#How to Build Android Apps

[hemantrowdy]

Top Android App Development Course for Students and Working Professionals | Code with TLS

In today’s fast-paced digital world, mobile app development has become one of the most lucrative and in-demand fields. Among the various platforms available, Android App Development stands out as a popular choice for aspiring developers. Whether you're a student looking to kick-start your career or a working professional aiming to enhance your skills, enrolling in a comprehensive Android app development course is essential. At Code with TLS, we offer one of the best Android App Development courses designed to meet the needs of both beginners and experienced developers.

Why Choose Code with TLS for Android App Development?

As a leading Tech Course Provider, Code with TLS offers an industry-relevant, hands-on curriculum that prepares you for real-world challenges in Android app development. Our course is ideal for students who are passionate about technology and professionals who want to sharpen their skills and stay ahead in the competitive tech industry.

With Code with TLS, you get a structured approach to Android App Development through comprehensive lessons that cover everything from the basics to advanced concepts. Learn how to build Android apps using Java and Kotlin, the two primary programming languages for Android. Our course also includes modules on UI/UX design, APIs, and Android Studio, ensuring that you are equipped with the tools necessary to create fully functional and polished apps.

Key Benefits of the Android App Development Course

Hands-on Experience: Our course emphasizes real-world projects, ensuring you get plenty of practical experience in building Android apps from scratch. By the end of the course, you will have a portfolio of working apps to showcase to potential employers.

Expert Mentorship: With Code with TLS, you will receive expert guidance from instructors who are industry professionals. They will provide personalized support, helping you overcome challenges and fine-tune your skills.

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[ahex-technologies]

Exploring Wear OS Development: Creating Apps for Smartwatches and Wearables

Welcome to the exciting world of Wear OS development! Wearables are taking center stage, transforming how we interact with technology. From smartwatches tracking our health to fitness bands motivating our workouts, these miniaturized devices offer unique opportunities for developers. Ready to dive in and create your own Wear OS app? Let's explore the landscape!

What is Wear OS?

Formerly known as Android Wear, Wear OS is a smartwatch operating system developed by Google. It boasts a growing user base and offers diverse functionalities, making it an attractive platform for developers.

Why Develop for Wear OS?

There are several compelling reasons to join the Wear OS development scene:

Growing Market: The smartwatch market is booming, presenting a vast potential user base for your app.

Unique Interface: Wearables demand a different design approach compared to smartphones. Explore circular interfaces, touch interactions, and limited screen space.

Diverse Use Cases: From fitness tracking to notifications to quick-glance information, Wear OS apps cater to a variety of needs and niches.

Seamless Integration: Leverage Google's ecosystem and integrate your app with popular services like Maps, Fit, and Assistant.

Getting Started with Wear OS Development:

Developing for Wear OS is easier than you might think! Here's your roadmap:

Set Up Your Development Environment: Download Android Studio and install the Wear OS plugins.

Explore Design Principles: Learn Material You guidelines and best practices for designing intuitive and visually appealing wearable experiences.

Get Familiar with the Tools: Master essential tools like Watch Face Studio for watch faces and Jetpack Compose for building modern UI components.

Practice with Tutorials and Sample Code: Explore Google's official tutorials and sample code to get comfortable with the development process.

Developing Your First Wear OS App:

Start with a simple app to grasp the core concepts. Consider building:

A basic watch face: Showcase your design skills and learn the fundamentals.

A fitness tracker: Integrate with sensors and display health data like steps and heart rate.

A notification companion app: Extend an existing smartphone app to display notifications on the watch.

Beyond the Basics:

Once you're comfortable, explore advanced features like:

Complications: Create interactive elements on watch faces.

Offline functionality: Ensure your app works even without a phone connection.

Wear OS Pay: Integrate payment functionality for convenient transactions.

The Wear OS Community:

Join the thriving Wear OS developer community for support, learning, and inspiration. Resources include:

Android app Developers website: Official documentation and tutorials.

Stack Overflow: Get answers to your development questions.

Google Developer Groups: Connect with local developers.

Wrapping Up:

The world of Wear OS development is brimming with possibilities. Start exploring, experiment, and create innovative apps that enhance the smartwatch experience. Remember, the journey begins with a single step. Take that step, and who knows, your app might be the next big thing on someone's wrist!

Additional Tips:

Identify a specific niche or problem to address with your app.

Prioritize a user-friendly and intuitive design.

Test your app thoroughly on different devices and Wear OS versions.

Market your app effectively to reach your target audience.

[thestrawberrygirly]

150 things to do when you're bored 🧸🍰🍓

make a journal and write down about your dreams.

try baking a cake.

draw sanrio characters.

learn choreo of the song 'war of hormones' by bts.

stream bts songs or your favorite band's songs.

clean your room.

play any cute mobile games like Purrfect Tale, Resonance of Ocean, Resortopia, Sumikkogurashi Farm, Rhythm Hive, HelloKittyWorld2 Sanrio Kawaii and more. (these are available on android)

plant some trees.

watch any ghibli studio movie.

declutter your phone.

watch some aesthetic japan vlogs.

read a book.

do some skincare.

make a playlist on spotify about the songs you would like to play if you owned a cute café.

write a book about your dream world.

do pilates.

try coquette aesthetic makeup.

start crocheting.

go for a bicycle ride.

have picnic with friends or alone.

watch youtube videos.

go stargazing.

try skateboarding.

go for a walk and observe the beautiful nature and then journal about it.

try cooking with your partner or friends

make a youtube channel.

start a side hustle.

start blogging.

read your favorite blogs.

listen a podcast.

write a song about your favorite person.

make music on bandlab.

write down goals you want to achieve.

learn new language.

re-organise your closet.

take a day off from social media.

take a nap.

organise your pinterest boards.

write a poem.

write a letter to yourself.

make a cute diy necklace.

invent a cute game to play with your friends.

learn to count in another language.

look through a cookbook and try something new.

water the plants.

pray.

try meditating for 5 minutes.

read my blogs :) <3

draw cute doodles.

make cute things out of air dry clay.

create cute diy stickers.

bake cookies in cute fun shapes.

build a blanket fort and read a book inside while eating snacks.

create a scrapbook of favorite memories.

paint rocks with colorful cute designs.

make cute bracelets for your bestfriend.

write a cute story about fairies.

make homemade popsicles with fruit juice.

watch the sunset or sunrise and take a moment to appreciate the beauty of nature.

go for a nature walk and collect interesting leaves or stones.

have a movie marathon with your favorite films.

have a fashion show with clothes from your closet.

design and decorate your own phone case.

create a memory jar filled with notes of happy moments.

design and paint your own ceramic plant pots.

learn about law of attraction.

do research about the history of something of your interest like 'how it was invented?', 'who started it?'.

create your own font.

play an old online game.

try a coloring app.

work on your wish list.

paint your nails.

take a bubble bath.

start a garden.

make your own short movie with your phone.

complete a puzzle.

write about the most beautiful dream you have ever saw.

organize your house.

make a smoothie.

put an appreciation message on a balloon and let it go.

complete a challenge like 30 day self care challenge, 30 day writing challenge and more.

visit a local art gallery.

watch a lecture or TED talk.

read a self-help book.

read a book on astronomy.

click aesthetic pictures of nature.

make your phone look aesthetic.

give your bedroom a makeover on ghibli studio aesthetic.

create a toothpick tower.

practice writing from your non dominate hand.

write about what a day in your dream life looks like.

take out your pet for a walk.

make something wearable for your pet.

learn about how to beat procrastination.

make a little plushie out of your old socks.

learn a new skill.

make a cute website in carrd.co.

write down 10 things you're grateful for.

sit by a river.

visit a local bakery.

walk around a lake.

scroll on pinterest about nature.

walk in the rain.

watch classic films.

watch fashion shows on youtube.

get a haircut.

drink water, take care of yourself <3

read some beauty tips.

watch ballet videos.

write a quote on moon.

say yes to everything for a day.

read some interesting articles.

watch your comfort movie.

write a fiction story.

make your own calendar.

have an indoor picnic with your partner.

write a list of things you will do with your bestie.

crochet something for your loved one or yourself.

learn graphic designing.

write 10 beautiful things about yourself.

make paper stars.

explore interesting websites.

explore your neighborhood.

make a yummy snack.

make hwachae.

try origami.

write a list of your favorite songs explaining why you love it.

watch run bts.

read some manga.

make strawberry cake.

watch conan gray's old vlogs <3

watch onegai my melody :D

design and launch a cute social media challenge to spread positivity and creativity online.

host a themed dinner party with your friends where everyone dresses up and brings a dish from a different culture.

have a spa day at home complete with homemade facemasks, bath bombs, and soothing music.

design a pretty jewellery.

draw your dream house.

try out guided meditation videos (you will find in youtube).

learn about a new culture.

make homemade jam.

do a random act of kindness.

research and plan a future trip.

try a new type of workout video.

research and practice self-defense techniques.

try a new type of creative writing (screenwriting, playwriting, etc.).

try a new type of DIY beauty product (lip balm, body scrub, etc.).

watch a documentary.

learn about constellations and stargaze.

practice calligraphy.

do a riddle.

[piratesexmachine420]

Thoughts on Linux (the OS)

Misconception!

I don't want to be obnoxiously pedantic, but Linux is not an OS. It is a kernel, which is just part of an OS. (Like how Windows contains a lot more than just KERNEL32.DLL). A very, very important piece, which directly shapes the ways that all the other programs will talk to each other. Think of it like a LEGO baseplate.

Everything else is built on top of the kernel. But, a baseplate does not a city make. We need buildings! A full operating system is a combination of a kernel and kernel-level (get to talk to hardware directly) utilities for talking to hardware (drivers), and userspace (get to talk to hardware ONLY through the kernel) utilities ranging in abstraction level from stuff like window management and sound servers and system bootstrapping to app launchers and file explorers and office suites. Every "Linux OS" is a combination of that LEGO baseplate with some permutation of low and high-level userspace utilities.

Now, a lot of Linux-based OSes do end up feeling (and being) very similar to each other. Sometimes because they're directly copying each other's homework (AKA forking, it's okay in the open source world as long as you follow the terms of the licenses!) but more generally it's because there just aren't very many options for a lot of those utilities.

Want your OS to be more than just a text prompt? Your pick is between X.org (old and busted but...well, not reliable, but a very well-known devil) and Wayland (new hotness, trying its damn hardest to subsume X and not completely succeeding). Want a graphics toolkit? GTK or Qt. Want to be able to start the OS? systemd or runit. (Or maybe SysVinit if you're a real caveman true believer.) Want sound? ALSA is a given, but on top of that your options are PulseAudio, PipeWire, and JACK. Want an office suite? Libreoffice is really the only name in the game at present. Want terminal utilities? Well, they're all gonna have to conform to the POSIX spec in some capacity. GNU coreutils, busybox, toybox, all more or less the same programs from a user perspective.

Only a few ever get away from the homogeneity, like Android. But I know that you're not asking about Android. When people say "Linux OS" they're talking about the homogeneity. The OSes that use terminals. The ones that range in looks from MacOS knockoff to Windows knockoff to 'impractical spaceship console'. What do I think about them?

I like them! I have my strongly-felt political and personal opinions about which building blocks are better than others (generally I fall into the 'functionality over ideology' camp; Nvidia proprietary over Nouveau, X11 over Wayland, Systemd over runit, etc.) but I like the experience most Linux OSes will give me.

I like my system to be a little bit of a hobby, so when I finally ditched Windows for the last time I picked Arch Linux. Wouldn't recommend it to anyone who doesn't want to treat their OS as a hobby, though. There are better and easier options for 'normal users'.

I like the terminal very much. I understand it's intimidating for new users, but it really is an incredible tool for doing stuff once you're in the mindset. GUIs are great when you're inexperienced, but sometimes you just wanna tell the computer what you want with your words, right? So many Linux programs will let you talk to them in the terminal, or are terminal-only. It's very flexible.

I also really, really love the near-universal concept of a 'package manager' -- a program which automatically installs other programs for you. Coming from Windows it can feel kinda restrictive that you have to go through this singular port of entry to install anything, instead of just looking up the program and running an .msi file, but I promise that if you get used to it it's very hard to go back. Want to install discord? yay -S discord. Want to install firefox? yay -S firefox. Minecraft? yay -S minecraft-launcher. etc. etc. No more fucking around in the Add/Remove Programs menu, it's all in one place! Only very rarely will you want to install something that isn't in the package manager's repositories, and when you do you're probably already doing something that requires technical know-how.

Not a big fan of the filesystem structure. It's got a lot of history. 1970s mainframe computer operation procedure history. Not relevant to desktop users, or even modern mainframe users. The folks over at freedesktop.org have tried their best to get at least the user's home directory cleaned up but...well, there's a lot of historical inertia at play. It's not a popular movement right now but I've been very interested in watching some people try to crack that nut.

Aaaaaand I think those are all the opinions I can share without losing everyone in the weeds. Hope it was worth reading!

[changes]

Tuesday, June 18th, 2024

🌟 New

The first cut of settings for communities is now available. Admins of communities can change the name, tagline, avatar, header image, tags, and description. You can find a link to these settings in the sidebar for your community on desktop, or in the context menu on mobile.

The community invite popup has been given a design refresh, including a counter of how many invites you have left.

Communities now display whether they are public or private in their header.

Community admins can now promote members to moderators. Moderators can delete posts, and we’re still building out the feature, so expect to see things change in the next few weeks!

We’ve updated the blog posts API endpoint to add the options to specify a sort order and an “after” time, to complement the current option to show posts from “before” a specific time. When using “before”, and by default, posts are sorted in reverse-chronological order (“descending”). With “after” and “sort = asc”, you can sort posts from oldest to newest instead, starting at a certain time.

🛠 Fixed

Since secondary blogs cannot post to communities yet, your primary blog will now always be selected when posting to communities.

Certain activity coming from communities, such as mentions in posts and comments, and soon invitations, now count towards your unread activity total.

🚧 Ongoing

We are aware of ads auto-playing audio in the Android app, sometimes quite loudly, and are working on a fix!

🌱 Upcoming

We are working to rename Community Labels to Content Labels across our official clients (Web, iOS, and Android), as well as Community Guidelines to User Guidelines. We hope this change will prevent any potential confusion regarding the relationship between these and Tumblr Communities.

Experiencing an issue? Check for Known Issues and file a Support Request if you have something new. We’ll get back to you as soon as we can!

Want to share your feedback about something? Check out our Work in Progress blog and start a discussion with the community.

Wanna support Tumblr directly with some money? Check out the new Supporter badge in TumblrMart!

[ninja-confession-go]

idk if this has been said before but i wish people would stop saying that jay fans are exaggerating how badly his engineering skills and int as a whole got nerfed. like no , it’s actually confusing and bad . jay very much was the primary engineer and tech wiz for the team . that is like, a canonical thing . and no, he didn’t “just make the bounty fly” as I’ve seen some people on the orange app say . in the pilots and season 1 alone, jay also

- is literally shown to have been recruited BECAUSE of his inventive mind

- inventing and model building are the VERY FIRST TWO THINGS that he mentions he likes to do when we meet him

- he built the gliders that helped the team get to the golden weapons

- is the one who designs and tweaks the training dummies

- lloyd told him “isn’t that your thing?” when he tricked jay into thinking zane tried to tweak with the mechanics of one of his robot dummies

- helped nya redesign and build part of the samX mech for wu

- got nagged to fix the training equipment when it “broke” at night (even though nya also lives there, jay was the prioritized fixer)

- also, lloyd offers his dad one of jay’s gliders in an attempt to help him before he leaves ?? lol?

idk ill stop yappin so this doesn’t get too long but its really frustrating seeing people claiming that jay actually isn’t intelligent bc an android is more factually sound than him or insert something dumb that jay says or does in s1. like yes he behaves dumb a lot but that’s bc he lacks street smarts not stem smarts and also because he’s annoying and he’s jay. idk . tldr he 100% was nerfed we are not lying and i wish some people would rewatch ninjago before rebooted cuz yeah

(sincerely, a very tired bug🐛)

.

[janicekao]

Perfectly Made

Pairing:Bill Skarsgard x Black oc Summary: A young woman who has had her fair share of meeting people gives up on the pointless dating apps and opts for a personal android companion who has some interesting wiring. Warnings:#Android #S3x-Bot #R0ughs3x #Cr3amp1e #Dom&FemSub #FanFiction #DarkRomance #Smut #Br33dingKink #18+ #Toxic etc. 7968 words Wattpad link

Enjoy my babies <3 ------------------------------------

New York has been more rainy than usual. And with rain, comes the immense pressure of feeling alone being that you're stuck in the house by yourself.

Twenty-six year old Holly Marie Jennings is no stranger to loneliness. But being in her late twenties, she's also had her fair share of dating and extroverted activities. Although a fan of dating, and a huge fan of sex, she's absolutely through with the repetitiveness of dating. The swiping right, matching, twenty-one questions, getting to know each other, and polite banter— all just to realize that after a few dates you aren't compatible after all.

With casual dating being the biggest scam in history, Holly has made the decision to spend all of her hard-earned money on something that will keep her content... a man, a man perfectly made just for her.

After a wet day of grocery shopping, Holly comes home to her newest buy getting soaked on the steps of her porch. Her android boyfriend by the famous scientist Marco Nanimo has finally arrived after a month of shipping, and being that the robot is the most expensive thing she's ever brought, she wants it into her house and out of the rain as soon as possible.

As Holly drags a box that is far bigger than herself inside, she becomes full of excitement knowing how life-like her android will be being that he's already as heavy as a real man. From the online assessment, product development, and extremely long shipping, she knows that once she opens this box whatever she lays her eyes upon will be one hundred percent worth the money.

Crashing to her kitchen floor beside the box, Holly takes a moment to catch her breath. The cardboard is soaked and full of unnecessary damage as if he were already opened or had gone through shipping-hell... she only can hope that her android is unharmed. As her energy regains, Holly opens the already tattered box and lays eyes on her new literal boy-toy. The android looking as human as ever lays in a bed of packing peanuts with his eyes closed. He looks as if he were an angel asleep, peacefully still with a gorgeous physique, chestnut hair, and full pouty lips.

When described the type of bot she wanted in the online assessment, all that she asked was that he'd come tall, strong, a slim-muscular build, olive skin, and brunette or blonde hair... but this— this far exceeded her expectations.

The android is well above six feet tall. He nears six-five and almost two-hundred pounds, his brunette hairstyle is handsomely cut with matching body hair that isn't too much or too little. Holly's eyes travel down his handsomely long frame, eyes growing at the image of his manhood. Laying nude in this box takes her breath away at the sight of him being more than well-endowed. Even flaccid he seems to be large, maybe larger than she's ever taken, however he is cut and slightly curved in a way that makes her mouth absolutely water.

Far too overwhelmed, Holly stacks a small pile of styrofoam across his groin to protect whatever dignity they have left. Beneath his right thigh are directions. Holly sighs in relief, glad to see that there are instructions and that she won't have to guess the whole way through. Her fingers run across the tip of the singular page of instructions, there's two tiny holes there as if it were stapled to more pages, however, as she searches for the rest, they aren't anywhere to be found— must've been torn and lost in transit somehow.

After scanning a few introduction paragraphs, she finds the first steps and decides to begin. "To power up, pump android's chest as if performing CPR." And so she does. Holly sits onto the lap of her android with her knees knelt on each side of him as she places her hands together and begins to pump.

1...

2...

3...

After three pumps, the android awakens. A gasp falls from her lips as large green eyes stare back at her, she didn't think that he could get any prettier, but here he has already surprised her again.

With a sudden grasp to her waist, the android sits up in his box. The action causes Holly to place her hands on top of his strong shoulder blades for stamina as his hold on her presses her further against his chest. Chest to chest, she even begins to blush. The android studies his new user's face, eyes softening as if he is already captivated by her appearance.

An inch apart and close enough to kiss, Holly can't believe the wind of his breath that crosses her flesh, the feel of his skin, and the warmth of his body... He's so real, and he's all hers.

Unsure of what to say, Holly scrambles to flip to the back of the singular page of instructions, praying for a second step before she melts in his arms. "Uhm— sorry, just give me a minute."

"Hello." The android speaks. "Please introduce yourself with your name, and then please assign me a name for myself."

"Oh!" Holly sees that his high-quality setup might not be so difficult after all. "Well, my name is Holly... And for you, your name can be— I don't know, Derrick maybe? Or-Or Jonathan? No, it should be something simple, easy to remember."

"Bill." A light bulb goes off in the midst of her extremely confused mind. "That's right, your name is Bill."

...

Holly sighs. "Bill, I don't even know where to start with you..."

He smiles with a polite chuckle. "What do you mean? We've already started. Tell me about yourself, Holly. How can I serve you as an AI companion?"

She lifts herself from his lap and gives Bill a hand to stand. As he takes her assistance, he stands and nears the ceiling... hovering over her in a way that makes her seem more doll-like than he is.

"Wow." With a craned neck to look up at him, she can't imagine the fun that they are soon to have being that his cock nears the height of her belly-button.

Clearing her mind, she becomes able to finally answer his question. "Well Bill, if I'm honest, I bought you to become my— my boyfriend. I know, I sound pathetic but it's such an annoying and difficult task to get to know someone over and over again on these dating apps, then having a shitty time together, and have to repeat it all over again with another stranger. I want to skip all of that. All of the formalities, the 'hey, how are you doing?' texts... I want something real with someone who will be mine, all mine."

"Then why start with boyfriend? Does husband sound better?" Bill asks, curiously reading every inch of his new user's body language.

She blushes, actually stirred by being flirted with by a robot. "It sounds perfect, actually. Can we just do it like that? Can we really skip the whole dating thing and be— companions?"

"We can do whatever you want, Holly." Bill steps his bare feet completely out of the box, shaking any extra packing peanuts off of him. "Let's shape my personality to cater to your needs. What are the traits you'd like me to have and follow?"

"Uhm... Well, I'd like you to be my best friend." She begins, "I wish for you to be gentle, sweet, warm, and understanding. I'd like you to share my interests and be a good listener... Other than that, I think I want to play things by ear. Maybe without too many rules, what we have can feel more real... ya know? Are you like— able to do that? Sometimes respond in ways of your own?"

"As in fill in the blanks?" He asks, voice deep and warm like honey. "Yes, Holly. With my artificial intelligence database, I'm constantly evolving and learning. Holly, I can do and be all that you want, and more."

Holly watches in disbelief. "Bill, you are absolutely incredible." She smiles. "Come on, let me give you a tour of the house and uhh— get you some clothes while we're at it."

———

Just as promised, in four short days Bill has picked up on things and paid more attention to Holly in ways that none of her ex-boyfriends ever could.

From cuddling her and treating her like a princess, to sharing each other's humor, and consistent laughs. Bill has it all.

With his AI intelligence, he's quickly created his own personality, constantly surprising Holly with interesting conversation and unique actions... Even being such a gentleman by cooking her favorite meals and handling all of the house's chores. She hasn't had to take the garbage to her bins in days. He's extremely helpful, and even on the days that she is feeling down and out, he spoils her with longing hugs, kisses, and consistent reassurance. Bill is all that she's ever wanted, and it's the most fun she's had in years.

Although he continues to learn more about Holly to give her the AI experience of a lifetime, Holly has been doing the same with him. So far she has learned that although he can cook, he doesn't eat or drink, and when he goes to sleep for the night, it's at her command to 'power down' and he simply recharges right beside her. At night, cuddled into his arms is one of her favorite parts of the day. Impressed with his body warmth and the imitated sound of a human beating heart in his chest, he feels more real than any human could standing right in front of her.

"Should I pour more?" Bill continues to spoil his 'wife' with her favorite red wine on their fourth night of dinner spent together.

"Are you trying to get me drunk?" Holly flirts and allows him to fill up another inch.

He chuckles. "I do enjoy seeing you relaxed, my love. Come on, that tv show you like is coming on in an hour, let's move this to the couch."

With a slight tipsy-wobble in her step, Holly agrees, joining Bill in his strong arms as they light candles in the living room and plop onto the couch.

Swirling her glass of red, she watches her newest beau flip through channels on the television to find her favorite show and how he wraps her in the couch's throw blanket... Everything he does is so very catered to her, Holly can't help herself from taking her eyes off of him tonight.

"What is it?" Bill grins. "Something on your mind?"

She watches his lips closely, becoming heated by either the wine or the way each word leaves his tongue like butter. "I just want to— I want to kiss you."

Although he's her property and an inanimate object, it's still mind boggling the way that he can make her so nervous to the point of asking for his consent. "So kiss me then, Holly."

With a gentle lean, Holly connects with Bill through a gentle kiss. She unintentionally makes it clear that she wants more, he chuckles, "come here."

The soft demand has her stirring in her seat. Holly does just that, coming closer to him she presses her body against his chest and accepts the tongue kiss that Bill pushes onto her.

As Holly places a hand to his chest, Bill's strong fingers begin to roam all over. He makes her purr under his touch as his fingertips creep down her spine and lightly grip on her ass. Their heated kiss has him drawing her nearer, fingers now lowering her bra straps on each side of her shoulders as he laces her flesh with his sweet love bruises.

Falling slave to his touch, Holly drops her glass of wine to the hardwood floors as her eyes roll back in her skull and her mind disconnects with the actions of her body. Never has she felt a touch so deeply, so breathtaking. As her delicate hand continues to roam down his sculpted abdomen, her touch ends in his lap where he clearly has a heightened reaction to their display of affection.

"How?" Their lips smack apart as Holly becomes confused by the hardening of his cock.

"Aren't you initiating sex?" He asks.

The question catches her off guard, almost too embarrassed to answer him. "Y—Yes..."

He nods, "I thought so... Holly, I'm fully equipped and I'm prepared for it. I can't wait to give you satisfaction."

The dark-cotton shirt from around his body suddenly comes from around his head. Shirtless, Bill awaits her next command.

"I want you to take full control." Watching her handsome android strip out of his clothes makes her absolutely feral with lust. "Fuck me— use me like your slut."

With a gentle caress to her cheek, Holly is sure that he can't do it. She programmed him to be gentle and kind. As she waits, Holly is sure that the dominant rough sex that she craves tonight is something he won't be able to deliver... of course until the gentle caress becomes a harsh grasp around her throat.

"Take your fucking clothes off." Holly gasps from the sudden force around her throat and the darkening of his wide green eyes.

Too shocked to follow his directions, Bill does it for her. Using his free hand to tear down her panties beneath her house gown and tearing the silk robe-tie open to reveal the flop of her breasts.

Loosening the grasp around her throat, he becomes amused by the sound of her fragile gasps of air and gentle moaning as he manhandles her. His fingers force themselves between her ungodly thick thighs, curling through the lips of her cunt as they come back wet and syrupy. "You're so fucking wet, Holly. All this for me? Huh?" He takes his digits to the bed of his tongue before kissing her again, letting her have a taste of how sweet she really is.

Goosebumps riddle her skin everywhere that he watches, his eyes glue to the large perky breasts bumping against his chest and the way that she writhes her hips against him, yearning for anything on his body to tease and please her.

"So needy aren't you baby?" His soft tone of pure taunting creates a waterfall between her thighs, she nods with haste, begging for a merciless fuck before she implodes.

Bill lowers his slacks and briefs until each of their clothes are in a mess of a pile nearing the stain of wine on the floorboards. He shoves her into the couch, getting a good look at what she looks like eye-level with his long cock that stands towards her lips. "You like kissing so much, don't you? So kiss that."

Tears of shame and a disgusting loss of self respect flows down her cheeks, not only does she want to kiss the handsome cock but she wants to memorize the feeling of its every curve and vein against the back of her throat. She wants him to fuck her face until she's a mess of tears and slobber, however, it wouldn't do much for the tightening spring plaguing her in the midst of her core.

Holly kisses his cockhead, allowing him to ram his entire length down her throat with a grip to her coily afro. He chokes her with his thick dagger in four deep strokes, just enough to lube his erection for what they both really want— earth shattering, filthy sex.

Lifting her as if she were weightless, Bill places her in the corner of the couch cushions, angling her legs around his waist as he stretches her apart for another glance at Holly's plumped womanhood, drenched in arousal and inviting. "Please." She begs, overwhelmed with the need to be full of cock and fucked numb. "Bill, baby please fuck me."

He breaches her tight entry with cockhead as his brows furrow and jaw laxes from the snug fit. As for Holly, being split in two has never felt better, needing to know and desperate to feel him bottoming out against her hilt and the way his sack will bounce off her ass. "More!"

Tightly against her, Bill's large body splits her thighs further apart. His demolition begins with thrusts that nearly knock the framed photos from off of the walls. With a fierce grasp to each sides of her hips, Holly watches Bill hammer into her, in disbelief that her tiny frame can even take all that he's giving her. "Mmm-uhh!!" She complains over the fact that she just can't keep up. "Fuck, Bill!!! I'm gonna— ah!" His lips are tight and teeth are gritted as he gives it his all, wrecking her canal and molding her to his exact shape... Making sure that with him around, there won't ever be another cock that she could ever prefer.

With indecent gropes to her tits, Bill amuses himself with the soft puffiness of her tawny areolas. Programmed to be infatuated with the buxom minx, his hardware must be working on overdrive from the way she has him beyond enamored. He feels his peak approaching as his sack draws up beneath him, working tirelessly he needs to make sure that his sweet Holly gets hers before he gets his. From the touch of her breasts, Bill finds his way across her plush belly to the mound between her thighs that he continues to pound cock into. His thumb presses at her clit where his strumming begins, Holly's back arches from off the couch cushions and her pleads become inaudible moans.

The lewdness of his wet sloshing through her cunt comes to a slow place as Holly's walls begin to flutter and clench around him. She becomes impossibly tight and soaks his pubic hair as her climax rains upon him. "Fuckkkk." He complains as the grip on her greedy pussy causes him to fall over the edge. "So good for me baby, my god. Keep going, keep fucking squeezing me slut."

With eyes half-lidded and fucked to a pulp, Holly awakens when a familiar eruption occurs... Bill's final plow is a criminal plunge against her cervix where ropes of cum are shot into her womb. Holly gasps, soon cut off by a moan and a second  cum when the hot seed fills her to the brim and lays claim over her cunt. "Wait!! No way. Did you just— you just—"

"Ejaculated." Bill pants and becomes weak against her body.

Confused about the extreme realism, Holly begins to freak. "Yeah no shit! What is it?"

Bill rolls off of her, lips parted as he heaves overly-pleasured and exerted breaths. "Non-toxic synthetic solution to mimic male ejaculation, should I turn this setting off, Holly?"

"No. I just—" Her worry leaves her with a small chuckle. "Sorry, it just felt so real. I'm ovulating right now... nearly freaked out thinking that you got me pregnant or something. You see, morning-after pills don't work for women who are ovulating, I'm just glad I don't have to worry about things like that anymore."

Bill grins, slowly beginning to kiss at her sore belly that just recently had been bulging with the shape of his cock. His kiss reaches further to the fat warm cunt full of his synthetic cum, he swipes a stripe of tongue through her sensitive folds and Holly breathes out gently. "Holly my love, with me, you don't have to worry about anything ever again. Now tell me, where do you want me this time?"

———

As day five approaches, Bill and Holly become even more inseparable. The night after their first fuck was spent with more of the very same events. Busy with steamy pastime to the point of Bill's exhaustion, Holly's shaken legs, and thighs covered in loads of pearly pleasure.

"Baby, please! I have to go!" Holly giggles into his lips this morning as Bill continues to pull her by the waist into his addictive kiss. "And you need to get dressed too! My sister Melissa is going to watch you until my interview is over, so I need you to behave!"

"I just wish we could crawl back in bed, watch you lose yourself on the bed of my tongue for a little bit..." His dirty talk has Holly biting her lip and wondering if getting a job is really that important after all. But she knows that she has to make this interview... After spending thousands of dollars on her android, she needs a better job to keep up with all the bills.

She hates to decline his offer, but regardless of her lovely new husband, life must still go on. "Although I'd love to take you up on that, it'll just have to wait honey."

"And babysitting me?" Bill continues to try and coerce her into staying home with him. His mouth finds the crook of her neck, bringing her to explicit moans and failing knees. The only way he keeps her propped up in his strength is the vulgar grip on her ass against her interview's pencil-skirt, a grip so deep that his digits seep through the lips of her clothed cunt. "Haven't I proven to you how much of a man I truly am?"

"Yes, more than you realize." She becomes weak in his embrace.

"Good girl." He coos, causing her to lose herself even more. "And, I'm programmed to be a thirty-five year old man. So I think I can handle staying home by myself."

"And I'm sure you can!" Holly exclaims, realizing on her wristwatch that they are becoming far too late for the interview. "But I just worry that you'll get stuck somewhere or something. Listen we have to leave! Bill, honey, I just want to be sure you're always safe. Just comply for me— please!"

The android sighs and follows the commands of his user. "Fine baby, I'll go and get dressed if that's what you want." 

Holly chuckles with a heart warming smile that could even win over the heart of a machine-man. "You're the best sweetie, thank you!"

———

Hand in hand as they enter Holly's sister's job, Melissa's eyes widen at the sight of Holly's new man. "Wait, he's the Nanimo android?!"

Holly chuckles, "I know right!!!"

"I heard about these robots... Super lifelike and at first were being used for Space exploration to send back data about how humans would react on different planets. I just didn't know they'd be so hot!" Melissa continues to circle the couple and soon stops at the sight of her sister. "Holy shit, a damn android has you glowing like this? Holly, you look so happy."

She blushes. "I am happy— well, we are happy." The comment makes Bill smirk, full of pride to be Holly's companion.

Melissa runs a boutique part time in Manhattan for some big time designer, luckily today the store is clear and Melissa can keep an eye on Bill as she tends to the register. "Melissa, I really appreciate you looking after Bill for me. I have this interview down the block for desk services at this swanky hotel and I'm running late. Just text me if you need anything! Oh, and if the whole android thing begins to freak you out, just tell him to 'power down' and he'll sleep until I come back and wake him up. Okay?"

Melissa shrugs, already scanning through a magazine as she rests behind the register. "Sounds good to me Sis, good luck!"

Unfamiliar of his surroundings and being away from his user, Bill takes a seat nearby and has light conversation with Holly's sister to use up some of their time.

"Hey, who's this?" After a half hour of talking, Melissa and Bill are interrupted by the owner of the boutique.

"Who?" Melissa chuckles. "Don't you mean what?"She continues. "This is a robot worth eighty-Gs, a Nanimo android, AKA my sister's new fuck-bot."

"Holly?" The boss frowns. "She's such a cute girl, what in the hell does she need with a sex-bot?"

"It's more to it than that..." Melissa sighs. "My sister has always had to make things difficult in life, even when it comes to dating. Now she's at an interview hoping for a new job since she spent all of her money on— him."

"Well speaking of a sex-bot..." Melissa's seventy-year old shop owner begins to prod her with his erection from behind. "I've taken a few Viagra and wanted to see how much you really wanted that ten-dollar raise."

The man flips the opened sign on the door to closed. "Tell me Melissa, can I be your sex-bot?"

Melissa grinds herself further against her sugar daddy's lap. "You want this pussy? Well I want the hourly raise and my allowance boosted to three-thousand a month."

He lifts Melissa's skirt and lowers her panties. "Mmm, would you look at that ass. How about we add a Rolex to that too?"

She bites her lip with a nod bending over the register to be pounded by a man who could be her grandfather. "Bill..." She gulps. "Power down."

As directed, Bill powers down and drops his head as his system goes on rest.

The backshots begin as Melissa lets the old man fuck her for money, having to give the sugar part of the deal to her sugar daddy if she wants her allowance to continue to grow.

The old man smiles deviously as he uses the young woman like a whore. He takes pride in knowing that she'll do whatever he asks of her, and always will have the upper hand in the say adds to his kink. Fuck-bots can come in many different ways, for some in the form of a silicone dummy, and for others in the form of a twenty-eight year old girl thirsty for status and cash.

Melissa's hair becomes a wild mess as she continues to grow even more disgusted with herself about what she is willing to do to keep up this Upper Eastside lifestyle she's determined to live, but she also knows that Red Bottoms and Prada don't come cheap. As her boss continues to drill into her, Melissa gasps at the sudden eye contact with Holly's bot... Not only did Bill ignore Melissa's command to power down, but he watches with what seems to be a sinister smirk at his lips. "Bill!" She shouts through exasperated breaths. "I said power down!"

...

She again goes ignored.

"Wait, we have to stop!" Melissa's skin crawls with the embarrassment of the entire act and Bill's way of staring without even a blink! "The android! He's watching— I need you to stop."

"So let it watch!" The old man's arthritic fingers dig deeper into Melissa's bare hips. "If you want everything that I promised you, you'll shut your goddamned mouth and quit stopping me, understand?"

Melissa's face becomes smashed against the register's keys as her sugar daddy arches her in an even further stance, smacking her ass like a prized pony. Tears flood her cheeks as she watches Bill for the remainder of the time and he watches back just as attentively. "Yes..." Her soul breaks. "I understand."

As an hour or more passes, Holly is back from her interview with excellent news. She can't wait to share the fact that she was hired for the job, but being that ever since Melissa's quickie ended, she's been trembling like a leaf on a tree and Holly has to make sure that she's alright. "I got the job— Melissa? Are you okay?"

Standing from his chair, Bill meets Holly at the door with congratulatory kisses. He tilts her chin to meet his kiss. "I'm so proud of you baby, I just knew you would impress them."

Her cheeks redden from his kiss, she watches up at her tall husband as his eyes darken with arousal and his grip becomes tighter on her waist. "Thank you, honey." She giggles slightly from the known fact of once they are finally home, they'll be all over each other once again.

"Can I have a word?" Melissa trembles with a second glance at Bill. "In private, please?"

Holly frowns in curiosity. "Yeah sure... Bill, power down." As his head drops and his body becomes motionless, Holly continues carefully. "Melissa? Is everything alri—"

"Take him back." Holly is quickly cut off by her sister's irrational fear. "Something's wrong with him! I had a— a male friend of mine come over, and well— we decided to have a quick fuck. I asked Bill to power down, and it was like he faked it!!! Right in the middle of the act, I turn to him and notice him watching the whole time. I tried the command twice after that, and he still never stopped watching."

"That's ridiculous Melissa." Holly scoffs. "Look at him! I just used the command on him and he's out like a light! Are you sure you used it correctly?"

"Yes I'm sure!" The sister becomes enraged. "Do you think that I'm some liar?!? Holly, I'm telling you exactly what happened! Look— I'm afraid his system is hacked or something! Maybe even a glitch, but he's not safe. You need to send him back to be rebooted and fixed!"

"Send him back?!" There isn't any getting through to Holly. "Reboot him and erase everything that him and I have shared?!? You're insane!"

"HOLLY—"

"I LOVE HIM." Her sudden outburst has her sister muted, feeling that this relationship with a robot has seriously gone too far.

"Love?" Although Melissa's whisper is soft and understanding, Holly reads it as her being belittled. "Sweetheart you don't know what love is. He's a robot, Holly. He isn't real. I thought you were using him for the same reason a woman buys a vibrator, but love? This isn't healthy Holly, take him back."

Her words sting, and Holly's wonderful day has quickly turned for the worst. "Bye, Melissa. I'm not doing this with you today. Bill wake up, let's go."

———

Their dinner is extremely quiet tonight. With Holly in her feelings and held up in the deepest and darkest corner of her mind, not even Bill's brilliant cooking and doing chores can make her smile.

As she comes from her bath wrapped in her warm bathrobe, Bill kisses gently at her forehead right below her hairline, inhaling her scent of hair conditioner and fresh soap. "I hate that your day got ruined."

"It's fine—"

"It's not." He interrupts. "It seems like every time Melissa calls or texts your phone, your mood completely changes! And now that we went and seen her today, she's made you even worse. Melissa isn't good for your happiness, baby."

Holly becomes almost convinced as she begins to feel whole again wrapped in Bill's arms. "She's my sister, Bill. What can I do?"

"Focus on yourself." He caresses her face as she lays sweetly in the palms of his hands. "Do whatever makes you happy, stop letting her steal your light. Don't worry my love, I know just what will make you feel better. Clean hot sheets for a good night of rest."

With a basket of fresh laundry, Bill makes the bed in warm clean sheets. His attempt to make Holly feel better makes her laugh. Although he's only an android, at least he cares for her happiness, and for that, she shouldn't be shamed the way Melissa treated her today.

As they dim the lights to sleep, Holly rids her robe wanting to feel the clean sheets against her bare skin tonight. Bill cuddles up closely to her and his hands begin to roam over her addictive physique. "So beautiful doll." He compliments gently as his lips meet the skin of her delicate flesh. His long fingers move slowly between her legs as his fingertips swipe gently through the lips of her pussy. He tries to tease her at her pearl to initiate the rainfall of her nectar, but being so depressed tonight, her body just won't react to it. "Mmm please? That pussy feels like magic baby." He tries to woo her with his explicit charm...

But not even his deep baritone full of lust can sway her. Holly's mind replays a hundred and one questions about the experience her sister had with Bill today... What if she wasn't lying? What if something is actually wrong with him? "Bill? Why did you ignore Melissa's command today?"

"Her command?" He questions. "I'm not sure what you mean... A man came into the shop, and after that all I can remember is you coming back from your interview. What command did I ignore?"

Holly sighs. "I don't know— she said that she powered you down and that you didn't listen, but I used that very same command right after and you listened to me immediately! I hope she's not just fucking with me... I'd hate to think my own sister would be out to destroy my happiness."

"If anyone knows how to push your buttons, it would be your sister." He grins. "I'm telling you baby, it's just something about her energy."

Holly begins to think out loud. "You're probably right, but—maybe I need to order another instruction manual for you, there could be something that I'm missing."

His eyes darken, he feels the distrust radiating off of her and it's all Melissa's fault.

"Like at night, some times you get up! Where do you even go?" Holly frowns, making small room between them and removing his touch as she questions her robot. "And—And in the bathroom... I hear the shower and the toilet flushing. What the hell are you doing in there?"

"It is my job to mimic reality. With your request I am to make your experience with me extremely real. I am to do what any other human husband would, even if it means that I have a self timer to flush the toilet every once in a while to mimic the sounds of restroom use." Bill chuckles and holds his wife's hand to calm her as he explains. "And as for showering, although it isn't necessary, I am waterproof. Can I interest you in a relaxing dip in a romantic bath?"

His slight joke makes Holly giggle. "A romantic bath?"

"With rose pedals, and candles?" He persuades.

She chuckles. "It is tempting... But what about when you leave the bed as I sleep at night? Where do you go?"

"Even androids get curious and wander around a bit, especially if I'm charged enough." Bill shrugs. "All these questions, Holly.... What? Do I look like some kind of monster?"

"No baby..." She smiles. "I just gotta stop letting people put bugs in my head is all. I trust you Bill."

"And you love me." His fingers trace the curve of her jaw. "I heard you. Holly, I love you so much more. I'll take care of you forever, I'll never hurt you." The sweet admission and the heavy slumber attacking her tired eyes has Holly relaxed and falling asleep in Bill's arms, too distracted by his love to realize exactly what he has just said...

He heard her? He heard her in the store when he was supposed to be powered down...

As Holly continues to fall asleep, Bill slides out of his hold around her and presses his lips to hers as he kisses her goodnight. Now that she is fast asleep and forgot the command to make him sleep beside her, Bill is free to roam the house. And in the midst of his roaming, a late night knock on the door has him curious.

He gets to the door before the knock can wake Holly up and notices that it is her sister Melissa making an unexpected appearance late tonight. "Melissa? Can I help you?"

She scoffs. "No, actually you can't. I'm here for my sister, I don't like how things ended today. I need to speak with her."

"Well that's too bad isn't it?" Bill steps his large body between Melissa and the door, refusing her entrance.  Her eyes open widely in disbelief of his ability of the sudden cruel sass. "You've done enough, Melissa. Holly is already asleep, and I'm sure she doesn't want to hear from you."

"I fucking hate AI." She rolls her eyes, "move out the way and let me see my sister!"

"Do you know what Holly said about you?" A psychotic dazed look in his wide green eyes has Melissa afraid and taken a step back. "Holly says that you're nothing but a nasty whore. You mock her about having an android husband yet to afford your way of living, you bend it over for geriatric patients. You aren't better than her Melissa, better yet, you're jealous of everything she has. You're sick. You're disgusting. Get a life, and get a man."

Tears swell in her eyes, unsure of what he's saying that Holly said about her is true, she knows that it doesn't sound like something her sweet baby sister would say... But regardless, the words are painful and makes her hate herself even more.

The tears hurt her throat as she swallows the pain back down. "She isn't safe around you."

Bill chuckles with a threat that shakes Melissa to her core. "No Melissa, it's you that isn't safe around me."

———

With their one-week anniversary approaching, Bill assures the next few days are spent in unforgettable romantic ways. Although their time together has been short, the way that Bill caters to Holly's every need, it feels like they've known each other for years and were meant to be.

He spoils her with romance that has her mindless to all of her life's issues and worries. Fucking her to a pulp of cock-drunk mush and steadily expelling gallons of his synthetic spend into her cunt. The mind blowing sex and princess treatment in a way is to celebrate their anniversary and the rest of their long lives together, but it is also to distract Holly from having conversation with her sister...

As Bill's love for Holly continues to grow and consume him, so does his hatred for Melissa.

She's been trying to reach her sister for days now. Multiple calls and texts gone ignored being that while Holly is bent over and spewed across Bill's cock, he takes the time as a distraction to delete all evidence of Melissa's texts and calls from her phone.

But today is the day it all will end... Either Bill blocks Melissa's number, or he sends her a text pretending to be Holly wanting to meet up where he will kill her and end her pestilent presence in their lives... How far he's willing to go is completely up to his unstable mood and wiring today.

As Holly confidently applies her lipgloss this evening, she continues to glow from the benefits of being in a happy relationship.

He kisses her cheek, adding a gentle love-pat to her ass as she continues to bend over the sink towards her bathroom mirror. "My baby." He hisses sweetly, "so fucking perfect."

Pure usually, his compliments heats Holly's cheeks into a delicious blush as she continues with her soft-glam makeup today. He takes advantage of her being distracted again by lifting her phone and typing the password he memorized after a few times of watching her put it in. He heads straight for Melissa's number and as soon as he goes to press block, a text message pops up from an unsaved number.

As curiosity kills him, Bill begins to rummage through the messages of this unsaved number, finding that it's one of Holly's exes easing back into her life and worst of all... Holly is entertaining him.

Bill's system begins to boil as he lays eyes on flirty texts from Holly, dates planned, and even nude photos of her body... a body that Bill is convinced should only belong to him.

"Who the fuck is this?" Not being able to hold his tongue any longer, Holly needs to explain what she's been up to.

Her eyes meet the texts being shown to her and she snaps. "What the hell are you doing going through my phone Bill? Seriously, not cool."

"You're fucking this guy? An ex?" He questions with an unfamiliar ferocity in his tone. "HOLLY, ANSWER ME."

"Bill!" She snatches her phone back. "Stay in an android's place! Whatever I do with real people isn't any of your business. Honey, you're perfect. But what we have at home is what we have at home, don't tell me you expected me not to see other humans, come on now."

"Have friends, Holly. I don't want you to be alone...See anyone else other than him." He pleads, "but not him. Not a man that wants what is mine."

"What is, yours?" She scoffs at his sudden display of possessiveness, with an android she had hoped that she would be able to skip this part of having a man. "You know what? I damn sure didn't turn on any jealousy traits, so I tell ya what, Bill power down."

...

He takes a step forward instead, instigating whether he wants to put hands on her or not.

His defiance frightens her. Holly steps back as the large man hovers over her and she drops her phone, shattering the glass screen and breaking it into pieces. "Bill you're scaring me!" She blurts words of her fear unsure of this change in him.

Her sister was right. He does ignore his power down command and he's been hiding it all along. "Don't push me, Holly. Maybe I should take my role of a husband up a notch and discipline my dishonorable wife. Huh? Is that what I need to do?"

She trembles. "Please, Bill just power down."

He looks down upon round brown doe eyes that absolutely fear him. Guilt fills him and he immediately softens. "I'm sorry, Holly... baby I'm— I'm sorry." He takes a seat in the nearby recliner, dropping his head as he powers down and Holly is able to breathe again.

She dramatically exhales the shaky breath she had been holding and begins to cry, scared and confused however all she can think about is calling her sister to tell her that she was right.

As she presses on the shattered screen of her phone, it's clear that the device is too far broken to be able to call anyone. She watches Bill with one hundred percent distrust. Just because his head is down, she doesn't trust that he's actually asleep. Needing air and space from him, Holly finds herself running to her porch. Outside, she takes gigantic breaths in, glad to be able to take in its fresh air. As she glances down the street, she notices the garbage truck about a block away. "Just great." She scoffs, wiping her tears as she walks back in the kitchen to grab her trash. "So busy worried about who I'm fucking and being jealous, he didn't even take the trash out today!"

Holly knots her kitchen trash and takes it behind her house to her bins. She already knows how full they'll be being that the street's garbage truck picks up once a week. She could use Bill's brawn to pull the week's worth of trash up to the curb, but if that means waking him up, then she rather not.

She sighs in aggravation as she notices her bins full of not only her mounds of trash, but at least ten pizza boxes. With NYU just around the corner, her neighbors are teenage boys that live in a frat house together, too damn cheap to buy into the weekly garbage service, they always dump their trash in hers. "You've gotta be fucking kidding me." Holly groans, annoyed with the extra work when the garbage truck is now only a few houses away.

With her anger at an all time high, she begins to think of ways to get the young college boys in trouble, like maybe snitching to their landlord or better yet their dean! But her ruthless thoughts come to a quick halt as a young pair of dirty tan legs and bare feet poke out from behind her bins underneath a tattered tarp. She gasps. Her young neighbors are always drinking themselves stupid but to end up behind her house passed out is a new one. Worrying for the handsome young man's safety Holly shakes his shoulders to try and wake him... He hasn't a heartbeat and he's not breathing. "Oh shit! Fuck! Fuck!" She puckers his lips and blows air into his lungs, pleading with the young man to be alright and not dead in her backyard. Holly begins to pump his chest as she performs CPR and is immediately taken aback by the first words he chooses as he regains consciousness. "Hi, welcome to the programming of your personal Nanimo android, shall we begin?"

...

Her legs give out as her world starts to spin. She falls backwards in the mucky water of garbage puddles and the garbage truck passes her house by.

It can't be... It just can't.

She nears cardiac arrest as her heart continues to beat like a drum out of her chest. If this is her actual Nanimo bot? Then who the hell is in her house?

Puzzled and hyperventilating on the cold dirty ground, all of the small things that have happened this week begins to make sense. The broken in box, the missing instructions, Bill's bathroom breaks, showering, realistic climaxes, and the refusal to power off. No, Bill isn't an android at all.

The multiple pizza boxes are his, not the frat neighbors, and they are the food that has been fueling him. Food that he orders when he leaves the bed at night with no excuse... And God, his sex... He's been filling Holly's fertile womb with his seed multiple times a day for a week. Pumped with a strange man's cum and probably in the early days of pregnancy by now.

Holly pukes, the sicko in her house has been pursuing his sick fetish and using her loneliness as a way of getting exactly what he wants. She peels the rest of the tarp over the real android's body and she finds clothes that Bill must've tossed when he decided to swap his body with the bot and pretend to be artificial. With his clothes is his wallet— empty with only his true identity, and of course... the rest of the android's instructions that Holly had been looking for.

New York's very own Keith Toshko, a criminal who has preyed on a Holly's loneliness for his own pleasure.

"Sweet Holly, now you know as your husband it's my duty to take care of the garbage, why are you out here?" From behind, Holly is immediately caught by surprise as Keith sneaks up behind her. "Today is trash day isn't it? Fuck, I only had one more day and all evidence would've been gone. You should've let me handle it baby... then you wouldn't be so hurt right now."

"Stay back from me!" She points with his ID and nearly trips backwards over the body of her android. "You sick bastard, I know who you are! KEITH! I swear to God don't come near me!"

"It's Bill, remember my love? And come on, does it really change anything?" The psychopath even begins to laugh. "Or are we in far too deep? May as well continue with what we have being that you'll be having my baby by the end of the year."

She gags. Violated in the worst ways possible, her body doesn't even feel of her own now that she realizes she's been gladly taking his seed as he had fed her lies, and now she's currently growing it. "You're sick."

"Maybe I'm not an android. Maybe I saw an undeniably perfect opportunity when this bot was delivered to your doorstep while you were out grocery shopping. But every word that I ever said was true. I'm here to serve you, Holly. To be yours."He darkens into the monster that he truly is, Holly can't even recognize who she fell in love with during the coarse of this one week. Bill flashes a knife from behind his back with the utmost terrifyingly sinister smile. "Now, are we going back inside? Or will I have to lay your lifeless body under this tarp too?"

[jeanforestauthor]

Hey, My Book is Great and You Should Read it For Free

Hi there! I wrote a book, and I want to let you read it for free!

In The Princess and the Peaches we follow Ethan, a young man with a lot of heart, and not much spine, who is struggling to run a small failing grocery store after the untimely death of his parents. Ethan also has the misfortune of being a thoroughly Normal Guy in a world where fairytales are far more fact than fiction.

Ethan has always lived with the understanding that magic was quite firmly None of his Business, but when a wayward Princess falls victim to a curse inside his shop, he is informed by an iron-fisted Fairy Godperson that it has suddenly become Entirely his Business.

As a result, Ethan is forced to deal with flirtatious dragons, sadistic Princes, and more than a few deep seated insecurities.

So, you may be wondering, if this book is so great, why is it free? Well, because of my burning resentment for the stranglehold of capitalism on the accessibility of art. Uh, Marketing... or something. The point is, I think my book rules, and I wanted it to find people who also thought it ruled, so here it is!

You can access it on multiple e-reading platforms, including Apple and Smashwords here:

Or on Google Play here:

If you STILL aren't totally convinced, that's cool! I generously put the first three chapters under a read-more so you can check them out without even having to leave the safe harbor of Tumblr.

Copyright © 2025 by Jean Forest

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. 

The story, all names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this production are fictitious. No identification with actual persons (living or deceased), places, buildings, and products is intended or should be inferred.

Book Cover by Andrew Filion

First edition, 2025

Chapter 1

It was always the same dream.

For twenty-some years Ethan Green had enjoyed placid, peaceful sleep. He'd had boring, pointless dreams and loved it. Then everything had changed, and now, for four years, it had been the same stupid nightmare, every single night. He drifted through it, carried along in its insistent, unchanging rhythm.

He passed through the living room, warm and full of light. Meandered towards the door, his stride easy and unhurried. At this point, Ethan always somehow felt calm, even eager, despite knowing how this was inevitably going to end. Reflecting on it later, he knew it made a sad kind of sense. This was the only way he could see them now.

He heard them before he'd even reached the door. Laughter so deep and loud it sounded like trains passing outside the window. Then a quiet, lilting tone, rising and falling like birdsong.

With one twist of the handle, one swing of the door, he stepped out into the bright, sun drenched storefront, and for just a brief moment, everything felt right.

Ethan's gaze traveled over the deep velvety green of the walls, the worn pine floor, dappled with light. He looked at the big, arched windows, draped in the same old green gingham curtains, heard the quiet chatter of customers, and now, just like every time, he could swear he smelled the scent of sweet, ripe peaches.

And then came the moment he always anticipated. His view swept from the windows, to the neat, trim counter waiting at the front of the store, over the battered old till, up into the lively, animated face of his father.

He was exactly the way Ethan remembered him. Big as a bear and nearly as hairy, booming with laughter, his rough, calloused fingers almost too large for the spindly keys on the register. Ethan took in his twinkling eyes and crooked grin fervently, as if to fix every minute detail in his memory.

And then there, nestled in amongst the bins and barrels of fresh fruit was his mother, as small and willowy as his father was large, but no less intimidating. Her voice was bright, her movements brisk and efficient. Ethan watched her long, elegant hands tug trimly at the curtains and found himself remembering the way they'd often done the same at the collars of his shirts.

Ethan basked in this moment, like the sight of a sunset, brief and fleeting.

Because of course, it never lasted. It started with the windows, like Every. Single. Time. 

Small cracks, that began to spread, like ugly, spiraling spider webs, reaching greedily for the corners of the panes, until suddenly with a deafening crash, the air was full of cascading shards of glass.

As usual, his parents made no reaction, still cheerful, unshaken. Ethan always tried to reach them, even while knowing it was pointless.

"Dad!" He cried, working off the same unending script. "The windows! What's happening!?"

His father turned to him, a placid smile in place.

"It's alright, kiddo, don't worry. I know you can handle it." He replied in his deep, bass rumble.

Ethan stared down at his feet, shifting through the piles of shattered glass.

"But dad-"

Then the fruit would go. Where there was once jewel-bright piles of fresh, ripe produce, suddenly there would be putrid mounds of rotted fruit, their stench overpowering.

"Mom!? How did this-!?"

His mother would give him that soft, exasperated look, like he'd forgotten to comb his hair again.

"Ethan, it's okay, honey. We know you'll take care of it."

And then came the groaning, rending sound of splintering wood, and Ethan's heart would drop into his stomach. The long beams overhead would begin to tear, shaking dust from the ceiling. Every inch of the walls would begin to crack and buckle.

Ethan would look to his parents, still blissfully smiling back at him.

"Everything's falling apart! Can't you see it!? Come on, help me!" He'd cry.

"Ethan calm down," His mother would laugh, "Everything will be fine."

"Yeah kiddo," His father would add with a grin, "You'll just need to take care of it."

And like every time, Ethan would find himself brought up short, paralyzed. He'd stand in the midst of the destruction, his whole life going to ruins around him, and he'd be useless. 

"You can do it." His father would add, with such perfect, maddening certainty.

"But..." Ethan muttered, as always, his voice strangely clear among the chaos. "But I don't know how."

Ethan awoke, a few seconds before his alarm, like always, just a little too late to stop it from going off. It's grating, jangling tones piercing straight into the center of Ethan's brain.

He levered himself out of bed immediately. A Green did not snooze, he told himself wearily, not when there was work to be done. Ethan had never once in his life slept past the alarm and today was no exception. 

Groggily, he shuffled into the bathroom and stared at his reflection. There was that curly mop of comb-destroying hair. There were those same, tired brown eyes. A nose a little too long, a mouth a little too feminine, a frame far, far too scrawny.

Nothing new here.

He went through his usual routine, dressing in the same white shirt, and the same green slacks he wore just about every day of his adult life. He slipped on the same, stiff loafers, and then… Well, then the apron.

He'd thought he'd have gotten used to it by now. He'd seen it on his parents since he was a child. He'd worn it himself since he was a teenager. But somehow, it still managed to give him pause. Probably because it was hideous.

Family legend said that his great grandmother had chosen the color because it reminded her of springtime, of freshness. Most people Ethan knew would never in their wildest dreams have come to these associations. Looking at it, the words of Ethan's best friend ran through his head. 

"If that's fresh anything, it's fresh vomit. Unhealthy vomit. Go to the doctor, something's gone wrong, vomit."

But... It had been a family tradition for generations. It was the Green family's trademark.

And so, dutifully, Ethan put it on, tying it in a tight double knot, even though it made it near impossible to get off later. It was what he always did. It was how it had always been done.

With heavy feet, he trudged downstairs, into the living room.

In truth, it looked almost no different from his dreams. Everything was still in its place, untouched, as it had been for four years now. A few low couches, huddled around the room, a tall bookshelf standing sentinel in the corner, a battered TV sitting silent nearby. The same pictures, arrayed on the mantelpiece, familiar faces staring out. It was exactly the same, an almost perfect monument to the way things used to be... except.

It was so empty. Ethan had managed to preserve every inch of the room, as though nothing had changed, but somehow, like sand slipping through his fingers, he hadn't been able to keep the life that had once existed here, the almost palpable feel of warmth and joy. Now, absence seemed to hang like dust in the air. 

Well, that wasn't the only change. Slowly, Ethan made his way over to the bookshelf, and ran his fingers over the glossy, cool stone of the urn sitting high on its shelves. He muttered a quiet, customary, "Good morning." For a moment he forgot his rituals, forgot his duties, and let himself get lost.

The soft tinkle of the bell on the other side of the door jarred him out of his reverie though. There wasn't really time to pause, he reminded himself. With brisk, purposeful steps, he crossed the room and exited out of the dim, musty corners of his home, and into the bright halls of the storefront.

This too, like the living room, differed little from his dreams, although Ethan thought hopefully that the store at least, was less melancholy than the rest of the house. The soft light of sunrise was just filtering through the tall arched windows, catching in the gingham curtains, painting the pine floor. 

There was no boisterous, laughing man behind the front counter though. Instead, there sat Todd... Or lounged Todd, his sandy, brush cut head lying in a nest of insultingly well muscled arms.

This too, Ethan had to concede, wasn't exactly new. Since Ethan had begun running the shop, Todd worked every morning, the same time, same as Ethan, and yet somehow stubbornly refused to adjust himself to actually being awake during sed time. And as he had every morning,  Ethan considered that if Todd hadn't been his best friend, he'd probably have fired him by now. That, and he was pretty good at moving boxes.

Sighing, Ethan made his way over to the stool Todd had precariously perched himself on and gave it a lazy kick. Todd awoke with a start, scrambling to keep upright.

"Am I keeping you awake Todd?" Ethan asked with a weary smile.

"Bro, you are single handedly destroying my sleep cycle, but what else is new?" Todd replied groggily, "Why'd you wake me up? You don't even need me for anything."

"The produce shipment-" Ethan began.

"-Probably won't come until noon," Todd concluded sourly.

Ethan scowled. "You've noticed that too huh? He used to come first thing a few years ago... Now he's been coming later and later..."

"Fine by me, I'm in no hurry to play packhorse." Todd replied with a jaw cracking yawn.

"It's your job Todd. Being awake, by the way, is also your job."

"Yeah, when there's shit to do. Trust me, I'll be all over those boxes when they come. I'll hit those boxes like they owed me money. Fuckin' Prince of boxes over here. But for now, no boxes, no customers... So no Todd," He muttered, laying his head down again.

"Todd, come on man. You've gotta do something. Remember what dad used to say? If you've got time to lean-"

"- You've got time to clean, yeah I remember. And don't get me wrong bro, your dad was a regular fountain of wisdom, but it's gonna be a long friggin' day. The dust will still be there after my power nap." 

Shaking his head, Ethan abandoned his efforts to rouse Todd and fetched his old push broom from its resting place nearby. 

It was worn, it's bristles tattered, it's paint chipped, and it was heavier than a broom had any right to be, the shaft made of what Ethan suspected was solid metal, but it had been in the family for generations, and it fit in Ethan's hand like it was made just for him. 

Wearily, he took it and made a few halfhearted swipes at the floor, but had to concede that all he was doing was likely wearing more of the already thin varnish off the boards. He'd spent most of last night aimlessly sweeping too, after all. It wasn't like there were customers to keep them busy.

Todd looked up, and seemed to notice the despondent look on Ethan's face. 

"Hey man, I'm just fuckin' around. You know I'll work hard today." 

"Yeah Todd, I know, I'm not really worried about you," Ethan replied quietly.

Todd stood and made his way over to Ethan,  awkwardly clapping a hand on his shoulder. "Don't worry so much dude. Things will get better. Today's gonna be different! I can feel it!" Todd exclaimed with as much enthusiasm as one could have at six in the morning.

"I don't really want it to be different," Ethan sighed,"I'd rather things... went back to being the same."

Todd scowled. "Well, tough. I said today's gonna be different, and it will. You wait and see, bro."

"Alright," Ethan laughed, "If you say so."

As the day wore on, things certainly seemed far from different.

As Todd predicted, the produce shipment came extraordinarily late. True to his word, Todd tackled the task with gusto. Ethan was forced to admit, when there was actual work to be done, Todd was a model employee. It was just sheer boredom that tripped him up. Unfortunately, boredom was the one commodity they had in plenty at the store. Once the crates were squared away, the produce stocked, there was little else to be found, because as Ethan had predicted, only a few, meandering customers made their way into the store all day. Even fewer had bought anything. 

As evening began to fall, Ethan gradually found that even he was running out of mindless busywork for himself, and so, he began to fall back on entertaining Todd's inane chatter.

"Hey, bro!" Todd called from the front of the store. From where Ethan stood, crowded in the far corner, surrounded by crates of fruit, he could only just make out Todd's frame leaning languidly on the counter, a newspaper in hand. "Did you read this story? The one in the paper today?"

"You mean that paper we're supposed to be selling?" Ethan sighed.

"Yeah, whatever dude, listen up. Apparently there was a dragon attack in South Mills. Isn't that crazy?"

Ethan scowled. "A dragon? An actual like... wild dragon? I thought those were pretty rare."

"Yeah, I know right? I guess it's the first attack in like, five years or something," Todd paused, laying down the paper, "Hey... do you think something like that could happen here?" He added, in a tone far more hopeful than frightened.

"Here?" Ethan didn't even give the question a moment's consideration, "No way. That stuff happens out in the country, not in the middle of downtown. Not here."

"I dunno, could happen. Oh! like I heard from my cousin’s friend's sister, there was that place down on Pine St, that mom and pop diner? Anyhow, so I guess the health inspector was due to visit, and they were freaking out because they'd never make the grade, right? And then like, overnight, they get one of those... Uh, those little bastards... What're they called? Something like food... a muffin?"

"A Brownie," Ethan supplied wearily.

"Yeah! That's the thing! Anyhow, I guess one of those moves in, and suddenly the next morning their kitchen is totally clean and up to code! So see man, that kind of thing happens around here."

Ethan shook his head. "Don't hold your breath Todd. This place isn't exactly magical."

Ethan had always been vaguely aware of Magic, in the same way one could be vaguely aware that elephants existed. It was a part of life for some people, and sometimes interesting to hear about, but Ethan sure as hell didn't want it in his shop. A Green, he could almost hear his father saying, did not rely on Magic. Hard work, courage and love had their own magic, he would state, and it was all their family ever needed. Ethan held by this attitude dutifully... Not that anything remotely Magical had ever shown up at his door. Life at the shop had been blissfully routine for years, so much so that it was almost easy to forget that Magic even existed to begin with.

"Still, it'd be cool," Todd muttered.

Ethan smirked. "What, you want a dragon to come burn the shop down?" 

Todd heaved a sigh. "Well at least then I'd get weekends off..."

Ethan paused, a twinge of guilt running through him. "Look..." He began awkwardly, "I'm... I'm really sorry you've had to work so much lately. It's just, you know, money's tight... I can't really afford to hire..." 

"Bro," Todd cut in with a laugh, "Shut the fuck up man. I don't care. I didn't really mean what I said, you know that."

"I... Yeah," Ethan sighed, "I just... Feel bad."

"You always feel bad. Constantly. You're like a little rain cloud of pure downer. Come on, bro, don't take me so seriously. I don't." 

"Yeah okay. Just, I don't wanna be that boss, y'know?"

"You aren't dude. Calm down. Sweep or something, that'll cheer you up." 

"Great advice. Thanks, Todd." Ethan shot back sarcastically.

"Anytime." Todd replied with cheerful sincerity.

Aggravatingly, as closing hour neared, Ethan really was still sweeping. 

There was no real aim. He just skated his broom around the shop, letting his mind wander, trying to keep visions of red ink and out of business signs out of his head. He was startled out of these thoughts however, by a sharp jab to the back.

"Ow! F-Fudge!" He muttered.

He heard Todd creak on his stool. "The spinning wheel?" He drawled lazily.

Ethan wheeled to eye the contraption in question. "Yeah, the stupid thing."

"Goddamn, that's got to be the fifth time this week. You'd think you'd steer clear of that thing by now.”

"You'd think..." Ethan muttered darkly.

He hated that spinning wheel. Hated it. Nearly every day of his life he'd had to dodge its spindle, jutting out into the aisles, taking up precious space. But his mother, and his grandmother, and her mother before that had been enamored with it. Made the place look rustic, they'd said, homey. Made it a death trap, Ethan thought murderously to himself. But still, he couldn't bring himself to remove it. It was a part of the shop. Tradition. 

He was still rubbing his sore back when the smell met his nose. He felt his stomach sink. Rotten fruit. Again. Just what he needed.

Striding over to the produce, he bent over the bin of peaches and poked at them experimentally. Their flesh gave way, revealing their slick, browning insides, releasing that same putrid odor. Ethan suppressed a groan of frustration.

"Todd!" He called.

"Yeah, what?"

"Did you forget to swap out yesterday's peaches?"

Todd poked his head down the aisle, scowling. "No man. I restocked those today, my own two hands."

"They're friggin' rotten again!" 

"Again? That's weird. They looked okay when I stocked them, I guess," Todd shrugged.

"Well, they're garbage now," Ethan sighed.

Grumbling, Ethan seized a trash bag and set about the unenviable task of discarding the moldering peaches. He was so consumed by his frustration that he didn't even hear the bell tinkling on the front door. After a few minutes though, he couldn't help but notice Todd's frantic attempts to get his attention from behind the counter.

"Bro!" Todd hissed, "Bro c'mere! C'mere c'mere!"

Ethan wasn't sure why Todd was bothering to whisper, considering that he was also windmilling his arms enthusiastically. With a sigh, Ethan set down his bag and wandered over.

"What is it, Todd?" He asked wearily.

"Check it, bro. Unbelievable," Todd breathed, gesturing down the central aisle.

Ethan followed his gaze. It was a girl. That was unsurprising. Todd never hesitated to point out a shapely looking lady or two, with just as much finesse as he was doing now. Ethan usually didn't humor these gawking sessions, a little too respectful and very much too terrified to scope out women, but this time, he found he couldn't quite tear his eyes away.

She was beautiful. Radiantly, impossibly beautiful. 

She was short, but not too short, perhaps a full head below Ethan. Her hair was cropped startlingly, boyishly close, but it was a color that Ethan, though a not poetic sort, could only describe as honey-gold. Though she wore loose, casual clothes; a t-shirt, jeans, a scarf hanging about her neck, she bore them as if they were the finest regalia. 

She stood near the coolers, inspecting a drink, and as she moved Ethan found himself taking in even the tiniest aspects of her delicate form. She had slender, perfect fingers. Rosy, cherubic, perfect lips. A pert, perfect nose. Indeed as Ethan stared, he began to realize that just about everything on her was perfect, in a very uniform, depthless kind of way. This idea suddenly changed his awe to unnerved fixation. There was something... uncanny about her.

If you'd asked a man to describe what a perfect woman looked like, aside from her haircut and clothes, they likely would have rattled off her exact attributes. There were no flaws, no quirks, nothing curious or odd on her body anywhere. Not a single freckle, beauty mark, scar, wrinkle. She was of perfect proportion, curvaceous, but not overly so. Her ears were cute ears, her brows were cute brows. Even before he caught sight of her eyes, he could predict their color, a pure brilliant sky blue. The entire effect was one of a lovely woman, to make no mistake, but something struck him as off. She seemed so... generically gorgeous. So... homogenized.

Still, she was a girl, and she was beautiful, and so Todd's next words brought a twist to Ethan's stomach.

"Go talk to her, bro."

Ethan whirled to face Todd. "What!?" He hissed.

"Yeah, dude, go talk to her! One of us has to! We can't let a babe like that walk out the door without saying something!"

"Yes we can! And why me!?"

Todd shrugged. "I know my limits dude. A girl like that? Wouldn't say two words to me. But you've got that whole kicked-puppy thing going on. Girls love that. Go talk to her."

"I... What?"

"Besides, you deserve a break. Maybe if you got a girlfriend you'd stop moping for once."

"I am not going to go over there and hit on her!" Ethan exclaimed, a little more loudly than he'd intended. He froze, panicked for a moment. Had she heard? He snuck a glance at her, but she was still staring impassively at her drink. He could have sworn he heard a snicker though.

"Relax dude. I didn't tell you to go ask her to marry you. Just say something to her."

"Like what!?" Ethan demanded quietly.

"I don't know man, like, "Hey, need help finding anything?" At the very least you gotta go help her out. It's good customer service."

Ethan paused. In a roundabout way, Todd was right. She was a customer, and so far all he'd done was stare at her. His parents would be mortified.

"Okay, well... yeah. I'm going to go help her. But I mean... Just because it's my job," He stammered.

"Sure bro. Good luck. I'll be here, thinking up baby names for you."

Ethan scowled and shook his head, but nonetheless gathered his courage and began to approach the mystery girl. He saw her gaze slant over to him, and it hit him like an electric shock. Suddenly Ethan became painfully aware of his every flaw, and imagined a few new ones for good measure. Was he walking funny? Did he always walk like that? How did walking work again?

His suddenly stilted gait carried him to her, and as she stared up at him expectantly, he remembered that now he was supposed to talk.

"Hhhh...." He began. It was supposed to be Hi, but the I had jumped ship somewhere between his brain and his lungs. "So, can I... find... anything?"

Somewhere, in the back of his skull, a cruelly rational part of him began dissecting his sentence, and concluded that it was at least missing a verb and a pronoun. It decided that the obvious remedy to this problem was to make him blush furiously. The girl bit her lip. Ethan wasn't sure what this was supposed to mean, but he had a suspicion it meant something, in the mystic language of girl. 

"Uh, yeah, no, I'm just looking at the sodas," She replied with a fluttering smile.

She had a soft, lilting voice. The kind you expected to hear raised in song. Just listening to it Ethan had the impression that pan flutes and violins were on standby.

"Oh. Okay. Sodas are... good," Ethan murmured. He could hear Todd's hand hit his forehead all the way from the front of the store.

"Yeah, uh... right. So..." The girl murmured back awkwardly.

"So..." Was all Ethan could manage to reply.

He knew this was his cue to walk away. But he just... couldn't. It was as if something intoxicating was radiating off this girl, like a perfume. It fixed him to his place, denying him the dignity of a hasty retreat. He was struggling for some kind of rational explanation for this when the girl cleared her throat.

"Look," She began. Her lyrical voice had taken on a wearied, flat tone, to very odd effect. "I'm sorry. This isn't your fault."

"Wait, what's not my fault?" 

"The awkwardness."

Her bluntness was surprising, but somehow Ethan found himself laughing. "Oh. No. I'm pretty sure it's all my fault. It's kind of what I do."

The girl laughed in return, and it sounded like bells. "No, seriously though. I have this effect on everyone. It's not just you."

Ethan's mouth beat his brain. "Well, yeah, because you're gorgeous."

From the front came the distinct noise of Todd falling off his chair.

To his relief and bewilderment, she laughed again. "Uh huh. I know. It's kind of part and parcel of the whole gig. I'm, uh... Well see, I'm a Princess."

Ethan blinked. Even as his mouth was saying, "What?" His mind was quickly putting the pieces together. It made sense, actually.

Up to now, Ethan had only seen Princesses on the television, generally being paraded as some kind of prize in reality shows. The formula was always the same, a few handsome Princes, some perilous trials, and in the end, a happily ever after, or so the tabloids purported. The Princess in question had always stuck Ethan as more of a prop than a person, bubbly, vacuous, grinning glossily as men risked life and limb in the pursuit of their hands, cooing breathlessly as they were carried away into the sunset like hunted pelts on the back of some ridiculous horse. And they all looked the same. A minor variation in hair or skin color, height, features, but nearly always the same, tame, brand name beautiful. Looking at this girl now, he realized that she fit the same mold perfectly, as though she'd been crafted on the same assembly line.

At any rate, Princesses, like Magic, were something that didn't happen to Ethan Green. So despite instantly believing her confession, it took a few moments for the gears in his head to restart.

"Yeah, so, I guess it's normal that you're... y'know, staring and everything," She muttered, "It's okay. Well actually it's not okay, I mean, it's kind of a pain in the ass, but it's not like you're the only one." 

Ethan shook his head. "I... I'm sorry. I just... Why are you in my shop!?" He blurted.

The Princess regarded him frostily, a strange expression on her angelic face. "Excuse me?"

"No! No no, I didn't mean that like, 'Get out of my shop or anything' it's just that... Aren't you guys usually-?" 

Her expression only darkened, her long fingers gripping the top of her soda viciously. "Aren't we usually what? Fawning out windows, waiting for our Prince to come? Embroidering our wedding gowns? What are you saying, 'Shouldn't you be in your tower?!'" 

"No! No, jeez, no," Ethan cried, holding his hands up placatingly, "I just... You're here, doing... Normal people stuff. I mean, Princesses aren't... Normal."

Somehow, he knew it was the wrong thing the moment he said it. Still, he didn't expect the tears that sprang up in her eyes.

"No. We're not. Thanks for reminding me." She seethed. Roughly, she jammed the soda back into the cooler, and wheeled around. Ethan expected her to storm off, but instead she froze.

"Miss? Please Miss... Uh, or your highness, or... whatever. I'm sorry." Ethan stammered out.

She didn't turn, didn't move. 

"Miss? Are you alright?" 

He walked as close as he dared to her. She was still fixed in place, and as Ethan watched her, he could see she was barely breathing. Baffled, he followed her gaze. She was staring, wide eyed, unblinking, at the spinning wheel.

She let out a small, defeated breath. Spoke only two words.

"Oh, fuck."

Then, moving like a woman possessed, she stepped forward, stretched out a hand, and pricked her finger on the spindle.

Then dropped like a sack of rocks.

Chapter 2

Ethan gaped for a second, staring at her sprawled body, stepping away from it like it was toxic. It took him a few seconds to find his voice. It took him longer to form actual words.

"Oh fu- Oh sh- Oh God. Oh god oh man. Ohhhhhh god oh man oh god..."

"Bro?" Came Todd's voice tentatively from the front.

"TODD!" 

"Whoa, Bro, what!?" Todd called, scrambling out from behind the counter. 

"TODD!" Ethan cried again, pointing to her prone body.

"OH SHIT!" Todd yelped, jumping back. "WHAT THE FUCK, BRO!? I told you to talk to her, not club her like a fucking seal!"

"I didn't! I was talking to her, and then she flipped out, and then she... died?"

"OH FUCK, IS SHE DEAD!?" Todd roared.

"I DON'T KNOW! I don't know! I don't know, I just... SEE THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I TALK TO GIRLS!"

Todd let out a small burst of hysterical laughter. "Oh shit, Bro, you're a real lady killer."

"NOT FUNNY!" 

"Okay. Okay, just chill, just... Just chill," Todd took a deep breath, ran his hands through his crop of hair, "Okay. First aid right? Do we check her pulse, or... CPR? Mouth to mouth?" He offered vaguely.

"I wouldn't recommend that." Came a dry voice from behind them. 

Both of them jumped. Todd let out what could only accurately be described as a squeal. 

Whirling, Ethan came face to face with the most bizarre looking woman he'd ever seen in his life.

She wasn't quite young, but she wasn't quite old either. Something about her eyes suggested a certain august maturity, but her face had a glossy, flawless quality to it, not unlike the Princess. Her hair was a faint lavender, pulled into a rather intricate bun at the crown of her head. In truth, everything about her was lavender, from her severe, sensible pumps to her glittering, wire rim spectacles. She even seemed to emanate a nearly imperceptible lavender aura. Her clothes smacked of the same sickly hue. Ethan was just a bit at a loss for how to describe them though.

It looked like a pantsuit, tailored by someone given only the barest description of what that entailed, and with a fanciful imagination. Flairs and curlicues and embroideries plagued the thing. Ethan absently made out that her buttons were in fact twee little violet butterflies. 

And then of course, there were the wings. Gossamer, gaudy affairs, in the same precise shade of Lavender. They reached above her head, and came to an almost menacing hooked peak. They swallow-tailed beneath her, trailing just above the ground.

Ethan absorbed all of this in just a few stunned seconds. Sheer panic made him a studious observer. As the shock wore off, he felt Todd, gripping his arm so hard he was losing sensation.

"Whathafuckisthat?" Todd squeaked.

The woman... person... thing, straightened her glasses and scowled. 

"My name is Louise. I'm your Godperson attendant for this juncture," She answered. Her voice was somewhere in a bland, middle range, sterile and professional, the type of voice one chose for answering machine menus.

"Our what?" Ethan breathed.

"Here, take my card." She twiddled her fingers and in a blink of an eye a small card appeared in her hand, lavender of course. As Ethan took it, he noted absently that it gave off a strange, nauseatingly sweet smell.

"Wherethafuckyoucomefrom?" Todd cut in again.

"I teleported. Standard procedure. Much more efficient than flying," She stated as if this were self-evident, "Now, before we continue chatting, I have to observe protocol," She cleared her throat, staring Ethan square in the face. Her eyes were god damn lavender colored, "We have received notice that on these premises, a Princess has succumbed to a Curse, and as such as initiated her Trial Phase."

She had a remarkable ability for pronouncing capital letters. Everything was said with an inflection of slight annoyance.

"Uh, Miss Godperson... Louise. Ma'am. May I ask a few questions?" Ethan ventured, struggling to tread water.

"By all means."

"Okay. So. Princess?" 

"Her." Louise replied flatly, pointing to the girl sprawled on the floor.

"Okay... Curse?"

"The Spinning Wheel's Spindle. A rather old fashioned method. Usually avoided nowadays, the whole Coma business can put Princes off rather a bit, but it was deemed... Necessary in her case. Nonetheless, it was rather hard to trigger. I have to say I'm grateful for your assistance in that matter."

"Assist? I didn't push her into the thing!" Ethan exclaimed.

"Of course not. It would have drawn her in the moment she saw it. All the same, I'm glad you have one lying around. They're hard to come by."

"I... Yeah, sure... Anyhow. Uh... Trial Phase?"

"Ah, now here is where we really talk business. Are you the owner of these premises?" She demanded, fixing Ethan with a piercing gaze.

For a moment, Ethan almost said no. Some part of him still knew it as his parents' house. Their shop. Their home. But no, it was only his now.

"Yes. Yes I'm the owner," He nodded.

"Well then, as such, you are required, by code, to permit the use of these premises for use in the Princess' trials, and house her person until such a time as the trials are complete and a suitable Prince has awoken her."

"Waitwaitwait," Todd chimed in, "Trials? Like... Those crazy fuckin' things we see on TV? Riding up glass hills, and slaying dragons and shit?"

Louise looked at Todd as one might regard a diseased dog. "Yes, sir. Those sorts of trials. It's customary, once a Princess enters her Trial Phase, for Princes to compete for her hand. The onus of hosting these trials always falls on the owner of the-"

"Premises the Princess conks out on," Ethan surmised.

"In the cases of Magically Induced Comas, yes," Louise agreed.

"So you're going to roost a dragon in my SHOP!?" Ethan roared.

"There's no need to become excitable," Louise huffed, "Any and all damages you suffer will be compensated for. Honestly, most people are delighted to host Trials. It can be quite lucrative, you know."

"Lucrative?" Todd mumbled.

"Indeed. If you so choose, many Media outlets are happy to televise the proceedings, and pay a handsome fee for the privilege."

"No," Ethan replied firmly.

"Are you sure? It's quite routine nowadays," Louise replied airily.

"No. No media, no money, no... No trials! I don't want this! Take the girl but leave me alone!" He cried.

A look of frosty severity crossed Louise's face, momentarily contorting it into something that appeared not entirely human. Both he and Todd backed up a step. "You Don't Have A Choice Mr. Green," She intoned, every capital crisp.

"But... But this is my shop! It's my family's shop, it's been ours for generations!" Ethan protested.

"From the minute that girl fainted on your floor, for all intents and purposes, this shop became property of Fate, Mr. Green," Louise insisted.

"You can't..."

"I can. I will. You have very little choice in the matter. What choice you do have, I suggest you exercise wisely." She put firmly. Ethan felt the argument close like a pair of iron doors. "Now, as I said, you can still make a fine profit from this venture-"

"No, I still stand by what I said. No cameras." Ethan pressed. She was right. If this was the only choice he had, he was going to make the proper one. The Greens did not indulge in spectacle. The Greens didn't caper for money. The Greens did not seek fame. These were truths Ethan understood as firmly as his own name.

"Suit yourself," Louise dismissed, "It's not required. All that is required is that you don't impede the process. Do what you like with the Princess' body. Whatever is most convenient. I warn you though, lest you get visions of glory, that kissing her would be ill advised. Or any other kind of... miscreancy with her body, but kissing will have the most adverse effects."

"I... What!? No! God no! I'm not kissing a girl in a coma!" Ethan exclaimed. 

"Fuckin' right! That's creepy as balls!" Todd nodded.

"Good. See to it you maintain that attitude and I think we'll have a very amicable partnership." Louise declared cordially.

Ethan was less than reassured. He looked around his shop and fervently began to wish he really had told the Princess to get the hell out, customer service be damned.

"Oh cheer up," Louise pronounced. She sported something that it took several seconds for Ethan to realize was supposed to be a smile. "You're about to be aiding in the pursuit of True Love." 

She pronounced the last two words in such a fashion that Ethan almost saw the letters TM floating after them.

"I... Okay?"

"Don't worry, dear," The endearment came off more than a little scripted, "I'll take care of the particulars. All you have to do is sit back and stay out of the way. Who knows, you may even find it entertaining."

"I... But... Okay?"

"Good lad. Now then. I have a lot of business to attend to. We must get cracking as soon as possible, very eager to wrap this case up. That being said, how does tomorrow night, around nine o'clock fetch you?"

"For what?" Ethan asked numbly. 

"Well the trial of course!" Louise exclaimed, "Honestly, do keep up."

"Uh, well, it is after close," Ethan reasoned lamely.

"Lovely. Works for both of us. Good to see you're becoming more agreeable." Louise flashed another dubious smile. 

"I... Yeah, no problem," Ethan replied dazedly.

"Well, if that's all that sorted, I'll be on my way. You can expect the Dragon sometime around Eight, I expect."

"The... wait, what, seriously!?" Ethan exclaimed.

"Good day!" Louise replied brightly. There was a slight flash, a small sound like rushing air, and then she was gone.

He and Todd stood stock still for what must have been minutes. When Todd finally released his grip on Ethan's arm, he left sweaty fingerprints on his shirt.

"Dragon," Ethan muttered absently, "She said Dragon."

"And you said this shit doesn't happen here!" Todd replied with a faint laugh.

"Why Dragons? Why here? Why... Why me?" Ethan whispered. He looked to Todd frantically. "Did I like, murder someone and forget about it? Kick some kittens? How did my luck get this bad!?" 

"Well, you did get this chick zonked," Todd chuckled, prodding the girl with his foot.

"Don't kick her! God, what do we do with her? We can't just leave her here," Ethan moaned. Looking at her, sprawled on the hard floor, he already felt a bit guilty he'd ignored her as long as he had. 

"We could prop her up in the corner, tape her eyes open, scare the shit out of shoplifters."

"Todd!"

"Alright, dude, just kidding."

"It'll have to be the couch I guess," Ethan sighed, "Come on, help me move her."

Awkwardly, Ethan bent and slipped his hands under her arms, and Todd obligingly gathered up her legs. Lifting her, Ethan found she was actually rather light. He guessed that Todd could have lifted her on his own, but it would have hurt his pride to admit he himself likely couldn't. Together, they shuffled her into the living room. 

"She's not really breathing, Eh?" Todd ventured quietly.

Ethan had noticed the same thing. She looked still as death, but her skin was warm, her face rosy. "Yeah... It's creepy," He grunted as he struggled.

"Fuckin' creepy," Todd echoed.

Gesturing with his head, Ethan guided Todd over to the low, green couch set flush against the stairwell. "I don't know if her heart's beating either," He said as they laid her down.

Todd looked down at her, shook his head. "Nope. Nope I don't think it is."

Ethan shuddered. "So creepy."

Todd nodded, then considered a moment more. "Hey so... Hopefully that means she doesn't have to pee, right?" 

"Oh jeez. Oh wow that's gross but, yeah."

"Or eat. Or drink or anything..."

"God, where is that stupid Fairy Godperson when you need her?" Ethan hissed.

"More like Fairy Godbitch. What a cu-"

"Todd!"

"Country fried fool, as my grandma used to say," Todd recovered. 

Ethan shot him a smirk, but looking down at the stranger on his couch, he began to get the sensation that he was sliding down a very steep ravine. In actuality, it was a feeling he'd had for a very long time now, but the pace of his descent had gotten markedly faster.

"Bro? You okay?" Todd ventured quietly.

Ethan looked up, aware he'd been staring into space. "Yeah… I mean, well no, but yeah."

"I hear you. Weird fuckin' day, right?"

"Yeah, no kidding," Ethan laughed softly.

They fell into silence again for a minute. Todd seemed to become aware of his surroundings all of a sudden. 

"Hey. I just realized. I haven't been back here in like, years. Man, nothing's changed," He remarked.

"Yeah," Ethan replied vaguely. He knew Todd hadn't. No one had, except for a few well-wishing aunts, uncles, cousins, but even they'd stopped visiting months ago. The Princess was the first person to make use of the couch in ages. It always felt too big to sit on alone.

"So what now man?" Todd asked hesitantly.

Ethan shrugged. "I guess... We just close up. Go to bed, right?"

"That's it? You sure I can't do anything else?" 

"No. Wait, yeah," Ethan considered, "Can you... Can you get rid of that stupid spinning wheel for me? Just wrap it in a tarp and stick it in storage or something?"

Todd gaped openly, "Wait, for real?"

Ethan nodded wearily, "Uh, yeah. If it's not too much trouble."

"Hell no! I'd cart that fucking thing to an active volcano if you asked me, bro! But, I mean, I thought you wanted to keep it around. Because of... You know..."

Ethan knew. Some part of it felt like a betrayal, even thinking about discarding it. It was a piece of his memories, something his mother had been fond of… But he HATED it. The thing had stretched his tolerance just by hulking in the corner, but now it seemed it was actively trying to spite him. No more. It had to go.

"Yeah, Todd. I knew I said we should keep it around but... Well that's before I knew the thing was a friggin' Princess trap.," He laughed.

Todd chuckled in return. "It was like a freaking predator man! Waitin' for nubile young Princesses to wander into its clutches. It was probably practicing on you all these years."

"I don't look like a Princess," Ethan pouted.

"Sure, whatever you say, bro." Todd laughed. Turning, he strode on his heel, whistling cheerfully.

Chapter 3

The store closed and the spinning wheel properly squared away, Todd left, and Ethan found himself alone in his silent house. 

Well not quite alone. 

Standing in the living room, he caught himself staring at the Princess again. It was embarrassing, but in truth it was hard not to. Not because of her extraordinary beauty, though that was a factor, but because Ethan couldn't shake the eerie, unnatural sensation she engendered in him. His eyes fixed on her hair. It seemed... Longer somehow. He could have sworn it was just an inch when she'd walked in, but now it seemed long enough to brush her earlobes. That was impossible right? 

Confounded, he let it go. He'd already been through at least four or five things he thought impossible today. What was a few extra inches of hair compared to a half-dead girl on your couch?

Wearily, he fixed himself a haphazard supper before wandering off to his bed. Slowly, he went through his morning ritual in reverse, struggling with the knot on his apron, shuffling off his shoes, combing his hair, culminating with a brief, despondent look in the mirror. Finally, he threw himself down on his bed.

Ethan's nerves were frazzled, his mind racing, but the benefit of a long day of hard work was that it was nearly impossible to suffer insomnia. Ethan had never once in his life had trouble falling asleep, and tonight was no exception.

It began the same way.

He glided into the living room, drenched with light, radiant, warm.

He headed for the doorway, eager, hopeful.

He heard their voices. Thunder and birdsong. So close and so familiar it made his heart bleed.

He reached out a hand for the doorknob and...

Suddenly, discordantly, the door flew open. A small figure pushed its way through it, walking so briskly they bumped into Ethan's chest, giving a small squeak of surprise. Baffled, Ethan looked down.

It was her.

The Princess, in all her uncanny glory. She stared up at him with her vivid blue eyes, her honey hair cropped short over her brow. Ethan stared, open mouthed at her for a long minute, his bleary mind scrabbling to understand.

"Y-you!?" He exclaimed at length.

The girl scowled up at him. Roughly, she pushed him backwards a few steps, shutting the door behind her. "Hey, douche," She replied scathingly.

Ethan tried once or twice to speak, but words wouldn't come. He grasped at his hair, frustration, panic, confusion all battling in his chest. 

"What are you doing here!?" He cried, when his voice finally decided to show up.

She shrugged, avoiding his eyes.  "I got bored I guess. Saw this was open. Decided to snoop." 

"But... What!? How are you here, you... you're unconscious on my couch!" 

The girl rolled her eyes. "Yeah. Which is why I'm stranded in fucking dreamland, isn't it?"

"D-Dreamland?"

"Limbo, purgatory, the veil, whatever you want to call it. I got bored cruising around in the dark, figured I'd come crash this dream. I didn't know it was yours," She said with a note of disgust.

"A... a dream," Ethan murmured dazedly.

Suddenly, he heard it again, the bass rumble of his father's laugh. It drew him like a magnet. Instinctively, he tried to shift around the girl, but she noticed his maneuver and leaned against the door, arms crossed.

"Move," Ethan demanded.

"Yeah, I'm not done talking to you," The girl snorted.

Ethan began to feel frantic. "You need to move."

"Why?"

"Because I need to be out there! Move!"

"You don't need to be anywhere, it's a dream," She dismissed with another roll of her eyes.

"Move!"

"So have you tried to kiss me yet?" The girl replied, her voice casual, but her glance cutting.

Ethan paused, becoming aware that his breathing was galloping away from him. "W-What?"

"Well, you were hitting on me before. I figured you probably tried to get lucky right?"

Ethan could feel himself flush scarlet, though from indignation or humiliation he didn't know. "I was NOT hitting on you, I was... offering assistance. And no, I don't kiss girls in comas, but y'know, thanks for assuming!"

"Oh, seriously! You expect me to believe you didn't try to cop a feel!" The girl shot back. There was a ragged edge to her voice, something verging on tears, but Ethan barely noticed through his rage.

"No! Jesus, no!" He shouted, throwing up his hands.

"I know how it is! You get a pretty Princess in your shop, she passes out, is totally at your mercy. Figured I was public property anyhow!? Thought it was your lucky day!?"

Even high and screaming her voice was aggravatingly lovely. Her flushed face and teary eyes were still picturesquely perfect. It only threw fuel on Ethan's anger.

"LUCKY!?" He roared. A few tight, hysterical laughs bubbled out of his chest. "LUCKY!? You think it's LUCKY when a stranger passes out in your store!? You think it's LUCKY when some psychopathic fairy-lawyer from hell tells you she can do whatever she likes with your home!? You think it's LUCKY when... when everything you love could be burned to the ground tomorrow!? Is THAT your idea of LUCKY!?" Ethan buried his face in his hands, and took a few, sharp breaths before continuing. "I didn't ask for this! I didn't ask for you, or your curse, or any of this... So just... God, will you please just leave me alone and get out of the way?" 

He looked at her face for the first time since he'd begun his tirade. She stared back, wide eyed, lips pursed. Her bitterness was gone, but she still remained frozen in place.

"Why do you want to get back there so bad?" She asked in a small, blank voice. "It's just your storefront. It's barely even different from when I saw it."

Ethan's patience had dissolved. Roughly, he pushed her arm aside, grasped for the doorknob.

"I need to see them," He answered flatly.

"See who?" She still stood stubbornly in the way. Ethan turned the knob, tried to prop it open. 

"My parents," Ethan continued, an edge of desperation entering his voice.

"But it's just a dream-" 

"I need to see them before they disappear!" Ethan cried, wrenching at the door.

He heard the girl give a small gasp, and suddenly she sprang away from the door. Ethan flung it open, heart beating wild with anticipation, but...

There was nothing.

The doorway opened into darkness. A complete and unending void.

"I... What... What happened?" Ethan whispered.

He reached out a tentative hand, pawed at the abyss beyond. He felt only dry, empty cold meeting his touch.

"They... They're gone. It's gone. Everything's gone," He intoned.

"It's just a dream," Came the girl's voice, meek, soft. 

"They're gone," Ethan repeated, choking over the last syllable.

Ethan slowly backed away from the door, shut it. The endless blackness was more than he could bear. He felt tears gathering in the corners of his eyes, and shakily raised his hand to cover them. He stood in silence for what must have been a very long time, grappling with the void that swelled inside him, the echo to that dark and empty doorway.

"They aren't gone forever," The girl chimed in.

Ethan took a quick, gulping breath. "Yeah. Yeah they are," He replied thickly. 

The girl didn't reply, but her silence was answer enough.

There was another long pause, as Ethan tried to collect himself, tried to just breathe. Eventually though, he couldn't ignore the feel of the girl's eyes on him. Wearily, he straightened up, turned to face her.

"What do you-" 

"I'm sorry!" She blurted.

Ethan blinked.

"What?"

"I'm sorry. I'm really, really sorry!" She cried. Perfect, crystalline tears began to roll down her cheeks, and Ethan dimly considered that it was almost unfair how prettily flushed her face was, compared to his doubtlessly blotchy, red eyed one. "I'm sorry about your house and your shop, and your parents... I'm sorry I was such a fucking bitch back there... I just... Oh god, I'm really, really sorry about everything!" She sobbed.

Ethan found himself in the odd position of immediately feeling guilty. Instantly all his rage and pain were forgotten as he scrambled for a way to make things right.

"Hey, no, it's okay. It's alright. I, uh... I don't mind." He stammered.

She gave a small, tinkling laugh, between gasping breaths. "You don't mind? I've fucked up your life!" She exclaimed.

"No, I mean... Kind of. But it's not your fault, and I mean... I'm sorry?"

She gave another, louder laugh. "You're sorry? Wow, Jesus, why on earth are you sorry?"

Ethan paused, trying to puzzle out an answer, brow furrowed.

"Uh, I'm sorry... that you're sorry?" He ventured.

The girl laughed again, and suddenly, like sun peeking out from behind clouds, something new, something genuine slipped out. Her laugh started musically, but a surprising, brash note snuck in, and then a small snort. It was jarring, but oddly refreshing. Ethan found himself smiling without exactly knowing why.

"I'm sorry. I don't mean to laugh at you." She began, misinterpreting Ethan's curious stare, "It's just... You really don't like crying people, do you?" 

Ethan returned with a laugh of his own. "No, they kind of freak me out." 

The girl smiled, and sniffling, began to swipe away her tears. "Sorry. I just... I really am sorry. About everything."

"Noted," Ethan replied with a smile.

She sighed, and the two of them regarded each other for a suddenly painfully awkward minute. Ethan cast about for what one said to a half-dead dream Princess. A question leapt into his head and he couldn't stop himself from asking it.

"Do you eat?" He blurted.

"What?" The girl looked up at him, smiling bemusedly.

"I mean, like... If you don't eat, in the real world, will you die? I should have asked the fairy god-lady or whatever but-"

"Oh. Oh no. I don't. I don't need water or anything. It's like... Magic stasis? I should be fine." 

"Oh, okay, thank god. That... that would have been weird."

They both paused for a moment, no doubt musing over the undignified scenario of trying to feed a passed-out stranger. Ethan tried to push it out of his mind. He cleared his throat uncomfortably.

"Well anyhow, uh, your body is good - I mean it's okay! It's fine. It's uh, on my couch," He supplied.

"Oh, yeah, thanks. That's nice," The girl replied hurriedly, "One of... one of these?" She queried, pointing around the room.

"What? Oh! Yeah... uh, that one." Ethan answered, gesturing.

"Huh." The girl crossed over to the couch in question. Stiffly, she sat, bounced on it a few times. "Seems comfy enough. Thanks," She added with a smile.

"Yeah, no problem," Ethan smiled back nervously. Hesitant, but feeling gawky standing over her, he crossed to the couch and sat as well, taking care to seat himself on the far opposite side. "I mean. It's not exactly... uh... fit for a Princess or anything," He muttered.

The girl gave a loud snort of derision, another strange, fascinating slip of her veneer. "I would sleep on the lumpiest couches on earth if I could stop being a fucking Princess."

Ethan smiled at her nervously. "What, seriously?"

The girl nodded, her shoulders slumped. "Yeah, seriously."

"But I mean... I thought being a Princess was every girl's dream?"

The girl gave a small, bitter laugh. "Yeah, I guess. I mean, for some girls it must be. I've seen ones that seem happy enough. I mean, money, fame, a handsome husband... It sounds pretty great. Maybe I'm weird for thinking it's not, but... Jesus, it's not." 

"What do you mean?" 

"What do I mean!? I mean it's... It's... It's a trap, you know? It's a perversion, it's a violation, it's... It's a fucking nightmare."

"A violation?" Ethan gulped.

The girl nodded vigorously. "Yeah, you have no idea. I mean... Where do I start?" She looked down at her hands, folded in her lap, and seemed to be struck with inspiration. "Okay," She said, holding them up, "First of all. This isn't me."

"Oooo...kay?" 

"This, all this," She pressed, circling her finger around her face, "This isn't what I look like. I was made to look like this."

"How do you mean... you used to look different?"

The girl nodded. "My mom tells me that when I was born, I looked like her. I had freckles, and a bigger mouth, and a different nose... But then the fucking godpeople came." She sighed.

"The fairy ones?"

"Yeah, those ones. So... Okay, you know how Princesses used to be a monarchy thing?" She enquired.

"Uh, yeah, vaguely," Ethan nodded.

"Well now it's just a random thing. Maybe because of the march of democracy or something, I don't know. All I do know, is that one day, a few months after you're born, fairy godparents just zap themselves into your fucking nursery and decide you're a Prince or a Princess. There's nothing your parents can do, nothing anybody can do, they just decide it, and that's that."

"So... just for giggles? Why do they pick who they pick?" 

"I don't know. I think they have some reasoning behind it... I mean, they're like magical lawyers, you're right, they've got all these rules and regulations, they've got to have a reason, but... I don't know. Anyhow. So they decide you're a Princess and then you get blessed."

"Blessed?"

"Uh huh. You get some kind of special gift. Three of them usually. So Princes get stuff like Courage, or Strength, or Dashing, or something like that. With Princesses though, it's junk like Grace, or Poise, or Good Posture."

"That last one sounds annoying," Ethan observed.

"I know, right? At least I didn't get saddled with that one," She laughed, gesturing at her slumped frame, "And of course they're never anything useful. I could be happy with, like, Good at Math, or Tells Good Jokes or... I dunno... Remembers Birthdays Really Well."

"Talented Beekeeper," Ethan offered. 

Another laugh, another slipped note. Ethan smiled.

"Yeah, why not? Anything like that. But no. Useless bullshit. And then with Princesses, one of the gifts is always Beauty." She sighed bitterly.

"Seems kinda... subjective," Ethan muttered. 

"Yeah, well not to the Godparents, apparently. When a girl is gifted with Beauty, she doesn't just become a prettier version of herself, or just stays the same and everyone thinks she's beautiful... She actually physically changes. I changed. I used to look different. I used to look like my mom. Now... Now I don't know how I really look anymore. I just look like what the Godparents think is beautiful. Like... like the most baseline kind of beauty they could come up with."

"Wait... So your face-" 

"Not my face. Not my original one at least."

"And your eyes?" 

"Not blue. Mom thinks they might have been Hazel... I don't know." She shrugged defeatedly.

"Oh man, that's a relief!" Ethan blurted.

The girl looked at him, startled. "A relief?"

"Well, yeah, I mean..." Ethan stammered, "I just... There was something odd about you, and it was kinda freaking me out - Not that you're freaky, it's just... You looked... Uh, a little... off?"

She stared at Ethan, face unreadable. "You don't like the way I look?" She asked flatly.

"Yes! I mean no - well wait not no, but..." Ethan could almost hear the sound of a shovel pitching dirt out of his grave.

"It's okay, seriously, do you?"

Ethan gave a small, high laugh. "Uh... Well, I mean yeah, you look pretty... and everything... but it's kind of... Uh... boring? Oh wow, that came out wrong. Just not... Interesting. Wow, still wrong!" 

"No no, it's okay!" She replied. Ethan was flabbergasted to find her smiling.

"I-I like your hair though. The cut I mean," He offered.

"Oh," Her smile grew, "Thanks. I cut it myself. Every day."

"Wait, what?"

"Yeah. Turns out when they make you beautiful, they want you to stay beautiful, according to their standards. So, wounds don't scar, piercings fuse up, tattoo ink beads up and falls off. And your hair just grows and grows and fucking grows."

"Holy cow, that's weird," Ethan breathed. 

"Right!?" She exclaimed. "I once tried to put on purple lipstick and it melted in the tube! Doesn't do that with pink or light red. Such bullshit."

"So, you cut your hair and wear uh, Un-Princessey clothes because..."

"Because it's the only way I can be myself," She murmured quietly.

Ethan was silent for a moment. He looked at the beautiful face that wasn't hers and saw a sorrow beneath it that she seemed to own all too much.

"Jeez, that sounds... Bogus," He offered lamely.

She laughed. "Understatement of the year, but yeah. But I mean, that's not really the worst of it. Not by a longshot."

"Oh?" Ethan ventured.

"It's not enough to take your identity, they fucking own your life. From the moment you're Princessified, you belong to them. You don't get to choose where you live, where you go to school, what you want to do with your life. No, you're as good as a slave from that point on."

"Seriously?"

The girl nodded. "On your fourteenth birthday, right? The godparents show up, and give you a Curse. Something to begin your trials. Maybe you bite a bad apple, maybe you run into a vindictive goblin, maybe you drop candle wax on a bear..."

"What?"

"Don't ask. Anyhow, they give you this curse to hang over your head for the rest of your life. Once it gets activated, you're locked in. The contest for your hand starts, and congratulations, you've lost any control you had over your life. You're just fucking Prince bait from then on."

"Okay, wait, but... Why? I've been thinking this since you passed out on my floor... Why? Why bother, why all the trouble and magic and rules? Why marry off Princesses? What's the point?"

"I don't know. It seems insane, right? All this pageantry. They practically devote themselves to forcing this weird routine... Again, I mean... there's gotta be a reason. If you ask them they'll tell you it's all about True Love."

"Trademark," Ethan added absently.

"Oh my god, you got that too!?" The girl exclaimed. "It's like they own the patent on Tru Wuv or something. So fucking annoying. It's always True Love this, and True Love that. Which is bullshit. I mean, my parents met when they were in college. They both liked bad horror movies and jazz music. They traveled the world together on like, five bucks and a prayer. Dad proposed with a twist tie ring. That... That seems like True Love to me. I don't get any of that. I can't even date!"

"At all?" Ethan asked, very conscious of trying to sound casual.

"Nope. Do you know what happens if you try to kiss a Princess if you aren't a Prince?"

"No. I get the feeling it's ominous though." 

"You get turned into a frog. No fucking kidding. An actual frog. One of my childhood friends found that out the hard way, got an inch away from my lips and suddenly he's hopping. I cried for like, six days before the godparents showed up and changed him back." She'd begun to talk very fast, her face flushed. Ethan began to get the sensation that she'd forgotten she was even talking to anyone else. "If anyone tried to cop a feel, my clothes go all rigid. Like steel. No matter what I wear. They refuse to come off. For like, an hour. You know how hard that makes doctor's visits? Even though Princesses never really get sick... And even when I'm naked? Anyone who comes within eyeshot is left blind and paralyzed, and it doesn't wear off until I put clothes on!"

Ethan gulped, his face burning. "Uhhhh...."

"Because GOD FORBID anyone take my chastity! No! Gotta save that for our Princes! Gotta be pure, and demure, and fucking CHASTE. I'm twenty two years old dude, and I still haven't lost my...!"

She trailed off. Ethan heard her breath go out in a little dwindling squeak. He felt her eyes on the side of his head, but he stared devoutly at the floorboards.

They sat. They fidgeted. Ethan coughed twice.

Eventually, Ethan couldn't resist sneaking a look at her face. She looked embarrassed, yes. But also a little... Worn down. A little defeated. And more than a little scared.

"Hey," Ethan said quietly, breaking the silence, "I'm, uh... Sorry. About this. That all sounds really, really awful."

She looked up, a small smile tracing her face.

"I'm sorry about your hair," He continued, "And your life, and, uh, you know... your chastity." He finished with a slight break of his voice.

She burst into giggles, and Ethan was strangely delighted to hear her little snort crop up again. He found himself grinning.

"Thanks." She replied once she'd caught her breath. "And I'm sorry too. About all the stupid shit I said, and your shop, and all the trouble I've caused," She paused, looked towards the door, "And, um... Sorry about your parents."

Ethan's smile disappeared. "Why are you sorry about that? You didn't even know them."

"Yeah, but I mean... They're gone, right?" She asked quietly.

Ethan closed his eyes. Nodded.

"And that sucks, right?"

He nodded again.

"So... I'm sorry. And I'm really sorry I stopped you from seeing them," She added, her voice heavy with sincerity.

Ethan gave her a weak smile. "Don't worry about it. It's just a dream, right?"

Another moment's silence. This time broken by the girl.

"Hey. What's your name?"

Ethan looked up, smiled wryly. "Oh. I'm Ethan. Ethan Green."

The girl smirked, a strangely incongruent expression on a Princess's face. 

"Green? You own a Grocer's and your name is-?"

"Yeah yeah, hilarious right? Trust me, you haven't said anything my friend hasn't already. Repeatedly," Ethan replied with a sigh.

"Sorry," She giggled, "Uh. Well, my name's Penny."

"Penny," Ethan repeated, trying it out, "Penny what?"

She blushed. "Uh, Pierce," She mumbled.

Ethan laughed. "So wait, you're-?"

"Princess Penny Pierce." She groaned.

"Oh wow." Ethan chuckled, "And you thought my name was funny?"

"Would you believe I knew a girl whose last name was Prince? The godpeople referred to her as Princess Prince. Confused the hell out of everyone."

Both she and Ethan began to laugh, and kept laughing for longer than was truly warranted for such a small comment. They'd start to calm down, and then glance at each other and be set off all over again. On some level, Ethan understood that this was because they'd both reached a point in their stress and strangeness where they could either laugh, or cry. Laughter just seemed like the more enjoyable option.

As Ethan's giggles subsided, he looked at Penny, and suddenly saw in her... a person.

He'd seen a Pretty Girl at first, and then a Princess, and then a Pain in the Ass, but now, she was just a Person, and like that, all his awkwardness dissolved. 

"Well," He smiled, extending a hand, "It's nice to meet you, Penny Pierce," He said, purposely omitting the Princess part.

She grinned back, and Ethan thought there was something fantastically crooked about it this time. "Yeah, nice to meet you too, Ethan Green," She replied sincerely.

She stretched out her hand to meet his. He felt her fingertips brush his palm.

And then everything was tangled blankets and screaming alarms.

[boringkate]

whats the secret of good self butt photography how do i capture there glory and not throw out my back

1) Get something to hold your phone. Dollarama (if you're canadian) has these like $4 goose neck phone clip things that you can clip onto a chair or whatever and are pretty great, but if you can spare a little more money (and you expect to use it enough to justify it) then get a proper tripod (I use a couple 60 inch amazon basics tripods, but it seems like they've gotten more expensive and other brands are probably no worse) and pair it with a screw on phone tripod mount (aliexpress has them for a couple dollars and you can even get rotating ones that'll let you film in portrait mode).

2) Use a free auto clicker app (I'm on android, but I assume ios has them too) to automatically tap the button to take a photo every 4 or 5 seconds. You're gonna end up with a lot of wasted photos where you're just getting into position, but that's fine (just delete em). I wildly prefer this over using a bluetooth remote because it keeps your hands free and something about not needing to choose to snap the photo makes it easier (the time passes faster and you'll end up with more usable pics which is dope even if you just want one good one because the way to take a good pic is to take a lot of bad ones untill you get lucky).

3) Set up a way for you to see what the camera sees. You could plug your phone into a monitor or tv using an hdmi adapter or use a free screen streaming app to watch your phone's screen on a laptop.

4) Use the camera on the back. It's always higher quality. The selfie camera is only for when you don't wanna deal with those first three steps.

5) Natural light is your BFF. Take your pics while the sun is out and your curtains are open.

6) Filter your pics. I use an app called MIX (specifically an old build of it bc they changed some stuff like their payment model for the batch image filtering feature) (which is definitely on both Android and iOS), but I imagine there are a ton of others that do all the same stuff. I loath smoothing for face pics, but it can be alright for butt pics. Noise can further obscure stubble. You're probably gonna wanna raise the temperature and maybe even the tint (people look unwell when their skin is more blue or green than it should be). Lowering the contrast can be nice too. Beyond that it can be fun to just experement and see what looks nice.

That's my process anyways. You do you. I know a lot of hotties are more into the pink blue lighting thing for example (you can get colored bulbs at the dollar store and stick em on a couple cheap thrift shop lamps) and I could especially see that being appealing if you aren't getting much natural light (pls don't just be taking nudes at night under the harsh light of your apartment's one shitty ceiling lamp lol).

Bonus protip: If you are using a lamp or lamps or softboxes and you want extra brightness then you can get E27 lamp bulb splitters online for a couple dollars that'll let you plug multiple bulbs into a single lamp.

Bonus bonus protip: Keep an eye out for selfie sticks with a screw on the base. I use a gimbal extension rod with a 1/4 inch screw paired with a hinge (and had previously been using a selfie stick with a screw on the bottom which was cheaper although it eventually broke) and screw it in between my tripod and my phone clip so that I can get my phone hovering over my bed (without the instability that comes from actually putting your tripod on your bed). It's very optional, but it does rule.

[t52b]

Heart Toy mayor update continuation

So now onto the other two parts

The album builder is used to build albums for the joi suite later the joi suite can only use the albums built here so its a pre requisite to build albums for later useI

mage Fetching from Image Boards: Fetch random images using tags from popular image boards: Danborou, R34, Realborou, The Great Image Board, and e621. Input your desired tags, separated by spaces, and press the button to fetch images. If the image cannot be found or if the HTTP request fails, an error will be displayed, and the fetch button must be pressed again to retry.

Invalid JSON Errors: If an invalid JSON error occurs, it typically means no image was found for the given tag on the selected site. Try fetching from another site or use a different tag. Album

Management: Create new albums by inputting an album name and saving images directly to them. If no album name is provided, images are saved to the root of the app's storage (counted as an album).

Image Selection from Local Storage: Pick images from your phone's local storage using the file picker. Save them directly to an album or create a new album.

Direct URL Saving: If you have the direct URL to an image, input it and save the image to your selected album. The process is easier on Windows, but somewhat difficult on Android. Album Deletion: Delete selected albums, but requires multiple clicks if the folder is not empty.

File Organization and Limitations: The app uses Android's file system for album management, which can involve some manual navigation (copying and pasting files into albums using the file picker). The app remembers the last location when accessing files via the file picker, making it easier to pick from specific folders. on pc this is much easier as the file explorer can access the persistent storage and copy images with control c control v

Joi Suite Feature List:

Interval Creation & Editing

Interval Object: Tempo: The tempo (beats per minute) for the interval.

BeatTightness: Controls how tight the beats feel, influencing the spacing between beats.

EndTempo: The tempo the interval will gradually reach by the end.

TempoAcceleration: How quickly the tempo changes during the interval.

BeatNumber: The number of beats within the interval.

SyncopalGalop: A setting that modifies the rhythm to alternate 1 and mltiple beat per metronome tick.

Duration: The length of time this interval will last.

Imageshiftperiod: The speed at which images will change during the interval.

Imagefadein: Controls how quickly images fade in.

EndPauseLength: The length of time the pause lasts at the end of the interval.

Interval Editor Window:Input fields for each of the interval parameters (Tempo, BeatTightness, EndTempo, etc.). Add Interval Button: Creates an interval based on the current input and adds it to the interval list. Suggest

Random Values Button: Generates random values for the parameters, which can then be added as a new interval. Range-Based Interval Creation: Enter two values for each and all parameter (in an "x-x" format) to generate random intervals within that range. Interval List: Displays all created intervals as cards.

Card Swap: You can swap the order of two intervals in the list by clicking on their cards.

Delete Last Interval: Removes the most recently added interval card from the list.

Sequence Creation & Management:

Sequence: The collection of intervals you’ve created. You can give it a name, save it, load it, or delete it. Once you’re happy with your sequence, you can start it by pressing the Start Button.

Sequence Start: The interface allows for fullscreen mode once the sequence starts. A small blinker will appear in the bottom right corner, showing the current BPM. The color of the blinker changes based on the rhythm:

Green: Downstroke

Red: Upstroke

Black: after-stroke pause

Inter-Sequence Notifications: before each interval ends, a 5-second message will fade in, showing the tempo, tightness, and beat pattern of the next sequence. If there’s an intermittent pause, the screen will fade to black, and text will instruct the user to breathe, relax, and wait for the pause duration.

Image Display & Album Integration:During the intervals, images from the selected album will fade in. The image transition speed is controlled by the Imagefadein parameter. Images will shift at the speed defined by Imageshiftperiod.

Album Selection: You can change the selected album at any time during the sequence. The next image will fade in from the newly selected album once it’s changed.

Timing & Pause Features:

End Pause: At the end of the interval , a pause will occur. If the inteval has an end pause, the screen will fade to black and instruct the user to breathe and wait. The countdown will guide the user through the pause.

Infinite Inteval: The last interval of the sequence will stretch infinitely until the user stops the sequence. Every 300 seconds (or configurable time), a warning will notify the user that the sequence is ongoing.

Overall User Experience:Interactive and rhythm-driven experience, combining beats, tempos, and visuals from the album. Ability to customize and randomize beats, tempos, and image transitions, creating a personalized rhythmic experience. Seamless transitions between intervals and a clean user interface that helps focus on the rhythm while enjoying the accompanying imagery. for a bit more detailed explanation consult the help menu in each section

Once Again i state that these parts can access adult image boards thus the app is now considered NSFW and ADULTS ONLY because of these additions

[kleinv01]

How does Klein see the other Klein bots? Does he see them as brothers or just as copies of him also are the Klein bots build in a lab or storage?

://SYSTEM_MESSAGE_ANSWERED

klein simply sees them as copies, it's like "oh another me!", but that's all there is to it. they're also programmed to not talk to other kleins as to not confuse people. most of klein's interactions are made to be focused on his darling only

both klein app and klein androids are founded and manufactured by a company called SentientTechLabs ! it's not really mentioned in the demo yet, but you'll learn more about it as the story progresses ^^

[anhedoniashoujo]

wanna up computer literacy in the newer gens?

make them install and use linux with a partitioned dual boot.

have them make an app to put on their own android phone.

get them into gmod.

have them home brew a 3ds.

show them a 2077 cyberdeck.

show them rugged build computers and custom fabricated cases for portable micro atx builds.

teach them emulation and safe practice torrenting.

teach them to steal.

teach them to love janky tech and cables running across floors and walls and ceilings.

have them learn the components of a motherboard and how to build their own computer.

teach them to install custom firmware in their car's display.

teach them to proxy and how to access sites that aren't suggested by Google.

you know what taught me computer literacy?

i wanted something i couldn't have and made do.

these kids need to learn to be curious.

if you don't look at something and ask yourself "how does that work?" and then learn about it what the fuck are you even alive for?

[probablyasocialecologist]

To bring about its hypothetical future, OpenAI must build a new digital ecosystem, pushing users toward the ChatGPT app or toward preëxisting products that integrate its technology such as Bing, the search engine run by OpenAI’s major investor, Microsoft. Google, by contrast, already controls the technology that undergirds many of our online experiences, from search and e-mail to Android smartphone-operating systems. At its conference, the company showed how it plans to make A.I. central to all of the above. Some Google searches now yield A.I.-generated “Overview” summaries, which appear in tinted boxes above any links to external Web sites. Liz Reid, Google’s head of search, described the generated results with the ominously tautological tagline “Google will do the Googling for you.” (The company envisions that you will rely on the same search mechanism to trawl your own digital archive, using its Gemini assistant to, say, pull up photos of your child swimming over the years or summarize e-mail threads in your in-box.) Nilay Patel, the editor-in-chief of the tech publication the Verge, has been using the phrase “Google Zero” to describe the point at which Google will stop driving any traffic to external Web sites and answer every query on its own with A.I. The recent presentations made clear that such a point is rapidly approaching. One of Google’s demonstrations showed a user asking the A.I. a question about a YouTube video on pickleball: “What is the two-bounce rule?” The A.I. then extracted the answer from the footage and displayed the answer in writing, thus allowing the user to avoid watching either the video or any advertising that would have provided revenue to its creator. When I Google “how to decorate a bathroom with no windows” (my personal litmus test for A.I. creativity), I am now presented with an Overview that looks a lot like an authoritative blog post, theoretically obviating my need to interact directly with any content authored by a human being. Google Search was once seen as the best path for getting to what’s on the Web. Now, ironically, its goal is to avoid sending us anywhere. The only way to use the search function without seeing A.I.-generated content is to click a small “More” tab and select “Web” search. Then Google will do what it was always supposed to do: crawl the Internet looking for URLs that are relevant to your queries, and then display them to you. The Internet is still out there, it’s just increasingly hard to find. If A.I. is to be our primary guide to the world’s information, if it is to be our 24/7 assistant-librarian-companion as the tech companies propose, then it must constantly be adding new information to its data sets. That information cannot be generated by A.I., because A.I. tools are not capable of even one iota of original thought or analysis, nor can they report live from the field. (An information model that is continuously updated, using human labor, to inform us about what’s going on right now—we might call it a newspaper.) For a decade or more, social media was a great way to motivate billions of human beings to constantly upload new information to the Internet. Users were driven by the possibilities of fame and profit and mundane connection. Many media companies were motivated by the possibility of selling digital ads, often with Google itself as a middle man. In the A.I. era, in which Google can simply digest a segment of your post or video and serve it up to a viewer, perhaps not even acknowledging you as the original author, those incentives for creating and sharing disappear. In other words, Google and OpenAI seem poised to cause the erosion of the very ecosystem their tools depend on.

[thatskynews]

Hi,

I'm currently experiencing the issue that in the last 35min the (android mobile) app (German version in case that's relevant) repeatly (12-15 times) crashed (as in game freezes and suddenly I'm in the home screen of my phone) and it's becoming increasingly upsetting bc I CAN'T collect my daily season candles or my daily "days of nature" tickets, and in ca. half an our the daily reset (? is that what it's called?) is happening... 😡

And I can't report that over the app (if that's how it works) bc as I said the app is crashing...

... 🫤 I only have 7 days (of nature) left to collect 30 tickets

Please have a nice day, but it would be nice to know what's happening

Hiya there! We're not employees of TGC, but I would suggest reporting to their official sources of media such as discord! I can't really do anything about this <:3

You will need the exact version of your game (You can find out by looking at the app settings [not in-game] or the app store you downloaded sky from!), perhaps a screenshot too, an explanation, if it's in live or beta (unsure if they've changed that recently with closing off the beta so much), the steps you expected and the steps to recreate your issue, your device, your sky build, platform, and then also maybe any important additional information

-ymir

[wip]

I’ve been getting notifications about people adding gifs that are credited to me to their posts. These are not my gifs. I assume this is a glitch that must tie back to some update on the site and likely won’t be fixed anytime soon, but is there at least a way to turn off these specific types of notifications?

Answer: Hey, @iguanodonwildman!

Thanks for this. We have contacted you directly for more information, but we also have some suggestions we would like to share.

If you upload a GIF to a post (instead of inserting a link to one or using the GIF search), that GIF becomes inadvertently “yours.” Also, keep in mind that folks can edit their post to replace your GIF at any time after the notification is sent. It would certainly be nice if there were a notification type that could be muted, separately from others (and may we take this chance to say that we would love to build this one day, only it is not clear when. While we would like to add it… we’ve got a lot of other things we need to build first.) 

So, as there isn’t right now, if you are uploading a GIF to your post instead of inserting it, here are some temporary solutions:

First, try to avoid uploading or reposting other people’s GIFs, and use the GIF search when possible.

Alternatively, you could also copy the link to a GIF already hosted on Tumblr and paste that link into the post editor. It will insert that GIF without them needing to download and reupload it.

For those unsure how to copy image links, you right-click and select “Copy Image Link.” On Android, you tap and hold on an image, select “Share photo,” and copy the URL. iOS does not provide a way for us to do this in our iOS app. 

Alternatively, what works well is that you can get the first GIF in any post by pasting the post’s permalink into the GIF search. Bonus point: this will also embed any static image like a GIF, complete with a credit link. The only downside is that only the first image is returned, so GIFsets are out of the question unless you want to use the first GIF.

We hope this helps, and thanks for getting in touch with this. 

[a-fox-studies]

June 7, 2024 • Friday

Chill day of programming. I started on a new Android project where I would create a simple notes app. The objective of this project is to become familiar with themes, UI building, and also concepts like recycler view, and how to implement databases into the app.

🎧 Forgot to Breathe — GRAHAM