#when my old manager ran the store literally no one got 40 hours. not even her

[delllamortes]

work keeps cutting hours i cannot afford this shit

[quokkacore]

with great power I [lee jeno]

summary: there are two things jeno loves most about his life. one being spiderman, the other being you, his best friend. there’s just one issue: after your father’s death, you decide you hate both spiderman and yourself.

pairing: lee jeno x reader

genre: superhero au, high school au, coming of age, best friends to strangers(ish) to lovers, fluff, ANGST, minor crack

warnings (for this chapter): language, violence, gun violence, the mafia, parental death, police presence, sexual references, bullying (ily san im sorry), the dreamies being dicks to each other, police corruption, towards the end jeno experiences something similar to sensory overload, americanized names, pop culture references, VERY jeno centric

song rec: we go up - nct dream // any song - zico // 21 questions - waterparks // talk (remix feat. megan thee stallion & yo gotti) - khalid // sunrise - ateez // i really like you - carly rae jepsen // dare - gorillaz // stray kids - the tortoise and the hare

word count: 10.5k

a/n: this is so late...... i blame attack on titan. but hey!! better late than never :] a huge thanks to @doderyscoffee​ for beta reading <3

main masterlist // story masterlist

chapter one: jeno and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week

Jeno despised Tuesdays. He was pretty sure that Tuesdays despised Jeno as well because all of his worst days just so happen to be Tuesdays. He was 96% sure that, if there was a god, his day off was on Tuesdays, or that the planets aligned in such a manner on Tuesdays that it caused universal despair and misery. If he was to take Donghyuck's word for it, his chakra attracted negative energy the most on Tuesdays.

When Jeno was 5, his goldfish Pippin had died on a Tuesday. When he had his ass handed to him on the playground by San Choi in the third grade, it was a Tuesday. And in the seventh grade, he'd failed his Spanish test, missed his bus and walked home in the rain only to find out that his Aunt Sunny was at work, he'd left his keys in his locker and that had to wait an hour before she got home to unlock it for him, all on a Tuesday. 

And wouldn't you know it, here he was, late for the first day of senior year, which was, of all days, a godforsaken Tuesday.

In his eternal wisdom, he'd stayed up gaming with Renjun until two in the morning, and because of it, slept through his three alarms, one set at six-thirty, the other at 6:45, the last one at 7:00. 

He'd woken up at 7:17, to the sound of his elderly neighbor's pet chihuahua barking at a pigeon, checked the time, immediately panicked, sped into the shower, gotten dressed in a haste, grabbed a few granola bars from the pantry, and ran out the door while trying to jam his backpack closed, and managed to catch the train at 7:40, which took about twenty minutes to get to his stop, plus a ten-minute walk to school, and class started at 8:10. Not to mention he’d have to stop by the office and pick up his schedule. At best, he’d be five minutes late to his first class. But tardies were tardies, regardless, and the last thing he needed was to lose his perfect attendance streak. 

He fished out his phone while standing on the train, waiting for his stop, scrolling through Instagram, and liking random pictures. A ping! from his phone caught his attention, then two, then a third. He smiled softly when your name popped up on his screen.

[7:48 AM]

y/n: pssst

y/n: shithead

y/n: where r u ????

[7:49 AM] 

y/n: i can sEE u online on ig u know

jeno: …… i'm on the train

jeno: woke up late

y/n: YOURE GONNA BE LATR

y/n: LATE*

y/n: ON THE FIRST DAY OF SENIOR YEAR

[7:50]

jeno: probably, yeah

jeno: it's the school district's fault, why would they make the first day of school on a fkn TUESDAY 

y/n: ohhh yeahh its terrible tuesday

y/n: [sent an attachment!]

[7:51 AM]

jeno: SHUT UP

jeno: you're not funny >:(

jeno: how dare you laugh at my misfortune

y/n: au contraire im hilarious

jeno: meanie :(

jeno: im gonna be late i hate it here

jeno: it'll end up on my permanent record and i'm not gonna get into college and then i'm gonna die,,,

[7:52 AM] 

y/n: sometimes ur worse than hyuck i swear 

y/n: FIRST OF ALL permanent records dont even exist !!!!!! its propaganda duh

y/n: also ur literally never late 

y/n: im sure o n e tardy wont do anything chill

y/n: dont be stupid youll be fine

Don’t be stupid. Too little, too late, he thought, already having got off the train at a previous stop. Now, he was looking for an unoccupied street or alleyway, which, for once, was easy, taking a deep breath before he did the exact opposite of what you’d told him not to do. Don’t be stupid. 

The buildings are low, he thought to himself, it’ll be easier to see me. 

Don’t be stupid.

Too late!

Thwip!

Jeno didn’t hesitate to use the web fluid to pull himself up onto the wall, climbing in a haste, before running and jumping onto the next building. He quickly built up a quick pace, using the web fluid occasionally to swing onto a building slightly out of jumping range. 

Signs in English, Chinese, Korean, and Spanish flew past him as he seemingly flew over the Queens traffic, leaving Flushing behind and crossing quickly into College Point quicker than he would if he took the train. He glanced to his left and caught a view of the bay, and far across it, the LaGuardia airport watchtower.

Jeno had lived in New York City his entire life. He knew Queens like the back of his hand, knew every dingy alleyway, every sketchy street, which restaurants to avoid if you didn’t want to get food poisoning, which convenience store aunties were the nicest and didn’t pinch his cheeks too hard. It was his home, and most likely would be for the rest of his life. 

But seeing it like this, flying past him below as he glided with ease from building to building would never cease to be a sight to him. It was like watching from the perspective of an outsider, seeing people in their cars, walking along the street gave him a brand new perspective. A Jeno’s eye view, he called it, since he was pretty sure he was the only one in New York City.

Another noise from his phone brought him back to reality. He shook his head, stopping briefly to catch his breath and fish out his phone briefly. 

[7:57 AM] 

y/n: let me know when u get here !!!

No time to respond, he put away the phone and continued his trek to school. He had less than ten minutes to get there. But he knew he was already at least five minutes away, much quicker than he would be if he had decided to stick to the train. He smiled a bit to himself, feeling ever so slightly smug.

The hustle and bustle of the city definitely proved challenging to find a place to land without many eyes, but he figured it out eventually, landing behind a dumpster in an alleyway behind a restaurant that he knew was about three or four blocks from the school. He figured it would be a lot better to take it on foot from here. The notebooks he was carrying in his backpack bounced up and down with every step he took. 

After what seemed like forever, the gates to the school appeared in his view, and Jeno felt a joy in his heaving chest, something he would have never thought would happen upon seeing the absolute hellhole that was Samuel Morse High School. 

[8:06 AM]

jeno: just did >:D

Picking up his schedule was both quick and insanely long. He couldn’t stop himself from tapping his left foot while the secretary found his schedule and handed it to him. “Kibum, please hurry,” He muttered, and Kibum raised an eyebrow at him, but his gaze was teasing. “That’s Mr. Kim to you, in school at least.” 

He handed Jeno his schedule a few seconds later. “Tell your Aunt to come pick up her casserole dish, by the way. She left it at my house after my last viewing party.”

“The Bachelor?”

“Please. We’re too classy for that. Drag Race.”

“Ah. I see.”

“Jeno,” Kibum said, staring up at him from his desk, his gaze now much more serious, “Get to class. Happy first day of senior year.”

“Thanks, Mr. Kim.”

He managed to make it to chemistry class at 8:09 with seconds to spare. His eyes quickly scanned the room upon entering, hoping his friends were in the class with him. He caught a few familiar faces, most of which, like San Choi's, he wished to avoid. No one paid him any mind. Everyone was still speaking to the people next to them, no doubt exchanging stories of summer vacation. 

  A hand shot up towards the back, waving at him. A smile stretched across his face as he registered your face, feet not hesitating to carry him towards the empty seat next to you. His heart skipped a beat at seeing your smile, and he tried his best to ignore it.

“Hey,” You greeted, “That was fast. I thought you said you were gonna be late.”

Jeno shrugged, eyes landing on the dark shade of the lab table. “The train was a lot faster than I expected, apparently.”

You wrinkled your nose. “Why do you smell so bad?”

“I, uh… ran a little.” 

You grimaced, and Jeno tried to casually sniff at his slightly sweaty clothes. It’s not that bad. “I still don’t understand why you won’t let me drive you to school. You’re literally next door.”

“I don’t know,” He answered, rolling his eyes, “Maybe it’s because when it comes to that truck, you are absolutely insane. You won’t even let me drink water in that thing.”

The truck in question, a faded red 1998 Chevrolet S-10, had been your gift to yourself for your 17th birthday. You’d spent two summers saving up to buy yourself a truck, and that was what you were able to get for what you had. To say it was a huge piece of junk on wheels was an understatement. 

The thing smelled like mothballs no matter how many air fresheners you bought it, the engine sounded like an old man having a coughing fit, and there was a very suspicious stain in the backseat that wouldn’t go away no matter how many times you scrubbed it. But for some reason, you treated it like it was your own baby. The amount of times you’d yelled at Jaemin for trying to put his feet on the dashboard was too high to count.

You mirrored his movement, eyes rolling as you sighed. “At least let me drive you home after school today. Maybe you can stay and we can finally watch Blade Runner.”

You’d been trying to get him to watch the film for almost a month now, begging and pleading because you insisted that he’d love it. He offered an awkward stare, before opening his backpack and pulling out a notebook. “Can’t,” He mumbled, “I’m headed into Manhattan. I have my internship afterwards.”

“Oh, yeah,” You said nonchalantly, eyebrows shooting up as you remembered, “Park Industries.” 

He was about to reply when Mrs. Baker, the chemistry teacher, finally entered. She’d been working at SMHS for 30 years and had never, apparently, been nice, if his Aunt Sunny’s stories were anything to go by. However, she had apparently always spoken as if she smoked two packs a day. She was rambling about the importance of making the most of senior year academically, adult responsibilities, college, and whatnot. You and Jeno exchanged glances often throughout the monologue, hoping it would end soon. 

“Enough of that,” She said after what seemed like an eternity, “Everyone quiet down, I’m going to call roll.”

Names were quickly called, and Jeno was ready to pull out a pencil and start working with you until Mrs Baker demanded a switch in seats, beginning to call on random names in an effort to deter everyone from speaking. 

"Please not with Choi, please not with Choi," Jeno muttered under his breath, glancing warily at San, who was staring ahead, looking bored. 

San had had it out for Jeno ever since day one, in first grade. For some reason, everything Jeno did seemed to annoy the other boy. He wasn't funny enough, or too nerdy, or too quiet. Jeno was always too much or too little for him. 

You touched his forearm, and he looked towards you. 

“You’ll be fine,” You said softly, trying not to alert the teacher, “You’re not gonna get paired up with him, and you can take it to the office if you need to.” “Yeah, because I’m sure Coach Peralta would be thrilled if someone tried to get his precious midfielder in trouble.”

“Choi, San,” Mrs Baker’s voice rang throughout the room, and Jeno braced himself for the worst, eyebrows furrowing with worry. 

“You’ll be sitting with… L/N, Y/N.” 

Jeno’s shoulders slumped, but your face remained impassive. You picked up your stuff, and pouted silently at Jeno in apology, before making your way to the front. 

“Lee, Jeno,” Mrs Baker called a few minutes later, “You’ll be sitting with Jang, Yeeun.”

He breathed out a sigh of relief. Yeeun is nice, Jeno thought to himself, I could sit with Yeeun. She wasn’t part of his main friend group, but he had tutored her in math during sophomore year in exchange for her helping him with Spanish, and they’d been pretty friendly ever since. 

“Hey,” Yeeun greeted as Jeno sat down, and Jeno smiled at her. 

“Remember, these will be your assigned lab partners for the rest of the semester. No changes, no exceptions.” Mrs. Baker sat down at her desk, before beginning to talk about something Jeno didn’t really pay attention to.

You exchanged glances with Jeno, and he gave you a look of sympathy as you gestured at San with your eyes. San was talking to you about something—probably bragging about some soccer achievement—but you weren’t paying him much attention. Jeno swallowed something growing in his throat as he looked at how your hair looked today. 

It was nothing relatively new, the same hairstyle you used on most days. But still, there was a bit of a shine to it. He wondered vaguely if you had changed your shampoo, the other day you’d been complaining about how itchy your normal shampoo made your scalp—

“You still haven’t told her about how you feel?” Yeeun asked quietly, and Jeno’s head snapped back to look at her, eyes wide.

“W-what? Me. Like Y/N…” He laughed nervously, trying to keep his voice down. He scratched the back of his head, avoiding Yeeun’s accusatory stare. “You’re hilarious, Yeeun. Tell another one.”

Yeeun shook her head. “You’d better hurry before someone else snatches her up, Jen. She’s not gonna wait around for you forever.”

 “I don’t like her, Yeeun.” 

“Keep telling yourself that.”

“Hey! Jeno Lee!”

“Hey! Jaemin Na! What do you want!” Jeno answered as he sat down, mimicking Jaemin’s tone next to him.

“Well, for starters, a million dollars, and second, a date with Yiren Wang, but I doubt you can help me with either of those, so...”

Jeno glanced at the rest of the table. Along with Jaemin, Mark,  Renjun, Donghyuck, and you were watching the interaction between the pair. “Where are the munchkins?” Jeno asked, noticing Chenle and Jisung’s absence. No one could really call them munchkins anymore. That nickname dated back to middle school, before the two underclassmen had gone through growth spurts.

“Eh, they should be here soon,” Renjun said, chewing on a french fry, “How’s your day been?”

“Pretty good so far, I guess. I got AP Calc with Mr. Washington later, though. That man wants me dead.”

You rolled your eyes. “He doesn’t want you dead. I’m telling you, you and Hyuck have been spending way too much time together. You’re being more dramatic than usual and Hyuck’s being more… weird than usual.”

“And just what is so weird about being enthusiastic about senior year, Y/N?” Donghyuck asked, shaking his head, “It’s our last year in this hellhole, I’m excited that we’re finally getting out of here. And besides—”

“Please don’t bring up the fact that you’re abandoning us next year.” Chenle seemingly appeared out of nowhere, sitting next to Renjun, Jisung following quickly behind him.

“Hi, Sungie,” You said with a smile, and Jisung smiled back. “Hi, Y/N.”

“What were you saying, Hyuck?” Jaemin looked at Donghyuck, who had taken the quick interaction as an opportunity to take a bite of his sandwich. His wide eyes darted to the slim boy, cheeks stuffed with chicken. 

“Oh,” He replied after swallowing, “This is gonna be my year. I’m getting male lead for the winter musical and no one is gonna stop me.”

“Do you even know what musical you guys are doing yet?” Mark asked, “What if it’s like… Shrek?”

Jisung made a face. “There’s a Shrek musical?”

Mark nodded, and Renjun laughed.

“I don’t know about male lead, if it’s Shrek. You should try out for Donkey,” The Chinese boy joked, “With those front teeth, you’re a shoo-in.”

The entire table was silent for a moment, before snorts and chortles started pouring out from everyone except Donghyuck.

“Fuck you, Huang.” 

Renjun flashed the friendliest smile he could muster. “Not if you paid me a million dollars.”

The subject remained on extracurriculars, everyone in your group except for Chenle and Jisung now wary of college applications. Donghyuck had been in theater ever since middle school, Renjun was in the robotics club and the debate team with Jaemin, who was also in the student council. Mark was on the math team with Jeno, and you had founded the film club. 

"You're not gonna believe who asked to sign up for film," You huffed, looking kind of confused. The rest of the table looked at you expectantly, and you pursed your lips, almost as if you were trying not to laugh.

"San Choi."

Renjun scoffed. Jaemin raised his eyebrows before letting out a single, humorless laugh. Jeno made a face, poking his plastic fork at you. 

"What is San Choi doing asking to sign up for film?"

"Fuck if I know. He said he needed one more extracurricular if he wanted to get into some college in Florida and he liked going to the movies, so he wanted to try out film."

Mark rolled his eyes. "I swear there's nothing in that guy's head but hot gas. It blows my mind."

"He's a dick," Chenle grumbled, "I'm still not over how he and Wooyoung taped Jisung to the flagpole last year."

Jisung scowled. "I thought we agreed to never bring that up again."

“Do you think they’ll finally calm the fuck down this year?” Jaemin wondered, looking wistful.

You took a sip of your coke and shook your head. “Doubt it. They’re not the hateful eight for a reason.”

The mood at the table turned tense, until Jaemin frowned at his french fries, before sighing and clapping his hands together dramatically. “I would like to hear,” He mused, “About the nuance that theatre gives the cinematic masterpiece that is Shrek when converted into musical form.”

Donghyuck beamed. “Oh, it’s amazing. You see…”

If it was difficult to get Donghyuck to stop talking in general, it was impossible when it was about theater.

The conversation continued on until the bell rang, and the eight of you had to go your separate ways. Jaemin and Jeno had the same class, so they both walked together down a relatively calm hallway. Jaemin looked both ways, before finally lowering his voice. 

“So, you’re going to see Mr. Park today?”

Jeno nodded, looking down at his shoes. “He said he wanted to give me an assignment. Says there’s something big going on.”

Jaemin’s eyes lit up with curiosity. “Did he say what kind of something?” 

Jeno shook his head, pouting slightly. “I’ll let you know tomorrow.” 

Once school was out, Jeno was getting ready to get onto the subway once again, this time heading towards Midtown. It was only day one and, as Jeno had predicted, Mr. Washington probably was out to get him, because he’d swamped the class with homework.

As he left the school, he spotted you in the parking lot, leaning against your car door, texting someone. He glanced at his phone. He still had plenty of time, he figured. He walked over to you, and when you looked up, you smiled. 

“Hey!” Your voice had that signature tone of enthusiasm to it, and Jeno smiled back immediately. 

“Hello,” He sing-songed. “So, I was thinking… are you free on Friday night?”

You looked somewhere above his head, furrowing your eyebrows before you perked up again and nodded. “Yep! Why?”

“I’m free after nine. Maybe then I could come over to your house? So I can finally get you to stop harassing me about Blade Runner.”

You grinned, pumping your fists enthusiastically. “Hell yes,” You answered, “Do you want me to get like, some frozen pizzas or something?” 

“Pizza sounds good,” He said. “Who are you even waiting for?” 

You made a face that made it seem as if you’d just gotten a whiff of rotten milk. “Well—”

Your response was interrupted when the school doors slammed open, and eight figures poured out, carrying themselves with confidence Jeno both envied and despised. He frowned, trying not to react at their loud whooping and laughing. The Hateful Eight.

“Oh.” Jeno averted his gaze, meeting your eyes again.

“Yeah. If you don’t hear from me later it’s because I jumped out of my truck because I don’t wanna work with—”

“Well, hello, gorgeous!” San’s voice filled the parking lot, and Jeno took a deep breath. Your mouth stretched into a tight-lipped smile at the unwanted ‘compliment’. 

“Hey, San.” Your friendly passive aggressive tone almost made Jeno smile. “I’ve been waiting here for like, fifteen minutes. You could have just given me your number and asked me to send you pictures of my notes, you know.”

He shrugged, turning his body so that his back was turned to Jeno. “Sorry, babe. Coach wanted to talk to us about the upcoming season. When he gets going, it’s hard to get him to stop. And besides, where’s the fun in just asking for pictures when I could come here, talk to you, and take the pictures myself?”

You didn’t respond, but rather pulled out your backpack and began digging through it. When you pulled out your notebook, you handed it to San, who flashed a wink at you. You barely held back a gag. 

“Thanks, Y/N. I’ll just be a minute.” 

He walked over to the hood of your truck, and just as you were about to continue your conversation, two figures slung their arms around both of Jeno’s shoulders, causing him to flinch. 

Out of the fifteen soccer players on the team, San and his best friends—seven of them, to be precise—were the worst. The others were pretty nice. But right now, seeing two of those seven surround your best friend made you uneasy. 

Wooyoung was loud. He was also a temperamental brat. His dad owned three used car dealerships over in Brooklyn, so naturally, he thought he owned the entire world. He wasn’t someone who would get too physical in fights, like San, or Jongho, or Yeosang. But when he was angry, he could easily get you to jump into the stratosphere by yelling at you once. Over the years, he’d made several teaching assistants and substitute teachers cry, only getting let off with a slap on the wrist every time. 

 Yunho was terrifying for completely different reasons. He was friendly, but a little too friendly to the people he wanted to control. He could read people like books and could easily manipulate whoever he wanted. But he wasn’t afraid of getting physical either, especially not when he was built like a goddamn Power Rangers Megazord. 

All in all, they definitely weren't anyone you wanted near you, near your friends. Especially considering how much they had it out for your friends. 

"Hey, buddy," Yunho said, looking down at Jeno with a wide smile. "How was summer vacation?"

Jeno gnawed on the side of his cheek as he considered his answer. "Um, it was okay." He looked at you to catch your eyes darting between San, Yunho and Wooyoung, like you were analyzing the situation. "I kinda stayed in and played video games most of the t—"

"Cool, cool," Yunho answered, carding his free hand through his bleach blond hair. "What about you, Woo?"

"Oh, dude, it was so cool," He bragged, "I went to Brazil for like, a month. I went clubbing with Instagram models and shit, it was wild."

You stared at him as he patted Jeno on the back rather aggressively. "Where did you go? Have you ever even left New York?" 

You knew the answer. Only a few times when the debate team went to compete in different states. Jeno spoke up again. "Well, yeah a few t—"

"Doubt it," Yunho scoffed. He craned his head back. "San, you done yet?"

"Almost!" San answered. Yunho turned to face you, and for some reason his smile seemed genuinely kind. “What about you, Y/N?”

You never understood why it was that the soccer team hated your entire friend group, but seemed to tolerate you. It made no sense.

So you shrugged. “Not a lot, I guess. Did my summer reading. Hung out with my friends.” You flashed a reassuring smile at Jeno. “Right, Jen?”

Immediately, he relaxed a little bit. “Yeah.”

San appeared from behind Yunho, Jeno and Wooyoung. “Thanks, Y/N. I owe you one.”

You waved your hand, wanting them to get rid of them quickly. “Don’t mention it. But next time, just text me for my notes. I have to get to work, so…”

“Oh! My bad,” He answered with fake remorse, before unlocking his phone and handing it over to you. “Here. For next time.”

You stifled a deep sigh, punching in the numbers hesitantly. “Just for homework, got it?”

San took his phone back, holding a hand over his heart and raised his head. “On a gentleman's honor,” He declared, and you bit back a laugh. Jeno looked like he was going to hurl.

“San!” The team captain—Hongjoong—called from a few feet away, “Are you guys done yet or what?”

“Coming!” San yelled back.

“Alright, we’ll let you go,” Wooyoung said, patting Jeno on the back again, a bit too harsh for comfort. “Bye, Y/N! See you around.”

 The three of them stalked off, leaving you and a very frazzled Jeno. “Dicks,” You muttered once they were out of earshot. “You good?”

Jeno shook his head, waving his hand dismissively. “I’ll be fine.”

You tilted your head, frowning. “Jeno—”

“I gotta go,” He said quickly. “I’ll see you later?”

You nodded, offering a lopsided smile. “Yeah. Be careful!” 

Jeno offered a deep bow, fluttering his eyelashes. “On a gentleman’s honor,” He sighed, adding a very bad British accent to it. You burst out laughing, eyes squeezing shut.

You didn’t catch the way Jeno’s shoulders relaxed at the sound.

I want you to know now

Baby, it could go down

I don’t wanna talk about it

Baby, let’s just go now

The train ride into Midtown didn’t take too long. He spent it digging through his backpack for his Park Industries lanyard, listening to music and thinking about you.

When you talk right to me 

You gon’ have to do me

Every time you think you’re leaving 

You running back to me

You’d met Jeno when you were six. Truth be told, he didn’t really remember. For him it was like you weren’t there at one point and by the time you were, you were thicker than thieves. It was a difficult time for him. He had just lost both of his parents, and was moving in with his Aunt Sunny and his Uncle Jinki, who were barely out of college at the time. He’d had to move to a new school and basically restart his entire life. You were the first sense of stability in his life for months. 

Your mom lived next to his aunt and uncle. So naturally, you went to the same school and went on the same bus. And somewhere along the way, you two clicked. You’d introduced him to Renjun, Jaemin and Donghyuck. You were there to comfort him whenever he got pushed off the slide by San or Wooyoung. 

He was there for you when your stepdad and stepbrother moved in when you were nine and you weren’t sure how to deal with it. He was there when your mom died when you were thirteen. He’d introduced you and your friends to Mark, Chenle and Jisung. 

And you were there when his Uncle Jinki got killed when he was fifteen. And because fate had an especially cruel sense of irony, it had happened on a Tuesday. You didn’t know, but at the time, he had just gotten his powers. Your comfort and words unknowingly had a secondary effect: he made the decision to use them for good, and… well. The rest was history. 

Can we just talk? Can we just talk?

Talk about where we're goin'

Before we get lost, lend me your thoughts

Can't get what we want without knowin'

Just like when he met you, he didn’t recall an exact moment where he realized he’d fallen in love with you. He knew there was a world where he loved you, but wasn’t in love with you. And he knew that there was a world here he’d fallen in love with you—he was living in that world now. He realized he was living in that world maybe when he was sixteen, and had been stuck in it ever since. 

You were it for him. He’d had crushes before. But never something like this, where he was so aware of your presence around him. It wasn’t the way he was hyper aware of someone like San, or like Yunho or Jongho. It wasn’t out of anxiety or fear, where a shift in mood activated his fight or flight. He was aware of you in a way that only people who truly know each other do, where he could pick up on subtle changes in your behavior, but not out of fear. Rather, out of a desire to take care of you and to not have you worry about anything. 

I've never felt like this before

I apologize if I'm movin' too far

Can we just talk? Can we just talk?

Figure out where we're goin'...

As the train rolled into the station that was a fifteen minute walk from Park Tower, Jeno put away his headphones and took a deep breath.

The “Jeno Tingle” as his Aunt Sunny called it—Jeno hated the term—had taken him a few years to gain control of. And while he could never truly turn it off, he could at least tune it out enough to be more at ease. The only time he did so was at school or when he was studying, just because he wanted to feel normal, and because being aware of everything going on around him really messed with his concentration. 

Jaemin didn’t understand. “If I was able to tell whenever Seonghwa was behind me because he wanted to scare me into doing his chemistry homework, I’d never turn that shit off,” He’d said once. But truthfully, Jeno didn’t really care. Because while yes, he was still slightly scared of the “hateful eight”, he knew damn well that if things got to be too much, he could kick their asses if he wanted to. 

It was his friends he worried about. He couldn’t be around them 24/7. You, not so much. He knew you knew how to fight. Even worse, he knew that San had the hots for you so you were off limits to the rest of them, be it bullying or flirting. But for everyone else… Well. He couldn’t hover over them like some guardian angel. 

Now that the “Jeno Tingle” was on, it allowed him to sense everyone within a certain range around him. He could zero in on certain sounds with ease, and his reflexes became heightened. Halfway on his walk up Park Avenue, he jumped away from a chihuahua on its leash a second before it started barking at him.

When he entered the first floor lobby of the Park Building, he scoured the crowd of employees and visitors until he landed on one familiar face. 

He'd met Doyoung about a year after his dad started dating your mom. Things between your parents were starting to get serious, and Doyoung was four years older than you were. When they moved into your house, Doyoung as your new stepbrother became the de facto chaperone and babysitter. If you wanted to go to the mall with Jeno, he had to take you. Every time you dragged Jeno to the movies, Doyoung had to go also. 

To an extent, it wasn't that bad. Doyoung was cool, and he was smart—he was the one who got Jeno interested in computers and chemistry. He graduated high school at 16, and finished his bachelor's degree at 19. He'd also interned at Park Industries, and secured a job there almost immediately after college. 

To an extent, he was the whole reason Mr. Park knew who he was, because of one incident. It was relatively soon after he started the whole vigilante thing. Jeno, still figuring out how to maneuver on the webs that shot out of his wrists, had accidentally crashed into your backyard late at night, when only Doyoung was awake. He was standing in the back door while he was waiting for his dog to finish peeing. 

Initially, the older boy had freaked out, thinking that it was a burglar or something. When he yelled out that his dad was a cop and was asleep in the house, Jeno panicked, and pulled off his mask, holding up his hands.

“Woah, woahwoahwoah! Doyoung! It’s me, it’s me!” 

Doyoung’s eyes had widened to the size of saucers, paying no mind to the dog as it sauntered up to Jeno, before turning onto its back in a request for belly rubs.

"You're the spider guy everyone's been talking about!?"

"Spider man," Jeno had answered, voice cracking as he dusted himself off. He cringed at the sound of his voice. "...and yes."

Of course, his cover was blown, and he'd begged Doyoung not to tell anyone, especially not you. And while Doyoung had promised not to tell you, it didn't stop him from telling his boss. 

That had been almost three years ago now. The rest was history, and after that Jeno didn’t have to run around in bright red sweatpants and dollar store swimming goggles. Now, he had a nanotech suit that allowed him to activate protocols of the suit through voice commands using something top-secret Mr. Park called D.R.E.A.M technology. Direct Response Engaged As Machine—yeah, Jeno didn’t get it either. 

Doyoung offered Jeno a smile as he escorted Jeno past security, showing them his employee clearance pass. "Hey. How have you been?"

Jeno shrugged, recounting his day in minor detail as he was led into an elevator labeled authorized personnel only. 

This elevator only went up to the 35th floor, seeing as everything past that was only cleared for a certain list of people approved by Mr. Park and his security team, and everything past the 90th floor were Mr. Park's private living quarters. 

Now, as Doyoung led him to another elevator to head up to the 85th floor, which was always where Jeno got to meet with Mr. Park—which wasn't often, maybe once or twice a year—he wondered where he would be if he hadn’t surprised Doyoung that night. He would probably still be using those ugly red sweatpants as part of his disguise.

"How's Y/N?" Doyoung asked. 

"Oh, she seems okay. That guy who hates me keeps coming onto her though. He's a huge douchebag."

Doyoung frowned. "He's not harassing her, is he? Because if he is—"

"He just won't stop flirting, even though she clearly isn't interested," Jeno said bitterly, "He isn't physical or anything. Trust me, it wouldn't end well for him if he was."

Doyoung wasn't quite sure how to respond to the younger boy's dark tone. He looked down, clearing his throat awkwardly.

“So… how’s the apartment?” Jeno asked. Doyoung perked up instantly.

“Oh, now that Taeyong’s moved in and did his interior design thing, it looks great. He’s really done a great job at it.”

“When am I gonna meet this guy? He sounds cool.”

“He’s really cool,” Doyoung hummed, cheeks heating up. “Things are getting really serious.”

Jeno smiled at how flustered Doyoung, who was normally so level headed and calm, became at the mention of his boyfriend.

“You guys sound like a really good couple,” He said. Doyoung chuckled, waving his hand. “Oh, well—” 

 The elevator dinged, and Doyoung sighed. “I’ll tell you later. C’mon.”

The hallway it opened up to was lined with pictures of the company's history, starting from pictures of black and white of people in vintage clothing, to pictures in sepia tones to finally pictures of the current CEO at locations around the world: Chanyeol Park.

Jeno walked behind Doyoung as he led him down the hallway, before stopping in front of a door, and a friendly looking man in a suit. 

Junmyeon was a part of Chanyeol’s Security and Intelligence team, and often sat in on these meetings with Jeno. The chain of contact also included him. If Jeno couldn’t contact Doyoung (which rarely happened), he’d contact Junmyeon. And if he couldn’t contact either of them, or it was an emergency, only then could he contact Chanyeol. So far, that had only happened once.

"Hey, Junmyeon," Doyoung said, "Mr. Park's 4:30 is here." 

Junmyeon nodded, before smiling at Jeno and giving him a wave. "Hey, kid."

Jeno offered an awkward grin. "Hi, Mr. Kim."

Junmyeon rolled his eyes sarcastically. "Kid, you're making me feel ancient. I've told you a million times, just call me Junmyeon."

Jeno shuffled awkwardly, before nodding at the older man, watching as he pressed a button on his earpiece. "Hey, Yeol. Jeno's here."

The muffled response was barely heard, but Jeno automatically understood what Mr. Park said. Junmyeon turned to open the door, and let the pair inside. The “office”—if it could even be called that—opened up to more of a lounge, than anything. A wall of glass overlooked the Manhattan skyline, but Jeno knew that from the outside it looked only like a wall, due to camouflage technology developed by Mr. Park himself. As Doyoung and Junmyeon stayed back, closer to the door, Jeno took a few steps toward the man in question.

Chanyeol was standing a few feet in front of the glass window, working on a holographic model of a new piece of tech. His face was turned downward in a concentrated frown. He barely spared the teenager a glance as he said fondly, “Hey, kid.”

Jeno was used to this. Chanyeol wasn’t cold per se, but he wasn’t warm at all. He knew that Chanyeol cared about him, even if he didn’t really show it in a conventional way. Chanyeol was a very… eccentric man, so he had his own way of saying and doing things. 

“Hi, Mr. Park. Um… you wanted to talk to me?”

“Yep! Needed some help from the friendly neighborhood Spiderman… A little birdie told me about something going on in Queens.”

“Queens?” Jeno asked, gripping the straps of his backpack. “You mean, other than the usual stuff?”

“Other than the usual stuff,” Chanyeol repeated, nodding. With a wave of his hand, the hologram disappeared, and another one appeared in its place. This time, instead of a 3D model, a few pictures and another, smaller 3D model appeared. Chanyeol turned to face him, frown deepening. He pointed at the model—a long, shiny oval-shaped purple stone. It reminded Jeno of an amethyst, but instead of turning white at the base, it turned to an iridescent jade tone. “You know what this is, right?”

Jeno nodded, remembering seeing the rocks all over the news when he was a kid. “That’s… that’s a Chitauri stone. From the invasion a few years back.”

Chanyeol nodded, standing up straight. “These stones have the potential to power weapons with no need to recharge, or change them out. They’re an infinite, extremely strong power source, Jeno, and in the wrong hands can be very dangerous.”

Jeno took a deep breath, feeling his stomach sink slowly. Chanyeol sighed. “Cleanup of the city after the invasion was long, and difficult, and obviously the government and the company weren’t able to get everything. It caused a black market to pop up. Now, the NYPD has been investigating it for years, but they have their limits… that’s where you come in.”

“M-me, Mr. Park?”

Chanyeol gave him a crooked, reassuring smile. He pointed at one of the pictures, which was of a man who most likely didn’t know he was photographed. He was walking somewhere, face looking angry and stern.

“You don’t know who this is, right?”

Jeno shook his head, and Chanyeol turned his head to nod at Junmyeon. “You’re up, tough guy.”

Junmyeon huffed, before walking up to Jeno. He put his hand on Jeno’s shoulder as if he could tell that he was growing anxious. 

“Jeno, that’s Henry Duke. From what we understand on the intel team, he’s one of the cornerstones of the alien tech black market. He’s one of the top dogs. From what we understand, he likes to be present for all major negotiations that his group makes. A source of ours told us that there’s going to be a negotiation on Friday night not too far away from LaGuardia. We want you to go out there and just get a feel of what’s going on.”

“Just watch them, right?” Jeno looked at Junmyeon, who patted his back reassuringly. “Just watch. Don’t engage unless you absolutely have to.”

“You can do that, right?” Chanyeol said quietly, crossing his arms. “Because if not, then it’s totally—”

“Yeah, of course I can! Friday—shit, Friday. At what time are they supposed to be meeting up?”

Junmyeon furrowed his eyebrows, before answering, “Around eight or nine.”

Jeno bit his lip, thinking about the promise he’d made to you. It would just have to wait, he supposed. Chanyeol rarely asked anything this big of him.

“Alright,” Jeno agreed, “I’ll do it.”

Chanyeol grinned, clapping his hands together. 

“Perfect.” 

They discussed logistics briefly after. Doyoung would be on call with Jeno, his custom made suit allowing them to communicate, letting Doyoung see everything Jeno was seeing via a video feed coming from the ultra thin lenses placed in the white eye sockets of the mask. Doyoung would then report to Junmyeon, who would report to Chanyeol, who would probably report to the FBI. Jeno was only to engage if absolutely necessary.

After that, he set out on patrol. He usually found some discreet place to hide his backpack, and then went all over Queens looking for trouble, quite literally. Around five thirty, he stopped a robbery in Murray Hill. Then, around seven, he stopped a man from stealing a woman’s purse in Elmhurst. Nothing too much.

Around eight, he finally headed home, this time dressed normally, using the train and not web fluid. He walked home, tired, knowing that he’d immediately have to do that cursed AP calc homework. When he got home, he opened his backpack pocket to look for his keys, rummaging between his notebooks and other things. 

Shuffling through his stuff, he furrowed his eyebrows as he couldn’t find them. Thinking back, he remembered this morning, when he’d left in a rush… and had very obviously left his keys on his desk.

“Shit,” He muttered to himself. He rubbed his eyes tiredly, remembering that Aunt Sunny had said she’d be working overtime tonight. He could very easily sneak in through his window, but he was pretty sure he’d locked it the night before, and it was too early. People’s lights were still on—anyone could see him if they just looked up, and then he would be screwed. 

Huffing and zipping his backpack up, he marched up to your house, before ringing the doorbell. He shifted his weight back and forth, from his heels to the balls of his feet, until the door opened up. A familiar man with a face just like Doyoung's, but older, with graying hair and arms scarred and muscled from years of working on the police force stood in the doorway.

“Jeno?” Your dad offered him a warm smile. “Hey, kiddo, what’s up?”

“Hi, Mr. Kim,” Jeno said, smiling back. He shifted nervously. “I, um… I left my keys in my room this morning, and my aunt’s working late, so… could I… maybe wait here? Y/N’s home, right?” 

The man nodded. “Of course, of course. Come in!” 

Your dad had always been super friendly, even from the day Jeno had first met him. You'd told Jeno once that he was the only real father figure you'd ever had. Once everything settled after him and your mom got married, you started calling him dad altogether. And since you and Jeno were practically glued at the hip, he got along with your dad almost as well as you did.

“Okay.” Jeno stepped in and set down his backpack at the base of the coat rack next to the door, as he’d done a million times before. Jeno stepped into the living room, and sat down on the couch. He folded his hands in his lap and looked up at your dad.

"I think Y/N's in the shower, but she should be done soon. You can just wait here if you want… have you eaten anything yet?”

“Uh, I had a granola bar on the train, but that’s it.”

“We have some leftover pasta here, if you want—”

“Thanks, Mr. Kim, really! I’m fine.”

Your dad nodded, sitting down on his recliner. “So, have you started your college list, yet? Y/N said you wanted to stay here in New York.”

Jeno nodded, pushing some hair out of his face. “Well, yeah. It would make things a lot easier, I think. I might want to apply to NYU, but I think I’ll just go to community college, or something.”

Your dad shook his head. “You’re a pretty smart kid, Jeno. I think you could get into Columbia if you set out to. Plus, Chanyeol Park doesn’t give out internships to anybody. That’s your secret weapon.”

Jeno smiled. “Well, you’ve got a point.” 

Your dad gave him a friendly punch on the shoulder. “Come on, trying won’t hurt!” Your dad made a face, and then rubbed his knuckles. “Have you been working out? Those muscles weren’t there the last time I did that.”

Jeno laughed, trying to think of an excuse. “Oh, a little bit? The house needed some fixing up over the summer, and I wanted to help Aunt Sunny, so…”

“Jeno?” 

He turned immediately, eyes landing on you at the base of the staircase. You’d changed into an old t-shirt and pajama pants. Your hair was slightly damp. “What are you doing here?” You asked, with a curious smile.

His shoulders slumped, and he grinned sheepishly. “Terrible Tuesday strikes again. I forgot my keys.”

You grimaced. “Brutal, dude. You wanna come up?” Your eyes moved to your dad. “Or am I interrupting guy time?”

“Oh, definitely,” Jeno answered, playing along. He took a cocky tone as he rested his hands on the back of his neck. “Your dad was just telling me about how much the NYPD needs me.” 

You stifled a laugh. You dad seemed to be holding back a laugh too. "Hey, you're joking, but if you keep working out like that, and if by some impossible chance, the college thing doesn't work out… We might just be able to catch Spiderman if we finally got some brain cells on the force."

"Ugh, dad," You groaned, unaware of Jeno's gut twisting, "Not again."

"Yeah, Mr. Kim," Jeno said, scratching the back of his head, "He's not that bad."

Your dad shook his head. "Look, I don't hate the guy. In all honesty, crime rates have dropped since he started doing his thing. But he thinks he's above the law, and his methods can be a bit… unorthodox sometimes. He’s been undermining us for years and his tech is state of the art. Makes me wonder about what we should do to modernize the force."

Jeno looked downward, wondering what would happen if your dad knew the truth.

"Well, I guess we may just never find out. Jeno'd make a horrible cop. He couldn't hurt a fly if you paid him a million dollars."

But you came to the rescue as you grabbed his backpack, and soon enough he was up the stairs with you, heading into your bedroom, laughing to yourselves when you heard your dad jokingly call out, "Fifteen inch distance, you two! Door stays open!"

He sat on your desk chair while you lay on your bed, limbs splaying out. 

"So you left your keys."

Jeno groaned. "Don't remind me. I was in such a rush to leave, that I… I forgot. I'm so stupid."

You rolled your eyes, rolling over onto your stomach to look at him. "You're not stupid, Jen. You made an honest mistake because you were in a hurry." 

Standing up, you walked over to him and leaned against the desk. "Seriously, Jeno. What's gotten into you, lately? You freak out about every little thing. It's starting to worry me." 

Jeno shook his head. "I don't know," He admitted. "I think I'm just scared about how after this year, everything changes. Renjun’s headed upstate. Jaemin’s going to Boston. You want to go to LA. I think Hyuck and I are the only ones who want to stay here. I just… I don't want things to change." 

Your expression turned sad as he continued. "Everyone is expecting great things from me. You're smart, Jeno. You can get into an Ivy. Or, you have a Park internship, you'll be fine. What if I don't want things to be fine? What if I want them to just stay the same?"

You stayed silent for a few moments, trying to think of what to say. Jeno was relatively level headed for someone your age, but even he had moments of doubt and panic. It made moments like these difficult.  You sighed before grabbing him by the hand. Wordlessly, you tugged him over to the bed, sitting him down and leaning your head on his shoulder. He could feel the dampness in your hair seeping slowly into his shirt.

"I guess I understand what you mean," You mumbled, trying to reason with him, "But come on. You wouldn't really want everything to stay the same. You can't tell me you want to keep getting AP calc homework. And I definitely doubt that you'd want to have your ass kicked by San for the rest of your life."

Jeno looked at the floor. "You're right. But you know that's not what I mean—"

"I know," You huffed, "I'm just saying. Change… it's inevitable. The longer you fight it, the harder it is."

Jeno nodded. "This sucks."

"It does," You agreed, taking his hand in yours. "But at least we have each other's backs, y'know?"

Something of a smile appeared on his face. You were so close to him, leaning on him, stroking his knuckles with your thumb. He hoped you couldn't hear his heart pounding in his chest. 

"We really do, huh?" His voice turned quiet, with a bit of a sleepy lull to it. He allowed his head to rest on yours. "You're so comfortable. Can I like, use you as a pillow for the rest of my life?"

You giggled. "I'll consider it on two conditions."

"Oh, you'll consider. How generous of you."

"Yes, I'll consider. Now, do you wanna hear my terms or not?" 

Jeno raised an eyebrow. "Go ahead," He said, before putting on his best Marlon Brando voice, "Make me an offer I can't refuse."

Snorting, you lifted your head off of his. "Okay. One, you finish your calculus homework here before Sunny gets home."

He pursed his lips. "Okay, I could probably do that. What's the other one?"

"Let me drive you to school for the rest of the year." 

Jeno stared at you, and you nodded, eyes wide. "Trust me, Jen. You wouldn't need to wake up so early! And plus, you can't text the guy manning the subway asking him to give you five minutes because you need to find your keys."

Jeno gnawed on the inside of his cheek. You did have a point, and to be honest, he could probably refrain from putting his feet up on your dashboard.

"Deal." 

You grinned. "Awesome," You answered, before nodding towards his backpack. "Now get to work, Einstein."

The rest of the week wasn't that bad. Yes, you were absolutely batshit insane about your truck in the morning, but he soon realized he didn't really mind. Not when it allowed you both to spend some twenty extra minutes together in the mornings, and they were spent joking around and listening to your extremely varied playlist. 

On the other hand, he was saddled with more and more homework, greater and greater expectations. The looming threat of Friday's mission rolled around, and it made Jeno feel like time was passing much too slowly but also way too quickly. There was so much on his mind. He had chemistry with you on Thursdays in the afternoon, which also meant that San was there. Which also meant that sometimes, his heightened senses would pick up on San dropping a tacky pick up line which made Jeno want to punch him in the jaw.

Finally, finally, Friday afternoon rolled around. As he bid you goodbye and promised to see you later, he tried to ignore the feeling in his stomach. The feeling that something was about to go very, very wrong. He went out on patrol, ready for Doyoung to set up the call and tell him where he needed to go. It didn’t help that there wasn’t a lot for him to do that day. Crime had seemed to slow down altogether. 

When the time finally came, and the sun was beginning to set, Doyoung rang in at about 7, telling him the location. An old warehouse near LaGuardia airport, hidden from prying eyes. Jeno made his way to the place, avoiding security cameras Doyoung warned him about, and found a place to hide. There was a hole in the warehouse roof, which allowed him to peer right into the building without being seen. It was about thirty feet from the ground.

“Why is it always old, abandoned warehouses?” Jeno grumbled. He heard Doyoung laugh quietly. 

“Beats me,” Doyoung sighed. 

And so they waited. Jeno wondered vaguely if you were still working. He wasn’t sure. They made time talking quietly, until a black SUV rolled into the warehouse. “Woah, Doyoung,” He murmured, “Hold up.”

Jeno leaned forward, but quickly realized he probably wouldn’t be able to hear what was being said. “D.R.E.A.M, activate Heightened Intelligence Protocol.”

Activating Heightened Intelligence Protocol.

The protocol allowed Jeno to use the lenses over his eyes to zoom in on specific targets, as well as use a microphone embedded in the suit to pick up audio from far away and feed it directly into his ears.

He watched as three figures got out of the car, a fourth remaining in the driver’s seat. The trio stood in front of the car, and Jeno recognized the man in the middle as the man Junmyeon had been talking about.

“Alright, there’s Henry Duke,” He said, “The one in the middle.”

 “Got it,” Doyoung replied, sounding satisfied. “Now all we have to do is wait for the other party.”

“Did Junmyeon’s sources say anything about who it would be?”

“No. They weren’t able to find that out. Guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

Jeno’s eyes never left the man. “Do you think it’s something international?”

Doyoung sighed. “I’m not sure. If it is international, then you need to be even more careful.”

“Got it. I think—Wait, here they come.” 

A second vehicle, this one another black SUV, rolled up not too far away from the first car. The lights turned off and the engine sputtered to a stop, and four men stepped out of the vehicle.

Jeno’s stomach dropped, and of its own accord, his mouth let loose a quiet, “What the fuck,” as he registered the person leading them. 

“What?” Doyoung asked, before realizing what—who—he was looking at. “...Is that my dad?”

“I think it is,” Jeno whispered, fingertips suddenly numb. Who was he kidding? They both knew who it was. 

“So,” One of the men next to your dad said, “You show us yours, we’ll show you ours?”

Henry Duke clapped his hands together with an impish grin. “I suppose. Reagan, get the case.”

One of the two men standing beside him started off toward the trunk of the car. “It caught me off guard when I heard that the force wanted to purchase these. Almost made me wonder if this was your attempt at a sting operation.”

“What made you change your mind?” Your dad asked. Jeno swallowed at how cold he sounded. This wasn’t your dad, and it didn’t seem like Officer Kim either. This was someone Jeno had never met before. 

“Honestly, Kim?” Duke raised an eyebrow, shrugging. “It was you. Your cooperativeness and willing to feed us information, as well as your… insurance agreement. And besides, you made a very interesting point when you said that the Avengers Initiative and Park’s alum Spiderman is ruining the way the law operates around here. That type of bitterness… hard to fake.”

Your dad huffed. “We’re fucking tired of it.”

The man leaning against the car your dad had stepped out of scoffed. “If this helps us catch the little asshole, then so be it.”

Jeno frowned. “I’m not little—”

“Jeno, shut up!” Doyoung snapped. 

“—Alright, then.” The man holding the briefcase—Reagan—clicked it open, as if it were a prize reveal on The Price is Right. Five guns, all modified to hold glowing Chitauri stones were placed carefully together side by side.

“You know the basics. No radiation. Keep it away from security scanners and x-rays. They will blow up. And second of all, these are at half the price, along with the promise from the chief of police that my business won’t be touched, and will only be distributed to officers in on the operation and have agreed to turn off their body cameras when they decide to use these weapons. Should this not be a sting operation, we’ll be back here to negotiate.”

Jeno leaned forward, watching anxiously.

“Yes, sir,” Your dad answered, nodding. “We have the money here.”

“Hand it over, then.”

That was when Jeno made his mistake. He leaned forward too much, and proceeded to fall right through the hole, bringing down some scraps of the roof with him. As he tumbled through the air, the zoom on his lenses caused him to grow dizzy as he had no idea what he was looking at. He caught himself before he could fall, clumsily commanding D.R.E.A.M to go back to turn off the current protocol. His vision returned to normal, and he swung up onto a rafter holding the warehouse up.

“So, we have company.” Duke didn’t sound as amused as he had before. His face turned into a sneer. “Get him.”

In less than a second, before Jeno could say anything, five guns were pointed directly at him. He managed to swing away before any bullets could hit him. 

“Jeno, get out of there now,” Doyoung ordered. 

“What about the guns?” Jeno asked, swinging to another rafter. “They know I’m here, I might as well get them before I go—”

“No! Jeno, listen to what I’m telling you. You’ve done more than enough, and you need to let it g—”

Your dad aimed, and a bullet fired right at Jeno’s chest. For a second, he forgot that the chest area of the suit was lined with bulletproof material. While it didn’t shoot into his chest, it ricocheted right off him, and since he was in motion, it somehow caused the bullet to bounce back in the direction in which it came. 

The wind was knocked out of Jeno, but it was nothing compared to watching the bullet land in the middle of your father’s chest. On the other line, he heard Doyoung yell, followed by the sound of something falling. And then, as he made his way back towards the hole he’d fallen out of, he couldn’t rip his eyes away from the body as it crumpled to the ground. 

The others around him scrambled to get back into their respective cars. Jeno was back on the roof now, trying not to hyperventilate. “I’m sorry,” He gasped, “Do—Doyoung, I-I’m sorry, I didn’t want to—”

“Jeno, you need to get out of there, now,” Doyoung said, voice raspy. “GO!” 

So he did, and Doyoung cut off the call once he was out of the vicinity. Jeno didn’t blame him. He swung across buildings, feeling numb as he looked for the apartment complex roof where he’d decided to hide his backpack.

When he finally did, he changed in a hurry, before slumping against the wall and forcing himself to take deep breaths. 

Doyoung’s dad—your dad—was dead. And it was all his fault. 

He cried on the way down the staircase. He cried on his way to the subway. The entire time, he ignored people’s stares. Suddenly everything was too loud, and if he met someone in the eyes he’d just about break down in the middle of the station. 

As he got onto the train, Jeno thought about all of the things your dad had done for you, and for Jeno. All the times he'd taken you both to Coney Island in the summer when you were younger. The year Pokemon Go came out he took the both of you driving around in his car so you and Jeno could catch as many Pokemon as you could. 

He’d formally adopted you when you were thirteen. You were his daughter in nearly every sense of the word, regardless of blood. And now he was dead, because of a stupid mistake that Jeno had made.

What would you say if you knew? He didn’t want to know. Checking the time on his phone, he saw he’d gotten a message from you just three minutes ago.

[8:36 PM]

y/n: lemme know when ur outside!! :)

“Fuck,” He murmured, wiping his eyes. He knew he needed to stop crying before he got to your house, and he had about ten minutes before he got to his stop, and then another five minute walk to the neighborhood. He focused on taking deep breaths and taking long swigs from his water bottle in the meantime, trying to tune out the sound of other people talking and the sound of the train on the rails.

The walk was the longest five minute walk he’d ever taken. The flashing lights of convenience stores did nothing to calm him down. As the stores in his peripheral vision began transitioning into suburban homes, he felt his heart speed up again. The constant movement as he walked meant he missed his phone vibrating in his backpack as you rang his number.

After what seemed like an eternity, two familiar houses came into his line of vision, and his shoulders slumped as he spotted you on your porch, looking small and teary, curled up into a little ball. In one hand, you were clutching your phone.

His stomach twisted as he put on a confused tone, even though he knew damn well that you knew. “...Y/N?”

You stood up, running to him and burying yourself into his chest, crumpling into his arms. You would have fell over if Jeno hadn’t held both of you up. 

“Jeno,” You sobbed, “You’re n-not go-onna believe it.”

He brought a hand up to caress your hair, holding back tears of his own as he asked a question he already knew the answer to.

“Y/N, what happened?”

taglist: @decembermoonskz @itsapapisongo @lenaluvs​ @crescentjen​

[bohemiansweede]

The Caregiver

The Caregiver

Fanfic

Pairing Roger Taylor Reader

Warnings Smut 🔞

Agegap

A/N Please like and reblog or if you want leave a comment

Thank You

🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷

- Oh Thank you so much Y/N, Mrs Lewis is my last one for the day but I really have to...

- It's ok Linda, I cover up for you, honestly.. It is ok.

I was so nice to everyone that I often forgot about myself, tonight it was my turn to cook on the chelter and before that my laundry really had to get organised... And the dishes, omg... Well it seamed that I had to do that one another night..

- You are such a rock Y/N.. How can I ever thank you? Mrs Lewis is a sweet old lady, you just have to be there on time and shop after her list, otherwise no problem.. Oh.. Right.. Almost forgot.. The bus.. Make sure you time it in.. It runs just once in an hour

- Ok, got it.. Have a nice dinner now.. Don't think about me, I smiled little sarcastic and headed out towards the bus stop

Jeez.. Well... I had nothing against helping people, the opposite frankly, I loved it, but it was a loooong time since I gaved myself some me time... And by that I should probably mention that it was about time that I had a good lay too..

With a cringy noise and a sigh, the bus stopped right by my feet

I asked the driver just in case where the closest stop was to the grocery store

The list was not that long but she was very specific what she wanted, down to the exact pound of cheese the special sausage at the butcher, her favourite olive oil, etc etc

I went in at butchers first and took it of the list, next was the post-office, I sighed.. There were tons of people inside and I just needed a few stamps for the letters. Just the thought of the fucking bus me freaked out.. Perhaps I should take the groceries first..

I went out again, it was a good choise to take my coat because it was cold today, but I still wore the shorter skirt from the lunch with Linda and that I regretted now

I grabbed a basket in the store and started to fill it.. The note was slightly wrinkled and it was little hard to see.. Usually I didn't have any problems with my eyes but..

- Ohh.. I.. ohh.. sorry..

I fell forward on my knees and almost grabbed a strangers legs

- Are you alright miss?

He reached out his hand

I looked up and saw straight up in a pair of gentle blue eyes

- Typical me... Ms Clumpsy..

I picked up the list from the floor which now also was dirty and wet

- Shopping for Mrs Lewis?

Guess she was well known

I brushed my knees of and took the basket which he had picked up from the floor

- Thank you, ehh.. yes.. Yes I am

- You better not be late then

He smiled and winked at me

I just stood and stared after him like my feets were glued to the floor, he was the most attractive man that I ever seen, maybe in his late 40's, the hair had just begun to turn grey and he had wrinkles around his eyes when he... Fuck.. The bus...

I sped up and went from isle to isle and grabbed my things.. There.. Just the olive oil then..

Of course on the top shelf

- Hello again.. Let me get that one for you dear

- Ohh.. H.. Hi..

My heart skipped a beat

He was soooo handsome and.. Yes... Hot.. Could I say a man in my dad's age was hot?

- We have to stop meeting like this.. I'm Roger

I took his warm strong hand in mine, wonder if he was married.. kids

- Y/N

When the olive oil was in the basket I went to the cashier, I had pretty good time.. Until I froze...

- Shit...

I grabbed the stuff and ran out, the post office was still occupied with people and the bus would leave in 10...

- Fuck...

The little kind old lady would turn into a witch.. A monster or maybe worse...

A car pulled in next to me, and when the window went down I saw him...

- Looks like you need a ride love.., did you miss the bus?

How happy I was to see this man right yet again

He asked if I was new at this job, and I explained that it was not even my job, he said he was sure of that Mrs Lewis was going to be satisfied with me anyway and I didn't have to worry

- I wait in the car while you go in to her

- But.. The bus stop is...

- No, I don't want to hear it... I am right here ok?

I don't think Linda or anyone had delivered groceries that fast before, I even managed to borrow her phone to cancel the chelter dinner... I had totally different things in mind

- Y/N.. I.. I was wondering if you wanted a cup of coffee?

- Coffee?

I didn't want to laugh but he sounded so cute and little nervous

- Yeah.. I.. Well.. There is not much coffeeshops around here and and.. Ehh.. Well.. Damn... Thing is.. I can literally be your dad.. but..

I silenced him with my finger on his lips, he swallowed hard and let out a shaky breath

Then I could not hold it anymore, he was like gasoline on my body that had cached fire, I crashed my lips onto his and at once he opened his mouth and met my tongue, I moaned in his mouth and his fingers tangeled in my hair

- Ro.. Roger.. Let's go... home

- Mmmmm... I would love to.. But... You have let go of my shift gear hunnie...

We both laughed, the situation was kinda weird brutal.. comic.. sexy

His lips was still burning on mine, I couldn't stop looking at him now and then during the drive

He did a slight left turn up on a gravel road and I saw a huge mansion

- You live.. He.. here?

- Yea.. I do.. Every other week I am alone..

There was my answer, divorced.. kids

He stopped the car right outside the door and gaved my knee a gentle squeeze

- You don't change your mind dear?

- No... Not a chance...

He grabbed his bags and went straight the kitchen

I was totally amazed by the fireplace and how beautiful everything was.. Really tastefully decorated..

I suddenly felt his strong arms around me..

He kissed my hair and my neck and his warm breath made my skin prickle with tiny dots

- You are so beautiful hunnie.. so young.. Almost untouched..

- I am n..

- Ssscchhh... I want to discover you... It is MY first time with you..

He took my hand and I followed him upstairs into the bedroom

We stod across eachother and my heart was beating so hard that he must have heard it

He cupped my face with his big hands and kissed me, the kiss was more passionate yet hungry

I tried to unbutton his shirt but I just fumbled, he noticed what I was doing so he took over

- Let me take care of you now darling... It is your turn to relax

He did not know how right he had

As he enjoyed every moment, he took his time undressing me and exploring my body, he was so different, he was a gentleman he was older.. he knew what he was doing..

Every inch of me was covered by tiny tiny kisses and nibbles

- Roger.. I whimpered.. please..

- I know I know.. Soon...

I could not hold it anymore and he knew it, he kissed the sensitive skin above my breasts while he cupped them, I felt how hard he was towards my leg and he groaned a little when he finally circled my nipple with his tongue

- Ahhhh God ... Ohhh ..

It felt like electricity in my whole body, I grabbed his head and even if it felt so good what he was doing I needed more, I pushed his head down.. further down.. to my dripping core

He looked up at me and gaved me a mischievous smirk

That totally changed everything

He grabbed a pillow from next to me and tucked it under my butt, then he grabbed my thighs and pushed my legs wide apart

He took his palms under my ass so I opened up more for him, this man was an oral expert.. Shit... He sloppy kissed my pussy and dragged his flattened tounge up and down along my folds, I arched my back and tried to grab the sheets but he pinned me down

He then circled my clit so fast that my eyes rolled back in my head he sucked it in his mouth almost nibbled on it

- Ahhh shit Rog Fuck... Ahhhh damnit..

He continued to lick with a rapid pace and it was not long until my walls started to collapse

- Shit Omg I... Iam... Ahhhh Gooood... Ahhhh

I squirted on his tounge and he was quick to drink the full amount of me

- Mmm... You taste delicious mmm...

- Omg.. It was... Do you want me to...

- No... I said I wanted to take care of you...

He smirked and kissed his all the way up to my lips again..

- Now.. I didn't exactly plan this.. Are you...

He frowned a bit

- Yes, I am safe, I am on the pill..

- Glad you said that... Cause cannot fuckin wait any longer

I felt how his erected cock trailed near my entrance, after the tip was inside me it just took a few seconds for me to adjust to his size

- Omg hunnie, you feel so fuckin amazing.. Shit..

His head fell back and his pace increased, his hips snapped and I bucked my body up to meet his

- Ohhh Roger... Fuck.. Ahhh... Harder... Harder... Ohhh...

He took a grip on the bed frame and the other one he teared apart the sheets, sweat was dripping from his forehead down on my neck

I felt that he was close and I was not far behind myself

With almost pornographic sounds we came undone together, he emptied himself deep inside of me and my final contractions maked sure there was nothing left

- Ohh God.. You were amazing.. Truly amazing...

- Roger... Wow.. I... I have no words...

- Not so bad for an ol...

I smacked his upper arm

- Don't say it...

We laid tangled together for a bit, I could sense that he was thinking of something

- Are you sure you don't know who I am love?

I froze a little, what have I missed

- Should I... I mean... I am not from here...

He chuckled a little..

- Well... I don’t know if I should be honoured or nervous.. It was long time ago since nobody didn't know who I was

I was even more confused

Well... He was in late 40s.. Maybe he had put on some weight?... Hair.. Was it the hair? The glasses?

- I am hungry love, do you want something to eat?

- Sure.. OK...

He kissed me softly and he gaved me a bathrobe that I could borrow

I took a glimpse in the mirror.. I looked totally fucked, and I was.. but I happy too.. There could absolutely be something with this guy whoever he was.. Politics? No..

And kids? Fine.. As long as it is ok with the ex...

I bounced downstairs and heard him hum on something for himself in the kitchen

On the way there I passed a big wall... A wall full of gold disc's platinum records...

WOW... Really...

I palmed my forehead and did an eyeroll.. I had totally missed out that it was him

In the corner of my eye I saw that he was watching me and he walked in my direction

- I... I'm sorry... I didn't tell you

- And I'm sorry I didn't recognise you...

- Sssscchhh... You know what.. Mrs Lewis doesn't know either..

He kissed me softly

- So.. are you staying?

- I am not leaving.. Well.. Maybe just for posting a letter

🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷

Enjoy more reading in my

[krkekcnehx]

Negan’s Rose - Chapter 1

Word count: 2351

Warnings: mentions of hunger pains.

This is my very first chapter of my very first fic. This just kinda sets up the character and lets you get to know her a bit. More exciting things are to come in the next chapters. If you read this, thank you !!!

—————————————————————

Chapter 1

You had been on your own for four months before everything changed. You had managed fine at first, finding an old barn about a mile off of a small stream that ran through the trees. You were lucky to have a source of fresh water and used it to wash yourself and your clothes, making you more presentable than the average survivor. When you investigated the barn for the first time it was completely empty apart from a few bales of hay that you had used as a makeshift mattress. There were no signs of life in the barn so you hesitantly made it your home for the time being. You spent the time scavenging in the small neighbourhood close by, it was a three mile walk each time however your scarce food supply was slowly depleting and you had hopes of finding others you could join. You were a natural introvert before all of this and you thrived being on your own. You loved curling up with a good book and a mug of hot tea while the sound of the rain calmed your mind after a busy day at work, but those cozy days were over and circumstance had forced you to become a people person. Over the weeks you were becoming weaker and weaker, the hunger pains getting worse. You were gonna have to go further out if you had any chance at finding new supplies and food.

You awoke at sunrise and the familiar dull hunger hit you immediately. You sipped on some water you had collected from the stream the night before, hoping it would briefly soothe the ache before you had to resort to eating the last of your food. With weak shaky hands you combed your hair through with your fingers before securing it in a tight braid the way your mother had taught you as a child, letting it rest on your neck. You had picked up the ginger gene from her side of the family and got your looks from her too. Your porcelain pale skin contrasted against your bright golden hair and red lips. You were the centre of a lot of attention before the world went to shit. Men liked you. You were witty and charming and had striking good looks. It could disarm a man and make him fall to his knees, but a year of surviving in this world had taken a toll on you and it was evident, with your protruding cheek bones and deep set eyes as green as the forest. You had dark circles and you looked and felt weak, not remembering the last time you had had a decent meal. Any muscle mass you had gained was withering away and your ribs were beginning to become prominent. Adapting to this new world was tough, you hated violence and couldn’t use a gun to save yourself. Literally. Guns were never your thing and your mother taught you to use violence as an absolute last resort. This wasn’t much of a problem in the old world as you could talk your way out of most things, manipulating the situation to your advantage. You had an incredible gift for reading people and a sharp, quick sense of humour which you assumed you picked up from your father, your mother telling you stories of how he had smooth talked and charmed her. This had helped you in the past when you came across other survivors, convincing them to trust you and let you join their groups. You never had any bad intentions but you knew that you had to convince them you didn’t anyway, they were wary of who to take in, naturally. But you knew you couldn’t rely solely on your personality and had to adapt your mentality as you navigated through this new world, forcing yourself to learn to use a knife. You had only killed a handful of walkers and it didn’t get any easier each time. Your breath still caught in your throat whenever you came face to face with them as you forced yourself to unfreeze and defend yourself.

You double checked your back pack making sure you had everything before you set off. Water bottle, a spare knife, a small blanket, the last granola bar you were down to and an old tattered photo of your mother and your older brother. You traced the outline of their faces with your fingers, losing yourself momentarily in memories of a past life. This was your only family and not knowing where they were, if they were even alive ate away at you, however you were good at repressing these things. The absence of your father growing up had rendered you cold and taught you to lower your expectations. You failed to form meaningful bonds with the groups you were a part of before so as not to get hurt, but this left you extremely lonely. On multiple occasions your mind retreated to a familiar dark place and you had thought about ending it, but you were strong like your brother and kept on going. You knew that there were other people out there you just had to find them.

You took another sip of water, the hunger still gnawing away at you as you tried to hold off on eating the last of your food for as long as you could manage. You always kept your boots on in case you had to run. You tied your plaid shirt around your waist over the only t-shirt you had, an old faded camp shirt that was another reminder of your past life. The summer had been harsh and unrelenting and scavenging and walking miles in the Georgia heat had been brutal, constantly testing your thirst however it was coming to an end and you knew the winter was going to be even worse if you didn’t find somewhere more secure. You slumped your denim jacket over your shoulders and put on your backpack before leaving the small barn, knife at the ready. You would miss your makeshift home that had sheltered you from the world, but you hoped someone else would find it once you had left. You didn’t know exactly where you were going but you wanted to make it to the small town a few miles away before the sun rose fully in the sky. You made your way through the woods, the familiar ache in your legs from your daily hiking trips to the water stream resurfacing as you picked up your pace. The sun was still rising so the woods were dusky, gloomy but peaceful. You walked for about two hours before you reached the long dirt road that led to the town. You allowed yourself to stop for a rest, stretching your legs and taking the smallest sip of water, knowing you had to conserve it for the day. You balled your hands into fists and pushed your stomach inwards, tricking it into feeling full to try and distract yourself from the growing hunger pains, a trick a former leader of an old group had taught you.

The silence you had become accustomed to was suddenly interrupted as you heard the snarl of a walker emerging from the other side of the trees. Walkers were rare when you were deep in the forest and you only had to deal with the occasional straggler, however you were edging closer to your destination and knew that there would be more walkers ahead. You quickly grabbed ahold of your knife taking a deep breath and in one swift move brought it down on the poor thing’s skull, instantly silencing it. You couldn’t help but wander if he - No, it- you reminded yourself had a family before all of this. You swiftly pushed that thought aside knowing it wouldn’t do any good. Even though it was smaller than you and weak, killing it had used a lot of your energy and you were starting to feel faint. You knew you were going to have to regain some strength if you were going to walk another hour and a half until you reached the town -Fuck it- you thought reaching into your backpack for the granola bar. You struggled to even open it, using more strength than you had as you took a small bite, appreciating how it felt in your mouth, the maple syrup it was coated in feeling sweet on your tongue. It was like heroin. You chewed slowly and deliberately, savouring it as you broke up the rest of it into three parts before putting it securely into your pocket, saving it for later.

You wanted to curl up in a ball on the dirt road for a few moments, your whole body exhausted and hungry. You had no time to stop and rest as you saw another walker emerge from the trees about 40 feet away from you. It was slowly making its way towards you however it was big and you knew it could easily overpower you in your current state. You forced your feet to move, ignoring the burn in your chest. You were faster than the walkers. If I keep walking it can’t get to me. This was the mentality you adopted for the rest of the day.

You had been walking for about an hour and had put some distance between you and the now group of walkers that had gathered. There was about five of them and even though you were practically running you still looked back at every chance you got. You came across the familiar sign for the town, telling you you were half a mile off. Not long now. Then you can rest. You kept a steady pace as you sipped on your water. The town came into view on the horizon, little houses and stores all lined up. You had lost the walkers that were trailing you and you were hoping the town was as empty as it was when you had re searched it for the hundredth time the week before. You felt the familiar heeby jeebies as you made your way down the desolate street, desperately wishing you had someone with you, the loneliness getting to you. It was times like this you wish your brother was here to crack a joke. You couldn’t remember the last time you had laughed.

You stopped outside a house you had searched before knowing it was free of walkers. You cautiously searched the lower half of the house, checking the kitchen, living room and small bathroom making sure to check behind every door. You made your way up the staircase methodically doing the same thing in all the rooms. Once you were convinced the house was still empty you made your way to one of the bedrooms. You had to deal with your hunger straight away as it was becoming all consuming. You found the rest of your granola bar and told yourself you were only going to eat two pieces of it, saving the third but you lacked the self control and ate it all. The burn in your stomach eased a little bit as the food settled, however the panic set in as you realised you were down to no food supplies. You tried to calm yourself down by familiarising yourself with the room. You would deal with your food problem after you had rested. You had been in here before but only to search for walkers.

You tried to tell from the decor who it belonged to. The walls were a pale pink colour and were covered in band posters and fairy lights that had been strung up. The batteries were long dead but you could imagine what the room looked like with them switched on. Looking closer, you saw photos taped to the wall in a heart shaped montage. The photos were of a young girl, maybe 16/17 with all of her friends, smiling and laughing. She had blue eyes as clear as swimming pools in July and long blonde windswept hair. You instantly felt a pang of sadness for this beautiful stranger as you realised you were standing in the remnants of this girl’s life. You made your way over to the dresser and caught a glimpse of yourself in the mirror, letting out a small gasp. Your hair was hanging loosely out of its braid and you noticed how long it had grown, well past your shoulders. Your cheekbones were sharper and your face looked hollow, devoid of any colour from your lack of food and rest. Your already pale complexion not doing you any favours. You took your hair down from it’s braid taking a moment to try and unwind all the knots. Your body desperately needed sleep and more food but you wanted to feel human again. You didn’t even recognise yourself. You opened the dresser drawer and searched around for a hairbush, finding moisturisers, hair products and perfumes and took the moment to rub some cream into your face, pretending for a brief moment that you were just a normal teenager in a normal world getting ready for school. You weren’t starving, lonely or tired, you were simply moisturising. Your skin tingled at the sensation, not used to being pampered after a year of a makeup less world. You kept searching for a brush when your hand touched smooth metal, it was a tin. You suddenly remembered your teenage years when you hid your diaries in your sock drawers and left little notes for the future you to find. This girl wouldn’t want a stranger snooping around in her things and you felt guilty for a moment, but she could have some hidden cigarettes or medical supplies. What you would give for a cigarette. You knew smoking was a horrible habit but it was your vice before all of this. Curiosity got the better of you and you hesitantly opened it, not believing what you had found. Tears of happiness threatened to spill over as your searched the small tin. It was packed full with chocolate, beef jerky, gummy candies and peanuts. You had found this strangers snack stash.

[imaginesfordayz]

Tickets ~ Jack Avery (Part Two)

Read part one HERE!

Word Count: 2,699

Warning: Some cursing and cheating

“Y/N, don’t get me wrong I love you, but what the hell are you doing in the kitchen at six in the morning?” Y/F/N yawned, making her way down the stairs, and grabbing a glass of orange juice. “Normally when I wake up I don’t really see you for another three hours or so.”

“I was hungry.” You lied, turning your attention back to the pan heating up in front of you on the stove. “Can you grab the butter for me? You’re closer to the fridge and if I don’t have butter these eggs are going to stick and then all hell is going to break loose and we can’t have that first thing in the morning.”

Y/F/N walked over to the fridge and searched around for the butter and after a few minutes she turned her head towards you. “Um, Y/N, we’re out of butter.”

You threw the spatula down onto the pan out of frustration. “Well isn’t this just fucking fantastic!” You screamed and walked out of the kitchen after turning off the stove. You stomped into the living room and tried to find something to watch on Netflix. Y/F/N followed shortly after and sat down next to you.

“It’s just butter, Y/N. I can always run to the store real fast. It’s literally just down the street.” She offered, handing you a blanket. You looked at her and she noticed you had tears in your eyes. “Wait, did something happen?”

“Carter.” You said, turning towards your best friend and bundling up in the blanket. “It’s finally sinking in that we’re done. I wasn’t sad yesterday because I was so angry about the whole thing, but today the anger has subsided and now I just feel heartbroken. Why wasn’t I good enough?”

“You can be mad at him and call Carter names all day long and believe me when I say I will not stop you. In fact, I encourage it and I would join you, but I will absolutely not tolerate you saying it’s your fault and that you’re not good enough. Because that’s the biggest load of bullshit that has ever come out of your mouth and I’ve known you since we were in diapers.” Y/F/N pulled you into her and held you while you sobbed into her shirt. “You are so much more than you give yourself credit for. Carter cheated on you, you didn’t cheat on him which automatically makes you a better person than him by default. The two of you have been fighting for the last whole year of your relationship, of course you’re going to feel hurt by all this, but just know that you have me here for you no matter what you need to say or do. Not to mention I’m sure Kyle would be willing to lend an ear.”

“I loved him.” You cried even harder. “We were together for three years for God’s sake! How could that asshole just throw that away because he wanted to bang some random girl? He and I have gone through so much, and he just tore all the hard work we put into that relationship to shreds in a matter of seconds.”

“Give me your phone.” Y/F/N demanded, holding out her hand and you handed it to her without question. She punched in your passcode and messed around for a few minutes before handing it back to you. “There. No more Carter.”

“What did you do?” You asked, going through your phone to see what she changed.

“I unfollowed him on Twitter, removed him on Facebook, deleted his number, and you know all the pictures you have with him?” You nodded, “Well, I downloaded an app that only allows you to see those pictures now if you have a password, and I’m not telling you what it is until I think you’re ready. I don’t need you beating yourself up over all this. I already unfollowed and blocked him on everything last night. He’s lucky I didn’t drive down to his house and remove his babymaker.”

You laughed slightly. “Y/F/N, I honestly don’t know what I would do without you.” The tears stopped streaming down your face at this point and you looked at your friend with such love in your eyes. “You’re my rock, have I ever told you that?”

“It’s about time you realize this.” She smiled and nudged you. “Besides, between you and I, I’m glad that dickwad is out of our lives. I know you say you loved him, but he honestly gave you nothing but heartache and pain. I hated seeing you in that toxic relationship. You’re now free and you can grow back into the amazing person I know you are. The one that Carter tried to change.”

“I love you so so so so so so much.” You pulled your friend into a suffocating hug. “But I have a question.”

“Yes?”

“What are we going to do about breakfast?” 

A few hours later, you and Y/F/N made your way back into the apartment after going out for breakfast. Neither one of you really felt like going to the store to buy anything that morning so you lazed out and went to a restaurant. The two of your settled on the couch and watched a few episodes of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia before you shot up and ran to your room screaming, “I forgot about meeting with Jack! Can you text him telling him I’ll be a bit late for me while I go change? Thank you. Love you!”

You quickly got changed into a more appropriate outfit than your sleepwear and ran down the stairs grabbing your jacket and keys yelling to Y/F/N on the couch, “I’ll text you every chance I get!” and with that you were out the door.

Somehow you managed to make it to the café only fifteen minutes late. When you walked through the doors you realized that you had no idea what he looked like, so how were you supposed to know which one was him? You glanced around and saw a group of students in one corner probably studying for upcoming exams, in another section there was a group of older ladies probably getting together for their weekly gossip session. Of course, there were couples scattered throughout the café, but you couldn’t find a boy sitting alone so you went and sat at a table by yourself and were about to text him when you heard a voice.

“Is it okay if I sit here?” You looked up and the first thing you noticed was a mess of curls. You nodded and he took the seat. You noticed that he had two cups of hot chocolate in front of him and your curiosity was piqued.

“You know they do refills here for half the price, right?” He looked at you confused and you gestured to the mugs and he laughed.

“Oh, I’m actually waiting for someone, but she’s running late. One of these is for her, mine’s half gone already.” He said giving you a smile. “I have no idea what she looks like but my one friend –“

“Let me guess, his name is Kyle?” You interrupted. He turned to you nodding and you saw the realization reach his eyes. “I’m Y/N, I’m assuming you’re Jack?”

“The one and only, and here.” He hands you one of the mugs. “I’m not sure if it’s still hot but it’s still chocolate.”

“Hey, it’ll just be like chocolate milk then, which is just as good. Thank you.” You smiled taking a sip. “I’m really sorry about running late. I had a really bad morning and my friend helped me out with some seriously needed comforting.”

“Yeah, Kyle told me you recently went through something pretty traumatic.” Jack said sheepishly. “He didn’t tell me what it was, but I’m not going to pry or anything, but if you need to vent, I’ve been told I’m a good listener. And don’t worry about being late, I found ways to keep myself busy. Besides, my uber caused me to run kind of late myself. I’ve only been waiting ten minutes.”

“Yeah, I don’t really want to go into it right now, but thank you. That really does mean a lot.” You smiled at him and you saw a hint of red grow onto his cheeks. “Bottom line is I walked in on my boyfriend of three years cheating on me. Hence the extra ticket. Which reminds me!” You reached into your bag and took out one of the tickets and handed it to him. “I believe this belongs to you.”

He picked it up and put it into his wallet. “Thank you, it’ll come in handy the night of the concert.” You giggled, causing another grin to break out on his face. “And I’m sorry to hear about your ex. If it means anything, he’s definitely an idiot for doing something like that to someone as beautiful as you.”

Now it was your turn to blush. “Thank you,” your eyes once again made their way back up to his hair. “Now I have a question….”

“It’s a perm.” He laughed. “I get asked about my hair all the time. It’s kind of impossible to ignore. My hair is actually naturally straight, but I got bored with it.”

“Well, the curls suit you very nicely.” You smiled, taking another sip of your drink. “I’m not going to lie, I was very nervous about coming and meeting you today.”

“Why’s that?” Jack smirked taking a drink of his own beverage.

“Kyle is one of my more…questionable…friends,” you laughed. “And I didn’t know what to expect when he told me that he had a friend to send me to the concert with. When he told me your name was Jack, my mind instantly thought it was going to be some 40 year old man.”

“Well, I’m not quite 40, but I do make a lot of dad noises when I sit down.” You laughed again and his eyes widened. “I’m not trying to tell you I’m a dad or anything. I’m not. I’m only 18 and I don’t even have a girlfriend.”

“I wasn’t thinking you were a dad, don’t worry.” You laughed harder.

“This isn’t going so well is it?” He asked you while scratching the back of his neck.

“I think it’s going perfectly fine,” you smiled at him and you saw his panic settle down a little. “In fact, this is the hardest I’ve laughed in a couple days. I needed this.”

“Well, if you think that’s funny, you should really see me when I’m around my friends. They definitely bring out the best in me.” He smiled warmly. “We’re all in this band together called Why Don’t We, maybe you’ve heard of us?”

“I’m sorry, I haven’t…” You cringed, feeling bad. “I’ll definitely check out some of your songs when I get home! I’m sure you guys are great.”

“Don’t worry about it, we’ve only been together for a year so we’re still making a name for ourselves.” He brushed it off. “But between you and I, I really do think we have what it takes to make it. I mean we’re already living in Los Angeles together! That’s got to count for something. We have a pretty big fan base formed as well.”

“How many guys are in your band?” You asked, interested in this new information.

“There are five of us total. There’s me, obviously, Jonah, Daniel, Corbyn, and Zach. They’re all really fun guys.” You could hear how much he loved his friends and how proud he was based on the way he talked about them. “Maybe you could meet them sometime!”

“I’d love to!” You smiled and before he could answer you heard you heard a familiar voice on the other side of the café, you turned your head and your eyes landed on Carter. “Hey, Jack, do you mind if we go somewhere else? Like right now?”

“Uh, sure, why? What’s wrong?” He followed your line of sight and when he saw Carter he put two and two together. “Oh, is that the ex?”

You nodded and stood up, “Yes.” Carter heard your voice and his head snapped towards you and he got up and started to make his way over to you.

“Y/N,” he said, halfway across the room. “I need to talk to you.”

“Sorry, we were just leaving,” You scowled. “Come on, Jack.”

Jack quickly got up, nodded to Carter, and followed you out of the café and into your car. You sat in the driver’s seat and started shaking. Jack reached over and ran a soothing hand up and down your back. “Are you okay? Do you need to go home? Do you need some air? Are you going to throw up?”

You rested your head in your hands and slowly calmed down. After a few seconds, you recomposed yourself and turned to Jack. “Thank you for not just running off. I’m sorry. This is the last thing I wanted to happen today.”

“Don’t worry about it, you were bound to run into him eventually.” Jack smiled at you reassuringly.

“Yeah, I just didn’t expect it to be the very next day.” You laughed uncomfortably. “Anyway, where to now? Or do you just want me to drop you off at home.”

“Actually, why don’t you come over and meet the guys?” Jack beamed. “They’re just going to hound me with questions when I get home anyway, might as well have you there to meet them yourself.”

“Alright, just give me directions as we go.” You smiled at him, turning on your car. “But hold on, I need to call my friend Y/F/N real quick. I’m sure she’s panicking over the fact I haven’t texted her in half an hour.”

“Of course, best friend duty calls. I completely understand.” He laughed, “Do you want me to leave the car?”

You dialed the number and pulled your phone up to your ear, “No don’t worry, this will be short. Hey, Y/F/N?”

“Oh my GOD do you have any idea how nervous I’ve been? You were supposed to text me like twenty minutes ago!” Y/F/N yelled at you. “How’s it going? Did you leave? Is he a creep? Is he nice? What’s he look like? What are you guys doing? How’s it going? Tell me EVERYTHING.”

“I’ll tell you everything when I get home, but I’m not sure when that’s going to be. We’re actually heading over to his house so I can meet some of his friends.” You told her and you knew the shit storm was about to go down.

“You’re going to his house already?” Y/F/N screamed. “How do you know he’s not taking you home to kill you? Are you sure there are even friends there or is this just a lure to lead to you to your demise?”

“No, all his friends apparently live together because they’re in some band together, but I’ll get more into that when I come home. But for now I gotta go, love you, bye!” You hung up quickly before your friend could protest even more. You Turned to Jack. “She said okay and have fun.”

Jack burst out laughing. “I couldn’t hear anything she said, but I know for a fact that’s not what came out of her mouth. I heard a lot of muffled shouting” You laughed. “She doesn’t trust me, does she?”

“Well, she hasn’t met you yet. But that’s something you have to be well prepared for ahead of time. She can be a handful.” You smiled warmly thinking about your friend. “Now, do your friends know I’m coming or are we surprising them?”

“I mean I haven’t told them or anything, but I thought we could play a prank on them when we get there.”

“Alright fill me in on your idea while we drive.” And with that the two of your made your way over to the Why Don’t We house, where you were about to meet four boys who were going to become a very big part of your life without you knowing it. 

[elevenhoursinfront-blog]

29th November 2017

We slept fine considering how hot it was. It does literally make you feel like you're oxygen is running out, it's weird. We walked over to the toilet straight away as we were busting. We said good morning to a few fellow campers as we walked through the rest area.

We got back to the car and the camper'car' next to us was eating breakfast. They arrived last night as Steve and I were sitting in the car park bay in our underwear (what a sight). Two girls and one guy. He had a roof tent which looked pretty cool. They were all very inconsiderately loud and from Germany. I've met so many German's this year that I reckon I could speak it. I recognise it quicker than English now! Don't get me wrong, I've met a few gems that I'll be visiting and if I time it right, it'll be during Oktoberfest!

We got dressed in the car and had our breakfast cereal on one of the picnic benches. There were flies and birds everywhere which were slightly annoying. It will be nice to eat a meal at a table inside without insects. What a thought for the future.

We wanted to get on the road as soon as possible, so by 0900, we were off. It was my turn to drive so I did. Another five hour drive. I'm sure my bottom is going square.

It's funny how we consider a 5 hour drive to be a normal drive here and a 1 hour drive to be popping to the shops.

My ankle started to really hurt after about 3.5 hours. Our old girl does not have cruise control so you can imagine how much the ankle hurts after 5 hours. 

Even though the drives are really long, I really enjoy them. Steve and I get to talk to each other for hours and it's amazing how much you can still learn about your partner, even after years of being together.

We pulled up to our caravan park around 1330. It was called 'The Reef' and had loads of mermaids everywhere. We parked up and walked in. The door was locked and a resident came out of a massive RV to check us in. He started checking us in when his wife came and done the rest.

She was lovely and told us about all the good stuff to do in the area. She gave us a map and circled things off. She got us some leaflets including our surf lesson that we had picked to do prior to arriving. We'll be doing that tomorrow.

For the last few days, the rain hasn't really stopped. The skies were grey the whole drive down from Airlie Beach which is annoying. We parked in our spot and the park was fairly empty. The lady said it wasn't in season yet. We had picked unpowered because it was much cheaper, but still expensive.

I can't believe people are charging a good $50 a night when they know we're renting a home that costs $35 a night any way. It's so irritating.

We went for a wee and checked around the 'camp kitchen'. It wasn't much of a kitchen to be honest with you, it was a BBQ, sink and a kettle. That was all. We went back to our van and decided to drive to the town. This was the cheapest camp site in the area of Agnes Waters/1770 because it wasn't smack bang in the middle of the town. There were loads more along the beach front but you can imagine the price of those.

We jumped in the van and drove the 10 minutes in. The town itself was small. A lot smaller than either of us had pictured. It's very popular amongst backpackers but at first glance, I was struggling to see why. Most come here to learn to surf. It's the cheapest lesson along the coast only costing $17 for 3 hours. Elsewhere is around $70 for 2 hours.

We drove to the top of 1770 and parked up. There were a few lookout points which were meant to be stunning, and still were, it's just that it was the most miserable day. You don't appreciate a good view without the beautiful blue sky. The lookout points were a walk through the forest area which we did whilst we were starving. We hadn't eaten since breakfast this morning so we were walking around with a pack of Snack'A'Jacks. Steve was having a real 'mantrum' (tantrum for full grown men) because in his eyes, his East Coast trip had lead to this. I really enjoyed them and they're not very fattening. It filled a gap so what else can you ask for!

We walked back to the van, after I by accidentally hit Steve in the balls with the pack of Snack'A'Jacks. I was swinging them as I was walking but Steve managed to get in the way. He had one of those dramatic moments where he felt like he was actually, for real this time, dying. He was over it in a few seconds though and besides, it was an accident.

We drove to the bottom of the town and drove around. It appears there's a fair bit of money in 1770 and the houses were unreal. The majority of them are on a steep hill though and I am not about that sort of life. Imagine carrying your full shop up 10,000 steps just to get to the front door? Nope!

We pulled over at a shop that said 'Information Centre'. These are based in almost every town along the coast for backpackers to find out what is best to do. They're basically travel agents too so they will try to sell you as much as they can.

We walked in and picked up the leaflet for our surf lesson we pre-planned. The English lad in the agents said it's a good surf school and obviously, the cheapest. He said we didn't need to book in advance, we just turn up at the school at 0900. Woop!

There was one more trip I wanted to do in Agnes which is really, really popular and it's called 'Scooteroo'. It's basically a school of motorbikes which gets you dressed up in black leathers with flames on and you drive round like you're a red neck for the day. You don't need a bike license as they're not real big bikes although they're are the spitting image of Harley's! It's pretty awesome but it was $65 each. I didn't really want to waste so much money on driving round on a bike, although it looked so cool.

As we were in the store, the heavens opened and it was chucking buckets. We ran to the car and decided to go to IGA to get some washing liquid. We were desperate to do a wash but we didn't keep any of our laundry stuff. Silly, really. We went inside and I managed to get a 2L bottle for the price of a 1L bottle – bargain! I bet we don't even use 1L of it...

We decided on having Alfredo pasta so Steve picked up some chicken breast and a garlic bread to go with it. We left in our van and returned to our camp. I was quite chilly so I put a hoody on and got our stuff out for dinner. We have to try and cook before it gets dark otherwise we're stuck with only a head torch.

We got over to the camp kitchen and tried to preheat the BBQ. We didn't have a lighter so we couldn't light the gas. Luckily, a guy came over with one of those long clicky lighters and lit it for us. He was from Scotland and really chatty – a nice guy. He was on his own with his Labrador. Steve reckons he's split up with his wife and now on his own.

We cooked our dinner which was delicious. It got dark but luckily there were kitchen lights. Just as we were finishing, the guy's Labrador came running over to see if there was any left for him. He came running over shouting at his dog but ended up standing there, chatting to us for about 40 minutes. Steve was right – his wife left him. He didn't have enough money to get a house so he was forced to leave his job and buy a mobile type home. He has the dog luckily so he has some sort of companion. I felt so sorry for him, his world had just been turned upside down and he's lost everything. He did his year working visa when he was around 19 years old. He's a good 40 years old now. He moved to Brisbane and settled down there for the rest of his life. He has no intention on moving back home. He's going to travel Australia for the year and see where his life takes him. He must be so lonely, which is why I guess he stayed to talk to us for so long. He was enjoying some company for the first time in a week, two weeks.

I washed our stuff up and we jumped into the van. We got our stuff ready for a shower and went just before bed. Cold showers before bed to at least give us half a chance of not over heating.

We were back and in bed by 2100. The rain hadn't stopped since we saw it open up at the stores earlier. It was so heavy and loud on the van, I thought it might come through.

[kayleygoestolondon]

Hola, Spain!

I’ve just logged on and realized that I haven’t posted since last summer... eek. In my defense, I didn’t travel anywhere exciting the first half of the school year, and by the time I went to Paris and Morocco, I thought people had surely lost interest in reading my posts. We have more important things to read about! Brexit! Donald Trump’s latest tweets! What bizarre name Kim Kardashian will give her newest baby! However, I had such an incredible time in Spain and Portugal that I figured I might as well write it down. Even if my grandparents are my only devoted readers, it’ll make a good memento for me to reflect on fondly when I’m 80 years old in a retirement centre in Camrose. 

My latest trip began with arguably the best flight I’ve ever had. Since I usually fly alone, I’m always stuck sitting beside one of the following Flight Ruiners™:

Crying infant who will not be soothed

Severely overweight person who insists on taking up most of my personal space

Armrest hogger

Somebody with a terrible illness (most likely the plague or Ebola) that coughs and sneezes the entire flight

NOT THIS TIME! I was seated with two guys from central London who were on their way to Barcelona for a bachelor party. At first, I expected the worst: when I flew to Morocco, an entire bachelor party boarded the plane at 6 AM already drunk and proceeded to be the most obnoxious human beings I’ve ever encountered for three hours. These guys redeemed my faith in good old British lads. They chatted with me the whole way about travel and insisted I have a drink with them to celebrate being hired at a new job! They even paid, which was great, because I am the stingiest person in the world and would never pay for a beer on a flight. It’s also part of my personal vendetta against RyanAir.  When we arrived in Barcelona, it was after midnight and pouring rain, so they offered to share their cab with me to make sure I got to my AirBnB safely. Chivalry isn’t dead after all!

My friends from Canada (Dillon, Candice, and Bal) were waiting up for me at the AirBnB with McDonald’s chicken nuggets and a batch of questionable homemade sangria. If that isn’t a welcome, I don’t know what is. 

BARCELONA

We had breakfast at the cutest tiny cafe and I had the best omelette of my life made by an equally cute and tiny Spanish woman. Also discovered that “cafe con leche” (Spanish coffee with milk) is pretty delicious.

We did a walking tour of the city and learned lots of interesting historical facts while seeing some of the main sights. On the tour, we met some other Canadians so we went for drinks with them afterwards. What a small world. 

Discovered you can go into a store and buy an entire jug of wine. Or, if you’re an efficient on-the-go type of person... wine juice boxes.

Checked out the Sagrada Familia. I’ve been to nearly every famous cathedral in Europe (#humblebrag) and this was the best one. If you go to Barcelona, it is 100% worth seeing.

Walked up to Parc Guell, which has a beautiful view over the city. Fun fact: the park was designed by Gaudi, the same designer of the Sagrada Familia. If you’re gonna read this all the way through, you bet I’m gonna give you some unrequested knowledge. His architectural style is pretty distinct and I really loved seeing how those elements were incorporated into the design of the park. 

Hopped in the car and prepared for the first portion of our journey. This is where it’s really important for me to note that we started our trip with “Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under” by Shania Twain (more like Shania SPAIN, am I right? lololol). This song did not leave our heads for the entire week. I’m not exaggerating. We sang it constantly. In the car. At the beach. In the bar. SHANIA TWAIN EVERY DAY. 

DRIVING IN SPAIN

Since Spain drives on the right side like we do (sorry UK friends, but the left side is stupid and I will fight you about it), it was pretty easy to navigate... excluding the massive traffic circles with stoplights in them and no lanes marked. We circled those in terror, not knowing what we were doing but somehow avoiding collisions.

There are tolls EVERYWHERE. We paid 40 euros in tolls between Barcelona and Valencia, which is a toll-tally ridiculous amount (lol, I’m not even sorry for these jokes)

The highways are really well-maintained, but are virtually empty. We encountered almost no traffic at all and didn’t see any police either. Dillon did not take advantage of this and drove a respectable speed the whole way, rather than living out our Fast & The Furious fantasy

The Spanish countryside is really gorgeous. It’s much more mountainous than I realized, particularly the areas that we drove through. We got some really stunning scenic views along the way.

We all had important roles within the car. Dillon was the Driver, I was the Navigator/DJ, Candice and Bal were the backseat Snoozers and Snack Providers. This meant that Dillon was the MVP of the trip, because he drove without any road rage at all (how is that even possible... my driving is just like a constant stream of swearing), whereas my sole contribution was playing 500 Miles by the Proclaimers as often as possible. 

VALENCIA

We had the unfortunate timing of arriving Valencia just as a massive football game was ending; Valencia had won against Barcelona to win the Copa Del Rey. The streets were swarming with people and the honking was endless. Easily the second-most stressful part of our drive. Want to know the worst one? READ ON FOR MORE (#clickbait)

Spent our whole day there at the beach. The weather was great, if not a bit windy, and Dillon was magically transformed into a red lobster thanks to the sunshine. We all went home with sand everywhere. I think I still had some in my ears at the end of the trip.

We enjoyed beers and a selection of meats and cheeses on the beach. We ate so much meat and cheese during this week. You may be thinking, “Meat and cheese seem very impractical to eat on the beach because of all the sand”, and you would be CORRECT... but sandy cheese is better than no cheese. 

There were no toilets or change stalls at the beach so we had to go on a bit of an excursion to find somewhere. We eventually infiltrated a fancy hotel to use their lobby bathroom. Candice and Bal got caught going in the second time when the concierge asked if they “had enjoyed the toilettes, and would they perhaps now like to pay for something from the hotel bar”. They ran away. Classic escape!

We sampled a traditional Spanish drink, horchata, which is a “plant-based milk drink” according to Wikipedia. Sounds appealing, right? We collectively hated it. That’s what we get for trying something non-alcoholic. Therefore, it was logically much safer to stick with beer for the rest of the trip. At least, that’s what I told myself.

GRANADA

En route to Granada, we passed through a place called Lorca. High on top of a mountain, we could see a massive fortress. We spontaneously decided to drive up there and check it out. Turns out Castillo de Lorca was built in the 9th century and is one of the largest castles in Spain. Super cool... and we were the only tourists there!

Most Stressful Driving Moment: leaving Lorca Castle. Obviously because it’s on top of a mountain, the roads coming down were windy and steep. Our Google Maps got confused and took us down a side road into this local area that was hellishly narrow and we ended up going down a road that was like a 75 degree angle. I had visions of us driving our poor Volkswagen Polo off the edge of the cliff. Dillon, ever the stoic hero, got us out of it while I panicked and failed at asking locals for directions.

Our apartment in Granada was in the historic part of the city, within the old city walls. Think super tiny, winding cobblestone streets with high buildings. It was very charming, if not excessively sweaty climbing all the stairs. Good thing there was beer at the top!

In the evening, we went for a really great traditional dinner and then to a flamenco show. Definitely one of the highlights of the trip for me. For some reason, the waiter did not seem to think we were capable of drinking 2L of sangria when we first placed our order. We proved him wrong.

We sampled churros with chocolate the next morning. This is apparently quite a traditional thing and honestly I could eat it every day for the rest of my life. Who doesn’t want to start their day with deep-fried dough and chocolate dip?

As we left Granada, we stopped at Alhambra Palace & Gardens. It was founded in 889 AD and mostly constructed in the 13th century. The gardens were stunning and were more impressive than anything I’ve seen before, including the gardens of the Taj Mahal. (#humblebrag2) 

SEVILLE

It was a long walk from our AirBnB to the centre of Seville and it was about 35 degrees out, so we punctuated our stroll with frequent beer stops. This meant that we were feeling pretty good by the time we arrived at the Plaza de Espana. Some scenes from Game of Thrones were filmed here, so you could probably add our names to the credits now.

We then had the best seafood paella and sangria at a local restaurant! The paella was HUGE... and we ate all of it. No regrets. 

Seville was one of the friendliest places I’ve ever been. When we went for breakfast the next morning, we went to a local cafe where literally nobody spoke any English. The manager seemed really excited that we were there and got us our own separate table. There was no menu, so we managed to communicate that he could bring us whatever he wanted. We got this awesome selection of incredible sandwiches and he checked to make sure we were happy with them. Everywhere we went, people were super eager to please and would joke around with us, despite the language barrier. I’d go back here in a second.

FARO

We crossed the border into Portugal after leaving Seville and made a pitstop at Praia de Faro. It’s a small island that’s basically just beautiful beach and little bars and restaurants. We had some great beach time and beers because it was a scorching 37 degrees. Dillon attained an even higher level of lobster. 

Women on the beaches of Spain and Portugal often go topless... so when we asked a stranger to take a photo of the four of us on the beach, I realized afterwards that there was a mostly-naked lady in the background. Thank goodness for Photoshop; I made that disappear. 

LISBON

People in Portugal speak better English than people in Spain. I only managed to learn two words in Portuguese: “cerveja” (beer) and “obrigada” (thank you). I got along with those pretty well :)

The metro system in Lisbon is super easy and efficient, so for the first time we took advantage of public transit and spared ourselves walking everywhere in the extreme heat

When we went out for dinner that evening, we discovered that boiled meats are pretty standard in Portuguese cuisine. This was not my favourite :( On the other hand, Portuguese custard tarts (pasteis de nata) are phenomenal.  

We checked out the seaside and a couple of cool markets. We also took a walking tour here to learn more about the city. Our tour guide recommended a super cool bar underneath a church. There was some kind of street festival going on, so there were outdoor bars and decorations everywhere. We explored that and then ended at an outdoor cinema. 

I had to get up at 4:30 the next morning to get an Uber to the airport. Note to self: next time I have an early flight, don’t have so many cervejas the night before. Lesson learned. 

If you’ve made it this far, wow - you probably need a hobby! This trip was so much fun and so interesting; I really wanted to take the time to tell the story. If you haven’t been to Spain or Portugal, maybe I’ve convinced you to go. I couldn’t recommend it enough. I owe the biggest thank you to Dillon, Candice, and Bal for being my travel companions and for making me laugh a million times during the trip. What an amazing final experience before I head back to Canada in August :) 

[vita-e]

My MPHFPC Movie Notes

Love the opening credits, fits spirit and theme of the book

(music in general is good)

Hate the different opening line – rather generic imo.

Asa please I know you’re a good actor. Please stop being so flat.

“Jake”

This all feels rushed.

Grandpa has lost his marbles and his acting ability.

“That guy gave me the heebie-jeebies” is all you have to say after nearly hitting a man?

“Jake” was in the house for only 10 seconds, didn’t even bother checking the whole house.

This opening is so boring that my foot fell asleep.

Was this the first take? There’s little to no emotion.

Grandpa Portman doesn’t sound like he’s dying. At all.

1943?! What’s the point of changing the date?!

Also, what’s the point of changing his last words which were a lot more mysterious?

C’mon dude, your grandpa just died! Show some emotion!!

Why do the hollows look like Slenderman rip-offs?

Dr. Golan’s a woman? I’m fine with this – but I won’t be later.

“A month ago,”? Wasn’t it more than a few months until he finally sought help? (I haven’t read the book in a while)

Asa is still a bit flat but he’s doing better in these scenes.

Tiny Jacob is super cute!

His acting is bad, though. This is a given for child actors.

The dad is an ornithologist. He wouldn’t change a bird documentary to a football game (although that was a bit funny.)

Why does Miss Peregrine look so young? In the book, she looks more like a mother waiting for her children to give her some goddamn grandkids.

Bronwyn is 9 now I guess.

Hugh is 11 now I guess.

“Where’s Emma? She could float.” SHE COULD NOT.

Grandpa Portman sounds more English than Polish. Throwing in a Polish nickname doesn’t convince me that he’s Polish.

“Little tiger”? He called him “Yakob.”

“No eyes,” in the book, Jacob tells a sketch artist that they have 2 like a normal mammal. This may be personal taste, but for me, monsters are scarier when they look more human.

Kids this age wouldn’t laugh! They’d see the picture of Millard and go “Holy shit! He’s invisible!” Kids are gullible, dammit. (I had this problem with the book as well.)

Funny how younger!Jacob dresses exactly like Asa.

Damn, kid, he said he didn’t want to talk about it! Chill!

Still 0 emotion, I guess.

“He was a wonderful grandpa, but not… such a great dad, you know?” Damn, that hits home for me – but doesn’t this talk happen later in the book? Like, this talk happens at the island.

Wait, the scene just ends there? No argument? Damn, Jake just doesn’t care that his dad is smack talking his idol.

JESUS fuckin’ twins.

Jacob’s cousins were brats and I believe teenagers as well, so why are they perfect lil’ angel twins that look 10 at the oldest?

Also, why is Jacob’s house so small? His mom is an heiress to a Wal-Mart type store-chain.

Cairnholm is apparently popular enough to warrant postcards.

And popular enough to warrant a spot in a travel book, wtf? It’s not even big enough to be seen on a map.

The dad looking at Jake like he’s crazy gives me life lmfao.

Cairnholm is 100% my aesthetic.

Where’s Kev???

What? But… Uncle Oggie is a relative of Martin?

Didn’t imagine Kev looking like that but okay.

Franklin is me trying to make friends tbh.

I’m so glad Worm and M.C. Dirty D made it in.

Aren’t the residents like… a bit afraid of the home themselves?

Aesthetic™

Wait, what? Oggie can see? He looks blind.

1943? At that point, Germany was taking a more defensive stance, doing lots of evacuating.

“And they were lovely, too.” In the book, Uncle Oggie claims they were strange and rarely spoke.

“3 months later”? He left the day after the loop was created!

Is that the dart competition I keep seeing on Vine?

Wait, why is Enoch there? I know they fucked with his character a lot but he probably joined after the loop was created since he’s from an older loop, otherwise he’d age forward ~30-40 years – so why is he next to (who I presume is) Abe, who left after the loop was made? (or in this case, before!)

Enoch’s little laboratory was in the basement, not upstairs.

The twins might’ve been in the loop at some point, but they certainly aren’t there when Jacob arrives.

Wait, so instead of chasing after them, he runs away? Jake’s a pussy.

And he trips and gets knocked unconscious by a rock. Wow.

Bronwyn, despite being the wrong age and having no personality, is at least cute and it’s fun to watch her carry Jake.

Why is Millard so tiny? You can say that his age is ambiguous, but in the book Jacob clearly states that his voice sounds like that of a young man’s, not a young child’s.

“You’re Emma!” (John Cena voice) Are you sure about that?

Why is Olive, like, 16? She’s supposed to be 7-9 years old (and ofc she has Emma’s powers instead.)

“She sent us to get you”? Why, though?

Standing there all creepy ain’t gonna make him want to follow you.

Jake doesn’t seem to see the change in the weather.

“I am the manager” reminds me of that one Tumblr comic.

Ngl, Millard would do this – if just for fun. He’s a little shit like that.

What’s the point of lighting the place on fire? They’re distracted enough.

Did they just steal someone’s horse?

Millard no longer has any personality out of “Yeah” and “Yep.”

Emma is not nearly bitchy enough. Or at all.

The house is gorgeous! It looks just like I imagined it!

What the fuck, why is Miss Peregrine so young? I know I mentioned this before but what the fuck.

“Right on time”?

“I had to kill them twice this month” WHAT. MISS PEREGRINE DOESN’T KILL UNLESS NECESSARY

Miss Peregrine is not nearly this creepy in the book.

THAT’S NOT ENOCH.

Why does he sound mildly Scottish? He’s from London and has a slight cockney accent.

From now own, every time I see Enoch, 5 years are taken off my life.

Why is Fiona 11 and English? She’s supposed to be in her late teens and Irish – not to mention, SHE DOESN’T TALK!

I don’t think Fiona’s powers make things huge.

“Imm-breen” it’s “imm-brinn”

Do the twins have names?

Claire looks cute!

I don’t think Millard, no matter his age, would be very interested in physical activity. He’s a brains over brawn kind of type, you know?

Kind of uncharacteristic of Hugh to send his bees after a friend.

I’m gonna cry. At least one of my babies looks right.

Horace feels… off. All the components of his personality are certainly there, but in different degrees than in the book.

I’m sorry, what? A daily chore that’s reset by the loop? Miss P, these are kids and teenagers! They’ll get bored of doing that every day! I know because I am a teenager!

That squirrel would be going crazy and scratching her up. I know this is a nitpick but squirrels are vicious, man.

Was this scene the only reason they swapped Emma and Olive’s peculiarities?

Why are her shoes so hard to take off? What if she has to get away in an emergency? She’s fucked!

Why’s it so hard to pull her down?

Emma doesn’t seem to heartbroken over Abe’s death. In the book, she bawled upon overhearing that he died.

This dialogue barely hints at Emma and Abe having a romantic relationship, making only people who read the book know this information. Non-book readers might just assume they were close friends.

Of course, instead of borrowing Victor’s clothes he has to borrow Abe’s.

God, am I the only one that hates looking at Finlay? He’s not ugly – a bit handsome actually! -- he’s just… kind of weird looking.

So… Olive is good friends with Enoch? Don’t get how they got that out of the book when they have no interactions in the first book.

His dolls are meant to be made of clay! Now he just looks like an older Sid.

The stop motion is terrible.

So, they care enough about Enoch’s character to remember that his parents ran a funeral parlor, but not enough to make him his actual character.

Did he not see Millard’s silverware moving? Did no one see it?

So, Enoch is clearly mad at the statement Horace made, so why hold back your retort by whispering? Was he sick on this day of filming?

No one needs that much carrot.

Hugh’s been living there for 70 years; pretty sure he’d never forget to put his net on.

Wait, so he remembered to bring it with him, but not to put it on?

S L U R M P

“She’s embarrassed in front of Jake.” Uh, Hugh, I think you flubbed your line, it’s “Claire don’t eat with the rest of us.”

Oh, thank god, she has the same peculiarity.

I’m crying, Claire is so adorable!

Enoch’s a bigger asshole than I remember him being in the books.

Although it wasn’t in the book, I do like the inclusion of the call from Abe. It makes no sense whatsoever, but I still like it.

Would Horace really be comfortable sharing his dreams – especially via projector?

“Some of his dreams are prophetic,” shouldn’t ‘some’ be ‘most’? Everyone’s dreams can hold some form of future-telling, albeit in an abstract way. If only some of his dreams are prophetic, that barely makes him peculiar.

I don’t get why Horace’s dreams are at all symbolic. They should be literal.

Why did he see Ms. Avocet get kidnapped when she, in fact, didn’t?

“Horace must’ve just had a bad dream, that’s all.” HIS DREAMS ARE PROPHETIC.

Wait, so they have a phonograph outside? And it works?

Why make Miss P creepier, but tone down the creepiness of the reset scene? Think of it: 9 children you barely know wearing gasmasks are singing an old song you don’t know to the tune of bombs falling. That’s a lot scarier than listening to the song on a phonograph.

I just remembered: they never offered the reason why Cairnholm gets bombed. In the book, it’s stated that the island had a sort of anti-aircraft gun which made it a target, but here the Germans simply bomb it to be seen as more evil than they already are.

I do admit, the reset scene does look beautiful.

Jake doesn’t seem as terrified, though.

Emma learning about cellphones is pretty cute.

And we’re back to talking about Abe.

“More than a few minutes,” it’s closer to hours, days even if we’re going by Library of Souls.

Already with Ms. Avocet?

(Cinema Sins voice) Jake’s dad reminds me too much of my own father in this scene.

Okay, so I’m assuming “Mr. Barron” is some wight higher-up? I know he’s not, but for the sake of the notes let’s pretend I don’t know.

Man, he really is my dad. He acts all weird and pretends like nothing happened later.

Who dresses like that in the 21st century!? I like the aesthetic too, but you don’t see me walking around in a Rococo period dress.

No one talks like this either.

That fuckin’ dart competition’s going to get me every time.

Who the fuck rests on their bed with their shoes on?

Bronwyn is cute but… I can’t get over the fact they made her younger and erased her character.

Would it kill someone to say, “Can we try that take again?”

WHY did they make Miss Peregrine so creepy? She was never this creepy!

Yeah, and he’s trying to warn you of potential danger. Also, can I ask where the fuck he got that letter?

Every time I see Finlay’s face a deep hatred resurfaces from the darkest corners of my heart.

All the kids in that room together just chilling is cute.

OKAY THIS IS WHAT PISSES ME OFF. I know for a damn fact that Enoch would never be mean to someone who was kind to him.

In the book, Bronwyn wanted nothing more than for Enoch to wake up Victor but go off I guess.

According to the timeline, HE SHOULD BARELY KNOW ABE.

That’s not how he brings them back to life, though? It’s not like he’s doing heart surgery, it’s more like he’s just gonna smell like death (literally) for most of the day.

Enoch being there as Jake realizes Victor’s dead really takes out a lot of the punch from the scene. Having him show up afterwards (like in the book) is better since it’s more like ‘Realization -> Confrontation’ instead of just… explaining and scaring.

I don’t know if Tim’s ever been around a normal human being before but usually you don’t see their heartbeat.

Okay, so… he can’t bring people back to life, only use them as puppets. First off, that’s gross, and second, that’s a nearly useless peculiarity.

How can tears roll down Victor’s cheek if he’s never conscious anymore? Dead people are known to shed tears, but it’s after they die and are decomposing, and Victor can’t decompose because he’s in a loop!

Does Miss P just do that on a regular basis?

Wasn’t that a rowboat?

That’s carbon dioxide, you can’t breathe that.

How is she swimming? Wouldn’t she just walk? She has lead shoes on!

I don’t think skeletons keep their hair.

Well how the hell does that work?

“Air, it’s my peculiarity.” No, it is not.

I’d rather trust a bunch of information I don’t want the people I love knowing with an adult, but okay.

Wait, so Emma has the Map of Days now?! It was stressed countless times in the trilogy how much Millard loves that damn thing and you give it to EMMA?!

Okay, WHAT? Barron is the leader now!? I guess Miss Peregrine’s brothers just don’t exist now!

“Bad peculiars”? They’re ex-peculiars, because they don’t have powers anymore!

They took the kids, too, you know.

Wait, while they’re at it, didn’t this conversation take place at night?

Just tell him how Abe could see monsters, then he’ll believe. No need to be dramatic.

Hollowgasts sure as fuck would not loop along with the townspeople, they’d be free to roam around or they’d get left behind. Also, Victor died AFTER the loop was made! He got tired of living there and tried to leave and died THIS IS SUCH A SIMPLE STORY TIM.

Did I mention that I hate how the hollowgasts look?

You could have told him earlier but okay.

I don’t remember any of this from the book.

“Tired of living in loops.” Caul was tired of peculiardom being a ‘matriarchy.’ Yes, there were some problems with how peculiar boys who could turn into birds were treated but overall Caul was crazy and narcissistic.

I guess there are only 13 wights, opposed to hundreds or even thousands.

Also, why are they all upper-class? I’d assume a lot would be lower.

Didn’t they also blow up half of Siberia?

EYEBALLS? It’s from consuming their souls! I guess Tim just wanted to put in some ugly ass imagery.

Wait, why are they still eating? They’re fine now!

Almost forgot Millard was in this fucking movie.

But they weren’t even going to try it again! It was a ploy! And why hold it where a normal person could find it!?

This ‘leaving’ bullshit pisses me off because it’s breaking so many fucking rules. Hollows can’t enter loops so leaving is more dangerous than staying, which is what she chose to do in the book!

Claire is so cute.

Makes a bit more sense that an old blind man on his own died than a healthy, (I’m assuming) mid-age museum curator but okay.

This is probably the dumbest thing Jake has ever done. Surely, he knows that normal people can go in, but that they can’t enter through the loop, right? And he could potentially also be a danger, so why call out to him?

This reveal isn’t nearly as powerful as the one in the book. By doing his other voices from previous identities he’d taken before to watch over Jacob, he intimidated him and by finally revealing himself as Dr. Golan, he immediately made the one normal person that Jacob felt a bit safe around a danger and in that moment, he realizes what he had done by telling him everything.

Okay, here’s why I’m pissed they made Dr. Golan a woman. Reason 1 is because it shows that Tim wanted to make the wights really overpowered by letting them keep their peculiarites, and reason 2 (separate of reason 1) is because they didn’t make the rest of their identities women. Like just make a lady ornithologist and have her be a peculiar who can turn into a bird but can’t control time, making her feel self-worth incredibly low and hate ymbrynes. It took me a minute to think this up, Tim.

That’s not how you take off contacts.

Did this fucker really think he could take on an adult?

Hollowgasts can’t enter loops but okay.

This is a bit of a nitpick but the fact that Jake was used as a hostage instead of Hugh just shows how much they didn’t give a shit about the other kids unless they had a relationship cookin’ for them.

So, she has a crossbow, but she’ll just go down without a fight? That’s not like her at all!

This is NOT the time to be petty, Wal-Mart brand Enoch.

I just realized that Horace has like 4 lines and now I’m sad.

I would be so happy that instead of turning into a bird and leaving that Miss Peregrine just fucking decked him. It’s a lot more in character than just letting them take her.

I don’t remember Miss Peregrine trusting a 16-year-old with the lives of 9 kids but okay.

One of the few good things this movie brought me was a peregrine falcon sound so I could look it up and see if it was accurate. I then found a video of a sweet old man filming a peregrine falcon’s call and providing quiet commentary. Just felt that was worth mentioning.

Since when did Jacob become good at strategy?

Cute scene, but it means nothing to me.

Okay I guess Miss Avocet never mattered.

Just destroy Wal-Mart brand Enoch, please.

Why does Fiona have the most lines out of the neglected kids? She only had 2 lines in the whole book!

That bomb would be enough to take care of it, but okay go ahead and shoot it.

Olive seems pretty in-control of her peculiarity, so why give her gloves?

“It’s only 6 months old.” What?

Time travel is bullshit. Also, I don’t think it works like that?

“I know you’ll choose Abe.” Well, duh, I’d rather see my grandfather again than some cute girl I met a few days ago that barely even seems to like me that well.

Okay, so the movie I’m watching is really choppy and cuts at random parts and it just cut in the middle of a sentence Wal-Mart brand Enoch was saying and I couldn’t be happier.

Yeah, but the loop entrances are usually in places normal people won’t go. (ex. Miss P’s loop entrance, Miss Thrush’s loop entrance, etc.) Seems dumb to put it on a ride. Imagine sending your kids on there and when the cart comes back one of them is missing?

Okay, so there’s only 4 hollows and 6 wights left according to the movie. Why are they all so afraid of them then?!

In the book, a lot of them were trained to handle guns, and in the movie they still have their peculiarities – so WHY are they not attacking Emma as soon as they see her!?

I’m pretty sure that in the book Jacob had been seeing Dr. Golan much longer than 3 weeks.

Yeah, Florida’s a hellhole, to be quite honest.

I guess no one cares about a floating girl in the sky. I don’t see any iPhone’s out recording.

Never mind, I see one (1). I should see much more, though.

How would the hearts stay in the skeletons? There’s nothing for them to hold onto.

Is there no staff at this place?

How are these skeletons in general staying together?

This fight is pretty dangerous. They’re exposing normal people to peculiardom.

Okay, so now the wights use their peculiarities to fight.

Horace saved lives at least 3 times but I guess he’s just useless now according to the movie.

Man, Tim, you sure did a good job of creating strong female characters! /s

How is Mr. Barron not dead? She lifted the boat out of water and the closer you get to the bottom of the ocean the more pressure you’ve gotta deal with.

3 cheers for this forced romance! Hip-hip! (Boo)

This 16-year-old doesn’t need to tell these women what to do.

Why is Miss Peregrine in a different cage?

I guess Barron just had some blue eye contacts on him.

How did the hollow get down there?

I guess Jake’s a perfect shot now, since it’s convenient.

(vomit noises)

Again, time travel is bullshit. Wouldn’t there be another Jake walking around?

Wait, they’re still there?

Hurray for more terrible loop entrances!

In the book, this would be the second time they had kissed but okay.

Never knew that birds could just be stationary while in the sky.

Wait, so she just… keeps her clothes? Trust me, I don’t want to see a naked woman in something other than an art piece or otherwise but that was a rule that they had in the book.

Well that was a load of shit. At least with the ending there can’t be a sequel.

[alyinargentina-blog]

Texas or Iguazu??

Iguazu falls looks like it’s fake, the pictures of it don’t do it justice but seeing it is like seeing something that would only exist in a Disney movie or a bad action movie that needs a cool set to make up for the mediocre acting. Katie and I left Buenos Aires Thursday morning, and sat at the airport getting live updates from her mom about the sentencing of Alec Cook, the UW student who sexually assaulted numerous female students in 2016. He was charged with five felonies and several other additional crimes, with a maximum sentence of 40 years. He got 3. Our justice system is so screwed up it’s revolting. Our flight there was painless, as was the ride into town. Our hostel, from the outside, looked nice enough, it had a lot of cool murals on the walls and our bedroom seemed clean. We hurriedly threw our bags down and retreated into the living room to watch the Argentina world cup game against Croatia, a seemingly meek opponent who turned out to look a lot better than Argentina ever did. 

A painful 2-0 loss later, Katie and I found ourselves with little else to do than go track down a very early dinner. We found a mexican restaurant on google maps and headed there, only to be told it doesn’t open for another hour. We tried entertaining ourselves by shopping and browsing the little markets outside but the town of Iguazu has about as much entertainment as the Wisconsin Dells downtown area, which let me tell you is about zero. There were lots of the same tourist stores filled with overpriced knick knacks, clothing stores with more graphic tees in one place than I’ve ever seen, and a surprising lack of bars where we could sit and sip a beer before we devoured some tacos. Thankfully we found a bar at the end of the main street, got some beer and cornnuts!! and wasted way an hour until dinner. 

The Mexican place was an experience if nothing else, one that involved very little real mexican food. Katie and I have decided that people generally like us: the waiter at the restaurant gave us a huge free plate of chips and dip with more to come later. We ordered some passionfruit daiquiris, which apparently are VERY different than margaritas according to the same waiter, and then our food. Turns out “quesadilla” to an Argentine means a flatbread ham and cheese sandwich, which is not quite what I had in mind, but oh well. The other two tacos we got were good, both of course needed something picante but we can’t expect Argentine sauces to provide that at this point in our semester, that would be asking way too much. After the food, our bestfriend (the waiter) came out with free tequila shots, which we were really not expecting but which were not nearly as deadly as I remember tequila shots being. By this point, Katie and I were sufficiently liquored up, and headed back to the hostel. 

We decided to shower, which in theory is a relatively easy process. False. I ended up falling and severely bruising my hand and elbow because wet tile steps are not a semi-drunk person’s friend. The rest of the night was spent icing my hand and complaining about our professor who had just decided to send the prompts for our final essays that night, two days after he said he was going to and after having the last class be cancelled without any prior notice because the professor decided she had better things to do and “didn’t have time” to text anyone about it. Juan rescheduled the class for this Tuesday, directly in the middle of a very important soccer game, so I will not be attending. Sorry Juan. We went to bed relatively early because no one was at the hostel and there was nothing to do, but nothing in Argentina can go smoothly. In this specific instance, both of our beds were horrifying. As context, our bunk bed was positioned right outside the bathroom that did not have nearly enough ventilation for a sewage system that did not allow for used toilet paper to be flushed down the toilets. The toilet seats were also cushioned, which has nothing to do with the bed situation but is just gross in general. Katie’s bed had patches that smelled very concerning, one of which was right by the pillow, so she got very little sleep. My mattress started leaking fluid, am assuming it’s water because don’t want to think about other possibilities. I didn’t realize this until I moved around to try to get warmer and realized that an entire side of my shorts were drenched, and that my shirt had some wet spots also. I very quickly decided to change beds after that incident. 

Friday was waterfall day! We woke up, had some rice and beans for breakfast, and then walked to the bus terminal to get a ride to the national park. The park entrance was surprisingly inconspicuous for such a big tourist destination, and the entire place really wasn’t too busy, which could have something to do with it being a week day. We got into the park and made our way to the Garganta del Diablo first, which is the biggest waterfall that literally looks like the earth just fell away and there’s a gigantic hole where the ground should be. You can hear the rushing water about twenty to thirty minutes before you can see anything. The trail to get to the walkway out to the waterfall is a gravel road next to the train tracks that transport all of the park’s old visitors to the flatter, easily accessible wire walkway over the river. When we got to the actual walkway, there were more people, many of whom were on guided tours that identified their members with fun matching hats. The walk out to the falls too about twenty minutes. The first thing you see is water seemingly being sucked away, and then the closer you get the more mist you see, and then the falls come into view. Definitely a “wow” moment: you can’t even see the bottom because the water hits with such force that the mist obscures it. It honestly looks like the earth disappeared and the water doesn’t ever hit a bottom. 

After this path, Katie and I decided it was lunchtime, so we headed back to one of the eating areas and attempted to make our sandwiches. However, there was a small blip in these plans thanks to animals called Cuatí. Cuatí are little rodent things that look like a mix between anteaters and raccoons, completely with weird snouts and a long tail that terrorize the tourist at the park and try to steal every single item of food they can get their clawed paws on. Katherine loved them, I hated them. The one time we decided to sit at a table and assemble our lunches, they swarmed, at least ten of them, and almost ran away with our bag of bread. I was horrified. Lunchtime turned into a detour to the only indoor food court in the park so that we could eat in relative peace. 

After lunch, Cuatí free thankfully, we did the lower path at the park, which was gorgeous, and gave us the stereotypical pictures taken at the park, with all of the waterfalls in a row and the rainbow glinting off of the spray from the water. This path was infested by this huge group of what seemed like an extended family on vacation, who would run on the walkway with all of the children, and then stop and take 20 minutes worth of pictures in the middle of the walkway because they apparently all needed a picture at the exact same place. Katie and I thankfully could bypass them, and get up to the last trail, the higher path. This one took us on top of the waterfalls we’d seen from the lower path, and had some cool panoramic views of all of the waterfalls with the Garganta del Diablo in the distance. This was our last trial, so we headed back to the park entrance behind a group of chanting geriatrics led by a man with a can who was zoom-walking and hitting signs with his cane aka an old man gone rogue.

We got back to our hostel to find it infested with a huge group of students from the University of Texas who were in Iguazu for the weekend, and in Buenos Aires for five weeks studying business management. None of them spoke spanish, or were making an attempt to learn it, they had never taken the subte or the colectivo (in fact they knew what neither of those things were), they spent the majority of their time at boliches and bars, and then had the audacity to question why Katie and I were a bit worn out by Buenos Aires. But they also turned out to be very entertaining. Matt, the first Texan that we met, took Katie and I to this light show overlooking the intersection of Paraguay, Brazil, and Argentina, which turned out to be very cool.  He parted ways to go meet his 35 Texan friends at a restaurant that serves Milanesa, something Katie and I get more than enough of with our host moms, so we headed to an outdoor burger place that had some pretty large burgers. 

We got back to the hostel and expected it to be empty: all of the Texans had said they were going to this ice bar that is literally made of ice, and where 300 pesos buys you unlimited drinks for 30 minutes, aka you’re buying the death of your liver. Boy were we wrong: Texas was in full force in Igauzu. They’d taken over the small bar area and were continuing their binge drinking, so Katie and I opened our bottle of wine and retreated to the quiet of the small patio by our room. About ten minutes later, Matt invited us to play Never have I Ever with their group, which got rowdy real quick. We learned more than we needed to ever know about many of the boys in this group, all of whom were freshman which contributed to the absurdity of the entire event. By the end of the night, most of them were absolutely hammered, one of them was asking me why his friends wouldn’t share weed with him, another was not wearing shoes around the hostel, another was defending his decision not to give oral to his girlfriend of 2 1/2 years. 

The next morning, they had to wake up at 7 to go on their guided tour of Iguazu, which meant not only that Katie and I got woken up when all of their 20 alarms went off in our room, but that we got to hear their shouted-whispers about how they were still hammered, had gotten into literal fist fights with their friends the night before, and had no idea what to bring with them to Iguazu. Katie and I stayed in bed for a while longer, ate breakfast, watched some soccer, and then headed to the airport to fly back to Buenos Aires. 

The airport in Iguazu is literally falling apart. It’s partially under construction to “modernize” it but I think that basically means they’re tearing it down bit by bit because it’s barely functional and only has one gate. We got there about an hour and a half before our flight, because according to the guy that worked at the hostel that’s all we needed. But, as per usual in my experiences flying in Argentina, about five families had ten suitcases each, and proceeded to take at least 15 minutes checking them all and arguing about if they could have them in the plane or if they needed to be checked. It took forever to get our boarding passes, but thankfully security took very little time, and we were at the one gate right as our plane was supposed to start boarding. Except it didn’t start boarding for at least another half hour, in which two lines formed, frantic Asian women were asking everyone they could find which line was for Andes Airlines (they both were) and then not believing any of the answers they were given. We eventually got on the plane and flew home, with quite a bumpy landing, but the entire boarding process was a mess. Although Beatriz tried shaming Katie into staying another day in Iguazu to visit these jesuit ruins that turned out to be like on the other end of the province, at least a five hour bus ride away, Katie and I both agreed that one day in the town was more than enough to see the falls and head off to bigger and better (hopefully at least cleaner) places. 

Speaking of bigger and better places, I only have two weeks from today before I fly out and home to Wisconsin. I am very ready to leave. Buenos Aires has been an experience that I think will ultimately be good for me, but right now I basically want nothing more than to be back in a city that I don’t have to worry about getting stolen from every minute, that doesn’t go on strike every other week, that has my dog and my bed and my car and a phone that can do more than one thing at a time. 

[littledonkeyburrito]

He just looked at me and my tiny serious expression and said, “No.”

1. What was the reason behind the last time you wore a bandage? I think the last time I wore a bandage was when I hurt my wrist in karate training when I was like 16. I really don’t get injured often.

2. What music artist have you listened to a lot lately? Genitallica. I love their music, so long as I don’t listen too hard and translate the lyrics haha. Then again, they’re barely more dirty than Despacito...

3. Have you ever been to a karaoke bar? Yeah

4. Who is taller, you or your best friend? She is. I am little.

5. When did you last go to a library? I think I went to a library in 2013 to print some documents and get them signed by a JP. That would have been the last time. I can’t believe I remembered that.

6. What did you last purchase at a gas station store? I think the last time I went to a gas station was when my Dad was visiting and we drove through the south of spain. I probably just bought a drink or something.

7. Which time zone do you live in? Central European. GMT +1

8. Do you remember what you wore yesterday? I had to think about it for a second but yes, I do.

9. When did you last lose your voice? It got husky a few times while I was travelling in Central America due to being drunk in clubs/loud bars and attempting to have a conversation with someone.

10. What was the last thing you looked up on the Internet? Give me a sec to check my search history... Last thing I googled was “Dahl Barcelona” because I was trying to find contact info for a shipping company

11. How much did you spend the last time you went out for food? I think it was about 20 euro which tbh was a bit more than I’d like to have spent. I don’t go out much though so it’s not like it broke the bank.

12. What was the last thing you purchased online? A sleeping mask for my brother for his birthday because he does shift work like I used to so I understand the need for a comfortable sleep mask.

13. Do your celebrity crushes tend to be more of actors or band members? Actors. I don’t follow many bands.

14. When was the last time you were at a coffee shop? I have no idea. I don’t drink coffee so I would only ever go if the people I’m with go. The last time might have been that super pretentious coffee place my friend dragged me to in Cartagena in Colombia.

15. Where is the farthest you’ve travelled this week? This week? To the grocery store.

16. Is your first language something other than English? No.

17. Are you a good cook? I’m alright. I like my food but I don’t know how other people feel about it because I don’t cook for others. Tbh I barely cook for me aside from the noodles I make.

18. Did you ever take music lessons for singing or playing an instrument as a child? I took drum lessons for most of highschool.

19. When’s the last time you ran? In the airport in Panama City when I almost missed my connecting flight to San José 20. Do your jeans have rips, tears, and holes in them? No, I don’t like jeans with holes in them 21. Do you celebrate 420? No. 22. Do you get the full 8 hours of sleep a night? When I’m not working/travelling, yes.

23. Have you ever been on your school’s track team? No, but I made it to districts for javelin/shotput a couple of times, and to regionals once. 24. Do you own a pair of Converse? I own a few 25. Did you copy and paste this survey? Sure did. No shame. 26. Do you eat raw cookie dough? When the opportunity arises 27. Do you wear your shoes in the house? Sometimes when my feet are cold I just won’t take them off when I get home. But not in a carpeted house. 28. At what age did you find out that Santa wasn’t real? I approached my dad at approximately age 7 because I’d been having this debate internally about whether santa was real and I was conflicted about it. So I went up to him and straight up asked, “Dad, tell me the truth. Is Santa real?”  He just looked at me and my tiny serious expression and said, “No.”  “Easter Bunny?”  “No.”  “Tooth Fairy?”  “No.”  “Okay thanks,” and then I continued with my life 29. How many phones, house phones and cell phones are in your house? Just my 1 mobile phone.

30. Who would you call first if you won the lottery? I’d message a bunch of people but the first call would be either mum or dad, depending on what time of day it was. 31. Last time you saw your best friend? February. 32. Are you in high school? Fuck no, thank god  33. How do most people spell your name? Maddy. And then sometimes people get my last name wrong even though it’s really easy and not that uncommon. 34. Would you wear a boy/girlfriends clothes? Around the house I suppose I probably would 35. Will you keep your last name when you get married? Probably. Would maybe consider hyphenating if they had a cool name 36. When was the last time you left your house? Yesterday. 37. Do you have a dishwasher? No. My last 2 apartments had one and I never used it anyway.  38. Would you survive in prison? I hope I’d be able to keep my head down enough to not get shanked 39. Who is the youngest in your family? I have a little cousin that’s 14 I think. 40. Do you know anyone with the same name as you? I know several people with my first name but I’m not actively friends with any of them. When I was in grade 10 at school, there were 4 of us, each with slightly different spellings. 41. What’s the last thing you purchased? Groceries 42. What brand are your pants right now? C&A. I stood in the corner of the shop googling for like 10 minutes to find a comparison chart for australian and spanish jeans sizes. 43. Ever been to Georgia (the state)? Just in the airport. The accents are so thick and southern that I couldn’t understand the girl working at maccas 44. Do you watch movies with your parents? Mum and I would often watch movies together when I lived in Aus. Either at her place or at the cinemas. 45. Do you get your hair cut every month? I get my hair cut every 2-3 months. 46. Do you go online everyday? Yep

47. Have you ever experienced something paranormal? Aside from the party pirate ghosts that apparently haunt my apartment, no. 48. What’s the longest amount of time you’ve been stuck in traffic? I don’t think it was the longest but when I left the San José airport in the cab we hit bumper to bumper traffic almost immediately and it took an hour and a half to get to my hotel.

49. Have you ever been to New York City? Not yet 50. What is the most amount of money you’ve spent on a meal before? Probably when my brother and I took mum out for her 50th birthday and we took her to a nice fancy place. I think in all it was close to $100 per person and of course we paid for mum too. 51. What’s your worst travelling experience? Oh god I’m sure I have a few but I can’t really think of any off the top of my head. Getting sick in India in 45 degree heat wasn’t fun. And then having diarrhoea during my flight stopover in southern china (read: squat toilets) was even less fun. 

52. Have you ever dealt with noisy neighbors or roommates? How did that go? At one of my old apartments, my bedroom shared a wall with the bedroom in the apartment next door. They often had sex at like 3am which was super frustrating, especially considering I was still a virgin at the time and was like, “wahh why can’t I be the one getting laid” and then they stopped banging and started arguing and sometimes it sounded like it was getting violent. Anyway, my flatmate and I called the cops on them once because it sounded like she was attacking him and like throwing stuff at the walls. Cops came and spoke to them. They stopped fighting. Month or so later they started banging again. That was not a fun place to live. 53. Who was (or is) the teacher that gave you the hardest time in school? Nah, my teachers loved me. The trick is to suck up to them at the start of the year and from then on so long as you get okay grades you can basically do whatever the fuck you want and they won’t care. I could literally just get up and walk out of class and not come back and they wouldn’t even question it. Actually, I often did but it was usually for a music lesson. But a lot of the time I would go to my lesson super early because I was bored and my drum teacher didn’t mind helping me skip class. 54. How do you feel when you meet someone with the same music taste as you? It’s fun to drive with those people 55. What is the strangest thing you’ve ever seen outside of your house? A couple were fucking on my street a couple of months ago at like 5am. I only looked because I was still half asleep and didn’t recognise what the sounds were until it was too late 56. How reliable is your internet connection? Better than Australia 57. What’s something that makes you incredibly nervous? Confrontation 58. What’s the latest you’ve ever stayed up to finish homework/a project? 2 nights without sleep. Here’s a tip kids: Don’t start a 10,000 word research assignment 2 days before the deadline 59. What is the worst thunderstorm you’ve experienced? I grew up in the sub-tropics so there’s been quite a few. I fucking love storms and floods (so long as people aren’t hurt and homes aren’t destroyed) 60. How quickly can you write an essay? Doesn’t matter because I don’t need to 61. Have you ever had problems falling asleep in class? Yes, actually. It always took me way too long to fall asleep in class. 62. Have you ever been on the barrier or front row at a concert? Yeah, that time @aturinfortheworse​ got hi fived by Jack Black at a Foo Fighters concert and I didn’t because I have little arms. 63. If you have a job, who is your least favorite coworker/manager? From my old job, my least favourite was probably one of my staff, Dave, because he was such a pain in the ass and always made problems and bitched about people and thought he could do my job better than me.

64. Are your parents supportive of you? Yes. My parents are pretty great. 65. How often do you take the train to go places? Whenever I have to go somewhere that’s not walking distance and not the airport (I bus to the airport)

66. What is the closest grocery store to your house? The closest big grocery store is Carrefour but I don’t go there because it’s right on the tourist strip.

67. When was the last time you colored with crayons? At a mexican restaurant in Panama City called Orale. The table is covered in paper and you get a pack of crayons. Keep in mind that this place is really really not designed for kids considering the amount of tequila they give you. When I went there at the start of my trip I was talking to a guy in Spanish but the music was too loud for me to hear him properly so I just handed him a crayon and told him to write it down. It legit took me over an hour to realise he was hitting on me...

68. Have you met anyone famous? Just at conventions

69. Do you have any special talents? I am weirdly good with money. I can be on the exact same salary as someone else, have more bills to pay than them and somehow I’ll still always have more money than them. I don’t even necessarily hold back in my day to day life. I don’t know how but money stuff just always seems to work out well for me. I suppose that’s a talent. A very useful one.

70. Have you ever been to a nursing home? No

71. What kind of job did your mom have when you were growing up? She had a few different jobs here and there when I was a kid, mostly in retail I think. But when I got to highschool, she went back to college and studied her ass off and now she does really well as an architect (side note: I accidentally wrote arquitecta which is spanish) and she loves her job. It’s great to see her succeed. I’m very proud of my mama.

72. Have you ever known anyone that’s been on TV, including you? There was a guy that came like 3rd or 4th on The Voice a couple of years ago that I went to school with. I also went to school with a girl who now has like 3 olympic gold medals for swimming so presumably she was broadcast on tv.

73. What was the most interesting animal you have seen in the wild? One time an echidna literally knocked on our door. I’ve also seen dingoes, sea turtles, goannas, baby foxes, koalas, kangaroos, wallabies and so much more because I grew up in the Australian rainforest. More recently, I saw sloths.

74. What was the first video game you ever played? Crash Bandicoot 2 on playstation1

75. What is the one thing you own, that if it got lost, you would be bummed? My passport because it would be expensive and a pain in the ass to replace.

76. What do you find yourself buying all the time? Flights. Haven’t bought any for a while though because I’m running out of money.

77. When was the last time you got a real letter in the mail? A few months ago from my health insurance company.

78. Were you born in the state you live in? Not even close. Firstly, I live in a province. Secondly, I was born in a county.

79. What is your favorite cheese? Probably camembert or brie. I like those soft cheeses. Also a big fan of feta.

80. What color are your jeans? Black. When I travel, I assume people think I only have one pair of pants when in reality I’ve probably got 4 pairs of black jeans on rotation that are not the same at all.

81. Do you get embarrassed when the buzzer at the airport goes off on you? I always dress so that it won’t go off. Except one time back in aus I had to go to the domestic airport and go through security to drop some documents off with one of the bosses on his flight changover and I completely forgot I was wearing steel capped boots and was so confused when it went off.

82. What does your last received message say? “NOICE”

83. What’s a smell that makes you feel ill? Puke

84. Have you ever deliberately tripped someone? When I was ~14 some boys at school were playing some tackle ball game thing and one of them ran right by where I was was so I stuck my leg out and tripped him. He got up and kept running. I hobbled to a seat, half thinking I’d just broken my goddamn ankle. It wasn’t broken but it did swell up so much over the next couple of hours that my friend told the teacher and they forced me to go the first aid room. Then my shin/ankle got the most colourful bruise I’ve ever seen in my life. I wish I had photos of it because it was fucking spectacular. I think the last of the bruising took about 3 weeks to fade.

85. Do you have any boxsets for TV shows? I had the boxsets for Buffy and Angel but I gave them to Mum when I moved

86. Are you tired? Usually

87. What was the last TV show you watched? Luke Cage

88. Is your door open right now? No

89. What was the last conversation you had with someone about? Whether I should agree to look after someone’s cat for a week

90. What was the last parcel you received? Probably a tshirt I ordered online a few months ago

91. Is the person you last messaged single? They both are, yes.

92. What color is your favorite bra? Red

93. What is the newest addition to your wardrobe? A red tshirt with little white birds on it

94. Do you have any currency that’s not your native country’s? I currently have 7 different currencies on my shelf, and I had 4 others when I was in Australia

95. Were you messaging someone right before you fell asleep last night? No.

96. Did you have any unread messages when you woke up today? Yep - it was a photo of their cat.

[adventuresaroundasia]

This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure for more info. 

I’ve noticed that the more I travel and the busier I become, the more impossible it becomes to keep up with my travels in real-time. Well, never fear monthly recap posts are here!

Pin Me!

This month I headed back to the US for a week of friends and family. First I stopped by Seattle for a few rainy days to see my parents, and then I was on to Napa Valley for my high school friend’s wedding!

May was also a month of moving. I moved out of my private office and into a public open office area (Which wasn’t as horrible as I thought it would be). I also began the process of moving from my Andingmen apartment to my boyfriend Chris’ place, because surprise my landlord sold our apartment and kicked us all out.

Where I Went

I spent most of the month hanging out in Beijing, but for one week I flew to the US where I went home to Seattle and headed to Napa for a wedding. In Seattle, I mainly relaxed and did a million errands, but in Napa, I rode I hot air balloon over the wineries with Tinggly Experiences and attended the fanciest black tie wedding I’ve ever been to at Auberge du Soleil.

Unfortunately, I was a bit too hungover for wine tasting the next day, but I drank enough fancy wine at my friend’s wedding that I didn’t really feel like I was missing out.

The beautiful couple!

Posing with my wedding parasol!

Monthly Highlights

A lot of great things happened this month! Let’s go through my favorites.

A Beautiful Napa Wedding

Last month one of my best friends from high school married her college sweetheart in Napa, so I flew down from Beijing for the wedding. Fun fact: In the summer of 2013 I actually traveled to Tibet with her husband (without her!) having only met him once a few years prior. Weird, right?

A year or so later, they let me crash in their Palo Alto apartment while I was applying for a Chinese visa, and we visited the Napa Wineries together. It’s crazy to think that the next time I’d see them together would be at their Napa Wedding!

They were married at Auberge du Soleil, a stunning resort overlooking the Napa Wineries. This was my first “friend-wedding”, and I didn’t think I’d cry… but I did. After a tear-jerking ceremony, they had a great reception with food and wine pairings and a lot of dancing. I sat at a table with the bride’s cousins and high school friends and we all had a blast!

Let’s hope my future wedding is at least half as good as her’s was.

My friend and I waiting for the ceremony to start

We suffered through our heels together

Road Tripping with My High School Friend

Unfortunately, I didn’t get as much time with the bride as I would’ve liked, but I did get to bond with another high school friend who attended the wedding!

Living in China, I feel like it’s pretty hard to keep in touch with my friends from back home, especially my high school friends who now live all over the country! So this wedding was a perfect opportunity to spend some time with a friend I’ve barely seen since high school.

The two of us rented a car (a first for me!) and drove from San Francisco down to Napa Valley where we crashed at a Motel 6. Classy, I know. We had a great time getting ready for the wedding together and eating all the non-Chinese food I could get my hands on.

a beautiful sunrise flight

Floating in a Hot Air Balloon Over Napa Valley

While the wedding was incredible, floating over Napa’s wineries with my high school friend was a close second! While I wasn’t a huge fan of the 5 am wake-up call, the two of us threw on some warm clothes and hopped in the rental car to a parking lot in Yountville, twenty minutes north of our Napa motel.

I gazed in wonder as they filled up the hot air balloons around us. I had seen a hot air balloon up close once in my life before this moment and I barely remember it because I think I was roughly eight years old.

The sensation of flying in a hot air balloon was literally magical. You float along with the wind, so the air is surprisingly warm and calm. For one hour we watched as the sun rose and spread its golden light across the sky. We also lightly crash-landed into a golf-course pond and took off again without a hitch, our guide cackling at our gasps of surprise.

Afterward, my friend and I ran across the road to the famous Bouchon Bakery to stuff our faces with macarons and sip on crafted lattes. It was a perfect way to start the day before our friend’s wedding. Granted, we did have a pretty big nap in the afternoon… We needed it.

I was invited to check out this hot air balloon ride with my long-time friend and partner Tinggly, the ultimate gift-giving site for travelers. With Tinggly you can purchase an experience for a loved one that they can cash in anywhere in the world. Seriously, if you want to give an awesome gift to someone who doesn’t like “things”, this site is gold. I almost wish I could’ve taken my boyfriend along as a surprise, but this “friend date” was a blast as well.

[button url=”http://www.adventuresaroundasia.com/tinggly&#8221; label=”Check Out Tinggly’s Experiences!” size=”large” target=”_blank”]

Back in Seattle!

Spending Time at Home in Seattle

While this trip home was rushed and a bit rainy, it was a good one. First, I had the opportunity to see my parents and grandpa, who I hadn’t seen since Christmas. I ate all the Mexican food and stocked up on healthy quinoa and brown rice for my upcoming diet in June (more on that later). Seriously, Trader Joes is heaven.

While I was home I also had time to sit down with my mom to plan my parents’ trip to China this September! Both of my parents will be flying to Beijing where we’ll spend two weeks exploring my China home, along with Xi’an and Yunnan province. I’ll be sure to write out our itinerary and share it with all of you because it really is a perfect two-week China trip!

Finally, I had the chance to get some hiking boots at REI for all of my upcoming Great Wall trips (and hopefully a surprise long-term trek that isn’t set in stone yet so you’ll just have to wait!). Having read the book Wild not too long ago, I paid extra, extra attention to whether or not my toes hit the front of the boot when going downhill on the fake rock they have set up in the store. I don’t want to loose all my toenails like Reese Witherspoon.

Overall, I’m super happy with my Oboz boots, and I’m glad I bought them through REI because they have literally the world’s best warranty.

I forgot to take pictures…

Flying First Class!

While the long haul flight from Seattle to Beijing and back was nothing to rave about, I did have a chance to experience first class on the trip from Seattle to San Francisco!

This was my first time ever purchasing first class for myself, so I felt pretty fancy! Why did I buy a first class ticket? Well, when you factored in the price of checking a bag, it was only $40 more expensive to spring for first class. TREAT YO SELF.

On the plane, I drank one too many Bloody Marys and enjoyed my antipasto platter, while all the business travelers around me chugged coffee and worked away on their laptops. Sorry, not sorry.

I only wish the flight was more than two hours!

America! Why you so expensive??

Challenges

Life can’t always be perfect. Here were my least favorite moments of May 2017.

Why is America so Expensive???

For the past few years, my only time in the US has been lounging at home in Seattle, with the brief exception of crashing at my friend’s Palo Alto apartment for a weekend. What does this mean? It means I have very little experience traveling in the US.

Living in a place is much cheaper than traveling, and I was shocked by how expensive the US has become. Over $100 a night for a shitty hotel room at Motel 6? Seriously?! My Uber to In and Out and back was how much???

Living in Asia has its benefits, and us bloggers are definitely not lying about the cheap cost of living and travel. Why spend $100 a night for a motel in Napa when you can spend $30 a night for a beautiful boutique hotel in Dali? (Yes, my parents and I will be staying here in September.)

Travel bloggers NEVER get a vacation!

Blogging Overload

This trip home to the US was extremely busy, which meant I got a bit behind on my blogging. Seriously, I got back to China I realized I was responding to emails from 11 days prior. ELEVEN DAYS!!!

Many bloggers joke about how their inboxes are out of control, and I am no exception. But I usually pride myself on responding to emails within at least a few days. Well, after a busy week in the US, I arrived home to China, and then promptly suffered a mild heart attack.

My inbox was out of control. I hadn’t written a blog post in two weeks. I was behind on work at my college counseling job. I hadn’t even looked at any of the THREE paid courses I’m working on right now. AHHHHHH

Now at least I’ve kind of caught up on the emails…

Drama in the hutongs!

Apartment Drama

Throughout March and April, my roommates and I lived under the constant threat of expulsion. My landlord started showing the property to potential buyers and we had no idea what was going on. In early May we got the official news: You all need to be out by the end of June.

Of course, I wasn’t too bummed by this news because I was basically living in Chris’ apartment half the time anyway. I was tired of living in two different apartments, never having the right belt, dress, or my external hard drive when I needed it. So, I figured I’d wait out my lease until the end of June, moving my stuff to Chris’ apartment slowly over the course of a month.

In the last week of May, I received an update: they managed to postpone our move out day until the end of July!!!

JULY?! I had already agreed to start paying rent in June for Chris’ place, and now all of a sudden I need to come up with another month’s rent at my old apartment? You can’t just drop that on someone last minute. When you say I have to be out by June, I assume I need to be out by June, end of story.

My old room! (In my THINX period panties?)

When I said I wanted to be out by June, my roommate who I’m subletting from insisted I needed to find someone to cover the rent for July. This led to a mini passive-aggressive fight between the two of us, as I asserted that I didn’t think paying for an extra month’s rent was my responsibility, and she took days to respond to my texts.

How would I be able to find someone to sublet my apartment for just one month? How would I find the time to show my apartment to a bunch of people when I was basically living at Chris’ place?

But, within a few days, a friend of a friend dropped out of the sky and into my lap. He needed an apartment for 6 weeks and was set to leave Beijing two days before we had to be out of my apartment. Score!

So, I went from moving to Chris’ over the course of June to needing to be out of my apartment in the first week of June. At least I found someone to cover the rent?

Having a little too much fun on the wall

My Most Popular Post

The best post of May was definitely my story about hiking the Wild Wall! Remember last month when I talked about my Great Wall birthday adventure in an off-the-beaten-path section not officially open to tourists? Well in this post I told you the ENTIRE story, from hacking my way through overgrowth on the wall to the near-death experience I had trying to get off of it!

I also give some great advice about how to plan an off-the-beaten-path Great Wall adventure of your own, where you can enjoy the Great Wall with no tourists.

Last month I also published a post about an incredible new water filtration bag from DayOne Response. While this bag is great for long-term trekkers, etc. it’s best for disaster relief, providing clean water to those who need it most. Why? It’s reusable, lays flat, and can filter enough water for an entire family in just 30 minutes.

DayOne Response is actually a finalist in the Chivas Venture competition for non-profit funding and I really hope they win! Unfortunately, voting has already closed, but you can always support them by sponsoring a bag for a family in need.

Best Instagram

My best Instagrams of the month were all from my Great Wall adventure this April! This first shot was taken when I first spotted the beautiful lake through a Great Wall tower.

Don’t usually break the square, but I had to for this one! . After hours of hiking on a crumbling, overgrown wall, @aussieontheroad and I stumbled on this view of Huanghuacheng below. . While this wall is a bit dangerous 😨😳 it was worth it for this view!!

A post shared by Richelle (@adventuresaroundasia) on May 11, 2017 at 8:03pm PDT

This second photo was taken on the way down. Just look at that view!!

Want to explore a section of the Great Wall not officially open to tourists? 🌸🌺Ever dreamed of having the wall all to yourself? . My latest post on adventuresaroundasia.com shows you how!! . Pay a villager $1 USD for the privilege of hiking a stunning, off the beaten path stretch of Great Wall literally NO ONE visits. ☀️Trust me, it’ll be worth it!

A post shared by Richelle (@adventuresaroundasia) on May 30, 2017 at 8:16pm PDT

Finally, I decided to make a second Instagram account, just for fun. I thought this new account would be a great way to connect with my friends and post photos in real-time without worrying about editing them in Lightroom or how they look in my Instagram grid (#ThingsBloggersWorryAbout). If you want to see some fun, behind-the-scenes photos that aren’t edited to perfection, come check it out @RichelleInAsia 

Song of the Month

This month I’ve been listening to John Legend’s Surefire. I’m obsessed with this music video about acceptance featuring a young romance between a Muslim girl and an illegal migrant boy from Mexico. Enjoy!

What I’m Reading

This month I read Oryx and Crake, the first book in a series by Margaret Atwood. After reading the Handmaid’s Tale, Chris suggested I read Atwood’s dystopian series that Atwood likes to call “speculative fiction” rather than science fiction because of course, everything she writes could feasibly happen in the near future.

In this book, Snowman, once known as Jimmy, struggles to survive in a world where he may or may not be the last human. In the aftermath of a world-wide plague, Snowman both protects and despises a new, genetically engineered humanoid species known as the Children of Crake, while he laments his lost best friend, the love of his life, and everything that went so terribly wrong.

I also literally just found out that this series is being made into a tv show on HBO. I’M SO EXCITED! Seriously, if you like the Handmaid’s Tale you’ll love this.

[button url=”http://amzn.to/2rTxDqY&#8221; label=”Download it on Kindle!” size=”large” target=”_blank”]

Best Blog Posts of May

What are my favorite posts from May? Check ’em out!

Taking Mom Overseas: Our First Mother-Daughter Trip – The Sweetest Way

I loved hearing about Leah’s trip with her mom to Greece. From their rocky past relationship to their experience wandering around Greece in the offseason, this was such a great read. I can only hope my trip showing my parents around China this fall will be as good!

Falling in Love with Northern Norway – Young Adventuress

This post makes me want to get a new blog theme so I can display full-width photos… and buy a better camera… and go to Norway.

Orangutans!

Orangutan Trekking in Sumatra – Aussie on the Road

I still haven’t written at length about my experience orangutan trekking in Bukit Lawang, but thankfully my boyfriend is literally the quickest writer on planet Earth and has been cranking out stories about our trip. Read along as he details that time we were chased through the jungle by an angry orangutan.

Cultural Clash: Why I and Many Others Will Gladly Serve Our Husband’s Food First – The Blog Abroad

I’ll be the first to admit, as a white non-Southern American, the idea of needing to serve my husband’s food first at a party before serving myself was kind of alien to me. It’s hard not to jump to conclusions that any woman who acts in this way is repressed. But from the quotes of women from all over the world Gloria collected, you can see that the answer is a bit more complicated.

None of this!

What’s Next for June 2017!

I have so many things going on in June! Firstly, I’ll be heading to a coworker’s wedding in Fushun, Liaoning province where I will be celebrating amongst 500 people! Second, I’ll also be moving into Chris’ apartment, which will be a nice change from having my stuff scattered across Beijing. I’ll also be welcoming (FINALLY) our third foreign counselor at my college counseling job… It only took them a year and five months to find someone.

Finally, I’ll be embarking on the test of a lifetime: and incredibly strict 1-month diet. In June I’ll be giving up alcohol, sugar, and simple carbs in China. Wish me luck!

This Beijing Life: Month 21 This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure for more info.  I’ve noticed that the more I travel and the busier I become, the more impossible it becomes to keep up with my travels in real-time.

[holisticpassport]

180 Flip

Okay folks, are you ready for a long one? *insert inappropriate joke here*

But no really this may be long. So as of the last time I blogged, I was fed up. I was at one of the lowest points I’ve ever been in my life, experiencing challenges I didn’t know how to mentally deal with although I felt I handled it as well as I could. I was literally a day away from having a friend lend me money to book my flight home to California, and then there was a decision about whether to stay in California or go back to Ohio which was weighing heavily on me for a good week with sleepless nights, migraines, and everything in between.

 I met up with Eta, my friend I met at the barista course, and one of her friends for drinks when I told them about my plans to go home. Both of them, without even knowing me for very long, began searching for jobs, sending me links and phone numbers for gigs and offered to become my housemates. We laughed, sang, talked, and read birth charts over a bottle of wine, and upon leaving, I asked the bartender if they were by chance hiring (they were, and I took an hour tram ride the next day to talk to the manager for approximately 2 minutes and she never called back, but the sheer notion that my mind switched back into a state of hope, thinking “I’m going to give this one more shot”… this was the best thing that could have happened). I also messaged one of the numbers Eta had sent me for a café gig, but my expectations weren’t high. I handed out my resume to another three or four cafes, lit some incense, candles, and said a little prayer to the universe that if I was meant to stay here in Australia, it needed to show me in the next three days or I was really done and going home.

            I talked with my host about how I was feeling because I couldn’t be bothered to do any housework for at least four days, and I broke down crying not knowing what else I could possibly do; I had tried and failed here. He told me that I had to stop listening to the voices in my head telling me this was the way my situation was. I told him about a mantra I had been trying to repeat to myself every day: I am not a product of my circumstances, I am product of my decisions and actions. He also told me that this was all temporary and I had to remember that nothing can stay bad forever. Lastly, he told me to think about exactly what I wanted (this was in terms of work, but I implemented it into a general life view/what I wanted out of my time here).

            I went to sleep at 8pm and woke up at 10am the next day. This was the day I decided to stop being sad. I thought about my best friend Skyla after her breakup with the guy she was with before she met her husband. She told me that she felt so low and worthless, but then she started to do things for herself that he used to do for her and began doing things on her own—she fell in love with herself and learned about who she was. I knew this was my time for that exact same thing. I had been trying to work on and love myself whilst here, but it wasn’t quite working-- if anything I felt worse. I was always being a critic of myself as opposed to learning to love exactly who I am-- stretch marks, acne, my addiction to pastries and espresso martinis, impulsive behaviors and all. Out of all the issues with money and work and housing… loneliness has been the major killer. I guess I use other people as a way to avoid all the things I don’t like about myself, but how can I possibly expect them to like me if I don’t like me? You all know I’ve been in relationships the past seven consecutive years and before that was in on and off long term relationships for four years. This whole being on my own thing is verrryyy foreign to me. If my last fling here hadn’t ended, I don’t think I would’ve realized how attaching myself to someone makes me lose the opportunity to enjoy my own company, and come to terms with the fact that I am enough for myself and anyone I choose to be with.

            So back to my revelation morning; my mind was still on the notion that I may be leaving the following week, so I wanted to see everything I could in Melbourne and surrounding areas before I left. I planned to adventure to the Victoria and Albert Museum in the city (which p.s. IS IN LONDON, and I mixed up a conversation I had with a cute British boy back when I was there). Once I realized I could not go to London, I hopped off at Melbourne Central which I had never been to before. I got lost trying to find my way out, venturing deeper into retail stores and arcades I never knew existed. I came across a stand called Grandma Funk, and the most GORGEOUS pair of hiking/travel boots I had ever seen. I no longer wanted to find a way out of the station, and I gravitated over to the stand, picked up the boots and read their size…. You can guess. Yep, they were my size and the only pair because this place was a second hand vintage shop selling items that essentially had never been used. The shop attendant saw the starry look in my eyes and said “these boots will take you around the world”. Well shit. It was in this moment that I thought “I can’t take these home with me, I don’t have room in my bag. If I choose to buy these boots, I vow to travel Australia and continue traveling in them.” I haggled the price down a bit, and I was off with a new pair of boots and a completely new direction in life than 20 minutes prior.

I began walking… I didn’t really know where to but just walked down some side alley streets. I came across a board with pamphlets for Spanish classes which Eta and I had discussed practicing together since we may be in Spain at the same time (I’ll get to that bit later). I took a pamphlet. I walked by some tables set up with flyers for a protest against Trump the next day. Grabbed one of those and talked with the people running it. I explored an exhibit in the Victoria Library about the history of one of their famous radio stations, and thought about how my Dad would love to see this. Next to the inside bookstore, I saw some flyers for open air cinemas around town and a Latin Festival happening that week. Stuffed them in my bag. I was staying, and I was making sure of it by whatever means of conviction necessary whether it be that I couldn’t miss the protest, or I HAD to see Lion at the MCG laying on the field. I eventually came to a park and sat for 40 minutes before I had to take a class for my RSA certificate or responsible service of alcohol which you have to have to work at a restaurant that serves any alcohol (which I bought on impulse when I decided to stay 5 days earlier and then changed my mind seventeen times). I thought about how much I’ve come to sincerely love this city with all of its incredible quirks, people, nightlife, scenery, art, etc. I had been a little sad earlier that morning thinking I was exploring the city so I could say goodbye to it. By the evening I was happy, and that’s how I knew it was the right decision.

I worked my waitress job Friday night and was so exhausted mentally and physically from my day that I ditched my plans for the Latin Festival, but made plans the following evening with some people from a Facebook group I joined. There was also a pub crawl happening beginning at a hostel around 8pm so I figured I’d go to that, have a drink, then head over to meet my group at 10pm like we planned. Life never goes as planned.

 I played giant Jenga, the gin and tonics were $3, and a cute guy said it was a crime that I was sitting, alone so I joined his group. We ended up doing the entire pub crawl together with his friends, and went to a Latin dance club. I got to dance after all! We also went to this creepy ass bar down some sketchy graffiti alley that ended up being a 1940’s hospital theme, with grey cement walls, sterile white lighting, syringes in the drinks, and even a hospital bed in the bathroom! Definitely need to figure out where the hell I went because I’m still not sure. Anyway, the conversation flowed so easily with this guy and more importantly for my self-esteem, he reminded me that I’m a helluva catch. I really needed to be shown that after feeling like absolute garbage thinking I couldn’t do anything right or be the right person for anyone. Not sure what will really come from this if anything, but plans for this weekend are brewing…

I got home around 5am after the kind gentleman accompanied me on my hour tram ride home from the city. I had work at noon so that sucked, but I had to power through because the St. Kilda Festival was happening! Not only this, but I received a call from that number I had texted about the café position for a trial on Tuesday (basically show him I know how to make a latte). Not only THAT, but I managed all of tables on my own at my restaurant without any mistakes for the first time! After work I headed down to the beach, listened to some bands, ate delicious truck food, and bought some hippy bracelets for a few bucks. I met up with Eta and also ran into the group of people I spent New Years with at the Tanglewood Festival. By the end of the day, I was feeling pretty damn good, but really f””king tired since I had 4 hours of sleep.

Oh you thought the blog would end there? No no. You love my writing. You want MORE. In my previous fragile state, I had made plans to see the Great Ocean Road before I went home to CA. It was with a guy I met on the Facebook group and two other girls were supposed to come but bailed last minute. This worked out though because we were able to talk about all of our travels, what we went to school for, shared music, and played Shape of You by Ed Sheeran on repeat while admiring the stunning coast of southern Australia. It was cold, windy, and rainy but it made the day even more memorable when the sun finally appeared as we reached the 12 Apostles. We bantered like we had been old friends and it was really nice to just enjoy the company of a fellow traveler without any kind of sexual tension or expectations honestly. He left for Sydney the next day, and now we have this awesome memory/story that we will share with other people.

On Tuesday I went to my trial, was immediately offered the job/asked to start work the next day, got a text from my MCG barista job that the Gun and Roses concert was tomorrow night so I’d be working it, AND I picked up an extra shift at the waitress job. All the monies! I knew I needed to move down to the city as quickly as possible because there was no way in hell I was making the hour tram ride every day this week between 3 jobs. Leaving my workaway was bittersweet, and I absolutely hate goodbyes. But I couldn’t have asked for a more understanding, supportive, generous, and all around good human being to be a part of my life and welcome me into his despite all of the hardships we endured during our time together. My time there will always be looked upon fondly for years to come.

I decided I wanted to be in a hostel to meet more people and get the travel vibe back in my life. I want to remember that I’m not just here to work and be stressed like I would be at home. My new job is a lot of work for very little pay, but I’m so lucky to have it right when I needed it most and I’m doing something I love in the best ranked city IN THE WORLD. I’m happier not only because everything worked itself out with a complete 180 flip in a matter of a week, but I can visibly see how I’ve grown from all of this craziness we call life. I’ve finally began to enjoy my own company, visiting museums, doing bike rides to local beaches, lounging in park hammocks and eating gelato whenever the hell I feel like it without anyone to judge me.

OH YES. And to top it ALL off, I had almost given up on the idea of working for Stoke Travel because I hadn’t heard back from them in a while. They finally did contact me for the final step in the hiring process, and also threw in that I should submit my photos to be in the running for their travel photographer position this summer which would be an absolute dream. This is why I said I wanted to take up Spanish with Eta since a lot of the festivals they set up at are in Spain  ;) I don’t know where I’ll be in the next couple months or what awesomeness may surprise me, but I trust the universe knows what it’s doing. I never thought I’d get here, but here I am. And here you are, a champion for reading through allllll of that. Thanks, you’re a legend for putting up with me.

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2/365

January 2nd, 2017 Day two. I woke up today feeling okay. Dragged my butt out of bed and got ready for work. I haven't brushed my hair in 4 days which is what happens when I get sad so it's a giant birds nest. Didn't even do my makeup today because duck 2017. I start my car and realized I had no gas. It's already 10:10 and I work at 10:30. My job is a 15-20 minute drive from my place. I'm not impressed. Went to the gas station, and normally 40 bucks fills my tank. I put 30 in and got just over a half tank of gas ( thanks ndp ;) ). Still not impressed. So far, the day is declining. Little things are starting to bug me. My lighter is a little fucky so I had to use another one, pissed me off. Got to work, saw who I was working with and cringed a little. I'm not a people person nor a morning person so not in the mood to spend 7 hours with a chatty Kathy. But hey, beggars can't be choosers. Everything is fine. And then shit hits the fan. We ran out of everything. Medium lids, ice tea, hamburger buns, tortillas, coke, and a whole bunch of candy. We have two tubs of butter left till Friday and two boxes of fries. But thank god we have 5 pineapples. ( as I'm saying this, I'm realizing I work at a really weird place ). Customers are yelling at me, managers are yelling at me and coworkers are yelling at me. Somehow, I survived till the last half hour of my shift when I got my finger literally stuck in a vacuum suction fridge that we had to pry open to free my finger. At this point, people are looking, my finger hurts and Everything from this day just wails on me. And I cry. At work. In front of this cute boy here. With out makeup. And rats nest hair. I was told I could leave so I could go to a doctor. I left. Went to the liquor store across the street. Then the clinic. The doctor described it as "a little bruise from a big suffocation". I waited an hour for some 40 year old man to massage the blood flow back into my finger. Not impressed. Went to Walmart. Spent 200 bucks of my birthday money there. Day got a little better till I realized I was happy I bought a swiffer sweeper. Growing up sucks. Got back home. Got a little faded. And then boom, shit hit the fan again with my best friend. I was being a little shit and he finally called me out on it. I'm not even mad. I'm crying tears of joy because my eyes were opened. I've spent 3 months slowly spiraling back into my depression and my anxiety is at an all time high right now and he really shook it into me as to how I was acting. And then it came to me. I have my new year's resolution. This little blog thingy. My new years resolution is to write once a day about my day, how my anxiety and depression was, and see how far I will come by 2018. Usually I stink at these things but I'm desperate to find some happiness again. It time to change. It's time to stand up. This is going to be different, this is my year.