#i just love myself an obscure dude huh?

[creativecuteness]

Etharah Week: Day One Dolls

Description: During a boring Evening Ethan invites Sarah to show her his action figure collection. Rambling about his interests ensures. Featuring Emily Jones who provides some snarky comments.

"They’re not dolls; they’re action figures." Ethan defended himself as he showed Sarah his collection. It was a mondain evening in the Morgen household; Jane was at her friend’s house for a sleepover, and Mrs. Weir was teaching Benny more advanced spells, leaving Ethan alone. With no one else to hang out with on this strangely calm evening, Ethan called Sarah, hoping she was free. And she was. Erica ditched her for some guy they met at the mall, and being alone just wasn’t appealing to her at the moment, so Sarah was grateful for Ethan’s invitation.

There really wasn’t a reason for her to be there since she wouldn’t be babysitting that week, but Ethan was one of her best friends. It’s not like either of them have many to turn to. Ethan being a social outcast and Sarah being a creature of the night makes it difficult to fit in with humans. At least Ethan and Dakota’s group understand what she’s going through. If she was being honest with herself, it was nice getting to know Ethan better considering they rarely get a moment of peace in this town. She didn’t even know how it happened. One moment they were chatting in the living room, the next they were heading upstairs to Ethan’s room to show her his doll- ahem, action figure collection.

"And this is a limited-edition Galaxia figure I got at Comic Con back in 08. I saved up my allowance for nearly a whole year to buy it."

"So, was it as expensive as the moon rocks you got or less then?" Emily pipped up who was sitting on the bed. She tagged along because Dakota and Mabel were on a date with Rory, so the young angel had nothing better to do besides tease the two relentlessly.

"Ummm." He hummed, "Actually, I think it was about the same price."

"Wow, talk about getting bang for your buck." Sarah laughed. It was cute seeing how passionate Ethan was about his collection, it reminded her of her own Dusk collection, which she and Erica used to spend years on. That was until she fell out of love with the series after the whole Jesse fiasco; she really couldn’t find it in herself to even look at a vampire romance novel anymore, let alone waste money on merchandise.

Gazing her eyes on the figurines from various franchises, Sarah’s eyes widened as she spotted a figure, she recognized.

"They made a Doug Falconhawk figure." She asked, picking the figure up careful not to break it. "I thought his show wasn’t popular enough."

"Oh no, I made that myself using broken figures I had lying around. He’s got Wolverine’s groin, but no figure had his iconic hair, so I sculpted that myself."

"That’s not sculpted, dude." Emily interrupted, "Sculpted hair is sculpted onto the model like precious moments or plastic toys that don’t have real hair. What you have is rooted hair, which is most common with Barbie dolls and their many rip-offs."

"Huh, I didn’t know there was a difference."

"Honestly, neither did I. Dakota and I were never big doll people, I wouldn’t have known the difference if it wasn’t for Rory and his hobby of digging up obscure and useless knowledge. Speaking of which, did Benny or Rory ever contribute to your collection?"

"Actually, they did." He smiled, grabbing a few figures off the shelf. "Benny got me this Stormtrooper figure shortly before the new Star Wars movie came out. He went to five stores and nearly had to order it on Amazon, but he managed to get the last one at a Hot Topic. I have no idea why it was there, but it meant a lot to me. And this figure Rory gave me for my 12th birthday He had a double at home and thought it’d be a good gift. I can’t say I’m as big of a fan of the show as he is, but it still looks pretty good. At the time, I thought about giving it back, but Mom said that’d make me look ungrateful, and again, he already had the same figure, so I just kept it. He was really happy to see it on my shelf."

"Wow, Eth, I gotta admit, this is quite the collection you’ve got here." Emily admired,

"I haven’t even shown you the best part." He smiled extremely pleased, Sarah and Emily were impressed, as he pulled down a prototype robot that was still in its box.

"This is Robot Robert; this was a prototype I bought on E-bay at a pretty fair price. He was a part of a cancelled toy line from a children’s cartoon I loved as a kid." The seer explained excitedly, "I’m pretty sure I’m one of the few people in the world that have it. I’m thinking of reselling it in a few years when its value goes up. This is one lost media the community would go crazy for. I can see the YouTube videos on it now."

"That’s really cute." Sarah giggled, "It gives your room a personal touch; I like it."

"Thanks, I enjoyed showing it to you." He grinned shyly, feeling a little embarrassed that he had rambled about his nerdy doll collection for over twenty minutes.

"Um, I hate to interrupt this relaxing showcase, but we've got to go." Emily said in alarm,

"What why?" Sarah asked, having a feeling it was supernatural related,

"I just got a text from Dakota; some slime monster crashed her date and is wreaking havoc downtown."

"Ugh, I knew there was something off about those chemistry class majors." Sarah groaned,

"We need to go now. Emily, get your group together and try to save as many people as you can. Sarah and I will grab Benny."

"I’m on it." She understood flying out the window.

"I’ll grab my jacket."

"Wait, hold on." Ethan said, grabbing Sarah’s wrist,

"What?"

"Well, what did you think? I know it might not be your thing, but did you at least enjoy my rambling?"

"Oh Ethan… I love it, it’s so you. Really, I think it’s cute that you’re so passionate about this stuff."

"Thanks, that means a ton coming from you. You know, maybe one day I can see your Dusk collection."

"You’d be interested in that?"

"Well, not one-hundred present. But I showed you my stuff, so fair is fair."

"Yeah, I guess that makes sense. I’ll see what I can do." She winked as Ethan chuckled.

"Hey guys." Emily said, knocking on the window, "I know you two want to do this kissy moment, but could you do it later and when you’re covered in slime?" It will have a way bigger impact. Oh, and also, the monster has grown in size and is coming this way. So, unless you want this town knee-deep in green slime or, ya know get eaten, I suggest you get a move on. Just a thought." She suggested and flew away.

The two nodded and hurriedly grabbed their things, but there was a promise that they’d show each other their growing collection again very soon.

[zackcollins]

The Great Heineman: Palm Cards || Team PR || 03/03/19

[lifewithdavefarts]

DaveFarts - Episode 16 “Just a Beer” [Episode List] After filming another session for Greg, Dave and Tom go to a pub to have a couple of beers and watch a football match together. After the game, things get a bit gassy… but Tom is no Tim.

I’m too gay to write about sport properly, so expect lots of made-up names for teams and players.

POV: Tom

Just a Beer

“And that’s one more sting from the Wasps!” I said, taking a triumphant sip of my beer.

Like half of the crowd in the pub around us cheered, while the other half complained, all eyes glued on the screen.

“You guys are just lucky as fuck!” Dave yelled back at me, in a lame attempt to mock my team. He wasn’t mad, but clearly he didn’t like losing. Who does.

Dave is, for the lack of a better word, a friend from work, and we have a very… peculiar relationship back at the workplace. Our common friend, Greg, is a wannabe movie director and he’s currently trying to make some short films about obscure kinks, including mine: fart fetish. My role is essentially the “taker”, while Dave here is the farter, and a really good one I have to admit.

Over the last few weeks we had a bunch of sessions in front of the camera, and while Greg’s films were not my first experience in regards of, well, “acting” in this genre, Dave, my straight partner, certainly is unlike anyone I ever met. He’s ridiculously chill and we bonded pretty quickly, and I’m surprised by how actually comfortable he is around me even after Greg sends us home, as not only he obviously knows that I have a fart kink, but also because my job is to basically be under his farting ass.

“Come on, Badgers!” Dave exulted, as his team almost scored a point.

So, me and this guy started hanging out a bit more after each work session, due to some common interests, and in the end we decided to watch some football matches together in a pub not very far from Greg’s warehouse. This is like the 5th time we’ve been getting mad at football players together.

“Tough night, huh?” I mocked him.

He answered with a death glare and took a silent sip of his own beer.

At this point, The Wasps (my beloved Wasps) were leading the match and we were only a few minutes from the end. I’m pretty well-versed in sports and I actually play football myself with some buds. Dave is a sport guy as well, but he’s not as cultured as I am on the subject, though it is one of our main common interests, that’s for sure.

I ordered another round of beer (I’m a noble winner, so it’s on me), which my new straight bud gladly accepted. Despite the rivalry, we had a toast, just as the match ended, with Dave and half of the pub complaining about the embarrassing defeat of their precious Badgers. Luckily, no barroom brawl ensued.

“Can’t spell Badgers without bad.” I love being stupidly petty about this.

“You know what” Dave said. “Why don’t we take this outside, bro?”

“Ohhh you wanna go outside?” I replied. “Bring it, mate!”

We both stood up as if we were ready to throw hands at each other, but this was simply our super-manly-playful way to jokingly tell each other that we were ready to leave the pub, just to have one last beer in the park across the street, where we’d usually discuss the match we just saw without the loud crowd of the pub.

Before leaving we bought two bottled beers and then left. It was relatively cold outside, but my jacket did the job. Dave was sporting his most casual “tuesday night” outfit, a green hoodie and a pair of jeans. What was odd, among other things, it’s that this is what he wore for today’s fart session, which made me think of his rough denim ass crushing my face as he blasted me. He actually didn’t fart much outside of filming sessions, which I honestly appreciated. I’m happy he’s chill but I’m not hanging out with him to get kinky.

It’s quickly become a tradition between us that, since this town is pretty dead and boring unless it’s the weekend, we simply take a walk in the empty park, probably getting mistaken for weirdos, or two dudes going on a romantic date, if you want to consider this shitty park “romantic”. We usually then look for the bench behind some trees and bushes, were we could have just a beer and chat a bit more before going home.

Yes, two guys sitting on a bench at night, drinking beer and chatting, all alone, far from everyone. We’re either the most boring men you ever met, or the gayest ones (despite the lack of any actual attraction).

“We completely destroyed you” I said, commenting tonight’s game “but I gotta admit that you got Donovan, who’s a beast. Too bad he’s the only competent player in that sewer.”

Dave was sitting next to me with his own beer. “You may be a filthy Wasp, but at least you’re not blind.”

“I’m a noble winner, I don’t kick a man while he’s down… unlike Bennet.”

“Oh please.” he said. “That was an accident, Wood fell in front of him. He literally tripped over him.” he took a sip of his beer. “If you’re looking for an asshole, just ask Foster.”

“Foster is like the best player of the last decade.” he laughed at my statement. “I can respect Donovan ‘cause at least he got skills, but your boyfriend Bennet is mediocre at best. And that middle finger he gave Reed? Totally uncalled for.”

Dave chuckled and then pointed his index finger up, a smirk drawn on his face, and looked at me.

“You know what else is totally uncalled for?”

He narrowed his eyes a bit and the silence around us was immediately broken by a loud, long fart. I felt the bench almost vibrating because of the power of that blast, as he also leaned just a bit to ease his fart out. My first reaction was a stupid laughter: fetish or not, this guy got some mad farting skills.

What was even more impressive, other than the sound and the loudness, was the length: 7 seconds and it was still going strong. I tip my imaginary hat to you.

“You see.” Dave said, after the fart faded out, sitting normally again. “That was a fart, and it was still a better point than yours.”

“Asshole.” I replied.

“Yep. That’s where it came from I think.” he joked back.

We both resumed talking about the game, past games, future games, all while carefully making our beers last longer. All taunting aside, Dave did bring up some good points (actual real points) about both teams and he also agreed with some of the stuff I said. It was a civil discussion, until he casually started ripping another one of his loud farts. I didn’t mind the interruption, maybe...

“Don’t waste your gas, dude. We gotta work together again tomorrow.” I joked.

He laughed, as his relatively short 5 seconds blast ended.

“Well, we’re hanging out. So technically we’re still at work.”

He laughed again. I was confused instead.

Dave stood up, now towering over me, then slowly turned around and lifted his leg, fully showing off his denim butt almost in front of my face. He then gently reached for my head with his hand, gradually pulling me closer to his ass.

“I guess you could say that farting in your face is literally my job.”

The fart was incredibly loud, up close and personal... but I was having none of that.

I pushed him away, perhaps a bit too harshly, before the stench could reach my nostrils.

“What the fuck.” I said.

He interrupted his loud fart and he was visibly confused by my reaction.

“What’s the matter with you?” I asked him, as I however let him sit next to me again.

I wasn’t feeling in danger or anything, but come on. A straight guy just casually face-farting someone like me as if it’s the most normal thing in the world?

“I’m sorry… I thought-“

“Oh please. You can drop the act, dude.” I was kind of mad, not gonna lie. “What are you up to?”

Dave stared at me like a confused dog for a few seconds, as if he was trying to understand what’s going on.

“What’s your endgame? What do you get out of this?” I asked. “You have a dom kink? That’s okay man, you can tell me.” I tried to sound as calm as possible, but then I said some stuff that was downright, well, an accusation. “Are… are you doing this to blackmail me later? Are you filming all of th-“

“What the fuck.” he seemed genuinely offended by those last questions. “Why would I ever do that?”

Unbelievable. “Oh shut up Dave. A straight guy, just a guy, with no fart kink whatsoever, just deciding to blast my face? For no reason whatsoever?” as I said, unbelievable. “I mean it’s already weird given what we do for Greg, but this? I’m not buying it.”

I was mad, but I didn’t want to insult Dave, though I did have my reasons to be skeptical. The guy seemed like he was looking for the right words to say in the meantime.

“I see.” he finally said, then laughed a bit. “I mean, I can’t blame you if you’re super skeptical about this. Me, a straight guy, of all people, just being suspiciously open-minded about your disgusting fetish. Clearly he’s got some ulterior motives…”

Disgusting is not a bad word for me and he didn’t look like he said it to insult me, weirdly enough. I mean, fart-sniffing? I can admit it’s weird and gross!

“But I can assure you man, I’m just a guy.”

I narrowed my eyes, I was still not buying it. “There has to be a reason. No one is that open minded.”

He just smiled a bit, staring back at me. “Look, I’m not naive. I do have an internet connection! I know this is gross.” he said, as he stood up, as if he wanted to be listened carefully. “I wouldn’t want people to know that I’m face-farting you whether it’s for a film or when we’re, you know, hanging out.”

He took another sip of beer and laughed bit more, clearly knowing how surreal this fart-related discussion was.

“But I don’t know man, perhaps I have a messed-up sense of humor. Maybe I’m just as weird or simply… I know that my bud likes it, so I think… why not?”

“Yeah. Why not having gay dude’s face up your straight butt as you fart. Totally normal.”

“OK… What do you want me to say, Tom?” he sat next to me again. “You want me to insult you? You want me to tell you to get lost? I can do it if you want but that wouldn’t be the truth!” he was sincere, against all odds. “Dude: I like hanging out with you, despite well, your obvious gross issue: being a Wasp supporter.” he joked, why was he joking?!

I was still skeptical, maybe too skeptical know, so out of nowhere I reached for his denim crotch, with no respect whatsoever of his personal space.

“Whoa. Going for the second base, man?” he said, half-serious.

What I felt was, well, nice, but indeed he wasn’t having a boner. He had no kink about farts or being dominant. And honestly I had no reason to think at this point that he was filming this to blackmail me in a way or another, when he could easily do that with the hours of fart sessions we filmed back at Greg’s warehouse anyway.

Fuck. I just realized I crotch-grabbed this guy. I quickly backed away.

“Okay, I apologise for that. This was uncalled fo- please don’t use that as a fart-cue again.”

He laughed, being super chill about my awkwardness. Fuck. I’m not awkward, I’m mad! I’m not a stuttering mess! I’m better than this!

“B-But you do understand that this still is absurd: I have the right to be skeptical.”

“You totally do.” he firmly said. “I’m sorry I made you uncomfortable.”

“It’s just… really, why would you do that? You really get nothing out it?”

Dave just shrugged and smiled. “I guess I got it all: I’m nice, cute, open-minded.” he joked. “And I’m comfortable with my own sexuality of course. You’re cool, but your face up my ass is not gonna awake anything in me, sorry dude.” he chuckled a bit.

I smiled and shook my head in disbelief, this guy truly is one of a kind. I’m not saying that all straight buds should be like him, I can accept people being disgusted by my kink, but man, Dave sure is different...

“Also, as I said, I’m aware that it’s disgusting, okay? Does that make you feel better, you freak?”

I laughed a bit. “I suppose so.”

“I know you’re not your fetish, man.” he finally said, as if this was the answer he wanted to give me like ten sentences ago. “Does that answer your question?”

“It doesn’t” I simply relied. “But in a weird way, it also does. Thanks.”

To me, it was still weird that a straight guy like him would just casually face-fart me with “no strings attached”, but I guess Dave can be trusted nonetheless, and I’m okay with that.

There was an awkward silence, but my new straight bud immediately knew how to break the ice again.

“And bro.” he said. “I’m just so good at it. Regardless of any fetish, why wouldn’t I want to share this?”

The bench shook as if there was an earthquake under the power of Dave’s blast, loud and proud as usual. It probably was the impressive rest of the fart that he tried to rip in my face earlier (what a weird sentence to say), and man, that only made his gas angrier and louder.

14 seconds, then silence, only Dave’s trying not laugh too much, with his damn smirk drawn on his face. I was impressed, and admittedly horny. I wanted to be mad, but there was something about him and what he said that, well, either he’ sincere or he’s the greatest liar in the world. I’d say the former.

“So what’s gonna happen now?” I asked.

“Same time, same place this Saturday? It’s the Wasps VS the Lobsters this weekend.”

I appreciated that. “Thanks, but I also meant, well-“

Dave simply stood up yet again, basically re-enacting what he did earlier, this time without me stopping him. Once in front of me he turned around, raised his leg and reached for my head with his hand, gently planting my face in his denim ass, immediately ripping another loud blast, a fart that he probably thought he owed me. I could inhale the stench of all of his previous blasts, as this final one made my nostrils burn.

That lasted “only” 6 seconds, but given the context, I thought it was the best one. I got farted on by Dave many times because of our filming sessions, but this one time felt different, and even better.

After that, he turned around and sat next to me again, as if nothing happened.

“Does that answer your *other* question?” he laughed a bit, and finished his beer.

No guy was able to make me look like an awkward idiot before Dave, fuck. But as I said, I appreciated that, not just for my weird kink. We both fully accepted each other tonight I guess, and I wanted to propose a toast to our weirdness, but I finished my own beer instead.

I didn’t want the face-farting to be the norm between us however, despite how I obviously appreciate Dave being ridiculously comfortable about it, but he seemed to understand that anyway.

We finally left our bench and walked towards the park exit, as it was getting late and we both had “normal” jobs to be at the next morning. As we approached the exit, Dave messaged back and forth with someone on his phone.

“Girlfriend?” I asked.

“Sort of” he chuckled. “This saturday a friend of mine is gonna join us.”

“Please not Greg!” we both laughed.

“Don’t worry. He’s my roommate. Not a sports guy but in his family they’re avid Lobster supporters.”

I faked an outraged expression. “The common enemy…” I whispered.

“I know!” he stated. “Let’s crush him!”

We shook hands as if we had a deal and called truce, temporarily ending our rivalry, because we’re very mature adults. We then went separate ways, not before exchanging a very manly bro-fist.

Thanks for the beer, but I still think you’re weird, Dave Maning. I guess you can be a good friend though, despite being a filthy Badger.

End of Episode 16

[lnc2]

this time next year

Summary: Marinette is worried about the future. Adrien wants to know where he fits into it.

A/N: This piece was written for the @mlwriterzine and I’m so excited to finally share this with you!  I hope you enjoy it and also go check out the zine because there are so many amazing stories/art pieces collected there.

AO3

The party was well underway by the time Adrien knocked on Nino’s door. Alya was the one who answered, half of her face obscured by gold tin foil pinned to a green beret.

“Speak of the devil,” she grinned, leaning heavily on the door frame.

Adrien bussed her cheek and passed over the bottle of rosé he’d swiped from his father’s wine cellar. “Sorry, Alya. The show ran late. You know how those things go.”

She waved him in, whistling at the bottle in her hands, and shook her head. “Thankfully I don’t. Everyone’s in the living room.”

Adrien followed her into the kitchen instead, eyes straying over the tipsy, crowded apartment. Back against the wall, where Nino’s faded and cracked leather couch usually sat, was a long table covered in gold plastic sheeting. Green and gold hats of various styles were littered across, as well as glitter, rhinestones, netting, feathers, and any other number of crafting materials.

He smiled. “I see you’ve all started without me.”

“Naturally,” Alya said, putting his gift in the fridge to chill. “You’re several drinks behind us now, Agreste. Pick your poison.” She gestured to the half-empty bottles of liquor scattered across the bar.

“No tequila?”

She snorted. “You’ll have to track down Marinette for that one. She ran off with the bottle half an hour ago.”

Something warm filled his chest. “A cup of ice and a lime then.”

“Good luck with that,” Alya said, bumping his shoulder as she passed him the glass. Adrien laughed as he followed her into the living room, his smile widening as he spotted Kagami fussing with the green flowers on her gold newspaper hat.

“I’m not sure how I feel about this.”

Alya batted her hand away. “It’s tradition!”

She pressed her lips together. “It’s archaic.”

“Boo,” a familiar voice called from behind him. Adrien’s heart stuttered as a familiar pair of arms slipped around his waist. “It’s just for fun. No one takes it seriously.”

Adrien thought back to earlier in the evening and Gabriel’s annual Saint Catherine’s Day gala and couldn’t agree. There was a stark difference between the frivolousness and whimsy of Nino’s house party and the staid sobriety of his father’s fashion show.

As if reading his thoughts, Marinette’s eyes sparkled up at him beneath gold netting. “At least no one here.”

“Speak for yourself,” Alya said. She adjusted her hat and threw an accusatory look towards Nino. “Tick tock, babe.”

“You won’t let me propose until you’re out of grad school,” he whined.

Adrien hid his grin as the familiar argument ensued. Instead, he tipped his cup of ice towards the half-empty bottle in Marinette’s hand.

“You’re one of the few people I’d share with,” she said, filling his glass. Adrien leaned down to whisper his gratitude only to be pushed from the other side, causing them to knock heads.

Marinette laughed waving off his apologies with a squeeze to his waist even as their assaulter continued to elbow into the group.

“I’m never getting married,” Alix announced from her position on the back of one of Alya’s coworkers. There was a crown on her head but no decorations. She gestured wildly with her free hand. “Just call me Queen Catherinette.”

“All hail,” Alya said, clinking her wine glass against a reluctant Kagami’s. Her glassy eyes strayed towards Marinette. “What about you, girl? It’s been a while since I’ve heard about Emma, Louis, and Hugo.”

Adrien tried not to sound too interested when he asked, “Who?”

Marinette laughed, her flushed cheeks flushing further. “I’m afraid that future is on hold, Al. I need to find a boyfriend first.”

She removed her arm from around his waist then and Adrien had to restrain himself from pulling her back to his side. Instead, he took a healthy swallow of tequila and let the conversation drift into less turbulent waters.

Now was hardly the time to volunteer his name to the top of her list. 

Adrien could think of two, maybe three very important conversations they needed to have before he could even approach that topic. The most pressing of which weighed heavy on his right hand and sparkled like precious gems on his lady’s ears.

He watched over the rim of his glass as Marinette giggled with the other women in their silly hats. One of them—Alix’s roommate, he thought—burst out with a jubilant, “For pity’s sake, give us a husband!” only for the others to raise their glasses with various tipsy rounds of, “Hear, hear!”

He smiled as Marinette wrestled Kagami’s fidgeting hands away from her hat. It had only been a few weeks since their reveal but Adrien was struggling to see how he could have missed the woman he’d loved for a decade in his dear and wonderful friend.

“Some party, huh?”

Adrien coughed as Nino slapped him on the back just as he was swallowing. Nino laughed at his accusing glare. 

“Sorry man,” he said, grinning. “I thought you heard me coming but I guess you were distracted.”

Adrien ignored the teasing lilt in his friend’s voice.“It’s a good crowd,” he said instead. “I’m sorry I was so late.”

“No worries. Although if everything goes well hopefully this will be the last Saint Catherine’s party we’ll be hosting.”

Adrien laughed. “You think you’ll have worn Alya down by then?”

Nino shrugged. “Fingers crossed. I’ve had this ring burning a hole in my pocket for two months now.”

“Maybe you should be the one wearing the hat.” He grinned, only to receive a rough shove to his shoulder.

“You’re one to talk.”

Adrien pretended not to understand.

“Seriously, dude?” Nino shook his head. “You’re not that slick. If you like her you should just ask her out. I know for a fact she used to have a thing for you.”

And even though Adrien already knew that, even though Marinette told him so several years earlier when her crush was a thing of the past as she’d laughingly put it, hearing his heart’s desire put into words so matter-of-factly did things to him.

Things like make him want to punch a hole in the nearest wall or tear out his hair in frustration.

Because really, how was it fair that the one woman he’d spent years chasing had actually spent several years of her own chasing him right back?

It wasn’t.

Not when Adrien still found himself in the chase and she had apparently just … stopped.

“That was a long time ago, Nino.”

“I don’t know if I’d say that.”

“... Why?” Adrien stared, stomach clenching. “Did she say something? Did Alya say something?” 

His heart raced like hummingbirds wings in his throat as he tried to catch his friend’s gaze. 

Adrien grabbed his shoulder and shook. “Nino.”

“I can neither confirm nor deny anything.” He laughed, before hiding his smile behind his glass as they caught Alya’s attention across the room. Adrien met her suspicious frown with a wave even as his other hand tightened on Nino’s shoulder. 

“But …?”

“But … I wouldn’t count myself out just yet.”

Adrien’s hand fell to his side as all of his breath rushed out of him. “Oh.”

“Although, that may change if you don’t do something about it. Sooner rather than later if Kim’s roommate is anything to go by.”

Nino nodded towards the corner of the room where Marinette was chatting with a tall brunette. He was leaning towards her, his fingers playing at the edge of the netting on her hat as he whispered something in her ear that made her laugh. Adrien was already halfway across the room when Nino shouted, “Good luck!”

He wasn’t exactly sure what he was going to do to break up their little tete-a-tete but he needn’t have worried. As soon as he was in her line of sight Marinette’s smile lit up like the Eiffel tower and there was little left for him to do other than introduce himself before the interloper tried his luck elsewhere.

“Come outside with me,” she said, tugging his arm. “I haven’t seen you all week.”

“Your fault,” Adrien said, happy to follow her anywhere. “You canceled patrol.”

Marinette rolled her eyes. “You know I had to finish up those pieces for your father’s show.”

“At least you weren’t forced to go.”

She laughed and leaned back against the balcony railing. It was cooler than usual tonight as fall slowly gave way to winter and they had the little patio all to themselves. “Perks of being a lowly intern.”

“Please,” he said, bumping her shoulder. “You’ll be a junior designer by next year.”

She hummed, taking a swig of tequila from the bottle only to cough as it hit the back of her throat.

“You can mix that with something you know?”

His lady winced and took another sip, smaller this time. “Who has time for that?”

“You if you’d just slow down.”

It was only half a joke. Lately, even before their Big Reveal, Adrien noticed something changing in Marinette. She was a little less scattered, a little more single-minded. There was almost a frenzied focus about her, like some great fear was nipping at her heels, spurring her forward.

It wasn’t until her timer ran out during an akuma attack that he began to understand why.

“It was ten years this September,” she murmured, turning out to face the cobbled streets below.

Adrien hesitated before wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her into his side.

“We’ll get him, bug. I promise.”

“But when, Chat?” She started to lean her head against his shoulder only for her hat to get in the way. Frustrated, she ripped the little masterpiece off her head and crushed it in her hands.

“Stupid holidays aside, I do want a life, Adrien.” She ripped lightly at the netting. “You said I’ll make junior designer by next year? I don’t see how that’s possible when I’m running out of work every other day because someone couldn’t control their emotions.”

Her voice caught on the last word and he was horrified to realize she was crying. “I want to run my own business someday. I want –– I want to fall in love and get married and have babies.” She looked up, teary gaze meeting his. “How can I do anything when I always have one foot out the window waiting for the next catastrophe? Who could put up with that?”

“You’re not someone a person has to put up with, my lady.”

“Yeah.” She sighed. “Right. Tell that to my exes.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, because really that’s all he could do.

“Don’t be.” She sniffed, giving him a sad, sad smile. “You can’t do anything about it any more than I can.”

That wasn’t entirely true though.

Adrien turned his attention towards the scrunched up hat in her hands. Marinette followed his gaze and gave a watery laugh.

“I want it all, Adrien,” she whispered.

“I know,” he whispered.

“Do you?” she asked, eyes wide and blue and wet and angry. “Do you really?”

Adrien pulled her to him then, giving her the hug her fears deserved. Marinette clutched at his back, her arms sliding beneath his coat to wrap around his waist, giving as good as she got.

“I don’t want to wait anymore.” 

Tears stung his eyes and words, the right words, stuck in the back of his throat as she gave voice to desires he’d never been brave enough to even dream. Not when Ladybug said no and not when Marinette said not anymore and not when they merged and became everything he’d ever wanted but feared he’d never have.

She wanted it all. 

Adrien closed his eyes and breathed in his lady’s perfume. Freesia and jasmine and something he’d never been able to name. Marinette’s arms loosened around his waist when it seemed like he would pull away, but Adrien only held her tighter.

“I––” He stopped. “You said you don’t want to slow down?”

Marinette nodded.

“Well … how—how would you feel about a chaser?”

She pulled away so she could see his face. “A chaser?” she repeated, frowning.

Adrien bit his lip, feeling heat rushing up his neck and ears. “Ah, yeah,” he said, doing his best to hold her gaze. “Like—like a partner. To your tequila, I mean.”

Adrien watched as confusion gave way to understanding in the form of a perfect little open-mouthed oh. His heart was pounding hard enough he was starting to suspect she could hear it when her eyes glistened up at him beneath the dim porch lights.

God help him but he couldn’t trust himself. He couldn’t trust the gentleness in her gaze or the way her body went soft against his or the purse of her lips as she watched him with that pleased little half-smile as realization gave way to something and that something could only be called wonderful as she ducked her head beneath his chin, pressed her lips against the open collar skin of his neck and finally, finally whispered in that small, hopeful impatient way of hers,

“Are you volunteering?”

And even though he knew she knew and even though the question really didn’t require an answer, Adrien tightened his hold on her until they were swaying together chest to chest and repeated the only thing he’d ever wanted to give her.

Yes.

[stressedoutcanary]

Hold On - Jason Todd x Batgirl!Reader [PART 3]

What this includes: Violence, a combo of angst and fluff, and just to be on the safe side I’d say language.

Word count: 3.1k

A/N😋: I am so glad it’s finally finished, now it won’t be sitting in my drafts staring at me all day. Also forgive me for any mistakes, half of it is written at 3 AM

Part 1 , Part 2

•°•°•°•°

“This is it”, you breathed out, stopping your bike near a bush making sure that place was obscure enough. You placed the helmet on the handle and hopped off the bike. After taking a few steps forward and scouting the area, you clicked your comms back on.

“O care to give me the layout of what I am getting myself into, ‘cause we all know the last time didn’t go so well”

“Nightwing said you might call me for backup and now I owe him 20 uggh! Anyways onto the problem at hand, I’m picking up a few heat signatures from the basement area and the schematics of the building indicate a vent on the other side which might help you get in.”

“Is there anything else I should know?”

There was no reply on the other end and you assumed she was looking into it. To your bad luck, it was far from it. You heard an all too familiar grunt and mentally cursed yourself for forgetting that it was an open line.

“(Y/N), I thought I made myself clear”, Bruce’s modulated voice came through which low-key made you want to strangle him with your bare hands.

“Oh come on B! Didn’t Alfred teach you that listening in on other people’s conversations is bad manners”

“We are 10 minutes out you will not be going in till we get there”

‘Like Hell I won’t’

“Hello? B? Your voice is breaking up. I can’t hear you! there is some interference in the signal. Batman?”

“Don’t- ” you clicked the comms off before he could finish his sentence and breathed a sigh of relief. ”Note to self after what you just did, avoid showing your face to anyone in the fam for at least a week.”

Snooping around, you came across the vent Babs told you about and you smirked to yourself, “Bless those idiots who decided to make an excess amount of vents throughout Gotham, plus no dumbass to shoot open the lock on any door, huh I’d say it’s going pretty good for me.”

After going through a very, very dusty vent, you silently dropped down to floor behind a goon and cleared your throat to draw his attention. As soon as he turned around, his jaw was met with your right hook, making him plummet to the ground. Grabbing him by the collar you inched closer to his face, which was yet again fully covered by a white mask.

“Alright no-face, tell me where Pyg is right now”, you made use of your deep modulated voice, making the man dart his eyes towards the far right corner of the room. You knew what that meant and without wasting any more time, you knocked him out and scurried over, finding a heavy door at the end. Somehow managing to push open the door, you were faced with a circular stairwell leading down.

“Well Oracle did say she got heat signatures down in the basement.”, you sighed and started taking calculated steps, making sure to check for any traps. ‘Why keep only one person to guard your supersecret creep-house? Either Lazlo is way too overconfident or way too crazy... Probably both.’, you thought, wheels turning in your head, hoping to make sense of the situation. As you went down, you could catch a faint sound of music. ‘Is that Opera?! Well at least it fits his M.O.’

The end of the stairwell opened into a large room. You hid behind one of wooden crates as your mind swiftly accessed the grim ambience; Pyg was sharpening his knife swaying along with opera music playing in the background but Jason was nowhere to be found. Your breath hitched and your blood ran cold, it felt as if the world around you was spinning.

‘What if... what if it’s too late’  Crouching down on the ground with your back to the crate your took in several deep breaths to calm your racing heart. You couldn’t think like that, not when you’re so close. You wiped the stray tear which escaped the tightness of your cowl and had trailed down your cheek. You tried to focus instead of jumping to conclusions.

You frowned upon noticing something odd on the wall in front of you, placing your palms on it, you gave it a slight push. To your surprise it paved way for an attached corridor which clearly didn’t come up in the schematics Oracle told you about. You slipped into the corridor, making sure that nobody saw you. Your feet froze for a slight second on the sight you were met with; cages like prison cells lined up in a row with people inside of them.

“The people who went missing”, you whispered to yourself, still reeling in the shock of it all. Upon hearing a familiar groan you sprinted across the pathway to the source, eyes scanning every inch of the person you found, the person you were here to rescue. You fumbled with the lock for a while, muttering curses under your breath until it clicked open. You dashed to his side and took a batarang out to cut the binds he was in.

“Jay if you die on me again, I swear I will kill you.”

“Been there, done that princess and honestly not a fan of it”, Jason croaked out, his reply came out weaker and voice barely above a whisper. It made your heart clench in a way it hasn’t in a long, long time. You lifted your head up, you gave him a soft smile, gently brushing off the matted hair on his forehead, 

“Jason I..”

‘Just tell him you love him you coward, It’s really not that hard’

“Jason I’m glad you’re okay”, you blurted out in way which was far from normal but he seemed way too tired to noticed. 

‘COWARD’

“How did you get free?”, he inquired, thankfully interrupting your internal yelling.

“I didn’t? I literally just walked in here to get you out.”

“But I thought-”, Jason looked utterly confused as he rubbed his wrists to ease the pain caused by the rope.

“Well long story short. You got captured. I was saved by Harley and Ivy, had a nice chat with them, and then I might have been responsible for Batman’s high blood pressure, and then I emotionally blackmailed Nightwing into giving me your location and then here I am”

“Wha...Yeah I will just pretend I totally understand whatever the hell you just said.”, Jason sighed, he tried to stand up but his feet wobbled and if it wasn’t for you catching him on time h would’ve staggered to the ground.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Mmhmm”, he hummed lightly leaning his weight on you. “Just a little dizzy, probably from the dehydration, It could also be because of the blood loss from the stab wound I got”

“The WHAT?!”, you looked at him like he was crazy.  

“Oh yeah I think I kinda forgot to tell you that the creepy dude tried to cut me open but my armor got in the way so he stabbed me instead and went away saying he had to sharpen his knife or something like that”, he started to slur and you knew you had to get him back to the cave as quickly as possible. You helped him get up on his feet, slinging one of his arms over your shoulders and wrapping one of your arms around his waist.

“Oh my God! Jay, you don’t just bring this sort of thing up in casual conversation!”, you shook your head and started taking small steps with him towards the way you came from. Suddenly a loud crash was heard followed by a couple of screams making the both of you share a nervous glance.

“What was that?”

“Only one way to find out”, you said as you walked through the door back into the large room. 

It was pure chaos, more like a free-for-all. Nightwing jogged up to you. 

“We did say we were 10 minutes out didn’t we?”, he gave you a bright smile and swung Jason’s free arm over his shoulder to help you support him better.

“Good, now since you are here, hold him”, you shifted Jason’s weight towards Dick.

“Hey-”

“Don’t even”, he glared daggers at his elder brother, “What are you even doing? I feel like a baby being passed around”

You ignored Jason’s whining in the background and fixed your gaze on the one person in the room who would soon face your wrath. The rest had already cleared up the goons and Pyg was the only one left. You narrowed your eyes and cracked your knuckles, making your way over to him.

By the time you reached Pyg he was already backing away from Batman and one murderous looking Robin, turning around he tried to make a run for it but was ultimately met with your fist, a sickening crack was heard and no one was quite sure whether it was from his mask, his jaw or both. Pyg was out cold and you shrugged at the duo in front of you while Dick and Jason made their way over.

“Remind me never to get on her bad side ever again.”, Jason whispered as both the boys looked completely terrified of you. You walked over to Bruce and held out your hand. He didn’t seem to catch the drift, for being the world’s greatest detective, he was quite dumb sometimes.

“The keys to the batmobile, unless you want Mr. surprise-I-got-stabbed over here to bleed out.”

After placing Jason into the passenger seat you hopped into the driving one. 

“Also there are people in the back, you know, the missing ones, so good luck with the clean up I guess.”, you called out before before closing the hood of the batmobile. 

You were on the road heading straight for the cave when you realized Jason wasn’t answering your questions anymore.

“Jason?”, you stole a glance at him and he was as pale as a ghost, “Shit!”, you yelled as you jammed your foot on the accelerator. 

•°•°

Jason woke up to the dull beeping of multiple monitors and by the looks of the place, he concluded he was in fact in the batcave. As he regained some control over his senses, he saw you sitting on a chair beside his bed. You were sound asleep but he could see worry etched on your face even in your slumber. Looking at you, Jason wished he had the courage to say what his heart felt instead he just went ahead taking your hand in his, giving it a little squeeze. You stirred awake at that.

“Hey! You’re up!”, you stood up abruptly and hugged him tightly. To him it felt as if you were actually afraid of what might happen if you let go of him.

“I told you I don’t do dying anymore. It sucks.”

You finally pulled away from him, a smile tugging at your lips. Jason glanced at your hand, taking it in his once again, he ran his thumb over your bruised knuckles.

“I knew you had a mean right hook, guess I just forgot how mean”, Jason said smirking at you. You didn’t pull away from him as he had expected in his head instead you just scoffed at the statement. 

“The next time you forget that, allow me to give you a reminder by demonstration Bird-Brain”, you called him by the name you often used back then. At first it was to annoy your very annoying best friend but then it stuck around but hadn’t used that nickname ever since he came back. You both realized that. A silence fell over the once playful conversation, his eyes found the celling and yours found your lap. After a while you cleared you throat to get his attention and he looked at you, his expressions were borderline unreadable.

“Jason I-I should go now, but don't worry I’ll get Alfred back here”, You got up and moved towards the door of the med-bay, scrunching your eyes shut you released a shaky breath.

‘It’s now or never (Y/N)’ 

“Jason when you get better, there is this place I have been meaning to take you to, with me of course.”

“Sure I’ll go”

“So tomorrow sounds good?”

“Tomorrow sounds good”, he repeated after you breaking into a grin. Your cheeks flushed and you had to take a sharp turn to hide the blush on your face. You mentally smacked yourself for behaving like a teen asking her crush out on a date for the first time. 

•°•°

The next night Jason met you on the roof of the Wayne tower.

“Please tell me this isn’t the place you wanted to see with me”, he chuckled behind you and you turned around to give him a quick hug.

“It’s not that bad of a place, plus I can throw you off here too if you get on my nerves”, you laughed at his faux scandalised face.

“You wound me”

“In case you forgot you are already wounded, drama queen, plus its your lucky day, this is not where we will be spending our evening. Just follow me and don’t get lost on the way”, you winked and jumped off the edge, him following the suit.

When you both reached the place you had in mind, the place Jason cherished when he was Robin, the expression on his face was priceless. It was like a mixture of awe and surprise with a hint of sadness.

“How did you find out about this?”, Jason inquired after a while of reminiscing. 

“Gee how indeed, ‘cause it cannot be the fact that I am detective who’s life is influenced by at least a dozen detectives and it’s most definitely not the fact that for me, you aren’t that difficult to figure out”

“Touché”

Jason chuckled at your usual playful sarcasm, his eyes were twinkling with something which felt more than just momental adoration and you couldn’t help but crack a small smile of your own. You made your way over to him, looking at the visible skyline for a brief moment, Jason watched as you sat down on the ledge with your legs dangling off, patting the space beside you gestured him to join you. 

“I have a feeling we’re gonna be here for a while, so might as well sit down and get comfortable”, you shrugged as he nodded and sat down beside you, placing his elbow on his bent knee. You both enjoyed the few minutes of comfortable silence, watching cars pass by below and the moon lit starry sky above.

“I am starting to see why you liked it here”

“Yeah...”

“Alfred told me”

“Huh?”, Jason looked at you dumbfounded, trying to process your words.

“After you...were gone, Alfred told me, he told me that this was your happy place, though I still can’t believe you had a favorite gargoyle”, stifling a laugh you somehow managed to continue, “Anyway so as I saying, ever since I found out about it, I used to come here every night when I got free from patrol, come to think of it I still do, sometimes”

You could feel his heavy gaze boring into you making you immediately regret bringing up this conversation. 

“Why?”, he finally inquired. You didn’t know whether to feel relived or be tense, but it was now or never, releasing a shallow breath you glanced at him, words flowing out on their own accord. 

“Even back then I knew everyone dies at some point and all we can do is try and find some meaning in it, in the memories they leave behind and I guess me wanting to be here, it was a part of me trying to do that and it made me feel somewhat connected to you so I kept doing it; Coming here, spending any time I could spare and leaving before the crack of dawn and before I knew it, it had become a habit.”

“So you did miss me”, he gave you a sad smile and wrapped his hand around your shoulder, giving you a light squeeze. 

“Of course I did you dumbass, I was best friend.”, you gave him a nudge and leaned your cheek on his chest, sighing deeply.

“The reason I avoided you after you came back was because I was scared”, you whispered, hoping it would sound less real that way. Jason pulled back a bit to take in your features and you could hear the strain in his voice, a hint of sadness in it.

“Scared of me?”

“Jason I wasn’t scared of you, I can never be, I was scared for you. I was afraid of losing you again. Every time you come back I lose you all over again and I am honestly tired of it and I thought that maybe if I kept my distance I--”

“Won’t get hurt again?”

“Yeah, something like that”

A moment passed where no one spoke anything, both of you running the scenarios of what might happen next in your brains. An idea clicked in your head and you abruptly got to your feet startling Jason in the process. Offering him your hand and a sheepish smile, you got him to his feet.

“I am tired of being scared Jason. I want this. I want us and for that I am willing to take a chance, are you?”, he stepped closer to you, his scent invading your senses.  

“For you (Y/N), anything. You should know that by now, plus I feel the same way, I have for a while now”, Jason breathed out as he pulled you in for a deep kiss leaving you dizzy for a while after you pulled away for air. Placing your foreheads together, you found yourselves grinning like idiots yet again in the two successive nights. Jason’s stomach growled, sending you into a fit of laughter.

“Hungry?”

“You really gotta ask?”, raising an eyebrow, he tried to look offended but ultimately melted against you as you pressed your lips on his for a brief moment.

“I know a place”, you murmured, lips brushing against his and before he could register what was happening you already had a grapnel gun in your hands, smirking as you jumped off the ledge.

“Last one there is a rotten egg hoodie!!”

“Hey! But I don’t even know where it is!”

“Not my fault Bird-Brain!”

Jason jumped on after you, smiling to himself. Both of you were thinking the same thing ‘maybe this was finally the start of a new chapter; something new, something scary and something beautiful altogether’

°•°•°•°•

Tags: @ladyperceval

[boognish-worshipper]

Midnight City AU

this is an au where the main characters are all young adults!! (or millennials ig? they’re in their 20s basically) i gave a rundown of what’s what on a diff post,, i’m also splitting it up into diff chapters,, so this is gonna take a looooong time to finish. i’m posting this before i nitpick my writing to the max

it’s basically a lot of references to that point in time, artists, pop culture etc. all the chapters are named after songs from that era (including the name of this au bc i love midnight city and what better way to describe LS ‼️), and the lyrics r usually connected to what the chapter’s about, or about a character dynamic :D i hope this isn’t too cheesy, or sounds off ig. any typos in this were probably over looked bc i constantly reread my writing and rearrange stuff and make sure it sounds good 🥳 hope y’all enjoy !!! i’m also including a tag to find the chapters under :)

//Chapter 1: Crimewave

Trevor would never, ever admit it, but he had fallen into the category known as “post-hipster”. This was a strange era that began culminating, taking LS by storm. Whether he liked it or not, he could never avoid it. Even if he swore up and down he wasn’t like them, it was practically a paradox. Saying he wasn’t like them just made him a branched off version of the thing he denounced. Each aesthetic that was churned out as the 2010s rolled in were tied to a style, a sound, and Trevor couldn’t care less. It’s not like people liked what he liked. He didn’t belong to anything in particular, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t like them. If anything, he just became another obscure genre in the mix.

One of his favorite music groups was a Canadian duo called Crystal Castles. He enjoyed a good number of their songs, developing an interest for electropunk and pop punk. There was something unique about the sound, and it made Trevor feel special, like he discovered some sort of hidden treasure. He was into pop punk groups like Paramore too, but it was something about them that was just different. People knew Paramore. He often lingered around Sterling Lake, where other post-irony hipsters and classic hipsters resided, careful not to fully associate with them. After all, he apparently despised them, even though he participated in their strange… “culture”. If you could even call it that. From time to time he would find himself discussing his favorite artists with whatever semi-normal person was there, making a couple friends himself who weren’t the snooty kind he’d grown used to.

They all loved talking about how exceptional their taste in music was, a wide variety of people hanging around with their own cliques. Some liked Fall Out Boy, while others liked Blink-182, and then there were the weirdos who liked groups like Radiohead. Most of those guys were whiny, proclaiming how misunderstood they were. He knew maybe one Radiohead song at most (he definitely, definitely never cried to “Creep” and even if he did, so what) but never found himself willingly getting into their music. Then you had the nosedivr crowd, which consisted of mostly girls, and the occasional hipster guy that defected. Their taste was.. alright. Consisted of artists like Lana Del Ray and Marina and the Diamonds, who were their idols. He found almost everyone there besides the few friends he made kind of edgy, and not in the cool way. But he figured all hipsters and guys like them were kind of uncool. Don’t even get him started on those other indie rock types. God. He still came back as often as he could though, establishing some kind of routine. Most people there avoided him anyway, which he preferred. He had enough troubles with them in the past. There was one day he grew tired of the people gawking at him, and he launched a hipster right into the lake. So yeah, nobody within their right mind so much as looked in his direction. That was just how he rolled.

Today, he sat on a nearby bench in Sterling Lake’s park, watching some ducks float on water. His usual friends had been there too, seeing his clowncore buddy Wade with his cousin Floyd. Wade was extremely different than the pretentious fucks around them. He had a shit ton of piercings, and ICP was his favorite music group. Floyd on the other hand, fit right in. Almost too much, like it was something he was forced to do. But he did genuinely enjoy Weezer, of all things you could enjoy. Wade started waving at Trevor, while Floyd hid behind him. All he did was awkwardly wave back, turning his attention back to the lake. He liked Wade, but the clown stuff he wore sometimes spooked him. He didn’t pay much mind to his relative. Looking back across the water, he saw someone new, observing the area. Some dude a little above the average height, hands in his pockets walking around. He seemed a bit lost, and Trevor figured he should help if he was. After all, what was this guy doing here? New people didn’t show up often.

“Hey bud, you lost or something?”

“Oh uh, nah not really. I’m just looking for this girl I met a while ago, said she hangs out around here?”

“What she look like? I’m here pretty often.”

“Uhh kinda short, dark brownish hair? Wears fishnet stockings, high waisted shorts or whatever those grunge people are into.”

“Let me guess, she into the Neighborhood?”

“How’d you know?”

“Yeah, that’s Amanda, she’s a bit of a regular. Not too fond of me I must say.”

“How come?”

“She’s just petty towards me.” He said with a shrug. He didn’t feel like relaying his encounters with her if the guy was dating her or something.

“Oh… well d’ya think you could help me find her? I don’t really know anybody else here. I could actually use the help, since you know her.”

“Eh sure, why not.”

It’s not like he had anything better to do. The two began to walk around the park, gravel and dirt crunching beneath their feet.

“So.. what’s this place about?” The strange guy asked.

“Hm? Oh, it’s just one of those places the hipster folks meet up I guess. Don’t understand it much myself, nor do I really like them.”

“Then why do you come here?”

“Dunno. It’s relatively peaceful, those freaks keep to themselves.”

The man, who was only a smidge shorter than Trevor, glared up at him.

“Hey man, don’t call my girl a freak.”

“Ehh I don’t really count her in with the generic skinny jean wearing hipsters. More of a.. what is it called.. nosedivr type. Whatever that stupid website’s called. Why do you think she dresses like that?”

“Huh.. Never really thought to ask her.”

As he thought about the stuff Amanda wore, he took note of how the man next to him was dressed. He sported an olive jacket with a black turtle neck, and a plain pair of jeans. He wore beat up black converse to top it off, and a pair of Rimmers sunglasses sat upon his head. He looked simple, yet distinguished with the way he presented himself, hair neatly combed back. He figured the two would look nice standing next to one another. They would’ve made an attractive couple, if they weren’t dating already, the kind that turns heads. Trevor wasn’t like them. He wore a black beanie over his mullet, and his favorite pair of red Dix sunglasses rested on the bridge of his nose. The rest of his fit looked disheveled. He had thrown on a wrinkled top, solid black with little surf boards and cars along the bottom- he was a sucker for Hawaiian shirts. His pants were tan colored but had some bleach stains, with old combat boots on his feet.

“Yeah, we may not like each other but I don’t really consider her a freak like those guys.”

He jutted a thumb in the direction of a circle of guys huddled around a phone. The man holding the phone had strawberry blonde hair and a clean outfit on. An expensive looking outfit.

“Who are they?”

“The people here I absolutely cannot fucking stand. The genuine hipsters.”

“Oh.. and you’re..?”

“I’m my own kind. I’m not like these losers, all uppity and shit.”

“Right. Gotcha.”

They walked around a bit more before finding the group Amanda was with. She sat on a bench, chatting with a few girls who dressed similarly to her. All of them had black incorporated into their style. She herself had a black jumper on, tucked neatly into the front of her jean shorts. Just like the guy described, she had fishnets on under them, skater shoes to match. Loose braids fell on her shoulders, and a small black choker was wrapped around her neck.

“Oh, there he is now! Babe! Over here!”

She narrowed her eyes upon seeing Trevor standing next to him.

“Hello, Trevor.” She huffed.

“Relax, I was helping your boyfriend or whatever look for you.”

Her face softened slightly, but still kept a small glare in his direction. She pressed her lips together tight before replying.

“Thanks, I guess.”

“Yup.”

The man turned to face Trevor, sticking out a hand.

“Hey, thanks for showing me around. Trevor, is it?”

“Don’t wear it out.”

He shook his hand, noticing how soft it was. It was in stark contrast to his own, which was rough and calloused.

“Name’s Michael. I’ll see you around most likely? Thanks again.”

“Yeah, no problem.”

Amanda huffed again, nudging Michael’s shoulder.

“Let’s go hun, Bean Machine closes soon!”

“I’m comin’ I’m comin’!”

The two sauntered off, hand in hand. Trevor stood dumbly, watching them walk away. He was right. They did look good together. He wondered if he would actually see this Michael again, kicking a rock. He went back to the bench he originally sat at, putting his earbuds in, listening to some Crystal Castles again to pass the time. The beat thumped in his ears, and all he could think was how much better this shit was compared to that club music shit that played on every radio station in a 5 foot radius. He sat there, scrolling through his own secret nosedivr account, reblogging some photo of a lit cigarette. Right before a hand touched his shoulder causing him to jump.

“What the fuck- Oh. Ron.”

Ron was another friend of Trevor’s, a guy he had met outside one of the iFruit stores talking about how “they’re tapping the phones they sell in there!” and all that conspiracy nonsense. He was a paranoid guy, but Trevor kind of liked that about him. Those were the kind of freaks he liked. He was shorter than Trevor, sort of frail in stature. He wore a bright red windbreaker over a faded tourist tee that read “I went to Liberty City and all I got was this lousy t-shirt!”, along with khaki colored cargo shorts. It didn’t help that he wore some goofy looking bucket hat, and socks with sandals. He dressed like someone’s middle aged father.

“Trevor! Have you seen Wade around anywhere?”

“Last I checked, he was with Floyd.”

“Did he say where he was going?”

“Uh no, but my best bet is they went to that vinyl shop Floyd’s girlfriend works at.”

“Will ya come with me to find him?”

“Now why the fuck would I do that? What do you need him for?”

“Well I- I uh- um..”

“I uh! I uh! Spit it out Ron!”

“It’s about the Merryweather Night Club.”

Merryweather was a big organization that had a wide range of private clubs all over the country, and complimentary body guards to suit. They were all expensive as fuck, and anywhere they settled jacked up the prices of everything else. A lot of neighborhoods became gentrified as a result, and people actually considered it a good thing. What a fucking joke. Trevor of course couldn’t stand it. He hated bullies, and Merryweather was no exception. He’d been wanting to dismantle the club since they settled in LS, seeing as they only amplified the fake feel of the city. Let’s just say he’s gotten into more than a few scuffles with the club. And let’s just say it ended with someone getting stabbed as a result. The guy had it coming to him anyway. Between bouncers and the clubbers, they didn’t like Trevor or his kind loitering around the joint. It didn’t stop him from plotting some sort of revenge though. Ron per usual was on board, his reason being Merryweather’s violent history that had been swept under the rug. They were rather forceful relocating people who had lived in certain neighborhoods for years, Ron being one of their victims. Wade only decided to tag along because he wanted to be included.

“Ah fuck, what’d those bastards do now?”

“They’re throwing some big party!”

“…What fucking for?”

“All I know some guy’s coming to visit, somebody they labeled important and he’s-“

“Woah woah woah wait, Ron. Who?”

“Steve Haines.” He breathed out, careful not to be overheard.

Trevor’s eyes widened, his gaze shooting over to the posse he had poked fun of before. Steve was talking to the group, all of them doing that fake laugh they always did. God, even their humor was pretentious.

“Those fucking hipsters!” He hissed.

“I abhor them, you know that-“

“I know. I know. But, that Weston guy’s gonna be there with him-“

“Weston? Devin Weston?”

If Trevor hated hipsters, then he utterly loathed rich daddy’s money boys like Devin Weston. He had only gotten that stupid fucking night club because his father paid Don Percival enough money to let Devin do whatever he pleased with the Merryweather body guards. It was an elitist club, and they only allowed the best of the best in there.

“What the fuck’s going on there?”

“Something to do with those guys he hangs out with. I think they’re doing something major, expansion maybe-”

“And him and Devin are working together or..?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t hear much after that, that’s why I wanted to grab you and Wade and-”

“Then let’s fucking go get him, Ron!”

The two rushed out of there, heading for the vinyl store to look for Wade. Trevor knew a shit storm was coming, and he absolutely couldn’t wait.

//the next chapter’s gonna be longer i promise lolz

[itsclydebitches]

(WLW anon) I really don’t like the “bad rep is better then none at all”. I hate that. We should want good rep, because bad rep has been used time and time again by homophobes as to say we shouldn’t get representation. To me it’s not “gay can have the same flaws as het”, it’s “fix the flaws in the het”. Also I know Renora being independent was a good, I was just saying in comparison BB. Also, yes, they were separated, but also didn’t stop thinking about each other. Especially bad with Yang.

Indulge me for a moment because I want to take a trip down memory lane and list some—just some—of the queer rep that has been important to me over the years:

Ellen comes out both as herself and as her character… years later, she’s a hated millionaire who is criticized for how she treats her staff

The wildly influential Buffy gives us two women entering a loving relationship… except then Tara is killed off, Willow goes evil for a time, and Buffy comes under fire for Joss Whedon’s everything

The beloved and respectable headmaster of one of the most popular book series ever published is revealed to be gay… except it doesn’t count because it wasn’t in the text and now all of Harry Potter is cancelled because JKR is transphobic

Kurt is an unambiguously gay teen in a hugely popular TV series, acting as one of the first overt representations a generation has seen… except he’s way too stereotypical and Glee is a joke now

Orange is the New Black gives us a number of queer women, including one of our first trans characters… but isn’t it problematic that they’re all criminals?

Brooklyn Nine-Nine hosts an out gay captain and gives us a bisexual coming out story that resonated with many, myself included… except now we’re supposed to hate all the characters on principle because they’re cops

Korra and Asami walk off into the spiritual sunset together… but they never kiss or anything, so that doesn’t count either

Steven Universe gives us a queer relationship and a wedding… but it’s an issue that this is just a kid’s show and, really, does it count when the rep is embodied by space rocks whose entire species only creates a single gender? Feels like a cop-out

Same with Good Omens. Yeah, Crowley and Aziraphale clearly love each other… but you never see them kiss or declare their intentions. It’s great ace rep though! Unless you want to level the criticism that asexual characters are always nonhuman

A character intended to be a minor guest becomes a show staple and eventually declares his love for one of the two main characters… except then Castiel immediately dies, Dean doesn’t respond, and they never meet on screen again

I finished Queen’s Gambit the other day and the main character had a one-night stand with a woman! … but everyone is talking about how bisexuality is used to represent her lowest point, so that’s bad too

I could go on for literal pages. Some of these arguments I agree with (Dumbledore), others I’ve pushed back against quite strongly (Crowley and Aziraphale), but all of them are valid criticisms depending on what part of the queer community you’re in and what your expectations are. My point here is that it’s all “bad rep.” I mean that seriously. If anyone reading this is scrambling for the comment section to say why [insert media title here] is actually fantastic rep, I guarantee that someone disagrees. Or if they don’t, give it some time. Just wait until the characterization becomes offensively outdated, or another part of the story ruins the relationship, or it comes out that the author did something truly horrific, or the terminology changes and it’s labeled as “problematic” now… just wait. At some point, any rep we feel is good rep now will be criticized, cancelled, and dragged through the mud. The rep that I personally haven’t seen much push-back against—like the beloved Captain Jack Harkness in Doctor Who, or Schitts Creek that just won a ton of awards—is wrapped up in the criticism, “So it’s all just about able-bodied, cis, (mostly) white dudes, huh? :/”  Even the argument that queer characters need to be written by queer authors doesn’t hold up. I absolutely adored Sense8. “Wow, a gay main character in a loving relationship with another gay man, both of whom enter a loving poly relationship with a woman, another lesbian trans main character who marries the love of her life on screen, an entire cast arguably queer due to them sharing orgy scenes centered around the emotional intimacy they share, everyone survives, and this was written by two trans women! Great, right?” Well, not according to the wealth of opinions explaining how Sense8 is horrible rep, actually. Every piece of rep we’ve got is either currently flawed or will become flawed in the future.

So what do we do with that?

That’s where my “I’d rather have bad rep than no rep at all” comes in. For me, that’s not waving the white flag. That’s not an oath that I won’t expect better rep in the future (I do) or that I won’t criticize the rep we get (BOY DO I), but rather just an acknowledgement of reality. The vast majority—if not the entirety—of rep is “bad rep” in one way or another, but I’d still rather have it than nothing at all. Because I’ve lived just long enough and studied media just enough to know what nothing looked like. It was watching all queer characters meet untimely deaths. Before that it was watching queer characters be derided and treated as jokes. Before that it was nothing but coding, where queer characters didn’t exist except in our own headcanons and interpretations. Obviously “bad rep” covers a very large range of issues and “They haven’t even confirmed this relationship yet” is a bigger issue than “This queer character embodies one or two, mild stereotypes,” but ultimately I’d take any of it over nothing at all. And enjoying what we’ve currently got doesn’t mean I’m willing to settle for it indefinitely.

To use an iffy analogy, imagine there’s a factory. This factory makes plates. So. Many. Plates. Big plates, small plates, plain plates, decorative plates, plates for every possible occasion in your life—and everyone with a steak for dinner is pleased as punch. You though? You’ve got soup. You need a bowl. Your entire life you’ve been struggling to eat your soup off a plate (it doesn’t work) and listening to friends and family claim that the plate with a slightly raised edge could be a bowl if you squint (it’s not). To say it’s frustrating is an understatement.

But then, one day, the factory starts producing bowls too. Hurray! Except as soon as you get your hands on one, you’re told you really shouldn’t be using it, let alone praising it. Look at the state of that bowl! It’s cracked right down the middle, ugly as hell, shoddily made all around… you’re not really going to settle for that, are you? And no, you obviously still want the factory to produce better bowls, but at the same time, this is a bowl. You’ve never gotten one before and you can finally enjoy your meal, even if the soup leaks at times. Sometimes a lot. But you’re still feeling better about your meal than you ever have before. And what you then begin to realize is that lots of the plates are a mess too. They also have cracks, they’re also ugly, many are also shoddily made. The difference is that the factory is producing so many plates at such a rapid pace that every steak eater is able to get by. One plate breaks completely? You’ve got a thousand fallbacks. Don’t like the look of this one? A thousand other options. You disagree about what “shoddily made” means? Luckily there are enough plates that everyone can find what they prefer! But the bowls… there’s only a few. Some are really expensive. Others are only available for a limited time before they suddenly disappear. Your bowl breaks and you have to wait months, years sometimes, to get another one. You’re constantly told to go buy this one obscure bowl no one else has heard about and yeah, you like it... but you’d also like to buy one of the bowls everyone is already enjoying. You find yourself looking at the plates and thinking, “I’d like that. I’d like to have so many options that the flaws, while still a problem, are much more bearable.” You’re still going to demand that the factory get its shit together, you’re still going to (rightly) complain about the awful quality of your bowl… but it’s still nice to have a bowl, period. There are still things you like about it, even if it’s a mess: the color, the size, the beauty of the shape of it. Its potential. You’re still pleased you have something to enjoy and that helps serve the need you’re looking to fill, even if that something is imperfect.

That’s “bad rep is better than no rep.” To bring this very long response back to Blake/Yang, I don’t think their problems negate their benefits. Is their relationship currently non-canonical and filled with a number of writing issues everyone has a right to be angry about? Yup. I express that anger a great deal. Are they still half of a team on a very popular show that is (presumably) set to be canonized as queer? Yup. I’d much rather live in a world where big shows like RWBY try to include queer rep and fail in a multitude of ways—with the expectation and hope that they’ll continue to improve—rather than in a world where authors a) don’t care or b) are too scared to try. Because that’s where a “good rep or no rep” stance leads. The danger isn’t homophobes because they’re, well, homophobes. It doesn’t matter if the rep is good or not, they hate it on principle. But if queer authors writing for other queer identities, or allies writing queer identities, or even queer authors writing their own experiences (like in Sense8) continually come under non-stop fire for their attempts… there’s a good chance that many people won’t ever try. We’re already seeing that here on tumblr with young authors admitting that they wouldn’t touch [insert topic here] with a ten-foot pole because just look at what happens when you get it wrong. And authors will get things wrong because authors are fallible people forever unlearning their own ignorance. So though it might sound strange coming from a blog that has turned into such a RWBY critical space, I am glad that RWBY’s queer rep exists, despite all the frustrations that I share about it. I think a RWBY with various types of “bad” queer rep is better than a RWBY with no queer rep at all, particularly when “bad” or “good” is so intensely subjective. There’s a middle ground between passively accepting whatever we’re given, and tearing into rep with such ferocity that we end up rejecting it all. There’s a space where we can be critical of rep and embrace the parts that work for us, simultaneously.

I hope and expect the het rep will get better too, but… that’s never going to happen instantly. To quote RWBY, there’s no magic wand we can wave to fix all our problems. Rather, it will take slow, plodding, meandering, lifetimes’ worth of work to see that change occur and I personally don’t want to spend the one life I have waiting for that perfect rep to show up. Because it’s unlikely that it will. While we work, I’d rather find the good in what rep we’ve already got.  

[some-dr-writings]

Affection starved Kokichi x Reader One-shot: Dancing at a Distance

Being with Kokichi Oma was a rather strange experience. You always had company yet after that moment, you feel lonely. You were happy but when looking back on your time together, it was sad. It was an almost surreal experience. Though he was a liar you had no doubt he cared about you and yet…

“Hey, Oma… care to dance with me?” You never knew you could get so many answers from that one simple question, but no matter how he phrased it, no matter how he ‘danced’ around the question, the sentiment was the same. No. You didn’t want to be pushy, but any explanation would have been appreciated, even a fake one,  or ‘I just don’t want to’, but he never gave you anything to work with, it seemed he more so didn’t answer at all. And so, you were left alone as he watched you from a short distance, just as he did all other times.

On one particularly nippy autumn night you found yourself unable to sleep. Perhaps it was your increasing worries about your relationship, perhaps it was the fact you had excess energy from sitting around all day hardly moving around, whatever the reason, you were still just laying in bed staring up at the ceiling… Maybe it was the fact that the world seemed to be dead silent. No rustling of the wind, not even the smallest moan or creek from the seemingly hollow dorm building. Just silent. The kind of silence that would allow one to hear their own gentle calm heartbeat.

…

After getting dressed in some loose clothing other than your pajamas, you took your boombox, small box of cassette tapes and left your room.

As the Super High School Dancer not many would assume you’d like the old bulky music equipment so much, but you did. You liked hearing the buttons and pieces inside make those satisfying click noises as you set up everything. Before Kokichi came crashing into your life, your main hobby was transferring new music onto cassette tapes. There was just something about… for lack of a better word, booming, sound of the old boombox. It was like the difference between listening to a recording of an orchestra and hearing one performed live before you. You can feel the music instead of just hearing it. Sure, you could use a modern boombox, but it wouldn’t have the exact same sound or feel, it’d be a little off.

You trotted your way out to the field as to blast the music without disturbing anyone’s sleep. You hummed feeling the slightly damp grass beneath your feet. Gently placing the boombox and box of cassettes down you quickly began set up. Now, what to play you wondered. Maybe something for quickstep since the fast-paced dance tired you out faster than most other forms. After placing the cassette in you quickly backed up from the boombox, ready to dance. You felt that joyous anticipation bubble up inside as the intro played… A-and played again? Maybe the intro was longer than you remembered… Okay, no, there was something wrong. Confused, you took out the tape. There didn’t appear to be anything wrong with it, and you weren’t entirely sure if this was a problem you could have with tapes. Perhaps something was wrong with the boombox? You decided to test this theory and placed another tape in… The intro was the same but a completely different song was played with the same instruments as the intended song. “You have got to be kidding me.” That smile you tried repressing kept growing wider and wider as you placed in more tapes, finding each one had some silly quirk.

“Nishishi. Y/N, you came!” Suddenly you were tackled from behind, being hugged so tightly. You tried sighing in annoyance, but it came out more as a soft chuckle. “Where’s my tapes?” “Hmm? What tapes?” “… Look we can play some other time, but right now I need my music to dance to so I can tire myself enough to get to sleep.” “W-what? Sleep? Y/N how could you!?” He began crying those crocodile tears as he nuzzled his cheek against your own. “You show up to our super-secret meeting only to abandon me! How can you be so mean!?” You rolled your eyes at his theatrics. “… Okay, I’ll bite. What’s this secret meeting about?” You raised a hand up, gently running your fingers up his neck and through his hair. After a moment he flinched and quickly backed away. Turning around you saw he had a small pack on him. He must have been on his way to set up some prank before hearing his tapes being played. “Planning our crime spree tonight!” “No.” “Whaaat? Y/N, I know you’re new to D.I.C.E. so I’ll let you off easy this time, but I’m the Boss, you have to at least listen to me.” “I’m not a part of your gang, I’m your partner.” “Yeah! My partner in crime, love crimes!” He looked absolutely giddy with sparkling eyes as he leaned in closer and closer, the tips of your noses touching. “… How would one even go about committing a ‘love crime’?” “Oh, Y/N, being so cheeky, like you don’t know.” His eyes narrowed on you as he wore that sharp smirk. “You stole my heart; I stole yours. Now, I want to work with you. Let’s go on a date, right now!” “Dude. It’s one in the morning or something.” “Yes, and…” “… Fine, hopefully this’ll tire me out enough to get to sleep.” Happily cheering Kokichi took the boombox and box of fake cassette tapes before bolting, leaving you to chase after him.

You quickly found yourself running out of the school and into town. Kokichi dashed down street after street after alleyway, then around a corner, down a street you had already passed. It was as if he were just running around on a whim without a destination in mind, which was entirely likely. You picked up your pace quickly leaving Kokichi behind. “Hey, no fair! You’re only faster than me because you’re not carrying all this heavy stuff!” Slowing down your pace, you turned around. “Are you sure it’ not my years of dancing?” You smirked, sprinting straight for him. You scooped him and all the stuff in your arms in a bridal carry style. Your movements were swift and effortless, completely fluid, no hesitation. You even picked up your pace. “Poor lil’ Oma, so tiny, I’m surprised you could even lift my boombox!” “Hey! Not everyone has giant beautiful muscles like you!” “They’re not giant, I’m just toned!” “Y/N that’s such an obvious lie! I’ve seen you lift people over your head with ease! You’re even… carrying me right now…” “Oma?” He didn’t hide how his voice trailed off. Did he only realize that now, or was it another lie? “You alright?” “Hmm? What’s got you wondering that? Of course I’m not! You’re holding me so closely, it’s embarrassing!” “Oh! Sorry!” Your pace immediately slowed down and just as your grip loosened, Kokichi threw his arms around your neck. “But that’s a lie! Geez, Y/N, you should know I can never get enough of you!” “… Sure. Uh, anyway! Are we just going to run around all night or are we actually going to go somewhere?” “Hmm… Alright! First go down the street we just passed! And while we’re at it, we need some racing music!” He pried a chuckle out of you at how clumsily he placed the cassette in and how he got increasingly ‘upset’ that he wasn’t finding a good enough racing song, which was only exacerbated by the ridiculous music that played.

“Stop, stop, STOP! We’re here!” Hopping out of your arms he sifted through his bag, taking out his signature mask and placing it on. “A costume shop?” “Duh! We need something to cover your face! You still haven’t made your D.I.C.E. mask yet, so we’re going to get a temporary one.” “… We’re actually committing crimes!?” He simply laughed his signature laugh as he picked at the lock. When the door opened an alarm went off. You were frozen in place as Kokichi dashed inside. Moments later the alarm stopped blaring. He then popped his head out the open door, taking off his mask. “Okay, it’s safe now! C’mon we only have ten minuets!” He then dashed back in. You were hesitant when taking those first few steps, you’ve never done anything like this before! When Kokichi spoke of ‘love crimes’ you weren’t thinking you were actually going to break into a building and steal something! Kokichi ran back out and took your hands into his own. “Don’t tell me you’re scared of walking into a building.” Then he held his mask up to you. “I’ve done this countless times, you’ll be safe with me, and that’s not a lie.” After you placed on the mask, he led you inside.

“Huh, this feels exactly like when I get into position before judges. Horrifying, and exhilarating!” “Nishishi.” Even in the dark Kokichi effortlessly lead you between the aisles. The place was rather eerie. Costumes and pieces hanging from the ceiling, random oblong shapes jutting out of the walls, the twisted shadows that seemingly scurried about. Your vision was also lightly obscured due to the mask. That coupled with you being slightly on edge from this entire situation, you were a little spooked. You squeezed his hand, lightly stroking the back of his fingers with your thumb. It was more of a mindless gesture, but an appreciative one. You only noticed you were doing so when you suddenly felt the grip on your hand loosen.

Suddenly Kokichi sprinted ahead, letting you go. “Here it is! The back storage room! They keep all the good stuff here!” He quickly picked at the lock before swinging the door open. As he entered, he searched through his bag, taking out a flashlight and with a short sharp click sound the light flipped on, seemingly blinding. You involuntarily held a hand before your eyes, squinting and looking between your fingers. Suddenly your view was darkened. “Who thought these tacky sunglasses would come in handy!” “Ah, thank you Ou-” Now that you weren’t blinded you saw how Kokichi managed to gather the most ridiculous pieces of costumes in mere moments. Clown shoes, fairy wings, giant sunglasses, boxing gloves, all of the bead necklaces, monster finger puppets on all of his fingers and some in his hair, a bowler’s cap, fox mask, checkered vest, striped shorts, feathered boa, frayed scarf, and whatever else was under all that. Being surprised by being greeted to that sight so suddenly a laugh erupted from you. That beautiful, sweet laugh that utterly melted Kokichi’s heart and caused that unconcealable, beaming smile to radiate off him. “Huh!? What’s so funny, Y/N? ~” He hopped just a little closer to you as he spoke in that knowing sing-song tone. “N-No, stop it!” You clamped your hand over your mouth, desperate to repress that laughter. Kokichi smirked. You knew better than to hide your laughter from him. “Y/N, tell me! Hey, hey, tell me, What’s so funny? Huh, huh, what is it?” With each syllable he made some sharp movement, whether it was drawing closer to you or flinging out his hands, smacking whatever was next to him causing it to fall on his head. “D-damn it Kokichi!” You laughed even harder as you kneeled on the ground, holding your stomach which hurt from laughing so hard. Meanwhile Kokichi froze for a moment, a scarlet hue spread across his cheeks and tips of his ears. His heart absolutely pounded against his ribs. You called him by his first name. After taking in your beautiful laughter he quickly removed the clothing, tossing it aside as if he were in a panic.

Once you calmed a little, Kokichi called out to you. “Y-yeah?” You hobbled towards him, taking the sunglasses off, your eyes having adjusted to the light. “There’s a whole lot of masks here!” He picked out a few holding them before his face. Very cartoonish looking shiny plastic masks. An anime girl, a bee, crocodile, a clown- “Oh, I didn’t know people made masks of your face Oma!” “Well, I’m just that handsome. Not everyone can be a face model.” He then made what you assumed to be an exaggerated ‘sexy’ face to which you rested your face in your hand. “You’re so ridiculous.” “You say that like it’s a bad thing, but I can hear your smile!” “I am smiling, and I hate it!” Your smile only grew at this silly light banter.

You drew closer looking at the open boxes. You picked up a Venice carnival mask. The face appeared to be a cracked porcelain with intricate gold, black and dark purple design. There were blank spaced under the left eye and over the right where scores of music were. At the top was what appeared to be a jester’s cap, even with tiny bells on the ends. “Ah! Perfect!” Kokichi daintily took the mask from you and placed it on. Even how he did something as mundane as picking up an object had so much personality. Perhaps as a dancer that was one of the things that drew you to him. “Alright, let’s go! We still have love crimes to commit!” “This wasn’t it!?” “Duh! Y/N, keep up. We were just getting a mask to hide your identity! This was only preparation.” He then dashed off towards the counter. You dashed after him, finding he was leaving money on the counter. “You’re paying?” “Well, yeah! I’m not a thief you know!” He said as he took a box of impulse buy mints. “Really now.” “Petty theft Y/N, petty theft.”

Once you were outside Kokichi repicked the locks, locking the doors. “Now, our date night can begin! Huh? Whoa, whoa, whoa! What are you doing? No taking off your mask when committing crimes! We don’t want anyone recognizing you!” “Uh… I’m giving you your mask back? I assumed you’d want it back, and I’d wear the store one. Wasn’t the whole point of coming here to get me a mask?” “… No, keep my mask on.” “Oh, uh, okay?” You sidled up beside him, gently taking his hand. “So, where are we headed to commit this ‘love crime’?” Kokichi flinched his hand away, instead occupying himself with the boombox. “Before that we need a sneaking around theme song!” “o-okay…” You awkwardly stood beside him as he fumbled with the cassette tape. “There, now-” He crashed into you carrying everything. “Carry me!” He nuzzled into you as you effortlessly lifted him up. “Now, off to adventure!”

As you raced around he played silly song after silly irritating song. You sighed as he scat or made up nonsensical lyrics for your soundtrack. He’d sing at the top of his lungs, making you fear he was going to wake someone. Quickly though he told you to stop. “This is it!” “… What even is this place? Off neon lights… I don’t even see a sign.” “Oh~ Nishishi. This is fun.” He joyfully skipped over to the door, picking at the lock. “You wait right here and be prepared for an emergency escape!” He then slipped through the door laughing his signature laugh.

It was awfully cool for an autumn night; it wasn’t even near winter yet. The wind picked up, rustling the leaves and throwing them up into the air. You sat on the sidewalk, looking out at those bright colorful twinkling lights. It was strangely dark and isolated here. The exact opposite of the lively town which lay not far. What even was this you wondered. You guessed you’d find out soon enough, but… would waiting too long be bad. Were either of you truly happy with this? Was this healthy even. You held no doubt that Kokichi cared for you but thinking back on what lead you here… like this place you felt somewhat isolated. Were you doing something wrong? You wanted to just ask Kokichi, but what if it was like dancing and not even lying, he’d simply say nothing as if the question were never asked. If, like times when he seemed to distance himself from you, he’d give you affection or make you laugh, get you to temporarily forget about it. You liked Kokichi, you truly did, but… maybe this wasn’t healthy for either of you. Maybe it’d be better to be friends instead. There wasn’t that much difference between being friends and being in a romantic relationship, it just the latter has more expectations… what if that was it. Maybe you were expecting too much of this.

“Hey! Y/n!”

“Huh? Uh- what?” “There you are!” He was smiling, crouching before you hugging his knees. “I called for you for a while, but you were off in la-la land!” “Oh, sorry. Just got lost in thought…” You then smirked. “But only because you took so long.” “Excuse me, but that was record time for disarming a building!” “Still took forever.” “You’re so silly.” Taking your hands, he jumped up pulling you to your feet. “Now, let’s go!”

He eagerly dragged you into the dark building. There was but a single door open where light beamed out, swaying and dancing about on the floor and wall beyond it. There were also two pairs of shoes before the door. “Come on, c’mon, put them on quickly now!” … The shoes had wheels on the bottom? Looking into the room you found it was massive. The floor was smooth and shiny with nothing atop it, the walls blank, and the ceiling was covered in lights. Against the walls was some carpeted flooring where Kokichi placed your things. He rolled along watching as you hurried to place the skates on. “I had no idea there were roller-skating rinks around here!” “Yeah, but I think this is the only one, but it’s so drab! So, we’re gonna liven things up!” He excitedly searched through the bag taking out a funky looking toy gun, colorful plastic cups and many cans of spray paint. You hobbled over to the rink, slipping forward and back, swinging your arms and body out in any direction to keep any semblance of balance. When Kokichi neared you threw yourself at him, to which you both fell. “S-sorry!” You rolled over quickly sitting up. “Ooh, I didn’t know my Y/N was so clumsy! Or were you just wanting an excuse to hug me?” “I’ve never been roller skating before.” “… You… you’re not lying… But you’re the Super High School Level Dancer! Shouldn’t you know roller disco?” “Yeah, High School Level, not Ultimate, or end-all-be-all… There are a few things I still have not mastered. Like how Tojo can’t cut konjac, or how Chabashira doesn’t know a thing about Aikido! We may be great, but not perfect, and roller-skating… happens to be where I’m lacking.” “Oh… That’s going to be a problem then. Oh well! This will just be more fun!” With verve he pulled you to your feet and placed a can of spray paint in your hand. “Let’s go paint!”

You slipped and tumbled as you painted, making sloppy, dripping designs. Kokichi linked his arm with your own, catching you before you fell and simply helped you keep your balance in general. You most often just made random lines or squiggles and Kokichi incorporated them into his own childish looking work. He turned the lines into the sides of dice and the squiggles into lop sided hearts or other things, whatever he felt like. You found yourself giggling from imagining how ridiculous you must have looked attempting to keep balance and nervousness from breaking into another building, this time vandalizing it. But you trusted Kokichi and followed his lead, letting yourself just enjoy the absurdity of it all.

Once finished the pair of you took a step back, admiring your work. “Masterpieces, all of it!” “I don’t know about that, but it was fun.” “Now, we need to fix these lights!” He glided away, picking up the packets of colored plastic cups then returned. “Toss me up to the ceiling Y/N!” “Excuse me!?” “I need you to toss me! I’ve seen you do it before! Besides, how else am I supposed to place these on the lights?” You looked up seeing the ceiling lights were the kind where the light was just stuck in a drilled hole in the ceiling. You supposed it was possible to cram the open end of the cup there. “… If you touch the ceiling or ground even once I won’t toss you anymore.” “Yay!” He hugged you, giving you the opportunity to quickly pick him up and toss him. “What was that? It’s wasn’t even close.” “Well excuse me for not wanting to hurt you.” “I know you can do this. I’ll be fine.” “… alright.” After you made sure you were standing on the toe stop, you tossed him much higher than before. You held your breath seeing him fly up then come tumbling down. Catching him in your arms you clutched him tightly as if fearing he was going to fly up on his own. “See, I’m fine. I know I can trust you.” “… Thanks.” “Now, onto the next!” And so, you tossed up Kokichi to each and every single light.

When you caught him that last time you hugged him tightly, thankful you did not slip up once. You certainly felt the pain of your dancing partner not catching you and though quick, it’s scary and can instantly shatter much trust that had been built up. However, you felt Kokichi squirm under your grip so you reluctantly let go. He then hugged you before skating away, picking up the strange gun. “Y/N, want to do the honors?” “… I don’t even know what the gun does!” “Okay, okay, just help me keep from falling over.” “Alright?” Before you could even approach him, he crashed into you. He then looked up at the ceiling and took aim. With a pop curtain string lights shot out, attaching itself to the ceiling. It was no wonder he asked you to keep him steady, the force from that thing shooting was much too powerful for one person to handle. Kokichi made sure to cover the entire ceiling with the thing. When he was finally satisfied, he raced off to the wall to plug the end into an outlet. Then the lights flipped on.

It was brilliant. It was like an otherworldly stage. The curtain string lights slightly swayed as Kokichi flew past, making it appear almost waterfall like. The colors clashed against one another and were slightly obscured by the string lights making it look to be a haze. The floor reflected the ceiling making the lights look endless. It was fun chaos. And what made it even better was the quickstep song Kokichi had playing on full blast from your boombox. “Wait. No that’s actually one of my songs. Not one you altered.” “Aw~ You liked my music. Well if you insist, I can play the Delfino Plaza theme intro loop for us.” “NO! No! I am so glad for this! I was just surprised for a moment!” Kokichi laughed seeing your flustered reaction.

“… Oma. You’re ridiculous and amazing. This is fun, and scary. Thank you for this.” Kokichi froze hearing the shear warmth that oozed from your voice. He was only snapped out of his trance feeling you so gently take his hand and intertwine your fingers together. He flinched away, immediately regretting it. “I’m not comfortable with that. I don’t like touch that much. I hope you understand.” He then hid his hand behind his head. “… But that’s a lie.” He quickly wrapped his hands around one of yours, pulling himself close. “Sorry for scaring you!” “… Is it, though.” You pulled your hand away. “Do you not like being touched?” “Hmm? Wait, what’s that?” He tried skating away but tripped over his own feet. When he hit the ground a buzzing sound went off. “Aw. My hand buzzer prank was revealed, oh well.” “… You really don’t want to talk about this, do you. That was a pathetic ‘prank’ to get me distracted.” You kneeled down beside him to be closer to his level. “You always do this, try to pull the wool over my eyes, distract me from… something. It seems you push me away, but you then approach me so freely. Is this a control thing? Do I make you uncomfortable? Is that why you’re only okay when you approach me? If you distrust me that much at least lie instead of ignoring it. I don’t care if it’s a painful truth or a happy lie, just… communicate with me, say something, anything. Please.” You couldn’t let this go. If you wanted this to work you had to communicate somehow, and you didn’t know what else to do at this point… and… You hated this. You hated being used to this feeling. It was just like dancing. Fun and amazing, and so, so exciting, but lonely. When dancing you need to be at similar levels for it to truly work, but because of your title, because of how quickly you learned others became intimidated by your skill believing they couldn’t keep up with you, leaving you on your own. You thought this would be different. No disproportion of skill level so you could be on an even playing field, so you could actually have a partner to work and be with. But even with Kokichi, it was like you were being dragged around. You wondered if you only felt like this because you were expecting too much. You thought things could be like when you were younger, you could actually have a partner, someone who you could rely on just as much as they relied on you. Someone you could trust to catch you, be someone they could trust in return… But it’s not. This just feels like whenever you invited another dancer to dance. Left to be by yourself.

“Do whatever you want with me.” “Huh?” He sat up and looked you directly in the eyes, or at least you assumed so, it was near impossible to tell with the mask on. You also thought so because of how you felt this gaze. It was similar to what you felt on stage, knowing all eyes were on you, but this was different. It was… intense. “I… w-what do you mean?” He dragged himself over only mere millimeters apart from you. “… You overwhelm me. I’m not used to this. Getting affection so earnestly. Everyone hates or distrust me because of my antics. The only people who cared about me before you was D.I.C.E., my family. But… we don’t show affection in the typical way. We mess with one another, making lighthearted jokes at our own expense to make others laugh, booby-trap places we know they frequent often and that trap having a treat or gift for them. But you… You just say it. You just hug me, touch me, hold my hand. I want it. I want you. I want you to keep wanting me. But then I feel like my heart’s going to explode and I get so nervous and my mind goes into a panic. It’s embarrassing that I feel ashamed of not being able to handle even your simple touches. So, I back away, but I still crave you and want you to know I care about you too. I’m not uncomfortable it’s just… so much to take in all at once my mind and heart can’t keep up!” As he spoke, he slowly draped his arms over your shoulders and leaned into you, closing the gap. He nuzzled into you. Even with that mask on, you could feel a shiver run down your spine as his warm breath brushed across your ear. “… Do whatever you want to me. Please.” This… You never heard him speak in such a serious tone before. He almost sounded like a completely different person. You wondered if he could feel how your heart raced, the heat radiating from your face, how you just wanted to melt into that embrace. Little did you know Kokichi was thinking the exact same thing in that moment and every other time you touched him. Still holding on to you, he backed up so you could see his masked face.

“But that’s a lie!” There was that playful tone you recognized. “I’m a supreme leader. I’m showered in love and affection all the time! Every single day I’ll have you know! How do you think I got so good at giving hugs?!” As if proving his point, he tackled you into a hug, throwing all his weight into it, knocking the two of you over. “… If all that was a lie, then what about the first thing.” “It’s the truth. Do whatever you want to me, and I won’t mind a Single. Little. Bit.” “Whatever I want huh… Then…” You slowly sat up. “Care to skate dance with me?” “What? Did you lie to me about not knowing how to skate?” “No. I don’t care if I don’t even know the basics. I just want to dance with you. Share my passion with you.” You shakily got up. “Want to dance with me, Oma?” He was still for a moment before taking your hand. As you helped him to his feet you noticed the song suddenly changed. It was one you didn’t recognize but had the same instruments as the intended song. Of course, he used a silly tape, why would you think he brought your original ones with him. It was Latin Jazz you believed.

Taking both his hands, you held them in a tight grip, fearful of falling over. You both laughed out loud, spinning around, clinging to one another attempting to keep any balance. You tried doing some dance moves, from ballet, to ballroom, to jazz, most of which ended in you and Kokichi almost toppling over and laughing to no end in the process. You soon noticed how Kokichi’s grip was almost unbearably tight, and how his hands trembled. “Nervous?” “I… I’m feeling lightheaded.” He then flopped into you. You immediately wrapped your arms around him, keeping him steady. “Ah~ much better. Thank you, Y/N.” He knew dancing was going to kill him. He could hardly handle you holding his hand and now he was trying something so intimate, dancing. Entrusting your entire being into your partner. Being so close with so much skin contact. It wasn’t like he didn’t like it. In fact was a desperately wanting this, but he believed he hadn’t become a complete wreak from these overwhelming feelings because his intense blush was hidden behind a mask and he couldn’t see how tenderly you were probably looking at him right now. Or how you were smiling, or… And even merely thinking of you was blurring his mind, being consumed by the desire to just stay like this longer.

Suddenly you stopped. “Oma. I think someone-” The moment he heard voices Kokichi dragged you to your things, chucking the skates away and quickly collected the boombox and tapes. “Y/N, run now!” You scooped him and your things before dashing away past the people at the entrance. The pair of you giggled like naughty school children as you zipped down street after street trying to lose any cops that were potentially called on you. After Kokichi was convinced you had escaped he burst into obnoxiously loud laughter, taking off his and your masks. He so cheekily smiling seeing the dawn of a new day. “You’re beautiful Oma.” Then you pulled him closer, kissing him on the cheek. His laughter choked, a loud squeak like noise replacing it. You chuckled seeing his tight-lipped wobbling smile as his already rosy tinted cheeks flushed to be absolutely red. “Oh? I thought you were great at accepting affection. Or are cheek kisses your weakness?” You were leaning in for a kiss when he placed and hand on your face and buried his own face into his other hand. “Y-you’re so mean. Don’t tease me like that!” “Aw~ but how am I supposed to resist when you blush so cutely like that!” You absolutely adored seeing that blush spread, and smile grow.

[michellespenscratchz]

Tagged by @frankenjoly. Don't mind if I do. ;)

what's your all-time favourite ship?

I guess at this point Rhysha is the one I've made the most content for, but I also used to ship Jesse/Jane (Breaking Bad) and Iorveth/Saskia (Witcher). I guess the more, um, incomplete a ship feels in canon, the more I feel the need to fill in the gaps myself.

how many works do you have on ao3?

66. To be fair most of them are short drabbles from when I would do Ask Prompts here on Tumblr.

what's your total ao3 word count?

90,157.

what are your top five fics by kudos?

Mostly Borderlands, but it seems whenever I do dip my toes in Legend of Zelda it goes over pretty well.

I Thought We Were Friends, Borderlands

Silent and Still, Legend of Zelda

The Tale of the Risky Venture Launch, Borderlands

Target Audience, Borderlands

A Father's Love Never Dies, Legend of Zelda (Huh, really? Wasn't expecting that.)

do you reply to comments, why or why not?

Oh absolutely. When someone doesn't reply to my comments, I assume I'm annoying them and I usually quit reading the fic. 😬 I want to be sure to communicate that will never be the case with me.

fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

That'd have to be a tie between Apology Girl's Dues (Breaking Bad) and Carried Home To You (Game of Thrones). Both are about a dude mourning his dead lover, imagining she's there, and then realizing she isn't.

fic you've written with the happiest ending?

I'd have to go with I Thought We Were Friends, because it's about a moment in Borderlands 3 that made me especially happy. (The footer notes of the fic elaborate on this.)

do you write crossovers?

In the "Handsome Jack goes through a time warp and meets Robert Edwin House" way, no. In the "Cast of this franchise re-enacts Charles Dickens' Christmas Story" way, yes.

have you ever received hate on a fic?

A fic, no. Rhysha art on Instagram, yes.

do you write smut? if so what kind?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Mine tends to stay pretty vanilla. It's an escapist thing for me as an Ace.

have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of, but then I used to be on DeviantArt, so anything's possible. Haven't checked in on the ones I orphaned on AO3, either.

have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope. Wonder if I should?

have you ever co-written a fic before?

Not unless you count the Zelda RP I was in on GaiaOnline for most of college. But I would be open to a collab. :)

what’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Oh, so many. Every time I get a sweet message on Saovine Convoy I feel a pang of guilt for abandoning it and tell myself I'll come back to it. Then I just, y'know, don't.

what are your writing strengths?

Character authenticity. YMMV on how well I pull it off, and some characters are trickier for me than others, but I always make a real effort to make sure all canon characters sound as in-character as possible. Having someone tell me "I actually heard that in their voice" is my favorite compliment to get. <3

Also, Canon Compliant fics. I will sift through tons and tons of lore to find the tiniest, most obscure, forgotten details to build on before I go completely off script.

what are your writing weaknesses?

Staying on task. And also, I'm trying very hard to break myself of editing while I write. I need to just be okay with the first draft sounding like a ten year old wrote it.

what are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I had Felix speaking Pig Latin in The Stars Align And Stuff. So, there's that.

what was the first fandom you wrote for?

I got in trouble in fourth grade for submitting a "Buttons and Mindy" fanfic as a class assignment, because the teacher thought I was plagiarizing the actual cartoon. Funnily enough, it was a fic of them as mermaids, and then later on there really was an actual Animaniacs episode where they were mermaids. Oops. :P

As for the first fandom I actually submitted fic online for, that would be Invader Zim. (I had a bit of a goth phase.)

what's your favourite fic you've written?

I have very fond memories of Deja Vu (BrBa) and Saovine Convoy (Witcher). It was a different time in the early 2010s. Readers would have whole-ass discussions about the fics and about the fandom in general right there in the comments, and I was living for it. :D

Tags: @laianely If you feel up to it.

[sepublic]

Dana Terrace AMA (Part 3)

Pink Stripe, AKA Amity’s look-alike from our world is confirmed to more or less be like a… Proto-Amity of sorts, so she’s more of an easter egg than anything else! That, or she’s a repurposed Easter Egg and WILL have lore… But more than likely there isn’t meant to be any counterparts in the human world on neither an in-universe nor writing perspective!

The Twins are salty over Grom, but will also have stuff to ‘distract’ them… This kind of screams ‘Blight family development’ a lot, doesn’t it? Probably Amity standing up to her parents and the twins likely taking her side, or at least acting from a place of protecting Amity… I can only hope these ‘distractions’ are good things, but who am I kidding?

Bird-themes are a Clawthorne thing, which really makes me wonder more about Owl Mask, especially since the Blights have never been associated with Owls before… Is this a long-lost cousin, parent, sibling? Child, even…?! Why didn’t Lilith nor Eda speak of them? I have to wonder if Eda’s ring is going to come into play here, if it was used to make some sort of ‘construct’ that is Owl Mask, who has a connection to Eda and is able to track her down as a result… And if Luz will pull off something similar with her shard of Belos’ mask once the truth is revealed!

Dana alludes to her favorite character having already been met, but not HIS face… While this could be Belos, I feel like these last two episodes count as a ‘proper meeting’ by now, which indicates she’s talking of Owl Mask… Which indicates that Owl Mask is a dude, but I can’t say for sure! Dana also said she has a bunch of other faves we’ve seen in some capacity, but not really, and I have to wonder if this includes the Blight Parents, the Heads of the Covens, etc.!

Eda’s been to Vegas, and she wasn’t impressed! Stan also got married in Vegas… Also, Eda would beat Lilith at Hexes Hold ‘Em, though she’d of course cheat! Though she also cheated in Grudgby but still turned out to be the better player in the end, so…!

We have confirmation that Coven Bindings also restrict very basic spells like levitation, even if they are still possible! This implies that there are base spells that don’t really fit into any category but are restricted nonetheless, or that you CAN do very minor spells from other categories, but as Dana said, it’s a lot harder and weaker! That implies such spells aren’t supposed to be accessible, which really furthers how Belos makes people dependent upon the system he’s created!

Dana also said that Witches can’t physically perform spells, which implies that the Coven Binding works on a body-level, and not as a mental block… Meaning it may be possibly for Glyphs to get around them! If so, then Luz is going to accidentally start a revolution and Belos will NOT be pleased, I have to wonder if he worked from the shadows to make a shift to Bile magic or at least focused on suppressing memory of Glyphs as a potential work-around to his Coven bindings! Everything DID change with Luz, huh…?

Also, ‘Wizard’ is apparently just a generic title (as implied by Episode 2), and there was a scrapped line alluding to Warlock=Edgelord!

Palismans are confirmed to have their own separate power source, so Eda can still cast magic without glyphs the way Luz did in the Season Finale! Witches will carve them from a special type of wood as teens (so before they join a Coven), usually at school or while their parents are watching… However, Dana alludes to that special wood no longer being around! Is Belos burning down the source of palismans because they’re a potential workaround to his Coven Bindings? Is he seizing the resource to make Palismans for himself? Did somebody else do it to keep Belos from making Palismans, what about the giant tree we see the Bat Queen fly off to, is this one of the final remnants of that ‘special wood’ that Palismans are made of?

We also know that Lilith’s palisman IS alive, which just furthers my idea that Eda is unusual in that she treats Owlbert as more than just a living battery, or an AI to give orders to but completely forget about otherwise! I love you Eda, you love everyone and everything for what they truly are and no wonder the Bat Queen trusted you…!

           Dana alludes towards Parental Conflict in Season 2, so likely stuff about the Blight Parents, but also maybe Camila? She also mentions Island Exploration, so we’ll likely be seeing the hand… MAN, this keeps reminding me of Bionicle (specifically that one concept that was never explored) and I am LIVING for it! I have to wonder if the Titan’s hand is related to a potential staff/palisman, how it cast magic, etc… If there’s something in that hand, if it’s clenched around something…

           If Eda were to be cured, her hair would still be gray! Also we’ll get a better idea of Belos’ inspirations later in Season 2, but that’s kind of stuff one would already figure out. Dana speaks of a distinction between ‘Hard Apple Blood’ and the stuff they put in juice boxes ‘for babies’, which makes me wonder if it’s like. The distinction between Beer and Root Beer? If Apple Blood is alcoholic, but there’s a non-alcoholic version for kids and it has nutritional value? Does Eda drink alcohol every morning?

           Teen Witches enter Covens as soon as they graduate, maybe even earlier if they’re talented! So about seventeen or eighteen… YIKES, I said it before but it IS messed-up that people are expected to immediately figure themselves out permanently at such a young age! Sure the process at least begins to set you down that certain ‘track’ in a literal and metaphorical sense when high school begins, but that’s so much pressure! Belos sure is eager to shorten the pipeline between schools and his Covens… And while options within a Coven are possible, that’s still SO MUCH that’s permanently removed from your possibilities!

           Willow works out every morning but doesn’t brag about it, unlike Boscha! Why am I gasping, I already knew that… Buff Willow, just love the idea that before we saw her in Episode 3, she had recently finished pumping her muscles! And that when she talks to Luz in the morning in Really Small Problems, she’d just finished a work-out or was even in the midst of it! I wonder why Willow works out, to help with gardening, or just because? Still, STRONK Willow! Recontextualizes her skill in Grudgby, even if her stamina when it comes to running could use some improvement!

           The Construction Coven is the most ‘obscure’ of the tracks, makes sense it’s the sleeve-color we see least, and naturally sculptors and architects are a part of it! Eda’s bile-sac stopped producing magic bile, which basically means her curse caused organ failure, yikes… But yeah, this makes it clear that Witches don’t exactly have ‘finite’ reserves of magic, or at the very least they recharge… But clearly the curse is messing with Eda!

           Luz is confirmed to just be oblivious, that she doesn’t realize that Amity has a crush on her! She’s also been distracted by Eda’s curse, which really speaks to her being ADHD… But I have to wonder that if Eda’s curse becomes less of an issue, she may have more room to explore Amity’s flustered reactions around her…?

           And… that’s about it! Besides basic confirmation on getting to learn more about literally everyone in Season 2, or stuff we already knew (like Willow and Amity still not exactly being friends, but at least having a good start)! This was a FASCINATING lore-dump, a brilliant AMA, and my first one ever and it did NOT disappoint! I found myself constantly refreshing to see Dana’s replies!

           There’s also a bunch of other stuff Dana talked about that isn’t related to lore, like her inspirations, how to pitch a show, etc.! So make sure to check that out, I can’t say much there because I’m not exactly an expert on that sort of thing!

[dearlazerbunny]

Let it Go (Ch. 1 of ?)

Pairings: platonic avengers team x reader, potential background loki x reader

Words: 1800

Genre/Ratings: -WARNINGS- there will be an (unsuccessful) suicide attempt by reader- chapter will be explicitly marked in advance. Drug (pills) and alcohol abuse, lots of negativity and self loathing. There will be an arc, but said arc is going to start in the eleventh circle of hell and inch up from there.

Summary: *not far enough into this one to give an accurate summary, so this’ll have to be updated eventually. enjoy for now!*

If I see another ad for Frozen, I might go homicidal.

I pass at least five of them as I work through rush-hour Manhattan at a snail’s pace. Smash Hit! Instant Classic! #1 Movie in the World! Awesome. Fantastic. Happy for you, Disney. Now please, dear god, get it the fuck out of my face.

I jerk away from narrowly shoulder-checking a businessman hustling down the sidewalk, speaking rapid-fire into the phone glued to his ear. It’s like a very, very fucked up dream; everyone in the world is in on the joke, and I just didn’t get the invite. Maybe they were spying on me. Sure, it could’ve been inspired by a fairytale, but who knows? I could sue. Demand fifty percent of the profits for copyright infringement. That’d be more than enough to set me up with a cabin in Alaska, somewhere all I’d have to worry about is making friends with the polar bears.

On the subway, I notice someone has Let it Go blaring from their earbuds. No less than three little girls are wearing something blue and covered in glitter. One has a cheap blonde plait clipped into her hair, accented by a snowflake charm dangling from the end. I suppress the urge to rip it off her head.

It isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, I want to say. It’s not Disney-dreamy like the mouse has made it out to be, living in a palace and making magical snowmen and singing power ballads about self-acceptance and overcoming your demons. In the real world, you quell those demons with a fistful of benzodiazepines, because if you don’t, something like a car alarm or a slammed door will make spikes of ice splinter through the floor around you. It’s constantly wearing three hoodies at a time, so that way if a stranger on the seat next to you brushes your arm, they don’t immediately get third-degree frostbite. It’s getting a papercut and watching the blood freeze on the tip of your finger, then melt back to liquid when you break it off and toss it away. It’s getting hospitalized when an inner-city charity doctor takes your temperature before you can object and your body temperature is barely higher than freezing, so they pump you full of warm saline and cover you in foil blankets and all that heat makes you sick, so you have to rip the IV out of your arm and walk yourself back to your apartment in your hospital gown while dodging orderlies and strange looks from passerby at 2 AM.

The kid and her parents get off at the next stop. The subway clicks along. I try to make myself smaller as the car fills up with more people.  

Maybe if they’d had Xanax in Arendelle, Elsa wouldn’t have had to deal with all that “conceal, don’t feel” bullshit. She wouldn’t be able to feel anything with all the pills and booze she’d be mainlining. Take it from me, babe, it’s a lot easier to drug those demons away. Much more effective than a song.

Something in me feels a weird flare of pride for handling this… whatever the hell it is better than a fictional cartoon princess. Then I want to laugh, because goddamn, my life is pathetic.

My meeting spot is in a back alley near Bryant Park. Some NYU kid is pawning his Klonopin for party cash, I guess. I think if you’re rich enough to be a frat boy at NYU you probably don’t need the extra fifty from your prescriptions, but whatever. I don’t have a ton of other avenues at this point.

I scan the neon bottle, then shake it open and count the pills inside. “These are only a half milligram? Fifteen.”

“Dude, we said forty.”

“Yeah, for a milligram pill. These will barely last me a week.”

“Twenty.”

“Fine.”

I don’t think the universe agrees with my choices.

The sky splits open with a shriek that balances the world on the edge of a knife. One heartbeat. Two. He and I both look up at the clear blue, unsure. Between the skyline, I see something- somethings- begin pouring from a split in the universe, ugly and black and hungry.

I wrench the bottle from the kid’s hands and run.

Run, run, run, don’t look up, don’t look back, oh jesus what the FUCK IS THIS- Midtown is a nightmare. Not from Friday traffic this time. People are scrambling, screaming and crying, trying to flee the scene. An entire side of a building gets shaved off and falls to the ground like an iceberg. A gas line broke somewhere because everything is hazy with fumes and starts shimmering rainbow colors. I round a corner, cursing and trying to keep my ratty converse on my feet as I dodge rubble and ash- don’t look up don’t look up don’t look up. I can see my breath starting to crystallize around me as my anxiety spikes, and I try to force it down. Don’t think about it. Now is so not the time for that.

In the middle of the street, six brightly clad superheroes stand with grim but determined looks on their faces. There’s Tony Stark in his mechanical suit, Captain America brandishing his shield. The star stands out like a beacon in the smoke. Cool, coolcoolcool, they’ve got this, right? They’ve totally got this. Everything is going to be fine. Everything is going to befineohholyshitthat’sabigalien-

I try to use an overturned car as cover. Dart to one, breathe, press my back to steel and try to shake my body back from shock, wait for a moment of silence between the chaos- run to the next pile of rubble. My footprints are outlined in frost on the cracked pavement, clean white against the ash raining from the sky. As I slam myself up against another car, heaving, I have a prime few of Captain-freaking-America bashing three ugly aliens in the face with his shield, battering them to the ground. He stops for a moment to flex his fingers, wipe some of the grime from his face.

He doesn’t see the alien rushing him from behind, mouth open and yawning in some sort of hideous grin, poised to shove a glowing blue gun against the Captain’s muscly back.

I don’t think. My feet move without my telling them to. I can taste the ash as I dart to the middle of the street, as close as I dare. The air around me is impossibly frigid. I’m not controlling anything at this point, but I can deal with that later. Hopefully.

“DUCK!” I scream as loud as I possibly can over the sound of metal and roaring monsters.

His eyes snap up to meet mine. He heard me, somehow, and then he actually heeds a random girl standing amidst the carnage and hits the deck so fast I can hear the whiplash. It’s hot enough to make my skin boil, but if I stretch my hand out and pull, I can feel something begin to crystallize in my waiting palm-

Fissures crack open in the concrete beneath me. In my hand, a thin lance of ice extends to a deadly point, too weighty for its slim frame, and while I should have all the grace and skill of an alcoholic drug addict, my aim is good enough that the alien now has an unforgiving pole of ice sticking through its breastbone. Frost creeps from the hole in its chest, discoloring its sickly black armor to a grey tint. For a moment, it's suspended in time, unmoving- then gravity takes hold and with one last nightmarish shriek it crumples to the ground in a heap.

Huh. Whaddya know. I flex my fingers, breathing hard. Take that, Elsa. Screw the power of love, I just single-handedly saved a national icon.

Said icon is picking himself up off the ground, a new layer of dust coating the front of his uniform. He looks behind him, at the ugly corpse and the ice that inexplicably hasn’t started to melt in the city’s heat. Then his eyes are on me, hard and curious.

Oh. Fuck.

Instinctively, I pull my hood up further over my head, hopefully obscuring more of my face than before. What did he see? Could he memorize my face? He knows I’m a freak show, that’s for sure. Fuck. My brain kicks in and I run, skidding over broken pavement and letting the sheer terror of a crumbling New York fuel my steps. Either we’ll all be dead by the end of this, or the strange girl with ice coming from her hands will be little more than a hazy memory after all this is said and done. I hope. Don’t think about it, don’t think about it, don’t think about it- cold prickles on the back of my neck and pushes me back towards being just another face in the crowd.

  There are over a dozen police blockades to try and control the battlefield, and between them and the rubble raining from the heavens, it takes me what feels like hours to crawl back to my underside of the city. It’s punctuated by the grinding of metal and shattering of glass and sickening cracks of lightning from Midtown, making me flinch and wring my hands deep into my sweatshirts to keep them busy with something other than frosting the ground over. Don’t think about it.

I shove my shoulder into the door, forcing it open, then close it the same way from the opposite side. I flick the locks closed, secure the ball and chains. Each one is encased in frost by the time I’m done, and the doorjamb is clogged with ice. I’m suddenly irrationally thankful that there’s only one window in the apartment. It’s a stupid comfort- those things were leveling skyscrapers, a ratty building like this would be flattened in an instant-

I wrench open the nearest drawer, sending the contents rolling. Bottles clack against each other; pills rattling against the plastic. It’s the most comforting thing I’ve heard all day. I pull one out at random, pop the lid, down it dry. In the back of my mind, the large green monster roars. I shudder and swallow another, this time chasing it with swigs from the obscenely large bottle of booze on the desk. It burns all the way down in the best way, chasing the little orange tablets and promising the sweet release of nothing.  

That should last a day. Maybe more. I fall into the bed, already feeling the combo tug at my system, making me heavy and slow. Maybe Manhattan will still be standing when I wake up. Or better yet, Manhattan will still be standing, but I won’t. I’ve never been that lucky, but it never hurts to hope.

[sodalitefully]

Enter freely and of your own will [GNR, Sluff AU]

I know, I know, I've written vampire AUs before… Several times.  But I had to write something about what a nerd Slash is for vampire fiction!  Mostly inspired by interviews Slash gave after gnr covered Sympathy For The Devil for Interview With A Vampire (so any digs at the movie adaptation are based on Slash’s opinion, not mine – I’ve never seen it!).  Occasional mentions of blood and stuff, but not particularly graphic.  This fic is expanding on an AU I originally drew here.

~~~~

In my mind, it all played out like the plot of a paranormal romance novel.  I’ve gotten familiar with those lately, thanks to the collection hidden in the bottom shelves of Slash’s library, buried below the gothic horror classics, the crime thrillers, and about a mountain of nonfiction.  Hell, I could probably write my own!  “Tall blonde unexpectedly falls for rock and roll bad boy with a dark secret,” yeah, the readers would eat that up.  Of course, our love story didn’t really start when the unsuspecting protagonist moved to a new city, or when the leather-clad love interest showed off his supernatural shredding skills.  No, I’d say it started a couple years later, when I found out Slash’s other deep, dark, embarrassing secret.   

It wasn’t a dark and stormy night… but it was a movie night at my place, a tradition for Slash and I.  Whenever we needed a break from the so-called rockstar lifestyle, we’d get together for a night in, smoke some pot and put on a movie. Slash laid back on my couch while I dug through a cabinet packed with VHS tapes and listed off a few options: 

“Let’s see, we have Jurassic Park, Alien, Interview With a Vampire – Uh, sorry, I guess that would be weird huh?”  Slash made a sour face. 

“Ugh.  I hate that movie, it’s such a bad adaptation. Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt, seriously?” 

“Wait,” I dropped The Empire Strikes Back and Blazing Saddles onto the growing heap of tapes and sat back on my heels to look at Slash in surprise. "You’ve seen it before?” 

“Uh…” Vampires may not be able to blush but I'd known Slash long enough to tell when he’s flustered.   

“And you’ve read the book?” 

“… Yes?”  I laughed, Slash ducked and hid his face, obviously feeling self-conscious, but I didn’t mean to laugh at him.  It was just… 

I’d assumed that a real-life vampire would roll their eyes at the cliche, over-romanticized movie interpretations of their kind.  Instead, I learned of Slash’s (nearly) indiscriminate love for all things vampire, anything from Carmilla to Buffy The Vampire Slayer.  He was a sucker (hah, get it?) for dripping fangs, swishing capes, even those crazy accents, ever since he was a kid.  And I can’t lie, it was pretty endearing.  I wasn’t in love with him yet, but the more he told me about his obsession, the more warm and tingly I felt, charmed by how genuine he was – Hell, I barely even teased him about it!  Somehow, that conversation felt even more personal than finding out he was a damn vampire.  I was really touched that he felt comfortable sharing his interests with me, that he trusted me with his softer, nerdier, more romantic side.   

I resisted the temptation to press for more details that night, but a month or so later, I caught him in the act!  I remember waking up in the afternoon after crashing at his place so late it was early the night before.  I wandered around his big, spooky house until I found Slash curled up in one of his fancy antique armchairs, his legs dangling over the armrest and a paperback book cradled in his lap.  I couldn’t make out the curlicued script on the cover, but from the captivated look on his face it was a favorite – his eyes were bright as they darted across the page, and his lips curled into a warm, gentle smile. 

I couldn’t stand to disturb him, so I snuck off before he noticed me in the doorway, and headed down the hall to the room he’d transformed into a tiny library – The man had a library in his house; between that and the subtly gothic decor it was hard to believe I never noticed that Slash was playing up the vampire aesthetic, consciously or not!  Anyway, I poked around until I found where he hid his collection of vampire lit, and snatched a few that were, shall we say, not quite as acclaimed as Dracula or even The Vampire Chronicles.  I don’t remember the titles, but there were a couple paperback romances and a horror novel with a badass-looking dude on the cover. 

I had to see what all the fuss was about, you know?  Yeah, this kind of thing wasn’t exactly up my alley, but Slash usually had good taste, so I figured it couldn’t hurt to check it out.  Plus, if it was important to Slash, I wanted to know about it!  And not just the well-known classics either; I wanted the guilty pleasures, I wanted to see what it was that could make Slash smile like that when no one was watching. 

I’ll be honest, it wasn’t bad.  I wasn’t a big reader at the time, but I raced through the horror novel in just two days, and trust me, I barely slept the night in between!  The trashy romance was more enjoyable than I would ever admit; even with all the cliches and melodrama there was something compelling about unraveling the tangled web of forbidden love in a world full of the supernatural. 

At this point, I was very cautiously beginning to entertain the idea that I might see Slash as more than just a buddy and a bandmate.  As friends, were were closer than ever, hardly spent a day apart, and I was beginning to notice things that I hadn’t noticed before.  Things like the way he always smiled at my lame jokes, the way he leaned on my shoulder when he was pretending to be drunk, the way he tossed his hair on stage… And I couldn’t help wondering whether Slash identified more with the heroine or the love interest.  Did he want to be the cool, mysterious vampire lover, or the unsuspecting protagonist who gets drawn into an alluring new world? 

I got my answer a couple months later, in town again after a leg on the road. It was a steaming hot summer day back in L.A., and Slash was dozing on his couch. This wasn’t unusual in and of itself, Slash’s sleep schedule had been fucked for as long as I'd known him. No, what made this instance significant was that I was also on the couch, reclined with my feet over the armrest and Slash draped across my chest. Tales From The Crypt played at a murmur on a brand-new TV set, but I wasn’t paying any attention. 

See, at this point I’d recently learned that, when Slash focused hard enough, he could hear a living person’s blood pulsing in their veins and detect changes in body temperature.  And that had me wondering: Could he tell that my heart beat faster when he leaned against me on stage?  Could he tell that my ears got warm every time he turned a smile my way? 

Could he tell how much I was affected by his weight on top of me?   

He was like a huge cat in my lap, relaxed from head to toe.  If you paid attention, you could tell that he was breathing more slowly that an ordinary human should be and his bare skin was slightly cool.  Other than that he looked completely normal… Except for his teeth.  His mouth was slightly open, allowing his pointed, knife-sharp teeth to scrape against his lower lip. 

To Slash’s chagrin, they weren't gleaming white, perfectly straight fangs; instead they more closely resembled a shark’s jaw, crowded with small flesh-tearing blades.  It was rare to see them exposed, Slash was careful to limit himself to tight-lipped smiles and mumbled dialogue whenever his secret was at risk. Even in private he was self-conscious about it, and I considered myself lucky when he grinned openly in my presence. 

“Hey, Slash?”   

“…Hmm?” Languidly, he shifted until he was looking up at me.  Midafternoon sun leaked through the blinds brightly enough for me to make out a hint of red in his eyes, the other (un)dead giveaway that was usually obscured by his sedately lidded gaze.   

"You know how you said the other day that you have really strong senses? Well... I was wondering what other, uh, non-human traits you have. How true are the myths about vampires, really?” 

“Well… Hm.  My eyes are pretty sensitive to daylight.  And technically I’m nocturnal.  But I don’t have fangs, I don’t really look like a vampire and I don’t have superpowers.” I swear to god, he pouted a little.  "All things considered I didn’t really get any of the cool stuff." 

“No super-strength?  Or mind reading? Can you shapeshift into a bat?” 

“Don’t you think I’d tell you if I could turn into a bat?  At least I don’t have any of those stupid weaknesses, I can be in the sun and eat garlic and whatever.” He paused ponderously. “…You know, I might be immortal, I was around a long time before Tony and Ola took me in.  Guess I’ll find out in a few decades.” 

“That would be pretty cool.” 

“Yeah, maybe." 

“So... do you enthrall your victims?” I prodded, in a spooky, menacing voice belied by my goofy grin. 

Slash snorted a laugh and shook his head at my antics. “No, I can’t do that either.  Well, I don’t know, do you feel enthralled?” 

I laughed awkwardly and counted my blessings when Slash didn't notice that my unspoken answer was an empathetic Yes. 

Slash chuckled with me, then sighed.  “Fuck, I wish vampires like that were real, though…” he confessed softly. 

“Like what?” 

“You know, badass, seductive, awesome powers…” He waved a hand toward a pinup poster on the wall with a corset and fangs, then let his head fall back to my chest.  He mumbled into my shirt, “Is it really so much to ask for a sexy vampire to come and sweep me off my feet?” 

“Slash, I hate to tell you this, but…” I couldn’t make it through the sentence with a straight face. 

He swatted my bicep – pretty hard too, was he sure he didn’t have super-strength? “Fuck you, Duff, you know what I mean." 

And, yeah, dreaming of being wooed by a beautiful, badass, intelligent and darkly mysterious vampire?  Who appeared in my life and changed it forever, who blew me away with his capability and his passion?  Who could captivate me with just a look? 

Yeah. Believe me, I could relate.

~~~~

Happy Halloween! 

[feverinfeveroutfic]

chapter eleven: fresh as fallen snow

***chapter title inspired by a one shot courtesy of grungeslash (except that’s called “fresh as fallen new snow”)

Sam awoke to the feeling of the hard floor underneath her back and her hips. She grimaced at the tense feeling and stretched out her legs. She turned her head for a look at Frank, who had lay down on his side on the floor. He had pressed his back to the wall and let his arms lay out before him; his lush dark hair spread over his face and obscured his eyes and his nose. His chest rose and fell in a steady motion.

Sam pushed herself into an upright position there on the floor and then she raised her arms up above her head. She opened her mouth and let out a soft, pained moan. Frank never stirred once but he did turn his head into the carpet a bit more. More strands of soft lush hair spread over his face like a blanket. She turned her head again to find her journal and the pencil and pens resting on the floor next to her right hip.

The entire apartment was silent except for a faint drone out in the front room. She rubbed her right eye with the base of her palm and hesitated there for a little bit. She peered out the window over Frank's slumbering body but she couldn't see what was out there. With a sore feeling in her back and her hips, she lifted herself onto her knees and then she pushed herself up onto her feet. She stretched her arms over her head again and spotted the large snowflakes drifting down from the pure white sky.

She looked down at Frank and his arms laying out before him. A noise out in the front room caught her attention and she ambled over to the closet door. The rest of the apartment was cold and still, and Charlie whispered something to Marla in the next room over. Sam crept towards the mouth of the hallway for a peek into the front room.

Scott and Billy were both passed out in the living room: the former had been laid out on the love seat while the latter lay down on his back flat on the floor with a blanket over his body.

She knew they were going to wake up feeling sick from all the booze from the day before. Indeed, the back of her mouth felt dry and parched from the bit of beer that she had drank down herself. She wasn't hung over but even with the feeling in the back of her throat, she knew it could be far worse.

Careful not to wake up the snoring Billy, she crept across the carpet to the kitchen for a cup of water. Scott shuddered a bit when she strode past him. Indeed, she wanted to switch on the thermostat but given Frank and the two of them were still sound asleep, and she took a glass for herself from the cupboard.

When she downed the cool water from the faucet, she thought about the man appearing in her dreams. The literal man of her dreams. She wanted to know him, and she wanted to know if he was even real. She poured herself another cup full of water and drank it down in one fell swoop.

Scott let out a low, pained groan.

“Fuck—”

Sam held still with the empty glass cradled in her hand. Scott moaned in agony as he limply rolled onto his side.

“Fucking hell. Oh, God...” His voice broke from that awful feeling. “Ugh—Billy? Bill. Billy.”

Sam sighed through her nose and stood in the doorway with the glass still in hand. Billy had rolled over onto his side and buried his face right in the carpet. Scott meanwhile lifted himself into an upright position on the love seat, and he rubbed his eyes.

“Jesus Christ,” he muttered. She hung there in the doorway and watched him hunch over his lap; he then ran his fingers through his hair and bowed his head. He peered at her over his shoulder and he raised his thick dark eyebrows at her, like a pair of blackened frozen fish sticks.

“Oh, hey,” he greeted her in a raspy voice. “What—What happened last night?”

“You fell asleep in the back seat of the car and we brought you and Billy back to Charlie's place.”

“Ohhh... shit.” He rubbed his eyes again. Even in the dim light, she could make out the washed out color in his face. He licked his lips and he breathed at a quick and heavy pace.

“You're not gonna barf, are you?” she asked him, concerned.

“I hope not,” he confessed. “I am dyin' of thirst, though.”

“Want me to wake him up?” She gestured to Billy laying still there on the floor, to which Scott shook his head.

“Nah, you don't wanna do that,” he assured her. “I did that the first time we got hammered together not long ago and he just about bit me.”

“Jeez.”

“Yeah. He narrowly missed me—if I hung over his face for just a second longer, I probably wouldn't have as big'a eyebrows right now.”

“Want me to get you something?” she offered him.

“An aspirin the size of the Bronx?” he replied with a sickly smile on his face. “A piece of dried toast to keep my stomach from flying out every which direction?”

“Something feasible,” she corrected herself, and she wrinkled her nose at the sound of that last request.

“A cup of coffee?” he followed up.

“Now, that I can do for you,” she said with a wag of her finger, “—as long as Charlie and Marla want some, too.”

She was about to step over Billy's unconscious body but then she stopped herself and stepped around him instead. She made her way down the hallway to Charlie and Marla's bedroom: she pushed open the slightly ajar door and found they lay next to each other in bed, snuggled underneath the covers against the cold of the apartment.

“Hey, you two—” Sam greeted them in a near whisper. Charlie lifted his head to look at her, and albeit with blurred eyes.

“Oh, hey,” he replied to her in a broken voice. Marla poked her head out from under the blankets: her orange disheveled hair stood up in every which direction at the crown of her head.

“Hey, girlfriend,” she greeted her after clearing her throat.

“What’s up?” Charlie closed his eyes and then he lifted his head up from the pillow.

“I just came in to ask if you guys want a bit of coffee,” she offered; even though she stood in the doorway, she could tell neither of them wore clothes under there.

“Like the best thing for a hangover,” Marla remarked: Sam could make out the sight of her hand caressing over Charlie’s bare chest, even with the blanket over him.

“Coffee and a bit of breakfast...” His eyes then popped open in surprise. “Wait, do we even have coffee on hand?”

“I think you do,” she told him.

“You haven’t been here, though,” he reminded her.

“Yes, but the last time I was here, we had a big pot of coffee together.”

“That was like three weeks ago,” he recalled.

“You had plenty left in the can, though... right?” Marla paused with her mouth slightly agape.

“Plenty for myself for the next couple of days,” he flatly said.

“Hang on, hang on, I’ll go look,” Sam offered, and she ducked out of there and doubled back to the front room, where Scott paced to and fro with one hand on the side of his head. Billy still hadn’t awoken. She was about to walk in when she felt something grab her by the shoulder. It yanked her back into the closet, and she realized it was just Frank.

“What’re you doing?” she demanded.

“Shhhh!”

“What’re you doing?” she repeated in a hushed voice.

“Dude, Charlie needs to see these,” he said as he held her sketchbook right in front of his chest with one hand.

“I thought we made a promise to not share them, though,” she reminded him.

“Yeah, but—I kind of changed my mind, though.”

“You changed your mind without telling me,” she concluded.

“Yeah, but—you weren’t in here when I woke up and thought it, though. I was going to tell you about it once you got in here. I saw you walking past and I just couldn’t take it anymore.”

“So you delve through my journal without my permission.”

“Not really. I just sorta picked up the journal and I remembered they were in there. Didn’t even open the thing.”

“Huh.” She shrugged her shoulders. “But that still doesn’t explain why we have to share it to all of them out there.”

“I didn’t say all of them, though,” Frank pointed out. “Just to Charlie.”

“Well, I was gonna make the bunch of us coffee,” she said as she tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. The piece of gum she had stuck back there had not left a single mark on the skin or the hair there.

“As long as neither of us are hungover,” he pointed out.

“I’m not hungover,” she promised him with a shake of her head.

“There’s another thing I want from you, too—if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” she said with another shake of her head.

Frank fetched up a sigh. She recalled what she had told him the night in that he was seeing her at her most self and her most vulnerable self: her artistry left her feeling naked, and the only way to feel it even further was if she had stripped down to her underwear at one point and let him do the same. He had witnessed a side to her that no one else had witnessed before either, and in a way in which the art took on a life of its own. She had a tiny ray of hope within her that it would be something innocent, even by her own standards, and yet she had a feeling that it would be something significant.

“I wanna see more art from you to me,” he begged her, to which she gaped at him.

“For you?” she asked him, stunned.

“All for me. No word to Charlie or Joey or anyone about it, either. I want it between the two of us. I want it. I must have it!”

“Well, get down on your knees and beg it from me then,” she teased him, and yet he did just that regardless of whether or not she meant it. Frank knelt down before her and held onto both of her hands.

“Please, Sam—Sam I Am—please. I want more from you just for me. As your best friend.”

“But you ain't my best friend, though, Frankie,” she pointed out.

“I oughta be, though!” he insisted. “I want to be your best friend.”

She looked down at his face and his big dark eyes, like the eyes of a puppy begging her for a treat.

“Yeah, but there's—Aurora and now there's—there's Marla—” she stammered.

“They can be your best girl friends—but I wanna be your best friend, period.”

“If I'll be your best friend, I'll take you to whatever show you wish this summer,” he vowed.

“Why this summer?” she demanded.

“Because that’s when we all go out on tour. The last stretch of time before you and Marla go to school, too!”

“That is, if I get into school,” she pointed out.

“You will,” he vowed. “Trust me, you will get into school. Trust me, Sam, you will.”

Sam nibbled on her bottom lip and that was when she caught the sound of Scott muttering something to himself. Charlie's laugh echoed through the wall to the right. Not even two weeks before, she was alone in the Bronx, and there she was, caught up between four men, or at least three of them unless the assumption with Joey rang true. Three men and she had no idea as to what to do with either of them.

“Okay,” she said in a low voice, and yet when the words left her lips, a chill ran up her spine. It was actually happening. She had said yes!

“Oh, thank you so much!” Frank climbed to his feet and threw his arms around her. Given he was so tall in comparison to her, he smothered her with his chest and his sinewy arms. She lifted her head in hopes to breathe.

“Oh, my god—it's such an honor, Sam,” he cooed in her ear. “It's an honor to be your first clientele.”

“I try my best—” she sputtered: he loosened his grip so she could breathe and touch his chest with both hands. “I try my best.”

“You are the best, though,” he insisted. “You and Charlie—two of the best artists I've ever seen, I swear.”

“Where am I on par with him?” She raised an eyebrow at him.

“You want the truth?” He lowered his voice to a whisper, given Charlie and Marla were right next door to them.

“Nothing but the truth,” she insisted in an equal whisper.

“You're slightly better than him,” he confessed.

“Only slightly?”

“Yeah. Charlie's excellent but you—you're in a whole other ballpark altogether. You're in a league of your own.”

“Hey, Sam, what's the hold up?” Scott called out from the front room.

“Oh, yeah, I was gonna whip up some coffee for the bunch of us,” she recalled right into Frank's face.

“Oh, boy!” A bright twinkle emerged in his eye as he let her go. Scott poked his head into the closet right then.

“There you are,” he said to her after a clearing of his throat.

“Yeah, Frankie just wanted to tell me something,” she quipped.

“I dunno if I have any coffee, though,” Charlie called out.

Billy groaned from the front room.

“We'll haveta keep our voices down, I reckon,” Frank declared.

“Not necessarily,” Scott told him even as he massaged his temple with two fingers.

“There was that time Billy tried to bite Scott, though,” Marla's wavering voice caught their ears.

“That was 'cause I stood right above him, though,” Scott pointed out. “On the other hand, I dunno 'bout all of this.” He hesitated with his lips pursed. The color had drained away from his face. His body trembled even when he stood perfectly still right in the doorway.

“You alright, man?” Frank asked him, to which Scott raised a finger. He then turned to the other side of the hallway to the bathroom: no sooner had he closed the door behind him when they heard that visceral, retching noise on the other side.

“A little bit ago, I asked him if he was gonna puke and what does he do?” Sam said in a single breath.

“Pukes his damn guts out,” Frank quipped with a straight face and a nod of his head. Charlie strode past the door to the kitchen, albeit in nothing more than his shorts and a pair of white tube socks; Marla muttered something to herself in the next room. While Scott stayed in the bathroom, Sam ambled into the next room to check on Marla, where she had sat upright on the edge of the bed with her camisole down over her chest. She tugged it down once she saw Sam standing there.

“Hey,” she greeted her, complete with a little smile on her face.

“Hey,” Sam echoed. Marla looked as though she never spent the night tipsy and with her body entwined with Charlie's: she had a rich rosey blush in her face and her eyes sparkled with the daylight.

“Could you do me a solid?” she asked Sam.

“Uh, sure.”

“You see my pants right there?” She pointed across the room to the pair of jeans she had worn the night before draped over the top of the chair.

“Yeah.”

“Could you hand it to me? I'm not wearing any underwear and I don't really want you to see my naked ass.” Indeed, she pulled the blanket over her lap to hide her naked legs. Sam handed her those pants in one fell swoop; she could still hear Scott in the bathroom.

“You're not hungover?” she asked Marla as she backed up to the door again to give her privacy, and she shook her head.

“I got drunk one other time with Frank and Charlie not long ago—and I never got hungover then, either,” she confessed. “I guess some of us handle it better than others.”

Scott groaned from the bathroom, which he then followed up with the faucet running. Charlie emerged from the hallway, right behind Sam no less; she stood back to look on at the loose tendrils of kinky black hair dangling down from his head onto his sinewy bare shoulder.

“Told ya I'm outta coffee,” he told her with a shrug of those bare shoulders.

“You didn't say that,” Marla scoffed as she slipped on her panties without standing up. “You said you weren't sure.”

“Yeah, and then I started questioning it.”

Sam rolled her eyes.

“You silly boys,” she joked.

“Right?” Marla joined in as she put on her pants, again without standing up. “Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.”

“We need ya, though,” Scott moaned from the bathroom; the three of them turned to see him standing in the doorway there. A warm blush began to bloom across his face and his eyes were clearer than before. Some water dripped down from his bottom lip and Sam could tell right away he was feeling better.

“Would you like some toast?” she offered him.

“Please.”

* * * * *

After Charlie had returned with a brand new can of coffee, the five of them congregated in that front room for breakfast, all around Billy, who never left his spot there on the carpet. Frank and Sam took their seats next to each other, albeit nestled down in the corner of the cushion and the arm of the love seat. She sipped on the blond coffee in the white china mug and snuggled next to her new best friend, or at least that was the assumption between the two of them.

“You wanna check on Joey?” Marla asked Charlie.

“I tried callin' him before I left,” he told her, “and got no answer. I'm sure he's alright, but I think it'd be a good idea.”

“We have to go back up there anyway,” Scott pointed out. “Grab the tape and hand it over to Jon and whatnot.”

“What should we do about him?” Sam asked him with a gesture to Billy on the floor before them.

“One of us should stay here and hang with him when he wakes up,” Charlie suggested. Frank turned to Scott at the opposite end of the love seat. Sam glanced over at him as well, followed by Marla and finally Charlie.

“Why you all lookin' at me?” he demanded, befuddled.

“Scott, you got drunk with Billy last time,” Charlie recalled.

“And? He just about bit me, though.”

“Yeah, but you got drunk with him the last time,” he insisted.

“He just about bit me.”

“You got drunk with him the last time.”

“He almost bit me.”

“You got drunk with him the last time.”

“He almost bit me!”

Frank, Marla, and Sam glanced at one another, and then the three of them burst out laughing. Charlie started chuckling himself.

“It's not funny! He really did almost bite me!” Scott's face flushed to a rich red color.

“Let's draw straws then,” Sam suggested.

“Eh, let's do something else instead,” Charlie said with a nod of his head. “I don't have any straws and I don't feel like going out again just to get a box of straws only for that.”

“Flip a coin?” Frank suggested as he reached into his pocket for some loose change.

“I choose heads,” Scott said.

“Who's going with tails, then?” Marla asked, and they froze right in their tracks.

“Good point, babe,” Charlie noted and Frank put the change back into his pocket.

“Nose goes!” Sam declared.

“Nose goes?” Charlie raised an eyebrow at her.

“Whoever touches the tip of their nose last has to watch over him,” she said in a single breath. “So—nose goes!” She touched the tip of her nose with two fingers. Frank followed suit, and then Charlie and Marla, and Scott touched the tip of his nose last.

“Damn it,” he muttered. “Best two out of three?”

The four of them looked at each other and then back at him.

“Nah,” they all said in unison.

Scott fetched up a sigh and bowed his head.

“Alright, I'll do it. Although Charlie, you just said you didn't want to go out again.”

“Not like that, though,” he pointed out. “I'd rather these girls not go out upstate solo.”

“I'd rather they didn't, either,” said Scott.

“I can take 'em out,” Frank suggested.

“Stormtroopers isn't your project, though,” Charlie said, nonchalant.

“Well, one of us has gotta go out there, though,” Frank pointed out. Sam and Marla glanced at one another.

“We can go out there,” the latter suggested.

“Yeah, we were out there with you guys,” Sam recalled.

“Do you know where to drop off the tape, though?” Scott asked them.

“No, but you could tell us,” Marla suggested.

The three of them took a glimpse at each other.

“One of us has to come along, though,” Scott insisted.

“I'll do it!” Frank said.

“Wait, what about Danny?” Marla suggested with a snap of her fingers.

“Oh, yeah, call up Danny!” Sam agreed.

“Do I even have Danny's number again, though?” Charlie wondered aloud as he wiped his hands together to rid of the rest of the toast crumbs from his palms.

“You ought to have it,” Scott said as he took another sip of coffee. Charlie sauntered over to the kitchen door and he picked up the phone.

“So you two girls plus Frankie and Danny,” Scott proclaimed as he tucked a lock of dark hair right behind his ear.

“Exactly,” Sam promptly promised him and she took another sip of coffee.

“Besides, I'm wanting to see Joey again,” Marla added as she took a sip of coffee for herself.

“I hope he's feelin' okay,” Frank chimed in.

“Yeah, you had to literally carry him into his apartment last night,” Sam recalled.

“Charlie just about kicked in the door, too,” Frank told her.

“Okay, we'll be waitin' for ya, Dan,” Charlie's voice floated in from the kitchen. He hung up the phone and returned to them. “Danny said he'll be here faster than we can say his name.”

“So you and I'll stay here and watch over him,” Scott said, “despite my losing the whole nose goes thingy.”

“Nah, I'm stayin' here 'cause it's my place,” Charlie pointed out with a sip of coffee.

* * * * *

Frank had put his shoes back on once Dan showed up at the door step wrapped up in a heavy black leather jacket and with little black gloves on his hands.

“C'mon, puff daddy,” Sam coaxed him as she put on her coat, which brought a laugh out of him. Marla and Charlie kissed each other on the cheek goodbye for the time being, and then the three of them headed outside to meet up with Dan there at the curb: lucky for them, the snow had stopped which left behind a light little blanket on the sidewalk and the cars around the block.

“We takin' my car or yours, Frankie?” He rose his voice enough for them to hear over the roar of the street.

“Does your heater work?” Frank asked him as he ran a hand over the crown of his head.

“Oh, yeah. Horn doesn't, though.”

“So if we get stuck in a jam, we can be toasty warm but we can't honk for someone,” Frank pointed out.

“Yeah, let's take yours.”

Without another word, the four of them piled into Frank's car and took to the road within time. Sam and Marla nestled to one another in the back seat with their hands tucked into their coat pockets despite the warmth around them.

“So we're gonna swing by the studio place and then we're gonna check on Joey,” Frank told Dan.

“Sounds good by me. He drank quite a bit last night, too.”

“Yeah, he did. Charlie and I actually had to carry him up the stairs to his apartment. Charlie had to lock the door for him and everything.”

“Did he wake up?” Dan asked him.

“Nah, he didn't even stir once.”

They fell into silence for the rest of the trip up to the studio. The fresh blanket of snow had coated the trees and the evergreen shrubs dotting the landscape. Sam shivered at the sight of the winter wonder land around them: the frost building on the outside of the windows only added to the sensation in her skin and bones. Marla glanced over at her hunching down in her coat.

“The New York cold is not for everyone,” she said in a low voice.

“I like it, though,” Sam confessed.

Within time, they reached the place, right up the block from the quiet place. Even when they drove past there, Sam could make out the sight of the thick blanket of white snow upon the trees that lined the pathway to the clearing. The quiet place between her and Charlie.

They parked at the curb within the view of the door, and Dan bowed out of the car and they watched him head in there to fetch that demo tape. Within time, he slipped into the front seat with it tucked underneath his arm.

“That was quick,” Marla remarked.

“Danny doesn't mess around,” Frank declared as he fired up the car again. They drove onward to Joey's apartment complex, which resembled to a series of ginger bread houses nestled there in the trees. They rolled into the parking lot, where the man himself sat there on the bottom step of the stairs, even with the snow around him. The clouds broke open as they took the spot next to him. Joey rested the side of his head in the palm of his hand. Even with the sunglasses upon his face, Sam could tell he was very hungover. He let out a long low whistle and ran his fingers through his black curls. She watched him tilt his head back; he grimaced at the feeling within him.

“You okay?” Dan called out to him once he rolled down the window.

“Feel like I've been hit by a truck,” he confessed.

“You need anything?” Frank asked him. “Like can we get you something for you?”

“Nah, I got a friend comin' back with some breakfast,” Joey assured them. “Thank you, though.” He gazed on at Sam and Marla in the back seat but he never waved at either of them.

“Thank you, though,” he repeated.

“Well, if you need anything, we're here for ya, man,” Frank assured him. “Me, and Danny here, and Scott and Charlie, and the girls—all of us. We're all for ya, even when we're not.”

A smile crossed Joey's face and he bowed his head from the glare of the sunshine on the snow around him. They backed out of there and returned to the road just as a second car pulled in next to them in the driveway: Sam peered behind her to find Joey standing to his feet and she knew that was his friend in question. Even though she knew he couldn't see her, she smiled at the last glimpse of him before they headed back onto the road.

Within a few hours, they returned to the City and to Charlie's apartment to check out the demo tape for themselves before submitting it, under the moniker of Stormtroopers of Death. Sam and Frank lingered back near the closet doorway as Charlie played it for them on his little walkman.

“So what do you think?” Marla asked him at one point.

“I'm sure all of this'll be good enough,” Charlie assured her. “I'm pretty sure.”

“Pretty sure?”

“Guarantee it—kinda.”

“Let's take it to Jon then,” Scott declared as he rubbed his hands together. Sam turned to Frank with a grin on her face.

“How exciting! A new record for you guys plus a brand new thing on the side.”

“Welcome to our world, Sam, babe,” he said as he put his arm around her. “We're just getting started.”

“Take my hand, Frankie,” she coaxed him. “Take my hand.”

“Take your hand in marriage!” he joked, and she burst out laughing.

“Scott and Danny are gonna submit it to Jonny Z now,” Marla told them as she rubbed her upper arms from the chill of having gone out in the fresh snow. Sam peered over her shoulder and spotted the sketchbook on the floor in the closet still. She nibbled on her bottom lip as she knew what she had promised Frank earlier, but it was going to have to come to fruition at some point.

“Alright, fuck it,” she said in a low voice.

“Fuck what?” Frank asked her with a bit of a chuckle.

“—let's just grab Charlie and do a demo of sorts.”

“You're gonna?” His face lit up, and she nodded in response.

[eeveecryptid]

※ BORDERLANDS: CL4P-TP EDITION

Various lines that Claptrap bots have said through Borderlands 1, Pre-Sequel and 2. feel free to change pronouns if needed. May include nsfw material. ( BL3 version here )

"Wow! You're not dead?" "Hey, check me out everybody! I'm dancin', I'm dancin'!" "Unce! Unce! Unce! Unce! Ooo, oh check me out. Unce! Unce! Unce! Unce! Oh, come on get down." "Yoo-hoooooooooo!" "I am the best robot. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I am the best robot. Ooh, ooh, here we go!" "Hey! Over here! I'm over here!" "Still haven't found the Vault?" "I'm over here!” "Rrrrrgh...this isn't working!" "Unce! Unce! I think I lost the beat... but, Unce! Unce!" "Wanna hear a new dubstep song I wrote? Wub! Wub--"  "(name) asked me to tell you about a, uh, ‘little sumthin' sumthin'’ s/he needs done. You should ask him/her about it!" "Did you find the Vault yet?" "Sure is lonely around here." "Oh my God, I'm leaking! I think I'm leaking! Ahhhh, I'm leaking! There's oil everywhere!" "I can see through time..." "My servos... are seizing..." "I can see... the code." "I don't like this... this is making me nervous. Take a deep breath- I can't breathe! This is just a recording of someone breathing! It's not real! It's just making me more nervous!" "I'm detecting a motor unit malfunction... I can't move! I'm paralyzed with fear!" "Please don't shoot me, please don't shoot me, please don't shoot me!" "Turning off the optics... they can't see me..." "The traveler will protect me. The traveler will protect me." "Good as new, I think. Am I leaking?" "The box is awaiting your attention." "Please open the box." "Yeah? Well, hmph!" [ gives the finger ] "Good luck!" "There's more to learn!" "Let me teach you the ways of magic!” "Magic waits for no one, apprentice!" "Still working on that quest?" "Shouldn't you be murdering something about now?" "Hey! You're TALKING to me! And I didn't even have an exclamation point over my head! This is the BEST day of my life!" "Sooooo... how are things?" "Hey, best friend!" "Yessss, look into my eyes. You're getting sleepy. You're getting... zzzzzz... Zzzzzz..." "Success! My spell to make you want to hang out with me worked!" "Stay a while, and listen. Oh god, please -- PLEASE! -- stay a while." "Away with thee!" "Don't you worry, minion! Give me one good shot at that (name) dude and I'll take them right out! I... just got some stuff to do first." "We've really come a long way, haven't we, minion? And you're still just as loyal as ever! Who's a good minion? You are! Yes you are!" "Yessiree! This whole place would completely fall apart without old Claptrap keeping things humming along!" "As a robot, I'm completely immune to (name)’s gas attacks. But that hasn't stopped me from incessantly cowering!" "And I thought bandits were bad BEFORE they had nightmare plants growing out of them!" "You already saved Pandora? But... but I'M the hero of Pandora! It's on my business card! I ORDERED SO MANY OF THEM!" "Sanctuary's gone? But the bank! All my stuff! All my crucial information! YES! I'M OFF THE GRID, BABY! NO MORE CREDITORS! Seriously, I owe a lot of people a lot of money." " The Vault Map is gone! Forever! It will never be found. Never, ever, ever-- is what I'll say to everyone I know while I look for it. " “ I can do more than open doors, sir/ma’am! We CL4P-TP units can be programmed to do anything from open doors to ninja-sassinate highly important Janitor-y officials! ” “ I once started a revolution myself. There were lots of guns and a lot of dying. You'd think I would have gotten some better benefits out of the whole thing but no, demoted back to door-opening servitude! ” “ ---Remember what? Are... are you my father? ” “ Are you god? Am I dead? ” “ I'M DEAD I'M DEAD OHMYGOD I'M DEAD! ” “ Thanks for giving me a second chance, (name). I really appreciate it. ” " Hey everybody! Check out my package! " " Let's get this party started! " " Glitching weirdness is a term of endearment, right? " " This time it'll be awesome, I promise! " " Look out everybody! Things are about to get awesome! " " Eww, what flavor is red? " "Where'd all my bullets go?" " Bullets are dumb. " " I need tiny death pellets! " " RUN FOR YOUR LIIIIIVES! " " Oh, s/he's big...REALLY big! " " I am a tornado of death and bullets! " " Stop me before I kill again, except don't! " " There is no way this ends badly! " " This is why I was built! " " You call yourself a badass? " " Is it dead? Can- can I open my eyes now? " " I didn't panic! Nope, not me! " " Not so tough after all! " " I have gaskets tougher than you! " " That was me! I did that! " " Don't tell me that wasn't awesome! " " Wait, did I really do that? " " Aww! Now I want a snow cone. " " Freeze! I don't know why I said that. " " I can't feel my fingers! Gah! I don't have any fingers! " " Why do I even feel pain?! " " Why did they build me out of galvanized flesh?! " " That looks like it hurts! " " Oh, quit falling to pieces. " " Is that what people look like inside? " " Huh, robot's don't do that. " " Disgusting. I love it! " " It's about to get magical! " " You can't just program this level of excitement! " " Push this button, flip this dongle, voila! Help me! " " Square the I, carry the 1... YES! " " I have an IDEA! " " Round and around and around she goes! " " It's like a box of chocolates. " " If I had veins, they'd be popping out right now! " " Roses are red and/Violets are blue/Wait... how many syllables was that? " " Aww, I should've drawn tattoos on you! " " Tell me I'm the prettiest! " " Trouncy, flouncy... founcy... those aren't words. " " The robot is dead, long live the robot! " " Take these, gorgeous, you'll feel better! " " Some days, you just can't get rid of an obscure pop-culture reference. " " Oh darn, oh boy, oh crap, oh boy, oh darn. " " Do not look behind my curtain! " " I'm made of magic! " " Like those guys who made only one song ever. " " Everybody, dance time! Da-da-da-dun-daaa-da-da-da-dun-daaa! " " I brought you a present: EXPLOSIONS! " " Is this really canon? " " ... You're dead to me. " “ Nobody hurts my friends! " " Wubwubwub. Dubstep dubstep. Wubwubwubwub DROP! Dubstep! " " I'll stop talking when I'm dead! " " I'll die the way I lived: annoying! " " Come back here! I'll gnaw your legs off! " " This could've gone better! " " You look like something a skag barfed up! " " What's that smell? Oh wait, it's just you! " " Yo momma's so dumb, she couldn't think of a good ending for this 'yo momma' joke! " " You're one screw short of a screw! " " I bet your mom could do better! " " Good thing I don't have a soul! " " I'll never go back to the bad place! " " I have many regrets! " " Can I just say... yeehaw. " " You're the wub to my dub! " " So... does this make me your favorite? " " What are YOU doing down here? " " We're like those buddies in that one show! " " This is no time to be lazy! " " You can thank me later! " " You love me, right? " " You, me... keeping on... together? " " You versus me! Me versus you! Either way! " " Dance battle! Or, you know... regular battle. " " You wanna fight with me?! Put 'em up!.. Put 'em up? " " A million baddies, and you wanna hit me? Aww! " " I am so impressed with myself! " " Ha ha, this is in no way surprising! Ha ha! " " Don't bother with plastic surgery - there's NO fixing that! " " I am right behind you, Vault Hunting friend! " " I can do that too! ... Sorta... Except not. " " You jerks have NO idea what you're in for! " " I'm so glad I'm not one of those guys right now! " " YOU! ARE! SCARY! " " That is in no way disturbing. " " I did a challenge? I did a challenge! " " Glad I didn't mess that up. " " I feel... complete!.. That's weird. " " I actually did something right for once! " " Hmmm, the possibilities are an infinite recursion. " " Do any of these come with a new paint job? " " Which of these gives me my free will back? " " The moon is not enough! " " I'd do anything for a man/woman with a gun. " " At least I still have my teeth! " " Coffee? Black... like my soul. " " Crazy young whippersnappers...  " " I've finally got an electric personality! " " Wait, this isn't vegetable juice! " " Cool! Now we're both super-crazy-amazing! " " These are the best kind of cooties! " " Can I shoot something now? Or climb some stairs? SOMETHING exciting? " " Times like these, I really start to question the meaning of my existence. Then I get distra-hey! What's this? This looks cool! " " It would really stink if I couldn't control what I was thinking. Like, who wants to know that I'm thinking about cheese and lint, right? " " How does math work? Does this skin make me look fat? If a giraffe and a car had a baby, would it be called a caraffe? Life's big questions, man. " " Who needs memories when I can do all this cool stuff? Stuff that I currently am not doing! That's what I'd like to call a 'hint'. " " Does this mean I can start dancing? Pleeeeeeaaaaase? " " Ya know when there was that Vault monster scare? I had these friends, and boy times sure were scary! But, I didn't care because I had friends, and they were like... super-friends! And then they left me, but they saved the world and I was like 'I know those guys!' Even though they never came back after that I still knew they cared, because no one had ever been... nice to me before. ... What is this? My eye is like... leaking. " " It's really quiet... and lonely... (hums briefly) Also this 'stopped moving' thing makes me uncomfortable. It gives me time to stop and think... literally. I'VE STOPPED, AND I'M THINKING! IT HURTS ME! " " Oh. My. God. What if I'm like... a fish? And, if I'm not moving... I stop breathing? AND THEN I'LL DIE! HELP ME! HELP MEEEEE HEE HEE HEEE! HHHHHHHELP! " " Ahem, ahem. What's going on? Did I break something? " “ You hear me, (name)?! You killed my friends! You destroyed my product line! I am the last Claptrap in existence, AND I AM GOING TO TEABAG YOUR CORPSE! ” “ You think a door can stop me, (name)?! I was MADE to open doors! ” “ Dammit, (name) - how did you know stairs were my ONLY weakness?! Next to electrocution, and explosions, and gunfire, rust, corrosion, being kicked a lot, viruses, being called bad names, falling from great heights, drowning, adult onset diabetes, being looked at funny, heart attacks, exposure to oxygen, being turned down by women, and pet allergens! Your brilliance is matched only by your malevolence! ” “ I'm just gonna go ahead and cloak now. You can't hear me crying if I cloak! (sobbing) stairs, why did it have to be stairs? I'll never climb those stairs! ”

[ambidextrousarcher]

Sarcastic StarBharat Reviews: Episode 14- In which a (completely non-canon) coronation is stopped.

Tagging @butchcaroldanvers, @mayavanavihariniharini, @medhasree, @chaanv @shaonharryandpannisim @allegoriesinmediasres @hermioneaubreymiachase @iamnotthat @ratnas-musings @justahappyreindeer @avani008. I’m forgetting someone...

The episode begins exactly where the last one ends. “Who dares?” asks Mr. Permanently Angry Drama Queen. Gandhari stutters a hesitant “husband…” I am NOT going to use the word ‘arya’. For some reason, if freaks me out. Another voice joins in “Putr Dhritrashtra”. “Mata?” “Are you ready, son?” “I have been ready for years, mother.” Yeah, Mr. Conceited Ego, we all know how ready you were. BTW, I think I have not pointed this out, thinking it obvious, but in case it isn’t, it’s a CANON FAIL #23: I don’t remember Dhritrashtra being the original person to be crowned. From what I know of canon, it was always Pandu. I’m not sure if Dhritrashtra was crowned after Pandu’s exile, but I doubt it, seeing that it was always Yudhisthir who was apparently the heir to the throne. “You will be Hastina’s King today” says Ambika. She gushes a bit about her happiness. She ends with “We should be there by the time Pandu and Vidur have finished taking the oaths. Come, Gandhari.” Mr. Drama Queen has to keep adding unnecessary drama (I’m actually kinda feeling sorry for the actor by now) and he says “Tell her not to walk by my side.” Dude, she’s your wife, isn’t she? Ms. Always Patnidharm? (This ain’t canon Gandhari, either). “If my pace slows while walking towards the throne for any reason, I will not bear it!” Ah, apparently this show has had enough of psycho ladies. Time for psycho dudes! Psycho dude #1: Mr. Drama Queen. #2 is Shakuni, I’ll defo come up with some name for him too. I think Mr. Ominous Music is good. Dhritrashtra strides off. “Come, sister. Whether or not you walk equally, he can’t sit on the throne without you.” This, quite obviously, is Mr. Ominous Music. Scene switches to an elaborate ceremony. Mr. Honey Boy and Vidur are here. They go stand on two sides of the hall. They do the required salutations. Vidur is the first to start the oath. He and Pandu do it in tandem. Vidur represents the virtues of justice, Pandu those of valour. They are handed the ceremonial spectre and the ceremonial armor respectively. They make oaths to the respective item. With that, the jayjaykars begin and the ceremony comes to an end. Mr. Drama Queen strides in with his usual angry strides, followed by Ms. Always Patnidharm, Mr. Ominous Music et al. He gives perfunctory pranipaats. Bhishm pointedly doesn’t bless him, his usual customary ‘Ayushmaan Bhav’ is missing. Satyavati gives him a blessing and then outlines her hopes. “The throne of Hastina will receive its lord today,” she says. (You’re right, lady, but the lord in question is not the one you think it is…here anyway). “This is one of the happiest moments of my life. Today, you will lift the weight of your father’s nations on your shoulders, that has been borne by myself and Bhishm for so long. Now is the time for your coronation.” Mr. Angry Drama Queen manages to look both angry and dramatic as he ascends the steps to the throne. He joins his hands as Bhishm passes the ceremonial sword to him. “Stop, elder brother,” This is Vidur. Ah, the moment of reckoning is here. “Mahamantri Vidur, how can you do something so inauspicious?” This is Satyavati. “The reason is that I just swore the oath of the Mahamantri.” He repeats that oath. “Hence,” he says “It is mandatory for me to stop this Adharm.” “What Adharm, Mahamantri?” “This coronation, Rajmata.” Cue shocking music. “A man who is blind from birth is not eligible to become a King.” This is further extension of Canon Fail #23, kindly note. Also, for all of Vidur’s ableist words, apparently, this made sense in the culture of that time…but I am not sure. Obviously, Mr. Angry Drama Queen is not going to take it well. But then, if it made sense in the culture of the time, enough that Dhritrashtra, to the best of my knowledge (correct me if I am wrong, folks) was never a candidate for the King at least until Pandu exiles himself, even after that I think he was more of a place holder type King, not the King regnant. People with better canon knowledge than I, please comment. The scene drags on a bit, with repetition of the above dialogue. “You are saying this now? You knew about the coronation beforehand.” Good question, also one that was in my mind, too. “With situation, dharma changes, Rajmata.” “Dharma and change?” This is Mr. Ominous Music, henceforth also dubbed Mr. Annoying Poseur. “This is the first time I have heard of it. I have heard of selfishness changing, but Dharm? Yes, but Hastinapur is a large Kingdom. Maybe the rules are different here.” “Yuvaraj Shakuni!” Here comes the Paragon of Perfection. “You do not have the right to speak in our dynastic issues.” “Forgive me, Mahamahim Bhishm, but a brother has a right to speak in his sister’s stead. Dharma says so, in the entirety of Aryavrata. Whether this is Dharma in Hastina or it has changed, only Mahagyaani Vidur can say so.” “I can answer your question also. Seeing no fault in his elder brother is a younger brother’s Dharma.” Title BGM starts playing. Ah, so this is important. “But when it comes to a King’s virtues and vices, then it is the Mahamantri’s dharma not to see the man as his brother.” “Only the eldest son of a family has the right over the throne, Mahamantri Vidur,” says Satyavati. She’s seriously sounding like a broken record by now. “If every son of the family is equally eligible, only then does the eldest have that right.” He then goes off into obscure philosophy that we don’t need, about Ashad and Shravan, so I am not noting that here. “When thinking between age and virtue, virtue is more important, Rajmata.” Title BGM plays again. Audience, please take note. There is some discourse about the Shaastrs but the long and short of it is that only an able bodied man can be King, according to them. “Not in a deficient man.” Finishes Vidur. Mr. Drama Queen has had enough. “Deficient!” he exclaims. All eyes turn to him. “Me, deficient!” “Forgive me, elder brother.” “Silence! Silence. I have been insulted enough, Vidur. When your ever-changeable dharma has left this Court, send for me.” He descends the stairs and strides back as everyone watches, absolutely shocked. Honey Boy comes to his senses first. “Elder brother!” He calls. “Stop!” But he strides away. Ms. Always Patnidharm (I refuse to give this caricature Gandhari’s name. The Gandhari I know has a lot of self-esteem) asks Sukhdha to take her to her husband. “Just because he is blind, we cannot accept that, Mahamantri Vidur.” “Eyesight is the first and foremost weapon of a King, Rajmata. Unless a King can read a man’s intents on his face, he cannot find hidden enemies in his court. When a King goes on progress, he sees the people with his eyes. How can a blind man do that?” “For all that only we have a Mahamantri, all the ministers, the Senapati.” “Forgive me, but we all have the duty to follow the King.” Dhritrashtra knocks braziers down. “Brother, listen to me,” says Honey Boy. “What else is left to listen, Pandu?” Dhritrashtra goes off on a rant about what a special snowflake he is. “Only Vidur has said so, brother. Since he is the Mahamantri, maybe he considers that his duty. But, we can also keep our side to…” Mr. Drama Queen knocks his brother off. “Ask for favours? Beg for favours? I am the eldest son of this dynasty! All those people who should by rights ask me for favours, you want me to beg in front of them?” “Please calm down!” “I am calm, Pandu! If I were not, I’d have killed you for your betrayal!” Huh? The one mistake Honey Boy is doing is that he’s too considerate of Drama Queen. Since when did he betray Drama Queen? “Betrayal? Brother, I have never…” “I know everything! You and that Dasi-Putr have planned this out. Talking about love and dharma, you want to steal my rights from me! You want to be King!” “This is a false accusation, brother! I have never even thought of such a thing in the wildest of my dreams!” “Go away, Pandu! Or you will burn in the flame of my anger.” Drama Queen pushes Honey Boy away, knocks another brazier down, growls, and strides off again. We come back to Vidur. The previous dialogue that he said is repeated again. “It is a King’s duty to be whole and full of virtue,” Vidur finishes. “And that’s you, Vidhvaan Vidur,” says Mr. Ominous Music. “Of course, you think of yourself alone as worthy.” “Gandhaar Yuvaraj!” This is Mr. Paragon of Perfection. Satyavati stops him with a raised hand. “Give him an answer, Mahamantri Vidur.” He bows. “A thorn’s duty to guard the tree, Rajmata,” he says to the strains of a sad theme BGM. “He neither aspires nor has the ability to replace a flower. I too am a thorn like that in the tree of this dynasty.” Why this much flowery language, bro? “When the subject of the country’s greater good comes to the fore, I will definitely bend. I know that God is always offered flowers, the thorns are thrown away first. But I have no sadness for that. I will always do my duty.” “Rajmata,” says Mr. Paragon of Perfection, “Vidur’s devotion to the throne of Hastina is complete, I have no doubt of that.” Just like that, everything is forgiven by Satyavati. “You are saying the right thing, Son of Ganga. But the throne cannot be empty anymore.” “That is why I advice that elder brother Pandu should have the throne.” Cue title BGM. The camera pans on everyone’s faces, finally focusing on Pandu who is standing at the threshold of the hall. Episode ends. I like this episode! You know why? No Krishna Gyaan! Yay!! Also, Vidur, how I wish you taught your younger nephews that dharma changes according to situation. If only you taught them that, they would not have obeyed their git of an elder brother when he sold them and their wife in a dice game…ah how I wish that! Precap: “There has been injustice with Gandhari, father, injustice and that truth is hurting my heart like a knife.” Yells Mr. Annoying Poseur as he drives a knife into his leg. Okay, that, too, as far as I know, is non canon, so here we have canon fail #24. “Shakuni!” Yells the queen.  

[lonelyheartsclubhaze]

We Sold Our Souls to Instagram

September 2020 // Chapter 2

“No, I’m not going to pick you up.” I shook my head, visibly and audibly annoyed. “You know damn well that I’m not getting behind the wheel. I’m hanging up, sorry.”

Converting potential energy into kinetic, the iPhone X left my hand, skimming across the wave-front of my bed. My hands ruffled through my hair as I inhaled then sighed, absentmindedly channelling the virtues of cellular respiration.

Tired of this perpetual bullshit, my fingers slithered across the Ikea desk before me, eventually detecting the apple of my bedroom’s Eden: a lychee ice Puff Bar. My fingers honed in on the device, ensnaring it, raising it to my lips. A deep breath saved me from the agony of sobriety, the nicotine buzz lasting a moment. Then, it was lost.

Six soft, knuckled knocks rapped at the bedroom door. “It’s unlocked,” I shouted.

A creak later, the door swung open, revealing Adam. There was nobody else in the house anyway. With a global pandemic at large and wildfires blazing on deep into September, neither Ajay nor Cam had seen Dwight House since March. Just Adam and me.

“Yo, we out,” he said, pulling a reusable, black cloth mask under his chin. “Can’t see shit outside but we still drinking, dawg.” Ah, the charming vernacular of a Korean-American friend from the elite suburbs of the East Bay.

“It’s good. What’re we feeling today?” I had actually enjoyed the past six months with Adam—it had been a good bonding experience. Despite his rough tone around me and the rest of the guys, Adam was quite versatile in social settings, weaving between upper-class gentility at investment banking info sessions and middle-aged rednecks at gun ranges. With classical Berkeley-liberal ideologies and Wall Street Journal-reading, center-right-leaning, finance friends, Adam defied social realities.

Adam shrugged. “Could go for some Chimay. I’m feeling classy.”

“Not a bad idea at all, my friend,” I said. It had been awhile since I’d had a good beer like Chimay, and I was getting sick of Coors Banquets. “On the other hand, your timing just might be—a bad idea, I mean. Air looks cancerous outside.” Marmalade light cast by the wildfires of a fuming Earth engulfed Northern California, held in suspense by cool, Pacific layers of atmosphere. It was like we were on planet Arrakis, from Dune, or trapped in the world of David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust.

“The air low-key is cancerous. AQI is pushing 180’s right now,” said Adam, raising his eyebrows.

“Looks like an N95-kinda day. I’ve got a spare, you know,” I said, gesturing to a pile of three or so N95 masks by the lamp on my desk.

Adam waved it off. “Eh, I’m good. That’s some puss shit. Let’s just run over to Crafts and Grapes or some shit, shouldn’t take long.”

I shrugged. “So be it.”

Tossing on a pair of five-and-a-half inch inseam Lululemon shorts, I joined Adam as he hopped downstairs.

“Got keys?” he asked once we reached the door.

“Yer, we out,” I said, shaking my keys out from my shorts’ pocket to lock the front door.

“Fuck,” griped Adam. “It’s actually hot as shit out here.” Smoky, red air obscured him from sight as he craned his neck to see me.

“Hence the shorts.”

Adam squinted his eyes, pursed his lips, and jutted his head back and forth, mocking me. “For sure. Forgot your MCAT-lovin’-ass could predict the future. But really though—it’s the middle of September, dude. This shit is wrong. It’s hot as balls and California is on fire and the sky is red and fools are straight-up dying off this COVID shit.”

“And you’re still an idiot,” I said, flashing a cheeky smile.

“Are you qualified to diagnose me as an idiot?”

“Maddie would say so.”

“Hence the pet names.”

“Precisely.”

“We gotta do something about this, bruh. This shit pains me to see,” declared Adam.

“Let’s start by drinking these brews. We’ll recycle the bottles after.”

We walked east on Dwight toward Telegraph, dodging cars as we skipped across the one way street. Adam was quieter than usual, for the most part, looking up from his iPhone 11 Pro Max periodically to comment on something he’d read in the news, or the glum weather. He wore a khaki short sleeve button-up, Kapital raw denim jeans with smiley face patchwork on the back left pocket, and a pair of slip-on Nike Janoski sneakers. The jeans were nice—quite expensive, from the looks of it—but looked baggy on him. He didn’t seem to mind. In fact, all of his clothes  wore a bit loose on him, akin to a fiery adolescent who’d picked out hand-me-downs from an older sibling. Who that older sibling might’ve been, I’d never know—with his unwavering demeanor, Adam always seemed like the eldest in the room.

Banking right onto Telegraph, we bore the full brunt of the veiled sun, which, though hidden behind dense clouds of smoke, now revealed its penetrating UV rays. We ducked under corrugated foam polycarbonate sheets, which lined the rooftops of mom-and-pop Telegraph shops, fending off the sun’s cancerous radiation. The insanity of the world mingled with the smoky, copper air, making me delirious. I imagined I was Mel Gibson or Tom Hardy in Mad Max, feigning off flashbacks in the Wasteland. At the corner of Telegraph and Blake street, Adam pushed and held open the door to Crafts and Grapes. Nodding my head at him in small thanks, I entered, squinting my eyes as the light shifted from hazy red to bright white inside. It was a tiny store, with two aisles directly ahead lined with candy, nuts, and other inconsequential (unless you ate too many) snacks, followed by two refrigerators: one in the back, the other on the far right. Cool, wispy air emanated from the cold storage, contrasting with the late summer atmosphere only meters behind us. A bell rang as the door squeaked to a halt, prompting the middle-eastern cashier, directly to our right, to rise from his stool and greet us. We nodded back silently, all three of us clad in masks.

Per usual, Adam took the lead, striding toward the fridge directly back. He popped open one of the see-through doors with his left hand, mapping his way through its items with his right pointer finger. Finding my eyes, Adam shook his head, indicating a lack of Chimay.

“Blue moons?” I suggested. “Mango wheats?”

Adam screwed up his face. “Fuck that. Let’s go with Lags.”

“Sure, why not.”

Adam kneeled and looped his hand through the cardboard handle of a Lagunitas StereoHopic IPA six-pack. We walked over to the register where Adam made small talk with the cashier. Eventually, he tapped his iPhone 11 to an Ingenico payment terminal, finalizing our transaction. Drinks acquired.

The bell jingled as the door shut behind us once more. We hurried home, eager to crack open our drinks, intent on droning out the blistered yonder. Adam tried to explain his enthusiasm for hoppy beers while I pretended to listen. He was distracting me, though; we both knew I couldn’t care less.

Arriving home, my keys found their way to the door, and we found our ways to the couch. A tenor beep resounded through our living room as Adam’s iPhone connected to an old speaker via bluetooth. “Street Lights” by Kanye West filled the air, followed by carbon dioxide bubbles freed by an unlikely liberator—the bottle opener.

Let me know

Do I still got time to grow?

Things ain’t always set in stone

That be known let me know

I found myself back in the hand-me-down BMW 330i, with her, the white wire packed into the lightning port of my iPhone, transmitting cosine waves that replicated the robotic voice I was listening to in my living room.

“Stop!” she cried, thrusting herself back against beige, leather seats. She wanted me to press the brakes. I had to stop the car, right, stop the car. Where were the brakes?

She was beautiful, of course.

Dark, brown hair fell over eyes of the same color, guarded by double-lids that I wish she hadn’t paid for.

Hardly anyone would notice the difference, but I did, and it hurt to know that she didn’t love them.

I loved them, unconditionally, but she loved the brakes.

Needed to find them.

We’d shared a large bowl of Marafuku’s acclaimed Hakata Tonkotsu DX ramen. I’d let her eat most of it, sneaking my chopsticks in for bites at intervals.

“Pennsylvania?” I shook my head.

“What, you’ve never been?” She tilted hers. “You’ll love it. Come with me.”

“You’re crazy,” I said, smiling. “My MCAT summer is coming up.”

She rolled her eyes. “Then I’ll help you study for it. Duh.”

“I’m sure Brandon would love that.”

“Will he? All the way from San Francisco?”

“He’ll make the trip.”

“Not if you do,” she said, melting my mind.

I was dizzy, sleepy, lost, a newborn. Vulnerable. And I couldn’t seem to find them.

I’m just not there in the streets

I’m just not there

Life’s just not fair

Life’s just not fair

Sonorant chimes reverberated in my ears as Adam clinked his glass bottle to mine. “Cheers,” he said with a nod.

“Cheers,” I echoed. Leaning my head back, I swallowed, allowing the cool liquid down my esophagus and into my gut.

“You good?” he prodded.

“Yeah,” I replied, my voice cracking a little. I cleared my throat.

“Pretty hoppy, huh?”

I took another sip, licking my lips after. “Quite. I suppose we knew what we were getting ourselves into. You know, given the ‘StereoHopic’.”

“You right.”

“Yeah.”

“Yo,” said Adam. “On another note—might be going in on an addy deal with Grace if you’re tryna hop in.”

I scratched my head. While I wouldn’t have any major exams in the near future (although midterms for my biochem course [MCB 102, for my fellow pre-med students at Cal] were slated for October sixteenth), I certainly had errands that might be eased by a twenty milligram dose of extended-release Adderall. There’s nothing like a thorough room-cleaning session when you’re high on stimulant drugs.

The first time I ever tried Adderall must’ve been during my freshman year, back in 2017. Midterm season was approaching—come to think of it, that was around this time that year—and our generous friend, Grace, was kind enough to grant me a ten milligram pill of instant-release Adderall. Grace and I, along with Adam and perhaps Ajay, too, were partaking in a midnight study session at Moffitt Library, which was open twenty-four-seven—prior to the pandemic. I popped the pill, chased it down with a Javiva drink from Peet’s, and got to work.

Twenty minutes later I began to feel its effects as the amphetamine altered monoamines in my brain, releasing surplus dopamine into my many synaptic clefts. Optimism filled me to the brim and my vision bent inward. I saw nothing but the iPad in front of me, my mind enamored by golgi apparatuses and various protein structures. The stimulant saturated me with a profound appreciation for all thoughts that meandered into my head; a giddiness originated in my heart, spreading down my arms, my legs, and outward across my skull, contracting then expanding once more. It was artificial love.

Eventually, I was distracted. Grace’s dilated pupils stared into mine as she chattered away  about Lin-Manuel Mir-something and a hurricane in Puerto Rico. After a second or two, my attention snapped away from cell membranes, landing instead on her words. The words of a girl from Colorado with a soft spot for the snow. I’d met Grace via Adam during Orientation Week and she’d quickly become one of my favorite people.

Gingerbread specks stippled her face like a George Seurat painting, fractal constellations arising as my eyes outlined her cheekbones. Gaps between long, chocolate locks revealed sepia collarbones, lined with descendants of the freckles on her face. A white Nike Alex Morgan soccer jersey overlaid the loose sweatpants that hung from her hips, held up by drawstrings I almost hoped would fail, concealing proportions that emulated golden ratios. Stained, white, laceless Vans hugged unpainted toes that tapped together when she spoke. Lips that scorned the artificially enlarged mouths of Instagram influencers communicated messages I was only barely beginning to listen to. She was the love interest of a nineties’ coming-of-age motion picture. But she wasn’t mine.

You know, I thought Adam might’ve loved her, but it was hard to tell when he was cycling through hookups with three different girls at a time. Come to think of it, I didn’t know if Adam loved anyone. A talker, yes; a charmer, certainly; but a romantic, I really didn’t think so.

He spent a lot of his time with her, no doubt. And she cared for him—anyone could see it. But she knew as well as I did that his head wasn’t in it. He wasn’t looking for love. He wanted to graduate, make money—to be someone. Sex seemed like nothing more than a physical need to him. I don’t think anyone would’ve described Adam as an emotionally vulnerable guy, and I don’t think anyone thought that emotion was what he kept those girls around for.

But at the same time, anyone could’ve seen what I saw in the way he bounced when she was around. Anyone could’ve heard the way he spoke about her. She meant something to him. But when you asked him about it, he’d brush it off; she wasn’t his type, or he had commitment issues (jokingly—but hey, grain of truth in everything).

Maybe she was his distraction from ambition—his distraction from latex-wrapped, emotionally removed nights and Wall Street Journal mornings, just as she was my distraction from cell structures.

For a good hour-and-a-half, Grace entertained me with conversation regarding natural disasters across the West; Broadway musical comparisons between Hamilton and Sunday in the Park with George; and the latest updates on Cal’s women’s soccer team, of which she was a huge fan. The Adderall certainly kept me focused, although not necessarily on my coursework.

“Let me know,” said Adam, tipping the bottle into the corner of his mouth. “I’m boutta text her back.”

I looked up from my lap at Adam. Right, I thought. “Sure, I could be down. Why not. Think you can pick me up two? I have some errands to run.”

“Twenty milligram XR work?” he asked as he tapped along the screen of his iPhone.

“That’ll do.”

The room went quiet for twenty to twenty five seconds as I was confirmed as an accomplice in the drug deal.

“What’s she been up to?” I asked.

“Hm?” he noised, raising his eyebrows without looking up.

“Grace,” I said. “Haven’t seen her much.”

He shrugged. “Not much, I guess. Drinking a solid amount though, from what I’ve seen.”

“Makes three of us.”

“Yeah,” he said, feigning a smile. “What about yours?”

“Maddie?”

“Yeah.”

I took a deep breath—inhaling, holding to the count of four, exhaling. “Not much of a difference, to be honest.”

“It’s not her fault, you know.”

“I know,” I breathed.

“Then talk to her.”

“It’s not like that,” I mumbled.

Adam paused.

I stared at my feet. “I’m sorry, Adam.”

He squinted. “The fuck you sorry for?”

“You know.”

He waved his hand aside, brushing it off. “I’m not tripping. Talk to her. Before I do it myself.”

I forced a smile. “Maybe it’s better off that way.”

“Here,” he said, handing me a two-foot-tall bong and lighter from under the coffee table. “Take it.”

Couldn’t stay away. My fingers gripped the paraphernalia as he withdrew. My heart quickened as the impending drug interaction approached. When it reached my lips, I lit, then inhaled, holding to the count of four, and then some. Blurry feelings rushed my mind as states of sufferance gave way to sedated nebulas, teaching me forgetfulness.