#would crying take away the pain?

[beautiful-songbird]

I can’t explain how weird it feels to realize I’m the only girl I know who doesn’t regularly cry

Everyone talks about crying like it’s something they do on the daily, and when I say I don’t cry, they either look at me in a way that tells me they think I’m lying, or they’ll say something like I’m lucky

I don’t feel lucky

I feel uncomfortable

Especially knowing how many people think I’m weird for not crying

[flowercrowngods]

making a real post for @rvspecter pls bear with me

anyway harvey hurt fic where after mike is busted and given a second chance at life (or a third, really) and pearson specter litt seizes the chance to instate a pro bono department mike is heading because he wants to get it right this time and harvey will do just about anything to keep him, these two men finally mention this Thing between them and decide to give it a try. and it’s good. it’s fragile and it’s tentative and it’s gentle and it’s the same as it’s always been but with more tenderness, more honesty, more vulnerability (and more sex of course) and it’s good. against all odds, it’s so good.

but then one day, long after hours, donna approaches harvey in his office and her eyes are shining, but it’s not a glow harvey is used to — he never wants to get used to donna’s eyes filled with tears so he asks her what’s wrong, but he’s not ready for the answer. because she tells him she can’t work for him anymore. she tells him she’s leaving him — to work for louis at first, maybe to quit altogether. the fact do the matter is she can’t be the Donna to his Harvey anymore because she’s in love with him and she thought she had it under control but she doesn’t, okay, she doesn’t and it hurts and she wants to be happy for him and mike because they’re so good but all this time she’d never thought that harvey would ever find someone real, and now that he has, well. she can’t pretend anymore that it doesn’t tear her up inside and she doesn’t want to put that on any of them so she’s doing the mature thing and leaving. to heal. to get over him. to come back stronger.

and she’s so, so sorry.

they listen to gordon one last time, they toast to thirteen years one last time — her words, not his, but they drive a knife into his heart nonetheless because harvey doesn’t do one last-anything and yet here sits his best friend and asks for one last night together and who is he but to give her everything she wants and more. she’s his donna — still, tonight; one last night. she is.

he doesn’t tell mike that night. couldn’t, even if he wanted to; because he doesn’t have the words. but in the secure hold of mike’s arms, he says “donna won’t be working for me anymore, starting tomorrow.” and he doesn’t mention how that means that donna went to jessica and louis first, he doesn’t mention that he was the last to know, he doesn’t explain how he wasn’t given a chance to fix this — not this time. “donna quit?” mike asks, and harvey swallows, shakes his head, shrugs. “just me,” he says. “just me.” and when mike pulls him closer and holds him tighter and tells him “i’m so sorry, harvey,” it’s the first i’m sorry that night that he believes.

unfortunately, sorry never fixed anything.

especially when soon after, mike finds out just why donna left. and he gets all up in his head about it, he allows himself to spiral because he’s so ready to succumb to tunnel vision and obsessing over solutions to problems that aren’t his to fix. and so he tells harvey that he can’t be the thing that comes between him and donna. they’re soulmates after all, mike can’t bear to be the one to sever their bond. harvey doesn’t understand. he’s the one who’s supposed to lose his mind over having lost his best friend and pretend like everything is okay, what right does mike have to make that about himself, to take it upon himself to fix everything when harvey’s the fixer, harvey is the one who solves problems and protects people. but mike won’t hear any of that and tells harvey that he can’t do it like this if it means hurting donna because she’s his best friend, too, and he wants to get it right this time. he doesn’t want to build this new life on decisions that hurt his people — not again. he’s hurt enough people, he can’t keep doing it.

harvey wants to ask him why he’s always so ready to protect everyone at his expense. isn’t this thing between them, their relationship, isn’t it meant to stop them from hurting each other? why is it okay to hurt harvey, but not to hurt donna?

he doesn’t ask any of that, only tells him that they’re not in high school, and that they’re either doing this or not, but he refuses to base their relationship on whether or not his best friend is okay with seeing him happy or not. “you’re either in this with me, mike, or you’re out. that hasn���t changed, and it won’t, because donna will get over it and everything will be back to normal before you know it.”

“you don’t know that.”

“yes i do, because we’re grown-ups and we get over things.”

famous last words, it turns out, because mike just slowly shakes his head, agonising over this and not thinking, clearly not thinking when he says, “i’m sorry, harvey. i can’t to this; not like this.”

and all he can do is watch mike’s back as he all but runs from him, dragging his heart behind him, through the dirt, uncaring as bits and pieces of it chip off with every step mike takes, with every second that passes and allows the words i can’t and i’m sorry, harvey echo in the hollow of his chest.

we’re grown-ups. we get over things. well, tough fucking luck.

and this is how harvey loses the two most important people in his life in the matter of a week. before he knows it, he’s alone, left to fend for himself and hollowed out. his walls are broken down, deconstructed piece by piece by carefully, gentle hands to reveal what’s underneath — only for the hands to retreat, letting in the icy cold and accepting what’s inside to wither and die.

there’s a reason harvey specter makes his own luck; the universe isn’t very forthcoming otherwise. a fact that is proven when he finds a stranger outside his building when all he wants is to curl up and breathe through the cracks of his broken hearts that have pierced his lungs, they must have, surely they must have, because he can’t breathe. and he doesn’t learn how to breathe again when the woman — a kid, really, merely twenty-five — reveals that she’s his half sister. because it turns out the reason lily specter was so ready to up and leave all those years ago; the reason she didn’t fight for her family and instead blamed it all on harvey, was because she was pregnant. and she lied about it — for twenty-six years.

amelia selene specter is the little sister harvey has always wished for — but cancer is a curse that rests on the specter family, and while marcus got lucky twice, selene isn’t. she didn’t have the money for medical resources, and it’s eating harvey alive that he didn’t know, that there was no way for him to help her and that there’s no way now.

but there is. because selene has two kids, seven and four, and she needs his help because they can’t get lost in the system, they can’t live with total strangers or be separated because the system doesn’t actually care about children, they only care about not feeling guilty. and she won’t ask lily. these two angels must be kept from her at all costs because she ruined two families already, she won’t ruin this one.

and harvey is obsessed with the thought of more family, he needs to take care of and be there for someone and he’s ready to take on the world to protect his niece and nephew — but he’s not warm, he’s not available, he’s not even at home most of the time, nor is his place suitable for kids.

he agrees to take them in and find a solution though. he promises selene that he’ll be there for them. he’ll always be there. and when he gets to meet them — a few days before his sister dies way too young, way too alive for something like death to not rip him apart entirely — he gets attached instantly and vows to himself and to selene that nothing will happen to them as long as he’s there.

even though harvey just lost his family — the one he chose, the one he was born into, and the one he never got to meet. even though harvey’s entire world was deconstructed with no one around to put it back together. even though he doesn’t know how, because evidently he got it wrong every single time, harvey gets to build a new family with these kids. and though it tears him up inside, it heals something inside him too — and sometimes they balance each other out, and he can breathe again for just a little while as he reads to charlotte because she’s feisty and afraid of nightmares and not listening when he says she’ll be tired in the morning because “i’m tired in the morning anyway, but now i wanna read” and he trades her going to bed for a bedtime story, and she falls asleep with her face pressed into his side.

it’s so frail, though, so fragile, this little family, and he knows what it’s like when everything breaks. he knows what it’s like to lose one’s family — over and over and over again. and he’s terrified that he’s building himself back up the wrong way. he’s terrified because there’s no one keeping him together but both his hands are occupied holding these children that cry for their mama.

he’s terrified because he’s not supposed to be doing this alone. but everyone else has made their choice and he, as always, is just there to bear the consequences and try to turn it into a win.

one day, he will. he has to. and one day, he’s not alone anymore.

[naamahdarling]

.

[acourtofquestions]

Kingdom of Ash Chapter 20 …

oh my gods chapter 20…

I am dead inside.

And somehow dying more per chapter.

Ow. THE NIGHTMARE DREAM SEQUENCE

"Do you know the story of the queen who walked through worlds?"

Seated on the mossy carpet of an ancient glen, one hand toying with the small white flowers strewn across it, Aelin shook her head.

In the towering oaks that formed a lattice over the clearing, small stars blinked and shimmered, as if they'd been snared by the branches themselves. Beyond them, bathing the forest with light bright enough to see by, a full moon had risen. All around them, faint, lilting singing floated on the warm summer air.

"It is a sad story," her aunt said, one corner of her red-painted mouth curling upward as she leaned back on her seat carved into a granite boulder. Her usual place, while they had these lessons, these long, peaceful chats deep into the balmy summer nights. "And an old one."

Aelin lifted an eyebrow. "Aren't I a little old for faerie stories?" She'd indeed just celebrated her twentieth birthday three days ago, in another clearing not too far from here. Half of Doranelle had come, it had seemed, and yet her mate had found a way to sneak her from the revelry. All the way to a secluded pool in the forest's heart. Her face still warmed to think of that moonlit swim, what Rowan had made her feel, how he'd worshipped her in the sun-warmed water.

Mate. The word was still a surprise. As it had been to arrive here at spring's end and see him beside her aunt's throne and simply know. And in the months since, their courting ... Aelin indeed blushed at the thought of it. What they'd done in that forest pool had been the culmination of those months. And an unleashing. The mating marks on her neck— and on Rowan's-proved it. She would not be returning to Terrasen alone when autumn arrived.

"No one is too old for faerie stories," her aunt said, faint smile growing. "And as you are part faerie yourself, I would think you'd have some interest in them."

Aelin smiled back, bowing her head. "Fair enough, Aunt."

Aunt wasn't entirely accurate, not with generations and millennia separating them, but it was the only thing the queen had suggested Aelin call her.

Maeve settled further into her seat. "Long ago, when the world was new, when there were no human kingdoms, when no wars had marred the earth, a young queen was born."

Aelin folded her legs beneath her, angling her head.

"She did not know she was a queen. Amongst her people, power was not inherited, but simply born. And as she grew, her strength rose with her. She found the land she dwelled in to be too small for that power. Too dark and cold and grim. She had gifts similar to many wielded by her kind, but she had been given more, her power a sharper, more intricate weapon-enough that she was different. Her people saw that power and bowed to it, and she ruled them.

"Word spread of her gifts, and three kings came to seek her hand. To form an alliance between their throne and the one she had built for herself, small as it might have been. For a time, she thought it would be the newness, the challenge that she had always craved. The three kings were brothers, each mighty in his own right, their power vast and terrifying. She picked the eldest among them, not for any particular skill or grace, but for his countless libraries. What she might learn in his lands, what she might do with her power ... It was that knowledge she craved, not the king himself."

A strange story. Aelin's brows rose, but her aunt continued on.

"So they were wed, and she left her small territory to join him in his castle. For a time, she was contented, both by her husband and the knowledge his home offered her. He and his two brothers were conquerors, and spent much of their time away, leashing new lands to their shared throne. She did not mind, not when it gave her freedom to learn as she would. But her husband's libraries contained knowledge even he did not realize was held within. Lore and wisdom from worlds long since turned to dust. She learned that there were indeed other worlds. Not the dark, blasted realm in which they lived, but worlds beyond that, living atop one another and never realizing it. Worlds where the sun was not a watery trickle through the ash-clouds, but a golden stream of warmth. Worlds where green existed. She had never heard of such a color. Green. Nor had she heard of blue-not the shade of sky that was described. She could not so much as picture it."

Aelin frowned. "A pitiful existence."

Maeve nodded grimly. "It was. And the more she read about these other worlds, where long-dead wayfarers had once roamed, the more she wanted to see them. To know the kiss of the sun on her face. To hear the morning songs of sparrows, the crying of gulls over the sea. The sea that, too, was foreign to her. An endless sprawl of water, with its own moods and hidden depths. All they had in her lands were shallow, murky lakes and half-dried streams. So while her husband and his two brothers were off waging yet another war, she began to ponder how she might find a way into one of those worlds. How she might leave."

"Is such a thing even possible?" Something nagged at her, as if it might indeed be true, but perhaps that was one of her own mother's tales, or even Marion's, tugging on her memory.

Maeve nodded. "It was. Using the very language of existence itself, doors might be opened, however briefly, between worlds. It was forbidden, outlawed long before her husband and his brothers were born. Once the last of the ancient wayfarers had died out, the paths between realms were sealed, their methods of world-walking lost with them. Or so all had thought. But deep in her husband's private library, she found the old spells. She began with small experiments. First, she opened a door to the realm of resting, to find one of those wayfarers and ask her how it was properly done." A knowing smile. "The wayfarer refused to tell her. So the queen began to teach herself. Opening and closing doors long since forgotten or sealed. Peering deep into the workings of the cosmos. Her own world became a cage. She grew tired of her husband's warring, his casual cruelty. And when he went away to war once again, the queen gathered her closest handmaidens, opened a door to a new world, and left the one she'd been born into."

"She left?" Aelin blurted. "She she just left her own world? Permanently?"

"It had never been her world, not really. She had been born to rule others."

"Where did she go?"

That smile grew a bit. "To a fair, lovely world. Where there was no war, no darkness. Not like that in which she had been born. She was made a queen there, too. Was able to hide herself within a new body so that none could know what she was beneath, so that even her own husband would not recognize her."

"Did he ever find her again?"

"No, though he looked. Found out all she'd learned, and taught it to himself and his brothers. They tore apart world after world to find her. And when they arrived at the world where she had made her new home, they did not know her. Even as they went to war, she did not reveal herself. She won, and two of the kings, her husband included, were banished back to their own world. The third remained trapped, his power nearly broken. He crawled off into the depths of the earth, and the victorious queen spent her long, long existence preparing for his return, preparing her people for it. For the three kings had gone beyond her methods of world-walking. They had found a way to permanently open a gate between worlds, and had made three keys to do so. To wield those keys was to control all worlds, to have the power of eternity in the palm of your hand. She wished to find them, only so she might possess the strength to banish any enemies, banish her husband's youngest brother back to his realm. To protect her new, lovely world. It was all she ever wanted: to dwell in peace, without the shadow of her past hunting her."

From far away, that ghost of memory pushed. As if she'd forgotten to douse a flame left burning in her room. "And did the queen find the keys?"

Maeve's smile turned sad. "Do you think she did, Aelin?"

Aelin considered. So many of their chats, their lessons in this glen, held deeper puzzles, questions for her to work through, to help her when she one day took her throne, Rowan at her side.

As if she'd summoned him, the pine-and-snow scent of her mate filled the clearing. A rustle of wings, and there he was, perched in hawk form on one of the towering oaks. Her warrior-prince.

She smiled toward him, as she had for weeks now, when he'd come to escort her back to her rooms in the river palace. It was during those walks from forest to mist-shrouded city that she had come to know him, love him. More than she had ever loved anything.

Aelin again faced her aunt. "The queen was clever, and ambitious. I would think she could do anything, even find the keys."

"So you would believe. And yet they eluded her."

"Where did they go?"

Maeve's dark stare unwaveringly held hers.

"Where do you think they went?"

Aelin opened her mouth. "I think —

She blinked. Paused

Maeve's smile returned, soft and kind. As her aunt had been to her from the start. "Where do you think the keys are, Aelin?"

She opened her mouth once more. And again halted.

Like an invisible chain yanked her back. Silenced her.

Chain—a chain. She glanced down at her hands, her wrists. As if expecting them to be there.

She had never felt a shackle's bite in her life. And yet she stared at the empty place on her wrist where she could have sworn there was a scar. Only smooth, sun-kissed skin remained.

"If this world were at risk, if those three terrible kings threatened to destroy it, where would you go to find the keys?" Aelin looked up at her aunt.

Another world. There was another world Like a fragment of a dream, there was another world, and in it, she had a wrist with a scar on it. Had scars all over.

And her mate, perched overhead ... He had a tattoo down his face and neck and arm in that world. A sad story—his tattoo told a sad, awful story. About loss. Loss caused by a dark queen.

"Where are the keys hidden, Aelin?" That placid, loving smile remained on

Maeve's face. And yet ...

And yet.

"No," Aelin breathed

Something slithered in the depths of her aunt's stare. "No what?"

This wasn't her existence, her life. This place, these blissful months learning in Doranelle, finding her mate—Blood and sand and crashing waves.

"No."

Her voice was a thunderclap through the peaceful glen.

Aelin bared her teeth, fingers curling in the moss.

Maeve let out a soft laugh. Rowan flapped from the branches to land on the queen's upraised arm.

He didn't so much as fight it when she wrapped her thin white hands around his neck. And snapped it. Aelin screamed. Screamed, clutching at her chest, at the shredding mating bond—

She screamed again. Screamed at her ruined arm, the unscarred skin, screamed at the lingering echo of the severed mating bond.

"Do you know what pains me most, Aelin?" Maeve's words were soft as a lover's. "It's that you believe I'm the villain in this."

Whenever that had been. If it had even happened at all.

"I have no doubt that your mate or Elena or even Brannon himself filled your head with lies about what I'll do with the keys." Maeve ran a hand over the stone lip of the altar, right through her splattered blood and shards of bone. "I meant what I said. I like this world. I do not wish to destroy it. Only improve it. Imagine a realm where there is no hunger, no pain. Isn't that what you and your cohorts are fighting for? A better world?"

The words were a mockery. A mockery of what she'd promised so many. What she had promised Terrasen, and still owed it.

Aelin tried not to shift against the chains, against her broken arms, against the tight pressure pushing on her skin from the inside. A rising intensity along her bones, in her head. little more, every day.

Maeve heaved a small sigh. "I know what you think of me, Fire-Bringer. What you assume. But there are some truths that cannot be shared. Even for the keys." Yet the growing strain cracking within her, smothering the pain ... perhaps worse. Maeve cupped her cheek over the mask.

"The Queen Who Was Promised. I wish to save you from that sacrifice, offered up by a headstrong girl." A soft laugh. "I'd even let you have Rowan. The two of you here, together. While you and I work to save this world."

The words were lies. She knew it, though she couldn't quite remember where one truth ended and the lie began. If her mate had belonged to another before her. Been given away. Or had that been the nightmare?

Gods, the pressure in her body. Her blood.

You do not yield.

"You can feel it, even now," Maeve went on. "The urge of your body to say yes." Aelin opened her eyes, and confusion must have glittered there, because Maeve smiled. "Do you know what being encased in iron does to a magic-wielder? You wouldn't feel it immediately, but as time goes on ... your magic needs release, Aelin. That pressure is your magic screaming it wants you to come free of these chains and release the strain. Your very blood tells you to heed me."

Truth. Not the submission part, but the deepening pressure she knew would be worse than any pain from burnout. She'd felt it once, when plunging as far into her power as she'd ever gone.

That would be nothing compared to this.

"I am leaving for a few days," Maeve said.

Aelin stilled.

Maeve shook her head in a mockery of disappointment.

Fenrys sat by the wall, concern bright in his eyes as he blinked. Are you all right?

She blinked twice. No.

No, she was not anywhere near to all right.

Maeve had been waiting for this, waiting for this pressure to begin, worse than anything Cairn might do. And with the collar Maeve now went to personally retrieve … She couldn't let herself contemplate it. A more horrific form of slavery, one she might never escape, never be able to fight.

Not a breaking of the Fire-Bringer, but an erasure.

To take all she was, power and knowledge, and rip it from her. To have her trapped inside while she witnessed her own voice yield the location of the Wyrdkeys. Swear the blood oath to Maeve. Wholly submit to her.

Fenrys blinked four times. I am here, I am with you.

She answered in kind. I am here, I am with you.

Her magic surged, seeking a way out, filling the gaps between her breath and bones. She couldn't find room for it, couldn't do anything to soothe it.

You do not yield.

She focused on the words. On her mother's voice. Perhaps the magic would devour her from the inside before Maeve returned.

But she did not know how she'd endure it.

Endure another few days of this, let alone the next hour. To ease the strain, just a fraction ...

She shut down the thoughts that snaked into her mind. Her own or Maeve's, she didn't care.

Fenrys blinked again, the same message over and over. I am here, I am with you.

Aelin closed her eyes, praying for oblivion.

"Get up." A mockery of words she'd once heard.

[izzy-b-hands]

I will be forever grateful i can be on this new med. it's one a lot of folks also need and can struggle to have access to! It's important i be on it, especially if i start doing any vid collabs

(some of which, really, all of which, i unfortunately actually need to cancel that were in the preplanning stages, bc the election results have me wanting to wait and see how the general atmosphere of the country is before i agree to meet up with anyone. I feel bad for cancelling, but also i just can't know for sure how safe things are/might be going forward and I'd rather avoid the potential of. ya know. various not great things that could happen at a meet up, tho i would certainly hope they wouldn't. i don't feel like actually addressing them rn, u guys know what i mean)

That said, if the truvada initial side effects could fuck off asap would be so lovely. three weeks at worst, then they should be gone/much better or so i am told. really hope that's true bc losing my mornings to being dizzy and nauseous is Not Working for me lmao. im on week two, and now understand why my new doc said to call if i needed any 'cheerleading' and support to get thru the side effects, bc apparently she's done that for several ppl to make sure they actually make it thru the three weeks and keep on it (lovely of her!!)

[rubiesintherough]

.

[iknowwhereyousleepatnight]

people begging me to do something to make a certain someone happy aren’t taking into account that i hate this person and i will revel in the knowledge that i kept them from getting the most perfect version of what they wanted. in fact i hope they mourn the loss of this for the rest of their life and die unhappy about it

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[0p1er0]

Sometimes when mentally ill

One must take 30 minutes to make a potholder

I am now out of fabric circles TwT

It will be a pan to get more

[nerice]

i do not think about how i had no concrete health issues after thesis. i do not think abt how the moment i started working out again i got 17 caution pop-ups across my body. i do not think about how i did not have wrist pain on main until i overplayed hades one night in december & how getting covid & then christmas prevented me from seeking immediate treatment until a full month in. i am going to cryscreamdie if i think about it

[chryzure-archive]

GOD, but the slow dawning horror azure must’ve had as he realized he couldn’t escape his family, his legacy. he ran off with chrysi to study the problem and own three cats and be, ultimately, two normal ppl (or as normal as you can get when your girlfriend can still see and communicate with ghosts long past the age when her abilities should’ve faded, but… hey, he still got to meet the family and meet her four adoptive brothers and try to impress them! normal ppl things!!).

then thoughts that weren’t his own began to press into his head. he’d be watching chrysi make him tea and then he’d feel the urge to take her hand and press it into the hot stove until it gave her permanent scarring. and, god, he was so scared—of himself, and for chrysi—until he realized that they weren’t his thoughts, and then got even more scared.

nothing he did helped, after that. mordecai’s smart—he’d give azure ring scares like that, then lull him into a sense of security by allowing azure total calm for weeks. sometimes months at a time. but he’d always come back with a horrible thought or impulse or dream, to keep azure on edge. keep him sleepless. weaken his defenses so he could take control over him.

it was the end of azure lafaye as azure lafaye the night that he woke up with his hands around chrysi’s neck. they were hovering, really, but azure woke up and knew that if he’d been just a moment too late, he would’ve killed the only person that mattered to him. in fact, he knew that mordecai had woken him up on purpose. it was a warning—return to the fold, else he’ll kill chrysi by azure’s own hands.

so azure returns. he could never run away. he was trapped from the start. there was no escape. his father allowed all his rebellions, and he decided when they would stop. and now his father would take his place for him.

[2024skin]

Something profoundly funny about getting snap memories where I adore and dote on my candle tattoo when I look back on it today as one of my worst decisions

[cuteniarose]

Me: *creates an OC*

Me: *heavily implies OC will meet a bad fate*

OC: *meets bad fate*

Me:

(Alternatively, I may have started it, but @katkastrofa enabled me and now I’m losing my mind)

[sensitivegoblin]

AHG!!!!!!!!!!!

Im screaming until my throat hurts in my mind

[deactivateddsstuff]

How I desperately yearn to fix everything, to right all the wrongs, to mend and heal the pain that should not have happened in the first place…

[loumauve]

not me having a minor breakdown at 7am bc I woke up in pain after only 6 hrs of sleep (after over three days with barely 5 hrs each) because it means I have to go brush my teeth to make sure nothing gets infected before I can take a painkiller and get an ice pack or two to even just lie down again.

and I already know I won't be able to fall back. and even if I could I'm no longer feverish and sick enough to get away with taking naps so I'm stuck on little sleep for the rest of the day until I inevitably do this all over again with even less sleep under my belt. no surprise about the fucking migraines tbh. fingers crossed it doesn't get bad enough to activate the bipolar sleeper agent cells or whatever, I do not need to deal with a fucking episode of any kind rn.

and then thinking about the fact that the doc said the numbness to my lip and teeth could very well take a few MONTHS to fully go away?? I have a final project to do, and a presentation to hold and a final exam and if I can't even eat snacks in all that time or bite into anything I don't know how I'm supposed to do any of those things. just. trying not to panic but fuck, this was not the plan