#and i’ve never felt like that for anyone irl and won’t bc the more i know a person the less instreasted i am on them

[lunimy]

why is a kpop idol making me for real question if i’m aro

[ennard-is-near]

Some Michael Afton headcanons and crack theories and whatnot

🚨 warning, If you know me irl (You know who you are, I see you) be aware that I’m not serious hahahahaha I would never be cringe hahaha 🚨

Okay, here we go:

Kid/Teenage hcs:

He’s super quiet after The Bite of ‘83. Like won’t talk to anyone or answer most questions outside of occasional one word answers. [I’ve talked about this before]

He was 13 during the Bite of ‘83.

Wasn’t really popular or a bully or anything before the Bite of ‘83. He was just like, a regular kid whose dad was well-known. It’s like if the mayor’s son was in your class or something. Yeah he’s kind of an asshole, but so is every middle school boy.

Ppl tend to avoid him after The Bite just because if you had the choice between talking to the guy who killed his brother or not doing that, you’d probably pick the latter. People felt bad for him or whatever but it’s not like they wanted to befriend him.

Cannot drive because he just never learned (William was NOT about to teach him). He walks most places.

I know this is semi-canon but he likes drawing stuff. He’s not very creative though, so he mostly draws what he sees around him. He ends of up drawing a lot of animatronics and TV show characters.

Mowed lawns and washed cars around the neighborhood for money when he was like 11-12. William was the type of dad who didn’t give pocket change and made his kids work for their own money. Michael wasn’t great at his neighborhood jobs though so people only hired him if they had money to give away and were willing to go through and fix the spots he missed.

The rest of these are Post-Scoop:

The FNaF 3 hallucinations are like a semi-regular issue for him. He occasionally just sees shit. Doesn’t have to be phantom animatronics, though. Can be more chill (by comparison lol) and like people he knew just standing there, weird shadows (especially in reflections) and sounds and voices. [I‘ve talked about this before too, sorry]

Really scared of the dark. Lights on in every room + flashlight on him at all times scared.

The power went out in his house a couple times when it snowed and (even though it didn’t get pitch black because of light from the windows) he did not like it.

He’s also the master of batteries, they’re scattered all over the house.

His power bill is so much. Like you’d drop dead if you saw it. TV and lights and air conditioning on 24/7 drive it up. His water bill is virtually nothing, though, so that’s good.

Doesn’t have issues with money because he has access to William’s bank account somehow.

Still lives in the house he grew up in. I just feel like he does.

Sort of has an issue with animals. They do not like him and will bark at and attack him whenever given the opportunity. He’s literally a dead body and animals tend to not like those. Birds will literally swoop down and attack him sometimes. He has fought two raccoons.

Absolutely a creature of the night. Only leaves the house past midnight and is back before sunrise. This is for a couple reasons, mostly just because there’s less happening at night. He carries a flashlight around when he goes out though bc he’s so scared.

Has like one guy who he’s on good terms with. It’s some random graveyard shift worker at the local corner store. He goes to the same store like every Tuesday or whatever and it’s always the same guy working there. They don’t even say that much to each other but they’re still buddies. When Michael works at the FNaF 1 location the employee is actually kinda sad because he doesn’t come in that week and he’s really confused as to where that guy could have gone or if he finally died or something. And then Michael comes in the next week and the routine continues and the employee will never know what happened that one week the weird guy didn’t come in.

Okay that’s it. <3

[afaramir]

hiiii denethor anon here!! wow you’re really IN IT now (denethorposting). not to add more fuel to your anger but last week i saw someone say they hated denethor. and i just realised god they don’t get him even on tumblr do they. since then i’ve been silently fuming in rage. anyway… i am very Very Intrigued by both your faramir-goes-to-rivendell-au and denethor-thorongil relationship (if you ever want to write another 800 words about this, i am here for it 👀) and this line “each of them sharpens himself upon the whetstone of the other…” fuck. fucking insane actually.

unfortunately i won’t be replying for several days (i’ve had to keep my phone in another room to keep myself from getting distracted) . my exams have started AND i’m going through some shit irl :( it’s alright tho i’ll have more Faramir and Denethor Hours soon <- chanting this constantly haha. but i am with you when denethorposting IN SPIRIT okay. oh and can we please please please have denethor december? 🙏 bye will be here soon after my exams (that will be after the 23rd march i’m afraid)

hiii denethor anon <333 i am SO sorry this is so late truly attempting to figure out how to write AND see my friends AND do things like clean my apartment and go to the grocery store while working The Job...it has eaten my life. and this week my regular coffee shop switched their hours bc i live in my old college town and they are on spring break and it has sent me directly to hell. the death of My Routine…i have coped by INCESSANTLY denethorposting on tumblr dot com. i am somehow EVEN MORE in it than i was when you sent this ask. i hope you enjoy me being truly crazyinsane whenever you get a chance to look at all those posts lol. would love 2 hear your thoughts on them. but ANYWAY as always it is so lovely to see you, i'm sorry things have been tough but truly with my whole heart i bestow upon you the strength of denethor's sixty-year psychic war (with none of the associated madness) to make it through. looking at the date i hope you are free now.

here is the mandated readmore because i have never met brevity in my whole life. u said write another 800 words and i took that as a challenge um this post is like 2000 words. well...back on my bullshit

i mean this with all the love and joy in my heart but i laughed so much. no my dear friend they do not get him on tumblr. they have not gotten him on tumblr from the beginning. if you have been spared the incessant tomato jokes i truly…[crying] I Wish I Were You So Bad. this guy doesnt even know about the tumblr denethor slander (POSITIVE) (YEARNING). its the trenches out here for real. i just live in my little bubble with me and you and like four other mutuals/Denethor Understanders and that is it.

speaking of denethor and the rivendell au. i miss the days when i was working on the faramir-in-gondor scenes. emotionally it felt like dying but i kind of knew what was going on. now i am in rivendell taking and failing this history of middle earth exam. and i am so very….the next time we see denethor for real is in return of the king. now girl…how will i survive another 80k words. i miss my boy my dear darling my tortured victim of the narrative. and according to the paragraph i just wrote faramir does too but is Refusing to admit it to himself<3

im also RIDICULOUSLY torn on how i want to resolve his arc. now just between you and me. and anyone who bothers to click that read more. I DONT WANT TO KILL HIM I WANT HIM TO LIVE. GOD I WANT HIM TO LIVE. I WILL WRITE YOU A THOUSAND HAPPY ENDINGS. except its not a happy ending its a you are not allowed to die you are forced to contend with your choices you must keep living ending. because he will always be tragic no matter what. but its ALSO a you can rest now you can be at peace son of gondor you have won your war. all you sacrificed has been worth it. you have given your all when that's what duty asked you for and it has been enough. and that makes my poor heart weep.

like on one hand the idea of resolving his storyline with faramir.......the opportunity for some kind of reconciliation, some kind of understanding between them...god. delicious. i know in my heart that faramir comes home and IS the lord that denethor once dreamed of being. not playing at it...he is high and lordly and gentle and the world bends around his will and he knows exactly what to bow to and when to stand his ground and his powers are honed to a keen edge that he uses with the utmost care and. AUGH. he walks into the citadel the IMAGE of his father. it makes me feel FERAL. and how would denethor react to that. man.

BUT ON THE OTHER HAND HOW DO I END THE STORY. like. LOL. do u know what i mean. likelihood of me being able to just have a triumphant coronation and tie it all up with a bow is soooo small. the narrative contortions i would have to go through. to have denethor accept that and still be in character. Girl....no thank u <3 so we havent worked THAT out yet. like how much of the madness and despair do i want to put into the narrative. We Shall See. IM not politically savvy enough to get real into the weeds with it all so im kind of rotating just. a beautiful set of reunions with the fellowship. eowyn and faramir get engaged. boromir and faramir see all their dreams of a gondor restored come true. we skate over the political minefield and deeply navigate the beginnings of denethor and faramir's relationship in this new world. and among it all, within it all, is hope, and a new dawn. and curtain.

i got distracted but re: we are in rivendell. it IS kind of fun to think about the themes and narratives. i am pushing my Let Faramir (And Denethor) Be Numenorean + Let Numenoreans Be Weird agendas so so sooo hard and i am having the time of my life with that specifically. birds follow him around and pick up the tunes he sings. he hears the voices of the people he loves in his head. he falls into a river and after having a breakdown about it promptly decides that The River Is Testing Him And He Has Passed. he gets to rivendell and INSTANTLY knows that there is someone Very Like Him Here (its elrond. the elrond-elros-faramir connection has me FROTHING at the mouth. faramir looks at elrond and sees his father and sees every statue of elros in minas tirith and Knows that this here is the son of earendil, gil-estel, his brightest north star. elrond looks at faramir and sees his brother, his dear dead doomed brother, and every numenorean descended from him and all their sins and all their glories and yet, kind as summer, sees beauty and knowledge and a strange quiet man who carries all the weight of his country on his shoulders and yet knows him, knows the legends; perhaps the blood of numenor is not yet spent in the south)

i just think that Every Elf that meets faramir along the way is like woah...hold up. there's something up with THIS guy! men ARENT supposed to do that! not anymore anyway! galadriel is Lowkey Threatened by him. and isnt that beautiful. woman who could be queen of the earth sees god's special chosen boy and goes hang on a minute. Fuck. i think they work out their shit by the time the company leaves lothlorien but like...just thinking about how faramir lowkey blamed her for boromir's death in rotk! idk how their dynamic is exaclty gonna manifest but there's definitely some sort of similar mindreader2mindreader tension!

AND. um the idea of faramir travelling with the fellowship discovering that maybe...well. he has never wanted to be a warrior but he has been honed into a blade anyway. by his father and by necessity. and perhaps for the first time in his life...outside of gondor he does not need to be all that. he can be mithrandir's pupil without censure he can be scholarly and witty and cunning - he is all these things, in gondor. but there he has to be them, and now he can discover that yes, this is what he wants to be. and he has never let his father and the expectations of his position STOP him but there is always a weight, there is always the knowledge that your actions are disapproved of, and being away from that for a while is i just think. really good for him. see above re: he comes home the image of his father in a gentler time. keep honking im sitting in my car crying about denethor ii twenty sixth steward of gondor.jpg (<- my greatest creation PLEASE click the link lol)

ALSO IM THRILLED YOU LIKED THAT WHETSTONE LINE LOL i kind of blacked out when i typed it on the page. i think truly the crazy thing about denethor and faramir is that they SHOULD understand each other. they know so much about each other and yet are so incompetent at actually putting it to any good use towards, you know, improving their relationship. faramir is incredibly emotionally intelligent AND can read minds AND has taken so many of what he probably views as denethor's worst traits and turned them to gentler uses. (im talking about his powers but im ALSO talking about that thing he does when he encounters frodo and sam where he plays woe is me my brother is dead and i miss him sooo much to get on their good sides. yes of course he misses boromir more than anything else in the world. no he is not above using it to his advantage. and we see the SAME THING when gandalf and pippin come to minas tirith. hey isn't it crazy that both of them use boromir as a. manipulation chip. even after he's dead. hey thats kind of fucked up actually!) and denethor is…well denethor is denethor. ok im mostly messing around and thought that sentence was funny. i think he Knows most everything that goes on in faramir's head and yet Wilfully Chooses to interpret it in the worst ways because its just soo....very I Thought I Raised You Better Than That/I Honed You To Be My Blade Stop Defying Me. and despite all that the Problem is that they understand each other right up until they don't. they know how THEY feel about each other (incredible love that they can only express in the worst ways/think they're expressing only to be spurned by the other) but cannot POSSIBLY imagine that the other feels the same way.

ive gone on for SO SO LONG ALREADY LOL but. what do i have to say about denethor and thorongil. not enough and too much all at once. they're so toxic and awful for each other they're MADE for each other they're beautiful narrative parallels they're homoerotic besties they're bitter rivals they're pawns in a proxy war they're locked at all times in a psychic psychosexual situationship. um the enemy of my enemy is kissing me with tongue. idk i have more symbolism and actual analysis especially of the denethor-ecthelion-thorongil Issue. but we are just getting into it. so i will start with the situations bc i have two angles for this. on one hand i do think it is very fun if they constantly homoerotically circle each other for years and years and never do a THING about it. like...this is a stitching up wounds wiping blood off each others faces battle couple/situationship situation that THEN turns into a ridiculously high functioning political rival partnership bent together over books long into the night catching each others eye in council meetings using their very real disdain for each other for Manipulation Purposes and getting uh. SO hot over it. like.....Do You Know What I Mean. just. truly unresolved sexual tension THROUGH THE ROOF. it DELIGHTS me. they are always putting themselves in situations. and then NOT making out about it. AND THEY CAN READ EACH OTHERS MINDS!! THE WHOLE TIME!! SO THEY KNOW EXACTLY HOW MUCH THEY WANT EACH OTHER AND STILL ARENT DOING ANYTHING ABOUT IT!!! like thats just really good. but on the other hand.......the idea of just an absolutely terrible beautiful toxic rivals with benefits codependent situationship. i hate you so much and you know what we DO need to make out about it. every time they fuck it is a power play and they are having SO much fun with it. they will both start arguments with each other (AND IN PUBLIC TOO) just so they can fight and make up. the mind reading...Oh You Know What I Mean. taylor swift voice we had this big white city all to ourselves we blocked the noise with the sound of i need you and for the first time i had something to lose! logically thorongil is not yet in his grubby ranger era but the idea of him being dirt smeared all the time and hanging out with prim proper polished denethor. in the fic (which does exist and DOES follow the second model) theres a scene where hes just chilling with his head in denethor's lap and denethor is actually rather delighted and devoting ALL of his copious braincells to pretending not to be. Man. well never say im not a slut for contrast. and now the rest of what i could say is simply straight up redacted for indecency so it is time for this post to be over. the last thing i have to say is that it absolutely ruins denethor's life forever when thorongil up and leaves. sometimes a situationship....anyway. MUCH LOVE TO YOU AS ALWAYS yes we will have denethor december i already have an url saved.

[pineapplerightsideupcake]

maybe kinda random but you give good advice so I wanna hear your thoughts. I feel really lonely due to living in a small town, not being able to make friends in hs bc my toxic parents never let me go anywhere. I have 2 irl friends that I love and appreciate but they work a lot so we rarely text or see each other bc they’re always so busy/tired. I wish I had more friends so I wouldn’t feel so lonely. I’ve tried dating apps, online spaces, etc but nothing worked. And if I made a (online) friend they’ve ghosted me for whatever reasons. I’m trying so hard to stay positive but I really hate my life (being stuck in a toxic household tryna save money in this economy…) not having anyone to have meaningful connections with makes it worse. Idk what to do. These days I’ve been thinking a lot about s*icide even tho I’m a coward and won’t do it. The only thing that makes me feel better is disassociating and pretending like I’m someone else or in a different situation. But I can’t do that forever…. I could go more in depth but I don’t wanna burden you. I’m wondering how can I make friends and actually feel like life’s worth living?

If you’re in your early twenties, I have good news! No part of your life will ever be as hard as it is right now. I’ve been right where you are. Depressed and lonely and suicidal. I felt like there was no escape. But there is light at the end of the tunnel.

My first bit of advice is that nothing external is going to fill the emptiness in you. It’s a wound that needs to heal and self love and fulfillment have to happen before anything else can. And those words look big right now because we don’t do a good job of talking about how to achieve them in little ways. Ways you can start today.

First pick the easiest thing to motivate you to do something regularly. Therapy is a good start, but for me my healing began when I started cleaning my (actually my dads) house. Cleaning was something I kinda liked and it wasn’t scary because I didn’t have to leave the house. I started by just picking a shelf to organize. Then one thing to scrub. Eventually I was proud of my spotless house and wanted to do things like cut fresh flowers for a nice table. I wanted to go to the store and get a fancy snack or a nice candle. I walked my dogs everyday and being in nature was profoundly healing for me. I picked the things I could do even when I was miserable.

Where you can start is the easy places for you. Maybe you’re more like my sister and need to pour that effort into your job. Or maybe you need to build things like my other sister. Maybe you’re close to a grandparent and can schedule a weekly dinner. I have a friend that started writing fanfiction, then her own novel. I have another friend that works on cars. That started with just tinkering with his own.

And none of those things have to be huge on day one. If you paint, just swirl colors or doodle on day one. If you write, write a paragraph. Do a 100 piece puzzle. Listen to music. Cry if you have to. Forgive yourself for the days you can’t do anything. If you’re self medicating with alcohol/weed/cigarettes try and cut back a tiiiiny bit.

But kids from disfunctional families are set up to fail. Children have very little autonomy to begin with and we spend the first 18-21 years of our lives having life be something that happens TO us. This is even worse in dysfunctional families where you have to sort of float with the current just to survive. Then they push us out the door and say “go live” without any instruction. All your skills and coping mechanisms are built around enduring life and not around building one.

And that’s the big secret. You have to build your life but you also get to. Fill it with things you love and enjoys and prune out the things that stress you out.

And lastly, the way to make friends is the same way you ask someone on a date. Luckily unlike a date, most people are JUST AS DESPERATE FOR A FRIEND AS YOU! People have never been lonelier. My secret is I go out, I do activities. I tell friends to invite other friends, then befriend them. If I run into an old childhood playmate, or college pal or old classmate I follow up on those half baked plans to “get coffee sometime”. Family can be included here too. Maybe you have a chill sibling or cousin.

DnD has been great for me. People hear I DM and so many people are like “oh I’ve always wanted to play” so I invite them! A low stakes way to find a new friend is to talk about a really fun thing you’re doing around coworkers/acquaintances and when someone makes this face 🥺 you say “why don’t you join us/me!”

Or do what my autistic best friend did and I quote “find one really loud but nice extrovert and don’t blast their huge social group with your autism until after you’re their party healer” which is a silly way for me to say that making one friend leads to others.

I could go on and on here but this is an essay already. Hope this helps and isn’t just a stream of consciousness.

[my-little-loverboy]

Pardon my rambling. Illness of the mental flavour this fine four in the morning.

On one hand I want to post shit as soon as I’m done drawing but I also like keeping a queue bc then my account doesn’t die for 7-14 business days when my wrists act up not from an obligation to post just bc I like seeing people interact with my art and i know I could take a break and keeping a queue makes it so I can but also I love consistency and I just because I should take breaks doesn’t mean I like doing it and I think I may spend too much time on the internet but I’m not entirely sure what else to do with myself because what else is there to do for me as someone who can’t really go out or do most normal things. I suppose I could read but I already do a lot of that not even just fanfic I read a decent amount of novels im just horribly picky and I find the process of finding novels I enjoy exausting. I could write more music too but I already do that a lot and it’s debatable if that’s better because I end up obsessing over even minor flaws. I want to redecorate my room but I’m not sure if that’s a good idea or if I’m just tired bc I’m pretty sure I forgot to take my meds last night even though I slept what felt like a normal amount. I should also go to bed now bc I did take my meds and I know that’s definitely making my current situation worse but on the other hand I want to run. Which I know is a bad idea last time i tried to go for a run my legs gave out and I was stuck in the cold for 4 hours until my roommate woke up and could bring my wheelchair and I’m not sure when my knees got this bad. Like I could never run because I was asthmatic but it was a different kind of couldn’t like I could technically run it was just a bad idea because I’d have an asthma attack. But now I can’t because I’ll fall and won’t be able to get back up or I’ll be in such severe pain I can’t get home or one time I got lost and just kinda kept walking for almost 2 hours bc I forgot my phone so I couldn’t contact anyone and I shit you not I ended up in the neighbor town (it’s not that far and I didn’t remember crossing the highway either way) and after that I barely got out of bed for like a week. Not that I get out of bed often as it anyway and I think that’s why it feels like I spend too much time online. Because I only really remember being online because it’s the best part of my day. Like I know I have one irl I could be hanging out with but also that is so much effort and I love her dearly but it’s a different kind of yearning I think. I want to be normal just for like a day I want to have friends who want to talk to me and people to spend time with irl. But I also don’t. I don’t want people I don’t want friends and I know that. I want the romanticized version of friends that don’t have drama or problems or complexity and I think that’s why I value my online friends and my mutuals so much because it fills the social need without any of the issues that come with humans and I feel horrible saying that because I know my mutuals are human but online is comfortable and the block button is always a click away and I’m not afraid to use it but also I am because what if I’ve misjudged the situation not that I’ll ever ask.

Edit I’m expanding this because my brain has gone in a very irl dangerous direction and I need to keep my hands busy lest I do something fucking stupid. Sometimes I wonder how much my apathy shows and sometimes I wonder if it’s even apathy because I am apathetic in a clinical sense but I wonder if I’m exaggerating because I get bursts of excitement or feeling but it comes and goes in minutes like. Even then direction I was going isn’t out of and particular negative emotion it was a passive thought and I think that’s arguably more worrying bc instead of being jarring and worrying I considered making a catastrophically bad decision with all the care of someone picking want to have for breakfast. Maybe I’d feel better if I jerked off I don’t think that’s is a great idea but also there’s certainly worse options I’m wondering if this reads as much like a conversation as it feels because I don’t remember writing most of it but also reading it does sound like me but not and I don’t know why that is but I don’t want to think to hard on it so.

[seaottersandstrings]

something lgbt just happened to me (extreme emotional pain edition)

(ignore me I just need an internet void to scream in where she wont see it or read if you’re nosy and willing to be nice about it)

(also if anyone has any advice for how to not be so fucked up about the girl who is kinda your ex but not really (in the “never actually dated but we both had feelings and acted like it a lot” way) officially dating a new person for the first time since she shattered your heart into a million tiny pieces please dm me said advice this is 100% serious)

like we have all the same friends and it’s been over half a year so I feel weird talking to irl people about it. even I am surprised at how intensely the emotions punched me in the lungs when she told us she has a bf now. like cmon brain I knew we weren’t over this but I thought we were at least getting better. 

also there’s the added fun layer of “her own internalized biphobia and biphobic family members made it so our connection was always laced with shame and repression and suffering anyway.” and now she gets to celebrate this moment with friends and family and do boy talk with her mom and ask her parents for advice about this guy she’s known for a couple months and have an easy friends to lovers arc with him. while I was stuck listening to her family coo over how she should get back with her ex bf once he transferred to our college while she and I were literally sleeping in the same bed the night before. but bc I’m not a guy ofc nothing could possibly have been going on there. 

like you’re telling me I was in a years-long, will-they-won’t-they sufferfest where I was embarrassingly emotionally devoted to this person only for npc #3 to crawl out of the woodwork and get the instant stamp of approval for wanting to get to know her better and giving it the old college try? 

and to be clear I’m not blaming her she feels how she feels and obviously the bi/homophobia is a societal/community level issue. it just sucks so bad to fall so deeply in love with someone over such a long time and have those feelings be treated less seriously because of things we can’t control. like just on top of the regular heartbreak of it all. and believe me the regular heartbreak of it all is more than enough for my little eggshell heart to handle. 

and on a regular heartbreak level it also sucks because she’s a good person that I genuinely care about on a non-romantic level and still think very highly of. like our relationship wasn’t and still isn’t perfect but she’s one of the best people in my life and an objectively decent human being. so it’s not like I can even rationalize to myself “well it was toxic” (actually maybe the dynamic was but like SHE wasn’t a toxic person y’know) or “she treated me badly” or “she sucks so I’m better off now anyway.” like no she’s wonderful and her new bf is very lucky life just sucks sometimes. 

did I mention she and I are still best friends and even though we live in different cities now which helps I still have to pretend to be totally 100% excited about this for the sake of being a good bestie? like god I love being a lesbian if I had to do life all over again and got a choice I would choose to be queer every single goddamn time. but this is the most painful shit I’ve ever felt in my life and that’s a pretty high bar at this point. especially since this is technically not my first heartbreak but it’s my first one since realizing I’m a lesbian and not bi and started having a lot of The Piercing Loneliness of Breaking Every Societal Expectation feelings about it. like I think my brain was unintentionally pulling a “maybe I’ll turn out normal-passing” on itself (which is total bullshit) for a while there. and even though I know that was bullshit coming to terms with being a lesbian was so much harder for me than coming to terms with being queer at all and everything related to it has just felt so much more intense since. 

and on some level I’m also jealous bc she got out and can have a relationship she can celebrate and talk about with her family without fear and I can never have that. like bi people obviously go through so much shit and have a hard time getting both straight and gay people to take them seriously and as someone who lived that (in the “other people treated me like I was bi bc we all thought I was” sense) and thought that was who I was for 7 years I would never want to diminish that but oh my god being on the other side now I can understand how easy it is to let yourself get bitter. And I never want to be that person but at the same time speaking purely of my own experience it didn’t take me so long (2+ years) to figure out I was a lesbian because I just didn’t know like at some point deep down I knew especially near the end of my questioning era but I kept asking myself “well are you SURE?” because didn’t want to face the loneliness of it. Of closing the door on the last possible chance I had for my family and I to bond over something in a normal way for once. And coming out again was incredibly freeing but I also had to be willing to break my own heart to do it and the compounding heartbreak is just so much. 

anyway if anyone is reading this I love you and I hope you’re having a better day than me. happy new year. 

[mysterystarz]

the romance checklist:

summary: a chance meeting with kageyama has you striking up a bet to see if one of you could fall in love with the other before the year was up. cue the romance checklist, a piece of paper that molded your fate and his.

pairing: kageyama tobio x g!n reader

word count: 3.2k

genres + themes: literally pure fluff, reader is a first-year karasuno student, reader is also kind of a romantic

warnings: none

a/n: so this is my first time writing for kageyama and i know he's probably pretty out of character, so my apologies!! this was inspired off some headcannons i wrote for one of my irl friends, and this wiki-how article which i used to structure the actual checklist! to all my lovely kags simps, this is for you <3 (also to all the people who hate angst, you lucked out bc i was about to add an angst part but got lazy)

You had never thought a trip to the vending machine could be so eventful.

It had been lunch break, and you found yourself wandering towards the machine, money in hand as your eyes trailed the snacks. It had become routine to sneak away during lunch hours for this, enjoying the fresh autumn breeze as you bought your snacks. It had always given you time to think and the time to recompose yourself when you didn’t have a clue what to do.

Usually it also provided you with time alone.

That wasn’t the case today though. Standing in front of the vending machines was Kageyama Tobio, frantically pushing the button for milk with a grumpy sort of scowl on his face. From the distance you stood, you could make out his height and the way he tapped his foot continuously, as if he didn’t have the time to wait for the milk to be dispensed from the spot.

Strolling up to the spot, you stood silently next to him, watching the way he retrieved the milk from the slot wordlessly as he walked away, not even a glance in your direction.

You knew full well who he was. In fact, you could barely walk through the halls of school without hearing a murmur about the prodigy setter and his closed off ways. The girls found him intriguing from afar, and while they never dared to approach him, they all wanted to.

You hadn’t really understood what they saw in him. He was average...if not below that in academics, and he seemed to dedicate most of his time to volleyball, not caring much for other people. He didn’t seem to have many friends, and was almost always grumpy.

All of this should’ve been reason enough to avoid him, and yet you couldn’t help but be intrigued. There was something about him that was different. You just needed to find out what that was.

The next day came around, and sure enough, he stood at the machine again, toe-tapping as his milk was dispensed from the slot. This time his eyes scanned the courtyard as if he was seeking something before they finally landed on you.

You weren’t prepared for the full impact of his gaze. It was calculated and pointed, with some sort of intent that was expressed in every inch of those dark blue eyes. You weren’t put off by it.

In fact, it was charming in its own way.

“Are you looking for something Kageyama?” You asked as you walked towards him, pulling a few yen out of your pocket. “You’re staring.”

“I’m not.” He deadpanned, his eyes still trained on you as you selected a snack from the machine’s buttons. “I see you everywhere. Who are you?”

You hadn’t expected that. You knew he was observant...when it came to volleyball specifically, but never realized how it translated anywhere else. “I’m Y/L/N Y/N.”

You weren’t sure what else to say to him. Gently grabbing your snack, you politely nodded at him before leaving him behind, the thoughts rapidly accumulating in your brain. Did he notice you the entire time? Why did he ask? Did he know something? Was he planning to use you as some example to the other girls who wanted to know him?

You wish you had an answer.

Unfortunately, you couldn’t think of any.

It had been two weeks since you had met Kageyama by the vending machines. It had now become routine to expect him there during your lunch breaks, milk box in hand as he regarded your very presence with something that felt a whole lot like curiosity. Every now and then he’d offer commentary on the mundane happenings of Karasuno, or ask about you, but you weren’t sure how you could hold a conversation with just these things.

“Kageyama.” You nodded, strolling towards the machine as you always did. He whipped around almost immediately, offering a solemn nod in return, clutching his milk box.

“Y/L/N.” He murmured, taking a sip of his box.

“Have you ever thought about love?” You found yourself asking, internally screaming at the word choice. Great, now he was going to think that you were some crazy person.

“I think so…?.” Was what he offered in response. His features seemed to soften at this question though as he scrunched his brows in thought. “What type of love?”

You raised a brow at him in question. “Kageyama...what type of love are you talking about?”

“Well...I love volleyball and milk.” He shrugged. “That counts.”

“That...wasn’t the type I was referring to.” You said, suppressing the laughter that bubbled into your chest. “I was talking about the other kind.”

“The other kind is stupid.” Kageyama replied instantaneously. “There’s nothing special to it.”

You felt confusion seep into your system before you quieted it, letting your mind wander. With Kageyama’s status, you assumed that he’d at least thought of the concept at least once, although it seemed that he’d never even pondered the idea altogether!

“You’d have to feel it to come to that conclusion,” you countered, “Have you?”

“No,” he scoffed, “It’s still stupid.”

“Why?” You asked, feeling the curiosity surface. “Any specific reason?”

“Why would anyone want to dedicate all their time to another person?” Kageyama asked straight back, his gaze unwavering. “I just don’t see the point.”

You stared back at him, feeling the challenge bubble in your veins. “I bet...I can make you fall in love with someone by the end of the school year.”

At that moment, the boy in front of you looked thoroughly surprised, throwing his empty milk box at the garbage can nearby. He seemed speechless to some extent, as if he wasn’t able to process the words that had just left your mouth.

“And what happens if you can’t?” He asked, hesitantly bringing his gaze to your face. “What then?”

“I’ll buy you milk for a whole month.” You placed your hands on your hip as you kept your glare firm. “I stick to that.”

“Okay then,” he sighed, “Game on.”

With a shake of your hands, you cemented your fate.

You would win that bet. That much was certain.

“What’s this Y/L/N?” Kageyama asked, pointing at the piece of paper you held at him. “How are you going to win a bet with this?”

The two of them stood in the courtyard of Karasuno, the fresh autumn breeze rippling the paper you held in your hand. It had been a good day so far, and Kageyama had surprisingly stuck to his resolve, meeting you at the vending machine when he could’ve easily avoided you.

It was always more fun to challenge a competent opponent.

“This is the romance checklist.” You grinned proudly. “This has all the things we need to get you to fall in love.”

“How is it fair if you don’t do the checklist’s things too?”

“Well, that’s why I’m doing them with you.” You responded, already anticipating these types of questions. “I drafted the checklist off of the things I’ve observed over the years that should totally lead to feelings of love!”

“Whatever.” Kageyama said, his blue eyes scanning the paper’s contents. “How do you plan to do this?”

“We follow the steps.” You nodded. “Since I’m doing this with you, it’ll be foolproof.”

“Y/L/N...what if we competed against each other?” He mumbled. “We follow the checklist and use it against each other. Whoever falls in love first loses.”

“Do you really want to risk that?” You smirked, “That’s a bold move you’re making.”

Kageyama stood up straighter at this, the challenge burning deep in his eyes. “I’m going to win, so it won’t be an issue.”

“Suit yourself,” you grinned. “I’ll be winning this anyways.”

He simply smirked as he looked down at the paper, the promise of a challenge fresh and bright between them.

STEP ONE: MEET SOMEONE

After a long time, you had finally gotten some free time away from schoolwork and the obligations that pinned you down. It was a rare occurrence with the amount of pressure that the college prep class placed on you, and you intended to make the most of it.

You found yourself on the pathway of a cafe you used to frequent in the summer with your friends. It had always been a place to collect your thoughts and let your worries float away with every sip of one of the immaculately crafted beverages that they offered there. You felt your lips twitch in an involuntary smile at the memories.

“Y/L/N?” You heard a voice call out, a shocking contrast to the normal chattering you heard within the shop. Looking up, you were met with Kageyama’s eyes, narrowed and confused as you sat at the table frozen. “What are you here for?”

“It's a break for me,” you shrugged, “I come here all the time. I haven’t seen you here before.”

“They have good drinks,” Kageyama replied bluntly. A few beats of silence passed between them, with neither of them knowing what to add to the conversation.

“You can sit down with me.” You offered, gesturing to the empty seat across from you. “The more the merrier.”

He didn’t question this as he slid into the seat, fingers drumming on the table as he looked at the window. From your point of view, it was almost picturesque the way he managed to appear. His blue eyes were focused on the trees outside, and his posture was ever so casual and relaxed as he sat there, as if he had no other care in the world.

It was unfair how model-like he managed to appear, even despite the fact he wasn’t trying.

Ah. Perhaps this is what the girls at school noticed.

Once the drinks arrived at your table, the two of them drank in comfortable silence, admiring the flavors on their tongues as their surroundings continued on as normal. You didn’t feel the need to contribute anything to the silence, finding it calming in its own right.

“So Kageyama, are you feeling anything yet?” You teased, setting down your half-empty cup.

“No.” He admitted, setting down his drink as well. “I am supposed to?”

“Well technically no, but it’d be good if you did.” You chuckled, finding amusement in the cluelessness of his ways. “Step one of the romance checklist: meet somebody.”

“We already met though.” He countered, “How does this count as anything?”

“Well, we just encountered each other out of nowhere.” You smiled, “That counts as a meeting in my book.”

He wrapped his mind around this information, nodding solemnly. “I guess so then. I still don’t feel anything.”

“Neither do I.” You said, willing the slight butterflies in your stomach to subside. It was really nothing. This was simply a chance meeting, nothing more than luck and fate that had you encounter each other today of all days.

You shouldn’t have been affected this quickly. You felt far too warm, far too...fuzzy, for a meeting of chance. It was simply far too intimate.

Well, it seemed that Kageyama had gotten the one upon you at this stage.

You’d beat him next time. You knew you would.

STEP TWO: FLIRT

“You look good today Kags,” you smirked, feeling a sense of satisfaction creep up in your veins at his flushed cheeks,

Over the course of the weeks spent together, you had been able to learn more about the mysterious boy in front of you and had even formed a friendship of sorts. For starters, he was flustered very easily, which is why you decided to make your move so early in the morning.

“I look like how I do every day, dumbass!” He growled, the red deepening in his cheeks when you merely winked in response.

Ah yes. He tended to insult those he befriended. That was yet another endearing thing about the boy in front of you.

“No, something is different today,” you commented, “Did you do something with your hair?”

“No,” he frowned, the flush never subsiding from his cheeks. “Why are you doing this to me?”

“I’m just saying genuine things you know.” You laughed, punching his shoulder casually. “Besides, I think I’m succeeding so far.”

“Succeeding? This is that stupid checklist again, isn’t it?” He sighed. “Step two: flirting. What is the point of this again?”

“It’s to show interest.” You remarked. “Besides, if you want me to fall for you, you’re going to at least have to act like you’re interested in me. I know it’s working on you so far.”

“No it’s not!” He yelled, although the defense was half-hearted. You knew he was merely putting up a front. You could tell it from his body posture alone.

You had the upper hand right now.

You waved him goodbye as you entered the Karasuno grounds, climbing the stairs to reach your class as he walked in the opposite direction. Even if you had the upper hand right now, you knew that you had to be on-guard the rest of the day.

If there was one thing you knew very well in the time you had spent with Kageyama, it was that he was extremely competitive. There was no way he’d ever go down without a fierce fight, especially when a month’s worth of milk was on the line.

You had been absolutely right to doubt him.

When lunchtime rolled around, he stood at the vending machine like he always did, leaning against it casually as he waited for you, his focus placed on the entrance.

The first thing you noticed was how calm he was. There was none of his usual frantic energy or the practiced insults that you threw back at one another. He simply stood there, content, as he watched you make your entrance.

The second thing you noticed was how an unconscious smile crept onto his face when you waved at him and slipped away the minute your eyes darted to his mouth. He sipped his milk casually, although you knew that internally, he was definitely scheming.

He could be a gremlin if left untapped.

You were about to purchase your snack in silence, thinking about all the ways he could win against you when you felt his hand on your shoulder. Turning around, you saw him holding out a container of your favorite snack, handing it to you wordlessly.

What?

“I thought I would get it today,” he shrugged, taking a sip of his milk. “You’ve bought me milk sometimes. It’s only fair.”

He didn’t consider it much of a big deal, but you felt your heart begin to accelerate in its pace at the thoughts that came flying into your head.

He had paid attention to your favorite snack? He had actually cared about when you bought him milk?

He noticed all of this?

“You...have a nice smile.” He mumbled, a flush rising onto his cheeks once again. You felt yourself fluster a bit at the compliment, not used to hearing it that often.

“Uhhh thanks.” You exhaled, not knowing how to respond to such an out-of-the-blue remark. “Your smile looks a lot like the Cheshire cat you know.”

For a moment his face was contorted into an expression of horror before he laughed a bit, the low chuckles sending heat straight to your cheeks.

Damn it. His laugh was adorable.

It was a low chiming sound, but it still managed to uplift your spirits in the brief time that you heard it. It was absolutely perfect.

You’d like to hear it again if you could.

A small smile was on his face as he looked to the ground, thinking about something while you took the time to really look at him. Behind the stone exterior, was someone talented, clueless, and amusing in every way you could possibly imagine.

You noticed how his posture mirrored yours, and the way how he smiled when your eyes finally met his own.

Damn it! He got the one-up on you. Again.

STEP THREE: GO ON THRILLING DATES

“Tobio! Let’s go on this one!” You yelled as you dragged him towards the large rollercoaster that caught your eye.

It was a beautiful Saturday with the most perfect weather. Sunny skies met a fresh breeze as you dragged Kageyama around the amusement park you had insisted on going to together. He kept with your quick pace as you went from ride to ride, never once letting go of his hand.

If anything, you were more confused why he didn’t comment on the fact that you had been holding hands that long. Rather he silently followed you from ride to ride, occasionally commenting on how small it looked for them.

From where you stood, the rollercoaster looked positively incredible with the multiple loops and drops in its track. This certainly fit the bill for thrilling. Maybe Kageyama could finally agree to ride this one.

“Y/N, do we really have to do this one?” He asked, his gaze not tearing away from the ride. “Doesn’t it look a bit too small for us?”

“Well if it’s too small, then we can still ride it as a joyride, don’t you think?” You grinned as you shoved him into the line of the coaster. Soon enough, it was your turn as you were ushered into the seats while the employees strapped you and Kageyama into the rollercoaster.

The wait was excruciating, with every second that passed sending a wave of anticipation and adrenaline through your system. Looking to your side, you saw Kageyama’s face, which was composed, even though his fingers drummed rapidly on the bar.

Was he nervous?

Hesitantly, you reached to clasp your hands together, relishing in the feeling of your palm on his as the rollercoaster suddenly began moving, bringing you up the tall lift hill.

“Tobio, are you okay?” You questioned as you neared the top, the grip he had on your hand tightening ever so slightly.

“I’m fine!” He yelled, just as the roller coaster fell over the lift hill, sending them into a plummeting drop.

You felt the exhilarating feeling of soaring as the ride propelled you forward, shouts of glee leaving your mouth ever so often. On the other hand, all you heard from Kageyama was the occasional shout of horror when they encountered yet another drop on the track, the grip he had on your hand deathly tight.

“Tobio! You’re afraid of rollercoasters?!” You shouted as you were guided into a loop.

“No I’m not!” He shouted back, shutting his eyes when he was finally upright again. “They just make me feel like I’m about to die!” When he opened his eyes, they first found yours in a look that was both petrified and fond. “I think I lost the bet!”

“You did what?!” You yelled as the wind rippled in your ears again.

“The bet Y/N! I think I’m in love with you!” He yelled. “I thought I should tell you before we die!”

You felt your heart soar at the words that had just been exchanged, a testament to the budding feelings you had felt for months around him.

“We’re not going to die.” You sighed as the ride finally slowed, feeling exhilarated as you smiled at him. “I love you too.”

Stepping off the rollercoaster, Kageyama was more silent than anything, red flush adorning his cheeks as you massaged soothing circles onto his hand. “We both lost it in the end.” You laughed.

“I think it was worth it,” he chuckled, the beautiful chime, showing you that he meant every word.

©mysterystarz all rights reserved, please do not plagiarize, translate, or modify my fics in any way even if credited

taglist (bold cannot be tagged): @moi-bunni @kousukii @littlecatfairy @iwasunshine @kawaii-angelanne @haikyuutothetop @dearkousei @catchmewiddershins @perqabeth @sunarinluvr @elektrosonix @milktyama

reblogs are very appreciated <3

[littlemisslipbalm]

“sorry to bother you”

Summary: Y/N meets Harry in a little shop in France. It was a lovely meeting between the fan and the rockstar, but when Y/N realizes she’s lost her phone, will she see Harry sooner than she had ever thought possible?

AKA Harry meets a fan and accidentally steals her phone

vibes bc they snack and she walks up to him while he’s looking at the sky lol ^

Ok so I just wanted to preface this: this was initially just going to be a short blurb about a respectful meeting between Harry and a fan because of the terrible stories I’ve been hearing lately about rude people being inconsiderate of Harry and his privacy and I wanted to showcase that you can treat Harry as a human being rather than an object when you see him irl. But then my writer brain wanted more and so it turned into more. All I have to say is if you ever meet Harry in real life, please be respectful and kind. Also there is a 0.00001 chance that this would ever actually happen as most fiction goes so please don’t expect more than a short convo and maybe a photo from him. For him to even speak with you is more than enough, he really isn’t a disneyland attraction. 

Also not proofread bc apparently its long lol, I’m not super in love with this but I think it’s good-ish the end is meh - pls lemme know what yall think :)

Word Count: 10.2k (wait im actually so confused how this got so long omfg) | Warnings: swearing, angst, fluff, idrk its long but it’s sweet?

-

She saw him long before she approached him. She was truly unsure of herself, not wanting to bother him or upset him. She had been a fan for so long and couldn’t pass up the opportunity to meet someone who meant so much to her.

In the small Bayeux shop, she hesitates as she risks another glance at the tall man. She whispered to her mom minutes ago about how Harry Styles was in the same shop as them. Her mom was texting her non stop telling her to go up to him or she would do it herself. Y/N shook her head, distrusting her mom and feeling self conscious. No one else was in the store and her interaction with him wouldn’t disrupt the rest of the store, but for some reason she felt a tinge of discomfort about going up to him.

Harry leafs over a tablecloth, not paying attention to the other patrons in the store or anything else for that matter. He was staying on the coast of France for the week and he hadn’t run into many fans, so he was feeling at ease. Mitch was somewhere else in the store, but Harry felt comfortable on his own. He feels a soft, small tap on his broad shoulder. He turns expecting the quiet Mitch, but is presented with a short, sweet looking woman.

“Excuse me. Um, hi...Sorry to bother you,” she starts, eyes wide as she works to maintain eye contact with Harry as she looks up at him.

His green eyes are widened, realizing this isn’t someone he knows.

“Hello,” he says simply.

“I-” she pauses, her hands fiddling, “I’m sorry to bother you, honestly. But, your music means so much to me and I’d kick myself for the rest of my life if I didn’t say something before you left.”

He smiles, his expression softening at how genuine she sounds. “It’s quite alright.”

“It’s not though. I’m sure you’d appreciate not being bothered for once.”

“No,” he cuts her off, “I love talking with fans.”

“Yeah, but I’m sure there’s days where you wish you could just go to a random store on the coast of France - so out of the way - and not be walked up to by a random person.”

“I mean, I guess, but you seem rather nice.”

“Thanks...I’ve been a fan long enough to know that there’s people who don’t always treat you with that kind of respect. I really wouldn’t have bothered you if it wouldn’t have changed my life.”

“Don’t feel like you’re a bother, please,” he pleads lightly as he grasps her hand out of instinct, dropping it immediately when he realizes what he’s done. “It’s the people who don’t actually come up to me and treat me like an animal that are upsetting. Or the people who are only after a photo and aren’t very nice to me. You… you’re treating me like a human being. Being overly courteous -- if I’m being honest.” He chuckles lightly at the end.

She blushes at his words and smiles up at him, mirroring the soft smile on his lips. “I’m only treating you how I would want to be treated if I were in your shoes.” She glances down at his feet and notices the Gucci boots and smiles to herself, laughing lightly.

“What?”

“We’ve got the same shoes on actually.”

“No way!” His voice is playful at first as he glances down at well and realizes she’s right. He laughs at the weird little coincidence.

“I’ve had these for years, my favorite shoes…” She mumbles, seeing the ways his eyes shift  with a flash of concern. It’s what she fears he would think of her, why she was so hesitant to approach him in the first place. It’s why she had tried to hide her laugh from him when she noticed the similarity. She just wants to interact with him in a normal way. He again softens at her words, her sincerity, realizing it really just is one of those random things.

“They’re good shoes,” he laughs again, kicking his left heel with his right foot. The way she barely touched him to get his attention and the way she stays a safe distance from him is reassuring. She’s aware of his situation, yet she’s treating him with the utmost care and respect.

“So what brings you to Bayeux?” He asks, deciding he wants to continue the conversation with her. Y/N flits her eyes behind her shoulder and sees her mother watching their interaction out of the corner of her eye. She sighs and runs a hand through her hair, leaning against the counter her and Harry are at.

“Vacation, I guess. My family and I love to travel and ever since the pandemic settled down - finally, we’ve been jetting everywhere we’ve ever been or wanted to go. Seize the day vibes.” Her voice is serious, but she falters and laughs at the end. Her words are honest and she’s happy to actually get to talk to Harry more than just hello and a picture.

“I get that. You’re from America, yeah? It was really rough there for a long time.” He says solemnly, mirroring her figure, leaning against the counter, getting comfortable with her.  

She laughs again, smiling up at him, eyes sparkling, completely in love with her idol, but desperately trying to play it cool. “The accent gives it away, huh? I’m trying to fix that, get a job out of the states and never go back.”

“Hey!” Harry interjects, throwing his hand out from his stance in her direction, like he might touch her, but this time being careful to not actually. “It’s not that bad. I like your accent...And I love LA.”

She can’t stop laughing with Harry. It feels so simple and common to just be talking with him. He doesn’t seem like he’s in a rush anywhere, but she also fears to take up too much of his time. “I’m originally from up north in California actually. Living in LA right now, though. But I don’t know, I’ve just always felt like I was meant to live somewhere else. Do you know how that is? Just feeling like you’re meant for something different?”

He watches the way she moves her hands and works through her thought process. He feels like in another world they would have been close friends. The way she talks about things is so familiar to him. It’s like she’s read his mind, even though he knows for sure she hasn’t. She’s funny and laid back, yet mature at the same time. He wonders how old she is, out of college it seems if she’s trying to get a job out of the United States. He wonders what she plans to do and who she wants to become. Her aura intrigues him to no end. He thinks he could talk to her for hours.

Realizing he hasn’t made any sort of response to her somewhat philosophical question, he nods quickly, eyes blinking rapidly, his body straightening up back to his full height. “Yeah..I mean that’s how I felt about music. Like, I always felt like I was meant for something more… Turns out I was!”

They smile together again, knowing the conversation is ending. She knows he won’t keep asking questions and she doesn’t want to keep him.

He knows he can’t completely turn himself over to this stranger, she’s obviously younger than him and even though he feels connected to her, she could surprise him still. He knows he can’t talk to her forever, the cashier glancing at the pair of them every so often since they haven’t been looking at any merchandise for a while now. He knows he shouldn’t flirt with her, ask her out for coffee or anything of the sort. He simply knows this must come to an end any moment now.

“You should definitely follow your heart,... I didn’t catch your name?” He realizes when he can’t finish his sentence by calling her name.

“Oh!” She says surprisedly, not realizing she never gave her name, “Y/N. And thank you, means a lot to hear encouragement come from someone who’s been such an inspiration to me. Honestly, thank you.”

He perks at the way she says her name, again feeling like he’s known her for much longer than these five minutes.

“It’s me who should be thanking you, Y/N. Your support is what makes my life the way it is. It means a lot to me - and you truly seem like a lovely person, genuinely.”

She throws her head back in laughter at all of the words he’s saying. The way he’s trying to convey his sincerity is earnest, but his word choice is simply funny to her. Without realizing what she’s doing, she throws out her arm and her hand lands on his bicep to steady herself while laughing - something she would do with anyone normally. He doesn’t shift from her grasp when she opens her eyes and even widens them at the sight in front of her. Her hand on Harry Styles. How is this happening? She thinks as he doesn’t disintegrate underneath her touch. He’s definitely real as she feels the coat fabric and the muscles beneath it. He smiles down at her, so sweetly that his dimples pop out. She’s in awe, but has to contain the slight sense of coolness she’d been maintaining during their conversation.

She removed her hand, gingerly, “I won’t keep you any longer, Harry.” She blushes when she says his name. “If you don’t mind, I’d love to get a picture with you, but I totally understand if you’re not okay with that. I wouldn’t post it anywhere, it’s more just for me to remember this.” She rushes the last bit, feeling nervous and shy yet again. He was so big physically, but his presence was also so strong that she felt even smaller around him.

His smile calms her immediately and this time it's his hand to touch her, his hand landing over hers that’s been resting on the counter during their conversation.

“Of course,” His lips are soft and plush as they maintain his sweet smile. “Hey Mitch!” He looks over his shoulder as he calls to Mitch who has returned from the upstairs part of the shop.

Mitch blinks at the sight of Harry with a stranger before coming over, “Yeah?”

“Do you mind taking a picture of Y/N and me?”

Y/N is still in disbelief of what is going on, completely awestruck that Harry just said her name again to Mitch Rowland. And that Mitch Rowland was even in this shop with her as well. She hadn’t realized that at first. But now she was going to be forever grateful to her father for insisting they come back to Bayeux during this trip.

Mitch nods and takes her phone once she slips it out of her pocket, fingers fidgeting to get it open quickly. Mitch smiles at her reassuringly as she lets go and moves to stand beside Harry against the counter. He pulls her into his side gently and her hand goes around his waist, feeling his warmth and substantiality for the first true time. She tries to ground herself in the moment, memorizing every detail of right now. His cologne that emanates from his neck, the way the material of his jacket feels against her bare arm, the way he puffs out a slight laugh as Mitch shifts around to get most of their bodies in the frame. Oh and the way he looks when he tilts his neck to check on her and he even risks a wink of one of his emerald eyes and she promises herself she’ll never give away any of the clothes she’s wearing right now. Her nonchalant response is to wink right back and then they both smile, turning back their attention to the phone in Mitch’s hands.

Her mom had gone up to the cashier, effectively distracting them from the photoshoot that had begun to take place. Y/N never wants Harry to let go of her, but again she knows this can’t last forever. Mitch takes a couple of photos before handing the phone back. Y/N assumes that’s it and is about to thank Harry, but he speaks over her and her words die in her throat.

“How do they look?”

“Oh?” She flips through them and Harry leans over her shoulder, respectfully. “Pretty good,” she sums up, she loves them and she’d love even more, but she’d obviously never ask Harry for that.

“Pretty good?” He echoes, unsure of her response, looking from her to the photos, “Do you want to take more?”

She thinks on his offer, already knowing the right answer, “No, no. It’s all good. Thanks.”

Then turning to face Mitch, who’s been watching the pair of them converse, “Could I actually get a photo with you, Mitch? Sorry if that’s super weird, I just think you’re really cool. I had no idea you were even here until, uh, Harry called you over.” She laughs nervously, blushing yet again.

Harry laughs under his breath at how both her and Mitch blush at her words. She’s more unsure with Mitch, which he finds interesting. She had carried their conversation easily and maintained eye contact casually, but with Mitch, it was like he was her schoolyard crush, nervous hands and fleeting glances. He wondered if she genuinely only liked Harry for his music and didn’t find him physically attractive. This nagging feeling at the back of his mind perplexed him, he twitched trying to shrug it off. Why did he care if this woman found Mitch attractive and not him?  

“Yeah, of course. It’s not weird, have had plenty of people say much weirder things to me than that…” He smiles at Y/N and she mirrors his expression, but then she bites her lip. Her expression falters slightly as she processes his words. “I’m sorry if you’ve had similar experiences as Harry with so-called fans being disrespectful and inconsiderate.”

“No need to apologize, you’ve been nothing but kind and respectful,” Harry interjects

She only fidgets at his words. She’s growing slightly more nervous, being in the presence of both Mitch and Harry was starting to wear on her calm exterior. Still, Mitch trades places with Harry and Harry plucks her phone from her hands. He takes more photos than Mitch, doing close ups and full shots, causing Mitch and Y/N to laugh as they hold onto each other. He gives them little instructions on what to do in the photos and soon Y/N is rolling her eyes at Harry like she’s been best friends with him for ages. She feels like she’s just out with a couple of her friends and they decided to stop and pose for photos randomly, rather than meeting rock legends that she had only dreamt of ever seeing in real life.

When Harry is finally satisfied and comes up to the pair of them, she moves away from Mitch first, his long hair shifting as she pulls away from his side. She turns to face him immediately and starts to gush, “You’re an amazing guitarist, by the way. I forgot to say that. When I heard ‘She’ for the first time...I was blown away. The guitar on it...Feels like you’re in another universe. And it follows up ‘To Be So Lonely’ which your guitar on it is also like crazy epic. ”

Harry and Mitch laugh, but Mitch’s smile is appreciative, like he’s about to speak, but Harry speaks first, “That’s because he was in another universe. You know the story?”

She smiles and nods. Harry nods in approval. Mitch interjects, “Thank you. Also, Y/N,” he stares intently at her face and she meets his gaze this time, “You’re truly one of the kindest people - maybe the kindest - who have come up to us. And I’m not just saying that because you complimented my guitar playing.”

“He’s right,” Harry nods solemnly. Her face beams up at them both, now she really felt like this was too good to be true. Meeting her idols and having them both say very complimentary things about her, she’d cherish it forever.

“You both are amazing people and deserve to be treated as such.” Her tone is the sincerest she’s ever been, meaning every single thing she says. Then she rushes out her next few sentences, “But thank you again, seriously, you both mean a lot to me - I’ll let you get back to it...Have a nice day!”

After they say their farewells swiftly, she turns to leave and bounces over to her mother who is grinning with pride for her daughter. Before she exits completely she risks a glance over her shoulder and throws a peace sign up, Harry returns it. Then she walks out of the shop, her mother finishing up her shopping minutes ago. Mitch and Harry stay back, talking and continuing to look around the store.

Y/N tries to keep her cool until they’re out of sight of the shop. Once they round the corner and are on the next street over, she’s jumping up and down and squealing to her mom. “Can you actually believe it? What the fuck just happened? That was real right? I wasn’t hallucinating?”

Her mom laughs and reassures her it was real, “You did that, I’m so proud of you. You handled yourself very maturely”

“Well I tried! I can’t believe Mitch was there too!” She interjects, cutting off her mom, completely ecstatic from the previous experience.

“So how did the photos come out?” Her mom asks once Y/N had stopped rambling about Harry’s outfit and their matching shoes and their conversation and basically anything that had happened in the last ten minutes. They were blocks from the shop now.

“Photos?”

“Yeah, the photos you took with them. How do they look? I was ready to come over, but then that other man popped out of nowhere.”

“He’s smooth like that,” she says wistfully, her little crush on Mitch being nowhere near her love for Harry, but still present, and pats for her phone. “Oh.” She says, stopping in her tracks.

Her mother stops with her, “What?”

“I...I left my phone in the store, I guess.”

“Y/N…” Her mom drags out her name in exasperation, in awe of her daughter’s ability to be so smooth with her own idol yet how forgetful she could still be.

“Shit!” She confirms that her phone is nowhere to be found.  

“Really?” Her mother sighs, hands sitting on her hips in the center of the French street.  

“Sorry?” She asks sheepishly. In her starstruck stupor she had been too transfixed on Harry and Mitch and must have placed it down on the counter.

“Well, let’s go back,” her mother states, tired but also not completely mad. She lost her phone plenty of times and it was usually because of less acceptable reasons. Meeting your idols warranted a spacey head.

The door chimes as Y/N reenters the store, she walks quickly to wear she had her conversation with Harry almost twenty minutes ago and her mom goes to ask the clerk if they had grabbed it. It’s not on the counter where they had been leaning. She glances around checking to see if it had fallen on the ground or if by some grand luck Harry and Mitch were still there. Due to her luck, neither of these hopes came true. Her mom joins her in the area and shakes her head, the clerk hadn’t gotten any phones turned in since they had left the first time.

“Give me your phone,” Y/N says suddenly. “Find my iphone,” she explains when her mom looks at her questioningly. Checking the phone, she sighs in exasperation, silently cursing herself for not sharing her location with her mom when her phone icon says ‘location unavailable’. She rubs a hand over her face in disappointment.

“Don’t click the sound button!” Her mom says quickly, “If someone stole it, they’ll turn it off when they hear it.”

“But how am I supposed to find it? It could be here and I just can’t see it.” Her finger hovers over the ‘play sound’ button, hesitant, but desperate. She had met and gotten photos with Harry Styles and they were already gone - oh and she’d have to replace her phone, which would be terrible, as well.  

“Maybe Harry Styles has it?”

“Mom, don’t be dumb.”

“Hey! Watch your tone. I’m serious. Did he ever hand it back to you after he took those second round of pictures?”

Y/N scratches her head nervously and hands back her mom’s phone. She places both over her face and presses her fingers harshly over her eyes trying to think. She hadn’t been paying attention to her phone at the time, too busy trying to commit everything about Harry to memory in her mind so that she’d never forget it. She was sure she’d never forget today, now, even if she ever stopped loving Harry, which she was doubtful of. Hey kids, I met a rockstar and I was so starstruck I lost my phone in France! She groaned. “Oh my fucking god!”

After a few deep breaths with her fingers pinching the bridge of her nose, she composed herself, “We need to play the sound. Either it’s here and we’ll find it. Or - worst case scenario - it sounds and Harry Styles realizes he has my phone and we go from there… Well, I guess in the worst case scenario some jerk stole it and they turn it off and sell it for parts, but I just don’t think that’s what happened.” She bites her lip and stares at her mom, who hesitantly raises her finger to press the button that sets off the alarm on the lost phone. She clicks it after an overly dramatic pause. Y/N prays to anyone who’s willing to listen, she says in her mind, please sound the phone in here. Life would be so much simpler if it worked out the way we wanted. But, in place of the annoying echoing ring of the Find My iPhone tone there is only silence. At least there’s silence in the little shop in Bayeux.

-

In a tiny taxi cab that was headed to a small chateau outside of the town of Bayeux, the phone sounds and causes Harry to furrow his brows. He was sure he had his phone on ‘do not disturb’, but he pulls it out anyway to see why it’s making this annoying sound. What he pulls out of his coat pocket is not his phone he realizes immediately.

“Shit,” he says under his breath, still loud enough for Mitch to look over from the opposite passenger seat.

“What?”

“This isn’t my phone.”

“What?”

Harry rolls his eyes at Mitch’s repeated question and opens up his purse digging out his actual phone and holds up his and the one he had apparently stolen.

“Oh, yeah, that’s not your phone. That’s not good.”

Harry huffs as he turns the unknown phone over in his hand, the screen was a scene of a city he didn’t actually recognize - San Francisco maybe - the lavender silicone case is smooth in his hand and he notices a little sticker, it’s of Y/N and two other women. His eyes widen at it and it makes a little more sense to him. He hadn’t really stolen a phone, he just forgot to give it back. It wasn’t much better, but it was how he was going to comfort himself. Dropping his own phone in his lap, he runs his hand through his hair, rings slightly tugging at his mused curls. Then he turns the sticker to show Mitch, “It’s that girl we met, it’s her phone.”

“You stole her phone,” Mitch states. Voice deadpan and eyes boring into Harry’s.

“No!” Harry defends, but quickly slumps, “I mean, technically? Yes...But-” Mitch’s laughter cuts him off. “You’re an idiot, Harry, y’know that?”

-

“I feel like I’m on punk’d right now…” Y/N grumbles as it becomes clear that the phone is not in this shop. “If this is punk’d, at least my phone’s not actually gone,” she says to no one really. Her mom is pacing the store and stops to look at her daughter, “This is most definitely not punk’d for so many reasons, dear. Mainly because the show got canceled but also because we are in Bayeux, France not Malibu.”

“Fuck…”

She walks out of the shop, barely paying a glance to the shop keeper this time, her usual kind demeanor nowhere to be found under the piles of distress and anxiety plaguing her body.

Back out on the street she looks around, again hoping that with any luck Harry is still around and will come running up to her to give her back her phone. Again, no such luck.

“What the fuck am I going to do?” She looks to her mom helplessly, her arms flapping by her sides, defeated.

-

“What the fuck am I going to do?” Harry asks as they get out of the taxi, glancing at the purple phone in his hand.

Mitch shrugs, “Hope she has her location on?”

“Then she’s going to come here...But wouldn’t she have tried to track it first instead of playing the sound?”

“Dude, I don’t know.You can try to unlock it and find her mom’s number, get in contact with them.” Mitch sighs as they walk through the front door. “Or we can go back to town, see if they’re still there? Did you get her last name? You could find her on social media maybe?”  

“I feel terrible...She was so nice.” Harry throws his bags down on the entryway couch and begins to pace, Y/N’s phone never leaving his hand. “Could go back into town tomorrow, maybe we’ll run into each other again.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Mitch sits and runs a hand through his hair, “Just calm down, right now, Harry. There’s not much else you can do.”

He’s right and Harry tries to not fixate on the phone, but he fiddles with it for the rest of the day. He doesn’t let it leave his sight and sets it beside his bed when he gets ready to go to sleep. As he shifts in the bed, unable to fall asleep he takes the phone and begins trying to unlock it, guessing random numbers and failing miserably. Eventually, he decides he should go to bed and drifts off into an uncomfortable sleep.

-

After being unsuccessful in town, Y/N and her mom went back to the little villa they were staying at on the outskirts of Bayeux. It was located next to some vineyards that the villa co-owned with the private chateau that sat on the other side of the vines. It was beautiful and she had been so excited to be staying there. But after the events of today, she was not in the mood to join the rest of her family for dinner among the grapes. She lays on her bed, staring at the ceiling, wondering how she had been so stupid to forget to ask for her phone back.

In the middle of the night, she wakes up in a cold sweat. She’s still in the clothes she had worn out and was laying on top of her covers at the end of her bed. All the windows of the room were closed and her shades weren’t drawn. Groggily, she rose from her uncomfortable position and changed. Moving to the window to let some air in she sees the lights flickering in a room of the private chateau across the way. She wondered why someone would willingly be up at this hour, even though she was unsure exactly what time it was without her phone. Her phone. That’s what had woken her up. She had dreamt that her mom had called her phone and the frog from the Frog and the Toad stories had picked it up. That was ridiculous, of course, but the idea to call her phone instead of just pinging it was solid. If Harry still had it, then he could pick up and they could figure out how to meet up. She decided she’d have to do that at a reasonable hour, however and moved on, opening her windows and closing the sheer shades, before getting under her covers to sleep.

-

Y/N wakes up early the next morning. Her sleep a restless one. Padding down the hall to her parent’s room, she knocks solemnly. She was far from a morning person and it was much to her mother’s surprise to see her standing in the hallway when she opened the door.

“Hey..” her voice catches in her throat, scratchy from lack of use in the night.

“Good morning, sunshine,” her mother laughs slightly, but Y/N only gives her an unamused look and walks into her room immediately searching for her mom’s phone.

“Need to use your phone, gonna call my phone,” she mutters, none of her thoughts being coherent sentences.

“Y/N, it’s 7 am. You’re going to call Harry Styles at 7 am? With your morning voice?”

Her eyes narrow and her lips form a straight line one her face, clearly not amused by her mother’s questions. Even if she knew her mom was right. She clears her throat and rolls her eyes at her mom, who is moving around the room beginning to get ready for the day as her daughter sits on the rumpled bed. Y/N’s father had already gone out to breakfast in the main area of the villa.

“Fine,” she slides off the bed when she realizes her mom isn’t offering her any more words of wisdom. “I’ll get ready for the day and then I will call my phone.”

Pattering back to her room, she slowly begins to dress and liven herself up for the day. Her hands instinctively reach out to her bedside table to pick up her phone to turn some music on, but of course she’s greeted with nothing. She groans loudly, “Of. Fucking. Course.” Shaking her head, she moves to take fresh clothes out of her suitcase.

Exiting her room again, this time far more awake, she walks down the hallway in a babydoll style top that read “Don’t play with my heart” with little girls playing racquetball with a red heart emblazoned over her chest and white jean floods. Her feet were covered in red high top converse today, matching the color of the small heart on her shirt. She liked the contrast of the white pants and the bright red of the shoes and she smiled to herself as she walked confidently into the breakfast area.

Her entire family was sitting around one of the tables, sipping coffee and eating pastries, it was now around 8:45 - a slightly more acceptable part of the day. They were all early risers, especially in comparison to her, and her older sister looks at her curiously. “What are you doing up so early, kid?” Y/N leans down to grab a slice of a peach from her brother’s place, which earns her a slight yelp of protest. She rolls her eyes at her sister and stalks off to the buffet, knowing she’s made her presence known enough.

“Can I borrow your phone now?” Y/N says after finishing a small danish and the lukewarm coffee that was at their table when she arrived. Her mother finally nods and hands it over. As Y/N grabs it, she’s already halfway out the doors that lead into the backyard of the villa. 

She stands on the grass that goes for a few feet before a hedge that separates the villa ground with the vineyard. Flipping through the contacts, she settles on hers and sighs, trying to calm her nerves. Her free hand ghosts over her hair and she uses one foot to step lightly on the heel of the other shoe. Please pick up, she sends out a prayer once again. Her last twenty-four hours seemed to consist of dreams, hopes, and prayers and she was starting to realize that she didn’t particularly like any of them. Biting her lip, she raises her phone up to her ear and gets her automatic voice message. Realizing she has her phone on ‘do not disturb’, she immediately rings herself again, knowing that it will go through this time.

-

Harry strolls out of his bathroom and widens his eyes when he hears a buzzing hear his bed. Seeing it’s Y/N’s phone he grabs it quickly and furrows his brow at the contact. Her mother’s name, but he doesn’t know that. To him it’s just a person’s name, it could be anyone she knew. Still, he thought about the odds of it being just one of her friends or her calling from someone else’s phone and decided to risk it.

“Hello?”

“Thank fucking God!” is all he hears and he’s pretty sure it’s Y/N’s voice.

“Y/N?” He laughs and takes a seat on his bed, staring out his window that opened to the vineyard.

“Yes! Harry? Hi!” She’s ecstatic that anyone picked up at all, bouncing up and down on the other side of the phone. She mutters to herself, once again, “Thank fucking God.”

“Who’s phone are you calling from?”

“Oh, my mom’s,” she says, calming down slightly as she begins to walk around the grass, unable to contain the renewed sense of energy she has.

“You don’t keep her in your contacts as ‘mum’? I almost didn’t pick up.” He tilts his head, trying to think of anyone else he knew who kept their mother’s contact as the actual name rather than ‘mum’ or some other variant of it.

“Well, thanks for picking up,” she laughs at his words, bringing her pacing to a stop to stare at the chateau across the way. “It’s really not that weird,” she insists, her arm going to cradle the elbow of the arm that holds the phone to her ear. “I don’t think any of my siblings have her as ‘mom’ in their contacts.”  

“I think it’s a little weird. I’m going to have to start asking people what they’ve got their mum down as in their phones. You’ve got me intrigued,” he muses, only slightly teasing. A smile curves onto his face as he hears her huff over the phone, obviously not liking his ribbing.

“So...you have my phone,” she changes the subject.

“Yes…” he scratches his head and she swears she could hear him awkwardly rubbing at his hair. “Sorry ‘bout that. Guess I forgot to give it back.”

“Not entirely your fault, I probably should have asked for it back. It was like twenty minutes before I even realized I didn’t have it and that was only really thanks to my mom.” She tries to not make him feel bad, because she honestly felt responsible for the mess up.

“Yeah, but I probably wouldn’t’ve realized till I got back to my place and pulled out one phone from my pocket and another one from my bag if you hadn’t tried the ‘find my iphone’ thing.”

“Oh my god, was it loud!? Did you have a hard time shutting it off?” She rushes as all the possible ways she might have annoyed Harry yesterday run through her mind.

“No, no, it was fine,” he reassures her, laughing lightly, standing up now and beginning to pace in front of his window. “Felt like a proper dick, though. Never in my life have I forgotten to give someone their phone back.” He sighs and stops in front of the window, deciding to open it for some fresh air.

Her gaze flits to a movement on the second floor of the chateau, someone opening up their window apparently. The long paned windows flip open and the little sheer curtains flutter in the slight morning breeze.

“So are you still in Bayeux?” Harry asks, hoping her answer is ‘yes’ as he takes in a deep breath of the air from outside.

“Yeah. Are you still here?” She asks timidly, moving her gaze down to her shoes bright red sticking out of the green grass. “Because that will make getting my phone back much easier,” she adds, clarifying that it’s not supposed to be a personal question, just simply a logistical one. Even if her heart skips a beat at the thought of seeing Harry again.

“Yes, I am. Well...just outside the town actually.”

“You don’t say? I’m staying just outside of town, too. At a little villa located next to a vineyard,” She looks around her surroundings again, walking the length of the garden once more. A movement from the same room that had opened their windows at the chateau catching her eye once again. A man, with his arm placed on the sill, leaning out slightly.

“You’re not wearing red shoes by any chance?” He smiles and she can hear the way it affects his words. Looking out of the window, he eyes the villa and the person who was pacing around its patio, seemingly on the phone.

Her brows raise and she stops in her tracks. “Did you just open your window?”

The only response from Harry that she hears is a soft chuckle. But, more importantly, the man in the chateau is waving to her. She grins and waves her free hand over her head, doing a slight jump to make sure he sees her. His laughter only grows, crackling slightly over the telephone line.

“What are the odds?” She breathes out after a moment. Her waving hand fell to her side and she looked at the figure in the window. It wasn’t exactly clear to her that it was Harry, but the way the man was hunched was enough to convince her. She vaguely sees him shake his head in agreement at the serendipitous nature of their current situation.

“Have you had a chance to dine in the vineyard yet?” Harry bites his lip after he asks the question, feeling a little more confident in his flirtation over the phone.

“I have - only once for dinner. Last night I was so stressed I couldn’t eat.”

“What do you think about lunch in the vineyard?” He’s smiling now, the charm dripping in every word he says. His accent is music to her ears and she thinks how could she ever say no to that offer.  

“I don’t know...lunch with my phone thief?” She imitates an unsure tone. Her tease is lighthearted and Harry huffs, playfully indignant.

“As an apology for keeping your phone by mistake,” he adds, emphasizing the ‘by mistake’ part.

“As long as I can get my phone back, I’m up for anything you want,”  She laughs, but then blushes at the innuendo that could be found in her words. Harry hears it and an amused look spreads across his face, the definition of anything running through his mind as well as his assured belief that Y/N did not mean what she had just implied. “I mean! Not anything, I just...Lunch in the vineyard would be lovely, Harry.” She sighs, a hand trailing down her face at her complete foolishness.

“Great. How does one o’clock sound?” He moves on from her slip, not wanting to embarrass her anymore. Especially when he was the one to cause this entire situation.

“Sounds smashing, Mr. Thief,” She breathes out, but laughs when she hears Harry groan.

“You’re something else, missy.”

“I know.” She rolls her eyes, trying to contain her giggles at their playful back and forth.

“See you at one.” He says finally.

“See you at one.” She echoes, continuing to watch him in the window. Neither of them seem to move to hang up. She’s stood in place and so is he, his head hanging out of the window now, resting himself on his arm. It’s just their breathing exchanging over the line and some gusts of wind crackling the connection every so often.

“Are you going to hang up?” She whispers, after a minute of complete silence, her voice coming out impossibly small.

“Thought you would’ve by now.”

“I don’t know why I can’t.” She admits, but she just feels weird hanging up on him even if they have plans to see each other later.

“Me neither.” His response causes her to tilt her head in confusion. Why would he have trouble hanging up on her?

“Okay.”

Then, it’s quiet again. Both of them shifting their bodies around, yet still managing to stay on the line. Y/N is the one who hangs up the phone after hearing Harry’s breath shake slightly, like he’s steeling himself to actually hang up. She realizes that while she doesn’t want to hang up on him, she’d rather do it than have him hang up on her. If that made any sense. She wasn’t sure, but the way he had invited her to lunch, it just felt like he had shifted their relationship from fan and star to something else. Something she didn’t fully grasp, but whatever it was made her stomach flip.

-

She informed her family that she wouldn’t be going out with them today and that she was getting her phone back, but not that she would be having lunch with Harry. She had no idea what they would think about it, but she didn’t want to give them the chance to inform her.

Walking through the vineyards, she watches the slight dust from the dirt gather on her shoes, the red converse. She had settled on what she had been wearing originally after changing her outfit upwards of twenty times. Best to be casual, she thought, like it was no big deal that she was about to dine with a musician whom she loved.

There was only one table on this side of the vineyard, it was the part owned by the chateau, a couple rows from where the villa had their tables. The simple cream tablecloth laid across the wooden table that had two matching wooden chairs with cream cushions placed around it. On top of the table was a picnic basket and a bottle of red wine, made from the grapes in the vineyard. And in one of the chairs sat Harry. Big square green glasses perched on his nose as he looked up at the sky. Y/N takes in his appearance, his cream shirt with stitched patterns on it, half unbuttoned to grant a full view of his swallows and butterfly as well as baggy light wash ripped jeans and dirty white vans. His shirt almost matches the tablecloth, but she’s not sure if he would take that as a compliment.

He hadn’t noticed her presence and he rubs his lips together, smoothing the lip balm he had applied before settling outside.

“Mr. thief?” She touches lightly on his shoulder, similar to how she had done yesterday. His head shoots up and he readjusts in his chair, to sit up slightly more upright. A smile curves onto his face and he moves his glasses up into his hair, pushing his curls back behind them.

“Y/N,” he drags out her name, toying with the sound of it. His eyes flit over her figure, taking in her outfit but quickly run back to her beautiful face. He motions for her to take a seat and she complies.

“The red shoes,” he smiles, glancing at her shoes. She laughs and does a little click of her heels.

“Can’t believe my phone was less than a mile away from me last night.”

“Oh! Your phone!” Harry’s eyes widened, “I forgot it in my room!”

Y/N laughs, her smile spreading on her face immediately, but her face falls when she sees Harry isn’t laughing. “You can’t be serious.” Harry says nothing, a blush creeping up his neck. “Harry…” she doesn’t know what else to say, scratching at the back of her head. “I guess stars really are just like us, complete space cadets.”

“I’m sorry! I was..distracted.”

She can’t keep herself from laughing and she places her hand over Harry’s on the table, trying to calm him down. “No worries, seriously, I was just teasing you. I’ve gone this long without my phone, an hour or so more won’t kill me.”

He smiles sheepishly, mentally kicking himself for how foolish he had made himself look. “Sorry ‘bout that. Seems like I’m really trying to keep your phone, doesn’t it?”

“Kind of...but I don’t think there’s anything in particular on there that you’d really be interested in having access to.”

He grabs the bottle of wine and takes the temporary cork off, he had previously uncorked it before Y/N had arrived. He pours the wine and then quirks a brow towards her. “I’m sure you’ve got some funny notes on there, you’re hilarious.”

She scoffs as his look is serious. Picking her glass up, she clinks it with Harry’s and takes a sip. She hums at the taste, judging the flavor and deeming it good. He watches her as she makes her silent decision and smirks at the way she smiles to herself. Coming back to the conversation she makes eye contact with Harry as she sets the glass down and leans back in her chair.

“You barely know me.” A coy smile flits across her features now. Harry’s heart skips a beat at her tone. He had been expecting some lighthearted quip, but this held something far more intense. It’s still teasing, but it’s far closer to flirting than friendly joking.

He begins to unpack the basket and place food onto the table, eyes constantly flickering between his task and Y/N. Her eyes are fixated on his hands, the way they flex and move and the way his rinks clink against the containers he’s moving around.

“Then tell me about yourself.”

“What do you want to know?”

“Anything.” He finishes placing the food on the table and removes the basket from the table so there’s nothing obstructing their view of each other.

“Very specific,” she takes a sip of her wine again, refraining from rolling her eyes. It was easy to talk to Harry, like they had been friends forever.

Harry lets out one of his loud single laughs. “See! You’re hilarious.” His compliment makes her finally roll her eyes playfully. Instead of responding, she puts some food onto the plate in front of her and takes a bite of a peach slide she had grabbed.

“You’re a flirt,” she says finally, her smile spreading across her face.

“That’s a fact ‘bout me not you, love.”

She bites her lip. For being extremely forgetful, Harry was also extremely charming. “Well, I’m not a fan of flirts.”

“I thought you said you were a massive fan yesterday?” He tilts his head to the side and looks at her with an inviting look in his eye, obviously trying to goad her.

She let out a gasp at his words and began to blush. His stare felt like a second sun boring straight into her, its heat traveling directly to her core. Trying to maintain her collected appearance that she had played so well yesterday, she takes a breath and another sip of wine. The liquid ran down her throat, soothing her. Shaking her head she says, “You know what I meant.”

Biting a piece of bread, Harry nods and shoots her a wink. Her legs instinctively shift together. Finishing his chewing, he speaks up, “Okay, but seriously, tell me more about yourself.”

They settle in, getting more serious and having an actual conversation rather than flirty comments shot back and forth. By the end of the bottle of wine, Harry and Y/N are cackling about some story she’s told about her first solo trip to Amsterdam and all the trouble she got into being a twenty year old college student with easy legal access to weed.

“I remember the first time I went to Amsterdam with the band,” Harry easily segways into his own story and she perks at the words ‘the band’. After all the fun they had been having talking and getting to know each other, the idea that Harry was a famous musician had left her mind completely. For the last forty-five minutes he had just been a really nice guy who was treating her to lunch.

She looks at him expectantly. “It was crazy cool, I think I was only seventeen then? But everyone else was over 18 so they bought us a bunch of pot and we smoked it and got high off our asses. Can barely remember what we talked about, but we definitely thought it was the smartest shit ever”

“Do you ever miss that?”

He finishes off his last bit of wine, “Being young and dumb?”

“No, the, like, relationship you had with them. I don’t mean to pry, but I feel like with any close relationship, when you stop being together all the time...it’s never the same.”

Harry sighs, thinking over what you had said, now knowing it was rather serious and not just about being young. He runs a hand through his soft curls before starting his response. “Short answer is yes. But, y’know, they were my family for so long and that bond doesn’t go away, even if we go through rough patches. Like that part of my life is such an essential part of who I am, I could never throw it away or discount it. I don’t know if I miss it all of the time though. I really like who I am right now.”

She nods, finishing her wine now too. Her body is fuzzy and warm under the soft light of the afternoon. Sharing a bottle of wine was enough to make her tipsy, but she felt sober enough to carry on their serious conversation. “That’s good. It’s important to like who you are right now. It’s how you know you’re ready to be there for others.” She says thoughtfully and then adds, “I like who I am right now, too.”

Harry smiles at her, a calm expression maintaining on his face, and twists his rings on his fingers. “That’s good,” he echoes. “Do you want to go for a walk?” His voice is soft and of course she’s going to say yes.

Her response is to stand up from the table and begin putting things back into the picnic basket. Harry watches her for a moment, taking in the way she moves with so much elegance even when doing such a mundane task. He is honestly so happy that he had gotten to see her again. She had intrigued him yesterday, but he had just expected her to be one of those fleeting thoughts in his mind. Now he wasn’t so sure. He had a feeling she would live in his memory for far longer. “You don’t have to do that. I’ll come back later and grab it all.”

“You set this all up, the least I can do is clean up a little,” She looks up at him from her crouched position as she packs up the leftover food into the basket still on the ground. Her hair is slightly falling into her face and she reaches to push it behind her ear while they continue to look at one another. Harry takes his lower lip into his mouth as he continues to look at her, trying to convince himself she’s not the most beautiful woman he’s ever met.

As they walk between the grapes, they continue to talk, further investigating Y/N’s job aspirations and what Harry was planning on for his next few weeks of vacation. He leads them down a dirt path after they cross the street, moving away from both the villa and the chateau. The path has tall grass flanking its sides that pushes around in the cool summer breeze. She mentions the beautiful sound of the birds chirping and Harry agrees. They walk until they reach the small lake that’s about a ten minute walk from their respective current residences. It’s not a lake for swimming so there’s no one around, just more tall grass, some small trees, and the animals.

“It’s really so beautiful here.”

“I love it a lot, I’ve been coming down here every evening and just sitting alone for an hour or so,” Harry motions to the little wooden bench located beneath a shady tree. She looks at him questioningly, unsure if he means for them to sit. He takes her hand in response and leads them over to it. It’s right before the edge of the pond and if their legs were just a bit longer they could touch the feet into the water.

“It’s nice,” She says, turning her attention from the scenery to stare at Harry, who she finds is already looking at her. Their eyes meet and she bites her lip. He’s so close to her. Closer than they were in the shop yesterday and now their faces are on the same level. His glasses are still pushed into his curls and she decides to pluck them from his head and place them over her eyes instead. Harry protests, but she says smugly, “I’m putting them to better use than just sitting a top that head of yours. It’s quite bright out.”

Harry leans into her, extending his arm behind her and resting it on the back of the bench. She sighs peacefully, with her gaze now hidden behind the glasses. She returns her gaze out against the water and tries to shift closer to Harry casually. They stay silent, listening to the rest of the world moving around them. Soon she’s resting nestled into his side and his arm has moved from the bench to rest around her shoulders. She exhales in contentment, but neither of them have said anything for a while. They were okay with it, being held was enough. Her right hand goes up and threads with Harry’s that is hanging limply against her.

After a few more minutes of silence, Harry decides he wants to talk. “I like being around you.”

“I like being around you too, Harry. You’re different than I had expected.”

“Really?”

“Yeah..I mean there’s that sinister quote about how you should never meet your heroes. But still, you were even kinder than I expected and even though you stole my phone,” she pauses to laugh,”it kind of turned out to be a blessing in disguise because I got to see you again.”

“Thanks…” Harry sighs and she turns her face to gaze up at him. “Well, yeah, now I’m sorta glad I did take your phone. You’re really wonderful.” She smiles and he smiles just as wide.

But then her smile falters, suddenly remembering everything. It was like a self-fulfilling prophecy, she mentioned that thing about heroes and it all came crashing down around her. Yes, it was amazing to be around Harry and it was great that he had been so down to earth. But what she had just said was true too. He was her hero, he was famous and their lives didn’t connect at all. Just that one fleeting moment in the shop. If she hadn’t known him they would have never interacted. She had even been on her last legs of being in that store, she was just about to ask her mom to leave when Harry had walked through the door.

She sits up and drops her hand from his and he looks at her confused. “Did I say something wrong?” He asks, concerned. She stands up now and walks the short distance to the edge of the water, pushing his glasses on top of her head. He follows quickly, growing anxious as she stays silent. “I just..” she laughs in spite of herself, “I just feel really dumb right now.”

“What? Why?” Harry’s really confused now, she won’t meet his gaze as he faces her trying to figure out what just happened.

“I can’t believe I fooled myself into thinking for even a second this could ever be something more.” She turns to Harry finally, looking him directly in the eye, even though her eyes are prickling with tears. She’s angry with herself, not Harry. “You’re you and I’m just a fan at the end of the day. All of the flirting and touching, it can’t be anything more. At most, I’m a one night stand. And as great as that would be in the moment, I know how I feel about you and I know it would ruin me. I can’t be a fling for you, Harry. I’m sorry.”

“Hey,” he grabs her arm, trying to comfort her, she shrugs him off. “You’re more than a fan to me, I thought that was obvious by now. You wouldn’t be some meaningless one night stand. When I say I like being around you, I mean I like you, Y/N.” His voice is strong yet soft. He needs to convince her that she can feel comfortable around him, but he sees the darkness in her eyes, how scared she is of being hurt.

“I don’t fit into your life, Harry.” She shakes her head, moving her hands more as she grows more anxious.

“That’s not true. You told me you want to move to England, we could see each other there and see if this was anything.”

She knows he’s right, that it was possible, but she had worked herself up so much now that she had a hard time believing it. She takes a deep breath, “Just answer me this. Would you have given me a second glance if I hadn’t come up to you in that shop yesterday? Or a second thought if there hadn’t been the phone mishap?”

Harry is taken aback. Her words had nothing to do with what he had just said. He had thought his solution was actually really great, a plan he had been meaning to tell her if the rest of the day had gone accordingly, which it didn’t seem to be doing. He pauses and if Y/N was anymore distraught that would have been her cue to leave. Thankfully, she had grounded herself enough in the situation to not let her hot head get in the way of this conversation.

“That’s a pretty unfair question, Y/N. It’s not like I’m constantly looking for someone to fancy.”

“Just answer the questions.”

“Probably not, about the first one, I hadn’t even noticed anyone in the shop before you came up to me. I was off in my own world.” She nods, taking his words into account. He continues, “But yes, about the second one, I thought about you in the car ride home before your phone even rang. Like I said, I like you.”

“Okay.” She softens.

“That’s it?”

“I mean you’re right. We could see each other in London and see if this is something. I just had to know about the other stuff, it was racing through my mind and I wouldn’t get over it unless you gave me an answer.”

“Oh, so can I kiss you?” His words broke the uncomfortable tension that had surrounded them.

“You still want to?” Her voice is small and unsure. The most nervous she had been around Harry was right now.  

“I want to do so much more than that, darling, you have no idea.” He cups her cheek and wraps an arm around her waist. She giggles in nervous anticipation. Then his lips gently push onto hers and she sighs into the kiss. At the edge of the lake, the pair of them taste each other for the first time. Tongues begin licking into each other’s mouths and the kiss becomes breathless. Her hands are at the base of his neck, tugging him closer to her while he tightens his grasp around her waist. She moans slightly when Harry nips at her lower lip and he smirks, happy with the sound she makes.

“We should probably go get my phone.” Harry whimpers at her words.

“What?” Harry is once again confused by the woman before him, who had now pulled from their kiss.

“My phone is in your room…” She trails off and then eyes widen and he giggles excitedly. Eventually realizing what she’s implying.

“Yes! Yes, we should go do that. Get your phone. In my room. Sounds like a good idea. Mhmm.” He pecks her lips between each sentence.

“You’re so weird,” she laughs and brings down his shades onto her face once again. He pulls her into his side and kisses the top of her head as they begin their walk back to the chateau.

“Do you want your phone or not?”

[apostate-in-an-alcove]

hello hello! Really sorry this ask is out of the blue but uhh. It’s the beginning of lent and so I’m a little in my feelings rn. I just wanted to ask as an ex-Christian like… do you ever feel a little stuck in-between?? This is worded so badly aaa but you know. Like as if you will never truly be free of the church despite it going against everything you stand for

Just for reference I was raised in A very weird household - my mother is a Latin Roman Catholic and my dad was an African Eastern Orthodox Catholic so even from youth I’ve always felt like I was stuck in some kind of limbo due to the conflicting views on dogma despite technically belonging to the same branch of christianity and it only got worse when my dad left his religion and my mother basically became an extremist. I never felt like I did enough for my religion and leaving to live in a more secular country for a few years really compounded on that and genuinely made me break down from the back to back crises of faith I was having on my own

now I feel sometimes like I don’t want to be religious. I deffo don’t want to be a Catholic of any kind at least, esp. considering the stances they take on my lifestyle (being queer, pro-choice, unwilling to get married or have children etc.) and I don’t like to pray or visit the church anymore, but I never want to call myself an atheist bc I still?? Kind of believe in some of the scripture I was taught growing up?? and mostly I won’t lie I feel lost without religion as a blanket. I think most of all I miss the community but that is fully blocked off from me now ever since I came out. I just…. I dunno. I wanted to talk to somebody about my crisis and to vent but I obviously don’t have anyone to do that with irl.

I’m really really sorry to be trauma dumping out of the blue btw but I just don’t know who I can realistically talk to and it’s been eating me up for a while now. More so bc of the season and being away from my family and from faith as a whole, and I really admire how open and forthcoming you are about your own experiences so wanted to do the same - if this is upsetting to you honestly don’t feel pressured to respond!! I just needed to get this off my chest. Also if nt already obvious this is Not an opportunity for Christians to proselytise, I’ve had enough of that to last a lifetime

No, I get what you're saying. It took me awhile to even label myself as an atheist because I was still attached to Catholicism and my theistic beliefs for a long time. And there's times where I do miss the community and security that came with that and the answers religion could provide. The loneliness is tough to deal with but it’ll take time to pass as you find more like-minded people and move on to greener pastures.

It certainly does feel like the Church will somehow always have its grubby hands on you in some way forever and this seems like a common thing when I talk to other ex Catholics (though this could certainly apply to other denominations and cults). There's work to be done in terms of deconstructing what we were taught in the Church and the Church ultimately has no authority over you and who you are and the life you wish to build. It'll just take time.

You don't have to leave Christianity or religion entirely though. There's plenty of ex Catholics who join other, more progressive denominations of Christianity or they move on to other religions and spiritual practices. I came to the conclusion of atheism after reevaluating my faith and religion and chose to deconvert, but I respect that that isn't the choice that everyone will make.

I'm sorry you're experiencing this Anon, it's rough. I wish you the best.

[lassieposting]

Hi i havent read the books post-resurrection so im kinda lost on why you dont like phase 2 val? She was easily one of my favourite characters ever, she was flawed (and the books took time to acknowledge them) and relatable and still really admirable (intelligent, brave, loyal) and i really liked her and really appreciated that she wasn’t perfect unlike every other young adult heroines. What went wrong😢😢😢😢

Okay I'm gonna put this under a cut because I very strongly dislike phase 2 val and I know it bugs people who don't feel the same, so. Dead dove dont eat

Okay so first off, phase 1 val and phase 2 val are completely different people. literally. phase 1 val was based on an ex-friend of lardo's who used to apparently be involved pretty heavily in like, editing the books and "she'd react like this" or "val wouldn't say that", and that val she was one of my favourite fictional characters from when book one came out to the release of resurrection. phase 2 val is based on his whiny little girlfriend who likes to start shit with 14yos on twitter, and you can absolutely tell she is no longer the same person. so the long story short of "what went wrong" is "the original irl val's friendship with dirty laundry ended for whatever reason and he decided to retcon her entire personality to suit his gf"

Phase 2 Val, in my opinion:

Weak, like won't even fight back when she gets jumped bc boo fucking hoo she's so awful, bitch get up already, nobody signed up for ur pity party

Whiny. So fucking whiny. All the time. And she's the POV character so it's inescapable.

"Pacifist" but in a really pathetic virtue-signalling kind of way like "Oh, I've done such terrible thiiiiiiiiiiings I'm so awfulllllllllllll look how good I'm trying to be nowwwwwwww pay attention to meeeeeeee" kind of way, it was both boring and a massive eye roll. It's a book about magic and asskicking. Kick some ass. We're here for escapism not "realistic" whining. Yes, irl she'd be a mess. As an author it's his job to strike a balance between the "realism" he wants to portray and making his readers so depressed and done with his heroine that they quit reading, and in my case, he absolutely failed.

Everything must be about her at all times. Skug is having personal problems? Fuck him, they're about her now. Everything is about how it affects her, and her feelings, and be damned to the person actually having the problem. Fucks phase 2 val cain gives about anyone except herself: 0

Bitter and jaded. Which yeah I get why but it's like jesus christ what do we get out of reading about this? It's not even good bitter and jaded where it makes you empathise or admire her strength in adversity or whatever, she's just become a really nasty person with no redeeming features that I could see. Which? Landy outright said she's based on his gf? If your boyfriend is gonna drag ur entire personality through the dirt like that and write "you" as just a collection of incredibly negative traits...yikes.

Really ungrateful about the awesome life she leads? Which bugs me bc I fucking hate mundanity and knowing that all there is to life is fucking working and bad mental health. I would kill to live her life. All she does is moan about it. Like? Quit then. Fuck off back to being a mortal if it's that bad and live the shitty life you wanted to get away from in the first place. That way we'd get no more books, and quite honestly, thank fuck for that. But anyway, she needs to pick one, stick with it, and stop complaining about whatever she chose.

The girl wallows in self pity. And if someone else isn't indulging her enough, she'll wallow harder and louder and more obviously. Yawn.

Her POV is now so depressing to read that Resurrection literally tanked my mental health. I'm not kidding. I fell off the self-harm wagon, the suicidal thoughts came back, reading her dissociating would make me dissociate, I just did not cope whatsoever. Being in her head was just like being in my head during my worst points, and I hate myself, so naturally, I hate her too. Like I get why some people like phase two val. I get that her depression is "realistic" and that trauma does just make some people completely dislikeable and self-pitying, and if people want to read about that, then...sure. you do you, my dudes. But I live that reality, I am that person whose trauma made her a dysfunctional, isolated bitch, and I hate, passionately, having it infest the media I consume to escape.

Essentially if I wanted to engage with a bitter, spiteful, depressed piece of shit in her 20s who pushes everyone away and sucks at everything, I'd live my gd life. Yall see me tryna engage with my real life? Hell nah I'm on tumblr dot com burying my head up the ass of whatever fandom will force my brain to produce some s e r o t o n i n and that is what I need this series for

Also? The dynamic she had with skug in phase one? "Until the end"? "You save me, I save you, that's how we work"? Forget that, it doesn't exist anymore. I stopped reading after Midnight, because she was written like he was a coworker she could barely tolerate. They went from "Lardo confirms on twitter that they talked on the phone a bunch while she was in america and he'd always ask her to come home" to "she comes home and proceeds to blank him for five months while she sits in her fuckin multimillionaire's mansion feeling sorry for herself". Their friendship completely disintegrated, they were totally separated for most of the book, she's written as not giving a single shit about him. She treated him like dirt, and their dynamic basically felt like it was becoming "Local Man With History Of Gravitating Towards Abusive Women Makes Same Terrible Choices For Fifth Time" and? that was the point of no return to me. he supports her unconditionally, no matter what he's going through at the time, he's walked on broken bones to try and get to her when she was in danger, she can tell him anything and he'd never use it against her. I did not, for one second in phase two, believe she felt the same about him. tbh it felt like she could - and wanted to - drop him at the first opportunity and not even feel bad about it, and that's not the dynamic that made me so emotionally attached to phase one. i signed up for "until the end", not whatever bullshit phase two has going on.

Apparently she's "less depressed" now and their relationship is "better" in the books published since midnight, which! might well be true. but I haven't read them and don't intend to, and she's gone from one of my favourite fictional characters ever (which! was impressive! because i almost never bond with the female lead - i normally get attached exclusively to the character i crush on, which would be skug here. val was the first female lead i actually cared about since xena! so im deeply salty about losing her!) to a character i? honestly prefer to pretend doesn't exist. i live in war era dead men/generals crackship land because that way, i don't have to acknowledge her or the fuckin character assassination phase 2 pulled on her.

so yeah, no hate towards phase one val at all. phase one val was awesome and flawed and gave me something to aspire to despite my shitty mental health and trauma, and if she'd kept her original personality she might still have been those things. but the original "real life" val is no longer involved (and doesn't talk to landy at all anymore, apparently), and the val based on landy's insufferable gf? i cannot get behind her at all ever, four for skug and none for phase two val cain bye

(tldr; you're not missing anything by quitting after spx)

[cluelesslesbian]

Check-In Tag✨

AKA a very long post about moi and this account bc I was tagged by the lovely @katelfiredemon <3

IF YOU SEE THIS, PRETEND I'M TAGGING U like this is completely optional (and long omg) so I don't wanna FORCE anyone to do it but asjhkl I think it's cute

1. why did you choose your url?

My og url was something dumb bc I only used tumblr to keep up with artists and writers I admired… this one is revamped to be ~relatable~ bc I wanted something that I felt comfortable adding on my art?? But ok-

clueless = because THERE’S TIMES THAT I’M A LIL SLOW TO GET A JOKE SDFHJKL

lesbian = bc I’m not out to my family but my sexuality is something I like about me,,, so I wanted to acknowledge it somewhere (and the anonymity of tumblr = ideal tbh)

2. any side blogs? if you have them: name them and why you have them

I made one like yesterday lol! It’s @blue-dragon-shin-ah and it’s for Akatsuki no Yona (an anime and manga I TOTALLY rec! It’s like a historical themed fantasy, comedy, romance WITH a found family trope it’s so good)

but ngl I have no clue how to keep track of more than 1 blog so it'll be a lot more inactive than this one asdhkl

3. how long you’ve been on tumblr?

hmm according to my tumblr account it’d be 2016 since that’s the oldest post I’ve kept (I deleted everything and revamped this acc in december 2020)

BUT I did the math and I would’ve made this account in middle school so around 2013-2014 lol I don’t think I used it much until voltron was booming in like 2016-2018.. Then I lowkey stopped… until now!

4. do you have a queue tag?

oof no

……...I probably should? like 90% of my blog is queued or scheduled… but ngl I barely remember to tag posts at ALL some nights so I probably won’t (rip if that’s annoying,, but I don’t make much og content so I figure anyone following me is chill with this lol)

5. why did you start your blog in the first place?

In middle school?? To see funny posts and not be pressured into having an ~online presence~ tbh. That’s literally it lol

6. why did you choose your icon?

Matching with @lesbianklance rn! and keith's expressions r hilarious

Before I just,,, chose sokka bc I love that blue boi and the edit of him had a yellow bg that I LOVED (and matched with my pink theme)

7. why did you choose your header?

Matching with @lesbianklance rn! and klance sdjfhk

Before it was just a colour palette bc I wanted my blog to be my fav colour: PINK

8. what’s your post with the most notes?

My zukka art omg- like I did one that I put effort into which I KNOW is my top post (it’s got like 600 notes??? I still can’t believe it I love that!! 🥰)

BUT MY SECOND TOP IS A POST OF REALLY REALLY ROUGH SKETCHES OF THEM AND I LOWKEY CRINGE AT IT (it’s got like 500 notes.. And I’m like… y ?? I can DO BETTER 😭)

9. how many mutuals do you have?

…...listen I’ve literally never had mutuals until this year (minus my one irl.. I love u bitch!! but u know that bc we text on other platforms too)

idek am i supposed to be keeping track??? I just smile a lot when i see the darker-tinted notifs in my activity feed

10. how many followers do you have?

hmmmmmmm ok i lowkey don’t want to answer this bc my whole love for tumblr is that followers don’t matter? You could follow me today and unfollow tmrw bc i ship something you don’t and life moves on??? So yeah no answer here

11. how many people do you follow?

1807 babeyyyy

12. have you ever made a shitpost?

...wait define shitpost- technically any original post under #yeetidk might be a shitpost cause they’re all just?? my shitty rambles tbh???

13. how often do you use tumblr each day?

Sometimes i’ve got the app open allll day long but other days?? I’ll go on like once in the morning or at night just to check my notifs and then that’s it

14. did you have a fight/argument with another blog once? who won?

lmaoo bold of you to assume i interact with anyone enough to have a fight (AKA no)

If i did tho?? I’m the type to try and come to some middle ground before dropping the issue so idk- i’m more likely to lose bc i’m willing to （づ￣3￣）

15. how do you feel about “you need to reblog this” posts?

Wish-granting/curse stuff: no.

Politics/Donation posts: depends! I try to only reblog posts like these that I know a bit about bc I don’t really wanna contribute to misinformation ykno?

I did start tagging these posts as #important but I’m not like?? gonna be mad at anyone for not reblogging political posts (also a heads-up if you wanted to block #important: I also tag some lgbt+ stuff under there so you’ll likely miss those too, not a huuuge loss but just an fyi yknow??)

16. do you like tag games?

asdfghjkl this is honestly the first tag game i’ve ever been part of so i have no opinion 😭 tho formatting this post has been a bitch asdhjkl I gotta get back to my homework when I'm finally done this

17. do you like ask games?

I've done a grand total of 1 and I felt so?? ashgjl awkward and bad for asking people to talk to me about myself- maybe if I do one that isn't about me I'll like it more

I do love sending other people anons to compliment them when they do these games tho 😌

18. which of your mutuals do you think is tumblr famous?

....this requires me to pay attention to people I follow more than I have been so I literally have no idea??

19. do i have a crush on a mutual?

yes. the one readings this. love u, sweetheart 😘

/jokes

I don't?? usually get crushes? idek.. thought I was aromantic for a while bc of that lmaoo (but then I got a crush on someone irl and I was like "oooh ok so maybe im just gay then")

[newhologram]

I've been doing some thinking and realizing just how far back this all goes. Those of you who know me and my family IRL may have a hard time believing the emotional abuse and gaslighting because whenever you've met them, they seemed fine. They may have even bragged about me to you which made you think that they thought very highly of me. They also may have neglected to inform you that I have been disabled by chronic illness the past 10 years (many of my other family members had no idea until they spoke to me personally. It's... really fucking weird? To just not tell anyone that your offspring is in bed all day in horrible pain and constantly at the doctor/ER?). Unfortunately this is also part of the gaslighting, putting on a persona of parental perfection so that no one believes me when I try to talk about it. Instead people, even within my family, make excuses for the abuse and say that I should just be grateful. Behind closed doors it's always been very different. In the event that me processing this in private spaces gets out to them (which WILL endanger me): This isn't about *~exposing~* or *~revenge~* or *~punishment~*, it's about putting the pieces together and saying, yeah, I'm right to finally put my foot down about the way I have been treated. This is my experience. This is my trauma. I'm finally claiming that after a lifetime of being told that these experiences and my pain around them are apparently "not real" (gaslighting). By talking about this, I am not victimizing myself, but empowering myself. Because none of this treatment was ever my fault. None of it was ever deserved. And none of this is to be blamed on my "response" to abuse. I hope that by talking about this I can paint a picture of the dynamic and inspire investigation into the health of your own family dynamics too. "But they're family" is literally what enables this kind of abuse to continue. And I'm done. My health and survival is more important than upholding a toxic family system. They're learning that the hard way, finally. I don't think my family members are bad people. I truly do love and care for them. They have some amazing qualities. They love animals and they've come a long way to now being LGBTQ+ allies even if they don't always use the right words. But they have a lot of flaws that most likely come from their own trauma... But these aren't just self-contained flaws. Because I am the one who will be undoing the damage for the rest of my life. I don't know if they will ever go to therapy themselves, but I certainly won't be waiting around for them to work on themselves if it means I'm going to continue to be mistreated and re-traumatized. - It's always been this way but things definitely got worse in my home when I became disabled (possibly bc it triggered insecurities in them?). Both parents ignored me to my face all my life. I'd say or ask something, and there'd be no response most of the time. If I said, "hey, I'm talking to you, that's rude" they would blow up at me about "WHAT. WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO SAY. I HAVE THINGS ON MY MIND OKAY I HAVE MY OWN LIFE". This happened even when I was a literal child. I grew up believing that nothing I had to say was worth hearing and that if they ignored me that it was because I was unimportant and annoying. But if I ignore them or take too long to respond because I'm thinking, they scold me me about being rude, that they are my parents and I need to respect them. My emotions and pain have been invalidated since I was a child too. I would get picked up from afterschool care, or my bully's house, and of course I'd be crying from enduring a day of bullying. I would say, "I didn't do anything to them, it's not fair." And my dad's response was always, "WELL GUESS WHAT LIFE'S NOT FAIR. WAIT UNTIL YOU'RE AN ADULT IN THE REAL WORLD." He has continued to say this to me on a regular basis whenever I am struggling, either with work, friends, relationships, a death, or my chronic illnesses. I wonder why he has never considered my world to be real? Why is my reality not real to him? What

makes that even more painful is that I was still sent day after day to the school where I was bullied, to afterschool care with my bullies, and to my bullies' homes. No matter how much I was always crying when they picked me up, they just kept sending me back. And then a few of my dad's girlfriend's had children who bullied me too. I literally could never escape it. If it wasn't that, his response to me crying about something would be, "YOU HAVE NOTHING TO CRY ABOUT. YOU'RE LIVING THE LIFE OF LUXURY HERE, YOU DON'T PAY RENT! JUST WAIT UNTIL YOU'RE OUT THERE HAVING REAL PROBLEMS!" Again, he said this to me when I was a 24 year old who was suddenly in the span of a year so disabled that I could barely work. I was scared for my future, because I had taken the time to educate myself about my illnesses, and I knew that things were going to be hard for me. What I needed was support, not "tough love" and emotional invalidation. I was also scared of the situation I am in now. I was scared that I was going to be too sick to afford to move out and that by age 30 I would still be stuck at home with a parent who did not see my reality, my pain, as real. I am living that and it's not fun. Whenever I tried to talk to him about this invalidation, it just turned into a fight, because he refuses to admit the things that he said, and says things like "That's a You Problem" which he has said since I was a child in response to him hurting my feelings. I have always thought it was worth the effort to communicate to my loved ones this sort of issue, because that's what I was taught at school. If there's an issue, you talk about it. But my family doesn't believe that I guess. - When I first got sick, I was throwing up a lot. It had built up over several years since I was 19 but then after I was officially diagnosed with my Big 4 (colitis/fibro/ME/narcolepsy) I started having really dangerous vomiting attacks. The first attack I had lasted 6 days. I lost 12lbs. I overheard my dad complaining on the phone to a friend that I was keeping him up all night throwing up. I felt so bad for bothering him, I had learned to value his comfort over mine. But after the third day of nonstop vomiting, I told my dad I needed to go to the ER, that something was wrong. He sighed and rolled his eyes and said I didn't need to go. He was so annoyed with me for being sick. I was completely pale. I hadn't eaten anything. I could barely keep water down. I argued but he wouldn't listen. I went back to throwing up, at this point just dry-heaving. A while later I said, "I'm taking myself to the ER." I grabbed my car keys and my dad stopped me. He said, "That's ridiculous, you aren't driving yourself to the ER, I'll do it." But he still wouldn't take me for some reason. I don't know if he just didn't want to pay the copay or what. But I was literally trapped. I tried to fight it and said, "If you're going to take me, then take me. If not, let me take myself." I kept throwing up for three more days before he finally agreed to take me. The ER was packed so I ended up going to urgent care, where the nurse scolded me. She said I really should've gone to the ER after the third day of vomiting. She said that if I had gone a 7th day I could have collapsed. I didn't know how to tell her that I had tried. She asked where my family was and I said my dad had to go to work so he had just dropped me off. She had tears in her eyes and she held my hand. She said, "he should be here with you." THAT is how sick I was. That year, I went to the ER three more times. Each time I would be sobbing and ashamed of myself just for bothering my dad and for him having to pay the copay since I was too sick to earn the money myself. Again, that's how little I had learned to value myself and my health. By my birthday that year, I was suicidal from this shame. A few months later, in the new year, I started having vomiting attacks again. My dad stood over me while I was hunched over the toilet gagging and he said something I will never be able to forget, "You need to snap out of it

because I can't go through this again." He was the victim of my illness. He was the victim of my pain. This year was when my dad told me that he and his gf had been "talking" and that they had decided it was "time for me to be independent". He said they'd even help me find an apartment. I cried and said, "Dad, I'm sick. I've been so sick the past year. How am I supposed to afford even splitting rent with a roommate when I'm in bed in a neckbrace all day long?" and his response was, "But your dad needs his bachelor pad." I couldn't even identify what I was feeling. I was so shocked. Did he really think having the apartment to himself so he could have girls over was more important? But he was always telling me that I was the most important person in his life. I was so confused.

He gave me a time frame to move out and I was terrified. I thought my life was over. But most of all, I thought, "it's not fair to my dad that I'm sick." I thought so little of myself and my pain because that is what I learned as a kid. I blamed myself for not being "strong enough" to power through these debilitating illnesses. I blamed myself for my dad's money troubles. I literally could not live with myself knowing that my dad had to support me. I was so ashamed that I learned to vomit quietly so that he wouldn't notice. I was in a constant state of suicidality for several years after this. And it's no wonder, because year after year my dad has barged into my room to harass me about "it's time to be a Real Adult! It's time for you to Contribute to the household! You need to Make Money! I'm HEMORRHAGING money supporting you! I'm having to use my savings!" and because I was too sick to do this, I felt like a complete failure who did not deserve to live. I was self-harming constantly because I hated myself for "doing this" to my father. He had convinced me that I was the villain. I would start freaking out about money, forcing myself to work even if it meant vomiting literally on set (and almost being sent home bc of it, but I insisted I was fine to work). But I still couldn't make enough to afford my medical expenses. So I would shame-spiral and be suicidal again and then suddenly the story would change. My dad did a complete 180 and said, "Why are you even worried about money? We're doing fine. Even if I didn't have to support you, it wouldn't make that big of a difference in the money that I spend on this household. Don't worry about it." And then as soon as bills were due, he was back to telling me that I needed to make money. Back to saying we spent too much money on food despite me not eating that much. Back to refusing to try shopping somewhere cheaper when I suggested ways to save money. When I brought this up to my therapist back then, she said, "He's giving you mixed messages. Maybe you should bring this up to him so he realizes he's doing it." But when I did bring it up, of course my dad denied doing this and called me ungrateful even as I worked two jobs. When I eventually got a third job (fucking up my health more) to pay off my medical debt, my dad patted my back and told me how proud he was. When I told my therapist that he denied it, she suggested I bring him in so she could help us communicate. When I asked him to come with me to therapy, he got angry and said, "I am NOT going to therapy with you, that is ridiculous." But even with those 3 jobs it still wasn't enough and I was constantly being pulled between "YOU HAVE TO MAKE MONEY RIGHT NOW END OF THE WORLD" and "uhh why are you even worried about money, you need to work your mindset..." When bugged about money I would ask, "What else do you want me to do? I'm working 3 jobs. I'm not hiding money from you. I'm sending you everything that is leftover after I pay my own bills. I've even been buying a lot of my own food, I've been living off ramen and cans of ravioli." And he never had an answer except "just make more money." -- Now to the dynamic I'm currently living in. My dad moved his gf and her dog in without talking to me about it to see if it was going to impact my health. She was only supposed to stay here for maybe 4-5 days while she figured out a new home situation. But when I asked my dad about it in the days leading up to her arrival, suddenly the answer was "oh, she's staying indefinitely." I had no say in it. But we had a talk about what I needed to make this work. I said to my dad that the most important thing was that I have some scheduled quiet time. If I'm recording content or editing audio, I'm going to need quiet that morning so I can get my work done. If I'm resting, I need there to not be shouting or slamming doors happening in the house. He assured me that this was fine and that it'd all be easy for the three of us. The first weekend she was moved in, I let my dad know that I was editing audio that morning and needed

some quiet. He was cheerful and said, "No problem!" I thought wow, this is different. This is nice! This is going to be great for my productivity and health. As soon as I started editing, his gf was blasting music in the kitchen (right next to my room) and they were both laughing and talking loudly just a few steps away from my door. I thought, okay, we talked about this. But I'll just power through. When I was done, I went to my dad and said in a calm manner, "Hey, so this morning I let you know ahead of time that I was editing audio but there was still a ton of music and stuff in the kitchen, so it made it take a lot longer for me." His eyes immediately went dark. He put on an angry parent voice and said, "Okay, I am about to pop. I have enough going on without worrying about making too much noise for you." I said, calmly still, "We talked about this, though, and you assured me it wasn't a problem that I needed this quiet time for editing. So I'm not sure what to do. I'm just letting you know that there was still loud music right next to my room even though we had talked about it." He responded, "Then you need to be more specific because I don't know what you're doing in there." I corrected, "But I told you this morning that I was going to be editing audio and you said it was no problem to have some quiet in the kitchen while I did so." He got more aggressive, "No, you need to be more specific." Again, "I was specific. I told you the time frame that I was going to be editing audio in. You said you understood. I don't know what else to do to fix this other than by openly communicating to you about it." I started crying because--I mean, uhh?? This is gaslighting. I couldn't believe that mere hours after I had specifically told my dad that I was editing audio and that he had assured me it was no problem to have some quiet, that he was accusing me of not telling him what I needed, and that he had not agreed to it or something. Like wtf. He got nastier and blamed me for his stress. But me crying triggered his guilt so he tried to soothe himself by hugging me like he does and I pulled away. I tried to emphasize to him that I'm not just making content for fun. I'm literally trying to make money and contribute to the household like he has told me I need to do for the past 8 years. And when he disrupts my editing process, it just makes it take longer, and it makes it harder for me to earn extra money. His gf was also super rude to me when I tried to be friendly and have a conversation with her. I was telling her about how great it felt to have my sister initiate a conversation about my gender identity and she interrupted me (like she does constantly) to say, "YOU KNOW YOUR SISTER DOESN'T ACTUALLY GIVE A SHIT, RIGHT?" (wtf...) After this, I didn't speak to them for three days. I was feeling the urge to self-harm that whole weekend and all I could do was stay in bed crying after that. I knew if I spoke to them I would just get triggered so I was protecting myself. My dad felt guilty and tried to talk to me in my room. I tried to explain how triggering this whole situation is for me and he said he would do anything to make it easier for me. I had told him what I needed but that he had gaslighted me about it. - This next and last part is going to illustrate the priorities in this household. A few years ago, I started having problems with hives. I spent almost a whole year having very painful breakouts all over my body. It kept me up all night and caused me so much discomfort during the day. I kept telling my dad about it (no response, or annoyed responses), I went to the doctor several times about it (useless ointments), and suffered month after month. I tried so many things, I thought maybe it was bugs, spiders, etc. My asthma was also acting up and I remembered that an ex-neighbor had been suspicious of mold because of their health issues getting better the second they moved out. They had told me back then that we should test for mold. I brought it up to my dad that I had been suffering from this for

long enough and that we should do something about it (mold also makes fibromyalgia and ME way worse). He angrily snapped, "What do you want me to do about it?" I suggested we ask the landlord to mold test the apartment. He refused bc he doesn't like to bother the landlord. I said that I would just order a mold kit myself and he said, "No, let me do it, I'll pick the right one." But he wouldn't even after I kept reminding him. Even after I sent him links to mold kits that we could order. After I got rid of my mattress, my hives got a lot better but I still have issues every now and then. For years I have just lived with this because I couldn't get him to even care about the fact that I was spotted with these big pink hives. When his gf moved in, we had a random rainy day, which seems to have activated the mold. His gf got one tiny little hive and the sniffles. She said to him once, "Hey, I think you have mold in this house." Want to guess what happened after that? You're right. He immediately ordered several mold test kits. I said to my therapist, "How am I supposed to feel about that? Is it really unreasonable, am I really in the wrong to feel hurt by that?" My therapist said, "I mean, I would feel completely invalidated and like I didn't matter." This isn't the first time empathy has been withheld from me obviously (above examples during my flare ups), but sometimes even when it's right in front of him he just can't bring himself to care for some reason. One time a big piece of glass was in my thumb. I said, "Ahhh, glass, help! Glass!" He was eating snacks in the kitchen and just glanced at me, didn't move or say anything. I realized he wasn't going to help, so shaking and bleeding, I managed to pull the glass out with tweezers very painfully. It bled so much and I stood over the sink trying to stop it. My dad just kept eating his snacks, not asking if I was okay or anything, he didn't even look at me. After 5 minutes I still couldn't get the blood to stop and asked my dad if he could help, maybe get me some gauze. He put food in his mouth and sighed, "Just put pressure on it" and walked away. It feels like he's just disgusted with me. I know that he does love me and that he's trying the best he can with all of his mental/emotional/personality flaws but he thinks that just because he puts a roof over my head that he can treat me however he wants and not work on his issues, that it's my fault for being hurt. He thinks that his issues are all on me to learn to endure and it's not right. I know that he resents me for getting in the way of him having a relationship because that's the only message I have gotten since childhood, with every woman he's brought into my home. But in the end his relationships always fall apart because the woman ends up realizing, and stating to him, that he is "emotionally absent". And every time, I comfort my dad through the break up. When he has tried to blame his ex I said once to him that therapy can really help him with his emotional issues and relationships. But he refuses, so. That's on him. But I refuse to believe that I am in the wrong here for saying enough is enough. But he's going to keep trying to make me believe that the problem is just me and my feelings, not his behavior. Nope. Boundary is up. I just have to keep to myself and do what I need to do to stay safe until I can move out. Because I guarantee you he's going to realize he doesn't get enough validation from his gf and then come running back to me as always and then be angry that I'm still holding my boundary strong. I know that this will hurt less as I get distance from it, but I don't like the idea of my pain being my fault when I grew up with this toxic stuff. I'm working so hard to make it hurt less but I can't heal if it keeps happening, so all I can do is back away from what is hurting me instead of being surprised when I'm hurt again. THAT is on me 100%. Hopefully he doesn't grab my desk and slam it against the wall again like in 2014 when I first tried to set this boundary. And of course when he

"apologized" he accused me of "punishing him" by not spending time with him. Jee-zus, dude. Get therapy. I can't be the only one in this family bearing this weight and working on my shit.

[zhuhongs]

なんか私の想いが溢れ出した. i went out with some friends last night and every time i go out i always realize just how bad i am at communicating and how bad I am with people. (long meandering post under the cut. feel free to ignore its unfocused and long.. like 2k words under there)

I’ve mentioned this before but I don’t really talk much irl. I don’t talk, I can’t connect properly. Every time I’m out with people I just feel fundamentally, like… different. So a group of my irls friends plus me were going to the movie theatre and I personally really hate movie theatres. I knew we were going to one and prepared myself thinking “oh it’ll be fine bc you'll be with friends, just enjoy their company '' But god I really hate movie theaters. It’s been so long, i forgot how much I really really hated them. They’re so loud and bright. I’d much rather watch a movie at home but tbh I also just don’t like movies bc I can’t sit through them and I can’t focus and I don’t get invested easily and I need to be doing something with my hands at all times. To make matters worse, my friend's friend that I really don’t like came along. I just, I don’t like her. She’s just too loud and attention seeking and childish. Like she says things for a reaction, like rlly not okay things sometimes and I just can’t stand her. like we went to see godzilla vs king kong and then entire movie she kept YELLING "IF THEY DONT KISS I WANT MY MONEY BACK" and i was like... you are 21 yrs old oh my god.. this isnt ur tumblr blog in middle school. shut up. But here’s the thing, I don’t know how to tell her or anyone that. Like I just can’t figure out a good way to say it, so I put up with it. Things like this just make me feel incredibly annoyed. I always talk on here about how if I have an issue with anyone, I’ll just say it like an adult. But in face to face situations I just don’t know how to say things. Well I do know how to say it - it’d be easy.  I just hate having to do it. Like I don't have to say the whole thing about how I don’t like her but when she says like “simp” when she’s nonblack I could just be like. “Hey don’t say that, here’s why” and I’m sure she’d stop. Yet I can’t bring myself to have that one moment of discomfort to tell her to stop yelling in my ear or stop saying things that make me annoyed. I feel useless in a way. ちゃんとできない。 ちゃんと伝えない。During the entire movie I was thinking to myself that I’d rather be home watching a drama by myself and doing hw. I also hate going out for other reasons. I hate being seen. I hate my appearance. I know I don’t have to be pretty, I only need to exist for me. Like wow, I just have so many body image issues, and they all manifest heavily as soon as I go out in public. 

But afterwards I changed my mind a bit. There was a moment where we were outside running around in the street and it reminded me of that one scene in AIB episode one with Chota, Karube, and Arisu in the street and I was rlly like… wow… maybe human connection really is good. It doesn’t matter if I’m pretty or good at talking, sometimes, to laugh and be silly wth others is all you need to make your night. Just one moment, just one person really is all it takes. We all went out for dinner afterwards and it was really really fun. I enjoyed it, there really is something about eating with someone that brings you closer to them.  

The entire time though, I didn’t talk much. I don’t really know when to cut in in a conversation to a point where it feels right. I feel like by saying my piece I’m interrupting others just to say something that wasn’t really of any use. Really, I prefer silence with others. I’m bad at talking in social situations but I’m great at talking in classes and at work because of the context. Because I’m expected to engage there. The pretense is different. Like you’re supposed to contribute in those places. It’s acceptable to talk there. But for me, it doesn’t really feel acceptable to just share about myself like that in a social group setting. I wish I could always communicate like how I am doing here. It’s so much nicer online. I get to post my full complete thoughts without bothering any of you. My words can easily be disregarded and just flipped through. It’s passive. Posting is passive, talking is active. And sometimes, people don't really want to talk to others, they just want to say their piece. Like when talking about their problems, often we just want to say it and the act of saying those words is all we need. We don’t want input, it annoys us. I don’t like to cut in, and I can never find the right words to say. Even right now, none of this feels like it’s coming out correctly. None of my words feel like they’re coming out correctly nowadays, but this is the only way I know how to be. If I can’t post my thoughts on here, even if they come out crooked and ugly, I may never speak again. I have to keep talking, and typing, and trying otherwise I’ll never get any better. And I know it’s okay to do things wrong, but still, I can’t let myself do that. Again, I do fine when I’m at work and school. I’m functional, normal, you would never be able to tell how much is going on in my head. But in private, I may never speak again if I wasn’t spoken to. 

When I was younger, around 12 or 13, I remember something a friend posted on my first online community. They posted, quite honestly, that they never wanted to meet anyone on there irl. No matter how close we are, it would never be the same IRL. I didn’t get that sentiment at the time. To me, why wouldn’t you want to see your friends everyday in person? That would be great. But I think I get it now. I’m afraid that if I ever met any of you someday it wouldn’t be the same. I’m not really the same in person. I’m bad at talking, bad at connecting. I’m not a proper person. But I feel like that’s okay. It’s okay to just exist on here as I am. While my friend was talking to me on our drive back to her place (we carpooled) she was telling me about her life. And she was apologizing like “oh I’m sorry I keep talking about myself” but quite honestly I was glad to just be able to listen. At some point my friend kept asking me what was up so I decided maybe I’ll tell them the arcane secrets of how I’ve been into guardian and how all the characters rlly hit for me for personal reasons. That was really the only thing I thought that was of note to tell her about. Really I don’t think I’ve done or felt much new since I last talked to her. But as I was trying to explain I just wasn’t doing it right. She just didn’t get it and trying to talk about something like that just made me embarrassed to the point where I just dropped it and tried to just say, “oh yea, you got it, that’s it.” and move along bc I didn’t think she’d get it. She’s the type that doesn’t really get how you can make meaningful connections online. So whenever I try to talk to her about certain things, it just doesn’t register. I’ve learned to choose my battles. I didn’t really think she wanted to get it. So I didn’t tell her. I tried telling her about stuff I liked in the past and I just always stop halfway through. I can’t communicate properly. I can’t speak in a way that I think is worthy of being heard. So I don’t talk. It frustrates me to no end. It feels like everyone else can do it so easily, that I’m the wrong one. 

I had another friend from Uni message me about something and she was like “so what’s new with you, twin” (we have similar bdays and get along well so we call each other that) and tbh I just, didn’t know what to tell her. I had talked to her in a long time, so things had happened but nothing so easily said that I could just tell her over text. SO I just was like “work, school, yk how it is” and yea. I really am the one choosing not to let people in. It frustrates me to no end but I don’t know what a good starting point is ever. I feel like I should just send all my IRLS my long reflection essays next time they wanna know what's up. All the secrets to why I am the way I am are in there.

I’m scared of telling people how I feel about anything. IRL when I say something I often speak quietly, moreso like I’m only talking to myself. People often don’t hear what I had to say. And I don’t repeat myself. If it was something someone didn’t hear, in my head, that means that it wasn’t important enough to repeat. I’m afraid of talking and being misunderstood and never being able to be interpreted the way I mean. I want to convey all my thoughts correctly the first time. So i don’t repeat myself, not bc I’m mad at the person who didn’t hear me. It’s not about them, it’s about me. I don’t believe my words to be worth repeating. I don’t want anyone to stop the conversation for me. Just keep going, it won’t come out the right way anyways. I was taking a uquiz a week or so ago and one question was “what power do you want” and one option was smth like the power of comprehension. Which would make it so every time you spoke, that person would understand you the way you intended. That is the most ideal power for me to ever possess like it was unreal. I’m still thinking about that quiz. It was good.

I know that I’m worth being listened to and that my words are valuable enough to be heard but I don’t want to do that. I’d rather listen. I only like talking when it’s safe like it is here. I’m trying my best to get better though. I keep saying that I want to be a proper adult. I want to live right and without regrets and i really think communication is key to that. I’m trying. It’s hard but I’m trying. But still, I can only talk here a lot.  I can’t talk any other way. I don’t tell my friends about my interests, it embarasses me to no end. 

Being on here is comforting though. When I talk about stuff like this, I always see a lot more people than usual like my post. I feel like you can all relate. Really, people are more similar than not. We all have very similar burdens and pains and baggage. It’s comforting, I'm not alone. My words might be able to help someone. Because when all of you talk about the same things, i also feel seen and comforted and since we are so similar, then the same is true for the things I say.

But anyways, I did a lot of listening tonight, and it reflects the sentiment above. People are the same. I was listening to my friend’s friend talking about her mom earlier and the entire time, I really resonated with what she was saying. I got it. Her mom’s situation was really similar to my own mom’s situation in the past. And I was just amazed at how I barely knew this girl but I felt really similar to her. I saw her differently after learning all that. It was really a great thing. ANd on the way home, my friend was telling me about her life recently and some things andi really understand what she was going through. I didn’t say anything, because again, I don't like to interrupt. And when I try and be like ‘oh me too, it's the same for me too” I feel like I’m derailing. I know I’m not but I really think she needed to say her piece. So I let her. But the entire time, I thought about the things in my life that were the same as what she was feeling and it was beautiful. Life and human bonds are beautiful. Even when they are hard and messy and annoying, people all want the same things. They want to be loved and seen and understood. And in those moments when we feel seen, it’s worth more than any of those complicated feelings that come along with it. Not to be cheesy but wow… in order to reap the rewards of being loved, you really do need to submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known. I was glad I didn’t stay home watching a drama. I was glad that I went out. No matter how alienated I feel from others, there’s still merit in being around other people. No matter how much others may misunderstand you and annoy you, they are almost always worth more than being alone. That;s because deep down, we’re all the same.

I’m not good at reminding myself that. As I said here, I don’t let people see me. I don’t let people in, I’d rather keep them out. I’m a picky, boring person. I don’t like people easily and I don’t tell them much. I stay inside my own head and I don’t like to come out. I was raised that way. But people are worth it. Communication is worth it, no matter how hard. It’s all worth it. I need to try harder so I can be a person who is able to see and enjoy more beauty in this world. I spent my hr long drive home listening to music and ruminating on these thoughts, trying to plan out all the words I wanted to say here. I don’t think I said any of it right. I’m not satisfied with how I write nowadays. But writing, talking, conveying emotions, all of these things are worth doing. So no matter how crooked and awkward it comes out, I will keep doing it. It is my goal. 

[hajimine]

hi lex!! im quite in a depressing state rn and i dont have anyone i could talk to atm (not that i hv no friends nor trust them but i always find it hard to open up to ppl esp ab my insecurities i dont want to bother them with misery) which why im not here to make u feel uncomfy too, im here to ask u do u ever feel the same way if the answer is yes what do u usually do to ease the pain/weight?? thank u in advance <3 im wishing u the most wonderful day ever <33

hi angel, that’s okay, you’re not making me uncomfy at all i promise. and mm my answer’s gonna be a bit long so i hope you don’t mind <3

i have had a handful of depressive episodes myself, and i’ve actually been diagnosed with depression by my GP before so yes i’ve felt that uncomfortable weight in my heart before. and i really get the ‘not being able to open up bc you dont want to bother people’ bit, bc im like that as well—i hate being vulnerable in front of people, even my closest friends.

(under the cut bc it’s really long)

what usually helps me:

- a long sob sesh while listening to your sad playlist, and a short nap afterwards (not more than 1/2h). but after that please don’t listen to any more sad songs bc that’s just gonna prolong your misery and you do not want that.

- cleaning my room helps a lil bit bc it gives me a sense of accomplishment, and that’s a positive feeling. so try to do that if you have the energy to.

- watch a comfort movie of yours, my personal fave is howl’s moving castle or saiki k, that might help you feel a lil bit lighter

- take a short walk. it’s so silly but it does wonders fr, stepping outside and taking a breath of fresh air always makes me feel a little less alone, and that maybe everything will be okay, yknow?

- eat your fave food if you can. or order some takeout from your fave restaurant—since it’s something that sparks joy, it can help alleviate the heaviness you’re feeling rn

- talk to your friends, please. text em or call em, you don’t have to talk about your feelings if you’re not comfortable with that, but social interaction with your loved ones might help make you feel a lot better afterwards. it may be draining to even think abt it, but if you choose the right people, it would be so worth it i promise

- most importantly, let yourself be sad. don’t try to force yourself to be happy if you’re feeling depressed, bc it’s okay. just know that it will pass, and it will get better. everything might seem so hard rn because you feel so alone in your own misery, but it won’t always be like this. but in the meantime, just let yourself feel.

try not to let yourself be consumed by the sadness (don’t isolate yourself, try to reach out to friends, do some self care if you can) bc once you’re in that hole, it’s really hard to climb out of it. know that the heaviness in your heart will feel lighter one day, and you’ll feel okay again. maybe not now, but you will eventually.

we can’t always be happy and positive all the time, it’s human nature to feel negative emotions so don’t bottle up your emotions because that will never ever do you any good.

and sometimes, talking to a virtually anonymous person like myself does help, since i don’t know you irl and vice versa, so feel free to talk to me whenever. doesn’t have to be for advice or anything like that, it can be sth as simple as what you had for lunch or what you’re grateful for that day :) ily and i know you’re gonna get through this, i believe in you <3

[neo-shitty]

toffee!

hehe glad i could make you laugh, oooh that sounds awesome! yeah id love to be tagged it sounds great :)

YES the differences are so fucking weird. like, they do know they're the same age right? i feel like its just an exagguration of how much the persons role in the group matters, like we see chan being held up as such a mature, old leader while jungkook who is literally the same age, is still babied etc. like enha hyung line is basically the same age (if a bit younger) as chenle and jisung but somehow the rules are different?? as you point out, still legal but still bizarre. hehe yeah, i mean where else are we going to rant? quora lol. mmm, hopefully more people can just write less smut abt people who are barely adults

ah, no prob it didnt take long. yeah i think thats right (i keep forgetting you know my url lol) mmhmm :( i think if that happened irl there would be some major trauma going on. knock wood it never happens to you or me lol (/hj)

hehe same! oooh glad Redemption For Cheese was realised! yess we cant rllycomplain that theyve written/produced too much good music lol. yeah, ive dragged him into being a stay so *dusts hands off* mission accomplished. mmm yeah, they tend to have a certain vibe but tbh it couldve worked if they were any other group but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ahh ur one step ahead of me on the stages of listening to ssick i think, still not convinced but thats okay! hehe, it had to be said. yesss the itch in the back of my brain is very satisfied by sorry i love you, felixs vocals deserve to be appreciated! (side note i feel like hes trying to sing more like his speaking voice, sorta husky, but tbh i wouldnt be mad if he sang like in glow, his sweet honey vocals made my life lol. but i think ive heard him say he doesnt like singing like that cos it makes his normal voice less husky, so what can you do)

> YES SOMEONE SAID IT. seungmin rap KING, he sped thru that rap like it was nothing, he deserves more rap lines. i do like how they gave minho some melodic rap lines this comeback, my guy deserved to show off those skills that made him not be eliminated (flashbacks to stay collectively wanting to murder jyp) and we already know changbin can sing, my man murdered masked singer. hyunjin can obviously sing as can jisung and felix, and i want to hear chan rap more! i feel like he started as part of 3racha (as a rap unit not producing) and then just became a vocalist (which im fine with, but it could be nice to hear him flex his rapping skills) and was partially replaced by hyunjin. anywayyy

back to album talk. lmaooo sad music to twerk to PERFECTLY describes silent cry. yes secret secret is and will always be, a masterpiece. hehe glad i could make you laugh :) i just felt like they have similar vibes. putting off skz stuff bc of not having time to cry IS the kpop stan life summarised. oh my beloved track, red lights. ahh thats okay, we can have different opinions, but by god the lyrics are *chefs kiss*. *banging on table* TWISTED AU TWISTED AU TWISTED AU. yess id love to see ur take on it! sdfghjkl it would have been glorious

no no! not stupid, just able to predict my brainwaves. ooooh thats so cool! makes me want to go there (wherever there is lol) yeah the waves are pretty good here, but none of my familys a surfer, so we dont rlly enjoy the full potential lol. YES moving on to gone away, it is indeed a heartwrenching track, but the vocals and the bloody key change? makes me want to brave being sad just to listen to it. mmm yeah, good point :( i feel like ive just gotten used to overthinking so much so that it doesnt matter what mood im in, ill do it anyway, so might as well just do what i feel like doing anyway.

yeah i think ur right! it is quite comforting knowing that all the tracks will get the love they deserve. i feel like also people assume kpop is just one genre which is utter bs. there are so many different vibes and feels and songs, i couldnt get into kpop (of which i thought only the bright cheerful present day bts stuff existed smh) until i heard gods menu so... idk where i was going with this but yeah. :)

YES FUCK YG, theyre literally on the brink of being kicked out of the big three and they are holding their salvation hostage without letting them do ANYTHING. idek what thought process goes thru their minds but arghhh its so infuriating. yess lisa's cb will be awesome but ot4 is the gold standard here.

hehe, glad u could get to this point. no no! u dont sound like a cult member at all lol yeah, i loooove some of their songs but the whole 23 members thing is getting to me. thats prob a common problem with nctzens but what can i say? im a simple girl with a limit to how many korean boys i can give my money to. atm im just trying to get into ateez and finish memorising enhypen's faces. also kard is kinda sucking me into their fandom atm, as well as eric name lol. ah what can you do? ooh thats good!

hehe i love it too! its exactly like online penpals, that was rlly well put. aww ty! hmm im okay, recovering from a bad case of rsv so thats fun. im doing okay mentally, starting therapy soon (after having to convince my mother that its not just smth i can brush off). physically i wont go into, basically i should be doing stretches to help but they dont completely fix it so my lazy ass doesnt do them, plus i got told recently im going to be stuck with this condition for the rest of my life so thats fun! ah, before you type smth dw abt me ill be fine. the weather atm is cloudy but warm, its been raining on and off today which is good for the garden. uhh i just finished reading sunburnt veils and im in the middle of prom theory which is rlly good. ummm ive got a concert tonight? that i may or may not be able to sing in (bc of the whole rsv thingo) and uhhhh idk. my dog is cute? im drinking tea rn? ive got a school dance coming up?

wbu? hows ur day going, how are you? whats the weather like on ur end? done anything interesting lately? found smth that makes you rlly happy? just any random thing youve been dying to tell someone?

no no! dont apologise, i love these exchanges. i think im happy to continue them for a long time :) on the other hand, if you get tired of them, feel free to just not answer at any time. goodness gracious this was a long ask haha hope it isnt too annoying

<3 w.a. 🐺

sorry it took me a bit to reply, i was fixing my theme ;n;

yeah, i figured it was because of the roles too. my friends and i still get taken aback when 3rd gen idols are the same age as 4th gen ones. in my head it doesn't add up sometimes. PLS THE RANT AT QUORA SKJDK tbh tho it's just going to be normalized as the years pass? esp that the boys are growing older and the amount of explicit fics will just increase. i might have to start blocking tags.

i had to look up the previous ask to remember what we were talking about xd i hope the events in champagne problems never happens to anyone. realistically, it probably happens a lot. damn i really won't wish that pain on anyone. dragging your brother into being a stay i whEEZED JFKSA additional noeasy music enthusiast o.o and ALL I CAN SAY WITH YOU GUSHING ABT FELIX IS AHA WHIPPEEEED OML can't blame you tho, i also want to hear felix sing more in other shades (if that makes sense HAHA) i really hope they'll do the role exchange in the next comeback :( or like in the near future bc i know they can do it :( the day i hear seungmin rapping it i will respectfully pass away. minho was given more lines this comeback thank fUCK i could rmb my irl being vocal abt her frustration. i don't get why minho barely has center time/lines in title tracks??? like the line distribution in the past eras just made me ???? if seventeen can balance lines with 13 members why cant a group of 8 do the same? moving on. i haven't watched the stray kids show simply bc i don't want to cry HAJS but i've seen clips. imagine if skz debuted without minho and felix?!?!? i rmb another irl catching bias feels towards changbin bc of the masked singer only to find out that the man's a rapper. i love how skz's vocals were highlighted this comeback :c there were a lot of mellow tracks! i find it cute when chan sings/raps bc it gets kinda obvious that he's a foreigner? the accent (im not even sure if it's the accent) it just shows. "putting off skz stuff bc of not having time to cry IS the kpop stan life summarised." CORRECT.

abt the twisted au o.O i'll inquire my irl if she wants to write it or not. if she doesn't want to, i'll do it. i miss writing twisted aus <3___<3 and i also miss going to the beach with my friends :' ) but it's starting to get cold here and i don't think i'll be able to enjoy the beach as much as i would if i went beaching in the summer. so maybe next summer? gone away really has an sm-ballad vibe. the thing about skz being a self-producing group, their songs don't sound like typical jype songs? and i just appreciate that bc in all honesty im not a fan of jyp groups at all. PLS the overthinking. i wish i could mute overthinking.

anyone who assumes kpop is just one genre obv hasn't listened to a single track. if kpop was just one genre why do i like some tracks more than the others??? oh you've only recently become a kpop stan? tbh im not a fan of the bright songs of bts either. i liked their older ones *chefs kiss* really matched high school vibes. yg has good artists and they're just wasting the talent ~.~ that strategy they have will get tiring eventually. people will stop waiting on blackpink and move on to newer more active groups ://

HAHAHAH yeah the 23 members is pretty overwhelming! it was the reason i didn't bother stanning before quarantine started. i don't regret stanning tho, met my ult bias in that group <3___<3 i don't really purchase albums unless i like the tracks xd ohhh getting into ateez just in time for the comeback! let me know what you think about them! i was fond of them at some point but grew out of it. good luck with memorizing enhypen! it took me a while to distinguish to people there XD i haven't checked out kard yet but chan plays their songs during lives and they're sexc hype music me likey *u*

i had to look up rsv im sorry. i'm glad you're recovering! please rest more and don't stress yourself out. bro i wish i could go to therapy too bc i have weird issues i can't justify and i need a professional to tell me what's the reason behind it. stuck with what condition btw? what happened? i'm sorry in case i just forgot. yesterday was a bit rainy for me too :(( it's not the type of rainy that makes me anxious so B) oh concert! good luck and i hope you'll be able to sing but i also don't think it's best for you rn :c what's your dog's breed? and yes i just finished drinking tea too. AAAAA i miss school dances :(( the last one i was supposed to have was cancelled bc of covid.

i was less productive today and i'm teetering between being mentally stable and becoming a hermit again. i'm anxious with a lot of things atm so like : D not the best state. today it was a bit sunny but not hot hot which was nice. i changed my theme today bc i couldn't wait for sept. 1st. and no i haven't found anything that makes me happy HAHAHA shit like that's hard to identify. don't have anything to say too, i'm just thinking about why i'm procrastinating too much atm T_T and i'm listening to this rap song atm and one of the rappers sounded like han.

it isn't annoying! i enjoy the long exchanges but i do admit it takes me awhile to type down a reply. so if i get more busy, it'll prolly take a bit longer for me to reply.

[sunatooru]

hellooo this is an emergency request pour moi pls. i really appreciate all the emergency requests you do btw, idk how you deal w all that stress AHAHA but um ig i just kinda want some comfort and highkey just validation. i tried to get my dad to stop treating me like a kid bc i’m 21 years old but it’s like whenever i tell my parents my emotions they just mock me for it and then when i say i don’t like that they tell me i’m being too sensitive and it sucks. my mum was on the phone w one of my aunties and my aunty says she still sees me as a cute little kid and i mean idk what to reply to that so i didn’t and it wasn’t bc i was upset, i just didn’t know what to reply yk. and then my mum told her that i don’t like being treated as a kid anymore clearly making fun of me like that has NO correlation to what she just said but anyways. ig i can understand it bc i was more of an adult at 19 pre covid than i am at 21 rn bc i’m unemployed and nearly done w my degree and idk what to do in the future. i can just, i’ve always felt like i don’t open up anymore and i can feel myself closing off more and more. i don’t think i’d ever open up about my feelings honestly bc they’re never validated, by parents or even my friends sometimes so yeah. LMFAOO this is just a vent at this point. i changed my mind about writing, i can’t even imagine a haikyuu character comforting me w/o me reading it and being skeptical. i’m just talking to you now, and idk if you wanna give me advice or comfort or even a similar life experience but that’s up to you babes. have a nice day/night and thanks for reading this word vomit lmfaoo

Hi lovely, I’m glad that you could get your emotions out here knowing that it’s harder to do irl. You can come here to vent whenever you want ☺️ This got kinda long but I wanted to cover everything so I added a readmore xx

I 100% understand what you mean and although it’s annoying, I know parents will always see their children as kids. I think them disregarding your wanting to be treated as an adult (which you are) is a little disheartening but I think it’s because they have probably seen you everyday. Like you won’t notice changes in a person unless you haven’t seen them for a while, so maybe that’s why they’re treating you the same as always. But them mocking you coming out and telling them how you feel is not nice. And if you try again with the same results then it’s an issue your parents need to fix. So don’t waste your energy on what you don’t have control over. Also if your friends aren’t understanding or comforting you then you should ask why. Because if you’re starting to close up then your friends should be more concerned and try to at least distract you with something fun.

And I’ve also found myself closing up more because it’s hard to explain pain sometimes but one day we’ll both be able to open up more 💕

Regarding life after your degree. I promise you, almost everyone is wary about their future. Especially with COVID making it harder for us young people to secure even a part time job. Also, it’s not necessary to know what you want to do in the future. Everyone thinks there’s a certain path to follow but really just follow your heart. And just because you don’t know now, doesn’t mean you’ll never know what to do. I think just focus on ending on a good grade and then in summer you can think about employment? Like there are many ways you could try to earn cash. If you’re good at DIY or like making stuff then you could sell them online. It’s going to be summer holidays and many parents work, if you like kids and are good with them you could check if anyone needs babysitters. Also, this might be good for when terms starts again, but tutoring is a good option. But do try looking for some summer temps or part time jobs so you have some independent income and also be out of the house more often. Don’t be demotivated if you can’t get a job!! Volunteering is always great just so you can feel like you’re doing something good and productive.

Oh and if your psychology department at your uni are recruiting participants then do it! They might compensate you (I once got £30 for 2.5hrs, which is great imo) so if there’s any experiments still running you might be able to grab some cash. Open a saving account too and check bank offers where you can get money for switching accounts!

If you change your mind and want some writing, let me know because they would never invalidate your feelings and mean every word they say to you. I hope I haven’t gone overboard but just remember it’s going to be okay and life gets better!!

Thank you and I hope you have a great day/night too 🤗❤️