#technically still sunday for me soo

[xoxosolia]

hii. ohmg, just read your post about you becoming a master shifter and I'm sooo happy for you!! seeing successes on here genuinely makes me feel so inspired and happy, so thanks for sharing it with us.

however, i would love to know how you shifted for the first time, what blockages did u let go of to finally have shifted. also i hope you can mention the method when u first shifted (if u used any), which methods do you use to shift regularly now? how does it feel to be a master shifter? and if its okay with you, can you share wid us your Drs? ALSO IS SHIFTING RLLY AS EASY AS THEY SAY!!?

thankyouu soo much💌

♡ How i shifted for the first time ♡

The first time I shifted was a normal Sunday. I was so depressed and I absolutely didn't want to go to class because the next day I had a lot of control, so i just said to myself "I'll shift tonight or never" I was seriously determined, so I tried closing my eyes and putting on a subliminal but it didn't work so I fell asleep.

I woke up around 2 a.m. and realized that I hadn't succeeded. I was a little disappointed and very tired but I wanted to try again. So since it was still early and I had time, that's what I did. I concentrated on my dr very precisely, imagining myself looking in the mirror and dressing myself in my dream clothes, I was extremely focused on all the details , my face, clothes my friends, things like that.

It lasted about 20 minutes I think, until my eyes opened on their own and was in my room in my dr on my bed, I didn't immediately understand that I had shifted , everything seemed so normal. It took me 5 minutes to understand that my room had changed and I was like "Oh shit"

I think what made me succeed that night and not the others was that I was very focused on my dr and that I was too tired to notice the symptoms that I had, And also because those days I was alone at home and therefore my house was completely silent, so i understood that was just a problem of distraction

I didn't use any particular method, I just let myself go and I don't use any at all now. I just think very hard about my dr and I'm there

Honestly I really like being a master shifter, I feel so powerful lol😭. and it really boosted my self-confidence. It also means that now I no longer ask for anything at all because I know that if I want it I will have it whether it is with the shift or with the manifestation. When I realized that I had become a master shifter I first had a mini existential crisis. I was asking myself things like "So technically magic exists?" "So technically I'm immortal?" "So anything is really possible?" I wasn't really sad about it on the contrary. I found it incredible (and still do)

The shift also really changed the way I interact with others, whether here or in my other realities. Personally I don't make a script and I keep everything in my head because my subconscious knows what I want and sometimes in my dr my personality changes without me realizing it.

In my fame dr I am rather extroverted or even arrogant, and in my barbie charm school dr I am rather introverted and stubborn, the worst is that I never realized it until the day I had a big argument with my best friends from my fame dr. They didn't want to talk to me anymore and that's when I realized that yes, I can have problems even on shift in a perfect reality.

I have a lot of idea for my dr but for now i shift only in my better cr, fame dr and my Barbie charm school dr (I will definitely do a post about my dr).

I hope I answered all your questions :))

Xoxo, Solia ૮꒰ྀི⸝⸝> . <⸝⸝꒱ྀིა

[jamiehashands]

Can you ramble about Ellis ggy?

Okay, okay, where to start, I think there’s like, a lot to go over so I’m gonna try to start from the beginning. This is gonna be a long post so strap in folks. (and ignore my discord nickname, it's an inside joke)

The Descent into Madness

Back in January/February of this year I decided to pick up writing as a hobby, I started off with little blurbs of a potential SB rewrite I had cooking up (and still cooking up today), however that’s not relevant to Ellis, so I’m skipping to the fic he’s actually include in. So, on February 4th I drew this as a joke, but then I wanted to expand on it and make it a fic.

(You can tell this is old by how light Ellis is and comparing him to my current design LMAO) (and the "like the show?" is supposed to be a reference to transformers)

That being said, that fic wasn’t even entirely focused on him, the basic premise was Greg came out to Ellis as nonbinary and Ellis would go “like the code??? XDDDD!!!!”, isn't he so quirky and not like other girls?? /j

“Guys the worms” haha, if only you knew dude.

Okay anyways, the thing was, I don’t think I got that far into reading GGY because most of it SUCKED and was really out of character. I didn’t even used the names “Rab” or “Boots” which actually annoys me so bad I don’t even wanna look at it. Sorry to the Instagram followers who wanted to see it, it’s in the garbage now and I hate it, but that’s completely okay! It was a learning experience for me, which lead me to my next fic that I am. Technically. Still. Working on.

I think this was the moment I realized I grew to be in love with Ellis’s “character”, in quotation marks because he’s not really a character y’know. This is also when I found a way to read GGY properly, so that means I’d have my fic more accurate. I actually documented my reading on my instagram (same username) if you’re interested, though it’s kind of corny looking back on it, definitely exaggerated some of my opinions on it.

If you follow my Instagram, you can see in a story I revealed that I currently find the fic really unfun to work on, and that I enjoyed working on a different one. Let me just explain, I believe that the fic is like, angst with no merit, someone might enjoy reading something like that but I don’t like writing it personally. Right now, I’m in the process of replanning, which is why I’d like to thank our today’s sponsor, Milanote!!!1! Kidding, but Milanote has genuinely made things easier for me it’s kind of insane. Obviously I’m going to keep some aspects in the fic (not spoiling though ^_^) but I hope to make it fun for me to work on again this time around.

I forgot to put my uquiz answer description thing I make for him here wait:

Ellis has a minor role in the short story ‘GGY.’ He is described as being impatient nearly all of the time, bouncing on his heels when he is. He often jokes around with his friend Tony, purposely calling him Tinkerbell instead of the pseudonym Tarbell, and telling him that he thinks too much. He immediately brushes off the writing assignment in Mrs. Soto’s class, saying that the story is due in two weeks and they’ve got plenty of time.

His dad insists that Sundays are for family time. He considers Tony’s real life investigations lame, making a dramatic snoring sound effect when Tony tells him he was people watching. At the end of GGY, Ellis ends up changing Tony’s story completely, albeit probably because of manipulation from Greg/GGY himself, he also compliments the changes they made by saying “it gets better.” (It doesn’t get better they’re probably going to get an F 🫶)

Ellis Fan Design(s)

In this section I’m just going to be rambling about Ellis fan designs, not naming any names though because it’s not really a specific design, just specific design aspects. Soo my first thing is: please stop making him grey/ashy or hell, incredibly light😢😢😢 it reminds me of when I was like 11 and all of my black characters were borderline grey. My second thing is that I’ve seen a handful of designs where he just. Doesn’t have curly hair. It annoys me sooo bad like guys please 😕😕 umm another thing is when people don’t give his square jaw, like maybe they do but it’s just really subtle??? Idk!!!

Anyways my Ellis design went through many changes actually, but one thing that remained consistent was the long hair with the. Brown?? Idk how to describe it lmao. Here are some sketches from old sketchbooks!! There are some more but those are kind of spoiler territory for my fic so >_>,, gotta wait another 8 months for those! /j

Way before these sketches were even created, I had an idea on how Ellis would dress, it's um. It's definitely a fashion statement...!

These were the drawings that had the designs I wanted to stick with, and have stuck with to this day! I took the idea that he would be a Monty fan and ran with it, for the jacket you can actually see it in the "im nonbinary" "like the code???" doodle I did, however looking back the short sleeved jacket and the long sleeved was kind of ugly.. In one of the doodles above, I drew him with ripped jeans, while they're quite fun they wouldn't really fit with the design I have now (and also I can't fit the rips on the current jeans anywhere)

However, that is old art, so here is his current ref I made for art fight! You can actually view his profile here!!!

The he/him/she/her pronouns (for simplification reasons I will only be using he/him in this post) and his birthday being on April 5th actually has some reason to it BUT we are not there yet!!! Oh!! And what's that thing at the bottom? Songs I associate with him?? what!!!

Ellis Playlist WHATT

Pretend I had a really smooth transition into this next topic, ANYWAY!! I'm going to pick a small handful of songs from the playlist and make them relate to Ellis in some way, because I. am really normal. ════════════════════════════════════════════

ᴺᴼᵂ ᴾᴸᴬᵞᴵᴺᴳ : Just Take My Wallet - Jack Stauber's Micropop

hope you like the formatting on this section, anyway

Your mama's crying Your mama's crying for you Mama's lying Oh, what's she trying to do To you?

I think this is self explanatory, after Tony's mom lost her only son a natural instinct is to cry her eyes out. For the "Mama's lying" part I'm just going to bullshit an answer that's relevant to the fic I'm writing. Sooo, in the context that is Ellis being like, y'know, sad, his mom would obviously try to comfort him, and since I hc that he blames himself somewhat, she'd try to tell him it isn't his fault and such, however Ellis doesn't believe that, which is where the "lying" part comes in. For the last two parts, Tony's parents actively tried to change what Tony wrote stories about, aka kind of changing his whole shtick idk.

Good times are singing They sang, they sang Those times are echoing through me Through me

Another theme in my fic is that Ellis reminisces, A LOT. Like first few paragraphs he's like "I miss my friends bro what the fuck!!!!!!!!11"

What's the softest way to say You took away my friend, my buddy? What's the kindest way to say You took away my friend? What's the kindest way to say You took away my friend, my buddy? What's the kindest way to say The end?

In this little animatic idea in my head, this is the part where Ellis and Gregory reunite and Ellis comes to the realization he killed Tony, "The end?" represents them cutting ties with each other, because there's no way their relationship can be healthy anymore. OR IS THERE?? DUN DUN DUNNNNN....

════════════════════════════════════════════

ᴺᴼᵂ ᴾᴸᴬᵞᴵᴺᴳ : Boys Don't Cry - The Cure

I would say I'm sorry If I thought that it would change your mind But I know that this time I have said too much Been too unkind

After Tony gets really pissed with Ellis, Ellis didn't realize what was wrong until later, in which he'd want to apologize and change Tony's mind about not wanting him to work on any writing assignment with him anymore. However he had done too much damage he can't undo, and also Tony is dead but SHHHH SHHHH

I tried to laugh about it Cover it all up with lies I tried to laugh about it Hiding the tears in my eyes 'Cause boys don't cry Boys don't cry

Ellis, being the comedic type in my hc (and many other's I think), would use humor to cover up his feelings by using humor as a coping mechanism y'know? "Boys don't cry" was/still is quite the common mindset, assuming Ellis would believe in said mindset, he's given another reason to not cry. Sorry that's probably a reach HELP.

I would break down at your feet And beg forgiveness, plead with you But I know that it's too late And now there's nothing I can do

I'm pretty sure Ellis would do anything to get Tony back, your honor that was his BEST BUDDY. The last two lines are obvious because Tony is like, dead,,,,, anyways skipping the next section because I'd just repeat myself

I would tell you that I loved you If I thought that you would stay But I know that it's no use And you've already gone away

Ok actually I'm gonna be repeating myself regardless because something something Ellis doesn't want Tony to leave but it's too late and Tony leaves and then dies blahhhh

Misjudged your limits Pushed you too far Took you for granted Thought that you needed me more, more, more

In GGY, Tony brings up that Ellis is very immature and feels as if he is outgrowing him, Ellis changing up his story is what broke the camels back, which is where "misjudged your limits/pushed you too far/took you for granted" comes in, Ellis, thinking Tony thought of him as someone he couldn't lose, so it'd hurt when Tony seemed to drop him just like that (ok well to him it seems unexpected but y'know, Tony's "im not like other girls" inner monologues. (kidding))

Now I would do most anything To get you back by my side But I just keep on laughing Hiding the tears in my eyes 'Cause boys don't cry Boys don't cry Boys don't cry

For the first two lines, I immediately think of @kai-rio 's (sorry for the @ lmk if you want to be removed but also you're really normal about Ellis like me so) Ellis fic, you can read it right here, um, in the briefest summary I can give of the first part, Ellis goes "omg I need to find Tony !!!!! >_<" and like plans. to go to that. like he gets geared up /j. I'd make a joke about the ending but that'd be SPOILERS.... anyways refer to what I said before for the other lines.

════════════════════════════════════════════

ᴺᴼᵂ ᴾᴸᴬᵞᴵᴺᴳ : I Can't Handle Change - Roar

Hangin' out where I don't belong is nothing new to me I get tired, and I get sick, and then I lose the strength to leave

If anyone reading this saw that. dumbass papa louie pals scene I made, I hc Ellis to be like!!! really alienated from everyone even if he comes off as an extrovert (im giving him every mental illness Ellis im sorry). Funny fact, in one of my ideas for the Ellis fic rework, I have a point that says "mention Ellis constantly feeling sick", not in the literal sense obviously, but it ties in with this lyric methinks.

I can't handle change I can't handle change

Ellis is left grieving the loss of his friend, a change, like the lyric says, he can't handle/accept

Nothing I do is ever good Nothing I do is ever good enough Nothing I do is ever good Nothing I do is ever good Nothing I do is ever good enough Nothing I do is ever good

Did I mention I'm giving him every mental illness ever (/j) well that also includes an inferiority complex, really ties in with the feeling alienated from everyone thing, yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Leave me alone Leave me alone (I wanna go home now) Leave me alone Leave me alone (I wanna go home now)

Guys would you be shocked if I said that I interpret this as Ellis wanting to be left alone??!????!???!?! "I wanna go home now" makes me think of this scene in my fic where Ellis remembers Tony's funeral (you can't spell funeral without fun btw! /j) and wanting to leave like 30 minutes in because he felt so overwhelmed

I can't help but repeat myself I know it's not your fault Still lately, I begin to shake For no reason at all For no reason at all For no reason at all For no reason at all For no reason at all

This would be Ellis to Greg, as Tony's death technically wasn't his fault, but he has to repeat it in his head like a mantra because Greg and GGY shared the same face and it's hard to separate the two from one another. Shaking for seemingly no reason is a symptom of anxiety, and if you checked Ellis's art fight page that I really need to revamp, it's stated he has that so!!! yay!!!!!!!!!!

G-g-g-grellis… VOMITS IN MOUTH. /j (and shipping in the GGY community in general ig)

I think I’m like the only person who ships this now,,,,, Ummmm I just wanna say I don’t really take this shipping thing too seriously because they’re just middle school kids and they’re bound to be silly/awkward. Obviously they do have potential to be really angsty like “oh my god you killed my best friend why do I still love you? Is it because I’m still in love with the person you pretended to be?” Or something idk it’s dumb I like to focus on the sillier things like passing notes in class, trash talking teachers they don’t like, and sharing snacks with each other or whatever.

Absolutely unrelated but can we NOT use the term "yaoi" to describe the relationship between two middle schoolers like, i'm sorry that's just hella weird. Sorry if this is flipline addictspilled flipline addictsmaxxing /inside joke but it's like saying "middle school boy yaoi" like is that NOT weird to you? Also I've seen some really iffy ship art and whenever I come across it I just think to myself: "bro aren't they like twelve???" And I’ve seen no one acknowledge it in the tags of the art, and I’ve brought it up to a friend who is an outsider to the GGY community and they thought the same thing too. Look. Maybe I’m just aroace and believe that romance shouldn’t all be about kissing and shit but someone here has got to agree right 😕

Anyways back to Grellis!!! When I first saw them, I thought their alternative ship name, “Grel”, was “Gel”, and I thought that was the funnier shit ever. You might be asking why I ship them and it’s because like, they’re seen interacting with each other for most of the story, and I don’t have to rely on post-canon “what-ifs” to get their relationship to work.

Ummm for their dynamic I already said they're just silly middle schoolers so. go my grellis related pics

also they play roblox together and watch the mlp eq movies but at the same time they head bang to death metal. Uhh I'm not gonna write about how I think these songs are so them(tm) but two songs I associate with them are Romantic Lover by Eyedress, and Door by iDKHOW. Also my friend @rippcharddrive drew them for an art fight attack and it was the best day of my life

now one might be asking, "why the fuck is NuMarcus from Papa Louie there" well!!!

NUTIMM (And Papa Louie in general)

Now you might remember when I said that I hc Ellis to be born on April 5th and use he/she pronouns and that we'll come back to that later. The reason is Papa Louie, okay well, NuTimm (Timm x NuMarcus) specifically, but Papa Louie in general. But before we get into it, I edited Ellis in the Flipline Style once ^_^

Ok so really short origin story of NuTimm is that it started off as a joke and two of my friends role played them breaking up, but Niall (rippcharddrive) started getting attached to it. Sooner or later he added them to his tomodachi life island and on March 31st 2024, they got together!!! and got married in under and hour of doing so!!! Now, how does this relate to Ellis? well on April 3rd, Timm got knocked up bro /JJJ

Niall didn't know what to name the baby so I jokingly suggested the name Ellis and everyone else liked it so the baby was going to be named Ellis!!

And on April 5th (I think you can understand why that's his birthday now), she was born!!! And everyone in du2 thought she was ugly </3

To make a long story short they ended up having like 7 more kids I think I forgot, and many more grandkids. Then one day I decided to get Tomodachi Life myself (with the help of Niall), made my own island and added fnaf Ellis and NuTimm Ellis to it, long story short they fell in love and eventually got married and became the gayest straight couple (/j). NuMarcus, wanting to give Ellis a head start in parenting, made 2 NuBaby's, each of which have incredibly long and stupid names because Ellis wanted to piss him off.

BUT THEN... THE PLOT THICKENS. On Nialls island, Gregory and NuTimm Ellis fell in love and also got married, thus forming the most confusing love triangle of all time. IM RUNNING OUT OF IMAGES BUT here is when I started using he/she for Ellis

ok guys pretend i have a really good transition to the next and probably last section

Headcanons (shocked face emoji)

I've mentioned multiple of my Ellis hcs in the song portion but I haven't really made an entire list of them so!! Here we go guys!!! We're at the homestretch!!!

- ummm neurodivergent (AuDHD), I interpret him bouncing his heels in that one scene in GGY as his stimming thanks, he also quotes memes as a vocal stim pray for him /jjj - types with a lot of emoticons and exclamation marks - laughs at the dumbest crap ever, you could show him the "she strogan me off till i beef" video and he'd cry laughing - somehow knows every unblocked games website - Picks at his. acne all the time - Knows the" most obscure ass media, he'll go up to Tony and Greg and be like: "Have you guys heard of Zigglyblorfblorf??" and they'll be like "???? WHAT????" - Wanted to become a youtuber when he was way younger because he thought it would be easy and it would make him look cool and awesome (his parents did NOT approve). Speaking of parents I made. fan designs. for them. SEE GUYS I AM SO NORMAL!!! THEY TOTALLY DONT HAVE THEIR OWN LORE OR ANYTHING!!! and totally can't be their own standalone characters1!!!

- Ellis is quite fond of dancing actually ^_^ boogieing and jiving is something he likes - Cuts the fat off his steak before eating it, he HATES the texture - Very emotional/sensitive :// - he sort of kind of lets his full personality show around Tony and Greg which kinda makes the whole “Tony feels like he’s outgrowing Ellis and thinking he’s immature” worse maybe because idk. Differences. - 5'4-5'6 ft tall idk idk - he probably dies ngl /j

- love-hate relationship with slasher films

- on one hand he’s like “hahahah people dying XD I’m so different!!” And genuinely just being squeamish.

Conclusion

um so. i'm glad you've read this far. thanks for reading about my insane thoughts about Ellis GGY uhhh TLDR:

[jaehyun-eclipsed]

Before I Met You | Five

Updates: Sundays, 8 PM EST

Pairing: NCT (Jaehyun, Lucas…) X Reader/OC

Genre: Romance, Angst, Coming of Age

Summary: Four. There were four people before I fell in love with you… Here are their stories.

Before I Met You Masterlist

Prev | Next

Seulgi, Soo Young, Lucas, Yang Yang, and I are all crowded around Seulgi’s open trunk after school. I lean against the side of the car, listening to them discuss a music artist I had never heard of. I wasn’t sure how to participate in the conversation and remained quiet, eyes wandering to each person as they spoke. My gaze stops on Lucas when I realize his body is pointed in my direction. He’s wearing his reflective sunglasses; they prevent me from seeing where he’s actually looking. I shamelessly stare at him for several more moments, trying to determine what he is paying attention to before he suddenly starts speaking to me.

“So did you get any scholarships from UCLA?” he asks.

“Hm? Oh, I’m not going there.”

“You’re not?”

I shake my head and don’t say anything further. The rest of the group ceases their previous conversation and the surroundings became eerily quiet. After a moment, he raises his eyebrows, realization hitting him.

“You got into Berkeley?”

“Yeah.”

“Wow!” Seulgi interjects. “I really admire you, Y/N.”

I give her a small smile, internally questioning the authenticity of her statement. Though, I quickly push the thoughts to the side, opting to take them at surface level and nothing more.

“That’s great, Y/N!” Lucas says with a warm smile.

I was happy; Stanford is where I was aiming to go, but if not Stanford (which was extremely unlikely any way you put it), then Berkeley would have been fantastic. In essence, Berkeley was my first choice.

The Friday night before Spring Break, Taeyeon and I were communicating via text, incessantly refreshing the page for application decisions, only to be met with loading errors. We had both been accepted to UCLA and considered the idea of being roommates in college. My first choice was Berkeley because it was closer to home and if Taeyeon got in, at least I would know one person who went there. I liked her and since we didn’t know each other that well, this would be a good time to become better friends.

I was browsing various social media platforms, looking for any sign that other people had received their admission decisions. To my amusement, I was met with a wall of comments saying essentially the same thing: I know I’m not going to get in so can you just give me my rejection letter now?

Since refreshing the page only increased my anxiety, I decided to take a shower, figuring that the decisions would be released while I occupied my time with something else. Upon finishing, my phone had exploded with messages.

Hana [6:18 PM] I didn’t get into Berkeley

Taeyeon [6:22 PM] I GOT IN!!!!

Hana [6:45 PM] Y/N, are you okay??

Me to Hana [6:54 PM] Yeah? Why wouldn’t I be okay?

Me to Taeyeon [6:55 PM] CONGRATULATIONS! OMG I NEED TO CHECK!

Hana [6:56 PM] You didn’t reply so I thought you didn’t get in and were really sad

Me to Hana [6:58 PM] Oh I actually haven’t checked! Let me check right now!

I ran out of the bathroom and logged onto the admissions page. Within five seconds, I let out a yelp of triumph.

Congratulations! I am delighted to offer you admission to the University of California, Berkeley for the fall 2015 semester!

Every time I looked at Lucas, I was incredibly confused and, quite frankly, somewhat disappointed. He was spending all of this time with me, but wouldn’t do or say anything. Each moment we were together felt like there was something unspoken between the two of us. There technically was, as the night of Winter Ball remained an untouched topic – like a secret we both tucked away that was only meant for us. We both knew it happened, but didn’t explicitly know how the other felt about it; it was the purgatory of knowing you liked each other, but both being too afraid to openly say anything.

Truthfully, it was a hopeless endeavor that would likely turn out to be fruitless. We only had another month together before graduation. Yes, we had the summer too. But then what? What’s the likelihood that anything would have lasted past that? I was moving to another state for the next four years. I suppose I could have a summer fling before then – that wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

Why did I even like him so much? He was attractive and… well, that’s basically it. He was nice to me, but nice only gets you so far. Obviously, he had demonstrated himself to be irresponsible. Yeah, we had similar music tastes and he would share his fries with me whenever I asked. But what did I even know about him? His name is Lucas and he’s half Chinese, half Thai. He likes video games, going to the gym, and eating food. He hopes to become a doctor, but doesn’t currently have the work ethic to get there. All of the things I can list are generic – things you can slap on an ‘About Me’ page and no one would question them because they can easily apply to anyone. While that was a good start and I could definitely ask questions about those things, would I be able to talk to him? Really, really talk to him. Ask him about his dreams, his hopes, his insecurities and secrets he hasn’t told anyone, including Seulgi. Do we have the same amount of ambition? If I thought about it, I wasn’t so sure.

“Do you think we want to go the little pond to take pictures before going to prom?” Hana asks me after school.

Prom is two days; it’s the last moment of celebration before we start three straight weeks of testing for senior year exams.

“Yeah, we can do that. I –”

“Come here, Y/N.”

I turn my head suddenly, my feet instinctively taking me to the boy who called over to me from his car, my thoughts with Hana left unfinished. I lean down to rest my arms on Lucas’s open window and Hana follows, standing just next to me. Sicheng is sitting in the passenger’s seat of Lucas’s car; both of them smile at me.

He presses a button on his stereo. “Listen!”

Loser 외톨이 센 척하는 겁쟁이

I smile, immediately recognizing the lyrics to the latest BIGBANG release I had texted to Lucas.

“Taeyang is so good in this song, but G-Dragon is my bias,” he says.

Since when is G-Dragon your bias? I told you he was my bias last week right after you told me Taeyang was yours.

I raise an eyebrow for a split second before slowly nodding in agreement, murmuring a quick, “Mine too!”

We remain silent for a moment, enjoying the song until he asks me a question that pulls me back into the state of confusion that I’m always in whenever I’m around him.

“Who are you going with to prom?”

Why the hell do you even care who I go with?

“Um, just with some friends.”

“Who?”

Why do we have to be so specific? I’m sure you can guess who. You know who I’m friends with.

“Uh, Hana, Doyoung, Taeyeon, and Seungwan.”

Sicheng nods slightly, but Lucas doesn’t say a thing. He keeps his gaze focused on his steering wheel, moving his lips ever so slightly as if he’s contemplating something.

“So, yeah…” I say, breaking the unbearable silence.

“Sounds fun, Y/N,” says Sicheng.

“All right, well, I gotta take Sicheng to get his haircut. So I’ll see you later,” Lucas says suddenly.

“See ya.”

Hana and I step away from his car and watch them drive off.

“Why does he act like that around you?” asks Hana.

I furrow my brow. “Like what?”

“Like… he wants to say something, but doesn’t. There’s a weird tension between the two of you.”

“So you noticed it too.” I sigh. “I wish I knew.”

I remember reading something once. It was along the lines of, “If someone likes you, you’ll know. And if you’re left confused all the time, then you’ll know what that means too.” I didn’t want to believe it. But as time went on, the rational part of me told me that what I read may have been right. Get out. He’s an idiot. You deserve so much more. You deserve someone who isn’t going to continue falling for this dumb girl clinging onto him, manipulating him, pulling him back in every time he wants to stray away.

But what’s the harm in this? It’s not like I saw myself marrying him. I just wanted to go out with him for a while, go on dates for the first time, experience my first kiss – all rites of passage that I would remember many years later, but would remain just that. As memories.

Prom. The moment of your high school career. We go to school for four years for it to culminate with this dance that’s depicted in the movies as “the night of all nights.” I remember when I was twelve and watched these movies that created my perfect ideal for what high school would look like. I thought I’d get a boyfriend and have my first kiss at sixteen, fall in love for the first time, go to prom and take those nice photos that couples do with some picturesque water scene in the background. And guess what? None of that happened! Still haven’t dated anybody, still haven’t kissed anybody, still haven’t fallen in love, and definitely did not have a date to take photos with in front of the picturesque water scene.

Now that I think about it, that’s a bit unrealistic. But I was twelve. I can dream.     

Tonight’s goal, I had decided, was to have fun. And maybe have another dance with Lucas. Dinner was at an American restaurant that was kind enough to give us free ice cream to “help us celebrate whatever we were celebrating.” This was followed by pictures in front of small pond near our school.

I guess I take that back; I at least get to have pictures taken with a picturesque water scene in the background.

As expected, Doyoung and Taeyeon agreed to go together as a “couple.” The rest of the girls in our group were going stag. Seungwan brought along her friend, Jieun. So in our photos, it was Doyoung surrounded by five girls. He joked that he looked like a pimp.

“Hey, Y/N?” Seungwan walks up to me while the other four are trying to take pictures with some of the geese near the pond. She creases her forehead and purses her lips. “Does Doyoung like Taeyeon?”

I look up from my phone and raise an eyebrow, feigning curiosity. “Um, I don’t know. I know they’re good friends… but I don’t know about anything else.”

“Oh… He doesn’t tell you who he likes?”

“No,” I say. “Other than he has unusual taste in women.”

Considering they’re not women at all.

“You want to take a picture together?” I ask, attempting to take her mind off of something that, unfortunately, could never be. She just didn’t know.

“Hey! Y/N! Seungwan! Let’s get going! The doors open in ten minutes!” Doyoung calls.

Okay, why the hell do you keep following us?

Goeun, another student in our class, ran into us at the entrance. She was quiet and rarely spoke in class. Unfortunately, when she did speak, she had a habit of being arrogant – making a point to talk about how far she was on our lengthier assignments. To her disappointment, everyone would stop paying attention before she could finish her sentence. I felt bad for her sometimes, so I tried to listen and at least make a comment. But if I had to be honest, it’s difficult to carry on a conversation with her. After she realized that everyone else had stopped paying attention, she would turn around and remain silent. Perhaps the blow from the lack of attention from everyone else couldn’t be overridden by one person giving a half-assed attempt. I wouldn’t blame her.

However, since we’ve arrived, she hasn’t stopped following us and she keeps trying to stand next to me. I’m not particularly fond of being followed without my permission, as a general rule, but she’s also wearing nearly the same dress as I am. The upper bodice has a different cut, but the rest of it is the same – same color, same style. This is really shallow, but I don’t know why you would intentionally try to stand next to someone who was wearing the same thing. No one likes having the same dress as anybody else – that’s why there’s a dress registry at the store. Wasn’t that part of the song in High School Musical 3?

“Why does Goeun keep following us?” Hana whispers to me.

I shrug. “I don’t know. I don’t think she actually greeted us either. She just latched on and I didn’t realize she was following us until we walked into the foyer outside the gym to get drinks.”

“Oh, I thought she was friends with you…”

“No, she’s in my Korean class and I’ve said a handful of things to her, but that’s it.”

“It’s kind of annoying.”

“I know…”

“Hey, who’s that?”

I follow her line of sight to see Lucas walking in with his group, a girl in purple latched onto his arm. Yuna.

“Is that his date?” she asks.

“I guess so.”

“I’m still mad that he didn’t ask you.”

“Hey!” Doyoung calls, walking back to us from the drink stand. “Let’s go back inside!”

Hana and I follow Doyoung into the gym. I look over to the back table where Lucas and his friends are and internally chastise myself for the thought.

“Want to go say ‘hi’?” I ask Hana.

“Sure.”

What are you thinking?

Oh that’s right. You’re not.

“Hey, Y/N,” says Kibum.

I smile. “Hey.”

“Uh, you look nice.”

“Thanks! You too!”

We stand there, an awkward silence between us as we exchange uncomfortable smiles. I flip around to end the anguish and am met with Lucas’s back.

Should I tap him on the shoulder…?

Fortunately, my thoughts are interrupted when Lucas turns around.

“Y/N!” He extends his arms out and I walk over and wrap my arms around him.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

“Hey! Good to see you,” I say, taking a step back to look at him.

He smiles and I see his eyes looking up and down my figure. “You look really nice.”

My face grows warm. “Thank you!”

Ugh! You still react this way around him!

“Y/N!!” Seulgi calls, throwing her arms around me. I stumble backwards.

“Oh!” I return her hug, feeling dazed. “Seulgi!”

She puts her hands on my shoulders, pulling back to look at me. “You look amazing, Y/N!”

Kind of her to say, but I wonder if she did that on purpose.

“Thanks! I like your dress!”

“Aww!” she coos. “Thanks!”

She pulls away from me and walks over to someone else. Hana comes over to me and we’re left standing by ourselves.

“He looked really happy to see you.”

I sigh. “This is confusing.”

For the next hour, Doyoung, Taeyeon, Hana, Seungwan, Jieun, and I try dancing to the awful playlist the Prom Committee had procured. One of us would lament every other song just how terrible all the songs were. But even with this distraction, my stupid eyes would wander, watching Lucas and Yuna dance together. They look like they they’re having fun. I can’t help but feel a bit envious.

She’s so lucky. She gets to hold his hand. She gets to dance with him.

But then, when our principal stops the dance to crown the King and Queen, it’s complete déjà vu. Only this time, I’m not alone in my observation. Hana and I stand at the back of the dance floor, watching as all of the nominees walk down the aisle towards the stage.

Don’t look at him.

“We are now going to have our Prom King and Queen start off our first slow dance of the night!”

I look at Lucas, waiting for him to grab Yuna’s hand to dance with her.

Only, he doesn’t.

He doesn’t do that at all.

Lucas runs off, pausing at the edge of the dance floor, frantically looking left and right, but mostly in the direction of the table I had placed my belongings.

What is he doing? Who is he looking for? Seulgi?

Me?

“What is he looking for?” Hana asks.

He’s looking over at my table… Maybe he is looking for me.

My brow furrows. “I don’t know…” I look back over to where Yuna is standing.

Why did he just leave his date there?

Turning back to Lucas, his shoulders raise and fall with a heavy sigh. He turns around, apparently unable to find whoever he was looking for. He gets up on his toes, looking over the crowd of people before making a gesture with his hand, signaling for someone to come over to him. Yuna walks out of the crowd, grabbing onto his arm as soon as she reaches him. As he heads back to his table, he turns his head and our eyes lock. Déjà vu settles in again for a brief moment before he looks away and continues walking to his table.

“He totally just looked at you,” Hana says.

He’s not going to dance with her?

When they arrive at their table, he sits down first, and then motions for her to sit down in the chair next to his. Only, it appears that she misunderstood because she takes a seat on his lap instead. A sudden pang a jealousy courses through my chest, causing me to look away.

“Why didn’t he dance with her?” Hana asks. “He surely couldn’t have been looking for Seulgi – she’s back over there, where Lucas’s date was.” She looks at me. “Do you think he was looking for you?”

“I’m slightly biased in this situation so part of me hopes that is the case, so if he wasn’t, why was he looking at our table?”

Boys are confusing. This whole thing is confusing. If Lucas was so adamant on dancing with Seulgi during Winter Ball, why did he seem so careless about slow dancing with his date at prom? It’s a courtesy – and really, an expectation – to dance with your date. Normally, the implication of asking someone to be your date is that you like them. The movies always show the girl wanting to go with the popular douche-bag who ends up asking them to go to the dance, but then humiliates them by ditching them and dancing with someone else. Maybe I should stop basing my logic on movies, but anyway, even ignoring all of the movies, why wouldn’t you want to dance with the person you asked? Yeah, dancing together during all of the upbeat and party songs is one thing, but not wanting to do the slow dance? There are so few slow songs at school dances – that’s why people always anticipate them because they want that chance of intimacy with their partner.

As the night ends, our group decides to stand off to the side to get some air. We ended up sitting out on most of the dance after the King and Queen were crowned because of the even poorer choices of music. Doyoung and Taeyeon expressed that they had grown bored – a sentiment we were all feeling, and collectively, we were thinking we would leave early.

“Hang on,” I say as I start walking to the back table. “I want to go say goodbye to a couple people.”

You idiot. You wouldn’t be saying ‘goodbye’ to anyone if it wasn’t for Lucas. He’s the only person you even want to say ‘goodbye’ to! You stupid, desperate –

“Y/N?”

I turn my head and Kibum is standing by their table. He looks down at my side, seeing my purse held in hand and asks, “Are you leaving?”

“Yeah.” I smile. “It was nice seeing you.”

“Y/N, you’re leaving?”

Lucas suddenly appears next to me and my smile fades as I nod. There’s a sinking feeling in my chest – one of disappointment at the relatively uneventful evening, realizing that I would be graduating in a month and that this was one of the last moments I would have with him.

“Uh, yeah.”

It takes him a moment to process what I said, but when he does, he extends his arm out and looks at me, silently asking for a hug goodbye. I run into his embrace, burying my head into his chest as I feel his arm tighten around my waist, like he doesn’t want to let me go. And suddenly I’m brought back to Winter Ball yet again. I can smell his cologne and feel his warmth, forgetting about any possible onlookers who would care to judge. But within seconds, I feel like I’m being slapped in the face. The deejay calls for the last dance of the night and “Wanted” starts playing over the speakers.

“Lucas?” Yuna grabs onto his arm and when I pull back to see who has called for his attention, I am met with her facial expression that feigns innocence. She pouts. “Aren’t you going to dance with me?”

Our arms are still around each other when I look up at him. He keeps his gaze on me and I swear I can sense a feeling of longing; it’s in his eyes. I drop both of my arms to my side and try to step away, but he only grips me tighter.

“Lucas?” she calls again.

I look up at him and smile, taking my hand and lightly pushing his waist to tell him he can let go. “It’s all right.”

It’s really not all right, but it’s rude if you don’t dance with her at least once. She is your date. I wouldn’t like it very much if I were her. If you wanted to dance with me, you should’ve asked me.

His expression is serious and he holds me for a moment more before letting me go. Yuna tugs on his sleeve, attempting to pull him away. He keeps his gaze on me for few seconds before sighing and turning to lead Yuna onto the dance floor.

I chuckle to myself. Y/N, you have the worst taste in boys.

The following Monday, end-of-year exams were starting. As I drive into the school’s parking lot, I see Lucas’s car. We had a three-hour delay due to testing, but because I had an exam, I had to be here early. I didn’t know why Lucas was even at school so early because he didn’t have any exams today. I figured that he had driven here early to meet up with some friends for breakfast. But as soon as I park my car, I realize that that is definitely not the case. He’s staring at me when I look out my window. I quickly turn away, my heart racing as I remember the incident from over the weekend.

I had been scrolling through Facebook and Instagram, browsing through everyone’s prom photos. Lucas had posted a collage containing three photos of his entire group and a larger photo of him and Yuna.

“Hey, Dad, you wanna see Lucas’s photos?”

I handed him my phone and he looked at the photo. “Why did he choose a gray suit?”

“I don’t know.”

“She’s all right, nothing special. He looks nice though.”

He handed me back my phone and upon looking at the screen, my eyes shot out of my head. My dad had accidentally hit the ‘Like’ button.

“Oh shit!” I exclaimed, quickly un-liking the photo and silently praying that Lucas wasn’t quick to check his notifications.

Maybe he didn’t see it! That’s totally possible! Snap out of it! You have a physics exam in an hour! Who cares about some stupid photo?

I grab my things to head inside to do some last minute cramming before my physics exam. As I open the door, I see Lucas get out of his car. Unfortunately, a sudden gust of wind blows one of my sheets of paper towards the back of my car. I quickly run over to pick it up and when I stand back up again, Lucas is walking in my direction. He’s staring at me and his eyes narrow, like he’s studying me. I gape at him.

He knows, he knows. Kill me. Just kill me now.

He looks away and says, “Hey.”

“Hi.”

Yeah, he definitely knows.

“You know what I like?”

I turn around and look at Juhyun. “What?”

“You,” she says.  

Our history exam was in a couple hours and Doyoung and I had decided to skip our English class and sit in our history class while we crammed so that we could ask our teacher any last minute questions. Coincidentally, this was Lucas’s history class.

The desks in the classroom were arranged in groups of two. Doyoung sat at the pair of desks in front of me and Juhyun sat in the ones behind me. I sit sideways in my chair and lean against the wall while reading about the Cold War.

I chuckle. “Oh, thanks. How sweet of you.”

Occasionally, I glance up to where Lucas is sitting diagonally from me. After responding to Juhyun, I catch Lucas looking at me from my periphery. When I turn to look at him, I realize that he looks frustrated.

Maybe he’ll come over here. I kind of wish he would come over here, but he’ll probably sit with Juhyun since they are friends. Actually, now that I think about it, I think they used to like each other.

He continues to sit there for a moment, staring ahead before he decides to get up and throw something away. I try to focus again on my reading when an earbud is shoved into my face. When I look up, Lucas is standing in front of me, his face expressionless. I raise a brow and hesitantly take the earbud from his hand.

“I’m going to sit here…” he murmurs as he sits down at the desk next to me.

I really need to stop wishing on things that I hope will happen because I don’t actually know how to react when they do happen.

“I found this really cool song by Jonghyun,” he says. “It’s called ‘Symptoms.’”

My face breaks out into a wide smile. “Oh! I love ‘Symptoms’!”

It’s disappointing really that the only things we can talk about are K-Pop and college. When I try to think about other things to discuss, I can’t think of anything.

“Are you thinking about going to the K-pop convention in LA?” I ask.

“I’m not really sure. It’s kind of expensive.”

This is obviously a shot in the dark, but going together would be nice. We’d have to get down to Southern California and since it’s a multi-day thing, we would have to get a hotel room. And I suppose to be cost-effective, we would get one hotel room. Maybe we could have a fling for a few days…

Lucas and I continue listening to music. He tells me to pick all of the songs from his music library until he recommends ‘Inspiring’ by Taeil.

“It’s such a pretty song, Y/N. It reminds me of y–”

My forehead creases, waiting for him to finish his sentence. “Reminds you of what?”

He shakes his head. “Nothing.”

After our history teacher finishes her lesson with Lucas’s class, she starts playing YouTube videos.

“What the f –”

I turn to look at Lucas just as he stops himself from swearing. “What the heck? That’s stupid.”

Lucas is known for having a loose mouth, swear words being a normal part of his everyday vocabulary. I swear a lot mentally, but I don’t use it in regular conversation. It seems that he has picked up on that and has adjusted his behavior accordingly.

The remainder of the school year was filled with moments like this. Lucas would come up to me at random times and we would spend time alone while being surrounded by others. What was interesting was that they would never interrupt us. We could enjoy each other’s presence, listening to music, with him occasionally making strange comments like he was trying to confess but wasn’t confident enough to fully commit. Graduation was literally right around the corner – do you want to continue playing this game where ultimately, we both lose because both of us can no longer play?

You act differently around me. Yet, you won’t say anything. Why?

I’m quite confident that you like me, but we’re running out of time.

So what’s stopping you?

Prev | Next

Before I Met You Masterlist Masterlist

[mirrorballparkers]

flower boy [p.p.]

summary; peter may not know much about flowers, but he did know how much he loved you.

authors note; i wrote this with zero sleep, an empty stomach and literally no intention of it being long or good in that matter soo fjsjfk yeah i’m sorry if i suck i won’t stop sucking at writing:/

warnings: my bad writing but hey peters cute and this is filled with fluff and cute :)

words; 2.5k

~

peter parker never really made huge, romantic gestures. not that he didn’t want to, it was simply because he was too shy and embarrassed to do so. the most that he did was say that your hair looked nice or that your smile was pretty. he wanted to do more than that, more than just saying that your hair looked nice or that you had a cute top on.

sunday afternoon, springtime — peter parker found himself at the local flower shop. he had spent the last five minutes eyeing the display window; admiring the various flowers.

peter didn’t know that there were so many different flowers to choose from; roses, tulips, sunflowers — so many. but as he walked in, he saw the daffodils displayed in the corner of a shop, wrapped in a brown floral wrap and the sun beaming on it, he remembered that you once said that daffodils were the prettiest flowers and your favorite. you loved how soft and delicate they looked, sure every flower was soft and delicate, but daffodils were by far your favorite.

peter’s face softened as he held the eesome bouquet in his hands, wrapped in the brown floral wrap. did he have to have a legitimate reason as to why he was doing this? often his uncle ben would buy a bouquet of lilies for his aunt, and most of the time it was after a silly argument they had - sometimes it was simply because his uncle was a sappy, hopeless romantic. he always admired their relationship, and simply wanted to be like his uncle. for peter, it was just because. because you were you, and he couldn’t really put it in words. maybe he was in love with you. that was something peter didn’t really want to think about; frankly, that word freaked him out.

for now, it was just because.

he held them with diligence; not wanting to squish them or mess them up in any way as he walked up to the counter.

peter tried not to feel so tremulous as he set the perfectly wrapped bouquet gently on the counter, feeling the middle-aged employees eyes pouring into him. he didn’t know what he was doing, he was fifteen and awkward — and possibly in love. very in love. the dowdy woman finally spoke up after a few seconds of silence as she rang him up, “daffodils, huh?”

peter looked up at her after reaching in his pocket for his wallet, he gave her a generous smile as he simply nodded.“ they’re not our most popular flower, even though they are predominantly spring flowers. what made you choose them?” she questioned him as she carefully caressed the brown wrapping of the yellow flowers.

now, there was no way peter was going to just flat out tell this woman that it was because they were his girlfriends favorite. he couldn’t help but feel way too awkward to tell that to a stranger. peter didn’t do so well when it came to talking to people, constantly stumbling on his words or his own two feet. so he simply just shrugged as he took out a five dollar bill and responded, “not entirely sure why. something about daffodils seemed like a better choice.” he responded, his hands trembling as he stuffs it in one of his pockets.

the woman gave him a kind smile before she spoke again, “someone special?” peter felt his cheeks grow warm as he nods, feeling utterly ethereal. incredibly special. he thought.

“yes, miss. she’s special.” he quietly replied, meeting the woman's eyes as he felt his cheeks heat up. the fact that all he was doing was simply talking about you and his cheeks still were tinted pink, as more than enough to explain how he felt about you. she could see the compassion and amity in his eyes and this made her smile at the young boy.

“i see, i see. three dollars, hon.” she tells him sweetly, not wanting to ask him any more questions. she could tell he was in a hurry, and he definitely was. peter quietly thanks her as she first hands him her change, then the bouquet.

“good luck, son. she’s very lucky to have you.” peter hears as he makes his way towards the door to exit. he turns around and gives the woman one last kind smile and a wave, then leaves the shop to head to your place.

he feels the brisk air brush against his skin and making the chestnut curls come down just above his eyebrows. peter brought out his phone, texting you that he was on his way

peter held the daffodils with tenderness as he walked along the streets of queens; a gentle breeze and his chestnut locks softly brushing against his face as he reaches your apartment building.

it was quite clear that his heart was racing more than ever; peter was being risky with love and he was okay with it. it was you.

all you knew is that he was coming over to study for your spanish quiz the next day, so you spent the afternoon cleaning up the house and making sure that your parents would keep their distance while you guys studied. your mom continuously tried to tell you that you didn’t need to clean the counter twelve times, but of course, she gave up eventually because it was pointless.

peter been to your house once, but it was brief. it was your first date and you didn’t have time to invite him in because you were going to see a movie - so, technically this was the first time peter would be coming over, and your heart was racing.

as he reaches the front door of your apartment, peter adjusts himself, fixing his hair up and quietly telling himself to relax. “you got this, peter. you got this.” he whispers, before balling his hands up into a fist and slowly knocking on the wooden door. he shyly bites his lip as he puts the bouquet behind his hand. he bounces on his feet as he anxiously waits for you to open the door. “just don’t be such a dork.”

“just a second!” he hears from the other side of the door, his heart flutters as he tries to prevent himself from smiling so much - but he couldn’t help it. just hearing it, your voice, made him feel like he was gonna burst with utter love.

little did he know, you were feeling the same mushy feeling and were trying to hold back the smile as you take a deep breath and unlock the latch on the door, swinging it open.

peter’s lips curved into a small smile, “hey.” he spoke softly. he didn’t even know why, but whenever he saw you his whole outlook on life changed.

the sun was brighter, the world was kinder; whenever you were around, he was a different peter.he saw the good in things he usually saw the bad in. he laughed more often, and he smiled more often. he wasn’t sure why this happened, but he had no problem with it, as long as he was with you.

you smile back, “hi, pete.“ you felt your cheeks heat up as you saw that smile that you absolutely adored.

peter was fully aware of his own heart beating rapidly, but he was not aware that yours was beating just as fast - if not faster. this was such a big step for the boy raised in queens, for he had ever done anything so drastic before.he clears his throat as he brings the flowers from behind, the delicate bouquet visibly shaking due to peters fidgety hands. and gives you a lopsided smile as he holds them out to you. “i - here. i got you these. sorry if their a little smushed..i was on the subway and it was crowded.” he nervously chuckles as he carefully adjusts the paper wrapping of the flowers. “can’t ever find a seat on the weekends.”

you giggle back, gently taking the flowers from peter as you place your hand softly over the paper wrapping. smiling softly, you admire the vibrant yellow arrangement. the smell was probably your favorite, for it reminded you of sunny days in the spring; the season of love.

you blush, realizing that for the last twenty seconds or so, you were just standing there in silence. “daffodils? these are my favorite kind.” you spoke softly. “how’d you know?”

of course, peter’s cheeks turned a bright shade of red as he ran his fingers through his oh-so-pretty curly locks. you found it adorable when peter blushed. it was very rare that peter was the one who was blushing, it always being you, but whenever he did, it was the cutest thing in you had ever seen. see, peter had freckles; not many, but since it was springtime they started to show up. they were often on the tip of his nose and a few sprinkled on his cheeks, making his face more pretty than it was before if that was even possible.

“i don’t really have a reason,” peter giggles nervously, scratching his earlobe and looking down at his shoes.

you quirk an eyebrow, moving to the side to let peter inside your warm apartment. it was tiny and cute, very homey and welcoming. you were all those things.

you sit down on the sofa, setting the flowers in your lap carefully and motion peter to sit next to you. hearing his voice, his poetic, beautiful voice, was all you needed to continue with anything. it was perfect.

peter sits next to you, careful not to sit too close, your hands brush against each other and you felt like you were getting launched into a world full of love and stars. you glance over at peters baby browns, smiling at him sweetly, a small gesture for him to continue. you were patient with peter, always patient.

“spring is my favorite time. i know it’s yours too,” peter states, his gentle hands reach towards yours, shaking in the process. once his hand was intertwined with yours, he felt safe.

“i remember you told me how much you love spring mainly because of the different kinds of flowers,”

“oh, the list!” you perked up, eyes glimmering. gosh, could you be any more beautiful to peter?

“yeah! the list, yeah.” peter giggles, you as well.

you had told peter this on your first date. he had made a list of things to ask, bringing it with him and stuffing it in his pocket. as he brought it out on the park bench you were sat at together, the stars in the sky and knees brushing against each other, he went down the list to ask you all the things he wanted to know. he wrote your responses down, but you didn’t think much of it. you thought it was cute, sweet actually. nobody had ever done something so tiny yet kind. this helped peter; whenever he needed to remember something, he’d just pull out that list. he carried it with him most of the time, he just had to.

“since i’m not good with words or anything, i pulled out the list and the first thing i jotted down was that your favorite flowers were daffodils,” now peter was blushing. and he was blushing a lot. if his hands weren’t sweaty before, they were definitely sweaty now. he was nervous that you could hear his heartbeat like he could, it definitely wasn’t your average, healthy heartbeat. but you did hear it, and it was melodic and pretty, like him.

“i-i just felt like...i needed to tell you how much i like and care for you, you know, how important you are to me,” peter stutters out. even though he wasn’t looking at you much, he knew you were listening. that was the one thing about you, you listened to peter. didn’t matter what it was about, you listened. “because you are. you’re so important to me and i wanted to show you, so that’s why i got you these daffodils. it’s my way of saying,” peter did this thing where he spoke with his hands too, and it was the cutest ever. he did it when he was caught in a ramble that he couldn’t get out of. all of his rambles, you thought, were sweet and too adorable.

“i love you, y/n. i love you and this is why i did it. because i love you.” it just came out, without warning or anything. was it evident that he was going to say it at some point? absolutely.

but, he went by what his uncle ben always says, “speak with your heart, and never look back.” he took those words and painted them onto his heart forever.

part of him thought, what if you didn’t love him? but, the minute he looked at you, he knew just maybe you felt it too.

and spoiler alert: you loved peter parker, too.

not one, but an infinite number of butterflies were swarming inside you right now. peter had absolutely no problem with expressing his feelings towards you, unlike most people who were non-combatant about it and didn’t feel like it was important. this was important to you. having the same thoughts, the same feelings. you were so glad peter had the same, so glad. it was the little things, the tiny little things, the kind that makes the smile form and the flowers in your chest bloom. it was those kinds. and, luckily, you were both a fan of the little things.

“you do?” you finally breathe out. peter giggles slightly at your adorable doe-like eyes, blush cheeks, and a nervous smile.  darn right peter was in love with you.

“i do,” peter cups your cheek, rubbing it sweetly. “gosh, i do. i love you so, so much.”

he plants a sweet, gentle kiss on your lips. something he didn’t do often, but when he did he was nervous, heart beating out of his chest and the feeling of dizziness and eternity. he was careful kissing you, never too long or intense a kiss. it was like holding onto a delicate baby bird, protecting it with all he had and making sure it was safe.

“i love you too, pete.” you breathed, eyes still closed, but at the same time, you could still picture peter and his gorgeous eyes and a pretty smile.

“aw, sweet,” he joked. “freaking sweet, dude.” you both go into a fit of shy giggles, eyes never leaving each other.

in the spring, on rainy days, when all was wrong in the world - you had and loved each other, always. to laugh, to cry, you had each other. but, most importantly, to love.

~

taglist: @plushparker @lovelyspidey @naturallytom @akaspiderman @spiiderman @cutesparker @raspberryparker

if u wanna be apart of my taglist just let me know!! <3

[amillionandonefandoms]

7, 8 and 14 for the pride asks :)

7. Are you the token queer person in your family:

Yes but like.. no? I haven’t formally come out at all, I’ve just given up on hiding it at this point- so I have flags and pins and I go by a different name, but I haven’t actually said anything yk? And as for being the token queer person: I definitely am to my sister and my mom’s side of the family, but my dad’s cousin is happily married to another man, and I’m pretty sure he’s the token queer person- even for me

8: describe your gender without using any words traditionally associated with gender

Folding cheese into a sticky biscuit dough, and the way Ryan gosling says boyfriendgirlfriend, and board shorts but also teeny tiny bikini tops, and 90s boy hair, and the home-made worms on strings I made 2 (3?) years ago out of fluffy pipe cleaners, and rollerskating (but not rollerblading), and the first kid I ever babysat (2 year old girl- I was 8, we drew with chalk), and the first kid I ever babysat alone (6 year old boy- I was 11, we played with transformers and used sticks in the yard as swords)

14: how do you think other factors like neurodivergence or upbringing have affected your identity

Ok- I want to start this by saying I don’t technically have a claim to neurodivergence yet- I have a test scheduled and my therapist has “diagnosed” me with anxiety, SAD, ADHD, and insomnia, soo…

That being said, I was raised Episcopalian (which is like chill Christian), and we went to church every Sunday and I was an Acolyte. My mom was very strict, and until Covid my dad was consistently out of town for work.

All of that background to say, I think my background managed to both restrict how I explored interpersonal avenues, and to expand them- I was never allowed to go to peoples houses or have friends over, so I didn’t have close friends until high school, but I spent recess and lunch reading every day, so I still found exposure to healthy relationships and beautiful friendships and support and love that I didn’t see every day and I don’t know what that changed about me, but it definitely changed something in how I look at relationships, yk?

[gusissus]

Diary

By: Gus

Monday, September 13

Hi! This is my diary now! I just found this ol’ notebook in one of my old school bags. It’s def not new, but hey, who cares anyways. I hope you won’t read anything inside of this precious book. Ok, bye!!

Wednesday, September 15

OMFG! Dylan Anderson just looked at me this morning!! HE.LITERALLY.SPOKE.TO.ME. He said good morning to me! GOOD MORNING!! TO ME?t!

Thursday, September 16

I know that this might sound bad, but I accidentally read through Abby’s Instagram messages earlier. Her relationship with Dylan is soo perfect. He even says good morning to her every morning! He’d always ask her how she slept and everything! I wonder what that feels like.

Friday, September 17

Football practise today was the same as usual. I’m low-key excited for the tournament this Sunday tho. I still haven’t got the gist of dribbling yet. I may be one of their best midfielders when it comes to kicking and passing, but my dribbling is still rubbish. So I am technically useless lol.

Sunday, September 19

5:37 pm

Abby and I hung out before the tournament started. The tournament starts at 7pm, so we still had time to hang out.

Abby has had at least 4 boyfriends already! I mean, SHE IS pretty. I wish I had one. That would be nice.

I really really wish I could tell Abby. We’ve been friends since we were in 1st grade and I haven’t told her yet.

6:52 pm

Dylan came with Abby!! I can see Abby waving at me right now. Dylan is always busy. Even though me and Abby hang out a lot, I rarely get to see Dylan. And when we do, we’d just be silent. The atmosphere always felt…awkward.

[tenaciousarcadeexpert]

The Switch(Part 5)

@marvelfanlife, @dontshootmespence, @literallyprentissstwin, @butsomeofusarelookingatthestars, @ultrarebelheart, @itsmeedee, @thebutterflyxx​, @cynbx, @jaqren, @captainreid​

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4

   After completing the case, the team gather on the plane as they head back home. Knowing that the unsub was a former researcher in spiders, the team laughed in amusement at the thought of someone trying to make a breakthrough in spiders, much to Matt’s dismay. At the same time, he and Reid sat far away from the team. Reid couldn’t help but stare at Matt as he sleeps. It felt weird to actually see himself out of his body as he observes his posture. Was he always like this. Seeing his friend in his own body was still a weird concept, yet so fancy. He always wonder what it’s like to be in the shoes of one of his friends and here he was, literally in someone else’s shoes, or in Matt’s case, boots. He wonder what his friend was thinking before falling asleep.

    Suddenly, he starts to toss and turn as he sees vivid images flashing through his head. It was hard to get a clear picture yet somehow, he was able to interpret most of the dream. From flashing lights, to bright lights, loud music and echoes of laughter and cheering, Reid since that there was something to it. Though, this tends to happen to any person who’s curious of the dream, but was it just any dream? As he tries to focus on even the slightest detail, he stops to see a sight of Matt, in his own body of course, smiling at him. It turns out that he was dreaming at the night he and Matt went out for a couple of drinks. The next thing he sees is a petite woman with several color streaks in her hair handing them two glasses containing a drink which has an odd yellow-green color. Still, it didn’t concern the two as they both grab the drinks, raising their glass before drinking.

“Bottoms up, Spence.” Matt said, as he and Reid tap their glasses together before chugging down on their drinks. Suddenly, a flash of multiple images reappear which prompted Reid to wake up. He slightly lift his head up from his seat. Fortunately, his actions did not alert the team, as they were still laughing over their conversations about spiders, though he did see Matt wake up, sensing that he too had a similar dream as he rubs his head.

“Spence, were you..” “Dream? Yes, a rather interesting dream.”

“Yeah, nothing but lights and blurred images flashing in my head.”

“You don’t think it means anything, does it?” He shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know.” “Yeah, me neither.” The two chuckle in amusement, only to stop as Reid hears Matt’s phone buzz. As Matt, he picks up the phone to see a text from Kristy. He then looks to his friend.

“Was that Kristy?”  Reid nods. “Uh huh. She’s asking me if we just finished the case. What should I say?”

“Well, what did she send?”

Reid then looks at the text. “She’s asking if we just finish the case.”” “Just say yes.” Reid then texts “Yes.” before placing the phone down. Just as he was about to rest again, he heard another buzz, prompting him to pick up the phone.

“What did she say?” “Uhhhh, let’s see. She said, well I just drop of the kids at my folks’ place on a road trip and won’t return till Sunday. Which means we have the house alone.” He then looks up to Matt before staring down at the phone again. “And she also texted like two emojis.”

“Well, what emojis did she send?” Matt asked, curious.

Reid squints his eyes on the phone screen. “One looks like a wink and the other looks like a.....smooch? Matt, do you know what this means?” “Seriously? You’re a genius, I’m sure you know how to interpret a text?” “Gee, thanks, although the only thing I can interpret is that the kids aren’t home and that both of you have the house to yourselves for the next few days. I’m not sure what the emojis mean but I guess she just can’t wait for ‘you’ to come home.” He then watched as Matt tries to figure out what Kristy has just texted him. He then extends his arm to Reid.

“Give me the phone.” Reid then hands him the phone as he reads the text, only to stop as his eyes start to widen with concern. “Well, you got most of it correct, but I do have a feeling of what those emojis mean.” “You do? Well, tell me.”  “Uh...........do you really want to know?” “Of course? If it means something then I need to know what it means. Besides, how bad could it be?” Matt was baffled by his response. “Clearly if you knew what it’s like to be married, you’d probably understand.” “Huh?” He rubbed his face in annoyance as he leaned close to Reid as a way to make sure to not alert the team. “Goddammit Spence, she’s teasing you-me, which is a sign for sex. Basically, she wants to have sex.”

“Oh, OHHHHH.” Reid responds as he realized what Matt was referring to. “My god, Matt. Do you and Kristy always....get intimate whenever the kids are away.” “Eh, when you’ve been married for almost ten years and spent most of your life away from your family........” Reid looked at him with disgust. “Damn Matt, you horndog.” “Woah Spence, Kristy and I are not like that-” “I always wonder why you tend to arrive late to work with you hair all disheveled, now I know. Seriously, you and Kristy should come up with better hobbies. Just.....dude.” “Well, it is what it is.”

“Yeah.....wait a second, that means she’ll be expecting you to come home, not me, which ohhhh.” Matt tries to comfort Reid as he dreads the possibility of making love to his friend’s wife. "I don’t want to do this.” “Don’t worry, I won’t let this happen, we just need to come up with a solution.”

“Well, should I say no?” “What?! No, it’ll make her think that I’m hiding something behind her back.” “Well technically, we are. But still, I don’t want to stab you in the back by accepting her advances. It’s against my character.” They then look to see the plane slowly landing back to Quantico before turning back to each other.

“I know Spence, I know.” He then taps him on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, as soon as we land, we’ll come up with something, I promise.” “This feels weird.” Kristy said as she hugs her husband, who happens to be in the body of his friend. “I know.”

 Hours after they land, the team decides to go out for a couple of drinks while Matt and Reid head over to his house. After dropping Reid off, Reid nervously walks inside, wondering what Kristy has in store, unaware of the situation that is going between the two of them.

“Hello? Kristy? I’m home.” Reid nervously asked. He looked around to see the living room dimly lit, apart from the kitchen. He walked up inside to see the a platter of fruit, a couple of empty wine glasses and a champagne bottle on the coffee table, as well as the sofa covered in rose petals. Just then, he is suddenly startled as he felt a couple of soft, delicate hands cover his eyes. He gently pulled them away as he turns to see Kristy in a fancy olive green dress smiling at him.

“Jesus Kristy, you almost scared me.” Reid respond, staying in character.

“Well, I uh wanted to surprised you...and it works.” She caress her husband’s  face as Reid smiles uncomfortably. “Soo......you uh want to know how my day has been?” He asked, trying to break away the impending awkwardness between the two. Soon, the awkward continues to intensify as she wraps her arms around him. This causes him to fall onto the sofa, bringing Kristy even much closer to him.

“Really Matt? You wanna talk about that?”  “You know, you’re right, we can talk about this later. Maybe some dinner?” She smirked at him. “Well, dinner sounds nice, but...” She then leans over by his ear. “I’d think I’d rather have dessert first.” Reid gasped as he felt her hand slide under his shirt, Matt’s shirt.  At this moment, he was already panicking on the inside.  Not wanting to startle her and hurt his friend at the same time, he tries to come up with something that’ll make her stop. He then looked with despair as she leans over to kiss him.

“S-Spencer.” Just then, Kristy stops as she hears her “husband” say a word. “Excuse me?” “Uh...Spencer. Yeah, I sorta asked him to come over since he accidentally left something here the last time he looked after the kids.” “Oh.” She then pulls herself up. “Okay, where is he?” “He’s in the van.” “You didn’-” “No, of course not. Should I ask him to come in?” She sighs. “Just give me ten minutes.” “Okay.”  Ten minutes have passed as Kristy cleans up all of the rose petals on the sofa, blows out the candles and placing the champagne away before heading to the bedroom to grab a sweater that she wears over her dress. She then returns to see Reid in the living room, unaware that it’s her actual husband inside.

“Hi Spencer.” “Hi.” Matt said knowing as much as he is relieved to see his wife, does not want to startle her.

“So Matt told me you left something here while looking after the kids.” “Oh yeah, it was a children’s book. The Illustrated Tales of King Arthur. That’s the one. The kids loved it, David especially to the point that we’d start playing knights and dragons. Well, don’t worry, I already have it. It was hidden underneath the sofa. Those little twins, good hiders though.” He chuckled awkwardly as he stares at Reid, who just glares at him indifferently.

“I see. So, are you about to leave?”

“Y-yeah.” Just as he walks to the door, Reid stops him.

“Actually Kristy, there’s another reason why he’s here.” “Okay, what is it?” Matt glares at him, as the two hover over each other and whisper before approaching Kristy. Reid takes a deep breath before saying something. 

“The truth is Kristy, Reid and I are not what they appear to be.” He then clutched his head as he comes up with a good explanation to her. 

She looked at him with concern. “Wait, you’re not-” “What? No, no. We would never do that. No, just no.” “So, what is it?” “The truth is.....Spence and I.” Just then, Kristy starts to get impatient, causing Matt to interrupt him.

“For fuck’s sake, something happened to the both of us. We don’t know how this happened or why but what we know is that our minds are completely switched. Spence is in my body, I’m in his. We basically switched bodies.” He then looks to Reid. “There.” Kristy looks at them with confusion and turns to her husband. “Is this true Matt? Please tell me he’s joking.” “I-I’m sorry, but you’re talking to the wrong man. I’m not Matt, he is. And he’s telling that truth, he really is.”

Kristy looks at them with confusion, only to burst into laughter seconds later, much to the two’s dismay.

“Seriously Kristy? Why are you laughing? This isn’t a joke.” “Oh Matt, honey. You’re cute, you and Spencer both. You think that’s something I can believe?” “We’re not joking, this is no joke, we’re serious. And I’m not Matt, I’m Reid. Doctor Spencer Reid.” “Okay doctor.” While laughing, Reid looks at Matt, as he tries to come up with something to convince Kristy that what they’re saying is true.

“Say something.” “Like what.” “Obviously, something only you know about Kristy. “Alright.” He then calls out his wife. “Kristy!”  “Yeah Doctor?” She mocked. 

“Look, this seems like we’re just playing you, but we’re not. You know how much your husband would never fool you like this.” “Are you gonna profile me?” “Yea-No! No, I’m not, cause this isn’t Reid, it’s me. Matthew, your husband. I’m speaking through the body of my friend. Weird, I know, but it’s true.” “Uh huh. Prove it.” “Well, I know that you like to be called ‘Kristy’ cause it just sounds better and you thought your actual name, ‘Christine’ was too formal.” “Yeah, keep going.” “I know that you tried saying something flirty in Korean, only to backfire since I thought it sounds like you were saying ‘The cat ate the cheese’ and you didn’t understand why I was laughing.” “Clever, but I’m sure Spence is smart enough to understand Korean. Keep going.” “Well, I know that you have a special vibrator that you only use it when you wanna spice things up.”

“Yea-what?!” Kristy said, realizing what he just said. She looked at Matt who continues to spill out some details that only he knows about her.

“You even have a small birthmark which I know is at the upper part of your inner right thigh. You even liked it when I kiss you on the left side of your neck and touch the spot below your waist and hipbones. You even get turned on when you get to dominate in bed.” 

“Seriously?! You’re saying all this right here and now with Spencer here?!”

“Yeah seriously?” Reid looked as he overhears Matt jotting down details of his and Kristy’s sexlife. He then looks on with disgust, trying to not imagine the erotic details playing in his head. “Damn Kristy.” He murmured  as he looks at her.

“And I know you got nervous one time when yo-” “Okay, okay, I got it. Wow.” Kristy stayed silent for a moment as she struggles to believe that what Matt is saying is true as she squeezed her forehead. She then looks at Matt, in Spencer’s body.  “Well, is there anything that you know about me which doesn’t have anything to do with our sex-life?” “I remember the time we first met in college. How I’d sometimes see you in the library. I was worried to talk to you cause I fear that you’d reject me. You saw how lonely I was and you offer to sit beside me as we study. I even know how much you smile everytime I come home and can easily sense that I’m here, even without having to kiss or hug you. I also know that the time my grandparents didn’t want to do anything with me cause I was Korean and how much it affected me, you touched my face and said, “It doesn’t matter what I look cause all I see is a wonderful man that I love and appreciate. They may not love you but I do. There is nothing that could change the way I see you.” Moved by his words, Kristy shed a couple of tears. “Matt?” She croaked.

“It’s me.” He smiled. Suddenly Kristy walks over and hugs him, while Reid watched, glad to know that his friend has reunited with his wife despite hugging him in the wrong body.

“Why must this happen to you? To the both of you?” “I don’t know hun, I don’t know.”

“Well this is weird, really weird. I’m hugging you but it’s not really you. Just you in a friend’s body.” “I know, I don’t blame you.” She slowly pull away from the hug as she looked at the two men, still processing the fact that they switched bodies. “Well, is there anything you recall before this happened?” Just as Matt was about to answer, he suddenly felt a slight dizziness in his head.  “Matt, are you okay?” She asked.

As he looked at his wife, he suddenly sees the same images flashing in his head, images of what appears to be from the same dream Reid experienced not long ago. Unable to bear the images flashing in his head, added with the constant echoes of people laughing, he drops down on his knees, collapsing on the floor.

“Matt! Oh my god!” Kristy yelled as Matt lies on the floor unconscious. As she taps his head, Reid suddenly suffers the same dizziness as he does. Kristy then looks up to see him rub his head.

“Spence...” Within moments, Spencer collapsed to the ground. As Kristy gets up, she couldn’t help but tremble as her husband and friend lay on the floor unconscious. Rubbing her head, not knowing what to do, she pulls out her phone, dialing the number.

“Hello? Garcia? Yeah? Is Emily with you? Oh, everyone. Well, tell them to come. We have a situation here and I need your help, all of it. Okay, thanks.” Kristy then hangs up as she looked down on Matt and Reid’s bodies. If what they say is true, then they could really use the team’s help, if only they knew how to help them.

[fillern]

,,,

[fereality-indy]

Wendip Week 2017 Time Travel

Time Travel

Friday August 31st, 2012 Mystery Shack Gravity Falls, OR

A large portion of the citizenship of Gravity Falls was gathered at the Mystery Shack for the combination birthday and going away party for the young Pines twins. The guests of honor were standing on the porch with their cake, presents, Grunkles, and close friends.

Staring out onto the crowd Mabel said, “I can’t believe you all got together just to throw a party for us.”

Mayor Tyler spoke up out of the crowd, “After all the Pines family has done for the town, it’s the least we could do. You’ve helped everyone here.”

Gideon is next to say something, “Thanks to y'all savin’ us, I’m gonna learn to open my heart to kindness. No more evil-doin’. From now on, I’m gonna try to be Li'l Gideon, regular ol’ kid.”

Leaning down next to the twins, Soos said “Dude! Make a wish, dawg.”

Dipper looked first at his sister and then out to the crowd and said, “You know, on my first day here, if you had asked me what I wanted, I would have said, ‘adventure, mystery, true friends.’ But looking here at all of you I realize that every wish came true. Heh. I have everything I wanted.”

As he finished Mabel added, “If I had only one wish it would be to shrink all of you with the shrink ray and bring you home with us in my pocket. But since that’s impossible…”

She turns to look at Ford and in a stage whisper asked, “Is that impossible?”

In response Ford waves his hand up and down and shrugs.

After his response Mabel continued, “ Since that’s probably impossible, my only wish is for everyone to sign my scrapbook. I’ll never forget you guys. Wait.”

She sets the memory gun on the floor and sromps down on itn smashing it. “Now I’ll never forget you guys.”

Mabel and Dipper then blow out the candles.

While the rest of her gang comes on stage, Wendy leand down and hugs the twins as she says “I now officially declare you technically teenagers. Welcome to angst and acne forever.”

Wendy, Tambry, and the rest of the gang begins chanting, “One of us! One of us!”

Blubs and Durland yell “WOOPEE!” as they fire off a cannon.

Off in the treeline two figures stand and watch everything before in a flash of blue light they disappear.

Sunday June 15th, 2025 Mystery Shack Gravity Falls, OR

Over the last couple of years the Mystery Shack had nearly doubled in size. It started when the twins moved back to Gravity Falls. Mabel had a started working with Soos while he And Melody had their third young one. And her personality made all the patrons want to spend more. It also didn’t hurt business when Dipper let slip that ‘Enigma County: The Adventures of Tyrone and Tia Cardinal’, a young adult novels he started writing while in college were 'loosely’ based on his time spent at the Shack. His fans began to beg their parents to go see the place that beget their favorite books. Eventually he just added the address to the book jacket with the caveat “Tell them Tyrone sent you!”. All that added business allowed Soon to expand the facility.

In a flash of blue light a couple appears at the edge of the expanded parking lot. He’s dressed in a blue flannel shirt over a black t-shirt with a white question mark on the front, black cargo pants, and hikers. With his hair down to his shoulders, squared jaw, and glasses he was looking more like the pictures of his Grunkles when they were younger. She was in a green flannel vest over a white t-shirt, jeans, and her ever present work boots. Her long red hair was still in the duel braid her sister-in-law had done earlier in the day. They both were wearing a blue and white baseball cap with a blue pine tree superimposed over a green bag of ice.

“Well that was a great little trip.” Dipper said as they walked towards their car in the parking lot. “I’m glad Blendin loaned us a Time Tape for our anniversary.”

“Yeah, but having us swear on Time Baby’s teething ring to fix all anomalies we may cause was a little weird.” Wendy said as they stopped by the rebuilt El Diablo that Stan gave to Dipper when he moved back to town. She placed her arms on his shoulders as he grabbed her by the waist.

Dipper said with a smile. “Well once a member of Time Anomaly Removal Crew, always a member I guess. I do have to ask you why you wanted to go back to that day particular? Why not say, our first date or our first kiss?”

“Well I was reading through your first draft of 'Enigma County: To Escape Ragnakook’ and I happened to remember that speech you have to Gideon.”

With a perplexed look on his face he asked, “And what does that have to do with that birthday party?”

With a smile on her face and a twinkle in her eyes she said, “Well as everyone was getting ready for the party, I did some soul searching. I thought about everything you had done for me and everyone else and while at the party I realised that you were worthy. So I decided that the next time you asked me out I would say yes. I just didn’t know it would take nearly three years.”

“Sorry about that,” Dipper said as he brought his forehead as close to hers as a their caps would allow.

“Don’t be man. It was a long fun ride and I wouldn’t have changed it for the world.” She said as she quickly booped him on the nose. Them with a smirk she added, “Ok, maybe I wouldn’t have dated Robbie.”

“Oh, come here you.” He said as he pulled her into a kiss that she happily returned.

As they broke apart seemingly at the same time they said, “Happy Anniversary!”

[quadratic-shipping]

Kay, new icon is Vriska’s dice cause the gradient was lame, and every Vriska blog halfway to sunday has already had every photo of her face as their icon twice. It also works cause of yknow liking dnd and stuff. one thing I really liked about my last vriska pic one was the negative space made it feel like it popped and I feel like this one has sort of the same thing going for it. Wow, it can be that deep. I’m just rambling cause it’s 3am and yet again I have stayed up this long. I can;t wait til it’s winter again so I can force myself back into a normal sleep schedule. I stayed up all night a couple nights ago, and that gave me one decent night of sleep so I might just try that again tonight. Rest put under the readmore because it’s irrelevant and sleep deprived rambling I wouldn’t dare subject my beautiful followers and browsers to.

While I’m here, posting a late night thing no one will see or interact with; thank god; I was cleaning and I came across one of those neck warmer things that legit just a tube you pull up your face to keep your nose from freezing off because Canada Winters, I never can use them because I always fog up my glasses, and I just wanted to say that Niqabi gals with glasses are so brave? Legit if I had to deal with my glasses fogging up I’d die, I’d rather lose my nose to frostbite than fog them up (like I go outside enough loll) so for them to deal with that everyday is like, legendary. I mean, I guess if you were pretty antisocial you wouldn’t have to deal with it much but still, point totally stands. 

While we’re on the positivity train? Lesbians? y’all really like Vriska HUH? Thank you for interacting, I appreciate, yall are so valid. I’m torn between “You have good taste” jokes and “Yall will just like anything w/ vriska in it” and either way it takes too strong a stance on my own content to feel good about it. Obvs goes the same way for all the NB and Trans ppl interacting, yall are also Excellent and I appreciate yall. Obvs I’m cis so I don’t have any real godtier takes or anything abt. gender, but reading your guyss stuff is excellent please keep making it.

Uh sexuality update; Still labelling as bi, IDK if I really want to date men tho, before I actually and FINALLY get a taste of the other side; please; because I feel like the problem with my relationships re; dudes is just that I can’t just be myself, I’m just 900000% in my own head about it and not even like; trying to be idealized, idk whats going on I just have a hard time connecting w/ them and it’s defo my fault so idk bro. IDK it’s fun to have crushes but dating is BORING from my very limited experience with only guys which is why a gf would be excellent. Or girl aligned partner. I feel like maybe what I’m attracted to is like, femininity, not necessarily femmes or women. IDK bruh it’s weird. doesn’t help I can’t even figure out how to get and keep friends LOLLL it’s 3am. Sorry

Honestly before I started vrisrose posting I felt so useless yknow cause in the vriska circles there are a lot of intelligent people who understand canon better and are overall smarter and better spoken so I just felt like everything I had to say was just old hat and not very interesting. But the thing I like about VrisRose is no one else is talking about it as frequently ( I was searching the tag and my blog came up in the recco’s for blogs up top and I was very happy) so I feel like, hey, this is my niche. That one engineer of useless inventions quote: The best way to become top of your field is to specialize:, I jsut love rarepairs so much! I think it’s such a great way to approach character analysis because no one exists in a vaccum so seeing peoples interactions and what people like is so fun!!!! I say, invalidating all my personal issues lollll

CHARACTER ANALYSIS! FUCK TALKING ABOUT INTERACTIONS OR ACTIONS ON THEIR OWN OR THOUGHTS OR HC’S, I STAND BY MY ONE TAAKO ‘vriska did nothing wrong’ QUOTE; Trying to understand what characters morals, and their opinions on certain things by analyzing their opinions and interactions in canon is 500x more productive seeming to me than other things. Like, say taako’s thoughts about vriska, V and Lucretia are p similar actions wise, and he was pissed at her but that was mostly cause of the personal connections, when it doesn’t affect him Taako doesn’t seem to have any moral objections to any of the icky moral stuff; think robot planet or whatevs where they were gonna genocide the place and lup was like no and that was like the only reason he didn’t I’m pretty sure, I’m not too big brained on taako or adventurezone either so don’t take my word; So I think that Taak’s would be chill with Vriska. Another thing? The Lucretia thing was like, giving up which Taako is not ok with and Vriska thigns were about not giving up so I do legit think he would be totally coool with her, even if she were real, unless obvs she hurt one of the seven bird red robe people and their new friends.

ISN;T THAT SUCH A FUN METHOD OF CHARACTER ANALYSIS? I’m not drunk or in an altered state just tired enthusiastic and with a lot of pent up thoughts. Speaking of which, this song just came on it’s “Slowdance with you” by the Marcus Hedges Trend Orchestra and it is SOOOOO good, it’s on a vrisrezi playlist I put on bc I’m rereading song of the pyre because it was vriska day and it’s super good soo so good. It’s on loop now, legit best

Quick detours before I lay out some more hs thoughts; 

Overwatch:

-Ben “Captainplanet” came out w/ a new article and I LOVE IT so much and I want hhis job so bad I wanna get into stats so much ahhh  please so good it’s giving me a , this is crude but it’s the best way I can phrase it, a math erection. I love math so much <33333333

-The Shock, my faves, are doing well and I’m happy for them! I hope they go 7-0, I believe in them! I’m lying I am so fucking nervous for literally every match they have they’re gonna 2-5 AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH Why am I so INVESTED? They technically could take first spot but that’s require titan’s to lose every match left and the shock to 7-0, but the thing is I thought that I wanted that but 

-then I watched the titans london match today, and I HATED the thought of titans losing. And losing so hard to other teams too, and I didn’t realize this but I think I do actually kinda like the titans?The thought of them not being a great team makes me sad. I think it’s like I really like them and shock as rivals, yknow, stage one and two, then this upcoming map? If Titans aren’t still Good in this meta it just sorta makes their rivalry not fun. Kismesis vibes is what I’m gonna say cause I’m TRASSSHHHHH pls stop my terrible hands from typing also if I ever saw actual ship stuff I would kill whoever made it. Like I’m not gonna check their socials or anything but if they’ve got a match against most teams I’d probs root for them. The Wolf section today was so funny lollll

-I think I might hate the London Spitfire. I have literally no reason to? I think all the players are good and I like them as people and I would never actively hate on them? But I’m like. Really mean to them in my head. I was so satisfied seeing htem lose to Florida, and Titans like IDK? Also they’re hella overrated so anticlutch jfc. Hate the franchise, love the players if that makes sense. IDK WHYYYYYYYYYYY

-Also I’m gonna miss tomorrows shock match and I’m so scared rip.

Misc: 

-Tripped backwards and somehow upturned my moms glass scale and it fell on my foot, that shit hurted.

-Oh My God I’m Projecting a million different things right now because I feel like this will not have an audience if you see this I’m begging you please don’t interact I’d die of embarassment keep the fact you’ve seen this a secret from me

HS:

-JFC song of the pyre is an excellent fic, I wish it would ever get updated it’s so fucking good guys

-I need to read more vrisrezi long form

-Non-sgrub vrisrezi is best vrisrezi

-My ideal Vrisrezi au would be like HS canon, diverge into non-sgrub and they completely fall out of touch, Killing Eve season 1, then Song of the Pyre. THAT is what I want.

-Killing eve season one and two would be an even BETTER VRISROSE AU AHHHHHH

-I once read a very good trollstuck rose but it was an eri-rose ship so basically what I want is that persons troll rose but paired with vriska. For how much I blog about it I’ve read very little vrisrose fic but almost everything I know comes from this fic. . Oh uh this is not the erirose fic that I read w trollstuck although it does unfortunately have erirose but I can excuse it when the vrisrose is this Excellent

Alright I’ve run out of hyper juice, have a nice night, sorry for posting thisssss

bye

[diddykongfan]

well in that case: Librarian + 77 d; if that's good for you

“I might even be able to tell you when there’s a ghost around before you know it yourself.” - Demons Are a Ghoul’s Best Friend, Victoria Laurie

So, I do not recall exactly when you asked for this, @amaryllisblackthorn, but I found your ask and the quote I was supposed to use as inspiration waiting around in my drafts and I am so sorry that it’s probably been three years? Just. Judging by when most of my Librarian + fics were written. For the delay, I sincerely apologize.

Anyway, this fic became a monster of a multi-chapter, if I’m honest with you, because of how I finally got my inspiration on what it could be - and as such, this particular post is only the prologue. Though, with all the pieces that are in play, I don’t know when other chapters are actually going to come, because I just have so much to work with.

Gremma, obviously. Though the prompt comes from Victoria Laurie’s Ghost Hunter Mystery series, the AU is based more around Heather Graham’s Krewe of Hunters series. Basically the formula I derived from the Krewe of Hunters and applied to Gremma goes as such: “psychic investigator + skeptic who probably actually has a bit ofpsychic ability themselves + gruesome murder + ghosts most likely, probably ahaunted house too = sparks flying!” and in that vein, since we all know who the skeptic in the relationship is (*looks pointedly at Emma*), Graham is gaining ghost-sensing related psychic abilities!

Despite the paranormal goings-on, this is absolutely a No Curse Modern AU, with a bit of role reversal in that Graham is the one to come from out of town while Emma is established as Storybrooke’s Sheriff.

There is a murder right here in this first part, just as a warning to the reader, and there will most likely be other dark moments later on, so read at your own discretion.

Things Half in Shadow, 1/?

The Storybrooke graveyardisn’t known for being haunted; it is, very much so in the opinionsof those in the know, but it’s a fact that the folks trying to drum up tourismrefuse to acknowledge, despite the draw New England hauntings tend to have.

Maybe it’s not being thesite of a great tragedy that saves it from such a cheap fate, the MotherSuperior muses as she walks among the tombstones. She’s never liked the idea ofghosts, of souls denied their final rest, but she has believed since the day ofher own biggest failure - the day Bae Gold went missing. Even now, no one knowswhat happened, not fully, but she would have sworn before a judge that theteenager had come to her that day, terrified of his father, looking for advice.

But he couldn’t have,because at the time that she would swear she saw him, he was also seen gettingon board his stepfather’s boat, though Captain Jones himself had been down atthe Rabbit Hole.

She’d had a soft spot forBae - so sweet, and willing to believe in a way that she foundwas getting rarer as years passed, to believe not just in a higher power but inthe goodness of man. It wasn’t the first time he’d come to her because hisfather’s abuse of power unsettled him, just the most openly frantic.

Except he could not havebeen two places at once, and he has come to her since - though it’s been nearlytwenty years, and he hasn’t aged in that time, he does appear in her officeevery year like clockwork, the anniversary of that last day. He doesn’t speak,anymore, just stands silent in the corner, and she mourns his bright spark and regretsnot doing more to help before he was lost to them all.

(Others might write offher visions of Bae as her own guilty conscience. But she knows the clock on thewall read 8:15 that night, when he arrived, and multiple witnesses at the docksconfirmed the same time for their sighting. She knows that something happened,something not just in her mind.)

Since then, she’s quietlyaccepted the souls between the headstones, makes a point to keep them companyweekly, as she’s doing now. Even if she has not seen them, she can feel in herheart it’s the right course of action.

But Bae only visits oncea year, the end of June, and on this chilly October evening, she is as far fromexpecting to see him as is humanly possible.

Yet there he stands, overthe grave his mother has occupied since her heart attack. He looks almostalive, the darling boy.

“Sister!” she could swearshe hears him, swear there is fear in his eyes, “Sister, you have to run!Run now!”

How odd. Butshe trusts in God well enough to know if Bae is telling her to run, He sent theboy for her protection.

Unfortunately, perhaps due to the surprise of seeing him unexpectedly, shehesitates to act on it too long for the warning to be of any use, somethingcrashing into the back of her skull with a sickening crunch as the boy’sfrantic spirit fades from view.

…

A few years ago, when theteam had only just formed, Graham might have been surprised to find Aurorasitting atop her husband’s desk, journal and pen in hand, glaring at whatevershe’d written like it personally offended her.

Now, not so much. Thoughhe is unsure why he’s faced with this sight instead of… Well, Phillip hadcalled him in to meet, hadn’t he? There had been a voicemail on his phone tothat effect, and stating he should just walk in when he arrived, when he’dwoken that morning. He’d gotten in as soon as he could. And yet, the man isclearly out of the office, for the time being.

Aurora’s dreams areplagued by spirits begging for help, but they can only communicate with herthrough oftentimes gruesome images.

He knows she envieshim his form of speaking to spirits - he feels, sees, andhears them in the waking world, where they are far more eloquent, so long asthey actually know they’re dead. If not, they tend to be in a state of shock,wondering why no one can see them, hear them, and why they’re- Stuck, for lackof a better word.

“What was it this time?”he asks. It may not be what he’s here for, and if it was particularlydistressing he would probably be the worst at providing any sort of comfort,because his social skills are… Lacking, as Ruby puts it. But he knows that ithelps Aurora to have someone listen, and he can do that, at least. She looks upat him, and her anger from before falls into sadness.

“A woman,” shesays, “Her son’s been missing twenty years, but I didn’t feel him. She’slong dead, but she was terrified for a nun that used to be kind to the missingboy. I think the nun may already be gone, I saw– She was on the woman’s grave,and there was… Quite a bit of blood.”

Between the six of them,blood and gore and murder are nothing new. He was NYPD Homicide before he wason this team, Belle worked in forensics in New Orleans, Ruby had been asmall-town deputy… Phillip had been in the FBI three years before getting thisassignment. August was an expert at special effects and sleight of hand, andspecifically debunking fake video and audio, but he’d gained experience on thejob. Aurora had been a nurse before her abilities got her invited in – sheisn’t squeamish, so that she seems reluctant to say what she saw attests thather vision must have been worse than usual.

Aurora’s visions, whenthey aren’t already on a case, almost invariably precede their getting calledin. He knows that as well as he knows that Ruby believes her ability to findmissing people is somehow tied to her sense of smell, as well as he knows thatBelle relies more on her research and logic and forensics than she does on herability to see past events as though they were taking place in front of her, aswell as he knows that when they first started this team Phillip didn’t believe any of them actually had abilitiesbeyond the normal (Phillip still is, in many respects, a skeptic first andforemost – though much more open to possibilities now than when the teaminitially came together).

For the past few years,these people have been more of a family than he ever had in his life. So, givenhow things tend to work out for their little group, he knows that the visionwith the nun is very likely to become their next case, however it is thatalways works itself out. So he contemplates for a minute before choosing hisnext question.

“Did you get any namesfor Belle to start researching?”

She usually does – andthen it’s usually up to him and Ruby to get Belle researching before whateverproject she’s been working on between cases distracts her too much. And provideher with caffeine.

“Not this time,” Aurorashakes her head, “Not people. Not even the ghost that contacted me. But I didsee the sign for the cemetery. Storybrooke.”

…

The moment the call had come through, Emma had known it wasgoing to be a long day.

On the phone, Kathryn had been completely composed as shereported finding a dead body on her trip to the graveyard to leave flowers forher late fiancé, Frederick. But, then again, Kathryn Midas is a lawyer and theyoungest member of the town council; composurehas long been her trademark.

Emma had called in Marian and called in Doctor Whale – her deputyand the closest thing the town has to a Medical Examiner. Technically, there’ssupposed to be an election for M.E. whenever the election for the Sheriff’soffice comes due, but no one has actually run for it in years, and thus theposition falls to whatever Doctor is available.

Not that there have been an abundance of murders, or even suspicious deaths, inStorybrooke, to put it to any sort of actual test, but the system works well enough.

Kathryn’s statement in person hadn’t varied at all from whatshe’d said on the phone, except in that the shock was starting to cause herusual demeanor to come apart. She visits Frederick every Sunday, had been onher way to his final resting place when she’d seen the body and the blood and,dropping the flowers she was holding, immediately dialed her phone and stayedwell back to not disturb anything.

The blood alone had made it obvious that the Mother Superiorwasn’t going to be moving anytime soon.

“My initial findings are that it was blunt force trauma tothe back of the head,” Whale stands from his place surveying the scene. “I’llknow more after a more detailed examination in the morgue, of course. Judgingby the injuries and the blood, I’d say this is your crime scene – she wasn’tbrought here and posed after death.”

To be honest, this is the first crime more complicated thanpetty theft that she’s had to deal with since becoming Sheriff; definitely herfirst truly violent crime. Storybrooke isn’t perfect, but it’s always beenalmost too peaceful. Like somethingout of the world’s most sterilized and boring fairytale. She doesn’t complain –it makes her job easy, means she can spend plenty of time with her son, and more crime is not something any saneperson would want.

Although it does mean that she’s a bit out of her depthswith this. Knows what she’s doing, intheory, worked hard to get her criminal justice degree as a single mother,and on the surface it’s just like any other crime – find who had the motive,means, and opportunity, and find evidence, make an arrest and send them tocourt, let the jury reach a verdict.

But theory and practice are not remotely the same. And,considering who the victim has been identified as, and the fact that it’s a murder, this is the highest profilecrime in Storybrooke in something like 20 years – since she was a kid and oneof the local teenagers had disappeared.

“Emma?” She turns to where Marian had been stringing up thecrime scene tape to keep out gawkers who might trample their evidence, is morethan a little surprised to see her best friend standing there. Elsa has been Mayor a little less than a year, now– shouldn’t she be in her office, working on legislation orwhatever it is her job technically entails?

Still, she heads over. The Sheriff’s department does answerto the Mayor’s office, meaning Elsa is technically her boss, and it could beimportant.

“Anything wrong, Elsa?”

Her friend rubs gloved hands together, a nervous habit thatEmma knows well. Then, she lets out a sigh before speaking.

“Ruby called.”

The words don’t seem relevant, not really. Ruby was theirfriend, was Emma’s deputy before Marian moved to town; she’d been invited tojoin some government team after finding a few missing people after thehurricanes that had plagued the coast for the past several years, and it hadbeen a great opportunity for her career, but they haven’t spoken much since.

“You know her team is… Unconventional,” Elsa continues, andEmma crosses her arms. Yeah, unconventional is one word for it. They’ve been inthe news from a few high-profile cases they’ve solved. Supposedly, they’re allpsychics, looking at supernaturalangles to their cases to find the living, breathing humans behind them.

“One of her teammates had a vision, she said. A nun. Dead.On a grave. In the Storybrooke cemetery. Anna told me you called her to look after Henry so you could come out here, so as soon as I heard what Ruby had to say I came to see you myself.”

There’s not many ways she can respond to that; she doesn’tbelieve in psychics and visions and the paranormal, but Elsa doesn’t exactly have a reason to lie abouta story like that. About Ruby calling her to say those things.

“Why did you need to come see me?” Ruby’s teammate’s “vision”has to be a coincidence or something. Anna telling her sister about babysitting Henry for her is innocent enough, something that the younger of the Arendelle sisters would have no reason to hide if Elsa invited her to lunch and she needed to explain why she couldn’t come. Neither of those things explains Elsa being here in person instead of just calling about it.

“Ruby was worried the minute she heard Storybrooke might beinvolved. She wants – well, she wants to bring a few of her teammates down hereto help you look into things. On a volunteer basis. Considering the cemetery’sreputation, it might be prudent to-”

“The cemetery’s reputation as haunted, you mean,” Emma interrupts, her stare absolutely deadpan.The reputation that has no merit in anything except people’s imaginations; it’sjust a cemetery. A burial ground. There’s no spirits haunting the place. There can’t be, because those don’t exist.

“Listen, you know I don’t want to overstep my bounds. TheSheriff’s department is your office. But these are law enforcementprofessionals. One of them was a forensics expert, one of them was NYPDhomicide. It can’t hurt, can it? You’reshort-staffed, and Storybrooke hasn’t had to deal with something like thissince…”

Since her step-grandmother had killed several people,including her grandfather, in some sort of misguided attempt at “revenge” oversomething her mother supposedly did. But that was before she was even born,which most likely says something about the town that she doesn’t dwell on to figure out. Just because herpredecessor had thought there were holes all over the story in the Bae Golddisappearance and had a very thick file on it gathering dust in the office didn’tmean it was something of this magnitude.

“I told Ruby it was up to you,” Elsa says, instead offilling in the blank of the last time Storybrooke had a case anything likethis. “She said you would be in charge of the investigation, no one isinterested in stealing your jurisdiction. They don’t have any active casesright now--”

“Elsa, stop,” she shakes her head, brings a hand up to pinchthe bridge of her nose as she thinks. Normally she would laugh the offer off,say something along the lines of not needing ghost hunters mucking up her investigation. But they are professionals in the law enforcementfield first, Ruby herself is proof of that. And it could be nice to see herfriend again, and, more importantly, more relevantly, they have actualexperience in murder investigations that she and Marian and even Doctor Whalesimply do not have.

“I’d like to meet them before I make a decision. Can I getthat at least?”

“I’ll call Ruby back, see what we can arrange, okay?” Elsasmiles, pulling her phone from her pocket. Emma turns back to her crime scene,resumes photographing the scene and gathering evidence, refuses to feel like she’s just been manipulated into agreeing to something - she didn’t agree. Not yet.

There’s really nothing else to do but work on solving thismurder.

[buri-art]

Detective Genius: Part 2 of 8

Chapter Two: The Justice-Selling Nurse and the Case of the Unlocked Room

Synopsis: Yoon is a financially struggling nurse and recognizes a trauma victim, Taejun, as someone from his boarding house. The victim’s brother, Kyoga, suspects foul play and offers Yoon money to figure out who caused this. The landlord, Soo-won, discourages Yoon from getting involved, but in order to support himself and his adoptive father Ik-soo, Yoon investigates the suspicious other residents--and then some. Genre: Modern Day AU, (Attempted!?) Murder Mystery in Classic ‘Who Done It?’ Style, General. Could be read as comedy, drama, or melodrama. Words: 3,365 Warnings: I don’t kill anyone, but I do make them suffer a little (sorry, Taejun, somebody had to be the victim). Probably nothing that would make people squeamish, as the focus is on the plot. Find the other chapters in the master post.

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

“Good morning, Doctor.”

“I’m a nurse. Good morning, Jaeha.”

I was on my way out, and he was on his way in. Typical party animal, crawling back now at 9:10 on a Sunday morning. The red tint in his eyes indicated he was still intoxicated. It didn’t bother him in the least. “Working today?”

“Not exactly,” I replied. “Did you hear what happened yesterday?”

“What sort of thing? I haven’t been watching the news.”

“No,” I lowered my voice, “Among the people here.”

“Ohhh,” he raised his eyebrows almost as high as his pitch. “I know what you might be talking about that. That lovers’ spat?”

“Lover’s spat?”

“The cute red-head upstairs,” he pointed. “The landlord’s cousin. She’s usually at with Hak lately. You know him?”

“The one on the fifth floor? Yes. That’s not what I meant, though.”

“That’s not what I meant either,” he grinned. “I’m pretty that’s not the only voice coming from her room lately, if you know what I mean.”

“I don’t want to know. Besides, I was talking about Taejun.”

“Ah! Taejun! That must have been who it was!” Jaeha snapped his fingers. “Thanks, Yoon, it was driving me crazy trying to figure out where I had heard that voice before.”

My inclination was to ask him how much of a hobby he had eavesdropping on everyone’s echoes, but I phrased it in a more useful way. “What were you doing yesterday? What time was that?”

“Me? Just at home, reading. That was maybe around five or six.”

“Can you get it anymore specific?”

He was about to answer, but with a glimmer in his eye he changed to a question. “Am I being interrogated?”

“Is there a reason to?”

“Did something happen to Yona?” he asked, his tone dropping to a serious one.

“No. But Taejun’s in the hospital.”

His droopy eyes went wide. He was probably gathering a number of suspicions as to why while he filed through all the echoed gossip he had heard, but he chose to reveal none of it. “What for?”

“A head injury. I’m trying to figure out how it happened.”

“Is it serious?”

“It could have been a lot more serious.”

“Did Hak do it?”

“Hak?” I shot him a questioning glance.

“That’s just—now, I’m not accusing him of anything—”

“You just did.”

“It was only the first thing that popped into my mind. Taejun sounded like he was causing trouble for Yona lately.”

“Did you hear Hak there too?”

“Knowing who did it isn’t going to change your job as a nurse, is it?” he smiled. I was caught, and we both knew it. He lowered his voice and got closer to my ear, and his liquory breath wafted toward me. “If you’re playing detective I’ll cooperate, but don’t do anything rash.”

“Then do you think it was Hak?”

“I don’t want to think it was, but that’s my only guess. He’s got a motive. That’s all, though.”

“You know an awful lot about this. Are you a stalker?”

“It’s not as if I go out following anyone! I don’t know where Hak was. I don’t want to get him in trouble if he doesn’t deserve it. You’re better off talking to Yona, but if I hear anything else useful, I’ll let you know.”

Not that I wanted to live across from one, but it would have been more useful to me if Jaeha was a more thorough stalker. He was right; if Yona and Taejun had been in a discussion yesterday evening heated enough for it to echo through the building, she was the best person to go to for information.

*********

I didn’t really like Yona.

She and Yuno were the two princesses of the fourth floor whose families paid for them to live in the big city without a worry about their own financial well-being. I didn’t mind Yuno—she was spacey but industrious with her indoor plant endeavors, and got along well with a meal exchange deal. Yona, however, would try to be a kind person, but utterly fail in the execution due to a poor understanding of how the world works. 

Early on when she moved here, she heard from Soo-won that Ik-soo and I have a special arrangement due to our financial situation, and she invited us up for dinner. It was a casual affair with pasta so simply even Ik-soo could manage to boil the noodles and open a jar of sauce without much incident, but she served it on a haphazard combination of plastic flatware and fine china with a delicate peony pattern on a pale pink base. I remember it well because I spent most of that dinner staring at it for distraction while she did her best to make conversation, but all she knew of us was that we were poor. Did we usually have enough to eat? How long had we been living at the boarding house? Did we make enough to cover the rent? Did we need anyone to talk to? No, I thought, we didn’t need anyone prying, and especially not if she lacked any basic understanding of how poor people can be more than their poverty. She didn’t even understand how rich she was, using fine china like that and not sparring a thought about giving a few pieces away to Yuno the very moment Yuno said it was cute. Besides being clueless and clumsy in all her attempts to be generous, I’m willing to admit that she’s probably does things like that because she’s lonely.

I decided to take the stairwell up to her room. It was brighter than I expected; I had never even noticed there was in a window up at the top floor. Soo-won had been busy yesterday; even the upper floors had been cleaned. When I knocked on Yona’s door she didn’t answer at first, but smiled and said my name as soon as she opened the door a crack and saw me.

“Hi,” I said. “Do you mind if I come in?”

Her smile wavered. “Right now?”

“If now’s a bad time—”

“Give me two minutes to clean up!”

She shut the door, and then I heard a mad rush of footsteps and doors opening and closing. Her voice called back ‘okay’, and I took that as though I should let myself in. I was cautious and announced myself just in case. “Excuse me, I’m coming in.”

“Welcome,” she beamed, pulling the table into the center of her kitchenette and patting the chair next to it. I had never meant to get pulled so far in as to sit at the table with her. Her living space was more cluttered than I remembered it, probably as a result having been settled long enough to accumulate more things. There were three beanbag chairs against the wall and a trash bag nearby them, but not all of the junk food trash was in it.

“How are you settling in?” I asked.

“Just fine!” she chirped. “The first couple months of living on my own were a little hard, but I’m doing a lot better now.”

“Have you made many new friends?”

“New friends?”

I pointed to the beanbags and she lightly smacked herself in the forehead.

“Oh, those! That’s usually where Soo-won and Hak and I hang out, if we’re in my room. There’s not much room in the kitchen.”

“You’re telling me. Mine’s the same size.”

“How do you do it, Yoon? I make such a big mess in here when I try to cook, it’s like there’s no room to put anything.”

“You have to use your space effectively. Like making your own spice rack! See?” I pointed, “You’ve got everything strewn all over your counter—”

She put her hand to mine and guided our glances away from the mess on the counters. It stank like she hadn’t washed her dishes in weeks, and I figured she was embarrassed. I changed focus.

“Did you meet Hak when you moved here?”

“No,” she shook her head, tossing her deep red tresses this way and that. “Soo-won and I grew up with him. His foster father was friends with our dads.”

I felt a twinge of sympathy nip at my ears. “He’s adopted?”

“Not quite. Technically not. But practically the same. Hak just likes to rub that in when he gets in trouble.”

“Does he get in trouble a lot?”

“I don’t know,” she shrugged. “What counts as a lot?”

“So how about Taejun? Did you meet him when you came here?”

Yona frowned with her whole face—her forehead, her eyes, her lips, everything. “Yes,” she groaned.

“I take it you don’t like him.”

“Nothing against him, it’s just that he’s a creep!” she replied, but immediately thought the better of it a moment later. “I don’t like him, but I don’t hate him. I know he had to go to the hospital last night, I heard the sirens and I saw them take him. Soo-won told me something hit him in the head. I wanted him to leave me alone, but it’s not as if I ever wanted something bad to happen to him.”

Something hit him in the head? Not that he hit his head, but something hit him?

“I didn’t think you did,” I said, doing my best to sound encouraging. “I’m one of the nurses who took care of him, so I’m trying to figure out what happened. Did you talk to him at all yesterday?”

She lowered her chin and her bangs fell in front of her eyes. “Yes.”

“Did he say anything that might give you any clues?”

“No.”

“What did he say to you?”

“He was just being a creep, that’s all.”

“Is that really all?” I raised an eyebrow and slid my hands into my pocket to grab my notepad and pen. “Seems you were loud enough for people on other floors to hear you.”

“He didn’t say anything that made it sound like he’d hurt himself or anything like that,” she spoke faster, her eyes tracking my actions. “And I sure didn’t do anything to him. I only told him not to bother me and he left. But it really didn’t seem like he meant to hurt himself when he left.”

“I’ve got that. I don’t think he’d have hurt himself either. Or if he did, he’s got very creative ways of doing it.”

“Then why are you asking me questions? Are you going to call the police?”

“Not unless I---I’m a nurse, that’s not really my job, Yona. I only need to try to find out how it happened.”

Her face was running pale. There was no reason to find her suspicious, any girl could feel the same way if they thought they were going to get in trouble with the law, or she might have even been jumping to the conclusion that there was a murderer on the loose.

“I—it’s okay, Yona! I’m not trying to do anything else!”

That was a lie. I wanted to turn someone in to make a profit, turning Taejun’s brush with death into my financial boon. Ik-soo’s face, with a disappointed look, came to mind.

“Is he going to be okay?” Yona looked me in the eyes. “Taejun.”

“Well—he’ll live, I know that much. I didn’t stick around late enough after my shift to get all the details.”

“Details?” she raised her eyebrows. “Wouldn’t you find out more at the hospital, then?”

“You know what, Yona? You’re right. Maybe they don’t need me to find out how it happened after all,” I stood from the table and backed toward the door, “But I’ll let you know if I have any other questions for you, alright? Will you help?”

“O… kay?” she looked befuddled by the prospect of anything she could do to help.

Yona saw to me to the door, and shut it, but that was it. I waited, then sighed and knocked.

She opened it back up. “What is it?”

“You forgot to lock your door.”

“Oh!” she giggled. “Silly me. I’m not in the habit of doing that.”

“You should be.”

“Thanks, Yoon,” she smiled, and that was the last I saw before her face disappeared from behind the door. The lock was promptly latched.

I wasn’t sure what kind of creep Taejun was, but if he had been violent, I would have expected her to keep her door locked. If Soo-won and Hak were over so often, however, that might have hurt her common sense for common dealings between young men and young women. I scratched my head, at a loss for how to explain her behavior as anything but a spoiled rich girl having no idea how to take care of herself, and even then it was difficult to excuse. I try to be empathetic, but I can’t make myself stupid.

**********

Yuno wasn’t there when I knocked, so I went up to the fifth floor to see if I could get any information out of Hak. I knocked at the door at the southern side of the hall, but it was the door at the northern end that opened.

“Yes?”

Out stepped a young man with skin kept brilliantly smooth by long nights of restful sleep and a shirt ironed as though he always accidentally dropped all his laundry off at a dry cleaner’s (which, knowing him better now, maybe is not much of a stretch). I always felt like I should hate him, but I didn’t know him well enough at the time to have a reason to do so. He could be naïve like Yona, but at least he wasn’t so air-headed. “Oh, Yoon,” he said.

“Kija! I was knocking at Hak’s door.”

“At Hak’s? Here’s the trick, you have to knock really loudly or he won’t come.” So saying, he demonstrated, beating on the door with monstrous strength I had never witnessed in one human hand. “Hak!” he raised his voice. “Son Hak, I know you’re in there! Hak!”

After several more seconds of beating—which I had backed away from to keep the sound from rattling through my rib cage—Kija came to a stop.

He turned to me and said, “He’s not home.”

“So glad you could deduce that.”

“You’re welcome.”

I take back my previous comment; Kija could sometimes be far more air-headed than Yona.

"Do you want me to give him a message when he gets back?" 

"No, I can write a note if I need him. You've got your own things to do."

 "Alright."

 "Do you talk to Hak a lot?"

Kija scoffed. "I try! But sometimes he is confoundingly rude. Why, just yesterday I when I got home he came in right after me, so I tried to be nice and share some of my granny's sweets with him. It was fine if he didn't want them, but he didn't have to snarl at me when he refused!"

I opened my notepad. "That was yesterday?"

"Yes, last night."

"Around what time?" 

He rolled his blue eyes back as he thought. "Maybe 6:30? I took the 4:10 train back from visiting Granny, so I would gotten home around then."

"Can you be any more specific?" 

"6... 40, perhaps? I took a few minutes to put my things down and find my keys, so Hak came up right after me."

"From the stairs, or the elevator?"

"The elevator."

Proving to me how air-headed he could be, Kija continued to answer without the slightest shred of suspicion. I pressed on. "What was he like when he came home? Do you remember what he was wearing, or if he was carrying anything?" 

"I don't recall anything like that, but I noticed he was all wet. Not soaked, just wet. He was a little flushed and said he needed to hurry up and take a shower."

"Did he say where he had gone?"

"No, not that I recall. He was in a grouchy mood and didn't say much."

"I see," I said, finishing my scratches against the paper. "That was around 6:40, right?" 

"Well, if I was walking fast, it could have even been 6:20."

I squeezed my eyes then wrote it down with several question marks after it. As he watched my face, he grew concerned--finally. 

"Is something the matter?"

"Yes. I'm trying to get to the bottom of some things going on."

"What things?"

"One of the other tenants got a head injury yesterday, and I'm trying figure out why."

He gaped; his fair skin became whiter than ever. "Who!?" 

"Kan Taejun, on the second floor."

"Oh. ...Ohhh! Him!"

Something set his whole body ablaze. Not wanting to get burned, I took a step back. "You know him?" 

"He's the one who’s been bothering the girl in room 402!"

"Yes, Yona. That's what I gather. You knew about this?"

"Yes, one time—last Tuesday evening, I think--when I came in I saw him bothering her in the elevator. I yelled at him to stop."

"Did he?"

"Yes, I startled him so he ran away. Scared him white in the face, more like it. After that, I told her she could always call me and I would be happy to escort her."

Don't you have a job? Was what I wanted to ask, but I stayed focused. "How did she respond?"

He sighed and his internal blaze got weaker. "She said she could ask Hak to help her instead."

"You don't need to take it personally. They've known each other for a long time."

"That's not what bothers me! She's been at odds with him lately, telling him to stay out of her business. Judging by the look on his face when he came home last night, my first guess was that he had just had another argument with her."

My pen scratched against the paper furiously.

He went on. "From what I've overheard, he says he's trying to protect her. Sounds more to me that she wants someone to protect her from him!"

"Then you think it's not just Taejun who's been bothering her?" 

"Not in the same way--Taejun is an outright creep!"

I paused. "And what would you do if she wanted help dealing with one of them?"

"I'd get rid of them!" 

I swallowed hard and took my time before staring back at him. He had his fist clenched and the fire was all in his eyes now. Objectively, this painted him as my number one suspect with a full admission of motive and an incomplete alibi. Subjectively, I couldn't suspect him at all. His honesty was too honest for him to be able to hide any guilt.

**********

I’d be lying if I said didn’t suspect Hak by this point. A voice inside my head told me to stop wasting time and to call Kyoga right away and see if this thirst for justice would be satisfied with any old person to point blame at, but a deeper, more nagging voice (a voice not unlike Ik-soo’s) told me it wouldn’t be right to implicate someone on a hunch. If I already doubted Hak, then I told myself I had to try to prove my doubts wrong. If I couldn’t do that, I agreed to myself, then I would accuse him.

While I was in the elevator I made a deal with that voice that wanted to take the higher road of justice rather than the lower, easier, finger-pointing one. When the doors opened at the first floor, Yuno was waiting outside of it with her very intimidating boyfriend. She was dressed in a loose and lacy blouse with a skirt and sandals and carrying a dry umbrella, and he was in a light jacket and jeans. His arms were folded and his back was up straight, and he have me a very direct look and a nod as he and Yuno stepped in. She smiled and waved and greeted me by name.

I headed for the front door, but it pulled away from my hand before I could grab the knob. It swung open, and I was blasted with the sound of angry voices.

“If this ever happens again—”

“It won’t! And I’m telling you, it’s not my fault!”

“Quit lying to me, Son Hak!”

[theexistentialstudentblog-blog]

Time

I feel like I am acutely aware of time these days. I mean we all get those days where we watch the clock continuously. Perhaps we’re anxious about waking up for our daily responsibilities the following morning, and subsequently find ourselves pondering the time, staring at the alarm clock (or in most of our cases, switching our phone’s on to check the time). This is pretty normal. I do it often myself; I feel as though my alarm might not sound, or I forgot to turn it on. (If you knew me, you’d realise how likely of a prospect that is). So I find myself tossing and turning and constantly checking the time on my phone. Usually it’s still early in the night and I literally have nothing to worry about, but when we have important things on our agenda- it’s pretty normal to be on our toes a little more!

Then there’s the usual time checking when we’re at work, school, or wherever. We are wishing the minutes, hours etc to pass, craving the sweet relief of comfortable clothes, TV, and bed. Again, it’s pretty normal.

For some reason, though, I feel like my awareness of time has gradually grown way out of proportion, and has become somewhat of an annoyance! It’s making time drag so much more, because all I ever do is wonder. At work is where I have it the worst; I check the clock constantly. I know people who strive to stay away from the clock as long as possible, rightly realising that time seems to go slower if you’re eyeing the clock all day. But for some reason I can’t stay away. My mind goes something like this;

“Okay. It’s a six hour shift. So I have a half hour break, which means 5 and a half hours of actual labour and I’m free. If I have my break after three and a half hours, I only have two hours to go until home time.” Blah blah. My mind will work out shift times and hours, when to have my break so that I am working for as long as I can possibly handle until my legs are close to giving out and I have to finally take my break. (may seem like a slight over exaggeration, but the pain I get in my entire body just by standing for a couple of hours is actually getting ridiculous, I feel like a 90 year old woman). So it’s a pretty accurate account. And then I find myself walking back and forth to the till points to check the time. 

“Well it’s been an hour now, which means I have roughly two and a half hours till my allocated break... maybe I can hold out for three hours? If not, at least that half hour before my break will go quickly, because I’ll be excited to go on my break. Maybe I can even sneak down a little earlier, so that half hour after my three hours might actually be 20-25 minutes.” Jheeze. What am I like? My shifts can vary, too. Some days I’m doing jobs like keeping an eye on fitting rooms, which means time feels very slow but I also like the silence of the fitting rooms, being able to collect my thoughts and not feeling like I have to be doing something every second in case I take a breath and get caught “doing nothing”. (My mind works like this, go figure!) But some days I am doing what I love, merchandising, making things looks great! Those shifts can go very fast. Sundays, too, since we close an hour after I arrive and my shift is only four hours. Those days, my mind can work out time more effectively, I guess!

“Okay so there’s one hour until the store closes. But in 45 minutes I’ll hear the store announcement that the door will be shutting soon, and those 15 minutes don’t count ‘cause they go fast and you stand around talking while you wait for people to leave.” Not that I do that, I usually carry on working if I’m focused on a specific area, but my brain still assumes those 15 minutes are nothing). “Now I have three hours left. In an hour, two people go home. In two hours, there will only be me and one person on this floor. That’s less pressure. That hour will go quickly because I can relax a bit and sit down, maybe sort out clearance”. 

Yep, I pretty much plan my entire day at work down. Although, you’re probably assuming I must really not like going to work. That’s not strictly true. The people there are very good to me and although I don’t fit in with the staff as much as I did in my old store, I still feel comfortable around them. We all do our jobs, but take the time to have the odd bit of banter (barring a few people of course!) But yeah, it’s nothing to do with the job in itself. Because, apart from not being paid for the past two months due to technical reasons (also not their fault), I am enjoying it. Soo, it’s probably just me and my brain. Because I get it with University, also. Oh heck, I get it often, there.

I don’t really need to bore you with the workings of my inner mind, with that one. The truth simply is, I just want time to pass, as soon as freaking possible. People are great, way better than my previous years (although I miss my best friend from uni loads!) But I can’t deal with the constant battle to want to be at home. Like I genuinely do less at uni than I do anywhere else, because I can’t do anything when I am around other people. That really has to change but that’s whole other ballpark. Point is, my awareness of time, and constant need to know what point in the day it is, is very disconcerting. Anybody else have this? Getting tired of waking up six times a night having a mini (and the odd full blown) panic attack, thinking it’s later than it is and that I have miss work or uni. (Okay, work, because missing uni isn’t exactly a new or strange.. or rare.. occurrence for me, haha!) 

But yep. That’s me and my completely random and off-topic blog post about my unrelenting desire to know the exact time... at all times. So i’ll lie here now, at 42 minutes past midnight, attempting to work out how many hours sleep I will get if I go to sleep within the next hour (of course, that’s never going to happen)... so that’ll be fun! This was just a random off topic post because my mind is running at a pace I cannot keep up with and I decided to write my thoughts down in the form of a blog post to settle them- as well as to create more cringe-worthy moments for me to look back on in the future and cry with embarrassment as I realise I opened up to the internet about random shit nobody cares about.. woohoo! 

Good night and happy blogging! Lest we forget that time is passing by at a marginal speed and some day (which seems like an eternity away but will approach us very fast) we will all be dead and this post, and every post we’ve ever written- word we’ve ever wrote or spoken, will be forgotten and lost in time until we and all traces of us have been wiped off of the face of the earth completely! 

(I apologise if you didn’t gather from my username that I am filled with existential dread with a hint of nihilism.. but I also call myself a Christian so maybe I’m just a whole new breed, lmao). 

[automatismoateo]

My Ex-Catholic wife recently had an existential moment. It hurt her, and hurt me to watch. I think it's time to tell another de-conversion story. Stop me if you've heard this one before. via /r/atheism

Submitted February 19, 2020 at 04:08AM by anon_guy_2468 (Via reddit https://ift.tt/39K4iE0) My Ex-Catholic wife recently had an existential moment. It hurt her, and hurt me to watch. I think it's time to tell another de-conversion story. Stop me if you've heard this one before.

First, I often deplore long stories on Atheism, and I often do not read them. With that said I completely understand if people don't read this. I wont be hurt.

However, I'm starting to understand why they exist. Sometimes we need to know that someone else has been through something before, just to know we're not alone. So i'm going to tell my wife's story today, through my eyes, starting when I met her and concluding last week. Don't worry, her story isn't over, she isn't dead, the story is just going to end there for today.

Who should be reading this? Besides the obvious of "Whoever wants to", I'm intending this to be read by two groups of people. Atheist Spouses married to a believer, and anyone who was raised religious but wants to hear another side of things.

By the term Atheist Spouses i'm referring to people like me. I (An atheist since ~12) fell in love with a catholic woman who said she would never give up her faith. She demanded that I let her raise the kids in Catholic values, and asked me repeatedly to join her in her faith. Her family did too. WARNING, WARNING, WARNING! Every bit of advice will tell you that I should've walked away. Don't get married, don't have kids, don't don't don't. It cannot end well. But I was in love. I wanted it to work out, and I was willing to let her have whatever she wanted.

But i'm getting ahead of myself. I was 23, working a dead end retail job in a city I hated. I got a promotion to store manager and suddenly had a crew working under me. One of them had two jobs, he worked for me and he also worked at a store across the hall. Unbeknownst to me, he knew a girl and thought she would be perfect for me. So they arranged a meeting. They brought her into my store under a false pretense, paraded her around in front of me asking questions about something she didn't care about. It worked, holy hell it worked. Love at first sight. Still to this day I have no idea why.

Within weeks we were arranging our breaks together, going for lunches, and less than 5 weeks in we were off on our first real date. Why did it take 5 weeks to have our first date? Well, that's where WARNING number one should have had me questioning my decisions. She had a (kid). The father was absent and she was raising (it) alone. Didn't matter, I was in love. But because she had an added responsibility this meant that she needed to take things seriously. She made it clear that she wasn't just "dating" for the sake of dating. Because of this I met her family early. They were catholic. VERY Catholic.

First was a lunch with her mother. She'd already asked her daughter if I was catholic, to which she was told that I was not. Then again during lunch she made sure to ask again if I was catholic. I said no. The following day I met the grandmother and the mother made sure to let HER know, in front of me, that I was indeed not Catholic. It came up often. I remember a conversation with her father some time later that sounded similar. None of them ever knew that I was an Atheist, they all just knew that I wasn't catholic. That was bad enough.

Flash forward a bit. 5 months into the relationship I've already proposed. We need to meet the Priest. He wants to interview us separately. Nigerian guy, worked his way to Canada on a religious visa, has to remain a priest to stay in the country. To my surprise he couldn't care less about my religion. He asks me some questions, asks if I will let my wife raise the kids Catholic... I honestly don't remember it much. It was pretty chill. Then comes the kicker. If we want to be married in his church, we have to take Catholic Marriage Classes. Lets be clear, this is the church my wife-to-be has been attending for a VERY long time. I'm willing to do what it takes...almost.

We live below the poverty line at this point. Times are tough, and we've got a (kid) to think about as well. These classes they want us to take are monday to wednesday, in a city about 150km (90miles) away. We're not commuting 3 hours a day, AFTER taking 3 days off work. This isn't going to work. She suggests we consider another church. I make absolutely sure she's okay not being married in HER church. She's not happy with it, but willing to do it. We've been telling people this whole time that my family is part of the United Church (technically not a lie, we are, we just haven't gone in like 10+ years) So we tell her parents that we're going to move the ceremony to a United Church. They are not happy, but grit their teeth.

That Sunday at the end of service they tell the priest that the wedding is being moved to another church. Moments later he literally gets in his car and follows her parents home! They're walking into their house and he's already in the driveway! It's a big thing. Him losing "another young catholic" isn't something he's willing to do. He bends over backwards, finds and arranges for us to take evening classes at a local church. This is the first flexibility I've ever seen in the Catholic Church, and i'm amazed.

These classes, in hindsight, probably should have made me walk away. The brainwashing my fiance had lived through became very evident. She was defensive when she didn't need to be, and even broke into tears a couple times. I still remember two of those times. One time she tearfully told me she was afraid she would live a lifetime with me, then get to heaven and find that I wasn't there. Another time she cried, begging me, "why can't you just believe?". She wasn't being manipulative, not at all. She was genuinely afraid. It hurt. It hurt not because of what she was saying, but it hurt because I realized she was soo deep into this all that she saw faith as fact. It was scary. But I did what I needed, and I agreed to let her raise the kids catholic. That part wasn't negotiable. I was not converting, that part was also non-negotiable.

The wedding goes...okay. This was in the early 2000's, so the priest who I've spoken about is already gone. They're moving them around a LOT right now. Boston just happened a couple years ago and priests are staying in small churches no more than 9-12 months right now. They cant risk anyone being in a church long enough to develop relationships with children. So our wedding is done by a new young priest who botches it completely. He even forgets the first kiss. My wife and I just take a moment to face the crowd, and lay a good 15 second one on each other to give everyone a chance to grab their cameras and capture the moment. The priest doesn't even notice! Oh well.

Soon into our marriage we move away from her hometown. Our jobs are both dead end, and we both wanna live somewhere bigger. My wife finds a new catholic church which she pledges to attend weekly, but that quickly starts to fade. In less than a year she's become a holiday catholic. She still prays, she teaches our (kid) about Jesus, and makes sure to let her family know that she's still living as a Catholic (minus church). Christmas every year has our kid getting a ton of religious gifts. It's kinda sick. Jesus books, Jesus art, Jesus toys. They really know how to make money off this guy.

(Quick Note: Her child is now our child, I always refer to that kid as our first/oldest, the word step dad is never used. We are about to have two children, and that nomenclature never fades)

Our second child is born, and I ain't seen NOTHING yet. The family goes ALL OUT trying to make sure they're not gonna lose this one. Jesus figures, more jesus art, and books that will never be read. But that's nothing compared to the litany of questions and promises that this child will also be raised catholic. The Christening is booked quickly (and don't you dare accidentally call it a baptism).

We move around a couple more times during the years, following jobs here and there. Both the kids go through Catechism classes at different times in different cities, and once again i'm exposed to some real horror. They really beat this "satan" stuff into the kids. If they don't do what they're told satan is gonna get them and burn them. It's scary shit.

But the church that does Catechism with our second child screws up. They screw up big time. During the classes my wife is told that she needs to attend weekly Mass, or they're not letting Kid#2 attend. After the classes are over my wife stops going. Not long after, we get a box in the mail. It's a box of 52, pre adressed and dated weekly tithing envelopes. It's the seed I've been waiting for. We've been married 8 years now, and I've been waiting for this. The church is greedy, and she's seen it.

But i'm not touching it. It's not my intent to make the church look bad. I'm not going to take my wife away from the church. That's dangerous ground. VERY dangerous. I need it to be her decision. So I don't mention it again. I do however start to teach my wife about financial scams. She gets lesson 101 in Nigerian Prince scams, tax scams, phishing scams. I teach her about cold reading, psychics, and I even slip in financial scams like prosperity gospel. All manner of charlatans who want your money, she learned about them. The base was there. She was starting to put it together.

But I really think the end came a couple years after that, all on its own. Her grandfather died. Pretty horrible time. He'd been sick a long time, and one day his heart just stopped. No word of a lie he was in his den watching Matlock, like any good codger should be. He had one leg up on his ottoman, a hand on the remote. When the episode was over he didn't come down for tea, and Grandma went up to check on him. He was gone.

And the fucking priest passed a collection plate at his funeral.....

Sorry, the language probably isn't necessary, but that part still makes me mad. As mad as it made me, the family was even more broken. My wife is completely done. She hasn't attended more than a few times since. Not even christmas is a guarantee anymore. She doesn't make the kids go. She doesn't give it a second thought. And i still don't say a thing. By now I'd call my wife a christian, hedging on deist. She still wants to believe in a god of some sort, but she's really leaning away from the catholic propaganda. She's done a little research on jesus, and knows that he probably didn't exist. She's definitely not catholic anymore, although she still tells people she is when asked.

But after allll of that, it's her mother who screws things up. It's not all at once either, it comes as a one-two punch.

One night she's putting some of her other grandchildren (our niece/nephew) to bed, and tells them a story about demons, and how demons can come for you in your dreams. Well naturally the kids both have nightmares that night. Grandma's right there to say "SEE! That's why we pray, we need to keep the demons out!" The fight is legendary. The nibblings parents are in a RAGE! And they have the right to be. Not long later we get the cliffnotes version. We decide to restrict our kids time alone with the grandparents

Flash forward another couple years. My wife and I book a trip to Vegas and her mother agrees to sit with the kids for the time we're gone. I know what I said earlier, but we didn't have a choice. Talked with the kids about their rights, and how Grandma has some pretty strong beliefs. It's like an innoculation. We head to VEGAS BABY! Out of the hotel I have very limited connection on my phone, only get data if I pass an open wifi network. We're walking around Freemont street Saturday night and I get a message from my oldest. "Dad, grandma wants to make us go to church tomorrow, but we don't want to. She's making us, what should I do?". I reply the only way I know how. Calmly. "I'm too far away to do anything, and if I call her she will know you contacted me and might think you went behind her back. Tell her you don't want to, it's your decision. If she throws a fit just go, it's only an hour in church and it wont hurt you". It's well past midnight before I get another wifi connection, the message goes through, I don't get another reply.

A few days later we get back home and I drive to pick up the eldest from school. I ask how the church thing went. The story is awesome. "We told her we didn't want to go. She wasn't happy. She cried, bribed us with lunch at a restaurant, even tried a guilt trip saying that she wouldn't go alone so it was OUR fault she wasn't going to church.. We stood our ground and didn't go. She wasn't happy. After all that she still took us out for lunch anyway."

That was 5 months ago. Last week my wife and I are doing dishes. She turns to me and says something along the lines of "I'm kinda sad. I realize now that when this life is over, that's it, it's over. There's nothing else after."

She's having an existential crisis. She's given up on the eternal reward, and it hurts her inside. I try a couple things that come quickly to mind, I mention the fact that death is like the time before she was born. She's not interested. She doesn't need it. She's okay with it. She's not entirely settled, but she's okay.

She's not religious anymore. At all.....

[millennialpharmd]

WPE 2017

Palm Springs was SO MUCH FUN! 

We drove over Friday morning and we got there early because we skipped getting breakfast since my friend thought she wouldn’t make it in time to present her poster. We asked our airbnb host if we can get the place early (since check in is technically at 3pm). We were able to get into our condo at 11am! It was such a nice, cute little place. Then we headed over to the conference. I was only in the Exhibit Hall on Friday. I basically walked around, played with puppies, ate, and got a whole TON of free stuff. :)))) My bf arrived early and I was stressed because I got lost getting out of the hotel and I would miss an event since I thought he would come later. I felt bad that I sorta took it out on him. But we drove back to the condo and just settled in and relaxed. I tried to napped but I couldn’t. My friends got back at 5ish and we went to downtown to get dinner. We ate with a few other classmates and some P1s. It was Thai food and my food was soo good. But some people didn’t put in their fair share and we were $20 short... My bf tips really well (usually 25%) so I don’t know how we still ended up short. I think it was the P1s... My boyfriend ended up putting in an extra $20.....  We should have split the bill. Anyways, his friends arrived so we went out and literally got more Thai food LMAO. It was mostly so they can eat something but we got some desserts too. Then we went to a tiki bar. My drink was pretty good. :) We got back and had some wine while watching Netflix. The boys were gaming forever lol. I went to bed around 2am because I had trouble sleeping.

I woke up super early the next day because of the alcohol. I got ready and went to the conference to attend my first event. I only had applesauce and some candy so I was soooo hungry during the meeting. My stomach kept growling. The second it was done, I texted my bf to come pick me up to get food. We went back to the condo and picked up the other two and went to check out brunch places. We ended up going to this one place that was super delicious. My omelette was amazing and my drink was so good. I was buzzed so quick lol. I couldn’t finish the omelette and I was going to to-go it but I don’t know where I would put it since I was going to the conference again after. I had my bf eat some of it and the others help me with my peach bellini. I got back to the conference just in time for the quiz bowl and then the film festival after so I had my three events required for reimbursement. My bf and the other two went hiking and grocery shopping for dinner. After my school’s team completely failed the quiz bowl and didn’t win any awards for the film, I headed back to the condo. We all just sat around watching Minions when my bf and them got back. They were making dinner and just finished in time when my other friends went to downtown to hang out. We ate dinner on the patio with some lighted candles. It was nice. We headed to the pool after with wine lmao. We were only there for a little bit and then I went back, rinsed off, changed and got ready so quick for the wholesaler party. I got there and was so overdressed. There was a ton of food but I didn’t get much except for the cotton candy which I ran to LMAO. I also got coleslaw which wasn’t that great but the chili cheese fries were pretty good. The drinks sucked. I only got gin and tonic but it wasn’t that strong. I was there for less than an hour and I was bored lol. I got some photo booth pics and then I grabbed another cotton candy and some fries for my bf. They picked me up and we hit up two places for drinks. I got a mojito because I wanted one. It wasn’t much but it was strong which I like. I didn’t feel too great after and I had to drink some water because I had wine and gin earlier lol. My friend got a Lyft to take us to the other bar and I just got water at that one because I didn’t think I should drink anymore. We got back after that and the rest of the group were already there drinking slurpees while playing a game. I was still pretty buzzed so I went upstairs to lay down. My bf joined me lol. I felt better after a bit but when I went downstairs, everyone was already sleeping or in their rooms. So I just took a shower and then knocked out pretty quick.

I woke up super early again because of the alcohol but I didn’t actually get up for another hour. I eventually got ready and then started cleaning and packing. Bf didn’t get up until 10am. Two of my friends had to go to the conference early to present their posters so they went to downtown after to just hang out and they were waiting on us for brunch. We cleaned up the place and went to meet them there. The brunch place wasn’t amazing but it was still good for a good deal. I had to say bye to my boyfriend :( and bye to Palm Springs and I had to head back to rainy Orange County. We were literally driving towards massive gray clouds lol. I dozed off in the car and then took a nap when I got home. It was such a nice weekend getaway. I wished we booked an extra night so we can spend the entire Sunday doing whatever.