#because I don’t know how closely the show sticks to the movie/books

[sophistikitten]

have most hannibal fans seen silence of the lambs

[alexiroflife]

"lazy summer days"

fluff, a little something sweet for the kids

suguru geto x reader

Synopsis: you, suguru, and the girls paint your nails during a hot summer day indoors

to sum it up: it's too hot to go outside!

WC: 1,249

Warning(s): none

There’s something about lazy, hot summer days that you love.

You’re biased, however, for you’re privileged enough to spend your overheated time in the company of your boyfriend and the precious girls. You like how the heat forces you all inside to spend time with one another, whether it’s in a miserable sweat or not.

Popsicle wrappers litter the living room floor as an array of fans blow angrily about the space, spewing air into all directions. Mimiko and Nanako lay flat on the carpet, bodies clad in swimsuits simply because the heat is far too unbearable for them to bother to wear actual clothes. They lay on their stomachs, their probably fifth popsicle propped in their mouths as they stare up at the television screen in blank dazes, toys and books strewn amidst their trash.

Suguru, who normally pesters the girls about cleaning up after themselves, doesn’t dare bother mustering up the energy it takes to do so in this heat. He sits with his legs spread on your couch with your legs propped over his thighs. His hair is pulled off of his neck into a rather sloppily done pair of pigtails that the girls insisted upon fixing into his locks. The messy strands blow over his face with the sway of the fans, light shirt unbuttoned. He cradles one hand over your ankle as he leans over your foot, staring calmly as he strokes a brush of cool nail polish over your big toe, paying close attention as to keep the color within the lines and not to let it brush onto your skin.

You fan him with a paper fan Nanako made you as he works, alternating between waving it at him, yourself, and over top of the girls, their fluffy hair bouncing upward with the extra ghosts of wind. 

You stare ahead at the screen that plays the girls’ favorite movie, watching rather intensely as the animated film reaches its climax. You’re probably more engaged than the girls are, for they’ve seen the film a thousand times, but you can’t help appreciating the surprisingly well crafted plot. 

You can feel Suguru blow softly over your foot after finishing your second big toe, and you jolt, giggling at the sensation. The black haired man looks up with the nerve to be perturbed, though he looks ridiculous staring at you in such a way with his hair sticking into the air. 

“Don’t move, (y/n),” he tells you for the umpeenth time, and you scrunch your face bashfully. 

“I’m sorry, it just tickles when you do that.”

“Well, you’re gonna end up making me mess up your nails,” he shakes his head, turning his eyes back to survey his work. “You don’t want messy nailpolish, do you?”

“No…” 

“Then sit still, baby.”

You roll your eyes, leading him to squeeze your ankle playfully.

“You’re showing a lot of attitude to the man pampering you,” he smirks. You turn your paper fan back to him to wave at his face aggressively, gusts of ever heavy whipping into the side of his face. 

His expression falls flat and you stifle a smile. “Sorry, Sugu. I don’t see a man, here. All I see is a pretty princess,” you beam.

“You’re just asking me to spill this nailpolish all of your feet, you know that?”

“Aw, but you wouldn’t dare,” you fake pout, and Suguru threateningly lifts the bottle to slowly tilt over your foot.

“It’s too hot for you to test me. I’ll do it.”

“No!” you panic, seeing how close he is to completely flipping the bottle upside down. “No, I’m sorry. Okay, I’ll stop.”

Suguru hums almost deviously, tilting the bottle back upright. “That’s what I thought.”

The girls suddenly grow disinterested with the film they put on and hop up, abandoning their snacks and turning to run up to the two of you to reconnect with their surroundings and see what you’re doing. Their cute faces light up upon seeing Suguru paint over your next nail.

“Oooo, can we try?” Nanako asks cheerfully, Mimiko nodding enthusiastically.

“Yeah! I wanna paint (Y/n)’s nails too!”

You and Suguru exchange glances before, of course, giving in, completely unable to deny them of anything. 

“Okay, girls,” Suguru smiles, and they rejoice. “Just watch how I do it first, okay?”

“Okay!”

The young girls watch closely with big eyes as Suguru glides the brush carefully over your nail, a shiny coat of white following his trail smoothly as his thumb caresses your foot softly. The hazel eyed man advises them to go very slowly and to keep the paint only on your nail, and to not get it anywhere else. They nod enthusiastically in return, reaching eagerly for the bottle and the brush.

Suguru hands Mimiko the brush and Nanako the bottle so that they could both have turns doing different things, but still feel included in the task at the same time. “Be careful,” you tell them as the brown haired girl very cautiously dips the brush into the bottle as the blonde holds it with both of her hands, their eyes training on the motion as though its they last thing they’ll do.

Smiles rise to you and Suguru’s lips as his free hand now rubs over the expanse of your leg, the other still cradling your ankle. Mimiki leans in with her brows arched cutely and touches your nail with the brush, gliding it over shakily just as their father showed them. 

When she finishes, a spec of paint touches your outer cuticle, and mimiko pouts, retracting her hands. “I got some outside the nail,” she says dejectedly.

“Oh, that’s okay, Mimi, you did so good,” you praise and she looks at you hopefully.

“I did?”

“Of course, honey, you can just get that one spot with a napkin.”

She smiles brightly, handing her sister the brush to hold before padding off happily to the kitchen to find a napkin. “My turn!” Nanaka exclaims, and you chuckle. 

“Nanako,” Suguru catches the girl’s attention. “Let me show you how to dry the polish. Okay?” she nods joyfully and follows Suguru’s lead as he leans over you and purses his lips gently. She does the same mimicking his movements while you eye him.

“Okay, now blow.”

The two blow onto your polish at the same time, and you tense, biting down on your lip to prevent yourself from laughing or moving. Suguru grins, leaning back to ruffle the blonde’s hair. “Good job.”

The day drones on as the girls work to finish your nails, suddenly fixated by the task. You and Suguru turn your attention at one point back to the movie, watching like children as the conflict finally gets resolved. You coo at the sight of the main characters hugging as the movie clothes, your happiness with the film’s end distracting you from the fact that you are basically at an in home nail salon.

The sun sets slowly over the city, melting your living room in an orange hue as the sun’s gaze peers through the windows. The heat finally begins to cool and the girls chatter loudly as they finish your nails, you moving to put on another film. Suguru leans over and pecks a kiss to your shin before inquiring what everyone wants to eat for dinner.

Despite the agonizing summer heat, you love days like these with the people you love the most, full of warmth, full of life, full of joy.

[holylulusworld]

Stuck on you

Summary: Dean can be annoying as fuck. But you're stuck on him.

Pairing: Alpha!Dean Winchester x Omega!Reader (fem)

Warnings: a/b/o, needy Dean, annoying Dean, fluff, cuddling & snuggling

“Dean, can you just not?” You groan and roll your eyes as Dean paces around the library. He glances at the book in your hands like it's an enemy he wants to kill. “What?”

“Do you read that book or just look at it?” He cocks his head when you slam the book shut. Crap, you’re mad.

“Dean Winchester, there are no pictures in the book. Do you think I just stare at the words and wait for them to crawl inside my brain?”

“That’s a funny thought,” he nods slowly. “Imagine, the words just jump at you and nestle in your brain. Would be cool.”

“You’d find it cool only because you hate reading,” you point the book at him. “Now stop distracting me. I try to get this essay done.”

“Why do you write an essay?” He sits on the table to run his fingertips over your thigh. “We could have a movie night or dinner in bed.”

“I need to finish this one because I want that degree,” you stick your tongue out when he rolls his eyes. “Remember, I told you that I want to be more than a huntress one day. The degree is important to me, and I expect you to support me.”

“I do, but—” his eyes drop to your cleavage, and Dean forgets what he wanted to say. He’s close to his rut and in need of cuddles. Dean is simply too proud to ask you to stop reading and start taking care of your alpha.

“Why did I let you claim me again?” You grin at Dean. He tries to hide his neediness and fails epically. You’re an evil bitch and love to tease your alpha. “I can’t believe my alpha is not supporting me.”

“Sweetheart,” he stammers. “I always support you. You know that. It’s just…I need … uh … your help with something.”

“How about you go to your Dean cave and let me read for another hour?” You fake that you are angry and pout. You need Dean to leave so you can take care of him later.

Dean sighs deeply but nods.

“Fine,” he hangs his head and hops off the table. Dean leaves the library without trying to get you to follow him. He knows when he’s not wanted…

“Why are you calling me? We live in the same place,” Dean asks while walking toward your shared room. He pouts as he enters the room. “Y/N?”

You hang up the phone to pat the spot next to you on your bed. “I thought we could have a movie night and…” You lick your lips, “I’m in need of cuddles and I brought all the nice blankets here.”

“Cuddles, huh?” He closes the door, considering his next step. The book you read lies abandoned on your nightstand. He glares at it and sticks his tongue out. “I’ll give the best cuddles and hugs.

“I know, alpha,” you croon. “Why don’t you come over here and show me how good you can cuddle me.”

Dean cockily smirks. He kicks off his shoes and strips his clothes off.

“I will cuddle you so good you’ll be a mess when I’m done with you.”

You chuckle. “I meant cuddling, not sex.”

He crawls onto the bed and under the covers to pounce on you. You end up on top of Dean, with his arms slung tightly around your body.

“Better?”

“Better,” he nuzzles you. “I have missed you today, sweetheart. Is all.”

“You’ve got me, Dean. Always…”  

[babydollmarauders]

FIGHT — JACK HUGHES

part of the el!hughes au

summary: y/n (lovie) and jack get into their biggest fight yet

warnings: fighting, mention of bad parents (lovie’s)

my head slumps on the back of the couch as Eleanor’s cries pierce my eardrums.

“El, baby, c’mon.” i groan out.

my recently turned one year old is sprawled out on the apartment floor, throwing a fit over something of which i have no idea.

i tried to pick her up, but she just kept pushing my hands away, screaming ‘mama! no! mama, no! no, mama!’

it’s been two weeks of this, and i have a sneaking suspicion that her constant sour mood has been all because of the particular absence of her favorite person. Jack.

it’s been two weeks of early wake-ups and late nights. two weeks of El having meltdowns if i mess up even one thing, like giving her cheetos in a bowl instead of her snack cup, or suggesting Moana instead of watching Lilo & Stitch for the billionth time, or reading her the wrong book at bed time. it’s been two weeks of sleep regression, no naps, and her throwing her food every chance she gets. two weeks of her screaming if i try and leave the room, but screaming if i try and pick her up as well. two weeks of bags under my eyes, messy buns because my hair is horribly greasy, and surviving purely on coffee.

i’m tired. my feet hurt because every time i sit, El screams at me. my head hurts from her screaming. and now my stomach cramps because i, of course, both started my period, and have not had a moment to eat all day. i’ve broken down in tears nearly every night once i finally get El to sleep, because i don’t know how much more of this i can take.

tears well up in my eyes at this very moment, and it takes everything in me to hold back my own screams. not necessarily directed at my daughter, but just in frustration. i can’t think clearly. it’s nearing midnight and i’ve tried everything to get her to sleep, but she just keeps fighting it.

i know she’s tired, just like i am. she’s been up since five in the morning, which means so have i.

“i give up.” i cry out, burying my face in my hands, weeping into them in frustration and exhaustion. “i get it, El. you want your father. i know. please, i know.”

El’s cries pause and i peek through my fingers to see her watching me with a tilted head, before she bursts back into tears.

i steel my spine, wiping my own tears, and strengthening myself. i rise from the couch, scooping my daughter up, despite her smacks to my chest and pulls on my now-falling-out bun, and shuffle towards her bedroom.

going for the last ditch effort, i grab the hidden pacifier in her top dresser drawer, and pop it into her mouth before turning on the white noise machine in the corner and placing her in her crib.

i gaze down at her, watching as she yawns, tears still slipping from her eyes. her eyelids flutter closed before she pries them back open and stares back at me.

“Eleanor Elizabeth Hughes, you have to sleep.” i scold in a whisper.

retreating from the room, closing the door and listening for her wails; i nearly cry in relief when nothing comes. nothing but silence and the sound of the white noise.

my feet pad across the wooden floors as i walk to the kitchen, keeping an ear out for El’s possible whines. too drained to make myself anything sustainable, i settle for a yogurt cup and a cheese stick. bringing my snacks with me into Jack and i’s bedroom, i settle under the blankets.

i have no energy to put into paying attention to a show or movie, and not nearly enough to read a book; so i sit in silence, staring at the wall as i eat.

placing the now empty yogurt cup on my nightstand, i pick at the cheese stick, lost in thought.

i’m struggling.

i feel like a single parent half the time.

i’m not sure how actual single parents do it. the ones who have to work and take care of their children. because parenting in and of itself is a full time job.

i know it’s not fair of me to think so little of myself, but i can’t help feeling like a horrible mother. she never wants me anymore; only ever yearning for Jack.

and i get it. i yearn for him too when he’s gone.

but can’t she be happy with me?

i miss the sound of the front door shutting; too deep in my own head. too far gone in my own thoughts.

but i do hear the not-so-hushed whispers of my husband and his brother as they venture farther into the apartment.

i hear the ‘goodnight.’ from Luke before his bedroom door shuts. i hear the nursery door opening, the white noise from the room getting louder. and then a few minutes later, i hear the nursery door click shut and the sound of my husbands footsteps getting closer down the hall before our bedroom door opens.

my cheese stick is long gone, and my fingers now settle for playing with each other. my nails picking at the others as i still sit in a catatonic state of exhaustion; staring at the wall in front of me.

Jack lets out a breath of surprise when he notices i’m awake in the dim lighting of the bedside lamp.

“hey, lovie.” he leans down, his fists pressing down on the mattress top, and lays a swift kiss on my cheek before rising back up to his full height.

i glance over as he throws Eleanor’s pacifier onto his nightstand.

“i thought we agreed no more pacifiers when she turned one? she hasn’t had one in the past month.” he huffs, stripping his shirt off and throwing it towards the hamper in the corner of the bedroom, narrowly missing by an inch. he eyes the shirt for a millisecond before shrugging and repeating the process with his pants, this time making it in the hamper.

“yeah, well, you weren’t here to attend to her screams and i was.” i retort.

“so you resorted to the paci?” he questions, pulling a pair of flannel pajama pants out of his dresser drawer.

“stop mom-shaming me.” i snap, scooting down and flopping onto my side, my back facing Jack.

“lovie.” he sighs. the bed dips as he sits behind me. “that’s not what i was doing.”

“yes. you were.” i accuse. “you’re saying i’m a bad mom for giving my daughter what she needed in order to fall asleep.”

i turn in the bed to look up at him and he parts his lips to speak, but i keep going.

“but you weren’t here, Jack. you didn’t hear her cries, or have to try every trick in the book to calm her down. you weren’t awake with her for nineteen hours with no nap only to still have her fight bed time. so, yes, i resorted to the pacifier. and ya know what? it worked.”

“i get that you’re in a bad mood, but why are you taking it out on me? i wasn’t even here for you to get angry at me.” he remarks.

“i’m not.” i deny, closing my eyes and hoping he’ll take it as a sign to just let me sleep.

“you are.” he grunts. “and it makes me feel like i’m the bad guy for doing my job.”

“well, i wouldn't have to do this all alone if it weren't for your fucking job.” i know as soon as i say it that my words were uncalled for. but, before i can take them back, Jack stands from the bed, making my eyes fly open to look at him.

“do i not help when i’m home? i’m so sorry that me providing for our family is so hard for you.” he sneers. his sarcasm is not appreciated, and i sit up in the bed in anger. “i’m so sorry that you have to be a mother, while i’m gone making money so that you don’t have to work.”

i shuffle onto my knees on the bed, glaring daggers at my husband.

“when have i ever complained about being a mother? and when have i ever said that i don’t want to work? i never asked to stay at home! but it’s what i do, because not both of us can work without putting El in daycare. which you said you didn’t want to do.”

my finger juts at my chest before poking his. my words harsh in delivery, but quiet in attempt to not disturb the sleeping baby down the hall.

“i never once complained about being a mother. i love her.” i continue.

“are you implying that i don’t love her?” Jack fumes.

“i never said that!” i cry. “you’re putting words into my mouth!”

“i’m just trying to provide for us!” our attempted quiet is long forgotten now, and i can only hope that the white noise in El’s room is enough to mask our argument.

“you think i don’t know that?” i exclaim, he opens his mouth but i don’t let him get a word in. “i’m just saying that you don’t understand how exhausting it is being a single parent half the fucking hockey season! you leave and play games and go out to fucking bars to celebrate wins and i stay here and take care of our daughter, who for the past two weeks, only wanted you!”

Jack throws his hands up in the air, huffing in anger.

“well, i can’t help that! i get that it’s hard, but you’d think you’d be a bit more grateful. it’s part of my job to leave, y/n!”

of everything he’s said, it’s those words that cut me the deepest. and what hurts the most, as small as it may seem, is that within all of our fights, big or small, throughout our entire six years together, never once has he called me by my name while we fought.

it’s always ‘lovie’.

but suddenly, i’m ‘y/n’.

i lower myself onto my butt on the mattress. tears are streaming down my cheeks and i try to wipe them away before Jack can see them.

“now you’re gonna cry?” he lowers himself onto the bed and i push myself off of it in order to gain distance, now standing a couple feet away.

“i quit.” my voice is quiet and surrendered, my words sheltered. i watch as his face drops, lips parting in shock.

“what?” he mumbles, his eyes softening.

i shake my head, letting my tears flow freely now as i round the bed and i head toward the cracked open door.

“where are you going?” he questions, his tone still holding a dash of anger.

“to sleep in Luke’s room.” i reply. he calls after me but his words fall on deaf ears.

i need space.

i don’t bother knocking on Luke’s door, opening it to find him just now sitting down in bed, his hair wet and leftover steam drifting from his en-suite bathroom.

his head snaps over to the door as i close it, and at the sight of my tears, he pats the bed beside him.

a sob racks my chest as i crawl into bed with the boy i look at as a brother. he pulls me into his side, no words spoken between us as he rubs a hand over my hair, letting me cry into his chest and soak his plain white t-shirt.

a muffled cry escapes my lips and he squeezes me tighter, pressing a kiss to my scalp. nothing needs to be said, no words needed to be shared, just quiet shushes and his hand rubbing up and down my back, the other still holding my head tight to his chest in grounding.

i’m not sure how long passes before i cry myself to sleep, Jack’s words echoing on a loop inside my head.

‘you’d think you’d be a bit more grateful.’

***

i’m unsure what time it is when i awake, but Luke is gone from the bed, and the sun peeks through the bedroom window.

i know Luke and Jack have the day off, so if Luke is already up, then i must have slept in later than i usually do.

despite the apparent long sleep, i don’t feel as well rested as i should. my eyes flutter shut for a few moments, but at the sound of the familiar squeal of excitement from my daughter, drifting in through the crack in the door, my eyes fly back open.

i kick my legs free from the tangle of blankets and throw them over the side of the bed, peeling my tired body up off the mattress. i rub my eyes as i walk over to Luke’s bathroom, ignoring the mess amongst the counter and looking in the mirror.

my eyes are still red and puffy from crying, and i turn on the faucet, cupping my hands under the cold running water and splashing it on my face before drying it with the hand towel that’s thrown haphazardly on the counter.

exiting the bathroom and bedroom, i’m immediately met with the sight of El’s smiling face bounding down the hall. her chubby little legs wobble as she runs.

“mama! dada!” she squeals, motioning behind her. a grin overtakes my lips at her excitement.

“yeah? is dada home?” i ask with a laugh as she runs smack into my legs, reaching up with grabby hands.

my heart melts in my chest. for the first time in two weeks, she wants me.

“mama! dada!” she repeats as i hoist her up, lifting her above my head and rejoicing in her giggles.

my eyes are all too soon drawn to my husband at the end of the hall. he stands leaned against the wall with his arms crossed, a faint smile on his lips while my own falls at the sight of him.

our fight replays in my mind; flashes of his red face and his defensive stance. echoes of his harsh tone and his cruel words.

Jack approaches us, leaning down to press a kiss to my lips, but i shift my face, his lips landing on my cheek instead. pulling back, his face falls, hurt shining in his eyes. it hurts me to see him upset, but i can’t bring myself to feel too bad, as i, too, am hurting.

i maneuver around him, padding down the hallway with El in my arms, making my way to the open layout of the living room and kitchen.

Luke is sat on the couch, eyes on his phone while Lilo & Stitch plays on the tv, and i flop down beside him. El crawls into his lap, pushing his phone out of the way and pushing her smiling face into his line of sight. i watch his eyes light up, sliding his phone into his pocket and tickling her sides.

a laugh escapes my lips as he lifts El upside down in front of his face, making her giggle contagiously. but once again, my lips fall back straight as Jack enters the room again.

the day continues like this, living amicably with Jack, but not happily. as the day goes on, the more i reflect on our fight the night prior, and the worse i feel. i was in the wrong. i knew that last night and i know it now.

i know leaving El is hard for him, just as taking care of her without him is hard for me. but my guilt doesn’t erase his words.

i know he didn’t mean it, just as he knows that i didn’t mean mine, but it still hurts. he cut deep. he accused me of being ungrateful, the very same thing he knows my parents called me when i told them i was moving out.

‘you’re so ungrateful. we offered you to keep living with us even after your graduation, and you’d rather move out with your unstable little boyfriend than live with the people who raised you. well, don’t come crawling back to us, we don’t take ungrateful children.’

a lump grows in my throat as i compare the fights. it’s nine at night and Jack is in El’s room, putting her to sleep, Luke long having retired to his own bedroom, leaving me alone on the couch. my knees are pulled up to my chest, my arms hugging them tight, as tears stream down my cheeks.

a small part of me tells me i should apologize. i know if i do, he will too. he already seems to want to move past it.

but the larger part of me says to wait. to let him apologize to me. to make him acknowledge that we fought. instead of brushing past it like it never happened.

Jack strides into the living room, child free, and it’s the first time we’ve really been alone together all day.

i avoid his gaze, rather wiping my tears and averting my eyes to the television, which still plays the credits of The Little Mermaid from our before bedtime movie.

he sighs, taking a seat on the opposite side of the couch. his hand reaches out to graze my leg and i flinch at the soft touch. the larger part of me wins and i rise from the couch, stalking off to our bedroom and away from him.

i quickly change into my pajamas, hoping to be out of the bedroom before he comes in, but i’m not so lucky.

he enters the room as i’m pulling my t-shirt over my head. my t-shirt. not his. he notices this change quickly and shakes his head.

he stands silently, his back leaning against the now closed door as i pull on sweatpants, watching my every move.

i move to the en-suite bathroom when i’m done. making quick work of washing my face and brushing my teeth. when i finally finish with my nightly routine, i head back out to the still blocked bedroom door.

Jack eyes me up and down, and a quick wetting of his lips tells me he’s horny, but i laugh inside at the thought.

does me angry and upset, turn him on? does he really think he has any chance of getting lucky tonight when he hasn’t even apologized?

“can you move?” i huff, crossing my arms.

“where are you going now?” he questions, shaking his head.

“Luke’s room. again.”

“you know we have a bed, right? the one you were in last night before you left me alone in here.” his words twist my heart, but i stand my ground.

“oh, you mean the same bed i was sitting in when you implied that i’m ungrateful and selfish?” i mock, tilting my head.

“lovie.” his tone is defensive enough to let me know that he doesn’t plan on apologizing tonight, so rather than waiting and hoping for Jack to move, i push him aside lightly with my shoulder and slip through the door.

i knock lightly on Luke’s door and it doesn’t take long for him to open it, letting me slip through into the room.

“you guys are still fighting?” Luke asks, shutting the door and walking over to sit on his bed.

“i promise, this is the last time i’ll sleep in your room. if we’re still fighting tomorrow night, i’ll sleep on the couch.” i assure him, crawling up the bed and laying on my side, facing him.

“i don’t have a problem with you sleeping in here, lovie.” he sighs, laying down on his side so that we lay face to face. “i’ve just never seen you guys fight like this, ya know? you guys are usually so in love, it just scares me to see you fight. i want the best for both of you.”

my eyes soften and i raise my hand, running it softly through Luke’s unruly curls.

“Lukey, i’m still madly in love with your brother. one fight isn’t gonna change that.” i tell him. “he said some things that hurt me. i said things that i’m sure hurt him too. but we’ll get through this. we love each other.”

i speak with assurance, but at this point, i’m not sure if i’m reassuring Luke, or myself.

“you should go to sleep, bubs. you have practice in the morning.” i press a kiss to Luke’s forehead before he turns his bedside lamp off and flops down on his side, his back now facing me.

i follow suit, my back facing Luke as i close my eyes and let myself drift to sleep.

***

i’m woken up by little hands smacking my cheeks, immediately followed by the sound of my husbands whispers.

“oh no, El, we don’t smack mommy. we’re gentle.” he tells her softly, and soon after, i feel her open mouth press against my cheek; her version of a kiss.

my eyes flutter open and i’m met by the smiling face of my daughter. she’s held hovering above me by Jack, who seems worried for my reaction.

“hi, baby!” i coo, a smile stretching over my lips as i take her from him. “good morning, beautiful!”

“mama!” she cheers, followed by a steady stream of babbling.

“she woke up a couple hours ago. she was looking for you.” Jack tells me. “i just changed her diaper, and she already ate breakfast, but i noticed she’s been chewing on everything this morning, so i threw a couple of her teething toys in the freezer and she’ll probably want a popsicle soon to sooth her gums.”

i look up at him and nod, acknowledging that i heard him, before i sit up and lay El down on the bed, tickling her tummy and listening to her joyous giggles fill the room.

“Luke and i are off to practice, we’re running late.” he runs his hand over El’s hair, leaning down and kissing her forehead before turning to look at me again. “Luke said he wants to take El to the park after we get back. he said for me to ask you if you can have her dressed and her diaper bag ready for when he and i get back.”

“yeah, i can do that.” i reply and he nods, pushing off the bed and laying a kiss on my own forehead before he leaves the room.

i heave out a sigh, looking down at El, who’s already looking up at me.

“you wanna go take a shower with mommy?” i baby talk, pasting a smile back on my face. she smiles right back, grabbing at my shirt. “yeah, you do. you love showers, don’t you? my little water baby.”

*

El is all dressed and ready to go when Jack and Luke arrive home, while i stick the last snack into her diaper bag.

“hey, lovie.” Luke chimes, throwing an arm around my shoulder and squeezing my head into his chest. “she ready?”

“mhm! she should be good to go.” i confirm as i push out of his hold, stuffing the bag into his arms instead. “you have the stroller, right?”

“yeah, i’m taking Jack’s car and it’s already in the trunk.” he confirms, slinging the diaper bag over his shoulder and scooping his niece up from where she was already staring up at him by his legs.

“alright, say bye-bye to mommy and daddy!” Luke sings out, waving to us. El copies him, waving her entire arm about in order to wave goodbye, and with that, they’re out the door; leaving Jack and i in silence.

i busy myself by picking up the toys strewn about the living room floor, while Jack unloads the dishwasher. but tension lingers in the air.

maybe i should just apologize.

i hate this feeling.

i hate not being cuddled up with him right now.

we usually spend any El free hours curled up in our bed. napping, watching a movie, talking, or just taking part in general bedroom activities.

but instead, we’re across the room from each other, doing daily household chores and trying hard to avoid the screaming silence between us.

i drop a barbie into the toy box and stand up straight, looking towards my husband, who’s already staring at me with gentle eyes.

“i’m sorry.” i sigh, squeezing my eyes shut, holding my hands to my face. “i hate fighting.”

his hurried footsteps click against the wooden floors, stopping when he gets in front of me. his hands come up to mine, delicately pulling them away from my face before his arms encircle my waist.

“i hate it too.” he whispers, and i know his words hold a double meaning. he hates fighting and he hates leaving.

“i shouldn’t have said the things that i did. i shouldn’t have taken my bad mood out on you.” i let my head bob forward, my forehead laying against his chest. “i was tired, and i was angry at the situation, but not at you. never at you. you’re providing for our family, and i’m so glad that you get to do that by doing something you love.”

he kisses the top of my head, his lips lingering on my scalp.

“i’m sorry too.” he mumbles against me.

“i’m sorry for making it seem like i was mom-shaming you, i should’ve chosen my words more carefully. i’m sorry for making you feel bad. i’m sorry for accusing you of saying i don’t love her, i know that’s not what you were saying. and most of all, i’m sorry for implying that you were ungrateful. you’re not. i know you’re not. i should’ve never implied that you were.

“you’re an amazing mom, lovie. the best i could’ve ever hoped for El. i should’ve been more understanding about how hard it is for you to take care of her alone while i’m gone.”

i peer up at him, my chin still resting on his chest, and give him a pointed look.

“and i’m sorry for not calling you ‘lovie’.” he huffs out through a laugh. the corners of my mouth quirk up and i pull his head down to push our lips together.

my whole body melts even further into his, finally at peace for the first time in over two weeks.

[alittlebitofloveliness]

PLEASE write more mini fics about ponyboy and curly i love them together

Hi anon! This is the first of the PaperCut asks I'm cooking up, so I hope you like it. Sorry it took so long!

****************

Curly Shepard knows he’s the hottest person alive, which is good, because he needs this to go well. 

He’s got a pair of Tim’s jeans on- they’re a bit long, but unlike his own they don’t have any stains- and he might pay for that later but right now it doesn’t matter. His muscle shirt might’ve belonged to Tim at one point or another too, but right now the important thing is that it shows off his arms. Gotta show off his gains if he’s gonna get a date for the rodeo this weekend. 

He really needs a date for the rodeo this weekend. Angela had bet him three dollars and a pack of kools he couldn’t find one and he was determined to prove her wrong. Also, he doesn’t have the scratch to spare if he loses- he’s trying to save up for a nail gun. Dally Winston told him a week ago about a guy in New York who used a modified nail gun as a weapon, and Curly wants to try it.

So, the date. He’d considered asking Catalina Perez- she’s been making eyes at him for weeks, and despite what Angela thinks he isn’t completely clueless- but he doesn’t really want to take a girl out. Girls are fine, but he’s gotta be like…nice and gentlemanly and shit and it's so boring. Besides, Angela just said he had to find a date. She didn’t say it had to be with a girl. 

There’s only one person he actually wants to ask out. Of course, Ponyboy will probably tell him to fuck off, but he tells Curly to fuck off a lot and only means it like a third of the time, so it’ll probably be fine. 

Curly flexes once more in front of the mirror (for confidence) and sticks his switchblade in his pocket. Momentarily he considers grabbing a jacket, but he didn’t spend the last three months beefing up his arms just to cover them with sleeves. Besides, it’s not that cold yet.

Angela’s in the living room with Sylvia, and he promptly decides he does not want to hear them rip him to shreds for his very cool outfit, so he climbs out his bedroom window instead. It’s good practice for gang stuff, he tells himself, because saying he doesn’t want to feel the sting of Angel’s judgemental gaze feels a lot like cowardice.

Once he’s outside he runs into a problem: he’s finally psyched himself up enough to ask Ponyboy out, but unfortunately he doesn’t have any idea where to find him.

Ok, that’s not completely true. Truth is, the guy is pretty predictable on account of his grumpy ass older brother keeping him on a leash shorter than Angel’s temper. Tim didn’t keep half so close an eye on him, and he’d done things Ponyboy probably hadn’t even dreamed of.

It wasn’t like Pony was any sort of goody two shoes. No, Curly didn’t like teacher’s pets and he liked Pony something awful. Pony just…wasn’t as dumb as him, that was all. And he had more to lose, with the state breathing down his neck and all. Curly could respect that.

He’d try the movie house first, he decided. Shit Ponkid liked movies, and anytime he went with him Ponyboy would get all pissy if he said anything about Paul Newman. (What did Pony like so much about that guy anyway? He wasn’t even that tuff looking and he talked like a soc.)

When he shows up, the movie house is empty except for a pair of socs getting handsy in the back row, so he makes his way to the library instead, hoping the old lady behind the desk has forgiven him for time he spilled Pepsi over half the books in the history section (it's not his fault ok? He got distracted.)

This time, his detective skills are as flawless as his face, and he spots a familiar head of reddish hair in the back corner near the biology section, Pony’s shoulders curled in his familiar slouch. The sight of it makes a familiar warm feeling start in his chest, like how good whiskey goes down, a feeling Angela had explained to him two days ago was ‘what a crush feels like, dumbass’ with an eye roll and a not so gentle swat on the head. Much as he hates to admit it, it’s a fairly common occurrence. He’s good at describing feelings but not naming them. Angela feels nothing, but knows what things are supposed to feel like. It works for them, even though Tim calls them weird for it. 

“Hey Ponykid!” His voice is too loud for the library and he knows it, but what’s the old bitch behind the desk gonna do? Kick him out? He could kick her ass.

Ponyboy scowls. “Shut up!” 

“You goin’ to the rodeo this weekend?” Shit. Curly had meant to build up to that, honestly he did, but Ponyboy Curtis has a way of getting him to act like a prize idiot instead of his usual cool, suave self. He hates what this crush is doing to him, and also never wants it to stop.

“No.” 

He goes back to his book. 

Rude.

“Why not?” Curly presses, leaning on the table in a way that makes his arms flex just the way he practiced. The moment is wasted though, because Pony doesn’t even glance up.

“Because.”

“Because why?” He should’ve known better than to come to the library. The only time Pony ever gets proper mad at him is this godforsaken hellhole.

“Because Angela told me you were gonna ask me out,” Pony shuts his book, a shit eating grin crossing his face, and fuck this was not part of the plan. Curly can feel his cheeks flushing and he’s not for the first time he’s glad his skin is dark enough it won’t be obvious. If Pony- or anyone else for that matter- had any idea how much he made Curly blush he’d never hear the end of it, “and she paid me a pack of kools not to say yes unless you ask again after this weekend.”

“She- she what?”

That had to be cheating. Even Tim would have to agree that was cheating, or racketeering or- or something. She was rigging their bet against him. Worse than that she’d told Ponyboy he was gonna ask him out, and now Ponyboy was prepared with his smirk and that face and whatever cologne he’s wearing which smelled so good it should probably be illegal.

“Sorry,” Ponyboy grins, not sounding sorry at all. He climbs to his feet, and Curly is suddenly acutely aware of how close they are, almost chest to chest. Pony’s maybe three inches taller, and Curly finds himself having to look up a bit into his eyes, “guess you’re gonna have to try again next week.”

Then he leans in and kisses Curly on the cheek. 

Curly’s brain melts. 

Pony must see it, because despite the slight flush on his pale cheeks, he manages to look completely smug as he turns away.

“Now fuck off, would ya Curls? I’m tryin’ to read.”

[thegettingbyp2]

I love drama and protective Austin so how about one where Vanessa is hating on musical theater actress & being jealous & shady & Austin sticks up for you & calls her out.

8 Times a Week

A/N: So sorry it's taken so long but it felt so GOOD to sit and write again!

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The moment you heard the front door close, you were quickly wiping your eyes and shoving your phone between the couch cushions. Jumping up, you checked in the mirror to make sure that there was no mascara running down your cheeks and you gave yourself a watery smile before turning to greet your boyfriend in the hallway.

‘You’re back!’ you exclaimed, running over to him and practically throwing yourself into his arms, partly because there was nothing you needed more right now than to be wrapped up in him but mostly due to the fact you hadn’t seen him for three weeks while he was away filming and you’d missed him more than anything.

‘I’m back,’ Austin sighed happily as he held you against him, burying his head in your neck and breathing in the smell of your shampoo, a smell he’d missed for the past three weeks. Pulling back slightly, Austin’s came up to cup your cheek as he pulled you in for a kiss that made up for all the kisses he’d missed whilst he’d been away. You let yourself relax into the kiss, focusing on nothing but the man in front of you and wanting nothing more than to order take-out and curl up on the sofa, watching movies with him. ‘You okay?’ he asked when he broke the kiss, noticing how your eyes were slightly red and puffy from where you’d been crying moments before he walked through the front door.

‘I’m fine,’ you replied quickly, not quite meeting his eyes. ‘I just missed you.’

‘Baby, what’s wrong?’ he asked, stepping even closer to you and running the back of his hand against your warm cheek, the cool sensation of his hand on your skin causing your eyes to flutter closed briefly. ‘You’ve been crying.’

‘No, I haven’t.’ You laughed, trying prove to him that nothing was wrong. But this was Austin and he knew you better than you knew yourself.

‘Please don’t lie to me, baby. Tell me what’s wrong and we can fix it.’

You sighed gently, knowing that Austin wasn’t going to let it go until you told him what was wrong. ‘It’s just some people on Instagram and Twitter posting some not too nice things about me.’

‘What do you mean “about you”?’ he asked, his tone growing dangerously calm as his eyes darkened slightly.

‘Just posting a video from the other night where I tripped onstage at work and making comments about how if I was actually good at my job, then things like that wouldn’t happen and that you deserve to be with someone who’s as talented as you.’ You spoke quickly and quietly, hoping that he wouldn’t hear, but he heard every single word.

‘That’s ridiculous!’ he exclaimed, pulling you into him and tilting your head up to make you look at him. ‘Baby, you don’t need to listen to any of that, okay? You’re incredible! I could never do what you do.’

‘You did do it,’ you said, laughter colouring your voice slightly.

‘No. I did a play. You do musicals, with all the singing and dancing, I could never do that over and over again,’ he insisted. ‘Show me the comments.’

‘No,’ you were quick to reply.

‘Why not?’

‘Because you made me feel better about the whole thing! I’m not even upset about it anymore!’ you tried to reason with him but the raised eyebrow you got in response only proved to you that it didn’t work.

‘I know that’s what you were looking at just now, show me and we can get rid of them yeah?’ he spoke gently, his thumb tracing back and forth over your cheekbone as you sighed, nodding gently before taking his hand in yours and pulling him with you into the living room.

‘Just…promise me you won’t get mad when you see who the comments are from, okay?’ Austin gave you a questioning look but nodded nonetheless, wanting nothing more than to make you feel better.

Once the two of you were seated on the sofa, you reached between the cushions to retrieve your phone before unlocking it and handing it to him. You knew the exact moment he’d seen who had wrote the comments because his entire body went still and you could’ve sworn that you felt the temperature in the room drop a couple of degrees.

‘You promised you wouldn’t get mad,’ you reminded him after a couple of moments of silence.

‘That was before you told me it was Vanessa making these comments about you. She has no right talking about you at all, it was fine when she was making comments when I was doing Elvis press because I’d not long broken up with her but to come for you?! I’m not putting up with it and you shouldn’t too.’ He gave you your phone back before pulling his own phone from his pocket and opening up twitter.

‘What are you doing?’ you asked warily when you saw him pull up a photo the two of you had taken on your opening night of your latest show.

‘Sticking up for my girl,’ he replied simply, wrapping an arm around you and pulling you in close while he began to type with his free hand:

The woman in this photo is the most talented woman I have ever met and I’m lucky enough that she saw something in me that made me want to give her a chance. She’s stuck by me through everything and I’ll be damned if I don’t do the same for her. This woman goes onstage in front of thousands of people 8 times a week and performs for them. So what if she trips over every now and then, the beauty of what she does is that it’s different every time and that she’s fucking amazing at it. And for anyone who has a different opinion, that’s fine but please, keep it to yourself. She has more talent in her little finger than most, Vanessa.

He clicked send and you couldn’t help the shocked gasp escape your lips when you saw that he’d actually called Vanessa out. ‘Austin, you can’t do that!’

‘I can! She needs to know that she’s not getting away with anything like this, (Y/N), I’m not going to come home to you crying over something that’s not true, know who it was that made you cry and not do anything about it. I love you so much and I hate seeing you upset, so I’m going to do something about it when it happens.’

You sat in a stunned silence for a couple of seconds, feeling like a weight had crashed into you as you realised just how much the man sitting next to you loved you. ‘I love you too,’ you whispered, your eyes tearing up again as you leaned in to press a gentle kiss to his lips.

A lopsided grin worked its way onto Austin’s lips as he looked at you. ‘How about I go get changed while you order food and we’ll spend the rest of the night on the sofa, how’s that sound?’

‘That sounds like something I’ve been waiting for for the past three weeks.’

[jnnul]

the right side of wrong. (part two)

TAGS ▸ uh like mentions of glass breaking, and food eating??, this chapter is pretty tame lol

PLAYLIST ▸ yosemite - travis scott, back - jey, stay - ari abdul, element - pop smoke, dirty laundry - blackbear

WORD COUNT ▸ 6.5k

AUTHOR’S NOTE ▸ didn't want this part to be too long since i'm trying to stick to my end word count of 40k lol. next chapter is gonna move things along for sure though! this one is just plot + world building. quick note: feedback, comments, etc. GREATLY encourage writers! if you felt any sort of way (in a good or bad way!) about this fic, pls leave feedback!

TAGLIST ▸ @hybeboyenthusisast

[march 19, 20XX, 11:48 a.m.]

[mount justice, happy harbor, rhode island]

“you’ve never watched television before?” soojin asks incredulously, staring at y/n. she shrugs, looking at the remote in her hand with a curious look. 

“i mean, television is harder to warp since it could be live broadcasted. magic takes a lot of energy, and i don’t think anyone cared about me enough to warp television day in and day out. i mostly just read books. fiction.” jay lets out a low whistle as he puts the baking tray into the oven. 

soojin and jay had taken it upon themselves to be ‘den mothers’ for y/n since she didn’t really have anyone else to connect with, and since they were the only ones who lived at mount justice.

“really? well, at least now you’ll never be bored. when i was on mars, watching television from earth is practically the only thing i ever did,” soojin says and smiles when she sees jay make his way to the television set in the other room, picking out dvd’s of old movies to start y/n with.

“yeah. i mean, it was pretty boring since i could only do things that were already vetted by my dad. i could only read the books he wanted me to. i could only eat the foods that he brought me. i could only learn the things in textbooks that he conjured. it was a life that felt like prison,” she explained, her voice trailing off as she reminisced not-so-fondly about her life in the other dimension.

“you know, i hate to say it, but usually people come out of solitary confinement totally mistrustful and don’t reveal anything to the people around them because of their time. i know that your case was a little different but i just - ” soojin is cut off by y/n, who’s eyes have grown hard and full of fire.

“but i don’t seem depressed or psychotic. in fact, i look and speak like a pretty normal girl, don’t i?” y/n says, her voice cold and emotionless. a shiver runs down soojin’s spine. this is what she had expected from someone who had no one but the light to grow up with. someone who was ready to fight at any given moment; a cold and ruthless killer.

“i’m sorry,” soojin says and just as quickly as y/n had slipped into the persona, she slips out of it.

“no, don’t apologize. i understand the confusion. it’s a mix of two things: my father may have been controlling my environment but he never actually tried to control me. he said that my powers and my face was all his, but that my personality and my brain was all of my mother’s. my father loved me very much, and locking me up to ‘protect me’ was his insane way of showing it. so i know what it’s like to be warm, trusting, and affectionate. it’s not as though i never knew the emotion. and as easy as it would be to live my life without ever trusting you guys, i just don’t think i want to live like that again. that’s how i’ve been living ever since i found out the truth about this dimension.” y/n sighs, crossing her arms over her chest and hugging them close to her body, as if to trap the heat into the depths of her skin. “but also - even with all of that love - i’ve lived a better life in the past two days than i have in the past twenty years. people here tell me the difference between reality and fiction. everyone in that dimension just told me whatever i wanted to hear. or whatever i needed to hear to stay in their grasp. i wasn’t really a child to look after to anyone else in the light. i was more like a harmless puppy.”

“that’s why they didn’t train you in combat either?” soojin asks and y/n nods, shrugging.

“it’s hard to keep a puppy under control when she’s been taught to bite.”

jay, who’d come back to the kitchen with a myriad of genres to explore sighs. “you know, that kind of reminds me of my time at cadmus.”

“what’s a cadmus?” y/n asks, and jay is silent for a moment, picking and choosing his words wisely.

“it’s a prison of its own. i was made as superman’s clone and raised in a facility to have the powers of superman but no mind of my own. i was literally created to be a rabid dog just barely on a leash,” jay says, and when he looks up at y/n, he doesn’t see the pity that he usually gets (and hates). instead, he just sees solidarity and for some reason, it feels as though she truly understood what exactly he’d gone through.

“but enough of the sad past talk. we’ve got to get you caught up on cinema and there’s nothing but time, right now! so what do you say, y/n? are you feeling mystery? romance? comedy? romantic-comedy?” soojin says, clapping her hands. y/n peruses her options before picking a movie, unable to tear her eyes away from the cover.

“i don’t think i know what love is but whatever it is, it’s gotta be this right now. who is this fine man?” y/n asks, staring at the man on the cover of the dvd and soojin giggles. 

“that’s henry cavill, and trust me, we all think that way,” she says, winking at jay, who just rolls his eyes with a grin.

“well then, the immortals, it is,” jay says, leading them all to the living area, where the television was.

“oh, i hate to bring up cadmus again but you said something that i thought i should clarify,” y/n says suddenly, her face serious and contemplative. jay and soojin exchange a look.

“what is it, y/n? do you remember something else about the light?” soojin asks worriedly.

“no. no - i just wanted to ask…what the hell is a superman?”

“oh boy.”

[march 19, 20XX, 11:48 a.m.]

[palo alto, california]

yujin checks her phone for the third time in the span of thirty seconds, her knee bouncing as she waited in the courtyard of stanford university for her boyfriend. she stares down at her phone impatiently, waiting for jake when she’s offered a short reprieve from the california sun beating down on her as a shadow casts across her face.

“you know, you really need to start caring more about your boyfriend and less about this new girl you have a crush on,” says the person who deprives yujin of her vitamin d.

“i don’t have a crush on her. but i do really need to check something out in gotham,” yujin says, looking up at jake. “and i need you to come with me.”

jake frowns, checking his watch. “is it serious? we have the pottery painting double date with the colemans at five.”

“no, it’s not serious. it’s just strange. and i don’t know, i just don’t want to investigate alone. figured i would put your forensics degree to use,” yujin replies.

“forensics? are we talking about a dead body here?” jake asks and yujin shakes her head, looking back down at her phone. she turns the phone screen so that jake could see what had her so on edge and gasps, taking the phone from her and examining carefully.

the image on yujin’s phone wasn’t gory or grotesque like jake had expected. instead, the image was (relatively) straightforward: someone had broken into ace chemical factory - literally. everything made of glass in the image was shattered to pieces, and the old stone building was suffering some serious cracks.

“this looks like some sort of sonic weaponry type damage. i see why this is sad and disturbing for gotham city history enthusiasts but i’m still not seeing why a forensics analysis is necessary. does sunghoon know about this?,” jake says, frowning as he examines the picture.

yujin swipes to the next picture, and jake’s frown grows even deeper as he looks at the picture.

“it looks like the same person who broke into ace chemicals also did some serious property damage to the yacht bridge. this has got to be at least twenty to forty million dollars in damage,” jake says, his eyebrows furrowed. “i still don’t see how this is an issue for forensics though.”

“check the timestamps. sunghoon wants us to do a little analysis for the team while he carries out the investigation on the legal side. you know, since superpowers are probably involved,” yujin says and jake swipes back and forth, checking the timestamps of the pictures.

“these pictures indicate that the damage was done at the same exact time. how the hell is that possible? i didn’t know that sonic weaponry was that easy to find,” jake says cynically, swiping back and forth once more.

“yeah. but check this: the damage looks the exact same. as if it were done by the same weapon,” yujin says, pointing out the shape of the glass shards that were scattered across the floors of each of the buildings. jake looks closer until he notices something that rubs him the wrong way, zooming in to show yujin too.

“look at this, though. in the picture of the yacht bridge, there’s clear indications that the weaponry used was barely functional; i mean the glass shattered but the shatter isn’t nearly as finely ground as the glass here, in the ace chemical factory picture. it’s not as identical as we think it is,” jake explains. “and this is just a hunch, but it seems like the motives are different too - i mean, i can’t think of a single reason why anyone would voluntarily go to ace chemical factory at eight in the evening. that place has been shut down for years, and it was never producing anything too valuable in the first place.”

“but the yacht bridge would mean that some rich people are moving some big amounts of money in the next couple of days,” yujin says slowly. “especially with the weather growing warmer, more and more people are getting their boats ready to take out onto the waters.”

“and when did you say icicle sr. was at the bank?” jake asks, mentally committing the picture to memory. 

“not even fifteen minutes later. the bank is pretty close to ace chemicals but it’s on the other side of gotham. unless it was you or the flash, i’m not sure that anyone could make it from the yacht bridge to the bank in time. but from ace chemicals, there’s more than enough time to do so,” yujin says, swiping to the next picture, where she’d circled the three locations.

“well, i’m not sure how much help i’m gonna be but i’ll check out all three of the locations with you if that’s what you need me to do,” jake says, handing yujin back her phone and she pockets it quickly, checking her watch.

“well then, i’m gonna have to borrow the powers of kid flash to complete this recon mission,” she says, a teasing glint in her eyes and jake flashes her a megawatt smile.

“kid flash, at your service, ma’am. now, let’s not keep the colemans waiting for too long.” 

[march 19, 20XX, 11:48 a.m.]

[gotham city, southern tip of new jersey]

“detective park? we have some people inquiring about the simultaneous break-ins at ace chemicals and the yacht bridge from yesterday. is the field team ready to go to the site?” byun euijoo, the station’s pretty boy and correspondent/representative asks, looking haggard from having to respond to entitled rich people all day.

“yeah. we’re ready,” sunghoon says, nodding at the team that he’d assembled to investigate the break-ins. he had a sneaking suspicion that yujin and jake would have better luck in finding the source of the issues but he had a job and appearances to keep up anyway.

“right. i’ll tell them that our team’s on site working on the case and that we’ll find the perpetrators as soon as possible,” euijoo says, typing away on his little ipad, murmuring something under his breath. “even though it’s most likely that the justice league’s gonna handle this anyway. or whoever the hell they send to take care of things secretly.”

“what’d you say?” sunghoon says, unbuttoning the buttons on the cuffs of his sleeves to roll them up, hanging the detective badge over his neck.

“nothing. it’s just - does our station ever really do anything? it feels like we just get anonymous intel that solves the entire case for us. not that you’re not a great detective and you’ve definitely been vital to solving cases and putting everything together. but, you know, it just feels pointless when the justice league or whatever team they’ve put together for undercover missions does everything for us anyway,” euijoo huffs, hugging his ipad to his chest.

sunghoon rests his hand on euijoo’s shoulder, slinging his jacket over his own shoulder. “this station is the face of every case that comes to this city. no matter what kind of anonymous tips we get - or however timely or true those tips might be - we deliberate the truth and we have to search and give the people an answer. our job is no less important because whoever is helping us has gotten involved.”

“but you don’t ever get curious about who exactly is helping us?” euijoo asks, somewhat shamefully.

“hm. maybe? but if they want to reveal themselves, they will. no point in looking a gift horse in the mouth, right?”

euijoo doesn’t have much to say to that and sunghoon just smiles, passing him to lead the team to first the yacht bridge, and then ace chemicals. yujin and jake would be checking ace chemicals first so it would be easier for them to examine things in peace if the detective team (and the horde of reporters that would be sure to follow) headed to the yacht bridge first.

plus, rich people were impatient. and pushy.

“alright,” sunghoon begins, clapping his hands. “let’s find these assholes.”

the motorcycle ride to the yacht bridge wasn’t that far. maybe twelve or thirteen minutes at maximum. but those thirteen minutes felt like absolute torture all the way through.

sunghoon preferred motorcycles because he liked feeling the wind whipping his jacket and at his hair when he wasn’t feeling like following rules. he loved the feeling of feeling superhuman in his speed and agility as he raced down the streets of gotham. it also could have been the time that sunghoon had spent with eunwoo rubbing off on him, now that he thought about it. 

but now, with all of these reporters hot on his heels, hounding him with questions that they were screaming over the howling winds, it was absolute torture. sunghoon could barely concentrate on the road in front of him from the sheer multitude of questions that he was being barraged with. 

sunghoon’s thoughts lead him to ardor, as a way to distract himself from the questions that he was pretending he couldn’t hear. 

she was probably spending time with jay and soojin around this time, wasn’t she? maybe catching up on the current events that she’d missed out on in all of her time trapped in that dimension? or possibly eating foods that she didn’t even know existed? knowing soojin, she was definitely showing ardor some sort of show or movie. jay was probably just happy to be around soojin and soojin was always happy to welcome new people into the den, since the only two permanent residents of the den were jay and soojin.

his mind goes back to something that eunwoo had said as sunghoon was on his way out.

eunwoo was a relatively stoic person and wasn’t shaken or moved by much. he didn’t really have intense highs but he also didn’t have intense lows, and while that had annoyed sunghoon when he was looking for affection that eunwoo simply couldn’t provide, it proved to be helpful and necessary every time sunghoon found himself shaking with the intensity of his emotions when he was going through his teenage years.

so for eunwoo to grab sunghoon’s elbow as he’s on his way out of the cha manor, his eyes downcast and contemplative… it was definitely a cause for concern for sunghoon.

“i don’t want to reveal too much because i’m not sure that it’s my place to share anything with the team when it’s a justice league issue but if what y/n is saying is true, the possibility that the justice league has a mole is quite frankly, worryingly high. i can’t tell you how to run the team and i’ll carry out my investigation as discreetly as possible but as someone in this field for longer than you have, i have some requests and some advice. first, i suggest that you keep y/n as close to you as possible. if word of the investigation leaks, the light will not hesitate to hurt her or maybe even kill her, depending on how desperate faust is. i trust the team but i trust you the most, sunghoon. second, this is my request, but you might consider adding her to the team. pyrokinetics are not a joke - and her flame doesn’t kill, which is even better. not to mention that if you take her on missions - ”

“we might discover something that she’s been keeping from us, intentionally or not,” sunghoon finished with a sigh, rubbing his hand over his face.

“you know?” eunwoo asked incredulously.

“not really, to be honest. but miss martian mentioned something about how she’s keeping something important from us. i’m pretty sure that not even she knows though. according to miss martian, it’s something that she knows is important but it’s behind a mental block - can’t tell if it’s a block from a magician or an emotional block. combat is pretty primal though; it unlocks parts of us that we don’t even know exist. so maybe after some training and survival techniques, ardor could be a good addition to the team. or maybe it’ll be a good way to release the stress or whatever mental blocks she has in her mind.”

eunwoo was quiet, watching sunghoon before shaking his head. “you really grew up too fast.”

“you’re still only a couple years older than me,” sunghoon replied but when he looked at eunwoo, he doesn’t see a scolding or discomfort welling up in his eyes - just unadulterated pride and joy in sunghoon’s growth.

“yeah. i know.”

sunghoon snaps out of his thoughts, parking the bike in front of the entrance into the yacht bridge, flashing his detective badge at the attendant in the front - although he’s pretty sure he doesn’t need to, since there’s only one detective that was always called upon in strange cases like this: him. 

“show me the way,” he says, trying his best to offer a charming smile. the attendant just sneers, pressing a button to open the gates into the yacht bridge with an unimpressed look, distrust swimming in his eyes and sunghoon does it best to keep it from affecting him.

today was going to be a long day.

[march 19, 20XX, 6:59 p.m.]

[mount justice, happy harbor, rhode island]

sunghoon collapses on the sofa in the living area of mount justice, a defeated look on his face, a wet cloth draped over his face to release the heat that he felt was practically coming off of him in waves after getting off of work just prior to using the zeta tubes to reach mount justice.

“gotham city giving you some trouble?” soojin asks, sliding a plate of cookies over to where the heaping lump of sunghoon was.

“not really,” sunghoon sighs before taking the wet cloth off of his face. “never mind. yeah, it seems like one of our cases is a little more complicated than i had anticipated. don’t mind me though. are yujin and jake here yet?”

“they said something about a double date earlier so i doubt that they’ll get back until at least eight.” soojin munches on the cookies, nose crinkling in satisfaction as she analyzes the taste. “wow, y/n’s a good baker. can’t believe she didn’t share how talented she was before.”

“y/n made these?” sunghoon asks, staring at the cookies apprehensively. they’re a perfect golden-brown, with chocolate chips added generously to each one. “they honestly look store bought.”

“nope. i made them from scratch,” says a new voice in the room. y/n looks somewhat shy as she enters the room, carrying two plates of dinner served in each of them. “i’m learning like pyrokinetics are useful for cooking - and easier to use than stoves. i don’t really understand them.”

“you made dinner? with fire power?” sunghoon gawks, his stomach growls betraying him as he takes in the smell of the dinner that y/n had made. his arms reach out instinctively, and y/n hands him the plate gingerly, handing the other plate to soojin.

“i had a lot of help,” she says, hiding her hands behind her back to keep sunghoon from seeing the number of bandages on her hands from her clumsy first trials with using knives. knives = weapons in the dimension she was from, so she didn’t exactly have too much practice with them until now.

“don’t be humble. i didn’t do anything,” jay says, entering with two more plates of food. “i just showed her how refrigerators and garbage disposals worked.”

“you didn’t have refrigerators?” sunghoon says, turning to y/n, mixing the curry into the rice.

“no. i ate on a day to day basis so i never really needed one,” y/n says with a shrug, but sunghoon can see the sadness in her eyes. he takes a bite of the curry, as if to divert her attention and immediately, his eyes grow wide as he stares down at the plate.

how could curry even taste this good? was it even possible for chickpeas to taste like this? were these even chickpeas?

his eyebrows furrow as he analyzes the curry, trying to figure out exactly what she’d had added to make it taste so heavenly.

y/n take his silence in the opposite way that he meant it, however, and her face falls as she watches his reaction. “you don’t like it? i’m so sorry, i’m sure that soojin has some leftovers from lunch!”

sunghoon shakes his vigorously as she starts to move out of the room to heat up leftovers. “no! i mean, i love it. i genuinely was just taken aback by how good it is. i had no clue that you could cook like this, y/n.”

she blushes, the prettiest color rising in her cheeks. “it’s just some stuff that i’d picked up whenever i got bored. cookbooks are surprisingly easy to memorize and fun to read.”

“well whatever you did, you have got to teach me,” soojin says, her face scrunched up in pleasure. “this is so good, i feel like i’m gonna cry.”

“no kidding,” jay agrees, eyebrows furrowed in what looks like anger at just how good the dinner was.

“you guys are too sweet,” y/n says with a shy laugh, falling back into her seat when she’s met vehement protests at her humility, comparing her to some guy (gordon ramsey?) she’s not quite sure of.

“this is incredible,” sunghoon says, and his eyes shine when they meet with hers, causing her to avert her own eyes, his gaze heavy on her face.

“oh, i really hope there’s enough for yujin and jake when they get here. although, i kinda wanna get seconds. or thirds,” soojin says with a sigh of satisfaction.

“yujin’s coming?” y/n asks, perking up at the mention of artemis. “i haven’t seen her all day today.”

“yeah, they’ve been busy for the past couple days but jake’s been complaining that he’s lost his girlfriend to the new girl at mount justice. apparently yujin’s been worried about how you’re holding up, all the way on the other side of the country.” jay’s words cause y/n to descend into another flurry of bashful denial, smiling when she hears that her new friend would be returning to mount justice.

“speaking of those two, has jake talked to you guys about the proposal plans yet?” sunghoon asks, chewing slowly, as if that would make the food’s flavor last longer in his mouth. jay’s eyes dart between him, soojin, and y/n as if to ask silently if it was okay to let y/n in on secrets such as these - even if they weren’t exactly damning evidence for crucial missions.

we can trust her. i’ll explain later but for now, just know that whatever you could say to the team, you can say to her, sunghoon explains through the mindlink.

“oh yeah,” soojin says excitedly, clapping her hands. she turns to y/n with an excited twinkle in her eyes. “jake, yujin’s boyfriend and our resident speedster, is planning on proposing to yujin soon! he recruited our help to help make sure the whole day goes perfectly.”

y/n leans forward, equally enthusiastic as soojin. “really? that’s going to be so wonderful; i can’t even imagine how that would look like! gosh, i’m so excited.”

“has he decided on a date yet?” jay asks, the tension from before having evaporated when sunghoon confirmed that y/n was allowed to be privy to such information.

“he said something about a june date? after they graduate in may, for sure, and on a day when it’s sunny and calm out. he wants that to be the one day that things go according to plan,” sunghoon says with a snort, shaking his head at the antics of his best friend.

“can you blame him? it seems as though having things go according to plan is a luxury we do not experience very often in our field,” says a new voice, and the four of them turn to see heeseung enter the room with a motorcycle helmet in hand. “your helmet was about to become a chew toy for wolf, so i figured that i’d bring it to safety.”

y/n checks the entryway, perhaps as if to see if wolf, jay’s wolf friend and resident snuggle buddy, would follow his recently confiscated chew toy but it seemed that wolf had found satisfaction in other toys.

she’d seen him bite straight through concrete with unbridled enthusiasm the other day, so all she could hope was that his toy for the day wasn’t going to be her door. which was bulletproof metal, but she wasn’t exactly sure what that wolf was capable of.

“thanks heeseung. wanna grab dinner? y/n made it and it’s absolute heaven,” sunghoon says, pointing at the plate that he’d practically licked clean. heeseung nods, and the two of them head out of the living area to the kitchen to serve themselves.

“here, let me come with you. i can get dessert started too,” y/n says, standing up. “i got excited after learning how an oven worked - though i kinda ended up, uh, getting creative with my fire because that was faster - so i ended up making brownies too. anyone up for brownie ice cream?”

soojin and jay’s hands shoot up almost unbelievably quickly.

“wow, those speeds would put kid flash to shame,” sunghoon quips and soojin and jay just ignore him, scrambling to their feet as all of them make their way into the kitchen.

“just wait. you think this dinner and these cookies were good? those brownies put them all to shame,” jay says, pacing back and forth in the kitchen, not looking too unlike his canine companion.

“it seems that you have won the hearts of many, y/n,” heeseung says, a knowing twinkle in his eyes.

y/n just looks at him, trying to decipher the meaning behind his words. heeseung was the person that she was the least close to - bar sunghoon, but she was warming up pretty quickly to the ‘pretty boy detective’ as jay called him. heeseung, however, wasn’t around mount justice over the past few days that she’d been there for too long and it seemed like he always knew something that no one else did.

he probably did know, though. there was just some aura around him that made him seem incredibly all-knowing and wise.

“uh, y/n? are the brownies in the oven or in the fridge?” sunghoon asks, and y/n is successfully distracted, rushing over to the fridge to pull out the brownies she’d made earlier, flitting from the counter and the fridge to assemble the brownie ice cream.

once everyone had been served their portion (jay was a special exception to the only one brownie rule; super strength required special food sizes was his explanation), the five of them headed back to the couch area, soojin excitedly recounting jake’s proposal plan as well as she could through a mouthful of brownie and ice cream.

“she’s charged up,” sunghoon comments, leaning over to whisper in y/n’s ear. “she’s been pretty excited about this whole proposal thing.”

“i’m not sure if i’m right but it seems to be a hint to jay; i think she’s waiting for him to propose too,” y/n whispers back and sunghoon looks at her with wide eyes.

“really? does jay know that?” he asks and y/n shrugs, spooning ice cream into her mouth.

“i doubt it. i doubt that even soojin knows that how she’s coming across to others. or just me, i guess. it must be a ‘woman’s intuition’ type thing,” she explains, nodding along to whatever soojin was saying so as to appease her excitement.

“speaking of intuition, i have to ask you something, but i’ll ask you later, when there’s no one else here. i don’t want you to feel obligated or pressured into giving an answer because of people being around you,” sunghoon says under his breath, just loud enough for y/n to hear. he looks out of the corner of his eye to see her reaction but she’s surprisingly stoic, nodding just the slightest before jumping back into the conversation.

the little exchange goes unnoticed by jay and soojin but heeseung makes eye contact with sunghoon and tilts his head, almost imperceptive to the untrained eye. sunghoon just blinks and heeseung is appeased. nothing serious. just want to ask her something.

sunghoon was pretty sure that as the most quiet members of the team, heeseung and sunghoon could conduct entire conversations without a single word.

sunghoon had picked that up from eunwoo and heeseung was just…heeseung.

the conversation is interrupted when the zeta tubes announce the presence of the missing team members, jake and yujin.

they hear jake and yujin conversing in low tones before joining the group, setting down their duffel bags (team gear) and backpacks (school gear) before taking a seat on the loveseat opposite sunghoon and y/n.

heeseung looks around the room, with all of the loveseats fully occupied before looking down at his armchair, a soft laugh escaping his lips. and so he was in the armchair. alone. while the loveseats were occupied with duos and couples. huh.

“how is everyone doing today?” yujin asks, breaking the silence that had fallen over the group.

“good! oh, you guys need to try y/n’s cooking - she made dinner and it’s absolutely heavenly,” soojin says, ushering jake and yujin into the kitchen. jake and jay follow her (the latter most definitely going for another helping) but yujin stops when she reaches where y/n is sitting, extending her hand to clasp y/n’s gently.

“hope you’re adjusting well?” she asks and y/n nods, honey practically dripping from her eyes.

“yeah. jay and soojin have been really welcoming. and sunghoon! and heeseung, of course,” y/n adds the last two names hurriedly, bowing her head at the two men. “everyone has been really kind.”

“that’s good to hear,” yujin says with a soft grin before her gaze shifts to sunghoon. “captain? i think that we’ve got a few things that we need to discuss.”

she looks down at where y/n is still holding her hand and reluctantly lets go. “and i think that y/n should be there too. classification omega.”

sunghoon is taken aback. the events of the yacht bridge and chemical factory were strange, most definitely, but he’d expected something along the lines of arkham asylum’s inmates staging some level of a robbery. something more novel. classification IV, at most.

classification omega? that really only meant sunghoon, yujin, and heeseung could be in attendance. not that they couldn’t trust the rest of the team but classification levels were more based on just how much members were willing to give for the team. classification levels were more for the safety of the members, rather than anything else.

so information at that classification level made sunghoon worry but yujin’s expression seems more puzzled than grim so sunghoon just nods, offering y/n an appeasing smile when she looks between the three of them, searching for answers.

“i’ll explain when we get a chance to talk,” yujin says, her gaze fixed on y/n and it’s obvious that the words are meant to put y/n at ease, rather than offer any hints to either of them about what she could’ve possibly discovered in gotham. it seems to work when y/n’s shoulder descend from their tensed state just the slightest.

the other three return, with jake holding an extra plate of dinner for yujin as well and the air in the room turns lighthearted once more. both yujin and y/n seem to turn off the serious mindset they were simmering in as if it were a light switch. but sunghoon is unable to take his mind off of yujin’s words.

his questions are answered even without an explanation when he hears y/n scream just twenty-six minutes later.

[march 19, 20XX, 8:26 p.m.]

[belle rêve prison]

“you heard what?” one of the inmates asks incredulously. icicle sr. shivers, almost as if a chill had run down his spine, and shakes his head, suppressing any sign of fear as he restates what he’d heard that night.

belle rêve prison wasn’t exactly known for its hospitality but there were very few conditions when it came to cold weather that startled icicle sr. - but the reason why it felt as though there was a cold air in the room had nothing to do with temperature.

“i heard the canary scream. cry. whatever those justice freaks call it. but when we got to ace chemical factory, there was nothing there. no canary, nothing. not a single feather on the ground,” icicle sr. grinds out, and to the other inmates, it seems as though he’s angry that he had to repeat himself. but to icicle jr., his son and the newest addition to belle rêve’s top gang, he can see that the grit in his teeth is from pure, unadulterated fear.

which made icicle jr. want to piss his fucking pants.

there was very little that scared his father. so if it scared his father, it sure as hell scared him.

“you heard the cry but you didn’t see the bird?” another inmates says with a cocky expression. his words don’t carry the pomp he tries to convey them with since his voice trembles a bit too much to take him seriously.

“she’s not usually in gotham unless there’s a fight to pick with someone,” another inmate points out. icicle sr. is silent as the prison cafeteria breaks out into a cacophony of different people trying to give their input on what exactly had happened for black canary to appear in gotham all of a sudden.

“dad? you’re kinda quiet,” icicle jr. says and his father side-eyes for a long moment before shaking his head.

“it’s not her. it can’t be her.”

“why?”

“because…it wasn’t her voice. not that voice means anything when that goddamn scream is so loud. but it’s just not her. i know that.”

which meant that there was someone else in gotham who could utilize the canary cry.

[march 19, 20XX, 8:26 p.m.]

[mount justice, happy harbor, rhode island]

sunghoon and yujin burst into a sprint the moment they can. that is, the moment that y/n stops screaming. sunghoon’s thoughts are all over the place as he tries to recon what had just happened.

the team had dispersed into different locations after dinner. jay and soojin had decided to leave mount justice to catch a late night movie while jake had with them when yujin broke the news that some of their findings were classification omega. he’d sulked at first (mostly about having to part from yujin again) but jay had enticed him into coming with them with promises of buying popcorn at the movie theater - as though they hadn’t just had three servings of dinner.

it was just yujin and sunghoon standing in the kitchen while heeseung went to make a call to a friend from atlantis (sunghoon had no clue that atlantis had cellphone reception). the two of them were silent, even though there were many words that had to be shared. it was as though neither of them knew how to share them and they were stuck in a standstill as they waited for y/n to return from the restroom for a quick shower and heeseung from his phone call.

sunghoon had just turned to yujin to ask her what she had found when an ear-piercing scream erupts from where the restroom across y/n’s room was. sunghoon and yujin both stumbled backwards, trying to regain their balance before setting off into a sprint, too many questions in their minds to think straight.

which brought sunghoon to the current moment, where y/n was standing next to her bed, clutching something shiny in her hands, wolf beside her, curled up into a ball of guilt and shame, his ears drooping as he looked up at the grief-stricken y/n.

her lips were still shaped as an ‘o’ as though she wanted to scream but she couldn’t find it within her to do so.

it takes less than three seconds for sunghoon to understand the situation: a) wolf had broken into her room while y/n was showering and had unknowingly destroyed something valuable to her. b) she possessed something valuable to her; something from the other dimension. c) she also had the canary cry - something that sunghoon had never heard of anyone else having besides black canary. d) the glass filled with water on her nightstand had shattered to pieces.

e) y/n faust was in gotham the night of the yacht bridge and ace chemical factory break ins. 

what the hell were they going to do now?

[thewrittingpan]

Painting Lies 3

Phinks x reader, Fetain x reader, Shalnark x reader

Tigger and content warnings include but are not limited to: blood, gore, violence, kidnapping, abuse, mental health issues, trauma

Wc: 6501

Tumblr links: Part 1, Part 2, Part 4

Ao3: Here

You think you remember the two blonds being there, but you also remember your legs being twice their usual size. Honestly you just stared at the ceiling for a bit wondering what the hell was going on in your head. For all you know you did get into a fight with a giant blanket yesterday but also you felt like you had somehow completed an entire treasure collection in that game you played. Everything in the dream was too close to reality for your liking.

“Hey Phinks?” You looked out into the hall to see if he was up.

“What?” The door across the hall from you opened.

“Weird question, did we have a staring contest during dinner or did I dream that?”

“That kind of happened.” he went to close the door.

“Okay, did you play video games yesterday with me watching?”

He looked at you terribly confused, “no?”

“Did we set up the table?”

“No, shalnark did.”

“Did I go to the basement? Does the basement have a whole art studio too? Because I dreamed there was like some art supply store or something in it and I feel like I'm going insane.”

“Yes to both.”

“Okay okay, now the part that ia really fucking with me is that i swear i woke up in the middle of the night-”

“You did.”

“-and you and the other guys were there-”

“Correct.”

“Then I got kissed goodnight by the three of you? And like some drink that you see moms in movies make for kids after a nightmare?”

He stood looking at you, you had no idea what he was thinking, honestly he looked as confused as you were.

“That didn’t happen, those two just wanted to see you before leaving.”

“Weird.” You mumbled to yourself. “It all felt like stuff that happened or could have.”

Everyone had dreams that left them confused when they woke up, or well you think everyone does. Waking up from them can vary, like with every other kind of sleep. When it came to “what the fuck happened who am I” level of confusion dreams waking up in anyway that left you dazed was not a good thing. What you personally think is worse is when you don’t feel like you have been asleep, or when you think you haven't had a dream.

Your thoughts fizzled out until you could have been a cartoon character with smoke coming out of their head. Confusion sticks, the whole day would probably feel off, and hell you might just fall back asleep with how just trying to think through it all was driving you mad.

“Are you going to spend time around the house or in your room?” Phinks was leaning against the door frame.

“Oh-“ you sifted through your ideas to keep yourself entertained.

There were the new games you’ve been given, but the clearly visible camera in your room had been creeping you out. You had some books but part of you couldn’t stand the idea of reading at the moment, something in your bones felt like they couldn’t find a comfortable way to sit to read. Maybe you could draw- there was that sketch you wanted to paint.

“I might go paint something?” You asked him.

It felt like you were allowed to go paint down there whenever, or that was the ideal goal they had with showing you it. Though there was something about this house, even with Shalnarks advice of Phinks being surprisingly soft, you felt like you were standing on an inch of ice and it was already waiting to break.

He nodded, “Not a bad idea, just don’t go past the curtain, Fetain doesn’t like anyone touching his things. I’ll make something simple to eat, I’m not much of a cook so you’ll have to put up with it or make your own food.” He walked past you towards the kitchen, “I’ll stay down there to make sure you don’t go poking around in things you don’t want to see.”

Yeah totally not threatening or creepy in the slightest. Hell part of you felt like a horror movie character right now, that vague warning only made you want to see what was down there. As you gathered your sketches your mind ran wild. The stairs in this unfinished basement were creaky wood. You looked at your feet as you descended, the wood was nice and sanded, with no nails that you could notice. Yet your mind drew with jagged lines, poorly put together stairs covered in splinters. That would be too empty, not enough visual interest but something could be drawn from those mental images of stairs. Maybe if something was spilling down the stairs it would be interesting, something twisted hidden in the shadows or beneath the stars themselves, something hard to notice but once you do it’s shocking.

You pulled out a pre-stretched canvas. For a while your hands hovered over two, each size would have its benefits, the smaller ones could make the figure have a “weaker” tone. Though the larger would allow the grotesque details you were longing for. Yet you could alter your concept slightly and “zoom in” on a smaller canvas, get up close and personal with the spine. You propped them both up so you could more easily compare them while sorting through your sketches. You tore them from the sketch book with a strange chaotic need. They were spread out across the cold concrete floor. Scattered and overlapped so they could all be seen without taking up much space. It was a kaleidoscope of paper and ink, and you were the crazed lunatic who had created it.

“You’ll have to pick those up when you finish painting.” Phinks stepped down the stairs holding a large plate full of scrambled eggs and waffles. “Or do you think you’ll need to have them spread out while working?”

“Do you have tape?” You asked, “Something stronger than a basic office tape, I could hang them on the wall?”

“Eat some, I’ll find some.”

The food was weirdly over and under done. The waffles had parts that were slightly more runny than they should be but the eggs were concerning. Parts were crispy and almost burnt, while the rest was fluffy, almost as if he had gotten distracted and almost made a bad omelette.

“Duck tape and packing tape.” He placed one roll of each on the table beside you.

“Oh, thanks, that’ll work fine.”

He was quiet, but it wasn't the same way Fetain is. Fetains silence was a threat, one you had grown used to. He had this weight to him that was impossible to ignore when alone, though he easily blended in and was easy to ignore in a group. Phinks was almost the opposite. You never noticed him when it was just him, though that didn’t mean you trusted him in the slightest. There was a comfort to him, familiar almost, half memories of moments with an old friend or a split second where you almost felt like you were sitting in the room with a long forgotten family member. Warmth tried to spread through you, you desperately wanted to trust him when you felt the familiarity, but how could you when you knew nothing about him.

You taped away. Deformed figures, haphazard diagrams and sketches of anatomy from memory. While each sketch held some semblance of a thought, a firework of an idea, sometimes you found that the best ideas grew when you worked without a clear thought. Molding fog and light created forms and shapes that you may overlook, sometimes you could compare them to an instinct, or a deep need to connect with something you had yet to fully understand.

These things made the beginning difficult but one of the most fun parts of it all. Every thought could be quickly scribbled out, fulfilling the urge to create, but not held back by perfection. It was wild, untamed, which made it unpredictable. A great idea could last a second before flickering out while a bad one could haunt you, not because the idea’s roots were rotten but because the branches had been infested by a failure to succeed.

You stared at the sketches of green bruises. The needles poked through skin, emerging from the bones themselves. Single drops of blood would sit atop the skin, staining it, drying deeply into the grooves. If the dirt and grime of the depicted horror went untreated it would stain not only the mind, but cling to the body like death itself, unable to be removed with hours upon days of scrubbing. It would always feel dirty, and you could always end up permanently stained.

This gorey twist that you adapted in your work was a little strange, even you had to admit it. You didn’t like the idea of torture porn when it came to horror movies, which some found surprising, clearly you didn’t hate it, but there had to be something gained from it. In your pieces you wanted each graphic mark to mean something, there needed to be a story you could read into if you wanted, but often they became reflections of struggles. It was relaxing, in the way that snapping and throwing something can make you sigh and sob after the frustration was finally released.

The thing about art is that it sucks ass. While it can be a weight off your shoulders and drain all of the stress out of you, it could just as easily make you want to stab someone’s eyes out. Staring at pins and needles for long enough just made you want to see your eyes shut so you didn’t have to see them everywhere else. Even closing your eyes made you think of the horrible blotchy shading that just did not want to work because you didn’t think and added too much water to your paints. Hell every time you groaned in frustration your fucking kidnapper look scared. So you tossed the brushes in the sink and worked on scrubbing out the paint before you ruined them right away.

“Do you usually work in these long multiple hour sessions?” He asked you over the sound of running water.

The water was cold, dangerously so. Your fingers toyed with the hair gently mixing small amounts of soap into it. This rhythmic movement helped calm you down and get out of the “holy mother of cats why won’t things go right” headspace that you got stuck in.

“Yeah, that’s common, anything less than three is an oddity.”

“I guess I just didn’t understand how hard it was.”

“Every job is kinda like that.”

You left the brushes on a spread out towel to dry. The pallet of rapidly drying paint was still there and there were a few reasons for why you didn’t clean off the paint; it’d ruin the plumbing, it was half dry anyways, you didn’t care, and it was fun to peel off later. If that little thing could give you some control maybe it would be worth it to wait and try to earn a way out.

Part of you felt like you were giving up too easily, that you had already lost your will to fight when you woke up that first day. Yelling at yourself wouldn’t do anything and you knew that but you felt like it was your fault. Perhaps you’re just the circus elephant tied to nothing. Yet you didn't blame yourself, or at least not as much as you think you were supposed to. Playing along and being good allows for you to be taken as a cute little pet that might be too frightened to try anything. Maybe other kidnappers are different.

You looked at Phinks from when he was leaning back in the folding chair balancing on its back legs. He was large, so much strength loomed over him, making him seem like the biggest in the room. Some damn part of him made you both think he was some jockey asshole like in movies and tv, or some large warm hearted man, though the latter seemed like a stretch.

“You’re starring again.”

“I’m thinking.”

“About?”

You gathered up the sketchbook you had ripped a handful of pages out of. You should lie. Shalnark said something like “he wasn’t perceptive” right? What if you were wrong? What about telling the truth? Would he kill you in anger? Slam you into the wall? Be the manifestation of the shadows from the covered half of the basement that had been driving you crazy, pulling you back and deep down into its maw, screaming as you die from-

“Just say it, I’m in a good mood, I don’t want it ruined with some anxiety attack because you’re scared to say someth-.”

“I don’t know how to feel.” You didn’t turn back to him as you walked towards the stairs, stopping at its feet, so he knew you weren’t trying to run away. “I don’t want to upset you or the others and risk dying or something arguably worse. I feel like everything has to be said correctly or not at all so I don’t find out someone is secretly more delusional than a damn LSD trip.”

You heard the chair squeak a bit as he stood up and walked towards the stairs, he didn’t stop like you and slowly started climbing them, slowly so you could continue.

“I should be scared, angry, maybe I should try to kill someone, or myself, try to escape? I don’t know, I can’t do any of those. I don’t want to, I hate how nice my room was, there was so much thought, so much detail, it felt so real, so close to my messy room. It creeps me out, enjoying the food, the room, the clothes, even the personal products make me feel like I graduated from a top academy with no debt and no depression.”

You lead him down the hall towards the living room. “I haven’t even looked outside you know, somehow I feel like it’ll make or break the dream. I think it might make me try something stupid, make me snap or something. I want to feel okay but I don’t, and when I don’t want to feel okay I do!” You ripped the curtain open, startling yourself.

“Did the window change anything?”

Woods. Beautiful moss covered trees that stretched far. The fire kissed trees rained down their leaves and it looked gorgeous. It reminded you of that date with the cats, the betrayal, of this fuck up of yours. It was something akin to heaven in your eyes, a perfectly twisted picture.

“I miss home.” You said finally tears slipping through your horribly masked emotions. You turned from the window stepping away from its bright light and into your dark room. You didn’t close the door fully behind you, it was very easy to look through the gap.

The blankets were smooth but when you burrowed into them to avoid everything, they felt fluffy against your skin. Even as your breath filled the underneath of them with hot air that felt suffocating, you accepted it with open arms. Stale warm air was unpleasant but it felt like the first warmth you’d felt in eons. The world outside this nest was cold and cruel, and you felt chained to the bed the more you thought about it.

The room's gentle darkness left you thinking as you tossed and turned. You fought back sobs but didn’t care about the tears that leaked down your face. Your sweetest boy laid next to you, his paw resting atop your hand as you faced him and the wall. You longed for the comfort of your real bed, sitting on the small balcony with your cat as he stared wide eyed at the birds.

Maybe you could have avoided this. Maybe if you had kept to yourself, avoided people like you had grown accustomed too, you could have continued your life. It didn’t change the fact that you were here now, but you were haunted by it. Those dark eyes at the damn exhibit. Why did it have to happen? Were you a fool? Were there any signs that you could have noticed? No matter how much crying you did or didn’t do you hated every second you were left to think about anything. Each damn second made you manic, and every other one made you depressed and unable to move. You felt so nauseous that soon you just vomited and sat on the bathroom floor headhung as you finally sobbed.

It was loud and obnoxious, you were lucky only one other person was home. It bounced off the walls. Phinks could definitely hear you. It was the kind of sob that was scratchy and full of angry screams, perfect for a tantrum that would destroy everything in a close area. You felt like a toddler who had been told no when asking for candy, a brat who wanted something. It felt like you were the problem even if you were just a victim of your surroundings. Yet you screamed and cried until your throat was sore, until it felt like it could have been bleeding, and you choked on the bubbling sobs as snot filled every airway.

You laid in a puddle of yourself, not moving when the front door opened and slammed shut. Unblinking as keys jingled down the hall with heavy footsteps. Looking with tired weak eyes, up at Phinks who stood, with plastic bags in hand, his face red and his eyes looking at the wall instead of you.

“It’s late, Fei and Shal want you to have a routine but they're not here… come stay up late and watch a movie or something? Shal bought some of your favorites and ones you’ve talked about! I have some chocolate, or popcorn if you’d like? I’m not sure what you all like when it comes to movie snacks…”

Your voice was so scratchy it hurt to hear you speak. “Please…” you whined as he helped pull you up and onto the living room couch.

He handed you the bags, a multipack of tissue boxes, an assortment of chocolate, popcorn, beer, teas, sodas, chips... You dug through it all and he returned with blankets in hand and a stuffed animal he knew you were attached to, that they all knew you were attached to.

He sat next to you, draping the blankets over you. He pulled a box of tissues out handing one to you. “Use the bag as a garbage bag for now.” He laid out everything haphazardly. He gently pulled your head down onto his lap and pressed the remote into your hand.

The blue glow of the tv puts you to sleep soon enough. It didn’t matter if it was one movie or ten, you were asleep, as soon as you were Phinks was too. You used his lap as a pillow, and Phinks leaned back, his head tossed over the couch’s back, his mouth hung open with a light snore as the tv eventually turned itself off.

In the morning you woke up when the keys turned to open the door’s lock. It made you jolt awake as the door was pushed open. Shalnark was clicking through his phone as he carried in a handful of something.

“Oh, you’re both up? How was the movie night?”

You sunk into the blankets giving back into your exhaustion. “Okay.”

You said it mostly to avoid any upset feelings on his end, the movie night was a nice way to avoid it all. You hated it considering everything, but those few hours of just zoning out at the tv and falling asleep to your favorite movies made you fell like home. You could imagine it so vividly it is what lulled you to sleep, the house didn’t have that smell of the three men, it was your home filled with cat fur, paints, and gesso.

You could feel the canvas frame from when you had to custom build one for a commission. Having to stretch it yourself, and you struggled to pull it back enough for it to hold well. The frame was obnoxiously large, you couldn’t fathom how they had the money to commission it or why they’d need one this size. That one had become a secret favorite, it was in someone’s private collection, an anonymous commissioner. You remember them sending someone to pick it up, which was strange, but if someone had that money how weird could it really be?

“Fei will be appearing soon, he has to drag something down to his office.” Shal giggled to himself speaking without catching his breath. “He’s surprisingly very interested in the work he brought back. It’s like a cat that got a hold of a mouse and doesn’t want to let it go.”

He set his envelope of papers down on the table, and sat down next to you on the couch. He was in front of you really, your back pressed firm against the couch nearly sinking into the cushions and the framework. Shalnark was turned slightly so he could face you and Phinks easily, his knees pressed against the front of the couch and one of Phinks’ knees. He breathed in deeply, his breath pushing both his stomach and chest out, he sort of chuckled as he sighed and leaned over to rest his head on the sofa’s back next to Phinks’ shoulder.

“I missed being home.”

Phinks and you didn’t say anything in response. Maybe Phinks secretly hated Shalnark, well, obviously not, but his silence kind of confused you. He cared deeply about the two from what you could tell, but who's to say you were ever good at reading the room. Your view upwards was obstructed by Shalnark hovering-leaning over you. Phinks moved his arm, you could see its shadow crossover you briefly, but you didn’t see what he did. Shalnark sat there resting with the two of you, this serene glazed look to him. He looked so pleasant, his hair hanging in his face, and his eyes closed.

He did eventually move, while he seemed content that was in no way comfortable to sit there for long. Shal eventually collected his things and ran off to go put them away. You gathered up the mess from the night before. Phinks took the trash out, you saw the cement steps out front as the door opened, and cool air rushed in to kiss your cheeks. The cat with wide eyes watched him complete his chores from the window, while you avoided looking at them. It was easier to stay busy with wiping the table and stacking the coasters in a neat pile in the center.

You kept wiping the table. Slow circular motions as you dazed off. The window just hurt you. Its clear glass was a mirror of your betrayal and gentle suffering, every damn time you saw that view it reminded you of the damned date. That date would remind you of his hands in your hair as you sobbed into his lap. What kind of suffering is this all? To be cursed with the inability to act, but blessed with a comfort of home and kindness. though it came from triplet tyrants. What tragedy had you fallen out of?

You went about giving yourself chores, dusting the shelves and tv stand, sweeping the kitchen floor, making a few pancakes with a box mix you had found, then cleaning up the mess you had made. Your hour or two of small chores only could keep you distracted for so long. You could hear Shalnark from his room, typing away on a keyboard and flipping through papers. When you walked past the basement you could hear things being moved around. It was faint and muffled, almost like you were hearing things, you wanted to go down there, the curiosity haunting you, but I’d anyone scared you the most it was Fetain.

You pushed open Phinks’ door. He had looked up at you as you did, but he didn’t say a thing, just motioned for you to come in. It was simple, navy sheets that were wrinkled, a strange mixture of pillows that didn’t have matching cases. There were some clothes lying around the room and the closet was open. He had a simple fold up chair in the corner and some green running jacket thrown across it. He didn’t have curtains, just the plastic blinds though some were bent and damaged. The closest thing to decoration was a digital clock on a wooden stool made bedside table and high quality at home gym equipment on the floor and tucked away into the closet.

“Need something?”

“I’ve never seen your rooms.” You half ignored the question, “and I don’t want to work on my painting when Fetain is working.”

He hummed, and you sat down on his bed looking at his window with the blinds pulled shut. “I hate it,” you said quietly to yourself, not knowing fully what you meant. “I might drive myself crazy. I keep trying to make things make sense, but I don’t get it.” You flopped down and rolled over, you didn’t look up at his face, didn’t acknowledge if he was looking at you or listening. “I think I’m ignoring half of everything to try and pretend that I’m okay.”

His hand rested on your head, his fingers playing with your hair. “You’re putting up with it well, though coming from me that doesn’t mean much.”

You grabbed his hand and his shirt. Pulling yourself up, straddling his waist. “Why couldn’t you have killed me? Torture me? Why not just make my life a real living hell? I feel like I’m burning but there’s nothing there, I keep thinking I’m drowning but I’m not!” Your hand trailed up to his neck, your nails pressing into his jugular, as you pinned him down to the bed. He laid there with his eyes wide but he didn’t move. “Please give me a good reason to hate it here! Please, I can't understand what’s going on! I didn’t ask for this. I don't know what I’m here for!” you screamed at him, though it wasn’t loud, just desperate. “I can’t do anything.”

His hand grabbed your hip and his other grabbed your neck, and he flipped the roles so he was hunched over you. His nails pressed into your skin. There was no weight to the threat. His hands while touching you, felt like they were hovering.

“You’re allowed to be angry, you don’t need permission for it.” And his hands were lifted away. and he was back on his side of the bed laying just like he was earlier, as if you never disrupted him.

Then you cried, you laid there curled up in a ball next to him. He never touched you, until you reached out and touched him, pulling yourself into his arms. He held you then gently and quietly until you relaxed and laid there half asleep and exhausted. His hands cupped your cheeks and you were held close to his face, his mouth a meare inch from your nose.

“I’ll do anything for you, even if you don’t like us or being here. We will do anything to keep you safe. I’ll make you as happy as I can, I swear to you I will.”

You heard Fetain come up from the basement when the door slammed shut. He was lighter than air with his footsteps so when he walked into Phinks’ room and ended up next to the bed you nearly screamed. “Try to sleep at ten and wake up at six. You need good sleep routine.”

You nodded, Phinks had mentioned it right? Ten to six seemed reasonable. “Exactly 6 am?”

“Roughly. Take time to change, one week to do yourself.”

“I’ll try to do it.” You nodded and a yawn slipped from your lips.

“Take nap, us three will talk work.” He waited for Phinks to get up.

Phinks patted your shoulder, “stay here and sleep for a bit we don’t want you dealing with our work stuff yet.”

“Okay.”

But Feitain hovered for a second longer than he needed to, just quietly looking at you with this deep thoughtful look in his eyes, yet he left without saying anything.

They had a habit of leaving you alone with your thoughts. Thankfully your cat at least sits with you when you need it, most of the time.

There was nothing to do with them all being busy. Something told you not to poke around for answers about what they were discussing. Even though you weren’t gonna search around for answers your mind wandered. It was a gross wandering similar to how one could lay in bed and gaze up into the darkness and just sit there. Rambling and turning whispers in your thoughts flashing images of blood gore and violence. How could anyone imagine what their jobs could be? You were used to surrounding yourself with images of oozing guts, but just beccause you had been decentized to it didn’t mean that fucking kidnappers who seemed more than used to living isolated was something you could handle.

You ran your hand back from the cat’s nose to his ears. He pressed himself so firmly against your hand that his eyelids were slightly pulled back as he demanded all of your attention. You could feel him breathing on you, his soft purrs are loud as he clung to you. When the fur around his face is pushed back his whole meringue look changes to one of a rat. His eyes while blown wide into dark saucers continue to look up at you fondly, his fur looks like a front facing bald eagle. There’s a reason you hardly ever see those angles, it’s less flattering. There’s less pride and a slicked back edge that is perceived as coolness. This is what that sweet cat looked like from this angle, his poofy roundness disappeared and strange looking from the front, while you never truly have looked too explore the other angles of the strange hair-do, the adorably crafted ugliness makes you melt into him as he melts into you.

As you lay there thoughts bubbling up worries and anxiety scratching away at your insides, this sweet fluff keeps you grounded. As was his task, he was an unofficial emotional support cat, nothing more than a pet that kept you mentally stable and provided both a comfort and reason to live. It was easy on the days where the paints seemed poisoned to be unable to reason and find out why you were alive. You wondered if everyone questioned this at times perhaps that’s why your artwork seemed so desperate, why you just cling to an intestine rope to pull you closer to answers and people who relate. It’s not something you can say for sure but even now, after a few years of this cat he kept you perfectly content to question but not give up.

He was also a good muse, posing in ways during his naps. Belly up, his head laid back against a pillow, his front paws folded under his chin but his back legs sticking upwards like two towers, fluffy and off white. He laid his ways that made it hard to determine if he was a cat or strang fluffy void, even though lots of cats did that. No matter how many photos and squeals you let out, it never felt the same, there simply isn't a connection. No photo could replace your cat, because you knew just about everything about him.

Sometimes you wondered if you relied too much on the cat, you’d question if the kidnappers thought the same if you weren’t so preoccupied with anything else. Even in captivity it seemed like you never had time for anything. All your plans would get mixed up or you would get horribly distracted. You acted as if you were wandering naked in a dark maze with how time snuck up on you. With no one to truly tell you otherwise you gave into it when you could, which was most of the time. Hours would be spent gazing off into walls and corners as you painted in your own head, it didn’t matter if you pictured it or not, it was the mental motions of the act that kept you entranced.

A jiggle of a brush, a whirlpool of the paint thinner. Hell the actions are what lured you down into the basement again. You hadn’t been told to stay, hadn't been told not to. You may not have paid attention to the home as you were pulled down to the basement by your navel; the living was quiet though the three men hummed and buzzed with a quiet conversation. You continued onto the door opening it so gently and silently you might have well just phased through the door to begin with. The unfinished steps hadn’t groaned or creaked as you stepped on them even though they should. The door hovered open, the light peering and stealing across the floor to the hall now behind you. As a moth would you step down and forwards moving towards your painting.

At this moment your eyes flashed with one lucid thought, “something isn’t right.” It didn't take a genius to know this but somehow as you were drugged by your own relaxation and you had taken the liberty to forget about everything that had been a bright neon sign telling you something was amiss. You looked away from your studio and across the room at another’s.

It’s important to note that some people have a personal belief that art is in the eye of the beholder, regardless of whether each piece usually has an original meaning in the grand scheme of things. You had thoughts and ideas, messages and stories to tell through your paintings. Each a commentary on something since you didn’t believe in unthoughtful gore and brutality, that wasn’t to say it had no meaning, but that there wasn’t a personal thought being expressed even deep below the surface. In this belief of art interpretation all art has at least two meanings, the artist’s original suffering inquiry, and the viewer’s lack of understanding. With this in mind the scene behind the curtain is much different then one in your studio.

The curtain had always been a temptation, that’s a simple fact of the matter. Place a marshmallow in front of a child and most struggle to resist even with the promise of more. This curtain in your case was so much more than temptation. A temptation is often pictured as sweet and sugary, lustful even, not a need but a want. This curtain was so much more than that, it was thorn covered and speckled with a lifetime of warnings but it wasn’t sweet, there was no guarantee of safety but an expectation of more. Even then you peeled it back.

It was more than a treasure trove of goodies, it was a threatening pile of one. The lights were on and you were slammed into with information as you peared across it all, for instance the room was large, much larger than you thought it was. While most of it was still unfinished further back against the far wall was a much more finished section. That is what you noticed second but you just were too in shock to register the first yet. The furthest wall was finished, a simple gray paint and from it hung old custom paintings, things both long forgotten and new. They were strange to see though in comparison to your room when you had first woken up nothing crazy. The first thing you noticed was crazier, though not too surprising.

The wall was lined with a board, hanging from it an assortment of household tools and even more specialty ones. Mostly pliers, wrenches, screwdrivers of all sorts of sizes. There were spools of wire, rope, and bolt cutters. There were more too, there were tweezers, the heavy duty kind, expensive looking, stainless steel and with a rubber grip. Each item while normally not threatening was fucking horrifying. The blindfolded and gagged half-dead looking man would ultimately agree if he saw the line up. Yet the detail of the organization, to the bindings, and yes even the table he was on, made it look like a perfectly created scene. To Feitain, who you half-confidently assumed was the resident torturer, this must be something artistic or even religious, sometimes the two came hand in hand.

His hair was glued by brown dried blood, his nose broken, the bruising covering his cheeks and eyes from what you could tell from afar. There was no way for him to escape from his binds, strapped down to the table. The table itself looked to be something akin to an embalming table, slightly slanted towards a floor drain, some blood already leaking down from the man and dried against the table’s cold smudged metal. He had bruises down his arms and legs dark purple and splotchy. His ankle looked painfully enlarged, not enough to be a break but horribly sprained.

You should have screamed in horror, your heartbeat sped up like crazy after all. There was enough adrenaline that maybe you could have killed a person, not your captors from the look and attitude of them. If a captor can be so unconcerned like they were either they were morons or knew full well that they had perfect complete control. From a second kidnapped person being in the basement looking like a corpse it’s easy to decide which.

Looking on even in your shocked state you made your third discovery. There were bulkhead doors. A small flight of stairs led up to them. In your shock you continued to move like a ghost, even though your chest was pounding. It rumbled in your gut, twisted and stabbed at your lungs, and you looked upwards at it, upwards into the dark steps a small crack of light. Your cat in all his loving sweetness rubbed up against your leg, mewling softly. You walked forwards reaching upward towards the door, climbing the stairs and gently pressing to see if they’d open, to your surprise it did.

[percyjacksonblog]

PJO TV series thoughts (some spoilers)

The actors know their characters really well

The pacing is too slow

It really missed the mark on Percy and Luke’s early relationship and therefore missed the emotional impact of Luke betraying Percy in the forest

Quit giving the kids the answers immediately, one of the best parts about the series is how you see Percy and the rest of the half-bloods wrestling with their issues during the quests and therefore generating more character development

Missed the opportunity to look more deeply into Annabeth and Luke’s relationship and Annabeth feeling betrayed by Luke

Did like them bringing up Thalia in more detail before SoM

Action scenes were lacking. These characters with the movie action scenes would have improved the overall experience in my opinion

The Lotus Casino and Hotel was disappointing to me. That chapter in the book revealed so much more about the characters then everything up to that point i.e a preview into their “fatal flaws”

Didn’t mention Annabeth’s love of architecture but A+ mentioning her fear of spiders

I did like some of the changes, and it overall was more true to the story than the movie

Not Jason Mantzoukas actually being one of the best casting choices for Dionysus

They did a good job making Kronos creepy, but missed just how sinister he actually is

Overall I did enjoy it. I think this was a good place to start to test the water and the audience before the rest of the story comes out.

Things I hope they do and keep in mind moving forward.

They need to pick the pace up. They cut so much from the book and just left the big plot points that it seems like nothing is actually leading them from one plot point to the next.

Hopefully the show runners saw what is happening with the stranger things kids and won’t let that happen here. They were like 12 years old when they started and now they’re in their late teens and early twenties. They need to film as much as they can for the next two installments as possible over the course of this year and then they can do the same with BotL and TLO. We’d either get a Logan Lerman or Stranger Things scenario where adults are playing teens and it looks so bad.

Better marketing for the pre-teen audience. I was in 6th grade when I first heard about Percy Jackson and The Lightning Thief had been out for probably close to 3-4 years so I literally grew up with Percy, it was a very personal story for me. That being said, because I was around Percy’s age I related to the characters more and there needs to be a better job of connecting the 11-14 year old target audience to this story. PJO fan clubs at the junior high schools, book clubs in their English classes with resources from the show etc. I love this story, but I’m a full grown adult now with an adult job and have had one for years so I know I’m not the target audience for this show, but I know several people like me who are in the same situation.

SoM is the shortest in the original 5 book series so they need to stick closer to the source material, maybe more Odyssey references as SoM is essentially a retelling of The Odyssey.

Unless they literally film the next 4 seasons at once within the next two years, I don’t think we’ll get a HoO series, the kids will be too old. The only work around I can see is recasting Percy and Annabeth or making two original characters, but then SoN,MoA and HoH wouldn’t make sense.

[infini-tree]

ok so... here’s krupp’s house interior recreated to the best of my ability! here’s some comments because i have Thoughts on it.

general

i don’t know what’s in the art book when it comes to krupp’s house. even if it was completely mapped out, it may not even be accurate to the final version seen in movie-- i know at the very least some older concepts where there was evidence of a pet bowl and a cat tower, but i’m not factoring that for obvious reasons.

this is not to scale, so some parts may be off.

fun fact after looking at these screencaps for ages: every part of krupp’s house has a different wallpaper pattern. i think that’s just fun. and it makes things/placement easier to identify! :)

to summarize my thoughts on this house: really, only the living/dining situation is the part i’m the most sure of, and that’s only because they’re confirmed to be next to each other. the placement of everything other room is more out of “common sense” that i’ll explain.

the parts of the house labelled with an asterisk ( * ) are those that are theorized to be there because of logistics. we don’t see a laundry, or hall closets in the boys’ montage, but its there to both fill out space and to be a bit “realistic” in terms of Where Does Krupp Keep His Stuff/Clean His Clothes.

The Closet At The End Of The Hallway is mostly for me as i put it there for sticky notes au reasons. you could easily swap it and where the laundry room is.

the exterior layout seen in the movie is completely disregarded. if it was, then the left half of his house would be gone. that being said, i tried to keep it as completely square as possible. there are a few particular discreprencies i had to contend with i’ll explain in later sections.

dining room / kitchen

i’m skipping the living room because there’s not much to say about it. like harold says, it looks nice! though, a bit empty.

his kitchen/dining situation is wild. typically one would just connect the two rooms directly like you would krupp’s living/dining, but this dining room shot implies that there’s a bit of hallway between the two spaces? it makes it feel a lot more congested than it needs to be. who ok’ed this? is it the same guy who put krupp’s office on the second floor as opposed to the front door? but i digress.

also its extremely extra of him to just have one chair when these sorts of things come in a set.

as for the kitchen itself... its honestly frustratingly vague considering how close the shots associated with it are. 

the shot showing the drawer shows a light source implied to be a window with blinds, but the reverse shot shows that there’s no room on harold’s right to facilitate a window. this is one of those discrepancies i had to either do one or the other for and i just decided to add the window (albeit a small one).

i also added a door leading to the backyard, mostly as a logistics thing. the other neighboring houses have one on the side, so there’s a precedence for it.

bathroom

the shot is pretty self explanatory. i’m not sure if krupp has a shower or a bathtub considering that the frosted glass obscures the view. the height of the porcelain in relation to the toilet makes me think ‘bathtub’, though.

bedroom

also self-explanatory. had to do a bit of gymnastics when formatting the closets to make it not stick out on the floor plan. honestly the most contentious thing about where i placed it is because right outside the bedroom door, the hall might extend to the left. due to the fact hat the boys are right in front of the shot its hard to tell, but i decided on it not being it.

also its a little silly how krupp decorates his own room with what seems to be one of his degrees/principal’s license. even in his home life and doesn’t need to perform it, he’s leaning into the principal identity.

[sharkiesaurusrex3000]

But what the Leah haters just don’t get is that she just plays Annabeth so well 💀 “Oh but she doesn’t have the blonde hair annabeth has grey eyes and blonde hair!!” Okay but you’re deriving from the actual point of Annabeth’s character. Annabeth is a smart girl who has lost so much, that she just needs someone in her life to stick around, help her be at least a little more of a kid than she thinks she needs to be. Yes in the books she talks about how she’s not taken seriously because she’s blonde, and I understand wanting the video content to be close to the books (we all hated the movies for not following that reason), but do you think that a black girl with braids is gonna get much more respect? You could tell from subtle hints from adults in the show like in the train scene, in the gas station scene, that she just wasn’t taken as seriously as Percy or Grover was. Whether black or white, they have the aspect of “ridiculous girl doesn’t know anything” down. Annabeth cares so little about her looks, so why should YOU care about her looks?

[pantoneyoongi]

neon signs | those are called dates

title ; those are called dates pairing ; campus crush!yoongi x campus crush!you 

notes ; 

this is part of the neon signs drabble series, where drabbles are released in random order (but listed chronologically in the masterlist!) 

series description ;

namjoon doesn’t think it can get any clearer outside of yoongi building a giant neon sign saying i have the absolute biggest crush on you but apparently, book smarts don’t exactly translate when it comes to you and your massive crush on min yoongi. 

(alternatively: namjoon and hoseok try for three years straight to get you and yoongi together.) 

word count ; 1.5k

tags ; fluff, they’re just so soft, there’s a pov switch, pls go to masterlist for more / general tags 

the only reason yoongi thinks this class is worth it is because you’re in it with him. 

yoongi’s resting bitch face is particularly aggressive in the mornings, largely because it’s not resting, it’s active. he hates mornings. with a passion. if someone who isn’t you talks to him (hoseok and namjoon included), they’re bound to be on the receiving end of a very sharp glare. 

so it’s fortunate that you’re smart. smart in a way that nobody else he knows is, though he supposes hoseok might contend as a runner-up. 

chinese cinema runs from 8am to 11am every wednesday, but because the building is so far from his dorm hall, yoongi has to wake up at an unholy hour just to get there. but on what was supposed to be a miserable first lecture in a series of miserable lectures thereafter, you’d showed up like sunlight breaking through gloomy clouds, a fresh cup of coffee in hand. 

“i knew you’d choose sleep over making coffee,” you’d teased that day. “you can’t be mean to me today, okay? i got up early to make it.” 

(yoongi’s never mean to you. he simply doesn’t know how to be.) 

he swears he could’ve melted into the ground that day. granted, it took him a couple minutes’ buffer time to understand the picture before him, of your sleepy smile and the coffee your hands presented to him, but when it finally clicked that you - who barely even likes coffee and only drinks it when desperate times call for it - brought it just for him - yoongi’s pretty sure his heart jumped the gun from crush to in love for a hot second. 

honestly, he still has that image of you memorized, tucked close in his memory bank of moments with you that feel like they belong just to him. your rosy cheeks, still flushed from the early morning cold, the way your eyes were hardly open, the warmth that emanated from you in spite of the temperatures outside. everything about you from that day sits sweetly in his chest, a reminder that pushes him out of bed every wednesday morning to come see you. 

a month and a half later, your weekly chinese cinema lectures have now become a trade of food and drink between you and yoongi. you bring the drinks; yoongi prepares the snacks. he spends a little extra time the night before to pack them up, making sure not to forget them in the mornings (if they need to be fridged, he sticks post-it notes to every possible surface he might walk into so he won’t forget them). 

“mmph,” you don’t even say words when you walk into the classroom today, just make a noise and hold out the thermos for yoongi. your eyes are practically glued shut today; you almost miss the seat when you go to sit down, yoongi narrowly grabbing onto your elbow in time and tugging you just enough so you don’t tip over. your head lolls forward, and yoongi kind of wishes there weren’t arm rests between seats. maybe you’d lean on him the way you sometimes lean on namjoon when you’re tired. 

“late night?” yoongi asks gently, resisting the urge to tuck your hair behind your ear. you look terribly cute like this, lips pouting slightly and head bobbing. 

“mhm,” you hum. your head swings slowly up to look at him through half-lidded eyes. “i don’t think i’ll make it through this movie today. will you take notes for me?” 

yoongi would do absolutely anything for you whether or not you asked. 

“sure,” he says instead, because that’s what normal people do. he can’t help it when he reaches over to pat your head, and you lean into his touch a little. yoongi’s heart might give out. 

professor li gives some vague speech about today’s film, then dims the lights and starts the movie. on cue, your eyes fall shut, entire body tipping slightly to the side. 

it takes yoongi an embarrassing amount of willpower to pay attention to the movie. he could blame it on the godawful time of day, but truthfully it has less to do with his anti-morning agenda and more to do with how utterly distracting you are beside him, curled into your chair as small as you can get, a soft cardigan wrapped around your body. you just look so cozy. he wants the rest of the room to disappear, have you tuck yourself into him, like it’s weekly movie date night and you’ve fallen asleep watching like you always do. 

except you and yoongi don’t have weekly movie date night, and he has no idea if you actually would fall asleep every week if you did. the desire to know makes his heart feel a little tight in his chest, like it’s been looped on a string and is being tugged towards you. 

he doesn’t mind. he’s come to terms with his heart being subject to your any and every whim - and he has no qualms with it. 

as the movie slowly comes to a close, yoongi finds his gaze dragged over to you once again, resting his cheek against his palm, trailing his eyes over your features. the lights from the movie cast different colors over you, until it turns into the dim lighting of the credits rolling across the screen. yoongi gives you a slight nudge, one hand resting on your shoulder to gently shake you awake before the harsh lights are flicked on by the professor. 

god, there’s no way his heart can handle the way you blink slowly at him, hands coming up to rub the sleep out of your eyes. he chuckles softly when you squint a little when the lights flick on, yoongi himself blinking a couple extra times to adjust. when you catch his eyes on you, he clears his throat quickly and lifts his notebook, waving it slightly. “i took notes,” he mumbles. “i’ll type them up and send them to you later.” 

“i could just take a picture,” you offer, but yoongi raises a brow at you. 

“you sure you can read my handwriting?” 

your hand which is holding your phone freezes mid-air. your lips flatten together. “never mind.” 

he grins, beginning to pack away his things as professor li lets the class go. “come on, sleepyhead,” he swings the bag over his shoulder. “let’s go get lunch.” 

.

.

.

you wouldn’t say you’re a morning person, but it’s not nearly as offensive a time as yoongi makes it out to be. then again, you’ve never met someone more averse to being awake during the day than yoongi, so maybe he doesn’t make for the best example. 

regardless, there’s something about knowing you’ll meet up with yoongi first thing in the morning that never fails to get you out of bed on wednesday mornings just a little extra early to make him coffee (it’s instant coffee; you might like him but you’re still a broke college kid). it makes you feel a little fuzzy inside knowing you almost always go to lunch together after, both of you free for the afternoon. 

“dates,” namjoon always insists. “those are called dates, y/n.” 

you always wave him off. “i go out to eat with you all the time, joonie.” 

the resounding groan he responds with every time makes you smile even when you’re just thinking about it. exasperating namjoon may very well be one of your favorite pastimes. 

besides, it’s not like you’re wrong. you eat one on one with namjoon all the time. sometimes hoseok, too. there’s nothing date-like about grabbing a meal with one of the boys, so you don’t see why it’s any different with yoongi. 

you know, minus your stupid huge crush on him. 

your eyes follow yoongi as he heads up to place your orders at the counter. it makes you feel insane, the way he makes even a simple grey hoodie and jeans look incredible. you have to busy yourself with your phone so you don’t stare too long. when he returns with the food, he comes with a glint in his eyes that makes you tilt your head at him. he smiles like he’s got the best secret stored away, and reveals it in time with his grin as he pops a bag in front of your face. 

“matcha cookie,” he looks at you like he’s extremely proud of himself. matcha is your favorite anything. he sets the wax bag down in front of you. “copped the last one.” 

it’s not a date. you don’t go on dates with min yoongi. but he does things like this that namjoon and hoseok and sometimes even seokjin don’t do, and it makes you wonder if this is exactly what going on a date with min yoongi would be like. when he sits down and leans forward on his elbows against the table, the way you look back at him hides nothing of your adoration for him, entirely enamored by him and the way he remembers even the tiniest of details about you. his eyes crinkle back in return, and there’s simply no denying the way your heart flutters for him. 

series masterlist ; neon signs

taglist ; @thelilbutifulthings​ @bbsantc​

[yellowhollyhock]

Mikey and April

They are each other’s stray cats

When Mikey meets April he literally acts in the exact same way he would if she were a frightened kitten. Beats up the thing threatening his creature, scoops her into his arms, and says to his brothers, “Can I keep her?” And then takes her home and gives firm instructions they should get him when she wakes, he’ll be listening to music. Tell me it wouldn’t be the exact same story on Mikey’s part if she had been a cat.

And meanwhile April allows her creatures to approach at their pace, let’s them into her home, bribes them with food (okay food Mikey and Donnie ordered but still), and tries to keep them—especially Mikey—away from fragile items. They are all cats in this show. Except for the, uh, rat. Sorry Master Splinter.

April and Mikey understand each other on a spiritual level. It isn’t very long after they meet that the banter begins, with her pretending to have ruined his comic books and him turning the lights off on her. They have fun and make each other laugh. They’re also very respectful of each other’s boundaries. Like when Mikey comes into her shop during a fight to say hi, when she protests and he realizes, he immediately gives the most sincere apology we’ve heard from him at that point in the show (maybe ever?) and backs right out. Or when Mikey wants to be a superhero and all of his brothers are making fun of him, but April rolls up her sleeves and helps him find an outfit. It takes them very little time to earn each other’s trust, and once they have it they never betray it.

I think the show under utilized their youngest sibling solidarity. Makes sense because Robyn is in one episode, and I don’t think age order is even stated (is Robyn younger in 2003? I’m pretty sure she’s older in Mirage and I like younger sibling April so I’m gonna pretend Robyn’s older). Anyway it would’ve been fun to see April remembering what being the youngest is like and sticking up for Mikey, reasonably or unreasonably. Could’ve been a cool bonding opportunity with Angel, too. But not very plot relevant so makes sense. I guess.

This friendship is so important for Mikey because she really is his first human friend. Donnie and Leo both seemed closer with the Professor (especially Donnie, but Leo is also shown to be trusting of the Shredder and the Utroms so I feel like it’s implied that the human thing isn’t a big deal to him), and Raph is close with Casey before he gets close with April. Mikey is the turtle who would want human friends the most. He shows the most interest in NYC culture and verbally states a desire to be part of the community more than once (the greater good thing). April’s first reaction on meeting them is screaming and fainting, so not great, but things turn around pretty fast and that had to have done a world of good for Mikey’s confidence.

You know how he’s obsessed with monster movies? I don’t think the irony is lost on him. Especially considering how quiet he immediately gets when Don points it out to him during Notes from Underground. The internalization of societal prejudice against him specifically is strong with this one. And in Mikey’s world, at fifteen, “society” irl is pretty much made up of April, Casey, and people who want to kill him. Thank goodness for April and Casey.

Some headcanons:

April is Mikey’s maid of honor just like he was hers

They are the party planning duo. Birthdays with the Splinterson-O’Neil clan are off the charts

They would have so much fun shopping together

April buys all the Turtle Titan merch

Most likely duo to argue about food. Does pineapple go on pizza? Sushi yes or no. How much hot sauce is too much. Why are you adding cilantro I hate cilantro—

[telomeke]

get to know me ask game

Thanks for tagging me @colourme-feral!

RULES: bold the ones that are true & tag 10 people to do it.

APPEARANCE

blonde hair // I prefer loose clothing to tight clothing // I have one or more piercings // I have at least one tattoo // I have dyed or highlighted my hair // I have gotten plastic surgery // I have or had braces // I sunburn easily // I have freckles // I paint my nails // I typically wear makeup // I don’t often smile // I am pleased with how I look // I prefer Nike to Adidas // I wear baseball hats backwards

I started graying early (in my teens) so the hair dye is for when I want to change things up a bit. Braces are a rite of passage for so many, including me. I don't often smile, so people think I'm more serious than I actually am (also because of RBF). I'm satisfied with how I look because you've always got to love yourself first, and understand that nobody is perfect (so you shouldn't expect that of yourself either, whether in looks or any other department).

HOBBIES & TALENTS

I play a sport // I can play an instrument // I am artistic // I know more than one language // I have won a trophy in some sort of competition // I can cook or bake without a recipe // I know how to swim // I enjoy writing // I can do origami // I prefer movies to tv shows // I can execute a perfect somersault // I enjoy singing // I could survive in the wild on my own // I have read a new book series this year // I enjoy spending time with friends // I travel during work or school breaks // I can do a handstand

Can play piano but not well. I like art but don't indulge in it too much (except maybe writing). Grew up in a multilingual environment and that's made me love languages and linguistics. Trophies were mostly school stuff, nothing to write home about. I cook a lot, bake a bit less, but it's to get around food intolerances. Used to swim a lot. Writing is my first love. Origami and papercraft are fun. Prefer singing to piano (always have, and the background in music theory means I can appreciate some forms though I much prefer pop and R&B to classical). I used to travel a lot more, but do it less after the pandemic; traveling is less fun for me now and I prefer to voyage on the Internet instead.

RELATIONSHIP

I am in a relationship // I have been single for over a year // I have a crush // I have a best friend who I’ve known for ten years // my parents are together// I have dated my best friend // I am adopted // my crush has confessed to me // I have a long distance relationship // I am an only child // I give advice to my friends // I have made an online friend // I met up with someone I have met online

Spouse and I have been together a long, long time. Old friends are to be treasured. Crush confessions are so awkward when they're not reciprocal. I give advice (comes naturally as the eldest child) but it's not always welcome and I've had to learn to hold back. My online friends are those I've met through Tumblr, mostly around a shared love for Bad Buddy.

AESTHETICS

I have heard the ocean in a conch shell // I have watched the sun rise // I enjoy rainy days // I have slept under the stars // I meditate outside // the sound of chirping calms me // I enjoy the smell of the beach // I know what snow tastes like // I listen to music to fall asleep // I enjoy thunderstorms // I enjoy cloud watching // I have attended a bonfire // I pay close attention to colors // I find mystery in the ocean // I enjoy hiking on nature paths // autumn is my favorite season

Hasn't every child put a seashell to their ear? I did this so many times as a kid. Watched the sun rise at the seaside and in the mountains; most spectacular was at Gunung Bromo but marred by the sulfurous fumes biting the lungs. The quieter sounds of nature are generally calming so chirping counts. I love everything about the beach because we used to holiday there all the time in my childhood. Snow tastes of nothing; I remember sticking my tongue out to catch snowflakes in Iceland. A good thunderstorm is the perfect setting for a hot coffee, pastry and a good book by the window. There was always a bonfire at teen gatherings. I'm very visually-oriented and can't help noticing colors, but have learnt to focus the attention beam and not get distracted so sometimes I ignore them. Love everything about the sea and ocean, including their unknowns. Enjoy hikes and have done country/forest walks in different places but nothing too strenuous please, and I think the comfort meal after the walk is even better. What's not to love about autumn? The colors are gorgeous, lots of late summer fruit are amazing (mirabelle plums my favorite) and the whiff of smoke in the cooler evening air is so evocative of coziness.

MISCELLANEOUS

I can fall asleep in a moving vehicle // I am the mom friend // I live by a certain quote // I like the smell of sharpies // I am involved in extracurricular activities // I enjoy Mexican food // I can drive a stick shift // I believe in true love // I make up scenarios to fall asleep // I sing in the shower // I wish I lived in a video game // I have a canopy above my bed // I am multiracial // I am a redhead // I own at least 3 dogs

Memories of falling asleep on long bus rides to faraway destinations. Quote I live by: no regrets (it's pointless to stress out about a past you can't change; just learn from it and move forward). Mexican cuisine is not my all-time favorite but I like anything with chilli, so there are always dishes to enjoy, especially if there's cheese and avocado. I learnt to drive on a stick shift so that's not an issue but hardly drive nowadays (don't own a car and don't need one). I believe in true love, because I've found mine. I sing in the shower (and in the kitchen, in the living-room, everywhere I can at home).

Tagging (and I'm not gonna stop at 10):

@crzshaly437 @dimplesandfierceeyes @dudeyuri @ranchthoughts @teaofdesaster @miscellar @dribs-and-drabbles @recentadultburnout @bengiyo @waitmyturtles @twig-tea @airenyah @lurkingshan @22grt23 @faillen @pandasmagorica @anotherlovr @orchdxtea @badinthelatin @rythyme @lurkingteapot @vegasandhishedgehog

Also anyone and everyone who reads this (forgive me if I didn't tag you personally, didn't mean to forget anyone). Do play along and remember to tag me so I can get to know you better too! But no pressure if you don't wish to play either. 💖

[bengiyo]

get to know me ask game

Thanks for tagging me @telomeke

RULES: bold the ones that are true & tag 10 people to do it.

APPEARANCE

blonde hair // I prefer loose clothing to tight clothing // I have one or more piercings // I have at least one tattoo // I have dyed or highlighted my hair // I have gotten plastic surgery // I have or had braces // I sunburn easily // I have freckles // I paint my nails // I typically wear makeup // I don’t often smile // I am pleased with how I look // I prefer Nike to Adidas // I wear baseball hats backwards

Growing up the way I did gave me a few complexes about my appearance. It's something I'm still working through.

HOBBIES & TALENTS

I play a sport // I can play an instrument // I am artistic // I know more than one language // I have won a trophy in some sort of competition // I can cook or bake without a recipe // I know how to swim // I enjoy writing // I can do origami // I prefer movies to tv shows // I can execute a perfect somersault // I enjoy singing // I could survive in the wild on my own // I have read a new book series this year // I enjoy spending time with friends // I travel during work or school breaks // I can do a handstand

I played Academic Games for most of my academic career and finally won a first-place trophy in Propaganda in my final year at Nationals (Hilariously, one of the games I used to hate). I was also part of a pickup team that challenged the reigning champions in 3 of our 4 games. I can make a lot of our regular meals without having to refer to recipes much. I am actually a strong swimmer. As much as I love series, I find it's easier to share a movie with a friend, and I love my friends! It's why I got a huge sectional! So many of my friends don't live near me, so I travel a lot now.

RELATIONSHIP

I am in a relationship // I have been single for over a year // I have a crush // I have a best friend who I’ve known for ten years // my parents are together // I have dated my best friend // I am adopted // my crush has confessed to me // I have a long distance relationship // I am an only child // I give advice to my friends // I have made an online friend // I met up with someone I have met online

I realized I was ace-spectrum about a decade ago, and so I haven't really dated someone in a long time. I'm a slow starter, and haven't gelled with someone who was okay with that in a very long time. I've had many an old friend, though! I have lots of best friends of more than 10 years! My parents are still going strong at 36 years and are having the best time as retirees. I've dated a best friend; it didn't work. I give advice to friends, but it's usually because they ask. I am mostly made of online friends, and I even met some last week!

AESTHETICS

I have heard the ocean in a conch shell // I have watched the sun rise // I enjoy rainy days // I have slept under the stars // I meditate outside // the sound of chirping calms me // I enjoy the smell of the beach // I know what snow tastes like // I listen to music to fall asleep // I enjoy thunderstorms // I enjoy cloud watching // I have attended a bonfire // I pay close attention to colors // I find mystery in the ocean // I enjoy hiking on nature paths // autumn is my favorite season

So, I was a Boy Scout, so I have done a lot of these just by happenstance.

MISCELLANEOUS

I can fall asleep in a moving vehicle // I am the mom friend // I live by a certain quote // I like the smell of sharpies // I am involved in extracurricular activities // I enjoy Mexican food // I can drive a stick shift // I believe in true love // I make up scenarios to fall asleep // I sing in the shower // I wish I lived in a video game // I have a canopy above my bed // I am multiracial // I am a redhead // I own at least 3 dogs

I'm an American in the South. If you can't sleep in a moving vehice you will suffer. I'm like the dad friend, in that I get asked for help with the most specific shit. I live by the quote: "Be brave enough to be kind." Who doesn't like Mexican food??

I think the whole squad has already been tagged, but tag me back if you do this!

[lilithsaga]

Get to know me tag game

tagged by @torstenerikssonvt

RULES: bold the ones that are true and tag people to do it.

APPEARANCE

Blonde hair // I prefer loose clothing to tight clothing // I have one or more piercings // I have at least one tattoo // I have dyed or highlighted my hair* // I have gotten plastic surgery // I have or had braces // I sunburn easily // I have freckles // I paint my nails** // I typically wear makeup // I don’t often smile // I am pleased with how I look // I prefer Nike to Adidas // I wear baseball hats backwards

* many are surprised by this since my highlights are natural

** I used to do it a lot more when I was younger

HOBBIES AND TALENTS

I play a sport // I can play an instrument // I am artistic // I know more than one language* // I have won a trophy in some sort of competition** // I can cook or bake without a recipe // I know how to swim // I enjoy writing*** // I can do origami // I prefer movies to tv shows // I can execute a perfect somersault // I enjoy singing // I could survive in the wild on my own // I have read a new book series this year // I enjoy spending time with friends // I travel during work or school breaks // I can do a handstand

* conversational Japanese/Spanish counts, right?

** "Loudest Chatterer" in child baseball. Oh how things changed!

*** I wish I had more time to really flesh it out, make it something I can be proud of.

RELATIONSHIP

I am in a relationship // I have been single for over a year // I have a crush // I have a best friend who I’ve known for ten years // my parents are together // I have dated my best friend // I am adopted // My crush has confessed to me // I have a long distance relationship* // I am an only child // I give advice to my friends // I have made an online friend // I met up with someone I have met online

* LDR is difficult when you used to be able to walk to each other's dorms and then next year you have to drive 5+ hours after school or work. I hope we can reunite within the next year...

AESTHETICS

I have heard the ocean in a conch shell // I have watched the sun rise* // I enjoy rainy days // I have slept under the stars // I meditate outside // the sound of chirping calms me // I enjoy the smell of the beach // I know what snow tastes like // I listen to music to fall asleep** // I enjoy thunderstorms // I enjoy cloud watching // I have attended a bonfire // I pay close attention to colors // I find mystery in the ocean // I enjoy hiking on nature paths // autumn is my favorite season

* only because I stayed up that long talking to someone

** honestly I just prefer to fall asleep to sound in general

MISCELLANEOUS

I can fall asleep in a moving vehicle // I am the mom friend // I live by a certain quote // I like the smell of sharpies // I am involved in extracurricular activities // I enjoy Mexican food // I can drive a stick shift* // I believe in true love // I make up scenarios to fall asleep // I sing in the shower // I wish I lived in a video game** // I have a canopy above my bed // I am multiracial*** // I am a redhead // I own at least 3 dogs

* but I know someone who will teach me when I become less afraid.

** I would be so much more productive if I lived in a video game.

*** I don't talk about it much, but my mom is white and my dad is Hispanic. I don't think its something people can tell by hearing/looking at me.

tagging @emery-matsushita-vt, @drakamut, and @slash-gallagher

(if you wanna do it and/or haven't done it already. I know these kinds of things can be cheesy but they can also be fun)