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#i made a donation that was the same amount as what i was buying (lunch and a coffee) and there was a big hubbub and they rang a bell for me
dionysus-complex · 10 months
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the Erewhon in this neighborhood is truly such an experience
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blackholemojis · 8 months
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(not a request)
Hai! As someone trying to experiment with AACs, I can't find an optimal and conveniently organized word list, can you please share any tips for that?
Unfortunately I've had the same problem when trying to make my own AAC boards, as well as with running this blog. There are some general essentials though, I've made some of them and tagged them with #blackholemojis basics, if you want to look through those.
Other than that, I can really only share the types of words I put into my own AAC boards first. I haven't found a convenient and well organized word list anywhere :(
Under the cut though I'll put a lot more words you could include in your AAC, if you want to check that out! I'll update it as I think of more
Basic words
Yes, no, maybe, I don't know, something else, probably, stop, go, I consent, I don't consent
What, when, who, where, why, how
Good, bad, better, worse, best, worst, same, different, alright
Basic activities of daily living
Hygiene: bathe, clean teeth, style hair, wash face, etc
Dressing: get dressed, get undressed, clothing, tops, bottoms
Eating: eat, drink, swallow, chew, breakfast, lunch, dinner, snack
Bathroom: use the bathroom, pee, poop, wipe off, wash hands
Transferring/mobility: walk, stand up, sit down, lay down, transfer to mobility aid, transfer out of mobility aid
Instrumental activities of daily living
Communication: speak, text/message, computer, phone, email, video call, write, call
Transportation: picked up, dropped off, drive, ride, bike, walk, take the bus, take the train, carpool
Meal prep: cook, bake, heat up, prepare food, plan meals, clean up kitchen, put away food
Shopping/finances: shop, buy, sell, donate, pay, write a check, manage balance, wallet, bank account, make a deposit, budget, pay bills, pay insurance, pay mortgage
Housework: do laundry, do dishes, dust, vacuum, sweep, mop, clean, fold, organize, take out the garbage
Medication: take meds, refill meds, order meds refill
Short words
Hello, goodbye, please, thank you, you're welcome, sorry, I forgive you
Do, don't, done, did, will, won't, could, can, can't, should, shouldn't, is, isn't, was, wasn't, were, weren't, want, like, dislike,
Now, later, soon, earlier, today, tomorrow, yesterday
And, a, an, the, or, which, if, so, then, because
Leave, come, walk, run, give, take, throw, catch, move, stay, find, lose, say, mean, think, let, need, want, help, belong, start, finish
I/me/myself, mine, you/yours/yourself, this person, she/her/hers, he/him/his, they/them/theirs, it/its/itself
Essential activities
Eat, sleep, wake up, use the bathroom, drink
Major senses
See, touch, taste, smell, hear, sense, feel
Places
Home, work, school, house, apartment, trailer, park, grocery store, clothing store, daycare, college, religious center
Health
Sick/ill, fever, nauseous, stuffy nose, runny nose
Scratch, burn, cut, bruise, broken bone, concussion
Hospital, doctor's office, dentist's office
Any other specific conditions or symptoms you have, physically or mentally
Any mobility aids you use
Other descriptor groups
Colors, temperature, size, amount, directions/location, time, body parts, family/friend names, relations (grandma, neighbor), emotions, pets, objects/belongings, weather
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0-waste · 2 years
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three days of a zero waste lifestyle!
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The zero-waste movement is an eco-friendly way of living that aims to reduce the amount of waste an individual creates on a daily basis, which worsens climate change and global warming. While I admit that it's quite impossible to achieve completely zero waste at all, its primary purpose still holds its ground and perseveres — a dedication and commitment to sending as little waste to the landfills as possible. By doing so, we act on reducing the harmful impact of humans on our ecosystem.
This journal aims to focus on and record a zero waste lifestyle within the household and the home with all of its members.
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Day One:
Refraining from using single-use items.
Instead of using paper and plastic utensils for eating, which always end up in the trash after a single meal is finished, I continue to use the recommended alternatives. They can be washed and dried again and again for them to be utilised more than once. To be specific, there are the metal cutlery (spoon and fork), a cloth napkin, and a water bottle, so that I won't need to buy plastic bottles from stores anymore.
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This is all in order to avoid further contributing to the already quickly increasing amount of paper and plastic waste day by day all over the world.
This practice made me remember what I, along with a lot of the Ibarang, already do during breakfast, lunch, and dinner time in the cafeteria in Makiling where we bring our own utensils to eat with and wash them clean afterwards to use again
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Repurposing household items.
Most families buy material necessities to provide each of their members’ basic needs and wants. Of course, mine isn’t an exception. That’s why there’s a diverse variety of things stacked away and kept within the shelves and cabinets of our house. It has then become a habit of ours to continuously put them to use and prevent them from just lying around as a means of neatness and organization of our belongings.
For example, in the photos shown, we fill an ice cream container with water, dishwashing soap and a sponge for cleaning purposes. There are also the Eden cheese and dental floss containers where our jewelry and little trinkets reside. Lastly, there are some mason jars that once held jams, sauces and such to store excess oil that we also reuse for cooking the next batches of food.
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Day Two:
Giving away or donating items that aren't or won't be of use anymore.
Connecting to the deed yesterday, having bought a lot of stuff over the years, I tend to grow out of these items, having clothes that don’t suit my taste or don’t fit me anymore, and I deem to be no longer useful to me as time goes by.
Rather than just letting them gather cobwebs and dust in our house and throwing them out in the end, our family has been collecting these said objects. We’ll be giving them to Tatay’s family in Capiz, Iloilo when we visit them again in December to celebrate Christmas. It’s similar to that of a little balikbayan box that I hope would be to their liking!
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Day Three:
Keeping and reusing tote and grocery bags and gift wrappers.
Similar to what was mentioned before in the previous days, the same goes to gift wrappers from gifts given to us. We make a collection of them, so we can use them again for the presents that we’ll be the ones giving to others this time during celebrations, holidays, and other occasions to our relatives and friends.
Moreover, whenever we go grocery shopping, we always have the same two large tote bags in hand where we place the newly bought food, drinks, and snacks. The remaining bags are also set aside so we have more room and options for storage of different items that we can also bring to different places.
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Creating situations wherein the already used papers can serve other purposes.
Both my parents work in offices in educational institutions and environments, and both their children, my younger brother and I, are still at school as well. That’s why we end up producing papers of all sorts. We gather those as well and turn them into scratch papers.
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references:
https://www.masterclass.com/articles/zero-waste-lifestyle-explained
https://www.ecofriendlyhabits.com/zero-waste-living/
https://meuresiduo.com/en/blog-en/moving-toward-a-zero-waste-lifestyle/
p.s.: credits to sophie reyes for the icon of this tumblr blog ♡
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sugar-petals · 3 years
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can you give us more thoughts about domestic yoongles? the taemin's one (wich I love) just made me miss the cat boy so much ;o;
i have a phd in househusband yoongi so let me fire out some ideas for ya.
myg at home headcanon
🐱 word count. 1.9k | fluff, slice of life, slight nsfw mentions, x reader, bullet points
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The doorbell sound is a recording of Yoongi imitating a doorbell. He’s such a meme. Ceci n'est pas une pipe.
Seemingly, he teaches himself a new recipe every week. To perfection. Yoongi is very particular about sticking to the recipe and wielding his kitchen tools in the right way. He collects knives, olive oil, and still hates cutting onions.
He separates sleep time, work time, and couple time as the holy trinity. For each, he switches his mood.
Blushes easily no matter for how long you’ve been together.
Establishes his own radio show where he DJs at one point.
Yoongi keeps an extreme track on the garbage schedule. He knows exactly what is due when. Separating the trash is a must. That includes sorting out fake friends trying to get between your relationship. Your social circle as a couple is extremely deliberate.
Yoongi deems himself a terrible host for guests. Unless Hoseok is there to drag him out, it's true he rather stays in the kitchen or at the barbecue preparing the menu courses rather than making small talk. He leaves the hospitality bits to you, however you want to go about it.
What he lacks in conversing with guests, he makes up in bed, God is absolutely fair.
He sings and hums pretty often and has his own vernacular of extraterrestrial uwu noises. It's an alphabet that you have to yet decipher but it's incredibly cute.
Self-made paintings everywhere around his house. 
Yoongi hasn't gone clubbing since grammar school. The most he does is going to a restaurant at lunch with very close friends. And always in a work context. His private life is so secluded from everything else and paparazzi just don't spot him anywhere, Dispatch thinks he must live abroad.
Very well, he does consider his big ole house a separate country. It's a living organism with a studio, gym, trophy room, small-size basketball court, and vastly equipped kitchen. A home theater as well, he likes American movies (like Inception) and Korean action genres, and you can stream whatever you fancy in there whenever you like. 
Yes, he has underwear with cute little bears on.
There's even a little pond in the backyard. Yoongi, Pisces he is, likes fishes after all. Sometimes he sits at the edge of the 'Little Ole Min Lake (LOML)' and stares into the water for literal hours with his chin parked on his palm.
His fridge is so high-tech and futuristic, even Yoongi is rendered clueless by its AI sometimes. The washing machine, too.
Yoongi watches RuPaul’s drag race. What did you expect? He finds it so humorous.
Owns lord knows how many comic collections.
Favorite holiday destination: New York.
Christmas is basically 50% you unveiling new music equipment to him in the garage and Yoongi almost fainting at the sexiness of it. The other 50% is spent holding hands and orgasm after orgasm until the new year since you loose track of time.
Goes on long rants why he’d marry you again every weekend.
Making you presents is his specialty. Always accompanied with a hand-written note. He writes a lot of things by hand for you in general. Texting, basically never. Always on paper.
No sex without a blanket and socks on. Yoongi gets cold very very easily and just doesn’t like showing skin. You buy him a heated blanket for his birthday, he even uses it in his studio chair.
Chronically addicted to making out.
Matching black outfits and glasses.
Laughs at even your worst jokes or phrases you didn’t expect you even uttered.
Yoongi owns the phoniest, most secretive-looking black car ever and nobody knows about it. Even he forgets he owns it, in fact he genuinely acts like it just doesn’t exist. Hilarious. And that guy has a level 1 Korean driver's license. Which allows him to drive trailers and busses and fucking trucks, and construction machines, let that sink in.
It's really a genius curse. Yoongi being put to the test will always deliver but he won't choose to execute his full skillset if he doesn't have to. Well, pragmatic. He's not as phony as he thinks he is, which is even more hilarious.
He uses that behemoth of a car so scarcely because he'd rather have things delivered to his doorstep and he's stingy with gas. Also, he doesn't like traffic and driving because of the traumatic shoulder accident and his tendency to space out. Translation: You drive that thing... that monster... it really is an impressive, fast, and scary machine. 
If someone devious ever even remotely manages to invade his privacy and get past the doubly-installed security system, he has enough money to deal with it no matter what.
If it concerns your privacy, he's a red belt. And owns Jin's number if a taekwondo master is required. Jimin's if it needs someone with kendo skills.
If Yoongi needs someone to go on a complete rampage, Jungkook lives just down the block. He can sprint to Yoongi's bunker I mean mansion within 45 seconds. 30 if it's very urgent. 20 if the reward is an instant ramen splurge with Yoongi's black card.
He has a sexy, glamorous sword collection hanging on the living room wall anyways, so. Who the hell is dumb enough to mess with him and his expensive lawyer in the first place.
But just in case, who knows... Yoongi settles matters shruggingly, anonymously, and with cash and he's too exhausted for violence, but don't underestimate his deter-min-ation and network for emergencies. Also, he is Agust D after all.
He will bonk a naughty burglar or kidnapper across the head with a wooden cooking spoon or take him down by throwing a basketball if the situation requires it. Damn, his reflexes are so fast, a feral cat in motion. So, lean back and sip on your drink of choice. Things are cared for.
If Yoongi is the one being kidnapped or a highly skilled stalker invades the property at night when he's fast asleep (nothing can wake this man during certain hours, strong REM right here): Don't forget that honeyboy is a Dodgers fan. There are signed baseball bats everywhere in this damn house.
In that sense, your parents visiting you here for the first time thought you were an undercover thug couple. Not to worry mom and dad, you both just like sports very much okay.
Yoongi walks around in all black clothes and the rooms are all seemingly dark. Even if you live together, you don't know his skin care routine. It's clear to you he's some sort of vampire.
Since Yoongi always forgets to remove his makeup, you made it a habit to wipe it down when he's about to pass out. He won't lie, he enjoys that kind of affection.
Holly is your resident child. You're essentially a family.
He insists to tackle this by himself, Yoongi sees his therapist monthly. Not shifting responsibility is something he's stubborn about and he pours his emotions into writing. You will do conversation about deeper stuff, but he says it's mostly up to him and his own mind. He dislikes burdening you or opening up too much and it's something to respect rather than force him about. If he wants to share a thought, he will. It doesn’t mean he can’t trust you or sucks at communicating (we know that he’s direct). Yoongi simply can’t put that much pain in such few words nor should you alleviate it for him.
Calls from the manager faze Yoongi as much as Jimin is bothered by gravity. If he’s busy kissing your body slow mo, who the hell dares to disturb his worship. 
This man had so many let-downs and interpersonal catastrophes in his life, he's super discerning with people. Because he rolls that way, during their first meeting Yoongi uses his psychology certificate on your friends. You see him squint at them, he listens very closely. After they pass the vibe check aka meow radar, he befriends them, too.
Yoongi doodles Grammy trophies everywhere to manifest them.
Yoongi shaves his legs.
All the sex toys he’s ever bought are black. Gotta vibe in style.
He spends ridiculous amounts of time in the studio but he's yours for the remainder of the night, breakfast, and he makes a lavish lunch and dinner.
Um, consider his head parked between your legs. The Hongkong line was not a joke.
Doesn’t mind you squishing his cheeks whenever and for how long you like. 
Every other weekend he gets flowers, vouchers, and gifts — not because of fans, they don’t know where his house is, but because he donates so much.
Namjoon often drops by and cleanses the area with his crystals.
Yoongi is a photography major so you can ask him to take professional, ceiling-high black and white shots of you.
Feeding each other food lovingly. Man, this guy got lips.
He set up a library just for you, in the exact historical aesthetic you like the most. Send him the link to any book you want, it's basically in the online shopping cart already. As I said, he wants to make you presents like every week.
Sometimes he sits on the other end studying English videos and vocab while you read. And yes, he's already 95% fluent but pretends being merely intermediate. He knows technical terms even native speakers have never heard of.
He collects pajamas and earrings.
Swears on the phone.
Namjoon being the horniest member is a cover-up story. Yoongi masturbates almost unreasonable amounts of times, by himself and in your arms when going to bed. Not gonna lie, it’s a sight to see his hands at work. He’s almost equally obsessed with fingering you once you ask him.
Yoongi was the one asking you to move in and almost had a nervous meltdown before meeting up with you to tell you just that. 
He’s the little spoon and of course a sleeping burrito to hold tight.
Finds you equally attractive in any state or styling. Yoongi practices what he preaches, he always reacts the same and says the same. 
Jams out to outrageous beats Namjoon sends him by dancing in the studio. You walk in on him every time. Was embarrassed at first, now you dance along.
Has bought you a life-sized Yoongi pillow and customized you a giant Shooky to hug when he’s not at home over night.
Owned a wine cellar until he quit drinking. Turned it into a piano room instead.
Only you know Yoongi has a serpent and dagger tattoo.
Scrubs the bathroom religiously.
The house smells like restaurant food and his extravagant perfumes half of the time.
Sometimes he has to remind himself he’s married to you and not his coffee machine. He shall be forgiven. You can’t complain that he doesn’t love you enough, nor is he ever not adorable when drinking his latte.
Never wears short sleeves. It can be scorching and he’ll wear a jacket. 
Tell him and the cap stays on during sex.
He grows his hair out and puts it in a low bun. The bangs remain.
Yoongi has installed the most fire-proof building in the entire city it seems. That he wanted to be a firefighter when he was young definitely shows. Figures the house has to be protected from heat: His blasting studio music and Yoongi himself are just way too sizzling.
Still melts into a puddle when you kiss his nose.
Couple sunrise watching. 
© submissive-bangtan 2017-2021. all rights reserved. do not repost or translate. all depictions fictional.
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gardenergulfie · 3 years
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Emptober Day 6: Struggle
Rating: G
Word Count: 2639
Relationships: Geminitay & MythicalSausage
Characters: GeminiTay (Video Blogging RPF), MythicalSausage (Video Blogging RPF)
Tags: Mage Sibs, Post Corruption Mythical Sausage, Magic, Jealousy, When you swear off dark magic but also have a really hard time actually swearing off magic, plus one of your closest friends who killed you to save you is a mage, Sausage is not having a good day, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Relapsing, Dark Magic
Sausage remembered nights spent with these very books, trying to learn to cast. There was this one spell about appearance altering that Kid Sausage had always wanted to cast. He found that spellbook quickly, its dark navy cover a familiar sensation in his hands. Now that he had magic he really should try and cast him again, he’d just have to ask Xornoth-
Wait, no. Sausage didn’t do magic anymore. He’d sworn it off after being freed from Xornoth’s control. No matter how tempting it might be he wasn’t going back on his word. No more dark magic from Xornoth.
With no small amount of regret, he put the tome in the “Donate” pile. Some other more magically gifted kid would have a better use for it. Sausage continued to work, trying to keep his mind away from the thoughts of magic and spell casting. It was really hard, being in a tower filled with magic.
Emptober Day 6: Struggle
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AO3 Link
Fic below the cut
It was a good day for Sausage. The feeling of heavy exhaustion that weighed on him constantly ever since he’d been revived was mercifully light today. It had been so light that he had felt good enough to visit Gem and help her with rearranging her tower library. She had a lot of books she didn’t ever read anymore so she was cleaning them out and donating them. She’d been a bit hesitant to ask him for help because of how recently he was revived and her worry of him overexerting himself but he’d convincer that he was fine! She’d been visiting him almost every day for the past week and seen his improvement herself. Besides, moving books around couldn’t be that hard. Gem chucked when he said that out-loud and said he would need to reevaluate that once he saw some of her tomes on the theory of magic.
He was at Gem’s tower now. He had ducked into the building right after arriving, not wanting to spend too much time around the outsides or in his own memory. Gem had greeted him cheerfully from where she was levitating books into two piles.
“Sausage! You made it!” She said, ending her spell and walking over to green him properly. She’d stopped infant of I’m, not sure what the right greeting was for a friend-turned-enemy-turned-friend. He solved that problem by giving her a big hug.
“Its good to see you too, Gem! I’m excited to get to work here! It’s been a while since I left Mythland.” He said excitedly. Gem extracted herself from his bone crushing hug.
“I’m really glad you could make it.” She said genuinely. Sausage felt the same hurt he’d get for most conversations with Gem over these past few days since his resurrection. He’d hurt her and yet here she was, having forgiven him and back to being his friend. It was bittersweet.
“Yeah! I’m excited to get to work here. Was getting restless being cooped up in my home. What should I start with?” Sausage asked as a distraction from his own thoughts. Gem tapped her chin, thinking for a bit.
“Well I need to go a reread my Astrology tones to see which ones I need to keep and which ones I can give away. While I do that, can you sort the tomes in the Illusion section via author? I only want to keep the ones by Mia L Kracklewisp. They’re the best Illusionist and honestly I really don’t use Illusion spells a lot so the other ones are just gathering dust.” Gem explained. Sausage nodded.
“Can do! Just watch, I’ll be done in no time.” He promised. Gem started walking over to a table with a large amount of books on it. She turned her head back to call out.
“If you need anything just ask! I’m just over here, turning my brain into jelly as I try and pick which Astrology books I want to keep out of a decades old collection. Why did I buy so many Astrology tomes?” She muttered to herself as she sat down.
Sausage got to work. It was easy finding the Illusion spell section, just follow the smell of citrus. Most illusionists added secret notes between the margins of their spell books in invisible ink and most of that ink was made with a lemon base. Sausage remembered when he was younger, holding pages up to candle light as he deciphered the hidden messages. He’d read most if not all of Gem’s magic related books in his youth. Sausage remembered nights spent with these very books, trying to learn to cast. There was this one spell about appearance altering that Kid Sausage had always wanted to cast. He found that spellbook quickly, its dark navy cover a familiar sensation in his hands. Now that he had magic he really should try and cast him again, he’d just have to ask Xornoth-
Wait, no. Sausage didn’t do magic anymore. He’d sworn it off after being freed from Xornoth’s control. No matter how tempting it might be he wasn’t going back on his word. No more dark magic from Xornoth.
With no small amount of regret, he put the tome in the “Donate” pile. Some other more magically gifted kid would have a better use for it. Sausage continued to work, trying to keep his mind away from the thoughts of magic and spell casting. It was really hard, being in a tower filled with magic.
When he finished sorting, he set the books down on Gem’s table with a heavy thump. Gem looked up from the tome on Advanced Cosmology and Lunar Spell-casting she was skimming through and met Sausage’s eyes.
“That was rather fast.” She said, looking at the pile of Illusion spell books on the table. “I must not have that many Illusion tomes.”
“You actually have a pretty good library of them. Most of them are just written by that one author you like so I left them there.” Sausage didn’t mention the fact that he knew exactly what author she liked and that he admired the spellwork they did. Better not to think about magic right now.
“Huh.” Gem said, peeking over Sausage’s shoulder to see the other, much larger pile of books behind him. “Well you’ve finished that task. It’s getting close to midday and I need to finish skimming this book before lunch. You’re free to do whatever you like until then.” She paused before continuing. “I know we’re having goat meat wraps with a chorus fruit pudding. There’s more than enough for two, if you’d like to stay for that.”
“Oh free food? Yeah I’ll stay.” Sausage responded before his brain could fully catch up. He was given free rein of the library while Gem was busy reading and he was trying not to think about magic. This was a bad combination. Gem went back to her reading and Sausage started walking around. He wasn’t looking at the book titles, merely moving around as to distract himself better. It really wasn’t working. Sausage was seeing books labeled “Conjuring Cakes: a Guide to Summoning Edible Food” and “Moss, Lichens and Molds: the Most Fabulous Herbology spells” and “Boommaking: How to Crush Your Enemies with Explosive Magic” (he was pretty sure that last one was a gift from fWhip). He found himself grabbing interesting tomes as he went, ones that would be useful to Mythland or just plain fun for him. Reading them couldn’t hurt, he’d read most of them before. He just needed something to past the time.
Sausage curled up in an armchair with his pick of tomes on the table beside him. He quickly lost himself in the spellwork, reading about complicated equations and runes. It was all great stuff but very familiar. Sausage remembered spending hours with Gem reading these kinds of books while fWhip was out tinkering. The two of them would curl up together to read these thick tomes after school. They both would dream about magic and what they would do when they could cast.
Of course, only one of them got that ability in the end. Gem had been blessed and Sausage had been left behind, no spark of magic in him at all. While Gem trained under the greatest mages in the world, Sausage was stuck rereading the same books, knowing that he’d never be able to cast these spells. It had made him so angry and bitter then and he could feel those emotions rising up again. It wasn’t fair that Gem got lucky while Sausage didn’t. Sausage deserved that magic just as much as Gem did.
Sausage looked back down at the page he wad reading, the paper showing a spell of levitation, the same spell Gem had been using earlier. Sausage remembered how easy casting had been under Xornoth’s control. Even before he was fully taken over, Sausage had been given a book of dark magic that even someone with no inane magic ability could use. There had been a levitation spell in there too.
Sausage wasn’t supposed to cast anymore, he swore off magic, even going so far as to give Gem the Great Staff of Mythland, the one other thing that let Sausage use magic. He was powerless now because he had been corrupted by that power before. He knew he wasn’t supposed to use dark magic anymore but he just felt so angry now. One spell wouldn’t hurt. Just a simple dark magic spell, not even calling on Xornoth, a spell of his own power.
Sausage started mumbling the incantation under his breath. His blood felt warm, uncomfortably so, but the book in his hand began to rise. There was a sound, the sound of someone’s surprised shout, but Sausage hear it fully, too caught up in the magic. He laughed loudly in joy. He’d done it! The powerless Mythlander still could cast magic! He wasn’t even using Xornoth’s power, not really. Even with his blood burning, he still felt too much glee.
“-age! Sausage! SAUSAGE!” He turned around to see Gem, anger at her for interrupting him fading away when he saw her face. She was holding her staff in front of her, magic beginning to swirl around it, and her fave showed only fear. Fear that he’d lost it again, fear that the demon was back, fear that she’d have fight him again.
The force of his guilt hit Sausage in that moment and he dropped the spell. He’d done what he wasn’t supposed to. He’d used magic and scarred the one person who’d forgiven him, the person who killed him to save him. What had he done?
“Gem… I…” Sausage stuttered out, trying to explain himself before stopping. There was nothing he needed to explain, nothing that could excuse his actions. He’d broken his own rule of no magic and it was his own fault.
“I’m going to go outside.” He said, standing up. Gem’s eyes followed him as he walked to the door, only able to shake the fear away and call out after him when he was already outside. Sausage hoped onto the mountain popper and started walking through the snow. He avoided the hatchery, Gem certainly wouldn’t want him anywhere near it after the scene he’d just made. His boots crunched against the icy snow as he just walked. Eventually he grew weary and had to sit down, the exhaustion catching up tp him again. He sat there on a rock for a while, just feeling upset and mad at himself.
“Sausage?” Gem had finally found him, the faun wizard walking up to him. When he turned to face her she stopped, seeing his face. He hadn’t been crying but he was sure that he didn’t look great. The negative effects dark magic have on the body was surely not doing him any favors either. The two of them stood in silence for a bit, neither of them speaking or moving closer or farther away from the other.
“….what was that back there? You were just reading and then suddenly you were casting dark magic. Did the book do something to you? Was Xornoth controlling you again?” Gem asked hesitantly, still nervous to speak. Sausage took a deep breath in. Alright then, he would explain. She deserved an explanation.
“No Gem it won’t either of those things. It was just me.” He started. “I was just caught up in all the magic, all the things you can do that I can’t and I felt angry. I let that anger influence me into make a bad decision. I broke my promise. I said no magic and yet i still cast magic, even worse dark magic.” Sausage hung his head. “Its just so hard when I see you doing it so easily and I know that I can too if I just break my promise and give in.”
Gem listened to his admission, understanding crossing her face. “It must be hard, knowing that you can do it but not letting yourself. How long have you been holding that back? How long have you wanted to cast dark magic after you promised not too?” Gem asked, sitting down next to him. Sausage thought of the weeks since his revival, of the habitual casting of magic and only just managing to stop himself, the constant thoughts that everything would easier if he just let himself do magic, the childhood daydreams of him turning into a mage that he had repressed long ago returning in full force. Honestly it was a miracle that he hadn’t given into his urges before this and also that he’d been able to stop so easily.
“I’ve wanted to do magic forever, my whole life. When I finally could, I used it whenever I could. When I was cured, I promised that I wouldn’t do it anymore. But honestly, I still wanted to do it.” He explained. “There were so many moments where I barely managed to stop myself form using it! It’s been calling to me ever since I tried to give it up. Every day I go without it makes me want it more. And I know it’s bad, I know it has horrible side effects and could put me back under the control of Xornoth but even still I still want to use it!” Sausage’s voice raised as he grew heated about this. Gem listened, always nonjudgmental.
“It isn’t going to be easy to just stop using magic. There’s been stories of mages who start using it and can’t bring themselves to stop, not for long. But there have also been stories of mages who have been ale to give it up, this is something you can do Sausage. This bothers you, not being able to cast magic, and you feel like you can’t fight it. But you can!” Sausage watched as Gem spoke. Normally Gem talking about his struggles with magic and her encouraging him came off as bossy and made him upset, but he wasn’t upset now. It seemed that Gem really wanted to help him. “We can find people to help keep you accountable, stop you from relapsing. We’ll remind you of how well you’re doing and how far you’ve come. We’ll try and figure out other solutions to your problem of wanting to use magic. We don’t have to rely on dark magic and you don’t have to swear off all magic, we can find something that works for you. I couldn’t find a way to help you do magic in the past but I’m stronger now. We can do this. You don’t have to struggle alone.” Gem’s voice was filled with determination and passion. Sausage fully believed that she’d try and help him. He really didn’t deserve this, not after he hurt her so much. Sausage pulled Gem in for another hug, giving her a tight squeeze that he hoped conveyed everything he was feeling that he just couldn’t say. Gem hugged him back.
“This really means a lot, Gem, thank you.” Sausage said honestly as he released Gem from the hug and stood up. He helped the shorter faun to her feet as she spoke.
“Of course! You’re my friend! I was to help you!.” Sausage felt the same bittersweet emotions he kept feeling but this time they leaned more towards sweet. She’s right, he wasn’t alone. Maybe he could fix what he messed up.
“Yeah.” Sausage said. “Now that the emotional talk is over, can we go back and get lunch? You said they were going to have goat meat wraps and I am so hungry for those right now. I might even just grab a wild goat and eat it right now.” Gem laughed at Sausage’s joke and together the two them headed back towards the tower
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nyan-koii · 3 years
Text
Hashira ft. Sabito as genshin impact players
aunotes : Bad grammar ahead! I didnt proofread it so be aware of brain damage. plus i initially wrote it at the 1.6 update
PART 1 : T.Muichiro, R.Kyojuro, K.Shinobu, S.Sanemi, U.Tengen 
Muichiro : he probably would be uninterested at first. He's more to first person shooting game or anything other than this concept of farming or investing. So that's why when he saw yuichirou banging his fist on his desk, trying to get his fav character, he would simply just watch
"Fck this game, i've had enough,"
"But you havent finish your wishing things yet,"
Stares. "How about you give it a try mui. You might get the character i want,"
"You sure about that? You might get angry at me," "better than nothing. Now go go, get em you donkey,"
His first ten pulls on the game brings out a light we all want to see
"Eh is tha-" "AAAA A FUCKING 5 STAR FCK FCKFCK,"
Apparently, it was one of the luckiest wish yuichiro had ever seen so far
"OHMYFUCK, you GOT A GODDAMN KLEE, QIQI AND SUCROSE WTFF???"
"I think i get your fav character?"
"Yeahh!! More than that to be honest. I want klee but you brought me two more person," sniffles and cries "you're really lucky mui. You should try and play the game,"
"It's probably the system. I doubt im that lucky tho,"
Nah, he really is lucky. Apparently he wished for his friends and got what they all really wanted for so long
"Thank you for getting me the aquila favonia, muichiro,"
"It's nothing really. I just simply press the button. It might be the system that's giving you the thing you want when i wish,"
"But still, even if i were to wish, i can get really scared and paranoid over it,"
"That's bad. You shouldnt invest yourself that much in the game tanjiro. It's just a game,"
"Ehehehe, i guess so. But you're really good at it muichiro! If you download it, we can play together :D!"
!!!!
It took the word "play together" to get muichiro down on his knee for that game. Usually the idea of playing with your friends is not that interesting. So when tanjiro said that, you bet he's going to play it
Type of player
Extremely lucky it's not even real. He got a five star on the beginner's banner
Fast farming. He probably will complete all the quest and become an endgame player within one month
"I just wanted to play with tanjiro..." bashfully
He's really good with whatever he's doing. Attack combo, dodging, elemental reaction and all sorts of stuff. If he invest more of his time on artifacts, he would probably even one shot it!!
He's very lucky. Very
Kyojuro : he wouldnt even know the existence of this game. Well, he took a glimpse of it one day and boom, heart stolen. Maybe it was the fiery burning passion in bennett that made him play the game.
'oh wow!! What a determined young boy! Even though he has a very bad luck he still keep pushing forward! Amazing!!'
'I want to be like him'
Kyojuro's the type of player to read and pay attention to every single lore of his fav character. Bennett, oh my how he wish he could've had bennett in his team. Every wishes he made would make him a c6 bennett main if only barbara wont stop coming home
"I really like you barbara but i dont want you!! Thank you for the c6 though!! I promise to use you in the future but just-" he prepares to wish
"not NOW!!" Clicks
The highest con of bennett he had ever gotten is probably c1. One day the paimon's bargain shop offered bennett as their monthly character. Kyojuro had never been so excited over a game before. He usually perks up over academics and not this kind of thing. But it's bennett, the character he admires the most.
Unfortunately he couldnt get it due to low currency. He had never feel so sad in his life.
"I shall not give up. Dont worry, i will be a c6 bennett main!!!"
He will be a c6 bennett haver!!
Type of player :
Carefully reads every stories and listens to their lines attentively. He finds it amazing how the company spent their everything on this game. It amazes him. From the stories, lores and lines, he truly appreciates it.
Balance his team pretty well. He mains bennett so he doesnt need that much of a healer in his team.
Enjoys bennett's hangout very much!! He tried to not get him killed by the dungeon's trap but ended up having to sacrifice him which ultimately ends the route. He had never felt so down and guilty before.
Not much of a damage dealer. He prefers to play it in normal mode and doesnt care that much about one shotting monster.
He feeds his character three meals a day!! If only there's a sleep option, he would be sending bennett to sleep first before the rest.
Everyone loves his teapot
Shinobu : found the game while she's scrolling through the app store out of boredom. Initially she played it on her phone but due to the fps and a really bad ping, so bad that douma wouldnt find her interesting anymore, she finally downloaded the game on her pc where things has starting to get real
"Ara, shinobu chan, it's lunch time already. Come downstairs please,"
"Sis give me five more minutes, JUST FIVE PLEASE I NEED TO KICK CHILDE's ASS,"
"he's not going anywhere sweetie,"
"yEAHH BUT MY BP IS,"
'Bp?'
"DIE DIE DIE!!" Aggresive clicking intensifies
"Shinobu chan dont hurt the keyboard that much!!"
She got lucky on the beginner's banner too and pulled a 5 star along with bennett and noelle. Who's the 5 star? Diluc Ragnvindr in all of his glory. Shinobu benched him sadly. She prefers sword over any other weapon
"I mean he's cool i guess but i just really dont get that 'WOAHHH COOL' vibe from him you know?"
"then give your diluc to me! I really want him so bad shinobu chan!"
Deep sighs "yeah sure. You can have my c2 diluc mitsuri..."
Loses 50/50 to diluc everytime everyone would think she either is lucky or cursed by the amount of that man greeting him on the screen. She still bench him though, sadly
"Im begging you, give me jEANN THE GRANDMASTER I NEED HEALER iN MY PARTY TO DO ABYSS
Type of player :
Suffers a lot in the abyss because she just want the primos which is a valid reason to do because that's the only thing that keeps her going
She's a sword character main. She'll properly build every character as either support or dps. The support would be kaeya and bennett, and her main dps ayaka
Ayaka main btw
Honestly at some point she wanted to quit the game because of how tiring it is but then inazuma came out
Fragile resin = 0
Resin = 160/160 happens once in a blue moon
"i should probably control myself with the amount of resin i've used,"
"But i cant,"
Hates domain but always can be seen playing in there
Only coops if mitsuri is there
"So that someone can calm me down,"
"That's not a really good reason shinobu chan,"
Sanemi : dude probably know the game through obanai. He watched the latter play and finds it interesting on how high the numbers he dealt. He loves challenges so a game like genshin impact would probably satisfy his need.
"Obanai, are you hearing this shit?"
"What is it sanemi, im busy doing this event,"
"That loser giyuu is also playing the game,"
"Oh yeah i know,"
"YOU KNOW? WHY YOU DIDNT TELL ME??"
"i just know right after you told me,"
"...."
Sanemi's a meta but a mediocre one. He's meta but he doesnt show it that much. Probably buys welkin once in every three months or when he really needs it same goes with battle pass too. Honestly, he really just use his money when he really needs something
"Donno if my allowance can buy me a welkin so i'll probably skip,"
"But the next banner is zhongli's,"
"....."
"Ah fuck it," buys
My man cant dodge after he got zhongli. Its very painful because he used to studies the enemies movement in the early game so that he can utilizes it on the team but zhongli's shield is so tank he forgot that dodging exists
"Im gonna kill you and you and you hhahaahhaah just you wait im gonna shred all of yo- oh shit zhongli's shield. puT IT BACK PUT IT BACK ON,"
That one event where zhongli's shield plays an important role in the domain? Yeah, he felt like a god at that time. Even got his c2 on his rerun. Sanemi just really like zhongli because it kinda reminds him of himejima. Calm and wise and strong too. He looks up on that kind of person
"Zhongli sama, im in debt for all of your hard work protecting my team," bows and wipes tears
Type of player :
Spends a little money on the game to get what he wants
Zhongli main
Is that one player that has hoards of food but doesnt even use it
"Why need healer when you have zhongli's shield,"
Compare to kyojuro, he doesnt even touch the teapot because he finds it ridiculous and bothersome to create and design everything in it
Loves one shotting bosses and compares it to giyuu. He ask for advices from obanai regarding team build supports and stuffs
Doesnt do character's story quest. The key is full every single time. He unlocks it but leaves the quest like that.
"Ah shit, i accidentally activate the quest,"
His friend list only has obanai in it. Whenever people sent him friend request, he wouldnt hesitate, more like wouldnt care to accept it
They either have to coop in obanai's world or his world and after that, unfriend immediately
Says thank you after coop because he has manners and then completely disappears
"Zhongli main forever,"
Tengen : played since 1.0 this madlad has been staying loyal to the game ever since. Quite huge amount of money he spend on this game to be honest but he never gets broke by it. You can see his regular donation to the game by purchasing welkin and battle pass and some genesis crystal too. He's loaded with money, he didnt know what to do with it.
Uzui also plays honkai impact and guns girl Z so when he saw the unknown god at the intro , he was not surprised.
"Oh we have to pick between the siblings? Cool cool co- oh hi kiana,"
"Thats so herrscher of void hahahahah,"
Although he is a loyal fan to MihoYo games, he lost his composure when he saw the 1st genshin anniversary reward because what was that. Imagine getting billions of money and they give us this? Tengen cant believe this shit
"Oh god wtf was that reward, i have to draw to get a welkin and some primos?? aND I ALSO HAVE TO BE LUCKY? WHAT-"
"WHERE'S MY FREE MONA,"
In need of mona. He needs mona so bad he literally spent his money on standard banner to get mona but always ends up with qiqi. Not that he's complaining but he just wants the astrologist to complete the support team
"GOD QIQI YOU AGAIN? WTF WFF WTF-" converts genesis crystal to primigems
"Tengen, you should control yourself!"
"SHUT UP KYOJURO, IM GONNA WASTE MY MONEY TILL I GET HER,"
"yeah but my f2p ass is hurting with how many bennett cons you got," droops
Tengen sees potential in every character. Everyone has their weakness and strength so when kokomi comes out, he diss her at first but then realize maybe its a new way for a character. Adds the uniqueness if he may say so.
"Meh i dont care honestly. You guys should pull whoever you find nice or beautiful. Like me ;)"
"Who do you main uzui?"
"Beidou,"
Type of player
Spoils the storylines, lores, leaks A LOT THE REST HAVE TO BLOCK HIM ON SOCIAL MEDIA
Speed runs the game and has become an endgame player ever since but he still does his daily commission and helps people with domains and stuffs
R5 every battle pass weapon
Fights azhdaha for fun and to test out his characters rather than ruin guards and stuff
Mona wanter
Puts traveller as the pfp and doesnt display any showcase of his characters and namecards. You can only see his achievements and spiral abyss ( 12-3 ). Says its for fun and mystery
Throws a lot of pickup lines and roleplays a lot. Spams your chatbox messages with stickers and censored stuffs
Probably steals your ores and exotic things like violetgrass, qingxin and silk flowers
Screams in the chatbox whenever he saw Mona until Kyojuro had to calm him down
Changes signature every single time and sometimes put spoilers in it
In every survey he would complain "MihoYo where the fuck is my Mona,"
Doesnt heals his characters
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flufflepuffle296 · 4 years
Text
“Chloe xxx”
I really want Chloé to get another redemption arc, but not because she wants to be Queen Bee again or prove herself to anyone-but because she wants to prove to herself that she can be as awesome as she wants. Also sorry but I rambled here.
I don’t even want it to start because of something big like being rejected or glares from classmates, it could just be she’s chilling in her room and she notices her butler flinching when she calls his name, or she’s watching a show and she wants to be just as cool as the main character, or even just looking around the class and just thinking “why not?”
She then starts calling her butler’s name a little sweeter, takes Sabrina out for coffee at her favourite café this time, pushes Alya’s bag towards her when it falls off the bench. She anonymously donates money to varying charities and doesn’t tell anyone about it. She feels warm when she does it-she doesn’t know why but it almost feels kind of nice. She begins working a shift or two here and there at the hotel. She smiles at Mylene when she walks in (even if she considers that outfit a crime against fashion), and returns pens when she borrows them. Nino loses a USB and Chloé helps in the search party for it (though does it secretly at break and lunch).
Becoming nice to Marinette is harder though. She decides however, that if she wants to be an ok person, she has to give everyone a chance, so buys a yard or two of a nice fabric the girl’s been eyeing for weeks, and posts it with a note signed “-C xxx”. It kind of feels a little nice when Marinette walks in in a pale pink beaded dress that isn’t totally horrible Chloé supposes.
She later realises that saying sorry is another thing she can do to become a better person, and she always kind of wanted to but was too prideful to do so-but no more! She apologises to butler Jean, saying that she’s sorry for screaming at him, firing him, everything.
She then apologises to Sabrina, for treating her as a slave and asking if she wanted to go to that film she’s been rambling about, since they always go for her choice. She also takes all of her homework back that Sabrina was doing for her, and starts working really hard on it.
She goes to the bakery later that week, and orders a large slice of cake, reasoning that she can’t be nice to others if she’s not being nice to herself, therefore she needs this chocolate cake. She then asks Sabine if she can go up to talk to Marinette, who is rather skeptical of her and only allows her in the dining room. She apologises for bullying her all those years, and hands her an envelope signed “-C xxx”. Marinette opens it, to find it full of cash that’s tied in small bundles with labels on.
“Homework soaked-age 7” €3
“Sketchbook ruined-age 10”. €18
“Teacher’s present destroyed-age 14”. €16
Everything she’s physically destroyed or ruined is accounted for and compensated. She then apologises for all the verbal abuse and mean comments, before asking for a truce. Marinette accepts, and points out that since they have a truce, she is obliged to inform Chloé that she has buttercream on her face.
A week later she gets all her homework back: B+, B, A-, B-, A+.
Not her usual report of full marks, but she’ll take it.
She starts working every night at the hotel, from 6pm till 10pm. She refuses to look it though-she is Chloé Bourgeois after all. Her uniform is spotless, her makeup is now impeccable (blue eyeshadow with pale lips? What was she thinking?), and she never has a hair out of place. She begins living on coffee-these grades aren’t going to raise themselves after all -and constantly has an energy drink in her bottle (not that the class is allowed to know that).
Grades: B+, A-, A, B, A+
Getting better...
Once in class, Rose slammed her head on the table (delicately? She somehow slammed her head DELICATELY?), and weeped that she didn’t understand the material. Chloé scribbled an explanation on a sheet of paper, and after class slipped it in Rose’s bag.
The next day, an akuma strikes near the school. They can’t leave because some kids live far away, and Bustier isn’t taking initiative and the class rep is no where to be found. Chloé bites her lip, before standing on the desk and clapping her hands. Once she has the class’ attention, she gives out instructions.
“KIM, IVAN! Grab heavy objects and block the doors. JULEKA, NINO, NATHANAEL! You can lock the windows since you’re the tallest. EVERYONE ELSE! Clear books away and any other things that could cause bruising if knocked over, put bags away, and hide under the desks and benches!”
Everyone stares at her.
“NOW!”
Everyone scrambled to their duties, before hiding under the desks, holding their heads like Chloé instructed.
Grades: A, A-, A+, B+, A+
Nearly there...
She informs her father that she’ll be leaving for a week next month, and tells Bustier and Damocles. She books a plane ticket to New York with her money from working, as well as a hotel room. She packs her bags and leaves, giving her dad a kiss and a hug beforehand and promising that she’ll be safe. She boards her plane and then hauls her bags up to her room, before making a call.
“Who is this?”
“Your daughter, Chloé.”
“I DON’T-oh you. Why have you called me I’m in the middle of working-shouldn’t you be at pre-K?”
“I’m 15 and French ma-but anyway, is it possible if you could promote Marinette’s website-MDC-in return I’ll work for you for free.”
“Oh yes Marinette-the exceptional one. How long will you work?”
“I’m only here a week-I’ll become your assistant even! I know you hate Stephanie.”
“...Fine. I’ll drop her into conversation at an interview if you’re only here a week. Now do not call me unless it’s an emergency. You start tomorrow-8am, sharp, in a fashionable outfit-or you’re fired.”
Chloé smiles as the line goes dead. Her mother may be a dragon, but Chloé can respect that she helps those she cares about.
Even if it isn’t her...
The next day she arrives at the office at 7:45, in a white suit with gold jewellery. Audrey nods, before sending her out with rapid instructions for coffee. Chloé takes her order to the café she requested, and starts reading it out to the barister, only for him to pale and interrupt her halfway through.
“Oh God-you’re ordering for Audrey aren’t you? Oh Lord-HEY AARON! STYLE QUEEN ORDER NO. 37! QUICK!”
The other worker, Aaron, goes white, before flipping every machine on and opening every can he can find in preparation.
“You must be her new assistant-good luck with her, the last one would come in to order her coffee and then sit in the corner and cry so much we set up her own space-look!” The first one says, pointing out to a comfy area of bean bags and pillows.
Chloé cringed. “Nah, worse. I’m her daughter, if you can even call me that, that’s interning for her in exchange for a favour.”
The barister pitied her. “Yikes.”
Chloé takes the coffee being thrusted at her and nods at the two, before sprinting back to the office.
After that week of hell, she still refuses to wear anything other than heels and designer clothes, and her hotel room is immaculate. She packs the night before, and sets off back to Paris in the morning.
MDC takes off after the Style Queen reccommended it briefly in an interview, and Chloé starts helping Marinette manage and organise commission dates and social media, eventually becoming her PR person/caffeination.
She starts working not only her 6pm-10pm shifts, but also a few shifts from 4am-7am a few times a week. She does her homework at lunch and as soon as she gets back from school, even doing it during akuma attacks. She gets through a concealer a week for her bags, and sleeps all weekend.
Grades: A+, A+, A+, A+, A+.
Perfect.
...Or not...
She realises that she can’t maintain this. She can’t survive on 3 hours sleep and an unholy amount of caffeine. She cuts back on her shifts, doing 4 a week at most, and only does homework for a maximum of 2 hours a day. She starts, meditation and yoga, trying to keep her mind peaceful. She still donates to charities, and goes out with Sabrina and shops.
Grades: A, A, A, A, A.
Still pretty good, and she’s happy this time!
She begins doing things more for herself. She’s always wanted to learn Spanish after all. She hires a tutor, and starts working extremely hard to become as fluent as possible by the end of her education.
She learns conversational Spanish in about 6 months of semi-intensive learning, and decides to do something else as well. She starts learning Mandarin with Marinette, and struggles slightly more than she did with Spanish, but she’s still progressing.
She realises that she has a knack for learning languages, and picks more up more easily after she starts learning Spanish, Mandarin and later Portuguese.
One day when she’s out she comes across a homeless man, and offers him some money and brings him a hot meal. She sees others around him in the same situation, and does the same for them.
She then volunteers at the local soup kitchen, feeding hundreds of people on weekends and washing up afterwards. She connects with the homeless and a few refugees, and starts learning Arabic from one of the regulars, in return slipping her a few Euros (basically she gives her €250 every week).
She takes a shift at the bakery, manning the counter and becoming fast friends with Marinette as they practise their Mandarin on one another.
Grades: A+, A+, A+, A+, A+
AND SHE’S HAPPY!!!
She eventually starts applying for universities, listing her abilities and experiences.
• A+ Student
• Volunteer
• Interned for Audrey Bourgeois
• Works at Boulangerie Patisserie
• Works at Le Grand Paris
• Fluent in Spanish, English and Mandarin, knows conversational Arabic and Portuguese, learning Polish.
The more she writes and thinks about the past 4 years, the more she comes to the realisation of
“Holy shit, I’m awesome. I’m an ok person. I’m a good person in fact. I’ve done good things. I’ve made a good impact on society. I did it. I DID IT!!! And I’m going to keep doing it-after all, I’m awesome and people rely on me, plus it makes me feel good. I’m no longer a spoilt 14 year old. I can be good. I am good. I am a good person.”
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jasmine-the-fox · 4 years
Text
Destroyed it (MLB salt fic)
It was a nice Friday in Paris, Marinette of course arrived to school late... But only because she was talking to Jagged Stone through video chat about a new set of clothes he could wear for a tour. Aurore, Marc and Luka were waiting for her so she could tell them how it went as she got to her locker, they headed to there class with Mari walking into her’s.
It was her first warning...
The class was glaring at her, Lila was just smiling from next to Alya... She now sat alone in the back since Nathaniel moved to be next to Ivan, this told her that she did something big, miss Bustier then made a sound to get her attention.
“Marinette, due to some... Incidents that I was told about, it has been decided that until you change... You will no longer be allowed on any field trips the class goes on” she had told her.
The class looked to be waiting... Waiting for her to beg to let her be on the trips or something... No way hell would she do something so fucked up.
She took one step and turned to face them “Are you all sure of this? I’m only giving you this chance to change your mind” she said.
That was her second mistake...
They all began to shout... Alya being the loudest, they pointed out things she did to Lila ever since she came back to school, claimed Lila only wanted to be her friend and she was being a bully... Even Adrien fed the fire.
Now that... Was there mistake...
She nodded and went to her bag holding her sketchbook... And tore it up right before the class... Showing that it held outfit commissions she was to make for them... Free, lists of baked goods she was being forced to bake for the class... For free, and all the plans and info’s for the field trips she had planned all on her own without there help.
She was simply done... She had poured so much blood, sweat and tears and commissions the class would push on her from three days left to just one day before they needed it, Mari couldn’t even remember the number of hours she slept because of them.
Not to forget the number of times once she brought them, not even a thank you was given, she still remembered the time Nino’s brother Chris watched her make a scarf his brother pushed her to make for there mom’s birthday and he had brought up how it must have cost about the same amount as the Dj set he got himself... Only for there parent’s to realize he didn’t pay Mari at all. He ended up returning the set to pay her... The class got mad at her for refusing to give the money back to Nino.
She had needed it to make jackets for Kagami and Luka they were paying for her to make!
And let’s not forget the number of times Alya and Nino dropped on Mari there siblings so they could go on a date... Without paying her, luckily the kids were nice enough to allow her to work on her designs and even help her... In exchange of a cookie or a cupcake of course.
Speaking of baked goods, Marinette couldn’t even count the number of times the class demanded her free food, and when she brought them they would get mad at her for not making the ones they wanted that Lila texted her about, she already was allowed by her parents to use the extra ingredients to make them... Now she had to buy ingredients to make what they wanted!?
No way in hell was she doing anything for them anymore...
The class watched in shock as some told her to stop destroying the sketch book, they thought the plan would work! After there teacher told Mari the news, she would beg them to let her on them, they would accept, she would apologize to Lila for hurting her and they would all be friends again! Why wasn’t she begging!?
Adrien was disappointed in Mari... So much for being the two who knew the truth... Now she was just being a baby, he had nothing to worry though. Once he told her his father wanted her as an intern... Everything will be better and everything will go back to normal... Right?
Caline was horrified! Marinette should have been the better person! Have her words not reached her at all!? She has told her many times about the hundreds of Marinette’s in the world and she still does this!? She so badly wanted to send the girl to the principal’s office... But her hands were tied, she couldn’t send her there without a good reason... And this wasn’t it at all.
Once the sketchbook was destroyed, Mari threw it into the trash bin and went to her seat... With a smile from her two friends Chloe and Sabrina who knew about Lila’s lies and weren’t going to do nothing like Adrien was, Chloe knew that soon Marinette would snap after everything the class did to her... And she couldn’t be anymore happy then she was now, she was so having a party with their friends at her daddy’s hotel after school.
That weekend, the class was at the park, Lila was being comforted as she claimed to have texted Mari for a few baked goods... Only for the girl to insult her and want her to kill herself, meanwhile Max was putting pieces of Mari’s sketchbook together to figure out the field trip she had planned “I can’t believe she would do that!” Alya sneered as Max gasped “New York... Next week we were going to New York” he said as he explained everything Mari did.
And there was no way of getting that trip since Mari got places that needed to be reserved months before... They would be staying in Paris instead...
That following week, while the class was getting ready for a trip to the museum... Mari was getting help from her friends to have transfer to miss Mendeleiev’s class... Only for Caline to have her stay for two weeks... Hoping Mari would be the better person and stay in the end.
No way in hell...
The next week, the class watched as Mari ignored them as they brought up the awful trip they ended doing... Which was there fault in the first place, they also watched as Lila was found out for her lies by the police and she was deported back to Italy... They had hoped Mari would be there friend again after that... But she never went to them and instead kept to Aurore, Luka and Marc.
A week later, Alya noticed Mari was holding something... A sketchbook, she then knew Mari was doing something big for them to forgive them so she told the class and they formed a plan at lunch to get it... Alya had to wait at the lockers of course but it was worth it to help Mari fix things with them... Only they were wrong.
The sketchbook had nothing for them... Only for her friends as presents and commission ideas for Jagged Stone...
“I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU!!” a furious Mari walked over and snatched the book back “I had a lunch meeting with Jagged for some outfits for his next tour! And because you guys stole my sketchbook! I need to wait MONTHS before he comes back to Paris and showed them to him!!” she screamed as Chloe and Sabrina glared at them... While filming the whole event.
“I’m sure the principal will be very disappointed in you all for ruining such a big moment for Mari... Especially daddy who has been donating money here to help the school... Now he’ll need to donate security cameras so stealing will be seen” Chloe said as Sabrina rushed to the principal’s office to report this whole thing as Chloe turned to Mari “Let’s go to my daddy’s hotel, Jagged must still be there and you can show him there!” she said making Mari nod as they left the school.
A few days later Mari, Chloe and Sabrina transferred classes... They saw the trio with other students... Not once going to talk to Bustier’s class, with time Mari ended up leaving school early since MDC designs was getting even more famous and demanded so she ended up working on it full time... Her friends soon following her to help out.
Years later while Mari and her friends became famous... Bustier’s class was ruined and never got their dream jobs.
All because they caused Marinette to destroy her sketchbook.
@edes-posts @vixen-uchiha @miraculous-saltybug @mlbchaosqueen
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peachyteabuck · 4 years
Text
under cover of darkness
summary: a 24-hour convenience store, the night shift, and the man who gets you through day. 
a commission for @lovelycarose​
pairing: eliot spencer x reader
words: 5510
trigger warnings: mentions of a break-in with canon-level violence, fluff, mentions of an unspecified chronic pain disorder
ask box / masterlist / commission info / ko-fi
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There are some good things about the night shift. It’s easier to balance classes and your precarious mental health, plus the pay wasn’t terrible – a few extra bucks per hour were thrown your way after eleven and before five.
So you kept with it, one earbud in so you could listen to music while the hours ticked by at a pace so slow it felt like some supervillain had not only completely frozen time – but was also determined to thaw is at room temperature.
That was another thing about the night shift – the customers. It was mostly regulars, or tourists who forgot something at home but didn’t want to spend airport prices for a travel sized container of deodorant. None of them really stick out, none interesting enough to stick in your brain for long as you mindlessly pack their various items into white plastic bags.
That is, until he starts coming in. Tall and impossible big – it’s hard not to marvel at him as if he was a breathtaking skyscraper, like you had never seen something so magnificent. His flowing dark brown hair, his tight jeans…it’s all nearly too much for eleven-at-night-you. (Also for “I haven’t had sex in so long and I think I’ve eroded the ridges on my vibrator from using it so often and holy shit I would do anything to have that man under/above me” you, a you only made stronger and more desperate by how late it was and tired you were.)
He walks around with the confidence not often seen in newcomers, your eye used to college students too drunk to stand up perfectly straight. You’re used to people stumbling around with eyes-half closed, rubbing their temples as the bright white lights feel like cheese graters shaped like ice picks against their already hurting brains. You’re used to watching them stumble around, using some Neolithic instinct to find the cool fridges where they’ll rest their faces against the glass for an oddly long amount of time before opening it up to grab as many Gatorades as they could hold before attempting to grab one or two (or five) frozen pizzas, never able to access the higher order thinking necessary to understand that maybe grabbing one of the baskets by the entrance is important.
Or, on the other end of the spectrum you’ve come to know as normal: soccer moms searching for alcohol for their husband’s post-game barbecue. Moms with large dark circles under their eyes who probably read (and watched) the Fifty Shades movie unironically but still feels weird when their husbands suggest having sex in any position besides missionary with the lights off. Moms who went to college just to meet some mediocre-looking frat boy who votes Republican just because his father did and thinks thirty seconds of oral is enough foreplay.
They don’t spend as much time in the store as the drunk/high students, but it’s still just as entertaining watching them grab the food and drink – but not before lingering in the makeup aisle, staring at bold shades of red and waterproof mascara and the bright hair dye whose advertisements have terribly applied photoshop.
No matter the type – no matter the customer – they were nothing like the man who stood on the other side of the store, staring intently at your soft drink selection. None of them were beefy men with crumpled grocery lists, permanently furrowed brows, and the most beautiful five o’clock shadow you’ve ever seen. None of them wear thick black work boots that make not a single sound as they walk around the store, none of them wear jeans that are so criminally tight around a perfect ass.
Not even a perfect ass – the perfect ass. It’s symmetrical, looking as if it was drawn by a pin-up artist in the 50’s whose specialty involves drawing super buff men in poses meant for petite, slender women with perfect curves. As he walks you half expect sparks to form on his backside as if you were in some kind of Anime, or for each individual cheek to bounce up and down on their own asynchronous accord. Normally you’d be terrified of being caught staring – of him turning around and catching your eye and mocking someone like you for having the nerve to be attracted to him.
But that doesn’t happen, because for once in your life the universe is kind to you. For once in your life you’re allowed to listen to music and stare dreamily at the hot guy who checks the ingredients on every snack dip option you have available before choosing three different ones with a small, disappointed huff.
You watch him with that same silent intensity as he fills the bright red carrier he grabbed without a sound when he first strutted in, the packaging of the items crinkling being the only way to track his location when he steps out of your eyeline. If your boss wasn’t the one on security cameras you’d be angling all of them to follow him around the store, your eyes hungry for another look at him at whatever angle and whichever quality you could get. You feel like a fangirl obsessed with some boyband, your heart rate determined by the amount of the mountain of a man you can see between displays of holiday-themed candy and cheap make up.
You’re not sure how long it is before he’s approaching your counter (time appears to have lost all meaning the second he stepped into the store), but whether it had been five minutes or five years, he still takes your breath away. As he steps closer you realize he’s fucking massive – something your grandmother (a wonderful woman, but one lacking when social situations called for, among other things, any kind of brain-to-mouth filter) would call a “shit brickhouse.” He doesn’t even need one of the baskets as he prowls the aisles – scanning every item like a lion watches the Sahara through tall grass. It’s hard to look away, to go back to the book you’ve been trying to read the same page from since long before the little automated bell above the door had announced the man’s arrival – but the only distraction before had been the tiny, exhausted voice in the back of your mind that was shaming at you for not sleeping before the night’s shift.
Now, though, the voice has quieted to allow your tired eyes to follow him, pupils tracing along every inch of him.
The man checks out without a word; shaking his head when you ask if he has a rewards card and paying in cash. When you give him $7.26 in change, your hands touch for a brief moment and you nearly stop breathing – lungs suddenly void of their capacity to hold air as sparks fly from his callous fingertips to the bottom of your spine. He pulls away, eventually, because he has to – depositing the totality of the meager amount of money you’d just handed him into the donation box plastered with facts about victims of domestic violence right next to your register.
The box is made of an opaque deep purple plastic, the coins making a loud clink sound as they crash into the near-empty container. The man stares at it for a moment, swallowing an apparent lump in his throat as his eyes go blank for a fraction of a second before he digs into his pockets and fishes out a thick wad of perfectly folded five dollar bills before stuffing them into the hastily cut slot at the top.
Neither of you say anything as he does so, you too stunned by his generosity and him too occupied with making sure he had no more money hidden in his pockets to try and muster some vague capacity for speech. Still, as he turns and leaves, you cough to clear your throat and call out a loud and slightly hoarse “thank you!” to which he just turns and gives you a small smile in return.
The moment between the pair of you is fleeting but still makes your heart beat rapidly in your chest, swelling until your lungs feel tight against your ribs as you struggle to breathe. Fuck, you think. You haven’t felt like this since middle school when Jamie told you that your Katniss braid was adorable and you followed him around for two weeks until he agreed to take you on a “date” during lunch. You don’t even know this man’s name and you’re fawning over him as if you have another girlhood crush.
God, you need to learn his name.
Luckily, you find out the next time that his name is Eliot, even though the name embroidered in red above the right pocket of his dirtied coveralls says “Evan” in a fancy looped script (whatever, you don’t question it. You regularly wore your roommate’s sweatshirt from her alma mater even though you didn’t attend the university – must be the same thing, right?). That time all he buys is hair ties and chapstick – lots of hair ties and chapstick, just another thing you don’t question – but stays to talk with you about the Robert Frost poem you were annotating.
“Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening?” he reads aloud, smiling a little as he does so. “Is that for class, or…”
“It’s for class, but I’m liking it a lot more than the other obligatory readings for my degree,” you tell him a small laugh. “Do you enjoy poetry?”
Eliot shrugs as he grabs the full bags. “Oh, ya know. Just the occasional piece. You have a good day now.”
You smile as he walks toward the exit, butterflies pounding in your stomach once more. “You too!”
God, you think as he disappears from eyeshot. You’ve got it bad, girl.
He comes in again, irregular in each way except for the fact he arrives. Sometimes he’s clean cut, standing straight as he takes his sweet time wandering the store – as if he has nowhere to be, no need to rush around.
On those days, he buys a lot of things. Duct tape, orange soda, hair ties, sour candy in all shapes and colors. He makes conversation, asking about the book you’re reading or what you’re listening to, asking about your classes when you wear a jacket embroidered with your university’s logo on the front. On those days, he waits a little – even when all his items are bagged and there’s no real reason for him to stay – picking up on anything that would give him another thread of conversation to pull at.
“Something new?” he asks when you dogear one of the first few pages of a poetry book your friend had lent you.
“Yup!” you perk up just at the sight of him, cheery now more than you had been the entirety of the day now that he’s arrived. “Told a friend of mine about the assignment I was working on the last time you were here, and she shoved this anthology into my hands.”
You like those days – you look forward to them each time you step through the large door marked “EMPLOYEES ONLY” in large white letters that stand out against the incredibly depressing brown that’s been peeling since the day you interviewed here, spots covered sparsely by the maintenance guy who you’ve never seen. Those days are good, fun – they make you smile hours after he leaves and occupy your thoughts until you go to bed, sometimes even making it into the margins of your notebook when you’re zoning out in class.
Sometimes, though, he comes in nearly limping – at least one eye blackened and dark navy baseball cap pulled as far down his forehead as he can.
It scared you the first time, watching as he grunted with each step, every item he grabs from the shelves seeming like it pained him, his face scrunching into a wince each time he raises an arm above his ribs. You checked his items (bandages, ice packs, gauze, antifungal cream, a few first aid kits) with bated breath, terrified of making his mood worse.
It isn’t until you tell him the total, until you finally look up from your hands – that you finally look him in the eyes. They’re always warm like plate of freshly baked macaroni and cheese (and always make you feel just as gooey), but now appear to be clouded with a type of pain you can’t pin down. He doesn’t say much – or anything – as you bag his items, placing them gingerly into the paper bag as if it was an extension of him.
You try to keep a happy face throughout the entire ordeal, not wanting to push him in case what happened was particularly bad. Eliot gives you a similarly small, but earnest one in return – even if he barely hides the wince in his side as he does so.
But that was the first time things seemed a little off – your first time, specifically – and the others get easier as time passes.
At first, “easier” meant a return to days similar to the good ones – telling him things about your day as you ring up all his first-aid related items. He doesn’t respond with as much enthusiasm, doesn’t have the same witty banter – but gives you a small smile that you recognize nonetheless. But then, as the weeks bleed into months, you learn how to handle both the terrible days, the bad days, and the good days all the same.
It’s on one of the good days that he buys tampons, a piece of every kind of chocolate item you sell, and enough Acetaminophen to knock out a horse.
“Your girlfriend is very lucky,” you tell him, blushing as you bag the items. For a minute you think you’ve embarrassed him, crossed some line as a sickening silence grows between you two like mold on two-week old leftovers in a fridge that was turned off. It’s just as disgusting, too, which is why you’re so happy that he still gives you a small smile when you dare look up from where your scanner’s red line centers on the barcode of one of the tampon boxes.
“Nah, just,” Eliot’s plump lips look so kissable it makes your heart pick up. “A roommate, uh. She needs this. Her boyfriend is doing some game night thing and couldn’t pick it up. So I, uh. I got drafted.”
You give a little snort as you grab the receipt, smiling wide as you place it in the bag. “Well, your roommate is very lucky to have you.”
Eliot laughs as he grabs his stuff, cheeks heating up as he blushes. “Can I kidnap you for a little while so you can come remind her of that?”
In a rare moment of confidence, you lean forward and grin. “Is it kidnapping if I want it?”
The blush rages as he sputters a response, eyes downcast as he turns to leave. You get no witty response back, but the way he turns to wink at you as the automatic doors part is enough of a rebuttal for you to feel satisfied with your quip.
No matter what kind of mood Eliot is in, you look forward to his visits, watching and talking with him. Each evening you get ready for work you wondered if he would come in that night, if you would be able to tell him about the dumb thing this guy in one of your seminars said, or how you won an argument during bar crawl over the weekend using some of the random things he had taught you during the very conversations you now wish to have with him. It’s nice, the nicest thing you have in a long time – and somehow that doesn’t scare you, and somehow that makes you feel even better each time you see him.
But then “The Day” happens, and it changes everything.
The evening of “The Day” you woke up from your pre-work nap with this unexplainable feeling that something was going to go wrong. This feeling deep in the bottom of your stomach that you can’t quite place, one that makes the back of your knees sweat and where your ribs feel just a little tighter. Each and every sound – the cars that drive way too fast down your street, the creaking in your house, the dogs that bark obnoxiously – seem loudly, harsher than usual. When you sit up in bed when your alarm goes off it’s like you can feel the muscles in your back contract, feel the bones in your joints grind against each other. There’s some electricity in the air like when it’s right before a storm – only the sky is clear and your weather app doesn’t predict any rain until next week (and, even then, it’s only a drizzle).
At first you think it’s just a bad pain day; not bad enough to keep you home, or make you forget even the idea of doing anything besides groaning in pain in your bed and taking as many pain medications as your doctor says you’re able to. Still, it’s quite noticeable, and occupies your thoughts as you go through each part of your pre-work routine. Even as you shower, turn on your coffee pot, do the minimal make up required to make it look like you didn’t just roll out of bed or are some Victorian orphan plagued by tuberculosis and possibly a deep sadness embodied by the terrible weather that crashes outside their overcrowded London orphanage – you can’t seem to get rid of the proverbial dark cloud that settles itself between your brain and skull, clouding your thoughts and making your stomach hurt just a little.
It doesn’t get better when you get into work, either. There’s a tenseness in the air you can practically taste – electricity in the air that settles over your skin and makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up straighter than the carefully constructed sales display of some B-list celebrity’s nail polish collection, the one you spent hours fussing over during one of your very rare day shifts. It somehow only gets worse when Eliot arrives, whistling some tune that normally would be wistful and happy, but given the context sounds like something straight from a horror movie trailer that invades your otherwise-sweet daydreams for weeks to come; one of those songs that everyone knows but no one knows the name of that sounds really creepy when played slowly over a clip of some old, beat-up doll being held by an adorable little blonde girl with black-out contacts in.
You don’t tell him to stop, but the tune does slow when he notices your tense state when he passes to get to the soft drink aisle. When he gives you a questioning look you just shrug, hoping he forgets (or finds it in himself not to ask) about it by the time he finds what he needs. Judging by the song, lack of list, and spring in his step – it’s a good day, one where he intends to meander around the store and grab whatever it is catches his attention. Today that appears to be anything with sugar, most notably soda in every color but orange.
At some point he finds his way closer to you – more specifically he finds his way to the chocolate aisle, which faces your register – and strikes up a conversation. It’s just small talk, and doesn’t do much to distract you from the twisting in your gut, but you appreciate his efforts nonetheless. The small talk just feels like a dead-end – a polite road to nowhere that feels pointless to engage in. Still, it’s Eliot, so you give half-hearted answers and ask half-hearted questions and hope he doesn’t press you too hard on your slightly-sour mood.
And, because it’s Eliot, he draws a few small laughs and a couple of tiny smiles and it’s…nice. It’s not the usual “Good Day,” but it’s not a bad one, either.
But then it happens. And it happens quick – all of it.
Three men, dressed head to toe in black, enter guns a blazing as if they own the place. They’re wearing masks over everywhere but their eyes, the thick, black material likely silencing their voices if they weren’t screaming at the top of their lungs.
They enter in an oddly-triangular formation – one you’d describe akin to the Charlie’s Angel’s post if you weren’t scared out of your fucking mind. One of them runs to the aisle where you keep cold medicine, the other ransacking the liquor aisle and shoving heavy glass bottles of your most expensive bottles of alcohol into the black duffel bag slung around his shoulder. The last one – the one you think is the leader – keeps his eye on you as he steps closer to where you are at the register.
It’s the scariest fucking thing to ever happen to you, and what occurs next happens too fast for you to describe.
You blink once and find that you’re staring down the barrel of a handgun that’s definitely loaded and definitely has the safety off. The end shakes just a little, as if the robber is nervous, and you wonder why he’s the one scared. Both of your hands are up in the air, elbow bent at a ninety-degree angle while sweat pools at your brow and your bottom lip trembles. It’s the most terrified you’ve ever been in your entire life, and if you had enough in your stomach you throw up, you totally would’ve.
But then – Eliot.
You’re screaming at him to stop, to get away and hide and what are you doing? They’ve got a gun! Get away! You could be hurt! Eliot!
But then you realize that, holy shit, he’s actually taking the guy down. Holy shit, Eliot just punched that dude in the face. Holy shit, Eliot just punched that dude in the gut. Holy shit, Eliot just disarmed that dude while punching him.
It’s only when the guy that targeted you is screaming in pain from a dislocated shoulder that the other two realize something’s up and come rushing towards the man that stands just in front of your register. You’d scream if you weren’t stunned – eyes not sure where to look as Eliot disarms them with the grace of a professional ballet dancer at the same fucking time. He’s fierce but controlled – not breaking any bones but definitely leaving some bruises as he knocks them to the ground and kicks their guns across the carpet.  
It’s then – when the inferior robbers are writhing in pain on the ground – that he grabs the leader by the collar of his black hoodie and pulls the teenager’s wincing face close to Eliot’s raging one.
“I will give you one warning,” he hisses, teeth bared like an angered wolf as he spits. “one warning to leave this place and never come back. If this,” his left hand raises to gesture to you in all your petrified glory. “Nice lady tells me that you have returned to so much as buy a single stick of gum, I will track you down and find you and make sure you pay for the damage you’ve done here today. You got that?”
The still-masked teenager immediately nods furiously, eyes wide with terror and legs already kicking at the ground to leave.
Eliot gives a small, faux smile, and shoves the kid back down onto the ground with enough force to knock the wind out of him. “Good, now get the Hell out of here and don’t come back.”
Without hesitation, the would-be robbers scatter as fast as their damaged legs can carry them, clutching their bags to their chests as they rush to their crappy getaway van.
If you weren’t scared shitless you’d admit you’re a little turned on at the feat, especially as Eliot flips his hair from his face as he watches them speed away.
Your boss appears a few seconds later, apparently one more to watch from his safe room in the back than to interfere. Thank Heavens Eliot was here, you think. Facing those three kids on your own – even if they were, indeed, kids – makes your blood pressure spike once more.
“Should I call the cops?” he asks, looking at the wreckage around the store. The only silent alarm is located under the counter where the register is and, given your petrified state, you weren’t one to trip it.
Eliot just sighs and shakes his head, kicking a broken bottle of whiskey that for sure was going to stain the carpet. “No, they can’t do much – those kids probably don’t have a record and I don’t think you’ll get much out of ‘em if they do find the bastards. They’re young, broke, and I don’t know how much priority your case will be given.”
Your boss sighs, rubbing his face. It’s not as if they stole more than a few hundred dollars’ worth of merchandise, but being the victim of a robbery is still both tiring and rage-inducing – especially when someone like him has gone so long without incident.  “But, I, what am I supposed to do? I just-“
Eliot grabs his wallet from his back pocket, reaching into it to fish out a small, professional-looking business card that he hands to your boss. “Call the number there come sun rise and tell them Eliot referred you. They’ll help you out with whatever you need.”
The man who signs your paychecks furrows his brow and reads the block print allowed. “Leverage, Incorporated? They can help me replace what I lost?”
Eliot nods, placing a comforting hand on your boss’ shoulder. “Everything.”
Immediately the man nods and steps away to go out the back exit, leaving you and Eliot in the center of it all.
It’s then – just as you’re alone – where the sun’s just coming up and the large windows in the shop allow its warm light to bath the both of you in a beautiful soft orange. There are no other customers there, and with your boss preoccupied with calming himself down, it really does feel like it’s just you and Eliot – just the two of you with the whole world still asleep around you. It’s nice, perfect.
He’s the one to break the silence, voice gruff as he flashes you a small, shy grin. “So, uh…you want to go for coffee?”
Your heart rams in your chest even louder than when you were staring the possibility of a gunshot wound to the face, the poor organ exhausted as your brain screams at you to accept his generous offer. It takes what feels like an eternity to muster up the courage to do so, but before you can Eliot’s already speaking once more.
“Not that you, uh,” he clears his throat. “Not that you should feel, uh, pressured, or anything. I just mean like, hey, you worked all night and just went through a pretty rough event, and you’re probably tired, and probably pretty hungry as well, and a coffee place just opened up a street away that I’ve heard good things about. I’ve wanted to try it out, for a while actually, and I wanted to, uh, see if I’d have the honor of you joining me…”
“Eliot,” you laugh as you step closer, placing your hand on his face to guide his eyes to yours. “Don’t be stupid. I’d love to go with you,” he smiles and it warms every bit of you. “Just let me grab my bag and clock out, I’ll meet you outside in a moment.”
He sputters through an “okay, sure, yeah,” before you both turn to leave – him out the front doors and you behind the large one your boss had just been hidden behind. Your hands shake just a little as you insert the little card into the dinosaur of a machine, the loud noise and sputtering sound it makes now white noise as you grab your purse and rejoin him outside.
When you arrive at the coffee shop (aptly named “The Bean Spot”) you order a caramel latte with a cheese Danish, Eliot getting a simple black coffee with cream along with a walnut muffin. You wait for your breakfast in relative silence, neither you nor Eliot sure what to say after such an event. When the food and drink are handed over to you, you find a spot tucked in the back with an excellent view of the whole place.
The coffee shop is nearly empty since it’s still so early in the morning – the only patrons coming in, getting their coffee, and zipping off to the next part of their day. It’s nice to be the only inert thing, the movements of the people around you providing a nice cover as they zip past, locking you and Eliot in your own little world as the world stretches its arms and prepares for another day of hustle and bustle.
By contrast, you and Eliot are wide awake, laughing as you swap horrible roommate stories and whatever else comes to mind. He asks about your degree but has enough class not to ask you about your graduation year (a rare feature of conversations these days), talking to you about all the books you’ve read and professors you’ve liked.  
It’s odd – not bad, per say – but odd nonetheless, to be able to talk freely and openly and having him in front of you, within arm’s length as your knees barely touch under the small table. Seeing him in this space, a space more conducive to conversation and watching his hands as they pick at his blueberry scone and watching his mouth as the corners of his lips twist into a smile every so often and watching –
You blush at your own serial-killer-like thoughts, trying to suppress them with another sip of way too expensive but totally worth it coffee.
Eliot notices, because of course he does. “Hey, you alright?”
You nod, trying to calm your racing heartbeat. “Y-yeah, just-“
He smiles warmly, one hand moving to cradle your chin – to guide your downcast eyes to his. “It’s weird, seeing me in a new place, isn’t it?”
Once again, you nod. “It’s not that I don’t-“
“It’s okay,” his smile widens even as he now avoids your gaze, his hands moving to his lap as he fiddles with them. “It’s…I understand. Trust me, I get it.”
You exhale deeply, your shoulders falling a little. “I’ve thought a lot about this moment for, like, since you walked into the store for the first time…to have you here,” you gestured vaguely to the rest of the coffee shop, to the very few customers and baristas chatting about something you can’t hear and don’t care to pay attention to. “It’s…I don’t know. It’s not as if you’ve fallen short of expectations-“
Eliot gives a little chuckle, mumbling an “I sure hope so” with a glimmer in his eye that makes you want to jump on his lap and kiss him right there. Somehow, you find it in you to continue.
“It’s just super, super weird,” you tell him honestly. “And I don’t like it.”
The man in front of you leans forward, placing a hand over yours to calm you down.  
“How about we get out of here,” Eliot murmurs, voice warm and thick like the caramel drizzle over your latte. “I have an espresso machine at my place, and could make you homemade baked goods a million times better than whatever you bought, and we can continue this in a space where the baristas don’t misspell my name on overpriced coffee.”
He gestures to the cup labeled Elliott, wincing as he does so. It makes you laugh, and you nod in agreement. Together you down the coffee and throw the empty cups along with the wrapping for your pastry away. It’s natural – the way the two of you move – as if you’ve known each other for a millennia, as if whatever it is between you two that’s formed is already as strong and sturdy as an oak tree.
Eliot places one of his large hands on the small of your back as you exit the cafe, thumbing at the fabric of your sweater as you wait to cross the street. It’s comforting – just a flash of the fire that he started for you back at the store a mere hours earlier, heat warming your blood from your toes and up your spine. As he guides you to his apartment his hand finds yours, his fingers fitting neatly next to yours as he points out parts of the city you’ve never slowed down enough to see.
You may not have known Eliot for very long, but even within that short amount of time (and even shorter conversations) he had become a safe house for you, one that you could easily make a home.
And, unbeknownst to the other person, the both of you intended on doing just that.
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purplepints · 4 years
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Red Cross & Donations during Emergencies
You’re probably going to see a surge in posts about why you should not support Agencies like the American Red Cross because “they refused our donations” or "they steal donations" etc. so please read this first before posting anti-ARC/Non-Profit/etc groups mostly run by volunteers.
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE REBLOGGING NEGATIVE STUFF ABOUT THOSE GROUPS!!
Okay, let's talk about this. Food stuff first, then clothes, then a list of Things You Can Do.
Pay attention, people, because while our actions during events like Hurricanes or other events can save lives, our half-cocked reblogging of emotional anecdotes can make lives that much harder. I am not going to claim that the Red Cross (or any other similar Organization) are perfect or unproblematic, but I will say that it is better to light a candle than to refuse to provide batteries for a flashlight. Provide the names of groups you are donating to and the PayPal or site where those groups are accepting monetary donations, don't just fill timelines with anti-Whomever stuff without providing alternatives. Moving on to the Big Questions.....
WHY DO THEY REFUSE FOOD?
— Food can be dangerous.
Think about it. Kids have nut allergies, people are lactose intolerant, the dish could have been sitting somewhere for hours growing bacteria....
— Food can be divisive.
Think about it. Who gets the fantastic homemade lasagna and who has to be content with a bag lunch? Who makes that decision? What about areas populated by people with religious dietary restrictions? Are the items kosher or halal or vegetarian? Worse yet, could someone donate items to locations having high numbers of immigrants, people of color, Muslims, Jews, Sikhs, LGBTQ, etc. that were made with the intent to harm groups of people?
Do you see how all of this could be a problem?
It is simply too much of a risk to trust that every person who cooks something followed all safety guidelines regarding ingredients, can provide accurate lists of ALL the ingredients (and no, not just "1/2 cup vegetable oil", because there could be differences between brands, someone may use olive oil or canola oil exclusively, or simply not think to mention that while they made the dish with ABC Brand 100% Canola, they sprayed the casserole pan with Pam or greased it with XYZ Brand Margarine) AND would leave their name & contact info in case people get ill from eating their food.
Businesses like restaurants have to follow certain guidelines and accept the risks, but private individuals? Not so much. Too many shelters/distribution locations simply don't have the fridges/freezers needed to store perishable foods for the number of people they are trying to help and are using what space they do have to store things like breast milk, formula, insulin, etc. Some shelters/locations are in places that face loss of electricity, disruption of utilities, you name it. They may or may not have generators. They may or may not have the resources to plate & provide utensils to every person. They may or may not have dishwashers or just several large sinks to clean dishes, and they can't just shove dirty dishes into a corner for people to come retrieve. Even if they do have sinks, they probably don't have the manpower to assign toward labeling dishes, storing them, reheating them, serving them and cleaning dishes/kitchen/etc to avoid contaminating other food.
Hate to bring this up, but it should be mentioned that many of those places also lack the bathroom facilities to handle the influx of victims, so a few dozen people coming down with salmonella (which, fun fact, can be spread by touching items which were touched by an infected person who wasn't as diligent as they could have been while washing their hands) or other common ailments caused by eating undercooked, poorly preserved or cross-contaminated items, especially in situations where clean water could be in short supply ...well. I think you can imagine how that would be an issue.
WHY DO THEY REFUSE CLOTHING?
— Clothing uses a lot of resources.
Think about it and you'll see similar problems to the ones regarding food. Some people are allergic to certain detergents, break into rashes when encountering pet dander or have other sensitivities.
— Like food, safety is a concern.
A lot of the clothing donated to shelters/organizations is nowhere close to new or in the ballpark of used: it skips directly to awful and most of it isn't laundered. Claims that all the items have been laundered doesn't change the fact that it has to be laundered again before it can be given to anyone due to the aforementioned issues. If possible, donate new, packaged unisex things like t-shirts. Leave the fancy stuff, out-of-season stuff and dress clothing at home unless you're told they are looking to collect heels, thick sweaters, ties, etc.
Laundering aside, the condition of items can be unbelievable. Pants with broken zippers or large holes in the crotch/butt, single socks, old promotional shirts covered in stains and holes, tops & bottoms stretched out or with blown seams. Soiled clothing (every kind of thing you can imagine), scuffed up individual high heels, bras with wires poking through other items, old prom dresses spilling sequins everywhere and all of this is shoved in garbage bags or boxes willy-nilly along with other random items....it is astounding what people will drop off with an attitude of "it's better than nothing" while failing to realize that all of those bags and boxes have to be sorted, laundered, grouped (child/adult, then sizes), then distributed. This is all worse than nothing and only eats up resources better spent on getting people help they actually need.
Again, many shelters/locations have a limited amount of resources and storage space. They may or may not have access to laundry machines. They may or may not have rooms to set up for sorting, nor space to keep the items for any amount of time. The volunteer hours spent digging through clothing hardly good enough for a rag bag would be much better spent on other tasks that can improve the lives of people impacted by these disasters.
WHAT YOU CAN DO:
If you want to provide food or clothing for people but don't want to donate money to the Red Cross/Other Large Organizations, here are some suggestions :
*** First, ALWAYS make sure to contact locations/groups and LISTEN when they tell you what they need! ***
FOOD:
* See if any restaurants are looking for volunteers to help prepare or deliver meals.
* Ask groups you're already involved with to host a shop-along to supply people returning to their homes with staple groceries. [Even if homes were not flooded or damaged, power outages could cause a total loss of all products in refrigerators and the majority of people who rent apartments do not have any type of insurance policy that pays to replace food.]
* Ask if specific items like bottles, sippy cups or reusable water bottles are needed, or if the location could use a reliable fridge/mini-fridge for storing insulin or breast milk, or offer up a hot plates or electric kettle that can be used to to boil water or prepare small amounts of food for ppl with special diets.
* Get with schools that have teaching kitchens (think Home Ec) and offer to help cook or buy supplies for use: this could provide parents who need a bit of time to check their property or fill out paperwork with that time while providing their child with an activity that results in cookies. Offer to do the same thing with entire families through the schools in the evenings, because a few hours away from a shelter, a hot meal and a bit of privacy can mean so much in times like these.
CLOTHING:
* If a group says they are accepting clothing, please only donate items without damage, without stains and make sure to ask if the location needs clothes hangers, special kind of detergents, mesh laundry bags for distribution, etc. If you have large-load capacity machines, offer use of them if you're close to the shelter or can lend them for a brief time.
* Most groups will ask you to only donate underwear and socks that are new and still in their packaging. Most groups don't receive new underwear and socks in packaging and I don't know of any group that will distribute used underwear or socks, so please think about providing child & adult sizes of those items.
* Consider a group effort to help specific groups of people: gather up gently used business/business casual attire for young adults seeking new jobs or returning to work; maternity clothing for all stages of pregnancy; or look into providing steel-toe boots, work gloves, jackets and safety vests for people involved in cleanup efforts.
* Look into sponsoring a future family event that was delayed by the emergency. Provide a dress and suits for a wedding, pairs of cleats for a soccer team, changes of school uniforms or go the services route by offering your own skills as a photographer, hairdresser, tailor, whatever, for free (or form a group that can provide several interconnected skills to work together over, say, 6 months-1 year post event for free or discounted for X amount of events) or at cost/discount.
* Ask groups if they need fabric or findings for arts & crafts and offer to bring items ready to go: bags of buttons, t-shirts cut into yarn, denim or other fabrics cut into sizes requested, etc. You'll be able to thin out your closet and provide a useful thing that can be used to craft a handy item or teach a new skill. This also applies to other art supplies & school supplies, as children in shelters aren't attending school and/or need an outlet for their feelings.
MISC:
** Masks, shower curtains, hygiene prpdicts: having mass shelter happening during this covid-19 breakout is a triple nightmare, so if you sew masks or have extra masks in any size offer them to the mass shelters.
* Different groups of people have different needs. Groups having more children may need more baby wipes or diapers ; groups having more seniors may need mobility aids ; groups having people with natural hair may need different shampoo ; groups having more autistic or special needs may need sense-friendly items, and so on. Help is “one size fits most” deal in many areas of care (like shelter, food) but there are many individuals who need something specific. Ask, listen, provide.
* Groups are almost always in need of translators, not just for adults & help with paperwork or other concerns, but to watch, entertain or otherwise provide assistance for children. If you are fluent in another language (or have books/movies in different languages) contact agencies and let them know.
* We rely on cellphones & electronic devices for much of our communication, so chargers, charger cords, battery banks, working phones and even laptops could help people find their families. Mobile wi-fi and pre-paid phone cards are things to consider, too. Battery or plug-in speakers with Bluetooth could be used for storytime or dance activities with children or audio books for adults, basically any extra electronics you have that are
fairly modern and can play video/audio would be a godsend. Older phones that have been factory reset while still able to work on modern system could help greatly, so call/check with providers and see if any older models you have will still connect & if they are doing anything with the phones themselves re: redistribution.
* Totes, backpacks, duffels and other reusable, durable bags can come in handy. Ziplocs too, to keep items dry. Often people only stay at a shelter for a few days while they're working on other arrangements so it's nice to have everything packed and secure as well as offer a bit of pride and normality rather than making everyone use hefty bags to carry their stuff.
* If you are a notary public or someone with special knowledge pertaining to documents, mortgages, bank accounts, medical POA, etc call and see if your services could be handy for people. A lot of victims lose their birth certificates and other important documents and will need help reestablishing their identity and proofs of ownership.
Most importantly, please make sure people you know understand that there are ways for everyone to help! There are reasons why certain things are not accepted, and it is frustrating, but keep in mind there are other ways to give. Right now, focus on ways you can help and encourage people you know to join your efforts. Please focus on what we can do to help!!
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alwaysmychoices · 3 years
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4,5,7,10,16,17 oc asks for ethan and charlie😊
Sorry I took so long to answer these! I’m responding to the  Super detailed questions about your OCs, & since you asked for both, I’ll do both characters! These were so much fun! 
4. What is their relationship with their parents? What’s a good and bad memory with them? Did they know both parents?
Charlie loves both of her parents, but ultimately, she’s closer to her dad because he understands her career aspirations better. Her mom wants her to be settled and safe nearby, away from the danger of heartbreak or potential failure, but Charlie wants to keep pushing to be the best. As a result, there’s a bit of tension, but they do love each other. Charlie has really nice memories with her parents growing up in North Carolina. 
Ethan, as we know, doesn’t have a good relationship with his mother. I think his relationship with his dad has been rocky as well, and I wouldn’t be surprised if their good relationship is relatively new. In the next chapter, we’ll talk more about his mom. 
5. Do they have any siblings? What’s their names? What is their relationship with them? Has their relationship changed since they were kids to adults?
Ethan and Charlie are both perfectionist only children, and as a perfectionist only child myself, that fits them. And to be totally honest, that’s probably why they lack some of that emotional intelligence with each other. 
7. Did they have lots of friends as a child? Did they keep any of their childhood friends into adulthood?
Charlie had a moderate amount of friends as a child. She wasn’t particularly popular, but she wasn’t unpopular. Very early on, she was distracted by her own ambition and her drive to help others. She was the kind of kid who went out of her way to make friends with the kid sitting alone in the lunch room, and those are the friends she held onto the longest. But when she left North Carolina and went in search of her own destiny, she left behind a lot of friends who went out and started their lives. She often felt like she had to decide between pursing her ambition and maintaining her old life, and she picked her ambition. When she goes home, she sees friends, but frankly, her friends in Boston have become her family.
Ethan, on the other hand, learned very early on that trusting another person made you vulnerable, and he rejected friendships for his own safety. Tobias was the first real friend he trusted, and we saw how that ended...
10. Do they like children? Do children like them? Do they have or want any children? What would they be like as a parent? Or as a godparent/babysitter/ect?
Charlie loves kids, and kids loved Charlie. She wants children, but admittedly, she has reservations. She’s not sure how a child fits into her demanding career, and she secretly worries that, after a decade of being selfish in pursuit of her career, she can’t make the necessary adaptations. But really, she’d be an amazing parent. 
Ethan doesn’t have the same luck with kids. His godson, however, effortlessly adores him, and the feeling is mutual. Given his upbringing, Ethan doesn’t know if he’s equipped or emotionally mature enough to ever raise children. He’s adjusted to the comforts of bachelorhood, and he prided himself that he’d never have to make the decision, given his longstanding singlehood. He would be a good father, but it would take an active effort to face and overcome his trauma. 
For either to have children, they would need to work together, but honestly? I think they’d do it wonderfully.
16. Do they collect anything? What do they do with it? Where do they keep it?
Charlie used to collect notebooks and diaries as a child, and in college, she had an overflowing candle collection. But after many moves for school and residency, she gave up on owning unnecessary things. Her one exception is the stack of books she promises herself she’ll read but never has time for.
Ethan, however, is a fully-grown adult with a settled apartment and an overflowing wallet. He’s inclined to buy nice wines, first-edition medical books, the latest in medical research, and jazz albums. Still, it’s hard to say he really collects anything because he’s in a constant state of decluttering. If something doesn’t get enough use, it’s decluttered or donated. 
17. Do they like to take photos? What do they like to take photos of? Selfies? What do they do with their photos?
Charlie takes photos all the time. She takes photos of her travels, cool graffiti on her commute, nights out with friends, or something simple like a flower in a park that really struck her fancy. Usually, she just keeps on her phone in folders for the nostalgia, but when she started dating Ethan, they printed out the photos. Later in their relationship, they hung up the photos around their apartment.
Ethan doesn’t take photos, but he likes that Charlie does. Dating her actually encourages him to take more, and soon, he develops a folder of her on his phone. About two years into their relationship, she used his phone to order dinner one night and realized his background was a picture of them and he’d never mentioned it.
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tortoisesshells · 3 years
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Six Sentence Sunday: Buying Time (1/3, ~1450 words, some salty language, people coping with grief poorly)
this was supposed to be modern!fake-dating!AU for Customs and Duties, but, so far, there’s no dating, fake or otherwise - just a lot of pottering around an antiques shop, with a side helping of cocktail-party knowledge of clockmaking and 19th century US naval scandals. I have a plan. maybe. I also may be sorry.
The first time Nellie Treat met James Norrington, esq., he was already drunk at 2:30 on a winter Tuesday. It was Tuesday simply because it was the day after Monday, and it was 2:30 because sometime after lunch the new-old naval clock had struck five completely uninspiring bells – and it was still light outside. A sixth bell rang from the door swinging open, and Nellie had glanced up from her unending round of correspondences and deep-internet trawling to see a tall, cleanshaven man glancing about himself with complete bewilderment, as though he’d been expecting Narnia – or maybe a drop into a bottomless pit.
“Welcome,” Nellie’d said, with her polished customer-service smile, “Can I help you find something specific? Do you have an inquiry?”
“I drank too much,” the tall man replied, gesturing vaguely behind himself down the main drag, to any number of establishments, “I’ve walked around for an hour but I left my coat somewhere.” He paused expectantly, as though what he said had made any sense whatsoever.
Unbelievably (or maybe believably – she was a widow with two children and wasn’t getting any younger, and it wasn’t like she got out much), this had been the start of a fairly interesting friendship  –
Even if he had spent the next hour rambling about the duel between Decatur and Barron and the Chesapeake-Leopard Affair.
*
What Nellie Treat learned about James Norrington, in fairly short order thereafter, was this:
(1) He was a graduate of Princeton, Yale, and Harvard, in some combination of B.A.s and M.A.s and J.D.s which, as a proud graduate of a state school, she forgot as quickly as she could,
(2) He had upper-class-WASP-male-appropriate love of all things maritime, which led her to believe there was probably a daysailer, at the very least, in a marina somewhere, and she would have bet Sam’s grandmother’s pearls that there was at least one model ship in his office, and a collection of Samuel Eliot Morison’s histories on his shelves, somewhere,
(3) He’d just been dumped by his fiancé at a political fundraiser luncheon in Boston, which didn’t precisely explain why he was here. “95,” was the closest thing she’d gotten to an answer, which she supposed was technically correct, and,
(4) He was both sharp and a little stuffily polite, because not two days after their inauspicious first meeting she’d received an immaculately-penned note thanking her for her coffee, her argument, and her kindness. A few days later came a formal inquiry through her shop’s email: he was looking for a shelf clock from a particular Newport maker she’d never heard of. Was this a commission she was interested in undertaking?
Considering Mary had one more year at Stanford, yes. Yes, she was.
*
God, that fucking clock.
*
There wasn’t any particular reason to believe that Elinor Coggeshall would have turned into a respectable antiques dealer, since as a kid the only thing old stuff meant to her was the endless round of family hand-me-downs. Antiques had been Sam’s thing – in part, he guessed, because he grew up around the stuff (that hadn’t been donated to places like the MFA or the Wadsworth Atheneum or even, in the case of his great-great-something-great Uncle’s punchbowl, with its bold maker’s mark, “REVERE”, in the Metropolitan). The other part had been his love of stories and people and the endless revolutions of historical rumor and gossip mills. So, Nellie had married into the business.
And then, after ten years of marriage, Sam started complaining about headaches. Six months later, he was gone.
Ridiculous as it was, she observed some of the old mourning traditions – she lived around the things that had seen it firsthand, over a century ago – and it gave her something to do, covering mirrors and tying black ribbons on her framed photos, and spending an atrocious amount of time on the internet only to discover no one really made mourning crepe anymore, because, well – who did that? Who needed it? She must have worn the same three black turtlenecks and the same two pairs of black slacks for three months, until Aunt B had kindly but pointedly told her she looked more like a beat poet than a widow. Polly and Sam seem pretty relieved, too – and Mary, all the way from Stanford, pointedly sent her a beautiful and brilliantly colored floral scarf, to mark the change.
And business went on. What else was she supposed to do? No amount of crying would ever bring Sam back – and it wouldn’t pay the grief-counseling bills, either.
*
Where the clock was concerned, she had little luck – furniture, really, was what she knew best, and sure, yes, there was a fair amount of overlap between cabinetry and clocks, particularly when, before the mechanization of clock production in the wake of Eli Terry’s innovations, clockmakers had really only focused on the gears and mechanisms, and left the housings to carpenters and cabinetmakers – but she’d never really dealt in clocks besides a novelty one every now and again. That was mostly for her own amusement, anyway – like the naval clock over the door to her office, or the clock in a fake old-fashioned diver’s helmet that she’d found at an estate sale and given to her brother, who laughed for a good fifteen minutes over Skype because of it.
At the end of the first month, she’d sent an email to Mr. Norrington, esq., reporting very nicely and not in so many words, that she’d found sweet fuck-all, but there were these promising leads on clocks similar in build, mechanism, or origin. She didn’t expect any of them were good enough, and, Mr. Norrington emailed back politely that he appreciated her effort, but none of these were correct, and he’d like her to keep looking.
March was much the same, as was April: Mr. Norrington, here are these clocks that aren’t exactly what you’re looking for; thank you, Mrs. Treat, but I’d appreciate it if you continued to look. There were a few more pleasantries from him, with reference to a short article on Decatur, belatedly making the point he’d tried to make but for the scotch those three months ago. It made her laugh a little, even.
May was shaping up to be much the same, save that, shortly before noon – an unimpressive seven bells, that was punctuated, again, by the ring of the shop-door-bell as it opened. “Welcome,” she said, looking up from her emails and list of estate sales she wanted to buzz through either for out of town friends or from her own sense of piratical treasure-hunting – and the intellectual challenge of getting in and out with two children at ten and eight in tow. It had been a good month since her last major commission.
At any road, she’d set aside her pen and paper, looking up with her placid expression, and –
“Ah, Mrs. Treat,” said Mr. Norrington, “Good morning.”
Nellie had a sudden presentiment that he’d come to thank her but dismiss her in person, since he seemed a thorough, conscientious, and probably old-fashioned sort. She probably should have expected that, and she smiled a little more determinedly and plastically as a result.
“Good morning, Mr. Norrington. How can I help you today?”
“I was passing through, on my way to New York,” he said, by way of explanation, “And I wondered, in light of that, and the work you have done for me, if I might not suspend the monthly email in favor of a short conversation?”
“All right.” She gathered her notes and her tablet under her arm, and gestured towards her office at the back of the shop. “It’s not the neatest place in the world, but it’ll do. Do you want some tea?”
“Would you like lunch? On my tab. I’ve never seen so many diagrams of mechanisms and assemblages, and I’ve certainly learned more about hardwoods than I ever expected. You must have gone cross-eyed, Mrs. Treat.”
Nellie protested that it was far too generous an offer, but Mr. Norrington pushed back that he had hardly discharged her – her kindness (he said, vaguely, a little color rising in his cheeks at the memory) towards him, from those months ago.
So, a little while later, that was how Nellie found herself locking up and setting the security system, setting her quaint little Out-To-Lunch sign that Sam had penned in during his calligraphy phase in the door, and poking her head into Hancock’s to tell Lydia that she’d be back in an hour.
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orange-waterfalls · 4 years
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I Won't Miss You Much
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Illinois x gender neutral!reader
@just-bts-trash-00 ty for the prompt
A/N: the title is a lie from our very own adventurer. Illinois being a lonely boy and getting a taste of his own medicine I guess. He leaves for adventures for weeks on end and just goes "haha y/n will be fine" yeah it's not so GOOD IS IT, ILLY? sorry I'm tired. Uuuuuuh comedy??? And fluff??? I took a jab at Hallmark movies at one point lol. Rated T for cursing. I didn't intend for the end to be suggestive but I think that's what happened. Enjoy!
Word Count: 2.8k
--
Illinois drove back home, smiling from ear to ear. He'd just found an entire chest of treasure. Gold, silver, jewels, you name it. He'd give a lot of it to museums, like always, but even with what he'd have left, he wouldn't have to adventure for a month! A month to spend time with you. That sounded lovely.
He'd been going on a lot of adventures recently, so you two didn't see each other much. He was pretty okay with it, but he knew how much you wanted to spend time with him. This was a great opportunity. He didn't call to tell you he was coming home. He wanted to surprise you.
He pulled into the driveway, turning the car off and walking up to the door. He knocked 7 times in a rhythmic pattern. He heard a bit of shuffling from inside before you opened the door a crack. Upon seeing your boyfriend, your eyes widened and you threw the door open.
"Illinois?" You asked, confused. "What are you doing here?"
"This is my house?" He laughed. You pulled him into a hug and he backed you into the house, closing the door with his foot.
"I thought you'd be gone until tomorrow…" you said and pulled out of the hug.
"I wanted to come home early," he shrugged. "Besides, I don't have to adventure for a month." You blinked at him.
"A… a month?" You repeated with less enthusiasm.
"Yeah! So we can spend a lot of time together, just like you want."
"Oh…"
"What's wrong? Were you planning on breaking up with me?" He chuckled. He looked behind you, seeing a suitcase on the couch. He looked back at you and frowned. "Please don't break up with me…"
"Oh! Oh, no, no, no! That's not what that's for!" You reassured. "I just…"
"What?"
"I'm… going on a business trip…"
"Business trip? To where?"
"Uh… Brazil…"
"Brazil?"
"Yeah…" you said apologetically. "A client hired me to take photos… in Brazil… I'm sorry…"
"It's alright," Illinois sighed. "We can have quality time after you get back."
"I'm gonna be gone for a month…"
"What? Why?"
"They want me to take pictures of everything. Families, animals, there's a parade that'll happen… I have to be there." You checked your phone. "And I my flight leaves soon, so I have to go now." You walked over to the couch and grabbed your suitcase, then back up to Illinois.
"Alright." He nodded. You gently kissed him, and pulled away all too soon for his liking.
"I love you! Goodbye!" You said as you walked past him to your car.
"Love you too…" he answered. You put your suitcase in the trunk and got into the driver's seat. You waved goodbye to Illinois as you pulled out of the driveway and headed to the airport.
Illinois stood at the doorway for a minute. So, he couldn't spend time with you. That was fine! You were a fantastic photographer, he couldn't blame people for wanting to hire you all the way from Brazil. He'd miss you a bit, but he'd be fine. I mean, you spent days, even weeks on end without him. He'd be completely fine.
--
Illinois was completely not fine. It had been three days since you left and he already felt like dying. How the hell did you last without him? More importantly, how was he supposed to survive without you?
The first day was probably the best one. He slept on the couch because of how tired he was. When he woke up in the morning, he went through the basics. He took a shower, washed his face, changed his clothes, brushed his teeth, and ate breakfast. He usually woke up before you, so he knew how to cook for himself. He was pretty awake when he got up, so he didn't make any coffee. He just made some of your chamomile tea. It was really good, he didn't know why he didn't try it before. He went through the rest of a pretty boring day. He watch TV, read a book, made lunch, watched some more TV, went through all of his trophies from adventures, made dinner, then fell asleep.
The second was a bit more chaotic. He was more tired that day than the first day, but he made tea instead of coffee again. He remembered you had told him that a brownie recipe you knew went very well with the tea, so he tried to make it. You were out of eggs, so he went to the store to buy some. Once he did, he got started on the brownies.
Now when I say he set the kitchen on fire, this dumbass set the kitchen on fucking fire.
He had made the batter and put it into a pan, and then into the oven. He decided to watch TV while he waited on the brownies. He landed on a Hallmark Christmas romance movie. That was a bad idea, because he fell asleep almost instantly.
He awoke to the smell of smoke and the alarm frantically beeping. He jumped up and ran into the kitchen. He swung the oven open and threw the extremely burnt baking onto the floor. He grabbed a nearby towel and waved at the air until the alarm stopped He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand, noticing he was sweating.
"Well, that's unfortunate," he sighed. He looked at the time. 10:24. There was still time for brunch.
He decided to make an omelette for himself.
He made the omelette for the most part, and let it sit on the stove for a minute. He wanted to make sure it was just right. he walked over to the couch and sat down, deciding to rest his eyes for a minute. The brownie incident was very stressful. Yet again, instead of just sitting there, he fell asleep.
For the second time this same damn day, Illinois woke up to the smell of smoke and the fire alarm beeping like mad. this time, he didn't jump up because he didn't think it'd be that bad. he slowly walked into the kitchen and almost screamed when he saw that his omelet was currently on fire. He panicked, not knowing what to do, because you two had an electric stove. What was he supposed to do? Throw some water on it? He looked around for a moment before seeing the towel he had to use to wave the smoke away. He grabbed it and threw it on top of the piece of breakfast, patting it to make sure it died. After about a minute, he gently lifted the towel. The fire was out. He sighed and, again, waved the smoke from the smoke alarm to get it to stop beeping. Illinois quit trying to make breakfast and just took some of your cereal. He honestly thought that that was going to catch on fire as well, so he stayed a little bit away from it at all times. Once he finished his cereal and his tea, he went back to the couch and just collapsed. he decided that another quick nap was in order, given the chaos that happened that day.
The rest of the day was pretty calm. He watched TV, went to the store to buy some other food, made lunch, watched some more TV, read a book and got takeout for dinner because he didn't feel like cooking again.
The third day was the one where he finally started to feel the effects of you not being there. It was a Wednesday. You always woke up early on Wednesday. He wasn't sure why, and neither were you. But you always woke up at the same time as him and made breakfast. He always made the coffee before hand so you can be more awake. And that's exactly what he did. He woke up, went through the motions, went into the kitchen, and made coffee. He got two mugs from the pantry and set them down on opposite sides of the table. When eating breakfast, you two always sat across from each other so you could talk. Illinois poured coffee into both of the cups and sat down. He stared across from his seat at the table for a moment, seeing the empty chair, and realizing that you were, in fact, not here.
And then he broke down.
He missed you. Oh, God, he missed you so much. How long were you supposed to be going? A month? And how long have you been gone? 3 days? He wouldn't make it. He couldn't make it. He started to pace around the kitchen.
"Ok… ok… you're ok…" he told himself. "You've been away from them for a longer amount of time, you can handle a month."
But the thing about Illinois being away from you for long, long, long amounts of time was that he had something to do. He'd be on an adventure. He'd be in some temple ruins, or a cave, or something of the sort running for his life. But this time, you were the one with the job, and he had absolutely nothing to do. Illinois didn't have many friends, mostly because he adventured so much. He was honestly pretty surprised when you agreed to date him. Now he realized why you wanted to spend more time together.
Okay. Okay. This was fine. He just had to find something to do… What did normal people do when they were bored?
He went to the museum. It was pretty interesting, and they were doing a lecture on treasures that he had donated there. He figured that could be pretty fun. He soon found that trying to correct to the tour guide on every single thing he was saying was not the best thing to do, because he got kicked out.
The next day, he went to the zoo. He informs people on the different types of spiders and bats and bugs that lived in caves. Heated ventured for so long that he figured it would be smart to learn the kind of animals he'd come into contact with when he went somewhere. Everyone was very interested in it, until he decided to take a tarantula out of its enclosure. Again, he got kicked out.
Third time's a charm. The next day, he went to the park. He sat on a bench and read a book and watched the kids play on the playground. One kid walked up to him and asked him if he was in an adventurer.
"Why, yes I am," he said smugly, "do you want to be one when you grow up?"
"No, you just remind me of Indiana Jones," the child answered. Illinois' hand squeezed the book in anger.
"Well, could Indiana Jones do this?" He asked while unsheathing his gun. He shot a nearby tree a few times to make a smiley face. He smirked at the kid.
"Probably," they shrugged and walked away from him. He snarled.
"Fuckin' kids…" he mumbled. A parent had apparently called the police on him, because he ended up in jail. They told him he had a phone call, so he called Mark.
"Hey, Mark! So, uh… I'm in jail," he said, trying to keep his cool, "I need you to come get me…"
"Dammit!" Mark cursed.
"What's wrong?"
"I bet Wilford that you would get arrested a week after Y/N left." He explained. "He bet 4-5 business days…"
"Ha! Told you!" Illinois heard another voice from Mark's end of the line.
"Oh, shut up!" Mark yelled. "Listen, uh… I'll get there soon as I can. Bye." He said and hung up. Illinois sighed and slumped on a bench.
This was gonna be a long month…
--
Illinois had the most boring month of his entire fucking life. For the first half of it, he sat in his living room, watching romcoms and almost crying because he wanted to be lovey-dovey with you. Why should these assholes get to be together? They were cheating on the one girl's boyfriend! She can have two spouses, but he can't be with his one?
For the second half, Illinois stopped being such a pissy little fuck and actually did things. He learned how to play the guitar, he finished three books, and he painted a picture from a Bob Ross video.
It was awful.
He was so completely bored without you. He hadn't realized how much you'd improved his life up to that point. You two had figured out how to video call halfway through the month, but you were almost always busy or asleep when he was ready. It was horrible.
But now, it was over.
You got back today.
And Illinois was fucking elated.
He jumped into his car and went through three red lights to get there, not to mention he was going 50mph in a 40mph zone. This man was going to die before he was late. He didn't even give a shit he was 5 hours early, he was gonna fucking wait for you at the airport. He brought a blanket and snacks, he'd be fine.
He took a nap after an hour, and woke up three hours after that. For the next two hours, he looked at pictures of you and thought about what he'd do with you when you got back. Finally, the time came when your plane was supposed to land. He knew it'd be a bit after that, but he stuffed his blanket and leftover snacks in his backpack and ran up to where you were supposed to enter the airport. He didn't have a sign, which he probably should have, but he'd find you soon enough. He looked through the crowd of people exiting the plane. All he saw were old rich people and young rich people. He looked across the herd of people, searching for any hint of your suitcase. You had gotten annoyed with the fact that you kept mistaking yours for other people's, so he bought you a neon rainbow suitcase. That didn't seem to be very useful at this point in time. He felt a buzz on his thigh. Groaning, he checked his phone. It was a text from Mark.
Hey! It said, Is Y/N home yet?
Illinois growled.
That's what I'm looking for.
Tell me when you see them
Sure thing. Illinois shoved the phone back into his pants, continuing his search. He suddenly saw a flash of color out of the corner of his eye. He whipped his head to the side.
There you were, trudging your suitcase along the floor. Your hair was all over the place, you were dragging your feet, and even from where he was, he saw the bags under your eyes. You were a hot mess.
In his eyes, you were an angel on Earth.
He wanted to be patient and keep up his suave persona. He noticed himself bouncing in his spot a bit, a smile forming on his lips. If he waited any longer, he swore to God he was going to explode. He eventually decided it wasn't worth it, and dashing over to you.
You were so tired. You were so, so very tired. The people who hired you were so nice, but they never fucking slept. Anytime they did something, they wanted you to take a picture of it. Mostly because they'd just gotten married, and you could respect their enthusiasm, but holy shit. Not to mention the PARADE. You got no rest. None. You couldn't wait to get home and just relax with your boyfriend…
Speaking of which, wasn't he supposed to pick you up?
You saw something coming towards you in your peripheral vision and turned, only to see said boyfriend sprinting at you. You opened your mouth to scream, but the wind was knocked out of you by Illinois pulling you into the tightest hug you've ever experienced and you simply wheezed.
"Oh my God, I missed you so much," he nearly cried, "do not ever do that to me again, please…" in response, you coughed. He realized you were having trouble inhaling and loosed his grip. He didn't let go.
"I missed you too…" you wheezed. He stood holding you for a second. A couple of girls giggled as they walked past you two. You flushed.
"Illinois, you're embarrassing me…" you whined.
"Oh?" He asked, the smirk audible in his voice. He pulled out of the hug and crashed his lips against yours. You basically collapsed into it and he had to hold you up against his body. He pulled away after a minute. You sighed.
"Can we go home now?" You pleaded.
"Of course, darlin'! We gotta spend some time together!" He answered. You let out a soft whimper.
Looks like you weren't getting your rest anytime soon.
my phone's at 5% lololol.
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dipulb3 · 4 years
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How the pandemic has changed Americans' spending and saving habits
New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/how-the-pandemic-has-changed-americans-spending-and-saving-habits/
How the pandemic has changed Americans' spending and saving habits
Appradab Business asked readers how the pandemic has changed their spending and saving habits. Here’s what some of them had to say.
Paul Grim described himself and his wife, Michelle, as “more savers than spenders” before the pandemic struck.
Then Grim was laid off from his IT job. His wife, who is still working, has reduced her 401(k) contributions to free up some cash.
“We have been dipping into our emergency savings to cover our bills where unemployment falls short,” he said.
The couple, who live in upstate New York with their dog, Barley, are eating at home, minimizing impulse purchases and postponing pricey things like dental work.
“Once I am working again we intend to increase the amount of our emergency fund to ensure we are even more well-prepared for any potential future financial emergency, no matter how severe,” Grim said.
Jim Stearns of Alaska runs big events for nonprofits, including the state’s annual music festival Salmonfest. But his business dried up once large gatherings were canceled.
When he started collecting unemployment he was getting $800 a week, but that has since fallen to $200 a week, after the temporary $600 weekly federal supplement expired. Now he is tapping his savings to support himself and his teenage daughter.
“I’m spending very little as my savings slowly but surely diminishes by the day,” he said.
Stearns is less worried about himself than the hundreds of vendors and musicians he normally books for events. “I can limp along and survive. But the tragedy of this is this incredible trickle-down effect.”
Slashing expenses, saving more
Sarah Way reworked her family budget when her part-time job in California was cut back to one day a week and her husband’s employer temporarily cut his pay in half. Travel, dinners out and commuting expenses were eliminated by default because of the pandemic. But she went even deeper.
“We parked a car and took it off insurance. We cut cable TV. We slashed the grocery bill. After four months, my hubby’s salary went back to normal, but we didn’t adjust our budget back up,” Way said.
Instead, she noted, “We have increased our retirement savings and built a six-month cash reserve. We did complete a few house projects that had gone unfinished, but for the most part we are in better shape now than we were before Covid.”
Natalie Sawyer, a school administrator in Texas whose husband is a retired military officer and now a teacher, also took the pandemic as an opportunity to power-drive household savings.
“Before Covid, I spent money without even thinking about it. We ate out a lot and I shopped for things that I didn’t necessarily need. It was a kind of free-for-all with my money. Once Covid hit and [we] were forced to stay in, we started cooking all of [our] meals,” Sawyer said.
“With that in mind, starting in March I decided to put $500 a month in an interest-bearing online savings account just to see if I could make it work.”
Sawyer has saved an extra $4,200 so far. Even though she has resumed some shopping, she said, “I find myself not spending nearly as much as I used to and we’re still cooking a lot more at home. … Covid helped us realize that we don’t need most of the stuff that we were spending on.”
Karen Jones works in the cloud software industry in Oregon. Her husband, Kim, whose work is tied to outdoor concerts and fairs, was laid off early on in the pandemic, then brought back in June. But he was laid off again in mid-August.
Jones initially halted contributions to her 401(k) and put the money into their savings account. “I wanted cash that I could get to right away if needed and I didn’t have faith that the market wouldn’t slide further and negate any contributions that I made during that time,” she said.
The couple canceled vacation plans and paid off their credit cards. The extra money her husband got as a result of the temporary $600 a week federal unemployment subsidy went toward savings. Jones is also saving money on gas and lunches out because she has been working from home.
“We still eat out or [do] takeout once a week to support local businesses, but are not looking for any other big ticket activities such as vacations through the summer of next year,” Jones said.
Putting life on hold
Michelle Williams graduated from college during the Great Recession in 2008. And it was only recently that she and her husband, Sheldon, had felt financially and professionally secure enough to consider trading up to a better house from their starter home in Missouri. They also were going to start a family.
Now they’re holding off.
Williams, who works for her county’s public library, didn’t lose her job. But her husband was laid off in March. He has since found new work, but their household income is a little less than before. Still, Williams said, “We are very, very lucky.”
Normally she’d put any extra money they made toward their mortgage or student loan debt. And she had planned to start saving for retirement before Covid hit, but now all spare cash is used to create a six-month financial cushion should they lose their jobs in the next year or have a big medical expense. “I don’t know what might be coming in the near future,” Williams said.
Paying off debts
Kalikoweo Keolanui-Daniele and her husband, Louis Daniele, both work for a coffee producer in Hawaii and live in a remote area, where their home — now paid off — runs on solar power and rainwater. They also grow their own vegetables.
Neither has been laid off, but Keolanui said the pandemic has made a huge impact on their money habits.
She used their stimulus check to pay down credit card debt and put more money toward her auto loan so she can pay it off faster. Plus, she added, “I put at least half [my paycheck] toward savings and plan to continue to do this to build up an emergency nest egg.”
They’ve eliminated all non-essential spending — from recreational shopping to haircuts and beauty treatments. Keolanui did, however, invest in a good pair of hair scissors.
“I feel more and more comfortable the bigger that nest egg gets,” she said. “You just don’t know what’s going to happen. There’s so much uncertainty.”
Looking to buy a home
Gillian Needham, a mental health practitioner, and her partner, Mike Ryerse, were not savers before the pandemic. They used to spend most of their disposable income traveling from their home in Minnesota to see their favorite bands.
But the pandemic has provided them an opportunity to squirrel away money.
“Since Covid began, we have dropped event and bar attendance to zero and have been able to save nearly $10,000 in the last seven months,” Needham said. That money is now earmarked to help them buy their first house.
Looking ahead, Needham expects they’ll continue to save and not only because there’s not much they do during the cold winters. “[The longer] I do something the more it sticks,” she said.
‘Comfort shopping’
Anna Harrington, a college professor in Tennessee, has never been much of a shopper. She used to spend money on plants, concerts and theater. But since the pandemic, she’s become a kind of impulse shopper.
“I’m ‘comfort shopping’ the way that others ‘comfort eat,'” Harrington said. “I’m saving and spending the same amounts as before — I’m lucky that my job is secure. But this past summer, I bought the oddest things I never would have normally bought — a sunrise alarm clock, pink fuzzy bunny slippers, the entire Buffy the Vampire CD collection, and vintage furniture from the 1970s,” Harrington said.
“When the bunny slippers arrived, I thought, ‘What am I doing?'”
Donating more than ever
Harrington also said that she’s making more charitable contributions than ever, including donating her entire stimulus check.
So is Kristina Laursen-Carr, a substitute teacher in upstate New York with four children. She feels lucky that her family’s finances have remained stable. Her husband, Joseph, a helicopter pilot who is retired from the military, is the main breadwinner and works for an air ambulance company.
When the pandemic hit, Laursen-Carr no longer traveled to pick up their two daughters and bring them home from college every weekend. And the family didn’t take vacation this summer. So she used the money they saved to bolster their retirement savings and help others.
“The best thing we started to do was buy food [and other] items for our local food bank on a weekly basis. We donate between $20 to $30 each week,” Laursen-Carr said.
Doyle Tarver, a retiree now living in Mexico, said his income — from Social Security and savings — has remained steady. But Tarver said he has been spending more in recent months than before the pandemic to support local businesses, even if it means sometimes buying things he doesn’t need. And he’s been tipping wait staff in restaurants up to 50%.
“I feel fortunate to be in the financial situation I am in and think everyone in a position to help should do so,” Tarver said. “There are many out there who have lost their jobs or had their hours reduced and need our help.”
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mondayglasses · 5 years
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Supergirl: 5x01. Event Horizon maybe but not the one they want or you want to remember.
So I watched the episode and it was beyond terrible. I mean for a season opener there was no action and they are 100% going to bait the SC fans if not go that route. Let me give you a breakdown.
It’s starts with Kara saving some kids who are going to get killed by a bus? Sound familiar? Cause they have literally done it a million times. Lena then tells Supergirl she knows who she is and punches her. It’s the scene from the trailer. It’s essentially a sim and Lena’s way of getting her anger out apparently.
Lena has a new AI friend who is like Gideon/Jarvis. When did she have time to build it and how did she have the tech? Who knows but it’s Lena so she probably did it in an evening cause you know she is amazing. She then goes into a load of diatribe about how she doesn’t trust humans cause they are ambitious and she doesn’t trust them etc? Of course that doesn’t include her, that could never include her.
Cut to a scene where J’onn, Alex, Kelly and Kara are in Noonans (which neither looks nor feels like Noonans) and everyone is staring into space cause they got virtual reality contact lenses. Apparently Kelly conveniently has a job at Obsidian the same company that is going to take over CatCo and they share the same building. Sound convenient? Cause it is and they can’t find a more tactful way to include Kelly at every turn.
They then talk about this new contact lens tech that Kara knows nothing about. You know the same Kara who won a Pulitzer for her hard hitting journalism that was full of all the facts. We can’t possibly expect Kara, a journalist to know about the latest tech that is taking over the city, no that’s not her job (biggest eye roll).
We then get to hear about everyone’s very scripted thoughts on what they think about technology and how dangerous it is or the potential good it can do. It was like the writers where challenged with trying to tell the audience the theme of the season but none of them had any idea how to do it subtly. Instead they give lines to characters that feel the furthest thing from natural.
Once J’onn leaves to go and teach tai chi, yes you heard me right tai chi and Kelly goes to her new job Alex rounds on Kara and demands that she tell Lena that she is Supergirl. This being the same Alex who has warned Kara countless times about the dangers of revealing who she is. It’s like everyone has collective amnesia and has forgotten all Lena’s dubious behaviour in previous seasons. If there is one person after 4 seasons I wouldn’t trust with anything it’s Lena no matter how friendly you are with her. But here we have the head of the DEO telling Supergirl, one of their greatest assets to tell Lena who she is. Sound OOC? Yes this whole scene is.
Kara’s response to it all is, of course, to doubt and blame herself cause Kara as to blame for everything. If there is someone that needs to beat themselves up more it’s Kara. *sigh*
The next scene we see the new boss of CatCo. Surprise! Not really. Another season another boss and owner. I swear CatCo is like Supergirl’s version of the Defense Against the Dark Arts professors. Although we might not be surprised by the new boss James and Kara are. Apparently normal business rules don’t apply to CatCo. You seemingly can buy the company on a whim without informing the board, or share holders or even your employees. You don’t even have to tell the government nor does it take months, potentially years. No, you can just rock up one day take over the Editor in Chiefs office and buying a company and the building. (Heavy eye roll).
Now you might ask what Andrea Rojas’s background is and if she is qualified for the position, the answers is no. She was given a portion of her daddy’s business and made a dodgy deal with Lena. But that doesn’t matter. Who needs qualifications at CatCo?????
What about Andrea Rojas personality you ask? Well she is a strong willed bitchy woman and does what she wants apparently. You know cause female CEOs and bosses can’t possibly be nice and supportive and help their employees by empowering them. They have to scare and bribe people and if they don’t do what you want then ruin their lives.
In the next scene we see a group of school kids at a museum that has things donated by the Supers. Cute yes but you have to wonder, would Superman or the DEO really allow a high tech alien pod with such a histories as Cal’s be donated to a museum and openly put on display. I think not. Also a ride about the phantom zone has got to be something out of a horror film. It is pure torture for everyone there, no time passes, all the worst of Krypton’s criminals were sent their, how is that a fun ride???? “Oh hey lets just say a friendly hello to Zod” (face palm). More to the point the only person who has really experienced the phantom zone in this universe that we know of is Kara and it gave her nightmares. There is no way she would wish that on anyone else.
Moving on, one of the little girls in the group is dodgy and bad things happen. Cut then to Lena and Kara in her office. The topic of CatCo comes up and Lena says that she was going to have lunch and tell Kara. Like Kara is the only person that needs to know that CatCo is being sold. No, the editor in chief, the board (remember them from S1?, yeh the writers don’t) they don’t need to be informed, who cares about them. *sigh* Lena then talks some more, not giving Kara a chance to say anything and then says, again no joke “The only reason I bought the company was you”. Yes you heard that right, you don’t need to clean your ears, Lena says that she only bought the company for Kara. It’s clear that the writers have been reading so many SC comments on twitter that they have lost their minds and memories and believe whatever they write. Forget the fact that in S3 Lena says the opposite about buying the company. Also if you are thinking that this seems like SC trope it’s cause it is.
After Kara and Lena’s “chat” AKA Lena’s monologue we get back to the museum where Supergirl arrives to “save” the day. I say save loosely cause she can’t even punch a dinosaur with full strength apparently. Once again the writers have conveniently forgotten that their main character could in fact throw that dinosaur into space, or burn a hole in it with her laser vision. No Kara just breaths on it a little and then gets knocked over, yes Supergirl girl of steel gets knocked over and Martian Manhunter arrives to help. While Kara, the alien with superspeed lies on the floor J’onn goes to attack it and gets thrown back by a force. Great “fight scenes” from Supergirl once again. (eye roll)
Back to Andrea, CatCo new extraordinary boss. She has a staff meeting where she essentially tells everyone she has taken CatCo over and it’s apart of Obsidian. Yes another creepy tech company taking over a media company cause it makes all the sense in the world and it isn’t dodgy. We haven’t had this trope before. It makes me wonder does National City publicise itself as the place to get away with questionable experiments? First Lord Tech, then L Corp, then Sphere Tech now we get Obsidian.  
Anyway I digress, in this scene Andrea essentially tells everyone that she wants CatCo to become clickbait and a tabloid newspaper/magazine. When questions she explains that reporting the truth (you know like wars and people dying) isn’t as important as profit and getting internet traffic or “consumer reporting” whatever that is…. She even says that Kara Pulitzer Prize winning story reduced the amount of traffic. Now I am no expert in media but if someone wins a prize for something that tends to drive up internet traffic. Even if people disagree with it human being are naturally curious. But then what do I know? Andrea also goes on and changes everyone’s contract to be 3 years only (I am pretty sure you can’t just do that) and invites anyone who doesn’t agree with her to quit.
One massive question that hangs over this scene and the later ones are WHERE IS CAT? If she saw what was happening to her company she would literally do anything she could to stop it. There is no way she would be ok with this. I mean Cat wouldn’t even publish the list of cheaters in S1 yet she is nowhere to be found and apparently is completely fine with the company that she started and bears her name to be passed around from person to person like a hot potato.
After all this stupidity we finally get back to Supergirl being Supergirl, you know fighting or something…… Kara gets called to come and look at a site and finds Brainy, Alex and J’onn, yes J’onn who is no longer a part of the DEO and who shouldn’t be allowed clearance at sites like this. Anywho they find a phantom zone projector and Alex and Kara work out too late that it’s a trap. The villain of the week appears and starts causing trouble. Supergirl gets some overly scripted dialogue which reminds everyone that yes she is still Supergirl and no the writer don’t have total amnesia (they still remember Alura from season 1).
A fight scene ensues where everyone gets blown over by some wind. Supergirl again uses none of her powers and ends up hiding behind some boxes with Brainy and Alex. As appears to be the norm now J’onn goes and fights her herself, meanwhile Kara continues to hide. Eventually Alex tells Kara to grab the projector and sort out the situation. As she does you can see her battling the wind to do what she needs to do. Yes, I did say battling some wind cause Supergirl who can lift an entire building and blow a wind out of her mouth that is probably as strong cannot withstand what is coming from this enemy. Amazing huh? (heavy eye roll).
 After that Oscar worthy scene, we get a lovely heart to heart between the Olsen siblings. Kelly tells James how amazing he is and then says she won’t stand against her new boss but gives him her abstract support. What is abstract support you might ask? I have absolutely no idea. The only thing I can think is she means she will be with them in thought but not in action, which let’s face it is completely useless and doesn’t help anyone. The long and the short of it though is that James quits CatCo and goes to pursue “something else”. And so we say goodbye to James, another original cast member who is male and no longer needed.
In another scene we get to see Kara come face to face with Andrea once again as well as meet the new guy, William Dey. William is a reporter from the Times “in London” who has an ego (cause we don’t have enough on the show already). Kara is told he has re-written her article and cut stuff out and although Kara says that it’s bias not to give all the facts he doesn’t care, he writes the POV that is requested. (Somewhere in the world Snapper is having an aneurysm hearing this.) Kara gets angry and turns to Andrea and says the following:
“I will be reporting what I want and writing it the way I want to. I will fight you every time, on every story to make sure it is told the way it deserves to be told. I will not be tolerated being rewritten by him and I will not allow my voice to be silenced.”
If your confused don’t worry you aren’t alone. This statement makes little sense when you break it down. Here Kara is saying she will do what she wants and refuses to be re-written but if she does what she wants that’s exactly what will happen. In fact it’s already been done.
At this point I have to question if Kara’s actions of defiantly staying at CatCo are helpful (even if it was nice to see Kara put her foot down). Andrea claims that she could ruin Kara’s and others careers so they will never work again if they quit but that hasn’t bothered Kara before. She was ready to quit on James in season 3 and in season 2 she gets fired for going out there and reporting the truth in the only way she could on her blog. Where has Kara’s moral compass gone from season 2? A few years ago she would have written it all on her blog thinking it was more important than her job. Now that she is a Pulitzer prize winner, and probably still has Cat support (yes I didn’t forget about her even if the writers did) the threat of ruining her is less potent. She could bring back danver.com or work full time at the DEO like she was going to before but instead she chooses to stay at CatCo where she is not be able to write what she wants? It makes no sense at all. Also Andrea’s threat about stopping someone from ever working again seems empty when all we know about her is that her father gave her part of his company. If it was Cat I would shudder with her I just laugh.
Now finally we get towards the end and we see Kara at her Pulitzer ceremony. Brainy gives her some nano tech which contains her suit that can be attached discretely onto her glasses. He explains that she needs to be careful because whenever she takes her glasses off her suit will appear. Inconvenient? 100%. Can you imagine Kara getting home and taking her glasses off only for her suit to appear? Then again her suit these days is more like a comfortable and slightly loose onesie that maybe she wants it that way.
The funniest part of it all is that in the very next scene Kara takes her glasses off and despite what Brainy says the suit doesn’t appear (although the next time it does). How does it work? Only the brainy, I mean only the writers…. Uhhhh no one knows.
It’s at this point in the episode we finally get the scene when Kara reveals her identity to Lena. As you would expect from this show and these writers, Kara cries throughout, apologies too much and blames herself. Her pain is hard to watch particularly when you know that it’s not warranted and they just want to make Kara sad. Lena plays the victim card, sheds a tear, yes a tear, and then goes to make a speech about Kara. In it she talks about how Kara stands for the truth (dig the knife in some more Luthor), and that we lie (but not you huh perfect Lena) and that Kara makes mistakes but picks herself up. They hug, cause they need to give SC the content they want and all seems to be ok, right? Wrong. If you know the show at all you will know that it’s all fake from Lena and she will stab Kara in the back as soon as she can.
She does in fact do this later in the episode when Supergirl comes to give her a signal watch (like James had) and says she isn’t going to keep anything from Lena. Lena then goes and tells her AI (her only friend is an AI, that’s not creepy) that Kara “broke her heart” (sounds romantic huh? Bait much) and that she didn’t want Supergirl dead she just wants to cause her pain. Yes apparently wanting to emotionally and possibly physically torture someone is better and more moral than murdering them. Who knew?
The final fight scene for the group comes at the Pulizer event when they all end up in a theatre. Again the amazing fight scene come to the for and we see Guardian, Manhunter, Dreamer, Brainy and Alex all stand in a line and blast the villain with their powers. Before you ask, yes standing in front of the enemy where they can see what you are doing, in a straight line no less and using one of your powers will work, everyone knows it’s the best strategy. Many great battles have been won that way. It is not at all necessary for Supergirl to use her superspeed or flight powers to disable the person, nor should J’onn use his physic abilities to play with their minds. Where is the fun in that?
When that tremendous strategy doesn’t work, they stand around, yes stand around and chat for a few minutes while the villain IDK goes for a coffee break? And then J’onn on behalf of the team once again tries to attack. Alex, yes Alex, the only human with no powers whatsoever, magically finds the phantom projector that was taken as a precaution to the Pulitzer event (there is nothing weird about that) and J’onn gets sucked into a black hole. Supergirl finally realises she can fly and tries to save him. To do that she uses her heat vision on the black hole cause that makes total scientific sense, don’t you dare question it. 
Once the crisis is over, all the superheroes have successfully used none of their powers in any way that’s useful and we can once again applaud the Supergirl team for another incredible fight. 
The episode ends with Nia telling Brainy to kiss her, and J’onn discovering he has a brother. While that storyline could be interesting it feels a tad repetative and you have to wonder if J’onn is going to find a problematic relative every season until the show ends. Who will be next, his daughter? his cousin? Place your bets.
As the Supergirl seasons progress they seem to get worse and worse but this episode has definitely taken the cake. For a premiere it was unexciting and with no real fight scenes and very little Supergirl you have to question who will tune in next week or for the rest of the season. SC may think that this is the best season ever and the writer will bait them with the “kara broke my heart lines” and hugs but they despite what they think are not large enough to keep the ratings up. If they keep going like this then we all better hope this show finishes sooner rather than later. The cast deserves better.
Anyway drop a comment or question below if you have any thoughts.
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What are your headcanons for Izuku and All Might’s father-son, master-student dynamic, and how do Inko and Hisashi fit into that? The other students? I love the world you’ve crafted in Butterfly and am desperate for more of your ideas, as I wait patiently between chapters.
My dude you have come to the right place.
- As mentioned in a previous headcanon post, All Might heard the advice, “be the person you needed when you were their age,” and took it to heart.  He was also a quirkless kid without many friends or family, and what helped him was Nana’s casual praise.  Moments where she pulled him aside and explained to him in-depth how important he was were rare, instead favoring the technique of tossing “you’re a good kid,” and “I’m proud of you,” into everyday conversation.    All Might does that for Izuku for a while, but after their talk at the sports festival he realizes it’s not enough.  Izuku had been misinterpreting his casualness as dismissiveness, and that was not ok.  Now, during their little tea sessions (which are probably once/twice a week), Izuku rambles about his concerns and self doubts, and All Might do everything he can at the time to ease his boy’s worries, then help formulate a plan for how to tackle the problems.  Basically, it’s a much more collaborative effort.
- Eventually, Izuku gets comfortable enough to ask All Might’s advice on stuff not related to heroes or One for All.  It’s probably stomething super basic at first, like running a paper topic for another class by him.  It escalates from there.  Maybe he wants a second opinion on a gift for his mom.  Maybe somebody on a hero forum said something weird about Izuku, who’s not sure how to feel.  Maybe he gets into a disagreement with a classmate, and asks how best to resolve the conflict without jeopardizing a friendship.  
- One day, he confesses that someone, and he won’t say who, told him to kill himself back in middle school.  All Might would give quiet support and advice in the moment, maybe a shoulder to cry on, but as soon as Izuku leaves, he loses his shit.  Some sick punk could have ended his successor’s (his son’s) life before it even truly began.  He uses his crazy All Might money and Naomasa to dig for evidence as the what happened, and finds nothing of the sort.  Instead, he finds clearly biased reports how how much of a “distraction to other students” Izuku was.  In private, he uses his connections to eat Aldera Middle School alive.  In public, he makes a sizable donation to one of the last quirkless’ rights groups in Japan, and politely dares anyone to say anything about it.
- I also mentioned before that All Might kept a lot of old fanart and pulls out some of Izuku’s to tease him in private.  Well one time, Izuku snagged one back,  and All Might thinks he’s crossed a line.  But a week or so latter, Izuku come back with the old art, a crayon drawing of All Might and Izuku in his hero costume flying through the air together from when he was five, and a new one.  The same scene, rendered with Izuku’s current artistic experience.  He’s no master illustrator, but All Might still frames it.
- All Might has a bad habit of spoiling Izuku with stuff.  Free hero merch from some conference?  Give it to Izuku.  Books he’s read over and over?  Izuku might like them.  Cool old clothes that don’t fit anymore but are still in decent condition?  Izuku might grow into them.  The clothes are especially fun to give, because the fanboy extreme himself will probably recognize some fight All Might wore them in back in the day.  His face lights up while asks if it’s really okay to have it, and Toshinori’s heart melts.
- there’s a betting pool in class 1A as to when Izuku’s going to call All Might Dad.  Joke’s on them, because Izuku already did and Naomasa had to buy Gran Torino lunch.
- Todoroki still genuinely believes Izuku is All Might’s son.  After the I-Island mess, he asked Melissa about it, to which she jokingly replied that yes, she and Izuku were cousins.  He took it seriously, and now half the hero course and a couple teachers have considered the possibility.
- Speaking of Todoroki, besides Izuku and Bakugou, he’s the one that All Might dads at the most.  Izuku didn’t tell him about Endeavor, because 1) he doesn’t think it’s his story to tell and 2) letting the cat out of the bag might make things worse.  But he did let on that Todoroki wasn’t super happy at home, so All Might offers his support where he can.
- most of the students trust him with their problems, especially after they moved into the dorms.  Some kids are away from home for the first time, or don’t have the most stable situations in general.  All Might has become sort of the official class 1A life coach.
- Inko gradually softened to All Might, particularly after the cultural festival, believe it or not.  The school put up a recording, and she thought Izuku dancing in the footage was fake at first.  She couldn’t imagine her son doing something so outgoing and outside his comfort zone before going to U.A.  And All Might helped him get there.
- All Might probably told her about the suicide thing in private, believing she already knew.  He was shocked she didn’t.  After the initial shock and crying session, she became one of the greatest assets behind the scenes for the case against Izuku’s old middle school.  The school may have covered their negligence up, but she’s got nearly a decade of screenshots of parents talking shit about her and her son.  
*gonna creep into minor spoiler territory for Butterfly so be warned*
- much like Izuku, Hisashi was a huge hero fan from a young age.  Also like his son, he was told from an early age that his dream wasn’t feasible.  He’s an asthmatic with a fire breath quirk, it was never going to work.  Unlike his son, he  made his peace with it and moved on to a different career, while still being a fan.
- when izuku was diagnoses as quirkless, it was like his world came crashing down too.  Seeing his son, his baby, go though the almost the same thing as him was torture.  Luckily, he knew all the right things to say from experience.
- he’s away at his translator job in America most of the year.  His knowledge of local heroes makes him popular with international hero chasers who need a guide.
- He and Inko are still married, and they videochats all the time, and sends emails and letters to Izuku since he doesn’t want the calls at weird hours due to time zones to mess up his son’s sleep schedule.
- he used to make sporadic trips home throughout the year, but recently has only been able to make it back for New Years.  The last time he visited, Izuku told him he was training for UA’s hero course.  Hisashi took him aside, and explained that once he accepts himself for who he is, he’ll be happier.
- once he heard Izuku not only got into the hero course, but got a quirk too, he was over the moon.  Hisashi is the founder and president of the unofficial American branch of the Deku fan club.  He keeps up with all the UA action and watches all the videos they put out like any good fan, not to mention he’s doubled the amount of emails and letters (fanmail) he sends.  Maybe that’s why it feels like his son responds a lot slower.
- he knows that All Might teaches Izuku at UA, but has no idea the man has chosen his son as his successor.  If he did, he’d never shut up about it.  Heck, he already never shuts up about it.  Like son like father, once he starts rambling, it’s hard to stop.  At least Inko is a good sport about it in their calls.
- he was planning on flying back home and surprising Izuku at some point during the school year, but stuff kept coming up.
These posts are fun to make, please keep sending prompts!  Thanks again!
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