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olivia-anderson-fanfic · 1 year

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Yuu can do it!

Part 27

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Ito sighed, rubbing their temples. They needed a couple of minutes alone to think.

Also, Ace and Deuce were already starting to complain and, quite frankly, they didn’t want to deal with it.

So, the moment they stepped back through the mirror, Ito let go of Ace and broke away from the group. “I need to go to work,” they lied through their teeth, sending an apologetic look back at their friends.

Kuroki’s eyes narrowed. “Bullshit. You don’t have set hours.”

“Sorry, bud, can’t hear you, in work mode,” Ito said.

But, despite what they said, they did hear Enma clear his throat and say: “Well, I actually do have set hours, soooooooo…”

“Set hours that I know for a fact you don’t have today,” Kuroki said, grabbing him by the wrist before the boy could abandon him. “You are not leaving me.”

In their moment of distraction, Ito fled down a different hallway.

It bought them a little time to clear their head. They had much to think about. And also a lot of work to do if they wanted to get the library to the point where it could be considered anything close to ‘orderly’. They had a plan, obviously, one that involved using a heck of a lot of the budget purely to annoy Crowley as revenge for giving them this impossible task… but, man, staring at the mountain of books by their desk was depressing.

They didn’t get much time alone, though. Obviously. Their dormmates knew where they worked, after all.

Honestly, Ito was mildly surprised by just how long it took them. Until they noticed that Ace and Deuce were both carrying bags adorned with the logo for Sam’s Shop (a skull wearing a tophat, inscribed in what seemed to be a rune of some sort). Okay. Looks like they were officially going to be staying at the Ramshackle Dorm for the foreseeable future. Ito would probably need to take off work early to help them all set up a room or two for the boys, because sleeping on the floor was not fun.

How sad they were that they might need to leave early. Truly, they wished to stay longer and help Crowley more. But they simply had no choice. This was their cross to bear.

“How’s being a pink-collar worker?” Ace teased.

“Pink-collar?” Enma said, his eyebrows knitting together.

“Jobs that are traditionally done by women,” Kuroki sighed. And then he yanked at Ace’s much more literal collar. “And, maybe, not the best time to tease people about their neckwear.”

Ace huffed at the reminder.

“Ai, if you guys start fighting in here, Crowley will have my head. Do it in the hallway so I can have plausible deniability.”

There was a beat as Ace seemed to genuinely consider it.

Ito sighed. “Don’t, please, I was kidding. And, to answer your question: whoever organized the library last – if anyone ever even did – put cookbooks next to books on childhood trauma.”

“It could be right. If a kid tried my cooking, they’d be traumatized,” Enma offered.

“I still don’t see how you can mess up cutting vegetables,” said Kuroki, narrowing his eyes at him.

“And, if there is anyone up there, you never will have to see – or worse, taste,” he said solemnly.

Kuroki rolled his eyes. “Weaponized incompetence.”

Enma rolled his eyes right back. “Last time I tried to cook I messed up mac n’ cheese.”

“... how?!”

Enma was saved from explaining himself (sadly, Ito was genuinely intrigued by that specific line of conversation) by Deuce tugging on Kuroki’s sleeve:

“Kuroki-san…”

“I don’t think that honorific bodes well for me.”

“I need help with my homework.”

Kuroki sighed. Deeply. But he nodded.

Grim huffed and abandoned ship before he would have to do something as nerdy as homework. Ito noticed, absently, that now that the monster was wearing a collar he was unable to float, and that the monster seemed very annoyed about this as he was forced to hop up onto Ito’s (admittedly rather tall in comparison to Grim) desk manually.

Much to their annoyance. The monster had sat down on one of the papers they needed. Despite the monster’s insistence, he definitely did have a lot of Cat traits.

But, before they could tell the monster off, Enma leaned against the desk as well, grinning. “Can I check out a book or will you have a breakdown?”

Ito clicked their tongue. “Go ahead. Just bring it to me when you’re done. Don’t put it back where you found it. I’m pretty sure that’s why this place is so messed up.”

He flashed a quick ‘ok’ sign and then promptly disappeared down the many aisles of books in search of something to read.

“That guy is the nerdiest jock I’ve ever met,” Ace commented.

Ito snorted. “Well, if you insist on putting labels on people then, yeah, you’re eventually going to find people that don’t really fit them.”

Ace narrowed his eyes at them. “Are you mad?”

“Mmm…” Ito hummed, the word ‘no’ on their tongue, but Ace seemed to already know the answer, and lying likely wouldn’t convince him otherwise. So, they shrugged a little and said, “Kind of. Not at any of you.”

“At Crowley?” Ace guessed.

“Not at the moment.”

“The ex-librarian?”

Ito’s lips twitched into a wry grin. “Well, maybe a little, but not who I’m thinking of right now.”

“Is it at the Housewarden?” Ace asked, hopeful.

“Nope,” they said. “But you can rant about him if you want. This is kind of mind-numbing.”

Ace lit up. Clearly, this is what he had been after all along. He slung an arm over their shoulders, leaning heavily on them as he began to complain, at length, about the Housewarden and his insane policies and how Riddle threw tantrums whenever things didn’t go his way and…

Grim rested his head in his paws and mouthed along in the background, the way one might with a song he had listened to dozens of times. It wasn’t a song, but Ito was more than sure that the hour they had been gone had been full of these exact complaints, said over and over again to anyone that would even pretend to listen.

Something that was further proven when Enma started to head over to read by Ito, overheard maybe three words, groaned, and immediately turned around to look for Kuroki and Deuce instead.

It was when Ito had started genuinely wondering how someone could say the same two things repeatedly while still changing the wording every time, that Ace’s flow was broken:

“Hey,” an unknown voice said.

Ito glanced up, expecting someone to ask them a question about the library (or, more likely, a fight, considering how everyone at this godforsaken school was), only to find themself speechless.

Grim peeked an eye open, saw what was there, and immediately decided to play dead. Complete with a blue tongue lolling out of his mouth.

Ace did not notice any of this, barely even waving a hand in acknowledgment of the person, still only concerned with complaining about the Housewarden like there was no tomorrow. Which simply could not do, apparently, because he was soon baited into looking over:

“Nice collar you’ve got there.”

Ace whipped around, mouth open, clearly about to tell the person off, but instead he shrieked.

“Hey, it’s a library,” said the fucking floating head. “Keep your voice down, yeah?”

Ace made a pitiful squeaking noise in lieu of an answer.

Kuroki, Enma, and Deuce rounded the corner in a rush, their eyes wide. But this was nothing compared to how wide their eyes got when they saw the floating head with no body what the fuck –.

“Ghost head,” Deuce said, maybe a little late, maybe a little simplistic in his wording, but accurate nonetheless. “That’s a ghost head.”

“Oh dear. It seems that I’m not all here,” said the head. They made no move at all to right this wrong. Honestly, Ito didn’t care much about most things, but they thought even they would be concerned if their body had gone missing. Was this a common occurrence for the head?

“So… you have a body, then?” said Deuce.

The head nodded, and wow was that weird to look at.

Not because of the head itself. The head was… nice looking, Ito supposed. Vibrant purple and pink hair, cat ears adorned with piercings, yellow eyes that glimmered with mirth. It was tough to get past the lack of body, though.

“Who’re you?” Grim squeaked.

“Artemiy Artemiyevich Pinker. Local conyandrum. Am I a cat? Am I a purrson? Wouldn’t mew like to know?”

Ito had been given way too much to process in a short period of time. Why is this person naught but a floating head? What kind of sadistic people gave him his name? Did that guy just meow at them?

On the other end of the spectrum, it seemed that the puns and intrigue surrounding the boy’s current lack of body had instantly won over Enma. They needed to do something about that boy’s lack of self-preservation.

Thankfully, Enma’s reaction was very much in the minority. Most people were closer to Ito in their reactions:

Ace put a hand to his temple, his brain clearly working overtime to make sense of whatever was going on. “Ooookay, listen, Art –... Arty? Run that name by me again?”

“People usually just call me Chenya,” the head offered, and thank god for that. “I’m, y’know, from the other side of the looking glass.”

Ito did not know. “Great. Another weird one.”

Chenya grinned. “You think? I’d say I’m just about as mad as any other purrson mew hang out with.”

“Hence the word ‘another’,” Ito said.

They ignored Kuroki’s sound of vague protest and Enma’s mumble of ‘pot, meet kettle’.

Ace didn’t seem to be pleased by this observation, either: “I don’t have the energy to deal with… whatever this is. Just leave us alone, man.”

“Aw, but I couldn’t help but overhear you complaining about the local… oh, what’d you call him? ‘Teapot tyrant’?” Chenya said, and Ito got the weird impression that the boy was crossing seemingly nonexistent arms.

“I mean…” Enma said. “Ace-kun really should learn when and when not to talk bad about someone. Most notably: in public, where they can overhear or where someone else can hear and tell them.”

Ace scowled. “Hey, he’s not here, you don’t need to lick his high heels or whatever. He can’t even collar you because you’re not in his dorm, and it wouldn’t affect you if he did. Relax. The bitch has no control over you.”

“Someone has learned nothing from what happened at lunch yesterday,” Kuroki commented, more amused than anything.

The tips of Ace’s ears turned red. “Doesn’t mean I was wrong! He’s crazy, and so are all of those insane rules he follows!”

“Can’t really say that’s wrong, purr say,” Chenya offered. “Riddle’s always been pretty strict, even as a kit.”

Deuce’s eyebrows knit. “As a kit – I mean – kid? Do you know anything about him?”

“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t.”

Enma’s eye twitched. Oh? Perhaps he would figure out self-preservation on his own because the thing that fascinated and amused him was also extremely aggravating to interrogate.

(Not that they were interrogating Chenya, of course, that was – probably – illegal. They simply had a couple of questions for him that they intended to get answers for in any way necessary. Like a very weird form of hazing. Unless hazing was also illegal. In which case they were not doing that, either… hey look Enma is annoyed!)

“Not an answer.”

“You didn’t ask an easy question to answer,” Chenya said as a counter. “Do you have anything you want to know?”

“Yeah, what the fuck is wrong with him?” Ace said bluntly.

Chenya’s eyes gleamed. “I believe your four-eyed friend might know.”

There was a beat as everyone went through their mental catalog of ‘friends’, trying to figure out which one that the head was talking about.

Grim, either mentally linked to Chenya on account of their shared cat-like traits or just rude enough to know who it was instantly, said: “You mean that Trey guy? What about him?”

“He’s known Riddle since we were all kids,” said Chenya.

Ito frowned. “You keep saying things that suggest you’ve known him just as long. Why won’t you just tell us?”

Chenya’s lips curled into a smirk of sorts. “If you’re that perceptive, then why do you need me to answer things for you?”

And then, as quickly as he had appeared, the head popped right out of existence.

“... spooky bitch,” Kuroki mumbled.

“No one makes any sense here,” Grim complained.

Enma crossed his arms over his chest. “Oh, I’m sure he could have made sense if he’d wanted to. But he didn’t.”

Kuroki shrugged. “Well, he did give us something, at least.”

Deuce frowned. “I don’t know, did he? I never really got the impression that Trey-senpai and the Housewarden were childhood friends, of all things…”

“It’s all we’ve got,” Kuroki sighed.

Enma nodded his agreement. “And we just finished our homework, so it’s not like we have anything better to do. No offense, Ito, but you’re not exactly my type, so watching you write just doesn’t seem fun to me.”

“None taken.” Ito tapped the end of their pen to their lips, quietly mulling things over, before shrugging to themself. “You guys should stay, though. That cookbook he used was from here. He’ll have to come back to return it at some point.”

They passed the time. Ace and Deuce played a couple of games of finger football. Kuroki decided he was going to braid Ito’s hair despite their complaints that it would get frizzy and Ito didn’t genuinely care enough to stop him. Enma went back to reading his book on yagujen. Grim slept, as always.

Ito worked. As people with jobs are wont to do.

And, eventually, Trey came in. Amber eyes caught on a sign by the door, asking everyone to hand the books they were returning to the person at the front desk, and he took a couple more steps inside before looking at the aforementioned desk. Which was surrounded by people. Trey’s shoulders tensed.

“Oh,” said Trey, quietly. He took just a few more steps forward, enough so that he could hand over the cookbook, but was still trying to keep his distance. “Heyyyyy, everyone.”

Ito bit their tongue to stop their teeth from grinding together as they added another book to the pile of things to be categorized.

“Hi, Senpai!” Enma said amiably.

Trey lifted a hand in a wave, however hesitant. “Are you guys…?”

“Here for you? Kinda. They are. I’m stuck here,” said Ito, shrugging.

“We’ve got a problem with the way Housewarden Riddle is handling all of this,” Ace cut straight to the point.

“Ah, yes, I assumed that would be the case…”

“What do you think about the whole thing?” Deuce said, not quite accusatory yet, but bordering on it.

Trey chanced a look back towards the exit, blatantly considering making a break for it.

An option that was quickly made far harder when Ace slung an arm over Trey’s shoulder, dragging him into his side. An action that seemed friendly on the surface, if it weren’t clearly just a way to trap him.

Which might have been intimidating if Ace wasn’t, like, ten centimeters (or four inches) shorter.

He smiled evilly in an attempt to make up for the loss of fear factor. “Really, do tell. You and Riddle are childhood friends, right? Have you been pandering to him all this time or is it a new thing?”

Trey raised an eyebrow. “Who told you that?”

“Some weird guy named Chenya,” said Grim.

“Chenya?” said Trey. He gave a small, fond sigh. “That explains it, yeah.”

“Off-topic,” Ace said, waving a hand vaguely.

“Right…” Deuce said. “You never answered. You don’t really think that what Rosehearts-senpai is doing is right do you?”

“Well…” said Trey, which wasn’t an answer but also definitely was.

“Aren’t you older than Rosehearts-senpai? He seems the type to look up to authority.”

A couple of side-eyes were sent Enma’s way. Ace coughed into his hand, and the cough sounded strangely like the word ‘hypocrite’, but that was surely a coincidence.

Enma ignored them all. “And if you’ve really known him all this long, shouldn’t a good friend tell their friends when they’re messing up?”

“I do when I need to,” Trey said, careful in his attempts to placate them all. “I don’t think the situation calls for it.”

Attempts that went completely unappreciated:

“You don’t?!” Ace said incredulously.

“Listen,” Trey said, but he didn’t seem to have much for them to listen to. No words escaped him for quite a while, despite him opening and closing his mouth several times. He pressed his lips together thinly. And then he sighed, all of his energy bleeding out of him. “Okay, you have to understand, these sort of strict rules made Riddle.”

Everyone stared at him like he was insane. As was normal when you say sentences that don’t really make sense without context.

Trey pushed up his glasses to rub the space between his eyes. “His parents were famous doctors – like, super famous, everyone where we’re from knows about the Rosehearts… and, uh, his mom really wanted Riddle to live up to her legacy.”

Enma’s nose scrunched.

“Exactly,” Trey said, sending a pained smile. “Basically, Riddle would spend every second of every day following this education program she made for him.”

“Sounds like it sucks,” said Grim, ever the well-spoken monster.

“Yep. What he ate, what he wore, what soap he used, who his friends were – she decided all of that for him. And Riddle did it.” Trey leaned forward, almost conspiratorial. “And, get this: it worked. He mastered his signature spell by age ten. He’s the top student in all of his classes.”

Kuroki nodded thoughtfully. “Well, if it worked for him, then he probably thinks it’ll work for everybody.”

“Exactly. He thinks he’s helping his dorm members grow. And breaking rules gets in the way of that.”

“I guess that makes sense,” said Ace, slowly, his eyes narrowed.

“Look, you see Riddle as a tyrant, and I get that, but… I can’t hold it against him, y’know?”

Grim nodded slowly. He flicked a no-longer-flaming ear, pretending to have a particularly bad itch back there to avoid Trey’s eyes.

Deuce wrung his hands. “So, that’s why, then…”

“I understand now,” said Ace, but he seemed no calmer. He jabbed a finger into Trey’s chest. “You’re the reason Riddle’s like this.”

“WHAT?!” everyone chorused.

(Ito coughed into their hand to hide their laugh. It was more startled than genuinely amused, but still probably a bad look.)

“You know what his parents did to him, and you know it was wrong, right?”

“I mean… yeah…?”

Ace sneered. “Well, Riddle is making the same mistake his parents did. And you know that’s wrong. He’s your friend. Don’t you want to yell at his parents sometimes? Yeah, right? Then do you really want him to become them?”

Trey’s eyes widened.

“You say you just can’t bring yourself to be mad at him,” Ace said, giving a mocking pout for just a moment before his face began twisting into a sneer. “You guys are supposed to be childhood friends!”

“Ace, man, come on…” said Deuce, putting a hand on Ace’s shoulder, trying to get him to calm down.

He was shrugged off. “You’re letting him go down a bad path. What kind of shitty friend does that? You want to call yourself his friend? Then FUCKING ACT LIKE IT.”

“HEY,” said Crowley, popping up out of nowhere.

The first years all jolted in surprise, but Trey seemed hardly affected. Outside of the usual sheepishness that came with being yelled at by the headmaster, of course.

“YOU THERE, BE QUIET! YOU’RE IN A LIBRARY!”

“You’re louder than any of us, though,” said Grim, pressing down on his ears.

Crowley could not blink in surprise, but it very much seemed like he did. He coughed into his hand. “Oh. Right. My apologies. But let us all strive to maintain the library as a quiet place for reading from now on, yes? Surely this –.”

He cast his gaze around, only to find Ito trying to disappear behind their now useful pile of books. Or almost useful, since he had still spotted them.

“Ito-kun. They were yelling right in front of you! Why did you not try to bring order?”

Ito shrugged. “It was interesting.”

(Kuroki shoulders trembled in silent laughter. Enma cuffed them both over the back of the head.)

The Headmage sighed. Softly, with feeling. “Fine. You’d better be right. What, pray tell, was so interesting?”

Deuce was quick to jump in: “Well, since you asked…”

It took a while to catch Crowely up, but he was a surprisingly attentive listener. Sure, he’d listened to their explanation of what had gone on at the mines, but he’d had a vested interest in making sure they were okay. Because if they weren’t then he might have been held liable. This was all just petty gossip about dorm members.

Maybe he was just interested in the goings on campus?

No, that didn’t sound like him.

Maybe the guy just liked drama.

It made sense, he was pretty dramatic.

Now, though, he was strangely serious as he brought his hand up to cradle his own chin, thinking. “I believe I understand… you are resistant to apologizing, but unable to devise any other method of getting the Housewarden to remove the collar.”

Ace nodded fervently.

“Well, if you and the Housewarden are truly unable to reconcile, you could always transfer. However, the Dark Mirror chose that dorm for you using the essence of your being, any attempt to relocate would necessitate a burdensome process, as well as a new ritual.”

Ito was suddenly very against Ace joining their dorm. Because they had their doubts that Crowley would be the one to carry out that ‘burdensome process’. And, quite possibly, they would be in charge of setting up the ritual as well, if only the non-magical parts. “Don’t you fucking dare,” they hissed.

Ace’s eyes gleamed with mirth, and he seemed to seriously consider it for just a moment. The prick.

But then he shook his head. “That feels like running away.”

Crowley hummed thoughtfully. “Then it sounds like you should challenge Rosehearts-kun for leadership of the dorm.”

“WHAAAAAT?!” The first years chorused.

“What did I say about lowering your voices?”

Okay. It was their turn to be sheepish.

But ‘Ace’ and ‘sheepish’ should never be in the same sentence, so he was entirely unapologetic: “But what you said was insane!”

“There is nothing remotely ‘insane’ about it. It’s how Rosehearts-kun first got the position, after all.”

Ito raised an eyebrow. They’d just assumed that it was based on academic merit, especially since Riddle had put so much weight on his academic standing making him ‘the most correct’, but…

“How do you become a Housewarden?”

“There are several ways. You could be appointed by the previous Housewarden, or it could be decided through a select procedure that is specific to the dorm. In your case, at Heartslabyul, this would be through a duel.”

Ace looked a little hopeful. “I thought fighting with magic was against the rules.”

Kuroki snorted. “That’s never stopped anyone here before,” he pointed out.

Ace tipped his head to the side consideringly.

Crowley eyed the two of them warily for just a moment before seeming to decide that it wasn’t worth it. “... in general, yes, fighting with magic is not allowed here. However, a formal process in the presence of the Headmage is another matter entirely.”

Ace huffed, a little put out, but not entirely. “So… will it work?”

Trey crossed his arms over his chest. “Well… I’m pretty sure the rules wouldn’t allow for preemptively handicapping your opponent. So this could force Riddle to remove your collar without apologizing. But –.”

“The right to challenge a Housewarden is bestowed upon all students when enrolling at Night Raven College. So, will you challenge Rosehearts-kun?”

Ace didn’t even hesitate. “Sure, worth a shot.”

Deuce did hesitate for a moment longer, but he eventually shrugged. “Becoming Housewarden within the first week would put me well on my way to being an honor student.”

“I want to beat up the brat, too!” Grim said, raising a paw.

“I’m afraid not, Grim-kun. You cannot challenge a Housewarden of a dorm to which you do not belong.”

Grim groaned and flopped against the table. “I’m never getting this thing off…”

“When I’m Housewarden, I’ll make Riddle remove it,” said Ace, a surprisingly nice gesture from the redhead.

“But then no one will know how cool I am,” Grim whined.

“We know how cool you are,” said Kuroki.

Ito and Enma shared skeptical glances. They might have given the monster ‘cute’, but cool…?

Trey looked between them all for just a moment before sighing. “I know you’ve all devolved into messing around, so it’s probably already decided… but… are you guys really sure about this? Deuce? This seems… unlike you.”

“Every man’s gotta make a grab for glory at least once in his lifetime,” said Deuce, grinning. He glanced at Ace. “And I will be the one to get the glory, okay? If we’re teaming up, you’d better believe I’m going to be the leader, yeah?”

Ace groaned. “Here we go again.”

“Huh?” Deuce’s expression darkened. “What’d you say? I have more experience with this kind of thing, anyways –.”

“That’s my cue to leave,” said Crowley, standing abruptly from where he had perched on Ito’s desk – what was it with people and their desk? But they couldn’t even take a moment to appreciate the newly-cleared workspace. “We should get started on the paperwork.”

Ito’s mouth dropped open. They were filing paperwork anyways?! What a scam!

They were still deciding on whether they would prefer glaring at Ace and Deuce for making them do this or sending them pleading looks to try and make them take it back, when the Headmaster placed a hand on their shoulder and steered them out.

They groaned as they stumbled back into their shared room with Enma and Kuroki, their back aching from leaning over a tablet for so long, their vision still swimming with formal words they only half understood. They glanced towards the bathroom, with its unfortunately cold shower, and decided that it’d be a problem for the next day. They could go to class with wet hair. Who cares.

They changed quickly before collapsing into bed.

“So?”

“They’ve got their own rooms,” Enma reported. “The ghosts even helped us clean for them. I think they’re warming up to them.”

“We should warn them about traps tomorrow, then,” Ito yawned. “Did you guys come up with any way to deal with the duel tomorrow?”

“Best chance is that they try and fire off a shot before Riddle. The guy looks weak, he probably can’t take a hit, so… Deuce sends out a spell, Ace uses his wind magic to speed it up, and we pray that you can’t block spells in this world.”

Ito hummed their understanding. That all made sense.

The quick catch-up session quieted for a moment as they all shifted into their usual sleep positions.

“So… we agree they’re doomed, right?” said Kuroki after a few moments.

Enma hummed his agreement. “We did what we could. It’s on them for choosing to try and fight their senior with magic. Honestly, their best shot is waiting for Rosehearts-senpai to take off their collars and make a run for it.”

Kuroki raised an eyebrow. “Why didn’t you suggest it earlier?”

“It’d be dishonorable,” said Enma, looking aghast.

“You want to know what’s dishonorable? Forgoing a fair and square rock-paper-scissors game to push your, poor, frail classmate off the bed –.”

“Oh my gosh. That was, like, yesterday. Let it go.”

Ito sighed as they half-listened to Enma and Kuroki bicker, peering up at the ceiling as if it might reveal to them what they should do about the upcoming duel.

But there were no words written among the dust, and they soon decided that they’d rather just sleep on it.

#god these kids are all so dumb #i love them so much #yuu can do it!#twst #twisted wonderland #twst fanfic #twst mc #twst yuu #yuu #yuu twst #grim twst #enma yuuken #kuroki yuuya #ace trappola #deuce spade #chenya #Artemiy Artemiyevich Pinker #trey clover #dire crowley

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builderon · 2 years

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The 99 Tragedies of Nikolas E. I. Nolan (Complete)

1.) “You never joke about anything!”

“Last time I made a joke a man’s head exploded.”

“What?”

“It was a sunny day and a large crowd came out to watch a handsome man and his sister in pink drive down the street slowly. The handsome man was smiling at everybody and to keep his good mood I told him a joke. What did the fish say to the deaf man… Exactly! The sister in pink didn’t find it funny, but the handsome man thought it was so good that his head exploded. After that, the car drew away really fast and the crowd went wild, but I felt bad because I didn’t want that handsome man’s head to explode, so I vowed to never make a joke again.”

2.) Nolan was walking down the street when he saw a person that looked like one of those people he went to school with. They locked eyes and as the inevitable passing by of each other happened Nolan and the man looked at each other closely. Nolan wanted to say something, but failed to and continued walking while tormenting himself for failing another interaction. The man continued walking, thinking where he could have seen this strange fellow before, and then a sudden flash of his father’s face came to his mind, making all the good memories of his now passed pa come back. The man was happy for the rest of his walk.

3.) Nolan’s father used to tell Nolan stories about cowboys. Nolan always felt a little sad for his father who could never become a cowboy because he spent all day milking.

4.) Nolan was asked to complete a survey for a company that seemed to want to get a new logo. The options were a donkey and an elephant. Nolan thought the design of the elephant was better so he chose that.

5.) Nolan watched a dog be put to sleep today. He sang a lullaby.

6.) “No I can not tell you a joke. I am sorry. Please just leave!”

“Not even a yo mama joke?”

“What are those?”

“Well… look I tell you one. Sorry teach but I couldn’t do my homework, because I was doing Nolan’s mom! BAAAM!!!”

7.) Nolan always liked to walk around alone. However, his fun was always ruined when a police officer escorted him back to his mother. Fortunately, Nolan’s mother was always nice and she always encouraged him to do the things he liked to do.

8.) Nolan wasn’t bullied in school anymore. He felt unwanted now because all the big bullies bullied the kids who got bullied big. They never noticed him.

9.) The weather report said that there will be a heatwave today so Nolan gave triple the usual amount of water to his favourite plant, but the weather report was wrong and it decided to rain heavily that day which made the plant die. However, when Nolan got back he saw that his favourite pot had finally been cleaned.

10.) An old man told Nolan that “Life will go on with or without you.” which made Nolan happy because he felt it would be quite inconvenient for everybody if he ended the world.

11.) Today Nolan did an IQ test and he was happy to see he got his favourite number as a result.

12.) Today Nolan’s family decorated a tree with balls. Nolan decided to decorate the floor with the balls.

13.) “Recount the votes. They can NOT win with only one more vote!” shouted the man with long hair who claimed to be the bringer of peace. “You are stopping the Age of Aquarius, you monsters!”

This made Nolan wonder what was the difference between monsters and animals. Nolan ended up asking the man with long hair who claimed to be the bringer of peace.

“If you keep asking me these stupid questions I will stab you to death with a dandelion!” Answered the man with long hair who claimed to be the bringer of peace.

14.) “Why would a fish want to talk to a deaf man?” asked the man in the comically large tophat. Then his head exploded. Nolan realized the mistake he made and learned from this experience.

15.) Nolan had to pay 9 more coins for butter today. He then realized this made his purse so much easier to carry and hopped all the way home with his weightless pants.

16.) Nolan was talking to this black guy who had a way of talking.

“But really how can one express these feelings only in a few minutes.”

Nolan was confused about the matter.

“What is love?” Nolan asked.

The man burst up with energy and started writing something. Nolan felt sad for not being able to help.

17.) Nolan saw a child today with really blond hair and blue eyes. The child came up to Nolan and said “Hide this!” and handed him a doll. Nolan then went home and forgot he had the doll with him. He knew he can never give it back now and that made him sad.

18.) Nolan met himself today and did not like what he saw.

19.) It always annoyed Nolan when people repeated unnecessary things and then skipped over important stuff.

19.) Nolan was annoyed today.

21.) Today Nolan was told off for missing a day at work and got fired. He wasn’t sad about this because he couldn’t really understand why more work-free days were a punishment.

22.) Nolan’s bank told him today that they have collapsed because of the recent economic crisis, but Nolan was happy because now all the sad and grumpy bank workers had work-free days too.

23.) “Schützen Sie irgendwelche Juden?”

“What?”

“Ist das Englisch!? Du bist ein Spion gegen den Führer!”

“Hey stop touching me, please!”

“Sie sind wegen Spionage des Dritten Reiches verhaftet!”

24.) Nolan was relentlessly tortured by Nazies but he didn’t know it was Nazies so he felt happy that the big bullies noticed him again.

25.) Nolan decided to not use THE MACHINE ever again. He instead made it into a pot for his favourite plant but felt bad for the plant because the new pot was dirty.

26.) Nolan saw a picture of sunflowers in a yellow vase being burned in a dumpster today. It was a cold day for sure.

27.) Nolan was walking around the city with the doll trying to find the bond child with blue eyes. Unfortunately, he left the doll at the restaurant he was eating at and he saw a man with blond hair and blue eyes take it. They both cried.

28.) Nolan decided to go on a walk today. On the way to the shop, he saw people parading and dressing up in costumes. He met his friend Eduardo.

“Hello, Eduardo!” Nolan said the way Nolan usually says hello to Eduardo.

Eduardo was an interesting guy. He seemed to care an awful lot about things Nolan could not understand.

“What a shit day to you too!”

This was Eduardo’s usual way of greeting people.

“Seems people are quite active today, did I miss something in my calendar?”

Eduardo knew the way Nolan saw the world. His childish perspectives on current events always entertained Eduardo and gave him a spec of hope in between the news articles he is constantly bombarded with. Nolan was the break from the world Eduardo needed every now and then to keep himself sane.

“Well let’s just say this is not the Mardi Gras.”

“Aww… I was getting excited about nothing then.”

29.) Bill was waiting at the bus station. He went asleep for a few minutes so he missed his early bus, which mean an extra 20 minutes needed to be wasted away before he could get home. Nolan saw the tired Bill sitting there by himself and decided to sit next to him.

“Hello.” said Nolan cheerfully.

“...Hi..?” answered Bill in a confused manner. Not too confused though because he was still way too tired to get really confused.

“You seem tired. You should sleep more!”

“Ah,” Bill chuckled “ in my work, sleep is considered the coffee for the weak.”

“What are you doing?”

“Waiting for the 252.”

“No, I mean like generally.”

“Oh, Security Testing. I am actively trying to put myself out of a job and seem to be good at it considering it has been a while since I got paid right.”

“It sounds interesting!”

“It really isn’t.”

“I don’t do much with my time. Just wonder about.”

“I wish I could do that sometimes,” said Bill in a sarcastic tone. He had that kind of personality to make sarcastic remarks feel natural. Practice makes the master after all.

“You can.”

“No.”

“Are you a slave?”

This gave Bill quite a shock. He was black, so the confusion was almost justified, but he was never politely asked if he was a slave or not. He couldn’t quite say it was racism because it didn’t feel like that, but it also somewhat fit the criteria to be racist.

“... No.”

“Oh no I said something stupid again didn’t I?”

Nolan felt really bad and wanted to bury himself in the concrete pavement or become the curb and get splashed on by busses all day so he could understand not to do this. But Bill was interested now. He wanted to learn more about the strange guy who he just stumbled across.

“Hey isn’t that your bus? Go catch it!”

But Bill didn’t budge.

“Who are you?” asked Bill from Nolan who was feeling worse and worse from making Bill miss another bus.

30.) Nolan saw a poster that showed a bunch of men wearing bicycle helmets. He thought this was a very funny picture.

31.) Nolan tried to kill a fly today. He was trying to hit it with a rolled-up newspaper but missed. Then missed again. Then missed AGAIN. Then Nolan hit his mother with full power.

32.) Nolan decided to go on a walk today. As he walked past a flower shop a pretty girl with red hair bumped into Nolan. She nearly fell, but Nolan caught her while knocking over the flowers. They both looked into each other’s eyes while covered in roses. Then Nolan realized touching a woman without consent is wrong so he dropped her.

33.) Nolan smoked a cigarette today for the first time. As he inhaled the smoke, his body felt the strange gas go through his entire body, from throat to lung to back to the throat and finally out. As if something finally scratched an itch he never knew he had. Letting the little white tube in his hand, filled with devil grass slowly disintegrate he watched as the sparkles of fire burned the paper away in a slow, methodical fashion. Nolan hoped this will help her mother connect to him. It did because her mother was happy.

34.) Today Nolan learned that notebooks are made of notes in a book. He never looked at butterflies the same way again.

35.) Nolan got a letter today. It said it was a draft so Nolan threw it away because he wanted to read the complete version. He never got the complete version.

36.) “Hello.”

“Welcome back to GoodMart”

“Did the butter get changed?”

“Yeah… you know due to recent events many companies have stopped shipping to our stores.”

“Finally, I can try some other kind of butter!”

37.) Nolan self-reflected today. Looking at his past he felt the existence of both pain and joy.

The decision was his to decide how he shall use those experiences and move forward to an undetermined future. He looked at his mother and chose.

38.) “What a shit day to you too!”

“Why, it’s sunny?”

“Yeah… knowing what has been going on I wouldn’t be surprised if one day it wasn’t the sun that shined across the sky.”

Nolan then explained what the moon is to Eduardo.

39.) “Ah good to see you again!” said Bill with a bit of enthusiasm in his voice that he had to conjure up from somewhere very deep and cold… and lonely.

“Hello there!”

“What has become of the world heh?”

“Oh no, the trees do that every winter. It's sunny today though, which is nice!”

Bill rolled his eyes at that comment. It wasn’t a sarcastic eye roll, more like the kind that you do when you can not quite believe what you have just heard.

“I wasn’t talking about the weather or the season.”

“Sorry, I can be such a stupid man someti-”

“Stupidity is gender neutral.” Cut in Bill with a dry tone in his voice that showed how many times this statement had to be repeated.

“Yeah… okay.” Answered Nolan who was confused about what did he mess up this time. He was usually confused when he messed up something so this did not phase him as much, but he is still perplexed now and then about what he can mess up.

They both sat at the bus station silently. Nolan decided to break the silence.

“You don’t look happy? Anything happened?”

“A person's face is naturally down, so it is very annoying to hear from people why you don’t smile. Like this is my neutral face, sorry it doesn’t make you feel good, if it helps neither does me. No, by the way, nothing really happened. Just, you know. Life.” Bill said that last word with a little chuckle as if saying, life was bad, was funny somehow. This broke Nolan and he felt that he had enough of people like these.

“I just can’t keep listening to you, people. Always gloomy and sad about, what? I see nothing wrong yet you keep making me feel like the world is awful! I don’t know much, but even I know that you won’t bring me joy.” Nolan blasted off from the bus station and decided to walk today because it was sunny. He did not make a new friend today.

40.) Nolan was walking on a crossroad when his ice cream fell on the ground. He wished he had a time machine so he could go back and prevent this tragedy.

41.) A pigeon with interesting blue feathers on its neck started eating the ice cream Nolan dropped at the crossroads. The scene filled Nolan’s heart with love. Then the pigeon with interesting blue feathers on its neck got hit by a truck and Nolan didn’t really know how to feel about that. He wished he had a time machine so he could go back and prevent this tragedy.

42.) Nolan was sitting on the bus today. He saw the pretty girl with red hair had an empty seat next to her.

“Hi!” The pretty girl with red hair said to Nolan with cheerful positivity in her voice.

“Hello.” answered Nolan.

They both sat silently next to each other as the rain poured down on the bus windows. The pretty girl with red hair slowly fell asleep on his shoulder. They both sat there in silence and both of them missed their stops.

43.) People were cheering on the streets. Nolan didn’t know why they were cheering but decided to join in and shouted “I got those guys here!” When asked why he was cheering, people decided to boo him and kicked him in the stomach. They said something like “You didn’t earn to be happy about this! Your vote got us here in the first place scum!” Nolan walked to the hospital where they rolled their eyes at him. He was bleeding a lot and felt like he was seeing the light. Nobody helped Nolan and he could not understand why? Did he ever do something wrong? What was it? Could he apologise?

44.) “I can’t believe it.”

“Hi, Eduardo!”

“They got away with it. They really just did all of that and got away with it.”

Nolan looked at the newspaper Eduardo was reading.

“Hey, my old butter is back!”

45.) Nolan lost his purse today. His pants were even lighter now.

46.) Nolan’s mother always pushed Nolan. Nolan tried to appreciate that.

47.) Nolan went out to his balcony. He looked down at the people as he was lighting his cigarette. There were days when Nolan was also just done with things. Today was one of those days. When you have to make up reasons that other people like to say, just to keep going… Nolan looked down again. Just looked.

48.) Nolan decided to take a walk today. As he was slowly swaying through the park as the autumn leaves were falling from the trees, covering the crass in that seasonal orange blanket, Nolan was hit in the head with a pineapple and got knocked out instantly. He got to take the pineapple home and made a wonderful dessert out of it, even though he kept losing his vision.

49.) Nolan remembered a story his mother used to tell him when he could not fall asleep. It was about a princess who didn’t wanna become a queen and an evil queen who wanted to keep the royal family going. The queen wasn’t the real mother of the princess. She died in childbirth of a brother the princess never got the chance to see. The queen was a mean old woman who married the princess’ gullible father who never had to think for himself. That kind of personality comes with royalty. The princess also had a grandma who supported the princess in her decision to leave but she got poisoned one day and the princess believes that it was not his father, but the evil queen who accused him in the first place. This drama meant that now it was only the two of them living in the castle together. The queen wanted to have an exemplary princess, but the real princess never wanted any of that. This meant that the queen was forced to use force and threaten the pets, the princess had, with the royal guard. So the princess wore all the dresses, did all the dances, smiled at all the people she had to. The one thing the queen could not get her to do was cut her hair because whenever the royal barber came around the princess would always move her head constantly making the queen's image of “a real queen having short hair” only be a fantasy. She also didn’t want the princess’ pearly skin to be scarred so she always made her pin her hair up really tight, which hurt the princess a lot. The queen was an awful ruler, selfish and arrogant, so an uprising from the people was on the horizon. The revolution was at a boiling point when the queen passed away, leaving her place to be only taken by the princess. Before the queen passed she made sure that all the coronation plans were done. This meant that against the princess’ wishes the coronation was extravagant with golden flowers and great cuisine from all around the world. Important people in expensive dresses are all attending. However, thinking that this is what the new queen wanted was the last straw that the people could take and the raging public outside stormed the castle. The princess, now queen, was crowned and she went out on the balcony to look at the kingdom she had just inherited. She saw the raging public outside. She felt their pain. Their anger. She didn’t want this evil cycle to continue. The new queen looked at the people and gave them what they wanted. She pulled her pin out, letting her long hair fly in the wind and she cut her throat. Her body fell from the balcony right into the masses who then ripped her clothes apart and cut her body in pieces. The End.

50.) “What a shit day to you too! Haven’t seen you in a while…”

“Anything interesting you have read recently?”

“Just the usual. People who can not understand the public, ruling over them.”

“Well, I have read a book.”

“Oh no. Really?”

“Yeah, it was given to me by the bald gentleman.”

“How was the book?”

“Well… I didn’t really understand it. I don’t speak German after all.”

“Nolan… was the book red?”

“Yeah! Did you read it too?”

“Oh boy…”

51.) A child in a red shirt walks up to Nolan.

“Quickly, sir, I need to hide, do you know a good place?”

Nolan thought about this for a second.