troubledkid

[troubledkid]

​percy + annabeth

𝐀𝐍𝐍𝐀𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐇 𝐒𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐄 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓 percyshe had faith in percy, of course, but she also had an’t like him ( she did & no, not like that ) but he was always doing things to annoy her. ❝ you’re the worst, jackson, anyone ever tell you that ? ❞ but she’s moving her things to her back pack so they can talk anyways.

❝ how’d your math test go ? good, right ? ❞ she had faith in percy, of course, but she had more faith in studying & practice problems.

&

to be fair, percy barely had faith in percy. any success he had? he was failing up. it wasn’t that he thought he was bad or useless or the troubled kid they’d branded him in kindergarten. it was that he just hadn’t found the thing he was good at yet. (sure, he was good at swimming, but high school swim captain wasn’t going to get him too far in life, and he didn’t have the discipline to go pro. besides, that wasn’t what he was meant to do. he could feel it.)

annabeth, of course, was good at everything. it should have annoyed him to high hades--and, yeah, sure, couldn’t she share, like, one thing--but it... didn’t. not really. they could compete, but she was annabeth. she was brilliant and brave and--fuck, percy. don’t finish that sentence.

“it was on all my report cards, actually,” he said, tucking his board under one arm and sitting next to her without waiting for her permission. he’d tried for the test, he really had. he’d been studying as long and hard as he could; he was so determined to not fail. but math wasn’t his forte. school wasn’t his forte. (nothing was his forte.) “eh, you know,” he shrugged. “math. who needs it, right?”

[troubledkid]

steve & tony

who: tony stark status : open starter location: tony’s garage.

he hasn’t emerged from his work space in what borderline reached a forty eight hour period. luckily he had the essentials in the work shed to handle a camp out without making the trip to the house where his husband fiancée would inevitably be aware of his transgressions. not that disappearing wouldn’t be a cause for concern either. his charred hand quivered with a tool that he held with it , in a tight grip until he was forced to drop it at the sound of someone outside his door. metal clanked loudly on the floor , followed by a curse ripping from his throat sharply. 

“ damnit. “

he didn’t respond to the visitor right away as he picked up the tool and dropped it roughly on the desk. “ the door’s unlocked. “  was his curt reply , his own frustration echoing in his tone and not bothering to turn around right away. 

&

he hadn’t seen tony in two days. he should have been worried -- should he have been worried? if it had been anyone other than tony, yeah. steve should have been worried. but it was tony. he did this. he disappeared into his work for hours and days and weeks at a time, reemerging, blinking, into the sun like an animal coming out of hibernation, when he was ready. only when he was ready.

except -- normally he answered at least a few texts. you know, confirming that he was still alive out there, not pinned under a few tons of metal from whatever behemoth he’d been working on that day. normally there was something that reminded steve that he didn’t have to call in reinforcements. 

today? radio silence. he’d started anxiously checking his phone every few minutes, unable to concentrate on his work. nothing. goddammit, tony. 

(also, steve missed him. it had been two days. they both needed sleep. shut up.)

he trudged out to the garage, hoping he’d find tony grease-stained and tired and not a smoldering lump on the concrete. and, politely, he knocked. then, less politely, he pushed the door open.

“ you alive in here? ”

[troubledkid]

CHRIS EVANS as Steve Rogers in MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE (2011-2019)

[troubledkid]

「    chris evans   ,   thirty-four  ,   cis male  +  he / him    」 ˚╰ ❃ ╮  did  you  know    THE MAN OUT OF TIME ’s    real  name  is    STEVE ROGERS     ?!    around  the  island  they  seem  to  be  quite     brave    ,  but  also     idealistic    ,  but  it  makes  sense  given  they  are  an   ARTIST     and  come  from     MARVEL    .  you  can  hear   AMERICA’S SON  by  AIR REVIEW   blasting  from  their  house ,  but  be  careful   !   they  can  be  agitated  as  nightmares  bring  back  memories  of  DEFEATING THANOS.  even  so ,  it’s  impossible  to  see  their    SHIELD   and  not  think  about  them .   ( penned by claire! )

𝐇𝐎𝐖  𝐖𝐀𝐒  𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑  𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒  𝐋𝐈𝐅𝐄  𝐒𝐎  𝐅𝐀𝐑  

(tw death, illness)

steve rogers was born small and scrappy, the only son of sarah and joseph rogers -- an underpaid, overworked mother and a father who did the best he could, but who spent more time nursing a bottle than caring for his family. joseph died first, when steve was young, and sarah had little to give him but love and courage and faith, honor and duty and humility. do no harm, but take no shit. always, always stand up for what’s right.

then sarah died, when steve was barely eighteen, barely out of high school, and there was nothing but bucky, his childhood best friend, his brother. then bucky enlisted; steve tried, but, even though he’d hit a late-stage growth spurt and outgrown most of his childhood ailments, he was still considered medically unfit and turned away.

so he went to art school instead, taking out mountains of student loans he was sure he’d never pay off. artists didn’t make money, but he wasn’t good for much of anything else. now, he pays the bills as a commercial artist, with comics and advertisements and graphic design, teaching classes and shopping around a little of his own original work on the side. it ain’t much, but it’s honest work. the fact that he’s dating tony stark, too, doesn’t hurt.

( in some sort of grudge match, he’s spent the years since his failed enlistment getting needlessly fit, determined to prove the army wrong. his dad told him to always get back up ; he’s getting back up. he’s probably... in much better shape than is reasonably possible for a half-starving artist with a history of asthma, but hey. we don’t question it. the early-morning runs keep him sane. )

𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓  𝐖𝐀𝐒  𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑  𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒  𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓  𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐄  𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓  ?

(tw body horror, death)

there’s a machine in the middle of a room, ringed by men in suits and lab coats. there are consoles, old and rudimentary, but they’re somehow also beyond cutting-edge. an observation deck, a blueish haze, a woman with dark curls and red lips. and him, strapped into that metal cocoon. it’s dark, so dark, then it’s glowing and hissing and burning and it hurts -- it hurts -- is it too late to back out -- oh, god, he’s dying -- and every bone in his body is breaking and reforming and every muscle is expanding and he’s screaming but he can’t scream because his body is remaking itself from the inside out and it goes on for forever and no time at all and then --

it stops.

the top lifts, and the room is much smaller. the woman is much shorter. a man with a white coat and a thick german accent is grinning, and then he’s dead. and then it isn’t a celebration, it’s a tragedy. and then steve is no longer the first of an army but the last of his kind. he can’t make out the details, but he knows it wasn’t supposed to be like this.

𝐇𝐎𝐖  𝐀𝐑𝐄  𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘  𝐅𝐄𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆  𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇  𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐈𝐑  𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓  𝐅𝐄𝐖  𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒 ?

oh, buddy. superheroes? aliens? really? how the hell was he captain america? (what the hell was captain america?) and why does he see his friends dying?

there’s so much good in them--a sense of purpose and identity he’s never had in aurora, the muscle memory of incredible strength. but there’s also the bad. there’s the pain (physical and emotional) and the hiding and the parade of lost friends and loves and the carrying the world on his (artificially very broad) shoulders. there’s no time there to just be steve, to just sit with a mug of tea and his sketchbook. but there’s no captain america here, either.

𝐀𝐍𝐘𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐄𝐋𝐒𝐄 ?

pinterest + playlist !

[troubledkid]

𝐑𝐎𝐑𝐘 + 𝐉𝐄𝐒𝐒

          sits    with    his    nose    in    a    book,    drawing    himself    into    a    reality    that    didn’t    exist    because    his    own    was    only    subpar.    as    a    hand    lifts,    thumb    brushes    against    his    bottom    lip    mindlessly    &    in    the    middle    of    his    thoughts,    his    wrists    display    remnants    of    cuffs     ––     slightly    red    &    raw    with    little    bruising    from    how    much    he    had    moved    in    them.    the    cops    weren’t    exactly    his    best    friends    &    maybe    he    knew    each    of    them    by    first    name,    but    that    was    beside    the    point    !    jess    acts    like    he    hadn’t    been    humiliated    in    front    of    dozens    of    people    the    night    before    for    a    slight    breaking    &    entering    mishap.    the    only    thing    he    stole    ?    stephen    king’s    cell,    a    book    someone    kept    getting    to    before    him    in    the    library.    that’s    what    he’s    reading    now    &    such    a    peaceful    moment    is    interrupted    only    by    the    approach    of    someone    else.        “      i’m    not    interested    in    buyin’    any    girl    scout    cookies.      ”        it’s    the    only    thing    that    leaves    his    lips    &    his    gaze    doesn’t    stray    from    the    pages    in    front    of    him.    

𝐑𝐎𝐑𝐘 missed her study tree. the best part about college had been sitting on the quad, grass prickling against her legs, tree bark snagging on her sweater, books piling around her. It was the kind of thing no one really bothered to question, because it was college, and scootering to class in your pajamas was more or less acceptable. a study tree? pretty normal. why make a fuss? 

unfortunately, the real adult world didn’t really have study trees. it had busy parks and kids throwing rubber balls near her head and dogs barking at her ankles. there were deadlines and bills and the constant texts from her mom, who was on an animal video kick, sending a new cat every twenty minutes. there was no peace to sit with brontë or austen or, hell, james patterson. but she tried.

today, though, there was a guy in her spot, engrossed in his own reading. dark hair, sharp nose--was he--did she know him? rory stood above him, clutching her book to her chest, unable to bite back a little frown. “ no girl scout cookies, ” she said. “ you stole my tree. ”

[troubledkid]

𝐑𝐎𝐑𝐘 𝐆𝐈𝐋𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐄 + 𝐎𝐏𝐄𝐍

𝐒𝐇𝐄 sat in a corner booth, her fifth cup of coffee growing cold in front of her. (she’d wanted to sit at the counter, but apparently her laptop took up too much space, and her notebook was at risk of condiment spills. apparently.) the piece rory was working on was a nothing of a story, one she’d hoped would take shape with enough grease and caffeine in her system. but she was three pancakes and a plate of bacon the size of her head in, and all she had was the byline. rory gilmore, contributing reporter. the rest was a blank page.

her cursor blinked at her tauntingly, and rory slumped down against the table with a sigh, letting her face fall on her keyboard. whatever smash her forehead generated would be better than what she’d written. behind her, there were footsteps. someone approaching the table.

“ keep ‘em coming luke, ” she groaned, her voice muffled against the metal. “ we’re gonna be here awhile. ”

[troubledkid]

𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐂𝐘 + 𝐀𝐍𝐍𝐀𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐇

𝐀𝐍𝐍𝐀𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐇 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐋𝐃𝐍’𝐓 𝐐𝐔𝐈𝐓𝐄 get comfortable, and it was starting to seriously dampen her mood / study mojo . honestly , she was mostly trying not to think about her nightmare . law books were not helping , and she was considering popping in headphones to help her focus ( her adhd told her this wouldn’t work, but she decided not to worry about it ) when she felt a presence across from her — she hadn’t realized it before, but the park she was sitting in was rather crowded . ❝ you can go ahead and sit ❞ she says, gesturing towards the seat across from her, ❝ i was leaving in a bit , anyways . ❞

&

gods help him, percy was not about to fail out of school. he was running on a several-year no-expulsion streak, and he didn’t think he could bear the look on his mom’s face if he came home to tell her he’d fucked it up again, this time so close to the finish line. not when he was finally getting the shot at college she’d never had. he couldn’t do that to her -- but he also had to actually pass his classes. the swim scholarship would only get him so far.

the homework wasn’t doing itself, and sitting still to study in the library? not happening. so he grabbed his skateboard and headed for the park, hoping for some kind of marine bio-related epiphany, and then -- hey, he knew the girl on the bench, didn’t he? he stopped his board in front of her and smiled stupidly as she looked up. “heeeeey, bestie,” he said. “don’t move on my account.”

[troubledkid]

「   @troubledkid ; a dependent mumu for @infinityhq . penned by claire.    」 ft ;; percy jackson ( intro ; tag ) + rory gilmore ( intro ; tag ) + steve rogers ( intro ; tag ) ϟ  pinterest + full tag drop ϟ

[troubledkid]

「    ella purnell   ,   25   ,   cis female  +  she/her    」 ˚╰ ❃ ╮  did  you  know    ACE'S   real  name  is    RORY GILMORE   ?!    around  the  island  they  seem  to  be  quite     smart   ,  but  also     stubborn   ,  but  it  makes  sense  given  they  are  a     JOURNALIST     and  come  from     GILMORE GIRLS    .  you  can  hear   THERE SHE GOES  by  THE LA'S   blasting  from  their  house ,  but  be  careful   !   they  can  be  agitated  as  nightmares  bring  back  memories  of  LEAVING STARS HOLLOW TO REPORT ON A POLITICAL CAMPAIGN .  even  so ,  it’s  impossible  to  see  their    BATTERED ANNA KARENINA   and  not  think  about  them .   penned  by :    claire .

𝐇𝐎𝐖  𝐖𝐀𝐒  𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑  𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒  𝐋𝐈𝐅𝐄  𝐒𝐎  𝐅𝐀𝐑  ?

lorelai leigh ( rory ) gilmore was born to lorelai victoria ( lorelai ) gilmore, a runaway sixteen year old hopped up on pain meds, who decided to name her child after herself in a fit of feminist self-reclamation. that’s what she always said, anyway. lorelai came from money, but rory wasn’t born into it. she was born into a lovely little shed in the back of a little local inn, just her and her young mother against the world. she wouldn’t have had it any other way.

as she grew up, her mother more best friend than authority figure, lorelai worked her way through school, worked her way up at the inn, found them a house and a home and a community that came together to raise a shy, bookish, too-smart-for-her-own-good toddler. there was talk, sometimes, of the gilmores, and the life her mother had run from--and, fleetingly, contact with her father, a well-to-do kid with nothing but charm, who’d never had to deal with consequences a day in his life. but, for the most part, it was just the lorelais. it was all rory ever needed.

( she wouldn’t realize until she was much older how hard her mom had worked, how much they’d struggled, how many sacrifices she’d made so her daughter could keep filling her drawers with books and her head with dreams. )

lorelai wanted more for rory. rory wanted more for rory, too, but she wouldn’t admit it. she’d talk about being a pulitzer-winning journalist, of going to the best colleges in the country, of circling the globe breaking the Next Big Story, and then she’d go to the same little diner and drink the same burnt coffee and make the same small talk with her neighbors. she was admitted to a very good private school, but there was no way to make the money work--lorelai would rather die than ask her parents, she said. for all intents and purposes with them, she was already dead.

so rory graduated public school, then secured herself a full scholarship to the local university’s honors college. it wasn’t quite what her mom had dreamed for her ( it wasn’t quite what she’d dreamed for herself ) , but it was good enough. she graduated college top of her class, with a job lined up reporting on a political campaign. she chased it, which led to fractionally bigger things, modest success, no pulitzers, then back to a full-time gig at the newspaper back exactly where she’d grown up. of course she had. things always came full circle with the gilmores, didn’t they?

𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓  𝐖𝐀𝐒  𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑  𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒  𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓  𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐄  𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓  ?

she’s in... jail? why is she in jail? why are they telling her she stole a yacht? oh, god, did she steal a yacht? she stole a yacht. there’s a boy with dirty blond hair and a crooked smile and a voice dripping with money beside her, like he thought this was a good idea, or he knew it was a bad idea but he didn’t stop her. she wants her mom ; she never , ever wants her mom to know about this. this is their turning point. this is where it falls apart. this is her rock bottom, but there’s no way she doesn’t keep sliding. there’s an older man hovering on the edges, a man with the blond boy’s nose and mouth, but the set of his jaw is harder, his eyes colder. he’s told her she’ll be nothing. she feels like she’ll be nothing. she is nothing.

𝐇𝐎𝐖  𝐀𝐑𝐄  𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘  𝐅𝐄𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆  𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇  𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐈𝐑  𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓  𝐅𝐄𝐖  𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒  ?

she’s confused, and she’s, honestly, a little sad and angry. her life is all she’s known, and it’s been so comfortable, so normal, made so much sense. but there’s a version out there, she’s seeing, who lived more. who lived better, maybe. who had more family. who knew her grandparents, who had adventures, who could have been something else entirely. and lorelai kept it from her. she thinks. she’s not sure. it’s all a little hazy.

𝐀𝐍𝐘𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐄𝐋𝐒𝐄 ?

pinterest + playlist !

[troubledkid]

「    wolfgang novogratz, twenty-one, cis male + he/him    」 ˚╰ ❃ ╮  did  you  know    SEAWEED BRAIN'S    real  name  is    PERCY JACKSON     ?!    around  the  island  they  seem  to  be  quite     loyal     ,  but  also     impulsive    ,  but  it  makes  sense  given  they  are  a     STUDENT     and  come  from    PERCY JACKSON    .  you  can  hear   SEVEN NATION ARMY  by  THE WHITE STRIPES   blasting  from  their  house ,  but  be  careful   !   they  can  be  agitated  as  nightmares  bring  back  memories  of  DEFEATING GAEA .  even  so ,  it’s  impossible  to  see  their  SWORD (SLASH BALLPOINT PEN; DON'T WORRY ABOUT IT)   and  not  think  about  them .   penned  by :    claire  .

𝐇𝐎𝐖  𝐖𝐀𝐒  𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑  𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒  𝐋𝐈𝐅𝐄  𝐒𝐎  𝐅𝐀𝐑  ?

(this is horribly long i’m sorry) (tw death, illness, implied domestic abuse)

They called him a troubled kid. A loser. A mess up. A failure. No attention span, a problem child, poor grades, nothing but backtalk. Whatever the opposite of “a pleasure to have in class” was. They didn’t see how hard Percy was trying. They didn’t see him playing catchup from the moment he was born.

Percy never knew his father--he never even knew who his father was. From day one, it was was just him and his mother, Sally, a young high school dropout. (Her parents had been killed in a plane crash when she was young, and she lost her dreams of a writing degree with her uncle, proof that the worst things happened to the best people.) Sally didn’t have much, but she gave everything she had to being a good mother to Percy. And she was--the best mother Percy could possibly have asked for, giving and patient and funny and kind and honest (except when it came to his dad; that was off limits).

And then she married Gabe Ugliano, who was as awful as Sally was good, but he did give them something resembling stability. A little bit. For a while.

Percy wasn’t exactly conducive to stability--he was kicked out of every school he tried, draining Sally’s savings and Gabe’s patience. Sometime around school three, when he was eight or so, he was diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia, but the labels didn’t do anything for the trail of inexplicable bad luck that followed him wherever he went. No matter what he did, no matter his intention, despite the fact that he never--never--meant to do anyone any harm, things blew up in Percy’s face. Sometimes literally. He was a good kid, really, but they only ever saw him as trouble. And he was running out of last resorts.

Halfway through middle school, all at once, Sally got sick, Gabe croaked, Percy got kicked out of another school, and someone granted him a full ride to a boarding school that would have him. (Rumors were maybe--maybe--his dad had something to do with it, whoever he was, but there’s no proof of that.) At long last, school stuck. For the first time, Percy had friends, did okay enough in his classes, made his way through with hope for a future.

Sally remarried--a good man this time, a high school teacher. Percy, against all odds, graduated high school (as captain of the swim team, at that!), and enrolled in college (Sally will insist she always believed in him, but she was surprised by that one, too). He’s still gods-awful at school, but he’s doing his best. He has no idea what he’s majoring in, if he’ll even scrape by at all. He’s still on the swim team, he’s drawn to the seaside, he spends his days wondering if he’ll ever catch a break; if he’ll ever be able to prove himself. Percy knows he was meant to do something--he just doesn’t know what.

𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓  𝐖𝐀𝐒  𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑  𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒  𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓  𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐄  𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓  ?

he’s underwater. he can breathe, or he thinks he can--he knows he should be able to. but this water is different, darker, deeper. it is subsuming him and suffocating him, and he feels himself washing away in pieces. the current swallows him up, and he is forgetting who he is, where he is, why he is. it’s dark, so dark. his body is boiling, feverish, burning up, but the water itself isn’t all that hot. he wants to scream. the only sound he can make is a muffled choke. there are monsters in his periphery, the detritus of lives, the lost echoes of souls. but, from the small of his back, he feels a tug. he sees a blonde girl on a dock. he sees-- he sees-- 

nothing. it’s so dark.

he can’t breathe.

𝐇𝐎𝐖  𝐀𝐑𝐄  𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘  𝐅𝐄𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆  𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇  𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐈𝐑  𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓  𝐅𝐄𝐖  𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒 ?

confused. a little bit afraid. and, somehow, hopeful? there’s been something missing his whole life, and, there, just out of reach--there it is. percy knows he’s good at something. he knows he has a purpose. he feels stronger around water and always has a pen on him, no matter how hard he tries to lose it. he just has to figure out what it all means.

𝐀𝐍𝐘𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐄𝐋𝐒𝐄 ?

pinterest + playlist !

[troubledkid]

Wolgang Novogratz as Nick in Feel The Beat

[troubledkid]

ella purnell being incredibly adorable in sweetbitter 1x01

[troubledkid]

rory gilmore + season 1

[troubledkid]

percy jackson ⇀ demigod

“Because I know you, Percy Jackson. In many ways, you are impulsive, but when it comes to your friends, you are as constant as a compass needle. You are unswervingly loyal, and you inspire loyalty. You are the glue that will unite the seven.” 

@camphalfbloodnetwork: demi-god search party