#even the god of seeking pleasure and happiness isn’t necessarily good!!!

[labyrynth]

i’ll be honest, the aeon/god concepts in hsr are really fucking cool?

like. take an abstract concept—preservation, abundance, destruction, elation, etc—now dial it up to a thousand percent. congratulations! you now have amoral, enigmatic beings who exist solely to embody their singular aspect—and they will take that aspect as far as they are able to.

it’s really driving home that Divine and Monstrous are not mutually exclusive

[merakiui]

What do you think of the concept of yan!xiao, childe venti trapping their darling in a teapot?

I feel like they would be less restrictive since the darling wouldn't necessarily be able to escape most likely, so they wouldn't worry about restraint much. Esp in Ventis case...he is the God of freedom so while his darling isn't exactly 'free' they're still kinda free in a way that they have their own world to be free in?

Xiao would probably be somewhat restricted, but only just keep them in the house because he probably wouldn't trust them to be by themselves yet--he figures they may try to run off and hide from him or something

Childe would probably let them try to "escape" on purpose and would be absolutely amused when his darling finds out they wouldn't be able to leave

(cw: yandere, captivity, unhealthy behaviors/relationship, mention of children and implied stockholm syndrome for childe’s part)

Venti doesn't exactly lie to you, but he does trick you. He's aware that it's not the nicest thing to do and that it's not exactly captivity if you're living in a world that resembles the one outside. Only this pocket-sized world is nicer and happier and there aren't any people to get in the way. He tells you about it when you're vulnerable. Maybe you're drunk or you're crying your eyes out because something horrible happened. Either way, you're not in the right state of mind when you make the comment: "I wish I could live in my own ideal world for just one day." And this is great news for Venti because it makes relocation so much easier.

He shows you the teapot and explains it briefly, leaving out certain details. It's better if you don't know everything about how the teapot works. After all, ignorance is bliss. Venti tells you how to get in, but he doesn't tell you how to get out. And the way he describes it makes it sound so tempting—as if living inside this teapot for a bit will cure whatever's bothering you. You decide it wouldn't hurt to spend a day or two inside the teapot to see the little world Venti holds in the palms of his hands.

It's a lot of fun at first. You and Venti glide from the top of the mountains in Emerald Peak, he sings melodious ballads as you look up at the sky, and the two of you play hide-and-seek inside of the house, playfully popping out of rooms and laughing when you’re caught. Eventually the charm wears off and you start to yearn for the outside world. It’s not the same in the teapot. As pretty and peaceful as it may be, it still feels so empty. And when you bring it up to Venti he finds small ways to change the subject. It probably plays out like this:

“Venti, I’d like to go home now.”

“But we were just about to play another round of hide-and-seek! Come on! Don’t be a spoilsport! One more round? Then we’ll leave.”

Or he’ll tell you that you’re already home. There’s always a big smile on his face when he says stuff like that. He’s happy that he gets to spend so much time with you and no one can interfere. But it does get annoying when you start to beg for the old world. Your pleas to leave will fall upon his deaf ears. Venti does feel a little bad when you start to sulk, but his sympathy is short-lived. Let’s not forget that you were the one who wanted this. You wanted to live in your ‘ideal world.’ And isn’t this ideal?

As an adeptus, Xiao is aware of Sub-Space Creation and the effort it takes to construct a presentable teapot. He’s been working hard on his ever since you came into his life. Before he knew you he didn’t have a reason to put effort into it because he stays at Wangshu Inn, but after he met you he started working a lot harder. He tries to make the teapot as comfortable as possible. You mentioned you like dogs or cats in passing? You can find a few in the teapot. You said you like berry bushes and flower fields? There’s a bunch in his teapot. He probably has a nearly perfect model of your room in there as well. Before he brings you into the teapot, he’ll often sit in that room and make sure everything replicates the original, down to the bed frame and the fabric used for the pillow case.

He’ll put some of your things in it just so it feels more personal. Xiao knows he’s stealing from you whenever he does this, but it’s not like you ever noticed anything was missing. Besides, it’s all going in the teapot anyways. You won’t even need your real room or mortal possessions anymore. Xiao is actually quite proud of the teapot and manages to fool himself into thinking you’ll like it, too. And you do (for the first few days, that is). He’s very forward with his question of whether or not you’d like to see his teapot. And you eagerly nod because the two of you are friends and Xiao wants to show you something he made and he looks a little…excited? There’s definitely light in his eyes when he gets your agreement to view the inside of his teapot.

Once you’re inside, you’re genuinely surprised. It’s far more beautiful than you could have ever imagined. The Floating Abode is a really gorgeous landscape. You’re so caught up in looking at the sunset and the flowers and the animals that roam the teapot that you aren’t aware of the horrors that lie just beyond. You’ll find the room that resembles yours in no time and it’s really creepy. As much as you try to tell yourself that Xiao means well and wouldn’t actually do something like this on purpose, it’s hard to ignore the fact that everything is practically identical to your room. It’s so, so strange. You want to ignore it, but you just can’t. It’s so obvious.

It’s definitely creepy, but you don’t have the heart to tell him.

You hold your tongue because you don’t want to hurt his feelings. You’re really the only close friend he has, so you’d feel bad if you insulted his interior decorating skills. Xiao’s pleased to hear that you like it so much. Praise falls from your lips like a waterfall and it gives him a sense of relief. He’s so happy that you like it and since you’re okay with it it’ll be fine if you live here. When he tells you that, your brain freezes and you’re not sure how to respond.

“Live here? Like…permanently?”

And to your shock he nods.

Xiao is far less lenient than Venti. With Venti everything feels like eternal, childish fun with the idea of freedom sprinkled in. But with Xiao it’s definitely a harsher form of captivity. You aren’t allowed outside because he’s worried you might fall off of the bridges that connect the floating islands or you might try to find your way out of the teapot. So you’re confined to the mansion. It’s got everything you could ever need and the interior design matches that of your home perfectly. Just treat it like it’s your own home and it won’t be so bad. You definitely try to see the good in this situation because you care about Xiao, but it’s so hard when he’s keeping you here like you’re just another addition to his teapot.

It’s miserable, but at least you can count on him to visit you every single day.

Childe is very receptive to the idea of owning his own little world in a small teapot. Maybe he was holding you captive before he came upon the teapot and while you’re sleeping he relocates you. You don’t expect to wake up in a new location, but you assume you’re still somewhere in Liyue. Childe finds it cute that you’re so startled, clearly confused with the change in scenery. And when you glance at the surroundings on the Cool Isle, it feels like you might have a chance. Childe seems to think so because he waves you off, telling you with the sincerest voice that you’re ‘free to go.’

You don’t need to be told twice and so you run because you’re invigorated. You can leave and he’s not coming after you. Childe doesn’t even raise his bow in warning. You’re actually leaving him and he’s letting you! But it feels too good to be true. A day passes and you learn that there’s no one else to help you. So you find an empty shack on the shoreline and you hide in it because survival is the only thing you know right now. And the day goes by, the night comes, and morning makes its arrival. You’re still safe. He hasn’t found you.

And it really feels like you can make it out of this. Even if there’s no one around, you can still find something to help you. You’d take anything at this point. By the end of the week, you’re losing sight of your goal and you really just want to head back to the mansion and nap on a comfortable bed. You’ve been catching the crabs and the fish and doing what you can to start a long-lasting fire. When Childe finds you, you’re so exhausted from running and hiding that you collapse into his arms. And he smiles so sweetly while he tells you something that shatters your entire world.

“You did well, comrade, but this isn’t Liyue. You have no need to run.”

It’s not even Teyvat. It’s another world entirely—one existing solely within a teapot. And everything comes crashing down when you realize just how impossible that makes any escape attempts. No human contact. No energy or life that comes from meeting with friends and seeing family. It truly does feel like you and he are the only people in this world.

Childe knows that you’ll adjust to this new world whether you like it or not. It was fun to toy with you in the beginning (and it still is) when you didn’t realize this was the world inside the teapot. But now he just wants to settle into a comfortable life. He takes every chance he has to visit you and eventually you’ll find yourself succumbing to the relaxing pleasures of domestic life. You learn how to cook delicious meals with Childe’s help, you collect seashells on the shore to cure your boredom, and you’ll take care of any chores or housework. It warms Childe’s heart to see you accepting this life.

Maybe the two of you can start a family. Maybe he should get a few pets to liven up the house. It’s not like you can get away from him while inside the teapot, so it’s a recipe for anything to happen. And you’ve come to learn that what happens in the teapot stays in the teapot.

[lokiarsene]

Hey, I wanted to ask if you'd be willing to say more about Akiren's grey morality with darker shades! I love it and your analysis of the game is always amazing!

Hello! Wow, thank you very much… And I can try, I suppose. I’m not sure what you’re interested in hearing specifically!

His Awakening is pretty dire in tone. All the PT have very grim, violent Awakenings, but Akiren’s is specifically about brutal rage, heresy, defiance, even if it means blasphemy itself. This is foreshadowing of his future destruction of a god (and him fusing Satanael, the rebel angel of heaven), and I think it also sets him apart as a Trickster Wild Card, and as a rebel among the other PT.

Yaldigor is constantly reminding Akiren that he has to use his Confidants and the deals he makes to (1) stop oncoming ruin, and (2) redeem himself through rehabilitation. This frames Akiren as an anti-hero, which is an interestingly judgmental take for a Velvet Room master and attendant(s) to have. We already know that VR’s take a form based on the Wild Card’s heart, so Akiren already feels bound to the idea of imprisonment (both literally and figuratively). Adding in the threat of avoiding ruin and serving time in some interstitial reality that grants him power is… a lot to put on a teenage boy’s conscience.

Basically, Yaldigor does not grant Akiren any reprieve from his anger at being wrongfully accused and convicted; if anything, he feeds into the prejudice and this fuels Akiren’s spite. He isn’t the hero to be praised and welcomed. He’s the Trickster. (Trickster gods and figures are heroic in their own way, but that’s another post for another time.)

Akiren’s behavior as Joker versus his behavior in reality is starkly different. Joker is cocky, confident, suave. He fights and moves with ease. He’s commanding and fearless with the taunts and shouts he directs at his enemies. He takes risks, delights in the risks, and can’t help but showing off a little bit. This is all a boy reveling in his status as a trouble-making thief and supernatural vigilante. Vigilantes seek justice, sure, but Akiren never struck me as purely justice-focused. What little personality we can glean from his dialogue choices (and his in canon choices that we can’t control) frame him less as a goody two-shoes, hardline black and white thinker the way some of the PT can be, and more someone who is not afraid to take risks, play a long con, and even go behind his friends’ backs to indulge in some questionable behavior (see also: his Confidant with Goro).

Akiren’s Confidants are all framed as beneficial to his work as a Phantom Thief, no matter how they begin (except for Goro; that one is all personal). That’s not to say that Akiren isn’t emotionally connected to these people–he is, clearly; he can gain significant social skill increases from bonding with them–but they all also have a root, core benefit of being useful to Akiren. The impact he has on their lives are personal, yes, but the fact that they all start with the concept of making a deal with each other is an indication of how Akiren views his current goal as a Trickster and how he sees himself. He’s viewed and treated as a criminal. He is on probation, an outcast in society. Therefore, any bond he makes with someone has to have a reason to be made besides the sheer pleasure of it.

That isn’t necessarily gray morality, of course. But it does paint him in a darker light than some of the other Persona protagonists have been (at least, not since Tatsuya).

I spoke in the other post about how eagerly he agrees to Mona’s deal, and how he left it up to Ann whether or not Kamoshida was going to die (something he didn’t really bat an eye about, unlike Ryuji). It’s his word that usually pushes the PT into their Awakening, words of rebellion, words coming from righteous anger. This is a kinder way of ripping the mask off the PT’s hearts, the same way he does to the Shadows (”Show me your true form!”).

Now why do I call Akiren an antihero? Because he doesn’t really have standard hero traits. He’s brave, yes. He has a moral code, sure. But he’s not out to be the savior of humanity, or saving the country for the saving’s sake. He’s doing it to punish, to snatch back society and tear it free. He’s also the Trickster, the one who stands out, defies, condemns, and ultimately controls the group of outcasts of which he’s a part.

Other antiheroes in fiction are: Hamlet, Geralt, Lucifer, Macbeth, Jaime and Tyrion Lannister, Maleficent, The Punisher, Han Solo, and John Wick. What all these characters have in common are convictions that center around personal moral codes and personal goals no matter how it sets them apart from society, no matter if it defies common law or codes of justice, no matter what consequences it brings down on them. They are scheming, clever, and occasionally violent people who also have a code of honor and loyalty. They are all darker shades of the idea of a heroic character, complex and commendable.

Perhaps no better example of Akiren’s gray morality is seen than in the third semester when you can take Maruki’s deal and damn your friends to the false reality all because he doesn’t want to give up Goro. He doesn’t hesitate to drag his friends from their dreams to bring them along to the Palace infiltration, and while he does reflect on whether or not it was the right/kind thing to do, he never has the option of not doing it (presumably because the devs didn’t want you not to have your whole cast–so I’m not sure I’d put much weight on this idea I pitched).

Regardless, even after he went through the trouble of waking them all up, he can put them all back in that lie when given the chance. This is his most antihero trait of all: when asked and given a chance, he will choose what he thinks is the right thing to do (keep Goro close, taking the short road to fulfilling their promise) over what is the fair thing to do (upholding his principles of rejecting manipulation and control). Incidentally, he’s still acting as a Trickster here. Tricksters can and do act in their own self-interests (see: Loki going to a dinner party with the other gods and telling them all how much they suck just to start some shit; Loki killing Baldr for a lark). So this isn’t even out of character for Akiren. It’s merely one of the darker ways he can turn.

The final glimpse of his Joker form in the train window makes me think that there’s always going to be a part of Akiren that is the Trickster, that will always be able to tap into this awakened “darkness” (or rather, gray complexity) that wasn’t present when he first arrived in Tokyo. All the other PT went their ways to a brighter future, taking control of their lives and reclaiming the goals and happiness that were taken from them, and what does Akiren do? Besides go home with his new cat (yay!), he catches an inkling hint of his rival’s presence, and sees his alternate self: the cocky, debonair, ruthlessly charming Trickster that lurks in his heart. That is his “future.” That is what he’s “claimed” during his probationary period in Tokyo: the will and spirit of a god-defying Trickster, an essential element of society that exists to shake it up, tear it down, challenge it, and refuse to bow to it.

Akiren wasn’t rehabilitated to be a good boy, redeemed and now on his best behavior. He is a law-defying young man who was exonerated of his wrongful conviction and revealed that Japan’s “justice” system was more of a legal system, both of them corrupt, both of them bested by him.

Not sure I talked much about gray morality here. I’ll have to pay closer attention to stuff when I do my NG+ run.

[athena1138]

Character Study: Pre-Inquisition

ah shit aight lets do this. i was tagged by @gaymingbinosaur​

#1: Alena Fanellis-Lavellan 

Note: Her answers are based while she’s with the Lavellan clan, so only 3ish years before Inquisition. 

Layer 01: The Outside

Eye Colour: Silver

Hair Style / Colour: White and crazy curly

Height: 5′5

Clothing Style: Very basic. Usually leather pants and a tunic. Robes only if she’s practicing magic. 

Best Physical Feature:  Her nose. She’s grown into it by now and it suits her so uniquely well. 

Layer 02: The Inside

Fears: Capture

Guilty Pleasure: Sneaking away from camp to take naps uninterrupted. She’s very tired. 

Biggest Pet Peeve:  Thievery. She fought very hard for the things she has. 

Ambitions For The Future:  Living the life she dreamed of in the circle. Free, unrestrained, unafraid. 

Layer 03: Thoughts

First Thoughts Waking Up: “Gods not again.”

What They Think About Most: What comes next. What will she do today, what will she do tomorrow, where will she be in a year? Things like that. 

What They Think About Before Bed: Nothing. Or at the very least, that’s what she strives for. Often it’s bad memories. 

What They Think Their Best Quality Is: She doesn’t think about it much, but she knows she’s brave. 

Layer 04: Either Or…

Single Or Group Dates:

Group. She’s too shy/scared to be alone with someone like that for a while. Growing up surrounded by people will do that to you. 

To Be Loved Or Respected:

Loved. To be seen and known is a beautiful thing. 

Beauty Or Brains:

Brains. She’s not shallow, and she’s very well educated. 

Dogs Or Cats:

Cats.

Layer 05: Do They…

Lie: Not often. She’s usually very direct, unless she’s afraid of something. (Like, she’ll lie to Templars, for sure.) 

Believe In Themselves: Yes and no. She’s overcome so much in her life but she isn’t sure she can handle much more, especially without the help she had before. 

Believe In Love:.  In theory. Familial and platonic love, absolutely. But romantic? She’s only ever seen it or read about it. 

Want Someone: Not necessarily. People are risky. They come and go so often and many times they’re not good people. If she were to live her life alone, she thinks she’d be ok with that. 

Layer 06: Have They…

Been On Stage: Once. The Circle had a little fun night once a year for the mages, and one year they put on a play. She had one line and she fucked it up. 

Done Drugs: Yes. 

Changed Who They Were To Fit In: No, not really. She’s always been weird. She doesn’t even think she could change if she wanted to. 

Layer 07: Whats Their…

Favourite Colours: Orange. The color of the sun setting on the ocean. 

Favourite Animal: She thinks nugs are the bees knees. 

Favourite Book: Anything but a spell tome. Maker, she’s had enough of tomes in her life. She likes funny books, things that can make her laugh and forget herself. 

Favourite Game: Chess. 

Layer 08: Age

Day Their Next Birthday Will Be: The 2nd of Umbralis

How old will they be: Ah shit. Um. We’ll say the year before the Conclave which means 9:40. She’ll be............. 27. Yeah.  

Layer 09: I…

I Love: Being in high places.  I Feel: Worried. I Hide: All the time. I Miss: Anders. I Wish: So many things. 

Vikara Lavellan

Layer 01: The Outside

Eye Colour: Green

Hair Style / Colour: Straight, black, mid-back length

Height: 5′3

Clothing Style: She’s both very fancy and very plain. She wears mostly black but it’s cut very finely to her body. 

Best Physical Feature:  Eyes for sure. 

Layer 02: The Inside

Fears: Losing herself

Guilty Pleasure: Sneaking desserts and sweets when nobody is looking. 

Biggest Pet Peeve:  Superiority complexes. Which is ironic for multiple reasons. 

Ambitions For The Future:  To become her clan’s Keeper. 

Layer 03: Thoughts

First Thoughts Waking Up: “Listen to those birds <3 “ 

What They Think About Most: Her training. 

What They Think About Before Bed: She usually reads before bed, so that, but also she’ll think about her day and if she was happy with how it went or not. 

What They Think Their Best Quality Is: She’s very good at drawing. 

Layer 04: Either Or…

Single Or Group Dates: Single. 

To Be Loved Or Respected: Respected. Nobody ever got anywhere being loved. 

Beauty Or Brains: Yes. She appreciates beauty and she appreciates brains, but one without the other is pointless. 

Dogs Or Cats: Dogs. 

Layer 05: Do They…

Lie: Frequently. Gotta keep people on their toes. 

Believe In Themselves: Absolutely. She’s badass and she knows it. 

Believe In Love:.  Not really. She has more important things to think about. 

Want Someone: Not really. It’d be nice, but again, she’s got more important things. 

Layer 06: Have They…

Been On Stage: Nah. Not for her. 

Done Drugs: Once. She liked it very much but she’s worried about it becoming a habit. 

Changed Who They Were To Fit In: No. The world can adapt to her. 

Layer 07: Whats Their…

Favourite Colours: Yellow. 

Favourite Animal: Harts

Favourite Book: She’s very fond of nonfiction and educational books. Her favorites are books that explain the other religions in the world. 

Favourite Game: Hide and seek

Layer 08: Age- Also when I do Evie I’ll skip this since twins

Day Their Next Birthday Will Be: ah shit. I know I’ve said it before. Um, we’ll say the 1st of Nubulis, the first day of spring. 

How old will they be: 30

Layer 09: I…

I Love: my clan I Feel: anxious I Hide: personal things I Miss: the ocean I Wish: i were more powerful

Asena “Not Actually the Inquisitor” Adaar

Layer 01: The Outside

Eye Colour: Bluegreen

Hair Style / Colour: Long, black, a mix between coiled and curly

Height: 6′5 without the horns

Clothing Style: If she’s at work, dapper. She dresses up and dresses neatly. If she’s at home, she’s more laid back, just comfortable and casual. 

Best Physical Feature:  Her mascles

Layer 02: The Inside

Fears: Nothing. She’s not afraid of anything. 

Guilty Pleasure: She doesn’t have any. Pleasure is pleasure, there’s no sense in feeling guilty about it. 

Biggest Pet Peeve:  Rudeness, both to her and other people. 

Ambitions For The Future:  Take over the business. 

Layer 03: Thoughts

First Thoughts Waking Up: Just that she’s gotta get up and get busy. 

What They Think About Most: Her job 

What They Think About Before Bed: Plans for tomorrow, important things that will need doing soon, she should really write to Gemma. 

What They Think Their Best Quality Is: She’s fearless. 

Layer 04: Either Or…

Single Or Group Dates: She doesn’t date. She fucks. Groups are welcome. 

To Be Loved Or Respected: Feared. Which is respected+ in her mind. 

Beauty Or Brains: Beauty. She doesn’t think she’d ever get attached enough to care about brains. It’s a lot of one night stands for her. That’s not to say she doesn’t care about the women she sleeps with, she just doesn’t get close. 

Dogs Or Cats: Neither, they’re just collateral. 

Layer 05: Do They…

Lie: You’d have a harder time picking the truths out of her words than the lies. 

Believe In Themselves: Yes? It’s weird. She doesn’t really... think of herself. She just does. So far she hasn’t failed, so I guess you could say she believes in herself. 

Believe In Love:.  No. 

Want Someone: No. All she needs is good people at her back and Gemma and TIB to be safe and sound. 

Layer 06: Have They…

Been On Stage: Literally, no. But every interaction in her life is one big show, so metaphorically, always. 

Done Drugs: No. She’s seen what that shit does to people. 

Changed Who They Were To Fit In: Pfft. No. In her line of work? People adapt to HER to fit in. 

Layer 07: Whats Their…

Favourite Colours: Purple. 

Favourite Animal: She doesn’t really have one. Sharks are cool, she guesses. 

Favourite Book: She doesn’t have much time for leisure reading but she has a soft spot for dashing lesbian romances. 

Favourite Game: Darts

Layer 08: Age- Also when I do Evie I’ll skip this since twins

Day Their Next Birthday Will Be: She isn’t sure. 

How old will they be: Again, not sure, but she’s around 28 she reckons. 

Layer 09: I…

I Love: Money I Feel: Disillusioned  I Hide: As much as I have to I Miss: Gemma I Wish: For the safety of my friends

Gemma Cadash

Layer 01: The Outside

Eye Colour: Purple and blue

Hair Style / Colour: Short bob, straight, deep red

Height: 4′5

Clothing Style: Low-key things. Lots of darker fabrics, hoods, leather armor. 

Best Physical Feature:  Her tattoos are neat. 

Layer 02: The Inside

Fears: Being forced into things. 

Guilty Pleasure: Every time she breaks into a house, she steals every left shoe she can find. Just because. 

Biggest Pet Peeve:  Being talked down to. 

Ambitions For The Future:  She’d like to be able to retire from her life. She loves her job, but she wants to die living comfortably in the countryside somewhere. 

Layer 03: Thoughts

First Thoughts Waking Up: “Fuck over” 

What They Think About Most: Gemma? Think? Nah babe, that head’s as empty as a politician’s. She’s very impetuous. 

What They Think About Before Bed: Not much. She falls asleep fairly easily every night. 

What They Think Their Best Quality Is: Her impetuousness often goes in her favor. 

Layer 04: Either Or…

Single Or Group Dates: Single. 

To Be Loved Or Respected: Loved. 

Beauty Or Brains: Brains.

Dogs Or Cats: GIVE THEM TO HER

Layer 05: Do They…

Lie: Yeah, in her line of work it’s hard not to. 

Believe In Themselves:  Sure? She hasn’t fucked up too badly yet so 

Believe In Love:.  She’d like to, but whether or not it’ll come to her, she doesn’t know. 

Want Someone: Most days, yeah. She’s kind of a romantic.

Layer 06: Have They…

Been On Stage: No

Done Drugs: A few. She’s not a fan. 

Changed Who They Were To Fit In: No, she’s pretty stalwart in who she is. 

Layer 07: Whats Their…

Favourite Colours: Blue

Favourite Animal: Dragons. Dragons are so fucking cool. 

Favourite Book: She’s not a big reader, but she loves Varric’s cheesy shit. 

Favourite Game: She loves a good drinking game. 

Layer 08: Age- Also when I do Evie I’ll skip this since twins

Day Their Next Birthday Will Be: She doesn’t know. 

How old will they be: Again, doesn’t know. Early 30s she thinks. 

Layer 09: I…

I Love: the sky I Feel: tired I Hide: nothing I Miss: Asena, Orzammar I Wish: i had a pet dragon 

Madeira Cadash

Layer 01: The Outside

Eye Colour: Gold/yellow

Hair Style / Colour: Ashy grey cropped short 

Height: 4′8

Clothing Style: Whatever she can find. Often oversized, worn down clothes. She’s not fancy. 

Best Physical Feature:  Those lips though 

Layer 02: The Inside

Fears: Being alone

Guilty Pleasure: She likes sneaking out at night to drink with the lads 

Biggest Pet Peeve:  Unexpected, loud noises.

Ambitions For The Future:  Survive. She doesn’t have plans for anything 

Layer 03: Thoughts

First Thoughts Waking Up: “Who the fuck is bothering me?” 

What They Think About Most: Food, honestly. She loves to eat. 

What They Think About Before Bed: She likes to pretend she lives different lives. One night she’s a princess, another she’s a dashing thief, another she has an entire harem of people to love her. Just silly, fanciful ideations. 

What They Think Their Best Quality Is: She’s pretty funny when she wants to be 

Layer 04: Either Or…

Single Or Group Dates: Group. You can learn a lot about a person based on how they interact with others. 

To Be Loved Or Respected: Loved, but that’s also very scary for her. 

Beauty Or Brains: Brawns. She likes toughness. 

Dogs Or Cats: Dogs. The bigger the better. She loves mabaris especially because they can grow to be as tall as she is 

Layer 05: Do They…

Lie: When necessary. 

Believe In Themselves: Not really. She dislikes herself more than anything. 

Believe In Love:.  Nah. Love is just a daydream.

Want Someone: Frequently, yes. 

Layer 06: Have They…

Been On Stage: Yeah. She used to work in an acting troupe once upon a time. 

Done Drugs: Nope.

Changed Who They Were To Fit In: When necessary. 

Layer 07: Whats Their…

Favourite Colours: Red. 

Favourite Animal: Druffalos. 

Favourite Book: She likes books of a more..... questionable nature. If they have pictures, well all the better. 

Favourite Game: Wicked Grace. 

Layer 08: Age- Also when I do Evie I’ll skip this since twins

Day Their Next Birthday Will Be: The 21 of Matrinalis. 

How old will they be: 35 (the oldest of them all.) 

Layer 09: I…

I Love: my parents I Feel: bored I Hide: myself I Miss: home I Wish: i had some booze. 

[iskierka]

Body Image and Aziraphale, or, Violently Projecting My Issues Onto This Character The Way God Intended

In honor of my new URL, I wanted to get down some of my feelings around body image since I’ve been doing a lot of projecting onto Aziraphale recently. I want to talk about both why Aziraphale is one of my favorite (and one of the more positive examples of) fat characters, and why I still relate to him through the lens of my own issues.

First off, there are a few trigger warnings that could apply here, but mainly if you’ve struggled with an eating disorder or disordered eating or body image in general, even though this isn’t a graphic discussion or anything, this may not necessarily be something you want to read.

Having dealt with different eating disorders for ten or eleven years now, and body image issues for longer than that, fat characters are really important to me—but only when they’re treated well (by the production, not as necessarily the other characters). There’s obviously a big difference between how Aziraphale is portrayed and how, say, a character like Thor was portrayed in Endgame. Aziraphale is fat, but it isn’t in and of itself A Personality Trait. However, I don’t think it’s a purely physical trait either. In fact, him being fat reflects the good (if not Angelic Good) aspects of his character. Aziraphale enjoys the comforts and pleasures of earth, and his body is just a reflection of that. I see it as a reflection of his love for the world. And look: when Gabriel says “lose the gut” the implication is for Aziraphale to miracle himself into shape, right? What’s made clear here is that Aziraphale can change the way he looks at any time. I think this is to be expected, but it’s important in this context because it means Aziraphale likes that he’s soft. When he comes back with “I’m soft,” it’s a reflection of how he sees himself in a permanent sort of way. Physical softness is not an immutable trait for him, but of course Aziraphale is not talking only about his physical form. His whole being is soft. (Certainly, there are other aspects to his personality; Aziraphale is just enough of a bastard to be worth liking. But compared to the rest of the Host that we see: other angels are rigid in a way that he just isn’t.) Basically, what I see is this: one, part of what makes Aziraphale likable (his love for the world) goes hand in hand with his being fat, and two, Aziraphale has made a conscious choice to be fat.

So then, something else about me: I’ve always felt alienated from body positivity and fat activism. It doesn’t matter whether I’m a size 6 or 22, as someone who has spent—spends—quite a lot of their time genuinely hating their body, those spaces have always felt unwelcoming. My experiences with eating disorders have felt often unwelcome in the context of fat activism. (“Deal with your shit on your own time.”) I’m not able to muster enough Positivity to be a proper activist. So, it may seem odd that a character like this, one so at home and satisfied with being fat, has struck me so emotionally. There are a few reasons here that I see that make Aziraphale comforting rather than needling at these same insecurities. I believe that’s because how little attention the show pays to him being fat. It’s not something that’s really negative or positive in its portrayal. Sure, Gabriel makes that “lose the gut” comment, but it’s not something the audience is meant to side with him on. He’s the villain here, and it’s also meant to be a bit silly or absurd—maybe you could put it in with his disturbance at Aziraphale eating sushi, which shows how much closer to “being” human Aziraphale is than the other angels. And on the other hand, while I have kind of argued here that his fatness is put in a positive light, but I don’t think that’s an overt thing. (For most people watching casually, Aziraphale’s weight is irrelevant and nothing but a one-off joke.) And it isn’t only treated that way by the powers that be, Aziraphale himself, in calling himself soft, says that is integral to him in an absolutely natural way—it’s just part of who he is.

But here’s the thing: I’ve near read my way through the body image and eating disorder tags for Good Omens on AO3. One fic in particular where Aziraphale begins to develop an eating disorder, I’ve already read through four times.* Honestly, it is that normality of his fatness, the permanence of it and role in his own self-image, that make this whole genre (I suppose?) of fics hit so hard for me. For a lot of people including myself, EDs are a form of self-harm. So what makes stories where a character like Aziraphale struggles with issues like these so rending is that it would be a representation of a deeper unhappiness with the fundamental parts of who he is.

And maybe to a lot of people, it seems just a little bit this side of absurd still that he ever would.** But people with EDs often share certain personality traits. A few I recognize in Aziraphale’s character: a tendency towards (personal) harm avoidance, worry, and lack of emotional openness. I think there a few examples of each of these. First harm avoidance—besides just his general desire to avoid ending the world (this is much, much more tied to his love for it anyway), I think his reticence in his relationship with Crowley (“you go too fast for me”) shows this best. Their relationship is also likely the best example of his emotional barriers. (Sure, he isn’t cold like other angels, but nor is he open, and Aziraphale seems to desire that warmth and closeness from connection in a way that the rest of the Host do not.) There are many points where his tendency to over-worry comes across: thinking Crowley is asking for a suicide pill, after five centuries still worrying Heaven will care about the Arrangement—these come up over and over. Maybe it isn’t so unreasonable to think that some version of Aziraphale could fall into an ED. Look at it this way: you lose your only real anchor on earth, your trust in the goodness and rightness of Heaven is broken down, so you try some way to feel in control again, no matter how irrational. Another part of Aziraphale that I think speaks to this tendency to fall into this as a coping mechanism is his position as a protector, a guardian. He lives a role that is about serving and providing for others. When you have an identity constructed around providing comfort, security, and faith to others, it can feel very natural to turn to inwardly or personally destructive habits like EDs instead of reaching out or opening up to others. If you lose some fundamental outward belief, it often feels insurmountable to also reassess your perception of yourself (“lose faith in yourself”) and seek out support.***

I think part of the reason that Aziraphale is comfortable for me to project on here is that his body is established as something neutral-to-positive in canon, while being fat is something negative societally. His character doesn’t bring baggage, and so I think those of use who are fat or have struggled with body image see ourselves in him. For some people that means seeing a character able to be beyond societal pressures on the body, for others it means seeing a powerful character still able to fall into the same things we do and not be bad or weak because of it.

I’m stopping here for now and I know this is all pretty jumbled, but I’ve just been feeling like I need to get this down. It’s been nice to see some positivity about Aziraphale being fat, but sometimes it can be hard to see only positivity because I can’t relate to that. I’m really happy to be in a fandom again where there are characters who aren’t fit/skinny & I love reading all y’all’s fic and seeing fanart—it’s meant a lot. Also: if you too have fat Aziraphale feelings, pls pls come talk to me!!!

* link to that fic

** I know there are reasons why this seems weird re: story mechanics, but I don’t think it’s that hard to understand this plausibly within canon. I’ve got lots of ideas anyway :^)

*** I’m trying not to stray into headcanon territory here but I think it is important that any fic that deals with EDs doesn’t fall into a gets together with/receives affirmation from skinny partner and ED suddenly disappears trope. The reality is that EDs usually stick around after whatever crisis that might’ve triggered their development has passed.

[wtfzodiacsigns]

Same Signs: Marriage or Murder

Capricorn:

Marriage: You’re the perfect couple. The Prom King and Queen. Super ambitious couple, competitive, probably insta-famous. You really are the sign that can have it all and juggle it all. White picket fence amazingness.

Murder: Y’all can be some inconsiderate motherfuckers. If it doesn’t benefit you, you don’t want it. This can work the same for your partner. Both of you could neglect the relationship and assume it will hold. It won’t. Also, finance struggles are fucking HARD on Caps cause you are all about materials and having the best in life (however you define that).

Aquarius:

Marriage: I’m biased. We’re fucking fantastic. As a couple, you’re the weirdos at a party. You have adorable inside jokes and can go in depth about topics that literally NO ONE cares about. You’re goofballs, and can be ultimately authentic with one another. We also make phenomenal parents because we encourage originality.

Murder: Two things can sink an Aqua/Aqua coupling… our innate need to be one of a kind, and our extreme want of freedom. Aquarians LOVE being different. We thrive there. So if someone tries to top us, or be more original/steal our thunder- MOVE. GET OUT OF THE WAY. Aquarian wrath is rare and therefore strong af. Also if you want to take too much time away from each other, you could experience the severe isolation that only Aquas can feel.

Pisces:

Marriage: Pisces are dreamy and empathetic, so this is a vvvvvvv soft relationship. They can see beauty in such small things. Like, leaving tiny romantic notes around the house, reading Pride and Prejudice aloud to each other, lots of cuddling and soft blankets and clean smells. This couple 100% owns those ‘linen’ scented candles.

Murder: Pisces can be super self-destructive and pity seeking and clingy. They know good things when they see them, but they oftentimes have the mentality of ‘I don’t deserve this’ or ‘I don’t deserve better’ which is why they can find themselves exiting good situations or settling for mediocre situations when they could do better if they just tried. If things were bad, this would be the most depressing couple to be around cause odds are they’d stay together even if they were both fucking miserable because Pisces oftentimes can’t handle being alone.

Aries:

Marriage: This would be a fun af couple. They’re all about doing stuff… no sitting at home for these folks. They’re at wine tastings or a basketball game or a fucking drag show. If something is happening- they are THERE. The intellectual convos between the two will be top notch, and since Aries are proud and determined and strong, this couple could literally take on the world. They’re huge show offs if their significant other does something great. Expect lots of annoying #wcw #mcm posts that are actually hella genuine and pure. In my experience, they also have the best sense of humour, so laughter is gonna be guaranteed with a good Aries couple.

Murder: Don’t fuck over an Aries. Fucking don’t do it ever. Aries know the exact thing you hate most about yourself or a situation, and they will point it out in a fight. So Aries Vs. Aries? Cue the flames. This sign runs hot but is also surprisingly sensitive, and if you hurt them deeply, there isn’t forgiveness. SO this the perfect example of a sign that can find a fault, pin it down, and make their other Aries BLEED. It’s brutal. Also, for being so determined, they can be huge procrastinators, and if their priorites aren’t the same, this could spell murder for Aries.

Taurus:

Marriage: This couple has everything… and they definitely got it on sale. Taurus are really materialistic, but unlike Capricorns, they can never justify spending money on luxury items. So the Taurus’s home is so perfectly curated, but it’s definitely all from Home Goods. They are the ultimate supporter when things are positive… and HOLY SHIT will this be a positive couple. They’re upbeat about everything, including each other. They deal with pain and pleasure in a grounded way, and they’re really adorable when they get excited about something. A very ‘childish fun’ type of couple.

Murder: Hi. Welcome to the weirdest and stupidest fights you’ve ever heard of. Tauruses HAVE to be right. They’re often not. But THEY FUCKING HAVE TO BE. AND YOU MUST SEE THEIR SIDE. YOU MUST. So if two Tauruses disagree about something, good God just let them be. Call the cops, then let them be. Tauruses are just fucking children, so they’re going to fight like children. I’m talking silent treatment, “but she said it first!” kind of asshole fights. Also, they suck if things are negative. If you complain about anything, literally a Taurus will drop you so fast you’ll never see it coming.

Gemini

Marriage: This couple is all about communication, they’re fab with each other about it. Also, Gem/Gem couples are good because they can understand the unpredictability of the other. They’re broad-minded people, and they embrace differences while also being the magnetic cool kids. This is the couple that everyone wants to be friends with because they have the exclusive invites to insider events that they got from some co-worker in the elevator this morning. They’re bizarrely lucky, and also total gossips, which makes for a couple that is NOT for everyone, but actually works really well together.

Murder: These bitches cray. Like, clinically. They’ll do insane things that make no sense, and if their fellow Gem doesn’t approve then they better GTFO. They’re also very quick decision makers, unlike fellow airs Aquarius and Libra. If they don’t like you, you’re dead to them. They will drop you like yesterday’s shirt even if you do something mildly stupid or weird that they’re not a fan of. Like Aries, they can find your weaknesses and prey on them. They will waste NO TIME doing such.

Cancer

Marriage: These bitches sure know how to nurture. In their finest forms, Cancers are basically the physical embodiment of a nice knit blanket and a mug of warm tea. They’re very in touch with their feelings, so heart to hearts with this couple are the best. They will get to know you on a deep deep deep level, and be really trusted with that information. This will be a wonderfully romantic couple who eats takeout like 90% of the time.

Murder: Hello sensitivity. Cancers are the least rational and can get weird about THE WEIRDEST things. I knew a Cancer once who literally ranted for a half an hour because the dishes people were bringing to her Thanksgiving weren’t ‘traditional’ dishes. They were still bringing food… it just wasn’t the food she wanted despite her never saying anything like ‘hey, bring traditional food’. Cancers want you to be mind readers, so if you can’t do that, why tf are you here. They have high expectations of everyone, but ESPECIALLY of other cancers. They’re also clingy af, so even if this couple does break up, they’ll still text flirt for like the next six months. Unhealthy.

Leo

Marriage: This couple is probably famous. They’re HUGE on big, romantic efforts. They want their marriage proposal to go viral on YouTube. They’re also big on events in general… anywhere where they can be seen and show each other off is good. A+ couple to bring to boring work functions… as no doubt this pairing is charming af.

Murder: Holy arrogance. While Leo’s are not necessarily considered clingy, if you don’t show them the attention they believe they deserve, they’ll drop you like a hot potato. With two Leo’s vying for attention in a relationship, SOMETHING’s got to give SOMETIME. Also, they are a jealous sign, so god forbid one of them flirts with someone else at a bar. Fists will be thrown. These are some needy motherfuckers. Also, if a Leo couple is fighting, call the local news crews. Something is GOING to go down. It might be arson, it might be an impromptu theatre performance. Who tf knows.

Virgo

Marriage: The cleanest house ever. Like wtf they keep this place organized. They also dress in matching outfits sometimes and make it weird for everyone else. Virgos can be so analytical that they’ll see something and be like, “Is this what the normal people do?” and just go for it. Slave to trends for sure. This is the ‘old people’ couple out of your friends. They catch up on the latest netflix show and then are in bed by 10pm. You have to plan things with them AT LEAST three months in advance because they are HORRIFIC at texting back. They’re adorable and a little robotic which is just fine for them.

Murder: JUDGE CENTRAL. They’re not always known for it- but Virgos can be hella judgemental. Especially of other Virgos, because they expect them to be better. Virgos expect the top effort, always, and so falling below that line can lead to fights. They’re super goal orientated, and so if they don’t meet those goals, or their Virgo partner doesn’t, then it is certainly game over.

Libra

Marriage: Oh hello there romance! This couple wants their love life to be an actual Nicholas Sparks movie. They both want to be loved more than anything on this planet, so fellow Libras are great for fulfilling that need. They’re soft and lovey and really exceptional cuddlers. This couple are also great at settling arguments. They can see both sides of things, and hate arguing, so disagreements are easily solved. A good libra/libra couple is like a good spa day, just really blissful and relaxing to be around. Refreshing.

Murder: Honestly? This couple couldn’t make a decision to save their goddamn lives. It’s why most won’t work out. Here’s the thing, if a Libra makes a decision, that’s it. They’ve already analysed every possibility. They’ve run the numbers. If someone is their end game, that’s it. Problem is, if the other Libra has not come to that conclusion, you’re gonna have a bad time. This is a stalemate of a couple… and if you’re happy where you are when you start the relationship, it could end well, but if either of you are still in development, it’s best not to even try.

Scorpio

Marriage: Best. Sex. Ever. Passionate af couple taking things to new levels. Trying crazy shit, cooking new recipes, watching porn to find new moves. You constantly stimulate each other both physically and mentally. Another ‘cool kid’ couple, but that’s because they give no shits. If they’re happy together, this couple won’t come down off their high.

Murder: These bastards are VINDICTIVE. If you hurt a Scorpio, you best hope they bury you close enough to the highway that the cops might be able to find your body. If a Scorpio betrays a Scorpio, welcome to the apocalypse. They expect a fellow Scorpio to KNOW that they’re insane, and to KNOW not to cross them. But Scorpios also love pushing people away. They are the ice of the water signs, and much like their totem of the scorpion, they will bite if you get too close. So two scorpions could easily drive each other out instead of just opening up.

Sagittarius

Marriage: This is the couple with their own travel blog. They live out of a fucking van and LOVE IT. They don’t like to be told they can’t do something, so like 90% of this relationship is just pushing each other to do something crazy. It’s basically one awesome game of truth or dare. They always have insane stories, and love throwing dinner parties just so they can sit you down and trap you into listening to said stories.

Murder: Bad Sags are BAD. This is because a hallmark personality trait of these guys is the fact that they believe everyone is dumber than they are. And also that Sags HATE being thought of as dumb. You see the dilemma. Sags are also the flakiest of the signs, so getting two Sags out on a date is gonna be hard enough. They’ll argue about EVERYTHING if they think you’re stupid, so dear Lord, get AWAY if you’re in a Sag/Sag relationship with a power struggle. Because unlike most signs who think they’re right, Sags are RARELY right.

Source: spookyscarysalamander

[cchellacat]

Game of Thrones Finale

Here be spoilers for the last season of GoT.  Turn back now or forever hold you peace.  Trust me, I am not holding my peace, I feel like going to war and breaking a bloody wheel over the back of D&D’s heads.

I knew going in, this wasn’t the ending I had been hoping for, or even expecting for nine years.  After the penultimate episode the writing was clearly on the wall, so I watched this final chapter, ready for crushing disappointment and grief. D&D did not let me down. 

They completed their character assassination of Daenerys with all the clumsy, lazy, pretension and dreadfully written dialogue as one might have come to expect, if they had been paying attention since the start of the season. 

When left to flounder in the seas of uncertainty without the masterfully crafted scaffolding of GRRM’s books to hold them afloat, the writers sunk the whole thing gleefully. I’m absolutely certain they took great pleasure in destroying every logical expectation.

This constant need to justify their own twisted ending and eradicate certain characters development and arcs, left me feeling bewildered and horrified.  The beautiful woven foreshadowing that had been building since season one seemed to be cast aside at the last and replaced with some Frankenstein monster, cobbled together from a need to be “different”  to “surprise”, to be “edgy”  and “subversive”.  

This isn’t how good writing is done.  You don’t change the track of a story just because it’s deemed predictable or because fans guessed the ending. 

The onus then, is on the writer, to follow through and complete the story while still making it enjoyable and intriguing.  It isn’t to upturn the apple-cart and refill with limes.  It’s to take the damn apples and make pie.  Make it interesting, draw the audience in, there is nothing wrong with giving the audience what they want. There is nothing wrong with delivering a satisfying and sensible conclusion.  There is nothing wrong with giving the main character/s a happy ending.

Their fear of cliche, lead them straight into trope hell.  The “face heel turn” of Daenerys from Liberator and Mother to Tyrant and Murderer was sloppy, poorly written and did not have a justifiable history to back it up. 

Do not even get me started on how they killed her.  JFC.  Could they have been anymore obvious about how that was gong to go down?  Talk about cliche. 

Murdered by the man she loves, who loves her and who is also her only family.  We’ll talk later about what they did to poor Jon.  Just for reminders sake though, here she is, held in the arms of the man she loves as he promises her she will always be his queen, kisses her and stabs her right in the heart.  **blood boiling**

Turing Sansa into Littlefinger 2.0 made my inner rage monster scream.  Her transformation from  the “The High Queen”  to “The Chess-master” makes me think the North isn’t in any better hands than it would have been with Littlefinger in charge.  How convenient that none of her siblings will be nearby to notice.  Bran in the south, Jon in the True North and for some inexplicable reason, the girl who spent eight season finding her way home, decides to go gallivanting off into the west on some LotR, knock off elf quest. 

Arya’s end is as unsatisfying as every other one.   She spent years growing stronger, learning to kill, striving to be No-one.  Her whole character arc was about her coming to terms with her loss and recognising that no matter how far she ran, she would always be Arya Stark. 

Then is was her journey home, learning that she could go back, that even changed by war and blood, family meant everything.  Her clarion call, that the “lone wolf dies but the pack survives” has been with her every step.  It’s the message her father taught her, one she held too.  Why on earth would she leave her pack behind? 

What even was the point of having her and Gendry meet again and come together if she was just going to walk away?  I’m not saying a character has to be defined by a romantic relationship, but why bother giving the fans a few crumbs just to spit on it an episode later?  This is clearly baiting of the worst kind.  I’d rather they met as friends and parted as friends than the shit show of having Gendry propose, only for her turn him down.  I mean, she could have learned another lesson with the Hound, that defining your life by revenge and forgetting to live only ends in death.  Her returning to Gendry after that would have made sense.  It would have made sense for her to go build a pack of her own.  But no, that would be too easy.  What shall we do with Arya?  Lets put her on a bus!

He did love her.  Jon was crazy about Dany.  She was crazy about him.  This is the man who puts family first, who lives by his honour.  He is his Uncle Ned come again.  Ned, who lived and died by his oaths.  The only time he broke them was to protect his sisters son, to protect Jon, his family. 

This is why they had to destroy Daenery’s character so completely.  They had to make her the worst villain imaginable to make it look even remotely plausible that Jon would;

1. Break his oath of fealty

2. Murder his own blood.

3. Betray the love of his life.

They had to preserve Jon’s good name, oh yes, because Jon wouldn’t kill her for power or because she lost her temper and disagreed with him.  No.  They destroyed both Jon and Dany with this plot. 

Jon is now Queen Slayer and Kin Slayer and he has broken his word, his oaths of loyalty, his unspoken oaths of love and protection, which she rightly expected from him as her blood and her lover and has been reduced to a shadow of the man he was meant to be, the king he could have been. 

He is cursed by the gods in the eyes of most Westerosi, or he would be if they knew the truth.  After all, look at how the nobility treated Jaimie after he killed the Mad King.  It didn’t matter to them that the King was evil, no, what mattered was that he broke his oath.

Oath breakers are anathema in Westeros. 

So much for a Targaryen Restoration.  Goodbye Iron Throne.  The whole point of Jon’s character was just erased.  Did he defeat some great evil?  No.  Did he overcome war and death and end triumphant on the throne as the last dragon?  No.  There was no point in bringing him back after his death in season six.  Anyone could have went to bargain with Dany and the outcome would have been the same.  Ugh!

Jaime and Brienne.  The love story/redemption arc I was so invested in.  One hand gives and the other takes away.  In the end it seems that Jaime learned nothing, according to the writers that is.  I call bullshit.  Jaime had redeemed himself.  If he had to die, it should have bee while killing Cersei.  The foreshadowing of him being Cersei’s death has been around for years. Cersi didn’t love Jaime, she loved controlling him.  Cersei loved no one but herself.  That was the lesson Jaime was meant to learn.  Thanks so much for taking away eight season of character development and self realisation.

Tyrion got shafted too.  His speech near the end, it was a load of cow dung.  In the end they left Tyrion to be Westeros’ own comic relief.  The Small Council was a bloody farce.  All that scene did was reinforce my belief that nothing in Westeros has really changed.  It doesn’t matter what title you give someone, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.  Give it ten years and Bron will be the power in Westeros in all but name. 

Now who have I forgotten?  Ah yes.  My Special Mention.

Sandor went out the way he meant to, bringing an end to his brother.  But not before the writers gave him a brief moment with Sansa.  There you go Sansan fans, he called her little bird!  Now shut up and let us kill him in a fiery fall of doom. 

Death by fire, the worst death they could give this man.  He wasn’t a good man, it’s arguable that none of the characters were good people.  However, Sandor Clegane suffered more than most.  He spent his life, angry and bitter, seeking revenge for himself and his sister and father.  I think, if they had to kill him, they could have given the man a better exit than him tossing both himself and his brother into the flames.  It was cruel to make that the only way out, the only triumph he could claim.  I think Sandor should have lived.  He deserved to find a life of peace after all the fighting he did.   It is not poetic or clever to kill a character off with the object of their own fear.  It’s not clever when they do it to a villain, it’s doubly unfair to do it to a hero.  He was a hero by the end.  Sandor deserved better.

Now look, I‘m not saying that in a show like this, that everybody should live or necessarily get the end they deserve, but, they went too far in the name of shock value, leaving no one happy, well, virtually no one. I guess the rabid Sansa fans who loathed Dany are feeling pretty good about now. 

(Yes, okay that was mean, but I got sick of seeing it in my timeline and unfollowed a few people.) 

I was always very much of the belief that Sansa and Dany had more in common than would drive them apart.  I didn’t expect an easy friendship or alliance, but I did expect them to find common ground and be able to build a relationship over time.  Strong women supporting each other is what we need more of on TV.  Not this misogynistic desire to see two strong women fight over a man, which is essentially what they reduced Sansa and Dany too with poor Jon caught in the middle.  

In conclusion...

I feel as though the writers went into season eight with a clear idea of where they had been building and then someone get a bee in their bonnet and posed the question, “Who is the least likely to end up ruling Westeros?”

The answer of course is Bran.  Bran the Broken, how fucking ignorant is that?  How about Bran the Burdened or Bran the Broker or Bran the Benevolent, if you’ve really got such a hard on for alliteration?

So now Bran, who is so disconnected from feeling that he can’t love anyone, sits the Iron Throne and is somehow meant to be a good ruler. 

All that’s needed to achieve this happy ending for the writers?

Goodbye Character development and epic love stories, hello smear campaign, death, destruction and the end of one of my favourite canon ships to ever sail.

Rest in Peace Jonarys.  I believed in you. 

[peachyteabuck]

act of godhood

summary: after you refuse to tell both of them which is the better dom, they take matters into their own hands

pairing: bucky barnes x reader x Natasha romanoff, bucky barnes x reader (past sexual relationship implied), Natasha romanoff x reader (past sexual relationship implied)

words:  4223

trigger warnings: smut smut smuttiest smut, threesome (mff), oral (female receiving), face riding, straight up fucking (no condom because consequences don’t exist in fanfic), spanking, lots of swearing, mentions of past sexual encounters. 

PART TWO, ‘BITE OF FRUIT’

PART THREE, ‘ACROSS A MINEFIELD’

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You feel like caught prey. Cornered, hogtied, ready to be devoured. This was your own damn fault, you had no one else to blame.

Lying on the corner of Natasha Romanoff’s large bed, your legs are free to writhe and kick while your hands are bound above your head, effectively turning you into a captured dog with some illusion of freedom.

Your mouth isn’t gagged, but it is covered. Tony had been experimenting with a bunch of different masks for Bucky in different fabrics and colors, trying to make them even more high-tech than whatever Hydra originally provided him with, and at one point had mismeasured his face dimensions. That made one set of masks (about five or six, all exactly the same in their fatal flaw) too small, and therefore useless to the wide-jawed supersoldier.

Still, you found a use for it. Even in their inadequate size, they still silenced any sound that escaped your lips was absorbed into the fabric and easily expelled. This made for a great hide and seek cheat, and an even better sex toy.

Bucky stays on one side of the bed corners while Natasha stands at the end. Both are staring down at you, mouths watering, cock and pussy aching. All for you.

You mewl, a desperate attempt for physical contact. How did I end up here?

It’s a rhetorical question to your broader consciousness. You know the answer.

You had been dommed before, both by the Winter Soldier and Black Widow. Albeit, you never got your brains fucked out by both at the same time.

One day, due to a very unfortunate laundry day mishap, they had found out about your sexcapades with the opposite assassin. They confronted you in the large laundry room, the hum of the machines almost drowning out the sound of your heart beating wildly against your ear drums. Whether you were screwed in a good way or a bad way, you were still screwed.

Both demanded to know which was better, which brought you more pleasure, who would you choose if you had to? What about this kink? Did you perform this specific sex act with the other?

You felt like a guilty criminal, one not very good at keeping secrets. You feverishly tried to calm them both down, to stop the nerve-rattling line of questioning. “Neither of you is necessarily ‘better’ than-”

“Bullshit,” Natasha scoffed. She stood tall, full-on “fight me, I fucking dare you” mode. The last time you saw this was when your ass was about to get torn up with a riding crop while you suspending from her maroon ceiling, the time before that, when Steve decided to go off on his own during a mission without wearing an earpiece.

You continued despite their shared glares. “You’re both, each of you is completely different! I can’t compare you two!”

Then Bucky spoke, voice low and commanding. “What do you mean…different?”

You shrugged lightly, still holding the laundry basket that mostly held your clothes, but also had Bucky’s black boxers and Natasha’s black panties. Geez, what is it with hot, scary people and black underwear?

If only you had just given their underwear back to them, or made them pick it up, like a normal sub. But no, your never-ending hunger for praise and to be good just had to manifest itself into you being an unreasonably nice bottom. God, next time you were just keeping it like a trophy.

You shivered, them both still staring you down. You now understood why criminals confess so damn quickly when they’re the ones questioning. “Natasha likes me, like, totally immobile. She likes to give or take whatever she wants, when she wants it. No word from me. Buck, on the other hand, likes for me to be brattier...likes me to put up a fight...likes to praise me...lay it on thick…” Your voice got quieter as you continued, ability to stand up to them withering away with every inhale.

You thought she was about to snap at you, but instead she turned to Bucky.

“You’re a brat tamer?” She exclaimed loudly, and you flinched; she’s talking a little too loudly for a common area.

Bucky shrugged. It was less tense than yours, though. That one wasn’t defensive or scared, it was relaxed. “I like that feeling of success, let me live my life in peace. What, you don’t like a little chase? Don’t like the feeling of accomplishment when a mouthy little brat finally gives into you?”

Natasha huffed. “No, I don’t. I like to be in charge, that’s why I dom you idiot. Plain and simple. If I wanted someone to back talk me, I’d go talk to one of you petty boys about following orders, or not being little bitches when something goes wrong on missions, or…”

You snorted, and it reminded the two of them that you were, in fact, still there.

Natasha reacted first, because of course she did. “What was that, pet?”

You locked eyes with her, your whole body going cold. Oh fuck. You just fucked up big time.

“Nothing, mistress,” you whispered, voice tight. It’s a last-ditch effort to avoid trouble. The problem is, it most likely won’t do shit for your acting out of hand. Nor will it do shit for your ass, which has just recently healed of the deep purple-green bruises and bloody scratches that criss-crossed your back, butt, and lower thighs.

Bucky’s thick arms crossed across his expansive chest. “She calls you ‘mistress?’ I feel like you’d be more of a ‘mommy’ type of person, Romanoff.” Natasha didn’t turn back to face him as she responded. Instead, her eyes raked your body. God, you felt so fucking small.

“Doesn’t have the same…” she tilted her head, scanning you while she searched for the right word. “Feel.” Her long pause felt like centuries, eyes still locked onto you. “What does she call you?”

Bucky stepped closer, only adding to the feeling of helplessness. He traced your plump lower lip, pulling it from between your teeth. His soft touches were a sharp juxtaposition to Natasha’s stony looks.

“A few things,” he replied, watching you like a hawk. You still didn’t break eyes with Natasha. “But my absolute favorite is daddy…” He leaned in impossibly closer. You dropped the laundry basket, narrowly missing their toes.

Bucky smoothly kicked it away before speaking again. “Isn’t that right, baby? You love making Daddy happy, don’t you?”

You whimpered and nodded ferociously. Bucky then pushes his thumb past your lips, and you knew exactly what to do.

You begin to suck and he moaned and holy fucking shit you’ve never been so turned on in your entire life.

Natasha rolled her eyes again, grabbing Bucky’s shoulder. It breaks the spell your interaction had cast on the two of you.

“As usual, you’ve turned a cross-examination into some kind of porn shoot,” She backed you into the wall completely, the coldness causing you to gasp. You could feel her body heat on yours, and all you wanted to do was reach out and touch, touch anything. Her soft belly, her scarred shoulders, her plump lips.

“Tell me, Printsessa,” her sultry voice sent shivers down your spine, even more so than the freezing cinderblock wall. “Tell me more about how Bucky boy over there and I treat you different.”

You gulped. Your voice tumbled out of your mouth like boulders down a steep hill: fast, uncontrolled, deadly. “You like to inflict pain, you like impact play, you like toys. So, so many toys...all Bucky does it lightly spank me when… when he’s taking me from behind...likes to hear me moan because of it...he likes to overstimulated me, you like to deny me until I...you both, both of you like it when you make me cry, love making me beg until tears stream down my pretty little face..”

Your hooded eyes flashed to Bucky, who was palming himself through his dark sweatpants. You barely had time to eye his thick cock before Natasha slapped the inside of your thigh, leggings doing nothing to absorb the blow.

She growled out into your ear, “I specifically told you to describe differences, pet. You want me to punish you until you can follow orders?”

You whimpered again, high-pitched moan never making it out of your throat.

Yes, you thought.

“No,” you replied.

Natasha’s eyes narrowed, fingers going to wrap around your throat. It was a warning, a shot in the sky instead of straight into your heart.

“No, what?” She hissed through her teeth.

You stumbled over your words as you spoke. “No, mistress. I’m sorry, mistress.”

That’s when Bucky moaned, guttural. It went straight to your aching pussy. “God, you two are gonna ruin porn for me for fucking ever.”

“Shut the fuck up, Barnes.” Natasha’s voice was commanding. It’s the one she uses on missions, or when one of the boys fucks up big time. She was already mad she had to share you, and Bucky’s deep voice might as well been a fucking dog whistle, or nails on a chalkboard.

Her fingers tightened against your throat, her other hand going South. Her nails pressed into your hip bone, and you knew for sure it was going to leave marks. Crescent shaped nail marks, to be exact. Say what you want about Natasha Romanoff, but that girl likes a nice manicure.

“Tell us more, pet” she purred.

Bucky’s metal arm moved across your stomach to keep in you place. When did he move so close? You thought he was...over there? On the side of you? It didn’t matter, you being touched. That’s what mattered.

“And feel free,” his voice was smooth, calm, collected. Gruff. His words were good whiskey. “To talk about anything you want, my precious little one.”

You cry out a little. You were wet, so wet, and all you were doing was talking. What would happen when they touched you? Would you fucking explode? Would the world collapse into itself like a black hole?

You didn’t care what happened. As long as you had them, you’d jump off a cliff. Or out of an airplane without a parachute.

You took a deep breath before you continued. “You both love butt plugs, but nothing farther...and Buc-Daddy, Daddy likes the jeweled ones, his favorite is a pastel pink one in the shape of a heart. Mistress prefers the solid black ones, sometimes if I’m good and she collars me she likes the ones with tails because they match,” your sentences devolved as Natasha started rubbing between your thighs, one of them still stinging. Bucky, who refused to allow anyone to have fun without him, began kissing your neck. “You both love when I ride your face. Once Natasha made me moan to loudly I lost my voice and didn’t get it back to normal until two weeks later. Three days after that Bucky left a bruise so big on my hip I had to cancel yoga with Peter because I could barely move…”

Bucky was the one who cut you off next. “Who made cum the most in a single  night?”

You moan before you answered. His beard scratched against your neck and ear as he spoke. “You, Daddy.”

Natasha reached around and lifted your butt from the wall before spanking you, hard. “What’s the most you’ve cum in one night, pet?”

You wailed at the contact. “Eight, Mistress.”

She smiled. “And who did that to you?”

You were almost crying at that point. “You, Mistress.”

“Who’s made you cum the hardest?” She snarls. It’s animalistic, and hot as fuck.

“You, Mistress,” You cried.

After that the next thing you could comprehend is you, laying on the bed, looking up at the two doms.

You’ve never been more turned on in your entire life. If you thought it was bad in the laundry room, the fire in your belly and the strain in your arms and the almost-incomprehensible pleasure would surely cause you to explode.

“What should we do first?” Natasha questions. Her nails graze the edges of the mask, right below your puffy eyes, and the tense muscles under your chin.

Bucky laughs, and palms your bare breast, occasionally pinching at your hardening nipples.“Gimme a sec, Nat, can’t think straight. I’m tryina wrack my spank bank for every single fucking lesbian porn video I’ve ever fucking watched.”

Natasha shakes her head. Her voice drips out of her lips like honey, or poison. Or cum. “Don’t think we’ll be doing all the work, Barnes. I didn’t do this so you could jerk off into a corner while I make our little pet scream for mercy, or more...whichever comes first.”

Your untied thighs press together, searching for some relief. Natasha tsks you, using her strong arms to keep them apart. “No, no, no, little mouse. You know that’s not allowed...pets don’t get rewards until they perform to their master’s standards.”

Bucky huffs, leaning down. He trails kisses down your body. Big, wet, sloppy ones. He only stops to ghost his fingers over your clit. He can’t hear any noise you make because of the mask, but judging by your arching back and screwed-shut eyes, you’re trying to moan. He chuckles a bit, before looking up at Natasha, who’s still standing tall. She’s wearing black, high-waisted lingerie bottoms with a matching bra. It look so good against her creamy skin.

“Don’t listen to her, baby,” you stare straight up at the woman in question while Bucky continues peppering kisses in your sensitive inner thighs, lifting his head up to speak every few pecks. “ Mistress is just mad that she can’t how much fun it is to fuck with you, eat your pussy until you’re squirming away from me, bruise you up until you can barely move, fuck you until you can’t speak. Daddy just loves hearing you whine and cry and scream...loves it when you disobey orders...love making you get yourself off while I just,” he presses an open-mouthed kiss to your clit then, and your eyes flutter shut. “Watch.”

“James,” Natasha warns.

You can’t what’s worse: being teased or nothing at all.

Natasha is incredibly possessive. You’re hers, not ever and will never be anyone else’s. It made teasing her easy as all Hell, because she gets worked so fucking easily. Once you just mentioned how an ex of yours gave you ridiculously sexy neck kisses and before you knew it your entire upper body was covered in so many hickies you looked like you had been ravaged by an animal.

In a way, though, you had.

That’s what made her so mad, her watching you get eaten out by one James Buchanan Barnes. She should be the one pleasuring you, not him. Still...it was so hot watching you try to resist him.

It was crazy.

Part of her wanted to rip Bucky off of you and tie him to a chair, or suspend him, or something, anything to keep him from soliciting another moan from you.

The other part of her wanted to just sit back and relax with a good glass of red wine and direct Bucky to do whatever she pleases to you.

Bucky was right, she’d give him that. Finding porn after this was gonna so fucking hard.

Well, maybe, she wonders. I could just film us...and then…

She’s snapped out of her thoughts by your sweet, sweet body about to orgasm. Hard.

“C’mon, baby,” Bucky’s baritone voice seem to vibrate the floorboards. “Cum for Daddy, Baby. You know I love it when you cum for me…”

Even after you cum, he doesn’t stop moving his fingers skillfully in and out of you and kissing around your clit until you find the strength to place your foot on his shoulder and kick him away.

You try to crawl away from him, but Natasha is immediately on top of you, placing one hand on your throat and the other right next to your hip. She means business.

“Did Daddy tell you do that?” She’s asking a question, but everyone in the room already knows the answer. Especially you.

“No,” is all your voice can muster. It’s small, tiny, just like how you feel.

Bucky’s stood up and is licking you off of his fingers. You can see him in your peripheral vision. You don’t make an effort to look at him any more than that, though. Your pupils have to remain trained on Natasha, or else you’re going to be in even more trouble.

Before you can process the switch in doms on top of you, you feel a sharp smack to your inner thigh again.

“No, who? That’s the second time you’ve made that mistake, Pet. I think Daddy being here, pleasuring you like that,” she tightens her grip on your throat and hooks her free hand under the leg you used to push Bucky away. She pushes it up to your chest, leaving your ass vulnerable to her. She then turns to the man in question, who’s currently stroking himself. “Do you think we should punish our little printsessa?”

Bucky rarely punishes you, once he explained he doesn’t really like to. It’s not his thing.

But that preference seems to have been lifted due to Natasha’s presence.

“I think we should Mistress,” he moves closer to you, to the side where your ass is lifted off the bed. “Our Babydoll needs to learn her place...needs to know who’s in charge…”

The mask is gone, now (When did it come off?) but you don’t dare speak again. Can’t talk out of turn if you don’t talk at all.

Your eyes flit between the two, wondering who’s going to make the first swat to your ass.

It’s Natasha who moves you into position: face down, ass up. She runs her dexterous fingers through your folds and it takes every ounce of your willpower not to moan.

Her voice is deep, commanding. “I’m going to give you ten spanks, Pet.”

Bucky speaks next. “And I’m going to give you ten, too, Babydoll.”

He’s never punished you before. Never. It’s so hot, so fucking hot.

“Count ‘em...kitten.” Bucky using Natasha’s nickname for you makes you gasp, but thankfully they both let it go.

Smack. “One, thank you Mistress.”

Smack. “Two, thank you Daddy.”

This goes on for what feels like forever, and by the end your ass is nice and red. Bucky’s metal hand leaves lines across your cheeks, which he traces with featherlight fingertips. The cool metal against your hot skin is an intoxicating feeling.

The teasing isn’t over, though. Natasha flips you over, looming over you. Her smile is sinister, sadistic. Your head is moved into Bucky’s lap, while he pulls your restrained hands above your head again.

Natasha’s voice is soft, and it forces you to pay attention more. It’s normally something dog owners do to make their animal more attuned to their commands.

“Beg, printsessa. Beg for me to touch you.”

Oh, do you beg.

“Please Mistress, I’m begging you to please touch me, make me cum, make me cum until I’m begging you to stop. I wanna feel you, feel both of you. Want you to stretch me out, make me feel you both for days and days, make me miss you when you’re not there...not inside me. Please I’m so fucking wet for you.”

“Well,” she says, moving down your body. She plants random kisses as she descends.

Left nipples. Right third rib. The mole on your tummy. Just below your belly button.

Then she’s there, ghosting over your clit and kissing your sensitive pussy lips.

“My, my kitten. You are wet.”

You try not to make a sound, determined not to get punished another time. Your ass is still so sore, and you know it’s going to hurt to sit for awhile.

Her fingers move expertly in and out of you, knowing when to curve up, spread apart, add another finger. You thrash, rolling your hips, hands nearly escaping Bucky’s grasp a few times.

Oh yeah, Bucky’s here. Holding your hands up. Keeping you behaving. Not touching you at all.

His eyes are locked on Natasha and your pussy. She doesn’t know where to look, your sweet oh face or Bucky’s hungry stare.

Natasha coaxes one, maybe two, maybe three (at this point you can’t tell what’s an orgasm and what’s just a fucking good g-spot stroke) orgasms out of you before Bucky rips off the restraints and is climbing over you. He settles right next to Natasha, who takes the hint and lays down next to you, running her fingers over your body.

You don’t know what’s okay and what’s not, but with Natasha in the room, you know you need to err on the side of caution. That means hands above your head, no noise, no pouting, no nothing. All you can do is bite your lip and hope your teeth don’t meet.

Bucky’s knuckle deep with his first finger before you hear a deep, dark chuckle. “‘S okay, Baby. Mistress may not want you to pull her hair or release a single sweet little moan, but Daddy sure does. Lemme hear it Baby, let it...all...out.”

He punctuates the last few words with little nips to the tops of your thighs, encouraging you to let it all out.

You do.

Immediately, your arms stretch before latching both into the hair of the man between your legs. You moan like you’re trying to lose your voice, hugging your legs to your chest to give him a better angle.

This forces Natasha off of your body, but she finds a way to still be attached to you. She sticks fingers into your mouth, and you know what to do. Sucking on your fingers, but it’s still hot as Hell, so Bucky doesn’t make an effort to stop it.

His five o’clock shadow scratches you, which is especially painful on your sensitive thighs. Still, it all feels so good. If this is Heaven, you’d happily convert to Christianity to ensure your safe return. It feels different than the first time he ate you out. Hungrier, sexier. It’s beautiful, like a work of Renaissance art.

Before you know it, his cock replaces his tongue. It’s thick, veiny, perfect. You’ve had it inside of you before, but this time...this time it’s different. More intense.

Bucky is slamming in and out of you so hard you’re sure there will be intense bruising on your pelvis.

Natasha slips from your side and onto your face, riding it with reckless abandon, your head locked between her toned thighs.

It’s insane. Your body is completely at their whim.

Occasionally, one of them will play with your nipples or rub your clit or press on a bruise or scratch down (or up) your tummy, sending even more shockwaves of pleasure through your body.

Every time you moan, it sends sweet vibrations through Natasha’s pussy, causing her to squeeze your head with her legs. You feel trapped, caged. It’s amazing.

“Fuck,” Bucky moans. “I’m gonna cum, Baby. Love your pussy so fucking much...keep clenching around me, Baby, don’t stop licking your Mistress...fuck.”

With that, he cums inside of you. The other two of you cum shortly after, bodies shaking furiously as you do so.

You’re gasping for breath, body aching all over. It’s a good ache, like after an intense yoga or pilates session. An accomplished ache. A fuck yeah, I just got fucked so fucking hard type of ache.

It feels good, so good.

Natasha takes the lead in the aftercare. Bucky stays next to you, whispering sweet words into your ear while he lifts you up and into a comfy chair on the far end of the room.

They work in fluid motions, like they’re dancing, or taking care of something complicated mission. Natasha strips the sheets, Bucky leaves you to replace them. The second you start whining about being alone like some angsty puppy, Natasha waits for Bucky to place you back on the bed before feeding you a protein bar (lemon, your favorite). When you’ve successfully chewed a few bites, she hands it to Bucky, while she tosses the used toys in a large container next to the tub, a reminder for later to make sure she cleans them.

You’re dead tired, unable to do anything for yourself. They sandwich you between them and mumble praises into your sweat-drenched hair, your sore shoulders, your abused chest. It’s nice, sweet. Makes you come down from your high nice and easy, right into a deep slumber.

They shift you around into a more comfortable position, a heavy silence falling over you three before Bucky speaks, because of course he does.

“Do you think we’ll ever do this again?” Bucky asks.

You’re tucked into his side, with Natasha draped across you protectively. He snakes his opposite arm across his chest to stroke your arm with his fingertips. You’d be overly warm if you weren’t totally naked.

Natasha leans into your shoulder, leaving a light kiss on a bruise she’s not sure who created. “Yeah, totally. As long as she,” she angles her head to gesture to you. “Wants it.”

Bucky smiles. “I think she will.”

[cherry3point14]

Dean Winchester definitely isn't in love, so don't ask him about it    

DESCRIPTION: All the times that Dean definitely didn’t have any feelings for you and totally wasn’t pining away like a lovesick puppy, so if everyone could shut up about it that’d be great.

THIS IS A ONESHOT AS PART OF THE ALONE SERIES, WHICH YOU CAN READ HERE OR HERE (AO3), I HIGHLY RECOMMEND YOU READ THIS AFTER THAT FIC AS THIS IS AS ADD ON TO THAT STORY.

[A collection of Dean POV drabbles glued together to make a oneshot of how Dean fell in love with you (in the multi-chap fic Alone). Ranging from S9 E5 up to S10 E12. Characters: Dean, Sam, Reader. Warnings: MOC!Dean and mentions of Demon!Dean. 14 Year old Dean cannot control his body.]

AO3 link here if you would prefer.

The first time he sees you

The first time Dean sees you he thinks you're dead. He gets that familiar churn in his chest, guilt at having lost another one. You make three. They'd already found two dead girls downstairs so you, hanging there lifeless, makes three dead girls.

If only they'd have got here sooner but they weren't exactly scouring missing person reports while the Wicked Witch of the West was loose in the bunker. He knows sometimes they miss some, but it doesn't make it any easier and like every other time, he's still taking it personally. Three dead girls because of one bloodsucking Djinn, and him not getting there fast enough. The Djinn he can kill, it's harder to forgive himself.

Suddenly he wishes he'd twisted that knife into the son of a bitches heart a little deeper.

Course, that is before they actually get to you and your eyes flutter open. You look like you don't have blood left in you but somehow, you're still kicking. And just like that, he thinks he's going to get to save one as he tells Sam to cut you down. That'll do for today, just let him save one of you and maybe he'll be able to sleep tonight.

Then you talk. He's about to tell you not too, you're weak right now and you shouldn't be talking but you ask about the other one. Dean prepares to tell you about monsters being real and these ones in particular. Djinn are lonely cave dwellers. They live alone.

He never gets a chance before you grab the knife from Sam and shove Dean out of the way, with strength you shouldn't have after being drained of your blood for God knows how long. He doesn't even finish blinking and you've killed the Djinn who'd been lurking behind him and saved his ass instead.

And when he asks if you're a hunter you basically call him an idiot.

Somehow, Dean knows you'll be ok.

The first time you leave

Dean hadn't liked the idea of leaving you with Kevin at first. Sam had been insistent since you were in pretty bad shape after the Djinn and Dean could admit you did kind of save their lives right after they saved yours. But Kevin was family, Dean was just being careful.

You making fun of him down the phone hadn't really improved his opinion of you, he'd been really excited to see the squirrel.

It's when they get back to the bunker, and Dean still swears he's got an itch behind his ear, that he changes his mind about you.

Because Kevin—won't take breaks because he wants everything to be over and still mourning his mother—is running around the bunker playing hide and seek. Dean doesn't think he's ever seen the kid look like he's having so much fun. When Sam clears his throat to get Kevin's attention he looks embarrassed, but he still animatedly talks about the afternoon you've both spent playing cards and board games. He claims he only started because you were annoying him while you were bored, but then he's talking about his strategy in Monopoly that should have worked so maybe you'd cheated.

Damn. Dean kind of super fucking appreciates you making this kid take the day off because Kevin suddenly reminds him of the kid they first picked up all that time ago. The innocent kid from advanced placement before heaven and hell were after him. 

Although with his track record Dean should have known that the fun was never going to last.

He's never really heard something as loud as your scream and he's heard angels talk. He knows that might be a slight exaggeration, but it is goddam frightening when you're screaming so loud about finding Crowley.

Somehow, it's even worse when you leave quietly.

He takes you back to your car because he's not a dick. If you want to leave he's not going to try and stop you. Doing the sensitive thing is Sam's gig.

He's just glad when you stop crying on the journey because crying chicks are definitely not his rodeo. Not unless he's saving them anyway.

And despite your freak out, you don't seem like you need saving.

He's horrified when he sees what you consider a car. It's one of those things that's more computer than engine and you try to sell him on the heated seats. Of course, he can't show you that he's actually intrigued by that, not with Baby right there. His hand rests on her hood while he watches you get in your truck and spend a moment appreciating it before you come back. 

He doesn’t understand what there is to appreciate but he doesn’t say anything more about it. 

He makes you leave with his number and a promise to check-in, not before you insist he checks in with you.

Maybe he can manage that.

The first time you text

He's sitting in the car after having watched Cas go into his date when his phone goes off.

Breaking News. Bieber has been arrested. How are the pretty boys of America dealing with this crisis?

Dean can't help but smile at the screen. He hasn't heard from you since he drove away leaving you with your transformer truck and this is the first thing you text him?

No comment. And you've gotta keep my membership a secret.

He throws his phone down on the seat next to him and drives off hearing it buzz while he's on the road. He's smirking at the sound when the Sheriff calls and he changes direction to head to the station instead.

It's not until Cas is sliding out of the passenger seat the next morning, after his adventures in babysitting and Dean's own continuing adventures in angel killing, that he looks at the message you'd sent back the previous night.

A secret? Oh, you poor pretty dummy. It's true what they say, brains or brawn. Can't have it all.

Dean doesn't type back and instead opts to drive back to the bunker first. When he gets there Sam is, as ever, reading something that looks like the most boring book they own. And they have a whole library of boring.

He snaps a picture of Sam and sends it back with a caption.

This is what brains look like in its natural habitat. There's no case, he is choosing to do this for fun.

He sits down opposite Sam waiting for the reply, which only takes a minute.

What a nerd. I'll take a pretty face any day of the week.

He only realizes how much he's grinning when he hears Sam's voice, "what are you so happy about? How did it go with Cas?"

The first time he doesn't tell you something

He doesn't like watching Crowley walk up the stairs and out of sight. It makes his shoulders tense and his fingers twitch like they're missing a weapon. Too many times has he fallen into a pattern of working with Crowley and usually the outcome is the same, bad. But really what the hell is he supposed to do? He needs to find Sam and the angel currently taking his brother for a joy ride. He needs to focus on the person he can still save.

His brain is about to dwell on Kevin again when his phone vibrates in his pocket, like an electric shock, and your name flashes on the screen.

When he opens it there's a picture. You're holding your phone up for a selfie that encompasses your face and the table in front of you. Your free hand is lifting a fry from the plate of chili fries below, but it's still attached by stringy cheese and blobs of meat while your face is frozen in some over the top look of pleasure. Eyes rolling in the back of your head and tongue hanging out of your mouth. Underneath is a caption.

Better than sex.

He really tried to resist but the corners of his lips curl upwards for the briefest of seconds. It's a momentary reminder that everything isn't fire and brimstone and dick angels. But it's also a reminder he doesn't deserve. He slips his phone back into his pocket without replying and flushes that small spark of joy from his system.

The one thing he's grateful for is neither of you talks about the deep shit because he doesn't think he can bear to tell another person about Kevin. Even the idea of telling you, who only knew him for all of a few days, is too much anguish for Dean to consider. He buries that shit. He tells himself it's not something you do over text anyway and he can't call you from a CIA outpost either.

Then when Crowley returns with news of Baby he's back behind the wheel of the pimpmobile. He's got a brother to save and a mission.

The first time you don't text back

Dean is consumed by a lot of things. Guilt is probably the main one but, in fairness, he has a lot to feel guilty about. Anger is another. Before the mark, he could focus his anger, use it to sharpen his senses, make him a better hunter but now? With the mark slowly draining the things that make him Dean it's only the anger that remains. An unrestricted fury that swallows him whole sometimes.

Since he touched the first blade though, since he took a life with it, something else lights him up like the sky on 4th July. Need. Hunger. To hold the blade again and never let go. To kill with it. 

It's getting harder to fight the more he tries to. Every minute that passes he can feel the power surge up his arm like he's still holding it.

So, it's a relief to be distracted. He's mostly been distracting himself with his faithful friend, drink. She's comforting and safe and takes the edge off, if only temporarily.

The last few days there's been another, not necessarily good distraction, that he's been clinging to so tightly he's becoming stalker level obsessive but screw it, he's worried.

Sometimes you've made him wait a day for a reply, he assumes you're on a hunt, but it's been three days now with nothing. He's tried starting one of your casual arguments or sending you a joke about Sam being too tall to tie his own shoes, but nothing. Radio silence.

The concern is enough for him to break down and finally send you a message that straight up tells you he's worried.

Not heard from you in a few days, check-in at some point, ok?

He'd hoped it would be enough to force a reply if you knew he was serious. But he finds himself swirling his scotch in one hand and thumbing through his unanswered message history in the other. Which is looking one-sided and excessive on his part.

Then Crowley shows up. Dean barely resists punching the demon in the face and he only manages that since the bottom feeder has the blade and that's the only way to kill Abaddon. Dean does allow himself a huff and eye roll combo though, "you're like a bad case of the clap, every time I think you're gone you pop up again."

"Always the charmer." Is all the king of hell replies as Dean escapes to the pool table.

What follows is a few hours of annoyance. Trying to ignore the demon who is so intent on not being ignored, until finally Dean is saving Crowley from a low-level wannabe bad guy and burying all thoughts of you in favor of the thing he really needs to do. Kill Abaddon.

He guesses putting aside his worry is just one more thing to feel guilty about.

The second time you almost die on him

He hadn't realized how bothered he was about not hearing from you, now for four weeks and six days, until he's leaving the penthouse where he's just killed carrot top.

There's a lot of things he's repressed. It's a damn hobby of his. Dean Winchester hasn't had a good day if he hasn't swallowed a complicated emotion and washed it down with a whiskey chaser. Some come back to haunt him, some stay where he keeps them, mostly.

Not often do they come back as quickly as his concern for you.

He swears he tried to sleep when they got back to the bunker, but it was pointless. He had a case to work, the case just happened to be you.

One plus side of the mark of Cain? Better than any caffeine buzz when he needed to be focused. It's just that increasingly the focus becomes violent or murder-y.  

He checks the GPS on your car but it's static at some motel in Columbus. The address gets written down anyway, just in case, but if something happened to you he doubts they took you in your own truck. Then he checks in with a few hunters that he figures might be mutual acquaintances and the ones that are haven't heard from you either. It's when Sam wanders in that he tracks your phone and sees it hasn't had a ping in over a month.

Or about four weeks and six days, give or take.

It's a few miles from the motel your ridiculous red truck is sitting at and it's as good a place as any to start.

He's only half-aware he's been having a conversation with Sam the whole time.

Dean can feel the tension in his body as he drives, accompanied by that heavy, sickly feeling of anticipation he gets when he's on a hunt. The one that sits in his gut when he's trying to save someone.

Who knows, maybe you're fine. Maybe you've shacked up with a Townie and you've spent the last four weeks living carefree.

He knows that's not what's happened.

From the outside, the building looks like a piss poor version of every bad guy's lair ever. It's a few miles out of town against a lonely highway and looks about ten minutes away from crumbling under its own weight.

Sam tries to suggest scoping out the place before going in hot, but Dean shakes his head to end that train of thought before it starts. He doesn't care what's in there. With the blade tucked in the back of his jeans, he feels invincible but it's more than that. It's the familiar anger emanating from the mark. The vengeful fury that he can't control when his emotions are already running so high.

After all, he's already wasted four weeks and six days, give or take.

They kick down the main doors together, guns raised, but only his door splinters away from its hinges. His boots pound the concrete and he's ready for a fight, he needs a fight.

Except there are only two other people in the room. There's a woman standing over a table with something sharp in her hand and there's this other person. Chained to said table and as he gets closer, shouting for the stranger to get back, he sees the prisoners face.

Your face.

He's about to shoot the woman standing a few feet in front of him, with utter boredom on her face, but she flashes black eyes. It'd be easy to say that he's doing it for you, that shooting isn't good enough for this bitch who's been keeping you here. But as his fingers wrap around the hilt of the first blade forging a connection between the mark and the blade and his unfettered bloodlust, it's not about anything except the pure joy that he gets as he drives it into her chest.

Her death flashes in his eyes as he stands steadfast, watching the demon become nothing but an empty, dead shell. 

It's the voice he hasn't heard in months that pulls him back from the murderous haze. A quiet and broken whisper and then sobs. He turns his whole body in the direction of those sounds and takes in the sight of you. Mangled and bleeding. Some parts of you so bruised that he can't imagine what was done to cause it. The blade slips from his hand like he's scared the sight of it is going to frighten you.

The same hand that had held it, the same hand that had killed this Demon, curls into the ends of your hair while you cry. He wants to hold you, but he doesn't want to break you any more than you already are so this is all he can think to do. Shushing noises and his fingers tangled in the knots on your head.

This time he's not so sure you're going to be ok.

The first time he doesn't text you back

He sent the message before he summoned Crowley. It does nothing to ease how shitty he feels about this to you.

He can feel his phone buzzing continuously in his back pocket, you must be calling, when Crowley arrives with a complaint on his lips. 

All throughout the conversation, while Crowley spouts out his knowledge of the mark, that it's controlling him now and he'll die if he doesn't kill, the image of you bloody and broken is in the back of his head.

"And you're gonna help me."

Crowley actually looks interested, "and why am I going to do that?"

"Because I haven't killed you yet for what you did to her."

Crowley isn't stupid enough to laugh in Deans's face like he normally would, but he doesn't hold back the bite in his retort. "Oh squirrel. So sensitive still. Y/N got what was coming to her. Besides, what's to stop you killing me once you've got the blade and a full dose from the mark?"

Dean lets out a sigh. He's fighting the part of him that's still telling him not to do this.

"Because I want to gut Metatron more than I want you dead."

Crowley smiles. After a brief reprieve, Dean’s phone starts buzzing again. He takes it out only to turn it off before he nods and escapes with Crowley in tow.

The first time you don't say goodbye

He hasn't left his room since Cas left. He's been clawing at the inside of his head trying to piece things together but it's all half stories and half actual memories. And somehow karaoke remains.

So, Dean does what he does best. His reflex. He goes to grab a beer.

"Hunting felt like the thing I'd always been missing but my sister was going to have a career and kids and everything she ever wanted. I was going to make sure of it."

Your voice is quiet but not so quiet that it doesn't fill the library, the room acting like a huge echo chamber. He stops dead. Neither Cas or Sam had mentioned you were here but hearing your voice brings back bits and pieces. Enough that he can still remember what your neck felt like in his hand and the look in your eyes as you passed out after he'd smashed your head into a wall.

He stands there listening to you pour your heart out to Sam. You sister had been one of Azazel's, you'd burned them all and you couldn't find a way to bring your sister back.

Something flashes in his head. What you'd cried out in that warehouse. He'd never thought to ask you about it before they'd left you at that hospital but now it makes sense. Your sister had been a demon, a demon who tortured you, and he'd killed her.

Dean wants to jump out of the shadow he's hiding in when you blame yourself again. He doesn't. He's stopped in place when you say his name. Apparently, he knows something. What did he know?  

He's trying to remember when he hears Sam.

"So, you're not even going to say goodbye to him? You're just going to run away?"

A lump forms in Dean's throat. You were leaving because of something he knew but he couldn't remember. Maybe he could stop you.

He doesn't.

Because the thing he does know is that you deserve a chance to get away and go back to your old life. Hunting monsters without the big bad and without him. Dean's life has too many complications and you deserve to get out of that.

He nearly killed you and he nearly killed his brother. Sam wouldn't give up that easy but you? He could let you go.

The first time you come back

The rain is battering the outside of the bunker but it's quiet inside. Sam is gone and Dean is buried in a book looking for a thread of hope and finding none.

It's been quiet in the bunker for days. Since Charlie. Since what he did to Charlie.

But rain isn't loud enough to hide the pounding on the door, or the voice he hears as he's climbing the stairs.

"Strippergram, open up!"

He almost falters, almost trips over his own feet but somehow, he rights himself. His heart beating faster than necessary and his palms a little sweaty for his liking.

You're alive and, more than that, you're here.

As soon as he sees you it's like you haven't spent two months off the map. You're soaked, your clothes cling to every curve of your body in the rain, making you look fucking beautiful. Even if your loose hair is stuck to your forehead and you shiver in the cold.

For a while, it's like none of it happened. Him becoming a demon and running off with Crowley. You leaving without a goodbye. All erased while you stand there being idiots and trading jokes. For a few minutes even, the things he's done because of the mark get cast into the back of his mind.

Then you limp.

He's in the middle of explaining why 'Pour Some Sugar on Me' is one of the top three stripper songs of all time when his words stop. You're leaning on your right leg, right arm on the banister with an iron grip and you're dragging your left leg the rest of the way, down each step. While you don't seem to be about to immediately drop dead he's still concerned.

Of course, he had no idea what kind of injury you were going to admit to.

He shouldn't laugh. You got shot. But worrying takes a backseat when you tell him where you got shot. He's even grinning to himself as he gets the supplies needed to patch you up.

It's only when he opens the door to find you casually lying on the bed, ass up, that he doesn't find it so funny anymore. In fact, he tells you as much when you decide to slap your good ass cheek and make another joke.

He has to bite back a groan watching that.

He sinks into a comfortable position once he's concentrating on getting the bullet out of you. Then he can focus on the task in front of him and forget about your shapely, bare legs that look endless from this angle. It's not your ass he's touching with careful grazes and patient fingers, it's just a wound that he's fixing. Doesn't matter where it is.

That works fine until he puts a fresh bandage on and you immediately start trying to roll off the bed in your half-naked state.

He doesn't need to be told twice when you tell him to leave. He's just grateful that he manages to do it, honestly, he wouldn’t have been surprised if he'd been unable to move because of the situation in his pants. 

Thankfully you take a while to catch up with him, now in clean and dry clothes. And for some reason, he remembers what you said to Sam, not him, the day you left. About that always being your room and there's a warmth in his chest that you were actually telling the truth. You left clothes there, in your room.

His smile only gets wider when you ask about Sam. You've been here as long as you have and not noticed Sam is missing. He tells himself that it doesn’t mean anything but, what if it did?

He hadn't even thought about going back to his room and trying to read more lore. It hadn't crossed his mind once. Instead, he'd venomously defended his TV choices and made you a grilled cheese so that you could both drink the hard stuff. He wasn't sure when you last ate.

It's when you've both finally agreed to watch an old movie, although he doesn't remember which one, that you start drifting. He watches it out the corner of his eyes.

Your eyelids start getting too heavy for you to keep them open although you desperately try. You curl onto your side to get more comfortable and stretch your legs out before you realize your feet land in his lap and you quickly retract them. Not that he'd mind but he's past the point of using words as he watches you like a nature documentary.

Finally, when your eyes close this big, deep breath falls out of you and it seems to take away the last of your resistance because then your chest starts that gentle up and down of sleep. It only takes a few minutes before he decides to put you in bed since you start fidgeting for not having enough space and it bugs him.

That's definitely the reason he scoops you into his arms as gently as possible and takes his time slowly carrying you to your room.

Although when he gets you there it presents another problem. You keep trying to roll onto your back, which causes you to disturb your bullet wound, which makes you whimper and almost wake up. So, he stands there for a few minutes nudging you back onto your front, not because the noise you make when you almost wake up is the most helpless thing he's ever heard, but because you probably need your sleep.

It's how he ends up sitting in the chair and watching you. Not in a creepy sparkly vampire way but to make sure you don't rollover.

When you finally seem settled, by the fact that you're now sprawled out on your stomach making happy mumble sounds into your pillow, his own eyes get too heavy to keep open.

He definitely didn't wait till you were comfortable before he lets himself fall asleep. He wasn't tired until now is all. 

The first time you wake him up

He doesn't know what time it is or how long he was out but he does know that your hand is on his shoulder when he wakes up.

Dean cracks his eyes open and looks up at you, noticing how you smile when you call him 'dummy' and the way your eyes seem to sparkle when you mention pancakes. The happiness is so obvious that it's all he can manage to repeat it back, to make sure he was hearing you properly.

"Pancakes?"

You tell him to lie down and that's when he notices the ache in his back from sleeping propped up in this chair. He doesn't have time to tell you that you were right about it though because you wander off, presumably for the love of pancakes.

He stands up and stretches. It takes care of his back enough that he doesn't feel the need to lie down like he was told to and, with the promise of breakfast, he's done with sleep now. He notices the practically empty whiskey bottle as he slowly trudges his way to the kitchen and groans to himself.

Then he hears Sam in the kitchen. Dean hadn't realized he was back but he sure as shit could hear him talking to you. Sam was telling you about the mark, how it had gotten worse and Dean didn't need to see your face to hear the concern in your voice.

It's too early for him to control the anger in his veins as he asks to speak to Sam privately.

"Dean, what the hell? I can't get you out of your room, but Y/N shows up and you're watching TV and hanging out?" If Dean didn't know any better he'd think his little brother was jealous.

"What are you doing telling her how bad I've been?"

Sam's eyes appear to bug out of his head momentarily, "what like it's a secret now? She knows you have the mark, what's the problem telling her that you've been struggling? You have!"

Dean runs a hand down his face but it doesn't stop the words tumbling out, "because I don't want her to be afraid of me."

He doesn't know why but Sam stares dumbly like he's trying to work something out and in true annoying little brother fashion he steamrolls ahead with his assumptions once they are made. "If you feel like that about her why don't you… I mean I'd be ok with you asking her to stay, especially if it helps."

Dean feels warm on the back of his neck, but he furiously ignores it, "I don't know what you're talking about Sammy."

"What you mean the fact that last night was the first time in forever that you've slept more than an hour or hung out without some lore? Dude why don't you just ask her, as a friend even?"

This time his fist clenches and he struggles to release it. His voice is louder and more frustrated than he intended, "would you shut up I'm not asking."

Sam is doing his dumb puppy dog eyes now in an attempt to be convincing and understanding all at once, "But what if it makes a difference Dean. I mean she clearly-"

Dean pushes his index finger into Sam's chest, cutting him off with a glare, "You keep your mouth shut."

He has to walk away after that and not just because he can feel the pink on his ears. It's probably anger anyway, at Sam for butting in.

And then he trudges into the kitchen and you're flipping pancakes with a little sway in your hips as you do like there's a song in your head that he can't hear.

It's not weird that he wants to know what the song is.

The first time he fights with you

You somehow sneak into the room without him noticing. Maybe it's the fact that he's retreated back into his favorite new hobby, looking up mark lore, or maybe you're just sneaky.

When you ask about that text message he wishes he had more time. Even though he's been expecting this question since he sent it. There were so many things he's sorry for. He's sorry for calling Crowley in the first place, he's sorry for getting himself killed by Metatron, and turned into a demon. He's really fucking sorry about what he did as a demon but mostly he's sorry for what happened to you in the first place. He goes with his practiced answer though.

"That was when I started working with Crowley. He had the first blade and it was the only way I could kill Metatron. But after what he did to you, I thought…"

"You thought you owed me an apology for trying to save the world?"

How were you so understanding about this? He saw what had been done to you, or at least the after effects, the rest he can only imagine. And yet you were so quick to forgive him that he wonders if you were even mad at him for his adventures with the king of hell.

Then you have to go and ask about his argument with Sam at breakfast.

You keep asking and asking, a question for every answer that comes out of his mouth. And he jumps away from you because you're too close, but you follow him anyway. 

He doesn't want to talk about it, if he was going to ask you to stay he wants it to be different. He doesn't want it to be because of the mark or his screwed-up life.

Except translating those emotions to the mark is something different entirely. All it knows is that he's getting agitated, which leads to violence, which leads to the resentments he buried down deep about you leaving flying from his mouth before he can stop them.

He knows he's already too far gone but it's so easy to push your buttons, you haven't seen him at his worst, so you don't know what he's capable of, so you fight back. You argue. You challenge him until he says it.

"No worries honey. I didn't cry myself to sleep or anything. With your track record, I think I dodged a bullet."

When you answer him with, "go fuck yourself, Dean," he wants to stop. He wants to pull back and apologize. Just the way you say his name is enough to make his chest constrict.

But that's not what the mark wants. The mark wants him to have the last word, so he follows you as you leave.

He should have just let you go.

Sam shows up at the worst possible time and you tell him that you’re staying. Dean knows it's only to spite him for everything he's said but in some twisted way he's got exactly what he wanted. He can calm down now, right?

"LIKE HELL ARE YOU STAYING, I WANT YOU OUT!"

He roars it against her own battle cry but both of you end the same way. Trying to stare at each other until one of you spontaneously combusts.

Neither of you do.

Dean has no idea how but eventually he tears himself away. He shoots daggers at you one more time before he retreats to his room, and with a slam of the door, he hears you do the same.

So much for that.

The second time he goes through puberty

He's sitting on a bus. A goddamn bus.

He had to leave Tina there alone and he is sitting on a bus. In a hoodie. Looking like Bieber.

Dean really didn't want to play into the teenage stereotype, but this seemed totally unfair.

He's about ten minutes into the journey when he closes his eyes. Just for a minute. He hasn't slept in what feels like days and the rumble of the bloated bus engine lulls him to sleep.

It's been a while since Dean had a dream, in fact, he hasn't since well before he got the mark. Maybe not being able to dream another side effect nobody writes in the lore books.

But he's in his teenage body now so with no mark it's Dreamtown USA, population Dean Winchester.

At first, the weirdest thing about the dream is that he's an adult, like he had been a few hours ago. It's simple enough. He's in the bunker, cleaning his gun except he's butt naked. Feet crossed on the table while he leans back in his chair but naked. And he thinks it's hilarious, he's laughing and making a plan to get Sam to sit in his chair for dinner. This goes on for a while until the bunker door opens and closes and he looks up to see you there. Dressed like a pizza delivery girl. But in roller-skates that you somehow use to get down the stairs without breaking your neck.

Dream Dean seems to have no issues with the fact that he's naked, or that the pizza delivery girl, you, let yourself in. He's mainly concerned about the pizza.

"Delivery for Mr. Dick Hertz," your voice is a sultry tone as if you're trying to be a porn star. He laughs at the name thinking his joke hilarious, but your mouth falls open in shock when you realize what you just said. "Oh no, is it true? Does your dick… hurt?"

You're moving towards him now like you're floating, although, it's probably the skates, and you toss the pizza box to the table carelessly. As you reach him the baseball cap on your head is thrown away too and your hair falls around your face in bouncy pornstar curls. "Because if it does hurt, I'm sure I can help with that."

Dean sits forward now, the front legs of his chair slamming against the floor and he sits up straight. His hands reach out for you and pull you forward so you're straddling him on the chair, while he's still naked. "I'm sure you can, sweetheart," he says smiling up at you as his fingers skin the hem of your tee, dragging it up your body. You bend your arms and duck your head letting him throw the offending item over his shoulder, leaving you topless because, of course, you're not wearing a bra.

He grins as he leans himself forward, pressing his lips to the skin of your chest, while you giggle. It's only a moment later that you push him back and lean into his face, your lips so close to his he can almost taste them.

"If I'm going to help you, I'm going to need to finish getting out of these clothes first," you whisper before you close the gap, crashing your mouth into his.

"Hey kid, wake up!"

Dean sits up abruptly. A teenager again, on a bus, in a hoodie. He blinks to adjust his eyes to the light when he sees some old guy shouting at him, "the driver said this is your stop kid."

It's only as he stands up that he feels something wet. It's a strange experience because it's a feeling he remembers only consciously having twice before in his life. And both times he was, shockingly, a teenager.

"You've got to be freaking kidding me."

The first time he kisses you

Dean is enjoying the ride home like any other time he's been kept apart from Baby. His full focus is on how she's driving and if that's a smudge on her hood or an actual dent.

He's so engrossed with the sound of her engine that he doesn't really listen to Sam much. Dean will tell him later and Sam will get annoyed, but Dean knows he'll repeat all of it anyway.

Or at least he wasn't listening until Sam said it.

"Oh, I forgot to tell you, I spoke to Y/N this morning and told her we're on our way back. She asked about us grabbing some dinner because, and I quote, 'she's not our maid'."

"What?" Dean asked suddenly very interested in every word his brother said.

"Well ok there was more than that, she went on about if we wanted a maid then we'd need to find a non-kinky one online, but I don't remember the whole thing word for word."

He can't believe his brother is as smart as he is and thinks the part that Dean wanted repeating was the maid thing. "Wait, so you're saying she's still at the bunker?"

Sam seems to catch on because he twists in his seat to look at Dean better with a smirk on his dumb face, "yes Dean, I'm saying she's still there. Like she said she would be."

Baby was used to sudden increases in speed but even this one made her jolt a little as Dean's foot hits the floor.

"Dean, what the hell? Is this about your, ahem, dream?"

He already regrets telling Sam about that but when he'd had to rush to the bathroom after arriving at the motel, Sam had forced the information out of him.

"Shut up Sammy," was Dean's eloquent response when, in fact, it was about the dream.

He'd been so sure that you would have left. After the fight, the way you'd both screamed at each other, more importantly, the things he'd said. You'd left before for a lot less. So, yeah, he'd been sure. He'd been expecting to come home to an empty bunker if he was lucky a note that didn't directly blame him even if it was his fault.

But you were still there. You'd stayed. He had no idea why you'd stayed but you had, and he wanted to be there ten minutes ago already, but Baby can only go so fast.

Denial was getting harder to maintain with the way he needed to be there already, the way his heart thumped in his chest or the fucking butterflies in his stomach. A man with the mark of Cain on his arm shouldn't be feeling butterflies in his gut, but here Dean is anyway. Maybe he wasn't ready to put words onto his feelings but fuck, if all he wanted to do was kiss you.

Sam wisely doesn't interrupt his daydreams for the rest of the way, he doesn't even mention that they haven't stopped for food.

When the bunker is in sight you're outside and Dean still doesn't believe it. 

You’re really there. You really stayed. 

You're in this outfit, God help him, it's cut-off jeans and t-shirt that is sticking to your skin on account of you cleaning your truck. He pulls up and throws Baby into park—he'll apologize for being so rough with her later—and as he slams the door you're offering to clean Baby later to make amends for raiding his car supplies.

Surely you couldn't have been this perfect the whole goddamn time.

Well, not perfect, considering your choice of wheels. 

He's by your side before you really finish the question. He's close enough that you have to stand up to full height and he can't help taking a second to look at you. Your hair is pulled onto the top of your head and there's a smudge of something on your cheek, your eyes are wide with oblivious innocence right until the last second before he kisses you.

In his dumb teenage dream, kissing you made him jizz in his pants, but this is even better. This is real. Plus he manages to control himself.

Your lips are full and soft and frozen for a split second until he runs his tongue over them. You taste like syrup and coffee and your mouth is warmer than his somehow. When you kiss him back his thumb rubs encouraging circles over your cheek, not that you need encouraging because you kiss him fiercely. You kiss him like you argue, with your entire soul.

When you can't breathe anymore, and you pull back, he tells you you're staying. And when you try to start a lecture, which he knows will be about not telling you what to do, he kisses you again.

Only partly to shut you up, mostly because once he's started he doesn't know how to stop.

[youcancallmecirce]

Elemental Chapter 7: Sleepover

I'd thought to get to THE scene in this chapter, but as it turned out, I had a lot more ground to cover before I get there than I thought I did.  Why must I be so thorough?

Chapter 1     Chapter 2     Chapter 3     Chapter 4     Chapter 5    Chapter 6

Read it on AO3

Marinette ended the call with a quick apology, and took the laptop from their knees to set it on the ottoman.  When it was gone, Adrien doubled over with his laughter, resting his arms on his knees and his face in his hands and his unnatural laughter gave way to wrenching sobs almost immediately.  Heart breaking for him, she wrapped her arms around his shuddering shoulders and he leaned into the embrace almost desperately.  Finally, she simply lounged back into the corner of the couch and pulled him to half-sprawl over her, without either of them releasing the other.

She had no idea how long they stayed like that, he sobbing brokenly and she rubbing his back in soothing circles, but he slowly quieted until she heard only his ragged breathing.   “Adrien?  Are you awake?”

“I am,” he replied, his voice raw.

“Are you alright?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you, um, do you want to talk about it?”

“I don’t—I don’t think that I can.  Not yet.”

“Okay.”

He was quiet for several minutes after that, and Marinette stayed quiet as well, understanding that he needed the comfort more than he needed words.  This left her to seethe privately.

From the little bits and pieces that Adrien had let fall about his life back home, Marinette had already formed an unfavorable opinion of Adrien’s father.  After their conversation with the Guardian, her opinion had plummeted and now she was using words like “despicable” and “contemptible” in her mental dialogue.

The man had told Adrien he was a disappointment?

He’d complained about his weak magic?

Those things alone were reprehensible—but add to that the fact that he was lying about it all, chipping away at his son’s self-worth with things that weren’t even true?

It made Marinette’s blood boil, and only the fact that Adrien needed compassion rather than righteous indignation kept her from marching around the room, ranting her fury.  Even then, she was practicing deep breathing exercises to distract herself, and keep her temper from boiling over.

She brought one hand up and threaded it through Adrien’s hair, finger-combing it back from his face, and he stirred.

“I’m sorry, Marinette,” he said quietly, his voice taut with shame.

“Adrien, no.”  She pushed at his shoulders and he sat up stiffly, refusing to meet her eyes.  “You have nothing to apologize for.”

“I completely fell apart, in front of you and your parents and the Guardian…”  He trailed off, and scoffed.  “Who does that?”

“You just found out—”

“That I’m a lot more powerful than I thought?  Yeah, but that’s a good thing.  Shouldn’t I have been happy about it?”

“Okay, Adrien, first of all: no.  More power is not necessarily a good thing. I often wish that I was more like my mom, because then my life would be a lot easier than it is.  And secondly—you and I both know that that isn’t why you’re upset.”  He scoffed again and stood, pacing away restlessly.  She followed him, but didn’t crowd him. “Adrien, please.   I’m not going to push you to talk about it, but I’m also not going to let you twist this around to blame yourself.  You have nothing to be ashamed of.”

“Listen to her, kid.  She’s right.”

“Ah, what do you care, Plagg?  Just…leave me alone.”

Marinette bit her lip, and shifted her weight uncertainly from one foot to the other.  “Do—do you want me to go, too?”  He shrugged, and she tried to pretend that his indifference didn’t hurt.  “Okay then.  I’ll just, um, grab my bag and—”

“No, Marinette, that’s not—Gods.”  He scrubbed his hands over his face, and then ran his hands through his hair. “I’m sorry.  I just—I hate for you to see me this way.  But…I think I hate the idea of you leaving right now even more.”

She closed the distance between them, and wound her arms around his waist, pressing her cheek to the middle of his chest.  “I can stay as long as you need me to, Adrien.”

His arms closed around her, and he lowered his cheek to the top of her head.  “Thank you,” he murmured.  “Thank you.”

Adrien woke sometime after midnight, with a pounding headache, a crick in his neck, and a warm weight on his chest.  He was disoriented at first, but it didn’t take long for the events of the evening to surface in his sleep-fogged brain.

The Guardian.

His ring.

His father’s lies.

And Marinette.

They’d fallen asleep on his couch, watching Netflix on his laptop.

The computer had long since gone to sleep itself, and he wiggled the mouse so that the screen would give him some light to see by.  It didn’t help much, though.  He was still pinned beneath a slumbering Marinette.  He didn’t want to wake her, but the pain in his neck would not be ignored. This left him with two options: pick her up, put her in his bed, and come back to the couch, or, pick her up, put her in his bed, and then crawl into it next to her.

There was no doubt which option he preferred.  Had she been Mer, he’d have taken that option without a second thought.  But she wasn’t Mer, and might well think him unforgivably presumptuous if he crawled into bed with her while she slept.

Then again, she had fallen asleep with him—on him, even—and it was his bed.

He heaved a sigh, and a cool breath of air fanned his face.

“What is it, Adrien?” came the tiny voice, and Adrien jumped.  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Marinette shifted in her sleep, but didn’t wake.

“She’s a deep sleeper,” Tikki giggled.

“I see that,” he whispered back.

“So what were you just agonizing over?”  He looked at her questioningly, and she giggled again. “Marinette makes the same face when she’s over-thinking things.”

He smiled, and glanced at the young woman sleeping on his chest.  “I was trying to decide whether it was really necessary for me to sleep on the couch tonight.”

“While she sleeps in your bed, you mean?”  He nodded.  “Oh, good heavens no.  She won’t mind.  She might have a manic attack in the morning, when she realizes she’s drooled on you, but she won’t mind.”

Adrien grinned at her, and began the slow, careful process of moving them both to his bed.

When Marinette woke late the next morning, she had no idea where she was.   She rolled to her back and stared in confusion at the strange ceiling, trying to figure out what had happened.  She remembered being at Adrien’s house, and the Skype call, and the fallout of that call, watching Netflix with Adrien, and then…nothing.  She must have fallen asleep watching TV, which meant that Adrien had moved her into this room sometime in the night.

She sat up and looked around, taking in the details of the guest room.  The walls were a pale taupe, with generic seascapes adorning the walls.  It was a generous size for a guest room, and for that matter, the bed was generously sized as well.   The night stand closest to hers held only a lamp, the top of the dresser was bare, save for a driftwood bowl that had been artfully filled with woven spheres, and the nightstand on the other side—

She frowned. The other nightstand held a wallet, keys, phone charger, a few Euro coins…Marinette’s eyes widened, and she looked at the pillow next to hers, seeking and finding the tell-tale divot that meant that the pillow had been occupied.

This was Adrien’s room.

This was Adrien’s bed.

The door swung open, and Marinette yanked the covers up with a shriek, startling Adrien badly enough that he sloshed coffee out of the mugs and onto the tray he held.  “Oh crumb, Adrien, I am so sorry!”

“Don’t worry about it,” he chuckled.  As he moved towards her, the little bit of liquid that had spilled floated up into the air and poured back into the mugs.  “I made coffee, but I’m not sure how you take yours so I brought it all with me.”

Marinette stared at the mugs in rapt fascination.  “That was amazing!”

“What?”

“That thing you did, with the coffee?  It’s like you didn’t even have to think about it.”

“Oh. That.”  He shrugged, at on the edge of the bed, and placed the tray on the bed between them.  “Yeah, I guess I didn’t.  Sugar?”

Marinette pursed her lips, but let it go.  For now.  “Yes, please.  Cream, too.  I love coffee, but I’m afraid that I have to have it well-doctored.”

Adrien smiled, and proceeded to prepare her coffee as requested.  “Nino says that ‘if you have to put all that crap in your coffee—’”

“‘Then you don’t actually like coffee,’” she finished for him.  “Oh, I know.  He’s an absolute snob about his coffee.”

He passed the first mug to her with a grin.  “How’s this?”

She took a tentative sip, and then hummed in pleasure.  “It’s perfect, thank you.”

“Good.” He busied himself with preparing the second up, and shot her a sidelong glance.  “I, um, want to apologize again for last night.”

“Adrien—”

“And to thank you, for being there with me, even when I was…like that.”  He set the mug down and gave her his full attention.  “I know you don’t think I should be ashamed, but I am, so this is important to me.   Please, accept my apology.”

“Alright.  I accept your apology.”

His expression eased, and he lifted his mug to his lips.  “Thank you.”

“Of course.”  Marinette wanted to press, to talk about last night, but—he’d talk when he was ready.  Instead, she said, “I guess I ought to be getting back home.”  She chuckled, thinking of the grilling that Alya would subject her to.  “I can only imagine what Alya thinks happened last night.  I’ll have to correct her.”

Adrien set his mug back on the tray and regarded her with a curious frown.  “Does it bother you, for her to think that we were…intimate?”

“Yes.”  Marinette blushed, and ducked her head.  “But only because it isn’t true.”

“Ah.”  He tilted his coffee cup, gently swirling the contents.  “What if it was true?”

Marinette grinned, in spite of the fresh blush heating her cheeks.  “I’d probably tell her about it myself, as soon as I got home.”

He choked on his coffee, and Marinette chortled.  “You asked!”

“So I did.”  He wiped the coffee from his chin with a warm smile, and Marinette felt her heart go all gooey.  Time to leave, before he had her melting entirely.

“Thank you for the coffee.”  She set her mug back on the tray, and slid her feet to the floor.

“Of course.”  He stood when she did, and led the way out of the room.

She bit her lip, suddenly feeling awkward again as she followed him to the front door.  “I, um, I’ll see you later, then, I guess?  Are you still planning to come over tonight?”

“I am!  1600, right?”

“Yeah!  Or, you know, whenever.”

He nodded, stopping in front of the door, and turning to face her.  “I’ll be there.”

“Good.”  She rocked back on her heels, smiling.

“Good.”  He propped his shoulder against the door, and smiled back.

“Oh, for crying out loud, would you just kiss already, so she can leave?”

“For fuck’s sake, Plagg!”  Adrien glared at the floating, smirking ‘cat’.   “I think I liked it better when you spent all day in your tank.”

Marinette giggled.  “He’s right, though.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

They kissed.

Adrien walked into the apartment at 1604, brown bag-wrapped bottle in hand, and Nino stomped in behind him with his arms full of Thai take-out.   Both girls jumped up to help them set everything out on the table.

“Alya, if you order from that place again, I swear that I am going to break up with you,” Nino groused.

Marinette glanced at him sympathetically.  “Bad service again?”

“Awful service.  Abysmal service.  I will never go back to that place, I don’t care how good the food is.  I will fucking make it myself.”

“Aw, my poor Nino,” Alya cooed, wrapping her arms around his waist and leering up at him.  “I’d be happy to service you.”

Nino choked on air, while Adrien snickered.  “Jesus, Al.”  He glanced at the blushing Marinette.  “Keep it in your pants, will you?”

Alya pressed a quick kiss to his lips.  “Don’t you slut-shame me.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.  I just don’t want to share you.”

She smirked knowingly, looked pointedly at Marinette (who was now very studiously ignoring all three of them), and then back at her boyfriend. “That not what you said when—”

“ALYA!”

“What?” she asked innocently, though she was fooling no one.

“Nino,” Marinette interjected loudly, “will you go get plates and silverware please?”

He relaxed, and flashed a grateful smile. “Absolutely.”

“Adrien, can you go help him?  We’ll need napkins, too.”  He nodded, and followed Nino back to the kitchen.  Marinette turned to a still smirking Alya.  “You, Mlle Horndog, can help me with drinks.”

“Excellent idea, mon ami.  I am quite…thirsty.”

They heard Adrien’s guffaw from the kitchen, and Marinette groaned.  “You guys are the worst.”

Alya bumped her hip into Marinette’s.  “You know you love us.”

Marinette heaved a long-suffering sigh.  “I don’t know why.”  But, she was smiling.

The four friends made short work of their meal, speaking little.  That Thai restaurant was notorious for shoddy customer service, but they managed to stay in business because their food really was just that good.  When they were done, the girls worked together to store their left-overs in the fridge while the guys washed the dishes and left them to dry.

Their tasks completed, Alya surveyed their selection of alcohol with a delighted smile.  Nino had brought over a bottle of rum and a two liter of Coke earlier in the day; Marinette still had a partial bottle of Scotch whiskey that that she’d been slowly sipping her way through for several weeks; Alya had both a bottle of tequila and a bottle of margarita mix—and Adrien’s choice was still hidden by the brown paper bag.  Curiously, she hefted it and slipped it out.

“Moscato?” she spluttered, laughing unreservedly at his choice.

He frowned.  “What’s wrong with Moscato?  You told me to bring what I like.”

“I did.  I know I did.  But I also said booze.”  She waggled the bottle, displaying the label for the others to see.  “This is glorified fruit juice, not booze.”

Marinette glared repressively at Alya, and took the bottle from her hand.  “I happen to like Moscato, too,” she protested, searching for their corkscrew.  “And even if I didn’t, there’s nothing wrong with his choice.”

“Thank you, Marinette,” Adrien beamed.

Alya shook her head, “Lightweights, the both of you.”  She mixed herself a margarita that was far more tequila than mix, and then moved out of the way to allow the others to make their drinks.

Nino slipped into the space she’d occupied, and made a far more moderate rum and Coke for himself.  “You have an iron liver, Al.  It’s unnatural.  The rest of us are just human.”

Adrien nearly dropped the glass that Marinette had just pressed into his hand, and she steadied it with an encouraging squeeze to his fingers.  It struck him, then, just how nice it was that someone knew, and could look at him in that moment with support and understanding rather than curiosity and concern.

He continued to stare at her as she turned to fix her own drink (whiskey on the rocks) and didn’t return to himself until Alya spoke again.

“All set?” she asked, surveying the full drinks.  “Excellent!  Let the sleepover shenanigans begin!”

The rest of them followed her to the living room, where the TV and Xbox were set up for an UMS4 tournament.  “Shenanigans?” he asked, warily.

Nino shrugged, settling himself into the corner of their couch.  “She’s exaggerating.”  Then he considered his girlfriend’s shit-eating grin, and amended it.  “Probably.”

Marinette settled herself into an over-stuffed beanbag chair on the floor, and rubbed her hands together excitedly.  “Who’s going to start?”

“Not you!”  Alya and Nino said together, surprising a laugh out of Adrien.

Marinette pouted.

“Why not Marinette?”

“Because she is insanely good at this game,” Alya replied, turning everything on and grabbing the controllers.

Nino nodded his agreement. “It’s pretty much a foregone conclusion that she’s going to win, but we play anyway because it’s fun and she’s usually a good sport about it.”

“The rest of us like to get a bit of playing in before she gets her hands on a controller and obliterates us.” She passed one controller to Nino, and offered the other to Adrien.  “You wanna go first?  Best of three matches between you and Nino, and I’ll play the winner.”

“Sure,” he said, taking the controller after a slight hesitation.  He’d been confident about his skill with the game, until they’d started talking about Marinette.  Now he was worried that he’d make a poor showing.

He needn’t have.

The first match was surprisingly quick, and when it was over, Nino groaned in disgust.  “You’re almost as good as she is,” he grumbled.  “As good, even.”

The second match went the same as the first, rendering a third unnecessary.

“My turn!” Alya chirped, and Nino handed the controller to her.

“It’s your funeral,” he said despondently, and Adrien felt a twinge of guilt.

“Maybe it was a fluke,” she said hopefully, taking the controller and changing characters to begin another match.

Nino arched a brow.  “Twice in a row?”

“It could happen.”

It wasn’t a fluke.  Adrien beat Alya as soundly as he’d beaten Nino, and she tossed her controller to Marinette with a groan after the second match.  “At least now someone can finally maybe knock Marinette from her pedestal.  Having my ass kicked is worth it to see someone take down the Queen.”

Marinette grunted.  “You can’t have my crown until you remove it from my corpse.”

“Whoa, dark,” Nino chuckled, then laughed outright when he saw the look she was getting from Adrien.

“I thought you said she was a good sport?” he said accusingly to Alya, who chuckled.

“That was before we realized that you’d actually be able to challenge her.”

Nino nodded sagely.  “You’ve tapped her competitive streak.”

Marinette looked back at him, determination writ clearly on her face.  “You ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.”

She nodded once, turned back to the screen, and started the match.

This time, the match lasted much longer, and Adrien found himself struggling to keep pace with her.  In the end, he did lose—but not by much.

“Well done,” he said, smiling.

“Anyone else need a refill?”  Alya asked, taking advantage of the lull between matches to get another drink.

Adrien and Nino chorused in the affirmative, but Marinette shook her head.  “Not more whiskey, but I’ll have some water.”

“Lightweights.  All of you.”

Nino, who was in the process of making a drink that had less rum in it than the previous had, scoffed. “I happen to like my liver the way it is. Functioning.”

“I’m less concerned with my liver, and more concerned with not being hung over in the morning.”

“Hung over?”  Adrien was briefly confused by the term, and then it connected.  “Oh, right.  The miserable feeling you wake up to the morning after over-indulging.”

Alya and Nino stopped to look at him strangely, and Marinette giggled.  He shrugged, and held up a wine glass that was only half-full.  “It happened to me once, and it’s an experience I have no desire to repeat.”

Alya blinked.  “Oh, you precious sun-child.  How have you managed two years at University with only one hangover?”

Nino pushed his girlfriend out of the kitchen.  “Leave him alone, Al, you’re embarrassing him.”

They settled back into their places in the living room, and the players took up their controllers for the second round.  It was another close game, but to Adrien’s delight, he actually managed to beat Marinette.

Nino and Alya both whooped their joy, slapping Adrien on the back.   Marinette wasn’t exactly celebrating, and her lips twisted sourly, but her eyes sparkled.

“Well done, Adrien,” she said, parroting his earlier words back at him.  “It’s nice to be challenged once in a while.”

“Happy to oblige you,” he returned, feeling a tad smug.  “Are you ready for round three?”

“Hoping to steal my crown, Adrien?”

He grinned.  “Ready to try, anyway.”

“Come on, Adrien!  ‘Do, or do not.  There is no try.’”

Marinette snorted and hit start.  “UMS4 now, Star Wars later, you nerd.”

“Star Wars?” Adrien asked, executing a complicated combination move that put him ahead of Marinette, if only slightly.

“You’ve never seen Star Wars?”  Adrien shook his head, and Alya looked at Nino in shock.

“I know, I know!  More than two years of friendship, and I still haven’t gotten him to watch it.  I’m a failure.”

“It’s never too late,” Marinette pointed out, taking back her lead.

“And no time like the present.”  Nino smiled triumphantly.  “I think I know what movie we’re watching.”

“Not until I beat—Adrien—”  Her fingers flew over the controller, stacking combos.

“Gah, how are you so good at this?”

“I played a lot with my dad growing up,” she said, systematically pounding his mech into the ground.  “And I played in a couple of tournaments in collége and lycée.”

“It shows.”  He tossed the controller to Marinette, who stood and put them on the shelf beneath the wall-mounted TV.  “I only started playing a few years ago.”

“What he means to say, is that he only started playing video games a few years ago.”  Nino shook his head.  “It’s crazy that you got so good so fast.”  He stood and stretched, then fetched his laptop from his bag and began scrolling through his movies, looking for Star Wars.  “You know,” he said absently, “sometimes, I think your life didn’t start until a few years ago.”

Adrien felt Marinette’s gaze on him, and avoided meeting it.  “Sometimes, I think you’re right.”

[nicolesqueloquence]

Recommended auditory pleasure: 

As I lay on my back watching a random Youtube video on the refugee situation and a proposed solution, it suddenly hit me how much grounding I’m in need of. The sun, perpetually streaming through my bedroom window onto my catatonic body covered in the usual loose shirt and boxer shorts, is not enough to quell the thirst of my soul as a desire for the unknown, the stimulating possesses me to look up when the next Oneness meditation session will be held at the center down the street.

Not this week, but next. Not soon enough. But where could I go? I look at my face, still pale despite countless attempts at tanning in the 108-degree sun and barren from any make-up, and cringe at the thought of leaving my room. ‘As I get older…’ a thought begins and is interrupted by another, ‘Am I really getting older? I’m 25..’

The newfound relief at realizing how young that is going to sound later on in life, as many of my older counterparts at work have remarked to me upon learning my age, sets in and I am happy to be this young but I am just so restless. Almost as if I’m not enjoying it, I’m simply not active anymore. I want to get out there, see things, and taste things that my tongue has yet to be blessed with besides the cursed vitriol of strong liquor, medication, and Fiber with B-Vitamin gummies that I’ve elected to aid me in the process of reaching my annual goal weight that seems to be much of an afterthought when I crave chocolate and post-indulgent guilt.

It’s all a toxic process of seeking more from the mundane while simultaneously fearing mediocrity with a passion that rivals that of my hatred of standing still. On paper, my life doesn’t look too basic: school, work, gym schedule, some books here and there to escape the black and white frame of my daily life through the fictional mind of another’s. But it doesn’t feel like enough. It never feels like enough.

Next to my fear of mediocrity is my phobia of complacency. That I will continue to feel the restless ache to constantly have something new and exciting happen to me in addition to every other endeavor I am on, and I will continue to wake up every year in the same bitter discontent. That I will get married and never fall in love. That I will have kids and it won’t satisfy this maternal urge to actualize my dreamed up image of Lili that I’ve had since I was 14.

The idealist in me still daydreams, still desires for more.. But when will it be enough? Will I ever find it?

Hurry up and wait, adulthood says. Wait to text him back. Wait for the next outing. Wait for next week to step on the scale to avoid any further disappointment. Wait for next semester to get further into my program. Wait for next year to feel more successful, more stable. Wait for my friends to have time for me and vice versa. Wait, wait, wait.

I’m terrible at waiting. If patience is a virtue, then I am simply immoral at best then.

I’ve always felt, even as a child, that I had this innate ability to perceive and even “feel” the atmosphere of other worlds. This strange feeling was further fulfilled by reading and diving through the portals of literature to explore these other worlds, see the novel happening in my mind’s eye as if it were a movie, and literally place myself so deeply into what was occurring that almost every single last past of every book I’ve read has been met with tears.

But here, in this life, I feel like I am in a bubble. I want to stretch out, abandon the protection of my mundane existence, and see what is truly out there for me. I want –

I want to see what’s out there for me. You’ve always gotten to date other people, and I haven’t.

Like a bullet, those words graze through my mind all over again. This was almost exactly three years ago.

And just like that my bubble becomes a prison. I’m a huge proponent of people fixing themselves if that is what they want, but they have to want that or it just won’t happen. But I’m also a huge hypocrite, because I have yet to do this for myself and reach out from this emotional jail cell that he kept me in for so long.

There’s more out there but I can’t keep saying that and not venturing out to find it. Of course there are obstacles like money, time, transportation- But if I hurry up and wait some more, I’ll have enough to finally go out and see some shit.

Because my life isn’t permanent. My time here is limited. I never once imagined when I was younger that I would make it to 26. I really didn’t want to, honestly. To me, it would have been blissful and better to die young. Even my own father voiced these words to me when I brought up all of the physical ailments I witness every single day by those who are either elderly or approaching old age.

The thing is, we take all of it for granted. The ability to walk, to talk, to sleep, to wake up and feel awake and alive for the most part. The ability to go to the bathroom without assistance, take a shower without someone to help, just basic functioning that we could never even imagine would be taken away from us by time.

And all at once, I felt ashamed of the years I tried to take all of this away from myself. But at the same time I felt an ambivalent gratitude because after all the damage I caused, none of it had lasting consequences, hence it took so long for me to learn to actually take care of myself and my body rather than constantly attempt to destroy it.

So many of us look in the mirror and think what we see isn’t good enough. And me, as I type a blogpost about complacency and the desire for moremoremore, I look around me and ask if this is really my life. Shouldn’t there be something more glamourous or exciting or spiritual for me? Aren’t there so many other places with that sleepy community feeling where chasing the US dollar and the American dream are not a 24/7 operation? There has to be people out there who ARE complacent, but they are comfortable and they are content living in a rural area with nothing more than an old radio and some dogs.

I don’t necessarily want the finer things in life, just because those places for me are something I want to taste. I want the diversity and the difference from this fish bowl of limited culture I’ve grown up in.

I can feel it from music. Especially the song I’ve linked for this post. I used to feel it the most in middle school and high school. This nostalgic, fuzzy feeling that there were so many more places linked to the one I was in. It’s transcendental really, and nothing that any amount of words would be adequate enough to describe.

So instead of keeping myself caged in this daily battle with anxiety over what may be happening or not in the confines of my PTSD-like mentality, it’s time to branch out. I’m going to try to make it a goal to see more things, go more places, and try something new for once. If my old lady preference of keeping everything the same can handle it, that is.

I wrote a poem yesterday to go with a selfie of mine in lieu of good lyrics because I am currently out of those:

She keeps her secrets close

Like the hidden thorns of a rose

The dark will always haunt her

But light will always find her

~Nicolesque, 6/24/2017

It’s honestly not my best, but it will do. And it is true, after all of the dark pathways in life I have taken, God had somehow always led me to the light that I could never foresee.

Trust is also not an easy thing for me to do.. But in His case, I think it’s essential. At this point in my life, if nothing else, the fact that I’m alive is more than enough evidence that His intervention has been more than enough. This is enough, I just have to know that and not question it so much while also making moves to explore other things around me.

Because nothing really is and everything really isn’t. Jhene Aiko lyrics that I live by.

There was a blog I was obsessed with in middle school, written by a young woman in Singapore called “infrarouge” and something like 1..2..3.. breathe. Or something like that. But the enormous amount of nostalgia I felt from reading her excerpts of traveling, drinking tea at 6 in the morning, and all of these things that seem super hipster now gave me this sense that I was traveling through her and into the experiences of another person.

That blog is now long gone but I saved most of the drawings she made and had uploaded. There are definitely not in good resolution as I believe I downloaded them from my Myspace but they inspired me to emulate it with my own style of SharpieArt.

I’m honestly unsure if these were the blogger’s drawings, but I’d like to think they were because I still have remnants of a world long forgotten in the vast dimensions of webpages that have vanished without explanation. I feel like so much of the world I had built for myself at that age is now missing in the pandemonium of speed of advancement surrounding the Internet and I’m grateful for absolutely everything I’ve digitally hoarded from then.

The only thing missing are my blogs from Freshman and Sophomore year of HS but part of me thinks it’s probably best that I didn’t save those because of the frazzled nature of my self-destructive spontaneity. Despite my blinding light of free spirited nature that lured so many innocent people into my web of catastrophe, I feel like my intentions back then were so pain-driven that they were practically nefarious at best.

This is different though. I’m a lot older now, I’m a lot more grounded in terms of sobriety and well-matured decisions, but I feel like I need even more. Something to bring me back to the ground from the irrational heights of my conditioned fear responses to imagined abandonment and anger towards me.

I know it will take time. I know it will take waiting, as much as I hate it. I want to be okay now. I always have been, for all of my life. I just wanted to be healed and after years of both studying and abusing medicine, there is just no quick fix to feeling this way. No amount of relationships or promises of young love will close the void either. It will take me and me alone to do so. And I like to think that is exactly what I am doing, even if it doesn’t feel like enough to keep me centered and focused sometimes.

My restless nature has always been prevalent, especially in my younger years when multiple teachers hypothesized and even attempted to diagnose me with ADHD. This was definitely not the case per my very skilled and competent pediatrician. “She is just bored,” he told my mother. “She is too intelligent to have nothing to do.”

Intelligence, creativity and bipolar disorder may share underlying genetics ~ The Guardian

This is also my mother’s consensus. When I asked her, as well as my father, if she thought a diagnosis of Bipolar II would fit most of my life’s treacherous and unstable periods, she replied no. She thinks I’m simply too smart to have idle hands, and couple that with what I’ve been through, they certainly make for a bad combination.

There is also cyclothymia, which is kind of a watered down Bipolar II with the same cycling between depression and euphoria. I’d be more akin to that simply because I’m a lot more functioning these days than ever before. But even now as I type this, the tears have already started and I couldn’t even tell you why. My appetite has suffered a bit, hardly existing except for when I wake up and when I take my medication.

She just wants to feel something, and I don’t think that’s asking for too much

~ The 1975 lyrics, “She Lays Down”

Because of my newfound professional aspirations and my educational path being much more clarified, I simply don’t have the urge to drown myself destructively right now. I’m able to have a good number of hard ciders and hard alka seltzers that just sit there and collect refrigerator dust unless I have one or two before losing interest in drinking alone in my bedroom. I consider it a social thing, especially when my social anxiety becomes an obstacle that I attempt to climb with excessive drinking. I haven’t done that in a while but in the last couple outings, I did really good in my opinion. It’s always good when it doesn’t result in some unwanted, negative encounter that I wake up regretting the next day.

So I would conclude things are simple. Things are stable. I just want a little more excitement, a little more exploring. And I fully intend on doing so, because my anxiety loves me too much when I’m laying around with nothing to do but suffer a panic attack or crying spell. The latter occurring in this present moment.

But everything is okay. I am okay. And I choose to stay.

When the soul thirsts for more, let yourself soar. Recommended auditory pleasure:  As I lay on my back watching a random Youtube video on the refugee situation and a proposed solution, it suddenly hit me how much grounding I'm in need of.

[jamesginortonblog]

Interview with Robson Green

 Robson Green talks about Geordie Keating and Grantchester 3

Q. How does it feel returning to film a new series of Grantchester?

“When the first script of a new series arrives you know it’s going to be quality because it’s written by Daisy Coulam. Then you want to find out how the journey is going to further develop with the various relationships on screen. Has it still got those likeable ingredients? Does it still have those dramatic arcs within each relationship that the audience care about? And like any script you get, because you see yourself in it, you think, ‘Where is it going to take my character? Is there a development?’ Not surprisingly there was.

“Grantchester is so refreshing. It develops in a way the audience will care about, want to follow and leave them wanting more. Which is essentially what you want with a long running series. When I get a script now I go, ‘Will I enjoy making this?’ And you’re 10 pages in and you go, ‘Yes I will.’”

Q: How is Geordie’s marriage to Cathy (Kacey Ainsworth)?

“Geordie is paralysed with the burden of guilt and obligation and has an overwhelming sense of routine. He feels the relationship is stale and redundant. But he’s looking at the wrong aspects of the relationship.

“Geordie begins a campaign that sets out to destroy everything that is precious in his private life. Looking at the public face of Geordie, everything he has seems to be bright, rosy and healthy. But there’s an undercurrent of something deeply uncomfortable. He begins to destroy the one thing he holds dear, which is his family. And seeks approval of his behaviour from Sidney.

“The overriding arc of the whole series is that both Sidney and Geordie have crisis of self. They try to advise one another on how to deal with this. But they both very quickly realise they’re not qualified to give that advice. It’s love versus duty, loyalty versus love, which are very powerful emotions and issues to play. One minute we’re dealing with betrayal, another with abandonment. But at the heart of it all is love.”

Q: What’s are Sidney’s thoughts on Geordie’s predicament?

“Sidney tries to give Geordie advice. And Geordie says to Sidney, ‘How can you give me advice? You are going out with a married woman who has a child with another man? And you’re standing there giving me advice?’ While Sidney points out Geordie has a wife and four beautiful children. Geordie, in a way, seeks forgiveness throughout the whole series. But not from God.”

Q: Geordie and Sidney form a batting partnership during a village cricket match. Was that easy for you to film?

“The script only allowed me to score four runs. But it had a century written all over it! It was a quintessentially English scene. It’s 1955, we’re in the Grantchester Meadows, all in our whites playing cricket.

“However I play cricket with a confidence that is wholly unwarranted. I was rubbish at school. The ball is too hard. I played in the cast and crew versus Grantchester villagers match at the end of filming for series one and was out for four.

“It just takes me back. I had terrible reminders of how bad I was at sport in school. I was a really good runner but I was never good at cricket and hopeless at football. I was described as a delinquent kicking about a pig’s bladder when I was playing football.

“And I was so paranoid when playing rugby. When they went into a scrum I used to think they were talking about me. So nothing has changed on the sporting frontier. But it was a lovely scenario to film. Beautifully directed by Tim Fywell.

“The Grantchester cricket captain Geoff Towler is played by Peter Davison. I also managed to have a lot of scenes with Emma Davies, who plays Rosie Towler, and she made me realise why I continue to do this job. Reminded me of why I’m involved in this industry. She is a tour de force when it comes to acting. Storytelling can be a very powerful thing. It was just beautiful to be alongside her performance in episode two.”

Q: Is storytelling even more important in today’s world?

“I think it’s important to see things from other people’s points of view. Storytelling can change the way we think about the world we live in. But more importantly it makes us think about ourselves and the way we behave. We have a duty to remind the world that we are all one.”

Q: What was it like working with Peter Davison?

“Growing up with All Creatures Great and Small, he was a very important fixture in our family home in Dudley, Northumberland. So I was a huge fan. The experience and joy of working with someone like Peter really helps when you’re in front of the lens. He was a dream to work with.”

Q: Geordie is not a fan of jazz or the ‘new’ sound of rock 'n roll. Is there an artist or band in real life you would travel a long way to see?

“I used to be a huge fan of The Flying Pickets. I would travel from Newcastle to watch them play in Islington and follow them on tour. I loved what they had to say and the way they did it. That ‘a capella’ format.

“The last big concert I went to was the Rolling Stones. I used to be a huge heavy metal fan and I’d travel the country to see Motorhead, Rainbow and bands like that. The last concert I went to in Newcastle, which is probably the best concert I’ve been to just for spectacle, quality and coming away with a life-­‐affirming sense of well-­‐ being, was Dolly Parton. She was sensational. But now I sit and listen at home on the radio. I live in Northumberland and go walking on the hills.

“When I sung many years ago, Jerome and I were on Top of the Pops and someone came into our dressing room to say hello and sat and chatted with us for two hours. I only realised 20 minutes into the conversation that it was Cat Stevens / Yusuf. Eventually I asked, ‘What’s your link with the music industry?’ He said, ‘I wrote the song Boyzone are singing.’ And I suddenly put two and two together and went, ‘Oh my God it’s Cat Stevens!’”

Q: Do you get much attention from fans during Grantchester filming?

“The public has welcomed Grantchester with open arms. We have a really loyal fan base. Especially for James Norton, of course. Who wouldn’t want a vicar like Sidney Chambers? We get crowds, especially when we film in Grantchester itself. There’s crowds every day there. They don’t pose a problem. They’re very obliging and welcoming. While the locals within the village we use as supporting artistes. It’s been well received and rightly so. The writing is great, the storytelling is wonderful, with a great production team and cast.”

Q: You were still filming on your birthday last December. How did you celebrate?

“We had a fireworks display. James did the food and I did the fireworks. Fireworks is one of my guilty pleasures. So I threw a fireworks display to music of the movies. It started with Superman, then Flash Gordon, The Magnificent Seven, Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet. It was wonderful. It was after we had filmed for the day and about 200 locals turned out in the village. We got permission to set a Category 5 display up. Everybody left with smiles on their faces.”

Q: Some think an actor’s life is all bright lights and glamour. Were there any moments during this series that summed up how far from the truth that can be?

“There was one night where we were doing an exhumation scene. It was raining and it was freezing. And it was taking an eternity. Not only were we fed up and the production team fed up but also members of the public were fed up. So much so that about half a mile away, this guy shouted out of his window, ‘Turn off your lighting and go home!’ With added bad language. We just fell about laughing and couldn’t continue.

“But other than that, our executive producer Diederick Santer calls Grantchester his happy place. And it’s true. I’m working with James Norton, Morven Christie, Kacey Ainsworth, Tessa Peake-­‐Jones, Al Weaver and Lorne MacFadyen. It’s a joy.”

Q: How do you reflect on the relationship between Geordie and Sidney in series three?

“I think this new series is the best one yet. At the heart is that loving relationship between Sidney and Geordie. For Geordie, Sidney is the son he never had and for Sidney, Geordie is the friend he never had. It’s the shorthand that you can’t quantify that really works. It’s the way they interact and relate to each other that sometimes isn’t necessarily in the script. It’s just implicit in the performance. James is so relaxed and charismatic in front of the lens, he makes it so easy.

“We knew we worked well together immediately from the start of series one. And if you combine that with good writing and a good production team, you’re on to a winner. A vicar and a detective works because it’s rooted in a dark truth. On the surface it’s quintessentially English, beautiful, tranquil, idyllic, pristine. But there’s this undercurrent of something deeply uncomfortable. Whether it be racism, bigotry or whatever. The darkness that existed and the denial people lived in in the 50s.”

Q: Aside from paying the bills, what has being an actor given you in life?

“It’s given me stability. I’m doing something I love. That’s what acting has given me. Storytelling is everything to me. It always has been from when I went to see Bedknobs and Broomsticks when I was that little kid with my mother. I’ve never shied away from the fact it’s all about the wonder of storytelling.”

Source: ITV Press Center

[memcriae]

100 ᴅᴀʏs ᴏꜰ ʜᴇᴀᴅᴄᴀɴᴏɴs. Cross Marian. ( 1 - 16 )

day #001 : : childhood

as an orphaned child, cross resented adults for a good portion of his childhood, and often acted out against any authority imposed upon him. he was an especially great nuisance to the pastor who took him in, although his growing years gradually sobered him up to the old man.

it was because of this that, although cross behaves largely the same way now, he was able to distinguish a manner of authority he didn’t agree with versus that which sought for his own well-being or compelled true justice. he doesn’t agree with the way central runs things, and so he pointedly acts out against regulations put in place by them; on the other hand, he respects komui, even if he does act like a little shit to him.

day #002 : : family

cross never knew his biological family, and had begrudgingly come to regard the pastor he was raised by as a father figure. when he met nea and mana, and eventually allen, he considered them the closest things to family he had otherwise, but he still wouldn’t think of them as more than friends.

day #003 : : dreams

once upon a time, cross dreamt of divine salvation, when he sought solace in god and truly believed he might achieve it one day. then he dreamt of freedom, independence, the discretion to decide what to do with his own life. and then, when both dreams were forcibly taken from him, he dreamt only of peace. peace of mind, peace in life, and to rest in peace. he knows he has duties to fulfill before that dream can become a reality, but for the most part, it’s all he has to hold onto most days.

day #004 : : smile

cross is a man of few words and many masks. one could reasonably argue that he has one for almost every situation one could imagine. of course, at that point it was left to the question of whether or not what he showed was actually a mask. few of his expressions are exactly of the happy variety, but he could scrounge together a good few if he tried hard enough. most of his smiles are sarcastic and leering, while others yet can be deceitfully warm and welcoming. few and infrequent are his smiles that deceive no one and mean no harm, but they exist. they just take a good bit of coaxing to draw out.

day #005 : : strength

the word “strength” has a few different meanings when it comes to cross. he has strength in power, in physical endowment, in knowledge. he has strength in personality—at least he finds his encrypted expressions and fickle moods to be “strong” traits that he’s developed. defense mechanisms, as it were. he garners strength from himself every day he doesn’t give in. to the order, to the noah, to his own self-destruction.

day #006 : : weakness

when it comes right down to it, cross thinks himself weak for several reasons. he’s been forced into a position that has encumbered his ability to act upon his own will, not just in one way, but in two. the order confines him, and nea binds him. he’s come too far, caused too much damage, to back out and start over again now. he is weak in that he hides his weakness, drowns out his immoral deeds, and seeks artificial solace any way he can just for temporary relief. he tries to forget how weak he is, truly, so he can focus on his duty and one day achieve permanent solace.

day #007 : : hope

hope isn’t something that cross holds dear. the way he sees it, hope sets up people for failure. hope is a distraction. despite the standards he claims to hold everything and everyone to, he really holds no expectations for future outcomes. he’s learned that it only leads to disappointment. and besides, when you’re a pessimist, you’re either always right or you get a pleasant surprise. it’s really a win-win situation.

day #008 : : loss

loss is something cross is very familiar with. the loss of his parents, the loss of his faith, the loss of his friends, and, of course, the inevitable loss of his freedom. and this isn’t the freedom of what it means to be a general of the black order. being able to travel the world and go about his own cause is something necessary to his ulterior motive. and, if you think about it, aren’t we all slaves to fate anyway?

day #009 : : desire

everyone is familiar with the rumours about general cross marian’s luxuriant romances, most notably the sheer number. it is not unlikely that one might re-trace cross’s path and find a former lover in most, if not all, town and village he’s happened across. probably rich, own brothels, have parent issues—you know the type. it’s no secret that cross has a way with the ladies ( and even the gentlemen ), and if one followed through with re-tracing his steps, they might find that he’s no stranger to the finer pleasures of life, if you catch the drift. it’s all part of this grand scheme to “fill the void”, as the hot punk bands are singing these days, and leave behind a bigger hole than when he got there. after all, despite what many might claim, he imparts a piece of himself to each and every one of his lovers, and he makes sure they know it.

day #010 : : clothes

one thing you can be sure of when it comes to cross is his impeccable sense of fashion. screw the trends and even the “i hate life too much to be normal”; cross dignifies his own style. he’ll splurge to find the most expensive fabrics—that’s the only way to get good quality, after all. his favourite statement in particular is the kind-of-pirate-kind-of-ballroom-gentleman look, or as he likes to call it, “medial”. clever, right?

day #011 : : destiny

cross may not acknowledge “fate” and “destiny” and all that noise, but he won’t necessarily renounce it either. if so many cultures have devised ways to foresee the future—especially in the case of innocence—then there must be some degree of predictability to life. he prefers not to think about it, seeing as he’s constantly reminded that his own fate is sealed.

day #012 : : school

being raised by a priest had its ups and downs. the downside was that his education had a very skewed perception. as a man who claimed never to have strayed from the “word of god” ( whatever that means nowadays ), father angus was as strict a mentor as he was a surrogate father. he denounced any and all forms of deviant behaviour ( which only made cross want to rebel more ) and delivered due punishment, so all that cross really learned was “make the teacher happy so he’ll leave you alone so you can sneak out later”. needless to say, cross and his adoptive father had something of a strained relationship for a time. but, on the upside of being raised by a priest, he got to call people “sinners” all the time.

day #014 : : work

cross’s responsibilities don’t end as a general of the black order. he’s still a chemist despite the full-time job of traveling the world ( in addition to working for nea, that is ) . when he isn’t on the hunt for innocence and its accommodators, cross is often developing some new serum or executing some reckless experiment. he rather enjoys it, honestly, and has provided his services to the medical department of the order to assist with new medications.

day #016 : : bed

cross’s tastes for luxury extends to most if not all aspects of his life. he managed to slip a four-poster, king-sized mattress into his chamber at headquarters, and along with it extravagant bed dressings and a canopy. of course it’s rarely used, seeing as he rarely ever stays at headquarters long enough to sleep in it during the few and infrequent visits he does take to headquarters.

[nothoward]

Discovered in the Archives, Today

The week I’ve been having. Has given me great advantage. People take such pleasure… People make huge investments in energy, time, and money. To be “better” than their neighbor. To win.

I was reminded of a thing that used to happen around me. If something was expensive, it went without saying.. . Better yet, if someone spent a lot of money they displayed “good taste.” Is that really either “good” or “taste”? I was reminded of it because I witnessed it again “good taste”. Hadn’t thought about it, I hadn’t been around it for a long time. There it was “good taste”.

I get in the way. This is what I do. I do it well, and I’ve been doing it for a long time. One of the modes of obstruction I have developed, even perfected is listening. I’m not the best listener. It’s an instrument I engage.

If someone says something to me they may expect a certain, pat response. Here is what I do. I will listen, and think. As for me this has always required more time. More time than any pat, or expected response should take. I’m not the best at any of this.

I am not reporting this to set myself anywhere in any status among any demographic. I would actually caution anyone from choosing this style of interaction. Honestly, it’s not a choice. It isn’t a result of a single manipulation that I choose. It’s hard. Unpleasant, even painful. Actually, it reflects a past that I wouldn’t wish on any form of life.

One of the ways this listening, and thinking is reacted to is anger, condemnation. How I am perceived is being condescending, and critical to the point of disapprobation (moral disapproval). When in fact my occupation of the moment is listening, and thinking.

This strange habit of mine has put me in a peculiar place. I don’t win. Any competitive impulse, I’ve ever had is usually resisted, repulsed. Humanity isn’t about the top of the food chain. It is not proof of anything. Humanity is the place in carbon life that necessarily requires care. In the most global sense: Care.

Humanity for many is about winning. It’s about proof. It’s sole purpose is to prove there is no greater life than that of the individual. I am here to win, to buy stuff. To raise my children to be separate, and superior. Money, and religion serve as the means to this end.

It is in this way more money (greed) will bring a person closer to their god.

I’m not condemning either. My point is that money and religion may serve to satisfy the needs of those who see no greater purpose, but to serve themselves. Perhaps the condemnation is happening here, because once money, and religion become so inextricably linked they loose value. Symbiotic and deadly.

I don’t care. I can’t be responsible for the effect my conclusion brings. I am certainly not interested in remaining silent, that those who live in the world this way may remain unchallenged, and perhaps I would be an easier pill to take, or ignore.

I’ve had a week in which the loses my life manifest. Financial failure, and spiritually bereft in appearance has become my place in society. I understand this now. I hardly subscribe to the same conclusion. Being years in the making, I am profoundly aware. Though damned difficult, it makes me lucky. Glad to know my place in the eyes of the culture in which I was reared.

Perhaps, I lack good taste, success, and righteousness. I guess I used to care. I used to be preoccupied with meeting the standards to which I have been guided, for better or worse.

Here’s my conclusion: I am grateful to be alive. I aspire to perfection, ultimate knowledge and success, but hope to never achieve such a state. More content seeking, I guess.

I sat and watched my dog today. He is beautiful, imperfect, and perfect. He was laying on the grass watching, making sure. People passed, otherwise occupied, or not. He, alert and happy invested in catching, and eating a bug.

I don’t want to be separate. I want to live my life, among life. I try to eschew nothing. I find loving life is challenge enough, for me. Kindness, treading lightly. Watching, listening, and thinking.

[galbraithneil92]

Reiki Master In Top Useful Ideas

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What Is Reiki Healing Symbols

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Reiki For Sacral Chakra

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[deitism]

100 ᴅᴀʏs ᴏꜰ ʜᴇᴀᴅᴄᴀɴᴏɴs. Cross Marian. ( 1 - 16 )

day #001 : : childhood

as an orphaned child, cross resented adults for a good portion of his childhood, and often acted out against any authority imposed upon him. he was an especially great nuisance to the pastor who took him in, although his growing years gradually sobered him up to the old man.

it was because of this that, although cross behaves largely the same way now, he was able to distinguish a manner of authority he didn’t agree with versus that which sought for his own well-being or compelled true justice. he doesn’t agree with the way central runs things, and so he pointedly acts out against regulations put in place by them; on the other hand, he respects komui, even if he does act like a little shit to him.

day #002 : : family

cross never knew his biological family, and had begrudgingly come to regard the pastor he was raised by as a father figure. when he met nea and mana, and eventually allen, he considered them the closest things to family he had otherwise, but he still wouldn’t think of them as more than friends.

day #003 : : dreams

once upon a time, cross dreamt of divine salvation, when he sought solace in god and truly believed he might achieve it one day. then he dreamt of freedom, independence, the discretion to decide what to do with his own life. and then, when both dreams were forcibly taken from him, he dreamt only of peace. peace of mind, peace in life, and to rest in peace. he knows he has duties to fulfill before that dream can become a reality, but for the most part, it’s all he has to hold onto most days.

day #004 : : smile

cross is a man of few words and many masks. one could reasonably argue that he has one for almost every situation one could imagine. of course, at that point it was left to the question of whether or not what he showed was actually a mask. few of his expressions are exactly of the happy variety, but he could scrounge together a good few if he tried hard enough. most of his smiles are sarcastic and leering, while others yet can be deceitfully warm and welcoming. few and infrequent are his smiles that deceive no one and mean no harm, but they exist. they just take a good bit of coaxing to draw out.

day #005 : : strength

the word “strength” has a few different meanings when it comes to cross. he has strength in power, in physical endowment, in knowledge. he has strength in personality—at least he finds his encrypted expressions and fickle moods to be “strong” traits that he’s developed. defense mechanisms, as it were. he garners strength from himself every day he doesn’t give in. to the order, to the noah, to his own self-destruction.

day #006 : : weakness

when it comes right down to it, cross thinks himself weak for several reasons. he’s been forced into a position that has encumbered his ability to act upon his own will, not just in one way, but in two. the order confines him, and nea binds him. he’s come too far, caused too much damage, to back out and start over again now. he is weak in that he hides his weakness, drowns out his immoral deeds, and seeks artificial solace any way he can just for temporary relief. he tries to forget how weak he is, truly, so he can focus on his duty and one day achieve permanent solace.

day #007 : : hope

hope isn’t something that cross holds dear. the way he sees it, hope sets up people for failure. hope is a distraction. despite the standards he claims to hold everything and everyone to, he really holds no expectations for future outcomes. he’s learned that it only leads to disappointment. and besides, when you’re a pessimist, you’re either always right or you get a pleasant surprise. it’s really a win-win situation.

day #008 : : loss

loss is something cross is very familiar with. the loss of his parents, the loss of his faith, the loss of his friends, and, of course, the inevitable loss of his freedom. and this isn’t the freedom of what it means to be a general of the black order. being able to travel the world and go about his own cause is something necessary to his ulterior motive. and, if you think about it, aren’t we all slaves to fate anyway?

day #009 : : desire

everyone is familiar with the rumours about general cross marian’s luxuriant romances, most notably the sheer number. it is not unlikely that one might re-trace cross’s path and find a former lover in most, if not all, town and village he’s happened across. probably rich, own brothels, have parent issues—you know the type. it’s no secret that cross has a way with the ladies ( and even the gentlemen ), and if one followed through with re-tracing his steps, they might find that he’s no stranger to the finer pleasures of life, if you catch the drift. it’s all part of this grand scheme to “fill the void”, as the hot punk bands are singing these days, and leave behind a bigger hole than when he got there. after all, despite what many might claim, he imparts a piece of himself to each and every one of his lovers, and he makes sure they know it.

day #010 : : clothes

one thing you can be sure of when it comes to cross is his impeccable sense of fashion. screw the trends and even the “i hate life too much to be normal”; cross dignifies his own style. he’ll splurge to find the most expensive fabrics—that’s the only way to get good quality, after all. his favourite statement in particular is the kind-of-pirate-kind-of-ballroom-gentleman look, or as he likes to call it, “medial”. clever, right?

day #011 : : destiny

cross may not acknowledge “fate” and “destiny” and all that noise, but he won’t necessarily renounce it either. if so many cultures have devised ways to foresee the future—especially in the case of innocence—then there must be some degree of predictability to life. he prefers not to think about it, seeing as he’s constantly reminded that his own fate is sealed.

day #012 : : school

being raised by a priest had its ups and downs. the downside was that his education had a very skewed perception. as a man who claimed never to have strayed from the “word of god” ( whatever that means nowadays ), father angus was as strict a mentor as he was a surrogate father. he denounced any and all forms of deviant behaviour ( which only made cross want to rebel more ) and delivered due punishment, so all that cross really learned was “make the teacher happy so he’ll leave you alone so you can sneak out later”. needless to say, cross and his adoptive father had something of a strained relationship for a time. but, on the upside of being raised by a priest, he got to call people “sinners” all the time.

day #014 : : work

cross’s responsibilities don’t end as a general of the black order. he’s still a chemist despite the full-time job of traveling the world ( in addition to working for nea, that is ) . when he isn’t on the hunt for innocence and its accommodators, cross is often developing some new serum or executing some reckless experiment. he rather enjoys it, honestly, and has provided his services to the medical department of the order to assist with new medications.

day #016 : : bed

cross’s tastes for luxury extends to most if not all aspects of his life. he managed to slip a four-poster, king-sized mattress into his chamber at headquarters, and along with it extravagant bed dressings and a canopy. of course it’s rarely used, seeing as he rarely ever stays at headquarters long enough to sleep in it during the few and infrequent visits he does take to headquarters.