#i found a bunch of boxes filled with stuff from when i was suicidal in highschool and it hurts too much to look at it

[vanyafresita]

why can't a boy take a break from the horrors ? oh, must i always suffer this way ? is there no end to this madness ?

[the-name-is-z]

SKELETONS | ch. 7

daryl dixon x f!oc

masterlist

a03 link

Summary: The group encounters some obstacles on the way out of Atlanta, and none they were expecting. Warnings/Information: AMC's The Walking Dead OC Insert | 18+ Advised | strangers to lovers; the slowest of slow burns; gore; angst; horror; humour; m/f; descriptions of explosion, violence, threat of violence, suicide, entrapment, ethical arguments

Chapter 7 - Outlands

They hopped between buildings on the way out of Atlanta. Rick kept talking into his radio every day, and when Iris asked, he explained that he was speaking to a man who saved his life, in hopes he could hear him.

They decided Fort Benning was their goal, and even though they had to siphon gas along the way, abandon cars, the journey would get harder still. Shane and Iris joined the group in the RV, while Daryl switched to his motorcycle.

It was the first time Iris had left the city since the outbreak. She was uneasy, out of her comfort zone, but comfort seemed to be a concept of the past. Shane was driving Iris crazy cleaning his gun and taking the pieces apart. Though, Andrea seemed to take a liking to him.

“Oh, jeez. Ah, no.” Dale grumbled. Iris turned to see the entire road blocked up ahead, cars flooding the highway. Daryl came back from scouting ahead, having an easier time weaving in between on his bike. “See a way through?” Daryl nodded, motioning for them to follow him.

“Maybe we should just go back.” Glenn suggested, analyzing the map in his hands. “There’s an interstate bypass—“

“We can’t spare the fuel.” Dale grumbled. T-Dog rubbed a hand down his face as they watched Dale weave carefully between the cars after Daryl. It was ominous, all these abandoned cars, all these abandoned lives. A few of the cars had corpses inside, but it was hard to tell whether or not they were walkers.

“Can we get through here?” Glenn asked as they came up to a particularly thin gap. His question was answered with a loud hiss and a pop as something in the engine broke, steam flooding Dale’s field of vision. He stopped the RV abruptly, wincing as it sputtered.

“Damn.” Iris muttered. Everyone filed out of the RV as the others walked over from the car.

“I said it. Didn’t I say it? A thousand times. Dead in the water.” Dale huffed.

“Problem, Dale?” Shane asked, walking around with a shotgun.

“Just the small matter of being stuck in the middle of nowhere with no hope of… okay, that was dumb.” He shrugged, looking around as Daryl started to loot the car in front of them.

“If you can’t find a radiator hose here…” Shane trailed off.

“There’s a whole bunch of stuff we can find.” Daryl stated, elbow deep in someone’s trunk.

“I can siphon more fuel from these cars for a start.” T-Dog hurried off with a jerry can. 

“Maybe some water?” Carol asked.

“Food.” Glenn nodded.

“This is a graveyard.” Lori stated, frowning at their surroundings. There was a long pause as they considered what she meant.

“Then make sure you say thank you before you put a knife in their skulls. They have no use for it, might as well benefit us.” Iris replied, wandering into the fray of abandoned vehicles. Lori scowled after her, shaking her head. Daryl snorted.

“C’mon, y’all. Just look around, gather what you can.” Shane called. Dale stayed and showed Glenn what he was doing, teaching him a thing or two while the others dispersed.

Iris was happy to dump out a duffle bag and fill it with things she liked, clothes, jackets. She found toiletries she collected as well as a few boxes of tampons. Someone was prepared when they left home. She turned as she heard some frantic whispers to see a hoard of walkers heading their way. She swore under her breath, pulling herself underneath a van. She watched as dirty shoes and feet meandered past, the others underneath cars all the way back to the RV.

She spotted T-Dog running between cars, his hand pressed tight to his arm that was bleeding profusely. She swore again. They would smell his blood. And, depending what he cut himself on it could be infected. He could get tetanus. He could bleed out, right there in the street. He stumbled, leaving a trail of fresh hot blood as he made his way closer to the RV. 

A few walkers caught his scent, coming toward him as he sat back against a flipped car. Daryl slipped quietly behind one, making quick word with a knife. Iris made to get up, but she watched as Daryl laid the dead walker on top of T-Dog, pulling another on top of himself. They walked past without a second look, and Iris was impressed.

After a few minutes the shuffling had subsided, and she waited for a few more before beginning to crawl out from under the car. She ran over to Daryl, helping T-Dog up and braced on their shoulders. Iris hauled open the door of a welding truck, hoping she was right in assuming it was equipped with a first aid kit. It was, alongside a bag of clean clothing. Iris grabbed a scarf, tying it over the wound as Daryl used his bandana as a tourniquet. They brought him back to the others, who stood by the edge of the highway.

“My baby, they’re after my baby.” Carol sobbed into Lori’s shoulder. Iris followed their gaze to Rick’s silhouette whisking Sophia off into the forest, a group of walkers on his tail. With T-Dog in safe hands, she and Daryl quickly jumped the barricade, going in after him. They followed Rick’s shouting to a creek where he stood by himself.

“No, no, she was here. I left her right here.” He muttered.

“Where’s Sophia?” Iris asked, jumping down into the creek next to him. He was staring into a tree well, shaking his head.

“She’s gone. I left her right here, told her to hide. She’s gone.” Rick explained, shaking his head in disbelief.

“Sure this is the spot?” Daryl asked, examining the tree well. Rick nodded.

“I left her right here.” He repeated. “I drew the walkers off in that direction up the creek.” He pointed.

“Without a paddle— seems where we’ve landed.” Daryl stated humourlessly. Iris raised an eyebrow. Shane and Glenn broke through the brush, scoping the tree line around the creek.

“She was gone by the time I got back here.” Rick shook his head again. “I figured she’d just took off and ran back to the group. I told her, go that way, keep the sun on her left shoulder.”

“She probably got lost.” Iris muttered. “Hard to see the road from here.”

“Hey, short round. Why don’t you step off to one side, you’re mucking up the trail.” Daryl chastised, tutting as Glenn shuffled off of the trail. Iris didn’t see much of a path, but Daryl seemed to know exactly what he was looking for.

“You’d make a terrible Indie.” Iris stated, coming up behind him. He straightened, giving her side-eye before turning back to tracking. Glenn turned to her with a half-grin and she flashed one back.

“Assuming she knows her left from her right—“ Shane started.

“She understood me just fine.” Rick snapped.

“Kid’s tired and scared, man. She had her a close call with two walkers. Got to wonder how much of what you said stuck.” Shane thought aloud. 

“We’ve got to consider all possibilities. She can’t be moving too fast, not tired and hungry like she is.” Iris argued.

“We’ve got clear prints right here.” Daryl agreed. “She did like you said, headed back to the highway. Let’s spread out, make our way back.”

“She couldn’t have gone far.” Rick nodded. Daryl pulled himself out of the creek, offering Iris a hand. She took it with a nod, Rick following behind her.

“Hey, we gonna find her.” Daryl assured, Rick nodding with uncertainty.

“She’ll be tuckered out, hiding in a bush somewhere.” Shane mused. Daryl led them down her trail, following her clumsy kid footprints. She’d been going straight, but started to veer off.

“She was doing just fine till right here. All she had to do was keep going. She veered off that way” He mumbled, pointing west.

“Why would she do that?” Glenn asked.

“Walker spooked her, she ran off.” Iris proposed.

“I don’t see any other footprints.” Daryl frowned. “Just hers.” Walkers made messy trails, that was for sure.

“So what do we do? All of us press on?” Shane asked.

“No. Better if you and Glenn get back up to the highway. People are gonna start panicking.” Rick denied. “Let them know we’re on her trail, doing everything we can. But most of all, keep everybody calm.”

“I’ll keep ‘em busy scavenging cars, think up a few other chores. I’ll keep ‘em occupied.” Shane assured. He nodded to Glenn, the two of them making their way back off to the highway. Daryl stood, rolling his shoulders as he led Iris and Rick further into the woods.

It was interesting, to watch Daryl work. He was fast, easily following whatever trail Sophia was leaving. Iris had to fight the urge to call out for her, but even if she was close by, drawing walkers was too risky. They slowed, weaving between trees, leaves and other litter layered heavy on the ground.

“Tracks are gone.” Rick mumbled.

“No, they’re faint, but they ain’t gone.” Daryl corrected. He pointed into the dirt. “She came through here.”

“How can you tell?” Iris asked.

“You want a lesson in tracking or you wanna find that girl and get our ass of that interstate?” Daryl asked. Iris and Rick exchanged a look, the former rolling her eyes.

They continued onward through the forest until the rustling of leaves caught their attention. They each fell into a crouch, raising their weapons. Rick gestured to the noise’s apparent source and they crept forward. They stopped, seeing a lone walker wandering through the brush at the bottom of a small slope. Rick turned back and Daryl gestured to them both to surround the walker. They ran down either side of the slope, Rick drawing it’s attention with a small whistle. It roared at him before Daryl put an arrow through it’s forehead.

They waited for a few seconds to see if that drew out any more, and when it didn’t, Rick leaned down to inspect the walker.

“Sophia!” Daryl called. Iris watched as Rick pried open the walker’s mouth.

“What are you doing?” She asked, recoiling.

“There’s skin under the fingernails. It fed recently.” Rick said lowly. “There’s flesh caught between the teeth.”

“Yeah, but what kind of flesh?” Daryl asked.

“Only one way to know for sure.” Rick said, in a ‘fuck-it’ sort of tone. Iris watched with baited breath as Rick opened its shirt and flicked open a knife.

“Here. I’ll do it.” Daryl offered, stepping over the body. “How many kills you skin and gut in your life? Anyway, mine’s sharper.” He flicked open his own knife and Iris shook her head. Everything was a damn dick-measuring contest. 

He cut open its gut, sawing through the muscle and fat and began to loot through the intestines. Rick recoiled, groaning and covering his nose with a hand at the smell. Iris watched as Daryl pulled a handful of tendon and sinew and chucked it aside as if he was carving a pumpkin. He was almost elbow deep in the damn thing.

“Yeah, hoss had a big meal not that long ago. I feel it in there.” He murmured. He ripped at a piece of flesh, pulling out the stomach. “Here’s the gut bag.”

“I got this.” Rick stepped in, slicing open the delicate flesh and stretching it open. He poked at a mushy lump of half-digested something, flicking it off the end of his knife. Daryl hummed in recognition, using his own knife to spear through the skull of an animal.

“This gross bastard had himself a woodchuck for lunch.” He mused.

“Great. Can we stop playing operation and keep looking now?” Iris grumbled, taking a big step back from their cadaver. 

“At least we know.” Rick stated.

“At least we know.” Daryl echoed. Iris nodded, using her bandana to tie her hair back as a bead of sweat ran down her neck.

They turned back once the sun began to set. There was no use stumbling around in the dark when they couldn’t see the trail, and none of them would be any use dead in a ditch like that gutted son of a bitch. Rick immediately went to Carol, the dejected expression on her face making Iris feel guilty for not staying out longer. 

“You didn’t find her?” She asked, resolve crumbling.

“Her trail went cold.” Rick replied. “We’ll pick it up again at first light.”

“You can’t leave my daughter out there on her own. To spend the night alone in the woods.” Carol sobbed. 

“Out in the dark’s no good.” Daryl shook his head. “We’d just be tripping over ourselves. More people get lost.”

“But she’s 12. She can’t be out there on her own. You didn’t find anything?”

“I know this is hard, but I’m asking you not to panic.” Rick consoled. “We know she was out there.”

“We tracked her for a while.” Daryl added.

“We have to make this an organized effort.” Rick said, addressing everyone. “Daryl knows the woods better than anybody. I’ve asked him to oversee this.”

“We’re not gonna stop looking, Carol.” Iris assured.

“Is… Is that blood?” Carol asked, looking down at Daryl’s clothes.

“Walker blood, Carol.” Iris said quietly, trying to keep her calm. “No sign it was anywhere near her.”

“Walker? Oh, God.” She sobbed.

“How can you know that?” Andrea asked, frowning.

“They gutted it to check.” Iris said, wincing at Carol’s alarmed reaction. She sat down on the edge of the barrier and Lori rubbed her back comfortingly.

“How could you just leave her out there to begin with?” She wailed, glaring at Rick accusingly. “How could you just leave her?”

“Those two walkers were on us.” Rick explained. “I had to draw them off, it was her best chance.” Carol began to hyperventilate.

“Sounds like he didn’t have a choice, Carol.” Shane said quietly.

“How was she supposed to find her way back on her own? She’s just a child. She’s just a child.”

“It was my only option. The only choice I could make.” Rick pleaded. Iris wondered at how sheltered Sophia must be that at 12 years old Carol was so worried. By the time Iris was 12 she was shopping for her dad’s cigarettes and sewing him up after he got too drunk at the bar and made a few mistakes.

“I’m sure nobody doubts that.” Shane stated. It was unclear from his tone whether or not there was any sarcasm there, but Iris wasn’t blind to the contempt Shane seemed to have for Rick. 

“My little girl got left in the woods.” Carol sobbed. Andrea came to her other side to comfort her as Rick walked off, presumably to do some soul searching. Iris walked over to T-Dog to check on him as they all made plans for the morning.

[writing-in-april]

The Five Stages of Grief

Stage five: Acceptance (5/5)

Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader (Spencer’s POV)

Thanks to @zhuzhubii who helped me so much with this series and made this gif for me 🥰

Summary: Spencer going through each of the stages of grief after the death of the reader. Stage five is acceptance.

A/N: Can’t believe my first series on here is done!!! I’m not gonna lie you guys this chapter is super emotional for me- I no joke cried the whole time while writing it and while rereading to edit. I basically have been going through the same thing recently with my Nana. This chapter is very close to my heart and is definitely the most personal chapter for me. The whole series is actually heavily inspired by season 3 episode 19 -one of my favorite episodes of criminal minds- and I also used elements from season 3 episode 15. This also kinda helps explain a lot of my writing choices throughout the whole series if you’re curious. I did my first real attempt at foreshadowing in this series, I hope you all enjoy it! Thank you for all the love and support on this series- with a special thanks to @spencerreidsmiles and @andiebeaword -you all have been so lovely and amazing.

Warnings (All warnings for the whole series are on series Masterlist): Sad Spencer, References to past drug use, References to past suicidal behaviors, Small panic attack, Hopeful Spencer, Unreliable narrator (much less so in this chapter)

Main Masterlist | The 5 Stages Masterlist Word Count: 3.5k (longest chapter)

It’s been a year; One full year since they had died in my arms. One full year since they had been shot so cruelly by a heartless unsub in an alley. One full year since I had been graced with their presence and the sound of their voice.

The elements of my emotions were extremely complex according to my therapist, and surprisingly I found myself starting to feel the benefits with them more every time I went to an individual session or a group session. It was hard for me to realize that I would have to learn to accept my situation.

It was hard to learn how to understand my own emotions when I had been so willing to shut them out, to try and convince myself that they didn’t exist.

I had begun to learn that I carried around the water that felt like I could drown in, the fire that burned so hot that anyone near it would get burned, the earth that I had wished would bury me with the pebbles I had chosen to cope with, and even the polluted air of my sadness around with me everyday. But, now I somewhat accepted the fact that they would always be with me, or at least I was trying to.

I had to learn to accept.

Even if it hurt I had to learn to at least try.

The next goal I had been given by the therapist was the most daunting of my tasks yet in my opinion. Trying to convince myself to open the boxes in the corner of the bedroom I had once shared with Y/N was harder than trying to get clean. The thought that had propelled me forward into getting clean was that I felt as though I would be disrespecting Y/N by not staying clean. They had been the reason all those years ago that I had spilled the clear liquid down the toilet and I needed to do it again, if only for them.

The boxes were something that were easier to ignore. I could ignore them by turning my back to the stack of boxes, choosing instead to stare at the painted walls of my apartment instead. There was no reason for me to stop ignoring the boxes, no one was trying to pressure me to open them besides my therapist. Everyone else in my life had no expectations for me to open them at any time, if ever, including Y/N’s family.

But, it had begun to feel like maybe I could try to attempt to open the boxes. I wasn’t sure what had finally prompted my brain into thinking that perhaps it would be a good thing to stop ignoring it. I stopped trying to understand why my mind works the way it does long ago, I had poured enough time into my life thinking about that.

I had felt this overwhelming urge to be able to look back at things that once belonged to them with some semblance of peace. I wanted to enjoy the memories we had together once more. I was tired of letting the memories get soiled by the unsub, I deserved to still think back on the one that I loved with a smile. I deserved to be able to preserve their memories with happiness and not let them sour with sadness. I wouldn’t let the unsub be able to kill something else while he was behind bars, my memories.

I was ready.

I was ready to open those boxes.

I was ready to at least try.

I was ready to try and look back at the memories.

I wasn’t going to let their memory die too.

My first attempt to open the boxes in the corner of my bedroom consisted of me staring for two hours at the stacks. I knew that I at least wanted to try to attempt to open a box, even if it was the smallest of the bunch.

That day I had gotten the lid of one of the boxes open. That was as much as I could handle emotionally in that moment. There was a small part of myself that wanted to push myself to look inside the box, but I couldn’t do it that night. That night I laid down on the bed, again facing the wall, unwilling to look at the boxes. I knew if I did I’d feel as if I had failed and I had to keep trying to convince myself that small progress was still progress.

I tried again despite the swirling anxiety in the hole in my chest.

I was still willing because I still wanted to have my memories unsullied by sadness.

I still knew that I deserved that despite my volatile elemental emotions threatening to push me into another toxic loop.

The next time I tried to look in the box I had previously opened just a little I immediately got choked, recognizing the contents sat at the top surrounded by other smaller insignificant items. I only managed to grab one of their old tchotchkes that used to sit on their desk in the bullpen. It was insignificant enough of an item that it didn’t make me fall into an endless loop of my emotions. I clutched it all night while I tried to sleep, though I still faced away from the boxes.

I hadn’t given up yet I still wanted to try, if only for them.

I would still try for them, even if I didn’t succeed, I still felt better for trying.

It had taken me awhile to muster up the courage to look at the box again, even though I still wanted to try I was scared that the contents would be too much for my fragile psyche. What I had gotten a glimpse of at the top of the box was something that used to be important for Y/N.

The next time I tried to look I successfully managed to pick up the item that had triggered the painful memory in my mind. It was ironically, it was another box.

The box wasn’t something that was explicitly tied to memories that we shared together. I knew it to be a music box from their childhood, given to them by someone that had meant so much to them. Out of curiosity I cranked the knob on the side and slowly opened the lid, wondering if I could handle the sounds of a song that I had often heard every time they had opened it to listen to the twinkle of the box they cherished.

As soon as the beginning notes of Swan Lake floated into the air I slammed to top shut, unwilling to open up the box of my emotions all the way just yet. I knew I couldn’t get rid of it, it was too important of an artifact in Y/N’s life. Though I knew that this wasn’t something I could keep to myself, this belonged to Y/N’s family. I clutched the box for a second in my arms when I came to the realization that the trinket should be with someone else as if it would be cruelly ripped from my arms right then and there. I felt a little fire being stoked in my belly at the thought of people taking it from me, even though there was no one there in my lonely apartment with me.

I started a breathing exercise that my therapist had told me to use when I felt like this. No matter how much it pained me to admit it, it did help immensely in snuffing out the emotions when I could feel them begin to spiral out of control.

I couldn’t let myself fall into an endless loop of volatile emotions again. I had worked hard to get clean after I had started to write my amends. It had been a hard uphill battle even after I had written down my amends, my grief hadn’t magically gone away that day. Getting clean had been much harder without my rock and the person who had helped me get clean the first time around. I wouldn’t disrespect their memory by going back to dilaudid again.

Once the initial fear began to fade and my breathing had grown steady I forced myself to loosen my grip on the music box. I then carefully set it down in a place that would be suitable enough for a stack of things I’d pass off to other people that had been important to them. I hoped I’d soon be ready to make a donation pile despite that I despised the mere thought of giving something away that belonged to them to a mere stranger.

It was already too much for today, I could only bear looking at the one item. I didn't know how I’d be able to handle it if the box was filled with more trinkets that were important to them. I did however find myself thinking when I laid down on my bed for the night after a hot shower to relax my mind. I found my mind thinking about the trinkets they’d had an affinity for collecting. It still brought tears to my eyes to think about giving away their stuff, even if it was to people who also mattered in their life. But, I found myself thinking about their old cute little trinkets without as much pain, though it was definitely still there.

Maybe tomorrow when I try, I’d do better.

The small box that I had begun to unpack over a series of days didn’t hold anything else seemingly important to Y/N’s life. Besides the music box I had found prior, the small box was only filled with unimportant trinkets that thankfully didn’t spark much meaning in my mind. It was obvious that when the team had initially helped me to put their stuff away until I was ready that things had been put away in a slight haste. They must’ve done it so quickly as a way to try and help me. The animosity that I had held towards my team for the last year because of Y/N’s death had been slowly melting away over time. I still wasn’t as friendly as I had been before, but I knew my frigid nature after the event hadn’t been justified. I knew now that they had only my best interests at heart, even if they didn’t always pinpoint what they were correctly. I had even begun to regain some of my desk duties once I had gotten clean. It had felt good to feel somewhat normal even though the sight of their desk directly across from mine and their still empty round table chair still made my heart pang with grief.

I had even begun texting them more frequently again, though I was still aversive to text, so I guess it still wasn’t that often. Some things really do never change despite the fact that my life had turned on its head in the past year. I had even begun to write letters to my mom again.

I knew I was lucky to still have people by my side, even if it wasn’t the one I knew deep down I still wanted with me.

I thought I could have at least done the box without crying anymore.

That was until I found something at the bottom of the box that made the dam holding my memories back in my mind break to flood my mind. The book would probably seem inconsequential compared to the rest of the items that I knew sat in the other boxes. Most people would assume after just looking at the surface level what items of Y/N’s meant most to me, the ones I wanted to keep. The black paper back was well worn around the edges, almost like if I read it too frequently and I wasn’t too careful that the spine would break. I ran my fingers up and down the battered book as I began to willingly reminisce. To other people the book would’ve looked beaten already beyond repair, maybe as if it had not been loved enough, battered perhaps because of neglect.

But, just like me I knew that Y/N had loved the book more than most people would be willing to.

I knew that I wanted to keep this book, no matter how painful I knew their contents would be for me. I hoped that I’d be able to read it so much that I’d be afraid for the binding of the book, just to be able to feel close to them again. Though I wasn’t quite sure if I was ready to dig up this particular memory, it might still be too painful for me.

I remember they had bought this book for us after I had connected with a grieving father on a case. He had specifically quoted a poem to me that stuck with me for weeks after. Once I had told them of the excerpt quoted to me they had immediately grabbed a copy of where it had originated from, a long Wordsworth poem. The book “Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood” became their favorite quickly, in fact it used to take residence in the top drawer of their nightstand. They had often loved to read me their favorite excerpts at night just before bed when my eyes couldn’t stand to focus on the pages anymore.

When I opened the well worn book it flipped open to where they had set their bookmark last, I recognized the excerpt immediately. My breath got caught up in my throat when the words danced around in my vision. I wasn’t sure if I could face this specific excerpt quite yet, or even be able to read any part of the poem. The book held so many memories of them. This specific poem held so much meaning to the both of us.

However, there was something in me that wanted to try. I wanted to be able to read the poem again and remember the memories we shared fondly. I wanted to be able to enjoy my memories with them. I had come to realize over the past year that their memory deserved to be nurtured with fondness not overwhelmed with sadness.

So, I decided to try.

The memory’s attached to the excerpt immediately began flooding back even as soon as I read the beginning words. The bookmark had landed on the page that had been quoted to me by the grieving father, the words holding even more meaning in my life now than ever before.

“What though the radiance which was once so bright Be now for ever taken from my-“

The tears in my eyes blurred my vision, so much so that I had to stop reading for a moment to wipe my eyes. I didn’t know if I wanted to continue, just those first few lines were already weighing heavily on my mind. I was already focusing on the radiance that had left my life forever. A radiance that was once so bright, but was now snuffed out, forever taken from my sight. My sorrow was creeping in with small little waves in my mind, I just had to hope that it wouldn't drown me. I didn’t want to get stuck on an endless loop of emotions again, I had just gotten fully clean a little while ago.

Even though I was feeling intensely emotional over just the first few words I wanted to keep trying. I wanted to read this poem and smile. I wanted to be able to look back at our memories with love, to take back what had been polluted by the acts of a heinous man. Once I had somewhat collected myself and my thoughts I began to read again from the beginning of the excerpt-

“What though the radiance which was once so bright Be now for ever taken from my sight, Though nothing can bring back the hour Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower,”

My entire being could not help but ache as I read the words, still aching for the presence of the one who had been forever taken from my sight. When I reached that part that I remembered asking the grieving man about all those years ago, the words held an even deeper meaning to me now than I ever thought possible. There was nothing I could do to bring back the hour where I was still in my lover’s embrace. I wanted to be back in the moments of splendour in the grass and glory in the flower, I knew that soon I’d have to fully accept that it wasn’t possible.

Again I had to wipe tears from my eyes before continuing to read the stanza. This time a few tears dribbling down onto the pages, marking them with my sadness forever no matter if it dried into the parchment or not. I continued to read the page despite the saltwater that continued to drip down my face,

“We will grieve not, rather find Strength in what remains behind; In the primal sympathy Which having been must ever be; In the soothing thoughts that spring Out of human suffering; In the faith that looks through death, In years that bring the philosophic mind”

I felt a small watery smile creep onto my face, it had been so long since I had remembered to smile with sincerity. I was thinking about some of the times they had read this to me as I tried to drift off into a most likely restless sleep. Though I had always slept better when they read to me. At the time the words hadn’t meant as much to me as they did now, I now had a permanent connection to the feeling of grief that would never be erased. For the first time in a long time thinking about them didn’t hurt as much for a moment, I actually smiled, even though it was rather watery. No matter how small or sad the smile was, I was still smiling. And, I knew in that moment that Y/N would’ve been proud of me.

I pondered on the stanza’s meaning in a deeper way than I had done before. The things stated in the stanza about how I would gain strength from this situation made me contemplate what Y/N would’ve wanted me to do after their death. They wouldn’t want me to give up as I had done before, they had always wanted the best for me. They would want me to gain strength from the situation.

They would want me to grow from the pain that sat in my chest.

They would want me to move on, to accept.

I didn’t know if I’d ever find someone else that I’d ever love as much as I loved them. I didn’t really ever want to, I had found my true love already. Maybe one day I’d find someone to fall in love with again and if I did I knew they would be happy that I was able to move on with someone else. Even if I ever did move on with someone else there’d always be a part of my heart that belonged to Y/N. For now I was ready to move on in a different way. I was ready to live my life without them, by myself.

The trauma of losing them would always weigh heavily on my soul, I’d carry that with me until I rejoined them in the earth. But, I was now ready to keep living, if only for them. I felt less guilty now since I had grown to realize that they’d want me to try and live the rest of my life as fully as I could. They’d want me to try and find happiness. I didn’t know if I would ever truly find it again, whether it was on my own or with someone else.

They may have been forever taken from my sight, but I found comfort in the fact that the radiance they brought into my life would always reside in me. Instead of letting the deep hole in my chest gape until the hour of my death, I’d let it fill with the radiance of their memory.

I was ready to try.

I was ready to try even if I knew the water that felt like I could drown in, the fire that burned so hot that anyone near it would get burned, the earth that I had wished would bury me with the pebbles I had chosen to cope with, and even the polluted air of my sadness around with me everyday would sometimes take ahold of me again no matter how hard I tried.

I’d always carry those emotions with me, but I knew I was ready.

“Nothing can bring back the hour of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower.”

I knew I was ready because their memory would always be with me to give me strength and to guide me. They’d always be there to help me try to live the rest of my life peacefully.

When I slept that night I faced the boxes while clutching the book to my chest.

Even though it still would always hurt on some level, I was ready to live in a reality where I could accept.

—-

Tag list (message me if you want to be added):

All works:

@shotarosleftpinky @oreogutz @90spumkin @kyra-morningstar

Spencer Reid/CM:

@calm-and-doctor @destiny-tsukino @safertokiss @slutforthegubes

5 stages of grief:

@joonie-centric @tatesimper @half-blood-dork @mcntsee @illuxions-x @rainsong01 @nomajdetective @loveheathens @day-n-night-dreamer @reidbuck

[goldeneyedgirl]

Jaliceweek20 Day 1

Against a Wall Part 2

Jaliceweek20 Day 1: Human/Vampire

Words: 6264

Notes: It is DONE. JALICEWEEK IS DONE. I am tired, so I’ll do a wrap up tomorrow. I’m honestly not sure how happy I am with this ending - I’ll write more notes tomorrow once sleep had been acquired but there still might be a third enormous rewrite.

I’m just so excited I finished EVERY SINGLE PROMPT.

Warnings for: suicidal ideation.

—

Nineteen.

There was a shoebox under his bed with a bunch of stuff in it, that he’s collected over his life. Stuff that was special - Sorates’ collar, a rock shaped like a dog, the rubber spider his grandfather bought him from the dime store. And the last thing he put in it was an unopened back of Skittles.

He wonders where that box is now.

—

Things are hard to remember. The doctors say his memory should return, with time, and everything will stop feeling like someone scooped them all out of his brain and threw them up in the air like confetti.

He remembers… Ava. No, not Ava. Yes, Ava, his sister.

She did something.

Ava lit the fuse that had been dangling over the family for six years. Wasn’t Ava’s fault. Never blamed her. He hurt for her.

Louise found the bit of paper and freaked out, yes. It was Ava’s paper. Evidence. And Louise was shrieking. And Jerry heard.

Everybody heard. He remembers making Flo and Hettie stay in the kitchen, hide under the table if you need to (the screen door is banging, Lydia is gone like a puff of air at the first sign of trouble; wish she’d taken Flo and Hettie this time). Hettie had already been sniffling, and he’d left the kitchen.

Bang.

He’d gotten between Ava and their father.

He would have killed them both; that look in his eye. There wasn’t love or affection in that gaze. There wasn’t recognition of his children. There was just rage. That’s a look he wished he could forget; of all the things lost in the confetti, he wants to know why that moment that Jerry looked at him and Ava (Ava was bleeding, can’t remember why) is still there?

Then it’s a blur. Then there’s nothing.

Then he joins the military. He walks away entirely, with only what he can carry and doesn’t leave any parting words because there’s nothing to be said.

No. Something happens before that.

Ava packed her car, yes, packed in Hettie and Flo, suitcases and boxes, and at the last minute Lydia materialises into the passenger seat, whilst their mother tries to … beg? Yell? Ava’s face is black and blue and bandaged, and there was someone he knew who could fix that, with Mary Poppins’ bag…

Then Ava drives off, and their mom is crying, and he walks straight to the nearest recruitment office even though he doesn’t graduate for another three months because once the bomb has gone off, there’s no taking it back.

—

What was the bomb again?

Bomb. Which bomb?

Ava’s, not the one that… not the other one.

Paperwork from Planned Parenthood. There was a baby, but Ava’s already raising her sisters, so she sucked it up, stole $500 from their father’s study, and took care of it. She’d thrown the money back in their father’s face, money she got from her own account, and their father had punched her so hard he broke her nose and her orbital bone, and then it gets blurry again.

His body stings and aches and itches. He recites all the swears he knows in his head, and a few he doesn’t, and he wishes everything would put itself right again.

Bang.

—

The other bomb. That’s why he’s here, in the VA hospital. The one that was strapped to a little boy who ran up to one of the guys in his unit, grinning and clutching a soccer ball to hide the shape obscuring his torso.

Bang.

Bombs don’t sound like ‘bang’ either. They are a vacuum of noise and pain and detritus and fire and he now knows the sound-taste-smell of roasted human fresh.  They are wiping out all but two members of a unit and a little boy who didn’t have a choice or an idea of what he was getting into.

The images are burnt onto his brain forever; when he closes his eyes, all he sees is a face roast black and splitting open to reveal the ruby red of the blood and muscle underneath, leaking clear and yellow fluid.

Empty, black eye sockets staring, just sticky blackened holes.

Bodies arched and twisted in pain, looking like blacked trees and burnt bark until you remember where you are and what you’re looking at and some of that burnt bark flesh is your own.

He wishes those memories would disappear.

Less than a year in the army, and already medically discharged. So much for an escape plan. Has to be a record, shortest army career in Whitlock family history. Shorter even than Uncle Wyatt’s, but Wyatt was smart enough to die outright, so it’s just a damn tragedy instead of a humiliation. He knows how the game is played.

Fuckin’ Whitlock curse comes for all of them eventually.

The skin graft hurts like hell, and the medication is still scrambling him, and even when the doctors have pulled out every last stitch, he still looks like some kind of monster pieced together from leftovers. There are still scars, dozens of scars. He asks when they’ll go, but the doctors just brush over his question - plastic surgery is the most solid of answers, but nobody wants to commit to an answer, so he guess he has it. This is how he looks now.

They fill his pockets with pills and send him on his way with their gratitude for his service, as if he has somewhere to be, someone to go to. He’s got nearly ten months of army pay just sitting there - minus a chunk that confuses him until he remembers he’s been sending money to Ava, a neat row of transactions he’s simply labelled ‘miss you’.

Should’ve sent her more.

He stays in Houston, doesn’t bother going home. There’s nothing there for him - his sisters are gone; Ava’s in Austin for college with the girls. Ava, who is somehow juggling three sisters, a college degree, probably a part-time job, and all her own pain.

Maybe he should go to Ava. But the idea of dragging himself all the way to Austin, to sleep on a couch or something, and have his sisters see this ruined version of him makes him want to hide.

The idea of his shaking hands, and the crisscross of scars, and limp being seen by sweet Hettie, dear Flo, sharp Lydia, and tired Ava; knowing they’ll hear his uneven pacing, his wild panic, his endless nightmares makes him stay away - he can’t even pick up the phone. He failed them so many times, and he can’t expect them to put him back together now. Ava’s got nothing left for herself, the others are too young; Lydia’d be graduating this year, she doesn’t need a fuckin’ ghoul of a brother hovering in the background after everything she went through. Better they remember him as he was, as the name on a receipt, that whatever he is now.

His mother is probably still there; working too many hours at the VA hospital and burning toast and being tired. She wrote to him once or twice after he left, and he hated how those letters made him feel. They were all messy apologies and excuses and blame and misery framed in the day-to-day monotony of her life. He felt her hollowness at being left, the mother of five with no children in her home. She should have been helping Lydia pick a prom dress, arranging her graduation party and college tours; driving up to visit Ava at college; sending him inedible cookies; dropping Flo off on her first date, and spoiling baby Hettie even though she’s almost in middle school. But she couldn’t. Because they’d all walked away.

He didn’t write back. He was too angry then, and now he’s … nothing. She feels like a ghost to him, like she died the first day Jerry hit him, and she slowly faded away every Tuesday after that.

And Ava’s the only name on his paperwork, for next of kin and power of attorney shit; and that’s only so she could have his money when he was gone.

His father’s still in Sheldon, he has no doubt of that. He hopes Jerry dies in that empty old house, abandoned by everyone he should have loved better, cared for better and surrounded only by the bottles that he let salt the earth and poison his family.

His uncles are still there, as reliable as the rising and setting of the sun, most likely ready and waiting to jeer at Jasper for his wasted attempt as a soldier, for his patchwork of skin and scars, for his limp and his confetti memory; to fail so fantastically after ten lousy months. No diploma, no future, no plan.

Not even old enough for a fuckin’ drink.

Still a better shot than Bo, though. Sometimes he wants to ask them, though, to look ‘em in the eye and demand to know what they expected from him - the sole Whitlock boy, the heir to a name that meant sweet fuck-all these days - when all they did was punch him when he was down? That letting a kid get beat up, then get insulted and demeaned and mocked and yelled at… that didn’t create a good man, that didn’t create a happy, successful person. They did everything they damn well could to see him gone, failed, erased and that was before he joined the goddamn army. There was no brotherhood in the Whitlock name. Even if he had gotten out unscathed, he would have run til no one knew him, and he wouldn’t have gone home again.

But he didn’t, and here he is having bitter arguments with old men who aren’t even there.

He sits in his motel room, takes his pills with water from the bathroom, and occasionally remembers to find food. He doesn’t sleep well on the hard, musty motel bed; the nightmares come in waves even when his brain is like mush from the medications. A car door slamming, a yell from the street, the smell of cooking meat - it all sends him skittering, panicking, pacing. He can’t stop moving, and his bad knee swells up and finally he gets his hand on some liquor and he ends up slung into the stained bathtub barely able to think. Definitely not able to stand.

He just wants it to stop.

The mostly-empty bottle hits the grimy tiles and smashes, but he thinks of a girl with amber eyes and a magic bag and a watch that she gave him - hurled at him. He remembers sleeping on a cold, bony shoulder in an alley, her voice sweet and warm.

She was so mad with him that last night. He did end up back behind Dewey’s again, on more than one Tuesday, but he didn’t see her again. And it wasn’t long after that when everything went to hell, so he never got to say goodbye. Say sorry for being a dick.

He can’t quite remember what they were arguing about that last night. Whiskey and valium have chased that memory away, and his head slumps over as he sleeps. Or looses consciousness. Either way, he doesn’t have to exist for awhile, and it suits him just fine.

—

Time passes. He finds a cheaper motel, because there’s a corner of his brain that is somehow still functional and practical, and he knows what money he has has to be stretched. Someone from the VA calls his cellphone and he ignores it. He takes his pills - less than usual, because they’re running out.

His knee hurts.

He breaks a lamp and the mirror after a nightmare, and ends up at urgent care getting his knuckles stitched up by some intern who asks him too many questions.  Tries to give him pamphlets, and he resists the urge to punch the doctor in the face.

The doctor does write him new prescriptions though. That’s helpful. And he gets something to eat at the cafeteria. It starts out as a bad night and ends up being one of those mornings he almost feels human, as long as he doesn’t look in the mirror.

That’s why he picks up the phone when the VA call again.

That’s how he finds himself sitting outside the VA hospital with a paper bag of the shit he left behind. His mother’s letters, his dog-tags, and an extremely broken watch.

“Happy freakin’ birthday.”

He looks at it closely now, more closely than he did when he was given it - even if it was thrown at his head, it was a gift in his mind. The brown leather strap is stained and nearly torn through, and the brass buckle bent. The face is cracked in an almost perfect spiral. The face is mottled cream, with neat gold Roman numerals; several have come loose and rattle along the bottom, along with the minute hand. It no works, and he hopes that the internal gears are still functional.

The watch will need to be repaired professionally, to be taken apart and pieced back together. A new glass face and band, the numerals and hands put back in the rightful place.

He doesn’t even remember wearing it, that last day. He knew he had it with him the entire time, through basic training and everything, but he didn’t remember wearing it. He’d had some chunky digital thing that told him the weather and GPS and shit that had been responsible for the mutilation of his left wrist.

Carefully it into his jacket, Jasper stands and begins the walk back to the motel.

Nineteen, still.

Sometimes, he thinks about going back to Dewey’s, just to see if she ever turns up again, on a Tuesday. For some reason, when he thinks of her - Miss Alice, in her funny clothes, and her lilting voice - he thinks of her exactly how he remembers her, that she is fixed in time and will never change. That he could return to that alley a week, a year, a decade from now, and she will still be there with her bag of tricks and big golden eyes.

He thinks about her a lot. He never knew where she came from, how old she was, why she spent Tuesday nights in an alley with him. He hopes she’s safe, comfortable, and happy.

He hopes she still thinks of him.

Time marches on, and he can see his twentieth birthday rushing up to greet him. He’s done nothing to change his circumstances - the cheapest hotel room, a fistful of pills on an empty stomach, patchwork sleep haunted by corpses. The PTSD special.

He finds a bar that respects his service more than his age, and they’re happy to let him drink himself numb in the corner as long as he doesn’t make trouble, and slips out the back if the cops come round. But even when they do, and get a good look at the scars, at his jacket, at the look in his eyes, they usually just nod and move along. No one asks questions, just counts out his crumpled money and then slides his drink along the bar.

Life doesn’t feel worth much on those nights.

Stumbling back to the motel, drunk and dull, he never notices the footsteps. He just goes to his room, his home, and passes out on a stained bedcover fulling clothed, waiting for the nightmares to kick in.

—

When the nightmares press in on him, and he’s lying on the bed staring at the discoloured popcorn ceiling, all he really wants is to go home again.

Not to Sheldon.

To the ranch.

Before Hettie, before Tuesdays, before everything. Where they buried Socrates under the tree with the treehouse, where he learned to ride, and would catch rabbits, and everything was easy. He still got told off by his father for being such a disappointment, but back then, they still had the family property, so his father wasn’t so angry.

He’s stone cold sober - aside from the Vicodin and Valium rattling around in his stomach - when he decides to go home again. He even stops in at a grimy diner and shovels in a plate of eggs and some coffee before he buys the bus ticket.

He knows the old place never sold; bank couldn’t shift it. Sold some of the land, but the old farmhouse just sits there, rotting. The Whitlock curse strikes again and again, into the heart of everything.

It’s a long trip; only way out there by bus is to go via San Antonio, and then down towards the old farm on another rural bus that only runs a few times a day. And he didn’t think much about how to get from the last bus stop to the old house proper, but some old guy in a truck takes a good hard look at him - his stained jacket, his limp, the scars twisting around his limbs and under his clothes, and offers to take him wherever he’s going.

He’s stiff and sore and hungry, but he doesn’t worry about any of that. The driver’s polite, amicable, doesn’t ask too many questions but gives him the number of the only cab in town for his return trip. He nods his thanks, and begins limping up the old driveway, towards home.

The house is… sad. Not like his memories, of blood red geraniums in the window boxes, and a pile of sneakers and boots in a jumble by the front door. There aren’t any bikes leaning up against the porch railings, either. Hell, the porch has a hole in it, the wooden rotten through. The yard is an overgrown tangle - probably concealing a few snakes.

The treehouse has long since collapsed, the wooden remains jutting out from the overgrown grass like a shipwreck. Socrates’ little grave is probably still there, under it all, with the brick he and Lydia painted his name on. He was a good cat.

He’s not going to go into the house, and now that he’s here, he’s not sure why he came at all. It’s just a house he once lived in, like Sheldon. But there is something peaceful about being back here, sitting on the - thankfully brick - front steps and staring out at the road. No cars come by, neighbours are too far away to matter. It’s just him.

He lets his thoughts float. More than once, he’s wished he’d been able to keep his service weapon, finish the job the bomb started. He thought about other ways - swallowing all his pills till there’s nothing left in the bottle; buying some razor blades and cutting along his seams; finding a motel with rafters he can loop a belt around. But he doesn’t. He hasn’t. He doesn’t know why - the thought is like a mischievous cat looming over his shoulder. The cat with a too-big smile, from Hettie’s books. Sinister yet convincing and trustworthy. But the thought lingers, and right now, he wishes he’d come prepared because … it’s quiet here. It’s quiet and he associates it with good things, and he’s really, really tired.

His VA shrink said that disassociation was a common symptom of PTSD. There were methods of dealing with it, techniques he could use, but he didn’t bother remembering them. Sometimes it was nice not to feel things, to be entirely seperate from himself for awhile.

When he comes back to himself, the afternoon has turned to night, and he’s an idiot sitting outside an abandoned farmhouse in the middle of nowhere, in a town with one cab. He swears under his breath, and the two braincells that are still desperately trying to keep him alive blaze into action, as he fumbles for his cellphone.

At least it isn’t dead.

He doesn’t even notice the sound as he dials, but as the phone rings he looks up in confusion, as a woman walks up the drive. She’s small enough for his heart to jump in misguided hope, waiting for that smile, those eyes, and that stupid bag that he placed so much faith in.

Her eyes are red, and her hair is long and brown. Her lips stretch too far like that stupid cat, and she takes the phone from him so gently and crushes it into a find powder. And he wishes he’d stayed drunk and high instead of staying sober and coming back to his childhood home like some kind of fucking book character.

She calls him ‘mi amor’ and apologises for what comes next.

He tries to back away, but stumbles on his bad knee, and when she hurls him back up effortlessly, she dislocates his shoulder and probably breaks his arm, and for a moment his vision swims and he yells, and that is only the very beginning of the pain.

—

In his few lucid moments over the next seventy-two hours, he wonders when he gets to stop suffering. When he finds the end of the tunnel of pain, from Tuesdays behind Dewey’s, to being half-burned alive, to be put back together and drugged senseless to function, to whatever this woman has done to him.

It feels kind of like the bomb did, except like it is taking him slowly. If he could open his eyes, he’d expected himself to be blackened and splitting, like the crust of a volcano.

If he could be sick, he would.

He thinks he screams himself hoarse. He might just think about doing it.

Red eyes watch him the entire time, with the ruby-coloured too-big smile, and if he still believed in god or fate or family curses or anything aside from the slow drip of pain in this veins, he would think she was the devil incarnate.

—

Time passes. He doesn’t know how much, since he woke up in the rotting remains of his family’s home with a burn in his throat, and Maria waiting for him. She’s quick to reassure him of his new status as a god, quick to find him something to quench the burn (the boy is young but strong and bulky; probably a high school football player. Healthy and full of blood and cries for his momma when Jasper half-rips his throat out. She is quick to caress his cheek and to kiss him long and deep and to fuck him in the wreckage of the house.  

Maria’s clan is small - only nine of them counting him. They are suspicious of him, of the way he stares and stays quiet. But Maria is quick to ease any of his own misgivings - newborns are entirely unpredictable, volatile. He is her new pet, her treasure, her mijo.

He loves what he is, truly. He leaves the pill bottles rattling in his pockets in the dirt of the farmhouse floor, and strides confidently after his new mistress. His leg is strong again, and all the scars have melted away into smooth, hard stone. He came to the farm looking for something, and he found it - himself, the way he was always supposed to be. If life had been kinder.

He’s found himself a soldier in another war, but war is a lot easier when you aren’t weighed down with equipment or fear or stupid fucking rules. When winning a battle means glutting yourself on blood, and losing means instant death, and there’s nothing in-between.

They are so fast now, hunting grounds stretch from Monterrey to Corpus Christie to San Antonio.

He refuses to go to Austin but sometimes its hard to remember why. He nearly kills Lucy when she tries to take the others to Austin, and Maria’s lips purse but she says nothing and they go to Laredo instead. They create a few more newborns, but he notices Maria’s attention to him never wavers; they are like pets, whilst he is her devoted prince.

(Later, he’ll find out it was only six god-damned months he lost. That he turned twenty and Lydia graduated somewhere in an Austin high school, and a bunch of people - mostly social workers and VA employees - were looking for him with the fear of the worst. He’d tell them that whatever ‘worse’ was, they weren’t even close.)

They figure out his gift during one furious early battle that leaves his arms and neck littered with bite marks, and they don’t go away. The venom works too fast, the bites are too deep, and he is once again a mess. A monster. His rage ripples around the camp, and everyone huddles in on themselves, and even Maria cowers a little, cooing and trying to settle him.

He makes them afraid, he makes them tremble, he tries to force them into fixing the unfixable.

Maria is so pleased with his gift, he is never punished for his tantrum. And more bite marks layer upon his skin; when he frets over them, with a sneer on his face, she laughs and promises he’ll have many, many more before they are done.

—

Nineteen, always.

Reconnaissance in the back of Houston is required, and Jasper and Maria take a small group with them. Maria is insistent there are others on their lands, and that is a crime of the highest order. They will destroy the newcomers, feed, and return to Monterrey. They each pick a point of Houston, and agree to meet in the centre.

He is ordered to the northeast, and he goes without resistance; he knows soldiering is following orders, and Maria lets his resistance to Austin go unremarked upon.

Most of his human memories are hazy, like they are so very much older than they really are. The streets he stalks are almost familiar, and he keeps his head low - more because of the blazing red of his eyes than any fear of being recognised.

There’s an aged but enticing aroma that he follows, that smells of nice, soft things; not fresh enough to guarantee a confrontation (or execution), but one that is a regular in this part of town.

It’s late enough there are few people in the street, in this working-class part of town. Even the dive bar has gone dark, and only the drunks and shift workers are left stumbling around. It’s not even hard to snag one of the less aware drunks around the wrist and vanish around into the alley with him.

His blood is nothing memorable, and it’s not hard to make the drunk look like he tripped and slashed his neck on a smashed bottle in the alley. He’s good at staging these scenes; at making things look like terrible, despicable accidents.

“Oh, Jasper.”

The words are soft and murmured, and he can’t decide whether they are sad or relieved or something in between. All he knows is that there is a sweet-smelling threat behind him, and he spins around with a snarl.

She’s only as tall as a child, with uneven black hair curling around her cheeks. She’s one of the prettiest girls he has ever seen, with huge amber-coloured eyes that remind him of porcelain dolls. She’s wearing a sky blue sweater a size too big over jeans with stars on the knees, and staring at him with hope and regret.

In the back of his brain, that little bit that is not quite human and not quite animals looks at her hard and breathes in her roses-and-rainwater scent and simply thinks, “Yes. Good.”

But the louder part recognises her as the trail he has been following, the one that Maria wants destroyed. A growl rumbles from within him, and the girl just looks sad.

“I’m so, so sorry Jasper,” she says, still standing there, not the least be defensive. “Carlisle and Edward forced me to stay away once you left, and then I tried to watch you but I lost track of where you were…” Her eyes are shiny, as if she wants to cry. “Do you remember who I am?”

The question hangs in the air between them, his growl fading away as he stares at her.

She steps closer, and he glares at her. The animal brain is getting louder - “Yes-good-yes-good-yes-good.” Her emotions are threatening, mostly sad, and she’s tiny. Nothing bad could be so dainty and pretty.

She’s right in front of him, standing on her toes as she presses her hand to his face. “I’m Alice,” she says simply, and his mind folds itself over and over again in an instant to provide him with an answer to this riddle, to this girl that is so clearly something good and known to him.

And he remembers.

“Are you okay?”

“It’s a stupid fucking decision you’re about to make.”

“At least I didn’t break it worse.”

“Happy freakin’ birthday.”

"They just looked nice. Happy.”

“I’ve come too far to watch you die in this disgusting place,”

“Alice,” he says hoarsely, and his memories of her are clear, sharp. He can remember that one strand of hair that always fell into her face; her ice cold hands roughly patching him up; the constant, lilting companionship of her voice, even when he slept. She is so clear in his mind he wonders how he forgot her in the first place.

Her smile and emotions bloom with joy all at once, and it warms him all the way through. It’s the kind of happiness that eluded him during his human life, and one he has not felt, waking up with this gift that feels like everyone’s emotions are constantly crawling on him. It’s something he wants to wrap himself in like armour.

“I’m so, so sorry,” her fingers brush a scar on his neck so gently, he wants to shudder.

“What for?” he asks, wanting to know if he can touch her. She’s so pretty and clean and is a good thing, a precious thing.

“I see things. Things that are going to happen,” Alice says, as she inspects his arm with a frown. “And when I saw what was going to happen to you in the army, I got mad that I couldn’t protect you anymore. And when you came home, I didn’t realise she was following you until it was too late and I couldn’t work out where you’d ended up. I would have come sooner if I’d known, I swear.” She turns his arm over to reveal a bite mark on his wrist and impulsively kisses it.

He flinches; the contact magnifies her emotions - and his - and it skitters pleasantly along his body.

“I don’t…” he begins, his voice still gravelly from lack of use. “I don’t blame you.”

“I do,” she replies softly, and then she backs away and that is disappointing enough that he takes a step closer to her. She giggles and smiles at him again, and he will follow her anywhere.

“You have to make a choice now,” she says, and he nods hypnotically.

“You can go back to Maria,” her voice wavers again, and he doesn’t like the coldness that sweeps through her at that statement. “And fight and kill until she’s bored with you. She creates war and destruction and monsters, Jasper, and I don’t want you to go with her. She will destroy you, and I couldn’t bear it if…” She stops, turning her head away and stays silent for a moment.

“Or,” her voice is steady again, “you can come with me.”

She holds out her hand.

“My brothers and sisters are distracting Maria and her friends for now, you and I can get away, and go somewhere safe,” she continues. “Just you and me together. I can…”

He never knows what she was going to say because his choice is made, his hand taking hers without a second thought, and she stares up at him with wide eyes, her mouth a perfect ‘o’.

“Are you sure?” she manages, and he nods. He thinks of pain, human and immortal. He thinks of rage and regret. He thinks of his lowest point as a human, of the permanent bite marks on his arms, and the weight that has only shifted now that he’s immortal, not lifted away.

He thinks of being happy and safe and clean and peaceful. He thinks of a girl sitting next to him in an alley, with her throat burning, but her only worry about his bruises.

The girl who can back for him.

Everything is still muddled, from his human life, but he knows that lot of people took him apart and remade him in both his lives. She’s the only one who tried to heal him.

“Let’s go,” he says, and she laughs sweetly, and then they are running faster than anyone can see as they disappear into the night.

—

‘Home’ is a cabin in the middle of the forest, somewhere towards the north east, he thinks. No people around, just wild animals for him to glut himself on. There is the constant running of the river beside them, covering their scent against nomads. It is quiet here - a good place to figure out the edges of his gift, to learn resistance and control, to try and heal and reconcile all that happened to him in such a short space of time.

Alice tells him Maria was indescribably desperate after his disappearance; their exit covered by a well-time rainstorm that washed all the scents away. She had torn apart Houston in her fury, and now she was in more trouble than she knew.

Meaning that Maria wouldn’t come hunting for him any time soon. And, he supposes, when she does, Alice will know. Alice knows everything.

She knows that he likes to sit on their front steps and just stare out at the forest without being disturbed. That the scent of smoke and fire sends him twitching worse than any vampire she’s ever met. That the scars that mark his arms, neck, and face are simply placeholders for the ones he gained as a human, and his disgust over them lingers from the injuries he suffered in war. That he misses his sisters, and they are one of the reasons he is so resolute in his control training. That, if nothing else, he will say good bye and fake his death to give them closure. Alice promises him that she knows someone who can help them figure all those kinds of details out, but she wants him to see his sisters one last time almost as badly.

He knows that Alice loves him, as truly as anyone has loved before. That feeling never wavers, not through his rages, his depressions, his disassociation. That just watching him read a book on their (broken) couch has joy blooming inside her. He knows that Alice will never pressure him, never ask him for more than he is ready to give - and because of that, he is willing to give her anything she asks.

Some days are harder than others, especially when Alice talks to him about her family - the one she walked away from for him - and he knows that she wants the both of them to return to the Cullens sometime in the future. And he feels obliged to do it, eventually, since her jumble of siblings were a part of his escape plan - the most dangerous part, if it involved aggravating Maria. But she never asks, just talks to him about them.

But mostly, he’s okay. Good, even. Animal blood is disappointing, and sometimes he’s so agitated he can’t sit still and wishes for … a battle, to run, to do something other than sit, and read, and hunt animals, and talk. Alice blames it on his newborn year, and he tries so hard to contain it, but it’s hard.

She tries to make it better, and on days that he can stand to be touched, she teaches him all the old-fashioned dances she knows, and he spins her around and sometimes it does make it better.

He’s got regrets, a laundry list of them, but Alice says that isn’t unusual; it takes very specific circumstances to be changed - especially young - and be satisfied with the final outcome. When he asks her regrets, she shrugs and admits that she doesn’t even remember being human. Leaving him unprotected is her biggest regret, and that makes her sad, which he doesn’t like the feeling of.

So he puts his arm around her, and she curls against him, and that makes the sadness evaporate, and she beams up at him with golden eyes he could drown in, and one thing he will admit is - that despite the pain and unhappiness that followed him from human to immortal - that he will never, even regret taking her hand.

[entitycradle]

A Tree Without Wind

Content warnings: mention of, discussion of, threats of, and plans to commit suicide. Panic attacks, disassociation, and paranoia are described, sometimes in detail. An eating disorder is alluded to. Characters are horny for each other but there’s nothing sexually explicit.

I promise the ending is hopeful. I genuinely am not trying to trick you, I know what this sort of thing is like, I want to respect your capacity while still being truthful to the experience and allowing tension in the story. If you’re in the right place for it, click that button.

A TREE WITHOUT WIND

I was nine years old the first time Phoenix told me he was going to kill himself. Is that too brutal? Sorry. It's where this starts. We were outside, in the morning before it got too hot, kicking around a ball in the scrubby grass. We used the long shadow of the I34Q tower to make the rules--you can't use your hands if you're in the sun, that sorta thing. It was fun because the boundaries of the shadow were always moving with the shape of the tower, and because the tower was a little scary. Phoenix lost a game and just said it, frustrated, "I'm gonna kill myself." I laughed.

When I was that age I loved looking at the shadow of the tower, because it made so much more sense than the real thing. You'd look at the dark, fuzzy stain on the ground and you could imagine it was some sort of antenna, or house, or marker. But then you'd look at the structure itself and your eyes would glaze over trying to figure it out. Unevenly rotating, stacked polyhedral structures, dark gray but covered with a rainbow film like an oil slick. Irregular pieces would be transferred between different sections with no apparent pattern. It smelled like someone you'd never met. The tower was doing something but no one was ever clear on what. That's how it is with I34Q stuff, I think.

I'm stalling. It was some stupid shit, he must've picked it up from some awful caster or something. As a kid Phoenix liked that sorta thing. He'd watch videos of mean people cursing and laughing and he'd laugh with them. I preferred my cartoons, or the I34Q casts, as weird as they were. Later I repeated what he said when I found out my dad was making squash for dinner, "I'm gonna kill myself," and my mom told me off pretty hard. Kept me from saying it again, at least in school and at home. Phoenix kept at it though.

- = -

Phoenix and I got put in the same dormitory when we went to T-school. Do they call it T-school in other places? It's the thing where 4Q tanks (as in I34Q) come and take a bunch of eleven-year-old kids to stay at "training" facilities. No one I've asked knows what T-school is actually for, same as the towers, same as all the 4Q stuff like I said before. An organic shape attached to the ground heads a classroom, gibbering except for the occasional english sentence (Phoenix said he also recognized some Cantonese). Mrs. Lough, who apparently also lives in the facility, tries to teach "formalist english," which is like english but the rules contradict themselves. You take notes on the behavior of a tank filled with inky fluid for four hours a week. One day a three-legged machine packs up your stuff and shepherds you to the gate.

I was ejected a year and a half after Phoenix. I went home on the bus and met him at burger king that afternoon. I caught a glimpse of him from outside. His hair was in long, tight braids. I felt self-conscious about the uncontrollable smile growing on my face. "Aco!" he said through a grin as I opened the glass door. A green poster advertised a meal made from "water beads," an I34Q plant thing.

"Dang," I said, grinning as I sat down. "Dang."

"You make it out? Fuck you to 4Q?" He'd stopped eating to greet me. His grin looked as uncontrollable as mine. Phoenix's nose was wide and flat, also like mine.

"Fork you, 4Q." I still felt nervous about cursing. I was fourteen. "How ya doing, Phoenix?"

"I'm good, I'm good. High school is interesting."

"Oh, man..."

"It's actually like, fucking nice to understand what's happening. But now there are actual smart kids and you actually get punished when you, y'know, mouth off. I'm like, I gotta get around to--" He swiped with his hand, bent his neck, and made a cracking sound with his mouth. I laughed. "Don't worry, I'll show you around. Maybe we'll have a class together."

- = -

We did have a class together. High school with Phoenix was fun, because I got to have a proper crush on him. Pining, sexuality, youthful obsession, yards and yards of it. It was weird, we kinda drifted--Phoenix hung out with kids that I was afraid of, I hung out with kids who played too many videogames. As our familiarity waned, I started seeing him differently. A foreign, adult desire began to penetrate me, replacing childish affection. It took me a while to realize that's what was happening.

It was a shame our familiarity waned, though, because Phoenix was really struggling, and I didn't see it. His friends were mean, when they weren't outright abusive. Not a lot of people liked him. I learned later that he started hurting himself when he was sixteen. Little cigarette burns, and then cuts. He got put on meds at seventeen--the wrong meds, for a year. He went to a psych ward when he was nineteen. His family did not have the money to pay for an extended stay. I still don't know exactly how that worked out. I do know he went into debt after his second stay two years later.

I wasn't doing too well myself, after I hit twenty-two. Something in me broke I guess. So when Phoenix told me he was going to travel to the Santitos digger and throw himself off a cliff, it didn't take me very long to ask if I could go with him.

- = -

"I... I didn't..." He paused for a long time. Ten seconds of silence feels unbearably long in a conversation, and I was quiet for fifteen. My teeth held each other tightly as his thoughts whirled. "I didn't..." He looked me in the eyes. There was an intensity to both our gazes. He'd stuck his jaw out, just a little. "I guess I did. I was, kinda, hoping you'd say that."

"Fuck," I said, looking away and down. "Fuck." I put a hand over my eyes, gripping my face as tears came.

"I'm gonna die," he said, beginning to smile and looking up. I felt the discomfort I'd felt since we were nine.

"Yeah, I wanna go, I wanna go," I said, pulling my hand away midway through and looking back at him with a force I didn't recognize.

He looked back at me and said, "I'm gonna die, and you're gonna die with me."

- = -

The Santitos digger is in northern California, in the Redwood national park. People have figured out the basic idea of what the digger is doing, unlike the towers or the T-schools: the digger is making a big hole. I'd heard that in some places it had dug more than a mile, almost straight down. Don't ask me how the digger would've done that. Don't ask me why it's called Santitos, either, since it's pretty big and not very saintly. Maybe it was the name of a town. Getting to the digger from Prince George County was about fifty hours.

"I figure we could do it in three days if we really fuck-you-pushed-it. But I'm planning on five." I craned my neck to look at Phoenix's cracked phone screen, where he'd pulled up the route.

Gas is expensive because 4Q takes most of it. Basically no one flies. Even in Phoenix's hybrid, it would be a thousand dollars to get to the west coast. But it's not like we'd need the money afterwards.

"We'll eat along the way," he continued. I bit my thumbnail. "I'm not picky, we'll just stop at wherever they won't run us out of town."

We'd sleep in the car. It was April, so temperature wouldn't be a concern. I packed a change of clothes, a water bottle, my meds, and a box cutter I'd stolen from my last job.

The next morning, he pulled his blue, dented '38 prius in front of my apartment building. I saw the car arrive out the window. There was an anxious pit in my stomach that deepened when I opened my front door. I didn't want anyone to see me. This is it, I thought, this is it, this is it. I repeated that phrase down the stairs. My landlord could fucking charge rent to my corpse, I could give a shit. This is it, I thought. That final T stretched to enrobe me. The sky was gray and wet. The sensation wasn't enough to rip me from my inwards reverie. I was about to get in the back of the car when Phoenix spoke. "That ain't it."

He was leaning out the window, regarding me coolly. "Morning. Shall we go?" I walked around the car and got in the front seat.

- = -

Virginia is beautiful once you get into the mountains, forested and rolling. I told Phoenix, "Once I read the Appalachians are millions of years old, and used to be taller than the Himalayas."

"No shit. Was there like an Everest? Where's the old Everest?"

"I don't know, I never heard anything about that. But yeah the continental plates looked totally different. And then things changed and the rain and wind and plants broke them down."

"Hah. Fucking awful. Just being broken down like that. I mean, it's better than what 4Q did to Everest."

I was quiet for a moment. "That's... the worst thing they did, right?"

"I dunno, dude, I think taking kids from their families is worse."

"No, right, right. But like... Everest was like... like everyone knew about Everest. When I was really little I had this big book about mountains and I read the bit on Everest so many times. And now it's like... they made it about them. And people lived in the Himalayas before 4Q came! It forced everyone out and carved a bunch of nonsense into it. A forever reminder that we're below them."

"Hah, literally. Hmmm. I still wouldn't say worst, but, I get what you mean. I'm so numb to it. It's good some people still care." Phoenix shrugged. "I mean I dunno. It doesn't matter much to me, at this point. But from an outside perspective it's good."

That first evening was alright. I drove Phoenix into a beautiful sunset. You hear the phrase "rode off into the sunset" and you think, what a nice ending, but it's not really an ending. If you're the cowboy you keep riding, and eventually the sky darkens and you have to set up camp and eat and sleep and wake up the next morning and eat and go riding again. A feeling of dread and desperation fills me when I think of surviving alone like that. Maybe I'd get used to it. The trip to Santitos was an attempt to write a story with a proper ending.

We didn't stop until we crossed into Illinois. We parked on the shoulder of a country road. I used the light in the car to look at the atlas we'd bought for when we didn't have cell service, and laughed. "We've been in five states today. Pretty good. Keep it up and we'll have visited every state by June."

"What the--?" Phoenix snorted, laughing. "You mean if we visit five states a day. Asshole."

I always giggled when he snorted and called me an asshole. "Hey, I'm just saying."

"Fucking dumb. Doesn't even work. You'd have to wake up in a different state than you fell asleep in." He caught my eye. The smile felt intimate, mutual. Born of sleepy exhaustion from a shared journey. I looked at the divot between his nose and upper lip.

I realized something. "Shit, I forgot to bring a blanket."

"Poor baby. You cold?"

"Hmm. I guess not really."

"Oh, you know what I do have..." He leaned towards me and reached toward the back seat. I watched his shirt stretch over his chest. Phoenix retrieved a big gray sweater. "Feel free to stretch it out."

My fingertips touched the back of his hands as I took the bundle. I did that on purpose. His skin was warmer than I expected, as skin always is. We tipped our seats back. Not the most comfortable, though the sweater would help, hopefully. I checked out Phoenix to see him on his side, looking at me and smiling. I let my own smile relax into me as I watched his eyes. His irises were a rich, beautiful brown. His skin was the color of cardboard in your childhood memories. I loved the way his smile wasn't symmetrical, wider on one side than the other. I carefully resisted scanning my gaze down his body. I actually saw his eyes flick down my form, instantaneously. His eyelids half-lowered, and then, horribly, what seemed to be a great tide of sadness overtook him. I watched him hold it back. I watched his smile mix with growing grief and fear, then bow to neutrality. He covered his gaze with his eyelids, breathed in, breathed out. "All right," he whispered, then opened his eyes. The gaze was gone. "Time to sleep." He sat up and turned off the light.

The sweater had a very particular, subtle smell to it. I guess it was his smell. I was desperately horny, yet blasted to pieces. A heady mix.

"I think I could fall in love with you, if things were a little different." He broke the silence, fifteen minutes later. "I probably would. But I'd cling to you like a fucking baby. And you're here, right?" He paused. For a response? I didn't give him one in time. "That's what I mean, codependent hell. I'd only be alive for you, and you'd only be alive for me, and then the second anything goes wrong we'd be right back here except I'd, fucking, direct all my shittiness at you... and you'd blame yourself."

I was quiet. "Ain't... ain't being codependent better than dying?"

"Hah! But that's what I'm saying, it doesn't change anything, it just leads us back here."

I fumbled for something. "Yeah but if it could... like stave it off..."

"Why is that good? The world is fucked, Acoatl, totally and truly fucked. Things don't get better from here, for me, for people. Should I beg? Stay here in misery out of some misplaced sense of morality? We're doing the only thing that makes sense."

I stayed quiet, not unconvinced. Sleep came, eventually, uncomfortably, anxiously.

- = -

The International Astronomical Union provisionally called it 8I/2034 Q1. I had to look that up. The eighth interstellar comet discovered, identified in 2034. I don't know what Q1 means. The name was briefly changed to 8I/Pasarati, for the research group that had discovered it, but by that time I34Q was clearly accelerating non-gravitationally and on an Earthbound trajectory. 8I/Pasarati is still in orbit, technically. You can see it through a telescope, it's like five miles across. But I34Q is the name for all of it, the craft that came to the surface, the life it brought with it, the structures it built, the war, all the consequences. No one can make any sense of it, except the one thing everyone knows: something else controls the world now.

- = -

I just barely remember waking up to switch seats in the morning, and then desiring nothing more than to return to sleep. Eventually Phoenix nudged me awake. "Hey." We were parked somewhere in Missouri. I'd slept all the way through the night and Phoenix's turn to drive. At least twelve hours, depending on when I actually fell asleep last night. I'd missed the big arch in St. Louis.

Phoenix was curt and reserved as I drove. I thought he was still thinking about last night, or angry at me for leaving him alone on his drive. Then he tilted his head back and began to gag. "My... heart..." Tears streamed down him face.

"Phoenix." I glanced back and forth between him and the road. There were abandoned cars on the shoulder; I couldn't pull over. "Phoenix, Phoenix, um."

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, stop." He bent, heaved, and emitted a yowling, harsh retch. Nothing else left his mouth. "My heart..." He was breathing hard. A panic attack, I realized, stupidly too late.

"Do we have..." Panic attacks can be interrupted with certain intense sensations. The general goal is to increase awareness of the environment, focus the mind on the current moment rather than the future or past. Holding an ice cube can help. There were no ice cubes. I reached into the back seat for my water bottle, which would at least be cool. A truck behind us laid on the horn. I swerved back into my lane. "Sorry." Phoenix dry heaved again. It was a uniquely distressing sound.

I searched for the hazards, feeling useless. Far too much time passed before I found them and started slowing down. A different truck laid on a different horn. I was able to slip in a gap on the shoulder between an abandoned pickup and a rusting minivan.

I led Phoenix onto the tall grass beyond the asphalt, where he collapsed onto all fours. His torso flexed as he heaved. I put a hand on his back. "Phoenix, look at the trees." There were bushy, broken trees lining the sides of the highway, a vibrant green against the blue and white sky. "The, listen to the road." No, the road was stressing me the fuck out. "Listen to the grass waving, feel it." Stalks crumpled in his fists. I twisted my head and saw the tip of an I34Q tower peeking up over the treeline. "Look, a tower, just like when we were kids." Over the next few minutes, his breathing slowed, his heaving stopped. But the tears stayed. He sobbed away the panic. I read somewhere that tears actually contain different chemicals depending on the emotion causing them. Something to do with hormones I think.

He apologized to me. I would've done the same thing. I've done the same thing. So I got it, but felt indignant at having understood--he didn't need to apologize!

We got back on the road and listened to static on the radio. Sometimes the edge of a station would pass by, and we'd get fuzzy country, or christian rock. I changed it whenever there was a sermon. Sermons always come back to 4Q and they're always awful. The 4Q broadcasts are actually better than sermons about 4Q. They're kind of like static, anyway, totally unintelligible. We encountered more of them than I expected. Maybe static itself is a 4Q broadcast. I don't think that's right, I think static is like cosmic background radiation. But maybe 4Q has changed it somehow, like it used to be white noise and now it's blue noise, a different random distribution but still random.

"I'm off my meds," he said, as we rolled into darkness. The moon was a crescent, low on the western horizon. He spoke flatly and calmly. "I didn't even bring them with me. I thought you should know."

I hesitated. I wanted to voice this diplomatically. But then, we'd be dead in four days, anyway. "Is that why you had the attack?"

"No. I panic even on meds." That made sense. I remembered a few times in the past year when he'd canceled an event with little notice, or left early. "But I'm not a person right now, and that's definitely because I'm off my meds."

"You're not a person right now?"

"Yeah. It's called depersonalization. Also derealization, which is when nothing is real. Or that's how it feels, as I'm told. It's pretty freaky if I'm honest. You don't get the same emotional reaction from stuff. It feels like you're watching from somewhere else." He wasn't looking at me. He was looking down. "You're not you. You're not even real." He whispered. "Pretty freaky."

"Can I--do you--"

"Ahh, I'm coming out of it. Some of it is just recognizing that you're in it." He drew a knee up to his chest and shook his head. "Uhh, could you. Could you hold my hand. Touch helps."

I gripped the wheel with my left hand and held his palm with my right. It was warm and sweaty. I wish I could say that was okay. I felt miserable. I wanted to feel happy, holding his hand, comforting him. I didn't.

Sleep came quicker that night, though still uncomfortable, still anxious.

- = -

I slept late, again. I hadn't touched the chicken sandwich I'd gotten from a drive-thru last night. It had awful 4Q stuff on it anyway. I hadn't eaten in twenty-four hours, so I was pretty hungry, but I had no actual desire to eat. I'd deal with it later.

My own panic attack must've seemed similarly unbidden to Phoenix, though I felt it coming about an hour beforehand, and tried to stave it off. We were on I-80, driving through the hypnotizing flatness of Nebraska. Every ten or fifteen minutes I kept seeing this scarlet structure. It was like a giant, bloody caricature of a water tower, a skinny, triangular column maybe ten feet across and at least two hundred feet tall, supporting an enormous squashed sphere more than twice as wide as the column was tall. I'd watch it rise from the horizon, far too big. I'd never seen them before but guessed they must be 4Q. I started thinking we were somehow traveling in a loop, that my sense of direction was faulty and we were passing the same structure in the same field over and over again. Then I started thinking about how crazy that sounded. But I couldn't stop the thought.

I wanted to pull over but I couldn't stop anywhere in view of the structure, because it was watching me. Of course it wasn't, but I couldn't stop the thought that it was. Hell, maybe it was. Maybe only the mad can decode the purpose of I34Q stuff. I felt how hard I was breathing and glanced over at Phoenix, wondering why he hadn't said anything. He was staring down. He was probably disassociating again, I realized later, but at the time all I knew was that I was alone.

I get angry at myself after my attacks. I feel so stupid. Phoenix apologized to me that night, which made me feel even stupider. I couldn't wait to get to the Santitos digger.

- = -

The next day was bad. Quiet, lonely, and frustrated. A further reminder of the reasons. I saw patches of 4Q purple grass climbing up the Rockies. We both took long shifts and entered Redwood park just after midnight.

- = -

I read a story once about a man that was falling in the dark. He was falling so far that he would die instantly when he hit the ground. He realized that his brain wouldn't have time to process the impact, or even the few moments before. And he couldn't see the ground. He couldn't see anything. All that was left in the world was him and his death. I wondered if Phoenix had read the same story, and was hoping for a similar effect, coming here at night. Of course, we got it wrong. There were clouds, burgundy with light pollution, and every few minutes a star would gaze through; an unearthly glow was cast up from distant pieces of the digger.

Some parts of the digger looked like the towers, spinning and shifting. Some parts looked like exposed microelectronics, cables sutured to shiny terminals of minute complexity. Some parts were just made of asphalt blocks, cream-, gray-, and lime-colored pebbles tightly embedded in dark tar. Distant redwoods, many damaged by fire, ringed the horizon. The Santitos digger was less an object and more a place.

I felt wordlessly close to Phoenix as we scrambled over asphalt, looking for a pit. We touched each other frequently in our effort, to assist, to communicate. We'd have to give each other boosts, lift each other up, look for alternate routes. This place was not made for people.

Finally we came upon a deep canyon. I had half a mind to walk off the edge immediately. But both Phoenix and I stopped to regard it.

I couldn't tell if the rumors were true. You could only see maybe a hundred yards down before the walls of the abyss disappeared into ink. Or, not ink--not blackness, either. People are black. This was something else. The most prominent features were the semi-perceivable red blotches left on my optic nerve after gazing at one of the digger's glowing sectors. The unknowable told me nothing. It just revealed the flaws of my being. Maybe we would achieve our effect after all.

"This is it," I said, elliptically. The beginning is the end. If you take out the 'h' that phrase is a palindrome. "That was the first thing I said out of the door before I got into your car on Saturday. If you take out the 'h' the phrase is a palindrome. The beginning is the end. This is elliptical. This is it."

"That ain't it." He was regarding me coolly.

I laughed.

He was angry. "Are you fucking kidding me? The point of this thing, the whole fucking point is you do it in your right mind. You're letting your madness make the decision for you. You have to make the decision!"

I found that extremely funny. I laughed harder.

"Shut up! Fuck!"

"What's a right mind?" I asked, still grinning. "There's no such thing anymore. Even when it was a thing, all it meant was the most socially-acceptable, capital-promoting mind. Now? The world doesn't fit us anymore. The human condition is inconvenient to its purpose. 4Q can't even train us. The right mind is a dead one. You want a right mind, go ahead." I gestured at the abyss. That's what I did.

He stepped forward. He stepped forward. A foot hung above the end.

I don't know what I would've done if he had lowered that foot, changing his balance, tipping him forward. Jumping in after him wouldn't have felt right. Maybe I'd have gone back to those red eyes in Nebraska and begged for them to torture me. Maybe his idiosyncrasies would have been repelled by the unknowable, flowing away from his body and into me, and I'd be lost forever in a derealized paranoia. Maybe I'd have gotten in the car and driven back home.

His foot remained, hanging, the edge a gallows. "Suicide is about pain. It's the ultimate response to ongoing distress. I never wanted you to be normal. I just didn't want you to be in pain. In a twisted way, I guess I thought, if this was your way of dealing with pain, I wasn't going to stop you. That is your right. I feel like that has to be your right." His balance was incredible. He remained still, a tree without wind. "But you can be abnormal, you can be a bad fit for the world, you can be utterly broken, and you can still live without pain." We're both crying. Tears descend into the pit.

| ' , |

I do think madness is the right way to understand I34Q. I feel this mysteriously. I wonder what it would be like if I tried going to T-school while embracing my altered states, living in them. I suspect Phoenix would have more success, being more comfortable with unreality. Not that either of us would participate in whatever hegemony 4Q perpetuates. More that we'd figure out what it wanted, and how to resist. I've been thinking about this a lot. Maybe other people are, too. We need to find each other.

Phoenix and I wandered north. We found this incredible queer community in Oregon, with actual traditions and mechanisms to deal with communal trauma. I can't say anything about the world, the world is unknowable. But I think there's hope for us.

Phoenix and I are together, now, in a way I can't quite name. We did finally make love. That was beautiful. But we don't live together. I make love to other people, sometimes, and he does the same. Sometimes I'll go a week or two without seeing him, without notice. Sometimes I'll go a few days without even thinking about him. I love him, and I tell him that, and he says the same to me, though both of us have admitted that we don't know what that means.

We still panic. I still get paranoid. Phoenix disassociates. He's been using the state to make art. I think about I34Q and write down what I think. I'm pretty good at eating regularly, even if I don't feel like it. I don't know if we're living without pain. I think maybe that's a pretty tall order. But I don't want to kill myself anymore. So I think that's pretty good.

[Ed.: have this little treat. It takes me about the length of this playlist to read the story.]

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5VD5lJJqNUJsITPj3Rg8Sn?si=d262096479104d4f

[spacedoutbunny]

Chapter 1

She was perched on the rooftop like a bird would perch if birds perched on this particular rooftop. Except they didn`t. Birds avoided this particular rooftop because they knew she perched there. It was almost out of respect for her two leggedness of perching.

She stared into the street before a crowd of people had begun to form. Soon there would be too many. And so, she betook herself off from perching to sliding down the roof and then to the gutter and then to falling off. She had to fall just right and so she waited.

Two nights previously the Abegaineo Family had sat down to have a conference. It was to discuss who, if anyone wanted the job would become head of the family.

 It was an annual discussion, that generally ended up with a vacant chair. 

Mostly it was an opportunity to come together to discuss what had happend during the past year and have a rather nice party. Introductions for marriage were also discussed where necessary for family continuity was paramount. Each branch carefully chosen. But bloodlines always from outside the family. No one who was not family could attend. And this meant no one who was not family usually had no clue they were under discussion.

If rejected then the rejected one would never see or hear from his or her potential mate every again. There were rules in place for a reason. 

Everyone took the name Abegaineo once chosen. No one ever left the family. Death was the only exit, but at this point even Death knew better than to take any within their ranks. 

They all just took up positions “Elsewhere” it was just how it worked. 

Those who had known when the chair had been filled had long since gone “elsewhere”. No one was here who remembered at this particular gathering. 

There was light music coming from the ballroom. It had a slightly eerie edge as though something was a little off kilter. Listen too long and it could set your teeth on edge. Listen longer and the need to start a fight grew. After that it was too late and usually involved rubber rooms. 

Chapter 2 

Two days later and outside, the percher was close to falling. And so she did. The person who caught her however, was not who she was expecting to catch her.

One step back and two streets over the intended catcher walked on oblivious. She had been redirected by a series of events that did not seem contrived, but in fact were. 

The recipient of the falling girl was surprised and not delighted. He had been carrying a painting at arms length so as not to bend or break it. So his arms had been extended in the correct position for falling into.  The girl did not yet know it was the wrong person. 

The painting fell out of his hands at the exact moment she hit. And a bunch of expletives followed after. The girls pride was a little hurt. The mans anger and concern for the painting over the person, put her back up. She stood up quickly enough and was about to lay into him when she really noticed his eyes, and then his hands which once again were holding the painting. 

“She apologised. She actually apologised” 

Across the street hidden in shadow Hecate stood talking to her companion, a sparrow. The bird perched on Hecate`s shoulder. “But it was the wrong one” he shrilled. “Where has Nona got to?Nona was supposed to catch her! This took bloody weeks to set up  and it`s all but banjaxed, I`m going to check up on Nona” and the sparrow flew off. 

Nona had wandered into a Cafe she sat looking out at the people walking past as she sipped her coffee. they all had the same bored expression. “Ruddy Robots”. She sighed and got up after finishing and continued down the street. 

A sparrow flew past her head and hit a window, it fell to the ground. 

Nona had not seen it. She was walking without really paying attention the projects in her head were outweighing the noises surround her, the people were a blur. 

A sparrow flew right past her and it a window, it fell to the ground.

She did not see it. 

The third time it happened and Nona ignored it the sparrow flew off muttering.

“Did you just say `for fucks sake?`” 

The sparrow came back round and hit a window right in front of her face, and landed on the ground at her feet. She nearly trod on it but instead bent down to pick it up. “Bloody suicidal birds.” she placed it gently on a table. It fluttered its wings pathetically. “Good God you want me to take you home?” Flutter “Ah what the heck. People think I`m nuts anyway” and she picked the sparrow up. “Better find you a box or something.” 

She rooted around in an recycling bin and found an empty box and put the sparrow inside. She continued to root around inside the bin. She found a bit of wood, some bubble wrap and an orange that was close to going mouldy and there was a painting just thrown to one side. The picture intrigued her and the rest she could find a use for.  She carried it all along till she found a spare poly bag floating down the street, then placed most of the items into the bag. 

The box with the sparrow in contained it and the bubble wrap, but no air holes. The sparrow was comfy but pissed off at the lack of air. 

Nona finally made it back to her flat/studio. she opened the box. The sparrow fluttered weakly. “I bet you need water” she said. The sparrow was thinking it could do with a gin sling right about now.

Nona found a pipette. The sparrow was really hopeful when it saw the clear liquid and nearly choked when water went past its beak. 

Chapter 3

Meanwhile Hecate was watching her main charge walk along with the man with the painting still held at arms length. 

Arabat-Lile,better known as Lily, kept pace with the man and his painting. Still apologising, it fell on deaf ears. This man was a nightmare. He tripped over stuff and nearly fell, he bumped into people and got banged a lot. It was only because Lily steered him, that he made it to his destination. A museum. He almost tripped up the stairs but made it inside and down to the store room where he gingerly placed the painting on the floor against a wall. 

He looked around and finally noticed Lily, and almost jumped out of his skin, falling backward. He might at that point, have crushed the painting, but Lily grabbed his arm and pulled him forward, so he fell into her. Once again their eyes met. She saw a flash of light, literally a flash, then it vanished. He saw her face and realised it was symmetrical. Both said “Wow” 

Hecate still hiding in the shadows just said “shit” it was very deep. 

Hecate needed information and quickly. Everything that could have gone wrong “had” gone wrong and she knew nothing about `Calamity` as she had begun to call him. Not his name, nor his purpose, not a damn thing except he couldn't function well at all. As human males went he was ... well ... clumsy.

Lily had managed to get them out of the storeroom and into a cafe on site at the museum. 

“You mean you had no idea you were coming here?” Lily asked

“No, none at all. One minute I was rooting around in an antique shop and the next I found that painting and I knew I had to take it here directly. 

Lily stared at him “It`s a Blue you know.” Calamity raised an eyebrow.

 “Blue as in Ambrose Blue?. There were no known Ambrose Blue paintings left to be discovered unless perhaps it was in a private collection.” Lily said echoing what the curator had said.

The curator who had been passed the painting had been sceptical about its origin. “There are NO Ambrose Blue paintings left around” he snorted at the idea.  And then on closer inspection he had nearly choked and having left a photograph and a paper of ownership with Calamity had whisked it off to be authenticated. 

“if it is a Blue” Lily continued “then it would appear you may be quite well off”

Calamity sipped his coffee carefully “You think?” he asked. “You knew it could be a Blue but to be honest I know very little about art as a rule, I`m more a collector of old Games and consoles. I was rummaging around for an old Nintendo when I found the painting.”

“Games?” Lily asked. The blank look on her face spoke volumes

“You know PS4, Xbox, Nintendo, Game Cube.” He searched her face for signs of her taking the mickey. 

“I`ve played Poker before does that count? Only I wasn`t very good at it and lost to be honest” 

“Where have you been hiding all these years?” Calamity was thunderstruck. “The Moon?”

[youarejesting]

Death need no invitation - PJM

[MASTERLIST]

Summary: Moving into your new apartment on the dance academy campus, you hear it is haunted. You find yourself practicing your routines with the ghoulish resident in the second bedroom. Things get heated, except you know ghosts are cold. so...

Pairing: Jimin x Reader

Warnings: Mentions of Suicide and Death, smut, feelings.

Genre: Supernatural, Mystery, Drama, Romance, Action, sexy stuff and more. HONESTLY ALL THE GOOD STUFF.

Words: 2k

I recommend listening to either Lie, Serendipity, or Promise.

You were setting up your apartment on campus, the rent was so cheap. You found out the reason why was because people said the place was haunted. The ghost of a dancer who had died in the second bedroom. Every story was different and you never particularly believed things that had spread so thin by word of mouth. You would rather find out for yourself. Stepping into the apartment it felt cold.

"Hello to any um spirits past or present. I am hoping it is okay if I move in, it's just Me," you said feeling stupid but thought it best to be polite. You began moving your things in, there were only two suitcases the place was furnished, had everything you would need in the kitchen and a dance school didn’t require any textbooks. You felt like you weren't alone so you acted as polite as you could with the space.

The place was dusty so you cleaned the dust off a some surfaces and found a few photos which once you wiped the dust you could see a smiling young man, "wow is this you, you are very handsome," you said and in the reflection of the glass you saw some movement behind you. Calming your racing heart you smiled and turned to the open space.

"So, uh… I assume my room is the door that's open?" You walked in and shut the door, taking a few deep breaths. Sleep didn’t come easy, but you slept quite peacefully. When you woke there was a flower on the pillow next to you. Sitting up, your heart was hammering out of your chest. Calming down when you received a call from your family, you blushed taking the flower and spinning it between your fingers.

You dressed for dance practice, heading to the kitchen, "thank you for the flower" it was placed in your hair at the front of your neat bun. You saw movement in the reflection of the stainless steel kettle, you smiled saying goodbye and left for dance practice. When you returned after school you placed a small bunch of flowers in a vase on the table.

"You gifted me a flower so I thought I could return the favor" You opened the flat cardboard box you had picked up after class and pulled out a large mirror. Turning to hang it on the wall you saw him standing behind you peeking over your shoulder. He was curiously watching you his eyes were sparkly and he beautiful features. The mirror crashed to the floor a few shards nipped at your shins.

"I'm so sorry, I am so sorry, you startled me, and I didn't expect you to be right behind me," you said hurriedly cleaning up the mess and in the shards on the ground, you saw him retreating to his room. "Wait please I would like to talk to you. I will always be here if you want to talk" he gave a sad smile and disappeared through the door to his bedroom.

You heard the water running from his room’s en suite, you frowned hoping he wasn't upset and flooding the place. Looking at the shards an idea struck you. Sticking pieces all over the walls you believed you could capture his reflection anywhere in the room. Whilst making dinner you caught movement in some of the mirror shards. He looked around causing you to smile, his hair was damp. And he looked a little tired.

"I don't know much about you and I am sorry if I offend you in any way. But would you like something to eat?" He nodded and carefully walked over to the breakfast bar and sat his hands clenched together on his lap, looking around at the mirrors. You made him a plate of food and turned catching him pushing his wet hair to the side, trying to stick it down.

He ate it in a strange way in the mirror his plate was being emptied, yet in front of you, it sat untouched. You asked him if he enjoyed it and he nodded his cheeks full. His voice was soft and sweet. "It’s delicious, thank you"

The days past and you had purchased more mirrors. You both had quiet conversations and he would practice dancing with you in the living room. He danced like a dream, his body moved with such grace you felt your heart flutter as he touched your body and lifted you into the air as your routine required. He was so different from your dance partner Hoseok. Hoseok was so energetic and an excellent dancer. Jimin however looked like he was sliding on Ice and every move appeared to take no effort at all.

Jimin went for a shower at the same time every day, he never kept a routine. But without a doubt at 7:30 he walked to his room and the shower began. He would return after about ten minutes always looking exhausted. You once showered at the same time, thinking if you got your shower over with you could join him in the living room again. But the water was ice cold and you could hear crying.

Late one afternoon you went to the dance studio to rehearse for your upcoming performance. Jimin followed, you checked the room was empty before he joined, dancing with you. There the mirrors surrounding the whole room and you could see him completely. No longer seeing fractions of him at a time, the only barrier was the mirror between you. But even in the mirror, you locked eyes, he spun you grabbing your body. Moving with you like a shadow.

Out of breath, you were in the finishing pose, his right hand was on your stomach and his left holding yours. You were panting he leaned in and brushed his lips against your neck. Your breathing hitched, you had found out a lot about him over the months. The mornings he was chatty and playful but when the sunsets he was quieter and affectionate cuddling up beside you.

It was getting late you would have to head home soon to start dinner. You didn't want to go not yet, his hand pressed against your stomach sliding his smooth fingertips up your abdomen and under your workout cropped shirt. Your breath shook, it was like lightning striking through your chest making your chest tighten. The electricity sparking between your legs, your stomach lurching in delectation.

He walked you forward until your hands caught the mirror before you ran straight into it. He was whispering sweetly in your ear, his breath was so cold. His hands that were currently under your cropped shirt grabbed your bra and pulled it down his hands massaging your breasts. He was hard, moaning into your neck and grazing his lips slowly up your neck and along your jaw.

"Baby, let me make you feel good" his hands sliding down your sides, squeezing your hips pressing his thumbs in circles. Your back arched at the pressure he felt amazing. He kissed your ear, his eyes looked to yours in the mirror asking you for your permission. Nodding he smiled pulling down your shorts and removing his sweat pants. He pressed inside of you, his mouth falling open in the mirror his eyes easing closed the sound of his pleasure a soft note in your ears.

His breath was shaky he gripped your hips moving slowly. You didn't want to miss anything so you tried your hardest to keep your eyes open. His lips quivered every time he pulled back and he whined softly every time he filled you once more. He was perfect, you couldn’t help yourself from begging for him. The two of you were unraveled, you hadn’t realized you had shut your eyes. Opening you saw Jimin hugging you, dressing you a few tears running down his cheek.

Heading back to the apartment in silence, you got inside, he went straight to his room. You heard the shower running as you made dinner. He never joined you at the table. Feeling lost, he had wanted you and what he changed his mind. Why was he crying, you felt your heart breaking and you couldn’t lie to yourself anymore. You loved him.

That night, you awoke abruptly, he was crying straddling you. His hair was damp and his hands firm around your throat, he sobbed apologizing. He let go collapsing beside you, you gasped for air. He was gone. The next day you were cooking dinner and you placed the tea towel on the bench by the sink while you went to the toilet. However, when you came back, the tea towel was on the stove on fire.

You quickly turned off the heat and splashed the tea towel with a jug of water. Turning you saw Jimin walk back to his room. Knocking on his door he greeted you, not looking in your eyes. Taking his hand you lead him to the couch and began talking about what he had been doing. "Did I do something wrong?"

"No I am being selfish, I am alone and undead and I wanted you to join me" he spoke softly, you hugged him and kissed his lips tenderly. Your heart broke every time you remembered this amazing individual had passed. He apologized and promised he wouldn't try to hurt you anymore.

Days past and true to his word, Jimin was no longer trying to kill you. You got the courage to ask him how he died. Nothing prepared you for the explanation "It was at 7:32 I went for a bath and drowned myself, now every day I relive that moment. I can't help it, I am stuck in a loop. I can do whatever I want but no matter how hard I try at 7:32 I am stepping into the bath every night, it's scary"

"Let me be there with you then, I won't let you face it alone," you said the two of you waited and when the clock read 7:32 you took his hand and walked into the bathroom. He undressed and started the shower you held his hand the whole time mirrors positioned around the bath. Sitting in the water his hand tightened around yours, you were crying as you saw his face slip underwater.

You couldn’t pull your eyes away from the mirror, watching his face contort through the emotions of his death. Eventually, his hand relaxed and his eyes were closed, you were shaking calling his name. He sat up looking at you his hair dripping and the water poured from his mouth as he coughed it all back up.

You kissed him the tears falling from your cheeks, completely heartbroken, he pulled you into the ice-cold bathtub. He kissed you stripping you down completely hands traveling over your form, your skin was raised gently from the freezing temperature. Your whimper coming out as fog as his blue lips attached to your nipple. Wanting to show you the finest of pleasures and how much he loved you.

You laid back allowing him to roam your body, he took things slow you could see his eyes looking upset. His features contorted in front of your eyes he was in mourning, there were absolutely no barriers between you. The kiss you shared made your lungs burning with the need to cry out but you held it your body, shaking the sensations becoming too much.

Thinking you were going to blackout but just as your vision blurred, you felt your body relax. Finally, the euphoria spreading through you. The burning in your lungs eased and you looked up at Jimin crying over you. Jimin no longer felt cold, he lifted your lifeless figure from the water and held you to his chest. You touched his face as he sobbed, "I don't know how to help you, I am so sorry"

You pulled your spirit from your body and looked up at him, "Jimin I will never let you go through this on your own"

[kweebtrash]

hate u love u (M)

Messy After Story

Pairing(s): OC X Johnny

Genre: College AU, Fuckboy AU, Smut, ANGST

Summary: Fuckboys are basically good for one thing. You hit it and quit it- except when his voice draws you in, his body keeps you there, and dumb ass feelings linger making things particularly messy.

Warnings: really sad fucking shit, talks about suicide attempts, drug addiction, alcoholism, talks about death, jealousy and insecurities

Features: contraceptives, smidge of a size kink, grinding, face riding & face fucking, sex tapes, choking, sex toys, anal fingering/fucking, thigh grinding, double penetration, creampies, rough fucking, trying some new shit and being kinda awkward and weird but also having some kind of slutty conversations

Word Count: 17.6k

A/N: ok this is the last one I promise😉 this is really fucking angsty and I teared up at some parts writing it so sorry in advance. Also there's a lot of smut. Like 6.5k worth of smut/smutty conversations. Also, i’m going to edit this in a little while so don’t @ me if you see mistakes. I’m gonna fix them probs tomorrow. I’m just tired.

Messy Masterlist  Other Stories   Johnny Only Masterlist

I didn't talk to him. For weeks. I couldn't. I was so angry. So hurt. So devastated. He didn't tell me where he applied to, must have been because he was running around so much for his gallery and all that shit. But a fucking heads up would have been nice. I didn't see him off at the airport. I tossed his shit in a box and kicked it to the back of my closet. I cried. I screamed. And at last it wasn't anger anymore. It was hurt. It was pain. It was missing him every. Single. Night. The pain was beginning to swallow me whole and I had no idea what else I should do, or could do. He was halfway across the country and I wasn't in his arms anymore. My pillows were tear stained, my floor covered in snot filled tissues, leftover wrappers, and dirty clothes. Everything was harder without him.

I sat cross legged in the middle of my bed as I chewed on my thumbnail and stared at my phone in front of me. I had reopened all the unanswered texts he had sent me. The "baby, please talk to me," the "baby, I'm sorry," the "princess, daddy needs you. Please." I couldn't cope enough to give him an answer. But now...now I felt too empty. I snatched my phone and dialed his number. My heart pounded so hard in my chest that I could feel the blood rushing to my ears. It went to voicemail. I dropped my phone and covered my face, preparing for another round of tears. My phone vibrated against my leg and I saw his number flash across the screen. I answered it instantly and for the first time in a long time I heard his sweet deep voice. It felt like a warm blanket had been wrapped around me and I sighed.

"Eri." He said sharply.

The blanket disappeared. "H-hi…"

I heard him chewing on something then swallowing. "What?"

"What do you mean what?"

"Why are you calling me?"

"I can call my boyfriend, can't i?"

"Am I your boyfriend?" The questioned stunned me. Of course he was. Why wouldn't he be? We didn't break up we just…

"Y-yes?" My voice trembled. "Yes. Yes, you are."

"Hmm." He chewed again. "Didn't feel like I was."

"I was...upset."

"Yeah, no shit."

I wanted to fucking cry. He didn't even seem to care at all. "I m-miss you. A lot. And I...I wanted to see how you were doing."

"Oh, now you want to?" I heard him cover the phone and call out to someone, though it was all muffled. "You can do it only at your convenience?"

"I just want to see you. Can I see you?"

"You're gonna fly here? And who's gonna pay for that shit? You're gonna make Quinn do it?"

The tears started to fall again, as quick as a waterfall in a rainforest. "N-n-no. I can do-do it on my own. Do you want me t-there?"

"You're crying."

I stopped talking for a moment, knowing that my voice was going to jump a few octaves and turn into an indecipherable squeak.

"Eri."

"Y-yeah?" I sniffled and wiped my nose with my shirt sleeve. Now it was his turn to stay quiet, save for his fucking chewing. "What in God's name are you eating right now?"

"Shrooms." He swallowed.

What? Like…? "You mean-?"

"Yeah, so anyway, I don't know if you should come here, you know? Seeing as how you didn't talk to me for basically a month and now you're thinking it's okay to call me in the middle of a party and make me feel a bunch of shit. That's pretty cool right? That's pretty fun, right? I'm gonna hang up now."

The line went silent and so did my entire world.

--

I pretended to smile when I was around Quinn. I pretended that I was supportive of Johnny and so happy for him. I only cried when they were over at Jae's house. I hadn't let them in my room and see what a disaster it was. It was closed at all times. I tried my best to keep up my facade and hoped that Johnny had too. If Jae knew anything it would fuck everything up and all would have been for naught. I didn't know how to ask him or if I really even should. Maybe I was keeping up this glamour for myself. So I could pretend that everything was fine and lie to myself instead of Quinn. Maybe it was all for the sake of my sanity.

I had found a slightly better job and quit the Italian restaurant. This one paid more and all I had to do was sit as a desk and listen to people complain about their orders and why it wasn't there on time. It was annoying to take so many calls a day and even worse for my fucking mood disorder. Hearing these people whine fucking drove me up the wall and I chain smoked every lunch break to try and keep it together. I couldn't lose this job. Because it paid so much more than I was used to I was finally able to set money aside. My savings account was looking pretty decent and that was why I wanted to go see him. I could afford to and maybe we could talk it out.

I was on my fourth cigarette since I got home and a quarter into my bottle of bourbon when I got a call. I wasn't really paying attention to who it was, i just answered when I heard the buzzing. "Yeah?"

"Hey."

It was him. I fumbled and almost spilled my paint cup that was filled with swirls of reds and purples. I managed to stop it from falling over and ruining the current piece I was working on. I kicked the canvas away gently and wiped my hands on my already paint covered thighs. "U-uh...um...h-hi."

"What are you doing?"

"Nothing, just uh…" I swayed a little and leaned back against my bed to support myself. I was starting to get the spins. "Just chilling in my room. Why?"

"Talk to me."

"Are you high?"

"Not right now, no." His voice sounded raspy, as if he had just woken up.

"Where are you?"

"My bed. Where are you? Oh...wait. You already said that."

"Are you ok?" I asked.

"Are you?"

"No."

"Me either."

He cleared his throat. "'m sorry about last night. I was at a party and-"

"Since when have you started doing other drugs?"

"Hm? Oh...I mean...it wasn't the first time. I've done it before."

"And you never told me?"

"It was before we met. Don't worry about it. You still drinking?"

"Yeah, I'm still fucking drinking." I scoffed.

"I know. I can hear it in your voice. You're getting there."

"Yeah, well...shit happens."

"You really want to come here?"

"Do you really want me there?"

He took a deep breath and went silent again. "Yes."

"You sure?"

"Yes."

"I can be there. I can ask for time off. I have enough vacation time."

"Come here. Come to me. Be in my arms. Be on top of me..." He exhaled slowly. "Kiss me."

"It still hurts Johnny."

"I fucking know that already. Trust me."

"Have you told Jae about what's going on with us?"

"No, not really. Told him I've been busy. That I love him. That kind of stuff."

"I haven't told Quinn. I kinda just...pretend."

"You always pretend."

"And you don't?" I snapped 

"Of course I do." He chuckled. "We always pretend that everything's okay. And that's when we tip back a drink or smoke and destroy ourselves together. Don't you remember? That night after we fucked...we just sat against the wall of the bedroom and drank half a bottle of whiskey and just laughed about shit. I got high and you smoked like half a pack. And then I ate you out so good you came twice."

I pulled my knees to my chest and buried my face in them. I hadn't expected him to say that, to bring that up. "I laughed so hard and cried until I had a mental breakdown."

"Yup. And what did we do after?"

"You wiped my tears and fucked me again and I held onto you so fucking tight because I didn't want you to let me go."

"I remember the scratches. Those weren't orgasmic scratches. Those were in pain scratches."

"I know." I sniffled and punched the side of my thigh over and over so I could redirect my thoughts to not crying.

"Come here. I want to have another night like that with you."

"That was a bad night Johnny…"

"It was and it wasn't. The bad stuff makes us closer and we understand each other better."

"I don't want a bad night. I want a good night. I want only good night's with you."

"We'll have good night's. We will. We'll talk about shit...that's what you want right?" He asked.

"You need to want it to johnny!"

"I do want it! Don't fucking yell at me! I mean I'm fucking asking you to come here. What else do you think I want?"

"Fine, I'll fucking get a ticket tonight and I'll go for like a week."

"Fine. Fucking sounds good to me."

"Fine!" What the hell was happening? We're we mad about seeing each other or not? I laid down on the floor and set the phone down, putting it on speaker. My head was hurting so much and now I had to ask for time off and plan everything by myself. "Can I come at any time or do you have to ask for time off?"

"I can get a couple days off. The rest I might have to work but you can sleep in and I'll be back by the time you wake up. Maybe come on a Thursday and leave on a Wednesday? I don't work weekends unless there's an event and I don't have a weekend event for a bit."

"Ok, I'll ask my job and I'll buy the ticket as soon as I know."

"'mmkay. Sounds good."

We were quiet again and I hated it. "I guess I'll talk to you later." I said, bitterly.

"Okay...if you wanna. I love you, yeah?"

It was the first time I had heard him say it in a long time and it made my heart clench and I started crying again. Goddammit, I could fill a fucking ocean with how much i cried for this man. I went back to hitting my thigh to try and distract myself from it. "I love you too."

"Do you want to...stay on the phone with me, maybe? I haven't heard what's going on with you. You haven't really posted on IG or anything in awhile."

"I don't want people to really look into my life right now. I've been kind of a recluse… You're...partying I guess."

"Ehh, kind of. Every once in awhile. I still have to keep my job right?" He chuckled. "It's been um...really rough without you."

"Yeah I...we...yeah…" He cleared his throat again and I heard him sniff a bit. "Johnny don't you dare."

I heard his voice crack and that was the end. We were two fucking cry babies thousands of miles away from each other and wanting to give up everything just to be together. I wanted to make it work with him. I loved him too damn much to give up now.

--

I was nervous when I stepped out of the airport. California had a weird vibe to it and I wasn't sure if I liked it or not yet. I could deal with cities, hell I lived in one for like half my life, but this was weird, even for just an airport. I looked around trying to find Johnny from the directions he had texted me. I felt so lost and was ready to call him until I saw him looking around as well. "Johnny!"

His head whipped around and a big smile beamed on his face. I ran to him, almost dropping my luggage because I really didn't care anymore. I just wanted him. He gave me a monstrous hug and spun me around, squeezing me as tight as he could. I almost couldn't breathe. His arms felt so much stronger, especially when I grabbed onto his biceps.

He set me down and cupped my face to kiss me hard, before I could even say anything. I had almost forgotten how warm and soft his lips were and definitely got harshly reminded of how much his tongue filled my mouth. Jesus...why did he feel so much bigger? "A-ahmm...j-johnny u-um…"

"Hmm?" His hands were already grabbing at my hips and I pawed him away.

"We're in public, you slut."

"Sorry, sorry. I couldn't help it. You-" He stopped mid sentence and looked me over. I stood up a bit straighter unsure of what he was looking for 

"What?"

"You're skinny."

"Excuse me?"

"Like skinnier. You were kinda chubby before I left."

"EXCUSE ME?!"

"No! I mean, like, it's not a bad thing I just-! Like you look hot! I mean you looked hot before too but-"

"Stop fucking talking before I get on that plane and go right the fuck home." I growled.

"Ugh, I'm sorry. That came out all wrong. What I meant to say was that...you look beautiful."

"Yeah that better be what you meant to say, asshole." I punched his arm but shook my knuckles out immediately after. Why was it so damn hard? Now it was my turn to give him the once over and I realized he was bigger. Definitely more filled out and muscular. His pants were straining at his thighs, like usual but even more so. His arms were more defined and he looked like he could throw me against a wall and I would say thank you. I could clearly see the veins in his arms and I was ready to die right there. "O-oh…" was all I managed to squeak out.

"What? Wait are you checking me out now?" He laughed. "You think I'm fat?"

"No…" I shifted, a bit self conscious of myself now. "You're hot, like always." How many girls had tried to hit on him since he moved here? Ugh, I never thought of something like that before. I wasn't really the jealous type...was I? Well...maybe a little.

He picked up my luggage and put an arm around my shoulders. "Cmon, we've got to check into the hotel."

"Hotel? Why aren't we just staying at your place?" I asked.

"Uh...well...I just wanted it to be special you know? Just me and you."

"Oh you have roommates?"

"Sorta…"

Suddenly I was staring in front of an ugly ass blue van with rust stains on the bottom and scratches along the doors. I was even more surprised when Johnny shoved a key into the lock and slid back the door. I peeked in as he set my luggage behind the passenger seat and saw a mattress in the back, a tension rod holding his clothes up on the opposite door and all his tech stuff hidden beneath the back seat. Curtains covered most of the windows and there was a huge bag of laundry behind the driver's seat. "Ready?" He asked.

I looked at the van then at him then at the van again. "Are you living out of your fucking car?"

"No, well...yes and no. Not entirely. Rent here is kind of ridiculous and I promised jae I would still pay my half of the rent for the apartment while I was gone. So I pay for that, the car, the insurance, my gym membership so I can work out and get ready in the morning there, and then sometimes I stay at my friend's place when I need to cook or do laundry. Hence the...hotel." He cleared his throat and shut the door quickly. "Well, let's get in."

I couldn't believe this. He went all the way to California for this?? What the absolute fuck? He opened the door for me and I stepped in without another word because I knew that if I talked I would say something I would regret. He got into the driver's seat and cut the engine on, leaving a trail of exhaust fumes behind us. He held my hand and stroked his thumb across the back of it, still smiling as he drove  "Are you hungry?"

"No, not right now. Maybe we can order something later? I'm a bit jetlagged." I lied.

"Yeah, whatever my princess wants."

I felt my cheeks flush a bit when I heard him say that. It was different in person than over text and it still made me shiver. I looked over at him as he drove one handed. He was still so heart stoppingly gorgeous and even though I had a bunch of questions and irritations about the van I realized that wasn't what was important right now. I was with my Johnny and we were trying to make things right again. That was what was most important. I gave his hand a squeeze and closed my eyes, letting him take us to where we needed to go. When we got to the "hotel" however, I found that it was just a generic motel chain and not anything remotely nicer. It was a bit of a let down and I tried not to be too materialistic but damn if I didn't want this to be a little more special. He opened the door for me and got my luggage out. We went to our room which was just a small ways from the car. The inside was plain, brown, white sheets on the bed. Nothing spectacular. He went back to get his own bag and lock the car before both of us were in the room, alone at last. 

I kicked off my wedges and sat on the bed which seemed a little too hard for my liking. We were quiet for a moment. I was too busy staring at my feet dangling off the bed to notice that he was now in front of me, pushing me down gently and crawling on top of me. "Hey." He whispered as he pushed my hair back and ran his fingers down the side of my face.

"H-hi." I looked at him then drove my eyes away.

"Do you want to kiss me?"

"I want to do a lot of things to you." I confessed.

"Oh yeah? Like what?" He teased before placing soft pecks against my lips. "Tell me."

"Um...can I just go freshen up a bit?" I squirmed away from him and wiggled myself off the bed. 

"Um...ok. Are you alright? Do you not want to?" He reached his hand out to me and I just patted it awkwardly.

"No I do I just...give me a couple minutes, ok?"

"Sure, babe…"

I grabbed my luggage and sped to the bathroom, almost a hyperventilating mess. I was so nervous! Why the fuck was I nervous? He's my boyfriend. He's seen me every which way. He's put me in all sorts of positions. We've made so many messes and yet...my stomach was churning and I was getting butterflies just thinking about him being so much bigger than I was and looking down at me. It just reminded me of our first hookup almost an entire year ago. Jesus, we had known each other for a year? I took a deep breath and looked at myself in the mirror. Ok, just...get ready for a sexy night like normal. You can do this Eri.

I took a quick shower, washing just the important parts and making sure not to get water on my face. I didn't want to do my entire makeup look all over again. Once I was done I brushed my teeth, reapplied some of my makeup and made sure I smelled like a yummy dessert with the perfume and lotion I put on. I was constantly wondering if I was doing too much but it was whatever. I was going to make sure he was reminded of what had been waiting for him back home. I slipped on my new half shelf bra that barely held me in and his favorite garter and thigh high set that had to be washed so many times because of how much he came on them. I gave myself the once over and made sure I looked ok before cracking the door open slightly.

He had pulled his shirt over his head and I could see every dip and ripple of his back muscles as he worked to undo his belt and shuffle his jeans down. I had to squint just to be sure but it looked like he was wearing red silk boxers. This whole nerd. I fussed over myself one last time before opening the door completely. I had expected him to still be standing but he was sprawled out in some cheesy "sexy" pose with a plastic rose in his mouth until his jaw dropped. "Oh my god, what are you doing, you dork?! Where's you get that flower from?"

He spit and wiped his mouth. "It was in the vase over there. I think it had dust on it. I didn't realize and...wow."

"Why are you such a dummy?" I crawled onto the bed and sat beside him, blushing still. "So...what do you think?"

"I can't think. What is thinking? Boobs." He made no point in hiding his staring.

I shoved his head away playfully. "Idiot. Yes, my boobs are here for you to look at."

"Touch."

"Yes, that too. Oh my god." I grabbed him by his chin and tilted his head up for a kiss. "I missed how much you make me laugh."

"I missed…" He grabbed my thighs and pulled them from beneath me so he could take his place above me again once I fell onto my back. His hands joined mine and pinned them beside my head. "Everything about you."

"I have a few rules for tonight." 

"Oh? Is there something you don't wanna do?"

"The opposite. Your rules are that you have to make me squirt, you have to choke me, you have to let me ride your face, you have to AT LEAST finger my ass, and if you do all that you can cum in me every time."

His eyes went wide. "Ev-every time? You'd let me do that?"

"Yeah, I took some extra precautions."

"Like what?"

"Well one, I just got my new birth control implant in so my arm doesn't fucking hurt anymore and two I got spermicide film."

"Yah what?"

I rolled my eyes. "Basically it's something I put on the inside and it kills the sperm on contact. So no cretins running around. We just have to wait a bit for it to dissolve but that's what foreplay is for, right?"

"Mhmm…" He licked his lips and started pressing kisses down my neck. "You're fucking amazing. I can't wait to fill you up so damn good."

"Eww don't say that." I giggled and smooshed his face away then rolled over onto my stomach beneath him. He instantly set his bulge against my ass and ground into me.

"Wait do I really have to finger your ass?" He said in between kisses across my shoulders and down my back.

"It would be nice since you still haven't done it yet. And I told you it's not "icky" like you think it is."

He groaned. "Ok, if I do it you swear I can cum in you?"

"Absolutely promise, love. I even bought toys to help you out. I mean, you love my ass so much why don't you play with it?"

"Ok, ok, fine. I'll agree to it. But just this once."

"Trust me, you'll want to do it again." I smirked as backed myself up against him, rubbing over the front of his boxers. "I like the silk by the way. Super cute."

He groaned and gripped my hip roughly, pressing into the spot that always drove me wild. I let out a small whimper and shoved my face into the mattress as my body felt tingly all over. "What toys did you bring?" I could hear the smirk in his voice as he continued to grind and keep his weight on top of me.

"U-um, just a vibrator, some lube, and a-ahh! Hmm...a dildo. Some other stuff."

"Why the dildo?" He nipped at my ear and traced his tongue over my lobe.

"I thought maybe if you didn't want to um...fuck me there I could just play with it."

"Your ass, you mean?"

I gripped the sheets tighter and rocked back harder against him. He hadn't let go of my hip and I was already getting flushed all over. "Uh-huh."

"How big is it?" He worked me onto my knees and spread them as wide as my hips would allow. His fingers had all the access he wanted to work up and down my slit, feeling the wetness that had just begun to form.

"U-um like...7 inches or-" I shuddered and wanted to snap my legs shut when he teased my entrance with a small poke. "S-so…"

"You can take all that there?"

I nodded. "I've done it before. I just need a little bit of help is all."

"And that help is me stretching you open?" He dipped the entirety of his finger inside me now and I bowed my back, hissing slightly. "Why are you so needy right now?"

"Well I haven't had sex since you left. Why the fuck do you think I'm needy? Aren't you the same?"

He didn't answer me and instead thrust his finger in deeper. "You're so small, you know that? You look extra tiny right now."

"We get it, Suh, you have a size kink." I grumbled and tried to move back on his finger but he pulled it away.

"You gonna behave?"

I pouted and gave him a glare. "Don't you dare tease me. That's not part of the rules."

"Let me implement some of my own rules then. One, I get to tease you all I want and I mean taking hours just to lick and kiss you everywhere and not letting you cum at all. Two, you let me face fuck you. Did you bring that spray stuff?"

I scoffed and looked away. "Tch, yeah...or whatever."

"Good. Three, let's make a movie."

I shot up entirely and shoved him away. "WHAT?!"

"Don't make it a big deal. It's just for you and me only. I'm lonely without you here and I can watch it when I miss you the most."

"It is a big deal! Don't you remember what fucking happened to me?!" I yelled.

"Yeah but I'm not stupid or an asshole. I'm your boyfriend. I don't even want anyone to look at you sexually let alone see you naked or getting rawed. I'd be furious. This is just for you and me."

"N-no...i-i don't know, Johnny. If we break up i-"

"We're not breaking up...I thought we were but I'm glad we're not." He wrapped his arms around me and kissed my shoulder. "It's not getting uploaded anywhere. It's going on my password protected photo app. No one can get into it but me. I swear, Eri."

"What if I want to stop it?"

"Then we stop it, duh. There's no reason to keep going if you're uncomfortable. We can at least try it for a bit. We're both doing new things tonight. We can celebrate."

"And if I don't like it, you'll delete it right?"

"You can delete it from my phone yourself. You're safe with me babe. Trust me." He held me tighter and nuzzled his face against against my neck.

"I'm nervous…"

"What? Don't be! It's just me, princess. I make you feel good, don't I?" I nodded meekly and played with the band of my thigh highs. "We can get going for a bit then I'll turn it on so that way you're really feeling it. Sound good?"

"O-ok." I agreed, still a little reluctant. But he was right. Maybe we could at least try.

"Good," He laid down, stuffing pillows behind his head and beckoning me over. "Come here, angel."

I shuffled over to straddle him, setting my knees on either side of his head. I propped my hand on the wall and looked down at him as he licked his lips. His arms wrapped around my thighs and held me in place. His face was buried against me in no time, diving his tongue into me as his nose brushed against my clit. I sucked in a sharp breath and let my other hand fall into his hair. "J-johnny, fuck...I missed your tongue."

He only hummed against me and flicked his tongue faster, slurping lewdly and licking up the length of my slit. His hands slid up and down my thighs, over my hips and stomach, and towards my chest. He grabbed each of my breasts and squeezed, rubbing his thumbs over my nipples. My fingers fisted his hair and pulled as I needed him more and more. I rocked my hips against his face, already feeling the effects he had on me. He parted for just a moment to take in a breath. "Just a sec."

"S-sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"It's ok. I'm fine now. You taste good. I want more."

"Shut up. No I don't. You're just say-" I gasped as he devoured me further. He caressed my body, hands flowing back down so his thumbs could spread my lips apart. The tip of his tongue painted intimate patterns into me, making me shudder and moan his name loudly. I didn't care anymore if I was loud or not. I needed this like it was my own personal drug. My toes dug into the mattress as I rolled my hips faster, getting closer to falling over the edge. He pulled away again and I figured he needed more air but instead he pushed my hips downward, making me rest over his boxers. "What the hell?!" I pouted.

"Grind on me."

"I was about to cum."

"Didn't I say that I get to tease you without making you cum at all? Now start." I huffed and slid his boxers off, revealing the girth underneath. I worked my hand over the length, wrapping my fingers around his shaft and giving him a good squeeze. "Not what I asked for."

"Fuck off." I hovered over his cock and planted my hands on his chest before I rode my wetness up and down from head to base. His eyes closed and his head fell back into the pillows, his whole body relieving itself of tension. I loved watching him sink into bliss; seeing that shit eating grin on his face because he knew he was getting what he wanted. He settled his hands behind his head and chuckled a bit as my hole brushed over the most sensitive part of him. I teased him by sinking down onto his tip, just a few centimeters or so, before sliding back down and never letting him enter me. Johnny knew that I would tease him just as much as he would tease me. Two could always play that game of course.

I pressed my chest to his, lowering myself just close enough that I could lick his lips. I swiped my tongue across his bottom lip and he easily let me in. Our tongues collided and I drew his in to suck on deeply. It morphed into deeper kisses where I could scarcely breathe and we would exchange licks and sucks in the dirtiest ways. One of his hands grabbed the back of my head while the other grabbed my ass, controlling all of my movements. I was his to fuck, his to play with, and his to love unconditionally. I managed to break away from him for a moment, panting against his lips. "Do you want to be inside me now?"

"Hmm, in a bit. Let me get my tripod. Get up."

Oh right. That. I scooted off him and wiped my lips that were still tender. I could taste myself on his tongue and wondered why he liked it so much. I unhooked my bra and tossed it aside before heading back to the bathroom where I had left my luggage. I dug through my clothes and pulled out all the naughty things I had brought with me, taking them back to the bed. His phone was all set up on the tripod ready to go.  "Tell me what I should do first." I propped myself on all fours, waiting for his answer. 

"Better get the spray out." He smirked.

"Of course, you slut." I spritzed a bit of the numbing spray into my mouth, wincing at the overly strong peppermint taste. "Blegh. It feels like toothpaste down my throat."

"Well hopefully my dick will make it better." He tapped record on his phone and told me to come to the edge of the bed. I was just at the perfect height for where he wanted me and I opened my mouth, sticking my tongue out. His gripped his base and rubbed the head of his cock against my tongue, swirling it a bit. I wrapped my lips around him and suckled on the sensitive area and the soft curse he let out warmed every inch of my skin. I set my hands on his hips and flowed back to grab a hold of his ass to steady myself.

He thrust into my mouth, slowly at first, getting me used to the stretch within my lips. Every few minutes or so he would push in further until he touched the back of my throat. It was a slightly uncomfortable feeling but I didn't gag thanks to the spray. Instead he remained nestled in for a while until he looked down at me. "Ready?"

I was already thinking about how sore my throat was going to be tomorrow but I nodded against him. He gripped the back of my head with both hands and pulled out slowly before plunging straight in. I dug my nails into his skin as my nose brushed against his lower stomach and he destroyed my throat. He didn't let up on his speed and I struggled to breathe through my nose. I squeezed my eyes shut as I felt tears already prickling at the corners of my eyes. He fumbled through obscene curses and almost incoherent mumbles, the pleasure of my mouth wrapped around him seeming to drive him insane. I tapped on his hip, signaling to let me go. He pulled out completely and I worked to clear the saliva between us.

He dragged his thumb across my lips to clean me up as well. "You okay?" I nodded and swallowed hard. "You sure?" I nodded again and pulled him back to me, opening my mouth for another round. "Good girl."

My body lit up at the praise and I held my head a little higher, squaring myself and gripping the edge of the bed. He worked his way back in, feeding himself into me and wreaking havoc on my taste buds. I managed to look up at him and realized he had been staring down at me the whole time. I darted my eyes away though he tapped my chin to get me to look back up. His big hand was suddenly engulfing my throat and added accompanying pressure to the point where I felt light headed. "You look so good like this, you know that?" I heard him say. My body was almost swaying and I tried to keep my frame firm but it wasn't any use. My eyes fluttered closed and I leaned into his hand until my breath was non existent. "Eri?" My hearing was fuzzy but I felt myself wanting to smile, whether I was doing it or not, I didn't know. The feeling of not being able to breathe and floating into an unconscious space was always thrilling but I was ripped from me just as it started getting good. 

He pulled back again, letting his grip on me fade and I took in a large gulp of air, falling into a coughing fit. He walked away from me to go to the mini fridge within our room and get a small bottle of water. He handed it to me and I took it graciously, downing it in seconds. He stopped the recording and sat down beside me. "You good? You looked like you were going to faint or something. I got scared."

"I'm okay, I just got lightheaded."

"Fuck, it was too much then, wasn't it?"

I leaned against his shoulder and giggled. "No, I like getting lightheaded when I'm being choked."

He scoffed. "Of course you do. Don't scare me like that though, ok? Maybe were not completely ready for the face fucking." 

"I'm sorry, baby. I liked it, I really did and I didn't think I would. It's just kinda like another form of choking." I nudged my head just under his chin and rubbed his broad chest. "Maybe we can try again a little later too?"

"It was pretty hot. You looked so damn good." He licked his lips then kissed me briefly before commanding me to lay down. He made me hold my legs open while he retrieved the bottle of lube from the small pile of things I had brought over. I watched as he added a small glob to his fingers and pressed it to my rim. "I guess we can start this now."

"You sure you're okay with it?" I asked, not wanting to force him to do anything he didn't want to.

"I might as well try it. I mean, I never thought it was really hot or sexy but you are so maybe I'd like it. You think it would make you squirt?"

"I've never done it with just anal but maybe if we add some other stuff it might. It'll be fun to find out." I grabbed his other hand and folded my fingers into his, giving the back of it a chaste kiss.

He returned the kiss to my stomach and took a deep breath. "I have to go slower, right? Like it'll hurt more if I don't?"

"Right. It's just like fingering me regularly just a little more cautious. You'll be ok." I assured him.

"What if it feels gross?"

"Oh my god, Johnny, it will not feel gross. I swear."

He scrunched up his nose and didn't move. I sighed and set my legs down. "You don't have to do- OH WELL OK THEN!" I felt him press into me, his fingertip wiggling its way inside.

"Keep your legs open, dammit."

"Ya could've warned me!"

"You wanted me to do this anyway so hush!" I reopened my legs and noticed that he was blushing through his face of deep concentration. He was even poking his tongue out a bit. It was cute but now I was a bit afraid of how thick his fingers were."How many do you want in here?"

"Three usually works. But not all at once!"

"I know that! Just calm down! You're making me feel weird." I kept quiet then, closing my eyes and trying to relax around his finger. He let my hand go to gently brush his thumb over my clit, letting me focus on that sensation until his entire finger finally poked through. "Huh."

"What "huh"?"

"Kinda feels a bit weird. Not like a normal vagina."

"Well duh," I said. "Probably because it's NOT a vagina??"

"Eri, Jesus Christ." He slammed his lips against mine then in order to keep me quiet as he started to slowly thrust his finger. 

"You're being a fuckboy again." I said in between a few kisses.

"No, I'm just being me. We can be weird and casual in bed." He nipped at my bottom lip and curled his finger gently. "Am I doing it right?"

"Y-yeah," I wrapped my arms around his ribcage and nudged my thigh between his legs. "Feels nice. You'll need some more lube for the second one though."

"I know." He swallowed hard and pressed his cock against the fabric of the thigh highs, beginning to rub against it. "Just give me a sec...fuck…" That always got him going; a begging and needy prince that wanted to fuck my thighs and grind against them until he made a mess. It had become my favorite thing for us to do just because I loved his change in demeanor. He was hiding in my neck, whimpering slightly and kissing me in the softest of ways. I pushed his hair back and encouraged him not to forget about his finger deep inside me. He had stopped as he had gotten distracted with his grinds that were gradually getting faster.

"You know you're not allowed to cum this way, no matter how much you want to." I whispered.

He nodded and sunk a small bite into my neck. "I-i know b-but-!"

"No but's Johnny. You know the rules." He had the biggest pout on his face and I couldn't help but giggle. "Someone's a little submissive."

"I am not submissive. I just like cumming on your thighs."

"But do you like cumming inside me more?" It was like he was weighing the pros and cons of each situation, never before encountering it. He opened his mouth to speak then shut it, his brows furrowing again in thought. I smirked and grabbed the bottle of lube and dangled it in front of his face. "While you're thinking it over how about you get to work stretching me more."

He sighed and snatched the bottle from me, pulling out his finger then adding lube to them both. He was even slower as he tried to pry in again. It had been so long since I had done this and I was too tight for comfort. It was going to be some time before I opened up full. The fingertips did eventually get in, making me gasp and mewl like a kitten in heat. I arched up, pressing my thigh against him harder and sliding my hand down my body to thrust inside my wetness. "Damn, is this what you're like every time you do anal?" 

"Shut up...I just kinda like...um...both holes filled at the same time."

"Ooohhh. Is that your fantasy?"

"To get fucked by two guys and eat out a girl at the same time? Yeah. I mean if you would've went with the foursome idea at christmasssss..."

"Hm." He shoved his fingers into me fully making me cry out.

"F-fuck! Johnny! You asshole!" The stinging pain was somewhat strong but the masochist in me wasn't running away from it. They were working faster, curling against the tightness and scissoring me open. I held onto his wrist, making sure he was pinned in place. I didn't want him to leave, I couldn't bear the thought of him stopping just to tease me again. I was pumping my own fingers into myself faster, my breaths war torn and ragged. He was grinding harder against my thigh, rubbing against the mesh and bringing moans out of him so deep that I wanted to scream. I fucking missed this so much; making him moan, whimper, beg, pant. Everything. It just brought me back to how much his voice made me quiver with orgasms since before I even met him.

"I need you, Eri. Now."

"Just a little more. Please. I want you too but just a little more!" I bit down on my lip as my other hand grasped the sheets between us. He was peeved that I wouldn't let him inside me just yet but by the way he was throbbing and leaving a wet patch on the fabric between us I could tell he was enjoying the show. He edged another finger inside me and we matched three for three. Both sets of fingers filling me had my holes clamping in eagerness to cum. The edge of my palm brushed against my clit while his thick fingers curled deeper inside me, circling against pleasure points and spaces that reawakened after so long. And then he pulled away and shoved my hand aside. "God fucking dammit Johnny!!" All he could do was laugh and I wanted to punch him in the chest. "Really?!"

"Yeah, you're hot when you're sexually frustrated." I watched him leave me to tap the record button again. He then returned to prop himself against the wall, his lap welcoming me to sit on it. He patted his thighs and I crossed my arms, my lips in full pouting mode. "Hah! Don't give me that shit. You want it bad. You're not gonna be a brat for long. Get over here, Eri."

"No! You're being a jerk!"

"You wanna cum don't you?" I glanced over as he said those words lower and definitely more enticing. His hand was wrapped around his cock and adding slow strokes to his shaft. His tongue poked out to graze his bottom lip and I hated that he was trying to win me over. I couldn't resist the way he looked when he had his legs open like that, hair sticking slightly to his forehead, and his broad chest heaving slightly. Droplets of precum slid down onto his fingers as he gave his head a squeeze, hissing as his teeth sucked in air. "Princess...come here."

Oh fuck you. I caved in and straddled his lap, lowering my gaze to his length. I set my hand over his and guided him towards my entrance, slowly sinking down until he filled me completely. We stood still for a moment, almost in shock at how amazing it felt. It was way different from when he wasn't feeling sexual when he first started his meds. We got to be intimate on other levels and though I craved him I was still mostly patient and comforted him. This was months of sadness, anger, hatred, pain, and heart wrenching love that had culminated into a burst of sexual frustration and passion all at once. I didn't need anything but him. In fact if we stayed holed up in this shitty motel the entire week I think I would be able to survive off his kisses alone.

"Move, for the love of fucking god, move." He begged. He was just as desperate as I was and I gave into his command before he even finished his sentence. I held onto his shoulders and worked through the burning in my thighs to bounce quickly. Feeling him plunge deep and fill me with every inch of his girth was a gift I was more than happy to accept. I noticed him fumbling his hands behind me but barely gave it any thought. I was too entranced by chasing my pleasure and hoping he wouldn't pull away again. That was when I felt something poking at my rim. I gasped as he pushed it through, stuffing me with the dildo in an act I'd never thought he'd do.

"B-baby, w-wha-what are you-?"

He gripped the back of my neck and growled against my lips. "Fuck yourself on them both."

I swallowed hard and nodded, switching my movements to swift rolls of my hips so I could catch both cocks on a heated rhythm. Johnny moved the dildo faster, almost as fast as his hips were snapping up into me now. I cupped his jaw and landed sloppy, half met kisses to his lips which he reciprocated with bites and licks to my tongue whenever he could. I was a literal mess and at his mercy. His free hand tore into my ass cheek, creating half moon indentations in my skin. I heard a thud then and realized his head had collided with the wall as he tried to move it back. "Ouch! Shit."

I giggled in between pants and cradled his head. "You're always knocking your head on something when we fuck. Are you ok?"

"Yeah yeah yeah, just keep going. I'm an idiot."

"My idiot." I gently rubbed the back of his head and held him close to my chest, setting my other hand against the wall. I mewled as my skin seemed to break with how rough he was digging his teeth in but it was fucking beautiful. With how much he had teased me and with all the sensory overload he was providing now, my orgasm was quick to come. When I rolled my hips, my clit would rub against his base and added to everything that was destroying me. That little motion was enough to have me dousing his lower stomach and thighs with my cum that gushed out in heavy spurts. My hand flew to cover my mouth and stop my scream from bursting through. It was so intense, too intense even, and I scrambled to pull away from him as my body curled up and I felt trembling aftershocks.

I could only curse and bury my face into the bed, my fist ripping the bedsheet from the corner of the mattress. Johnny hovered over me, tossing the dildo aside and trying to pry my legs open. "Nonononono." I whimpered as I was still too sensitive. I didn't want him to drive me into another orgasm that soon. I didn't think my body could take it. But he was inside me again, my hands pinned by my head as he slammed into me. I could barely look up at him but he was hovering over me, casting a shadow against the ceiling light and somehow seeming much bigger than before. "I love you…" He gasped out. "Cum with me this time."

I sure as hell would try. My walls were weak and anything could send me over the edge again. I closed my eyes as I felt him throb then stutter, a warmth filling my belly and simultaneously flowing out of me. I felt tears prickling at my eyes as my second flow of cum spread onto the sheets beneath us. He collapsed onto me and I held onto him so tight as the tears finally fell. My mind was a sea of emptiness. No thoughts filtered through and I just wanted to stay in this moment with him forever. I closed my eyes and let our heartbeats slow down until our breaths steadied. "God…" I whispered. "That was…"

"All I ever wanted and more." He pushed back his sweat drenched hair and gave me a small kiss. "Are you crying?"

"Oh." I wiped my eyes quickly. "Not sad crying. Like it was just a lot at once and it felt so good. I don't know. It just...happened." I laughed.

"Weirdo." He smiled. "Oh shit, the video." 

"Shut it off." 

"Well I don't wanna pull out yet."

"Fine, just shuffle with me until you can reach it." We looked stupid scooting our bodies close to the edge of the bed just so he could stop the video and take his phone off the tripod. I sighed as he sat back and made sure my legs were wide open.

"This is why I didn't want to pull out yet. I want to see it drip out of you." He held the phone above me and I rushed to cover myself.

"That's embarrassing, you giant pervert!!"

"No it's not! It's so damn hot. Please? Pleaseeeeee??" He covered my face in silly little kisses, trying his best to convince me.

"What is up with you suddenly becoming a porn director?!" I grumbled.

"I told you, it's because I miss you and I can only think about you when I jack off. But with this I can see us together and it will be so much more intense when I cum. I can see and hear how good I made you feel. The sounds you make are something else."

"O-oh…" My face flared up as I hadn't expected him to say all of that. "You are so lucky I love you more than anything. And I know you would raise hell if anybody else saw me like this. Fine, pull out."

I heard the beep of the video begin and covered my face as he moved. I felt his cum flow out of me, more so when I clenched my pelvic floor to push it out. He let out a deep moan of satisfaction and used his thumb and index finger to spread my lips apart, making me even more flustered. "Are you done yet?" I mumbled behind my hands.

"No." He dragged his fingers through his cum and nudged my hands away. "Open." I kept my eyes closed but opened my mouth, taking in his fingers that rubbed the bitter musk over my taste buds. He spread his fingers across my tongue, pinching it slightly before plunging to the back of my throat. I winced and moved my head away. The numbing spray had worn off and I wasn't into vomiting all over my boyfriend. He pulled away and stopped the third clip. "Damn."

I sat up and sighed. "Can you clean this up? I don't really wanna move."

"Yeah, I got you." I adjusted myself to lay down on my side of the bed while Johnny plugged his phone in to charge and gathered up the things we had made a mess on. I was already drifting into sleep, not even really caring about how sticky I was. "Is there anyway to clean a dildo without it feeling like you're jacking it off?!" I heard him call out from the bathroom.

"No!" I responded to his stupid question before turning my head away from the bathroom and falling asleep.

I woke up in the middle of my deep sleep after having the weirdest dream ever. I hated when I had dreams like that because I could never seem to get back to sleep until hours after. I sighed and rubbed the sleep from my eyes, pouting at my now awakened state. Johnny was spooning me, arm wrapped around my torso with his hand on one boob as usual. That I didn't mind that as much as i did his erection jabbing into my lower back. He was dead asleep too, I could tell by his snoring. How he managed to get hard while not even being awake, who knows. Maybe he was having a more pleasant dream that I had. But he needed to move if I wanted to be comfortable at all again.

I nudged my elbow against him and removed his arm from around me. "Johnny." I whispered. "Move over."

Nothing.

I sighed and whispered a little louder. "Johnny! Move over." I tapped his thigh, hoping to get his attention but all it did was make him grind into me. This man never stopped. "Johnathan. Please move."

He grumbled and nuzzled between my shoulder blades before pressing me onto my stomach. I huffed and turned my head to the side so the pillow wouldn't suffocate me. "Boy, if you don't get off me-" I gasped sharply as I felt him enter me, his head popping through instantly. "W-wrong hole!" I squeaked.

"Fuck...why is it so tight?" He rasped, voice still laced with sleep.

"You're in the wrong place!"

"Mhm-hm. It's where I wanna be."

Did he just…? Was he…? WHAT? "A-are you sure? You never liked this like ever be-" My words were taken from me as he sunk in deeper. I was still somewhat stretched out from him using the toy on me earlier but this was even heavier and thicker than that measly thing. He raised me to my knees and rubbed his hands all over my body.

"Was dreaming 'bout you."

"I-i can tell. U-um…" I was blushing hard as one of my fantasies with him was finally checked off the list. "Do you like it?"

"Not sure yet. Can I move?"

"Yes, please."

He pulled out slowly and sunk back in, testing the waters and gauging how we both felt. I was still in shock but craved more and I wondered what was going through his mind. Why did he have a sudden change of heart? Just wanted to explore? Maybe he liked what we had done earlier? Or perhaps he was doing it because he wanted to make something up to me, like leaving, in a way. Whatever it was this change of heart was giving me pleasure in a way no one had made me feel before. He held onto my hips tightly and soon I heard the familiar slapping of his hips against my ass. I closed my eyes again and let him take over and figure out what he liked and didn't like.

"Open your legs more."

My thighs already were still sore from earlier but I wiggled them apart as he pressed his hand firmly against my lower back. He wanted that deep feeling of being in my stomach and drawing moans out of me. It was one of my favorite things to do with him and it made my body tremble. "Baby...shit…" I mewled. "It's good. I told you it's good."

"Hmmm... Can I cum in here too?"

"Yeah, whatever you want. Do whatever you want to me, love."

"I like the sound of that." He pressed my hips back harder, slamming us together and taking me back to a whimpering mess. He reached over and clicked on the bedside table lamp. "Wanna see you." I didn't even protest and let him marvel in the way he was stretching my ass open. I was too wrapped up in how good it felt to even care. He pressed his chest to my back and nipped at my ear. "I wanna see you fuck yourself this time."

"A-ahh...with the dildo?" 

"Yeah." He moaned against my ear. "Fast. And. Deep." He landed each word with harsh thrusts that I could feel in my stomach. I noticed he had set the clean toys on the bedside table and I reached out for the dildo, shuffling it between me and the bed. Johnny sunk his teeth down onto the back of my neck just as I pressed the toy into me. My favorite sensation was back and I was thrust into a place of bliss and heightened senses. He controlled the speed of my thrusts for a moment, making sure I knew how he wanted me to fuck myself. I almost couldn't take it but he made it even worse when I heard the whir of the small bullet vibe I had brought. It was deadly in his hands, especially since he kept it firmly against my clit. I wanted to crumble beneath his weight but he wrapped his arm around my waist and linked his ankles over mine so I couldn't move an inch. I was trapped beneath his big body, helpless and begging for my release.

"That's my babygirl. You're doing so good for me." He cooed. I buried my face into the pillow, blushing at his sweet words. I was already flustered and he was making it worse. "Do you wanna cum for me?"

"Y-yes daddy." I said meekly.

"I know, and I want you to squirt again. I want you to cum so hard. So sensitive and overstimulated that you collapse and cant take anymore. I want that."

He worked the bullet into small circles which made my toes dig into the sheets. His hand that was around my waist slid down to cover mine, controlling the speed of every single one of my pleasure points. With both his hands between my thighs and his cock stuffed inside me, I gripped the pillow between my teeth, clenching hard as my body came full force for the third time that night. I felt my cum flow over my thighs and his hands, pitter-pattering onto the mattress. My nails clawed at the walls as he let the dildo go but kept the vibrator on me, keeping up the relentless torture. I screamed a chaotic monologue of "Daddy! Please! Daddy please!!", begging for him to ease up on my sensitivity but he didn't. Instead his hips drove all the way home, pounding harshly and creating an infestation of tremors throughout my entire being. Finally, the bullet stopped and dropped by my knee. 

Both of Johnny's hands were on my hips again as he chased his own orgasm, breathing hard in between growls and moans. I brought my hand to rest on his, squeezing my fingers against him tight. His cum rushed into me then, warming me like he had done before and making me feel absolutely full. He let me lower myself to the mattress and caved on top of me again, resting his head by mine. "Was us fucking always this amazing? I mean like yes but also like...this is some next level shit." He chuckled. "Eri?"

"I'm so tired, you asshole."

"Well I know your asshole is tired. Pretty much got plowed into oblivion."

"Uh, yeah, so...what was that about?" I asked curiously.

He huffed, trying to blow some of my curls away from his face. "I don't know...just...guess I should try stuff before I say I don't like it. I never found it sexy but your ass is perfect. It was like suffocating. Only with you babe."

"I feel so special. And also like I wanna die. I need to shower. I'm so sticky but I don't think I can move."

"I'll help you. Hold on." He slid out of me slowly, leaving my hole gaping and dripping with his cum. "Fuck…" he breathed. "I could watch that all day."

"Jooohhnnnyyyy!" I covered my head with the pillow, wanting to disappear forever every time he stared at my openings like that.

He tossed the pillow away and helped me sit up gently. "I just like teasing you."

My big pout didn't last long because he scooped me up in his arms bridal style and carried me to the bathroom. I held onto him tight, almost in disbelief. "Well damn daddy, just bench press me."

"Knowing you, you'd like that." He set me down gently in the shower and joined me before drawing the curtains and turning on the water. "I'm so glad you came, baby." He set his head on top of mine and wrapped his arms around my shoulders.

"I am too. I just want to be with you. No matter what."

--

The next morning (or afternoon, I wasn't really sure) I woke up with almost every inch of my body aching. My ass hurt, my legs hurt, all the bite marks hurt, my throat hurt. Having sex with Johnny was like getting hit by a freight train and trying to pick yourself back up from the aftermath. On top of that I was so damn hungry. I rolled over slowly and hit an empty spot instead of the warmth I expected. I felt around, trying to figure out if I was missing something before opening my eyes. He wasn't there. I sat up and looked around, perplexed as to where he went. "Looking for me?"

My head swiveled when I heard his voice. He was coming out of the bathroom, pulling his shirt over his head. "How ya feeling?"

"Like death." I croaked. "Where did you go?"

"To get you breakfast and a chai latte to try and make your throat better. I got your favorite. Strawberry pancakes, eggs, sausage, and chicken nuggets."

"Fuck yeah, nuggies." I giggled a bit and reached out for the latte. I definitely needed it to soothe my throat.

He tossed off his jeans and brought the bag of food to sit between us. I curled up against him instantly and nuzzled his shoulder. "Let me guess, you want me to feed you?" I nodded and gave him puppy dog eyes. He rolled his own and opened the containers cutting up the pancakes and feeding them to me. "I wanted to take you out later on if you're up to it?"

I chewed a bit then swallowed. "Take me where?"

"Shopping and stuff. We've got big malls here. Figured you'd like all the makeup stuff."

"Oh yeah? You gonna be my sugar daddy or something?"

He scoffed as he ate one of the nuggets. "More like generic store brand sucrose father."

I laughed and kissed his cheek. "You know you don't have to buy me anything right?"

He shrugged. "You just seemed kinda disappointed in the hotel and my car…"

"Well...I am, I mean I was. I just expected you to have more since this was your big internship, you know?"

"Yeah...well I like my van. I can go wherever I want and not have to be tied down. I've traveled along the coast and to different cities already. It was like this place was made for me. There's so much to do here. It's better then our college town."

"Right…" I said rather sadly.

"Babe, you know I do miss you. I don't want to be away from you and that's not what im trying to say right?"

"I know...I know. Let's just not focus on that right now I guess."

"I still wanna take you shopping. Get you looking all cute and shit. I'll carry your bags and all that." He fed me another bite of pancakes. "Is that ok?"

I felt bad. I didn't want him to think that he had to do this for me, especially not spend money to make me feel happy. "Johnny, I'm sorry about the van and the motel. You don't have to buy me anything. I don't want to be a materialistic bitch. That doesn't matter to me. I can stay in bed with you all day."

"Shut up. We're doing it. It's not just shopping. I can show you around too. You have to at least do other stuff on your vacation than just fuck me. Even though I'm about it."

"Ok, ok, sucrose father." He gave me a laughter filled kiss which I returned with hidden intentions. I swiped my tongue along his bottom lip and cupped the back of his neck.

"Mhm...baby...you want something." He said, seeing through me instantly. "Aren't you sore?"

"Not all that." I eased my way into his lap  "Just wanna warm you. That ok?"

"Hmm...only for a little bit."

I nodded and wrapped my arms around his neck, settling my center over him. He held me close too and guided my hips to grind smoothly over him. I avoided his lips so we both wouldn't get too worked up, just enough for him to nestle  inside me and stay there for a little while. "Did you wanna do this this morning?"

"Yeah but you left." I pouted.

He swiped his thumb over my lip and I took it into my mouth, sucking gently. "I got you food didn't I? I made it up to you."

I laid my head on his shoulder while keeping his thumb in my mouth. I hummed a little response and lifted my hips for him to guide himself in. He pressed the head of his cock against my entrance and I sunk down slowly, wincing a bit at my tenderness but the feeling of him inside me made me all cozy and gushy with lovey feelings. Johnny scratched at my head gently and turned the TV on low, not minding me wanting to fall back asleep. "If you don't want to go shopping today, we can do it tomorrow. But my friends are also having a party tomorrow and I'd like it if you met them."

Blegh, socializing. Socializing with my boyfriend's friends. Socializing with people that weren't that great because he only had one good friend. I sighed internally and tried to gauge if I could really take in that much anxiety in one day. Probably not and I would be suffering the entire time but I would do it for him. I would do anything for him.

--

I squeezed Johnny's hand tightly as we walked up the stairs to this ridiculous baby mansion. I had never seen a house this huge before but I guess it's what happened when you were California dreamin'. There was way too many people already and I clung onto him tighter as my breath sped up. The music was way too loud and when I tried calling out to him he didn't hear me even though we we're right next to each other. So I continued to follow wordlessly as he did his social butterfly shit. He was saying hi to people he never mentioned to me and making his way through the crowd until he found a couch for us to sit on. He sat down and set me beside him, his arm loosely around my hips. About a dozen people were circled around us and a few people stared at me including this gorgeous girl who sent me a small smile. I straightened up a bit as I looked her over. She had beautiful skin, a little darker than mine, and braids going all the way down her back with some pink synthetic hair mixed in. She had the coolest punk vest on, all decked out in patches, studs, and distressing. I wanted to ask her about them but my social anxiety was making me shrink away.

Johnny didn't seem to notice our exchange at all. He was too busy laughing at something someone said before he got passed a joint. I rolled my eyes and propped my elbow on my knee, setting my chin in the palm of my hand. "You gonna be social or pout all night?" Johnny asked as he exhaled smoked.

I waved it away instantly. "I am being social, I'm here aren't I? Also you know I hate that stuff. Don't blow the smoke around me."

He rolled his eyes and took another hit before passing it onto the next person. "I would like you to at least talk a bit."

"And what you you like me to say Johnny? That I'd rather be in the hotel? Maybe grinding on you until you begged to be inside me? Do you want me to tell them that?" I was getting snippy because of this atmosphere. I never should've agreed to come but I didn't think it would be this bad.

"Don't be a smartass."

"I'm not. It's the truth."

He looked over at me and leaned in to whisper in my ear. "You need to behave and I mean it."

"Or what?" I challenged. "It's a lot for me to take in at once, ok? You of all people should fucking know how anxiety works."

"There's nothing to be anxious about. It's just a party. We gone to parties dozens of times. It's the same thing."

"It's not…" This was like some fashionista bullshit. Like high roller drugs and top tier liquor everywhere. All sorts of people dancing around through flashing lights and thumping music. It was overwhelming and I was uncomfortable seeing people snort coke off of tables or toss back unknown pills. I didn't know how Johnny could stand this either. This exact environment was the one that got him roped into trouble. I knew it affected him so why wasn't he showing it?

"Just chill and talk. These are my friends and it's important that everyone gets along."

And what if I don't like your friends? I wanted to scream. Why did I have to be friends with your friends? Were your friends the ones acting like fools and looking geeked out of their minds. I sure as hell would've thought you'd be smart enough to not be friends with them either. "Fine." Was all I actually said. "I will try."

Johnny turned away, releasing his arm from around my hips to distract himself with someone else. I was hurt that he seemed so intensely peeved about me feeling this way. He was acting brand new, as if I, as if HE, didn't have social anxiety. He handled his differently. He partied more and I got angry before I got drunk. I was in the angry phase currently. I was about to call it quits right then and there when some guy got close and asked me a question. "So you're Johnny's friend?"

"Friend?" I scoffed. "I don't think "friend" is the right term."

"Ohhhh, so like a fuck buddy thing?"

I was totally confused. Had Johnny not introduced me as his girlfriend? I looked over at him for a second, wondering if it was just a miscommunication error or something he blatantly didn't want people to know. "No, were not fuck buddies. We're together."

"Johnny never told us he had a girlfriend. Did you just start dating?"

I grit my teeth and tried my best to stay calm. What the hell? Why hadn't he told them? Did he want to feel single over here? Did he want to fuck other people while I was at home crying over him? I was fuming.

"Kylo, chill with the 20 questions bro." Johnny laughed. "We're just here to have a good time."

"Sorry! I was just curious! I mean, she is pretty cute after all." Kylo said with a wink in my direction.

Johnny just laughed. He didn't get into his usual jealous or dominating role. He fucking laughed. Who was he right now? We had just had three days of paradisal bliss and now at some party he changes into someone I don't know. I wanted to flirt with this Kylo guy to really test Johnny but  I also wasn't in the mood for whatever karma would come of it. I crossed my arms over my chest and avoided them both. Instead my eyes landed on the beautiful girl who was chuckling. She mouthed something that looked like "he's wack" and nodded towards Johnny.

"That's for damn sure." I said in agreement. She laughed louder, a really sweet and airy sound. I loved it and could feel myself getting flustered. I didn't know why- well I did. It was because girls made me crumble to my knees faster than any man could. But I shouldn't have been acting this way. It just seemed wrong. Suddenly a shrill voice cut through the high strung atmosphere and before I knew it some girl was draped over Johnny's lap and kissing his cheek.

"Johnny!" She practically squealed. "I knew you'd be here!"

At first I was shocked. All I could really do was take in her incredibly expensive, diamond encrusted bracelets, her Yves Saint Laurent tiny purse, and her chanel sunglasses perched atop of overly processed blonde hair. She was just a little miss Paris hilton who was way too comfortable with my man. He let her hang onto him, even putting an arm around her shoulders. Was it really fucking social if I snapped someone's neck?

"Cassie, babe," He joked. "What are you on tonight?!"

"A little coke, a little molly. Just the usual combo."

"Ugh I fucking hate molly. Never again."

Yeah because that's what you took the night you got assaulted and now you're hanging out with someone who does this on the regular? Nothing made sense. Was he even thinking? Also, what was this 'babe' shit? I was the only one he called that!

"I know, I know! Don't worry. You can just have some Percocets and chill for the night. You're so wound up and tense!" She laid her head on his shoulder and looked up at him with doe eyes. I felt the rage building in my fist and I was dead set on punching her in her fucking designer face.

I pushed Johnny back against the couch and leaned into this chicks face, grabbing her shoulder roughly. "Hi I don't think we've met." I growled. "But you need to get your hands off my-"

She gasped, completely ignoring my anger and not taking me seriously. She reached out a manicured claw to try and touch my hair. "Your curls are so pretty! Oh my god! How do you get them to be so nice?! You know I tried a perm once and-" 

I gripped her wrist and yanked her twig like arm away from my head. "Don't. Touch. My. Hair." It was the one thing I absolutely hated. Strangers weren't allowed to touch my hair. Barely anyone was allowed to touch my hair. It was my sacred crown that I took pride in and I'd be damned if little miss cokehead was going to touch it.

"Eri, what the fuck?" Johnny said harshly as he pulled her wrist from my grasp. I glared at him in disbelief. Was he actually defending her?

She rubbed her wrist and held onto him. "Johnny! Why is she being mean?!"

"Oh I'll fucking show you mean." I got up and made a grab for my gauges, ready to square up and get charged with assault. I gave zero fucks right now. I suddenly felt a hand gently wrap around my arm, tugging me away from the situation. "Come walk with me." The beautiful girl from before said. Since Johnny was too fucking busy coddling the bimbo I decided to go with her. I felt a sense of calmness when she touched me, like a connection had suddenly been formed. We moved away from the party altogether and made our way outside to pretentious garden area that was filled with dozens upon dozens of flowers and plants, with a fountain, swing set, and gazebo in the middle of it. 

I was shaking, violently so. I dug my hand into my purse to pull out a cigarette from the carton. I set it between my lips and went to light it but I couldn't keep myself steady enough to ignite it. I was two seconds away from tossing the damn thing when she unfolded my tense fingers and took the lighter from me. She cupped her hand around the flame as it burst forth, making sure the wind wouldn't extinguish it as it caught the end of the cigarette.

"Thank you." I said as I took a deep drag.

She slipped the lighter back into my purse, so smoothly that I barely even noticed.

"So you're Johnny's girl?" She asked in a voice that was a bit husky contrary to her laugh.

"I guess barely! What the fuck is his problem? Who is that chick?! I swear to god! I'm about ready to slit her throat! Why didn't he tell anyone that I was-"

"Hey," she cupped my face gently and I instantly shut up. She smiled down at me and rubbed her thumb against my cheek. "Johnny's an idiot. All he does is hang out with Cassie's drugged up ass so he can score free drugs himself. Then Kylo's a fucking douche that gives him all these shrooms and shit. There's barely a time when were all hanging out that Johnny isn't high. Don't sweat him, chica. You could do way better."

"W-wait you mean he does this continuously? What does he take?" My heart suddenly halted from insane race car speed to devastating crash.

"So far I've seen him do shrooms, weed, percocet, acid. Maybe he does more. I'm not sure. But that's what I've seen."

Suddenly I didn't want to be here anymore. Not just at this party, but not in California and certainly not around him. He left me for drugs, a rusted van to live out of, and some bimbo that was making him an addict. "G-great...just what I need right now. That's exactly what I need right now. I came all the way here to try and make us better and he just makes everything worse. It felt so good before...what the fuck is happening."

"So dump him. What the fuck do you need a man for? Come over to the lesbian side, were much better." She teased.

"Oh," I looked up at her for a moment. "I mean, I'm not straight. I'm pretty gay, trust me." I said.

"But you're dating Johnny?"

"And? I'm still gay. Well queer. Honestly it would take me 87 years to explain my labels but the short version is I fuck anyone and I romantically want anyone. This time around it happened to be him."

"Ahh...well the invitation still stands to join us again. Start off with something way better than that jerk, honestly."

I raised an eyebrow and almost coughed on an inhale of smoke. "Are you like...flirting with me?"

"If it's working then yes, if it's not, then no." She smiled. "I'm Aaliyah by the way."

"I'm Eri...I haven't had someone flirt with me in awhile." I laughed a bit nervously. "I mean Johnny doesn't count."

"Nah, nothing he does counts…" We were quiet for a moment but I hated it because it kept me in my feelings. Thankfully she started back up again not long after. "So, you don't live in Cali do you?"

I shook my head. "I go to school on almost the other side of the country. Johnny graduated and took an internship here, got up and moved, and didn't really warn me. We've been rocky ever since. I thought it was getting a bit better. We didn't leave our hotel room for two days and I'm still sore but I guess sex can't fix anything. I mean I knew that but it kinda always did for us."

"Nah, it's just a bandaid for the problems. I would also recommend completely punching Cassie in the face."

"Why'd you stop me then?" I asked.

"Don't need another sis locked up in jail. Rather have you free and without a record. Trust me, I've wanted to deck her myself plenty of times. She thinks she's amazing because she's rich and can afford all this wack shit. She's got a big problem though. She's high on the daily and no one will get her to rehab."

"I can put her ass in a coma and then she'd really detox." I said as tapped out my ashes.

"Your hair is really beautiful by the way." She said, diverting my anger. "But you're not a damn poodle or something where she had to try and pet you." Aaliyah commented.

"Yeah, I get that all the time. Especially because my hair takes up space. I get old people staring at me, little bastard 13 year olds taking snapchats or whatever of me at the store, and white girls trying to touch me without permission. Can I get Solange Knowles in here please?"

"I know exactly how you feel, especially with my braids. Sometimes I just whip my head around real fast to hit someone with them and they can leave me alone."

I smiled and took another drag. "That's a mood. Why can't people understand personal space?"

"They think people like us were meant to be ogled at, ever since we got pushed onto podiums for sale in the slave trade."

"Ain't that a bitch." I sighed and didn't realize I was leaning in towards her until my shoulder brushed against her arm, which she put around my waist.

I left her arm there, not really sure of what I should do. She was really pretty and super cool but I was with Johnny though he was currently acting like an addict who didn't have a care in the world for me. A complete 180 since yesterday. I felt sad and angry all at the same time and really wish I had someone to comfort me since it felt like I was alone in this battle. "I'm sorry to kind of dump this on you. We just met and i'm telling you about all this bullshit with my boyfriend and-"

"Its fine. I wouldn't mind making you feel better. Just tell me what you need."

Ok, definitely flirting and maybe propositioning me for sex? She leaned in, setting both her hands on my waist, and smirking down at me. "U-uh...a drink would be nice. I like drinking."

"Yeah? I can do that for you. What do you like, babydoll?" Aaliyah said.

"Anything dark."

She smirked. "I could tell." She placed a kiss on my cheek that caught the corner of my mouth a little too closely. "I'll be back in a sec."

Aaliyah left then, retreating back inside the house and leaving me to sit on the swing set. I was trying hard not to cry. Iwnas even trying hard not to text Quinn. Hearing their "I told you so's" right now may not be for the best. Their anger would also trigger mine and I would end up as a giant mess. I snubbed the last of my cig into the ground and crushed it beneath my strappy sandal. What the hell was I going to do?

I wiped away the few tears that were starting to spill over. I wanted to go home now. I stared down at my phone and texted Johnny. I couldn't do this anymore. I couldn't pretend I was alright at this party now that I had all this newfound information about him. He needed to explain himself and I didn't want it to blow up into a big argument in front of total strangers. He didn't answer back right away, leaving me impatient and more anxious. Aaliyah came back then and handed me a plastic cup. "My special concoction. Drink up."

I tossed it back without another though but regretted it when I felt the sharpest and fiery burn. "Ughh fuck!" There was rarely a time where alcohol made me flinch but this was a disaster. "Jesus, woman, what the hell is in this?"

"Don't worry about it." She said, tipping the cup back again. "It'll get you buzzed easily." Well that was exactly what I needed. I wanted to get stupid drunk. Like walking disaster drunk but I didn't trust her enough yet to do so. "Better with a bit of alcohol in your system now, huh?"

"Yeah, I guess...I asked Johnny if we could just head out."

"You need a man's permission to go somewhere?"

"No, not like that. I mean he drove us here. I don't know my way around here. It's not permission, just...you know."

"Like I said, forget him. We can hang out and chill. Where do you wanna go, hm?"

I scooted a bit away from her, suddenly feeling that moment of calmness wash away. She was being way too friendly and flirty but... should I even try and make Johnny jealous? Would that even do any good? Everything was making me second guess myself. I just wanted everything to go back to being normal. Suddenly I felt her lips on mine which yanked me from my thoughts immediately. My eyes went wide and before I could even raise my hands to push her away I heard Johnny screaming my name. He had stormed over to the swing set and split Aaliyah and I apart. "What the fuck are you doing?!"

Before i could even answer Aaliyah butted in. "She can do whatever she wants."

"THEY don't need to kiss you and they sure as hell aren't going to sleep with you!"

Aaliyah rolled her eyes. "Well THEY seem to need a bit of loving since you'd rather be up Cassie's ass."

"That isn't true! Cassie's just clingy when she's high. It's nothing like that. Eri, get over here."

"You didn't even push her away…" I said. "You just let her hang onto you. You can go on being her druggie boyfriend if you want."

"What? What are you talking about?" Johnny asked, confused.

"You know exactly what I mean. Aaliyah told me about all the shit you're taking. You left me for drugs, some shit van, and partying all the time. Is that what you really wanted? To get away from me?"

Johnny glared at Aaliyah then looked at me. "Come here. We need to talk."

"I'd rather just drink." I whispered.

He tugged me towards him but Aaliyah yanked me back. "Let her go Johnny."

"No, you let them go! They're my girlfriend and we need to talk. Let go."

"Dont pull on me! Either of you!" I dropped both their hands and held my own close to me. "I'll just...i'll just go with him for now and maybe I can come back later or something?" I was giving her false hope of course, but some part of me, amidst confusion, did want to see her again.

She rolled her eyes and stuffed her hands in the pockets of her vest. "Yeah, sure."

Johnny grabbed onto my arm and pulled me away quickly, taking me back to his van. "What the hell are you talking about? Calling me a druggie?? What did she put in your head?"

"She didn't put anything in my head. You're smoking more weed, dropping acid, getting geeked? What the fuck johnny? You had come so far and you're just turning back to who you used to be."

"That's not true. Just because i've tried some stuff doesn't mean i'm a drug addict. How could you say that to me?"

"Because-!" I yelled. "I don't want to date someone like that. It's only time before you try something even harder then i have to find you in a tub with a needle in your arm!"

"Eri, what in the hell are you talking about?! I'm not planning on shooting up heroin or something!"

"Yeah, sure. You can get all you wanted from that stupid bimbo."

"Cassie's a cokehead. She just needs someone to help her." He argued.

"So taking drugs with her is the answer? What is wrong with you?"

"Nothing is wrong with me! Im only 24! I just want to have fun!"

"Well you can have fun without me! I came all this way to fix what we had and you don't care. You don't care at all. You didn't care about leaving me behind. You haven't even said one thing about your internship. You just...you wanted to get away from me. What did i do johnny? What did I do?" I was getting choked up and trying not to cry over him yet again.

"Eri, you didn't do anything. I want new experiences, I want to travel, I want to see the world. I don't want to be cooped up in a boring ass college town. I cant stay there waiting for you to graduate. I needed to do something and this was a good opportunity for me to get out."

"So if you wanted to leave why did you even fucking want me to be your girlfriend?! You said you wouldn't hurt me! You promised, johnny! You! Promised!"

"I'm not trying to hurt you! I just need you to let me spread my wings a bit. It's not like i don't want to be with you. I love you. So fucking much. I'm glad you're here. I want you to be with me."

"Why? So you can fuck me and then ignore me?"

"No! Because-" he sighed and ran his hand over his face. "Even though i want to explore you still keep me grounded. You keep me from going crazy."

"Not really since you're doing all these drugs and partying. How is that being grounded?"

"Why are you so focused on that?! I don't get it!

I slammed my fist against the side of his van. "When you find your fucking uncle overdosed in a bathtub when youre 7 you'll see that drugs arent fucking my thing. And if you try and kill youself in a bathtub you'll spend every second that you're cutting your wrist feeling just like him. Thats why im fucking focused on it Johnny. I didn't even like the fact that you were a pothead when I first met you. That you still are one! But i kept on. I looked past that because i saw you for who you were but i can't look past this."

"Fuck…" He stepped closer to me and I curled away, holding my stinging hand.

"Dont. Just dont…"

He grabbed a hold of me anyway and pulled me to his chest, giving me a hard squeeze. "Babe...i-"

"You called her babe." I snipped.

He exhaled deeply. "It just slipped."

"No it didnt. Dont add liar to your list."

"I'm sorry. I didn't think it was a big deal."

"You don't think anything is a big deal. Do you even want us to be together anymore? Tell me truthfully. Its only been 5 months, Johnny, almost a year if you want to count us fucking around." I shoved him away and glared up at him. "Tell me."

"I…" He pushed his hair back and looked away.

"Oohh!" I laughed as my voice cracked and tears started to fall. "So thats how its going to be? All that shit in the back of your car meant nothing then?"

"I didn't say anything!"

"Your hesitation said it all. Just…take me back to the hotel. I'll see if I can get an earlier flight to go back home."

"No, no, no! Please don't go back home. Eri, i want to be with you. I want to. I want to."

"You want to? Then fucking act like it, Johnny Suh. I dont have time for fucking little boys that want to play games. I want a real man that can own up to his shit and treats me like i'm important. I want my daddy to take care of me and make me feel safe, not make me have to worry about what he's doing states away."

He leaned down and set his forehead against mine. "I want to make you feel all that. Just dont leave yet. I can't have you leave. Will you stay?"

"I don't know. Just take me home. And don't ever bring me to one of his high roller Beverly Hills movie ass parties again. Ever. I mean it."

"I won't, baby." He took my sore hand in his and rubbed his thumb over my knuckles, giving it a gentle massage. "Let’s go back." I got in and crossed my arms over my chest, staring out the window. He got in as well and started up the engine, beginning the semi lengthy drive back. He tried reaching over to set his hand on my leg but I pulled away. "Please don't be like this…"

"Like what? Pissed off?"

"No I mean...just like let me at least try and make it up to you."

"How you gonna do that? Hmm? You would have a hell of a lot of making up to do."

"Let me try. It's the least I can do."

"Fine. Whatever."

We stayed quiet and I closed my eyes, wishing that this whole trip was over. A few tears were still falling down and I left them there, wanting him to see the suffering he caused me. I sniffed a bit and tried not to turn my breath into a hyperventilating mess. The drive seemed too short for us to be at the hotel and when I opened my eyes I saw we had arrived at a beach. Beaches seemed to just pop up whenever you needed them here. I liked that at least about this place. Everything was deserted and the end of the parking area matched up almost perfectly to the sand. "Did I say take me here?" I snapped.

"I know it's not the hotel but I know the beach is your favorite place to be. I’ve messed it up at that beach party last year, and I messed up tonight's party so I was hoping that maybe this would work.”

"Yeah, you messed up the beach. The literal place that is my sanctuary and make me feel close to home. Good job."

He shut off the engine and crawled into the back of the van, opening the back doors. "Can you come here?"

I looked back at him. "What for?"

"Just come." He extended his hand and I reluctantly crawled around the back seat to sit on his mattress, both our legs dangling over the edge. Outside I could see the stars much clearer and the sea breeze was crisp against the overwhelming heat of California. I was thankful to not sweat at least for a moment. "I never meant to hurt you or make you cry, Eri. It wasn't my intention at all. You mean the world to me but we're so intense it can be overwhelming sometimes. And it is true. I did want to get out of our stupid college town. It had nothing to do with you but rather with me being sick of that fucking place. I've been there for years and it drove me crazy. It wasn't to run away from you."

"The internship in of itself," he continued. "Is not exactly what I wanted it to be. I get assignments and stuff but it isn't the exciting stuff I want to do. Mostly I'm in the office doing desk shit and editing photos. I don't mind the editing I just," he shrugged. "It's not thrilling but it'll look good on my resume in the future. As for the drugs...I'm sorry about your uncle, I really am. I'm sorry about how that affected you when you tried to commit suicide. I don't make good decisions. I never really have. Drugs are like my escape. It's nice not to think about shit sometimes. I don't do it nearly as much as Aaliyah made it out to be-which by the way she definitely wanted to fuck you."

"Oh, I know."

"Were you...gonna do it?"

"You're asking me if I was gonna cheat on you?"

"I don't know...I don't think you would've but I know you basically hate me…"

I rolled my eyes. "I don't hate you. Don't be a damn baby. I wasn't going to fuck her. If she tried anything I would've shoved her away just like any man. I want my boyfriend. I just felt lonely. I wanted some comfort…"

He pulled me closer to him and set my head on his chest. "I want you to feel safe. I want you to feel like I love you. I want you to tell me anything and everything. I'm there for you and I fucked up...if you want me to, I can stop doing drugs. Maybe not weed-i got my med card here- but everything else I can."

I sighed and wiped away the leftover tears. "I'm just scared. I've had that feeling since I was a kid. You said you wouldn't do something harder but that's what they all say. Then it gets worse and worse. I was really close to him. He and my mom got into a lot of fights but he cared about me. I didn't know it was bad, I mean, I was just a kid. How was I supposed to know what drugs were? I don't want you to end up like that. I know it seems impossible but it just...haunts me."

He kissed the top of my head and took my wrist in his hand gently. His thumb rubbed over the scar that I tried to hide with tattoos. I never thought he noticed. Maybe he had noticed all my scars. I had tried to tattoo over them all but some were fresher than others. "I can see why and I don't blame you. If I stop taking drugs will you stop drinking? We can get sober together…"

"I can try…" I sad rather sadly and unconfident.

"How much do you drink a day?"

"Never enough to get drunk but a buzz is fine. Couple ales or wine coolers, maybe a bit of brown liquor. Like a fifth of the bottle? Whole bottle lasts me about 5 days or so."

"Christ…"

"Guess I'm a hypocrite, huh?" I came to that pathetic realization all too late.

"No. I don't have that trauma that you do, seeing your uncle and all. But that doesn't mean that I want to lose you to drinking either. Do you still go to therapy?"

"Yeah and get my meds changed but it's been a little...bit worse since you left. Not that I want to put that on you but it's just been happening."

"You can take one of my shirts back if you want. I know it's not much but I know you like them."

I nodded and clung to him, not sure if I completely forgave him but finally feeling like we were at least connecting again. "Do you still sleep with the rillakuma?"

"Of course. I have to now." He chuckled lightheartedly. "It's just as comforting to me as my shirts are to you."

"I sleep in your hoodies sometimes too. They're nice and roomy."

"Yeah I know. You basically have them all." He nudged his face against mine, playfully but also ended up connecting our lips. He paused after we separated but kept his close distance. "Do you forgive me?"

"I don't know yet. I feel a lot of things right now. Maybe I just need some time to think."

"Oh…" He sounded extremely disappointed. "Do you still want to go home?"

"I think I would want to spend a few more nights with you…" I squeezed his hand lightly.

"Thank you. I really want that. I promise to make this trip worthwhile."

"Well...the sex was pretty good at least. My ass still kind of hurts though."

"It was...phew..uh…" He wiped his other hand on his jeans and I saw his cheeks flush.

"You can admit you like anal now, you know."

"I'm on the fence, okay? Let's just leave it at that."

"Mhm...sure."

"Do you want to watch the stars with me?" He asked suddenly. That was a pretty sweet gesture I had to admit. Something straight out of a cheesy romance movie but still sweet nonetheless. 

"Yeah, that sounds nice actually."

He scooted back onto the mattress and took off his shoes, tossing them over the back seat. I did the same with my sandals and we both leaned back onto the pillows, looking out into the night sky that was littered with bright white orbs. We didn't say much, just relaxed beneath the moon, hearing the waves lapping at the Earth. Johnny set a soft playlist to play on his phone and kept it beside him, adding something to fill the otherwise silent space between us. I closed my eyes and focused on letting myself go, trying to make my heart less heavy and remind myself why I fell in love with him in the first place. That was when I felt his pinky lock with mine. Memories came flooding back; every time he made me laugh, the hurt we had been through, all the trust that I gave him and no one else. There was so much invested in us. I had no idea if I really wanted to let it go.

He was humming now, softly, strumming his fingers against his chest to the beat. When I looked over I saw that his eyes were closed as well and I wondered what he was thinking about. "Johnny?"

"Yes?"

"What are you thinking about?"

"What am I going to do after this internship is over. I don't know where I want to go. Maybe try and find some jobs in Chicago, maybe New York, cities where I can expand and maybe do a lot more."

"Do you want us to be long distance?"

"Not particularly, no. But I know you want to finish school. That's important. You're not going to quit just because you want to follow me around the world. Maybe when next summer rolls around and you graduate you can come travel with me."

"Do you think we can really be together for a whole other year?"

"Yeah. Don't you?" He asked.

"Yeah...I do." I squeezed his pinky tighter. "I do want to be with you Johnny. For a long long time."

[shigarakis-fifth-hand]

Ok picture this. Thief!Uraraka x Rich!Reader. And it's as angsty as possible? Like Uraraka really out here just looking for that coin, ya know? She didn't come to play!

Warning: Cursing, smut~ish, major angst, thoughts of suicide, kissing, gayness, cuteness overload

Uraraka sat in the kitchen, eating the last Christmas cookie in the entire building. “Ugh, I don’t see why you don’t want to go to your parents for the Holidays! I love your mom! We’ve gone to my family’s house for the past three years.” Kirishima argued as he and Bakugo carried their suitcases down the stairs. “No! You’re mom makes the best food for Christmas, and we get the pool house all to ourselves! Do you realize how much fucking we can do?!” Bakugo slapped Kirishima’s ass, unaware that Ochako was in the room. 

“Plus, we agreed that your mom does Thanksgiving and Christmas with the cooking. My mom does Halloween and the fourth of July with the decorations and explosions.” Bakugo kissed Kirishima before they walked back upstairs to get more of the luggage.

“Todoroki! Say hi to my mom!” Izuku yelled, running up to him with a phone in his hand as Todoroki walked down the other hallway. “Hi Inko!” Todoroki smiled as Uraraka saw Izuku’s mom on the screen. “Oh Todo, Bora Bora is lovely! Make sure to thank your sister for allowing me to use the family vacation house!” Inko exclaimed as the two boys nodded, smiled, and then hung up the phone. “Now, Touya is going to be here soon so let’s move!” 

Todoroki grinned, taking all the luggage in his hands as they walked, not letting Deku carry any of it.

Uraraka smiled, happy for her friends who were doing things over their holiday break. Her on the other hand... would be at the dorms alone. She was the only one in 1-A who didn’t want to go home. Her parents would be working their tail off, and she would just be forced to lug around heavy boxes, sweep, and do their office management for two weeks straight like she did every year. She would never tell anyone that though... how embarrassing.

“Ochako!” She heard behind her, turning around to look at you. “You were on the phone with your parents while holding your LV purse. Your Gucci slides shined on your feet, and the diamond earrings you had been given by Todoroki glimmered in the light. You were everything Ochako wished she could be.

You were an icon for a boss bitch, a model, powerful, brilliant, gorgeous... and as rich as someone could get. Sure Uraraka had the biggest crush, but more than not she wanted to be you. The luckiest human alive.

Your father, Endeavor Todoroki, and Tensei Iida been rivals growing up, eventually becoming pro heroes and starting their own agencies. Of all of them, your father had grown to become a millionaire by going to America instead of Tokyo, and starting his agency there where the competition was pitiful.

That had led to your family becoming one of the most wealthiest in all of Tokyo, above the Yaoyorozus and Iidas. In fact, you, Iida, and Momo had been close friends since toddler age.

“Yes Y/n?” Ochako responded, coming out of her trance. “My mom says I should invite a friend to our beach house. I know you said you didn’t want to go anywhere for the Holidays, but would you? My modeling agency is sponsoring our trip so we can get massages, go snorkeling, you know. All that fun stuff.” Ochako perked up more as you explained. “W-where is it?” She asked excitingly. “Ever heard of Hawaii? My dad’s main office is there.” Ochako hopped off the barstool and smiled brightly. 

“Sure! I’d love to go!” She hugged you before running to go pack her things. “Wait, I don’t have any bathing suits!” She yelled back as you just rolled your eyes, still on the phone with your parents. “Yes Daddy, email them about my plus one. Just borrow mine, I have a few you can use. No Daddy, it’s not a boy, it’s Ururaka.” You winked at her as she ran upstairs, hurrying as fast as she could as if you would leave her.

Once her bags with packed, Ochako came back to the room to see you on the phone still. She sat down, choosing to watch you adoringly and letting you finish your call. “Yes Claire, I’m having a couples massage with my bestie on the third, and snorkeling on the thirtieth. Now don’t get that screwed up with my photoshoot the sixth, and the fireworks for New Years. Yes, the maid went to the house earlier.” 

As you continued, she stared at you. Wow, she’s so... impressive. If only I could have a sliver of that... power. Or you. Honestly, you seemed to get more attractive as Ochako stared at you. ‘If only I could use this to help my family... I’m so god damn scared of what’s going to happen. Mom isn’t working, and Dad might have cancer. What can I do? I’m a student taking classes at UA full time. There’s no time to work!’ Ochako thought deeply, stressing out.

“Phew, I’m glad that’s over! Just called my manager to schedule our break.” You grabbed her bags happily, carrying them to the car outside. “Wonderful! My sister is waiting at the airport with our jet! Then we can zip over the Hawaii and get this party started!” Ochako found herself shaking as you two entered the large black car.

...

Walking out of the airport, Ochako found herself woozy. That’s what sleeping for 15 hours straight did to you after all. Of course... you looked beautiful. You had been drinking hot water with lemon the entire time, had moisturized every half hour, and had taken only four naps, being half an hour long each.

 You were literally the perfect human being, while Ochako had helped herself to your plane’s supply of cake and soda while watching videos on her phone.

“Look! There he is!” You pointed to the boy wearing only rainbow swim trunks and sunglasses standing on top of the blue Jeep. “Andrew! Babe!” You ran and hugged him. “Chance, this is my friend Uraraka. Ochako, this is Chance, one of the models I’m working with for the company’s LGBT campaign!” Ochako perked up, staring at you. You... liked girls??? She... had a chance?

“You bet it! Hop in ladies!” With ease, you lifted Ochako into the Jeep and followed her in. While you were driving, Ochako couldn’t help but relax greatly. The sea breeze and smell of the ocean salt consumed her, almost making her forget all her problems. But she couldn’t forget all her problems... she had promised her mom that she would fix everything by the new year. 

And here she was... going to party while she ignored her family.

“Here we are!” As you pulled in, Ochako almost passed out. “You like it? Daddy got it remodeled it last Spring. It has two pools, a hot tub, an amazing view, and of course... the beach is only a few steps away!” You exclaimed, taking your bags in and upstairs to your room. Ochako had her breath taken away completely. 

“You... live here? Like... you own this place?” Ochako found herself dying over the marble everything, the flowers everywhere, the splashes of color from the expensive art, and the views outside. “Don’t be silly. This is only our vacation home! Daddy lives here sometimes while he’s recovering from injuries since he stays in America, but Mom and I stay in Japan. I obviously live at UA.” You smiled, walking out to the balcony from your bedroom. “Oh, I almost forgot! Here, you can choose whatever you want!”

You opened the closet to reveal a room the size of Ochako’s bedroom. Filled to the brim with clothes, shoes, jewelry, mirrors, and led lights. “Over the years of modeling I get a bunch of cute clothes! You should only imagine how much I have from when I did child modeling. Oh, and here! Pick out some jewelry for tonight. We can totally play dress up while we’re on vacay. We have to look famous, right?” You laughed, hugging Ochako while walking out of the closet. 

“Oh, and the purse rack is to your left! We can use that when we go shopping or out to eat! I have a bunch of LV so you can use one! I never use them anymore!” You giggled, smiling as you looked back at the view. “Pick out what you want to wear tonight, and a bathing suit for night swimming at the pool! I’ll go downstairs and give the chef recommendations! Any ideas?” You asked, sticking your head in the doorway. “N-n-nope!” Ochako called out as you ran downstairs.

Ochako’s eyes led to the big case of jewelry. It had so many gold chains, so many rings. Dozens and dozens of real pearl earrings. “I can’t... no. I have to.” She grabbed two pairs of pearl earrings, a gold chain, two rings that both had diamonds, and then a pair of heels. You were a size 8, but these were a size four. They were Ochako’s mom’s size. 

Without thinking, Ochako shoved them into her bag and zipped it back up. In the heat of the moment, Ochako looked around, desperate for more. She had found her solution! Steal from the rich and give to the poor! She easily had just taken over 5k from you, and you probably wouldn’t even blink. You would never suspect her, right? Of course you wouldn’t. You two had been flirting with each other since you met. You trusted her.

Ochako stopped herself, slapping herself in the face. “W-what are you doing? She trusts you! You fricking like her you dumb idiot!” She yelled at herself, looking around. No, she had to help her family, even a little bit. Just little things you wouldn’t even bat an eye at.

She took a ten dollar bill under your desk, stuffed the pencil pouch you had gotten from Italy, and easily slipped a Gucci perfume bottle into her bag. “Hey, Ochako!” Uraraka turned around to see you smiling ear-to-ear. “Happy early Christmas!” You held out your hand, revealing a tiny box. “H-huh?” She exclaimed, slowly taking it from you and gasping. Inside was a simple silver ring, polished and perfectly fitting for her small finger. “It’s a promise ring.” You walked closer to her. 

“As to promise that once we become heroes, we will remain friends.” Ochako stepped closer to you, staring at your lips. “And... maybe...” Ochako couldn’t finish her sentence as you two slammed your lips into each other. The kiss was hot and passionate, as if it was releasing all the thoughts you two had had for four years straight of having to resist. “God, once I found out you were gay.” You kissed Ochako’s neck as she tried to talk, moaning in between words. “Once he said LGBT, I knew I had to...” She moaned again, turning you on. You bent her on the bed, running kisses up and down her neck. 

As Ochako was about to remove her shirt, you stopped her. “Let’s save that for after dinner.” You winked, leaving her feeling teased. “So, what are we Y/n?” She asked, blushing from what you had just said. “Well it depends. I’ll be whatever you want me to be. Just say the word.” You moved closer as she sat on your bed, getting closer and closer. “Be my girlfriend Y/n.” She whispered as you smiled, slowly kissing her lips. 

“Well then I guess that ring is more than a friendship ring. What do you think it means?” You asked, kissing her neck tenderly again. “I... don’t know. Once we have so many responsibilities next year, let’s stay together. Promise to make time for each other... and one day, settle down.” You sucked her neck extra hard as she said that. “We’re getting out of UA soon Y/n. Maybe we can move in together to... try things out.” She talked as you continued to kiss her neck.

 She had to admit you turned her on like nobody else could. “Awesome. Well, dinner is about ready. How about we go down and... introduce you to my family. I’m sure they’d love to meet my new... girlfriend. First, let’s get changed.” You walked over to your closet and pulled out an outfit you had prepared beforehand. A white t-shirt and black jeans, cute and tomboyish. 

“Oh, and I promise not to peek.” You winked, before facing away with your back to Uraraka. Ochako picked out a pink sweater and black skirt, thinking as she put it on. Is this wrong? Of course it is. But wouldn’t it be worse to deny this love for her and steal from her? At least she’s happy, look at her. The poor thing will never know, and eventually... you’ll forget all about it. Just... no more stealing.

But as time went on, Ochako found herself being the happiest she had ever been. She woke up to you two full-on making out in bed for at least half an hour, then would spend the entire day watching you model, then you two would eat, swim, walk around, and vacation. Of course... the days started to end even better. Nighttime was when you two couldn’t contain yourselves. There was a hot tub on the balcony right outside of your room, so you two couldn’t help yourself. Surely, you two had found yourselves naked while kissing once or twice. Sure you two were going fast, but Hawaii set the mood so much, and you two were so excited to release all the sexual tension from the past four years

Of course, Ochako also found herself getting more greedy as she adapted to the rich lifestyle. She slipped one of the nice soap dispensers, took one of you dad’s pairs of expensive sunglasses, stole another ten dollar bill she found under your bed, and had somehow managed to slip a Gucci robe from when you were six into her bag. It was stuffed to the brim, but she needed more. Her family would die if she didn’t.

Then, things turned for the worst that one night. “Ochako, let’s go night swimming!” You called out, reaching for her hand. “But I’m not wearing a bathing suit!” She yelled out instantly, still looking at herself in the mirror. You had straighten her hair, and she liked it. “Exactly.” You whispered into her ear as she grinded into you. “Okay then.” She responded, smiling as you two began to walk to the hot tub as you removed your shirt slowly, Ochako watching your every move. That was until you tripped over Ochako’s bag, falling to the ground. Along the way, a shatter could be heard from inside the bag. 

“Ochakie, I’m so sorry. What did I break?” Ochako blushed at the nickname you had given her, before realizing what you were doing. As you opened the bag, your eyes widened. Inside was your old Gucci robe, your new perfume, your soap dispenser, your dad’s sunglasses, and your old shoes along with a bunch of jewelry. 

Immediately your face turned bright red, looking up at her. “You...” You murmured angrily, standing up as she started crying. “I fucking trust you with everything and you stole from me!?” You yelled, not feeling bad at all. “You don’t understand! My family needs the money! They’re going to die if I don’t do something!” Ochako yelled, trying to defend herself. In an instant, you took out your wallet, slipping out five hundred-dollar bills and throwing them in her face. “Here’s your money Uraraka! Now where’s my trust! I was so ready to give you my virginity, give you my life! I wanted a life with you Ochako!” You began crying as she turned silent. “So that’s why you came? I wanted you, you wanted my money? Is that why you came? Is that why you kissed me?” You asked as she stared at you, trying to find words. 

“My dad has cancer! My mom is dying! I’m terrified Y/n! Please don’t be too mad at me! I needed all the money I could get quickly!” She yelled at you, still crying as you stopped. “Ochako, I could write you a check for a fucking hundred grand as we speak! You think that I would poor out my soul to you, but not help your fucking family?! Ochako, I gave you my trust and love! Do you know how hard that was?! But no, everyone just wants me for my money! Everyone! Even you!” Ochako tried to spill out words. 

She tried to tell you that she did love you, more than anything. She tried to tell you that she was obsessed with you, and that she wanted nothing more than to have you in her life. That the past few days had been the best in her entire life because of you. 

But no, all she could do was cry. 

All it took was one look in your eyes, your heartbroken eyes, for her to run out of the house. Out of the house, down the small path, and to the beach. The sunset was shining brightly, shimmering against Ochako’s tears. She was so mad at herself, and the fact that she had messed up the one amazing thing she had with you. Sure, money was great, but ever heard of love? Ochako had felt it only with you, and she had ruined it. Why hadn’t she thought of asking for your help? You were a hero god dammit, one of the most generous and giving jobs in the world. 

“God dammit! God Dammit! God dammit!” She kicked the sand, yelling as she stomped angrily. God... she should just throw herself into the ocean. After awhile of standing there, Ochako heard a noise behind her. “Oh dear, it’s just me. Tom and I are going to the country club’s cocktail party! We will be back around midnight sweetie. Y/n said to tell you to come inside, she’s getting worried. You crazy kids have fun!” Your mom called out as Ochako smiled before running inside and up to your room where you waited on your bed, a stuffed monkey in your life. 

“You know what I love about the Indian monkeys? They’re called gibbons. Funny name right?” You asked, looking up at Ochako as she nodded. She could see the mascara streaks running down your face, and she hated herself for causing that. “See, they’re cool though. Because, even if one of the monkeys makes a mistake like getting lost or eating too much of the food, they’re with their partners for life because they trust each other.” Ochako smiled sadly, understanding what you were saying. 

“When I went to India, I saw how they wouldn’t let you get close to their partners because they were protective, but if their partners walked up to you, they would allow that. It’s because they trust each other with their lives.” You got off your bed, setting the stuffed toy behind you as you walked towards your girlfriend. 

“I need to be able to trust you Uraraka. When- I mean... if we get married, all of this is going to be yours. There’s no need to steal it, you’re welcome to anything. Shoes, you bet. Want to use my perfume, go ahead. Wear my clothes, eat my food, live in my house. It’s all yours because I trust you. Right now, I need you in my life. I need to be able to trust you.” Ochako buried her face into your chest. 

“I’m so sorry Baby! It was the worst decision I could ever make! I got desperate and I did the worst thing imaginable! I’m so sorry!” She cried as you pulled her away. “In other news, both your parents are on my dad’s insurance and are going to start receiving medication right away. Don’t worry, my mom said they won’t have to pay a thing. 

She also said they can stay in our lake house if they want, it’s only a half hour away from UA.” In an instant, Uraraka started balling, pulling you into a tight hug. “Oh my god. Oh my god.” She freaked out, holding you as tight as she could. “I owe you so much! Let me do something for you! Anything!” She begged, desperate to do something nice for you like you had done for her.

“Get on the bed Baby.”

I felt extra gay while writing this but that’s not a bad thing sooooo. Honestly I’ve never found Ochaco cute until now so dangggg, thx bby. I always love your requests they make me so happy when I get one @drbumpkin

[shakethispeare]

DARK : S1 - EP1 [ GEHEIMNISSE | SECRETS ]

NOTE: I'm only pouring my thoughts into this post. I'm taking notes every time I watch Dark since I heard the story-line is complicated. Also, my memories suck. It's not spoiler-free, of course. So, only read if you have seen this episode.

So, I have finally started watching this TV series. I was shocked to find that it had aired since 2017 because I've never heard of it before. It should have deserved the hype. What the fuck was I doing in 2017? Oh right, binging Game of Thrones.

Anyway, I've only watched the first episode, and I have to say, I am hooked, like a fish-getting-pulled-with-a-hook kind of hooked. The plot already nudges me in the head to start thinking and memorizing every single detail that will show up on the screen (although, I'm confident to say that I will most likely still miss some stuff). I'm sure that the makers of this series will drop valuable clues (subtle or not). Not to mention, a bunch of characters were introduced only in the first ten minutes and that’s when I feel like I have to start doing the connecting.

So, the episode starts with a grim quote:

Alright, in here, I can guess this is going to involve a series of flashbacks, probably one that is too many to count.

The date is 21st of June, 2019, and a man named Michael has a detailed mind-map filled with photos of, what I assume at first, would be the rest of the characters in the series (in other words, his neighbours). He had photos of them when they were young children and as adults. There were cuts of newspapers on a few of them too. And then, without saying anything, Michael commits suicide by hanging. But he leaves a letter with a warning that said, "Do not open before 4th of November, 10:13 PM."

JONAS KAHNWALD POV

Time-skip, the story now takes place on the 4th of November, 2019, roughly five months after Michael's death. It turns out he has a son named Jonas. I think Jonas suffers from depression after the passing of his father since it's shown that he took pills the moment he woke up. Then, Jonas goes out to meet his therapist named Peter Doppler. They both took a walk in the woods. Jonas was still mad about his father for not telling him why he committed suicide.

When he went to school, he meets his friend, Bartosz. Bartosz is currently dating Martha, who Jonas found shocking. The look he gave suggested something happened between them before. They attended the assembly where Katharina addressed Erik's issue and told everyone if they have any information regarding it, they should come forward.

Later on, Bartosz wanted to go to the cave rumoured to be where Erik hides his "stuff". Jonas was reluctant at first, but agreed to go with him eventually, Martha too. Then out of nowhere, Magnus overheard their conversation and insisted going with them to the cave.

That night, Jonas met with Martha first, who briefly discussed 'the thing that happened last summer'.

Shortly after, Magnus came, bringing along Mikkel.

Jonas and his friends continued to walk until they reach the cave, and Bartosz was disappointed not to find the weed there because Franziska had arrived first and claimed it. Interrupting Franziska's and Bartosz fight, a loud noise emitted from the cave, shocking everyone. Their flashlights go dark. Out of fear, they all ran. The last to run were Jonas and Mikkel. Jonas slipped and fell. He had a hallucination of his father covered in black liquid before starting to run again. But Mikkel was nowhere to be seen.

When he finally reached his friends, Mikkel was not with him, neither was he with his friends.

ULRICH NIELSEN POV

Ulrich's first seen having sex with Jonas' mother, Hannah. I assume a family affair is going on, and I was right. Ulrich has a family comprised of his wife, Katharina, who is a high school principal, and three kids, Magnus, Martha and Mikkel.

I feel like the dialogue above is significant towards the story. This is purely a hunch.

Ulrich works as a policeman along with a woman named Charlotte Doppler. We first see them together being confronted by Erik's parents, who admitted even though Erik used to run away before, he always returned. Ulrich thinks he ran away, but Charlotte thought otherwise, and she seemed to have set him off when she implied the situation is not the same as Ulrich's brother disappearance, which happened thirty-three years ago. Okay, so far, there have been two (prominent) people missing in Winden. I think they didn't have much luck in finding Ulrich's brother.

Ulrich's mother, named Jana claimed to have seen a creature roaming the woods, describing it to have a gigantic head. At this moment, I couldn't help but feel like this is some Stranger Things shit. Also, she found a snack wrapper his brother used to love before he went missing. Jana believes something is happening out there that their minds can not comprehend, and it's the same thing that happened 33 years ago. At this point, I'm starting to think, okay, what is up with 33 years ago?

When Ulrich heard the news that his son, Mikkel has gone missing, Ulrich ran into the forest yelling out his name. Dawn arrives, and he didn't find his son. Then, he heard a dispatcher's call claiming they found a child's body. Ulrich rushed to witness it. But after thoroughly checking to make sure it's Mikkel, it turns out the child wasn't Mikkel. I was also suspicious to see the child, because, based on his clothing, it wasn't the clothes Mikkel wore the night he went into the woods. Also, the child's eyes had burn marks for some reason. I’m suspecting it’s Ulrich’s brother. He has been missing for 33 years and if he died somewhere in between, he would not be the same age as Ulrich.

HANNAH KAHNWALD POV

When Jonas complained about the expired food and lack of electricity in the house, he yelled for his mother. His mother, named Hannah, was having sex with a man named Ulrich. I don't think Jonas knows about this. We'll see how this will fare in the future.

Hannah goes to the nuclear power plant with a large briefcase. It turns out she is a massage therapist and had massaged Aleksander, the power plant's director. He's worried about the nuclear power plant. He mentioned that it had been 33 years since the day he came to Winden. He looks like a bad guy to me. I don't think his work is clean. He gives off this Russian villain vibe who wants world domination. 

Hannah went to school to attend the meeting. She meets Katharina. Katharina hasn't completely suspect her cheating with her husband. She left quietly and went outside to smoke. She met Ulrich, who was on his way, but stopped to meet Hannah.

REGINA TIEDEMANN POV

Regina Tiedemann answers a phone call from her bank who has been in business with her hotel for 20 years. She explains the reason why her hotel's business isn't good lately was due to Erik's disappearance, but it sounds like the problem has been going on for longer than two weeks. Then, Regina became angry with the bank's representative and slammed the phone down. She also mentioned that she build her hotel business by herself without help.

In the meeting, Regina had disagreements with Katharina, and when she said that Katharina should "mind her own problems", Katharina looked offended.

Everyone in the meeting received a phone call at the same time. It’s probably because of the kids reporting to the police that Mikkel has gone missing.

INES KAHNWALD POV

The old lady who's ripped out of the Kahnwald Family picture turned out to be Ines Kahnwald. In here, I don't know who she is, and the episode didn't explore about her yet. However, when Hannah called her, it doesn't seem to be her mother, so I'm guessing it's Michael's mother? Maybe. Also, Hannah seemed to harbour hate for Ines. She has Michael's suicide note and has been waiting for the whole day just to read it. When Ines finally opened it at 10:13, the camera didn't show the contents of the letter, nor did Ines read it out loud. Later, she placed the letter back in a box and cried. Perhaps the contents of the note will be explored in future episodes. I'm dying to know what's written in it.

OTHER CLUES:

In Winden's Rest Home, an old man named Helge repetitively says "It's going to happen again. It's going to happen again. It's going to happen again." What's going to happen? He knows something.

Helge then walked out of the rest home heading somewhere, chanting the same words. Eventually, Helge arrived at the school and walked into the meeting. Charlotte stopped him. He asked if it was too late before being escorted out.

---

A man walked out of the cave wearing a raincoat with a hoodie. Who is this man? I feel like he's the reason why Erik's missing. He could have kidnapped Erik or something.

---

The scene that surprised me was when they showed Erik being held somewhere in a brightly-lit room with an electric chair in the middle of it. It got me thinking where he could be. Was he abducted? Or did he go there willingly? The episode ends with Erik tied to the electric chair, and his eyes are blocked by a metal covering.

---

Despite being a therapist himself, he seemed to be troubled with something and he’s keeping secrets from his wife. I’m looking at him as a major suspect though. Not sure if the other characters are going look the same way as I do.

MY THEORY:

So my theory is this. I think Erik is hidden somewhere in the cave and the only person who knows the ways of the cave is the man in a raincoat. The deceased child found in the woods probably met the same fate as Erik. I think he got kidnapped before, and then this man in the raincoat did some experiments on him, resulting in him dead. This situation doesn't look good for Erik, though. I have a feeling he's going to die.

Also, why is it that whenever the camera showed the cave or the nuclear power plant, a forbidding soundtrack starts to play. What the fuck is going on—

[tribridkissed]

Everything Afflicting Lil’ Ol’ Me…

Sleep Paralysis:

Starting off with the basics here because this has been what sort of started it all. When I was little, I was super into the whole idea of spirits. I honestly still am for different reasons, but it started when I was young and having sleep problems. The doctors still don’t know why it started, but I’ve always thought I sensed ‘presences’ so I told ghost stories…because I saw ‘ghosts’ in my sleep, some of which were terrifying and would sit on my chest and I’d still feel that feeling when I woke up, so duh it was real.

When I was a teenager, I started getting these hallucinations far more vividly and the doctors started to take it a lot more seriously, especially when I was getting depressed and suicidal on top of it all. Turned out I had ‘Old Hag’s Syndrome’, or ‘Sleep Paralysis’, and there was now a logical explanation for it. Basically my brain wakes up sometimes before my body does, and I’m paralyzed but I can still see the hallucinations. Feeling pinned down and violated is honestly the worst, and it fucks me up for the rest of the day mentally when it happens. It is why I’m against lucid dreaming, and why I vehemently believe in demons and evil spirits even if doctor’s wanna just call it a hallucination induced by stress. Either way, I have insomnia sometimes too and my sleep is all over the place and that never helps one’s body.

Hormone Imbalances

My hormones have probably been all over the place my whole puberty experience? Like, my periods started out being heavy, irregular and painful. I know that’s mostly normal--we women handle cramps like a boss, okay?--but I would have to stay home from school once or twice in a row every time I got my period, because I was curled up in a ball hurling: much like I do now. Going on birth control helped for a while and then started to make it worse, so we took me off of the birth control and my period started to even out and I stopped getting so sick, unless I ovulated from both sides and not just one, which they found out was also happening. Yay for the possibility of twins naturally, but yikes to the extra hormone surges.

Paraxysmol AFib:

I went through a whole stint of my early 20′s having palpitations in my chest. I just attributed it to my anxiety, and to stress because I had just finished a whole High School career of only honor’s classes, and I had switched from Pre-Med to Early Childhood Development, and so even when the doctors from an arrhythmia, I just sort of dismissed it. I didn't have the time, I was working twelve hours days as a nanny, I was doing college, and I didn't have time...and then I had an AFib attack after exercising and ended up having chest pain.

That pain lasted a month and a half without going away or getting any better, I had a bunch of doctors tell me I was being a hypochondriac, and then I got put on a heart monitor. The heart monitor caught not one but two episodes in the span of three weeks, and it was only then that they took me seriously. So even though I was ‘too young’ and ‘healthy’, I ended up becoming a heart patient at the ripe old age of 25, and it has been part of my life ever since. I take medicine daily to keep my heart rate down, because it beats too fast on its own, and I had to cut down on coffee, which...I was a caffeine addict so that was rough, lol. I’ve had to change dosages, which stresses my body out for a week each time that happens, and it has just been who I am now. I have heart patient jewelry and everything, just in case of emergencies.

Cyclic Vomiting Syndrome

So this all brings me to the next big thing: cyclic vomiting syndrome. I have been sick for 6 months now, nauseous basically every day, vomiting stints every once in a while that land me in urgent care to get IV fluids and meds because nothing will stay in my stomach, it all comes up. This started back in August, now known actual cause, and it has been my main affliction these days. I am on antacid medications, my heart medicine still, and anti nausea I have to take every single day. My body is exhausted, and that’s not even the half of it.

The doctors aren’t even fully sure this is what is going on with me, this is just how they are treating me because they can’t find anything. I have had an MRI, CT scans, ultrasounds, blood tests of all sorts (food allergies, diabetes, etc.), and everything says I am healthy. I have had a tumor removed from my esophagus when they did the endoscopy in the beginning, and I had a history of cysts (I’ve had one in my head, in my arm pits, and now one in my right nasal cavity), and I have a second and third tumor growing in my right arm. They aren’t convinced any of this is related, they just know that my period problem from high school is happening again, so they’re convinced it is hormone induced cyclic vomiting syndrome...which has no for sure cause or cure, so, that has been nice, and has triggered my depression, but I’ve been dealing with my depression my entire life.

Depression/Abuse

Since I was a kid, I’ve had a messed up home life. My uncle did some truly horrible things before he ended up eventually in jail for four life sentences, and short story on that because I simply don’t talk about it, is he used to tape my sister and I shut in boxes, and threaten us with his pet snake. He even through a knife at my cousin once, and would put my sister and up on the top shelf of the closet and leave us there.

On top of that, my Dad was never around much, and he left for good when I was 7, the same year that my grandmother died from the chemo for her ovarian cancer. He is a whole other story in itself, but he only added to my abandonment issues when I was 21 and he showed back up ONLY to talk my sister and I out of making him pay off the back child support he owed (it was a whole thing), and having the audacity to say he stayed away because he loved us...but raised our half siblings, so...just. I don’t like talking about him either.

Then I had a mother who was constantly verbally abusing my sister and I--she still does--and calling us fat even when we were skinny. Telling us we wasted our potential, telling us we’re useless, etc., and only recently getting herself the help she needs for her own emotional issues because she too was abused. Our family is filled with abusers, and she’s much better now that we’ve all addressed we have some problems, but dealing with that on top of all the other things that I deal with now, has been rough.

I feel broken. My mother tells me not to say that, but all of my health issues, and my failed past relationships with boys that have thus kept me single the last three years, make me feel that way. I’m a demisexual person who had two boyfriends cheat because they couldn’t wait for me to be ready for sex, and one basically admit after a little while that he just wanted sex and was “putting up with my feelings until then”, and I dunno, I delved farther into writing and honestly, it has been my only constant.

I’ve been writing stories since I was 6, and this is a hobby, yes, but it is also an escape when I’m not working on my stuff to get published (I’ve actually been a published author since 2011). I’m editing my second book right now and it gets priority sometimes when I’m in a funk, but I have been so sick lately because of my stomach, and just so tired and stressed with work really only keeping me on because they can’t fire me when I have medical reasons and doctor’s notes, and I just thought you guys should know.

I try to be on because writing helps me not think about all of my issues, but sometimes I’m so tired, or so sick, that I just can’t do replies. Plus, my arm with the tumors has been hurting more and more lately, and I may have to get them removed, which will mean another two weeks of a sling and pain meds, and crying myself to sleep because recovery from arm surgery hurts.

So if I’m ever slow, something is up. I love being around to write--it’s my safe space--but I’ve been dealing with a lot lately. I really do love and appreciate all of you, and I’m so grateful that you guys are so patient with me. <3

[jjeanerr]

The Quiet Place Project

Written By : Admin J

I’m going to be as open as possible and just share with you my story and what is the quiet place project. This is a-part-of-life story so just skip through if you aren’t the kind of person that loves reading about another person’s life :)

Warnings: Maybe none?? This is to promote a stress-free and relax environment so I don’t think there’s any warnings unless you’re afraid to be all alone then this is not for you :D

“I need a break from all of this.” We often tell ourselves that. We constantly feel like taking a break from social media, work, studies, sometimes even people in general. I’ll take myself as an example : 

I’m not a very cheerful person, neither am I a optimistic one. On a scale of 1 to 10, my negativity vibes is approximately a hundred. I seem to see my life as the worst one of all, and not gonna lie, I still do. Plenty of people tried to help me get my shit together and get my life back on track. But... you can’t help a person who refused to be helped. 

I know it sounds crazy that I don’t want to be helped, but yes, that’s how negative I am towards life. At some point, I reached to the stage where I often had suicidal thoughts (not trying to brag, just to give you a scenario), disorders that were probably just made up in my head and my life just scares me so much that I wanted to quit everything, block everyone and live off the grid. So that’s what I did...

I switched off my phone, disabled most of my social media accounts, clean my room up by throwing everything that contained past memories ( as in photos, exam papers, marked assignments, report cards etc), I even threw away things that I thought was valuable to me (gifts, diaries, journals) because I literally took a few years to write things in those books, but I can’t them back now, they’re probably in some far away garbage factory. I was basically insane. I was mad at everyone, I know friends that are concerned about me but I didn’t bother to tell them anything that’s happening to me. I filled my youtube playlist with a bunch of sad songs (I had access to the internet through my laptop, as much as I wanted to live off the grid, I still had some important things to do with my laptop so...) and I just played them on repeat, and cry all alone in my room, during the day all the way to the middle of the night. 

I had rapid increase in dreams where I was dying, and at that time, I felt like they weren’t nightmares but signs and messages for me to take action on taking my own life. I ignored about the fact on how worried my parents were and skipped meals. I was just a total mess, but to me, I was “having a break”. That’s when my parents decided to take me out of where I live and bring me to somewhere outskirt. They brought me to literally almost all over the world, but not back to home. They had a theory, they said that I need to forget about everything (precisely) and only keep the important things with me and move on. And I was pretty fascinated by the fact on how happy I have been for the past few weeks and possibly for months/year in the future, I mean they’re theory worked, at least for me. 

While I was clearing my mind, the different places I went to helped a lot, but there were still stuffs cramping my mind. That’s when I found the quiet place project. This website consists of the thoughts room, dawn room, the quiet place etc. It is designed for people to go and empty their mind and just relax. The thoughts room is a place where you can just go and type in your status, anything that you’d like to say, and the things that you type into the “thoughts box” will fall out as if they want you to forget and move on from whatever that’s stressing you. I used the thoughts room most of the time and just basically typed in things that I hate, people that I dislike/hate to the core (we’re humans, we can hate people just like how we are free to love someone,right? don’t judge, hush), and those words would just fall out the box, as if falling out from my thoughts, which reminded me that I can choose to forget unnecessary things and irrelevant people, so I did. 

The dawn room is a place where you can send and receive anonymous messages of comfort. You can send what you intend to say to someone you love or care about when they’re feeling down, and you’ll receive anon messages from people that typed caring messages as well. At least, you know that you’re not alone in the dawn room... 

These websites really helped a lot in clearing minds and finding your inner peace, they have soft music playing in the background as well. Sometimes we really just need to take a break from life, if you really don’t have the time to go on a short vacation, the quiet place project is the kind of place you should go to. Pour your mind and unleash yourself in these rooms, take a deep breath, it’s going to be alright ! Although, I’m still working on making myself better...

check out : thequietplace project , the thoughts room , the comfort spot

[masseffectgayliens]

How come the rest of the gang isnt aware of their fans?

Tali read the question out loud, for the whole “gang” to hear. It was virtually pointless though, as most of them were entrenched in their dinner anyway.

“I wouldn’t say you’re not aware. You’re not the brightest bulbs in the bunch but you can’t be that thickheaded, either. Especially since some of them send you suspiciously regular mail and stuff.”, Tali answered, mostly addressing herself to the Normandy walls and to Gardner. Ah, Gardner. Always conspicuously trying to appear inconspicuous while listening for any dirt on members of the crew.

“Tali, we joined the Normandy squad fan forum. You know that.”, Shepard grumbled, frustratingly stabbing her peas.

Garrus chuckled slightly from next to her, to which she responded with an objectively painful kick to the helpless turian’s shin, and a murderous glare.

Then the whole thing came back to Tali, and she started audibly giggling as well, rejoicing in the fact that she was a safe distance away from the angry commander.

Throwback to a few months earlier. Tali had just stepped into the cargo bay, ready for another mission, but as she looked around, she found only Garrus, leaning back against the Hammerhead, fiddling with his datapad. She shrugged, realising they were both probably early, and she thought there would be no better opportunity to hone her turian-pestering skills than while waiting for Shepard to waltz them off towards more danger. He was so entrenched in what he was doing that he didn’t notice her until she cheerfully plucked the datapad from his grasp.

Sneaky quarian snooper: 1, Her victim, now with increased trust issues: 0.

While he was exclaiming with surprise, Tali examined the screen in front of her.

“…Galactic Ass-Kickers United?”

Garrus flicked his mandibles in annoyance, swiping his datapad back and holding it above his head.

Self-elected Normandy midget representative: 1, Tall turian asshole: 1.

Normally, Tali would give him another type of well-deserved kick to the shin for this blatant abuse of his freaky height, but right now she was too curious as to why Garrus was browsing an online nerd forum.

“It’s, uh, it’s what some people call us. Apparently.”, he said sheepishly.

“Us?”

“You, me, everyone who went after Saren.”

“Oh.”

A few moments of uncomfortable silence passed. Tali was pondering his words, Garrus was still warily holding the datapad above her reach. Until he suddenly felt his earlier assholery get repaid tenfold when the quarian forcefully stomped on his foot, causing him to double over with a groan, which prompted Tali to swiftly rid him of his precious possession. Again.

Everyone that isn’t Garrus: 2, Garrus: -25684.

With Garrus’ whines as relaxing background noises, Tali looked through the site, its threads and topics, until the realisation dawned on her.

“Garrus, how long have you been a part of our official fan forum?”

“First off, that was a cheap move, second off, why’s it matter?”

“OhmygodhaveyouseenthisfanartGarrusKeelah”, she exclaimed in one breath.

Dismissing her suit’s inner ventilation system for not having enough dramatic effect, Tali fanned herself, admiring a smutty piece of work depicting Shepard, Garrus and herself.

“Spirits, Tali, I don’t go looking for it!”

“How come your inbox isn’t totally full of spam from our dedicated fans, then?”, she asked, looking over his sparse chat boxes with various members.

Most of his interactions were quite tame. He left witty remarks on most discussions, and chatted harmlessly with a few users about nothing in particular.

“Probably because they don’t know who I really am. To them, I’m simply TheLegend27.”, he declared, a bit too confidently for someone who chose TheLegend27 as a username.

Tali snorted, still shamelessly going through his activity log.

He seemed to engage with one forum user specifically. Almost every comment Garrus posted was somehow in relation to one Quads_of_fury. Tali tapped on his latest notification, which brought her to a thread entitled “NORMANDY CREW MOST LIKELY TOs”. And, although the thread itself was a goldmine, a certain inspired username caught Tali’s attention.

Quads_of_fury, 4:36 CT: most likely to spend all their credits on stupid shit?? i vote kaidan. he looks like the kind of guy who would literally start crying happy tears when he sees a lush shop

 Interestingly enough, Kaidan had swooned at the sight of the intergalactic bath bomb. He broke down, actually. Two times. Two times Tali had to almost completely physically restrain him so he didn’t waste his credits away on soaps and perfumes and lotions and OK they all smelled really good, but Tali was taught better than to give in to Satan like that. She wasn’t weak. Not to insinuate that Kaidan was. He was just really, really, into self-care products. Tali pictured the value of property damage they’d have to cover when Kaidan’s tears eventually flooded the lush shop, setting off all of the bath bombs at the same time.

She shuddered.

Naturally, TheLegend27 had something to say to Quads_of_fury.

TheLegend27, 4:38 CT: I vote Shepard. Mostly because I’ve actually stumbled into her at the supermarket. I could only stare in awe as I watched her pay for a disco ball helmet, a ketchup gun and glow in the dark toilet paper.

 Tali snickered, turning towards Garrus.

“Does Shepard know you’re shamelessly backstabbing her on the extranet?”

“Oh, please. She should’ve expected it.”

Tali clicked on Garrus’ most recently created thread: “Shepard is fuckin short. Discuss”. She put it in her “Stuff To Shamelessly Blackmail Garrus With” mental folder.

“Nevermind, I know she doesn’t know because if she did she’d have killed you by now.”, she stated matter-of-factly.

He just looked at her strangely, his mandibles flaring in what she came to recognize as the turian equivalent of a smile. Confused, she decided his cryptic looks could suck it, and she resumed her activities.

Quads_of_fury, 4:50 CT: ok first off RUDE second off shes not fuckin short her online bio says shes 5’4” shes AVERAGE honestly and even if she was short who cares shes like the badassest person ever rn and these kinds of threads just undermine her authority so to conclude. u suck @TheLegend27

 Tali was moved to tears. Honestly. Quads_of_fury’s speech would make Shepard proud.

TheLegend27, 4:56 CT: *She’s 5’2”. **Which is short even for a human. ***The most badass

Quads_of_fury, 4:57 CT: I KNOW HOW IT’S SPELLED ASSHOLE

 The next thread was entitled “Shepard Appreciation Thread”.

Honestly Tali’s blackmail folder was having a field day.

She scrolled down to a piece of fanart depicting the crew, with Shepard as a focal point, happily crying while hugging Liara.

Quads_of_fury, 3:23 CT: false shepard does not cry

TheLegend27, 3:24 CT: Except when you point out the fact that elcor don’t wear shoes, then she spirals into depression

 It was a universal certainty that Shepard was never going to live that down. The one time she decided getting drunk was a good idea, after finally saving the galaxy, she got filmed by a bunch of curious teenagers. Honestly, the entire crew was pretty hammered, but when they started waxing philosophical about different species, Shepard had an epiphany, and no amount of alcohol would ever help her forget the vid of her sobbing at the thought of elcor rubbing their nasty feet-hands on every public bathroom floor. The extranet was a cruel and unforgiving mistress.

“So like… Are you going out of your way to personally victimize this user? Are they like your forum crush or something?”, Tali asked, finally tearing her eyes away from TheLegend27’s forum drama.

Garrus smirked at her again, then, without answering, turned around to greet Shepard herself, finally showing up, ready for another day of dodging bullets.

As they climbed into the shuttle, Tali felt him bend down, mouth closing in on her ear.

“You’ll see.”, he said, passionately typing away on his datapad.

Fast forward to dinner time, when Tali had all but forgotten about Garrus’ extranet vendetta against Quads_of_fury. Until the commander walked in, fashionably late once more, brows meeting in a small, frustrated knot.

“Who pissed in your cereal, huh?”, Jack inquisitively jabbed an elbow at her, careful not to drop her own bowl of cereal.

“This random extranet dickbrain. It’s no big deal, they’re just really annoying.”

“Oh, really? What sites are you surfing these days, Shep?”, Kasumi innocently piped in, giving Garrus, who was sitting right next to Tali, a knowing wink.

“Uhm, you know. Fan forums. And stuff. I’m interested in what people think of us.”

Shepard had her back to Tali, but the quarian was certain her face was now doing that distinctly human thing, when it became redder than the N7 stripe.

“I’m a member of your fan forum too, actually. Who’s bothering you? Is it TheLegend27?”, the thief pressed on.

Tali wanted to die.

“Yeah? How’d you know?”

“Who’s TheLegend27?”, Jack asked, her words just as dripped in confusion.

“Some say TheLegend27 is the first forum user ever. Born from fire.”

“I heard, TheLegend27 can never get banned, because they always come back.”, Garrus casually added.

“I heard TheLegend27 once locked an entire thread with a single roast.”, Joker joined in.

“But the worst part is, just when you think you’re safe”, Kasumi went on, ”just when you think you might escape… WHAM!!! Just like that! You get trolled.”

When everyone around the mess table faked a collective gasp, she sank even deeper in her suicidal disposition.

“I hate literally all of you.”, she caught herself saying, but she was cut off by the sound of Shepard’s datapad notification.

She checked it, slowly, then very suddenly her head snapped up to Garrus, who was cheerfully typing away, just as another notification sound pierced the tense silence.

Shepard didn’t advance, not before getting a tall glass and filling it with cold water. Then, as she menacingly started approaching Garrus, raising her glass like a weapon, all Tali could think was, he had it coming.

“This is a good time for you to become a missing person, Vakarian.”

Yep. Definitely had it coming.

[sinangoral2017-blog]

[07.29.17]  i recognize that i am ridiculously behind on writing this post, so for those of you who have still been keeping along, i am very sorry! i can explain! let’s rewind.

the in-limbo period of time that i had in between japan and iceland was chaotic, to say the least. consumed with fixing things around the house (our ac broke so i had to readjust the fan unit outside), visiting mom at work, and gearing up for iceland, i got really busy. i was always hoping to write about my downtime in minnesota because, after all, it would’ve been one of the highlights of the summer (I LOVE MINNESOTA). ultimately, i just never had the chance.

in either case, wifi in iceland turned out to be far more limited than i had originally predicted. since i slept in my car most of the nights (more on that later), the only wifi i had access to was when i was filling up at a gas station. even those connections were weak, so the prospect of uploading any text entries, let alone photographs, were minimal. i was sad to admit to myself that the trip couldn’t be shared with you all as i lived it. instead, it had to be relayed after the fact upon my return to the states.

now that things have calmed down a bit and i’m living a slow and sleepy minnesota life, i can take some time to update you and share with you some of the trip’s highlights. though it’s pretty difficult to walk you through 11 days in iceland in one post, i’ll try to do my best.

it makes sense to start with the disappointing email i received from a mycology professor upon taxiing to my gate in iceland, saying that he had decided to take a last minute vacation and couldn’t meet up with me. understandably, these sorts of things happen, but i was pretty bummed that one of my connections had to back out. luckily, my other connections (who were a married couple at the iceland academy of the arts) and i were to meet towards the end of my trip, so in a matter of minutes, i was a free bird with no agenda. as such, i landed in iceland with a certain restlessness that, for some reason, urged me to just hit the road as quickly as i could.

my shuttle bus from the airport to my rental car location was 6 hours late, so i had to bum around the airport. i know – first world problems – but with that agitation that was boiling inside of me to just get rolling, i started to go nuts. nonetheless, several hours later, a sweetheart girl, who couldn’t be more than 19 years old, picked me up. she insisted on carrying my duffel bag and backpack. i could tell that she could tell that i felt a little weird about it. seemingly reciting a speech that she likely gave to many idiotic american males before me, she explained to me how iceland is one of the most feminist, forward-looking, and optimistic countries. as we drove off in the 14 passenger van and she slam-shifted the burly van’s gear shift, i couldn’t help but notice that she was enjoying my slight surprise.

well, i picked up my rental car (a five-speed fiat panda that was a joke compared to my female friend’s bus), bought a map, and hit the road, traveling north towards reykjavik. the only plan i had decided on was to drive through reykjavik and ignore the city, promising myself that i’d spend ample time there upon my return. and so, i kept driving north on the ring road (highway number 1), taking my time, stopping every couple of kilometers or so to soak up the scenery. i took about an hour to stop at a “bonus,” which was the equivalent of a small-sized costco, to pick up sandwich meats, bread, and preservable food. i had heard the horror stories about the food prices in iceland, so i made it a goal to live off of my own concoctions for at least the first six days.

since i knew i would be living out of the panda for the majority of my eleven day trip, i made it a goal to compartmentalize the car into different zones. blame it on my architectural brain, or occasional obsession with specificity, but i had to get comfortable in the car.

the front passenger seat was dedicated to brushing my teeth, trimming my beard, making coffee, and changing clothes, while the driver’s seat was for… driving. nothing too weird up in the first half of the panda.

the rear seat was dedicated for sleeping, but only sort of. since my rather large body didn’t fit easily back there, i would sleep on my left side and swing my legs up through the center console and rest them in the passenger seat. when i’d get tired of this position in the middle of the night, i’d switch sides and sleep on my right side. strangely enough, it felt too awkward to let my feet rest in the driver’s seat when i was in this position, but after the third or fourth night, i found it pretty comfortable to hang my foot off the gear lever if i parked the car in first, third, or fifth. the miserable techniques of an aspiring architect.

the rear hatch was dedicated solely to food, as i ate out of a ‘kitchen’ that i built in the trunk of the panda. two cardboard boxes housed all the plastic cutlery, toilet paper, and rolls of paper towels that i had stolen from the airport. after all, i had to do something productive with my 6+ hours, and i had made the mistake of finishing my book on the plane. i kept all my deli meats, cheeses, jelly, and spreads inside high quality ziploc bags inside an equally heavy duty plastic bag, which i hung from the exterior rear windshield wiper of the panda. this way, i could prevent insect buildup. in addition, the weather was pretty cold overall, so i took advantage of the icy rain and cold wind while i drove and slept to naturally refrigerate my food. with the exception of some dirt that entered the bag on the eastern parts of iceland, this technique worked out pretty well for me.

to compliment my weird program divisions inside the panda, i developed a strict routine of eating, resting, refilling fuel, and begging for free hot water for my french press that i had brought along. strangely enough, it was through this chronology that i was able to tell what time of the day it was, since the all-day brightness was so disorienting. all in all, i charted my travels, favorite locations, and quirky experiences on the aforementioned map, notating for myself as many things as i could recall from the day. i’m hoping to pin up this map on my apartment’s wall when i return to pittsburgh.

i’m going to sound stupid if i try to describe what i saw - it was just too beautiful. color was surreal, mostly because the abundant grays made everything else feel so saturated and accented. while i’ll let the photographs speak for themselves (there’s just no way i can try to explain how beautiful iceland’s landscapes actually are), i’ll share with you two existential moments that i had along my travels, which adequately color the trip for what it was. the first involves a bunch of multicolored sheep at 4am, and the second involves a hitchhiker that i met along the road.

after around the fifth night, having a full night’s rest became a great difficulty, and i started to have lucid dreams as i fell in and out of sleep. this particular night, i woke up to find that what i had thought was an ingenious plan to hang black tshirts from my rollup windows to block sunlight was actually a horrible decision. a zillion mosquitos were in my car. not 10, not 100. a bagilion. just like the horror movies. i had idiotically parked near a marsh/swamp for the night, and all the stupid insects had crawled through the gaps in the windows. here’s an excerpt from an email i wrote to an important friend about the event, which adequately captures my inner turmoil:

despite the success of this leg of the trip with camping inside the car, last night was a disaster. i woke up to ten thousand mosquitoes inside the panda at 445a because i'm an idiot and fool and i left the windows open because i'm an idiot and fool. i knew nothing else than to drive like a madman with windows down for two hours to get rid of them, eventually ending up in little town. weather is overwhelmingly foggy and don’t want to drive because it's a bit unsafe. i can't see these ****ing suicidal sheep that come out of god's **s onto the road and baaaaaa and bleep around. and the farmers spray paint their butts to know whose is whose so i just see these little pink and blue and red butts galloping towards and away from me through the fog. it's slightly poetic but also so maddening. and i guess, at this point, i break down, knowing that this hell is sent from the gods and that they're rightfully directed at me. ***k ***k ***k stupid sheep ***k.

i don’t think i can look at sheep in the same way, to be honest.

several days later, on a random impulse, i decided to pickup a hitchhiker that i found just outside of hella, iceland. jeanne, who turned out to be a total sweetheart, was french-canadian. we stuck together for the whole day, visited a couple of waterfalls, and talked about the weirdest stuff. later, we stopped by the side of the road and pet some random horses. wouldn’t you? it’s amazing how comfortable you can get with someone you don’t know and know you likely won’t see again, simply in light of the fact that you are both blank slates to each other. you have nothing to lose. so those several hours we spent together were really nice.

my time with jeanne also made me realize how lonely a solo traveler can feel in iceland. again – first world problems – but a reality for me, nonetheless. iceland, no matter how grateful i was for the experience, should’ve been absorbed with someone else, at the very least. it was just too beautiful and esoteric to have been lived through alone. i find that relaying my experiences with my mom and minnesota friends has become quite difficult, because the picturesque scenery i’m trying to depict seem exaggerated. and as cathartic and uplifting as iceland was for my health, i wish i had shared that with someone else as well.

when i finally finished the long loop around iceland, i had three to four days to soak up reykjavik, so i checked in at the cheapest hostel i could find and explored the city by foot. i had great beer, good grocery-store food, and occasional splurges on drip coffee. it was during this time that the married couple i was scheduled to meet informed me of a sudden family emergency – one which forced them to fly out of the country last minute.

this brings me to the guilt that i felt about missing out on my mycology connections in iceland, despite how much it was out of my control. i keep asking myself: what if i had planned for just one more resource? was three really enough? of course, i know that these things happen, and that i should learn from this, but an underlying sense of embarrassment still resides. originally, i had hoped to visit japan and iceland to soak up 50% of research and knowledge from both, but i’m now realizing how naïve that was. iceland, in the end, turned out to compliment japan as a therapeutic release from my everyday worries – something that arguably is extremely important, especially as i delve into my fifth and final year of school – but also something which admittedly steers away from the original thesis-based proposal i had put forward to carnegie mellon.

i was lucky enough to fly through boston, both on my way to and from iceland, and see several important people in my life. i stayed with nick, who was my best friend and roommate at grinnell college before i transferred. though i wasn’t able to see the wonderful temple rea, i got to annoy his awesome sister, walton, for an afternoon. i even got to see the handsome and well-dressed kyle wing in the city, which was a blast. the rest of my time was spent soaking up the boston public library, perusing random bookstores, and gawking at MIT’s media lab and campus. ultimately, boston was a wonderful reprise for me as i get ready to return to pittsburgh.

i have spend quite some time wondering if i should keep this blog going or not. i likely will for thesis, but i’m not sure if i’ll start a new one or just continue on this platform. more on that after i talk with my advisers on the matter. i think i need a springboard for thoughts, i just don’t know if i should start over or not.

nonetheless, i’m so incredibly grateful for the opportunities i’ve had throughout this summer to travel, learn, and live. i still cannot believe how this fantasy became a reality, so to my donors, department, university, and mom’s patience, thank you.

[ciathyzareposts]

Game 33: Mission Impossible (1979)

The opening screen of Mission Impossible

The screen above shows the beginning of Mission Impossible, the third Scott Adams adventure, and it starts with a bang. Well, relatively speaking; we’re not exactly at the fireworks factory, but by the standards of the era things are zipping along. You start in a briefing room, with someone running away (from you, presumably). There are three obvious courses of action suggested here: check out the mysterious object in your possession, listen to the tape recorder, or follow the person. From a modern perspective it doesn’t seem all that special, but having spent the last few years playing adventure games from the 1970s, this feels propulsive. There’s a sense of action that no game before this one has attempted, and it feels refreshing.

But before I get into the game proper, it’s time to back up and talk about the history a little.  I’ve already covered Adams’ previous two games on the blog: Adventureland and Pirate Adventure. I enjoyed them well enough, though both of them were standard affairs, being innovative only because they came so early in the life of home computing. Adventureland in particular was a valiant effort to get something resembling Colossal Cave Adventure onto the TRS-80. Regardless, both games sold well, and it’s probable that by this point Adams was one of the most successful game designers around.

For his third game, he went with a spy theme, and in a blatant disregard for intellectual property rights called it Mission Impossible. In Adams’ defense, the early gaming industry was full of such infringements, and the show was hardly a going concern by 1979.  Even so, somebody must have wised him up, because later ports were renamed: it was called Mission Impossible until around 1982, when it was briefly renamed Impossible Mission, until the name Secret Mission was finally settled upon. Also, it was called Atomic Mission on the Commodore 16 and Plus/4 for some reason. These name changes were fairly haphazard; I’ve read that while the title on the front was covered with a gold sticker featuring the new title, the spine remained unchanged, and the disks inside were still labelled as Mission Impossible. Regardless of any later names, in this post I’m going with the original title. The title screen for the TRS-80 version calls it Mission Impossible, so that’s what I’m going with.

The original packaging is not entirely accurate; the saboteur didn’t have a key or a gun!

As I mentioned above, the game presents you with three obvious options from the outset. Checking your inventory reveals that you’re carrying a surgically implanted bomb detector, which is currently glowing green to indicate that the bomb is safe. What bomb, you might ask? That riddle is solved by listening to the tape recorder, which plays the following message:

A little more of that good old IP violation. The recorder doesn’t self-destruct, though.

Okay, so a saboteur, presumably the fellow who just ran away, has set a time bomb to blow up a nuclear reactor. The security keys and map you’ll need for the mission are contained in a provided manila envelope, but when you LOOK around the room the envelope is nowhere to be seen. The game doesn’t draw your attention to this, but it leaves it up to you to draw your own conclusions, the obvious one being that the saboteur has made off with it. It’s a very early example of environmental storytelling, and the game has a little more of that to offer later on.

The area that can be explored outside of the briefing room is small, but it actually comprises almost the whole game. It consists of a central hub, with a Maintenance Room to the west, a room with a strange apparatus to the south, and three colour-coded doors (white, blue and yellow) each monitored by a security camera that demanded I “show authorization” before I’d be able to get through.

All of the time I was exploring this area the saboteur was running about just out of my reach. At first I worried that catching him might be a time-sensitive puzzle (the kind I hate most in adventure games, just ahead of “all alike” mazes), but I was thankfully wrong. After a while I heard a thump, and found the saboteur’s dead body slumped on the floor near the yellow door. An empty pill case on his body indicated that he had just committed suicide via cyanide capsule.

Also on his person was an empty envelope and a torn up map, no doubt the one I’d been looking for. There was no sign of the keys, but he was carrying the tape recorder, a piece of yarn, a photo of himself labelled “window maintenance”, and a leaflet. The leaflet was nothing more than a cheap plug for Voodoo Castle, Adams’ fourth game, and could safely be ignored, but the rest was sure to come in handy or provide clues to where he might have hidden the keys.

Finding the saboteur’s body

Still unable to unlock the coloured doors, I went back to the other rooms. In the Maintenance Room I found a bucket, but of much more interest was the apparatus in the south room, a box pointing at a chair bolted to the floor. Sitting in the chair revealed a line of buttons: red, white, blue and yellow. The buttons had keyholes under them, but I figured I’d try pressing them anyway.

I went in order, and discovered that pressing the red button caused my bomb detector to buzz angrily and flash yellow: the bomb had been armed! Pressing the white button right after that activated the box pointing at the chair, which turned out to be a camera. It also disarmed the bomb, at least temporarily. I guess the saboteur had booby-trapped the camera? That’s fair enough, but he really shouldn’t have made it so easy to disarm right after. I’d guess that most people would press the buttons in order, and that’s all I had to do to get this sequence right. If he was really committed, the bomb would have gone off as soon as I pressed that red button.

I left the room, now in possession of a photo of myself stamped “visitor”. After some experimentation, I figured out that showing this photo to the camera on the white door would allow me to pass. (It didn’t work for the blue or yellow doors.) Past the white door was a visitor’s room, with a panel of buttons, a window connected to some red wires, and another camera monitoring the window.  Looking through the window (with the EXAMINE command) I could see that I was on the second floor, with the control room of the reactor core below. I could also see a ledge, just outside the window.

The panel had two buttons, one white and one green. The white one simply allowed me to leave the room, while the green one activated a movie projector that was currently empty.  Obviously the window and the ledge beyond were of more interest. I tried to BREAK GLASS, and the game prompted me as to what I’d like to try breaking it with. It’s suggestion of my fist was ineffective, so I had a look at my inventory. A picture, an empty bucket and a piece of yarn didn’t sound heavy enough, so I tried the tape recorder. Success! It smashed through the window, falling to the control room below. Unfortunately, the TV camera came to life, and my bomb detector starting flashing yellow again…

Ignoring the warning, I stepped out onto the ledge, where I found some broken glass and a yellow key. My bomb detector was wailing now, but I scooped up the key and tried my best to get it back to the room where I’d had my picture taken. Alas, the bomb exploded before I could get there, and it was back to the beginning.

This time, I figured that I should try to identify myself to the camera before breaking the window. The saboteur had a picture that identified him as “window maintenance”, so I took that with me this time. The camera was powered down when I tried to show it though. So I broke the window and then tried it, getting a message that said “owner of badge is not present”. Figuring that a dead face is still a face, I lugged the saboteur’s body into the room and showed the picture again. This powered the camera down, and allowed me to get onto the window ledge without setting the bomb into a countdown mode. I was able to take the key out of the room, use it to unlock the yellow button, and take a picture of myself marked “maintenance”. And once again, taking this picture set my bomb detector back to a safe green level.

Fooling the security system with a dead body.

The maintenance picture allowed me to pass through the yellow door, which led to another maintenance room. This one contained some wire cutters and an old yarn mop. I pocketed the wire cutters, because I figured I’d be defusing a bomb at some point. As for the mop… remember the piece of yarn I found on the saboteur’s body? That was a hint, and a SEARCH through the mop caused the blue key to fall to the floor. Upstairs there was nothing but an empty movie projector, so there was nothing left to do but head back to unlock the blue button.

This time, unlocking the button and pressing the correct sequence got me a picture marked “security”. The only door left that I hadn’t been through was the blue one, and sure enough my new picture allowed me to pass. Inside was an anteroom, with a door labelled “control room”, a room to the west, and stairs leading up. For some reason I couldn’t open the door, so I looked in the room to the west. In this storage room I found a radiation suit (which I put on) and a vat full of heavy water, which is generally used for cooling nuclear reactors. I figured I’d have to fill my bucket with this stuff for later.

The stairs up lead to a viewing room, with a small window. Looking through, I could see that the control room door was blocked by some debris. Heading back down, I tried a bunch of ways to get the door open. HIT, BASH and PUSH were all ineffective, and I didn’t have anything in my inventory that looked useful. At this point I was stuck, but also pretty eager to get this game over and done with, so I looked up the solution: PUSH HARD was the answer to my problem, and I later discovered that KICK would have worked as well. So I had the right idea, but ran afoul of the parser. Stepping through, I saw that the debris that had been blocking the door was the tape recorder that I had earlier thrown through the window. It’s a nice bit of continuity, but when I read “debris” I was picturing a pretty sizable blockage. I doubt it affected my ability to solve the problem, but it was a bit of a disconnect from what the game described.

The control room had stairs leading down to the core, and a break room off to the east. There was also a sign: “No beverages, please use Break Room”. A seemingly superfluous detail, but those are few when you’re dealing with games with such tight memory restrictions. There was also a film cartridge, which I took back to the empty movie projector to watch. It showed me a safety film about the core, with two relevant bits of information: 1) Plastic deforms strangely in radiation, and 2) Even short exposure to high radiation is lethal, so suit up. I’d already done the latter, so all I had to remember was to not take my bucket into a high radiation area.

There was nothing left to do except head down into the core. I found a time bomb attached to the reactor by a red wire. I snipped it with my wire cutters, causing my bomb detector to buzz angrily. Taking the bomb, I carried it to where I had left my pail, in the break room. There I put down the bomb, poured heavy water all over it, and it was defused. I had, apparently, beaten an “impossible mission”.

No, it was actually very possible.

Going into the core without a radiation suit on is lethal, of course, and results in you falling over and retching as the bomb explodes. Taking the bucket into the core is also a bad idea, because it deforms and spills your heavy water. Finally, you can’t defuse the bomb in any other room except for the break room. You can’t actually take the bomb back out through the control room door, so there are only three rooms to choose from anyway, but the break room is the only one that has a floor that doesn’t absorb the water when you pour it.

So that’s Mission Impossible, a pretty simple, small game that nonetheless did some interesting things with the adventure game genre.  Firstly, it completely discards the treasure hunt format so popular at the time for something with a more narrative focus. It’s not necessarily the first game to do this, but it’s definitely among the earliest. Of more significance is its use of environmental storytelling: the missing envelope at the beginning, the various items on the saboteur’s body, and the piece of yarn from the mop in particular, are examples of this kind of thing. I’m not playing the games from 1979 in a strict chronological order, but regardless of whether another game got there first, Mission Impossible is still doing it in 1979, and that has to count for something.

That said, the story it’s telling, aside from being a complete knock-off of a popular TV show, doesn’t exactly hang together. The saboteur’s plan is the main culprit here, as his various booby traps are pretty nonsensical, obviously designed to be puzzles from an adventure game rather than actual traps a real saboteur might set. Yes, I get that criticising a game for having unrealistic puzzles is a little absurd, but the closer to the real world a game’s setting tries to be, the more it invites this kind of criticism.

And now, to the Final Rating.

Story & Setting: The setting for this is a novel one, but it’s not all that convincingly realised, being little more than a series of coloured doors to get through. That’s no doubt a consequence of the hardware, but I gotta rank what’s there. As for the story, it gets some extra points for novelty and environmental storytelling, but it’s still too simplistic to rank high. Rating: 2 out of 7. Characters & Monsters: There are none, aside from the saboteur who commits suicide right at the start of the game. You’re never able to occupy the same area as him until he’s dead, and his body is even used to solve a puzzle, so he’s much more of an inventory object than a person. Rating: 1 out of 7. Aesthetics: It’s a sparsely-written text adventure on the TRS-80, what did you think it was going to get? Rating: 1 out of 7. Mechanics: It’s the same two word parser that Adams has been using since his first game, and even at this point it’s starting to feel a little long in the tooth. I had one “guess the verb” problem, which I probably shouldn’t dock it for, but I’m feeling ever-so-slightly uncharitable right now. Rating: 3 out of 7. Challenge: I’d say this game is a little too easy, even though I consulted a walkthrough to beat it.  That took me about an hour, and I’m pretty confident that I would have sussed out the answer without too much time on top of that. It’s certainly Adams’ easiest game yet, so I can’t rank it high. Rating: 3 out of 7. Innovation & Influence: This should get some points for being an early Scott Adams game, as well as for its storytelling innovations. It might seem simplistic now, but I haven’t played anything else for the blog that had done this kind of thing before. Rating: 4 out of 7. Fun: The main advantage this game has in this category is that I finished it really quickly. On the other hand, I consulted a walkthrough so that I could finish it more quickly, which I think says something. It didn’t elicit any negative feelings in me, but I wasn’t exactly having a blast with it either. Rating: 2 out of 7. I won’t play Mission Impossible again, so it doesn’t get the bonus point. The above scores total 15, which doubled gives a Final Rating of 30. That put’s it 23rd out of 33 games played, and 12th out of 19 adventure games. It’s equal on points with Greg Hassett’s Voyage to Atlantis as well as Colossal Cave Adventure II. Both of those are better games, but the former lacks Mission Impossible’s interesting points, and the latter is full of hella annoying puzzles.

NEXT: I’m sticking with the TRS-80 to play Atlantean Odyssey, which has a decent claim to being the first ever fully graphical adventure game. Eat that, Roberta Williams!

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/game-33-mission-impossible-1979/

[timclymer]

I Was Freed From Suicidal Thoughts With EFT

On January 7th, 2011, I decided to commit suicide. It was a crisp, sunny, Friday afternoon and I was walking on an overpass with a busy freeway underneath. There was a concrete barrier beside me, and a chain link fence on top of it.

I thought to myself, “I can easily climb over the fence and jump to my death on the freeway below.” That thought would have normally shocked me, but after the last few months it didn’t seem like a bad plan.

I had just hung up the phone with my ex-girlfriend of seven years. She informed me that she was with someone new. She had ended our relationship only months before and moved out-of-state. Her two adult children were still living in my house, and I kept in contact with her hoping that we’d get back together.

So it was official. My ex-girlfriend had found someone new. She was out my life, and without her I didn’t know whether life was worth living.

I didn’t have any friends I could reach out to, or call as my best friend had died some months before, and my life had revolved around my ex-girlfriend. Out of decency, fear, or both, she called my ex-wife (and the police) because she knew I was in trouble and needed to talk to someone quick, though she had no idea of my location.

Luckily when I was on the overpass, my ex-wife called me I answered. Through burning tears, and a cracked voice, I wailed into the phone shouting to her how I wanted the pain in my heart to stop! I was truly a wretched soul – totally, emotionally destroyed from the pain of it all.

The breakup with my ex-wife was many years before, through the years we forgave each other and became friends, so as odd as it may seem – my ex-wife was the best person to understand my pain.

The relationship with my ex-girlfriend was more complicated. You see I found out, sometime before all this, that my girlfriend had been having a sexual relationship with another man that she had met a year before going out with me. Her relationship with this man lasted for almost the entire seven years we had been together – and her two adult children living in my house knew all about it, but kept their mother’s secret.

So, the whole relationship was filled with betrayal, and deceit. Even after I had learned all this, I forgave her and hoped that one day we might get back together. You may think that is crazy, but it’s how I felt at that moment.

I had found out that the man, whom she had the affair with, was out of her life and I had hoped that if I put my whole heart and soul in the relationship that she would completely commit herself to me. We would live happily ever after. The whole bit. I was really in fantasy thought.

The night before, when I was on the overpass, she sent me an email that made it brutally clear that she never intended to get back with me. She lacked the decency to tell me on the phone or to my face. To make it even more confusing for me, she asked for me to help her with closing costs for a house she was buying as if I were her partner. I lent her the money with high hopes for the future. I loved her and wanted to do whatever I could to make her happy.

What she neglected to tell me was that she was involved in another relationship with a new man and the house was for them to live in. That was the news I had received just before going on the overpass.

I felt as though I were being manipulated like a puppet. I loved her and her two kids, but they gave me no respect. They all said they loved me, but really they were just using me. I was devastated as I made this realization.

The good news is that I obviously didn’t jump, or else I wouldn’t be writing this article, but it came very close. I believe that if I were under the influence of alcohol, or some other mood altering substance at the time, I would have jumped.

My ex-wife successfully talked me out of jumping for our daughter’s sake. She made me realize the pain I would cause my daughter by committing suicide – not to mention that I would be a terrible role model by setting a horrible example for her to follow. She was (and is) in recovery from drug addiction and has dealt with depression issues as well. I felt ill at the thought of her mirroring my actions.

As distorted as my thinking was, My ex-wife’s reasoning somehow got through to me and I knew I didn’t want to commit suicide for our daughter sake, if not my own. Her phone call saved my life. In a strange way, I am grateful to my ex-girlfriend calling my ex-wife, too, because I never would have gotten that call; otherwise, and I wouldn’t be here writing this now.

Looking back in time, before this scene on the overpass, I could see that a storm within me had been brewing. I had been plagued for months with suicidal thoughts that began to accompany my lifelong battle with depression.

I was on prescribed medication for depression. I was seeing a therapist, as well. Had I not been, I am certain that even my ex-wife would not have been able to convince me to not jump to my death. But, thank God I had that help, because now I see that this awful situation was sure as hell unworthy of me senselessly sacrificing my life. My girlfriend’s betrayal, and her children’s concealment just wasn’t worth it; and my daughter’s life now mattered more to me than my own life.

Strange how screwed up my thinking was. Here, I was in a crisis ready to throw my own life away, but I guess I still cared about something greater than myself, my daughter.

My own biological father had abandoned me along with my mother and younger brother. My committing suicide would have been the ultimate abandonment of my daughter – something I swore I would never do when I had a child. I would not carry on the family tradition and abandon my own flesh and blood.

Once I hung up with my ex-wife, I no longer had the desire to jump. But, I still felt like dying, and I found myself alone and emotionally destroyed. I hurt, and I wanted it to stop. You know the expression about how “it felt as though I’d been stabbed in the heart”? That’s how I felt.

So, how did I cope with this hurt?

Well, some months before this incident, I had attended a seminar where I was introduced to an energetic therapy to help release negative thought patterns. It is called the Emotional Freedom Technique, otherwise known as EFT or tapping.

Gary Craig invented EFT in the early 1990’s. He was a student of Dr. Roger Callahan – the father of TFT, or Thought Field Therapy that he discovered in the late 1980’s.

Carol Look, a well-known expert, and practitioner of EFT, describes EFT as a form of psychological acupressure. The way EFT works is first, you find your target – the subject of the problem your having (for me it was suicide) and imagine a scale of zero to ten with zero being the least degree of pain, or emotional discomfort of whatever you are feeling about the problem, and ten being the highest degree. You identify where you are on that scale of pain, or suffering, then you start the process.

The process is a series of tapping your fingers on certain places known as Meridian points of your body. As you tap, you say out loud what is known as set up statement, followed by a tapping progression called the negative reminder phrase, ending the process by a tapping round using the positive statement, or phrase.

At first, this whole tapping thing really sounded ridiculous to me, but I did it anyway and saw how it helped. It was the solution to my problem. I kept at it and although I didn’t feel like living, or even doing the tapping rounds, it helped me get through the feelings of suicide. I figured I’d try the fake it until you make it approach, and it worked!

Little by little, something inside me started to change. I began to feel better. My suicidal thoughts became less and less frequent. It took a while, but this tapping stuff really worked.

I have struggled with depression all my life and while I’m not completely rid of it, my suicidal thoughts are gone! I can actually envision a future for me. Every day I live I give thanks for what I have, and I can see what a terrible mistake it would have been for me to end my life.

Not every day is perfect. I still take depression medication and see a therapist – although less often – now I can better cope with my depression thanks to EFT. I now can enjoy life and look to the future.

I do not advocate replacing professional help with EFT. But, EFT is yet another tool I have to use in my arsenal of defense against feeling low, depressed, and hopeless.

The reason I am writing this article is to help anyone who is in a similar situation. I want everyone to know that no matter how bad things seem, even to the point that you are hurting so badly that you are thinking of hurting yourself (or killing yourself) that there is hope.

Suicide is not a solution. It’s the worst thing you could do, not just for you, but for anyone you leave behind who will have to live with your suicide for the rest of their lives.

Do you really want that? Of course, you don’t.

I believe that EFT helped me, and that it can possibly help you. If you are feeling depressed, and/or suicidal give it a try. There is a ton of free literature out there on the subject of EFT (a free guide is downloadable on my website). You can also go to YouTube; type “EFT” in the search box, and a bunch of videos will appear showing you how to do it.

You are important and worthy of living though you may not believe it, or feel it. Give EFT a try. It’s free, and it’s easy to do. You are positively worth it! The phrase fake it until you make it was never truer than it was for me using EFT. And I did make it! So can you!

Source by Glenn P Jones

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