#it's the irresistible force paradox all over again

[steelthroat]

I think that if Terminus and Optimus ever met, they would cause each other an aneurysm.

I want them to meet, obviously.

[mind-travel-er]

Pitfall Trap

# Pairing: Tyler Galpin x Wednesday Addams # Synopsis: Carnivorous eyes can be mistaken for loving eyes. Tyler had learned that with Wednesday Addams, he couldn’t dissociate the two. He didn’t even want to. # Warning/Content: Spoiler S01, Obsessive behavior, Sexual Tension, Primal Instinct, Toxic relationship, Character Study. # Word Count: 1.2k [read me on AO3]

Carnivorous eyes can be mistaken for loving eyes. Tyler had learned that with Wednesday Addams, he couldn’t dissociate the two. He didn’t even want to.

She is perfect.

And during that Rave’N dance, staring at him with dark, wide pupils, he wasn’t so much swaying to the music, but rather swayed by her.

By the girl who brings piranhas to a swimming lesson; just because someone usurped her right to torture her little brother. He knew she wouldn’t be phased by the monster crawling under his skin. Wednesday wore hers with pride on the outside.

" … Like putting piranhas in a swimming pool?"  She frowns. He explains himself with a purse of his lips he can’t hope to hide: 

"I may have done a little digging on you after we met."

"I’d do it again."

"I knew there was a reason I liked you." 

She is exquisite.

She dances, and he grins with all his teeth. She walks away, pulling the invisible elastic between them; then comes back to him, barely brushing his white tuxedo. He could growl right there and then. He wants his strong hands to grip her sides, but instead he snaps his fingers two times to the rhythms of The Cramps. ♭ I cruise through the city and I roam the street Looking for something that is nice to eat ♭ His eyes won’t let go of her. As if he’s both captured by the sight of an irresistible prey and hypnotized by a force that has relentless power over him. She moves and he follows. He is a paradox. He is all want, possessiveness and even rage. Yet, he smiles. He dances. He dances with her . Sky eyes meeting the dark of hers; somewhat meeting the dark of his. There are times, she gets so close, he wonders if she knows.

Wednesday Addams. Lovely and awful Wednesday Addams.

The one that smells like cardamom and the musk of the forest at midnight. When he gets close and breathes deeply in; her raven braided hair has a whiff of a wild cherry tree’s bark and a hint of sebum. At the sounds of the electric and psychedelic guitar , she’s moving at times like a rag doll; other times with lascivious movements that awake a fire that he knows too well. Her sweat is beading below her elaborate updo and making its way between her shoulder blades. Salty. Irresistible. He licks his lips. He has done much more than that before. The girl wasn’t a stranger to excursions in the woods near Nevermore Academy. She would kill for a brother. He would kill for her; he had. Rowan Laslow. If he wasn’t lying to himself, he would even die for her. Either way, what bliss. She would appreciate the gesture if she knew. But there’s joy in a secret threatening to become undone. It’s his way to have power over her; as she has that unsettling power over him. After he had indulged with Rowan, he had seen her lying there on the ground, hard to differentiate from a lifeless corpse. Her scent had been jealously retained by the leaves and the earth beneath. Once swept away by her peers, he had come back. Rolled in her aroma. Covering himself with her; with a depraved glee that only a monster could be satisfied with. ♭  Yeah, the city is a jungle and I'm a beast I'm a teenage tiger looking for a feast ♭ For a moment, he loses sight of her. Then, coming from behind, there are a few light taps on his shoulder. Wednesday stands behind him. Only Wednesday can lurk around without the ravenous monster in him noticing. If anyone could describe the traits of his face, only a love sick one could apply. He doesn’t mind. On the contrary, he loves the chase. He welcomes the ache that comes with it. He loves how unapologetic she is while dancing; as unapologetic as he is when the Hyde comes to play between the entrails of his victims.

In a primal way, Tyler knows that the Addams girl must sense the edge to their relationship. She’s not just drawn to "The cute boy next door". Admittedly, there is that. However, when she rarely comes to Weathervanes, she takes the quad over ice from his warm hands, and for only a few seconds, there's darkness at her fingertips. At that precise moment arises a conundrum. Does the chill roaming her arms merely exists because she fancies him? Or is it due to instinct? Those days, he can see the goosebumps leaving a trail on her fair skin— a warning; a thrill. A terrible danger near the surface that only her reptilian brain can perceive. One that has meant death for countless children, teenagers, and adults alike. Yet, everyone knows that Wednesday is in love with Death.

And tonight, she is dancing with It. ♭ You better duck When I show up The goo goo muck ♭ She rolls her hips, rolls her shoulders, draped in black ethereal satin. The intensity of her stern stare sets him ablaze, and he swears he can feel the scorching of the flames. He sees red instead of black and white. He dreams of his palms meeting the delicate crook of her neck. He dreams of shared heated lips that could never quench his thirst, except perhaps when he’s drenched in warm carmine; metal taste on his tongue.

The music stops. Wednesday doesn’t move anymore; still staring. Close. He can hear her little heart pumping the adrenaline away. While the world around continues to dance, he stands still; like the reflection of a mirror. Opposites. She’s in black, he’s in white. She’s controlled and neat. He lashes out whenever he can.

He finds those oppositions intoxicating.

Then. Then he thinks his dream might just come true because the livid face of Wednesday turns into shades of red; translating his mind. He looks up in shock. Hemoglobin droplets raining on them like a Christmas present. Delectably covering her ink-black hair; staining the shoulder pad of his jacket; staining everything. And for the first time during this Rave’N ball; for the first time ever for that matter… He sees her smile . Covered in crimson. A lovely reminder of when he does the same in secrecy; only Wednesday does it out in the open. As she always does. And it might just be the beautifulest thing he’s ever witnessed.

His irises grow wide. As wide as his hunger.

Around them, it is mayhem. Guttural screams, panic, and trembling limbs attempting to run away. It feels like home. They aren’t moving. Between them, a quiet wonder. He observes Wednesday looking sideways with a luscious twist on her lips. Then, in perhaps the longest seconds of his life, his eyesight reduces to a pinpoint as his dilated pupils follow the elegant finger of the Addams girl, slowly entering the sacred circle of her mouth. A taste. 

He might just lose his head. And he doesn’t mind. Nonetheless, she’s disappointed: "They couldn’t even spring for real pigs’ blood." Disappointed that she can’t taste the real thing. If only she knew. She turns away from him. A pit in his stomach. And an ache to see her wolfish smile again.

"It’s only paint." He can make it otherwise. He is breathless. And famished. He usually likes endings. The one he inflicts on others, that is. Still exposing her spine to him, he huffs and puffs from the yearning to bite whatever he can put his teeth on. Please, for the love of God, he thinks, let me sink into your flesh. Perhaps… Perhaps there is more than one way.

[kakusu-shipping]

Anon back again to harp on my multi-decades love for Luca Blight. Buckle up and hear me out. I'm talking about a character-driven irresistible force paradox.

When you have someone who endures trauma so impactful that their way of 'dealing' with it is to simply decide to burn the entire world down at any cost, what happens when he meets the opposite side of the same coin?

Luca has no remorse, no grand and righteous 'I will destroy this world and rebuild it anew because I'm special' manifesto. No - he just wants to watch the world burn because he hates it. Plus there's speculation that he had an unhealthy symbiotic relationship with the True Beast Rune that may or may not have been magnifying his rage and bloodlust, but that's a whole separate topic entirely.

So what happens when you take someone so volatile and doggedly set on his goals and put them in the path of another character who's just as bullish and focused as he is, but their entire life's purpose is the opposite?

Someone who cares about the world just because they love it. Someone who is *determined* to befriend him instead of destroy him, who spreads sunshine and rainbows. Someone who shows no fear in the face of him and is all stubborn smiles and wholesome gumption? Lovebombing instead of hatebombing because, "didn't your mother ever teach you any better?! Fine then, I'll just do it myself!" (Oof, that'd go over well.)

I'm going somewhere with this, I swear.

Luca is violent and cruel, but he has his values. He has great pride for Highland. He's shown to hold certain qualities in high regard (competence, passion, bravery - "I don't care about breeding. A sword doesn't need a fine lineage, it just needs to be sharp.") In short, much of what he holds in regard are qualities he ascribes by personally, and the things he hates run opposite (cowardice, indecisiveness, incompetence).

What happens when he comes face to face with someone who embodies the *traits* he respects but exercises them in the opposite way he does?

By the way, I'm not talking about your classic, "he's a terrible villain and I can fix him~" scenario, but instead introducing a foil who's just as stubbornly focused and intense about their wholesome love for sunshine and happiness.

I think he'd be frustrated, conflicted, and ultimately torn because it flies in the face of his worldview. At the same time he'd likely find himself harboring some sort of begrudging respect for this individual (while simultaneously conflicted and pissed off).

We talk about Luca for being the crazy 'mad prince' of Highland so what happens if he's in the crosshairs of someone just as 'crazy' as him but in a wholesome and positive way? He'd be annoyed as fuck while also probably winding up enjoying himself in a backward sort of fashion because this individual embodies many of the same qualities he esteems.

And most of all, there's the potential for inner turmoil where he'd have to process how to feel about someone who cares unconditionally in a way that strongly parallels maternal affection. He can't bring himself to kill Jillia because she *looks* like his mother. But what if someone *treated* him in a way reminiscent of a parent's unconditional love? Someone who has the same brave, reckless lack of self-preservation Luca does, bold enough to scold him the shit out of him for tracking mud across the fancy carpet yet in the same breath steamroll him over with sunshine and positivity and rainbows?

I posit that he'd be a mess over it. He'd hate it and at the same time enjoy it. And then hate it even more *because* he enjoys it.

Thanks for coming to my TED Talk. I thought about this way too much.

I've read this novel of a Luca X Reader pitch so many times anon I hope you're aware I never answered it because I had nothing to add, but I loved every word of it and reading it over and over. You're so correct.

Today seems like a good day to post it was we Finally have Suikoden remake news. So here's to you, your immovable object vs unstoppable force dynamic, and to the potential new fans these remakes may bring who may themselves see the glory of Luca Blight as we do

[elminx]

Energy Update: the final square between Saturn and Uranus

A note that I forgot to mention about October:

On Tuesday, 10/04, retrograde Saturn in Aquarius and retrograde Uranus in Taurus meet up in an (almost) exact square to one another for the fourth time in this ongoing cycle.

This is our irresistible force paradox: Saturn in Aquarius is an immovable object and Uranus in Taurus is an Unstoppable Force. All of us living on the earth have been caught between this rock and a hard place for more than a year now.

The prior dates from 2021 when these two giants clashed: 2/17/21, 6/14/21, and 12/24/21.

Something has got to give: something in the greater macrocosm of the world and (likely) something with the microcosm of your own personal lives. By now you may know what it is but sadly, it hasn't been moving yet. This is because both Taurus and Aquarius are fixed signs and, by their very natures, a bit prone to stagnation.

Saturn wants to contract and compress everything down into the essence of what it is to teach you a lesson. Uranus is completely beyond us - the lightning strike in the Tower Card that shakes the very world at its foundation. You can see how these two energies don't exactly see eye to eye. Something needs to change (Uranus) but fate is holding us in this spot (Saturn) so that we DO IT RIGHT.

This kind of astrological energy is not meant to be easy. There are no shortcuts and to half-ass these moments is very ill-advised. Whether you are on the side of holding on (Saturn) or letting go (Uranus), know that the other half of this hard square has validity, too.

Again, we come back to the idea of compromise - highlighted by the fact that we are in Libra season. Likely all of us need to do a little bit more holding on AND a little bit more letting go, each in our own ways. Both are a bit stymied at the moment as these two cosmic giants hold their stalemate so fervently. It is a very human idea that a thing can last forever and a very cosmic understanding that all things must end in their time.

For this one last square, both of our cosmic giants are retrograde which shows, like many other transits this month, that we are in an ending cycle. This is not a bad thing unless you make it into one. The big flex right now is to let the dead weight fall away with as much grace as you can manage. To hold space for the change within yourself.

If you are a Taurus or an Aquarius and you feel like you've been in the hot seat for the last year and a half: I see you. The fixed signs have been getting hammered by this and by our eclipse cycles - it is merely a sign that it is your time to move. I know that you're not the fastest, but that is totally okay. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other. Keep showing up for yourself. It'll be okay.

For you non-fixed types out there, I know how tough it is when the fixed signs stop creating the structures that y'all rely on. This is the divine right time to show up for yourself and build your own structures. Gravity will always be there but that doesn't mean that you should take it for granted. Your fixed sign Others could really use some support right about meow - maybe you could return the favor for a change.

Do you like my work? You can support me over on Kofi.

[djarinsidebitch]

Guns, Ghosts, and Run away Birds

a/n: this is kinda in the same universe as 'irresistible force paradox' but you don't need to read it to get this- its just a similar character. this was also supposed to be a short drabble....

word count: 2.6k like i said 'supposed to be short'

Warnings: Swearing, kinda graphic violence its the punisher so. Mentions of the Accords and other avenger stuff

Summary: rewrite of punisher season 1 eps 4 heist with frank and David but now with you- bad ass avenger reader.

paring: Frank Castle x Avenger!Reader

“How many guns do you go through”

“I didn’t get to take them to my next life”

You stood looking between Frank and his new ‘accomplice’ David Lieberman, he looked like a wet rat but you didn’t judge- out loud…

“So you need help stealing guns from the feds- you do know I am seen as a global terrorist I am on every red notice list out there”

“And we are both dead” Lieberman speaks up “they wouldn’t expect us to steal from them

“Because it’s stupid” You snap back then shifting to focus on frank and he sighs

“Are you going to help or not”

You look around at the shambles of their base, it’s not much better than where the rest of the team was hiding out in Europe. This was a stupid idea but at least you could make sure the two ghosts in front of you don’t actually get killed

“Fine- what do you need me to do” You cross your arms over your chest leaning the weight onto one leg jutting your hip out. Frank almost cracks a smile pushing himself to stand up straight from leaning against the table

“There's my birdy,” he says gruffly while explaining the plan, it was a smart plan, for them it was stupid but it would work. Lieberman would jam the feds signal then frank would take control of the truck with all of the guns on them and You would deal with the snipers.

“One thing,” Frank says as you crouch down to the dark duffel bag of supplies causing you to look up “If we are gonna work together again you gotta ditch the suit” he looks down at the black and red suit- that one was new for him to see, he was used to seeing the Black and yellow one.

“What’s wrong with my suit” you responded shifting your weight once more to drop a knee onto the ground looking down at the old widow suit, after the accords you had to ditch your nicer avenger’s suit because of the built in trackers tony had put in for emergency’s. You had pulled this one from one of your hidden caches.

“It’s just as bad as red’s, obnoxious” he grumbles looking down at you as one eyebrow quirks up

“It’s protection- it’s nothing worse than your old vest”

“It’s an almost skin-tight black suit”

“It’s a Kevlar blend that is made for the best assassins in the world”

Frank goes to open his mouth but shuts it once again knowing if there is anyone as stubborn as him it is You

“We need a car.” Frank grabs his jacket walking away saying “Leave the suit”

“You're not gonna leave the suit are you” Lieberman looks over to you, who is already taking off your jacket and boots

“Of course not” you motion with your hand to shoo so you can change. He quickly turns around to follow frank.

It only takes a couple of minutes for you to change put your clothes back over the suit and stash the bag. Walking out with the holsters over your jeans you slide the gun into place.

“What took you so long” Frank mods towards you

“I had to stash my bag- I may trust you but him” you throw a glance at Lieberman “not so much”

Lieberman goes to say something but Frank looks at him like “do you really want to get this started” he just shakes his head as the three of you head off.

The warehouse was the target Lieberman stayed behind mostly because You and Frank didn’t want him getting in the way. You both split up, scaling the side of the building you pull yourself up and through a broken part of the roof holding onto one of the steel, beam supports watching there were about 8 men one was already dead another was tied up, the other 6 visible targets looked like your average street rat wanting to be the next Fisk. It was clear they were trying to get some sort of information out of the two

“Rookies” you muttered under your breath, they were using a car battery to try and shock the information out of them but clearly by the dead man they sucked at it. The poor kid that was still breathing looked like he was about to piss Himself he was so scared.

Waiting for the perfect time you watched as one man walked right underneath where you are hanging. Letting go pulling a hand comes down grabbing one of your many knives from its sheath. The knife expertly went into the man’s carotid artery, he would be dead in seconds. The only noise was a thud as the two of you hit the ground and a slight squelch of blood but it was enough to intrigue two other men to investigate.

This is where the fun begins, You smirk one hand holding the now bloody knife you slide into the shadows waiting like a cat about to strike. They walked right into your trap; You jump wrapping your thighs around one of the men's necks, snapping it then as you start to fall with the now dead body you grab onto the other man who was able to let out one shot alerting everyone else before you slit his throat open both falling dead.

The man in charge calls out to his two, scratch that, three dead lackeys. By the sounds of the guns cocking they had semi-automatic or an assault rifle or two, you sneak through the shadows until you want them to hear your boots tap against the ground.

“They won’t be coming back,” you say slowly coming from behind, they all whip around to look at you and the main man pulls out his own pistol

“Lady you are in the wrong place- run along before you get hurt” that was his last mistake- underestimating you and you were counting on him making it. Throwing the knife in your hand towards the one lackey that was holding the assault rifle the blade landed right above the clavicle severing the aortic artery. Bullets start flying as you run back to the shadows behind some crates. They are all too nervous to make a good shot to save their life.

Two shots ring out as you feel a large presence behind you

“Glad you could join me, Frankie”

“Could have waited like the plan”

“Like you would have followed the plan”

He grumbles something and you jsut sigh twisting to face him. Placing a quick kiss on his nose then pulling out your gun you vault back over the crate, landing softly. You aim and shoot one shot to the left then drop to your right knee, twisting your shoulders and upper body to pull the trigger again; another shot to the right with two bodies dropping to the ground. Spinning on your knee your left leg moves to the side giving you momentum to turn around and stand up taking out one more person.

It took a couple of seconds for frank to process what happened but then gets around the crate to the last standing person, other than the one person tied up, as they aimed at your back but when he pulls the trigger the gun clicks- Frank grabs the gun from his hand and smashes it into his face knocking him onto a pinball machine and punches him one more time to knock the lackey out. Frank lets out a whistle for Lieberman that it is clear to come in; then walks behind you as you move to muffle the pleading man who did in fact pee himself.

“Gross” you murmur stepping back into Frank's chest, he puts one hand on your hip to steady you even though he knows you don’t need it.

Lieberman walks in one hand covering his mouth slightly with a disgusted look on his face.

“There- there was a dead man in a wheelbarrow”

“I didn’t do that” Frank responded looking over at Lieberman then to the cars

“And this you did-“

“I did most of the work” You snark walking over to look at the different cars

“Could have saved some” Frank murmured looking at Lieberman’s sick face

“What are you gonna puke-“ “I’m not gonna-“ “Hey do not leave your DNA here for the police- Hey!” “Give me a second” Lieberman tipped his head back to try and not hurl at the scent of blood and guts.

“You said you wanted to be the guidance system right- this is what happens when the missile goes off, didn’t think about that part now did you” “it smells more than I thought”

“You get used to it” “I’d rather not”

“I guess life is a little easier through a computer screen huh- now get in the van and let's go” “what about that guy”

“Not our problem” You finally rejoin the conversation leaning against the red mustang as frank opens the driver side door

“After all of this, you're taking the mustang” “Always buy American”

“I wanted the Ferrari” You reply getting in the passenger seat next to frank.

The second they got back to the warehouse you were out of the car before Frank could even turn the car off.

“What did you do to Edward scissor hands,” David says looking at how fast you moved to pull out the burner phone that started vibrating in your hand and walk away from frank and himself.

“None of your business”

“How do you even know her. She was an Avenger”

“Not important just go get ready” Frank wasn’t stupid it was probably the rest of the defunct avengers looking for her, but it seems like you weren’t supposed to be here because you disappeared, Frank cursed under his breath going back to the car making sure everything was working.

About an hour later David is sitting looking at a pistol resting on a small table in front of him, he looked shaken his hands trembled as his breath was in even. “I can’t do this” he mumbled as frank was a few feet away shutting the hood of the red mustang

“Jesus Christ-“ he mumbled to himself walking closer to Lieberman

“This is a team job- as much as I hate it you don’t got a choice”

“I sit behind the screen- I don’t do this, this is you and the avenger's world not mine”

“Your done” Frank exasperates “pick up your shit let’s move”

Lieberman just sighs not moving Frank starts talking again

“So this is what your wife meant huh”

“Excuse me”

“Your wife- she said that you never got your hands dirty and if there was a tough job you would just call someone when you needed something done” that seemed to strike a chord in David he grabs the gun and walks over to the car. Like the Baba Yaga, you appeared leaning against the back wheel of the car, you had taken off the clothes over your tactical suit, and your hair was pulled back out of your face.

“Are we ready?” you say looking at the duo

David was in charge of jamming the feds signal as you dealt with the snipers and frank took control of the truck with the guns in it. Frank jumped onto the side of the truck yanking the door open and shoving the previous driver out onto the street. He glances up as he passes the second sniper position to see you wrapping your grappling hook wire around the sniper's neck and jumping off the side of the building and landing with a soft thud on the top of the truck

“Atta girl” he mumbles to himself as you swing around and slide in the passenger window

“Couldn’t do that in a pair of jeans” you quip at him, Frank couldn’t help but crack a tiny smile, no matter how much you can frustrate him, he cares deeply for you for the things that you have done as a Black Widow, or an Avenger one of earth mighty hero’s (you are the only one he cares about- all the others seem like pricks) “That you couldn’t Birdy” he glances over at you then back to the road focusing on losing the car behind them long enough to get back to David.

Parking the white truck frank jumped in the back while you stayed in the cab making sure there weren’t any other cars or agents heading your way. You heard the following car pull up and the two agents get out of the car. You slid down in the seat as one set of footsteps neared the cab of the truck. the back of the truck open- then a flame thrower…….. A flame thrower? I mean it worked the two agents were very keen on listening to Frank’s demands

“Drop the guns- you see that water over there, you are gonna jump in that water or else it is gonna get really hot really fast” They were smart and ran jumping into the water.

You get David and escort him into the van. Frank was taking the Mustang while you stayed in the back of the truck while David drove it away from the drop site.

“I am going to drag their attention while you get to the highway and get back to base,” Frank tells David what to do then looks back to where you would be

“And keep her safe, if she gets hurt- you are gonna wish you never came after me” Frank threatens lowly and Lieberman nods quickly. Frank then walks to the back of the truck to you.

“You gonna tell me what that phone call was about,” Frank asks looking up at where you stood in the middle of the guns and ammo

“That is what you are worried about?” you look over at him with a confused face

“Well you did run away as soon as that phone went off”

“I missed a check-in, that's all, after the accords we split up but we all check-in, I missed it helping you so I had my ear chewed off” “You didn't tell them what you were doing” Frank responds, it kinda hurts your feelings thinking that frank thinks you would sell him out so easily

“No- they think I am in a hideout in Kyiv, you know I wouldn’t do that to you.”

“I know Birdy, it's just been a long week” Frank admits stepping up into the back with you

“I probably will be gone tonight, they are gonna get suspicious if I stay away any longer.”

“Why don’t you just stay, we can keep underground just as well as they can out there” “They are my team frank I can’t just leave them, you know that” You two have had this conversation before, as much as you love and care for frank it wasn’t safe for you to stay in one place long let alone stateside, and you couldn’t leave them high and dry, they were like family to you.

“I know I know birdy; I don’t want you getting hurt” “You know I won’t; I promise, after some more time it will be easier, hell maybe in a few years I can come back home” you point to his heart “But for now I have to stay in the wind”

Frank reaches up to cup the side of your face returning the nose kiss from earlier.

“I’ll see you soon then sweet girl” he murmurs against your face before stepping back out of the truck and sliding the door closed on you. He hits the side signaling David to go as he walks back to the red mustang.

Tags: @parzival3 @galaxysgal

[glowingbadger]

A student! reader (over 18 obviously) who has an awkward crush on Seteth who may reciprocate? This ask is like on the verge of the DONT section in your rules so feel free to ignore if it is too uncomfy xD

I actually got a couple asks in the wake of that post I made about teasing Seteth in the Academy uniform, so I'm glad you guys are vibing with me on that lol~

That said, I will say that a literal teacher/student thing is ehhhhh for me, BUT I think I have a way to make this work for all of us :3

Jeez, the number of times I've written Seteth fucking someone on his desk-

CW: former student, degradation, spanking, me being a Seteth simp

Seteth (FE3H) x FEM Reader - Garreg Mach Uniform

NSFW 18+

Sometimes it seems that your austere lover is even more busy in the post-war scramble for stabilization than he had been during wartime. Seteth had already been known for an almost worryingly dedicated work-ethic when you'd met him during your time as a student at the Officers Academy. Now, many years and sociopolitical shifts and one nervous love-confession later, it only seemed that more rested on on his shoulders than ever. Perhaps that's why, when you discover your old uniform while cleaning up your quarters one day, an irresistible idea forms in your mind.

Seteth's eyes drift, then refocus. He blinks away the exhaustion threatening to break him from his duties, then sighs as he runs a hand through emerald hair. The Chapel bells had signified the end of administrative hours some time ago, but he can't allow himself to become lax. There's still much to be done. It's days like this that make him think with a wry smile that his brothers would scoff at the way he's chosen to live his life, having traded fangs for bureaucracy.

His office door is propped open as usual, but he hears a knock that shakes him from his thoughts.

"Come in-" he glances up at you, and his brows furrow deeply. You can't help a playful smile at the sight of Seteth's face already tinted pink. With as much innocence as you can affect, you step into his office to show off your attire. Your old uniform still fits- more or less -but you've made some careful adjustments. The jacket and white blouse underneath are only buttoned as high as would be strictly necessary to be seen in public, exposing a daring view of your chest. Thigh-high stockings hug your legs, then lead up to perhaps the most scandalous aspect of this ensemble. You've rolled up the hem of your skirt until it flutters about your hips so short that when you're not careful, a glimpse of your backside is clearly visible. This latter point, Seteth clearly notices as you twirl for him, saying,

"Look what I found, love," He's already on his feet approaching you, and you smile up at him as sweetly as you can, "sure brings back memories, doesn't it?"

Without a word, Seteth tugs you away from the office door and shuts it firmly behind you.

"Did you parade yourself all the way here from your quarters looking like this?!" he demands, and you hear the click of the door locking behind you.

"Well I don't see how else I could have gotten here, so..." you reply flippantly.

"Goddess above," he says with an exasperated sigh. His thumb and forefinger worry at the bridge of his nose as he turns back towards his desk, "To think that anyone could have seen you-!"

You roll your eyes with a grin and follow him. You take his hands in yours, drawing them away from him and opening up his closed posture.

"Come on, I just thought you might like it," you say as you draw closer to him. Seteth sighs again and looks you up and down.

"Whether or not I like it is immaterial, my love."

"But you do like it," you prod him further, your grin widening.

He opens his mouth, then closes it again. His lips tighten for a moment, then he manages to say,

"It is... flattering."

Releasing his hands, your own travel up the front of his torso, enjoying the dips and swells of his muscled body beneath those conservative robes. You feel his chest rise as he inhales sharply, and you say,

"Have I ever told you that I had a hell of a crush on you even back in my student days?"

Seteth speaks your name with a hint of a warning his his voice. You press your body to his as your touch travels up the strong contour of his neck to tease along the line of his beard.

"It's true. I've always wanted you, Seteth," you go on, "Every single time you scolded or lectured me, part of me was... incredibly turned on. Sometimes, it was simply too much to bear," you curl a lock of his hair around your fingertips. You can see his ironclad will beginning to fracture. "Sometimes, I'd return to my room and pleasure myself, all while dreaming of you disciplining me."

Then, his lips are on yours, his kiss so hard and impassioned that for a moment, you're breathless. Your smug posturing falters immediately. He drags your bottom lip between his teeth as one hand wraps around you while the other grabs onto the plump swell of your ass beneath the flimsy coverage of your skirt. Seteth pulls you firmly against his strong body, and you can feel his cock throbbing against you. Then, as suddenly as he'd initiated it, he breaks your kiss- but before you can speak, his hand holds at your chin and forces you to meet his fierce gaze.

"So, you came here in this shameful attire with the express purpose of provoking me," his voice is a husky whisper, the mere sound of it nearly enough to make your knees buckle, "Very well then- you will have your scolding."

He manhandles you into position, rougher and more forceful with you than he's ever been. Before long, you're bent over his desk beneath him, and he stares down at you with a heat that paradoxically makes you shiver. Then, he raises a hand, and brings down his palm across your ass. You whimper and arch up from the hardwood, but he only says coldly,

"Straighten your legs."

You do your best to obey, holding your backside upright for him as though presenting him with your body. Despite your efforts, his hand descends once more, the wonderful sting of his strike warming your skin.

"Spread them wider." he commands, and once again you obey without question. You hear the familiar rustle of his belt and outer robes coming undone, and you glance back over your shoulder.

"Eyes forward, Miss Y/N." he says, his tone now balancing on a dangerous edge. You whine in protest, but follow his instructions and merely await your punishment. He gives a low hum and says, "I see you are capable of some measure of discipline, at least."

You feel the stiff head of his cock pushing between your folds, but before you can prepare yourself in the slightest, Seteth drives into your waiting cunt. Immediately, your eyes roll back and you gasp out his name. He holds you by your hips, pulling you back against him until your ass presses flush against his pelvis. He's nestled deep inside of you, his powerful manhood stretching you to your limit- and for the moment, he simply remains as such. The tip of his cock is nudging hard against your womb, sending blended pain and pleasure radiating through your nerves. It's all you can do to keep yourself positioned properly for him.

"To think that you would flaunt your body about the Monastery in such attire," Seteth snarls behind you, his cock throbbing against your inner walls, "You're every bit as hopeless as you were as a student." Once again, he spanks you, and you have to imagine by now that his abuse has begun to mark your tender skin.

You're already panting aloud for him when finally, his hips begin to move. His pace is immediately firm and punishing, his cock pistoning in and out of you, stimulating your every aching sweet spot and sending a painful jolt up your spine with each thrust. Your lips hang parted as you gasp for breath, your eyes dazed and unfocused in your bliss. A sudden rush seizes your body, and you feel your pussy clench around the massive intrusion of Seteth's cock.

"Cumming already?" he says with clear derision in his voice, though he never eases his pace as his bucks into you, "Perhaps you were even aroused by showing yourself in public in this shameful state."

"Nuh- no...!" you whimper softly, "It was... it's only for you-!"

Smack! His palm strikes your bouncing flesh once more. You're still riding the wave of your climax- or perhaps you're cumming a second time already. It's impossible to tell.

"Yet you were already soaked by the time I bent you over," Seteth goes on as he pounds into you, "One can't help but think that perhaps my troublesome student quite enjoys behaving like a wanton whore."

You can't manage to reply anymore. Your head is spinning and your body aches. Seteth's full length drives into you to its base again and again, and you can't even begin to say how many times you've cum before he begins to falter. His hips snap towards you haltingly, his body shudders, and his balls feel large and heavy as they slap against you with each thrust. It seems even his immense self-control can't stand up to this lewd punishment session for much longer. As your hands uselessly try to find purchase on the surface of his desk, Seteth leans over you, his hands now on your waist, pinning you down beneath him. His member throbs from base to tip, and with an animalistic groan, he says,

"I expect you... to take full responsibility-!"

With this, you feel the heat of his release pouring out at your core. His length twitches with every shot of cum that he spills into you, and his hands grip you so tight you can feel his nails digging along your skin. Seteth moans out your name, and you're distantly grateful that no one else stays in the offices as late as he does- you've both certainly made enough noise to have caused a scene by now.

At long, long last, his member pulses with the final throes of his orgasm. Seteth's grip on you loosens, and his office is quiet save for soft panting as you both struggle to collect yourselves. He pulls his length from you in one motion, and already, you can feel his thick seed dripping along your lower lips.

"You will head to my chambers," Seteth says, then clears his throat as he struggles to regain his usual composed dignity, "And if you don't want anyone to see this dripping out of you, you'll go quickly."

"Whose fault is that, I wonder," you manage to mumble, slowly pushing yourself up from the desk. Seteth actually laughs at this. Even now, his laugh is a rare treat that makes your heart skip like nothing else.

"I am tempted to say yours, given your intentional provocation," he says, bending over to place a soft kiss to your lips, "but I acknowledge that my own weakened restraint is partially to blame. To that end," he adds, his smile once more gentle and fond, "I am feeling rather rejuvenated. I'll be done with my work before long, and I do hope to see you in my quarters then."

[chiseler]

Wanted Man: On THE FUGITIVE

The road at night is home to one of America’s perennially romantic figures: the man who’s on the lam. The escaping slave wading in the water to throw off the dogs; the western outlaw with his face on a Wanted poster and a price on his head; the Depression-era bank robber gunning his stolen V-8 toward the state line. Guilt or innocence is almost incidental; it’s the race to stay free, and the need to keep on the move, that lend such dark luster to the fugitive. The double meaning of “wanted man” is inherent, never stated more succinctly than in Nightfall (1957), when just before they kiss Anne Bancroft tells Aldo Ray, who is pursued by both cops and criminals, “You’re the most wanted man I know.”

With all due respect to Aldo Ray, the most wanted man of all was surely David Janssen, who carried one hundred and twenty episodes of the television drama The Fugitive (1963-1967) with a charisma deeply rooted in the unease, alienation, and desperation of the man on the run. As Dr. Richard Kimble, who escapes en route to the death house after being falsely convicted of killing his wife, Janssen imbued the show with a hunted, haunted, hellhound-on-my-trail mystique. His might be called a one-note performance, but that note is a suppressed intensity that never slackens for an instant; he never forgets or lets us forget that he’s under sentence of death. The fear of being caught is in his husky, constrained voice; the nervous smile that twitches one side of his mouth; his darting, plaintive eyes; the way he stands with his shoulders slightly hunched, as if against a cold wind. Every woman wants to give him aid and comfort. Who could resist a strong, quiet, kind, yet just possibly dangerous man who is also as lost, alone, and in need of help as the bedraggled stray kitten he fleetingly bonds with at the end of the series debut? Because Kimble is a mensch, at times perilously close to a saint, it’s all the more important that Janssen has a dark, gritty edge to his presence. While the scripts place him again and again in the position of risking his safety to help someone in trouble, Janssen brings out Kimble’s exhaustion and bitterness, his reflexive distrust of authority, his lonely and self-punishing stubbornness.

Every episode of The Fugitive ends with Kimble alone, walking down the highway, thumbing a ride, huddling in the back of a truck, skulking through a railyard, or slumping in the gloom of a Greyhound bus—disappearing into the no-man’s-land of the American night. The look and mood of the series are relentlessly drab and melancholy. “Another shabby room, another lonely night,” the narrator intones; another dreary town that looks just like the last, another cheap hotel, another menial job where the stranger must put up with bullying bosses and needling co-workers, another toxic web of resentments and desires waiting to trap the newcomer. The Fugitive paints the life of a drifter as a dismal and repetitive slog. In this it forms a perfect counterpoint to Route 66, another popular television show with which it overlapped. (Route 66 ran from 1960 to 1964, and Janssen was a guest star on the show just before The Fugitive began its run.) Buz and Todd, footloose buddies zipping around the country in a Corvette, are troubadours for the philosophy of moving on; at each stop they help release people trapped in emotional ruts, then motor on, restless searchers for some ultimate true home.

These contrasting shows nicely illustrate the two kinds of travel that haunt the American imagination: exploration and flight, discovery and escape. To be on the road is to be free, unfettered by emotional bonds or confining routines, going to the next new place. To be on the lam is to have no safe haven, no-one to trust, just a desperate and dwindling hope of eluding capture. In The Fugitive, Richard Kimble wants nothing more than to settle down, to return to the stable and wholesome life he once had as a pediatrician in the fictional small town of Stafford, Indiana. He roams (rather than fleeing the country) in the far-fetched hope of tracking down the one-armed man he saw running from his home the night his wife was murdered. He stubbornly pursues the dream of clearing his name—a determination that is part of the machinery required to keep the series in its perpetual holding pattern of flight and pursuit. The paradox of the show is that it depicts all the horrors of being a fugitive—the constant fear of betrayal, the impossibility of forming ties, the need to remain in a sub-legal twilight—yet also creates an irresistible glamour around the figure of the fugitive, who is strangely purified by his shadowy existence outside society, and who unintentionally seduces or provokes the masses gnawing at their private traps.

The show’s machinery is also kept running by Kimble’s dedicated hellhound, Lieutenant Gerard (Barry Morse). Writer Stanford Whitmore confessed to deliberately giving the character a name similar to Javert, the monomaniacal policeman obsessed with capturing Jean Valjean in Les Misérables. Gerard, who comes within a whisker of catching Kimble in roughly every third episode, is robotic in his idée-fixe; inhuman in his refusal to respond emotionally or change his mind. The keynote of his character is his peculiar refusal to state that he personally believes his quarry to be guilty. Every time the question comes up, Gerard smugly states that it doesn’t matter what he thinks. “The law pronounced him guilty. I enforce the law. Whether the law is right or wrong is not my concern. Let others debate and conclude. But when I begin to doubt, to question—I can’t permit it.” In a sense, Gerard is not a person at all, but a personification of authority at its most rigid and unimaginative. Often, people encountering Gerard remark that now that they have met him, they hope Kimble gets away. Even more often, the thwarted Gerard complains that he can’t understand why so many people, especially women, side with the fugitive and help him escape.

Kimble is a litmus test. Every plot turns on the way people react when they learn who he really is. Some help him because they believe he’s innocent; or because they’re grateful for something he’s done; or for some obscure personal reason, like a desire to get back at someone else who wants to turn him in. Some people betray him because they figure it’s their duty under the law, some for gain, some out of spite. Carrying his own story with him like a personal storm-cloud, Kimble continually stumbles into situations involving crime, injustice, mistaken identities, false accusations, and deceptive schemes. The whole country is filled with wrongly accused ie. nnocents and villains with law-abiding fronts. In “Come Watch Me Die,” Kimble helps a young man who is accused of murder but proclaims his innocence escape lynching, only to learn that he did commit the brutal killing and is a remorseless sociopath. Frequently Kimble is torn between his need to testify to things he’s witnessed, and his fear of coming forward and risking police attention. He’s a supremely ethical, conscientious man for whom the law and all its trappings is the enemy. “Come Watch Me Die” ends with a rare moment of humor, when a sheriff, favorably impressed by the way Kimble has captured the killer, asks if he has ever considered a career in law enforcement. The fugitive responds with a nervous, queasy smile.

Flung from one moral dilemma to the next, he is constantly caught between his societally-imposed guilt, which forces him to hide his identity, and his innate goodness. “Wings of an Angel” incisively illustrates the way he is caught between the forces of law and crime. Wounded when he (yet again) helps capture an escaping convict, he’s taken to the nearest place for treatment—which happens to be a prison hospital. He’s a hero to the guards whom he fears and a villain to the inmates, who sneeringly call him “cop-lover.” When some inmates recognize him, they blackmail him into stealing morphine for the prison’s junkies. Being a doctor adds to Kimble’s trials, as he often feels obligated to help the injured despite the risks of revealing his medical knowledge.

Though he always resists serious moral compromise, his life is constructed of lies and deceptions: in every town he assumes a new name, invents a back-story and a home town, fills job applications with phony references. He’s quite ready to knock people down to make an escape, steal a wallet when he needs identification, or fake his own death. His surprising competence at living outside the law is a large part of his attraction. In “See Hollywood and Die,” when he is held hostage by two young thugs along with a woman whose car they steal, Kimble convinces them that he’s a cool professional crook, and plays the part of a fast-working seducer to forge an alliance with his fellow hostage. The sense that this man could be dangerous, if he wanted to be, keeps him from seeming too idealized—or rather, it idealizes him in a different and more appealing way.

Much has been written about the transference of guilt in Hitchcock’s wrong-man stories. But being a fugitive, even with all the attendant ethical snares, does not tarnish Kimble’s conviction of his own innocence and his right to stay free and alive. (The one exception comes when, inevitably, he contracts amnesia, and on learning his identity, can’t be sure of his innocence.) The moral dilemmas so elaborately constructed in each episode can sometimes feel contrived or repetitive or strain credulity, but the show is driven by this basic, burning core of Kimble’s desperation, his raw fear and profound depression whenever he’s cornered or fingerprinted or locked in a cell. The suspense is superficial yet sure-fire: watching each episode, I know perfectly well that he’s not going to get caught, because if he did the show would be over, yet I respond with dutiful Pavlovian reflexes. Oh no! How’s he going to get out of it this time?

The Fugitive has the ritualistic, same-time-next-week quality of classic television, so different from today’s mandatory novelistic arcs. Each episode opens with a re-cap of the premise, which grows tiresome, though it comes in the deliciously portentous voice of William Conrad. (The credits were changed, very much for the worse, at the start of the second season; the season one credits include wonderful noirish footage of Kimble’s escape from a train wreck, and Conrad somberly intoning, “Richard Kimble ponders his fate as he looks at the world for the last time, and sees only darkness. But in that darkness, fate moves its huge hand…”) The Fugitive was the creation of Roy Huggins, the veteran writer and producer who was also behind Maverick, 77 Sunset Strip, Run for Your Life, and The Rockford Files. According to his obituary in the New York Times, Huggins taught himself to write by copying Chandler’s Farewell, My Lovely in longhand, which is enough to put him in my good books. He got into movies when his novel Too Late for Tears was adapted into a taut and terrific 1947 film noir with Lizabeth Scott and Dan Duryea. A member of the Communist Party until 1939, he was called before HUAC in 1952 and pragmatically named names—but only of those who had already been named. Presumably, he knew something about moral compromise.

The Fugitive was both a critical and popular success, though only for one season did its ratings break into the top five TV shows. Famously, the show’s finale (a two-parter called “The Judgment”) was watched by more people than any previous television program—72% of all households that owned TV’s tuned in. For the record, I have not yet seen the final episode, since I am still working my way through season three. I have an idea how it might go, though: I imagine Kimble will capture the one-armed man and be exonerated, at which point all of the scores of women who fell in love with him over the course of 120 episodes will appear, saying, “At last we can be together!” Then an enormous fight will break out, and he’ll be torn to pieces like Orpheus by the Maenads.

But seriously…

The enduring power of The Fugitive lies precisely in its unresolved tension, the way it portrays being a fugitive as a universal and eternal condition. Richard Kimble has nothing. He often carries a small suitcase, but since he’s regularly forced to flee with only the clothes on his back, the suitcases can’t hold anything that he’s attached to. He has no identification, just whatever petty cash he earned at his last job. He works as a mechanic, a farm laborer, a handyman, a lifeguard, a truck driver, a hospital orderly—always something faceless and expendable. He goes by whatever name he pulls off the top of his head. But his own identity clings to him as an inescapable threat: his fingerprints and his face inform against him, yet he never tries plastic surgery or burning his fingertips with acid. (He does dye his hair, but this fools no-one—though it vastly improves his appearance, and neatly distinguishes his fugitive identity from his previous square self.)

The scripts may insist that Dr. Kimble yearns to go back to being a solid citizen, with his medical degrees hanging proudly on the walls of his office, but those who love the show just want to see him in another shabby room, for another lonely night. He’s the eternal drifter; the hitch-hiker with the worried face; the guy keeping to himself in the corner of a boxcar; the stray that every woman wants to take in and console; the friendless stranger turning up his collar against the cold wind; the man who is from everywhere but here, and who’ll be from here soon.

by Imogen Sara Smith

[cy-fi-theansweris42]

Written for @donitkitt‘s Aftermath AU forever ago, this one’s pretty short, enjoy!

It was quiet in the lair, Mikey and Raph watching television while Donnie tried to determine what the orb they’d stolen from Bishop was. It was a slow day, something they all needed every once in a while. Every so often, Donatello glanced over towards his brothers, silently glad that for once, things seemed almost their old version of normal, lazy afternoons after training filled with forgettable TV shows and the occasional laugh instead of the newly normalized tensed silence as everyone waited for a reminder in flashbacks and panic attacks that nothing would ever be the same.

As Leonardo walked into the room, heading towards the couch where Mikey and Raph were sitting, Donnie looked away, eyes focused again on the mysterious device. Leo’s sight was practically gone now, the turtle in question the only one knowing just how bad it was. Donatello could guess though, from the far-off look that never left the leader’s eyes and how now they had to be extra careful about not moving things around. Leo had said nothing, of course, ever the stubborn bastard that would rather suffer from some stupid ingrained belief that he deserved it than accept help, but when he was suddenly bumping into slightly shifted tables and not reacting to a penlight subtly being shone into his eyes by Donnie himself, there were few other explanations. As the last bits of his vision slipped away, so did any chance of Donnie being able to fix it.

With that realization, Donatello found himself unable to look at his older brother.

He bit down on a sharp laugh, eyes crinkling and mouth turning upwards in what was almost more snarl than smile. Can’t even bring himself to look—at least he can look, can still see his family. It was almost more curse than gift in this situation, a cruel punishment concocted by Bishop himself, continuously being able to see the result of his failure, how his brother would forever suffer from his own lack of action.

It wasn’t like he didn’t try! He had practically hounded Leo from the moment he got the new arm working and didn’t have anything Leo could tell him to work on instead. The leader in blue still brushed his attempts to help off, told him to focus on other things, more important things. They had almost perfectly mirrored the Irresistible Force Paradox, himself the unstoppable force as he asked time and time again, always pushing the issue, and Leonardo the immovable object, not budging in his stance, never hesitating in the slightest in his refusal.

Guess he now knew the answer to that question, that eventually the force will give up from sheer frustration and hurt. He still could have tried more, been just as stubborn, gotten the others in on it, just tried more until he helped his brother.

Donnie quickly wiped away the tears that had started to build, shoved down and compartmentalized his guilt.

He had work to do.

[an-incurable-affection-blog]

Wieland, or The Transformation. An American Tale.

Charles Brockden Brown. 1798. “Romanticism and Gothic” list.

Pro forma for early novels, Wieland opens with the obligatory justification for its existence on the grounds of its salutary moral lesson. The next thing we learn from the first-person narrator, à la its predecessor Caleb Williams, is that the story will have an unhappy ending. But many pages will have to be turned before we learn the specifics.

Wieland creates suspense, not with immediate action that makes us want to know what happens next, but by stating an outcome up front (total devastation of the narrator’s life) and making us read not for the what but the how. It triggers the same impulse as not being able to look away from a car crash. The narrator’s long interjections bemoaning events further delay the gratification of learning what happens next.

It features countless themes and tropes of (especially the early) gothic, and early novels more broadly, but I’ll start counting them anyway⁠—terror and horror; the hypnotic, irresistible power of the horrifying; curiosity; madness; the somatic roots of emotion; melancholy and imagination; Burkean principles of sublimity; closets; corpses; perfect heroines; interplay of interior emotions and the external environment; naturalistic explanations of seemingly supernatural events; dreams. Characters place themselves at windows to ruminate. They understand the paradoxical pleasures of pain and the solace of weeping. Their emotional traumas lead, inevitably, to physical illness. Women understand “the remediless and unpardonable outrage on the dignity of the sex” involved in being the first to disclose one’s romantic feelings; they preserve their chastity at all costs. (This invariably involves sequestering oneself in one’s room against the external threat of rape.) 

Each of the above, in its own way, testifies to the Gothic preoccupation with human psychology. Wieland is particularly invested in phenomenology, and thus, its literary project is what Dorrit Cohn calls “narrative modes for presenting consciousness.” (As the 1822 preface to Brown’s unfinished sequel Memoirs of Carwin, the Biloquist, perceptively notes, “[u]nlike most other writers, [Brown’s] modes of thinking, the systems of ratiocination with which he invests his characters…” are “more the objects of our admiration or attention than the incidents or themes of his fictions.”) To this end, Wieland is far from alone among 18th-century novels in its appropriation of the language and concerns of Enlightenment philosophy (association of ideas, errors of the senses, reason vs. emotion, etc.).

The vehicle of the book’s detailed rendering of consciousness is a main character as first-person narrator⁠—not quite typical, as only one-third of the 18 novels on my Gothic list use this. It is, then, our narrator Clara Wieland’s—and not just the implied author’s—tacit foregrounding of her thoughts and feelings over events. In one example among many of Clara’s long internal monologues, it takes two pages between one concrete action (sitting down) and the next (going to her closet). In between, she wonders why her love interest failed to show up at a prearranged social engagement; invents two different possible reasons, one that causes her delight and the other, despair; accounts for why she seized upon those reasons; acknowledges her obsessive thinking as an unfortunate recent development in her character; meditates on the human condition, generally, and then her father’s fate, in particular; resolves to peruse a manuscript written by her father; and plans how to execute the resolution: which should come first, fetching the manuscript or preparing the lamp? (She goes for the book first, in the dark—spoiler alert, bad decision!).

Supplying these details draws out the scenes, serving a purpose of suspense. More importantly, it goes beyond merely narrating consciousness (achievable through third-person narration) in demonstrating how many people habitually narrativize our own lives and selves, often without realizing it. Clara recalls and retells events by retracing her thoughts and feelings about them, just as she filtered them through her thoughts and feelings when they were happening. She can’t escape this reflexive self-narrativization: “at such a crisis my thoughts might be supposed at no liberty to range; yet vague images rushed into my mind…” 

Wieland advances psychological theories both through Clara’s stated beliefs and narrative demonstration. It seems to come down on the side of Hume, that reason serves the passions, as Clara repeatedly suffers unwise impulses and supplies the bad reasoning to talk herself into following them. At one point she expresses the belief that we can never understand the motives of others; yet, she seems almost as ignorant of her own motivations, listing various alternatives as she tries to assign them post hoc. She walks straight into closets containing probable murderers. She cannot even acknowledge that she is drawn to darkness and danger, much less explain why.

A gothic novel is not complete without a villain, but Wieland’s Carwin is more rounded than most. He confesses to bad things, but is not responsible—or at least, not fully nor intentionally responsible—for the dark climax, the hero Wieland’s murder of his own wife and children. Mischievous rather than evil, Carwin uses his talents for ventriloquism and mimicry to perplex people with unembodied, often seemingly supernatural voices. On almost every occasion when someone hears a voice of warning or command, or when the overheard voice of a friend sows misunderstanding and anger, it’s Carwin. But he did not, it seems, order Wieland to kill his family in order to prove his devotion to God (the story of Abraham and Isaac should come to mind). The voice of God was all in Wieland’s head. No one was ever in actual danger until Wieland’s descent into madness. The real villain is the human mind and its vulnerabilities.

Carwin’s role is more complex than villain, as he seems to embody the gothic tale writ large. Albeit minimally involved in its defining tragic event, he is the inadvertent engine of most of the plot. His gift is the easy solution to all mysteries. He confesses to “a rooted passion for scattering around me amazement and fear”; it is “for the sake of creating a mysterious dread,” he says, that “I have made myself a villain.” What could be more fundamental to the Gothic project than the scattering of amazement, fear, and a mysterious dread? Like Clara’s, Carwin’s motives are perplexing. He seems to enjoy arousing gothic emotions just to see how it affects people, and so, it seems, does the novel. We could see it was the ventriloquist, just because he felt like it as a lazy, anticlimactic, and improbable explanation of events, or as an insight into the genre and the human psychology. 

In a shorter piece written three years after the close of these events, Clara reveals that she did not, as she predicted, die with the completion of her written account, but lived to find happiness again. She traveled for a change of scene and became curious about the world again (a central motivating force of the novel). She married the object of her affections, who, in a reversal of the traditional gender dynamic, has moved from admiration to reciprocating her love. Surprise, it’s actually a happy ending after all. Clara transcends generic expectations on two levels, existing outside the Gothic story and changing the ending.

[chaos-weekly]

is it too much to hope for?

Her confirmation email had been sent and her deposit had been paid. It was official: Seneca was going to be attending UChicago for law school. It felt right for a lot of reasons. It was a top school without being filled to the brim with people whose entire lives revolve around academics. It was in a big city. And most importantly, the man she’d been in love with since high school would be making frequent trips, and might even consider taking a permanent vacation, to Chicago. 

Seneca didn’t make decisions for men. It went against everything she stood for as a woman and an individual. But that didn’t mean that she couldn’t compromise a little. Going to UChicago meant she wanted to make things with Fox more serious, and she could do that and attend a prestigious law school. If she had the opportunity, why wouldn’t she take it?

Now, if only she could find the time to tell him.

She’d told her parents earlier, not really caring to wait until Zeus was around to break the happy news. They were thrilled. Seneca was their pride and joy. They didn’t do much to hide the fact that she was their favorite daughter, not anymore. When she’d been in high school, they hadn’t played favorites. But now that the sisters had graduated… Well, any parent’s favorite child would be the one that went off to college and blossomed and not the one that still lived in their house and deteriorated. It wasn’t like Zeus wasn’t capable of much more than she was showing, it was just that she felt like her powers alone were enough to justify her greatness. She called herself “Zeus,” for Christ’s sake.

Seneca missed the days of her own childish naivety, but only because it was more comfortable. No, she’d long come to realize that the world was more than their little borough, and she was all the better for it.

Zeus could be, too. She still held out hope that her sister would grow out of her reckless pride. 

Was that wrong?

///

The Admiraal’s had enjoyed a Seneca-centric family dinner, feasting on her favorite Greek food and reminiscing on all of their memories together. Well, her parents did. Seneca and Zeus ate in relative silence, participating in the conversation only when needed. Seneca hated when her parents thought of her as their golden child. It only made her feel dirty and disgusting and even more guilty for lying to them about what had happened at college. She wasn’t perfect, she hadn’t ever been perfect. But how could she tell them that without breaking their hearts?

Seneca had volunteered to clean up dinner and Zeus had been forced to help her. Neither sister was happy about this, as made apparent by the lack of conversation. 

“So,” Zeus said, breaking the silence. “UChicago, huh? You’ve got a thing with UStates’.”

“Chicago is a city,” Seneca replied, “but yeah, I guess.” She could feel Zeus rolling her eyes. She didn’t really care.

“I heard Fox is thinking of starting a club in Chicago once his one in Miami opens. Faye said that should be pretty soon. But you already knew that, didn’t you?” So this was her game. She wanted to dig into her relationship with Fox. Zeus had always been jealous of the couple. H-ll, she’d just tried to get with Fox the other night! But Seneca had a suspicion that her little sister was more jealous of the consistency and the connection than she was of her actual ex-boyfriend, even though Zeus would never admit that.

“He just told me the other night.”

“And you just put down your deposit for Chicago this morning.”

Seneca sighed, placing a dish in the drying rack. Zeus had that awful smug smile on her face. 

“I’m not going there because of Fox, Aria,” Seneca said cooly, looking her sister dead in the eye. Her voice had a touch of steel in it, her power to influence people seeping in silently. 

“It’s Zeus,” her sister corrected. “And don’t try to weasel your way out of this by using your powers. You really think you’re holier than thou, huh? Chastening me for using my powers to get what I want and turning right around to do the same f-cking thing to me.”

“I’ve never said sh-t to you about how you should be using your powers.”

“Not out loud. But don’t think I haven’t heard you screaming in silent judgement.”

“It’s because you’re better than that, Ari!” Seneca exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air as she burst out with the childhood nickname. “You are, and we both know it. You’re just too scared to admit that you’re capable of more, so you hide behind your powers.”

“How can I hide behind something that makes me stronger? My powers are gifts! I might as well use them! You do! Why can’t I?”

“Because you treat them like a toy.” They were staring at each other now, the air visibly electric. The two sisters were the embodiment of the irresistible force paradox, one immovable and the other unstoppable. They hadn’t argued like this in years. Now, all the built up tension was rising to the surface. 

“When you step outside of this stupid bubble, there comes a point in time where you realize you’re not invincible like you thought you were. It doesn’t matter that you’ve got powers that would make other people fear you; you’re just another person, and evil doesn’t discriminate,” Seneca said quietly, eyes filled with tears. “I miss when I thought just like you did, but I’m glad I don’t. You are so unaware of how the world works, Aria, but I hope nobody ever shows you how it does.”

There was a moment of silence between them. They were still staring at each other, and for a moment, Seneca thought her words might have sunk in.

“Are you done now?” Zeus hissed, setting her drying towel down. “I don’t need your ‘wisdom,’ oh Wise One.” With that, her younger sister made her way out. 

“Where are you going?” Seneca asked, following after her.

“Out,” she said shortly, grabbing her keys. “I need a drink. I know Fox is probably at that karaoke bar on MLK. I should buy us both a shot to celebrate you getting into UChicago. His is for him always having a f-ck buddy. Mine is for getting you out of my hair again.” 

“He doesn’t know,” Seneca growled, standing in front of the door. 

“Move,” Zeus replied, folding her arms over her chest. “Move, or I’ll make you. And stop being such a baby. Someone needs to tell him, and it should be--”

“I will be the one to tell him,” she said firmly, hard enough to shut Zeus’ mouth entirely. “And if I found out you told him, I will personally make sure you aren’t welcome in this house, this neighborhood, or this city again.” And she meant it. Zeus knew her well enough to know what she was capable of and what she would and wouldn’t do. Seneca would do this, and her sister knew it.

“Whatever,” Zeus said, pushing her out of the way. “I’m not even going to go to that stupid bar anyway.” She slammed the door behind her, and Seneca sighed, returning to finishing with the half done kitchen.

Maybe it was too much to hope anymore. At this point, Seneca thought a miracle might need to occur for her sister to see the light, and she didn’t really believe in those anymore.

[elminx]

Energy Update: Uranus stations retrograde, 8/17/21

This is going to be a very Uranian week so hold onto your butts, pack your patience, and expect the unexpected.

The setup: Uranus is heavily in play all week. Uranus stations retrograde at 14 degrees Taurus on Thursday as well as making a trine to our Mercury-Mars conjunction in Virgo all week. All of this will re-activate our Saturn in Aquarius - Uranus in Taurus square energy once again. (I know, I'm sick of it too).

As one of the outer planets, it can be hard to quantify how Uranus feels on a personal level. Unless the planet is heavily aspected in an individual's chart, Uranus is normally seen as a generational aspect - it takes ~7 years for Uranus to move through each sign and so it impacts all children born within 7 years in a group fashion. It is the planet of change, rebellion, and independence - where you find Uranus in your own chart will indicate where you feel the most need to rebel and be yourself - both by house placement and by sign.

To understand Uranus's strangeness, I illustrate with this point: Uranus is the only planet to be named from Greek mythology rather than Roman. In this we see the nature of the ice giant - the energy of Uranus, though unusual, cannot be held back in its differentness. The truest expressions and most strong forward momentum of humanity are shown to be led by their call - over and over again. Uranus is the great rule-breaker - the king of "Don't Tell Me What To Do". You see this most often in its natives: both people born with Uranus heavily aspected to their personal planets or Aquarians as the outer planet is one of their co-rulers. The great ruler breaker has been at odds (square or sitting 90° apart) with Saturn for all of 2021 - this is our Irresistible Force Paradox - Uranus is the Unstoppable Force and Saturn is our Immovable Object. Since the square last went exact, they have been pulling away from each other - Uranus has been moving forward and Saturn retrograde has been moving backward. This has done a bit to lighten our load - to create much-needed space between where we've been and what we need to change to get where we are going. This comes to an end on Thursday as Uranus joins Saturn in retrograde - now the two planets are moving backward in motion together. This is going to shift this tension point inward for a month until Saturn stations direct and moves quickly to reignite this square energy last in the year. The five degrees of space between Saturn and Uranus is the most that we are going to get for this very challenging aspect - maybe take a moment and savor the in-between over the course of this week. Herein you find one of the secrets to success in handling Uranian energy: let it be. We humans will never be able to harness the powers of the outer planets. They are part of the outer force of energy that happens to us, all we can do is live in it. Uranus dictates the changes that are beyond our control, all we can do is learn to control how we handle the change. In a way, this Saturn-Uranus square is teaching us what is within the scope of what we can change (Saturn in Aquarius) and what we cannot (Uranus in Taurus). This week is focused on the latter. This energy is going to make a lot of people feel uncomfortable. The more that you hold onto the illusion of control this week, the harder this energy will be on you. The big flex will be to let it go to let it flow. With both Mercury and Mars in the mix, this shit will get personal for a lot of people. If you're feeling really "in it" this week, know that you are right on time. You may need to change something about the way that you are communicating or working to get what you want - stay open-minded to sudden changes in work or your personal life. Yes - "Open Minded" - that is a very good way to describe the upper frequency of Uranian energy. This week is a great week to practice your "Yes and" mentality. Despite our Mercury-Mars conjunction in Virgo, this isn't a great week to make plans or at the very least, to expect to plan your plans and then follow through. Uranus in Taurus is indicative of natural disaster - keep an eye out for the earthquakes, tidal waves, or volcanic eruptions in your own life. If you've been wearing self-imposed blinders, the effects of Uranus this week may feel like they came out of nowhere. Look again. Anything that is coming up now has likely had the writing on the wall for quite some time - at least through the beginning of the year or longer. Notice the breakups and the breakdowns. What happens in your life is happening for you, not to you. It will be okay. My natal Uranus is closely opposed to my Sun and Mercury so I have to live the Uranian experience and "It will be okay" is one of my favorite mantras to remind myself. You may never come to be a person who enjoys change but resisting it only ever hurts you. I have an old oracle deck that I bought probably in '96 or '97. In a card called "River," the author wrote, "When you step

into the river of life, you have three choices: you can sink, you can swim, or you can float along." As a life-longer swimmer, this has always stuck with me - both the general sentiment but also that you need to know how to do each of these three things. None is the right decision or the wrong decision in any given situation - not for sure. Not always. But it does take a very discerning eye to know the difference. When you try to swim upstream, you quickly tire. If you simply let the current take you, you make no efforts to control the outcome. If you sink without purpose, you'll drown. How do you know which is the right action? The answer here also lies in Uranus for as well as being the great breaker, he is the great Awakener. Your intuition may be especially heightened this week, if so, acknowledge it. Stay very aware and with it. Checking out during this process will be very detrimental - this is a week to stay in your own life. Uranus is the crack in the cosmic egg, the skin that grows so tight that it breaks to begin the shedding process. This is a week to really dig into the differences between fear and intuition. Fear happens anytime we encounter something that is not part of our normal programming - it's our body's defense mechanism to keep us in stasis. It is, incidentally, controlled by the planet Saturn which is always concerned with what has always been. Uranus has the opposite ideal - our ice giant says that the status is NOT quo. Uranus is always leading off into the wilderness and the unknown. Uranus drives us all to stand up on our own two feet so that we can see. I am called to return to the Icelandic joke that I made some time back: When you are lost in the forest in Iceland, Just Stand Up. Here the Irresistible Paradox is formed: we are so fearful of the unknown that we are afraid to even LOOK at it. We lie down and then, we get lost. But the answer lies in the connection point between Mercury and Uranus - you need to open your eyes. Sure, there will be uncertainty in anything right now but you can alleviate some of your uncertainty through careful observation. Lastly, this is a week to be prepared. As I said before, Uranus in Taurus is contraindicated for natural disasters (I find it interesting that we are in the middle of this transit as we really get our first serious looks into what climate change is doing to our planet). We are also, here on the east coast, facing the threat of a tropical storm. It's a good week to check your emergency preparedness - to make sure you're still stocked in TP and canned goods or whatever you might need to get yourself through a rough patch (apply this metaphorically as needed.)

Do you like my work? Please consider supporting my writing by Buying Me A Ko-Fi.

[aion-rsa]

Toronto International Film Festival 2020 Movie Round-Up

https://ift.tt/2ZPmb1K

It really is a festival like no other. That’s something critics and journalists probably write every year about the Toronto International Film Festival. After all, TIFF (along with Venice) is considered the kickoff of awards season. Studios and independent distributors alike bringing their biggest hopes and brightest dreams to Canada, where a positive reception can make or break early Oscar buzz. However, in the case of TIFF 2020, there really has not been a film festival like this.

In the wake of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the entire press component, including our attendance to the festival, was virtual; the red carpet was permanently rolled up; and even the stars and filmmakers stayed away, giving rare publicity one press conference on zoom at a time.

In this environment, and with studios keeping their traditional highly marketed end of year wares in indefinite stasis, some worried that the show couldn’t go on. But as glimpsed in our notes on the handful of movies we screened during this year’s festivities, there remained as great a range as ever of cinematic stories and triumphant debuts. Some of these projects shined, and others revealed illuminating facets of talent we only thought we knew. Despite so much other anxiety in the world, Toronto’s show did, in fact, go on. Here’s why we can be glad it did.

Another Round

In the abstract, most people are smart enough to know they shouldn’t stare at the carnage left by a wreck. It’s unseemly and never leaves you feeling good about yourself. But that sensation of indulging what you should know better about permeates director Thomas Vinterberg’s Another Round, both for audiences and its protagonists. As Vinterberg and star Mads Mikkelsen’s reunion after the masterful The Hunt, their follow-up once again documents the fragility and unspoken lunacies of upper middle class life.

Take Mikkelsen’s Martin in Another Round. As a history teacher, he should know better than to think alcohol can fill the void of years of encroaching ennui. But when his old school buddies and fellow teachers buy into pseudo-science that claims keeping a buzz up at 0.09 BAC will wake you out of the doldrums, it’s drinks in the morning and evening. Martin leans on historic figures like Churchill and Grant to excuse his mistakes, but we all know where this is going. Vinterberg’s intelligence is that he gets there in an immersive and morally ambiguous, if not outright indifferent manner. The excellent ensemble cast, and Mikkelsen’s slick jazz ballet dance moves (really), also make this stiff drink go down all the smoother.

Concrete Cowboy

As the other artful indie that relies on real people from a real subculture to give its film texture (see Nomadland below), Ricky Staub’s Concrete Cowboy is fascinating whenever it’s about the actual culture of Fletcher Street Stables. A last holdout for a Black population of horsemen and women in north Philly, these stables are where honest to God urban cowboys still ride. And they pass like ghosts in a city that left their community behind nearly a century ago—and is now coming for the last few blocks.

That is the documentarian aspect of Concrete Cowboy that is, at times, engrossing. Unfortunately, it suffers from being background to a rather generic and aloof coming-of-age story that is the film’s center. Both Idris Elba, as the laconic father who hasn’t seen his son in years, and Caleb McLaughlin, as the wayward lad who’s been unexpectedly dropped on his doorstep, do fine work. McLaughin is especially good in a part which is outside Stranger Things’ nostalgic suburbia. But every narrative beat in his and Elba’s relationship arrives minutes or hours after you’ve guessed the whole familiar yarn. And it makes you wish the film belonged more to the horses and their real riders.

Get the Hell Out

In this day and age, it’s easy to feel like politicians have turned us all into monsters. People who once went about their day helping their neighbor are now ready to attack them over a bumper sticker, and cheer on the verbal theatrics in legislatures in seemingly every seat of government in the world. Wouldn’t it just be better if these pols had it out already? They finally do with maximum amounts of bloodlust in I-Fan Wang’s Get the Hell Out, a bizzaro horror comedy where the Taiwanese Parliament is infected with a zombie virus.

It’s an amusing premise that could make for terrific sketch comedy or a YouTube video, which is about how long Get the Hell Out works. Opening with a bugnut montage of MPs ripping at each other’s throats and spilling blood on the floor, the movie promises midnight madness, but you may be asleep much earlier with the often cliché-riddled script. The film attempts to make up for its narrative thinness by using stylish graphic introductions for characters, and freeze frames that wouldn’t be out of place in anime or video games, but all the hyper-kinetic energy here ends up being hyperbolic.

Good Joe Bell

If you lived only in social media threads where like-minded people discuss the need for inclusivity, you might convince yourself the world really has changed. But take a few steps outside of that safe space, and reality will inevitably rear its messier, and often tragic, head. And it’s a messy reality, indeed, that Jadin Bell (Reid Miller) and his father Joe (Mark Wahlberg) are forced to confront in Good Joe Bell.

A well-intentioned drama about a traditional American father in the Oregon heartland trying to understand and then honor his gay son, the movie casts Wahlberg in perhaps his quietest and most circumspect performance to date. But that is of course Joe’s parat of the tragedy: He mistakes silent resignation to his son coming out of the closet as loving support; and then after his son’s suicide following years of bullying, Joe attempts to make sense of his child’s life and death by again stepping out, now by walking from Oregon to New York in his son’s memory. It’s a noble gesture, as is the film, even as they both leave you wanting.

Written by Larry McMurty and Diana Ossana (Brokeback Mountain) and directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green (Monsters and Men), Good Joe Bell is a sweet but emotionally distancing experience. Told in a nonlinear fashion in which vignettes of Joe and Jadin’s relationship are interspersed with Joe walking in his son’s name, the mounting awareness by Joe in the present, or despair of Jadin in the past, is consistently fractured and strangely muted. There are moments of grace, especially when the very strong Miller as a distraught youth can (or can’t) connect with his father. But as even Joe admits late in the picture, “I just made this all about Joe Bell.” That’s a problem when the movie’s stronger with his son.

I Am Greta

“I shouldn’t be here.” It’s a refrain teenager Greta Thunberg repeats time and again, whether she’s speaking before the UK House of Commons or the General Assembly at the United Nations. And yet, here she is: one of the most effective advocates for addressing the climate change crisis in the last 30 years. It’s a painful paradox that the all-too-young public figure struggles with in I Am Greta. She’s aware that nothing changes year after year, applauded speech after applauded speech.

The power of Nathan Grossman’s new documentary is not that it only chronicles Greta’s high points of speaking truth to power (though it does), but it also undercuts some of the nastiest criticisms lobbied at her by certain world leaders and their supporters. By following Thunberg’s journey from speaking with random disinterested Swedish adults on the side of a Stockholm street to standing before the world, we see how her message has remained as laser-focused as her love for her family, their dogs, and being a kid surrounded by stuffed animals and often sudden bursts of hyper energy.

She really shouldn’t have to be in these places and focused so severely with having the weight of the world on her shoulders. Really. As the film documents the growing stress this child is under while crossing the Atlantic in a boat that’s little better than a skiff, one is forced to question the healthiness of such pressure. But her ability to actually grab attention is as evident as the endless loop of world leaders, legislators, and one bodybuilder turned Governor of California line-up to extol their admiration… and then change nothing. That’s the real honest takeaway, though the doc errs on a cheery message in the last few minutes about how children will save us all. I suspect the real Greta might have her own doubts about those attempts at uplift.

I Care a Lot

Not since Gone Girl has Rosamund Pike been so perilously irresistible. All toothy grins and smiling eyes, Pike’s Marla Grayson enters every room in I Care a Lot as a ball of sunshine. But also like the sun, if you get too close to this woman, she’ll burn you alive—all while dipping into your savings account and selling the family home. That’s literally her job as a legal guardian: She takes care of people the state deems incapable of caring for themselves… and she’s made a hell of a mint doing it.

Read the full review here.

MLK/FBI

The FBI spied on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. It’s a simple fact, but the uncomfortable implications of the federal government attempting to undermine and eventually intimidate a Civil Rights leader are unpacked in full, disquieting detail via this Sam Pollard documentary. In this way, it’s a sobering record of the salacious details about King’s private life that the feds unearthed and a chance to remember perceptions of King during his lifetime.

As the film strikingly reminds viewers, during a public dispute between FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and the Nobel Prize winning King, polls showed 50 percent of Americans believed Hoover when he called King “the most notorious liar in the country.” Only 15 percent of Americans believed King’s protestations. It’s a glimpse into how a figure now considered saintly in U.S. history could be smeared as a radical in his time when juxtaposed with the self-anointed gatekeeper of American values. It also helps understand why Hoover thought he had the right to anonymously tell King he should kill himself.

This sordid shadow conflict between one of the most influential leaders of the Civil Rights Movement and the feds is examined with the precision of an anthropologist’s chisel. But what’s most surprising about MLK/FBI is what it doesn’t show. Until the end of the film, the sources and interview subjects remain unseen and uncredited, while only the most sordid words from the FBI’s declassified documents tease the extent of King’s apparently numerous infidelities. Yet the film doesn’t ask to judge King so much as consider a broader portrait, bigger than the tabloid muck the FBI peddled, but maybe more complex and dimensional than what our marble statues also suggest. It makes him loom larger.

Nomadland

Frances McDormand’s Fern is a gateway into a 21st century heartache, representing thousands of similar stories of Americans who’ve turned to a nomadic lifestyle of transient existence and seasonal gigs. One of the most fantastic actors of her generation, McDormand is searing as the hardscrabble heroine, yet she is matched by a troupe of real-life nomads whom Chloé Zhao has populated her film with. Images of these displaced Americans persevering in the margins where they’d been pushed can at times make Nomadland feel like a modern day Grapes of Wrath, save McDormand’s version of Ma Joad travels only with her ghosts. And yet, the beauty of the movie comes from her visible enjoyment of that specific kind of company.

Read the full review here.

One Night in Miami

These are the benefits that come from Regina King and Kemp Powers—the latter drawing from his stage play of the same name—using extreme artistic license to put Ali (El Goree), Malcolm X (Kingsley Ben-Adir), Sam Cooke (Leslie Odom Jr.), and football star Jim Brown (Aldis Hodge) alone together for most of One Night in Miami’s running time. But while the situation may be fictional, the textures and paradoxes it reveals among these four real-life friends is luminously authentic. It’s also a feat more lasting than traditional biopics, which posit themselves as allegedly true accounts of a person’s entire life. Instead One Night in Miami prefers examining the legion of pressures facing Black artists and leaders who hold the double-edged sword of America’s undivided attention.

Read the full review here.

Pieces of a Woman

If movies could win awards for their first 30 minutes, Pieces of a Woman would be a shoo-in. With a single tracking shot that details the anxiety, terror, and (brief) joy of giving birth over nearly half an hour, the movie begins with a stunning piece of emotional whiplash and theatrical bonafides from its leads, particularly Vanessa Kirby as the expecting mother. But as her home birth goes awry, and the worst fear of every parent comes true, all the vital oxygen escapes Pieces of a Woman’s balloon, never to return save for a brief, devastating monologue.

Directed by Kornél Mundruczó, working from a screenplay by Kata Wéber, the movie remains watchable due to the strength of its ensemble performances. As the anchor, Kirby is sure to be a frontrunner in the Oscar race, while Shia LaBeouf does fine supporting work as her partner Sean. My personal favorite performance, however, belongs to Ellen Burstyn, who’s late in the picture speech is the single other time the movie sizzles—even if it’s out of absolute fear of this wrathful, denied grandmother-to-be.

Read more

Movies

Aaron Sorkin: Donald Trump Made The Trial of the Chicago 7 Movie Possible

By David Crow

Movies

Ava DuVernay Reveals Netflix Documentary 13th is Her Most Popular Film

By David Crow

Yet performances alone cannot carry a movie, and beyond that early opening salvo, Pieces of a Woman is a movie left adrift, unsure of where to go, or how to keep the viewer engaged with getting there. It wants to be a chilly intellectual melodrama in the vein of latter day Ingmar Bergman. Instead it’s just chilly.

Shadow in the Cloud

Yes, there is a gremlin in Shadow in the Cloud, and like the claustrophobic verticality of the movie’s setting, its presence is always felt like a breath on the back of the neck during a stormy flight. Granted this makes for a more effective first act than second (there is no third). Yet when the film turns into an all-out creature feature with more pulp than an orange grove, there’s still enjoyment to be found for horror fans who always wanted to know what would happen in one of these old school gremlin stories if the monster got through the glass.

Read the full review here.

The Water Man

David Oyelowo is another actor who tried his hand at directing this year via The Water Man. Decidedly family friendly in his first behind-the-camera effort, Oyelowo offers a sweet and gentle children’s adventure story that will land right in the sweet spot for distributor Disney’s target audience. It’s a ghost story for all ages, and like the best spectral yarns from your youth, it is about setting the imagination free to look beyond its backyard.

Oyelowo has a supporting part in the film as a second-guessing father, but The Water Man belongs to the impressive Lonnie Chavis as Gunner, his sensitive son. Gunner is a kid more inclined to sketch his graphic novel than engage with his father, but after realizing his mother (Rosario Dawson) is ill, Gunner and cool girl next door, Jo (Amiah Miller), set off into the woods to find a local legend: to find the Water Man, who’s discovered a way to cheat death. More classical Walt Disney than modern day Guillermo del Toro, there’s still just enough shadow in Oyelowo’s direction to give The Water Man shading. And in those dark pools, young ones can carry much out after the closing credits.

The Way I See It

So much of our collective memory of the men who’ve occupied the Oval Office in the last 50 years is shaped by the invisible hand (and eye) of the Chief Official White House Photographer. Most Americans don’t know the job title, but ever since the Kennedy administration, we’ve known the work. Lyndon Johnson standing next to Jackie Kennedy while being sworn in on Air Force One; Richard Nixon shaking hands with a spaced out Elvis Presley; Bill Clinton blowing hot air into the saxophone in front of Boris Yeltsin; and everything from Barack Obama playing Spider-Man with a young boy to being wound tighter than piano wire while watching the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

More than any other president, Obama’s tenure was defined by a cornucopia of history-making photographs taken by one man: Pete Souza. An old school photojournalist who’d been freelancing around D.C. for decades, Souza made his bones as a White House shutter fly during the much more private second term of Ronald Reagan. But even in his younger days, Souza dreamed of one day getting to go on the full ride of a presidency as its visual historian… little could he suspect he’d do that with the first Black President of the United States.

The Way I See It showcases some of Souza’s most famous images and unpacks the stories behind them, just as Souza unpacks his own life story and career. Directed by Dawn Porter, this documentary offers an astonishing bit of whiplash by transporting us to the Obama Years—an era which feels like four years and a lifetime ago. Warmly nostalgic, the movie ultimately acts like a wonderful exhibition for Souza’s artwork while rarely diving deeper than museum placards with bite-sized information and background. Thus the film is mostly a chance for Obama lovers to get wistful, and for Souza to hone his own political attack ad against Donald Trump by reminding us how much better the world used to be. Which… fair.

The post Toronto International Film Festival 2020 Movie Round-Up appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2RHlBP7

[allenmendezsr]

Fast Fat Burning Meals Cookbook - Paleo, Vegan, Real Food Recipes

New Post has been published on https://autotraffixpro.app/allenmendezsr/fast-fat-burning-meals-cookbook-paleo-vegan-real-food-recipes/

Fast Fat Burning Meals Cookbook - Paleo, Vegan, Real Food Recipes

 Buy Now

    ATTENTION: Men and women over 30 who love good food, are pressed for time, tired of figuring out “what’s for dinner?” and still want to enjoy delicious healthy meals that keep you lean in just minutes a day!

How a Breakthrough Discovery From a Busy Mom and Dad Helps Your Body Burn Fat 24/7 Without Counting Calories, Starving Yourself, or Relying on Unhealthy “Diet” Foods

Hey, Yuri Elkaim and Amy Coates here and we’d like to ask you a question:

Are you fed up with not being able to lose weight and keep it off? Sick and tired of constantly trying to figure out what to have for your next meal? Are you bored of the same old bland meals?

This letter will change all of that for you.

Did you know that in 2013, Americans spent an estimated $2.4 billion on weight-loss diets and pills, according to a report by research firm IBIS World?

Yet, still more than 2/3 of Americans are overweight or obese. So what’s going on here?

Well, one of the largest studies on this topic out of UCLA found that people who diet typically lose 5% to 10% of their starting weight in the first six months, but between one-third and two-thirds of them end up REGAINING more weight than they lost within four to five years.

Why does this happen?

First, when you eat foods that trigger inflammation inside your body – like many diet and processed foods and even seemingly healthy foods like whole grains and soy – your adrenal glands pump out the stress hormone cortisol. Over time, this chronically high level of cortisol prompts your body to store more fat around your stomach and vital organs.

Also, worrying out about what to eat is another form of unneeded stress that leads to elevated cortisol and eventually increased belly fat.

Second, leptin is a hormone that is produced by your fat cells, which tells the control center in your brain (known as the hypothalamus) that you’re “full” and have enough “energy” to function.

Normally, when you eat, your fat cells increase in size slightly, and leptin is released, telling your brain to STOP eating.

However, when you’re overweight or eat processed foods that contain brain-disrupting ingredients like sugar, fructose, MSG, or aspartame, your hypothalamus becomes resistant to leptin.

That means that your brain NEVER gets the message that you’re full and so you feel like eating everything in sight. Your brain’s “off switch” no longer works properly.

So…can you see why eating common “diet” and processed foods (and being overweight) is so dangerous?

Have a look at most of the people you know that have gone on a diet or obsessed about counting calories. Have a look at women and men who choose the low-fat yogurt, the margarine over butter, or think they’re doing good by drinking diet sodas.

Now, you tell us: have their bodies changed at all in the past 90 days? We’ll wager you said, “No,” And you would be correct.

And that’s because most people can’t keep themselves from eating forbidden foods for long…so when they do, they BINGE, taking in a ton of “bad” calories all at once.

The result is simple – MORE fat on your hips, thighs, belly, and everywhere else!

If you’ve ever found yourself in this situation then please know that it is NOT your fault.

Why? Because good people just like you have been misled and lied to by the food and diet industry. You’ve probably even been brainwashed to believe that low-calorie diet foods are “smart” options because they supposedly help you lose weight…quickly and conveniently.

Just pop them in the microwave or open the box…and enjoy!

But the TRUTH is that sneaky food companies vilify health-transforming whole foods because they supposedly take too long to make…and so they force their man-made products on you as the quicker, healthier solution.

(We’ll show you otherwise in just a moment. So keep reading.)

According to a 2006 study in the Journal of Marketing Research, people who saw a “low fat” label on a food package ate up to 50% more of that food in a sitting than people who didn’t. No wonder diet foods make us fatter!

And a 2010 study in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association found that the actual amount of calories in frozen diet foods was an average of 8% higher than what was listed on the label, and that items served in restaurants had 18% more calories than the menus said they did!

The TRUTH is that the diet industry is in the business of making you scared of real, wholesome food and getting you addicted to their quick-fix (yet dangerously fattening) artificial products.

Living off “low calorie”, “low fat”, and other “diet” foods NEVER works in the long run. And it drives you crazy in the process!

Have you ever heard of the French Paradox? It was a catchphrase, first used in the late 1980s, that referred to the paradox that French people have a relatively low incidence of obesity and disease, while having a diet rich in delicious natural foods, including saturated fats.

How could this be?

Here we are in North America obsessing about every little calorie and avoiding the very foods that are helping the French stay lean and healthy.

Michael Pollan, in his book In Defense of Food, explains it best by saying:

“…not any single nutrient, but the combination of nutrients found in unprocessed food; not any one nutrient, nor the amount of carbohydrates or fats or proteins, but the whole length and breadth of nutrients found in “natural” foods as opposed to “processed” foods.”

Eating REAL FOOD made from scratch is how the French and most indigenous cultures around the world have remained lean and healthy.

And that’s exactly how YOU will do it too. And the best part is that you don’t have to spend all day in the kitchen.

We’ll show you how in just a moment…

I (Yuri) used to live in France and experienced their culture and delicious foods firsthand. And I can tell you that calorie counting and diet foods were never a part of their diet – until they recently adopted more American dieting ideals.

And the best part is that we’re going to show how to enjoy the fat burning and health benefits of eating delicious “real” meals in just minutes per day!

Now, we’re sure you understand how important it is to eat real food. We’re not going to insult your intelligence.

But we also know that one of the reasons many people don’t do what they know (ie. eat better quality food) is because most healthy recipes either taste like cardboard or require too much time to prepare.

It’s certainly a lot easier to order take out or rip open a bag of chips when you’re stressed or tight on time.

We get it.

But what if you actually craved delicious, whole food meals? Meals that are simple super to make and that dazzle your tastebuds. And best of all, meals that take mere minutes to make…that you could turn to in a pinch.

Both Amy and I are naturally quite lazy so we completely get not wanting to spend all of your time in the kitchen. Yes, we love good food but we’d rather have it sooner than later, right?

That’s why we only create delicious whole food recipes that burn fat and take no time at all to prepare. We’ve quickly become known for providing the BEST quick and delicious healthy meals that burn fat.

Recipes and meal plans that work for the busy, over-30 man or woman who wants equally FAST results… without spending all day in the kitchen, counting calories, or the same old bland recipes.

Listen: We don’t spend more than a few minutes preparing our meals. We’ve got 3 young boys (and ourselves) to feed so we don’t have time to mess around. But we also love great tasting food that’s good for us and that’s exactly what we’re here to provide for you as well.

Are you tired of feeling like a prisoner to impossible dieting rules and bland health foods that take forever to make? Are you tired of beating yourself if your diet isn’t “perfect”? Are you done feeling guilty for enjoying foods that actually taste good?

If so, then the “Food Freedom Formula” that is integral to this program will finally give you the FREEDOM (and mouthwatering, healthy meals) you’ve been craving for far too long.

Let us quickly tell you about the 3 tenets of our Food Freedom Formula:

Is that something you want?

I bet it is.

This is truly the ultimate done-for-you solution for quick and delicious healthy meals that burn fat…without counting calories, feeling guilty about food, or spending all your time in the kitchen.

It takes the frustration and thought out of meal prep and resets your body’s natural ability to start “burning” every ounce of unwanted fat…

…fat that has been “trapped” inside your body for years.

And yo u’ll get to do this all while savoring delicious dinners, sensational smoothies, healthy “wonder” breads, and even irresistible homemade desserts as often as you like.

Whether you’re looking for paleo or vegan options, you can enjoy the most delicious healthy meals that will please your tastebuds and sizzle away fat. And you’ll get the daily meal plans and grocery lists to make eating yummy, fat-burning meals as easy as 1-2-3.

As a leading holistic nutritionist, health expert, and New York Times bestselling author who’s helped more than 500,000 men and women to amazing health over the past 15 years…

I (Yuri) can tell you that the most important thing you can do to lose weight and keep it off is to focus on the QUALITY – not quantity – of the foods you eat. That means calories matter little if you eat foods that are packed with high quality nutrients.

And that’s what my wife (and fellow nutritionist) Amy and I have spent so many years compiling for our clients. And now you get to benefit from it as well in a way that simplifies your life and allows you to enjoy great tasting food once again.

Here’s what a few of our clients have said about delicious, fat burning meals:

“Eat your way to a new healthier you with Yuri, Amy, and their team’s fantastic recipes! Yes you can eat and love it along with loving your newfound energy and body!! I did and I am!!!”

– Nadine Miral

“I thought that I could never stop eating bread and cheese, but now that I’ve started using these recipes, I can’t imagine eating any other way. Most meals can be prepared in less than half an hour, and they taste great. More importantly, I feel so much better. My acid reflux and IBS symptoms have improved tremendously, and so far I have lost 23 lbs!”

– Michelle Urena

“I have been so impressed with all of the recipes on this plan. They’re simple to make and all very satisfying. I especially love the Creamy Tomato Soup with Sausage, my kids love it too and that is a big plus in my household!”

– Hillary Lambrecht

Having helped more than half a million people to amazing health and lean bodies over the past two decades I’ve seen it…I’ve tried it…and I keep coming back to what really works:

Eating real food in a way that is simple, tasty, and nourishing. No deprivation or complicated dieting schemes.

Did you know that most people have been duped into believing that secret diet foods are required to lose weight and that eating real wholesome foods takes too much time, is too expensive, and is too complicated?

Well, that’s exactly why I’ve put this together Fast Fat Burning Meals cookbook!

You deserve to feel FREE and no longer held hostage by stupid diet “rules” or meals that are impossible to make.

Unlike traditional cookbooks that simply “fire hose” hundreds of time-sucking recipes at you – that are likely more suitable for professional chefs…

The simple “done-for-you” recipes and meal plans inside our cookbook give you fast, fat-burning results, while allowing you to once again enjoy your food – without the guilt!

And you can feel like a hero in your kitchen because they’re so easy to prepare.

Ah…doesn’t that just feel great?

You just have to be willing to follow the recipes and simple meal plan and your body will take care of itself. There are no complicated meal plans, counting calories or points, or gimmicky diet foods found inside.

Why? Because none of that nonsense works…and you know it.

Every shady marketer, diet book, and food company wants you to believe there’s some kind of shortcut to the body and health you desire. They’re full of it. You’re too smart to buy into that, right?

Remember, Amy and I are in our mid 30s. We’re extremely busy raising 3 young boys (under 5 years old), and are on a mission to serve millions of people around the world. We don’t believe in stupid, time-sucking diets or laborious, tasteless recipes.

We put this solution together with busy men and women like us (and older) in mind, and it’s specifically and uniquely tailored to provide you with quick and delicious healthy meals that burn fat.

People like Patrick Diaz…

A busy new dad who for years struggled with being severely overweight. However, following these types of delicious fat-burning meals he lost 30 pounds in just 42 days!

Or look at Michelle – another one of our client’s who was always tired and bloated because she relied on convenient processed foods for most her meals.

After just 21 days she noticed increased energy and that her pants were looser. She even fit into an old pair of skinny jeans!

By day 42, her cravings were gone and she had lost 13 pounds, 4 inches, and 6% body fat!

And it’s these same real food-based meals that will slow the aging process, help you lose years of “trapped” fat, add a pep in your step, and overcome food cravings that may have held you hostage for years!

You’re going to eat anyways so you might as well be eating foods that create the body you want.

And just know THIS…

Over the past 15 years, we have seen the same common “stories” told over and over again…

“I’m too busy and I don’t have time to prepare healthy meals”

“I don’t know how to eat healthy”

“Eating healthy is too expensive”

“I’ve tried everything…I simply can’t lose weight!”

We want you to realize that these stories are just that – stories. And if you have been telling yourself one or more of them, they will hold you back from achieving the health and body you want!

That’s going to stop today because:

The Fast Fat Burning Meals cookbook is a simple, proven system that works for anyone at any age, without overhauling your life.

That means you can prepare delicious healthy meals for yourself and your family without becoming a slave to your kitchen or blowing all of your money on expensive foods.

Amy and I use these recipes to make dinner together with our kids and we have a blast. Most importantly, we look and feel better than ever.

And so too have our clients all around the world. Here’s what a few of them have to say:

“These healthy but oh-so-delicious recipes are the number one reason why I decided that going gluten- and dairy-free is not so bad after all. I couldn’t have done it if it wasn’t so delicious! These meals are amazingly delicious, they make me feel so much happier, healthier and more energetic. They completely changed the way I look at food and eating.”

– Judite Senkane

“Eat your way to a new healthier you with Yuri, Amy, and their team’s fantastic recipes! Yes you can eat and love it along with loving your newfound energy and body!! I did and I am!!!”

– Nadine Miral

“I’ve been everything from vegan to paleo and tried all sorts of eating plans. Yuri’s fat burning meals have been the easiest to make, follow, and most importantly enjoy! They are delicious and straightforward, and easy to incorporate into my busy lifestyle. Moreover, I can make them for my husband and he has no complaints either!

– Kate Skeith

Although we’ve helped hundreds of thousands of men and women around the world to radiant health, know this:

We aren’t genetic freaks. We both had to overcome years of terrible eating habits. And we certainly don’t spend all of our time in the kitchen.

In fact, up until her mid-twenties, Amy struggled with her weight. In college, she exploded past the typical “freshmen fifteen” by packing on a total of 30 lbs in just one year.

It didn’t help that she also worked at McDonalds’ flipping burgers as a teenager. Growing up on fast food and rarely ever having a meal at home that was made from fresh foods, was a ticking time bomb that eventually forced her to body to pack on stubborn weight.

For years, she tried every diet under the sun. She would lose some weight here and there, only to put it back on (with interest) shortly thereafter. It seemed like the more diets she tried, the more weight she ended up gaining afterwards. By following the latest “low fat”, “low calorie”, and other diets-of-the-day she likely did more harm than good.

Then, one day, Amy snapped.

She was gearing up for a hockey game. Getting undressed in the locker room with all the other girls, she felt embarrassed about her body. She was certainly more comfortable hiding under her hockey equipment. At least she thought so.

As she started to “gear up”, she slid her legs through your hockey pants and pulled them up. But they wouldn’t budge! She couldn’t believe it. She couldn’t even fit into her big hockey pants anymore. She felt like running away and hiding in a cave. She knew something had to change.

Then there’s me:

I certainly wasn’t always a highly sought after health and nutrition expert or New York Times bestselling author… and I certainly wasn’t always a regular guest on shows like Dr. Oz or The Doctors.

Growing up, my terrible diet caused me to suffer from a host of health problems that I thought would simply take care of themselves because I was so active.

Instead, my digestive problems, eczema, asthma, and low energy eventually erupted into a full-blown autoimmune condition, in which my body attacked my hair, leaving me complete bald from head to toe just before my 17th birthday. I later discovered that this was largely caused by my diet and eating a lot of supposed health foods.

Because of our mutual struggles growing up on foods that are known dangers to the human body, Amy and I have always been passionate about learning the truth about what creates optimal health and a lean body. We wanted answers to our problems and those answers came rushing in when we returned to school in our mid-twenties to study holistic nutrition.

Since discovering the life-changing health and nutrition secrets from that schooling, Amy has lost years of stubborn weight, had to buy smaller hockey pants, and kept off the weight even after multiple pregnancies. And both of us are leaner and healthier than we’ve ever been.

And we’re motivated more than ever to keep eating this way so that we can provide our kids with the best start in life as possible. Something neither Amy nor I had growing up.

It just so happens that the very meals that have kept both Amy and I super lean and our entire family healthy are the SECRET to helping you burn more fat as well.

Amy and I are not genetics freaks (as we just showed you) and the recipes and meal plans that you’re about to enjoy inside this cookbook haven’t just transformed our bodies and health…

They’ve also done so for countless other men and women around the world as we showed you above.

The same exact system that produced the above results can give you the health and body you want as well. But how?

No matter how much weight you have to lose…no matter if your hormones are a mess…and even if don’t think you can lose weight and keep it off…

You can! And you will because:

Our “unique” whole food recipes help your body in TWO specific (and powerful) ways:

They cool deadly inflammation, and

They rebalance your hormones and re-establish normal hormone-to-brain communication that puts an end to cravings, insatiable hunger, and excess fat storage.

And this is crucial since we’ve already shown you that eating the wrong foods that disrupt your hormone and create inflammation are the very cause of your weight gain!

Thus, eating foods that fight inflammation, like the ones that are abundantly found in our Fast Fat Burning Meals cookbook, is vitally important at helping you beat belly fat.

In fact, ALL of your hormones will start to function properly as you start eating the right kinds of foods…

The result…effortless weight loss!

Now, here’s the really good part (and ladies, listen up!) You are in TOTAL CONTROL — you simply eat when you want and stop when you’re full. At last, your body works as it should and you are in control of what you eat – not the other way around. You enjoy complete peace of mind knowing that every meal and necessary shopping list is provided for you. No more guesswork. Doesn’t that feel awesome?!

I know, this sounds so incredibly simple… and it is. You see, you might be confused right now about how to eat to lose weight…in a way that is actually easy and healthy for you.

There are so many super-complicated diets and recipes out there that are not as healthy as they’d like you to believe – it’s enough to confuse anyone! And it’s not your fault.

So many magazines print the most confusing, and downright STUPID diet plans and recipes (loaded with inflammatory and hormone disrupting foods) we’ve ever seen! It’s no wonder the nation is growing fatter by the year, and people have no idea how to eat well.

Our motto is: radiant health and lasting weight loss begin in YOUR kitchen with clean, simple, and great-tasting whole foods.

So, let’s recap what we’ve learned so far:

Since your body is truly made in the kitchen, the fastest way to lose years of “trapped” fat is to have “done-for-you” recipes and meal plans based on real, whole foods that fight inflammation and reset your body’s hormones to function properly. NOT counting calories, relying on fleeting willpower, or turn to “diet” foods that send a wave of toxins into your body that disrupt your ability to lose weight and keep it off…and drive you crazy in the process.

The mistake you absolute MUST AVOID is obsessing about calories and depriving yourself of delicious REAL foods. Because, if you do, it’s only a matter of time before you rebel and eat everything in sight…causing you to pack on even more fat!

The solution is to focus on eating high-quality foods that are fast and easy to make so that obsessing about calories becomes unnecessary. Remember, low-calorie “diet” foods disrupt hormones in your body and create excess inflammation, which forces you to store fat and eat more. By contrast, eating delicious (even higher calorie) REAL food lowers inflammation and helps your metabolism reset so that it can naturally release unneeded fat. And you get to actually ENJOY your food again!

The results have been proven for centuries by generations of men and women who ate real food found in nature. Not the processed crap that you see on TV and down most aisles in the grocery store. Now, YOU can have the exact “blueprint” to give your body exactly what it needs to shed fat and feel amazing! And it’s easier than ever before. Just eat!

Unless you’re a NY times bestselling nutrition author and health expert who knows exactly the right foods to eat for cooling inflammation, resetting your hormones, and releasing “trapped” fat, OR…

You’re a trained chef who knows exactly how to make mouth-watering healthy meals in a matter of minutes, OR…

You already have a proven “done-for-you” daily meal plan with itemized grocery lists that’s actually getting you the fat loss results you want, THEN…

You simply cannot find anything like the Fast Fat Burning Meals cookbook anywhere on the planet but on this page.

Sure, you can find copycat approaches to meal planning online. And there are certainly no shortage of cookbooks at your disposal. If you really wanted to, you could order every cookbook on Amazon and try figuring out which ones will help reshape your body. You could also spend about 100+ hours on Google and probably track down 80% of what Amy and I provide for you in the Fast Fat Burning Meals cookbook.

You could do that…but why?

After all, that’s the exact reason why we created this solution. We’ve not only created the system FOR you. We’ve already put the beautiful recipes with full color professional photos that make your mouth water, the daily meal plans, and the action steps all into one convenient, easy to follow place that you can access AND put into action immediately. That’s it. Quick and delicious healthy meals that burn fat – every time!

So, it’s up to you: get access to everything we’ve created for you – for pennies on the dollar – or start digging around and hope you figure it out.

And, no matter what you decide, you will never access our amazing transformation stories (just look where Amy started after 3 pregnancies), all the specifics that can make or break your results, and all the ridiculous freebies I’m about to show you without trying out this one-of-a-kind cookbook.

Here’s what you get TODAY:

Fast Fat Burning Meals Cookbook($37 value)

Enjoy 30 of our best fat-burning meals that you and your entire family will enjoy. They take less than 15 minutes to make, are 100% allergy-friendly, and big on flavor.

Plus, we’ve organized them for you in a convenient and easy-to-follow 30-day meal plan so that you know exactly what to have for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Now you can look forward to eating again without all the fuss – quickly and conveniently! Finally, enjoy – 100% guilt-free – delicious, healthy, fat-burning recipes like these:

And many more!

Easy-to-Follow 30-Day Meal Plan ($17 value)

Built into this cookbook is a “done-for-you” 30-day meal plan that structures all of your recipes into a daily breakfast, lunch, and dinner MENU for faster fat loss and so that you never have to stress about what to have for your next meal ever again.

Itemized Grocery List ($7 value)

To make your life even easier, you’ll also get an itemized shopping list for all of the necessary ingredients for each meal so that you know exactly which foods and ingredients (and in what quantities) to grab at the store. Having this detailed breakdown will save you time and money on foods that may otherwise go to waste.

Together, that’s a total retail value of $61 and even at that – it’s a total steal. Yet, that’s not what you pay today because I’ve set up a special discount just for you to make grabbing the Fast Fat Burning Meals cookbook as an absolute no-brainer!

Go it alone, and you will end up confused and frustrated…and you’ll end up right back here where you are right now. Amy and I have seen it time and time again – people try and do it on their own without our super simple recipes and daily meal plans.

The results are NOT pretty.

Sure it sounds easy to “eat healthy” and that you can probably get similar solutions elsewhere. But let’s get real: if that were true, you would have done so already and would look and feel exactly the way you want.

Without using our “Food Freedom Formula” your body will continue to struggle with excess inflammation and messed up hormones that are preventing you from losing weight and feeling more youthful.

That’s because our Food Freedom Formula is highly specific and requires eating (and omitting) exactly the right foods. It requires adhering to a simple-to-follow, yet specific, daily meal plan that is proven to melt fat.

You can’t just slap a bunch of recipes together and expect great results. That’s what amateurs do. Pros follow a proven plan that is developed by experts who have discovered the “formula” to quick and lasting results.

That’s what Amy and I have spent the last 15 years mastering. Now, for less than the cost of a greasy pizza you can tap into our expertise and enjoy the quickest, tastiest, and healthiest meals that burn fat – quickly!

There are some people we simply do not want to give a copy of our cookbook to… and we mean NO offense, but we just don’t want you to waste your time and money. Fair?

You think “simple” means we’re going to “hand deliver” these meals to your front door. Dream on. You are the one that has to take a few minutes each day to prepare your meals. We’ve done everything for YOU except shop, chop, and cook your food…making it as easy as possible for you to meet us half way.

You don’t want to improve the way you are eating. We cover some very simple, basic dietary improvements that you will need to make to see results come extra fast. These are essential, especially if you need to lose weight. Nothing radical, but still…you will not be eating pizza, French fries, and ice cream and wake up with the body of your dreams.

You don’t love great tasting REAL food. Both Amy and I are big time foodies. We love good food that’s actually good for you…and that’s what we specialize in creating for you. If you want to rely on “diet” foods that come in a box, then isn’t for you.

Or, you refuse to move away from counting calories and worrying about grams of fat. Once again, calories matter very little when you eat the right nutrient-rich foods. Sure coconut milk contains more fat and calories than margarine, but you know which one is better for you, don’t you? So let’s agree to just eat natural, whole foods without fussing about that nonsense.

Or, you are just one of those folks who will buy the cookbook and then let it sit on your desktop and never put it to use. Please, don’t waste your money if that’s the case. However, if that IS the case, just realize you’re only going to gain more and more weight…lose control over your diet…be held hostage by food cravings….and perhaps even become ill…unless you do something about your diet and health, starting today.

Look around you…drive down any major street…walk through any food court…

What do you see?

Nothing that will support your goal of eating healthy and losing weight. In fact, the onslaught of terrible fast and fattening convenience foods is exactly why Amy and I are determined to get these simple, healthy fat-burning meals into your hands.

We know you’re pressed for time. So are we. We know you don’t want to give up delicious foods. Neither do we. And we know you’re done with all that calorie counting nonsense, right?

We want you to succeed and we want to make it easy for you to incorporate fast, healthy fat burning meals into your life.

That’s why we’re giving you this to you TODAY at such a ridiculous discount.

Also, this is not some super-fancy hardcover book with a million-dollar publisher’s ad budget. This is just a simple, yet beautiful, comprehensive, and to-the-point digital cookbook (PDF format) that will give you the everything you need – recipes, inspiring pictures, meal plan, ingredients – in as little time as possible.

Plus, we’re on a mission to transform the lives of more than 10 million people by 2018. And we know that the only to do that is by making done-for-you healthy, fat-burning recipes and meal plans more accessible to reach as many people as possible.

Which means that if, within 60 days, you do not feel that the Fast Fat Burning Meals Cookbook has saved you time, given you more peace of mind, and helped you stay lean without ever counting calories and giving up delicious foods, then you don’t pay a dime…. and you still get to keep the cookbook as our gift to you!

If you aren’t impressed before the end of your FREE 30-day trial, then simply email us so we can cancel your membership.

To celebrate the release of this new cookbook, we’re giving you a $20 discount. However, this offer is only valid for a few days – until this countdown timer on this page expires.

After that, this RIDICULOUSLY low price will be gone and we’ll be increasing the price of the cookbook to its higher regular price.

So you best order now to make sure you lock in the lowest price possible. Plus…

Yet, We Wanted to Give You These Extra Gifts Today…

To accelerate your success and give you even more quick, healthy “done-for-you” meals, we’re also throwing in the following 2 “juicy” bonuses:

Wheat-Free Wonder Breads ($17 value)

Who doesn’t love bread? Sadly, most breads are terrible for your health, create high levels of inflammation, send your blood sugar soaring, and force your body to store excess belly fat.

Well, not anymore! Now, you can have your bread and eat it too with our delicious gluten-free, wheat-free “wonder breads”. You can enjoy these delicious breads until your heart’s content because they’re 100% healthy, loaded with fiber and protein, and take less than 30 minutes to bake in the oven. You’ll enjoy breads like our “Guilt-Free Super Bread”, “Delicious Dinner Rolls”, and mouthwatering “Banana Bread” – just to name a few.

21 Slimming Smoothies ($17 value)

Making a smoothie is one of the easiest ways to send a surge of easily absorbable “high-power” nutrients into your body. In just one glass, you can get 3-5 servings of vegetables and fruit, which provide the vital nutrients your body needs to stay lean and healthy.

In this recipe guide, you’ll get 21 of our best slimming smoothies that you can whip together in 3 minutes or less so that you can get on with the rest of your day and feel about yourself. These are perfect to use when you’re pinched for time and want a quick, healthy “liquid” meal.

Then, we’ve got to be really honest with you. We don’t like sugar-coating the truth and that’s part of the reason we’re so good at helping people transform their bodies and health.

Moments from now, you could be transforming your relationship with food, eating as much of the right foods as you desire…all while burning more fat than you thought possible.

But here’s the thing:

You can keep doing exactly what you’re doing now. You can continue struggling to find the right recipes that are proven to prime your body to release “trapped” fat. You can count all the calories you want without seeing any difference on the scale. Your pants will still feel tight. And you’ll still be held hostage by food cravings and last-minute “convenience foods” decisions because you lack the right plan.

Your “obsession with food” will kick into full gear…all while others who are using our Food Freedom Formula are FREE from the shackles of dieting struggles. They’ll be in full control of the foods they eat. You won’t be.

The months and years will pass, and you will have LOST a golden opportunity to take advantage of a proven system…at the absolute lowest price that will ever be offered.

Sure, that may sound harsh but we’d rather be honest with you then pretend that everything is going to be ok if you try figuring this out on your own.

But never forget this:

Both Amy and I believe in YOU. We believe that you will make the best and only decision for your greatest chance at shedding years of “trapped” fat, eating healthy consistently, turning back the clock, and living a life full of energy.

Your friends in deliciously healthy and simple meals,

Yuri Elkaim, BPHE, RHN New York Times bestselling author, The All-Day Energy Diet

Amy Coates, BSc., RHN Creators, Fast Fat Burning Meals

P.S. Every second you wait the odds are good you will do nothing. Success in life requires action, so act right now while it’s fresh in your mind…

P.S.S. Remember, you have a full 60-day trial period to put Fast Fat Burning Meals to work for you! Put these meals to the test and you’ll see and feel the difference almost immediately. With today’s special discount and “no questions asked” Money Back Guarantee there’s NO WAY you can lose…

“Excellent easy to follow recipes. Most importantly, they are delicious and healthy and I look forward to making them. Now I consider myself a better cook and the credit goes to Yuri and his team!”

– Seann Vinyasa-Billson

“Loving the recipes – common grocery items, easy to put together, and taste wonderful! My hunger is totally satisfied and there are enough servings for your better half or family to eat, too. I’m already feeling more energy and less bloated. Yuri – you should have your own show on the Cooking Channel or Food Network!”

– Brenda Halverson

“These recipes have been a life saver for me! It takes all of the guesswork out of what to cook everyday. Not only is the food delicious, but it makes me feel great! Thank you, Yuri, for making weight loss so simple!”

– Allison McWilliams

Q. What makes this cookbook any different from all the rest?

No other cookbook uses our “Food Freedom Formula” which gives you delicious whole food recipes that take less than 15 minutes to make. The end result is that you are in full control of what you eat, free of bad choices, spend less time in the kitchen, and are eating your way to the body of your dreams.

Each recipe is accompanied by a beautiful picture that will make you salivate just looking at it. And to make your life even easier, we’ve provided a no-thinking-required 30-day meal plan so you’ll know exactly which of the meals to make and when. Plus, you’ll also get an itemized grocery list so you have pinpoint accuracy when buying your groceries – this saves you both time and money! Good luck finding all this anywhere else, at such a no-brainer price.

Q. Will these recipes fit into my paleo/raw/vegan, etc… lifestyle?

Yes, the recipes we create that can soothe all eating plans. Some are perfect for paleo, others for vegetarians, and so forth. The one thing they all have in common is that they’re low in sugar, allergen-friendly, are quick to make, and taste amazing.

Q. Are these recipes suitable for the entire family?

YES, they are absolutely family-friendly. Amy and I have 3 young boys and they eat what we eat, which means our meals need to be healthy and delicious. You’ll enjoy most of the meals we make at home as well as those from our contributors, which even the pickiest of eaters will fall in love with.

Q. What if I’m allergic to dairy, gluten, soy, or eggs?

Not worry. None of the recipes contain gluten, dairy, or soy and we have many egg-free recipes as well.

Q. Is this suitable for a non-cook?

YES! On top of all the recipes you’ll learn simple and essential cooking techniques that deliver outstanding taste and great nutrition in no time at all. You don’t need to be a pro to enjoy clean and lean food at home.

Q. Is it going to be really expensive to follow the recipes?

No. We’ve committed to making this easy for you to follow and light on your wallet, especially when you consider spending less money dining out and more time dining in and enjoying the food you cook in your own kitchen.

Which means that if, within 60 days, you do not feel that the Fast Fat Burning Meals Cookbook has saved you time, given you more peace of mind, and helped you stay lean without ever counting calories and giving up delicious foods, then you don’t pay a dime…. and you still get to keep the cookbook as our gift to you!

If you aren’t impressed before the end of your FREE 30-day trial, then simply email us so we can cancel your membership.

[animeniac]

Starbomb Ch. 13

Fandom: BNHA Pairing: Katsucha; Kacchako; Bakuraka Genre: Romance Word count: Over 5k! Chapter Summary: Uraraka stays up all night thinking about Bakugou. He keeps her company and they bake cookies in their own kacchako way. One thing leads to another, and Uraraka gets into a mess she might regret. A/N: Last chapter was not lighthearted. This chapter is…kinda. PM me for more chapters and links.

“Don’t. Go.”

Bakugou’s strong hand clutched her arm like she was his last resort. Uraraka could hear each breath he took in between her own until they became in sync. What did this mean?

Many questions bounced through he mind into the thickening air between them. She could have freed herself but instead realized the narrowing of their distance from each other. Magnetic.

Since when did Bakugou have such comely features? His quivering brow inspired endless fluttering from her stomach to her heart. Such serene slumber could draw tears from her eyes.

She sharply breathed.

Following the middle line of his body, she noticed how his buttoned shirt revealed his muscular and chiseled midriff. Did that appeal to her? She had never considered the appearance of Bakugou. While she did not consider anyone ugly, she did only consider the physical appeal of someone once she had grown fond of them.

Though his hand around her wrist caused her heart to speed and palms to sweat, she immediately realized that the fearless sentiment that rapidly consumed her. Instead of panic, his strong arm secured her safety by such a simple gesture as hand holding.

She leaned closer. Was this what it meant to find something irresistible? A guilty pleasure.

No, not pleasure. If she moved, then he’d wake up. He would never let her live this down.

Her head remained mere inches above his pillow as she pondered and contemplated how someone could change their appearance once they slept. Bakugou was handsome. Gravity pulled the girl more than it had ever burdened her before. And she wanted to give in.

Her elbow that supported her began to buckle.

Tears of confusion dropped before she did. Inevitably, she her head fell to the pillow.

Bakugou’s eyes shot open. They widened before he understood the reality of the situation.

Closing her eyes, she apologized, “Sorry, sorry, sorry. I’m sorry for pushing you. And calling you a villain and being weird. Sorry.”

Silence.

She anticipated his wrath - strident outbursts, huffing, or a scoff - yet his grip became no tighter than it had before. Slowly, she opened her eyes and expected a hot glare.

His inherently intense, scarlet eyes peered back at her. The gaze alone left heat on her pink cheeks until a burst of warmth developed in her chest. Not a twitch in his brow or a clenched muscle in his jaw, he blankly stared into her like he had seen the entirety of his life and future in her large, brown eyes. Awe written in bold letters across his face, his lips never closed from his slumbering state.

Her breathing slowed and calmed and settled as he held her with his eyes. Only for split seconds did he break their mutual gaze to blink. By the second, she melted into the pillow and the earth below them.

A quick sigh of relief escaped her lips, for she felt a strange familiarity with the man she lied next to. A resonating tune that transcended dreams. Surely, she must have attributed too much of that to this person.

Tears stayed suspended at the corners of her eyes and threatened to leak and long for a person like that mythical Bakugou.

Was he still sleep? Why didn’t he say anything?

A sneeze came from the opposite side of the room. Then a yawn. Kotone. She brushed her dark bangs from her eyes and looked up at the TV. “Is the movie over? You guys gotta come back. This doesn’t count.” she asked as she stretched her arms.

Suddenly the room paused as Kotone’s brightening cerulean eyes glanced up and around the room.

“Why is Bakugou on the ceiling?” she innocently asked as she placed a finger at the lobe ear.

Truthfully, Kotone had been awake for a while. No one could have slept through the deafening heartbeats of those two.

Bakugou crossed his arms with his back against the cement ceiling. He groaned, “Yeah, Uraraka, why am I up here?” Dry and free of rage, his red eyes loomed above her like blazing, red stars.

And she could not stop herself from staring into them.

Finally, Uraraka escaped from the bed and stood on the floor nearby. “My hand slipped. I guess I was starting to fall asleep,” she lied. She frowned to stifle her smile, “I’ll get you down.” With a short exhale, she choked on laughter when Bakugou fell face first onto the bed.

Kotone begged, “Please stay a little bit longer.”

They both knew they needed to leave. Though between them was an undeniable sense of complacency and security, a paradoxical danger of the unknown loomed above them. Why did they lie down together? How did they find forgiveness after a day full of conflict in silence?

Uraraka gulped. She knew that she needed to mask the events of the day and the mutable feelings that brewed in her core with an innocent friendship of felicity. After all she was Uravity the buoyant hero. She could befriend anyone.

On the other hand, Bakugou sank into his mattress. He dwelled on the intensity of his pure and unadulterated joy. “Anything to keep her,” he thought.

On the way home, Uraraka wanted to ask - was he awake or asleep when he pleaded for her to stay? She thought the former circumstance to be impossible, but then why did he dream of her. From the train, she noticed his lethargic hesitation to cross the automatic doors.

“Oi, fucker,” she chirped.

Bakugou jumped in place. He forced his rigid legs forward to chide, “What the hell are you saying?!” He did not know whether to fall for her all over again or curse himself for smudging her dialect. “Don’t say that!”

She smirked, “That’s Bakuology 101. Bakugou always says somethin’ to cuss words.” That woke him up.

Approaching her, he sprawled his fingers and placed a hand on her face to cover every round feature of hers. He took a deep breath as the train doors closed behind him. Those doe eyes shined their spotlight on him, and for the first time that day, he felt confident that he could make sense. “Yeah, okay. Fine.”

He smirked at her. A true and smug smirk as opposed to her amused, sly grin.

That meant he accepted her apology, right? His palm pressed against her lips when she mumbled, “What are you doing? Why are you covering my face?” Uraraka knew not to dwell on his passing remark, but internally, she rejoiced. Could he see the energy that blazed from her soul?

“Because it pisses me off.”

So then, that was it? Uraraka hoped she had gotten her wish that they had gone back to normal. That’s all she knew that she wanted from him. Seeing the humanity in his intimidating, red eyes inspired a floaty glee inside her as she stood on the tips of her toes. “Move your hand,” she whined.

That side of him. Maybe she wanted to see that glareless stare. Maybe she wanted to hear the tenderness in his voice. Maybe she wanted to feel his touch. That perfectly balanced temperature - maybe she wanted more of that.

They talked about how crappy the movie was for nearly half the trip before they realized that they had no reason to stand so close to each other on an empty train car.

For some insane reason, they stood inches away from each other like they had nowhere else to go. Perhaps this happened because of their earlier, routine commute.

Uraraka pointed it out. “Oh, I guess we can sit down,” she noted as she backed away from the pole. Typically, she would have been bold enough to threaten to sit next to him. Now, she anticipated his pursuit.

The train rumbled and she lost her footing.

Bakugou caught her by the wrist once again and glared down at her. “What do you think you’re doing?” he growled.

The girl blinked, “What do you mean?” Escaping!

Ditsy girl. “You’re better than that.”

Surely, he did not mean the fact that she ran. Or her bumbling balance.

When he pulled her up, their chests met - reminiscent of their passionate kiss. She touched her hot face before separating from him. He always had to shift the tides of the atmosphere - flaming the waters in his favor.

Bakugou merely quirked an eyebrow as he attempted to read the foreign language of her features. Frowning, blushing, fidgeting fear. All these social cues would have been easier for him to understand if he only looked at people more. “What are you going to do?” He asked. He was willing to learn.

“Sit down. I’m feeling kind of dizzy.”

Was she sick? “You’ve been eating, right? Or are you on your - your?” What was that thing that girls like his mother experienced every once in a while?

“Stop!” she pleaded as she plopped down. Why did he always have to ruin everything?

Bakugou could not decide which side to sit on - hers or his own. So, instead, he chose to stand in the middle.

That made Uraraka stir, for she anticipated a decision the entire time. Biting her lip, she admitted, “I had fun today.”

After all that shit? The fighting, the silence, the tears, the drama? “I didn’t!” he declared. Though, any day with her was a good day - day he would not trade for anything.

But the night bore more gifts for the two - ribbons of destiny that would wrap them together.

…

Night of routine: gym, dorm dinner, pajamas, sleep. Then a reprieve from monotony. Uraraka could not sleep.

She tossed and turned until she nearly fell from her bed. That pure, ruby stare had stained her mind. As she crept into the commons, she figured moving around would aid her, but that decision only led her back to him.

“What are you doing?”

Uraraka didn’t need to turn around to know that he stood behind her. Bakugou. Once again. “I can’t sleep,” she admitted.

He pivoted himself over the back of the couch and landed on the cushion to her right. “Because of that stupid movie?”

Stiffly, she nodded and kept her eyes on the floor.

“You’re such a shitty liar.”

She jumped. No way he saw through that. Glancing over at him, she stuttered, “W-what?”

“You said it didn’t bother you earlier. Now you can’t even sleep.”

Fortunately, she could breathe a sigh of relief. Her shoulders leaned back into the couch. “Leave me alone,” requested Uraraka. Maybe she was a little tired and definitely hungry. The stirring and ponderous nausea in her gut left little room for food at dinner time, so she only ate a small salad. Yet now, she felt audible growls erupt.

Without giving her shit, he stood up and trailed away.

Uraraka got to her feet and followed after him for a few paces before she asked, “Wait, where are you going?” She didn’t mean for him to actually leave.

“I don’t like being irresponsible by skipping meals. Unlike you.” Well, he wouldn’t be Bakugou Katsuki if he didn’t criticize her a little bit. Maybe the night subdued his hostility, or maybe she looked damn cute in those bland, black pajamas of hers.

Uraraka did not know whether or not following him into the dark abyss of the kitchen would lead to her demise. However, she could not resist the pull of his strong, muscular back against his dark undershirt. As she stared at the way his large arms paced along with him, her head grew lighter, so she caught up to him and walked next to him to avoid the strange sensation. “Hey, that was complicated!” she finally replied.

He spat, “Keep your voice down.”

If he were so damn intimidating, then why did she walk by his side?

Pleased, he covered his mouth. He’d rather die than allow her to catch the slightest twitch of his lips. But finally - if only for a moment, she was equal in pace and spirit to him.

The distance satisfied him as well. Though his free hand dangled at his side, he could deal with the absence of her palm.

She turned on the light to the kitchen, and Bakugou scoured the cabinets. Crackers, rotten lemons, stale bread, and crap like flour. Heroes loved their snacks - especially meat apparently. “Who ate my damn chex mix? I bet it was Kaminari. I’ll kill him.”

“Bakugou?” called Uraraka.

He jumped. Though, he hadn’t forgotten she was there. That sweet, melodic voice graced his ears. “What?” he asked. Truly, he could listen to her all day.

“Are there any cookies or something? I had a little food earlier.”

He silently continued to search. Flour. Butter. Sugar. Once he realized everything came together, he grinned.

Uraraka furrowed her eyebrows and placed a hand on his back. Immediately, he tightened, and she noticed his muscles tense beneath her palm. “It’s okay. I can just drink some water.”

He leaned over the counter to break their contact and groaned as he shoved his fingers through his hair. “If you want the damn cookies,” he growled through his teeth, “then we’re making some damn cookies.”

Sweat slid down her temple and backed away. “O-okay.”

Maybe they hadn’t gone back to normal. She stared at her hand that had grazed the tension in his back.

Bakugou had opened himself up to try new things. He could not admit to Uraraka of all people that he’d never baked cookies. Of all his talents, surely he could accomplish it. Grabbing the measuring cups, he let out a quick, disgruntled sigh. Those were necessary, right?

“I’m not really a good chef because I never have all the ingredients I need, but I like sweets so I learned how to cook those at least. Plus, they’re pretty cheap to make,” explained Uraraka as she grabbed other ingredients like baking soda and vanilla extract. “Let’s keep it easy and just do some sugar cookies.”

She didn’t want to embarrass herself either. Surely, he would judge her harshly or make a remark on how even Deku needed better wife material because that’s how she felt. Asui could cook for her entire family. She sighed.

“Sugar? Don’t all cookies have sugar in them?” Bakugou asked. Dammit. He shouldn’t have. Late at night, perhaps, his guard had dropped.

“Oh, I know it by heart,” Uraraka proudly smiled over her shoulder. “Could you pass me the eggs? 3 of them.” Going into the pantry, she grabbed a frilly, pink apron by the mere force of habit.

Bakugou muttered under his breath about how he didn’t like to take orders before he inevitably grabbed 3 of the 6 eggs from the fridge. When he turned around, he saw her. Cute and pink and frilly with a cloth of an apron that accentuated her oh-so-feminine bust and hips.

Boom. Crack.

The three eggs busted in his explosive hands. Running them to the sink, he cursed, “What? Don’t tell me you’re scared of getting a little food on you! What are you doing wearing that?!” His hot face steamed the water that he splashed onto his face before he went back to the fridge to try again.

Three eggs. He took a deep breath. He could handle that.

“Hey, you don’t gotta be rude,” complained Uraraka. Why did it anger him so much? “Just pass me some eggs. Do you need me to hold them?”

Instead of handing them to her like most boys would have with their crush, he pitched them like ping pong balls.

With her agility, she scrambled to catch each of them. “Bakugou!” she whined. “Cut it out!”

That’s a hero for you.

Bakugou smirked, “Shut up! You got that stupid towel on you. What does it fucking matter?” A haughty snicker in his throat, he grinned.

Dashing for the sink, she grabbed the hose and aimed it at him. “I swear Imma shoot ya,” she promised with a light giggle. What a jerk.

…

Midoriya lost track of time when he went out with Asui. He hadn’t broken curfew since moving there. How could he be the number one hero if he missed curfew?

When they approached the corner near the kitchen, Asui pulled him back to hide. What were Bakugou and Uraraka doing at that hour? She couldn’t let her friend see her return with Midoriya at that hour!

“Why are you hiding?”

Bakugou violently whipped a bowl of butter and sugar while Uraraka poured flour into a measuring cup. His elbow bumped her arm, and he barked, “Klutz!” Before laughing at her blunder.

She laughed, too.

Midoriya was not sure what that meant, but they looked like they were having fun. Although his old friend had moments where his body grew stiff, his sunken shoulders and relaxed smirk indicated a rare aura of happiness between the two.

Asui hoped that the scene meant that her relationship with Bakugou had improved. She wanted a clear and guilt-free pathway to build something with Midoriya. She could hardly say that she liked him, and he was too dense to understand simple implications.

“Tsu,” he called.

She put her finger to his lips and blinked at him. Asui whispered, “Ribbit.”

What did that even mean? Midoriya internally groaned until he realized the contact. His eyes widened and he straightened his back against the wall. “T-Tsu,” he moaned.

Asui stared into his eyes for a few moments until the touching became too much for her to handle. Her racing heart and sweaty hands threatened to break her calm facade, so she released him.

She insisted on hiding.

No way! Did Asui like Bakugou? His heart sank until he decided to ask, “Do you like Bakugou?” He knew not to get his hopes up, but he wondered how that would affect their time together. Also, he probably vented too much about the blonde’s developing relationship with Uraraka.

Before Midoriya could spiral down a whirlpool of doubt, Asui stopped him. “I like you,” she admitted clearly and all at once.

She needed to drive the wedge, but she wondered if their friendship would collapse because of her tactless declaration.

Midoriya twitched and whimpered and panted in response. His red face complemented his dark, green hair. “Gah? L-Like a friend, right?” he assumed! He couldn’t allow himself to jump to conclusions.

Twisting the metaphorical knife, she sighed, “More than a friend, ribbit.” How many times would she have to confess before he understood?

His heart hopped from his chest as his panting quickened. “Hah? What? Asui, you couldn’t be saying that,” he cried. Literal tears dripped from his eyes. A girl - not any girl but cute Tsuyu - confessed to him like it was nothing. This had to be a dream. “Tsu, am I dead?”

Tsuyu sighed and rolled her eyes. He was making too much noise. She rolled her eyes, and pushed him back towards the exit. His answer hardly mattered. No matter what, they could not be together until Uraraka gave them her blessing. That’s what having a friend meant in this love triangle situation. So, her trembling mouth did not fret rejection.

“Let’s go,” she suggested.

“W-Where? Oh, right, I have to answer.” What would his answer be? The confession disoriented him. The only reason he had not thought of her as more than a friend was that he thought someone like him could only have girls as friends. What was love? Was it what Bakugou and Uraraka had?

Asui frowned, “No, you don’t.”

…

Cookies placed and baking in the oven, Bakugou sat on the counter while he watched Uraraka clean up the dishes.

“I wanna lick the spoon,” announced Uraraka.

“And get salmonella? Don’t be stupid.”

Grabbing the spoon, she taunted as she waved it in front of her face, “I’m washin’ the dishes, so I get to lick the spoon. That’s how it works.”

Bakugou snarled, “Shut up.” His eyelids sunk as he watched her pink tongue caress the convex side of the black, silicone spoon. He pressed his tongue against his teeth.

“Yummy,” she mumbled with her protruding tongue. Though the sweet dough satisfied her curiosity, stroking her tongue against the utensil in front of Bakugou had a new, lurid connotation. Uraraka frowned, “Dontcha think we should talk about the kiss?”

Bakugou nearly fell from the counter. Just in time, he jumped down and regained his footing on the floor. “What?” exclaimed the young hero with a tomato painted face.

How could she bring it up so easily?

Crossing her arm over her chest, she hugged herself and sighed, “I’m not mad anymore, and I know it was an accident. I just can’t stop thinkin’ ‘bout it.”

She only wanted to dispel the tension in the room. Why did licking a spoon in front of him have to feel conducive to his attention? Or, rather, seductive.

Bakugou silently cursed her audacity and bold demeanor. He marched across the kitchen to the sink. “I’m your first kiss, right?” asked the blond. That curiosity had been weighing him down ever since. He furrowed his eyebrows and averted his eyes when he asked.

Oh, why did he have to be such a weirdo? Slowly, she nodded, “Y-yeah.”

With a thumb pointed to his chest, he declared, “And I haven’t swapped spit with anybody else neither.”

Uraraka looked at the tile floor as she leaned back against the sink. “So what are you sayin’?” asked the trembling girl. She held the spoon up to part their faces.

He slipped his tongue across his lips and stroked it against the concave side of the spoon. “It means something is there that can’t be undone, alright? So get over yourself.”

His crimson eyes melted her. As he leaned closer towards her, he stared her down to nothing. Every inch of her body heated under his leer and the pulsing of her heart rattled her to the core and beneath the rim of her short pajama shorts.

Ding.

Uraraka gasped and whacked Bakugou’s nose with the spoon. “Cookies are ready!”

“Mother fucker. What was that for?!”

Opening the oven door, she hardly felt the wave of heat that pushed against her face. “What did he mean when he said 'don’t go?’” she silently wondered. Without thinking about the safety of the situation, she reached for the cookie sheet with an exposed hand.

“Uraraka!” shouted Bakugou before he snatched her from behind by the waist. “Your hands are your future. What the fuck are you doing? You could have burned yourself, you idiot.”

She panted. What did he mean when he said don’t go?!

The anti-gravity hero didn’t realize what happened until Bakugou pulled her back and released her. She touched her face before fleeing to the corner.

“What is your problem?” He complained as he dressed a hand with an oven mitt and retrieved the cookies.

“Sorry,” she quickly apologized. Her hand dropped down to rub her abdomen where he had grabbed.

Bakugou scoffed, “Don’t go losing your shit again.” She scared him with her carelessness.

Neither of them said another word before they went back to the couch in the commons to eat. Bakugou had loaded the goods onto a bright red plate while Uraraka poured herself a glass of milk.

Bakugou figured she would have left by then. Cold sweat coated his palms as he held the plate of cookies. He felt like he would burst beyond a point of return.

Uraraka bravely or foolishly stuck around. She wouldn’t have been able to sleep with the unanswered mysteries that heavily weighed on her heart.

The silence bothered neither of them. They could spend an entire train commute without even a word, but the strange current that rushed through Bakugou’s thighs when Uraraka reached for a cookie from the plate startled both of them.

Naive as she was, the brown haired girl thought she could talk over the screaming tension. “These cookies are amazing! We make a good team,” she hummed and chewed as her cheeks filled with joy. “I didn’t know you liked cookies, too. Tough guys like you always complain about sweets.”

Bakugou ground his teeth and dug his elbow into the arm of the couch as he shoved several cookies into his mouth. He grumbled, “Are you saying I’m not tough?!”

She sighed in return. Of course not, but there was no point in counteracting that. “Um,” she stammered. “I’m glad that we can talk like normal. Maybe we can find fun stuff to do together on nights like this. Do you like board games?” she suggested. Tipping her glass, she drank cold milk.

Then part of her eager and alert chocolate eyes yearned to catch a glimpse of that enticing and phenomenal gentleness in Bakugou’s face again. The perilous curiosity kept her glued to the cushion of the pillow.

Their eyes met.

There it was. The look of warmth that drained her breath and spiked the temperature of the room.

She gulped.

Bakugou could not resist her gravitational pull. The atmosphere between them anchored him to her. That kiss had to mean the world or nothing at all, and that night he set out to find her answer.

The ceramic plate dropped to the floor without shattering. Bakugou pounced Uraraka by pinning her down and across the couch.

Her glass of milk floated above them.

“Kiss me,” she thought but did not say. And she cursed herself for allowing such a wish to cross her mind - denial of the strongest kind. A surreal serenity replaced the fear she knew she should have had as she slowly exhaled.

Somehow, he must have heard her. Perhaps his novice dexterity led to a slight hesitation, for all he knew was that he wanted her. Tasting the supple skin of her hot neck, he stroked his tongue up to the plump lobe of her ear.

Why was she so god damn sweet?

Her sharp, short moan sang from her lips. He never knew he waited his life for such a tune.

Pleading, she reminded him, “I love Deku.”

“Yeah, I got that,” he grunted into her skin.

Was she foolish enough to end up in this situation? Was crazy enough to go this far? Even if he calculated every step that led to this, she felt like she had reached her goal in a maze rather than wandered into his trap.

“You don’t even like me.” Was she more upset that she kissed someone that didn’t like her? Or about Deku? The lines had blurred, and she could not clearly see. “You’re just trying to take me from him.”

He hungrily pressed his lips against the trail that his tongue had left until he got to her collarbone before he somehow halted to answer, “Last time I checked, he never had you. And he never will.” A snide chuckle erupted from his chest as he continued through hot breaths to place kisses down her shoulders.

Just like he needed.

He deliberately and relentlessly continued kissing her as she softly moaned. Between the tangled signals and mixed up legs, he could only hope that her audible pleasure meant something deeper and mutual and fucking special.

His teeth graze but did not bite - he could control himself to that extent. Though, when he glanced up at her plump, moist lips, he understood the irresistible allure of her.

Uraraka pressed her hand to his chest. A place of interest and curiously dragged it down his body to feel the muscular rises and ridges. Tightening her thighs, she squirmed and gazed into his ruby eyes to send a clear message of desire.

So Bakugou gave into his temptation and hovered his lips above hers. Her short breaths cut across his skin.

She closed in the distance. She grabbed onto his back! This was all her, and he could not be happier. Inquisitively, she pressed her tongue past her teeth and his before meeting the flavor of him.

The tip of his tongue tenderly stroked hers.

Sweet. Warm. Hot. Soft. A deep craving she had had all day long. A need they may have had their entire lives only to indulge in that night.

Uraraka moaned and caressed his hot cheeks all the way up to his messy, blond hair. The massive and euphoric sensation dazzled her from the friction of them to the pressure between her thighs to the magnetic contact of their lips.

How could he make her so happy?

Sharply, he snapped awake to the hot tears that fell from her eyes against his cheeks. “What? You want me to stop?” he asked as he respectfully pulled away. “You were enjoying this a second ago.” God knows he was.

“No, I wasn’t,” she protested in a shaky whimper.

“Fucking fine. Fuck off if you want to,” he shooed as he sat up on the couch. How the hell did he get ahead of himself? If she never talked to him again, he’d understand. It didn’t matter what he thought he saw, he obviously wasn’t thinking straight.

“No, I wasn’t,” repeated Uraraka in a sob.

Bakugou slowly turned back to face her. Just who exactly was she trying to convince? “I don’t give a shit what you say now. I stopped, okay?”

Uraraka just wanted a pleasant night of hot cookies and cold milk to forget about the humanity in Bakugou. But he always had to dig up the most heinous parts of her. She sat up and scooted to the opposite side of the couch. “Bakugou,” she whispered.

“Hah?” he asked as he lifted an eyebrow. Why was she still there? Why had she stayed by his side for nearly the entire day?

“I just want to forget and continue being your friend. I thought because of earlier - you were different, but you still want to claim me.”

Bakugou thought to protest, but he would say anything to keep her from leaving. He couldn’t let go. “Fuck being friends,” he declared. At least, not just friends. Under his breath and looking away, he said, “We’re going to get married.”

“Why did you do that just now?”

“I-If you want to forget, then you gotta stop asking questions. Let’s change the topic,” he convulsed and trembled as heat and sweat coated his skin.

If it were something as simple as he wanted to hurt her or get back at Deku, he would have claimed so and proudly. But, he was right, she needed to drop it. Rubbing her neck, she wondered why she didn’t stop him. Why her body tingled like diamonds in the sky to that very second.

Why her shortened breath still pulsed from her chest like it did.

Why she closed in the distance.

Is this something she could forget? Thinking about Deku helped her. “We don’t gotta be friends, but let’s just go back to normal.” The only way to get accustomed to him would be to be near him. “And don’t try anything funny again. Promise?” To tame him.

Normal? He’d be fine with anything. “Hah? Funny? I don’t joke.”

Uraraka’s special talent aside from resisting gravity was breaking the tension. “How do you make a hot dog stand up?” she asked before pausing even though she knew he wouldn’t respond. “You steal its chair.”

“Pft!” coughed Bakugou as he hid his mouth.

He liked that? “You laughed!” Uraraka cheerfully exclaimed. She needed to build a tolerance to his tumultuous personality or else she’d never be able to think straight around him or resist him.

“No, I coughed. There’s a difference!” Bakugou protested. Looking at the girl, she didn’t seem hurt at all. Her eyes filled with the moonlight from the window, and her cheeks radiated her healthy pink. The mood, her energy, seemed happier than before, in fact. Was she really that strong and resilient? Or did none of that affect her? Maybe he simply wanted to believe that she enjoyed their second kiss.

Uraraka glanced down at the cookies. “We made such a mess,” she yawned. In more ways than one. Looking up, she gazed at the floating glass of milk and reached up to catch it and pull it back down to Earth.

He glanced over at her reach for the ceiling. Uraraka’s arms stretched to the air as she hopped in place to grab the milk and return it to the coffee table in front of them. When she sat back down, she landed closer to him. He realized the warmth that he had longed for in those short moments apart.

She yawned again.

“Don’t tell me you’re going to fall asleep,” he smirked.

Uraraka shooed the thought as she reclined back onto the couch and sighed, “No, I’m fine. I’m just going to close my eyes for a second.”

Her ample chest heaved into a slower rhythm than before, but Bakugou did not find that arousing. Rather, he found it undeniably and incredibly beautiful. And as her eyes gradually closed, he took the opportunity to admire her. A tickling snore emerged from her pink lips.

When she slid to rest her head on his shoulder, he bit his lip and clutched his arm to prevent kinetic reaction or the slightest sound from escaping his throat.

Bakugou could study every inch of her face, shoulders, neck, arms, and he savored every bit.

Her pure skin. Part of him regretted tainting her. Was his body heat enough to warm her? Hesitantly, he put an arm around her. If anyone disrupted this moment, he’d kill them.

Someone sneezed. And it wasn’t him, and it wasn’t her.

So then, that someone would die.

[hotcocosharing]

History Repeats Part 5 (IM RP)

After playing sly fox Shun in both Second Chance and Glory Days, here I am role playing as our playboy doctor Maki who’s bumped into an ex, desperately trying to avoid history repeating itself again. Well, I’ll say both of them should try harder if that’s what they want but WHAT do they WANT?

That’s the ultimate question for everyone, isn’t it?

Me as Yukihisa Maki x amixofmidori as Midori Page

❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ ❥ Midori’s POV

Was what I heard meant to be some kind of test? Vindictive to provoke some kind of answer I wasn’t sure I wanted him to hear, or know - more the latter rather than former. My shoulders dropping heavily with what felt like the expectations of the word suddenly falling onto them, I stopped still, near frozen in the half stride I was in and brought my bottom lip tightly up between my teeth in order to give myself a short time waster; possibly over thinking the response i was half ready to spit out, even if my voice communicated the thoughts I had tumbling around inside my head rather weakly.

“Top draw in the bathroom vanity for the blow dryer; everything else, if you’re actually being serious still lives in the bottom drawer of the dresser in the bedroom like it always did. I’m sure you’re a big boy and can manage to find your way there yourself – yes? Or do you need me to hold your hand and walk you there?”

While I don’t particularly want it to, I can’t stop the gratifying smirk which pulls at my lips when my eyes deceive what I actually expect them to do - dropping down to admire still - how tempting, attractive and irresistible Yukihisa after all these years; shirtless, still is. Wondering if there’s any underlying enigma or paradox to why he’s so easily (or so it seems) accepted my desire for company.

“Stop me if I’m being too bold with my insinuations - but it seems like we both are after something which could be ‘ideally’ fixed with a simple solution. You want to dry off and I’m after 15 minutes of distraction, if you haven’t already noticed, to haul myself out of the boredom of hell of which I’ve been dragged deep into”, I explain; stepping forward half cautiously to close the gap between us, “You up for some fun? It won’t take long – I mean, in the past, it ever use to.”

When I’m close enough - a mere few centimeters enforcing lack of personal space; I find that without thinking, my fingers are already lingering at Yukihisa’s hips. Lazily, they dance and draw patterns of swirls and stripes up his chest until they become comfortable around the back of his neck and without any warning, I’ve jumped up and wrapped my legs around his waist forcing the young doctor to catch me.

“…… mhmmm”, I mumble quietly before adding a semi-honest, “I’ve missed you.”

Yukihisa‘s POV

Fun- was the only word that caught my attention though I would guess the one she prefers me to hear was she’s missed me which didn’t seem relevant when it comes to fun, it sounded flattering nevertheless.

With my hands giving a firm squeeze on her round bum, I crushed my lips onto hers and stumbled across the corridor to finally making my way to her bedroom. Slamming the door closed with one foot, her body warmth was firing me up through the thin soft fabric but the soaked pants confining my growing twitch underneath was still very uncomfortable.

I lifted up her right leg and held her in place, lips still deeply connected and exploring her cavern. One hand impatiently getting rid of the sticky undergarments before my fingers found their ways to the hem of hers and pulled them down without a second delay.

Neither of us spoke. No words were needed to express what we wanted- FUN, that’s what we’re both after, were we? A quickie, a harmless, mind-blowing distraction.

Lowering my attention to her breasts while my hand had sneaked onto her thigh and spread her wider. Her sharp gasp and arched back were good signs, tempting me to taste more of her. I flickered my tongue once I had pushed her bra up and sucked harder when the first whimper escaped her juicy lips. Grinning wickedly, I pulled away and waited for her eyes to open. Once her mischievous beautiful eyes met mine again, they were now twinkling with lust.

Positioning myself at her entrance and brushing my manhood against her wet folds ever so lightly before slamming it into her. The empty room was soon filled with slapping moist flesh sounds surrounded by heavy lustful panting, satisfying groans and moans in pleasurable ecstasy.

The familiar feeling of her tightening around me was strangely exciting and comforting, she’s closed. Her signs were the same, people could change their appearances and even personalities but the fundamentals remained the same, as long as it came to human bodies. I pumped harder, faster but pulled out just in time, “Well, it looks like your fifteen minutes is up.”

The moment the words slipped my mouth, I could feel the corners of my lips curl into a smirk. God, I’m such a cruel jerk but then again, her expression- watching her high and low was still worth it. Whether she’s about to beg or slap me next didn’t matter, the fun we I just had was enough to entertain me for the rest of the evening. The phone rang at the perfect time as I pulled up my trousers and looked decent again, “Hi Shun, the service was fine. No, of course, I didn’t forget. I … just bumped into an old acquaintance. Yes, Bar Lupin, on my way now.”

I quickly hung up and thanked her like I planned before leaving the apartment and woman I had left years ago all over again.

[courtneytincher]

Salvini May Have Missed His Moment to Shine

(Bloomberg) -- Want to receive this post in your inbox every day? Sign up for the Balance of Power newsletter, and follow Bloomberg Politics on Twitter and Facebook for more.Matteo Salvini’s drive to win outright power in Italy has run into trouble.When the anti-immigration deputy premier broke with his uneasy coalition partner, the Five Star Movement, in a bid to force a snap election earlier this month, he looked irresistible: His League party was close to 40% in the polls, Five Star was in disarray, and the opposition Democratic Party was still reeling from its electoral drubbing last year.But over the weekend signs emerged of a potentially paradoxical alliance to block the man who cites Donald Trump as his political inspiration — between the populist Five Star and the establishment Democrats.The real drama starts tomorrow when Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte addresses the Senate with the future of the government in the balance. If his administration falls, President Sergio Mattarella must choose whether to hold a new election or ask the anti-Salvini forces to form a governing coalition.The outcome of Italy’s latest drama has huge implications for Europe: whether its most dangerous pile of government debt will be managed by a hardliner bent on further tensions with Brussels or a weak coalition that will need all the help it can get. Global HeadlinesBite of the Apple | Trump offered a readout of his Friday-night dinner with Tim Cook, telling reporters the Apple CEO voiced concerns about chief competitor Samsung getting an edge because its products won’t be subject to tariffs when imported by the U.S. The majority of Apple’s products are made in China and face 10% levies before year’s end. The U.S. president said Cook made a “very compelling argument.”Trump said the U.S. is “doing very well with China, and talking!” but suggested he wasn’t ready to sign a trade deal, hours after his top economic adviser laid out a potential timeline to resume talks. Support for free trade among Americans is on the rise, as Trump’s backing dips to its lowest level in more than a year in a new poll. Subscribe to our Terms of Trade newsletter to receive all the big developments in your inbox each weekday.Youthful energy | Democrats’ prospects in the 2020 presidential election will turn on whether they can keep fanning the fires that drove young voters to the ballot box last year. A record jump in the 18-to-29 turnout helped the party win control of the House, and several signs point to a repeat of that trend. An uptick could prove particularly useful to Democrats in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire — states that were decided narrowly in 2016.Democratic candidates are spending the final weeks of summer raising cash in the enclaves of the rich and famous. Former South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford said he’s exploring challenging Trump for the Republican nomination but that he’d still vote for the president over a Democrat. Elizabeth Warren is chipping away at Joe Biden’s strongest selling point — that he’s the candidate most likely to beat Trump.Priming the pump | As Germany’s economy slips further toward a possible recession, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government is starting to eye a fiscal stimulus package. Finance Minister Olaf Scholz floated the figure of 50 billion euros, days after Merkel said the country was heading for a difficult phase that might require action. But don’t expect an announcement until the most politically sensitive of all indicators comes under threat — jobs.Lesson plan | Senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller and other top aides spent months searching for a way to give states the power to block undocumented immigrant children from enrolling in public schools. The previously unreported aspect of the administration’s efforts to stem illegal border crossings was ultimately abandoned after its advocates were told repeatedly that any such effort would run afoul of a 1982 Supreme Court case.Tricky decision | Brazil is considering designating Lebanese group Hezbollah a terrorist outfit, as President Jair Bolsonaro aligns himself with Trump on foreign policy. As Samy Adghirni exclusively reports, the idea is being mulled at the highest levels but doesn’t have across-the-board support: It could strain ties with Hezbollah ally Iran, which imports $2.5 billion of Brazilian products a year, and displease Brazil’s influential Lebanese community.What to Watch This WeekFrench President Emmanuel Macron hosts Russian leader Vladimir Putin at his summer residence today, with Paris insisting it has no plans to mediate between Russia and other world powers. More moderate Hong Kong opposition leaders hope yesterday’s peaceful march of more than million people will help reset the protest movement after violent rallies threatened to sap public support. A tanker carrying Iranian oil has departed Gibraltar — likely headed for Greece — after being seized last month by U.K. forces on suspicion of hauling oil to Syria in violation of European sanctions. The U.S. attempted to block its release. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell kicks off the central bank’s annual Jackson Hole symposium Friday with a speech on the challenges facing monetary policy. Embattled Argentine President Mauricio Macri is grappling with the resignation of his economy minister and a double downgrade to the nation’s debt. Turkish authorities fired three elected mayors today and detained more than 400 people for alleged ties to a terrorist group, escalating tensions in the Kurdish-dominated southeast as the government looks to expand its military presence in Syria.And finally ... As leaders prepare to gather for the Group of Seven summit at the French seaside town of Biarritz, Trump’s again raising the possibility of targeting one of his host country’s most prized exports: wine. The U.S. president told donors at a Hamptons fundraiser this month he could impose a 100% tariff to retaliate for a tax on multinational technology companies, Jennifer Jacobs and Jenny Leonard report. It's unclear how serious Trump was. \--With assistance from Kathleen Hunter and Raymond Colitt.To contact the author of this story: Ben Sills in Madrid at bsills@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Karl Maier at kmaier2@bloomberg.net, Rosalind MathiesonFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines

(Bloomberg) -- Want to receive this post in your inbox every day? Sign up for the Balance of Power newsletter, and follow Bloomberg Politics on Twitter and Facebook for more.Matteo Salvini’s drive to win outright power in Italy has run into trouble.When the anti-immigration deputy premier broke with his uneasy coalition partner, the Five Star Movement, in a bid to force a snap election earlier this month, he looked irresistible: His League party was close to 40% in the polls, Five Star was in disarray, and the opposition Democratic Party was still reeling from its electoral drubbing last year.But over the weekend signs emerged of a potentially paradoxical alliance to block the man who cites Donald Trump as his political inspiration — between the populist Five Star and the establishment Democrats.The real drama starts tomorrow when Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte addresses the Senate with the future of the government in the balance. If his administration falls, President Sergio Mattarella must choose whether to hold a new election or ask the anti-Salvini forces to form a governing coalition.The outcome of Italy’s latest drama has huge implications for Europe: whether its most dangerous pile of government debt will be managed by a hardliner bent on further tensions with Brussels or a weak coalition that will need all the help it can get. Global HeadlinesBite of the Apple | Trump offered a readout of his Friday-night dinner with Tim Cook, telling reporters the Apple CEO voiced concerns about chief competitor Samsung getting an edge because its products won’t be subject to tariffs when imported by the U.S. The majority of Apple’s products are made in China and face 10% levies before year’s end. The U.S. president said Cook made a “very compelling argument.”Trump said the U.S. is “doing very well with China, and talking!” but suggested he wasn’t ready to sign a trade deal, hours after his top economic adviser laid out a potential timeline to resume talks. Support for free trade among Americans is on the rise, as Trump’s backing dips to its lowest level in more than a year in a new poll. Subscribe to our Terms of Trade newsletter to receive all the big developments in your inbox each weekday.Youthful energy | Democrats’ prospects in the 2020 presidential election will turn on whether they can keep fanning the fires that drove young voters to the ballot box last year. A record jump in the 18-to-29 turnout helped the party win control of the House, and several signs point to a repeat of that trend. An uptick could prove particularly useful to Democrats in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire — states that were decided narrowly in 2016.Democratic candidates are spending the final weeks of summer raising cash in the enclaves of the rich and famous. Former South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford said he’s exploring challenging Trump for the Republican nomination but that he’d still vote for the president over a Democrat. Elizabeth Warren is chipping away at Joe Biden’s strongest selling point — that he’s the candidate most likely to beat Trump.Priming the pump | As Germany’s economy slips further toward a possible recession, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government is starting to eye a fiscal stimulus package. Finance Minister Olaf Scholz floated the figure of 50 billion euros, days after Merkel said the country was heading for a difficult phase that might require action. But don’t expect an announcement until the most politically sensitive of all indicators comes under threat — jobs.Lesson plan | Senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller and other top aides spent months searching for a way to give states the power to block undocumented immigrant children from enrolling in public schools. The previously unreported aspect of the administration’s efforts to stem illegal border crossings was ultimately abandoned after its advocates were told repeatedly that any such effort would run afoul of a 1982 Supreme Court case.Tricky decision | Brazil is considering designating Lebanese group Hezbollah a terrorist outfit, as President Jair Bolsonaro aligns himself with Trump on foreign policy. As Samy Adghirni exclusively reports, the idea is being mulled at the highest levels but doesn’t have across-the-board support: It could strain ties with Hezbollah ally Iran, which imports $2.5 billion of Brazilian products a year, and displease Brazil’s influential Lebanese community.What to Watch This WeekFrench President Emmanuel Macron hosts Russian leader Vladimir Putin at his summer residence today, with Paris insisting it has no plans to mediate between Russia and other world powers. More moderate Hong Kong opposition leaders hope yesterday’s peaceful march of more than million people will help reset the protest movement after violent rallies threatened to sap public support. A tanker carrying Iranian oil has departed Gibraltar — likely headed for Greece — after being seized last month by U.K. forces on suspicion of hauling oil to Syria in violation of European sanctions. The U.S. attempted to block its release. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell kicks off the central bank’s annual Jackson Hole symposium Friday with a speech on the challenges facing monetary policy. Embattled Argentine President Mauricio Macri is grappling with the resignation of his economy minister and a double downgrade to the nation’s debt. Turkish authorities fired three elected mayors today and detained more than 400 people for alleged ties to a terrorist group, escalating tensions in the Kurdish-dominated southeast as the government looks to expand its military presence in Syria.And finally ... As leaders prepare to gather for the Group of Seven summit at the French seaside town of Biarritz, Trump’s again raising the possibility of targeting one of his host country’s most prized exports: wine. The U.S. president told donors at a Hamptons fundraiser this month he could impose a 100% tariff to retaliate for a tax on multinational technology companies, Jennifer Jacobs and Jenny Leonard report. It's unclear how serious Trump was. \--With assistance from Kathleen Hunter and Raymond Colitt.To contact the author of this story: Ben Sills in Madrid at bsills@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Karl Maier at kmaier2@bloomberg.net, Rosalind MathiesonFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

August 19, 2019 at 11:10AM via IFTTT