#but also I’ve always been addicted to being helpful because I feel like I am actually capable of something

[squidmaid]

sometimes I really MISS being young and feeling passionate about things like. I used to be so into writing and drawing and all these sorts of things and i could make myself work so much harder at them and nowadays I’m like. I would be content to be content at this point? like idk what I feel PASSIONATE about anymore I just aim to be comfortable but also sometimes that doesn’t feel like it’s enough. I miss that spark.

[junkissed]

goodnight n go

member — fwb!vernon x reader genre — smut, angst, non-idol au word count — 1.7k synopsis — you keep coming back for more, but every night ends the same. maybe this time things will be different. warnings — mentions of alcohol, drunk sex, car sex, guitarist!vernon, rock band!hhu, no physical descriptions of reader, vernon is afraid of commitment, sad ending for this part but there will be a part 2 with a happy ending !! notes — before you ask, yes this is based on the ariana song lol but also inspired by black eye because it's been stuck in my head the past few days. as always, thanks to @onlymingyus for reading over this for me <3 i'm still on hiatus and requests are closed but i randomly had inspiration to write something for vernon so i hope you enjoy! i am planning on writing more for this story, but i'm back at uni and my time is already quite limited, so i'll try to write more when i can! reblogs, comments, and asks are super appreciated, it means a lot and helps me keep writing so please lmk if you liked it :)

“hey, you wanna get drinks tonight?”

as usual, that’s how it starts.

you probably should have said no. you’d played this game before. you knew exactly what hansol meant when he offered to hang out after band practice, because it was never just “hanging out”.

you don’t even know why you still go to practices anymore. for a long time you’d avoided them; it wasn’t really your style, and you were never interested in being a groupie for their local gigs. your roommate seungcheol always invited you to every practice, and every time you declined with the excuse of homework or other plans, but cheol finally convinced you to come just one time.

at first, it had been because he wanted you to hear a new song they were working on and he’d wanted to know how you liked it before they played it at an upcoming show. but then he’d introduced you to the rest of his bandmates, and after that there was no going back.

you couldn’t help the way your eyes always gravitated towards hansol, who insisted that you call him his real name instead of his stage name that everyone else called him. from the very first practice, you were captivated by him: the way his long fingers seem to dance along the neck of his guitar so effortlessly, the way his voice rasps when he sings, the way your breath catches in your throat when he grips the microphone stand and rolls his head back, lips parted in ecstasy.

he’s addictive, and it’s exactly the reason why you find yourself in the backseat of his car over and over again.

every time, it was easy to pretend that things would be different. you’d walk into the bar together and sit at the table in the back, order a few drinks, chat for a while about nothing. did you like the new stuff we played tonight? yeah, i know cheol is really excited to perform it saturday. you been doing any writing lately? mmm, a little. i’ve been feeling inspired. we could go back to my place and i could show you. except he never does.

hansol wasn’t a bad guy. he always paid for your drinks no matter how many times you offered to pick up the tab, he was polite, he listened to what you had to say. he just didn’t want more than that, and that’s where it all fell apart. you’d screw around for a while, then you’d part ways and wouldn’t speak to each other until next week. you never went to see them play shows, he never texted, you never called, never went on a real date besides meeting in the same bar down the street every thursday night after practice.

he seemed fine with that. you weren’t. and yet every time, you ended up back in his arms.

he groans into your mouth, pushing his hips into you and pinning you harder against the faded leather seats of his old honda. his lips are sloppy but eager, messily pressing his mouth into yours as his fingers tangle in the hair at the base of your neck. you can taste the beer and smoke on his breath, but for some reason it doesn’t bother you. maybe you’re used to it, or maybe it’s just because it’s him. you don’t want to know which reason is the truth.

he kisses you until you’re dizzy, and you can’t tell if it’s from the alcohol or from the thrill of kissing him once again. it’s a high you’re convinced you’ll never get tired of, although you’re not quite sure yet if it’s one that he will.

hansol always lets you set the pace, but tonight he can’t seem to keep his hands to himself. both of your shirts met the floor of his car what seems like hours ago, leaving you in just your pants as he makes out with you as if it’s the first and last time he’ll get that chance. his fingers breeze over your waist the same way they breeze over his guitar strings when he plays: careful yet greedy, each touch intentional yet impulsive as he grips your waist.

he drags his fingers higher and it sends a shiver down your spine, arching your hips up against him and rolling your head back against the seat’s headrest. if there’s only one upside to this relationship, it’s that he’s good at this. really good. if he weren’t, then you wouldn’t have spent so many nights letting him fuck you in the parking lot of your shitty local bar. it does something for your confidence knowing that he must feel the same about you, or else he wouldn’t keep inviting you out. at the very least, this arrangement is mutual, even if you wish it wasn’t.

his hips rock against your crotch again, and even through both of your clothes you can feel how hard he is. your mind is clouded, everything’s a haze, and all you can think about is how badly you want him. the warmth of his skin, the gentle scratch of his nails on the back of your neck, his long eyelashes that flutter against your cheek as he kisses you.

you feel your hands slide haphazardly down his bare chest, fumbling over his hips as you tug on the waistband of his jeans. none of it feels graceful, not like the way he handles his music. it’s sloppy, desperate, clumsy, and it’s everything you need right now.

he manages to lean back from you enough to undo his pants and push them down to his knees, but his mouth is back on yours in an instant. somehow you end up on your back across the seats, gazing up at him with slack lips as his thin silver chain dangles over your face. you might not remember a lot of what happens on these nights when you’re with him, but you’ll always remember this moment. him hovering above you with heavily lidded eyes, biting his lip and cursing as he pushes into you, is etched into your mind in a way you simultaneously love and hate. love because it feels so good, hate because it never lasts.

the rest of those nights never stands out in your memory. you remember feeling good, you remember trembling in his arms and gasping and moaning and crying in pleasure, but the images are too fuzzy to make out. you don’t really need to reflect on them anyway; you know he’ll just bring you out next week and do it all over again.

hansol kisses you once more after you’re both finally spent, but the kisses afterwards are always different. more… hesitant, more uncertain. none of the passion and desperation that you’ve come to crave from him. not what you really want.

“i can drive you home,” he offers once he’s finished cleaning you up. for once you think he might genuinely mean it, but you can never be sure enough to take that chance. you want him to drive you home. god, you want him to so bad. to have him come over with you and stay the night, stay another night and another until your apartment isn’t just yours anymore, that’s what you’ve wanted all this time. and it’s what you’ll never have.

“i’ll call an uber,” you answer.

“i’ll wait with you, then.”

the silence that settles over his car is heavy as you climb back into the front passenger seat. you want to tell him to get in the uber with you, stay more than just a couple hours with you in the furthest back corner of the bar parking lot that’s too far to be illuminated by streetlights. you want to argue that he’s too drunk even to drive himself, that he needs to come home with you and sleep it off together in the comfort of your bed, but you know it’s not true and it won’t work. this is a conversation you’ve had many times before. every night you’ve spent with him blurs into the next, always the same. 

sometimes you want to laugh at how naive you are, for thinking he’d eventually come to his senses and realize there’s more to you than a good lay before a gig. sometimes you want to grab him and shake him by the shoulders and tell him to grow the fuck up, give him an ultimatum and make him tell you what he wants from you or else put an end to it all. sometimes you just want to cry, to mourn your wasted time when you’re fully aware it’s never going to lead to something more, no matter how badly you want it and how hard you try.

no matter how many times you get your hopes up, no matter how many times you pray and beg and plead with god and the universe and every other higher power to get him to realize this can’t keep going on the way it is forever, nothing ever changes. you’re never going to stop running to him when he calls, and he’s never going to stop calling.

finally another car pulls into the lot, and you manage to pull yourself out of his car. you hear your name behind you and you stumble, swaying on your feet as he rolls down his window.

maybe this time will be different.

he says his usual goodbyes and goodnights, flashing you a loose grin and a wave as his engine sputters to life, and he asks if you’re planning on coming to practice next week. 

and you find yourself nodding.

you’re left standing there, your head and your heart pounding, watching his headlights fade as he drives away, until you’ve stood there for so long that your ride starts honking and calling for you to get in the car so you can leave.

maybe next time will be different.

i hope you enjoyed this!! if you did, please consider reblogging or leaving a comment or an ask :) it shows me this is something people want to see more of, and knowing people like this makes me want to write more of it! thanks for reading!!

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[scientia-rex]

I made that post about how smoking is bad—actually, no, I’ve made two relatively popular posts about how smoking is bad for you. Raises your chances of dying from multiple factors including heart disease and stroke in addition to lung (and mouth, throat, and bladder) cancer.

I am always so baffled by the responses going “well I could die from something else!” Yes. You could. Statistically speaking, you will most likely die of heart disease, stroke, or cancer, if you live in the US. Your average life expectancy is somewhere around 78 for women, 76 for men. Many people die younger than that, for a lot of reasons. Many of my patients have illnesses that will shorten their lives. I hate to split it into “fault,” as if there’s some kind of perfect way to live a blameless life. (There isn’t.) The numbers, however, are both clear and pitiless. People who smoke are more likely to die younger than they otherwise might have.

Medicine is a numbers game. My job is not to psychically predict exactly what will punch your ticket and when. It is to improve your odds. I want you to both live as long a life as possible but also as high-quality a life as possible. I want for you to live a life you enjoy.

It’s that simple; it’s not sinister. I’m not out here going “I’ll tell them not to smoke so they can have LESS FUN before getting hit by a bus at 30!”

Because smoking isn’t actually fun. What it is, is a very quick (and faster = more addictive) reduction in physical feedback systems that heighten anxiety. Withdrawal of an unpleasant stimulus is rewarding. (Technically, it’s a negative reward; the negative doesn’t refer to a moral judgment, but the addition or subtraction of a stimulus.) Something that is very rewarding very fast will be very addictive. It’s why crack cocaine is also so addictive—it is also a very fast and very potent reward. It’s also why benzodiazepines like Xanax are so addictive to so many people; it’s a slower peak blood level but the removal of severe anxiety is profoundly rewarding.

So smoking can make you feel better when you do it. But your body will try to fix any broken signals. It doesn’t just want to be able to signal to you when you need to feel stressed: it has to be able to signal you, or your long-ago ancestors would have been eaten by predators. So it ramps up the signaling. Now you’re not smoking because you feel better than baseline; you’re smoking to get back to baseline.

That’s why quitting sucks. When you quit smoking, all of the sudden your body’s signals of stress that got dialed up to 11 to overcome the nicotine are just out there at full blast, making you feel scared and jittery and irritable. It’s why when you quit benzos (or daily alcohol) cold turkey you can get life-threatening seizures. It’s why when you stop alcohol you’re likely to have sleep disruptions that can persist for weeks to months.

That’s why things that help reduce the suckage can help. Nicotine patches, lozenges, or gum. Chantix. Wellbutrin. Slowly stepping down the nicotine level on your vape. Eating more, eating things you like. (I would 1000% rather have a patient be fat than be smoking. I know other people will be shittier to you if you gain weight. Living is worth it.) Being kind to yourself helps you quit smoking. You need to recognize that “quitting smoking you” is not your baseline you. It is you with an invisible illness that will take weeks to months to get over.

And sometimes you can’t face that hump right now. But if you want to maximize your odds of the longest and healthiest possible life, knowing that any number of terrible things can happen to you at any time, making the effort—over and over again, if you need to—is the best shot you have.

There are a couple of conditions where smoking does markedly reduce symptoms. The well-known ones are schizophrenia and Crohn’s disease. If you feel not just better, but better like this is a medication for you, like you poop blood or hear things without it, talk to your primary care provider, because there are other medicines that might be safer and/or more effective for you. The landscape around pharmaceutical research has shifted dramatically over the last 30 years. We have more options than we’ve ever had before. Maybe this doesn’t have to be the expensive, dangerous medication that half-works for you. And if what you’re self-medicating is your anxiety, nicotine is a pretty crappy medication for that, because it doesn’t fix you; it changes your baseline to an even shittier place.

You have bodily autonomy. You can make your own choices. I will never go to a patient’s house and slap the cigarette out of their hand. But if what you want is the longest and healthiest possible life, smoking makes your odds worse.

The number of people who think that I, as a doctor, would be unaware of how profoundly unfair bodily health can be amazes me. It’s like the first Father Brown story, where Father Brown is explaining to the villain that someone whose main job is to hear about all of the terrible sins people have to confess cannot remain naive. My job is watching people age, or filling out their death certificates. One or the other. I prefer watching them age, but everyone will die. Someday my doctor will be filling out my death certificate. I’ve removed one potential contributing factor from that line—maybe I’ll get diabetes, maybe I’ll get cancer, maybe I’ll have a workplace accident, but “smoking” isn’t going to be on that line anymore. That’s the best I can do. I can’t psychically predict my own death, either; just play the numbers, try to do my best, and hope.

[doctorsiren]

"The first step is always the hardest, I’ve heard. I know there’s no way I could have taken it without her. Of course, my problem wasn’t magically solved. She’s an amazing little magician, but no one is that good. Yet…she showed me a way to get out of the hole I was in…showed me that it was possible to be okay when I thought I had lost everything. In reality, I hadn’t…but in the process of this, I was throwing everything away from her. I knew I needed to get better. Initially, it wasn’t for myself. I didn’t feel like I deserved it. It was for her…and somewhere along the way…I realized that I did deserve to get better. It took a lot of time and support. I am better now.

Even so…it shouldn’t have been her responsibility. Only 8 years old and she was both so mature and so innocent. She knew too much about the world, about how harsh it could be…and yet she still held onto her childlike light. She shouldn’t have been put in the position to be the parent. That was my job. But she would run in with her glow and help me see the way. I needed to show her that the world didn’t need to be so harsh, the same way she had already done for me. I couldn’t do that in the state I was in. I knew I had fallen too far when she cried because of me. I vowed from that moment to never let myself be the reason she felt pain or sadness.

I love her. She loves me…and one day, her love allowed me to love myself again. She truly is my sunshine."

I wanted to give an explanation for why he's addicted to grape juice rather than alcohol / wine. I get that it's supposed to be a joke about him being addicted to grape juice because the way that it's talked about in the game, it's very much alcohol-coded. But I like to think of it as literal.

This goes sort of the same way my beanie comic did. This takes place after it, as shown by him putting on the beanie to try and quell his panic attack. I also wrote a monologue, as the beanie post was captioned with something from the game itself. I wanted this to feel similar.

The beanie post focused on colour and light, whereas this one is purely on the light.

[youbutstupid]

What d’you think is the “best” trait the main bau team members have?

OH I love this question thank you so much. There’s a lot so bear with me

Hotch: his compassion for his team. He’s an extremely compassionate and empathetic leader, constantly allowing for his team to leave work if they need to and following them on their hunches, even if they seem unlikely, purely because he loves and respects each of them. Quite often Hotch is portrayed as stone faced but I’ve honestly never seen a male leading character be so openly loving to their team.

Gideon: how much he cares for the victims in his cases. Gideon is often characterised as being a bit clueless to the feelings of his team, yet he never is to the people he is trying to save because he puts his everything into it. He has always been so open and accepting in cases which was rare for a 51 year old man in 2005; he was very willing to let go of his old ways and what he used to know so that he could evolve with the changes in society in order to best help the people he was saving. We also got to see his book of the people he saved. It was amazing.

Rossi: his ability to read and help the people on the team when no one else does. I wholeheartedly believe that if Rossi was present during the Hankel case, Reid would not have gone through his addiction alone. Rossi is always the one to call out people who try to hide their problems and he puts in so much effort to help them, even using his hours outside of work to do so. We see him waking up early to help Hotch coach Jack’s football matches, him inviting Penelope over for scotch so that she can finally disconnect from technology and him hosting the cooking class, the wedding and Strauss’ funeral dinner ar his house. His character development from being weary about the team to adoring them all individually was amazing.

Reid: I love how despite him admitting that he has trouble with emotions, he is always the one doing everything he can to be an emotional support when people around him are struggling. We see him try and comfort Elle when everyone else disconnected from her, he stayed with Garcia the entire time when she was shot, he is the one to call Emily to ask if she wants to hang out when she started disconnecting due to the Doyle situation, he is the one to try and help JJ with her PTSD in season 10 and so on. He doesn’t like the idea of the people around him going through things alone despite the fact that he often tries to go through things alone and he is extremely selfless in this sense.

JJ: I am constantly inspired by how throughout the show, she is repeatedly putting in effort to try and improve herself as a person and as an agent. We never see her get cocky, even when she deserves to be like she was in the FBI from a very young age, she had one of the most challenging jobs as the press liaison and then she was able to work herself up to profiler where she was one of the most formidable people on the field. Despite how impressive she really is, the audience are never given a chance to consider it because she never boasts about it and instead spends everyday striving to be better.

Morgan: he is always willing to take on a leadership role when he has to, yet he is always willing to give it back to Hotch when he doesn’t need to take it on anymore. I’m not just referring to season 5 either, I’m talking about any time when Hotch is unable to take on his role. Morgan respects Hotch a lot and is always willing to support him by taking on the role of team leader when Hotch can’t anymore, yet he never tries to take the role permanently for himself, despite being told he could by Strauss. Despite his years of experience and his leadership skills, he is willing to give up the role because he sees it as what is best for the team and he respects Hotch too much to keep it.

Elle: her protection of women. Elle was, in my opinion, ahead of her time. She previously worked in the sex crimes division and in season 1, she was the only female profiler and she did not step away from her previous role as an advocate for women in sex crimes just so she could better ‘fit in with the men’ of the BAU; she instead brought her perspective with her and implemented it in her cases. She was the only one in episode 3 to look at the woman who was assaulted and realise how uncomfortable she must have been surrounded by men. She ended her career in the BAU fighting for women and it hurts me that the BAU lost her.

Garcia: she never, ever stops being herself, even when people question her or bring her down for it. Sadly, because Garcia is the brightest person in the room, she is quite often the one who the profilers take their frustrations out on; we have seen JJ, Morgan, Hotch, Rossi and Emily all do this. Despite this, she doesn’t waver, she doesn’t stop being the brightest person in the room just because someone is simply not in the mood for her to be because she knows that she does not need to apologise for simply existing as her authentic self. In the episode The Black Queen, 9x12, her ex tells her that they both used to make fun of girls like her, and she corrects him saying that he made fun of girls like her, this was who she always wanted to be. This is so empowering to me.

Prentiss: my love, she was so unbelievably loyal to those around her and this was clear from the beginning. She was the only one to question Reid’s suffering in season 2, she literally uprooted her life and faked her death so that her team’s lives could be protected in season 6. When she found out JJ was in danger in season 9, she was so quick to jump on a plane back to help her. When the team calls for favours whilst she is in London, she always answers to help them. When Reid got arrested and imprisoned in season 12, she didn’t once believe that he committed the crime of which he was accused and even risked her entire career tampering with possible evidence so that it couldn’t be used against him. She is loyal to a fault and so many don’t acknowledge that.

Todd: we only got Todd for 9 episodes but I loved how human she was. She was the first character to make the audience realise that none of what we were looking at was normal. By season 4, the audience became very desensitised to the crimes that we were looking at and Todd broke us out of that and she also was not afraid to call out the fact that it wasn’t normal that the profilers were desensitised either. I respect how in the end she would rather admit that she couldn’t do the job anymore than lose that human side of her. I also loved how she made sure Hotch never took JJ for granted.

Seaver: we never got to see much of Seaver’s development because of the writers, but I loved her willingness to learn. Seaver hadn’t even graduated from the academy when she joined the team, she was not a profiler, she wasn’t even a qualified FBI agent. Watching her learn and grow in such a traumatising field and take it all in her stride was so incredibly interesting to watch. I also loved watching her friendship grow with the team; going to the cinema with Reid, Morgan and Garcia, gaming night with Rossi and going out for curry with Reid. 

Blake: Blake was so incredibly talented and so unbelievably smart but instead of using it as a way to get ahead of her team, she used it as a way to relate to them and bond with them. She almost became a protective figure over them and she took that role very seriously too. It was honestly amazing watching her mind work and how easily she was able to take on her role as a profiler because of it. I know I just named multiple good qualities but it is incredible to me how much her character was able to grow and be adored in just two seasons, she had no idea what dynamic she was getting into when she joined the team yet she fit in perfectly and adapted to it so quickly in order to help them and gain their trust.

Callahan: her confidence. She went into that bullpen being unapologetically herself from the beginning and she fit herself into that team without an ounce of apprehension. She made so much effort to establish herself and she was not shy about it which I adored; she had banter with Rossi, she opened up to Reid, she carpooled with JJ, she became a close friend for Garcia and she gained Morgan’s trust all within a few episodes; the last two being hard to do as a new member of the team. I love how she didn’t question where she belonged, she knew she belonged.

Simmons: to me, Simmons was just so incredibly sweet. When he first joined and I saw that he was buff and conventionally attractive, I was weary that he was just going to be another jock detective that we see in other shows, but he wasn’t. He, again, was an incredibly strong and skilled agent yet when he arrived on the team he took everyone for who they were and never once acted like he was in any way better than them because he had skills that they did not have. He was just a nice person and that may sound like a basic description but to me, it’s the best description to give a person. I felt genuinely safe with Matt’s character on the screen because it was just lovely to see a man on the screen who was just good.

Lewis: OH I love this woman. Tara brought a new element of self assurance to the screen and also humour. She, again, was very unapologetically herself and she knew her worth, as we saw when she went through her breakup, which was so refreshing to see because it is rare you see a woman know her value and not be portrayed as cocky for doing so. She is also a character that marked her place on the team and I also love how unafraid she was to come out and say that she was dating a woman, which was a risk in itself because the BAU had never had an openly LGBTQ+ profiler before. I also loved how she brought ‘your mum’ jokes to the show because watching a 50 year old woman with a doctorate make multiple ‘your mum’ jokes is all I needed from the show if I’m honest.

Alvez: I don’t want to repeat things too much but I also love Luke’s loyalty, which is something we also saw from very early on in his time in the show. Bear in mind when Reid was in prison, Luke was only on the team for a very short period of time, yet he believed wholeheartedly that Reid was innocent and even made threats for his safety. I also love how he took Garcia’s original dislike of him in his stride and honestly embraced everything about her, whether it was her distrust in him or her ‘quirkiness’ as the team would dub it, he took it all in and loved her because of it all, not in spite of it.

[starsandhughes]

Penalty Box Series— National Boyfriends Day Edition

23-24 Season Masterlist

referenced: not so happy birthday and knight in shining armor

yourusername

liked by trevorzegras, jackhughes, and 10,611 others

yourusername “‘it’s always been him,’ she smiled. ‘our souls just dance the same.’” (atticus)

trevor zegras— my first love, my only love, my other half, my perfect match, and my soon to be husband, i don’t think the world knows how to fathom the love i have for you. because there isn’t a perfect word to truly capture how you make me feel.

there isn’t a word to perfectly describe how i feel when i see your brighter-than-the-sun smile, or how i feel when i hear the melody of my soul that is your laugh. there isn’t a word that expresses how complete i am with you, or how you’re the only home i’ll ever need.

if love is the only word that comes close to all of that, then i will never stop saying it. but there’s other ways to describe “love,” and i’ll say those, too. you’re captivating. i’m enamored with you. i’m infatuated with you. i’m addicted to you. you make me burn with desire. you’re my sun, my moon, and all my stars. every fiber of my being aches for you. we fit each other perfectly. i’ll always choose you.

so happy national boyfriends day to my ex boyfriend and future ex fiancé!

i love you, always, my sweet boy❤️ YOU are my roman empire

tagged trevorzegras

view all 377 comments

trevorzegras you really know how to swoop a man off his feet❤️ i love you, forever, my sweet girl (when will the ex boyfriend jokes stop?) (you’re my roman empire)

yourusername it’s a powerful give i choose to exert every day! (never)

trevorzegras can i say it?! can i say it?! can i say it?!

yourusername yeah, go ahead

trevorzegras SAP

yourusername speak for yourself!!

_quinnhughes you’re still going to call him your ex boyfriend when you’re married, aren’t you?

yourusername oh most definitely

trevorzegras @/yourusername can i sometimes be called your husband?

yourusername @/trevorzegras i’ll think about it

_quinnhughes @/yourusername you chose her

trevorzegras @_quinnhughes and i’ll do it again

user48 i’m in tears oh my god🥹😭

user22 i’ve said it before and i’ll say it again! THIS will be my royal wedding

jackhughes stop being disgustingly cute

yourusername i will throw things at you

jackhughes you’re across the country

yourusername true, but not forever. prepare for war december 5th

jackhughes @_quinnhughes @/trevorzegras send help

trevorzegras @/jackhughes you’re on your own, kid. you always have been

_quinnhughes @/jackhughes i’ll let her go a few rounds

jackhughes @/trevorzegras @_quinnhughes if she dies, the blood is on your hands

yourusername @/jackhughes dramatic much?

jackhughes @/yourusername i learned it from you

jamie.drysdale i wish you two weren’t my roman empir but i constantly fear i’ll have to bail one of you out of jail

yourusername ONE TIME! IT HAPPENED ONE TIME!

trevorzegras you didn’t even bail us out!

jamie.drysdale @/trevorzegras i was prepared to

_quinnhughes @/trevorzegras he tried but i told him you two were my mess to take care of

yourusername @_quinnhughes idk how to respond to that

trevorzegras @_quinnhughes what she said

_alexturcotte i’m having war flashbacks

jackhughes me too

lhughes_06 me too

colecaufield me too

_quinnhughes me too

yourusername me too

trevorzegras me too

jamie.drysdale MY BAD! DAMN!

user7 you two are the travis and taylor of the nhl and i stand by that

yourusername i’m so honored😭

slknight35 @/trevorzegras remember when you called yourself sissy’s knight in shining armor because she tripped and you caught her and then asked what your prize was for winning the shot competition and then we all made you two kiss?

trevorzegras that was the best party you ever threw

trevorzegras wait, do you also have a sissy pass?!

slknight35 @/yourusername was this supposed to be a secret? i’ve called you sissy for years?

colecaufield @/slkight35 YEARS?! DO YOU HAVE A TWO PER YEAR PASS?!

slknight35 @/yourusername i think i broke them

yourusername @/slknight35 don’t worry, spency, i got this

yourusername @/trevorzegras so help me god, we AREN’T IN HIGH SCHOOL ANYMORE! WE DO THE DIRTY! WHY WOULD YOU CALL ME SISSY?!

trevorzegras @/yourusername WHY WOULD YOU PHRASE IT LIKE THAT?!

yourusername @/trevorzegras so sorry, my love, would you like me to go into specifics?

slkight35 @/yourusername let’s not

_quinnhughes @/yourusername MINORS COULD BE PRESENT

yourusername @/slknight35 @_quinnhughes I WASN’T GONNA DO IT

_quinnhughes @/yourusername you’re unpredictable. we have to take precautions.

colecaufield @/yourusername and where is my explanation, best friend number two?

yourusername @/colecaufield i like him better than you

colecaufield @/yourusername we aren’t friends for the next 28 minutes

yourusername @/colecaufield cry baby

slkight35 @/yourusername that’s some tough love

jackhughes @/slknight35 that’s not even close to her tough love

trevorzegras @/slkight35 i’m actually proud of her

yourusername @/trevorzegras it’s your national boyfriends day gift <3

user19 sissy: *writes the sweetest caption in the history of ever* also sissy: *still unhinged*

user5 “future ex fiancé” y/n give me one chance! i’ll gladly be called your ex fiancé!

jackhughes did you use up your niceness cap in the caption?

yourusername maybe, who knows?

colecaufield @/yourusername me! i know!

yourusername @/colecaufield mwah!

colecaufield @/yourusername mmf

jackhughes @/yourusername you’d think that california sunshine would’ve made you extra happy

yourusername @/jackhughes i AM happy! i just must protect spency! i love him! and i love you, soulmate!

jackhughes @/yourusername suspicious… i love you, too, soulmate…

_alexturcotte you two are disgusting(ly cute)

yourusername nice save, bestie

_alexturcotte i gotta stay on your good side!

yourusername i don’t have a bad side! @.trevorzegras do i have a bad side????

trevorzegras @/yourusername no, sweet girl, you’re all good side

trevorzegras @_alexturcotte quirky! we call her quirky!

_alexturcotte @/trevorzegras whatever you say

jamie.drysdale @_alexturcotte you’ve been friends with her for how long?

_alexturcotte @/jamie.drysdale to be fair, we used to call her our precious psycho

jackhughes @/jamie.drysdale she was so precious

jamie.drysdale @/trevorzegras she’s so sweet at home and i’m frequently shocked the more i learn about you guys in high school

trevorzegras @/jamie.drysdale love changed her

yourusername @/trevorzegras you make me a better person, what can i say?

_alexturcotte there’s that disgusting cuteness again

trevorzegras I JUST WANT TO PUBLICLY ANNOUNCE THAT Y/N IS ACTUALLY THE SWEETEST, KINDEST, MOST LOVING PERSON ON THE PLANET! WE ALL JUST SHOW LOVE VIOLENTLY!

yourusername god i’m so in love with you

trevorzegras uno reverse

colecaufield i’m cole caufield, and i approve this message

yourusername @/colecaufield damn right <3

jackhughes sissy just shows love more violently than us

yourusername @/jackhughes bite me

jackhughes @/yourusername wouldn’t be the first time

_quinnhughes @/jackhughes @/yourusername you two are a lot

lhughes_06 @_quinnhughes i’d normally say don’t talk about my parents like that, but i was there the last time jack bit her

slknight35 @/lhughes_06 nice to hear they haven’t changed

lhughes_06 @/slkight35 they got worse

jamie.drysdale ignoring the biting, i’d like to also say that my ex wife is the loveliest, weirdest person i’ve ever met

yourusername @/jamie.drysdale aww, you sap!

trevorzegras @/yourusername I LOVE YOU THE MOST! THIS IS MY DAY! MY POST!

yourusername @/trevorzegras OKAY I’M SORRY! I LOVE YOU THE MOSTEST! YOUR DAY! I’M ALL YOURS!

trevorzegras @/yourusername forever?

yourusername @/trevorzegras always❤️

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - There's so much airing even I'm struggling to keep up

That's why I'm late.

Aug 2023 Wk 3

Ongoing Series - Thai

Laws of Attraction (Sat iQIYI) 6 of 8 - Oh no. I am totally in love with the escaped young master & his smitten bodyguard. How did that happen? (Be careful P’Thee the broken ones are the most tempting. Tin understands.) NO SINGING! Trust Thai BL to destroy any moment of sentiment I might have by picking up a damn guitar. And we finally get Charn’s Batman villain origin story. Good use of back hug! This is a GREAT show. Melodramatic as fuck, but GREAT. Gotta say this pair in NOT Thailand’s best kissers but not everyone can be Zee++. Still I think that + singing + a touch of overacting is likely to keep this out of the 10/10 club.

Dangerous Romance (Fri YT) ep 1 of 12 - Rich /poor dynamic with characters & set up exactly as expected. Chimon is great. Perth is good too. A real rich-kid bully, Heirs level or Japanese F4 evil. All the teachers are also corrupt (that’s kinda a Thai thing, I think because they can't call out the government). I gotta say, Marc is doing a bang-up job as the jock friend, too. And the kiss twist was fun. All in all, this is good. And you know me, I love a high school BL.

I Feel You Linger in the Air (Sat YT) ep 1 of 12 - The time travel historical romance many of us have been waiting for. Adaption of y-novel by Violet Rain, from the producers of Lovely Writer. Heartbroken architect is transported to the 1930s. Nonkul (actor playing Jom) keeps reminding me of Cho Han Gyeol from Love Mate. It’s a bit slow to start but interesting when it hits its stride. The pacing feels like a Chinese historical (makes me wonder if this with be 4 or 6 act structure). Nonkul is a wonderful actor. They weren’t sharing the screen for long, but the leads seem good together. I’m in. 

Only Friends (Sat YT) ep 2 of 10 - Well. It’s entertaining, I'll say that for it. Addiction. Manipulation. Queer as folk & all that jazz. (No jazz for you, Thailand. Oh no! I’m giving them ideas.) I would like it to turn out that Mew is actually manipulating everything. This is his revenge con on Top. Mew is, after all, supposed to be "the smart one." Gotta say, this is darn near perfect casting. But honestly? This show could just be about Ray & Sand. Their story (and them in it) is easily the most riveting. Sand better be careful, the wildly broken ones are always the best in bed, because they don’t care ao they have no shame and that's HOT.

Hidden Agenda (Sun GMMTV YouTube) ep 6 of 10 - I like how soft Joke’s version of seme flirting is. It’s mellow, like his voice gets with Zo. I also liked Zo casually chatting to his friends about how he feels about being flirted with. His friends gave good advice & were supportive. Oh no! A boy in a BL went into the rain ALONE. What ON EARTH will happen next? The argument was interesting, because it gave us insight into Zo’s maturity & ability to handle a relationship. I’ve been wondering why anyone would like him, and now I know. Joke & Nita’s backstory is fun. I like the gay boy protecting the straight girl reverse beard action. On a complete aside, I really like Dunk’s makeup in this series. It’s very Kdrama.

Low Frequency (Sat iQIYI) ep 7 of 8 - The house ghosts trying to help are cute. The plot is at least... a plot? I don’t know. Dias Ex Mafia is a new one on me. (COME ON THAT’S A GREAT PUN, PRAISE ME!) I’m ready for this show to be over. 

Be Mine Super Star (Mon Viki) ep 7 of 12 - Honestly, the whole time I’m watching this I’m just thinking I wish JaFirst got better scripts. Speaking of, I don’t object, but these characters sure moved into sex fast. I really don’t quite understand how Daddy & Hot Doc got together so fast either. It feels like their story was meant to be spread out into the other episodes but didn’t get cut in properly, so it ended up all in this one? Or is it just the pacing is particularly bad in this show?

Dinosaur Love (Sun iQIYI) ep 8 of 10 eps - I have no idea what is going on. What are all of Dino’s friends doing? What do they want? what’s their point in the story? I’m even annoyed by Peak, and love him. Sex scene which they tried to make sexy. Operative word being tried. Although, there was some interesting after sex discussion about mechanics. And there was a cute bathtub chat about pet names. But this show is a lotta work for very little pay out. 

Wedding Plan (Wed YT & iQIYI) ep 5 of 7 - I like the sunshine sides? PUNCH LOM 2023! Trash watch here!

Love in Translation (Sat iQIYI) ep 1 of 10 - Pushy older bro is Earn from Love Sick, yay! And he’s the hyung of a side couple, which is "best friend’s older brother" trope! My favorite!!!! Have we seen this in BL before? I don't think so. Anyway, DOUBLE YAY! The main couple… eh. You know I loathe stalker characters. And I viscerally HATE this one. Almost as bad as SCOY, not sure I can take it, actually. The squealing of "Tammy!" is worse on my ear than any off-key guitar strumming. I may have to DNF or fast forward through all his parts… but he’s the lead. What to do? I do like the “Chinese” businessman actor. He very cute. (On an aside, I was just reading about commercial real estate as the loophole for foreign property investors in Thailand. Cool plot point.) I’m getting a Taming of the Shrew vibes from this. Just me? For now it's living at the bottom of the list for sheer unadulterated loathing of Phumjai. Not the actor, he was my favorite and only good thing about Our Days. But this character? NO.

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Jun & Jun (Korea Thur Viki) ep 5 of 8 - This is basically the gay Boys Over Flowers of my heart. Or as close as I think we’ll get from BL. I like both of the 2nd leads, even though I suspect Simon of actually being into everyone’s fav hyung. Cute to see the Mr Heart boys back on my screen, oh so briefly. Such a Taiwan trick, reusing a beloved couple like that. Nice gimmie to the fans. Meanwhile, Choi Jun - boy sure knows his angles but his motives? Please don’t let this be another arranged marriage beard situation? I can’t take 2 in the same month. 

Stay By My Side (Taiwan Fri Gaga) ep 8 of 10 - The boyfriends ep! JC is biggest simp spoiling his baby EVER. Taiwan = the sappiest of saps. “Owning the same key” is such a cute way of putting it. Also I love the "knew all along" twist, made me happy. The angst is silly but that's normal in Taiwanese BL. 

Love Class Season 2 (Korea Fri Viki) eps 3-4 of 10 - Pair 1: Lee Hyun is such a wide-open, bleeding, no-shame romantic. It’s kinda great. Boy has a poet’s soul & NO artifice. J-Min is startlingly good, very nuanced. I know I keep saying that, but I’m v surprised by his skillz. And… add in creepy stalker, goody. Pair 2: The "other student couple" I’m not into, also NO SINGING. Pair 3: The underwear gift was so fucking funny. “I’m going reap the boxers I sewed” is next level script excellence. These two are brilliant at gayest-of-gay flirt-negging, I'm INTO IT. One of my housemates said, in response to my audible cackling, "You seem to be enjoying your shows extra much tonight."  

My Personal Weatherman AKA Taikan Yoho (Japan Sat Gaga) ep 2 of 8 - Oh I love love love them. It’s so old school yaoi and SO JBL. No other country could produce this kind of show. I love this little feminist aspect where the weatherman treats his boy like a 1950s housewife & said boy thinks that makes him an indentured servant. Clocks. But also, the way our weatherman LOOKS at his boy. He is so in love. (It looks like we skip next week for holiday reasons?) 

Sing My Crush (Korea Wed iQIYI) eps 5-6 of 8 - It remains enjoyable. 

Minato's Laundromat Season 2 AKA Minato Shouji Coin Laundry Season 2 (Japan Thu Gaga) ep 6 of 12 - At least we know Minato actually desires Shin, he just won’t do anything about it. Also, Minato chose the perfect person to come out to. That's nice for him. Finally, Shu & Asuka are glorious. Sides are winning these days.

Stay Still (Hong Kong Tues YouTube) ep 3 of 5 - A proper faen fatal has entered one of our couples. She won too, since she ended up marrying the boy. Still not sure about this show (and it should have convinced me by now). I definitely like the tattoo couple better than the reunion couple. Still, not a lot happened in this episode and this is short series, they don’t have time to waste. It remains intriguing but not... erm... good.

In case you missed it

River Knows Fish Heart is leaving Gaga soon. It's a decent little bully romance Chinese BL (pulp) - yes, you read that right. Actual CBL. Not great, but if you're into the CBL stuff, especially the early stuff, this has some of that tenor only made in 2018 (I have a feeling it was shot in 2017 and skated through). Anygay, just staying. Catch it before it disappears because with CBL once they gone, often, they gone forever.

Friend. Boy Friend a new Thai BL pulp was supposed to start airing on Aug 19th. I can't find it. Neither can MDL.

Next Week Looks Like This:

Everything from Thailand seems to be dropping on Sat & Sun this month. It's a good thing I got quiet weekends for a while. Also the BL firehose is upon us, so much content.

Starting this week:

8/20 (tomorrow) My Universe series (Sun iQIYI) 24 eps - This is sampler pack BL, 12 pairs, each pair gets 2 eps, not sure on the order they’ll drop. Known couples include EarthBank from Destiny Seeker and KaownahTurbo from Love Stage!!!, fresh faces otherwise. Jane to direct.

8/22 Kisseki: Dear to Me formerly known as Miracle (Taiwan Tues Viki & iQIYI) 13 eps - From screenwriter Lin Pei Yu (We Best Love, H3: Trapped) features a student doctor forced to take care of a gangster. I love the premise and like the writer.  

8/23 Why R U? (Korean remake iQIYI) 8 eps - I find everything about this hilarious. I mean if Korea remakes it, we lose all the sexy and then... would we have a story at all? No we would not. Not even for 8 short eps. It’d be like one of those mesh shopping bags.

8/24 Man Suang (Thailand movie, domestic cinema release) - historical drama about Thai burlesque with KP’s MileApo. 

2023 forthcoming BL master post (see comments, some are inaccurate, NOT KEPT UPDATED).

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

Another show reviewing itself. (Dino Love)

Don't insult bastards, Lom. (Wedding trash)

I would like this adorable romcom GMMTV, please and thank you.

See what I mean? Trixy.

Thanks boys. (All Only Friends)

(Last week) 

[fanfics4all]

Fainting

Request: Yes / No Thank you @badthingshappenbingo​ for my card! 

Don’t be shy, request things! <3 Have a nice day/night

Fangs Fogarty x Fem!Reader 

Word count: 3747

Warnings: Bulimia, Self-harm, Starvation

Y/N: Your Name 

Y/N/N: Your Nickname

Prompt(s):

PLEASE DO NOT STEAL MY WORK, I WORK HARD ON MY FICS AND IT’S NOT COOL TO STEAL SOMEONE ELSE’S WORK! 

If you want to be on the tag list for anything (My series fics, specific character fics, or just all of them) All you have to do is send me an ask and I will add you! 

Masterlist 

If you enjoy my work, you could also show support by buying me a coffee! 

(Not my photo, credit to whoever made it!)

Fangs and I have lived together for about a month now, and in that month I’ve managed to hide the fact that I fucking hate my body. No one knew and I was too worried about being judged to tell anyone. I knew deep down that Fangs would never judge me, I mean we’ve been dating for three years now, but the voices always win in the end. So that’s why I spend a lot of time in the bathroom whenever Fangs goes out without me. 

“I’ll be back in a bit, babe!” Fangs called. He was going out with Pea for a job with the Serpents. 

“Okay! Be careful!” I called back. Ironic I’m telling him to be careful when I sit at home and throw everything up. 

“I will, love you!” He said. 

“Love you too!” I said and heard the door close behind him. I waited a bit to make sure Fangs wouldn’t walk back in because he forgot something. The last time that happened I pretended to shower so he wouldn’t hear me. Once I was sure he wouldn’t come back I got off our bed and walked into the bathroom. I pulled out the scale and took a deep breath before I stepped on it. I closed my eyes and tried my best not to shake. I took another calming breath and slowly peeled my eyes open to look at the horrid number. 130 pounds… I sighed, at least I lost two pounds since yesterday. I didn’t really eat anything yesterday. Or the day before. Or the day before that. In fact, I couldn’t really remember the last time I ate a proper meal in which I didn’t throw up a few hours later while Fangs was asleep. It was probably a year ago? Someone at school made a comment about me that I brushed off in the moment, but it was like a silent switch flipped in my brain. After that, I went home and stared at the mirror, noticing all the imperfections about myself. That was the day I decided to lose weight. When normal methods weren’t working, I turned to the extreme. It was the only thing that gave me results… It didn’t help that I started comparing myself to people Fangs talked to. The girls were way prettier than I am. The boys were skinnier than me. I couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that Fangs chose me out of everyone. I couldn’t think of any reasons that Fangs stayed with me all this time, or even why he asked me to move in with him after my trailer burnt down. Don’t get me wrong, I’m so happy with Fangs, but something in my head just isn’t on the same page as my heart. 

I sighed and looked down at the number once again. 130 pounds. It was below the average weight of my age group, but 120 or even 110 would be way better. I stepped off the scale and looked at myself in the mirror. 

Look at your thighs, they’re so fat. Don’t forget that huge stomach of yours. Did you see that girl he was talking to at the bar last week? Now she was perfectly skinny. The perfect body. 

I sighed and ran my fingers over my body. Fat. That was all I could feel. I was fucking fat. No matter how little I eat, or how much I worked out. I will always be fat. Fat and fucking ugly. I would never be perfect like those people Fangs talk to. I took off my clothes and looked in the mirror again. I stared at my stomach. Even though the scale says I got smaller, to me it looks like my stomach has grown another twenty pounds. My stomach growled as I lightly touched it. I hated the hunger pains, but the feeling of emptiness was too addictive. I love feeling like I finally was in control of my body. I moved my hands down to my thighs and felt the small scars that were slightly raised. When I first started that’s how I would punish myself when the workouts didn’t work, or if I gained another pound or two. That didn’t last long since Toni found out and told Fangs. I wasn’t too attached to the cutting, so that was easy to stop. The sharp pain as the razor glided through my skin, pulling beads of crimson up through the cut, wasn’t as good as the starving. It didn’t make me feel better like not eating. I shook my head and glanced over at the toilet. I’ve become very acquainted with it. My head was shoved inside it at least twice a day. Sure my stomach was empty, but I knew I could still get some stuff out of me. I kneeled down and gently lifted the lid. I stared down into the toilet and took a few breaths. Throwing up on an empty stomach always hurt, but it was worth it to lose those few pounds. I opened my mouth and took my pointer finger into my mouth. I slowly pushed it to the back of my throat and gagged once I found the spot. I was good at not pulling my finger out when I gagged now, so I just kept pushing on it. My stomach was screaming in pain as it tightened with each gag. It took a few minutes, but eventually, I felt the burning creep up my throat. I pulled my finger out and leaned over the toilet. I watched as the bile flew into the water and already felt a little lighter. It wasn’t much, but every little bit helps. I took a few breaths to recover and quickly pushed my finger back inside my mouth. Once again it took a bit, but I eventually threw up more bile. It still wasn’t enough though. I kept going and going until my head started to spin. I felt really dizzy and weak, but it was working. I felt lighter. I kept going until black dots invaded my vision. I fell back on my ass and held my head. 

“J-Jus-st a b-bi-it mo-ore…” I slurred to myself. I tried to get back up so I could finish, but I just fell to the floor more and my vision turned completely black… 

*Fangs POV* 

I walked back into the trailer with a smile as I carried some Pop’s for me and Y/N. I placed the bags and drinks on the coffee table and noticed Y/N wasn’t there. Must be in our room with her laptop or something. 

“Babe, I’m back! I brought Pop’s.” I called but got no answer. 

“Baby?” I called again, thinking she couldn’t hear me. Still nothing. 

“Y/N, you asleep or something?” I said as I walked towards our bedroom. She wasn’t there. I furrowed my brows and wondered if maybe she went out with Toni or something. I pulled out my phone and called her. I heard her phone ring and followed it to the bathroom. I quickly hung up and walked over to the bathroom. The shower wasn’t running so she should have heard me. 

“Y/N? Baby? You in there?” I asked as I gently knocked. No answer. My heart started pounding faster and I quickly opened the door. I stopped in shock as I stared inside the bathroom. Y/N was lying on the floor, looking unnaturally skinny and there was vomit in the toilet. I quickly rushed over to her and checked her pulse. The small thump from her neck made me sigh in relief. I carefully pushed my hands under her and lifted her up. I gasped when I felt how light she was. How did I not notice how much weight she lost? How did I not notice how her bones were starting to be visible through her skin. I shuddered and felt tears pushing themselves to the surface. How the hell could I be such a shitty boyfriend and not realize the love of my life was putting herself in so much danger. I carefully made my way to our room and gently laid her down. I grabbed one of my shirts and carefully put it on her, she was drowning in it. I tucked her in so she wouldn’t get cold and checked that she was breathing again. I sighed and left to deal with the bathroom. Once I was done cleaning I grabbed her some water and placed it on the nightstand. I pulled up a chair and sat next to her. I stoked her hair and tried my hardest to think of what could have made her do this, or even when she started. I blamed myself for not seeing anything different. I believed every smile Y/N always put on. Every laugh she made. How the hell did I not see anything!? I tried to calm myself down, but I was so angry with myself. Maybe even a very small part of me was mad at her for not coming to me, but I pushed that away. I shouldn’t be mad at her, she needs me more than ever. I grabbed my phone and decided to call Toni and see if she knew anything about this. 

“Hey Fangs, what’s up?” She answered after the second ring. 

“Did you notice anything off about Y/N lately?” I asked, getting right to the point. 

“Uh, no? Why? What’s up?” She asked, worry clear in her voice. 

“I came home and she was passed out in the bathroom with vomit in the toilet. She’s really fucking skinny Toni…” I said, feeling a tear involuntarily fall down my cheek. 

“What? How skinny?” She asked. 

“Like I can see her ribs starting to poke out.” I answered and she gasped. 

“W-What? H-How?” She asked and I sighed. 

“I don’t know, T. I didn’t notice anything different…” I said quietly. 

“How? Have you guys not… ya know?” She asked and my eyes widened. 

“We’ve both been busy, but every time she’s just wanted to ya know, please me…” I said and felt my stomach turn slightly. She’s been hiding this for so long… 

“Shit Fangs, are you at the hospital? Want me and Pea to come by?” She asked and I shook my head. 

“I just have my bike and I-I don’t know what the hell they’ll do to her. I’m scared to take her there. What if they say she’s dying, or they lock her up, or I don’t know…” I sighed. 

“Fangs if she’s really bad you’ve gotta take her to the hospital, they’ll help her.” She said, gently. 

“Toni I can’t, what if she never forgives me for that? Clearly, she’s been hiding this for a while I don’t want her to hate me…” I said, fully crying by now. 

“Listen, Fangs, you wanna help her, right?” She asked with a sigh. 

“Yes…” I whispered. 

“Then you gotta take her. I’ll call Pea and we can use his truck, okay?” She asked and I shook my head again. 

“Can’t I just wait till she wakes up? They’re gonna keep her there for who knows how long.” I said and she sighed. 

“I don’t think you should wait. What if this isn’t the first time she’s passed out?” She asked and my eyes widened. I didn’t think about that. 

“J-Just let me wait till she wakes up first. Let me talk to her.” I begged and she sighed. 

“Fine, but you call me after, you got it?” She asked. 

“I promise.” I said and she sighed again. 

“I’m still calling Pea and letting him know what’s going on.” She said and I sighed. 

“Fine, just keep him from barging in, I don’t wanna scare her.” I said and she agreed. We said our goodbyes and hung up. 

I sat there in silence as I just stared at Y/N. I couldn’t stop thinking about how awful I am for not noticing anything. She hid it really well, which hurt. I had stopped crying but didn’t bother wiping my face. I just held her hand and stared at her. That’s when she started shifting. She slowly opened her Y/E/C and looked around for a moment before they landed on my dark brown ones. Neither of us moved or made a sound, just stared at the other. 

“I’m sorry…” She mumbled after a moment. She looked down and a tear rolled down her cheek. 

“Never. I mean never, do that again.” I choked out as my tears returned. Y/N looked up silently and reached up with her other hand to wipe away my tears. 

“You shouldn’t cry over me, I’m not worth it…” She whispered as she continued to caress my cheek. I felt the anger return and pulled back from her. 

“No Y/N! Don’t you ever think that! You’re more than worth it, you’re my perfect girl. I don’t understand why you even thought you needed to lose weight in the first place, but you’ve always been perfect! You’re beautiful, funny, caring, and amazing! I love you, I always have. I can’t stand seeing you do this to yourself when you don’t need to. I saw what was in the toilet, when was the last time you ate?” I asked and she had more tears falling down her gorgeous face. 

“I-I don’t know. Yesterday at lunch? I don’t know. I-I…” She started crying harder. I pulled her in for a gentle hug and stroked her hair. 

“How long have you been doing this babe?” I whispered. 

“A-A ye-year…” She answered between sobs. My heart broke and I sighed. I held her for a bit longer and gently pulled her back once she calmed down a bit. 

“Baby, you need to eat and actually keep it down. You need to get better, Y/N. Please.” I said and she shook her head. 

“I-I can’t! Looking at all those people that you talk to, they’re so much prettier than me! They’re skinnier, hotter, cooler, everything! Those people at school made me realize that I’m never going to be like them. I’m never going to be good enough for you…” She said, sobbing into her hands. My eyes widened as I stared at her. Who the fuck said that to her? She’s always been perfect, my everything… I gently pulled her hands away and tried to catch her eyes, but she avoided me. 

“Y/N, look at me, please?” I asked quietly. She looked up and she looked so broken. 

“Y/N Y/L/N, I love you more than anything. I always have and I always will. No one in this damn world could ever compare to you, baby. You’ve always been my number one and I have never even thought of another person. Guy or girl. You don’t need to change yourself just because some jealous bitch said something to you. I will always love you no matter what.” I said and she sobbed. 

“Do you mean it?” She asked in a broken whisper. 

“Every word baby. I promise you that I love you with every piece of my heart. I just want you to get better right now. You passed out Y/N, do you know how scared I was?” I asked quietly. 

“I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…” She cried and I pulled her into my chest. 

“Shhh, it’s okay baby. You don’t have to be sorry okay? We’re gonna get you some help and get you better, okay?” I asked and she nodded. 

“Now, I gotta call Toni and tell her you woke up before she and Pea come breaking down the door.” I said and her eyes widened. 

“Y-You told Toni and Pea?” She asked with more tears falling. 

“I called to see if Toni noticed anything with you, I was so worried Y/N.” I said, caressing her cheek and wiping the tears. She closed her eyes and leaned into my touch. 

“Toni wanted me to take you to the hospital and I know I should have, but I just didn’t want to lose you.” I admitted and she looked up at me. 

“I’m so sorry, Fangs…” She said and I shook my head. 

“You don’t need to be sorry, baby.” I said and kissed her forehead. 

“Now let me call Toni and maybe I can convince her to not take you to the hospital, but you have to eat a bit of the Pop’s I brought home, deal?” I asked and she nodded while taking a shaky breath. 

“I’m not gonna make you eat all of it, but you need to eat at least a little okay? We’ll work on this slowly.” I said and she nodded. 

“O-Okay…” She whispered. I smiled and kissed her head once more before I went to get the food. When I walked back in she was fiddling with her hands. She looked up and I saw her sniff the air subtly. Her stomach growled and I smiled slightly. I walked over and placed the food on her lap, but left the milkshake in the other room. It would be way too heavy for her right now, even if she did love them. 

“I got your favorite, but I think we’re gonna skip the milkshake today and just stick with water, alright?” I asked and she nodded. Her shaky hands took out the burger and fries and gently laid them on the blanket. 

“Alright, I’m gonna sit right here and call Toni and you’re gonna start eating, okay?” I asked and she nodded. I pulled out my phone and called Toni as I watched Y/N slowly start to eat the cold fries. I watched as she put the first one in her mouth and she moaned slightly. I smiled as she continued eating them. 

“Fangs! Is she awake?” Toni answered. 

“Yeah, she’s awake.” I answered and I heard her sigh. 

“Perfect, I’m with Pea and Juggie right now and we have the truck so we’ll be over in a few and we can take her to the hospital.” She said as I heard movement from her side. 

“I don’t think we’re gonna need to take her to the hospital.” I said as I watched her pick up the burger. She took a bite and her eyes rolled to the back of her head. I chuckled and smiled at her. 

“Fangs she passed out, she needs to go to the fucking hospital.” Toni said, slightly annoyed. 

“I think we can deal with this ourselves, T.” I said and she groaned. 

“Seriously? You agreed to take her to the hospital when she woke up.” She said and I sighed. 

“Just come over and see, I promise we got this.” I said and she sighed. 

“Fine, we’re already on our way.” She said and hung up. I hung up and saw Y/N was halfway done with the burger. 

“Slow down babe.” I said with a small chuckle. She blushed and looked over at me. 

“Sorry…” She mumbled and I smiled at her. 

“Don’t be, I know you’re hungry, but like I said we gotta take it slow.” I said and she nodded. 

A few minutes later, our front door was opening. We heard three sets of footsteps coming towards us and Y/N looked scared. I grabbed her hand and gently gave her a reassuring squeeze. The door opened and in walked Toni, Pea, and Jughead. They all looked at Y/N with wide eyes and Toni rushed over to her other side. She pulled her in for a hug, which Y/N returned. 

“Are you crazy? Starving yourself or throwing shit up, whichever. How long has this been going on, huh?” Toni asked and Y/N looked down in shame. 

“Toni, relax. We already talked about it and look she’s already eating.” I said and grabbed Y/N’s hand again. 

“I’m sorry…” Y/N said quietly again. 

“Babe I already told you, you don’t need to be sorry.” I said. 

“No Fangs is right, sorry Y/N/N, I’m just worried.” Toni said, taking a seat on the bed next to her. 

“We all are.” Jones said. She looked up at Pea and Jughead and they each smiled at her. 

“Yeah, so who ass do I need to beat for starting this shit?” Pea asked and Toni rolled her eyes. Y/N laughed and I smiled at her. 

“If I’m honest I don’t even remember who said something…” She said and blushed slightly. 

“I just know it was about a year ago and that’s when I started looking at myself differently. I just hate how I look and constantly compare myself to everyone else and…” She trailed off. 

“Wait, that’s when you started cutting, were you doing this too?” Toni asked and Y/N shook her head. 

“No, I started after you guys helped with that…” She said with a guilty tone. 

“Oh Y/N…” Toni said and pulled her in for another hug. 

“I’m so-” 

“Nope, don’t you dare apologize.” Toni said, cutting her off. 

“Yeah, we’re sorry for not noticing anything.” Jones said and Y/N shook her head. 

“I hid it, there was no way you guys could have known. I mean I was wearing clothes that were a bit too big for me so you guys wouldn’t see my weight change.” She said and we all looked at each other. That explains a bit. 

“We’ll that’s fucking over, let’s go get you some more food.” Pea said and she shook her head. 

“I’m kind of full.” She said and I placed the rest of the food on the nightstand. 

“That’s okay, like I said, slow.” I said and she nodded with a small smile. 

“Fangs is right, we gotta take this slow, but we’re all here for you and we’re gonna help every step of the way.” Toni said with a smile. Pea and Jones also nodded and Y/N teared up. 

“You guys are the best and I’m really so-” 

“Stop apologizing Y/N/N, or I’m gonna kick your ass.” Pea said and she laughed a real genuine happy laugh. We all smiled at her and I gently squeezed her hand. This might be a hard and long road ahead, but we would all support her every step. I think she finally realized that she’s amazing and if not we would all be here to remind her.

Tag list: @les-bio-lie @tashy-bear @ashwarren32 @hollie-blogs-blog1 @lover-of-books-and-teas @nerdygaloresposts @teenwolfbitches28 @kmc1989 @drw0301bieber @lady-of-lies @ravenmoore14 @ravenempress101 @cillianchamp @rowanthomasknapp @rachelxwayne @ready-4-fanfiction @emo-godess-loves-you @hiya-imthatgirl @mindsetjupiter @averysinclaire @mittelerde1999 @sweetest-peas @rousewriter @camiconfessions-blog @thecaptainsgingersnap @cenyddtheunicorn @jacksxsouthsideserpents @lover2448 @mamacobie13 @fandom-princess-forevermore @liz-owl

[gingerylangylang1979]

Male identity: Carmy and Richie

I’m finding that a certain demographic of fans have a much harder time relating to Carmy but very much relate to Richie. Granted, a lot of this has to do with what fandom platform you observe. I actually kind of hate The Bear subreddit but continue to browse it periodically because it’s super interesting to hear what “the others” are talking about. I rarely engage anymore because it’s mostly nonsense and a totally different vibe than Tumblr. The contingent is definitely very anti-Carmy x Sydney and seems to hate Sydney. I’ve also noticed that while there is a lot of love for Carmy there is even more love for Richie. I’m very intrigued by this perspective. 

This season Richie was definitely a standout. I think Ebon is an amazing actor and am glad he is finally getting nominated for his role. I thought he got robbed with the non-Emmy nominations. But even before S2 I noticed that Richie was the most favored character among the Reddit demo and perhaps a big part of the general audience. That’s fine, people can favor who they like. I know that doesn’t represent everyone but I do think that speaks for what I consider general audience and makes sense considering how society still views manhood despite social progress. This season even a lot of the reviews were kind of meh about Carmy. I get it, I initially was writing him off too, was pissed, and thought he had the worst arc. Then once thoughts settled he went back to being my hero. Deeply flawed, but I just relate to him so much and he’s fascinating to watch. I’m a woman, so maybe that helps my empathy. I also don’t think The Bear would work with Richie as the lead as some have suggested. 

The thing is Carmy is a more difficult character because he has multiple layers of trauma, his work is so specialized and niche, he is a sensitive soul, he’s artistic, and he doesn’t fit the mold of the working class male models he was surrounded by. Your typical man can’t relate to him. And most likely your typical conservative leaning woman can’t either. At the Christmas party he was appalled at how the other guys were talking about Claire. And this is a woman he had a crush on and is present day attracted to. He could have easily been superficial and macho and laughed at the jokes as expected. He didn’t let Richie get away with calling Syd sweetheart. Richie says he’s “woke”. He employs a woman in a leadership role. He’s built different. 

He is struggling in many ways that are hidden and he also lashes out. The hidden ways and the lashing out are interpreted as whiny and annoying by people that can’t relate. He’s been cited as not growing but people can’t acknowledge that his healing won’t be linear. But how can it be when his trauma was collected in overlapping seasons for most of his life? The pain didn’t develop in a linear path. He had a stutter when he was young. There are hints that there is a learning issue of some sort (I’m not going to try and diagnose). He was always the “different” one in the family. The other guys call him “weird”. His father was absent. His mom has mental health issues and is an alcoholic. He witnessed the traumatic incident at Christmas and I’m sure it wasn’t the only such incident. His brother was an addict that pushed him away, then killed himself. He went into a chaotic, highly demanding field that required him to isolate to excel. He is shy and has trouble forming close bonds. He had a mentally abusive boss. He was always super competitive. He comes back to own The Beef and it’s problem after problem. How are people expecting him to be “fun” and have an easy comeback like Richie? 

Richie has issues, too. Stagnant in mid-life, spent years devoted to an addict, failed marriage, feeling disillusioned and displaced, also an absent father. But when we meet Richie he’s not as wounded as Carmy. Carmy is literally sleep cooking, almost starting fires, dissociating, having panic attacks. Richie is sad but it mostly manifests as him being kind of nasty and grumpy. He’s like a sour old man with dated and offensive jokes. His behavior is dismissed because he’s grieving. Which yes, he deserves a pass. But why does he deserve a bigger pass than Carmy who is dealing with so much more or Sydney who seemed to bear the biggest brunt of his outrage and was also struggling? Carmy is literally on the verge of a breakdown and has the weight of trying to keep the staff, the business, and himself afloat. Despite all this Richie gets a lot of indulgences for his bad behavior that Carmy isn’t. 

Richie is easier for a lot of people to digest because he’s funny, he’s the working class representative, he’s tall (yes people have height bias, especially with men). Carmy is viewed as the pompous prodigal son that’s trying to ruin Richie’s delicate ecosystem by gentrifying and kicking out “the working man”. There are people posting in disgust that he dare change The Beef despite it being a hell hole money pit. 

It’s just so interesting that in reality we are dealing with an unprecedented numbers of men who report extreme loneliness, depression, hopelessness. Richie and Carmy both fit that profile. Yet, a man like Richie is broadly understood and accepted and a man like Carmy isn’t. It goes back IMO to the continual coding of masculine/good vs feminine/bad. Richie is the stereotypical red blooded American male. He wants the stripper’s panties. He has a gun. He needs to be alpha. He views anything outside the norm as a threat. He wants to preserve tradition at all costs. Carmy is his foil. Carmy is viewed as feminine. 

I see it even on Tumblr with the persistent identification of Carmy as somehow feminine. Like he can’t be soft and traumatized and just be a man. So what does that say when even people who would probably consider themselves progressive still classify a man in feminine terms if he isn’t a MAN? We accept all types of gender identities but still struggle with a man not fitting the correct paradigm. Society still has issues accepting that men can be vulnerable and struggling without being feminized. People also make assumptions about Carmy’s gender identity and sexuality based on his trauma. Like, of course he has to be XYZ because well, look at him, he’s sad an pathetic. What does that say about men’s sexuality and identity? Are only queer men accepted as sad? Carmy could be a queer character, cool, representation matters. But I just find the semi-automatic equation of queerness with an atypical male to be odd and a bit regressive. 

Edited to add on above: I hope what I’m saying doesn’t get interpreted as dismissing queer people who identify with Carmy. I get it, I support it. What I’m speaking to is the insistence that canon Carmy is queer because of his interests, aesthetic, and mental health as if that is the only identity option. Granted, he could be bi. I also think some people are insistent on this, just as they are on Syd not being into men, as a way to negate the possibility of them being romantic. Again, I’m saying some people. Also, proximity and shared struggle doesn’t equal identity. This makes me think of once when a white gay male bestie claimed we are the same because I’m a black women. I had to kindly correct. We share the same haters, we are both marginalized, but he will never know my experience just like I will never know his. We can bond on the commonalities but we aren’t exactly the same. IMO, it would be a disservice to both of us to claim different.

I’m really rambling, but just thought I would share my thoughts and open a conversation about this. 

[strawberryraviegutz]

I feel like this needs to be said but..Am I the only one getting annoyed with the “Ame Chan is a bad person/problematic” discourse?? I’m not just talking about the ppl who’ve been complaining about her character saying they “didn’t realize how awful she was”. I’m also talking about ppl being like “lmao yall clearly didn’t play the game of course she’s a horrible person you’re just now realizing that??”

You don’t necessarily have to play a game to be a fan of it. It’s pretty common for ppl to watch gameplay videos or videos covering the story of/analyzing games and characters if they can’t or don’t wanna play it. Second I dont think we should just look at Ame through a black and white lense. Ame’s not a horrible person but she’s not necessarily good either. She’s a very VERY flawed person who struggles with mental health issues and addiction and makes rlly bad decisions and says rlly mean/bad things.

But that’s like…literally everyone on earth. Everyone has flaws especially mentally ill ppl, nobody’s perfect. It’s implied that Ame was literally abandoned/disowned by her parents so of course she’s not going to make the best decision with a “stable” mind especially if you’re desperate.

Ame Chan does terrible things/decisions like taking drugs on stream and self harming on stream and I think she even killed herself on stream too in one ending(tho feel free to correct me if I’m wrong) which is obviously irresponsible and dangerous. And she says things that aren’t necessarily nice or the best(some of it is warranted since some of the ppl in her chat were saying rlly awful, gross and even misogynistic things and calling her “old”).

And while she only wanted to be kangel for attention online, it’s kinda possible that she’s been able to have positive impacts on her fans/audience. We’ve seen how she is with the younger side of her fanbase as Kangel. She’s very kind and compassionate and overall very sweet towards them. Kangel’s entire persona is revolved around reaching out to lonley ppl online who’re struggling and to make them happy.

She may be doing it only for money snd attention, but like most ppl who struggle with mental health issues, they sometimes don’t realize the positive impacts they’ve had on the ppl around them. Hell maybe deep down Ame made Kangel to also help reach out to ppl like her online and make them happy too.

And as for the whole shotacon accusations, Ame Chan is NOT a shotacon. It was a very bad translation error and we all know that most translators aren’t always reliable(especially Google Translate) so please stop spreading that around. It’s been debunked already.

Maybe I’m biased because while I don’t have BPD(at least I don’t think so), have never taken drugs, nor have I ever cut myself in like a very VERY long time(tho I never left any scars cuz i didn’t like pain)and have an anxiety disorder and am autistic, I still sorta relate to/kin Ame Chan.

I’ve had my moments where I’ve had emotional and or violent outbursts(not where I’ve beat someone up or broke anything)due to a rush of emotion and or getting real worked up/frustrated online and irl.

And it’s always rubbed me the wrong way when I’ve been seeing ppl trying to put Ame into the box of “bad/problematic person” whether you’re trying to defend her character or not. It’s a lot more complex and morally grey than that and I think characters like her being in media are important to lessen the stigma of mental health whether it be in Japan or worldwide.

Feel free to correct me and fill me in on stuff if I missed anything or left anything out but in conclusion, Ame Chan is a not a good person, but she’s not necessarily a monster and or all bad either and I think ppl on both sides should realize that.

[topguncortez]

its been a couple of days since i made the tough choice to cut ties and temporarily walk away from a place that i love really really deeply.

but i’ve had some time to reflect and come to some conclusions about myself.

now excuse me while i vent out loud:

1) the phrase “once an addict, always an addict” is true. just because i don’t take pills anymore doesn’t mean i haven’t found a way to feed the craving of being addicted to something. im not 100% sure what that addiction is; maybe it’s that im a sucker for pain, maybe it’s i can’t walk away when i know i should, maybe it’s fucking caffeine (it’s 97% caffeine).

2) everyone heals and handles things differently. again, back to my past with addiction; some addicts can heal with still being able to be around the thing they are addicted to. i learned a long time ago, i am not that person. i have a hard time knowing when to walk away, but once i do… its like breathing fresh air. it hurts like a bitch sometimes but its also one of the best things for you. sometimes we get so blind with those rose colored glasses on, that we truly can’t see our own faults until we step back and reflect

3) i’m an angry person. i always have been and probably always will be. i’ve dealt with a lot of shitty things in my life. i’ve lost people who didn’t deserve to be taken away. i’ve watched some of the most vile humans get away with horrible offenses. i have been abused and assaulted. i’m angry. and there’s little i can do to shake that anger. however, i can control it. i can lock it away and deal with it in a healthy manner than just let it explode all over the place.

4). God knows what’s best for you. now, i don’t mean to get all religious on yall. i have struggled with my faith for years. I went through a period of time of questioning who God is and what his intentions are. If this great and almighty God sent his son to die to end our suffering… why are people still suffering? I still struggle with my faith, but i am relearning to put my trust in him and know that He is putting things in my life he knows I can overcome.

And finally,

5) never feel bad for doing things for yourself. i have been so well trained to put other peoples feelings above my own. for years, i have bit my tongue and told myself “i can’t say that, that’ll hurt their feelings” and let people continue to roll over me. believe it or not… i hate conflict. i hate awkward situations. i hate feeling like im being suffocated and i can’t breathe. i have become more vocal (good and bad thing) in speaking up when i have been hurt. it’s a slow learning process and sometimes it comes back to bite me in the ass cause i’m thrust into another situation i don’t know how to handle and the anxiety builds and then there’s tears and all that shit. but i have learned i should never feel bad for doing things for myself.

anyway, i know this is just a long ass vent that nobody is gonna read, but i hope maybe, just maybe this reaches someone who has been feeling the same way i have these past couple months.

i know not everyone has a great support system in real life that they can rely on when things get hard. i can honestly tell you that without some of the people in my everyday life and online life being there and helping me and offering me an ear to listen while i vent and scream at the world… i don’t think i’d still be here. but i want yall to know, if you need a place to vent and scream at the world, i am here for you. and i’ll do whatever i can to get you the help and resources if you need it. or if you just wanna get shit off your chest.

i’m here for you.

[shuxiii]

Everyday

Hanni Pham x reader pt1, pt2, pt3, pt4, pt5, pt6, pt7, pt8, pt9, pt10, pt11, pt12, pt13, pt14, pt15, pt16, pt17, pt18

A/n this is based on the novel book "every day" by David Levithan saur credits to him I tots recommend reading the novel itself it's so damn goodies bro like gosh golly lawrd.

synopsis: You, someone who wakes up in a different body every day to live a different life. You spend your days inhabiting a new body and pretending to be the person without changing their personality or life. 

TW: profanities

Day 5994

I wake up.

Immediately I have to figure out who I am. It’s not just

the body—opening my eyes and discovering whether the skin on my arm is light or dark, whether my hair is long or short, whether I’m fat or thin, boy or girl, scarred or smooth. The body is the easiest thing to adjust to if you’re used to waking up in a new one each morning. It’s the life, the context of the body, that can be hard to grasp. Every day I am someone else. I am myself—I know I am myself—but I am also someone else.

It has always been like this. The information is there. I wake up, open my eyes, and understand that it is a new morning, a new place. The biography kicks in, a welcome gift from the not‑me part of the mind. Today I am Kim Minji. Somehow I know this—my name is Minji—and at the same time I know that I’m not really Minji, I’m only borrowing her life for a day. I look around and know that this is her room.

This is her home. The alarm will go off in seven minutes.

I’m never the same person twice, but I’ve certainly been

this type before. Clothes everywhere. Far more video games

than books. Sleeps in her shorts. From the taste of her mouth, a smoker. But not so addicted that she needs one as soon as she wakes up.

“Good morning, Minji,” I say. Checking out her voice. Low. The voice in my head is always different.

Minji doesn’t take care of herself. Her scalp itches. Her eyes don’t want to open. She hasn’t gotten much sleep. Already I know I’m not going to like today. It’s hard being in the body of someone you don’t like, because you still have to respect it. I’ve harmed people’s lives in the past, and I’ve found that every time I slip up, it haunts me.

So I try to be careful. From what I can tell, every person I inhabit is the same age as me. I don’t hop from being nineteen to being ninety. Right now, it’s only nineteen. I don’t know how this works. Or why. I stopped trying to figure it out a long time ago. I’m never going to figure it out, any more than a normal person will figure out his or her own existence. After a while, you have to be at peace with the fact that you simply are. There is no way to know why. You can have theories, but there will never be proof.

I can access facts, not feelings. I know this is Minji’s room, but I have no idea if she likes it or not. Does she want to kill her parents in the next room? Or would she be lost without her mother coming in to make sure she’s awake? It’s impossible to tell. It’s as if that part of me replaces the same part of whatever person I’m in. And while I’m glad to be thinking like myself, a hint every now and then of how the other person thinks would be helpful.

We all contain mysteries, especially when Seen from the inside. The alarm goes off. I reach for a shirt and some jeans, but something lets me see that it’s the same shirt she wore yesterday. I pick a different shirt. I take the clothes with me to the bathroom and dress after showering. Her parents are in the kitchen now. They have no idea that anything is different.

Nineteen years is a lot of time to practice. I don’t usually make mistakes. Not anymore. I read her parents easily: Minji doesn’t talk to them much in the morning, so I don’t have to talk to them. I have grown accustomed to sensing expectations in others, or the lack of them. I shovel down some cereal, leave the bowl in the sink without washing it, grab Minji’s keys, and go.

Yesterday I was a girl in a town I’d guess to be two hours away. The day before, I was a boy in a town three hours farther than that. I am already forgetting their details. I have to, or else I will never remember who I really am.

Minji listens to loud and obnoxious music on a loud and obnoxious station where loud and obnoxious DJs make loud and obnoxious jokes as a way of getting through the morning. This is all I need to know about Minji, really. I access her memory to show me the way to school, which parking space to take, and which locker to go to. The combination. The names of the people she knows in the halls.

Sometimes I can’t go through these motions. I can’t bring myself to go to school and maneuver through the day. I’ll say I’m sick, stay in bed, and read a few books. But even that gets tiresome after a while, and I find myself up for the challenge of a new school, and new friends. For a day.

As I take Minji’s books out of her locker, I can feel someone

hovering on the periphery. I turn, and the girl standing there Is transparent in her emotions—tentative and expectant, nervous and adoring. I don’t have to access Minji to know that this is her girlfriend. No one else would have this reaction to her, so unsteady in her presence. She’s pretty, but she doesn’t see it. She’s hiding behind her hair, happy to see me and unhappy to see me at the same time.

Her name is Hanni. And for a moment—just the slightest beat—I think that, yes, this is the right name for her. I don’t know why. I don’t know her. But it feels right.

This is not Minji’s thought. It’s mine. I try to ignore it. I’m not the person she wants to talk to.

“Hey,” I say, keeping it casual.

“Hey,” she murmurs back.

She’s looking at the floor, at her inked‑in Converse. She’s drawn cities there, skylines around the soles. Something’s happened between her and Minji, and I don’t know what it is. It’s probably not something that Minji even recognized at the time.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

I see the surprise on her face, even as she tries to cover it. This is not something that Minji normally asks. And the strange thing is: I want to know the answer. The fact that she wouldn’t care makes me want it more.

“Sure,” she says, not sounding sure at all.

I find it hard to look at her. I know from experience that beneath every peripheral girl is a central truth. She’s hiding hers away, but at the same time, she wants me to see it. That is, she wants Minji to see it. And it’s there, just out of my reach. A sound waiting to be a word.

She is so lost in her sadness that she has no idea how visible it is. I think I understand her—for a moment, I presume to understand her—but then, from within this sadness, she surprises me with a brief flash of determination. Bravery, even. Shifting her gaze away from the floor, her eyes matching mine,

she asks, “Are you mad at me?”

I can’t think of any reason to be mad at her. If anything, I am mad at Minji, for making her feel so diminished. It’s there in her body language. When she is around her, she makes herself small.

“No,” I say. “I’m not mad at you at all.”

I tell her what she wants to hear, but she doesn’t trust it. I feed her the right words, but she suspects they’re threaded with hooks.

This is not my problem; I know that. I am here for one day. I cannot solve anyone’s girlfriend problems. I should not change anyone’s life.

I turn away from her, get my books out, and close the locker.

She stays in the same spot, anchored by the profound, desperate loneliness of a bad relationship.

“Do you still want to get lunch today?” she asks.

The easy thing would be to say no. I often do this: sense the other person’s life drawing me in and run in the other direction. But there’s something about her—the cities on her shoes, the flash of bravery, the unnecessary sadness—that makes me want to know what the word will be when it stops being a sound.

I have spent years meeting people without ever knowing them, and on this morning, in this place, with this girl, I feel the faintest pull of wanting to know. And in a moment of either weakness or bravery on my own part, I decide to follow it. I decided to find out more.

“Absolutely,” I say. “Lunch would be great.”

Again, I read her: What I’ve said is too enthusiastic. Minji is never enthusiastic.

“No big deal,” I add.

She’s relieved. Or, at least, as relieved as she’ll allow herself to be, which is a very guarded form of relief. By accessing, I know she and Minji have been together for over a year.

That’s as specific as it gets. Minji doesn’t remember the exact date.

She reaches out and takes my hand. I am surprised by how good this feels.

“I’m glad you’re not mad at me,” she says. “I just want everything to be okay.”

I nod. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s this: We all want everything to be okay. We don’t even wish so much for fantastic or marvelous or outstanding. We will happily settle for okay, because most of the time, okay is enough.

The first bell rings.

“I’ll see you later,” I say. Such a basic promise. But to Hanni, it means the world.

...

At first, it was hard to go through each day without making any lasting connections, leaving any life-​­changing effects. When I was younger, I craved friendship and closeness. I would make bonds without acknowledging how quickly and permanently they would break. I took other people’s lives personally. I felt their friends could be my friends, and their parents could be my parents. But after a while, I had to stop. It was too heartbreaking to live with so many separations.

I am a drifter, and as lonely as that can be, it is also remarkably freeing. I will never define myself in terms of anyone else. I will never feel the pressure of peers or the burden of parental expectations. I can view everyone as pieces of a whole, and focus on the whole, not the pieces. I have learned how to observe, far better than most people observe. I am not blinded by the past or motivated by the future. I focus on the present because that is where I am destined to live.

I learn. Sometimes I am taught something I have already been taught in dozens of other classrooms. Sometimes I am taught something completely new. I have to access the body, access the mind and see what information it’s retained. And when I do, I learn. Knowledge is the only thing I take with me when I go.

I know so many things that Minji doesn’t know, that she will never know. I sit there in her math class, open her notebook, and write down phrases she has never heard. Shakespeare and Kerouac and Dickinson. Tomorrow, or someday after tomorrow, or never, she will see these words in her own handwriting and she won’t have any idea where they came from, or even what they are.

That is as much interference as I allow myself. Everything else must be done cleanly. Hanni stays with me. Her details. Flickers from Minji’s memories. Small things, like the way her hair falls, the way she bites her fingernails, the determination and resignation in her voice. Random things. I see her dancing with Minji’s grandfather, because he’s said he wants a dance with a pretty girl. I see her covering her eyes during a scary movie, peering between her fingers, and enjoying her fright. These are the good memories. I don’t look at any others.

I only see her once in the morning, a brief passing in the halls between first and second period. I find myself smiling when she comes near, and she smiles back. It’s as simple as that. Simple and complicated, as most true things are. I find myself looking for her after second period, and then again after third and fourth. I don’t even feel in control of this. I want to see her. Simple. Complicated.

By the time we get to lunch, I am exhausted. Minji’s body is worn down from too little sleep and I, inside of it, am worn down from restlessness and too much thought.

I wait for her at Minji’s locker. The first bell rings. The second bell rings. No Hanni. Maybe I was supposed to meet her somewhere else. Maybe Minji’s forgotten where they always meet.

If that’s the case, she’s used to Minji forgetting. She finds me right when I’m about to give up. The halls are nearly empty, the cattle call has passed. She comes closer than she did before.

“Hey,” I say.

“Hey,” she says.

She is looking to me. Minji is the one who makes the first move. Minji is the one who figures things out. Minji is the one who says what they’re going to do.

It depresses me. I have seen this too many times before. The unwarranted devotion. Putting up with the fear of being with the wrong person because you can’t deal with the fear of being alone. The hope tinged with doubt, and the doubt tinged with hope. Every time I see these feelings in someone else’s face, it weighs me down. And there’s something in Hanni’s face that’s more than just the disappointments. There is a gentleness there. A gentleness that Minji will never, ever appreciate. I see it right away, but nobody else does.

I take all my books and put them in the locker. I walk over to her and put my hand lightly on her arm. I have no idea what I’m doing. I only know that I’m doing it.

“Let’s go somewhere,” I say. “Where do you want to go?” I am close enough now to see that her eyes are brown. I am close enough now to see that nobody ever gets close enough to see how brown her eyes are.

“I don’t know,” she replies.

I take her hand.

“Come on,” I tell her.

This is no longer restlessness—it’s recklessness. At first, we’re walking hand in hand. Then we’re running hand in hand. That giddy rush of keeping up with one another, of zooming through the school, reducing everything that’s not us into an inconsequential blur. We are laughing, we are playful.

We leave her books in her locker and move out of the building, into the air, the real air, the sunshine and the trees and the less burdensome world. I am breaking the rules as I leave the school. I am breaking the rules as we get into Minji’s car. I am breaking the rules as I turn the key in the ignition.

“Where do you want to go?” I ask again. “Tell me, truly, where you’d love to go.”

I don’t initially realize how much hinges on her answer. If she says, Let’s go to the mall, I will disconnect. If she says, Take me back to your house, I will disconnect. If she says, Actually, I don’t want to miss sixth period, I will disconnect. And I should disconnect. I should not be doing this.

But she says, “I want to go to the ocean. I want you to take me to the ocean.”

And I feel myself connecting.

It takes us an hour to get there. It’s late September in Maryland. The leaves haven’t begun to change, but you can tell they’re starting to think about it. The greens are muted, and faded. Color is right around the corner.

I give Hanni control of the radio. She’s surprised by this, but I don’t care. I’ve had enough of the loud and the obnoxious, and I sense that she’s had enough of it, too. She brings melody to the car. A song comes on that I know, and I sing along.

And if I only could, I’d make a deal with God...Now Hanni goes from surprised to suspicious. Minji never sings along.

“What’s gotten into you?” she asks.

“Music,” I tell her.

“Ha.”

“No, really.”

She looks at me for a long time. Then smiles.

“In that case,” she says, flipping the dial to find the next song.

Soon we are singing at the top of our lungs. A pop song that’s as substantial as a balloon, but lifts us in the same way when we sing it.

It’s as if time itself relaxes around us. She stops thinking about how unusual it is. She lets herself be a part of it.

I want to give her a good day. Just one good day. I have wandered for so long without any sense of purpose, and now this ephemeral purpose has been given to me—it feels like it has been given to me. I only have a day to give—so why can’t it be a good one? Why can’t it be a shared one? Why can’t I take the music of the moment and see how long it can last?

The rules are erasable. I can take this. I can give this.

When the song is over, she rolls down her window and trails her hand in the air, introducing a new music into the car.

I roll down all the other windows and drive faster, so the wind takes over, blows our hair all around, and makes it seem like the car has disappeared and we are the velocity, we are the speed.

Then another good song comes on and I enclose us again, this time taking her hand. I drive like that for miles, and ask her questions. Like how her parents are doing. What it’s like now that her sister’s off at college. If she thinks school is different at all this year.

It’s hard for her. Every single answer starts with the phrase I don’t know. But most of the time she does know, if I give her the time and the space in which to answer. Her mother means well; her father less so. Her sister isn’t calling home, but Hanni can understand that. School is school—she wants it to be over, but she’s afraid of it being over, because then she’ll have to figure out what comes next.

She asks me what I think, and I tell her, “Honestly, I’m just trying to live day to day.”

It isn’t enough, but it’s something. We watch the trees, the sky, the signs, the road. We sense each other. The world, right now, is only us. We continue to sing along. And we sing with the same abandon, not worrying too much if our voices hit the right notes or the right words. We look at each other while we’re singing; these aren’t two solos, this is a duet that isn’t taking itself at all seriously.

It is its own form of conversation—you can learn a lot about people from the stories they tell, but you can also know them from the way they sing along, whether they like the windows up or down, if they live by the map or by the world, if they feel the pull of the ocean.

She tells me where to drive. Off the highway. The empty back roads. This isn’t summer; this isn’t a weekend. It’s the middle of a Monday, and nobody but us is going to the beach.

“I should be in English class,” Hanni says.

“I should be in bio,” I say, accessing Minji’s schedule.

We keep going. When I first saw her, she seemed to be balancing on edges and points. Now the ground is more even, welcoming.

I know this is dangerous. Minji is not good to her. I recognize that. If I access the bad memories, I see tears, fights, and remnants of passable togetherness. She is always there for her, and she must like that. Her friends like her, and she must like that, too.

But that’s not the same as love. She has been hanging on to the hope of her for so long that she doesn’t realize there isn’t anything left to hope for. They don’t have silence together; they have noise.

Mostly her. If I tried, I could go deep into their arguments. I could track down whatever shards she’s collected from all the times she’s destroyed her. If I were really Minji, I would find something wrong with her. Right now. Tell her. Yell. Bring her down. Put her in her place. But I can’t. I’m not Minji. Even if she doesn’t know it.

“Let’s just enjoy ourselves,” I say.

“Okay,” she replies. “I like that. I spend so much time thinking about running away—it’s nice to actually do it. For a day. It’s good to be on the other side of the window. I don’t do this enough.”

There are so many things inside of her that I want to know. And at the same time, with every word we speak, I feel there may be something inside of her that I already know. When I get there, we will recognize each other. We will have that.

I park the car and we head to the ocean. We take off our shoes and leave them under our seats. When we get to the sand, I lean over to roll up my jeans. While I do, Hanni runs ahead. When I look back up, she is spinning around the beach, kicking up sand, calling my name. Everything, at that moment, is lightness. She is so joyful, I can’t help but stop for a second and watch. Witness. Tell myself to remember.

“C’mon!” she cries. “Get over here!”

I’m not who you think I am, I want to tell her. But there’s no way. Of course, there’s no way.

We have the beach to ourselves, the ocean to ourselves. I have her to myself. She has me to herself.

There is a part of childhood that is childish, and a part that is sacred. Suddenly we are touching the sacred part—running to the shoreline, feeling the first cold burst of water on our ankles, reaching into the tide to catch at shells before they ebb away from our fingers.

We have returned to a world that is capable of glistening, and we are wading deeper within it. We stretch our arms wide as if we are embracing the wind. She splashes me mischievously and I mount a counterattack. Our pants, our shirts get wet, but we don’t care.

She asks me to help her build a sand castle, and as I do, she tells me about how she and her sister would never work on sand castles together—it was always a competition, with her sister going for the highest possible mountains while Hanni paid attention to detail, wanting each castle to be the dollhouse she was never allowed to have. I see echoes of this detail now as she makes turrets bloom from her cupped hands.

I myself have no memories of sand castles, but there must be some sense memory attached, because I feel I know how to do this, how to shape this.

When we are done, we walk back down to the water to wash off our hands. I look back and see the way our footsteps intermingle to form a single path.

“What is it?” she asks, seeing me glance backward, seeing something in my expression.

How can I explain this? The only way I know is to say

“Thank you.”

She looks at me as if she’s never heard the phrase before.

“For what?” she asks.

“For this,” I say. “For all of it.”

This escape. The water. The waves. Her. It feels like we’ve stepped outside of time. Even though there is no such place.

There’s still a part of her that’s waiting for the twist, the moment when all of this pleasure will jackknife into pain.

“It’s okay,” I tell her. “It’s okay to be happy.”

The tears come to her eyes. I take her in my arms. It’s the wrong thing to do. But it’s the right thing to do. I have to listen to my own words. Happiness is so rarely a part of my vocabulary, because for me it’s so fleeting.

“I’m happy,” she says. “Really, I am.”

Minji would be laughing at her. Minji would be pushing her down into the sand, to do whatever she wanted to do. Minji would never have come here.

I am tired of not feeling. I am tired of not connecting. I want to be here with her. I want to be the one who lives up to her hopes, if only for the time I’m given.

The ocean makes its music; the wind does its dance. We hold on. At first we hold on to one another, but then it starts to feel like we are holding on to something even bigger than that. Greater.

“What’s happening?” Hanni asks.

“Shhh,” I say. “Don’t question it.”

She kisses me. I have not kissed anyone in years. I have not allowed myself to kiss anyone for years. Her lips are soft as flower petals, but with an intensity behind them. I take it slow, let each moment pour into the next. Feel her skin, her breath.

Taste the condensation of our contact, linger in the heat of it.

Her eyes are closed and mine are open. I want to remember this as more than a single sensation. I want to remember this whole.

We do nothing more than kiss. We do nothing less than kiss. At times, she moves to take it further, but I don’t need that. I trace her shoulders as she traces my back. I kiss her neck. She kisses beneath my ear. The times we stop, we smile at each other. Giddy disbelief, giddy belief. She should be in English class. I should be in bio. We weren’t supposed to come anywhere near the ocean today. We have defied the day as it was set out for us.

We walk hand in hand down the beach as the sun dips in the sky. I am not thinking about the past. I am not thinking about the future. I am full of such gratitude for the sun, the water, the way my feet sink into the sand, the way my hand feels holding hers.

“We should do this every Monday,” she says. “And Tuesday. And Wednesday. And Thursday. And Friday.”

“We’d only get tired of it,” I tell her. “It’s best to have it just once.”

“Never again?” She doesn’t like the sound of that.

“Well, never say never.”

“I’d never say never,” she tells me.

There are a few more people on the beach now, mostly older men and women taking an afternoon walk. They nod to us as we pass, and sometimes they say hello. We nod back, return their hellos. Nobody questions why we’re here. Nobody questions anything. We’re just a part of the moment, like everything else.

The sun falls farther. The temperature drops alongside it.

Hanni shivers, so I stop holding her hand and put my arm around her. She suggests we go back to the car and get the “make-​­out blanket” from the trunk. We find it there, buried under empty beer bottles, twisted jumper cables, and other crap. I wonder how often Hanni and Minji have used the make-​­out blanket for that purpose, but I don’t try to access the memories.

Instead, I bring the blanket back out onto the beach and put it down for both of us. I lie down and face the sky, and Hanni lies down next to me and does the same.

We stare at the clouds, breathing distance from one another, taking it all in.

“This has to be one of the best days ever,” Hanni says. Without turning my head, I find her hand with my hand.

“Tell me about some of the other days like this,” I ask.

“I don’t know...”

“Just one. The first one that comes to mind.”

Hanni thinks about it for a second. Then she shakes her head. “It’s stupid.”

“Tell me.”

She turns to me and moves her hand to my chest. Makes lazy circles there. “For some reason, the first thing that comes to mind is this mother-​­daughter fashion show. Do you promise you won’t laugh?”

I promise.

She studies me. Makes sure I’m sincere. Continues.

“It was in fourth grade or something. Eric’s was doing a fundraiser for hurricane victims, and they asked for volunteers from our class. I didn’t ask my mother or anything—I just signed up. And when I brought the information home—well, you know how my mom is. She was terrified. It’s hard enough to get her out to the supermarket. But a fashion show? In front of strangers? I might as well have asked her to pose for Playboy. God, now there’s a scary thought.”

Her hand is now resting on my chest. She’s looking off to the sky.

“But here’s the thing: she didn’t say no. I guess it’s only now that I realize what I put her through. She didn’t make me go to the teacher and take it back. No, when the day came, we drove over to Eric’s and went where they told us to go. I had thought they would put us in matching outfits, but it wasn’t like that. Instead, they basically told us we could wear whatever we wanted from the store. So there we were, trying all these things on. I went for the gowns, of course—I was so much more of a girl then. I ended up with this light blue dress with ruffles all over the place. I thought it was so sophisticated.”

“I’m sure it was classy,” I say.

She hits me. “Shut up. Let me tell my story.”

I hold her hand on my chest. Lean over and kiss her quickly.

“Go ahead,” I say. I am loving this. I never have people tell me their stories. I usually have to figure them out myself.

Because I know that if people tell me stories, they will expect them to be remembered. And I cannot guarantee that. There is no way to know if the stories stay after I’m gone. And how

devastating would it be to confide in someone and have the confidence disappear? I don’t want to be responsible for that.

But with Hanni I can’t resist.

She continues. “So I had my wanna-be prom dress. And then it was Mom’s turn. She surprised me, because she went for the dresses, too. I’d never really seen her all dressed up before. And I think that was the most amazing thing to me: It wasn’t me who was Cinderella. It was her. “After we picked out our clothes, they put makeup on us and everything. I thought Mom was going to flip, but she was actually enjoying it. They didn’t really do much with her—just a little more color. And that was all it took. She was pretty. I know it’s hard to believe, knowing her now. But that day, she was like a movie star. All the other moms were complimenting her. And when it was time for the actual show, we paraded out there and people applauded. Mom and I were both smiling, and it was real, you know?

“We didn’t get to keep the dresses or anything. But I remember on the ride home, Mom kept saying how great I was. When we got back to our house, Dad looked at us like we were aliens, but the cool thing is, he decided to play along. Instead of getting all weird, he kept calling us his supermodels, and asked us to do the show for him in our living room, which we did. We were laughing so much. And that was it. The day ended. I’m not sure Mom’s worn makeup since. And it’s not like I turned out to be a supermodel. But that day reminds me of this one. Because it was a break from everything, wasn’t it?”

“It sounds like it,” I tell her.

“I can’t believe I just told you that.”

“Why?”

“Because. I don’t know. It just sounds so silly.”

“No, it sounds like a good day.

“How about you?” she asks.

“I was never in a mother-​­daughter fashion show,” I joke.

Even though, as a matter of fact, I’ve been in a few.

She hits me lightly on the shoulder. “No. Tell me about another day like this one.”

I access Hanni and find out she moved to town when he was twelve. So anything before that is fair game, because Hanni won’t have been there. I could try to find one of Minji’s memories to share, but I don’t want to do that. I want to give Hanni something of my own.

“There was this one day when I was eleven.” I try to remember the name of the boy whose body I was in, but it’s lost to me. “I was playing hide-​­and-​­seek with my friends. I mean, the brutal, tackle kind of hide-​­and-​­seek. We were in the woods, and for some reason I decided that what I had to do was climb a tree. I don’t think I’d ever climbed a tree before. But I found one with some low branches and just started moving. Up and up. It was as natural as walking. In my memory, that tree was hundreds of feet tall. Thousands. At some point, I crossed the tree line. I was still climbing, but there weren’t any other trees around. I was all by myself, clinging to the trunk of this tree, a long way from the ground.”

I can see shimmers of it now. The height. The town below me.

“It was magical,” I say. “There’s no other word to describe it. I could hear my friends yelling as they were caught, as the game played out. But I was in a completely different place.

I was seeing the world from above, which is an extraordinary thing when it happens for the first time. I’d never flown in a plane. I’m not even sure I’d been in a tall building. So there I was, hovering above everything I knew. I had made it somewhere special, and I’d gotten there all on my own. Nobody had given it to me. Nobody had told me to do it. I’d climbed and climbed and climbed, and this was my reward. To watch over the world, and to be alone with myself. That, I found, was what I needed.”

Hanni leans into me. “That’s amazing,” she whispers.

“Yeah, it was.”

“And it was in Minnesota?”

In truth, it was in North Carolina. But I access Minji and find that, yes, for her it would’ve been Minnesota. So I nod.

“You want to know another day like this one?” Hanni asks, curling closer. I adjust my arm, making us both comfortable. “Sure.”

“Our second date.”

But this is only our first, I think. Ridiculously.

“Really?” I ask.

“Remember?”

I check to see if Minji remembers their second date. She doesn’t.

“Dack’s party?” she prompts.

Still nothing.

“Yeah...,” I hedge.

“I don’t know—maybe it doesn’t count as a date. But it was the second time we hooked up. And, I don’t know, you were just so . . . sweet about it. Don’t get mad, alright?”

I wonder where this is going.

“I promise, nothing could make me mad right now,” I tell her. I even cross my heart to prove it.

She smiles. “Okay. Well, lately—it’s like you’re always in a rush. Like, we have make-outs but we’re not really...intimate. And I don’t mind. I mean, it’s fun. But every now and then, it’s good to have it be like this. And at Dack’s party—it was like this. Like you had all the time in the world, and you wanted us to have it together. I loved that. It was back when you were really looking at me. It was like—well, it was like you’d climbed up that tree and found me there at the top. And we had that together. Even though we were in someone’s backyard. At one point—do you remember?—you made me move over a little so I’d be in the moonlight. ‘It makes your skin glow,’ you said. And I felt like that. Glowing. Because you were watching me, along with the moon.”

Does she realize that right now she’s lit by the warm orange spreading from the horizon, as not-​­quite-​­day becomes not-​­quite-​­night? I lean over and become that shadow. I kiss her once, then we drift into each other, close our eyes, drift into sleep. And as we drift into sleep, I feel something I’ve never felt before. A closeness that isn’t merely physical. A connection that defies the fact that we’ve only just met. A sensation that can only come from the most euphoric of feelings: belonging.

What is it about the moment you fall in love? How can such a small measure of time contain such enormity? I suddenly realize why people believe in déjà vu, why people believe they’ve lived past lives, because there is no way the years I’ve spent

on this earth could possibly encapsulate what I’m feeling. The moment you fall in love feels like it has centuries behind it, generations—all of them rearranging themselves so that this precise, remarkable intersection could happen. In your heart, in your bones, no matter how silly you know it is, you feel that everything has been leading to this, all the secret arrows were pointing here, the universe and time itself crafted this long ago, and you are just now realizing it, you are just now arriving at the place you were always meant to be.

We woke an hour later to the sound of her phone. I keep my eyes closed. Hear her groan. Hear her tell her mother she’ll be home soon.

The water has gone deep black and the sky has gone ink blue. The chill in the air presses harder against us as we pick up the blanket, providing a new set of footprints. She navigates, I drive. She talks, I listen. We sing some more. Then she leans into my shoulder and I let her stay there and sleep for a little longer, dream for a little longer.

I am trying not to think of what will happen next.

I am trying not to think of endings.

I never get to see people while they’re asleep. Not like this.

She is the opposite of when I first met her. Her vulnerability is open, but she’s safe within it. I watch the rise and fall of her, the stir and rest of her. I only wake her when I need her to tell me where to go.

The last ten minutes, she talks about what we’re going to do tomorrow. I find it hard to respond.

“Even if we can’t do this, I’ll see you at lunch?” she asks.

I nod.

“And maybe we can do something after school?”

“I think so. I mean, I’m not sure what else is going on. My mind isn’t really there right now.”

This makes sense to her. “Fair enough. Tomorrow is tomorrow. Let’s end today on a nice note.”

Once we get to town, I can access the directions to her house without having to ask her. But I want to get lost anyway.

To prolong this. To escape this.

“Here we are,” Hanni says as we approach her driveway. I pull the car to a stop. I unlock the doors. She leans over and kisses me. My senses are alive with the taste of her, the smell of her, the feel of her, the sound of her breathing, and the sight of her as she pulls her body away from mine.

“That’s the nice note,” she says. And before I can say anything else, she’s out the door and gone.

I don’t get a chance to say goodbye.

I guess, correctly, that Hanni’s parents are used to her being out of touch and missing dinner. They try to yell at her, but you can tell that everyone’s going through the motions, and when Minji storms off to her room, it’s just the latest rerun of an old show.

I should be doing Minji’s homework—I’m always pretty conscientious about that kind of thing, if I’m able to do it—but my mind keeps drifting to Hanni. Imagining her at home. Imagining her floating from the grace of the day. Imagining her believing that things are different, that Minji has somehow changed.

I shouldn’t have done it. I know I shouldn’t have done it. Even if it felt like the universe was telling me to do it. I agonize over it for hours. I can’t take it back. I can’t make it go away.

I fell in love once, or at least until today, I thought I had. Her name was Danielle, and it felt so real, even if it was mostly words. Intense, heartfelt words. I stupidly let myself think of a possible future with her. But there was no future. I tried to navigate it, but I couldn’t.

That was easy compared to this. It’s one thing to fall in love. It’s another to feel someone else falling in love with you, and to feel a responsibility toward that love.

There is no way for me to stay in this body. If I don’t go to sleep, the shift will happen anyway. I used to think that if I stayed up all night, I’d get to remain where I was. But instead, I was ripped from the body I was in. And the ripping felt exactly like what you would imagine being ripped from a body would feel like, with every single nerve experiencing the pain of the break, and then the pain of being fused into someone new.

From then on, I went to sleep every night. There was no use fighting it. I realize I have to call her. Her number’s right there in her phone. I can’t let her think tomorrow is going to be like today.

“Hey!” she answers.

“Hey,” I say.

“Thank you again for today.”

“Yeah.”

I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to ruin it. But I have to, don’t I?

I continue, “But about today?”

“Are you going to tell me that we can’t cut class every day? That’s not like you.”

Not like me.

“Yeah,” I say, “but, you know, I don’t want you to think every day is going to be like today. Because they’re not going to be, alright? They can’t be.”

There’s a silence. She knows something’s wrong.

“I know that,” she says carefully. “But maybe things can still be better. I know they can be.”

“I don’t know,” I tell her. “That’s all I wanted to say. I don’t know. Today was something, but it’s not, like, everything.”

“I know that.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

I sigh. There’s always a chance that, in some way, I will have brushed off on Minji. There’s always a chance that her life will in fact change—that she will change. But I have no way of knowing. It’s rare that I get to see a body after I’ve left it. And even then, it’s usually months or years later. If I recognize it at all. I want Minji to be better to her. But I can’t have her expecting it.

“That’s all,” I tell her. It feels like a Minji thing to say

“Well, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Yeah, you will.”

“Thanks again for today. No matter what trouble we get into tomorrow for it, it was worth it.”

“Yeah.”

“I love you,” she says.

And I want to say it. I want to say I love you, too. Right now, right at this moment, every part of me would mean it. But that will only last for a couple more hours.

“Sleep well,” I tell her. Then I hang up.

There’s a notebook on her desk.

Remember that you love Hanni, I write in her handwriting. I doubt she’ll remember writing it. I go onto her computer. I open up my own email account, then type out her name, her phone number, her email address, as well as Mniji’s email and password. I write about the day. And I send it to myself.

As soon as I’m through, I clear Minji’s history. This is hard for me. I have gotten so used to what I am, and how my life works. I never want to stay. I’m always ready to leave.

But not tonight. Tonight I’m haunted by the fact that tomorrow she’ll be here and I won’t be. I want to stay. I pray to stay. I close my eyes and wish to stay.

[thrashkink-coven]

Lucifer has been such an incredible presence in my life when it comes to addiction.

I am disabled and suffer from chronic nerve pain and debilitating migraines that cause paralysis and other not so fun things. Most days weed is the only thing that can bring me relief. The painkilling drugs have helped a bit, but weed is the only substance I’ve found that can actually ease the pain almost instantly. Because of that I have become heavily addicted to weed. There’s really no way for me to function without it. Or maybe there is, I wouldn’t know because I have an active addition. I don’t want to stop smoking weed, and unless it’s posing an immediate threat to my health, I probably never will.

I can be completely aware of how heavily I rely on my addiction whilst still being addicted. Weed is medicine for me, but I also know that sometimes I smoke just because, not because I’m in pain or anything, but because I’m just bored. I know that I don’t need to constantly be using weed as medicine to be allowed to just enjoy it, and others in my same situation may not consider it an addiction, but I do and I’m at peace with that. I can confidently say I am addicted to weed.

Lucifer helped me come to terms with the reality of my situation. Everyone is addicted to something, using some kind of substance or drug to cope with this sick fuck of a world we live in. Being addicted is not a moral dilemma, it doesn’t make you a bad person, and being sober doesn’t make you a good person. The problem is not with the reality of needing something, the problem is with letting that indulgence get to the point of causing me real harm.

There have been times when I’ve been being so hard on myself, actively trying to cut back or quit, putting myself through unnecessary nerve pain, and migraines because I feel “bad” about giving into that urge. It makes me feel weak, like I’m not in control of myself, and Lucifer has come to me and been like

“Bro… lmao you’re fine. Smoke a joint and chill out, you deserve it today. This isn’t causing you harm right now, it’s okay. You’re not doing anything bad. Im here to tell you that this is okay.”

And, at the very same time, there have been days when I’ve smoked 5 or 7 a day, scraping the last scraps of weed together to smoke a pathetic bowl from a dirty ass pipe, and Lucifer has come to me and been like

“Bro, it’s time to take a break. Your tongue is caked white from the constant cotton mouth. Your throat is sore and inflamed. You’re dizzy, your eyes are glazed over. You feel dumb. You can’t think. Your smoking is actively giving you an even worse headache. You’re not even getting high any more. It’s time to stop.”

and … I’m so fucking grateful for that. There’s a very human tendency to either be super strict with myself to the point of borderline self harm or not give a fuck and let myself indulge to the point of hurting myself. Lucifer has always been the one to keep me in line respectfully, to say “you can do this thing if it makes you feel good, but I will not let you do it to the point of making you feel bad.”

I love how understanding he is of the human condition. He doesn’t pressure me to be perfect or scold me when I’m doing bad. He just presents the facts the way it is, without judgement or disappointment. Hey, you’re slipping, we need to get it back together. Hey, you’re doing fine, allow yourself to relax for a bit. Life is a balancing act. If we keep in check with ourselves and we’ll be just fine.

Thank you infinitely, Lucifer. I know Im in good hands when Im with you.

[identitty-dickruption]

here for questions as it was invited by your post, and thank you because this topic is important to me i want to focus this on addiction but i want to admit that as a full grown adult who went to collage for psychology, worked in special needs and nursing homes so has seen a wide array of neurodivergencies in very intimate and real ways, AND as someone who has adhd and is partners with someone who was a higher needs autistic in their school days- i feel like i dont fully understand the strict differences between terms like i want to and the grey area really dose make my head spin often but in regards to addiction and how i experience it differently because in a way i feel an almost "immunity" with how my executive dysfunction can translate to "not able to maintain a pattern regardless if it is a constructive habit or addiction" watching my father struggle with alcoholism and it really takeing its always sunny to wake up to the fact that he even was one, i really want to understand what it means to be addicted better is it defined by its sunk cost? emotional emptiness? the damage done outward to others? or is it just the pattern. the way that i experience a hyper fixation with my adhd feels distinctive enough to prove that i can differentiate the two concepts per the entire point of your post, and then there are just paradigm shifts like how the only thing ive been accused of being addicted to has been "the computer" 20 years ago when we still had dial up. but ive been a strong advocate to how web designs especially for cell phones play into addictive tendencies with the biggest being short form content with the slot machine endless scroll feature. so the dangers TRUE addiction poses a unique threat in the attention economy functions today with tec and also how easy it is to get trapped in a social bubble making traditionally understood as addictive substances form even more tight knit communities to enable people and never realize they could be helped. its a problem i want to be vigilant of in myself and always help those i love through where it comes so i hope this message wasnt too long or overbearing i just am glad to see someone who knows firsthand about it who might be willing to talk more about it for education.

okay I finished answering this only for tumblr to reload and lose my progress so sorry if this comes across as overly abrupt. I’m not upset at you but I sure am upset at tumblr!

addiction is a complicated and multi-faceted issue. it’s not just the frequency of substance use and it’s not just the impact to life, it’s a lot of different things all at once. addiction tends to be broken into three parts: physical dependency, emotional dependency, and impact on life

physical dependency is your body becoming reliant on the substance. this looks like physical withdrawal symptoms (e.g. the shakes, dizziness, fatigue, nausea, etc)

emotional dependency is the result of extended use of a substance as a coping mechanism. this means that anything the substance was helping to cope with is going to come up in full force (along with added anxiety and anger from not having access to the substance)

impact to life really depends on the person, but this is all the external influences of addiction. struggling with employment, struggling with relationships, struggling to look after yourself and others, etc

all of these things will look different for different people and different substances. I am always wary of people trying to apply an addiction framework to non-substance use addictions. evidence around behavioural addictions is sketchy at best, and just do not have many of the features of addiction that I’ve struggled with the most

out of everything, the mechanisms of addiction are most similar to OCD, but with the additional challenges of physical dependency. for those who don’t know, the obsessive compulsive cycle is:

trigger

intrusive thought

obsessive thinking

compulsive behaviour

it’s a cycle because the more you do the compulsive behaviour, the harder it becomes to cope with that initial trigger in a healthy way. and that’s kinda how addiction functions, too. it just so happens that the compulsive behaviour is substance use. and that’s just not how other behavioural addictions tend to play out

beyond that, we have to consider the ways the word “addiction” is used politically. addiction is heavily stigmatised. addict is seen as a pejorative term, rather than a descriptive one. so even if you could say that phone use is similar in some way to substance abuse….. calling someone an addict for using their phone a lot comes with a lot of baggage and a lot of implications I am deeply uncomfortable with

the terms “phone addict” or “addictive technology” are not literal phrases, they’re metaphors. technology is being compared to substances, and use of that technology is being compared to addiction. and I think everyone needs to have a deep think about why it is that those comparisons are used. until addiction stops being demonised, it is not useful or helpful to be applying an addiction framework to situations where it doesn’t 100% make sense

I hope that helps and makes sense!

[shytastemakerthing]

Can I please request a romantic TWST and Ikemen Prince matchup! I am veryyy outgoing. I make friends really easy and overall I’m a people pleaser. I do get very anxious and overwhelmed easily, which can cause panic attacks. I dont like sports, but I do like studying and my grades are something I take pride in. I overwork myself a lot and I make myself crumble. I thrive in environments where I get to help people. I tend to fall for possessive people because it makes me feel like someone actually likes me, even though they’re toxic. I get a long with people pretty easily though a lot of people have taken advantage of me because I’m naive and overly kind and I do anything in my power to make sure that people like me. I crave validation so I love being praised and taken care of, it makes me feel like I’ve done something right. I really enjoy video games and puzzles cause they challenge my brain. Its very easy to get me to do anything- just tell me “if you do _____ then I’ll be so proud of you.” And I’ll do it-. I am a little chubby with stretch marks and surgical scars. I have some sensory issues that can cause panic attacks, like loud places/crowds. I also refuse to eat anything that has even the slightest abnormal texture, like green beans, asparagus, or Brussel sprouts. I love love love sweets, and I almost always have a sweet tooth. Thank you!!!

Hello and thank you so much for your request!! While I work on the remaining requests that I have in my inbox, I'll do the match-up for Twisted Wonderland in this post, and then do the Ikemen Prince match up as soon as I have the rest caught up.

I hope that you enjoy your match-up!

Tw: None

I match you with...........

Malleus Draconia

I may or may not have been listening to a Malleus Draconia playlist as I was writing this but it went so well and I loved it

By nature, Malleus is a rather possessive fae. I mean come on, the man is a literal dragon and it is well known just how possessive dragons are, especially of those they care a great deal about.

Now, he won't just go and lock you up in a tower to keep you all to himself, he was taught better than that no matter how much his draconic instincts scream at him

But he lets this side of him show in other ways

Holding you closer when anyone seems to get too close

Appearing by your side the literal second that someone seems to be bothering you

The subtle 'they're mine' that sounds more like a growl towards anyone who approaches you with more romantic intentions

When he loves, he loves with all that he is

Not to mention, with how lonely and isolated he grew up, he craves your presence and your touch. It does not take him long to be addicted to it

You have a sweet tooth?

Well, so does he, his favorite is ice cream

Meaning that there are plenty of ice cream dates

And lots of them

Malleus is one to surprise you at your front door, either to escort you to a nice ice cream parlor he heard about, or he already has said dessert and the two of you can go on a walk or just hang at yours or his dorm, he isn't picky

You always know when he is near, those green fireflies are always an indicator as to where he is. Sometimes he likes to lead you with them to wherever he is at.

The longer you are with him, the more he grows attached. Whether it be just be a simple study time at the library, hanging out at his club, or even just sitting on a bench and enjoying each others company, he loves it all, just so long as he gets to be with you.

Overall, Malleus is a protective lover, possessive as well (though he can't exactly help that side of him, but he is not one to cross the line. Sure, he may not always have the best solution to problems, sometimes being worse, but he really is trying to do his best. He loves you, and that is a fact that he will remind you of every single day.

Thank you so much for your request!!

[hersterical]

soul lore in Buffy is finally beginning to make sense in my head (give me a break, I didn’t watch the show until COVID and didn’t start taking part in the fandom until at least a year after that). A lot of this is basic stuff the fandom’s been saying for years, this is just to help get my thoughts in order before I fall asleep and lose the train of thought.

There are a few important elements but I think the two biggest ways the lack of a soul influences a vampire is 1. No moral compass and 2. No empathy (as we see mostly with Spike but a few others as well, they can have sympathy but no empathy). I also don’t get the impression that soulless vampires are capable of true, selfless love. Again looking at Spike, whenever he loves someone pre-soul it always felt possessive or like he wanted to be possessed by someone. Sure, he sincerely wanted certain people he cared about to be happy, but he didn’t want them to be happy just for the simple sake of them being happy. At best he wanted them to be happy because being around them makes him happy and it’s his happiness that truly mattered to him. So if there ever came a time where the happiness of the person he cared about didn’t make him happy anymore, then he wouldn’t care about their happiness. This is mostly based on Spike because he’s the vampire we have the most opportunity to understand while he doesn’t have a soul. To me it seems that all soulless vampires could be placed on a scale from Spike, who possesses the most amount of sympathy and derives the greatest amount of happiness from the happiness of others, to Angellus who doesn’t have a single ounce of sympathy and actively takes joy out of the misery of others. Most seem to tend closer towards Angellus’ end of the scale and I wanted to explore that a bit.

Before I do that though there are some important things of a more physiological nature that would influence vampires both with and without a soul. The first is that I’ve always gotten the impression that a vampire’s primal, predator instincts are more heightened and animalistic than humans. The way I see it there are two main explanations for this: 1. Those instincts come from the demon that possesses the body or 2. Something about becoming a vampire allows them to access the human’s dormant predatory instincts. I’m no evolutionary scientist so I can’t say how likely that second one is, but no matter what it’d be far from the hardest thing this show asks the viewers to suspend their disbelief for. The other thing about vampire physiology has just little enough evidence to support it that I would probably have to classify it as a headcanon. I am convinced that human blood is an addictive substance to vampires based on how secretly being fed Connor’s blood influenced Angel.

With all that said, I’d like to take this opportunity to explore the after-life span of an average Joe vampire.

Imagine you wake up and it is dark, cold and suffocating. But none of that bothers you because more than anything you are hungry. No living being has her possessed this great hunger that you are experiencing right now. Not even being capable of conscious thought at this point, you start clawing. Eventually you dig your way up to the surface where you either have your sire waiting for you, holding in their arms the greatest smelling meal you’ve ever smelt in your whole life, a human, or no one and you need to find something to eat yourself. Even if you find a small animal to eat that’s not enough to satiate your all consuming hunger. No matter what you’re going to get your first taste of human blood as a vampire that night. And it is the greatest thing you have ever tasted. Sure, you had to kill someone to get it, but you don’t care. As you finished eating and stared at the corpse of a human being whose heart is no longer beating because of you, the closest you get to regret, shame, or guilt is the surprise that you don’t feel any of those things.

That was the best thing you’ve ever experienced but you still don’t have a particular desire to kill people. You might even avoid it for a bit in order to avoid attention or out of habit. But even if you actively don’t want to kill another human for whatever reason, you can’t get the taste of their blood off your tongue. The thought of human blood consumes you every waking moment of your life, which is quite a bit considering you don’t need to sleep anymore. But whether it be in a day or a week or a year, you will kill another human. This time you do care. Not that they’re dead, no. But in that moment as you took their life force and made it your own, you have never felt more powerful or in control (ironic considering vampires actually tend to lose control while drinking human blood). Even with all of this great supernatural power you’ve been gifted with, nothing is as powerful as taking a human life. And the blood itself. It feels almost like your rapidly fading memories of warm sunlight on your skin, gentle instead of burning. You’ve never been particularly power hungry before so even though that part might be cool, it doesn’t hold a candle to the sensation of drinking blood. Whatever hesitation you might have had towards killing humans is now gone. But that still doesn’t necessarily mean that you want to though.

You go and visit your loved ones from when you were alive, but when you get there all you can think is how weak you were. How dull the life of a mortal is. How nice the warmth of the sun was on your skin. How it felt to be loved. How it felt to be willing to give your own life and happiness for the sake of someone else’s. It fills you with rage, disgust, and even jealousy for your old self. You take your power back and get rid of any reminders of who you used to be.

Time goes on. Decades pass. You feed, you travel, and you learn. And you grow bored. What was once an exciting after life is nothing but pure drudgery. Even the taste of human blood is becoming common after so long of living off nothing but that. What hasn’t gotten old is the chase. The hunt. That power you once got a taste of but didn’t particularly care for at the time is the only thing that can make you feel anything. Humans are no longer tasty little juice boxes, they’re your play things. The adrenaline from the hunt turns your hunger for blood, into a hunger for power over people.

Eventually the chase grows stale. It’s just too easy. You try to spice it up by toying with humans. Making them scream or beg. But it’s still not enough. That’s when you hear about it. A hellmouth. A slayer. Both together in the same place. One of the greatest sources of power for a demon alongside with the greatest challenge any vampire could hope to face. It’s more powerful than any siren call, how could you possibly resist. Sunnydale is waiting for you.

You get there and between the influence of the hellmouth and the group think of a ridiculous amount of vampires and other demons, it feels as exhilarating as the dance floor of a crowded nightclub. Which is funny because the local nightclub is where you do most of your feeding.

You lead your latest victim out into the back alley, and start feeding. You are once again growing bored even on a hellmouth with the prospect of facing a slayer. It’s just too easy. These are your thoughts when you hear someone clear their throat. This surprises you enough to pull you away from your meal to see a small, blonde girl who’s dressed for a night of dancing. Dessert. Except something’s off. She tilts her head and outs on a mock pout as she asks if she could just get one night off. You don’t like her attitude, her face looking far too smug for your taste, and her blood is singing out to you like no blood has ever done before. You feel almost as hungry as the night you crawled out of your grave. Tossing aside the barely alive human you were just feeding on, you eagerly lunge at the small woman.

She punches you in the face. Hard. You fall to the ground and scramble back up as quickly as possible as you’re filled with a sudden certainty. “Slayer!” You snarl with equal parts shock, anticipation, and fear.

“Is that part of the vampire handbook or something? You guys really gotta get some new material.” She says in response.

How dare she? The insolence! You’ve drained the life out of hundreds of humans before her. You are immortal. Invincible. And she just dismisses you like you’re nothing? She will learn. You are the night, you are fueled by the life-force you’ve been draining out of humans for decades. You’ve seen things this little girl couldn’t think up in her worst nightmares. You have purged yourself of all weaknesses and now you will obtain the greatest power any vampire could ever hope to possess, the blood of a slayer.

You run for her, your claws reaching for her.

You are immediately impaled. As you crumble to dust you hear the last words you’ll ever hear: a half-hearted quip about you not being the dance partner she was hoping for tonight.