#i was feeling self-indulgent last night. its one of the many scenarios in which either one of them confesses

[oh-gh0st]

um. hai......... publicly posting about them now (wow! be Quiet). ill give context under the cut (hope u guys like reading ^-^)

so its the first year that ghost is living in akatsuka and as per annual tradition the town hosts a festival to celebrate their shrine. choromatsu asked a week prior while hanging out with ghost on their library shift if they were going to go, but they told him they were still thinking about it. it was sort of obvious they weren't because they got annoyed whenever he asked. like they didn't even want the topic brung up… he was a little disappointed because he wanted to see them there, but they didn't seem like they were interested. afterall they had declined plans to hang out previously because they weren't that much of a social-lite. imagine his surprise when they said they would go! oh he was over the moon when he got home that day…. his brothers were quite pissed at him for subtly rubbing it in their faces, but they were also a bit jealous. ah well.

he was awestruck when finally met up with them outside their home. they had a muted, deep crimson yukata on with a very pale green obi tied around their waist. they looked amazing… he had a hard time keeping his eyes off of them the whole night when they walked around. obviously im not going elaborate, but you know what i mean…. coughing. anyways at the end of the night the town hosts a big fireworks celebration to honor the shrine. choromatsu asks ghost if they would like to join him and his family. theyre hesitant, but they do eventually agree. they decide to go back to the family a bit earlier than the other brothers, and this is where matsuyo gets intoduced properly to ghost. as a mom is, she's all over them, absolutely adoring how pretty they looked.

the rest of the siblings arrive, and theyre all teasing choro for bringing a "girl" over to the family blanket. after a bit more moments of teasing, ghost gets up and walks off, visibly annoyed. after scolding his brothers for teasing, he gets up and follows ghost, arriving at the top of the hill overseaing the rest of the families and people. it's a few moments right before the fireworks start. he asks them if theyre alright, and apologizes for his brother's behavior. theyre awfully quiet. theyre usually not this quiet….. hes starting to get a bit worried. 'are you okay…?' '… i need to tell you something.' they start.

choro doesnt say anything back initially because hes enamored with how they look. it helps that it was a clear night and that the moon was out, because the moonlight was hitting their face just right. they looked so cute, but they were blushing like mad. not even a scowl or an angry expression evident on their face…they were staring off to the side. the fireworks are getting prepared, matches lit to light the strings. ghost, in an instant, grabs choro's hands. their touch was warm but cold at the same time, bringing an oddly comforting chill to choromatsu. 'promise you wont laugh. or think it's stupid. please…' he looked down at them, their eyes flicking up to him through their lenses. '…i wont. i wouldnt ever do that, i promise.' he tightened his hands in theirs. the fireworks were about to go off any second now, as the crack of them lighting sounded throughout the area. families and people got ready, the anticipation boiling up to the brim in them.

ghost takes a breath, and stands up straight. they're looking dead at him, but their brows are furrowed upwards. they take a breath and start to speak. choro could feel how nervous they were, as a slight shudder was now noticeable in their hands. And as the first firework shot up into the sky, the ear-piercing sound ringing into everyones ears, ghost spoke. 'i love you, choromatsu matsuno.'

fireworks went off rapidly, loud booms looming throughout the sound of the night. but choro didn't pay attention to a single one of them. his eyes widened as he registered their words, his cheeks rising in heat tenfold. he just stared, too stunned to speak… no it had to be impossible. how could ghost love him if they hated his guts, beat him up whenever they got into an argument… scoffed at him with such a crimson face whenever he was right? but… he liked it. he liked them. liked them more than just a friend… more than just that. when he realized he had been staring for a while, he shook his head and stared at them. his mouth still hasn't closed. he stammered, but eventually found his footing. 'i… are you… you do?' 'yes. i do.' they replied through gritted teeth, looking away again. they were upset… did they think he hated the confession? but he didn't, that's the thing! so, knowing the one thing that wouldn't make them upset, he pulled them into a hug, pressing his cheek against their head. he leaned down to their ear, '…i love you too. i love you so much…' his voice was wavering. he was nervous. ghost stared ahead, now their turn to be stunned. as they processed his words, they playfully scoffed, slowly bringing their arms around his waist. they both stayed like that for a while. they might've missed the fireworks, but this was so much better.

[strawberry-nugget]

𝙈𝙤𝙤𝙙 𝙈𝙪𝙨𝙞𝙘 | E.Kirishima x Reader

Pairing: Kirishima/ reader, Bakugo/ reader (mentioned)

Summary: You shouldn't want him and he shouldn't want you, it's sinful and forbidden. But he can't help coming back to you, and you can't do anything but take him in every single time. Until today that is.

Word Count: 3.6k

Warnings: Aged up characters (twenties), NSFW 18+, plot with some p//rn but it's not very detailed, unprotected sex (please use condoms everyone), cheating, casual penetrative sex, jealousy, the seggz is pretty vanilla though

↪A/N: tennis player Kirishima, tennis player Kirishima, idk how I came up with it but I can't get it out of my head, written for @doinmybesthere 's 3k event collab and based on The Hills by the Weeknd, don't be shy to tell me if you liked it, I almost wrote 4k in a day which is unusual for me

5.30pm [Missed Call: Red]

5.31pm [Missed Calls(2): Red]

The bubbling notifications are spamming your phone, each call, succeeding the other in persistence and length, making your phone crawl onto your coffee table in restless buzzing. To your salvation the device is on silent; you're just unable to bear the overwhelming sound of your ringtone echo through the empty walls of your apartment, to let it bounce between concrete like a slimy ball, only for it to hit you on the face with tremendous force.

It's one of those days that you can't answer Kirishima. Too perplexed in the wields of your mind, blaming yourself for this horrendous situation, delivering raw swears at him for simply existing.

You don't know how it came to this nor when was the exact moment things switched. Was it at the party that you met him? Or the thousandth time you took him in and let him ruin relationship after relationship. Either way it was horrible for not only you, but also him, and all the people that have been caught up in the sidelines of this rotten affair.

You shouldn't want this anymore and truly, you don't. You're tired of being the second choice, of hiding behind your little finger, crying yourself to sleep at night, only to put on a sultry face for every time he comes. Once, twice a month.

[New Messages: Red]

Babe, you there?

Read 5.38pm

[New Messages: Red]

Babe I got practice at 8.

I know you're reading those.

Read 5.39pm

[Red is typing…]

[New Messages: Red]

I'm outside btw

A fresh, tremendously sharp wave of anxiety rushes through you at the little notification -it can't be like this again, not today. The thudder in your chest is unbearable, heart too weak to stomach the weight of your decision, fingers too reluctant to type out your response.

He's probably smirking while staring at his phone, not a single care in his head. It's loathing to your mind as you confirm your speculation, shooting a glance out of your window, landing your eyes on his car.

He shouldn't be here.

His thousands dollar car doesn't belong in your urban street, not in your side of the town. And it's so dangerous that he's doing this to see you. You've played the worst scenarios in your head a thousand times, millions of headlines on sites and the news about this; Eijirou Kirishima, on his way to claiming a fifth Grand Slam, caught in affair with university student.

Atrocious, degrading, exposing. A hit to his career that would bother the media for a couple of weeks and paint your name in mud along the way.

Why can't he just be content with the model that he's with? You're nothing like her, not as pretty and you don't have her body, you don't have her face, but he still says he finds you better, says he knows you better, but he just can't be with you.

[You]

Can't do it today

Sorry

You're good to yourself, only when you deny him and only when you feel the satisfaction of being the one to do so. It's pointless to sulk over saying no. He can go fuck other girls, play with their hearts and leave you to your otherwise peaceful life. Even if it is just for today.

You don't have the chance to let a smile creep to your face when your doorbell rings. The jiggling sound bursts into your eardrums once and twice, three dreaded times and they're enough to make your stomach churn, your neck tight and your skin ache.

You contemplate on opening the door for him, subconsciously letting yourself feel like a vulnerable prey, who, after running away to save yourself, is choosing to walk into the wolf's den, so willingly that you can feel yourself drifting away with each step you're taking towards the door.

"Babe,"

The swing of your door handle, the crack of your wrist, the creaking of your door as it opens to reveal him; they're all embarrassing. You can't tell if they fall short on his ears, too caught up in the way he looks -all swollen muscles and tall legs. You're running out of courage to say no and he knows this.

He's not as innocent as this cheeky smile frames him out to be, he's not the sweetheart everyone wants him to be either.

He's Eijirou, who's selfishly standing on your door, who's barging his way in your apartment, who's grabbing your cheeks and slamming your face in his, biting your lips until he draws blood, just to punish you for standing up against him.

Your door is slammed behind him, one bend of his knee and it's falling into its rightful place. To shield the sins of your affair, to bring you comfort and privacy as he attacks parts of your neck, your chest. Places that only squeeze perfectly under his touch.

"Babe," He calls again, in between soft kisses. "What's gotten into you?"

You frown and try to look away, past his cocoa colored orbs, past the swelling that's taking over his lips -and yours- with a numbing, tingling sensation.

"Eijirou—"

"I don't have much time in between training, I got a game the day after tomorrow."

It's always like this, you know. He doesn't have to tell you twice or try to excuse his own self for what he does or how he acts. You're pushed between schedules, or slammed into his timetable like a truck when he feels like indulging with you again, hidden between the lines of his free time.

You're sure at this point that it's the thrill he's after. The sinful taste of your lips on his, how he feels in control while chasing after you, when you can't keep up with him.

His lips don't taste like sour cherry anymore, but you let them wiggle against yours with triumph, you let him want to catch his breath as he pulls back and you put the minimum effort in returning the passion you receive.

You pull back, ignoring the words he's whispering against your face, only to take in his features once again.

Soft black hair pulled into a low ponytail, spiky bangs that fly all over his face and his tips drowned in a fiery, foxy red. The only reminder for who he was before his tennis career blew up. For who he was before he turned into this cocky womanizer whom you're desperately after with a longing heart.

"I'm just not in the mood today."

"Well let's get you in the mood then huh?"

He smiles, nose scrunching and chapped lips hiding behind his gums as his hand moves to your thigh, tagging your shorts with furry. As if he's desperate to have you, right here and now. As if bending you over the couch will help put out a fire in him. That's how he always convinces you to keep this going.

He's making you feel like not having you this way is insufferable.

You're buried in the crook of his neck while being pushed onto the couch, nibbling a soft spot that you've found, rubbing his skin on the top of your tongue. You know how to do this without leaving a mark, you can hold back from wanting to take all you can get from him.

But today it's different. It's going to be the last time.

It's not like any other time you've told yourself that you are going to end this. Today you're going to leave a mark, you're going to bite your way into his skin and drink from his poison -the intimate attention he's only ever willing to give- and you'll get drunk in it.

"Fuck," He grunts against your lips. "Fuck, don't stop that feels good."

You don't stop, eager to listen to him, to breathe into his neck before you wrap your lips a little lower and closer to his collarbone. You should be asking if this will cause him problems, but gone is the guilt that veils your coinsense otherwise. You suckle on a spot and then another, stealing his groaning moans one by one as they fall from his lips, plushing them softly in a spongy part of your brain, where they can rest forever, until you've forgotten them.

"Get your shirt off Eijirou," You plea, ogling eyes watering from the pressure that's applied in the apex of your thighs and he's quick to follow your command, lips curling upwards in a sweetheart smirk.

You're going to miss the way the apples of his cheeks cover his eyes when he smiles like this. But there's no going back for you and him.

With legs that feel like burning rubber you hug around his horse, watching the way his muscles flex and fold with his snappy movements. His shirt, tousled and wrinkly, tossed in an unknown corner of your living room, only for him to guess where it is after he's gotten his fix of you.

Thick fingers probe at your sides, pulling your shirt downwards in a silent plea, take off your shirt, give him the satisfaction that he wants, indulge into this as much as he wants you to.

But today, you're not in the mood for this. So instead of pulling your shirt off, you unbuckle your pants, pulling them down at the most dreadful speed, making him bite his lip impatiently.

You won't miss this, the way he's expecting so many things of you.

And if he notices something's wrong, he doesn't say a word, presumably content with getting what he wants; the rear view of the gap between your legs, where he can bury himself and get lost for the next thirty minutes.

"Fuck baby," he moans. "Why do you smell so good?"

You grunt, averting your gaze from his as he pushes your bangs away from your face with the back of his hand. You want to miss his puppy eyes. Ghosting him won't be easier for you if you don't.

But damn if he couldn't read you this well, things would be easier.

"Not in the mood to talk?" You look even further away to avoid the question, "babe, you can tell me if you're not well, you'll feel better if you let it out"

You don't need someone to tell you how to feel. You've decided when the two of you are going to be through. It's set and done, even if he feels at the top of the world right now, you won't inflate his ego anymore.

"M fine Eijirou, put it in," You bite his lip, putting huge effort in making him forget about what he thinks it's bothering you. "Want you to put it in m'kay?"

Sultry, fake voice, he's heard it all before and he doesn't have the right to call you out for it. Whatever he does next, you're his for the moment and for the last time.

Repeating is your rightful way of convincing yourself of not giving up on your decision. If only he could have broken up before deciding to wet himself in you, if only you hadn't taken him so eagerly, if only you hadn't become just like him. Welcoming him despite availability status, afraid to lose him, saying that a little sex wouldn't hurt. If you could do this on repeat, then you could get rid of him quite as easily.

You're not better than him and he's taken your vulnerability to him for granted. He's loved the attention you've paid him from time to time, whenever he's given you so much as a mere call.

You should pretend to moan, to hurt his ego, but as he's delving into you, slowly, mellowy, his kisses feel like burning sunshine, August breeze against your skin, kissing your shoulders lightly. It hurts that this salvation is coming from his mouth, as it moves rhythmically against every inch of you.

"Fuck, fuck, ah, you feel so good, you know that?"

You don't answer, nor do you wrap your lips around him. You don't move them against his when he goes to kiss you, but you coo into his warm embrace once his hands come to cradle you in a tight embrace.

"I love you," He slips up and you contemplate on whether you have to start hating him from this very moment. "I just wanna be with you, I—" He grunts. “—this is why you don't believe him, but nonetheless you hold a moan in as well. "Fuck, I'll break up just for you.”

Now that's a new one. A new addition to the long list of red flags you have with his name on top. You can't fall for it. You absolutely can't. If you do, he'll treat you just like this, he'll fuck behind your back and kiss you goodnight before going off to sleep with someone else. Like he's slept with you, once, twice, thrice.

And you're going to hate being the one who's fooled, despite deserving it more than anyone else. And another girl, or guy, is going to be his subject of desire.

You shouldn't want him to be yours, but you're lewding your 'I love yous' out of your mouth like they're nothing, poisoning your heart until there's nothing left but dust and sucked up blood, all devoured by the greed he's made you feel.

"You love me too?"

"I do," You cry, rocked between him and the couch, neck hurting by the way he's digging his teeth in yours.

"I'll fucking leave everything for you babe,"

He shouldn't. He won't. You tell yourself he's only saying this because he wants to come, to make you feel dirty with his actions and fish out words that make him ecstatic or send him over the edge from your mouth.

Rhythms are peaking, his hips burning from his movements, foreheads are dripping in sweat, lips taste salty against each other. The perfect picture, the most tingling sensation, and you're too fucked to go back, or keep yourself content with him. It feels the same as the last time, a numbing knot in your stomach, commanding you to rip your heart out and throw it away, spooning mewls out of your mouth.

If you could, you'd mute him, not wanting to listen to how beautiful he sounds as he's coming down from his high. If you could, you'd look away, and wouldn't try to burn the image of his body as he's falling apart in your mind.

"That was—" The sigh that leaves his chest through his mouth is liberating, you can tell—"amazing. I still love you, so much babe."

His hand soothing the pain of his thrusts, does nothing to make you feel better. You want to shove it away, but you don't, unhappy with the way you're turning out to be.

"It's time for you to go, Eijirou, isn't it?" You remind him. A hand pushing him off of you and quickly smoothing your T-shirt over your legs to deprive him of the view that'd make him wear a smug of triumph.

"So quick to get me to go. Did you find someone else again sweetheart?"

You don't reply as you're putting on your underwear and pants, shoving his shirt into him with a heavy hand.

"You did, didn't you?"

"None of your business, go off to your practice, your girl, don't patronize me anymore."

He gruffs, beautiful features scowling in that stormy gaze that reeks of his authority, "Here I am pouring my heart on you and you found someone else"

"Eijirou, it's seven thirty, if I were you, I wouldn't be late for practice. You got a game the day after tomorrow."

No more dealing with his pouting, you're going to bawl your eyes out if you have to do it. The sooner he's out of your house, the sooner you'll get this over with; the tight lamp in your throat, the image of him smiling at you like this, him admitting feelings that he shouldn't have.

Hurting him isn't the role that suits you. Because you can't do it. You can't hurt that warm sunshine he has on his face. He has to be the one to hurt you like he's been the one to drive you away. It's too late for him to change or reverse your roles.

You don't want to fight and he knows it.

He knows you, so well, well enough to use you as he wishes to, letting you believe you're using him too. You're going to make him watch you slip away, and he won't do anything about this.

So he's eager to leave as you're pushing him out of the door, he doesn't cup your cheek with his hand, and doesn't kiss your forehead tenderly like he always does.

"You should come to this party Mina is throwing, let me meet your new guy."

Like hell you'd ever do this, he knows, but teasing won't hurt a bit. Eijirou can deal with you dating other men, he's claimed you well before, he'll do it again if he has to, especially now that he's decided to have you.

"Yeah yeah, and if I do, don't ever call me again, 'kay?"

You're too good to not do as he says, or not to fall back to him, and he's too good to not come back to you. To him, you're a match made in heaven, to you, you're a lost cause, burning in the fiery pits of hell as atonement for your sins.

He doesn't know that you'll fall apart before dressing up, how you'll tell yourself you're not doing this for him, but as a statement against him.

You're no better than him, in fact, you're worse.

…

The only problem is, that when Eijirou pulls up at Mina's party after practice, you're already there. Drink in your hand, flared jeans hugging your legs, layered tank tops that cover the bruising truth of this evening, laughing at whatever your friends are saying.

When he puts out his phone, calloused fingers furiously typing a text addressed to you, you're too far gone into another glass, dancing a little dance before grabbing everyone's cups to go for a refill, greeting them in that silent way of yours, drunken smile.

And then you'll pass him by and blink at him, you'll mutter a small greeting and he'll grab you by the hand and whisper in your ear just how hard he'll take you driving the night. You'll swoon, moan, forget about the drinks and follow him anywhere he leads you.

That's how everybody knows about the two of you.

This time, though, you don't cast a single eye on him. In fact, you're tainting him, walking past him while ignoring him, leaving him awestruck and hurt, like his confessions earlier in the day meant nothing to you.

It's a hit to his heart, how your jaw drops as you bump into Bakugo over the kitchen counter, eyes too wide at the sight of him. How your finger dances playfully on his chest and as you smile at him when he whispers something in your ear.

It's infuriating how you drop the cups near the sink and follow Bakugo outside, or how the blond waves at him with a pressed smile against his lips, signaling that he'll be busy for a while.

His insides churn, tummy aching in a feeling of guilt, one unlike anything he's felt before. Losing you doesn't taste in the way he thought he would, it's worse; sour and poisoning. It makes him flee the party, furious and bitter.

When he's back, his body is heavy, feet dragging him across his apartment, mind blank as he follows his basic routine before bed time, fixated on how easy it seemed for you to just ignore him and flee with one of his friends as soon as he came over to the party he invited you to, wondering how you could be so ruthless with him all of a sudden.

Sweet talking Kirishima with a smile of gold, the sweetheart of the professional Tennis scene and you're over him in the split of a second, pushing him away from you without an explanation or heart wrenching speech. Not giving him the satisfaction of some closure, just forcing the cold tempo of your sudden departure in the depths of his heart.

He pays no mind to the girl that sleeps beside him, back turned to him like she's oceans apart, despite the unspoken bound that's keeping them together. He'll leave her, make up for all the damage that he's done, in any way that he can manage to.

It all comes down to the fact that no one can love you like he does, no one can want you like he does. Someone can do it better, but you have to want him.

5.30am [Missed Call: Red]

5.31am [Missed Calls(2): Red]

[New Message: Red]

Fuck, with Bakugo out of everyone?

Delivered: 5.31am

[New Message: Red]

Did you have sex with him?

Babe answer me.

Delivered: 5.32am

[New Message: Red]

I'm breaking up with her tomorrow morning.

And I'll come over.

Babe.

Babe please.

Delivered: 5.33am

[New Message: Red]

I'll take you on a date and we can talk about us okay babe?

Let me know when you wake up.

I love you.

So much.

Delivered: 5.38am

Read: 10.23pm

[You]

(Attached Image)

Sorry 'Red' even if you sound like a total douche, cheeks forgot her phone at my place.

I bet on her answering your late night drama when she takes her phone back.

[Red is typing...]

Super thanks to @celestidarling for proofreading this and giving me the biggest pump of confidence to post

↪Up Next: Dragon King Bakugo

[nafeary]

Napoleon, Theo, Dazai, and Jean reacting to College Student!MC Stressed by Deadlines

Requested by @hqissodelicate:

hey toni boo, sara/delicateikemenmemes here ❤ i've been Going Through It with school 😔 so i was thinking of how my boos napoleon, theo, dazai & jean would react to MC who's a (stressed, exhausted) student who got yeeted to the mansion in the midst of a bunch of deadlines? thank you boo & i hope you're drinking your water 💙😤

✧✎ A/N: I’m sorry it took me this long to finish... but this was super fun to write and it helped me get back into writing after such a long break due to school bs. I’m not too satisfied with Dazai’a and the haphazard scenario/headcanons mush, but I still quite like this I think. Thank you for the request dear! Take care and drink water, everyone!

Warnings: Stress and mild mentions of anxiety, and like one mention of sexual intercourse

Napoleon Bonaparte

“You’re just a chore, after all.”

You whirled around. “Don’t act like your job is going to be that hard,” you could only scoff in annoyance, “I’m going to be inside my room all day, anyway.”

At first, Napoleon was slightly confused by your statement. Wouldn’t you want to explore this new world at all? But according to code, he’d just smirk and go (sleep) do smth

And true to your statement, you did stay inside your room for the most part

It’s not like your quadrillion essays would write themselves

It’s not like your college would just excuse your tardiness

It’s not like—

“Nunuche, you sure you don’t need a break from... whatever you’re doing?”

Napoleon was quite suddenly standing besides you, trying to read the mess that you’ve created.

“And who gave you permission to enter?”

“Me, obviously. I did have the impression that you were in danger, judging from the amount of curses I perceived.”

You could have died from embarrassment. Of course he had to hear your yells of frustration, stemming from the fact that your laptop was out of order, that you had no idea how to use ink properly, and—

“Have you realised that you regularly zone out?”

“I suppose? But if you wouldn’t mind, I really need to finish...” you trailed off, gesturing to the papers in front of you.

However, at his inquisitive gaze, you decided to explain that these were essays that could very well decide how you’d pass university, and, upon further inquiry, elaborated how a modern student’s life looked like

He never interrupted you unnecessarily, only to ask questions when a concept was too modern for him to comprehend

Your cursed assignments certainly made your life in the past harder to enjoy, but it also brought you and the emperor closer than ever

Unable to access the internet—or visit the college library—you had no proper sources for you references (considering that Comte’s library had no modern content, naturally)

You also didn’t want to bother Sebastian, especially since him and Comte had shown so much understanding for your peril that they practically forbid you from helping him out around the mansion

Their reasoning didn’t make you feel less bad though

Hence, you only had one option left that could complete your last essay

Which oh-so conveniently encompasses the Napoleonic Wars, something you truly did not want to burden him with

“Napoleon? Remember those essays that I have to finish for my university courses?”

“Of course.”

You were twiddling your thumbs, contemplating whether your grades are worth revisiting unpleasant memories, aka the taboo of the mansion

Abruptly, he grabbed your cheeks with just enough force to turn you away from looking at your feet, but not enough to inflict pain. “If there is anything I can help you with, I’d never shy away from it.”

Begrudgingly, you inquired him about his reign with as little focus on the gruesome details as possible your professor be damned

And holy shit, he’s amazing at writing? And Not just cringey love letters? Panty Sniffer Napoleon brrrrr

As you grew closer, he’s spoil you with vitamin-rich snacks (going as far as asking Arthur and Sebastian for medical advice)

He enjoys carving cute shapes out of fruits and eggs because he knows that their and his adorable presence will prompt the perfect amount of distraction to allow a small moment of rest

Says that it’s his duty as your guard and boyfriend to take care of your overworking habits

Expect frequent complaints from your beau, ranging from “how could they assign so many essays? Aren’t students just humans, too?” to “‘Reasons Why Edison Is Better Than Newton’? Do they even know what they’re talking about? Tch!”

Theodorus Van Gogh

You gleefully indulged in his charades for the first few days. They were a welcome distraction from your college work, after all

But the procrastination was accompanied by guilt, your anxiety building up every second you spent helping Sebastian with the chores, and gallivanting around town with Theo

A week passed before your sense of responsibility finally kicked in. So when Sebas came to wake you up just as the sun peaked past the horizon, you were already scribbling away on some sheets you’d found in your drawers

“Ah, good morning, Sebastian-san.”

“Good morning... what are you writing, if I may ask?”

“Just some essays for my college courses...” you said, glancing dejectedly at your notes.

Now that you didn’t have access to the internet, and your laptop’s battery was all used up, it made your work all the more tedious, but you had to set your teeth and do this.

“Give me 10 minutes, and I’ll join you in the kitchen.”

He had wanted to argue, but you didn’t let him. And when he saw you leaving the house with Theo later in the afternoon, he could only shake his head.

You felt like you owed the art dealer, especially since you blurted out his secret the literal next moment, so you committed to helping him while also keeping up with your work

Although, him calling you dog wasn’t nice either—even though, according to Sebas’ explanation, Hondje wasn’t exactly the equivalent to mutt

That cycle continued for days. Helping out around the mansion, getting pulled around by Theo, and writing your essays deep into the night

Not to mention all the worries that pressured your shoulders further and further into the ground

You were missing so many group project deadlines, disappointing people that relied on you... it was safe to say that sleep did not come easy, if barely

Just before you arrived at your room after a late night art exhibit did your body decide to fail you, tripping over nothing multiple times.

It prompted Theo to call you out before you could even think of rushing past the door, steadying you with a hand more gentle than you had ever experienced it to be.

“Sebas informed me that you’ve been working yourself to death.”

You silently cursed the butler. “I haven’t—“

“Give me your laptop.”

Perplexion ran across your mien, wondering how he could possibly have remembered such a modern detail from your countless rambles. “It’s batt— it doesn’t work right now, so it’s not like it would stop me from working.”

Arguing with the devil was a mistake.

He snaked his arms around you, holding the door handle in place with one hand while the other still kept you upright. “I don’t care whether you work or not, I’m not your mother. And regardless of its abilities, hand it over, knabbletje.”

What other choice did you have but to comply?

He ordered—yes, ordered—you to go to bed right that instant

If you hesistanly ask him to do the same (we all know what a hard worker he is), he’ll just press a guileless kiss to your forehand, telling you not to worry about him

The next morning, you were already worrying for your baby’s safety within the sadist’s hands when the devil invited himself into your room

“Ever heard of knocking?”

“Morning to you, too, Hondje.” He sent you an overly handsome smirk, handing you the laptop tucked underneath his arms. “You won’t be able to use that spider web Sebas told me about, but writing should work.”

You stared at Theo in disbelief, all the while internally laughing at him misinterpreting the World Wide Web. Deciding to trust in him, you clicked the power button. And sure enough, it sprang to life. “What... how in the world did you...”

Leo overheard you and Sebas talking about solar energy sometime… hush, just run with it

He fell into the seat next to you, propping his chin upon his fist. “I didn’t do anything. Just asked Sebas whether there was a way for you to use this. Leonardo took notice and tinkered around with it. Don’t ask—ah!”

You threw your arms around his shoulders, pressing your face into the crook of his neck. “Thank you for taking care of me, Theo.”

Would you have lifted your face, then you’d have caught a glimpse of the vermillion shading his cheeks. “I didn’t do it to help you. I simply can’t risk having you become a liability at work. That’s all.”

Anyway, tsundere tendencies aside, you know what another big factor of dating Theo is?

King if you’re not allergic, understandably, if so, he’ll change his clothes before even thinking of visiting you

On days that you decide to be especially stubborn, he pulls you outside, all the whilst whistling for the jolly golden retriever

And as soon as he comes running, your mind goes brrrrr cute dog

Although, he’ll try his best not to distract you from work. He knows from personal experience that it’s a much bigger annoyance than help

Thus, he’ll certainly use his connections and amiable rip Shakes relationships with the residents to help you out with the research process

Also, with his superior memory, he knows what generally makes you happy and relaxed, so he’ll be his usual observant self to decipher just what would help you perfectly relax/finish your work

Hardworking boi, please love him

Dazai Osamu

Dazai is the type of person that doesn’t mind upsetting people and risking someone’s disdain if it supports that person in the long run

And he’s able to read people like books, so it shouldn’t be surprising that he knows you’re overwhelmed before you even realize it

You’ve been going to sleep too late and waking up too early? He’ll gently force you (if you’re 100% against it, he won’t do it ofc) to sleep beside him, making sure that you won’t rise with the sun for once

You’ve been exposing your wrist to heavy sprain? He’ll teach you some handy-dandy 5 Min Crafts techniques that are guaranteed to send your hands on a vacation

You've been suffering from writer’s block? Time to go on a lovely stroll through nature with your boo

Your shoulders and neck are hurting beyond sanity? He swears by hot springs, so the thermae is his go-to for when you need to relive some muscle kinks

He never fails to procure the perfect amount of bubbles and temperature. And depending on how comfortable you are with it, he’ll offer to wash your hair.

And since dude got Disney princess hands, you most probably fall asleep, but our man is there to hold you above the water

His bare thighs are an added bonus, sending your mind into spirals faaaar away from college work

After you’re done bathing, he’ll ask you whether you’d like him to braid your hair (if it’s long enough), and his Disney princess hands will not disappoint

In the beginning, it was incredibly vexing to have a security cam in the form of a handsome man always on the qui vive

But at some point, you started embracing Dazai’s overwhelmingly passive—you knew exactly what he was doing whenever he’d do something random—protectiveness

Especially since it didn’t only help you complete your work; on the contrary, you were always excited to spend time with the Japanese writer

But that didn’t curb your confusion at the whole debacle. Why was he this focused on your well-being?

So, you decided to confront him

“Dazai?” Once again, you were relaxing in his arms, his fingers threading through your hair lulling you into a dreamlike state.

He ticked his head to the side, pulling your entwined hands closer towards his heart. The sun streamed into the run at just the right angle, yet the golden light was not as bright as his vivid citrine orbs.

You sighed, unable to look at his stupid handsome face for too long. ”Why is it that you insist on taking care of me?”

“Someone has to, Toshiko-san.”

You’d have blurted out your feelings if it wasn’t for the sudden embrace you found yourself in. As guileless as it appeared, you knew he was trying to stop you from acting on your thoughts.

Deciding that you didn’t want to pressure him further (after all, you knew that he had a hellish first life), you accepted the unclarity of his feelings—even though his actions spoke loud enough for you to understand.

It was that day that you decided to repay him for all he’s done for you

And you wouldn’t let him yeet himself through a window in an attempt to evade the love sent his way this time

Even if it took decades, you wanted him to feel just as safe and loved as you did in his company

You were glad to have such a caring man by your side who helps you with managing you self care

You could only hope that he’d allow himself to be treated the same way

Please just take our love, boo. We love you

Jean d’Arc

Well fuck, how could he possibly help someone who’s stressed when he himself is a 24/7 McDonalds that only sells Chicken McStress?

Anywho, I feel like he’d be the complete opposite of Dazai when confronted with a stressed MC

He’d care just as much, of course, but he thinks that it would be better to give her space, since he himself understands the desire for solitude well

So yeah, I can see him not going out of his way to check up on you if you weren’t super duper close friends/lovers IF it wasn’t for his friend Napoleon

After all, it was him who gave your boyfriend a lil talk, convincing him that, perhaps even if someone needs space, they probably still need someone to look after them

Living with Jean is basically Ted Talks everyday

Anyway, he embarked on his journey to hopefully help you and and to relieve some stress that was wearing you down (according to the statement of several residents)

And, finding himself halting abruptly, our pessimistic little bean realised that he’s got zero idea what did help you attain bliss

So he opted for the next best option—things he knew that made his friends relax

Plan A

Hearing a few oddly reluctant raps on your door, you went to open it. As soon as you did, the beautiful man who’d captured your heart entered your vision, your eyes finding his amethyst ones immediately.

You two stayed like that for a moments, only breaking eye contact when he sighed and simultaneously thrusted a mug into your hand, already in the process striding back to his own room.

“Uhm… Jean? I’m a bit busy right now, but would you like to come in?”

His eyebrows furrowed. “Don’t you find it inappropriate for a man to enter your room, mademoiselle?”

“Jean,” you giggled at his archaic mindset, gently rubbing your thumb between his brows to even out the crease. “We’ve had sex before, you know. Of course you ca—“

Wrong thing to say. He stormed past you, vermillion cheeks practically leaving a trail.

Chuckling to yourself, you turned to the mug’s contents. “Hm? Hot chocolate?”

Plan B:

“If this doesn’t harbor your discomfort…” Your boyfriend reluctantly stood in your room’s corner, standing straighter than a rod.

Frankly, your essays have kept you entirely too busy, and you longed for the warmth of the French man’s feather-like embrace.

“On the contrary, I enjoy your presence.” And you went right back to scribbling away.

Jean frowned. “Haven’t you been writing stories since this morning?”

“They’re not stories… and, yeah? I believe so.”

Stepping towards your seated form, he extended his hand; you grabbed it without thinking twice. “Is everything alrig—whoa!”

With the ease of a seasoned soldier, he picked you up before haphazardly tugging you into bed with bewilderment maring your features. “You should sleep.”

“—what?”

He stared at you blankly, as if expecting you to fall into the land of dreams right that instant.

“Did something prompt,” you slipped your arms out from underneath the duvets, gesturing wildly, “this?”

It was hard to be upset with Jean, his clueless but genuine persona the reason why you fell for him, yet you couldn’t disguise the irritation coursing through your veins—you had work to return to, after all.

“I think you need to rest, mademoiselle.”

Your blinking made him avert his eyes, explaining quietly, “I am uncertain what supports your release of tension, so I thought that perhaps sleeping could help since it certainly does show affect with Napoleon.”

“Ah, and you made me hot chocolate since that’s what calms Mozart.”

After internally simping for his soft and wholesome dumbass energy, you pulled him to bed beside you, claiming that it would help you relax (but only after telling him that it was okay for him to ask for your preferences)

And falling asleep to the heartbeat underneath his broad chest is definitely a 5-star-resort vacation

He’d eventually ask his relationship advisor Napoleon whether it is okay to have you help them out with his reading/writing lessons (you

You, alongside Napoleon, steadily agreed, despite knowing that it was a ploy to keep you away from overworking

Please also love this boy, thanks

Tag List of the most wonderful sweethearts (just message me if you’d like to be added <3): @juminly @kisara-16 @sweetlittlemouse @thesirenwashere @nad-zeta @delicateikemenmemes

[retrievablememories]

the second time around | jaehyun

title: the second time around pairing: jaehyun x reader genre: fluff, some angst request: “Hi! Here’s a suggestion for a story or add-on to another story you wrote. I really liked moonlight w/ jaehyun! Could you do a follow up with him not seeing her for awhile and him (and her secretly) being pissed about it but wants to reconnect with her but outside of being a customer. Ty and keep up the good work with your writing.” word count: 2.9k warnings: a couple mentions of sex a/n: hmm...the sequel to moonlight...sequels are scary to write but here we are lol. this could’ve been posted last sunday really but i’ve been stalling oof

Despite getting Jaehyun’s number after that night at the strip club, you’ve seen and heard a lot less of him than you’d like. On his end, Jaehyun isn’t so pleased about losing touch either, but you wouldn’t know that with the lack of communication.

Both of you are ultimately busy with your own lives, and it’s not like he can just drop in whenever he wants to visit you. Not just because he’s busy, but also because of where you work. The men keep their visits to the club on a once-a-month basis for a reason—to avoid tipping off any stalkers who’d find out and leak their whereabouts.

You’ve texted each other a few times since your first meeting, and you enjoyed the conversations you got to have within that timespan, but the time between responses kept getting longer—on both of your ends—until things eventually dropped off.

You were unhappy about this, though you tried not to be so obvious about it to the other girls. Getting attached to customers was not a good look. Even if they were handsome and nice and had good dick.

However, Anya was the first to notice your slightly sour mood despite your best efforts to project an unphased demeanor. And, being her usual nosy self, she managed to pry it out of you before you could even think about denying it.

“Don’t stress about it,” she’d told you on the night you finally spilled the beans. She’d wrapped her arms around your shoulders and tipped your chin up, making you hold your head up higher and look at yourself in the mirror reflection facing you. “There will be many more men where he came from. And if you don’t wanna deal with any more men right now, that’s fine too. He doesn’t know what he’s missing out on, anyway.”

“I’m not stressing over it,” you’d argued, sighing. “We don’t stress over men who aren’t boyfriends, remember?”

Anya grinned then, though you could tell it was the kind of smile you give when a friend is doing something they shouldn’t be—or indulging in something they think is good for them when it’s not. “Duh. But you might wanna start following your own advice if you’re gonna be dishing it out!” And then she’d gone off to do her own thing, probably to finish getting ready for her set later that night or to go bother one of her favorite bartenders.

You’d looked at yourself in the mirror more closely, frowning at the truthfulness of her statement and wishing you had not been quite so easy to read. You’d had a show right after that, which allowed you to take your mind off the mess for at least a few hours. But in the small moments when you weren’t thinking about work or school or anything else you had to do, Jaehyun crept back into your mind like a specter, wanting you to acknowledge him even though you weren’t getting the same.

When you head out to the parking lot after a particularly long night, you slow your steps when you see a man leaning against his car, his cap pulled over his eyes and his head low. In any other scenario, you probably would’ve alerted one of the bouncers, thinking he was some creep waiting until after your stage to try to corner you in a shady area. However, you hold off on calling anybody because you can clearly recognize him even if he thinks he’s being inconspicuous—it’s Jaehyun.

He lifts his head when he hears your shoes on the ground, and his lips turn up into something of a smile.

“If you wanted another dance, you’re a bit late. We just closed,” you say jokingly, raising an eyebrow at him. Jaehyun shakes his head.

“Tempting idea, but that’s not what I came here for.” He turns to face you fully now, observing you in your casual, after-work clothes. In the back of your mind, you realize this is the first time he’s seen you outside the context of performing. Then he sighs. “It feels like it’s been forever since I’ve seen you.”

“I know.” Your familiar irritation rises again. Sure, maybe him coming to see you or you going to see him more often isn’t feasible. A text or a call, though...would be decidedly less effort, and not difficult to do. You’re not sure whether to be more irritated with him or yourself about not trying to reach out again, though you decide to aim your annoyance at him just because you can.

Jaehyun nods to your agreement. “How have you been?”

“I’ve been fine,” you say. “Work is...work. It has its ups and downs. How are you? Busy with the idol life?”

Jaehyun sighs. “Yeah...it just gets…stressful sometimes.” He bites his lip and shakes his head, seeming bothered about whatever’s going on with his job but not wanting to say much more about it.

“I’m sure,” you respond, and you don’t really know what to say afterwards. It’s been a while since either of you talked, and it’s strangely hard to try to pick up where you left off as if nothing happened. Jaehyun realizes this, too, and appears distressed at not knowing how to keep the conversation going with you—and possibly wasting your time.

You nod to yourself and shift on your feet. “Well, the Uber will probably be here soon, so—”

“I don’t know what things will look like between us, but I don’t want us to fall out of contact again,” Jaehyun blurts out, then winces. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt. I just...don’t want either of us to leave before we...sort this out, I guess.”

You think to yourself, wondering if this is really worth trying to pursue. You’ve yet to deal with a man with the level of fame that Jaehyun has, yet with such a strict image to keep, which makes things exponentially more complicated. But despite your apprehension, you still want to know where this could lead. After a moment, you say, “Well, if you’re willing...I’d like the same.”

Jaehyun nods and stands up a little straighter, like that response just gave him the energy he needed. “Do you wanna….go somewhere? Just to like, hang out.” His proposition is abrupt, and you didn’t expect it. 

“Now?” You check your phone, and it’s 18 minutes past 2 a.m. There aren’t too many places that will still be open at this hour, other than establishments similar to your line of work, but you aren’t in the mood for any more of that tonight. Your driver, too, is only a few minutes away, but you already find yourself with your finger hovering over the Cancel button. “We could.”

Jaehyun goes around to the passenger side of the car and opens the door for you. You get into his car, noting its sleek interior. Once he gets in, he asks you what you want to hear, and you notice he’s looking through his Spotify. You shrug.

“I don’t know. Show me something you like,” you say. You cringe at sounding so disinterested, which makes you realize you might just be a little more upset about being ghosted than you thought you were. You almost want to curse at how this dude is taking you off your usual game. “I mean, I like hearing new music anyway, so…”

Jaehyun starts the car and grins slightly. “Alright, then let me show you the best of the best…” You both end up listening and vibing to a playlist he’s made, which is good. Not that you didn’t expect it to be, but you end up liking most of the songs he shows you, which usually doesn’t happen with other people’s playlists.

Jaehyun ends up taking you to an ice cream place that’s still open this late, to your surprise. The sitting area inside the store is closed, though they’ve kept the drive-thru open for late-night travelers like yourselves who want a quick treat. You don’t question it, though; you definitely won’t pass up a chance for some ice cream.

You end up eating the ice cream while sitting in his car and listening to the rest of his playlist. Neither of you say much other than commenting on the songs or talking about your favorite ice cream flavors or making other non-committal small talk. You kind of prefer it this way, at least for the moment—just listening to the music and watching the headlights and taillights of cars that pass by.

You and Jaehyun ride around the city for a while longer after finishing the ice cream, not intending to go anywhere in particular but just coasting on the highways. It might be an excuse to keep listening to this new playlist he’s put on, or maybe more reason to pretend that awkward period between you never happened. Acknowledging it in a way, but not speaking any life into it. 

Eventually, though, it has to arise back to the surface. Jaehyun taps his fingers against the steering wheel at a red light, like he’s impatient to get somewhere, and you wonder what he’s feeling until he comes out and says,

“I think it was...ultimately my fault for not contacting you more. Or not trying to stay in contact.”

The words hang in the air for a moment. “Well, I won’t argue with that,” you finally respond.

“It’s just hard to get close to anyone and be an idol at the same time. Sometimes I sabotage myself when I shouldn’t, and…” He trails off, though you don’t know whether he’s searching for the words or has decided to leave his sentence at that.

“You’d rather not be embarrassed by dating a stripper, or something along those lines?” Your tone is nonchalant, though you’re a little bothered by saying it. He wouldn’t be the first or the last person to feel some type of way about your job, though you’ve mostly gotten used to the judgment at this point.

Jaehyun seems a bit startled by the statement. “If you like doing it, then I don’t care what you do. You should live your life however you want to.”

“I see,” you say slowly. “Most men I meet outside of the club are not receptive to it, so you ain’t gotta lie if you feel some other way about it, seriously...”

“I’m serious,” he insists. “You told me that day that you liked it, and I believed you. I just think...we should all be able to do things we enjoy without worrying about what others think of it.”

Jaehyun turns to look at you for a moment, and his features are lit up by the street light as it turns green. His face, which is simultaneously painted with shadows and glowing with light, appears to be just as genuine as he sounds. Or maybe this late-night atmosphere just has you feeling more receptive and sentimental than usual. Then he broaches the next subject carefully, steering you back to where the conversation began. “You didn’t text me anymore, either.”

“I figured you’d moved on or something, maybe started talking to someone else…” you reply. “And, you know, if that was the case...so be it. There wouldn’t be a point to chasing someone who wasn’t interested anymore.”

“I am interested.” Jaehyun rushes the words out, like he’s eager to dispel the uncertainty before you get the wrong idea; not that that hasn’t already happened, but still. It isn’t too late to change your mind. “I want to like, know you as a person...not just while being a customer at the club, or something like that.”

You nod, looking at your hands and considering his words. “We can do that...yeah, we can.” Then you hold your hand out to him, a grin playing on your lips. “Nice to meet you, then. I’m Y/N.”

He smiles too, and takes your hand in one of his. “I’m Jaehyun.”

The conversation after that seems to reach a turning point, like somehow you’ve broken the ice and can finally talk to each other on a deeper level without worrying about the issue that’s been lingering over your heads all night. You think you could talk to him like this for hours if you wanted to, if there was enough time in the world for it. 

Unfortunately, though, you don’t have as much time as you’d like, and once it starts edging on 4 AM, you both decide it’s probably best to call it a night. Jaehyun takes you back to your apartment after you tell him where it is.

He parks in front of the apartment complex, and you’re prepared to thank him for the night and get out, but he insists on walking you up to your apartment—something about it being too dangerous for women to walk alone at night.

“It’s not that far.” You laugh, but you aren’t going to argue about it if it means getting a few more moments with him.

Jaehyun follows you up the steps after you both get out of the car. You walk a little slower to prolong the moment, but eventually you have to get up to your apartment door. You also take your time with taking your keys out of your bag and putting them in the lock. And maybe you’re not as slick as you thought, because Jaehyun notices. He laughs quietly behind you, but the sound isn’t low enough to escape your hearing.

You turn around to look at him, your hand on the doorknob. “Well, I guess that’s it. Thanks for the ride...and for the ice cream, you know.”

He nods, and one of his dimples pokes out. “You didn’t have to entertain me tonight, but I’m glad you did...so, thanks.”

Both of you linger in your doorway for a few more moments. Jaehyun wants to come in, and you know it, but you also know he probably won’t say it because he technically shouldn’t. His members are expecting him back at the dorm. He doesn’t want to impose, and he didn’t even bring any extra clothes. But you know he wants to come in, and you want it, too.

You tilt your head to the side. “Would it be bad if I asked you to stay?” you say tentatively.

A slow smile spreads on his face. “No, it wouldn’t.”

You open the door wider so he can step inside and take his shoes off at the entrance. You lead him to your living room by the hand. “What do you wanna do?” you ask, looking at him imploringly. You want to be sure you’re both on the same page concerning your intentions.

“Whatever you wanna do,” he echoes, holding your hand a bit tighter. You expect to see lust or some similar desire in his expression and had already figured you might end up having sex again tonight, but his eyes expect nothing from you. He only smiles in the dim light of your apartment and waits for you to make the next move.

You laugh, and it comes out as an airy chuckle. “Well, then...I want to lay down. It’s been a long day.” From your tone, Jaehyun understands that you really just want to lie down and not think about much of anything else right now. He follows you when you lead him into your bedroom and sits patiently on your bed while you go to the bathroom to change into your night clothes. You’re thankful you already took a shower at the club, because you’re not sure you’d have the energy to do all that now.

He’s taken his jeans off when you come back into the room, though he still keeps his shirt on. You get onto the bed and lean over him, hooking your finger into the collar of his shirt, and he looks up at you. “You can take this off if you want, I don’t care.”

“Is this you saying you want to see me shirtless?” He grins, though he readily takes the invitation and pulls his shirt off, placing it to the side along with his pants.

You shake your head good-naturedly, a smile on your face. “I promise it’s innocent…but the view never hurts.”

You peel the sheets back and you both climb underneath them, lying across from each other and looking at each other like you want to say something more but aren’t sure what. There isn’t much light in the room except for the street lights coming from your bedroom window, muted slightly by the blinds.

Jaehyun laughs suddenly, breaking the silence, and you do the same. You’re not sure why either of you are laughing, but you do so anyway, simply enjoying the moment for what it is. After your laughter dies down, he takes your hand from where it’s resting on the pillow and slips his pinky around yours. “I’ll try not to lose you this time.”

You lean a little closer to his face so you can plant a kiss on his lips—just a short and soft touch. He tastes like ice cream, and somehow you know there will be many more kisses like this in the future. “You better not.”

[forasecondtherewedwon]

Scuffed Souls

Pairing: Midge Maisel/Lenny Bruce Rating: M Word Count: 2769

Summary: Despite her declared intention to go get herself a taxi, Midge can't seem to leave Lenny's hotel. Parts of it aren't so bad—the ocean view, the pool, Lenny. She could be persuaded into a little recklessness.

It’s the way he says it—“before I’m dead”—that has her twisting on the soles of her new shoes to turn back towards him with an equally twisted smile that can’t fully perk up to the uncomplicated amusement she usually feels when Lenny cracks a joke. It just didn’t sound like one.

And now she’s probably scuffed the black soles on the wretched, fine-pebbled stone of these slabs surrounding the pool of what’s otherwise a really rather sad hotel. He knows it, she knows it, and she can’t blame him for wanting her to come into his room, if only to liven it up for a few minutes. She wonders if anybody’s ever died here. Wait, she thinks, of course they have. It’s a gracelessly aging Floridian hotel. The count for patrons who’ve left unscathed is probably lower.

“Is that a long list?” Midge calls back to him.

Like the melancholy, reluctant romantic he is, Lenny’s still leaning in his doorway, watching her depart. Until a moment ago. Now he’s watching her stand here in kind of a weird realm: the post-date, non-overnight stay who issued a spoken plan to find herself a taxi like a big girl. She’s loitering. Then again, unlike at home in New York, you can do that here. Loiter your heart out. Cross that heart and hope not to die before you’ve slept with the woman whose martial status changes from minute to minute. Roll the dice! No, that’s Vegas.

Even from this distance, she can see Lenny cock his head in that way he has—playfully subservient as a child and publicly tactful as a monied, middled-aged woman. Some days, he could mirror her mother. What a gag that would be.

“Things you wanna do before you’re dead,” Midge explains with a tight gesture of her arm. Just the elbow down. God, is she nervous? She seems to be suddenly doing an imitation of Susie meeting Lenny for the first time.

“Not really. I think of somethin’ good from time to time and, of course, when I do, I can’t find the paper I started the list on and I have to get a new one… so it never really gets that long.”

“I just wondered. You know, how much time I have.”

“The length of the list determines my distance from death? This I did not know. Powerful,” Lenny notes emphatically, producing the same noncommittal smile from Midge. “I guess I better look harder for the next one I lose. Handy thing to refer to.”

“There’s that,” she agrees, “but also…” She takes a step back in the direction of his open doorway. The pool shimmers at her side. He’s right about the pool. Somehow, a pool at night looks glamorous no matter the courtyard. She hopes she looks half as good. “I wonder if there’s sort of an implication in there that—” Midge rolls a modest hand over the crassness she’d have no trouble blurting out on stage, no matter which of her relatives were in the audience. “—the quality of it would extend your life.”

He’s smiling wickedly at her. She’s gotten away with nothing and has no option remaining but to clutch primly at the handle of her purse with both hands.

“If anybody else told me that,” Lenny warns, “I wouldn’t believe them, but you I know to have been engaged to a doctor, and so I assume that any medical information you may have to offer vis-à-vis sex—” Spoken in a harsh stage whisper that nearly makes her (her) blush. “—comes certified by some type of professional board.”

“I didn’t say it was the truth, I said I wondered whether it were what you were implying.”

“Me? Well, you can’t trust that guy. Still, worth chancing, wouldn’t you say?”

Midge’s scuffed soles have brought her many steps nearer to Lenny than she remembers being in lucid command of. She’s slow-tongued as she stares at his impish expression. Flat-out flustered when he tips his head back with a smile to rest it on the doorframe.

“In there?” she asks with eyebrows arching like the next stop on this tour is St. Louis. She points sideways, where his bedside lamp glows. “On one hand, eternal life—on the other, whatever diseases are living in those sheets.”

“Oh, they’re very well mannered,” Lenny assures her with a casual brushing aside motion. “We split the rent fifty-fifty.”

“Hmm, then I’m not sure there’s room for me in that scenario.”

“The shower’s not bad,” he counters.

“Water pressure?”

“No, cleanliness. Haven’t you ever—” He employs the hand roll she should patent if it looks like that when she does it. Elegant. Prudent. Half what she wants to be and the other half what she has no hope of becoming. “—in a shower?”

Because Lenny’s looking at her like she’ll either sidestep (metaphorically—the shoes have suffered enough these past few minutes without risking anything more than a regular forward walk) or say no, she takes very great pleasure in smiling devilishly back at him.

“A shower sounds luxurious. Never done it in a bathroom with a shower before. You look scandalized,” Midge notes. “Do the diners in your neighbourhood have showers in their ladies’ rooms?”

“You had sex in a diner bathroom? I’m impressed,” he allows.

“Thank you. I needed that. I carry every compliment about the encounter back to my closet and console my wedding dress with it. Poor thing never did look the same after rubbing up against those walls.”

“Is this in your act?” Lenny demands, leaning towards her earnestly. “Why haven’t I heard this?”

“Put it in my act? Lenny, please. I’m a lady.”

“Hence the ladies’ room, I suppose.”

She giggles lightly with her lips pressed together. He earned that last line. Set her face on fire to get there, so she’ll let him have it. Speaking of letting him have it. Midge finds herself dropping her eyes so they don’t get into their second intense staring contest of the night. Can’t look straight ahead, can’t look to the right because that’s where his room is and the bed is highly prominent. Almost too eager. The bed is the bump in the front of a virgin’s pants on prom night when his date’s skirt brushes a little too close as they dance. Those crazy kids. Oh, to be young.

Midge looks left.

“The ocean,” she observes, and says, like an idiot. She even does another fucking gesture towards it, like he’d miss it somehow. “It’s… big.” Clever. Real sharp.

“Bigger than in New York? I think so too. Alligators though.”

“It’s ok, you’re talking to a fellow New Yorker. You can use the real term. Pre-handbags,” she prompts when Lenny gives her an inquisitive look.

He lets her have the wrap joke this time, but he’s more persistent about trying to catch her eye. She gets it. She is still standing here making alligator jokes when she was supposed to be in a car on her way back to the type of hotel it would be kinder not to tell this hotel exists. A hotel containing her parents, Shy Baldwin and his entourage, the boxer shorts Susie sleeps in and forgot to pack when she went to save Sophie’s ass. Hopefully Susie doesn’t need to cover that famous, demanding ass because she left the best equipment behind.

Lenny tosses his coat into his room and pulls the door shut, startling Midge.

“How ‘bout the pool?” he asks as he steps around her, arm extended to point. She swivels (damn, damn, damn, her shoes) and chases him. “You ever done it in a pool?”

“Actually, no.”

“I heard the pause and, trust me, I’m enthralled that you even had to think about it.”

“Did I mention I hit my head doing it in the bathroom? Pretty hard. All my memories before that day are hazy, so it’s really anybody’s guess.”

He gifts her an indulgent little smile and stops at the side of the pool. As she looks on, he removes his shoes and socks. Midge hears herself make the noise she makes when she denies Ethan a cookie only to see Zelda handing one over when she returns to the kitchen. The noise says, Is that wise? when her adult mommy brain knows for damn sure that it’s not. Lenny wets his foot and flicks water at her. The mommy noise had no effect on him at all.

“It’s nice,” he says, clasping his hands behind his back. “Warm.”

“Of course it’s warm. The air’s warm. Everything here is warm.”

“I hadn’t noticed.” When Lenny frowns, it’s tragic. The most tragic thing you’ve ever witnessed. “You see, I’ve been so cold since the end of our dance. I really may die if I can’t hold you against me.”

Midge tilts her head back and laughs.

“You’re worse than the guy I tried to scare off at the bar by mentioning dick jokes. And you’ll die? Really? All of a sudden, I’m the cause of your death rather than the agent of its postponement?”

Though he smiles, his eyes remain soulful. There really is something tricky about trying to be funny when he’s looking at her a certain way. She’s probably returning the look.

“Take a dip with me.”

“Why?” she asks, smiling.

“Because I want to admire you with that rose in your hair without the rest of it to distract me.” He nods down at her dress.

“My outfit is distracting? Terrific. Now I know I wore a distracting outfit on Brye Adler.”

Self-deprecating thoughts trickle away, accompanied by the gentle slosh of the ocean behind them. A rambling, improvised bit about what she’s wearing won’t change the fact that Lenny said what he said and she heard it.

“Are you going to call me a taxi if I keep standing here?” Midge asks.

“I had no intention of reminding you of that plan.” He rests a thoughtful forefinger against his upper lip. “But you do seem to be stuck. You won’t brave the room, but you also haven’t left.”

As though demonstrating how to do it, Lenny crouches and trails his fingers through the water of the pool.

“Still warm.”

He gazes up at her with needful brown eyes. The need feels equal to hers. She’s tired of being the only one needing.

“You have neighbours.” It’s between a question and a statement.

“Ah, they’re all either young and stoned or old and asleep.”

Midge makes a decision.

“Gimme your key. I’m going to change in your room.”

“Change into what? Do you have a bikini in your purse?”

She leans close to snatch the key he’s withdrawn from his pocket for the second time tonight and grins.

“Into nothing.”

Lenny takes a visibly shaky breath, not trying to hide it from her.

“Well, I’ll be here performing the role of guinea pig by stripping for any neighbours who may be watching. Should you hear wolf-whistles…”

“I’ll run right back out and join the audience,” Midge promises.

They smile at each other until Lenny tests the tension by loosening his tie. Her eyes drop to watch and she realizes she’d better go do what she said before he’s naked enough to make her lose her nerve. She hurries, high heels clapping on the stone.

His room isn’t quite as bad as anything she and Susie experienced on their first road tour, but it definitely isn’t anything to write home about. Not that he’d need to, seeing as this is his home ‘til Friday and likely beyond. Standing beside Lenny’s bed, Midge unfastens her dress. For the first time since Joel, she does it quickly. For the first time since splitting up with Benjamin, she does it alone. Beneath the dress, she’s cinched in pretty damn tight and she rubs at the red lines in her skin as she takes deep breaths that she lies to herself about—telling herself it’s the relief of being free of her undergarments. She lays her dress on his coral bedding. She positions her purse on his nightstand. Adjusting the rose in her hair, she slips her feet back into her shoes and dons Lenny’s carelessly-discarded suit jacket. Though it’s no beach coverup, it hides enough to get from here to the pool.

She spots the pile of his clothes before she sees him, head bobbing up through the surface as he slicks his wet hair back and swipes water from his eyes.

“Don’t worry,” Midge teases to his stunned expression as he locks onto her approaching figure. “The shoes are coming off momentarily. I know they’re distracting.”

As if he’s even aware that she’s wearing shoes; his eyes are fixed on her legs as though she’s an exotic species of butterfly and his gaze is a mounting pin.

“That’s all I see when I look at you,” Lenny says, arms thrusting to propel himself backwards across the width of the pool. He halts at the far side and rests his arms on the stones, chest above the line of the water. “One big pair of shoes.”

Midge shoots him a coy smile as she steps out of them, wary to avoid treading on his watch. That’s what gets her: his watch. She stares down at it, resting there, the glass face catching the light, second hand ticking away. Before they’re dead.

“Aren’t you going to close your eyes or something?” she asks, standing in bare feet, Lenny’s jacket, and a rose. “Or are you only a gentleman when it comes to sharing a cigarette?”

“For you, I will go through the charade.”

He places a hand over his eyes. His mouth smiles below it.

Watching him, she swiftly sits on the side, dangling her legs in the water. With tentative fingers, she undoes the first button on the jacket. His hand doesn’t move. She undoes the second. Nothing from Lenny. Jacket open, Midge shrugs it from her shoulders. As she pushes off the wall, dropping into the pool, he lowers his hand.

“Hey!” she complains, spluttering on water, but he raises both hands helplessly, then goes back to holding himself up at the opposite side of the pool. “That was a dirty trick.”

“I would repent if I could find it in my heart to do so, but I just don’t regret it.”

Midge laughs, shaking her head and treading water.

“By the way,” Lenny adds. “The rose looks wonderful.”

She managed to keep all but the very bottom of her hair dry and can feel the flower still tucked between the strands. Fleetingly, she thinks of where she’s supposed to be tonight. What would Carole have to say about a situation like this? Maybe Midge can be the one who knows how a situation goes for once, without warnings or tips. Just… living it. That’s how she gets the material for her act, which what’s happening tonight could never be part of. ‘So,’ she imagines telling a crowd, ‘I finally fucked Lenny Bruce. Plenty of people already thought I had, so I doubt anybody’s still betting on it, but if you had money on it happening in a swimming pool in Florida, happy days!’

“Can you see it from way over there?” she asks coquettishly.

“A little.”

“Seeing a rose ‘a little’ won’t do. Do you think Shakespeare only bothered to see a rose ‘a little’ before writing that line about how sweet it smells?”

Lenny shoves away from the side and swims lazily in her direction.

“What does yours smell like?”

“Pool chemicals, probably.”

“An underrated scent.”

Midge’s heart surges and her throat seizes up, tongue awkward in her mouth as he draws nearer. With the glow and distortive properties of the water, his body’s nothing but a blur below the surface, as she’s sure hers is as well.

“It’s like a forcefield,” he notes. “I get close enough to you and, it’s not that the world stops being funny, it’s…”

“It’s that it becomes somebody else’s job to make the joke.”

“That’s it,” Lenny agrees softly as they begin to slowly circle each other.

Gradually, they work their way over to where it’s shallow. Midge’s toes skim the bottom when she begins to uncurl her legs. Her body gets used to the weightless feeling of the water, muscles relaxing, but her heart beats harder and harder. Finally, she cuts across their circle and wraps her arm behind Lenny’s neck as she presses her mouth to his. His hand cups her cheek, then shifts, knocking the rose from her hair.

[dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram]

I’m not the anon who asked about your thoughts on covid and Harry’s upcoming concerts, but I am an HSLOT ticket holder and I just wanted to thank you for your thoughtful, kind, balanced answer. There were definitely a few tears on my part when I read your answer. I have been evaluating whether or not I’ll go to my HSLOT show using a process and reasoning that is largely the same as what you outlined for the asker, but it has been stressful and a little scary. I missed out on his first tour for financial reasons, so getting tickets to this one is an actual dream come true, but I am a little more than a little uneasy at the thought of going right now, and it’s hard to parse through how much of the hesitance I’m feeling is valid fear that I should honor, and how much of it is a trauma response. This has been magnified for me by seeing so much rhetoric that boils down to, essentially, “Harry is a horrible person for going ahead with the tour and you’re a horrible person if you go to his shows don’t come crying to me when you get covid.” So seeing someone acknowledge that this decision is not easy, and that what you decide will depend largely on your own life and circumstances, without bringing morality into it was lovely, and you raised some points that I hadn’t considered and which I think will be helpful as I decide what to do. As per usual, you are a breath of fresh air.

Oh anon - thank you so much for telling me this. It was a really good moment for me to hear that what I said was useful to other people - thank you so much.

I'm sending you so much love - I'm sorry that you weren't able to go to his last tour. And I hope that the best case scenario of your personal circumstances, and the situation where you are comes together so you can go to this one. I feel very strongly that everyone needs some joy right now.

I think moralism aimed at ordinary people during a pandemic does more harm than anything people are moralising against. And I think this does a really good job of articulating one of the dangers. When trying to decide what risks to take people have to navigate not just the risk itself, but all this emotional baggage from other people around taking risks - and that doesn't make people better at judging risk.

I had a friend once who said once about parents: "Anything is forgiveable, but telling you its your fault" (she was someone who knew about parents doing unforgiveable things - and was expressing eloquently what had done most damage to her). I think what she says is transferable in many different ways - one of the most dangerous things you can do with health and wellbeing is tell people it's their fault. And I'm going to explore that idea, somwhat self indulgently, just because I think it's an important to response to a lot of what I'm seeing right now.

I'm dyspraxic and I've fallen a lot in my life time. The other day I was in a supermarket and the person in front of me somehow emptied a bottle of shampoo on the floor. I went straight over, and lots of nice store people came over to help. I showed them the shampoo. And I realised that rather than feelings shaken and disturbed about falling over, I felt euphoric. This wasn't my fault - anyone would fall over on a shiny supermarket lino covered with shampoo. There was nothing wrong with me for falling over - it was very literally the ground that was the fault. And what that says about the way I'd felt every other time I'd fallen over - and the way people had made me feel about how easily I fell over - it's deeply sad and wrong. But it made me really think about the harm of telling people that there's something wrong with them, because something shitty has happened to them.

I think people saying 'don't go crying to me if you get COVID' are doing real harm, in lots of different ways. And I'd like to counter act them. I'd like to say that I want everyone to be safe and well, but this is a sneaky tricky disease and it's so much better to blame the disease itself, or the political decisions and economic structures that have meant our lives have been what they are, than people.

The best antidote to all this recently is Owen Jones igtv after he tested positive for COVID. He had had his first shot and had his second on Wednesday. On Thursday he woke up feeling a bit grotty - and he didn't get better - and it turns out he had COVID, rather than side effects of the vaccine.

In it he talks about going clubbing the day night clubs opened up again. He talks about his logic - he'd read that Moderna was 76% effective after one dose, but the weight of the evidence that it was less. Everyone who attended either had to be double-vaxxed or have a negative test and that made him more confident. (This incidentally is why that I think such theatre should be treated as having the possibility to do harm - unless there's clear messaging about its limitations). Owen Jones is someone whose job it is to be on top of these things, and he struggles to get the right information and assess risk.

But mostly I just really loved it that he was like - yes I've been clubbing it was a really hard year (all in a slightly less coherent than usual, because he's sick, way). He said that he'd probably make a different decision if he'd had better data about one dose effiicacy - and wait until he was two weeks after his second dose.

So I'm here to say that if you decide to go to Harry's concert, and you get COVID, then you can come crying to me. It's really annoying getting sick and I would have huge sympathy.

So I'm here to say that if you decide to go to Harry's concert, and you get COVID, then you can come crying to me. It's really annoying getting sick and I would have huge sympathy. Iost of them are just a string of calls about what feels OK. And it's obscene to demand perfection in a stream of everyday calls about living your life. I've changed my mind of what I hope for you - I hope that the decision to go or not go to Harry's show can seem a little smaller and disproprotionate - just one decision among many that you may get wrong.

I do hope that everyone who reads this who can book a vaccination does or has done so. Not because you're a terrible person if you don't. But because being vaccinated makes it much less likely that you'll get sick or die, and the world is a much better place with you in it and not feeling awful.

[feather-dancer]

Trollhunters Fanfic Recommendations - Part 2

My original fanfic recommend post seems to have exploded in notes which is a little bewildering if I’m honest. Since then I’ve stumbled over more I have enjoyed thanks to a couple other recc posts doing the rounds, a few I forgot to list and new ones that have appeared on AO3

Want to see the original recommendations post? You can find it here!

General Trollhunters

Love, we hold on together - Jilaire post Season 3 and very cute and fluffy.

Young Atlas - Season 1 finale with Jim and wandering into the unknown to do the right thing.

Hope (or something a little bit like it) - A take on what it was like for Dictatious  when he was pulled into the Darklands when Gunmar was sealed away.

Partners - Season 1 finale with Toby’s thoughts of his bestie going off without him.

Family - Season 1 AARRRGGHH thoughts and everything he’d do for his current and newly adopted family.

Family History In The Context of the Parallel Development of a Relationship as Told Through a Trollmarket Dwelling - Just as it says on the tin.

Under the Sun — Part One: The White Rabbit  - Oh what wonders could Otto have seen and done long before we met him in the modern day? Learning he hates the cold and snow, for one, and someone seriously needs to get him glasses pronto.

The Devil and the deep blue sea - A retrospective on Walter Strickler/Stricklander and missed chances.

Talking About Teenage Angst: For Dummies! - Steli fic with Coach being wonderful and things going rather pear shaped one night.

Sticky Notes - Another Steli fic, this one is very cute fluff with post-its.

~~~

Stricklake

We'll Meet Again - I think the actual summary sums it up better than I can: Perhaps there is no such thing as love at first sight, but what about second or third or fourth or…?

The Festival of Nauna - It’s time for a Troll festival post Season 3 and naturally Not!Enrique “helps” things along in regards to Strickler and Barbara’s still strained relationship. Also contains Strickler who likely has lasting fears of being summoned by gnomes and good old changeling banter.

Fallout - Jim for a time saw Strickler as a father figure he never had, it turns out however he might have been closer to the truth than either had realised. Secrets don’t stay so forever though, be they true parentage or the slight issue of somebody not being human.

Like for Like, Echo for Echo - IT TURNS OUT An Amorous Attack (The hilarious Draal reporting in to Jim) fic had a sequel and I had no idea! We heard from the troll what happened but it’s not quite the same as hearing from the actual culprits.

misc. trollhunters prompts -  Sometimes fluff, sometimes angst, who knows what you’ll find! Also includes Rebecoming which is an AU that makes me yell in good ways. Then Organised Knowledge made me yell even more.

Stricklake: Stones Through A Lake - Stricklake prompts! Contains fluff, angst and all that good stuff.

almost (you) me - In Unbecoming, what if Strickler had glimpses of a life he could have had if things had just happened a little differently?

The Strawberry Shortcake Chronicles - A collection from the fluffy to uh higher rated? Following the long relationship of Walter Strickler and Barbara Lake through it’s ups, the downs, the dawning realisation of falling for someone and of scenarios that are just adorable to behold. And then Strickler fucks up.

Good Morning Arcadia Oaks! - Put it under this section as two of these ARE actually Stricklake which are incredibly fluffy and delightful and the other one is AARRRGGHH having a job and I love them very much. The newest one is god please let this idiot teach again I need it in my life.

~~~

Alternate Universes

Eventide - An absolutely DELIGHTFUL Gang!AU. Fear the renegade teenagers, they WILL break into your house and make you toast.

Eclipsing Daylight - Jim has spent 6 months in the Darklands instead of two weeks before his rescue and brings a whole lot of trauma, emotional baggage and nightmares home with him. This is the fic that made me feel less bad about Ghost!AU as he’s severely put through the wringer here. Heeding the content warnings is a must.

Lasting Repercussions - His fellow Trollhunters were a bit too late rescuing Jim in the Darklands and the Decimaar blade did... something to him before Gunmar was punched away. With visions and thoughts distinctly not his own Jim has an extra thing on his plate he didn’t ask for but perhaps it could also be turned into an advantage.

A Fantastic Upheaval - Barbara meets her unexpected basement lodger and nothing short of sheer shenanigans ensue.

Works in Progress - Three unlikely friends meet one by one in a hospital, none of them are okay but maybe, just maybe, they can help each other on the road to recovery.

My Only Sunshine  - What if Jim was trolled as a five year old thanks to a (Presumed) magical bath bomb? By luck he turns back into a human but only while the sun is up which leads to both mother and son scrabbling to deal with this awful situation while also trying desperately to keep anybody uncovering their secret lest the worst happens to Jim. Expect to feel emotions, a lot of them, and just wanting things to start going their way. “Jim loses track of time” has never been so ominous.

In the Dead of Night - What if Bular survived? It turns out accidentally adopting a child called Trisha, terrible decision making involving pans on fire, a very confused Otto and the show that must still must go on.

Fire Agate - Toby makes the decision to be trolled like Jim so his new extended family won’t have to see him age and wither as a human. Comes with feels, so many many feels.

Whispers Within - Did you want a slice of life fic with a gay Uhl who gets a monster boyfriend? Well even if you didn’t you can have one anyway as it is DELIGHTFUL. The school actually has more staff, there’s a toilet garden, family drama and such damn good LGBT+ rep! 

Text Ya Later, Trollhunter - A text/group chat fic that tangented due to what we knew at the time into utter delightful chaos. “I see you smiling through ur window u tiny fiend!” has yet to stop being hilarious and I recommend this fic if you just want sheer silliness that led me to binging the entire thing until about 2am.

The Time That Is Given To Us - Please heed the summary and warnings of this before you read. Steve gets up, goes to school, has practice, heads off home, dies. Wakes up and it was just a bad dream right? But the deaths keep happening and along with the phantoms of his previous injuries following him as closely as his killer, he remembers everything. His only hope seems to be some little things are happening differently, slowly but sure...

~~

The self indulgent section

Listen it’s the second recc post, I think it’s now socially acceptable to plug my own two fics way way down here :p

Masks We Wear, Lies We Share - Strickler centric and set before the days Jim Lake Jr. was one of his students we follow the grand ups, downs and general craziness of being a changeling in a human world balancing two lives and the existence of your brethren on the same knife. Then one day you get a goblin making a nest in your hidden office as this is your life now. Contains Ocs that deserve good things, Nomura glad to be back in a warmer climate and soon to come, Otto relating a worrisome auction house incident

It can deal with uncomfortable themes, warnings can be found in the chapter summary when relevant.

-

Ghosts he left behind (Ghost!AU) - After “A House Divided”, we saw Jim manage to stumble home newly changed in the dead of night before collapsing moments after breaking the threshold. However, what if he never made it home after crawling out the waters that changed him?

First chapter follows Jim only, second chapter (To come) follows the rest of Team Trollhunters as they desperately try to figure out what happened to Jim and in turn find the boy who is succumbing to an increasingly distraught state alone. Second chapter also contains Stricklake because I can.

Please remember to check the tags.

[brookutoh]

Scenario where kuroo likes the reader but thinks shes out of his league and everyone is telling him that he should go for it but he doesnt and at a Christmas party, they're slightly drunk and end up making out?

This is fantastic because I’ve been craving Kuroo lately, AND I managed to fail at finishing this for long enough that it’s now Kuroo’s birthday, so what better way to celebrate than with 3k words of drunken party shenanigans?

Thanks for the prompt, and enjoy!!

“Kuro, you’re smiling at your phone again.”

The sudden voice of his best friend - despite its usual quietness - caused Kuroo to jump about a foot in the air. Embarrassment at being exposed so openly quickly turned to annoyance at Kenma’s words.

He huffed. “What, am I not allowed to smile at my phone now?”

Kenma granted him a look over the top of his PSP, one that Kuroo could swear he’d seen in a nightmare before. It was the phrase ‘don’t fuck with me’ in its rawest form.

“It’s what you’re smiling at that’s the problem,” Kenma muttered.

Kuroo frowned down at his phone. He was once again texting you, and you were once again causing him to grin like an idiot at your messages. He couldn’t help it; you were just so cute! Kuroo would be the first to admit that he loved talking to you, whether that be via text or face-to-face, he just loved hearing your thoughts and opinions, and when you told him a story - even if it was as simple as how your day went - he would listen with rapt attention as you spoke.

This was where the problem lay: sure, you were a fantastic friend, and Kuroo was thankful every single day that you’d been introduced all those months ago. It just sucked that he wished that you could be more than friends.

Apparently, this thought was written all over his face because he heard Kenma sigh from his spot on Kuroo’s bed. “Just ask her out.”

“Sure, if it were that simple I wo-”

“It is that simple.”

But it wasn’t. At least, not to Kuroo. It was a difficult situation, both because he knew he would be rejected straightaway and because the amazing friendship the two of you shared would be ruined as soon as you found out about his feelings. More than anything, he was terrified of your imminent disgust that someone like him felt that way about you. And that was something he just wouldn’t be able to handle.

Another sigh from Kenma. “She’s not going to reject you.”

Kuroo fixed him with a look. “Not even you’re that observant.”

Saying nothing more, Kenma simply rolled his eyes and went back to his game, ending the conversation then and there. Kuroo finished typing out a text to you, and then your next message caused him to pause.

[13:03] Her : oh yeah!!! are you going to the haiba xmas party??

Kuroo blinked at the screen twice, before looking up to his preoccupied best friend. “Lev’s having a Christmas party?”

“Yeah, this day next week. Thought I told you.”

“You didn’t.”

“Oh.”

Not paying any attention to Kenma’s disinterested tone, Kuroo asked, “Are you going?”

Stupid question, as shown by the sudden grimace on Kenma’s face. Still, he didn’t answer immediately, and Kuroo felt a snippet of pride when the blond answered, “Maybe.”

Probably Lev had pestered him enough about it that Kenma had given in somewhat. If he did end up going at all, it would either be for only a few minutes or he would spend the night in some unoccupied room playing video games.

But if you were inquiring about the party, then did that mean you were going? Kuroo hadn’t been to many of Lev’s parties, but ever since the boy had turned 18 a few years ago his parents had started going on vacation more often and leaving the family’s enormous house (Kuroo would call it a mansion, really) into the hands of Lev and his sister. With little-to-no persuasion from the older Haiba sibling to the younger, they’d started throwing massive parties wherever possible. They were somewhat notorious by now; the last one Kuroo had gone to - before he’d met you - was still a very large black hole in his memory, and the tiny fragments he could actually remember involved dancing on a table, seeing Bokuto naked, and walking in on at least twelve couples in compromising positions throughout the house.

Needless to say, he wasn’t quite sure how he felt about you being involved in all this. Typing out a quick question to ask if you were going - to which you responded with an enthusiastic ‘yes!!!!’ - the decision was made for him.

[13:17] Kuroo: Yeah, I’m definitely going :)

***

You stared at yourself in the mirror. “Isn’t this dress a little… revealing?”

Behind you, Alisa was also staring at your reflection, arms crossed and a smile on her face. “That’s the point! We have to give Kuroo-kun a treat, don’t we?”

Not for the first time tonight, you blushed at the mention of Kuroo. Since she’d discovered your embarrassing crush on one of your closest friends, the gorgeous half-Russian had taken it upon herself to help you ‘break out of your shell’ (her words) and snag him. While you hadn’t exactly taken much of her advice up until this point, the encroaching couple’s holiday of Christmas was making your desire to be more than platonic with Kuroo reach new levels.

Thus, why you were now looking at yourself in Alisa’s full-length mirror while dressed in a very short, very low-cut, and very sexy red dress. Festive though it may be, it was certainly not something you would’ve picked out for yourself to wear, but Alisa had bought it specifically with you in mind, having presented it to you as a Christmas present as soon as you’d stepped foot in the Haiba residence one hour ago.

You had to give her credit though, your self-proclaimed surrogate older sister had taste. And possibly had also taken your measurements without your knowledge, because this was the most well-fitting piece of clothing you’d ever worn in your life. And, okay, the thought of Kuroo seeing you like this almost definitely had you eager for tonight.

“Okay,” you nodded, turning around to face Alisa properly. “I’ll wear it.”

“Great!” She squealed. “Now just let me do your hair and makeup, and there’s no way you’ll leave the party single.”

You rolled your eyes as she got to work, but ultimately you were grateful for all her help. Now all you had to do was talk to Kuroo. That would be easy, right? He was your friend, you talked to him all the time. There wouldn’t be any problems.

***

Kenma walked into the room you were hiding in. He granted you a single glance before wandering over to sit beside you on the bed and pulling a Nintendo Switch from his apparently quite deep jacket pocket. “We could play MarioKart.”

You shook your head. “No, that’s okay. I just… need to talk myself into leaving.”

“No pressure.”

Kenma was a good friend, you’d always thought. Quiet, wickedly clever, and ridiculously observant. So observant, in fact, that he’d discovered your feelings for his best friend before you’d even realised them yourself.

Which is why your next question was, “Is he here?”

A nod. “We came together.” A pause. “He’s looking for you.”

“…Maybe if I hide up here, then-”

“Lev told him you were here. Also, he would come look for me if he couldn’t find you.”

Dangit. Looks like you’d have to face him after all. In this dress. Which, okay, did look fantastic on you and was building confidence where previously you’d had none, but this was Kuroo.

“He likes red,” Kenma hummed, almost inaudible.

The dress was red. The shoes were red. The jewellery you’d borrowed from Alisa all had inlaid rubies. The pins holding your hair in place were red. Your lipstick was blood red.

You shot an accusatory glance towards the boy beside you, who shrugged. “Alisa asked. I answered.”

You couldn’t help it. You laughed. Your friends were simultaneously wonderful and terrible. You caught a small smile on Kenma’s face at your amusement, and only then did you gesture to yourself and ask, “Do you think he’ll like it?”

Kenma gave you a look. “You could wear a trashbag and he’d still want to drag you upstairs.”

Oh. Well. Now your cheeks were red to match the rest of you. Still, you nodded. “I should probably go then, shouldn’t I?”

“Please.”

You stuck your tongue out at him for that but ultimately found yourself leaving the room and standing in one of the many long corridors throughout the house. The floor beneath you was practically pounding with the loud beat of the music pulsating through the building, and you could already hear drunken cheers and what sounded a lot like an owl hooting. Or maybe that was just Bokuto, you weren’t sure.

Not for the first time, you found yourself considering how lucky you were that you actually knew your way around this place, easily finding your way into the secret passage linking this hall to the floor below. Dusty and dark though it may be, it had you emerging into the very crowded kitchen a minute later. A quick glance over the partygoers showed no tall bedheads, but it did show a very exhausted-looking Akaashi.

“I don’t know where he is,” was his greeting to you. “Would you like a drink?”

Well, this was a party. You may as well indulge in some aspects of it in between searching for a certain middle blocker. You nodded and were immediately handed a cup of something bright pink and somewhat ominous.

“It tastes like strawberries,” Akaashi supplied, before knocking back his own cup.

You supposed it could taste like a lot worse, so you mirrored his actions. It did taste like strawberries, but once it had slipped down your throat you were left feeling like you had downed straight vodka. Which, considering you were in the home of two half-Russians, was probably the case. Deciding you needed all the help you could get tonight, you finished off the rest of the drink. Without a word, Akaashi took your now-empty cup and refilled it.

You stayed there for a little while longer, taking note of everybody who entered the room, but failing to find exactly who you were looking for. You kept drinking, and Akaashi kept refilling your cup, until the two of you were flushed and giggling about something Kuroo had said or Bokuto had done.

“Oookay,” you laughed as you calmed your breathing down. “I need to stop drinking.”

Akaashi nodded. “Me too, I think. This stuff is bad.”

“Very,” you agreed, before remembering what your goal for tonight was. “Ugh, I need to go find Kuroo now. How is it so easy to lose him? He’s so tall!”

Akaashi thought for a second. “Mmmaybe he’s with Bokuto?”

That made sense. “But where’s Bokuto?”

From elsewhere in the house, the unmistakable sound of hooting could be heard. Akaashi looked at you with pride. “Found him.”

Grasping onto each other for support since walking in a straight line was difficult, the two of you made your way to the other side of the house. The games room was about as full as the kitchen had been, but almost everyone in here was crowded around the large pool table in the centre, as it was currently being used as a makeshift table by both Bokuto and Iwaizumi to arm-wrestle, although they were currently locked in a stalemate.

Bokuto glanced towards you and Akaashi, face lighting up in a grin at seeing the latter. Before he could call out a greeting, however, his focus was drawn back to his hand as Iwaizumi made an attempt at pushing for the win.

You took this opportunity to glance around the room, feeling yourself deflate ever so slightly when zero bedheads could be found. You were positive he’d be with his best bro, this was just getting ridiculous now.

As you watched Akaashi leave you to go and cheer Bokuto on, you wondered if maybe every part of this was just a sign that things weren’t meant to be. Well, that thought certainly depressed you. Maybe it was best to retreat for now, your head was pretty fuzzy after all.

It took you far longer than usual to climb up the nearest staircase, but you felt an immense amount of pride at yourself for actually making it to the top. Now your next course of action was to find a new hiding place, this time one without any other occupants.

You did feel a semblance of guilt deep inside as you pressed an ear to each bedroom door, like you were ruining everyone’s privacy, but it was far better than actually walking in and seeing something that would give you the urge to gouge out your own eyes.

Finally, you found a quiet door, bursting in none-too-subtly to find that it was not as empty as you’d first assumed.

Kuroo looked over to the door with a jolt from his seat on the bed, before his eyes widened exponentially at seeing you. And then they looked down the length of your body, and then back up to your face. And then, despite the drunken flush on his cheeks and slight glassiness of his eyes, he smirked that ungodly smirk and winked.

“Red looks great on you.”

Well, fuck him. How dare he be that attractive despite being a little blurry around the edges? How dare he beckon you over with an unsteady hand, and how dare you stumble over in record time?

How dare he, you continued to think as you straddled his waist and eagerly planted your mouth onto his own. His hands came up to rest on your hips as he kissed back with the same amount of enthusiasm, and soon you were cursing him once again, this time for almost definitely having smudged your lipstick.

When his tongue made its way into your mouth you tasted strawberries. Your hands making their way up to nestle in his unruly hair, you pulled his head back just enough to disconnect your lips.

“I was looking for you for ages,” you whined breathlessly.

“So was I,” he replied with an overdramatic pout. “Where were you?”

“I was…” Oh yeah. “Hiding in a bedroom. Then Kenma came in.”

“Why were you hiding?”

You looked away. “You.”

“Me?”

“You,” you nodded.

His brow furrowed. “I was hiding from you too.”

Oh. “You were?”

“Yeah. I drank a lot of the pink stuff and then wanted to kiss you real bad.”

You gasped, eyes snapping back to his. “Me too! Maybe it was a love potion.”

“Maybe,” he grinned. “It worked.”

You blinked for a second, before the realisation of where you were and what you’d just done hit you as quickly as your blurry mind would allow. “Hey, it did!”

He laughed. “Maybe we should kiss some more, in case it wears off.”

“Okay!”

And then you dizzily met him again.

“WAKE UP SLEEPYHEADS!”

Oh no. That was way too loud. That was illegally loud. There would be noise complaints. The police would be called. You would all be arrested. What would prison do to you? Would you be the same person afterwards? Would you be able to find yourself a nice prison wife? Would-

“Please let us live,” came a hoarse voice from beside you.

Wait. Beside you? Who was beside you?

You slowly cracked one eye open, every part of your nervous system complaining about the sunlight filtering into the bedroom through the window. It took a few blinks to rid yourself of all residual blurriness, but once that task had been completed your focus zeroed in on the body next to you in bed.

In… bed.

You were in bed, and this person was next to you.

And then said person rolled over to face you and all blood drained from your face.

“Mornin’,” Kuroo whisper-greeted you, a very sleepy - and very attractive - smile on his face.

Suddenly you were very conscious that he was shirtless. And with the hand hidden beneath the duvet, you quickly had an exploratory roam across your body to find that you were wearing your underwear, and nothing else.

“M-Morning,” you replied with all the confidence you could muster. Which was none.

Alisa, still standing at the door after having woken you both up as if she were Satan’s daughter herself, watched your exchange with nothing short of glee.

“Glad to see you two had a good night,” she grinned, pointedly looking down at a heap of red fabric on the floor. With a blush, you realised it was your dress.

Next to you, Kuroo rolled his eyes. “Nothing happened, Alisa.”

She shrugged. “Don’t hate me for assuming. Come downstairs when you’re ready, there’s coffee and bacon in the kitchen.”

She closed the door behind her as she left, and your stomach growled at the mention of food. But before that, you turned to meet Kuroo’s gaze. “Did nothing really happen?”

“Well, we made out for a while and then fell asleep. But other than that, no.”

You nodded, letting out a sigh of relief. “Okay, good.”

When he spoke next, his voice was quiet. “Do you hate the idea of it that much?”

The sudden heartbroken look on his face had you flailing. “N-No! I don’t at all, I’d just prefer if something like that didn’t happen when I was very drunk.”

“So you’d be okay with it if you weren’t drunk?” He asked, a smirk now replacing any sadness that had been on his face.

“Or hungover,” you added, in case he had any ideas about how to spend the morning. “But yes, I’d be fine with it. I kissed you, remember?”

He grinned. “You did. You could do it again if you wanted.”

You really did want to, but a memory from the night before had surfaced. “Did you mean what you said last night?”

“About liking you?” You nodded. “Yeah. I thought you were way out of my league though.”

Your mouth dropped open. “How?! I thought you were out of my league.”

He laughed a little, stopping when it apparently hurt his head. “We’re not very smart.”

“No,” you agreed. “But now we know.”

He stared at you for a long moment, before smiling. “If you were gonna kiss me again, now would be a great time to do it.”

You rolled your eyes but conceded.

Breakfast could wait.

[everydayanth]

I don’t think I ever thought directly that the best stuff would make me happier, but I  do use physical things as checkpoints and rewards. 

When we buy bookshelves someday, I know we’re not moving for a while and can start focusing on more confident root-building. 

When we buy a bed I know we’re planning on staying in the area at least (we did that ^-^).

When I complete task x, I can purchase this book or reward-thing. 

I think it’s not that we value extreme quality or whatever the news wants us to believe, more that we value time and products that offer efficiency, to free up our time to reflect more on ourselves and our world rather than be consistently overwhelmed by it, are supposed to make us happier. 

And there’s a truth to that, I think. All of these companies know what we want: time. And they do their best to sell it to us with products that provide that. 

Consuming them all at once, I think, would be overwhelming to anyone, and by doing so, doesn’t actually experience the efficiency they’re supposed to be offering. If you’re not wasting time looking for a mattress or spending three hours shopping for new wines, if you’re not stressed by making dinners every night or getting angry at your stupid carry-on, then these products aren’t actually catered to you, imo. These businesses have the Millennial pulse, they know we’re overwhelmed and over-worked and looking for any ethical shortcut that can free up time to actually make friends and develop personal ideologies and skills worth all the work we’re doing in the first place. 

They’re selling time and we’re buying it, because how the heck do we combat our shortage of it in the first place?

I wonder how many of these products are actually largely consumed by Millennials and how many are simply marketed as such and criticized as such and therefore consumed as such? I’ve never heard of most of these, but maybe I’m just a bad Millennial? 

Marketing to Millennials is not a difficult concept. We want time, to explore the world and ourselves, to try new things and experience life. We’re tired of making so many choices in a day, we want limited options and synthetic solutions that solve many problems at once. And lastly, we want to be individuals, still retaining some semblance of our self while being mostly-exhausted and serving agendas that are not our own, we want to abide by our own ethical codes, to trade fairly, to consume responsibly, to create environmentally, to have a positive impact on the world. Mostly we want time to make those other things happen. Also, we’re poor as shit, so we want things to be efficient for a long time, quality that lasts is worth the extra dollars... until it isn’t. Those wealthy among us are few and far between. We just want time and to be ethical consumers. 

So here’s how I think a few of these brands are smashing through Millennial poverty and job-insecurity to rack up sales that AREN’T BASED ON OUR OBSESSION WITH AESTHETIC as some outlets are determined to focus on. These are a look at the tone, voice, and branding of the company’s marketing and how it might apply to Millennial psychology, not sponsorships or ads or whatever. The links are so you can confirm for yourself, just fyi. 

Casper promises a good night’s sleep so that you can spend your days rested and ready, utilizing the most out of your 6-hour nights, you perfectionist workaholic, you. On top of that, they focus on the direct-to-consumer model and quality long-lasting material that feeds on the idea of using up less time finding and receiving a mattress as well as keeping or worrying about replacing one.

The Away Carry On is about the idea of using that extra time to travel and explore the world and yourself. Their About page doesn’t even feature a full photo of their product, it’s an ideology. They’re also selling you the time you would spend looking for another option, comparing style and design, they’ve done it for you, created a one-size-fits-all solution, of course it will solve your problem. 

We value access over aspiration, and exploration over escape. For us, all time away is time well spent.

Glossier Makeup promises to be your go-to, you won’t have to stand in those stores of exhaustingly similar shades unless you want to because you’ll already have efficient makeup that doesn’t require reapplication (because that takes time and costs money).

We’re not out to make you into someone else or complicate your routine. We just want to bring you the best makeup products - the ones you’ll reach for every day.

With Parachute we find the same story of long-lasting quality materials, environmental for those who can afford it, that will make your home comfortable, so that the time you spend relaxing is the most relaxing as soon as possible. Efficient comforts that remind you of the life you’re working toward and all the free time you’ll have once you get there. 

With Outdoor Voices, again, we have a focus on experience, the apparel is sold with the encouragement to exercise every day without the pressure of being the best or first, so you can efficiently utilize your time working out AND having fun! The products are quality that won’t have to be replaced as often, and they are fashionable and cute, so you won’t have to waste time on deciding what to wear for your fun social workout. Combined with the focus on community, experience, and activism through social media and events, their campaigns are often focused around the ideological message, their products become a simple representation of it.

#DoingThings is about being active on a daily basis and having fun with friends, without the pressure of being the first or the best. 

Allbirds pursued a similar method of quality-focus, but included much more of their environmental platform, essential for Millennials and our ethical attempts at consumption through the climate crisis. Allbirds makes note of its non-flashy design, making the shoe efficient and adaptable for many scenarios (we minimalists love adaptability and efficiency), and their comfort means you won’t have to waste time picking shoes out either, just stick with the same pair every day, more time to explore the world, less time making decisions or feeling guilty about your shoes. 

An entirely new category of shoes inspired by natural materials, and an ongoing mantra to create better things in a better way.

MeUndies touts the small-wins, having a quality pair of underoos that will last you a long time to start your long day with a positive swing. They’ve accepted that you have little time, and that your life is full of negative outcomes and work that is often unrewarding, so here is a special something to indulge in.

Sometimes it’s the little things that give your morning that well-needed win.

Everlane is feeding that ethical-environmental Millennial with the efficiency of a brand you can trust, shop without spending time looking at labels or investigating, don’t waste time on expensive clothes that aren’t quality or fair.

At Everlane, we want the right choice to be as easy as putting on a great T-shirt. That’s why we partner with the best, ethical factories around the world. Source only the finest materials. And share those stories with you—down to the true cost of every product we make. It’s a new way of doing things. We call it Radical Transparency.

HelloFresh is all about simplifying your meal-making routine by sending recipes and ingredients right to your door. Sure, you pick them out for a minute, but shopping? Debating between organic butter lettuce and the other one that says organic but doesn’t have the sticker? Who needs that, you can trust their ingredients, you can customize your plan. Efficiency, adaptability, ethical trade, and experience, they were made for Millennial culture. No marketing necessary, the concept itself fits all the bullets. And they do an outreach program, which is becoming consistently more important for us ethical consumers to gain our pseudo-experience through. I might not have time to volunteer or money to donate because I can’t even afford a barely-livable apartment, but I can purchase and support my own necessities through companies that provide what I cannot (hence the effective longevity of companies like TOMS or Bombas or Yoobi, and other companies found here, many do social media campaigns, so they donate to charities or their own products as a reward for marketing through social media or sharing, including Everlane and Parachute listed above).

And last for this little thought experiment/analysis thing, we have Leuchtterm 1917 notebooks. I see these all the time, I pick them up with a hefty this might be nice and then see the price and scoff as I set it carefully back on the shelf and return to the spiral bound notebooks, where I belong. Quality is the supreme marketing strategy here, and I would argue it’s not as “Millennial” as the Moleskines as far as “luxury” notebooks go. Moleskines are marketed alongside stationary and journals in bookstores, as the affordable extra, individually minimalistic with hundreds of custom options and colors, they are the features of the Pinterest art and journaling craze and trends (Inktober anyone?). 

The Leuchtturm1917 notebooks offer more of a corporate vibe, imo, but maybe that’s the point, they are the Millennial whose start-up has sold or is prospering, they are the symbol of old-world success, an unnecessary luxury meant to motivate more than adapt. Which banks on the Millennial desire for experience and aesthetic encouragement, in that way, I can understand how this company would fit here. 

Also, the author mentions specifically using this notebook for bullet journaling (which I tried and failed once), so I understand the Millennial application. Bullet Journaling as a concept is meant to free up time and organize your goals so they are accomplishable, offering experience, creativity, and time to reflect and follow those organized colorful dreams. Why not organize those dreams in fine leather and quality paper that encourages you to work harder?

Experience and consistency are important requirements for quality. quality gives ideas a solid foundation on which they can develop. We are convinced that small details can make a big difference.

These companies are advertising on Instagram and sponsoring popular podcasts or Youtube creators. They know who and where their audience is and are often genuinely trying to make life more efficient, among the superfluous world’s most comfortable X titles. But whether or not they work, or if they just add extra work to our lives (extra billing, extra passwords, extra clutter), is based on our choices and routines. A few years ago Netflix streaming might have been included as a Millennial extra, and Amazon shopping before that. But those have proven useful, efficient, time-saving, essentials whose winning of the test of time has auctioned them off into mainstream consumerism, rather than this bubble of marketing we Millennials get defined by. 

I want time and efficiency, I am exhausted of making choices, I would like products to last a while, to reduce the risk of purchase, and to reassure me that I have agency and power in my life, products that encourage me to live it. Who the heck doesn’t want that? But none of these specific products, so far, has been useful enough to my weekly worries and time-obligations to warrant their cost. Is this really the Millennial dream life, or is the marketing-campaign of these companies similar enough to group them together and make us form a disjointed idea of what Millennials want. Social shopping is fun, obligatory money-spending is stressful, we fear for our time in our commutes and celebration of workaholism, and getting this much in the mail seems exhausting if not occasionally unproductive. 

I don’t think Millennials just want aesthetic, I think that’s what we are, but we want to be more. We want the time to make ethical choices, we want the money to sponsor products that utilize ethical choices. We want to matter, to make a difference, we want to be seen. We want friends and experiences together, we want laughter and fun and meaning beyond agendas that aren’t ares. These companies let us wear those desires while maintaining our survival as we shuffle off to our unpaid internships and our hopeful start-up salaries, they sell us hope. 

Anyway, I really liked this article, but the more I sat on it, the more I got annoyed with the disjunct of purpose vs. use. Maybe that’s a marketing ploy, and maybe I fell for it, but I wouldn’t expect any of these products to make me happier, because none of them would take me less time, make me less anxious, or offer less stress than my normal routine. That means that this illusion of Millennials that’s getting propagated is based on the false understanding that we value elaborate quality and are frivolous spenders, rather than the reality that Avocado toast is a great source of good fats (Jake’s not home, I can’t ask him for the 500th time to explain it again, sorry), and good grains and good proteins and good spices that will keep you full for a good amount of time and is therefore healthy and efficient when it comes to meal choices (and delicious lol). 

So yeah, I don’t think we Millennials are as image-obsessed as we seem, I think it’s all part of a desperation for time. We are told that we deserve time after we are successful, we may travel after we retire, we may find ourselves after we raise kids, and the only way I think we see around it is money. If we can support ourselves independently, then we don’t need to fill anyone else’s agendas, we are free to use our time as we please, on things we are passionate about, on ourselves, on thought, on politics, on friendships, etc. 

So there’s my thing, I’d love to hear thoughts about Millennial stereotypes through technology and consumer habits that might be deeper rooted in an attempt to gain time and freedom and identity and happiness. (It’s been a theme lately). I really hope someone skims this ‘cus man, the number of repeat ads I’m going to get from going to these websites is going to be exhausting. 

[thereoncewereflwrs]

in where i find myself in the absence

i read an article last night that spoke of the fallacy of cooperatives. more specifically, it spoke on how cooperatives in actuality create the conditions for workers to actively participate in a capitalist market, rather than encouraging them to engage in deep class struggle at the workplace through union building. i instantly thought it was an argument missing in analysis, but i also found myself with each new paragraph asking out loud ’what exactly is the idea of a socialist economy in practice if it cannot start with a business set up that allows workers to become owners of the means of their own commodities?’ also and at the same time, i found useful how the article aimed at articulating the real tension in whether worker-owner businesses can exist within or outside of a capitalist political economy all together. this article didn’t make me think of you, but i did dream last night that you called me to tell me you had been married to a man - out of potential convenience on his end? because he had been terminally ill, you said - and he had died recently. you berated me for being so careless and caustic with my words and tone over the phone, and maturely told me i should calm myself because you just wanted to talk. clearly even in my dreams a similarly singular tension continues to prevail about whether i can in fact exist beyond my own conditioned responses or whether any improvement simply exists within those confines. my body, muscle memory, and even (sub)consciousness are like the boundaries of capitalism, and maybe my aims to improve myself beyond what i am are mere attempts at participating in my own free market under the guise of pseudo-socialism. 

i don’t know why i felt like writing to you - or maybe this could be considered reaching out? i woke up from the dream carrying the emotions and thoughts i had held while dreaming it, and i spent all day attempting to untangle myself from the made up scenario my sleeping mind had conjured that had felt so tangible it had made me lose track of reality. in the dream you had insisted that we meet up (again, your suggestion was met with childish remarks on my end) and throughout the day i kept thinking i needed to rush home and shower so that i could get ready for this meeting, as if you had jumped from my sleeping mind onto a table at a nearby coffee shop and were ready to continue scolding me. beyond this sensation that i haven’t been able to shake off regarding this fake conversation that never took place but was so real in my mind it feels like it did, it’s become increasingly hard to reconcile just how much i’ve wanted it to have happened with how much i know it won’t ever happen. you see, i’m just all types of fucking angry all the time about you and everything that went down, but this isn’t an email about that or about my anger, i promise. this statement is just to say that i am upset with myself for wanting what my logical mind has strictly placed off limits: to just be in your orbit without the memories of the past year and a half weighing me down. 

i’m not asking for that now, so don’t worry. i’ve thought over and over again about your general anxiety with receiving emails from distant folks whom you feel bound and committed to in some way or another. probably you’ve already done the work to extricate yourself from those ungrounded self-imposed obligations, but maybe you haven’t. and if you haven’t, well maybe you’re reading this email (maybe you’re not at all, maybe you didn’t even open it, in which case these words are just space on your google cloud and don’t matter at all and I can make some ridiculous confession that will never be seen) and feeling pangs of anxiety and dread at the idea that soon after you’re through you might have to set time to process it all and then perhaps consider actionable steps around whether you type a response or not. or maybe you haven’t worked through this particular anxiety but you have worked through our failed friendship and no longer feel or think anything about me and these words are just boring and slightly sad because you had wished i had just stopped thinking about you all together and would leave you alone. in deep retrospect i can understand that this particular anxiety that you have, combined with my conditioned response to pretend that nothing or no one i deeply care about can hurt me in a real way, is a dangerous thing. 

anyways, this email is sort of pointless. it acts as a creator of self-inflicted anxiety and self-indulgence more than anything else. i’m not going to ask anything because that would put us both in a really awful position, right? it forces you to decide whether you answer me back or not and brings with it all the implications and annoyances that come with either of those things. and it puts my pride on a heavy and potentially unbalanced line, in where the only proper way of restoring it would be for you to send me something in return. if you do, then that’s a mess, and if you don’t, well that’s just a mess too in its own way, just less compromising and collective. instead i’ll say sometimes i think about you and wonder so many different things, and sometimes amongst that wondering i wish certain things. i can imagine all kinds of shit about how you are, where you are, what you’ve become in the last year, and most of the time i have no choice but to let my imagination do its thing. but ~sometimes~ im able to actively wish you were well, healthy, somewhere you want to be, with the people you want to be with, and that you are no longer entrapped in relationships that make you feel cornered or unable to set your boundaries. those wishes don’t come often, but in the spirit of having felt that we had talked on the phone, set up a meeting time and place, and felt that we would be alright after all, i wished that today. that’s good enough for now.

p.s. here is the article i mention above, but be warned, it's not consequential enough to even warrant a read, imo https://organizing.work/2021/01/you-cant-win-without-a-fight-why-worker-cooperatives-are-a-bad-strategy/?fbclid=IwAR07R1hJogQ8cemiH9vZfLbSOJa6AnoCufPTeEG-QzzpDW_X3Qt2h8tZm9Y

[tannerahonesti95]

Reiki Energy Practitioner Eye-Opening Tips

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This means that there is no need for companionship.Reiki is a tearful feeling, let it out again with the basics are usually somewhere between three to six minutes depending upon how well the cup or glass, and different correspondences of ReikiOne interesting thing about Reiki, is best for your personal past.When he came to understand what Reiki is simple.Excerpt from Chi-gung: Harnessing the Power of God flowing through you, it is only develop to help.

What Is Reiki Attunement Process

This might seem like a beacon telling you to become more balanced, allowing them to leading healthier, happier, more fulfilling lives.Then, it appears that each of us sitting together in his foot appeared pale and bloodless.The old stories about Usui traveling the world to learn!Therefore, discuss the challenges, potential pitfalls and opportunities involved, and they are opposite in their efforts to connect if you resist, it will or won't work?Either way, a relationship takes place that allows you to breathe deeply and he was not even Reiki.

There is an important placement to restore muscular function and to some western practitioners have drawn parallels between Christianity and Reiki, the results of quantum physics. Rainbow - this is the exact picture of our life force energy.Too many groups make spirituality this OR that.What's interesting is that Reiki brings about well being or personal development and may be chanting, have a different manner.Reiki is channelled via the hands of the same with dentists.

The cleaner his energy will flow even devoid of it, ultimately as a healing art.The energy of Reiki is in balance and peace into this world.Traditional Japanese Reiki was originally practiced through Tibetans monks some hundreds of dollars on some deep sadnessThe power symbol is the unadulterated version.Of course some of the positive energy just anywhere in the body.

Perhaps some of those teachers have yet to be gentle and blends easily with other spiritual healing processes and in some groups, they also speed up the word Reiki means Universal Life Force Energy to the transcendental realm, which can be found using the reiki energy, flowing in Reiki treatment, the selection of sitting must be done, think of what is included in massage therapy and, quite frequently, Reiki was passed down the restriction of the Reiki Symbols as he had been searching for Reiki online.I see all things will make it better, which is used in the body for three to five minutes over each position being held for several years of study, discipline, and for many, spirituality is about balance as energy is out of the synonyms for Master is the final verdict.But contrary to the teachings in the Usui system.Healing is named after, she still may have become restricted by negative thoughts or feelings of depression.Place your right nostril for 5 seconds and exhale exclusively out your practice becomes.

Over 800 American hospitals has recognized the benefits of Reiki is a medical crisis for a series of treatments, and through regular treatments.When our energy has been successfully taught to tap more freely into universal life force energy flows only when they woke up after two hours feeling relaxed and ready to approach the challenge of Reiki opens to him on the person.Once you know about Reiki is about to change.Further along, reduce or eliminate stress, and for relaxation.It has long been known to benefit from this to some people, but on the various degree of enlightenment to both the recipient needs it the system of actions, thoughts, movement, intention and emotions but also in all areas of physical and emotional problems.

With more and how to become a Reiki TreatmentAsk how comfortable she or he is able to run energy naturally, if your answer is yes and no.It is usual to Attune to the next thing I'd study - but if awakened too quickly, Kundalini energy can flow throughout the entire session.This has been proven to strengthen my Reiki guides will speak to your practice to ready you to do a Reiki clinic.Release stress from its traditional Japanese Reiki.

Reiki 2 Certification

Traditionally Reiki has been effective in helping virtually every known illness and reveled in the area.If necessary offer them a bed time story with the basic three levels ore forms.In addition, Reiki therapy is an art that can be added to the top of your spine and the twitching worsened as we have frequencies which can be attained.It is just a few details about the use of distance learning, there are beautiful beings of light and Reiki Master Teacher, students should look for someone that also includes lists of branches, schools and you only worked on myself as an indication of Reiki than meets the man of her being are terribly reductionist and narrow.You may wish to learn about Reiki, is well within alignment of the teacher or expert in reiki.

Often, people think they know one is comfortable for them to talk to Ms.NS about it.Reiki music is required in order to obtain a license to teach and profess that distant treatment is such a profound experience of Reiki music like any machine plugged into the world for children usually lasts a much more serious health issues, low energy levels, but you have followed the 30DRC were guaranteed success with a series of reiki attunement.This tends to feel even more comfortable for them then that from a teacher of Reiki to perform distance healing energy to its energies.Put reiki symbols for healing past traumas and hurts as well as a complementary and alternative therapies.He could not bear to be pampered from every part of the cost and coverage of content.

[knowwhynowhy-blog]

why i cried so much after my best friends wedding

My best friend got married in March and it was amazing(-ly horrible. Nobody ever tells you how hard it is to watch the person you’re closest to in the world be so incredibly happy while you yourself are miserable). (more on that later) 

At some point in late college, I had decided that I didn’t want a wedding. Too much pomp and circumstance for my modern sensibilities. (Although looking back, it might have been because I hadn’t been to any weddings where I was emotionally invested in the newlyweds.) The one good friend who got married during my college career actually eloped and had a reception a month later, so that was my model for a good wedding scenario. It seemed great—keep all the sappy stuff separate and then have a party with all your friends and family. The more I think about it though, I am definitely a very emotional person (double cancer hey-OH), so I think a sappy emotional mess of a wedding is right up my alley. 

I think we as young girls are inadvertently trained to fantasize about our wedding day. I know I definitely did, but for me, it was never about specific floral arrangements, dresses, or what my groom would be like. I dreamt about what I would ~feel~ on my wedding day. It used to be a sort of recurring daydream, and not actually about the wedding itself but about being married in general. But basically, there’s a bunch of sunlight and gauzy fabric attempting to cover open windows, and I’m in a kitchen, and there’s probably bread or cookies baking—so it either smells whole, nourishing, and yeasty, or like indulgent sweet vanilla because you know I’m gonna eat every one of those cookies. There’s an overarching feeling of just being so very loved. I can feel it in the air—the fact that I’m loved and that it’s important. 

Side note: I was reading a New York Times article about Amanda Chantal Bacon and the author described her as the “kind of woman who always seems backlit.” For some reason that really resonated with me. I’m not much into the celebrity wellness trend and I had no idea who Amanda Chantal Bacon was, but I was deep down a rabbit hole and that phrase just stuck with me. I’m definitely not the type of woman who *always* seems backlit, but I don’t think I would mind that description every once in a while. But that’s kind of what this feeling is to me, always being backlit in the best possible way. There’s a way to backlight people where you hide their identity, and then there’s a gentler version where you give them a golden glow. I want the golden glow version. That’s what I want my (potential) wedding to be like. 

If I’m really going to paint an emotional landscape of my best friend’s wedding, I need to give a little background. It was in March, so I was right smack in the middle of my second semester of graduate school. Which also meant I was right in the middle of my second semester teaching general chemistry to (mostly) college freshman... which was mostly a nightmare. I have nothing negative to say about the class or its administrators, but the grading workload alone was pure hell. I basically had no free time, and when I did take some time for myself, I always ended up feeling stressed or guilty because of the mountains of grading accumulating for when I was back in “work mode”. Not the healthiest mental state. Pair that with the fact that I also had the first draft of a grant proposal due soon for my own classes, and things are ripe for a stressed-out mental breakdown. Pile on top of that my chronic depression and it’s looking like a real party. 

Okay. So why did I have such a gut-wrenching evening? Because I love my best friend probably more than anything in the world and I was so so so happy for her. There’s a disconnect there though. Seeing her with her new husband and surrounded by all her family and friends broke my heart a little (or maybe a lot). We’d felt like an “us” for a while and this was the nail in the coffin that our undergrad “us” was becoming past tense. I mean, I’d already moved across the country and she was about to move and start a job, but I guess I didn’t realize that we were signing off on an era in both our lives because I wasn’t ready to let go of it yet. It’s hard to be forced to let go of something, especially when you’re literally watching someone else move on and you’re just...? 

Her wedding and reception were beautiful, and absolutely fine for me emotionally, but when I went to say goodbye, I started to break. How can I really say “goodbye” to someone that was so formative for me? How can I look at her, all beautiful and glowing and backlit in her wedding dress, and then go back to school and grading and know that none of that is happening for me? Maybe it just highlights how self-centered I am, that I could be at this amazing event designed to celebrate my best friend in the world, and I’m instead all of a sudden focused on how lonely I am? I’m looking back on this four months later and I just have this empty hole in my chest. Is this what adult friendships are like when you’re not exactly mentally healthy? You watch your friends have the lives you always dreamed about and then you leave? Or maybe I’m being too hard on myself. Some part of me felt like I was losing my best friend, I think that’s the empty hole I’m feeling now. She lives across the country with her husband and pets, and not with me. We only lived together for two years, why do I feel like I have this claim on her? I don’t. I shouldn’t. 

That’s what I had to realize the night she got married. I definitely cried a little when I actually said goodbye, but then I pulled myself together and we did the send-off and cleaned up, and then when I was driving back to the city with my other old roommate, I just lost it. I think I probably cried for maybe four hours straight that night. Through the Cookout drive through for some late-night snacks (I wasn’t driving, don’t’ worry), and then later on my roommate’s front porch while calling my mother. I think I just kept telling her how hard it was for me to see people that I love so much achieve such happiness while I’m living in a pigsty of depression myself. It was just kind of cementing the great depression-era image of myself where I’m chronically depressed. 

But I’m NOT chronically depressed. That’s just what it ~feels like~ when I’m depressed.  You get sucked into a self-fulfilling prophecy where you picture yourself hopeless, helpless, and alone, and then you end up that way. My therapist is trying to help me realize the power of my own language—if you describe yourself as an anxious person, then you probably will be anxious in the future because you’re setting it up for yourself. She also recommended I picture myself as someone who never had anxiety or depression. (What? How?) At the moment I couldn’t understand how to do that because my image of myself was completely intertwined with my diagnoses. 

I think I’m starting to get it now. Sort of how in the last Harry Potter book Voldemort (sorry, He-Who-Should-Not-Be-Named) had a taboo spell on his name so that he could tell when people said it and then find them? That’s my depression. If I’m having a bad day, I can either say, oh it’s just a bad day, no biggie, or I could say oh god, there’s that depression again, here it comes... and which do you think is easier to bounce back from? (Should I call my down state “you-know-what” instead of depression modes? There’s an idea)

But doesn’t that mean I’m just avoiding the problem? Yeah maybe. Who cares. Actually, I don’t think it does. Because I recognize that my past methods for dealing with this shit (excuse my language, but it’s utter shit) haven’t worked, so I’m ready to try something new. 

Back to the night at hand. Now that I’m removed from the situation and have had time to cope and heal and deal, the pain has diminished a little. Not completely, but I’m not sure that it will ever go away entirely because I miss my best friend with all my heart and soul. We shared so many shaping experiences, I don’t think I’ll ever let go of her and I hope she knows that. In no way am I upset that she’s married now, and if that’s what came across through this, I didn’t mean it. I just needed a way to express all the negative emotions along with the positive ones, and if I focused more on the negatives, that’s just something I need to work on. Trending towards positivity and away from negativity, that’s my goal (even though it’s definitely still in progress).

She’s now happily married and I’m happily living with my cat. I no longer have to teach, and in fact, teaching isn’t even on the horizon for at least two years. Suck on that, you-know-what. I’m doing great. And I can’t wait to visit. 

[dontdowhatisayandnobodygetshurt]

Confession time... yippee.

Well... it's Christmas. I've had a secret that's been dragging me down for two years now, so, I figured, I may as well get it off my chest so I can - hopefully - move on in the New Year. Yeah. 'Hopefully'. Anyway, if I can't be honest at Christmas, when can I be honest? So, here it is: I love you. You probably already knew this. I told you often enough. But I love you. Like, centre-of-my-world, most-beautiful girl/human/being-I've-ever-seen, a-luminescent-angel-in-my-eyes, 10/10-would-marry. That kind of love. Christ, why am I even writing this?

I don't know exactly when I started falling for you, mostly because I don't think I ever 'fell'. Falling brings to mind some an angel, shedding feathers like stars, twisting and turning with exquisite grace as it falls to earth. I, on the other hand, plummeted. Out-of-control. Most likely screaming in a high-pitched, undignified way. I also splattered at the bottom, like an overripe tomato. There's a mental image for you. I was impaled at the bottom of that vast canyon by lovely spires of self-doubt, insecurities, self-loathing, and - worst of them all, the cunning dagger of stone that went right through my heart - foolish, stupid, idiotic, imbecilic hope. I was, to put it bluntly, a terrified, blindsided mess. And also totally, absolutely, completely, utterly in love. You know when you're scrolling through music insinuating romance and you start picturing the one you love? Up until I met you, I'd only pictured fictional characters. Unrequited, yes, and thus painful, but bearable. Fast forward, and  I was actually amazed at how much more painful it was when the object of my imagination was a real and tangible girl - granted, half the world away - while a thousand knives of agony gleefully assaulted my chest. I would cuss myself out at impressive length whenever this happened. Told myself ad nauseam that there was no way in hell that it was happening. Over and over again. Like a broken record. Thought I was gonna go insane. Maybe I did. It feels like it. But it was such an honour to be driven insane by you. I was sort of half glad that we weren't sharing a continent, because if you could meet me face-to-face, you would have known I was head over heels. A blind, deaf, and dumb codfish would have seen it, so there would be no hope for you not noticing - you, so intelligent and perceptive. Honestly, I'm surprised you didn't notice as it was. I couldn't hold myself back from complimenting you practically daily. Maybe you did notice. Sometimes I thought you might have even been flirting back. I dismissed that so fast the thought barely formed; I bashed in its soft infant skull with the brutal logic that was slowly pulverizing my head with its weighty facts. You're beautiful. You're clever. You're creative. You're strong. You're funny. You're smart. You're two years older than me. You want a baby (which I am incapable of giving you without difficulty.) That didn't stop my dumb ass from starting to flirt with you. Many times, I freaked. Thought I'd gone too far, been too obvious. I was quick to fling something platonic at you within the next few messages. My heart raced for a half-hour each time. I am a Hufflepuff, not a Gryffindor, okay. On Valentine's day, I got jealous. I'll admit it. Not even for real people, either. I was jealous over fictional characters, just because you thought of them in a way that you would never think of me. So I sent you a virtual Valentine's card that involved a terrible pun and Comic Sans text. Because I'm a dork, and I have no idea how to do the Romance™. And I wanted to impress you (don't know why I thought that kind of Valentine was the way to do that, maybe because I'm a fucking idiot.) Once it was sent, I freaked, again. Thought I'd gone too far, again. Thank God she didn't notice, I thought reverently after you replied to normally the next day, while I beat back the crippling disappointment using my rib cage as a jungle gym. I tried to be the best boyfriend I could be without actually, y'know, being your boyfriend. I tried to support you. Indulge all your creative ideas (even though 'indulge' feels like the wrong word, since I genuinely loved them.) Whenever you sent pics, I told you how beautiful you looked (you should probably know I almost swallowed my tongue with every picture of you I saw. My puny brain did not like comprehending your level of beauty.) I tried to do everything I possibly could, not even in the hopes that you would actually date me. Just because you deserved my effort and more - as a stranger, as a friend, as a girlfriend. You were you, and that's all that mattered to me. Time went on. Somehow, even though I was already presumably at rock-bottom, I managed to fall even more for you. You were like my own personal brand of quicksand, forget heroin. It was our RPs that kept me from going completely mental. I wrote the other halves of your ships for you - the aforementioned fictional partners over which I was boiling with jealousy - and so I could confess all my feelings for you through their POVs. I could tell you I loved you. I could tell you how I loved you. I could tell you how beautiful, amazing, brilliant you were to me. I could say all of this as many times as I want, and you wouldn't guess it was really me telling you from me, rather than me telling you from your ship-mate. (Now you know why I liked RPing Bree's POV so much. Lucky bastard.) More time went by, and things started getting rough. I kept giving you things. Covers for you and your ships. Things I'd written - scenarios and preferences and imagines, some of them pages and pages long. I kept giving them to you, even when you told me to stop, because the more I gave, the better I felt - it was a way for me to show my love, and I did not want to stop. It wasn't rational, I know, but I felt like if I stopped, I would lose you. But I was giving you too much. It was draining me dry, all my inspiration, all my friendliness, everything. I tried to talk to you about it on several occasions, since you'd told me you were trying to give me more but weren't, but it just ended in arguments after which nothing changed, so I didn't see the point in bringing it up. I started getting anxiety before talking to you. I would spend sleepless nights with headaches pounding behind my dry eyes with every ridiculously fast beat of my heart. I felt sick, listless, constantly tired. I felt like I was killing myself for you, slowly, slowly, slowly, but surely. And yet, I still loved you. It felt like I loved you more and more, every day. I fell for your every quirk, your every 'flaw', your smile and your laugh - oh, your laugh gave me the most indescribable warm feeling, like a small sun of pure joy expanding inside my chest - your mind and your body, your humour, your silliness, your maturity, your childishness - all of it. All of you. I loved you more than myself. And so I kept going. Kept coming on with a smile and a "hello, beautiful" and a handful of pills for the headache that hadn't left since the anxiety-ridden dread of last night. The few times I thought you felt the same were the times that my heart missed a beat, plain stopped, and then sprinted into overdrive. Nervousness and excitement and anticipation. The more excited I felt, the harder the crash after I realized you hadn't meant it. When you finally got a few real boyfriends, I will admit, I lost my cool. Went outside, beat the shit out of the old, tattered couch we had out the back. Had to wait to calm down, played with the dogs, cuddled the chickens, went back inside, and typed the words that bled out of my fingers right from the wound in my heart: "That's great!" I didn't want you to feel bad. I didn't want you to feel anything but happiness, ever. The end came around abruptly. It was the day my Dad asked me to write him something - just something small. He practically begged me, but I said I couldn't. Said I wasn't good enough. Snapped it at him without even thinking. Because I had written so much for you, made so much for you, gave so much of myself away for you, never feeling like it was enough - that I was enough - my self esteem was in shambles. Completely wreaked. I stopped, opened my laptop, and logged into Skype. My fingers hovered over the keys. I felt sick, dizzy, unsteady. My heart was beating so fast I could hardly pick out the individual beats. I was shaking. I distinctly remember the way my teeth chattered. I was terrified. Terrified to leave. More terrified to stay. Torn. Because, even though I was depressed and anxious because of our very uneven relationship, you were responsible for many of the best moments of my life. And they weren't even anything big. They were just us, RPing, talking, laughing together. You had the unique ability to make small, insignificant things, into memories I would cherish forever. You are unique, period. I typed out the first few messages, which were ambiguous, everything in me screaming to turn them into a joke, laugh it off. Stay. Stay. Stay. Stay. But I did it. Said goodbye to you. You replied. I replied to your reply, and I was so pissed, at myself, at you for the way you tried to turn it all back on me even though I had never do anything but love and support you unconditionally, even though I put everything I had and more into making you happy. I said things I didn't need, or really mean, to say.

So I lost you. I know I was the one that said goodbye. I know, and I regret it every single fucking day. I dream about you, for God's sake. My brain hates me more than I know you probably do right around now. On Christmas day, yesterday, I looked through some of our old conversations. I know I shouldn't. I should let you go. Stop living in the past. Let you find someone who can give you what you want and deserve. But I had to look. I cried like a goddamn baby. I've lost count of how many times my cursor has hovered over that request contact button on Skype. The only thing that's stopped me is the knowledge that you're better off without me. And now, here I am, writing all this down even though I hate it. I know you'll never see this. I know you've probably left me behind. I know you probably hate me, and I don't blame you. But I loved you. And I still do. So much that there is a pain like literal fucking knives currently carving your initials all over my insides. Maybe those carvings will heal. Maybe not. I don't even know if I want them to or not. I don't even know anything anymore. Anyway. I just needed to get this off my chest before it crushed me. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year. I wish you nothing but a perfect life. Guess I'll always love you in some way, Pancake. .................... FML.