#i had the pleasure to read as a miserable teenager

[dragonsarecats]

my personal love letter to adam parrish <3

[drinkthemlock]

Book asks! 10 & 16. Happy early new year btw :)

10. Do you have a guilty fav?

Noite na Taverna, by everyone’s favorite consumptive teenage goth: Álvares de Azevedo. It’s intensely depraved and misogynistic, but that’s kind of the intention (to shock, that is). Also had to read a few passages of Fanny Hill for school once and I actually thought they were very interesting? The narrative voice is surprisingly… modern? I’m not sure.

16. How many books have you read this year?

Counting only books that I read for pleasure, just about eight. BUT in my defense I read Les Miserables fully for the first time this year and that took a good three months out of my life, plus I’ve been drowning in novels and plays I have to read for work :(

Happy early new year too !! :) and thanks for the ask <3

[iriswords]

Blood of the covenant-Part 1

It is a universally known fact that the Crows love Wylan. Here is a four-part story of four adjectives to describe their attitude towards Wylan.

This can also be found on ao3 right here.

All parts can be read independently. Check the pinned post on my dashboard for more information concerning the rights on this story, and the other things I have written. 

Part 1 - Protective

I. Kaz 

Kaz was used to hate, he was used to scorn. Those feelings came easily to him, almost as easily as breathing. The man he hated the most was, of course, Pekka Rollins, but Kaz found Van Eck came close second in the competition for Kaz’s hate. He certainly came first when it came to scorn.

You see, Kaz hated Pekka Rollins but he didn’t despise him. Pekka was smart vicious, but the only time he had been pathetic was when he had believed Kaz on his son’s death. Van Eck, on the other hand, had always been utterly pathetic. A child trying to play the adults’ game. A full-grown adult who had been incapable to care for his kid.

Pathetic. 

Locked as he was in Hellgate—the place certainly fit his loathsome personality—he could do no more harm, only wallow in his misery. But Kaz was nothing if not thorough, and making sure Van Eck would never be a threat anymore  was a matter he intended to deal with. That, and the fact that he liked to brag every once in a while, and would surely revel in Van Eck’s rage at seeing him.

Getting a pass to Hellgate proved to be of no difficulty. Kaz went alone, at night, his cane clicking on the empty corridors’ floor, loud and ominous. Normally, Inej would have come with him, would have been his shadow and managed to be more terrifying than him, but she was away at sea, busy terrifying other criminals, ones who deserved her attention much more than fallen Jan Van Eck ever would.

Van Eck was slumbering in his cell when Kaz stopped in front of him, and Kaz took vicious pleasure in watching him startle awake and hit his head against the wall when he banged his cane against the metal bars of the cell. The man’s eyes narrowed when he spotted Kaz standing in front of his cell, his lips curling up in a disgusted snarl. 

“You,” he spat. “Have you come to taunt me?” He let out a laugh that he must have meant to be bitter. It sounded, in Kaz’s opinion, more broken than anything, and he didn’t bother hide his smirk. 

“I have,” he admitted. “You are a pitiful sight, after all, as I knew you would be. How does it feel, to know a group of half a dozen teenagers ruined your life? How does it feel, to know you really aren’t as smart as you thought you would be? Better yet, how does it feel to have been bested by the son you spent years belittling?”

Van Eck snorted. “He may have fooled me when I interrogated him, but I unlike you it seems, am not delusional. I know he was of little use to you, and dumb as he is he will not make it far. He will dilapidate the familial fortune before he can even begin to comprehend what he has done.” 

Kaz contemplated him, all his emaciated and ratty glory. What a sight. He was far from the wealthy merchant Kaz had known, but his eyes still held the familiar gleam of hate and disgust Kaz had always seen him direct at Wylan. 

“It had always baffled me,” he said as he took out his lock-picking tools from his pocket and set onto opening the cell, “how you could be so blind to your son’s cleverness. And now it baffles me still, how you can bear such contempt for him when you are the one rotting away in a miserable cell.” 

“You tricked me,” accused Van Eck. 

“That I did. It doesn’t mean you are innocent.”

The cell opened, and Van Eck frowned. “What are you doing?” 

Kaz stepped in, and closed the door behind himself, though he left it unlocked. He saw in Van Eck’s eyes the moment when he thought of lunging and make a break for it, and took a knife out of his sleeve . It glinted in the feeble light coming from the corridor, and Van Eck paled upon seeing it. 

“I find it more agreeable to chat when we are not separated by a cell door. Don’t you?” Van Eck did not answer. Kaz stopped in front of him, looming over the sitting man. “I am not here to taunt, Van Eck. I am here to ensure you will not come bother me again.” 

Van Eck smirked. “You cannot keep me in this cell forever.”

Kaz smiled his Bastard of the Barrel smile, the one that haunted his enemies’ nightmares. The one that marked him as a ruthless monster.

“I cannot ensure you stay in prison for the rest of your life,” he agreed. “Even I do not have that power over the Merchant Council. But I can make sure you don’t leave the prison alive. Guards here are not very careful to what happens to the prisoners, you see. No one will be able to stop me. No one will even know it was me.”

Van Eck stared at him with terror in his eyes. “What do you want?” 

“I am not one for unnecessary murder, Van Eck. Yours will only be necessary if I think you a threat. When you come out of prison, years from now, remember this night, and leave the country. I do not care where you go, so long as you leave. But be careful, for if you do anything that displeases me, I will hunt you down and I will kill you.

“That includes trying to contact Wylan again. You have hurt him more than enough already. And despite this, he still believes in people and in the world, he still tries his best even though you tried to make sure he would fail forever. He has already achieved more than you ever will, and it is only the beginning. If I hear you contacted or even tried to contact him again, and trust me I will hear, I will ensure you wished I had killed you tonight.” Kaz turned away from Van Eck. “Pray to Ghezen you haven’t traumatized Wylan enough for him to be affected by the fact that you still live. If I think he will be more at peace with you dead, I will not hesitate.” 

He left without another word after having locked the cell. The sound of his cane on the ground, he was sure, would stay with Van Eck for the rest of his life.

II. Inej

Wylan had never actually been abducted before. When he had still lived with his father, Van Eck had kept him well-guarded, at first too scared for his son’s security, and then, when he had stopped caring about Wylan, too scared about what Wylan could reveal about him. During this period of his life, Wylan had never left the house much anyway, so opportunities for him to get abducted had been rare and few in between.

The only experience he had to some semblance of abduction had been when Dregs disguised as Dime Lions had taken him to his father, but that had been staged and thus didn’t count as a proper abduction, in Wylan’s modest opinion about kidnappings.

Things changed this morning. He had been out in the Barrel, on his way back from the Slat, where he’d had a meeting with Kaz about an ongoing job. He hadn’t been paying attention to the streets around him—his first mistake. 

When he had first come to the Barrel, he had been so scared of being abducted, assaulted, killed, or raped that he had tried to pay attention to everything and everyone around him. This had faded with time, as more and more people associated him with either Kaz or the Merchants Council, two entities most would rather stay away from if possible. 

Wylan had been deluded into a false sense of security, and he was paying for it now. A hand had shot out from an alley as he passed before it, and he had barely had time to struggle against his aggressor before he was dealt a blow on the head, effectively knocking him out.

He woke up to a cold, damp room not unlike the one he had been held in by his father in the church. His hands were bound with thick, rough rope behind his back, and his ankles had been similarly tied together. The position left him slumped on his side, putting an uncomfortable pressure on his left shoulder. His head throbbed with vivacious pain, and his neck and scalp were partially covered in something damp that must have been drying blood. A sob threatened to shove its way through his throat, and Wylan took a deep, careful breath through his nose to force it down. 

Everything was going to be alright. If his blood was still damp, it meant it couldn’t have been that long since he had been taken. (He refused to believe it meant he had bled out a lot). Jesper expected him back for lunch, and Wylan had left the Slat at nearly thirty past eleven. He would go and complain to Kaz for not releasing Wylan for lunch when Wylan inevitably failed to come home, and when Kaz would tell him Wylan had left the Slat already, they would come to the conclusion something had happened to him.

And they would come to him. 

Right? 

Something ugly that sounded suspiciously like his father told him they didn’t care enough, that he was nothing more than a tool for Kaz and a passtime for Jesper. A toy soon discarded. 

No. They would come, because they cared for him the way he cared for them. Kaz could never quite hide the pull of his mouth when he and Wylan interacted, and Jesper’s eyes were so full of adoration every time he looked at Wylan one would have to be a fool not to know he loved him. 

They would come.

His captors came back before. 

The wooden door of the room slammed on the wall. Wylan recoiled sharply, and immediately regretted his movement when another burst of pain assaulted his head. The people who barged in all boasted lion tattoos on their forearms, and Wylan lost any doubt this was about revenge on Kaz rather than them being after his money. Why they had chosen him to get revenge on Kaz was beyond him, but Wylan was not in any position to question their choices. 

A Dime Lion stepped closer to him and roughly hoisted him up. Wylan could not stifle his groan of pain, and the man snorted loudly. “Won’t hold long, that one. How long do you think it will take Brekker to come running for his protégé?” Another laughed. “Well, he certainly won’t come running, not with that leg of him.”

The Dime Lions did not try to get any information from him. They simply roughed him up, punched him in the guts a couple of times, broke one or two ribs. All in all, Wylan had survived worse. This was nothing his father hadn’t already done to him multiple times. He was scared, but he knew how to handle it. 

He waited for what felt like days in the cold room. His stomach was knotted with hunger and fear, and he rubbed his wrists raw trying to get out of the bounds, to no avail.

Eventually, the Dime Lions came back, this time holding crude knives and daggers. “Thought Brekker would react more quickly. It has already been a day.” The woman turned her cruel gaze onto Wylan and smiled. “Guess we’ll have to give him some more incentives.” 

Wylan’s eyes widened, and he tried his best to get away from the Dime Lions’ grasp, but hunger and blood loss made him sluggish, and his struggles were easily ignored as two pined him to the ground and another splayed his hand wide. 

Wylan was openly sobbing now, his eyes clenched shut as if it would make his tormenters go away. Kaz would have endured it without a word, he knew; Jesper would have cracked puns through the pain. Inej wouldn’t even have let herself get caught. But he was only Wylan, and he sobbed as he felt the blade meet his tender skin.

The blade never cut through. He didn’t realize there was someone else in the room until the Dime Lions’ who were holding him suddenly released him with alarmed shouts, the knife gone from against his finger. Wylan shied away from them and the noise, curling up as well as he could. 

A lithe, graceful figure crouched in front of him, her face shadowed by her hood. “Inej,” he breathed. 

She nodded, and cut through his bindings. Without a word, she helped him straighten up and stand, providing unyielding support when he leaned heavily on her, courtesy of his broken ribs and likely concussion.

The Dime Lions who had been in the room with him were all sprawled on the ground, unconscious and more or less injured.

“What about the others?” Wylan asked her.

“Taken care of,” was all she answered, before she ushered him towards the door. “Come on, they won’t hurt you anymore. I’ll make sure of that.” 

Wylan believed her. His family had come for him.

III. Nina

Nina had never understood how anyone could dislike Wylan. Even Kaz Brekker, the Bastard of the Barrel, had a soft spot for him! And yet Van Eck had not loved him, all because he couldn’t read. Kuwei was jealous of him, though the two of them were making progress in tolerating each other. But what unsettled her most was the opinion the Dregs had on Wylan. 

At first, she too had mistaken him for a rich kid who had ran away from home because he thought himself skilled enough to make a life for himself in the Barrel. But she had quickly discovered that was far from the truth, and Wylan was anything but brazen and arrogant the way rich kids were.

She had thought that, with time, the other Dregs would see it, too, would take a liking to the soft-spoken boy who blew up buildings and was not quite as righteous as everyone believed him to be.

Nina and Matthias were back in Ketterdam after a trip to Ravka. They had happily accepted Wylan’s offer to stay at his house with Jesper and him, a merchant’s house being much more comfortable that the cold, humid Slat. Despite this, she often found herself wandering back to the Barrel, paying a visit to people she knew, or lounging at the Crow Club.

Today, she was at the Slat nestled against Matthias. Kaz had sent for them, something about having a job to give them. Wylan had gone with them, claiming he had something to discuss with Kaz, and he had been the first to go in Kaz’s office. That had been half an hour ago, and he had yet to come back down. 

Nina and Matthias were not the only people in the Slat’s first floor. A handful of other Dregs Nina had never really gotten to know were there, too, and had been whispering and snickering among themselves since Wylan had walked passed them. At first, Nina had tried to tune them out, but she was rapidly getting fed-up with their attitude.

Eventually, one of them groaned loudly. “What is taking the merchant so long?” 

“Maybe we should check he hasn’t murdered Kaz,” suggested another mockingly.

The first one—Nina couldn’t be bothered to remember their names—snorted. “Please, soft merchant hands like his can’t kill. If anything, it’s Kaz who would have killed him.” 

Another one snickered. “Must be fucking. It’s the only reason Brekker would have to keep him.” 

Nina jumped off the couch before she knew what she was doing, and punched the man who had last talked square in the jaw. He stumbled back with a strangled cry, his hand cupping his jaw, and his companions came up around him protectively.

“What’s gotten into you, witch?” asked one of them. 

“What’s gotten into me is that you are being assholes.”

“Is this about the merchant? Come on, Zenik, you can’t possibly defend him.” Nina clenched her jaw and her fists. The men before her stepped back. “I can and I will. If you are all too stupid to see how useful Wylan is, then it’s your problem. But don’t you dare insult him or doubt his worth ever again.” 

The man she punched dropped his hand from his jaw. A bruise was already forming on it. “Wait, are you angry because I suggested he and Brekker are fucking? I thought you already had a boyfriend.”

Nina breathed in slowly through her nose. “I am not jealous, you fool. Kaz keeps Wylan around because he is useful.” And because he has basically adopted the kid, but that was besides the point. “You know he is half the reason why Kaz managed to send Van Eck to Hell’s gate? You know he’s gotten the Dregs out of several tricky situations since Kaz recruited him? You know he is smarter than all of you combined? I don’t know why Kaz keeps you around, but I know precisely why he keeps Wylan around.”

“He’s just a rich kid.”

“He really isn’t. He sacrificed himself for the Dregs. You remember when he was all beaten after what happened in the church?” The men nodded hesitantly. “That was not fake. His father really did that. Ask Anika and Keeg. They were there. They beat him up on his own father’s orders.”

A moment of silence passed. The men squirmed uncomfortably. “We didn’t know,” whispered the one she had punched eventually. 

“You would know,” she retorted, “if you had paid attention to Wylan instead of insulting him every chance you get.” 

She returned to her place on the couch next to Matthias, whose face was somber but proud, and when, twenty minutes later, Wylan finally came down from Kaz’s office, none of the other Dregs on the floor said anything to or about him.

IV. Jesper

The Merchant Council was made up of a bunch of men Jesper absolutely despised. All of them without fail had been born rich and had never had to do anything besides keeping up their father’s business. They didn’t know what poverty was, and obviously thought of Jesper as a thug only because he came from the Barrel. 

(He was a criminal, but that had little to do with the Barrel, and more to do with the thrill that came with Kaz’s jobs. That, and his utter inability to stay away from games, which had led to him having no other choice than to resort to crime to keep surviving. Not that any of these men would know what it was like.)

They tolerated Jesper only because they worked with Wylan, whom they tolerated partly because he was his father’s son and partly because he had let them no choice on the matter. They would work with him, or they would mourn he fortune he brought to the Council. 

Still, it was obvious most of them looked down on Wylan for his young age and liked Jan Van Eck better, nevermind that he was an abuser.

The point was, Jesper hated Merchant Council meetings, but he would bear them to help Wylan. They had convinced the Council to let Jesper come to meeting after Wylan had spun a lie about his eyes growing tired quickly, which resulted in his inability to read when it happened. It had worked, surprisingly enough, and none of the merchants had belittled Wylan for it. (They belittled him for other things, instead.) 

That day, the meeting was stretching out, and Jesper was growing increasingly frustrated and annoyed at the old men who slowed things down only for the sake of complaining and making it more difficult on Wylan. He would have snapped already, had he not known it would only stress Wylan further.

A knock at the door of the room they were reunited in interrupted the tedious discussion. 

A man opened the door, and looked around the room. “Mister Van Eck,” he called, “someone is asking for you. I know you are in a meeting, but it appears to be an emergency, and the woman has promised it would be quick.” 

Wylan glanced at Radmakker, who nodded, before getting up and following the man out of the room, leaving Jesper alone with the rest of the Council. Said Council had apparently forgotten Jesper even existed, and one of them—Jesper couldn’t be bothered to remember his name—sighed, shaking his head. 

“I know Jan is a criminal, but his son is a pain to deal with.” 

“Don’t be so unkind on the boy,” replied Radmakker. “He is young. It is normal that he wants to change things. He’ll see the reality of the world soon enough.” “Still,” someone else agreed with the first. “It’s a shame Jan is in prison. He, at least, knew what he was talking about. I don’t understand how he has let his son become so weak and ignorant about business.” 

“He must have tried,” scoffed another, “but the boy was too stupid or weak.” “Wylan is smarter and stronger than all of you,” said Jesper before he could think. Everyone stopped talking and turned to him. A heavy silence fell on the room for all of two seconds before Jesper spoke again. He had started this, he might as well finish it. “Wylan is smarter and stronger than all of you, and he is doing his best considering Van Eck was an abuser and a piece of shit who taught him nothing about business. 

“Might I remind you Van Eck nearly lost the Council millions of kruge, while Wylan has done nothing but enrich it with clever and thoughtful propositions since he has entered it? Might I remind you, too, that he is the only merchant Kaz Brekker is willing to deal with, considerably increasing the Council’s wealth and power? 

“You speak of weakness, but you have never had to do a single day of labor in your lives. You bask in your comfort, too afraid to risk losing it to offer any real reform. You are scared of the Barrel and you are scared of change, because you know both could bring you down from your privileged positions, and you deem Wylan weak and ignorant because he isn’t afraid like you are and it threatens you.”  

Stunned faces met his speech, and Jesper leaned back in his chair with a satisfied smirk. It was the moment Wylan chose to come back into the room. He stopped on the threshold, taking in the tense and stupefied atmosphere of the room. 

“Did something happen?” he asked.

Jesper smiled blindly at him. “No. Nothing at all. Shall we resume the meeting?”

It only took another ten minutes to resolve the problems the merchants has been unnecessarily raising, and if that night Jesper kissed Wylan even more passionately than he usually did, it was no one’s business.

V. Matthias

for the sake of this story and because I decided so, Matthias is alive

They were at the library. That, in itself, was unusual. But Kaz had needed them to get information that had been left at the library by one of his informants—he had needed to find others, since Inej was not in Ketterdam as often anymore—and Wylan was the one who looked the most like he belonged in the place, despite not being able to read. Wylan had looked slightly upset when Kaz had announced the mission, but he had relaxed when Kaz had added he wouldn’t need to read anything, and that Matthias would come with him. 

Matthias, if he was honest, had a soft spot for the kid, though he wouldn’t admit it to anyone. Wylan was arguably the gentlest and kindest of them all, but his determination and cleverness never ceased to impress Matthias. Thus, when Kaz had bid him for the mission alongside Wylan, he had not protested as he usually would have. (For which Nina had endlessly teased him.)

The walk to the library had been pleasant, Wylan talking passionately about a chemistry project he was working on while Matthias tried to understand with his meager knowledge about the topic what exactly the younger boy was talking about. Needless to say, he failed miserably but the thrilled gleam in Wylan’s eyes and the wide grin on his face were worth the effort.

The boy hunched on himself when they entered the library, the way he did whenever he tried to make himself invisible, either because he felt threatened or because he felt ashamed. Matthias would have liked to reassure him but he had never been very good with words—except with Nina, with whom they flowed easily—and he was certain his attempt would have been more awkward than anything.

Wordlessly, Matthias guided Wylan to the section where Kaz had said the information would be. The aisle was empty but large, and they decided to split to look for anything that might be the information. As he set to work, Matthias cursed Kaz for not having given them more precision on what form the information would be given in. 

He was painstakingly flipping through books for a lose piece of paper when he heard it. A masculine voice rang clear in the aisle, the whisper nearly a shout in the silent library.

“Well, if that is not the last person I expected to find in a library.”

Matthias nearly dismissed it as a casual conversation starter when he remembered that he and Wylan were alone in the aisle. Farther down the aisle, a man as tall as Matthias had stopped next to Wylan who, backed up against the shelf, was hunched in on himself. 

“Have you finally learned how to read?” asked the man. Wylan’s lowered head, his posture mimicking that of a grounded child, was answer enough and the man sighed theatrically. “Of course not, you haven’t. You’re the only student I haven’t managed to help, you know. If that’s not a testimony to your failure, Wylan, I don’t know what it is. Such a pity Van Eck is in prison. He, at least, knew how to discipline you.”

Wylan was now trying to make one with the shelf, his bag held against his chest to tightly his hands where white. Matthias moved in quick strokes and pushed the man away from Wylan. 

“How dare you speak to him like that?” he snarled as quietly as he could. 

Annoyance passed on the man’s face, but whatever rebellion he envisagea for a second was quickly dismissed after a glance at Matthias’s stature. 

“Look,” he said, “I don’t know who you are, but this is none of my business—” “It is, since you are insulting my friend.” 

The man laughed mockingly. “Your friend. And did your friend tell you he cannot do what every children can?”

Matthias stepped forward, shielding Wylan from the man, who fell back a step, eyes widening in panic. 

“I know, if that’s what you’re talking about,” said Matthias, “that he cannot read. And I don’t care. Because it doesn’t make him any less brilliant. In fact, he understands music and numbers better than any of us can, and I have never been met with such genius before. What I wonder is, how brilliant do you think you are?

“How insecure are you, that you resort to humiliating a boy who hasn’t done anything wrong to you? To insult him and degrade him when I am certain he has always tried his best with you? To blatantly ignore the fact that, even if he cannot read, he is one of the most brilliant people of his generation? You must be feeling really low about yourself, if the only way to feel confident is to bring down other people to your level of misery. Get out of my sight, and don’t even think about insulting Wylan ever again, or I swear you will regret it. And Fjerdans always honor their promises.” 

The man threw a last glance at Wylan and left promptly, nearly tripping over his own feet in his haste. Wylan, when Matthias turned back to him, was teary-eyed, cheeks red with shame. He refused to meet Matthias’s gaze until Matthias crouched before him. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t intervene before that.”

Wylan shook his head. “It’s not your fault.” A tear slipped down his face and he wiped it away angrily. “He’s not entirely wrong, though.” 

“He is,” said Matthias forcefully. “I meant everything I said. It doesn’t matter, whether you can read or not. It doesn’t take away your intelligence, and knowing how to read doesn’t make people intelligent anyway. Your old tutor is the living proof of that.”

Wylan chuckled wetly, and wiped a couple more tears, less angrily this time. “Thank you. Let’s find this information, now.” 

It was Wylan who found it (no one else would have been brilliant enough in their crew), in the form of a tiny ball in a material that would apparently dissolve when put in water—Matthias hadn’t understood everything to his explanation but it didn’t take away his pride. And if he made sure to show his affection to Wylan a bit more after that, well no one made any comment about it, not even Nina.

Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4

[museenkuss]

Thank you for your nonjudgmental and thorough response.

I guess you can say I started reading that stuff last summer, unplanned. I was looking thru some tags and I stumbled upon a Rey/Ben solo one. Just clicked and read it without even realizing what I was getting into.

And after I saw the tags, I was scared tbh. I felt gross but it only made me curious to know why a big chunk of authors were writing this trope. And even more people reading it. So I got into it.

After awhile it became cathartic. I read it not because I found sexual pleasure in it, but I could see my naive self as a teenager in these characters. I was sexually assaulted a lot by strangers and related men. Till the point that I didn’t even physically react after awhile. This was me growing up in a 3rd world country. Consent was an alien concept and still is.

So now my head normalizes all the dark, gore and taboo topics. For me I feel freer everytime I read some fucked up shit. But I’d KILL someone if they went after someone young IRL. I’d protect them with my life. I don’t okay that shit IRL.

I just get lost in the fictional world. And I know it’s bad, trying to get outside that mental state but whenever I read fluffy stuff I don’t find enjoyment in it.

Sorry this got a lot. And I hope it doesn’t weird you out. I just felt like sharing it with you.

Thank you for sharing! I'm incredibly sorry you've had these experiences, that's beyond horrible. My heart goes out to you and I hope you're at a safe place where you can heal and grow.

In general - but especially with this context - I just need to say again that reading dark stories (or engaging with dark topics in fiction in general) doesn't make you a bad person. Fluffy stories aren't for everyone. There's a little webcomic that came to mind that you might've come across on tumblr already with the caption "different stories resonate with different people". Maybe it's a little more focused on the writer, but it's still very relevant here I think. To me, it really summarised the whole question of "why do you read/write stuff like that????" - Because sometimes, it helps.

That's why it made me sad when you said you "know it's bad", because really, reading those stories isn't a bad thing. You're reading something, that's all. That's not hurting anyone. I know I keep repeating myself but I know we can feel shame or guilt about things we engage with or have an interest in and I don't want you to feel that way. It seems that you found yourself reading something that resonated with you based on your experiences. That doesn't make you a bad person.

Also, you're not alone in this. Finding certain tags and being shocked, intrigued, curious or scared, and then doing research, reading some more, reading a lot more - it's not uncommon at all. It happened to me, too. Sometimes, I look back at stories I was super invested in and liked a lot and am surprised at how dark they are. But then I think that at the time, they helped me in some way. I read them for a reason, maybe I needed to read them. I don't feel guilty for that. Maybe in the future I'll look back at stuff I'm reading right now and will be equally shocked, but right now that's what I want to read for one reason or another.

If you start to notice that it's actively making you miserable, I'd advise you to switch gears for a while because sometimes, we can be stuck in a downward spiral and (intentionally, maybe) make ourselves miserable. I've been there before and found myself binge watching south park (of all things) because it made me feel horrible and I was sad and stressed. In that case, I had to tell myself at some point "this isn't helping me, I just end up feeling worse about myself, also I'm procrastinating doing things I have to do or enjoy doing by doing something I don't enjoy." - if that sounds familiar, maybe try stepping away. In either case, be kind with yourself.

This got SO long again, but I hope it was still a little helpful. Again, I'm sending a lot of love!

[straycatboogie]

2024/03/05 English

BGM: Massive Attack - Daydreaming

As I have written this many times, once I was never a diligent/dutiful student at any schools. When I was a teenager, I had already disappointed about this whole life itself (at that time, I had never learned I am autistic.) Although I had attended the schools to learn, I couldn't find why I should do that kind of activity. As The Smiths sings in their "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now," I had thought "why do I give valuable time?" to this absolute nonsense.

After graduating Waseda, in my 20s and 30s, I spent my whole time with drinking really heavily. At that period, I had completely lost any hope toward my future. I could even think that anything seemed impossible to me, because I had been born in wrong time, wrong situation (or simply I am cursed autistic one.) Therefore, all I can remember about that drinking period is almost nothing. At these days, I simply worked, ate, slept, and dreamed I could die as soon as possible.

And… my 40s started at last. One day, I thought this when I could stop drinking only one day. If I start drinking again from today, then I will die in my 60s (or maybe 50s.) Can I accept such a miserable life (not leaving anything to this world, but just staying drunk all the time) as mine? If I do that, then I will accept that I'm a loser…

Maybe that idea let me make the decision of quitting alcohol - and I have quit the habit of drinking for over 9 years. After starting quitting, I also began learning English like this - but this time, the purpose has been different from the one I had kept as a student. Now, I have been learning it for the simple pleasure of learning itself, not for any exams. I can find that I can use my free time with this sober mind to learn something eventually, steadily. That's good for me.

Yes… after quitting alcohol, at last I've found that staying sober will enable me to enjoy every single moment. Great meals, good reading, precious working time… and also, learning something to make myself wiser. That kind of satisfaction is the one I always want to taste, therefore I would give this valuable time to do learn English.

[apartmentnumber4]

Jonathan Byers Headcanons as someone who grew up in Indiana and knows a lot about the punk scene

Disclaimer: I’m largely ignoring seasons 3 and 4 because I did not like them and also believe season 2 wrapped up the show pretty well. I could go on a separate rant about that that I might post if people are interested but…

Also trigger warnings for some mentions of like self harm and drug use

First one that I have to get out there is that in season 2 that scene where he doesn’t know the girl at the Halloween party is Siouxsie Sioux is BULLSHIT he’s an outcast punk who reads Vonnegut of COURSE he would know who Siouxsie Sioux is. I don’t think he would get super into her music but he would definitely know who she is. He gets into more goth music as he gets older but as a young adult/teenager he is pretty much on the punk side of things.

He was probably one of those people who were born depressed. A combination of Lonnie being a piece of shit and genetics would combine to make him a miserable kid. I think he was probably pretty existential even as a ten year old and this combined with the Byers having an already shitty reputation contributed to him being an outcast kid. He definitely didn’t want to play tag or superheros, instead wanting to read or watch TV or listen to music and this also contributed to why he never had long-lasting friends.

Along with this the Byers were likely way more casual about things that most adults in a small conservative town in a conservative state would not want their kids to know about and that made parents wary of him. I don’t think he ever gathered children around to tell them about things, but he would say stuff without thinking. He was the type of kid to deadpan say what sex is to a fellow seven year old and leave the parents clutching their pearls.

I think when he was fourteen he had a short-lived self-harm habit. Joyce or Will probably found a bloody tissue in the bathroom trash and asked if he’d hurt himself making dinner or got a bloody nose and it would freak him out so much that he quit then and there, but it definitely is a thing that happened.

He would be genuinely proud that so much early punk music came from the Midwest. He definitely was into The Stooges and DEVO. He had at least some interest in Iggy Pop, and his favorite Stooges album would be Raw Power. Being in the Midwest, he would appreciate just how many songs from these kinds of bands were about being in a shitty town with nowhere to go, and realistically this would be the stuff he would have the easiest access to because of proximity. Pere Ubu’s Final Solution would have been his favorite song for at least a few months. When Big Black released Kerosene he listened to it for days on end

He definitely has an individuality complex. He was of course outcasted, but he also would grow to take some pleasure in being different. He genuinely sees himself as superior to popular kids. We know from the show that he sees himself as having a moral high ground over jocks and whatnot, and I don’t think that ever goes away even as he gets older. He just learns to turn it down a bit.

When Whip It came out it was secretly devastating to Jonathan because now something he liked was popular. Likewise, I think he probably liked Blondie’s first album but started disliking them when they went in a more pop direction. As he grows older he goes back to liking them and appreciates how they were willing to do a bunch of different things, but he has to hate Blondie at least until he’s 25 for “selling out.”

Most people I know either really like the Sex Pistols and hate The Clash, or really like The Clash and hate the Sex Pistols. Obviously, he’s a Clash fan so he has to hate the Pistols. When John Lydon was revealed to be a trump supporter his teenage self was so retroactively happy to be proven right*

Not necessarily a head canon but I think it was intentional that they made Jonathan and Will be Clash fans. The Clash was one of the more outwardly left-leaning punk bands of the time. While most punk bands would put out a message of leftist ideals, The Clash were pretty active in their efforts. One of the more well-known examples of this is the Rock against Racism event that they helped put on. There is a story along with this event where Malcolm McLaren, who was the Pistols’ manager, went around giving out Nazi arm bands and the Clash came on stage and said that if they caught audience members wearing the bands they would be kicked out. Considering Jonathan being the supportive brother to Will who is (obviously) gay, it makes sense that he would be more into bands that actually adhered to left leaning ideals.

I like Bad Brains so I’m going to go ahead and say Jonathan was also into Bad Brains.

A lot of punk bands were also into Reggae, and he tried to get into it but never could in the way he wanted. It wouldn’t be something he hates, but it wouldn’t be his favorite either.

I know in the happy ending he goes to NYU and all, but realistically I don’t think this would happen, and instead I think he’d end up at Indiana University for a few reasons. Tuition would be cheaper - I know that at least right now in 2022 the in-state tuition for some New York schools is more expensive than IU’s out of state tuition. IU has a pretty good arts program and it's a Big 10 school so it would look good. It’s a known research school as well. He would not go to Purdue because it's a STEM focused school and he wouldn’t go to Ball State because it's regarded as a trash school for people who don’t have any drive. He definitely lives in the Collins dorm his first and probably second year. For those of you who don’t know, Collins is (or at least used to be) the dorm hall that was known for having all the weird artsy kids. It was for the stoners and punks and goths. You used to be able to paint your walls at IU as long as you painted them back come move-out. I don’t know if he would paint his walls or not, but if he did it would probably be some ugly yellow or green color. I have no basis on this, I just know it in my heart.

He would (of course) study photography but I have a few ideas of how this could work out:

One, the most obvious, he’s wanted to go into photography for years and doesn’t have to think twice about majoring in it

Two, he would have a freak out about money and decide to major in something boring like Econ, Business, or PolySci for job stability. After a semester he’d realize how much he hates it and switch to Photography

Three, he majors in something else like journalism and minors in photography (or double majors). I think this is a possibility because he would believe this makes him more marketable to the job market.

I think it would be cool if he took some classes revolving around music as well. I know there used to be a history of The Beatles course, which he might take even though I don’t see him as being a Beatles fan. He’d enjoy some sort of music production class, but would never learn an instrument himself. I could propose a fourth Major option where he ends up going into music engineering on the off-chance he doesn’t go into photography.

At some point in his early college years he would have a major breakdown regarding everything that has happened in his life. I’m talking smashing glasses, throwing books out the window, getting the RA involved, the whole nine yards. He probably is made to go to the IU counselors but since they have a limited number of times you can go for free he doesn’t stick around. He gets a therapist later in life around mid-late 20s.

I don’t think he and Nancy would stay together. I just don’t. They would probably break up sometime in their second semester of Freshman year, and Jonathan would then go on to have a bunch of short-lived relationships with alt girls.

You know that Kurt Cobain quote that’s like, “I am not gay, but I wish I was to piss of homophobes?” I think Jonathan has a similar mindset and dates a couple of dudes in college but ultimately comes to the conclusion that he’s straight.

He doesn’t ever get married. I don’t think he has one life partner either. He has serious relationships, but they end at some point. When he’s young this disappoints him a lot because he wants a happy ending that his parents didn’t have, but as he grows older he comes to accept this and enjoy the time for what it is.

In college he gets really really into drugs. He wouldn’t be a heavy drinker for obvious (Lonnie) reasons, but he would try a lot of shit in his early 20s. The most obvious is weed, which he would enjoy a lot, but he probably dabbled in ecstasy and coke as well. He would try psychedelics exactly once and have such a horrible trip he wouldn’t ever do it again. Post college he gets put on an antidepressant and gets a Xanax prescription. He most definitely takes more Xanax than he should but it never officially gets to the point of addiction.

Jonathan moves around a lot as an adult. He would stay for a while in Bloomington before moving. He definitely lives in New York for a couple of years, and probably some in California. Eventually (I think around 35-36) he would move back to be closer with his family, either to Chicago which is relatively close or Indianapolis. He would not go back to Hawkins.

Either a reluctant democrat or doesn’t vote at all. Indiana is so gerrymandered that its almost impossible to turn it blue, and then when he’s moving around he lives exclusively in liberal states so he never feels like he has to.

*The Sex Pistols used a LOT of Nazi imagery and so its not really retroactively being proven right, more like a pattern being fulfilled. However a lot of punks, especially British punks from what I’ve seen, used Nazi imagery and it was generally at the time seen as being done for shock value. I don’t think it would be out of character for him to look at that and not immediately think that the band was conservative or really supporting Nazi beliefs. Also I’m not saying I support the sex pistols or their use of nazi imagery. I think it’s pretty abhorrent, and would never use those symbols.

[youryanderedaddy]

Imagine a yandere ghost who is cursed is trapped in the doll, so one day a family came to live in his house, but what the ghost did not expect is to fall in love with the couple's eldest daughter. Maybe this yandere ghost (doll) use the younger brother to get closer to his beloved...

I didn't really include the doll, but the overall idea is here ;)

Tw: nsfw, non - con, underage sex? (The reader is meant to be around 18, her brother is 16 - 17, but the ghost is 100+ so idk), (technically) incest, ghosts, possession, possessive/obsessive behavior, slight parental neglect ig

You knew it was a mistake moving into the old house up the hill. You tried arguing with your parents so many times about the mansion being hidden in the woods, so far away from any civilization, bringing up the fact it hadn't been bought for the last 8 years despite the insanely low price or the news about the previous owners dying in their sleep just like that, from "natural causes" even though they were an young energetic couple. But of course your worries had been discarded so easily since your younger siblings were ecstatic, constantly talking about finally living in a castle, which was obviously pushing it too far, but kids will be kids.

Your family was big, consisting of your mother, father, two younger sisters and a brother currently in his late teens. Your siblings managed to take all the nice bright rooms on the second floor so you were forced to sleep in the attic. At first it didn't seem so bad, yes, the place was dark and dusty, the space was limited, but it was a quiet spot and there were many interesting things left there to explore and discover.

The first week you discovered a huge box full of old books, medals, notebooks and different souvenirs from all over the world. The second week you found a few paintings covered by a thin disheveled cloak, most of them depicting a pretty young boy with golden locks and sad green eyes, dresses in an expensive silky clothing resembling what was nowadays considered an elegant suit. You didn't pay it much mind yet the miserable longing gaze of the kid haunted your dreams in the following days.

During the third week you noticed that things were going missing one by one. First it was your favorite lipstick, then your new dress, and suddenly your favorite items were gone just like that. On top of all, almost as if fate was tickling your paranoia, you could hear certain sounds at night that were too distorted be natural and too human to belong to an animal. There were sobs, loud and tormented, sometimes you could make up a few words in a language no one spoke anymore. You slept less and less each night, you could swear you felt someone's lingering touch on your shoulders, them gently stroking your hair and even pressing their cold unmoving lips on yours. This was usually the point when you opened your eyes and screamed in fear only to realize you were alone in the room. There was nobody there.

Still you decided to speak with your parents about the creepy events taking place in the attic. Much to your dismay they brushed your concerns off once again, laughing softly and calling you a scaredy - cat, going as far as to joke around about your "oh so creative" imagination getting the best of you just like it did in your childhood. But this time you insisted on holding your ground, almost begging them to take action and help you. At the end your mother decided to let you sleep in your brother's room for a while until you calm down, and as embarrassing it was to share a room with a hormonal teen, it was better than constantly being on the edge and losing sleep. Or so you thought.

The first night you slept in Steve's room nothing out of the ordinary happened and for the first time in weeks you actually managed to rest. The second night was blissfully peaceful as well and you quickly fell into a deep dreamless slumber.

The third night started well, just like the previous two. Your brother was tired from studying all day and went to bed early, giving you the freedom to relax a little bit before following his example. You could read a book or try to revise for your exam tomorrow, maybe even call your bestfriend and finally let her know all about your new classmates and just how boring life in the village was. But in that moment all these suggestion sounded annoying, nothing was interesting enough to hold your interest for more than a minute. Thinking about what to do next, you suddenly became aware that your body was tense and tired, but your mind was restless. After all you hadn't had time for self - care between the paranoia episodes and the fear, maybe it was finally time to do something nice and therapeutic for yourself.

You snatched a quick look at Steve and he was sleeping soundly, snoring from time to time, his usually angry face now calm and childlike. Making sure there was no one in the room awake, you finally slipped a hand down your pajama bottom until you felt the soft fabric of your panties. You closed your eyes and run a finger up and down your clothed sex, following the line of your slit. Your pussy throbbed at the sudden contact, the lack of pleasure in the last few weeks making it sensitive to the touch. You pushed your underwear lower so it hanged around your legs, and shoved one finger into your warm hole, enjoy the way your walls clenched around the digit. You flicked your clit gently, feeling it swell from the arousal, rubbing slow circles and pressing on your sweet spot every once in a while.

Your free hand went to your breasts, bare under the comfy oversized shirt, and awoke the cherry nipples with subtle pinches causing them to harden. You couldn't help but moan quietly as you decreased the pace of which you teased your hole and added a second finger in your pussy, fucking yourself on it. You were so focused on chasing your pleasure you didn't even notice the hand on your thigh pulling your own away from your excited throbbing core and replacing it with a big hard cock. Only once its head reached your tight entrance and pressed on it did your mind register the atrocious size difference. Your words stilled in your throat, the sudden panic rising in your chest, making your vision blurry and your cheeks rosy pink. You finally opened your eyes, your heart racing at the image of your younger brother towering above you with his member so close to entering your heat.

"Steve, what are you doing?" You whispered as you tried to squirm away from the boy, but he was quicker in pinning your wrists above your head in a deadlock. When did the male become so strong? Just yesterday he would ask you to open up his water bottle and help him with his math homework and now he was doing this...

"My name is Henry, my love." The voice was different from your brother's, lower and huskier, gentler in a way. You narrowed your eyes and observed the teenager's face, gasping as you noticed that his eyes had changed from black to green, yet all his other features had stayed stayed the same. You wanted to ask so many questions - who is Henry, why were your sibling's eyes and voice different from before - but you were quickly shut by one stern gaze. "I used to live here 80 years ago." The stranger started off with an unexpectedly soft tone as his grip on your wrists loosened. "I'm a ghost. I possessed your brother." He confessed calmly while you watched his pink lips part slightly with each breath as if you were in a trance before you found the strength to break your silence.

"Why are doing this to me? Why did you take my brother's body?" You questioned him manically, feeling like a confused little lamb sent to the slaughter, trembling and stuttering in front of a knife. Henry simply chuckled at your adorable dumbfounded expression and lowered his torso until his face was mere inches away from yours and you could feel his ice - cold breath on your warm red cheek. "Because I love you, darling." The ghost replied with a confident smirk that looked so weird and unnatural on the younger boy's face you almost gagged. Before you had the chance to say anything, he continued. "I've been wanting you for a while now, little girl. And with this body I can finally have you all to myself." You opened your mouth in a protest but your screams were easily muffled by a harsh kiss and a wet tongue down your throat. Next thing you knew the man had pushed your brother's manhood into your wet sloppy cunt in one sharp thurst and in your despair you had yelled for help once again, the ghost taking your whimpers greedily and shushing them away. Struggling was pointless.

In the next hour you were reduced to a sweaty whimpering mess of pain and arousal, fear and pleasure. The ghost was fucking you in a fast brutal pace while his free hand was playing with your clit, bringing you so damn close but never enough to send you over the edge. You were crying and your whole body was aching, your tits red from the rough manhandlind, your lips bruised and swollen from the rough kisses and bites. There were purple hickeys adorning your neck, belly and thighs and you went quiet in embarrassment every time you wondered how you would be able to hide them the next day.

"Please, whoever you are, let me come, I'm begging you." You pleaded desperately as you arched your back to meet the next couple of deep thrusts. Your cheeks were wet with tears and you could even taste the bitter salty flavor in your mouth mixed with your own drool and saliva. Upon hearing your meek pleas the man mercifully started hitting your cervix with each shove until his moves became sharp and quick, targeting your g-spot. You were so close you could feel your abdomen clench and tighten from the tingling sensitations. "Please..." You uttered weakly again, making doe eyes at your brother.

"Say you love me. Tie your soul to mine forever and I'll give you exactly what you want, beloved." Henry basically growled in your ear as he groped your breasts, squizing lightly the soft flesh. Your mind was so hazy and clouded you weren't sure how to respond so you just repeated the words easiest to grasp. "Love... you... forever, ngggh..." You muttered under your breath before moaning wantonly when the forceful thrusts finally sent you over the edge and your pussy clamped down in a big, satisfying orgasm. Your bliss was short - lived because soon the ghost was pounding into you again and again, keeping you too tired to move, struggle or even speak properly besides whimpering every once in a while. The rest of the night was a blur but eventually you fell asleep from the exhausting and the pleasure.

You woke up sore, your eyes red and puffy, your muscles tense and unnatentive. You rushed to look at your brother, but the teenager was sleeping just as peacefully as he did eight hours ago. One side of you was more than glad to know everything that had happened was simply a bad, terrible dream, while the other one still felt extremely uncomfortable and uneasy. You couldn't bear staying in the room any longer so you got dressed and went into the hall. Everyone else was still asleep and you felt as restless as if you hadn't caught a blink at all. You finally gave in to your paranoia and climbed the stars leading to the third floor.

You knelt on the ground where you had found the beautiful paintings. Those green eyes from your dream seemed way too familiar for it to be a coincidence. When you finally got a hold of your favorite piece, the one with the sad young boy, you had to cover your mouth to suppress the shock. There wasn't an aristocrat with golden locks on the picture anymore.

Now the one trapped in the painting was none other than you own brother, Steve. Instead of misery and pain in mysterious blue eyes, there was only terror in his tormented black ones. You screamed for the last time before you dropped the picture on the ground and ran away from the attic, the tears streaming down your face, but unfortunately, there was no escape from the restless dead souls.

[zoraalja]

prompt: cutting corners • words: 1,075 • era: childhood • [ masterpost ] to do something in the easiest, cheapest, or fastest way.

“Annette.”

The girl did not hear the harsh whisper of her name. It became lost somewhere among the short stacks of tomes positioned between the two of them, likely tucked into some beveled edge or unable to climb the gold embossed spine of the thickest volume. Either way, the Annette in question did not lift her head from the pages of parchment in front of her.

Ink dried slowly in the Noumenon, as if time itself crawled to a near-halt to benefit the students with impending deadlines, but that also gave dread time enough to sink through her skin.

Professor Lenkeini was bound to hate her scribblings.

He always did, and he had the worst ways of showing it. Her fellow students still made fun of her for writing a sentence so singularly terrible that his tail fluffed up twice its usual size. Teachers should not make such a show of their displeasure. No teenager could come back from having their paper regarded with a snarl or defensively flicked ears.

“Your academic writing is not usually so verbose.”

Finally stirred from her anxious fervor, Annette clutched the pen in her hand. Its casing squeaked in fear of snapping.

“What?”

Olivier leaned over in his chair. He’d finished his paper two nights prior, as he was wont to do. Now, he read for pleasure from a stack of books taller than her own, each of them brimming with both intrigue and academic merit.

Annette couldn’t have been more envious.

He pressed a tapered fingertip to the margin beside the wettest ink on the page.

Aloud, he read, “What had once been a perfect cycle of Aether regeneration inside of the subject had changed seemingly overnight.”

Her soft face scrunched into a displeased pucker. When Olivier opened his mouth to continue reading from the passage, she smacked her hand down against his forearm and held up her forefinger.

“Stop that.”

Olivier arched both of his brows before settling back into his chair.

“I know that Proffesor Lenkeini requires that our papers be upwards of fifteen hundred words, but is such padding really necessary?”

Her friend never meant to be hurtful when criticizing anyone’s work. Annette knew that well. But sometimes, sharp things were just sharp without the intention of cutting; that didn’t mean they didn’t draw blood.

“N-no, I suppose not, but—”

“Is this because you waited to do this at the exact last moment?”

He was right.

When was Olivier ever wrong?

“And now you’re cutting corners on your research in order to finish before we are expected to turn them in.”

The soles of Annette’s shoes swished nervously over the polished tiles beneath them. A motion that would have comforted her the day before only felt like stalling now. Fear made everything feel miserable.

“I have no interest in this course,” she barely managed to get out, her throat gone tight to stifle the rise of bile from her stomach. Skipping breakfast in order to  spend as much time in the Noumenon as possible had been a mistake. Skipping lunch had been a grave error. “I am doing the best I can with what little passion I have for the subject.”

That seemed to satiate him.

Or, at least, he was quiet for a long moment as he flipped another page in the book he’d been reading. A great serpent crawled across the spread, the detailed drawing winding around neatly printed paragraphs. He looked to be going right for her and her paper.

Annette wondered if that could be taken as an excuse.

“I apologize, Professor Lenkeini, but an ancient serpent ate my research paper. And all of the books about Aether regeneration in the Noumenon. And at least a dozen mammets. It was a great tragedy.”

Olivier glanced at her from over the shiny golden frame of his glasses.

“Why do you find the regeneration of Aether so boring?”

Staring down at the careful tilt of her handwriting and all of the blank parchment she had yet to utilize, she didn’t quite know how to respond. Annette knew that she hated Lenkeini’s lectures. He said in twenty words what he could say with five. Maybe an overly verbose report was precisely what he deserved. Also, he had a penchant for calling on students who were clearly not paying attention rather than engaging them on even ground.

She couldn’t count the number of times he’d humiliated her during the past half-year, and there were still many months to go.

“I don’t see why the subject should be required learning,” Annette murmured. The last thing she wanted Olivier to know was that she just didn’t like the professor. Reminding him of how mean Lenkeini could be felt so childish coming out of the mouth of a fifteen-year-old. “I want to learn about history, about art and war, about people. Not about… this!”

Annette flipped one of the books in front of her shut with a huff, her shoulders sagging.

“I have no interest in becoming a healer!” She could have chewed through her pen in that moment, leaving her mouth splattered in ink. She could have torn one of the leather-backed tomes in half, right down the spine. A nearby mammet reminded her to speak quietly, and what might have been a shout became a hurried, harsh whisper. “The re-accumulation of Aether into the internal reservoirs that feed into my magic means absolutely nothing to me.”

The look Olivier gave her was one of a boy exhausted. A measured silence followed, and in that silence, there was preparation. It made the waiting even more painful.

“Come on. Stop stalling and call me an idiot already.”

Surprise shone on the boy’s face rather than acknowledgment. Hurt, rather than amusement.

“I… would never say such a thing to you,” he murmured. “You’re one of the most intelligent people in any of our classes. I know that Professor Lenkeini tests your patience. He has hurt your feelings in the past, too, hasn’t he?”

Annette gave a nod, sullen as she both looked and felt.

“Then he deserves verbose.”

A growing smile curled at Olivier’s mouth once Annette looked up at him again.

“There are a few changes I would make, however, since this paper needs be finished in an hour,” he continued, reaching for her pen and dipping it into the inkwell beside it. “In order to get you requisite word count.”

[moonctzeny]

baby, we're two strangers

pairing: jeong jaehyun x fem!reader

genre: smut

word count: 2,255

summary: "When you attend your company's black mask party, you expect free booze and boring small talk with your co-workers. What you don't expect is to meet a cute stranger, who's more than willing to take you out of your misery. You don't know anything about him, not even his name, only the two deep dimples adorning his cheeks"

warnings:  alcohol consumption, fingering, cunnilingus, smut in public (what else did you expect from me), jaehyun is a little on the subbier side at some point(??) but not really

a/n: happy birthday to our precious jaehyun! hope you like this anon, sorry it took so long :(

You always thought those business parties were a pain in the ass. You barely managed to go through 5 days a week with your co-workers without committing first degree murder, now you had to see them during your precious weekends too? The thought of you starting small talk with the lady at the front desk, or having to laugh with your boss’s terrible humour all night made you sick to your stomach. But alas, you know how much your supervisor loved those kinds of parties, and your wallet needed that promotion. He’d lecture you about how they cultivate group spirit and strengthen the company’s teamwork. You just saw it as an excuse to get drunk free of charge.

Catching your reflection in the mirror, you spot a stray hair that escaped the adhesion of your new hairspray, and you quickly brush it to place with your fingers. Your favourite black dress hugged your body, simple jewellery decorated your skin. You don’t even know why you bothered with eye makeup, the obligatory black mask for tonight’s dress code hiding most of your face already, with the exception of your red lipstick. You wonder whether the people who just quickly rushed by you in the hallways, too focused on their own deadlines and to-do lists would even recognize you.

The party was boring, just like you predicted. You’d given up long ago in trying to keep the conversation going with Matt from the IT department (who proved to be the most boring man on earth, apparently) and planted yourself right next to the booze table. You had your own little wine tasting party in the past hour, trying aged drinks from 10 years ago up to vins ordinaires. The alcohol relaxed your muscles and left a pleasant buzz in your head, effectively drowning out the dj’s playlist that only had hit songs from 2016. You were content in your solitude, satisfied with just staring at your co-workers interacting with each other, noticing who disliked who, who were the funny ones, who needed help with social interactions. But your comfortable loneliness wouldn’t last for long. 

“Mind if I join you?”

Ugh. Just what you needed. Matt from the IT department probably told his buddy, Ben - who keeps rudely staring at your skirts at work - that you’re here and informed him about your location. Maybe if you ignored him he would go away. Or maybe you’d just tell him that you suddenly need to go to the bathroom. Had he ever heard you speak? You wonder if he’d believe you if you told him you were deaf, actually.

You turned around to face the man, hoping that he didn’t know sign language when you finally made eye contact with him. This definitely wasn’t Ben. He was the most beautiful man you’d ever seen in your life.

He was tall, with loose curls adorning the top of his head. His porcelain skin seemed to absorb all the light in the room, then send it out three times as bright. He looked fit, his small waist cinched in with the buttons of his suit, filled in fully in all the right places. You could only manage a deranged hum that barely sounded human. 

Through the small holes of the black mask he was also wearing, you can tell he was staring at you. You tried to keep the eye contact but failed miserably, your heart picking up a pace that sure can’t be healthy.

“I don’t think I’ve seen you around. Do you work in the IT department on the bottom floor, maybe?”

You clear your throat, begging the wine in your system not to mess this up for you by making a fool of yourself. “I also work on the top floor. Maybe you just didn’t notice me before.”

“No no”, he insists, taking a sip from his drink as well while raking up and down at you with his eyes, “I would definitely remember”.

Your cheeks are burning up at this point and you leave your drink at the table, not trusting your clammy hands to not drop the 2017 Merlot all over the floor. You were done acting like boo boo the fool. You weren’t gonna let this one slip away.

“It’s weird, I don’t remember you either. And you seem like such nice company”

He smiles at your reciprocation and you almost gasp at the appearance of two deep dimples on his cheeks, framing his lovely smile. He looks like a mixture of a prince and what you pictured Edward Cullen to look like when you were reading The Twilight Saga as a teenager.

“What department do you work at, then?”

You have to roll your eyes. The wine has made you a little impatient, and the heat of your body was getting hard to ignore.

“Here’s the thing Dimples, one thing I really fucking hate is small talk. So how about you really entertain me out of this boring party?”

He seems taken aback by your sudden confidence, yet amused either way. He doesn’t miss the fact that you’re the one checking him out now, your whole body leaning against him.

“I figured I should be a gentleman first”

“I don’t want a gentleman. I need a distraction”

He flashes you those dimples again and you get the sudden urge to tackle him.

“I see. Wanna get out of here?”

You didn’t need to hear more. Taking his hand, you lead the mysterious stranger outside the hall area the party was held at, finding an empty bathroom. You felt naughty dragging a man - a stranger at that - to a place like this, reminding you of your days as a teenager. A cold breeze sneaking through the little window spread goosebumps all over the skin of your legs that was uncovered by your short dress, yet you were hyper aware of the heat emitted from the man’s body.

The moment your hands left the rotating lock, you felt his body towering over yours, then the pressure of his soft lips. He tasted sweet, like the liquor he had enjoyed earlier, his hands snaking around your waist to bring you even closer against him. You kissed with vigor and a passion that was burning in your belly, and you suck on his tongue to show him a sneak peek of your talents. He moans in your mouth, a deep rumble that you gladly swallow up, your fingers tugging on his locks in hope you get another one out of him.

You do, and he’s had enough, wrapping his hands around your legs and lifting you up on the counter. He’s sitting right between your legs, right where you want him most, and your dress has now well ridden up, only one layer between you. He seems to be thinking the same thing as his teeth are breaking the skin of your neck, one hand behind you on the mirror, staining the glass.

“Can I make you feel good?”, he asks with a voice filled with arousal and the want to please. In that moment, you wanted to moan out his name, followed by a ‘yes, please’ but you realised you never asked for it, and it didn’t really matter at this point. 

You nod back pleadingly, your eyes watery with how much you’re desperate for any sort of friction. He lifts the hand that had been kneading the soft skin of your hips, and places his thumb right over your lips. Like a reflex, your tongue peeks out from between your teeth, tasting the saltines of his finger. He moves it further inside, satisfied with the feeling and your tongue dancing around it, and when he has finally pushed half of it in you start to suckle the digit. 

The stranger’s eyes haven’t left your lips for a second, completely mesmerized by your mouth’s work and he messes up your red lipstick a bit, dragging his finger down your chin, leaving a red line behind. Dipping his thumb back in your mouth again, he lets you suck a little more until you have coated it with a satisfying amount of spit, then brings it right over your panties.

They are cotton, dampened from the moisture of his fingers and your own arousal. He applies pressure right over your clit, just enough to see you squirm on that counter, then continues to draw figure eights over the fabric. His finger dips in your opening on the lower curve of the number and you feel yourself get wetter, holding on tightly to the man’s broad shoulders and moaning in satisfaction.

He shuts you up with a kiss, nibbling on your lower lip as he pushes you panties aside, and you’re a little embarrassed with the printed watermelons they have on them. He toys with you a little, spreading your wetness around before finally dipping in, smirking at the way your head falls back. 

The heels of your feet are sitting stubbornly on the marble surface of the counter, knees next to your shoulders to give your new friend as much access as he needed. There was no time for you to be ashamed for showing him all of you, the pleasure was overflowing and ripping out your seams. He starts a trail of kisses from the junction of your next, sucking and licking his way to your chest, and frees one of your boobs with his other hand. The cold and arousal has your nipple stay erect and he seems to enjoy the view, sucking lightly and then harshly, while following the same pace petting your pussy. 

“Am I a good company?”, he asks you then, and you’d expect his tone to be teasing but it’s anything but. He’s looking back at you with wide eyes, expecting your feedback and you pet his hair, lowering his head down with the tiniest bit of pressure so that his mouth reconnects with your chest.

“You’re doing so good, baby. Are you going to make me cum?”

He nods eagerly and you lift him up with the collar of his shirt, and you know his expensive cologne will dwell on your fingers after you’re done. You bring him into a kiss, tasting his lips before you whisper over them.

“Then you have to try a little harder”

You could practically see the determination in his eyes, and he wastes no time as he immediately gets on his knees. His breath is cool over your hot core, the feeling sending tingles down your spine. The anticipation is so high that when his tongue finally comes in contact with your sensitivity you almost yelp. 

His talent isn’t limited to his fingers, you think as he leaves kitten licks over your clit, giving the bundle of nerves a gentle suck periodically. Just as you’re getting used to the soothing circles of his tongue he dips one more finger in, successfully stretching you open and you bite your hand to stifle your moans. You’re worried that your wetness will drip down to the floor but then you’re reminded of your panties, the friction of the fabric stimulating you even more. 

“I’m gonna cum”, you moan in a high pitched tone, bracing both you and the man feasting over you on his knees. One last suck and you’re thrown over the edge, legs shaking as you’re desperately trying to hold yourself in place, before you fall or crush his head with your thighs. He lets you ride out your high, still dipping his fingers in and out slowly, prolonging your pleasure as much as possible. When you both feel like you’re done he gets up again, drying up his chin that is wet with your come. The tent in his slacks is painfully visible, and you rub over it seductively as you also rub your still exposed nipple.

“How about I pay you back”

The stranger doesn’t have time to answer, a loud knock making you both jump in shock and you quickly get decent again.

“Is someone still in there? I really need to use the bathroom”

“Coming!”

“Yes!”

You facepalm at the dumb mistake, exposing yourselves so easily at the man on the other side of the door. He lets out a rumbling laugh, and if there was really such a thing as ‘the end of the world’ you wish to any god out there that it happens right now.

“Ahh, I get what’s going on. You keep at it kids, another bathroom became available just now. And use protection!”

You bury your face in the stranger’s shoulder, and you feel him laugh silently at the ridiculousness of the situation. He opens the door just a slither, and when he makes sure no one is waiting for you outside the bathroom, he leads you back to the main hallway.

“So that was…”

“...hot”, he finishes your sentence with a naughty smile and you swear those dimples are gonna kill you.

“My name is y/n”, you say and firmly shake his hand, the gesture too formal compared to the things you’ve just finished doing together, “I still want to thank you for that, if you do too, of course”

“Jaehyun”, he says right back, then rubs the skin right under your lips with his thumb, and his fingertip comes back red. “Sorry for that, I got a bit carried away. You have nice lips.”

“Thank you, Jaehyun”

[perpetual-help]

If I might ask, how did you return to Holy Mother Church?

Well, the short answer would be by the graces won for me by The Blessed Mother. I owe everything to her intercession.

I was a cradle Catholic who fell away from the Church during my later teenage years. I abandoned God out of anger and also out of a growing curiosity in the occult. I studied and practiced (and eventually mentored in) witchcraft for about six years. Towards the end of the six years, my pursuits into witchcraft grew darker and more sinister. To give you an example of the mindset I was spiraling towards - back then, I was becoming more acquainted with groups who condoned human sacrifice / cannibalistic rituals / cursing for the pleasure of causing chaos and misery / knowingly working with demons. I thank God that I was spared from going any further in these groups than simply learning what they do or what they encourage to be done through text, and nothing more.

I met someone I will call “H” through a mutual friend (in person.) My first impression of H wasn’t a very good one, given that I could tell from our first interaction that H was a Christian. Back then, I could differentiate between Christians and non-Christians by the feeling of the air that would surround them, and if I found them to be Christian, there would be an immediate swelling of hatred towards them. I had a tarot reading done for H and I to see whether it would be worthwhile to humor a friendship with a Christian, and the person who gave the reading claimed that H and I were actually soulmates. I took this seriously and decided that, since H and I were apparently connected in such a way, I had to make an effort towards H’s wellbeing, even if it never led to anything romantic. H attended a small Pentecostal church that would post its service online, and I would occasionally watch some of the sermons in order to mock and laugh at the ridiculousness of it. They would “speak in tongues,” give “words” to people, run around in “the spirit,” and do other things that I found stupid but thoroughly amusing. My interest was especially piqued by the idea of “speaking in tongues” - because, when some of them would “speak in tongues,” I could understand what they were saying. (More on my present thoughts about this later)

H suffered from depression, which I considered a blight to the both of us, given that we were allegedly soulmates. One Sunday, H said they did not want to go to church because of the depression, and so I offered to go with them, knowing that they would leap at the opportunity to drag a heathen to church. On my way to the church, the voices I recognized as my “spirit guides” at the time were leaving me with strong internal impressions such as: “He is going to say that your chains are breaking, ignore him.” And “he is going to single you out, don’t fall for it.” My answer to these impressions was “fine.”

When I entered the Church, I felt an immediate repulsion. People were dancing and singing pop worship songs, and I internally questioned why I had chosen to do this. Sure enough, the pastor did single me out. Most of what he said to me could be attributed to cold reading, but it was entertaining. I was told “Your chains are breaking. You wear your past bad relationship like a scarlet letter on your forehead.” and “You’re going to meet a Godly man and your relationship will be like out of movie. When you do, cling to him.” I’m not sure how to describe some of the sensations I felt during parts of the service. At times, I felt like my skin was crawling, or like my skin was burning, and other times as though my throat were closing and I was being choked. I initially brushed these feelings off and tried to convince myself that it was social anxiety, but that experience lingered with me even after the service. H and I talked a lot after church, mostly about the Bible and different parts in the scripture. I had a lot of questions and H was kind enough to offer loving and well-thought-out answers. I went home and cried, and it was the first time I had properly cried in several years. I wasn’t sure why I cried at first, but the day’s events recurred in my mind’s eye and I recalled how horrible I’d felt while people worshipped around me. At that moment, I genuinely wanted to know the truth - I wanted to know whether God was real. And, if He was real, I wanted to know whether He would help me. So, I prayed. I asked God this: “If you are real, please touch my heart so that I know.” Immediately, I enveloped by this warmth and peace, and something I can only think to describe as perfect love and tranquility. My heart felt this so intensely that it seemed to be overflowing in and through me, and I wept. I only then was able to realize how absolutely miserable and exhausted and anxious and depressed and wrathful I had been for so long. I wept, and I promised to give myself entirely to God. In return, I asked Him to help me to become a servant pleasing to Him - to love Him more, always. The demons I once considered my “spiritual guides” and “deities” showed their true colors after this experience. I would say, for the first year of my conversion, I was tormented a lot in different ways - but especially in my dreams, and by feelings of intense anxiety and despair that would be thrown upon me out of nowhere and that coupled with the sensation that the walls were closing in. The voices and impressions I once recognized as “friends” started to say things like “you can’t be saved, you’ve already given yourself to us.” among other lies. These torments continue today, and in other ways, but they aren’t as constant as they were towards the beginning.

I threw away six years worth of junk I had acquired which left my room essentially empty, but it was a liberating feeling. I started to attend the Pentecostal church, but my time there didn’t last. They hosted a woman who called herself a prophetess who spoke in tongues, but what she would say would be blasphemies. People would shout “amen” and “alleluia” to these utterances, and I began to understand that this group didn’t know how to discern the spirit. The breaking point for me was when the pastor claimed that Jesus had to learn how to perform miracles - that, and, the glaringly obvious inconsistencies between his sermons and scripture. There was an unhealthy focus on titles of ministries and “what God can do for your health and wealth.”

I lasted three months at that church before it clicked in my head that the Catholics were right. This, was also in part due to my rediscovery of the Bible verses that referred to Jesus’ command to eat His flesh and drink His blood, and a dream that followed. So, I went to confession for the first time in probably 8 or more years. It was a frightening experience and I cried during the entire confession like the wimp I am, but the liberation I felt afterwards far outweighed it all. A couple of days after my confession, I attended Mass with my mother. During the Transubstantiation, while the Priest held up The Body and Blood of Our Lord, I smelled a strong incense. I only noticed the smell because I normally disliked Church incense for how strong it is, but this one, while it was strong and impossible to ignore, it was the most beautiful smell I’ve ever encountered. (There was more crying) After Mass, I asked my mom whether she knew what kind of incense they used, and she deadpanned “They didn’t burn incense.”

Now that I have had more time to process the beginnings of my conversion and especially my encounters at the Pentecostal church, I am of the impression that I was able to understand their “tongues” because it was demons speaking through them. I’m aware that there’s a Charismatic Movement of Catholics who also claim to speak “in the tongues” but I am always wary of such claims, and I avoid such practices like the plague.

God is so merciful and so loving, and my entire life is a testament to this. I did nothing but offend Our Lord and hate all things good and Holy, but still, He called out to me and saved me from the miserable state of death I hadn’t realized I was in. All Glory to God.

As St. Germanus of Constantinople said: ”There is no one, O Most Holy Mary, who can know God except through thee; no one who can be saved or redeemed but through thee, O Mother of God; no one who can be delivered from dangers but through thee, O Virgin Mother; no one who obtains mercy but through thee, O Filled-With-All-Grace!”

For this reason, I also attribute these great graces given to me by the intercession of Our Blessed Mother, and I owe her nothing less than my life in return for this favor she has shown me.

I hope my answer has satisfied the question without being too tedious.

God bless you, and keep you.

[rostovs-lover]

dalí on tuesday

charlie dalton x reader | cursing, smoking, brief mentions of sexual things, charlie (probably) has daddy issues, cameron | she/her pronouns | fluff | wc.2562

i am in love with charlie, this is now a charlie dalton centric blog, also ignore how terrible the title is please

anon : Hi!! I love your blog! can I request a charlie Dalton x reader fluff where reader is an artist and he visits them while they're painting? (maybe they end up wiping paint on his face?) I don't know, something really sweet at cute <33333

Charlie Dalton had been resigned to relish in small pleasures to keep himself sane at school, never did he think the library would be one of those. More specifically, the painter tucked into the basement of the library. 

                            ───☮︎───

     Charlie Dalton was a connoisseur of many things. Pretty girls, expensive wine, shitty poetry, and hand rolled cigarettes - to name a few. His imprisonment at Wellington made only one of those things readily available. So he settled - boxes of cheap smokes bought through upperclassmen, bottles of grocery store wine someone would sneak in from a party, and the two girls that occasionally came with Knox. The shitty poetry was always on deck, he had that at least. It was a tragedy to be resigned to such a bland life, there was absolutely no carpe diem-ing happening in a school that held adolescent boys to uniforms.

      It was miserable, truly, but Charlie scrapped by on the thought that soon enough there would be no more stuffy Catholic school and he could finally have a taste of freedom. In the meantime, he would have what little fun he could. The meets in the cave were always the highlight of the week. A place where he could talk and people would listen, and not because they had to but because they enjoyed it. They enjoyed his words and thoughts and presence. No one else had ever really seemed to enjoy Charlie’s presence. They could tolerate it, handle it, but they always had more pressing matters. A business meeting to attend, a bill to pay, a dinner to go to. Always something just a little bit more important and never quite enough time for Charlie. But the other Dead Poets, they valued him. He wasn’t just a kid, a college tuition to pay and a life to layout. He was a person, with interests and hobbies.

      It had been there, in the safe haven of the cave, that the idea for the library first came up. Meeks had already talked Pitts into coming, Neil didn’t take much convincing at all, Todd was also easy to lure, Cameron groaned about leaving school grounds but refused to be left out, and Knox agreed to go but only if Nuwanda came too. Charlie had already started to cover what there was to do at a library, read?

      Meeks dove into the technical manuals and Pitts followed tentatively, cradling their science project in his arms. Todd had followed Neil to the S authors, Cameron was trying to chat up the woman at the register, and God only knew what Knox was doing. He had been stranded with few options. He could find the geniuses and be talked over for the next hour or third wheel Neil but that guaranteed intruding on something he probably shouldn’t. The polite thing to do would be to rescue Cameron from making a complete fool of himself, throwing bad pick up lines at a clearly uninterested college student, but it was amusing to watch.

      Charlie settled on trying to find Knox, at least then he could have some company. Said company was absolutely nowhere to be found. The rows of shelves wound in a confusing maze and Charlie was lost before he could even begin to look. Weaving around he did come face-to-face with a rather large picture of Charles Dickens that made him recoil. It was perched just at eye level above a short staircase and it seemed to judge his every movement. Charlie followed the carpeted stairs down to escape Mister Dickens’ strange little beard and beady black eyes.

      The further down the steps Charlie descended the brighter it appeared. The lower level was the children’s section. Considerably more fun than science books or Shakespeare. The big oak counter was abandoned but the lights were still on. He was alone, still.

      Charlie sighed, sitting down in one of the bright red wooden chairs. He was much too big for it but it held well under his weight. A sad stuffed bear stared dully into him from the green glossy table.

      “Well hello,” He mumbled, picking it up under the arms, “And you must be?” He cleared his throat to take on a gruff baritone, “Mister... Bearington,” Charlie sighed, that was bad. He dropped the bear into his lap, “This is so stupid,”

      “Bearington?”

      Charlie shot around in the chair, tipping himself off center and stumbling to his feet, bear still clutched in his arms, “Where the hell did you come from?”

      “A few blocks over, walked here actually.” You turned back to your work. A painting. Not just a painting, Charlie realized, a mural. It stretched the length of the wall, roughly sketched in pencil and waiting to be finished.

      He blinked, “That’s good. The wall I mean,”

      “Thank you,” Your face flustered and Charlie took notice, “It’s not much of anything yet, just an outline. It’ll look better painted.”

      He took a few steps closer, sidling up to you, “What’s it supposed to be?”

      “A forest,” You pointed to a rotund blob perched on a long line, “That’s an owl, and there’s going to be a fox somewhere down in the grass,”

      Charlie grinned, “That’s an owl?”

      “That-” you tapped the blob, “Is a shape, objectively. Subjectively, it’s an owl.”

      His brow creased, “Subjectively it’s an owl? That's like saying Mister Bearington is a rabbit, subjectively,”

      You stared at him, baffled. It was almost irritating that he could so casually come down to your domain and invade your creative bubble. And it was even worse that he talked to himself as a stuffed bear but now he was challenging your judgment on what was and was not subjectively an owl. But he had a wonderful smile and it lessened the intrusion. Plus, you had never seen a teenage boy develop an attachment to a stuffed bear as quickly as he had, “What’s your name?”

      “Nuwanda,” He grinned, setting his chin atop his bear’s plush head.

      “Nuwanda?” You blinked at him, “That’s… neat. I’ve never heard that before.”

      “What can I say? The only Nuwanda this side of Vermont. What’s your name?”

      As you opened your mouth to answer several sets of footsteps thundered down the stairs. Knox spun around the corner first, closely followed by Pitts and Meeks.

      “Charlie!” Knox called, “We gotta go before Cameron proposes to the clerk.”

      You looked at the boy in front of you, “Is Charlie short for Nuwanda, or just a nickname?”

      He shrugged, “I’m Nuwanda, subjectively. It was truly a pleasure meeting you. Can’t wait to see your thing DaVinci!” He set the stuffed bear back on the table as he made his way out of the room. With Charlie’s energy gone it became much quieter and you were plunged back into the impressionistic outline of your artwork.

      The next time a library trip was suggested Charlie didn’t completely dread it. Yes, it was still numbingly boring because it was a library and he didn’t have clerks to fall in love with, people to write love letters to, anyone to kiss in the aisles, or a spaceship to build, but he did have his own personal Van Gough to torment.

      The lower level was the first place he went, not even hanging his coat on the rack inside the big double doors. He made his way past Cameron’s preoccupied receptionist and under Dickens’ hard glower. Halfway down the steps, the smell hit Charlie. Wet paint.

      You had just picked out a brush when he pulled one of the wooden chairs next to your station. He sat in it backwards, holding Mister Bearington out in front of him, “Never got your name Monet,”

      “Well, it's not that. Or Da Vinci.” You stroked the brush up the grassy outline.

      “Do you want me to guess?”

      You had yet to look at him, “Nope,”

      “Are you gonna tell me?”

      “Should I?”

      “Obviously, I told you my name.”

      You set the brush down and turned to face him, “(Name).”

      “Pretty,”

      Charlie Dalton liked many things and the musty old library uptown had never been one of them. It had ancient red carpets and gaudy gold ceilings and it was trying too hard to look regal. So it was a sheer shock when he began to leap at the suggestion of going and even more so when he chose to go by himself one afternoon. Naturally, the other poets followed him, they had to.

      Charlie didn’t dally upstairs, waving hi to the clerk and rushing down to the children’s section. A sign was posted outside the entrance warning of wet paint but he stepped around it.

      “You’re making progress Picasso!” He set his hands on his hips and took in the wall.

      You turned back to look at him, “Did you not see the caution: wet paint, do not enter sign?”

      “Oh no I saw it,” He pushed his sunglasses up on top of his head, “It's bright orange, hard to miss, really,”

      “So you just chose to ignore it?”

      He nodded, making his way over to sit by you on the ground, “I choose to ignore lots of things, it really makes life easier,”

      You shook your head, “Are you just going to sit here and bother me?”

      “Yes, that's actually the whole reason I came today, believe it or not.”

      You blubbered in vague disbelief, “Please tell me you’re not serious,”

      “Dead serious,” Charlie grinned, leaning closer, “I had to see how your weird owl was going. And also make sure you hadn’t gone mad and cut your own ear off yet,”

      “You’ve already used the Van Gogh joke, Charles,”

      “Maybe I want your ear,”

      You paused, “You… what?”

      Charlie’s confidence cracked, “That was bad. Shit, that wasn’t supposed to sound that way. It was like, a bad pickup line? Because Van Gogh cut his ear off to send to his girlfriend,” He sighed, shaking his head, “Sorry,”

      “I mean if I had to pick someone to give my ear too I guess you would be my first choice?”

      Charlie looked at you, eyebrows pinched together, “Why?”

      You shrugged, “No one else has asked, first come first serve.” You dipped your brush back into the blue paint and went to work on a patch of flowers.

      “Huh, well I do appreciate it,” Charlie scooted closer, leaning over your shoulder. He was close, very close. When you took a breath you could smell his cologne and whatever it was he used in his hair and you could feel the edge of his sunglasses brush your ear. He brought an arm around to dip his finger into the soft sky colour on your palette. And then he wiped it on your nose.

      You gasped sharply at the foreign feeling, snapping your head to the side to glare at him, “Why?!”

      Charlie snickered, leaning back, “The opportunity presented itself, how could I just let that pass?”

      You reached back, squirting a touch of purple paint over the palm of your hand, “That was truly a horrible idea,”

      Charlie shot up just as you did, stumbling backwards, “I’m sorry-” He stuck his hands up in surrender, “I regret my actions and if I could take them back I would,”

      “Hmm, but you can’t” You took a step closer, “Surrender now and it doesn’t have to get any messier than this,”

      He pointed towards your paint coated hand, “Do not,”

      You grinned, “I might,”

      “I’m begging,”

      “Fine-” You offered him your other hand, “Truce?”

      Charlie mulled it over for a moment, “Fine, truce,” He grabbed your clean hand and you used it to pull him towards you.

          “Why on earth would you trust me?” You tugged him even closer as he shrieked and smeared your hand down his cheek, “There, now we’re even,”

      Getting distracted by your triumph gave Charlie the upper hand. He pulled you to him the same you had done to him and pressed his cheek flush to yours. The paint was cold against your skin and you jolted back, away from him.

      “Vile,” You hissed, “You are vile and evil. That's so cold. You will pay, I hope you know that.”

      Charlie snorted, “Oh please, what’re you gonna do?”

      “You underestimate me, you ass, I’ll figure something out,”

      “Will you?” Charlie grinned, “I will be waiting in anticipation,”

      “You better be,”

      Meeks elbowed back into Cameron’s ribs, “You’re going to knock me over,”

      Cameron craned his neck further to peek around the corner into the children’s section, “I just want to see, let me look,”

      “Nothing is happening-” Meeks snipped, “They’re just talking now and I might be able to hear if you could can it!”

      Cameron rolled his eyes, “Of course, whatever you say,”

      “Will you shut up?” Knox batted at Cameron’s shoulder, “They’ll see us, we’re not super well hidden,”

      “If you don’t stop talking they’ll realize we’re here,” Pitts mumbled, rolling his eyes. Cameron started to rebuttal, turning to look at Gerard but the motion knocked Meeks out of place and he gasped, stumbling forwards. This did indeed draw Charlie’s attention.

      “Meeks, what the hell?” Charlie snapped. He was in a state, sunglasses askew in his hair, paint smeared from his cheekbone down to the corner of his mouth, and his shirt was wrinkled away from his collarbone.

      Meeks stared, “Hi Charlie. Are there any textbooks down here, uh… the science ones?”

      Knox groaned, stepping out from behind the wall as well, “We wanted to see why you came here on a Tuesday afternoon by yourself,”

      Charlie blubbered, “Did you all come? Is Keating there too?”

      “He could be,” Meeks shrugged.

      Charlie rolled his eyes, “Will you leave, I’ll be upstairs in a second,” The other poets nodded, scampering up the steps to the first level.

      “Assholes, should have known they’d come,” Charlie sighed, adjusting the sunglasses atop his head, “I need to go before they decide to intrude again. I’ll see you soon though, anxiously anticipating payback,”

      He was almost out the door when you bucked up the courage to call out to him, “Charlie, wait.” You let him turn back to you before continuing, “Could I have your phone number?”

      He clicked his teeth, “Don’t have one, private school. But I’ll find the library number in the books and try to shoot you a call sometime,” He winked and started back up to his friends.

      Knox was waiting at the landing with a handful of tissues, which he shoved into Charlie’s hands, “So you’re gonna read your stupid poem about tits at a Dead Poets meet and then not tell us you’ve got a girlfriend?”

      Charlie grabbed the tissues, “Not my girlfriend, I meet her like two weeks ago,”

      “Didn’t stop Knox,” Neil elbowed him.

      Charlie wiped at his face, “Well I’m not Knox. I like her painting, she's good.”

      “It looks like she was painting you,” Cameron slapped at Charlie’s chest and he threw the tissues at him in retaliation.

      “Shut up, at least my library worker actually talks to me,”

      Cameron fumbled with the dirty material, batting it away from his chest, “You dick!”

      Charlie grinned, pulling his glasses down and starting towards the door. Something about it was thrilling, having this to himself. A little secret that he and you shared. His personal Salvador Dalí, something to look forwards to besides bad tobacco and Keating’s eccentric lectures. It was bright and exciting and he felt seen. He felt important. The blue paint he had stolen from your tray was still on the tip of his pointer finger and he wondered how long it would be until he could see you again.

 ( @interwebseriesfan24 )

[obeymefictionwriting]

Diavolo's Important Meeting

Barbatos appeared out of nowhere and grabbed my hand “MC.”

I stared at him in a slight shock. Never before the demonic butler allowed himself to be so straightforward with you. But before I could speak a word, he suddenly bowed down and said:

“Could I please ask you to accompany Young Master to the Human World? He has a meeting arranged there and I cannot leave the castle but I would really love someone to keep an eye on him while he is out there…”

“Sure!” I’ve missed home, to be honest, and was happy to get this opportunity.

“Then shall I transport you to the Castle and you leave immediately?”

I closed my eyes and when I opened them again, I was in the Demon Lord’s castle. Lord Diavolo was standing in the middle of the room, casually dressed and looking genuinely surprised.

“MC? What a wonderful surprise! But I’m afraid I cannot pay you the attention you deserve - Barbatos insists there is a meeting in the Human World… Or maybe you’d like to accompany me?”

He said the last words with such hope and happiness that I’d go to the end of the world for him. Barbatos smiled behind my back.

“Young Master, MC graciously agreed to accompany you to the meeting. I thought it would be a lovely idea to keep you company.”

“Hey, awesome!” Diavolo beamed with happiness again. “Shall we?”

He took my arm and nodded. Barbatos nodded back and, in a moment, I was transported back home.

I opened my eyes and said “Ouch!” The sun was shining bright and I almost forgot how powerful and intense the sun rays are. But in a moment, I felt something on my head. A baseball cap??

I turned to Diavolo and found him in sunglasses and a baseball cap, looking absolutely delighted.

“Look at you!” He screamed happily. “I took these caps just in case and here we are! Regular humans right?”

I smiled back at him. He looked like a child during his first visit to the amusement park and suddenly an idea appeared in my mind.

“Lord Diavolo… Diavolo”, I corrected myself, “What time is the meeting?”

“Hmmm lemme see… Oh, we still have a few hours left. I suspect Barbatos forgot about the time zone difference. Do you know what we can do meanwhile? Can you be my human world guide?”

I already had a plan ready “Sure. First stop - corndogs.”

Five minutes later, we were standing in front of a small stand where a smiley woman sold us two corn dogs. “Mustard or ketchup?” She asked Diavolo and then turned to me and winked. “What a handsome young man you got. Lucky you!”

I blushed heavily. Not that I did not want that but I wasn’t really sure if Diavolo would agree to be “my young man”... But Diavolo laughed and thanked the woman:

“Of course they are lucky - but also, they are the very best! I’m not sure sometimes I’m good enough!”

“Of course you are, honey!” The woman squeezed his cheek and Diavolo laughed again. “Look at you! These eyes are angelic!”

“If only she knew,” I thought with a smile. We thanked the woman and sat on a bench nearby.

“So how do you eat that?” Diavolo asked, inspecting his corn dog. “I suspect you dip and bite, right?”

“Yup.”

“DELICIOUS! Never have I tried such a snack! Definitely telling Barbatos about it!”

I smiled. It was such a pleasure to look at the happy and relaxed Demon Lord. At that moment, with the wind blowing his hair and his eyes glowing, he did look like a teenager on his first date. I gently wiped mustard from his mouth and couldn’t help but stroked his lips with my finger.

His eyes widened and he was about to say something but I jumped up and cheerfully said “Now it’s time to go to the beach!”

He shook his head, getting rid of the thoughts that were racing through his mind, and joined me. The beach was full of people and there were people playing volleyball, reading, and swimming. When a group of young people noticed us, one of them threw a ball at us. Diavolo instinctively caught it and asked me “What do I do with it?”

“You just throw it back - but make sure to calculate your strength. You want them to catch it.”

He obediently threw the ball and the same young man caught it, giving Diavolo a thumbs-up. The man then waved and called us.

“Hey, he wants us to join! Wanna play?”

“But what are the rules?” Diavolo was ready for anything.

“You’ll learn while playing!”

We got into different teams and the game resumed. Diavolo was a quick learner and his teammates were giving him pats on the back and thumbs-up any time he scored.

“This is so fun!” He shouted to me when falling on the sand. “I never played anything like this before!”

I ran to him and jumped right on him, laughing. “Now we can wash it all off, right? The water is really warm!”

When we got in the water, Diavolo gasped “The Devildom Ocean is so cold compared to this one! Hey, wanna ride my back?!

Of course, I did! Without any effort, he lifted me up and there I was, on his back, clinging to him tightly. I felt the warmth of his body and his solid muscles and I couldn’t help myself - I kissed him on the head lightly. He turned to me, with a strange and hypnotizing look in his beautiful eyes and then…

Threw me in the water!

“I thought you’d like to cool down” He laughed again. “Hey, I didn’t mean to…”

“Water fight!”

I splashed water at him and quickly swam to the shore. “Catch me if you can!”

“Oh I will!” He roared and started to follow me.

As soon as we got out of the water, I proposed getting an ice cream when suddenly…

“I see you are enjoying yourself, Young Master.”

Despite being in shorts and a shirt, Barbatos was still looking flawless. In his hands, two ice cream towers were standing, with huge strawberries covering their tops. “Fancy an ice cream?”

“Barbatos? But I have a meeting…” Diavolo looked confused.

“With Mister Bartos? Well, you are looking at him.” Barbatos smiled and then sighed. “Young Master, you hardly get any rest. When was the last time you had a day off? Forgive me for my conduct but I decided to make a day off for you without your consent…”

Diavolo looked at him and frowned. “Barbatos.”

“Yes, Young Master.” The butler looked really miserable.

“I order you to get third ice cream, finish it promptly and join us in a water-splashing fight. I shall be awaiting.”

“Yes, Young Master,” Barbatos smiled happily and vanished in the crowd.

“As for you…” Diavolo turned to me, his eyes glowing. “You know what I do with conspirators? Well, you have to wait till we get back to find out. And no mercy!’

He bent down and his lips nearly touched mine. “You can try begging me though”.

[bubbleteaimagines]

One-shot: Y/n Is Spiderman(Andrew Garfield Version) and goes to Forks High School, and Is a loner, and orphan. The Cullens are curious, about him, because Edward can't read his mind because of his Spider-Sense, and Alice can't see his future. Also because his blood, and scent acts as an anchor to The Cullens to control their bloodlust which makes them appreciate him more, and're always near him in school so Jasper doesn't go outta control.

the amazing spider-man

twilight one shot

twilight & spider man crossover, male!reader x the cullens

no warnings really

your senses were in overdrive as you entered the small cafeteria. not just because you were now surrounded by hundreds of chatty teenagers, but because they were there.

the cullens has been on your radar for quite a long time. having fought vampires before, it was your nature to inspect them before they became a threat.

you had known that the cullen’s were a ‘special’ breed of vampires, choosing to only feed on animals than humans.

it was nobel act but still, you had to be cautious.

you took a seat at an empty table and gently set your lunch down. after months of attending forks high school, you still hadn’t made very many friends. instead, you preferred the silence of being alone.

you took a bite out of your sandwich and just as you did, you smelled them.

looking up, you saw the five unnatural creatures walking into the cafeteria like they owned the place. the blonde, rosalie, was scowling at all the people that gawked at her. the burly brunette, emmett, had an arm around her protectivly. jasper, the one you knew had the most trouble controlling himself, was being reassured by his mate alice. and edward...well...he looked the most normal as he wore an expression that was downright miserable.

you noticed them the second they entered the cafeteria. your senses tingled, warning you of danger. but they didn’t seem to notice you though, at least not yet. it would be a couple seconds before edward realized that he couldn’t read your mind, and that your blood was calling out to them in a way different than everybody else’s.

you slumped back into your seat as the curious vampires turned to you. with your hearing, you knew that they were talking about you.

“do you guys smell that?” emmett asked his siblings, nodding his head in your general direction so fast you almost missed it.

“it’s coming him,” edward hissed, motioning towards you. “i can’t read his mind.”

“and i can’t see his future, either,” alice said worriedly.

“do you suppose he’s something supernatural, too?” jasper asked.

“not likely. just a really rare human,” rosalie said.

you almost smirked. oh, if only they knew.

shaking your head, you leaned back into your seat. you had biology with edward and jasper next. you’d learn more about them there, but for now, you enjoyed your lunch and let them speculate over who exactly you were.

the classroom filled up quickly.

and you were late, no thanks to flash thompson, a boy that seemed to have it out for you ever since you arrived.

he had tripped you in the hallway, and because of this you weren’t able to get a good seat.

you were hoping to be somewhere near the cullens, but by the time you had arrived they had already stolen your table in the back.

you scowled as you had to sit in a middle row, next to a clumsy girl named bella. you hated that you were so exposed, but luckily bella was just as antisocial as you were.

she made no move to talk or even want to acknowledge your presence during the whole class. the only time she had to speak to you was during the lab you guys were working on, and it was because she asked for a bandaid.

“papercut,” she whispered, her cheeks turning red at your expression.

you looked horrified, but it wasn’t because of her.

it was because you currently had two vampires behind you, knowing that at least one of them could barley control themselves.

you froze up, your instincts kicking in just in case you needed to stop them.

but...you dared to take a peak back at the cullens.

you didn’t know what you expected — maybe them staring at bella with dark eyes with their fangs bared or something — but in reality, it was none of that.

both edward and jasper seemed to be in complete control, not even phased by the human girl’s blood. in fact, as far as you could see their eyes were still as gold as honey.

they weren’t even looking at bella.

but that was because they had their attention on someone else.

someone who’s scent seemed to cancel out everything else in the room.

you.

the confrontation came shortly after school that day.

because you were an orphan and lived by yourself, you had the pleasure of walking yourself home.

only, that’s not quite what happened.

for some reason, you decided to walk through the forest that day and use your webs to swing around. it was honestly your favorite thing to do. there was nothing more liberating than swinging above the tallest trees, and saying hi to the birds that flew in the sky.

you had just made your way past a river and was pertched in a tree when you saw them.

or rather, your senses alerted you of their presence and a second later, they were there.

all seven cullens seemed to be gathered at the base of your tree. it shocked you, and you began wondering why in the hell they were there. you tried to hide but you knew it was no use, they could smell you.

“hello there! do you mind coming down? my family and i would like to talk to you,” carlisle, the leader of the group who you knew to be a doctor and had the most control, spoke.

his golden eyes held kindness and he held his hands up to show he wasn’t a threat. the others simply stared at you curiously.

“and how do i know you’re not being genuine?” you called back down to them, hanging onto the tree. “i’ve met your kind before. most if not all want to kill me.”

“we’re different,” a woman, esme, spoke up. “but i’m sure you already know that. because you’re different, too, right? you’re not human.”

“partially,” you found yourself correcting. “i had an...accident a few years ago. now i am what i am.”

“please, just come down. we can talk about this in a more comfortable setting,” carlisle said.

you found yourself hesitant for a moment. sure, their eyes were golden but they were still vampires, right?

but then again...if they wanted to kill you they wouldn’t have entertained you for that long. despite living forever, vampires had no patience when it came to a meal.

“...fine...,” you reluctantly agreed and got your webs ready, “i’m coming down.”

the forks breeze whipped at your face as you latched your webs onto a tree and swung down. the cullens looked absolutely amazed as you landed in front of them, unharmed.

“how did you do that?” emmett wasted no time in asking. he sounded beyond excited.

you almost smiled. “long story. i was bitten by a spider and now i have all the capabilities except i’m human,” you explained.

“fascinating,” edward whispered. “is that why i can’t read your mind?”

“or why i can’t see your future?” alice piped up.

“probably,” you merely shrugged. “but i can’t be for sure. i don’t really know much on vampires, except how to kill them.”

the family looked stunned at your revelation.

“why are you here?” rosalie asked cautiously, her body language changing to protect her family. “what do you want with us?”

“what i want with all vampires,” you told them. “i don’t wanna hurt you but i will if you hurt any humans.”

“jasper told us that you prevented that, though,” carlisle spoke up. “around your blood...he wasn’t even phased.”

“it was like everything else cancelled out,” jasper confessed. “this girl...she had a paper cut but it didn’t even bother me.”

“and it was because of him?” rosalie asked astonished.

you blushed slightly as they all turned to you.

“didn’t know i had that effect,” you muttered.

“would you be willing to talk more?” carlisle asked. “my family and i, we live not too far from here. perhaps we can talk more and see if maybe, you could help us.”

“help you? you mean like with your thirst?” you asked.

“precisely. if you can stop jasper...” edward shook his head. “i heard his thoughts. isabella is alive because of you. if we can find out more, then maybe...”

“maybe we could have a real shot at not thirsting for human blood anymore,” rosalie said.

the meeting with cullens had been strange, to say the least. but it was also nothing short of fascinating.

it took you a while to open up, but after discovering that your blood was somewhat of an anchor to them you found yourself actually wanting to help the cullens.

they weren’t bad people. and if they all had a choice, they wouldn’t be what they were.

you knew jasper especially had regrets about being a vampire. he had a hard time controlling himself around humans after decades of drinking their blood.

but now, you had decided to come to an agreement with them.

if they helped you hunt rouge vampires that were feeding on humans, then you’d stick around and help them control their thirst.

that was precisely why, a week later, the whole cafeteria stared as you walked in with them side-by-side.

for once, jasper didn’t look tortured as he walked passed the array of humans. alice didn’t have to search the future constantly wondering if he’d hurt anybody.

rosalie and emmett were over the moon at the possibly that you could help them adopt a baby since their thirst was under control.

and edward...well...

he still looked miserable, but you supposed you couldn’t help everyone. besides, it wasn’t because he had to endure thoughts coming from a room full of teenagers.

it was because, for some reason, he still thirsted for isabella swan.

but that was a story for another day.

[headcanonsandmore]

“Breaktime At The Ministry”

Summary: Hermione finds herself working into the early hours of the morning. Luckily, Ron is there to make sure she is rewarded for her efforts. (A fic to celebrate Hermione’s birthday)

(Warning, this fic contains scenes of a s*xual nature and is not ace safe)

                                                     Read on AO3.

This fic contains: cunnilingus, doggystyle, cowgirl style, office s*x, and some mild allusions to food k*nk.

~~~~~~~~

Bloody typical, it was!

Hermione Granger-Weasley was not in the habit of swearing, but sometimes she couldn’t help it.

It was night-time, at the ministry. Hermione glowered down at the stacks of papers on her desk that she had been sorting through. Even by her standards, this was too much. As a teenager, she would have probably enjoyed this. But, after spending two decades married to a certain wonderful redhead, Hermione had long since stopped enjoying working herself to the bone that much.

God, she wished she was at home. Aside from a few apricots obtained from the café before it closed, Hermione hadn’t eaten in over six hours. Normally, she would be at home, enjoying a quiet Saturday night in, perhaps cuddling in bed with Ron after an excellent lasagne he had cooked from scratch.

But, no, she had been called into the office on short notice. Apparently, there had been a sudden development in a high-profile case, and no-one else in the department with her level of authority was available.

Still, she was almost finished now.

Signing one last paper, Hermione placed it on the desk. Yawning, she rose to her feet, and began to place each paper into the safe set against the wall. Given the amount, this sadly took longer than she would have normally liked.

Finally, she placed the last one inside, and closed the safe door.

Hermione gave another yawn, and locked the safe with a flick of her wand.

‘Ms Granger-Weasley?’

Hermione’s head shot upwards to the door. She knew that voice anywhere.

‘Ron!’

In an instant, she’d crossed the room, and threw her arms around him in a hug. She gave a contented sigh as she leaned into his frame, breathing in his signature Ron scent. He smelled of home. Of baked goods, cuddles on the sofa, and of late night misadventures.

‘I missed you,’ she murmured, as they leaned against her desk. ‘It’s been a long day.’

‘Missed you too, love,’ he whispered, pressing a kiss to the top of her bushy hair. He had placed a large box on the desk. ‘Honestly, of all days for you to get called into work. Still, at least you’ve finished in time.’

‘In time?’ Hermione asked, looking up at him. ‘In time for what?’

Ron chuckled.

‘It’s now the Nineteenth of September. Your birthday.’

‘What?’ Hermione exclaimed, suddenly turning to look at the clock on the wall. Sure enough, midnight had just struck. ‘I’m…’

Her shoulders slumped.

‘I’m older.’

‘Hey, what’s with that tone?’ Ron said, his mouth quirking into his signature lop-sided grin.

‘I’m the oldest one out of our friends!’ she said, miserably. ‘I was born in the seventies, Ron!’

‘Only by a few months!’ Ron chuckled, giving her shoulder a gentle squeeze. ‘You’re barely six months older than me.’

‘Still-’

‘And I seem to recall you having no issues with me getting older.’

‘That’s because you get hotter as you get older!’

Ron’s blue eyes twinkled, and he leaned forward so that he was right up close to her ear.

‘Well,’ he whispered, the tone of his voice sending shivers down Hermione’s neck. ‘Whoever said the same thing wasn’t happening to you too?’

‘V-very funny,’ Hermione stammered, feeling her face flush. Even after almost two decades of marriage, she still found herself shocked that Ron was able to have this effect on her. ‘You’re a tall, handsome redhead. I’m-’

‘Bloody gorgeous,’ Ron whispered. ‘You being a year older isn’t gonna change how mind-bogglingly in love with you I am.’

Ron’s lips met hers, and she found herself clinging to him as their kisses lingered and became emboldened. It was blissful oblivion. Pure and simple. The outside world disappeared. There was only Hermione and the man who loved her.

Eventually, Hermione pulled away, breathlessly.

‘How about you take the weight off your feet, love?’ Ron breathed. ‘You’ve earned it after working so hard.’

With a happy squeal, Hermione found herself lifted off the ground, and placed softly into her desk chair.

‘Why would I need to-’

Hermione’s voice cut off as Ron dropped to his knees before her, his hands sneaking with expert care up her legs to the top of her skirt. His fingers curled around both the pencil skirt and the knickers beneath.

‘R-Ron,’ Hermione stammered, feeling heat begin to pool around her centre. ‘W-We’re in my office…’

‘I know,’ Ron murmured. ‘Is that a problem?’

‘W-well, no… but what if someone turns up?’

Without a word, Ron pulled his wand from his pocket, and pointed it over his shoulder at the door. He was so tall that he didn’t even to reach up high.

Hermione heard the lock in the door click, and the unmistakable buzzing sound that came with a ‘muffliato’ charm.

‘You were saying?’

‘W-well… I… I suppose there isn’t any harm in it-OOOOH…’

She slipped downwards in the chair as Ron’s hand pulled down on her skirt and knickers, the material sliding down her legs. Ron promptly threw them both over his shoulder.

‘You won’t be needing them for a while,’ he growled, as he pulled the chair closer to him. The coolness of the air on her bare skin, as well as the feel of the leather against her bare arse, was oddly thrilling.

‘R-Ron…’ Hermione breathed. ‘D-don’t leave me hanging here…’

The redhead smirked, the desire in his blue eyes encouraged by the soft tremble in his wife’s voice. Ron’s hands began to skim along Hermione’s thighs, sending shivers along her body. The heat in her centre grew stronger, and Hermione found herself perspiring.

‘Wouldn’t dream of it, love.’

‘T-then p-please-oooohhhhh….’

Ron had leaned forward, and his tongue had begun to explore.

Hermione’s legs wrapped around Ron’s head, as her brain began to discombobulate. She was vaguely aware of how constricting her blouse seemed to be as her chest heaved. Her eyes had long since fluttered shut, but she could feel Ron’s mouth still fixed in a grin against her centre.

‘Oooh… f-fuck… Ron… oh, god…’

One of Ron’s hands began to explore further up her body, his fingers skimming over her blouse. With a quick flick of his fingers, the buttons were undone. His hand came to rest on her left breast, fondling her through the lace bra she was wearing. The heat was now roaring through Hermione’s body, concentrating every atom of her being on the pleasure that was emanating from her centre.

‘R-Ron… I’m… almost…’

Ron chuckled against her, and Hermione let out a breathy gasp.

‘Do it, love,’ Ron whispered. ‘Fuck, I love you…’

Her body gave one last tremble, and Hermione felt her orgasm erupt. Her limbs sprawled out as the full force of her ecstasy rolled over her, pulsing through her being over and over again.

Gasping, she fell back against the chair.

‘Merlin, ‘Mione,’ Ron breathed, emerging from under her skirt. ‘You’re so beautiful…’

He climbed to his feet, and leaned forward, kissing her softly on the mouth. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, still half-dazed. God, Ron knew just what buttons to push with her, and Hermione was not complaining!

‘R-Ron…’

Ron’s eyes glinted in the candlelight as he stared down at her.

‘‘Mione…’

With a growl, Ron pulled Hermione to her feet, wrapped his arms around her waist as he pressed their lips together. Hermione shivered as she felt his girth throb against her stomach.

‘Someone’s excited,’ she whispered, against his lips.

‘Can you blame me?’ Ron growled, his hands now fondling her arse cheeks. ‘Merlin, ‘Mione, you drive me wild…’

Ron’s expert hands rose up her back, and a few seconds later her blouse dropped to the floor. Ron’s shirt and trousers quickly followed. Hermione felt her centre grow hotter as Ron’s pectoral muscles flexed before her. God, why was he so sexy?

‘Been a while since I was naked in the office’ she said, as Ron’s hands undid the clasp of her bra. The lacy item joined the rest of Hermione’s clothes on the floor. The reaction from Ron’s nether regions was immediate, and Hermione felt her breathing continue to grow heavier.

‘Must be at least a year,’ the redhead replied, his eyes glinting as he stared down at her. ‘Shame we can’t make this a routine.’

Ron picked his wand up where he had left in on the desk, and cast a non-verbal spell. The tell-tale signs of the contraception charm washed over them, leaving a brief purple light that disappeared after a few seconds.

‘I’m… I’m the head of the department,’ Hermione gasped, pulling down on Ron’s black boxer-briefs. ‘I can’t make a habit of shagging my husband in office hours.’

‘True,’ Ron replied, kissing her neck as he stepped out the offending material pooled around his ankles. ‘But we’re not in office hours, Hermione. And speaking of shagging…’

With a deep growl, Ron spun Hermione around, so that she was pressed up against her desk. One of his hands reached around her, closing around her left breast. Ron’s lips met hers once again, and Hermione found herself pressing her arse up against Ron’s girth.

‘Do it,’ she gasped, reaching up to wrap her fingers into Ron’s hair. ‘Make love to me, Ron.’

Ron surged forward, and Hermione was struck by the familiar sensation of being filled. The heat pulsing through her body grew more intense by the moment, as Ron continued to buck against her.

‘F-fuck,’ Ron growled, into her ear. ‘‘Mione…’

‘Ron…’

Their lips met again, and Hermione moaned against him. God, this was wonderful. Even after so many years of marriage, the attraction between them never seemed to diminish. If anything, it had deepened and developed over time, forming a bedrock of love and affection that had seem them through so much.

‘Ron…’

‘H-Hermione,’ Ron moaned, ‘The chair…’

Turning around, Ron pulled Hermione with him. Stumbling slightly. he sat down in the leather office chair, and Hermione bestraddled his lap, moving around so that she was facing him. Their lips met again, as their bodies began to buck against each other. One of Ron’s freckled hands became entangled in her bushy hair, while the other was busy fondling her arse. She could already feel it beginning to pinken.

‘I… I love you, Hermione,’ Ron gasped, his breathing ragged and intense. ‘No matter h-how old we get. You understand?’

Hermione nodded, her heart beating faster with the welling of emotion within her. Lust mixed with the sheer love she had for her husband.

‘Mione…’

‘Ron… g-god, I’m…’

‘M-me too… can… can I…?’

‘Y-yes! Do it… Ron… oooohhhh!’

Their bodies gave one last motion, and their orgasms hit. Hermione’s limbs flailed, and she fell against Ron’s chest, gasping for breath.

‘Merlin, I love you, Hermione,’ Ron breathed, his voice less ragged. ‘I love you.’

‘I love you too, Ron,’ she replied, kissing him on the lips. ‘So much.’

After their breathing had slowly calmed, they sat up in Hermione’s office chair, and cuddled against each-other, enjoying the feeling of just being with the other.

‘Do you mind if we have a slow day after we get home?’ Hermione said. ‘I could use a nice lie-in. Unless you had anything planned?’

‘That sounds good to me. Although, before we leave for home…’

Ron clicked his fingers, and his wand leapt from the desk into his hand. He then summoned the large box that he had been carrying earlier. He opened it, and Hermione was immediately aware of a sugary scent.

‘You brought cake?’

‘You were working into the early hours, Hermione,’ Ron said, cutting a couple of slices with his wand and then handing one to her. ‘I knew you probably hadn’t eaten in ages. And, well, it is your birthday cake.’

‘You’re so sweet,’ she said, pressing a quick kiss to his cheek. Ron smiled at her, and the two of them began to leisurely eat.

‘So…’ Ron asked, wrapping an arm around Hermione’s shoulder. ‘Do you feel a bit better about being a year older?’

Hermione smiled, coyly.

‘Maaybe,’ she replied, her finger running up and down Ron’s thigh. ‘Although I could probably use a little more persuading.’

Slowly and deliberately, Ron scooped a large part of cream off his slice of cake, and began to daub it down Hermione’s chest. Hermione felt her centre began to heat up once again, as Ron’s mouth twisted into his signature lop-sided grin.

‘I think that can be arranged.’

~~~~~~~~

Thanks for reading, everyone; hope you liked it!

[suzukiblu]

About 3k of handmaiden!Anakin for @thisarenotarealblog. Bit of a timeskip from where we last left off this time, so we're writing a bit out of order right now.

And a read-more, of course!

--

Obi-Wan has no idea why he's at this party, but he is. It was the Supreme Chancellor's idea, certainly. Usually the Supreme Chancellor is to blame in these situations. Obi-Wan appreciates the man's efforts, but not in this kind of thing.

“Enjoy yourself, Obi-Wan. How often do you take a break?” Palpatine says with a smile, handing him a glass of something definitely alcoholic, and Obi-Wan can’t really argue with that.

He doesn't take breaks, though.

"If you say so, Supreme Chancellor," he says, taking a sip of the drink. It is definitely alcoholic. Palpatine looks amused.

"I do," he says. "Relax. You don't have any responsibilities tonight."

Obi-Wan always has responsibilities.

He drinks the drink, though, and he listens as Palpatine makes political small talk with various senators and other dignitaries, and he follows him from group to group as he does. Palpatine occasionally ropes him into the conversations, but Obi-Wan manages to escape most of them effectively enough. It's a bit of a trick to do it without offending anyone, but he pulls it off, hopefully.

Someone gives him another drink. He’s more than glad to take it.

"Hm," Palpatine says at one point, pausing in his steps between one group and another. Obi-Wan isn't sure what's distracted him, mostly because he's just been hugely distracted himself.

Anakin Skywalker just walked into the building, is the thing. Obi-Wan has no idea where he actually is, but in his defense, the ballroom is crowded and he might be a little tipsy. Or—well, perhaps a little drunk.

But he can feel Anakin Skywalker in the Force like a force, and there is no mistaking his presence. And yes, Obi-Wan is a little drunk, but not drunk enough to miss someone so obvious as that boy. It's been years, but he's never forgotten the feeling of Anakin Skywalker’s Force presence.

He's never forgotten anything about that awful, awful mission.

He exhales, steadies himself, and has another drink. Palpatine continues making his way around the room, continues all his little small talk and pleasantries, and a few minutes later they come face-to-face with Queen Amidala.

Obi-Wan reflexively looks at Padmé, not the handmaiden in the white face paint and red lipstick and golden headdress. The handmaiden is wearing layers upon layers of shining black silk and heavy gold ornaments. Padmé and the rest of her handmaidens are in robes with a simple dark gray ombre, flanking "Amidala".

Palpatine greets Amidala, not Padmé. Amidala inclines her head in reciprocation. Padmé looks at Obi-Wan, just for a moment, and he has to look anywhere else.

She brought Anakin Skywalker here, wherever he is. He can't figure out why. The boy can't be more than . . . twelve? Thirteen, maybe?

He doesn't know.

He should know. Anakin Skywalker should be here with him, in fact, wearing Jedi robes and a padawan braid, and Obi-Wan should know everything about him.

He takes another drink.

"Such a pleasure to see you again, Your Majesty," Palpatine says, smiling serenely at Amidala. Padmé’s eyebrow quirks, and one of the other handmaidens makes a subtle little gesture that Obi-Wan only catches in the reflection of another dignitary's shiny ornamental armor. "It makes me think of home."

"And you as well, Supreme Chancellor," Amidala says. Her voice is a very close match to the way Padmé’s own voice as Amidala was, actually, though that's definitely her actively imitating it. Or she might be wearing some kind of voice modulator; it's hard to tell with all the layers of silk wrapped around her throat. "Naboo misses your company."

"Perhaps one day soon I'll have time to go back for a vacation," Palpatine says, clearly amused by the idea that he'd ever have time for one. "You remember Knight Kenobi, yes?"

"Yes," Amidala says. "Of course."

She bows her head to Obi-Wan. He bows properly in return. He could say something, but all he's thinking about is the smell of burned flesh and the weight of Qui-Gon’s body in his arms.

"Naboo is still very grateful to you, Knight Kenobi," Amidala says. Padmé is watching him intently out of the corner of her eye.

"Thank you, Your Majesty," Obi-Wan says, immediately wanting to leave. He doesn't want to be anywhere near all this black silk and bad memories. Everything about Naboo is another reminder of his failures, and Queen Amidala more than most.

He's tried so hard to be a Jedi Qui-Gon would've been proud of, but always there is Qui-Gon’s own death and Anakin Skywalker’s existence.

He can never be the Jedi Qui-Gon would've wanted.

Not that Qui-Gon actually wanted him, in the end.

But that's such a selfish, miserable thought.

"I hope the party is to your tastes, Your Majesty," Palpatine says.

"Of course, Supreme Chancellor," Amidala says, inclining her head politely.

"Good, good," Palpatine says gamely. "I'd hate to see you bored."

"We are far from bored," Amidala says. The handmaidens shift very slightly behind her, but Obi-Wan misses whatever little gesture they've made this time. He's not sure if they're communicating among themselves or just fidgeting, and he's a little too drunk to trust a guess.

It doesn't matter anyway, really. He doubts they'd be saying anything he wants to know.

Or deserves to, more like.

An attendant comes up to Palpatine and murmurs in his ear, and Palpatine pauses to listen, then smiles pleasantly at Amidala and Obi-Wan.

"I may be needed, it seems. Why don't you two catch up?" he says. "I won't be but a moment."

"Supreme Chancellor—" Obi-Wan starts warily, and Palpatine pats his shoulder.

"Offer the queen a dance, Knight Kenobi," he suggests. "I'll be right back."

". . . of course, Supreme Chancellor," Obi-Wan says, too baffled by the idea to argue it. Also he's fairly sure arguing it would come across as an insult to Amidala, so . . .

Palpatine walks away with the attendant. The handmaidens rustle amongst themselves. Amidala looks momentarily bemused, but then clears her face.

"If it pleases Your Majesty," Obi-Wan says, feeling like a fool. He holds out his hand to Amidala, who looks momentarily bemused again but takes it.

And she's not a handmaiden, Obi-Wan realizes the moment their hands touch.

She's Anakin Skywalker.

Hell.

It's too damn late to do anything else, though, so he leads the other to the dance floor. Anakin Skywalker follows with perfect manners, and they step into the dance. Obi-Wan knows it, but not quite as well as Anakin apparently does. It's not too demanding, at least, which is probably for the best for the both of them—Obi-Wan is a little drunk, still, and Anakin is wearing very heavy robes and jewelry. He doubts they're the best for dancing in, though Anakin doesn't seem to mind.

Obi-Wan can feel the handmaidens' eyes on them.

He could speak to him, he supposes, but he can't imagine what he'd say.

What could he, after everything?

"Hi," Anakin says, his voice still a near-faultless match to Padmé’s. Obi-Wan still doesn't know what to say.

"Hello, Anakin," he replies, voice pitched low so as not to carry to the other dancers. Anakin doesn't seem surprised to be recognized. Well . . . Obi-Wan supposes he remembers a bit about Jedi senses, more than likely.

"Nobody calls me that anymore," Anakin says. He doesn't make a face, but Obi-Wan gets the impression that he would, if not for Amidala’s makeup.

"What do they call you, then?" he asks. It's only polite.

"Anaké," Anakin says. Obi-Wan frowns faintly. He would've expected "Ani", he supposes, or just "Skywalker".

"Anaké?" he repeats questioningly.

"Yes," Anakin—Anaké—says. "Except my mom calls me Ani."

"Your mother?" Obi-Wan says, his frown deepening. "Isn't she . . ."

"Padmé bought her," Anaké says.

"Oh." Obi-Wan feels like a fool, again.

"You missed a step," Anaké says.

"Ah—my apologies," Obi-Wan says. Anaké’s right; he did. "It's been some time since I danced."

"You're okay at it," Anaké says, with all the unforgiving bluntness of a teenager. Obi-Wan really doesn't know what he feels right now.

"Thank you," he settles for, diplomatically. He tries not to picture what Anaké might look like without the makeup, and especially not what he might look like in Jedi robes and a padawan braid. That's something that didn't happen, and never will.

Something he couldn't trust himself to let happen.

Something he wasn't strong enough to make happen.

"So you're a knight now?" Anaké says.

"Yes," Obi-Wan says.

"Not a master?" Anaké cocks his head.

"Not yet." Obi-Wan is mostly sure that wasn't meant to be an insult, but the words stab him anyway. He should've taken a padawan by now.

He should've done a lot of things.

"Sorry about your lightsaber," Anaké says.

"What?" Obi-Wan asks blankly. He's wearing his lightsaber.

"Never mind," Anaké says. "Um."

Obi-Wan is about to say something, but then he gets a bad feeling. He tightens his grip on Anaké, and Anaké stiffens.

"What's that?" Anaké says, and then the ceiling blows up. People scream. Obi-Wan throws Anaké to the floor and shields him from the debris with his body, and Anaké lets out a startled yelp. There's already a long vibroblade in his hand. Obi-Wan has no idea where he was hiding that thing.

The handmaidens swarm them. People in armor that Obi-Wan doesn't recognize drop through the ceiling with weapons drawn and start shouting demands. The panicking dignitaries are forced back towards the walls.

Obi-Wan really wishes he hadn't had those drinks earlier.

"Fall back. Don't get pinned down," Padmé says tersely. She's right at their side, a blaster drawn from somewhere within her robes. All the handmaidens are suddenly visibly armed in one way or another, but they're definitely outnumbered.

"Padmé!" Anaké says.

"We'll cover you," another handmaiden says. Obi-Wan thinks she looks familiar, but he doesn't know her name.

They fall back, and Padmé and the handmaiden lay down covering fire. Obi-Wan draws his lightsaber and flicks it on.

He really hopes Palpatine isn't in the building right now. That's not a problem they need.

The attackers shoot back. Obi-Wan dives forward and knocks back a blaster bolt before it can hit the handmaiden. She keeps firing her own blaster over his shoulder, not missing a beat. A few more of the dignitaries and attendants scream.

"Cover!" Obi-Wan barks, slashing another blaster bolt out of the air.

"You're doing fine," the handmaiden says dismissively, firing again.

"Fé!" Padmé shouts. "Fall back!"

The handmaiden sighs, but listens. Obi-Wan covers her retreat, and they fall back towards the heavy buffet tables. Someone's already kicked them over, and they drop back behind them. Fé checks her blaster. Obi-Wan feels like throwing up, which is probably the alcohol's fault.

A few other dignitaries have pulled out hopefully not ornamental weapons and there are guards in the room too, but at this point everyone's taken cover. Obi-Wan can't see or sense Palpatine, so that's some mercy.

Assuming he's not dead, anyway.

Obi-Wan steels himself. Palpatine isn't dead. He isn't even in the damn room.

One of the attackers starts shouting again. Fé takes aim at them, but Padmé puts a hand on her arm to hold her back.

The attacker is clearly under the impression that this is a hostage situation, which is awfully optimistic of them, Obi-Wan thinks. They might have more blasters, but they're nowhere near containing the situation.

"They get one chance to surrender," Padmé says. The handmaidens all nod sharply. Anaké flips his grip on his vibroblade.

Obi-Wan . . . well, he's the Jedi here, isn't he.

"Ready to wave the white flag?" he calls out to their attackers.

"You corrupt bastards will regret your crimes!" one of them yells.

"Oh, well, I could think of a couple people we could let them shoot, then," a handmaiden says.

"Very funny, Yané," Padmé says dryly.

"I was joking?"

"I don't think we should expect them to surrender," Obi-Wan says, adjusting his own grip on his lightsaber.

"Probably not," Padmé sighs.

"Maybe if we shoot a couple of them?" Anaké suggests.

"I do have the shot," Fé says.

"I'm considering it," Padmé says. Obi-Wan wonders if they're always this prepared for chaos. They seem better organized than the guards are. Definitely better than their attackers are.

"Let me take care of this," he says. "I'm the peacekeeper here, after all."

"You've been drinking," Padmé says.

"I'm still capable of negotiating," he says with as much dignity as he can muster. He's not that drunk, dammit.

This is what he gets for letting himself get talked into going to a party.

"I'm more concerned with you being capable of not getting shot or stabbed," Padmé says frankly.

"I'll be fine," Obi-Wan says.

"You almost tripped while we were dancing," Anaké says.

"I did not," Obi-Wan says indignantly. Anaké and the handmaidens give him an unconvinced look.

Teenagers. For Force's sake.

"Just try not to die, please," Padmé says.

"I haven't yet," Obi-Wan says. The attackers fire a few rounds into the ceiling. Some people scream again, which is really not helpful. He sighs, then flicks off his lightsaber.

"We'll cover you," Padmé says.

"That's very thoughtful of you, thank you," Obi-Wan says, clipping his lightsaber to his belt. He really doesn't need the assistance, but he's not going to protest a little bit of insurance either.

Now the question is, can he stand up without getting shot?

Chances may be slim, he admits to himself.

Alright, he may need the assistance. And really, he's done more dangerous things in his life.

"Let's talk, perhaps?" he calls over to the attackers.

"We don't talk to lying politicians!" one of them yells.

"Well, I'm definitely not that," Obi-Wan says.

"Padmé’s not a liar!" Anaké says with a scowl.

"Thank you for your entirely correct priorities in this situation, Anaké," Obi-Wan says dryly.

"Traitors to the people!" another attacker yells, and takes a potshot at the table they're behind. Obi-Wan is grateful that they brought out the heavy-duty furniture for this party.

"I'm going to shoot them now, my lady," Fé says.

"Let's, yes," Padmé says, and fires back at them. The other handmaidens do the same, except for Anaké, who doesn't have a blaster and looks impatient. Obi-Wan considers pulling out his lightsaber again as the attackers return fire. At least they're focused on them, and not any of the less-protected people. No one's died yet, and Obi-Wan would like to keep it that way.

It might be a fool's hope, admittedly, but it's one he lives by.

Enough people have died on his watch in his life.

The table is starting to take some serious structural damage. Obi-Wan gets his lightsaber out again after all.

"I'm going to do something a bit dangerous now," he informs Padmé and the others. "Please don't shoot me."

"No promises," Yané says.

Well, at least they're honest.

Obi-Wan sighs, then shifts into a crouch and leaps over the table with a Force push, high into the air and over the blasterfire. He flicks his lightsaber on and lands in the middle of the attackers, and things proceed logically from there. Some of them attack him; some scatter. He's a bit more worried about the scattering ones, though it looks like the handmaidens are doing their best to pick them off.

Alright, yes, he might've needed the assistance.

Obi-Wan slices his way through opponents as they do their damnedest to kill him, and blasterfire continues to rain down around them all. He's not really sure who's shooting, at this point.

Someone screams, and Obi-Wan senses terror. He jerks his head towards it and finds an attacker doing a very bad job of taking a hostage, by which he means "being viciously stabbed by Anaké".

Very viciously.

Sweet Force, Obi-Wan thinks, then narrowly avoids getting stabbed himself.

The fight is messy but brief, and it doesn't take long. Obi-Wan has been in worse ones, certainly. He does nearly get killed once or thrice, but that's just a normal day, really, and before long he's surrounded by fallen bodies. Padmé shoots past him one last time and takes out one more attacker, and then silence falls in the ballroom.

Obi-Wan rakes his hair back out of his face, trying to catch his breath. He feels . . . pained, a bit, and not because of any injuries.

He just feels Qui-Gon like a lost limb, sometimes.

"Well, that was a bit unfortunate," he says as casually as he can make himself, flicking his lightsaber off.

"A bit of an understatement," Padmé says, standing up and dusting her robes off. The other handmaidens swarm Anaké again, who's busy wiping blood off his hands. It might not be the best example of body-doubling ever committed by the Naboo, but then again, what does Obi-Wan know about either the Naboo or their body-doubling practices. He's certainly never looked into them.

Padmé joins the group around Anaké and steps up to him to carefully wipe a little more blood off of Amidala’s makeup with her thumb. It doesn't smear, to Obi-Wan's mild surprise. He doesn't know much about makeup either, of course.

The guards come out to collect the surviving attackers, and the dignitaries and attendants start coming out as well. Most of them are wary, but they're grateful too.

Obi-Wan doesn't feel drunk anymore, at least, though actually at this point he'd like another drink or two.

He thinks about going over to Amidala and her entourage, but he can't imagine why they'd want him there.

Palpatine comes back as the guards and attendants are cleaning up, looking alarmed.

"What happened?" he says. Obi-Wan still wants another drink.

"Just a minor incident, Supreme Chancellor," he says, though the hall is trashed enough that he doubts that's a convincing statement. "Nothing to worry about."

"I see you've handled things well enough yourself, Obi-Wan," Palpatine says, looking at the lightsaber wounds on the attackers. Obi-Wan straightens up, trying not to look as tired as he feels.

"I had some assistance," he says, tilting his head towards Amidala and her entourage. Palpatine makes a thoughtful noise.

"I see," he says. "Well, it's a good thing you were here."

"I suppose," Obi-Wan says, which logically he recognizes is true, and yet . . .

And yet.

"How was your dance?" Palpatine asks, and Obi-Wan smiles weakly at him.

"Perhaps I owe Queen Amidala another," he says.

"Ah, well, there's always next time," Palpatine says, and Obi-Wan really doesn't know if he ever wants to see Amidala or Padmé or Anaké's faces ever again.

"I suppose," he says again, and watches the handmaidens fuss over the debris-covered hem of Anaké's dark robes, and feels him in the Force like a star: the lineage-brother he'll never have, the padawan Qui-Gon was never able to take, the would-be Chosen One that went unchosen. The boy wearing a queen's face like he's worn it a thousand times, so impossible to miss but so well-hidden all the same.

Obi-Wan still doesn't know what he feels about any of this at all.

He supposes it doesn’t really matter, though.

No one's going to ask him, after all.

[ash-rabbit]

Reading Recs for Each Entity

When Magnus ended, I thought back on different media that I've enjoyed, some of them fit very neatly into the dread powers, unsettlingly so in some cases, others not so much. If you enjoyed the show for it's horror, and want more of that, then I've got a list for you.

Assume everything here is rated M and has some gore, death, and general dark themes.

Beneath the cut, because there's 15 of these fears. Feel free to add on if you like. By the way, I'm citing writers, not directors when there's a movie.

Beholding

1984 - by George Orwell: Classic surveillance society. Very boring to start off with classical lit, but it was and still is a relevant commentary on society.

Psycho-Pass - by Gen Urobuchi: Has anyone read Hobbes' 'Leviathan'? It's like if that met psychological horror. This anime engages in what it means to live in a world where crimes can be stopped before their ever committed due to the Psycho-Pass system. This system allows authorities to monitor ones emotional state and likelihood of turning violent. I think there's a brief mention of sexual violence, but it's been a hot minute since I've watched.

Panopticon Theory - by Michel Foucault: Yes, political theory. I've read it multiple times (not by choice) and it offers some interesting insights into the world of the Magnus Archives. It's greatly influenced how I regard the dread powers, that being that Smirke's 14 is incredibly limiting.

Buried

Nutty Putty Caving Incident - A real life news story. The only time I can say I've felt properly horrified and deeply unsettled. If 'Lost John's Cave' was the statement that gave you nightmares, avoid this. It's true and it's tragic.

Corruption

Fate/Zero - by Gen Urobuchi: Another anime by the Urobutcher. If you thought Jane Prentiss was excellent this is the show for you. It's excellent for all sorts of reasons, and engages with other avenues of horror but when I heard the Prentiss statement, I was brought back here. Living hives, magical evil wasp larvae writhing beneath someone's skin, it happens. Your warning is that anything bad that can happen to a child, will happen to children here. I mean it.

The Picture of Dorian Gray - by Oscar Wilde: Moral decay, and it's just a damn good read. It's not conventional Corruption material, but the corruption of one's soul in the pursuit of beauty and pleasure is somewhat fitting I should think. I like it, so it's here. Also Jonah Magnus vibes.

Dark

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind - by a bunch of people: it's a movie. Not an orthodox choice but I feel the dark deals better in ignorance then the literal. Err, no spoilers, but nothing particularly bad happens, it just sort of tugs.

The Flowers - Alice Walker: A short story about innocence and ignorance. Not particularly spooky, but it hits you at the end.

Allegory of the Cave - Plato: Just a good preliminary reading that provides an alternate lens. It's not spooky, I just like it.

Desolation

All is Quiet on the Western Front - by Erich Maria Remarque: The effects of war on the youth, child soldiers, and the death of innocence. It's bleak, and miserable, but it's honest and Remarque and his family were persecuted by Nazi-Germany because the book carried 'anti-german' (anti-war) sentiments. There's a movie as well.

Pan's Labyrinth - by Guillermo del Toro: Also anti-war, with bad things happening to good people and children. A bit heavy handed with it's symbolism, but hey it's a two hour movie. Also be prepared to read subtitles. It's very good, and if you haven't seen it, I don't want to say too much.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - by Ken Kesey: There's a more popular movie version as well. Corrupt systems, cutting people down until they fit into a socially appropriate mold. It's fairly dark, and has lobotomies since that was what, the 60s? I watched this in my catholic high schools film studies class, so I don't think there's anything overly egregious. But an interesting lens for the Desolation.

The Count of Monte Cristo - by Alexandre Dumas: For a fun revenge romp. The titular count gets his revenge after everything he's ever loved has been stolen from him and looks to do the same to his betrayers. Err sexual violence happens here as well. A bit of background that might inform the reader: Dumas' father was half black and affected by the 1802 discrimination laws, causing him- a high ranking military officer to be dismissed. The precursor to Monte Cristo, 'Georges' deals more heavily in themes of colonialism and racial discrimination.

End

Masque of the Red Death - by Edgar Allen Poe: You know why this is here. Warning for plague allegories and people not properly social distancing.

Nothing in the Dark - (Twilight Zone): No words needed, it's the Twilight Zone.

Death Parade - by Yuzuru Tachikawa: This is your fun suggestion. It's light for the most part, but there are scenes and moments that will absolutely hit you.

Extinction

Godzilla - A whole bunch of people: Atomic bomb fear during a time of censorship. Everything is an allegory.

Flesh

Tokyo Ghoul - by Sui Ishida: It's the most Magnus-y out of all my suggestions and I desperately want to see a crossover between them. The manga is better as the anime tends to brutalise plot points and water down the horror. Deals with becoming a cannibal, the nature of humanity, and other things. Warning for mentions of child abuse. Kaneki has a sort of - if Martin was the Archivist vibes. Not 1-1 of course, but if I had to make a comparison, that's the one.

Lamb to the Slaughter - by Roald Dahl: Arguably more slaughter, but hey I'm not giving you any warnings. I read this short story for ninth grade english, so I'm sure you can survive this one.

Hunt

Se7en - by Andrew Kevin Walker: A movie about a detective hunting serial killer. It's excellent, there's gruesome murder scenes. It's from the 90s go watch it.

Frankenstein - by Mary Shelley: From the perspective of Mr. Frankenstein it's the terror of being hunted, from the monster's perspective it's the horror of being alone. It's good, a pillar of sci-fi written by a teenager, don't snub this because it's classical lit.

The Bone Collector - by Jeremy Iacone: Another detective hunting a murderer. Also from the 90s and also excellent. Look, the 90s don't pull their punches, it's got blood and lots of it. A favourite film of mine.

Lonely

The Metamorphosis - by Franz Kafka: Turning into a big bug does not a corruption/flesh story make.

Passengers (2016)- by Jon Spaihts: I hate this movie, it's clearly a horror, but they try to pass it as a romance. Anyway, for psychological lonely horror and manipulation, this is a movie for you.

Slaughter

Go watch a classic slasher film. I don't care for senseless violence, so I don't like most of this sort of media.

Read up on a war or a riot. Learn how your nation's government discriminates and persecutes minorities historically and today.

Sweeney Todd - by Hugh Wheeler: The musical is the better known version. Some flesh horror here as well. It's not really senseless, as I think the Slaughter should be, but hey, we need substance here.

Spiral

The Giver - by Lois Lowry: A utopia that is not quite right. Read for school when I was nine, I'm sure you can all live without a warning list.

The Matrix - by the Wachowskis: Reality is an illusion, and the Universe is a hologram.

Truman Show - by Andrew Niccol: You know why this is here.

Stranger

Coraline - by Neil Gaiman: The scariest children's book. Other!Mother and all that jazz are so very Strange.

The Landlady - by Roald Dahl: Taxidermy.

Vast

Lovecraft: I'm sorry, I can only think of him. No one else is so ignorant as to be able to capture the horror of things beyond their ken.

Web

Medea - by Euripides: The God's suck, it's a Greek tragedy, bad things happen to everyone without discrimination. Children are harmed, Medea is dosed by Aphrodite, Jason is literally the worst.

Animal Farm - by George Orwell: It's anti-authoritarian and deals with the mutability of laws and how uneducated masses are sheep. . . literally. You will feel horrified, it's a short read.

There's also some children's story about a spider/snake(?) and gluttony that I've been looking for, for the past year. It's pretty similar to Mr. Spider, but the villain consumes so many victims that he becomes too large to leave his den and is blockaded in by those he terrorized, and it's heavily implied that he starves to death. For the life of me I can't remember a title, but then, it's been 15 or so years.