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hopefullystillatheatrestudent · 4 years ago

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The One Where Jensen Ackles Confirmed Cockles in 2016(????) No. Seriously. For real.

this is a DOOZY. strap in folks.

DISCLAIMER: this is chock full of rps. if you are against cockles/jenmish in any way, this post is not for you. however, if you’re like me, ummmmm...

alright. so. we are REALLY in it now, cockles truthers. and make no mistake, i DO NOT want to undersell the significance of what we have found on this glorious day in 2021.

BUT HEY! DISCLAIMER FIRST, THOUGH IT SHOULD GO WITHOUT SAYING! do not EVER bring this to jensen and misha’s attention. do not comment disrespectful things on social media. when cons/panels start again, don’t ask them questions about it. ever!!! that’s super weird, for one thing, and for two, they won’t give you the answer you want anyway! so, yeah. just be decent, y’all. let’s continue.

so my dear mutual @green-blue-heller made this post today and i promptly lost my mind. in it, they link this video:

youtube

as far as i can tell, it’s from VegasCon 2016 but was only unprivated on january 24, 2020(dean winchester’s birthday??? wow ok) for some reason, and we have overlooked it until now. to whoever it was that posted it, THANK you for my reason for being and this delayed gratification five years later. anyway, let’s get into it.

right off the bat, those expressions in the thumbnail kind of tell you all you need to know about what we’re venturing into. i have to thank BOTH jensen AND j*red for being ridiculously transparent. i mean...j*red purposefully avoiding eye contact with jensen and looking at the ceiling with his eyebrows raised sky high? jensen hiding his face in his hands, smiling and blushing like a fool, the misha face™ & grin???

so let’s break down what happens with timestamps and everything.

so! i looked up what the question was, i scoured through the entire Vegas Con video, and here it is:

‘My question is for Jensen and Jared. You guys are both happily married, and I noticed that many people had a hard time explaining how they know their significant other is the one. The one they want to spend the rest of their life with, the one that they want to be with, and so, I wanted to ask you guys, how did you know that your current- who you’re with now(audience laughter cuts the rest of the question off and it’s unintelligible)’ ….i’m solidly guessing that the end of that question boils down to ‘was the one’. (....i...uhhhh....have some thoughts on how this question affected jensen, and i will be going into them later.)

Jared: *laughs* Jared, Jensen. When did you first meet your future ex-wives?

*both of them laugh*

Jared: I’m just kidding-I get what you’re trying to say and thank you, um...I, uh, I guess my current wife, uh-

*both laugh again*

Jensen: (sarcastically) Let’s start with her.

Jared: (repeats) Let’s start with her. I, uh, I...you said something kinda, uh, amazing in your question, which is that a lot of people have a tough time or a difficult time explaining to their significant others or to themselves what it is. And I guess I feel that I have no way to possibly explain it to myself or to her... I remember that I had been in a relationship and that I was single and I was like ‘I am not interested in getting in a relationship’ and then she and I went on a date and I was like, ‘I can’t go anywhere else. I’m not interested.’ So, that was kinda what, um, what started it for me *clears throat loudly* Uh. Yeah, I just feel like (searching for words) she makes me a better person-there are a lot of people that make you a better person, and so that’s not enough, I don’t think-or maybe it is, who knows-um...I don’t know, I can’t really...if I could explain, I’d be a poet.

here’s where things start to get interesting. before jared says ‘If I could explain, I’d be a poet,’ Jensen’s face looks like this:

stoic, thoughtful, composed. and then AFTER jared says that his face makes THIS little journey:

go watch it for yourself. this man is ridiculous. in terms of body language? he gazes up and AWAY from jared. it is a private thought, he is not sharing in jared’s joke with him, if at all. it is his own personal musings that make his face LIGHT up like that. this fool looks lovestruck!!! this fool is lovestruck!!!

now, i think it goes without saying, but there is an obvious cockles reason that springs to mind for this reaction. (hint: misha is a poet. that’s it, that’s the reason.) i don’t think jared intentionally said this with misha in mind, but jensen’s thoughts IMMEDIATELY went there. whether or not this is because he was already planning on answering and hinting at his relationship with misha before jared says this, which i think he was-you can certainly see the wheels turning in jensen’s head before this moment-his brain involuntarily makes the connection and it shows in his glowing smile. after that remark...jensen’s gone. he’s whipped. and he HAS to say something about it.

continuing from where we left off:

Jared: ...and I would love to be a poet. (thought it would be fun to mention that at this point Jensen catches what his face did and immediately looks over to Jared and WIPES the expression of his face...but it’s too late, because someone recorded it, i saw it, and now i’m writing about it five years later)

Jared: But uhh…

Jensen: (interrupting) Just tap me when you want me to take over.

i think that jensen is simultaneously joking and is also more than ready to say what he’s been composing in his head diligently for the last thirty or so seconds. he has made up his mind, and is now ready to drop the bomb on us.

*audience laughs, Jared playfully swats at him*

Jared: Uh… *thinks in silence for a bit* It’s really difficult, it’s really difficult. She makes me feel safe, she makes me feel loved. Uh...when...I’m in a position where I don’t love myself, I know she loves me, you know, um...she’s just an awesome, awesome lady.

*audience claps*

alright! so in terms of my OWN analysis for what’s happened up until this point, the conclusion i have come to is that there was something in the question that was asked that sets jensen’s mind off about misha, and i think it was the ‘the one’ comment. if we’re putting our cockles goggles on, jensen doesn’t HAVE a ‘the one’. he resents thinking like that. i’m also very intuitive, and i get a sense that jensen is an honest person and can’t really tell a convincing lie. i mean...we all saw that horrible airbnb debacle, right? and his slip up when he accidentally confirms that misha woke up and said ‘i miss (maison)’[which how would you know that unless you were...nvm] and became a stammering mess and had to sit down and cover his face. and that misha is always the one to take the lead when it comes to denying clothes sharing, for instance. jensen has never ONCE attempted to explain that away, because i don’t think anyone would believe him, and i think he’s incapable of doing so because he’s not a dishonest person and can’t lie easily. i’m the same way, so to avoid telling a lie i always speak partial truths, and i’m 99% sure jensen is well versed in this talent as well. oh, also, just to really land my point....we all know how he feels about the finale because he can’t make himself speak well on it. he’ll gush about 15x18 and the PEOPLE BEHIND the finale, but he has not uttered one. positive. word. about the actual finale itself. i mean, we all know what he thinks about it. in his own way, he has made his rage glaringly obvious. and i think he’s doing that exact thing here, where he resents the implication that daneel is the only ‘one’ for him, because that’s simply not true, and he can’t and won’t lie about something like that.

i watched it back again and wrote notes on jensen’s body language as he’s processing the question. here they are:

from 0:13 to 1:21, jensen:

looks down - tenses face - searching eyes, lost in thought - jared’s comment brings him out of it but it takes a second - fidgets, adjusts clothes, looks at jared - bites the inside of his cheeks and moves tongue around his mouth(pacifying gesture) - eyes start wandering away from jared, looks down and tenses face, looks back at jared - then looks away, eyes and mind far from the panel and pondering the question itself - somewhat wistful expression, gears clearly turning in his head, lips pursed, stops reacting to what jared is saying, fingers start fidgeting, eyes have moved downward as he is lost in thought - something shifts in his brain, he looks to the ceiling, fidgets and adjusts his clothing, squints and seems to resolve an inner thought - slightly comes back down to earth with newfound resolution - and then jared’s ‘i would be a poet’ comment happens while he’s coming down from that

i mean, this obviously doesn’t necessarily mean anything huge(yet), all it shows is that this question took a lot of thinking for him. when you compare it to how jared kind of just dove in?

anyway; so then jared’s done, he slaps jensen’s thigh to indicate it’s his turn, jensen makes THAT face you see in the thumbnail, jared’s eyebrows raise, jensen looks down and scratches his forehead, and then makes the statement of a lifetime.

here’s the link for this next part

Jensen: Ummm..I kind of feel like there’s two types of people ..uh..in regards to marriage and the, the one. Uh, it’s the ones that just, just know with an absolute and, and have a certainty of like, this is the one for me, unequivocally. And then there’s those who are, you know, I don’t know, I’m scared, but I’m willing to take that leap of faith with you. And, I kind of find myself in between both of those(...types of people). And uh, and so, it can be a scary endeavour, and it can, and it will certainly have it’s ups and downs, um, but I think it’s a, uh, it’s a bond, and it’s a connection, and it’s a friendship, and it’s a ride, and it’s a journey that, uh, if you’re willing to stick it out with one another, can be an amazing, beautiful thing and I’m glad that I picked the partner and the teammate that I have, so.

i’ll give you like a second to recuperate before we dig in.

let’s start with both jared and jensen’s body language first, because it wasn’t even the words that clued me in, it was whatever the hell was going on with jared’s face.

i really wish i could gif, but i can only attempt to convey the SPEED and VIGOUR with which jared snaps his head toward jensen.

these pictures are objectively hilarious because you can see the entire mental journey that jared goes on. he was aloof and kind of relaxed because he was done, it’s jensen’s turn now, he’s surely not gonna out himself with this question right? and then jensen goes ahead and says ‘there are two-’ and jared instantly zones right into jensen with a look of horror on his face, that he tries to contain, but does so unsuccessfully. that is the face of a man who is internally freaking out, thought to himself ‘did he seriously just say...’ and is kind of staring at the culprit in shock and awe.

i know that’s what’s happening, because this is not the first time we’ve seen him react like this to something jensen has said. the classic head whip. a few examples, just off the top of my head:

1. ‘he has, hasn’t he?’

2. ‘he sounds like that in the morning’ ‘how do you know’

3. when he whips his head around when he notices jensen’s face(and instantly understands when he realizes it’s misha)

so yeah, i’m sure you get it by now. jared can’t really keep it off of his face. there’s no real analyzing to be done here...it’s just an obvious tell on his part. there’s no real reason for him to have reacted this way if jensen was saying something inconspicuous, is there? he would have continued to just kind of space out if jensen hadn’t just said something jarringly questionable.

as for jensen’s body language, i can’t really tell where he’s looking from either angle of both videos i’ve seen. sometimes it seems like he’s looking straight at jared, and maybe nods at him once, but he could also(and is most likely) looking at the fan who asked the question. i don’t think there’s anything particularly telling about his body language because i think he rehearsed his answer in his head and also, he’s not shying away because he’s not lying about anything. like...everything he’s saying is true, so he’s not going to have any tells. and it’s the fact that he is TELLING THE TRUTH that is freaking jared out.

now for what he actually says. because oh my god.

right off the bat, he says “i kind of feel like there’s two types of people..” and first off, what? what does that even mean? if you think of it in terms of ‘this is about daneel and only daneel’....isn’t this a realllyyyyy strange thing to start out with? objectively? the question that was asked to him was ‘how did you know they were the one?’ and he goes ‘actually there’s TWO types of people’ ...like, jensen never answers the question at hand.

and then he goes “in regards to marriage and the one”. i hope i’m not the only one who noticed he said the words ‘the one’ in a resentful and kind of degrading tone? seriously, listen to it again. he seems like he’s almost mocking that sentiment. i swear i’m not making it up, it really sounds like that to me.

and then he says “-it’s the ones that just, just know with an absolute and, and have a certainty of like, this is the one for me, unequivocally. And then there’s those who are, you know, I don’t know, I’m scared, but I’m willing to take that leap of faith with you.” *NON TINHAT VERSION OF EVENTS* what he could mean, i guess, is he was both scared to be with daneel but also knew she was the one for him. which....ok. alright. *TINHAT BACK ON* first off, there’s absolutely no risk with daneel. that’s not a judgement, because i love her; it’s just true. she’s a pretty, talented, amazing woman and they are very much in love. i’m not sure what risks he’s taking there. next up: pretty strange wording then, don’t you think? idk, if it were you, and you wanted to get that point across, wouldn’t you use words like ‘she both scared me and i knew i wanted to be with her at the same time’ and NOT this convoluted mess of ‘there’s two types of people and they are both drastically different but also one and the same’?

SECOND OF ALL, as many people have pointed out.....he never uses pronouns. this is strange. jared does. jared says gen’s name, even. and uses ‘she’ and ‘her’. jensen never once does that, he practically refuses to do so. and yes, i fully believe it is entirely intentional.

because if you look at this phrase from a cockles lens it makes more sense then if you do not.

the one that jensen knows, unequivocally, with the utmost certainty, is the one for him, no doubts, no risks; is daneel. the one that he doesn’t know about, is scared of being with, but is willing to take that leap of faith anyway; is misha. and all of a sudden the puzzle pieces fall into place.

because he goes on to say “I kind of find myself in between both of those.”

he doesn’t say ‘i find myself in between both of those...with her.’ nope. he’s just...in between. caught in the middle. of those two types of people. translation: of those two people. mish. dee.

“And it can be a scary endeavour, and it will certainly have it’s ups and downs, but I think it’s a bond, and it’s a connection, and it’s a friendship, and it’s a ride, and it’s a journey...”

every single one of those words can be applied to more than one person. think about it. bond(between three people). connection(between three people). friendship(between three people!!!). there’s no ‘partnership’ in here, which does only apply to two people.

lastly, “i’m glad i picked the partner and the teammate that i have.”

ok, look. you can easily say that it’s just one person he’s talking about here! of course you can. but this is jensen ackles we’re talking about. jensen ‘rock and pebble’ ackles. jensen ‘mish. dee.’ ackles. so yes. i definitely think that ‘the partner and the teammate’ fall into this category. and i think daneel is the partner and misha is the teammate.

to put it matter-of-factly: you simply cannot prove that this isn’t about a poly relationship. there is absolutely nothing he says that makes it obvious he is talking about one person here. because he isn’t.

i just feel like, in the simplest terms, if this were about only daneel, that he would not be using these weird phrases that are half-hidden truths. just to compare, i watched another panel where pretty much the exact same question was asked, minus the whole ‘the one’ debacle, and, just as i suspected, it was an entirely different answer. he talks about the moment where he knew he liked her. her, specifically. says the name daneel. gushes about her. there’s no tiptoeing and weird pronoun usage and vague terminology.

tl; dr : i think he answered the question this way because there is no ‘the one’ in his life. and he is physically incapable of leaving misha out when talking about ‘the one’ because he has TWO ‘the ones’. and he wants to answer the question to the best of his best ability, but lying is unnatural to him. he will talk about daneel at length and misha at length, but i honestly to my core don’t think you could make him choose between the two. oh! and we literally had confirmation all the way back in fucking 2016, we just never paid attention until now. so......thanks, jensen?

sorry, this got super long, but i hope i warned you well enough.

#helloooo cockles truthing community #my anxiety is sky-high rn bc this is so damning for them #but i mean i can't feel bad because jensen SAID those things.#anyway am i contributing to cockles lore??? god i hope so #i mean it when i say i am SWEATING #if you think i'm reaching...i know more than you #rps for ts #team dumpster mansion #cockles confirmation #cockles #jenmish #long post for ts #cockles meta #relationship spec #all that jazz #jensenxmisha #mine

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serenityseventeen · 4 years ago

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Love & Letter: To The Thirteen Boys I've Loved Before

The Seventh Letter

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To: Jeon Wonwoo

From: Y/N

Hey, Wonwoo.

Now that I think back on us, we were a romance novel with a bittersweet ending. Every moment I spent with you felt like I was drinking a comforting cup of hot chocolate even if it didn't have any additional toppings. Warm. Sweet. Lovely. Temporary. I guess I finished the cup of hot chocolate now, huh?

Maybe one day I'd get a refill.

But for now, I'm satisfied.

I don't know how to exactly explain this. I'm just grateful. I'm also happy. I'm not happy with the breakup of course, because it's sad and I'm heartbroken too. I'm happy with the memories we made. I'm happy that a warm and sweet guy like you loved me. I'm happy that I got to love an understanding and intelligent guy like you.

I think deciding to become an avid reader may have been one of the best choices in my life, even if our love lasted only about a year. My unfortunate love life has taken a toll on this love as well. I know you'll say it wasn't any of our faults that we broke up. Knowing you, you'd probably say something along the lines of, “We couldn't hide our hearts that's why we dated. We can't change time that's why we have to separate. We didn't have a choice.”

You're always positive like this. I know that sometimes you're hurting and I was hoping that maybe one day you'd tell me about everything; everything that hurt, bothered, or annoyed you. You did tell me a few things that cut deep but I knew, each time that you opened up to me, that there was an even deeper cut in your heart that you didn't dare to tell yet.

Wonwoo, you were always a happy kid in my eyes. I think you wanted to show me only your good side even though you acted as if you could tell me everything. You were able to speak up for me when I couldn't and you even put my friends in their place. Thank you for that.

At that time, we weren't even dating, so I was always asking myself, “Why is he defending me?”

You were just this bookworm I met in the town's book club that I signed up for. You were just this guy who always happened to be reading in the local library. So, why were you defending me?

Well, we both know that answer now. It was because you liked me.

You began seeing me almost every day, at the local library, because I wanted to build a good habit of reading books. You looked like a cold nerd, always reading in that same, dark corner, barely lit by the lamp nearby. Sometimes I would just, while picking out a book to read, wonder what book it was that had you so invested.

Did you notice me staring? Or is it because I always took a long time looking for books? You never told me which of the ones were the reason you approached me. Well, I also never asked but by the time the question crossed my mind again, we had already fallen in love and broken up.

When you approached me with a book in your hand, I can still hear the words you said with your deep, calming, and dreamy voice. “Read this one if you're having a hard time. I already finished it.”

If you're reading this letter, you're probably cringing, right? Such a cheesy line for a first actual meeting. Well, I will admit now that it left quite an impression on me and lingered in my mind for a while. I never told you that though because I thought it was embarrassing.

You were really sweet even before we started dating. I was always wondering why you would leave me yogurt when I wasn't looking or become protective of me when I was alone. You always acted as if it wasn't a big deal but I know you were taking hours to head home because you insisted on seeing me off every time.

Wonwoo, when we began dating naturally, I wasn't convinced I was in love with you yet. I'm sorry if it sounds like I deceived you but the reason this letter is being written is because I loved you. Back then, even if you don't know my heart, I want to tell you that I'm sorry for dating you when I wasn't sure of my feelings. Whenever I dated or liked someone, it didn't end up that happily.

That day when I told you outside the library at night about how loving me felt like a curse, when you kissed me that night and reassured me that I wasn't cursed, that's when I truly fell for you. You were willing to accept me even when I talked so much that night about my past and failed relationships. Your lips... breath... It was all so warm that I didn't want to let go of you.

You didn't mind it when I talked about my ex-boyfriends and you understood me well. Even the next days that followed my breakdown, you treated me the same. You treated me like I was yours. When you wanted me to be close, you'd pull me close with my chair and ask if it was okay. When you wanted to hold hands, you wouldn't hesitate to do it in the most natural way possible.

You were also very romantic, I don't know if you think of yourself that way though, Wonwoo. I hope the things you did to me and my reaction also made your heart flutter; because every little thing you did to me made my heart race. It's memorable. I wanted to do the same things but I lacked the confidence. At least I gave you some good laughs though?

I remember, one time, I accidentally forgot my book at home during the book club and there were no extras. No one knew we were dating then and you suddenly took the seat beside me and slyly slid your arm around my waist and hand in mine before you started reading the chapter. You don't know just how much my heartbeat spiked because of that. I'll also be honest here, I didn't remember anything you read out loud and ended up reading the chapter again at home.

I think we got close because of our many conversations. Soon, I grew attached to you in many ways. You were the reliever of my stress, the lover of my nights, and an inspirational reader of my days. I had you to talk to when things were hard. I had you to talk to when I wanted to flirt and have fun. I had you to talk with about books.

What a boyfriend you were, handling so many jobs just for me. Now that we've broken up, I've realized that I was selfish. I used you for myself and though sometimes I did try to try and get rid of your hardships by listening, I found that you were independent. You thought you'd be able to handle it all so you always told me, “Just seeing you is enough.”

I honestly hope you don't think that way. I want you to be like me. Be a little selfish sometimes and allow yourself to use another person to rant. I want you to be able to let out all that stress you're having, whether it's from school, home, or your part-time job. I want you to be confident and continue being positive without having to hide your scars, but please, don't make the mistake of trusting the wrong person.

Remember the day when I called you crying, whining about how I failed an important test? It was probably almost midnight at that time and you were probably sleeping. I don't exactly remember the details but I remember this much.

You woke up, got out of bed, and ran to me. When you saw me crying on the bench beside a lamppost in the park, you immediately hugged me, not saying a word. Do you know how thankful I am for that?

It wasn't even that big of a deal. I was being a baby over something so trivial but you still ran to me. Your warm embrace filled with love... I could never forget that.

I still always think about that day when you came over to my house with the excuse that you wanted to read together. You ‘fell asleep’ on my couch.

I don't know how you knew I was staring at your handsome features but somehow, you knew. I still don't know how. I was just staring at you while thinking, ‘This guy cares for me... he's really nice... Why does he like me?’

It was like you could hear my thoughts. You turned your head to me and opened your eyes gently then pulled my head closer and kissed me. My heart fluttered so much and even thinking of it now gives me butterflies.

“Sorry, I didn't mean to do it without your consent.”

Seriously, which novel did you learn that line from?

I also know that sometimes when you ask me to hug you, it's because you're having a hard time, not because you missed me. Do you think I wouldn't know that? I can just remember how desperate your grasp was and how weak your breath was. I wished that you would tell me about your problems one day.

Even though you didn't end up telling me about your deepest fears and scars, I'm glad that you wanted hugs from me. That means I was at least some sort of comfort, right? I was also comforted when I hugged you, even though you were the one who asked for hugs.

I can't do anything but compliment you in this letter because our relationship did not have any flaws. Truly, we only have happy memories to reminisce. Like that day when you kissed me in the library, between bookshelves, or that day when you made a poem about me and read it out loud, or when you came over to my house and helped me water the plants but ended up getting both of us wet. When I was with you, I only had smiles and it felt like I could forget everything and just live as if there were only the two of us.

Because of you, I could forget about college for a while, I could stop stressing about schoolwork, I could be happy and live in the moment. I hope it was that way for you too. Your cold face when you're not smiling and your sharp eyes are enough to slice someone in half. You need to smile warmly with that beautiful smile of yours. You have a beautiful smile.

Wonwoo, I know you're a strong guy. Even without me, your ‘healer’, I know you'll be fine. Please don't make me the only one who remembers this love story. If I wanted to, I could write a romance novel about us. You, the male protagonist, and me, your love interest. We had so many lovely moments that I just want to keep it all in a book.

Well, it's a shame that we have to end our relationship like this. Maybe the timing is just never right for me. College is in a few months and long-distance relationships would never work for us, that's why I asked for us to break up. I know you and you usually rather act than talk. I'm sad about it but there's nothing I can do. I need to go to college.

I just have a few more things to say to you in this long letter.

Wonwoo, sometimes you would be straightforward but sometimes your words and actions would be implicit. Sometimes, even though you were my boyfriend, I would find myself failing to understand you. Everyone is complex but you may be the most mysterious man I fell in love with.

What was I to you?

Was I like a warm cup of hot cocoa?

Or a blanket to give you warmth throughout the nights?

To me, you were warmth, reassurance, love, and like the seasons.

You taught me life lessons while being my partner.

Even if sometimes you seem like a stranger, I don't regret it. I think you must've had a hard time but I'm sorry I couldn't do much to help you. Now that we're over, I'm just happy about what we had.

The fact that we loved each other is enough.

Yours truly,

Y/N

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6/24/21 - 11:42 am

a/n: My baby brother and parents came back so I spent a lot of time with family and didn't get to finish this. + SVT appearing on so many western shows/channels makes me so happy... I'm just happier these days :)

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ickle-ronniekins · 4 years ago

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For your writing project about falling in and out of love: I fell in love with a friend (not a close one) I had known for about ten years and I had a crush on him for almost that long, yet I was always too shy to tell him. He was a year older than me and very funny and talented. I remember always laughing really hard at his jokes and when I look back at my favorite moments from high school and middle school (which were some of the darkest years of my life), a lot of them involve him. I always used to always tell myself I couldn’t possibly fall in love with him until after we at least started dating, but there was one day when I watched him perform a song on his acoustic guitar at a concert and it literally felt like we were the only two people in the room, even though it was packed full of people, and that was when I knew I had fallen hard. We were in a few musicals together and were cast as love interests a few times. Though we never kissed or anything for those roles, but I always loved being on stage with him and being able to hold his hand and say all those things that I secretly felt but was too shy to say to him. There were a lot of instances where I accidentally moved towards him during a scene when I was supposed to be standing still or a couple times when I almost kissed him during really charged moments between our characters. I remember once when I held his hand (the first time I did after realizing how I felt about him— there’s a lot of opportunities to hold people’s hands in theater!) I literally felt like fireworks were going off, the same way you feel when you kiss someone.

Part of the reason I never told him was because by the time I got close to working up the nerve, he had a girlfriend. To this day, she was one of the kindest people I have ever known. I didn’t want to disrupt anything because I really cared for them both and wanted them to be happy, even at the expense of my own happiness. I tried to get over him a few times when he was dating her but it was almost impossible whenever we would hang out with our friends, and I always wanted to be his friend if nothing else, so I would bury my feelings. Their relationship really wasn’t the best (they managed to bring out some of the worst aspects of one another) and broke up, but even then I couldn’t feel happy about it because I knew he was hurting and I didn’t want to make a move when I knew he was grieving his relationship. By the time I worked up the nerve again, he started dating a different girl and I felt like my heart had been smashed into a million pieces... but even then, I could seem to get over him. I would get drunk and cry about him at parties and I didn’t believe anyone who told me that I could do better or that I would meet someone better suited for me because it didn’t seem possible... and then the pandemic happened.

The pandemic put a barrier between us and was a very physical sign that made me slowly realize we would never happen as a couple, which was a difficult thing to comprehend. I have always been a romantic and believed in soulmates. By this point in my life, I had convinced myself that he was mine and that it was only a matter of time before we got together, and it was always really easy to slip back into that mindset whenever I saw him again, but with a pandemic disrupting everything, it was easier to actively resolve on getting over him— at first, it was more tabling the idea of getting together in the nearish future but resolving to be with him if things worked out much later in our lives, like in a very rom-comesque way. When I started committing to that, I slowly started to love myself more and realize I had incredibly low self esteem and had overlooked some of his more glaring flaws because I didn’t believe I could find someone who watched my exact standards. I began to understand that we were just also incompatible with one another— for example, I hate being late to the point of showing up incredibly early to things in order to avoid it, whereas he habitually shows up an hour late to just about everything with Starbucks; I always told myself that I could change him, which I know now was an unfair expectation. As time went on and I slowly realized my worth, I also came to realize that even if he were to ever ask me out, my answer would probably be no because I was now just a whole different person who had grown up.

But the falling out of love process was an incredibly painful one. I cried myself to sleep a lot of nights. Like I said, I really thought he was my soulmate and that we were really destined for one another, so when I understood that we weren’t, it made me cynical about the whole concept of love for a while because it felt like everything I had ever known about it wasn’t real and that I had been stupid for being so naïve. I was angry with myself for a while and angry at him, too, because I was hard for me to comprehend that I was falling out of love with someone who hadn’t done anything wrong. I had been so convinced that my love for him was so strong that it would take something monumental, like him suddenly revealing himself to be the antithesis of what I thought he was (ex. a cheater, abusive, racist, etc.) for it to ever shake, yet he hadn’t done anything. He occasionally made some poor decisions (like an ugly tattoo or smoking) but it wasn’t anything regarding his moral character that changed who he was. It was me who was really changing and maturing.

I’ve only seen him once since falling out of love, and there were still those lingering feelings of my teenage self lurking beneath the surface. It really threw me off and I found myself distracted by his hands as he played his guitar and my heart would beat fast when he would talk directly to me or blush, but I was more clear-headed than I have been in a long time, almost clinical. I was able to think through my answers to his questions without stammering them out and I was nowhere near as nervous as I once was around him. Part of it might just be my own growth, but certain things he did that I once would have been swooning over didn’t affect me at all. I was upset when I went home because I wasn’t as far along in my moving-on process as I wanted to be and I definitely cried to some sad songs that night, but in the end I was grateful for it because it felt like a check-in to gauge how far along I really was. Back then, I was still in sort of a “maybe one day” phase; now I’m in a “probably not”. I think there’s still a part of my teenage self inside of me yet that still loves, but every day that goes by, I feel less and less like her and more like an adult.

I still sort of feel cynical about love but the one thing that has helped me is reminding myself that I will fall in love again someday with someone who will love me back and he will be right for me. He’s not going to be a perfect person by any means but we will be more compatible. I know I haven’t met him yet but I am really excited to meet my person, even though for the first time in my life I’m enjoying being single. I’m also loving the person who I have become and all the growth I’ve made— for example, a month ago I would have cried while writing and reminiscing about all this, but I didn’t get teary once! As hard and as agonizing as it was at different points, I’m so glad all of it happened because it made me who I am today.

Sorry for writing an entire novel here, I hope it was useful for what you are writing! Have a wonderful day my lovely, I hope this helps you write whatever wonderful thing you are planning!!!! 💜💜💜

this. this is just about the most beautiful thing i have ever read. oh my goodness gracious.

can i tell you lovely anon, that i could physically feel your growth within every single word? the way you described your friendship with this boy in the beginning... it reminded me of how i felt about a boy when i was a teenager. i was head over heels for him, though i never admitted it to myself until years later, after we stopped talking. your feelings felt so genuine and pure and just about every lovely thing you’d expect from a teenage romance. and as i continued reading on through your story and found myself heartbroken for the both of you, i can see just how much you’ve grown -- not only in the sense of recognizing that he wasn’t the one and letting him go, but also realizing your own worth and what you want out of love.

i felt so deeply every ounce of your heartbreak. i remember the boy i loved was with someone the entire time we were friends. i met him when he was in a relationship and we stopped talking just a few months after they had broken up. they were together for years, and i loved him every single second of every single day. that was over ten years ago now. sometimes i think of him and wonder how i’d feel if i ever saw him again. sometimes i feel like a sixteen year old again when he creeps into my thoughts. the nerves sometimes trickle back too, but he’s married now. i didn’t realize it until after we had stopped talking, but i so desperately wanted to be with him, and i was broken for years afterwards realizing we never would be.

please, do not apologize for writing a novel. this is exactly what i was looking for. thank you for being brave and sharing your story with a complete stranger. i’m just in awe of you as a person and your outlook on love.

i have such a difficult time telling myself that i’ll find the right person and he’ll love me and i won’t have to doubt anything. it’s something i struggle with every single dang day. but your words have moved me. you absolutely will find the right person, and he’ll love you and every single thing about you, and you’ll remember this boy who you loved when you were young and remember why you two never ended up together... because the one you’re meant to be with is getting to you as fast as he possibly can.

UGH THIS IS EVERYTHING. it brought me back to years ago. thank you so very much for sharing. this was just so fucking gorgeous jegnolvadnsf i cannot.

#writing project #YES CAN YOU HEAR ME CRYING???????#emotional OVERLOAD rn omfggggggg #this is gorgeous #you beautiful human you #asks #anon

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gardens-light · 5 years ago

Text

Friends To Lovers

Writers Note- First post/fanfic. Hope you enjoy.

Warnings: Light smutt. Fluff. Fingering. Unexpected/Slightly forced sexual interaction.

You and Eddie Brock have been friends as long as you can remember. Growing up in the same neighborhood as kids, witnessing highs and lows throughout the years. But since his public interview with Carlton Drake and the breakup of his ex fionce' Annie. You've watched Eddie go into a downward spiral, becoming distant with you, which he's never done.

Friday. 8:30pm.

The harsh, winter wind nipped your ears and fingers as you stood in front of the bare bricked apartment block. A heavy sigh breathed from your lips, trying to ignore the side glances of people outside. "Why am I even here?" Questioning yourself as you rubbed your hands together, attempting to stay warm.

Eddie hasn't returned any calls or texts for weeks, which at first only bothered you a little, till yesterday. Your worries and concerns grew when his ex, Annie called you, explaining Eddie's recent 'episode' and basicly calling him 'crazy.' Her voice echoed inside your head, 'you're his friend! Say or do something! Eddie already ruined things for me once. You'll wouldnt let him do it again!' You never liked her, but always remained positive and kept your opinions to yourself whenever Eddie spoke of her.

Not being your first time visiting the building, you found Eddie's door easily. But that didn't stop the nerves and worry consume you, after slight hesitation you gently knocked on the door.

---

Eddie's head suddenly perked up from the table, slowly waking up from his drunken nap. The gentle knock on the door came again, eyes widening when a familiar voice calmly called out his name.

She is at the door.

Venom's deep, darkening voice echoed inside his head. "I know..."

You've been ignoring her. Upsetting her.

"It's for the best..." Eddie's attempt at convincing made Venom laugh. Closing his eyes as he placed his head upon the table, hearing the muffled voice call out to him caused him pain. Wincing in discomfort as the ache in his chest tightened.

Extending a tendril from his host's body, wrapping it around the neck of the empty beer bottle and suddenly launching it against the nearest wall. "What the?-" "Eddie? Are you ok?" "What was that for?" He hissed lowly at the symboite. But Venom remained quiet, forcing his host to walk towards the door, peeping through the eyehole he saw you. Standing there, still with a worried expression while playing with your fingers. "G-Go away! Leave!" Those words tasted like poison burning his throat, his heart aching more as your face saddened.

---

"I-I-" "N-No! Leave!" Gathering the stubbornness you had, your hands curled into fists as they remained by your side. "I wont leave! Not until you tell me what's wrong! What's been going on?-" "N-Nothing! I'm fine!" You could hear the pain within his voice. The loneliness in his tone, you curled your lips as you thought, why? Why was he acting like this?

"Eddie... please talk to me, Annie told me what happened at the restraint" there was a slight pause before Eddie spoke again. "What did she say?" "That you stormed towards her and her new partner as they sat at the table. Rambeling about your 'proof' about Carlton Drake- whatever that means. Then you suddenly snatched and eat food from other people's plates, all before exclaiming to everyone you were hot and sat in a fish tank filled with live lobsters." "Th-That's not, ugh that bad-" " you eat the lobster from tank! Alive and fresh while sitting in the tank!." Eddie's voice fell silent when you raised your voice, calming your nerves, your fists unclentched and leaned against the door. "Please Eddie... let me in, just talk to me" you tried to keep your voice from breaking but tears reached your eyes as he snapped. "N-No! Annie thinks I've gone crazy and so will you! Sometimes I feel like I've gone crazy! Carton Drake took everything from me. My job! My home! My girl!-" "but not me."

You were greeted with another silence from his side of the door. Allowing you to repeat yourself, "but not me. You may have lost your career, home and fionce', but not once have you ever lost your friend. I have no idea what's happening or what you're going through, but nor am I understanding why you're pushing me away." "Why would you care?" You blinked multiple times in confusion, your voice breaking as tears rolled down your cheeks. "Why would I care? Because you're my friend! We've been through so much- too much! To stop caring about one another now!"

Leaning your head against the door, with your hands remaining still against the wood. "I've missed you... so much"

---

Matching your position on his side of the door, Eddie breathed deeply accidentally admitting in a low tone. "I've... missed you too"

Aww, isn't that nice?

"Shut up!" Eddie cursed under his breath.

Look at her. You did this to her.

"I-I know" feeling the symbioates toothy smile inside his head. Eddie witnessed as the black trendrils wrapped around the door knob.

Let's, let her in.

"No!-"

C'mon... I won't interrupt. I shall be on my 'best' behavior.

Not giving him a chance to react, the door opened with a slow extended swing. The pair of you gazing at each other in awkward silence, tears continued to roll down your face.

---

Losing yourself, you stepped towards him and wrapped your arms around his toned torso. Eddie pulled you into his apartment, gently closing the door behind him. Surprising you as he hugged you back, squeezing tightly. Not that he would admit out loud, but he missed your touch, your warm hugs, even the sound of your voice and the smell of your favorite perfume.

Gently pushing him away, looking up at him through watery eyes, so many questions swirled around your head but all you could mutter was, "why?." The longer you gazed at him, the more you saw the change. Eddie always kept his brown hair sleek and styled, but now it was greasy and unkept. Dark circles and slight bags framed his hazel eyes, indicating days- possibly weeks of sleep deprived. Pulling you back for another tight hug, resting his chin upon your soft hair atop of your head. "I... don't know" he admitted, "I don't know."

Realizing he may have held you for too long, Eddie quickly let you go before you had a chance to feel lost in his embrace. Panic quickly flashed across his face as the symbioate's low growl rumbeled in his chest. Only speaking the word.

Hungry.

Shock and confusion came to you, as you witnessed him stumble towards the kitchen, each movement being jumpy. "D-Do you want something to eat?" The tone of his voice was quick and jumpy, moving too fast for his reflects, eyes darting rapidly.

Pulling the fridge door with unessarcery force, Eddie took two beer bottles and placed them onto the counter top. You quickly grabbed the bottles of alcohol, saving them from falling over. Your eyes widened as he opened the cupboard door, grabbing a bag of chips and forcing them open, causing loose pieces to fly out of the packet. Grabbing handfulls and shoving them into his mouth, before throwing the packet into your direction, then immediately reaching out for the packet of biscuits.

"Whoa! Whoa! Stop" you called out, stepping towards him but before you had a moment to react, Eddie threw the biscuits away from him. Reaching out for you instead, his hands grabbing your waist and forcefully pinning your back against the wall. Your gaze remained wide eyed as you tried to make sense of what just happened, feeling his quick breath upon your face, you wasnt sure what you were supposed to feel.

Nothing made any sense to you. Eddie was always calm and confident, not jumpy and jittery like he is now.

---

His eyes looked down at your waist, then back to your confused expression. Eddie felt his heart beat like a rapid drum within his chest.

Delicate curves. Soft skin. Lovely eyes.

"No! No! Don't you harm her!" He growled lowly to Venom. "Y/N is my friend! We don't harm friends!"

Who said anything about harming her? Y/N, is attractive. Brave. You have feelings for her. Sexual thoughts.

Eddie shook his head, attempting to stop the symbioate from talking. Stopping him from reading anymore of his feelings which he tried to bottle up.

Yes, you do. They're all here, inside your head. Dreams. Desires.

"No! Not now!" "No what?" Eddie pulled you away from the wall but also away from himself. Stumbling a little, just stopping as your heels hit the couch. "You shouldn't have come!" His voice was more jumpy and quick than before. "I-I'm not myself! I can't control what I'm feeling! Thinking! Acting!-" "It's ok" Eddie loved but also hated how calm and collective you were. You always tried to work things out, even when it appeared hopeless or unusual.

You want to Eddie. The need for her is strong. I can taste it. I can feel it.

"Leave! Just leave!"

---

Without warning Eddie lunged forward, pushing you onto the couch as he crawled on top with predator like movement. Stretching the collar of your top downwards, exposing your breasts, his mouth opening wide placing your breast inside. You bit your bottom lip, feeling his tounge swirl and circle, while firmly grasping your other breast with is free hand. His jaw moved slightly as he sucked on your skin, tounge licking your nipple as satisfied moans came from him.

You closed your eyes as heat built up in your core, slowly moving downward towards between your thighs. Realising his firm grip upon your breast, feeling his fingers trace the curves of your body. His touch flowing downwards, slipping between the gap of your skin and undergarments. A low moan escaped from your lips as his fingers softly felt your folds, before placing his middle and index finger into you. Both fingers curling upwards within, making your back arch and causing your legs to quake. Your fingers clutching onto his shirt as you felt wetness come to his fingers.

Burying your head against his shoulder, as he raised his head from your chest. Hearing your gasps of breath and low moans into his ear, Eddie felt his trousers tighten around his crouch, breathing deeply as he became satisfied of the wetness around his fingers. Slowly pulling them away from you and out of the gap between your skin and undergarments, raising upright and sitting upon your hips. Eddie saw the hot mess he turned you into, your gazes met and he watched you flush pink, returning your smile as he unbuttoned his jeans.

No communication was needed. You both wanted what the other craved for.

She wants us, Eddie. Make her crave. Make her scream.

The heat and wetness between your legs grew as you bit your lip. Watching him unbutton his jeans, pulling out his full erection. Pushing down your leggings and undergarments, you moaned his name loudly as Eddie drove his member deep into you, thrusting hard against your g-spot.

#reader x venom #eddie brock x reader #venom #venom symbiote #marvel fanfiction #fanfic #gardens_light

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canyouhearthelight · 5 years ago

Text

The Miys, Ch. 88

Sophia, the day after her conversation with Tyche.

Thank you to @satan-parisienne and @baelpenrose for keeping me going and on an even keel! Sorry the Author’s Note is so short... I didn’t realize until I had about 10 mins before I had to be back at work that I forgot to queue this for today *facepalm*

The next day was an entire education on new places I could be sore. A hot shower and analgesics only took the barest edge off, and I ended up needing a transport to get to my office instead of my routine walk. I did my best to ignore the grin on Conor’s face every time I moved too fast and winced. After the third time I scowled at him, I brought up my datapad and did some research, careful not to tap my legs as I gestured, which had become something of a habit.

“That snot,” I gasped. Conor glanced at me, so I clarified. “Tyche had me doing fencing footwork yesterday…. Intermediate footwork, it turns out. No wonder I’m so sore.”

“Least it wasn’t sparring,” he pointed out cheerfully, gently lifting my chin to get a look at my lip. “You should have let Noah heal that, love.”

I brushed my cheek against his hand. “I want the reminder. May even let her do it again once it heals.”

This time, it was his turn to scowl. “Not funny. That face has been bruised enough for one lifetime.” He gently rubbed my cheek as the transport stopped. “Okay, time to go be the boss. No fighting with the other kids.” Despite the joking tone, his eyes were serious as he leaned in to kiss me before he headed to his shift.

I realized that Alistair not only beat me to work, but could apparently hear me groaning as I tried to walk, because the door opened before I was even within three feet of it. True to form, he gave me an appraising look before his expression settled on my face. “Door get a bit mouthy today? Or did your feet decide you needed to stay home?”

“Tyche punched me, actually.” My tone was light as I inched my way to my desk. “For defending myself. And then she decided I need more ways to defend myself, so now I can hardly move.”

“Solid logic,” he deadpanned as he handed me a cup of coffee. “I feel obliged to point out that the coffee is hot, seeing as you display a disturbing propensity to get hurt.”

“Very funny.”

“You have been warned, et cetera, so on, so forth.” He waved a hand nonchalantly as he turned, bringing up my agenda for the day. “Your first meeting is the one to discuss medical testing ethics, criteria for volunteers, and determination of the necessity of the procedures. Then you have time set aside to review the status of the Galactic Core Curriculum, along with proposals for expanded learning topics and their existing analogues in the education systems of other planets - “ He paused and tilted his head. “I will never cease to be caught off guard when sentences like that exist.”

I restrained the urge to nod - or more accurately, my back twinged with a warning not to even consider it. “Believe me, I understand. Noah and I were talking about other species a few weeks ago. Did you know there is a species of avians out there who essentially live on a planet with no surface atmosphere?”

“The Preeyar, yes,” he sighed wistfully. “Knowing that Fermi was simply impatient has been quite eye-opening, so to speak.”

“Well, he wasn’t wrong,” I conceded. “We were too young for extraterrestrial civilizations, we weren’t listening properly, they apparently weren’t trying to contact us until recently… But they do exist.” A smile crept on my face at the idea that we really hadn’t been alone in the universe.

My office door opened without warning, and a familiar voice chimed in as Alistair turned with clenched fists. “I do argue that we are entirely too dangerous to have been contacted.” Arthur Farro stood leaning against the frame, and Alistair relaxed marginally. “At least we were until relatively recently…. Throwing nuclear ordinance at each other the moment killing each other in the thousands - rather than the millions - stopped scratching that vicious itch. Who does that? We’re like demented eight-year-olds who got bored of burning ants and started setting each other’s hair on fire instead.”

“You really should keep that door secured,” my assistant sniffed as he closed out my agenda, right around the time he caught Arthur squinting at it.

“He has the code,” I admitted.

“Or maybe that was accidental,” our resident history teacher continued, ignoring us. “I’m a big fan of assuming stupidity instead of malice where possible. And, dear lord, does our track record make it plausible.” Finally entering the room, he flicked a finger at my face. “That was not, however.”

Before I could stop him, Alistair took one glance between me and my friend, and strode to the door. “No.”

“Alistair…”

“I’ll clear your calendar. No. Have a good day.”

“What the fuck were you thinking?” Arthur asked as the door closed behind my soon-to-be-ex assistant.

“That he’s a coward,” I muttered.

“You know damned well that’s not what I mean.”

“Tyche already decked me.” I gestured at my split lip and the bruise that bloomed on my chin overnight. “So, yeah, I know - “

“No, you really don’t seem to.”

“Arthur, stop.”

“I will not.” He stepped forward and placed both his hands, palms down, on my desk. He knew I hated that gesture. “Bjornson’s entire narrative hinges on you being more dangerous than anyone realizes, and you putting up a display of false helplessness to make everyone trust you. By decking one of his followers, not only did you show that you do, in fact, have violence in you - meaning that it’s now entirely plausible you’re as Machiavellian as they claim - but you’ve also gone and indicated for whatever reason that Jokull is enough of a threat to drop that premise.” Straightening, he crossed his arms in clear disappointment. “If you wanted to give him more credibility, good job. You succeeded.”

I swallowed every bit of hurt I felt at his words, reminding myself they were nowhere near as barbed as the ones Tyche had given me the day before. Instead, I tilted my head and arched an eyebrow at him. “Are you done? Did you say everything you needed to say?” I paused, giving him a chance to respond. When he didn’t, I poked harder. “Feel better?”

“Not particularly, but big picture? I’m not a terribly gleeful person, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. But yes, it is your turn now.”

“Gracious of you,” I cooed sarcastically. “Tyche made the same points yesterday, after punching me in the face, with the added gravitas of a guilt trip served with that special seasoning of having watched me almost die and thinking I abandoned her as a child. Also three hours with a rapier, whipping my ass. So. Far more impressive, I assure you.”

“Foiled again by the smaller Reid,” he sighed dramatically before catching himself. “Rapier, you say? I was going to say no pun intended, but I’ve decided I did that on purpose. Yep. Totally intentional.”

I rolled my eyes before pulling up my tunic to show the bruises on my midriff. “I’m not very good at it, for the record.”

He waved a hand dismissively. “Don’t worry, saber’s a better style anyway. And I’m not just saying that because it’s my favorite.”

“Uh huh,” I nodded, not entirely convinced. “As far as Bjornson… seriously. She gave me the scoop. I seriously fubared the entire situation yesterday. Apparently, our suspected cult leader only believes in physical attacks on those who would defend themselves. No honor in beating a beaten foe, et cetera.”

“Mmm hmmm,” he nodded, like I was a student he was letting reach her own conclusion.

“Which means I just made it open season on Sophias,” I groaned.

“Really, saber is much better for brawling tactics,” he hedged.

I laughed bitterly. “Doesn’t matter. My walking privileges are revoked until further notice. Must be accompanied by one of six people, or two out of another ten, and on a transport.” The last word came out like a profanity. It was a known fact I hated using them.

Hence why I was now being forced to, unfortunately.

“If you think there is any possibility that I’m going to argue against Tyche on that decision, I need to talk to her about that head scan,” he told me pointedly. “Then again, you and I have different definitions of the word ‘think’, but I’ll be clear - it’s not happening. Moving target, faster than a walking pace, with a protective attachment? Which roster am I on, again?”

“Very funny. You already know.”

His expression softened slightly when he realized I was actually upset. “There is some good news in all of this.”

I threw up my hands and spun in my chair. “Oh, do tell, great military historian and warlord. What is the shining silver lining to the fact that I just gave a man who thinks I am the only thing standing between him and his New Start a golden ticket to sic his followers on me?”

“Okay, first off, sassy shit, my main career is a school teacher. I only moonlighted as a warlord to pay those apocalypse bills. Not my fault I was good at it.” Suddenly, he got serious. “The good new is, if he was too stupid to realize that your talent for inspiring loyalty meant you were a massive problem for any takeover plan, and a problem he’d have to deal with sooner or later….. Well, he’s probably too stupid to keep his little cult together much longer. Leaders who don’t recognize more than one kind of strength never manage to build a lasting legacy.”

“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair…” I said, half to myself.

“Yeah, our guy is no Ramses II,” Arthur replied. “Besides, those who seek power are rarely good at keeping it.”

“I would have given him my seat on the Council if he’d just asked,” I admitted.

“Besides the fact that you literally just proved my point, if he was suited to the Council, he’d be on it. It’s not like you were the only candidate.”

I shrugged. “No idea. I didn’t even know I was on the Council for the first week. I think it was a week.”

When I turned to look at him, I was met with a flat stare. “I know it was explained to you at some point. How does that search function work?” He reached forward like he was going to tap my head before I swatted his hand away. “You were appointed to the Council to replace Simon, you represent a specific population on board the Ark, when we arrive at Von, you will serve an additional two planetary standard years before elections are held, of which you cannot be a candidate….”

Ugh. “I was put forward as a recommendation by Simon. The other Councillors put forward their candidates. The population I represent voted based on my personnel file, since no one even knew any of the candidates at that point. We’d only been on the Ark about six months. Some of us, anyway.” Glaring, I narrowed my eyes at him. “I don’t know how you figured that out, but I have a feeling I’m going to kill someone.”

He waved a hand at me in a very familiar gesture. “I see other people do it all the time. Jog your memory, and some phrase or word triggers it. Cool to watch, though.” With a shrug, he continued. “Point is, Bjornson wasn’t even a candidate, same as me.”

“How do you know that?” I asked incredulously.

“Fuck, Sophia. You really need to keep track of your constituents.”

“Hey, I didn’t even want to be a - Wait. You are one of my so-called ‘constituents’!?”

“Even voted for you,” he grinned. “Didn’t know it was you-you, but… Communications background, peaceful but intelligent attributes to balance out our resident warhawk, fair enough to offset Huynh, and you seemed like the type to actually listen to Grey, Pranav, and Eino.” He shrugged. “To be fair, I was right.”

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#the miys #humans are weird #aliens #apocalypse #science fiction #original fiction #my writing #earth is space australia #humans are space orcs

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mageicalwishes · 5 years ago

Text

Read on AO3: here

Read the previous chapter (On Tumblr): here

Summary: “I’m egging your house for a dare, but you’re parent is a cop and now they’re yelling at me, so I told them you were my ex and you wronged me, and now you’re coming outside, so please just go along with this, I really don’t want to go to jail” AU.

When Simon Snow agreed to egg some posho’s house, he never thought he’d find himself here - The only thing standing between himself and a criminal charge, the word of a handsome stranger.

Chapter: 6/7

Words: 7,418

Finally done with Chapter 6! Sorry for such a long wait, this chapter was a pain. A lot goes down, though - So, I hope you feel as though it was worth the wait :)

Baz

Staring into my reflection, I fiddle with my hair, desperately trying to smooth out a particularly disobedient wave. Realistically, it doesn’t matter (From the persistent tangle of Snow’s curls, it’s fairly apparent that he doesn’t mind the messy, untamed look), but it feels important.

Clicking my phone, I check the time once more. 11:07 - Seven minutes late, typical.

We haven't met up since whatever happened last time, and I’m anxious to get the potential awkwardness of seeing him again over with, as soon as possible. We completely ignored it over text (Since he never brought it up, and I wasn’t exactly thirsting to accidentally expose my idiotic crush), but I'm not sure when can do the same face-to-face. I mean, surely it'll be more difficult to just pretend it never happened, confronted with the face of the memory, in real life. Although, despite the optimistic spark of hope buried deep within my gut, I doubt it really meant anything to him - So, maybe it won’t.

Either way, I just wish that he’d get here soon. The anticipation is killing me.

————————————————————————————

Just as I’m about to call and berate him, the doorbell rings.

Scrambling over to the door, I swing it open, pitifully enthusiastic.

“What time do you call this then?”

“Dunno,” he smiles, stepping inside. “I bought scones, though. So I think I’m worthy of forgiveness.”

My pulse slows at the sight of him, the trepidation thrumming throughout my body cooling. Bright and smiling, he’s the same Snow as always. So, it seems that, despite it all, nothing is weird. Just as I suspected. Which is good, obviously (I mean, I didn’t want to ruin what we have), although, somehow … Mildly disappointing, too.

Risking a lingering glance, I take him in, appraisingly. It’s immediately apparent that he’s made an effort with his appearance today - Although, I consciously avoid thinking too deeply about why that is, knowing that my love-plagued mind would only lead me down the dangerous path of wishful thinking. He’s obviously attempted to brush his hair, which, going by it’s strangely loose, fluffy appearance, was a remarkably stupid idea. And he’s sporting a simple, white shirt. Objectively speaking, it’s a little too tight for him, the fabric pulling obscenely against the swell of his chest (Although, personally, I can’t say I object).

He’s a sight to behold - A little dishevelled, perhaps, but no less wondrous. I'd lavish in it all day if I could, although, conscious of getting caught, I tear my eyes away from him, reluctantly, and stare down at the floor, instead.

“Now that … Is entirely up to me, Snow,” I drawl. “And, I’m not convinced that a packet of scones is enough to earn you my forgiveness, especially considering that this isn’t your first offence.”

“Offence,” he snickers, bitterly. “I’m ten minutes late, at worst!”

Showily, I lift my wrist to glimpse at my watch (It’s set at the wrong time, so is, in reality, useless - Although, I won’t tell him that).

“Twenty three, actually.”

He glares at me, and murmurs something incoherent under his breath (Probably a swear word. He always resorts to those, when he’s frustrated), so I decide to ease off. He's only been here a minute - And there really is no need to do all of our bickering now.

“Come on up, though,” I call, biting back a laugh, and padding up the stairs - The heavy clunk of Simon’s stomping, following behind me, momentarily. “I’m sure you can make it up to me somehow.”

————————————————————————————

“Just to let you know, I like talking while I’m watching movies.”

“Oh god,” I groan. “I should've known, you’re one of those people. Why didn’t you warn me?!”

“I just did, you pillock!”

“Yes - As I’m putting the bloody disc in! That doesn’t give me enough time to mentally prepare for your onslaught of meaningless commentary, Snow!”

“Hey! It’s not meaningless! I’ll have you know that I’m very perceptive ... I’m sure that my commentary will only enrich your movie-watching experience.”

I raise my brow, entirely unconvinced. If he was really so perceptive, I doubt that we’d be spending the day watching Pride and Prejudice - Considering that there are many other things I’d rather be doing with him, right now.

“You're such a liar,” I tease. “You best not just sit there spouting a bunch of useless crap, and claim your being insightful. If your chatter gets to be too much, I retain the right to clobber you, you know - So be warned!”

Apparently at a loss for words, he sticks his tongue out at me - His nose scrunching up, sweetly, as he does. Oh god. I even find that pathetically childish display endearing. Clearly, I’m disturbed - I mean, poking his tongue out, seriously? I'm in need of some serious correction.

Sucking in a breath, I try to push Snow out of my mind - Which is an undeniably big ask, considering that he’s sat barely a metre behind me, laid out on my sofa, grinning to himself, boyishly. So it’s no surprise that, I fail - My mind trailing off into thoughts of whether Snow’s chest is as freckly as the rest of him.

I sigh, frustrated. I’ve had crushes before, obviously (I mean, Rhys from Year Eleven Maths was an absolute God), but none have been quite as virulent as what I have for Snow. Nobody else has ever consumed my thoughts, so entirely. Nobody else has ever made my heart stutter, so dangerously. Nobody else has ever …

I seriously need to stop. He’s barely been here half an hour, and I’m already subsiding into a hormone-fuelled madness. If I keep this up, it's going to be an insufferably long two days.

————————————————————————————

True to his word, Snow has managed to ramble over pretty much every scene, so far (With an unhelpful 'He sounds like Snape!' here, and a 'Her legs must be super tired, if she walked all that way!' there).

The urge to throttle him (or shut him up another way) was certainly growing. Although, beneath the seething anger, I must admit that his menial observations were somewhat winsome.

We’re about three-quarters of the way through the movie, when Snow flops down onto my leg, with a dramatic puff - His cheek pressing against my thigh, heavily.

Suddenly tense, I clench my hands into fists by my side, and try to refocus on the movie.

“He’s cute isn’t he? I like that guy,” he mumbles, his voice slightly muffled against the fabric of my jeans.

I glance down at him. He’s staring up at me, his blue eyes bright, and his lips curved into a soft smile.

“Really?” I ask, my tone laced with judgement.

“Yeah? You don’t think?” He asks, his brow furrowed deeply. His forehead folds into small crinkles, and for a mad moment, I imagine reaching out and smoothing them out with my fingertips. I don’t. Obviously. But, I could. He’s right there - Within my reach. It wouldn’t take much (Except a level of confidence I simply don’t have).

Pathetically, I look away, unable to hold his gaze any longer (My treacherous face, already flushing with heat).

“No. I never said that-” I scoff.

I didn’t say that, because it’s objectively untrue. He is, as Snow so eloquently put it,'cute' - His hair ruffled excellently, and the hint of a dimple popping each time he smiles (Just like somebody else, I know). And while he is, undoubtedly, a blithering idiot, somehow, on him it’s charming. So ... It would be unfair to call him unattractive.

“- He’s … fine. But this is a very emotional scene, Snow. I thought you might have more to say than 'He’s cute'. I pity your English teacher, if that is your level of analysis!”

“Oi nah! I got a B in English. And my teacher loved me! She gave me a homemade cookie on the last day, and everything - Only a few people got that! So don’t be a bellend!”

“Sure she did,” I taunt. “I mean a B … That certainly is impressive. I got an A star, but -”

I’m interrupted by Snow jabbing his fist into my thigh, as hard as he possibly can, his knuckles digging into the muscle, sharply.

“Fuck off, you arrogant tosser!” He gruffs.

I laugh, despite myself - Embarrassingly loud and cackling.

“Ow, dick! You didn’t have to hit me so fucking hard,” I whine, snapping my head down towards him, and swatting at his arm, teasingly.

“You deserved it.”

“I know, I know,” I laugh. “I’m only winding you up though - A B is a perfectly good grade. It’s just funny to watch you pout ... If it’s any consolation, I only got a C in DT. My shitty attempt at a table fell apart before it was graded, so the coursework sort of tanked my grade. It’s my greatest shame. I told everybody else I got an A, so you're the only one who knows the truth.”

He beams over at me, his tongue pressed against his front teeth, goofily.

“Really? Well … That is unfortunate. I got an A star. But I guess we can’t all be so talented.”

I glare down at him, my face twisted into the cruellest scowl I can muster (It’s a fairly weak effort, though, but, in my defence, he does look adorably happy when he’s pleased with himself).

“Oh ha ha. So hilarious,” I drone. “Just shut up and watch the film, you numpty!”

With an over-exaggerated huff, he rolls his head back towards the screen, his weight shifting against my leg, warmly.

Unobserved, I smile down at him, the movie significantly less appealing than the sight of him beneath me - His curls swept to one side, and his face smushed slightly where it’s pressed against me.

He doesn’t look back up at me after that.

I try not to let it bother me.

————————————————————————————

I leave Simon playing Fortnite alone, to go to fetch our dinner (He’s better at it than me, anyway).

“Hello, you,” Daphne smiles, scooping a mush of baby-food off of one of the twin’s chins (I find it impossible to tell them apart when they’re not in their colour-coordinated clothing, although she always manages to, somehow). “Your dinner is in the oven- I wasn’t sure how long you’d be, so I thought I’d keep it warm. There’s dessert in there, too … If you’d like. Your favourite.”

I scrunch up my face, awkwardly.

“Cheers.”

“No problem. So … How is it going? How's Simon?”

“Good,” I drawl, suspiciously. “We’re only playing on the PS.”

“Okay,” she shrugs. "I was just wondering.”

I turn, scrambling with the casserole dishes, and hurrying over to the door, hoping to nip this mortifying line of conversation in the bud.

“Hey what!” Mordelia shouts, finally looking up from her plate. “How come he gets to eat in his room? That’s not fair! If he gets to, why don’t I?”

I falter, my hand on the door - Freedom laying tantalisingly close.

“Because,” I spit. “I have a friend over. When you have friends over, I’m sure Mum will let you, too.”

Daphne nods in confirmation. “Let Basil get on with his dinner, Mordie.”

She crumples up her face, angrily, apparently dissatisfied with the idea. Oh, Christ, here we go!

“Does Dad know about your friend?” She presses, an sinful tinge to her voice.

My shoulders drop, instantly. Shit. Of fucking course.

“Don’t tell him,” I command, sternly.

“Why not?”

I press a fist to my forehead, in irritation.

“He doesn’t like my friend. Okay?”

“Why?” she coaxes. “Are they a girl.”

“No,” I sigh. “Obviously not. Look, I really don’t have time for this. Just … What will it take for you to keep your mouth shut?”

She grins, manically. Even though she’s just a child, she’s already worryingly devious (I suppose, in that respect, she takes after me).

“You … Have to help me with my violin practice, this week,” she chirps.

I think of her horrifically, screechy 'playing' with dread, and look over to Daphne for help - Her perfectly painted lips, pulled taut, into a poorly suppressed smile. For God’s sake!

While I do enjoy spending time with her, I’d really rather skip the whole violin tutorial element of her bargain. Although, I suppose, a short-term earache, is a small price to pay for avoiding Father’s acrid disapproval.

So, loathfully, I agree - Storming out of the kitchen, and jogging back upstairs, in a rush.

————————————————————————————

Simon

I peek a glance around Baz’s head, staring over at the casserole dish on his dresser.

“Do you normally have dessert?” I ask, innocently, shovelling the final spoonful of Shepherd's pie into my mouth.

“Not normally, no,” he laughs. “Although, I made sure that Daphne made one, especially for you. Which I think you may have suspected, given that you’ve been gawping over at it for the last five minutes."

I scrub the back of my neck, and chuckle awkwardly, embarrassingly exposed.

He flashes me a smile, mercifully free of mocking.

“I can get you a serving now, if you’d like?”

I definitely would like. Although, Baz still hasn’t finished his main - So, I should probably wait (Penny said it’s rude to make people feel like they have to rush their meal).

“Oh no. It’s alright,” I murmur. “I’d rather wait a minute.”

A knowing smirk spreads across his face, and an eyebrow raises, suspiciously.

I wish that I could do that - The eyebrow, thing. I tried practising it in the mirror the other day, but I didn’t look all cool, and elegant like him … I just looked like a constipated twit.

“You don’t have to wait for me to finish, Snow,” he beams, his voice alluring velvety. “If you’re hungry now, then I’ll serve you up a bowl - It tastes better warm, anyway.”

“Okay,” I chirp, contented. “That’ll be perfect. Thanks.”

Siding his plate off of his lap, he stands, treading over to the dresser, and spooning the pudding into a bowl for me.

I try not to stare at him (I’ve been trying all day), but it’s proving increasingly difficult.

He hasn’t tied his hair up today - Leaving it free, draped in loose waves against his face. And, he’s dressed more casually than I’m used to - Having opted for a navy-blue T-shirt (Rather than his usual boxy button-ups). But, in spite of his more dressed-down style, he still looks ridiculously expensive - His jeans dark, and perfectly fitted, and a thin, silver watch glimmering against his thin wrist.

“Here you go,” he says, thrusting the bowl into my hand.

Excitedly, I snatch it out of his hand, and peer down into it. The look of it catches me off guard - The bowl filled to the brim with a mildly peculiar looking, light brown, slush.

Confused, I scrunch my face up.

Baz sighs, rolling his eyes upwards, exaggeratedly.

Fuck. That was definitely rude of me.

“It’s nothing sinister, Snow,” he assures. “Don’t worry. If I wanted to poison you, I wouldn’t waste a perfectly good dessert, on it. I’d just spike one of your scones, or something.”

I school my face back into an uncertain smile. God, I’m such a dick.

“No, no, sorry,” I stumble. “I didn’t mean to do that. It’s not bad. I mean … There’s nothing wrong with it. It smells delicious. I just … Don’t know what it is. That’s all.”

“Om Ali,” he shrugs.

I still have legitimately no idea what he’s talking about, but I decide to just drop it. I wasn’t lying, it really does smell nice - So I suppose that it hardly matters what it actually is.

Clearly, he sees right through me, though - Rolling his head backwards, and scoffing, dramatically.

“It’s sort of like … A Bread and butter pudding. Just with proper flavour ... It’s Egyptian.”

“Oh, I see,” I say, smiling, and digging my spoon into it. “Are your family like … Egyptian then?”

“Yes, Snow. My family are 'like' Egyptian,” he drones. “Well, my Mother’s side are, anyway.”

I really am excelling at making a twat of myself, today.

“Oh. Sorry. I didn’t mean for it to sound … I was just - Sorry. Is that your mum, then?” I ask, pointing over to the field of photo frames. “The lady in the pictures?”

“It’s fine,” he laughs, his gaze following my finger. “And, yes … That’s her.”

“She’s pretty.”

He raises his eyebrows, smirking suggestively.

“Not like that!” I splutter. “Ew, no! I just mean ... You look like her.”

“Yes, well, funny that - That is how genetics tend to work, Snow”

“Sod off!” I grunt. “You know what I mean. You look nothing like your dad.”

“I know, thank the merciful gods! Could you imagine if I'd inherited those non-existent cheekbones … That would be a tragedy of unparalleled proportions!”

I beam over at him, my eyes scrunching half-shut, as my cheeks force themselves upwards. He’s being completely ridiculous, but I still find myself stupidly endeared.

He looks up at me, then, and catches me smiling.

“Just get eating, you divvy,” he chastises, scowling at me fiercely. “You barely breathed between mouthfuls, earlier, and now, suddenly, you’re Mr. Chatterbox ... It really is nicer warm, you know.”

He doesn’t have to tell me twice - Plunging my spoon into the bowl, I scoop up the largest mouthful possible, and take a bite. It’s slightly unusual (And much crunchier than I was initially expecting), but so, so good - Filled with intoxicatingly sweet coconut and raisin.

“Oh my god,” I moan, unable to find the words to convey how fucking delicious it is.

He simpers over at me, clearly pleased with himself (Even though he didn't make it).

“I know. I did tell you it was good … It was actually my favourite dessert, as a kid. My mum used to make it for me every Saturday, as a treat.”

“Does she still make it for you?” I ask, the words slurring in my food-stuffed mouth.

Something awful flashes across his eyes, the smug look wiped clean from his face, immediately. Oh, God. What have I done now?

“Uh no. Not anymore,” he mumbles, staring down at his bedsheets, blankly. “My mum, she ... Passed away when I was around five. Car accident.”

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I’m such a moron. I’d just assumed his parents were divorced, and that his mum lived in some other mansion, down the road, or something. Not that. I never even considered that.

“I’m sorry,” I breathe.

“It’s alright. You weren’t to know.”

“I know, but still … I really am sorry.”

“Hey. Come on now, Snow. There’s no need to get all gloomy,” he smiles. It’s a shadow of his proper smile, hollow and painted-on - Although, I can hardly fault him for that. “I didn’t 'go all awkward' on you, the other day, so don’t do it to me. That would just be terribly hypocritical, of you!”

“Okay. I won’t. Promise.”

We sit in silence for a while after that.

I occupy myself with the dessert, while he just sits there, scraping his fork over the top of his mash, aimlessly. Regretfully, I think that my line of questioning may have killed his appetite. But, I’ve still got some scones left, so if he gets hungry again, later, we can just share those.

I snatch a glance at him, in my periphery vision. He’s got his brow tugged down, and he's scrunching his lips up on either side of his face, alternatively.

I’m pretty sure he’s thinking, so I just sit there munching, quietly - Patiently, waiting for him to speak (I've learned my lesson. Anything I could say, would probably just make matters worse).

He clears his throat, with a stifled cough, and then he’s talking again - His voice, barely a whisper.

“When Daphne found out about it (The dessert thing, I mean), she bought herself some Egyptian cookbook, and taught herself how to make it. It’s not quite the same, since my Mother used some family recipe she had memorised, but … It still reminds me of her. It was lovely of her, really, but, when I was little, I used to get so mad at her for making it. I’d always pretend that I didn’t want it, but when I thought everybody was asleep, I’d always sneak downstairs and steal myself a bowl. It makes no sense, but I just - Always thought that she was … Trying to replace her, or something. And, you know, nobody could replace her. Not ever.”

He looks at me then, his grey eyes stormy, and flooded with tears. His lips pulled into a hard, stony frown, and his jaw taut with tension.

I gulp, miserably. I don’t know what to do. I didn’t mean to upset him - I’d never mean to upset him. I just … Wish I’d never said anything.

Leaning forwards, I grab his hand - Slotting our fingers together, and squeezing lightly, in an attempt to comfort him. I’ve never really been the best at physical affection (Being unused to it, it always made me feel clumsy, and weird. Sort of like my skin didn’t fit right), but it’s easier with him. Everything is easier with him.

He smiles, meekly, clenching my hand back, and pressing on with what he has to say.

“One day, when I was around fourteen, I confronted her about it. I was properly awful, screaming at her in the kitchen like some spoiled brat, throwing it all right back in her face. But, you know, I was … Well, I don’t know what I was. Just … Not good. I hadn’t been for a long time, either, so I just - Snapped. Accusing her of trying to replace Mother, and yelling at her for even daring to make it. I went so far as to say that she did it on purpose, just to upset me. I mean, can you imagine?”

He snickers, mirthlessly - Wounded, and weak.

“I probably deserved a slap, to be honest, but she didn’t even raise her voice. She just hugged me - Even after I tried to fight her off ... Eventually, I just gave up, and sobbed against her chest. It was all very dramatic, and I can’t imagine how pitiful I must’ve looked. But, afterwards, I felt … Better. Not fixed. I don’t think I can ever be fixed. Something like that, I don’t think that it ever goes away - Not fully, anyway. But, I think that … At that moment, that's what I needed the most - To just … Let go. It had been a long time coming.”

I nod my head, affirmatively, just to let him know that I was still listening.

“Later on, when I’d calmed down a little, she told me that she knew that I used to eat it, secretly - That she’d always known. She apologised (Even though she really had no reason to), and explained to me that she was only trying to help. I think that, deep down, I’d always known that ... I just wanted somebody to be angry at. And you know what’s funny?” He asks.

I shake my head.

“Nobody else in the house even likes the bloody thing! She used to just throw a few portions in the bin, so that I’d feel safe to go and steal mine (Under the impression that, nobody would notice a little bit extra going missing).”

I smile, cautiously, tracing a finger against the inside of his palm.

“I was so cruel, Snow. So bitter, and broken, that I’d torn her apart, when all she wanted to do was help me. I didn’t speak to her for days, after that. I mean, how could I, after I’d been so awful to her? And, I stopped eating the Om Ali, all together. I didn’t deserve it, anymore - Didn’t deserve the joy that it brought me. I thought … If my Mother could’ve seen me, she’d have been so ashamed of what I’d become - Of who I’d become. Like I said, it was always intended as a treat - And ... Bad people don’t deserve good things -”

I interrupt him then, unable to listen to him berate himself, further.

“Please don’t say that, Baz,” I plead. “I know, I don’t know her, but … It’s obvious she loved you, dearly. She would’ve understood. It was a mistake. You’re not a bad person, you were just … Hurting.”

He nods, wordlessly. I don’t know if that means he agrees, or he’s just acknowledging what I said, but he clearly doesn’t want to speak - So, I don’t ask.

“She still made it, every few weeks or so, in that hopes that I’d crack. She even still threw half of it away! And then, you know, on my mum’s birthday she snuck one up into my bedroom, for me. She looked so hopeful, and I just wanted to make her happy, again - So ... I took it. I gorged myself that night - Ate the whole thing, in one sitting (I’m surprised I didn’t hurl, to be honest).”

He lets out a watery laugh, then, his eyes damp, but a slight, genuine smile breaking across his face. Hesitantly, I mirror him, grinning back, shyly.

He huffs in a shaky breath, and grips my palm tighter.

“It was amazing. I'd denied myself it for so long, as a sort of penance. And I still wasn’t sure that I actually deserved it, but it was so, so good to finally have it back. To have a piece of her back.”

I stare at him, unsure of what to say.

“Anyway,” he laughs, his voice splintered. “I don’t even know why I’m even telling you all of this … There’s me lecturing you about getting gloomy, and then I go and start bloody weeping! Do forgive me.”

“There’s nothing to forgive,” I shrug. “I like … Knowing about you. I want to know things about you.”

“I see … Well, I promise you that the rest isn’t so dreary.”

“Even if it was, I’d still want to hear it. It’s still you.”

He smiles properly then, the reddened skin surrounding his eyes crinkling, slightly.

“Yes, well,” he murmurs, tearing his hand from mine, and reaching up to scrub at his eyes. “We’ll save all of that for another day. Want to play some FIFA, or something? I fancy beating you again.”

Truthfully, I don't, and I don't think that he does either - But, I can tell that he needs the distraction, so I agree.

I mean, there are definitely worse things to do.

————————————————————————————

We’ve been playing for about two hours, when Baz flops back against the sofa, dragging his hands down his face, tiredly.

“I’m going to go and get ready for bed,” he sighs, his voice still a little rough from earlier.

Despite my initial reluctance, I don't want to stop playing. I mean, it’s only just gone Ten, and I’m finally winning - Four matches to two (I may, or may not have, forced the lads to play with me everyday, since I last saw him, as practice).

“But I-”

“Hey,” he interrupts. “Quit complaining. I saw you yawning, Snow. We can play more tomorrow.”

Displeased, but unwilling to argue, I nod my head. I suppose that, as long as he doesn’t actually intend to go to sleep right now, it doesn’t really matter - Mostly, I just want to talk to him (Beating him at his own game while doing so is just a nice, little bonus).

“I’ll be fifteen minutes, okay?”

“Okay,” I sing.

I don’t trust that timescale, for a second - But, I’ll tease him about that later.

————————————————————————————

Unsurprisingly, he takes ages in the bathroom (Even though all he really needs to do is brush his teeth).

When he eventually reemerges, the familiar scent of Cedar and Bergamot fills the room, although that is not what I pay attention to. What I pay attention to, is what he’s wearing - A set of long, silky, maroon pyjamas, decorated with a deep blue piping.

I let out a wild cackle, clapping a hand over my mouth, in a failed attempt to try and contain it.

“What?” He asks, indignantly. “What the fuck are you laughing at?”

I pause, still desperately trying to stifle my laughter.

“What the fuck are you wearing?”

“Pyjamas,” he deadpans, scowling slightly.

I laugh, gesturing toward him vaguely.

“But I mean … Really?”

“Yes really, Snow. Why? What do you wear that’s so much better?”

“Boxers,” I shrug.

He snaps his head down towards the floor, clearly embarrassed.

Whoops. I sort of forgot about that, to be honest. It probably would’ve been polite to bring a pair of trackies to sleep in, or something (Even though, they'd only make me overheat).

“Right well … I get cold. So, I wear clothes, like a normal person … Now quit being a prick, and go and brush your teeth.”

“Okay, grandpa” I giggle.

He shoots me a warning look, his eyes piercing into me, fiercely.

Alarmed, I dart towards the safety of the en-suite, slamming the door behind me, and guffawing absurdly.

“Stop laughing right now, you nightmare!" He shouts, bashing against the door, angrily. "Or else, I’ll make you sleep in the garden!”

————————————————————————————

Luckily for me, Baz didn’t actually make me sleep outside. Although, the spare room he does put me in, is hardly any better.

It’s bitterly cold, and the bed is covered in these horrific, carved gargoyles, whose eyes stalk me around the room (Well, maybe not, really - But it definitely feels like they do!).

I thought he was having me on, at first, but one look at his stupid, smug face, showed me that he was (Unfortunately) deadly serious.

I’m just about to text him to voice my complaints (Manners be damned!), when I hear it - An awful, shivering wail. Because, of course, out of all of the rooms in this shithole, Baz just had to put me in the one that's fucking haunted!

Petrified, I bury my head beneath the starchy, old duvet, and pray for safety.

————————————————————————————

Baz

It’s barely twenty minutes before there is a timid knock at my door. My little plot having, seemingly, worked perfectly.

Smiling to myself, I pad over to the door and pull it open as quietly as I can manage (It still creaks, gratingly, but I at least tried).

And there he his - Simon Snow. Standing on my doorstep, his hair mussed, and a blanket pulled over his shoulders like a cloak (Apparently, he wasn't kidding about the boxers thing, then).

He looks a little ridiculous, to be honest, but that doesn’t stop the swelling in my chest.

“Your house is haunted,” he whines.

“No it isn’t, Snow. Don’t be ridiculous. It’s just old.”

“Nu-uh … It’s haunted. There were all these creepy wailing sounds.”

“That’ll be the pipes,” I deadpan. “Somebody probably just ... Used a tap, or something.”

“Well … It’s weirdly cold in there - Like there is a ghostly presence.”

I shake my head, amused.

“Yeah, that's down to the practically non-existent central heating. Like I said … The house is old.”

“Whatever,” he huffs. “Can I just … Sleep in here, with you. I’m too creeped out to go back in there, alone!”

I roll my eyes in faux displeasure, and step to the side.

“Come on in then, coward. I’ll protect you from that dastardly pipework.”

“Just shut up,” he mumbles, shuffling into the room, and plopping himself down onto my bed.

He stares down at his hands, picking at his nails, savagely.

“Do you - Do you want me to sleep on the sofa, or something?”

My throat constricts, purposelessly, as I swallow down a nervous lump. I definitely didn’t think this through, properly.

“Up to you,” I drone, moulding my voice into a cool, nonchalance.

“It might ... Be warmer if we’re both in your bed,” he breathes, his voice so quiet that it’s barely audible.

“Sure. That makes sense,” I shrug. “Just get in, then.”

Tip-toeing across the room, I slide into bed besides him, and stare up at my canopy, expressionless.

“Baz,” he whispers, turning his body to face mine.

I mimic him, immediately - Rolling onto my side, to face him. His eyes are wide, with barely a slither of blue still visible - His pupils fully dilated in the dimness of the room.

“Hmmm,” I hum.

“Do you like ... Anybody?”

I puff out a breath, shaking my head in disbelief.

“Yes, Snow. Obviously, I like some people.” I answer, tartly.

“No, you dick. You know what I mean! Do you … 'Like like' anyone?”

“Oh wow,” I sneer. “'Like like', Really? What are we twelve? I can go and fetch Mordelia, if you’d like. I’m sure she’d be very interested in this conversation.”

“Just answer the question, you knob,” he groans, shoving the hell of his palm into my shoulder blade, painfully.

“Alright, alright,” I laugh. “Yes, Snow. I 'Like like' someone … How about you?”

“Yeah,” he huffs, his eyes fluttering shut, and a soft smile gracing his face.

My stomach twists uncomfortably, as bitter jealousy pulls at my gut.

“What’s he like, then? - The guy you like.”

I scan my eyes across his face, taking him in properly - His stubby, bronze lashes, the slight rosy tinge of his full cheeks, the perfect constellation of moles that adorn practically every inch of skin. He’s perfect. Indescribably perfect.

“I don’t know,” I whisper, my voice pinched.

He opens his eyes then, beaming over at me, cheerfully. My chest swells, pitifully, at the sight of him. Drenched in moonlight, he’s the Sun - Bright, and warm, and beautiful. And, painfully untouchable.

“You must know,” he titters.

“Well, yes. Obviously. They’re just - It’s just hard to put into words.”

“Oh wow! The great Tyrannus Basilton Grimm-Pitch speechless, they must be special!”

“They are,” I reply, thoughtlessly.

His eyebrows jump upwards, clearly shocked by my earnestness.

“I see,” he drawls. “And have you known Mr. Special long?”

My heart stutters within my chest. I'm walking on dangerously thin ice, here.

“No. Not really. How about you? Have you known your person long?”

“Guy,” He rushes, his tone urgent. “They’re a guy,”

“Okay,” I whisper. “Have you known your guy long?”

“Nope. But, that doesn’t really matter … Does it?”

“Not really, no … I don’t think so, anyway.”

He smiles softly, then, but his brow quickly follows, furrowing conflictingly. He looks - Well, I don’t know how he looks. Disappointed? Pained? Worrying his lip, he screws his eyes shut, firmly.

My eyes dart across his face, madly, desperately trying to read him.

“Snow,” I call, poking a finger to the inside of his wrist. “Are you alright?”

Opening his eyes slowly, he sucks in a breath, and lifts his lips, weakly.

“I’m good. It’s good. I’m just -”

He sighs, frustrated, tugging at the curls that lay over his forehead, roughly.

“I don’t know. I just … Don’t know how to say it.”

I nod slightly, my pillow crinkling beneath me.

“Okay. Just take your time.”

"I don't think - I mean, I don't think that rushing is what's wrong. I can ... Maybe try and show you, instead. If you'd like?"

“Sure?” I answer, my voice creeping with uncertainty. “Whatever is easiest for you.”

Trembling slightly, he reaches forwards, timidly, and carefully tucks a wave of hair behind my ear.

My breath stills, as my treacherous body tenses up, defensively.

“Okay?” he whispers.

I nod, not trusting my voice.

He huffs out a breath, relieved, and reaches up, laying his hand against my cheek, properly. Tracing his thumb along the high-point of my cheekbone, softly.

His eyes trail downwards, tantalisingly slow - His gaze, impossibly hot, as it lands on my lips.

My heart skips a beat - A momentary break, from the insistent careening of my pulse.

I don’t really know what I’m thinking anymore, my mind trapped in a useless haze.

It’s completely overwhelming - Being looked at like this, being held like this. Like I’m something precious. Like I’m something worthy. Like I’m something … Loveable.

He must know - Surely, he must see it. His touch rendering my utterly defenceless, it must be written all over me, the truth of my affections tattooed across my skin, clear as day.

He’s right there, his face mere inches from mine. His hand resting against me, warm and reassuring.

I think I might do it. Just forget words, forget an explanation, forget caution, and just do it. Just end this exhausting charade and kiss him.

“Simon, I -”

And then he kisses me. Surging forwards, and crashing our lips together desperately.

For a moment, I freeze, stunned into stillness by the newness of it all. But then, instinct takes over, and I’m kissing him back - Sliding my lips against his, hungrily.

I have no idea what I’m doing, but doesn’t seem to mind - Humming against my lips, contentedly, his hands clasping at my hair.

He just his chin forwards, confidently, and I feel it everywhere - My body thrumming with his fire, from my tingling lips, to the white-hot heat, stirring deep within my stomach. It’s a wild push and pull, and I take everything he has to give me, willingly - Savouring each and every spark, greedily.

Utterly blissed out, and unstoppably happy, I smile against his lips, helplessly.

He pulls away, giggling breathlessly - Grinning down at me, his hair hassled, and his cheeks flushed.

Pushing my shoulder lightly, he presses me down into the mattress, and clambers on top of me, clumsily. Holding himself up above me, before leaning down and pushing his face into the crook of my neck - Nipping at the skin there, teasingly.

“I cant keep doing it if you keep smiling, idiot” he sing-songs, the deep gruff of his voice vibrating against my neck. “As much as I like you, I don’t really wanna kiss your teeth.”

Still floating, I laugh openly, my heart squeezing within my chest.

“It’s not my fault,” I mumble, leaning upwards, and pressing a chaste kiss to his exposed collarbone.

“Hmmm,” he hums, cradling the back of my head in his hands. “Whose fault is it, then?”

Refusing to answer, I stare at him - His eyes sparkling, and a wicked smirk, plastered across his face.

“Shut up,” I smile, rolling my eyes jokingly.

“You’re gonna have to make me.”

I raise my eyebrows, suggestively, reaching up and tugging him down towards me by the back of his neck. Our lips mere millimetres apart, I whisper against him, coquettishly.

“Oh. I will. Rest assured, when I’m finished with you, you’ll barely be able to string a sentence together.”

Puffing out a shaky breath, he trembles against me - A needy whine escaping his lips, as he does so.

I did that to him. Me. Fucking marvellous.

Wonderfully pleased, I snake my arms up his body, pulling him forwards, minimally, and claiming his lips with mine once more.

————————————————————————————

I’m sat propped up against the headboard, now (Snow pulled me up a while ago, grumbling about how I was 'Too far away'). He’s seated himself atop my thighs, our hands laced together between us, and his mouth working against mine, insistently.

I don’t know how long we’ve been wrapped up in each other (Long enough that my leg is prickling through lack of movement), but I’m certainly not complaining.

Shifting backwards, he beams over at me, a playful glint, sparkling in his eyes.

Enraptured, I trail my eyes over him, appreciatively, my gaze falling on his neck. Reaching a hand upwards, I circle a thumb over the small, red mark, blooming against the fair skin, a strange sense of pride welling up within me, as I do so. I hadn't set out to do it (Starting off with completely innocent intentions, I'd only hoped to press a kiss to a particularly appealing mole), but I’d quickly gotten carried away, his breathy huffs urging me ever onwards.

With a chaste kiss to my brown bone, he rolls his hips down against mine, just-so - The friction eliciting a pathetically needy moan, from me. I grip his hips, tightly - Pressing my fingers into the softness of his side.

Humiliated, I thunk my head down against his shoulder, hiding my face away, as it fills with a burning heat.

“Eager,” he giggles, his lips moving upwards, brushing against the peak of my forehead.

I pinch his thigh, lightly, in retaliation - Simon yelping against me, in surprise.

“Unless you want to discuss what’s currently pressed against my thigh, I suggest that you shut up! Otherwise, you can sleep alone,” I threaten.

“No, Baz,” he cries, throwing himself down onto the bed besides me. “You can’t do that to me. I’ve been proper nice to you, all night!”

I flip onto my side, so that I’m facing him, again - Apparently incapable of keeping my eyes off of him, for even a minute.

“I'm pretty sure that I can.”

His shoulders drop slightly, as his hand pats along the bed in search of mine.

“Yeah, but ... You wouldn’t, though. Would you?”

“No, Snow,” I breathe, weaving our hands together. “I wouldn't.”

Harumphing, he pouts his lips outwards, sulkily.

“What?” I chuckle, pushing myself up onto my arm, and leaning over him. “I thought you didn’t want me to.”

“Yeah but - You called me Simon before.”

I press out foreheads together, helplessly charmed.

“No, I never,” I argue - Because, despite all my unforgivable softness this evening, I’m still me. Irritatingly petty, to a fault.

“You definitely did.”

“Hmmm,” I hum, airly. “Well … I have no memory of it.”

He scoffs then, rolling his eyes, and peppering a flurry of kisses against my jaw.

“You definitely did. But ... No worry - Deny it all you want. I’ll get you to say it again, soon enough. I just need to soften you up,” he shrugs. “And that is easy, enough - A couple of snogs here and there, and hey presto ... I’ll get myself another 'Simon'”

I wince at his awful imitation of my accent. I don't know why he even bothers trying, with it - He always just ends up sounding like a drunken Prince Charles impersonator.

He chortles, bright and joyous, but is interrupted by a long, gasping yawn.

“Tired, Snow?” I goad.

He nods, smiling lopsidedly.

“Didn’t get much sleep last night.”

“Why ever not?” I pry.

“Nervous … You know - About this,” he murmurs, stroking the pad of his thumb against my lower lip.

My chest swoops joyfully, an unbridled grin breaking across my face.

Pursing my lips, and kissing his thumb, quickly, I reach down, and slot my hand into his. Interlocking our fingers, I drag our joined hands down, underneath the duvet, and spread his palm flat against my left breast.

He giggles lightly, pushing upwards, and pecking the tip of my nose.

“Your heart’s going super fast,” he breathes.

“Yes, well. You are aware of what we’ve been doing for the past … I don’t know how long.”

“Uh huh, I’m aware,” he affirms, the smugness plain in his voice. “It’s okay - Mine is, too.”

“Is that so?”

He nods, driving forwards, and pressing our lips together, once more. It’s slower this time, although no less exhilarating, his lips moving against mine, languidly - Our frantic desperation, replaced by a slower, sweeter indulgence.

I sigh, joyfully, luxuriating in the feeling of him against me. Melting into his touch, I’m putty in his hands - Open and relaxed. My heart feels exposed - Beating proudly, unprotected outside of the walls of my chest. But, I’m not afraid. I know he’ll treat it tenderly.

Snaking his free hand upwards, he tugs against my hair, enticingly. Moaning against his lips quietly, my stomach sparks with heat, once again.

Despite my eagerness to continue, I'm increasingly conscious of the hours slipping away from us, and so pull backwards, mournfully - Lifting my hips away from his, to remove temptation.

“Enough of that, you insatiable thing,” I chide, twisting a bronze curl around my finger, absentmindedly. “We’re going to have to wake up early, to put you back in the right bed, in case Daphne decides to check. And, if we don’t stop now, I’m not sure we’ll ever get to sleep.”

He huffs petulantly, his eyebrows pinched, and his lips pulling into a deep frown. I shake my head at him, unimpressed.

“Fine,” he whines. “Just - Roll over then.”

“What?” I cough, flustered.

“I said - Roll over. I wanna cuddle you.”

“Oh my god. 'Wanna cuddle you',” I groan, disdainfully. “Seriously?”

“Yes seriously, you wanker. Don’t pretend you don’t want to. It’s definitely a too late for you to start playing hard to get, Baz.”

Called out, I abandon my false protests, twisting onto my side, and wordlessly surrendering to what I want.

Wrapping a strong arm around my waist, he pulls me backwards slightly, and tucks me against his body, neatly.

With my face hidden from view, I smile, privately - The simple innocence of having him besides me, embarrassingly thrilling.

“G’night, Baz,” he mumbles, drowsily, blessing my shoulder with a feather-light kiss.

Uncontrollably lovestruck, I decide to indulge him (And, if I’m being honest, myself).

“Goodnight, Simon,” I coo.“Sleep well.”

With his smile against my skin, I flutter my eyes shut, and snuggle against him. Unfamiliarly content, I succumb to sleep, quickly - My mind blissfully quiet, and my heart seeped in love.

#carry on #wayward son #snowbaz #snowbaz fic #simon snow #tyrannus basilton grimm pitch

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moonstruckbucky · 5 years ago

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Rant Fest

So for the past couple of months, my “in-laws” (we’ll call them that even though my SO and I aren’t married *whispers* yet) have been driving me up a wall and then some.

His mom? Super sweet, loving... but a helicopter. And I don’t mean one of those dinky little news helicopters. I’m talking full-out military style, equipped with heat-seeking missiles kind of helicopter. She hovers a lot. Calls my SO multiple times a day, for no real good reason at all except to check up on him. Mind, he’s 30 - he’s a big boy.

Things have been a little stagnant for him since he had his seizure two months ago - he’s stranded without a car (totaled in the accident) and without a license (if you have a seizure MA state law dictates you automatically surrender your license for 6 months). So he’s been getting rides from her when he needs to, or his grandmother.

(Gonna throw a read more on this puppy. We now resume our regular scheduled dash scrolling).

Anyway. Besides the hovering, which has undoubtedly gotten worse since his accident, she gets a little too touchy with him that bothers me. Pinching his behind (again - he’s 30), and just all over him in general. I get because he’s the first born, she’s probably super attached to him - plus, he fell 15 or so feet when he was 2, so we think that’s what spurred her hovering because at the time I don’t think she was watching him; he ended up spending two weeks in the hospital after bonking his head. She doesn’t really act like this with her youngest son, who’s a year older than me at 28, but because he’s had issues with drugs/drinking in the past, she hovers over him too and clearly doesn’t trust him all that much.

Which, not that it’s my business, I have a problem with, because she isn’t giving him the chance to earn her trust back at all.

Then came Baxter, our one year old lab pup, who we got for free because we studded out our 6 year old male to a guy who’d grown up breeding coonhounds - so a responsible breeder. We took him home over Labor Day weekend last year. From the get-go she was all over us about training him, and what we should or shouldn’t do. A little note: I have my Associate’s in animal care, had to take hours of classes on dog training and behavior, so I like to think I know my shit about dogs, okay? Okay. It bothered the fuck out of me.

Cut to less than a month later, Nick’s grandmother gets out of bed in the middle of the night, takes a wrong turn and ends up falling down the stairs. Breaks her fingers on one hand and doing some other damage to her other arm.

First thing out of his mom’s mouth? “Did she trip over that dog?” I was livid. As if she couldn’t trust that we’d keep Baxter with us in his room at night - he was fast asleep when this happened. Even Nick (SO) was annoyed that she’d asked that.

Jump to this past weekend, and here’s a long background to this event.

About two months ago, Nick’s brother and his ex - not even his girlfriend anymore - decided they were going to get a puppy. Now, I think it was Jake’s idea to get the dog, and then the ex just maybe saw an opportunity to stick around, and voila, their puppy.

Who is a backyard bred pit bull puppy bred by a guy either by accidental pregnancy or because he “just wanted to try and breed his dogs”. Either way, these are key signs of an irresponsible breeder. Next sign? The fact he told them both they could take him at 5 weeks of age. When the normal age to take home dogs is 7-8 weeks. We took Bax home at 7 weeks. So not only is he missing out on crucial socialization skills such as bite inhibition and when to cool his jets with corrections from mom, but he’s incredibly small, the runt probably. And then begin the seizures. 5 week old puppy is now on anti-seizure meds - the same ones Nick is on actually.

What’s worse? Jake and his ex didn’t even pay for the fucking dog - Nick did, because Jake didn’t have the money. Makes me wonder how the fuck they’re paying vet fees for a sick dog.

You angry yet?

Jump to a few weeks later. This puppy is a fucking menace. Has zero bite inhibition and those puppy teeth are like razors. He was actually fucking vicious about it as well. Would only let you pet him so he could turn and nail you. Even. Worse? His “parents” encouraged this fucking behavior! Every time he began biting people, even if he was in someone else’s arms, “mom” would take him from them and cuddle him - thus, if you know a little about dog training, is seen as a reward by the dog. Even when I put him down on the floor when he started biting, she picked him up and cuddled him while trying to tell him “no”.

It doesn’t fucking work like that.

So you’ll understand why I get nervous as he gets bigger around Baxter. Having the reputation pits do (I don’t hate them; I just think not everyone should be allowed to own them if they’re not going to take training seriously - and even then, you can’t guarantee they won’t display some genetic aggression later in life), and I brought it to Nick. He’s convinced they’ll “be fine”, and frankly, I don’t want to take that risk because Baxter? Is a softie. He’s a wimp (sorry bubba, but you are), and he won’t stand up for himself - and I don’t want him to be in that position with another dog’s teeth in his neck, where he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do. Because by the time he figures it out, he might be dead (I’m gonna cry just thinking of that possibility).

So I keep an eye on them when they play. Jump to this weekend. The whole point of this rant. Sundays are for family dinner, and the puppy usually accompanies his parents. Why the ex still comes to fucking family dinner, I have no idea - she was his plus one to his sister’s wedding, which multiple people thought was fucking weird, myself included. Anyway, our boys are blocked off from the kitchen while we eat so the puppy can roam and we can keep an eye on him.

Then after dinner we let everyone in the kitchen. Well, Hydro (the 6 year old and Baxter’s father/sire) is at the table looking for scraps (bad habit, I know) when the puppy wanders over.

Now, let me mention this: Hydro was trained and raised as a hunting dog, so while he is socialized, he isn’t a very social dog with other dogs or even strange people. When Baxter was a puppy learning about boundaries, he pushed Hydro too far, and Hydro nailed him - picked him up by the head and tossed him. Baxter was fine, but he kind of got the gist. I was concerned, but at the same time I know it’s how a dog communicates enough is enough. Baxter still pushes boundaries but he’s a jerk like that. It isn’t for lack of trying.

So, puppy wanders over to Hydro, who gives a low warning growl to tell him he’s too close, he needs to back off. Adult dogs don’t very much like puppies to begin with because they have absolutely no manners. It’s crucial in dog development for them to be able to be taught by older dogs in their own way what is right and what is wrong.

Well, puppy made a wrong move not backing off, and Hydro snarled and snapped his teeth at him. He ended up catching him on the snout. Puppy starts screaming because he probably hasn’t had a dog do this before, and it’s bedlam. Hydro ducks under the table thinking he’s going to be punished for communicating in a way the puppy will understand. “Mom” scoops up the puppy, in goddamn tears (fucking please), acting like Hydro just tried to maul him. I’m watching this whole thing happen trying not to roll my eyes at everyone losing their minds.

I feel terrible for Hydro, so I’m the only one (even Nick wasn’t assuring him he wasn’t a bad dog right away, and that dog is attached to his hip) worried about Hydro. So I give him love and attention and tell him he’s okay, he’s not a bad dog. You can’t punish a dog for communicating that he’s had enough, for setting his own boundaries - and “mom” coddling the puppy isn’t helping him either, but he did learn. He was a little nervous about Baxter approaching him, but I’m glad his instinct wasn’t to bite. Had Hydro wanted to hurt him, he would have.

The puppy has to learn - even Baxter was trying to get away from him and everyone was just letting the puppy leap at him. Now granted, I read this morning you shouldn’t do that - if your older dog is trying to get away, you need to separate them.

Anyway, the family, besides Nana and Nick, kept giving Hydro wary glances every time he entered the room in case he was going to just up and attack the puppy. Which pissed me off.

What made it worse? Nick’s mother claiming Hydro wasn’t “socialized”, and the fourth time she said it, I corrected her with, “He’s socialized just fine. The puppy has to learn that dogs have boundaries. Not all of them are going to be like Baxter.”

(Spoiler alert: he would’ve learned this had he been allowed to stay with mom those extra 3 weeks)

So I’ve come to the decision that when Nick and I move to Maine next year, the dogs are staying home, and I’ll be minimizing contact between them. I don’t trust at all that they’re going to take the puppy’s training seriously, especially for a breed that’s so stigmatized like pit bulls. 7% of the dog population and they’re number 1 in fatalities? There’s something wrong there.

Anyway, this is my giant rant that’s been building up.

OH, and when we move to Maine, I’m going to do a happy dance because it means Nick’s mom can’t drop in unexpectedly all the fucking time and disrupt my domestic life. I can’t wait.

Uh, yeah, so y’all asked for it and here it is. Go wild on feedback, thoughts, agreements, whatever.

#personal #in laws #dogs #dog training

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urcountrygirl · 4 years ago

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Silent Thoughts- My own story

(this is my favorite story I have written ever because most of it is showing my true feelings on people and vice versa. Most of the people in this story are real, wherever they are in their life now. )

If I'm right, If you live to be 80 years old, You end up living 29,220 days. So one day you can't remember shouldn't matter. Especially if it's a day that you can't remember. I mean, I can't remember some things once it is a few weeks, months and even days or hours past. So a day you can't remember shouldn't matter, but it's different if it's a day that's lost. It's like a hole in your body and as much as you try and pretend that it's not there, you can't help but poke it. To probe it. Because even though it's empty, you can still feel something. l try to focus on the life I’m living. I am trying to get momentum to do tasks like chores, homework, and my art. Most days I can't do it but most days I actually can do it. In my heart I know I'm lost in a different way. I sit here and think. It was only 2 days ago I played on XBOX 360 for a full day. After about 2 hours, I had gotten to the top level. Once I had gotten to the top level, I felt a momentary exhilaration than a sadness because it was done. I could go back and redo it. To try again and I could find new variations, things that I had missed the 1st time. But in the end, It would still be over. I would Still reach the point where it was over. That was my life now, replaying the simple game or being in a fight I have already won. I know I deserve better. I am constantly apologizing to myself as I stumble through school, as I barely hear what the teachers are attempting to teach us. But I think more. Life is harder when you have somebody or something to miss. The next day comes. Monday morning at 3:00 in the morning and my alarm goes off playing a song I actually enjoy. This makes it easier for me to get up and start my workouts. As I am eating pancakes and a Starbucks Mocha after my workout, I feel like something is missing or I should be doing something. Because of this, I think even more. Part of what makes my personality actually work is my ability to be here day in and day out for people that I love and trust. My friends rely on me and I rely on them. The simple balance on which so many lives are built. My acquaintance that is wanting to be a friend of mine tells me her life story, then some. But as of now all I got out of her story and the then some part is that she is pregnant and the baby's father is in jail even though she is 16 years old. She also tells me she trusts me more than the father. But then I flashback to all of 5he little fights I have had with my father. Stupid fights like over fish sticks or music. He tells me that my music is a dead-end calling and I should stop even though he encouraged my brother to pursue music. I flashback in reality. I am still standing there listening to this girl go one about her life so I am sipping down my second Bang energy drink after I already had two Monsters. I am back home drinking the Starbucks Frappuccino and trying to finish an essay. I am failing my French class and in tears when my parents confront me about it. I am finally alone in my room and I am playing the same tune over and over again trying to figure out what it exactly means to me and what words to put in it. My ex-girlfriend is apologizing to me about her cheating on me. I decide to go and meet up with my closest and only friend at the park. We are swing on the swing set and I have the small flashback of me in the exact swing at 6 years old going higher and higher until I was convinced at that moment I could fly. I slip money into my friend’s purse so she can pay her half of lunch. I am dressed as a ladybug at 2 years old for Halloween, and my mom burnt her hand on the stove that same night making mac and cheese. I am failing my driver’s test and to the point, I am practically balling my eyes out when the lady tells me. I finally pass the test a week later and the first thing I do when I get my license, I go to the beach. Watch the sunrise and the birds attacking the fish as they dive into the water. I am in my own world. I am blocking out other people that are there. I do this a lot because I keep in my mind that I am lonely and every person is the possibility. I met this guy (you) a month or so ago. You like me and I like you. I asked you why you like me. You said because of me, because of my kindness. My engagement in the world. Engagement in the possibilities of different ways of living life. We met up at a bookstore. You stared at me. "I have an idea." "Okay?" I responded skeptically. "Let's pretend that this is the first time we have ever met. Let's pretend you came to get the book. I happened to want the same book so I accidentally ran into you. We struck up a conversation. I like you and you like me." You paused and smiled at me. "Now we are going to get coffee. I don't know anything about you. I don't know anything about your ex." You had paused again to think about what you just said and did a try-hard smile like 'sorry about mentioning him'. You took a sip of your frappuccino. And for some reason, this all feels right. You continued, "We are meeting for the first time. Okay?" "Okay but why? " You ignored my question. "No past, no future, just present. Okay? It's that easy. Forget about the world. Forget about all of the pain us teenagers are going through right now." "Okay. I guess." We went to the store. Then after we got $200 worth of food, mainly fruit, we went to your house. You had me cook because I am Italian. We filled the air with music, we moved in tandem. We moved in unison. This is our first date. First time alone together without any adults breathing down our necks. And I can't help but think this is the way it should always be. The easygoing sharing of space. Your parents are in California. I am there. Chopping garlic and vegetables and I am totally unaware of my posture, the craziness of my hair. Unaware of how much you are staring at me. With a lot of love, and outside of our kitchen size bubble, the nighttime sings and dances. I look up through the sky window and I see the stars shining bright like a LED light. And I also see your reflection mapped up out on top of it. Everything is where I think it should be and my heart believes it is all right. That this can always be true. My heart wants this all to be true. Even if something darker tugs it away. Friday comes faster than it should have and I am distracted again. Everybody is having their conversations. Earlier in the day I actually for once, paying attention. But my mind says that it is enough for one day. My friends don’t mind if I am quite once and a while. As long as they feel I'm present. Physically I am there but mentally I am not. They think I am listening and I used to feel like this was enough. To pretend like everything was perfect. Like the world has no evil. I go to the hospital to see the maternity ward. All of the little babies. So innocent. Of purity. Seeing how they know no evil. How they don't know rejection or heartbreak. They don't have any pain. They are like puppies, so adorable, but have so much to learn. So much to figure out and discover. That to me? Is what life is all about. Finding things out and living with risks. To be honest risks that nobody else will take because they are trying to live the perfect life. And yet there is no such thing as perfection. Nothing and nobody is perfect. It's just how the world is.

#my writing #silent thoughts #depression #struggle is real #love #prefection

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davidedwardking · 5 years ago

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Has anyone heard of this city?! No one seems to remember it, and something horrific might have happened to it.

Apparently, there was once a city in the north of Sweden called Korona, but somehow we’ve all forgotten about it. I’m a police officer working in Kalix, a municipality close to where the lost city of Korona is supposed to have been. At that place, there are no signs of the city – only a dense forest – but certain details related to my own family makes me certain this place was indeed real.

The entire world just forgot about it… I can’t imagine how or why, but it’s the only conclusion I’ve been able to reach. For me, this all started when two Romanian blueberry pickers came into my small office to report something they had found deep in the dense forest. They didn’t know enough Swedish or English to explain exactly what it was that they had found, but it was immediately clear to me that it had terrified them completely. From what I understood, it seemed to involve a human corpse. Eventually, after having brought in an interpreter from the town next to mine, it was revealed that they had stumble upon a dead child, no more than ten years old.

They led me and two of my colleagues – followed by an ambulance – to the location where they had found the child. The sun was setting behind a thick mist when we got there. I lit a cigarette while we left the main road and walked into the forest, to where the child was supposed to be. I felt a bit uncomfortable having to deal with a dead child, but I had handled cases like this before – some car accidents – and didn’t feel too affected by it now. It was just another job, or so I thought.

The Romanians stopped when we got close and refused to go any further. There was panic in their eyes, more than I expected even given these extreme circumstances. One of my colleagues stayed with them while the rest of us continued. We soon came upon a huge boulder that had been placed there by the ice sheet that covered Europe during the ice age. My colleague walked around it and a few moments later he came running back, pale as if he had seen the Devil himself. He bent down and puked right in front of me.

“It…” he said. “It’s on the other side… Holy shit.”

I didn’t ask him any questions, I only proceeded to check it out for myself with the medics following behind me. What we found on the other side of the boulder… It wasn’t natural. Half the child – a blond little girl – was fused with the boulder just as if she had been passing through it as a ghost and then suddenly turned into a human before she had time to exit the rock. Or, as my colleague later remarked, it was as if she had been teleported into the rock. The girls sorrowful, dead gaze into the forest seemed to tell a story of a tragedy unknown to the living. The medics quickly shied away from her eyes in silence, horrified by the fate she must have suffered, but I couldn’t look away. I’ve never been a religious man, but this experience made me doubt everything I’d believed before.

And I don’t just mean the bizarre way the poor girl had lost her life, half engulfed by the boulder… There was something else about the girl as well. Something that made me feel completely empty inside, just as if a piece of my own soul was ripped out of me leaving an empty hole in my heart that quickly filled up with a sorrow I had never felt before. It was a dreadful feeling, only made worse by the strange fact that a small part of me recognized the girl. I couldn’t tell from where… Her face was like the vague memory of a dream recently forgotten.

We collected ourselves and started talking, trying to make sense of the situation without any success, while the medics approached the body. I tried to focus on the hard facts while we investigated the scene. The girl was wearing a pink jacket. In one of the pockets, we found an odd looking flower – it’s colors were exotic and resembled the wings of a beetle – and a yellow library card with a text that puzzled us. “The library of Korona,” it said.

The girl had written her name on the card as well. When I saw it, my world started spinning. “Isabella Lexelius”, it said in the girls childish handwriting.

“Isn’t that your last name, sir?” my colleague said.

“It… it is…” I didn’t know what to say or think.

“Well, do you know her?”

“I… I don’t know… No… No, I’ve never seen her before in my entire life. It must be a coincidence.”

“That’s a pretty big coincidence, sir.”

I didn’t respond to that.

“There’s something on the ground as well”, one of the medics said.

On the bloodstained moss beneath the girl, there was a notebook. It must have fallen out of her hand, the one that was hanging limply above the book. I picked it up and opened it. The pages were covered with small text, written with a different handwriting than the girl’s.

“Sir!” one of the medics said. “We will have to bring some tools to cut her down.”

“Yes”, I said absently.

“There’s one more thing”, the medic said.

I put the book in a plastic evidence bag. “What?”

“There’s too much blood.” The medic pointed at the ground.

“What do you mean there’s too much blood?” I asked.

“Beneath the boulder, sir”, the medic explained. “It’s impossible for all that blood to come from a child.”

A moment of silence, then I said:

“We will have to come back here with better tools.”

A day later, we successfully removed the upper body of the girl and brought it back to the morgue where it was examined. We also tried to lift the boulder with the help of a crane, but it wouldn’t budge. Instead, we dug a hole under it but we didn’t find any new body parts. All we could do this day was to sample as much of the blood as possible.

During the examination of the body, I read the notebook. It contained the story of the city of Korona. I was convinced it was fiction – a deranged story written by the man I thought must have killed the girl – until a few weeks ago when the forensic lab called me.

I still have a hard time believing it, but they told me there’s no other way. They had tested the DNA of the girl and compared it to mine because of her last name. It was my idea, since I didn’t want anyone to suspect anything. We didn’t think it would reveal anything, but it did… The ten or so years old girl, Isabella, was my daughter. I was sure it wasn’t possible. Ten years earlier I lived with my ex-wife and I never cheated on her and certainly didn’t have any children with her. We stayed together for five more years, so I would’ve known if she had a baby during that time. And yet, there was nothing wrong with the test.

Below is a transcript of the notebook. I’ve typed it out here in the hopes that someone will remember the city of Korona or someone who might have lived in it. Please contact me if you have any information.

This is what was inside the notebook:

My name is Helena Fredriksson. Five years ago I was a different person. I was younger back then, not just in the ordinary sense but in spirit too. There was joy in my life and I had hopes and dreams. That’s all gone now… I don’t have that much time to write this down, but I will try and explain what happened to us – to our entire community – as well as I can.

The event, as we have come to call it, occurred on July 9, 2013. I was only visiting Korona over the day to take my niece – Isabella – to the grand opening of The Red Grove, the cities new amusement park. It was supposed to be the biggest one in Sweden and Isabella had begged her parents to go to the grand opening, but neither of them had been able to due to work. So they called me and asked me to do it for them. I was their go-to person for when they needed help with Isabella, the only one they trusted. How I wish that hadn’t been the case now, considering what happened.

We arrived pretty early, a few hours before the opening, so that we wouldn’t need to stay in line the whole day to get inside. The weather was amazing. It had rained earlier in the morning, so we had been a bit worried, but when we got to the city there wasn’t a cloud in sight.

Isabella couldn’t stop talking about how much fun we would have, and it warmed my heart to see her so happy. It took us a bit longer than expected to get to the amusement park since one of the main streets had been closed off for a military parade. This didn’t bother us that much, it rather increased the feeling of celebration in the air. To avoid the parade, we had to take a bus to the city center, the Freyja square, and from there we had to take the subway to the Yellow Neutral business cluster – the tallest skyscrapers in Sweden. It was possible for us to walk to The Red Grove from there.

There were people everywhere. It turned out that a lot of them had taken a ferry down the river that I didn’t know about. This meant we had to stand in line after all. Isabella didn’t mind, but I knew she would get hungry soon, and I worried that it would ruin her mood. Luckily, there was a man selling hot dogs from a cart that he was pushing down the line. I bought a hot dog and a soda for Isabella. Her parents didn’t really like when I bought her junk food, but a day like this I thought they would understand. The man was also selling red balloons to the children. Isabella said she wanted one. I tried to tell her that she would have to carry it around all day and that there would be more balloons inside the amusement park, but she wouldn’t listen. Reluctantly, I bought her a balloon as well.

At this point, no one knew that their entire lives were about to change in a matter of minutes.

Isabella accidentally let go of the balloon. I feared it would make her sad, but it didn’t seem to bother her that much. We looked at the balloon as it rose up into the air and drifted away. Soon, it was but a red dot against the vast blue sky. Then, suddenly, it vanished.

“Where did it go?” Isabella said.

I couldn’t explain it. It had just disappeared.

“I don’t know”, I said. “Maybe it popped?”

But something – an uneasy feeling I couldn’t rationalize – made me doubt that. Then, only a few minutes later, strong winds came from every direction. It carried a smell with it that reminded me of something rotten.

“Ew”, Isabella said as her long white hair was blowing in the wind. “What’s that smell?”

I held her hand harder. “I don’t know,” I said.

People looked around, confused, and their joyful voices became concerned. Something was happening, but no one knew what it was. Sirens echoed in the distance, seemingly coming from the business cluster.

“Oh my god,” a woman said and pointed towards the skyscrapers. “The top of the building is gone!”

It wasn’t that easy to see, but she was right. The top of the tallest building was gone as if it had been cut off with a knife. Isabella was too short to see it, but she picked up that something wasn’t right on everyone's faces and she became worried herself.

“I think we need to get away from here,” I said, acting completely on instinct. “I don’t think it’s safe.”

Isabella teared up. “But the opening, aren’t we…”

“We will come back later sweetheart,” I said as I walked away from the crowd with her. One of the ferries were just about to leave. We quickly stepped aboard. A few others joined us, but most of the people stayed behind in the hopes that everything would be sorted out. Isabella cried, but she wasn’t mad. As the ferry slowly drove away from the riverside promenade a commotion of some kind erupted among the crowd back on land. I couldn’t see what was going on, but suddenly everyone screamed in terror and tried to run towards the water. They were clearly escaping from something, but I couldn’t see what it was. All I saw was people stepping on each other while they tried to jump into the river and swim away. It was a horrible sight, and I’m glad Isabella wasn’t tall enough to see over the railing.

Next, the sirens from the emergency alert system began blasting its eerie sound of imminent catastrophe. Everyone asked questions no one had any answers to. Most people I heard thought we were under attack, either by terrorists or the Russians.

I picked up my phone to call my sister, but there was no signal. I tried with Isabella's phone as well without any luck. I soon discovered that no one had any signal. At the sides of the river that passed through the city, people were looking out of their windows trying to get a glimpse of what was going on but the only thing they could see that was out of the ordinary was the cut off building in the Yellow Neutral business cluster.

“Look”, Isabella said and pointed at the sky. “I’ve never seen such a big bird before!”

An enormous bird-like creature soared high above us. It was pitch black. Although it was impossible to say for sure, it seemed to be just as confused about seeing us as we were seeing it. It circled the city center a few times and then flew away again. The sight of the giant bird, or whatever it truly was, turned our anxious confusion into terror. We still didn’t know what had happened, but now we knew it didn’t have anything to do with terrorists or some foreign power. This was something else, something impossible to believe and yet at the same time impossible to deny.

The ferry let us off a bit further down the river, close to Freyja square. People seemed to be in a state of panic, although no one knew what was wrong. Some were packing their cars to escape the city, others were running somewhere – perhaps to their loved ones – but most people clustered around police officers, city workers or military personnel from the parade to try and get some information. But they only got the same answer over and over again, yelled at them so that it could be heard over the sirens from the emergency alert system: that nothing was known and that they needed to return to their homes and listen to the radio for more information.

“How are we suppose to listen to the radio when the power is out?!” The voice came from an old woman. “Look around, there’s no power!”

She was right.

“Go home and close your windows and wait for the power to come back,” a policeman said. “We don’t know what is going on, but the safest thing to do is to follow the procedure…”

He was interrupted by something happening a few meters away. The first person who had tried to leave the city – a man on a loud motorcycle – had come back. I was carrying Isabella, comforting her at the same time as I tried to hear what the man on the bike was trying to tell everyone. I pushed through to get closer to him. He walked to the center of the square and climbed up on the foot of the statue of Freyja. Few people believed him, but everyone that had seen the creature in the sky had no doubt he was telling the truth however impossible it seemed.

“There’s no way out!” the man yelled. “The main road cuts of at the edge of the city and… There’s only jungle. I can’t explain it. I’m sorry. But it’s true. We are surrounded by a dense, thick, jungle and there’s no way around it.”

“Then it’s true,” a policeman whispered to himself next to me. “For the love of God, it was all true.”

I asked him what he meant. First, he didn’t want to acknowledge my question, but when he saw my confusion and tears in my niece's innocent eyes he turned to me and said quietly:

“Before we lost contact with the helicopter that was surveilling the parade, the pilot said something that simply didn’t make sense. He… He was crashing. Something had cut off his rotor blades. And he said that it all had changed somehow… The view had changed. Before he hit the ground he yelled that he had seen a jungle to the west and an ocean to the east.”

More and more reports came in and even though it was impossible to tell rumors from facts they were all telling the same story: the entire world around the city had been replaced in an instance. The city was the same, but the sky above it wasn’t. Eventually, the screaming sirens went silent, the cars stopped beeping their horns and the cacophony of voices died out. An uncanny silence fell over the city. The feeling was beyond unreal.

I didn’t know what any of this meant. I tried to explain it to my niece, but she was only five years old and she couldn’t understand. She wanted to go home to her parents and I didn’t know what to tell her. She was tired and needed rest, so I went to a hostel nearby and paid for a room. Soon, the economy of the city would collapse but for the first few days in this new unknown world, people still accepted money as payment.

What followed was five years of unending trials and hardships, a continuous battle for survival with no hope for help or rescue. It started during the first night. The sun, identical to our own yet new and strange, sat due north instead of west and was replaced by unrecognizable stars covering the entire sky. As I looked up at them from the small window in our room, I didn’t feel awe, but rather I felt completely lost. The strangest feeling during all these years must have been the paradoxical sensation of familiarity on the streets mixed with the awareness of total displacement. I think this was partly why people kept close to the city center, to drown themselves in the illusion of being home even though they knew, deep down, that they couldn’t escape their fate as stranded in the unknown.

Then, as I leaned out the window, I heard the sounds. People screaming, gunshots, cars driving madly through the streets without anywhere to go and the occasional odd howling that made my blood run cold. I never saw anything of what happened that night, but it changed the population – more than two million people – forever.

I closed the window and hid behind the bed with Isabella. She wanted to cry for her mother, but I kept my hand over her trembling mouth.

The next night was calmer, probably because no one dared venture outside. During the days, I soon realized, the threat didn’t come from the unknown jungle outside of the city but from the people within it. It was impossible to tell how much crimes were committed, but given what I saw with my own eyes – looting, robberies, and even murders – I figured the rate of crime must have gone up by a lot. However, it wasn’t total anarchy. The police and the few military units that had been in town for the parade kept some vital order to the community. Since ordinary people didn’t have guns, the police and the military wasn’t threatened by the average citizen.

A leader stepped forward – the man on the motorcycle – and after a few weeks, everyone seemed to cooperate peacefully. The food that was left in the stores were mostly distributed fairly and everyone that could work seemed to do it without hesitation, even I.

The scientists that had been working at the university at the time of the event couldn’t figure out what had happened, but with the help of hundreds of citizens, they managed to build a small nuclear power plant that could return electricity to the city. I mostly helped out with that project. I didn’t know anything about nuclear physics, but I did what little I could. It was amazing what we were capable of as a people and in all my dreadfulness a feeling of pride grew in my chest. Although, our time in this world wasn’t simple. Far from it.

Aside from my personal problem with keeping Isabella healthy and safe – which I succeeded with although she never felt safe – there were three major problems that kept growing larger for every week.

The first one was the food and water situation. Some people had managed to grow wheat and potatoes in parks and on soccer fields, but it wasn’t enough. We were running out of food and water. It did rain from time to time, but very few people felt safe drinking the rainwater. To battle this problem – and to find solutions to some other problems as well – expeditions were sent out to explore the jungle. These typically ended the same way, that is with no one coming back. Only once or twice did someone manage to return to the city, but they weren’t themselves anymore. It was as if something in the jungle had captured their souls and let their bodies walk back unscratched.

The second problem was nature. It seemed to have spared us the first couple of months, but soon after we got the electricity back it turned on us. It took a while before I saw it with my own eyes, but – seemingly at random – mysterious creatures entered the city. Sometimes they just walked right through it, never to return again. A policewoman – one of the new recruits – told me that she had followed a naked blue child as it solemnly walked into the city and then back out of it again.

At other times indescribable monsters wreaked havoc on the streets, killing as many people as they could before returning to wherever they came from.

At one point – and this I actually saw for myself – an enormous centipede, pure white with hundreds of red eyes, suddenly appeared from a manhole. It quickly climbed up against a building – as if it knew exactly what it was doing – and entered one of the windows on the top floor. Next came the screams from the people inside the building. A few escaped, but everyone else inside were ripped to shreds. Only after about five minutes did the centipede exit the building from the entrance, it’s white segmented body stained with blood, and returned down the manhole.

These attacks, as they were called, aroused fear and panic in all of us. Although it didn’t happen that often, it happened often enough for everyone to be on edge all the time.

The third problem also didn’t become noticeable until later. It was a problem of health. There was no pattern to who was affected or not, but some people – probably no more than 1% – got sick. It started out like a fever and slowly progressed with nightmarish mutations randomly hitting the body. Most of these mutations made the victims handicapped and disfigured, but sometimes – very rarely – the victims developed properties that were seemingly beneficial to them. The most extreme case of this that I saw was a young girl who grew a third eye in the middle of her forehead. The iris of the new eye glittered with amazing colors and the girl claimed that she could use the eye to see other peoples emotions.

At the beginning of the health crisis, the sick people were treated badly, just as if they had been monsters from the jungle. This treatment only got worse when it was revealed that the creatures from outside never attacked the sick. At one point, a mob gathered at Freyja square, set on chasing the sick people out of the city. Luckily, this was stopped by the military.

In the end, however, the sick people were sent into the jungle. Not to be away with them, though, but to make use of their immunity to the nature of this world. This turned into a huge success that eventually solved the food and water problem. They could venture out and explore the surrounding area and return with edible fruits, vegetables, and small mammal-like animals that they hunted.

This was a turning point for us. And then luck stroke again. All attempts at fishing had failed so far, but all of a sudden there were fish everywhere in the river. We soon learned that there were different periods for when the fish was out to sea or close to land. However, as soon as they came close to land mysterious purple thunderstorms that lasted weeks tormented the city. And yet, we survived. Many people didn’t, of course, but life was possible. In the end, we prevailed.

During the five years that followed there weren’t that many catastrophes and our focus on survival kept most of our thoughts of home away. Even Isabella thought less and less of her parents as she grew older. Over time, most people got used to the bizarre situation they had found themselves in back in July 2013. Many people did commit suicide, yes, but most people choose to live on in this unknown land.

Two events, however, changed things. First, it was what happened to a planned expedition at sea. Hundreds of people, mostly men, decided to venture out into the ocean with one of the luxury cruisers that had been moored next to the city. This was going to be a great adventure and, perhaps, a way to find some answers to where we had ended up. It inspired all of us. Thousands of people – Isabella and I included – had gathered to watch as the huge boat slowly sailed out. It all felt similar to that day five years earlier when we had waited for the amusement park to open. We all stared at the horizon as the boat – named Birdo de Espero – turned into a small dot against the setting sun. We imagined the amazing adventures they would be on and looked forward to their return. But then something that must have been larger than anything we had seen so far came out of the water and swallowed Birdo de Espero whole.

Some people screamed and others cried. This was a hard blow to the city. Just knowing that a being like that – a being able to eat an entire luxury cruiser in one bite – could exist deprived many people their hopes of a future.

The next event was different. It was a miracle, to say the least. It happened only a month after the destruction of Birdo de Espero. A military guard, a young man who had only been fifteen at the time of our disappearance from Earth, discovered that when he stood at a certain place at Freyja square he could tune into to a specific radio station from our old world. The station's name was Synthwave Mix and dedicated most of its broadcasting to that kind of music. Hope returned immediately, but this time the hope was different from the one we had spent five years building up within ourselves. This was the hope of seeing our loved ones again. The hope to return home. The people at the university investigated the area to try and determine where the radio signals were coming from. They didn’t have much success but soon realized that they emanated from the ground beneath Freyja square.

While the area was investigated by the scientists, ordinary people showed up en masse. They all had radios of different kinds with them, like children carrying stuffed animals to feel safe, hoping to tune in to Synthwave Mix and get a taste of their lost home. Of course, the area where the radio station could be heard was too small and the police had to chase everyone away to give the scientists the room they needed. A few days later, though, the scientists placed a set of large speakers at the foot of the statue of Freyja and connected them to the receiver they were using to listen in on the radio station.

Day and night the relaxed, somewhat melancholic, synthetic music played non-stop to the entire city. People congregated around the statue. They even defied the dangers of the night. This became our cities new tradition. Ending the day by going to the statue and sitting down around it, as if in prayer, became our pilgrimage. It wasn’t exactly the music that drew people to the square, but rather it’s origin. Still, the electronic melodies soon turned into a symbol of all of our hopes and desires. From time to time, people got up and danced – sometimes while crying from a bittersweet joy difficult to explain. Although, the thing that made us all go silent and become totally focused was when the hosts said something. Usually, they only spoke about the music they were broadcasting – completely unaware that an entire city full of people were listening to them almost religiously – but on rare occasions, they talked about the world outside. At those times it felt like our hearts collectively stopped in anticipation. Would they say something about us, about their efforts to figure out where we all had gone and how they would bring us back? But there was never any news about us, just as if they had already forgotten about us or never known about us at all. The tragic fate of the city of Korona never came up. Yet, we never lost fate.

It took a long time – and now I’m getting closer to the present day – but eventually, the scientists decided that it would be worthwhile digging a large hole right where the radio waves seemed to sip out of the ground. This was no easy task and neither was it safe. The work took weeks. Again we all helped. No one really knew what exactly we were looking for, we only knew that it was something.

When we reached the bottom, where the rock was too hard to dig through, a mountain of dirt covered the entire square. Our efforts hadn’t been in vain, we discovered. Right beneath the place where the radio waves had been picked up, there was a small hole in the bedrock. People were asked to back away from it while the scientists investigated it. First, they tried to measure how deep it was. This took some time since it was hard to find a long enough rope. In the end, it was estimated to be about 700 meters deep. Next, some equipment was sent down tied to the end of the rope, and to everyone's surprise everything that was sent down was swallowed by the hole. Of course, no one knew where it went but we all thought the same thing. That, somehow, it had returned home. It was a reasonable assumption given that the only thing coming out of the hole – the radio waves – came from Earth. We all rejoiced in this discovery. More experiments were done and although some questions remained unanswered the consensus – even among the scientists – was that the hole really was a portal back to our own world.

There were two large problems that needed to be solved though. The first was the safety. Every time something tied to the rope disappeared at the bottom of the hole, the rope was cut off just like the skyscraper five years earlier. This meant that it was possible that whoever entered the hole would be cut off as well. However, this problem was solved pretty soon. By tying a camera to the rope, connected to a screen above ground, it was discovered that the rope was only cut off when pulled back. As long as it wasn’t pulled back, the screen still received signals from the camera. The camera never recorded anything other than darkness on what was assumed to be the other side, but since it continued to work until the rope was pulled back this didn’t seem to be such a big problem. After all, some technical issues were expected under the circumstances.

The second problem was that the hole was too small for anyone to fit into. Many attempts were made to widen the hole, but the bedrock seemed to be made out of a stronger material than any of our machines could tear into. This was extremely frustrating. It made us feel like we had reached the finish line only to discover that we were unable to cross it. In the end, one of the scientists said she wanted to send her ten-year-old son down the hole. He was small enough to fit into it. This was widely debated for quite some time before it was approved. The mother argued that the city of Korona was no place for her son and that all the evidence suggested the hole was the only way home.

The boy was brave. He knew he would probably never see his poor mother again but still went through with it. He was given a walkie-talkie and after a tear-filled goodbye to his mother, he was sent down the 700 meters deep, pitch black hole. He was instructed to radio in after he reached the other side, confirming he was safe. After the rope was pulled back, the mother waited and waited for her son to report. However, he never did. For weeks, the mother sat at the edge of the hole – under merciless heat and under pouring rain – calling her son over and over again with her walkie-talkie. No one knew what, if anything, had gone wrong. Since no other radio waves had been picked up other than Synthwave Mix, it was possible that other radio waves simply couldn’t enter into our world for some reason. Still, the authority deemed the hole too unsafe for anyone else to enter.

This didn’t change peoples minds though. The hole represented the only true hope we had felt in years. And given all the horrible things in our world that could destroy us at any moment as easily as it is for us to blow out a candle, the small risk of going through the hole seemed to be more than acceptable. The hole was guarded by the police, but most of the police shared the cities collective opinion that the hole was the only way out… not for any of the adults, but for our children.

And now I’m sitting here, in the room I payed for five years ago, writing this down. During the last few weeks, many parents have been sending their children down the hole at night. This world is truly no place for them. Although they could survive, they deserve better. Hence, like many others, I’ve decided to send Isabella home. When I told her about it, she looked at me with a happiness in her eyes I hadn’t seen since we were transported to this dreadful, godforsaken world.

I’ve been writing this all day now. It’s my testimony to what happened to Korona. I will give this notebook to Isabella. I’m sure she will be able to give it to her father. Somehow, I know it in my heart that she will find her way home to her parents. Soon it will be dark and I will bring Isabella to Freyja square one last time.

I’m sorry it took so long,

Helana

#favorites

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bro-stoevsky · 6 years ago

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The Story of Lt. Michael Fitton and the Shark Papers

(@pilferingapples @thiswaitingheart @twofrontteethstillcrooked and @artificialities thank you for your Shark Papers support. @plinytheyounger as always thank you for listening to me BREATHLESSLY relate this on mobile during the workday.) and now

IT IS TIME for the story. The story of.....

Lt. Michael Fitton and the Shark Papers.

This story has every element necessary to a good story, those being:

Breakfast

Sharks

Paperwork

I accidentally stumbled upon the story of Lt. Michael Fitton and the Shark Papers last night in the following nigh-inscrutable anecdote about HMS Abergavenny:

“The tender Ferret and the cutter Sparrow were involved in a curious incident in which Ferret's captain, Acting Lieutenant Michael Fitton, served a shark to Lieutenant Hugh Wilie, captain of Sparrow and then surprised him with some papers.”

Reading this I have no idea what the fuck. You served someone a shark and “surprised him with some papers”? Like fine but. Why? Let us find out.

DISCLAIMER: I should warn you that this is not a legitimate academic inquiry into the Shark Papers, and certainly there are Shark Papers experts more expert than myself. But do they have my current feverish Shark Papers enthusiasm? I think not! Also it seems that the story of the Shark Papers, as with many good stories about sharks and/or papers, has split into many apocryphal directions. Still. It is time for the story......of Lt. Michael Fitton and the Shark Papers.

The year is 1799. The place, the Mona Passage. The West Indies? Very confusing trade wise. America? NEUTRAL in the war between England and France (despite fighting an undeclared war with France) honestly because we were busy with, I assume, an escalating workplace prank war between John Adams and Alexander Hamilton.

This was, in general, a very unsafe region in which to be an American merchant ship, fearing as they did not only harassment by the French but also sometimes the Royal Navy, Spanish, and Dutch as well as the prospect of returning home to find that Adams had superglued Hamilton’s wig to his head or released bees into his desk drawer.

Into this tense climate sails a brig called the Nancy.

A Lieutenant Hugh Wylie of HMS Sparrow, finding it suspicious in some way captures the ship and escorts it to Port Royal to find out exactly what is going on.

The captain of the ship, whose name is Thomas Briggs, insists that he has done nothing wrong. In some versions of the story his insistence is based on just straight the fuck up telling Wylie he and all his crew are Dutch. In other versions just his paperwork is Dutch, authorizing him to trade some goods in Curacao.

Either way, this story/paperwork/situation seems to check out with the prize court, and involve Holland somehow, and Lt. Wylie leaves Port Royal in disappointment.

Two notes on the character of Lt. Wylie (courtesy of Mr. Fitton):

(1) He seems to be dehydrated:

(2) Although he abhors the pope, he would save the pope from drowning if the pope happened to be drowning nearby:

HMS Sparrow rejoins the unfortunately-named HMS Ferret, which is being commanded by Acting Lieutenant Michael Fitton, of whom we know much more. He got up to a lot in his career, including the capture of some “30 or 40″ enemy ships and a great deal of derring-do, most notably during an action with the Spanish Santa Maria during which:

“Lieutenant Fitton leaped overboard; and, with his sword in his mouth, followed by the greater part of his crew similarly armed, swam to, boarded, and after a stout resistance carried, the Spanish schooner.”

He shows up injured twice, once after having been run over by a gun and once after falling down a hatch during a hurricane. Most intriguing of all is the delicious but, it seems, receipts-less tea spilled on wikipedia:

“Fitton never received a promotion beyond the rank of lieutenant. Not only did he lack a powerful patron but there is some suggestion that he may, by injudicious conduct early in his naval career, have made a powerful enemy.”

He is the main character in the 11 novels of the “Lieutenant Michael Fitton Adventures” which I have not read but have very disappointingly thwarted my nascent ambition to sit down and write 11 novels about him.

Unknown is whether he would save the pope from drowning if the pope happened to be drowning nearby.

On Wylie’s return, Fitton invites him to breakfast by signal and while killing time waiting for Wylie to come over he notices a dead cow in the water and associated sharks (Ferret was a tender ship to Abergavenny, and presumably on supply ships you do end up with a few dead cows in the water from time to time). One shark in particular catches his eye and and decides he wants a shark cartilage walking stick, apparently must-have accessory:

He catches the shark and gets a guy to butcher it. Inside the shark they discover a metal container and inside, some papers tied up with a string. The sailor who had been butchering the shark makes a joke:

In the retelling of this story, this joke remains, but gets less funny. By 1820 we hear nothing of this sailor’s “old blowing”:

Interestingly enough Fitton does not seem to be exaggerating his role in catching the shark, as he repeats it under oath:

We never know if he got his walking stick.

Fitton, figuring any papers you find inside a shark are probably worth something, dries them out and reads them, and discovers they relate to an American ship Nancy.

In some versions of this story this alone is the required proof -- the ship is American. In others, it shows her original orders, which are French and not Dutch. Fitton just calls it “mercantile affairs.” The most likely version, because it is the most complicated, and because it has as its end goal the acquisition of coffee, is that the shark papers formed part of a paper trail proving that the ship deposited its original, legal cargo on Aruba, where it took on illegal cargo, armaments which were sold to the French in Haiti (for coffee).

Either way, the shark had given Fitton receipts on the Nancy. Wylie, throughout this course of events, has still been rowing over. By now he has made it.

And he wants breakfast:

Fitton drags it out and some more delightfully period dialogue ensues:

You’ll be a boy all your life-time, Fitton!

They go back and forth and Wylie is increasingly frustrated by how much Fitton seems to know about the Nancy (his disappointment at losing the prize presumably still fresh) and STILL wanting breakfast. Hilariously, he seems fairly convinced that the American supercargo is in fact Dutch because his last name is Schultz, lending some credence to the “fake Dutch” version of events:

Fitton explains (but very annoyingly) that he knows all of this because he read it in the Shark Papers. Wylie cannot wrap his mind around the Shark Papers, which are in fact pretty far-fetched, and having heard Fitton explain the situation one too many times, STILL with no breakfast in sight, finally loses his patience with the breakfastless situation. I know people like this. Do you know people like this?

The story is almost over.

Wylie gets breakfast. In most cases, this breakfast is the shark. In every case, gratifyingly, the breakfast exists, which is a nice thing to know about a man in 1799 who so ardently wanted breakfast.

Then he rows back to his own ship and apparently goes about his day for a while before it all dawns on him that Shark Papers are just the smoking, sharky gun he needs to reverse the prize court’s finding about the Nancy, and immediately orders Fitton to accompany him back to Port Royal, where they and the shark papers are deposed, and the captain of the Nancy convicted of smuggling.

It is possible that the Shark Papers were only half of the evidence, the other half being provided by additional papers discovered in a pork barrel:

So hard drove........into the pork? or in the barrel?

In some versions, news gets ahead of them (though I can’t imagine how?) and Briggs escapes, leaving the Nancy behind. In a fictionalized account that one hopes is inspired by the real thing, he blames the shark, “...swinging out of court, exclaiming,

Wylie made £3,000 and Fitton £1,500 for his role in uncovering the Shark Papers.

But our hero is not done yet.

The shark jaws remained in Port Royal until they were lost after an earthquake; the Shark Papers were still in the museum of the Royal United Service Institution as of 1889, but my google image search of “royal united service institution museum shark papers” only yielded pictures of sharks.

Here ends the Story of Lt. Michael Fitton and the Shark Papers. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk on/Drunk History episode about this important subject.

I think there are morals to this story:

1. Sharks will eat anything, even and especially your secrets.

2. If a shark has eaten your secrets, your secrets are not necessarily safe.

3. If the pope is drowning nearby, it is a mark of good character to save him, even if you don’t like him

4. Sometimes all that’s standing between you and a shitload of prize money is your annoying friend, a dead cow, the desire for a walking stick, some patience with fishing, and one shark.

Addendum: Fitton’s career began with the discovery of some secret papers in the ocean, too. When he was 14, having just entered the service as a Captain’s Servant on HMS Vestal:

“...he witnessed that of an American packet having on board Mr. Laurens, ex-President of the Rebel Congress, who was proceeding to Holland with a secret treaty of alliance with the Dutch. This treaty, previously to the actual capture of the ship, had been thrown in a bag overboard, and would never have been discovered but for Mr. Fitton, who, being at the moment employed in furling the fore-top gallant sail, observed what he considered to be a man overboard, and instantly made a report which led to its recovery. A declaration of war against the Dutch, and the immediate sweeping of their numerous vessels from the face of the sea, were thus the momentous results of Mr. Fitton’s keenness.”

Michael Fitton, pulling receipts on from the ocean and its sharks since 1780.

#the story of lt. michael fitton and the shark papers #extremely long post #sharks #papers #those are the main elements of the story

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surveys-at-your-service · 5 years ago

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Survey #232

“i’ve never bought a suit before in my life, but when you go to meet god, you know you wanna look nice.”

Do you have trouble typing when the room is dark? No, I don't look at the keyboard. When’s the last time you had a headache? I had an abomination of a three-day-long headache before my cycle like a week or two back or something. How often do you take surveys? Not as much as I used to now that I actually have school, but occasionally. What did you last write on paper? I think some items to Mom's shopping list? Does anything on your body hurt? No. What do you currently hear? "Bullet" by Hollywood Undead. I can hear cars outside, as well as Bentley biting himself incessantly. Sounds gross. Do you have any goals you’re trying to fulfill? As for in the near future, hopefully - I'd pray if I believed in it by this point - start losing weight again. Grow more in my photography, 1.) because I want this so badly and 2.) there's no way I could handle the stress of school and a "real" job but we're in serious need of money right now. I'd really like to make progress with driving too, but I haven't been able to in months because a headlight in broken, the license plate or whatever is expired, and the car can't pass inspection, so Mom doesn't want me at the steering wheel and get pulled over for it. Being on the borderline poverty line is A BLAST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Do you ever do the dishes? I'mma be real, real honest here. Not really. Reason being we don't have a dishwasher and I am super queasy actually hand-cleaning dirty dishes, I get frustrated because I feel I don't clean them well enough (being a germaphobe is also fun), and my OCD goes absolutely insane trying to play Tetris with the drying rack thingy. All that being said, it's my least-favorite chore. At your house, does everyone eat together as a family? No. We started to drift apart when I was... maybe a pre-teen? When did you last have butterflies in your stomach? Sara decided she wanted to try making out and I was fucking terrified of going too far or scaring her. Are you independent or dependent? I'm embarrassingly dependent. Who last made you smile? My pup. How did you find Bzoink? Taking surveys for so long. What’s your dream job? If travel and heat weren't considered, a meerkat biologist. Do you brush your teeth twice every day? Just once. Do you have a pool? No. Are the streetlights on? We don't have streetlights on my road. When you wear a hoodie, do you pull the sleeves over your hands? Not unless I'm really cold. Do you trust anyone, besides yourself, fully? Sara. I would say Mom, but I'm entirely aware she's lied and made stories up about Dad. Do you believe the saying “once a cheater, always a cheater”? No. I've never really understood this. People change. Are you in any advanced classes at school? I bypassed the freshman English class, yeah. Well, is that considered "advanced?" I don't believe it's like an AP course or anything, but it's not a class I'm supposed to be taking as a freshman, so??? How often do you eat your favorite food? Every once in a while. Have you ever fallen asleep on public transport? (including planes) Probably. What was the last TV show you watched? Uhhhh I think it was all the way back when Colleen and I were still friends and we checked out The Good Doctor. Or it was either Parks and Recreation with Sara and her family or Avatar: The Last Airbender, also with Sara. Where was the last place you went on vacation/holiday to? Who’d you go with? The beach with Colleen, her husband, and their son. Well, does that count since it was only for a day? Does the place you work have music playing? What sort? I don't have a job. What’s your favorite type of donut? It varies between chocolate frosted, glazed, and plain. What do you usually eat for breakfast? If I even eat, it'll probably be like, a meal replacement shake or Pop-Tart. Can you touch your toes without bending your knees? Surprisingly. When was the last time you went out for dinner? Like at a sit-down restaurant? Hm. I think it was El Tapatio with my mom and Nicole maybe near two months ago. What was the last thing you said to someone else in person? Idr, something to Mom. Do you use Windows, Mac, Linux, or something else entirely? Windows. How many times do you call someone on the phone a week? Like zero, usually. Have you cooked anything today? What was it? No. Do you have a lot of cousins? What are their names? Yeah. I'm not sharing all their names on the Internet, and besides, I don't even know most. What does your shampoo smell like? I don’t know. What about the body wash or soap you’re using at the moment? I don't remember, even though I got out of the shower like an hour ago. Any movies you’ve seen recently that you’d recommend to me? No, I barely ever watch movies. Why did you last go see a doctor? The primary reason was for my night terrors. Do you know how to play Minesweeper? No. What was the last thing you bought online? A new heat lamp for my snake Venus. Where do you usually park your car? I don't have a car, but Mom parks in the driveway behind the house. Does your mail get delivered to your house or do you have to collect it? It's put in the mailbox on the other side of the road. Are you more logical or creative? Creative, I'd say. Do you cut tags out of clothing so they don’t itch and bother you? Usually. How many times a year do you go on vacation? Pretty much never. Can you curl your tongue or do anything else cool with it? I can curl it a little bit, but my snake eyes piercing prevents me from doing it all that well. What was the last job interview you went to? For a deli position at a Food Lion. Got the job, lasted not even two hours. :^) What embarrassing music do you listen to? I'm not really *embarrassed* of any I listen to. Just kinda surprising to admit to some people sometimes. What’s your biggest talent? Writing, I guess? What’s the best gift you ever received? My dog. What fear would you like to overcome? More than ANYTHING? Probably being judged in a negative way or being seen as "weird," and not in a good way. AvPD is a bitch and makes me less open about myself (mostly just irl, but yeah), which I REALLY don't like. Would you rather ride in a hot air balloon or hang-glide? Hm, hang-glide, maybe. I dunno. What habit would you like to break? Procrastinating, lately. Describe the most romantic moment you’ve ever had. I can think of a few, but here's the one that had the most biggest effect on me, I think. There was one time Jason and I were kissing, I told him I loved him, and he whispered, "I love you too, wife," before going back to kissing me. Remembering that still hurts, a lot. I know now us separating was for the better, I don't want someone who doesn't have faith in my strength, just the memories like those from the time I was convinced our love story was a fairy tale are very painful. Just typing it caused a discomfort in my stomach. What’s your worst personality trait? Laziness, probably. Or impulsiveness. Have you ever cheated on a test? No. What’s your favorite karaoke song? I don't sing karaoke. Do you know anyone with two different colored eyes? I don't believe so. What was the last thing you bought for someone else? Sara's anniversary present, which was a pillow that said something along the lines of, "Hug this pillow until you can hug me" or something. Do you like hot fudge sundaes? My fat ass can't even associate with you if you don't like HOT FUDGE SUNDAES????????????? Do you like to sleep a lot? It's funny, I tend to like naps during the day, yet I don't look forward to trying to go to sleep at night. It always takes longer, and there's also the possibility of just waking back up and struggling to fall back asleep for the rest of the night. Is there a garbage can in the room you’re currently in? No. Have you ever been in a class that you thought you were too smart for? I don't think so. Can you type without looking at the keyboard? Yeah. We had a mandatory typing course in middle school, so I learned it exceptionally well. Have you ever been snorkeling? No. Who was the last person you apologized to? Maybe Sara? Do you throw things when you’re frustrated? NO. I am very conscious of not expressing my anger with physical violence of any sort. How much do you get paid at your current job? N/A Are your friends mostly older than you or younger than you? I think younger. Would you ever get a pet tarantula? Nah. Do you want to dye your hair? Ugh, you have no idea. What’s your favorite zoo animal? Meerkats, duh. Is there anything in your room you’d be ashamed to show to your parents? I'm VERY self-conscious of my artwork, so I'd be mortified if my mom saw my drawings, even though there's nothing "wrong" with them. I'm just shy about 'em. Have you ever accused someone of cheating when they weren’t? Yeah, hence the end of that day-long relationship. Him cheating was a lie from his insane ex, but at the time, I just believed it, but it was absolutely for the better. He wasn't for me. I really shoulda just listened when my art teacher literally took me aside one day and warned me about him. Wha'd'ya know, he wound up on house arrest or something similar, and who the hell knows what he's done by now. When was the last time you played hide and seek? I played with my niece and nephew some months ago. Don’t you hate when people stare at you? Fuckin' yes. I'm too self-conscious for that shit. Have you ever accidentally caught yourself on fire? Well thank god no. Are you Jewish? No. Does anyone copy the things you do? No. Is your dad still alive? Yes, yay. Have you done anything lately that you instantly felt was a mistake? Possibly. What melts your heart/makes your knees weak? Watching Mark with kids causes me severe physical pain. What would you consider unforgivable? Rape. What are your views on spontaneous human combustion? Freaky. Parasite Eve first made me think "oh shit what if this could actually happen," and I've also watched a Shane Dawson video about it, and the idea of it possibly being a real thing is absolutely terrifying. How many dryer sheets do you put in an average load of laundry? I think Mom uses one or two? I dunno. Have you ever felt trapped in a relationship? No. What is your favorite frozen treat? Ice cream. Do you have a sexual fantasy? ...What is it? There's probably something I could think up. Maybe like bang on a church pew or something lmao idk. Who was the last person to insult you? I'm not sure. What color is your brush/comb/whatever? White. Is it wicked hard for you to sleep when its hot in your room? It is almost entirely impossible. Have you ever purposely given someone wrong directions? No, but then again, it's not like I even give them. I have a horrible sense of direction and don't know street names, highway numbers and locations... What is your favorite thing to do with your best friend? I'm not sure. Everything is fun with her. Are you easily offended? It depends. In most contexts, no. Have you ever acted as tour guide for friends/relatives from out of town? Not really. If you were an anime character, would you be a yandere or a tsundere? HAHAHA I AM PAINFULLY A YANDERE. If you have glasses, do you get days when you don’t feel like wearing them? No, because I like to see. Have you ever played bingo at an actual bingo hall? No. Ha ha, this reminds me tho, I can't recall if he did it once or just WANTED to, but my brother may have gone into one, yelled "BINGO," and immediately left. Did your parents ever collect any magazines they didn’t want you to read? Uhhhh no. I'm quiiiiite sure neither of my parents had those. Have you ever pledged money to a Kickstarter and it reached its goal? No. I probably would if I had excess money and really believed in it, though. Is there a color combination that holds a significance to you? Because Jason's favorite thing in the world was the Joker, seeing purple and bright green together is one I just prefer not to see. I wouldn't call it a PTSD trigger, like I don't freak out about it, it's just like an "ugh ew" sorta thing. If you use Facebook, do you ever look at the Memories page? No. I cringe 90% of the time when they pop up. Do you have a drawer where you just throw some random stuff? No. Have you ever had to provide an alibi for something? No. What’s the funniest shirt that you own? I have a Batman one I'm trying to shrink back into that says something like "I wish I was Batman but I'm poor and hate fighting" & I love it. What is something you absolutely refuse to pay for? Idk off the top of my head. Has a stray/runaway cat or a dog ever followed you home? Cats, I think? If so, what did you do with it? Fed it with the other cats, and I'd assume Mom would've called the owner's number if given. If you could grow a beard or a mustache, would you? I'm a cisgender female so like... Is there a stranger you expect to see every day? No. What is something you take pride in? I'm proud of just how deeply and genuinely I care about people. And my writing and photography, mostly. What does the nicest dish set you own look like? All our dishes are literally the same, and they're ancient. I think they were my grandma's but given to Mom. Pattern's worn and everything. They're ceramic with a floral design. Why did you stop working at the last place you were employed? I absolutely cannot be in a position of responsibility or customer service, and the environment was way too busy. What would you do if you found out your ex was pregnant/fathered a child? I... don't know how I would react? Picturing it, I first feel like I'd be so happy for him, but I KNOW my PTSD would act up at some point shortly after and I would probably end up in a bawling ball (lol "bowling ball" that wasn't intended sorry) because "that was supposed to be me," but then I'd be fine again after I got all that emotion out. Who was the last person to smoke a cigarette in front of you? Someone at school. You can smoke outside, and it's the one thing I don't like about my college. Are you very close to your siblings? Not nearly as close as I wish we were. How often do you watch the news? Never. Do you have a dishwasher? No. What is the worst lie you’ve ever told? I don't like talking about it. Well, it wasn't a lie, but I stretched the truth because anxiety's a goddamn asshole. Where is the last place you drove to? I drove to, probably home. What is your favorite Disney movie? The Lion King. I may even like the live-action remake more, but I can't say with certainty. Do you have a fan in your room? Yeah. What color is your lampshade? I don't have a lamp. Do you like to wear belts? Not anymore. What is the most expensive electronic in your room? This laptop. Only a year old and yet it's so abused with how much it's used. Are you involved with any charity work? I wish I was in the position where I could, anyway. Do you celebrate St. Patrick’s Day? No. Have you ever hatched an egg? OKAY SO! I remember in elementary school, maybe like 1st grade or something, we incubated a chicken egg and hatched it. I can't remember where it went. Do you chew gum on a daily basis? No, I rarely do. What brand shampoo do you use? Suave. When is the last time you went to an amusement park? Years ago shortly before the breakup with Jason and Dillon. Or Dustin. Whatever his name was. Do you have a garden shed in your backyard? Nope. Are you obsessed with anything? Y'all know I don't know how to love in moderation, not even remotely. Do you prefer non-diet or diet soda? I hate diet, and the artificial sweetener also gives me serious headaches. Who was the last person you hugged? My mom, maybe? What did you do when you found out Michael Jackson died? We were swimming in the pool while Mom or Dad was grilling, idr. What’s your best friend’s favorite band? Pink Floyd, Evanescence, and Within Temptation. What’s your favorite kind of beer? Never tried it, don't want to. How do you get songs out of your head? Binge it 'til I'm tired of it lmao. Have you seen all the High School Musicals? I've only seen the first two. Do you dress appropriately for your age? I don't know? Probably not? Do "normal" 23-year-olds wear graphic tees? What’s your favorite word? "Serendipity." What’s the worst sickness you’ve ever had? A serious stomach virus that made me puke all the food I'd eaten since birth. Do you take compliments well? Of course I appreciate them, but I get shy. Are excessive piercings sexy or trashy? Well they're definitely not "trashy," but SERIOUSLY excessive ones, I don't usually find attractive. But it really depends on the person, the size, and where. What do you put on toast? Cinnamon, sugar, and butter. The Southern cinnamon toast. Have you ever watched Fear Factor? I LOVED it when I was younger, and I still enjoy it if I happen to see it. Joe Rogan was one of my earliest crushes, too. How many songs do you have on iTunes? Over 1k. What song reminds you of summer? MAN I remember as a kid, back when I liked country, my sisters and I loved "When The Sun Goes Down" by Kenny Chesney. Big summer vibes. Has a bird ever flown into your window? OH WOW I don't think so, but I do remember one flew into the car's grill when I was very young and going on a trip. Safe to say it died.

#survey #quiz #questions #random #bored

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marvelous-heroimagines · 6 years ago

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Slurred Confessions

Requested by: Anonymous (Here are the specifics)

Pairing: Reader x Bucky Word Count: 1.8K Warnings: Angst, drinking, fluff

A/N:

~~Bucky’s POV~~

Bucky knew that his stupid, super soldier body made it almost impossible for him to get drunk, or even tipsy, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try tonight. Tonight felt as though everything he had been so hard to fight against was coming to a head - and it didn’t help that you looked drop dead gorgeous in that dress.

“If you keep staring, you might burn a hole in her dress,” Steve mumbles, pulling Bucky’s thoughts back to reality.

“Huh?” Bucky blurts out; his cheeks flushing red the moment his best friend’s words register in his mind, “I wasn’t staring,” he lies, trying to sound non-chalant,

“Yeah, right,” Sam scoffs, his voice dripping with a mix of pity and amusement. Bucky shoots Sam a glare while wishing he knew anyone else at this party so he didn’t have to hang out with Steve’s pet bird.

“You know,” Sam continues despite Bucky’s glare, “You could do something totally crazy... Like telling her how you feel...” Steve snorts a laugh, but quickly covers it with a fake cough, after seeing Bucky narrow his eyes at him.

“I don’t like Y/N,” Bucky snaps, his jaw clenching with the annoyance of his friends’ and teammates’ constant bickering.

Sam lets out a loud, short laugh, “I didn’t mention Y/N,” Sam cocks an eyebrow at Bucky.

Embarrassment crashes over Bucky as he’s been caught out, but he hides it. His mind races as he considers what his friends had been pointing out for months now - did he actually like you? But as soon as he starts to admit his feelings to himself, he pushes them down. You were barely 20, he reminds himself, it wasn’t appropriate for a 100 year old man to have a crush on you; or that’s what he keeps telling himself.

Bucky clenches his fists as he forces himself to stop thinking of you and him in a romantic relationship - and how much he wanted it - and he doesn’t realise how much strength he’d been using until the scotch glass shatters in his metal hand. Steve and Sam stare at him, wide eyed and concerned, but Bucky shakes off the alcohol and abruptly stands, shoving the bar stool away and storming off to cool down.

~~Reader’s POV~~

Your heels were killing you, the bobby pins in your hair hurts your scalps and you were desperately trying to make this look seem effortless. You’d never really been one to dress up for Tony’s regular Tower parties; but you’d made tonight your final attempt to get Bucky’s attention.

The two of you had grown exceptionally close over the last few months, and you’d accidentally fallen for your teammate. That wouldn’t have been a bad thing if he wasn’t so confusing. When the two of you were alone - either during meals, the weekends or during training - you were convinced he felt the same, but other times he acted so cold to you it was like you’d done something to him.

Natasha and Wanda weren’t much help with finding out if the super soldier saw you as more than a friend - they were just as stumped as you were. His mixed signals have been getting on your nerves for weeks now, so you decided to dress up for this party, hoping it would get him to make a move.

But as the night went on, and you were still dancing alone, your hopes started fading. Maybe you’d been reading the signs all wrong, maybe he didn’t feel the same. You became discouraged as the possibility of that started to set in and you started to convince yourself that you were falling for someone that didn’t see you in that way.

It was nearing 1am when you called it quits on the night - you couldn’t stand the pain of your heels any longer, and it was pretty clear by now that Bucky wasn’t going to make any sort of move. You hobbled around the party, bidding a goodnight to the friends you could find - Bucky was nowhere to be seen - before heading to the residential floor to put yourself to bed.

While you couldn’t help but be disappointed about the night’s outcome, you try to stay positive. As you wander around your suite, taking your makeup off with a wipe, you start convincing yourself that maybe remaining only friends with Bucky was for the best. You remember how awkward it was when you broke up with someone at school; living with an ex would be a thousand times worse.

With your hair now tied up, your face makeup free and in comfy PJs, you finish brushing your teeth and head to your bed. But before you can snuggle under the covers, a knock sounds at your door. A frown settles between your brows as you head to the door, wondering who was behind it.

You swing the door open and your heart starts racing the moment you see Bucky leaning on your door frame. But it only takes you a second to notice that he isn’t exactly sober - he wasn’t even in the ball park of sober. He gives you a lopsided smile, his eyes blinking out of sync, before he stumbles past you and into your suite.

“What’re you doing here?” you ask, a little embarrassed by the waver in your tone.

He leans close, sending a strong smell of alcohol wafting towards you, “Wanted to see you,” he says, his words slurred and mumbled.

“How did you get drunk?” you ask as he wanders to your bed and slumps down on it, “I didn’t think you super soldiers could,”

“Thor,” Bucky simply says. It takes you a second to realise what he meant, but then you remember that Thor had some inhumanly strong liquor that he always brought when he came to visit.

Silence falls over the two of you as Bucky holds your stare with such intensity it makes your cheeks flush. Bucky’s stare finally gets to be too much and your eyes drop to the floor as you awkwardly clear your throat.

You don’t know what to say, and you can’t stop yourself from saying the first thing that comes to mind, “Happy birthday, by the way,” your voice is quiet and weak as you shuffle uncomfortably.

A sign from Bucky makes you glance at him, and you see that he’s looking at his hands now, an annoyed frown knitting his brows together, “Please don’t,” he groans. His voice was so low he probably didn’t mean for you to hear him, but you do.

You unconsciously step forward as Bucky begins to look more troubled. You tentatively sit down, on your bed, next to him and can’t stop yourself from laying a comforting hand on his metal arm.

Bucky yanks his arm from your touch, which sends a prang of rejection through you. Bucky abruptly stands from the bed and starts pacing. After a few minutes of Bucky silently pacing, you decide to speak up.

“What’s wrong?” you ask, concern thick in your tone,

“I’m too old,” was his only explanation, which only confuses you more,

“Buck, I don-”

“You’re too young,” he almost spits.

Your heart sinks as you catch on to what he’s talking about. You’d been so carful - or so you had thought - with keeping your feelings for him a secret from anyone but the girls.

“Look, Buck,” you start, desperate to try and smooth things over and not ruin the friendship, “This crush will just go-”

“Y/N, I like you,” Bucky’s words are louder than yours, and it seems his drunken mind doesn’t even register what you had started to say,

“W-What?” you stammer, your heart beating faster, “What do you mean?”

“I like like you,” he admits, his pacing coming to a stop as he turns to stare at you, “I’ve been trying to deny my feelings for you, but I can’t any longer. I know it isn’t right because I could be your grandfather, but I can’t lie to myself any longer,”

You’re rendered silent, your mouth gapping open as you stare at him. You’d swear you were dreaming if Bucky didn’t move to you within a second and crash his lips against yours. You kiss him back for a moment, before the taste of strong alcohol brings you to your senses.

You pull back from the kiss and Bucky immediately looks embarrassed and regretful, “I’m sor-” he starts, but you cut him off,

“I like you too, Buck,” you admit, causing Bucky to blink rapidly with confusion, “But you’re extremely drunk right now,”

“Drunk words are sober thoughts,” Bucky slurs,

“I can’t trust that,” you retort. Bucky just nods, looking a little disappointed, “Okay, here’s the deal” you say, drawing his attention to you, “Right now, I’m going to bed,” Bucky cocks a flirtatious eyebrow at you, causing you to giggle before you continue, “Alone,” you add, as Bucky pouts, “And if you still feel the same in the morning, we’ll talk about it then,”

Bucky nods; and when he sees your extended hand, offering a handshake to seal the deal, he just smirks and plants an impossibly quick peak on your lips. You curse yourself for your better judgement as you watch him stumble out of your suite.

“See you in the morn’, doll,” he calls out before leaving you alone.

You wanted to jump up and down with excitement, but you kept yourself in check. What if it was just the alcohol talking? You didn’t want to get your hopes up just to have them crushed in the morning.

Your body clock wakes you up 2 minutes before your alarm, and it takes you a few seconds of morning grogginess to remember the deal you made with drunken Bucky last night. Your stomach knots as you let yourself hope that he still felt the same.

Trying to stay realistic, you go about your morning routine - but you can’t help but rush a little and skip a few steps of your routine. Deciding that brushing your teeth, showering and getting dressed was good enough this morning, you head to leave your suite for breakfast.

You open your suite door and jump from the surprise of seeing Bucky waiting in your doorway, his hand raised as if he was about to knock. You only get a second to register his face - his eyes seemed to focus on you, telling you he was no longer drunk - before he pulls you into his frame and kisses you.

Noticing the absent taste of alcohol, you allow yourself to relax into his grip and run a hand into his hair. The kiss was deep and Bucky was holding you so tightly agains this chest that you can feel his rapid heartbeat - which matched yours.

The kiss breaks, leaving you both breathing heavily and grinning ear to ear.

“I’m sober,” Bucky notes, “And I still like like you,” you catch a hint of amusement in his voice as he quotes his drunk self,

“Oh thank god,” you breathe out, finally letting yourself believe that last night wasn’t the result of Thor’s liquor, “Happy b-”

“Don’t,” Bucky chuckles before pulling you in for another kiss.

Tags: @redstarstan, @rosyfluffyprincess, @heismyhunter, @coffeeismylife28, @klutzly, @leahhavoc, @invisible2niall, @addictwithafandomblog, @hantu369mc, @thegreatestpilotinthegalaxy, @impala-moose, @stratmoxphere, @bearded-bucky, @meep-meep22, @caitsymichelle13, @pleasefixthepain, @strangermarvelthings, @specs15, @sebstanwassup, @wunnywho, @thedarknesswarrior, @girlwith100names, @melconnor2007, @ipaintmelodies, @letsgetfuckingsuperwholocked, @spookydoritos, @fanboyswhereare-you, @yoinkpeter, @tcmhollnd, @providence-impoverished, @lilya-petrichor, @hells-princess, @sarahp879, @indecorousthoughts, @geeksareunique, @courtneychicken, @peter-spider-parker-man, @mizzzpink, @lovely-geek, @httpmcrvel, @sebstanismylife, @glitteringsarah, @stardustandbucky, @lena-stan-xavier, @princess76179, @bexboo616, @jeanneblanche, @hdthdthdt, @dj-lowkey, @srgtsprout, @theglowstickofdestiny

Tags that didn’t work: @hesitant-poison, @mo320, @impossiblyteenagestudent96400, @janellexox0, @xplumsceptrequeenx, @yoyolovesbucky, @mrs-stan-barnes, @addictionmarvel, @spn-worm

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lordberenger · 7 years ago

Text

state of mind

Or: the modern, ex-boyfriends AU no one asked for, ever

read on ao3

Laurent shouldn’t have come.

He knew this the moment he stepped through the door. He took a second to be bitter about it, then he corrected himself: he had known he would spend a horrible night the moment he chose to put on a tux and climb into his car. Denial was not going to get him through the evening.

The Marlas Hall was an impressive building, allying the golden varnish of the expensive and well-conserved with the bluntness of the old. The gardens were particularly noteworthy, full of wide trees and cleverly half-hidden ruins. People raved about finding millennium-old stones in the middle of their evening strolls, but failed to realize the trees were often even older.

The gardens were tempting, yes. Laurent could smell the perfume of early-summer flowers and feel the breeze on his face through the open french doors leading out, but he refrained himself. This was a charity event thrown by his own brother: he had to socialize and charm the room into parting with a few of the superfluous zeros in their bank account.

Still, he couldn’t banish the feeling of dread pooling low in his stomach as he stepped through the room, darting furtive looks right and left. But what was the point? Was he trying to locate or avoid?

Auguste snagged him by the arm before he could finish that thought.

“Laurent,” he said with forced cheer. “I’m so glad to see you. Thank you for coming.” He squeezed Laurent’s biceps a little tighter. Laurent didn’t know who he was trying to convince. “Um, Vannes is here.”

“I hope you’re more eloquent in your speech,” Laurent said, shaking off Auguste’s almost painful grip.

“What?”

“Tell me what you have to tell me and go. You have a party to host.”

Auguste’s eyebrows drew together. “I have the right to be concerned for my little brother’s—”

“Oh, so we’re concerned, now?”

A pause. Auguste looked at him with his clear blue eyes and sighed.

“You know, don’t you?”

“The name’s hard to miss.”

It was right there at the top of the invitation list. No one would see it other than Auguste, Laurent, and the affected staff, but that was enough.

Damianos Akielos.

The name didn’t haunt Laurent. He felt unease and excessive annoyance, but he knew he could get through the evening. He didn’t have a choice. Or maybe he did: maybe Auguste would give him one, out of brotherly affection and concern, and ask him later for a favor that Laurent would be too happy to fulfill. But Laurent hadn’t made it this far in life without an iron spine and a stronger discipline: he would see the night through.

Ex or no ex present.

Who had dumped him. Or would have, had tried to, before Laurent did it first, out of pride and self-respect.

“Laurent,” Auguste started.

“I’m fine.” He was a little surprised to find it true. “I won’t talk to him, though.”

“He might want to talk to you.”

This was probably a plea to be civil. It missed its mark by a hundred feet.

“I doubt it,” Laurent said, and turned away to greet the newest arrival of guests.

He did. In securing his pride, Laurent might not have stopped to preserve Damianos’s. That was what the “I’ll never see him again” part of the plan was for.

Damianos didn’t enter until the gala had started in full. Laurent noticed the kind of commotion near the door that announced a new arrival: the steward drawing people forward, the customary stop on the threshold to gauge the room and let people gawk, should they need to—and it was almost always assumed that they did.

Laurent slipped behind a large group of people dressed as severe as he was and tried to will the light off his pale hair. He thought he was making a decent job at pretending to consider the paté hors d’oeuvre when Jord’s voice grunted from behind him.

“I’ll punch him back to Ios.”

Jord was much less conspicuous in his staring than Laurent, although he was wearing a simple black suit that marked him without subtlety as a bodyguard and was thus invisible to most of the people milling around.

“Please don’t,” Laurent said.

Jord grunted again. It could have meant anything from a disregard of Laurent’s words to reluctant agreement: knowing Jord, it was most likely a mix of everything in between.

Laurent took a flute from a nearby tray. “Is that apple cider or champagne?”

Jord shrugged. “Drink and find out.”

That was the method Laurent usually preferred to avoid. He took a careful sip, though, and almost recoiled when the tart taste of alcohol hit his tongue. Laurent didn’t drink: he liked neither the taste nor the effects. Tonight, though, in the shadow of Damianos's large back, the idea was more tempting than it had ever been.

“That’s not apple cider,” Jord warned next to him, as though Laurent had missed it after his first taste.

“I know.”

Jord eyed him for a moment with the easiness of a man who had seen Laurent grow up and suffered through his teenage moods. He shrugged then: Laurent was not the person he was paid to protect and he would not dare baby him, for the same reasons.

“Don’t mess up,” he called as Laurent departed, done with the insidious interrogation.

“I never do.”

Laurent chose not to hear the ugly snort behind him. He waved through the crowd, stopping to chat with couples on the look-out for recognition from the hosts and larger groups who would unanimously revel on his witty conversation once he departed.

He saw Torveld and the blonde doe-faced youth he had taken as unofficial sugar baby, and the looks exchanged with the closest server, barely older. Vannes smiled her shark grin at him from across the room. Laurent met her stare and raised his glass in salutation. He almost bumped into Ancel a minute later, and spent a longer time than he intended talking horses with Berenger.

Laurent had to give it to Ancel: though he was clearly bored and out of his depth, he found a way of holding Laurent’s gaze dead on. It would have been uncomfortable, had Laurent not spent his formative years developing and honing the same tactics.

It was almost enough. The clock was indicating well past eleven when Laurent’s eyes passed over Damianos for the first time.

It was a quick glance, accidental turned informative: Laurent noted the width of his shoulders, possibly greater than two years ago. The shine of his hair, combed and slicked back in a way that somehow tamed the curls. The dark color of his suit; almost a perfect match to Laurent’s. The thought bothered him for a moment, so he traded it for a third glass of champagne.

It was almost certainly a mistake. He found he did not care much.

Drinking meant relative immobility. He had raised the glass to his lips when Damianos turned from his conversation—who was it with him? Did it matter?—and saw him.

The look on his face was too earnest to stomach this late in the night with alcohol in his blood. Laurent held his gaze for two seconds, which were two seconds too long but did not appear that way at the time, and turned away.

The party was winding down: the charity part had been done, and now there was music from a half-hidden orchestra and some dancing. Laurent cut through the small of gatherings of people he did not have the obligation nor the will to entertain anymore and stepped outside.

The balcony was wide, closed off by a wide stone bannister with intricate carvings, and led off to the sprawling grass. Laurent took a moment to inhale deeply. The cool air was a blessing on his overheated skin; he put down the glass and folded his arms on the bannister, pressing his forehead into the stone. He didn’t know what kind of stone it even was: sandstone? Granite? Were the two even alike? He knew it wasn’t marble: he could still feel its smooth expanse under his hand and the blinding vision of it under the sun.

There he went again.

Laurent stayed close to the bannister when he took down the stairs, unsure of his own legs. He had no experience on which to base his current state on. He didn’t think he was very drunk, but the filter in his mind seemed to have a life of his own. He felt as though he would explode in words if anyone talked to him. Maybe he would keep on talking until there were no words inside his head anymore, let them pouring out until he was dry as a desert.

Maybe he was a desert: dry and cold at night, uninhabitable and hostile.

Damianos found him leaning against the remains of an old column, watching the stars unblinkingly until his head spinned and he had to close his eyes against dizziness.

“Laurent,” Damianos said after a while, after moment spent aware of the other and their shared history. It weighted between them, like a bag full of water that kept splashing them frozen.

“Ah,” Laurent said. He opened his eyes. “Hello, Damianos.”

Something passed in Damianos’s gaze. He was probably thinking about the last time Laurent had called him his full name, before they had dated. He liked easy camaraderie and friendliness, but Laurent was not here to reassure his need to be well-liked.

“Did you know I’d come and find you?” he asked. “I didn’t know myself until I did it.”

“You’re a really bad liar.”

“You’re drunk.”

Laurent let out a silent laugh. “Does it bother you?”

“I hope it’s not because of me.”

Of course it was. Laurent turned fully toward him and crossed his arms on his chest. Damianos’s eyes were wide open and dark in the moonlight, like his clothing and his hair. He looked like a sketch on canvas, his lines suggested rather than fully drawn.

He looked like the man Laurent had left a year ago alone in his apartment, angry and crushed because he had not gotten to do the crushing himself.

“What are you going to do about it?” Laurent asked, meaning the long conversation everyone had wanted to have with him afterwards.

Oh, Laurent, why did you break up with him?

I thought you guys were moving in together!

Laurent, he was perfect. What have you done?

Love is a scam. Drink?

Damianos didn’t seem to understand him. “You’re drunk,” he repeated.

Laurent waved his hand. “Astute observation. Are you trying to make it disappear by repeating it? If you say ‘Laurent is drunk’ three times, you’ll invoke—”

He was rambling. Damianos strode forward once, breaking his pace immediately. He gained and lost his assured expression in the same breath.

“This is the first time I see you in a year,” he started, running a hand in his hair, messing it up, “and you’re drunk.”

Why did he keep saying it? Laurent had seen him with a glass in hand: he could not pretend at perfection. Laurent pushed back from the column.

“Right,” he said, not entirely sure of the next words pushing out of his mouth. “This is as predictably boring as I thought it would be. If you’ll excuse me—”

“Wait.” Damianos’s arm shot up to block Laurent before he could step around him. It was for show and they both knew it: Laurent would be able to sidestep before Damianos could make up his mind to reach for him. “Were you avoiding me?”

“No.” Laurent made a dismissive gesture. “You don’t avoid a fly.”

“Is that what I am to you? Something to swat away?”

Laurent wanted to say yes, you are. Get out of my way. He wanted to say, no, because I’ve never felt this lost than this past year. His mouth felt full of cardboard.

“Damianos,” he started, focusing on the lapel of his jacket, rather than the strong chest under it or the face above his own, earnest and true when it was not bearable to be. “Damen.”

The look on Damen’s face changed with that word: in a flash, he was still the slightly arrogant young man who had swept Laurent off his feet even though he had felt nailed to the ground.

“I—” Laurent said, and then his phone rang.

They looked down at the same time. Laurent let out a little disbelieving laugh. Damen said “Your phone” like it was an incantation.

It was Auguste. It stopped ringing right when Laurent tapped to accept the call, then started again almost immediately.

Auguste wasn’t an anxious caller. There had to be a problem.

“Then you should go,” Damen said, and Laurent realized he’d said it out loud.

“Yes,” he said and picked up.

Damen turned away first, stepping aside to let Laurent go back toward the building.

Laurent went without turning back, trying not to hear the singular sound of his steps on gravel. He didn’t want to think about Damen’s solitary figure next to the white stone, half cast in the shadows like an echo of the past.

He did anyway.

#lamen #laurent #damen #captive prince #captive prince fic #my fics #i don't do angst usually so this is my best #also i'm falling asleep standing so this is unedited #i'll regret it in the morning #ex bfs au

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deeeelightfuldee · 3 years ago

Text

surveyss 008.

1. Can you remember what you were doing at 8:15 this morning? I was just staring at my ceiling. 2. In your phone’s contacts, who is the first person listed under the letter ‘R’? When did you last see that person? Rana. Uhhh, I don’t think we ever really saw one another in person because of Covid, but maybe once or twice in passing 2 years ago. 3. If someone is sticking their nose into your business where it isn’t wanted, how would you deal with that? Would you say something to them?I tend to either withdraw entirely, change the subject, or just flat out say well that isn’t something I feel comfortable discussing. I’m kind of over spending so much energy to make everyone else comfortable and myself miserable.

4. What did you have for lunch today? Or, if you haven’t had lunch yet, what do you think you will have? I had a bagel for breakfast/lunch.

5. Is there someone you desperately want to see/speak to atm, but you can’t? Yeppppppp. I really want to talk to and see kile, but that won’t happen. He won’t message, or try to contact. I’m pretty convinced he never wanted to come out here anyway, so I guess it’s for the best. It’ll get easier.

6. Do you and your significant other have a special song? What is it? no sig other at the moment. 7. If you HAD to sing something on karaoke, what song would you choose? Turn on the radio by reba is the first one that came to mind hahaha.

8. Can you remember the last time you felt ill? What was wrong with you? Yeah, today! I think some of it is stress related.. not sleeping, not eating the best, but I have been having these awful headaches and it’s been making me super nauseated.

9. What time is it now? Are you tired? It is 10:35 pm and I’m not really tired. Mentally I’m freaking wiped, but I won’t be able to shut my brain off for some time. 10. If you wear make-up, do you take it with you, to reapply throughout the day? Does your make-up stay for a long time after you first apply it, or do you find that you need to reapply often? Are you wearing any make-up atm? I seldom take it with me unless I plan on being super warm, wet, or gone overnight. It typically stays for a long time. I have a little left over but I am not feeling up to going and washing it off.

11. What if you found the last person you kissed, in bed with the last person you texted? Hahahahahaha, well I know that they are both straight so I doubt it would happen. If it was the last opposite sex situation uhh, it would be very surprising because she is happily in a relationship and he has no idea really where she is. 12. The last person you held hands with - have you ever kissed them? Not yet.

13. Can you remember what your parents bought you for Christmas last year? My mom got me so many lovely gifts. She got me an awesome speaker, art stuff, slippers, perfume, etc. She spoils me. My dad has never gotten me anything for Christmas.

14. Think about the person you fell hardest for. Why do you think your feelings for this person were so strong? How is he/she different compared to everyone else you’ve had feelings for? Oooo boy. There are two people that I have had really strong feelings for that are completely different from one another. One of them was just... so .. in sync with me. I could flirt shamelessly with him, he calmed every insecurity, had this smile that melted me, and we were like the most beautiful fit at the worst possible time. He was smart, super dang funny, helpful, patient, kind, driven, talented, hard working, thoughtful, and made me feel so safe and so special. The other guy I had fought feelings for for a while. I was determined not to like him because he was self-centered, hard-headed, cocky, and it just bothered me. However, over time he morphed into this like... completely different person. He began to work on himself and he poured SO MUCH time, effort, money, and energy into making me feel like the most incredible creature he’d ever encountered. He is intelligent, stubborn, generous, and was my very best friend that I just felt whole when talking to him. We didn’t live near one another, but it felt like I took him with me everywhere every day because we just stayed in contact constantly. He became this amazing version of himself that just... so fit me.

30. Have you ever caught your friend cheating on their boyfriend/girlfriend? If you have, what did you do about it? If you haven’t, what do you think you would do? Yeah I have and I called her out on it haaaaaaard core. Her sig other found out and even saw the texts of me saying “you need to tell him NOW.”

31. When your last relationship ended, how long was it before you felt ready to think about being with someone else? I think it’ll be a while. I wasn’t even in an official relationship this last time, though it felt like it. The previous one it took me maybe a year or so before I dated again, but a lot of that was because I just genuinely didn’t have the schedule.

32. Has any of your friends ever had a boyfriend/girlfriend that you found attractive, and you would secretly have liked to have for yourself? Hmmm.. I’ve found some attractive, but no not for myself. I’m very picky and (without sounding terribly cocky) I know what I am worth. I bring a LOT to the table and I just don’t want to settle. The guys that I’m thinking of are PHENOMENAL fits for the girls they are with, but not for me. My needs are different.

33. How many guys do you know named Matthew? Love that name. always wanted to marry a matthew. I know probably 5? --- none are marriage material HA

34. Think about the last person that made you cry. Would that person be there for you if you needed help? Uhhh, I guess it depends on the help. I honestly think a couple months ago he would have dropped anything to help me any time for any reason. He was always dependable. But now it kind of seems like .. idk. He just doesn’t care about me. I think if I needed help that was financial? maybe he would step in. But beyond that, no I don’t think so. Wow, thats.. hard to think about.

35. Who was the last person you talked to before you went to sleep last night? Do you remember what you talked about? Kile. We talked about how we were done. We discussed an airbnb for some reason.

36. Has someone of the opposite sex made you cry at any point during the last 24 hours? Yeppppppppppppppppppp. Which is unusual for me, but this is the loss of a really very close relationship. It’s the adjustment period.

37. Is there anything you would like to say to your most recent ex? Depends on what you call an ex. an official boyfriend, gosh no. I am very much OK not ever talking to him again. If it is this semi-relational situation, yeah there’s a lot I would say, but it doesn’t quite seem.. no.

38. If your friends are sexually active but you aren’t, does that bother you? Have you ever felt pressured to have sex before you were ready, because your friends had done it? It doesn’t bother me at all. My friends have different viewpoints regarding sex and they know mine is totally different than theirs because of my trauma. Definitely never felt pressured by them.

39. In your opinion, what is the difference between having a crush and being in love? Have your own experiences helped you to realise that there is a difference? Crushes are like “eek, I hope he looks at me! I hope we bump into one another! I hope our hands “accidentally” brush against one another” whereas love is just consuming. It’s loyalty. It’s the deeper... passionate and steady feelings. It’s working towards making another persons life better without looking for anything in return.

40. Did the last person you hugged have any of these letters in their name: T, R, K, P, J? R 41. What’s the most unhealthy thing you’ve eaten in the last 24 hours? m&ms

42. What was the last compliment you received from someone of the opposite sex? I was just asked if I could be someone’s sugar baby because “your eyes scream beauty while looking trustworthy and genuine” lololol. 43. Who did you last say ‘I love you’ to? What colour are that person’s eyes? My sister, blue eyes.

44. If you took away the first and third letters of your name, what would you then be called? Ina.

45. Name 7 things that make you happy, and explain how it might affect you if you had to give them up. Benny, family, school, air conditioning, pools, bobs burgers, bread --Some of these things I don’t have access to and lemme tell you it is BRUTAL. Some of these things would destroy me if I lost them.

46. Think about your Facebook profile photo. What kind of assumptions do you think a stranger might make about you, from seeing that photograph? Would any of these assumptions be correct? Yikes I don’t even know what that photo is. They’d probably think “wow, thats an old looking photo and why doesn’t she ever update her profile” and each of those statements would be correct.

47. You buy a bar of chocolate, but you decide that you don’t want to eat it now, and put it in the fridge. When you go back later, half of it’s gone - someone else has started eating it! Who are you most likely to blame? My grandma forrrrrrrrrr sure.

48. Choose 5 friends, and talk briefly about each person’s longest/most serious relationship. Who was the relationship with, and how long did it last? Oye. No. 49. Do you think it’s wrong for someone to commit themselves to a long-term relationship at a young age? Explain. No. I think the only downside is that you lose the ability to learn who you are on your own, your beliefs, values, standpoints, non-negotiables, standards, etc. without the influence of the other person. Plus, getting together really young takes away the ability to think about yourself solely which is kind of a bummer. 50. Is there something happening in the near future, that you’re looking forward to? The distraction of the holiday will be wonderful.

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