#Im tired and overwhelmed and I’m so sick of being the only responsible person in my house

[makkie-is-screaming]

I fucking can’t today

[winter-soldier-vibes]

Can I request HSP + depression reader (who thinks they are just weak and being crybaby) x Bucky, please? I understand you are super busy right now and I didn’t mean to rush you or anything but I'm just struggling with both HSP and depression and couldn’t help but send it right now. No need to hurry, just when you are free and maybe when you had nothing to write. Thank you and I love you!

Thank you for the request, I’m sorry it’s been a difficult time for you! I’m here if you need me and I hope that this helps!!! 

It’s called empathy

Bucky x reader

Word count: 1981

Warnings: depression, HSP (highly sensitive person), low self worth, negative self talk, swearing (that’s normal for me but this one’s a little extra), angst (more so internal idk if that needs a warning), fluff/comfort

Taglist: @buckys2thicc @babydaddy-buckybarnes @barnesplums @peggycarter-steverogers @mardema @abitgryffindorky @buckys-blue-eyes @strawberrimae @thatfangirl42 @freigeistundanderes @bucks-bunny @broadwaybabe18 @im-sick-of-failing

Taglist     Masterlist

--------------

Breathe in

Breathe out

In 

Out 

...in…

You felt a tear escape your eyes

Goddamn it

You didn’t want to cry, you couldn’t let yourself. It was stupid, it was just some shitty remark from someone when they were in a shitty mood, it wasn’t your fault, all that bullshit you tried to tell yourself. It never worked.

You were trying to control your breathing, looking up at the ceiling trying to will the tears away, biting your lip. You would not cry, not over this. Not over something that wasn’t worth your tears

Not when you didn’t even know what exactly you were crying over. 

Yet here you were, gripping the edge of the bathroom sink with white knuckles, looking up at the ceiling trying to keep the tears at bay. And it wasn’t working.

Weak sensitive piece of shit. 

What good were you to the team if you cry in the bathroom like a baby every time something remotely stressful happens? People usually cry when they're in pain or when they’re grieving - the only excuse you had was you were stressed or sad. 

You felt another few tears escape and you angrily swiped them away, cursing yourself for being so weak. 

You hated this, you hated yourself. You were so numb most of the time, especially when you were alone. You found yourself alone in your room with racing thoughts feeling like you were falling apart. Yet when you were alone you could only stare at the ceiling wondering if it would get any worse. 

The answer was usually yes.

Whenever you would go on missions with the team, you were able to push aside your stress. You had a job to do and you would do it. But when the mission was over and you were walking back through the rubble - seeing all the blood, destruction, fear - then it would start to get to you. You would panic, you would feel tears cloud your vision. Tears for those you were leaving behind, and those who had nowhere to go, those who lost someone. That was understandable. 

It seemed to affect you more than the others though. It was understandable to be moved by so much destruction. But for you everyone felt like someone you had known and loved. 

You could feel the grief in those left behind, feel the sadness and pain that they were going through. 

The same was true when you weren’t on missions. When those who were on them would come back. Whether they were injured or their eyes were saddened - you knew when a mission was rough. You would listen, you would be there for people. It was easy to talk to you, and you were very wise. 

But it still overwhelmed you. You couldn’t say no, you didn’t want to. You wanted to help but it would be so emotionally taxing for you. So behind closed doors, you would break. Be there for others, listen when they need to talk, others come first - you took their emotional pain onto yourself. 

You were grateful that you could help - but in the process it was hurting you. 

You allowed yourself to feel sad when you were alone in your room. No one could see you be weak in the dark of your room. But you never cried much just from the pure exhaustion of your thoughts. Sometimes you wanted to, just feeling so incredibly empty that you just wanted to have an ugly crying session curled up in bed.

But you didn’t get to make that choice.

The crying wouldn’t come until the absolute worst times. If you had messed up on a mission, if Tony said something a little too harshly because to him everything was a joke, seeing something gruesome on a mission- whenever it came to someone else getting involved, the tears would come. Hell sometimes even being overwhelmed in public would be enough to start the waterworks. 

You always felt so fucking weak for it. The slightest environmental stressor could stress you out too much and move you to tears. You had no reason to be upset most of the time. But you would get angry at yourself for being upset, which would make you more upset that you couldn’t control it, making it harder to control.

It was a vicious cycle.

Lately it had been popping up more and more recently. Smaller things were upsetting you more than usual. You were becoming more sensitive to external stimuli and as a result, you spent as much time as you could in your room. You were embarrassed by yourself. Both by your emotions and by your inability to control them. 

This time you were just upset that you were upset. It had been a long night the day prior, just a lot of paperwork to do. There had been a mission earlier this week that you hadn’t been assigned to, but it had been brutal for everyone who had gone. So far today had been a normal day by anyone’s terms, an emotionally exhausting one for you. One of those where you woke up tired and the thoughts of another day were enough to draw you to tears. Nothing had even happened, but apparently nothing needed to happen. 

Your emotions came and went without your consent. 

You knew deep down it was probably some sort of emotional build up - that whole quote about bottling things up until they got to be too much - it happened every time but you still thought you could handle yourself better than that. You didn’t want to vent or be a problem to anyone. But when you are the emotional support for most of the team and you haven’t been able to get enough sleep or take time for yourself - you didn’t have much of a say as to when the bottle overflows.

A few more tears fell and you slammed your hand on the counter, wiping your tears angrily once more. “God fucking damn it why can’t you just stop fucking crying!” you exclaimed, feeling a few more tears falling “Weak piece of shit!” 

There was knocking on the door, pulling you out of your self deprecating thoughts. You gasped lightly, wiping your face again. 

Knock knock

You jumped a little, gasping slightly. No one was supposed to be here, it was the middle of the night. 

“Y/n? What’s going on in there? Are you alright?”

You took a shaky breath. Of course it would be Bucky who heard you. Why would it be anyone else?

“I’m fine Bucky, it’s late, you should go to sleep.”

“Then why are you still awake?” Bucky responded. You heard him sigh a little outside the door. “Come out here and tell me you’re okay.”

“Really Bucky?”

“Unless you want me to come in there, but I don’t think Stark would appreciate me breaking your door.”

You took a small breath and walked over to the door, opening it. You crossed your arms and met Bucky’s concerned eyes. “I’m fine, Bucky.”

Bucky sighed, taking in your appearance. Red eyes, flushed face, your hair was messy - you were definitely crying. He hated when you wouldn’t admit that you weren’t ok. “You know you don’t have to be, right?”

You clenched your jaw, trying to keep fresh tears from clouding your vision. “What?”

“You say you’re fine, you always say that you’re fine until you break. I heard you crying, I can see that you’re not feeling okay yet still you try to keep a brave face. And I just want you to know that you don’t have to always be okay.”

You let out a breath. “I - i…” you looked down and shook your head, lost for words. 

“Y/n, I’m not here to judge you. Can you try to tell me what’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” you said looking up at him “It’s literally so stupid, Bucky.”

“Y/n, nothing you say right now is going to sound stupid. 

You shrugged your shoulders, still not quite meeting his eyes. “I don’t know, I just get so worked up sometimes, but it’s stupid. I tell myself I’m not going to be bothered and then I freak out again. The smallest things bother me and I get stressed out and then I cry like some stupid weak bitch. People have it worse than me, God, you have it worse than me. Everyone here has some sort of traumatic awful thing happen to them and then there’s me and I get sad because I see other people sad,” you were crying again and you wiped at your face, covering your eyes. “God Im so fucking stupid I -”

Bucky pulled you into his chest as you let out a sob. “You’re not stupid, y/n.”

“YES I AM. I get worked up over the smallest shit, I don’t listen when people tell me to take breaks, I take everything too personally and I can’t stop fucking crying when I don’t even know what the fuck is wrong!” you exclaimed, trying to push yourself away, ashamed.

Bucky held you tightly, not letting you go. “That’s not your fault. It’s not up to you how your feelings show up.”

“But I cry at the most stupid shit and I can’t control it.”

“You’re not supposed to know how to control it,” he said, pulling back to look at you. “Emotions can’t be controlled. They just happen and it’s rarely convenient.”

“Then why do I feel so weak? If this,” you gestured to yourself “is so goddamn normal then why isn’t everyone else breaking down every other day?” 

Bucky brushed some hair out of your face. “Your emotions are yours, no one else’s. No one has the right to tell you how to feel. Think of it this way - you can’t expect everyone to have the same amount of strength or stamina - no one has the same emotional response either. And that doesn’t make you weak, it makes you you.”

You shook your head. “I just feel so weak all the time.” 

“And I’m here to remind you that crying isn’t weak. You are not a weak person, you are not a bad person, you’re not any of those things your mind tells you. You’re a kind and thoughtful person. You put your heart into everything you do. You help everyone you can. Mourning someone else’s loss isn’t weakness. It’s called empathy.”

You took a small breath. “Then why does it hurt so goddamn much?”

“”I don’t know. And I can’t say for certain that you won’t always feel that way. But I know I can tell you that you aren’t weak, and I’ll be here every time you feel that you are.” 

You nodded your head slightly. “You don’t think I’m weak?” you asked quietly.

He pulled you back into a hug. “Not in the slightest, y/n.”

[redhawtriot]

IM DYING for some domestic things, can I please have small request about it? What if Bakugo, Kirishima, Shigaraki and Dabi (seperated, obviously) coming home and bringing one cutie plusiu for their unborn child? Sorry for wxtra fluff I just need more cute things in our lifes 😭 YOU R AWESOME HAPPY ONE MONTH LUV YA

Tip Jar ☕- Not expected but always appreciated💞

I had to do this one right away! Sorry if some of these are very narrow-minded views on expecting children! I know surrogacy and adoption are also options! Let me know in the comments if those are things you guys would like to see as well!

But I got too excited when I saw this! lol The mucus filled disaster where my heart is supposed to be jumped for joy when I read this prompt!

HnM💕

💖Dabi:

When you first met Dabi, one of your very first presumptions about the man was that he should never have offspring. 

That’s not to say that you were not immediately drawn to his physical looks and demeanor, rather you just couldn’t picture such a stoic man ever having the visceral capacity in his cold heart to care much about anyone besides himself. 

It wouldn’t be until much later than your initial meeting where these feelings would be fully swayed– passed when you got to know him better and saw his standoffish mask fade away, revealing a loyal, surprisingly warm man– passed becoming romantically involved with him and finding him putting aside his own slight needs at times to fulfill yours– passed even your first pregnancy together. 

It was the day of your child’s birth that you knew just how much of a kind-hearted creature your partner could be. 

You already knew that he wouldn’t be able to attend the birth. He was a known “terrorist” after all. The sight of him in a hospital would only end in havoc.

Those people— always quick to label anyone who won’t conform under their oppression with such othering terms.

You gave a quick glance to your sleeping daughter, immediately feeling a heaviness in your heart. The picture just wasn’t complete without Dabi.

Yes, it hurt to be alone but you reminded yourself that you would soon return from the hospital to reunite your little untypical family.

But for the moment, you could only sleep and let your body heal from child birth.

A familiar sound suddenly chipped away at your peaceful unconscious, “You are so beautiful. Just like your mom, huh?”

Was that Dabi?

You tried to pry your heavy eye lids open and call out to him but only a slight tired groan came out.

“Go back to sleep, Y/N,” you felt a warm hand rub your cheek, “You did a good job. Rest up,” you tried to fight against your sleepiness but the soothing nature of his touch eventually dragged you back to sleep.

“You are perfect. I… I didn’t know I could feel so much for one person. God, I am going to spend every moment of my life protecting you until the day I die, baby girl.”

“Dabi!!” You gasped. You finally snapped your body up, and ignored the searing pain in your lower abdomen and you crazily searched the room for the father of your child.

Your heart sagged at his absence.

However on the visitors chair next to your daughters plastic crib was a large array of pink stuff animals and hearts.

You dragged yourself off of the bed and scuttled to the display of rosy penguins and pigs and bears and saw a card with a lone pink balloon on the front.

Curiously, you slowly opened the card,

I hope this doesn’t gross you out, me being all soft and everything, but as soon as I saw her I wanted to give her absolutely everything. My baby girl is the most precious thing I have ever seen.

I’m so proud of you. You did a good job, babe. Heal up and come home soon, kay?

I can’t wait to hold my girls again.  

🐊Kirishima:

He was beyond happy to become the father to your children. Words wouldn’t even be able to begin to describe the pure and overwhelming feelings of joy that he felt as he bounced out of the doors of the drug store near your house.

He glanced down to a torn piece of a magazine the two of you had lying around the house, checking the small list he made one more time before he left the stores premises: 

Vitamin B6

 A plush crocodile

flowers 

Left Twix

pregnancy test

Yep! All accounted for! He had practically no trouble at all finding most things on the list, but the plush crocodile was a bit harder than he expected.

He had asked an associate about the plush toy in hopes of finding it, but they only had alligators.

“But this is a stuffed alligator. See?” As Kirishima pointed to the stuffed animals face, the associate only became confused, so Kiri explained further, “The nose shape is all wrong. It has to be a crocodile? Are you sure this all you have?”

It was indeed all they had. Kirishima let out a small sigh, but honestly not even the drug store’s reptile discrimination could bring his day down!

“My wife is pregnant!” He exclaimed with an extremely proud smile to a couple he passsed as he made his way into his car. One of the strangers immediately cheered him on with a loud “whoop whoop!” before his boyfriend smacked him on the shoulder for the wild display.

Meanwhile, you couldn’t believe how long it was taking your husband to return home from the store. You bounced your leg uncomfortably as you waited on your living room couch.

He was only supposed to be picking up one thing! The longer you sat and waited for him to return, the more your nerves stacked upon each other.

You’re heart flipped in your chest as your front door suddenly opened. You quickly stood from the couch, “You got it?”

He hurried up to you, “Yep! Here, go take the test!” He pressed a kiss on your cheek and frantically handed you an already opened pregnancy test like a baton in a race.

You raised an eyebrow to him, before pausing as you caught a glance at the flowers in his other hand. You shook your head in disbelief, “Eiji look, I told you not to get too excited,” you pointed an accusing finger as you walked away toward to bathroom, “The test we took was old. It might have been a fake positive,” you hollered from the bathroom after shutting the door.

He followed you to the bathroom, but remained fidgety on the other side, “Well I know for a fact that it wasn’t a fake positive,” he replied with a slightly smug tone as he tried to mask his own nervousness.

“Oh yeah?” You laughed at his smugness, “Well… would that be such a bad thing?” You tried to sound lighthearted as you stared at the stick in front of you and waited for the second line to appear.

The two of you hadn’t really been planning for a child. You hadn’t ever really even talked about having children much, so when you missed your period last week and became sick this morning, this response from Kirishima was very unexpected.

He was way happier than you would have thought he would be. Just when you thought your beam of light couldn’t get any happier….

God, you didn’t want to let him down.

Suddenly Kirishima heard you scream on the other side of the door.

The man immediately burst through the door accidentally busting a portion of the frame, “Oh man, S-sorry. But WHAT IS IT!?”

“Happy face!” A smile split your face as you threw yourself at him for a hug.

“T-that means pregnant!?” He frantically stuttered, frozen in place.

“That means pregnant!” You hopped up and down.

He wasted no time at all as you scooped you up into his arms. The both of you laughed in unbelievable glee as he carried you to the living room and sat you down on the couch. He swiftly handed you the flowers, “Here you go, baby mama.” You laughed at his phrasing as he reach somewhere behind him to grab his drug store plastic bag.

“And these,” he smiled up at you, “for your stomach.”

Chocolate and…. B6?? What even is that? You threw him a confused glance, so he immediately explained.

“I was talking to a lady by the pharmacy about your morning sickness,” no wonder he took so long, you laughed at his diligence as he continued, “She said B6 can help. So the vitamins will do good for your stomach, and the chocolate will taste good for your stomach.”

Your face almost hurt from how hard your were smiling, “God, you really went all out! You really are hard headed you know that?”

“Only the best for my girls,” he argued as he pulled the stuffed alligator from behind his back.

“Oh my goodness!!” You explained with a laugh, the two of you always got each other crocodile things. The first thing you ever said to him in high school was a mocking joke about his choice in footwear—crocs. You laughed, “You think its a little girl, huh? Well, I think it’s a hard headed little boy just like his dad.”

“I guess we’ll see,” he said as he pecked you on the lips.

“I guess we will.” You smiled back at him.

🐻Shigaraki:

The two of you weren’t exactly on the greatest of terms. What was meant to be a drunken fling ended up turning into, in your opinion, a long, drawn out train-wreck of a relationship– if you could even call it that. 

You swear that that man has the mentality of a child, and it seemed like every time he would take a step toward the grand goal of maturity, something would come by and knock him two steps back again. 

So it was obviously not a shock to you that the overgrown baby was no where near prepared to raise a baby of his own. You almost expected him to storm off sooner than he did when you told him you were pregnant.

But he just stared at you.

“What? Would you stop staring at me like I’m some alien now?” you had thrown your hands on your hips as if to undermine any overwhelming feelings he had, “You did this to me!!” you had foolishly screamed at him, causing him paused in shock before storming away as you feared he would.

How could you say that to him? Then again, you knew you had your faults as well. After all you were the one who hid the pregnancy until you had begun to show. 

It was just too much for you to bare– the thought of being left alone to raise a snotty little thing, the thought of him staying and you being forced into a failing relationship, the thought of what kind of fucked up hero society you would raise the thing in. All of these thoughts festering in your mind over the past few months boiled into a harden crust and weighed down upon your mind. 

“Shit…” you sighed under your breath, finally releasing the flood of emotions that you had been holding back for all of these months in a wave of tears.

“Y/N,” Shigaraki’s voice suddenly snapped you out of your despairing trance, “Here,” he harshly shoved a soft object into your face much like a student would an unseemly note to his classmate. 

You looked down at the object and was completely surprised by what you saw, “A bear…?” you gawked at the plush object. He hadn’t ever bought you any gifts before.

“I wasn’t planning on staying with you,” he said very simply, his words sending a sharp pain through your heart.

Your still teary eyes blinked a few times as you tried to hold back your inevitable crying, “O-okay? I-“ he suddenly cut you off,

“I’m not as stupid as you might think. I can see that you are unhappy with me, so I was gonna just drop this… us,” he trailed off as if he were carefully preparing his next set of words, so you sat in silence and waited for them,

He finally spoke, “but knowing that we are expecting a child makes me really happy. Because it’s with you. I will… try to make you happier.”

You immediately wrapped your arms around him and held him closer to you than you ever had before, as if you were finally becoming one with him. You honestly didn’t know if the two of you would work out, but hearing those words come from him would make all of the difference in the possibility.

💥Bakugou:

“GOD DAMMIT! THE BRAT’S ON FIRE AGAIN, Y/N!!” You heard your husband screech from the other side of the house.

“WHAT?! ALREADY!?” You gave a groan in annoyance as you walked down the hall. You could already see light from the flames your son was probably swallowed up in in your living room. You shook your head in exasperation.

As soon as Bakugou spotted you coming, he threw you and expectant look, causing you to throw you hands on your hips as you chastised him, “Well, don’t just stand there looking at me! Grab the extinguisher!”

He immediately became defensive, “What do you think I am trying to do, you idiot! I can’t find it!” He roared back over your sons terrified screams.

“What do you mean you can’t find it?! We have one in every room now!” You screamed back as you picked up your son and hugged him close. The boy dropped something from his hand as you did so.

It was a blessing that you had just come back from work and had your fireproof hero costume on. You already had a full store of clothes that your young toddler had burned through. You patted him on his flaming back in a feeble attempt to soothe him. He continued wailing still.

Your poor baby! You knew he had your fire proof cells, but he was still terrified.

“Babe! Where’s that damn extinguisher!?” You called out.

“You must have moved it earlier this morning when he scorched your shirt!” He accused angrily.

“Oh crap. Well, grab the one from the kitchen, or playroom! And that was more than a scorch and you know it! My favorite blouse looked like a teenage bonfire,” You tried to defend yourself.

“Put me out mommy! Put me out!” Your son sobbed, clinging tightly to your chest as the flames raged around him, “we need ‘wata’!” Your heart broke a little at his hiccups and gasps,

“We can’t use water, baby,” your fire breathing quirk along side Bakugou’s oily nitroglycerin sweat resulted in a pretty terrifying combination for a small child who had a habit of setting himself on fire. The oily fire would only surge if you used water to extinguish it. That’s why you had special extinguishers made just for these occasions, “if DADDY FINDS AN EXTINGUISHER you’ll be okay! Remember? It doesn’t hurt.”

Bakugou suddenly burst back into the room, “I FOUND IT!” He screeched like a battle cry as you held your son an arms length away. Much like you often practiced, Bakugou flipped the nozzle of the red container and released the foamy continents as they sprayed all over your son.

You quickly calmed him down and cleaned him off as Bakugou ran to grab him some more clothes. The two of you worked like a well oiled machine as you swiftly dressed him and consoled him out of his sobs.

Your son eventually cried himself into a nap, meaning you’d have at least 2 hours to prepare for the next inevitable incident. You sighed as you slumped down onto the couch next to an already sprawled Bakugou, “What are we gonna do with this boy,” you shook your head.

“Train him how to use his damn quirk,” he huffed.

You sat up defensively, “We do!”

“Yeah, a few minutes a day,” he spat back.

“He’s a toddler, Katsuki, Jesus!” your face upturned.

“Tell him that! He’s the one spontaneously combusting!” he loudly argued, “Besides, he’ll be four in like a month.” 

It was a rare occurrence that he obtained his quirk so early. The two of you hadn’t expected it for years. 

But doctors theorized that quirks would soon come earlier in age as their power grew— your son might just be among the first of a new era. Different things like diet, stress, activity could all also trigger the quirks to come sooner.

“Well the doctors said his outbursts could be stress related!” Your face shriveled. You weren’t so ignorant to think that yours and Katsuki’s interactions weren’t stressful for a small child. It’s not that you guys weren’t happy together. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Loud and passionate was just the dynamic that the two of you shared, but your son was gentle and nervous somehow. Much like your brother. You shook your head as guilt ate away at your heart, “God, only three years in and we are messing him up already.”

“He’s not fucking messed up!” Your husband argued “He’s perfect!” He announced proudly. This sent a wave of happiness into your heart.

You never really expected Bakugou to be the doting father type, but he had pleasantly surprised you the past few years at how passionate he was about raising your son. Of course there were times where you would question his harsher parenting methods, but all in all, he was a very good, supportive, present father.

You looked up at him proudly, “Yeah,” you agreed with a soft smile.

“Plus, I fixed our plush toy issue,” your husband huffed, “that probably why he was easier to calm the hell down than usual.”

“Our… what?” You raised an eyebrow.

“You really didn’t notice? Are you fucking serious?” He sounded almost hurt, “You said he get’s even more worked up when he’s upset about melting or destroying his toys during his tantrums. So I fixed that problem,” he pointed to the scorched carpet in front of you and that’s when you noticed a small, unscathed plush doll.

Your heart melted. It was a little cute Ground Zero doll! “Oh! Wow! How long has he had that?!” You excitedly exclaimed as you bent down to pick up the fluffy Bakugou.

“I just had the agency brand them yesterday. It’s a fireproof prototype,” he gruffly explained nonchalantly. You immediately leaned over to him to give your thoughtfulness sweetheart of a man a kiss but he harshly threw his face away from you so you only caught his cheek.

All these years, and he still hated affection, “Whatever,” you huffed,  “I have a new man anyway,” you teased, causing him to angrily whip his head back towards you, only to see you placing a kiss on the small plushie.

“YOU ARE SO FUCKING WEIRD, YOU KNOW THAT!?!”

Suddenly you heard an explosion coming from your sons room, followed by familiar terrified wails, “MOMMYYY! PUT. ME. OUUUUUUT!”

Both you and Bakugou sighed before you angrily punched him on the arm for his loud mouth.

[musashi]

whatever im just directly responding to this one because apparently if i don’t you’ll just take every other post i make out of context

Okay, for anyone concerned, here’s the end to the tumblr user musashi saga. To reiterate, the original sin is that I blocked her without comment. 

the original sin is that you did something i’ve repeatedly stated is heavily traumatic. reducing it to you blocked me is an intentional downplaying of my feelings and baggage. i have a disclaimer in my BYF to not befriend me if you are incapable of ending a friendship civilly and instead ghost/abandon people. you read the BYF. You read the disclaimer. you did it anyways. you blocked me without a word. i thought we were friends, and you sliced me out of your life without so much as an explanation.

Because I saw her post this shit beating others down all the time. And I got tired. And then she did it to me.

i literally don’t know what you’re referring to. there’s no link here. i don’t beat anyone down. sometimes people mistreat me and i get rightfully mad at them for mistreating me. beyond that, i literally just blog about pokemon. in another post you said you unfollowed me over hazbin hotel or some shit, which is an animated show i’ve never seen and have no opinions on.

[screencap of a personal post where i’m clearly panicking]

cool! nice one. real empathy and compassion showing here.

I didn’t say any of this, aside from that we weren’t friends.  (edited to point this out.) We literally had only talked on a cursory level a handful of times. 

you’re literally missing the point. you said that we weren’t friends, and used that as your defense for literally blocking me. it doesn’t MATTER if you personally thought we weren’t friends. I thought we were friends. I thought you liked me. my feelings were hurt, i was crushed. just because you think its NBD “she probably doesn’t even remember me” doesn’t mean you are absolved. You may have thought that, and I believe you thought that, but you were mistaken. This made me even more upset--not only did my friend block me, but my friend didn’t even consider us friends.

even if i didn’t consider us friends, what you did to me was wrong. but the fact that i did and you don’t just means it hurts more. that’s literally it. i recognize that i didn’t mean to you what you meant to me, but that literally does not mean anything you did was okay. i don’t know how to spell this out further!!!!!

She also says that I am falsely claiming that I did not block her – a claim I never made– and also that I never apologized for unfollowing her, when in fact I did, repeatedly, trying to get this to stop.

YOU DID NOT APOLOGIZE. I DON’T UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU ARE TRYING TO GAIN FROM LYING ABOUT THIS. you keep saying this! what do i have to do to prove you didn’t apologize? does ANYONE reading this have ANY ideas??? Elliot literally won’t state, anywhere that i can FIND, WHERE he supposedly apologized. alledgedly, he’s sent me apologies MULTIPLE TIMES EVEN??? i dont know where i’m supposed to be looking. my tumblr DMs? my tumblr asks i think? i pretty obsessively read my ask box, i don’t have access to DMs but i never received any, of that I am sure. this is important to me and i would remember! you have not contacted me! the closest you have come to contacting me, besides publicly talking about me on your blog, is frantically sending my friend marcus a bunch of messages about me and then BLOCKING HIM AS WELL. ALL of this i learned because marcus came to me incredibly confused (as was i) asking why my name was coming up all of a sudden. that is ALL i have heard from you. there have been no apologies, no one on one chats. it is WAY easier for you to prove to your followers that you sent an apology than for me to prove that i didn’t receive one, so can you please? can you give me ANY ideas on how to prove that i’m telling the fucking truth? literally WHAT do i have to gain from lying about this????? do you think i get some kind of sick enjoyment out of this shit??? do you think having someone i thought was my friend on the opposite side of things makes me happy??????? do you think i enjoy this?? i don’t understand what you think i have to gain from lying! i didn’t receive an apology, a clarification, a single word from you! this is all the talking you have done with me. public talking, and talking through marcus. you have not contacted me. the last time i heard anything from you was probably an ask or dm you sent me months ago. i wish you would either believe me or just admit you didn’t apologize and send me even one message and have EVEN ONE CONVERSATION with me! i don’t understand how THIS is easier for you! i don’t understand why THIS is the way you did things, and why you’re insisting you tried any other approach!!! i literally just want to understand!!!!!

Literally please compare this post to what I have ACTUALLY said about the situation on my blog. 

ok i will

literally right here you posted an interaction between us. it’s just an ask where you asked me a question about getting to your ask and i responded. you go on to say ‘how am i supposed to get ‘friendship’ from this?’ and then you go on to talk about how i answered some other asks before yours, denoting the asks i answered as ‘friends’ and (correct me if im misunderstanding!!!) implying the ones i didn’t answer as ‘not friends.’ but that doesn’t make any sense. my friendship level with people has nothing to do with how readily i am to answer their asks. what asks i answer depends on time, energy, how compelled i am with the topic at hand, and a lot of other things. im looking at this screencap and i don’t understand how I’M supposed to get “not friends” from it. you posting this made me feel like you were reading deeply into every single interaction i had with you... i dont understand how i was supposed to know that the way i responded here was “unfriendly,” and i don’t understand how i’m supposed to know that me answering certain asks in a certain order has any connotation other than the literal one-wendy is answering certain asks in a certain order. and yeah sometimes i burnout or lose steam and just delete all my asks or don’t get to some. i didn’t realize i was being monitored on that too... thats what i was talking about in my personal post you very rudely put on display. i just thought we were friends, i didn’t realize there were all these... micro-interactions i had to be monitoring? i didn’t realize this stuff would make a difference about if you liked me back or not, i thought we were just friends and we liked each other already.

you also said:

She genuinely never called me by my name. She didn’t know how to spell it because she’d never spelled it before. My friends know that my name is not spelled like that because it’s 1 letter off from a very famous person. This wasn’t a guilt trip; it was truly just hurtful for her to address me by name the first time when she was calling me an asshole.

i didn’t know this was a social faux pas either. i am honestly really bad with names and even if i’ve known someone for years i will nervously check their blog to make sure i am getting their name right. i didn’t nervously check yours because when someone hurts me i can’t bear to look at their social media for fear of what i might find there. but i think “she spelled my name wrong and therefore we weren’t friends” (my understanding at least) is kind of drastic. if that is the case, i really don’t have as many friends as i thought i did.

sorry i did that, in any case. i’ll learn from it and not do it in the future.

I hope doing so makes it clear the extent to which a popular blogger (WHO I LITERALLY HARDLY SPOKE TO BEFORE THIS) 

like you literally just keep twisting the knife in. i don’t know how to tell you that how much i am able to talk to people has nothing to do with how much i like them and if i consider them a friend or not... this is hurtful. you keep bringing up how little we talked, or how i talked to you, and its hurtful. i just don’t understand why it’s so hard for you to understand that, esp when you’re autistic also. how have you not experienced exactly what you’re doing to me? someone who doesn’t understand the way you value a person’s company because they’re not allistic ways? i can’t talk to my friends all the time. sometimes, the most i can do is a like in their direction, a response to something they sent me, or even just silently reading their posts. 

what about this is not clicking? my ways of showing love and appreciation are different. you were in my private discord server, something that is HEAVILY vetted due to past abuse and full of people i consider my closest friends. you were someone i followed on tumblr, something i do not easily extend because of just how much rhetoric on this website upsets and overwhelm me. and regardless of if we didn’t talk enough by your standards, you still liked so many of my posts and i regarded you fondly and enjoyed seeing you and considered you my friend. just because my ways of showing appreciation were not in alignment with your ways or your standards, that doesn’t mean they don’t exist or matter.

has been intentionally manipulating my words and actions to make herself feel better about losing a follower she thought was cool, through her own actions at that. 

i’m not a “popular blogger,” who “lost a follower,” i’m a person who lost a friend. if i am really this... image you’re painting of me, of some social media influencer with “tens of thousands of followers” (i’m. not?? i don’t even have one 10k, let alone several) then why would i care about losing ONE?

i don’t know how to spell this out clearer. i’m traumatized. my trauma centers around repetitive abandonment from friends, more specifically blocking/softblocking/deactivating/moving blogs. to paint you a picture, there are certain posts on this website that actively trigger me despite being harmless, because they were the last post at the top of a friend’s blog before the friend remade their entire social media just to leave me in the dust. sometime’s i’ll be scrolling and some errant funnyman text post will send me spiraling.

and that’s what you did to me. that is why i am upset. it has nothing to do with making me feel better, it has nothing to do with manipulation, i do not need to manipulate this situation and to say that about a borderline having a fucking breakdown because someone perpetuated a horrible trauma she’s lived through time and time again is fucked up, wrong, and shitty. you are constantly downplaying my feelings by acting like just because you didn’t consider me a friend, what you did was okay. you refuse to talk to me one on one, or show me any indication of the apology you keep claiming you sent. and now you are acting as though this speaking out i am doing has to do with some ~tumbler dot corn callout dramaz~ instead of a person lamenting and hurting on her personal blog about yet another person hurting her in a very easily avoidable way.

i don’t know what “my own actions” are that drove you away. you didn’t have a conversation with me about them, or if you did i never saw it. i just woke up one day and you had blocked me. i still don’t know why you blocked me. i just know all the reasons you think it was an okay thing to do.

You can genuinely read back to see that what she claims I am saying and doing is at best self-aggrandizingly misinterpreted, and at worst actively and maliciously misleading.

maybe things wouldn’t get misinterpreted if you instead communicated with me instead of just ghosting me and trying to talk yourself out of the guilt of it. i don’t want to misinterpret anything, i just am having trouble understanding why you did any of this to me and your answers to all those questions aren’t helping me understand because i can’t ask about them in real time.

I am reiterating the same shit because it’s the truth. Her desperation to convince her tens of thousands of followers that I’m “lying”, while asserting that I said things that I did truly actually not and you can literally just go see that on my blog in writing, is tremendously telling.

i clarified some here, but i still don’t know where i’m supposed to be looking for this apology. 

again, i don’t have tens of thousands of followers, and me posting on this blog isn’t about reaching an audience or whatever, it’s about... processing the pain you’ve caused me.

I will say it bluntly now: You are not a person I would ever want to be friends with. 

thats fine, but i wish you would have just told me that instead of doing this. a lot of my friendships end because i was incompatible with a person who doesn’t feel the need to traumatize me to avoid having a conversation. you could’ve just shot me a DM and told me it wasn’t meant to be, and i could’ve thanked you for your time and moved on with my life.

I cannot be emotionally manipulated in such transparent ways, and I am not impressed by you. If that makes you mad, I hope the fire keeps fizzling.

my suffering won’t make your life better, and demonizing me won’t lessen the guilt of what you did to me. you’ll heal a lot faster if you just admit to even just yourself that maybe you could’ve handled things more gracefully. 

this is exactly what you did to me. and you confronted one of my friends asking for space/understanding about why it hurt you. right here you literally ask marcus, word for word, what i wanted for you. the hypocrisy you’re showing me is astounding.

[piamii]

Taking a mental health day from work today but was really conflicted about how to word it.

Last year I took a few mental health days but there were 6 of us so maybe it was less conspicuous

It’s only me this year and I for some reason keep feeling this push pull with my supervisor to be close and honest with her

Last night I was feeling ok about work. But after once again not sleeping properly I feel like somethings up with me

I’m feeling all the ways I used to feel about my mental health

Being small is not okay, it’s not okay to let go, I’m responsible for all of my clients progress and safety

Which is true in a way but

I also have beeen thinking about the difference between me and my supervisor

She’s the only person I see on a regular basis. Like I see her 4 times a week

So I don’t know how to be myself, a postdoc

I keep comparing myself to her

I wondered to myself would anyone else take a mental health day in my position?

Who cares, others aren’t me

It’s like I forgot I’m extremely sensitive and have been sobbing every day and not sleeping well at all during the weekdays

My nutrition and hydration and shit has been ok, so I’m not getting sick which is the weird part

Im so incredibly emotionally constipated

There are so many incredibly destructive thoughts in my head right now that haven’t been addressed

Things have just gotten increasingly harder for a long time now and I can’t tell where adjustment starts and my dysfunctional mental state ends

Is it really ok for me to say work is too much?

Does it make me pathetic?

Didn’t I feel this way in all previous years too?

2nd year, it wasn’t like this but at least I was more honest with myself about how anxious and nervous I was about work. I definitely took it easy and complained more often. I slept poorly frequently on clinical days and would feel really angry about it. I don’t think I got sick more than once that year

3rd year i wasn’t sleeping quite as poorly but still had sleep problems, hated my commute. That was the year I kind of had to start blocking people out of my life, like not completely but was so down and exhausted that I couldn’t function socially outside of work and school. I didn’t get sick much tho. Definitely noticed SAD symptoms starting this year but to be honest felt somewhat depressed on and off through early winter until spring which is I guess the colder darker months in OR. I think I had some SI but it was towards the end of winter

4th year was when I had more somatic issues. My sleep was honestly not bad that year comparatively speaking but when m and I broke up during internship application season I had a bunch of health issues that resolved shortly after my interviews ended. Tbh internship interviews were a nice reprieve from the dark slump that probably would have hit me if I had just done school in the winter. I had my first sinus infection in spring and went to see Slushii anyways Hahahha.

Internship year... I had a sinus infection too and got a cold maybe 2 other times. Last year was the most I’ve ever gotten sick. I took a mental health day maybe like 3 times and actually used sick days too. I want to say this was the hardest year for me mental health wise until this year in terms of symptoms but the best in terms of self care. By like April/May I was feeling really good about life. Maybe it’s the weather here too idk

This year feels so much harder than the other years combined. I’ve used one sick day and two mental health days and I’m having a hard time understanding where I’m at mental health wise in conjunction with who I need to be to do well at work. It feels like I’m growing at an unmanageable pace. I’ve had the most frequent SI I’ve ever had in my life which is somewhat alarming to me. I’m safe don’t worry but I’m just saying the thoughts coming into my head. My sleep is getting reallynfucked up over these last 2 weeks. I sleep like a baby on the weekends which makes me feel like it’s stress related. On one hand I’m acclimating to this insane amount of stress and on the other hand it feels like every day I’m being stretched open and carved out.

I’m not even ruminating that much before bed anymore. Like I’m not actively distressed like I used to be when things hit me hard last year. I’m just constantly unhappy and anxious this year which I feel like is my lot in life right now. My self care has gotten much better last year and this year, but this year it’s been harder to find ways to relax. Things went downhill really fast, when the seasons finally changed here and I started seeing 4 of my clients in the field. I am most definitely consistently working over 40 hrs a week now. I tried really hard last year to work less whenever I could and honestly the agency was pretty good about giving us a reasonable workload. But now it feels like I’m meeting the real world, where work just comes at you and never says sorry. You had to do extra and stay longer this week? Sucks for you. You have to completely uproot your already untenable schedule because one of your clients has really a really complex risk presentation? Welp that’s the price of doing this work.

Like when I was told the weeks here typically don’t go past 40 hrs I feel like I was lied to. I feel alone and singled out bc I’m the only postdoc this year. I want to know how C felt 2 years ago. If there were 2 of us I feel like I’d be having an okay time. Can you fucking believe they had a hard time building to full caseload last year? It cannot be just me in this position. I want to give up every day.

I don’t feel protected I don’t feel like I can ever let my guard down. There is no one I talk to regularly that I can be honest with. I don’t have the energy to relay this information to the people I do talk to regularly which at this point is my supervisor and M. And like hell im going to tell my supervisor this stuff.

Is this the real world?

Something tells me it is, but I have to find a way through it somehow

I’m still debating about this one client. She’s on my mind a lot and I’m scared which is probably a parallel experience to what her family is experiencing.

The fuck you mean our ethical duty? What am I supposed to take away from that convo? I know I have my own voice and opinion but that made me feel really bad for not doing exactly as you said. I know I tend towards the anxious paranoid side of things but that really scared me because instilll can’t think straight about this client and I sure as hell cant go to you.

The relationship between e and I has changed too, I think she’s overwhelmed too

Something that keeps popping up over and over again is- how fucking awful it would be for a client to complete suicide

I know it happens and it’s time I face that this could happen

It’s a terrifying thought and I almost don’t want to tell anyone that I’m having it

It feels shameful and dangerous to think about, because if I can’t handle it who could?

Who can contain this for me and tell me it’s okay? I don’t want to fucking hear that I should do more

It’s a complex mess of emotions inside my head. I understand why I would need to do more in this situation but there’s no room for it. I want help in trying to balance but my schedule is already unbalanced and bringing me into a dark place emotionally.

What if because I took today off no one sees my hospital patients all week?

Friday is going to suck ass if that’s the case

I could ask my supervisor directly to see them

But I want to be small today

And that would take a lot from me

How does the psychology service work at the hospital during Xmas break?

Uhhhh....

Shit.

I’m scared for some stupid reason that someone will make me stay during break or I’ll have to work some crazy stupid long hours on Friday

I hate ongoing patients bc they still need to be seen but it’s kind of your choice whether or not to see them

It’s like adding an automatic to do to the list every time I’m there but the task takes 2 hrs at least

I’m always scared I have to stay late at the hospital, luckily the latest has been 6:30 but I’m terrified every time I go in that it’s going to be longer

This is new for me and it’s ok to get freaked out

To not have a clear idea how much I am going to work each day and each week really puts me off

I feel pathetic because aren’t there a lot of jobs that are unpredictable like that? Especially once you become salaried ?

My stomach is starting to hurt

It’s weird because I haven’t gotten any somatic symptoms this year but I’ve also been sobbing my eyes out every day so maybe that’s why my body is feeling okay. I haven’t really cried the last few days because I’m just very tired of crying at this point, so maybe that’s why my stomach has been hurting a bit more

Every time m says something nice to me, hell anytime anyone says something nice to me I start to cry and I’m just so fucking done with crying and feeling out of control just to have nothing change and things even get harder at work

Fuck!!!!!

I haven’t properly dealt with this terrified feeling

I have to tell myself this feeling is informative but separate from reality

I’m so fucking scared.

[taexual]

HOLIC - 2 | jb x reader

Strangers, united by their big dreams, try to learn to live together and lift each other up to reach their goals without losing themselves or their relationship on the way to the top.

pairing: Im Jaebum x Reader

genre: enemies to lovers au | roommate au

warnings: strong language, mentions of sexual themes

words: 2.9k

disclaimer: i do not own the gif, please let me know if it belongs to you, so i can give proper credit

          prev / next

You and Jaebum watched each other for a good minute, both unable to find the words to say in this situation. The classic “so, we meet again” crossed your mind but it sounded oddly childish so you chose not to voice this thought and stayed quiet while Jaebum’s unreadable eyes burned into yours.

“I don’t understand,” he was the one who started to speak. You felt like you’ve won the game of who could stay quiet longer, even if neither of you had officially agreed to play it. “You’re… you.”

He wasn’t very specific with his description but you understood exactly what he meant.

“Yeah,” you said, crossing your arms over your chest defensively. “And you’re… a-a guy.”

“Obviously,” Jaebum retorted. “But how you are a girl is beyond me. We’ve been talking for, what, two months now? And you never once mentioned you were a girl.”

“You never mentioned you’re a guy, either.”

“That’s because I thought you were, too!”

“Well, I thought you were a girl,” you said. “You had a cat as your profile picture, what kind of guys use cats for their—”

“What, so now only girls are allowed to use cats as their profile picture?” he countered before you finished. “How is the usage of cats for profile pictures even restricted to a specific gender?”

He did have a very good point that completely shattered all arguments you might have had and that frustrated you. What pissed you off even more was the small part of your mind – the same part which hated all men today, even if you knew it was stupid and, probably, temporary – kept whispering to you, he’s a guy! It’s his fault! All of this!

“So am I to blame for this?” you decided to say. “If I remember correctly, you never clarified what your gender was, either. Def sounds exactly like something a girl who’s trying to go for a mysterious look would use as her username.”

“How is Def mysterious?”

You looked away from him. “I thought those were your initials.”

“Oh, so did my initials sound feminine to you?” Jaebum’s voice had risen. “Is that why you assumed I was a girl so easily?”

Not liking the way he continued to act as if all of this was your fault, you groaned. “Well, did I sound masculine to you? What was it that made you think I’m not a girl? My excessive usage of emojis when we first met? My undoubtedly very masculine profile description which has an all-girls school listed as my education?”

“I…” Jaebum was quick to open his mouth and just as quick to close it again. But then he scoffed, his cocky attitude returning. “Did you really think I checked what school you went to? How was I supposed to know it’s an all-girls one?”

“So, you did exactly zero research about the person you were moving in with?”

“Of course! I’m not a stalker.”

“Yeah, you’re a dude alright,” you snarled.

Jaebum frowned, finally giving you an emotion that wasn’t as self-assured as the ones he’s shown you before. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” you responded and the two of you went back to the angry, confused silence you’ve shared before.

This time, neither one of you broke it for another few minutes. Then, you both got tired of standing there, staring at each other as if the two of you were having a face-off in a western movie. Next line would have surely been, “this apartment ain’t big enough for the both of us.”

But no next line came because Jaebum huffed – breaking the silence for a brief moment – and turned around to face the door of the apartment. He was here for less than ten minutes and now he was off again.

“What are we going to do?” you ended up calling after him, knowing that you were absolutely not going to sit still and think about this while he was out, cruising for a new one-night-stand, most likely.

“What is there to do?” he replied, not turning back. “This whole thing is too weird. We’re not doing this.”

“Alright,” you played along even though the easy way he said it offended you. You two may have only known each other in real life for one day – or one night – but he could’ve still shown a little bit of regret, given the fact that you’d spent two whole months getting to know each other before you found this large gap in your knowledge that seemed to change everything. “Which one of us is moving out, then?”

“I meant, we’re not talking about this like—” Jaebum started to explain and, for the lack of a better comparison, ended up saying, “—like we’re a couple on the verge of a break-up, alright? We’ll just deal with this later. I don’t know.”

You didn’t like later. Later meant you had to spend the whole night tossing and turning in bed as your mind was busy trying to come up with a solution to a problem that clearly didn’t seem all that important to your roommate.

“Deal how?” you pushed, fighting for a peaceful night of slumber. “In my opinion, there are only two ways to solve this. Either you move out or I do.”

“Why would I move out?” he questioned. “I found the apartment.”

“I-I—“ you began but the sudden surge of anger at his particularly egotistic response overwhelmed your mind so much that for a moment, you weren’t able to formulate a single coherent thought. “Wow, okay. So, you want me out of here, then?”

“You said there are only two ways to solve this,” Jaebum replied, shrugging his shoulders.

He wasn’t looking at you so you couldn’t tell if his face looked as remorseless as his words were but you had a feeling it did. What exactly had attracted you to him that night at the bar? He was starting to seem more repulsive by the second.

“Right,” you said. “And, naturally, you’re going with the solution that benefits you the most.”

“Wouldn’t everyone?”

“I don’t know,” you shot back. “Normal people would try to find a compromise.”

Jaebum rolled his eyes at this, rolling his head back as well, before looking at you with pursed lips that strengthened the annoyed look he was going for.

“You’re doing this again,” he informed you, his voice irritated.

“Doing what? Trying to decide what’s going to happen on my own because you’re being no help?” you tried.

You could tell you were pissing him off more by purposefully pretending to misunderstand everything he was telling you and countering everything he said with something that actually made sense, but you couldn’t stop now. Perhaps the rational thing to do would have been to try to calm down and then talk about this like adults – which, clearly, neither of you were – but Jaebum was getting on your very last nerve and you’d have rather died than not done the same thing to him in retaliation.

“I’m going to go,” he said and you knew this statement was a final decision. You weren’t sure what he was going to do if you disagreed with this and yet, for some reason, you didn’t want to find out. “You can do whatever you want here.”

Whatever you wanted was exactly what you did as soon as he left. You went back to your room – although it wasn’t really your room since, apparently, you’d be moving out of here soon – and returned everything you’ve unpacked into the boxes again. You only left the sheets on the mattress because, whether Jaebum liked it or not, you were spending this night here. It was almost eight-thirty already, there was no way you were getting another van to transfer your stuff someplace else.

Sitting down on the mattress, you almost laughed at the thought of having to call the same driver who had explicitly warned you to make sure he won’t have to take your belongings out of here after you met your roommate. God, you really should have seen this coming. Everyone else did and they warned you about it, too.

You hated yourself for jumping head-first into this adventure-gone-wrong and you needed to talk to someone about it. Getting your phone out, you texted your friends’ groupchat. You tried to reply to some of their messages but they quickly noticed that you seemed distracted and asked what was wrong. Right as you finished typing the message about what went down when you moved in, you hesitated, your finger hovering above the “send” button.

They warned you it could come to this since you didn’t know enough important information about your roommate and here you were, about to prove them that they were right. That you were wrong. The patronizing “I-told-you-so” wasn’t going to make you feel better about yourself and your very poor decision-making skills.

Deleting the text message, you chose to give them the abridged version of what happened.

“My roommate is out,” you said under your breath, typing the words as you spoke them. “I haven’t gotten a chance—no, wait, but I did get a chance. He was back here and he was a complete dick about everything.”

You groaned, deleting the message again. There really wasn’t much you could have told your friends without revealing the entire truth and without having to lie.

Finally, you ended up just letting them know that you were tired, so you’d be going to sleep. They didn’t pry – they could tell you didn’t want to talk about it right now – and instead changed the topic. You were surprised that reading their text messages about the most mundane things actually calmed you down. There was Kiera still freaking out about her crush from work. There was Hyojin who had just broken her oven after she didn’t read the instructions on the microwave pizza box very carefully. And there was May who was sick and tired of studying – it was her last year of college, that poor girl – so she was just looking for someone to drink with.

They didn’t have to worry about suddenly moving in with their one-night-stand – and thank God for that – and they surely didn’t have to worry about finding a proper excuse to explain the reasons why they had to move out twelve hours after moving in.

Another thirty minutes later, you sighed, pulling away from the calming groupchat and putting your phone down. You had secretly hoped Jaebum would return before you fell asleep so maybe the two of you could finally talk about this and find a sensible solution – you didn’t want to live with him, either, but moving was a difficult process and you’ve already unpacked almost everything – but, clearly, Jaebum wasn’t going to be back unless you were sleeping.

No surprise there. He’s already bailed on you while you were sleeping once.

You thought you heard the first bump in your dream so you didn’t react in any way. The second bump, however, happened much closer and you flinched, startling yourself awake as you realized you weren’t dreaming at all. Someone really was approaching your room.

You debated screaming but as soon as you opened your eyes, you were really more terrified of the unknown surroundings – because you weren’t in your bedroom –  than the mysterious noises. This wasn’t the room you were used to and you spent at least twenty seconds trying to understand how you got here before your sleepy mind finally allowed you to remember that you’d moved out.

Grabbing your phone to call 911 because the steps outside of your door were getting louder, you also glanced at the time. 3:58am. The perfect time to get killed while half asleep.

You clutched the blanket tighter to yourself, not really planning to use it as a weapon in case this was an actual intruder, but rather hoping to use it for safety purposes and, for example, throw it on the attacker while you fled. It seemed like an innovative and, hopefully, successful idea and you felt a little more confident as you awaited the door of your bedroom to open.

The thought that this could have just been Jaebum finally returning home didn’t even cross your mind, so when you saw his face behind your open door, you gasped as if you’d seen a complete stranger, just wandering in your apartment at the witching hour. To some extent, he really was just a stranger. But you were living with him. For tonight, at least.

Just like that, the memory of the argument you’ve had before he left returned.

“What the fuck are you doing?!” you yelled, your voice groggy from sleep and irritation. “Do you know what time it is?”

“No,” Jaebum replied, talking quietly because he didn’t think it was right to speak louder in your pitch-black room. He could only see a meter in front of him because that’s how much the light from the hallway illuminated, so he took a small step forwards. “What time is it?”

“Definitely not early enough for you to be in my room,” you shot back, watching him take another tentative step towards your mattress. His legs seemed to wobble a little as he walked and you squinted at his silhouette. “Fuck, are you drunk?”

“I’m not, shit, there are just so many boxes in your room and it’s dark, and—”

“Why are you in my room?” you cut him off, hoping he’d stop walking before he tripped over a box and then proceeded to sue you because of it. He seemed exactly the type of person to do this. But, then again, you could have attributed all the worst traits to Jaebum simply because he woke you up after leaving you hanging in the middle of an argument.

“I wanted to apologize,” Jaebum said and silence was the response to his statement because an apology was not what you had expected from him. Realizing this, he continued, “I was rude. I didn’t mean to act like I’m kicking you out of this apartment. It’s not fair for me to do that.”

It only took him seven hours to realize this. You couldn’t help but still feel vexed with him.

“Well, then,” you said. “I’m glad you finally see it.”

Jaebum remained unphased by your harsh tone, though. “I just wanted to say that we signed the lease on the apartment on the same day, so it’s equally yours as it is mine. It really wouldn’t be fair for either of us to move out.”

You had a hunch where he was going with this and yet your heart still started to beat faster in anticipation of his next words.

“Maybe we should both stay,” he said, having a hard time speaking because he still hadn’t adjusted to the darkness of your room so he couldn’t see your eyes. “We both have jobs, I’m sure we won’t see each other that often anyway. Maybe it’ll work.”

You had been angry at him for attempting to kick you out but you weren’t sure if you wanted him to take his words back and offer to try living together instead. Naturally, this should have been the solution you’ve been looking for since you were so opposed to moving out, but it still felt weird.

Jaebum was the person you had slept with. He had left before you woke up so he wouldn’t have to participate in any type of pillow talk the next morning. He had thanked you for a “good night” in a note, which, you were obviously still bitter about.

But… at the same time, he was also the person that you’ve gotten to know from an ad. He was the same person who understood your complaints about commercial holidays, such as Valentine’s Day, because both of you had spent the majority of these holidays single and frustrated. He was also the same person who had stayed awake with you a couple of nights in a row, because the two of you were so deeply involved in a discussion about your favorite artists that you simply couldn’t go to sleep.

You could see very clearly now that Jaebum had multiple sides to him. There was the side he’d shown you as a temporary lover – you cringed at the word – and then there was the side he’d shown you as a friend and a potential roommate.

You couldn’t control your curiosity as you wondered how many more sides of him were there and how many of them were fake. You weren’t sure if he’d ever satisfy your curiosity by actually revealing himself to you but, at the end of the day, you didn’t care about that as much as you cared about having an actual roof to sleep under.

“Yeah, alright,” you decided, hoping that the late hour didn’t influence your decision and, contrary to the morning after you had slept with him, you weren’t going to regret this tomorrow. “Let’s see what happens.”

               chapter directory

[xurkitips]

On Conveying Personality Through Chatroom-style Dialogue

A friend of mine shared screenshots of a roleplay he was having via a Discord server, wherein the style was chatroom/texting based. Each character would have a different style of typing completely unique to their person. Though unfamiliar with all of them, I could see what their personalities were like

Like real human beings, a character very much so has a “voice”. I mean that both in the literal sense, through their manner of speaking and what they say, but also through their self expression, interests, and actions. This carries over into the digital realm in ways we may not even notice. Text messages may not be verbal, no, but there are ways to show inflection.

There are many, many ways to show meaning through text. Here are some that I’ve picked up and utilized with my own characters:

Sentence structure

all lowercase sentences VS Grammatically correct

Lowercase gives off the feeling of someone familiar with others or willing to become familiar. It lacks the tension of formal writing, complete with its capitalization and proper periods ending sentences, and feels very casual and approachable. It may also be a sign of someone who doesn’t care much about perfection, a lazy person, or an easy going individual. Seems like a lot of internet regulars prefer this kind of typing style.

“im dying

‘deafening horrorcore rap’ ok i listen to literal noise and idk what this even is”

Using a properly capitalized and punctuated style is very formal, like one would see in a book, an official email, etc. It’s more serious and stern than lowercase is and may imply an older, more mature person typing...or maybe just someone trapped on their phone at the mercy of autocorrect. 

"I am always happy to see you, even if you are not feeling your best.“

“It's nice here.

Quiet.”

There’s a certain respectful steadiness to it as well. It can be calming to read at times.

Punctuation VS Lack of punctuation

End-stopped lines come with both a pause and a bit of a pointed and direct feeling. It strengthens both lowercase and grammatically correct styles, but in different ways. In conjunction with “proper” writing, it’s less noticeable, merely giving the reader a moment’s pause. In conjunction with lowercase, especially if the one typing isn’t keen on using periods, it can come off as stern, serious, passive-aggressive, or angry.

“whatever.

it's less excruciating than it would be without it.”

Removal of punctuation is a different story. Typically just shown with lowercase, it leaves it with that casual feeling intact, or like one’s sentences are more like quick thoughts or questions. Removing them from grammatically correct sentences does ease off some of the tension, implying someone with a more neutral-positive tone while still being more mature. 

“I’m not terribly good with conversation”

And then there’s the run-on sentences from those who type small novels per response. Usually complete with multiple and’s. It’s a sign of nervousness, enthusiasm, or oftentimes a younger character...

“actually i don't know much about it i just happened to see something online and it's apparently only manufactured overseas exclusively for this one particular shop and they made the original design and initial product i guess”

Oof.

Proper spelling (or lack thereof)

The better the spelling, the more the likelihood of the person being older, calmer, or neutral. There’s also a sense of being well educated or careful about one’s typing. Perhaps a confident air may exude from what they say, too.

“Can you come help me for a moment?”

Those who make a lot of mistakes will simply confuse words for other words, forget apostrophes, or type too fast to notice things missing or in the wrong location. Some just don’t really care enough or are too tired to deal with it. Too much focus and people know what they mean anyway. Probably.

“i laug hso hard hes come runin

he thougt i aws dyin”

It can also happen in very emotional situations, in bouts of laughter, crying, rage, or when one is drowsy, medicated, or sick. It tends to stand out when one’s style is suddenly very, very different and tips others off to something being wrong.

Younger characters, especially kids, also make spelling mistakes all the time depending on their age, whether due to sounding out words or just in a hurry to reply.

Short sentence fragments, single words, and lengthy paragraphs

Sometimes people with rapid-fire thoughts, who are excited, busy, stressed, or angry, will take to quick and short responses (sometimes of many fragments in a row). These show a similar feeling as do lines of poetry. Stacking small fragments on top of one another adds emphasis. The reader has to read them one by one rather than as a straight sentence. On its own, the word or fragment stands out and becomes more important.

"well

yeah thats

what i was tryina do

but i mean”

I’ve seen it used used for storytelling from one person to another in larger chunks of things, quick responses, for poetic value, and in irritation or passive-aggressiveness.

In full sentence conversations sent in short bursts, it’s also allowing the reader pause to read each comment without it feeling like a novella. Though it can also feel like someone is obnoxious, rambling on and on as the notifications keep coming, or has a lot to talk about and keeps thinking of more.

Then there are those who type rather large responses all at once instead of hitting the enter key with every sentence:

"Whoever did it was quite thorough; either the power in that area of the lab was cut while we were distracted or they tampered with the security cameras, because that footage is missing. But, we have some theories now. It had to have been someone with direct access to the laboratory. I hesitate to place blame on any of my coworkers...they're all my trusted companions and friends! And yet...”

It’s concise and a solid, complete story in one spot. Could be someone who loves to talk, could be someone who didn’t want a response before they were done talking. It’s also commonly seen by middle-aged texters who want to say everything they can all at once.

Exclamation points and Question marks

Simple one here. Question mark for a question or confusion, exclamation point for emphasis or an exclamation. But when a person adds multiple to a sentence it can convey more of the person’s feelings; 

“are you okay??”

Here is someone who is very concerned. Multiple question marks can imply things such as worry, stress, disbelief, and shock. There’s a sense of hurry and tension. Perhaps the person on the other end is frightened, easily afraid, or tends to have an overwhelming reaction to things.

“oh!!! it’s nice to see you!!!”

"! 

!!! 

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Meanwhile, multiple exclamation points convey much more friendlier, happier tones. Often such things as surprise, excitement, happiness, friendliness. Users typing !! as a punctuation (like I tend to do) may do it as an assurance or to show how thrilled they are to talk. Occasionally !!!! is tacked onto an angry statement to be more of a shout, but I see it less and less.

Chatspeak and Internet habits

Shortenings of words have been a regular thing for ages. It’s easy, convenient, and gets the point across quickly. But the internet has taken it to a new extreme, where sentences can be almost entirely compromised of them.

“wtf r u talkin abt?? gdi man idk wuts even happening rn”

A character wanting to be quick to respond, always on the ball, always involved, may be more likely to utilize and understand chatspeak. They’re the social butterfly of the group. It’s also a sign of a long-time internet lurker who’s aware of what the lingo is, and how to use it. A complete lack thereof points toward either an older user or someone who’s unused to social media.

The more memes, the harder someone is trying to fit in. Or maybe they’re easily amused or just absorbed things from their friends without thinking about it. The comedian of the group is going to know the best ways to use them.

Smilies and Emojis

:D D: :DDD // :3 3: >:3 :3c // :o :O O:<

These kinds of smilies have always struck me as the most friendly. Whether used in devious ways or with genuinely heartwarming intentions, the playful, lightheartedness of the user really shines through these. 

"not a bad way to spend a lazy day :D”

“it's also my birthday :3″

It’s got just the right vibe to punctuate a sentence that’ll leave the reader feeling that the person likely means no harm or wants to be friendly, positive, or encouraging. I’ve met a lot of people that use these and turn out to be very kind or considerate people.

:), ;), ((((: and related

A long time positive, friendly smiley. 

"You said you've known them a long time? I think they would understand. :)”

And yet these days I tend to associate it with passive aggressive statements, plotting, slyness, devious behavior, or anger. Older users may be inclined to use :) as a means to show their emotional state, but newer users seem more inclined to do the opposite. The more parentheses there are, the more upset the person, it seems.

“man don’t u love it when the power’s out in the middle of the night it’s just (((: really great thanks (((((:”

Then the ;) smiley comes off more specifically flirty and a bit playful. Doesn’t seem to change much there.

“if i find a good chance 2 hook u up ill do my best ;)”

XD

The bane of my teenage existence. It’s a more old school sign of laughter, rarely seen in today’s world due to falling out of favor and becoming associated with, “LOL Rawr XD Tacos I’m So Randoom,” culture. But time to time you do see it. Mostly with sarcasm but sometimes with genuine intentions.

“xDddddDDD

It was a good joke. XD”

A character using it genuinely comes off more playful, and to me, personally, as an older person who’s genuinely unaware of the associations with the smiley itself trying to show how they laughed without using LOL. 

Letter/Character smilies

Y’know, things like .w. and ._. or owo, where the letters or symbols make a face. These are fairly popular, it seems. I don’t like using them myself, but know a few who do use them.

"I'm sorry that they can be mean qmq”

It’s a different feel from the others. There’s something soft to it, almost a gentleness. When these or Japanese characters are used, there’s more whimsy. It’s cute and almost a bit feminine. It may convey an open person or give the impression that said person is easier to talk to.

Though honestly I can’t see uwu and owo as anything but heavily sarcastic. I’ll be honest with you.

Emojis

The first rule of Xurkitips club is that we don’t talk about Emoji Movie. Just putting that out there riiight now.

Used sparingly by most for fun and for emphasis. Characters may use them to be lighthearted, aesthetically, joke, or to make a conversation more flavorful. The use of emojis may determine a character’s personality; I find that characters who use hand emojis like 👌 are rather laid back, those who use 🙃 do it passive aggressively, and we all know what kind of person uses 🍆.

Then there’s what in common terms known as, “The DudeBro”:

[MFKNSTARBOI]: the thing i never undstood about hair is why people buy shampoo like regular soap not good enough for you LMAO 😂😂😂

[gostones]: .

[BIGDICKTOYOTA69]: what the fuck man

[ahogekun]: do... you not use shampoo

[MFKNSTARBOI]: aaaah you guys got sucked into big shampoo as well 😔

[MFKNSTARBOI]: When it comes to horses 🐎  the stars in the sky ✨ or just man to man no bullshit advice 👬 IM youre guy 😤😂

I think this one speaks for itself.

[imagine-darksiders]

A few days ago I came down with a bad cold and only made it worse by going out to class in the cold and the rain. Suffice to say I was running a high fever when I returned and suffering from recurring dizzy spells. Im feeling a bit better today but could you maybe help a sick person out and do a scenario with the very worried Horsemen, Azrael, Samael, and the Watcher when their s/o comes down with a high fever that causes them to be dizzy and delerious? Something cute would certainly be nice.

Anon, I am so sorry. I suck. I wish I’d gotten to this when you were unwell. Death’s is set weirdly so bear with me, lets just say you’ve been somehow transported into The Abomination Vault and leave it at that… xoxoxo

Azrael: The poor angel is a fusspot regardless of whether you’re ill or not. So when he paid a visit to your home following up on the promise of showing you an ancient Earthen text the Keeper had given him to transcribe. 

You’d entirely forgotten about the angel’s impending visit, dressed in a dirty pair of jogging bottoms, wooly jumper and thick socks. Despite your pitiable state that clearly suggests you really ought to be in bed, you continue to bustle around your home. You start at a knock on your front door, grumbling about visitors, you pull it open to reveal a softly smiling angel. With a croak, you slam the door shut, not really thinking, just aghast that he should see you in such a dishevelled state when you’d entirely forgotten he was even coming. 

“….Certainly not the warmest welcome, but I suppose I’ve received worse.” Came Azrael’s muffled voice from the other side of the wood. You grimace with shame and turn to open the door again, this time to see Azrael peering at you warily. The caution turns to concern however when he sees how peaky you’re looking. “Sorry Azrael, I was hoping you wouldn’t have to see me like this..”

 “Y/n?! What in Heaven’s name is the matter? You look terribly sick.” He folds his wings delicately as you step back to allow him inside, ducking under the doorframe as gracefully as he could before straightening up again and allowing his feathers to brush against your walls. 

You open your mouth to answer, but a cough worms its way up your throat forcing you to splutter into your sleeve, waving away Azrael’s approaching hands. “I’m fine, Az.” You at last croak out, “It’s just a cold, that’s all.” The angel, however, looks less than convinced, placing a soft hand against your forehead and frowning when he feels your temperature has skyrocketed. “Hmm…” He ponders, “It’s good I came along when I did….” 

Azrael sighs and looks down at you with a strict expression on his features, “You need rest, Y/n. I implore, let me take care of you.” You shake your head rapidly, unwilling for the angel of death to sacrifice so much of his time in look after you when you could easily do it yourself…Unfortunately, the motion of shaking your head ‘no’ winds up causing an overwhelming dizziness to wash its way over you. Without warning, you begin to teeter on your feet before falling gracelessly towards the ground. 

You land with a small ‘oomf’ in silk covered arms that lift you carefully into the air, accompanied by the sound of someone humming in discontent… Azrael comes to the decision that he’d be best suited to looking after you at his home in the White City, so he takes you there at once. 

For an entire week, the angel is at your total beck and call. Not that you ask for his help much anyway. He’s an attentive nurse, constantly keeping close watch and monitoring your fever. He keeps assuring you that you are not a burden, and he’s just glad to be able to properly administer care. Azrael makes you promise next time that you’ll tell him if you’re unwell. 

Death: He’s unsure where you could have picked this bug up… Being separated from any other human by an entire realm. Still, here you were, bundled in one of his spare cowls on Despair’s saddle as he rode from the Keeper’s world. 

“The Grand Abominations have been released, the council are up in arms about it and on top of all that, I now have to deal with a sick Y/n…” Death grumbled, causing you to blush with shame at being such a burden.

“I’m sorry Death…” You croak miserably, setting off another round of coughing. The horseman behind you lets out a quiet sigh. “No, no. This isn’t your fault…It just couldn’t have come at a worse time.” 

You nod in agreement, only slightly set at ease that he doesn’t hold you accountable for your sudden illness. 

There’s a noticeable lapse in conversation after that, during which you stare miserably at Despair’s neck, while Death stares down at you. In truth, the horseman was worried. Your health had been gradually declining over the past few days and he both unprepared and unwilling to allow it to claim you just yet…. 

All of a sudden, the horseman is roused from his thoughts by a warning squeal from Despair. Death notices you’ve slipped out of the saddle and curses himself for not seeing you fall. Just before your head connects with the ground, Death slams himself down against his mount’s neck and grabs at you. His hand finds the hem of your trousers and he stops your descent just in the nick of time. With a dramatic sigh, Death hefts you back into Despair’s saddle and begins to shake you. “Y/n?” he calls….No response. “Damn.” he mumbles to himself. Pulling the steed to a stop, the horseman drops to the ground, exercising a surprising amount of care in removing you afterwards. 

Death props you against a rock and stands up, hands resting on his hips as he scowls down at you disapprovingly. 

“Of all the inconsiderate…” He begins, resigning himself to having to wait until you’ve at least recovered a little before he sets off again. Death knows he could easily just leave you there. Never have to worry about you again. Wouldn’t that be nice? 

……No……

Something deep in his gut lets him know that the very idea is as abhorrent as it is cruel. Besides, loath as he is to admit it, he likes you. Much to his chagrin. With yet another deep sigh, Death slumps to the ground beside you, glancing your way briefly.

“What have you done to me, Y/n?” He whispers, adjusting the cowl to better shield you against the cold. The horseman rests his head back against the rock and sends a sideways look at Dust as the crow settles on your thigh. “I’m getting far too old for this, Dust…” Death mumbles. 

The crow simply sneezes, looking mightily disinterested in his master’s troubles and wondering instead why you weren’t currently lavishing his feathers with scratches. 

War: The look on his face when you sneezed loudly would have made you burst out into hysterics, had you not felt so rough. 

Despite his innate desire to enact vengeance upon the Destroyer for his false conviction, War insisted upon stopping to allow you some recovery time, arguing that it would only slow you down if you got even sicker. 

“You could just leave me…” You mutter dismally against your hands as you run them over your face. War’s expression darkened, half with the way he didn’t like how you were talking and half because he was dimly aware that you’d become far too integral to his story for him to simply let you go. 

He grumbles loudly as he sets you down on a soft patch of grass beside the tunnel entrance to the Drowned Pass. 

“Rest.” He commands, turning to set up a perimeter around you, scouring the area for any demons who felt brave enough to attack a horseman protecting his sick charge. You let out a grumble of your own at his instruction, perfectly aware that you’re slowing him down right now.. 

War turns to see you staring off at the unliberated Tormented Gate, a look of utter despondency on your face. His permanent frown deepens as he marches back over to you, dropping to one knee he looks at you and finally sees the tiny tremors that wrack your body, despite how you tried to suppress them. 

“I knew it.” He suddenly snarls unhappily, “You’re feverish.” 

“No I’m not.” You stubbornly reply, crossing your arms and cursing yourself for letting your shivers show through. 

War sends you a disapproving glare, but without warning, he scoops you up again and begins to make his way down to the lake. You struggle weakly in his arms, “War, I told you I can walk.” you protest, but you’re ultimately ignored. 

Setting you down by the water’s edge, War tears a small piece from his already ragged and worn cloak. He dips it into the water and looks up at you. You just sit there in a confused and tired state, before you realise that he’s waiting for you to actually give him permission to touch you. After you give him a slow nod, War reaches forward and begins to gently wipe your face, arms and neck with the cool cloth. 

You sit there in stunned silence, this unnatural display of softness from someone called War is unheard of and downright mystifying.. 

Both of you remain by the water well into the night, silently regarding each other, one with astonishment and the other with quiet, growing affection. 

Strife: When he’d barged into your bedroom one morning like an overactive toddler, the last thing he expected was to find you still laying in the dark, with the heat turned up full and buried under piles of blankets. 

“Sheesh! S’like the council’s been in here…” He teases, fanning himself to try and alleviate some of the heat. When you don’t react to his jab, Strife taps the covers where he assumes your head would be. “Hey, c’mon squirt. Time’s a wastin’. Let’s go.” 

You simply groan, the action causing your throat to tickle and you begin coughing violently. Suddenly alarmed, Strife flips back your covers to see you looking utterly woeful. “Y/n!” he shouts, causing you to grumble at the loud noise and roll over to try and get away from him. “Whup, no you don’t.” Strife grabs you and lifts you out of bed, prompting you to let out an undignified shriek. 

“Strife! Put me down, I need to go back to bed.” you weakly fight against his hold as he carries you into the bathroom. 

“Nope,” the horseman shakes his head as he sits you down on the toilet seat and begins to run the bath, “Bein’ in that room’ll only make it worse. Gotta cool you down…” He mumbles the last part to himself. 

“Whaaaat?” you moan. “But I’m already freezing my arse off!” He places a hand on your shoulder and pushes you back down when you make to get up. When the bath is full, he turns the tap off and places his hands on his hips sternly. It’s strange to you, seeing Strife so serious all of a sudden. 

“Clothes.” he deadpans. “Off.” 

You gape at him. “You must be joking!? Not with you in here!” 

Strife rolls his eyes, “Remember that time I walked in on you in the shower? I’ve already seen everything Y/n, now come on.” You squeak when he begins to tug at the bottom of your shirt and you cross your arms over your stomach crossly. 

“Strife, this is ridiculous. I don’t need you playing nursemaid, I was perfectly fine just wallowing in my room. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going back to bed.” The whole speech comes out as a croak but you feel you’ve made your point, ambling past the horseman, you barely make it to the door when you’re overcome with a spell of dizziness. You collapse backwards into a solid wall of muscle that catches you with a smug, “Hmmph.” 

You’re only vaguely aware of Strife carefully removing your pjs and lowering you into the luke-warm water. Instantly, your teeth start chattering and you shiver violently. Strife grimaces, obviously broken up over how miserable you look. 

“Sorry kiddo,” he apologises quietly, “But this’ll help in the long run, trust me.” The visceral embarrassment of having Strife see you naked up close disappears the moment your body hit the water. The horseman stays beside you, tense with the urge to just grab you and rush you somewhere warm. But he stops himself, knowing it’d only make the fever worse. After 5 minutes of torture on both your ends, he finally lifts you out of the bath and you weakly reach for a warm fluffy towel. Strife drapes it over you but stops you when you start to rub your arms with it fervently. “Stop that. Can’t go warming yourself up again, not just yet.” he states. 

You sit there with him on the bathroom floor as he pulls you backwards to sit in his lap, cursing him out for being so damn helpful but at the same time, grateful that he cares enough to want to help. 

Fury: Her caring nature shone forth the minute she discovered you trying to leave your home whilst still feverishly ill. She’d been on her way to see you when she spotted your timely escape, spotting that something wasn’t right with the way you moved. She lurches forwards as you stumbled down the steps and just managed to catch you before you fell to the ground.

“Uggh, Fury?” You groan dazedly, peering up at her stern face as she lifts you effortlessly into a bridal carry, taking you back inside. 

She sets you on your sofa and begins to busy herself with grabbing all sorts of things from your cupboards. Once properly equipped, Fury rushes back to your side and sits on the sofa beside your head. She hands you a glass filled with a suspicious looking liquid and a packet of paracetamol. 

“I don’t know how many of those a human is supposed to take, but they were in your drawer and I saw the word painkiller so…” she trails off when you begin to sneeze, pulling a box of tissues off the windowsill and handing you one. You blow your nose and want to weep at the look of sympathy your horseman is giving you. 

“What are doing here?” You wheeze out. She looks a little alarmed at the hoarseness of your voice but chooses not to comment on it. 

“Why, I came to visit my favourite human, of course.” She winks. “And a damn good job I did…” came the displeased growl a moment later. “What were you thinking? Going out in this state. Do you know how vulnerable you are?” She demands. 

You’re barely able to defend yourself under her smouldering glare, spluttering out between coughs, “I thought some fresh air might do me good.” Fury sighs frustratedly as her eyes soften considerably. She places a hand on top of your own and bends slightly to be closer to your face. You try and refrain from coughing all over her. 

“You needn’t worry about doing yourself any good. I’m here now. I’ll be looking after you for the time being.” She finishes her sentence with a firm nod, unwavering in the matter even as you try to protest. Fury holds her hand up to quiet you, “I will not leave you here on your own until you’re better.” she claims, loudly. “Now hush, tell me…..what would you like to eat?” 

For the next few days, Fury confines you to the sofa or your bed. Making you rest and sweat out the fever until it subsides. In actuality, despite your illness, you do have a good time with her as your temporary roommate. Fury watches television with you, she tells you horror stories from Hell and the amazing places she’s been. At night, she makes you as comfortable as possible with pillows galore and sleeps right next to you, telling you to wake her should you need absolutely anything.

The Watcher: “Eugh….” It is possible for a creature without a mouth to grimace, evidently. You sneeze into your hand again, trying to keep your face pointed away from the Watcher for his sake. 

“Humans….” he hisses, “Are quite possibly the most revolting creatures when it comes to bodily functions.” 

You turn to send him a sidelong glare as you stumble alongside it behind the horseman. “I’ve got a cold, Watcher. It’s not exactly something I can help.” You grunt. 

It rolls all six of its eyes and flits in front of you, taking in the languid way you’re walking and the droop in your eyes. It growls for a moment, before turning to bark at War. “Horseman! Slow down, the human can hardly keep up.” The horseman turns to fix a steady gaze in your direction, ultimately he must have agreed with the sprite because he huffs and nods towards a still standing bench. You breathe out a thanks and move over to slump onto it, half expecting the Watcher to disappear into War’s gauntlet now that you were still. 

So it came as something of a shock when it  suddenly hovered directly in front of your face, what looked like a coat in it’s long, slender claws. “Here.” It shoved someone’s century old coat into your arms without ceremony. You stare up at the Watcher with a mix of curiosity and gratitude. 

“Thanks,” you say, laying the coat around your shoulders, “Really, that was good of you.” 

The Watcher gives the impression that it’s sneering when it turns it’s head down to you again, having bee avoiding your eyes. “Your teeth were chattering loud enough to wake the dead.” It complained, but still leant itself forward and tugged the coat closed around your body. It pulled away quickly upon realising what it was doing, hissing at the smile that played at the corners of your mouth.

“Shutup Y/n.” it seethed. 

“I didn’t say anything.” You return, sneaking a content glance up at it, noticing that it had still yet to return to War’s gauntlet. You blink upon the secondary realisation that hit you….

The Watcher actually called you by your name. 

Samael: The demon growled possessively when you got up to try and stretch your legs. You groan in defeat as he, yet again, lifted an enormous, clawed hand to grab you and pull you back into his stomach. 

You’d been sick for a few days now and the stifling heat of Samael’s throne room was doing little to help the fever along. It was the equivalent of nighttime, and Samael had laid down in his lavish bed with you at his side. But the heat had made you restless, as exhausted as you were, you’d needed to get up and do something. 

Sniffling, you moan when he presses you against him with another irritated snuff of air from his nose. “Stop trying to escape.” He grumbles sleepily, flicking his tail to curl itself around your leg in a guarding gesture. 

“I’m not trying to escape,” you mumble, “I can’t sleep. I thought a walk might wear me out.” Samael lets out a rush of air as he sits up in bed and yawns widely, allowing you to catch sight of his intimidating fangs. Then, he stands up, stretching his wings out behind him and offering you a hand. You blink at it in confusion so he sighs. 

“If you won’t sleep, I’ll take you for your little walk.” He shakes himself, his armour clinking and creaking loudly in the quiet of his chambers. You ignore his hand and make your own way to the edge of the bed, placing your feet on the warm ground. You struggle to your feet and take a few steps forward, but your new position of begin upright causes you to start feeling a little dizzy. You shake your head to be rid of the feeling but it only increases and before you know it, you’re teetering sideways and nearly fall down the stone steps that lead up to the Prince’s bed had he not snatched you up and set you on his shoulder. 

“Hmm, I’d half a mind just to let you fall.” He smirked, “It may have taught you a lesson not to refuse my aid.” You roll your eyes and lift yourself up into a more comfortable position, leaning against the side of Samael’s head. His eyes flick to you for a moment before he starts to walk. The air rushing past as he strolls through his Hellish home is cool enough to coax a happy, relieved sigh from your lips. 

Samael takes you to one of his overhanging, craggy ‘balconies’ standing there to survey his territory whilst you turn your gaze upwards to the sky. He stays there for a long time, waiting. 

He needn’t wait long until he feels your body begin to slump sideways off his shoulder. Swiftly, the Dark Prince reaches his arm around to catch you before you can tumble from his shoulder completely, the fever sleep having finally taken over you. He looks down at you in his hand for a moment, his fierce brow pulling together in a secret moment of worry. Snorting, Samael turns, making his way steadily back to your shared bed. 

[iwannainspire]

rambling 12/15/18

so lets start with the universe

i’m feeling more and more connected to the universe lately. i’ve always felt a connection to the universe, but its different now. like my relationship with ethan maybe. we used to fight, but realized we’re family and stuck together, now its all love and he’s so much cooler than i used to give him credit for. same goes for me and the universe

anyways, i feel like i can feel the vibe in the room. everyone can but some rooms have more tension. the outside is sometimes calm and other times its chaotic regardless of how many people are out there with me. i feel overwhelmed by the chaotic air when there are no people and i feel overwhelmed by the people in calm air. idk calm air is easier to walk in tho people or no people. i feel like my horoscope is always accurate and even if its not i check my friends and see theyre right. i like vice horoscopes because theyre vague ish. yknow? like it just tells you how the day will feel not what will happen. i like knowing how the planets change moods. i am connected to the planets and the tides. the universe moves and i move with it. my emotional state does. my psyche?

i feel overly connected. i feel the universe too strongly sometimes and it weighs me down or pulls me off my feet. i live in a snowglobe for days at a time caught up in the tides of emotions that don’t always belong to me. i invite them in and let them go in their time tho now which i used to not do. i used to ignore feelings i didnt like and sought out the happy ones. the search left me disappointed because happy wasnt as happy as i expected it to be. i put a lot of pressure on myself to feel happy when i knew sad was the one knocking at the door. ignored him or asked him to wear a happy mask. disrespected him and only made him feel worse. i’m sorry sadness. i accept you now. i invite sadness, anger, frustration, jealousy, anxiety, etc to come in and talk. where do you come from? what do you need? how can i help you before you carry on your way? i know we’ll meet again, but we won’t fight and hurt each other like we used to. let’s be friends.

i’m trying to accept all of my emotions. not just the happy ones. holding on to happy isnt good. trapping happy hostage when he comes to visit lol. locking him in the basement so he can’t see the sunlight and bloom. he gets sick and dies down there then you’re left alone again with just the painful memory of happy. it didnt have to be painful! let happy come and go as he pleases! i promise you he will come back if you let him go. don’t hold on to old happy times when you could be making new ones. live each day!

————-

zephyr-

the thing about zephyr is

idk. i forgive him. he isn’t evil or a bad guy. he is a product of his circumstances. he was born and raised to be this way. the environment and political climate he grew up in created him. it’s not his fault he is the way he is.

but he could be better.

i think zephyr is immature. i think his parents failed him. i think he failed himself. i think we all fail ourselves and other people. nothing to feel guilty or bad about tho. who has time for guilt for the past when the future is always a second away? accept what happened, where you are, who you are, and move forward. keep moving forward because you can’t go back. alright im getting weird and off topic now but anyway,

zephyr has a good heart. he has an innocent child’s heart. he’s young and immature. he was raised to believe he’s a grown man since 4. he makes his own independent choices. nobody can tell him what to do. he resents people telling him what to do. even if its good advice or something he knows he should do and was going to do but wont now because someone told him to. he’s an idiot. but it’s not his fault. he’s just immature.

he is sexist and shitty. it’s not his fault? but it is. he knows better than to be homophobic/transphobic/misogynistic/racist/EVERYTHING but he still does it because he has been told not to be. and that’s not okay with him. he doesnt like being told what to do more than he cares about how the other person feels when telling him what to do. its a virgo thing i think. not selfishness, but just stubbornness.

so zephyr could be better and he knows it, but he won’t be. he has to decide to do it for himself. i can’t make him decide to be a better person. i can’t make him understanding of others if he doesnt want to be. i cant teach him. i could, but why would i? i spent years climbing that hill and never reached the top. then it occurred to me that i had my own hill to climb. i need to take care of myself, not zephyr. he is not my responsibility and i am no one else’s but my own.

so i forgive him. im not mad about the time i spent climbing his hill to never reach the top. i wouldn’t have been able to see my mountain with its patchy trees and shrubs as beautiful if not for the barren desolation of his mountain. thank you zephyr for teaching me so many things about myself.

i am stronger than i thought i was. i’m always surprised by my growth because i can’t see it while i’m in it yknow. being with zephyr was experiencing growing pains and now that they’ve stopped i’m taller and stronger than i was before. thank you zephyr for making me feel alone. i found a friend in myself. thank you for making me feel smaller than i was. it makes it easier for me to see how much i’ve grown. thank you for hating the same things about me that i did. i know exactly what to work on loving and embracing about myself

i hope you can learn to love your true self too

————-

people have demons. i believe everyone has a good heart. this is leading off the zephyr paragraph bc he’s an example of a real human but it’s not about him.

i think all people are born innocent. theyre babies! completely and 100% being themselves. i think everyone has a good heart. nobody at their core wants to inflict misery on another. life is what you make of it and you are what life makes of you! it’s the universe!! we’re all connected to it and thus connected to each other so nobody at their heart of hearts wants to do anything to hurt the universe we are all a part of. but things happen! not everyone feels as strong a psychic connection to the universe. we have demons too. we have anxieties and jealousies and angers. they look like the wendigo to me. or centipedes. semi-translucent grey shapes lingering in the shadows. big ones stomp around making the floor shake. they rocks at you from a distance. they follow you when youre walking home alone at night. they whisper in your ear. they slither through your blood stream making your heart beat too fast then too slow and your hands cant stop shaking. they twist in your stomach and bubble up your throat. they wait until you aren’t looking to move.

do you do what they say? if you do that then maybe they’ll stop terrorizing you! they’ll leave you alone and you’ll spend the rest of your day worry-free. right?

wrong! everyone has demons! they don’t stop! but guess what? theyre not as strong as you think they are. don’t give in to them! they’ll invite their friends and by then you’ll have a real problem. demons breed demons. don’t feed the demons.

so what do you do? you can’t stop them and you can’t give in to them. should you fight? you could try that. you could try ignoring them too. i’m not really sure yet honestly. i know you shouldn’t feed them though. i’ve found ignoring them to be the easiest option, but it doesn’t kill them. so maybe it is a good idea to fight? fighting makes me tired, but the demons aren’t as strong as you think. tackling one or two a day shouldn’t be too hard and then i could take off weekends.

but wait, let me tell you that fighting the demons isnt a risk-free option. be prepared to lose to them every once in a while. but if they get you down, dont stay there. get right the fuck back up. finish the fight if you can or go home and take a nap to regain strength but dont just sit there in the dirt feeling defeated. never do that because you’re a fighter. life isn’t fair. everyone has demons and we’re all fighting our own battles.

so don’t judge people so harshly because you don’t know their battle. maybe their demon of the day is a level 2 maybe its a level 20. we all have good hearts and we all have demons. some of us have fallen for the demons and their tricks and that’s why we do bad things. the demons want to disrupt the universes cycle. i’m fighting them because i want to protect myself and everyone else. we’re all one

[escupelo]

12:46am

I need to write. I need to let it all out so I’m just going to. I’m writing the time of this post at the end cause I don’t know how long it’s gonna take me to get all the thoughts out of my mind... fuck, where to start? Let’s start with what happened in New Year’s... what the fuck happened in New Years... well I got drunk. Very drunk. And I fucked up. I don’t know what happened, one thing led to the next and I was vomiting all over the bathroom. My parents found out and so here we are, four days later and I’m risking going on my trip to London, a party I have been waiting for since like September. I understand, I understand why they are thinking about it. But at the same time, I have had enough punishment already. I have tortured myself for what I have done. And it’s not all about the physical damage, it’s about the damage I have made to the relationship with my parents. I had been working on me going out for a really long time and it was all based on trust, and suddenly all this trust is thrown away, thrown right into the trash... and why? Because I am stupid, that’s why. Because I am an idiot. Because I fucked up. I felt like absolute crap physically but I feel like absolute crap mentally too. This sucks, I am an asshole. Why did I do it? I don’t know... I have been thinking about this a lot. I don’t know what it was, I guess I just got sick of everything and it was a big fuck you to I don’t even know who, cause the person it fucked the most was myself. I think after so much of my parents telling me to behave and being the perfect girl I got sick of it and I got carried away by the alcohol. And I don’t know what happened. I was an absolute idiot. Idiot. Idiot. Idiot. My friends don’t understand how I feel, to them it’s normal. To me, it’s not. But I don’t need them to understand, I just neee to understand it myself. I was an absolute idiot and I boycotted myself. I threw away all my work and I don’t understand why I would ever do something like that. Yes, it’s fun to get drunk and it’s fun to be tipsy, but this level of drunk? What’s the fun in that? Nothing. Let me tell you again: no-thing. I was an absolute idiot.

Moving on, next topic. My objectives. I don’t know what it is with this year but I said it from day one work hard play hard, but it seems like lately the only thing left is play hard and I don’t know why... I guess I just got tired of being the perfect one and tired of being the one that always studies and the one that is super responsible and never fits in and I just wanted to be normal for once, but I’m throwing away all my work all these years... I’m taking care of my academics but I’m throwing away the person I am today and now I don’t even know who I am anymore. I’m confused. I’m lost again. I thought I wouldn’t get lost anymore but here I am, once again. I don’t know what is happening, I thought I was fine and now again I am not and this is all happening again and everything is starting to break down again and my world is falling down again and I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what I’ve been trying to find this year, I honestly don’t know what I’ve been looking for. I guess I’ve been trying to prove myself something. My mom talks a lot about proving myself to others and belonging, but I don’t think it’s about that, I think it’s all been about proving myself something, and I think I’m done. I think this New Years Im done trying to prove myself things and I’m done living the crazy life. This doesn’t mean I’m not gonna go out but it means I’m done being insane, or at least I think so. But I don’t know, maybe this is me now, guilty me. Dissapointed me. I don’t know what that New Years thing was, I honestly don’t know. I hadn’t given it much thought at first but now I guess I am giving it much more thought and I’m realizing that it wasn’t about that night, it was all about everything.

This links to the next topic, my friends. I’ve changed my friendships a lot... I’ve let you go... a lot. I’ve thrown away that relationship. And now no, I’m not going to blame myself for that since it wasn’t all my fault but yes, I gave up on our friendship, I gave up on it. And now I don’t know what to do. My mom is right, she’s saying I need people that bring me up and lately all I have are people that I’m comfortable with, people that make me happy. Is that really that bad? I don’t know. I guess right now I’m looking for different type of people, I’m in a different stage in my life, I’m in a temporary state. I’m in a place where I don’t know what I want, I’m trying to find myself cause I’m lost again and I don’t know what to do. And yes, I’ve surrounded myself with people that want to hang out and be distracted cause that is what I’m looking for right now. This doesn’t mean that I don’t love them and that they don’t bring anything into my life, that’s not true. But I just don’t know what it is that I want, what it is that I’m looking for.

Moving on to the next topic, let’s talk about you, the other you... what is happening. I love you and I am super comfortable with you but there is something that’s eating me alive. I feel like you’re lying to me... and I’m not the only person thinking this. My parents find everything super strange and there have been two things that I have found disturbing if you wanna put it some way. First, the message you sent to your mom the other day, it didn’t say anything about what is happening, it just said what is happening to me and that but it didn’t say anything in particular. Actually there’s more than two things that I find just weird... then what Ana said. She asked me if she could ask you about it and I said it wasn’t a good idea but the first thing she asked was, is there a possibility that she’s lying? Or that this is not true? And honestly, I think there is a possibility that this is not true and I don’t know what to think. Then there’s the thing about your mom not knowing that we know... what is that about? When the whole thing with Victor saying he’d call your mom happened you completely freaked out, what was that? You said there was absolutely no way your mom could know, absolutely no way. And I think about it and I’m like what is happening here... also there’s the medical part. Yes, I see differences in your physical state but not extreme. But, I’ve never seen you take a single medicine in my life or I’ve never seen the medicines in your house. Ever. You said you had to take a two week break to start the new treatments, it’s been what? 4 weeks? More maybe? And now you’re saying it was 6 weeks in between treatments. Then you said you needed to get an appointment with a stomach doctor, a general one. When you have something like what you have, you don’t get an appointment with a random doctor at a random hospital, you have your doctor that oversees your entire case and then you ask him where to go or to go to him. You only go to the doctor like once a month. You’ve never gotten that injection... If you flatlined like you said you did, why did you leave the hospital at like midday? They wouldn’t have let you. Also, that day that you had the endoscopy without anestia, you said it lasted really shortly and that you were done with it already, but literally 10 minutes ago we had been texting... how is that possible? I mean it might be possible, this is all speculation, but it sounds weird. You talk about the kidney transplant like it’s nothing, like it’s an option but that’s not how it works. I just don’t know anymore... everything is so overwhelming. Maybe we are all just making up this story and you’re telling the truth and if this is the case I am so sorry and I really hope I can forgive myself one day and if you find out I really hope you can forgive me one day. I’m here for you, I’ve proved it a million times but I don’t know what to think anymore. I wouldn’t love you any less if you didn’t have a disease but I’m just thinking about everything. Yes, you are a person that lacks a lot of love in your family, your situation is crap and I can understand how that can lead you to desperately need love and now thinking about it it kind of makes sense. You lost your center, your guidance, your love... what would you do to get it back? And what he said, he’s never seen you take medication in his life, and he has been next to you for every day. You are not weak, you have never been in the hospital... anyways. I don’t know if you’re tying to find the love and the care that you lack, but you don’t need this. I can give you my love and my care just in the same way. It just sounds very surreal. And I’m sorry.

Every time I think about it more I spy one more lie or one more thing that doesn’t add up. If you’re lying to me, I’m not gonna back out, I’m not going to abandon you. But damn, I’m going to be hurt. You know my family, my situation. I have lived in hospitals, I have seen how this things work. I have been there. My sister has a chronic disease, I know how it changes your life. I know a lot about hospitals and doctors and diseases. I know how it can change your life. If this is a lie, I’m going to be personally very hurt. And if it’s not, i am going to feel like the biggest asshole, bigger than I already feel right now. Maybe my parents are right, maybe they are not.