#unprompted! we were just taking a shortcut!

[dieschwartzman]

my dad watched ‘rogue’ without me so rewatched it with me. he said ‘i love [ncuti] as an actor - he’s so demonstrative!’ then called jonathan groff ‘colin firth’s love child’

[squadrablog]

Now hear me out: (Non-binary reader x Hot Pants) Reader has a stand that can read people’s souls, sort of like an aura and gets curious about what they see on Hot Pants, extreme guilt (we all know what happened to her brother right?). They follow her around awhile through the race trying to see what up with her and slowly befriends her along the way. Reader also has no combat experience so H.P. has to save them a few times but she still lets them ride along with her because they’re nice.

Finally finished it! I keep it free of most major spoilers for Steel Ball Run. I also decided to make Hot Pants a trans woman as per my wife’s request, and both your and her conception of gender is like... affirmed but also contemporary with the time period and understood through the lens of what would be available in the 19th century.

Hot Pants x Nonbinary Reader

Ao3 Mirror Here.

Words: 8414

Warnings: Really light body horror (just Hot Pants’s Cream Starter), and mild violence + animal death. Light angst.

Under cut for length!

Something happened to you in the desert during that last stage.

You had barely escaped with your life from what you had rationalized was a sinkhole, or a sandstorm, or maybe one of those hallucinations of an oasis people have when they’re on the verge of dehydration, although you hadn’t been tricked into seeing water but rather large arching natural rock formations around a smooth bowl shaped crater. Before the ground swallowed the whole landmass up and buried you in a tomb of sand you managed to guide your horse away from the danger, but not unscathed.

While you and your horse had managed to avoid a terrible death with only minor physical injuries, after you had set up camp you started to realize that something was wrong with you. As you fed the fire you realized despite the growing warmth, your hands were shaking. You were in something of a daze, and you kept seeing things out of the corner of your eye, causing you to jump and yelp and call out to any possible intruders only to hear no answer. You could tell your horse was starting to get a bit jumpy too. Could she sense the strange presence as well?

No, she could not. She was reacting entirely to your stress. You were making her nervous... concerned for you, even? Yes… concerned. Was that too human an emotion for her to feel? Were you projecting onto her, anthropomorphizing her to cope with your current mental state? You were close to her, sure, and you could pick up on her body language better than anyone. But this feeling you had watching her now was so strange, as if you were looking past those usual outward displays you used to read her and were seeing something else. Almost as if she was whispering to you in a language only you could understand… or you were at least hearing an interpreter whisper for her.

You screamed again when you saw something in the corner of your eye. It was a hand, translucent and only vaguely human, hovering right above your own, but when you turned to look at it, it was gone. 

The near-death experience had been pretty traumatizing. You cursed yourself for following after that Gyro man in some attempt to get the edge on the competition; he might have been reckless and unconventional in how he had approached the race so far, but he had the skill to back it up. You weren't bad on a horse by any means, but the rough terrain and constant toughing it in the wilderness was way harder than you had ever imagined, and it was taking its toll on you. From here on out you would take the paths that the majority of the other racers were using and not get tempted by every promise of a shortcut from some eccentric rider playing loose and fast with life and death.

You apologized to your horse for scaring her again before crawling inside your bedroll and covering your head, shutting your eyes tight, willing yourself to sleep and leave these phantoms behind with the night. Come morning you’d be better.

And come morning, you were better.

For a while.

When you were riding with your horse alone in the wilderness, finally comfortable in the safety that the main course provided, you felt ecstatic. You loved horse riding of course, you wouldn’t be doing this otherwise, but something was different today. You and your horse were in perfect sync and you swore you felt as energetic and driven as if you were her yourself. If this was going to be the tone for the rest of the race then you’d have no problem leaving your waking desert nightmare long behind you.

When you saw the checkpoint in the distance you became even more excited, rushing ahead with all the energy your horse had been saving up for this point. You probably weren’t first but you were absolutely giddy at the thought of crossing another checkpoint. The closer you got, the more excited you were, until you realized something definitely felt off about everything.

Your excitement was starting to make you jittery. Frantic, even. The closer you got to the crowds of people cheering at the top of their lungs the shakier your breathing got. You didn’t have a problem with the crowds before the race, so why now?

Your horse of course picked up on your stress and you felt it magnified back towards you worse than before. You weren’t sure what was worse, the joyful excitement that threatened to drown you, or the anxiety feedback loop between you and your companion.

When you crossed the finish line you didn’t even listen for the announcer to try to figure out what place you were in. You dismounted your horse, tied her to a hitching post, and stumbled as best as you could towards the food and water table set up for competitors. All you needed was some cold water to ground you, that’s all. Maybe you were still shaken up from last night and it had just chosen a bad time to boil back up to the surface.

You practically fell over, stepping back suddenly, when another hand that wasn’t yours extended from your own to grab at a cup of water you were reaching for. It was the ghost hand from last night, only this time it didn’t disappear. To your horror it actually grew out of you until it was an entire creature, humanoid in shape but alien in appearance.

You looked around frantically at everyone in your vicinity, but all they did was raise their eyebrows at you in confusion, looking at you like you were out of your mind. Could no one else see it? You could only faint from the shock.

---

When you woke up you were in a medical tent, but you felt no relief when upon scanning the room for any staff members you once again met the gaze of the ghost that had put you here to begin with.

“What are you!? What do you want with me?” you demanded, only to receive no reply.

“So you do have one,” an intimidating voice called out behind you. Your head snapped back and you saw an androgynous stranger dressed in hot pink sitting in one of the chairs by the tent’s entrance, staring at you with an apathetic expression. The words seemed less directed at you and more just the stranger musing out loud.

Despite what must have been a conscious attempt from the stranger to disguise any secondary sex characterisitics, you knew right away she was a woman. You knew it before your eyes had even adjusted to get a good look at her. You suddenly knew a lot of things about her that you had idea how you knew. Her face was entirely unreadable and gave nothing away, but it didn’t need to.

This woman was a cosmos of warring emotions that threatened to rip her apart from the inside. How could she sit there and look so calm when she was currently drowning, burning, and crumbling before your very eyes? Shame, fear, despair, grief, an ocean during a storm.

You had many questions fighting in your mind for permission to be asked first. Who was she? Could she see the ghost? Did she know what it was? 

“Are you… are you okay?” you sputtered out instead. Her overwhelming aura had won out against all your curiosity.

She raised an eyebrow. “Shouldn’t I be asking you that?”

You couldn’t articulate why you had asked her that unprompted, but there was no way you were just projecting emotions this time like you had with your horse. These were human emotions from a human woman that were attacking your human mind. You clutched your head and winced in pain.

“What’s happening to me?” you choked out, the beginning of sobs starting to form in your throat. “What are you doing to me?”

The ghost that had been watching you with curiosity this whole time floated up to you, placing its hand on your shoulder. Your instinct was to flinch, but now something else was overwhelming all your senses. You didn’t notice at first, but this ghost had a mirror where its face should be, and now that you were staring at it you could only see yourself. Then there was a gentle calm, a bright light snatching away your vision, and a sudden realization.

This thing was you.

Although you were spared the continued assault of the stranger’s emotions, your now exhausted body drifted off once again.

When you woke up again it seemed as if not too much time had passed, as the announcer’s voice could still be heard calling out race results in the distance and the lighting in the tent hadn’t changed much. You sat up again and glanced around. The ghost was gone, and so was the woman. It hadn’t been a dream, had it?

Well, if there were no nurses available to check up on you before heading out you supposed you’d make your leave. As you popped out of your own tent and glanced into the others you passed by you supposed you could understand. While you had fainted most of the other people needing medical attention had some pretty nasty injuries from the race. After finally leaving the medical tents behind you saw a familiar (and very much not a figment of your imagination) pink figure in the distance, preparing to mount her horse.

She wasn’t getting away that easily! You ran to intercept her, unsure of what to call to get her attention, settling on just, “Hey! You!”

She turned towards you as you approached, and without a change of expression she went back to readying her horse. “You’re awake,” she stated, matter of factly.

“You left before I could talk to you!” you wheezed out, catching your breath. “You didn’t explain anything!”

“I don’t have anything to explain,” she replied flatly, still not turning to look at you as she untied her horse from the hitching post. “But if you have something to ask I suggest you ask it now.”

“But you were waiting for me to wake up! And you know about the ghost that I saw, right? And… when I looked at you before everything got all… weird and dark…? But it’s not like that anymore! Did you fix me?”

“I saw you out in the desert,” she replied, ignoring your questions. “You found the same rock formations I did, didn’t you? No one else could see the thing you call a ‘ghost’ except for me. I thought you’d have answers, but you don’t know anything, so I saw no point to sticking around,” she explained before climbing up onto her horse.

“Wait, don’t go!” you called after her, but her horse was already trotting off. You looked around for the hitching post with your own horse and quickly got to work mounting her before trying to catch up with the mysterious woman. You pulled up beside her and gave her a big frown, but she didn’t even look over at you. “Please, I have no idea what’s happening!”

“I answered all your questions, didn’t I?” she asked, increasing her horse’s pace while you pulled ahead to match it. She didn’t, not even a little bit, but it seemed like she might be in the same boat as you. Didn’t she want to figure out what was going on? How could she be so disinterested?

“Are you being serious right now?”

“I’m always serious,” she said, finally sparing a scathing glance in your direction. Approaching the border of the town where streets finally made way to an open dirt path, her horse started up a reasonably well paced running speed, leaving you behind in a cloud of dust. She really wasted no time cooling down between stages before getting right back in there, did she?

Fine then, you’d keep pace. You’d follow her across this entire damn continent if you had to in order to get an explanation you were satisfied with.

At first you didn’t try to continue your conversation since most of your energy was placed on just trying to catch up and stay caught up. While the overwhelming anxiety you had felt in the presence of the crowded city streets had faded to background noise, distancing yourself even further was still a huge relief. Whatever your ‘ghost’ had done to you before you passed out the second time, it seemed to make the influx of emotions ebb to a steady trickle. You also felt like you had a bit more control of what you took in now, focusing your new ‘ability’ at your horse and shutting everything else out.

Whatever was going on with you at least it was making you a better competitor, more in tune with your horse than you ever had been. You were starting to realize you’d need any advantage you could get if this was only a starting pace for the woman. Once your horse got comfortable staying in line with her horse and you felt confident she wasn’t going to try to pull ahead again you called out to her.

“Who are you?” you asked. A reasonable question that could perhaps break the ice. When she didn’t answer you told her your name instead. Nothing. You glanced over and noticed the brand on her horse that read: “HP? Are those your initials?” Again, silence.

You had something you could use to get her attention, although you hadn’t wanted to start with it. Still, it was something about her that made you very curious. She was clearly trying to disguise the fact that she was a woman from other competitors, and while there were plenty of viable reasons a woman would want to do that, and she might not react well to being found out, you had to know if her reasons were similar to yours.

You wore clothing that disguised aspects of your figure and facial features, in addition to a wide brimmed hat, bulky scarf, and gloved hands. A lot of people assumed you were a man by default, but others sometimes projected different traits onto you. Truth is that you’d rather keep it a mystery, leave everyone guessing. You never felt like you fit into either the world of men or of women, but you had never met another person who felt the same way as you.

While you knew this stranger was definitely a woman, could the fact she disguised herself mean she understood too? Or was it for her safety?

“You’re a woman, right?” you asked, a bit awkwardly. You immediately regretted it when although it had the desired effect of getting her attention she now turned towards you with a glare.

“What makes you think that?” she asked, controlling her expression back to its neutral unreadable state, turning back to look ahead.

“The ghost told me so,” you said. “But you don’t want people to know.”

“It would be inconvenient, but I don’t really care what anyone thinks of me. I can’t be blackmailed,” she responded, a bit of gruff annoyance seeping into her voice. “What about you? Are you not also attempting to hide your identity with the way you’re dressed? I’ll warn you now, if you’re an outlaw I won’t hesitate to knock you off that horse and hang you.”

“Oh my God, what?” you yelled at her, taken aback. “No! I just… don’t want people looking at me, is all!”

“I’ve noticed,” she replied. “Which is why I wasn’t expecting you to follow after me.” Had she been keeping an eye on you? Noticing your withdrawn and secretive nature? You did rank decently in the first race, so it would make sense if she did some snooping on her competitors. “But here you are, after I’ve already told you I have nothing for you.”

“But... you have a ghost too, right?” you prompted. Even if she seemed to think comparing notes wasn’t worthwhile, you had to disagree. And now that you had her talking maybe you could get some answers.

“No,” she said. “But I have this.” She pulled out what looked like a… lighter, perhaps? The handle of a gun? She did take it from her holster. “It appeared after I encountered that place in the desert. It’s called Cream Starter.”

“What is it?”

“A weapon. It lets me melt flesh.”

That was a scary thought. You hadn’t done anything like that yet. “And it’s called Cream Starter? How do you know? Is that just what you named it?”

“No,” she responded, holstering it again. “I just know.”

Did your ghost have a name too? You thought about how you’d like to get another look at it since it had not reappeared yet, but simply thinking that made it materialize into existence next to you. You flinched a little, but this time you were able to keep your fear under control. You didn’t want to scare your horse again.

You gave it a quick glance, not wanting to distract yourself from the road ahead of you. It still had that same mirror face and you noticed what looked like a rotary phone embedded into its chest. Without understanding why you knew, you knew.

“Mine is called Kiss Me Through The Phone,” you said out loud, not necessarily at her. You weren’t expecting a reply to that. You sent the ghost away and spoke again to her. “I don’t exactly understand what it does, but it lets me… tell what people are like. Who they are and how they’re feeling.” You weren’t sure if she gave a grunt in reply or not, but she didn’t say anything else.

The both of you rode in silence for a while as she seemed to have no intention of trying to ditch you, but she didn’t seem happy about you following her either. You could always check to tell exactly how she felt about you riding with her, but you were afraid of feeling that same drowning sensation you felt before you were able to control what got in and what didn’t.

Before you knew it the sun was setting and you finally broke the hours of silence. “There’s an inn up ahead in a small town! Some of the competitors look like they’re stopping there for the night!” You pointed ahead even though she wasn’t looking at you and could probably already see the distant figures of three of the other top ranking competitors heading towards a town in the distance. You recognized them as Gyro, Johnny, and Diego. While Diego had been a favorite to win from the start, the other two were generating their own buzz after their performance.

But your companion did not change course to veer closer to the cliffs leading into town, but stayed on the lower path.

“Wait! The inn is at the top of this hill!” you called, as if it was possible for her to not already know that.

“Don’t let me stop you,” she called back at you, continuing ahead as your horse’s speed faltered a bit. You wanted to rest in a comfortable inn and you had already sworn to yourself that you wouldn’t follow any more shortcuts presented by other riders after what happened in the desert. But you didn’t die in the desert, did you? It was almost as if you were fated to end up there and receive this power. And now you had met someone else caught up in the same situation.

You already knew what type of person she was. She was cold, but not malicious. She was harboring a deep pain within her, something she was able to keep hidden from everyone else but not from you. She was lonely, and you were no stranger to loneliness yourself. You had kept your true self hidden from everyone since the race started, and for some time before it if you were being honest. You were drawn to her, despite the way that your stomach turned every time you imagined the terrible pain that peering into her soul had given you.

But she was the one who had to bear that pain the worst, always. She couldn’t shut it off like you could. If you couldn’t help her fight it, maybe you could at least help her carry it.

---

“Why couldn’t we just sleep at the inn and leave earlier than everyone else? Are we really saving that much time by camping a bit ahead of the others?” you whined. You had been complaining like this for a while as you helped Hot Pants set up camp.

You had finally learned her name was Hot Pants, but knowing HP was indeed an acronym had you playfully calling her that occasionally, her much to her indignation. You also saw her Cream Starter in action briefly as it managed to heal some scrapes on her horse’s legs as if they had never been there. The thick meaty substance was a little gross, but the fact that it had applications outside of use as a weapon made you a little less afraid of it.

“I’m not making you camp with me,” she said in her usual blunt tone. “You chose to follow me.” You knew she was right, but you still grumbled. It took some convincing for her to even let you camp in the same spot as her, but you had offered to share your resources and help her gather firewood.

“Sorry,” you sighed. “I’m just not used to roughing it.”

“I’m not here to take care of you,” Hot Pants said, looking at you firmly. “I won’t wait up for you in the morning, either.”

“Hear you loud and clear HP,” you said, giving her a smile. Despite the outward apathy in her expressions and words, you could be sure her hostility was mostly empty. You did try probing her with your ability just a bit more, focusing on the outer layers of her psyche without diving any deeper than you needed to. At the forefront of her mind, beyond the despair she held deep within, was a fierce determination and a sense of hope that had been overshadowed last time you looked at her soul. Knowing that she had found some distant light to strive for had you a bit relieved for her sake.

Still, as surface level as you tried to keep your readings now, you still felt a bit guilty about seeing her as you had before. It didn’t sit right with you to keep silent about it, and you felt like in the spirit of trying to gain her trust you should be open about it. After the fire was built up to a level where it didn’t need your constant attention you leaned back and decided to bite the bullet.

“HP… about when I first saw you,” you began. You were expecting her to ignore you until you got to your main point since she wasn’t very tolerant of any preamble in your conversations, but this time she did look at you with a raised eyebrow. “With my ability… I saw something really scary inside you, really painful to experience. I don’t know what it means, but I just thought you should know.”

“My soul has strayed too far from God’s light, then?” she said as a question, although with her flat delivery it sounded more like a statement. You were expecting denial of what you saw, or annoyance that you saw it, but you weren’t expecting her to say something like that.

“What? No? It wasn’t like… evil or anything. Just… sad,” you said. You hadn’t wanted to use the word ‘sad’ because it stood in such stark opposition to the unaffected aura she was trying to project, and you didn’t want her to feel insulted.

But she gave a small chuckle, quiet enough to where you almost didn’t hear it. “Just sad,” she repeated, to herself. She looked towards you with a weird kind of curious smile. “Earlier you had also said that my soul is that of a woman, correct?”

“Y-yeah… that’s how I could tell. And, I mean… if you already know it then some of your prettier features start to stick out, more,” you began, your cheeks quickly flushing a bit in embarrassment for admitting you found her attractive. You tried to backpedal. “But if you’re worried about other people finding out-!”

“No,” she said, interrupting you. “I told you already, I don’t care about that. I’m just surprised is all.”

“Surprised?” you asked in a tone of confusion.

She looked at you as if it was the first time she was really taking you in as another person, not just a competitor or obstacle she was sizing up. But before too much vulnerability could show through, she was closed off again. It was silent for a long while and it was clear the conversation was over for her, but you didn’t want to relinquish any of the progress you had made so far so you awkwardly tried to start up the conversation again.

“I’ve just never met someone else who’s tried hiding their gender is all,” you blurted out. You had thought that maybe being vulnerable about your own secret would show her you were trustworthy, but you regretted it soon after you said it. “I mean, whatever you’re doing it for is probably different, but! I was just… I don’t know… curious!”

“Your disguise is for hiding your gender?” she asked, seemingly interested in the conversation again. “It’s effective. I really can’t tell one way or the other.”

You gave an involuntary smile at that. “Th-thanks! Truth is… I don’t really like being seen as anything in particular… ever since I was a kid it always felt weird. I know that probably doesn’t make much sense to you… you probably want to know what I actually am...”

Once again, she was looking at you very closely, her face its usual neutral but far more relaxed and visibly contemplative. “No,” she said again. “It doesn’t concern me.”

While she had tried to say it the same apathetic way she had said it before, as if she really didn’t care to hear any more about your life story, once again reading her revealed a softness to her intentions. It was meant as an affirmation. You gave her a big sheepish grin in response to that, and she let out an annoyed huff before standing up and heading to her bed roll.

She said she wouldn’t wait up for you in the morning, but the next day you could tell that the noisy way she packed up her supplies was intentional.

---

“Those two took my cattle,” Hot Pants said with some uncharacteristic frustration, reaching over to one of the bags on the side of her horse to dig around for something. She pulled out two ropes and began tying them into what you slowly realized was two nooses. “They’ll hang for that.”

“Huh!? Really? I can understand being upset but don’t you think that’s kind of harsh?”

She looked towards you as if she could not possibly understand what your reasoning was. “They’ve broken one of the laws of this land, correct? Is the punishment outlined by your laws not hanging?”

You weren’t familiar with the exact word of the law, but something like that was probably true. Still, the idea that she could be so casual about hanging two men who you hadn’t even investigated yet had you pouting.

It was also interesting to note the way she said “your laws” and the laws of “this land.” She had registered in this race as an American, right? Did her origins have to do with her disguise? Or was she just from the other side of the continent? Maybe you’d ask her about it later. She had been a tad more open with you lately, although she had yet to tell you her “true objective,” which you slowly began to realize through small clues here and there that it was not winning the Steel Ball Run.

As you got closer you saw it was Gyro Zeppeli and Johnny Joestar. “Nice weather for racing, isn’t it?” Hot Pants asked casually as she threw both nooses over a tree branch. “But I’m not here to talk. Can I ask the two of you to dismount so I can hang you properly?”

Gyro furrowed his eyebrows and looked between Hot Pants and you. You just looked at him a bit wide-eyed and awkwardly shrugged your shoulders. You didn’t like the idea any more than he did. Hopefully the three of them could talk things out.

“You’re that Hot Pants guy, aren’t you?” Gyro asked before looking at you and saying the false name you had entered the race under as well.

“The two of you finished an hour before anyone else, what need do you have to kill off the competition like this?” Johnny asked, frustration as well as curiosity laced into his voice. You directed your ghost’s power towards the two men and found no hostile intentions between either of them on a surface level.

“You misunderstand my intentions,” Hot Pants said. “That cattle you slaughtered for its meat was mine. For theft of cattle the punishment is hanging.”

“Hey, HP? I think that we should hear them out…” you said, but it came out a bit more quietly than you were hoping before Gyro was speaking over you.

“Hey, hey, hey, let’s not be hasty. We only took a little bit, but only because the cow was already dead and picked apart by scavengers by the time-” he started, but he was interrupted by Hot Pants jumping off her horse with her spray bottle at the ready. You really wished Hot Pants wasn’t the kind of person to act before talking. She had already started spraying them with her Cream Starter, and while Gyro had reached for what appeared to be a weapon of sorts he was immediately overtaken by the fleshy substance.

“Ah! HP!” you yelled to try to get her attention, but she was paying you no mind, tackling Gyro off his horse and to the ground. Johnny Joestar held his finger out towards her in a gesture reminiscent of aiming a gun, although unlike Gyro he didn’t have a weapon on him, but HP was quickly spraying him as well. Soon the faces of the two men were covered with a thin layer of flesh that blocked all their orifices, causing them to thrash around sightless and unable to breathe.

You probed them a bit deeper to ascertain their guilt, since Hot Pants wasn’t going to listen to reason. As far as you could tell Gyro had been truthful in saying that they had come across the cow already dead, and deeper than that he didn’t seem like a bad person by any means. Certainly not the type of guy who deserved to be hung. Johnny Joestar was a little trickier to get a read on, and while you could tell he too was not necessarily a bad person he did harbor a deep anger and an almost dark level of determination that kind of frightened you a bit. If you could stay off his bad side, you definitely would. Hot Pants wouldn’t listen to them, but you hoped she’d listen to you.

“HP, please! They didn’t kill the cow! Gyro is telling the truth, they really did just find it like that!” you called out to her. She hesitated for a second before crawling off Gyro and calling off her Cream Starter’s attack. Just in time too, it looked like Gyro was about to hit her with that iron ball of his.

“If you say it’s true, then it is,” she said, casting a glance in your direction. “But I won’t apologize to someone who ate meat that legally belonged to me, regardless of how much they took.” She walked casually back over to her horse and remounted it.

“Bastard,” Gyro grumbled under his breath. “Good riddance.”

“Wait!” Johnny said before Hot Pants could move her horse. “Did you get your stand from the Devil’s Palm too?”

“Stand?” you asked.

“Yeah, that’s what they’re called. I got one during the Arizona leg of the race too, out in the desert,” he further explained.

Hot Pants looked thoughtful for a moment, although she remained quiet. You weren’t about to let the opportunity go to waste though, and you pulled out your Through The Phone.

“Is this ghost a stand too?” you asked.

The two men looked a little shocked at first before relaxing. “Probably,” Johnny said. “Looks like mine and some others I’ve seen.”

“There’s others? How many!?”

“I dunno… we’re bound to see more by the time this race is finished, though.”

Hot Pants was looking over her shoulder at you, clearly already content with the amount of information she had received and ready to get going. You were a bit surprised that she was actually waiting for you before going on ahead, but the thought made you happy.

“Well, maybe we’ll run into each other again!” you offered with a friendly wave good-bye. The two men looked at each other with raised eyebrows, confused with your demeanor considering your riding companion had just tried to kill them, but they offered a reluctant farewell as your horse trotted off after her.

After you had put some distance between yourselves and them she muttered out, “We still need to hang the one responsible.”

“I’ll give you some of my food tonight if it would make you feel better,” you offered to placate her.

“It’s not about the food. It’s against the law. If justice doesn’t exist out here, I’ll bring it myself,” she stated. While her convictions seemed almost a little ridiculous to you, you could tell from her aura that she did in fact abide by this black and white sense of righteousness. You hoped for the thief's sake that you two didn’t stumble upon them.

After a while of trotting along on your horses you started to feel like all the trees looked the same. It felt like you were making no progress at all, no matter how long you walked for. Eventually Hot Pants took out her compass and gave a confused huff at whatever she saw on its display. The two of you noticed some familiar figures that you thought you had just left behind drawing closer, and a small log house some ways behind them.

“Well, at least we can trust those two to help us out,” Hot Pants said plainly, pulling up ahead of you. Despite your fear from the current predicament you were in, you couldn’t help but smile a bit. Her choosing to trust those two was an extension of her choosing to trust you. That thought also made you happy.

---

You hadn’t been ready for a gunfight, let alone a stand fight. That man, Ringo Roadagain, didn’t even bother looking at you. You weren’t worth his time, and you could have honestly gotten out unscathed if you had stayed back like Hot Pants told you to. But when he aimed to shoot her you ran to push her out of the way, acting on pure instinct, and you were shot pretty badly in the process. You were out cold after that and by the time you finally came to your senses it was night time.

You sat up quickly, frantically feeling at your shoulder to assess the status of your wound, but you quickly realized that there was nothing there except a faint dull pain. You were on top of your bedroll in front of a campfire, your horse next to Hot Pants’s horse.

“You’re awake,” came a familiar voice, and you turned to see her sitting on a log, watching you, her head leaned on her steepled fingers.

“Did we… get out of there?” you asked, a bit groggy.

“Yes. I healed your wound.”

“Thank you,” you murmured, laying back down on your bed roll.

“You would risk your life to save that of a stranger?” she asked, straight to the point. No ‘you’re welcome’ or ‘how are you feeling’ or even ‘that was a close one’, as her eyes continued to bore into you. “You have no reason to believe I’d do the same for you.”

You gave her a tired smile and chuckled, which only made her eyebrows furrow in annoyance. “You could have left me back there. Even if you just wanted to heal my wounds to be polite… you could have left me behind.”

“You’re clearly trustworthy,” she said, a little too quick, as if to dismiss the idea that it was purely out of the goodness of her heart. “I need allies I can depend on, and your stand will be useful in discerning who stands in the way of my objectives.”

“Hmm… so it’s just because I’m useful? How utilitarian of you,” you said, your smile turning into a smirk. But still, did that mean she was officially inviting you along? Was she no longer going to pretend that you just happened to be in the same places she was in and that you were of ‘no concern’ to her? The mention of her ‘objectives’ also made you think she might let you in on whatever she was really in this race to do.

Hot Pants finally broke eye contact with you. “You’re a good person. And you can keep pace with me.” There she went again, dampening a compliment by following it with another less sentimental, more practical one. She stood up and made sure the now dwindling fire was fully out before she went to her own bedroll, slipping inside it and turning her body so it faced away from you. “Next time do not sacrifice yourself for my sake.”

You just smiled to yourself, getting settled in your own bedroll, which you realized that she must have spread out for you. Your heart fluttered a bit at the deep appreciation and respect noticeably radiating off her.

---

“They got ahold of another corpse part,” Hot Pants said, putting her binoculars down. “Good.” Gyro and Johnny were off far in the distance with a girl who Hot Pants had recognized as Lucy Steel. It seems as if you caught them in the aftermath of some battle, as they were looking pretty beat up, but they had managed to secure the spine. There had been some heavy rainfall earlier, but the sky was finally starting to clear up, which you were glad for.

“Why can’t we just work with them, instead of waiting to steal the parts later?” You already knew why, of course. You’d seen Johnny’s overwhelming desire to obtain the corpse, and you knew he wouldn’t give it up easily, especially not if Hot Pants was unwilling to reveal her true intentions to him. You’d told her as much before, so she didn’t bother answering your question. While you didn’t want to hurt Johnny even you had to admit something like the holiest corpse on the face of the Earth was too precious a thing to belong to any one man. The Vatican collecting it seemed the most reasonable option to you.

“Well… let’s keep moving then,” you said after the figures in the distance were out of sight even with Hot Pants’s binoculars. The two of you continued along, and as usual you were the one trying to lead a conversation. “So, you’re like a high ranking agent of the Vatican, right? Do you go on other missions as big as this one too?”

“The Vatican deploys me as they see fit,” she said, devoid of any of the juicier details you were hoping for. “Before this I performed the duties of a sister in my covenant.”

“You’re a nun?”

“No. The Church felt my skill set made me better suited for an uncloistered life. I did spend years training to become a proper sister with the idea I may one day become a nun, but once the period of my temporary vows elapsed I underwent a different type of training.”

“Secret battle nun training?” you asked with a playful smile. She just stared at you blankly.

“It’s probably for the best, in the end. I don’t think it was God’s will that I continue on as a sister,” she said, her voice lacking its usual conviction. “Although…”

“Hm?”

“It seems it is still God’s will I live my life as a woman,” she said, almost too quiet for you to hear. “As I believe it is also He who brought us together.”

You bit your lip to stifle a giant grin that was appearing on your face, although Hot Pants was not looking in your direction anyway, now lost in her own thoughts. What types of vows did a covert agent of the Vatican have to abide by? Was it wrong that you felt yourself falling for her, little by little? Could she even be with someone like you, someone who lived as neither a man nor a woman?

The more you learned about Hot Pants, though, the more you began to suspect she and you were more alike than you originally had thought, as clearly her relationship to her gender was more complicated than it appeared on the surface. You never asked outright about it; if she wanted you to know she would tell you herself.

There had been a night when in the middle of a round of questioning from you on various aspects of Catholicism the topic of Joan of Arc had come up. Apparently there were ongoing efforts to canonize her as a saint. Joan of Arc was acting under the directions of God when she wore men’s clothes, right? It wasn’t the same at all, but… was it too hard to believe that God’s plan had accounted for your circumstances?

“Well, if that’s true, this God fellow is alright in my book,” you said with a chuckle. She turned back to give you a glare as she usually did whenever you didn’t show God what she felt was the proper amount of reverence, but it was hard taking her seriously when you could read her actual feelings at any given moment.

And for the first time since you met her she seemed content.

---

“HP!” you called out, shaking her awake with one hand, holding a lantern you had quickly lit up with the other. “HP, there’s something in the woods! Our horses ran off!”

She blinked a few times to clear the sleep from her eyes before she heard the same snapping of branches that woke you up. She shot up onto her legs and grabbed Cream Starter from her side, turning towards the noise.

“Enemies?” she muttered.

“Whoever it is, they’re angry, and… hungry? Really simple thoughts. I think it’s an animal,” you murmured, positioning yourself behind her.

Your suspicions were confirmed when a bear lumbered into your lantern’s light, its eyes a bright yellow green as they reflected back eerily at you two in the dark. It stood still for a while, sizing you two up, and you noticed that Hot Pants had noticeably tensed, her hand with her weapon still held uselessly at her side.

Just like that you were transported back to that moment you first met her, before you understood your stand’s power, when you felt the weight of the entire world crushing you from all sides as you sank lower and lower into despair. All the layers between the image Hot Pants projected outwards onto the world and the deep sadness she felt at her core were gone, and you were hit with it all at once before you could guard yourself against it. 

“HP!” you yelled, clutching at your head. “HP, please!”

She was breathing heavily as she slowly turned to look at you, her eyes wide and horrified in a way that looked so wrong on her usually calm and collected face. She looked past you at something else, someone else, far away from here. Her mouth hung open with the promise of a silent shout, but the only sound she made was her panting.

“Look out!” you yelled, pushing her out of the way as the bear behind her swung its claw. She fell to the ground with you following after her, your bulky clothes ripped to shreds at your side where blood seeped out from a few of the deeper cuts. Despite the pain your adrenaline allowed you to shoot back up and drag Hot Pants away from the bear as it turned around to follow you with its gaze.

“Hot Pants, please,” you begged, your breathing just as ragged as hers. “My stand isn’t strong enough to hurt it.”

“I’m sorry,” she cried out, tears spilling from her eyes. She wasn’t talking to you, still looking past you. “Lord, I’m sorry… I’m sorry.” She repeated it over and over and when shaking her by the shoulders didn’t snap her out of it you turned around to face the bear again.

You summoned your stand and tried to think of what you knew of bear safety. Were you supposed to play dead? Was it too late if it was already attacking? Did you aim for the nose or did you try to run and not engage? Your stand was only about as strong as an average person’s strength, but you used its arms to hit the bear hard on the nose. That seemed to stun it momentarily, which gave you the opportunity to pick up Hot Pants and drape her over your shoulder as you started running away, the feelings of anger only intensifying behind you.

While Hot Pants dragged her feet initially, eventually she was able to take steps in time with your own, although she still needed your support. “I’m sorry,” she said again, although it sounded a little more grounded this time. “You’re injured.” She sobbed loudly upon finally comprehending the situation at hand. “I told you not to sacrifice yourself for me, I told you to never sacrifice yourself for me...”

“HP, it’s still after us,” you said firmly now that you had her attention. She stopped walking and removed herself from your grip.

“Keep going. I can handle it now,” she said, her voice a shaky imitation of her usual confidence.

“I’m not leaving you!” You knew she was hardly in a state to handle a bear all on her own, and you could still feel all the negativity she exuded like thick gooey tar. You didn’t want to leave her to any self-destructive impulses she may have.

“You have to live,” she said, turning back to you with a weak smile. “That bear is just here for me.”

“It’s a bear!” you shouted indignantly. “It came here for food! It doesn’t know who you are, Hot Pants! If it was a holy messenger of divine wrath I think I’d know!”

“But-” she stuttered. “My sins- I can’t-”

“I told you before,” you said, loud and firm but more gentle than your previous yelling. “Your soul doesn’t have a shred of evil in it.”

She paused for a second before turning back to face the oncoming bear, her Cream Starter raised and poised to attack. “No… not evil,” she quoted with a wavering laugh, “just sad.”

With that she was leaping forward, spraying the bear’s face with a thick layer of her meat spray and taking away any of the senses it had to track either of you. Unable to breathe or see or smell its surroundings, it thrashed wildly in all directions as she continued to spray without end, borrowing flesh from its legs which now wobbled weakly under its weight.

Eventually it collapsed and the heaving of its body as it struggled to find any air finally ceased.

Hot Pants was shaking again as she fell to her knees in front of its corpse, her Cream Starter falling out of her hand. As you tried to calm your own heart still pounding in your chest, you approached her and plopped down next to her on the dirt. She cried for a while, silent this time, as the two of you just looked at it.

“Well, at least this takes care of our food situation for a good few days,” you said at last to break the tension. When you heard her give a small laugh you were glad that you didn’t come across as insensitive. “Although I hear bear meat is pretty gamey.”

Instead of responding she abruptly wrapped her arms around you and squeezed you tight. “You saved me,” she whispered.

You were taken aback, but you slowly brought your arms to wrap around her as well. “I’m pretty sure you’re the one who took it down.”

But the true meaning of her words was not lost on you. Once again your heart was overflowing with the ambience of her inner self, and while she still held an ocean within her it felt as if the storm clouds had finally parted and the waters were steady.

You two finally disentangled and stared at each other in a contemplative and comfortable silence for a long time. She had a sweet smile on her face, and you didn’t need to use your stand to see the way her eyes were sparkling with adoration.

“I won’t leave your side, Hot Pants. I’ll stay with you until this whole thing is over,” you promised, holding up your hand to cup her face. “And I’ll follow you after too, if you’d let me.”

You leaned in slowly, giving her ample space and time to move away, but she only fluttered her eyes shut and leaned in as well. Eventually the two of your lips met in a soft kiss, almost chaste but definitely warm and just a touch desperate. Slowly the two of you backed up again, searching each other’s eyes for some help in deciphering the intimate moment, but it was clear neither of you had regretted it.

She gave you a smirk, a playful twinkle in her eyes. “Whatever you do,” she began, grabbing at the hand on her face to intertwine her fingers with it. “It doesn’t concern me.”

[jardaddy-a]

@serpentsexile​ delivered a letter ! ( ╰┈➺ ♡  ┊   A PUMPKIN PATCH                       is never the first place one thinks of when they’re offered exploration.╰┈➺ ♡  ┊    The car pulled up to the dust - ridden lane  ,  polluting a gust of tan tinge to the air.   He parked on a patch of    yellowing   grass   ,   exiting to open the door for their apparition guest.   The heated    autumn     sun hung heavy in the crisp    paper  sky above them.   It was roughly past four.   Envy supposed Lenore would be getting off of school right about now.   Mimosa would be on the way to pick her up.   Hopefully  ,   they would pick up food for the two of them as well  . . .   Last time   ,   she returned   UNFED.    ╰┈➺ ♡  ┊    Truthfully   ,   they are here because Envy promised he would pick up a few    pumpkins  before he returned to the cabins at sunset.   Lenore wanted to   carve   faces into them   --   an odd    MORTAL   tradition.   Lust also required pumpkin innards for seasonal breads   ,   he supposed he would save her the trouble.  But they’re also here because he   invited  the sable - haired spirit to take some time off to explore.   What better for a  poetry  lover than a pumpkin patch   ??   It was a field that   pandered   to both the hopeless romantics and those of the occult. ╰┈➺ ♡  ┊    ❛  That’s odd . . .  ❜   Envy checked the small   stand   for any sign of service   ,   but to no avail   ,   the place looked empty.   The sign on the side of the road   swore  they were open   ,    yet only the rustling    CORNFIELD    greeted them.   The rows of decaying crops seemed to    stretch  into a maze that curled for miles.   Envy checked his phone   ,   ready to simply search for another   ,    but there was no reception.   From the sidelines   ,   Envy breathed out a     ❛  stupid fucking glass box ❜    while tapping violently on the screen.╰┈➺ ♡  ┊   THERE WAS A SIGN PLACED ON A CHAIR JUST BESIDE THE STAND           it reads  :   Pumpkin Patch 1 Mile   ,   shortcut through cornfield.   )  ┊ 🏮HIGANBANA ┊UNPROMPTED ! 

         ˗ˏˋ🏮❀┊ ( * THE TRAGIC HIGANBANA ) ━ THE SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE steps out of the vehicle , carrying a journal    &&.    pen on hand ;   she adjusts her crimson skirt as it billowed over ghostly legs .     SHE PEERS at her surroundings , shielding ruby hues from the harsh , autumn sun .        THE FIELDS were vast     &&.     picturesque . . . although it seemed like it was akin to an ocean that stretched for miles .     A SCENIC venue of solstice it may be , but the specter found herself struck by the eerieness that surrounded the meadow like a fog .      THE MAIDEN silently scoured the colors of fall , it doesn’t take long for her awe to shift into discomfort , her lips curled     &&.     her brows knit together .      SHE WAS no Anima-type Laniatura , but something about this domain reeked of phantoms much like herself .    SHE may be a spirit , and yet she still found herself wary of what lurked from the realm beyond her reach .     BUT with Envy with her , surely they’ll be fine , right ? 

         ˗ˏˋ🏮❀┊ ( * HIGANBANA ) ━ HER GAZE FLITS TO THE DEITY ,  ❝ ah , envy-san . ❞  A GENTLE PROD to his side , a phantasmal finger points at the sign board .    ❝ you’re here for pumpkins , right ?     the sign says there’s a pumpkin patch through that path , but it looks far .   ❞ A MILE . . .  Higanbana pressed her lips together in reluctance , ❝ we can always look elsewhere . ❞ ALTHOUGH , she had promised Gladiolus a souvenir , perhaps a small pumpkin that she’d mostly likely bash into pieces for entertainment . 

[pertinax--loculos]

Character Study: Cassidy (1)

1. Intro My name is Cassidy Vick, but you probably know that already. I know, I know, you’re probably all sick of seeing me up here. But I’m hoping that I’ll be able to use this opportunity to pass on some knowledge.

Note to self: too immodest??

Some people may say that I’m just naturally talented, but I don’t believe that’s the be-all and end-all. You can only get so far on raw talent. At some point, you have to start putting the work in. And it is my belief that someone who works hard, and works consistently, will always end up outstripping someone with natural talent that just coasts along.

Note to self: ugh, is that too preachy? Feel like it’s starting to sound like a self-help book. Maybe:

I have worked hard to achieve what I have, and I feel I can offer

Note to self: nope. Implies other people just don’t work hard. Hmmm…

I don’t think of this ceremony as an ending, but as a beginning

Every journey begins with a single

Our college lives may be over but our real lives are just

I lucked into a love of an industry that is expanding rapidly, and I have a good head for academics. I keep my head down and I put on whatever face I think will go over well with whoever I’m talking to at the time stay polite and professional, and so I’ve been able to develop contacts that have given me the opportunities I’ve been offered beyond graduation. But I don’t know what to choose. I don’t wanna offend anyone. I don’t wanna make waves. Up til now it was easy. It was all laid out for us, y’know? It was simple; follow the rules at school and graduate top of the class, go to college, knuckle down and complete that degree. But now? The real world? Yeah, I’m not sure I wanna deal with that.

I’m not sure I’m cut out for making my own decisions.

Why can’t someone just tell me what to DO, why cant I

Note to self: Scrap all this. Start over.

2. Family “Mail, Cassidy!”

The bolt from her room was far from graceful, but Cassidy didn’t care. She skidded into the kitchen, overshooting the table and having to scramble back to get close enough to snatch the letter from her mother’s hand.

“Well, I didn’t think you’d be that enthused,” her mother said with a smile.

Cassidy flipped the letter over in her hands a few times, the lump in her throat preventing her from speaking. The crest in the corner seemed to mock her, the division into thirds forming a smirking face. The envelope seemed incredibly thin.

“Well, are you going to open it?”

“I don’t know,” Cassidy said, her voice faint.

Her mother’s face softened, and she stepped over to squeeze Cassidy’s shoulder. “You know we’re proud of you no matter what, right?”

Heat flooded Cassidy’s eyes, and she blinked rapidly. She knew. Of course she knew. It wasn’t her parents she was worried about disappointing; it was herself.

“Do you want to take it up to your room?”

“No.” A note of despair had entered her voice; Cassidy swallowed laboriously, caught her lower lip between her teeth. Try as she might to hold the envelope still, it continued to shiver slightly, magnifying the fine tremor of her hands. “No, I— just give me a moment.”

“Take as long as you need.” Her mother moved away again, tossing the other letters onto the bench before she busied herself with stacking the dishes.

She hadn’t gone to college. Neither had Cassidy’s father. Both worked unskilled jobs, scraping together enough money to keep their house on the border of the suburbs. But they’d never have enough to move. Never have enough to enjoy a night out if it wasn’t planned weeks in advance. Never have enough to change up their yearly date night on the waterfront for their anniversary.

This was Cassidy’s opportunity to do what they hadn’t. Her opportunity to not only grasp a higher rung on the ladder, but to carry her parents up with her.

She took one, final, deep breath, and slowly peeled back the flap on the top of the envelope.

Her hands were shaking so much that she couldn’t read the letter to begin with. She had to drop the envelope and steady the thick, expensive paper with both hands, squinting a little against the itch at the back of her eyes.

We are delighted to inform you that your application was successful…

Cassidy shrieked and bolted across the kitchen, throwing herself into her mother’s arms. Behind her, the letter drifted slowly to the floor.

3. Friends Cassidy was going to kill Eliza.

She simply could not believe she’d flaked on her. They’d been planning this night for weeks, tweaking and adjusting the itinerary, considering all angles, the pros and cons of each place at each time. Eliza had even insisted on having the final say on everything, claiming that she had enough experience to make Cassidy’s first bar crawl a night to remember. They’d had to postpone twice due to assignments and hardass professors that refused to allow extensions.

And fifteen minutes after Cassidy had arrived at the first bar, Eliza had texted her and said she couldn’t be bothered.

Well, she’d actually said she was sick, but Cassidy had heard the excuse enough times that she knew what it really was. A blow-off.

God, she was so stupid. She should’ve known this would happen. She’d thrown herself into her friendship with Eliza because of nearness rather than a true aligning of interests, but her first-year roommate was notoriously mercurial. All the reassurances, all the denials that anything would come up, all the claims that Eliza was so excited; Jesus. Cassidy just shouldn’t have gone out. It would’ve been less embarrassing, having Eliza scream at her over the phone for standing her up rather than being stood up herself.

She swiped impatiently at her eyes. They were tears of frustration, of course. Not distress. Not rejection.

The glass on the bar in front of her was slick with condensation, the liquid inside vivid green. Cassidy eyed it for a few seconds and then sighed, sliding a twenty onto the bar and leaving the drink untouched. It was a long walk home, and half of it was seedy enough that she really didn’t want her perceptiveness impaired. The notion of getting a taxi floated through her head as she made her way out of the bar, but she dismissed it just as quickly. The timing was all wrong — too late for people to still be coming into town, too early for the taxis to start showing up unprompted. And the last thing Cassidy wanted to do was skulk in front of the bar, alone, for god-knows how long. It was intimidating enough just weaving her way through the crowds of smokers lining the pavement.

Away from the main bar strip, the streets were quiet. Her heels clacked impossibly loudly against the concrete, a signal broadcasting her position to anybody else who might be out here. She rubbed her upper arms briskly, though she knew the goosebumps weren’t due to the cold.

At the corner of Fifth and Valdegreen, she paused.

The decision should’ve been easy; turn left, five blocks down before a right, another three blocks before another right, and then it was four blocks back before a straight shot to the campus. Well-lit, past a couple of all-night businesses that employed security. For a woman walking alone at night, it was the safe option. It was the sensible option.

It was the long option.

Cassidy’s feet were already aching, and every time she thought about why she was out here, walking home from the bar by herself, the tears threatened again. She just wanted to get home.

The alley opposite her was shrouded in darkness. Even the buildings seemed to have their backs turned to it; few doors and fewer windows, because who wanted a view of another brick wall? The three blocks down the alley consisted only of private residences — no cameras, no security. Cassidy didn’t know exactly the sorts of things that happened in alleys like these, but she had a pretty good idea.

The shortcut also eliminated ten blocks of walking. Cassidy threw back her shoulders, lifted her chin, and marched into the shadows.

She nearly made it, too.

A tiny sigh of relief escaped her as she crossed the second narrow lane that serviced the access road she was walking down. There had been no hint of movement so far, no noise except for the clack clack of her heels. And she had passed the two points that always made her heart race, the two dumpsters on the previous blocks that could hide anything or anyone. This final block was a straight shot, no nooks or crannies for someone to hide. Her steps slowed a little, a concession to the pain in the balls of her feet.

A few metres ahead of her light flared.

Cassidy stopped dead. For a moment she thought it was the Orn, someone trying to blind her with light manipulation, but after a moment the flash resolved into a flame. It was just bright enough for her to see the outline of a person, leaning against the wall to her left.

She’d been standing still for too long; suddenly she felt paralysed to the spot, too awkward to keep walking when it was so obvious that the person had startled her. Panic unfurled in her chest as she wondered if she’d get away with a quick, oh, you scared me!, a nervous laugh before she continued on. But then the prospect of turning her back on the stranger wasn’t exactly a welcome one, either.

The flame disappeared, leaving behind a small glowing coal that Cassidy eventually recognised as the tip of a cigarette. She’d just resolved to say something, anything, to let the person know she’d seen them and would recognise them if they tried anything when they spoke.

“Cassidy Vick, as I live and breathe.”

All thoughts of speaking, of running, of everything left Cassidy’s head as she gaped into the shadows. After a beat a soft chuckle reached her ears, and light flared to life off to her right.

That was light manipulation, no question about it. Or, considering the man it illuminated, technically it was illusion.

“Jay?” Cassidy croaked.

He tilted his head as he took a drag off his cigarette, considering.

“So, I’ve got an reason to be in this dodgy-ass alley at way-too-late at night,” he said. “What’s your excuse?”

“It’s a free country,” Cassidy retorted. “I don’t need an excuse.”

Jay’s lips quirked, though his eyes remained distant. “Seems like a risky route for a late night jaunt.”

“Oh, shut up.” Cassidy hitched her purse a little higher onto her shoulder and started to walk past him. Jay Johns was among the least preferred of all the people she could’ve run into, but at least she knew he wasn’t going to hurt her. Most likely. Probably. “I need to get home.”

“Kinda a long walk.”

“Speak for yourself,” Cassidy snapped without looking at him. “I live on campus. God knows what the hell you’re doing all the way out here.”

“Hey!”

His voice wasn’t particularly loud, but it was authoritative; Cassidy had halted before she’d really thought about it, and she spun around more to make the reaction appear voluntary than out of any real desire. “What?”

“Why are you walking home by yourself?” There was a tiny frown on his face. It looked genuine, but Cassidy wasn’t stupid enough to trust anything he said or did, typically-unconscious actions included.

The thought, the memories that came alongside it, brought her anger to the fore, and it was easier to embrace that than the nostalgia or the hollow space inside her chest. “Oh, don’t pretend like you fucking care,” she spat, face twisting as she glared at him. “You showed your true colours a long time ago, Jay. You can’t fucking fool me.” She turned on her heel again and stalked away, not bothering to listen for a response.

The only upside to the whole thing, she reflected later, flopping onto her bed and kicking off her heels with a sigh, was that for fifteen whole minutes she had completely forgotten about the whole situation with Eliza.

4. Rivals “What’d you get, Bridget?”

Bridget smoothed out the papers in front of her, proudly displaying the bold, red 96% emblazoned in the top corner.

Relief flooded Cassidy’s chest, and she felt her smile become more sincere. Her voice, too, as she gushed, “Oh, wow, congrats! That’s so great!”

Bridget clearly picked up on the change in tone; her smile was far too bright as she looked up. “How’d you go?”

“Yeah, really good.” It was a struggle to temper her expression, to keep it from becoming triumphant. “Ninety-eight.”

“Oh, that’s awesome!” Bridget gushed in turn, no sign of envy or disappointment present. “Well done! You so deserve it!”

Cassidy thanked her as graciously as possible, then turned back to the front of the classroom before her facade cracked.

Honestly she wasn’t entirely sure whether the ongoing feud with Bridget was all in her head. The girl always seemed entirely honest, suitably encouraging and impressed whenever Cassidy beat her in a test or assignment, never letting slip a snide comment or backhanded compliment. But she had to feel the same way, had to realise they were in exclusive competition for the top of the class. There was no way she didn’t resent Cassidy beating her at least on some level. Surely.

Or maybe she just wasn’t as preoccupied with being the best as Cassidy was. Maybe coming in second didn’t bother her as much. Maybe that was why she was able to be so amiable.

“Maybe she’s just secure enough in her own abilities to not have to compare herself to other people,” Jay had said, not entirely kindly, a few months before they’d stopped talking. Cassidy had ignored him; easy enough, given it was something she’d been doing more and more as time went on.

And so the competition had continued, in Cassidy’s head at least, the wild highs when she came out on top, the bleak downswings when Bridget triumphed instead. And those were the worst moments, because Bridget was always perfect; sympathetic but not pitying, proud but not arrogant. It almost would’ve been easier if she’d just rubbed Cassidy’s face in it. Crowing and bragging Cassidy could’ve dealt with, because she would’ve known the next time she won that it was definitely affecting Bridget somehow. As it was, she could never be sure.

She topped the class, that year and the next and the next. She’d been disappointed in her final scores during their last year of high school, until she’d discovered that although it wasn’t what she’d expected, it was still higher than Bridget.

They’d gone their separate ways, different colleges, different majors. That should’ve been the end of it.

It wasn’t.

Cassidy just started following her on social media, keeping tabs on the unspoken competition, still feeling surges of resentment when she saw Bridget get a scholarship or a dean’s award or a job offer right after graduation, knowing it was unhealthy but unable to stop herself. Something about the girl kept Cassidy checking in, kept giving her incentives to strive for her best, to beat Bridget.

And so it was no real surprise that, sitting covered in blood and handcuffed in the back of a police car, Cassidy didn’t think of her parents or friends or her future.

She thought of Bridget.

Winning all along.

[andrewdburton]

How to Give Money (and Get Happiness) More Easily

If you have more money than you need, you should start giving some of it away.  That’s the lesson I learned about a year ago, when I took a gamble and donated $100,000 to a variety of charities, centered around the Effective Altruism movement.

More on Effective Altruism: The Life You Can Save website, and my earlier article on the subject.

At the time, I had no experience with giving to anyone other than immediate family and friends, so I didn’t know how I would feel about it. But over the course of this past year, I have had many late nights to reflect on life and what it means to live one that feels worthwhile. There are have been successes and failures, mostly happy times but also plenty of sadness shared with my siblings as our Dad made his departure.

During all this questioning of life, I kept thinking back to the times I’ve been less selfish and less fearful, and more willing to help other people. These were the things that reassured me that my life was indeed a good one, and that I wasn’t squandering the opportunity too badly so far. In short, being a good person was by far the most reliable source of happiness.

So. If hard work and generosity are what bring meaning to life, it makes sense to keep at it, even when it seems difficult. With this in mind, I vowed to make another round of donations of equal or greater size this year.

The Tricky Side of Philanthropy

While most people would assume that giving away money is easier than making it, when surveying wealthy people I have found the opposite is often true. After all, once you build a prosperous business or career, the income becomes almost automatic. You indulge in your natural and joyful tendency to work hard every day, and the money keeps flowing in, often faster with each passing year. There are no decisions to be made, and you know every dollar of net income is going somewhere worthwhile: to you.

But to give money away, you have to overcome a whole new set of challenges:

Overcome your fear of having less money. After all, more is always better – you can always benefit from more security, right? (this is actually wrong, but it can be hard to recognize)

Figure out who is most deserving of your money. It took so much time to earn the money and overcome the fear of giving – the last thing you want is to see it go to waste.

Figure out how to get that money to the worthwhile recipient. You have to find their webpage, mail a check so the credit card company doesn’t steal 3% of your donation, and ask politely that they don’t put you on their mailing list and hound you for the rest of your life.

Sort out the tax consequences. In most cases, you can deduct charitable donations on the “itemized” part of your tax return, but until you hit the itemizing threshold of around $10,000 you might not get any benefit. On the other hand, certain charitable expenses are deductible directly from your business income, if you run a business.

“Too confusing already. Forget it, I’ll just keep my money.” And thus, you end up in the same trap that keeps many people from being generous.

Since I had already pushed through the pain last year, I knew I could handle it and repeat the same thing this year. Just write the same checks and mail them to the same places. Job done.

But then I noticed a few shortcuts that make things even easier:

Betterment Investing just added a spectacular no-cost automatic donation feature. Using their existing tax-optimized system, they allow you to donate your most appreciated shares directly to any of their many connected charities. This gives you the maximum tax deduction right now, while reducing your taxes further when you later withdraw from your account later in life.

Paypal has a similar feature: even from within the minimalist phone app, you can click a “donate” icon and transfer out surplus bits of your balance directly to a large selection of good charities. Paypal does its part by not taking any fee for these donations, no matter how large. You can use up existing paypal balances, or have them draw through your connected checking account  – I found this was a very smooth and easy way to try your hand at giving.

MMM Headquarters Becomes an Automatic Philanthropy Machine

MMM Headquarters shows off its holiday style, just last night.

I noticed that PayPal feature because I happen to have a constant, growing surplus in my account these days, as a result of starting the MMM-HQ Coworking space right here in downtown Longmont.

The money side of this situation is pretty interesting:

We bought the property (which now hosts two businesses) for $225,000, which means my half cost me only $112,500.

Then I spent about $30,000 in materials and subcontractors to whip it into shape. (Plus about 700 hours of my own labor, which I happily donated)

We now have about 60 paying members at $50 per month each, for a total of $3000 per month or $36,000 per year.

But the coworking space is still kind of quiet during the days, so we can sign up a few more people and bring this annual number to $50,000.

Property taxes ($4k), Utilities and Beer ($1600), and ongoing upgrades ($10,000) only consume 30% of this budget, leaving a huge surplus, as long as I keep running it myself and don’t draw any salary.

Many people and companies have started donating supplies to us, in an unprompted show of generosity. Authors send us books, Nimbus Roasters keeps our coffee stocked, Urban Tribe sent a fancy electric cargo bike, Aerobis sent some cool strength training equipment all the way from Germany, Flatiron Spice Company brought in red and green chili spices, Lefthand gave us a discount on beer kegs, members are donating useful equipment like 3-D printers and weight training equipment from their homes, and the list goes on.So I figured, in the spirit of all this sharing, why don’t we make this building a philanthropy machine? Its ongoing profits can be donated to charities – both local and international – on a regular basis. Along with doing a lot of good, this will probably give all of us members a stronger sense of belonging.

What if I’m Not Ready to Give?

I’m writing this post to encourage people who have plenty, to consider giving it to help people (and parts of our natural environment) truly in need. If I can prompt you, wealthy person, to decide that giving to the world’s most effective charties, is even better than getting a slightly better car or leaving your children an extra-large estate, then this post might be the most effective one on this whole website.

But I do not want to make anyone feel guilty for not giving away money, when they don’t yet have a surplus. If you’re working hard and saving effectively for financial independence, abundance will come. If you’re not there yet, don’t stress out about it. There is no “tithing” in the imaginary religion of Mustachianism.

Details on Easy Giving

Some of the staff of Givewell in San Francisco office perform the “Mustachian Salute”

As part of writing this article, I made part of my $100,000 donation via Betterment’s new system. I have three accounts with the company (my public Betterment Experiment, a rolled-over IRA, plus a personal taxable account with the largest balance of the three). All three accounts have seen rapid appreciation due to the current boiling-hot stock market,  so there are lots of capital gains available to harvest.

Donating appreciated shares expands the power of your giving compared to just giving cash, which is quite a neat trick. This quick table from Betterment’s new Charitable Giving Explainer page lays it out very simply:

In this example, your donation nets about 19% more tax savings than a direct cash donation.

So I tried the same thing in real life. The largest of my donations this year ($70,000) was to GiveWell, through the Betterment system.  As I fired it up, Betterment automatically estimated my tax savings in real time:

This $70,000 donation will cut my 2017 tax bill by $22,841.. AND reduce my eventual capital gains taxes by $4188. This is the true power of donating appreciated shares.

As with last year’s donation, this biggest chunk went to charities based on the Effective Altruism philosophy. What this means in practice is, “Create the best results for humans possible, on a worldwide basis, with each dollar.”

I believe this is both the most humane and the most logical way to donate money, because of the following course of events which has been proven again and again:

Improve developing world health and education -> these people have better lives immediately -> but also the more empowered people also choose to have smaller families -> world population growth slows and eventually reverses -> everybody wins.

So in this round of donations, here is where the money went. You can click each charity name to get to their own website for easier research.

Charity Amount Funding Source Givewell $70,000.00 Betterment World Wildlife Fund $10,000.00 Betterment Doctors without Borders $10,000.00 PayPal (MMM-HQ) Amazon Conservation Association $5,000.00 Website/C.Card Natural Resource Defense Council $5,000.00 Website/C.Card Bicycle Colorado $5,000.00 Website/C.Card Total $105,000.00

Note: there are more ideas for places to donate in last year’s article. Also, as of the day of publishing the WWF donation had not yet been made since I’m waiting for some money to transfer. This sentence is to keep me accountable – I’ll erase this once I get that last task done.

Note on Donating Appreciated Shares: you don’t need a Betterment account to do this, it just makes it easier. Several other financial institutions make this possible, and Vanguard has a nifty “Donor Advised Fund” feature.

Got Questions?

Since this is an unusually important topic, I will try to invest extra time into answering questions in the comments section. And if you’re an expert on any of these subjects – philanthropy, investing, tax policy, the developing world, medicine, or the environment, please feel free to do the same.

Thanks, world, for another prosperous year and here’s to the next one!

from Finance http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2017/12/04/how-to-give-money-and-get-happiness-more-easily/ via http://www.rssmix.com/