#Add Title Properties to Table Class

[joelhappyhil]

What's DAWN, and why should I fund it?

Tumblr doesn't feel like the place to spam ads to get a Kickstarter going, I don't know what makes me think that, but it feels right.

So at risk of wasting my time, I've decided to write a comprehensive overview of my upcoming Kickstarter, DAWN.

INTRO

To get started, here's the opening text as of the game's current version:

DAWN is a grid-based, combat-focused, setting-agnostic TTRPG, made with a focus on mechanics that provide as much depth as possible while keeping the game fast-paced and easy to pick up and play. 

Create your heroes, discover truths of the world, face against thinly veiled metaphors in the forms of fearsome overlords and monsters, and grow - both in power and as people - within a world of your own making! Embark on an adventure with friends, coming with its highest highs and lowest lows, bearing the greatest storms to gaze upon the beautiful DAWN.

NARRATIVE

What may or may not be clear from reading this primer, is that DAWN is heavily inspired by the anime and games I enjoyed in my childhood, KMMOs like Elsword and shows like Fairy tale, both properties with strong color-coded character designs and fun magical specialties for each. I'm trying to recreate this vibe in DAWN, but in a way that can fit into nearly any setting.

The game's got a setting creation activity that can help you both make a fun world and get an idea of what the game's intended tone / important narrative elements are.

There are also a number of roll tables I've written up to serve as suggestions or a way to quickly throw together a setting!

COMBAT

The game's combat is meant to be similarly quick and snappy, with its rules less than 10 pages long (As of now), you've got action points to spend on your turn and by default all characters have access to a melee, ranged, and heavy attack, with your Powers adding additional effects and flavor.

Want to be a cool and quick sword master, no need to choose a class, equipment set, and feats to make this possible, just pick up a power or two that fit, and you're done.

WHY SHOULD I FUND IT?

I haven't shown everything here, but the game is available for free on my Itch, and with that you may be asking "Why should I fund this?"

Short answer: There's still not enough.

Long answer: I really want to add some important things to this game, I need more art, I need a proper title page, and I would really love to pick up Affinity and improve the layout, and with my minimum wage income I can't afford that along with being alive. So if you have interest in this project I would really love if you would follow the KS and consider supporting it on release.

[itwoodbeprefect]

shuffle your favorite playlist and post the first five songs that come up. then copy/paste this ask to your favorite mutuals

hello friend. ❤ i think you sent this to me in april of 2024 so surely finding it in my drafts and actually responding to it in january 2025 is, like, normal. and stuff.

to make things better and/or worse, i'm going to be incapable of keeping this short. this is from my playlist just called "thai", which i need to start splitting up in some way that makes sense, rather than throwing everything in a pile, but i haven't done that yet, so it has 219 songs in it, nearly all of which are there due to some sense of emotional attachment:

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สะมะกึ๊กสะมะกั๊ก (stuckling) - earth & mix ft. jennie panhan

fjdkfd okay, look. we're starting off strong with a song i skip half the time it comes on, but it stays on the list because it does also make me go <3 when i'm reminded of it. this is the OST for ossan's love thailand and it's very nearly unlistenable to me and i deeply love it. the MV is very loud chaos in its purest form (i thought that was true about the peaceful property MV and in hindsight that was SO wrong. the peaceful property MV is goofy in its own way but it's almost demure next to this). bonus points for featuring jennie panhan! i don't know how this series will turn out yet (it's a remake of a japanese property, a type of history on which gmmtv (the company behind this) has a mixed record so far) but GOD am i happy to see that they're finally letting earth (the one in front of the pool table) play a role that lets him be the useless immature babygirl object of everyone's affections, instead of a stoic forest ranger (a tale of 1000 stars) or "almost 40" at 29 (moonlight chicken (i am. still not over that. i may never be.)), because he's GOOD at goofy comedy! jojo tichakorn did not make mama gogo (yet another series) to prove this but he did, inadvertently, prove this! also, there's literally never a bad time to watch mix sahaphap on screen because he's always great. also also. a gmmtv series with an actor who is (actually!) 46 as third billed and an official part of the central love triangle shenanigans? yes, please, thank you. most of this paragraph is not directly relevant to this song but to me it is, because these are the thoughts i have when i hit skip. (actually, one thought that's truly about the song: this has an E rating on spotify, which is incredibly funny to me, because the english subtitles on youtube don't have a single thing even close to a curse word in them, but apparently the thai original may be more rude? or spotify is being weird, which is also possible.)

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เพื่อชีวิตกู / peua chiwit koo - TaitosmitH

taitosmith!!! one of the first times i listened to them i put on a random album and most new thai song lyrics are way too much for me at once to catch more than a sentence fragment here and there, but then at some point i snapped to attention when it was, like, wait. are they singing that someone doesn't want to be a man? and they were. i love their songs, and i love the music videos they make for them, i love how often those MVs actually add layers or tell their own stories. they have a huge number of songs about class struggle, poverty, getting painted as a criminal, problems endemic to thai society (and many societies, but they're very clear about their roots). the MV for กี่ฤดู (kii reudoo, "how many seasons") tells a much smaller story but caught me at the exact right time to have me sobbing for a bit. and then there's one song that had me squinting at the title going ? is this called "helmet"? that can't be right. but it was! that's what it's called! so i was like, okay, this is a song about. wearing a helmet, i guess. but then the lyrics go something like, wearing a helmet isn't cool, i want to go really fast and smash my head into the pavement, it's my business if i want to take this risk. but then the MV was released (fairly recently, this is one of their newest songs) and in it a guy goes on a sort of vigilante spree to force people into wearing helmets and avenge his family member(? or friend?) who was killed by reckless drivers, and also there's a chance that at the end he's a ghost? which, just. i do enjoy a poppy catchy love song, but goddamn, the journey that one single song can take you on.

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เจ็บก็สิอดเอา (stay strong) - MANG bamm

love this one, it's great! in the MV mang (from bamm. mang is her name, bamm is the group she's usually in) stands in the middle of a field in a giant hat and a beautiful dress and high heeled boots and it's honestly pretty impressive she doesn't fall over. it also stars daou and offroad (actors, singers (though not here), etc.; currently stuck on my radar because they're the leads in century of love, which is stuck in my head) playing characters seemingly called daou and offroad (it's on daou's namecard at the start, and near the end he's crying over offroad's actual instagram handle. choices.) who meet and start dating and break up because they have to follow their dreams (that's those few lines of on screen dialogue in thai in the second half somewhere. offroad saying that) and so during the entire video the village is performing a traditional healing method on daou (they're not preparing to burn the man! they're helping him with his broken heart), except then they keep piling more and more improbable things on the fire, and it's a very understated kind of comedy and i'm incredibly here for it. it took me a second watch to realize that at 2:30 daou is absolutely about to burn down the whole music building because it reminds him of meeting offroad, and it's only mang's wise guidance (she shakes her head) that keeps him from going to prison i guess. i unironically love every single thing about this.

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แพ้คำว่ารัก / pae kam waa rak - calories blah blah

the title means something like "losing to the word love". we're staying daou pittaya adjacent somehow, because this song is here because he did a cover of it. i'm in love with the band name but i don't really know them. i'm pretty sure daou sang this on an episode of a tv show that seems to be about singers covering other people's songs (i'm right. it's here), and another one he did was รอพี่ก่อน / roh pi korn, which has one of my favorite (of many, by now) moments where i misunderstood what the lyrics of a thai song were doing, because the song is called, essentially, "wait for me", and it's about how he doesn't have money right now but he'll hurry up to get it and then he will, or so i blindly assumed, hurry to his lover. because at some point he sings something about a car, and a train, and a plane. except then it clicked that in between the car and the train he sings about a refrigerator, and for a while there i was having lovely whimsical visions of paddling down a river using a fridge as a boat (?? how else are you going to use a fridge as transport?), but actually. he's singing that once he's rich he'll pay for the car, and the fridge, and the train, and the plane. some of which seem like more realistic goals than others, but hey, go for it.

-

แม่เกี่ยว / mae kiauw - palmy

you know what. i actually genuinely don't have a long story about this one, not even something that's vaguely related around two corners. i have zero memory of how this even ended up on my list (spotify recommendation? maybe??? i don't really know palmy beyond this one song, though i keep meaning to more seriously explore), i just know i really really like the sound of it! i've been listening to this one a lot.

-

and finally! i don't think i'll be sending asks but i will tag some people: @redgoldblue (you may have forgotten by now that you ever did this, so that could be the perfect time to do it again, if you want), @theartichokesarepurple, @littlestarsailor, @spaceradars, @batvreason, and anyone else who wants. all of this with no pressure of course, only if you feel like it!

[codebriefly]

New Post has been published on https://codebriefly.com/angular-19-fundamentals/

Angular 19 Fundamentals

Angular 19 introduces powerful new features and enhancements that make building modern web applications more efficient and intuitive. Whether you are a beginner or an experienced developer, understanding the fundamentals of Angular 19 is essential for creating high-performance applications. In this article, we will cover the core concepts and best practices, including Angular architecture, data binding, directives, dependency injection, and Angular CLI tips and tricks.

Table of Contents

Toggle

Understanding Angular 19 Architecture

Components

Modules

Services

Templates and Metadata

Data Binding and Directives in Angular 19

Built-in Directives

Dependency Injection in Angular 19

How Dependency Injection Works

Benefits of Dependency Injection

Angular CLI Tips and Tricks

Creating a New Project

Generating Components and Services

Running and Building Projects

Linting and Formatting

Best Practices for Using Angular CLI

Final Thoughts

Understanding Angular 19 Architecture

The architecture of Angular 19 is designed to facilitate scalable and modular applications. It is built on core concepts such as Components, Modules, Templates, Metadata, and Services.

Components

Components are the building blocks of any Angular application. Each component in Angular 19 consists of three parts:

Template: Defines the view and structure of the component.

Class: Contains logic and data handling.

Metadata: Provides configuration data to Angular.

Modules

Modules group related components, services, and directives into a cohesive unit. In Angular 19, you can use both module-based and standalone components, offering flexibility and modularity.

Services

Services are used to share data and logic across multiple components. They are often used to make HTTP calls or manage data.

Templates and Metadata

Templates define the HTML structure of a component, while metadata provides Angular with the necessary information to process the component.

Data Binding and Directives in Angular 19

Data binding is an essential concept that connects the component class with its template. Angular 19 supports four types of data binding:

Interpolation: Embedding dynamic values within HTML.

<h1> title </h1>

Property Binding: Binding a DOM property to a component property.

<img [src]="imageUrl" />

Event Binding: Handling user actions like clicks.

<button (click)="handleClick()">Click Me</button>

Two-Way Binding: Synchronizing the data between the model and the view.

<input [(ngModel)]="userName" />

Built-in Directives

Angular 19 offers several built-in directives to enhance the functionality of templates:

Structural Directives: *ngIf, *ngFor, *ngSwitch

Attribute Directives: ngClass, ngStyle

Custom Directives: Creating reusable directives for custom behaviors.

Dependency Injection in Angular 19

Dependency injection (DI) is a core concept in Angular that allows services and dependencies to be injected into components and other services. Angular 19 enhances DI with improved modularity and standalone component support.

How Dependency Injection Works

DI in Angular uses the Injector to maintain a registry of services. You can specify services at the root level or within feature modules.

Benefits of Dependency Injection

Promotes code modularity.

Increases testability.

Enhances maintainability by centralizing service instances.

Angular CLI Tips and Tricks

The Angular CLI is a powerful command-line interface that simplifies development tasks. Here are some tips and tricks for using Angular CLI efficiently:

Creating a New Project

ng new my-app --routing --style=scss

Generating Components and Services

ng generate component my-component ng generate service my-service

Running and Building Projects

Development Server:

ng serve --open

Production Build:

ng build --prod

Linting and Formatting

ng lint ng format

Best Practices for Using Angular CLI

Use ng add to easily integrate libraries.

Utilize schematics to automate repetitive tasks.

Customize the configuration in angular.json for optimized builds.

Final Thoughts

Understanding Angular 19 fundamentals is crucial for building scalable and maintainable applications. By mastering components, data binding, directives, dependency injection, and the Angular CLI, developers can create robust applications that leverage modern web standards. Stay updated with Angular’s latest features and best practices to ensure your applications are efficient and maintainable.

Keep learning & stay safe 😉

You may like:

Introduction to Angular 19

How to Manage Password Strength – Angular

Deploy Angular App on Firebase

Setup TailwindCSS in Angular?

[buymangoinbulk]

Why Devgad Alphonso Mangoes Are the King of Fruits: A Detailed Guide

Introduction

Devgad Alphonso mangoes, often referred to as the "King of Fruits," are a symbol of premium quality and unmatched flavour. Grown in the coastal region of Devgad in Maharashtra, India, these mangoes have gained global recognition for their unique taste, aroma, and texture. This detailed guide explores the factors that make Devgad Alphonso mangoes a class apart, from their cultivation to their culinary uses.

The Origin of Devgad Alphonso Mangoes

Devgad is a picturesque taluka in the Sindhudurg district of Maharashtra, known for its rich laterite soil and favourable coastal climate. These conditions are ideal for cultivating Alphonso mangoes, which have been grown here for generations. The geographical indication (GI) tag granted to Devgad Alphonso mangoes ensures their authenticity and preserves their unique identity.

Unique Characteristics of Devgad Alphonso Mangoes

Flavour Profile: The taste of Devgad Alphonso mangoes is a perfect balance of sweetness and acidity, with a hint of tropical floral notes. This complexity sets them apart from other mango varieties.

Aroma: These mangoes are renowned for their rich, sweet fragrance that can fill an entire room, adding to their allure.

Texture: The pulp of Devgad Alphonso mangoes is buttery and smooth, with no fibrous strands, making them a delight to consume.

Colour and Appearance: They are easily recognizable by their golden-yellow hue with a slight reddish tinge, which adds to their visual appeal.

Cultivation Process

Devgad Alphonso mangoes are cultivated with care and precision. Farmers follow traditional and organic farming methods to ensure the fruit retains its natural goodness. The mango trees are grown in red laterite soil, which is rich in minerals and provides the fruit with its distinctive flavour. Additionally, the coastal climate offers the right balance of sunlight and moisture, ensuring a superior harvest.

Health Benefits

Rich in Nutrients: Devgad Alphonso mangoes are a powerhouse of vitamins A and C, which boost immunity and improve skin health.

Antioxidant Properties: They contain antioxidants like beta-carotene, which help combat free radicals in the body.

Digestive Aid: The natural enzymes in these mangoes aid digestion and promote gut health.

Low-Calorie Treat: Despite their sweetness, these mangoes are low in calories, making them a guilt-free indulgence.

Culinary Uses

Devgad Alphonso mangoes are incredibly versatile and can be used in a variety of dishes:

Desserts: Mango lassi, mango ice cream, and aamras.

Beverages: Fresh mango juice, smoothies, and cocktails.

Savoury Dishes: Mango salsa, salads, and chutneys.

Traditional Recipes: Items like mango shrikhand and mango barfi are popular in Indian households.

How to Identify Authentic Devgad Alphonso Mangoes

Check the Label: Look for the GI tag or certification mark.

Examine the Skin: Authentic Devgad Alphonso mangoes have smooth, golden-yellow skin with a slight red blush.

Aroma Test: A strong, sweet fragrance is a hallmark of genuine Devgad mangoes.

Buy from Reputed Sources: Purchase from certified sellers or online platforms specializing in Devgad Alphonso mangoes.

Conclusion

For more information or to source authentic Devgad Alphonso mangoes, contact us today! Devgad Alphonso mangoes have earned their title as the "King of Fruits" due to their unparalleled taste, rich aroma, and exceptional quality. Their cultivation, rooted in tradition and supported by nature's bounty, ensures they remain a global favourite. Whether you savour them fresh or use them in culinary creations, these mangoes promise a delightful experience that justifies their regal reputation.

The next time you think of mangoes, remember that Devgad Alphonso mangoes are not just a fruit; they are an experience—one that brings the essence of India's rich agricultural heritage to your table.

[unogeeks234]

ORACLE APEX LIST VIEW

Oracle APEX List Views: A Versatile Tool for Data Display

Oracle APEX (Application Express) offers a powerful and customizable component for displaying data in a clear and organized way: the List View. List Views are essential for presenting data effectively throughout your APEX applications. Let’s dive into the features and use cases of this component.

What is an Oracle APEX List View?

A ListView is a component that transforms data from your database tables into a structured list format on your web page. It is a more flexible and interactive version of a simple HTML table.

Key Features

Customization: Control the appearance of your ListView with various templates (like cards, icons, or simple lists), as well as the ability to include badges, icons, and dividers.

Search: Easily add a built-in search field to let users quickly filter down the list.

Interactivity: Make list elements clickable, link them to other pages, or trigger actions within your APEX application.

Responsiveness: List Views automatically adapt to different screen sizes, ensuring optimal viewing on desktops, tablets, and phones.

Advanced Formatting: With HTML and CSS knowledge, you can unlock even greater customization possibilities for the appearance of your List Views.

When to Use List Views

Displaying data summaries: You can display a list of products, customers, orders, or any other data in your database.

Navigation: Create a list that links your application’s different sections, much like a navigation menu.

Master-Detail Views: Use a List View to represent the “master” records. Clicking on a list item displays more detailed information in a separate region.

How to Create a ListView in APEX

Create a Page: Add a new page to your APEX application.

Add a Region: Add a “List View” region type to your page.

Select a Source: Choose a table or query as the data source for your List View.

Choose a Template: Select a template that suits your display needs (cards, icons, etc.).

Customize: Configure the display options, formatting, and behavior of your List View in the region’s properties.

Example: Creating a Product Catalog

Start with a table called “PRODUCTS” containing the columns ‘PRODUCT_NAME,’ ‘DESCRIPTION,’ ‘PRICE,’ and ‘IMAGE.’

Create a List View region using the “PRODUCTS” table as its source.

Select the “Cards” template to give your list a visually appealing layout.

In the Cards template settings, map the correct columns to the title, subtitle, and image display areas.

Let’s Get Started!

With their power and flexibility, Oracle APEX List Views bring your data to life in organized, user-friendly formats. Start experimenting with them in your APEX projects – they’re an invaluable tool in your developer toolkit.

You can find more information about  Oracle Apex in this  Oracle Apex Link

Conclusion:

Unogeeks is the No.1 IT Training Institute for Oracle Apex  Training. Anyone Disagree? Please drop in a comment

You can check out our other latest blogs on  Oracle Apex here – Oarcle Apex Blogs

You can check out our Best In Class Oracle Apex Details here – Oracle Apex Training

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[piecksz]

dirty money | (m) - part one

pairing: professor!levi x fem!reader

warnings: nsfw, oral sex, penetrative sex, bondage, explicit language, sugar baby/sugar daddy, age gap just because it’s levi and he’s an elderly 

summary: you’re a college student making money on the side as sugar baby, but one evening levi seeks you out for a date, and it soon becomes clear that one arrangement is about to make your life a lot more complicated. 

words: 6,600+

1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15  / 16 / 17 / Prologue

a/n: this was inspired by a work i read years ago, like four or five years ago i believe (i’ll link it if i can find it again). it dealt with a student x professor relationship but i decided to add a little bit of “spice”. :) enjoy! stay tuned for more notes at the end! 

You hugged your arms to your chest tightly, trying desperately to retain what little body heat you had left as you shuffled quickly along the sidewalk of the congested plaza.

The neighborhood where your client arranged for the two of you to meet was nothing like the usual middle-class locale you usually found yourself in during your dates.

Where you lived was your average suburbia, unremarkable and lackluster, with run-of-the-mill families where the father supported his family on one paycheck, or a single mother supported her several children on hers. Even then, as a college student, with your apartment situated in the most modest region of town, you were still struggling to get by. The property bills were incessant on top of your countless university fees, and it seemed like the minute you cleared one due, you turned around and another payment was expected. You didn’t even hold the resolve to ask your parents for monetary favors because you knew they were also grappling to make ends meet, just to barely have enough for their own self-indulgences. You’d been a financial liability for them since childhood, and you figured the least you could do was look after yourself since you were no longer under their roof. This turned you to sugar babying after a comical recommendation from your friend, Sasha, but it still delivered a pretty sufficient pay.

However, you doubted anyone here was facing the same endeavors. The plaza streets were lined with ritzy, upscale luxury stores, fortified by suited men at the front doors. The restaurants were premium, titled with names of languages you didn’t even speak, and out front were high-end sports car owners entrusting their set of wheels to gracious valets.

You felt utterly misplaced. You kept wrestling with the hem of your mini dress, fretful that it was too short and inappropriate for your setting. Your attire had never been an issue when meeting up with a customer, but now you were worried that they were betting on a date that was more refined.

Upon entering the restaurant your client made reservations for, you exclaimed silently, eyes going wide at the regal decor of the establishment. Large chandeliers adorned the lofty ceiling, and deep velvet carpeted the floor. The music of a live jazz pianist imbued the atmosphere amidst buoyant chatter.

You felt like you couldn’t even afford to breathe the air inside.

“Name?”

You were drawn out of your musing by the hostess, who was dressed much more like a flight attendant than a hostess.

“I’m meeting someone,” you replied, sauntering up to the stand. “Levi Ackerman?”

The hostess tapped several buttons on her tablet before she asked you for identification. You blinked, stunned by the extra extent of security, but you still reached into your purse to retrieve your ID. When the restaurant’s website disclosed that they were an exclusive eatery, you figured that just meant there would be a wait. Hell, Red Lobster was an exclusive eatery to you.

She handed your driver’s license back with a smile and stepped out from behind the stand. “Right this way.”

You followed her through rows of occupied tables and tried not to stare at the meager portions on customers’ plates, wondering how a meal that cost $150 for one person but was sized big enough for a hamster could possibly leave anyone satiated.

The hostess finally stopped in front of a table, and sat down was your client. He had a dark undercut parted in the middle that framed a strikingly attractive and mature set of features. On his profile he mentioned that he was 39, and although he looked just slightly younger than you expected, his cool grey eyes harbored years of maturity. His tailored attire flaunted those years of experience in the form of a black, fitted Tom Ford two-piece suit and velour Christian Louboutin loafers. Even the way he held his martini by the rim of the glass emitted a polished aura. Your grip on your clutch tightened, because all you had to do was work this man, and you'd be able to take a break from sugaring for at least a few months. Just enough so you could comfortably ease into another year of university with your debts paid.

Your client glanced at you quietly, surveying your appearance from your curled hair to your black patent pumps, while he slowly pulled his drink from his lips.

“Are you going to stand there all night?” he asked, dryly.

You managed an artificial smile, a craft you had mastered. Pompous men in your line of work were typical, largely because they were individuals with money to spend, and they knew sugar babies like you desired the money they had. You sat down once the hostess pulled out your seat and ordered a Gin & Tonic to start off, knowing you’d need some form of alcohol to get you through the night. Once she nodded to your request, she departed, leaving you to get acquainted with your date.

“You must be Levi,” you remarked, placing your purse on the table.

Levi hummed lowly, eyes cast aside as if he had no desire to look at you while you spoke.

“That’s a formality you should have gotten out of the way before you sat down. If I wasn’t, you’d be a nuisance who just interrupted my dinner.” He finally set his glass down, but still refused to make eye contact.

You winced at his snide reply, wondering why a simple yes wouldn’t have sufficed. If it had been an ordinary dinner, you would have been out the door already, after all, you had no leniency towards bad manners, but you needed the money, and you needed it badly. Levi looked like the type of man who had cash to throw.

“You’re absolutely right, I’m so sorry. It’s a good thing chance was on my side.” You forced out a light-hearted apology, merely to appease him. “I’m Y/N. It's wonderful to finally meet you, you look even better in person.”

Levi kept his attention diverted. “I’m so glad.”

Jesus Christ, what gives? You wondered, unsure why he came off so reserved. As many times as you had dealt with affluent men calling you promiscuous names and treating you like a pair of tits and ass on legs, you’d never dealt with a customer, who it appeared, evidently had no interest in being there. If he was lonely and needed company, dogs and cats were excellent for that.

You were swiftly exhausting your conversation options considering Levi was inept at giving anything more than a two or three word response. As a sugar baby, you were expected to keep the rapport light and good-humoured, which was never too difficult. Rich men loved to talk about themselves. They enjoyed boasting about their corporate ventures or gloating about the new boats they’d just bought, so once you kicked off the exchange they always kept it going.

However, Levi seemed to have nothing he wanted to disclose about himself. He refused to brag about his wealth, or parade his material possessions. He simply answered, or avoided, all of your questions unequivocally, and ignored the opportunity to make himself the subject of your dialogue.

“Your profile never mentioned where you worked.” You desperately hoped this topic would stick to the wall, so with luck, you’d be able to sustain the discussion until dinner was over. At least then you wouldn’t have to talk much on the drive back to his place, and the sex that was insinuated after didn’t require much talking anyway.

Levi cut the meat on his plate into several even bites before he stuck it onto his fork. “Do all your clients pay you to ask about something you’re supposed to be distracting them from?”

You held a forkful of food to your mouth, but paused once Levi spoke, registering an ardent urge to bite back at him. He really could not have made this arrangement any harder for you. He must have been doing it purely to get under your skin, perhaps that was his idea of entertainment. It was possible he found gratification in watching you fidget while you struggled to remain subservient. He could have been into power play, a lot of men enjoyed that. Or maybe it was just a test to see if you fulfilled his standards, but as a college student, you never tested well.

“Yes, actually,” you shot him a contemptuous grin. “Rich asshats with money love talking about their job. My mistake for assuming you’d be the same.” Your retort was fervid on the tip of your tongue, but the moment your churlish commentary slipped past your lips, you were overcome with regret. Another thing about rich men was that they were exceptional at being in charge, which meant they loathed being defied more than anything else, and that meant you could kiss your pay goodbye.

The longer Levi took to answer, the more uneasy you became. You kept your head bowed in light of your fuck-up, suddenly finding your food’s artistic plating very interesting. After Levi plainly insisted that you were allowed to order whatever you wanted, you went out of your way to choose the most expensive thing on the menu. You figured the least you deserved out of such a hellish date was a lovely meal.

“I’m a teacher,” he finally acknowledged after minutes of tense stillness.

You looked up and recoiled even further into your seat once you realized that Levi was now looking at you, his slate-colored eyes reflecting concentration. To think you actually preferred it when he took no notice of you, because now that his attention was yours, he was even more intimidating than he was to begin with. Even so, his deadpan expression had lightened, and on the contrary, he seemed amused by your cheeky mouth.

“Don’t you have to like being around kids to be a teacher?” you retorted, witholding a snort.

“What gives you the impression I don’t enjoy being around kids?” Levi took another bite of his food.

You brought your hand to your lips to cover your mouth while you spoke and chewed. “Nothing. You seem like a blast.”

Levi registered your cynical tone, but decided it was best to disregard your taunt. He only gave another quiet hum in response and waited to swallow before he acknowledged your comment.

“I meant I’m a professor,” he explained.

You groaned, distressed at the clarification of his profession. The last thing you wanted to hear was anything associated with college, especially on the night before your fall semester started. You envied your friends and the other students that were at home preparing for the first day. Likely relishing in their last few hours of freedom, presumably getting some early shut-eye. Doing anything other than having dinner with a man nearly twice their age just to pay off a couple textbooks.

“Not to pry,” you prompted reluctantly, just to keep the conversation going since it’s what your job entailed. “But how can you afford all this with a professor’s salary?” You hoped you hadn’t gone too far, poking your nose where it clearly didn’t belong, but you were verily curious. There was no way Levi didn’t expect you to be quizzical when none of the professors you’d ever met had the assets for pricey name brands.

Naturally he didn’t reveal too much, but you expected that. You didn’t anticipate a lengthy answer since you’d already caught on that Levi was a man of few words.

“My family comes from wealth, so I had the luxury of choosing whatever occupation I wanted. I never had to worry about living strictly on a teacher’s salary.” Levi’s face hardened again with his explanation, as if something else was agitating him.

After recognizing the steep shift in his character, you decided to take his answer for what it was worth and didn’t probe any further about his fortunes. To some degree, Levi was a refreshing change from many of your other clients, and he was feeding your fascination past the limits of your arrangement.

“But out of everything you chose to be a teacher?” you questioned, sitting back in your chair once you’d finished your meal. With support from a wealthy family, you wondered why he didn’t choose something more elite, like an actor, or a model. He definitely had the face for it.

“Because young people like you are empty-headed. Anything I can do to help is a decent occupation.”

You smiled at his answer, now catching on to his wry sense of humor.

“I think that’s funny honestly,” you sighed.

Levi watched as your waiter sidled by quietly to retrieve your empty plates, and he signaled with his finger to request the bill.

“Like what are the odds of a student,” you gestured to yourself, “and professor ending up on an arrangement? That’s highly inappropriate,” you teased, whispering the last sentence to stress the social taboo of a student being seen outside of school with an instructor.

Levi glanced up at you from the bill and exhaled heavily, visibly unimpressed by your joke.

Once he had finished paying for dinner, with a gold-enamelled credit card that was impossible to overlook, he stood up and extended his arm to assist you out of your chair. “Ready?”

You obliged before looping your arm through his and rising from your seat. “I am.”

You just realized the height advantage your heels offered against Levi, and despite he wasn’t the tallest when matched with your other customers, his nature and magnetism alone compensated for that.

Out front you waited with Levi for the valet to pull his car around, and you didn’t know what you expected when his ride rounded the corner: a slick, black Bentley. The rims had been polished, and the car’s body had been buffed until it glistened, so when it pulled up in front of you two, you could clearly see your reflection in the door.  

“Wow…,” you marveled, never having been escorted in a vehicle this decorous. You’d made your way around town in a couple Mercedes with your previous sugar daddies, give or take a few Tesla’s, but the sheer riches Levi owned eclipsed all of the other men you’d met.

“Are you kidding?” you gaped, as the valet opened the door for you while Levi rounded the front of his car to the driver’s side. “How much is this car?” You asked, as if you could even afford anything like it.

“I don’t know.” Levi opened his door. “It was a gift.”

The interior was just as lush as the exterior, the seats and wheel were wrapped in matte black leather, and the dashboard was equipped with a rotating display.

This wasn’t a gift, it was a fucking Transformer.

The drive back to Levi’s place was, for the most part, comfortably silent. You’d break the peace to make a few observations here and there while you were stopped at a red light, and Levi would return with his brief on-brand answers, but overall your attentiveness was fixed on the beauty of downtown at night. You remained relaxed even when Levi uncharacteristically rested his hand on your thigh, which was the most affection he’d shown you all evening.

When Levi pulled up to his apartment building, you were inanely stunned that he parked his car in the garage like an everyday civilian.

“Oh, you don’t have an elevator that takes your car directly to your floor?” you asked, pretending to be disappointed while you strode through the lobby entrance Levi had swiped open for you. “I thought you said you were rich?”

He scoffed and shook his head, which you had also learned was his code for laughing whenever you said something quick-witted. You were finally starting to get the hang of him.

After the two of you reached his floor and stepped out of the elevator, you followed Levi’s lead down a few doors until you came to his apartment. Past his front door was a spacious duplex, like a house you’d only seen in your mother’s magazines. His furnishings were glossy and modern, and alongside the sizable living room and stainless-steel kitchen were floating stairs leading up to a second floor with a cozy loft, only to be topped off by massive floor-to-ceiling windows that showcased the city’s skyline.

You had to quell the temptation to speed into the living room and drop to the floor to make carpet angels.

“You live here all by yourself?” you gawked.

“No,” Levi replied, and you could hear him shuffling from the coat rack by the door into the kitchen behind you. “Luna lives here too.”

Luna?

He never mentioned he had a wife or a fiancee. Girlfriend? Stay-in maid hopefully. You didn’t know how you felt about being a sugar baby to a man that was taken, and you weren’t keen on the thought of having to explain his affair to a jealous woman that would have been out for your throat.

You pivoted on your heels to look at Levi, about to announce that you no longer felt comfortable with the post-dinner festivities you guys had planned given the new information, when you saw him standing in the kitchen, cradling a fleecy, gray cat in his arms. He was too involved in showering the pet with tenderness and clearly couldn’t see your obvious unease.

“Luna is…,” you trailed off, waiting for Levi to explain.

His eyes drifted up to you, before dropping back down to the feline in his arms, as if that was his answer.

“Luna is your cat?”

Levi didn’t correct you, so you took the absence of a response as your answer.

“Of course Luna is your cat.” Your frown spread into a sheepish grin, and you watched, embarrassed, as Levi bent down to release her from his arms.

He straightened himself out, uninterested in your awkward assumption but attentive to you again. “Do you want something to drink?”

You glanced over to the large wine rack by the door to the pantry, just underneath it was a curated assortment of teas in another fancy display. What an ironic contrast.

“No, I’m fine. It’s getting late, and I still have to finish the job before the night is over.” You delivered a suggestive smile, and Levi gave you one of his half scoffing half-huffing exhibits of amusement.

“Don’t sound so eager.”

He directed you to follow him, and even when he disappeared into a scarcely lit hallway, you still trailed him. He guided you into his bedroom, and while you were absorbed by the grandeur of the space, Levi stepped onto the raised platform in the middle of the room to retrieve a box from underneath his bed.

“Isn’t it weird getting dressed with giant windows in here? You’re basically, like, flashing the whole city,” you asked, snorting and turning to Levi.

“Are you gonna ask stupid questions in every room?” Levi countered.

Your eyes dipped to his position beside his bed, and they grew wider at the sight of Levi wrapping a leather bind around his hand, tugging on the other end of it tightly to test its durability. You looked past him into the box filled with an array of handcuffs, blindfolds, collars, clamps, and gags.

What an unsuspecting surprise.

You weren’t as speechless at Levi’s impressive collection of toys as you were at the fact that someone so two-dimensional was into bondage. As the night had gone on, and you continuously failed to charm any exceptional secrets out of Levi, you concluded that there was nothing particularly notable about him, besides his money, but here it was in all its filthy glory.

Levi was a horny fuck.

After Levi checked the quality of his instruments, he ordered you out of your clothes and onto his bed. Considering how the night had gone, and the jocular first impression you’d already made on him, you were inclined to respond with something sassy and witty, but your mouth went dry at the sudden godless look that shrouded Levi’s features.

You complied with what you were told, and allowed him to direct you on the mattress. You were orientated upside down, with your head towards the foot of the bed so Levi could wrap the leather restraints around the sturdiness of his bed frame before tethering them to your wrists. You didn’t even speak, for fear that you’d ruin the sexually tense atmosphere, because you couldn’t help but admit that the vulnerable state you were in had you pressing your thighs together. You were completely at Levi’s mercy, or sin.  

It was obvious that seeing you stripped bare on his silk sheets was pleasing to him too, because every few seconds his eyes would waver over to you and down your body. The stiffness in his pants was unmistakable, and he’d grunt every so often at his discomfort. He was way more capable of being impure than you’d thought.

The loss of your movement was coupled with your inability to see once Levi put a satin, red blindfold over your eyes. Now with your vision obscured, the only useful senses you had were your ability to feel and hear, which were more superior than you expected. You could hear Levi picking up and unbuckling a collar, and you knew you were correct once he slipped it around your neck.

You waited for a few empty and agonizing moments, hearing Levi strip down to his underwear mere steps away. Then you felt the bed sink between your legs, followed by the brief motion of Levi unbuttoning his shirt and taking it off. You held yourself back from complaining, upset that you wouldn’t be allowed to see what he looked like when he was ravaging you, but you remembered that you were his for the night, not the other way around.

When you felt the mattress dip on either side of your head, you guessed that Levi was on top of you, caging your body in underneath him. He wasted no time attaching his lips to the sensitive spot under your ear, placing rough, deprived kisses along the curvature of your jaw until he met your parted lips.

Levi’s kiss was far less methodical than he was, showing voracity like all his subtlety and composure had gone out the window. His breathing became heavier once he slipped his tongue past your lips to explore the warm, wet limits of your mouth with his eager muscle.

Your teeth came down on his bottom lip once you detected Levi’s intent to pull away, and you heard him groan desperately, muttering an indistinct “you little shit”. The deep guttural sound of his lust was enough to have you driving your hips up against his clothed cock, but he pinned you down with the weight of his pelvis.

“Don’t.” You could hear his dangerous warning by your ear, and you immediately ceased your attempts at relief. He moved down slowly, now hovering over your chest. If you’d been able to see the way he was eyeing you, you would have lost all self-control.

Levi’s grey eyes had grown so dark they were nearly obsidian, and his neatly groomed hair now fell into his face in wisps. You could feel his hot and heavy breath drift across the tip of your hardened nipple as he spoke.

“If you’re a good girl, you’ll get what you want.”

Heat pooled in your core at the sound of his rich voice and enticing promise. You were expecting the sex to be quick and straightforward, you’d faked enough orgasms to know how to make one sound realistic enough to please a customer, but you didn’t expect that Levi would make you so needy. You became excited at the thought of wanting him. You wanted him to force your legs apart and sink himself into you, claiming your most intimate parts.

Levi used his thumbs to toy with your nipples, rolling them under his fingertips, while he licked a long stripe up the valley of your breasts. You squirmed at the ticklish sensation, pulling at your restraints so you could grip anything. The sheets, his hair, Jesus Christ, just anything. His movements were slow and sensual, which made it that much harder to endure.

But Levi’s delicate touch soon faded once he grabbed your breast and dug his fingers into your skin. He closed his lips around your nipple, tugging harshly with his teeth before soothing the sting with the flat side of his tongue.

You mewled at the delightful pain, writhing against your binds in a futile attempt to break out of them. It was so unfair that you could feel him, yet you weren’t able to touch him.

“Stop struggling.” Levi’s panting fanned over your chest. “It’s useless.”

You felt his weight on top of you lessen, but shortly after, his touch was on your thighs, brisk fingers drawing your legs apart. The worst part about being unable to see was that you couldn’t predict what he was about to do next. You partially wanted to close your legs due to your apprehension, but anticipation is what kept them open.

Your core was on fire, and every time your walls tightened around nothing, you could feel how wet you were, and you wanted Levi to fix it.

“Please fuck me,” you begged, eager just to feel him inside you. “Levi, please. Please.”

He didn’t move for a second, and you could only visualize his callous expression at your humiliating outcry.

“Levi,” you stressed again.

You felt him shuffle around briefly, and once your mouth opened to release an anguished sob, the sound was stifled by a wad of balled up lace.

Was that…?

“Be quiet.” Levi had rolled up your discarded underwear and forced it into your mouth to keep you muted. Now you’d forfeited your own oral privileges.

Without your interruption, he continued what he had been doing before you distracted him. You felt something cold and smooth nudge your clit, and you flinched, unsure of what he had in his hands. He ran the slick, foreign object up and down your wet folds before you heard a soft click, and Levi had turned whatever it was on.

A vibrator. You recognized the sensation instantly once he used it to stimulate your clit, rubbing slow circles around the bud with the device’s head. You let out a muffled moan at the intensity of the feeling, instinctively trying to close your legs, but Levi kept them parted with a strong hand.

“You want me to stop?” he asked, mercilessly, pausing only momentarily. “Oh, I forgot you can’t talk.”

Another click amplified the vibrations and sent you into complete disarray. Your mind was growing cloudy, and you were becoming lightheaded, already feeling yourself on the edge of your orgasm. Your screams were suppressed due to your gag, which only encouraged Levi more as he slipped the vibrator into you with ease, and your arousal made its generous size feel like nothing. However, it didn’t stop there. Levi lowered his mouth to your clit, using his tongue to lap at the swollen bud while the vibrator worked against your walls.

Your orgasm came fast, you didn’t even notice its onset until you were struggling. Struggling to move, and struggling to breathe. Levi recognized when you’d hit your high and decided, only by his measure, that enough was enough. He pulled out the toy and withdrew from your dripping pussy, but with very little haste.

He held up the pink gadget, now glistening with your juices.

“You’re fucking filthy,” he belittled.

But his tone didn’t match what he was feeling, he was incredibly turned on, and undeniably pleased. Your skin was covered in a thin sheen of sweat, body limp after you’d come down from your climax, and you no longer fought against your restraints.

In Levi’s eyes you looked absolutely divine, and he needed to feel you around him.

He pulled his underwear down to let his erect cock spring free before wrapping his hand around its thick base. The precum that gushed from his swollen tip leaked down the side of his shaft and created an absolutely profane display.

Levi let out a series of pained grunts while he pushed his head past your folds, rubbing himself up and down your tender cunt. He lined himself up with your entrance and plunged his cock into you, eliciting a sob from you while your back arched in tandem. You weren’t able to see him, but holy hell could you feel him.

“Fuck, right fucking there,” Levi groaned.

Your walls stretched to accommodate Levi’s large size as he slowly filled you up to the hilt, doing his best to ease his own sensitivity. He bit his lip and started moving gingerly, murmuring foul words to help mitigate the pain, but after a few minutes, his discomfort subsided, and he began moving faster. His pace quickened until he was ramming into you, changing your breath with every thrust. You immediately felt him in all of his raw intensity, and you grappled against your insufferable ropes yet again. You wanted to touch him, badly. You ached to bury your hands into his hair and dig your nails into his back while he ruined you, but there was nothing you could do except struggle.

The sound of skin slapping and dissonant moaning echoed off of the tall walls. You didn’t feel shy even after remembering the massive windows that lined the perimeter of Levi’s bedroom. The city being a witness to the two of you coupling only prompted you further and brought you closer and closer to your second high.

Levi was hunched over on top of you, mouth by your ear so you could hear his sultry sighs timed to the rhythm of his hips as he rolled his lower body against yours. He shut his eyes, feeling the first wave of ecstasy, and his release and yours followed shortly after.

“Shit,” he snarled, reluctantly pulling himself out of you to cum while your body seized with another orgasm. What he really wanted to do was pump you full of his hot seed and watch as it spilled out of your tight hole, but he knew it would be irresponsible of him, so instead he opted to release onto your lower stomach and thighs, painting you in white.

After Levi pumped himself with a tight hand to make sure he was completely empty first, he waited until he was soft to pull up his boxer briefs. He lingered on top of you, taking out your gag and delivering a fleeting kiss to your parted lips before reaching over to undo your restraints.

“Not bad,” he panted, but you took his loose compliment as praise.

Your body was tired, more tired than you usually were after sex. The feeling of being fucked raw while fighting for movement drained your energy twice as fast, and you weren’t sure if you could even pry yourself out of Levi’s bed. Once he undid your binds, and gently slipped your blindfold off, he returned them to his box, and kicked the case back under his bed. He left the room, and returned quickly with a dark towel, damp with warm water.

He sighed as he cleaned you up, unenthused about paternal role he now had to play while you fell drowsy in his bed.

“What a pain in the ass,” Levi exhaled, rolling his eyes once you groggily turned down his request for you to shower.

The last thing you remembered before you fell asleep was your head against Levi’s built chest while he hoisted you up in his strong arms. When he returned from showering and getting dressed, he found you completely passed out from exhaustion on his bed and unresponsive to any of his nudges or calls. He unwillingly slipped you into one of his shirts and tucked you in, muttering something about being a “fucking babysitter”.

Now the sun had risen, beckoning the start of a new day, and you were propped up on your elbow, feeling around for your phone on the side table while you rubbed away your bleary vision. Once you felt your fingers close around the noisy device blaring your incessant alarm, you brought it to your face and squinted at the time.

10:03 AM.

“Fuck!” you exclaimed, tumbling out of bed swiftly while accidentally dragging the bed’s duvet with you. You quickly turned around to throw it back onto the mattress, and you realized Levi was nowhere to be seen, but you had no time to speculate where he might or might not have been. You were already thirty minutes late for your first day of class.

Levi had been thoughtful enough to leave your clothes from last night folded on the table beside you with your phone, keys, and a modest envelope filled with four twenty dollar bills next to them. You assumed the cash was for the cab ride back to your place since you were always paid for the set up directly through the arrangement’s website, and Levi had literally left you stranded at his place.

You grabbed your heels frantically, hopping around while you attempted to jam your feet into them, and you didn’t even bother with the troublesome straps.

“Oh my god,” you exclaimed, panic creeping up the back of your neck. “I’m so fucked.” You didn’t mind being five minutes or even ten minutes late, but half an hour late would have the entire class looking at you while you stumbled in, including the professor, and they’d most likely reprimand you in front of the entire lecture hall. That was the last instance of public humiliation you wanted to face.

You grabbed your belongings and hurried out of the room, running into Luna in the kitchen before you reached the front door.

Even the cat’s face looked like she was judging you, scrutinizing your degrading walk of shame.

“Don’t look at me like that,” you retaliated, wobbling around her while her stare followed. “Your daddy was the one that hired me.”

Once you were outside, it took you another five minutes just to haul a cab. On any other occasion, you would have been reluctant to stand out in public, especially in such a wealthy area of town, dressed the way that you were. You’d been smart enough to borrow one of Levi’s coats on the way out to cover up your scantily clothed frame, and you made a mental note to return it whenever you got the chance. Besides, if you never got around to it, surely he had enough money to buy another one like it was a pack of mints.

You released a heavy exhale after you slid into the back of your cab and directed the driver to your place.

“I hate to be that kind of person,” you started, leaning over his chair. “But could you, like, step on it, please? I’m really late.”

The driver peered at you through the rearview mirror and nodded silently, picking up slight speed.

You uttered a rushed “thank you so much” and collapsed back into your seat. You grabbed your phone out of your lap and unlocked it with your thumb. You had four missed texts: three from your friends Sasha, Eren, and Connie, and one from Levi. Sasha, Eren, and Connie’s messages all had the same premise, wondering where you were, whether you were going to be in class today, or if you’d switched out of the course last minute. You opened Levi’s message instead, your eyes scanning quickly over his words.

You were asleep this morning, so I didn’t get a chance to thank you for last night. It was nice, however, it was a one time thing, and I don’t plan to keep in touch. Take care, Y/N.

Your eyebrows knitted at his statement.

“Who the fuck uses perfect grammar when they’re texting?” you whispered to yourself, masking the real reason why your stomach knotted in disappointment.

You placed your phone back in your lap face down, and didn’t look at it for the remainder of your ride. Your journey was lengthy since you had to make a detour to your apartment located on the other side of town to change into your own clothes. After you paid your driver, and tipped him extra for going out of his usual way, you briskly made your way up to your apartment. You threw on the unironed shirt you’d left strewn over the back of your desk chair and the first pair of pants you could find. It didn’t really matter what you were wearing because you cloaked the outfit with a large oversized jacket anyway. You didn’t even go through the trouble of fussing with your hair, you only put in the effort to shake it out, and tie it back.

Time check. 10:34 AM. An hour late.

There were thirty minutes left in class, and it would take you another fifteen minutes to drive back up to midtown where your university was.

“Should I just skip?” you contemplated to yourself, quietly, chewing on your lip. No, perhaps it was even worse to miss the entire first day of class. Your professor would expect a good excuse, like you’d gotten held up rescuing a kitten from a tree. Or something like that. Maybe it was worth the risk to throw yourself down the staircase of your building. If you showed up in a cast, you would have to be granted an excused absence. You pinched the bridge of your nose, irritated by how indirect your thought process was.

You murmured a string of profanities before you decided to just take whatever punishment your teacher had to offer. It would have been better, and much quicker, than trying to weasel your way out of your situation.

As you calculated, your drive to midtown left you with only twenty minutes remaining until class was over, even when you managed to speed and neglected every yellow light. When you arrived on campus, you didn’t have the patience required to loop around the area six times, like you typically did, trying to locate a decent-enough parking spot that didn’t have you running through the lot before you got to the building. You hesitated and groaned before parking in a reserved space.

“Sorry...sorry, sorry,” you apologized repeatedly, out loud but to no one in particular, as you pulled in to the reserved spot. You hauled your bag out of the passenger seat, and left your car, switching between walking and jogging until you found the room number that matched up with the picture of your schedule on your phone.

You took a deep breath before pushing the door open, and sure enough, the first thing you saw were your classmates. The lecture hall was filled, surprisingly not a head was missing, at least not on the first day, but now everyone’s attention had turned from the professor to you. You shook off your nervousness with a small smile, and you turned to the professor to apologize for your lack of punctuality, but your heart sank.

It wasn’t a normal sinking feeling like anything you’d ever felt before. It felt like your stomach and chest both caved in, drawing you nearer and nearer to the floor until you’d eventually fall through. Your eyes were as immobile as your face and the rest of your body, as if what you were seeing was impossible to digest any faster.

Of course he hadn’t seen you, because what felt like minutes to you, were only seconds in real time. His head was down while he kept his focus on whatever was being projected from his laptop screen to the front of the classroom.

“Take a seat, I’ll deal with you after class.”

Your morning had already been a testament to your bad luck, but this--this was the icing on the cake. You forced yourself to move, but unadulterated shock and dread kept your feet pinned to the floor.

“I said--.”

It was only then that he lifted his head, and his eyes made contact with yours, that Levi’s face fell.

a/n: dun dun dun :p i know its so shitty to leave off on a cliffhanger, but i was really conflicted about whether or not i should go ahead and make multiple parts to this story. i’ve only written a full story maybe once or twice, and it’s been a while, but if it’s something that picks up, or i just become really invested in it, i might go ahead and continue it. i’d of course go more into levi’s family, and his actual past, which i’ve already kind of thought out. plus its very fun to steer away from levi’s canon background a little bit since he’s suffered so much, our poor baby. :( but as always, thank you guys so much for reading! i appreciate you all so much you have no idea 

[blacklinguist]

how i use notion #1: mega assignment list

i promised i would update this from last year, and decided to do a walkthrough for @sleepanon!

i’ve taken my school bujo-ing digital for the past year, so i’m going to create a mini-series of how i’ve tinkered with notion to make it work for me! there’s a fair learning curve to it, so my inbox is open for questions if you have any from my posts (not notion in general. ..i’m not an expert lol).

step 1: start a new page! under database, select table

step 2: rename the labels to assignments and class (leave Files alone) for now. you can also title the page and add icons/covers

step 3: select the files label, then under ‘property type’ change it to ‘date’ (this is for deadlines--i start with my official syllabus dates)

ALSO a part of step 3, but after changing to the deadline property, add another one! click that next label, and follow the same menu as above, but select checkbox to give you an option to ‘complete’ your tasks:

step 4: in the ‘class’ row (the first blank after the label), type in a course name to create a tag. once you do so, you can select the tag to edit it or change colors // you can repeat this step as many times as you need to for your assignments. i like to do my entire semester at once since i work ahead of the syllabus, but it might be good to take it month by month!

step 5: now, let’s add the calendar view. on the lefthand side, ‘add view’, name it, then select calendar (not just highlight like me, but click it!)

step 6: you should now see your assignments on the calendar. on the right side (top) of the calendar, click ‘properties’ and turn everything on!

you can also filter the calendar to only show completed/non completed tasks or by class:

and you can click on any assignment to open it, and add further properties:

again, if you have any questions about this, please let me know! 

[capsized-heart]

Sky Castles

Pairing: Laurie x Reader, Jo x Reader

Summary: Summer has always been your favorite season in Plumfield. Perhaps it’s the lovely, sunny mornings and cool, calm nights, or perhaps it’s the fact that you and Laurie and Jo are practically inseparable in midsummer. 

Follows the summers from childhood into young adulthood, with turmoils of the heart along the way.   

Word count: 6.1k+

Warnings: fluff!!!!!!!!

A/N: hi, everyone. I hope you’re all staying safe and well! Right off the bat, I want to mention that I’ve pinned a post on both this blog and my main blog @sarapii-peachy​ about resources for the BLM movement to raise awareness and petitions you can sign to help make a difference on a smaller scale. Everything counts!

i’m back and now with a bachelor’s degree :’) class of 2020 high school and college esketit!!! we did it!!! in this historic pandemic!!! Sorry I’ve been gone for a bit, this fic has been my rocky transition/attempt out of writer’s block after my INSANE last semester of uni and with all the craziness going on in the world. I hope you can channel and take in some of this innocent happiness and childhood glee into your own lives as we navigate the shitshow that is 2020. Saoirse x Timmy x Reader here to cure me of my depression lmao

this title is also based off a chapter in the Little Women book where Laurie, Jo, and the girls go to a park and gaze at the passing clouds and talk about their futures...it’s honestly really sweet. Loosely based off of that! 

Comments and feedback would be greatly appreciated on this💛! Not that you guys don’t leave love, but this fic like I mentioned is my attempt at kicking writer’s block in the ass, please let me know how I did! :) talk to me I missed you guys :)

tags: @ravenmoore14 @monikakrasnorada @dangertoozmanykids101 @toozmanykids​ @adawn1970​ @mrchalamet-mrstyles @chavezlikesthings @loveylangdon@daygiowvibe @statisticlytimmy @ceexreverse​ @bamposworld​ @lilttletimmy​ @cindere-llaaa​

gif credit to @sheisraging​

You love New England for its rich, distinct seasons, how they each paint the countryside in eloquent sweeps of shade and hue. Snow, sun, and breathtaking landscapes of fall color that tinge the treetops throughout the year. You love Plumfield, Massachusetts more for the warmth and love the March sisters have shown you, each alike in personality, nature, to the equinoxes that have shaped your girlhood, each tender memory from your youth synonymous with Meg, Amy, Beth, and Jo. 

 Autumn. Cozy and comfortable, where motherly Meg showed you how to heat and dip caramel with the apples you’d carefully picked from the orchard for a rare treat, the kitchen swirling with the aroma of cinnamon, nutmeg, turmeric, and spices that left you feeling aglow. She’d taught you how to use an embroidery hoop, how to let dough rise, how to bake a proper pie and how to fix any clothing tear with a simple needle and thread, her compliments quick for your ever growing domestic talents. 

Winter. Like cool, ambitious Amy with her painting and taste for luxury and pleasure, how she would praise you for being the only subject suitable for her artwork. Laurie would moan and complain about sitting for hours by the fireside, begging to be excused to go play in the snow, but never you. Amy called you her muse, arranging your hair and skirts to her liking, softening your lips and cheeks with a touch of rouge. It was always such fun to make a day out of modeling for Amy’s portraits, talking and laughing as she’d set up her paints.

Spring. Sweet and angelic like little Beth, windows wide open as her piano trills would float on the warm air, curtains ruffling in the breeze. You’d sit beside her on the piano bench and turn her sheet music for her, to which Beth would give you a shy, rosy smile in thanks. She taught you how to play Chopin and Tchaikovsky, duet pieces where you’d accompany her on the keys, harmonizing with chords and your fingers flying easily together.

Summer. Your favorite season, refreshing, bright, where you and Jo would spend balmy days and long, cool evenings tucked beneath the shade of tree trunks and willows as you’d read in the sun, listen to Jo’s carefully crafted stories. Her creativity and imagination never failed to amaze you, how her writing could transport you to the farthest countries, or keep you grounded in whatever fantastical setting she’d constructed for herself. She’d often write about the two of you; two young girls, best friends who’d have all sorts of dazzling adventures exploring the corners of the world, without the taxing responsibilities of chores, or schoolwork, or the foreboding, inevitable reality that one day you will be young adults and childhood would be gone forever. You’d have picnics and excursions to the nearby fields, dozing in the sun and picking wildflowers, splashing and wading through the rivers and creeks when the heat became unbearable. Before Laurie would come and spoil your fun, of course. Then, you and Jo and Laurie would be like three rowdy boys playing in the woods, your laughter echoing off the trees and sparkling waters. 

You first meet Theodore Laurence as a young girl in the fields connecting the March’s property and your own. You live just down the road from the March sisters, your house tucked away beyond the bend and you’d make the trek across the meadow and grasses daily to visit your neighbors. Being an only child with your father off fighting for the Union, the March house was like your second home and the girls and Marmee and Hannah always made you feel like part of the family, your own loneliness long forgotten as soon as you’d step through the door and you’d be welcomed back with laughter, squeals, and embraces.

Today, you are seeking the company of your friends as usual, returning a book Jo had lended you with a basketful of scones you’d baked in repayment. A recipe you’d learned from Meg. The autumn air is surprisingly warm against your skin, indian summer, flushed and golden and dappling the plains. It makes you smile softly, your mood pleasant as you gather your skirts in time with your step, adjust your basket. 

Then, you see him. A boy making his way in the same direction, dressed smartly in a black woolen coat and matching trousers, a silk scarf tastefully tied around his throat. His curls are windswept and tousled, his gait relaxed. He feels your gaze and looks up, eyes finding yours and the corner of his mouth ticks up in a friendly smile. Warmth floods your cheeks. You quickly duck your head.

He looks to be your age, but you’ve read tales of highwaymen and bandits roaming the countryside, how they’d feign kindness, only to strike unsuspecting travelers. Perhaps it was the work of Jo’s overactive and contagious imagination playing at your nerves, but why was he heading towards the March’s? You think of little Beth, how boys and newcomers made her nervous, timid. Your resolve hardens protectively. You have to keep this stranger away from the girls. 

Your pulse hammers in your throat as you lift your head to see the boy still looking your way. He waves his hand in greeting. 

“Hello!” he cheers. 

With your eyes still locked, you pick up your pace and keep your silence. Curiously, the boy finds this amusing, laughing, making it into a game as he too begins to walk briskly towards the house, of who will reach the door first. You narrow your eyes, summoning as much hostility and wickedness to your expression, demeanor as you can muster. The two of you are running now, his grin wide and eager, your own mouth twisted with hard concentration as you race each other.

Your chest is heaving when you brace yourself against the doorframe, blocking his way with your arm, back against the wood. He’s not a second behind you and is already on the stoop when you turn to face him.

“Are you Jo’s friend?” the boy asks you with a breathless, easy smile. “You’re quite fast, even faster than her.” He adds. He’s practically bouncing on his feet, jovial and buzzing with energy. The mention of Jo’s name curbs your distrust further. Bandit may now be off the table, and the thought makes you feel a bit foolish now, but how could Jo befriend such a strange boy without you knowing? How did he already seem to know who you are? 

Up close, you notice his eyes are green and mischievous, reflecting back the shimmering plains in flecks of amber as he gazes at you, your pulse fluttering ever so slightly…

You scold yourself internally. 

Handsome or not, he was undoubtedly a boy of trouble who had somehow won over Jo’s attention. And no easy feat, might you add. Headstrong and resolute, Jo’s circle of friends was quite small outside of you and her sisters, and you liked it that way. You’d like to keep it that way as well. 

You feel a sharp, ugly pang of jealousy curl in your stomach. You stick out your lower lip in a pout, turn up your nose in a way that would certainly earn a scolding from Marmee if she were to see your impoliteness. 

“Who are you to ask?” You snap.

Your words do not take the desired effect on him. Instead of hurt, or embarrassment, the boy smirks at you, amused. He cocks his head to one side and leans back on his heels, studying you like you’d just asked him why the sky is blue. His mood is breezy, amiable. 

“I’m Laurie. Is that better?” he offers with a comical pout of his own. You wrinkle your nose. This boy was starting to irritate you more and more.

“Surname?”

“Laurence.”

“Laurie Laurence? My, how silly and dull.”

He laughs, a low and pleasant sound that threatens to melt your angry facade. He shakes his head, hands in his pockets. 

“It’s a pet name. Jo calls me Teddy, but you may call me whichever you like,” he says. Your jealousy burns brighter, flushing your skin, twisting together with a hint of desire and yearning. 

You were once Jo’s everything, her favorite companion. She made this clear with how she’d tell you plainly, how she’d spoil you with compliments and stories and affection. And now, it seemed Jo knew another, this Laurie, well enough to call him Teddy when you had no pet name of your own. She seemed to speak of you, which would explain Laurie’s cordiality, but did she tell him how you were the only one she felt comfortable enough with to critique her writing? How she would encourage your aspirations of becoming a dancer by arranging the foyer into a stage and cheering for you while sitting atop the staircase like an admirer in the box seats? How the two of you could jest and play for hours with nothing but your imagination, crying from laughter until your bellies ached?

You feel a sense of betrayal and heartache at this, an intrusion, a tirade of emotions you can’t quite explain. Did you want Jo all for yourself? Did you want to befriend Laurie as well? Did you just want to be someone’s everything again and to be doted on and loved? 

Then, Laurie’s voice tapers into a quiet hum, a touch of softness. You hear the first indication of bashfulness as he looks down at you through full, dark lashes. “I hope the three of us can be good friends. I’d like to know you as well.” He murmurs. 

You don’t know what to think of him. Your chest feels tight and your cheeks burn, from anger or passion you can’t quite tell. You’re contemplating leaving your basket on the doorstep and shoving past him to go back home when you suddenly hear a clamor of voices and the turning of the knob and then the door falls open behind you. 

Laurie catches you before you can tumble through the entryway, hands finding your waist. Jo, vibrant and chipper as ever, lights up when she sees you and her sky blue eyes shine like glass. She has her cap fitted over her wavy blonde curls, skipping into your arms and for a moment you’re sandwiched between the two of them. You flush scarlet. 

“Oh, good! You two have met. Goodbye, Marmee! I’m going out!” Jo calls into the house, her voice overlapping with her sisters’ as they all greet you in a burst of chaos. But before Jo can usher you outside, you feel your childish temper flare and you squirm out of her reach and back through the open door and into the house. You set your basket onto the table, turning to hide your face in Amy’s shoulder with a flutter of your skirts as you feel the hot sting of tears prickle your eyes. You weren’t going to let this Laurie boy see you cry upon your first encounter.

“I’m not coming.” You mumble. Amy’s hand comes to soothingly pet back your hair with a hush of surprise and you sense her look to Jo with a characteristic glare.

“Jo, what have you done?” Amy presses.

“I’ve done nothing!” Jo retorts with a huff. Then, her voice turns gentle, curious as she speaks to you. “Dear, what’s the matter?”

“She wouldn’t be on the verge of tears if you hadn’t done nothing, would she?” Amy replies. You laugh weakly, tightening your arms around her. “See?” Amy says. “You’ve broken her heart, the poor thing.” 

“Jo’s made new friends,” you sniffle, embarrassed when Laurie’s eyes meet yours. Amy’s arms around you make you feel comforted and safe, brave enough to voice your true burdens when you say, “I’ve been replaced,” and gaze back at Laurie in defiance, protest. He frowns and shifts his weight, looking genuinely sorry with a guilt that touches his eyes. Good, you think. Let him think twice before stealing away your best companion. 

At this, Jo’s expression softens with understanding and warmth as she sees you curl into Amy once more. Jo takes a step into the open doorway, leaving Laurie on the stoop.

“No one could ever replace you, dear,” she says. “I only keep Laurie around for when I’m bored and you aren’t around to play. Look at him,” she gestures in his direction. “He’s aloof and vain, he’s lazy, he doesn’t have an ounce of the imagination you do-” 

“Don’t forget arrogant.” Amy pipes up.

Jo nods, wagging a finger at her sister. “Right you are, Amy. We mustn't forget that.”

Laurie starts to puff up with a temper, his lips twisting together and you can see him struggling with whether to speak up and defend himself, or let the girls have their fun for your sake. Jo goes on, saying he was devious and too pretty for his own good, making you and Amy giggle as she rubs soothing circles into your back. It’s rather polite and charming as you watch Laurie suffer silently, biting his tongue as Jo continues to defame his character before she finally turns back to you.

“I should have introduced the two of you properly, and for that, I’m sorry,” says Jo. “You must have had quite the surprise running into him.” Laurie again glances to you with an apologetic softness, wringing his hands together. “So, what do you think, Teddy? Are we ready to start afresh?” Jo asks him, hands on her hips. 

This makes you laugh, bubbly, your mood perking up as you finally lift your head from Amy’s shoulder. Of course, Jo would be able to comprehend your grievances and somehow peg Laurie with the blame, how she knew your heart was delicate and tender and so full of devotion that you were quick to hold grudges. Your envy dissipates and you feel a bit sorry seeing Laurie now in such low spirits, his theatrical demeanor now quiet and modest. 

“If she’ll have me,” Laurie murmurs, glancing up at you with such a pureness in his glittering eyes that regret starts to settle in your stomach.

“And I’ve written more of that story you enjoyed so much,” Jo holds out a hand to you. “Won’t you come hear what happens next?” she asks. Slowly, like the pull of a magnet, you untangle yourself from Amy’s arms and cross the room to take Jo’s outstretched hand. 

“Alright.” You say at last. Jo beams and cradles your face with her other hand, swiping away your tears with her thumb. You let her baby you like she would with Beth, enjoying her touch against your cheek. 

“That’s my sweet girl.” She smiles.

You then look to a sheepish Laurie and extend a hand, filled with new courage. You tell him your name and echo back his words that you hope the three of you can indeed become good friends, that you and Jo could do well with another acquaintance. The smile Laurie gives you is genuine, sweet and gentle, the corner of his mouth turning up in crooked delight. He clasps your hand warmly.

“I would want nothing more.” Laurie laughs. 

And with that, nestled between Jo and Laurie, you step back outside into the rich and golden light of a warm autumn afternoon, curious, excited for what adventures the day will bring you. 

**

Laurie joins your duo swimmingly and the rest of the year passes in pleasant tranquility as the three of you spend nearly every waking moment by each others’ sides. All Hallow’s Eve finds you dressed in a costume of French royalty, a pompous and comical gown of ballooning fabrics, complete with a powdered wig of pins and curls. You’ve painted your face with overlined lips and the trademark mole below your eye and the March sisters double over with laughter as you enter the foyer, fluttering your paper fan with an aristocratic pout, Laurie saluting your entrance with a roar of, la plus belle fille du monde! Jo is dressed as a fearsome pirate, outfitted in boots, breeches, and a captain’s hat, the wooden sword you and Laurie helped to paint swishing through the air as she parades into the room. Laurie enters last with a bang and a flash of white powder, appearing before your eyes in true magician fashion with a top hat and cane, a false mustache pasted onto his upper lip. All six of you then march across the field to the Laurence residence, now alight with carved pumpkins and lanterns, for your All Hallow’s Eve party of sweets and games.

Christmas brings festivities, flurries, and cheer. Sledding, ice skating, days of cold and winter fun making snow angels and snowmen, decorating the March house with holly, mistletoe, culminating into a hearty turkey dinner as you sit perched next to Laurie. The candlelight is homely, the sound of laughter and clinking silverware washing over you and you catch Laurie’s eye as he lifts his fork to his mouth. The two of you grin, leaning into each other with quiet happiness, heads bowed. You and Laurie both mirror each other in being only children, meaning these times together have been filled with welcome camaraderie. Where your instances of yearning for the companionship of siblings that only those without can understand, you’ve found company in each other, never a dull moment, never lonely. 

The thaw of spring keeps you tucked away indoors with torrents of rain pelting against the roof. Jo reads to you aloud from her novel, asking for your thoughts every so often as you and Laurie lounge on the sofa. When you articulate a point of slight critique on Jo’s use of character, Laurie teasingly tugs on a lock of your hair with a smirk. 

“How perceptive.” He murmurs, grinning.

You swat his hand away, glaring at him in mock anger. 

And as the days grow warmer, so does your heart. You’ve learned to share your affection between Laurie and Jo in a way you think is equally matched and that autumn day where you’d been so sour to both of them seems like ages ago. Soon after that incident, your bravado had quickly morphed into appreciation and Jo had been eager to break the ice between you and Laurie. And like all children, your differences and jealousy had been set aside as you’d discovered he was quite fun to be around. Laurie shared Jo’s quick wit and intelligence, like an androgynous mirror, so much of yourself also reflected in both of them in time and they in you. And yet, Laurie had a certain charm about him; how he could have the two of you in stitches and still maintain the air of sophistication that was so often expected of the Laurence boy. Admittedly, you were thrilled to have them both as your best and favorite playmates. 

In turn, they had done the same, showering you with loving attention and teasing, keeping you entertained with their bickering, quarreling over how they both wanted to occupy your time with their respective ideas for sport. Fighting over you. The thought of it makes you blush furiously. Yet, you feel cared for, like the most precious thing in their lives.You’ve also selfishly enjoyed being the apple of their eye and all the privileges that has bestowed; Jo writing you into her stories, featuring you as a beautiful sugar plum fairy, and Laurie promising to write you a French ballet, to someday whisk you off to Europe to experience high art and culture. 

At last, spring turns to summer and the three of you are back to mischief and horseplay in the great outdoors. The days are lush, agreeable, bright and pleasant with flashing sunshine and lofty clouds. You’re again reminded why summer to you is synonymous with Jo as you run together through the waving fields bursting with flowers, Laurie right on your heels as he too gives chase. 

“Jo! We were only kidding about the toads!” Laurie calls out from behind you. “It’s not like I have one in my pocket this very moment who’s squirming to get free and might have bitten me earlier when I caught him by the river and-”

He gives a shout of surprise and you hear his footfalls pause in the grasses. You and Jo both turn, breathless, already laughing when you see Laurie hopping about like hot coals are burning beneath his feet.

A small pond frog wiggles out of his pocket seam with a croak and then disappears into the meadow, waddling with great speed. With out-turned pockets and wrinkled trousers, Laurie stands there with his hands on his hips, confidence and humor masking his faults as always.

“My, they grow up so fast, don’t they?” Laurie says as he looks out over the crest of the hill with a humorous glint in his eyes, like a mother watching her child leave for the vast, cruel world. You and Jo collapse into a fit of giggles, holding each other upright by the shoulders and gasping for air.

**

Eternal summer and sun, a tender paradise. And as midsummer arrives, so does the heat. It’s stifling, heavy, the kind that suffocates and forbids any excessive movement or play, when being idle is perfectly acceptable, a rarity for you three young adventurers. Today, even nature herself seems to be drowsy from the stifling weather. Sunflowers droop from the weight of honeybees as they float lazily over the fields. Birds chortle from the treetops, as if too tired to fly, their song intertwining with the rustling grasses, tousled by the rare cool breeze. The sky burns a dome of brilliant blue above you, filled with towering, cotton white cumulus clouds. You watch as they drift slowly over the horizon. Like colossal ships at sea. 

You rest your head on Laurie’s chest and he toys with your hair. Jo dozes with her arms pillowed across your stomach and the three of you are a sleepy dog-pile of limbs. The feel of Laurie’s fingers makes you relaxed, drowsy. You hear Jo then give a soft snore and you chuckle.

“What is it?” Laurie asks. You can already hear the smile in his voice, how just your laughter is enough to amuse him too. You shake your head against his chest and the movement makes you giggle again. Laurie joins you, flopping out his legs, the heat making you both delirious and loopy.

You reach up blindly and give him a firm nudge, your hand landing just under his chin.

“Stop it, you’ll wake her.” You scold him with as much seriousness as you can muster and failing miserably. 

“Ow,” Laurie groans. He grasps your wrist, moving your hand to place it against his cheek and he puckers out his lower lip. “You’ve hurt me, I’m unwell.”

“Oh...Laurie, I didn’t mean it..” you sit up and coo, caressing his skin. Laurie looks pleased, a flash of playfulness in the green of his eyes as you lean towards him. “Let me take a closer-” 

You cuff him on the ear ever so lightly, catching him by complete surprise and Jo wakes, cackling, throwing her arms around you. 

Later, the three of you gaze up at the passing clouds, a comfortable silence settling over you all as you enjoy the afternoon.

“If we could fly up into those clouds and there was a castle with anything your heart desired, what would it be?” Jo asks. “Where do you two see your lives leading you?” Her tone is pensive, romantic. You and Laurie both hum in thought. 

“You first, Laurie.” You murmur. 

Laurie turns to look back at the bright blue sky, to the billowy clouds that look like spun sugar candy. 

“I want to live abroad in Europe and be surrounded by music, my music. I want to compose, I want to be renowned for my operas.” He declares with a proud puff of his chest. Jo nods, you give his hand a reassuring squeeze.

“That sounds very much like you, Teddy,” Jo says. “A bachelor making art in Europe, how capital.”

He makes a face, then winks at you out of the corner of his eye. You stick out your tongue.

“You can do it if you stay focused,” you add. “No more billiards, for a start.” 

Laurie wrinkles his nose. “And what is it that you want, prima donna?” he asks you in challenge. 

You turn away with a roll of your eyes, gaze to the heavens. The thought comes to you easily as you listen to the birds, feel the breeze tickling your skin, drinking in the sky. 

“I want to be a ballet dancer in a prestigious company. I want to tour the world.” You say softly. Before, you would have felt embarrassment to share such an ambitious dream. But something about this moment, of being with Laurie and Jo makes you feel brave and safe enough to speak your mind, to put your words into the universe and have it come to fruition. Like a magic spell of sorts. With them here with you, you feel like any dream is possible.

Another chorus of hums and Jo looks pleased at your response. Laurie smirks up at the horizon.

“No fair if it’s likely to happen,” he laughs. “That’s cheating.”

“Oh, hush,” Jo chides with a rather hard sock to Laurie’s arm. She ignores his whines as he recoils and grumbles dramatically. “You’re well on your way, dear,” Jo tells you. “Now that you’ll be in that New York production next summer, I’m sure your opportunities will be plentiful.”

You hope she’s right. You’d secured a role as an ensemble dancer in an upcoming production of Romeo and Juliet, your most prestigious show as of yet in your young and budding career. Jo’s warm praise makes you blush like the flowers surrounding you, pink and full. Laurie’s quick eyes catch this, envious, and he changes the subject, a muscle ticking ever so slightly in his jaw. 

“And you, Jo?” He asks tightly. 

Jo exhales, crossing her arms behind her head. “Being a writer, of course. A great one. I don’t want to settle for less.” 

“Doubtful,” snides Laurie. “I don’t see it.”

You and Laurie look to each other with a quiet smile.

“No, not with all the prizes you’ve won,” you add. “Impossible.”

Jo shoots upright, too quickly for the heat. She slugs Laurie again.

“Ow...Jo, it’s too hot for your beatings,” he moans. “Don’t be a poor sport.”

She doesn’t answer him, only gives him a final push and hunkers back down onto the grass, turning her back to him with a huff.

“Why am I the only one that ever gets hit?” Laurie grumbles, opening his shirt to cool himself off and throws his forearm across his eyes for shade, frowning. You giggle, curling up beside her.

“I believe in your abilities, Jo.” You whisper to her. She takes your hand. 

It’s not long before the three of you are fast asleep in the sun. 

**

And as the seasons and summers roll on and the fruits of childhood begin to slowly ripen with the passing years, you find your companionship with Laurie and Jo changing and growing like never before. Your friendship starts to blossom into fondness, adoration. Indeed, you’ve loved them as playmates and companions since the three of you were children, but as you flourish amidst that quaint, strange, and budding pocket of time when young men and women come of age, where you and Laurie and Jo are now struck with bashfulness and an awareness of being alone with each other, your love for them arches and glows like summer sunset. 

This makes you acutely conscious of your appearance and dress, your posture, how you carry yourself, your mannerisms. How did your hair look? Did you laugh too loudly? Would Jo think your comments about her writing were too harsh? Why did you feel such warmth in your chest every time you saw her? And why were you starting to anticipate Laurie’s company? Why did you always have a sharp hope that he would come around with every visit of yours to the March residence? The constant whir of thoughts and worries was enough to make your head turn with heaviness, make you collapse from the pressures of simply existing.

“You’re acting odd,” Laurie tells you one day.

The two of you lay in a meadow with summer buzzing all around you, resting beneath the drooping leaves of a willow tree. Jo had been unable to join you as she had Beth’s lessons to teach that afternoon, much to her own disappointment and promising to make it up to you soon with an affectionate pinch to your cheek. You’d considered going home then. The last thing you wanted was to be left alone with Laurie, that familiar crush in your chest, an inkling of dread coupled with a shortness of breath, fear and excitement. You were terrified. But when he’d taken your hand and asked you so sweetly to accompany him to the meadow’s waters, how could you possibly refuse? 

But of course, Laurie was quick to notice your nerves. 

“The heat is getting to your head,” you say evenly with eyes closed, enjoying the warmth of the sun on your face. “Besides, that’s rather rude.”

You hear him move and feel his presence directly in front of you, as if leaning in.

“It is a bit hot, do you feel up for a swim?”

This makes your eyes snap open. Following Jo’s mannerisms, you give him a shove in the chest. “You’re vile,” you grin. 

To your surprise, Laurie’s teasing, playful demeanor is nowhere to be found. His gaze is instead thoughtful, holding your own like you are all he sees. Immediately, you feel your pulse kick up in the side of your throat.

“I didn’t mean anything by it,” he continues with a shake of his head. “You don’t seem like yourself. I thought a change in our routine could be refreshing.”

You give a light shrug of your shoulders. “I feel fine,” you say. 

He brushes the back of his hand against your forehead. He hums, then curls his fingers down along the planes of your face to rest on your cheek. 

“You’re flushed,” he murmurs. 

Time seems to slow. The roar of blood deafens your ears and the fragrance of the sweet waters and blooms around you is overwhelming, sunlight refracting like prismed rainbow. Laurie kisses you then, a gentle touch of his lips, tilting your chin up to meet him. A sweetheart’s kiss, one that tastes of summer secrets as you’re shaded by vines and mist. When you break apart, he keeps his hand cradled against your cheek, his thumb circling the corner of your mouth.

You don’t know what to say. You’re speechless, your chest rising and falling softly, staring back at him with wide, surprised eyes. Laurie looks reflective, emerald irises half-lidded.

“What am I to tell Jo?” you whisper to him. Heat diffuses through your body like desert wind. You feel elated, cherished, frightened, embarrassed. Guilty. Laurie’s eyes flicker once more to your lips, his dark lashes fluttering with the movement. His smile is melancholy, yet knowing.

“You love her, too.” Laurie hums. It’s a statement, a confirmation of your feelings for both of them. The fact that the boy you’ve adored for so long has uttered your very thoughts out loud should have you completely mortified, yet there’s a small sense of comfort knowing he’d understand. Laurie knows this because he himself feels the same way, knows you or Jo or himself could never bring themselves to choose.

Laurie’s smile prompts you to lace your fingers together in the grasses and you give him a light peck on the cheek. He brightens up, raking a hand through his black curls. 

“You love me.” Laurie beams.

**

When you tell Jo about the kiss, she’s dancing with you on the porch in the evening light. Inside, you can see Marmee and the girls entertaining themselves through the windows as you practice your pirouettes. Jo is dressed in her writing jacket and trousers, keeping you balanced as she plays the part of the male dancer, perfectly competent. 

“What an impish boy,” Jo says of Laurie. You laugh and the two of you continue your steps, running through the dance number in a private rehearsal. Laurie is due to rehearse with you the week before your performance and the thought itself is enough to make butterflies explode in your stomach. Jo is a strong, leading dancer, while Laurie is graceful and firm, both capable of making the palms of your hands sweat with nerves. You know in your heart if you could rehearse with them, you’d have no fear on opening night. You’d already be invincible.

“Again from the top, please, kind sir,” you curtsey to Jo. Her smile is giddy and she gives a click of her heels before returning to her starting position. 

“Of course,” she responds. Taking your hand, she guides you through the steps once more, your heart soft and temperate like the evening around you.

**

The sound of applause is warm and full, washing over you as you take your bows. You feel weightless, aglow, eyes brimming with tears. You think you see Laurie and Jo leap to their feet in the audience, but the stage lights are too bright and you cannot see clearly and you think you may faint from happiness. 

In the auditorium, you’re still in your costume of Venetian silks and flowers when you’re swept off your feet by a boisterous Laurie and he twirls you around in his arms, his riding cloak billowing out behind him. 

“There’s our Capulet! You were phenomenal!”

“I’m so proud of you, dear!” Jo practically shouts with excitement, tackling you next in a bearish hug when Laurie finally sets you down. Their praise is boundless, endless, showering you in so much adoration that your heart feels close to bursting. You gather them close, tears threatening to spill down your cheeks.

“Thank you both for everything,” you choke out, squeezing them tight.

Over Jo’s shoulder, you spot Marmee, Meg, Amy, even shy little Beth with a bouquet of flowers and then you let the tears fall when you run to them and you thank your stars for the luck and love you’ve been blessed with.  

**

Another year, another summer soon arrives. You and Jo and Laurie are back in the fields cloud-gazing, a lazy afternoon of heat and leisurely time well spent. Things feel familiar, recognizable between the three of you, yet there’s a sense of distance between now and when Jo had first asked about your castles in the sky all those summers ago. 

 Jo was now making a name for herself in the writer’s world, having won another prize in a New York newspaper. She’d been gaining the attention of devoted readers and critics alike and was now working on a proper novel, her longest project as of yet. She tells you not to worry, that she’ll be sure to feature you as a central character in the same way she’d done as a child, nostalgic tales of pirates and adventure and love.

“My sweet sugar plum fairy,” she’d gruffed, pulling you into another powerful hug.

Laurie had finished his opera, now with aspirations of pulling funds together and opening a production in Europe. He was still in the midst of planning and conversing with his grandfather about finances and departure dates, but it seemed like Laurie’s promise of spiriting you away to Europe could now become a reality. And with the possibility of your very own French stage debut! 

Thus, you three souls were being tugged into three far corners of the globe, to your respective callings. The realization scares you, to know that this may be one of the few times you have left together. But underneath it all, there was a sense of excitement to see the world and make it your own. You were satisfied, proud knowing that the three of you had come so far with your aspirations and you had no doubt you would find success in your art.

In the comfortable silence, serenaded by the hum of cicadas and birdsong, you gaze up to the clouds gliding over Plumfield, Massachusetts. You feel an aching longing for those childhood days of carefree play, the countless rose-tinted memories of Laurie and Jo by your side, yet looking up at the sky, you know these memories of summers past will always be with you. 

And there would be better and more to come. 

[themaninthegreenshirt]

Evelyn Waugh's guide to wine [1948] 

The first and essential thing to be borne in mind about wine is that it is something made to be enjoyed. The pleasure it gives is the only ultimate test of any vintage. The corollary of this is that, like all the good works of man, its pleasure is enormously enhanced by knowledge and experience...

The titles of connoisseur and epicure are by no means synonymous. An epicure seeks pleasure for its own sake, not knowledge... A connoisseur is a scholar and a specialist. He requires an abnormally sensitive palate which is capable of causing him as much pain as pleasure. Indeed, of recent years it has caused much more pain than pleasure…

Let us give all honour to the connoisseurs, as to pre-eminent athletes. If we have not their peculiar gifts, it is a mistake to simulate them. There are those who drink their wine so anxiously, in fear of being caught out in a bad judgement, that they fail to enjoy it... Let us rejoice, rather, in the fermented juice of the grape in all its vast variety. After all it is the wine merchant's function to know all the niceties of his trade. His service is to find his customers the wines they enjoy and having studied their idiosyncrasies, gently lead them towards something better in the direction they have taken. It would be a poor librarian who was always seeking to press Virgil and Dante upon readers in search of a novel...

The reputations of certain vineyards have not been capriciously or arbitrarily fixed. They rest on the considered judgement of generations. In general it will be found that the more wine becomes a part of one's life the more one's tastes gravitate towards the famous vintages. But do not set out with any preconceived snobbery. Drink copiously of what you enjoy, because you enjoy it: keep your curiosity alive to find if there is anything you enjoy more...

Champagne

Whatever purpose is served by cocktails is more nobly served by champagne in its naked beauty... Its uses are limitless from launching ships to reviving the moribund. It is acceptable at every hour of the day and night; it can be drunk with every variety of food. Drunk in excess it has the least direful consequences. If I were confronted with the appalling decision of having to choose one from all the fermented liquors of the world to be my sole companion and stay for the rest of my life, I should choose champagne.

Bordeaux

The wine of the whole area is good and eminently suited to day-to-day drinking. To find the finest wines we must particularise and choose from the châteaux of the Médoc which in 1855 were judged and put into various legal categories. There have been slight changes in quality since due to the relative care that has been bestowed on certain properties, but the 1855 categories still stand as a very fair judgement. Three châteaux alone - Lafite, Margaux and Latour-were placed in the first class. There are many connoisseurs who would now give equal eminence to several wines that were then classed as 'second growths,' but what must be borne in mind, and is sometimes not realised, is that to be classed at all is the mark of wine that stands among the finest the world produces. A wine in the third class is not a 'third-rate' wine. It is rather as though a committee had decided that Virgil, Dante and Shakespeare alone among writers, stood in a class apart. They would not thus make Milton and Tolstoy second rate writers...

White Bordeaux… are strangely neglected in England and America. Many dubious liquids appear under the name of 'Sauternes' and many wine drinkers are inclined to dismiss them all with a single perfunctory nod of recognition towards Château d'Yquem. By false analogy with champagne, their sweetness, all their own, natural and deeply scented as the rose, is held against them. There are four or five château bottled Sauternes which can stand slightly behind, perhaps, but in the same first rank as Youem. The taste for them, once acquired, is immensely gratifying and personally I find them incomparably delicious after champagne, to drink very slowly when the thirst is entirely quenched.

Burgundy

The system of land tenure in Burgundy greatly complicates the problem of recognizing its fine wines from the outside of the bottle. Wines greatly dissimilar are entitled to the same communal title... The Château Margaux of a given year is a definite, invariable wine; two bottles of authentic Chambertin of the same year, blended by different merchants, may be very different indeed. Again, the only security for the amateur wine buyer lies in dealing with a wine merchant of the highest reputation who studies his customers' tastes.

Sherry

Sherry is a name much misused and even in the strictest sense applicable to a great diversity of wine from Manzanilla, as pale and dry as old paper, to the heavy, sweet, brown wine sold under a variety of names, often as 'East India' or Solera… I do not, myself, find that the richer and sweeter sherries serve any purpose that is not more perfectly fulfilled by port, but this is purely an individual judgment. Nothing can be more delicious than a glass of pale, very dry fino, chilled at noon in the height of summer. It makes an admirable apéritif before and at the beginning of dinner. Like all good wine it is best enjoyed in tranquillity; the 'sherry party' of recent growth is an abomination to me. As long, however, as people continue to entertain between six and eight in the evening, they will find Amontillados and Amorosos a useful knock-about stand-by, less deleterious and less expensive than cocktails.

Port

Port is the wine proper to the heavy drinker, and it may be admitted that whereas champagne, claret, burgundy and hock are all entirely beneficial and indeed, in a Well-ordered constitution, essential to the digestion of food, port, and the very finest port at that, can be slightly deleterious. Its charm insidiously invites excess, and excess of port, though not in itself harmful, sometimes discloses latent infirmities. The heavy port drinker must be prepared to make some sacrifice of personal beauty and agility. Its martyrs are usually well content with the bargain and in consolation it may be remarked that a red nose never lost a friend worth holding and that by universal testimony the sharpest attacks of gout are preceded by a period of peculiar mental lucidity.... No one, I think, ever contracted gout by port-drinking. What can be said is that those who are naturally gouty may find their weakness aggravated by port. Port is not for the very young, the vain and the active. It is the comfort of age and the companion of the scholar and philosopher. The particular qualities of British university scholarship - its alternations of mellow appreciation and acid criticism -may be plausibly derived from the habits of our Senior Common-rooms...

Port is, of course, designed to be drunk after dinner. It should be drunk at the table; only so in the masculine calm which follows the retirement of the women, when the decanter travels from hand to hand round the bare mahogany, can it be enjoyed at its best. The best of all tables for wine-drinking on winter evenings are those excessively rare eighteenth-century pieces made the shape of a semi-circular arc which fit across the fireplace; some of them have brass tram-lines and a little wheeled carriage to carry the decanters. He is a fortunate host who possesses such a piece of furniture; he must, however, confine himself strictly to male company, for no body of men once established there can be persuaded to leave for the chintz and chatter of the drawing-room...

Hock

Shall we ever, I wonder, drink good hock again?... No one can say what the future of these wines will be. Perhaps they will survive only in memory. They were the product of centuries of devoted skills directed against the hostile forces of nature; if these forces are reinforced by the malice of man there is little hope.

A word may not be out of place here about wine which is 'corked or, more correctly, 'corky' or bouchonné. I have heard people complain their wine was 'corked' when they found a fragment of broken cork floating in the glass. When wine is truly corky the cork is diseased and foul-smelling, and the wine is more or less tainted. It should never be drunk in this condition. Any respectable restaurant or hotel will immediately exchange a bottle found affected...

Wine is a bride who brings a great dowry to the man who woos her persistently and gracefully; she turns her back on a rough approach. For the sot or neurotic who drinks merely for the kick.' 'kick" is the mot juste. Wine has attracted as many false suitors as the art of painting. Do not let impatience with the charlatans lead you into thinking all discrimination affected. Even the matter of dress is important. It is difficult to enjoy a good wine in a bad glass. A good glass is large and thin and clear; the best are slightly tulip-shaped. I have drunk a lot of claret out of an army mug and enjoyed it, but only half as much as I should have done in gentler circumstances…

All that I have written may seem to some readers to apply to an Arcadian age which can never return. Leisurely entertaining, profuse expenditure, a worldwide choice in the market - all these may seem the condition of a past age. We are all poorer and likely to remain so…

If we cannot afford to drink fermented liquor more than once a day, let us drink with our dinner. A half-bottle of sound, unambitious red wine nightly does not cost more than the accumulated short drinks which the average man consumes in the course of the day. If you cannot afford even that, emigrate to a wine-growing country or become ascetic. Do not become that pitiable type of modern life - the man who never keeps anything 'in the house' but likes stopping for 'quick ones' at public houses. If you can afford, sometimes or often, more than this minimum, build round the central fact of the dinner wine - add a glass of port after or a glass of sherry before the meal; choose a slightly more interesting main wine. Choose your friends from people of similar tastes and when you entertain them, build more ambitiously. Ensure that the food, however sparse and simple, shall be what will enhance the wine and not destroy it. These are the foundations on which the restoration of good living can be built, until perhaps we shall one day see the return of days of plenty, and wine fully honoured in all its splendour.

[talkfastromance4]

Ashton snippet

Found this while perusing through old docs, it’s titled ‘Don’t Call Me Angel” and it ends abruptly because I never finished or I don’t know what happened. But here’s a snippet of a TA!Ashton as an art teacher. 

Might have to add this to my list of WIPs to finish if it gets good reviews. Let me know what you think :)

Copyright talkfastromance4 © All works is intellectual property of the author. All rights reserved. Any redistribution or reproduction or any part or all contents in any form is prohibited. You may not, without written expression and consent from the author, distribute works amongst other social media platforms

donate to my ko-fi here :)

Masterlist

• • • •

Ashton has always felt things so deeply. He loves deeply, he rages deeply, he sympathizes deeply and he plays his drums with everything he’s got. He tries to keep his emotions in check but they change like the tides, even he finds it hard to keep up with them.

Ashton lives, breathes and sweats creativity. His passion is seen in his brush strokes, his despair is shown through the negative space of his photographs. Long hours spent in the dark room and sometimes endless nights painting on large canvases in his studio apartment has given him the cliché brooding artist look; dark circles under his eyes complete the look.

When he’s not in the dark room or his apartment he frequents the coffee shop that is the perfect halfway point between his familiar places. It’s called Java Bean and serve the best iced coffee Ashton has ever tasted to tell you the God honest truth and the shop is a literal godsend for being open twenty-four hours.

Ashton’s insides are made of caffeine, paint and a constant ebb and flow of pulsating thoughts and phrases that won’t leave his mind unless he writes them down in his sketchbook. That’s another thing Ashton can never leave the house without, his sketchbook.

It’s large, black and hard covered even though the spine has long since lost the potency of its glue causing it to lie open like a cracked crab. It’s filled with his thoughts, lyrics he can’t get out of his head, small sketches of flowers or images he sees late at night when he dreams (when he gets a chance to sleep).

The book is his vice and he would rather die than ever part with it for Ashton is a closed book with every person (aside from his three best friends) but he opens up fully between those pages.

For his last year at University he’s the TA for his favorite art professor, Miss Dooley who is the perfect amount of scatter-brained and genius. She calls every student ‘pet’ and always has incense or essential oils burning in her classroom.

It has been Ashton’s wish and dream to be an art teacher for high school students, to help those like him who want to stay in their shell reveal who they truly are on the inside.

“Hello, my pet,” Miss Dooley trills in her usual sing song voice as Ashton enters the large art classroom.

He inhales the acrylic paint, the fresh wood waiting to be turned into canvases and the waxy aroma from the oil pastels stowed away in a cupboard. It’s one of his favorite smells in the world, the mediums just waiting to be used and Ashton’s fingers twitch in anticipation to create.

“Hey, Miss D,” he grins making a beeline to her desk at the front of the room. Behind her on the charcoal colored chalkboard is her name in calligraphy with broad strokes of curves and flowers.

‘Advanced Art Multi-Medium’ is written in block letters below her name as well.

“Excited for this year?” she asks rolling around a small was of blue putty in her hands. She claims it keeps her fingers and joints from failing so she’ll always be able to make art.

“Yeah, does it look like we’ll have a good class this year?” he taps the pads of his fingers on the black resin tabletop, a habit he’s always had when he’s anxious.

“Oh, I think so,” she beams her robin’s egg eyes twinkle. “It’s a full class this year, which I have you to thank for my little chickadee.”

“Me? What do you mean?”

“You’ve been the best student for the past six years you’ve been here, my prized pupil and a very handsome fella if you don’t mind me saying.”

Ashton feels the back of his neck heat up from her sentence full of compliments. Surely he’s not the reason for a full class this year? That’s ridiculous.

“I don’t think—“

Before he could finish the double wooden doors swung open and a flood of college students entered and Ashton couldn’t help but judge the first few that came in. He recognized three of the girls in front who were in Delta Zeta which he knew the only amount of creativity in their body was decorating photo backdrops.

Apart from them the rest of the class he’s seen hanging around the art wing of the school and at some of the showings he was at. At the rear was one of his best friends, Michael Clifford who decided a month ago to dye his hair a deep purple again. Michael smirks at his friend as he takes a seat next to a petite girl opening up a small black notebook.

Ashton let out an exasperated breath through his nostrils at his friend who did not tell him he’d be taking this class.

“ . . . Twenty- three . . . and twenty-four. Excellent! We’re all here!” Miss Dooley claps her hands together and moves to the front of her desk to smile sweetly at her pupils. “I recognize some of your faces but welcome to Advanced Art! I am Miss Dooley and this young man next to me is Ashton Irwin who will be my aide for this year. Would you like to inform them what this year will consist of?”

Ashton clears his throat then steps forward to stand next to Miss Dooley but ends up leaning his back against the counter behind him. He wanted them to see he was relaxed.

“Hey everybody. This year will be about using different mediums and creating something great out of them and also finding your niche in your art. Every class you’ll have five sketches of a landscape or a self-portrait or anything else that catches your eye. If you don’t have a sketchbook I recommend getting on.”

Every eye is on him and he is making a point not to look anywhere near Michael in the back. He clears his throat again before continuing.

“Your final exam for the first semester will be the beginning of your portfolio which will show the progression of your ‘voice.’ When—“

“Our voice?” a platinum blond of the Delta Zeta trio asks with her hand in the air, a confused pout on her glossed lips.

Ashton folds his arms across his chest, the leather of his jacket squeaks from the motion.

“Each artist has a voice in their work, a certain style that is all their own. That’s why when you see the blurred colors of a lily pond you know it’s Monet or the small pointed brush strokes and vivid colors of Van Gogh. Art is a voice for when you don’t know what to say, you can convey so much emotion into it. By the end of the year I want to be able to tell who’s piece is who’s, that’s how prominent it needs to be.

“If you don’t think you have it in you or won’t rise up to the challenge of being vulnerable, then I suggest you drop the class. Some people really want to be here and create art, I don’t want you to be deprived of that.”

He stands there eyeing each and every person almost daring one of them to stand up and walk out. A motion of a hand raise catches his eye in the back, he thinks it’s Michael and is ready to kick his friend out if he makes a rude comment. But it’s not Michael, it’s the girl sitting next to him.

“Yes, pet?” Miss Dooley calls on her.

“How many pieces should be in our portfolio?” she asks in a gentle voice but with sureness behind it.

“However many it takes to find your voice,” Ashton answers her. She nods then bends over her notebook to write furiously on the page.

“Well, since no one has jumped ship, let’s start off with a little exercise. Turn to the person you share a table with, introduce yourself and sketch them while you get to know each other. You will be each other’s buddies for the semester. Begin, my pets,” Miss Dooley claps her hands together again and all the students shuffle around for pencils and paper.

» » » » »

It’s a Friday night and Ashton is sitting in his favorite booth at Java Bean with his sketchbook out and earphones in to block out the small chatter of other college students. His first week of class as a TA went really well, a lot of the students showed promise. To his amusement Michael’s first sketches were of the little succulents he has scattered about his apartment.

Ashton was pleased that they took him seriously and Miss Dooley always offered her help and guidance to those who had questions. None of the students had approached Ashton but he was fine with that, he’s still learning by watching Miss Dooley interact with them.

Ashton’s hazel eyes landed on Michael and Calum approaching his table as he sipped at his black coffee. He licks his lips watching them approach with shit eating grins on their faces and he reluctantly removes his earphones. He closes his sketchbook with a soft thump, slightly glaring at his friends. They know better than to interrupt him while he’s drinking coffee and immersed in his sketchbook.

“Hey teacher,” Michael snickers pulling up a chair from the next table over. He slumps down in it with his fingers twiddling in his lap while Calum spins the chair opposite Ashton around and straddles it.

Calum pulls his dark gray beanie down lower over his ears then rests his chin on his elbows.

“Can I help you with something?” Ashton sighs leaning back in his own chair.

“Luke’s throwing a party tonight,” Calum begins, “a back to school rager, if you will.”

“Good for him.”

“C’mon Ash,” Michael whines leaning forward on his knees. “Come party with us like old times.”

“You mean like when we were freshman and your head caught fire?” Ashton quirked his eyebrows up.

“We were young and dumb then,” Michael waves it off. “Come on, it’ll be great. The girl I sit next to in your class will be there.”

“And?”

“What girl?” Calum pipes up.

“And she’s cute,” Michael shrugs, “and it will be fun for you to get out of your little hermit hole you’ve set up here.”

“I dunno guys. I want to get up early tomorrow to take some photos of the waterfall. In my photography class I’m doing a series of different locations throughout the seasons, and I think the—“

“Yeah, yeah, we get it,” Calum interrupts holding his hand up. “Just . . . come hang out with us before you get neck deep in your work, yeah? Just for a few hours.”

Ashton rolls his eyes then sighs before giving in.

“All right, fine. I’ll come.”

“YES! The Ash Man is back!” Michael hollers clapping his friend on the back and the other customers turn to look over in irritation.

“You’ve never called me that,” Ashton says gathering his stuff in his shoulder bag, “and don’t start now.”

 The party was like any other party Ashton has been to in his college career, granted it is a bit tamer than when they were all freshman and sophomores. For the most part everyone had their clothes on which relieved Ashton. He hated having to try and wrangle whoever it was to get their clothes back on.

The townhouse was stuffy with vape smoke making the air foggy, beer and liquor filled his nose and he felt the music course through his body.

“Hey, you brought him!” Luke exclaims with a large smile. His arms are raised bringing Ashton in for a tight hug. “Glad you’re here, buddy.”

“Thanks man,” Ashton says tousling the younger guy’s golden curls.

“Drinks are in the kitchen, but I think I hear a shot of fireball calling your name,” Luke wiggles his eyebrows dragging the guys into the kitchen.

“I haven’t had fireball since New Year’s two years ago,” Ashton chuckles.

“Ashton! Hey!”

His head snaps when he hears his name then wishes that he hadn’t. The voice belonged to Breanne Thomas, a girl he used to hook up with on and off a few years back. She was even the model for some of his photography assignments.

“Oh, hey, Breanne,” he nods politely then shuffles past her into the kitchen. He did not want to relive old times with her at the moment.

“Yikes, sorry, mate,” Calum says handing him a shot glass filled with the golden liquid.

“Whatever, let’s cheers to a new year,” he shakes it off holding his glass up in the air. They all clink and down the shots heartily. Ashton remembers the burn as it travels down his throat and into his stomach.

As the night progresses he becomes pleasantly buzzed and that’s when he knows to stop. He just stumbles out of the bathroom when he hears his name being called and looks up to see Michael waving him over near the back of the house to the backyard.

Ashton pushes through the bodies, waves of weed swirl around his head and it’s so strong he’s sure he’ll get a contact high from it. When Michael becomes more in view he notices the girl from his class standing next to him.

“This is Lennox Hastings,” Michael introduces with a loopy smile. “Lennox Hastings this is Ashton Irwin. Our teacher. My best friend.” A small hiccup escapes him.

“Hi,” she smiles shyly at Ashton, “And it’s just Lennox. You don’t have to use my last name Michael.”

“It’s a badass name, Lennox Hastings! I have to say it all. You should show him your notebook, he’s got one too. Oops, I’ve got to go. Bye!”

He skirts away into the crowd and Ashton shakes his head at his drunken friend then turns to Lennox who now looks oddly familiar now that he knows her name. Apart from seeing her in his class he swears he’s seen her somewhere else before, but where? Or did she have a twin?

“I’m sorry you’re stuck with him as a table partner,” Ashton apologizes and she laughs lightly.

“He’s not so bad. He’s fun to talk to when I’m not working.”

“How’re you liking the class so far?”

“It’s good, I’ve been looking forward to it since I got here, actually. I was in all advanced classes in my high school and I’ve heard how amazing Miss Dooley is.”

“Yeah, she’s great,” he smiles then glances around at their surroundings. There’s a couple making out against the fridge and Ashton realizes it’s Calum and some short blond haired girl. “You wanna step outside? Get some fresh air?”

“Yeah, that sounds good,” she smiles opening the door.

Ashton picks up two water bottles from the bucket on the counter then follows her into the warm August night. The screen door swings shut behind him, he inhales deeply and sits on the gliding bench besides Lennox.

“Thanks,” she says taking the water bottle from him and takes a sip. “This isn’t weird, is it?”

“What isn’t weird?”

“Us being out here? You’re basically my teacher,” she laughs nervously.

“Nah, I’m just an aide. I’m not a teacher yet,” he grins at her.

Now that he’s not inside the house with loads of distractions all around, he can finally get a good look at her. She looks familiar for some reason now as he stares at her in the yellow porchlight. Her auburn hair is pulled up in a half ponytail with some fly aways clinging to her round cheeks. Her eyelashes are long atop her doe eyes and Ashton finds himself wishing to see what type of blue they are and if he could paint them.

“You’ll make a good one,” she says pulling him from his wandering mind.

“Ya think?” he leans back and rocks the glider back and forth slowly, it creaks and groans as he does.

“Yeah, you control the room well and I can tell how passionate you are about art.”

“Thanks,” he says sheepishly. He’s never been able to take compliments well, whether it’s about his art or himself. “How’re the rest of your classes going?”

“Okay so far, lots of work already in my poetry class and advanced art,” she gives him a sly smirk and nudges his ribs playfully with her elbow.

“You write?”

“Mhm. Wrote a lot this summer, great inspiration,” she says grimly.

“That’s good, right? I’ve heard writers block is shit.”

“It is.”

“So what inspired you?” he turns his body so he’s angled towards her more.

Lennox shakes her head, a piece of hair clings to her lip and Ashton desperately wants to pull it away.

“I don’t want to bore you with my heartbreak, Mr. Irwin,” she says.

“Please, call me Ashton,” he grimaces at the title. “I’m an artist, too, remember? Heartbreak makes the artist.”

“You already know it, though, the cliché story of girl meets boy. Girl falls for boy and they date and commit but then the boy gets a record deal and leaves girl behind.”

“Wait,” Ashton sits up straighter when he heard record deal. “You aren’t talking about Harry Styles, are you?”

“You know him, huh?” she says airily.

“Yeah, we don’t get along very well. At all, actually,” he chuckles.

“How come?”

“That’s not important right now. I’m sorry he hurt you.”

• • • •

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**if your url has a strike through it’s because your blog didn’t show up as a tag! :(

[trevorbarre]

The Fall: 'Excavate!'. On a Coffee Table Near You. Part One.

If you had told me, back in 1979, that The Fall would eventually be the dedicatee of a 'coffee table book', I'd have been tempted to administer a gentle zen-blow to your head with a Metal Box. "An oversized, usually hard-covered book, whose purpose is for display on a table intended for use in an area in which one entertains guests and for which it can serve to inspire conversation or pass the time" (Wiki). Great for an anarcho-punk/hippie squat maybe, and I'm currently staring at Excavate!': the Weird and Frightening World of The Fall, a 350-page "hard-covered" tome, nestling on our own Barre family version of a coffee table, right next to Necronomicon: the Best Weird Tales of H.P. Lovecraft. I've been ploughing through the latter over the past few weeks, and this has led me inexorably (given M.E. Smith's reading preferences) on to Excavate!, even though I thought I'd read enough books about The Fall for one lifetime.

Edited by Bob Stanley and Tessa Norton, it's a handsome volume of pictorial memorabilia, album covers and short articles from the band's near-forty year career, interspersed with longer essays by various writers. Already 'hip priests' by 1982, they later became the critical darlings of such 'heavyweight' critics as Michael Bracewell, Ian Penman and Mark Fisher, who all seemed particularly taken with Smith's fascination with the literature of the weird and the uncanny, such as works by M.R. James, Arthur Machen and Lovecraft. Comparisons with James Joyce and T.S. Eliot were made. (I kid you not.)

All Fall fanatics have their favourite 'periods': I, for example, can break these down in my mind to: 1977-1979 (Step Forward), 1980-1983 (Rough Trade), 1984-1988 (Brix), 1990-1994 (Cog Sinister), 1995 onward (the long period of relative decline and curate's egg albums?). The true obsessive can obviously parse these even further. For the record, I think that the band's absolute peak was reached with the resolutely 'no-filler' The Weird and Frightening Word of The Fall (1984) and This Nation's Saving Grace (1985), with the gradual, yet objective, diminishment starting to take place from Middle Class Revolt (1995). Just like the much shorter career of The Pogues, this decline is measurable by increasingly terrible and incomprehensible vocals, with the unique properties of the group replaced by a more generic 'rock band' sound. (This was further reflected in increasingly terrible design and art on their album covers.Just compare Hex Enduction Hour! to Re-Mit, for example.)

So, yet another book about The Fall, who are now joining the premier league of the darlings of music literature, which includes The Beatles (natch), Dylan, Miles and Joy Division/Factory Records. I myself now have EIGHT of 'em, from Brian Edge's (in itself a great name) Paintwork from 1989 (which also has a rather 'coffee table' look, slick and 'professional' at the end of the 'Brix period', and the very opposite of the early Rough Trade graphics). Add to the written word(s), the plethora of live albums, bootlegs and compilations, and you have a quite remarkable body of work and criticism for what started out in 1977 as just another 'punk' band, who few thought would last even to the 80s (hence the title of the very first album, Live at the Witch Trials).

To be continued...

[sagar-jaybhay]

Generic List Routing & Routing Constraints

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Generic List Routing & Routing Constraints

In this article we will understand How to display Generic List In Asp.Net Razor Pages? How Routing Works in Asp.Net Razor Pages ? How to apply Routing Constraints in Asp.Net Razor Pages by Sagar Jaybhay.

Generic List Routing & Routing Constraints

Now see below image we need to display employee list like this image. We have Employee property present in our Index page model we access this in our view. Now iterating over this list we apply some bootstrap CSS and formatting to display like below.

Code in the Display template

@page @model RazorApplication.Pages.Employee.IndexModel @ ViewData["Title"] = "Employees"; <h1>Employees</h1> <h3>No of Employees : @Model.Employees.Count()</h3> <hr /> <br /> <div class="container-fluid"> @foreach (var emp in Model.Employees) var imgSrc = @"images/" + (emp.Photopath.Trim().Length != 0 ? emp.Photopath : "noimage.png"); <div class="row" style="border:thin 1px black"> <div class="col-lg-4"> <img src="@imgSrc" alt="@emp.Name" style="height:150px;width:150px" /> </div> <div class="col-lg-4"> <table style="border:thin;1px" class="table table-bordered table-active"> <tbody> <tr> <td>Name</td> <td>@emp.Name</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Email</td> <td>@emp.Email</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Department</td> <td>@emp.Dept</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </div> <div class="col-lg-2"> <table class="table table-bordered"> <tbody> <tr><td><a href="#" class="btn btn-info">Edit</a></td></tr> <tr><td><a href="#" class="btn btn-primary">View</a></td></tr> <tr><td><a href="#" class="btn btn-danger">Delete</a></td></tr> </tbody> </table> </div> </div> <hr /> <br /> </div>

See the above image in that we use this Employees Property in our Index.cshtml Display template.

Basics Of Routing In Asp.Net Razor Pages:

Routing is the URL pattern matching techniques and in this, it matches URLs with razor Pages. It is like most of page centric frameworks where URLs match with physical file paths. Keypoint to remember it start with the Root folder and in this Pages is the root folder.

Like MVC Razor pages also use Conventions and Configuration for routing. Razor pages use the same infrastructure as MVC for routing.

The standard Razor Pages 3.x site template includes 3 pages in the root folder.

Error.cshtml

Index.cshtml

Privacy.cshtml

By default, route templates are generated by taking the root path of each Content Page and then it removes root folder name from the start of path and extension from the end of the path.

In Asp.Net Razor pages Index.cshtml is the default document present in any folder so it has 2 different routes one with “blank and other with https://sagarjaybhay.com/index

So in our application, we created the Employee folder and in that we Index.cshtml so our route becomes

“blank which is an empty string path is “https://yourdomain.com/Employee”

“Employee/Index” this is the second path https://yourdomain.com/Employee/index

But if you create Employee.cshtml in your root domain and Employee folder is present in your Pages folder then when you run your application it will throw an exception.

An unhandled exception occurred while processing the request.

AmbiguousMatchException: The request matched multiple endpoints. Matches: /Employee /Employee/Index

Microsoft.AspNetCore.Routing.Matching.DefaultEndpointSelector.ReportAmbiguity(CandidateState[] candidateState)

How to handle this AmbigousMatch Exception in Asp.Net Razor pages?

One to overcome this error by renaming one of the file or folder names in our Asp.net razor page application.

The second way is to Overwrite default routes. We know that if Routes in Asp.Net razor pages are mapped to a physical file location.

@page "EmployeeList"

We are giving above custom route names to our page in Employee folders Index.cshtml file and error is gone see below image

So by giving this custom route, you can’t use the default route in our application means  https://yourdomain.com/Employee/Index this route won’t work.

The third way to overcome this error is used Route parameter in our application

@page "name"

In the above we give name is our route parameter and when we invoke the URL

https://yourdomain.com/Employee/abc here ABC is our route parameter.

Constraint on Route Parameter

If we see above URL we pass ABC to name parameter in Index view which can accept any value like character, number any value to add a constraint. Now we want our URL parameter to accept the only character then we have name:constraint_name syntax.

@page "name:alpha"

By doing this our URL only accepts the character and if we pass number it will throw an error.

GitHub:- https://github.com/Sagar-Jaybhay/AspNerRazorPages

[file-formats-programming]

Insert Hyperlink Dynamically for LINQ Reporting Engine, Setup Language Preferences using .NET

What's New in this Release?

Aspose development team is happy to announce the monthly release of Aspose.Words for .NET 18.6. This month’s release contains over 62 useful new features, enhancements and bug fixes, such as exposed Title and Description properties into Table class, Added feature to insert shapes through the DocumentBuilder using ShapeType, Changed public properties of AxisScaling class, implemented API allowing to set up language preferences, Added IsMoveFromRevision and IsMoveToRevision properties, exposed properties for Asian typography into ParagraphFormat class, Public TXT save option AddBidiMarks is added, implemented “left” and “right” alignment support for Ruby objects rendering, improved rendering of DrawingML chart data labels with percentage values and the specified format, Flat shapes that are perpendicular to the projection plane are not rendered now, Zero-width characters in DrawingML textboxes no longer cause an exception during rendering, Fixed an issue with font fallback rendering for 1F600 – 1F64F (Emoticons) Unicode range, Fixed a bug with the rendering of the chart data labels, when label text and SpPr are specified, fixed a bug with the maximum value of the chart axis when rendering DrawingML charts, Fixed a problem with rendering of subscript and superscript text in DrawingML charts, Enhanced logic which handles page breaks inside text frames, LINQ Reporting Engine supports dynamic insertion of hyperlinks and many more. A new feature has been introduced in this version of Aspose.Words to insert hyperlink dynamically using LINQ Reporting engine. Starting from Aspose.Words 18.6, users can set the alternative text of table. It has added Title and Description properties into Table class. This release has added following methods in DocumentBuilder class to insert inline and free-floating shapes. These methods allow to insert DML shape into the document model. It has removed MinimumIsAuto and MaximumIsAuto properties from the AxisScaling class. The type of the Minimum and Maximum properties has been changed from double to AxisBound. A new class AxisBound has been added in latest API that allows specifying axis bound as a numeric, datetime or “auto” value. This release has added new feature in this release to setup language preferences. In MS Word, users can setup it from ‘Set the Office Language Preferences’ dialog. It has addd following public properties into the Inline, Paragraph, ShapeBase and InlineStory classes to work with ‘move from’ and ‘move to ‘ revisions.  This release has added support of line break options for Asian Typography. Following public properties have been added into the ParagraphFormat class. It has added TxtSaveOptions.AddBidiMarks property in this version of Aspose.Words to support insertion of bi-directional marks in output TXT file format. Obsolete enum RowAlignment was Removed from API. Please use TableAlignment enum instead.  The list of new and improved features added in this release are given below

Add DateTime type to Minimum/Maximum AxisScaling

Add feature to get Move From and To revision type

Add feature to insert mailto link using LINQ Reporting

Add feature to insert shapes through the DocumentBuilder using ShapeType

Add feature to rotate VML text box (shape)

Add Table properties in table object to get/set Title, Descriptions in table>properties>Alt Text tab

Consider adding a InsertShape method to DocumentBuilder

Implement possibility to create DML shapes by default.

Support Asian Typography options of Paragraph

AW throws NRE if a field contains a comment

Blank page added in generated PDF

Document.Save lose the 'Image Size and Quality' setting

Emulate special "page break before" handling

Fonts of SVG fragments saved to HTML are not included in font resources

Paragraph moves to the right during DOCX to PDF conversion

RTF to HTML is not Converting all the RTF content to HTML

Shape.Rotation does not work for Shape node created by Aspose.Words

System.TypeInitializationException when try to create new CertificateHolder at .Net Standard 2.0

Throw a meaningful exception when inserting a Shape in GroupShape with wrong markup language

A Paragraph is pushed down to the next page in output Documents

Aspose.Words drops header/footer from altchunk document

Contents position is changed after conversion from DOC to PDF

Debug assertion failure when loading an HTML document

Document.Protect is not worked with AllowOnlyFormFields protection type

DOCX does not open in MS Word 2016 after re-saving it

DOCX to PDF conversion issue with shapes' position

Docx to Pdf conversion issue with spacing at the top of page

Extra line appears in rendered PDF

Extract contents between bookmark is not working for bullets

Field.Unlink changes font size of paragraph break

Foreign language rendering as square boxes

Images are not rendered in output PDF

Incorrect alignment when converting docx with Ruby to PDF

Incorrect percentage value for data labels after converting DOCX to PDF

List numbering incorrect when comparing documents

LprSpan.LocaleIdFarEast is not populated from the document model

Negative indent issue in DOCX to HTML conversion

Node.ToString returns incorrect output for English and Arabic text

Non-XML data in CustomXmlPart causes Aspose.Words to produce a corrupted DOCX

ODT To DOCX - Conversion problems with tables

RTF to HTML conversion converts Text boxes to Image

RTF to Html conversion issue paragraph indent

Shape.Filled property returns incorrect value

Shape.Rotation does not rotate the text of shape

Shape's background color is lost after conversion from DOCX to PDF

System.NullReference is thrown when show revision balloons is on

Text formatting lost in DOC to DOCX conversion

Text position is changed after conversion from Docx to Doc/Pdf

The alignment of the paragraph is changed in the output DOCX

The conversion MHTML to PDF produces corrupted output

The small letters in the chart are rendered incorrectly after converting to PDF

The table moved to the next page in PDF output

The text color of the chart data labels is changed when converting to PDF

Wrong page headers during Word to PDF conversion with merged document (AltChunk)

Other most recent bug fixes are also included in this release

Newly added documentation pages and articles

Some new tips and articles have now been added into Aspose.Words for .NET documentation that may guide users briefly how to use Aspose.Words for performing different tasks like the followings.

Working with Alternative Text of Table

Inserting Inline and Free-floating Shapes

Overview: Aspose.Words

Aspose.Words is a word processing component that enables .NET applications to read, write and modify Word documents without using Microsoft Word. Other useful features include document creation, content and formatting manipulation, mail merge abilities, reporting features, TOC updated/rebuilt, Embedded OOXML, Footnotes rendering and support of DOCX, DOC, WordprocessingML, HTML, XHTML, TXT and PDF formats (requires Aspose.Pdf). It supports both 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems. You can even use Aspose.Words for .NET to build applications with Mono.

More about Aspose.Words

Homepage Aspose.Words for .NET

Download Aspose.Words for .NET

Online documentation of Aspose.Words

[wendydarling823]

How to fix public education?

The reason for the question mark is 2-fold

1) I want to know other people’s ideas and theories.  I can’t get enough of articles of teachers who have left the profession pre-retirement because they have snapped under the weight of the problems in our schools.  These are the people that know what’s wrong because we are in those trenches every day.  Don’t ask a superintendent or a SBoE rep how to fix schools - they’re the ones doing the breaking.  Ask the teachers.

2) My ideas are only based off of what I’ve seen and read.  I’ve taught in public school for 4 years.  I’ve worked in public schools for 10 years.  I’ve worked with children for 16 years.  I know a lot, but obviously I don’t know everything.

So, how do we fix education?  Longest freaking post I’ve ever written.

1) Spend money, obviously.  But what the money goes for has to be taken into consideration.  You don’t need to fund a program for high schools to have a 1:1 Chromebook to student ratio - these kids are carrying computers in their pockets.  You don’t need to spend thousands on a boxed curriculum unless your teachers have tried it and specifically ask for it because they believe it will help the students they have in front of them.  You don’t need to hire a superintendent for each high school feeder zone AND a district superintendent, plus 20 other administrators in between and off to the sides.  So what should the money go for?

A) Teachers.  

i) Reduce class sizes hire more teachers so teachers have fewer kids in a class at a time.  When your child is struggling to learn, do you put them in a class with 20 other kids?  No, you pay for one-on-one or at least small group support.  At the very least, there should be more teacher’s aides.  Hell, student teaching should be a paid internship when that teacher is in my room every day.    

ii) Pay teachers more.  We have a college degree, often advanced degrees, we are constantly earning more hours of professional development and honing our craft (because it is a craft) but we are being paid like (paid) interns or apprentices.  Compared to other jobs with commensurate degrees and experience, we are paid nearly 20% less.  And we pour our money right back into our jobs to buy things we want/need to make our classrooms comfortable, effective, and fun for ourselves and our kids.

B) Books.  I started to type “and supplies” and then I realized that books are a category of their own.  What determines a child’s success later in life more than any other factor?  Number of books in the home, and whether parents read to them.  We can’t barge into houses armed with books and force parents to sit at their kids’ besides and do the voices for the characters.  But we can do that for them at school - we can make libraries into palaces, we can work with the city library to get a bookmobile that visits every neighborhood zoned for our schools and we can gift books to children that they can keep forever.  Hell, Dolly Parton will send your child 60 books (1X a month every month until they are 5), we can do that.

C) Supplies.  Paper.  Pencils.  Manipulatives. Markers, paint, glue, scissors.  The basic supplies of an art room for the purpose of giving every student the opportunity to CREATE.  A dedicated closet or cart of everyday items that students can view with new eyes.  Is that a Q-tip for cleaning out your ears?  Or is it a bunch of bones you can use to recreate the skeleton of that stegosaurus you read about in your book?  The supplies for the creation of writing, the creation of art, the free space to work out a math problem and show every step of your thinking.  Some schools have so much they waste it, other schools don’t have enough.

D) Technology*  The star is because the current model is ‘technology for technology’s sake,’ and that’s wasteful and also reductive.  These kids have phones and tablets, they are digital natives.  They know how to use computers for writing, computation, research, slideshows, video production.  Show them what else they can do!  Teach them to design. To compose music, to edit and add effects.  Yes, let them learn to code if they want to, but don’t force it.  A friend of mine wrote a grant to get a 3D printer in her school, and she got it, but not a single other teacher was interested in learning how to use it so they could teach their kids.  Spend the tech money on things that will prepare students for the real jobs of the future.

2) When you spend the money, spend it fairly.  Not equally, fairly, justly.  My school district is decently sized.  Theoretically, every person who owns property zoned for our district is paying their tax dollars into a single fund that is being spent per student, right?  But even inside our district limits there are schools so poor the teachers don’t even have a supply closet of basics (I’m talking printer paper, staples, paperclips) and schools so rich the teachers get $400 to spend on their classrooms.  Why?  Because the poor school is in the part of town that is mostly low income, and the rich school is in a master-planned community that gets money from the HOA foundation and has a PTA that can do the old “Spend money to make money” method of fundraising.  It’s funny, because the poor school is poor enough to get extra money because they are poor (Title I), but it’s still not as much as the rich school is getting. 

3) RESPECT. YOUR. TEACHERS.  Sure, paying them, making their classes smaller, and giving them the tools they need is a big part of respecting them, but there are other components.  

A) Respect a teacher who says that a student is creating a bad environment, even if that student has a behavior plan.  We’ve pushed the LRE (least restrictive environment) for a couple of decades now, and for the most part it is a very important thing to honor.  Kids who point and gawk a at a student in a wheelchair or with leg braces or who has Downs or CP are kids who’ve been taught to view that population as “other”.  They should have kids of all abilities in their classrooms to foster community and empathy, and because all should be welcome to the table of education.  However, when a student is able to terrorize a classroom, physically injure or attack a teacher or another student, and get off with little more than some isolation in the office, and then appear back in class the next day, you’ve created a restricting environment for the other 19 kids, and the teacher.  The teacher is walking on eggshells so the student doesn’t throw a chair or shove another student, and boundaries are not set or enforced.  The students hold their breath each time this child speaks, wondering if this is the point where they have to have class in the hallway while their peer turns all the desks over and makes it rain crayons. 

B) Respect a teacher who says that not every part of this curriculum is appropriate, and fills in the gaps with things that are.  Tina Fey says, “In most cases, being a good boss means hiring talented people and then getting out of their way.” You ostensibly hired that teacher because they demonstrated an ability to understand and teach the standards, manage a classroom, make learning accessible, whatever it is that they bring to the table. Lessons in a box are a product sold to make money for someone.  They can be an ingredient in a recipe, they are not the only thing you serve or the only store you shop at.  Respect a teacher who knows from experience and backs it up with research.  You will not teach every 5-6 year old how to read right away.  Some are just not ready yet. Not every student develops the same way at the same time, so why would they learn the same way at the same time? And why, when the studies show that early childhood is birth through age 8, would you expect Kindergarten kids to sit at a desk all day reading and writing?  They should be learning through play.  Respect a teacher who wants to introduce more banned/challenged books to her literature circles.  Respect a teacher who challenges the set curriculum when they know it is what’s best for their kids, and FOR PETE’S SAKE ask the teachers who are STILL. IN. THE. CLASSROOMS. for their input in adopting curriculum standards. If I had my way, any person who makes decisions regarding schools, whether it’s a principal, a superintendent, or a member of the SBoE would have to re-enter the classroom every 10 years.  Sort of like recertifying.  They want to issue rulings and set standards?  They better know what that’s going to look like on the most micro level.  Once a year, every decade, they must teach a class or a section of a subject  in order to keep being in charge of making decisions.

C) Respect a teacher against a parent. You don’t work in customer service, you don’t owe it to the parent to bend over backwards to make them happy.  When mama bear comes roaring using the “B” word (bullying), ask them to sit down with the teacher and make it clear that you trust the teacher and her handling of the situation. When you do have to intervene, make sure that teacher knows you have their back.

4) Shift the entire cultural narrative to valuing education and educated people, build schools that are places of value to a community (and hey, the school can be a community center after hours, so long as classroom hallways are locked up).  Public school is not just a babysitter for your kids until they turn 18, it should be treated as their job and their responsibility.  It should be able to teach them things they will really need - social skills, survival skills, basic home economics, finance, SEX ED and actual health.  It should offer creative outlets for everyone - art, music, theater, dance, woodworking, metal shop.  Learning should be given as a right but revered as a privilege.  That starts with all of us right now.    

[kendollsx-blog]

kendall grace yasir is finishing up her last year in the hamptons with hopes of graduating and attending harvard university to study history. four years in at bridgehampton and she’s known as the fallen angel, which makes perfect sense considering how endearing, fervent, stubborn, and ostentatious she is. that title landed her the senior class superlative of most likely to end up on page 6. when you hear glory and gore - lorde coming from a car this summer, it’ll most likely be them. speaking of summer, once school ends i hear her plans are to experience paris in the summer. i can’t help but to be reminded of messages left on read, plaid skirts and bold lipstick, the white noise of whispers in your wake, music louder then the beat of your heart and dancing until your drop.

hey fam it’s me, vee! i’m so hyped to be here and everyone’s characters look lit AF. i stan already. gimme that rich kid drama-rama. i love that for us. okay so let’s get onto my baby kendall. she’s a mess but honestly.. who isn’t? messy hoe, but make it fashion. give that heart a slap and i’ll hit you up on messages or on discord and we can plot!

hittin’ you with the basics

her mom is an ex model turned fashion designer. she’s got her own line that’s hella expensive and sold to the rich and famous all over the world. and her dad is the CEO of this fortune 500 company. so big big bucks.

so basically she used to be little miss popular. one of the school’s most well known. pretty? check. on the cheerleading team? check. hot older boyfriend? check. rich rich rich? check check check.

of course that all comes crashing down in big dramatic fashion. that older boyfriend she was dating? yeah, turns out he’s not such a good dude. they had a pretty big fight because he was accusing her of cheating on him and she broke up with him bc aint no one got time for that. well he was pissed and to get back at her, he took a video he had recorded of them having sex without her permission and blasted it all over the school. he sent it to everyone’s phone and they sent it to people they know and basically it was everywhere by lunch.

ur girl was fuming. she was embarrassed and betrayed and really really hurt so she went out to the parking lot and kinda took a crowbar to his car ??? low-key badass right? but the school had to call the police and they charged her with distraction of property and all this shit and her parents had to be notified and it was an ever bigger scene.

her parents bailed her out and got the charges dropped and took her home to flip shit on her in the privacy of their own him. when she told them what happened they flipped and got the original video taken down but he wasn’t stupid and used some hacker to encrypt everything so it can’t be traced back to him so she can’t prove it was him who distributed the video and once it’s out there, it’s out there.

it was all over the school in no time and her reputation pretty much imploded. rumours and whispers followed her wherever she went. people posted pictures and snaps of the video on her locker door and said all kinda of shit about her to add fuel to the fire. she lost a lot of friends bc let’s face it, it was a pretty epic fall from grace.

the worst might have come from her parents though. her mom cares more about image and reputation and reception. it’s not about how things are it’s about how they look. not only was kendall’s reputation tarnished but the family’s as well and she never let’s kendall forget that. she kinda blamed her for the whole thing which fucking sucks.

her dad couldn’t look her in the eyes for at least a month after the fact. he doesn’t know what to say so he basically doesn’t talk to her anymore?? he just buries himself in work and tries to ignore it ever happened.

she didn’t have a great relationship with her parents before but it’s pretty much ruined now. 

now she wears it as armour. if everyone is gonna stare at her, fine. she’ll give them something to look at. she dressed in tight fitting clothing bc ‘pls don't act like u haven’t already seen it’ and when people try to use it against her she throws it right back. 

she’s basically gone rogue. nothing if off the table now. she parties hard and drinks to forget and doesn’t give a fuck if she gets caught dancing on a table bc the worst has already happened. wit is her best friend lol and she will go off when necessary.

she had to quit cheer bc ‘it wasn’t sending the right image to have her on the team’ but she refused to quit soccer bc girl needs to get some aggression out somehow lol

and she’s going to harvard bc her dad went to yale and has a hard on for the school and it’s a bit of a fuck you to him and her mom

[suminta]

title: a mags-nificent summer

character: mags romero

author’s notes: i just missed writing and i missed mags! i love mags. i realized while i was creating her character that i needed to be smart to show off her smartness so i just tend to focus on her emotions. she has a lot of em. anyway, this is a four-parter. five, if i’m not lazy. based off of this thing i made that i later realized i didn’t like as much as i did rip :/ 

June 2021.

On an old, faux-maple table that the Romeros had procured from an estate sale a few blocks over, Mags began to write away. Somewhat mindlessly, but her best sessions came from when she was feeling her lowest. So off she wrote!

About her school year. About people she loved, and people she might end up loving. Even people she’d think she could end up loving if the circumstances were right. It went down like a list: her parents, her grandparents, her cousin Nikki, then the people she had met at Gallagher. And that one was a table all on its’ own. There was Ria, there was Willow, Val, Sunny, Ruby…

“Mom, can I just help you put some dishes out or something?”

“No, honey. Just sit. Take a rest. You must be exhausted.” And the young girl looked up to her mother, Felicia, giving her a sly wink as the older woman moved around the kitchen to take care of this and that. Wafting through the air was the smell of fried lumpia, being pushed around by a sunny afternoon in Washington D.C. The family had opted to keep the windows open, heat emanating from the food frying, the rice cooking on the counter, and the warmth in Magdalena’s cheeks as she thought about the night before.

Being an only child can suck sometimes. Mags knows that her parents know that as a young woman of her age, attending college quite a distance away from them, away from their protectiveness...it was only normal to go to parties and drink.

And Beyonce’ was there, so if you asked Mags, there was no regret whatsoever. Even if she was as exhausted as her mother says she is.

“You know, your Lola had called me up this morning.” Miguel Romero had started to put the last of the lumpia on a bowl, ready to be served, as he went on. “She said she’ll be flying to the Philippines for two months. There’s some..family stuff that needs to be looked over.”

Felicia raised a brow, “Well, that’s the first I’ve heard of that. What kind of family stuff, my love?”

The older man shrugged. “It’s nothing too important. Well, that’s not true. Just..real estate. Some land that may or may not belong to us. Who knows? That’s the whole reason she needs to be there. And hey--” He set the bowl down on the table. “Maybe some of it does belong to our family and we’re lucky and we can say that we own land back there. And when I say ‘we’, I really mean my mom. But part of the family’s properties nonetheless.”

Mags could only nod, still scribbling away as she mentally notes to add some doodles and pictures to her journal pages after their late lunch was over. “I sure hope it’s ours. Otherwise, Lola would be wasting a trip. Also, at her age, I don’t think flying would be ideal. Especially flying commercial and cheap. It’s scary!” Cue the interesting times she had running from one terminal to another for her flights to the Berlin internship. “People can be rude too. Flying is not for the weak.”

“Mags, your grandmother is just pushing eighty. And your cousin Nikki is going with her, seeing as she has all those points saved up. I’m sure they’re as comfortable as they can be.” Miguel reassured her before taking his seat and sighing. “Of course, I would’ve loved to come. But there’s work to be done here. Your mom and I have a case that we need to tend to.”

Her ears perked up at that. She theorizes that the more time she spent at Gallagher, the more nosy she became. Though maybe she could class up the terminology just a bit. Nosy could be called observant. And easy as it came, she could put that down on her curriculum vitae and call it a day. “A case?”

Felicia sent her daughter a smile. Part comforting, part .. mystery, if you asked Mags. There were ways her mother could smile at her and she wouldn’t really know how to feel. “Nothing too big. But it is tedious, so we can’t spend as much time with you as we’d like, honey.”

Miguel grunted. “Part of me wishes I was retired so we could at least enjoy you during the summer. I mean, you might keep chugging along after you graduate from Gallagher and we wouldn’t even have spent a single month with you.” Though the older man knew that it is what it is; him and Felicia had things they needed to do while Mags could pretty much go wherever. Their only comfort was that, in the midst of all this, Mags could experience a normal life.

One without near-fatal home invasions, people her age being poisoned and having their lives cut short, or fellow students dying from organizations that hunted people like her down. That last one was a doozy; Felicia had broken some oaths in telling him that one. A necessity and just plain common sense, as the two were married and would continue to be for the rest of their lives. Felicia tells Miguel, Miguel tells Felicia, and sometimes Mags would be told things. Sometimes. That’s how it worked.

Before he could pick up a piece of food, Miguel eyed his wife as she sat down. Felicia responded by giving him a puzzled look; Mags being none the wiser as she finished up the paragraph she had been writing. Miguel gave one knowing grunt and gestured towards their daughter.

As the realization dawned upon her, Felicia cleared her throat and waited until Mags had her journal closed before she spoke. “Honey, since we can’t spend time with you this summer, your dad and I were thinking that you could..stay over at your grandma’s farm.”

Mags blinked before taking a glance at her parents. One on each side of her, with her brain only running through multiple possible responses before uttering a single: “Huh?”

“To be fair, there are still some keepers left at the farm. You know, there’s the people that tend to the lands and the cattle, and the house. Just .. I – W-we, don’t really know of any other place that we feel you’d be safe in. Your mom and I know each and every one of your Lola’s farm keepers. They’re like family as well.”

“Well..--” “And before you ask, no, my side of the family..no. I mean, you’ve met them and they’re nice, but ..I just don’t want you wrapped up in what they’ve got going on. It’s..too much. Your uncle is trying to run for mayor in their little town and I just don’t want you within their circle. Politics can be very dangerous.”

Mags looked down at her journal, closed up and buckled. Worn over by the many times she’s opened it up to write, dropped it down in a hurry to get to her next class, thrown it down on floor of the science labs every time she got frustrated (to her mentor’s displeasure, she was sure), and the sleepless nights she’d studied for one or more tests. The droplets of tears that adorned both the cover and several paragraph-riddled pages as she thought of the worst when it came to her grades, to her friends, to the rejections she’d experienced, both professionally and personally.

Even through two whole years at Gallagher and the many times she’d picked up her head from the toilet after a night of drunken fun at one of Gallagher’s many events, Mags still felt like she did years ago. She was good, she followed the rules, and she could count the amount of tension-filled confrontations she’s had with one hand.

And maybe part of her was delusional, but it was her summer before her third year. Her first year at Gallagher after Laura Sutton had resigned, for better or for worse.

She could envision herself at her dorm window, looking down at the incoming class of first years and wonder where the last two years had went. Because she could swear it was just yesterday that she was arranging her plants by her dorm’s window, thinking about the many ways her first years could end. And how none of it lived up to what actually happened.

“Mags?” Her mother urged, a hand reached out to grasp her shoulder. “What do you think?”

She tapped her fingers on her journal’s buckle and gave a small smile. “I guess I could do months on my own at Lola’s farm. Could be a good experience for me.”