#while my manic silhouette is casted upon the stone walls

[crandberrysaucewithpulp]

it’s not safe anymore to say whiplash is your favorite movie as a film enjoyer nowadays you need to come out with ‘oh yeah my favorite movie is actually Long Complicated Sentence In a Foreign Language by Extremely Specific Director (1896) because it really captures the dying essence of art and obsession of todays age!’ to be regarded by anyone

[birbleafs]

[fic] It’s A Matter Of (In)Convenience

Series: Saiki Kusuo no Ψ-nan || The Disastrous Life of Saiki K. Rating: T Genre: Humour, Breaking The Fourth Wall Character(s): Saiki Kusuo, Aiura Mikoto, Toritsuka Reita, Kaidou Shun, Kuboyasu Aren, Nendou Riki, Yumehara Chiyo, Teruhashi Kokomi Warnings: None, save for canon-typical shenanigans Summary: Saiki Kusuo’s plan for a quiet Sunday spent shopping for desserts in an ordinary konbini is thrown into disarray when he runs into several… inconveniences, much to his dismay. A/N: I've been re-reading/re-watching Saiki K. during this quarantine period and I haven't laughed this hard since I was into Gintama. This series has given me so much ridiculous joy, it’s great for helping keep anxiety and existential despair at bay lol. Fic can also be read on AO3

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Saiki Kusuo could not say he dislikes commuting by public train but he’s not particularly a fan of it either. After all, it’s exceedingly more troublesome and vexing for someone like him, encumbered with psychic abilities beyond human comprehension. He’s unable to switch off his telepathy at will, so it’s no small feat being stuck in a packed cabin and trying to filter out the cacophonous thoughts of fifty-odd passengers buzzing incessantly in his mind throughout the long ride to the next town. Distance isn’t an issue today, however. Not that it had ever been an issue, mind you—he could teleport to almost any location he so wished. But Kusuo had long since mastered inconspicuousness into an art form, and teleporting to his destination and appearing seemingly out of thin air in the middle of a packed convenience store was sure to draw unwanted attention to himself. No, it’s not worth the risk, even for such a coveted goal at the end of his journey. Besides, Kusuo is a man of principle, one who does not easily succumb to using his powers for self-interest. He will do this the ordinary, pedestrian way.

In any case, travelling out of Hidariwakibara-chō to neighbouring Tonari Machi on a random Sunday morning would also mean the chances of him running into certain... inconveniences are very nearly zero. Forty-five minutes and twelve stops later, Kusuo beams in quiet triumph as he walks past the automatic sliding doors and into the aforementioned convenience store, barely registering the musical jiggle over the speakers. He steps through the sparse crowd, pausing midway through the snack and desserts aisle when he finally catches sight of the neat row of orange boxes with silver trimmings on the top shelf. Kusuo allows himself a tiny grin as he reaches for a box, eyes bright with anticipation as he gazes upon its wondrous contents—three cups of chocolate brownie and cherry parfait, infused with coffee jelly and topped with dollops of luscious cream and cinnamon sprinkles. A simple but unmatched delicacy right here in this nondescript konbini, he thinks, savouring the glorious moment a little longer. Still, as fate would have it, he would be reminded in less than ten seconds that his life is but an unfortunate series of daily disasters, and his current reprieve short-lived. And it comes in the form of a young woman who had waltzed through the crowd and is now latching onto his arm with garishly pink manicured nails, her wavy blonde hair already casting a dark cloud over Kusuo’s face. Aiura Mikoto, resident soothsayer and trendsetter gal. Inconvenience No. 1. Ah. So it begins. “Wassup, Kusuo!” Aiura chirps a little too brightly. Already two or three mob characters in the konbini are throwing scandalized looks their way, but to Aiura they’re nothing but background scenery and lazily drawn silhouettes. “Who woulda thunk we’d meet here like this? It must totes be our destiny as soul mates, fer sure!” Isn’t it more because someone is totes a stalker? Kusuo deadpans telepathically her way, even as he makes no real attempt to avoid Aiura’s smothering embrace. Instead, he fixes her with a stare as blank as stone canvas. This is an invasion of privacy. Also, what’s with the meta observation in the previous paragraph? Stop messing with the readers like that. “Man, you sure are a ray of sunshine sometimes,” Aiura pouts, before she breaks into a giggle and relents. She unlatches herself from him, putting some distance between them. “Anyway, can’t your BFF like, just accidentally bump into you while shopping for the same box of snacks you no doubt travelled all the way out here for?” So you admit you really are a stalker then, Kusuo counters drily, only to frown again at the sudden creeping presence of another aura. He feels the weight of another arm draping carelessly over his shoulder, followed by the brusque yapping of an over-eager and desperate hot-blooded young male in his ears. “Yooo, Saiki-san! What a coincidence!” Toritsuka Reita, the spirit medium and an exemplary specimen of the most depraved life-form, the lecherous scum. Also known as Inconvenience No. 2. Saiki Kusuo, a man most unfortunate, lets out a weary sigh. “I see you’ve got that accusatory glare painted all over your face.” Toritsuka wags an annoying finger before Kusuo. “Now, now. Before you also accuse me of stalking, Mister Doom and Gloom, let me just say that I’m only here for one thing.” He flicks a furtive glance towards a discreet corner of the magazine section. The shelves are filled with magazines wrapped in plastic, large R-18 stickers plastered across the covers and over the spines much like indecent warning signs. Toritsuka dabs towards the third shelf, waving a mini poster at both Kusuo and Aiura, and this sentence then abruptly proceeds to describe the close-up of said poster—a particularly titillating centre spread featuring a curvaceous model’s skimpily clad... assets. “Surely there’s no better reason to be here now than for the special compilation of EROmag’s Greatest Upskirts And Panty-shots Of The Month!” Toritsuka exclaims, echoing the thoughts of all resident perverts. “Ugh, grody to the max,” Aiura says, lips curled in utter revulsion. For once, the stars are aligned and Kusuo finds himself wholeheartedly agreeing with her sentiment. Before he can get a retort in edgewise however, he’s unceremoniously tugged closer into Toritsuka’s one-armed embrace, who then proceeds to thump a hand over Kusuo’s chest in a grand show of obnoxious male posturing and solidarity. “You women will never understand,” Toritsuka counters with an ingratiating smirk. “But Saiki-san and I, we’re bosom buddies, connoisseurs of refined aesthetics. Together, we’ll finally gaze upon those heavenly lace panti—A-ACKK!!” He hacks up a lung just as Kusuo nonchalantly drives a sharp elbow right into his solar plexus, causing him to stagger backwards onto the floor. Bosom buddies? Kusuo echoes ominously, glaring daggers at the pathetic writhing form before him. Pretty sure that ridiculous thump you just pulled is both an outrage and insult of my modesty. Hey, can I call the police? I’m calling the police. Aiura nods at that, lips curved into a Cheshire grin and looking extremely pleased with herself as though she’s the one to suggest calling the cops. “Delusional sleazebags should just crawl back into the garbage bin where they belong. Like the skeevy trash panda that they are, right Kusuo?” “Who are you calling delusional, huh?!” Toritsuka snaps, jumping back to his feet. “I’ll have you know that Saiki-san and I have been nothing but the most loyal, the tightest of all bosom buddies—” Refer to me as your bosom buddy again and I’ll crush your windpipe, Kusuo interjects without missing a beat, and the EROmag poster in Toritsuka’s hand spontaneously combusts into flames. “Argh, not the panties!!” Toritsuka yelps, watching in despair as the poster shrivels up in the blaze, only to catch sight of the eerie, voidless depths of Kusuo’s inscrutable gaze. The spirit medium pales at the split-second reminder of his fleeting mortality, sweat dripping down his nape as he carefully backs away from the precarious jaws of death. “B-B-Bros! I-I meant that we’re the best kind of bro-some buddies, ahahaha! T-That is to say, brotherly and wholesome—R-right, Saiki-san? So don’t get all conceited just because you’ve got big knockers, Tits McGee!!” “Pfft, brotherly and wholesome? As if!” Aiura scoffs, unimpressed. “You’re about as wholesome as your d*ck aura and a college frat boy’s porno stash. Just admit you ain’t nothing but a tiresome anime trope!” “Look who’s talking, Miss Fanservice. This is a wholesome shounen series, so how about you take those bazongas back to Hooters where they belong!” “Haaah? You looking for a fight, you raunchy racoon?!” “Bring it on then!” Kusuo scowls at the petty squabbling, exasperated at how easily his quiet Sunday was already going awry, much like the metaphorical train wreck poised for a manic spiral off its rails. He decides to take his leave then from the two inconveniences bickering loudly, making his way towards the self-checkout station near the entrance. He pays for his items, stealthily packing them away with a subtle flick of his psychokinesis, and is only a few paces away from complete freedom at last when the generic musical jingle blares from the speakers overhead. “♪~Welcome to F☆mily Mart Konbini, We Guarantee 99.9% Shopping Satisfaction! It’s A Matter of Convenience~! ♪” Kusuo frowns at the jingle. Why is it only 99.9% satisfaction? And really, a matter of convenience? Not when he’d already run into two inconveniences in a row and all in a convenience store. Is God conspiring with the universe and pulling a sick prank on him right now? What a horrible sense of humour. The automatic doors at the entrance slide wide open then, and in saunter three terribly familiar faces—Kaidou Shun, Kuboyasu Aren, and Nendou Riki. Inconvenience No. 3, No. 4, and No. 5 respectively. “What did I tell you, Aren? Not only did we manage to beat traffic, but this unexpected change in my Sunday routine would’ve thrown a wrench into Dark Reunion’s plans of attempted kidnapping. Too bad I, The Jet-Black Wing, am always several steps ahead. Heh.” “Uhmm, yeah I guess… Hey, Shun, look! There isn’t a queue for the limited edition Ginta-Man figurine raffle tickets here at all. Good thing you insisted we meet at the crack of dawn—Tch, Nendou, don’t dawdle around and block the entrance like that! What’re you looking at anyway?” “Oh? I thought I saw my pal just a few seconds ago...” “Huh, Saiki’s here too-?! Oh, you mean that. Don’t be daft, Nendou, that’s just a cardboard cut-out of that kiddie hero show, Cyborg Cider-man Mark II.” Seriously?? Kusuo curses irritably as he dives inconspicuously out of sight from the passing trio, right into the bath and shampoo aisle. It’s just been a series of inconveniences one after another this morning, the metaphorical train wreck already hurtling itself past the edge of no return. Good grief, what a pain. May as well have the rest of the cast show up next— Another cheesy musical jingle, another swoosh of the sliding doors, and— “Waahh, it’s really you, Kaidou-kun!” “Hello, what a nice surprise to run into everyone here.” “Oh, hey there, Yumehara and... Offu~! T-T-Teruhashi-san?!” Saiki Kusuo, ever the suffering protagonist, drags a hand over his face. See? God hates him. Two aisles over, he can still hear Aiura and Toritsuka’s voices drifting over: “Man, I’m sick of looking at your pervy mug. C’mon, Kusuo, let’s ditch this loser—Huh, where did you run off to, Kusuo?!” “Your petty squawking has given us all an earache and must’ve driven Saiki-san off as well!” Oi, oi, Kusuo flinches inwardly, seized by a helpless fear of watching his quiet Sunday careening off the cliff and further away from his grasp. Quit yelling out my name like that and throwing me to the wolves already! Too late. At the mention of Kusuo’s name, Nendou cranes his neck 270 degrees Exorcist-style like a hideously monstrous owl and rushes over to Toritsuka’s side. “Oh! Did you just say my pal is here?!” he exclaims happily, shaking Toritsuka by the shoulders like a dog shaking an unfortunate chew toy. “I knew I’d seen him when we walked in earlier!” Not to be outdone by Nendou, Teruhashi also leaps forward before Aiura with none of her previous composure, her unblemished, porcelain visage now dusted with a hint of rose, a conflicted mix of perplexity and (envious) shock pooling in her angelic eyes. “D-Did you say ‘Saiki’?! H-Hey, Aiura-san, you did say ‘Saiki’ and not actually ‘Kusuo’, right? M-My, I must have misheard things, right? R-Right?!” “What the heck is going on? Is Saiki really here?” Anxious, Kusuo grits his teeth at the growing clamour as his friends converge from all corners of the store towards the aisle where he’d been forced to hide. Guess there’s no avoiding it after all, he frets despairingly, and in less than a nanosecond, teleports unnoticed from the konbini to an empty street outside. Kusuo sighs, relieved to have finally escaped. Minor inconveniences aside, perhaps a quiet Sunday spent savouring chocolate brownie and cherry parfait in the comfort of his home isn’t beyond his reach yet. What? Didn’t he just use his powers for self-interest to teleport out of a sticky situation? Foolish readers, that was for self-preservation and completely acceptable, of course. He holds his shopping bag close, pleased that he’d managed to avoid a disaster, and begins to walk down the street—only to freeze mid-step when he feels a sudden splitting headache jolt through him… A flash of images appears: Aiura and Toritsuka crouching in fear together, Kuboyasu bracing his bleeding arm, Kaidou screaming shrilly as he shields Yumehara and Teruhashi from a masked man brandishing a gun, Nendou digging his nose with his pinky—That’s just disgusting, no one wants to see that, stop it!! The vision finally ends, and Kusuo lifts a hand to his face, massaging his temple to clear the precognitive fog from his mind. An armed robbery, huh. He lets out another resigned sigh. Good grief—What a pain, Saiki ‘I-don’t-(but I actually really do)-care-about-my-friends’ Kusuo mutters internally in annoyance, even as he yeets himself head-first into other people’s business and right back into the convenience store to stop a future robbery. Still he smiles, eyes soft with perhaps the slightest flicker of affection for this dysfunctional bunch of people in his disastrous life. Someone has to protect them and save the day, after all.

  –End–

[typealittlefaster]

The Pain It Costs, To Love as She Does

Federico García Lorca – It’s True

Ay, the pain it costs me

to love you as I love you!

 For love of you, the air, it hurts,

and my heart,

and my hat, they hurt me.

 Who would buy it from me,

this ribbon I am holding,

and this sadness of cotton,

white, for making handkerchiefs with?

 Ay, the pain it costs me

to love you as I love you!

 1924:

The autumn air was cold, and my legs felt the chill through the thin fabric of my skirt. I had decided to forego stockings that evening after an irrationally long deliberation; I suppose I hoped that their absence would make the process easier? Somehow less invasive? Either way it seems foolish now. I turned left at the top of the deserted road and found myself in an entirely unfamiliar part of town. I made my way along China Street, until I saw the turrets of the castle rising above the houses; the ancient buildings were grimly striking in the dark, looming out of the night, grey and pale, ghostly and imposing against the stark backdrop. The chill in the air seemed to grow deeper and I pulled my jacket tighter around me. I turned right, onto a cobblestone street, constructed in a time before the city as I knew it, these streets weren’t designed for the motorcars in which I had become accustomed to travelling.

I pulled in breath after breath as my feet carried me a little too fast along the stones. The uneven terrain pulling the tendons in my lower legs much too fiercely and causing me to teeter and wobble in my tiny delicate heels. Quite why I had dressed in so genteel a manner for such an occasion I’ll never understand. It strikes me now that I must have made a hilarious figure cantering along the stones in the dark and weaving manically in the pursuit of some semblance of balance. I found that the rapidity of my breath was starting to burn my throat with freezing northern air. So I paused.

My fingers found the cool silver of the embossed cigarette case in my right-hand pocket and the book of matches that accompanied it. Standing now under the imposing figure of the Priory, a little past the castle walls, I lit a match. The sift hiss of the flame soothed me for a moment, and the golden light began to thaw the freezing air. The ornate pattern engraved on the gilded cigarette case glowed richly in the brief light and my slender fingers were, for a second, bathed in liquid gold. As I pulled the night air through the flame, through the sweet tobacco, and into my lungs, it became warm and merciful, rather than frigid and unforgiving as it had been moments before. As the familiar dizziness set in and I wondered whether everyone enjoyed sensual pleasures such as this with the depth and profundity that I did, I was reminded with sobering nausea that it was my indulgence in such vices that that had caused me to drag my sinful body past a house of God this evening. I can still remember how I got there. It could all be traced back to the smallest finger of his left hand. That was the true culprit in the crime I was about to commit – or perhaps I had already committed the true criminal act. If they found me, and wanted to ostracise me, arrest me, or string me up, I could pin it all on that little finger. I reckoned I could make a solid case too, might not completely absolve me in court, but surely they’d see that I was just an accomplice. Strolling past the graves, with tributes carved in a religious middle-English that I wouldn’t have understood even had it been light enough to see, I remembered the smallest finger on his left hand, and the first contact it had ever made with my right knee.

 The night had been a veneer of champagne glasses and loud laughter so far. Too-white teeth glinting in the low light as though their owners might be smiling or preparing to bite. We were all wearing those new American dresses and felt completely untouchable. The boys were enjoying our high hemlines and the American lightness of spirit that we wore to match our new style. Champagne fizzed gently in my head and cast a soft focus over the setting. He was sitting on my right and, as I conversed emphatically with the golden-haired girl opposite me, I felt his touch for the first time. He traced patterns up my thigh and under the hem of my dress, approaching the top of my stockings; I was caught in a foolish, childlike combination of excitement and fear, wondering what he would do when he got there. We both continued separate conversations and he refused to meet my eye, keeping his hosiery-based journey a secret buried within the crowd.

 Continuing my own journey through the night, with less anxious urgency but slightly more melancholy than before, I glanced up through the swirling smoke released by my lungs at the clock looking out from the top of the Priory tower. The golden numerals told me that I was still early. My nervous desire to pull myself up hills and fling myself through streets while forcing air through my body far too rapidly often caused me to arrive at destinations early, usually perspiring slightly and looking a little less kempt than I generally preferred. I meandered slowly over and between damp grey stone. I had no fear of the night. No fear of the dark. No fear of criminals. After all, wasn’t I a criminal? Therefore, my fairly reckless logic stated, the night should fear me. I admit I didn’t make a very fearsome figure, a girl of my age and stature wobbling through the dark with tears in her eyes caused by the acrid smoke from her own cigarette; but the weight of my decision and the might of its infinite possible outcomes and significances sat like lead beneath my soft translucent skin, making me impenetrable in my immorality.

During my introspection, my cigarette had burnt out. I only noticed when the cold night air was once again being drawn into my chest. I looked at its remains and the absence of a crimson lipstick mark jarred for a moment

 His fingers had brushed my lips momentarily, parting them slightly as he took his cigarette back. He lowered it to his side and met my eyes through the haze. I couldn’t tell if the dizziness was caused by the kiss or the smoke. The night became water, rushing past us, smooth and quick and beautiful; from street to stairs to sheets in consecutive heartbeats; time bunching in layers and then stretching to infinities. He wasn’t the only one. But the first had been painful, uncomfortable, fearful. A grey silhouette in a black room; cold hands; empty kisses; and, soon, nothing. But this was different, this was rapture, this was us. No brief and painful invasion of bodies, but a layering of pleasure upon pleasure, hard upon soft, silver upon gold.

 Pausing on the pavement, I looked to my left and saw the understated, easily bypassed dark green door that she had told me about. Clutching the thirty pounds rolled up in my pocket, I savoured my last moment of contemplation before I left the street behind. Did every dizzying, warm, soaring, golden moment like that eventually have to be paid for with a moment like this? A moment in the dark, on a cold street, outside a green door.