#vulgar ch 10

[deceptive-daydreams]

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Smoke Signals

Chapter Ten - A Chemistry Lesson

W/C: 8.2K

Eddie x Fem reader - Grumpy!Bartender!Eddie x Shy!Reader

And for once, you let go Of your fears and your ghosts One step, not much But it said enough

You Are In Love - T.S.

A/N: so i decided to split the chapter up, I started moving into another scene and it only felt right to give it it's own chapter as it opens up the night. i hope you guys love this chapter as much as i love this chapter <3

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“Dustin Henderson!”  The younger boy shoves past both of them confidently, his hand shaking yours impressively.

“We have heard so much–”  Robin begins though she’s cut off by Steve lightly smacking a hand against her stomach.

Frozen.  You’re frozen in time, an influx of information and new faces rendering you a speechless idiot.  Each one stares expectantly, awaiting some kind of a response, more than likely drawing their own conclusions about your silence and lack of communication.  They were going to be so disappointed in your shyness should they even have the patience to wait around.

Before you can humiliate yourself, Steve saves the day as an offended Robin glares at him, rubbing her stomach rather dramatically.  “Donnie.”  He states, only creating further confusion.  Several people stood before you and Donnie was not one of them, you were now struggling to keep up with the current interaction at the mention of her.  Overstimulated.  You were definitely overstimulated.  You can’t even imagine the dumb face you were sporting, the silence too loud as you struggled clinging onto words.  Any words in the English language at all at this point.

“Donnie has told us all about you.”  Steve elaborates finally.  “All good things, I promise!”  He chuckles, seemingly attempting to ease your anxieties that had made themselves evident in your wide eyes and worried forehead creases.

“Oh.”   

“Yeah, yeah!  And she’s told us all about how you’re Eddie’s new babysitter.”  Robin chimes in again, earning a pointed look from Steve.

Eddie’s reaction is lost on you, his existence temporarily vanishing as you take in the current conversation.  The idea of being perceived was one thing, it was entirely another to be perceived by four strangers who had apparently already been made aware of your existence.

“What she means is that we’ve heard you’ve been a good friend.”  Nancy softly smiles.

Friend.

You didn’t quite know why but the word felt insulting.  Not on any account of Nancy’s, there was no malice detected in her tone though you were still intimidated by her and figured with her being the prettiest girl in the room, she must at least be on Eddie’s radar.  The word ‘friend’ was starting to feel vulgar the more it played over in your head.

“Yeah, ‘friend’.”  Dustin uses air quotes, a wild grin on his youthful face.

At this, Steve delivers a harsh smack to the boy’s abdomen, more aggressive than he had done to Robin seconds ago.  

“Henderson.”  Eddie reprimands.

His voice lures you in despite your inner protests, your gaze traveling over each unique face until it settles on his.  That familiar distress showcases itself in the form of a frown; there was no telling what reaction you had expected of him but something about it makes your heart drop, your stomach feeling as if it was free falling in the worst way possible.  Were you really that repulsive?

It was obvious Dustin had only been joking but the disgust on Eddie’s face only forced your tear ducts to strain, your eyes becoming glassy in seconds.  It was a long shot, thinking that there could be any semblance of interest on Eddie’s part and you suppose you should be to blame for your hurt feelings.  He owed you nothing and here you were mourning over something that never was, all because he had let you see a piece of the inner workings of his mind.  It didn’t warrant a one way ticket into his heart.

“What!?”  Dustin shrugs, unbothered.

Robin steps forward, an apologetic smile gracing her features as she addresses you.  “I promise we’re not all gigantic dinguses.”

A flood of complaints spills from Dustin and Steve, Nancy only rolling her eyes at the interaction before taking the initiative in pursuing the conversation with you as the others bicker, Eddie only spectating the whole scene playing out in front of him.

“Dustin doesn’t always know when to keep quiet.”  She giggles, subtly pulling you to the side, her hand gentle as it rests on your forearm.  It almost repulses you, although your logic kicks in and pieces together that this woman has never done anything to elicit such a response from you.  “But he always means well.”

The heat was dying down, the unsolicited jealousy now tame within the confines of your body, not totally gone but no longer raging just beneath the surface.  If it were up to you you’d ball up the lingering feeling and burn it, if it were only so easy.

“Are they brothers?”  You ask, recalling that night you drove him home.  He only spoke of his uncle, Wayne.  He did also mention Dustin but never insinuated that they were related.  Based on the way they were interacting, you’d assume they were brothers in some sense of the word.

“Where’s your family?”  Eddie suddenly mumbles, eyes still glued to the scenery outside.  

The question is out of the blue and the last thing you would expect from him.  Although he had taken somewhat of a liking to you, he’d never taken an interest in something so personal.  And you offered him that same respect.  

“What?”  You ask, sneaking a glance at him, your hands squeezing the wheel.

His focus shifts from the window to you, his body turning inward as he leans his cheek against the headrest, waiting for your response.  The way his lips pucker from his cheek squishing against the seat only makes your heart clench.  His large awaiting eyes reflect the moon and you find it hard to change the subject when they appear so patient and attentive.

“Um, well, they’re back in…back home.”  You answer simply.

“Where’s that?”

He looked the most inquisitive you’d seen him, body turned toward you, his attention not once wavering.  Instead of the usual knit brows he often wore, his features remained softer and full of wonder.  Lips parted and eyes twinkling, who were you to deny his efforts?  Even if he was slightly under the influence.  Worst case scenario, he doesn’t remember this conversation.

“California.” 

“Oh.”  

You didn’t know what kind of response you were expecting but for some reason, the one word was a bit too vague, self consciousness kicking in.  

“What about yours?”  You shift the spotlight over to him.

From what you can tell as you keep your focus on the road, his gaze drops while he collects his thoughts, his breathing going shaky for just a second before he regains his composure.  A hum deep in his throat notifies you that he’s ready to begin speaking again.

“Uh, don’t really have one.  Never really have.  Or, uh, I just don’t remember them?  Other than my uncle, Wayne.  He’s back…”  Eddie hesitates.  “He’s in Indiana.”

Nancy’s gaze follows yours, locking in on the two boys catching up.  “Dustin and Eddie?”  Her puzzled expression already grants you your answer, though she continues.  “No, no they’re not related.  You’d think they are, with all the fantasy stuff they talk about and what not.”

“Fantasy stuff?”

“Dungeons and Dragons.”  Her perfectly plucked brows raise.  “My brother used to have me play with them, thank god Eddie stepped into the picture.”  She mutters.

“Eddie did mention Dungeons and Dragons.”  You nod. 

“And Dustin’s little drawing.”

“And the drawing?”

Your grin along with Nancy as you simultaneously speak, a few giggles filling the air between you.  

“So your brother is…Dustin?”

Amidst the calm conversation, Steve and Robin are cheering a few feet away, both of their arms now slung around Eddie.  It wasn’t clear what they were celebrating and it even seemed that they were just trying to embarrass him in that true friend fashion.  It was sweet, how much they cared about him, the lengths they went just to surprise him.

Nancy gracefully shakes her head, brunette curls bouncing with the movement and freckled nose scrunching playfully.  “No, no.  Dustin is one of my brother’s best friends.  Mike is my brother, he’s back at home in–”  Before she can reveal where ‘home’ was, her bright blue eyes widen.  “Back in Indiana.”  She corrects herself.

“I think Eddie’s mentioned Mike a few times.”  You recall the conversation, how he took Mike and Dustin under his wing in highschool.  “He couldn’t come?”

“He’s studying for midterms.”  She shakes her head.  “He really wanted to come but…you know between his girlfriend in California and college it’s just all…a lot.”  Her eyes are kind, probably the kindest you’d ever come across.

“I’d love to meet him one day.”  You smile, only hoping that you were reciprocating the same compassion she was radiating.  “And Max, and Lucas, and Wayne…”

Nancy’s eyes seem to brighten, ears perking up at the names.  “He told you about everyone?”  She asks softly, her baby pink lips upturning slightly.  

You nod.  Another eruption of laughter and shouting forces your attention toward the rest of the group, a proud grin displayed on Dustin’s face only hinting that he had just made a joke that even had Eddie hunched over in laughter, Steve’s arm still draped over his shoulder with his head thrown back.

“That is not funny.”  Robin pouts, arms crossed.

“I think it’s pretty funny.”  Steve smirks.

Nancy politely excuses herself from your one-on-one conversation, joining Robin’s side.  “What’s not funny?”

“When Robin swallowed an egg whole–”

“It’s not funny!”  Robin continues to protest.  “I almost died!”  

This only makes the boys cackle more, pulling an eye roll from Nancy.  

“C’mon Nance.”  Dustin grins.

“Yeah, c’mon Nance.”  Eddie chimes in.

Nance.

Why did it rub you the wrong way when he said it?  You assessed Nancy’s body language and nothing conveyed to you that she had any interest in him, however your mind continued it’s unruly torture.  Even so, Eddie had made it clear what he thought of you, that you were ‘too busy dry humping’ Jett and that even though that couldn’t be further from the truth, he would still lose respect for you.

Heat burrowed deep in your belly once again, the kind that wasn’t yet uncontrollable but should anyone add fuel to the fire would result in your own self destruction.  All because Eddie had to go and cause a scene.  All because he had a temper that never rested even when it appeared dormant.  

“I-um, I’m gonna go get the drinks–what did–what did everyone want?”  You manage to pitifully scramble the sentence together and eventually get your point across.

“Stevie!”  Donnie interrupts, crushing the poor guy in a tight hug.  It makes you question her disgust for physical touch.  

Steve doesn’t seem to mind, a twitch of his eye only projecting a smidge of discomfort but other than that he contently hugs her back.  They begin catching up, everyone completely ignoring your request for their drink orders.  It’s not their fault you were so invisible, it was just your nature, you were always meant to be put on the backburner until further notice but for some reason it causes an extra deep pang in your chest this time.  Especially since Eddie had completely disregarded you as he jumped into the conversation.

With the tiniest huff, you quietly step away to make yourself useful behind the bar.  A pair of blue eyes follows you, considerate blue eyes that you attempt to ignore.  If you looked carefully enough, you’d see that pair of ocean blue eyes making connections between yourself and a certain brown eyed man.  You were in no mood to act as a detective though.

–

It was irresponsible.

Your track record so far was evidence enough.

But as you stared down the bottle of tequila sat in front of you, howls of laughter and echoes of inside jokes entering your ears even from the other side of the bar, it seemed like more and more of a good idea.  Or like the only idea.  

You could have one shot, just to relax the nerves, make you more approachable.  No one would notice.  You could come off as the friendly stranger in the background instead of the miserable mouse in the corner.  It was for your benefit.  Your thoughts would become less intense, your bitterness would melt away.  Eddie would temporarily become the dream boat he had previously been in your eyes rather than a mouthy douchebag, your hazy mind would erase his wrong doings if only for a few hours.  

You hope.

Or maybe you’d open your eyes and see what Eddie was seeing, had you really shown any interest in Jett at all?  Maybe a shot would be enough to introduce you to the narrative.  Maybe you should let loose and throw yourself at Jett for the fuck of it.  Bad decisions were starting to sound more appealing the harder you stared at the bottle of liquid courage.  Until your careful thought process was interrupted.

“We doin’ shots?”  

The deep but soothing voice catches you off guard, calm brown eyes and concerned brows gaining all of your attention.  They weren’t the brown eyes you secretly hoped for, even if they were the most infuriating sight you could possibly be faced with at the moment.  No, they were a lighter hue, the overhead light casting golden flecks within the irises that regarded you with genuine interest, his lips pressed together tightly as he awaits your answer.  In his hand he holds what looks to be a scotch on the rocks though it could also be whiskey, you were no expert quite yet.

“Uh…no.  I dunno.  Maybe?”  You squint your eyes painfully.  “Forget I said that.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell the others.”  Steve takes a seat at one of the vacant stools directly across from you.  “But…”  He clicks his tongue.  “If you are going to, count me in.”  He smiles charmingly, finishing off his drink.

“I…”  You’re about to take the sensible route, you’re so close to making the right decision.  Then again, bad decisions were far more tempting.  Especially with the help of an unaware acquaintance.  “Okay.”  You sigh, offering him a friendly grin.

Without further consideration, you pop the bottle cap off, pulling out two sparkling shot glasses and setting them on the counter confidently.  At least you didn’t have to drink alone.  

“Munson giving you a hard time?”  Steve suddenly inquires.  Your eyes nearly pop out of your head which you assume is why he elaborates.  “I know he’s kind of intense.  The first year he moved out here he was…he was so fuckin’ unhappy y’know?  And I know what you’re thinkin’: Why is this guy, Steve, who I just met, going on about Munson?”  He begins to ramble.

Slowly, you start to pour the foul smelling alcohol into one of the glasses as you listen intently.  A few drops trickle down the side but it goes ignored as you watch Steve’s every move.  He toys with the glass he’d just finished off, spinning it over and over again in circles atop the bar, a ring of condensation following.

“Don’t–fuck how do I say this?”  He pushes a weft of voluminous hair back.  “Don’t give up on him.”  Steve practically pleads.

You stop pouring the tequila, pausing to chew on your lip and look at him in confusion, which encourages him to continue.

“Look, Donnie was talking about how–how you’ve been really good for him.  And I don’t know–I just–I could sense that…you were mad at each other–you and Eddie, I mean.”

He takes your silence as a means to further explain and god, he could feel a migraine coming on just by the way he was stirring things up but he couldn’t keep his mouth shut.  Not when Donnie had been so adamant about Eddie being in such good spirits since you showed up only to come face to face with an almost seething Eddie, and Donnie wordlessly conveying to him that something was wrong.

“The point is, I know that he’s an asshole, okay?  Whatever he did, I’m sure he deserves a slap to the face.  Just–don’t give up on him.”

Steve’s words sink in.  You aren’t sure what has been said but it’s apparent that the tension between you and Eddie tonight was obvious among his friends.  You ponder his request–to not give up on Eddie as you fill the second shot glass and slide it across the counter.  If anything, Eddie had given up on you by accusing you of messing around with Jett.  It was insulting and humiliating.  Dehumanizing.  

“I think he’s the one who gave up on me.”  You admit, tossing the shot back with teary eyes.

The sting spreads down your throat, the potent smell filling your nostrils as you slam the glass down.  Your eyes are glassy though you only hope Steve can gather that it's just from the alcohol and not the idea of Eddie essentially throwing whatever you had in the garbage combined with the burn of tequila.

As if caught off guard, Steve quickly throws his shot back, apparently an expert as he doesn’t flinch, only widens his eyes as he slams the glass down as you had.  He exhales heavily, nodding, thinking to himself.  You await more wise words, more advice that he had no business giving although you appreciate the sentiment anyway.

“What are you doing?”

The world feels distant and not because of the alcohol.  Your blood runs hot, most definitely because of the alcohol.  The question is asked with such outrage that it almost has you shaking.  Getting caught was more embarrassing than any outcome you could’ve imagined though you didn’t even try to hide the evidence, didn’t even go as far as to take shots in the back.  Did you subconsciously want Eddie to catch you?

“Nothing.”  You mutter, quickly capping the bottle and setting it on its designated shelf.

“I just saw you.”  Eddie grits, hands splayed out on top of the bar, his arms spread out as he attempts to keep quiet so as not to interrupt the customers scattered throughout the bar. 

Eddie’s glare burns a hole into you and maybe it’s because of Steve’s sudden advice, the fact that he felt the need to stick up for Eddie even when he didn’t know the whole situation, but you refuse to give in.  He holds a fire in his eyes that you hastily reject as you begin cleaning out the shot glasses.  It was your goal to come off as unbothered but you fear you’re coming off more as guilty.  Like a dog that had been caught chewing up the family couch.

“It was my fault.”  Steve chimes in nonchalantly.

Eddie glances over, brows knit together in irritation.  “Your fault?”

“Yeah, we were getting acquainted.  I insisted, it was–”

“Steve had nothing to do with it.”  You fess up.

Eddie’s face reveals a whole other level of rage, his eyes nearly glazing over with black.  You fucked up.  That much you could admit to yourself.  Steve appears to be panicked, his gaze glued to the bar top, his hands gripping the edge, nails threatening to dig into the wood.

“Meet me in the back.”  Eddie demands, pushing himself off of the bar.  

Terrified doesn’t even begin to explain the list of feelings coursing through you.  You’d never seen him as angry as he was tonight.  You were drinking on the job, something that in a small town usually isn’t a big deal but with all of the tension hanging in the air, you could only assume it would add to his irritation.  It would only give him more ammo against you.

Steve offers you an apologetic stare, clearly also taken back by Eddie’s irate mood.  And then, he half nods as if to wish you good luck before standing and making his way back to the rest of the group.  As you timidly step out from the bar and round the corner, you catch Nancy’s sapphire eyes before they disappear, your legs carrying you into the narrow hallway where the office was located.  Except Eddie wasn’t in there and you could only conclude that he was outside.  ‘Meet me in the back’ meant ‘meet me outside’.  Which could only mean he was about to unleash hell on you if he needed to completely remove you from the building in order to reprimand you.

You don’t let yourself prepare, you need to face him without any thoughts clouding your judgment, only further shoving you into the hole you dug yourself.  With a push to the metal door, you’re met with an aching cold, the kind that stings the surface of any exposed skin.  Immediately your cheeks burn, a few snowflakes landing delicately among your eyelashes.  You should have grabbed your jacket.

Leaning against the hay bales stacked like a Tetris game, is Eddie.  A cigarette hangs from his lips while he struggles to keep the flame on his lighter alive, the wind fighting his every attempt.  He grunts in annoyance, his head tilting toward the sky as if to personally ask it ‘why?’.  Already, his cheeks and nose are tinted pink, borderline red.  You contemplate asking if you could talk inside but you quickly bite your tongue, you didn’t want to be the one to initiate the conversation.

“What’s your problem?”  He asks simply.  As if he were asking for the weather forecast.  It’s insulting, quite frankly.

“My problem?”

Suddenly the fear that had consumed you seconds ago dissipates, no longer plaguing you and being replaced with a wrath you’re convinced no one else on the planet could pull from you.  Even worse, he refuses to look at you, keeping his stare on the cloudy evening sky.  

“Are you trying to get fired?  ‘Cause I should fire you right–”

“Oh yeah, go ahead.  Fire me.”  

He’s quiet, attempting to light his cigarette once again.  This time he succeeds, the stick catching the flame as he inhales and tucks his lighter into his back pocket.  You begin to question if he even cares about the cold until you see the goosebumps pricking across his arms.

“I should.”  He mumbles, taking another drag.

“Great!  I’m glad we’re on the same page.”  You reply, sarcasm dripping from each syllable as you rub up and down your exposed arms.  It didn’t help that you decided to wear a skirt and tights tonight either.  

Without time to process, he takes a large step toward you, his breath hot as it fans across your face.  A sense of softness flashes in his eyes before they return to the fiery nature they previously exhibited.  His cigarette idles in his hand at his side, his jaw clenched and visibly tensing before he scowls.

“Same page?”  He bites.  “The same page.”  His free hand rubs along his jaw in thought.  “Okay, if we’re on the same page then explain to me why you’re doing shots with Harrington?  If we’re on the same page then we must be reading completely different languages because you started this.”

You scoff, his statement on replay in your ears.  Each time it plays again you find yourself even more enraged.  “I did?”  You’re smiling but there’s not an ounce of happiness in your features or your tone.  

Eddie backs away, the heat from his breath is missed, no matter how mad you are and no matter how strongly it smelled of smoke.  He paces, turning around before coming full circle and facing you again, another deep drag from his cigarette indicating that he’s stressed.  Then he nods, bangs falling into his eyes as he does.

“You did.  You just–you start ignoring me, start acting like I’m not even a person?”  He points the cigarette at you and you’re starting to believe that in the midst of his rage, he’s completely forgotten about the cold whereas it was the only thing you could focus on.  Regardless, you fight through it, even if your teeth chatter.

“And, and–hold on.”  He shakes his head, curls following his movement as he rushes inside.

Great.

He left you out in the cold, literally.

You weren’t going to wait, his disrespect wasn’t going to keep prodding at you, not if you had anything to say about it.  He didn’t get to storm off and leave you outside in the freezing cold, even if you did do something you weren’t proud of.  He was probably going to wait and see how long you would hold out, how long you would sit in the cold before inevitably running in and looking for him, how stupid you would look–

The door squeaks open again, smacking against the wall as Eddie comes racing out, leather jacket in hand.  Well, if he was allowed to grab his jacket then so were you.  His cigarette hangs from his bottom lip as he begins muttering around it.

“You started treating me like I didn’t exist, I don’t know how normal people react to that but–”  He adjusts the jacket, flattening out the material before draping it over your shoulders, encouraging you to put your arms in the sleeves.  “I assume any normal person would be fuckin’ pissed so I guess I’m not–I’m just not understanding.”  He says a bit harshly.

You don’t react, frozen as he waits for you to put your arm in the sleeve.  While he’s still visibly aggravated, his eyes also communicate something else to you.  The deeper you look into them, the more his pupils dilate, a nervous gulp noticeable as he awaits your reply.

“C’mon, you’re freezing.”  He whispers, a large contrast to his previous tone.  It’s warmer, it’s familiar, it’s like home.

“What about you?”  You mumble, staring dumbly into his big brown eyes, his lashes heavy against his cheeks, unlike how they were seconds ago when he was wild-eyed and riled up.  He was still riled up, that was for sure but now…now it was diluted with something else.

“Don’t worry about me, Bambi.”  The term of endearment slips from his tongue effortlessly.  Like it was meant to fall from his lips directly into your ears.  Like it was meant for you and only for you, always.

With parted lips, you can see your breath escape into the night.  You know he can hear your labored breathing and you should be embarrassed but you can’t find it in yourself to care when his gaze softens, the sturdy exterior he had built up again crumbling just as it had that one night.

“I do worry.”  

It falls from your lips quicker than you can contain it.  You shouldn’t be offering him such compassion, not when he was so okay with insulting you hours earlier.  But pools of melted chocolate never left you any other choice but to get lost in them.  He moves in closer, ever so slightly, only enough that you feel the familiar warmth of his breath on your cheek, so that you can still make out his whole face.

“Don’t.”  He says breathily.

“Why?”

He only shrugs, his focus trailing down your face, reaching every inch.  It makes you want to shy away but you can’t, not when he looks so sincere.

“‘M sorry.”  He whispers, reaching up to brush a rogue strand of hair from your face.

Your instinct is to ask ‘for what?’, but you know better.  You don’t need to play dumb, both of you are aware of his nasty words and your tendency to take things to a level they should have never gotten to.  You’re both to blame.  But you don’t need to pretend to not know what he’s apologizing for.  There’s no pretending with him.  So you can only hope that he’ll see through to the deeper meaning of your initial question. 

“For what?”

For what?  Would he say that he’s only sorry he hired you in the first place?  Or that he’s sorry he ever met you.  Would he understand your words and be in tune enough to decipher them?

“Everything.”  He whispers.

It’s quiet, almost eerily but not.  No, it’s too peaceful to be eerie.  The first snowflakes of the season are still falling and you’re standing outside the bar with Eddie Munson, a man who was so stubborn he seemed almost impossible.  Almost, but not.  Never for you.

“Everything.”  You repeat.  And he knows he owes you more.

“Everything.”  He swallows the lump in his throat that was preventing him from saying the necessary words.  It goes down smoother than he expects.  “Every second I was ever an asshole to you.  Especially my stupid ass comment about Jett.  I-I was mad and I took it out on you.  I tend to do that pretty often don’t I?”  He laughs humorlessly.  “I don’t think less of you if you’re actually…y’know.”  He gestures vaguely.

“What?”  You ask, genuine confusion taking over your features.

For a moment, his eyes shift back and forth, as if to beg you not to make him say it.

“With Jett.”  He mumbles, gaze now avoiding you.

“With Jett.”  You repeat in disbelief.  “I have done nothing to suggest we are at all together.”  You scoff.  

“I know.”  Eddie squeezes his eyes shut, as if he’s bracing for more choice words from you.  They don’t come.  “I know.  I just, he got in my head and–”

“Got in your head?” 

“It was nothing, he got in my head and got all, I dunno protective?  If that’s even the word.  He just seemed jealous, okay?”  Eddie explains.  “I know that’s not an excuse for what I said.  I’m really sorry for saying you dry hump–”

“Don’t ever use the word dry hump and Jett in a sentence where you’re referring to me again.”  You laugh.  This time humor floods through you.  His whole demeanor relaxes, shoulders less tense.  “It’s happened one too many times.”  You cringe jokingly.

“Okay, that’s fair.”  He smiles, that boyish grin returning to his face.  The one you hadn’t seen in days, the one you missed every time, the second he directed it toward you the first time.  His dimples deep, eyes shy, he still lingers close to your face, neither of you protesting the invasion of each other’s space.  “Now put your arms in the sleeves.”  He demands, tugging on the collar of his jacket still laying over your shoulders.  “Please.”  His face only inches closer to yours as he convinces you to shove your arms into his jacket.

“We’re about to go inside, I won’t need it.”  You argue, crossing your arms in front of you, a hip jutting out with sass.

“Oh okay, we’re back to this then?”  He smirks, finger grazing the button at the lapel of his jacket, almost scorching the skin of your neck.

That familiar spark ignites in his eyes, the fire that showcased so much unexplored emotion, so many uncharted territories within the man before you.  You wanted to explore them all, you wanted to hold his hand and trek across each foreign feeling.  You wanted to bathe in the sparks and light yourself on fire to speed up the process.  You didn’t just want to burn for him, you wanted to burn with him.  Your soul was drawn to him, you wanted to melt into him, melt into his touch, even if it was just his fingertip.  You’d take what you could get.  And you were really convinced that he wanted the same things solely based on the way he was looking at you with heavy eyes and rosy cheeks.

“Yeah, I’m not done addressing my grievances with you.”  You joke.

At this, he lights up even more, his entire face exhibiting pure fondness.  His lips are so perfectly pink, a little chapped, but the sweetest pink you’d ever seen.  They were pillowy and plush and as he licked them you blinked, falling out of your trance.  Then, his hands travel down the zipper of his jacket, only touching the worn material and not at all forcing his touch upon you though he longs to feel your warmth.  

Instead, he pulls you forward by gripping each side of the jacket, leaving you no choice but to come flush with his chest.  You welcome the heat, the sudden warmth that engulfs you like a cozy blanket calms your chattering teeth.  

“Yeah?”  He whispers, nose nearly bumping against yours.  You wish it would.

“Yeah.”

Your lashes just barely flutter against his cheek, only teasing him of what he actually desires, and you don’t even know it.  He’s glancing between your eyes and your lips and your internal reaction is to scream at him to just do it.  But is that even what he’s hinting at doing?  Maybe there was something on your face.  You weren’t going to assume his intentions and make yourself out to be a fool.

He hums in response, his hands still tightly clutching the jacket, the damn jacket that you were now wishing he never put on you just so you could feel his skin, the heat of his hands against your arms.  The ache was becoming too apparent in your chest, you needed him and there was no way to express it.  You couldn’t.

He smells of tobacco and a hint of pine.  Even a tiny bit of spice from some kind of cologne you’d grown used to smelling on him.  There’s a waft of beer falling from his breath as well, not too obvious, but obvious enough that you can gather that he had at least had a beer before work or during his break.

“Do me a favor?”  He asks.  And in that moment, you would do anything.

“Mm?” 

A quick finger pokes your nose playfully.  “No more tequila.”  

You can only laugh along with him, almost burying your head in his chest but refraining as you enter your body again.  This was not a daydream and he was not someone to call yours.  Fooling yourself was only going to get you hurt.

“I’m serious, it fucking stinks.”  He scrunches up his face in mock disgust, plugging his nose, you giggling along with his antics.

With that, he pulls away, leaving you feeling frigid, already missing his presence even if he was still right in front of you.  Opening the door, he gestures for you to go ahead of him.  The atmosphere had been flipped upside down, all hostility left outside in the cold to be swept away in a snowstorm.  

–

“And then Eddie fucking jumps off his roof!”  

The bar fills with laughter, unfiltered, stomach grabbing laughter of five friends and yourself.  The regular customers had long gone and paid their tabs, leaving the bar empty and the possibilities endless as everyone shared treasured stories over beers and drinks.  Steve appears to be pleased with himself as the laughter carries on for over a minute.  The image of Eddie drunk and jumping off of his roof as a means to prove he can ‘fly’ only to face plant into the ground and be driven to the ER was somehow the best entertainment you’d been faced with in a while.  

It was mentioned that he didn’t get injured too badly and only required a few stitches above his eyebrow where you could now seek out a scar and remember this night.  The night Eddie’s friends accepted you into their circle.  Even if only for the night.

“Well what about when you got a lampshade stuck on your head.”  Eddie points at Steve with his beer bottle.

Steve only offers a disapproving expression as the giggles erupt once again.  Robin sits to your right while Nancy sits to your left.  The pair had immediately taken a liking to you and moved chairs just so you could sit between them.  It felt nice, you felt welcome.  You had no worries and nowhere to be.  And for once that made you feel alive rather than anxious.

“Okay, but can we talk about you babysitting Eddie on Halloween?”  Nancy attempts to hold in her laughter.  She had said it quietly but not quietly enough as Eddie deadpans her.  

Robin lets out a shriek of laughter, clearly intoxicated.  You can only grin at everyone’s reaction.  Steve and Dustin had gotten into some kind of a ridiculous argument and throughout the night, you noticed it was a regular occurance.  They paid no mind to embarrassing Eddie further but Nancy had no issue with it even if she wasn’t outright talking to the whole group in the first place and only you and Robin.

“What, Munson?  You got plastered and she had to save the day.”  Nancy giggles.  She had obviously been a little wine drunk, a tiny bit tipsy.

“Yes, it’s very funny.”  He says monotone.  “Can we find a new joke now?”  He asks, rolling his eyes although you know he’s only playing around, his lips threatening to pull themselves into a smile.

“It’s okay to get white girl wasted every once in a while.”  You banter.

“Oh, it is?”  Eddie raises a brow.  “It’s okay to puke all over me after getting white girl wasted?  Off of my tequila?”

The table erupts in a series of ‘oh’s’.  You could take offense.  But it was so much more fun to mess with him.

“I’m not the one who got puked on at least.”  You shrug, unbothered.

The table gets loud again, siding in your favor based on their volume.

“Yeah?”  He asks.  As if you two were suddenly the only people in the bar.  As if his friends had disappeared.  As if you were back outside behind the bar just a few hours ago.

“Yeah.”  You answer, a certain softness in your tone that only he could understand.

Nancy’s gaze flits in between you, mischief crossing her features for a brief second, you swear you see it.  But nothing comes of it as she turns her attention to the argument that Dustin and Steve had started up again.  Robin chimes in every now and then, hiccuping dramatically.  You and Eddie, though a little buzzed, can’t stop staring at each other from across the table.  His gaze is heavy and yearning but for what you’re not sure.

His bottom lip continues to get tugged in between his teeth, abusing the already chapped skin as he unknowingly communicates his nervousness.  The only thing you’re sure of is that he won’t tear his eyes away from you.  Not for Steve’s request to aid in the argument, not for Dustin’s screeching voice demanding he take his side, and not for Jett who was making it known that he was leaving for the night.  Eddie only mutters in response, something along the lines of ‘see you tomorrow’.  Steve and Dustin are too caught up to even pay any mind to Eddie’s ignorance to their debate.  Robin is in her own world, curling her legs up to her chest in her chair as she becomes fascinated with the wood grain in the table while Nancy pretends to be preoccupied with swirling the wine in her glass and acts as if she’s listening to Dustin’s reasoning, nodding every now and then.  But you notice the way her diamond eyes take in the scene before her.  And now you’re sure that she has no interest in Eddie nor has she ever shown it.  

But she does have an interest in whatever was happening between you and Eddie.  She was studying the chemistry.

–

It was 4:00 AM, the sun would be emerging just on the Horizon within hours.  An exhausted Steve lays his head on the table over his folded arms.  Drool threatens to fall from the corner of his lip onto his sleeve, his mouth hanging open as he sleeps almost like a newborn.  Every other breath a deep snore rumbles through him.

“This isn’t even the weirdest place he’s fallen asleep.”  Dustin snaps a polaroid, the flash doing little to make Steve stir in his slumber, his eyelids only twitching as he navigates his dreams.  “One time we found him under his bed.”

You chuckle at the sight, Steve had been completely hammered off of several beers and a few shots of vodka that Robin had convinced him to take with her.  The second he wakes up, he’s in for a rude awakening, you’re sure.  

“Do you take a picture every time?”  You ask as Dustin hands off the developing picture to you, only to continue getting just the shot he wanted as he crouched down to get a better view of Steve’s face.

“Of course.”  He laughs, stating it like there was no other option.

“Steve’s reputation with drinking isn’t necessarily…the best?”  Nancy speaks, setting a fresh glass of water on the table in front of him.

You’d learned throughout the night that Steve and Nancy dated in highschool and although it was a nasty breakup, they remained friends and it never was weird after that.  They respected each other as they did their other friends and it showed.  

“I mean…I don’t think it’s that bad.  He’s just sleeping.  I’ve dozed off while drunk a few times.”  You defend.

“Yeah but have you dozed off in places people couldn’t even find you until we tore the house apart?”  Dustin counters with raised eyebrows.  “He also used to reign under the title ‘King Steve’ if that tells you anything.”

Showing your hands in surrender, you begin collecting the remaining glasses from the table.  Several dozen shot glasses that had provided a good night but would surely bring on a rough morning for those that had participated.  You’d taken two shots throughout the night and had half of Robin’s Dirty Shirley that she couldn’t seem to stomach.  And she wouldn’t quit until it was gone so you humbly volunteered seeing as she was already almost obliterated, stumbling around anytime she got up and slurring every word.

Robin was now talking Eddie’s ear off as she sat at the bar, narrating every piece of her life that he’d missed since she visited and last updated him.  You could vaguely make out her explanation for still not getting her driver’s license, stating that Steve was more than okay with being her chauffeur for the foreseeable future.  Then she insisted that should she get her license, she’d be an even worse driver than Eddie used to be so it’d be in everyone’s best interest to keep her off the roads.  

Eddie hums along to the conversation, letting Robin steer the topic as he leisurely polishes the glasses he hadn’t gotten to earlier, his friends occupying his full attention a majority of the night.  An impressive pile of glasses and cups are building up on your tray, Nancy assisting in collecting what she could as she follows you toward the bar.  

“Nance!  Tell him!”  Robin whines.  “Tell him how I’m a danger to the roads of suburbia!”

“You are most definitely a danger.”  Nancy smiles softly, moving Robin’s bangs out of her eyes with her free hand before delivering the glasses she’d collected onto the counter.

“See!”

“No need to convince me, Buckely.”  Eddie throws his rag over his shoulder.  “Although I’d probably have the time of my life with you behind the wheel.”  He grins, scooping up the tray you were having trouble setting down.  “But I’d also prefer to live a little longer so you avoid that DMV for as long as you can.”

Nancy nods in agreement, taking a seat on the stool next to Robin.  As you rush around the counter to assist in washing the remaining glasses, large brown eyes follow you, as if they missed you.  Like they’d never been happier to see you.  You still shy away from them, only because you’re not sure how long you can last until you melt, until your knees collapse beneath you and you’re a puddle on the floor.

“So what’s our game plan this time for getting Steve to the car?”  Nancy asks.

“Leave ‘em here.”  Robin slouches in her seat.

“Rob–”

“I second that.”  Eddie chuckles.  

“You guys are awful!”  Nancy proclaims.

You can only giggle to yourself, bubbles coating your hands as warm water leaks down to your elbows as you scrub each glass.  A sudden hip jabs into your side, creating enough room for Eddie’s lean frame to partake in the chore.  

“What’s so funny, Bambi?”  He questions, quiet enough for only you to hear.

You shake your head, still tuning into Robin’s scheme to leave Steve behind.  She had obviously been joking, the two constantly bickering with one another throughout the night like siblings only proving so.  But she seemed to enjoy pressing Nancy’s buttons as she persisted in her idea of abandoning the poor guy.

“Nothing.”  You mutter.

Your backs are facing the two girls, neither of them able to sneak a glance at Eddie’s wandering eyes that you could very clearly spot just out of your peripheral vision.  His hands continued to concentrate on the task at hand though not very well as he scrubbed the same tiny shot glass for at least two minutes too long.

“Y’know, you’re not being very helpful.”

With a click of his tongue, he finally sets the overly-clean glass atop the drying rack, reaching over you in the process.  It only made you aware of his comforting smell that you had basked in out in the cold earlier.  You’d never imagine wishing to do dishes for the rest of eternity but here you were, hoping that an eyelash would fall onto your cheek just so you could wish on it to stay in this very moment.

“‘M not?”  He smirks.

“Nope, you’re just making more work for me.”

“Oh, you tell him!”  Dustin suddenly peaks over both of your shoulders, quiet as a mouse until he had made his presence known.  It startles you, a gasp escaping your lips.

“Henderson, don’t sneak up on people like that.”  Eddie holds a hand over his chest.

“Look alive.”  He shrugs, snooping around at the shelves that would otherwise be obscured from his view on the other side of the bar.

“Nothin’ for you back here, you’re not even twenty one.”  Eddie turns around, leaning against the sink and crossing his arms.  

“Wha-oh don’t be like that!  I only have like two more years and that’s rich coming from you of all people, Eddie.”  Dustin points a finger, sticking it harshly into Eddie’s chest.  

“Do as I say, not as I do.”  Eddie mumbles, returning to his task, snatching up the last two glasses that remained before you could, swatting your hands away.

“What’s he talking about?”  You dare to ask.

Dustin brings an arm over your shoulder, the other over Eddie’s, a huge grin plastered on his face as if he’d been waiting for you to ask the question.  Eddie only offers him a side eye, nothing malicious but a light warning.

“Eddie here used to have a big reputation.”  He explains, patting him on the back.  Eddie only rolls his eyes, clearly indicating that he didn’t have any real issue with Dustin revealing pieces of his past.

“Oh?”  You wipe your hands on a nearby rag, turning toward Dustin, intrigued.

“Yeah, he used to be the friendly neighborhood drug dealer.”

Your face doesn’t shift, only making it more difficult to gauge your reaction.  Eddie starts to fear that this was going to be your wakeup call.  Your revelation as to who he really was.  He knows Dustin meant know harm in it and to be fair, the kid had probably snuck a few beers away from Steve.  There was no ill intent, only playful banter although Eddie hadn’t anticipated how you might have felt about his previous endeavors until after Dustin spoke those words.

“Dustin!”  Robin calls for his attention, chewing on a cocktail straw.  

Without a second thought, the boy turns his attention toward the two girls sitting at the bar, making his way around to take a seat next to Robin only to assist her in some kind of party trick she had been trying to work out with a napkin.

“How’s it go?”  She mutters around the straw.

Eddie stares at the bubbles in the sink like they’re the only thing in the room, his eyes following each one drifting toward the drain and idling at the bottom of the basin as the remaining water drains.  Sparkly little bubbles created reflections in his eyes that could resemble stars.  And he waits.

He waits for your reaction, waits for you to detach yourself from him because god, he didn’t know what was happening between you two since stepping back inside the bar all those hours ago but he didn’t want it to end just because his past put you off.  It was inevitable that the single good thing happening to him would come to an end.  That this night would end.

He doesn’t expect you to shove your hip into his just as he had done to you earlier, twirling a rag in between your fingers, offering him a smirk.  

“Big reputation, huh?”  You playfully raise your eyebrows up and down.

Relief washes over him.  It doesn’t have to end.  This night isn’t over, maybe he can have whatever this is for a few more minutes, an hour if he’s lucky.  He’d delay going home if it meant you’d keep toying with him, teasing him over silly little things that his friends had told you about.  He didn’t mind, not when your face would light up at every tiny ‘secret’ you were let in on.  Eddie knew very well that his friends had been enlightening you with small details about his life back in Hawkins, about every time they’d visited Knife’s Edge, all the big moments and embarrassing drunk shenanigans.  He didn’t mind.  Because it meant that they’d already accepted you as one of their own.

“Shut up.”  He gently nudges your shoulder with his.

~end~

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tags - @gravedigginbbydoll @ohauggieo @spicysix @lunatictardis @ali-r3n @batkin028 @mrsjellymunson @witchwolflea @emma77645 @emxxblog @eddiesxangel @angietherose @lottie-90 @sheneedsrocknroll92 @pullingattheroots @avalon-wolf @vintagehellfire @cryingglightningg @foreveranexpatsposts @winchester-angel @mmunson86 @witchwolflea @kurdtbean @micheledawn1975 @tlclick73 @erinekc @hazydespair @whenshelanded @corrodedcoffincumslut @ms1oftheboys @lma1986 @uglypastels @aysheashea

[bookish-bogwitch]

Hi everyone! Thank you to everyone who tagged me over the past couple weeks. In the past week and a half I’ve gone halfway around the world, which is why I’ve been AWOL from from WIP stuff. And also why I kind of under-promoted chapter 10 of Basil Pitch’s Diary, which I posted in a fugue state five hours before hopping on a plane.

Anyway, here’s a bit from that chapter. If you’re reading along and ch 9 left you in despair, please rest assured that things are looking up for our hero, even though he’s now at webs woven: 1 (v. tangled).

Below the cut for ch 1-9 spoilers.

“So when do we lay eyes on him?” Dev asked.

“You’re not laying anything on him.” If anyone could steal an imaginary boyfriend, it was Dev.

“Calm down.” Dev slid the plate toward me. I shook my head. “I just want to see the man who deflowered you.”

“Don’t be vulgar,” I said, feeling extremely flowered.

No-pressure tagging an arbitrary bunch of folks, some of whom I’m not sure like doing WIP posts. If you’d prefer not to be tagged in the future just let me know! ❤️

@brendughh @beastmonstertitan @carryonsimoncarryonbaz @carryonmylovelies @creepyspice

@comesitintheclover @cows4247 @confused-bi-queer @cutestkilla @chen-chen-chen-again-chen

@chronicallyhomoerotic @drowninginships @dragoneggos @excalisbury @emeryhall

@erzbethluna @ebbpettier @f-ing-ruthless-baz @fight-surrender @fatalfangirl

@facewithoutheart @fiend-for-culture @forabeatofadrum @foolofabookwyrm-activated @giishu

@gekkoinapeartree @goblindad-emoshit @henreyettah @hertragedyconnoisseur @hushed-chorus

@icarus-n-flames @ineffable-grimm-pitch @ic3-que3n @ionlydrinkhotwater @iamamythologicalcreature

@whatevertheweather @ileadacharmedlife @ivelovedhimthroughworse @shrekgogurt @im-gettingby

@monbons @mooncello @raenestee @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @thewholelemon

[judesmoonbeauty]

Quick Quip from Licht Klein’s Act 2 Ch. 10 - w/Azel

Just a quick quip from chapter 10 summary t/l - not 100%. Idk why, but I can’t help but laugh at Azel and his salesman ways 😝

///denotes alt translation

After waking from a dream about the rose in the rose garden, Emma receives a knock at her door. It’s Azel. It’s the middle of the night and he lets himself into her room.

Emma asks if this is common Tanzanite etiquette. He says it’s not but he doesn’t really care. He is there with an offer. 

Azel gives Emma three packages to choose from - each costing money from her - he’s not helping out the goodness of his heart. 

The lowest option plan is delivery service of a letter he offers one way and round-trip deliveries, but the cost will vary.

The middle plan includes a monitoring service of Licht and his well-being, & the letter delivery service.

The high option plan of Azel his authority to bring Licht back.

Since Emma can’t afford to pay out, she chooses option 3 the most affordable package.

He congratulates her for her choice and offers to bless her letter at an additional service fee………(🙄 oh god.)

Emma thinks that when Azel is silent he really seems like a god, but as soon as he opens his mouth he seems strangely vulgar///mundane.

————

I’m planning to translate summaries of each chapter once I complete his first ending. There is part of this conversation where his veil is slightly lifted imo and it gives me a little reassurance of some theories I have about him. This will be posted later.

[sourkreem]

Tim being Chindo is something I never knew I needed in my life ✨️✨️✨️

Like, can you imagine whenever any of the BatFam members ask him to pass an object to them & Tim's right hand is occupied, so he uses his left hand instead? He apologized for using his left hand, leaving whoever it is confused, but they didn't think much of it.

Same scenario with receiving items - right hand is occupied, so Tim has to use his left hand to receive stuff - and again, he apologized.

Again, this confused the rest of the BatFam but no one questions it.

Or whenever he swears or mumbles or counts, he reverts to his mother tongue...

"Hey Tim, what time is it?"

"Hmm, let me check... (mumbling) satu, dua, tiga, empat, lima, enam, tujuh... (shouts) Ah! It's currently 10:00 P.M."

Tim & the BatFam discovers an enemy's nefarious plot during a briefing at the BatCave.

Tim: (swears in Indo) "Bangsat!! Kurang ajar!"

Before you mentioned the right and left hand mannerism thing, I have never thought about how Indonesian it is lmao.

Also, Tim definitely swears a lot. All sorts of curses and vulgar insults from many ethnic languages, like the average chindo geek that he is. I personally think he shouts "Ngent*t!" , "P*kimak!" , "Ch*bai!" , or "Kont*l!" a lot.

Also, do you think he's that type of Chindo that speaks fluent Mandarin and/or Hokkien or that he's just another victim of the Soeharto regime? 😭😭

[script-a-world]

Submitted via Google Form:

I have a world in which a lot of words, majority being nouns are never actually translated and thus languages all have common and unaltered loan words. What I mean is like 'chocolate' is always 'chocolate', there's no 'chocolat' 'coklat' 'cokolada' etc... To make it easier, all languages do have a similar alphabet. If this continues on a vast scale, how do languages develop and how understandable are different languages?

Tex: What is your base language? Why is it not another language?

To illustrate a point, here is the etymology of the word chocolate (Wikipedia):

Cocoa, pronounced by the Olmecs as kakawa,[5] dates to 1000 BC or earlier.[5] The word "chocolate" entered the English language from Spanish in about 1600.[6] The word entered Spanish from the word chocolātl in Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs. The origin of the Nahuatl word is uncertain, as it does not appear in any early Nahuatl source, where the word for chocolate drink is cacahuatl, "cocoa water". It is possible that the Spaniards coined the word (perhaps in order to avoid caca, a vulgar Spanish word for "faeces") by combining the Yucatec Mayan word chocol, "hot", with the Nahuatl word atl, "water".[7] A widely cited proposal is that the derives from unattested xocolatl meaning "bitter drink" is unsupported; the change from x- to ch- is unexplained, as is the -l-. Another proposed etymology derives it from the word chicolatl, meaning "beaten drink", which may derive from the word for the frothing stick, chicoli.[8] Other scholars reject all these proposals, considering the origin of first element of the name to be unknown.[9] The term "chocolatier", for a chocolate confection maker, is attested from 1888.[10]

To illustrate another point, here is an excerpt for the article on the history of the English language (Wikipedia):

English is a West Germanic language that originated from Ingvaeonic languages brought to Britain in the mid-5th to 7th centuries AD by Anglo-Saxon migrants from what is now northwest Germany, southern Denmark and the Netherlands. The Anglo-Saxons settled in the British Isles from the mid-5th century and came to dominate the bulk of southern Great Britain. Their language originated as a group of Ingvaeonic languages which were spoken by the settlers in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages, displacing the Celtic languages (and, possibly, British Latin) that had previously been dominant. Old English reflected the varied origins of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms established in different parts of Britain. The Late West Saxon dialect eventually became dominant. A significant subsequent influence on the shaping of Old English came from contact with the North Germanic languages spoken by the Scandinavian Vikings who conquered and colonized parts of Britain during the 8th and 9th centuries, which led to much lexical borrowing and grammatical simplification. The Anglian dialects had a greater influence on Middle English.

Linguistics is a large, old, and complex subject. It has a lot of overlap with other sciences, and there are always new things being found out about it. Below is a list of links to help introduce the depth and breadth of languages and their development:

Further Reading

Linguistics (Wikipedia)

Global language system (Wikipedia)

Integrational linguistics (Wikipedia)

Language geography (Wikipedia)

Dialect continuum (Wikipedia)

Sprachbund (Wikipedia)

Writing system (Wikipedia)

List of creators of writing systems (Wikipedia)

Ebonwing: If your world’s languages evolved and changed in a broadly similar way than ours did (independently all over the world, resulting in a great deal of linguistic diversity) this is unrealistic. Pronunciation naturally changes as languages evolve over time; English wasn’t always pronounced the way it is today, either. As a result, a word loaned from another language isn’t going to sound the same way a few hundred years later.

Plus, loan word pronunciation changes are also driven by languages having different phonology from the source language. Japanese loaned chokoretto from chocolate, but it’s really not pronounced the same way. Sometimes even the meanings change in the process; in German, a Handy (loaned from English) is actually a mobile phone.

Of course, if you’re not going for an Earth-like linguistic background, you have more leeway in doing things like this.

Utuabzu: Something you should consider when dealing with multiple languages is that every language has its own phonology - set of sounds - and phonotactics - rules about how sounds can be combined - and these can differ significantly. These differences become particularly clear with loan words, as speakers will alter the word to fit their language’s rules and available sounds, eg: Hawaiian alters Christmas to kalikimaka, because it doesn’t have the sounds ‘r’, ‘s’ or ‘t’ and doesn’t allow consonants to follow consonants or to end a syllable.

This doesn’t even account for the problems of trying to use a single script for all languages. Different languages have different rules about what sounds are distinct enough to differentiate words. For instance, English has a relatively limited number of vowels, but other Germanic languages have more, which they write using additional letters, eg. å, ä, æ, â, ø, ö, ü, etc. Some languages, like Icelandic, even have additional consonant letters - þ and ð - because it’s necessary to clearly distinguish those sounds. Then there are languages that aren’t generally written with roman script, like Hindi, which needs to clearly distinguish aspirated consonants, or Chinese languages, which need to account for lexical tone*. If you want a script that can depict all the many, many possible sounds of human language, you’re going to end up with something like the International Phonetic Alphabet, which is far too unwieldy to be used to write any single language, and even linguists don’t generally use unless they’re describing the sounds of a language. Especially because most languages will consider multiple sounds to be equivalent and interchangeable that IPA uses distinct characters for, because different languages will lump together different sets of sounds and usually omit many of them entirely. (Eg, Standard English dialects lack the voiced glottal fricative 

Much of the time, it’s just going to be easier to use a purpose-made script that can actually depict the language accurately, and even when that doesn’t happen, the borrowed script is likely to be altered and evolve over time to accommodate the needs of its users. Roman, Greek, Cyrillic, Arabic, Hebrew, Armenian, Georgian and the vast Brahmic family of scripts are all derived from a common ancestor, Proto-Canaanite, and have mutated and evolved over the course of 3500 years to suit the languages that use them.

This further complicates loan words, as they then need to be altered for the script, because not all scripts have equivalent characters, eg Japanese hiragana ら is most often realised as /ɾa/ or /la/ which to English speakers sounds like ‘ra’ or ‘la’, but to Japanese speakers are considered the same sound.

A further complication also comes from grammar, as many languages have rules that alter words based on their role in a sentence or the surrounding words. A common way to do this is with morphemes - units of language that have independent meaning but cannot appear on their own, eg. suffixes and prefixes (together with infixes, which get shoved inside the root, and circumfixes, which get split and tacked either side of the root, these are called affixes) like ‘-s’, ‘-ed’, ‘re-’, ‘pro-’, ‘anti-’, etc. - these are attached to the root, the base word, to convey additional information. 

Agglutinative languages (like Finnish or Inuktitut) add multiple affixes to indicate case and number of nominals,, while fusional languages (like German or Russian) use one affix to express both. Polysynthetic languages (like Algonquian languages) frequently and extensively alter both to convey a lot of information. Other languages, most famously Welsh, alter the sound of a word based on the words immediately around them (mutation).

All these factors are going to make what you want here really difficult to achieve. If you are determined to have this, you probably need all the languages in your world to have a relatively recent common ancestor that had a well established literary standard and standardised orthography. By recent I mean very recent. The Romance languages have been diverging for over 2000 years (Cicero was complaining about the Sardinian dialect of Vulgar Latin in the 1st Century BCE), while the entire Indo-European language family - containing languages from Icelandic to Sinhala and the first languages of approximately 46% of the global population - is estimated to have been diverging for about 6000-10,000 years, depending on the theory. Our species, Homo sapiens, is over 300,000 years old, so this isn’t very long in comparison.

*lexical tone is one of two main tone systems, the other being prosodic tone. Lexical tone means that individual words have a tone that impacts their semantic meaning, while prosodic tone is carried across multiple words and conveys pragmatic meaning. This difference is why native speakers of lexical tone languages (like Mandarin or Zapotecan languages) can often sound oddly flat when speaking prosodic tone languages (like English). The roman alphabet was not created to deal with lexical tone and Vietnamese gives an excellent example of how much it needs to be altered to depict tones.

Blue: Natural languages change for so many different reasons; some of the big contributing factors are technological and cultural changes. The farther apart they are geographically, the harder it is to maintain the homogeneity. One would think that the advance of modern technology, such as the internet, would smooth out the differences, but it does not appear to be the case (see Wikipedia’s article on ELF) 

Language has a socioeconomic, cultural, and religious (e.g.: sacred language) significance. It can be a status symbol: French was adopted at various courts across Europe and became the distinguishing feature of aristocracy. People are often very reluctant to part with their native language, because it means giving up a part of their identity. If it's an artificial language imposed on different communities, why would they accept it and refuse their own language? If this situation developed naturally, how did it happen?

Lingua franca – "common language". Some of the historical examples are Akkadian, Koine Greek, and Latin; more recent ones are English, French, and Arabic. The spread of linguae francae is often associated with the colonial efforts to establish the language of the colonizer as the primary language of communication, but it is not always so: Tupi (Brazil) and Classical Maori (New Zealand) were adopted by the colonizing population. A lot of linguae francae were adopted and stayed dominant to facilitate trade most and foremost. 

Due to the cultural and economic hegemony, English is arguably the lingua franca of the world. One of the reasons why English is the dominant language of international communication is the expansion of the British Empire. In Russia, lingua franca is (obviously) Russian, but there are many native languages across the country that are officially recognized and taught at schools in their respective regions; Russian also serves as a lingua franca in many post-Soviet countries. In the Americas, there are obviously native languages that are very far removed from English and Spanish. In all these examples, native languages are used alongside the common languages: the lexicon and grammar of the native languages perseveres.

There is also such a thing as an auxiliary language - the kind of language that's been artificially constructed to aid communication internationally (esperanto) or for a more limited group (Interslavic). Esperanto is the only one that is relatively well-known and widely used; none of auxiliary languages have ever become widely spread though. That might change one day, but then the question becomes: will they stay the same across the globe, or will they also see regional changes?

It's theoretically possible for a language to exist in a time capsule if it's used by a small isolated community that doesn't see much change; but even then, there's a possibility of phonetic shifts over the years. 

Let's for a second imagine that it did happen to a degree, but only with nouns.

Here we run into another issue that would hinder understanding: a lot of human languages view verbs rather than nouns as a central feature of a sentence. On a larger scale, verbs convey the relationships between nouns and actions you perform with an object: “I ate chocolate” and “I bought chocolate” are two very different things, and just knowing the word "chocolate" tells you nothing about the meaning of the sentence in general.

[ma3-author]

✎ 30 ✉

Previous CH: -ɴᴏᴛᴇ- /// ✎ 00 ✉ ///  ✎ 01 ✉ ///  ✎ 02 ✉ ///  ✎ 03 ✉ /// ✎ 04 ✉ ///  ✎ 05 ✉ ///  ✎ 06 ✉ ///  ✎ 07 ✉ ///  ✎ 08 ✉ ///  ✎ 09 ✉ ///  ✎ 10 ✉ ///  ✎ 11 ✉ /// ✎ 12 ✉ /// ✎ 13 ✉ /// ✎ 14 ✉ /// ✎ 15 ✉ /// ✎ 16 ✉ /// ✎ 17 ✉ /// ✎ 18 ✉ /// ✎ 19 ✉ /// ✎ 20.1 ✉ /// ✎ 20 ✉ /// ✎ 21 ✉ /// ✎ 22 ✉ /// ✎ 23 ✉ /// ✎ 24 ✉ /// ✎ 25 ✉ /// ✎ 26 ✉ /// ✎ 27 ✉ /// ✎ 28 ✉ /// ✎ 29 ✉

TW: attempt suicide; sorrow; accusation.

I changed the cover as well as the sequel. I got to say my editing is improving. Do you like the cover of this chapter? For the readers to visualize what MC requested of Nemo, it exactly as on the cover.

Note: If you see this three-line phrase (- - -), it means flashback.

___________________________________

The clock is starting again, but this time.. it is moving faster, then slower, then faster.

Tick~

The twins birthday is coming soon, yet Nemo's story is still in silence. Each second that passes by makes you nervous. Unlike the time when you will know what time or date will happen to Aida or Aisha, this is very different, like being told to be cautious at all times. Though you never let your guards down and are always awake 24/7, it still can't help but divert your attention to something else.

- - -

After Carlo almost hugged Aida, which you prevented, and him telling you off to his mother as he promised, it wasn't that long before Sylvia called for you in regards to this news. She wore the same unappealing smile she always does.

"I heard what you did; didn't they teach you to respect your masters?" Sylvia scuffle said eyeing you sharply. Her lips were pursed, but she swiftly replaced them with a frown.

Not only are you alone with her and her son Carlo in that room, but Arthur is also there watching it all. Any servant will think that he needs to be there, and as the head of the housekeeper, he should get a lecture as well for not keeping an eye on a servant. For you, it's simply a show that Sylvia wants to humiliate you with.

Even if Carlo is giving you this smug look, thinking you can't win this argument despite the fact that you can, you don't give a damn even if they think it that way. For you, all you care about is going back out to check on Nemo. As long as you stay there, it could be happening any minute. You were about to speak and tell her the reason as to why you did it—to get it over with—when suddenly the door burst open, presenting Aisha and Aida, who were now walking to where you are.

Aisha gave you a quick peek before talking to Sylvia. Explaining what happened and how she and Aida were witnesses. As for Aida, who is now asking if you're all right,

"Did you really teach your son how to have gentlemanly etiquette?" Aisha asked, eyeing her and Carlo, who has this annoyed look on him.

"Of course, dear. Why wouldn't I? He just wants to play with you two~"

"If you call following us a play? *Frown* Your wrong. That's simply called stalking."

Sylvia then gave a quick glance at Carlo, who was trying to explain himself, only for Sylvia to avert her gaze. Inhaling before saying, "Aisha, where did you learn that word? This is not stalking; he just really wants to play~"

Aisha scoff "For you, maybe, but for us, it's not."

"But that doesn't explain why she needs to do such a vulgar thing to people who give her something to eat."

How you wanted to laugh at her remark. Yes, she has a point, but that reason is only for people who are on her side. As you get your paycheck with the twin allowance, technically, she or any of her sons don't owe you anything.

Aisha wanted to say something, but she found her mouth gaping with no sound to be heard. Sylvia, who saw this, hid her smirk underneath her smiling one. She then glanced at you and wanted to tell you the punishment or get fired as she couldn't have anyone near the twins as she couldn't conduct her scheme.

But before she could open her mouth, you stepped in. "Please excuse my interruption. Madam Sylvia I apologize for what I did. I simply thought that he was going to attack Miss Aida, and I quickly jumped to shield her."

"No! I just wanted to play with my dearest sister."

"You heard him."

"Yes, but I'm just following what the order is. I was tasked not only to watch over them and take care of them but to always guard them at any cause."

"Even if it cost your life?" Without hesitation, Sylvia asked that question. Aisha and Aida look at Sylvia. There was shock on their faces that morphed into annoyance as she took it too far. But before they could stop her or you from answering it,

You stand tall, looking at her straight in the eyes. "Yes." One word, yet it has a big impact. Not only you left an impression on her. But all the people inside that said room

Sylvia wore an annoyed look but hastily smiled to cover it. Soon she dismissed you and the twins. Even if Carlo tried to reopen the case, Sylvia simply ignored him. First, she let you go, not because of the contract but because she had a plan just for you. Second, you remind her of her past self.

Arthur also saw that. It was so refreshing.

- - -

Tock~

You found yourself in the same garden again. Where you and Sein met. You were simply gathering some flowers for the twins upcoming birthday. Ordered by Sylvia as a decoration for the party. Not only do you find this as a good opportunity to view the outside window of Nemo in case he opened it and do his things rather than walking past his room,

It was a field of vision to see where his room was, and you were just eyeing it. You can't help but wonder if he ever saw you talking to Sein whenever you go pluck out or admire the flowers.

'I should go back'

Seeing that you gathered enough You took one last peek before walking away. Only for him to stop you. Where he stands is where Sein is supposed to be. You find it weird and creepy at the same time, being wary of what Arthur wants from you. Did he follow you? Or simply stumble upon you after finishing his routine? Maybe... as well as you don't care.

"Miss F/N, what are you doing here~?"

'Are you blind?'

"Mister Duncan... *bowed* I'm simply gathering some flowers for the miss's upcoming birthday."

"I see~ but wouldn't it be best to do it before it begins?" Arthur pointed out how the flower might die if it stayed that long. Arthur looked at you with curiosity as to why you had shaken your head.

"Flowers can last up to ten days; they just need a good amount of water. And the birthday starts in about three days, so it will be good. Also, if I do it before it's about to start, I fear that the flowers won't make it."

"Hmm, you know a lot about flowers. Did you learn that from your previous work?"

'Now you're interested in flowers? No, I know that look.' The look he gave you is oh, so familiar. You wanted to scoff at this, as you had experienced it before. A very déjà vu event

"Yes."

That word again: simply, yet it has this impact. It just does that. It interests him. Your so mysterious... He wants to learn more about this girl standing in front of him with these lifeless eyes staring at the basket then looking at him. Who really is she? Now that he saw you up close

'She has a fair skin. a good posture... hmm'

"I should get going now. The missis might be looking for me. Good day, Mister Duncan." You bowed once again.

As you were about to walk away, just like what happened back then. Is happening now. Only this time, it was a different character and question. A shadowing.

"Why did you choose that among these other flowers, Miss F/N?"

You look at him for a mere second before thinking of an answer: "It's beautiful... Just the right flower for Miss Aisha and Miss Aida." You just wanted to be honest with him and share your opinion, but with what you did, it has caught his attention now. He needs to learn and unravel this facade he saw in front of him.

While he watches, you walk away from him. He soon followed, as Sylvia would be wondering where he was. What you two didn't know was that, behind the bushes, hid a boy. The boy has the same feature as the person F/N talked to. He has this shock—or surprise—and nostalgic expression.

Even if a year has passed since she left the world, that word—that exact word but in a more lively way. He can't simply forget that. After all, her memory is still intact in his mind. Even the smallest detail, he remembers it...

Tick Tock~

There's only a day before Aisha and Aida's birthdays begin. After that interaction between you and Arthur, you always find him looking at you with this smile, and you know something will come up. But you ignored it because it would distract you. Furthermore... Nemo had shown a huge sign.

A sign telling you to observe him even more. Be caution. Be aware. Double the standard. Be ready. Just like today. Right now they were having breakfast, but instead of having them all at the table.

"Where's Nemo? Carlo?" Sylvia asked, as Nemo's chair was empty.

"How should I know?"

"Sein?" Sylvia redirected her question to her second child. For a second, you thought he was eyeing you. Or maybe Arthur, who was standing beside you. Maybe that was.

"His painting."

"Again? This is the third time he missed breakfast with us," Sylvia grumbled. After the death of Lady Y/N. She noticed that boy always seems to stay in his room. painting until he asks for another set of paint. but even so when it comes to her rules. That boy will obediently follow. She may favor Carlo more, but Nemo is still her son, and this worries her.

Before she could order a servant to fetch Nemo like she usually does, you stepped in. As your instincts are telling you that today is that day. "Madam Sylvia. I don't mind fetching, young master."

"Hmm, may I ask why you suddenly volunteered?" Sylvia eyed you curiously.

Yes, you never volunteered to fetch him whenever he wasn't around. First, you don't want to get caught immediately. Second, you want to show them that you only take orders from the twin. Third this. It was a good thing that you had a good reason for her to let you go.

"It's for the way I acted toward. Young master, Carlo, I wanted to apologize for jumping to conclusions; I should have learned his real intention first." You then glance at Carlo, as you wanted him to give you this order. Knowing Sylvia favors Carlo She doesn't have a choice but to allow you.

Bowing at him, you then continued. "Young master, would you like me? To fetch young master Nemo as a way to accept my apology?"

Just hearing his snort, even if you can't see it, made you know he had the biggest smug on his face. "Sure, why not? At least you're not a dumb peasant!"

"Carlo!" Aisha exclaimed, glaring at him, who just gave her a shrug.

"What? She said it herself~"

"F/N, you don't need to do that; it was his fault. Not yours. Stay here." Aisha ordered, but you need to break some trust points with her as you really need to do this.

"I'm sorry, Miss Aisha. But it is against my morals to not apologize for what I did wrong—I am wrong. So please. Let me fix my mistake." Even if you had lost her trust. You did earn Carlo's and Sylvia's trust.

Sylvia interrupted, "Very well~ if that's what you want. I would let you. Go now"

"Thank you, Madam."

Aisha eyed you for a second before nodding at you. Allowing you to do what you want. It annoyed her as she felt embarrassed, but Aida quickly comforted her. As soon as you walk out of the room. Someone had followed you.

It took you a solid minute to reach Nemo's room. Obviously, you speed-walk your way to his room after exiting the dining room.

You knocked. *Knock Knock* but silent was only be heard.

You tried again, *Knock, Knock* this time calling him.

"Young master?" You then heard a shuffle followed by a thud, *Thud Thud*.

The good part was that the door wasn't locked, and without hesitation, you opened it. Heart thumping so loudly, sweat began to form. The place was a disaster. Only one painting remains in its frame. The painting that you requested before "The White Bird"

Nemo had enough. He was tired. He just wants to see her again, the person who comforted him. The person who sees him as the real him is the one who will appreciate him. The first person who gave him an encouraging word So before he joined her, he held the acorn close to him, remembering all the good memories.

'I'm coming. You don't need to wait Y/N'

-DING! DING!-

"NEMO!"

Y/N? He quickly glanced behind him, but he lost his footing. Falling to where he was standing. which was the open window where the sun was shining at him. This is what he wants. So why is he scared? Why does he want to be saved? Didn't he want to see Y/N a minute ago? But wait a minute. He heard Y/N call him. Was he dead already?

If so, he didn't expect it to be this painless.. or--

'Huh?

A pant and groan snapped him from his thoughts. not only that, but he felt His wrist being held by someone... So, he looked up. There he saw Miss Aisha and Aida's personal maid. Struggling to bring him up. What was her name again?

"Y-you..."

"I-I can't-- *pants* let you-- " Before you could scream and ask for help, a person made their way beside you, helping you bring Nemo back. You didn't expect him to be the person to come to your aid, but thanks to his sudden appearance, he draws your conclusion. As you caught his attention again.

This book made you look like a joke; you wanted to laugh and curse at it. It made you mere entertainment for the Dimoche family,

"Se-second brother!" Nemo exclaimed as Sein was now helping him.

It looks like they heard you after you screamed Nemo's name because as soon as Sein brought Nemo back, a lot of footstep can be heard and Sylvia's voice followed suit.

"What is happening--- Nemo!" As soon as she saw Nemo's quivering figure and face filled with tears, What's more, his room was a disaster. She immediately went to you. You didn't expect it, and neither did anyone else watching.

*SLAPPP!*

Sylvia had slapped you, and because of the impact, it made you look the other way. Feeling the burning sensation. It hurts when you touch it, but you need to endure it as she wipes the makeup away to reveal the scar. Not only that, but the contact lens had moved away from its original spot.

You didn't dare to look at her nor look up, fearing they might discover you. You also might scoff at her. Or you might say something awful. Obviously she quickly jump to conclusion.

"How dare you! After what we did, you return it like this?! Is this why you wanted to do it?"

You stayed quiet while Aisha and Aida tried to defend you, helping you to stand up. Arthur is trying to calm Sylvia, who doesn't want to. The servant watched from the back. Carlo is glaring at you. Finally, it was Sein's turn.

He first glanced at you, then at his mother. His lips were pursed, as this scene was very familiar to him: "Mother. Miss F/N saved Nemo."

"Saved? She obviously tried to do something! Aren't you here to stop it?"

Sein ignored his mother's question: "Nemo tried to kill himself. But Miss F/N here saw him before he could... She saved him."

"Is this true? Say something, Nemo!" Sylvia's hands are now on his shoulder, trying to make Nemo look at her. She can't believe this. What drives Nemo to think this way? Was she really focused on buying things? Just why did Nemo do this? Or maybe something else? Maybe the death of Lady Y/N?

"I-I.. it's true mother. I'm sorry!"

"Shhh. It's okay. Let's get you fixed." Sylvia called some servants to clean the mess, as she would consult Nemo. Ordering the servant to call a doctor as well.

Aisha wanted to block Sylvia before she could get away; she wanted her to apologize to the person who was still quiet. She could clearly see the handprint on your cheeks before you covered it up. Before Aisha could do so, a hand stopped her by grabbing her wrist.

"What are you doing? She needs to apologize to you!" The person who grabbed her was now shaking her head, confusing both of them.

"It's okay, Miss Aisha, Miss Aida. It wasn't Madam Sylvia's fault. She's just concerned. It's the same as what I did to protect Miss Aida back then."

Your eyes and cheeks is startling to get hurt. It was a good thing that they told you to go to their room, as they will tend to your injury. You want to protest and do it alone. but this is a good opportunity to introduce yourself as Cypress to Aisha.

It's time. so before you followed them. You face Sein. "Thank you, young master."

In their perspective, as they helped you, your hand was resting on the spot where Sylvia had slapped you. Your other eye was closed, and only one was open. The mobcap that was neatly wrapped around your hair was messy. You look pitiful, and it made them pity you.

Why are you still so kind? Why just accept it? Fight back. But, like they said, if you don't have the power, you're nothing but a low rank.

Aida had gritted her teeth at what you looked like. Aisha clinched her palm, almost taking out the blood because of her grip.

╰┈➤ ❝ [✎ 31 🕮 ] ❞

══════════ ⋆★⋆ ══════════

ꜱᴄʜᴇᴅᴜʟᴇ ᴏꜰ ɴᴇᴡ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀꜱ (ᴘʀᴏꜰɪʟᴇ ᴘᴀɢᴇ)

[rye-views]

Goodnight Punpun. おやすみプンプン. Ch. 1-46. (not finished) 7.4/10

I would not recommend this manga to my friends. I would not reread this manga.

So much unnecessary but natural vulgarity here.

I personally just don't like this animal form we are taking on. It makes things weirder. like not okay.

I do want to know more about what Aiko thinks like.

Memorable Quotes: "Anyone who holds other people back is gonna live an unhappy life!"

[thebananniediariesbyannie]

did i just attempt to recreate sabrina carpenters's makeup look? yes i did! here's a simple breakdown...

by now, the name sabrina carpenter is all over social media. from her stunning concerts to her style, and of course, her flawless makeup..she’s become quite the household name. when i began recreating looks, i knew i had try a look from sabrina carpenter. now that i have, get ready for more! because her makeup looks are STUNNING!

the photo below is my finished look. here in this blog post you’ll find the full makeup tutorial, a beauty breakdown, links to shop the products i used, and my own rating on how i think i did (we can always learn and improve)

something i like to point out when recreating these looks is that you do not need to be a professional makeup artist to try this. it’s so fun to learn how to create! i am not a professionally trained makeup artist, i just started doing makeup for fun and i love it! which means you can try it too! step out of your comfort zone with me and give it a try! i can’t wait to see what you create!

i always appreciate it when you shop through my links as that allows me to continue creating for you! be sure to bookmark my ltk account @banannie so you can instantly shop my posts as soon as they’re live 👇

watch the tutorial right here! 👇

beauty breakdown:

kylie skin - hair clips

fresh beauty- rose & hyaluronic acid deep hydration emulsion

apres beauty everlast eye mask

summer fridays jet lag mask (applied extra under the everlast eye mask)

viseart eyeshadow palette

anastasia beverly hills - glam to go eyeshadow pressed pigment palette

fenty beauty moroccan spice palette - mo’rockin ice (white shimmer)

keys soulcare - 2-in-1 skin tint

anastasia beverly hills - clear brow gel and brow wiz in dark brown

eos - lip balm

dibs beauty - glow tour duo in starlit (only used the bronzer/contour)

hourglass cosmetics - ambient lighting blush in diffused heat

viseart eyeshadow palette in black

anastasia beverly hills - mascara

viseart eyeshadow palette in brown (added intensity to brows)

dose of colors x sarahii eyeshadow palette

pretty vulgar - shimmering swan highlighter

kylie cosmetics - give me a kiss lip liner

kylie cosmetics - savage matte liquid lipstick

marc jacobs - ch-ch-changes enamored high shine gloss

and for the comparison…

rating myself….

alright i’d give myself an 8 out of 10 on this look. i know that i did not match the lips as best as i could have and if i were to recreate this look again, i’d go a bit heavier on the blush. i wouldn’t change much else though because this look photographs so well! honestly, i would wear this look going out any day!!!

follow along for a daily dose of style, beauty, and wellness wisdom served with a side of humor and a sprinkle of self-love – because life's too short not to be fabulous, and i've got some secrets to help bring out your best self

*FTC Disclosure: This website, page, post, and/or video contains affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission for purchases made through my links

[lunarmessenger]

vulgar. - chapter ten.

It took everything in Y/N to stay calm as she made eye contact with Jumin's father, his brows furrowing as he looked at her. He wasn't the only one who was displeased; beside him was a woman who seemed to be closer to Jumin's age. She had long hair with blond highlights, brown eyes piercing as she gave Y/N a brief look of distaste before turning her attention to Jumin. In contrast to Y/N's soft floral look, she wore a black turtleneck sweater tucked into a pencil skirt, black stockings and black heels tying her outfit all together as she opened her mouth to speak.

"Jumin, this is Mi Cha. From the Boon family." Though  Y/N didn't agree with her background, she couldn't help the small scoff that was urging to leave her body as she fought the need to roll her eyes. The Boon family was very well known in South Korea for their influence in fashion, but had yet to reach the United States in their ideals. Their lack of influence on the general public in the US made them weaker than Y/N's family, who had already implemented several corporate buildings world wide.

"I'm very excited to get to know you, Jumin. Your father has told me many wonderful things about you." Her voice was smooth yet icy, a certain coldness radiating from her poised posture as she gave a slight curtsy. It took everything in Y/N not to laugh, as this strange woman's energy was rather similar to Jumin's. Stifling her laugh, she cleared her throat to gather everybody's attention, including the chairman himself. His eyes flashed with recognition as he turned to face his son, the man sighing deeply as he realized that his father had put a name to her face.

"Y/N Walker. The trouble making heiress. Not exactly the best choice for you son." Jumin felt a slight pang of irritation that he wasn't expecting, his father's actions getting on his nerves more than normal. But before the man could say anything Y/N was way ahead of him, standing up and bowing respectfully.

"Hello, it is very nice to meet you sir. I am honored to have the chance to meet one of the most powerful men in Korea, as well as his beautiful guest. It is my pleasure, Mi Cha." Her tone was proper but Jumin could see the slight spark of mischief, excitement replacing irritation as an idea came to his mind.

"Father, I would like you to meet my girlfriend." Y/N faltered, sputtering slightly as she looked up at Jumin who had stood beside her. Her face had gone warm, a slight flush gracing her cheeks as Jumin placed his large hand at the small of her back. His touch was barely there but it was enough for her to feel it, her heart beating faster at his actions and with what he just said. Girlfriend? His father and guest were just as shocked as she was, suspicion riddled all over their faces as Y/N struggled to give a happy smile.

"Son. Did you not just tell me when I was in your office last that you were not looking for anybody special?" This was a surprise, Y/N keeping still as she looked up towards Jumin, who avoided her eye contact as he challenged his father. As far as she knew, woman were constantly groveling over the handsome business man, dreaming of being doted upon by him. He could quite literally, have anybody he wanted; yet here his father was, airing out his dirty laundry in front of his supposed girlfriend.

"I was simply not ready to introduce the two of you to each other. Especially now with this so called "scandal" that her parents and ex-fiancee have put together." The mention of the tabloids caused Mi Cha to laugh, her perfectly manicured hand coming up to her pink lips as she slowed down to a small giggle.

"I'm so sorry, I don't mean to laugh. I just never expected a daughter from a family as well mannered as the Walkers to behave in such a chaotic manner, so much as to runaway from a perfect life." Jumin looked down to see Y/N grow angry, her brows slightly furrowing as she struggled to keep her composure. He was trying to keep her comfortable by keeping his touch light, but he couldn't help but give her hip a slight squeeze as she opened her mouth to speak.

"Pardon my abrasive tone, but to be frank; you don't know anything about me. You have no right to speak my family's name with a mouth like yours. Haven't you been told? Never bite the hand that feeds you." A snort made all three people whip their heads over to Jumin, the man's head turned to the side as one of his large hands came up to hide his face. Y/N tried her best not to smile in return, feeling a slight sense of pride at the fact that she'd made the stoic business man actually laugh. The opposing pair were not as amused, Mi Chan growing visibly red from anger as she looked to the chairman for help.

"Jumin, I really think you and I should have a discussion—"

"Not tonight father, as I am trying to spend quality time with Y/N. This is what you wanted, isn't it?" There was a gleam in his eye that came as a surprise to Y/N as she watched it all unfold, a feeling similar to butterflies erupting in her stomach as she watched him. This right here is what Jaehee had told her about; that hidden charm that Jumin carried with him that allowed him to make her feel this way.

Without another word the chairman simply looked at Mi Cha and held out his arm, glancing back at his son and his new found partner as if to say, 'This isn't over.'. But for now it was, the front door slowly coming to a close and Jumin giving an audible sigh of relief. With them gone he'd slipped his hand back from her hip, Y/N fighting a hiss that almost escaped her lips at the sudden wave of cool air that came between them. To her surprise she found herself to be disappointed with the removal of his arm, the man gesturing to her chair to have her take a seat.

"I am sorry that this happened Y/N, this was not meant to be part of the reason I am helping you in your situation." Usually she'd have a snarky remark but this time she could only nod, the chef soon bringing out new plates of dinner and removing the previous ones.

"It's not a problem, though I take it you're not usually one to forget important plans like that?" A slight blush spread across his cheeks as he gave a small sigh, nodding along as his only response.

"Let's not discuss that. You weren't brought here to act as a surrogate; I wanted to discuss your role as a new member of the RFA." His serious demeanor was back as he began to neatly cut into his meal, Y/N following along with him as she watched him carefully. For a split second she had gotten to see a humorous side to Jumin, one that he most definitely wasn't known for. It almost made her sad to see him shove it back down where he preferred it to be, trying not to let the pang of her heart hurt too much as she chewed on her food.

"Before we were interrupted you asked what exactly the RFA is, and what we do. It is a charity organization." Jumin smiled at Y/N's expression showing interest, raising an eyebrow to signal him to go on as she sipped on her wine.

"It was created by my dear friend V's late fiancee, Rika. She saw that the world was not always kind to others, and so she wanted to create a fundraiser that would help those who were in need. Rika's Fundraising Association." The abbreviation made sense to her now, and while she could appreciate this Rika's motivation, she couldn't help but notice the way Jumin spoke about her. The fondness that ghosted over his grey eyes, a smile hinting at the corner of his usually neutral set mouth. She didn't want to admit it, but Y/N could feel slight jealousy entering her heart at the way he spoke about her.

"Anyway, with her gone we haven't held a proper fundraiser in a couple of years. It was her responsibility to gather the guests for the fundraiser; she just had a way with others that none of us could seem to replicate. That is where you come in." Y/N paused her chewing as she took in what he said, pursing her lips slightly as she tilted her head.

"Okay...are you saying that you want me to take her place? Fill her old role?"

"Not exactly take her place. You are not Rika, and nobody could possibly come close to the magic she carried with her." He hesitated as he picked up his glass of wine, bringing it to his lips and taking a gentle sip. Again, she felt another pang of jealousy as she felt the idea of rejecting his proposal rising in her chest.

"But you do have the potential, as well as being stuck in a rather compromising position. You can't exactly go home, and sooner or later your money supply will run out." This was a harsh reality that she had been putting off thinking about; but he was absolutely right. All she'd managed to take without being noticed by her family and her ex was a few thousand dollars in cash; and most of that was spent on her plane ticket and the few art supplies she'd bought for herself. She looked away for a few moments to mull it over, but Jumin knew the essentially she had no choice.

"How much money are we negotiating here? I would need enough to rent my own place and—"

"That won't be necessary." This made her pause as she sat up straighter in her chair, bringing her hands to her lap to fidget with.

"What?"

"After the failed attempt of kidnapping, I do not feel comfortable having my assistant and her friend living alone. In exchange for your work with this association, you will have free housing here, as well as all the supplies that you will need for your artwork." This caused Y/N to falter, almost choking on her vegetables as she brought the napkin up to her mouth.

"My artwork? How did you even know I'm an artist?"

"With your recent scandal planted by your family I had Jaehee do a report on you. Your exhibits were quite good." Jumin was surprised to see her roll her eyes, leaning back in her chair as all proper etiquette that was taught to her disappeared.

"Those pieces weren't me. Just proper prim landscapes that would sell easily to make my parents look good." She blew a stray piece of her hair away from her face while Jumin only looked on, slightly amused.

"Then, paint what you would like. With your name in the tabloids I'm sure your work would raise thousands for the association. Even if it isn't 'proper prim landscapes' that you've grown so used to replicating. You won't have to pretend for this exhibition of your work." Y/N gave a slow nod, returning to her proper seated position as she decided.

"Okay, Jerkmin. You have a deal."

[synchronousemma]

15th March: Emma calls on Mrs. Elton

Read the post and comment on WordPress

Read: Vol. 2, ch. 14; pp. 175–176 (“Emma had feelings” through to “‘How delightful!’”)

Context

Emma and Harriet pay Mrs. Elton a call on the occasion of her introduction to the neighborhood.

We are told that Emma’s strategy to gain entrance into the vicarage in mid-December (vol. 1, ch. 10) occurred “three months ago” (vol. 2, ch. 14; p. 175).

Readings and Interpretations

Pride and Propriety

We are told that Emma “had feelings, less of curiosity than of pride or propriety,” that cause her promptly to pay the requisite formal call on Mrs. Elton upon her marriage and entrance into the community. Toby Tanner writes regarding this description that we should “beware of thinking that [Austen] had a simple unproblematic notion of […] propriety” (p. 19); it “may be mixed with — or indistinguishable from — related but more egotistical (and thus potentially socially less constructive and cohesive) motives or characteristics”:

It is a mark of Jane Austen’s scrupulous awareness of such fine distinctions and necessary differentiations that we are made to recognise the importance of a tireless vigilance over the nuances of motivation and intention. Jane Austen knew as well as anyone that feelings do not come pure and motives unmixed. But as far as possible we should be aware of which feeling or motive is dominant. Pride — or propriety? Which? It matters — even if any final and conclusive disentanglement is impossible. No more than Emma should we allow ourselves to act in a motivational mist or an emotional blur. (pp. 19–20)

For Tanner, then, Austen’s novels are at least in part didactic, intended to inculcate in their readers the same qualities that they value in their characters.

Handsome—Enough

Clause Rawson tries to separate anticipation from reality as regards descriptions of Mrs. Elton, seeing in Austen’s method a similarity to that of Henry Fielding:

Emma is shown shallowly jumping to conclusions when she decides that Mrs Elton is bound to be plainer than Harriet. Actually, though we won’t know this for another ten chapters, after ‘Mrs. Elton was first seen at church’ and then more fully examined at ‘the visits in form which were then to be paid’, Emma is not far wrong. ‘Her person was rather good; her face not unpretty; but neither feature, nor air, nor voice, nor manner, were elegant. Emma thought at least it would turn out so’ [vol. 2, ch. 14 [32]; p. 175]. And it does, as the evidence of ‘visits’ confirms [ibid., p. 175ff]. Ten chapters earlier, Emma predicted that Augusta would be ‘handsome enough’, but plain beside Harriet [vol. 2, ch. 4 [22]; p. 118]. An old fictional trick of using physical charms or the lack of them to reflect character is being activated, but in an unillusioned mode on which Austen evidently prided herself. Augusta Elton is no ogress or hag, ‘not unpretty’, but not ‘elegant’, like a Sophia Western in reverse, who is as superlatively beautiful as any heroine, ‘but rather inclining to tall’ (Tom Jones, IV. ii). (pp. 350–1)

Rawson points out that this account of Mrs. Elton contrasts with an earlier description of Jane Fairfax:

A more direct parallel to Fielding, with richer and more intricate modulations, occurs in a description of Jane Fairfax, a few chapters earlier […]: [Quotes from “Jane Fairfax was very elegant” to “distinction, and merit,” vol. 2, ch. 2 [20]; p. 107].

Whether or not the contrast with Mrs Elton’s lack of elegance comes over as pointedly, across an interval of a dozen chapters, as it might seem to do in this juxtaposition, it is at least subliminally sustained by the use of the words ‘elegant’, ‘vulgar’, ‘merit’, ringing their ironic changes, whose varying inflections would repay study in their own right, through the accounts of both women. And both accounts enact versions of Fielding’s balancing act between the atavistic romance of a heroine’s perfect beauty and the refreshing effects of minor imperfections which are a tribute to the reality principle […]. (pp. 351–2)

As for Mr. Elton, Emma��s thoughts about him in this section are another example of narration in Emma showing a character’s contemplations as they evolve in real time (see also Deresiewicz, p. 49): “his manners did not appear—but no, she would not permit a hasty or a witty word from herself about his manners” (p. 175). This breaking off also explicitly reveals the device of free indirect style that the previous paragraph shades into (“Her person was rather good…”); we are reminded that the past tense here may only be grammatical convention, that these thoughts are being expressed as they occur and thus may be broken off and reframed. Of the thoughts themselves, Linda Bree writes that they evidence in Emma “a high degree of intellectual generosity, even a sense of humor strong enough to empathize with people she dislikes” (p. 138).

A Pretty Fortune

Emma repeatedly emphasizes what she believes to be the mercenary motives underlying the Eltons’ marriage on both sides, and Harriet repeatedly refuses to understand:

“I am not at all surprized that he should have fallen in love.”

“Oh! no—there is nothing to surprize one at all.—A pretty fortune; and she came in his way.”

“I dare say,” returned Harriet, sighing again, “I dare say she was very much attached to him.”

“Perhaps she might; but it is not every man’s fate to marry the woman who loves him best. Miss Hawkins perhaps wanted a home, and thought this the best offer she was likely to have.”

“Yes,” said Harriet earnestly, “and well she might, nobody could ever have a better.” (p. 176)

Emma, in the new pragmatic attitude that the Elton débâcle seems to have lent to her (Hughes, p. 72), ironically reframes Harriet’s discourse about “love” in repeating its terms (“surprized,” “surprize”); Harriet, for her part, probably unintentionally reframes Emma’s logic about what constitutes a ‘good’ offer of marriage in repeating her terms (“best,” “better”).

Discussion Questions

What is Austen’s (or the narrator’s) approach to propriety and to emotion? Are Austen’s novels intended to be didactic?

How do Emma’s thoughts and speeches in this section characterize her? How is the conversation between her and Harriet used to reveal the preoccupations of each?

Why is this first meeting recounted through Emma’s contemplation, rather than through direct description?

Bibliography

Austen, Jane. Emma (Norton Critical Edition). 3rd ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, [1815] 2000.

Bree, Linda. “Emma: Word Games and Secret Histories.” In A Companion to Jane Austen, ed. Claudia Johnson and Clara Tuite. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell (2009), pp. 133–142.

Deresiewicz, William. “Emma: Ambiguous Relationships.” In Jane Austen and the Romantic Poets. New York: Columbia University Press (2004), pp. 86–126.

Hughes, R. E. “The Education of Emma Woodhouse.” Nineteenth-Century Fiction 16.1 (June 1961), pp. 69–74.

Rawson, Claude. “Showing, Telling, and Money in Emma.” Essays in Criticism 61.4 (2011), pp. 338–64. DOI: 10.1093/escrit/cgr018.

Tanner, Tony. Jane Austen. London: Macmillan Education (1986), pp. 176–207. DOI: 10.1007/978-1-349-18432-3_6.

[wangxianficrecs]

❤️Resolutions by incendir

❤️ Resolutions

by incendir

E, 204k, wangxian, 14 works

Summary Part 1:  Sizhui cannot fall asleep for a long, long time that night. He hears the ever-familiar melody again. He thinks perhaps he has memorized it by now.

My comments: *wow, this series is so epic and covers so much that it’s really hard to summarize and this is a pretty shitty bookmark that perforce has SPOILERS so I dunno, read with one eye shut, maybe?*

The primary story arc covers wangxian and the 13 year interval, so Parts 1, 3 (13 year interval, Sizhui POV, growing up) and then WWX's return with Parts 4, 5, 8 and 9 (the relationship between the two plus their perceived desirability from others, including a long arc about an attempted sexual assault of wwx with attendant trauma). Parts 12 and 13 are Jingyi finding love and happiness and blossoming into himself: the OC is awesome, I love him.

Part 1: Sizhui's childhood w/lwj playing 'are you there, are you happy, are you warm' inquiry; sizhui being a relationship busybody

Part 2: haven't read yet, WIP

Part 3 (with folks hitting on lwj over the years) is a ❤️ and Jingyi cracks me the fuck up (see excerpt)

Part 4: when all those folks that hit on lwj in the previous story get to meet wwx, which is a hoot. Also, in the second half, we're introduced to wwx's deeply embedded insecurities and feelings of worthlessness, when he thinks that lwj is tiring of him.

Part 5: humorous in the beginning, with the Juniors heading off flirtations to which wwx is utterly oblivious; much more serious in the second half, with an attempted sexual assault and trauma for wwx.

Part 6: haven't read yet, 2/3 wip

Part 7: lan qiren/wen ruohan history, haven't read yet

Part 8: Extra from Part 5: wwx from the POV of the sexual predators (heavy)

Part 9: The (unsuccessful) sexual assault in ch. 5 from wwx's POV (heavy)

Part 10: haven't read yet, wip, 4/5

Part 11: haven't read yet, wip, 5/6

Part 12: Jingyi and Captain Yi of the Nie, flirting and finding their feet (first kiss!)

Part 13: The courting/dating of Jingyi and Captain Yi (spicy!)

Part 14: Nie Huaisang through the years, with his brother, with Nie Zonghui and Captian Yi.

Excerpt Part 3:  “D’you think everyone who’s propositioned Hanguang-jun is everyone who wants him?” Jingyi asked. “For every one reputable person who’s done so, there’s at least a dozen who didn’t because they thought they weren’t accomplished enough. You have to have nerve and accolades. You have to have enough nerve that you think you have enough accolades.”

“Is all you do theorize about Hanguang-jun’s personal life?” Sizhui sighed.

*THIS IS MY FAVORITE DESCRIPTION OF MO XUANYU, BAR NONE:*

Mo Xuanyu was a mentally-addled, disreputable, donkey-toting, village fool, whose spiritual energy was just a faint dot no matter how hard Sizhui tried to sense for it—whose robes were threadbare and covered in dirt and dust and who-knows-honestly what on earth else, whose hair was caught with bits of straw and grass and more dirt, tied up inelegantly into a messy bun; whose face still had remnants of the terrible white paint and gaudy rouge he’d apparently tried to wash off.

Sizhui was nineteen and already extremely confused by the events that had just occurred, frozen at Jingyi’s side, when he witnessed the worst, most vulgar, crass, unrefined proposition, that he had never thought he would see in any reality, be made towards Hanguang-jun.

13 years, growing up, various POV, grief/mourning, Inquiry, adorable juniors, lan sizhui is the best boy, lan jingyi is the best boy, other people hitting on lan wangji, protective lan sizhui, protective lan jingyi, protective juniors, immortal lan ancestor, jealous wei wuxian, insecure wei wuxian, married wangxian, self worth issues, self esteem issues, light angst, humor, domestic, protective lan wangji, protective jiang cheng, attempted sexual assault, date rape drug/roofies, trauma, recovery, happy ending, favorite, @incendir​

(You may wish to REBLOG as a signal boost for this author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

[chouhatsumimi]

Words from Noragami, ch. 9

Words in bold are particularly relevant to the story, and words in italics seem like they’d be worth remembering outside the context of the manga.

真っ当, 全う, 真当 まっとう proper, respectable, decent, honest, entirely, completely, wholly, perfectly

縁者 えんじゃ relative / pariente, familiar

縛 ばく tying up, restraint, restriction, arrest

布 ぬの, ふ, にの, にぬ cloth, bujian (spade-shaped bronze coin of ancient China) / tela

陰 イン / かげ, かげ.る shade, yin, negative, sex organs, secret, shadow / sombra, oscuridad, oculto, negativo, ocultar

固 コ / かた.める, かた.まる, かた.まり, かた.い harden, set, clot, curdle / endurecer, fijar, terco, testarudo, originario de

^These kanji are combined (縛布 and 陰固) to make the names of techniques.

此処いら ここいら around here, in this vicinity, this area

探索 たんさく search, lookup, hunt, (item of) research, exploration, investigation

出しゃばる でしゃばる to intrude, to butt in, to meddle, to be forward, to be self-assertive, to show off, to be pushy

掌握 しょうあく grasping, seizing, holding, commanding, having control over

健勝 けんしょう good health

徒ならぬ, 啻ならぬ, 只ならぬ ただならぬ unusual, uncommon, extraordinary, out of the ordinary, incomparable, serious, alarming

只ならない ただならない unusual, serious, incomparable

蓄積 ちくせき accumulation, accumulate, store / acumulación

卑しい, 賤しい いやしい lowborn, humble, lowly, vulgar, coarse, crude, mean, base, vile, shabby, greedy, gluttonous, avaricious / vulgar, bajo, despreciable, vil, villano, innoble, de baja condición

悪ガキ, 悪餓鬼, 悪がき わるガキ, わるがき brat / niño malcriado, mocoso

諭す さとす to admonish, to persuade, to warn, to remonstrate / convencer, persuadir, disuadir

弾む, 勢む はずむ to spring, to bound, to bounce, to be stimulated, to be encouraged, to get lively, to pay handsomely, to splurge, to part eagerly with (money, etc.), to breathe hard, to pant, to be out of breath / rebotar, ser estimulado, estar animado, derrochar

浮かれる うかれる to make merry, to be festive / animarse, enfiestarse

晴れ着, 晴着 はれぎ (one's) Sunday best, (one's) best clothes, glad rags

晴れ着姿 はれぎすがた dressed up (in fine clothes)

見違う, 見ちがう みちがう to hardly recognise, to mistake for something or somebody else

曰く付き, いわく付き いわくつき with an interesting history (story), with a shady history, with circumstances that are difficult to explain

恥部 ちぶ private parts, privates, genitalia, secret place, disgraceful thing, shame, embarrassment, underbelly

少子化 しょうしか declining birth rates, decrease in the number of children

数多 あまた, すうた many, a lot, much, multitude

本能的 ほんのうてき instinctive, instinctual

怖気, 怖じけ, 怖じ気, 恐気 おぞけ, おじけ fear, dread, fright, willies

下賎, 下賤 げせん low birth, humble origin, lowly, base, vulgar, coarse

じゃれ合う, 戯れ合う じゃれあう to frolic about, to mess around

危害 きがい injury, harm, danger / lesión, daño, peligro

むっくり, むくり abruptly (rising), slowly (rising), plump, rotund

- Ch. 8 | Ch. 10 -

[takoyakitenchou]

masquerade ch.10

im back (fr this time)

“I always knew you were weird,” Akira muttered when they got onto the skydeck turned landing pad. He and Hisako had just graduated from their respective colleges and now they, Souma, and the Denmark Nakiris were gathered on top of the Copenhagen penthouse for some quality catching up. There was no doubt that the day would end in another round of shokugekis.

“Rude!” Alice pouted as she set down a large blanket and a few red Solo cups in the shade of Ryo’s new helicopter. “I just happened to buy my amazing husband a gift! Besides, he has a license now and having a charter plane is fun.”

“You talk as if your family doesn’t own three private jets,” Akira pointed out, pouring draft beer from a two-liter pitcher.

Alice waved this off with an annoyed flap of her hand. “Hayama, when are you and Hishoko gonna get married?”

“We’re twenty-two,” Hisako pointed out dully. “And don’t call me Hishoko.”

“I’m not, Hishoko. However, as the official matchmaker of the Nakiri Faction, I must insist that you get the hell on with it already.”

“Nakiri Faction?” Akira inquired.

“Yes! You’ve been an honorary member since you assisted my booth at the festival in first year.”

“You mean Jun’s—”

“And you and Hishoko are going to get married in like… two days, so she’s automatically a part of the faction as well now!”

Souma laughed as he took out a few boxes neatly packed with onigiri. “Yo, Arato, did you buy Hayama a helicopter yet?”

Hisako raised an eyebrow. “No,” she smiled with a teasing air. “But he bought us a company.”

The red-haired chef spat out his Lagunitas IPA. “What!?”

“Yeah, I bought Habui,” Akira said casually, as if he were talking about bargain eggs.

“Holy shit! Is that why you were on the front cover of Forbes!?”

“It’s been the only thing on the news for the last week, Yukihira,” he replied drily.

Alice added, “It was definitely a shock at first, though.”

True—it took her a full hour of staring at the magazine to properly process the fact that twirling his Phi Beta Kappa key around his finger and still wearing his graduation gown, the fresh Columbia graduate had dethroned the Sendawara sisters with a phrase that would become legend—“My nose can make better curry than your hands.” How he’d made that much bank as a college student was up to debate, but nobody questioned the fact that he was the new CEO of Habui. 

“Tokyo will be our home base,” Hisako said, staring speculatively into her cup. “I’m starting med school at Johns Hopkins in the fall but after Innlausn opens next month Akira will probably be moving back to Japan.”

Souma’s eyes widened. “Wait! I just had an idea. Why don’t you guys stay at my place in Evanston for the startup period?”

“You’re only saying that because you want us to be indebted to you so we don’t run your ass out of Illinois,” Akira scoffed.

“Cruel,” Souma retorted, feigning hurt. “I’m just being nice. Right, Arato?”

“I mean, I’ll take you up on it,” Hisako grinned, and she and Souma exchanged a fist bump. “We owe you one.”

“No, we do not! Don’t say things like that to him!”

Alice smirked at this. “Oh, yeah? You only got your Chicago floorspace because Yukihira’s journalist girlfriend pulled strings with the contractors.” She paused for a second, then whirled on Souma. “By the way, Yukihira. You’re getting pretty serious with Erina again, aren’t you? What a fuckboy. Two girls at once?”

A vein pulsed in Souma’s temple. “Oh, shut the fuck up. I’m single and Erina doesn’t like me like that anymore.”

“Baseless assumption!” Ryo bellowed.

They all laughed at this — the story of the spontaneous kiss after Origin’s opening night had circulated among the friend group and now they were placing bets as to when the former first and second seats of the Elite Ten would finally quit beating around the damn bush. Souma, who had been too embarrassed to call Erina since the debut, had chosen to aggressively not participate.

Within moments, they were all rolling up their sleeves and getting their hair out of the way to crack down on each other in a shokugeki themed “obscenely expensive”. They had just raided Alice and Ryo’s apartment-sized kitchen, making vulgar comments on how Akira had only bought Habui because he was still salty about Sendawara Natsume hitting on him during the Elections and talking general shit like they hadn’t already earned each other’s highest respect, when Hisako’s phone rang.

Everyone leaned over the doctor-restaurateur’s shoulder to see just who the hell would dare interrupt their shokugeki episode.

Incoming FaceTime call from: Nakiri Erina

Before Hisako could even answer the call, Souma dropped his knife and bolted for the door. His flight was cut short by Ryo, who grabbed his collar and yanked him backwards. “The fuck you going?”

“F-finland,” Souma squeaked, his arms and legs in frantic motion.

“Oh no you are not,” Akira snapped, shoving Souma back over to Hisako, who was greeting Erina over FT. “Take responsibility for your dumbassery.”

The blonde chef dropped her phone when Souma entered the frame. “Y-yukihira!?”

“Um… yo…? Nakiri? Sup?”

Erina was already blushing, but she managed to say, “Nothing much. You?”

Hisako passed the phone to Souma with an expression of amusement, who nervously combed his fingers through his hair and started moving around to find better lighting. “I’m uh… not doing anything either. Where you at?”

“I’m in Tokyo,” Erina said. “At dinner with—”

“Yukihira!” Asahi grinned, popping into view.

Erina looked a little disgruntled as the two proceeded to treat each other like the brothers-in-law they were probably going to be (hahah the foreshadowing). 

The rest of the Nakiri family greeted Souma and asked him if he knew where the hell Jou had disappeared to this time, and obviously Souma had no clue, but it really did seem like things would work out between the two families after all. Once it was just Erina watching him silently through the screen, Souma gave a slow smile and said, “Good seeing you again, Nakiri. I guess I’ll…”

Erina asked hesitantly, “Are you free later? Maybe around midnight my time?”

Shrugging, Souma answered, “Should be. Why?”

“N-no, it’s nothing. Never mind. Goodbye.”

“I’ll call you,” Souma offered. 

Erina’s ears turned red. “If you insist, I will pick up your call.”

“Sounds great.” Souma passed the phone back to Hisako and sat down grinning like a foolish idiot. 

Alice had been watching the whole interaction with mild amusement, and now she tapped the kitchen counter for attention, first dibs on the truffle oil long forgotten.

“So, Yukihira. You still think she doesn’t like you?”

[weishenbwi]

A Lesson Learned Ch. 9 "Mercury”

Group: BTS (AO3 version)

Pairing: TaeKook

Chapter: 9 Jungkook/Taehyung  (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)

Words: 722

CW: Dead Dove: Do Not Eat (click on ao3 link for all tags & triggers)

Summary:  A short chapter to get me back into this fic. The next chapter is already written - just needs to be trimmed and sorted. I’ll post it this week. Read tags and read at your own risk. Messages that disregard this will be ignored. Inspired by Texas Chainsaw Massacre. 

Jungkook has stared at the softness of Taehyung’s sleeping form since his eyelashes fluttered and his breathing became deeper, drifting off to rest away from his nightmares; the rise and fall of his chest in Jungkook’s shirt that’s too big and too unfamiliar. He watched and waited as the minutes turned into hours, for what he couldn’t be sure, as the thin sliver of moonlight crept through their room like an uninvited guest. It lay resting over the boy’s small curves blanketing him in an intrusive pale glow. It could have been a beautiful moment, should have been if the moments leading up to it were intrinsically pure and taken with permission.

But it had been volatile and vulgar. The contrast between himself and the boy, the carefulness he deserved versus what Jungkook made him experience twists something ugly in his gut. Now this intrusion... a sobering reminder that the world will always try to break in and steal what belongs to him even if he doesn't deserve it. He shakes his head and pulls Taehyung in closer.

It doesn't matter. He's entitled to it.

A shaky breath escapes followed by gentle kisses to every spot the light of the moon dares violate until it’s filled completely with his own darkness. It is only when his eyes are too heavy to guard against the unseen does he allow himself any rest; content in the promise that the tiny white pill he had given his puppy, despite tiny protests and weak fists, will keep the other resting peacefully well into the next day.

Taehyung doesn’t wake when Jungkook has to use the restroom nor does he wake with the sound of running water, the scent of mulled cider soap wafting into the room as if to fill it with the first day of Autumn. He doesn’t wake when Jungkook gets a glass bottle from a tall shelf and pours and pours, eyes refusing to leave Taehyung as his thoughts lacerate the distance between them.

He doesn’t wake when Daddy sends a message and Jungkook has no choice but to leave the room, locking the door as he exits. And he doesn’t wake when Jungkook returns with Daddy an hour later going over a checklist they’ve both executed many times before -lifting the shirt that hangs over him like a nightgown, his underwear pulled down to show the bruises from not listening or because there were paying customers or because Jungkook could. He doesn’t wake as Daddy’s cool hands caress his body nor when their lips meet like soft petals falling, his lips parting ever slightly as Daddy tastes what belongs to him as much as it belongs to Jungkook as much as it belongs to Seokjin. As much as it no longer belongs to Taehyung. And he doesn’t wake when Jungkook bows his head low, Daddy taking it into his hands to kiss as sweetly as he did Taehyung before leaving and locking the door behind him.

He stirs only gently as Jungkook nuzzles his cold body into the warmth that is provided through deep sleep and fluffy covers. "Thank you for being such a good boy, puppy. For being my good boy.”

If Taehyung were awake, he would have seen how well behaved Jungkook was, how he didn't make fists or claw into the palms of his hands at Daddy’s inspection of his pet's body. He would have seen that Jungkook’s face remained blank, his stance detached, as if whatever Daddy could do to Taehyung is not only permissible but proper. If he were awake, he would wonder how the moon’s light is an intrusion that he must be protected from but Daddy’s tender molestations are not.

But Taehyung is asleep and it is this small mercy that allows his consciousness a naive obscurity to the observations, checklists, and trespasses that Jungkook will not mention when the little pill has run its course. He nestles into the comfort of the boy’s tenderness, entwining their fingers in a cold, bruising hold not unlike a metal chain.

Taehyung doesn’t hear the words whispered into his ear or feel the length pressing into the thin cloth that acts as the only barrier between them. He doesn't wake when Jungkook begins to thrust lightly, the lullaby of gentle motions soothing like the rocking of a cradle.

[crash-cinematic-universe]

a sickly satisfaction (ch.2)

pairing: jason dean/reader

summary: kurt and ram are vulgar as usual. thankfully, jason saves the day (and your ass)

warnings: uuhhhh murder, language, suicide discussion, homophobia sort of a little bit, fighting, mention of a concussion.

notes: heeheehee welcome to the wednesday chapter update. i hope you enjoy

taglist: @stuckysdaughter

            If Westerburg High is hell, the Cafe is the deepest, darkest, fiery-est pit there is. It’s a warzone filled with asshole jocks and preppy cheerleaders whose main goal is to ruin the lives of everyone else. Everyone divides into their respective clique in an attempt to find solace in the midst of their humiliation. The only ones who explore different groups being the ones looking to incite terror. If you’re like me-- completely alone-- you’re the most vulnerable. That’s probably why Kurt and Ram walked directly to me the minute our lunch period began, their eyes clouded with anticipation and eagerness. Other than that, their eyes didn’t hold very much. They were idiots. 

            “Ah, Y/n, just the chick we wanted to see--” Kurt slurs. He couldn’t possibly be hammered already, it’s only noon. 

            “What do you want? D’ya want me to hit you again? ‘Cuz I had a ton of fun the last time,” I spit, my voice low and irritated. Ram looks shocked.

            “Maybe I’ll be the one to hit you instead,” he growls. “Every bitch can be soothed by a good hard slap,” I stand up, my movements jerky and ungraceful. 

            “Sorry, Ram, you and your boyfriend might be into the whole slapping thing, but I’m more of a rope girl myself,” I sneer. The brainless meat-suits in front of me look horrified at the mere insinuation that they might be anything but red-blooded, flag loving, America-worshipping heterosexuals.

            “Listen up, bitch, you can’t talk to us like that--” At this point, I was pissed. My hands were balled up into fists.

            “Why not? Are you too stupid to understand? Sorry, I’ll try to dumb it down next time,” 

            “No wonder no one wants to fuck you, you’re a giant bitch!” Kurt howls. Ram nods.

            “Yeah! There’s no way either of us are going to want a handjob from you now!” I gag at the thought. These two were truly disgusting.

            “If you really thought I’d get within 400 meters of your microdick, then you’re a lot dumber than I thought!” This seems to strike a chord with Kurt, because before I knew it I was flying backwards. My head hit the tile floor with a sickly ‘smack!’. My head throbs, the lights suddenly too bright and the Cafe suddenly too loud. I see movement from the corner of my eye, and I brace myself for another hit. 

            When I open my eyes, I don’t see the face of God. Instead, I see Kurt and Ram lying on the floor, weakly gripping their dicks in a fetal position. Standing between them is none other than my knight in shining armor, Jason Dean. Kurt is back on his feet within seconds, his fist languidly flying past JD’s face. JD slammed his fist into his jaw, Kurt’s limp body hitting the group in an instead. Ram scrambles away, his ratty sneakers squeaking against the tile floor. Jason turns to me, his expression dropping from amusement to concern.

            “Hey, you alright?” 

            “Eh,” I shrug. “I’ve been better. What about you?” I gesture to the red splotches on his knuckles.

            “I’ll survive.” He grins.

            “Y’know, it’s good to see ya, Salinger--” I stumble over my words a bit. I’m still dizzy from my unfortunate fall. 

            “Salinger?”

            “Yeah, ya know. Jason Dean... J.D... J.D Salinger,” The floor seems to sway beneath me, and I instinctively grip onto JD for support. A part of me thanks my slightly concussed brain for allowing me to collapse onto someone so hot.

            “Hey, darlin’, you don’t look too good. I think I’m gonna take you down to the nurse, alright?” He holds my arm tightly as we walk out of the Cafe, the attention drawn in by the fight from before was quickly snatched by Heather Chandler rushing across the room to attack a freshman. 

            When we get out of the Cafe, everything is much quieter. There are no arguments ensuing or insults being thrown; the only thing breaking the silence was Jason’s soft breathing, and the sound of our footsteps.

            “You were right about the whole ‘knockout button’ thing,” Jason spoke softly. I couldn’t tell if it was because of my injury or because he was afraid of ruining the moment. “I didn’t think Kurt would go down so fast. Made me feel sorta powerful.”

            “You are powerful, dude,” I winced at the fleeting pain that talking shot through my skull. “You could get this entire school to eat out of your palm if you wanted to,” 

            “Oh yeah?” Humor is laced in his words. He moves so his arm is around my shoulders and I think about how great of a story this’ll be once I meet up with Tommy.

            “Yeah, you’ve got it all,” I say without thinking. “You’re smart and tough and super hot, you know how to throw a punch and start a f--” 

            “You think I’m hot?” Apparently, my bitch brain decided not to register the embarrassment I should feel in that moment.

            “Oh, totally. You blow every other guy here out of the water, they don’t hold a candle to you, Jason,” Jason smiles a proud smile, his face suddenly going soft pink. 

            “You’re pretty hot, too,” he adds.

            “Eh,” I shrug. “I’m a solid 6/10, 7/10 on a good day, but you? You’re off the charts, baby,”

            “Darlin’, once you’re coherent I am going to do everything in my power to show you how attractive you really are,” Apparently, that was enough to sober me up for a moment. Regardless of the fact that my head was really the only thing injured, I was pretty sure I was going to die on the spot.

            “I’d like that, I think,” I grin. We get to the nurses office much too quick for my liking, and Jason is ushered back to class. If it weren’t for the throbbing in my head, I think I’d be swooning.

[whatdoesshedotothem]

Friday 28 November 1834

8 35

12 ¼

No kiss very fine morning F48° at 9 ¼ am breakfast at 9 35 - Had Charles H- at 10 to say he found Spaldin best to deal with – A- and I out at 10 ½ for an hour – went to 2 or [3] booksellers’ shops for Rennies’ pamphlet on railroads – learnt that he had been surveying for a railroad from Burlington to York (I think) and that his pamphlet was probably on that subject  - Wood’s work 1vol. 8vo on railroads gone thro’ 7 or 8 editions not to be had in Hull - went to Wilson’s paid for inkstand an improvement on the Indian rubber stopper - the top of the box part fixing on with a spring instead of screwing - went into the Joint stock bank corner of Silver street to ask them to give smaller bank of England notes for the note for £500 n°3884 dated Leeds 21 June 1833 signed J. Booth that A- got some while ago from Briggs’s bank – the people civil enough but against rule to exchange so large a note for a stranger unless taking some respectable known person as guarantee - as the note might have been lost before coming into my hands – I thanked the people for the information and walked off – mentioning the circumstance to Loft House, the druggist, in the market place on paying him got his Palmer’s wax candles – Wilson could get me Chalmers’s biology 32 volumes  8vo. bound for fourteen guineas – would let me have for 55/. + 20/. a copy (got for a subscriber and thrown upon his hands) of Walker’s (published by Nicoles of Wakefield) map of the canals and railways of England and Wales, published a few years ago at 3 ½ guineas with a 4th at 2 guineas and an 8vo at 1 guinea volume of text by Priestley agent to the Aire and Calder navigation - but the map was mounted for hanging up and the back, at least, looked a little soiled - back at the X Keys at 11 ½ and had the agent the Messrs. B..... and Spaldin and paid him for 120 (six scores to the hundred of deals) 21ft. rid Petersburg deal at 5 1/2d. per ft. 50 America Pine (12ft.) picked at 4/3. per deal and 10 Riga oaks logs at 4/9 per ft. - the red archangel deals are ¼d. per ft. dearer than the Petersburg - the man said Charles H- had explained what I wanted the deals for - for railing or thin rafters, and the Petersburg would do better for these purposes than the Archangel which latter is of stronger coarser grain, but works better than the Petersburg that CH- chose the Petersburg against himself - Thomas Greenwood buys the Wiburg deals (and it is Wiburg I have had from him) which are 1/4d. per ft. cheaper than the Petersburg - there is a rise of 1/4d. per ft. since Greenwood was last at Hull - CH- says we have paid 6/. instead of 4/3 per deal (12ft.) of America Pine at H-x and that I have paid for Riga oak &/. instead of 4/9 - I gave the agent the £500 b. of E. note described at the bottom the last p. and in ½ hour he sent me the change (£400 in b.o.E. notes) as I had paid the odd money [over] than £100 out of what I had in my purse - the very best Archangel timber to be had of Spaldin at 2/1 per ft. cubic - A-and I out again at 1 35 - to call on the 2 Miss Bedingfelds Humber bank - the proprietors of the row of houses there are gaining 30 or 40 yards breadth of ground from the river - driving larch piles and filling up, which ground costs them 3/. or 4/. per yard for every yard measured on the surface - a great improvement, and not dear - 20 minutes in going - found the 2 ladies at home and their niece Mrs. Steel (çidevant Isabella Waterton) with them - looking well and vulgar - all very civil to us both - sat 40 minutes - detained in returning about 10 minutes by the bridge being thrown open for a vessel to clear out of the rock - back at the Inn  at 3 – A- had a mutton chop and I ½ of one and off from Hull (Charles H- with George in the rumble and Eugenie inside crowding us) at 3 57 - Hull is a town abominable for is radicalism – a meeting last night in favour of Hutt and Hill the present radical members, their constitutions declaring they were ashamed of the name of Whigs and should in future call themselves radical reformers - Wilson (our bookseller) a conservative, a tory, a sensible man, but says he is left in the lurch by all his high tory friends - the tory interest divided - Mr. Conuthers (the tory candidate from London who was to speak at 2pm today) has not much chance of success - off too late (at 3 57) to see much– a 16 miles stage to North Cave where we arrived at 5 53 in dark and were told we should be four hours in reaching Selby 21 miles for no horses kept at Howden – to change

SH:7/ML/E/17/0115

at Booth Ferry would not expedite us – it being a mile round about and we should have to wait for horses from the other side of the water – just 2 hours in reaching Lofthouse bridge – and at Selby (George Inn) at 9 ½ i.e. by York for my watch (as entered in travelling account 9 ¾) is ¼ hour too soon – very bad tea - ate and enjoyed our score of nice smelts brought from Hull - too early for them here by 2 months - sat talking till 11 ½ - we had had in the master of the house (Hawdon) - the Selby people not for the railroad being continued to Hull - everything would then pass thro’ Selby without stopping - the Selby line estimated at £160000 - has cost above £300,000 - they have borrowed of government £90,000? Walker of London the engineer - had Mackintosh contracted for the job (he did the last Hull dock and has just taken the new dock to do at Goole) it would have been done long ago; but he was a few thousands too high § and they have expended far more than that - the Line from Selby to Hull estimated at £300,000 but it will cost at least twice that sum - (§Mackintosh’s estimate of the Selby line £7,000 above Walker’s estate which Hawdon said was £160,000 or £150,000) - fine day – a smartish shower at Loft house bridge at 8 5 but tolerably fair again in about 1/2  - F51° at 12 ¼ tonight in my dressing room (no fire) -