#you meet some woman on the internet and take her home

[pinkorchidsinspring]

I haven’t seen anyone post the reaction to this line, and I’d like to say that Detroit N2 had the best reaction ever-

“You meet some woman on the internet and take her home”

Personally just based on the way everyone was SCREAMING during Girl in Red’s performance, there was many gays (like myself) in the audience. This was by far the most welcoming concert I’ve ever been to.

Really missing my show right now 🥹

[oh-my-damn]

[kissandships]

The problem with watching Eras Tour videos is that I want to sing all the key changes while listening to the original versions

[newfoundjasongrace]

everyone is mourning tolerate it but im mourning the 1 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

[monster-disaster]

[shadow monster] Monster at midnight

male!shadow monster x male!human!Reader Good to know: well, cheating and dubious/non-consensual, but not in a traumatizing way, I guess? mxm, oral

Summary: The new bed your wife got came with something else.

It all begins with your wife's newfound obsession with antique stores and online markets. What starts as a casual interest for her soon turns into a frequent activity for you, with mornings and afternoons spent in parking lots, waiting for strangers and whatever she bought from them through the internet. These transactions are mostly pleasant surprises—garden tools, books, and seasonal decorations that would cost much more in stores. They are harmless things, and you have no issue picking them up just to make your wife happy.

The situation takes a strange turn when she gets another bed. At first, there is nothing wrong with it. It is much bigger than your previous one, giving her and you enough space at night to sleep without kicking each other every few hours. It looks good, and it's comfortable.

So it's fine, right?

However, after a month, things start to feel off. You begin waking up at odd hours with an unsettling feeling of being watched or touched. Sometimes, you wake up drenched in sweat, feeling inexplicably hot and agitated. On other nights, you find yourself waking up aroused, ready to climax at any moment. This last detail you keep to yourself, driven by a strange instinct to remain silent about it.

When you finally bring up your concerns to your wife, she just laughs it off. "I don't know what you are talking about," she says. "I sleep like a baby." You hum in response, uncertain whether it is a good sign or something you should worry about. "Maybe you're overworked," she continues. "You're always so tired when you get back from work." You are tired because you can't sleep at night, but you keep this answer to yourself, partly because your wife's explanation sounds much more rational than the unsettling fantasies that have been plaguing you. Her suggestion that you're simply overworked and exhausted from your job is a comforting alternative to the bizarre thoughts swirling in your mind.

Yet, even with her reassurances, the nights don't get any easier. The feeling of being watched, the burning heat, and the unbidden arousal continue to haunt you. You toss and turn, trying to rationalize these experiences, but they persist stubbornly.

In the quiet, dark hours of the night, your thoughts wander, and you can't shake the growing sense of unease. There's an underlying tension, a feeling that something is not quite right. Despite the logical explanations you try to offer yourself, a part of you wonders if there's more to this new bed than meets the eye. The once-pleasant surprises from your wife's shopping sprees have now taken a turn, leaving you questioning what you've welcomed into your home.

- With an exhale through your chapped lips, you let your head fall back on the pillow, arms tucked beneath it. Your body melts against the mattress as your muscles relax and your eyes close, ready to fall asleep again despite the nagging feeling in the back of your mind.

It's nothing, you tell yourself. Your wife is right; it must be stress from work. Maybe you should take some time off. A few days of vacation would do some good for both you and the still-sleeping woman next to you. Go somewhere warm and sunny. No matter how much you love living in Grimbrook, the gloomy town can play tricks on one's mind if they're not careful.

Something nudges your leg, and you scowl into the darkness. Your wife's name rolls off your tongue in a low, barely audible grunt as you pull away from her, but the sensation remains around your calf. The hold reminds you of long, slender fingers with sharp nails grazing your skin. It's warm and heavy, and you have to shake your head to dispel your ridiculous thoughts.

A shiver runs down your spine, and you tell yourself it's just your imagination, fueled by exhaustion and stress. Yet, the feeling lingers, making your heart race. You take a deep breath, trying to calm yourself, but despite your efforts to rationalize, the sense of unease is undeniable. You glance at your wife sleeping peacefully beside you, and suddenly, a thought crosses your mind; what if your wife is right? And wrong? What if there is really nothing wrong with the bed, but stress has nothing to do with your problems? What if you are going insane?

What if…

But no. There is a hand on your calf, moving up and up until long nails graze the back of your thigh. Your heart leaps into your throat, and you jump as you struggle for what feels like an eternity to turn around and yank the blanket off your body in one frantic motion. The springs creak as your back hits the bed, but the sound is drowned by your pulse pounding in your ears.

And you need several, several seconds to believe your own eyes.

The darkness is thick and almost tangible in the bedroom. A strange, eerie fog rolls across the floor, curling around the furniture and casting shapes and shadows on the walls. They stretch and twist in ways they shouldn't do, and at the end of the bed, a creature kneels, barely distinguishable from the surrounding darkness. The monster is lean with a hunched posture. You can see the long, slender fingers tipped with sharp nails, the same ones that grazed your thigh moments ago. Multiple eyes glimmer faintly at you, reflecting what little light there is coming from the window. The monster's skin is so dark that it nearly blends into the blackness, a seamless extension of the night itself.

As your heart races and your breath comes in shallow gasps, you struggle to make sense of the sight. The monster's eyes, too many, seem to pierce through you, seeing into the deepest corners of your soul. You feel paralyzed, unable to move or look away. The weight of its gaze is heavy and oppressive on you.

For a moment, the world narrows to just you and the monster. The bedroom, the house, your sleeping wife next to you, and everything else fades into insignificance. It's as if time itself has stopped, trapping you in this moment. With him.

He is the one who breaks the stillness of the room, placing his large hands on your thighs just above your knees. His grip is strong, and his touch is cold yet surprisingly soothing. Your muscles twitch at the sudden feeling, and you brace yourself on your elbows, wanting to sit up but halting your attempt as you speak hurriedly. "Hey! Hey! Hey!" Your voice is still hoarse from sleep but filled with alertness and panic as you stare at the monster with wide eyes. He looks back at you with a calmness you certainly don't have. The creature’s multiple eyes glint in the dim light, each one reflecting an eerie curiosity. "Who… What are you?" you manage to stammer out. The monster tilts his head when he hears your question, the movement is seemingly innocent and almost graceful as his fingers flex around your legs, sending shivers up your spine.

The silence stretches, heavy and tense, until finally, you hear a sound that seems to resonate in the air and within your very bones.

It's… purring.

It's deep and reverberating. You can’t tear your gaze away from him, a strange mix of fear and fascination holding you captive. The purring grows louder, filling the room with a sound that is both comforting and lulling. The rhythmic vibration somehow keeps you grounded, preventing you from losing your mind entirely.

The fog that had enveloped the room now swirls lazily around the bed, as if it too is under the monster's spell.

But you don't get an answer.

Instead, his grip on you slips up and up and up, and before you can say anything, his hands are under the thin fabric of your loose underwear. Your lips fall open as your breath catches in your throat with a strange, strangled sound that bounces out of your heaving chest. Your first instinct says to grab him, but your body freezes before you can do something stupid. His long, sharp nails graze over your inner thighs, too close to your balls, and there is no way you are ready to risk it with a reckless move. Now, you have to be smart, but damn, your brain stopped functioning several seconds ago.

"Wait! Wait!" You gasp. "You shouldn't… It's not…" No matter how you try, the words don't want to roll off your tongue as you hobble for some coherent thoughts. The tips of his nails wake goosebumps on their way, making your tense muscles tremble at the feeling. While one part of your mind is frozen by panic, the other is intrigued. Despite his looks, the monster doesn't seem dangerous with his big eyes that stare at you with as much curiosity as you watch him.

When you don't say anything else, he moves again, punching a startled groan out of your chest. His long, slender fingers curl around your dick, holding it steadily and firmly. "No!" You wheeze, trying to pull away, but the movement makes him tug on your shaft, and you swear you can see stars for a moment. Your cock twitches, and you can feel your arousal building up in the base of your spine despite the absurdity of the situation.

The creature purrs again. The sound is short and excited as he lets you go only to tug on your underwear before you can catch your breath. Your cock juts out, half hard, while the waistband of your boxer stretches around your thighs and slips down off your legs as you struggle to reach it. The monster does nothing to help you, mostly because his attention is entirely elsewhere. "Look," you inhale. "We shouldn't…" Now that your cock is bobbing under his heavy, intense gaze, there is no way a flimsy fabric you use for sleep can be more interesting for him.

He shuffles forward a little, the bed dips under his weight as he finds his new place between your legs, forcing you to spread them open for him. Your lips open again to say something, but he takes hold of your cock, and again, your mind goes blank. The black monster with several eyes and no words tugs on your cock experimentally, stroking you into full erection as he explores your shaft from base to tip. Your hips buck upward automatically, and you groan at yourself. You shouldn't do this. You shouldn't enjoy this. And yet, when his thumb finds a vein at the underside of your cock, you can't stop the tingling feeling running through your body. His large palm feels warm and velvety as it rubs up and down on your erection. His fingertip ghosts over the edge of the crown of your cock, teasing the sensitive skin under it to the point you can't even breathe to say something. Your lungs burn for air, and your voice is barely audible when a wheeze escapes your lips. One glance at the monster hovering over your cock is enough to know his next step. And while your body aches for it, your mind still trying to hold onto the reality. "Don't!" Without even acting like he hears you, he leans in and licks a tentative path along your shaft, lingering at the tip and teasing the small hole there. His tongue is thick and long, you can feel every movement of the wet muscle on your throbbing cock. Your chest expands with a ragged inhale as you stare at him taking you into his mouth. He is warm and wet, and his long, long tongue wraps around you easily. "Fuck!" Your voice is loud and hoarse in the silence, mixing with the wet, suckling sound of the dark creature around your cock. Adjusting his grip at the base, he takes you deeper until you can feel his throat tightening and working around you.

The sight of the monster's fingers and long, sharp nails so close to your most sensitive area surges adrenaline through your veins while his lips rubbing up and down on your hard shaft softens the sharpness of your survival instincts.

The monster backs away, jerking you off with his hand much more easily now that your cock is soaked by the mix of your pre-cum and his saliva. His fist rubs up and down on you for long seconds while your hips rise and fall as you fuck into his hold, chasing your pleasure. Every rational thought is out of your mind, and you don't even fight for it anymore. Not when he dips his head back, letting his tongue circle on the tip of your cock, sliding lower and lower until you are in his mouth again.

The slurping sounds of his lips are loud as he drools down to your balls, using his free hand to play with them softly, carefully. Your groan is almost painful as your back arches away from the bed from the electric jolt that shoots through your body, making your muscles flex and spasm.

Your oxygen-deprived brain can't even fathom anything outside the thick, curling fog around you and the monster between your legs. Your toes and fingers go numb as they curl, and you grab onto the sheets under you. You tug on the fabric with every wave of pleasure washing over you, making your muscles twitch and turning your bones into liquid. Your shirt sticks to your body like a second skin from the thin layer of sweat covering you. You are all lost and ruined under the sensations. His drool dripping down to your balls is tickling and messy and so fucking good. And his tongue is long and wet, wrapping and massaging your erection all the way from the tip to the base.

It goes like this for a while, you wheeze and writhe while he sucks you deep down to his throat, and when you think you can't go higher, the creature starts to purr. The vibration tightening and fluttering around your cock makes you shout with a release. Before you know it, you spurt your cum into his mouth. He swallows down your load easily, and every gulp sends sparkles over your spine until it almost cracks under the pressure of your orgasm.

By the time your body goes limp, you are dead to the world. Your eyes fall shut when the darkness takes you so you don't see the monster retreating to his hiding place while the thick, rolling mist slowly disappears, leaving you and your wife on the bed as if nothing happened.

The next day, when your wife joins you in the kitchen while the scent of coffee lingers in the early morning air and you are more relaxed than ever before, you say nothing about your midnight visitor. When she asks how did you sleep, you reply with a smile behind the brim of your cup.

[dazzlinhaze]

you meet some woman on the internet and take her home...

[lbcreations-blog]

Emily x an immortal reader soulmate au

Not proofread, I'm way too tired, and this took forever to make with my writersblock

Also, should I do more Emily x reader? And possibly do some Sera x readers as well? Or?

Masterlist

-------------

In this universe, everyone had a soulmate, sometimes more than one. And to know who your soulmate is, you would need the same tattoo that was placed on your shoulder.

You, a simple human who was cursed with immortality, had not found the one you love.

Then again, you have only been on earth for about 24 years. The only reason you knew you were immortal was because you fell off a skyscraper and lived with only a few scratches.

But to say the least, you were worried your soulmate or soulmates would be simply mortaliezed.

Now we turn to Emily, a seraphim who was given a mission to come to earth to collect your human soul, to come to heaven, and reside there due to you being registered as dead and being on heavens list.

Emily went into the portal that was shown to her after being instructed on her mission. Once entering the human world, she put on her human form to go find your soul, which she assumed was just floating around.

Now back to you, who was at an internet café studying for your college test that was coming soon. After a while, your eyes started to get sore, so you decided to look away from your computer for a few seconds to give your eyes a break. And when doing so, you saw a woman walk through the café door, and you knew she just looked stunning and you had to introduce yourself.

And lucky you, she was walking just your way!

But before you could say anything, she spoke to you. "Hi, my name is Emily, but you can call me Em or Eme. uhm, your name is reader? Yes?

What. The. Fuck? How does she know your name?

"Yea, hi. Emily. H-how. How do you know my name?" You asked her, a bit creaped out. "May I sit here?" She asked, ignoring your question. You agreed, wanting to figure out how she knew your name, even though you were pretty freaked out.

"Sooooooo," you started. "How do you know my name?" She then responded,"Will it explain myself if I told you I knew you were dead? or well immortal from what i can see." She asked.

"What?" You whispered,"I sai-" "no, how do you know this?" You asked, interrupting her. "Well i-" "Wait, no. Let me pay for my stuff and we can talk about this at my place." You told her, putting your hand up so you could tell the waiter that you were ready to pay.

Once paying, you left the café with Emily and took a two minute walk to your home. while walking home, Emily talked your ear off about things she likes. Yes, it was annoying, but you enjoyed it in some way, You weren't sure why, but you tried not to question it.

Once you got into your home, Emily immediately complemented it. You thanked her and told her to follow you to your lounge. Once in your lounge, you both sat down on your couch, and you asked your first question.

"How do you know im immortal?" You asked. "Well, you see, I'm a Seraphim from heaven," your jaw dropped. Emily continued, "And well, I got a mission to come down here and bring you to heaven because you were registered as dead, and you are on our list," Emily told you simply.

"I-" you started. "Give me a few seconds to process this Em," you told her as you got up and went to your room to think.

-------------

You walked back into the lounge and sat down on the couch. "So... you were told to take me to heaven because you were told I'm registered as dead?" You asked."Yes, I was told to do that" Emily told you.

"Can I not go? I like it here on earth, and i still wanna meet my soul mate." You told Emily. "No, I don't think so... but I can see if I can convince Sera, " Emily told you. "Yea sure, thank you Em"

--------

It was the next day. You were jalaxing on your bed, scrolling through tiktok when a bright light went into your room. You closed your eyes until you felt the bright light go away.

Then you saw Emily in angel form looking beautiful. "Oh hey there, Emily, so what did Sera say?" You asked her "well reader i-i tried to convince Sera, but. She said no. She said it was- "what? B-but Emily, I like it here!" You started tearing up, being passionate for where you live.

"What about my soulmate?! I'm just never going to meet them?! I want to at least let them know I love them!" You told her passionately "well they might end up going to heaven- "no! No, that's a might! I just want to meet them once! Atleast!" You told her tears falling down your cheeks alot of emotions spilled.

"Ugh, get out of my room Em" you told her, hugging your torso. "I- ok then." Emily then walks out of the room.

-------

Emily sat on your couch, feeling sad that she could not convince Sera to let you stay on earth and upsetting you. She felt that you should be happy.

After a few more minutes of Emily sitting on your couch and thinking, you walked into the lounge without the hoody that you always wore, or at least around Emily (Which makes sense since you've only known each other less then a day if you put all the hours together) you were now wearing your black tank top due to it being hot.

You then sat down on the couch and looked at the floor. "So... I'm sorry for shouting at ya Emily, " you told her."I was angry and just really emotional, you did not deserve that, I hope you can forgive me, I know you were just doing your job, im sorry." You said you continued to look at the floor anticipating for her answer.

After about 30 seconds, you looked at Emily and saw her jaw was dropped. "Em?.. Emily?" Emily slowly brought her hand to her sleeve and brought it up to reveal her soulmate mark.

You were. Shocked, to say the least.

"Your. My soulmate, " you said in shock

Your body suddenly moved on its on and you passionately kissed her. Emily kissed back. "I guess I would not mind going to heaven with you, Eme," you told her.

Well uhhmmmm

Hope yall enjoyed it

-L.B Creations

[brinconvenient]

This is a long tale, but I appreciate you taking the time to meet my friend Chris and help her out if you can.

TL;DR: my friend, an elderly queer woman I met when she was homeless just lost everything she owns in a fire at her first permanent home she had after becoming unhoused. Luckily, she and her cat were not home at the time. Please help if you can by donating or boosting.

This is a queer elder who needs our help. I'm hoping tumblr can come through for her

https://www.gofundme.com/f/fire-took-chris-baileys-home-they-need-help

Here's the long tale:

A friend of mine just lost everything except herself, her cat and the clothes on her back to a fire at her apartment (her first after being homeless for years) on Friday. We learned yesterday that nothing from her apartment is recoverable. Please help!

(Long post with cute cat pictures behind the readmore)

I met Chris one Sunday afternoon after driving past her three times as she sat on a bench outside our local library after closing. I stopped to ask if she needed a ride, and found out that she was homeless, staying in motels when her SSI came in and on the street when it ran out.

As the years have passed, I've learned a lot about her. Despite her parents kicking her out at 17 when she was outed to them as gay, she went back to school and became a social worker, working in several Chicago hospitals through the 80s and 90s, and, like a lot of queer women in the caring fields at that time, tended to and provided comfort and care for (among others) so many gay men, young and old, living with and dying from AIDS, from the earliest days of the disease through the availability of the triple cocktail and to the brighter days of hope.

Through it all, she had relationships with women in a time where that was something that wasn't always safe to do. Some were good, some bad, and some resulting in her losing nearly everything, but she struggled through. She quit social work in 99 or 2000 when her mom got sick and passed away, and then stayed out of the workforce to care for her dad until he passed in 2006. Those experiences impacted her deeply, and she became permanently disabled during that period, leaving her living on SSI, and struggling with her own mental health. She eventually lost her condo, and bounced in and out of apartments and motels.

When I met her in Sept 2019, I helped her get back into the motel she'd been staying at and bridging her to her next check and then making sure that she could stay there, and reliably get her maintenance meds and start rebuilding her life and credit.

This is her and everything she owned as we left her hotel room for the final time on Valentine's Day 2022.

The cat there is Bailey, her constant companion since they adopted each other in September 2021. They've both been through a lot and are absolutely the picture of "Who rescued whom?"

We started having biweekly dinners and I worked with her creditors and tried to get her credit score back into a good place, and helped her get banked and fixed up with access to the Internet and just help her feel more solid and stable in her life.

Just over 2 years later, in February 2022, we were finally able to get her into a senior independent living apartment, her first permanent home since about 2017. She had no furniture, but with some secondhand pickups and occasional pickups, we got her something resembling a home.

It wasn't perfect, and she had her grumbles, certainly, but it was her home. It was a place that she could launch from to recover and consider moving some place even better, if she chose.

However, Friday, July 14, Bailey had an afternoon vet appointment. Everything was fine when we left, but when we got home, with Bailey in a carrier in the backseat, we were shocked to see what looked like a million emergency vehicles & a whole lot of seniors sitting on the grass.

Chris and Bailey came with me to take my daughter into the city that evening, giving the situation 2 hours to develop and for us to get more information. We heard a few newsradio updates and saw this story on abc7, getting the sinking feeling that that balcony looked too familiar.

When we got back from the city, we were able to drive around the back of the building and confirm that this was her apartment.

We were able to get back to the building on Tuesday and get into the apartment to get her medications, but everything is water damaged from the sprinkler system (with all of its stagnant water) and the firehoses. All her furniture. All her clothes. Her bed. Her degrees. Gone.

Everything she owned is gone. She literally owns less now than when she was homeless. She's despairing and trying her best to keep it together, but she's lost so many homes in her life, going back to when she was 17 and her parents found out she is gay and kicked her out.

This all feels like too much. Please help. Please donate what you can, and share where you're able.

https://www.gofundme.com/f/fire-took-chris-baileys-home-they-need-help

[selfaware-bungou-stray-dogs]

Hello!! This is my first time requesting something so I'm sorry if I did it wrong or something, so I was wondering if you could do one with preferably Dazai where the reader is suicidal and mostly copes with humor. Oh and could the reader also be a teen like 13 years old?

Circus Hop

Self-Aware! Platonic! Dazai Osamu x GN! Teen! Suicidal! Reader

Description: You were two years younger then him, when he tried to end his life for the first time. You resemble him in more, then one way.

Warning: Mentions of Suicide, Suicide attempt. Parental Neglect. Emotional abuse. Terrible parents. Self-harm. Breakdown. English is my second language

Inspired by the song Circus Hop by YonKaGor.

List of Suicide hotline numbers can be found here and here.

____

Your father brought you to this small building. Someone from school insisted on that.

The room she asked you to stay was quiet. Her voice and your father's voices were muffled, because of the door.

Few minutes ago you were talking to the woman. She asked you about your life, your plans for the future, your friends.

Your answers were simple.

Nothing interesting. Don't have any plans for future. Don't want to meet my friends... Just don't want to.

Then she asked you about pictures you have drawn. And asking about your parents about death. And when the thoughts appeared.

Another set of answers.

I feel like drawing it. I feel like talking about it. After Granny's death.

You... think, that you feel like it. You still can feel, right?

Then she asked you to do some tests. First, you must answer, if some sentences can describe you¹, than you must finish some sentences², then group other sentences together ³.

After you finished, she asked you to wait here, while she talks to your father.

You were left alone.

You looked around.

There were nothing interesting for you. Yet, you continue sitting on the sofa and dangling your feet.

You didn't flinch, when your father opened the door, shouting at the woman, who was talking to him.

"Don't you have anything, that will fix them? They are creeping out everyone!"

Woman's voice was firm.

"I already told you, that your child need professional help. You should..."

Your father's gaze became colder.

"I will take them home. They aren't suicidal. They just a little brat who want some attention and who are angry at their mother and I for working too much and not playing in their stupid games. Come, [Y/N], we are leaving!"

He took your hand in his and start to drag you behind him. You simply follow after him.

Before completely leaving the small building, your father stopped.

"Where's your jacket?"

You point at the door, that leads to woman's office.

"There. I forgot it there "

Your father grumble something and, after slapping you on the back of the neck, he walked towards the door and enter the office again.

"Idiotic brat."

Nothing new. As usual.

Then you heard, how the secretary and one of the janitors were talking.

"Another one of these parents. At first, they refuse to treat their children, because they don't have time for that..." Janitor said, glaring at the office door.

"And then, they must find time to bury their kid..." The secretary's gaze was full of sympathy, when she looked at you.

Your father returns with your jacket. You put if on and follow your father again.

He was mumbling under his breath.

"The nerve of this woman... [Y/N]! Just stop being sad. Be happy!"

You mindlessly nodded. You didn't pay much attention to your father's words. One thought were circling in your head.

"Is it important... to attend someone's funeral?"

_______

It was important. At least, The Internet said so.

Your parents... Work hard. If you die, they won't be able to go to your funeral.

You shouldn't die. At lest, for now.

But... You were so tired. You were so afraid. Future was scary. Life was scary.

and you were a failure

You remembered, your father's advice.

"Just stop being sad. Be happy."

Maybe... you could...

________

For a year, you followed your father's advice.

For one year, you manage to keep up a happy façade.

You became interested in life again.

probably... you do become interested in your hobbies again... at least...you don't even scratch your legs or pull out your hair that much.

Dad's advice works.

kind of... your jokes freaked people out... but the school therapist insisted on helping you in secret from your parents.

when dad found out, he enrolled you in a different school.

he yelled at you for being a brat

mom yelled at you for being a difficult child

You must stay happy. Just be happy.

Pretend to be happy.

you just want to be truly happy again

________

You liked BSD even before these thoughts appeared in your head. Your Granny bought you BSD Manga as a birthday present. It is special to you.

Dazai was one of your favorite character before. Now, he truly became your most favorite. You two are similar. He laughs and jokes. You laugh and joke.

both of you need help

You shake your head, chasing away the thoughts.

You open BSD Mayoi app, humming that song again.

________

Dazai felt nervous.

Two weeks ago, he and the rest of BSD Cast finally got into your world. And, he didn't like what he saw.

First, your parents left the country for a business trip. Leaving you under the care of a complete stranger. Who checked on you two times a day. For the rest of the day, they were doing their own business. And don't pick up the phone.

Your parents left a thirteen-year-old you on your own!

Thankfully, with a few bucks from Fitzgerald and a death glare from Fukuzawa, your 'babysitter' left. You were under BSD Cast care now.

Second, your jokes are concerning. Dazai isn't a hypocrite, he admits, that he jokes about ending his own life! When he and others heard your jokes, back in their world, Dazai was sure that it was his bad influence. But, it turns out, the truth was much darker.

Dazai stopped joking about suicide. He didn't want to worsen your condition even more.

Third, the scratches on your legs.

You scraped your knee a few days ago, and Yosano bandaged it. And she saw this strange marks on your legs. Scratches. Deep. Dazai had a feeling, that you were the one, who made them.

Dazai was worried about you. He wanted to help you.

_______

With each day, it became harder and harder for you to pretend to be happy.

BSD Cast makes sure of that.

They weren't rude. They didn't yell. They... were there.

Asking if you need help. Telling you, that you are allowed to cry. That they will always be there for you.

You wanted to tell them everything. To tell the truth.

But, the call from your father happened.

_____

"Why your voice shaking, [Y/N]? Are you being a brat again?"

"I...I..."

"You're a little ungrateful... You want to make our lives hard?! Did you like it?! You know what, fine! If you didn't want to be there so badly, then d[|||||||||||||||]! See, if your mother and I will cry."

The call ended.

And you were broken.

______

It was dinner time. And you were uncharacteristically silent. No laughter. No jokes. No questions. No talking about your day. Nothing.

Then in the middle of the dinner, you start humming the song. Song, that they heard you humming all the time.

But your eyes were empty.

Dazai carefully touch your shoulder.

"[Y/N], kiddo? Are you alright?"

You slowly nodded. An empty grin appears on your face.

"I am! I am fine... I am happy! I...I can even sing a song!"

BSD Cast looked at each other. Dazai carefully spoke.

"A song?"

You nodded, taking your phone. You quickly found an instrumental.

"Yes! Want to hear it?"

You didn't wait for his, or anyone's response, you pressed play button. The song started playing from the middle.

A cheerful melody start playing.

Soon you sang.

"I shall now accept the fact that I'm a failure (You're a failure). 'Cause I'm still afraid the future might be scarier (It is scarier). I'll slip while having fun and cut off my own tongue. They'll think I was dumb!"

The grin on your face and empty gaze was frightening. Everyone slowly stand up from the table. Fukuzawa took a step towards you.

"[Y/N], if something is wrong, please..."

You ignored him.

"Up from the sky, I won't want you to cry. So here's an act for everyone to sneer at"

Suddenly, you stand up and star jumping up and down.

"So sing along, it's such a silly song. The cackling carousel, it spins and never stops. The acrobat who's waiting at the top. Should do a circus hop!"

You let out a hysterical laughter.

Mom and dad won't cry. No one would care. You can't be happy. You didn't feel anything. No one would care.

"I've said goodbye, I don't want you to cry. So have a laugh with everyone but me"

You were now standing in the middle of the room. You didn't pay attention to BSD Cast. To their pleas to talk to them.

The only thing that matters to you was the open window.

Quick.

You made a dash towards the window. For some reason, you still sang.

You forced yourself to sing. Like this song gave you strength.

"So sing along, it's such a silly song. The cackling carousel, it spins and never stops. The acrobat who fell off from the top. They did a little drop!"

Right before you grab the window's handle, something heavy crushed against you.

You fall down on the floor.

Dazai was pinning you to the floor, making sure, that you can't move.

Something wet fall on your face. You looked up.

Dazai was crying. With shaking hands, he hugged you.

BSD Cast surrounded you. You were in a group hug.

"[Y/N]! Never, never do it again! Kiddo..."

"[Y/N]! Are you hurt? Do you need medical help?"

"First thing tomorrow we are going to the therapist... No! I will find the therapist right now! There must be someone working right now!"

Tears. They were worried about you. They were crying for you.

For the first time since Granny's death, you cried.

"I... I am so scared! After Granny died, I was so alone! Mom and Dad weren't home! They didn't answer my questions about Granny! One day... I just stopped to care about the future. I was afraid of future! Live became so hard! I didn't feel anything... I just want it to end! I want to..."

You didn't finish your sentence and sobbed, hiding your face in Dazai's chest.

Dazai's words were warm. His voice was still shaky.

"You are not alone, [Y/N]... We will be there. I will be there."

_____

For the next few days, you were constantly under supervision. BSD Cast make sure, that you don't have any access to sharp things, medicine, windows.

You start attending therapy. What surprised you the most, that Dazai were attending it with you.

"I will be a bad big brother, if I don't act as an example."

Your parents were fired. Fitzgerald pressed charges about neglect and abuse.

You don't know how, but Fitzgerald adopted you almost instantly.

You had a long way ahead of you.

But you know, you will be better.

Because, one time, you finally thought about your future. And you were waiting for this future to come.

____

¹ Modifications of "Eysenck's Personality Test" for Teens is used to diagnose suicidal behavior.

²Modification of "Sacks Sentence Completion Test, SSCT" is used to diagnose suicidal behavior of teens and children.

³ One of the test, that is used by psychologists in Russia.

[baiwu-jinji]

Hi ! I'm @memt_tgcf from twitter, I saw from your tweet that people were asking questions via your tumblr, so I decided to do the same, hope it isn't bothering you. I've been seen LOTS of comments from 猫耳 calling huahua as "HuaCha", or (flower emoji) + (tea emoji), (lots of tea/cha emoji) whenever there seems something going on between Hualian, but couldn't really understand what this "CHA" supposed to mean.

Could you kindly elaborate on this one ?

Hi! :) Sorry about the late reply >< “Cha” means tea and it’s a reference to the Chinese internet slang “lü cha biao” (绿茶婊), literally meaning “green tea bitch”. A “green tea bitch” is a woman that projects a guileless, harmless and innocent persona but is actually ambitious, manipulative and calculating - she’s good at creating situations and making insinuations to get close to the guy she wants; she acts meek and delicate in front of a guy to make him feel empowered and protective of her; she’s nice and attentive to a guy she wants but indifferent to other people; she makes an effort with her appearance to attract a guy but makes it seem effortless etc. “Green tea bitch” is a derogatory and arguably misogynistic term, but TGCF fans use it to take a dig at HC for being sly and scheming when he’s courting XL. HC does actually exhibit some actions similar to that of “lü cha biao”: he acts like he’s scared of the ghosts so XL would comfort and protect him, and then he compliments XL for how powerful he is even though HC scared away the ghosts himself; he acts like he just casually runs into XL when it’s a deliberate meeting; he tells XL that he prefers XL’s place to his Paradise Manor because XL’s place feels more like home, so XL basically has to invite him over again; he makes those moves that slyly send the message that he and XL are a couple, such as telling XL that ghosts gift their ashes to someone they choose before giving his own ashes to XL, and tying the red string of fate on XL’s hands in the name of keeping in touch of him; he’s most attentive and considerate to XL but careless of anyone else; he wants XL to like his appearance and dresses up for him (this is apparent in the new extra), and being HC, of course he makes it effortless.

[two-white-butterflies]

take her home | c55

Description: He meets some woman on the internet and takes her home. Carlos Sainz opens twitter and finds the one.

Pairing: carlos sainz/doctor!reader

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yn_is_me: Just to remind people that I exist 🍒

liked by carlossainz55 and 1,239 others

>comments

nicerevengegirlie: BABY YOU ARE POSITIVELY GLOWING - yn_is_me: birds of a feather, bbyghorl ❤️

carlandosupporter: CARLOS I SEE U IN THE LIKES

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yn_is_me: 10.21.23 Flashback to my modeling days in Miami. I was 15/16 by the time this photo was taken. The cigarette was a prop and I had sooo much fun. It's nice to look at the road I could've taken. Ultimately, I chose to become a doctor 🍒 and dios mio, life has been a dream ❤️

liked by carlossainz55 and 3,283 others

>comments

carlandoshipper: NOW I'M QUESTIONING YOU... BABE UR SO FUCKING GORGEOUS WHY ARE YOU FANGIRLING OVER CARLOS REPLYING TO U?

carlandoshipper: You are the fucking goal NOT HIM

ultravioletrays5: I used to go to school with her in Salvador. She's one of the few ppl that looked gorgeous before becoming famous.

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formulaoneshitposting: IS IT JUST ME OR IS Y/N IN THE SAME FREQUENCY AS CARLOS 😭 THEIR INTERACTIONS ONLINE ARE GIVING ME LIFFEEE

liked by 82 others

>comments

ohwwwwheen3: Yeah it also helps with the fact that she's so hot 😭 we're gonna get the most beautiful ferrari WAGS

hotnotch: We've been known since she became a VS Model. I think she always had the best face and body for modeling but she chose to become something more private. ALSO RESPECT ON HER NAME IT'S DR. Y/N L/N

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FormulaOneUpdates: Dr. Y/N L/N in the paddocks !

liked by 7,128 others

>comments

AvidAviator: OH MY GOD? WHO IS SHE?

hoareu4: She's so beautiful

watchmewhip: VS MODEL?

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carlossainz55: Not a cruel summer 🌊☀️ tagged: yn_is_me

liked by 1,293,102 others

>comments

holymackerels: THE HARD LAUNCH IS REAL

yn_is_me: only one picture??? hm..will post the others 🤣

ynandcarlosfanbase: THEY LOOK SO BEAUTIFUL

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yn_is_me: resisting the urge to push him down tagged: carlossainz55

liked by Charles_Leclerc and 5,682 others

>comments

ohnowhw: It all started with AI...

Charles_Leclerc: Nice picture of your dog! - yn_is_me: nooo that's my cat 😁

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yn_is_me added a picture to her story!

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F1WagsStarterpack: Who is Y/N L/N? Dr. L/N graduated from Yale University with a degree in Neurosurgery. She came from a very proficient family who used to live in Brazil. She is a former Victoria's Secret model who was active from 2008-2012.

liked by 712,832 others

>comments

mastermindf1: So she's a rich girl? Nothing special about that. - F1WagsStarterpack: Yep, idk why people are praising her over being a neurosurgeon. When you come from money, you don't have to do anything else 🤦🏻‍♀️ BARE. MINIMUM.

yn_is_me: I love the picture that you used of me, but there's a little mistake in the caption. I didn't come from a proficient family :((❤️ I had to work as a model to afford my medical school.

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yn_is_me: when boredom strikes ...

liked by 1,382 others

>comments

shehzadeshang: SHE LOOKS SO MUCH LIKE KELLY PIQUET HERE OMG WHAWHAWHAH

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[afictionaladventure16]

Heyyy!!! I absolutely loved your latest work “Taking it All In” I haven’t stopped crying since I read it. I was wondering if you could write something about the depression that the reader has in the story. Something along the lines where reader has been skipping school for some time due to depression and she hasn’t told Pedro about it. He finds out cuz eventually the school calls him and tells him whats going on with your absences and your bad grades. You two get into a fight about it because you refuse to tell him what’s going on as to not worry your dad. After days of not talking, cold shoulders and staying in your room/bed as much as possible Pedro finally cracks and tries to talk to you again. You’re in laying on your bed not wanting to move while Pedro is talking to you and he notices small cuts on your arm that your trying to hide, way to linear to be from your cat, and he finally puts the pieces together.

Taking It All In Pt. II (Pedro Pascal x Daughter!Reader)

Pt. 1

Word Count: 4.3 k

Warnings: Descriptions of Self-harm, mentions of depression, suicide, and some slight hinting of eating disorders.

A/N: Thank you! You're so sweet! I hope you like this part two of Taking it All in!! Also, thank you for the details in your requests! It helps to plan what to write!

It’s been months after that hike with your father. You had gotten help, but it only helped so much. You had this fear that if you told your therapist your actual thoughts, you’d end up somewhere where grippy socks were mandatory. 

It didn’t help that you found your mother, you hadn’t told your father, but you searched and searched the internet until you found her. The woman who was so afraid of loving you, afraid of having a life with your dad, she was alive and well. 

She was happy too. You would think it would make you feel happy to hear that she was happy, to see the photos of her and her family, her two kids and husband. But all it did was take you to a dark place. The images of her at her sons' soccer game, or her at her daughters' recital. It should be you in those photos with her. 

This whole time you thought your mother was most likely dead or if she were alive, she was alone in some other country probably traveling. You didn’t ever imagine that she could have started another life. You hadn’t brought it up to your therapist, mostly because they’ve been trying to help you cope with other issues in your life. It was mostly how you felt about constantly having to travel from place to place or not having your father around as much, it meant a lot of journaling. Plus, if you told your therapist, it meant telling your father and you didn’t know how he’d react or if he already knew. 

What if he already knew. You hadn’t thought of that, it was another scenario that could happen, another scenario you don’t know if you can handle. 

You heard the front door open and then close, “I’m home!” You heard your dad call out. 

You sighed to yourself, you had ditched another day of school, but luckily for you your dad left for meetings before you even got up. Meaning that it was easy to ditch. In fact, you hadn’t gone to school at all the past week. 

Pedro was met with silence, he shrugged, “probably studying,” he muttered to himself. He made his way over to the kitchen to get dinner started. He wasn’t the best cook in the world, but he knew a thing or two. 

You made your way down the hall, “There she is!” Pedro said as he heard your footsteps get closer, “Hey, I was thinking, how does spaghetti sound tonight?” You walked over to the fridge, grabbing the bottle of apple juice. 

“Sure,” you said with a shrug. You poured yourself a cup of apple juice, putting away the bottle right after. 

“Long day at school?” You gave him a nod. “Alright, well, go ahead and rest. I’ll let you know when dinner is ready.” You felt horrible for lying to him. He had thought everything was getting better and that you were beginning to feel happier, but it was all just a lie. It was a mask. 

** mentions of self-harm begin here **

You walked back to your bedroom, closing the door behind you. You felt tears begin to well up in your eyes. The lying, the feeling of abandonment, everything, it just felt like it was all tumbling down. You pulled up your sleeves, revealing the linear cuts that you had done to yourself. It started off with something small, hitting your hands against something when you were mad, but the pain felt kind of nice. 

Not kind of, it did feel nice. It took away the pain of everything in your mind for a moment and you liked it. You liked your mind being peaceful for just a moment. But those moments only lasted a few seconds and you needed something that would last longer. You had saw some girls with some cuts on their wrists at school, it wasn’t till one day you aksed one of the girls what they were while you both were in the bathroom. The girl seemed a bit embarrassed but you were genuinely curious. She explained what they were, but she didn’t explain it further. 

For weeks you couldn’t help but think about it, but the thought of hurting yourself in that way seemed scary. What if you went too deep or if you got caught? But a week ago, when your dad had to work late, you felt yourself drowning in your thoughts. Hitting yourself against your bedframe wasn’t working. That was the night you first self-harmed, you felt lucky that the weather was getting cold again so hiding your scars was easy. 

Your dad played some music while he began to boil the pasta. Your cat watched from the other side of the counter, he knew his boundaries and Pedro seemed to like the company. Pedro began to slowly dance to the rhythm of the song playing until it was cut off by the sound of ringtone, “That’s not part of the song,” he grumbled as he grabbed his phone. 

The number looked familiar, he hesitated on answering, “Could be important or a scam,” he muttered. He shrugged to himself before answering the phone, “hello?” 

“Hi! This is Linda from the JFK High School, may I speak to Y/N Pascal’s father?” 

“This is he speaking,” Pedro responded. He had no clue why your school would be calling.

“Hi, Mr. Pascal! We’ve been trying to get a hold of you for the past few days, it wasn’t until we looked through our files that we realized we had an old phone number.” 

“Ah, yes, I changed my number. Probably should’ve updated you guys on that,” is that it? He thought. 

“It’s quite alright, but the real reason why we’ve been trying to get ahold you is because we’ve noticed that Y/N hasn’t been attending her classes for the past week.” 

Pedro stopped what he was doing, placing the wooden spoon he had in his hand down on the counter, “I’m sorry, you must be mistaken.” 

“I’m afraid not. Her teachers are beginning to worry now that her grades have been slipping and she hasn’t been showing up. We were wondering if maybe the family went on vacation and someone forgot to notify the school?”

“N-No, we’re not on vacation,” Pedro looked towards the hall. 

“Well, is there any reason why she hasn’t been in school?” 

“I-I don’t know, I thought she had been going to clases this whole time.” 

“Will she be there on Monday?” 

“She’ll be there Monday,” he stated. 

“It is my obligation to let you know that if the student doesn’t show up for school for another full week that the school will revoke certain privileges for Y/N.” Pedro knew the consequences of you missing school, it could also mean jail time on his case. 

“I’ll get to the bottom of this. Thank you, Linda.” 

“Of course,” Linda said before hanging up. 

Pedro placed his phone back on the counter, he then shut off the burners on the stove. “What do I do, gatito?” he asked as he leaned against the counter, pinching the bridge of his nose. He knew what he had to do, he just didn’t know what to say or ask even. He let out a deep sigh before making his way down the hall. 

He knocked on your door, “Mija, puedo entrar?” (Can I enter?)

You opened the door, “dinner is ready already?” you asked with a confused expression on your face. 

Pedro felt his heart break, there you stood, his little girl, in front of him. He never expect you to miss school and not tell him, it only meant one thing. You were lying to him about everything. “No,” he said softly. He was trying so hard to remain calm, but there was a part of him that wanted to yell and ask why the hell you werent going to schoo. Then there was that nurturing side of him that just wanted to ask you why you weren’t going to school. Both had the same question, just a different way of approaching it. “Can I come in?” 

You shrugged, stepping aside to let him in. You watched as he sat on the edge of your bed, “I’m gonna ask you something and I want you to be one hundred percent truthful with me, okay?” He asked

You chuckled slightly, expecting some dumb question, “okay.” 

“Mija, no estoy bromeando horita, necesito que me escuches.” (I’m not joking right now, I need you to listen). 

Oh fuck, he knows, you thought. You gave him a nod, “did you miss school this past week?” You nod again. Pedro took in a deep breath, “Why?” 

You shrugged, “papi, it’s no big deal.” 

“No big deal!?” He yelled as he stood up. “Mija, do you know I can go to jail because you haven’t gone to school!? Do you have any idea how stupid that is? Que te estabas pensando, huh!?” (What were you thinking?)

You felt tears well up in your eyes, “I’m sorry! I just didn’t feel like going!” 

“If you don’t feel like going then you tell me! How come you didn’t tell me?” You remained silent, Pedro let out a deep sigh, trying to calm down again. “What’s going on, Y/N??” 

“Nothing,” you whispered. 

“No me dices que nada esta pasando, por que tu no te comportas como asi. Tu eres mi hija, y yo queiro saber que esta pasando.” (Don’t tell me that nothing is happening because you don’t behave like this, You’re my daughter and I want to know what is going on.) 

“Nada esta pasando!” You yelled, “Deja me en paz!” You walked out of your room. (Nothing is happening, leave me alone) 

“Dejarte en paz?!” He followed you out. “What is going on with you?!” 

“Would you just leave it alone? I didn’t go to school this week and I’m sorry, okay? I’ll go to school on monday, just leave it alone!” 

“I’m not just gonna brush this off, this is serious, Y/N! Missing school for a week? You can’t just do that! So, what is going on?” 

“Ugh! I don’t have to tell you every fucking thing okay?!” You yelled. You believe that this was probably the first time you ever yelled at your dad. The first time you had ever gotten in such a big argument. Didn’t mean that you two didn’t argue, you argued but it never led to a screaming match. Not like this. 

Pedro stood there in disbelief, “Y/N M/N Pascal, I am your father and I demand to know what the hell is going on with you.” 

You couldn’t tell him, you couldn’t just blurt out that you found your mother; but not only did you find her, you also found her new family. You couldn’t tell him that you felt replaceable, that even he was replaceable, at least to your mother. You just couldn’t. “Nothing is going on,” you said. 

“You’re grounded,” he said in defeat. 

“Fine,” you said as you began to make your way back to your room. 

“For two months,” he added. “I’ll need your phone and your game consoles.” 

You stopped in the middle of the hall. You were doing this for him, you wanted to keep his happiness even at the cost of your own, “Fine.” You walked into your room, slamming the door behind you. 

“Slam the door and I’m taking your T.V.” 

You groaned in annoyance, “Fuck you,” you spat. You had instantly regretted saying it. Pedro stood there for a second, in shock mostly. He felt the tears begin to well up in his eyes, he wasn’t going to take your T.V. as a matter of fact, he didn’t want to take any of it away. He partially said it in hopes that you’d crack and tell him what was going on. 

He heard the cat meow at his feet, he looked down, “I think I’m loosing her, gatito,” he whispered before turning around and making his way down the hall and back to the kitchen. 

~~ 

Days went by, you didn’t speak to your dad all weekend. Spending most of your time in your bedroom, your mind was all over the place and you had self harmed some more. It felt like the more you did, the more you craved it or the more your mind raced, the more you felt the need to have that feeling. 

You didn’t eat much either, for some reason you just couldn’t think about eating. Your stomach didn’t feel hungry either so you snacked on small things. When you came home from school on Monday, your dad was in the kitchen prepping for dinner. You walked past him, not saying a word. The tension was thick, someone could cut a knife through it. 

Pedro didn’t say anything to you when you walked past him to grab something to drink, even though he wanted to say a million things. He had so much to talk to you about, so many exciting things, but he was stubborn and you were too. 

When you didn’t come out for dinner, he left a plate at the foot of your door, knocking to let you know, just like he did for past two days and just like you did, you’d wait a few minutes before grabbing your plate. You would leave it on your desk, hoping that maybe you’d feel some sensation of hunger. Yet, just like the other full plates of food beside it, you’d never touch it. 

“Just give her some time,” Javiera said into the phone. Pedro had called her Monday afternoon while he was out for a drive. 

“How much time?” he asked, his voice strained from crying. He had called her up crying about twenty minutes ago, and like the big sister she was, she tried her best to console him through the phone. 

“A few more days, she’ll crack soon enough,” she said hopeful. “You’re a good dad, Pedro.” 

“I sure as hell don’t feel like it right now.” 

“I know,” she began, “all parents feel that way one day or another.” 

“I just… I wish I knew what happened you know? Why did she all of a sudden just become this totally different person?” 

“Teenagers,” she expressed. “Don’t you remember how you were?” 

“Don’t get me started,” he chuckled. 

“You were the worst!” Pedro knew she was right. He had given his parents a hard time when he was a teenager. “It’ll get better, I promise.” 

Tuesday comes and goes and so does Wednesday. By Wednesday night you ate some of your dinner, but you still couldn’t stomach to eat all of it. You only ate because of how dizzy you felt all day. Thursday comes and goes, you caved into your cravings more as each day passed, your arm was full of scars, it felt raw to the touch. 

You cried yourself to sleep most nights. Friday night Pedro went to knock on your door, only to hear you crying. He knocked softly, but was only met with “Go away.” He felt so defeated, he wanted this silent treatment to be over with. He wanted his baby girl back and he wanted to help you with whatever you were going through. He knocked again, “Go away!” He shook his head, opening the door, you were laying in bed, your arms covering your face. 

“Mija,” he said softly. 

“Please, just go away!” you yelled. 

“I’m sorry, but I can’t do it anymore,” he began to say, he noticed the uneaten food on your desk. His heart sunk, looking back over at you, taking in how you looked. He walked over to the desk, some of the food began to develop mold. He let out a shaky breath, walking over to the bed, “Baby girl,” he said. Pedro noticed that you weren’t wearing your usual long sleeve, for a while he was beginning to worry that you had begun to harm yourself because you were always wearing long sleeves. 

It relieved him to see you in a short sleeve for once, he inched closer, you still hard your arms covering your face. You were too focused on what was on your mind to realize that your father was near you and that you weren’t wearing a long sleeve. Even if you had realized it, it would be too late. 

Pedro spotted something red near your wrists, but your arms were in a position where he couldn’t see your whole wrists. Yet, the small amount he did see was enough to send him in a panic. Pedro was soft with his touch, he grabbed your hand gently, pulling it towards him so he could see your wrists. 

You quickly pulled away your arm, holding it close to your chest as you sat up in the bed, “get out,” you said through clenched teeth. 

“How long have you been doing that?” Your dad asks, tears welling up in his eyes. 

“Get out!” you yelled. 

“How long!?” tears fell from his eyes, he stood up from the bed. “How long, Y/N?” he asked again. 

“Dad, I don’t want you to cry,” You said as you looked at the ground, “Just please get out.” 

“No! I’m not gonna-” he inhaled, “you’re not shutting me out.” 

“Please,” you begged as you looked up at him with tears in your eyes. You got up from the bed, walking over to the door and opening it. “Get out,” you begged. 

He shook his head, “Why?” he cried, “Why would you do that to yourself?” You opened your mouth to speak, but he cut you off, “And don’t say it’s the cat, because that’s too many for the cat. It’s too clean. I thought you were getting better.” 

You looked at your dad, you could see the pain you were trying avoid. The heartache you hated to see, “I’m not better,” you confessed. “I’ve never gotten better.” 

“What?” He asked in disbelief. 

“I didn’t get better, okay?” You said loudly, holding back the sob that was scratching at the walls of your throat, begging to be let out. “Is that what you want to hear?” 

“You think I want to hear that my baby girl never got better?” You remained silent. He walked over to you, taking your had to look at the marks again. He sniffled, “My beautiful baby girl,” he sobbed, “why would you do this?” 

You couldn’t hold it back anymore. You let out a deep shaky breath, letting the sob take over you. “I couldn’t handle it anymore, it’s all too much, okay? It’s so loud in here,” you gestured towards your head. 

Pedro couldn’t handle seeing you cry, he pulled you in, feeling you tightly wrap your arms around his body. “Why?” he kept asking. 

“I was trying to protect you,” your dad let go of the embrace. 

He placed his hands on your face, “Mija, I should be the one protecting you, Okay? Whatever it is that you’ve been holding in, I can handle it. You never have to worry about me.” 

You wanted to spill everything, it was like the dam inside was breaking and this was just the little drop of water to break it. “I found her,” you confessed. 

He looked at you with a confused expression, “who?�� 

“My mom,” you inhaled, “I found her,” you couldn’t help but chuckle. Pedro was in disbelief, she was alive, for the longest he just kind of accepted that she passed away. 

“That’s what you were trying to protect me from?” He questioned. 

You shook her head, “That’s not the best part,” you began. “You know what the best part is?” You began to walk back over to your bed. You let out a small sob, “The best part is that I also found out that we’re replaceable.” Pedro watched as you sat on your bed, it pained him to see you in such dismay. It also pained him to hear the news that your mother was alive, she was alive and had another family. “The woman we both thought was trying to protect us from herself, is out there with a family of her own-” 

“Cariño,” your dad tried to interrupt. 

“I have a brother and sister that I don’t even know! And she’s in these pictures laughing with them, she’s at birthday parties and soccer games,” you took in a shaky breathe. 

“Y/N,” He took a couple steps towards you. 

“That should be me, dad,” There was the drop of water to break the dam. “It should be us,” you sobbed. Pedro quickly pulled you into an embrace, letting you cry into his shoulder, “It should be us,” you sobbed. 

“I know, Mija,” he whispered as tears fell from his eyes, “I know.” He let you cry it out for a few minutes, mostly because at that moment he didn’t know what to say exactly. How he should console you after finding out something no one should ever experience. His mind wandered, how could someone create another family when they left one behind? He thought if it were him, he wouldn’t be able to do it. He knew it would always be in the back of his mind that he had abandoned another family. 

Did it wander in the back of her head? Or did she just not care? 

Pedro felt so angry just thinking about it. He wanted to track her down and just yell into the void. She was the love of his life or so he thought. He had considered her the love of his life, hopeful that one day she’d realize what she left behind and come back. She wasn’t coming back, though and now he knew that. Now he had to console you and find a way to show her what she missed out on. 

Pedro let go of the embrace, taking your face in his hands once again. His thumb gently wiped away the tears that were streaming down your face, he placed a soft kiss on your forehead before looking at you again. “We don’t need her,” he started to say. 

“But-” 

“I know, Mijita. It hurts,” you nod, “She has no idea what she’s missing out on, Mijita. Her kids have no idea what a horrible person she truly is as fucked up as that sounds, it’s true.” He gave you a smile through the tears, “The only thing that matters is that she gave me you, my beautiful baby girl. That’s all I know of her, she gave me you and she was nothing else.” 

“You don’t regret being with her?” 

Pedro could never regret it, “No, because then I wouldn’t have you. I can’t imagine my life without my little girl. I’m sorry you don’t have a mom in your life, but not every girl has multiple mom figures in their lives.” It was true, you had your tia and some of your dads close friends. Your dad let go of your face, he took a hold of your wrist. “But this,” he started to say, tears welled up in his eyes again, “Oh, baby girl,” he sighed. 

“I’m sorry,” you cried. 

“No, no, no,” he pulled you in for a quick embrace, before letting go, “we’re going to work on this together okay?” You nod, “I can help, we’ll make more appointments with your therapists, we’ll find healthy alternatives, and we’ll overcome this.” He choked back a sob, “but I never want to see you harming yourself again, please promise me that?” You remained silent. 

You weren’t sure if you could promise it, mostly because you were addicted to the way it made you feel. “Prometeme, Y/N.” (Promise me)

“I-I’ll try,” you finally said. Pedro didn’t want to push it, if trying was what he could get, then it was enough for him. He could work with trying. Trying meant putting the effort and it meant to him that you still wanted to live. 

“Trying is all I need,” he said. “I can’t lose you. Know that you have people that love you.” 

You looked up at your dad in realization, you never realized how much it could impact your dad. How self harm was always correlated with darker actions. Darker actions that your father had a past with. This time, you pulled him into an embrace, “you won’t lose me,” you said.  “I can promise you that.” 

He let out a relieved sigh, “we’ll have to talk about the food on your desk too.” 

“I’m sorry,” you began. “I just-” 

“No, I know.” You didn’t have to say more, he knew what it was like. To be too much in your mind to even eat. He understood, “let’s get you something to eat, hmm?” 

You nod, watching as he got up from the bed, “I love you, papi.” 

“I love you too, Mija,” he gave you a small smile. You got up from the bed, following him into the kitchen. He ordered you your favorite take out, once the food had arrived you both took the food to the living room. 

Pedro glanced over at your wrist from time to time, his heart sank every time, but he was going to get you better help. Over time, the cuts will heal and they’ll just be white little memories of the battles you’ve dealt with, but Pedro knew he never wanted you to feel like you’ve hit rock bottom. From here on out, he was going to try his hardest to make sure you were your healthiest, physically and mentally.

He placed a small kiss on your temple, “love you,” he said softly. 

You gave him a smile, “Love you too, dad,” you said, focusing your attention back on the television. You both knew the journey from here on out wasn’t going to be easy, it wasn’t said aloud, but it was like a silent acknowledgment. But eventually, it’ll be okay because pain was just temporary.

Pedro Pascal Taglist: @Sophieelizabeth01  @tracysnookok  @cilliansangel @change-the-world-someday  @graciegoeskrazy @twkobii

CLICK HERE to be added to the taglist

[coltrainbat]

What about chubbish and kind reader getting criticized for dating the world's sexiest man of 2022, she felt upset and cries. Chris felt angry at the people who doesn't know about his girlfriend

Sexist Girl Alive (Curvy!Reader)

A.N/WARNING: Screenshots are obvi fake, TW for fatphobia, slurs, people being mean ☹️ but happy ending, photos arent mine (mwah pinterest)

You smiled at the photo of you two, dressed up before a night out. Chris lips lovingly on your cheeks as you smiled happily. You thought you looked great in your new skin tight dress. Sure it showed a few insecurities but you hoped the black would hide it. Your makeup and hair was all done up and Chris couldn’t stop loving on you all night.

You chuckled at the sweet yet corny caption. He would never live it down - would he? You shook your head, grinning like an idiot. 

Fighting your better instinct, you went through the comments, chewing your thumb nail as you eyes laid on the key words:

“Fat” 

“Cow” 

“She takes up the whole mirror.” 

“It should be illegal for someone like her to wear a dress like that”

“Chris Evans is legally blind if he thinks she’s sexy”

You licked the taste of salty tears that had landed on your upper lip. You took a shaky breathe out as you quickly wiped away the tears that were forming. You felt pathetic, crying about what a bunch of nobody’s had to say about your body. They were jealous, they didn’t know you, they were protective of their internet boyfriend - your mind ran through all the reasons for such vile comments but that still didn’t stop the feeling of sadness and inadequacy that ran through you. 

That was until a wet little nose landed on your cheek, paw pushing the phone away from your face. 

“Would you look at that you found mama- baby what’s wrong?” Chris came in, catching your tear stained cheeks and red, watery eyes.

“The um… instagram you posted you-“ You were hiccuping, anxiously patting Dodgers coat. Too embarrassed to meet his eyes, firmly focused on the Instagram comments that were now blurry. 

“I didn’t post your nudes did I?!” His face full of concern that he had pulled another, much worse, social media blunder. 

“No.” You left out a shaky faux laugh 

“You left comments on and well some people aren’t very nice.” 

“Show me right now.” His jaw went tight and his expression changed to pure disgust and anger.

You handed him the phone, digging your face into Dodgers coat, drying your tears.

Chris’s eyes scanned the comments, jaw tightening as he grounded his teeth. 

“That’s it.” He throw the phone next him, making his way up in a frenzy.

“Chris it’s not a big deal I’m just emotional.”

“It is a fucking big deal.” He raised his voice now, running his hands through his hair in frustration. Chris wasn’t an angry person, rarely getting upset but when you were involved; people better run.

It perplexed him everyday how he thinks he landed the most beautiful woman in the world yet people want to pick apart something as stupid as your weight.

Chris wasn’t blind at all, he was  engrossed and obsessed with every curve, every roll, every stretch mark, every sag. He loved them all.

He couldn’t get enough of grabbing your belly whenever he could, even in public. His hand without fail always travelled from your waist to your pudge, slowly stroking the skin or the fabric - it relaxed him.

Or at home when he’d forgo your ass and instead just grab a roll and jiggle it in his hands, fuck, in his mind it was a bonus to your ass, more skin he could fondle and touch and enjoy, more ways to get a whole body ripple out of you.

Or in the morning before you’d wake up when he’d slowly trace your stretch marks, adoring the way they looked like tiger stripes he felt like they were a natural piece of art on your body.

The way your thighs would wrap tightly around his head, a built in pillow for him to rest on while he traced your body with his hands, following the natural trail created by your curves.

How every hug felt soft and warm as you pressed your plump body up against him, he would get so frustrated that he couldn’t grab every single part of you all at once and just squeeze but a hug was the closest thing.

He didn’t think pure beauty existed until he saw you for the first time, he remembers the way he jaw fell agape slightly and his eyes widened desperate to touch you, desperate to have you in his bed every night. 

You were his now and he wasn’t going to let some bullshit comments take that away from him.

To take the spark and light out of you, to push you down to a place where you felt you were anything but incredible.

You body wasn’t just a wonderland but the home for the soul in which he adored, his kind, intelligent, resilient, witty, outspoken, well read and highly cultured, drop dead gorgeous woman.

The purity of you being so authentically yourself was sacred to him and he was fiercely protective of you for that.

He dreaded the day the comments got too much and he cringed at the thought of you changing any part of the woman he met for some fucking comments. It wouldn’t happen. Not on his watch.

“You can’t just- you can’t fucking say those things about someone! I mean we go back 200 fucking years and there’s your body in fucking oil paintings around castles and here we are now where your accomplishments, your personality, your kindness, your fucking beauty is just completely shitted on.”

“I dealt with it way before I started dating you.” 

“Well it ends now.” He said crouching down in front of you as you sat curled into a ball on the couch. 

His eyes had softened and he was desperate for you to meet his. Wanting to assure you with everything he had that this meant nothing to him. 

“Baby you know I don’t agree with those comments right. Fuck, you remember how much I couldn’t keep my hands off you that night.”

“And every night before.” You snorted 

He gave you a soft smile, happy you were back to making jokes “Exactly.” 

“It’s my fault I should of turned comments off but we shouldn’t have to do that. I’m going to write something and that should be the end of it.” 

“We shouldn’t react that’s what they want.” You said wearily.

“In no world is that going to be said about you and I just sit back and let it happen. Absolutely not. Now come on, let’s get you in the bath.”

You sunk into the steaming water as the smell of lavender and rose filled your nose and muscles you didn’t realise you were tensing finally relaxed. Repeating mantras of self assurance in your head with the distant sound of Chris scurrying around the bedroom and his muffled voice on the phone. 

 Getting out and into your robe after an hour you made your way into the bedroom, finding an exhausted Chris waiting for you on the bed.

“Come here I wanna show you something.” He tapped the spot next to him, inviting you to snuggle against his chest as he got out his phone.

You rolled your eyes, sighing as you got comfortable. 

“Read.” He said sternly, putting his phone into your hand.

You brushed the tears forming in your eyes from happiness. Two things you could always count on with Chris is his ability to make you the happiest person alive and his passion. Combine them and you’re a babbling mess of gratitude and love. Pulling his head down towards you, peppering kisses all over his face and whispering thank you against his lips. 

“Don’t thank me come on now.”

“It was very well said.”

“Yeah well we won’t need this for awhile.” He grabbed his phone from you, throwing it down the bed as he fell off the edge, landing with a small thump.

“Come here sexy, I wanna love on my girl.” You giggled as his beard brushed against your neck as he left wet soppy kisses down your body, untieing your robe to get your unfiltered body in all its glory. 

Chris’s comments created a storm of support, bringing up a conversation of why a woman’s body is ever a topic of concern and the high expectations of male celebrity partners to look a certain way. 

And months down the line he still stood by them. Stating in an interview:

“I don’t think I have ever been more furious than when I read those comments. You know you have this beautiful, intelligent partner and you’re both in this happy little bubble of love and admiration and then these strangers, randoms on the internet just start attacking them for all the things you love about them. It’s like a kick in the gut. I felt so guilty like it was my fault because she didn’t ask to be famous or anything and it’s not easy to give that privacy and anonymity up to follow your heart but she did it anyways and all she was met with was horrible comments. Man, I was so scared that was going to be it for her and I’d never see her again. It just felt like people don’t realise that’s a real person, we are real people and if you wouldn’t say that to someone’s face then why comment it where they can see? She didn’t deserve that at all and I was going to do everything in my power to make sure it never happened again. She means the world to me, I’d do anything to protect her. I’m just lucky I get to wake up to her everyday and she’s this strong, resilient person who can’t be knocked down easily.”

[jqmalikhsgib]

planets aligned

note: this is for my plus size readers! as a plus size woman myself, we deserve more representation!!!

one

you groaned as your alarm goes off. you reach over to slam your hand against the machine, but you couldn’t find the button. you frowned with your eyes closed until you felt someone turning in the bed.

you turned slowly to find your ex boyfriend cuddled up to you. you remember the events of last night. both of you had got really drunk, talking and laughing about the past. you remember the paparazzi yelling at you when you left the club that night, holding hands with trey.

you groaned once more before getting up and finding your clothes scattered all over the bed. quickly grabbing them, you rushed to get dressed before leaving his hotel room. you put on your shades, knowing the paps are most likely waiting for you outside.

when you spot them you groan once more before walking out the building.

“yn! yn! yn!”

“yn, what does this mean for you and trey?”

“are you and trey back together?”

“she we be expecting a wedding soon?”

you ignore every last question. thankfully your best friend was outside waiting for you. you didn’t even have to call.

you hop in the car quickly before she drives off and hands you a coffee. “you’re a lifesaver!”

“none of that. what were you thinking?! trey? seriously? you went home to him of all people?”

you frowned. you knew exactly why she was upset. trey had cheated on you for the whole two years you were together. he was a dick and mentally abused you for half of your relationship. he’s the reason why you’re so insecure about your body. for so long, many people have called you fat, you never really battered an eye. when trey did it, you became shy, closed off, started wearing baggy clothes, quit multiple modeling jobs, you became super depressed. your best friend was the one to pick up the pieces. if it wasn’t for her you’d probably end your entire career and move back home to your parents house, who cut you off until you come to your senses and quit this modeling nonsense.

of course if you let that happen you’d let them win. besides, you were a very successful model! you earned way too much money and had millions of women who adored you to pieces. you were one of the few faces to plus size and bigger women who struggled with their confidence because of bullies and internet trolls who had nothing better to do than harass a woman for being comfortable in her skin.

you enjoyed your career and your fanbase. you weren’t about to let some loser like trey or your parents take this way from you.

“i know, fariah, i know! i wasn’t thinking. i was drunk and horny. trust me, im kicking myself already.” you sigh.

“you better be lucky i explain to your date that it was an idiotic mistake and it’ll never happen again. he agreed to still meet you.”

you shook your head aggressively. “absolutely not! im not going on a date with another one of your boyfriends, friends. they’ve all been a total disaster, fariah. i have no idea jason had friends like that. you seriously need to tell him to hang out with better people.” you state.

“confessions? they’re more like jason’s brothers, friends.”

“that explains a lot then! jason’s brothers a dick.”

“come on! one more date, please? if this one turns out to be a dick, no more!”

“fine! what’s his name?”

“preston.”

“he sounds like an asshole! but i’ll give it a shot! no more after this, though! please?”

“cross my heart.”

you’d been at the restaurant you were suppose to meet this preston guy. it had been an hour since you’ve sat down, waiting. you roll your eyes, realizing you’d been stood up.

finally getting the courage to sit up and head to the bar, you ordered a drink. you were extremely embarrassed. you felt like everyone was staring at you.

in that moment you decided to give up on love and just stay single forever. every guy you’ve dated had been boys men who clearly had commitment issues or simply just assholes who didn’t know how to please a woman.

your sex life was completely sad and dull. most men just wanted to get off. they couldn’t care less about making another woman cum. it had been a while since a man has made you orgasm.

that wasn’t the biggest issue, though. you were just tired of getting your heart broken. you’d let someone in, they show you love and affection for a few weeks, suddenly they act like you don’t exist. it was exhausting!

you wanted—needed something more.

“penny for your thoughts?” you turned. you were about to tell the guy to leave you the hell alone but, he was none other than eddie munson.

you remember having multiple corroded coffin poster on your wall back home. you loved corroded coffin! your parents hated listening to them. they were into classical music and never understood why you listened to such ‘trash’ music.

you didn’t understand why you liked them either. you weren’t much of a heavy metal fan, but they sounded amazing. not to mention, eddie was your celebrity crush. he was handsome with his long dark hair, leather jacket, the multiple rings he’d wear, the guy-liner, most importantly, the tattoos and piercings. god, he was the most attractive man you’d ever seen.

you were ten when you started listening to corroded coffin. eddie was twenty-six. now you were twenty-six and you knew he was in his early forties.

but eddie was still handsome as ever. though today he didn’t have long wavy hair. instead he had somewhat of a bold cut. it suited him, honestly.

he definitely had more muscle on him, his facial hair was coming in slightly, he dressed a little more the same, currently wearing a black sabbath t-shirt. he looked amazing.

“you okay there, pretty girl?”

pretty girl?! holy shit!

“uh—yeah it’s just—you’re eddie munson.”

eddie chuckles. “that’s correct! but you’re yn yln! everyone adores you. including my daughter.”

“oh? she a fan, huh?”

“yeah! all she talk about is you. ‘daddy, yn posted another photo!’ ‘dad, yn commented on my post!’ ‘oh, yn is going to paris. could we go too, daddy?!’ she likes you more than me.”

yn giggles.

“well she should adore you! i use to listen to corroded coffin all the time growing up. my parents hated my ‘loud ass music’ but i couldn’t get enough. i still listen to you guys when i need to just feel, you know?”

“hmm, i completely understand, darlin. so i take it you’re a huge fan?”

“you’re kiddin right?! absolutely. i had the biggest crush on yo—” before you could stop yourself, you groan.

eddie smirks. “yeah? was crushin on me hard, sweetheart?”

“god, please tell me i can rewind that and start over?”

“don’t think that’s how that works, baby. but if it makes you feel any better, im crushin on you now.”

suddenly the room gets significantly hotter. eddie runs his hands against your cheek. “i got a hotel room right above the restaurant. why don’t we head up there?”

you hum as eddie grabs your hand and you both head to the elevator.

the very next day you woke up to another alarm. immediately getting deja vu you shot up. when you turned you heard the bathroom door open. when eddie munson walks out he had a towel wrapped around his waist and he smirks at you.

“good morning, baby. slept good last night?”

you blush when you think about the events of last night. eddie had made you cum a number of times. you lost count after three. he’d been the best sex you’ve ever had in a long time. and the aftercare, fuck! he was such a gentleman. your brain soon starts to fumble though. you knew this was probably a one time thing.

eddie hasn’t dated since his ex wife died, leaving him with a daughter to raise on his own. you didn’t expect anything else from him.

“yeah! it was great.”

you give him a fake smile before looking for your clothes. once you found them, you got up and started to put them on. eddie frowns.

“what are you doing, baby?”

“i get this was a one time thing. i don’t wanna waste anymore of your time. im just gonna head out.”

“hey! first, you don’t need to go, okay? second, i had a great time with you, and lastly, who said anything about a one time thing?”

“i just assumed you wanted me gone. i don’t know. most guys expect me to leave right after. guess im use to it.” you shrugged your shoulders.

eddie shakes his head. “those are little boys, darlin! im a grown ass man, alright! i definitely wanna keep seeing you. maybe take you on a few dates, get to know each other better, possibly start a real relationship, baby.”

you smiled widely. “yeah?”

“mhm! now take that goddamn bra off and let’s me order some room service and possibly fuck you some more, yeah?” eddie walks over to you and kisses you passionately.

“okay!”

“good girl.” he smirks as you shiver.

[desognthinking]

recruitment drive. 5.3k. (or, the haunted house designers au.)

Suzanne sends the pre-meeting email just one and a half hours before the onboarding call is scheduled to begin. Beatrice knows this because her watch buzzes just as she emerges from the bathroom, wringing her hair dry after her post-run shower.

It’s still the middle of the night back in America. Beatrice thinks Suzanne just doesn’t sleep. 

She makes herself a pot of tea and carefully sets her mug down onto its cork coaster at the dining table. Her phone, face-down on the table, vibrates thrice as she boots up the laptop.

She flips it over: three texts from Lilith. That’s two too many. 

A curious sense of anticipation, and perhaps the shallowest hints of doubt, settles over the skin of her neck as she loads up her unread mail. It’s uncharacteristic of Suzanne to forward basic administrative material at such late notice. Especially since it concerns mere formalities like the Zoom link for later, and the confirmation of the meeting participants – an email that should take less than two minutes to formulate. After all, everyone already knows the team heading the expansion project.

Beatrice had mentioned this to Camila once, recently, during their weekly lunch call. Week six or six thousand into their strictly enforced remote work sojourn (the only way, Suzanne said, she could ensure that no Extra Responsibilities would be surreptitiously taken on) and she was already pacing the room from boredom and overthinking.

Camila had reminded her that, in her defense, Suzanne had just been out on that scouting trip in Peru without reliable internet. Whatever spare bandwidth she did have was probably best served hurdling over the mountains of administrative obstacles these new pop-up Houses inevitably would create. Not fretting over Zoom links.

Camila, as always, is sensible; probably the most sensible of them all. So Beatrice very seriously, and very conscientiously, takes a deep breath and runs through that one breathing exercise she’d found very helpful from her therapist.

Suzanne is a stickler. She holds her cards carefully close to her chest, arranged back and forth in some pattern nobody but she can see, and Beatrice trusts her fully. And that’s all that should matter – as Suzanne had made glaringly clear, even before she’d sat the three of them down one by one in her office, and then emailed them the remuneration clauses – that she’d wanted Beatrice for the job, had worked to convince her for it.

For an industry chest-deep in the currency of terror, Beatrice had – has never been lured by the screams. 

It is tradition for a House’s creative team to prowl the exit on opening night.  Maybe grab a drink and share a toast to the accompaniment of desperate footsteps sprinting out, or breathless, choked sobs at the gates. 

Beatrice doesn’t like that. Ever since she got personally banned by Mary from coldly going through the whole maze (yet again) with a clipboard on Night One while bona fide, ticket-purchasing customers were busy hollering their heads off, she’s preferred to go home right after the ceremony to a mug of hot chamomile and a dogeared autobiography. 

She plans to keep it that way, too. There is nothing more distasteful than cheap gore, or cultish fantasy, or whichever half-baked nightmare slough some over-excited writer could dredge up from the hallucinatory afterburn of a weekend bender.

She carefully takes a sip of her tea, gazing out into brightening but still charred-gray skies. She’d had an interview in Tales of Terror last year, and hadn’t known whether to be flattered or dismayed at the opening paragraph. 

‘You wouldn’t guess this is the home of the woman responsible for some of the most blood-curdling, spine-chilling effects, traps and rooms of the last half-decade. Nothing in her fourth-floor unit screams Creative Psycho. Every pale beige curtain in her flat is drawn wide, light flooding in. There are no letterboxd-worthy poster displays from the indie foreign films she watches religiously for research – only a framed print collection of early twentieth century European urban landscape paintings. There are no carpets, it’s almost unsettlingly clean, and there’s not a single ounce of bedragglement. Beatrice tells us, mild mannered and polite almost to a fault, that this is how she likes it.’

(Are you sure you want me?)

“Precisely,” Suzanne had said, careful and stern, “we need precisely that.” She’d been rolling a brass knuckle tightly over the surface of her desk as she spoke. Beatrice thought it produced a gorgeous, rich sound. 

“We need reinvention. Reinterpretation. Things should not be left to stagnate, for their own sake,” she’d stared at Beatrice meaningfully. “This applies to people too.” 

Beatrice had simply stared back, uncertain.

“Besides,” Suzanne turned away, the edge of her mouth twisting up like she knew something Beatrice didn’t, “As I’m sure you know by now, the workload will be shared.”

It made sense then that Suzanne had last year taken them aside to allocate them as leads to three of the flagship site’s Houses that season. Upon their successes she had allocated them, despite protests, those purely consultancy and remote assistance roles for this year’s season. 

Two years ago Beatrice and Lilith were section heads in their respective maze portions. Camila, then freshly poached by the firm, was primary set designer of the same House. That year they huddled together night after night and sixteen-hour days to cobble together something out of the most dysfunctional House of that year’s stable of nine.

The lead for said House was a man called Vincent. He was woefully incompetent to the point of unintentional sabotage. He had, of course, slunk away quietly upon the season’s conclusion, but until then the three of them had had to spend wee hours crawling up and clawing at walls and reinforcements and contractors that had been given contradictory instructions.

They built an easy partnership, eventually – disciplined and stone-smooth efficient to the extent that Beatrice reluctantly allowed herself to catch a few agonizing hours of unguilty sleep each night.

And through necessity she had come to know them as well, as only a truly nightmarish haunted house build will have you know a person.

After that wretched time they had been wrenched apart. The OCS had multiple Houses to churn out at full steam and speed every season, and a brutal reputation to maintain. The cruel prize of a job well done involved getting split up, even if for bigger, better things.

But the point is, they’re tried and tested. Beatrice likes that. She isn’t sure she would have agreed to taking on this challenge otherwise, and she knows Suzanne knows that, too. 

It is a weight on her shoulders, irregular and uncomfortably shifting across her shoulder blades; a worry that any success she has in executing such an endeavor would be largely circumstantial.

Last summer, long before everything had been set in stone, Shannon sent her a link to an Instagram post. It detailed some theories and speculations over an unnamed upcoming OCS expansion. A strategic leak, perhaps, although Beatrice worked far too distantly from the marketing team to be certain.

They were lying next to each other on the mud-streaked safety mats they put over the wooden boards beside the building site. Her building site. The one with the credits board, hooked up at the exit, that would bear her name first at the top. 

It had been the muggiest, most intolerable time of the day when Shannon, overseeing production on this half of the Houses, had come round, somehow hoisting a bulky IKEA carrier over her neck and under her left arm. She pulled out a variety of chips and buns that she’d gone down to the shops to buy, and handed them out far too cheerfully for someone who must have already half-melted in the heat. When Beatrice raised her eyebrows, glancing over behind the barriers where Mary’s motorcycle very conspicuously was parked, Shannon merely winked – poorly – and pretended to be very innocent. 

She stayed to help, afterwards, peering over the storyboards pinned up on the board like it wasn’t the thousandth time she’d gone over them. That year she’d also had her own House to take care of, in addition to the small matter of co-running the entire season’s program. So Beatrice tried to weakly bat her away, but she pulled out a banana from some back pocket, peeled it, took a large bite with a moan so obnoxiously loud Beatrice turned red, and shushed her.    

At this point construction was going ahead in full force, and Beatrice would frequently navigate every step of the maze and inspect every bolt and hidden door with a pocket-sized Moleskine in her hand and three gel pens in her pocket. Yasmine, her head writer, preferred to make notes directly onto her phone, stopwatch dangling from her wrist and an earbud in her ear as she ran over the preliminary audio cues for each section. Ambling behind them, Shannon found a nail and tried to spin it as long as she could on her fingertip. When the nail rolled off into a groove, irretrievable, she dusted off her hands very innocently on her cargo pants and off the back of her greasy tank top. Then she folded her hands behind her back and looked up very seriously to examine overhead mechanisms that Beatrice ‘might be too short to see clearly’. 

With the work lights strung up, the innards of the House did not look particularly scary. 

To Beatrice it was a purely cerebral challenge, despite the very physical layer of sweat, powder, and grime that pressed itself under one’s skin. A puzzle to fit and form and reverse-engineer under cool light; door mechanisms and false ceilings and spring-loaded foam sprays, optimized and timed within fractions of a second. Clean, clockwork.

And as if to prevent her from getting hauled fully into the vortex of her mind, Shannon accompanied the little pilgrimage around the set, pressing a water bottle firmly into Beatrice’s hands every half-hour. It made Beatrice feel like a moody little child, but she accepted it grudgingly every time. 

At the end of the day Beatrice sent everyone home twenty minutes early, and ordered dinner for her and Shannon to eat out on the boards. Fast food, Shannon insisted, and she would be paying for it, because “do you know what day it is tomorrow?”

“It’s not my birthday.”

“It’s better than your birthday.”

And to Beatrice, that was true, so she kept quiet.

After that, they lay down for a while, two cans of soda cracked open and resting on the square of wood beside them that hadn’t been covered by the mats. Shannon sent her the post, then, and when Beatrice complained limply that she couldn’t read the comments because she didn’t have an account, Shannon rolled her eyes and handed over her own phone. 

She made a peculiar dialect of eye contact with Beatrice as she did so; weighty, certainly, and telling. 

The post itself featured garish word art splattered over a mangled, heavily-filtered edited image of one of the previous seasons’ Houses – a fan favorite, actually, from the year Beatrice had first joined. Back then she was still working shifts on the engineering team, not even yet being assigned a maze section to look after its technical execution. 

There was a rumor, the post said, that the OCS was considering broadening its operations to seasonal pop-ups in different cities. All-new sets, all-new storylines, all-new takes on the haunted house experience. What do you think? The caption asked, Do you want more of the OCS brand of sleek, seriously messed-up and sickeningly chilling?

Below that a disclaimer: Not appropriate for young children! Please remember that this is not your typical carnival house of mirrors.

A staggering amount of likes and comments. Beatrice clicked to expand the latter, saw the word ‘legacy’ in the topmost one, and then quickly swiped to close the app entirely. 

Mary and Shannon grinned up at her from the home screen, half-buried in sand somewhere on their Greek island-hopping honeymoon. 

Shannon raised her eyebrows as she received her phone back, and Beatrice suddenly understood the meaningful look she’d been given. Are you ready? 

She reached out blindly for her soda can and finished the rest of the drink in one long, shuddering gulp.

At lunch the next day, Beatrice’s fifth year OCS anniversary was celebrated with some fanfare in the makeup and fittings trailer, where Beatrice had spent the whole morning hunched over fabric textures she could barely distinguish from each other.

Everyone came down from their sets, even Mary and Shannon. Beatrice thought they must have been exhausted; they had stayed late the previous night, after Beatrice had left, to thread their way softly through the OCS’ gaping campus of half-built sets. Simply looking over their modest kingdom. It had a certain wistful luster; in this summer twilight it was a garden of greenhouses, transparent and skeletal. A complex slowly unfurled over the years. Ghostly-quiet, too, in a way it could never be in the throes of peak season. 

Mary waited for Shannon at the gates of the House, silhouette sharp against the work lights, as Beatrice had gotten up to pack for the night. Up by the lockers she glanced over, but looked away when their hands fell gently together. They walked slowly away, murmuring things she couldn’t hear. 

When Beatrice bolted the gate to leave, it clacked too loudly, and they’d called over to say goodbye, dark intertwined shadows stretched grotesquely and longingly over sawdust towards her.

Nevertheless they had made it to the celebration the following day, Mary holding aloft a large creamy cake. Unlike the customary employee milestone cakes, dark and billowing and elaborately stylized with elements of houses previously worked on, Beatrice’s was plain white, with light blue frosting.

The celebration moved outside to the large, white refreshments tent, industrial fans blowing hot, coarse air. Beatrice marveled at how everyone seemed to be able to fit under its canvas. The team working on her House had all come, of course, pooling money for a hamper, and so did a surprising number of others across the other sets.

Lilith and Camila arrived together, squeezing through the throngs to the unsteady plastic table at the center. “We were not bringing your gift into this slaughterhouse,” Lilith huffed, “you’ll have to go back to the office to get it.”

“What is it?”

Lilith scoffed. “Why would we ruin the surprise?”

Camila put her hand on Beatrice’s shoulder. “What we’re really here to say is that we’re proud we’ve been able to work with you during these five years, and we hope we’ll get a chance to do it again.” Beatrice looked at Lilith, who shrugged, stabbing her paper plate.

Mary, still slicing up the cake and handing them out, stopped to meet Beatrice’s eyes. She grinned.

It was many months later, deep into November, that Suzanne had made the formal pitch in her office. By then social media was awash with rumors of possible locations where the OCS could plant their pop-ups. Names, too – there were spreadsheets and Clue-esque checklists on Reddit lining up members of every significant OCS creative team in its past iterations in vertical rows. There even were columns of ‘evidence’ For and Against each individual’s involvement in the as-good-as-guaranteed pop-ups project.

Beatrice couldn’t tear her eyes away as the online crowd reached a consensus, drawing red circles in damning permanent marker ink again and again and again around the names that everything pointed towards. She closed the browser before getting to the point where the discussions dissolved and devolved into bitter catfights over creators’ artistic styles, as they always did.

Suzanne’s office, for as long as Beatrice had worked at OCS, felt like something out of a natural history museum. It was all burnished wood, walls fully doused in dark, rich green, and glass display cases of her collection of Southern European invertebrate fossils. Symmetrical tiles underfoot and over them, a thick carpet that swallowed the clap of footsteps. In Beatrice’s early days here it had been a terrifying place; severe and gloomy even when the heavy curtains were fully peeled open to let light in. The exacting botanical sketches on the walls, too, did not help in the least. Even now she thought it would make for a wonderful basis for a section in a House – a museum, of course, or perhaps a town hall.

Some might think her an unlikely horror creator – easily spooked by many things and a fervent hater of surprises, but Beatrice thought it was a good thing, for a designer, to be able to find something genuinely terrifying in everything.

She took a seat gingerly at Suzanne’s beautiful oak desk, angled so as to always make her seem taller and larger. So that the light would fall in a certain slanted way across her face, carving a cavern of contrasts down the thin scar through her eye.

“Suzanne.”

“Beatrice.” Suzanne inclined her head, expressionless. From a drawer she took out a stapled set of papers, and flicked through the corners thoughtfully. Her leather chair let out a sigh as she leaned back and appraised Beatrice silently for a minute.

“It’s time” she said, “for a new challenge.” She placed the papers down in front and to the left of Beatrice, next to the handmade tin man figurine gifted from her son. 

For Beatrice it had never really been about the horror; the thrill of smelling blood in the water, and Suzanne knew that.

“Some details have not been hammered out yet, but you have a role here should you accept it,” she said, at the end, sliding the papers into a manila folder. “You all are ready for it.”

Beatrice bit her lip. It was hard to argue otherwise, if not for her, then for the others, at least.

Camila, who she traveled with halfway across the world on a budget airplane that rattled and croaked just to take hundreds of terrible reference pictures in poor lighting with their bad phone cameras. 

One evening, Beatrice had eaten something foul, and she’d found herself slung across Camila’s lap, cringing in the back seat of an overpriced taxi without a working AC. Groaning with each bump of the road and helplessly dipping her head further into the crook of Camila’s arm. Throughout the ride she had gently brushed her fingers through Beatrice’s damp, clumped hair, whispering things Beatrice could no longer remember, and dabbing her clammy, chattering cheeks dry every two minutes with her own sleep shirt. 

Beatrice insisted she get back to the hostel to get some rest while she was kept overnight for monitoring and IV rehydration. It had been a rocky trip, and a break would do them some good. Instead Camila had spent the next one and a half days finishing up three days worth of location scouting, and then had it all packaged into a neatly organized folder by the time Beatrice was ready to go again. 

There was nothing imaginable, Beatrice thought, that could truly faze her.

And Lilith. The most capable person Beatrice knew to spearhead the overall production and creative direction of something like this. 

Not just because Beatrice knew she would genuinely do a marvelous job masterminding and knitting together a house of horrors. Beatrice also considered it important that, if she were to join the team, a satellite unit stationed thousands of miles away from the safety of the Cat’s Cradle headquarters, the team would be led by people she trusted.

Or the equivalent of ‘trusted’. Whatever you call the thing between two people who fly desperately over to each other’s homes with some regularity to scream and claw at particularly unyielding scenes and transitions and then fall exhausted into sleep in each others’ beds.

“Take some time to think about it,” Suzanne had said, afternoon light shining harshly so that the whole room was a prism of contrast. “Let me know what you think.”

So here they are.

“Subj: OCS Halloween Pop-ups - Onboarding”. Beatrice puts down her mug, takes a deep breath, and clicks the email from Suzanne. 

Her phone rings.

“What is it?” Beatrice copies the zoom link at the top of the message and pastes it into the top of a new tab. With her other hand she holds her phone to the shell of her ear. 

“Have you seen the email?” Lilith is terse and tight, even through the phone. Her voice is faraway; Lilith has her phone on Speaker and on a table or drawer somewhere while she looks at something else. Unusual. Her calls are usually curt, succinct, and fully focused. It makes Beatrice’s ears go hot and buzz with static.

“I’m reading it now,” she says, scrolling and scanning the words. 

It’s a short email, in Suzanne’s usual clipped style. No attachments if she can help it. Below the zoom link there is a brief four-point meeting agenda, a reminder to be punctual, and finally a brisk thank you.

In-between these lines Suzanne has appointed lead and three accompanying names of the members of the steering team of the OCS’ first expansion project. 

Lilith’s name is listed second. She's not the Creative Director.

Silence.

“You’ve read it.” The statement is biting; almost a sneer. Beatrice smells the bitterness licking under the corners of its thin, cool veneer. Sticky.

Beatrice rereads the four lines. She rereads it again. She opens her mouth, then closes it.

Ava Silva.

“Who is she?” she exhales, finally. Weakly.

There is a scoff on the end of the line. Echoes of slippers marching down parquet, a door slamming, and then, quietly, an uncontrolled squeak of leather. A furious stream of mechanical clicks, as Lilith’s hands race over the keys of her expensive desktop setup. Beatrice can picture her in her room as if mirrored before her: Lilith still in her terribly fancy robe, sprawled ungainly before the expanse of her monitors in her glassy, austere, home office.

Her voice is suddenly much closer over the call, and Beatrice pictures the phone wedged to her ear by her shoulder.

“Ava Silva,” Lilith spits, in a dry, desiccated whisper.  “Is a Disney rat.”

Beatrice raises her eyebrows, pulling up the matching LinkedIn profile. The most recent post was uploaded a week ago – it seems to be an incredibly effusive Farewell-slash-Thank You post for, indeed, the Disneyland Anaheim Imagineering team and the Creative Development department. She scans the prose: candid and emoji-laden, bordering on unprofessional. 

Beatrice counts seven Disney Princess puns, and one awful Star Wars quote to cap it off. There are eight – yes, eight – images attached to the post, all full-sized so that the page runs on like a travelog blog post. 

The last image appears to be a mountain of goodbye swag. These include, Beatrice notes: a Moana beach ball, a matching Buzz Lightyear set of wheelchair spoke guards and cane covers, and a Sven the Reindeer onesie. The rest of them are all pictures of the woman who must be Ava, with her now ex-coworkers. All adorned with Mickey ears and pin-studded lanyards, in front of various rides and experiences she probably had a hand in creating. 

No, Beatrice scrolls back up to information messily hidden in the overlong farewell paragraph: Specifically, two of these are rides for which she’s been part of the main creative team. Three more that she’s played some role in creating, whether at the design phase or in later consultancy during implementation. 

One picture is a solo snapshot of Ava in a bright yellow baseball cap and remarkably tiny denim shorts, in front of a Disneyland hotdog stand. She’s holding an extra large hotdog, absolutely drenched in ketchup and mustard, high over her head like a trophy. Her smile, Beatrice thinks, is dazzling. 

She swipes down on her trackpad too quickly.

The last picture is of Ava and two others standing on a boulder in front of a massive Zootopia indoor roller coaster, while crowds in the background swarm the attraction in a snaking queue. ‘My pride and joy / baby / first full lead’, Ava has captioned it, ‘aka Great Zootopian Escape 🫡 . Just opened !!! I will be back 2 visit :’)) ’

Beatrice sighs. 

“What the hell is Suzanne thinking,” Lilith mutters, teeth gritted; tone cold. She’s shaken, and Beatrice knows it.

She herself can barely stop herself from scrolling, and scrolling, and scrolling. That’s enough, she snaps at herself, and her hand leaves the touchpad with a short jerk. There’s no point. 

//

“Good morning,” Suzanne says flatly, the moment the call holds five participants. “Thank you all for joining the call punctually.” Her face is crisp and too-sharp against the blurred-black virtual background.

Like they wouldn’t have come anyway, even if thoroughly rocked. Three stern, stiff and silent faces look straight ahead. Suzanne probably prefers them this way. 

Beatrice looks quickly through the five rectangles on the screen and finds the label that she seeks. 

🗿Ava Silva’s iPad 🗿.

“I would like to welcome a new member to the OCS.” Suzanne begins. She nods: “Ava Silva.”

There is a light smattering of the hand wave emoji reaction floating up from the toolbar from 🗿Ava Silva’s iPad 🗿. The device itself seems to be held up very close to her face so that all Beatrice can see is patchy pixelated bits of nose and cheek, shaking about as Ava presumably works to send the emojis.

Beatrice clenches a stress ball in her fist. It had been gifted to her for April Fools’ Day by Mary and Shannon. Something about clenching and unclenching, although Shannon had been laughing too hard to deliver the line in full.

“Ava has been a Creative Development Director at Disneyland and worked on numerous attractions both there and at Universal.” Suzanne pauses. “So, to put it crudely, this is something of a coup. We are very happy to have her with us to lead this creative expansion of the OCS brand.”

Beatrice’s phone, which has been relentlessly buzzing, skates across the table. She turns it over, a stormy headache already gathering steam: dozens of unread messages from Camila and Lilith, and more still on their way. Sighing, she shoots off a quick ‘Later, please.’ and then puts it on a tea towel on the kitchen island, out of reach.

“As you may imagine, it was not easy. She was… highly sought after by various studios and companies. Miss Silva,” Suzanne deadpans, “you are a difficult woman to track down and convince.”

The image of Ava’s face, very close to the camera already, wobbles further. It jostles like she’s jabbing at her screen fiercely. A good while later, after Suzanne had moved on entirely, her delayed message would finally deliver through the Zoom chat: 

🗿Ava Silva’s iPad 🗿: thats only bc i don’t read my emails lol! Glad 2 be here too 🥰

“You will all be working very closely together. In case anyone has forgotten…” Suzanne begins summarizing the contents of that fateful paper packet that she’d handed over in her office last November. The words, the clauses, are identical, but Beatrice can’t help but see it all in a different light. It sinks in more completely. 

Close collaboration to envision and map out the overall direction and themes for the pop-ups. Planning and writing for each house. Liaising with and consulting Admin back at the Cradle, yes, but otherwise almost entirely shouldering production independently. All of that now with Ava Silva thrown into the works.

For Ava’s sake, Suzanne briefly recaps the typical in-house workflow of the production of a Haunted House. Steering team meetings to establish expectations and aims; brainstorming and ideation and finalization of directions; traditionally an in-person bootcamp-esque intensive where the engine of development truly shifts into gear; followed by an ever-accelerating process of recruitment, research, sourcing, production, and testing. A process that should be second nature suddenly feels daunting.

“Now, this meeting is taking place so late because we have only just secured the venue permits for the pop-ups. I have briefed Ava already, and she will be able to explain this separately.”

Beatrice doesn’t have to turn around to hear her phone begin to rattle furiously behind her again.

“Finally, Ava,” Suzanne says, “let me introduce the rest of the team.”

First there is Camila, who Suzanne praises modestly for her extensive set design and art experience. Beatrice knows she’s always had a soft spot for her – resilient and optimistic and ready to put her teeth into anything. 

But in sharp contrast Camila’s face now is neutral and unreadable. The usually bright, tasteful splashes of color in her room are muted against the only two lamps she’s chosen to keep on, shades down and twisted away so her face sits in half-shadow. 

Lilith, then, in her icy postmodern tech den. Her arms are folded and her eyes are cast somewhere. Distant and acidic. 

Beatrice snaps back to attention when Suzanne mentions her name. She keeps it short and sweet: Beatrice’s original training was in engineering, and so, beyond her job scope, she’s best equipped to provide the team with technical and mechanical expertise. 

Ava nods. From what Beatrice can surmise from her patchy rectangle, she is not in a room at all.

No. She is, it seems, on some kind of wicker chair on a sun-dappled porch or veranda, lined by orange and beige walls and pillars veined with vines and hanging pots. A pair of sunglasses, perched on the crown of her head, keeps slipping down, and every few minutes Beatrice sees her lift a finger to nudge it back into place.

Her iPad seems to be on her lap, because it’s shuffling precariously at a strange angle focused on Ava’s chin as she flits about, constantly in blurry motion. 

When Ava holds up the iPad, there seems to be an inscrutable wall of something behind her, simultaneously metallic yet moving in dashes of color. For a moment, her video lags and freezes, and Beatrice gets a better look.

They’re birds. Dramatic plumages and muted tones of all kinds of domestic birds. In cages of every shape and size and color, decked from floor to awning, hanging off bars and resting on customized stands. The whole place is full of them. The iPad tilts as Ava adjusts herself and Beatrice finds that there’s more to the side, off-camera, too. 

Suzanne does not comment on it. “Ava, any thoughts?” 

Ava unmutes herself, grinning.

Beatrice’s earbuds erupt in utter, screaming, avian cacophony, and everybody winces at the exact same time.

Ava – muffled by bird screeching – yelps, mutes herself, and switches off her video.

The call melts into thirty seconds of stunned silence. 

“Oops sorry”,  types 🗿Ava Silva’s iPad 🗿 in the chat.

Beatrice can see Lilith physically take a deep breath and count one to fifteen out loud. Camila is in disbelief; shocked and a little delighted. Beatrice reflects on the strange, confusing mess of large feelings, and decides that she possibly wants to throw up.

Suzanne bites a lip and frowns.

Deep breath, Beatrice reminds herself. Exhale. Inhale. 

Ava’s camera switches back on eventually, and this time, she has, in each ear, one bud of a pair of half-untangled earphones. The wires are frayed and taped over with red duct tape, and the sounds of the surrounding aviary are now blessedly punched out.

This time, too, her iPad appears to be propped up on something. The earphone cord stretches dangerously taut when Ava scrambles to sit back into her chair. 

“Sorry,” her voice careens back into the call. “I’m crashing at a friend’s home at the moment. It’s also kind of a bird shop.”

“Anyway,” she takes a deep breath, grinning, “I’m so happy to join the team. I love horror, and haunted houses, so much. And like, the OCS is– wow. It’s such a dream.” 

She lifts her arms to either side excitedly to gesticulate, and Beatrice watches Lilith balk at the unabashedly kitschy Universal Monsters tie dye oversized t-shirt. Ava leans in just enough that Beatrice can see the crudely cartoonish red-and-white design on her black flask, swirling about.

Bite me I’m scared scrawled over a crude cartoonish vampire.

“So,” Ava goes on excitedly, “I have a lot of ideas, and I can’t wait to get started.”

[storiesbyjes2g]

3.130 Whoop that trick

At dawn, Sophia got up to pee, so I pulled myself out of bed to make breakfast because I knew she'd be hungry and head for the kitchen next. I felt like trying my French toast recipe again, as I hadn't perfected it yet. Cooking for Sophia had proven to be even more frustrating than cooking for Dad, because nearly everything contained dairy in some form. Scouring the internet every day for something new to try had gotten really old, so I started buying plant-based milk for my sanity. I think she appreciated it too because sometimes the temptation to eat dairy was so strong she gave in, damning the discomfort of bubble guts. How anyone could live life without cheese, I didn't know.

"Mmmmm, that smells so good," Sophia cooed.

"Thanks. I think I got it right this time."

The plant-based milk worked well for most things, but I needed to make adjustments to my custard. In my initial trials, either the bread came out too soggy, or it developed an eggy crust while it cooked. Everything looked perfect this time, so I hoped to remember what I did for next time.

"Okay, so hear me out," she started.

I had no idea what she was about to suggest, but I knew it would involve her not resting at home.

"It's Night Out on the Town tonight! We should go."

"Is that a good idea? You're due literally at any moment now."

"Okay, yeah, but this might be our last night as a child-free couple! We should spend some time together before we have to start scheduling it."

I wanted to come up with an irrefutable rebuttal, but I had none. Her logic was sound, as always. She'd been cooped up inside a lot lately, anyway. It wouldn't hurt to leave the house for a little while. It's not like we were going jogging around the lake or anything.

"Okay. But we're going to stay in town. There's a nice restaurant in Anchorpoint Wharf I've been wanting to take you to."

She clapped and did a little happy jig in her chair. I loved that woman.

Kooper and Rosie were getting old. Their coats turned gray, they slept a lot, and they walked a little slower. None of that seemed to stop them from running around the house like a pair of puppies, though. Rosie still demanded that Kooper play with her and dashed around the house and yard like she was training for a marathon. I loved that their age didn't stop them from having a good time. I was playing with Kooper when I realized something that stopped me dead in my tracks.

"Oh my Watcher," I shouted.

Sophia was behind me, asking what was the matter. I didn't mean to startle her, but it just occurred to me that Alessia might have her babies today!

"We need to get to Mama's house!"

She started to ask why, but I had already dialed Dad's number to see if he would come. Once she overheard my end of the conversation, she went upstairs immediately and got dressed. Dad said he was already on his way and would meet us there.

When we arrived, Mama wasted no time checking up on Sophia and loving on her youngest grandchild. She hammered her with a bunch of questions, like if she was getting enough rest and if she had experienced early contractions. All moms were lay doctors, I guess. Just as I had begun to think it was nice to have the whole family together again, loud forbidden words and angry screams rang out from upstairs, followed by rapid stomps heading in our direction.

"I'M GOING TO MURDER HIM," Alessia yelled.

"I'M GOING TO FIND HIM AND PUNCH IN HIS PRETTY FACE!! AND THEN I'M GOING TO CUT OFF HIS-"

"Whoa, Less," I said. "What in the world happened?"

Her face was as red as a strawberry, and her eyebrows scowled, just like an angry cartoon character. The lasers shooting from her eyes made me want to stay out of her way, but I needed to know what and who upset her so.

"JACE happened!! He's a PUNK!! Ol' llama-faced liar!!! I'M GONNA KILL HIM!"

"What did he do, Less?"

"He went back to his ex! IN MT. KOMOREBI!! And he married her!! He f#@$ing MARRIED her!!! HE SAID HE LOVED ME!! Ever since we found out it was triplets he's been weird!! HE IS DEAD TO ME!!!"

Mama had previously gone to the kitchen, no doubt to be near Dad when she noticed him taking out the trash, leaving only me to diffuse the situation. Alessia's anger was palpable, like an electric current coursing through the room. I had never seen her like that before, and it both scared and fueled me. I tried balling my fists and breathing extra slow and deep to keep myself from going off, but thoughts of confronting that piece of shit and laying hands on him stirred a fire inside me. There was no kind, gentle way to deal with this, and if I ever saw that cowplant turd in the street, it would be on sight! Nobody betrayed my sister and got away with it. I should have known something was up when he bailed at the baby shower. I saw him when we arrived, but after that, he was nowhere to be found. How could he weasel his way into my sister's fortified heart, knock her up, and leave her with THREE babies??? Did he really think running away to the mountain would absolve him of fatherhood? Like, did he not know child support was a thing? And he had THREE to support?? What an idiot! COWARD!! I hoped his wife had a real job because I knew Alessia would try to milk him dry. He'll be sorry he even met her! The sheer audacity of it all made my blood boil.

I was concerned about my niece and nephews and finally got Less to sit down. She didn't exactly calm down, because how could she? But she and I had a great time plotting and scheming against ol' Jace, planning what we'd do to him the next time we saw him. True, that wasn't healthy either, but it sure was fun. Revenge wasn't really Sophia's style, and she remained quiet. She also didn't have a sibling she would take up for at any moment, so she didn't understand why I acted like that and occasionally tried to talk sense into us.

But just like when she was a kid, Less found it hard to sit still and be calm, so she jumped up and paced the room, fuming like a teakettle. Even though he would eventually find out, I hoped Dad was still outside during Alessia's initial rant. Her situation was way too close to home, and I feared it might trigger him, especially being in Mama's house with all of us. But like I said, he would eventually find out. He and Mama came out from wherever they were, asking what all the yelling was about. I guess Mama had enough of Less' pregnant mood swings to come find out immediately. Less filled them in, and I saw a quiet rage growing within my dad. He looked just like how I felt. Maybe we could take another family trip to Mt. Komorebi and murder him together, heh.

I saw Mama eyeing me, as if to silently ask what we should do as the expert on all things mind, body, and soul. But I had no answers for her. My mind was set on destroying Jace, and my body was ready for it. I felt that in my soul, ha!

"I think we all need a dip in the pool," she said. "That should relax these tense mommies, right buddy?"

I sensed both sincerity and sarcasm in her tone, as she seemed disappointed that I provoked instead of diffusing the situation. Either way, she was right. Less definitely needed to calm down, but the rest of us did too, so we got changed and hopped into the pool.