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mintchocohip · 3 years

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sub!bts ﹢ the reason for chastity 🔐

❝ Chastity is best approached with a sense of purpose. Although the OT7 have their individual reasons for wanting the cage, they all do so with a deepening desire for your control.

a/n ─ a little something i worked on to break writer’s block. with locktober as inspiration, i set out to write a few sentences about how the members would approach keyholder relationships. 1.5k words later, turns out thinking about the members in chastity is, indeed, very inspiring...

note ─ sub!bts x domme!reader. see each member for any other kinks or notes!

🔑 TAEHYUNG ﹢ adoration

other kinks - possessive behavior | note - poly mentioned

Without your constant gropes and nuzzles Taehyung is in danger of forgetting you’re obsessed with him. Although he understands you’ll stop if maintaining his interest in this play becomes boring for you, Taehyung also very sincerely hopes you view jealously withholding his body from a world that wants him as your job. When life pulls you in separate directions Taehyung feels connected to you through this private, secure symbol of ownership. You call constantly to hear that he’s being a good boy and ensure he’s comfortable in equal measure. Resting on your bed surrounded by cozy blankets looking vaguely shy to be captured from his thick collar down to his glittering cage and thigh harnesses while you photograph the artwork calms Taehyung with safe knowing. You’re proud this boy is yours. Every time he’s frustrated you won’t let him out of the cage so he can play with his friends Taehyung rereads the notes you scrawled on the backs of those polaroids, stashed inside an envelope in his sub journal—notes about how precious he is to you, how breathtaking his cock is, and how the world's finest treasures are always kept under lock and key.

🔑 YOONGI ﹢ masochism

Yoongi’s tastes hide in plain sight. He finds satisfaction in intentional, controlled discomfort. Doing it to himself is easy. When he discovers you have the same interests he tries to cut his giddiness at finding a keyholder with a little diffidence. It’s similar to your elegant silk shibari knots under his work clothes, or simple pressure on the bruises you left along the insides of his thighs when he crosses his legs to sit and check his notifications while waiting for the butcher to call his number. Reminders of a body possessed willingly keep him grounded. Yoongi has caged himself in the past out of curiosity. He enjoyed forming new routines around the cage, remembering it slowly when he awoke at night confused by a strange heaviness, observing its effects on his libido, and generally experimenting with a transformative yet tame form of self-discovery. Your hand holding the key will change the experience completely. Before he can do this with you, Yoongi needs to hear you explain why you’re interested. The tension of physical strain and emotional warmth is what makes him itch for it. Beyond that, whatever rules you want to set, or games you want to play—Yoongi is here to follow your heed.

🔑 JUNGKOOK ﹢ initiative

The moment the uncomfortable cage touches his sensitive skin Jungkook’s affectionate mannerisms shut down. Showering together finds Jungkook maneuvering around you awkwardly. Part of him is confused. His body serves you well. He’s internalized this confidence so deeply that even when you explain your intentions he secretly wonders if wearing the cage is a punishment. You always tell him he’s too tempting. Most days he can’t hug you without risking a hand on his cock two seconds later. The removal of his ability to provide all of himself to you feels like a subtle hint that he should give you some distance. Or, at the very least, he should cool down on the teasing touches and deep kisses until you want to fuck him again. “It isn’t about your body, baby,” you remind him patiently, “it’s about your loyalty. There’s no reason to stop showing me affection. Just because you won’t be getting off doesn’t mean I can’t.” The learning curve is a surprisingly steep slope. Satisfying you with his touch without worrying about getting hard as fast as you’d like and coming before you get bored is almost a relief. Jungkook begins to understand. By focusing on your body alone this dynamic is reinforced in a way he could never truly understand when he had his freedom.

🔑 HOSEOK ﹢ humility

other kinks - pegging, degradation

Firm control corrects Hoseok’s scattered priorities when he forgets his true nature. Although you reassure him again and again he can slide it off comfortably with lotion and patience, Hoseok never tries. Not because he enjoys wearing the cage—but because he respects you, he’s a little bit scared of you, and honoring you is worth losing his autonomy. Initially, there’s no real purpose to the cage besides dominating Hoseok psychologically. You become so accustomed to seeing him with it on, though, that his bare cock begins to look underdressed. Slowly, bespoke cages in a glittery rainbow of colors fill out a sleek strongbox near the bed. Choosing what color he’ll wear today is fun for you. The flippancy hurts a little bit, but that sting is what pulls Hoseok in deeper. Neediness to have all this pent-up energy fucked out of his electrified skin fogs Hoseok’s mind and quiets him into obedience with the hopes that you’ll enjoy his plaintive kisses on your legs and give him what he needs. A condescending pat on the head when the strap pulls out of his ass brinks Hoseok into forgetting why he’s shaking yet unsatisfied and begging for more. Thankfully, you’re here to tell him. He’s a whore. Your whore. And, that’s all he really needs to remember.

🔑 JIMIN ﹢ passion

Jimin has always known chastity would be easy for him. He’s operating on intoxicatingly high levels of horniness every second of the day, anyways. He’s learned to cope valiantly. With his own pleasure defined loosely he readily offers one facet of it for the comforting notion he’ll be gifted a plethora of new intimacies. The cage will bring you closer. He knows it will. Scheduled check-ins keep you fed on each other’s attention. Randomly sending him a partial nude of yourself during the day with the promise you’ll give him one number of this week’s passcode for every photo he recreates to your liking has Jimin rushing to the nearest public bathroom, heart hammering with both desire for you and hope for good lighting to pose in. Tracking tasks on the daily habit app to earn evenings without the cage motivates Jimin to do the things he wants to do for you but sometimes lacks the energy for, like practicing the piano and providing you accompaniment when you sit with your cello. Caged sex is, however, never a loss. Jimin might prefer if you simply told him you love how creatively you please each other in bed without adding that you want to start incorporating anything from foot massage to prostate toys into his tasks. Nonetheless. This light in your eyes as you’re overtaken by whims of intrigue is too sexy for Jimin to resist.

🔑 NAMJOON ﹢ self-improvement

other kinks - sub training, toys, voyeurism/exhibitionism, filming

Mediocre sex isn’t worth your time. Namjoon adores that you hold him to your standards. The intense single-minded drive that consumes him when you turn him on is redirected and channeled into other forms of pleasing you. Graduations from watching you use toys on yourself, to using toys on your body at your direction, to free play with the toys, to eventually repeat the process incorporating hands-on techniques fascinates Namjoon more than anything. In a scheme of education the cage is simply a reminder that you haven’t gotten to that part yet. Until then, Namjoon keeps the records of how many times he’s made you come this week and how he did it with fervor. Watching old videos of himself fucking you to take notes distracts from purpose; but, Namjoon can click his pen, shake his head, and refocus on a studious attitude. An extravagant rewards system combined with aftercare orgasms stop Namjoon from getting antsy. This venture is predicated on his ache to study your individuality, but you need to feel him savoring the process, too. When he is granted momentous opportunities to show you what he’s learned, mutual gratitude shines.

🔑 SEOKJIN ﹢ modesty

other kinks - cuckolding, threesome

Seokjin asks about it often. If he’s too big, or too small—if you would like his cock better if it was thicker, or harder, or softer, more curved; a different shade of pink. “Stop with the inane questions,” you finally snap during attempts to assuage him for the hundredth time when it’s obvious you love it because you’re laying here blushing and cooing while you jerk it off, “or I’ll lock it up.” Seokjin shuts up; flustered. Coyness isn’t Seokjin’s usual style when talking about kinky things. Yet, chastity gives you an unusually sulky boyfriend. When you ask if this is what he’s wanted all along Seokjin won’t deny it. He’s also too embarrassed by how good it feels to say “yes”. There has always been an understanding in this relationship. You’re the only person he gives himself to like this. Fully. Wholly. Through that virtue of submission you’re falling in love with his body all over again. You kiss him deeper as if to imprint your love. You tease him harder, but pet him softer and let him cuddle him tighter. Seokjin has wistful daydreams about romantic vanilla missionary and hearing you moan in approval when the cage comes off; but, he also knows he can get confused. If you decide what’s best for him is listening to your fond laughter at how hard he’s dripping through the cage while you warm each other up for the guy who’ll be arriving in a few minutes—he trusts your judgment without question.

#sub!bts #domme!reader #member x reader #ot7 post #sub!taehyung #sub!yoongi #sub!jungkook #sub!hoseok #sub!jimin #sub!namjoon #sub!seokjin #mch #headcanon

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wardens-stew · 3 years

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my review of The Mask Falling - an ode to Arcturus and Paige

For me, the soul of this series has always been the relationship between Paige and Arcturus. It’s apt that this book, the exact middle of the series and as @sshannonauthor describes it, its heart, spends so much time with this pair. The intensity and uniqueness of their bond really emerges as the shining jewel of this series.

It’s clear that Samantha Shannon was intentional about putting Arcturus and Paige on equal footing for the first time in The Mask Falling. She manages the power dynamic between them with such attention and nuance, reversing their roles often and fluidly escaping gender roles. The protector role comes naturally to Arcturus, given his immortal strength and anxiety about losing Paige (it’s even part of the etymology of their names), but for much of The Mask Falling he is her silent shadow, trailing being her and supporting her quietly. They negotiate their differences with refreshing candor and in good faith, their arguments free from ego. “My fear is not your cage,” Arcturus tells her. “I will never ask you to mold yourself to it.” His affection for her is empowering, supportive, never constrictive or diminishing. Paige herself is markedly independent, doing the bulk of her fighting and plotting on her own. When she does seek support from Arcturus, there is no sense of her own strength being diminished, and as often as he rescues her, she turns around and rescues him just as easily.

Indeed, while Arcturus is the immortal god, it is Paige’s power that really shines in this book. Her incredible ingenuity and strength is on full display, getting her out of certain-death scenarios at such a gripping pace I had to cover the pages with my hands to avoid glancing ahead. She couples her incredible powers with extraordinary mental fortitude and an acute conscience; each of her escapades has a satisfying emotional resonance that enlivens her broader quest. Whereas many YA heroines possessed of supernatural power oscillate between immobilizing moral anxiety and moral bankruptcy, Paige tempers her impulsiveness with reason (most of the time) and a powerful motive for justice. It’s clear that she has yet to access the full extent of her abilities, and I’m eager to see what roles she’ll play in the fight to take down Scion.

While previous installments show Arcturus/Warden on various levels of guardedness, The Mask Falling gives us time and space in excess to see his true character. I was struck by his compassion, his hopefulness despite all that he has endured. He is often reassuring and comforting Paige, his optimism clear-eyed and measured. The contrast is especially stark with his persona in The Bone Season, where he appears cold and calculating, morally gray at best. In this book, he is almost unbearably kind, devastatingly sweet and thoughtful. As Paige remarks, “there was nothing terrible before me now.” The almost unimaginable beauty of his character is achieved with such a soft touch; the books are not about Arcturus being the the epitome of goodness - he simply is.

A central thread of tension of this book follows Paige and Arcturus negotiating their relationship and coming to terms with their mutual attraction. Samantha Shannon manages this tension beautifully, carrying it forward constantly with poignant moments of intimacy interspersed with Paige’s honest internal dialogue. The smallest interactions and gestures between them felt so heightened. There are all the classic scenes - getting drunk and saying too much, jealousy spirals about past relationships, almost-kiss scenes interrupted, near-death confessions - all building up to a beautiful and satisfying climax.

Samantha Shannon writes intimacy incredibly well. The love scenes feel specific to the characters, managing to be both meaningful and erotic. Romances between an immortal man and a mortal woman in particular tend to translate the man’s primal instincts and extreme physical strength into a voracious sexual appetite that leaves little room for gentleness and consideration. Arcturus really breaks the mold in this respect. He is so reverent, so sincere, so generous with Paige in a way few male characters with female partners approximate. Rather than relying on an imbalance of power in order to convey eroticism, the sexiness of Arcturus and Paige’s dynamic derives from the equality of their relationship. It’s so difficult to create a heterosexual romance unsullied by patriarchy, and Samantha Shannon gets close to that here.

I wonder if it is Arcturus’ immortal nature that makes him such a uniquely engaging character. Samantha Shannon really commits to that aspect of him - he’s not just a hot teenager. The best word I can think of to describe him is mature. He is so beyond the petty concerns of YA love interests, so ego-less and self-reliant. One of my favorite ways he diverges from human men - and traditional male love interests - is his lack of fixation on Paige’s physical appearance. This book has several of the classic moments that would typically elicit a remark or a look from the love interest on the heroine’s appearance, often framed as a cute romantic moment. Yet when Paige dresses up, or dyes her hair - even when she asks him outright - he never comments on the way she looks. “A human might have whispered in my ear, told me I was beautiful or perfect, but not him.” I love that. I’ve never found that lustful, almost predatory demeanor in male love interests nearly as sexy as the author would like it to be, and it always rubs me the wrong way when the man telling the woman she’s beautiful is framed as the epitome of romance. It strikes me as a very lazy way to convey attraction, for one thing, and it reeks of benevolent sexism. Arcturus never plays into those supposedly romantic tropes of disparaging other women in favor of the heroine or being selectively kind. His love for Paige is so pure.

I continue to be impressed by the sheer scale of worldbuilding in this series. Many books attempt to create fictional tyrannical governments, but few succeed in building one as convincing and elaborate as Scion. The Mask Falling peels back even more layers of this complex world, bringing to fruition seeds planted in the very first book. Although the basic plot leans on some familiar tropes, Samantha Shannon always manages to add an additional twist of the screw. The complexity of this series is truly extraordinary, drawing on etymology and mythology, dropping mysteries and complicating loyalties with incredible dexterity.

SPOILERS!!!!! --> I am still struggling with Arcturus’s possession and Paige’s failure to connect the dots and realize the reality of his situation. I see Samantha Shannon has pointed out on Twitter that Paige’s trauma and illness may have affected her judgment and decision-making. She says, “There's a particular scene where Paige reacts to an event in a way that is so deeply rooted in her PTSD and past experiences.” (I assume this is the scene she’s referring to.) I think that’s fair - Paige has been so inundated with the Rephaite aversion to humans that it’s almost as if she only needed one piece of evidence to confirm her doubts and destroy her trust in Arcturus. And it’s not as if she just takes it at face value, either - she does question him and try to convince him otherwise. But I still can’t help feeling that it’s a stretch. The Mask Falling makes Arcturus’ character so clear that the prospect that he would be loyal to Nashira the whole time is just ludicrous. Not to mention the fact that Paige somehow overlooked the obvious signs that he was being possessed. His eyes were such a dead giveaway - Paige had already seen that same thing happen when she possessed him! And when he moved to strike her and then suddenly stopped and his eyes flared - come on! That’s a classic mind-control trope. Paige is usually so perceptive, and they had built such a strong foundation… it feels unrealistic that she wouldn’t have connected the dots just because she hadn’t thought there could be another dreamwalker.

If I had to find fault with this book, and it is difficult, I would say that it leans a little too heavily on some YA dystopian fantasy tropes towards the end - the mind-controlled love interest, for example, instantly made me think of Divergent, The Hunger Games, The Mortal Instruments, etc. Likewise, the forced memory loss is a fairly common fantasy trope that tends to be really frustrating to read. I have faith that Samantha Shannon will keep it from sliding into those tropes, and of course there remains so much mystery still to be untangled from those final 100 pages. /END SPOILERS :)

This was the kind of book that captivated me immediately, left me lying awake at night and had me eating energy bars for dinner so I could keep reading. It was such a visceral, immersive experience, the kind where returning to the physical reality is almost physically disorienting. It’s been two days since I finished it and I’m still clinging to that fictional world, wishing I didn’t have to leave. Books like these are rare for me, and I’m still marveling at the miracle of finding that book that in Arcturus’ words, exists for everyone: “a book that will sing to them.”

#the mask falling #the bone season #arcturus and paige #warden and paige #the mask falling spoilers #spoilers #review #otp #Samantha Shannon

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freddiekluger · 3 years

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Do you think that if the ghosts sees period dramas set in their time, it will reignite memories of their life?

i think it definitely depends on the accuracy and style of the drama- if they're too poorly researched, any attempts at reverie would be totally disrupted by the historical and visual inaccuracies (think: thomas yelling about the 'roccoco legs' during the byron shoot). of course the other big thing is setting: it's all well and good to watch to a movie set in your time period, but if it's based in a country you've never been to (especially for the older/less privileged ghosts like mary and robin, who probably didn't have much knowledge of the world outside of their continent when they were alive), it's not going to feel particularly familiar.

working on the assumption that we have at least partial historical and geographical accuracy, here's how i think each of the ghosts would respond to

robin: considering how little we actually know about early human history, i don't think robin would be that fussed by any attempt to put that on film- he'd still appreciate a good caveman joke, although he's not a big fan of how stupid every movie assumes they would have been (it's not like they had omega-3 tablets back then!). robin's unspeakably old, and for the most part he seems to have processed through all the parts of his past that he possibly can, and is now committed to enjoying his time at button house as much as he can (a big part of this is his prankster spirit and frankly underrated friendliness), so it would have to take a lot more than a stone age movie to rake up serious conflict.

mary: given her incredibly traumatic death, mary avoids virtually anything that hints of fire or witchcraft which is where things become difficult. i think mary could really enjoy a film set in her time if it follows a working family not dissimilar to her own- it could help her remember some of the positive things from her life, and probably help her feel a lot more seen as she often ends up misunderstood or ignored by the other ghosts (pat initially dismissing mary's advice about the camera work because he didn't think she properly understood what was happening; the ghosts focusing on correcting her speech more than what she actually says). the problem is, almost all movies set in mary's time that follow people from her class end up focusing on the witch trials, which is a BIG no no for her.

humphrey: i think humphrey could really enjoy watching some tudor set films. like mary, he often gets ignored (and straight up left behind), so watching a period film absolutely gives him the opportunity to feel a bit more seen and stew on those long forgotten memories like post-meal games of cards with friends, or the occasional hunting trip when the king came to visit (the trips themselves were more stressful than anything, but mouthing off about them with the king's entourage after he went to bed was always a highlight). humphrey would definitely have a keen eye for inaccuracies, but i don't think they'd bother him. it's just nice to have things be about him for a change (if by him, we mean having all the ghosts watching something that is vaguely related to his alive-period and actually looking to him with questions instead of just using his head as their personal football/security camera/magic 8ball).

kitty: kitty is one of the ghosts who accesses her memories pretty easily- she has no problem with thinking about her life, even when the anecdotes are screamingly sad to anyone listening. so a period film would naturally bring some memories, but i don't know if they'd be anything radical or new- kitty's real growth and drama would come from her leaving behind the rationalisations of what clearly was severe neglect. actually on that note, while not quite kitty's environment, i think she might get a lot out of Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette. something about the themes of the loneliness that comes with growing up in high society and only being valued for what your status and your biology can give to your family and your husband (who you likely didn't choose), along with feeling like an outsider and being visibly othered, even by those you outrank, no matter how friendly and approachable and like them you make yourself (while not necessarily linked to the broader themes of familial neglect kitty's character touches on, i think her experiences as a georgian noblewoman of colour would have to have impacted her growing up and also socially- i'd love to hear any thoughts on this from fans of colour, as i'm white and so any theories i could come up with would likely be a poor approximation). and she'd definitely like the pretty dresses and stunning rooms of versailles, and for that i can't blame her.

thomas: most of thomas we sort of got to see in Free Pass- the detail nitpicking, the excitement until a specific trigger from his life (in this case, lord byron, the man thomas considers his greatest enemy, although i’d be curious to know whether byron acually had any idea of thomas thorne’s existence) causes him to go into a full thomas hissy-fit. sure, the emotion is real to him, but he absolutely plays it up, even trying to get humphrey’s body to fetch alison so she can see how ‘upset’ he is (thomas reminds me of a child in this respect). there’d probably be less of the tantruming for a movie that had already been made, although i’m not so sure about the memory point. The Thomas Thorne Affair sort of brought out thomas’s big Unresolved Life Mystery, and now i think all that’s left for him to work through has got to be a lot more internal. sure, he’d be reminded of a few good old parties, and maybe any romance scenes might trigger some of the sad isabelle/general lost love emotions, but i don’t think they’d be anything particularly spectacular.

fanny: now fanny would be a real stickler for accuracy. she would be calling out every makeup, decorative, hair, wardrobe, architectural, and lingual failure with the classic lady button judgement in her voice. this is probably half because she can't help herself, but half a measure to distract herself from actually having to pay proper attention and relive her life. i think fanny struggles a lot with no longer running her own household (along with the shifting morals, and fashions, of the modern world), and so to be reminded of everything she can no longer have would be tough. i'm not saying she would long for a time when women didn't have a lot of rights, but she went from a wealthy society woman who held a lot of power in her own sphere to a ghost, unable to touch anything or even be seen by the living (save for the photo glitch), and stuck spending her days with a motley crew of equally frustrating ghosts whom she doesn't always feel respected by (noting that 'respect' to fanny is much the same as deference). she could have it a lot worse, but i think fanny would much prefer to not have to think about her old life.

the captain: the captain is an interesting one. he's one of the few ghosts who actively seeks out media related to his time, although that's within the impersonal war documentary which focuses on facts and mechanics as opposed to day to day realities and feelings. on the one hand, any war film for the captain would be sure to rake up memories of wartime (even if he never made the front- that remains unconfirmed), and the immense grief that comes with watching the people around you slowly stop returning home. the captain is a war fanatic, and has no problem talking about the great battles, victories, and tactics, so i think the heightened emotional states that a film presents would be the key to unlocking the captain's inevitable wartime trauma and going beyond the surface level facts. for that reason, i'd really like the captain to see Peter Weir's Gallipoli. i know it's the wrong war and the wrong country (although the australian's were technically part of the British forces), but i think the overarching themes of the idolisation of the military, the deconstruction of the glory of war, and the intense (bordering on the homoerotic) although never quite realised relationship between Archy and Frank (which, spoiler alert, ends in tragedy), could give the captain a lot in terms of food for thought and unlocking some of those deeper experiences. on the other hand, the captain watching a period film set in the years before his war could be equally interesting- i think they'd play on some his is insecurities and general issues surrounding the difficulty he may have had fitting in with day-to-day life (not just due to his homosexuel répression, but due to his broader issues with fitting in socially which we see through his interactions with both the ghosts and his own forces- some particularly valid fans have used these to headcanon cap as autistic). in short, films would unlock a fair few memories for cap, but even more EMOTIONS.

pat: with pat and julian it gets interesting because while yes, technically any movie set in a non-current time period is a ‘period piece’, you also have to deal with the fact that they’re going to have less impact on their respective ghosts because you also have actual movies from those periods floating around. for this reason, my answers for pat and julian are relatively similar: they wouldnt have any more memories appear than for any film coming from while they were alive. for pat, this means he’d get pretty excited about ones that came from his childhood (pat would be a giant sci fi fan don’t @ me he loves technology), but i think anything that came with too strong a family attachmet, or that he watched in the weeks/months/year leading up to his death might bring out the angry pat we saw in Happy Death Day and Perfect Day. anger is how his inherent death trauma (and the additional loss that comes from the world moving on without you) manifests, so i definitely think that would come out here, even if he isn’t quite able to put his finger on why specific movies make him so angry/irritated. for pat, childhood memories would abound, but the closer we get to his death, there’s less memories but definitely more unresolved emotion.

julian: see my point above about the whole period-film-vs-regular-film thing. julian doesn’t really strike me as a movie person, and i definitely think he wouldn’t give much care to the influx of 80s/90s set british political media (think The Iron Lady etc). in his words, “i don’t really care for politics, and they’re all too busy trying to push their labor propaganda”. he just makes a captain-inspired noise when alison reminds him that he WAS a politician. julian is another character who accesses his memories pretty easily (although they’re usually either horny or at least slightly morally bankrupt), and i honestly find it hard to give a tory emotions so i’m very excited to see how the christmas special manages. julian is a self-centred bloke though, so i think only things that are directly about him could have the power to rake up buried memories and feelings. now i really want to see julian watching a documentary on himself and just getting outraged.

thanks for this one, sorry for the delay!!

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wolveria · 4 years

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2, 4, 7, 8, 20 with sixty pls! love your fics btw 💕

Yess my first Sixty ask! I’m excited. Thank you dear that’s very sweet of you.

2. What was their reaction to seeing you naked?

Depends on the circumstances. If it’s one of those you-accidentally-walk-out-of-the-bathroom-naked situations, Sixty would wolf-whistle you and be a relentless tease about it.

If it’s in a more intimate setting, he would be a much different animal, and I really do mean animal. Sharp-eyed, hungry, moving like a predator. He’d have trouble staying in control and he would go straight for his target.

4. How/what was your first time having sex with them?

Very intense. Sixty isn’t one for holding back, and the built up frustration that would have led to this point would be let loose. He would fuck you hard into the mattress, hands bound behind your back or tied to the headboard, and wouldn’t stop until he’d made you cum at least three times. He can go for as long as he needs to, and he’s been waiting for this moment a long time.

7. What are their orgasms like (sound, what does their o face look like)?

Like Connor—and he would hate that comparison—Sixty is a noisy boy. His sounds are more guttural, intimidating, and he doesn’t hold back any of his pleasure.

8. Would they rather give or receive oral?

Sixty loves both in equal measure. He would love the idea of holding your head in place while fucking into your mouth, or pulling you onto his cock to use how he saw fit. But he also would love the idea of restraining you, tying you so you can’t touch him as he licked between your legs without mercy or respite.

20. What are they like after the act (what’s the pillow talk like)?

Sixty might seem like the type of person to get up and leave afterwards, but he needs the tenderness. It’s one of the rare times he lets his guard down, lets himself be vulnerable to all his insecurities, and he can turn into quite the needy cuddler. It’s a side of him that no one else gets to see but his partner.

NSFW Self Ship Ask Game

#dbh #detroit become human #sixty #rk800 #sixty x reader #gender neutral reader #ask game #headcanons #meta #Anonymous

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thezodiaczone · 4 years

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Scorpio Compatibility

SCORPIO + ARIES (MARCH 21 - APRIL 19) Aries' ruler, passionate Mars, also wields minor command over Scorpio (whose main overlord is Pluto). Fierce physical attraction draws your signs together, but it's a game of sexual gunpowder and erotic explosives. Not that either of you is afraid of such things. No sign is as darkly intense as watery Scorpio. When mixed with Aries' concentrated fire-power, you stir up quite the hydroelectric charge. However, this match can only last if Scorpio has evolved from a ground-dwelling, vengeful scorpion into an elevated "eagle" state. Here's the fundamental challenge: Aries takes; withholding Scorpio takes away. When Aries reaches out his grasping hand, Scorpio's first instinct is to jump back, which wounds the sensitive Ram. Aries energy is consuming, which leaves Scorpio weak-kneed but scared. Aries will need to temper the raw desire, or at least mask it to avoid overwhelming Scorpio. Jealous Scorpio will need to stop Google-stalking Aries and hiring private detectives whenever the independent Ram goes out for a beer with friends. One way in which you're alike? You're both hyper-sensitized to abandonment, and may even shun each other in a self-protection paradox: "Go away before you leave me." (This tactic only guarantees another hot reunion tryst.) Selfishness can also be this couple's downfall. Scorpio is the sign that rules other people's resources—his karmic job is to create wealth from another man's pocket. Aries is simply born entitled. In a sense, you both live by the credo "What's mine is mine; what's yours is mine." Who will refill the coffers once you empty them?

SCORPIO + TAURUS (APRIL 20 - MAY 20) You're opposite signs who can fall into a real love-hate dynamic, mainly since you both like to run the show. Taurus is the bossy Bull, and Scorpio rules power and control. It's like two mafia kingpins trying to rule the same territory: it works as long as you're loyal, but cross each other and you're getting whacked. Differences can be a turn-on for some signs, but for this pair, they're often a deal breaker. Taurus and Scorpio are both "fixed" signs, gifted at perseverance and holding your ground, terrible at adapting to other people's personalities. This inflexibility can lead to serious power struggles and enmity that burns bright after the relationship ends. If ever a couple needed a prenup, it's you. Better yet, you'll need to be extremely self-aware and conscious of your personal power. If you can avoid arousing the sleeping dragon in each other, there's plenty of rich material here. You both love music, food and sensual delights. You're equally intense about your beliefs and passions, and sex is a lusty, no-holds-barred affair. You'll give each other the attentive listening both of you crave. The Bull's earthy nature can be grounding for watery Scorpio, whose emotions can warp his perspective. Practical Taurus will pull Scorpio out of depressive slumps, and Scorpio will help Taurus look below the surface to see hidden motivations and agendas. You're loyal and protective of each other, so stay off each other's sacred turf and respect your differences.

SCORPIO + GEMINI (MAY 21 - JUNE 20) You live on completely different planes, which either turns you off or utterly fascinates you. Both of you are accustomed to reading people like flimsy comic books, then tossing them aside. Here, your X-ray vision fails to penetrate each other's psychic shields. Mutable Gemini is the shape-shifting Twin, home to a traveling cast of personalities. Intense Scorpio is shrouded in mystery and bottomless layers of complexity. Being baffled leaves you without the upper hand, but it also stokes your libido. You're piercingly smart signs who love a good puzzle—this is your romantic Rubik's cube. The challenge sets off sexual dynamite. You tease each other with cat-and-mouse evasions, neither of you making your attraction obvious. This prickles your insecurities, daring you to strive for the other's unbroken gaze. No two signs are as quietly obsessive as yours! There will be frustrating moments, too. You're both prone to depressive spells, and swing from giddiness to unreachable shutdown. Clever mind games edge on cruel or callow, breaking the trust that Scorpio needs. At times, airy Gemini may not be emotional or sensual enough for watery Scorpio; in turn, the Scorpion's emotional and physical passion can be overwhelming to Gemini. However, if you combine your strengths, you'll go far. Gemini is dilettante and a trivia collector who's always got a pocketful of creative ideas. Instinct-driven Scorpio rules details and research—this sign hones in like a laser and masters his chosen field. Whether it's starting a family or running a business, you can be an indefatigable team, with Gemini playing the rowdy ringmaster and Scorpio running the show from behind the scenes.

SCORPIO + CANCER (JUNE 21 - JULY 22) ♥♥♥♥ You're an ideal match, twin Water signs with deeply complementary natures. Highly suspicious and protective of your privacy, neither of you trusts easily. As a result, you intuitively trust each other. The good news is, you've bet on a winning sea-horse. These two signs can mate for life, and the emotional facets of your relationship deepen into an intimacy few couples reach. Romantic and sentimental occasions never go uncelebrated: birthdays, Valentine's Day, the five-month anniversary of the first time you said "I love you." Sex is a sacred, erotic act that can transport you on a one-way trip to Tantra-ville. You feel safe enough together to try anything. The challenge will be breaking the ice, since you both tend to clam up in a red-faced fluster or any icy aloofness around a new love interest. It helps to talk about music, books, films—anything but your feelings. Once you get past the awkward phase, it's smooth sailing. You genuinely enjoy each other's company, and like to do almost everything together. As parents, you're incredibly nurturing and hands-on, and may struggle to cut the cord when your kids reach adolescence. In fact, control is the big challenge for your signs. Jealous and possessive, you know how to avoid your mate's hot buttons—or to push them when you're feeling spiteful. (The Crab pinches and the Scorpion stings; both can wound the relationship fatally.) At times, Cancer's sulking seems childish to Scorpio, and Scorpio's sharp edges can maim the Crab's tender feelings. Fortunately, you know how to win your way back into each other's good graces once the moody spells pass.

SCORPIO + LEO (JULY 23 - AUGUST 22) This combustible combination drips with power plays, a white-hot dynamic you find infuriating and sexy in equal measure. In many ways, you're complete opposites. Secretive Scorpio is a private soul who rules the night. Leo is an exhibitionist ruled by the sun, and his piercing rays expose Scorpio's hidden shadows. Scorpio hates to feel this vulnerable—especially in public—yet, behind closed doors it can be thrilling. You're both passionate and imaginative in bed, with very little you won't try. As business partners and collaborators, you can make a dream team, too. You're both super intense, outdoing most people with your drive and focus. Leo plays the glamorous showstopper, and Scorpio acts as producer behind the scenes. (It worked for Leo Jennifer Lopez and Scorpio Diddy, who collaborated on her breakout album.) At least you don't compete for the spotlight, which can be a saving grace. But you'll struggle for the upper hand, since Scorpio likes to be in control and Leo is the bossy ruler of the jungle. Flirtatious, charismatic Leo can also spark Scorpio's jealous streak. Remember: darkness absorbs light. Leo must be careful not to get swept into Scorpio's powerful undertow and vengeful obsessions.

SCORPIO + VIRGO (AUGUST 23 - SEPTEMBER 22) ♥♥♥♥ Virgo and Scorpio are two of the zodiac's shrewdest signs. Your collective gaze misses nothing, and your conversations can be as hair-splitting as Freudian analysis. You're both insatiable when it comes to understanding the human soul, and examining your own neuroses can keep you busy for weeks. While your obsessive natures would drive other people mad, it only makes you more fascinated by each other. You're like two scientists in the lab of love, researching, analyzing, and measuring data. Moody and introverted, you both have spells where you crave total privacy, and you'll grant each other that space. You unconsciously absorb so much energy from your environments, and you need to clear yourselves on a regular basis. Nature is soothing—Scorpio is a Water sign, and Virgo is Earth—and you may enjoy a healthy or outdoorsy lifestyle. That can mean renting a private chalet on a pristine European lake, or devoting yourselves to raw food, vegetarianism, and yoga. Virgo is the zodiac's Virgin and Scorpio is the sex sign. In bed, Scorpio can be a bit too intense for earthy Virgo. You're both lusty sensualists, but if Scorpio breaks out the dungeon props and dominatrix gear, Virgo draws the line. The Virgin may indulge a fetish with strangers, but he keeps a strict boundary about how far he'll experiment with a partner. No matter. You're good friends and supportive partners who find beauty in the smallest details—the makings of a quality life commitment.

SCORPIO + LIBRA (SEPTEMBER 23 - OCTOBER 22) Libra is light and Scorpio rules darkness, but your searing sexual chemistry blazes through borders. As a couple, you're quick to bed and slow to wed. In many ways, the long prenuptial pas de deux is a mutual choice. Romantic Libra loves an extended courtship—long dinners, vacations and lavish gifts. Shrewd, suspicious Scorpio will subject Libra to a battery of character tests, gauging whether Libra can be trusted. Libra is an incurable dilettante whose surface skimming can feel lightweight beside Scorpio's obsessive, detail-focused nature. Because your temperaments are so different, your initial phase can be fraught with misunderstandings. Libra is an outgoing butterfly and an unrepentant flirt, provoking Scorpio's jealousy at every turn. Possessive Scorpio prefers passionate bedside confidentials to paparazzi and parties, but Libra quickly feels smothered without a social scene. To say you'll need compromise is an understatement. Combine your strengths, though, and you can also make a powerful society couple—with Scorpio dominating the world from behind the scenes, and Libra presiding as its lovely, doe-eyed diplomat.

SCORPIO + SCORPIO (OCTOBER 23 - NOVEMBER 21) We like this combination, for seldom can any other sign so skillfully navigate your unspoken power dynamics. Talk isn't just cheap between you; it's unnecessary. You understand each other's wiring based on pure primal instinct, much like a dog leaves his scent as a calling card. We forget that human beings are animals, an amnesia that plagues modern civilization. Yet, Scorpios know that the one you love might also become your prey (if you're hungry or threatened), or could attack you by night. Your ruler is Pluto, god of the underworld; learning your mate's shadow side is a prerequisite to trust. Scorpio is a master at subtle cues, emotional intelligence, and feeling your way through each other's dark depths as though reading Braille. When it's time to let the other be the Top, you submit, then artfully ease him down to the mat when it's time to rule again. Power glides into your gullets like oysters, every bit the aphrodisiac. In the bedroom, you sexy, spiritual stinger-tails make a Tantric twosome with a twist. There's a hint of force and a danger to all you do, even in the way you fiercely protect your children and property. The real threat of this relationship is to the outside world, for you make an invincible familia that could send Tony Soprano on the lam.

SCORPIO + SAGITTARIUS (NOVEMBER 22 - DECEMBER 21) Level with us: Would you really be interested in each other without the element of danger? There's always something that feels a little dirty here—and it's not because you share an aversion to showering (although the musky pheromones might play in…). Your combined willpower—enough to combust a small village—can yoke you together despite your own best interests. The issue is anatomical: Scorpio rules the crotch and Sagittarius rules the hips and thighs. From the waist down, a magnetic field pulls you into insatiable sexual attraction. Above the midsection, it's a love-hate drama as you battle for mental and emotional domination, one-upping and offending each other at every turn. You both love to have the last word, and deep down, you're pretty sure you're smarter than the rest of the population. As friends, this makes you smugly superior comrades, but in love, you tend to unleash your intellectual weapons on each other. Sag's sarcasm and Scorpio's acid-washed retorts will leave you both wounded and estranged. Yet, a good shag seems to erase your short-term memory between attacks. For best results, remain naked at all times, and only discuss problems in the afterglow. Grant each other your own turf and never cross the line of demarcation.

SCORPIO + CAPRICORN (DECEMBER 22 - JANUARY 19) ♥♥♥♥ If you were to sign a pre-nup, Schedule A must clearly designate who will play the "Top" and who will be the "Bottom." After your attorneys haggle over the prone position, you may just call off the engagement. An inability to reach settlement is likely for two uncompromising Alphas such as yourselves. Although your business-savvy signs can make quite the contemporary Napoleon and Josephine, LLC, there are terms that must be negotiated in advance. For one, you'll need to swear off secrecy—and that will be the true test of your relationship. Scorpio and Capricorn are masters of underhanded power plays that could topple this merger fast. Your first job: learn and practice direct communication ("whip me like THIS" or "no, darling, the leather corset, not the PVC"). Master it, and the rest is a cakewalk. You can lash each other to bedposts, tryst on the conference table in your glass-paned office tower, or earn your mile-high wings with nary a flight attendant knowing. The 2.5 kids you produce will have some interesting conception stories, that's for sure. Not that you'll ever tell. A little secrecy with the rest of the world is fine. Just make sure to erase those sex tapes before the housekeeper finds them.

SCORPIO + AQUARIUS (JANUARY 20 - FEBRUARY 18) Years after their modern-day Mrs. Robinson relationship ricocheted the term "cougar" into cliché-dom, the Scorpio-Aquarius pairing of Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher can still baffle the naked eye. Scorpio is an intense, seductive creature with ruthless ambition, eagle instincts and a complicated psyche. Aquarius is a silly prankster and a cold-souled nomad who avoids emotion, then releases it in embarrassing blurts of sloppy sentiment. You're certainly an odd couple, down to your values, style and interests. Then there's the power issue to settle. Scorpio wants ultimate control over everything, while rebel Aquarius chafes at any restraint. While Aquarius is happy to hand rulership of the household to Scorpio, any breach of personal freedom will be an instant deal-breaker. Possessive Scorpio must accept that Aquarius is a social creature with friends from all walks of life, and curb the jealousy. Aquarius will need to cut off a few friends (the ex you met at a strip club, the swingers "who are actually really cool") and adopt a few of Scorpio's interests, like Kaballah for Ashton. So where's the click? Different as you are, you both prefer a mate who's hard to figure out: it staves off boredom. To keep this strong, borrow each other's strengths. Aquarius needs Scorpio's depth, and Scorpio lightens up from Aquarius' outrageous jokes and impersonations.

SCORPIO + PISCES (FEBRUARY 19 - MARCH 20) ♥♥♥♥ You're both "spiritual beings having a human experience," Finding an equally sensitive, divinely connected soulmate feels like coming home. Scorpio and Pisces are compatible artistes who love music, drama and romance. Like a lighthouse for two ships adrift on the emotional high seas, your relationship is an anchor and a haven. However, it's not immune to the turbulence caused by your secretive, Water sign natures. Emotional withdrawal is a self-protective act you've both honed over the years, but this tactic backfires when used against each other. The trick is learning to catch a bad mood when it starts, then processing the feelings instead of lashing out. Once the righteous anger and wounded egos kick in, you're like two runaway trains waging a war of domination and submission. Scorpio control tussles with Pisces guilt, Scorpio withholding wrestles Pisces evasion, and so on. Yet, you both want the same thing: a partner who inspires absolute, unshakeable trust with a money-back guarantee. What you need to learn is how to give it before you get it. To adapt the saying, be the change you want to see in your partner. It will keep you together for lifetimes.

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grigori77 · 4 years

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Movies of 2020 - My Pre-Summer Favourites (Part 2)

The Top Ten:

10. TRUE HISTORY OF THE KELLY GANG – Justin Kurzel has been on my directors-to-watch list for a while now, each of his offerings impressing me more than the last (his home-grown Aussie debut, Snowtown, was a low key wallow in Outback nastiness, while his follow up, Macbeth, quickly became one of my favourite Shakespeare flicks, and I seem to be one of the frustrated few who actually genuinely loved his adaptation of Assassin’s Creed, considering it to be one the very best video game movies out there), and his latest is no exception – returning to his native Australia, he’s brought his trademark punky grit and fever-dream edginess to bear in his quest to bring his country’s most famous outlaw to the big screen in a biopic truly worthy of his name. Two actors bring infamous 19th Century bushranger Ned Kelly to life here, and they’re both exceptional – the earlier half of the film sees newcomer Orlando Schwerdt explode onto the screen as the child Ned, all righteous indignation and fiery stubbornness as he rails against the positions his family’s poverty continues to put him in, then George MacKay (Sunshine On Leith, Captain Fantastic) delivers the best performance of his career in the second half, a barely restrained beast as Ned grown, his mercurial turn bringing the man’s inherent unpredictability to the fore. The Babadook’s Essie Davis, meanwhile, frequently steals the film from under both of them as Ellen, the fearsome matriarch of the Kelly clan, and Nicholas Hoult is similarly impressive as Constable Fitzpatrick, Ned’s slimily duplicitous friend/nemesis, while there are quality supporting turns from Charlie Hunnam and Russell Crowe as two of the most important men of Ned’s formative years. In Kurzel’s hands, this account of Australia’s greatest true-life crime saga becomes one of the ultimate marmite movies – its glacial pace, grubby intensity and frequent brutality will turn some viewers off, but fans of more “alternative” cinema will find much to enjoy here. There’s a blasted beauty to its imagery (this is BY FAR the bleakest the Outback’s ever looked on film), while the screenplay from relative unknown Shaun Grant (adapting Peter Carey’s bestselling novel) is STRONG, delivering rich character development and sublime dialogue, and Kurzel delivers some brilliantly offbeat and inventive action beats in the latter half that are well worth the wait. Evocative, intense and undeniable, this has just the kind of irreverent punk aesthetic that I’m sure the real life Ned Kelly would have approved of …

9. JUST MERCY – more true-life cinema, this time presenting an altogether classier account of two idealists’ struggle to overturn horrific racial injustices in Alabama. Writer-director Destin Daniel Cretton (Short Term 12, The Glass Castle) brings heart, passion and honest nobility to the story of fresh-faced young lawyer Bryan Stevenson (Michael B. Jordan) and his personal crusade to free Walter “Johnny D” McMillan (Jamie Foxx), an African-American man wrongfully sentenced to death for the murder of a white woman. His only ally is altruistic young paralegal Eva Ansley (Cretton’s regular screen muse Brie Larson), while the opposition arrayed against them is MAMMOTH – not only do they face the cruelly racist might of the Alabama legal system circa 1989, but a corrupt local police force determined to circumvent his efforts at every turn and a thoroughly disinterested prosecutor, Tommy Chapman (Rafe Spall), who’s far too concerned with his own personal political ambitions to be any help. The cast are uniformly excellent, Jordan and Foxx particularly impressing with career best performances that sear themselves deep into the memory, while there’s a truly harrowing supporting turn from Rob Morgan as Johnny D’s fellow Death Row inmate Herbert, whose own execution date is fast approaching. This is courtroom drama at its most gripping, Cretton keeping the inherent tension cranked up tight while tugging hard on our heartstrings for maximum effect, and the result is a timely, racially-charged throat-lumper of considerable power and emotional heft that guarantees there won’t be a single dry eye in the house by the time the credits roll. Further proof, then, that Destin Daniel Cretton is one of those rare talents of his generation – next up is his tour of duty in the MCU with Shang-Chi & the Legend of the Ten Rings, and if this seems like a strange leftfield turn given his previous track record, I nevertheless have the utmost confidence in him after seeing this …

8. UNDERWATER – at first glance, this probably seems like a strange choice for the year’s current Top Ten – a much-maligned, commercially underperforming glorified B-movie creature-feature headlined by the former star of the Twilight franchise, there’s no way that could be any good, surely? Well hold your horses, folks, because not only is this very much worth your time and a comprehensive suspension of your low expectations, but I can’t even consider this a guilty pleasure – as far as I’m concerned this is a GENUINELY GREAT FILM, without reservation. The man behind the camera is William Eubank, a director whose career I’ve been following with great interest since his feature debut Love (a decidedly oddball but strangely beautiful little space movie) and its more high profile but still unapologetically INDIE follow-up The Signal, and this is the one where he finally delivers wholeheartedly on all that wonderful sci-fi potential. The plot is deceptively simple – an industrial conglomerate has established an instillation drilling right down to the very bottom of the Marianas Trench, the deepest point in our Earth’s oceans, only for an unknown disaster to leave six survivors from the operation’s permanent crew stranded miles below the surface with very few escape options left – but Eubank and writers Brian Duffield (Jane Got a Gun, Insurgent) and Adam Cozad (The Legend of Tarzan) wring all the possible suspense and fraught, claustrophobic terror out of the premise to deliver a piano wire-tense horror thriller that grips from its sudden start to a wonderfully cathartic climax. The small but potent cast are all on top form, Vincent Cassel, Jessica Henwick (Netflix’ Iron Fist) and John Gallagher Jr. (Hush, 10 Cloverfield Lane) particularly impressing, and even the decidedly hit-and-miss T.J. Miller delivers a surprisingly likeable turn here, but it’s that Twilight alumnus who REALLY sticks in your memory here – Kristen Stewart’s been doing a pretty good job lately distancing herself from the role that, unfortunately, both made her name and turned her into an object of (rather unfair) derision for many years, but in my opinion THIS is the performance that REALLY separates her from Bella effing-Swan. Mechanical engineer Norah Price is tough, ingenious and fiercely determined, but with the right amount of vulnerability that we really root for her, and Stewart acts her little heart out in a turn sure to win over her strongest detractors. The creature effects are impressive too, the ultimate threat proving some of the nastiest, most repulsively icky creations I’ve seen committed to film, and the inspired design work and strong visual effects easily belie the film’s B-movie leanings. Those made uneasy by deep, dark open water or tight, enclosed spaces should take heed that this can be a tough watch, but anyone who likes being scared should find plenty to enjoy here. Altogether a MUCH better film than its mediocre Rotten Tomatoes rating makes it out to be …

7. ONWARD – Disney and Pixar’s latest digitally animated family feature clearly has a love of tabletop fantasy roleplay games like Dungeons & Dragons, its quirky modern-day AU take populated by fantastical races and creatures seemingly tailor-made for the geek crowd … needless to say, me and many of my friends absolutely loved it. That doesn’t mean that the classic Disney ideals of love, family and believing in yourself have been sidelined in favour of fan-service – this is as heartfelt, affecting and tearful as their previous standouts, albeit with plenty of literal magic added to the metaphorical kind. The central premise is a clever one – once upon a time, magic was commonplace, but over the years technology came along to make life easier, so that in the present day the various races (elves, centaurs, fauns, pixies, goblins and trolls among others) get along fine without it. Then timid elf Ian Lightfoot (Tom Holland) receives a wizard’s staff for his sixteenth birthday, a bequeathed gift from his father, who died before he was born, with instructions for a spell that could bring him back to life for one whole day. Encouraged by his brash, over-confident wannabe adventurer elder brother Barley (Chris Pratt), Ian tries it out, only for the spell to backfire, leaving them with the animated bottom half of their father and just 24 hours to find a means to restore the rest of him before time runs out. Cue an “epic quest” … needless to say, this is another top-notch offering from the original masters of the craft, a fun, affecting and thoroughly infectious family-friendly romp with a winning sense of humour and inspired, flawless world-building. Holland and Pratt are both fantastic, their odd-couple chemistry effortlessly driving the story through its ingenious paces, and the ensuing emotional fireworks are hilarious and heartbreaking in equal measure, while there’s typically excellent support from Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Elaine from Seinfeld) as Ian and Barley’s put-upon but supportive mum, Laurel, Octavia Spencer as once-mighty adventurer-turned-restaurateur “Corey” the Manticore and Mel Rodriguez (Getting On, The Last Man On Earth) as overbearing centaur cop (and Laurel’s new boyfriend) Colt Bronco. The film marks the sophomore feature gig for Dan Scanlon, who debuted with 2013’s sequel Monsters University, and while that was enjoyable enough I ultimately found it non-essential – no such verdict can be levelled against THIS film, the writer-director delivering magnificently in all categories, while the animation team have outdone themselves in every scene, from the exquisite world-building and character/creature designs to some fantastic (and frequently delightfully bonkers) set-pieces, while there’s a veritable riot of brilliant RPG in-jokes to delight geekier viewers (gelatinous cube! XD). Massive, unadulterated fun, frequently hilarious and absolutely BURSTING with Disney’s trademark heart, this is currently (and deservedly) my animated feature of the year. It’s certainly gonna be a tough one to beat …

6. THE GENTLEMEN – Guy Ritchie’s been having a rough time with his last few movies (The Man From UNCLE didn’t do too bad but it wasn’t exactly a hit and was largely overlooked or simply ignored critically, while intended franchise-starter King Arthur: Legend of the Sword was largely derided and suffered badly on release, dying a quick death financially – it’s a shame on both counts, because I really liked them), so it’s nice to see him having some proper success with his latest, even if he has basically reverted to type to do it. Still, when his newest London gangster flick is THIS GOOD it seems churlish to quibble – this really is what he does best, bringing together a collection of colourful geezers and shaking up their status quo, then standing back and letting us enjoy the bloody, expletive-riddled results. This particularly motley crew is another winning selection, led by Matthew McConaughey as ruthlessly successful cannabis baron Mickey Pearson, who’s looking to retire from the game by selling off his massive and highly lucrative enterprise for a most tidy sum (some $400,000,000 to be precise) to up-and-coming fellow American ex-pat Matthew Berger (Succession’s Jeremy Strong, oozing sleazy charm), only for local Chinese triad Dry Eye (Crazy Rich Asians’ Henry Golding, chewing the scenery with enthusiasm) to start throwing spanners into the works with the intention of nabbing the deal for himself for a significant discount. Needless to say Mickey’s not about to let that happen … McConaughey is ON FIRE here, the best he’s been since Dallas Buyers Club in my opinion, clearly having great fun sinking his teeth into this rich character and Ritchie’s typically sparkling, razor-witted dialogue, and he’s ably supported by a uniformly excellent ensemble cast, particularly co-star Charlie Hunnam as Mickey’s ice-cold, steel-nerved right-hand-man Raymond Smith, Downton Abbey’s Michelle Dockery as his classy, strong-willed wife Rosalind, Colin Farrell as a wise-cracking, quietly exasperated MMA trainer and small-time hood simply known as the Coach (who gets many of the film’s best lines), and, most notably, Hugh Grant as the film’s nominal narrator, thoroughly morally bankrupt private investigator Fletcher, who consistently steals the film. This is Guy Ritchie at his very best – a twisty rug-puller of a plot that constantly leaves you guessing, brilliantly observed and richly drawn characters you can’t help loving in spite of the fact there’s not a single hero among them, a deliciously unapologetic, politically incorrect sense of humour and a killer soundtrack. It got the cinematic year off to a cracking start, and looks set to stay high in the running for the remainder – it’s EASILY Ritchie’s best film since Sherlock Holmes, and a strong call-back to the heady days of Snatch (STILL my favourite) and Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels. Here’s hoping he’s on a roll again, eh?

5. THE INVISIBLE MAN – looks like third time’s a charm for Leigh Whannell, writer-director of my current horror movie of the year – while he’s had immense success as a horror writer over the years (co-creator of both the Saw and Insidious franchises), as a director his first two features haven’t exactly set the world alight, with debut Insidious: Chapter III garnering similar takes to the rest of the series but ultimately turning out to be a bit of a damp squib quality-wise, while his second feature Upgrade was a stone-cold masterpiece that was (rightly) EXTREMELY well received critically, but ultimately snuck in under the radar and has remained a stubbornly hidden gem since. No such problems with his third feature, though – his latest collaboration with producer Jason Blum and his insanely lucrative Blumhouse Pictures has proven a massive hit both financially AND with reviewers, and deservedly so. Having given up on trying to create a shared cinematic universe inhabited by their classic monsters, Universal have resolved to concentrate on standalones to showcase their elite properties, and their first try is a rousing success, Whannell bringing HG Wells’ dark and devious human monster smack into the 21st Century as only he can. The result is a surprisingly subtle piece of work, much more a lethally precise exercise in cinematic sleight of hand and extraordinary acting than flashy visual effects, very much adhering to the Blumhouse credo of maximum returns for minimum bucks as the story is stripped right back to its bare essentials and allowed to play out without any unnecessary weight. The Handmaid’s Tale’s Elizabeth Moss once again confirms what a masterful actress she is as she brings all her performing weapons to bear in the role of Cecelia “Cee” Kass, the cloistered wife of affluent but monstrously abusive optics pioneer Aidan Griffin (Netflix’ The Haunting of Hill House’s Oliver Jackson-Cohen), who escapes his clutches in the furiously tense opening sequence and goes to ground with the help of her closest childhood friend, San Francisco cop James Lanier (Leverage’s Aldis Hodge) and his teenage daughter Sydney (A Wrinkle in Time’s Storm Reid). Two weeks later, Aidan commits suicide, leaving Cee with a fortune to start her life over (with the proviso that she’s never ruled mentally incompetent), but as she tries to find her way in the world again little things start going wrong for her, and she begins to question if there might be something insidious going on. As her nerves start to unravel, she begins to suspect that Aidan is still alive, still very much in her life, fiendishly toying with her and her friends, but no-one can see him. Whannell plays her paranoia up for all it’s worth, skilfully teasing out the scares so that, just like her friends, we begin to wonder if it might all in her head after all, before a spectacular mid-movie reveal throws the switch into high gear and the true threat becomes clear. The lion’s share of the film’s immense success must of course go to Moss – her performance is BEYOND a revelation, a truly blistering career best turn that totally powers the whole enterprise, and it almost goes without saying that she’s the best thing in this. Even so, she has sterling support from Hodge and Reid, as well as Love Child’s Harriet Dyer as Cee’s estranged big sister Emily and Wonderland’s Michael Dorman as Adrian’s slimy, spineless lawyer brother Tom, and, while he doesn’t have much actual (ahem) “screen time”, Jackson-Cohen delivers a fantastically icy, subtly malevolent turn which casts a large “shadow” over the film. This is one of my very favourite Blumhouse films, a pitch-perfect psychological chiller that keeps the tension cranked up unbearably tight and never lets go, Whannell once again displaying uncanny skill with expert jump-scares, knuckle-whitening chills and a truly astounding standout set-piece that looks set to go down as one of the year’s top action sequences. Undoubtedly the best version of Wells’ story to date, this goes a long way in repairing the damage of Universal’s abortive “Dark Universe” efforts, as well as showcasing a filmmaking master at the very height of his talents.

4. EXTRACTION – the Coronavirus certainly has thrown a massive spanner in the works of this year’s cinematic calendar – the new A Quiet Place sequel should have been setting the big screen alight for almost two months now, while the latest (and most long-awaited) MCU movie, Black Widow, should have just opened to further record-breaking box office success, but instead the theatres are all closed and virtually all the big blockbusters have been pushed back or shelved indefinitely. Thank God, then, for the streaming services, particularly Hulu, Amazon and Netflix, the latter of which provided a perfect movie for us to see through the key transition from spring to the summer blockbuster season, an explosively flashy big budget action thriller ushered in by MCU alumni the Russo Brothers (who produced and co-wrote this adaptation of Ciudad, a graphic novel that Joe Russo co-created with Ande Parks and Fernando Leon Gonzalez) and barely able to contain the sheer star-power wattage of its lead, Thor himself. Chris Hemsworth plays Tyler Rake, a former Australian SAS operative who hires out his services to an extraction operation, under the command of mercenary Nik Khan (The Patience Stone’s Golshifteh Farahani), brought in to liberate Ovi Mahajan (Rudhraksh Jaiswal in his first major role), the pre-teen son of incarcerated Indian crime lord Ovi Sr. (Pankaj Tripathi), who has been abducted by Bangladeshi rival Amir Asif (Priyanshu Painyuli). The rescue itself goes perfectly, but when the time comes for the hand-off the team is double-crossed and Tyler is left stranded in the middle of Dhaka with no choice but to keep Ovi alive as every corrupt cop and street gang in the city closes in around them. This is the feature debut of Sam Hargrave, the latest stuntman to try his hand at directing, so he certainly knows his way around an action sequence, and the result is a thoroughly breathless adrenaline rush of a film, bursting at the seams with spectacular fights, gun battles and car chases, dominated by a stunning sustained action sequence that plays out in one long shot, guaranteed to leave jaws lying on the floor. Not that there should be any surprise – Hargrave cut his teeth as a stunt coordinator for the Russos on Captain America: Civil War and their Avengers films. That said, he displays strong talent for the quieter disciplines of filmmaking too, delivering quality character development and drawing out consistently noteworthy performances from his cast. Of course, Hemsworth can do the action stuff in his sleep, but there’s a lot more to Tyler than just his muscle, the MCU veteran investing him with real wounded vulnerability and a tragic fatalism which colours his every scene, while Jaiswal is exceptional throughout, showing plenty of promise for the future, and there’s strong support from Farahani and Painyuli, as well as Stranger Things’s David Harbour as world-weary retired merc Gaspard, and a particularly impressive, muscular turn from Randeep Hooda (Once Upon a Time in Mumbai) as Saju, a former Para and Ovi’s bodyguard, who’s determined to take possession of the boy himself, even if he has to go through Tyler to get him. This is action cinema that really deserves to be seen on the big screen – I watched it twice in a week and would happily have paid for two trips to the cinema for it if I could have. As we look down the barrel of a summer season largely devoid of big blockbuster fare, I can’t recommend this film enough. Thank the gods for Netflix …

3. PARASITE – I’ve been a fan of master Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho ever since I stumbled across his deeply weird but also thoroughly brilliant breakthrough feature The Host, and it’s a love that’s deepened since thanks to the truly magnificent sci-fi actioner Snowpiercer, so I was looking forward to his latest feature as much as any movie geek, but even I wasn’t prepared for just what a runaway juggernaut of a hit this one turned out to be, from the insane box office to all that award-season glory (especially that undeniable clean-sweep at the Oscars). I’ll just come out and say it, this film deserves it all. It’s EASILY Bong’s best film to date (which is really saying something), a masterful social satire and jet black comedy that raises some genuinely intriguing questions before delivering some deeply troubling answers. Straddling the ever-widening gulf between a disaffected idle rich upper class and impoverished, struggling lower class in modern-day Seoul, it tells the story of the Kim family – father Ki-taek (Bong’s veritable good luck charm Song Kang-ho), mother Chung-sook (Jang Hye-jin), son Ki-woo (Train to Busan’s Choi Woo-shik) and daughter Ki-jung (The Silenced’s Park So-dam) – a poor family living in a run-down basement apartment who live hand-to-mouth in minimum wage jobs and can barely rub two cents together, until they’re presented with an intriguing opportunity. Through happy chance, Ki-woon is hired as an English tutor for Park Da-hye (Jung Ji-so), the daughter of a wealthy family, which offers him the chance to recommend Ki-jung as an art tutor to the Parks’ troubled young son, Da-song (Jung Hyeon-jun). Soon the rest of the Kims are getting in on the act, the young Kims contriving opportunities for their father to replace Mr Park’s chauffeur and their mother to oust the family’s long-serving housekeeper, Gook Moon-gwang (Lee Jung-eun), and before long their situation has improved dramatically. But as they two families become more deeply entwined, cracks begin to show in their supposed blissful harmony as the natural prejudices of their respective classes start to take hold, and as events spiral out of control a terrible confrontation looms on the horizon. This is social commentary at its most scathing, Bong drawing on personal experiences from his youth to inform the razor-sharp script (co-written by his production assistant Han Jin-won), while he weaves a palpable atmosphere of knife-edged tension throughout to add spice to the perfectly observed dark humour of the situation, all the while throwing intriguing twists and turns at us before suddenly dropping such a massive jaw-dropper of a gear-change that the film completely turns on its head, to stunning effect. The cast are all thoroughly astounding, Song once again dominating the film with a turn which is at once sloppy and dishevelled but also poignant and heartfelt, while there are particularly noteworthy turns from Lee Sun-kyun as the Parks’ self-absorbed patriarch Dong-ik and Choi Yeo-jeong (The Concubine) as his flighty, easily-led wife Choi Yeon-gyo, as well as a fantastically weird appearance in the latter half from Park Myung-hoon. This is heady stuff, dangerously seductive even as it becomes increasingly uncomfortable viewing, so that even as the screws tighten and everything goes to hell it’s simply impossible to look away. Bong Joon-ho really has surpassed himself this time, delivering an existential mind-scrambler that lingers long after the credits have rolled and might even have you questioning your place in society once you’ve thought about it some. It deserves every single award and every ounce of praise it’s been lavished with so far, and looks set to go down as one of the true cinematic greats of this new decade. Trust me, if this was a purely critical best-of list it’d be RIGHT AT THE TOP …

2. 1917 – it’s a rare thing for a film to leave me truly shell-shocked by its sheer awesomeness, for me to walk out of a cinema in a genuine daze, unable to talk or even really think about much of anything for a few hours because I’m simply marvelling at what I’ve just witnessed. Needless to say, when I do find a film like that (Fight Club, Inception, Mad Max: Fury Road) it usually earns a place very close to my heart indeed. The latest tour-de-force from Sam Mendes is one of those films – an epic World War I thriller that plays out ENTIRELY in one shot, which doesn’t simply feel like a glorified gimmick or stunt but instead is a genuine MASTERPIECE of a film, a mesmerising journey of emotion and imagination in a shockingly real environment that it’s impossible to tear your eyes away from. Sure, Mendes has impressed us before – his first film, American Beauty, is a GREAT movie, one of the most impressive feature debuts of the 2000s, while Skyfall is, in my opinion, quite simply THE BEST BOND FILM EVER MADE – but this is in a whole other league. It’s an astounding achievement, made all the more impressive when you realise that there’s very little trickery at play here, no clever digital magic (just some augmentation here and there), it’s all real locations and sets, filmed in long, elaborately choreographed takes blended together with clever edits to make it as seamless as possible – it’s not the first film to try to do this (remember Birdman? Bushwick?), but I’ve never seen it done better, or with greater skill. But it’s not just a clever cinematic exercise, there’s a genuine story here, told with guts and urgency, and populated by real flesh and blood characters – the heart of the film is George MacKay and Dean Chapman (probably best known as Tommen Baratheon in Game of Thrones) as Lance Corporals Will Schofield and Tom Blake, the two young tommies sent out across enemy territory on a desperate mission to stop a British regiment from rushing headlong into a German trap (Tom himself has a personal stake in this because his brother is an officer in the attack). They’re a likeable pair, very human and relatable throughout, brave and true but never so overly heroic that they stretch credibility, so when tragedy strikes along the way it’s particularly devastating; both deliver exceptional performances that effortlessly carry us through the film, and they’re given sterling support from a selection of top-drawer British talent, from Sherlock stars Andrew Scott and Benedict Cumberbatch to Mark Strong and Colin Firth, each delivering magnificently in small but potent cameos. That said, the cinematography and art department are the BIGGEST stars here, masterful veteran DoP Roger Deakins (The Shawshank Redemption, Blade Runner 2049 and pretty much the Coen Brothers’ entire back catalogue among MANY others) making every frame sing with beauty, horror, tension or tragedy as the need arises, and the environments are SO REAL it feels less like production design than that someone simply sent the cast and crew back in time to film in the real Northern France circa 1917 – from a nightmarish trek across No Man’s Land to a desperate chase through a ruined French village lit only by dancing flare-light in the darkness before dawn, every scene is totally immersive and simply STUNNING. I don’t think it’s possible for Mendes to make a film better than this, but I sure hope he gives it a go all the same. Either way, this is the most incredible, exhausting, truly AWESOME experience I’ve had at the cinema this year (so far) – it’s a film that DESERVES to be seen on the big screen, and I feel truly sorry for those who missed the chance …

1. BIRDS OF PREY & THE FANTABULOUS EMANCIPATION OF ONE HARLEY QUINN – the only reason 1917 isn’t at number one right now is because Warner Bros.’ cinematic DC Extended Universe project FINALLY got round to bringing my favourite DC Comics title to the big screen. It’s been the biggest pleasure of my cinematic year so far getting to see my top DC superheroines brought to life on the big screen, and it’s been done in high style, in my opinion THE BEST of the DCEU films to date (yup, I loved it EVEN MORE than Wonder Woman). It was also great seeing Harley Quinn return after her show-stealing turn in David Ayer’s clunky but ultimately still hugely enjoyable Suicide Squad, better still that this time round they got her SPOT ON this time – this is the Harley I’ve always loved in the comics, unpredictable, irreverent and entirely without regard for what anyone else thinks of her, as well as one hell of a talented psychiatrist. Margot Robbie once more excels in the role she was basically BORN to play, clearly relishing the chance to finally do Harley justice, and she’s a total riot from start to finish, infectiously lovable no matter what crazy, sometimes downright REPRIHENSIBLE antics she gets up to. Needless to say she’s the nominal star here, her latest ill-advised adventure driving the story – finally done with the Joker and itching to make her emancipation official, Harley publicly announces their breakup by blowing up Ace Chemicals (their love spot, basically), inadvertently painting a target on her back in the process since she’s no longer under the supposed protection of Gotham’s feared Clown Prince of Crime – but that doesn’t mean she eclipses the other main players the movie’s REALLY supposed to be about. Each member of the Birds of Prey is beautifully written and brought to vivid, arse-kicking life by what has to be the year’s most exciting cast – Helena Bertinelli, aka the Huntress, is the perfect character for Mary Elizabeth Winstead to finally pay off on that action heroine potential she showed in Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World, but this is a MUCH more enjoyable role outside of the fight choreography because while Helena may be a world-class dark avenger, socially she’s a total dork, which just makes her thoroughly adorable; Rosie Perez is similarly perfect casting as Renee Montoya, the uncompromising pint-sized Gotham PD detective who kicks against the corrupt system no matter what kind of trouble it gets her into, and just gets angrier all the time, paradoxically making us like her even more; and then there’s the film’s major controversy, at least as far as the fans are concerned, namely one Cassandra Cain. Sure, this take is VERY different from the comics’ version (a nearly mute master assassin who went on to become the second woman to wear the mask of Batgirl before assuming her own crime-fighting mantle as Black Bat and now Orphan), but personally I like to think this is simply Cass at THE VERY START of her origin story, leaving plenty of time for her to discovery her warrior origins when the DCEU gets around to introducing Lady Shiva (personally I want Michelle Yeoh to play her, but that’s just me) – anyways, here she’s a skilled child pickpocket whose latest theft inadvertently sets off the larger central plot, and newcomer Ella Jay Basco brings a fantastic pre-teen irreverence and spiky charm to the role, beautifully playing against Robbie’s mercurial energy. My favourite here BY FAR, however, is Dinah Lance, aka the Black Canary (not only my favourite Bird of Prey but my very favourite DC superheroine PERIOD), the choice of up-and-comer Jurnee Smollet-Bell (Friday Night Lights, Underground) proving to be the film’s most truly inspired casting – a club singer with the metahuman ability to emit piercing supersonic screams, she’s also a truly ferocious martial artist (in the comics she’s one of the very best fighters IN THE WORLD), as well as a wonderfully pure soul you just can’t help loving, and it made me SO UNBELIEVABLY HAPPY that they got my Canary EXACTLY RIGHT. Altogether they’re a fantastic bunch, basically my perfect superhero team, and the way they’re all brought together (along with Harley, of course) is beautifully thought out and perfectly executed … they’ve also got one hell of a threat to overcome, namely Gotham crime boss Roman Sionis, aka the Black Mask, one of the Joker’s chief rivals – Ewan McGregor brings his A-game in a frustratingly rare villainous turn (currently my number one bad guy for the movie year), a monstrously narcissistic, woman-hating control freak with a penchant for peeling off the faces of those who displease him, sharing some exquisitely creepy chemistry with Chris Messina (The Mindy Project) as Sionis’ nihilistic lieutenant Victor Zsasz. This is about as good as superhero cinema gets, a perfect example of the sheer brilliance you get when you switch up the formula to create something new, an ultra-violent, unapologetically R-rated middle finger to the classic tropes, a fantastic black comedy thrill ride that’s got to be the most full-on feminist blockbuster yet – it’s helmed by a woman (Dead Pigs director Cathy Yan), written by a woman (Bumblebee’s Christina Hodson), produced by more women and ABOUT a bunch of badass women magnificently triumphing over toxic masculinity in all its forms. It’s also simply BRILLIANT – the cast are all clearly having a blast, the action sequences are first rate (the spectacular GCPD evidence room fight in which Harley gets to REALLY cut loose is the undisputable highlight), it has a gleefully anarchic sense of humour and is simply BURSTING with phenomenal homages, references and in-jokes for the fans (Bruce the hyena! Stuffed beaver! Roller derby!). It’s also got a killer soundtrack, populated almost exclusively by numbers from female artists. Altogether, then, this is the VERY BEST the DCEU has to offer to date (Wonder Woman 1984 has got a MAJOR job ahead of it beating this one), and my absolute FAVOURITE film of 2020 (so far). Give it all the love you can, it sure as hell deserves it.

#movies 2020 #true history of the kelly gang #just mercy #underwater #onward #the gentlemen #the invisible man #extraction #parasite #1917 #Birds of Prey #birds of prey and the fantabulous emancipation of one harley quinn #awesome sauce

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ajokeformur-ray · 4 years

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Self Shipping Ask Game

I’m feeling self-indulgent as all hell so I did another one, with Patrick Verona this time!! 💙 I’m starting to lose track of my F/Os...

Tagging @jokershyena so she can see!

Word count: 2, 253 (lmao woops?)

Date you got together? April 24th 2020. We are... a very new couple and we’re still finding our way with what we have together. It feels like stepping into shoes you’ve worn a thousand times before, but the soles are different; there’s new marks left behind and we’re finding out what they mean slowly but surely. We have lots of love between us and we’re letting it guide us.

Favorite personality trait? I love Pat for all that he is, but if I have to pick just one thing then it’s his nature. He feels like... you know when you lay down outside on the grass or the beach and there’s a gentle breeze in your hair and the sun is warm on your face and your eyes are shut and you feel yourself smiling because this is why you’re alive, for moments like this? That’s how Pat feels to me, all the time.

Favorite physical trait? His smile. I almost said his eyes but, oh... that smile makes flowers bloom in my heart. I would die to keep that smile on his face. He’s so beautiful and those dimples and his eyes, I... he’s so beautiful. 🥺

Couple song We don’t have one yet. I’m still looking for the perfect one. I often listen to I want you to want me from the soundtrack when I want to feel him close by, just because it makes me think of him, so maybe that one?

Pet peeves... He likes to leave his switchblade open and lying in random places and it freaks me out. I don’t even like kitchen knives near me and there he is, leaving it stabbed into the coffee table pinning a note for me to the surface. Sure, it’s convenient to just grab his knife out of his pocket and it’s a good way to get my attention, the silver glinting of the blade in the light of the room, but still.

Favorite outfit on them? As much as I adore those leather trousers, it has to be the dark grey shirt with the chain poking out... just him putting it on in the morning and the cold metal against his skin contrasted with the heat on my tongue... *ahem*

Favorite meal? Pat and I eat separately; I have coeliacs disease and Pat’s lucky enough to not have any food allergies so I always make us separate meals. I make his first, scrub down the kitchen and then I do my own food. Pat likes the tuna pasta bake I make; the golden crust of cheese on the top is his favourite and I always give him the corner bits; he likes the cronch. He always says I can just make one meal which is gluten free but I don’t feel right doing that to someone who doesn’t share my dietary requirements.

Early bird or night owl? Pat’s definitely a night owl, so long late night conversations where the two of us lay down in bed together are very common. I stay up every night for him to come home from the pub and then he showers (no dirty sweaty bodies in my bed, thank you) and we cuddle up in bed and just... talk. Sometimes we just lay there listening to music. Neither of us especially like mornings and it’s not unusual to wake up at noon or afterwards 😂

Snorer or sleep talker? Pat snores very lightly most of the time but when he’s deeply, deeply asleep, he sounds like a chainsaw lmao. I like that, though, because even though it makes the bed shake a bit, I know that he’s there with me and it eases my fears of the dark. I have my nightlights but I don’t need music because I know he’s there for me and he’ll keep me safe. Sometimes he’ll mutter unintelligibly as he rolls over and it’s always right in my ear and I have to try not to jump 😂

Do you have any pets together? Not yet! 💕 I wanna get some cats with him in the future; they’re such precious creatures. Pat wants a dog but between him and a dog I’d never get any free or alone time 😂 and I’m protective of both of those things.

Pet names! (Both from them and yours for them) I call him Pat mostly, but other times it’s “sunshine”, “baby boy” for when he needs comforting, “angel”, “darling”, “love” and he knows I’m angry/mad if I call him Patrick ksksksk it gets his attention so quickly.

Pat calls me “sweetheart”, “angel”, “love” (saved for when he’s being sarcastic, it’s like a hint I need to Do Something Soon) “honey”, “girlie” and by my name when he thinks he has to.

How often do you fight? Not... very often. We have playful banter more than anything. We do fight, that’s normal and healthy, but we try to talk things out calmly rather than go at it and risk saying something we can’t take back. Words have greater power than people know, and where the sword cuts and forgets does the tree fall and remember.

What starts fights? For me, Pat gets angry at my blatant lack of self-care and it angers him to see me treat myself as I do (or don’t, more accurately) but to shower others in love. He doesn’t understand why and it frustrates him. I struggle to explain myself properly so then I get frustrated and it can lead into a whole thing lmao the tears start when he raises his voice so he usually calms down pretty quickly. And as I said, we prefer to speak it through calmly so we’ll go calm down separately and meet in the middle later on. He knows he’s forgiven when I throw myself at him and smother him in kisses.

For Pat, I don’t get angry very often or very easily but when I do, it’s because he was out for so long that I started thinking he’d died or was injured or something and he didn’t text me to let me know and though I don’t want to control him I also don’t enjoy staying up worrying he’s dying in an alley somewhere. So when he gets home I’m a bit... colder in how I greet him and then Pat gets defensive and eesh 😬 In the end, he’ll sigh and I’ll apologise and he’ll get irritated and we cuddle and talk it out. I’ll know I’m forgiven when he kisses my forehead.

Who apologizes first? Me. I will always apologise first, even if I was right. I cannot handle any kind of conflict or confrontation and due to things which have occured in the past I will always just... take it. I’ll just apologise, and get it over with, and hope it all smooths over quickly. Pat gently tells me off when I do this, “No, Erika. I’m the one apologising, not you.” and I usually get upset so we have some cuddle therapy - our touches speak louder and more concisely than we ever could.

Big spoon or little spoon? asdfghjkl; we switch depending on who needs or wants what! Whomever needs comforting, the other is the big spoon and on the times we both need comforting or we just can’t decide who is either spoon, we lay facing each other so that we’re both the little and the big spoon at the same time! Problem solved! <3

Dom or sub? Pat’s a switch; it depends on what either of us needs the most in any given moment. For the most part he’s dominant; I can be really shy sometimes and I have no idea what I’m doing with anything, so he tends to take the lead... before we realise that we’d rather walk into undiscovered territory together, hand in hand the way it should be.

What are their kisses like? They’re somehow comforting but intense. He kisses me so tenderly it can make me cry but it’s so passionate that it leaves me breathless. He commands my lips against his and he both takes and gives in equal measure. Pat is a passionate, compassionate soul and it comes through every time he kisses me; like he, too, is coming home. He never kisses just once - just one sentence can hold a multitude of kisses. And the ghost of his lips against my skin lingers for hours after he’s gone home. He’s always with me, in one or another.

What do they smell like? Apples, leather, whiskey, stale cigarette smoke... and something spicy but so Patrick. If I concentrate, I can find it when I nuzzle into his neck.

What are their hugs like? Coming home. He always hugs me so tightly that I can feel those lost parts of me click back into place. I’m a known squeezer and he playfully grunts in my ear and it makes me smile and he squeezes back and it makes me giggle. Pat sighs happily and drops his head down into the crook of my neck and he rocks me from side to side... I’ve been known to fall asleep standing up in the safety of his embrace. He’s my home, nothing and no one make me feel as safe as he does.

Who is more protective? I think we’re both as protective as each other. I have a mean streak when my loved ones are threatened or in any kind of danger and I’m not afraid to stand up for Pat against rumours, even if he’s not with me at the time. I hate confrontation but for my loved ones, I’d walk straight through fire if I had to. Similarly, Pat gets easily defensive and seems to have a bit of a temper as well so if anything happened to me, he’d get protective. I also... feel like we protect each other from our own selves, sometimes. I have some Bad Habits and so does Pat and neither of us are afraid to tell the other when we’re hurting ourselves and need to stop... like right now, it’s way past midnight and I’m yawning every few minutes but I’m pushing through to write this. Pat’s frowning and wanting to take my laptop away.

Interested in children? Pat might be... when he’s older. But he knows my stance on this topic and we never talk about it.

Who needs the most TLC when sick? Pat. OMG he tries to work through it, to walk it off, but I can see. I do the same thing, I always pretend I’m not sick until it’s so obvious that I just can’t hide it. Pat’s a natural caregiver, he’s so used to taking care of others and that’s exactly why I deliberately go overboard when I take care of him. I buy every kind of medicine specific to his illness (and I dip into my savings but shush, don’t tell!), and I make him soup and I’m there for him and I make it known that I love him. I’m usually squeamish with sickness, even when it’s my own, but for Pat I push through and I try because he deserves nothing less than the best of everything I can give him.

Who says ‘I love you’ first? Mmm.... I think Pat said it first. He has more confidence in what we share together than I do and one day when I came through with his favourite meal and I had my own one, I sat down and he said, “I love you, d’you know that?” I just blinked at him a few times in shock and he said it again... and again... and again until I just had to put my food down so that I could grab that beautiful face and swallow his next words; he is... ethereal and I’ll never understand why he loves me but I’m so, so glad that he does! I said it back, of course I did, and his smile was brighter than the sun.

Which of you is more accident prone? Meeeee ~ omg lmao I always have bruises I don’t even remember getting. Pat gets frowny because I sit there poking them hoping the slight pain will trigger a memory of how I got the bruise, but I rarely remember. I’m forever bouncing off door frames, walking into tables, tripping over my own feet while I’m stood still... Pat finds it funny and sometimes when I actually trip he’ll say something like, “I know you fell for me, but, ah - did you have to show me, too?” or “How’s the world from down there?” and once... once, he laughed and laid down next to me on the floor and we just stared up at the ceiling and we just... were for a time. It’s a memory I cherish.

Bed hog? OMG me, hands down. Pat tends to lay on his back and I put my head on his chest so that I can listen to his heartbeat or I nuzzle into the crook of his neck, but it’s not unusual for me to wake up with my duvet on the floor and the sheets all over the place. I’ve been known to actually kick in my sleep and sometimes I wake up with bruises I don’t recall getting. Pat wraps himself around me like a koala when I move around too much because a) shitty mattress and b) I drink 18 coffees a day and in this way, I’m able to fall asleep quicker and in a more relaxed way. If I fall asleep relaxed, I move around far less when I’m asleep. I don’t know how Pat figured that out and he won’t tell me, either.

Who loves the other the most? We’re a very new couple and we’re finding our way with each other and our relationship, but I do think that I love Pat a little bit more than he loves me. But that’s okay; statistically, one is always loved a bit more than the other. I have trouble believing we’re even compatible because ??? look at him ??? and then look at me ??? and it drives Pat insane.

#self-shipping #erika x patrick #patrick verona #10 things i hate about you

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queenpersephonesgarden · 4 years

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from my song to yours

Wangxian Week Day 2: Music

“Perhaps we should save the rest of our speculations for the morning.”

Lan Wangji blinked gritty eyes and looked up from where he’d once again been studying the malevolent disembodied arm currently floating just above the qiankun bag it was normally kept in, meeting Wei Ying’s eyes across the table.

“Already?” he asked, mildly surprised; more than one memory of cheerful laughter and quicksilver smiles shining in the light of the moon served to remind him just how late into the night Wei Ying preferred to work and play in equal measure, and one quick glance out the window confirmed the moon hadn’t even fully risen into the sky yet. “You’re tired?”

Wei Ying snorted a laugh, a lovely, light-hearted sound that seemed appropriate coming from a face as young as the one he now wore.

“No, no, I’ll be fine for another four hours at least.”

A finger rose to point accusingly right at Lan Wangji’s face, who blinked placidly.

“The investigation can wait for tomorrow because of you! I know all about you Lans and your ridiculous nine o’clock sleeping schedule!”

Can also be read on AO3

He was worried… about the Lan sleep schedule?

Lan Wangji raised a placating hand. “I am fine.”

“Are you?” the rising of Wei Ying’s right eyebrow was entirely skeptical.

Confusion made Lan Wangji’s own eyebrows furrow the slightest bit. “Night hunts often run far past midnight on serious cases-”

“But this isn’t a serious case,” Wei Ying interrupted, then quickly amended “Well, it is serious, but it’s not the kind of case we can solve in a single night of staring intensely at the problem, so instead of doing that, we should focus more on things we can achieve in a single night. Like sleep!”

Without waiting for Lan Wangji to attempt a response Wei Ying swept the resentful arm back into its pouch, tying the bag firmly shut before setting it back down on the table where they could easily keep an eye on it.

When Wei Ying stood, Lan Wangji haltingly tried to slow him down from heading back to sleep in his own room next door. “We. Don’t have to-”

“Hanguang-jun.” One eyebrow rose imperiously as Wei Ying scrutinized him with too-dark gray eyes. “If we go any longer, you’ll sleep in past noon and bring some calamitous dishonor upon your ancestors. How would the Cloud Recesses ever recover?”

Such a bizarre statement said with such gravity almost made Lan Wangji reach across and press fingers to Wei Ying’s forehead, thinking perhaps he had somehow contracted an unnoticed fever, before the slightest shine of amusement in Wei Ying’s eyes gave it away.

Ah.

Still playing the madman he’d been reincarnated into.

While he wished fiercely Wei Ying didn’t feel the need to keep up the act around him, Lan Wangji couldn’t deny that it was… nice, to be the focus of this strange farce, because as elaborate as it is it still feels intensely familiar.

It was such a nonsensical, roundabout way of showing concern.

It was unnecessary.

It was bizarre.

It was- it was exactly the kind of ridiculous game he would have tried to play in their youth, reaching across a sun-dappled table in the Library Pavilion to tug at Lan Wangji’s sleeve, crying dramatically, “But who in their right mind is ever tired at nine o’clock, hah?”

The tidal wave of nostalgia makes it hard to keep steady when he stands from the table.

Wei Ying, eyes sharp as ever even in a new body, caught the infinitesimal slip in posture and grinned triumphantly. “See? I was right all along!”

“Of course.”

Two slim hands laced their fingers together and rose up above Wei Ying’s head in a languid stretch. “Well, I suppose I better leave you to sleep,” he sighed contentedly.

Stay.

The thought comes unbidden, but not unexpected; letting Wei Ying leave his sight for any length of time since his return has been difficult.

The reluctance in his silence must be truly palpable, because Wei Ying pauses and looks back at Lan Wangji despite not allowing even a single muscle in his face to so much as twitch in protest.

Dark gray eyes light up with some unspeakable mischief. Lan Wangji does not glare as he once would have as a teenager, another stark difference from his memories.

“Aiya,” Wei Ying bat his eyelashes in an outrageously flirtatious manner. “Would the great and noble Hanguang-jun like this one to sing him to sleep?”

Despite the sour pang in the pit of his stomach at the tease, the clash of foreign-familiarity of the new face and old mannerisms had Lan Wangji responding without thinking especially hard about it. “Mn. If you wish.”

Wei Ying stared, frozen in an exaggerated coquettish pout.

Lan Wangji stared back, resolutely keeping his expression as blank as ever even as his ears grew hot. He refused to regret the slip.

“….. huh.” Wei Ying said intelligently, looking genuinely poleaxed, and if Lan Wangji were a pettier person he might have felt the slightest bit smug for their positions during many an afternoon in their youth to be reversed. But he didn’t, of course, because the Second Jade of Lan was not petty.

“Haha, um, I don’t know very many songs suited for a lullaby.” Desperate verbal backtracking was something Lan Wangji had never expected to see the most shameless person he’d ever known do, but there it was.

Lan Wangji turned and padded over to the bed, fingers trailing up to pull the pins that held his hair in place out with a confidence he didn’t really feel. “You are clever. I am sure you can think of something appropriate.”

A strangled sound came from behind him, and for the first time in a very long time, Lan Wangji resisted the urge to smile the slightest bit.

Yes, being the one to initiate the teasing was far more enjoyable than getting teased himself, he decided.

For a moment he balked the slightest bit at the thought of slipping into bed with Wei Ying still in the room, the far more recent memory of his warm weight laying across him making his breath catch, but Lan Wangji could admit to himself that he was always stubborn to a fault; if either of them was going to back out of this, it wouldn’t be him.

So, he slipped into bed, and did a rather remarkable job of keeping an expectant look off his face when he glanced over at where Wei Ying was still standing rather awkwardly next to the table with the qiankun pouch.

Wei Ying stared back, still clearly flummoxed, but rallying to the challenge.

A softer grin painted his new face in a different way under the moonlight, and Lan Wangji felt his heart stutter.

“Oh, don’t worry, er-gege~,” Wei Ying said cheerfully in that way that always made an aborted shiver run down Lan Wangji’s spine. “I think I know just the right song for someone as lovely as you to drift off to!”

And because time was cruel and heartbreak was his oldest friend, he began to hum the song Lan Wangji had written himself in the throes of frustrated, sun-drenched love as a teenager, and his blood froze solid.

This was-

This was a mistake.

This was a mistake, and Lan Wangji was a fool, but if he asked Wei Ying to stop, to sing something else, he would ask why, and Lan Wangji-

He couldn’t.

His eyes fell shut, but only because looking at Wei Ying as he was now, happy and lovely in the muted candlelight and singing the song Lan Wangji wrote for him, felt too raw.

The only solace, Wei Ying knew the melody, but that was it. He’d never heard the lyrics before, the words Lan Wangji had slowly dared to thread through the harmony during thirteen years of waiting. Thirteen years of yearning. Thirteen years of missing Wei Ying with every breath of air in his lungs.

But that was alright, because those painful words were still locked behind Lan Wangji’s heart, and the melody was still all that was needed for an impromptu lullaby.

It seemed a much kinder reversal of the first time Lan Wangji had sang it to Wei Ying, trapped deep within a cave with no guaranteed escape, the both of them injured and wracked with fever for days on end.

Yet it was also strangely crueler, because despite the gentler setting they were still so very far apart. In the cave, at least Lan Wangji had been able to touch Wei Ying, to try and soothe him between intermittent bouts of shivering on the cold stone floor.

Here, now, Wei Ying hummed the song that had taken root in Lan Wangji’s heart on the night they had first met, and Lan Wangji desperately tried not to drown.

Do you know?

Do you know what that song means to me?

Did it ever mean the same to you?

In the wide empty space of the bed, fingers clench almost painfully hard around a handful of fabric.

Did it ever mean anything to you?

Only decades of discipline kept his face as smooth as unfeeling jade when the song tapered off slowly, Wei Ying’s voice – so different from before, slightly higher in a not unpleasant contrast to Lan Wangji’s even tones – growing quieter and quieter with each repetition until he ended it with a deep, quiet sigh that tugged incessantly at Lan Wangji’s heart; the voice was different, but the cadence was exactly the same.

I know you, some wild thing shrieked in Lan Wangji’s head. I know you, how could I not? How could you ever think I would forget how you are when you’re happy?

A rustle of fabric, a squeak of a floorboard as Wei Ying stepped away with a small sound of satisfaction, a soft breath of air as the candle was blown out.

“Good night Lan Zhan.”

He must have turned away, must be focusing on something else, because if he were still looking at the bed there is no way he could have possibly missed the way Lan Wangji’s hands spasmed reflexively at the sound of his name.

For several heartbeats it’s all he can do just to keep breathing through it, the terrible heaviness clamped hard around his chest in an agonizingly familiar way.

He breathes in deeply, twice, three times, long years of meditation serving him well in getting his breathing back under control.

Once he is certain his voice will remain steady, his heart will not shake apart under another onslaught of emotion, he forces his eyes open to try to say- something, no matter how breathlessly quiet his voice is-

“Wei Ying-!”

But the door has already shut softly behind the man, leaving the room aching and cavernous in the silence.

A/N: Yeah you know how there's a scene in the audio drama where Wei Wuxian just absent-minded started humming Wangxian.mp3 while he was cutting out a paperman?? Yeah my heart may never recover. ~Persephone

#Wangxian #Wangxian Week #Wei Wuxian #Lan Wangji #Lan Zhan #Wei Ying #Mo Dao Zu Shi #MDZS #MDZS fanfiction #my writing

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fhimechan · 5 years

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#Hannigram Meet-Cute Challenge: April Monthly Update

In between the April Fic Swap and the Just Fuck Me Up, it's time to remind everyone that there's also our meet cute challenge running. Do you feel like you want to imagine a different, equally iconic way for Hannibal to fall in love with Will at first sight? Do you have more sassy rude lines to feed Will? There's the time to bring them out!

This month, @cinnamaldeide took the challenge upon herself, and delighted us with an AU where Hannibal is entranced by a rude employer who may be more than it seems...

Admirable Deceit by @cinnamaldeide #13: There was indeed no doubt about Hannibal being an acclaimed artist. His mere flaw was having lost inspiration along the way. He’d been however fortunate enough to meet a flippant cashier at the hardware store around the corner.

This story joins our previous beautiful entries, which you can find here:

#29: Welcome to Widdershins Close by @zigzag-wanderer #110: Fancy meeting you by @mazephoenix #74: Going My Way by @fragile-teacup #55: A Face Like Yours by @hannibalsimago

Since everyone who fills a prompt can choose the next, our list is already different from the initial one, and it's worth repeating ／(=･ x ･=)＼

#1: B works at a bookstore and offers assistance to an embarrassed A, a customer carrying a large stack of self-help books.

#3: A walks into the kitchen, half-asleep, and mistakes B for her roommate. B knows the roommate and stayed overnight; makes breakfast for A. Need more details? Click on the post.

#22: A is having a quiet night at home – that is, until A’s apartment neighbour begins blasting music. Frustration levels rising, A goes to knock on the neighbour’s door to ask them to keep it down… at the same time B, the resident on the other side, is about to. Need more detail? Click on the post.

#27: B is sitting at a coffee shop, headphones in, attempting to write the next YA hit when A slides into the seat opposite B with a charming smile. B hesitantly takes off his or her headphones, and A says: “I just wanted to tell you that you’re the most beautiful person in this coffee shop.”

#32: A checks into a cozy inn while on a cross-country road trip, beyond tired and ready to collapse. When A gets to the assigned room, he or she is in for a surprise! Someone else, B, is already in the room. Uh-oh.

#50: A is at his/her cousin’s wedding. At the reception, A wanders over to B, a stranger, and in the spirit of the romance and happiness in the air, asks if they’re here for the groom or the bride. B’s answer is both simple and, ultimately, confusing: “Neither.”

#116: Although A normally goes to the cafe on Thursday evenings, A’s sibling had called in tears, and s/he had been forced to miss it. So instead A goes the next evening, sitting down at a table with a fresh cup of tea, and then abruptly realized that Friday night was Speed Dating night as B slides into the chair opposite and says, “They say you and I only have five minutes, but I can tell we’re going to need longer.”

#117: A is a professional assassin hired to take out a client’s cheating husband. But the client also spoke to B, a close friend, who has made it his/her’s own mission to also kill the husband. Unfortunately, both A and B have chosen the same night to do so, and it just so happens that B is a bit clumsy… and keeps getting in A’s way.

#143: A’s blind date just left, mumbling some sort of excuse about leaving the stove on. Confused and feeling rejected, A sits orders another beer at the bar, wondering where s/he went wrong. B, who had witnessed the situation, goes over and says sympathetically, “I think I know what went wrong… there’s something in your teeth.”

#162: A is interviewing potential roommates and is having very little luck. When it comes to B, A says, “I’m so sorry, I don’t think this is going to work. I can’t live with someone that I’d like to ask out.”

#166: A is at a coffee shop and sits down at a table, only to find a book on the chair. Intrigued, A starts flipping through it, and realizes it’s actually someone’s journal that had been left behind! And it’s fascinating. Unfortunately, B, the journal’s author, rushes back to retrieve it… and is horrified to see A reading it. But A, having gotten a feel for this person through his/her writing, asks if they want to go out sometime.

#176: A works at a pet store and is utterly surprised when B bursts through the door in a hurry and walks up to the cash without looking around. Out of breath, A says, “Please don’t ask why, but what do capybaras eat?”

#180: There has been a series of recent break-ins in A’s neighbourhood. B, a cop, knocks on A’s door to recommend safety measures and to ask if A has noticed anything peculiar — A hasn’t really seen anything, but invites the cop and his/her charming smile inside for coffee and a bit of false information so s/he might stay a while.

#186: A is walking through the park at night and notices B following close behind. With every step A is getting more and more paranoid until finally, as B goes to pass A, A swivels on his/her heel and punches B in the face! Turns out, B really was just trying to quicken his/her pace to make it home in time for the hockey game.

#207: A meets B and falls immediately for them, but B clearly doesn’t feel the same. After being rejected, A calls on Anteros, the avenger of unrequited love, to exact vengeance on B.

#210: A is a writer struggling to find inspiration for their next book. The publishers are breathing down their neck and the pressure is almost more than A can take. When A comes across an old Greek book in a thrift store, A brings it home and flips through the pages…. only to come across an old chant that was supposed to bring inspiration to those who read it out loud. A gives it a shot and… oh dear. Oh, oh dear. Somehow that summoned B, one of the Muses, to A’s living room.

#215: A is brought in to the police station for questioning about a crime they know nothing about and is put in an interrogation room… with B, who is another suspect in this particular case.

#239: A is sitting in a cafe trying to casually read their book, but is distracted by B’s loud phone conversation at the table over. B tells a joke over the phone, which makes A crack up unexpectedly – B looks over at A, annoyed that they were eavesdropping, but also appreciative that at least someone liked their joke! B hangs up and offers to tell A another.

#248: A is a barista and has come to recognize the regulars and their orders. One day, B walks in and A greets them, starting to prepare their order, when B stops A with a sigh: “I’m not who you think I am.” After receiving a blank stare from A who has no idea how to respond to that, B continues, “I have a twin. I’m the other one.”

#252: A is in the public library and notices a strange book that looks like it doesn’t belong in this section. A moves along to another genre, but it seems that this book is in every section… almost like it’s following A. How peculiar! When A finally picks it up to see what exactly it is, B appears out of thin air, and simply says, “I’ve been waiting fifty years for you.”

We welcome any type of media and any genre, from angst to smut to fluff to actual cute, and we're looking forward to receive any Hannibal or Hannibal Extended Universe themed works.

Anyone is welcome to participate, we'd be pleased both to receive a work from someone we pestered know or to encourage creativity in someone who's never participated before! (≧◡≦)

As always, we're grateful to @shikin83, @another-lost-one, @diemetzgermeisterin, @kio21557, @bonesandscales, @mazephoenix, @erodingthebluff, @hannibalsimago, @krey-9-jorce, @jadegreenworks, @h4nnibalism, @a-beautiful-day-to-be-arrested, @midwest-fannibals, @mowgliscode, @tigsmulii, @fragile-teacup, @cassraven, @alternativesky, @ache-for-him, @you-dropped-your-forgiveness, @killergamer97, @tinyenthusiasttriumph, @planetstarclaw and @cinelitchick for helping us spread the word. We wouldn't be able to reach anyone without your help! Thank you!

We're running this initiative on tumblr and on pillowfort, and the works are collected under this AO3 collection. Feel free to contact me or @cinnamaldeide for any doubt or question :)

We hope you see many of you next month... Happy meet-cuting!

Ps. We're still missing a fucked up story, and with the jfmu coming soon I'd like to express my intense desire to see such a thing ;)

#HannigrahamMeetCute2019 #hannibal #meet cute #fanfic #rec #mads is there because he's cute

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parrishes-writes · 4 years

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smutty alphabet: genevieve

Smutty alphabet for my main OC, Genevieve. @ocelotsflatass I had to do this because I was FILLED WITH A MIGHTY NEED

Answers under the cut!

A - Aftercare (what they’re like after sex) Depends on the kind of sex that was had. If it’s pretty... normal, for lack of a better word, she’ll probably just... rest or curl up next to you, or doze off lightly. If it’s... intense, she’ll clean you up, ask you what you need, and cuddle with you--she’ll bring you food, put on your favorite movie, show, read you your favorite book, whatever helps you decompress and unwind. If she’s the one who needs aftercare, it usually consists of cleaning her up, taking a nap with her, showering, and then some of her favorite food + something stupid to watch.

B - Body Part (their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner’s) Viv is, on the whole, very pretty, but her favorite body part of her own are her eyes. They’re highly expressive and a very dark blue, which makes them stand out, because she’s overall pretty fair-skinned.

As for her partner... it depends on the partner. Viv is bisexual and her preferences change depending on the person, so... for a woman, it’s primarily her face, but their whole body is appreciated, and Viv will make damn sure her female partner knows it. On a man, Viv likes good bone structure and height. Long hair and beards are not required, but are a definite bonus. Was into lumberjacks before they were cool.

C - Cum (anything to do with cum) Not a huge fan of men finishing on her face or chest, especially if they don’t clear it with her beforehand, but doesn’t really mind them finishing inside her (protection will be used) or in her mouth. For women, if you squirt, she’ll be a) impressed, and b) turned on. Unless your relationship is legitimately serious, if you’re a dude, condom stays on, no exceptions. Viv will 100% ask you about your STD history, even if it kills the mood.

As for Viv herself... she can squirt, but it’s rare, and it usually only happens when she’s purposefully being overstimulated.

D - Dirty Secret Viv has a few kinks that she’s a little embarrassed by, not because they’re gross, but because they kind of go against the image she presents to the world, and she feels like she’d have to turn in some of her feminist street cred.

E - Experienced (how experienced are they? do they know what they’re doing?) Viv has had multiple partners over the course of her sexual history, and she made it her business to learn from each one. Although she considers the concept of being “good” or “bad” in bed to be somewhat arbitrary, and not the point of sexual intimacy... she’s good in bed, and knows what she’s doing. She’s very receptive to you and your wants and needs--sex is one of the few places where she’s good at taking directions from another person.

F - Favorite Position Cowgirl, or any position where she’s on top, really. She can get a little iffy about missionary because it can quickly start to feel claustrophobic or smothering, but for the most part she just likes to be in charge, watching her partner as she rides them, uses her fingers...

Strangely enough, though, she actually quite likes getting it from behind, and it’s one of her deepest darkest secrets. There’s a part of her that likes to be at a... disadvantage, shall we say, but it does take a lot of trust for her to be able to get to this point with a partner. It’s also a position that feels good for her and hits all the right spots, but depending on the size of the dick/penetrating object, she might not prefer to start off this way.

G - Goofy (are they more serious in the moment, or are they humorous, etc.?)

Normally she’s pretty serious, because Viv only likes to play games when the right mood strikes her, and when that mood does hit it’s always to the... frustration... of her partner. It’s a sign of how far she’s progressed with a significant other that she can chuckle or laugh when they’re in the heat of the moment.

H - Hot Spots (a place that drives them crazy when touched) Her butt and her hips are particularly sensitive, as is her lower back. Using your nails to scrape ever-so-lightly down her ass is a surefire way to get her to shiver. Her neck is also a go-to area. Nipping it is a good way to get her hot and bothered.

I - Intimacy (how are they in the moment, romantically?) It depends on how emotionally intimate she is with the partner. Viv does not frequently engage in casual sex, but has done so in the past--those encounters were not what she would call romantic or intimate. Expect a lot of deep, slow kisses and lingering touches if she’s truly into you.

J - Jack Off (masturbation headcanon) Doesn’t have a problem with doing so while single, but isn’t necessarily inclined to masturbate if she’s in a relationship with someone... unless it’s on purpose. Then it’s a whole other story.

K - Kink (one or more of their kinks) She doesn’t like to go full dom/sub, but Viv is more than happy to either be in charge of you or, depending on the person, have you take charge of her--she does have a bit of a thing for being bossed around. If she really trusts you, she’d be willing to have you tie her up or blindfold her, and do the same to you.

Some of her other kinks are edging/orgasm delay, overstimulation, hair pulling, biting, holding her in one position/controlling her movements, a little bit of voyeurism and exhibitionism...

L - Location (favorite place to do the do) Genevieve isn’t picky. She’ll get it on with you wherever, as long as you’re not interrupted, because she does hate it when that happens. Viv will absolutely start riding you on the sofa, stretch out on the bed, or go along with you if you want to bend her over the kitchen table. She’s down.

M - Motivation (what turns them on, gets them going?) Letting you be you is usually enough for her, but watching you do something you’re good at or passionate about can get her up and running. Seeing you get really into something is a turn-on, especially if you’re kind of mad, or want to fight (somebody else, not her). For Viv herself, being stressed or anxious can make her instigate a sexual encounter--pounding the bad feelings out of her usually works for a bit.

N - No (something they won’t do, turn offs) Keep your excrement far, far away from her. She’s not a fan of rape fantasies or roleplays, and will not do them under any circumstances, even dubcon. Viv doesn’t like being hit during sex aside from maybe some light and/or brief spanking and, unless agreed upon prior, she will not consent to being hit with an implement. Lactation kinks are a hard no. Also, don’t ask her to do dd/lg stuff, because it’s gross. Professor/student, however, is on the table, so to speak.

General turn offs? Rudeness, derogatory language that is out of line or out of place for the situation, switching things up without asking or telling her. She’s usually pretty okay with most stuff a partner might ask, but don’t just flip her over and start calling her a whore, or talking about her holes (yuck), because it won’t fly. Try to at least be present with her, because she hates to feel like she’s just being fucked. Sex should involve mutuality.

O - Oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc) Viv will gladly give you oral, and will absolutely delight in making you delirious with pleasure, but she does have a slight preference for receiving oral from her partner.

It doesn’t mean that she won’t return the favor to the best of her considerable skill, but something about the sight of your head between her thighs, especially if she’s on her back, just makes her ache and melt. If you’re using your mouth to edge her or overstimulate her, you can bet she’s going to go off like a rocket when you finally let her come.

If she’s giving you oral, pull her hair close to the scalp. Don’t yank, but definitely tug it, run your fingers through it. She loves that. Run your finger over her lips. She loves that too.

P - Pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual?) She’ll do either; it depends on the round at hand. She can lean towards fast, though not necessarily rough, because she can get needy and impatient. Viv recognizes the perks of a measured pace, but it’ll be up to her partner to enforce it because Viv will just go for it, if she’s not making a deliberate point out of the slowness in order to tease her partner.

Q - Quickie (their opinion on quickies rather than proper sex, how often, etc) Not necessarily opposed, but she would prefer to be able to take her time. Quickies have their uses, but... overall, meh.

R - Risk (are they game to experiment? do they take risks, etc?) For Viv, the only risks that she won’t take are ones that could seriously jeopardize either her job or her sense of security--sex at work, for example, is not happening, even though the risk is what makes it fun. Certain roleplays are off limits because they make her nervous or she finds them gross, even if trust is a key component of them; they’re still not happening. She’s pretty open to try new things, but it takes a while to get to that point, because she has to really trust that a partner will respect her limits and boundaries.

S - Stamina (how many rounds can they go for? how long do they last?) Viv can go for quite a few rounds, but her stamina is that of a normal human’s compared to, say, Dante’s. She comes quickly, but also recovers quickly, which are the primary two reasons why edging and overstimulation are two of her kinks--forcing her to hold off an orgasm or forcing her to come three or four (or more) times in a row sort of equalizes things.

T - Toys (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or on themselves?) Overall she prefers to use her own body, but she does own toys because sometimes fingers and mouths can’t quite do it all, especially on a same-sex partner. She doesn’t own many, though, and the ones she does own are extremely discreet.

Viv would absolutely be willing to, and did, use toys on a partner. Her partner also used them on her--she has a preference for vibrators that can stimulate both the clit and the g-spot, and for ones where the partner can control the setting remotely. She’ll sometimes like a plug in her rear, but rarely.

U - Unfair (how much do they like to tease?) Oh god, she’s the worst. She loves it. She’ll tease you in ways you never even dreamed possible, both in the buildup and the foreplay and the acts themselves, and even when she’s giving you what you want she’s still teasing you. Viv is literally the worst when it comes to teasing, but give her a taste of her own medicine; she’ll love it. She’ll bitch, but she’ll love it.

V - Volume (how loud are they? what sounds do they make?) For the most part Viv is pretty quiet--Dante, for example, can turn it into a game where the goal is to get her to let loose and moan or scream or cry out with abandon. The quietness is mostly just out of habit, but some partners have taken it as a indicator that she wasn’t enjoying herself, which wasn’t the case at all.

Viv isn’t a big talker during sex, aside from curses and dirty talk, and doesn’t really like a lot of talking from her partners either--but if she’s really into you she won’t necessarily mind you telling her you love her, or something similar though. Don’t be sappy, though. Calling her “my love” is a surefire to piss her off.

W - Wild Card Viv is secretly a little embarrassed because some of her particular likes make her feel like she needs to turn in some of her feminist cred. She has a Type with men--long hair, beard, way larger than her (Dante, coincidentally, hits all those buttons), a bit older--and has a desire that she has consciously chosen not to articulate to be somewhat dominated by a man of said type. She’s bossy and likes to be in charge, but that doesn’t change the fact that she secretly kind of wants her male partner to be in control some of the time.

X - X-Ray (what’s going on underneath those clothes) A slender, rather petite frame, but still adequately curvy. Viv actively tries to keep herself in shape and exercises, even though just running around during the day tires her out; she makes it a point to eat well. She doesn’t have a huge chest, but chest size is relative to frame, and her boobs can stick out a bit. Her butt is also quite nice. She doesn’t have a huge ass, but it’s appropriately perky, and looks amazing in high-waisted jeans.

Viv’s a little insecure about her hips and thighs, because she thinks she has violin hips (she does, a little bit) and that she has thick thighs compared to the rest of her (not really, her inner thighs are just very soft). But overall she’s beautiful, and any insecurities are just that--insecurities. No one would ever look at her and think she has any reason to feel self-conscious.

Y - Yearning (how high is their sex drive?) Average to a bit higher than average--there are times during her cycle where she’s particularly prone to feeling horny, but sometimes she’s just Horny.

Z - Zzz (how quickly do they fall asleep afterwards?) Depends on how intense the sex was and how many times she came. The more intense and/or the more orgasms, the more likely she is to fall asleep, but it isn’t unheard of for her to take a quick nap after milder or softer activities. She’ll also sleep if you sleep--sex is a good way to get her to fall asleep, actually. Viv has insomnia? Go down on her.

#oc: genevieve #text: genevieve

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iluvsexyvoltageguys · 5 years

Text

One Bed and a Demon

Fandom: 10 Days With My Devil (Love 365)

Pairing: Satoru Kamagari x Reader

"You look good enough to eat, ____. All spread out just for me.” Satoru smirks down at me.

Blindfolded on the bed, I give a soft sigh and wiggle, testing the soft ropes that bind my wrists to the headboard. I lay deceptively languid upon the silk sheets.

"Patience, ____," soothes Satoru, his large palm ghosting over my naked body from navel to breast. He pinches a nipple and my hums of approval sharpen suddenly into a shocked gasp. I arch my body and he watches with fascination.

"Satoru," I say, and he smirks to himself at the rough edge to my voice.

"Tell me what you need, ____," demands the demon, as his fingers unbutton his shirt, moving with quick, practiced ease to toss the shirt away.

"You, please!" I gasp, writhing on the bed, and Satoru chuckles.

"Do better."

A low whine escapes me, and I chew my bottom lip in thought. While I contemplate, Satoru continues to undress, taking the time now and then to move his hands across my nude form to remind me where he is. The mattress dips and creaks when he leans on it, leans over me, his mouth descending onto a nipple, teasing the little bud with tongue and teeth and I cry out — a beautiful mix of pleasure and pain to my voice.

Distracted, I cannot answer his question. I whine as his lithe fingers tap their way down my torso. Truth be told, he’s far too gone himself to play our usual games. He’s already painfully hard, and each noise he pulls from my throat makes his cock twitch against my belly. When I arch, my breasts brush against his bare chest, sending shivers rippling through us both.

"Yes, there," I gasp breathlessly, when his fingers find my slick sex and immediately set to work, teasing and rubbing until my hips buck off the mattress.

Bracing his weight on one forearm, Satoru watches me as I writhe beneath his talented fingers. When he pushes a finger inside my hot core, I moan loudly— a sinfully delighted sound that has him growling in response. Another finger joins the first, and there’s an exquisite ache as he stretches me.

"What do you want, _____?" growls the demon through clenched teeth, and he curls his fingers upward.

I can barely speak past the noises I make. Crying out, I arch again, grinding my hips desperately against his hand. But when he receives no response, his hands withdraws. It takes all his considerable willpower, especially since my hips follow his hand weakly, and my desperate moans turn into pitiful whines.

"Answer me," demands Satoru, bringing his slick fingers to my lips and loosing a pleased growl when I suck them eagerly into my mouth. My teeth scrape against the pad of each digit, licking them clean and tasting myself on them.

"Please," I whimper, when he pulls his hand away and instead slides his massive palm down the length of my body. "Please, I need… Fuck me, Satoru, please.”

Suddenly, his weight and presence at my side is gone. Shivering, I wait, wondering what comes next… Something nudges apart my knees, and wide, his palms press into my inner thighs. When his chin grazes against my sensitive skin, I hum out my approval. When his warm mouth connects with my waiting heat, I cry out, pulling against the rope that binds me.

With the intensity of a man possessed, Satoru works me to a frenzy, using his tongue and teeth and lips in equal measure. He brings me to the very cusp of pleasure, and when I writhe and gasp out his name, he withdraws.

"You ass!" I cry out, kicking my feet in an unmistakable tantrum, and my lover only chuckles.

"Whoa, easy, _____,” he says, his voice suddenly very close to my ear, and his large hand presses on my hips to still me. “You know I’ll take care of you,” rumbles the demon, and I whine softly, frustration breaking through my voice. His hand slides from my hip to my breast, kneading the soft flesh until I moan again, submissive and compliant once more.

“Please —" I whisper hoarsely, and his mouth swallows the rest of my plea. Lips against lips, he kisses me with surprising tenderness, maneuvering my thighs around his hips as he bears down upon me. My hips rise to meet his, desperate for that sweet friction to build even higher.

"Damn, you’re gorgeous," growls Satoru in my ear. Roughly, he grinds against me, his hard cock pressed heavily against my belly, and I whimper his name. "See what you do to me, _____?"

"Yes, please, I need —”

"Hush," commands the demon, and with a whine, I fall silent. Sitting back a little, Satoru takes his leaking cock in hand and positions it, the head slipping against my slickness. My hands strain against the ropes as he slowly pushes forward, groaning loudly at the sensation of me enveloping him. Inch by wonderful inch, he fills me, until he is hilted fully. Shit, he won’t last long.

"Fuck," he grunts, lowering himself until our bodies are flush, and each shuddering breath from me presses my breasts to his chest. One hand on my hips, the other fisting in the bedsheets, he begins moving. A languid rhythm builds — slow, shallow thrusts that have me pleading for more.

"What’s that?" says the demon, smirking against my neck as I beg for more, "I can’t hear you.”

"Harder, please!"

A grin blossoms in full force across his face. Oh, this is something he can definitely do. With a carnal growl, his pace increases, until the sound of my panting gasps and the slap of flesh against flesh fills our ears and echoing off the walls of our bedroom. The edge, sharp and vivid in the distance, is rapidly approaching once more, and I barely manage to moan out the arrival of my orgasm before pleasure crests and I wordlessly cry out.

With a final, rough snarl, Satoru’s own release chases after mine, and a few more shallow, erratic thrusts finishes us both off. Jaw muscle twitching, Satoru grunts out a string of praise in my ear, and breathes out a heavy sigh as he stills. There’s a fine sheen of sweat coating both our bodies, rapidly cooling in the night air wafting through the ajar window.

"Mm," I moan appreciatively, flexing my fingers as he slips out of me and pulls the blindfold down to my neck. As always, there’s a tenderness to his actions that surprises me. When my arms are finally free, he brings them to his lips and presses gentle kisses to the soft skin of my wrists.

"Good?"

"Always," I respond with a smile.

10DWMD Masterlist

#10 days with my devil smut #10dwmd smut #satoru kamagari smut #voltage inc smut #voltage inc fanfiction #10 days with my devil #10dwmd #satoru kamagari

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peacefulwriter88 · 5 years

Text

One That Got Away - Chapter 4

Chapter 4: Proceed With Caution

Universe: Marvel Canon

Rating: M for Mature (Language, Sexual tones eventual)

Previous Chapter

“Is that her?”

Bucky’s voice is calm but there’s a tinge of eagerness behind each word as he looks from your moving form back to Steve. Steve gives a slight nod, his eyes unmoving from watching you as you cross the room, make it to the bar.

“Then ask her out for drinks! My god – she’s perfect for you.”

“Bucky,” Steve flickers his eyes over to his longtime friend, who is watching him with amusement.

“No.”

“What? Why!?”

Steve stays in silence and Bucky sighs, crossing his arms. Knowing that if Steve wasn’t going to open up about it he’d get nowhere fast and quite frankly he was too tired to fight with his former 5’3 friend; it had been a long week.

“Because he’s afraid she’ll say no.” Sam chimes in and the idea causes Bucky to roll his eyes.

“Are you kidding me?”

“Let it go Bucky…” Steve sighs, his eyes flashing over to where you stood at the bar. It doesn’t take long before you’re flanked by Ellie and another man, both curious to know where you had gone.

He tries to focus on something else, the conversations others are having about the art, but it’s hard not to eavesdrop when his body was trained to pick up something dropping for miles off and while he feels intrusive dropping into your conversation, he knows that it can’t be helped. Just like Bucky equally can pick up on the words that carry over the large sound of the room.

“Aria,” Ellie’s voice is light and giggly, clinging on to her friend as she places her empty glass down on the bar, “Where have you been? Nel’s been quizzing me and you know I don’t care for this art crap. Let’s go home, or get some drinks in a sketchy bar and play a game.”

“That’s fine.” Ariadne’s voice doesn’t fluctuate as Nel gasps.

“Oh that’s it. You’re not going to address where you’ve been gone for half an hour after you walked off with that handsome piece of chocolate and probably found the world’s next best portrait.”

You give a deep sigh, looking over at him. Unamused.

“You’re the art curator. I’m just here for the free drinks and moral support.”

Nel narrows his eyes.

“Then support me. Who’s Mr. Chocolate man and where did you go?”

Ellie looks up from where she’s resting alongside Ariadne’s bosom, her eyes caging her as she wraps an arm around her body.

“You went off with a man and didn’t even tell me?”

There’s sadness tinged in her drunken voice, though she’s amused and Ariadne’s sighs, rubbing her back. It was interesting to see your maternal instincts kick, strong despite the sassiness you exuded earlier,

“It wasn’t like that.” You assure her.

“Then what was it like?” Nel and Ellie chime in together and he sees how you stiffen, can see the way you play with the empty glass in your hand. You shrug, pulling out the remaining olive and biting into it before nodding over to his and Bucky’s direction,

“See for yourself.”

Ellie and Nel work effortless together, heads swinging back before Ellie’s gasps and Nel giggles, both turning to you,

“You have to invite him out for drinks!”

Everyone waits for your response, Steve and Bucky included as you finish your olive, keep your eyes trained on the window that allows you a glimmer of the cold, rainy evening. Seconds later, olive freshly swallowed you keep silent, eyes trained on the outside.

The silence saying it all.

“See,” Steve doesn’t want the pain and disappointment to show. “Not. Interested.”

He turns back to the photo, back to Sam who turns to him.

“So you asking her out for drinks?”

He can see Bucky’s hand twitch, knows that the super soldier wants to hit him against his head but decides against it for a second. Not because he decides in that moment to be a good person, to take a second to reflect and understand why Sam was restating the obvious for Steve to live through again. Not because knows the action in of itself will frustrate Steve. It’s because the sound of your shoes clicking against marble drives his attention. You’ve ignored your friends as they yell out to you, ignore Bucky as you eloquently move past his questioning eyes as you clear your throat, gaining the attention of Steve and Sam.

“So eager for seconds?” Bucky teases, though his eyes are gleaming with amusement like they were before. You nearly choke on your laughter, rolling your eyes as you return them to Steve’s. It’s the intensity of the stare that causes you to falter, to cause you to bite down on your lips and Steve frowns, instinctively placing his hands in his pockets.

Trying to relax his nerves.

Lips shouldn’t be as succulent as yours.

“Steve,” your voice is sure and collected, feels different against his ears, “Would you like to join me and my friends for drinks?”

There’s a slight moment of silence, he can hear how fast your heart is beating, your fingers falling on top of the other as you fidget with them.

“You can even bring your friends. Even you’re rude ones.” Your eyes flicker over to Bucky who guffaws and you give a subtle wink before your irises are bearing back into his own. There confident, cool, collected – measuring him and he wonders if they’d look that collected with his cock ramming into you.

The idea shakes him, the knowledge of having the pleasure of your mind and body if just for a night, so he smiles as he responds,

“I’d love to. I’ll just tell the art gallery owner I’m heading out and can meet you at the entrance?”

“Perfect.”

You smile at him, not the sweet one he’s become accustomed to but something more seductive, teasing as you turn on your heels and return to your friends.

“You are in trooooubbblleee,” Bucky sings lowly and Sam laughs, slapping the back of Steve as Bucky continues. “I don’t know if you can handle all that Steve but I’m willing to risk the rest of my evening to see.”

“When do you jump into being third wheel?” Sam guffaws and Bucky shrugs, his eyes flickering back to the group.

“Oh, I have my reasons.”

By the time Steve joins Sam and Bucky outside, they’ve been left alone at the side of the curb and for a second Steve thinks that he’s been played, that you’ve been pulling his finger all night and he was left being the joke. Instead Sam looks up, a smile on his face as he says,

“Ariadne just texted me the bar. It’s a few blocks from here but easy ground to cover by foot.”

Steve furrows his eyes as he zips up his blue bomber jacket, getting in stride with Bucky as they follow Sam.

“Ariadne texted you? You have her number?”

Sam snickers, looking over at him as Bucky groans.

“Steve, really? You’re going to get jealous over Sam? Sam? Of the two of us he’s the least competition.”

“Hey!” Sam says though he chuckles and nods his head, “Though he’s right. Ariadne is far from my type and I’m sure I’m far from hers.”

Bucky chuckles, shaking his head,

“I don’t know Sam. I’m sure she thinks you’re handsome. It’s just your sexual preferences that might throw her off.”

The two jump into mild banter as Steve falls back into his mind. He knows that Sam isn’t a threat – that he wouldn’t purposely try to swoon you even if he was straight. He also knows that the banter he had observed between the two of them had been light and playful, falling more on the scale of brotherly and sisterly then romantic. You just made him second guess things. Kept preoccupying his mind, taking over his instincts.

It was regret. Bucky had laid it out simply when he had walked into Steve’s studio, seeing the same image of the same woman over and over again. Sam had filled in the little details he had already picked up and immediately berated Steve.

Of course he was curious. She was a mystery to Steve. Hadn’t fulfilled his itch of either being someone he wanted to know or someone he wanted to fuck. Either way, Steve was going to continue down this pathetic road of obsession until someone new distracted his mind or he ran into you again.

Steve knew that he was then, in the most limited of words, fucked. Women normally didn’t capture his attention. Not anymore – not like that. Sure, sometimes he had physical needs and those needs called for him to sometimes go out and connect with a woman. But it was purely just that – physical. He didn’t want to be emotionally invested, didn’t want the baggage of a relationship. He had explored that once in this decade with Sharon and that had turned out great. He was still convinced he had a scar from where she damn near almost shot him in the head. Of course, he could have chosen to break up with her in private, not while they were on mission trying to take down a group of Soviet terrorists.

Either way, he didn’t understand what was happening to him – couldn’t pinpoint why you were haunting his mind. Sure you were attractive. He liked the curve to your hips, your plump ass, the way your cleavage accentuated your breasts. You had plenty of features that he looked for in a woman. There was something more. You intrigued him, kept him on his toes, wasn’t afraid to push back. To see him.

He liked that in a woman.

Sam directs them to a bar eight wet blocks later, and they follow him down the dark set of stairs before walking through a worn red door.

The other side – like all things in New York – was different and came to be a surprise. Sure it was one of those kind of bars where you have low conversations and good laughs and the drinks are strong and the food is subpar but jazz played in the space, high and sultry as stale cigarette smoke lingered in the air. It had the kind of speakeasy vibe that was hard to truly replicate in this century and Steve likes it already, likes that you can get caught in the smoky darkness. Likes it more that it’s a place you’ve picked out.

“Not what I expected.” Bucky says, looking over at Steve who’s looking for you. He finds you easily, the shawl you’ve been wearing across your shoulders now hanging off the back of the large booth you’re in as you lean over the table with Nel and Ellie, looking at the cards in her hand. There’s a few waters in front of you as you sip yours slowly, laughing along with your friends. It’s the most relaxed he’s seen you, he likes you like this, unguarded and he’s not quick enough to look away when you look up at the door, catching the three of them awkwardly standing there and waving them over.

“If you don’t ask for her fucking number Steve I swear, I swear to you, I will kick your ass during tomorrow morning's training.”

Steve chuckles as he flickers his eyes over at Sam who’s eyeing him down.

“Understood.”

“Okay dad.” Bucky chuckles, breaking up the tension though he nods, “Though I might hold you down while he punches if you don’t. I mean it Steve-O, you fight aliens…you can handle one dame that’s into you.”

Steve returns his attention back to you as you all move in the booth, adjusting yourself so they can sit down. You’re sandwiched between Ellie and Nel, dead set in the middle and Sam makes a move to slide in beside Nel – Bucky beside Ellie. He’s left with grabbing a chair and sitting across from you, able to get a full look at the low dip in your top, the way your cleavage teases his eyes as you pull your hair up in a bun.

“You boys are just in time to buy us a drink.”

Your voice is light and flirty and though you address them, you’re looking directly at him. You’re mood has shifted a bit, holds a bit more confidence though you flicker away from his gaze after a few seconds as you look over at Bucky.

“Bucky you could buy Ellie’s drink on my behalf. You know, for being so rude to me earlier.”

Bucky shoots you a sly smile, eyes flickering over to your smaller friend who is just shades red, already under the influence of his friend. Not like Bucky can notice. He’s too busy looking at everything but, responding back to you,

“You’re a demanding one. But if it means I can get you’re beautiful friend a drink….why not?”

“Oh boy……” Ellie’s voice is low as she grabs her water, taking a long sip as you move to signal the waitress.

“In the meantime,” Nel says, eyeing the four of them. “I’m Nel. Dearest friend of Ellie and Ariadne and fellow curator at a nice little art museum downtown otherwise known as The Met. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that my beautiful friend Ariadne tells me you’re quite the artist Captain.”

Your hands are quick as you jab his arm, causing Nel to furrow his eyebrows together and mutter, “Ow” under his breath.

“Did she?” Steve’s eyes flicker back to you as you shrug, keeping your eyes trained on the waiter.

“Don’t be surprised Steve,” a moment where your eyes flicker back to him. “You heard my thoughts on your painting, I can’t deny that. It really is good…..I enjoy it. I think others would too.”

Steve eyes don’t deviate from you as Nel says,

“Ariadne has quite the little eye and I trust when she’s impressed by a piece. Takes a whole lot to impress her.”

Another quick slap by you, but it doesn’t dissuade Nel.

“So how about it. Can I buy your little masterpiece to display in my gallery?”

Steve shifts, his eyes flickering back to you as you give a relieved smile. He focuses on the waitress’s feet bringing her over, the sound of Ella Fitzgerald over the loudspeaker, the way you move your hand around your water glass. Nel’s waiting for an answer as Sam watches in amusement and you do everything but make eye contact with him.

“I’ll think about it.” He finally says, looking over at Nel. “I don’t normally care to get my stuff out in the public ….you know I like displaying them in places they’ll be forgotten. But I’m sure the right person could persuade me.”

You falter in your movement, hooded eyes looking up at him as he turns right on cue as the waiter asks,

“Ladies and gentleman you have company tonight. Handsome company,” she winks at Sam before asking, “What can I get you?”

You all order with ease, the waitress easily taking your orders and leaving before Nel wraps an arm around you and smiles,

“Well Ariadne – work your magic,” his eyes flicker back to Steve. “I don’t know by what means you wish to be persuaded, but my dearest friend does have a talented way with that tongue of hers I’ve been told.”

You jab your elbow into his rib cage, hitting him hard between bone and muscle as you say,

“Actually, I thought it’d be fun if we let Ellie do a tarot card reading.”

“Fucking hell….” Nel groans as he bends over and rests his head on the table, Ellie breaking her eye contact from the Bucky as she stammers out,

“What?”

“You bought your tarot cards,” you say, taking another long sip with your straw. He hated that Nel had brought attention to your mouth, he can’t help but be distracted by the way it envelops the plastic device, your tongue moving the straw up and down as you delicately sip up water.

Oh boy.

You might ruin him for 100 years more.

“Sure.” He says, returning his eyes back to your own. “Sounds like fun.”

The cards don’t last long. Ellie starts off with Bucky, upon your insistence and they get caught up in a slow back and forth. This causes Sam to steal Nel’s attention, babying the man’s aching ribs as they dive into conversation. It leaves him staring across at you as you drum your fingers against the table, your chin cupped in your hand.

“You promised a tarot reading.” He finally says and it causes you to laugh and shrug as you point over at Ellie and Bucky, who have moved on from the cards entirely and were deep into whatever topic they were on.

“Blame her.”

He laughs and nods, wishing he was closer to you. Jealous of his colleagues advantages.

“I would but I don’t want to get on your bad side.”

You smile, your eyes teasing as you slowly start to grab the cards from the ruffled deck Ellie has spread out in front of her, not driving any attention to yourself.

“Well….we’re stuck in the middle of two intense conversations and my martini is starting to flow out of my veins so I’ll uphold this promise and see what the cards read for you Mr. Rogers.”

You shuffle them in your hand, biting your bottom lip again and he wonders if it’s a nervous tick or something you do when you’re concentrating on something.

“I’m not as good as Ellie.” you say, flashing your eyes back up to him and he smiles at you gently, shifting his drink a bit so he can lean over to the table. Closer to you. He can capture your perfume you again, soft vanilla that emits off the pulse point of your neck and he chokes down the groan that wants to escape out of him.

He’d love to taste that smell.

“I doubt that. You are very impressive.”

You flicker your eyes back up at him,

“You have a bad habit of thinking you know people. How do you know how impressive I am?”

He shrugs, leaning into the table more. Wanting to get closer to you,

“What do you know about tarot cards?”

You look up at him carefully, your hands never moving from the shuffling movement,

“Not a lot……Ellie’s uses them because her grandmother uses them and so on and so forth. I looked into it and while it was originally used to play trionfi, an older Roman game, it was much later that they used it to how we use it today….” You look up at him as he gives you a short smile and you roll your eyes, reaching over the table to playfully push his shoulders. He likes the movement that you’ve relaxed enough to kid with him.

“Okay wise guy I’m a journalist – I research things all the time. It’s my job. I like to learn and understand the things that I participate in. Sue me.”

“It wasn’t meant to offend.” He says softly and you look up at him, your eyes softer.

“I know,” you both pause, staring at each other and he wonders if you would mind if he could spend the next few hours, days, months….years allowing him to stare into your eyes. “So…..what I’m going to do….I think…is find my inner energy.”

He watches as you knock on the cards, giving a deep breath before you spread it in front of him. You furrow your eyebrows before raising both and look up at him,

“Okay, what Ellie always tells us is that we choose the cards we are drawn to.”

“Is there a certain amount?”

You think about it before shrugging,

“No. Sometimes I want to pull one. Sometimes seven. Just depends on my mood that day. What the universe is calling to my spirit.”

He raises an eyebrow and you laugh, taking a sip of your martini.

“What!? C’mon – choose your cards.”

He chuckles, his hand dancing across the deck until he pulls one. You look over at it and smile,

“Great I know this one! Swords…hmmmm I know this has to do with power and courage and ambition which makes sense as you are Captain America.”

He nods, his fingers grazing another and flipping it over,

“Ok…..I feel like Nel gets this one a lot,” you bite your tongue and he notes that it’s a concentrating tick that you default too. He likes its. “The high priestess. It means you’re in touch with your feminine side,” you wiggle your eyebrows and he laughs, “really, this is reversed so it means that you might be shielding yourself from it. Disconnected, secretive. Denying yourself something. Ring any bells?”

He furrows his eyes looking at, thinking to himself and you laugh, pushing him lightly. The movement causes him to watch your hand as it falls on his shoulder, the way it lingers there before he looks over at you,

“I actually see what it means. Steve Rogers needs to stop taking himself so seriously.”

Your voice is mocking, teasing and he shakes his head, moving into you. Liking that your opening up.

“Ok…..one more,” he grabs a card and you look down, nodding your head trying to read it.

“The cups….ummm….I think this is….”

You’re leaning in closer, scrutinizing it and he was sure that if minds moved like a clock, ticking endlessly he could hear yours as your martini sloshed in its glass. Your close enough he can feel your hair tickle his forehead, has a vantage view down your shirt and he turns to look away in time to see Ellie’s eyes widen. He thinks that it’s her realizing that maybe he did happen to glimmer a bit of your breast before deciding to look away and he can feel his face heat up in shame as she says,

“Ooo Steve, the two of cups! That’s special,” she moves away from Bucky, much to his displeasure as she looks over his deck. “hmmm you’re complicated Steve Rogers. You’re hiding a lot but also…I think there might be a bit of hope for you. And you obviously want to invite light into your darkness. Two cups represent the flow of love between two people……or to put it frankly, the blossoming of a new relationship. Which feels appropriate considering…”

Her eyes flash between the both of you, a large grin on her face as you and Steve eye each other. From this angle he can see how your dimples dig into your face, as your eyes flicker downward, playing with your glass.

“I need to go to the bathroom!” You say suddenly, placing it down and pushing at Ellie who furrows her eye together.

“We both do…..we need to go to the bathroom. We’ll be back.”

The look on your face is different and he’s worried he’s offended you, that you had genuinely only invited him as a friend as you bully Bucky to ease out of the booth, pushing Ellie out as you glide out, grabbing her hand and moving through the crowd.

“…..you couldn’t figure out how to charm her for another ten minutes. Ten minutes and I could’ve gotten Ellie’s number.”

Bucky’s voice is annoyed, irritable and Steve sighs, placing his head in his hands.

“I didn’t do anything but draw some stupid cards! Ellie was the one who exposed me!”

“Don’t blame Ellie because you couldn’t follow up afterwards and come up with some cheesy fucking line.” Bucky crosses his arms, taking a seat looking over at Sam and Nel who are watching in amusement.

“I wouldn’t be so hard on yourself Steve. Ariadne never reads anyone’s cards….she wouldn’t even do Ellie’s and mine for a long time and she was more than willing to jump into yours. Alcohol or no…I think she’s just freaked out more that you…..pull out a different side of her.” Nel finally says and Steve looks over at him,

“You think?”

Nel shrugs,

“Maybe….or maybe not. Who knows, I’m drinking gin and sometimes I say shit that doesn’t make sense when I have gin in my system.”

Sam laughs, causing Steve to groan and Bucky to roll his eyes,

“I’m kicking your ass tomorrow anyways. For ruining my chances of getting a number.”

Steve doesn’t say anything but sits back in his chair, drumming his fingers on the table. Part of him wanted to escape, to get up and leave and forget this exchange has ever happened. But he already knows that the moment he leaves, that the moment that he walks out of the theater his mind will already flash to this moment. To what your face might look like upon realizing that he’s left, abandoned you and he wondered if disappointment would etch your features or relief.

That kind of possibility, that little floating idea of what if, that was something that would hurt Steve more than the actual knowledge of knowing if you reject him.

He doesn’t have a chance to second guess himself, again, because just as soon as you and Ellie have left you’ve returned.

“Ok, well I drank too much and I have a long day and I gotta work tomorrow so I’m going to head home.”

You say it all as one sentence, breathy and heady as you flash your eyes over at Steve before returning them to the group. Nel furrows his eyebrows, disappointment dripping in his voice as he says,

“Noooooo”

“Really drama king,” you say, grabbing your shawl as you wrap it around you. “Stay. Drink. Really, don’t stop on my behalf.”

Ellie’s biting her lip, her eyes flashing between you and Bucky before she sighs and nods,

“Are you sure. I could leave….” She looks over at Bucky one last time and you give her shoulder a squeeze before saying with a smile,

“Stay El. I’ll see you at home. Have fun – it’s been a long week. You deserve it.”

Nel sighs as he grabs your purse, throwing the tarot cards inside before grabbing your phone and handing them back to you before looking at Steve. He knows what those dark irises are saying. Take the opportunity idiot and walk her home. It’s what he was thinking of course, he wasn’t going to let you walk home alone, but there seems to be something more attached.

“I can take you home.”

Steve’s voice echoes among the table as you pause, your hand freezing from placing the phone in your bag before you say.

“Ok.”

It’s colder when you both step out into the Harlem air, and you instinctively tighten the shawl around you, the light material doing nothing for the shiver that spreads across your arms.

“Here,” Steve says, taking off his jacket. “Take this.”

You’re already shaking your head,

“It’s cold Steve and I was the fool that didn’t bring a heavier jacket.”

He smiles, pushing the last sleeve off before he’s placing it over your shoulders, his arms brushing against your own,

“I’m a super soldier. My blood tends to run warm, whether I care for it or not. I insist you take it. Besides,” he stuffs his hands into his pockets, “I’m trying to be a gentleman. Don’t ruin it for me.”

You laugh but nod, burrowing yourself into it more much to his pleasure.

“Well you don’t have to take me all the way home. It’s not too late to take the subway and I’ll be fine.”

Steve furrows his eyebrows together, looking down at you,

“I’m not going to let you take a subway, after the sun has set, alone from Harlem to Queens.”

You scoff and look at him,

“Okay Captain America. I’m a big girl. I’ve done it plenty of times and will do it plenty of times after. I survived then and I will probably continue to.”

He can’t help his jaw from setting, the way his hands dig deeper into his pockets as he follows you silently down the few blocks to the subway. He doesn’t notice the speculative way you watch him as his mind digs deeper into itself, curious to understand what would make any woman brave or stupid enough to take the subway so late from one part of the city to the other.

“Listen you can silently pout or whatever but I don’t get the luxury like most women to have men like you offer to walk me home every time I go out. And listen I’m smart and safe. I carry a taser and mace and don’t make eye contact and go to kickboxing twice a week. You don’t need to….eternally beat yourself up for it.”

It’s your voice that cuts off his thinking, watching you scurry down the subway stairs with ease.

You. You were the kind of woman who would jump into danger without a second thought.

“I’m not pouting,” he says after you, catching up with you with ease as you walk to the turn stalls, “I’m trying to understand the kind of woman who would be stupid enough to invite danger into her world.”

He can’t ignore the offended way you scoff at him, before playfully pushing into him,

“Says the man who was always starting a fight. I’ve read your biography at the Smithsonian. You were always the one starting something before you got all that super juice pumped in you. And now you’re even more stupid because you’re damn near invincible. Who willing goes to fight aliens, ALIENS, without thinking twice? Good of humanity or not, there should be some second thought that runs through that handsome noggin of yours. But nope, not what I’ve heard from people. You just jump in, feet first, consequences be damned, your life be damned for the sake of good. So don’t sass me about stupid choices Captain Rogers.”

You swipe your card, walking through and he furrows his eyebrows, grabbing his card and doing the same. You raise an eyebrow and you shrug,

“…..though you gain some points for carrying a metro card.”

He laugh as he walks beside you again, slowly before you both make it to the train platform. The E was behind, he could tell by the restlessness stirring in the air with the few people waiting for it so he returns his attention back to you,

“Sometimes you gotta jump in. Because if you don’t, people get killed. People who can’t’ defend themselves from things that most humans wouldn’t have to see. From things that you only read about. And if I have the power to change it…why not?”

“Because,” you sigh, looking over at him. “It’s reckless. Reckless.”

He looks at you pointedly, before looking around the subway.

“Riding the subway at this hour….damn near midnight by yourself with god know what perverts doesn’t feel reckless to you as a single woman?”

You sigh as you dig your hands into his jacket pockets, pulling it closer to you,

“What do you want me to say? That sure I’m a journalist, a really good one I'd argue but I still gotta have a roommate because real estate prices in this city are goddamn ridiculous and sometimes you have to sacrifice safety for groceries and paying the light bill and so you do stupid reckless things in exchange for livelihood and pray for the best? Because being a brave badass just sounds better in my book.”

Your voice is low as you look down the large passage to where the train should be, he can feel the shame in each word, the embarrassment and he realizes that he subconsciously hit a nerve. You’ve got your guard up again, he can feel the walls being built and he walks toward you, cupping your face and tilting it toward him.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you feel…..I shouldn’t have pried you’re right. I know it may not seem like it, but I wasn’t always this….you know Captain America who was friends to one of the richest men on the planet. I get it….I get doing things in order to be able to survive. But the thought of you making this kind of commute, alone….it tears at my core. Because you deserve safety every day of your life.”

Perhaps it’s the hour, the tension that’s been building up for hours that lends way to this honesty. He feels embarrassed immediately after, like it was too personable to say to you in the first place, that he should have respected your distance. But he also didn’t like the idea of knowing that you were okay with risking your life in order to get by.

You were worth far more than that.

Time stops again, the both of you looking at the other before the train speeds away, causing a huge gust of piss smelling warm wind to also fly by along with the sound of metal on metal as it screeches to a stop. You both scrunch your noses, before you blink and pull away from him, moving to find a seat inside the metal compartment. The first part of the ride is spent in silence as he sits near you, wrapping his arms around your shoulders as he side eyes the patrons on the car. When you both switch to the D line, you’ve both relaxed a bit and end up laughing about the wildest things you’ve seen in a subway, talking about the first time you commuted alone in the big city, Steve talking through what it felt like to walk through it now.

He almost forgets that he’s taking you home before he finds himself walking beside you down a quiet block, old houses peppering the long, narrow street.

“I miss streets like these.” He says quietly, his hands back in his pockets. You’ve hooked your right arm in his left, he doesn’t know when but he likes knowing how near you are, that you’ve found safety in him.

“They’re still here. They just look a lot differently.”

“Yea,” his voice is quiet as he sighs, “It’s just not the same. Doesn’t capture that spirit of family unity. Different people who all have different paths that are just trying to make it. Building community. Now it's Starbucks and ballet workout studios and those hipster guys with their vegan restaurants. Cheap homes built after cheap homes sandwiched between the two.”

You laugh, the sound resonates in the air and pierces into the faint sound of the city as you nod,

“Yea…this decade kinda bites.”

You’re both silent as you finally pull him off course, toward a small family home. The grass is green in the small lawn you direct him to despite it being autumn and there’s a large maple tree that’s littered its leaves on top of the greenery. The driveway holds an old car, a Chevy though he can’t make out the year in the dim lighting and the porch light is on though the rest of the house sleeps in darkness. The weathered mat on the top of the stairs reads, “Oh Shit Not You Again” and there’s a Halloween wreath on the door.

It’s clean and organized and looks like the kind of place Ellie and you would live in.

“This is me,” you say as you hesitantly pull from his embrace, move up the few stairs to the small patio. He stands at the bottom, watching you as you turn, fidgeting with your keys, “Thanks for walking me home. I know sometimes I put on a big flare of being a big girl but…it was nice feeling safe getting home for once.”

He nods, watching you carefully. This was the part where he’d normally say something classic and cheesy, sweet enough to convince the woman to let him in. And god does he want you to invite him in. The porch light is hitting you perfectly, shadows hitting all the best features of your face as your eyes glisten down at him, innocent and nervousness intertwined in one. Those lips are so plump from your constant biting, all he wants to do is taste you. But he knows if he allows it, that he caves into his desires he’d lose something more important from you. He wants more than just a night with you. He wants the possibility of all the nights with you.

That realization causes him to sigh to himself, to keep his hands in his pockets as he responds lamely instead,

“It was nothing. Wouldn’t be Captain America if I didn’t walk a beautiful lady home.”

You smile at him, one that’s all teeth and tugs your right dimple to dig deep into your cheek as you nod,

“Okay well then…..good night.”

He’s sure that you’ve both froze time staring at each other tonight, trying to get a read, to make a move and it’s you that finally mutters,

“Fuck it all.”

He has fast instincts, his body typically can react to movement without a beat but when you press your lips on his cheeks, cold and chapped from the wind hitting them he freezes for just the smallest seconds. It takes his mind a minute to register before his hands find your hips and you pull away, your hands skimming across the broadness of his shoulders and he feels his breath hitch.

Fuck you were trouble.

And he knows if he doesn’t do something, he’ll regret it.

He’s lived in regret too much to have to live it in again.

“You wouldn’t mind if I asked you for your number, would you?”

He hates how weak the question comes out, that his voice is shaky and uncertain and he thinks you’re going to say no.

But then you smile and nod, your voice low as you ask,

“Yes, of course. Let me see your phone.”

He furrows his eyes together and you chuckle and laugh, nodding.

“Right. You probably don’t carry a smart phone with you…..or any phone?”

Your voice is uncertain as he shrugs, laughing as he takes one of his hands away from your hips and throwing it behind his neck,

“Sam and Bucky and Tony keep badgering me about it but…..my flip phone does its job. I can put it in there. When I get back to the tower….”

Now he understood why this could be embarrassing for this type of situation. All those years from Tony’s badgering and finally it clicks. Great.

“You’re right, you can,” you say in agreement as you dig in your bag, grabbing one of the free tarot cards floating around and finding a loose pen. “So I’ll just write down my cell phone number and I’ll look out for a text. Or a call. Or whatever it is you do.”

He doesn’t realize until much later, when he’s smiling to himself in his room, trying to figure out where to take you out to first that it’s the same card that drove you away.

Two silver chalices that gleam with your name and number.

Tag List: @ssweet-empowerment@capsofwinchesters@tacohead13@harleycativy@pietrotheavenger@francezka10@papichulosebastian@obsessionsofmynerdheart@melaninmarvel@avengedqueen26@nasteaxluvgal@winterbuttmunch@nys30@buckyslongasshair@ohlumi @wellthirsted @gifsbysimplysonia

#Steve Rogers #steve rogers au #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x ofc #chris evans

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panthegenderfreak · 5 years

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My Detectives & Their ROs

Why Atalanta likes Adam: Where do I even start? Adam is 100% her type: tall, strong, focused, stubborn (which she both loves and hates in equal measure), really nice eyes, a stunning smile which makes trying to get him to smile so worth it, protective, a sense of safety just exudes from him at all times, dedication to service and protecting others, a sense of humor that never fails to catch everyone (including her) off-guard, just UGH. She hasn't even seen his dimples yet and she's head over heels for this frustrating man.

Why Daniel likes Mason: At first, it was mostly that playing with him was really fun. He loves how genuinely caring takes Mason off-guard and how blatant and honest Mason is about what he wants. Talking with him is always interesting and lets Daniel practice his flirting skills. Mason, in general, is just interesting to Daniel. He wants to hold out on sleeping with Mason so that Mason can see and care about Daniel as much as he does about Mason. He finds playing the long game just as fun and rewarding as being in an actual relationship.

Why Kira likes Farah: Ah, this is my favorite dynamic. Kira herself is very awkward and uncomfortable with her emotions and she always has been. They feel too messy, unpredictable, and intense which is anxiety-inducing for her. Farah, just by virtue of being herself, calms those anxieties. With Farah, Kira feels comfortable and at ease, like coming home. Farah is so sure and unembarrassed about her feelings, especially her feelings for Kira, which helps get rid of Kira's instinct to hide hers. It feels easy with Farah and I don't think Kira will ever be able to express just how much it means to her to have even met somebody like Farah, let alone having mutual attraction between them.

Why Jules likes Nat: Ugh, god, why wouldn't they like Nat? Nat has intensity that Jules didn't notice at first but now thinks is both incredibly endearing and potentially dangerous. Other than that? Nat is kind, respectful, sensitive, perceptive, empathetic and sympathetic, calm, and really fucking smooth. Jules likes that they can be sure of Nat's feelings for them. I cannot stress enough just how much Jules loves that Nat really, truly cares about people.

#the wayhaven chronicles #twc detective #detective atalanta kingston #atalanta kingston #detective daniel lin #daniel lin #kira lin #detective kira lin #detective jules langford #jules langford #i love the dynamics between all of them so much

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redefinethegrind · 5 years

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Borderline Personality Disorder, The Will To Power, Spirituality, and Happiness: tying it all together

I am writing this manuscript on Borderline Personality Disorder because I want to connect to others with the same diagnosis. I am a provider with the diagnosis and I have an intimate understanding of what my brain goes through on a day to day basis. It is fascinating to me that something as simple as going to the gas station and buying a coffee could cause so much anxiety and grief. It has, however tied me up. I have spent hours trying to gather the courage to understand the perfect way to obtain a cup of coffee and it has impacted the flow of more than one of my days on this earth. That is ridiculous, but seemingly unavoidable to me when my anxiety, obsessive thought, splitting, and mood imbalances all hit at once.

My perception of self has never equaled the perception that others tell me that they see. People around me assure me that I am funny, charismatic, outgoing, caring, and a good person. In my head I often feel that I am disgusting, pathetic, weak, and a loser. I feel like a parasite sometimes while I fully strive to be a giving human being. That is the faulty wiring of my brain that I adopted sometime in early childhood. I have formed my personality around hating myself and feeling like I am never good enough. I don’t even know what I am trying to measure up to.

Formerly I thought that feeling never good enough was a positive thing for me. I thought it would push me to achieve more as I rose in life. I wanted to be the greatest human being in the world and I hated myself for not being that person already. I set an unreasonably high bar and laughed at myself when I failed to achieve success. If I failed at any task I would use it as evidence that I was indeed the failure I had come to know. If I succeeded I would write it off as something that should have been done better or more efficiently. It was unreasonable and counterproductive to my being to have those thoughts, but I could not make them go away.

I began seeking solace in material possessions at some point in my life. I was buying expensive cars and bigger homes. The material things would distract me from my inner conflict and pain. Ultimately, I realized that material possessions can never fill the void that I was feeling. Human connection is the only thing that can satiate that craving. I am indeed a human being. BPD has made me truly feel alien at times though and unable to connect with others. That is a fallacious thought and I now recognize it as such.

I have had days where I look around and everything seems foreign to me. During periods of stress and duress I would swear that people’s faces change and even the colors of my surroundings change. My inner voice takes on a different tone. My perception of the world warps with my mood. I feel it intensely and deeply. I am not making it up or crying for attention as I was led to believe as a child. My world genuinely changes based on my mood and faculties. That very subjective nature of my own reality makes this personality disorder difficult to pin down and properly treat regardless of the time and energy I dedicate.

This had led me to studying the very nature of consciousness and reality. I have read books by Jeffrey Schwartz and Caroline Leaf on neuroplasticity. I have studied quantum mechanics, relativity, anatomy, physiology, and psychology seeking concrete reasons for my sensation and perception. I became familiar with Deepak Chopra’s views on tying quantum mechanics to our consciousness. I started to see that I was not alone in viewing this reality as a very mailable and ever-changing substrate. I saw that humanities greatest minds were struggling with the same questions and looking on with both awe and frustration.

I wanted nothing more than to understand what my perception of consciousness, space, and time, truly boiled down to and to share my experience with other human beings. The kinds of thoughts I have are not typically talked about over morning coffee or the evening’s spaghetti. My thoughts are sometime uniquely Ernie ‘isms and I must accept that. Having BPD makes me immediately feel lonely though as I struggle to connect with others on concepts and ideas. I am well adapted at helping others in my professional life because I have an outlined task at hand and an end goal. I actually think my personality disorder makes me a better provider in some ways because knowing the type of person I am, I do not pass judgement. I am able to relate to others and feel empathy. Because my emotions are felt so extremely I am able to understand the emotions of others.

One maladaptive behavior I have taken to over the years is stifling my emotions completely on the surface. I have found myself to be suppressing the expression of my emotions to the point of operating in a robot-like fashion. I remember actually consciously choosing this process as a young child, as young as 5 years old maybe. I chose to suffocate emotions of anger and to sit in a hallway for hours on end one day. As I remember it I was at a relative’s house I did not want to be at and instead of participating in any social activities I sat in a hallway staring at the wall. Even at that young age I would sometimes skip breakfast and lunch as to isolate intentionally and not participate in normal activities. This went from a conscious decision as an early child to a subconscious reaction as an adult. Where the switch happened I don’t know, but now I catch myself avoiding social situations, meals, or performing simple daily tasks without having ever thought about it. It will be something that another person will point out. “Aren’t you hungry?” and I will think “Hmm, I don’t know, let me think about it… I guess I am hungry, I didn’t eat lunch.” Sometimes I will find a reason. It is like I throw a subconscious temper tantrum. I don’t even recognize myself doing it at this point and I wish I could control it. I am now monitoring my mood and looking for cues in order to correct the maladaptive behavior. This is strange as I am 33 years old.

I recall an experience in preschool when I was asked to sit in time out for coming at another kid with a plastic chainsaw. I took my time out of two minutes as I remember it, without fuss, then I would not get up on time in. I refused to get up for the rest of the day in fact. I made the punishment intentionally extreme as a choice. I remember choosing to not stand up as an act of self-disparaging rebellion. I remember thinking “I can sit here all day in time out just to show these people it doesn’t bother me.” As an adult I evaluate the behavior. I am thinking it was a way for me to say “I can’t be broken by your punishment.” I took a strong nihilist stance early on. Rules were ridiculous to me and whether or not I was supposed to suffer I would refuse to. I think I was trying to show them that punishment would be useless. They could not change me. They could not break me. I was in charge. I think I needed to feel in control. I believe it was overcompensation for a life that was truly out of my control. That is the best theory I can put together as an adult.

This sense of loss of control and my struggle to maintain a sense of it went on to define many aspects of my personality. Perhaps I was wanting that preschool teacher to look at me and say, “enough is enough, you don’t deserve to be punished” and to look at the ridiculous idea of changing another sentient being’s social behavior. I never understood why someone else could make rules or boundaries that I had to abide by. I think even as a young child I found them to be repulsive and insulting… arbitrary at best.

Was this manipulation? Was I truly engaging in a mind game with an adult at such a young age? In my mind the internal voice kept telling me to sit at that table in time out. To just wait it out. To see what happens. Who would break first? Not Ernie. That is what I did. It was a small event that essentially meant nothing, but in my mind, I can still relive it and feel the same emotions I felt then. I needed to show these people that though they could physically put me in restraints, it didn’t change a damn thing.

As an adult I saw the same behavior in a woman I call my twin. She seems to have many of the same thought processes and beliefs that I do. She struggles with boundaries and guidelines. She finds life to be mundane at best most days. She wonders why in the hell someone with so much mental energy has to be caged in such a dull environment. I stood in her way during a minor mincing of words we were having. I blocked her path to exit our shared kitchen. I could see her anger building. She was absolutely not going to give me a single answer at that time no matter how much I demanded it. She was appalled that I could stand in her way and physically overpower her. Though I could block her way, I could not get her to speak a single word. I could not break her. She was in control. She struggled and longed to have the ultimate sense of control. She could be physically restrained but even her living twin, the person she connects with deepest on this planet, was not going to be able to pull a single utterance from her conscious mind if she didn’t will it so. She had to win.

I saw myself in her that day. I saw an absolutely unbreakable spirit. What twinsie and I share is beyond physical, sexual, or psychological. It is deep and I cannot label it. I have never seen it in two other people. It is uniquely ours to share. We have something that the rest of this world could only dream of. I am the one person that she will ultimately break down for in this world and I am proud to be the one person that will break down for her. To take away those secure walls and expose our vibrant inner beauty. I love seeing her stand true and proud, a defiant lotus that the rest of this world doesn’t have access to. I am actually driven by being the one person that she lets in to her secretive world. That is how I define true love. I will absolutely break down and give up my sense of security and become vulnerable to share the ultimate connection with my true twin flame. I feel as though I long to both break through her every wall and to allow her to simultaneously break through every one of mine.

That is something I was seeking in this life and BPD was limiting me from sharing. A connection. The world felt alien. Until I felt someone with the same splitting, angst, core values, and pain I didn’t think I would ever find someone who would understand me. That feeling of loneliness was overwhelming and was defining my life. It left me standing alone in a crowded room.

Back to childhood, I look to an incident on the school yard. I was dangling from the monkey bars. I remember kicking my friend directly in the testicles intentionally while playing “chicken.” In my mind I knew exactly what I was doing, and I intended to kick him in the most painful area possible to drop him from that collection of steel. I was a child, I don’t know why I wanted to hurt him, but my thought was “I need to hurt this person right now.” I am still friends with him today, his name is Josh. We went on to discuss spiritual matters as adults. That day on the school yard I brought my leg forth and connected as intended right in his groin. I then remember the teacher coming to me and telling the other children that it was an accident. I bought into her story and lied about my intentions. I claimed I did it on accident. I took the teachers story and went with it. I saw that I could get away with murder. I saw that given the right social performance I could do anything and spin it as something it wasn’t.

Unfortunately, that ‘social performance’ aspect became central to my childhood. I felt like an actor much of the time. I was playing a role to get the results I wanted from every given situation. I never let even my family know the real me. I only opened up to a few core friends, and even then, I never fully opened up and showed my real core. I felt vulnerable if people were able to figure me out, so I always acted. I would pretend to be engaged in some boring TV show just to throw people off of understanding my true interests. It was like I knew I was surrounded by people that I really didn’t want to connect with so I would connect with them on things I didn’t care about so that I could then have false relationships with them. By maintaining the superficial relationship, I was in control. If I ever felt comfortable enough I would break down the superficial connection and allow a true, deep connection to exist. I can count on one hand the number of people I have ever started that process with. The people I would feel comfortable truly connecting with were special and I would show them my true vulnerabilities and interests in music, art, video games, and science on my own terms. To give them some sense of control in getting to know me was my ultimate way of letting them know that I truly loved them.

I don’t know why I complicated my social interactions so much, but I did. It was elaborate and took a lot of my thought process. It continues to do so and I do it now without conscious thought or effort. The truth is, I am able to ‘bond’ with anyone on just about anything because I have become a chameleon at blending in when needed. I can fake being interested in just about anything when needed and people automatically see me as their friend. The truth is, deep down I have not connected and with most of those people I share surface level connection I do not wish to have anything deeper. I do not wish to let them in. I genuinely have come to love all people and I actually enjoy getting to know them, but initially that wasn’t the case. Early on I simply played a role and felt completely detached emotionally from almost everyone I came into contact with. I now get my sense of well-being from being able to keep everyone calm and genuinely liking me. I don’t know why, but my personality has developed in that fashion. It seems that if someone has a problem with me I genuinely internalize it and let it gnaw at my gut deep down. On the surface, however, I have made a habit of acting completely unphased by anything no matter how harsh. It is like I feel one thing and exhibit another on the surface. My personality is complex and maybe even inappropriate.

I knew at some point my truth was my own truth. I could easily manipulate reality one way or another even as a child. I found myself in deep thought over emotions and relationships. If something was not going my way as a child I would do something like go out of my way to put myself in an obviously vulnerable position in order to gain some leverage in the form of getting an adults attention and therefor gain control over my environment when the adult found me to be in a precarious situation and would come to my rescue whether it be mentally or physically. I could use my projection of deep sadness to get adults to feel sorry for me. I could use a projection of being excited about something that everyone else found repulsive as a way to get people to back out of my personal space and think I was weird. I was in control. I was letting people in who I loved and pushing people away who I didn’t. I was learning more about those people while they learned nothing about me. It was a guaranteed safe place.

I now see my eccentric likes and dislikes as an elaborate filtering mechanism. I would put up a wall of weirdness and if someone actually tolerated getting through all of the weird parts of Ernie they had earned the right to get to know the true Ernie. They could get through and see that I am indeed a loving, caring, compassionate, gentle, altruistic human being. But first they had to wade through a sea of dead baby jokes, menstrual blood tinged cottage cheese and conspiracy theories that Ernie also finds amusing.

The good energy that makes me up is also capable of appreciating the dark side of life and finding it amusing. It is important to me that my true friends see that and know that all in all I am a good person but that I can laugh and muse at the darkness. That having no boundaries and no limits is simply my way of being truly open to experiencing every aspect of life. That being able to test my power one day doesn’t mean I want to be in control, because the very next day I might test my vulnerability. I want to experience life to it’s fullest and most extreme. I am wired that way. I want to feel fully in control while knowing fully well that ultimately I am powerless.

Looking back, it seems like a child’s cry for attention. As an adult I think that sense of control over emotional relationships gave me comfort in a way. I was more comfortable knowing that I was leading the adults on and letting them think I was a certain person when in my mind I was not that guy. I am trying to honestly explore that feeling and to see if I am indeed driven by the want to control and manipulate or if this is truly involuntary… or at least to explore what it is like living in a mind with BPD

In my first marriage I connected fairly quickly with a quiet girl who had a somewhat bumpy past. Growing up she was also left to fend for herself at times, at least that is what I gathered from the stories she told me. I connected with this girl and we spent much time together. We learned each other’s personalities, likes, and dislikes. I was not always honest in the beginning. I would, for example, say I didn’t like sea food when in reality I loved eating fish. I would choose to not like it because she didn’t like it. I would lie to connect with her. That went on for the first few months of our young relationship. I was 17 years old when I met this girl. I was still figuring out who I was, and I was forming it with another person around a process of manipulating in the context of borderline personality disorder.

The relationship had ups and downs, but early on I was the first to say “I Love You.” I was the first to make the extreme moves and then use my brain to fill in the rest later, trying to logically connect the dots. I saw this girl in a hallway in high-school and my first thoughts were “could you ever marry her, would you be with her forever, would she be the love of your life?” I immediately began planning to go all in with her after we first agreed that we were dating. I escalated things quickly and vowed to spend eternity with her because she gave me the time of day. Most people don’t think like that. I did. I was all in day one. I also at the same time felt like I would destroy her life by letting her get with such a loser like me. I wanted to love her and to save her by pushing her far away from me. The selfish part of me needed her, the selfless part of me needed her to be free.

I started off spending my every waking moment obsessing about this girl and ultimately did go on to marry her, but in the process, something strange happened as I did not understand my brain at the time. I would get comfortable with her and things would be going well, and I would assume that I was not doing enough or good enough for her. I would then create tension and angst in the relationship and pressure her away from me. I would push and push. Because I was not perfect. I would always assume that there was some flaw or fault in myself that just wasn’t good enough and I would use it against us. I would tell her time and time again that I was not good enough for her and that I was a pile of garbage and that she could do better. That was my depression seeping in and it was not a valid thought. The example that I read from a person with BPD that really stuck with me is this: “I could see a person begging for money. If I didn’t give them money I would kick myself for being selfish. If I did give them money I would kick myself for not giving enough.” It was like no matter what I gave it was never enough. I was wired to believe that my all out best effort was going to fall short and therefor I was doomed to be a piece of trash.

The pattern of constantly self-loathing and memorizing disparaging remarks created emotional turmoil and I would then push my partner away and reel her back in. This happened over and over again. It was exhausting. It resulted in significant damage. My personality was unstable enough that she never knew what she was going to get. She spent her time going out of her way to keep me from going insane and I constantly tested boundaries. What would she truly tolerate? Did she love me enough to put up with this? Unfortunately, this also enabled the borderline behavior to exacerbate. It went from something that I was doing at age 5 as an experiment to something that I couldn’t control as an adult. My emotions had become out of my control and they were being used to shape relationships in my life. It was chaotic and seemed a bit peculiar when compared with the way other people seemed to feel.

I have often felt alien and alone in this world. I felt that other people could not possibly feel so disconnected to their fellow man while fully knowing that they are indeed human themselves. Now reading the literature, I am encouraged that many people feel just like me. Alien. Robotic. Foreign. They have unknowingly programmed themselves to inappropriately use emotions to influence relationships as some sort of response to stress. The problem with BPD is, by the time it is active and roaring, it is too late to look back. It becomes the norm. The ego is established and without a great deal of introspection, guilt, pain, and rethatching, identifying these things as maladaptive can seem undefeatable. As a young adult I lost control of my emotions quite a bit and I was a bit all over the place. I didn’t recognize why, or even see it as a problem. It was just me. I would have outbursts of anger at others, at myself, at friends, and at family. Relationships would seem to be crashing to me when others had no clue what I was even focusing on. I would sometimes just stay quiet and disappear. I remember that was my way of quitting bands or quitting jobs… I would simply stop showing up, stop answering phonecalls, and just cease to exist. I would back out of relationships rather than face the conflict of admitting that perhaps it was time that I moved on.

I didn’t want to face the conflict in person, eye to eye. I didn’t want to let anyone down. I truly wanted to give my all to make everyone happy, but at the same time, a part of me was dying inside by continuing to be fake. I felt like an actor. I felt like I couldn’t simply stand up sometimes and say “this music we are making isn’t what I want to make” and walk away. I wanted to be in control of the writing and creative process but instead I would remain silent in the background playing drums and flexing to keep others happy. All the while, my unhappiness was boiling over and being exhibited through my avatar (as I have come to call my body) in silence and palpable disconnection. Where other people wanted to make music to make crowds of people think they were cool, I wanted to make music that connected spiritually with myself. Sometimes my peers would view me as a weird guy just wanting to make weird music for the sake of being different, a cry for attention perhaps. That wasn’t the case. I wanted to write the kind of music that truly expressed how I was feeling.

I wanted to the go on to perform that music on my own terms in my own way for others to either appreciate or reject. I longed to connect to others through that music, but if they couldn’t appreciate it that was okay too. I felt disconnected from my bandmates who simply wanted to perform a couple of cover songs for a room full of drunks. I was not there to entertain, I was there to teach and experience. That is what interested me and ultimately why I wanted to quit every band I was ever in. I have not been able to find another person who feels the same way, of wanting to create something that we can all connect on at a visceral level.

I would give my all to writing and performing drum and vocal parts for some of the bands I was in over the years. I would try to contribute my musings through ironic lyrics and nuanced drum fills. All the while I felt underappreciated. I felt like I was just a guy who was there to fill in where any drummer could just sit in. I felt that my views on the world and lyrics weren’t taken seriously, as much as they were written in satire, that is the seriousness that I intended. To satirically point out the ridiculous nature of heavy metal’s backbone which is isolating and pushing people away more and more as they seek the next “legit” band and scoff at “posers.” I wanted to bring these people together and give them a sense of “maybe we’re all in the same boat and we should just have a good time” rather than worrying about how freaking gay breakdowns and hardcore dancing was.

I lost music somewhere along the way because I could never find like-minded people to play it with. I wanted to simply connect. I wanted to make music for the sake of music, connection, love, solidarity, and to express our feelings with the human experience. I didn’t want to replicate what other people were already doing. I didn’t want to entertain a room full of people on a Friday night. I didn’t want a free bar tab or a backstage pass. I didn’t want paid for a single gig. I just wanted to see who else was feeling what I was feeling. I still want that, but I don’t know where to look.

Moving on, ultimately, I went on to end my first marriage and I had reasoned that there was just too much damage done and that there was no way to mend from the amount of times I had pushed and pulled this girl. I also had begun falling in love with another girl who happened to share many personality traits with me: the aforementioned twinsie. I finally felt that deep connection with another human being that I had been seeking for so long, and it was on the tail end of me trying to come to the conclusion that I was in fact not human refuse.

That connection that I mention is a key part of my personality. It is central to my sense of well-being that I be understood, appreciated, and loved by someone else. I never recognized that before. I was so caught up in self-loathing that I honestly believed that I was not worth loving. I have read that this is common in those with BPD. A sense of being the one person that cannot be loved, appreciated, respected, or connected with has become central to many of us. We have developed maladaptive personalities as a response to absurd stimuli in the setting of distinctive genetics.

Western society has us filing through as caged animals. We are in fact mammals. We are designed by nature to eat, sleep, reproduce, and dominate. We have done a good job of dominating our environment. We are now at the top of the food chain on this planet, Earth. We human-beings are the apex predators and because of that we sometimes lose touch with our true inner animal. It is like the alcoholic who is 10 years sober who has that one drink, he is suddenly rushed back in to that cycle of drinking. Day after day and starting over at square one.

Human beings are complex social creatures. We thrive in settings of love. True love and empathy are the only ingredients necessary to produce positive results. We must love our children and nurture them. We must find ways to break down their walls and get through to them and let them know that we truly love them no matter what. That is the only ingredient needed for a successful life. Love. We must support them and bear with them as they learn this process of living.

I now realize that I am a valuable human being and that I do deserve to be loved. Unfortunately, it took me a very long time to realize this. It seems so simple, and on the surface, it is. But even with all of the logic in the world, my emotions would never allow me to love myself. I could have come in with this first, but it may have poisoned my understanding of life. I may have not gained the knowledge and insight that I have had I not suffered.

The worst decision I could have made in my life was to begin using chemicals to “shut my brain off” as I always called it. I began drinking heavily or taking sleeping pills to just go to sleep at the end of the day. The constant struggle of never feeling good enough or worth living. Studies clearly show the prevalence of alcohol and drug abuse with BPD. For me it was the option to turn off the torture generator in my head to drink enough alcohol to sleep. I wasn’t doing this to destroy my marriage, my career, or to hurt anyone. Ultimately it did cause a lot of strain and did cause stress on the things I valued. I didn’t choose alcohol over life, I chose shutting off painful thoughts over suicide. I was just wanting an off switch from the reality that I was interpreting as so painful. People don’t realize that. I feel sorry that people view it as a personal attack when I say reality hurts. I don’t mean it that way. I also don’t mean to ask for their sympathy. I simply want to live and let live. I will get by, I am strong, I have faith in me and I want others to have the same.

I was able to stop drinking alcohol and focus on myself early in 2018. But at that time, I was not really even thinking about the BPD, I was more focused on depression or bipolar disorder. I stopped drinking and started really focusing on myself through exercise and diet. I wasn’t aware of how my personality disorder played into my mood disorder. It was a chaotic dance of sorts. There were nuances of mania and depression rearing their heads with this an almost flat affect I had developed. I found everything in life to be absurd and treated life as though I were a stand-up comedian just musing on my observations. I kept a straight face. Only the most extreme things could cause me to truly laugh. I somehow inappropriately (or maybe appropriately, this is subjective) attached laughter with absurdity.

I was able to see the humor in everything. There was absolutely nothing off limits. My extreme personality allowed me to explore extreme topics. I had watched clips of people being hurt and killed and essentially found the ridiculousness of it all to allow me to laugh. My brain had seemingly wired a circuit to find absurdity funny, so I could escape the true pain that it was causing me. We see people get kicked in the scrotum on MTV all day and laugh at it, this is a light version of what I am describing. Having access to all things human via the internet I desensitized myself to the most extreme of human behaviors. I have seen video footage of a man being beaten to death with a hammer. I have seen a chainsaw beheading video. Even worse, I have heard a chainsaw beheading video.

When I honestly put myself in that man’s shoes whose lifeless body is gurgling for wind from some prehistoric reflex I feel the pain of the human condition. I am able to know that I am mortal. I will die. I will cease to exist in the form of Ernie one day. I have been face-to-face with death as a young child raised by elderly distant relatives, and I have watched other human beings take their last breath as a hospice nurse. I have hunted deer and geese. I have taken the life from a dove and consumed her flesh. It is a chaotic balance of energy that I have been a part of in this very real chain of events.

The will to power, the longing to be in control takes a darker turn at times. So for me to make the decision to take another sentient being’s life in order to eat, I now must question what that truly means. As a 33-year-old white male in America I am surrounded by meat and cheese. Lives lost for the sake of contributing energy back into the circle of life. It all comes back to me and I can feel so clearly the morning I first took the life of a white-tailed deer.

I was camped out in my tree stand. I was dressed like a redneck in camo and I had hiked into some fall scenery right out of a Mark Twain novel. I was sitting silently and waiting for motion. When I finally heard the crushing of leaves my heart began to race. This is it. This is the moment I have been waiting for. To kill this sentient being. The hunt was on.

I saw two does playfully wondering through a sparse patch of thin trunked trees. The leaves were golden and red. They were almost dancing with one another. They hadn’t noticed me but I watched them come into my field of vision. I moved and one of the does looked up. She made eye contact with me. Her tail flipped up. White flag! She was ready to run. She was afraid. I drew my bow and let loose an arrow into the distance.

There was a calamity of hooves and cracking leaves. My heart was racing and there was sweat on my brow. I could smell autumn. I was one with the nature scene I had very realistically painted myself into. I rushed down from my latter clumsier than I would like to admit and began taking large gallop-like steps toward a creek bed. I could see a faint trail of blood on the ground guiding me to where this injured creature must be. It was like I looked up and there she was. Right in front of me. I was on top of her and didn’t even see her. She appeared out of nowhere.

She was lying in a shallow creek bed making labored breaths. Begging mother nature for her life. I pulled my 9mm side arm from my waist and did what I thought was the right thing at the time. I mercifully killed her by shooting her in the head. To end her suffering. My adrenaline was coursing through my body and I could not imagine what my next move was. I picked up the lifeless doe that was once dancing with her friend and threw her over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes. I carried her out of the woods like a “real man” and disrespectfully threw her body in the back of my hatch back ford focus. Her eyes were glazed over and her tongue fell out the right side of her mouth.

I brought her to my home and removed her skin. I hung her from her hind legs in my shed with some bailing twine that was laying around and I opened YouTube videos on how to butcher a deer. I called my friend Gabe to see if he had a knife, he was too drunk to help me dress my kill.

I began hacking parts off of this majestic creature’s body with an axe and a dull kitchen knife. I had already purchased butchers paper and I broke down the meat the best I could with the guidance of Youtube. I turned on a death metal album by Cannibal Corpse to get me in a disgusting mindset as I butchered away. I needed the distraction in order to complete the job. My now ex-wife came home to find blood on the back porch and door knob and she knew “Ernie got a deer.” What the fuck does it even mean? I got one.

We went on to incorporate this fresh meat into our cooking for the rest of that year and I even tried to consume the organ meats with Gabe as to not waste any of the animal. Looking back it seems so barbaric and out of character for me. I don’t think I could ever pull the trigger again or let another arrow fly. The sanctity of life is not something that I wish to choose when it shall end. All life is sacred in This consciousness. That is what I have come to appreciate. I know others struggle with it and take it lightly, but I have intimately been there. I have danced with death and I know every callus lunge.

To me, now, the thought of being able to obtain a permit to hunt and end a life is absurd. Of course, creatures need to eat. But I am looking at this planet as a whole. How can human beings simply choose what life is sacred and what life is not? We fish the oceans dry. Why must we consume those things with sentience in order to survive? I don’t believe it is necessary at this point. That seems a bit misguided to me to think that it is entirely just sack after sack of matter and therefore vitamins and nutrients. Sure, I have stomped out an ant hill, I have crushed a fly. But what gives me that right? I believe as a human being we are blessed and cursed to know that life is finite. I do not wish to be a god amongst plebeians.

Knowing that my true moral code is to love all life and to appreciate it and hold it in high regard is paramount to my existence. I can then, unfortunately, explore the very opposite of this notion. That life is not sacred. That this existence is pointless and meaningless. That we are simply chemical reactions. The view of materialists is that we are a complex series of reactions. While I don’t believe this to be accurate, I have had my brain chemistry altered to the point that I almost believed it.

I had a short stent of taking the drug Abilify for an episode of mania and panic. I was started on this in-patient and continued it for about a week after hospitalization. Honestly, within a few days of being on the drug I felt no emotional attachment to my wife of so many years. I also believe, however, my true emotional attachment to her had waxed and waned over the previous years as my personality disorder pushed and pulled my life. While on Abilify I was able to make cold and rigid decisions without any emotional repercussions. I truly feel I could have strangled somebody to death and not felt any remorse on that medication. Is it simply the neurotransmitters in our brains that regulate our sense of right and wrong or are we tuning into something greater like a collective consciousness?

Through the years professionally and personally I have chronically had angst about my performance or accomplishments. I would always immediately downplay my performance and know that I could do better. Until I drastically modified my lifestyle and stopped drinking alcohol I was headed toward self-destruction. Having our neurotransmitters out of balance is like tuning a piano with an out of tune reference. I don’t know how to better describe it. It is like interpreting the world through a faulty interpretation device. Nature provides us the tools to perfectly balance and calibrate our interpretation device if we are willing to take the time and effort.

In this eastern society it does take time and effort to calibrate your device. In the wild it would not. You would not worry about being depressed or manic in the wild for a number of reasons. The cycle would have simply played out as it should. In our artificial reality that we have constructed with these cities and roadways, we have to take the time to get back to nature if we want balance. We need to re-calibrate our brains. We need to balance our neurotransmitters.

Our neuro-endocrine systems naturally produce everything we need if they are functioning properly. In order to function properly they need the correct environment. Our biology is specifically fine-tuned to allow us to thrive in whatever given setting we happen to arise from. We are at a point in which we are modifying our environment faster than evolution can catch up with and thus we have the central disconnected feeling that comes out as angst and turmoil. Identifying this and utilizing our strengths to fit into our own lives on an individual level is the prescribed treatment. There is no one size fits all plan.

Neuro-endocrinology functions optimally when given appropriate ingredients and in human beings those ingredients can be obtained from plant sources, water, and of course love. In order to best fuel our bodies optimally we should be eating a vegan diet which is free of processed foods, hormones, antibiotics, and suffering. When we eat food, we are eating the building blocks of our body and mind. Food is information essentially. What we take in builds what we are. This is important. The fuel we run on is central to our functioning at our best.

Looking at myself now, I am obsessed with telling the truth and being accurate. I want to live a life that I am proud of and therefor hold no secrets. I want to connect with another human being on an intimate level in which I tell her no lies. I want to be as open and forth coming as possible. The ultimate vulnerability. The payoff, is the ultimate relationship. It is important that we all begin to shift our culture to a culture of openness. We should be proud of who we are. We should be able to express our deepest desires and interests freely.

If we have something to hide, it is likely leading to negative karma. This is how I weigh my karma. When I do something I ask myself, “Is this something you would feel proud to tell everyone in this world?” If it is not, there is a better option. It is important as a species as we continue to evolve spiritually and emotionally that we understand this internal compass and respect it. We need to always bend to the will of the internal compass and listen to it in order to have the most fulfilling lives. If your gut tells you not to do something, you seriously need to stop and reconsider that decision. Take time. Make the right choice. To truly work through this process is grueling but it will lead to the ultimate transcendence.

The ultimate will to power is to give up complete control. Give your life over to the laws of the universe. To love without questioning “what is in it for me?” to give without wondering “do they appreciate it?” to teach others to better themselves and stop judging them for what they aren’t. Start seeing human beings for their potential. To push forth and get every bit of positivity out of our fellow-man’s soul. To not wonder “how am I going to get by” and just wonder “how can I help someone else get by.”

That is what I am striving for. I will post this long post for free, relatively unedited, though it feels like it should probably be in some sort of BPD and spirituality book or something. I know that in my life the Universe will provide for me food, shelter, wisdom, and love if I stay on the right path. I have that faith. I am following it with open mind, open heart, and open soul.

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tentoriwrites · 6 years

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Time-Scattered Blossoms: Part One

This is whole thing ended up right at 10k words. That is WAY too big for one post so it’s going up in at least two, possibly three parts. I will post the rest as I finish editing it. Speaking of, I make no guarantees the editing on this is any good. At a certain point, it all runs together. ^_^;

THIS IS SUPER SPOILER HEAVY FOR SHINGEN’S ROUTE

Inspired by this part of Shingen’s route, Backstreet Boys - Unmistakable, and Skillet - Watching for Comets

That’s right, this is a 10k long songfic! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Was it chance or fate that caused Yukimura to find her that day? The longer he knows her the stronger the feeling grows he’s made a promise to someone to protect her. That she’s waiting for someone, they both are...

One. Two. Three. Does he love me? Or does he love me not? Remember or forgot? Four. Five. Six. Will time fix, a broken heart, when time tore it apart Seven. Eight. Nine. Will love ever be mine? And ten. If so, when?

She recited the poem as she plucked the petals one by one from a flower in her small hands. She finished with one petal remaining and a bright smile on her face. A pair of teenage boys sauntered up behind her snickering. One of them plucked the flower out of her hand and crushed it in his fist while the other kicked her book bag. The contents spilled out and skid across the pavement.

“Didn't anyone tell you, you can't predict anything with a stupid flower?” One jeered, a wicked chuckle under his breath after saying so. On the other side of the park, another boy took notice. Something about seeing the events unfolding caused his chest to get tight with anger. His hands coiled into fists as he got to his feet.

“And what exactly are we doing, Dear?” Saizo asked disinterested as the boy passed him by.

“Isn't it obvious? I can’t sit by and let them bully her!” He declared as he marched forward. He knew he couldn't explain it. Even if he could, Saizo had no reason to believe him if he said something in his very soul told him had to protect this girl. It was something so strong it caused him to move, caused him to speak without even thinking. There was something intensely familiar about her, intensely comforting. Like she was home, or part of it. Like, she had always been a part of his life. Which is why watching one of them push her out of her seat set him over the edge. He didn't need courage to call out to the delinquents, courage meant he was afraid. No, in that moment he didn't feel afraid, he felt anger and an odd sense of purpose.

“Didn't anyone ever teach you not to pick on girls like that?” The stern voice that called out, accompanied by cracking knuckles was not the boy she expected. She had thought it would be her friend, an older boy named Inuchiyo, mean mugging the older boys. To her surprise it was a boy she'd never seen before. He was older than her, but not as old as the boys antagonizing her. The older boys didn't seem to pay him much mind.

“Oh, and are you going to teach us a lesson?”

“Damn right I am!” Suddenly, a hand clapped over his shoulder.

“And if he doesn't, I sure as hell will.” The voice beside him growled, low and threatening.

“Toshiie...”

“Damn right, Toshiie. And this is my martial arts junior, Yukimura.” He went on pressing forward. “He's never understood how to hold back.” He slowly cracked individual knuckles with each step he took. “Then again, neither have I...”

“Hey... We don't want any trouble...” The delinquents were back pedaling now. Hands shaking and voices quaking as the school's martial arts champion and his protege drew closer.

“If you didn't want any trouble, you shouldn't go around bullying others.” Yukimura growled, stopping next to the girl.

“Especially not my family friend...”

“We... we didn't know!” They were tripping over themselves as they tried to back away faster.

“It doesn't matter! You shouldn't be bullying anyone. Now, get out of here and if I ever see you screwing with people again you'll regret it!” The delinquents scampered away and Toshiie turned back to Yukimura and the girl. Yukimura looked deeply distressed as he tried awkwardly to sooth the crying girl.

“Geez, you always were a crybaby...” Toshiie sighed in exasperation but his face was nothing but fond. He helped her up to her feet again. “Skinned your knees, huh?” She nodded as she wiped the tears from her face. “It's not too bad.”

“That's not why I'm crying!” She blurted out in frustration. “They said there's no such thing as true love and I'll die an old, gray. lonely woman!” She sniffled looking like she might burst out crying again.

“You're not going to end up alone.” Both boys spoke in near unison, with equal measure of resolution. Toshiie looked at Yukimura incredulously.

“You just met her, how would you know?” He wilted under the gaze of his superior.

“I... just... I have this feeling, ya know?” He knew there was no way he could explain it to Toshiie either when he didn't even fully understand it himself.

“A feeling he says...” Toshiie sighed in exasperation as he bent down to start picking up the girl's scatter belongings. “Well anyways,” he looked over to the girl, “whaddya say we take Yukimura here to the restaurant to meet Mom, Pops, and Yahiko?” She sniffled one last time, gave her face one last good swipe of her hands, and nodded.

Several years passed and she came to be good friends with Yukimura. Somehow, he had an almost as inexplicable sense for when she might be in danger as Toshiie. As they got older, Toshiie went off to college leaving Yukimura the task of protecting her. Though he had been asked, Yukimura would have done so anyways.

“You can count on me, Toshiie! I promise on my honor as a man I will protect her! And Sanada Yukimura never breaks his promises!” Though he had said it so enthusiastically, something in the back of his mind gave him pause. A nag saying maybe he didn’t always keep his promises. He brushed it off as a bit of anxiety over his friend leaving and went on.

The passage of time made the feelings he had around her no less explainable. A new one had started to coalesce that seemed to be related to them though. A feeling like he was waiting for someone, he had to get her back to someone. Someone important to them both. He never talked about it though, not until one day at the restaurant she broached a topic he never would have thought to discuss.

“Yukimura... Would you, I don't know, want to go out sometime? Like on a date?” Her straightforward question made his body stiffen and cheeks redden.

“I... um... well...” He stammered and fumbled for words and she giggled. The smile on her face told him she didn't understand the cause of his distress. Realizing that, he knew he had to be honest with her. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath to steel his resolve and calm his nerves.

“I never considered the possibility.” She looked utterly crushed, he knew she would. “From the day I met you I knew there was someone out there for you. Someone truly great and strong. I know I'm not that person.” Her brows furrowed as a memory came back to her. A memory from when they first met, the resolve in his eyes when he said she wouldn't end up alone.

“It probably sounds crazy... but...” He looked away, eyes clouded with doubt. “For a long time I felt like I had to protect you, because I made a promise...”

“And Sanada Yukimura never breaks his promises...” She finished for him with a troubled smile. “If it's a promise you don't remember making, can you really say you're still honor bound to it?” That was the problem... The thing he couldn't explain. He did remember and he didn't at the same time.

“It's like a dream you know you had but don't quite remember when you wake up. It's a feeling like something happened and you should know what it was. No matter how hard you try though, you can't.” His eyes never could hold a lie, they were clear and earnest as he spoke. It was obvious to her now he honestly believed what he was saying, no matter how crazy it might seem. She smiled softly at him as she slid her hand across the table, laying it atop his.

“I know how I feel when I'm around you, Yukimura. I feel like you're meant to be in my life. You feel like...” She paused for a moment trying to find the right word.

“Home.” They both finished in unison, both looked at each other shocked. Blushing they promptly looked in opposite directions.

“If... If by some chance you ever change your mind. I would much rather grow old and die with you than alone.”

“You're not going to die alone.” His answer was no less resolute than it had been all those years before.

Shingen stood looking out over the city from the balcony of his hotel room. He idly plucked the petals from a flower he had taken from the arrangement inside. One by one he pulled them out and watched them flutter away, caught on the breeze, carried off to parts unknown.

“You know girls used to play a game doing that. Pull the petals off one by one chanting 'he loves me, he loves me not.' If the last petal you plucked said he loved you, it had to be true.” A woman’s voice interjected itself into his early morning musings. “That couldn't possibly be what you're doing, is it?” The indignity in her voice irritated him, her demeaning laugh infuriated him. “Let's not fool ourselves, shall we? There's not a single romantic bone in your body. So, why delude yourself with such foolish notions as true love?”

“If I were playing the game you described, that would imply there was someone I hoped loved me, would it not? Perhaps you brought it up hoping it was you?” The tiger bore its fangs, but she simply smiled and shook her head.

“I have no need for your love as long as you keep giving me your body.” She replied so self-assuredly it made him sick as she ran a finger down his arm in a languid stroke. “Besides, we'll be married before long anyways. Love or not...” Those words left a knot in his stomach he didn't like but couldn't explain.

She had once been his friend and confidante but over time they had grown apart. Now all she was to him was someone to warm his bed he knew wouldn't try to blackmail him later. Their parents had arranged for them to wed to bring their family businesses together. At the time, a year ago, he had agreed to it because he had been able to force down the vague sense of wanting something more out of a marriage. He justified it as his duty to his family. But the vague feeling of wanting something more grew each time they interacted. Someone who could do more than only warm his bed. Someone who could also warm his heart.

“Anytime, anywhere, anyplace. You could be anyone today. Maybe I would recognize you on a crowded street...” He muttered as he continued to stand there, watching the people scurry to and fro, flower in hand, when a different kind of chant filled his mind. Recalled from his childhood... or maybe a time much further away.

One. Two. Three. Does he love me? Or does he love me not? Remember or forgot? Four. Five. Six. Will time fix, a broken heart, when time tore it apart? Seven. Eight. Nine. Will love ever be mine? And ten. If so, when?

He looked down at the one petal remaining, recalling that meant he was destined to find love. He laughed in self-deprecation because for one moment he allowed himself to believe in a childhood oracle. Surely his betrothed was right about that, such things had no place in their world. And yet... Why couldn't he let go off the hope the thought of true love kindled in his heart?

“You have a meeting with your Father in an hour.” Kansuke's voice pulled Shingen from his thoughts. The remnants of the flower slipped from his hand as he turned back towards the door.

“This marriage is a bad idea.” Kansuke said as if he knew what was on his employer’s mind.

“We've been over this before.” His answer was firm, firmer than his own feelings on the matter. Kansuke couldn't know that. No one could. The pair glared at each other, if one could call Kansuke’s nigh emotionless expression a glare, for several moments before Kansuke turned and disappeared into the hotel room again.

The room where Shingen and his Father sat was richly furnished with dark wood pieces and deeply colored rugs contrasted against white marble floors. Bookshelves lined the high walls on one side, flanked on one end of the room by a pair of massive double doors and wide fireplace on the other. A fired burned in the fireplace bringing much needed warmth to the chill atmosphere of the room.

No more than a month prior, his father had announced Shingen would be marrying a childhood friend. It was a last-ditch effort on his Father's part to save their company. He had been unsuccessful in his attempts to consolidate power within the company and impose his vision on it. Shingen knew this all too well. At the same time, he wasn't willing to toss his hat in the ring just yet and try to take the reins. He certainly could, being the CEO's son, but he was on the cusp of graduating college and unproven. He had to get some experience under his belt, some supporters behind him.

Understanding the arranged marriage didn't make him anymore willing to go through with it. The older they got the more their relationship had devolved to small talk turned to sex and little more. If she walked out of his life completely, he would wish her well, but wouldn't miss her. He knew little of romance, that was true, but he knew you should probably at least miss the person you're married to when they were gone.

“You're quiet.” His father finally called after taking a puff of a cigar. Shingen turned his gaze from one of the massive windows and the snow falling outside to look at his father.

“I was thinking about something...” His response was passive, indifferent. He didn't want to be there, he'd rather be outside skiing and find himself a nice snow bunny to warm his bed in a cabin far away.

“About the engagement?” His father seemed hardly any more interested in the conversation than Shingen was. He leaned back in his chair and peered at the fire.

“Yes.” Shingen moved from the window to sit in one of the over-sized leather armchairs by the fire. “I have reservations.”

“It's not too late to add something to the pre-nup. You haven't signed it yet.”

“Nothing like that.” He answered with a low tone, eyes trained on the dancing flames. His father quirked an eyebrow at him, a knowing scowl on his face. He extinguished the cigar before picking up a glass of dark liquor and drinking all of it down. He huffed out his next breath to suppress the burn of the liquor from coming out in his voice.

“Then what is it?” The elder Takeda wondered with no small measure of irritation in his voice.

“When was the last time you saw your wife?” Shingen's step-mother had been a marriage of convenience, much like his would be if he went through with it.

“We had dinner a few weeks ago.”

“And before that?” His grip on the arms of the chair tightened to keep his expression from changing.

“A few months. I can't really recall.” His father got up, waving his hand as if the motion would dispel Shingen's train of thought. “Look, I know where this is going. You have known this girl your whole life. You even dated for a few years there.”

“There's a reason we aren't dating anymore.”

His Father pressed on, rolling right over Shingen's interjection as if he had never said it at all. He had a habit of that, sometimes, to just ignore what those around him were saying even if the advice was good.

“Why the sudden change? If there's someone else, it's fine as long as you keep it and them quiet.” He said it as if it were nothing, the simplest thing. It made Shingen's blood boil from the sheer inability to reconcile what he was hearing. Why would he marry someone he didn't care about and keep the person he did care about as a mistress? He got to his feet and turned toward the door, so his Father wouldn't see his trembling hands.

“If I wanted to marry her, I would have proposed myself.”

“It would be bad publicity to call this off now.”

“I'm not calling it off, but I'll be making my own decisions from now on.” He heard his Father start to say something, but it was abruptly cut short by the heavy thunk of the old wooden door shutting.

Later that evening, Shingen sat in his apartment, sweat dripping face as he sat in his workout room panting. A shadow appeared from the corner and offered him a towel.

“Thanks, Kansuke.”

“Are you sure going through with the engagement is the correct thing to do?” Kansuke's level voice questioned him but his face revealed nothing.

“It's what's expected of me.” Shingen answered simply enough as he wiped the sweat from his body.

“The Harunobu I knew wouldn't do something simply because it was expected of him.” Shingen's gaze shifted to where Kansuke had been standing. “He would do it with a purpose.”

“What did you call me?” The question left as lips as he turned but Kansuke was already gone. He sat on the bench staring at his hands a moment as a warm and familiar feeling settled in his chest. There was something about Kansuke calling him that name felt... right... Like that's the way it should have been all along. Once the feeling passed, he was left with the confusion of what Kansuke meant. The more he ruminated on it the more he decided what he was going to do moving forward. First, he needed out of this engagement.

Part Two

#slbp #slbp yukimura #slbp shingen #slbp saizo #fanfic #fanfiction #songfic #fluff #angst #slbp toshiie

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