#two more days and then i’m not in this office until january. just need. to make it. two more days

[bright-and-burning]

i like my job i like my job i like my job i like my job

[zepskies]

Smoke Eater - Part 18

Pairing: Firefighter!Dean Winchester x F. Reader 

Summary: Dean Winchester is the cocky, but well-respected Lieutenant at Firehouse 25. He leads by example, but he’s also known to break a few hearts. He’s starting to crave something he’s never had, though. Something stable. Something real. 

That’s when he meets you, on a truly terrible day, trapped in a rickety old elevator.

🔥 Series Masterlist

Word Count: 4,000 Tags/Warnings: Angst, fluff, brief mentions of the events of Part 13, some ADA Sam, Detective John, and a cliffhanger…

Part 18: “V for Vendetta”

After that first rocky month, Dean started to improve physically, and so did you emotionally, as he tried his best to let you help him when he needed it. 

In turn, you did your best to gauge his moods; when he truly did need help, and when it was best for you to just be his girlfriend, not his caretaker.

January rolled onwards, and the resulting winter cold snap brought a kind of calm before a storm. Nick Savage still hadn’t been found, but that didn’t mean your worries were over.

Dean knew that this would hang over all of your heads until both Nick and his father were caught and exposed.

Today Dean walked with Sam on his day off, doing a few laps around the neighborhood as part of Dean’s rehab. They knew a police car was stationed nearby, watching them for their safety. It was a bit unnerving, but necessary.

They were walking back into the building when Sam stopped to check the mail. The box for their unit was along the wall in the corridor with several other locked boxes. Sam unlocked theirs and pulled out a rolled-up newspaper, some coupons, and a stray folded note addressed to Dean. Sam’s brows furrowed.

“What’s that, a love note?” Dean asked dryly. He took it from Sam and unfolded the scrap of paper.

20579. Your badge will join your dad’s on the wall.

Both the Fire Department headquarters and the 84th Precinct had a wall to commemorate firefighters and officers who had given their lives in the line of duty. Each of their badges had their own display plaque hung on the respective walls.

In short, the note was a threat.

Sam’s worried frown deepened as he watched Dean’s good mood evaporate. He crumpled up the note and pocket it, before he met his younger brother’s eyes.

“Keep this between us,” he warned. As in, don’t tell you.

Sam shook his head. “Dad needs to know, at least. And you two need to be careful.” 

“That goes for you and Eileen too,” Dean replied. He reached for Sam’s shoulder and squeezed. “Don’t matter that you��re an ADA. Azazel goes after cops and their families. He’s gonna be gunning for an opportunity to get to one of us.”

Sam’s lips pressed together, but he acknowledged that with a nod.

They went back upstairs together, where you were dressed casually and gathering up your purse.

“Heading out somewhere?” Dean asked. Sam shot him a glance, which Dean silently answered with a short nod. He looked back at you when you offered him a smile.

“Yep, we need a few things. Milk, eggs, more Twizzlers, apparently,” you quipped, lightly smacking his stomach. Dean quirked a smile.

“Give me a sec. I’ll go with you,” he said.

You made an uncertain sound. “Didn’t you just get back from a walk? You sure you don’t just want to shower up and relax?”

“I’m good,” said Dean. He knew you didn’t like the idea of him overexerting himself, but he didn’t feel comfortable letting you go out alone. He could tell by the look Sam once again threw his way from the kitchen that he didn’t think it was a good idea either.

Dean slid a hand up your arm. “How about this. I’ll stay in the car. I just want some more fresh air.”

You tilted your head at him, but you conceded. He followed you to the door and held it open for you.

“Can I drive?” Dean hedged.

You chuckled. “Don’t push it, Lieutenant.”

On the way back from the grocery store, you discreetly eyed Dean’s profile. His knee was bouncing as he stared out the window.

Sometimes he checked the rearview mirror of your Camaro. Sometimes he fiddled with the radio or checked his phone.

It was all nervous behavior you took a catalogue of. By the time you pulled back into the parking lot of Dean’s apartment building, he finally seemed to relax a fraction. You parked the car and turned to him. 

“Okay, what’s the matter?” you asked.

Dean gave you a curious look, but there was an unmistakable tension in his demeanor.

“What do you mean?”

You tried your question a different way. “What’s got you all on edge?”

He didn’t seem to want to answer at first.

“Dean,” you prodded. “Does it have something to do with why you insisted on coming with me, even though I can see that you’re tired?”

His face tightened, but he reached over for your hand. Your fingers curled around his. Now you were getting worried.

“We’ve got the police watching us here, but anything could happen out there,” Dean said. “Until this blows over, I don’t think you should go out by yourself.”

Until this blows over. You wanted to ask when that would be, but you knew he wouldn’t be able to give you an answer.

“Zachariah called me this morning,” you admitted. “He’s standing in for Nick as CEO. He said I have a job waiting for me when I get off medical leave next week. Everyone’s been working from home since the fire, but we’d be going to a new building the company owns downtown.”

Dean tightened up, just like you knew he would. His eyes closed as his head tilted back against the headrest. He let out a long breath through his nose. You stayed quiet, both waiting for what he might say and preparing for him to get upset.

He surprised you by calmly looking over at you again.

“It’s not a good idea. If Nick’s still alive, it means his dad probably knows you know who he is,” he said. “And not for nothin’. Even with Nick out of there, that place’s probably been built on blood money.”

Both were fair points.

“I know. I’m going to find something else, as soon as you’re better,” you said. Dean shook his head and held your hand tighter.

“Don’t let me be an excuse,” he said. His gaze was firm and direct meeting yours. “I need you to start taking care of yourself too, all right? Please.” 

Faced with his earnestness, you couldn’t help but soften. After everything he’d done to save you, to protect you, was it fair of you to keep making him worry?

In the past, you’d felt justified. You couldn’t quit. You needed the money. You could handle it, whatever came next. You would deal with it because you had to.

But maybe this time, you didn’t have to. It wasn’t worth all this.

With that resolve, you let out a breath.

“I’m going to call Zachariah,” you said, “and tell him that I’m working from home, or I quit.”

Dean stared back at you with a measure of surprise.

“I’m not going back,” you said, squeezing his hand. “If he has a problem with that, I’ll use whatever I have left in my savings. Hopefully that’ll be enough until I find a new job.”

After a moment, Dean expelled a breath of relief. He beckoned you over, and carefully as you could over the upholstery, you leaned over and caressed his cheek before you went in for a kiss. He welcomed you, with his hands slipping up your sides and around your back, pressing you into him with a heady warmth.

He paused against your lips after a while. His forehead rested against yours.

“You don’t need to drain your savings. I can help you,” Dean started to say, but you pulled back and held your fingers to his lips.

“You’ve helped me enough. You’re already letting me live with you rent free,” you pointed out. “Let me figure out the rest.”

After a moment, Dean wordlessly agreed. He wanted to argue that you wouldn’t have had to move in with him if not for Azazel putting you in his sights, but at the same time, Dean understood that you’d been providing for yourself for a long time. He respected you for it.

So he just guided you back to him for another slow kiss.

John Winchester owned a condo approximately 20 minutes from his sons’ apartment. It was the home they’d grown up in after the house fire, over thirty years ago.

John had learned a lot since then. In fact, some might say that he’d become a paranoid bastard.

Aside from a professional alarm system, he’d installed hidden cameras inside and out of his home, and at every window. It meant that even when he was asleep, his eyes were never truly closed.

When the intruder took his first steps into John’s bedroom, the man himself was waiting with a gun cocked and loaded. The safety clicking back made a small sound, but in the silence, it might as well have been a gunshot.

The masked man swiftly turned and ducked, throwing a punch. The scuffle that followed was quick and covered by darkness.

The cameras on “Night Mode” picked up every moment.

And that was how John later showed video evidence of Alastair Rolston breaking into his condo, and subsequently getting his ass handed to him.

Both men had their fair share of bruises, but at the end of the day, Alastair was the one cuffed to a chair in the bowels of the 84th Precinct. He sat beside his court-appointed lawyer.

Meanwhile, Cas watched the scene from behind the one-way glass window of the interrogation room. Rufus Turner, their Lieutenant, was beside him, along with ADA Sam Winchester. He watched the man his father questioned very carefully. 

“Well, I think you know what this means, Mr. Rolston,” John drawled.

Alastair’s stance in the chair was relaxed, almost unfazed. He gave the detective a wry smile.

“What’s that, John?” he asked.

“I’ve got you dead to rights on attempted murder of a cop,” said John. “It ain’t a good look, my friend.”

“Don’t answer that,” said the lawyer. Alastair glanced at the man, unimpressed, to say the least.

“No fucking shit,” he replied.

“I’d say you’ve got two options,” John pressed forward. He leaned on the table between him and Alastair.

“Did Azazel…excuse me, Daniel Savage, put you up to this? You can answer that question, or I could just skip to the part where you sit in a cell for 20 to life.”

Alastair’s face gave away nothing but calculation and amusement. John nodded, with a grim smile.

“I’ll bet you set the fire at Savage & Co. Trying to get Nick to look like a victim in all this—the consequence of doing business with the likes of Azazel,” he said. “Better yet, I think you’re his favorite hitman. Clean, precise, no tracks left behind, no traces of evidence. Perfect kills. I’ll bet you consider yourself a goddamn artist.”

Alastair lifted his gaze, and John saw the familiar depths of a killer.

“I don’t like setting fires,” said Alastair.

John was nonplussed. “I’m sure you don’t.”

The other man rolled his shoulders.

“It’s all very…messy, you see. Unpredictable.” A smile graced his lips. “But I know someone who does.”

“He’ll give you his employer,” the lawyer said. “The person who ordered the hit.”

“Which hit?” John arched a brow. “I can’t be the only special one. What about Paul Richardson, Jerry Stillwell, Amanda Waller?”

The lawyer shared a look with his client. Alastair rolled his eyes and leaned over to whisper in his ear. After a moment, the lawyer nodded and met John’s gaze.

“He’ll tell you what you want to know, but only for a blanket deal of immunity.”

John could’ve guessed. Alastair smiled once more and leaned back in his seat.

The detective held up a finger and exited the interrogation room. He met Sam’s gaze, and the latter already knew what his father was thinking.

"Give me a minute," Sam said. He went into the room and tried to negotiate with Alastair and his lawyer, but the man wouldn't accept a plea of 20 to 25 years, even to serve all the murders they could charge him with concurrently. Nor would he accept 15 to 20, or even Sam's best deal: 10 to 12.

Sam exited the room and hid his discouragement. He met his father's waiting gaze.

“We can’t give him immunity,” Sam said. “He’s likely the one who committed Azazel’s hits. Not just for the past six months, but for God knows how long, and how many bodies.”

“At this point, it’s the only way we’re getting a chance at Daniel Savage,” John said. “Not just finding him, but pinning him as the mastermind behind the whole operation. Drug trafficking, arson, murders…the whole thing, Sam.”

Sam didn’t like it. No one did, for that matter, but even Rufus heaved a sigh.

“You can’t move forward without a trigger finger willing to testify,” he said.

“Yeah, because hitmen make notoriously credible witnesses,” Sam retorted.

“Do think he set the fires as well?” Cas asked John. “He seemed to imply that he committed the murders, but not the arson.”

John hummed in contemplation.

“We’ll find out. But first, I want a confirmed name from the horse’s mouth,” he said, shifting his attention to Sam. “Can you get me that, son?” 

Sam’s lips pursed.

Within an hour, the paperwork was drawn and the plea deal was arranged. Father and son sat side by side on one side of the interrogation room, while Alastair and his lawyer sat on the other. Alastair finished signing the final document as the cuffs on his wrists jangled.

“All right,” said John. “Tell me what I want to know.”

Alastair smiled and spread his hands as wide as he was able.

“I’m an open book, Johnny. Ask away.”

John leaned forward.

“Let’s start with this,” he said. “Who ordered you to kill me?”

Nick Savage was unearthed from a luxury apartment in the south of France. He was extradited back the United States and hauled into a courtroom in Lawrence, Kansas for arraignment.

Sam Winchester was the prosecutor on the case. As luck would have it, one of his favorite judges was also assigned for this docket.

“What do we have here?” asked Judge Devereaux. He was a portly man, short and graying, with square black glasses that framed his perpetually surly face. The man now adjusted his glasses so he could read the slip of paper the clerk had just handed to him after reading off the docket.

The charges included four counts of murder in the first degree: the murders-for-hire, enacted by Alastair Rolston.

Followed by attempted murder in the first degree, ten counts of murder in the second degree (those who had lost their lives in the most recent building fire), conspiracy to commit murder, arson, and if that weren’t enough, a charge each of attempted sexual assault and sexual harassment.

When the last two charges were read out loud in the courtroom, Nick looked visibly angry.

Sam glanced over at the defendant with thinly veiled satisfaction. Some days, it was difficult for him to come to work.

Today was not that day.

“All right, that is a laundry list of potential misdeeds,” Judge Deveraux remarked. He looked up at Nick Savage. “How does the defendant plead?”

At the prodding of his lawyer, Amelia Richardson, Nick spoke up.

“Not guilty,” he said. Though he rolled his eyes, as if this was a waste of his time.

“What’s the deal here, Mr. Winchester?” Judge Devereaux asked.

“The primary charge is a murder-for-hire, your Honor,” Sam replied. “Mr. Savage hired a hitman to murder at least five people, and succeeded with four. He also masterminded several arsons. This includes a fire at his own company building, which claimed the lives of ten people and injured several others. This is all part of a larger connection to organized crime, which the People intend to prove in our case. Due to the nature of the charges, and the defendant clearly being a flight risk, we seek his remand to custody without bail.”

The judge raised his brows. He turned to the defendant’s lawyer.

“What about it, Miss Richardson?”

Amelia shot Sam a glance, but she replied to the judge.

“What we have here is a conflict of interest, your Honor,” she said. “Detective John Winchester has a vendetta against my client. Therefore, Mr. Winchester should recuse himself. It’s a family affair, Judge, and they have no evidence for any of these charges, except for the testimony of a confessed murderer.”

“It’s called prosecutorial discretion,” Sam cut in. “Our evidence goes beyond Mr. Rolston’s testimony and will more than support our case. I’ve also tried my father’s cases before, your Honor. This defendant is no different.”

The judge peered closer at the docket with incredulous eyes.

“Except for the fact that one of the attempted murders was on your father. John Winchester?” Judge Devereaux actually chuckled. “Oh, Mr. Savage. Many have tried and failed on that regard.”

“Judge,” Amelia tried, but Devereaux waved her off. Sam took in that small victory without giving anything away outwardly. The fact that John was on the docket as a “victim” was easily Sam’s biggest challenge in this arraignment, but he just couldn’t hand this off to another prosecutor.

“And what’re these last charges about?” the judge asked.

“Mr. Savage attempted to sexually assault one of his employees at a company Christmas party in the defendant’s home, your Honor,” Sam replied. His gaze once again cut over to Nick, who glared back at him with a sneer.

“That’s a goddamn lie!” Nick shouted.

Amelia grabbed his arm and tried to shut him up, but Nick jerked out of her grasp.

“Put a gag on your client or I will, Miss Richardson,” Devereaux warned with a deepening frown.

“Hey,” Amelia hissed a whisper, grabbing the sleeve of Nick’s suit jacket this time. “Get it together and shut your mouth. Remember where you are.”

He ignored her to try and speak to the judge himself. 

“That bitch tased me. Did she tell you that?” Nick levied Sam a look, before he turned back to Devereaux. “Yeah, she assaulted me, Judge. So that charge is fucking bogus.”

“I’ve heard quite enough!” Devereaux snapped. He raised his gavel and slammed it down loud enough for Nick to flinch. “The defendant is remanded to custody, without bail.”

It was more satisfying than John would admit.

While the development wasn’t exactly what he had expected, having Daniel Savage’s son dragged out of his new prison home to sit in another musty holding cell was the highlight of the new year.

This was the poor excuse for a man who’d given him such a headache these past few months. This was the little shit that nearly got his son killed, and who’d been terrorizing you for months, if not years.

But he would be a means to an end.

“I’ll tell ya what, Nick. You don’t look like a man that could organize a handful of murders and arsons, but here we are,” John said.

He scratched the back of his head and sat on the corner of the desk. Sam was seated across from Nick, and Cas was hanging back within the cell, watching the exchange (and watching Nick’s reactions for any tells).

On the other side sat Nick himself, dressed down in his gray prison garb. It was a far cry from the $5,000 suit he wore in the arraignment. Next to him was his lawyer, Amelia Richardson.

“Is there a question in there somewhere?” she asked. She shot Sam a glance.

They had dated in law school for a few months. It had ended abruptly when her husband returned from Afghanistan. It had been a shock to both of them, since the man had been presumed dead.

Clearly, Sam had moved on since then. He was happier with Eileen than he ever was, but he could tell that Amelia had never quite recovered from the “what could’ve been” of their relationship.

Still, Sam had set all that aside the moment he stepped into this room. He watched his father work.

“Why did you set fire to your own building?” John asked.

He’d expected Nick to be more explosive with his denials, but the man was quietly simmering, like he just wanted the questioning to be over. It reminded John of when his sons were teenagers. Maybe he hadn’t been the perfect father, but intuition was telling him something…

“You didn’t do it, did you?” John mused. “At least, not that fire.”

It was interesting, however, that Alastair had pinned the Savage & Co. fire on the son—that Nick had started it himself, along with the other arsons. Alastair had just been the muscle, committing the murders and the brandings on the victims.

John wasn’t so sure he believed that. He leaned in a bit and gave Nick a wry smile.

“Did Daddy do that one for ya?” he asked.

At that, Nick held firm. “My father has nothing to do with this.”

Hmm, a bit of familial loyalty? Maybe trying to prove himself, John detected. How far is he willing to go to protect his dad?

“So you did do it, along with the other arsons,” John said.

“Are you trying to get him to confess without a plea deal?” Amelia snarked.

“I’m trying to figure out how badly this kid wants to stay out of jail for the rest of his life,” John said.

“I’m not a fucking kid,” Nick grumbled.

“If you have something for us on Daniel Savage, then we’re willing to listen,” Sam added. “Do you really want to spend the rest of your life in jail?”

Nick crossed his arms, clearly uncooperative.

Sam narrowed his gaze. “This is your last chance, Nick.”

“You don’t have anything on me except for the word of a murdering felon,” Nick retorted. “I’ll beat this trial in a few months and I’ll be out free…but if you really want to know, I’ll let you in on a little something.”

He leaned in, meeting John’s eyes.

“Dad retaliates,” said Nick. “I think you know that best of all, Detective. This time, I think it’s one son for another. And you’ve got two to pick from.”

“Nick,” Amelia warned, but he ignored her.

He glanced at a carefully stoic Sam before he smirked in John’s face, which had become devoid of all humor and revealed the stoniness underneath.

“If I were a betting guy, I’d put my money on the one that had a fucking building fall on him.”

After leaving the county jail, John drove Sam and Cas back to his sons’ apartment. They couldn’t treat Nick’s warning as an idle threat.

Sam was the prosecutor on the case. He wasn’t willing to step down, so the best they could do for him was give him a police security detail that would have to be with him at all times. However, all three men agreed that you, Dean, and Eileen needed to be put in protective custody during the trial.

“Damn it, Dean,” Sam muttered. His brother wasn’t answering his cell.

“Try him again,” said John.

“Is Eileen still at work?” Cas asked.

“Yeah, but she’s talking to the principal now about a temporary replacement for her classes,” Sam replied. He was worried about her safety, but he was also worried about you and Dean. Neither of you were answering your cell phones.

He later let John and Cas into his apartment, where all looked normal and clean.

“Dean!” Sam called out. He was just about to search the apartment when the man came out of his room, looking freshly showered.

“Hey, what’s up?” said Dean. “The gang’s all here, huh?”

“I’ve been calling you for an hour. Where’ve you been?” Sam asked in annoyance, though it was edged with a hint of more that tipped off Dean.

He sensed the tension in the room between his brother, his father, and his friend. He frowned.

“I had a doctor’s appointment. Why?”

John explained the latest round of questioning with Nick Savage, and his most recent threat. John asked where you were right now, if not in the apartment. Dean’s expression shifted to one of worry as he went to find his cell phone.

“She had a job interview,” he admitted, scrolling through his phone to find your name. “She couldn’t reschedule it, else she would’ve gone with me.”

He’d been uneasy about you going to the interview by yourself, but you hadn’t wanted him to change his appointment, and you had assured him it was only a few minutes away…

Dean held the phone to his ear and waited what felt like an eternity as it rang.

Pick up. Pick up, damn it.

Finally, the line connected.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he greeted…but you didn’t answer.

“You there?” he asked. There was a pit forming in his stomach when he glanced up at John. His father met his gaze with furrowed brows that betrayed concern.

The line was silent for one more painful moment. Dean opened his mouth to call out to you again, but a smooth voice interrupted.

“Dean, Dean, Dean,” a man replied. “Forgetting something?”

AN: 🫣 Sorry lol.

But the next chapter will bring the final showdown...

Next Time:

Dean’s heart began to pound. His mouth parted, but for a moment, the words wouldn’t escape.

“Who is this?” he said. His voice was a hint unsteady.

“I think you know, son,” the man replied.

Keep Reading: PART 19

Dean Winchester Masterlist

Main Masterlist

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[juqtier]

₊˚╰ 𖣠 MERCY ✧.* SPENCER REID

SUMMARY: During one of the most detrimental and devastating outbreaks this world has ever seen, the BAU had spent countless hours trying to bring in the man responsible, dead or alive. When they seek help from a minacious mercenary, and personal feelings somehow get involved, the situation quickly becomes much more complicated and difficult than anticipated.

GENERAL WARNING: ANGSTY and horror (somewhat), weapons, violence, descriptions of viruses and diseases, death, kissing of course, zombie like creatures, apocalypse, outbreak, descriptions of mutations

CHAPTER WARNING: descriptions of violence and viruses, reader is kinda an asshole. THIS CHAPTER MAY SEEM BORING BUT PLS the story will get interesting as it progresses! just gotta explain the basic concept!

A/N: the first chapter, yay! this is clearly inspired by resident evil (my fav game series). i thought it’d be interesting and unique to combine my two fav hyperfixations. i made the virus names and effects, and im clearly not a scientist so if they are scientifically inaccurate ignore it or im gonna cry. also, I wrote this with early spencer in mind (3-5) but if you imagine him from a different season lmk! ALSO sorry if any of the writing is bad, my english is terrible!

ACCOMPANYING SONG : SMELLS LIKE TEEN SPIRIT, NIRVANA

. . .

CHAPTER 1

January 15th, 2009

- 985 days since the outbreak

You had been caught. You had finally been caught.

Of course, you were well aware of the risks that came with being a mercenary, being caught was one of them. Yet, this didn’t diminish the anger you felt, sitting in a dingy, dark interrogation room, cuffed to a table.

It felt as if days passed by. Your eyelids felt heavy, you couldn’t manage to find a comfortable position to rest in. A metal folding chair would quickly prove to be a poor place to even attempt to relax in. Sitting in silence for so long, your ears could perfectly hear the buzzing of the flickering bulb above you, and it drove you crazy.

Just before you could drive yourself insane, focusing on each bothersome aspect of the interrogation room once more, the door opened.

Two men, two entirely different vibes.

One was an older, tall, stoic man wearing a suit practically devoid of color.

And while the man that stood beside him wasn’t wearing the most colorful outfit, his blue shirt and purple tie were a stark contrast to the other man’s outfit.

His long, wavy brown hair stood out as well. A part of you wanted to just stare at him, he was so pretty. But the other part of you, the majority of you, wanted to knock both officers unconscious and attempt to run away.

“I’m Unit Chief Aaron Hotchner, this is Special Agent Dr. Spencer Reid. We’re with the Behavioral Analysis Unit.” The older man explained as both of them took a seat across from you.

The words practically went unnoticed by you, your mind had been more focused on the discomfort caused by the tight cuffs around your wrists. Your eyes met Hotchner's, and he could tell exactly what you were feeling.

Angry.

“Wanna take these cuffs off?” You request.

“I’m afraid I can’t do that until you cooperate with us and give us the information we need.”

“What information?”

Your eyes naturally rolled, gradually growing more annoyed by the second. Even with how frustrated you were, you weren’t going to cooperate easily. You were a mercenary, and the FBI was well aware you had only ever been motivated by payment.

It sounded selfish to everyone else. It was selfish, but to you, it was the only way to survive.

Hotch extracts papers and files from a manila folder, spreading them out onto the table in front of you. Your eyes watched his hands as he displayed each paper for you.

“For the past seven months, me and my team have been observing your every move.” Hotch’s eyes are glued to you. “Several times in these past months, you’ve been employed by Luca Ansaldo.”

The name has been drilled into your ears by this point.

Luca Ansaldo, a wealthy, ‘brillitant’ virologist and CEO of the virology company SynX. And, unbeknownst to you, the creator of the Lazarus Virus.

Ansaldo had employed you many times before, and with the pay being more than generous for a seemingly easy job, you didn’t think twice about accepting his offer.

But now, just hearing his name was enough to enrage you. Yet, you remain calm, returning Hotch’s eye contact. You barely even noticed Reid beside him, merely observing the interaction between you and Hotch.

“He paid me well for a simple job, is that what you wanted to hear?” You mutter.

You knew that wasn’t what they wanted to hear, but you also couldn’t tell what they wanted.

The past officers that had come in, aggressively interrogating you, never made it clear what exactly they wanted from you. All you could really understand was that they wanted his whereabouts, and you couldn’t tell them that. You didn’t even know.

“What jobs did he pay you for?” Hotch inquires.

“Easy jobs. I’ve done that plenty of times before for others, why does it matter now?”

Hotchner adjusts in his seat, probably finding it just as uncomfortable as you were in that moment.

“It’s important because we’re not currently after the other individuals you’ve worked for, we’re after Ansaldo.” He explains, sliding a document toward you.

Your eyes quickly scan the words on the paper, taking in all of its details.

“Under SynX, Ansaldo has managed to manufacture one of the deadliest viruses known to man, the Lazarus virus. You can see the results of his work walking in the streets.”

“Lazarus Virus?” You question. “Like, from the Bible?”

You clearly knew about the outbreak, every human did. You just had never been able to put a name to the virus responsible.

Reid took this question as an opportunity to share every bit of knowledge he had about the virus.

“Yes, actually. The name derives from Lazarus of Bethany, mentioned in the Gospel of John. The story claims Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, only four days after his death.” He hadn’t even noticed your eyes locked on him as he rambled. “We believe the virus attacks the brain stem, destroying the brain's basic functions. However, while mental capabilities deteriorate, physical capabilities are enhanced, explaining why they’re rather strong and violent. Those infected by the virus are called ‘Revenants’.”

You couldn’t help but be impressed at his ability to speak for so long without even losing his breath. He had spit out each word with urgency, as if he had been waiting to share this information with you.

“You seem to know a lot about the virus, why am I here?”

“We don’t know enough.” Hotch replies. “Without a sample of the virus, we won’t be able to produce an effective antidote. Ansaldo is currently the only man we know of that has any samples, and you know more about him than any of us. You may be our only chance at finding him before it’s too late.”

He leans forward, an even more intense stare accompanying his statement.

For a moment, for a brief moment, you allow yourself to absorb his words. It was as if a switch flipped in your brain, allowing yourself to prioritize others before yourself.

And again, this sounded so incredibly selfish. You could recognize that, of course. But you couldn’t blame yourself. And quite frankly, neither could Hotch or Reid.

The outbreak was and is devastating. Major cities were overrun and filled with chaos, with millions dead or missing. Trusting people wasn’t as common as it was years ago. Especially for you. You had been alone, fighting to survive, for years. It was all to protect yourself. You had the right to protect yourself, right?

“How much?” Hotch’s words bring your attention back to him, back to the situation you were in.

You weren’t sure if you misheard or misunderstood him, and it seemed as if Reid shared that same thought. His eyes widened as he snapped his head towards Hotch, questioning him with his eyes. Hotch, however, doesn’t even seem to notice Reid’s shock.

“What?” You stutter just a bit, clearly confused.

“How much do we need to pay you for your cooperation?” He repeats.

“You want to pay me to work for you?” You reply, skeptical about the offer.

Reid visibly shared the same sentiment. It was as if he couldn’t close his mouth. You didn't expect this, and neither did he.

“You are the closest connection we have to Ansaldo.” Hotch ignores the shocked faces of you and Reid, “If we have to pay you for your cooperation, then we are willing to do that.”

His expression shows that he’s serious. You consider the offer a bit longer before spitting out the first number you can think of.

“Two hundred thousand.”

You wait for any change in his expression, you wait for him to simply refuse. But he never does.

“We can arrange that.” He gives you a small nod before rising from his chair, Reid following. “I will assign an agent to keep an eye on you. You will be kept under supervision at all times as you work alongside my team. If you even attempt to betray our agreement, I promise you will not see a single dollar.”

“Wait.” You blurt out before they can even make their way to the door. “Can I choose what agent gets to follow me around?”

The way you word it makes it sound like a privilege, like it was an honor to have to watch over you. In reality, it most likely wasn’t.

The FBI considered you a dangerous, difficult mercenary. Asking you for help was a last resort, one they tried to avoid. But as they watched the virus spread across the country, unable to stop it, they knew they had no other choice.

“Do you have an agent in mind?” Hotch raises an eyebrow, confused by your question.

You nod in response, your eyes landing on Reid.

You couldn’t explain why, but his quiet, shy demeanor drew you to him. He wasn’t standoffish like the other officers and agents, he was actually quite the opposite of you.

Reid furrows his eyebrows. Neither he nor Hotch had expected the request; their looks expressed that. Hotch looks over at Reid, as if he were contemplating whether he could handle such a job. It was a silent conversation between the two; you were just an observer in that moment.

“Reid will watch over you as you work the case with us.” Hotch proclaims.

“Hotch, are you sure?” Reid whispers, just loud enough for you to hear him. He sounds nervous as he speaks, causing you to smirk.

“If she causes any problems for you, I will assign a different agent for the job.” Hotch responds, going for the door. His hand lands on the door knob, twisting it and pulling the door open with Reid behind him.

“Can you take these cuffs off me?”

Hotch and Reid turn their attention towards you once again before Reid digs in his pocket, pulling out a set of keys. Hotch watches as Reid walks over to you.

Your gaze remained fixed on Reid as he fumbled with the keys. You observed his shakey hands, finding all of it almost humorous.

When he finally managed to remove the cuffs, he let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding in.

You stand up from your seat, rubbing your wrists where the cuffs had previously been.

“Thank you so much.” You say with a teasing, playful tone.

His eyes never meet yours as he steps back, allowing you to stretch, glad to be free from the metal chair you were held down to.

“The team is gathering to discuss our next steps in the case. You’ll be joining us, since you’re working alongside us now.”

He explains the situation quickly as he leads you out of the room, still avoiding any eye contact.

“Exciting.” A smirk was still plastered on your face as you walked behind Reid.

While Reid was more nervous about the situation, and you clearly found it amusing, there was one thing the two of you had in common at the moment.

You had no idea what you were getting into.

. . .

pt. 2

a.n. : again sorry if the writing is bad, but i’m excited for this series to play out! it’s a concept i haven’t seen done before so i wanted to make something cool with it! i believe even if you aren’t a fan of resident evil, criminal minds x mercenary is still kinda cool. also, if you want to be on tag list im more than happy to add you!

[ebonyheartnet]

Important 2024 USA Year-End Holiday Healthcare Reminders

Monday, Dec. 23rd 2024 is the best day to reliably request any year-end meds. This goes double if it’s new—do not get fucked by prior authorizations!

If you need a prior authorization, ask the office/pharmacy to request an expedited one from your insurance. Even with that, your insurance may still drag it out. They absolutely will if you don’t try tho.

Noon on Friday, Dec. 27th is pretty much last call for year-end refills. Everyone is calling in. Your doc is almost certainly not open to process orders on weekends. Being realistic here, depending on their caseload, you still may not make the cut.

If you request a refill after Friday, Dec. 27th 2024, it is probably not getting filled until January. Please still try if you need the refill, but I’m not gonna sugarcoat it. This is not necessarily because your doc’s office isn’t trying. It’s much more likely that they’re short due to holidays & illness.

Whatever you do, do not lose your shit. There are shitty people in healthcare, and you should be able to get mad about it. Do not lose your shit at the office! If you do, you may be barred from that practice. No idea how it looks elsewhere, but it’s a 2-4+ month wait for new patients at nearly every PCP/specialist in DC, MD and VA. I know, it fucking sucks sometimes. Please don’t risk your access to life sustaining care.

Please be kind. A lot of the healthcare workers who don’t suck are disabled and/or otherwise marginalized. We get it, and we’re drowning over here. If you act like we’re all UHC CEOs, we’re gonna burn out trying to help you. Then, you really may be left with everyone who’s aiming for that job.

Everything I’ve said also applies to pharmacies. They’re damn near criminally short on a normal day. Q4 is hell, and the last two weeks are Black Friday: extended edition. They’re painfully aware that someone will go without, even if they work themselves to collapse. Yelling at them isn’t going to help you, it’ll likely just lead to a nervous breakdown and/or early closure.

Sincerely,

Centralized scheduler on LTD ❤️🧑🏽‍🦼❤️

[likeadevils]

Reputation Timeline

This is a very long post that puts all the songs on Reputation in order of Taylor creating them. I’ve also included a few other songs she worked on while writing rep and quotes from Taylor and her collaborators talking about her process.

If you don't want to read all that, check out this playlist of the album in order or this playlist of her entire discography.

I’ve also added this color coded scale of how sure I am of the date: 

Confirmed: There is some type of official source for the date

Inferring: Nobody has officially said “This is when we wrote it,” but all available evidence points to that date

Speculation: This date is based off pure vibes and guesswork and is highly likely to change.

Unknown: All that is known is the year (from the US Copyright Offices

February 13, 2015: Taylor's interview with Vogue is published (likely conducted on January 14/15).

"I don’t worry that I haven’t started the next record yet. I don’t worry that I don’t know what it’s going to be. I’m not worried that I have absolutely no timetable as to when it needs to be done. It could be two years from now; it could be three, it could be four. Or it could be one. You get these bursts of inspiration right at the moment you’re not expecting to. You just have to live your life, and hopefully you’ll take the right risks."

March 2, 2015: Taylor is photographed leaving a studio. (Note: I can not find a place that specifies if this is a recording studio, dance, photography, radio, or television studio).

May 20, 2015: Taylor's interview with Marie Claire is published (likely conducted two months beforehand).

Taylor is not even sure she'll have made another album by the time 2020 rolls around. "I'm not going to put out an album until I've made one that's better than this one and that's going to be really hard," she says. And how might her music evolve if she does find love? "If that does happen, I think I could find complexity in happiness," she says. "I don't think anything's ever simple. Just because you're happy in a relationship doesn't mean there aren't moments of confusion or frustration or loneliness or sadness. Hopefully, if I ever find some sort of meaningful relationship, I'll be able to still find inspiration, just through everyday ups and downs."

October 7, 2015: Taylor is photographed leaving a recording studio in New York.

November 13, 2015: Taylor's interview with Vogue Australia is published (likely conducted two months beforehand).

Every two years since 2006 she has released an album, followed by a tour, then moved onto the next one. But her latest album, 1989, might change plans a bit. “This album has produced more number ones than any album in the past, so we’re just going to go with it,” she says, going on to explain how the usual album cycle could be extended. “Then I’ll feel like I’ll need to give people a breather from me because at a certain point they’re going to get a little sick of hearing about me, so I’ll need to go away for a while then, depending on my gauge on how sick of me they are, I’ll decide when to put out the next album.” [...]  “I’ve been learning every single day what the right amount of sharing [of her personal life] is, and lately it’s been not natural because this album is such a snapshot of my life – it was so vivid, direct and honest.”

April 20, 2016: Taylor interview with Vogue is published (conducted in February).

So what the hell are you going to do with the rest of your life, Taylor Swift? “I have no idea,” she says, with a sigh that’s more blissful than anxious. “This is the first time in ten years that I haven’t known. I just decided that after the past year, with all of the unbelievable things that happened . . . I decided I was going to live my life a little bit without the pressure on myself to create something.” Do not freak: Swift is not abandoning making music. Those who know her know this is chemically impossible. (“Her not being creative is one of the last things I’d ever worry about,” the musician and producer Jack Antonoff tells me later.) “I’m always going to be writing songs,” Swift says. “The thing is, with me, I could very well come up with three things in the next two weeks and then jump back into the studio, and all of a sudden the next record is started. That’s an option, too.” But probably not for the moment.

August 29, 2016: Taylor writes in her diary "This summer is the apocalypse."

Gorgeous: Sep. 1-5, 16, 17, 19 (Confirmed)

In the Making of a Song video, Taylor is seen wearing this outfit in her Nashville apartment, which dates the song to September 17. From there, the rest of the dates are just math. 

King of My Heart: Sep. 6, 19, 20, 21 (Confirmed)

In the Making of a Song video, Taylor is seen wearing the same outfit in the Gorgeous video and the KOMH video. It's also the same outfit as a video she later posted to The Swift Life (RIP) where she talked about how excited she was to be working after a long break.

September 9, 2016: Gigi Hadid says "You know, [Taylor] is starting to go back to work in the studio again."

I Don't Wanna Live Forever: Early Oct. (Speculation)

In a teaser for the Making of a Song series, Taylor is seen in an unfamiliar outfit (black mesh top) with bleached hair and a thin gold choker that she was fond of in October 2016. She is not wearing her silver J pendant, which she got as a 27th birthday present (Dec 13, 2016). IDWLF is the only song with no video footage that was written in 2016. I don't recognize the studio in the clip, but she recorded IDWLF with Jack Antonoff, who is based in New York. Taylor was on the east coast until October 22nd, and was seen in New York between October 11-13.

Delicate: Oct. 24-26 (Speculation)

Taylor is seen wearing the aforementioned thin gold choker,  with her post Sep. 24 haircut (straight across bangs instead of a side part). Since she normally goes into the studio with Max Martin and Shellback with a few ideas, and creates multiple songs during their sessions, I'm inclined to group this song with IDSB and place it in late October.

I Did Something Bad: Oct. 14, 27 (Confirmed)

In the Making of a Song video, at 4:18 you can spot a gold temporary tattoo on the inside of her wrist, similar to ones she was wore at Drake’s Birthday Party on October 23. Since she is seen working until sundown (She leaves LA on October 28) and had to be in Nashville 13 days priar (She was seen in New York City until the 13), October 14 and 27th are the only dates that make sense. 

January 3, 2017: Taylor writes in her diary "I get all scared about the future because so much has changed in the last year of my life. I mean this time last year I was living in LA, getting ready for Grammys and now, I’m essentially based in London, hiding out trying to protect us from the nasty world that just wants to ruin things. We have been together and no one has found out for 3 months now. I want it to stay that way because I don’t want anything about this to change or become too complicated or intruded upon. But it’s senseless to worry about someday not being happy when I am happy now. Ok. Breathe."

Don't Blame Me: Jan. 10, 11, 12 (Inferring)

Taylor is seen wearing a similar jacket as she was papped wearing on the 11th in the Making of a Song video. (This is pure speculation on my part, but the mood also seems to be a bit lower than on other days). We know she was in LA around this time “for work.”

Dancing With Our Hands Tied: Jan. 11 (Confirmed)

This post explains the situation pretty well. There are multiple accounts of what seems to be a similar story. January 11th one of two times she is seen leaving the gym after a long paparazzi dry spell, the other being in July. Seeing as the song is produced by Max Martin, who is located in LA, and the July pictures are in New York, I’m inclined to agree with the original source.

Dress: Late January/Early February 2017 (Speculation)

Jack Antonoff: “Dress is my second favorite [from Reputation]. It's the first one we made for it." Taylor was mostly based in London in early 2017, but there’s two times we know she was in the states. The first is in early January, when Taylor was in California working with Max Martin and Shellback. The second time is in late January/early February, when she was in Nashville preparing for Super Saturday Night. My guess is this was written in Late January, mostly because she was on the east coast, but theoretically she could've done it earlier in the month, or even later in the year.

Look What You Made Me Do: Late January/Early February 2017 (Speculation)

In promos for the Making of a Song Video, as well as in Miss Americana, Taylor is seen with straight hair and her J initial necklace (dating the song to post-Dec 13, 2016). Her hairstyle (the deep side part) is very Mid-2016. For most of 2017, she seems to favor the straight across braids with strands on the side. Long story short (ha), the hair makes me what to put this as early in the timeline as possible. We know Taylor was on the east coast (specifically Nashville) in early February, preparing for Super Saturday Night.

New Years Day: 2017 (Unknown)

There isn’t any footage of this, but Jack Antonoff has said that it came together fairly quickly and unexpectedly while they were hanging out at his house. 

...Ready For It?: May 2017 (Speculation)

In promos for the Making of a Song series, as well as Miss Americana, Taylor is seen with curly hair, her J necklace, and not her Sapphire Evil Eye Ring, which starts showing up on June 27th (We don’t know exactly when or why she got the sapphire ring). . Since the song partially focuses on whether or not her lover is ready for the media frenzy that surrounds dating her, I’m inclined to place this song in May, when her and Joe’s relationship leaked to the press. The song was recorded in Sweden, and we can assume she was in Europe between May 15 and June 1, 2017. (That being said, we can assume she is in Europe for most of the first half of 2017). 

Call It What You Want: June 2017 (Speculation)

In the Making of a Song series, Taylor is seen with straight hair, her J necklace, and not her sapphire evil eye ring. Once again, I am tempted to put this after her relationship leaked to the press, probably in early June (She is in the states on the 1st and 3rd, and probably leaves sometime in mid-June).

End Game: Mid July (Confirmed)

Ed Sheeran has said that the song was written around July 14th, while he was playing in Connecticut and Taylor was in Rhode island. Ed: End Game was written - I was playing Mohegan Sun in Connecticut, and she has a place in Rhode Island, which isn't too far. So she hits me up like, 'I know you're in Connecticut, come around.' I go around, she plays me some of what turned out to be reputation, and plays me this End Game, and I was like 'Man, I really like this. Can I do a verse? Can I do a rap verse?' And she was like, 'Yeah, for sure!' So the next day, I remember, I was in bed, and woke up and got my laptop out, put the song, just looped it, wrote this verse, and I went in with Max Martin, who she did the song with, and recorded it. Then Future did a verse, and then Taylor wrote a verse and we did the video.

Getaway Car: July 2017 (Speculation)

In the Making of a Song series, Taylor is seen with curly hair, her J necklace, and her sapphire evil eye ring, placing the song sometime shortly before/after June 27th. We know she was in the states for most of July, and in New York City on the 17th and 24th.

This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things: July 2017 (Speculation)

In the Making of a Song series, Taylor is seen with straight hair, her J necklace, and her sapphire evil eye ring. For all the same reasons as Getaway Car, this song was probably recorded in July. The exact order of Getaway Car and TIWWCHNT is probably impossible for anyone not involved in the making of the song to know. I could see arguments for either order, but Taylor has said that reputation is in fairly chronological order, I’m putting it in order of tracklist.

So It Goes: September 2017 (Inferring)

Oscar Görres, a cowritter on the song, said he got a call from Max Martin, Shellback, and Taylor asking to use his track after he’d just had a child. According to social media, he had a daughter in 2015 and a son in September of 2017. The interview is a bit confusing, timeline-wise. On one had, Görres says “I’d just become a father,” but then he implies that Max and Shellback had already completed most of the album. (For context, English isn’t his first language). Personally, I believe the believe the September 2017 date. Multiple sessioners have said Taylor said all songs on the album were about her relationship with Joe, and the tracklists in the reputation magazines are out of order, suggesting a late change. Taylor has has also been known to add a song to the album incredibly last minute— most notably Forever & Always on Fearless, but also with Death By A Thousand Cuts on Lover, which had to have been written post April 20, 2019 (but that's for another album).

And that's all for this timeline! Check out my others:

TIMELINES: debut • fearless • speak now • red • 1989 • rep • lover • folklore • evermore • midnights PLAYLISTS: debut • fearless • speak now • red • 1989 • rep • lover • folklore • evermore • midnights • entire discography GENERAL: tag

[blakelysco-pilot]

This Is Always

From the Love Letter Series

Robert “Rosie” Rosenthal x Josephine Harris (OFC)

The holidays are usually a time to be spent together, cold noses warmed by the fire, and joyful cheers as the New Year approaches. This year, Rosie is struggling with being away from Jo, and acknowledging the future that he dreams of sharing with her. A heart to heart with Crosby helps put things into perspective for both of them.

Read Part 3 Here Follow along with the Love Letters Playlist

January 1944

My Dearest Jo,

Happy New Year, honey pie! It’s just after midnight here, and though I wanted to be the first person to wish you a Happy New Year, I know that by the time you get this, it will be after the fact. I guess by writing this now, while it’s still ‘43 back home, I’m letting myself be greedy in being the first to send you those wishes. I hope you’re doing something fun tonight, and getting all dolled up to paint the town red. Your last letter came just after Christmas, but I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you just how happy it made me to hear that you were still doing all of your usual Christmas favorites, even if I’m not home to carry all your shopping bags back to Brooklyn after a full day in the city. Believe me, I even miss doing that, no matter how heavy some of them are. 

I got Ma’s last letter just a few days before yours arrived, and she mentioned that you went by the house to celebrate Hanukkah with her and Jeanie. I know that made her really happy, and I can’t thank you enough for keeping an extra eye on both of them for me while I’m stuck over here. My sister would argue that she doesn’t need anyone keeping an eye on her, but I’m sure she appreciates your company, and will rub it in my face after the fact that she got to spend so much time with you. That’s what little sisters do, isn’t it? 

We had a small thing in the Officers Club for the holidays; nothing too fancy, but there was music, and some good liquor that someone managed to scrounge up for the occasion. The Red Cross Clubmobile girls pulled some resources and, even with rationing, managed to bake a few cookies for us. They were good, but they couldn't hold a candle to yours. 

I have never wanted one of your Christmas cookies more than after reading your letter, and to know that Jean Crosby took over as the official taste tester this year; oh it broke my heart darling. But, I’m glad to know that you two girls are keeping each other company, and I know that Croz is happy knowing that she’s not alone. I do hope you two aren’t causing too much trouble while we’re away. Knowing you the way that I do, I know that’s a bit of a pipe dream, but one of the reasons I adore you the way that I do. 

At the risk of sounding melancholy, I’ve spent most of today wishing I could take you dancing; spin you around until we’re both dizzy, until finally we can ring in the new year with champagne. Crowded on the dance floor at Minton’s, wrapped up in each other. Maybe it’s bold of me to ask, or maybe it’s the whiskey, but would you have allowed me a midnight kiss, Jo? I can’t picture kissing anyone else as the clock strikes twelve, nor do I want to, on this holiday or any other day. I hope that by next year, we'll be able to spend the evening together, and not have to send holiday wishes in letters that take too long to get there. 

I dream of you every night, sweetheart, and every night these sweet dreams end with a kiss before I’m pulled back to reality. I’ve been dreaming of the future, and if the real thing is anything like my dreams, I can’t wait for those days to begin. I wonder,do you dream of those days too? Of building a home together, a life that’s just ours. Living in the city, maybe somewhere near Harry and Jean. We could go to the pictures on Friday nights, and sleep in on Saturday’s, warm under the blankets until we peel ourselves from the sheets only because we need to make coffee. I’d spin you around the kitchen while we made breakfast, a record on the Victrola, the two of us tangled together while the eggs burned. The more I think about it, the more it all sounds like a dream come true. 

Maybe it is the whiskey talking, but it’s getting late here. Or early depending on how you look at it, and even though we aren’t flying tomorrow, I’m sure the rest of the fellas will be returning from the Officers Club soon enough. I’ll be dreaming of you tonight, sweetheart, and counting the days until we’re together again. 

Sending you millions of hugs and kisses, and all of my love. 

Yours for always

Robbie

Rosie took a deep breath, and without giving himself a chance to second guess anything in his letter, folded it up and slid it inside the envelope. He’d address it in the morning and drop it off at APO so that it went out with the next mail call; tonight it would remain on the nightstand next to his bed, with Jo’s photo. He was still in his uniform, not having bothered changing after he returned to the Officer’s hut, and was about to take advantage of the empty shower stall, when the door swung open and Harry walked in.

“Thought I’d find you in here.” Harry spoke, hand coming up to loosen his tie. 

“Yea, I uh, wanted to get a letter out to Jo,” Rosie signed, dragging his hand down his face. ‘Or at the very least, written.”

“It’s rough around the holidays isn’t it.” It wasn’t a question. Harry knew as well as he did, and he knew his friend was giving him an opening to get his feelings off his chest. 

“Probably the most difficult part of all this. We’ve spent every Christmas and Hanukkah together since we met.”

“She celebrates Hanukkah with you and your mom?”

“Jo is the best gift giver in our family, according to my sister.” Rosie grinned. 

“Sounds like your sister will be the disappointed one if you don’t put a ring on Jo’s finger when we get home.” Harry chuckled, dropping down onto his own bed, across from Rosie’s.

“She’d have to fight my Ma for the top spot, if I don’t marry Jo.” 

The two shared a quiet moment  as their thoughts drifted to a place far from England. Far from flak and casualties and torn fuselages. No thoughts of missing friends, mission counts or that damned red light never blinking off. 

Rosie knew that Harry understood better than anyone; how it felt to be so devoted to someone, and yet, he felt compelled to ask the one question that, if he had to wager, everyone asks at some point. 

“How’d you know Jean was the one?” He asked after a moment, gaze turned upward to meet that of his friend. 

“She wanted nothing to do with me when we met,” Harry balked so loudly that it seemed to echo off the walls of the Nissen Hut. “But I knew. I didn’t want to spend another day without her.”

“Just like that, huh?”

“Oh yeah, you just know,” Harry nodded. “When did you know Jo was the one? And don’t tell me you didn’t…”

“Let’s just say I should have opened my mouth a long time ago.”

“Well, better late than never.”

“What if I was too late, Croz?”

Harry stood from his bed, moving around the front to lean himself against the footboard. With a determined gaze, he made sure he had Rosie’s full attention before saying what was on his mind. 

“You can’t think like that. You need to believe you’re going home to her, that you two will have a life after all this.”

“God, I hope so.”

“I don’t know Jo as well as you do,” He started. “I only know what Jean tells me in her letters, but it sounds to me like she’s really something. And I’m not just saying that because she went out of her way to befriend my wife.”

“I told her I want a life with her, a future, our own place, Saturday mornings in bed, lazy days…”

“You want the dream.” Harry nodded in understanding. 

“Told her maybe we’d move to the city, leave Brooklyn, get a place near you and Jean.”

“Sounds like we’ll be in trouble if that happens, Jo and Jean a stone's throw away from each other?”

“I think the two of us are going to have our hands full when we get home, Croz.”

“I bet they’re saying the same thing about us,” Harry laughed. “And I wouldn’t blame Jean. I’ve been a real handful as of late.”

“Oh yea, you’re causing lots of trouble all the way over here.” Rosie chuckled, propping his legs up on the bed, feet hanging off the edge so as to not dirty the sheets. He didn’t miss the slight look of distress that flashed across his friend's face. 

He regarded him carefully; he looked like he had something on the tip of his tongue. His face looked worried, like he had something weighing him down exponentially, and Rosie would allow his friend the moment if he needed it. After all, it was the holiday’s and they were the best source of camaraderie that they had; friends should be there for each other. No one understood that better than he did. 

“No, I’ve been a handful…” Harry finally continued. 

“Croz?”

“Remember after Munster? When Harding sent me to Oxford?”

“Yea…”

“They double you up when you’re at those conferences, and my roommate, she-”

“Ah jeez, Croz…”

Harry sighed, dropping his head, too ashamed to look his friend in the eye. The moment had turned in the blink of an eye, and he wasn’t sure how to handle it, or get his friend through it. But he’d be damned if he didn’t try. 

“I don’t know how to tell Jean.”

“Is this why you kept disappearing up to London? To see her?”

“How do I tell my wife that I slept with another woman?”

“You just do, Croz.”

“That’s the worst possible thing to write in a letter. ‘Honey, I miss you terribly, by the way…’”

“Alright, I see your point. But you need to tell her.”

“This fucking war,” Harry sighed. “I swear, it peels the humanity right from your bones.”

“Then you fight it.”

“More than we already have? More than what we’ve given and lost?”

Rosie knew he was referring to Bubbles, and for a moment he let his mind wander to Nash, and that first mission to Bremen. It would be easy to fold; to pack it up and let the fight take from you more and more. But he would be damned if he’d let it take more from him, and if he had to fight a little extra to make sure it didn’t take any more from his friend, he’d do that too. 

“You’re not fighting it alone, Croz.”

“Feels like it most of the time.”

“And you’re fighting for something back home, even if you feel like you don’t deserve it at the moment.”

“I don't deserve her.” 

“Yea, you do. And you’ll tell her everything, whether you write it, or tell her when we get home. And Jo and I will be there for you both.”

Harry looked like he was about to respond when the door to the Officers Hut swung open. He turned, half expecting a replacement officer, but was surprised to see Blakely and Douglass, the former with a cigarette tucked behind his ear, and Douglass swinging a bottle of something in his left hand. 

“Nightcap, fellas?” Douglass lifted the bottle, and Rosie could just make out the label. Vat 69. 

“Where the hell did you get that, Dougie?” Harry’s eyes went wide at the familiar label from back home. A very expensive label. 

“Been saving it, so come on, let’s have a drink.”

“No, seriously, who’d you steal that from?” Rosie asked, watching as Blakely gathered four of the glasses the boys kept on their side tables for brushing their teeth. 

“I won it in a bet, if you must know.” Douglass grinned, pulling the wax seal from the neck of the bottle before pulling the cork out.

“The details are not of importance,” Blakely chimed in, swatting Rosie’s legs off the bed to take up the space next to him. “What is important is that we’re here, and alive, so stop asking questions and have a drink would ya?”

Douglass poured for the four of them, dropping himself down on the bed next to Rosie’s, while waiting for Harry to join them. 

“Any day now, Croz…” he groaned, glass between two fingers as he held it out for the navigator. “It’ll be ‘45 by the time you move.”

“Dougie… fuck off.” Harry stood with a laugh, brushing off his slacks before snatching the glass and taking the seat next to him. “And anyway, we’d all better be home by ‘45.”

“I’ll drink to that.” Blakely nodded, holding his glass up to cheers his friends, the only ones left that weren’t replacement crews, or trapped somewhere in the Stalag. 

The foursome sat silently as they sipped their prize whiskey, thoughts turned presumably to home and memories of Christmas and New Years’ spent with people they loved and missed. 

“Alright, what would you be doing if you were home right now?” Ev broke the silence, leaning his elbows on his knees, gaze landing on Harry. 

“His wife, dumbass.” Douglass chuckled. 

“Woah hey, none of that.” Rosie looked between the two, the rules immediately being put into place without having to say them. 

They didn’t talk like that, but he assumed it had been a bit too much whiskey already for Douglass, and with there no mission on the horizon for tomorrow, their guards were all down a bit. 

“Right, right, sorry Croz,” Douglass held his hands up in apology. “For real, what would you and Jean be doing if you were home?”

“We’d go out for dinner, but I think we’d probably be home for the bells,” he closed his eyes wistfully, and Rosie knew his friend was simply hoping that he’d be able to do that next year. “Dance in the living room, and yea, off to bed.”

Blakely nodded, reaching across to drop his hand to Crosby’s knee in a gesture of good faith, that he felt for him in a way, and was hoping he’d get that moment sooner rather than later. 

“What about you?” Ev turned to his right, finding Rosie sitting quietly. 

“What about me?” Rosie brought the glass to his lips, taking a small sip and letting the taste linger on his tongue a moment. 

“Would you and Josephine be out on the town?” Douglass asked, gesturing to the photo on Rosie’s side table. 

“Oh yea, we’d be at Minton’s, dancing until they kicked us out I’m sure.” Rosie laughed. 

“Together at the club then?”

“Every year we go dancing on New Years,” Rosie started. “Christmas and Hanukkah are for family, New Years is for friends.”

“She’s more than a friend.” Harry looked at him pointedly. 

“She is, and a fella can dream that she’ll say yes when I get home.”

Blakely, who had been pulling the cigarette from behind his ear to light it, fumbled, dropping it to the ground at Rosie’s confession. 

“You got a ring?!”

“No, but, that’s my second order of business once I’m back stateside.”

“And the first?”

“To kiss the hell out of her.” Rosie confessed. 

“Good man.” Blakely slapped him on the shoulder, a smile on his face. 

It was absolutely the whiskey talking this time, but he was among friends. The trust was insurmountable. Between the confessions that had taken place before Ev and Dougie had joined them, and the warmth flowing through his veins, Rosie lifted the glass to his lips to drain it, before standing from his place on the bed. Swiping the envelope from earlier, and a clean sheet of paper from the table, he glanced at his friends with a grin, and offered a two fingered salute. 

“Gentlemen, I’ll be back.”

“Where are you going! We still have more whiskey!” Douglass hollered after him. 

“Save it for another occasion!” Rosie called back as he pushed through the doors and out into the chilly January air. 

He walked until he found a spot under one of the lamp posts, the bench undoubtedly cold as he sat down, but he wouldn’t be out here for long. Just enough time, and privacy, to get the thoughts swarming around in his head out on the page before he lost his nerve. 

Pulling his pen from his breast pocket, he carefully let the paper rest on his thigh before he began scrawling his extra note. 

Hi Sweetheart, 

I know this is coming with no context but, I want you to know how much I adore you. I know I’ve said it in different ways, and a few times by now, but, I mean it. Truly, you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, and I’m sorry it took me so long to say it. And to say it from thousands of miles away, with a war on no less. I wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to hit me once I’m back home. 

Just know that I’ll always, always, carry your heart with the most careful of hands. I’ll keep you safe, and treasure every moment we have together. Anything you want, it’s yours, Jo. A quiet life together, or a herd of children that jump on the bed on Sunday mornings. I’ll make sure you have it honey. 

Just know, I’m yours for however long you’ll have me, Josephine. I’m hoping for forever, but that’s a question for another day. 

I love you,

Robbie 

Read part 5 Here

A/N: Thanks for reading! This series will continue for Rosie & Jo, so if you enjoyed this, please like, comment, reblog- whichever is your poison. Feedback is always welcome & my ask box is always open. If you want to be added to my tag list, or removed, let me know!

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[helphowdoiusethis]

I made my gift for @royal-chandler

To preface this goes of book cannon, so characters like Leo, Cash and June are here! So yeah.

I was going to make three fics for you but my motivation decided to dip so I’m sorry, but yeah; you may have two other gifts coming during the year! Who knows- I really did want to write for the other prompts!

I took the prompt: firstprince, ringing in the new year as a family with kids

Alex and Henry have mixed feelings about new years. If you asked a Henry before Alex if he loved new years? He would say no, the need to be too proper and the loud firework displays of London and every where else in the UK and after his dad has passed having bad days due to debilitating grief. Henry before Alex hated new years, he detested it until Alex’s New Year’s Eve party and things change there.

But if you asked Alex, he’s always loved new years, the fireworks, the sparklers, the barbecue. He tried to bring that energy to his new years function that he held each year, but when Henry had attended and through his life upside down in the best way possible, Alex had adapted his way of celebrating with Henry, careful to avoid going outside to watch the displays on new years if Henry had a specifically bad days on Christmas or after it.

After each year with the other; after being outed, after they were out properly to the world and Alex’s mom was in office again were good. After years of just enjoying each others company, David’s also and a good few years of married new years nights and days they decided to have children and that made new years a lot more chaotic than even their first kiss new years had been.

The two girls, Elizabeth and Clementine had seen a few new years with Alex and Henry; both had taken Alex's love of new years and the traditions that the Claremont-Diaz family had for the new years nights in Texas. Due to spending so much time split between England; much to Henry’s dismay but the girls and Alex’s happiness of seeing the fireworks in London but the family have rarely spend a proper new years in America since the girls came into their lives, having the 1st of January or the 30th of December to celebrate the drawing close of a year over in America in a way the entire family preferred.

Normally Alex would be frantically packing the girls bag at 6 morning of the 31st of December or re packing he had left Clementine's favourite pair of boots to wear in the Uk and the girl had refused to go aware unless carried by Alex and Alex only, making the journey through customs and security a challenge. However today Alex didn't need to pack, cause they weren't going over the pond to England this year, he doesn’t know how Henry convince his family to let them miss new years in England this year but the light in the girls eyes when their dad told them they get to do new years in Texas? Whatever Henry did was worth it to see those little girls eyes widen like it was a second Christmas.

Getting the Claremont-Diaz family together in Texas was not as difficult a task as Henry had first thought, June, Pez and Nora where already on their ways over after no frantic call from Alex at four in the morning had happened. Oscar had said they never even need to bargain and he'd be there in four hours. Bea was over in London with the Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor's and had apologised for missing the girls first out of the Uk new years, Shaan and Zhara had also apologised for also being over the pond; the pair being family just as the rest.

Ellen, Leo, Amy and Cash where also on their ways as soon as the invites had been given out.

So the only thing now was to clean up and get ready for hosting new years.

This was eaiser said than done. Having two girls that were raised by Alex Claremont-Diaz, they were messy.

Cleaning up was rarely in the girls vocabulary so when Henry had been cleaning up the living room, Alex had taken the girls outside to get the garden ready; getting the girls and himself covered in dirt and mud in a record time of 10 minutes. So after baths and tidying of bathrooms and bedrooms and getting dressed, people arrived.

As the night drew on, Alex was outside with the girls, enjoying the sparklers that he had gone and brought at 3 pm as most of the Claremont-Diaz’s, Nora, Pez, Cash and Amy were all outside as well while Henry called his family and set up the news, so he could call his family in when the time came, avoiding the mass amount of noise that came from two screaming little girls being chased by hyper family when he was not exactly in the mindset of dealing with the volume, still in his Uk new years mind.

When it got closer to the time and the family had been called in, the girls had settled with Alex and Henry, perched between the couple and tucked up in pyjamas for when the clock hits twelve and they are sent off to bed. It’s one minute too and every one is waiting, the clock clicks slow, phones go off with happy new years from every other timezone that has already started the next year. It’s 30 seconds to, Clementine and Elizabeth both say that they love their family while almost falling asleep, the family their say it back and the girls are a sleep, so Alex turns down the TV.

It’s ten seconds to new years, quiet counting in the house starts in tandem with turned down yelling from the TV.

It’s five seconds, Henry and Alex have carefully picked up the girls, ready to take them to bed as the whole house whispers a “4,3,2,1”.

And it’s new years. Quiet cheers and hugs exchanged, kisses from on the lips to forehead kisses are shared where appropriate, on the TV and in the house. Hugs are given to all, Henry and Alex bring the girls upstairs, setting them in beds and whispering happy new years to them before leaving.

The walk down stairs is quiet, until Alex stops the pair and kisses Henry gently with a whispered, “Happy new years, Baby” that Henry responded with a gentle and quiet, “Happy new years, Dear”.

Before returning to the rest of their family, rather happily.

@rwrbnygiftexchange

[atlafan]

1963 - Part 1

a/n: I have been dying to share this with yall and I'm so excited to finally be doing that. As per usual, this is the only part that will be posted here on Tumblr.All other parts will be posted on Patreon. In fact, Part 2 is already up! And Part 3 will be posted Friday.

Please consider joining my Patreon. It's only $5 a month, and it charges you the following month on the date you joined. So, if you signed up today, you wouldn't get charged again until January 10th. I post 2-4 times per month. If anything is under 10K words, that's usually when I'll post more. I depend on this extra income to help pay bills for essentials. The community there is also incredible and I write and post some of my nastiest smut on there, so if that's what you're looking for, you'll get it!

Warnings: mentions of infertility

Words: 3.8K

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“Every month I keep hoping I’ll have different news for you two,” Doctor Simmons sighed, “unfortunately, I have the same news. Beverly still isn’t with child.”

“We’ve been trying for five months, we’ve been doing everything you’ve said. Beverly drinks the teas, she lays with her legs up after we’re done, I don’t know what else we can do.” Robert was exasperated at this point. He was squeezing his wife’s hand, desperately trying not to let any tears escape his eye ducts.

“You two have exhausted all natural remedies, so I think it’s time we consider IVF.”

Beverly’s eyes widened, and she squeezed Robert’s hand back. She looked at him, panicked.

“Beverly is terribly afraid of needles.”

“You don’t need to decide on anything right now. Take these pamphlets and look over the information. If you two want to have a baby of your own, then this may be the next step.”

“We’ll look it over and have an answer by our next appointment.”

Robert and Beverly are silent on the drive home from the doctor’s office. They’re silent on their way back into their home. Beverly goes right to the kitchen to get started on dinner. Robert comes up next to her and puts her hand over hers.

“We should read the literature on IVF.” He said.

“I have friends who have done it, and all it has done is make their hormones crazy, and not in a fun way. I really don’t want to, Robert. I’ve done everything else, please don’t make me do this.”

“It feels like sometimes I’m the only one who wants to have a baby.”

“How could you say something like that to me? If I’m infertile-“

“You’re not, though. Doctor Simmons has run every type of blood test on you.”

“I know, I was there when the nurse was drawing it after you accused me of secretly taking birth control pills.”

“Well, with how apprehensive you were about having your diaphragm removed, I had to make sure you weren’t doing any self-sabotage.”

“Maybe I’m not getting pregnant because my body knows you don’t trust me.”

“I do trust you, you just weren’t exactly thrilled to start trying.”

“You sprung it on me, I was surprised. We never really discussed having kids before we got married.”

“Sweetheart, why would two people get married if not to have kids?” He chuckled.

“That’s not why I married you. I married you because I love you and I want to be with you.”

“I love you and want to be with you too. But if I hadn’t wanted kids, we could have just shacked up in an apartment in the city. I bought us a house in the suburbs so you could keep house and raise our kids. You like being a housewife, you’ve told me as much.”

“I do. I like making your meals and keeping things tidy, but I also like my free time. I like to go have brunch with the other ladies, and I like going to the library to check out new film analysis journals, and I like being able to go to the movies in the middle of the day. Having a baby means I can’t do those things anymore. At least, not until it’s old enough to go to school. That’s five solid years I’d be putting on hold. And within that five years, I could have at least two more kids. So, now I’m thirty-one with three kids under the age of five, and oh yeah, I’ll still be expected to keep the house clean and cook all your meals and pleasure you even though everything between my legs will feel like sandpaper.”

Robert eyes his wife, then puckers his lips in thought. “Is that how you’ve really been feeling? You haven’t said a word.”

“I didn’t want to disappoint you. You’re not easy to talk to these days. Every time I reach for my clip-belt for my sanitary napkins, I can see you watching with such sadness in your eyes. Motherhood is scary. My friends tell me these horror stories about childbirth. Their husbands barely take a week off from work to be home with them and the baby. So, we’re expected to push these kids out, then get up the next day and get back to our usual routines.”

“Beverly, you’re worried about things women have been doing since the beginning of time. Don’t be such a child. The fear of needles I can understand, but the fear of being a mother makes no sense. I know you and your mother have a strained relationship, but that doesn’t mean history will repeat itself.” He placed his hands on her shoulders. “If we’re not pregnant by our next appointment with Doctor Simmons, then I would like us to start IVF. Have I made myself clear?”

“Yes, dear.”

“Good.” He looked at the ingredients on the counter and grimaced. “I don’t want meatloaf tonight, make something else instead.”

“Yes, dear.”

“I’m gonna go to my office, have a beer, and listen to the ball game. Let me know when dinner is on the table.”

“Yes, dear.”

Robert smiled, grabbed a beer out of the fridge, and walked out of the kitchen. Beverly took a deep breath and rummaged through her cabinets to see what else she could possibly whip up for dinner. It needs to be something heavy enough that Robert won’t feel like making love before bed. Beverly doesn’t have it in her to put on a performance tonight.

**

Most people get married to have kids. Beverly married Robert because she loved him. He wanted to take care of her. But when the honeymoon phase ended, and he stopped saying thank you to her for all of the things she did to take care of him, she grew resentful. She never let on about it. Robert didn’t need to know how she really felt. Opening up the way she did the day prior wasn’t normal. Things had been good between them for a long time. Beverly didn’t mind stepping into the role of a stay-at-home wife. She was college educated, but it wasn’t like she’d ever be able to carry a position in the profession of her desire. And since she didn’t want to be a schoolteacher or a nurse, Robert asked her to stay home to tend to the house he had bought for them.

At twenty-three, she really hadn’t minded. They met in college, as so many young couples do, and it was love at first sight. Their courtship was disgustingly romantic, and their wedding was a dream come true. The honeymoon phase was so sickly sweet. Beverly enjoyed making breakfast for Robert before he left for work. She enjoyed sending him on his way. She had the whole day to herself. She’d tend to her various gardens, and she’d make sure the house was clean. She’d meet up with friends for brunch. She did everything a good wife was supposed to do.

At twenty-six, Beverly feels like she’s on autopilot. She can’t help but wonder if the reason why older couples have designated sex nights is because the wives must need the six days in between to psych themselves up. She also can’t help but wonder if this is why so many older couples opt for twin beds that can be pushed together or pulled apart.

And it’s not that Beverly doesn’t want kids, she thinks it could be fun, but she’s petrified of essentially raising a child by herself. Robert will stroll in from work, bounce the baby on his knee for all of two minutes, and call it a night. She’s scared for all the reasons she tried to explain the day prior. Robert also didn’t give Beverly a choice five months ago…

“I was thinking of maybe enrolling in graduate school.” Beverly brought up one morning over breakfast. Robert had nearly choked on his toast. “I know what you’re thinking, but you wouldn’t have to pay for a thing. They have stipends for students. I could teach while I learn.”

“I thought you didn’t want to teach.”

“I didn’t want to teach children, but something about having high level discussions with college students makes teaching sound like fun. I miss being in school.”

“What’s the point of a graduate degree in film and media? It’s not like you can do anything with it.”

“A graduate degree could lead to a doctorate, and I could keep teaching. I know female professors are few and far between, especially in the world of film, but it is possible.”

“So, you want to be a career woman, is that what you’re saying?”

“Not exactly. Classes wouldn’t take up all my time. I’d still be able to cook and clean and do everything I’m doing now. Except now when I go to the library, I’ll be doing schoolwork instead of reading for leisure.”

“Seems like you have it all figured out already.”

“Well, I wanted to show you I had thought it all through, that I was serious. You got your graduate degree. If you hadn’t, we never would have met.”

“Exactly. What if some older professor comes on to you? You’d have no way to protect yourself.”

“Oh, Robert, I’ve gone this long without something horrible happening to me on a college campus, I think I’d be fine. Besides, all I’d need to do is show off the lovely rings on my finger.” She grinned. “No one would mess with a married woman whose husband can afford a diamond like this.”

“Did you already sign up for a course?”

“Of course not. I wanted to speak with you first.”

“Good.” He finished his breakfast. “Let me think on it.”

“Alright. Anything in particular you want for dinner tonight?”

“Actually, I was thinking we could go out tonight. I wanted to take you somewhere nice.”

“Oh? For what?”

“Does a husband need a reason to treat his wife to a romantic evening?”

“No.” She giggled. “I’m just excited at the prospect of a spontaneous date night. I’ll pick out a dress I haven’t worn in a while, so it feels like new.”

“I think that’s a great idea.” He stood and kissed the top of her head. “I’ll call you before I leave work, so you’ll know when to expect me.”

“Okay, have a good day, dear.”

Beverly was excited. A night out was a positive sign. Robert wouldn’t take her out just to give her bad news. He was going to say yes to her going back to school.

The restaurant Robert took Beverly to was ritzy. He danced with her, ordered an expensive bottle of wine, and kissed on her shoulder and neck while he sat next to her in their booth. That sickly sweet feeling Beverly thought might be gone was sparking again. When the cheesecake came out, they fed each other bites. It was adorable.

“Are you having a good time tonight?” He asked.

“Yes, this has been such a wonderful evening. Thank you for taking me here.”

“You’re welcome, Bev.” He put his hand over hers and gave it a squeeze. “I’ve been thinking about a lot of things lately, and our conversation this morning was the kick in the pants I needed, so I’m really glad you brought up graduate school.”

“I’m glad it was a positive conversation.” She smiled. “What’s been on your mind?”

“I think it’s time we started trying for a baby.” All of the color drained from Beverly’s face, but her smile never wavered. She couldn’t let on how disappointed she was. “You’re clearly bored with the amount of free time on your hands. I know school seemed like a fun thing to do to pass the time, but I think we’ve waited long enough. We’ll be married almost four years soon, I think we know what we’re doing in the bedroom by now. So, next week, I’m taking you to the doctor to have your diaphragm removed-“

“You called my doctor about something like that?”

“I know it’s a bit awkward, but it’s not a secret that you have one. I went with you when you got it, I should be with you when you have it taken out.”

“Robert…I don’t like that it feels like you’re not giving me a choice. What if I’m not ready?”

“It’s not that you don’t have a choice, I’m just stating that it’s time. You take care of me just fine, you’ll be a great mother. This is what I would rather you do than go back to school. Besides, think of the fun we’ll have while we’re working at it. I got excited at work today thinking about it. I was hoping tonight could be a test run.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “I love you so much, Bev, I wanna turn that love into a physical being.”

“Yeah, um, that makes perfect sense. Let’s…let’s make a baby.”

“Really?” He asked, elated.

“Yes, dear.”

Robert kissed his wife. He kissed her in the car. He kissed her on the way into their home, up the stairs, and into their bedroom. He made love to his wife, then called it a night.

After getting her diaphragm removed, they waited until after her next period was done to start trying. This gave Beverly plenty of time to figure out how she could avoid pregnancy. She needed to keep some semblance of control over her own body. Robert wasn’t going to tell her when she was ready. She could decide that on her own.

Lysol douching didn’t work, she knew this. Her sister told her as much. Some of her friends offered her their birth control pills, but she knew they’d show up on a blood test, which Robert made sure she had after the second month of her still not having gotten pregnant. Beverly may have studied film, but she was an excellent student in biology and chemistry as well. She knew how condoms worked. They were coated in spermicides. She just needed to figure out how to coat her vagina with it. She bought condoms and squeezed all of the lubricant and spermicide off them and got a good amount into a bottle. She mixed it with olive oil, what ancient Greeks used to use, and douched with that before having sex with Robert. She knew it would be a long shot if it worked, but she had to try.

When the third month came along, and she still wasn’t pregnant, she took solace is knowing her little concoction was working. And because Robert never went down on her, he’d never smell or taste a thing. When he used his fingers, he just thought she was extra wet, which made him feel proud of himself.

She was perfectly content with her plans until the topic of IVF came up. Even the harshest of solutions couldn’t stand up to IVF injections. She never felt bad for lying to Robert because she didn’t like that he had become so controlling, but she also didn’t think she’d be doing this for so long. The thought of her giving her body up didn’t sound any more appealing five months later.

What was she going to do?

**

“I really think that one is gonna be a winner.” Robert sighed happily as he relaxed into the bed, looking over at Beverly as she lay with her legs in the air. “I’m glad we waited a couple of days in between, feels like my boys swam stronger.”

“Yes, dear.” Beverly closed her eyes and tried to breathe steadily, counting down the minutes until she could go use the bathroom and cleanse herself.

“I had an idea today. I really want to spare you from having to be injected with needles. I’m a good husband, and good husbands protect their wives. So, since we have about five weeks until our next appointment, I thought we could try one last natural method.”

“I’m listening.” She turned her head to look at him, intrigued.

“I overheard some ladies talking in the break room this morning. It’s the one good thing about having so many female secretaries. Anyways, they happened to be discussing various issues with conceiving. One of them said they had a friend who got pregnant the second she and her husband stopped focusing so much on it. The wife threw herself into different projects, and a month or so later, she was pregnant.”

“Wait.” She sat up on her elbows. “Are you saying I can enroll in a graduate course after all?”

“What, no.” He laughed. “No, I was thinking we could finally redo the patio and have that pool you’ve wanted put in. You’ve been talking about wanting to host more parties for our friends. You always do so well with the workers when we have something done here, and you love gardening. I think you’d really enjoy overseeing a landscaping project.”

“Let me get this straight: you would rather pay thousands of dollars to have our backyard redone, than pay a couple of hundred for me to enroll in a course?”

“I think school would be too stressful. If you’re stressed, then you definitely won’t conceive. Overseeing a project that puts you outside in the sun will be a win-win. Not to mention an old friend of mine is willing to give us a deal on the work.”

“You have a friend that’s a landscaper?”

“Yeah, this guy from my old neighborhood took over his father’s business. He said he could swing by Saturday to take a look at things.”

“It sounds like you’ve already decided that this is what we’re doing.”

“That’s because I have.” He grinned proudly. “Bev, when we got married, I promised to take care of you. This is me taking care of you. Not all husbands would do something like this for their wives. You could at least pretend to be grateful.”

“I am grateful, I’m sorry if my tone suggested otherwise. What time Saturday is he coming over?”

“That I left up to you. I didn’t know if you had any errands or plans with the ladies.”

“Oh.” Well, at least he was trying to be considerate. “Maybe around three? That would give me time to pick up the dry cleaning and stop at the market.”

“Three is perfect. I’ll give him a call tomorrow to let him know.” He looked down at his watch. “You should be good to use the bathroom now.”

“Yes, dear.” Beverly lowers her legs and slings her robe on. Once she’s in the bathroom, she locks the door and flips on the fan. She rummages around in the back of the sink-cabinet until she finds her douching solution. She used some prior to having sex with her husband, but she likes to use it after for good measure. She bites into the heel of her palm as she cleanses herself. It tends to sting from time to time. When she’s done, she looks at herself in the mirror. She knows she can’t keep doing this to herself. She just doesn’t know what else to do.

**

Beverly loves her weekend clothes. There’s something so freeing about slipping on a pair of high-waist capris, a sleeveless button-up that ties in the front, and a pair of flats. She usually gardens after running her errands, and this is what she typically wears to garden. Robert hates it when Beverly wears pants, or anything form fitting, in public. Why should anyone else be privy to how round her bum is, or how full her thighs are? She’s got a body like Marilyn’s, and that’s something he prefers to keep under wraps.

When the landscaping van pulls up out front, Beverly is in the front yard, planting and mulching. She has the radio going, so she doesn’t pay any mind to the sound of an engine turning off. The man in the landscaping van tilted his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose, getting a better glimpse of Beverly. Robert starts walking over, so the man gets out of his van, rounding it to meet his old friend.

“Harry.” Robert smiled and shook the man’s, Harry, hand. “Can you believe it? Got a nice house in a suburb just like the one we grew up in.”

“I never doubted you’d get everything you wanted.” Harry smiled back.

“Seems like the Navy treated you well.”

“Yeah, I can’t complain too much. I didn’t get blown up or lose a limb.”

“And now you own your father’s business. Sorry for your loss, by the way. That’s the drawback of inheritance.”

“Yep. You working for your father?”

“Yes, and proud of it. I’ve got an office with a view, and I can afford to live more than comfortably. Got a beautiful wife, too.” Robert looked around. “Beverly, c’mere!” Beverly stood and dusted off her trousers before making her way over to the two men. “Harry, this is my Beverly.” He put his arm around his wife’s shoulders.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Clark.”

“Likewise, Mr…”

“Styles.” He points behind him with his thumb. “Of Styles Landscaping.”

“Right, of course.”

“Your husband told me you were hoping to have some work done in the backyard.”

“Yes, we’d like the patio redone and to have a pool put in, if possible.”

“Let’s show Harry to the back.” Robert said as he led his wife to the back. Harry followed close behind.

As Beverly observes Harry observing her yard, she can’t help but feel confused. How is this man a friend of Robert’s? Harry’s t-shirt is stretched tight over his chest, not to mention how beefy and muscular his biceps are. His arms are also littered with tattoos.

It takes about twenty minutes for Harry to look around, take some measurements, and get a feel for the land.

“Alright, I can come back on Tuesday with some different mockups of what can be done back here. I can bring my portfolio too, so you can look at some of my past projects. Does Tuesday work for you, Mrs. Clark? I’m assuming you’ll be the one home.”

“Yes, the early afternoon works for me, Mr. Styles.”

“Perfect.” Robert clapped his hands. “H, come in for a bit. We can have a couple beers and catch up while Bev does her gardening out front.”

“Sounds good to me.” Harry nodded, and Robert started to make his way inside. For a split second, Harry tilted his sunglasses down to look at Beverly. “It was nice meeting, Mrs. Clark.” He winked and smirked before catching up with Robert.

Beverly felt her cheeks heat up. She turned and watched Harry walk into her home. Why did he wink at her like that? And why did it make her feel like she just got a B-12 shot?

She shook it off and made her way out front. Gardening will help her clear her head. She’s a married woman. A friend of Robert’s wouldn’t flirt with a married woman…would he?

[avastrasposts]

The British Connection - ch. 5

Summary: Grace Mallory makes a reluctant Billy Butcher and The Boys team up with an MI6 operative sent over from London to track down a dangerous supe killing people on both sides of the pond. Billy is being his usual arsehole self but maybe opposites attract?

It's 14 chapters and complete and 'll be posting a new chapter every day

Warnings: canon typical violence, smut, fluff, Butcher being his usual grumpy and unreasonable self, nasty supes, guns etc.

“Right”, Butcher says, “Frenchie and Hughie, I need you two to sweep the office for bugs. Just to make sure we’re not being fucked by our own side. Until it’s clean, not a word of this inside that building. Get on it.” 

Frenchie gives a sloppy salute and starts off at a jog back towards the Flatiron, Hughie and Kimiko in tow.

“Edwards, have you got access to the CCTV footage of the attacks on the PM and the Chief of the Defence staff?”

“Not yet,” Eve replies, “I’m working on it, my CO at Vauxhall will send it over as soon as he has it.”

“Can you trust him?” Butcher asks. 

“Yes, Cochran’s reliable.” 

Butcher nods and looks over at MM. “I need you to ask around our connections, discreetly, for any word on the attacks on the two US politicians. You know the drill, no traces.”

“Sure thing, Butcher,” MM replies, “I’ll get on it straight away. You wanna bring Mallory in on this too? She’s got the best connections and you know this kinda fucked up shit is generating a lot of buzz that she’ll hear.” 

“No, I need to see Mallory about some other business, I’ll see what she knows, if she’s got the same info Edwards does.”

“Do you want me to come with you to see Mallory?” Eve asks. 

“Get that CCTV footage, that’s your priority, Edwards. It’s still office hours in the UK, get on to your CO and get that footage before this cunt supe kills someone else. I’ll ring ya when the office is clean.” 

Eve nods, “Keep me posted.” She raises her hand in a wave to MM and leaves them in the park. 

“Do you trust her, MM?” Butcher asks, watching Edwards retreating back as she makes her way to the subway.

“No more or less than I would any other government agent.”

“Ye, we’re gonna need to keep an eye on her, see what her game is.” 

“Does it make a difference that she’s British, Butcher?” MM asks. 

“Na, MI6 or CIA, they’re pretty much all the same type of cunts. And with her background…” he trails off, still watching Edwards. “I’m not sure Mallory clocked it but Edwards and I don’t exactly speak the same type of English, you know wha’ I mean?” 

“Yeah, you sound like Michael Caine, she sounds like Lady Mary Crawley.”

“She’s posh alright, probably went to Cambridge and got recruited to the service straight from the local Tory meetings thanks to a tip from a well connected daddy. And I’ve never had any good experiences with blokes of her background, served with a couple of right cunts who thought they could order me and the other lads around just ‘cause we didn’t grow up with bleedin’ silver spoons. But I’ve never served with a woman from that background, had a couple of higher ups of course, but never in the field.” 

MM hunches his shoulders against the creeping cold. “I say we let her prove herself before we make any judgments. At least maybe now you’ll have someone to bitch about American tea with.” 

“Fucking ‘erbal shite.”

Butcher claps MM on the shoulder, “Right, I’m off to see Mallory. Let me know if you dig up something I need to know. I’ll see you at the office later.” 

“See ya, Butcher.” 

Grace Mallory’s house is located in the countryside outside the city, surrounded by forest and hills. The usually lush green drive up to the house is grey and slushy this January afternoon as Butcher approaches the house in his beat up car. Mallory is already at the door, expecting him. 

“Two meetings in one day, William, what an honour,” she says in a dry voice as he walks up to her. She steps aside and lets him in. 

“Well, you set up the first one, and I’m here for some more information about Ms Edwards, so blame yourself,” Butcher says and walks over to the large windows overlooking the hills, trailing slush on the floor. Mallory stops by the fireplace. 

“I know that her CO, James Cochran, wanted her on this case and contacted the CIA Deputy Director directly and arranged for her to be flown over on a military flight. He vouched for her discretion and capabilities and the Deputy Director passed her on to me for the enviable task of convincing you to take her onboard. Cochran has worked with the CIA on multiple occasions and has a solid reputation, we have no reason to doubt his recommendations.” 

“I don’t need her CO’s bloody letter of recommendation,” Butcher scoffs. “I want her background info. Why her on this case? Where has she served and with who? Who’s she connected to? I need to see her bloody file, Mallory.”

“You don’t have that clearance, Butcher,” Mallory sighs. “Your job is to find the supe, with her help. You don’t need to know more about her than what the Deputy Director thinks you need to know.”

“Don’t give me that bullshit, Mallory,” Butcher snarls, “She showed us the videos MI5 picked up. That supe can control anyone to do anything by the looks of it, so I bloody well need know who the fuck I’m letting on to my team.” 

“That doesn’t make any difference, Butcher.”

“The hell it does! I have no doubt she’ll be able to put a bullet in Hughie’s head if he suddenly tries to kill me, but will she? Or will she focus on nabbing the fuckin’ supe alive and get MI6 a new superweapon while me and the boys are tearing each other’s throats out?”

Butcher steps up to Mallory next to the fireplace, staring down at her. “Show me her fuckin’ file, Mallory, or I walk.”

“You walk away from this and you can kiss your budget and office goodbye, Butcher.” 

“We’ve done just fine in underground basements before, I’m sure we can find some new crack den to clear out and use as a base away from the fuckin’ cunts at the CIA.” 

When Mallory doesn’t move Butcher makes for the door, digging up his car keys from the pocket, jangling them loudly.

“Last chance, Mallory. Or you’ll have to explain to the Deputy Director that you lost The Boys.” 

Mallory tilts her head back and looks at the ceiling for a few seconds before cursing under her breath. 

“Wait Butcher, just wait.”

She disappears further into the house and Butcher stops by the door. After a few minutes Mallory returns with a USB stick. 

“This is the file I got from the Deputy Director on Eve Edwards. Parts of it are censored, not my doing, so you’ll need to go higher up to get your answers there. Or ask Edwards directly.” She hands the stick to Butcher who pockets it. 

“Knew you’d get there in the end, Grace,” he replies, giving her his best bullshitting smile. He takes a few steps out of the door but as Mallory is pulling it closed he turns, as an afterthought, and stops her from closing it. 

“By the way, I heard on the radio on my way over that the Speaker of the House died yesterday morning, you wouldn’t know anything about that, would ya?”

“I heard it was lunchtime today,” she replies, “Heart attack.” 

“Oh, was it today? I must’ve misheard it, could’ve sworn it was yesterday,” Butcher walks towards his car again, giving Mallory a wave over his head with his back turned. 

A couple of miles down the road Butcher pulls into a pit stop and pulls out a laptop from under the rubbish littering the back seat. Firing it up he puts the USB from Mallory into the slot and opens the file contained within. He tabs through the first page, past all the standard text about classified information and finds what he’s looking for.

Title: The Honourable 

First name(s): Genevieve Horatia Daphne (Eve)

Surname(s): **** Edwards (Edwards)

DOB: 1977-03-14 Father: Name redacted for security

Mother: Name redacted for security

Brother: Name redacted for security

“Fuckin’ the honourable Genevieve Horatia Daphne…” Butcher mumbles darkly as he scans the first page. Her first surname is redacted and he can see that it’s been redacted in several places. He skims through her background, she went to Christchurch College, Oxford, modern languages, was on the college rowing team, the PolSci club, recruited by SIS as intelligence analyst while still at Oxford, recommended by her father, name redacted. She speaks five foreign languages; French, Spanish, Russian, Arabic and Farsi and Butcher makes a mental note to tell Frenchie that she speaks French, just to be safe. Both French and Russian are listed as “native level”. 

Her first foreign posting seems to have been in Chechnya in the late 90’s. She was in Pakistan and Afghanistan in -01 and -02, Iraq in 2003. Injured and on leave for most of 2004, the injury is redacted. He skims through the pages of her history, and starts paying attention when she moves from the SRR to MI6 in 2011 but finds nothing suspicious until he gets to the end of the file and present day events. Big chunks have been redacted and the file stops making sense. The last two pages are wiped completely. 

“Someone made sure Mallory didn’t see this, or wanted to make sure she didn’t pass it on to us,” Butcher thinks. He’s tapping his fingers on the steering wheel, trying to piece together the fragments of the file that haven’t been redacted. Scrolling backwards towards the beginning again he re-reads the file. Something at the back of his brain is itching, he’s missing a detail, and he can feel it trying to break through. He re-reads it again and his eyes catch on her redacted surname and it hits him.

“Why the fuck are they keeping her father’s name secret?” he says out loud in the car. “Who the fuck is her dad?” He scrolls back to the top and sees that her parent’s and brother’s names have been redacted for security reasons. 

Suddenly his phone rings, breaking his train of thought. The display shows Frenchies name and Butcher picks up. 

“ ‘Sup, Frenchie, we clean?” 

“Qui, Monsieur Charcutier, we found nothing, only deux cafards. We can return to the office but we may need to bring gas masks, MM has emptied two cans of Bug-Off in there.”

In the background Butcher can hear Kimiko cough as Hughie yells at MM to open the window before they all die of chemical poisoning.

“I’m on my way back, I’ll ring Edwards and get her back to the office too.”

“She is quite something, Monsieur Charcutier, I did not expect MI6 women to look like this, she is very attractive no?”

“Be careful Frenchie, get too close and she’ll slice your French cock off just like at Agincourt.” 

“Ah non, I will not try anythin’, I am a professional!”

“Right, Frenchie, just keep your game face on. And that reminds me, she speaks French fluently, so mind what you mumble, alright?” 

“Elle parle français aussi? Mon Dieu…”

Butcher hangs up on Frenchie while he’s still speaking and hits the dial on Edward’s number as he shuts down the laptop and starts up the car. She picks up after a couple of rings. 

“Hi Butcher, secure line?” 

“Should be but you never know. You got what we’re after?”

“Yes, he came through for us and sent it over. I’ll bring it over to the office if it’s clear?” 

“No, not yet,” Butcher lies, “I’ll come ‘round your place and we can review it. Should be there in about an hour.”

Eve gives him the address to an apartment hotel downtown and he hangs up. 

Chapter 6

[depressedhouseplant]

🔞 In Darkness I Found You 🔞

Chapter 18

Tags: None!

Hobi started to panic.

“How did you…?” he asked.

“When I woke up and you weren’t in bed, I knew. I called Jin and he filled in the gaps,” Yoongi told him.

“He’s dead,” Hobi had to say it.

“I didn’t expect anything less,” Yoongi replied.

“Are you mad?” he asked. Yoongi walked over and put his gloved hand on Hobi’s cheek.

“No,” Yoongi shook his head. “But now you see the reality of how we lived. I risked everything by escaping. I had no idea that I’d find you. Most of them are happy to just have a roof over their head and eat on a predictable schedule. I’ve always been a rebel. I’ve always been willing to risk uncertainty. I’m afraid our daughter will end up like me.”

“Our daughter?” Hobi repeated.

“Yes, our daughter,” Yoongi smiled at him.

“What changed your mind?” Hobi asked.

“I just needed a little time. I have trust issues,” Yoongi gave him an awkward side hug to not squish Jina in her sling.

“Really?” Hobi laughed.

“Maybe one or two,” For the first time since they met his eyes sparkled a bit when he smiled.

“I love you, Min Yoongi,” Hobi kissed him.

“I love you, too, Jung Hoseok,” Yoongi replied. “Let’s go back inside.”

Hobi took a long, hot shower when they got back. Yoongi was waiting for him when he got out. Jina was asleep in the cot next to the bed.

“Don’t bottle it up, Hobi. Tell me,” Yoongi rested his hand on his mate’s hip.

“If this was the right thing to do, why do I feel like I ruined lives?” Hobi asked.

“Because they don’t know any better. If what Namjoon says is true about these surrogacy centers then they’ll all be just fine,” Yoongi replied. “He’s a good Alpha like you.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t listen, but I’m not sorry I let him die,” he whispered.

“Maybe it was for the best. Maybe you needed to see it with your own eyes,” Yoongi brushed back Hobi’s still damp hair.

“I wanted to help. I just wanted to help,” Hobi felt himself choke up.

“I know, my love. You helped me. You helped Jina. You showed me kindness I’d never known. You had no idea who I was when you pulled me out of the mud, but you treated me like you’d loved me forever. You didn’t have to do that. You didn’t have to spend a month on bedrest with me. You didn’t have to do everything you did when I was pregnant to make sure Jina would be okay. Let that be enough right now,” Yoongi smiled gently at Hobi. Hobi furiously wiped hot tears off his cheeks. He wasn’t supposed to be crying. He was supposed to be the hero. He was supposed to be proud of what he’d done. Except maybe the only truly happy ending he’d get were the 2 people in the bed with him at that moment. For now, that would have to be enough.

Hobi tried his best not to let it get to him. He’d returned the papers to Namjoon like he’d asked. He’d come in for training in January. However, for the next week he spent most of his time working either in the barn or online. Three days before Christmas, he heard a soft knock on his office door.

“Come in,” he sighed. Jungkook stuck his head in, then slid in the darkened room.

“I was going to wait until Christmas to tell everyone, but you looked like you needed some cheering up,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Hobi asked.

“I’m pregnant,” Jungkook smiled.

“Really? That’s great! Does Tae know?” Hobi smiled a real smile for the first time in a week. Jungkook nodded.

“I found out yesterday,” he replied. Hobi stood up and hugged him. Jungkook had finally filled out and he was now broader than Hobi. He still gave gentle hugs though.

“How far?” Hobi asked.

“Due in July,” Jungkook told him. Then he paused. “It’s okay to cry.”

That’s all Hobi needed to hear. He started sobbing into the younger Omega’s shoulder.

“Did I do the wrong thing? Did I hurt them more than help them?” Hobi cried.

“Hobi, freedom is relative. I was a runaway, too. My story isn’t that far off from Yoongi’s. My choices were to die on the street or live as a Breeder. I chose to go to that place because at least it wasn’t where I was. Then they discovered I wasn’t what they wanted and I became disposable all over again. My only freedom was to decide if I was going to live or die in those woods. I decided to at least try. Maybe I’d finally find the better life I’d been looking for. Maybe not. I know Yoongi feels the same way,” he said. “You absolutely did the right thing. Anyone who actually knew Jimin knew that he’d figure out a way to either get out or never go to prison in the first place. He might haunt me forever, but I know for sure he’ll never show up on my doorstep.”

“What do you think about these surrogacy centers? Aren’t they just the same thing with a better name?” Hobi asked.

“I don’t know. I’d have to see one for myself. I know that I wanted to be able to come and go as I pleased. Some had other things they wanted. I’m happy to go with you sometime and take a look,” Jungkook offered.

“You wouldn’t be afraid?” Hobi asked.

“I might need to do some deep breathing exercises in the parking lot, but this matters to me just as much if not more than it does to you,” Jungkook replied. “I know Yoongi would rather have bamboo shoots under the fingernails than go anywhere near somewhere resembling where we were.”

“Thank you,” Hobi said.

“Anytime,” Jungkook smiled. “Now if you’ll excuse me I have to go puke.”

Yoongi was in their bedroom scrolling through his phone. He looked up when he heard Hobi come in.

“Jungkook gave me his news,” Hobi said awkwardly.

“I thought you’d be happy to hear it,” Yoongi put his phone down and got off the bed.

“I was, I am,” he replied.

“Let me take care of you for once big, tough, Alpha,” Yoongi hugged Hobi’s waist.

“I can’t. Not now,” Hobi scented Yoongi’s neck gently.

“I don’t have to fuck you to take care of you, Hobi,” Yoongi kissed the side of Hobi’s head.

“I guess you’re right,” he sighed.

“Of course I’m right,” Yoongi smiled. He led Hobi over to the bed and wrapped the Alpha around him.

“Sleep, my love,” Yoongi whispered. “It’ll all be okay.”

That was all the permission Hobi needed.

[comfy-whumpee]

Birdhouse: Left Behind

@neuro-whump​, @rosesareviolentlyread​, @whumper-in-training​, @mylifeisonthebookshelf, @pumpkin-spice-whump, @whumpsday, @firewheeesky, @why-not-ask-me-a-better-question

End of the Roman’s Rescue arc! BBU. Previous piece here.

Tyler wasn’t there on the first day. He took it off, booked it ages ago, figuring he’d have a hangover and need to sleep it off before January kicked in. He was lying in bed at home, blinds closed and covers up to his chin, staring at the ceiling.

 January blues, they called it, but this was something else. He hadn’t gone out last night. Hadn’t done anything but sit awake in front of the TV. He’d eaten takeout and watched the quiz show and the variety act and the fireworks. He’d watched the commercials too. He’d stayed up for the ancient sitcom reruns. He’d stayed up until the room stank of greasy pizza and his back ached from being in one place for hours. He’d crawled to bed without brushing his teeth or even changing. It wasn’t like he’d gotten dressed.

 He almost didn’t even pick up. If Charlie was calling him, he had a real excuse not to pick up today. Even if he’d be in the shit for not helping when it could have been urgent, it wasn’t like he could be in more trouble.

 But really, if he was honest, that was why he had to take it. If he was going to chicken out and not do anything for Roman, he could at least not abandon the poor guy.

 “Hey Charlie,” he said, wincing at the sound of his voice. He hadn’t talked to anyone since his mom went home on Boxing Day and he sounded like he’d been gargling gravel.

 “I need you to come in.”

 “It’s my day off--”

 “Let me rephrase. The cops need you to come in.”

 “Oh shit.” He clambered out of bed, hunting for his work clothes in the clean laundry pile. “What happened?”  

There was a heavy pause. Then Charlie said, slowly, “You’ll find out when you get here.”

-

 Tyler made it to the office in twenty-five minutes. Not all the way, though. He was stopped outside the doorway, after riding up from reception. There was police tape over the door. “I’m sorry, sir, I’m going to have to ask you to step back.”

 “I’m Tyler, I work here,” he said absently. The office looked normal from the part he could see. Clean and bright, with some guy milling around in a hazmat-looking suit.

 “Can I see some ID?”

 “Uh, yeah,” he tore his eyes away, “yeah, sure. Here.” He flips his wallet open and lets the cop take note of who he is. “Alright, Mr Schatz. I’m going to let them know you’re here, and then we can get you caught up.

 Caught up. So everyone else knew what it was about. They’d all been here, of course. He nodded numbly and stared at the hazmat guy until someone came and took him by the elbow. “Mr Schatz. Come and join us in the security office.”

 They went downstairs Tyler looked as he was led and saw the regular security guy was standing outside the elevators, hands in his pockets. There must be a real thing happening if he wasn’t involved or even trying to be. Something serious was going on.

 The office was cramped with two other officers and the four others. Charlie was the only one who acknowledged Tyler with a tense nod. Joel glared at the wall, Dillon sat on one of the desk chairs looking tired, and Phil hovered nervously against the wall.

 “Mr Schatz, thank you for joining us. When was the last time you were in this building?”

 Tyler glanced at Charlie. “Uh, before Christmas. Twenty-second.”

 “And do you recognise any of these women?”

 He looked. There were six ID-looking pictures on a tablet screen in the officer’s hands. He glanced over them. “Uh, number three, that’s Macy, our cleaner. I don’t recognise any of the others.”

 He wanted to ask what this was about, but between the nerves in the room and the abrupt interrogation, he figured it was better to keep his mouth shut. Don’t say anything to incriminate himself, just cooperate.

 “I see. When was the last time you saw Roman?”

 “Uh.” Roman? Oh god, had something happened to him? “S-Same day, twenty-second. Is he okay?” He looked to Charlie, to Dillon, hoping one of them had taken him home after all. “What happened?”

 “Your colleagues came into work this morning to find him absent,” the cop finally explained, fixing him with a stare. “We believe he has been stolen.”

 Of course. Roman wouldn’t leave. He’d said that so many times. He wanted to be here. He’d refused to be saved. Tyler was distantly aware of his face burning. “Fuck. Uh. When?”

 “I’m afraid we don’t know that yet. So far, the only person we know visited the business was your cleaner.” Hard, dark eyes. “We’ll be taking statements today.”

 Tyler looked again to the others. He’d gone to college with these guys. The assholes wouldn’t even look him in the eye. Charlie had told them, told the cops, that it was him. “Do I need a lawyer?”

 “It’ll just be a few questions, Mr Schatz.”

 Yeah, no. That look, that silence. He needed a fucking lawyer, and he needed a cup of coffee, and he needed ten minutes alone to cry, because Roman was absolutely fucking gone and--

 “Was there - any sign of a struggle?”

 “Not that we have seen so far.”

 …and he’d left on purpose. Not with Tyler. With the cleaner. Or on his own. Or something, without ever saying that he would. All this time he’d been debating whether he could abandon Roman, but the choice hadn’t been his to make. Roman had abandoned him.

 He knew what he had to do.

 “Fuck,” he said again. “Fuck!” He turned away, slamming his hand into the wall, knuckles cracked against the paint. “Fucking asshole! After everything I, everything we did for him.” He took a breath, feeling the emotions swell up, pushing against him like an overinflated balloon. “Fuck!” he shouted, and the volume jarred something loose. His face was bright red, he knew. His voice was cracking. He pushed his fists into his eyes. “I’m so stupid.”

 “Take a seat, Mr Schatz,” the cop said, voice cuttingly calm. We’ll be with you when we’re ready.”

 Yeah. Yeah, whatever. Tyler sat down in the other chair and threw a hand over his eyes. Roman might have lied about wanting to stay, but he’d suspected that. If someone had given Tyler the chance to leave, he certainly wouldn’t say no to that and he worked here for real. It hurt to be left behind, that was all. It hurt to be alone. It hurt to be even more isolated than before. It really fucking sucked to be a suspect.

 But the more angry he seemed at Roman for leaving, the easier it would be to excuse the sympathising he’d done before. He could shout and swear and punch things if that was what it took. His old man had always gotten away with it.

 He was going to quit this job. He knew that right now. No matter how it looked, he needed to get away from this. He’d find somewhere established, that didn’t buy pets for secretaries, and maybe they’d even have real lunches and not work overtime and get weekends off and all of the other stupid start-up shit he had to do.

 Fuck these assholes, sitting around like they didn’t all think he did it, not looking at him when it was their fault Roman ran. He didn’t want to be here when the shit went down. They’d tank without him, but they’d probably tank with him too. He didn’t want to be on the sinking ship. He’d go somewhere where he could work under a director, and get a 401k, and be stable.

 Maybe he’d find somewhere that was cool with gays.

 Maybe he’d figure out how to donate to some pet lib thing.

 -

 That evening, he logged into his throwaway account for the first time since Charlie had sent him home.

 holepunch6409: is he safe?

 She took three hours to reply.

 BritBird03: Safe. Delete this account info from your phone and clear browser data. Good luck.

 He followed her instructions, and went a step further. He uninstalled Reddit, and downloaded Grindr.

[poisonously-alluring-sev]

Snape One Shot - January Ninth

Severus Snape Masterlist

Summary: You’re another teacher at Hogwarts and you happened to be out from the school longer than any other teacher after the holidays. You try every way to get back as quickly as possible as Severus’ birthday is on the ninth, but you only make it back to the school that day at 7pm during a teacher meeting.

Pairing: Severus x female teacher

Time: Anytime before Harry is at school

Warnings: Swearing & angst

Word Count: 2374

Recommended Songs: j’s lullaby by Delaney Bailey & The Last Time (taylor’s version) by Taylor Swift

“Good Damn!” You exclaim loudly. You had been busy with Christmas with your family, but some other things had come up the two weeks after. You were trying your best to get back to the school as quickly as possible, but not because of your classes, because it was getting very close to Severus’ birthday. Every little thing that you needed to do you rushed to get it done and get back to the school, but now it was 7pm on the ninth of January and of course there was a teacher meeting happening until 8:30 to boot.

Throwing your coat on the floor you quickly move around and decorate you and Severus’ quarters with light birthday decorations, make a small cake, while also dressing for the teacher meeting, but leaving something else on underneath. AS all this was going on you were missing more and more of the meeting, but that hardly mattered today. You had promised Severus to be here on his birthday. While he always told you to never worry about it, you knew that he must be very upset and likely it’s making it easier on the other teachers who only want what’s best for him today. Some of the cake is done, and you check the time.

“Damn it! 8pm! Fuck, I’m missing the meeting, and it’s getting late.” Quickly you throw on your teacher attire and run out the door. After a decent five-minute jog through the whole lower half of the school you make it to the headmaster’s office.

“Please, just let him at least try and be happy for tonight. Please don’t let me mess this up.” Opening the door, you get everyone’s attention. You quickly walk over to where all the papers are placed on Dumbledore’s desk while saying,

“Sorry everyone. Tried to get here as soon as I could, but it seems the job I was given,” You glance over to Dumbledore who only gently looks at you, “Had a few extra things that needed to be done before I could return.” You hold the papers and stay standing next to the headmaster.

“Hopefully my students haven’t been in too much trouble, those lot need to stop jumping around the place all the time.” Dumbledore quickly spoke up,

“Oh don’t worry about them. We’re glad to finally have you back, Mrs.Y/N.” Dumbledore continued on with what he had previously been talking about and soon enough the meeting was over. Once everyone had let out all their thoughts on the night's meeting you quickly pulled Minerva aside to ask her something important.

“Hey, um. This probably seems odd of me to ask this, but, has Severus been acting upset and easily frustrated lately? Not that he isn’t most of the time, but…” She smiles and responds.

“I get what you mean dear, and yes he has been a little on edge and has been acting quite upset for the past few days.” You lower your head and frown to yourself.

“Damn it. That would be my doing.” As you walk out of the headmaster’s office Minerva says one last thing to you before you close the door behind you.

“Oh, don’t worry. I’m sure he’ll come around.” After you’ve left Dumbledore and Minerva share a few words about you and Severus.

“They are quite soft on each other. Did you hear her smiling like an idiot when she looked at him?” Dumbledore laughed lightly and said,

“I think that we’re the only ones that have noticed their friendly relationship.”

You quickly move through the halls and try to get back to your quarters before Severus. You did ask another teacher however to distract him for a good few minutes before making sure he gets back to the quarters after you do. Once you’re there, you look around to see if the teacher had failed at stalling him, but they seemed to have done their job. Quickly you take off your teacher attire and throw on some light flowing clothes to be comfortable. You stand in the living room by the door waiting for him to open the door. After a few minutes you feel even more nervous than before and constantly keep checking to make sure everything is how you want it. Soon though a good 15 minutes has passed and now your eyes are completely locked on the door.

“Where is that grump?” You pace back and forth a few times before a knock on the door is heard. You open the door to see the teacher you asked to bring him here, standing on the other side with Severus.

“Where’s Severus?” The teacher holds their hands together and quietly spoke to you,

“I’m sorry. I tried to get him to come back here, but he snapped at me and went to his classroom to finish his work.”

“What? But it’s a Saturday.” The teacher apologises once more but you told them not to. It was your fault that Severus was extra blunt and snappy today. Feeling offal, you throw on a robe and leave the quarters to find him. You soon make it to his classroom but can’t bring yourself to knock or open the door. You placed both your hands on the door, one on the handle and one on the door itself. After a few more seconds of trying to bring yourself to open it, you lean your forehead on it instead. Soon enough you hear him say,

“Come in.” The tune in his voice was clearly annoying and you couldn’t tell if it was because he knew that it was you or not. After hearing his voice like that you stay where you were standing against the door for a good minute before you hear him yell what he had just said making you tense up for what you know is a man who’s rightfully upset at his partner on his birthday of all days. Letting out a shaky breath you finally get the energy to open the door. Keeping your head down you walk in and close the door behind you without turning around. You had a feeling that this might not go the way you want it so you start up a muffling / locking spell while your back is to the door. Almost immediately there is a silence growing in the room that makes you want to just sit down and hide, but you knew that you had to say something to him.

“I…” You stutter a bit before continuing with starting a conversation.

“Severus, I’m… I tried everything to get here earlier.” He kept writing down on a piece of parchment as you spoke, not really seeming to pay attention. He only hummed with annoyance in response to you.

“I really did. I’ve been running around like a lunatic trying to get back here, but…”

“But you just couldn’t find it in yourself to stop working and come back.” As he spoke, he didn’t look up for a single second, you didn’t either.

“I know that I made a promise to you,” Severus mumbled a ‘yeah’ in the middle of you talking. This behaviour from him was making it hard for you to focus on the spell and soon you just dropped it and leaned your head back onto the door closing your eyes.

“I tried my best to get back here, okay? I know that you’re upset with me and- “Again he did another one of those ‘yeahs’ but this time a little louder making you start to get annoyed with him. Looking at him you spoke in response to his little comments.

“I know that it’s not fair to you, but come on, what else was I going to do? You acting like this isn’t fair to me either.” He let out a scoffing cough at that and now you had finally had enough of this from him. You knew that it was the only day of the year that he probably actually cared about, and it was the first time that he was actually going to have someone be there with him for it. Him acting this rude and blunt towards you though made you upset. You wanted to cry at him and make him feel bad for you, but you knew that wasn’t fair. You were the one that was late to his birthday after all. After that a few minutes passed with silence from both of you. Feeling the heaviness in the air and knowing that he was very hurt by you, something comes out of your mouth that you had no real reason for saying,

“I know you’re upset and hurt because of me. So… If you want me to go back to our quarters… I will.” Nothing came out of him this time, but he did slowly stop working. After a bit he spoke up saying,

“I had already planned for you to not be here tonight.” Feeling not only the hurt in your heart grow, but also the frustration at how unfair he was being made you say more things you would never think to hear yourself say to him.

“Maybe I’ll leave the quarters too if you feel so upset with me.” You stared at him annoyed with him and those words finally made him completely stop and look up at you. However, there was no emotion showing on his face. You knew that you had struck a nerve there as you easily could tell that losing you would break him, but you had to get him to realise what a dick he was.

“It seems you don’t want anything more to do with me.” You let a few seconds pass before continuing.

“I honestly don’t understand why you are still acting like this.” You take a few steps forward.

“I’m here now, aren’t I?!” You felt that harsh clamming feeling you get in the back of your throat when you’re about to cry.

“Why do you insist on acting this way?” This brought you over the edge. You had tried your best at getting here, worked your ass off, barely got any sleep to do it, decorated the whole quarter’s and everything, but he still couldn’t even bring himself to let go of his bluntness and let himself be loved for one day. You took a step forward into the classroom and let it all out.

“Damn it Severus! You have no idea what things Dumbledore had me doing this whole time. I never got to see my family, I barely got any sleep, I’ve been worrying about getting back here and about you. Fuck, I ran around like a chicken with its head cut off once I got here decorating our quarter’s, baking a cake, finding something nice to wear, and even missing half of the damn teachers meeting just for you! I was hoping to God that you would at least let some amount of sympathy through that thick head of yours, but no!” You let out a good few tears before being able to speak again.

“I’ve busted my ass off for two weeks for you, and this is what I get for it! I get to go back to the quarter’s alone and cry knowing that I messed up the one day you would be yourself because I couldn’t get here in time. But now that I am here you don’t want anything to do with me! You don’t want me to be there for you finally and let yourself be adored for one night. We may never even have this chance again either you know, with you being all the way you are I’m not sure I can take much more of this from you.” The tears now weren’t stopping, and you couldn’t bring yourself to let anymore words out. After a few seconds You found it in yourself to look at him and you saw his eyes completely locked on yours. You wrapped your arms around yourself and felt horrible for just how badly you had messed up today. Seeing you like this made Severus stand up and walk towards you. You thought that this was going to be another one of his annoyed things he does where he just leaves, but he wrapped his arms around you instead. Not moving you kept crying quietly as Severus held you for a good few minutes before he spoke.

“I’m sorry Y/N.” He rested his head on the top of yours as you buried your face in his chest.

“I’m so very sorry. I know how much you wanted to be here today. I had no idea what things you had been doing and what you had planned to do for me once you got back. I’m a stupid bloke head that needs to get yelled at before I realise that I’m the one who needs to be sorry. I was worried about you the whole time that you were gone. Once it was starting to get closer to today, I kept getting more worried and upset with you that you weren’t here. Once you walked through the doors at the meeting, I was so happy to see you, but frustrated that you hadn’t been here for the whole day and had only shown up when we were having a meeting that would go on all night.” You let out a loud weep while in his arms and with that Severus leaned you back and gently held your face in his hand. Looking at him you saw just how soft and tired he looked. He always worried too much about you and what things you might be doing. After a little bit of holding each other and letting the last few tears fall, you both finally headed back to your quarters and held each other tight as you spent the rest of the night together for Severus’ birthday. 

Any Requests?

[thessalian]

Thess vs Inconveniences

My stepfather, holy shit.

So it’s about 8pm my time and I’m about to get a bath and settle for the evening, and phone rings. It’s my stepfather, telling me that the people who apparently screwed up my windows the first time and had to look at the hinges some more on my first day of work-from-home (which was, like, nearly two months ago now) are coming back tomorrow and Thursday, this time to actually do the work. Please note:

I got zero notice about this, and had to move things like plants off the windowsills

I’m working from home basically all the time right now, so I am definitely going to be working when these people are banging around in here

Some of it will be in the study, which means I have to move my work-from-home set-up to the sitting room, which means no music and a worse ergonomic situation

Some of it will be in the kitchen, which means I’m boned if I want coffee or, like, lunch

It is JANUARY, and the temperature’s plummeted again, and I’m going to be having the windows open on a day that, according to the area weather forecast, is going to be 2 degrees Celcius at best. Mostly, though, it’ll be freezing. Literally, 0 degrees Celcius freezing. And I’m having people leaving my windows open

I don’t even know if they’ll be in this flat on Wednesday or Thursday! My stepfather says he’s asking them to start with flat 13, and while they’re sure it’s going to take six hours per flat, he’s convinced it won’t take nearly that long. So if he’s right, it’s on tomorrow. If he’s wrong, it’s Thursday. I DISLIKE UNCERTAINTY

Here’s the stupid part: this is partly the window people’s fault. They keep insisting on calling my stepfather and saying that they’re ready to work the very next day. The reason he doesn’t? “I don’t want to mess around with it”. But he’s entirely happy to mess me about, apparently. The man will not say, “Can I get back to you on that? I need to check with my stepdaughter”, or “Can I get a range of dates and see what works for everyone?” Noooooo; he just accepts what they give him and never mind how that messes with my doings. If I’d had even a day’s more lead time, I could have spoken to my manager and switched around some of my annual leave days so at least this wouldn’t be messing with me while I’m working! (Not that this is a great time to do it, mind you; we are so swampled...) I just hope moving to the living room works because the internet cables aren’t where I need them to be and I think I have a workaround but I’ve never tested it. I should probably do that now, but I don’t really want to move my damn laptop until I have to.

The other really annoying thing is that they would not have been calling him at 8pm. So he must have known for hours before he rang me. He knows my work hours. He knows my email. He knows my mobile number. He knows I’m home most of the time now! He could have taken five minutes to confirm things with me, or at least called right after. But instead he waits until 8pm when half my options for trying to make this less disruptive are unworkable because the work day has ended. (Not that it would have mattered this week anyway since Scruffman was on a half-day and was out of the office while I was logging in for the day, but you get the general idea.)

I have no idea how to say any of this to him. It’s frustrating as hell; he vacillates between “procrastinates for months if not years” and “It will be done NOW NOW NOW according to MY schedule!” and no in-between. I am getting just a little bit sick of it. I mean, at least I know the work is slowly but surely getting done, but ... it’s just annoying.

[jodilin65]

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 31, 2018 No stomach pain and when I do have it it’s very mild to the point that it’s barely noticeable, so that much is good.

I really need to stop bragging about how much better I’ve been doing anxiety-wise because every time I do I jinx myself. I was a fool to think I beat it for good, but deep down I knew it would be back sooner or later. This shit is going to torture me on and off for the rest of my life, isn’t it? Really beginning to fear that now. Especially if it’s more the meds than the perimenopause, something I won’t find out until after I’ve gone a year without periods and I could still have quite a ways to go.

Yesterday I got so anxious that I had to take Lorazepam for the first time since July. My heart wasn’t racing but I skipped my meds today and I’m going to tomorrow as well so I don’t get there. I’m almost positive that if I didn’t skip I would end up with a racy heart and diarrhea. Then I would go from feeling shitty to feeling terrified.

Today I’m better but still not calm. I think the mistake I made after the last skip was that I didn’t let myself get totally better before I took another dose. The day I skipped I still had mild traces of anxiety. At first, I felt better than the last two days yesterday, but as yesterday progressed, it was the worst I’d felt in a while.

So I skipped today’s dose and I’m definitely skipping tomorrow, too. Would really like to know where my numbers were yesterday, but I know my TSH can be high while I still feel bad. The numbers go up right away after a skip but you don’t feel better right away. Just wish I knew what was causing this the most! Peri or pills? It would be a great relief to know that this would be gone forever once I hit menopause, but if there’s anything I’ve learned in life it’s that the longer something goes on, the less likely it is to stop. If it’s not the peri then it’s got to be the pills. I can’t believe I would’ve suddenly up and become this way for no reason at all and that’s it for life. I really hope it isn’t the pills. Again, the pills are for life, the peri isn’t.

Really hope I can stand to take it regularly leading up to the lab so I can get good enough numbers that won’t cause her to send me right back to the lab a few weeks later. I will not, however, let myself suffer just to please the doctor.

After going so long with just a few days of mild anxiety, it was a very disappointing and frustrating setback just as it was to get a period after nearly half a year.

Which do I think is the main culprit? I still don’t know. This feeling seems a bit extreme for hormonal changes but not for a chemical substance. It’s just that that “substance” is supposed to be what our bodies make anyway. I don’t know what to think anymore. Like I said, until I’ve gone a year without periods, I won’t have the answer. It’s like they both make sense but they don’t. Hormones can certainly affect the way we feel but it’s also a coincidence that it starts after I start the medication.

The only thing I’m sure of is that I’m not interested in OD anymore. Too many glitches to be worth bothering with for a place I don’t intend to remain at anyway.

Last night I dreamed I was in Japan. I was in a room with a mix of Japanese and American police officers and couldn’t help but notice how much taller the American police were. Someone said something to me about being considered average height if I were from Japan since the Japanese tend to be shorter and I’m short, too.

In the next dream, I was in a small store of some kind. The store was a bit deep but narrow and seemed to have (light yellow?) painted brick walls. I’m guessing it was a little convenience store or something. I knew whoever was at the register and while I didn’t work there I was standing next to them as they rang up someone’s order. Standing nearby was a tall woman on a phone. Even though she didn’t look like Nane, I knew it was her. She had long dark layered curls and she didn’t seem to know who I was.

In the last dream, my parents were still alive and I had to cancel a visit to them. I learned that Lisa was to visit them at that time instead and I knew she wouldn’t have gone then had I not canceled.

My vibrator broke. It needed charging, so I charged it up, but it keeps going on and off like there’s a short or something.

I wrestled this 80-lb doll that I mostly regret getting onto her stomach to help keep her ass from going flat, though I would rather her backside become deformed than the front of her since it’s the front of her that I see.

Amazingly I was able to get off on her Monday morning. I didn’t think I could but I did. With her sitting against the back of the couch, I straddled her lap and sat facing her as I rubbed myself against her.

This morning I tried different positions but had no luck. Just couldn’t get the angle right. So much for trying to get at least a little pleasure out of something that costs so much.

I got a hilarious idea for my second OD account. Even though I changed names and locations, it still wouldn’t surprise me if some figured out who I was. It wouldn’t be the end of the world if they did but since I don’t think most people will, I thought it would be hilarious to go back in time exactly 20 years ago and share entries one by one with the months and dates matching the current ones except for the year. So I just posted January 31st of 1998 when I was 32 years old and dealing with the freeloaders’ shit in Phoenix. Guess I had just gone bottle tossing and they tried to have me served. The only difference is that the day may not be the exact same day of the week that it was 20 years ago, so it may seem weird to some people reading that it’s almost the weekend when it’s not, LOL. Just thought it would be something fun to do just to see how many people check it out since it’s easy to track there. Not allowing comments on that account, though.

As expected, not a peep out of Palma or Stacey, but at least I know I accomplished my goal since I left Stacey a VM and tagged/friend-requested Palma… They read my messages. Wonder how long it’ll take Palma to delete my friend request, though?

MONDAY, JANUARY 29, 2018 What a night it’s been. Our attempt to go out and eat was a real bust. I cannot believe how many people are out and about on Monday at midnight, big city or not. But we went to the IHOP and were told we had a 15-minute wait just to be seated.

So we took off and decided to go for some fast food. Of all the places that were still open, KFC wasn’t one of them, so we went to Jack-in-the-Box’s drive-thru. But there too, was a small mob of sorts with several cars in a line that didn’t seem to be moving much.

So then we decided to stop at Applebee’s. Sure enough, the place was closing. So we decided to say fuck it and go home. He offered to stop at Walgreens but I knew it would be crowded there too, I didn’t have anything in mind I wanted or needed, and I didn’t want to be tempted to get junk food.

So we came home and I made us the cheddar potato bake we got from Walmart that you just throw in the microwave.

On the way back the pigs were next to us and the fuckers changed lanes without even signaling. I’m surprised they didn’t go through a red light, too. But what bothered me more than these law-breaking lawmen was the fact that Tom seemed annoyed by my complaining about them. Almost as if to say, “How dare you bitch about them despite what they did to you in Arizona!”

The defending of others and lack of defense on my behalf from him really bothers me at times. You know, like when someone’s sister starts almost sounding like she’s defending her beloved ex. The one she never stopped loving. Seriously, I don’t think she ever fell out of love with him. I think she just realized she loved Mark more. She would never have left Bill had she not met someone else. Tammy’s never lived without a man and she never will unless Mark dies first.

Later…

My stomach pain is sometimes nonexistent and other times it’s just barely noticeable. It’s still in that small concentrated little spot right under the ribs and a few inches away from the center of my stomach.

Skipped my meds yesterday and today I feel better than I felt yesterday and yesterday I felt better than I felt the day before. However, I’m still not as calm as I could be and I hope it’s nothing to worry about. Again, until I’ve gone a whole year without bleeding, I can’t say how much of it is on my meds.

Thanks to the traffic, I was woken up for the third time this month. So that’s two pill skips and three wake-up calls with another wake-up call coming Friday when they pick up the trash.

Tom thinks one of the reasons I can’t adapt to sleeping with background noise that isn’t consistent (and believe it or not, the louder traffic isn’t regular enough to be a consistent pattern) is because he grew up having to sleep with a lot more background noise than I did. He’s got a definite point there. Sometimes I still wonder if part of it is compensation for not having to get up to an alarm five days a week and not having kids waking me up either.

Nothing from Stacey or Palma. Unless it didn’t go through, I don’t see why Stacey wouldn’t at least read my message even if I don’t hear from her. Another few weeks and I’m going to be convinced that Palma has indeed stopped posting publicly because no one’s that busy.

Been slacking off on my story and I need to get back to it as well as editing my next book. I’m just tired tonight. I’m slacking off on exercising too, although this doll has given me a bit of a workout! I should at least do my core and do some back flies and ab crunches tonight. Been doing quick random sprints and yes, I’ve lost a couple of pounds, but it’s not like even I can’t lose at least a couple. It’s probably just water, though. Rather than focus on calories, I’m trying to focus more on spacing out when I eat as well as ingredients.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 28, 2018 Last night OD was running really slow but tonight it seems a bit snappier. 28 days left! No way I’m going to pay for that site. I like PB way better mostly for its simplicity and the way we can have multiple books. I don’t expect to ever have the search feature I’d like or to be able to customize backgrounds or anything like that, but that is definitely my preferred platform these days.

The teenager who read my diary on YouTube contacted me to say that the first one (she did a series of three videos) now has over 1000 views. Good for her. :-)

Anyway, my book Evil Amongst the Evergreens has now been fully re-edited, redesigned and republished. Six books published and counting! Couldn’t resist sending Maliheh a copy… WITH her name. No reply, of course, not that I have any way to know if she’s getting my messages or not. One of the accounts was taken over but the message didn’t bounce so she must have recovered it.

I’ve got mild anxiety in my chest right now probably because I splurged on sugar today.

No stomach pain today. The old lady in Texas said that when they say severe they mean it and that there’s no doubt about it. She’s had it before. Another person suggested uterine fibroids, but I would’ve thought the pain was too high up for that. It’s funny because she’s now following me just to see what happens with that, LOL. I think she is somewhere in the southeast.

Tom and I were talking about what an idiot Trump is. I see his wanting to reform immigration and keep dangerous cultures out (though Tom insists Muslims are like anyone else and it’s just a small group of them that are crazy). Not sure I agree with that but that’s okay. We don’t have to agree on everything. I agree, however, that he really should ignore Kim’s childish and immature taunts. When we feed the trolls, we stoop to their level. Trolls hate being ignored. Since he’s thousands of miles away, I really think it would be best if Trumpty Dumpty stopped giving Kim the negative attention he so obviously craves.

While I wasn’t being euthanized in my dreams last night, I seemed to be very lonely and depressed, living alone in some apartment with absolutely nothing. No computer, no TV, no radio, no nothing. All I did was lay in bed depressed. It seems I did get up to look out the window, though, and I must have been several floors up because I was looking down at a stormy sea. It seemed to be nighttime, too

Then I beat up Jenny C for some reason in another dream.

Later…

Palma doesn’t appear to have checked in for over a month and her friend count is the same. Don’t know if she hasn’t been on or if she just hasn’t seen my message, but I just tagged and friend-requested her. Would be surprised if I ever heard from her, though. Maybe she’ll even block me like Scot did, but I see her more as the ignoring type than the blocking type if she remembers me, and I think she will.

I also left Stacey a message and was surprised at how self-conscious I felt when I did it. My heart even raced a bit. It was nice to hear her voice again. Do I think she’ll reply on Facebook or by phone? I’d say there’s a 60% chance she’ll leave me a voice message, a 40% chance she won’t do anything.

When Tom leaves I’ve got a lot of catching up to do as far as my voice blog goes. I haven’t done any posts on Bubbly since Friday. I don’t usually do it on weekends.

My dreams told me that I was done with periods but I’ll believe it when I see it. I skipped my meds today because I felt a little anxious yesterday. It’s a good thing I did too, because I can still feel very slight traces of it.

They really are a bunch of idiots at Amazon. I decided to tell them that I wasn’t receiving reviews and they asked for a screenshot of the reviews in question. Stupid idiots.

We’re going to the IHOP in the wee hours of the morning before he goes to work. I’m sure the music will be blasting there too, but at least it will drown out his eating sounds I never cared to hear. I just hope there are no little kids because nothing drowns them out.

We talked about getting a wheelchair for the doll so I could at least have her in whatever room I wanted her in and I could hide her easily that way as well. But the more I think about it the more I don’t think it’s necessary because no matter how I try to lift her I simply can’t do any more than maneuvering her back and forth between a sitting and a lying position. I can’t even transfer her from the couch to the footstool. No way I could transfer her in and out of a wheelchair and onto a bed, couch or whatever. Whenever I want her on the bed I’m going to have to have him put her there. It’s funny because Aly is so sure she can lift 100 pounds if not for long. So could I depending on the way the weight is distributed, the angles, and the length. I really, really don’t think she could lift this doll any easier than I can. If she did I sure would be jealous as well as pissed at myself. Really, I would feel like such a wimp, hahaha. Maybe it’s time to really work my arms double-time on the Bowflex.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 27, 2018 The EMDR must have worn off, LOL, because I’m practically crying happy tears at the realization that I haven’t needed Lorazepam (with the exception of one or two to help me sleep for last year’s appointments) since July 5th! You know how everyone has their moment when they realize they’ve either accomplished or survived something? The reality is starting to set in that I might have actually really truly survived the hellish nightmare I suffered from the summer of 2014 to the summer of 2017 and I just might actually be back to myself for good. Or at least for what I hope is a seriously long time.

I don’t even want to think of what my next long-term problem will be or when it will start, and yes, it does seem I have one long-term crisis after another with just a year or two in between. As an adult, I’ve had what I consider to be a crisis 5 different times in my life, and a few other long-term problems that I wouldn’t describe as a crisis but that were very frustrating. Of the 5 times I was in crisis, two were monetary, two were medical, and one was legal. Even though the last crisis was by far the worst, my life was never truly in danger. But the series of killer asthma attacks I had many years ago could have killed me, and the two times I was in a serious financial crisis could have done me in as well. So I would say that three out of five were dangerous or close enough to it.

I can only tell you this… Whatever the next one may be is either going to be a piece of cake compared to my “meds-peri crisis” or it’s going to kill me because anything worse than the last crisis would certainly do just that, that’s how bad it was, life-threatening or not.

Anyway, can’t say that I’ll never get another period again, but I can definitely say that in April, when the Lorazepam expires, I won’t be requesting a refill.

Later…

Tom had just finished helping me dye my hair and I was just about to jump in the shower to rinse it out when he comes back into the bedroom and says, “Don’t freak out but there’s a body in the carport.”

I really thought he meant that someone passed out or died in our carport. It didn’t hit me that the “body” was actually the doll because I didn’t expect her until the week after next. But yes, she’s here! The doll I’ve wanted for 13 years is here and I’m very disappointed. She is OMG heavy as fuck! She’s absolutely gorgeous and very lifelike as well as life-size. No problem from an aesthetic point. She looks even more realistic than I thought she would and she has a great body despite being a little too titsy.

The problem is I can’t lift her to save my life! It’s a huge struggle even for Tom. It’s just that people tend to exaggerate so I didn’t buy all the complaints about these things being so damn heavy. Well, they weren’t kidding! The best I can do is maneuver her from lying down into a sitting position on the couch. I couldn’t even pick her up to get her into my office chair to wheel her into another room if I wanted to. So that much is pretty disappointing. But every time I walk by it’s like, wow! What a beauty!

I took some pictures of her to show Aly. Not sure I want to tell Tammy but if I do I’ll say we won her, LOL. The plan was to enjoy her while we were still here and get a flat-chested one with a tan when we move. No way! Until they can make these things no more than 30 pounds, I’ll pass.

She came with an outfit that fits her perfectly and looks great on her. Sheer baby blue lingerie that really shows her realism because you can see her nipples through the lace on the upper part of the top. I realize now that putting her in a typical outfit would cover a lot of her realism. This way you can see her nipples, belly button, etc.

I put a necklace, earrings and a couple of rings on her, but I can’t find my other toe rings.

She came with a comb that has fat metal prongs but goes through the wig easily. The doll and the wigs are definitely very high quality. The eyes look very realistic, too. If I’m disappointed with something that costs $740, imagine how pissed I’d be if we had spent over 2K! Tom never wanted to send her back unless she was damaged, so she’s staying. Would I undo this order if it was as simple as snapping my fingers? Yes, I would. But since I can’t, I have a very beautiful, realistic and life-size doll to look at every time I walk through the living room.

We couldn’t resist feeling inside her, LOL. Feels pretty realistic to me. The only thing that doesn’t seem realistic is the positioning of the openings. They seem too far forward.

Anyway, right now I have the Suki head on her which looks Chinese. She wears a shoulder-length dark brown wig parted in the middle. Later I’ll switch to Gia who looks Korean but will probably take out her blue eyes and put the brown ones in. She can wear the lighter brown wig with the green and blue colored streaks on the ends. It’s a really cool-looking wig. Hell, I might even wear it just for kicks. The wigs stay on these heads much easier than on the mannequins which had a smooth slippery surface. The wigs don’t slip as easily on the rubbery surface. That’s part of what makes her hard to move too, is that she hangs up on things easier. Between her rubbery surface and her weight, I can’t just slide her into position easily on the couch. She has to be lifted.

I added coral-colored lipgloss to Suki and will add bright pink to Gia. The natural color of the lips is just a light reddish color. I’m kind of surprised that they don’t have removable tongues. Anyway, I have to really be sure to do the lips well because she stains very easily. They should’ve whitened the teeth a bit, though.

She came with a warming stick and I can see why. Even after she’d been indoors for a while, she remained cool to the touch, almost cold. She’s very soft and almost tacky feeling. You can get rid of that by putting baby powder on her. I have to be careful when handling her that I don’t cut the skin with my nails, that’s how soft it is. It’s funny because when I slap her breasts, you hear a hollow sound. When I slap her thighs, it sounds just like when I slap my own thighs.

She also came with a plunger-like thing to clean her out after you screw her, so that’s definitely not anything we would need, haha.

They also enclosed white gloves (I don’t want to cover her pretty hands and nails) and a charcoal gray fleece blanket. What, do they think that will warm her up or something? One of her nails popped off but it was easy enough to glue it back on.

The joints are a bit stiff but that’s nothing compared to trying to lift her. As soon as I tried to lift the box I knew I would never be able to lift her.

At least I can change the damn heads! The head alone is like 8 pounds. They said she’s 70 pounds, but I think she’s closer to 80, maybe even slightly more. I’m learning I’m not the toughie I thought I was, LOL. Anything else about myself I may be giving myself too much credit for?

FRIDAY, JANUARY 26, 2018 Still fighting like hell to keep from gaining more weight but again it’s like trying to hold back the tide. I really think I’m going to see the 160s really soon. I don’t know what else I can do to stop it, though. I’m trying to arrange my eating schedule in a different way but I honestly don’t see how that will help because I really do have to go down to a thousand calories or less in order to lose weight and I just can’t stand that. I’m just too old for that shit.

Now here’s the thing I’ve noticed. It’s not that I’m gaining easier, but more like retaining easier. In the past, If I didn’t eat the last 4-5 hours of my day or so I would drop a couple of pounds before bed. Not anymore. The weight is clinging longer after eating or drinking and it’s taking longer to drop back down after a few hours of having nothing. But why? What could be going on with me that’s causing this? It just seems a bit extreme for age/peri.

I’m hoping, however, that the new eating arrangement will at least stop the gaining but I don’t think it will. I think I’m just slowing down the inevitable. I can’t even drink a cup of coffee without jumping half a pound that can take half a day to lose.

Last night I was browsing through YouTube videos and saw a horrible picture. One of the videos I watched showed photos just moments before tragedy struck. One of them was a gay man falling from a tall building that was pushed off and being executed by ISIS. It was a horrifying thing to see. Just totally sick, sad, infuriating and disgusting. How can one human do that to another without feeling a shred of guilt? How can they feel that’s the right thing to do? How can they believe their imaginary God would possibly pat them on the back for it? If it would, then it’s no God of mine.

But then I got to thinking about it… Is there really no one on the face of this Earth that I myself could do that too? Being honest with myself, I realized that while I couldn’t participate in actually throwing them off the building, and I couldn’t stand to watch them hit the ground like a watermelon hitting the ground with a gross, messy splat, I could certainly stand to know that child molesters, rapists and murderers, for example, were meeting a fate like that. Even one worse would be okay with me. Meaning that I would gladly look the other way without saying anything in protest. There are only a few people that I could actually torture and that I would be willing to do certain things to, but cutting their heads off, lighting them on fire or pushing them off of buildings isn’t what I would have in mind. Oh, I may end their existence in the end, but I would prefer a much less gory way. But then I think that humiliating them for the way they’ve wronged me would be much more fun and rewarding than actually taking their lives. Once you take lives they can’t live with whatever humiliation you’ve inflicted upon them and the horrible memories it would certainly bring.

Later…

So the world was more dangerous than ever at 11:58 PM (PT?) last night. But we survived. Wow, huh?

It’s a quiet Friday night and now I’m doing my writing now that my household duties have been taken care of. Well, it’s almost quiet. I hear the buzz of the freeway and who knows when the planes might get in on the action.

Nothing at all from Stacey or Palma and I have a feeling I’m probably not going to hear from either one of them no matter what I do. At first I was thinking, why bother sharing and tagging Palma when she’s almost certainly going to just ignore it? But then I realized it would at least flag her attention to the message I sent if nothing else. There’s still a chance she could have already spotted it and read it but there’s no way to know for sure. There doesn’t seem to be any activity on her account for a month and her friend count hasn’t risen either.

As for Stacey, she may reply with a message by phone but I wouldn’t count on it. I have a feeling she would prefer to keep me in the past as I have been in light of me calling her out on stuff she ultimately denied. I’ll find out soon enough, though. I was thinking I’d call her and tag Palma next week. Most people still have more free time on the weekend so I want to give them one more weekend to check in.

Didn’t have much stomach pain yesterday but today I had a little bit for the first few hours of my day.

Definitely didn’t have good dreams last night. The saddest one was where I guess I was terminally ill or something like that because I was being given a lethal dose of whatever. It was weird, though, because I was outdoors with a bunch of people somewhere. Maybe it was someone’s backyard. Only I didn’t seem to know anyone. I mean I knew the people but I didn’t know the people. The people closest to me were actually made-up characters in one of my books. I felt very woozy at one point and started to wonder if they were killing me in stages, so to speak, with whatever the on-hand nurse had been giving me so I wouldn’t be so overwhelmed.

Then I felt like I couldn’t keep my eyes open and I said I had to lay down. So I laid down on this lounge chair and could’ve sworn I heard someone say something about me not getting back up. Someone else said, “It’s okay sweetie. You can take a nap now and will finish later.”

What she meant by “finish” was the party going on. When I closed my eyes I wondered if I would ever open them again. I felt a slight prick on my arm and realized I’d been given the final dose that would put me out forever.

In another dream, I was in a bank somewhere with about 10 other people and this camera with this weird blinking red light followed my every move. Instead of thinking it was a motion sensor camera, I was sure that it was a gun and that whoever had set it up would shoot anybody who tried to leave the bank.

Then I had another dream where Tom and I were either homeless or the car had broken down and we had to carry some things. It was strange because one of the things was this large plastic doll sort of like an American Girl doll. I said I was going to just put her in the car and Tom snorted and made a gesture with his hands as if to say “What car.”

Instead, since she came with a backpack that could be strapped to a child’s back and since I was on the small side, I strapped her to my back.

In the last dream, I was back in jail and Mary slapped me. Instead of kicking her ass like I would have in real life, I just stood there completely flabbergasted.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 25, 2018 I don’t understand this doomsday clock shit they keep tweaking. So the world is going to end at 11:58 tonight? Great! Then we won’t have to worry about getting old and not having anyone to help us. Seriously, the world will indeed end by war but I still think it’s about 100 years away. Once technology gets to the point that everyone can send enough bombs without being able to deflect any coming their way in time, that’s when it will happen. People really will kill themselves to kill others. We wouldn’t have murder-suicides if they weren’t. For now, I still think what I’ve always thought… that actions speak louder than words and that people take threats too seriously. Threats don’t mean shit without action to back them up. Anybody can threaten anything at any time and that’s meaningless unless they actually do something.

Thank goodness for hourly weather updates! I was able to time my jog perfectly. It’s pouring like crazy now and pretty dark out there, too.

They put up a trellis fence around the side and back of the house that’s STILL being flipped and at first I was worried they would enclose it and encourage the new people to leave any dogs they may have out there in a park that’s not likely to do much about it. It’s not enclosed, though. It’s just to add a little more privacy.

My dangling “diamond” earrings came today from China and they’re gorgeous. It’s nice to be able to wear earrings again if I want to without them looking ridiculous. Should have thought to try clip-ons years ago!

LOL, that silly Marie. She sure is quick to move on and like with all her other girlfriends this is the “only one who’s ever really understood her.” I wouldn’t tell her this, of course, but sadly, I think she’s either going to cheat on her latest catch or scare her off with her problems and dynamic mood swings. It seems that where some of us have accepted what happened to us as kids and have vowed not to let it affect our future, she somehow got stuck in a rut for some reason and was never able to move on. Gotta love her, though. She’s still a sister and I’ll always hope for the best for her.

Aly and I swapped story ideas earlier. She wants to do a mindfuck story with a character that has my kind of sleep disorder, so she consulted with me about it. The sleep doctor I saw calls it non-entrained circadian rhythm disorder and it is a definite, definite curse from above if there ever was anything up there. There is no cure for it. I do have some control over it but very, very little. I can control it to a degree for about a week or two if even that. It really depends on what’s going on. Yes, the nights are much more peaceful, especially if you’re a writer, but I would still love to always be on days because that would be much more convenient. I wasn’t kidding when I said that the things most people struggle with come easier to me while the things most people take for granted and that’s like second nature to them are what I struggle with most.

What’s interesting is that at the same time I don’t have a schedule, my schedule is actually more predictable than your average person’s. Tom wrote a program to predict what my schedule will be in the upcoming weeks or months when scheduling my appointments. Right now the current prediction for when I’ll get up on his birthday in June is 1:30 AM and 10:30 PM on my birthday in December. This is based on an average jump of one hour and 15 minutes a day. Amazingly, the program is almost always right on.

The program helps enable me to know went to start pushing or pulling it in either direction if it’s a little off in one direction or another for pending appointments, and if I start early enough, it may only require a 10-minute manipulation. So if I fell asleep at 11 PM the night before, then the next night I will push it to 11:10 PM. Get it? I know it’s very hard for those that don’t have it to even conceive of how it’s possible to not be able to control your schedule no matter what you do and many often go into denial about it much in the way those do that don’t understand that yes, we’re born with one out of 4 possible sexualities… Straight, bisexual, gay or child molesters.

No matter what anyone gets or thinks, it’s something that’s very real and it’s on me. I’m the one that has to deal with it, after all.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 24, 2018 Unfortunately, this is the third day that I’ve had that cramp-like feeling in my upper right gut. I’m starting to suspect there could be a connection to my gallbladder, but I’m not worried at this point because according to what I read, gallstones are common. Gallbladder cancer is not, however.

I think it will back off on its own. I sure hope so as I’ve had enough of the medical drama these last 3 years! Now that I’ve been healthy again for over half a year I want to stay that way for a very long time.

I read that it’s more common with women (figures) and that it has to do with these deposits that harden and build up which can sometimes lead to infection. I don’t have any fever or chills, though I still get cold easily. I’ve always been sensitive to cold.

It describes the pain as “severe” but I would call it more like annoying. I also don’t have any back pain which it says you can get along with it. You can feel it more when you take a deep breath and it does seem to intensify the cramp a bit but once I release the breath of air it goes back to being just annoying. It also said it can come and go, sometimes lasting a few hours to a few days. It can become worse after a heavy meal, especially if it’s a greasy one.

Last night I dreamed that Virginia seemed to be angry at me every time we would cross paths and I suspected it may have been because of something I said about her to someone else living in the park.

Then I had a dream that I may have been in some kind of psych ward, though it seemed like I was able to leave at my own will because I was trying to remember Tom’s number so I could call him to have him pick me up.

I mentioned to a large black woman who worked there that I had a disease that affected my memory and I had forgotten both my phone number and his. Then they gave me something that they said would “help make me feel better.” Next thing I know I’m falling asleep and waking up in a pitch-black room at 2 in the morning. I was the only one in the tiny windowless room with its door slightly ajar. Realizing that they gave me something that knocked me out, I got up and decided to go look for my phone, hoping that Tom’s number would be stored in it. I don’t know why my dream self didn’t think of this before but when I exited the room, the hallway was just as dark and I couldn’t see a thing. I then realized that it would only be a matter of hours before he would be there to get me anyway.

I checked the FedEx tracking number they gave me but the doll still isn’t in their system yet. We’re guessing they won’t post any useful information until she’s actually on the plane. I’m thinking it might not even be until she’s in the US. I just hope that we have enough warning so that Tom can know what day to take off from work.

Still texting with Aly who has been staying with her nanny family. I forget that she sometimes does that. Again she contradicted herself. A long time ago she said that obesity didn’t run in her family but this time she said it did even though her parents weren’t that big. She says she’s 120 pounds. Yeah, but she’s only 36. Another 5-10 years and she’ll probably be 30 pounds heavier and unable to lose a single pound.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 23, 2018 Another thing I don’t get is how some people say that God is the reason their lives are good at the moment. So then what is the reason some poor kid that’s being abused or starved in some Third World country is going through what they’re going through? Did they somehow do something to deserve it or to ask for it? I just don’t get that. If you’re supposedly so special that you’ve been blessed by Him, what do some of these innocent children do to end up not the least bit blessed?

This is the second day in a row that I’ve woken up with pain in my upper right stomach. Not sure what it is. It seems like it could be a lot of things from what I looked up, but I’m still going with either a pulled muscle or some kind of weird gas pain. It better not be anything serious! Really had enough of the doctors and don’t want to have to see anymore other than for regular maintenance.

I checked Palma’s page some more and determined that her son is now 9 years old. Also, she seems to live in a pretty nice house too. I’m guessing that if she and her husband both make at least 50K a year, then they can easily afford it with a six-figure income.

Aly said she’s now pre-diabetic. She doesn’t have to take medication or insulin yet but she has to monitor her blood sugar and go to the emergency room if it gets too high. This really sucks. Like Tammy, hasn’t she had enough to deal with? Especially for one who hasn’t even hit 40 yet?

I don’t remember much in the way of dreams last night other than hearing someone say hello and then running through the house which didn’t look like this place in search of someone I couldn’t seem to find.

After soaking in the tub with the fairy bath bomb it turns out that the surprise inside was a fairy pendant/charm that you can attach to a necklace or bracelet.

The doll is on the way and I got her FedEx tracking number! So excited! I just really REALLY hope I can handle the bitch.

I worked out on the Bowflex but haven’t yet convinced myself to go out for a walk down to the lake and back. Actually, now that I’m through the worst of the perimenopause I really should go further than that and stay out there a good half hour or so. But between being lazy and having three different pieces of exercise equipment indoors, I only do a 15-minute walk and make up the rest of the time doing something indoors.

MONDAY, JANUARY 22, 2018 Got a cramp-like pain in my right upper gut. I’ve had this before but today I woke up with it and it’s a little steadier. Used to think this was due to pulling muscles when ab crunching. Hopefully, nothing’s wrong with my liver or gallbladder. Part of the pancreas is there too.

So Aly said she talked to a live person on Amazon about her review not going through. Apparently, it wasn’t just me she tried to leave a review for but a few other authors as well. They said something about her account being new and needing time to be approved, while some of the rude trolls I encountered in the forums said Amazon has BOTs looking for links and connections to those leaving comments. This seems like an awful lot of work for Amazon to go through, but apparently, they have become very much against those who know the author leaving comments on their books that they’re checking for links we share to our book pages on social media and any connection to those leaving comments.

What do I think? At this point, I think the whole review system is just glitchy, but I’ll find out more soon when I go to leave a review on the book I’m currently reading.

Last night I looked up free e-books and had fun adding dozens of new books to my library. I like mystery, suspense, thrillers and things like that. I have a couple of true crime novels as well.

I forgot to mention the weird scene I saw yesterday at Target. A little girl of about perhaps 10 years of age was wearing a sundress. Yes, a sundress with absolutely no jacket. Meanwhile, it was in the 40s out. I don’t get that any more than I get why they were selling flip-flops, swimsuits and summer clothes in January. Okay, so we’re in a moderate climate and we may not be like Oregon but we’re not like Florida either.

I’m back to sleeping shitty even though I don’t feel tired. I just have to sleep longer to make up for waking up so much, but yeah, I’m back to waking up constantly. At one point during the night I got up to pee and I wasn’t sure I would be able to fall back asleep first.

I was kind of disappointed to find that the doll is still awaiting shipment when I checked the status on Ali. It’s early Tuesday morning now in China. Shouldn’t she have been shipped out by now? I sent a message to them asking when they thought she would be shipped out because I would really like to know what day she’s going to arrive in order to be able to be available to sign for her. Tom said he would take that day off. He has over two weeks of time off accumulated. I teased him about telling them that he was going to take a day off for his new sex doll. LOL, they wouldn’t believe that one if he did.

As expected, not a word from Stacey or Palma but I still can’t say that either one of them has checked in since I sent their messages. Goes to show, though, that nothing has changed for me when it comes to prayer. Nothing I’ve prayed for recently has come true. The only thing that’s close to being granted is that I’ve only had a couple of anxious days since asking for the anxiety not to return which is by far the most important thing to me. My weight and who I hear from is nothing compared to that.

Being the curious person that I am, I googled why prayers don’t always seem to be granted, and some of those that believe in God say that He hears you no matter what, but there are a number of reasons your prayers may not be granted and this can range from not being the right time or what’s best for you to you not be sorry enough for past sins and not forgiving of others.

Well, if that’s the case then I may as well return to not praying because not only am I still not sure there even is a God, but I’m never going to be sorry for every mistake I’ve ever made and I’m never going to forgive everyone who’s ever burned me either. Furthermore, I have no shame, guilt or regrets for saying so and for feeling as I feel either. If there was a God, first He allows me to have the kind of mother I had. Then He allows me to want a child and a career I could never have before the idea of these things wore off on their own. Then I was never allowed to have a woman I really lusted for before meeting Tom. Then I had to go through the poverty. Then I had to be thrown in jail for something no one should ever be thrown in jail for. Then I had to have the shit terrorized out of me for a few years.

Sorry, but that’s not something I can just “forgive and forget.” I could forgive some of the people that have screwed me with a sincere apology, but not those that had the biggest hand in screwing me over in the biggest of ways. Same goes for God. What He did by sitting back and allowing so much of it to happen is no different, in my mind, than a woman who sits back and lets her boyfriend beat the shit out of her child. He could have prevented at least some of it. But He didn’t. The fact that He willingly chose not to makes me unable to help the ill feelings that I harbor toward Him as well as to others. Again, though, this is only if He even exists in the first place. Even if He doesn’t and even if everything that happens to us is purely random, that doesn’t excuse my biggest perps. So if reacting to the freeloaders’ shit and speaking my mind is considered a “sin,” then that’s okay with me. I would send them the exact same journals all over again. I just wouldn’t be dumb enough to answer any court calls.

On the flip side, whether my life has been happenstance or planned by something we can’t see, I realize my life could be a lot worse than it has been. There are millions of people out there who suffer a lot more than I have and who never find their true soulmate either. So, it’s weird. It’s like I’m blessed while I’m cursed. But either way, no matter what happens to me in the present or the future, nothing can ever undo the past. You can never excuse, make up for or compensate for those that knew damn well what they were doing yet chose to screw me over anyway. Or the possible God that sat back and let it all happen.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 21, 2018 We went to Target earlier and I saw a collection of small fake flowers and cacti that I would have loved 20 years ago. Maybe in the next house since I plan to have a more “grown-up” theme of decor at that time for variety’s sake.

I ended up getting a couple of color-changing nail polishes. One is pink and turns purple when your body temperature is cooler or like if you run it under cold water. The other is yellow and turns orange in cooler temperatures. Just going outdoors will darken the colors. It’s been so cold the last couple of days!

I also got a large, colorful bath bomb that says it has a surprise inside. That oughta be interesting, though my guess is that it’s a tiny plastic toy I’ll have no use for in the shape of an animal of some kind.

Didn’t get much else there other than toothpaste and some treats. Decided not to stop anywhere else either. That’s what having money does to you. Once you accumulate so much shit, not much is new and exciting anymore. You don’t feel like you just have to have this or that because you’ve already got so much shit. I don’t need or want any more clothes, jewelry, shoes, knickknacks, perfume, makeup or anything else right now. I’ve definitely got way more than I need, LOL. I just want my doll! It’s early Monday morning in China now so it should be close.

The short story I shared on a site for writers that Mitch recommended to me and that I don’t plan to publish, has nearly 200 views and a handful of positive feedback. No one had anything negative to say yet and someone was kind enough to catch a discrepancy in character ages for me. You have the option of receiving comments and critiques, just comments, or nothing at all. I chose the first option.

The kitchen smart switches have really turned themselves into dumb switches. I don’t know why they’ve gotten so unreliable but I’m having to turn the lights on and off manually which kind of sucks. I guess it’s not all bad, though, as with the switches you just tap them. They’re not toggle switches. We have about four different brands throughout the house and this particular brand (I’m not sure what it is) really sucks.

It’s a shame to see so many things pop up that I really could have used in the past. Like some of the amazing bikinis they have these days. Why couldn’t they have existed when I was young and skinny? And why couldn’t self-driving cars have been a thing back when I was single?

Other than a burst of daily landscaping and annoying planes circling round and round, it’s been a cold but peaceful day.

I noticed a rather uncanny pattern and I wonder if it means anything. I always thought it was rather interesting that the dates that my parents, siblings and myself were born are in two different groups. A group of two and a group of three. The days we were born are 4, 5 and 6, and then 9 days later, 15 and 16. No one has a birth date that isn’t adjacent to someone else’s birth date.

But where the pattern gets really interesting is that so far we have a string of death dates forming a group of three, just like with birthdates. My parents and brother died on the 22, 23 and 24. I then began to wonder if all the death dates, including the two pending ones, are of the same pattern only in reverse. This means that if you go back 9 days from the 22nd you’ve got the 13th. Adjacent to that is the 12th, forming the group of two to go with the group of three.

Can’t find a pattern with years, but here’s another possible pattern with months. I wrote the numbers 1-12 in a circle like on a clock. I made two “clocks.” Only the numbers represent months instead of hours. On one clock I colored in the numbers representing the months we were born which are January, April, June, August and December.

On the other clock, I colored the three months my parents and brother died which were February, September and December. When I colored in the months of April and August and then merged the two clocks, it lined up perfectly when I matched the pattern based on the spacing between the numbers that were colored.

So does this mean my sister and I may die on April 12, April 13, August 12, or August 13?

SATURDAY, JANUARY 20, 2018 I had this dream last night that I went to the hospital in labor. I was both alone and terrified. Never before had I had a dream like that and again I wonder about parallel lives. I was so terrified that I woke up. Never did feel any pain in the dream, though.

Then in another dream, Tom and I were thinking of having me artificially inseminated. I wrote about it in a letter to my parents who were still alive, knowing they would likely disagree with it since they’d always encouraged me to skip kids and enjoy life and living. Determined not to be persuaded by anyone, to live for myself and make up my own mind, I was thinking of backing out just because I didn’t want to have to work so hard in that kind of way on something that brought so much noise and so many expenses. I really did value my freedom, too.

I thought of something really cool that Tammy could do with her second sink. I always thought it was kind of silly to have two sinks in one bathroom, but then I realized one could be filled with water and bamboo plants. All they need is water, after all. That would look weird yet kinda cool.

I honestly don’t see the point in the women’s march. I still say that while most men may not be “gay by action,” they’re still “gay at heart,” always favoring each other and preferring each other to women. So I think that as long as that attitude remains, and it is human nature to favor one’s own kind, things aren’t going to change. But I also can see where sitting back and just taking their shit in silence isn’t going to help either.

Most people may be quick to say that violence never solves anything but when you think about it, maybe it does. Maybe sometimes it really is necessary to step on people to get what’s right and the only way to put people in their proper place. Maybe things won’t change with women until we’re willing to enact the same kind of violence and control upon them as they have with us. For example, look how fast blacks got ahead compared to gays. Now they have more rights than whites ever had, even if some people aren’t willing to admit this. Gays always went about protesting and fighting for their rights in a calm and peaceful way. But the blacks didn’t. And no matter what anyone says, ever since the LA riots, the law has tended to favor them in most places because cops and judges are getting sick of being accused of racism. Even today, that’s all you fucking hear about. People will always do whatever works for them in order to get ahead. Right or wrong, it’s human nature to do so. As long as playing the race card works for them, they’re going to keep on doing it. Meanwhile, women need to start doing what’s going to work for them and I really think resorting to violence may be the only way if they want men to stop deciding what they can and can’t do with their own bodies, for example.

Tom, however, thinks violence won’t help and that they’re doing a fine job. There are more women in politics, the military, and just about everywhere, he says.

True, but they’re still not being paid fairly and are still being told how to live their own lives.

So Leslie Van Houten has once again been denied parole. Sometimes I wonder why she even bothers to try. I don’t know that I would bother wasting my time if I were in her shoes.

I do agree, however, that it was wrong of the courts to approve her parole and then deny it simply because Manson died and they’re afraid of creating a so-called new Manson Family. Did they expect Manson to live forever? Besides, any sicko can follow in his footsteps anytime. But you know how the law is, they can do whatever the fuck they want. They’re above the law and nothing is illegal for them. I’ve seen this firsthand. When you make the laws you can break them, too.

Do I think she should get out simply because she was young and under a horrible influence at the time of the murders? Absolutely not. I heard her once say that she doesn’t understand why she’s still being punished for something she did when she was 21. I would agree if she had stolen a car or something like that. But this is one case where it’s good to see someone held accountable for their own actions because there are too many cases of others being held accountable for other people’s actions. I’m seeing more and more of this shit lately and it’s sad. I can see if you influence an impressionable child to kill themselves or something, but we really ARE responsible for our own actions as adults who should be old enough to know the difference between right and wrong no matter what. Yet if I were attacked by some random stranger on the street, chances are excellent that they may get off by claiming I somehow provoked them, especially if they weren’t white. Recently there was this sickening case in the UK where a guy got just 3 years for bludgeoning his ex. The courts claimed she provoked the attack by seeing someone else when in reality she’d already left him, not that this should be an excuse to smash someone over the head with a hammer.

But then the provocation argument would surely cease to exist for those who fucked with me, wouldn’t it? How much you wanna bet no one ever asked or suggested if the welfare bums in Arizona just might have done anything on their part to provoke me?

Okay, enough negativity. As it is, I myself hate it when some of my FB buddies post nothing but negative shit as they often do. Yeah, the world can be both depressing and scary. And yeah, I wonder if violence and vigilantism may not be such a bad idea in some cases, but life is never going to be fair no matter what.

Anyway, we’re not doing much today. I’m doing laundry and just relaxing for the most part.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 19, 2018 Damn Amazon and their glitches! I swear something up there does not want my books to get any reviews. Aly left a review but it’s not visible. This isn’t the first time this has happened with reviews not posting so I finally complained to Amazon, assuming I complained in the right place. Amazon is a very complex site and they make contacting them rather difficult. Either way, I’m pretty much counting on not getting any reviews at this point. In fact, I may quit publishing with them because it’s too much work for too little money. It was just meant to be a fun hobby of mine anyway.

So I’m going to be quitting two things, sugar and not writing but probably publishing. the odds of making any real money in writing have always been like winning the lottery just like with trying to get a record contract or something like that. Besides, I learned years ago that you can’t make something be that wasn’t meant to be. That’s okay. I can still have fun with it and I will.

Just like sleeping normally and having a woman I was really attracted to wasn’t meant to be, I learned years ago that I wasn’t meant to have a job or career of any kind either so maybe that’s part of why the reviews aren’t “meant” to go through. I mean maybe something up there is interfering with reviews because the more reviews you get, the more notoriety I would think your books get. It’s so fucking frustrating, though, and I’m so pissed because Aly would have gladly read and reviewed everything of mine. This may have really helped, too. Then again, during the time I had the two books published, I had four-star ratings and still didn’t make shit. So it isn’t about the ratings but about fate. What if I was suddenly a perfect singer who was also young and gorgeous? The odds of this earning me much money are next to nothing.

Although it was fun to try, I don’t think I’m going to get this peel-off nail polish again. It actually takes longer to peel the damn stuff off than it does to remove it with nail polish remover, and the ones with glitter wash off every time I wash my hands.

Today is the sunniest it’s been in a while, so I went down to the lake. It was cold enough to see my breath in the air but otherwise gorgeous.

The doll is still listed as “awaiting shipment.” It’s already the weekend in China so I guess she’ll sit there at the factory waiting to be picked up until Monday.

Last night I dreamed I was waiting in a large waiting room with a couple of detectives. I don’t know if I was a witness or why I was with them, but I wasn’t handcuffed or anything, so I guess I didn’t do anything wrong. It seemed like we’d been sitting in the room forever with dozens of other people when I complained about getting tired and wanting to go home. One of the female detectives insisted I stay, though.

Then I dreamed that Virginia was sitting at a small card table at the side of the road where it forms a T on Oak. She asked us when we expected to move and we both told her we had no set moving date. She seemed irritated and said something about getting people upset by not knowing exactly when we would move.

In another dream, I was at Mary’s place when I felt a fork underneath her carpet. I thought that maybe if I turned it upside down somehow the tines wouldn’t poke through the carpet but wasn’t able to maneuver the fork around through the thick carpet.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 18, 2018 Woke up to the exciting news that the doll is shipping from China today. Not only that, but she showed me pictures of the doll and both heads and they’re exactly what I want. They got the right faces, eye colors, and wigs. She’s absolutely gorgeous. Just a little too titsy. Now I just have to hope I can handle the bitch! It’s exciting after wanting this for so long. It’ll be like getting two dolls in one. Maybe even like four in one since a drastically different eye color can give one’s face a different appearance.

I didn’t realize it but she’ll have standing feet. This is fine even though she’ll have three screws in each foot as I don’t expect to see the soles of her feet very easily. Still don’t understand how throwing a few screws in the feet can stand and balance an 80-pound doll but I will soon find out.

While $740 is a lot of money in itself, I got a smoking deal! These aren’t the Bentleys of these dolls but they’re the Caddys. A low-ender without a second head is usually over a grand, so to get a high-ender with an additional head for less than a grand is a great deal.

Realizing that I’m probably never going to get any reviews on my books at this point and that Stacey probably isn’t going to check them out anyway, I went ahead and sent her a message. I just can’t get anybody to leave me one single fucking review but I guess that no reviews are better than bad reviews. I was going to wait until I republished Evil Amongst the Evergreens before contacting Stacey, but again, even if she did at least check my book page out, I can’t see her buying anything. I told her that if I didn’t get a message confirmation from her within a week or two, I’ll call her. So around February 1st, I’m sure I’ll be calling.

I was going to wait a couple of weeks after sending Palma’s message before I shared and tagged one of her memes, but I might wait and at least see if I can see some activity on her account at some point. She has gone a month or so without posting in the past, so unless she’s posting things I can’t see, there’s a chance she hasn’t checked in since I sent the message. I was kind of hoping she would see it and be like, oh no! I don’t want her sharing and tagging me, so I better at least give her a confirmation.

I really think that’s why Scot blocked me; not because I messaged him but because I shared one of his memes. Could be a power and control thing too, but who knows and who cares? I say what I have to say and leave it at that but it would definitely be nice to at least get something from Stacey.

After having to hear landscaping every single fucking day so far this week, I’m really hoping it will start raining and keep things quiet today. Really, I’ve had enough.

Unless she has a legitimate excuse, I’m a little disappointed in Aly. I was under the impression days ago that she was going to tell me she finished the book and left a review. But I guess it’s normal for her to take a handful of days off from the Internet here and there because Kim says she hasn’t heard from her either if I can believe Kim, and I think I can in this case. I sent Aly a text and an email but the rest is up to her.

Today I’m going to finish the housecleaning. I’m doing my least favorite chore which is dusting. Then I’ll order groceries, hit the Bowflex and do my usual editing and things like that.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 17, 2018 This is it! I’m SOOO excited! The doll I’ve been wanting for about 13 years is now on its way! Ordered from AliExpress and she came to a total of $740. What’s really cool is that the owner in Guangdong, China is sending a bonus head! They’re both Asian and I’m calling them Gia and Suki. Gia has squintier eyes and you can see four of her upper teeth because her mouth is a little more open than Suki’s, who has larger eyes that appear a little more round in shape.

I only have to hope for two things and that’s that they don’t fuck up the order and that I really can lift what’s going to be a 70-80-pound doll. Not sure if she’s 5‘3” tall or 5‘5” tall because they list both heights, but she’s going to measure 35.4–23.6–35.4. These are approximations. The only thing I don’t like is that she really does have huge tits. Just as long as I can lift her!

The two heads I chose are two of the most beautiful faces I’ve seen of all the various types of dolls I’ve looked at. I decided to go for the face, like Tom suggested, as that’s what I’m going to see the most. We’ll just have to hope I’m as strong as we think I am, but in the worst-case scenario, I can wheel her around in my desk chair.

The Yuna doll was nice but I think she was a little anorexic and that I would have had a hard time fitting clothes on her. These faces are much nicer and even more realistic, however. She won’t be quite as well proportioned as my manikin, but she will be more realistic. Her hips and tits will be a little bigger than the manikin’s but her waist will be a little skinnier. I was tempted to ask for a doll with flatter tits in which they have a black doll featured in but I didn’t want to end up confusing them. Their English is shitty enough.

If they don’t botch the order, one will have brown eyes with a short black wig, and the other will have blue eyes with a long brown wig with streaks of blue and green towards the ends.

It’s pretty damn exciting! Like I said, I just hope I can handle this bitch. She’s actually considered a bit plump for one of these things. But I focused on the face and not only got one great face but two. And all for less than a grand. Yuna would have been just over a grand. Furthermore, I was just on time because they just raised their prices on this brand which is called 6YE. I first noticed them nearly a year ago and while I immediately loved them, they were always over a grand or two.

She’ll be here in 8-16 days! Really would like to know exactly when she’s coming because I’m guessing someone will have to sign for her. I’m hoping Tom will be here when she arrives because the package itself is going to be 92 pounds.

Haven’t heard from Aly in a few days. I guess I will hear from her in spurts but that’s okay. I’m just glad to have her back in my life even if she was a bit contradicting in a funny way. She may have been dishonest in the past but this is the first time I’ve known her to be contradicting. She said she missed having someone who didn’t judge her too much yet that was supposed to be the reason she dumped me back in 2016. She also always used to say how forgiving she was, yet she just admitted she’s not.

I skipped my meds today because I had some anxiety the last couple of days sitting in my chest. Nothing serious but enough to be noticeable and that was enough for me to take a day off. It won’t hurt to do that every now and then. It sure was nice to be able to go straight for the coffee, too.

Last night was the first time I dreamed in four different languages and everything I said was actually correct too, LOL. Someone was asking me how to say grandmother and grandfather in German and I told them Großmutter and Großvater. But then they asked if there was a way to simply say granny or grandpa instead. Oma and Opa, I told them.

Then someone asked me how to say grandmother in Spanish and I told them “abuela.”

Then I was reading a comment I got in Italian, and in the dream, I knew it was some kind of negative comment about something I wrote about my pets. I only remember the word “animali” which is plural for animals. Deciding to play dumb, I told them I couldn’t read Italian.

I also dreamed about chatting with Adonis, and some estranged family member showing up at some family gathering. I don’t know what side of the family the girl was on but it looked like a heavy teenage girl with red hair.

In the last dream, I seemed to be sitting in a row of seats watching or listening to someone as I ate one granola bar after another. My dream self thought that the guy near me must think I was a major pig, haha.

Speaking of eating… I saw a fascinating YouTube video on the negative effects of sugar and I’m seriously contemplating not quitting sugar altogether but cutting way down. It’s said to be more addicting than cocaine according to an experiment with lab rats. It definitely seems that the more sugar you have the more you crave it.

I was surprised at the many benefits besides the obvious ones… Sugar being bad for your teeth and putting you at risk of diabetes and obesity. Quitting sugar is supposed to improve bad breath, eyesight, skin, blood pressure, bad cholesterol and much more like our mood, sleep cycles and quality of sleep while leaving us less sluggish when we’re awake.

The most surprising thing I learned was that sugar can affect asthma as well as brainpower. It affects learning and memory. Furthermore, it’s an inflammatory substance that can lead to inflammation like acne. I wonder if getting rid of sugar would help my rash. I’m soon going to find out! I’m not going to cut back on sugar forever but I’m going to try to eat as little of it as I can for as long as I can stand. I will also be lowering my risk of Alzheimer’s and heart disease this way.

They say that by eliminating 10 teaspoons of sugar a day from your diet which comes to 40 grams, you’ll lose a pound every three weeks. Women aren’t supposed to have more than 25 grams of sugar a day, men no more than 37 grams. I know I won’t lose weight because I just don’t have the metabolism to do it, but I’ll gladly take the other rewards I may reap if I can stand to stick it out.

It really does seem that once so much junk became so readily available was when I started having more cavities and other issues. I know I’m older and that I have Hashimoto’s but maybe I would be 10 pounds overweight instead of 30 if there wasn’t so much temptation everywhere I go.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 16, 2018 I was reading about Nostradamus’s predictions for 2018. Sorry guy, but you’re just too general with your predictions to be taken all that seriously.

He talks about earthquakes and natural disasters but these things happen every year all over the world, some years worse than others. Yes, the world will likely end someday and maybe due to war, but I don’t see it happening anytime soon. I think we’re still 100-200 years away from that. Or maybe it won’t be a war that ultimately ends the world. Maybe it will be some disease that spreads quickly that we can’t control. Anything is possible, but I don’t see the economy collapsing and World War III happening this year.

I do cringe a bit every time our wonderful president goes on one of his bullying sprees. I mean he’s how old? To see “leaders” with this degree of immaturity is really sad. I still can’t believe, with all the obsession with political correctness and bleeding hearts for minorities, that this cock still managed to get elected. Then again, he didn’t “win.” Hillary actually got more votes. I’ll never understand for the life of me why some could be against Hillary over some emails while they welcomed this woman-hating pervert.

Most of us are willing to admit and accept that some breeds of dogs tend to be more trouble than others. So then why can’t we admit that some groups of people tend to be more trouble than others? Well, we can’t. That’s why it still stuns me to this day that such a hater got elected.

ROTFL! Tammy says my new shoes are ugly. Gotta love that girl’s honesty.

I was contacted by Caitlyn and given the YouTube channel link to the series she’s featuring me in. I had to laugh when she mentioned me being in my 50s and so I’ve lived a “long time.” LOL, yeah, compared to a 14-year-old. It was cool to hear my journal read and to be part of her series. She just needs to raise the volume. She’s got good potential as a narrator, though. It was just a bit of a struggle to hear her.

It’s a wet morning out there but not that cold. We went walking down to the lake and got back just in time because it started pouring after that. I don’t mind getting caught in the rain but not when it’s cold. That’s something I don’t mind in the summer only it almost never rains here in the summer.

My goal is to have Evil Amongst the Evergreens republished the weekend of the 27th-28th with the edited version and new cover design. I think I can get it into my publishers at Amazon by then. It’s just that I still prefer to do my own editing as much as I hate it. It’s the most tedious part of writing a book. Of course I tipped Maliheh off just to worry her a bit at the two email addies I know of hers.

Yesterday I was slightly anxious for the first eight hours or so of my day. I don’t know if I’m pocket-flaring or if it’s the perimenopause. Even though I’m through the worst of it, it’s certainly not 100% gone. Today I’m better, though not as calm as I’d like. I figured it would be back to haunt me soon enough, only I’m smarter now. I’ll skip my meds if I have to in order to keep it from getting worse and to the point where my heart gets in on the action and I have the runs. I took it today but I cut my waiting time to 20 minutes before diving into my coffee. Loving the new coffee maker so far. It has a bigger reservoir and it seems to heat up faster.

Waiting for the sun to come up a bit and then I’ll finish with today’s cleaning and get to work editing as well as on my current book which I’m still writing. So I’m editing an old book while writing a new book. It keeps me busy. At the end of the day, I’ll indulge in audiobooks and coloring. I didn’t realize my Only Girls coloring book was as explicit as it is, haha. After I get a few more that I want to get I’ll probably just print out my own coloring pages. They have millions of them on Pinterest and this way I can get exactly what I want. Each book I get has some pages I don’t care for. I don’t like overly detailed ones.

For now, I’m just enjoying the peace until the daily onslaught of landscaping and traffic sounds come to steal the peace.

Palma doesn’t appear to have been on Facebook yet this year unless she’s posted anything I can’t see. Either way, I know I’m not going to hear from her any more than I’ll ever hear from Kathleen. I just hope she at least gets my message.

I swear my sleep is cursed no matter what. I woke up because Tom accidentally told Alexa to turn on the bedroom light. Either that or Alexa thought “rat room” was “rainbow.” We should change one of those room names since they’re too similar. For now, I’ll flip that switch off before I crash. I also woke up several other times and not due to traffic. There’s no doubt in my mind my sleep is cursed. I just don’t know why. Because I don’t have to get up to an alarm regularly? I don’t know about that because I have sleep issues stemming back to childhood. Unless there is an afterlife in which we learn all the answers to the mysteries of this life, I’ll probably never know. It’s just more than obvious given the excessive amount of sleep disturbances over so many decades that yeah, it’s cursed.

MONDAY, JANUARY 15, 2018 I dreamed that my mother died all over again only this time I learned of it from I don’t know who. I was trying to get a hold of Tammy to ask why she didn’t tell me herself. Before this, I was talking to the mystery guy that notified me. After spelling my name wrong and then correcting myself, I gave him my name to verify my identity. Then I was showing him my passport in person a split-second later.

In another dream, I was standing in my maternal mother’s bathroom and saying, “It looks so old now but seems smaller than I remember.”

In real life, we went out to Jack-in-the-Box as well as Walmart yesterday. It was pretty dead and it would’ve been quiet save for the blasting music in both places. I really hate having loud music forced on me when I eat and shop. Is this a California thing or does this happen everywhere?

Anyway, I got a breakfast platter full of calories and cholesterol I definitely don’t need, and then I got a few things on clearance at Walmart. A pink sleepshirt with sheep all over it to lounge around in, super comfortable pink and purple shoes with a memory foam sole (size 4 girls), and the perfect shade of light pink lipstick that’s noticeable but doesn’t stand out like a neon sign in the night.

The sleep shirt has a small tear in the seam at the side so I’ll have to sew that. Should only take a sec.

Wish I could say I was feeling great but I’m not right now. I feel a touch anxious so I may skip my meds tomorrow to play it safe. We went out walking in the middle of the night and it was gorgeous. It was foggy and the air was dead still as it was dead quiet. I loved it and knew it was only a matter of hours before the peace was spoiled with the sounds of landscaping and traffic.

When we returned from what was just a 15-minute walk down to the lake and back I felt oddly fatigued as well as a bit wound up. I had some of my special tea but that didn’t help at all. Instead, I just felt drowsy on top of wound up. No racing heart, though, or hot flashes. Hopefully, some of the anxiety is just due to it being Monday morning and knowing he’s not going to be around as much the next five days.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 14, 2018 Wow, Tom said there were motorcycles tearing by that I managed to sleep through today.

I got a message on another site I keep journals on from a teenage girl in Alabama named Catelyn who hopes to make a career out of YouTube someday. She wanted permission to use my journal on a series she’s doing, saying she wouldn’t receive payment or anything like that for it. She said she liked the way my journal was detailed, went far back into the past as well as the present, and was consistent. She pointed out that many other journals weren’t updated regularly and only contained a few sentences.

I guess she wants to do a series on different people’s lives, so I said sure, she could use my journal, and she thanked me for the “amazing opportunity,” LOL, and said she’ll pass along the link to it once it’s up. So that was a pretty interesting request.

Aly bought and read Locked-In, liked it for its inner dialogue/thoughts and is going to leave a review on it. She did say she caught a couple of grammatical errors and asked if I wanted to be told about them. Definitely, even though editing is a pain in the ass and not the simple task it should be as it is with editing blogs.

Saw something strange here in the middle of the night last night, though I don’t think they were up to no good. The gates are closed at that time and you have to know the code to get in. At 4 AM I happened to be up and noticed the sound of an engine idling close by. I looked out the living room window and saw a man and a woman sitting in a car in front of our place. The interior of the car was lit and the man seemed to be going through some papers that were either stapled together or attached to a clipboard. The car then backed up in front of Bob and Virginia. I know they saw me at that point, which was what I wanted them to do just in case they did have any ill intentions in mind. But then they pulled back in front of our place and appeared to be in a heated debate, though not necessarily arguing. I think they were truly trying to find someplace and were frustrated and confused despite the odd hour. They left a minute later.

Who were they? Why were they here? Where did they go?

The only thing I remember from last night’s dream was being in a pool somewhere with Tom and half a dozen other adults. A small patch of sunlight was shining on a section of the pool. I tried to follow it but it kept moving. At first, I was treading water with my hair up in a bun, not wanting it to get wet. But then I floated onto my back, not caring that it was now wet. I swam up to Tom a minute later and said some nonsensical thing about seeing Melanie (from AZ) later on for counseling and that my hair would be all curly then.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 13, 2018 That’s TWICE this week that I’ve been woken up. This is fucking ridiculous. Worst place I ever slept. At least since knowing Tom, it is if you don’t count jail or hotels. The windows were a complete waste of time and money. :(

If I don’t hear from Palma over the next couple of weeks I’ll share one of her memes and tag her in it with a message asking her to check her non-friend inbox which is something not everyone does. From what I can see of her timeline which seems to be mostly public, she shares stuff every few days to every month. Her whole life must be her job and kids so I doubt she has much free time for social media. This means that even if she does check messages from non-friends, it could be a while.

While I still wish one of the more memorable people from my past would contact ME for once on their own, it would still be nice to get some type of acknowledgment/reply even though I’m not expecting one any more than I did with Dr. O. A part of me is a bit surprised Dr. O didn’t block me as well but by doing that she would have to acknowledge that she got my message. I can see where it’s probably more important to her to appear as if she didn’t even get it.

Sometimes I wish I could forget others as easily as they can forget me. Like Norah M, for example. Like she even remembers my name?

While I’ll always appreciate the help Palma gave me years ago, I realize I wouldn’t want to be her friend. As in a friend I saw in person. I get the impression we’re too different. I know we had some common ground and I’m sure we still do, but the last thing I would want would be to sit and discuss kids and God or something like that. Sorry, but just not my cup of tea. Her oldest kid is in her late 20s and is a nurse practitioner. The other two girls and the boy seem to range from age 6-7 to about 14-15.

Anyway, she looks a lot like she did when I last saw her. Just a little older and a little heavier but definitely not obese.

I exchanged tweets and messages with Aly and Kim, and now I’m doing laundry. Thanks to being woken up and a little on the tired side I doubt I’ll have the energy for working out tonight. That’s why I try to push myself to do it when I have the energy. While the nights will always be quieter it will also always be harder to sleep during the daytime. They both have their pros and cons. I hate being up with all the distractions during the daytime but there���s something about being on nights that makes me lazy. I don’t seem to want to be as active physically.

Seriously though, if I had to be cursed with CRD did I also have to be cursed with being the lightest sleeper on earth? He can sleep through anything with no sound machines. Me? I blast sound machines and I still get woken up. It was the garbage and green waste trucks that did it. Driving less than 10 feet from the bedroom makes the whole room vibrate.

My new earrings, pink teardrop gems on silver chains, are the best yet! They look almost normal. Almost. So now I know what kind to get that will fall more evenly. The one on the bad ear is just slightly higher than the other one but not as noticeable as the other earrings. They’re quite a pincher, though. They pinch harder than the other ones, especially the good ear. I can’t see myself wearing them all day. Out to the store or out to an appointment, sure. But that’s about it.

Got my new red wine-colored Keurig today. My violet one was definitely having issues with the heating mechanism firing. It just wouldn’t always fire up and I would have to restart it. It can be put away as a backup since it still works at times. My new one is less technical so hopefully, it will last longer than two years.

I wasted 23 minutes on the phone on hold waiting for Dr. S’s nurse to tell me what I already knew. A message was left for me to call back a couple of days ago. What’s the point of having the online portal if they’re just going to call you anyway?

Not sure why, but I have a headache now. Could be due to lack of sleep or from wearing my hair up for too long.

Last night I dreamed that Tom and I were getting blood drawn only it wasn’t by someone drawing it from our arms. Instead, Tom took two syringes and extracted our “blood” from something attached to the wall.

Then I dreamed I was finishing packing and leaving to go on vacation for a week. Tom was with me as I was leaving what looked more like a room or an apartment in a building than a house. I slipped off a rocker switch and said something like, “Bye room.”

THURSDAY, JANUARY 11, 2018 Wow, life really is full of surprises! I found Palma on Facebook! Having been running my old journals through Grammarly, I got to reading about those times in 2000 and was missing her. But how could I find someone with just a first initial J and a common last name? Multiple variations of keyword searches brought me nothing. I’ve actually made a few attempts over the years. I went with the first names that would come to mind… Juanita, Juana, Janessa, Janelle, Jada…

Then it hit me like a bell in the night that the first two initials on her nametag were actually JM and not JA. So I ran the name JM Palma on Zabasearch and came up with three possibilities. Kind of surprised by what her first name is. It’s also kind of ugly.

Anyway, I thought there was an uncanny resemblance as soon as I saw her picture. Given the passage of 17 years and the fact that they had to wear their hair up and different lighting/angles of the pics, some of her pics made me wonder at first. Otherwise, there was the same curly frizzy hair, the dark eyes with lashes that sort of shot straight out rather than curled upward, the perfectly tweezed eyebrows that formed a perfect arc, the same nose and lips I remembered as well as teeth so perfect that she probably had braces, assuming they’re real, and I think they are.

She moved from Glendale where she’s from to Goodyear, Arizona and is now married to a white guy with four kids. She was single with one kid when I knew her, and I think she’s about five years younger than me. Most of her posts seem to be about old shows/items, God, and support of diversity, even gays. Hardly any political posts, so that’s nice.

She worked at the MVD before becoming a detention officer from 2000 to 2004. Now she’s working at some nuclear energy generating power plant. She doesn’t list her time as a DO and has no work history for those years listed so obviously she doesn’t want just anyone to know about it. Maybe her temper got her fired? A lot of people in law enforcement don’t do it their entire lives because it’s so stressful. I checked her friend list and found she has a couple of friends who work in the Department of Corrections, and one of them was S Nottelmann, another DO I remember well. They used to work together quite often in A Tower, so this pretty much confirmed her identity in my mind.

I don’t think Palma had a crush on me as well, but she was definitely my candle in the dark that helped brighten an otherwise super shitty situation and that helped deter my mind from how much I missed Tom, home and the pet rats we had at the time. Other inmates did think she had a crush on me too, but either way, I miss some of the times we would share jokes and stuff like that. The officer some considered a bitch as well as “cool” definitely did seem to favor me but then so did a handful of DOs because they felt bad for me for being there for something I shouldn’t have been jailed for even if I had been totally guilty of those words on paper. You know, as opposed to actual actions? Nonetheless, mutual crush or not, I always admired the officer who could put a smile on my face when I would break into a fit of tears and who let me swear and shout up a storm when I would become frustrated and angry even though she could have easily broken me in half as if I were merely a wishbone if she wanted to.

It’s all pretty exciting to have finally found her! Can’t wait to send her a message even though I don’t expect a reply.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 10, 2018 Just got done adding Aly to my contacts on my phone. She gave me both her phone number and her current email address.

Sure enough, I didn’t even make it a lousy month after my last period before the water started building up on me. I’m back up to my high of 155. Sadly, it takes work to keep from climbing into the 160s which my body would love to do. Someday I’ll let it, but it’s too soon.

I didn’t work on my story last night (tonight I’ll make up for lost time) but instead, I was doing what I’ve been doing for many months now…researching TPE sex dolls. There’s a new doll called Yuna. She’s listed as Chinese but personally, I don’t think she looks it. She’s still beautiful. What makes this one unique is that she sort of has her tongue in a position where she’s about to stick it out like to lick an ice cream cone or something even though it doesn’t actually protrude past her lips. It sticks out just beyond her upper teeth and rests just inside her lower lip. I could still put lipstick on her easily enough.

She’s on Fine Love Dolls for $1700. There I can get her in a slightly more realistic body that’s a couple of inches taller than me, about 65 pounds, and with a 24” waist. For a grand, I can get her a couple of inches shorter than me at 60 pounds but with a 20” waist on AliExpress. That’s awfully skinny but $700 is a big savings.

I was researching and researching away and then when I finally fell asleep all I did was dream of these dolls. Don’t remember much detail other than asking Tom to help find one’s body parts I had packed away somewhere (guess I only kept her head out) because I supposedly read that you could dance with her, LOL.

I got a couple of pairs of earrings (pink dangles and clear dangles), a lesbian adult coloring book, and a new Keurig in dark red because my violet one was turning off quite often and I figured it was only a matter of time before it quit altogether. I only got it two years ago, though, so it does seem a bit soon for it to be having issues.

Keurig saw my tweet about it and asked if I reached out to their customer service number with my issues, saying they wanted to help. Too late, but I’ll keep the purple one as a backup since it’s not completely broken.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 9, 2018 Tammy left a message on Facebook saying that she was getting better but still tired. She was waiting for a nurse to come to the house. I realized she definitely can’t be doing that well if she needs to have a nurse come out and help her. It really sucks.

Tom and I were talking about her and her health and we both agree that while she may exaggerate her condition which Tom says is often human nature, we don’t think she has anything that literally constitutes Munchhausen after all. She’s not fabricating her problems. She’s just getting off on the sympathy she’s getting from what she really does have. At least that’s the impression I get. She’s exaggerating and sucking up what she can get from her illnesses, but she definitely didn’t make up her pneumonia anymore than her heart attack or fibromyalgia.

Coincidentally or not, Aly’s disappeared a second time since reconnecting after having just moved. She did tweet a few hours ago that things are kind of shitty there and that she would explain and catch up on things soon. I don’t doubt that she’s busy and that things do come up, but we’ll see how often she happens not to be able to check in for a handful of days at a time. Kim’s pretty busy most of the time yet she manages to be pretty consistent, and this is even with being punished all the time for lying and other things.

Something woke me up this morning but I otherwise slept okay.

Now that the rain is over I should be able to get back outside for my walks as long as I’m willing to put up with the cold.

Last night I dreamed it was late at night and Tom and I entered this hotel. He suddenly shot off running ahead of me as if to say, “Catch me if you can!” He disappeared into an elevator and was gone in a flash up to our third-floor room. I realized I suddenly felt a bit spooked, alone with some guy entering the building behind me, and then I ran into a different elevator. Only it had buttons for just two floors. So I stepped out of the elevator, relieved to see that there were now a few couples milling about in the corridor and found an elevator with three buttons that would take me to the third floor.

MONDAY, JANUARY 8, 2018 When I realized my curiosity might be coming off as pushy about Eileen’s surgery I told her she didn’t have to talk about it if she didn’t want to and I didn’t mean to make her feel uncomfortable or anything like that. She thanked me for my understanding, saying she didn’t like to talk about it and preferred to focus on life’s positive things like friends like me. This makes me think it’s pretty serious. Like maybe she’s fighting an aggressive form of cancer or something. I’m thinking hysterectomy or mastectomy but I may never know unless she decides to tell me. I don’t know that she’s atheist but I admire how she doesn’t kid herself about God, if there really is one. I know I shouldn’t and that everyone has a right to believe what they believe but when I see people suffering yet continue to praise God and insist they’re oh so loved by Him, it’s all I can do to resist the urge and slap them awake and scream, “This is NOT love! It’s NOT love any more than a man who slaps his woman or a woman who slaps her child! Even if He’s not actually doing this to you, He’s not exactly helping you either, so wake the fuck up!”

I get that it’s a matter of perspective and that some people who go through shit and claim that God was “looking out for them,” means that things could have been worse. True, but didn’t they suffer enough in the first place?

But I understand that many who are suffering have a fierce need to tell themselves that they are loved from above and that out of 7 billion people, they’re somehow special. People have to do what they have to do in order to cope, and I guess this is better than drugs or alcohol, whether they’re kidding themselves or not in the end. I’ve definitely noticed that those who are serious God fanatics do tend to be either very controlling, crazy, or absolutely miserable.

As Tom once pointed out, people tend to be less hesitant to discuss the more serious things. It isn’t just that, though. It’s that Eileen is naturally the type to focus on the more positive things in life no matter what, not because she’s too emotionally weak to address negative issues but because that’s just how she is. Over the years I’ve tried to become similar. I dwelt on too much negativity for too long and have been trying to get more in the habit of focusing on positive things. Not those that have hurt me in the past. Not the horrible things going on in the news. Not the everyday annoyances and inconveniences we all have to deal with. It doesn’t mean I forgot the people of the past who have burned me or that I can’t discuss them, and it doesn’t mean I have my head buried in the sand as to what’s going on in the world, just that I prefer to focus on positive things going on at the present moment. I’ve had enough of the constant overload of racism, diseases and other negative stuff. No, ignoring them won’t magically make them go away but neither will obsessing over them.

I don’t remember much in the way of dreams last night. Tom said something about how we might actually get snow here. It actually does get cold enough but that would be an extremely rare event if it snowed at this elevation and not being overly far to the north.

Got some awesome ideas for the book I’m working on and I’m going to be backing up some of them on Facebook but only Tammy will be able to see most of them. I don’t care if she read them or not. I just think it’s always good to have multiple backups.

Tammy should be home now. I hope so! And I hope this will be the end of her own misery for a while and having to deal with one thing after another after another after another… I swear it seems like things have gotten much worse for her since she moved! I was thinking about how a friend said that suffering is part of the human condition. I know that and I know all about suffering. But it’s just gotten way extreme for her. It at least seems to have gotten to be anyway. Every single one of them has had to be in the hospital in the few years they’ve been in Florida, and two of them were involved in car accidents, one serious. Okay, so is it me or does that seem a bit extreme? Even though I’m still inclined not to believe in gods, devils, angels, ghosts and all that stuff, such extremities do sometimes make me wonder if there’s a health curse on the family. Well, whether it truly is an unusual amount of hardships or not, they really, really deserve a break for once! I can’t remember the last time Tammy was able to contact me about nothing but good things to say. So yeah, life’s been a little too rough on her.

It’s been raining steadily since I’ve been up. I got up in the early afternoon. It would have been nicer if it had rained like this when I was on days because it rarely rains in the daytime and the nights are usually quiet anyway.

Sometimes I get really sick of hearing the guy’s TV at night that lives across from next door. This is the last place I should be hearing anyone’s TV! I’m in a house after all and not an apartment. But I know how poorly most Westerners tend to take to complaints no matter how legit the complaint may be, and since it is easy enough to drown it out with the soft whir of the air cleaner, I just deal with it. I don’t want to have to deal with how they may react along with everyone else around here which they would certainly tell. I have too much of a temper to stand for anyone’s possible rudeness these days. While I prefer to ignore people I don’t like, if I’m not left with much of a choice since they are my neighbors, after all, there’s no saying how I myself may react after years and years of having to deal with problem neighbors like I did before we came here should anyone get confrontational and I doubt there are many people here that could take me, so I don’t want to do anything I would regret, not that I can imagine it coming to that. But since it’s not every night and it’s just a little annoying and not something that’s maddening to the point that Bob’s power tools and hammers can be, I can just deal with it. Bitch about it in my journal but deal with it otherwise. The guy’s probably hard of hearing but why the hell would he open his windows at this time of year? If they’re not then that TV’s got to be OMFG kind of loud!

Oh, almost forgot before I sign off…my hematologist sent me a message letting me know that my bone marrow tested normal as I suspected it would. I really believe it’s just normal for me to have an elevated white blood cell count and sometimes red as well. Even so, I was surprised at the relief I felt when I read his message. I guess maybe in the back of one’s mind, we always know there’s a possibility, no matter how slim it may be, until we’re told otherwise.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 7, 2018 Aly and I have discussed Kim regularly and sometimes Molly as well. Aly has a cousin named Tracy who is mentally ill and has flourished by being in a group home much as Molly has. Yeah, I figured Marbridge is either doing a really good job of keeping Molly off-line or Molly really is a changed woman. Either way, I don’t want to hear from her. Aly says she hasn’t heard from her since August and has no desire to seek her out. We wonder why Kim isn’t in a group home herself. That way she would still be able to get assistance with things like transportation, but wouldn’t have to deal with her SIL that way. Then I realized they may be paranoid about putting her in one since her sister Tracy died in one, despite no foul play being discovered.

She’s talked to both Kim and Molly by phone before and said that it’s natural for Kim’s voice to tremble. Kim continues to insist that she doesn’t know of any disability she has. As Aly said, she is good at denial but is inclined to agree that it might be that her disability is simply beyond her understanding as I suspect it might be. She also wonders how much of the way she’s treated is her fault. We both know she’s not always the most honest about things and when confronted she’ll deflect or play the victim. Aly’s thought of contacting Carol to let her know how Kim feels about the way she’s been treated but doesn’t want to get Kim in trouble.

Yes, I definitely remember how good Kim can be at denial and dishonesty. I wonder how much of her situation may be exaggerated, though I’m inclined to believe most of it. One thing she says that I don’t get is that she gets in trouble for going up and down the stairs on one leg. This mystifies Aly as well. The question is, is she really “abused” or are they just very strict?

Peter O may be the biggest mystery and coincidence of 2018! Aly doesn’t understand the blocking when all he had to do was simply delete me. Whether he deleted or blocked me, why would you add someone and then change your mind right after adding them?

Aly did say that Twitter does sometimes recommend you to people that you’ve been looking in on. So does Facebook do the same thing? But even if I was recommended as a friend to Peter, that doesn’t explain commenting on my comment. Was I recommended to him and then did he check out my profile and then search for my public comments? This doesn’t seem likely anymore than the doc giving him my info.

And then Becky from VH gave me her opinion and a great idea. She can’t swear to it but she thinks he may be disturbed and that he got a hold of his mother’s password and he was messing with me but then decided to block me when he’d had enough, which is why she thinks he may be disturbed. She suggested I return the block in case he unblocks me and starts messing with me again. This was a great idea! Because we connected, he could easily unblock me and then post anything he wanted on my wall before I could catch him.

It’s been a year or two since I’ve visited his profile, so I do find it hard to believe that all of a sudden I’m being recommended to him. And even if I had been, what are the odds of him commenting on a comment that I leave on an article? Probably similar to winning the lottery. He’s got to have gotten my info from his mother. That’s the only way he could know to look for me. The question is why? What was motivating him? What did he hope to gain from me? Another big question is, did he get my info from his mother in a sneaky way without her knowing? Or did she actually divulge patient info to her son? I think the top most likely scenarios are that it’s either one hell of an amazing coincidence, or he somehow got into his mother’s account. I don’t know if he hacked it or if she left it open on a computer that he had access to. The thing is that they live in different states and it’s been a couple of years since I contacted her. So why now???

I googled her to see if anything new came up (much like I did with my first endo) and there was a recent comment that was negative even though most were positive. The negative comment described her as cold, rude, icy and condescending. Yeah, I can see that. She could be stern at times and the last time I saw her she almost came off as a bit icy and like she couldn’t wait to get rid of me.

So…there are four possibilities.

It’s a truly amazing coincidence. His mother did give him my name. He got into her account and found my info. I showed up in his ‘people you may know’ section. Initially, my first guess was number four. Now I’m going with number three. He might’ve gotten scared by my mentioning his mother. Maybe he thought I wouldn’t connect the last name somehow. But when I did, maybe he blocked me out of fear of getting in trouble with his mother over it, and maybe he felt like it was best to get me as far out of the picture as possible so as not to dig the hole deeper. I doubt I’ll ever know but I am laughing at the thought of her getting my message about it. I also looked up the son on Twitter and tweeted to him. He’s either going to be surprised if it’s him and if it’s not he’s going to be in for one very confusing moment! LOL

Not liking the number of dreams I’ve been having where Tom’s died. I never see him die in the dreams and it seems to be a sudden thing and for unknown reasons, but I still hate it just the same. In last night’s dream, I was thinking about how he now knew what it was like to die and whether or not there was an afterlife. Ugh.

Lately, I’ve been obsessed with the idea of having a place, particularly a high-rise condo, with a spectacular view of bodies of water and buildings galore. The story I’m working on is set in a luxury high-rise in New York City. I would never want to live in New York City or any place that was cold and snowy. 26 years of that in New England and 3 in Oregon were more than enough. I know we’ll never be able to afford a soundproof luxury high-rise place but it sure makes for a nice fantasy. Hey, I can dream, can’t I? Just imagine how much detail there would be to look at in the daytime and all the twinkling lights at night. I suppose a dynamic view would be rather distracting, though. The buildings in New York are old and ugly and the Hudson is brown and yucky, but when I was looking at pictures when doing research for my book, I was amazed by even those views. There would be so much to watch all the while giving me more privacy to do so because I wouldn’t be at ground level with it all. One could really get lost in a scene like that and waste time daydreaming instead of working. You know, like I should be doing now. I expected to have chapter 3 of my new book done by now but I’ve been too busy.

I thought of the pros and cons of high-rise living. One of the positives would definitely be that Tom wouldn’t have any landscaping to keep up with. Vehicles and landscaping equipment couldn’t come right up to the bedroom windows either. But the negatives would be hearing people attached to us and I definitely don’t want to return to the days of having to hear TVs blasting through the wall and the floor vibrating from elephant walkers or unruly kids. Another negative would be when it comes to pets. We’d have to go all the way up and down to walk a dog, assuming they’d allow them, and it would be a pain in the ass when dumping the rats’ bedding. You just couldn’t just step outside and throw something smelly in the outside trash if you wanted to.

There can be similar beauty, although maybe not quite as spectacular since you couldn’t see such a vast expanse at ground level, in waterfront homes. Realistically, our best bet would be a manufactured home in a retirement community such as we have here, only I would definitely prefer one with a waterfront view. I also want to get off of busy streets and away from freeways. I can hear a loud car stereo booming down the freeway right now and it just makes my head swim at times. But you know how twisted the laws are. Why stop someone from invading people’s homes with their music and their lungs with their secondhand smoke when you can happily sit back and let illegals come leech off of us at our expense?

Yesterday and today I had some lightheadedness for some reason, but today I’ve been okay.

We ran out to McDonald’s earlier. Although their fries were a little cold and soggy, they were good. Not too salty. I also decided to get chicken nuggets instead of a burger. Tom had his first burger in a while. He tried some new kind of bacon burger but it was too spicy.

Thank you, Walmart, for changing the looks of my pills. Nice thing to do to someone with a medication phobia. I’ve had two pills so far and of course it’s the same stuff (just a different manufacturer), but even so, I had Tom run the number that was stamped onto the pills all the while he was assuring me it was just fine. “Wow,” he said after typing into the computer, “it says here that this is a medication called Levothyroxine, used to treat hypothyroidism, Hashimoto’s…”

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Miss Paranoia can never be too careful.

For a couple of days, I had this strange pain on the side of my left tit. It was a small concentrated spot that almost felt like a sharp cramp or bruise. It’s gone now so I guess I just pulled a muscle. There are muscles that run into the edges of the boobs. Then again, I felt it when I took off my bra.

The mystery of Peter O still remains just that, a mystery. Even if his commenting on my comment was a grand coincidence, it still doesn’t explain why he would deny who his mother was and then run and block me.

I’m never going to know if Doc O read my messages unless she too was to block me because people have the option of making it look like they didn’t get your message if they want. If having the runs, horrible stomach cramps, and a touch of nausea like I had last night is my punishment for messaging her about her son and then tweeting to what might be him on Twitter, it was all worth it. grins mischievously

While I’m glad that the holiday craze is over and I’m looking forward to good things in 2018… the TPE doll, the new roof, the new oven… it sucks that he now has to work 5-6 days a week regularly. That is unless I have an appointment, of course. He does have a couple of weeks of vacation time accumulated but we like to keep those days for appointments and any unexpected emergency that may come up.

Wow, I’m shining my desk lamp on my keyboard and it went from 67% charged to 82% charged in 16 minutes.

Aly moved with her boyfriend to an apartment in central Omaha today and I couldn’t help but laugh when she tweeted that with the help of a couple of friends, they got all their stuff into three vehicles. LOL, we’ve collected so much shit over the years that we could never fit it into three vehicles! Actually, Tom said, we could if two of them were semis. LMAO! So true. We’re definitely going to be traveling light when we leave, wherever we end up. I’m tired of having so much junk to dust and I have no interest in doll collecting anymore. If I don’t need it, I’m not taking it unless I absolutely love it and don’t want to part with it.

WTF? Now it says my keyboard is at 78%.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 6, 2018 Argh! Tammy’s “God” really needs to give her a fucking break in life. For once! Seriously if there’s anything up there that’s not against her it certainly isn’t for her either. She messaged me to say that she’d been rushed to the hospital Friday morning and has been there ever since and probably will be until Monday. She’s got pneumonia. I thought she and the girls all had colds and that she sounded better the last time she left me a VM, but apparently, she never got better.

Really wish she’d quit smoking. The weight gain is worth all the benefits she’d get. I’ve been fat ever since I quit 30 years ago and that’s okay. I can breathe, I’m resistant to colds and other illnesses, and I’ve saved so much money over the years.

Okay, this is too fucking weird. Even if I were the type that didn’t believe in coincidences, there’s no way I could possibly think that this was a coincidence!

Before I get into it, I was really curious as to what Aly would think of this one. So cool that I can go to her with things like this again, too. I really missed being able to go to her for opinions.

Well, I left a comment on a news article and who should comment on my comment but Dr. O’s gay son Peter! That can’t possibly be a coincidence out of all the millions of Facebook users. My research shows her having two daughters and a gay son in New York. I know it’s the same one. It’s got to be. It was definitely her who got the message I sent a few years ago and then the one who viewed my blog from the same place they live in when she told me she was on vacation on the health site and was just checking in, etc.

So anyway, I requested to add him and he said his mother wasn’t a doctor. My intuitive side, besides what I just said in the last paragraph, said he was lying for some reason. Yet he told me I didn’t seem like a threat at all since he was a gay male, now in Iowa, and so he would add me. I told him that as a bisexual woman happily married for 23 years, I was definitely not a threat, but that he didn’t have to add me or anything.

Yet he did, and then we talked weather before he asked me if I was a gamer or a Facebook lurker. When I said neither and that I was an author, I found I was blocked right after I sent him a link to my book page. My first thought was that Facebook thought I was sending spam and blocked me from sending messages. But then I realized I couldn’t view his profile and doubted that Facebook would block me from him altogether. Especially after adding each other.

The question is how he found me and why he commented on one of my comments! He had to have been looking for me specifically. Unless he read his mother’s private messages or she gave him my name, which I highly doubt, did I show up on his ‘people you may know’ section after I checked him out a year or two ago? I didn’t think that’s how it worked, though. I think when we look at someone’s profile they end up on our ‘people you may know’ section. Not the other way around. So then HOW did he find me, WHY did he comment on my comment, and WHY did he block me after adding me???

Before I was blocked I did leave a “thank you for adding me” note on his wall. Could it be some grand and amazing coincidence after all and could the good Doc have spotted my post before she told him who I was and urged him to block me?

Curious to see if I got a reaction from the doctor, I sent the same message to two accounts that I believe are hers. Leaving out the part about being blocked, I said I just wanted to make sure she wasn’t uncomfortable with us being friends and told her I was doing better.

Aly agrees it’s no coincidence and that I probably was blocked by him and not by Facebook for suspected spam. I sent Becky a message about it too, to get her opinion on the matter.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 5, 2018 My Sedimentation Rate ESR (this is the one for inflammation) is 17 which is normal. For women, normal is 0-29 according to the reference range I found on the Mayo Clinic site. So where that’s concerned I have some normalcy.

My white blood cell count is still elevated and my red blood cell count is high but not quite high enough to be red flag worthy. My November tests showed a white blood cell count of 11.5 and a red blood cell count of 4.75. Now my white blood cell count is 11.9 and my red blood cell count is 5.06.

Yesterday I had a few faint spots and I thought, oh no, not this shit again! But the coast has been clear ever since.

The new earrings I got do look better than pierced earrings but if you know to look for it or if you’re an observant kind of person, you can tell they’re still a little lopsided.

The cops were here yesterday and we still don’t know why. Tom was coming home from work when he saw three squad cars in the middle of the park. That section of the road was blocked off so he had to turn around and come in the back gate instead. He can’t swear to it but he thinks they were arresting someone. Jon said he asked a friend about it who lives on the corner there but he didn’t know anything.

After I finish the laundry, order some groceries and do some working out (I think I’ll skip the cardio today and just do strength training), I’m looking forward to starting my next book, Socio. It’s going to be an obsessive love triangle of sorts that takes place in a luxury high-rise, involving two residents and one sociopathic doorman, nicknamed Socio.

I’m so pissed that my state has become a sanctuary state for illegals. That is just so wrong and so backward.

Like many who grew up in New England, my dream was to live in or at least visit California someday. To outsiders, especially children, you tend to have this image of California that for the most part is as far from reality as you can get. The longer I live here, the more fucked up I realize this state truly is. It gives and takes all the wrong things to and from all the wrong people.

To say, “Hey, it’s okay to be illegal. Come on in and enjoy your stay at the taxpayers’ expense,” is quite an insult to California and to those who are from here. I’m sick and tired of illegals getting so many freebies while those who are from here and work hard have to struggle to afford various things. How backward is that? I can’t get disability benefits even though I have a sleep disorder that prevents me from working at a set time outside of the house simply because I didn’t work enough years to begin with. But if you come to my country illegally, you can have it all. Free medical treatment, free money, free housing, free food stamps, free everything.

What’s next? Is Cali going to be the next home for pedophiles and a place where they can go to get all kinds of freebies and special treatment?

Thousands of lazy people come here illegally and instead of having to face the consequences of breaking the law (many of which are criminals in other ways besides not belonging here), they’re giving generously.

Like I said, how twisted, fucked up and backward is that?

THURSDAY, JANUARY 4, 2018 Hmm…someone tried to log into my GoodNightJournal account that I stopped using due to glitches. That’s what the email said that I received, assuming it was legit. It said my account was temporarily locked due to multiple logins. Not wanting to take a chance on clicking the link in the email, I went directly to the site without any problem. I found that I was still signed in and then I deleted the account. So if anyone tries to hack it again, if they really did, good luck with that.

Out of curiosity, I contacted GNJ on Facebook to see what they’d say, and they said they did send the email.

Had fun swapping voice messages on Facebook with Tammy yesterday but did she really need to lie about buying one of my books? First, she tried to tell me that she once bought one a long time ago but didn’t remember the name of it. Then I remembered that she told me she read a manuscript I sent Dad before he died. When I mentioned its title she said yes, that was the one. So she never actually bought anything. She just read a copy of the manuscript.

At least I didn’t have to hear about God and Lisa!

Edited the message I’m going to be sending Stacey in a few weeks on Facebook. Of course I mentioned her inspiring Dr. Goldstein in Locked-In. It will be interesting to see if she buys it but I don’t think she’d be that curious.

Yesterday, having not received a reply to the message I sent Aly on Twitter the day before Christmas and not receiving any tweets from her lately, I started to wonder if she was ghosting me. It wouldn’t be the first time that happened, but I would think that if she ghosted Kim would do the same. But then she tweeted today, promising to catch up and saying that her cold has really kicked her ass and she’s been doing nothing but sleeping. It will be interesting to see if she suddenly has one thing after another that just happens to prevent her from keeping in touch very often.

We’re now about six weeks away from ordering the TPE sex doll. I’m excited! I have picked out and changed my mind many times on many different dolls in the months of research I’ve been doing. For a while, I was set on a pale Asian doll with purple eyeshadow and pink lipstick. But as I’m learning, the makeup is semi-permanent. After a few months, it does fade. Permanent would have been nice but this way the door is open to change and variety. Deciding to go simply based on features and not makeup, I settled on a doll that could be black or Hispanic. Pale skin and white dolls are boring compared to ethnics, at least as far as I’m concerned. The face I chose looks like it could be a dark Hispanic or a light black when done in a tan skin tone. The type of wig she wears determines this as well. The store I like best that really lets me customize the dolls the most doesn’t sell extra wigs or eyes. So I picked out an Asian head that also looks good tanned and this way I could get three races in one, so to speak. I got a long black wig parted in the middle and black eyes, plus a ginger wig with bangs and light blue eyes. I was first tempted to get a 55” body that was only 55 pounds, but her measurements would be too small and she would be too hard to fit in some of my clothes that way. So I chose a 61.4” body that’s 64 pounds with bigger measurements. Her waist and hips would be just a little slimmer than the mannequin’s and her chest would be a lot slimmer. That is unless I change my mind again.

My crotch has been doing weird things. At the end of the day before yesterday as well as the beginning of yesterday, it was burning. First, it burned towards my ass and then towards my clit. Today I’m not having much of a problem. I don’t know what it is I’m doing that makes it flare up or what backs it off. I’m thinking I should try to resist throwing the diaper rash stuff down there so that I can learn to toughen up to the irritation. Especially if it’s never going to go away. I better start getting used to it.

Finally had an interesting dream last night. That quack Venezuelan endo I had was in it of all people. I don’t know where we were but I asked her how many kids she had and she shrugged and said, “I don’t know. 10 or 11.”

I wondered how the hell she could work such a demanding job all day and then go home to so many kids. I know there was more to the dream that I’m not remembering.

Anyway, because the dream put her on my mind, I googled her to see what would come up these days and was surprised at what I found. She’s still down in Orange but now she not only has a promotional video claiming that her parents own a pharmacy which prompted her to become oh-so compassionate and interested in medicine, but she’s also got nine positive reviews and a five-star rating! I’m like, where did all this come from? I wonder if her shitty reviews up here are what prompted her to head south. Maybe she realized she fucked up enough here and vowed to make a change down in Orange. Her voice sounded younger and higher pitched than I remembered it to sound and her accent isn’t as hard to understand as Dr. A’s.

I recently had an idea for a high-rise love triangle story where I would have a woman living with another woman in a high-rise that was probably in New York, but it would be a fancy high-rise with all kinds of amenities that was like a fancy hotel. Her lover would be gone a lot due to her job and she would end up having an affair with the doorwoman/doorman (I haven’t decided which yet) who turned out to get a little possessive, obsessive and jealous. Because she works at home she would be nervous when her lover wasn’t home, etc. I had been unable to think of anyone for at least one of the leads, so maybe I’ll throw good old Doc D in there and torture her. :-)

She’s as attractive as she is ugly. Her worst feature is her ears with the way they stick out. But she has beautiful long black hair to her waist, is slim, has thick eyebrows, and dark eyes which I usually like the best when it comes to eye color. Nice smile, too.

Chatted with Margaret Thatcher. No joke. I walked down to the mailboxes to grab the mail when I saw her coming towards me with her walker as she often visits Bob and Virginia.

“Are you my new neighbor?” she asked. She lives next to where the contractor used to live and the house on the other side of her recently sold. I pointed to our house and reminded her that we met while watching the July 4th parade.

“Weren’t you the one that said I have beautiful hair?” I asked.

Recognition clicked and she asked me why I cut my hair. I told her that I used to dye it and that damaged my hair but now that I’ve switched to stains and a better leave-in conditioner, it’s much healthier. I assured her it grows fast and would be long again soon, LOL.

She said she stopped dying her hair some time ago and I won’t see her as a beautiful brunette anytime soon and then I said, “Your name is Margaret, isn’t it?”

She nodded and said, “There’s only one Margaret T in the park.”

I told her I remember spotting that name in the directory a few years back and thinking, is this a joke?

She said she called some business for some reason and when she gave her name they said, “Look, lady, we’re running a business here. We’ve got no time for jokes.”

Haha, I’d hate to share the name of a famous person.

Anyway, I did a little writing and speaking with Irene for a while in German and now it’s time to switch back to English and get back to work on my editing!

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 3, 2018 And so begins the onslaught of Laubsaugers, lightheads and firecrotches. :( At least anxiety isn’t in the mix. But yeah, the lightheadedness and the burning in the crotch have returned. I just DREAD the day the anxiety returns! And there’s still nothing to say that it won’t either since it hasn’t been more than half a year yet. The burning is worse than the lightheadedness, though.

Dehydration. That’s another thing that the hematologist said could cause an elevated white blood cell count but I’m definitely not dehydrated. If anything I probably drink more than the average person.

I’m seriously considering no longer sharing my book links in blogs. I am so fucking sick of hearing people say they’ll buy my book but don’t. I can only tell what countries sales have been made in and not the individual buyers, but the number of sales is basically a good indicator telling me if all these people followed through on their word or not. Funny, though, how many people suddenly wish they had a Kindle or are so broke that they just can’t afford a lousy $.99. One of my younger followers in New Zealand is going to buy my book as soon as she “figures out” how to get a Kindle. Yeah, right. You figure it out, Nicole. If people aren’t interested then I wish they just wouldn’t say anything at all. Instead, it seems that people feel obligated to say something, even if it’s not true.

Smiling to myself in anticipation of sending Stacey a message on Facebook but I want to wait until the end of the month or the beginning of next month. Definitely not sending it on Valentine’s Day! I drafted a message several months ago and I’ll begin editing it soon. I just didn’t want to jinx anything I might have said so that’s why I didn’t polish it up sooner.

My black Goodwill doll’s head came off. The spring broke and she’s not worth fixing as she was quite old and only cost a few bucks. I put another doll on the rocking chair where she used to sit. A gorgeous, realistic hundred-dollar doll I got on Amazon.

I don’t remember much in the way of dreams. A split second of being wheeled on a gurney by my dentist while I was very sleepy, and something about astral projection. I was telling someone that when I fell asleep, a part of me floated out of my body in the way that those that have had near-death experiences have described and up to the ceiling which was pretty high for the room I was sleeping in. It was a freaky experience and so I urged myself awake to come down from the ceiling before I could go through the roof.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 2, 2018 OMG, I’ve had 44 appointments since switching medical groups in November of 2014! The bulk of them were due to anxiety, too. If the peri and the adjusting of my meds hadn’t caused so much anxiety, then I’d likely have only had a few a year. This isn’t counting my dentist either. Once he gets a raise this spring we’ll probably have to pay even more for insurance because he makes so much money.

Saw the hematologist who was late even though I was the first patient of the day. His Indian accent wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be to understand but I still prefer American female doctors with my own damn accent. They’re the most in-demand these days, so they’re not very easy to get. He was okay, though. Nothing bad but nothing special. He got right down to business and explained most of what I already knew. Didn’t know that smoking can cause an elevated white blood cell count. It’s a good thing I quit 30 years ago. But Tammy still smokes and she says her white blood cell count has been elevated for years. I wonder if that could be one factor as to why.

So is it my autoimmune disease causing it? Yes and no, from what he explained. One good thing is that when you look at the numbers from my last three trips to the lab, the numbers are actually going down. He said that if they were going up, then he may be a little worried, but seems to agree that it’s likely just how I am since I’ve had this for as long as I can remember. It’s likely that the rash I had could explain why the numbers were up and then gradually went down as the rash was treated. The rash isn’t gone but it is better. Could be on its way to getting worse again, though. Having more burning down in the crotch area today. Yeah, I figured it was a matter of time before it got worse again.

So after meeting with Dr. S, I shot on over to the lab which was at the same complex the oncology department is at, and had six vials of blood drawn. They’re going to test for inflammation and for anything bad in the bone marrow. The lab was surprisingly crowded and I had to wait for nearly a half-hour. Either way, I’m virtually positive that all is fine and even he said that 95% of the time labs are negative. He said to call his office if I don’t hear from them online in two weeks.

Then we went treasure hunting at the Eco thrift store as well as Goodwill but didn’t find anything.

We also stopped at Carl’s. I got a breakfast platter. Fucking loud-ass Mexicans, though. Why do they need to talk so damn loud so much of the time? We were the only customers in there but the whole time they were practically screaming at each other behind the counter.

We mailed off Tammy and Eileen’s incense. After asking Eileen about buying one of my books and leaving a review, I saw that she got the message but didn’t reply. I thought it was because she wasn’t interested in buying any of the books, but this morning she told me she had surgery and is still recovering. I don’t know what surgery she had. I asked but haven’t heard back from her even though she appears to have gotten the message. More than likely she really doesn’t want to buy any of the books and that’s fine. I don’t expect to ever make much money even though I’ve submitted Stepping into Psycho for publication. It’s something I’m doing more for fun than for money.

Ordered a refill of my meds. The pharmacist will have to call my doctor. I usually get 3 months’ worth in the bottle the manufacturers use since it’s a common drug.

Last night I dreamed that Nane was my doctor but I barely remember the dream. Then I was talking to some weird pharmacist about some tests that had unusually large ears.

In the last dream, I was living back in Massachusetts and realized I hadn’t had any anxiety since moving back there (I think I was living with my parents?) as I rode my bike to Goldie and Al’s house just to say hi. When I got there, I realized all I had on was a tank top and no pants. The tank top was long so I pulled it down as far as I could to try to make it look like one of those short athletic dresses. No one seemed to notice, LOL, and then I accompanied Goldie to visit someone in the hospital.

Speaking of anxiety, notice I’ve mentioned it less often lately? Yes, I’m doing better. :) Trying not to get too excited and jump the gun, though, and assume the worst of the storm has passed. If I can get to around March or April, then I can start getting hopeful and excited that I could have finally beaten it. Never had anything like it before 2014. It was the WORST experience of my life. I hope that 3-year reign of torture really is over, but just like I’d broken records with going the longest between periods just to get hit with one when I thought I might be done, the anxiety could still return to haunt me. Been a lot less hot flashy too, but again, is that because I’m through the worst of it? Or because it’s cold now?

MONDAY, JANUARY 1, 2018 Citrus Heights, CA Age: 52

Amazingly, I slept through the firecrackers last night. Also amazingly, I made it down to 153.4 pounds from 155.8 but now my body is rebelling against the weight loss by way of being stuck, as usual. I’ll be back to 155 or higher soon enough.

Now if the motorcycles could stop roaring around, I can get some writing done. Oh, to be in Tammy’s park where motorcycles aren’t allowed and they’re stricter with enforcing the rules. The only potential negative to being in a tougher park like that might be that they could nitpick on every little thing.

It took us about four hours but was well worth the time and money to put up our new birch tree mural in the master bedroom. It looks gorgeous and the furniture placed against it doesn’t detract from its loveliness like I worried it might. I love it so much that I may eventually put an underwater ocean scene in the hall. It sure would be nice if we didn’t have the damn grooves and strips that the old-fashioned paneled walls had back in the 80s. I swear our next place is going to be no more than 15 years old! I’ve had it with older places.

Heard Kim’s voice for the first time on Facebook but she sounded weird. It almost trembled robotic-like and like she was about to start crying or something. Tom heard it too and figured she was just self-conscious.

Started off the New Year with some strange dreams. In one dream, Tom rented a mail truck for some reason. From the window of our house, I saw a slim beautiful woman with a sarong over a swimsuit walk up to Tom. They chatted a minute and by the time I got outside, she had gone. I was surprised to learn she was 72 years old.

Then in another dream, I was 15 minutes late for an appointment with Stacey, only Tom didn’t drive me to her building. Instead, a woman drove me and dropped me off with some guy. The guy went somewhere else in the building as I waited in line to check in to see Stacey. I suddenly realized I didn’t have my purse with me and knew I would need it in order to pay the copayment. I went into another room and found that someone had been kind enough to hang it on a hook on the wall for me. While I was glad to find my purse, I was dismayed to have to get to the end of the line and make myself even later for my appointment. I thought of Stacey wondering where the hell I was and whether or not I was going to show up.

[notaboutcurrentpolitics]

Day 2 | 7th November 2024

Pain scale: 4/10; leading problems continue to be my right foot (extreme soft tissue tearing and damage), my ruptured left ovarian cyst, and a prodromal sore throat.

It’s so surreal. The earth, the air, the sky feels heavier today.

My partner just came in and said he’s not going to work. He is too sick. He’s not as politically involved as I am, but he knows I’m scared. “Your body, my choice” keeps ringing in my head like a proverbial downward spiral. I feel like a Junji Ito character, the one who has a spiral going into her head.

The news reports are repetitive. Hell, I don’t even WATCH the news so so much as listen to the social media platforms they’re hosted on.

I have the need to protect them. The young people who are first time voters. The women who can’t find access to medical care. The couple next door. All of them. I see the fear in their eyes and in their wavering, fragile voices. Many are strained from crying and screaming. I’ll admit I am at that point too, but I have bottled my emotions in, for the sake of everyone around me. I wept quietly last night and blamed it on the extreme pain of an ovarian cyst rupturing. That did happen last night too, and once again I nearly threw up from the pain.

Having proper access to pain management, even if a euthanasia program like MAID becomes a thing in the US, is something I will always fight for. I am deathly afraid that my own opiate script - my measly ten Norco a month - will get cut by the Trump/Vance administration. My hip dislocated and relocated with a loud BANG! last night in front of my partner. He thought his knee was bad until my “hip joint said ‘hold my beer’.” I was honestly more surprised that he’s never seen or heard my hips pop like that. I wish I could do it on command so my dumb pharmacist can release my medications to me. My measly 10 norcos a month, a muscle relaxer, and klonopin to keep my vagus nerve from wigging out every five seconds.

It’s all in my head my ass.

In the stillness, I look back at the hope and strength the minorities had for our nation. As Kamala put it, stars in the darkness. I am so proud of all of the GenZers and first-time voters who went out there and did their civil duty and so much more. I look at my “I voted” sticker on my tea bottle and know that while the outcome is grim, this will be his last term in office. In two years we can vote MTG out - or at least try to. The Princess who used Daddy’s Money to secure a seat in Congress.

The lack of sleep I continue to get is causing me to have hallucinations. Many of them are in the style of the original artist of “Scary Stories to To Tell in wthe Dark.” Faces and spiders a routine became the norm.

I am cowering in fear as I watch Biden and Kamala secede. Men are getting more bold, more brazen. Shouting “your body, my choice” at them. I fear another Oscarville Massacre is in the wings. Another J6. I have myself intellectually and physically armed to the teeth. The men in the house are sympathetic towards me, but I pray they never go through what I went through. It’s a burden of trauma I fear will happen more often now.

This is the second day I would hop back into RDO and have chosen to stay in bed and read - The Deep by Nick Cutter. I haven’t found it scary yet but I’m only twenty-something percent through. Anything to distract me and keep me away from republicans and men at this point.

Also the new season of handmaid’s tale starts on January 20th, how convenient!

[crossroadsnumber1doctor]

STATEMENT OF DR LIONEL ELLIOT. STATEMENT CONDENSED TO FIT.

Right. Well, I shouldn’t even have been teaching the class, really. As far as I knew, I wasn’t going to be needed for any teaching on the Biomedical Engineering course this year. I can’t say I was particularly upset. The Human Anatomy module is where a lot of the engineers discover just how messy the human body is, and while the human heart is a phenomenal piece of machinery in terms of design and function, most of the students would be more comfortable holding a transistor. Not to put too fine a point on it, I get tired of… squeamish students, and was glad that I could avoid it this year.

You can perhaps imagine, then, that I was not best pleased when Elena Bower, the admissions officer, emailed me last November to say that there had been a mistake, and I was needed to take a ‘spillover class’. Apparently the system had accepted more students for the course than there were places, and they were trying to organise an additional class for the seven who were unassigned. It didn’t make a lot of sense to me, Anatomy class wasn’t until the second term, so surely this mistake should have emerged earlier, but Elena just kept saying she didn’t know, she just had seven students who needed tutorials. I won’t pretend I took the news gracefully. I have a lot of research due shortly and, well, you know academia – never enough hours in the day. Still, I was the only staff member both qualified to teach the class and technically free when it had to be scheduled. So I agreed, although that really makes it sound like I had more of a choice than I actually did.

I didn’t meet the students until the module started this January. I wasn’t responsible for any of the lectures, so the first time I saw them was in our initial class tutorial. They all sat there, all seven, staring at me, and I felt… oddly uncomfortable. There, there was nothing wrong with them, of course, nothing strange to see or to look at, just… well, this is going to sound stupid to say out loud, but I don’t remember what they look like. Any of them. I remember that each wore blue jeans and a white shirt, though they were all different makes and styles; I think one of the girls had a skirt, instead. I must have noticed that they were wearing the same outfits, but it didn’t strike me as odd. They all just looked so… normal. Unremarkable. I remember their names, though, from the register. They stuck with me – maybe because they were such an international group. There was Erika Mustermann, Jan Novak, Piotr and Pavel Petrov, who I think were brothers, maybe twins, John Doe, Fulan al-Fulani and Juan Pérez.There was no-one else who could take the tutorials. Believe me, I did everything I could to try and find a replacement. Still, once I got used to their stares, their silence, and the fact that their questions were both specific and oddly basic – one of the Petrovs once asked me “How sharp are the knees meant to be” – I swear, it was just about tolerable. I’m a bit ashamed to admit it, but I came to terms with the fact that I didn’t care if they passed any exams, and that actually made the whole affair more manageable. I just did my best to stop caring.

And then came our first of two sessions in the dissection room. We were looking at the skeleton. I had been dreading this. Given exactly how creepy and unsettling the students were just sat in a classroom, the idea of what they could do when given access to human remains made me feel quite nauseous. But I couldn’t bring myself to leave them there alone, so I went.

It was even worse than I’d feared, seeing them stood there over the bits of cadaver. Their faces, normally so neutral, were alive with… what was it I saw? Excitement? Curiosity? Hunger? Whatever it was, it didn’t reach their eyes, still staring and blank. I went through the procedures with them and tried my best to keep the trembling out of my voice. When Fulan reached for a scalpel and started cutting into our samples, I felt faint.

I was trying to keep an eye on everyone, but the dissection tables were arranged in a semi-circle around the lab, and each time I turned to face one of the students, I began to hear this cracking sound from whichever tables I wasn’t looking at. Like a snapping bone, or a ribcage being forced open. I’d turn back and see nothing untoward, just John or Erika or Juan or whoever it was, looking at me quizzically over distinctly unbroken bones. But it kept happening. Whenever I wasn’t looking, I heard the crunch and the crack of bone. I couldn’t ask about it. I knew the dead-eyed, mute stare they’d give me if I did, and I just couldn’t face that.

Finally, I managed to position myself so that I could see what was happening behind me in the reflective edge of the metal table. It wasn’t much, but I could see a slightly warped image. It was Pavel, in this case. I saw him pick up a bone – a radius, I believe, from the forearm. He held it up next to his own arm, and then there came that snapping, crunching noise. I swear I saw his arm distend itself, the skin shifting as something inside changed and rearranged, until it matched the length of bone he was holding up to it.I started taking more sick leave after that. I avoided their tutorials as often as possible, and when I did go we largely just sat there in silence until one of them asked a question about human anatomy, which I would reluctantly answer. I know I should have just abandoned them entirely. If they were going to complain to anyone, they would have done it already. But even then, I was worried my colleagues might notice, and I really didn’t want to get a reputation as some absentee tutor. It didn’t help that a colleague of mine, Dr. Laura Gill, once expressed surprise on learning I’d been absent the day before, as apparently she’d passed by my teaching room and my anatomy class had just been sat there, waiting quietly. The thought of them politely filing into every tutorial, just sat there, blank and staring, whether I was there or not, just waiting… To be quite frank I think that bothered me almost more than being sat there with them.

Still, I managed to largely avoid them until the 21st of March, when they had their second lab dissection. Hearts. I’m not an idiot. I was well aware of the sort of sinister nonsense that was likely to happen if I went, but I also knew by now that they would attend whether or not I was there. And to leave them in the lab unsupervised would be the sort of thing that would get me actually fired from my position.

It was a rainy morning. I remember that, because I deliberately didn’t put up an umbrella. Something inside me was so dreading what was going to happen that the very act of opening umbrellas seemed pointless, as though my being dry couldn’t stop what was coming, then there was no reason not to get soaked. So I was dripping wet when I entered the lab, and my glasses had steamed up to the point where I could no longer see through them. When I wiped them clean, they revealed those seven blank faces, utterly unconcerned with my sodden state. Each had somehow got the heart laid out in from them on the dissection tray. I decided not to prolong it, and waved them to start.I don’t know what I expected. Maybe I thought they’d descend into some sort of feeding frenzy, but they didn’t. They just began to dissect the hearts, as any other class would, occasionally asking me polite questions. I was so taken aback at how normal the whole situation seemed to be that it took me some time to actually answer them. I did, though, and the first hour of the class almost put me at least a little bit at ease. The more I thought about it, the more it made sense. Maybe they were doing weird things to their insides, but if it was the heart, then I couldn’t see it and I couldn’t hear it. And I’d long since decided with this class, that if I couldn’t see or hear it, I didn’t care.

Then Erika Mustermann held up her heart and looked at me. I began to get that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach as she asked me “How does the heart pump blood?” I started to explain the biological mechanisms of the heart pumping, when she shook her head slowly and said, “What does it look like?” And then, when I didn’t answer, “Is it like this?”

The heart in her hand began to spasm. Not like the regular, rhythmic pulse of a heartbeat, but like a balloon being rapidly squeezed at one end. Bits of it swelled and stretched and distorted seemingly at random, and blood began to flow haphazardly from the ventricles, dripping down Erika’s forearm and dribbling onto the floor.

I stood there, speechless, staring at this horrible miracle, when from behind her I see Fulan raise his heart, saying, “That’s not what it’s like.” And blood starts to gush from all over his heart in tiny geysers, shooting in every direction. Soon each of them is holding a heart up, each pumping and throbbing differently, blood leaking, spurting out of them in a different way, a different nightmare. They wanted me to tell them which was right. [Nervous laugh] I don’t know how long I stared before I finally raised my hand to point at Jan Novak, who seemed to have the closest to an accurate impression of a regular human heartbeat. Then I turned and walked out of the lab.There was one other thing. When I went to the classroom shortly after what should have been their final tutorial, I found… something on the desk.

It was an apple. Next to it was a handwritten note that said “Thank you for teaching us the insides”. I burned the note, just in case.

I didnt eat it. I cut it in half, first, to check if it was… off.

And Human teeth. Inside were human teeth arranged in a smile.

" What in the ever loving- No, wait, hold on. Human Autonomy? Is this some sort of work of fiction..? If so then uh. Good job? "