself for fucking it up so much again. “No, no you love Elain,” you tried to tell him, shaking you head.

His heart broke and he knelt before you, lifting your face with his hands as you stared at him with tear filled eyes. “I love you (y/n), you’re my mate, you’re the girl I love.”

“You know.” Your face fell completely, and you pushed him away, standing and moving to the other side of the room.

“I do, but it doesn’t change anything, I loved you before I knew.” You were shaking your head as he spoke, sobbing into your hands.

“NO! No you’re in love with the idea of me, you’re in love with having a mate. There’s a difference.”

He moved closer to you again, reaching for you, his eyes filling with tears when you pulled away again, moving as far away from him as you could.

“Let me explain (y/n), baby please. I understand what I was feeling now, I even made a list,” he begged, nerves easing when you smiled slightly at the mention of a list, so he continued, “I wasn’t in love with Elain, not really. Like you said, I was in love with the idea of her, of having a mate, but then I started speaking to you more and I thought it was just a crush, but I actually love you. I loved you first because I never loved Elain, not really.”

“You’re just saying that” you said, voice sad and broken as he stepped closer, relief coursing through him when you didn’t run again, pulling you into his arms and holding you gently as if you were made of fine china.

“I’m not, I’m not. I love you.” He whispered into your hair as you wound your arms around his torso, chin tilting up to look at him through glassy, tear filled eyes, “And I will spend the rest of my life making up for hurting you.”

He leant down, resting his forehead against yours and you inhaled shakily, “I love you, so much,” you whispered, your voice rough from crying.

He couldn’t help his grin as he brought a hand to your face, wiping away the stray tears before tilting your head up from your chin and pressing a gentle kiss to your mouth. You instantly melted against him, moulding into one as you finally kissed, all your love being pushed from one to another as you finally joined together as one.

You pulled away all too soon for his liking and he whined but you just giggled, pulling him over the mirror that stood on your floor, grabbing the strange device, and posing him so he stood behind you, rms wrapped around your waist and chin resting on your head. You lifted the device and held it to your eye, squinting slightly before pressing a button on top, the two of you standing in that form for a few moments more.

Eventually a blank film was printed but as she put it in a darkened space, Azriel watching her work meticulously he smiled before pulling her away and in for another kiss, one that signified that start of a life of love.

[damiano-mylove]

Members of Måneskin with a mentally ill/disordered S/O

Illnesses included: Depression, ADD, Tourette's and PTSD (so warnings for that and SH, drug usage, isolation, and heavy topics in general) *Masterlist*

This was a collaborative effort between Nik, Lina, Lute and two unnamed but very appreciated people - all of us afflicted with the varying illnesses above

Vic

Vic would take an empathetic approach to your illness/disorder (relating to you, researching, never pitying)

Depression

Vic would take a more of a nurturing role to your sadness

On the more sad days, Vic would nap with you for a little bit but she'd get to a point where enough would be enough

She would coax you out of bed in ways that appeal to you more than you'd ever care to admit, starting out with just getting you to eat somewhere else than in bed, then eventually moving up to showering, etcetera, etcetera

Vic would be very acutely tuned toward your needs, and she always fulfilled

It broke her heart that you were so sad, but she could relate and that made it a lighter burden on your back

When you first told her, Vic just went silent, then hugged you for a long time

ADD

Vic wouldn't be as supportive in this, but not in a neglectful way

She had a way of getting your attention back on the topic at hand, but sometimes she was just as bad as you for getting away from the main point

The impulsivity, she wasn't the biggest fan of, but you two worked through it like adults

When you'd forget things, Vic wouldn't get annoyed - but she would always remind you when you forgot what you needed to remember

Also, she was the best for finding misplaced things

PTSD

Vic would be very careful to avoid your triggers, however she never felt as if she was walking on eggshells

Before you were able to fully tell her what happened, Vic would never force you to tell her anything you weren't already ready to tell her of your own accord

There was no way she couldn't feel a bit sorry for you, but she never showed it, and she certainly didn't pity you - she just was sorry that something happened to you to give you PTSD

She would be mindful to never act as if she would be able to fix you

Tourette's

It didn't annoy her as much as you thought it surely would - especially since you had been trying to keep the tics at bay in the beginning of your relationship

Vic usually went on like nothing happened when you'd tic, but sometimes she'd laugh if your tics would hit her

Vic would proudly go out with you, even though you were scared about the looks you'd get on the street, but she never minded because she loved you and she wanted to show you that she loved you

Thomas

Thomas would take a supportive approach to your illness/disorder (reminding you to take your meds, making appointments for you if you'd ask, doing anything he could to make you feel better)

Depression

Thomas would always be the perfect person who would just shut the fuck up and cuddle you, but he would only do it if you'd ask because he knew sometimes you didn't feel like being around people

Wasn't really trained in any of this so he just cared for you like he'd like to be cared for

He was doing his best, and it was apparent, but sometimes you'd have to tell him what not to do and what to do

Of course, Thomas wouldn't bat an eye to stop or start doing anything at the raise of your finger - whether it be rub your back or let you be alone for a bit

He understood that he alone could not cure your depression, but he understood that he would be around for the ride, if you would have him

When you first told Thomas, he was silent, just nodding. He asked you a few very respectful questions but would never dream of pushing you. He would rub your knee and assure you of his love for you, no matter what

ADD

Honestly, Thomas didn't know what ADD was, at first

He googled it, then thought better to just ask you for a primary source

During nights where you couldn't sleep, Thomas would be right beside you, not sleeping either, which wasn't healthy for either of you, but it sure as Hell made you feel less lonely

Thomas lost shit and things all the time, so he never judged you for that, and his memory was potentially worse than yours so who was he to speak on that

But he was extremely good at getting you to finish tasks before moving on (sometimes just finishing them himself)

PTSD

Again, didn't exactly know what it entailed at first, but asked you a few questions to clear the air

Thomas would lead you through deep breathing exercises (unless you told him not to) when you were triggered and started losing control

Would always do anything and everything he could to avoid triggers with you

He would he more than patient with you

Tourette's

He would find some of your tics endearing (not harmful ones)

At one point, you'd even developed a verbal tic saying Thomas' name, which he always chuckled at and responded to you every single time as if you'd requested his presence, each time with a new pet name and a smile

If your tics would hit him by accident, you would apologize profusely, but Thomas would always laugh and brush it off

During tic attacks, he knew to just let you be, unless you would stop breathing, then he would certainly step in

He would ask his doctor a "hypothetical" about how to help someone through a tic attack, then used that advice forevermore, and it usually made a helpful difference

Ethan

Ethan would take a companion role (letting you take the lead, showing him what would happen and what to do to help, always listening to you before making his own move)

Depression

He'd dealt with depression before, but thoroughly understood that everyone is different in how they display mental illness

Ethan would recognize what to do, but would ask you for confirmation before acting upon anything that had potential to make a difference

On days where you couldn't leave your bed, he would bring you food (not a steak dinner, but he would definitely bring you soup or toast or a sandwich)

On days where you couldn't shower, he'd either be in the shower with you, or he'd draw you a bath instead, or he'd buy dry shampoo and sanitary wipes (those would be the last case, because he didn't want to throw off your pH)

He would assure you of his love and that you didn't burden him whatsoever

You were suffering, and you didn't make him suffer, but he did take some of that suffering from you

ADD

Certain times, I regret to say, he may get slightly annoyed, but not for long and not to the point of icing you out or anything

Ethan always found things to keep your mind occupied (watching Monty Python (actually a great programme for AD(H)D people), intricate games, new books, etc)

The best at finding lost things, and also has the best memory under the sun

Your symptoms wouldn't bother Ethan, save for constantly speaking (which can get a little annoying during a film or something)

PTSD

Would basically just go one with life - he would avoid all things relating to your triggers and PTSD - but otherwise, it would be business as per usual

If you got triggered, he would be by your side and on your side

He would do anything; deep breathing, distractions, grounding, getting your meds, anything

Ethan would always let you speak about it, when you'd want to, but otherwise treated you the exact same way as he had before you told him

Tourette's

He's always looking for something to joke about, and sometimes your tics provide just the material

He wouldn't dream of taking the piss out of the harmful or mean tics, but if you were laughing, then he was sure to be laughing as well

If your tics involved a bird whistle, he'd call you his 'little red bird' but wouldn't anymore if that upset you

Tourette's are a tough subject to joke about, but Ethan would always listen if you told him it was offensive, unfunny, or just a bad joke and Ethan would always take it in good humour and apologize

Most of the time though, he could make some funny fucking comments

Damiano

Damiano would take a nonchalant approach (not explicitly talking about it, never take the spotlight off you (if he could help it), try his best to help you through any challenges without making you feel like you were an inconvenience to him

Depression

He was your best friend before he was your lover

As such, you were always able to talk to Damiano about your depression anytime you felt it getting bad, as to warn him

Damiano would never leave your side, unless you told him to, but he'd always have a film on in the back, or he'd play with your hair, or distract you by brushing your hair or having you help him pick out an outfit

He enjoyed cleaning, so your bedroom would never become a depression room, and that helped get you out of your slumps most of the time

Dami was also swimmingly good at getting you up, even if it be just for a dance in the moonlight then back to bed, or a walk around the block then on the couch

He understood wanting to cope, but if you were prone to drug usage, Damiano would totally discourage it and stop you from using as best he could

ADD

Not everyday is a trip to Disney, but with Damiano, it is

Damiano always had new records to catch your fancy, he'd always have some home project lined up for the two of you, he'd always let you do extravagant things with makeup on his face

It seemed if you lost something, Dami would find it, but if Damiano lost something, you would find it (good system actually)

Would always have reminders in his phone so he would add reminders for you on his phone (appointments, birthdays, events)

Damiano seemed to always have just the trick to get you to sleep, even when you felt like you physically couldn't

PTSD

After you told him, Damiano would immediately avoid the topic in future conversations

He would support you fully during any trigger or episode, but he never treated you any differently at all just because you have PTSD

It hurt him that something hurt you so badly, but he took it all in a deep breath - after all, he signed up for you, all of you, so he certainly wouldn't give up on you just because of a disorder

Damiano would be in your corner 100%, and you knew it and you knew you could always go to him

Tourette's

Some tics would get that beautiful smile on his face, but otherwise he continued conversations like nothing ever happened

He didn't bat an eye at a physical tic, not a verbal tic

But he was the man to go to during a tic attack

He wouldn't treat you like a science experiment, or like an insane asylum patient - he treated you with love and support, like no one else ever had

Damiano had read about a dozen books on how to support people with Tourette's, and he'd also talked to other people he knew who had Tourette's - Damiano was thoroughly educated on how to help you, the love of his life

headass this was hard to fuckin write and i know its shitty and the cw’s are a bunch and i cut it but im sorry and hope its good enough

[dreaming-about-fanfictions]

Choose Me Instead II Draco Malfoy x Reader II Chapter 19 of 27: Cursed

Summary: Pretending to be in a relationship with Draco Malfoy to get back at your ex might have not been the smartest idea you ever had. Especially during your last year of Hogwarts where you should be focusing on exams and your future plans. However, you were just pretending. There was no way in hell you could actually catch feelings for someone like Malfoy. … Right?

CHOOSE ME INSTEAD MASTERLIST CHOOSE ME INSTEAD PLAYLIST

A/N: Better late than never lol! Here it is! Thank you for being patient though! ilysm <3 This was a difficult one, I hope you like it! Btw, I recently found out that Dracos mum is called “Narcissa” and not “Narzissa” in the english version. She’s called “Narzissa” in the German Books. However, I’ll keep calling her Narzissa in this story (because I’m lazy and don’t want to change it). Enjoy!

Words: 3.4k Pairing: Draco Malfoy x Reader, post war Warnings: tw eating disorder (mentions of it) --> please be aware that the way eating disorders are approached by the purebloods in this story is not something i (the author) approves of. I just thought it’d be a more realistic way for them to act like this.

It felt wrong.

Draco only used the Room of Requirements to be with you. He never went here on his own. Not that he would ever admit it – but the room scared him. The last time he’d been here alone was at the beginning of this school year. He found out then that it didn’t change for him anymore. All he saw when he walked in were the dirty, cracked windows and the flies and spiders that died in front of them. Old furniture, forgotten books and dirt was scattered around, piling up and towering over him.

As he stood there, his gaze was drawn to the end of the room. Hiding behind the corners, buried under black linen, there it was. The vanishing cabinet. He felt its presence. Looming, waiting, calling for him. Alright, to be fair, the last part was probably only in his imagination. It didn’t change his feelings towards this particular room of Hogwarts though.

It was different when you were with him. It changed for you and turned the monster that it was for Draco into a purring housecat. With you, it felt like a vacation. As if he had travelled to a small cottage, far away from roaring cities or ancient castles.

However tonight, you were not here. Astoria Greengrass had taken your place. She sat on a couch across from Draco, back straight, hands neatly folded in her lap. Her black hair was tied up in a bun and not a single strand of hair was out of place. The spitting image of her mother, Draco thought. He had always wondered about how different the Greengrass sisters looked. Astoria inherited the sharp features, thin lips, and slim figure of her mother. Daphne resembled their father a lot more with her round face, long blonde hair, and the doe-like eyes. The both of them were like night and day. Yin and Yang.

Draco looked around the room which had turned into a smaller version of the Slytherin common room. All the important details where there – from the green colors to the Slytherin emblems on the pillows and carpet. Only the windows were out of place. They didn’t offer him a view inside of the lake but were the same cracked ones, he had seen one too many times in his life. It reminded him that he wasn’t here with you.

It felt wrong.

 ***

Draco leaned back against the chair. He crossed his leg and his fingertips tapped a non-recognizable rhythm on his right upper thigh. Astoria didn’t look up at him when she spoke. He could tell that the words had been carefully chosen in advance. Remembered and recited in front of a mirror. Yet she couldn’t meet his eyes. Draco noticed the way she plucked at the skin on her thumb.

When you’d ask him tomorrow for how long the conversation went on, he wouldn’t have an answer. Time seemed to stand still the moment Astoria opened her mouth for the first time.

“Say something,” she whispered when she finished, and the silence became unbearable.

Draco noticed that there wasn’t a fireplace. Another thing that the Room of Requirement had gotten wrong.

“Say something,” Astoria repeated herself, her voice shaking a little more this time.

Draco stopped the tapping. “Is that why?”, he finally asked.

She hesitated and then nodded. Draco sighed and looked out of the window.

“I’m sorry,” he said after a while.

Astoria scoffed. “Me too.”

“I am,” he looked back at her.

For the first time since he had entered the room, Astoria lifted her head. When her eyes met his, he saw the anger in them. “I’m dying and all you have to say is ‘Sorry’?”, she spat out.

“You don’t know that,” Draco said matter-of-factly.

Astoria raised her eyebrows. “What?”

“That you’re dying.”

She looked at him as if he was a little slow in his head. “I … I just told you.”

“You told me about the family curse,” Draco corrected her. “No one can say if it will happen to you.”

She let out a huff, stunned by his reaction. Had he not listened to a word she said? “I told you about the clairvoyant at Knockturn Alley!”

“Seers say a lot of shit.” He shrugged and added: “Especially when you pay them.”

Astoria lost her posture – with wide eyes and a shake of her head, she let herself slump back against the pillows. “I can’t believe you’re not taking me seriously.”

Draco sighed and began tapping on his thigh again. The same rhythm from before. “I am, Astoria. I believe you.”

But I don’t want to, he added in his mind. He had heard rumors of the Greengrass curse before – only once, when he was maybe eight or nine years old and while he pretended to be asleep on an armchair, he listened to his mother and her friend.

“The poor woman,” Narzissa had said. “And those girls …”

“We don’t know if it will happen to them,” her friend replied softly.

“Why risk it though?”, he remembered his mother ask. “And decide to give birth to not only one but two girls?”

“Well, if one dies, she will still have the other.”

Looking back, the joke was tasteless and not the least bit funny. He didn’t remember how his mother responded to it. Back then, Draco didn’t understand what the women were talking about. So he had shoved the memory back and forgot – until tonight.

When Astoria came up to him at the Winter Dance, she was more … vague. Talking about how something had changed in her life, how decisions were made for her and that she was left with no option but to finally confine in him. Merlin, Draco had thought she was pregnant. This was worse – for obvious reasons.

“If you believe me, why are you like this?”, her voice ripped him from his thoughts. Draco hadn’t notice that he was staring out of the window again.

He cleared his throat and focused back on the Slytherin girl. “I believe you’re overexaggerating.” It was the truth. Or better – it was a truth. The one he was able to share with her.

“I’m dying.”

“You’re not!”, he replied with a sharp voice.

Astoria flinched.

Draco sighed and leaned forward. “Look,” he continued, much softer now. “I’m sorry. You’re obviously very scared of this – and honestly, who wouldn’t be after receiving such news.” He paused. “But didn’t you just say you never experienced any symptoms?”

She looked to the ground. “Yes.”

“See?”, a smile played around the corners of his lips. “Stop beating yourself up about it.”

Astorias gaze stuck to the ground. His words didn’t ease her pain, he saw that. “I … Look at me, Draco,” she then mumbled.

Draco tilted his head. “I am.”

“No, truly look at me!” She lifted her head. “What do you see?”

He stared at her for a while. What do you want me to say? He refrained himself from asking that. Instead, for the first time in years, he truly looked at her. Her school uniform was in perfect condition, no spot or loose thread in sight. The diamond earrings sparkled in the soft light and around her neck hung a delicate golden necklace. Her outer appearance was perfect. As always. The only thing that was different were her eyes. He frowned when he saw it. The fire in them. Gone. The arrogant spark, challenging every Ravenclaw and Gryffindor that didn’t get out of her way fast enough. He wondered when it had left her.

“I resemble a corpse! I swear, my grandmother had a better complexion than me on the day she died!”, Astoria continued after another minute of silence.

Oh. Draco blinked. She meant that? He wouldn’t have noticed that in a hundred years.

“And I’m so thin and –”

“Because you’re starving yourself,” Draco interrupted her and immediately scolded himself for it.

Astoria, who was in the middle of shifting to a different position, stopped, and stared at him. “What?”

Draco pondered for a moment about his next words. Astoria and her fucked up relationship towards food wasn’t a secret. Well, not since fourth grade when rumors started spreading about the true reasons of why she was always so eager to get to the nearest bathroom after meals. And then her bones began to stick out underneath her school uniform. Everyone noticed it. Everyone looked the other way.  Problems like hers … they weren’t uncommon among their circles. Yet, they were problems to keep to behind closed doors. They were private. Nothing to talk about.

“Everyone needs an outlet for the stress that comes with living like we do,” his father had once said. “Women are just worse in finding the right one.”

Oh, how he hated his father.

Draco smiled sadly at Astoria. “Everybody knows, Astoria.”

“Knows what?”, she asked sharply.

“That you have issues with food.”

Astoria blinked. “I … you’re such an asshole,” she then exclaimed. “You’re an asshole, Draco Malfoy.”

Draco sighed and shifted positions. “Anyways,” he tried to change the subject. “You’re scared, I get it. But so far, you don’t have any symptoms. In fact, you started feeling ill once your mother went with you to see the seer, right? It frightened you and now you can’t stop focusing on that fear.”

Astoria scoffed. “Thanks, Mr. Therapist. You’ve got it all figured out, haven’t you?”

“No,” he shook his head. “I’m just guessing. It doesn’t make sense to care so much about something that might not even happen to you.”

“Doesn’t make sense to you, you mean”, Astoria corrected him.

Draco frowned.

“Because your problems are much more important.”

“My problems are real.”

That was probably the wrong thing to say in this situation. Even Draco realized that. The words had just slipped out. He hated to admit it but the egocentric, narcissistic part of himself believed them.

Astoria stood up abruptly. She smoothed over the fabric of her skirt and tucked a strand of hair that had fallen out of her bun behind her ear. She then looked at him, no expression on her face. When she spoke, her voice was calm and quiet: “Fuck you.”

With long steps Astoria made her way towards the door.

“Shit,” Draco mumbled under his breath and got up as well. “Astoria!”

She didn’t turn around.

“Astoria, wait! Please!”

The last word made her stop, hand already reaching for the doorknob. As she turned around, there was a bitter smile playing around her dark red lips. “Why?”, she asked him. “I trusted you with something and all you’re giving me is shit.”

Draco looked down to the ground and then back up. “I don’t know how to respond to this.”

“With empathy, Draco,” she folded her arms in front of her chest. “You might want to look that word up.”

Draco let out another deep sigh. A part of him secretly wished she would ignore him and just leave. It would be easier for him. Knowing this wasn’t an option for her, he finally walked towards Astoria. He pulled her into his arms and hugged her tightly. His words had failed him, they had made everything worse for her and he hoped from the bottom of his heart that this would ease her pain just a little. Astorias body went stiff at first – only after a few seconds did she let her body relax. She leaned into his embrace as if someone took a weight off her shoulders.

“You know I’m here for you,” Draco whispered. “And I will be there in case …”

“In case, I’m dying after all.”

When Draco breathed in, he could smell her lavender shampoo. “Yes.”

Suddenly, her petite body began to tremble. At first Draco mistook it for giggling, then he heard the soft whimpers against his shoulder.

“It’ll be fine. I promise.” He hugged her tighter.

“You can’t promise me that,” she sniffed.

Draco let go of her and took a step back. He put a hand to her cheek, making her look at him. “The curse hasn’t been around for decades. It might skip your generation again.”

Her eyes were red and her cheeks puffy, silent tears running down them. “I’m so scared.”

“I know.”

“Please marry me.”

Draco closed his eyes at her plea. His head suddenly hurt and he wished you were here. You’d know how to handle situations like this.

“Astoria …”

“I know you don’t love me,” she interrupted him, her voice still trembling. “You couldn’t.”

He opened his eyes, looking at her in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“You love her.”

Her. You. Draco blinked. “What? No, I –”

“I realized it on New Years Eve.” She wiped the tears from her cheek, still holding on to him with her other hand. Astoria cleared her throat. “I didn’t believe it in the beginning but … it’s so obvious. You love her so much, how could I ever expect you to look at me the same way you look at her?”

Draco shook her head. “Astoria –”

“But you know the relationship has no future. Neither of your families would ever agree to it. You know it. You know it in your heart.”

The piercing pain in his forehead grew stronger. When he’d remember this moment, Draco wouldn’t be able to describe his feelings. Her words barely managed to get through to him. You love her, he heard her say over and over again. You love her.

No. He didn’t love you.

He couldn’t.

“Marry me,” Astoria repeated herself and took a step closer again. She had to lift her head to look into his eyes. “My family will secure the future of the Malfoys.”

“I …”

You love her. You love her. You love her.

“What do you get out of it?”, he finally managed to get out and tried to focus back on her, feeling weirdly out of breath.

Another tear rolled down her cheek. No sobs this time. “Once people will be able to see the sickness …”, she hesitated. “I won’t be looked at as the second daughter who’s living in her sister’s shadows.”

You love her.

Draco furrowed his brows at her words, utterly irritated by them. “Nobody thinks that, Astoria.”

She laughed. “Yes, they do! Daphne has always been prettier, smarter, more desired. I can’t compete with her. I am the leftover Greengrass that no one wants and that’s now dying from a family curse. Because of fucking course it would hit me and not my picture perfect sister!”

Draco stared at Astoria.

“But with you,” she continued. “With you people would see that I’m more than that. That I’m worthy of attention and of love despite … being me.”

This is wrong on so many levels, he could hear your voice in his head, clear as day.

“Have you met with the therapist yet?”, Draco suddenly asked out of the blue.

“What?” The Slytherin was thrown off by his question. “Yes.”

“Did you talk to her about this?”

Hearing this made her drop his hands, taking a few steps back. She buried her face in her hands, taking a deep breath. “Oh, fuck you, Draco!”, Astoria muttered. “Stop trying to analyze me!”

“I’m not!”, he assured her. “But … Astoria, this is so fucked up what you just said to me.”

She looked back up at him. “You’re such a hypocrite.”

“Excuse me?”

She chuckled. “You spent a few months with a Gryffindor and now you act like our values mean nothing to you when you are the one who used to scream ‘mudblood’ the loudest.”

Draco swallowed.

“Merlin, what is wrong with me,” Astoria sighed. “After everything I just confessed, you don’t find it in you to show me a little mercy and change your mind?” She smiled at him sadly. “Do you want to marry me?”

“No.”

You love her.

 ***

The talk with Astoria left him feeling uneasy.

It handed after she asked Draco to marry her a second time and he declined. She nodded when she heard his answer, sniffled, wiped the remaining tears away and left. Not without saying “You’ll change your mind sooner or later”. When she was gone, she didn’t take the anxiety with her. Draco had to deal with that on his own. Now, as he walked through the halls of the old castle, his steps were stiff, and he had deep lines between his eyebrows.

“Calm down, she has no symptoms,” he mumbled to himself as he turned another corner.

Yet.

What if he would be wrong after all? What if the curse wouldn’t skip another generation of Greengrass women and fall upon her? What if she would die and he made her last remaining years even more miserable in her eyes because he turned down the proposal?

What if, what if, what if.

He wanted to talk to you about all of it. You’d tell him he didn’t have to feel bad. He didn’t owe Astoria. He shouldn’t be put in this position in the first place. You would find the right words. To be honest, Draco knew all of this himself. He just wanted to hear you say it out loud. Hear the words from another person to ensure that he was right. That he wasn’t crazy or selfish for not sacrificing his life, his future, for a dying girl.

“She’s not dying,” he reminded himself. A Hufflepuff boy passed him and frowned.

“My family will secure the future of the Malfoys.” It was the argument his mother had used against him countless times. He was certain that he’d hear it a lot more often soon. He was aware of how strong the argument truly was. His family could return to their former glory with all the luxury that came along with it. Fancy parties, status, high-paying careers – something he had been promised his whole life and that was stripped away the moment he was forced to become a Death Eater. The promise of a good life. An easy life.

Maybe life shouldn’t be easy for them. At least not so fast. Maybe his father shouldn’t come home from Azkaban one day to live like nothing ever happened. No, Lucius Malfoy deserved to suffer longer than his time in prison. And ultimately, so did his mother and Draco.

Draco gritted his teeth at his thoughts. He couldn’t marry Astoria. Not for that reason. Not to make the life of his family easier. His parents needed to work and plea for their redemption. Just like he did.

“Watch it, Malfoy!”, Seamus Finnigan hissed when he bumped into him. He came out of the library, a stack of books in his arms.

Draco didn’t look at him. Until now, he hadn’t even noticed that he was walking towards the library. It made sense though. The bag that hung from his shoulder seemed to become heavier with every step. The black notebook. He needed to write.

 ***

You sat alone on a table, hunched over a book. More of them piled up next to you, accompanied by an overused quill and bottle of ink.

Exams, Draco remembered. How easy it was to forget those mundane things in the midst of all the sadness. Exams, followed by entrance tests to become an Auror. Draco smiled at the thought of you fighting evil. He was certain that you’d excel at it.

He stopped in the middle of the corridor, not caring about the annoyed huffs and curses from students who almost ran into him. He watched you. The way you sometimes licked the tip of your finger before turning a page. How you sighed and frowned when you didn’t understand a passage.

You love her. The words shot through his mind.

It was different to the scenes he had read in books when he finally saw it. When he blinked and it was suddenly so clear to him. His heart didn’t stop, his knees didn’t become weak, he didn’t hear violins around him. No, a ray of sunlight that fell through the window and hit your face, caused you to lift your head. In that moment, your eyes found his. A smile played around your lips as you waved at him and pointed at the seat next to you. And it was so clear to him, that he wanted this all along: to be with you. To come home to you.

You love her, Astoria had said. 

And he knew she was right.

***

A/N: How did you like it?? I’m so excited to hear from you!! <33

CHAPTER 20

HP Masterlist General Masterlist

Tag List:  @writerdee1701, @youareinllve, @sjmahoney, @detroitobsessed, @takura-rin, @jadam268, @wynterwind,  @renaissance-confiance, @doitforthevine67, @ilovemollyweasley, @flowerpowerpixie, @gold-flowing, @starkssnarks, @bookcornerkins, @harpersmariano, @markedsweetly, @iraniq, @pointlesscoconut, @hvrcruxes, @pillowjj, @idkatee,    @magicwithaknife, @graystherapy, @scoote-rankle, @nxstalgicnxbxdy, @sunsetsofanemoia,  @tommy-holland, @lordfxxker, @streetfighterrichie, @awaken-the-sirens, @destiels-assbutt13, @pockitparks, @just-addicted-to-bangtan, @cuddlykoala101, @zpandaqueen ,  @natsiboo, @jjjmaybank, @justmesadgirl, @books-and-tings, @slytherinprincedracom , @katiaw2, @saintkore, @nctnight, @lifestragedy, @obxmxybxnk, @spideydobik , @ladylizzieofdarbyshire, @aspiring-ginger, @dracomalfoyswifey, @jpow345, @realistic-breadstick,  @abbs-is-tired, @alwaysbeanunknownfan, @niallsarmveinstho, @is-this-a-febreze-commercial, @acciowilltolive, , @sexytholland, @faangirl101, @donttellany1iusetumbler, @mendesmuffinsss, @lilxnvm, @kill-the-teen-memories, @darkusangelus, @itsbebeyyy, @hesaidimcrazy, @jenniweaslee, @hpxpjo, @brisbubble, @xomaymay, @shitnstuffillregret, @serialkillme, @angel-tears15, @panicattheeverywherekid, @obsssedwithjustaboutanything,  @nobleking, @tashii-blr, @ddaeing, @randogirlo-fando-main, @sadgirlnumber92899, @captivateing, @bitchyegirl, @smiithys, @ninipoo1, @intheawks,  @nothanksnyla, @calpal-4ever, @dracosathenaeum, @belsandthings, , @kiwi-sloan, @xdmx, @lexi-ravenclawdracomalfoy, @kvyenxay, @live-awkward, @babebenhardy, @bitchysweets-blog, @cravingmusic, @frau-moon, @ohissandhalasta,  @broken-but-beautiful-cassie, @lil-black-heart,  @vminenthusiastt, @dracos-sluts, @mrmoonyy, @saucysuazo, @fuzzzwald, @matsuno-nadeshiko, @amber-arsenault ,  @loveableasshole,  @spideycures, @echpr, @shiningstar-byulxx,  @twinklebug2282, @bloodiedroses, @klthmef, @ostorian ,  @bi-chai-tea, @maddieisnotok, @amandaluvssupernatural, @makeoutwithstiles,    @i-am-addicted-to-tea, @tenclouds, @lovingdracomalfoy, @lannaax, @dr-bitch-bby,  @fallinallinmendes, @suckerforparker, @runninglownad, @piercinghorizons, @dosicas, @yanaaaaaaa,  @akzer300500 @hoseokslily, @dracofeltonmalfoy, @emilianamason, @tothemoonwithclifford, @gcldreinhart ,  @angelofthorr, @k-k0129, @musicalmuffindog1410, @andydre4m, @mxl-foyrecs, @seeinorange, @vlgsqd , @justmimithings, @allthevoicesinmyhead, @pipppaaaaalouisee, @yessirrz, @2think2twice2 @spencerreidisbootiful, @find-a-little-faith, @thatguppienamedbae, @emmamarie7708, @dontpanicitsdan @jordaangx, @ceeellewrites, @drxcomvlfx, @7minutes-tomidnight, @coldheartedslytherin, @wingardiumdepressionosa, @perfect-storm95, @danisaur1324, @unlikely-y-bliss, @trentdijklfc66, @saptediavoli, @treestarrrrrrrr, @aangsupremacy @yaanasluv, @megamihatake, @lavenderblossom12, @bimbelle, @beiahadid, @weasleytwinswheezes, @bogikrmn, @gublerslut, @prongsandprancer, @superkawaiicandyfloss , @instantllamaruins​

If you want to be added to my tag list, let me know! <3

[obeiii-mee]

Heyo, this is my first time asking (im kinda new to tumblr, so please dont judge) if you would'nt mind, could you do some headcannons (or oneshots, it dosen't matter) with all the demon bros and a MC who is crippled/paralized in their legs, and has to use a wheelchair to get around? Thank you!!

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This is the first time I’ve written about a crippled MC, so I hope I didn’t fuck this up or anything. I found out that being paralysed in both legs is a disability called Paraplegia so that’s how I titled this post. And y’all are too sweet, you are more than welcome anon! I hope I can portray this properly because I am not crippled myself so I’ve opted to do some research before writing this! I hope you like it! Also, I feel inclined to add that none of the brothers would treat you too differently if you happen to have a disability because you’re their human nonetheless :)

——————————-

The Brothers with an MC that has Paraplegia and needs a wheelchair to get around:

Lucifer:

-Lucifer was in charge of choosing the final human, exchange student for the program so it’s guaranteed he already knew about your predicament before you even arrived

-Him and Diavolo probably had many meetings concerning your disability before the program could commence, considering that being unable to walk would double the chances of you getting killed since you are obviously more vulnerable

-Not to mention all the treatment you would require

-Lucifer is not well versed in human illnesses and disorders, but he makes sure that he is educated enough on the matter before you get brought down there

-It would not be easy, but he is determined to help you survive your year in DevilDom for the prince’s sake

-First problem of the day was, of course, your wheelchair

-Due to lack of time, Lucifer was unable to instal ramps around the House of Lamentation which meant that for the first couple of weeks, someone would’ve had to help you move around certain parts of the house

-He gave that highly prestigious job to himself because he didn’t trust his brothers and thought they would accidentally drop you and your wheelchair down the stairs

-He talks a lot to you, even at the beginning, because he needs to establish your needs and what he should do to make sure you don’t die for the following year

-You would have to tell him about physical therapy and how most commonly it uses heat, massage and exercise to stimulate your nerves and muscles, making it a great treatment for people with leg paralysis

-Once you two enter a more intimate and personal relationship, it’s more than likely he’ll help you perform those things himself (instead of kidnapping a human doctor from somewhere)

-Lucifer knows you have no problem getting around with your wheelchair by yourself but there are times where he’ll insist to push you along in order to give you a quick break

-I can totally imagine you two strolling around DevilDom and having cosy chats about RAD and your adjustments to DevilDom

-He has a softer side to him that he’s afraid to show most of the time, but he feels so at ease when you’re around, it’s hard for him to hold that part of him hidden from you

-Of course, your safety still remains his primary concern and he acts more like your guardian than Mammon does, even if he was originally supposed to look out for you

-He will accompany you almost anywhere. And if he can’t, he’ll have one or more of his brothers do it. And even then he’s probably lurking nearby, just in case

-He would always be willing to listen about your condition, if you wished to tell him whether you were born with the defect or why you ended up crippled later in life. Either way, he’s all ears

-If you would rather not speak about it, he wouldn’t pry and respect your decision because he knows it’s not his place to pressure you

-Because of your paralysis, it’s quite obvious to demons that you are even weaker (physically speaking) than most humans and that usually puts a target on your back

-Howver, never fear, because Lucifer is pretty quick to put lower rank demons in their place with just a mere stare

-Oop one of them passed out from the fear, haha

-In conclusion, he’s the most responsible when it comes your comfort and safety during your stay

-He makes sure you are always left in good hands and and provides most of the requirements you need

-Y’all should see how his wings puff up when he senses a threat approaching you, he looks like a peacock ready to go on attack lol

Mammon:

-The second born is unsurprisingly a bit of a jerk at first

-He stays really grumpy the whole day of your arrival because he’s stuck babysitting you stupid human

-“Lucifer c’mon, what’s all this workload for? The human can’t even walk by themselves, why do I have to help them out?”

-Wtf Mammon you can’t say shit like that

-Anyways, the following very few days, the only thing he’s thinking about is how much money he could sell your wheelchair for

-He’s the literal incarnation of greed, what else did you expect from him?

-After a while, he starts feeling a bit guilty every time he thinks about it though

-Mammon is gonna take this secret to the grave (laughs in immortal) but he actually really likes pushing you around

-Maybe it’s because it’s a clear indication to everyone around him that you are HIS human, under HIS protection and therefore you trust HIM the most since he was your FIRST MAN

-He will insist on helping you get out of that thing when you need to go to bed and stuff every night and he will get pouty real fast if you let any of his other brothers do it

-You wake up to him trying to roll around in your wheelchair one night at like 3am

-At some point, he stole a wheelchair from the human realm to match with his human. You can guess the consequences of his actions

-I can imagine you having to face a staircase or something at school and Mammon being like:

-“Fuck it, imma carry this fragile human instead; wheelchair and all!”

-Like you were a sack of potatoes or something smh

-Cue his brothers watching him from a distance as he heaves you and basically weight-lifts you up the stairs

-Ok but every now and again, he gets so sad thinking about you not being able to walk, like he starts crying kinda sad

-While you stand there like 😐 “Why are you crying?”

-He’s so quick to help if he senses you’re in danger too

-It’s canon that Mammon is crazy fast if he wants to be so if he has even the slightest impression that your life is threatened, his feet are already moving

-He will charge at your immediate threat at around 120 miles per hour-do not try him when he’s mad

-“The Great Mammon saved the day! C’mon MC, let’s go buy some ice cream. My treat! Ya better be grateful!”

-He says while the demon that tried to eat you lies on the floor with about a dozen broken bones

-Mammon is the second most powerful demon out of all of his brothers, even if he doesn’t resort to violence often

Levi:

-He didn’t really know how to react when you first teleported to DevilDom

-I mean, from the very beginning he considered you to be a human normie but at the same time, he felt bad you were stuck with his brothers for the rest of the year

-I think he would understand you would have an even harder time integrating yourself in their house because of your disability and he knows his siblings are really fucking annoying, always pushing you around and whatnot

-So, he kinda lets you hide in his room quite often

-You guys chill out in there all the time, much to the dismay of the other brothers who also want to spend time with you

-At some point, Levi definitely begged asked Lucifer to let you start online classes with him

-“But wouldn’t it be easier for MC to do online school from home rather than go to R.A.D since there aren’t any ramps or anything around there???”

-“The answer is no Leviathan.”

-“Ugh fine! What a fucking boomer-“

-For some reason, he gets so flustered whenever you ask him to push you around

-He blushes right to the tips of his ears and then he starts sputtering some nonsense that you can’t make out at all

-But he’s more than happy to do it, especially if you guys are going to a convention or if he’s dragging you out to buy new merch

-You two would get along in the sense that Levi realises the struggles you faced all your life were tough to overcome and he believes you are just like him

-Usually left out by other people, ignored even

-He knows you always listen to him ramble on about whatever he is currently obsessed with and how much you check up on him to make sure he never isolated himself

-He wants to do that for you too! Talk to him about your hobbies, please I’m begging you-he feels so bad whenever he’s doing all the talking

-If you ask him to help you with anything (getting something, helping you into bed—that sort of thing), he legally and physically can’t say ‘no’

-And he would get envious enough to stop talking to you for a day or two if you let his brothers do it instead (the second and third born are indeed similar lmao)

-S T A Y I N H I S R O O M, W H E R E Y O U C A N B E P R O T E C T E D !

-He will feel so much more at ease if you’re in his room because to him, that’s his haven

-If you’re in there with him, that means you’re not getting involved in his siblings’ endless and dangerous shenanigans

-Whenever you’re at school, he can’t help but worry about your well-being

-Because you’re human! You’re gonna get killed!! Do you know how much your organs sell on the black market in DevilDom??? 100x more than in the human realm, that’s for sure

-Would they have a black market or would it be a regular market lol

-For some reason, he also likes staying in your wheelchair when you’re not using it

-I think he just takes comfort in knowing it’s something that belongs to you and smells like you and-

-OK Levi, sit back down

-He wouldn’t treat you any differently if you had a disability tbh, but he’d be more concerned because you can’t even run away or anything

-So he’s so fuckin’ relieved when you guys are just vibing in his room

-He could die happy knowing he kept his best friend/ partner safe

Satan:

-Satan would be even more prepared for your arrival than Lucifer would, in a sense

-Out of all of his brothers, he’s most likely to understand and recognise paraplegia (either from studying human illnesses/birth defects/disabilities or from encountering humans with said disability)

-He’s a smart boy, alright?

-Always seems to be the first to notice if you need help or if someone’s bothering you

-Though in the very beginning, he was pretty tempted to just let you get killed to see how angry Lucifer could get

-Seeing dear Luci’s misery brings him great joy 🥰🥰🥰

-Once you two manage to build a very honest and strong relationship, he feels more and more inclined to keep you out of harm’s way

-Pls, he would feel so honoured if you let him push you around (it’s like you asked him to h*ld h*nds or something)

-If you require treatment of any kind, he would be so happy to help

-But in a subtle way...?

-Satan makes it seem so smooth too like he doesn’t mind lending a helping hand when in reality he’s all giddy inside

-*Kinda wants to rub it in his brothers’ faces but at the same no, because he’s definitely the bigger person here

-He wants to know how your wheelchair works

-It’s got all of these neat mechanisms and he wants to learn how they’re constructed because he never had the chance to inspect one before

-He’s such a sweetheart about asking you as well and never pries about your disability unless you start elaborating yourself

-Most of the time, he acts all charming and very gentleman-like

-So people have a hard time spotting and acknowledging the building rage inside of him every time he sees you are threatened by some moronic low rank demon

-Satan’s usually chill when it comes to injuries, unless he can see you’re in horrible pain

-There’s nothing a few spells can’t accomplish

-But when others purposefully try harming you?

-It’s like he loses all the self control he’s been trying to perfect over the centuries and he can’t help himself from at least breaking someone’s rib cage

-Satan’s a weird one because he’s protective of you even though he’s more on the relaxed side when compared to his siblings

-He very much acknowledges that you made it this far in life with your predicament so he doesn’t feel the need to baby you or anything

-You’re strong and he knows this

-It’s one of the many things he clearly loves about you

-That one time you rolled over Mammon’s foot with your wheelchair on purpose, he was wheezing

Asmo:

-Even now, he can’t help but wonder what it would be like to be stuck inside a wheelchair for the rest of his eternal life

-I mean, he’d obviously still be absolutely fabulous, have you seen him? He’s gonna be gorgeous either way

-But after the two of you meet, he definitely starts thinking about how he takes his feet for granted all the time

-It would be so difficult to complete his daily tasks without the ability to walk or run around

-That’s why he gets sad every time he remembers that’s your reality and on days like that, you’ve noticed he gives you a helluva lot more attention than usual

-He knows you don’t need pity or anything so he’s just making sure his human has all the support they can get

-Paraplegia or not, shopping trips are still a go-go

-He loves buying you clothes! And he loves helping you try them on! Asmo takes it very seriously

-Might have a go at the employees if they’re being rude to you

-You don’t even ask him to, but he subconsciously starts pushing you around himself whenever the two of you are out together

-“MC! Look at that new shop that’s just opened! Isn’t it adorable? We have to check it out!”

-He can’t help it! There’s so many places he wants to visit, he sort of just drags you with him wherever he goes

-Even at home, he always pops out of nowhere to coax you into coming to his room

-Y’all have so many skin routines to do each day

-Like he’s in your room most nights to greet you goodnight and tuck you in, with the rest of his brothers it gets so awkward at times

-Asmo just wants to see you smile, ok? He thinks you have a beautiful smile and laugh and he wants to remind you that you’re marvellous, disability or not

-And if anyone does anything to put an end to your self confidence, he will swiftly put an end to their life

-Please, he’s a pro at ruining lives, he’s been doing it for centuries

-Asmo has such a huge influence over the people in DevilDom, he just needs to make this one post on Devilgram to end said demon’s whole career

-I mean, who is he compared to him, Hmm? So don’t worry MC, scum like that don’t even deserve to breathe the same air as you :)

-That one time Mammon tried lifting you up the stairs and Asmo started shrieking, like put them down! Don’t manhandle them like that, poor human :(

Beel:

-I know I sound repetitive, but he would be an overall sweetheart to you no matter the circumstances

-If Mammon is not by your side, then Beel definitely is

-His big, scary aura and figure usually scares off any threat in a 10 mile radius

-Most demons don’t fancy being eaten by the Avatar of Gluttony, ya know?

-Idk why but I feel like he’d be the type to ask for oral consent every time he wanted to push you around

-He doesn’t want to make you uncomfortable :(

-Surprisingly also the type to lift you and your wheelchair whenever an obstacle gets in your way

-You basically weigh the same amount as a paper plate compared to him, so he has no problem doing so

-He doesn’t really understand your condition as well as Satan may do, but he’s trying his best

-You mean so much to him and he feels it’s only fair he learns more about your disability as a thank you for what you’ve done for him

-He has a rough time keeping up with you when it comes to stuff like physical therapy because he’s very unfamiliar with it but that doesn’t mean he’s not gonna help

-Of course, Beel believes that this is the second best way to show you how much he cares for you besides the obvious ‘I love you’

-Giving you a hand whenever you need his support the most

-That’s his way of saying “I’m not going to let you down. I want you to trust me, the same way I trust you.”

-And knowing him, he will try to do everything in his power to keep you safe and sound

-After a while, you’re bound to notice he’s the first one to pull you out of his brothers’ pranks before you have a chance to get hurt

-Beel is always the one handing you stuff from high places you can’t reach, without teasing you for it like Mammon might do

-Always the first one to remind you to get plenty of rest and to eat enough

-He wants to protect you and his brothers because he knows he failed to do so with Lilith so yeah, he’s a bit overprotective at times

-He doesn’t mean to be overbearing, but he gets so anxious knowing you’re by yourself

-After a few months of getting accommodated with him, your disability is no longer brought up in the conversation

-Because he doesn’t care that you are crippled and forced to use a wheelchair

-You are part of his family and he loves you no matter what

Belphie:

-He didn’t really care, even when you first met and his hatred for humans was at its very peak

-It didn’t matter that you had a disability

-All that mattered to him at the time was killing you to satisfy that deeply rooted need of vengeance inside of him

-Though he was sort of surprised his brothers didn’t get to you first

-In general, he’s pretty chill about you being crippled in both legs

-It takes too much effort to worry about your well-being 24/7 after all

-Surprisingly, he does keep an eye out for you if his siblings aren’t nearby

-It’s his redemption arc people, he’s trying to be nicer

-But he has such an irritating way of showing his affection for you

-Do not let him push you around

-He’s either going to a) fall asleep after 30 seconds and slump over you in the middle of RAD’s halls

-Or b) be annoying and fling your wheelchair in every direction possible just to piss you off

-He likes messing with you because you give him the best reactions and he thrives on that

-You’ve almost fallen off your wheelchair multiple times because of this asshole

-Not that he’d actually let you fall, he just wants to see how easily he can get you to yell at him

-Speaking of said wheelchair, like Mammon and Levi, he also loves using it when you’re not

-You’ve woken up to him curled up and asleep in that thing quiet often and he’s gotten in trouble over it every time with Lucifer

-But he doesn’t care

-And at this point, I don’t think even he knows whether he’s doing it to get a reaction out of you or because he somehow found a way to make himself comfortable there

-He would low key use you as a mode of transportation every time you go to RAD

-Just clings the damn wheelchair and almost topples both of you over

-“Belphie, there’s nothing stopping you from walking 😐”

-“Shh, just bring me to class and let me nap until then.”

-He doesn’t mention your legs but he still lays his head on your lap often

-Might make you hold him like a bride every time you stroll around the house

-It’s done out of love, I promise 😌😌

———————————

Al~

[definitely-not-a-wasp]

I'm okay with a bunch of disorganized rambling honestly 😂. But if I had to narrow it down then I guess I want to know about main and side characters and how they compare to the original?

I know that tumblr is the Prime Site for disorganized rambling, but I have perfectionism issues. But that is a great question, nonnie, and I will be happy to ramble is a slightly less disorganized fashion.

When reading Maximum Ride as a somewhat-formed adult who discovered they enjoy English classes about 3.5 years ago, I noticed that JP, when writing, doesn't understand consistency. At all. Which means, in many ways, I have a free sandbox to work with.

Spoilers for my rewrite WIP, because I strongly believe that if a story would no longer be good if one had spoilers, then it wasn’t a good story in the first place.

I'm trying to keep the backstories the same, plus or minus the scientific method and a few characters (RIP my OCs. I want to bring you back so bad but it wouldn't fit with the thematic narrative). I've mostly kept their (starting) abilities the same, too. Without further ado, I'm going to introduce some WorldBuilding. (If I'm good at nothing else, I'm good at world building)

First off. Logically.

How are they getting Cable?

How are they getting internet?

How are they getting money to eat and stuff?

JP's answer: handwave it off. Sometimes you need to ignore logistics for the sake of plot. This is an answer I'd accept from an author that I like, such as Julie Kagawa, that makes amazing worlds, characters, and narratives that I will happily handwave a few things that wouldn't work in the real world. James Patterson, on the other hand, did not make any of that; he made a cool concept, some good rough-draft characters, and nothing else, and therefore this is an unforgivable sin.

Wasp's answer: They are not getting any of that.

Introducing Cottagecore.

The house is off the grid. Solar Panels and a wind turbine create electricity. They have their own well. They grow their own food, raise livestock for eggs, milk, and wool, and trap fish for meat. They get money through dumpster diving and pawning. They still have to steal half of the necessities they can’t make themselves. They do have a TV, but it can access about three channels on a clear day. Internet is only a thing when they go to the public library.

Giving the flock a background that’s heavy in farming and livestock rearing shores up the plot holes mentioned above, but in my opinion, ties the flock more tightly to the environment, thus giving them something tangible to lose when they have to leave the E-shaped house. Because they’re not just leaving a house and a safety net— they’re leaving their entire way of life with no promise of getting it back. It also gives them a tangible connection to the earth in case I want to actually pursue the global warming themes.

Main Characters

Maximum “Max” Ride (Birthname: nonexistent)

First off, I'm letting her be Latina, James Patterson.

In the original, Max was very much the headstrong, independent, action girl. Leaning into Strong Female Character (TM), but overall she had a strong, solid foundation and enough character consistency through the first three books for me to not have to just make an entire new character. However, I felt that she was, in some ways, a bit too Action-Girl and Strong and Capable. Yes, Max is incredible and competent, but she’s also fourteen. She’s a child.

In the rewrite, Max’s character is still headstrong, independent, capable, and sometimes not the best at listening to others. All of that’s the same. But she’s that way not because of girlboss energy, but because there’s no one else to do it. She doesn’t want to lead, necessarily. She wants to get some rest and let someone else handle the problems life keeps throwing at her. But she knows if she did that, the responsibility of leader would fall to Fang and Iggy, and she can’t ask that of them. She doesn’t want to place that burden on anyone else (Look, there’s a reason I chose Ayano’s Theory of Happiness as one of her signifier songs, okay?). Her narrative is very much centered around burden, and also around loss. She lost her cultural heritage when she was taken away from her birth family, she lost her childhood to being a leader, she lost a good deal of her friends to the school (RIP my OCs), she lost Jeb, and then she lost her stability. And she’s going to lose a lot more before the end of the story. So a lot of her character arc deals with learning that there are some things she can’t fix, some things that can’t be recovered. She can’t get the E-shaped house back. She can’t get her Little Baby Angel back, even after they rescue her. She can’t get her friends back from the school. And instead of working so hard to recover those or find something to replace them, she has to learn to live with that sense of loss and move on with her life without feeling guilty for leaving things behind. And she has to learn that asking for help and sharing her burden is selfish or weak.

Other changes I made that don’t necessarily fit into her narrative arc, but you asked for rambling so rambling you shall get:

Max hallucinates, because mental illness is also a prominent theme in the rewrite. She doesn’t have a psychotic disorder, but her C-PTSD causes visual/audio hallucinations, especially when she’s stressed or sleep deprived. 

Max ends up having a Gender Discovery throughout the story and goes by He/She pronouns eventually. I don’t know when, but it will happen.

As far as genetic modifications/special quirks go, she can fly faster than the rest of the flock, but not 300 miles per hour. She averages about sixty mph with diving speeds of 240. She cannot breathe underwater or shut down her organs on command. She also has the Super Special Power to predict the weather, but that’s not because of genetics, it’s because she has chronic pain in her right arm that gets worse when weather fronts change.

Her favored weapon is her trusty rebar that she picked up from a condemned building. I think she’s going to name it eventually but I don’t know what yet.

Fang (Birth name: Gabriel Xue)

In canon, Fang is characterized in early books by being the “dark, strong, silent type”. He’s probably the most reserved member of the flock, to the point of falling into the Brooding Mystery Man trope in parts of the book. They care a lot, but they’re not the best at conveying that, especially with the younger members of the flock, and at times their high empathy leads them to making mistakes. Despite the high empathy, he’s often compared to a robot due to his lack of expression and external emotions.

Well, first change is that they’re not a man, so jot that down—

If Max’s narrative is centered around burden and loss, I would probably say that Fang’s is centered around humanity and moving on. None of the flock was treated as human while in the school, but Fang was more often than not treated like a wild animal due to “behavioral issues”, and therefore had and continues to have a difficult time considering themselves real and alive, let alone human. This manifests through a several different ways— where in canon Fang definitely had a ‘fight’ reaction, in the re-write they have a ‘freeze’ or ‘shut down’ instinct. They’re selectively mute for multiple reasons (including derealization, jaw pain, the fact that they didn’t learn how to speak until they were 10, and genuinely forgetting it’s something they’re capable of), a period of Cotard’s syndrome, and a tendancy towards self-loathing and self-sacrifice. In short, Fang is still halfway stuck in the mindset that most of the flock grew out of when they escaped in the school, and doesn’t know how to move past it.

Much of their character arc revolves around not necessarily seeing themselves as human, but learning to treat themselves as human even when they don’t feel like one (or even feel real), and knowing that just because they don’t feel human all the time doesn’t mean anyone else can treat them the same. They never start easily expressing their emotions, and they’re always going to be selectively mute, but they learn to accept that those aspects of themself aren’t character flaws or signs that they’re sub-human. 

Other additions to Fang’s character include:

They don’t get their hair cut in New York. It stays long through the entire series. They have the longest hair in the flock by the end of the series, and they can wear it in so many styles.

Fang uses they/it pronouns because themes of reclaiming the weapons used against it and, more importantly, Gender.

They’re actually really good at spelling compared to the rest of the flock, because they and Iggy communicate with Print-On-Palm when they’re nonverbal, and they’re nonverbal for some pretty long stretches of time. 

They and Max have... zero romantic tension. At all. There is none. The number of times Max calls them her sibling/little sibling in the first arc alone is staggering, and that will not change.

Igneous “Iggy” (Birthname: Jamsetta “Jamie” Griffiths)

I’ve talked about Iggy before. Canon doesn’t give us much to go off of, but from what’s shown, he’s smart, sarcastic, has sharper edges than Fang and Max, and also has a sizable ruthless streak. So that’s what I have to go off of.

The big difference between Iggy and Fang&Max is that Iggy has a much better memory of the School. Most of the flock have areas (months or years) that they don’t remember, or people that they’ve blocked from their mind, but Iggy... doesn’t. So he’s the one that remembers all of the other AVIAN test subjects that were old enough to have names and identities but died due to complications. Max might have the burden of leadership, but he has the burden of memory. And that has lead to both a massive fucking guilt complex, because why did he survive when they didn’t, and, as mentioned above, a ruthless streak that he doesn’t shy away from.

Which is to say, by the end of the story, Iggy has the highest kill count.

I love, love writing Iggy next to Max and Fang. I love writing Iggy next to Gazzy and Nudge. Because, I say this with all of the love of the world, but Iggy is not a good person. He is loyalty and love incarnate, and the world can burn down if he and his siblings are safe. Max and Fang will always try to save as many people as they can. They will wonder what’s wrong with them the first time they kill and don’t have a mental breakdown about it. They are good in a way that Iggy is not. He’s okay with killing Erasers. He’s okay with killing humans. He’s okay with killing people who might not necessarily deserve it, if they show themselves as a threat or are simply in the blast radius. He knows perfectly well that most of those Erasers he’s murdering are four and five and he is okay with that, because a lot of the AVIANs were that age when they died. (Yeah, in the rewrite it’s not Fang who has an issue with Ari; it’s Iggy who wants the 7-year-old wolf-boy dead.) 

And this is, of course, juxtaposed with Iggy being really, really good with Nudge and Gazzy (especially in the beginning). Because, again, he actually remembers being a child. He remembers a lot of kids that died and is therefore fiercely protective of the kids that didn’t, as well as fiercely protective of the innocence that he never got. So he’s the one that cooks their favorite foods when they’re having a bad day, always makes time when they want to talk about something, and convinces Max to let them go to that toy store in New York because, yeah, he Max and Fang aren’t kids. They never were. But Nudge, Gazzy, and Angel can be. (And if he has to be a murderer to preserve that, then he’s perfectly okay with that.)

He and Angel don’t get along very well, though. The telepath doesn’t like hanging out with the person with the most clear memories of the school.

Other additions:

Iggy is trans and says trans rights

He also has paranoid episodes, because C-PTSD. Sometimes they’re very helpful. Sometimes they are not.

I actually decided that he’s one of the flock that doesn’t meet their parents. I know in canon he did, but I always found that very clunky because it didn’t add to his character. He was one of the characters who, until it was convenient for the plot, seemed to care the least about his family. I’d much rather give that to a character whose arc would benefit from it.

Iggy! Gets! Older Sibling Rights! Seriously, he’s two months younger than Fang, he is just as capable.

Iggy does not know braille because Jeb decided it wasn’t necessary for him to know. Iggy is also the best speller in the flock, because Print-on-Palm was the only way to talk to Fang for a solid year. Yes he mocks everyone over this.

Iggy is the only member of the flock that enjoys swimming and can take into the air from water. Everyone else in the flock is incredibly jealous.

Nudge (Birthname: Monique Robinson)

If Iggy is defined by his memories, Nudge is his polar opposite. She was seven when she left the School, but she has next to no memories of it. She is missing a lot of time in the first year she escaped. And that causes... a lot of things. It makes her feel disconnected from her older siblings, it gives her the ability to function in society in a way the other’s can’t, it lets her feel less grief over the ones that didn’t make it and she doesn’t remember, it makes her feel guilty that she doesn’t remember what she’s old enough to know. 

Basically, in order for me to keep the character of Nudge as I saw her (more extroverted, not afraid of the world, fascinated with humans like her siblings aren’t, desiring to fit in instead of isolate), I had to put a little bit of distance between her and the flock. Of course, she loves them— that will in no way change— but she’s old enough that she should remember the school (and her dead friends) unlike Gazzy and Angel, but she can’t, and she very much fears forgetting the flock if anything happens to them. So she’s trying desperately to keep the flock close and wants desperately to experience the world at the same time, and doesn’t know what to do when she can’t have both. That’s her biggest character conflict throughout the series, along with that in-between area where she’s not quite where her older siblings are but understands so much more than Gazzy and Angel, and where she stands in that.

So yeah. Nudge’s journey is that in looking for belonging in the world, in her family, and in herself.

This is why she’s one of the ones that gets to find her parent, James Patterson. 

Other additions include:

She never straightens her hair. Never. Her resources at the E-shaped house aren’t perfect, but she still has learned how to take care of her hair and has a few styles she cycles through.

She becomes the default person Max sics on people when the flock is trying to befriend them. Also their de-facto diplomat around strangers.

As in canon, she does take some time away from the flock to expirience ‘normal life’. This does not last long due to the stress of being separated from her siblings/not being able to help them and [REDACTED]

Nudge is... not the only person in her head. I’m not focusing on it much because she doesn’t actually know and neither does the flock (I don’t know if they ever figure it out during the series, either), but she has dissociative identity disorder. She’s not aware of her alter(s?). Her alter isn’t super aware of her, either. 

The alter that I’ve developed is named Oxy and is not super aware of the outside world. In her eyes, she’s still seven and they’re still at the School. She would not recognize the body as her own if she looked in a mirror.

Nudge actually leaves the flock for a while to pursue her dream of living a normal life. She deserves it. She learns how to make muffins and the basics of software development. These things are unrelated.

Gasman (Birthname: No first name, surname “Falk”)

Honestly, writing Gazzy is kind of hard for me. Partially because I’m not great at writing kids, and partially because I feel like he’s a pretty surface-level character in-series that... isn’t super compelling in canon. But even if that’s the case, I try to treat all of my characters with respect, so here we go. In my rewrite, he escaped when he was four, which was half a lifetime ago for him, so his memories are ill-defined. Therefore, he managed to circumvent a lot of the trauma that the rest of the kids have, and not in the way Nudge did, which is by creating an elaborate blockage in her memories. 

Which means Gazzy... really doesn’t know how to deal with all of this traumatic stuff happening. So much of his development turns out to be a coming-of-age narrative. Learning how to deal with the horrors of what his siblings grew up with. Learning the fears that they had the entire time. Losing his innocence when everyone around him never had it in the first place, and being so terribly alone because of it. Because, really, how can you explain such a deep loss to people who never had what he had? How can they help in a way that matters?

Also, relationship-wise, I’m slowly deteriorating the relationship between him and Iggy. Slowly. Or, changing it, at least. Gazzy hero-worships Iggy in-series, and for good reason, because Iggy is super cool, especially in the eyes of an eight-year-old, and especially when Iggy has taken care to cultivate parts of his behaviors to be child-friendly. Part of growing up is seeing the flaws in your heroes, and Gazzy has to learn how to deal with it. End of the series Gazzy is much less closer to Iggy than beginning of the series Gazzy, and neither of them are really okay with that, but they learn to live with it, because that’s really all they can do.

Notes:

I’m keeping the mimickry! It plays a bit of a bigger role because that’s how Gazzy learned to talk. I’m debating whether or not he has his own voice or if he just borrows the flock’s as he sees fit. He also uses it to scream really loudly and occaisonally burst the eardrums of Erasers.

At one point he cosplays as Jessica Jones. No you don’t get any more context than this.

He has a horrible sense of fashion.

I’m changing his name eventually because it sucks. He’s either going to change it to Gannet, Garrison, or Ivy Mike temporarily, and permanently to Zephyr. (I never said I was going to make his name GOOD, because he’s eight, but it’s changing. You’re welcome.)

Angel (Birthname: No first name, surname “Falk”)

It’s just... a completely different character, at this point. I’ve changed so many things about her in an attempt to make her consistent and act like a six-year-old and work in the whole “telepath before she has a solid sense of identity”, so it’s a different character. Also, I’m tired of writing coherently or in paragraphs, so have some interesting facts.

She has epilepsy! Super severe epilepsy! I think she might also develop juvenile MS in the future because her brain has so many scars from being a fucking six-year-old telepath. There’s no way she could get out of that unscathed.

She has more memories of the school than Gazzy, but only because she keeps accidentally reading the minds of Max, Fang, and Iggy. On a related note, she interacts with Iggy as little as possible.

The mind reading means that she has a hard time developing as a normal child with a normal sense of identity or reality. She can’t tell how much people are individual people and how much they’re just extensions of her. Conversely, she can’t tell how much of herself is actually her instead of the thoughts/opinions/identities of someone else. It’s... kinda fucked? But also super not-her-fault. 

She’s albino because white wings. Also, because I thought it was cool. This also means that her vision sucks, though. Also she has the biggest straw sunhat and the most stylish sunglasses a six-year-old can have.

She’s responsible for Max shaving her hair off.

She has the highest swear count because I think it’s funny. She’s the only person allowed to say the fuck word in writing. Everyone else can only say ‘hell’ and the occasionally ‘damn’ but she can say whatever she wants for dramatic and comedic value.

She is NOT THE FUCKING VOICE, J*MES P*TTERSON.

Honorable Mentions

Jeb

I’m skipping Jeb because of how little I care about him. He’s a little bitch, next character.

Ari

STILL HASN’T BEEN REVEALED AS AN ERASER. I’ve been writing for 50,000 words and he’s over here saying ‘nope nope not yet, not dramatic enough’. He’s had speaking lines but has refused to make himself known to Max. I am so frustrated with this seven-year-old wolf-child that I’ve already considered how I would kill him, if I decide I want to kill yet another child in my writing.

So, my main thoughts for Ari is that he... really just drew the short end of the stick in every possible way. While Jeb didn’t sign him up for Eraser expirimentation, he didn’t do anything to stop it, and pretty much cut his losses when he realized this expiriment made a wreck of his ‘perfect, unflawed’ son, because Jeb doesn’t consider children of any species to actually be humans. So, Ari really hates his dad, which makes things complicated, because he also really loves his dad and really wants his approval. 

Which means that he also really hates Max, because she’s the child that always got Jeb’s time and attention, even when Ari was human. I think, on some level, he knows that trying to tear Max down to a less-favored level isn’t actually going to help his situation— infighting for the love of an abusive parent won’t make them any less abusive— but he’s also seven, and his development is already severely stunted due to becoming an Eraser, and he doesn’t see ‘leaving ITEX’ as an option like the Flock does. ITEX is his everything. It’s all he’s ever known, and they tell him he’s doing the right thing, and he wants them to love him. He wants his father to love him. He knows that if he ever questions ITEX, his father will never love him. So it must be his older sister that’s ruining his life and being a horrible child, and once Ari drags her back down to his level, Jeb will realize who the best child is and love him properly again.

Ari, on an even deeper level, does care for Max quite a bit, because she’s his older sister and he wants that to mean something in a way that ‘Jeb being his father’ obviously doesn’t. He wants what she made for herself, and he hates the Flock because she loves them and obviously doesn’t love him. 

Ari, if anything, is the product of neglect, and both loves and hates everyone who shows a chance of caring about him. And he’s seven, so he can’t notice these patterns, let alone break them.

So. Notes!

He doesn’t look like an adult. I thought that was gross and unnecessary. He’s seven, but he looks closer to thirteen or fourteen. Still young enough that he looks like every Eraser’s little brother, and the Erasers high-key treat him like it.

On a related note, he’s the only Eraser who can talk. The others don’t have the mental capacity or vocal structure to replicate human speech, but they can understand language (at about the level of a two or three year old) and are very good at nonverbal communication. This is why Ari managed to climb the ranks despite only having three years of “service” and also looking like a tween.

He doesn’t have an expiration date because that is SUCH a stupid plot point.

I’m giving him a chainsaw! I don’t know how, I don’t know when, but he deserves to have a chainsaw and GODDAMN I will give it to him.

Emergency and Gene

The OCs that I love and also killed pre-series. They don’t have any scenes, because they’re dead, but their deaths greatly effected Max, Fang, and Iggy, and they are very commonly referenced. Their voices are probably Max’s most common hallucination, to the point where she sometimes pretends they’re ghosts that she can talk to. They’re not ghosts. They’re dead.

Dr. Valencia Martinez

I’m actually keeping her pretty close to canon— loving, supportive, the type of person to take in a gsw victim with minimal questions. The difference is that rather than kindness fueling her actions, it’s incredible guilt. She has three goals surrounding Max: Give her as much support in any way she can, teach her as much about chicane culture as possible, and never let Max know that she’s her birth parent.

(She’s probably going to fail at AT LEAST two of those, but it’s the thought that counts.)

Notes:

She has a pet fox named Robin Hood that she rescued from an exotic animal salesman that got arrested.

I think I’m going to kill her. I don’t know yet, but it’s on the table.

Anne Walker

Y’know, the fake FBI Agent. Who’s not actually a fake in my story because I hated that plot point. She’s genuinely an FBI agent who put the Flock into pseudo-witness-protection in order to build a case against the Institute of Higher Living, accidentally got attached to her prime witnesses, raised them for a few months, realized a [SPOILER] and promptly had to let them get the hell out dodge.

I really like the Anne Walker that lives in my head. She is a VITAL part of the Flock’s development, their mental/emotional recovery, and adding to their safety net to fall back on. She serves them as their first adult role model, and is the first adult to show them what parent/child are supposed to look like from a healthy perspective. Though she has several fuck ups, she becomes someone that the Flock genuinely trusts and loves, which makes it all the more difficult for them to leave when [REDACTED].

Notes:

She and Max do butt heads initially, because Max is paranoid and also afraid of becoming uneeded. This ends up being incredibly important because Max needs to learn how to live and find meaning in life without being the designated Leader/Parent/Big Sister

Anne, at one point, sits the entire flock down to teach them about consent, which was something no one ever talked about with them before. She goes in talking specifically about consent in a romantic/sexual sense (because they’re fourteen and that’s something they need to know), but quickly turns into a full-fledged no, people are NOT allowed to do that to you, what the FUCK.

She’s responsible for giving the flock a laptop. It’s because Angel is online schooled (bc telepathy makes actually learning difficult) and was therefore provided with a computer.

Anne is also allowed to swear, but only when it’s funny.

Michael “Grey” Rivers

Aka Grey from the Sewers Aka GR3Y H47 Aka Mike from the Bronx Aka Gifted Child Syndrome Incarnate Aka Would-be-in-MIT-if-his-parents-weren’t-horrible. He’s my son, your honour.

Basically, his backstory boils down to him being a genius, getting into MIT at 14, his (horrible) parents wanting a perfect child who could “make it out” of the Bronx and represent his family/neighborhood/borough to the world. When he inevitably failed their expectations due to stress, a schizophrenic-spectrum disorder that completely alienated him from the rest of his support network, and refusing to take his psych meds because the side effects were horrible and they made it harder to think (and therefore pass his classes), they kicked him out. He fully intends to go back to MIT when he turns 18 and has control of his finances/scholarships/medication/therapy.

So that’s how the flock meets him. 

Mike ends up in a very prominent support role for the flock both in technological persuits (helping them track their parents, helping them get information from ITEX, trying to disable Max’s chip and failing multiple times until it becomes a matter of personal honour—), in helping the older members of the flock figure out how to deal with hallucinations/delusions (because he’s actually been to therapy, unlike them), and in being one of the only people who talks to them and helps them without any ulterior motive. He’s not trying to build a case against ITEX/The Institute of Higher Learning, he’s not double crossing them, he’s not plagued with guilt. He just genuinely wants to help them, and they genuinely want to help him, and that’s their first introduction to a healthy, non-codependent relationship.

My many disorganized notes on Michael Rivers:

He’s from specifically Morris Heights, Bronx, NYC.

He would say that his last name is actually Rivera, but his grandparents changed it to Rivers so it would sound more English, and his family has been in America for so long that he doesn’t know much about any Latino heritage he may or may not have. He identifies as African American, not Afro-Latino. He’s just bitter that his family felt the need to change their surname to have better opportunities in New York.

Nudge aggressively befriends him pretty much the moment she meets him, bullies him into teaching her how to code, and he very quickly adopts her as his pseudo-little-sister.

His delusions in the book seemed to involve government conspiracies, but as that’s the one delusion that is proved correct in the book, I’ve decided it would be best if his delusions and reality intersected a bit less if I don’t want to write him having a manic/paranoid episode in the second scene he has screen time. So his delusions are more based on “none of this is real”, “someone is recording everything I do and setting me up to fail” and “my ill-wishes on people can and will come true if I dwell on them too long.”. Government conspiracies are one of things he is skeptical about because he thinks most conspiracies are either “CIA admitted to this twenty years ago” or “antisemitism”.

He’s taking online free college classes that don’t actually give him any college credit, but they have good information and help him feel like he’s working towards something. He plans to double major in computer sciences and electrical engineering, minor in marine biology. He’s wanted to join NOAA since he was twelve and he is nothing if not stubborn.

There you go. These are my characters, now. I have custody.