James couldn’t read very well, he never could. The letters always shifted around, jumbling up and proving it very difficult to read. The only person he had ever confided this information in had been Sirius, but Sirius had been no help, seeing as Sirius also was severely dyslexic, but Sirius had Remus to read to him. That felt almost too far from platonic for the two for James to ask Remus to do the same for him, and it outright embarrassed him too much to ask Peter.
When him and Lily began talking without the two of them butting heads (more so Lily doing the ‘butting heads’ than James, for James was always so openly head over heels for the woman), he made a very strict attempt at hiding his disadvantage, and this secrecy only worsened when the two began talking to Regulus, ever the bookish one. James hated the idea of the two discovering he couldn’t read, afraid either of them would think of him as stupid. Lily was so smart, and practically a goddess at potions. Regulus had read almost every book imaginable, each page filled to the brim with scribbled ink annotations, handwriting neat but also too sloppy for James to read whenever he caught a glance of the books Regulus would read (Sirius’ hand writing was completely illegible to James. Sirius’ handwriting appeared like a four year old had taken a writing etiquette class, and missed half of the lectures. Remus and Peter both had rather neat hand writing, and it was easier to discern. Usually, Regulus wrote in cursive, and it was practically impossible for James to understand, and Lily’s handwriting was neat and precise; James could read hers better than any of his friends’).
James was pretty good at hiding this, up until James made the foolish agreement to study with Regulus and Lily. They hid away in the Room of Requirement for privacy and to avoid annoying interruption, curling up together on a large sofa as each one studied their own things.
James, on the other hand, just kind of sat there awkwardly. James was more of a hands on kind of person, studying by replicating and practicing rather than reading and memorizing. He definitely wouldn’t sacrifice being sandwiched between the loves of his life just to stand and practice some nonverbal spell work though, so he pretended to be interested in his copy of his Charms book.
“James you haven’t flipped the page in fifteen minutes,” Regulus suddenly said, and both Lily and Regulus’ eyes locked onto James. James blinked a couple times, trying to make an excuse. “We didn’t have to study if you didn’t want to,” Regulus said, closing the book that he previously held.
“Well you need to study, James, you’re taking N.E.W.T. courses,” Lily said with a certain accusatory tone, and Regulus glanced at the book. Now that he focused on it for long enough, book itself seemed entirely untouched, even by others’ standards of untouched. The pages looked completely unbent and clean, and after a moment, Regulus realized that James had his book open to about six units behind what Lily had hers open to.
“You’re not even on the right unit,” Regulus added, and James stared down at his book before glancing at Regulus.
“Review,” James managed, severely unable to lie to the younger. Regulus saw through it instantly, raising his brows.
“Sure. Whats wrong?” Regulus asked, picking up on the almost frightened expression plaguing James’ face currently. James swallowed.
“I can’t read very well,” James said quickly, as if trying to say it so fast neither of them would catch it; they both did.
“It can’t be as bad as Sirius,” Regulus said complacently, waving his hand dismissively. “He always said the letters were moving and dumb stuff like that.” James was going to cry.
“They do.” Regulus paused as he realized his lapse in judgement, glancing at James. Okay, so James and Sirius both had the same issue. Regulus could save this.
“Our cousin Andromeda, before she decided to go off with a Muggleborn, helped Sirius fashion a reading spell that would read to him. I’m sure Sirius would tell you if you asked,” Regulus insisted, not fully understanding that his attempt wasn’t helping at all. James wanted to merge and become one with the sofa below them, solely so he wouldn’t have to see the look of uncertainty in his lovers’ eyes as they stared at him.
“Or,” Lily began, letting her fingers card into James’ hair, “we could read to you whenever it was needed? Would that help?” James flushed a slight pink, relaxing into Lily’s touch anyways.
“That’s embarrassing…”
“I don’t find it embarrassing,” Regulus said, inching closer to James to supply the latter with more comfort. “And neither of us would mind.” James swallowed slightly.
“That…that’d be nice, then,” James mumbled. Lily gave a smile, continuing to play her hand through James’ hair. “You guys…don’t think I’m dumb?”
“Of course not,” Lily said as if it was obvious, almost sounding offended at the prospect. “You can’t control being dyslexic, Jamie, it certainly doesn’t make you stupid.”
“But Reg said-”
“I think Sirius is the epitome of idiotic to begin with, so anything that he does is stupid. Your guys’ issue isn’t stupid, Sirius just is.” Despite Regulus just insulting one of James’ best friends, James laughed at it anyway.
“Okay then.”
“I’ve got a genuine question. If you can’t read, and I’m assuming you just don’t read for class, how the fuck have you been passing everything?” Regulus suddenly asked after a moment, blinking at James. James gave a smile.
“Remus, we copy off him all the time,” James confessed, and Lily scoffed a laugh.
“Of course you do.”
“He lets us!” James defended. “We let him copy us in potions, so it’s even.”
“Mhm,” Lily hummed teasingly, still playing with James’ hair. James couldn’t think of another comeback, so he just simply relaxed into Lily again, closing his eyes.
“We still have to study.”
“For Merlin’s sake, Reg.”
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So like I work at like the only Burger King in my city and it’s a really small Burger King, like, really small, so at most there’s like 20 ish employees maybe more working in the whole thing do we all know each other very well
I wear contacts, and because of this when it comes to onions I don’t really cry. Sure my eyes water but I don’t like bawl when onions are cut. So I tend to do onion prep (just cutting them) because I can do it fast.
One day one of my managers ends up asking who cut the onions because they were done well, and this leads to two of my managers (who I consider friends) to figuring out that I don’t cry when I cut onions. So the reason they’re done well is because I can take my time with them and not rush to do them while having to take breaks while also being able to hop between onions and assembling burgers at record pace
So once my managers figure this out, every time I walk into work I get asked to chop onions. I’m fine with it, it’s next to the speaker so it’s kinda peaceful.
Then the nicknames come in
Every manager calls me something different and here are my favourites
Manager 1: Little Miss Dead Inside (8/10 I’m not a miss but she doesn’t know that so I’ll let it slide)
Manager 2: The Onion One (10/10 that’s hilarious)
Manager 3: Onion Boy (9/10 correct pronouns)
Manager 4: Four Eyes (3/10 how rude)
Manager 5: Onions (8/10 not unique)
I’m gaining more with each manager that gets hired. Eventually I won’t need to wear my name tag to work I will simply be known as “onions”
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