#just drug myself into a state of detachment and lack of feeling

[magnoliamyrrh]

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[sadcatjae]

Young Master Kamiiki - Arrow Removal

Masterlist I was inspired by this post to write about arrow removal. Probably not accurate but I really wanted to indulge myself lol These characters and this world is from a new novel I've been plotting out. The lore isn't important at all here but I did want to beta test the characters a lil bit O3O . CW: Blood and gore, arrow removal, medical procedure, mentions of abuse, mentions of drug use/abuse, fever, restraint.

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“Young master!” Ruri rushes forward, panic stark upon her face. Her charge, the scion of the Kamiiki Faction, stumbles into the main house, only saved from falling by the sturdy servant supporting him. 

Kosuke’s wild sable hair is dull and damp, sticking to his deathly pale face. His pair of sharp, mean eyes are heavy-lidded and absent, and by his groggy glances, he doesn’t seem to register his surroundings. 

Heart palpitating, Ruri notices the lord’s right shoulder, drenched in blood, and from his back she spies a feathered arrow shaft. 

“How could this have happened?!” she gasps, feeling faint. “Someone call for the physician! Quick!”

A passing servant sprints ahead to notify the doctor. 

Meanwhile, Ruri assists in carrying the semi-conscious lord inside, fretting and asking question after question. Since the master and mistress of the estate are away undertaking their Arbiter duties, this old maidservant will have to care for the young master in their place. 

“The young master was fooling around with his friends,” Giiki, the sturdy servant grunts, his expression dark. “They caused a fight with the wrong people and this was his punishment.”

“Who are these people??”

“I won’t say.”

“And why not??”

Giiki takes one look at the older woman who's almost spitting fire. “Because I fear for their safety…”

Ruri shoots Giiki a glare. “You would defy your mother?!”

“You can punish me later. Help me carry the young master to his quarters.”

They don’t dare rest the injured man on his bed, lest they agitate his wound, so Giiki sits on the bed and holds Kosuke upright instead. The lord sways in his arms, cold sweat dripping from his delicate jawline. 

In the dimness of his waning consciousness, Kosuke feels the incessant throbbing in his shoulder. Like someone’s exerted a great pressure upon it and is refusing to release him. He groans and tries to push away those strong arms, feeling suffocated, but they are unmoving. 

“Young master, you must stay still,” Ruri chides worriedly, preparing a basin of fresh water. “The physician will be here soon.”

The maidservant dunks a clean cloth into the water, wrings it out, and dabs it over Kosuke’s clammy brow. How many times has this foolish boy returned home in a sorry state? Because of his poor temper and (terrible) personality, Ruri is certain that one of these days she will keel over from stress alone.

Just as Ruri finishes cleaning her young master’s face, the physician hurriedly enters with his signature leather bag. One look at his patient is all he needs to know that the situation is dire.

“Physician Asa! Oh, please help the young master! He’s lost so much blood…”

The doctor immediately sweeps past the fretting maidservant and prompts Giiki to move Kosuke deeper into his arms. The position ends up with Kosuke’s head resting upon the servant’s wide shoulder, and those strong arms wound around his waist, keeping him secure. 

The wounded shoulder is exposed from the back where the arrow shaft sticks out. Judging by how short the shaft is, the arrowhead is buried much too deep to simply pull out. 

Asa grimaces and quickly washes his hand in the water basin, before cutting through the bloodied fabric to expose the wound. “The arrow is too deep. I will have to detach the shaft and see if the arrowhead has struck bone.”

Ruri kneels beside the bed, taking the wounded man’s hand into hers. “I told you to stop getting into fights, young master,” she scolds, though her tone lacks severity. “When you have recovered, I will be sure to have the master and mistress discipline you for this!”

“Insolent…” Kosuke slurs, glaring at a hazy blob he assumes is his noisy maidservant. “No supper for you…go to bed hungry…tell me what to do…“ Dissatisfied grumbles peter out as he dips out of consciousness again. 

Giiki and Ruri both watch in silent apprehension as the doctor carefully cuts the shaft with a pair of sturdy scissors. From the way he handles the task without even causing his patient any pain, it’s clear that he is well practised in this operation. 

But in truth, removing the shaft is the easy part. Asa pushes out a steadying breath and glances at Giiki. “Hold him tight. I have to feel around inside and it won’t be pleasant for the young master.”

The sturdy servant returns a serious expression, his grey eyes unnaturally dark and thunderous. “Yes,” is all he says in that deep, rumbling voice. He tenses his arms, squeezing Kosuke tight against his chest. The latter stirs and protests weakly, raising his head to scowl at the big lug. 

“Release me,” the lord huffs, knocking his forehead into Giiki’s cheek. This seems to have hurt the injured man more, despite his malicious intentions. “Ow. What are you made of? Stone?”

Giiki stares down at those arrogant pair of eyes, so easily full of wrath and sadistic glee. But in this moment, they are glazed over and feverish, making him appear uncharacteristically soft. The servant swallows and says, “You can bite me if it hurts too much.”

A puzzled expression ripples across Kosuke’s face. Before he can respond, he jerks and cries sharply as Asa nimbly cuts an incision to widen the arrow’s entry point. “Ahhh–!! W-What are you doing to me?! It hurts! Stop it at once!!” 

Without pausing, Asa pushes his finger into the incision, gingerly feeling around the arrow head. Kosuke’s sharp cries deteriorate into mindless howls, his spine arching and legs kicking as incomprehensible pain erupts in his back. 

Thanks to Giiki’s efforts, he’s locked in place, so all he can do is writhe minimally and choke on his cries. 

After what seems like aeons to Kosuke, but in reality is only a few seconds, Asa removes his hand and wipes it on a clean cloth. His expression is troubled. “It hasn’t struck bone, but the arrowhead is the kind to cause more damage upon removal. The only solution is to push it all the way through.”

Ruri winces as her young master pulses bone-cracking squeezes around her hand, but the doctor’s words instantly numbs her to the pain. “All the way…” She truly will faint this time! “Must you do this??”

Giiki simply stares down at the raven haired man, who is panting weakly against his chest. His cheeks are shock white and his eyes are misted over. Pale lips quiver in fear, indicating that Kosuke understood the physician’s diagnosis. 

A pinch in Giiki’s heart makes him stroke the small of Kosuke’s back. A silent comfort. 

“Unfortunately, this is the only way to avoid irreparable damage.” 

“At least give the young master something for the pain!”

“I do not know what substances he has imbibed,” Asa says, frustratedly. “I dare not risk accidentally poisoning my patient.”

“But surely–”

“It is not worth the risk,” Asa says sharply, ending that line of discussion. Does she think this is ideal for him too? What doctor enjoys seeing his patient in pain?

He pulls out a delicate looking tool from his physician’s bag. It’s a specially designed set of pliers that should clamp onto the arrowhead securely. The thin length of the steel clamps afford the physician dexterity he could never achieve with hands alone. But even with a tool like this, the procedure is difficult to endure for even the most seasoned of warriors. 

And the Kamiiki scion is not a warrior, but a pampered young master who had never earned a callous in his life.

The doctor slips a leather strap between Kosuke’s teeth, urging him to bite down. “Giiki,” Asa says, “Remove his robe and turn him so that I can access the front.”

Giiki gently slips the bloodied robe down to expose the lord’s wound and angles the latter’s torso as guided. There’s a flicker of upset in the servant’s strong, handsome features. 

Kosuke’s head lolls this way and that, held upright only by Giiki’s large hands, clamps tight upon his arms. Ruri holds down his legs, and in this way, all four limbs are secured. 

As the lord stews in his fever and confusion, Asa makes another incision in the front, creating an exit for the arrow. Fresh blood dribbles down Kosuke’s torso, creating a rather shocking contrast against his skin. Ruri’s quiet weeping joins the lord’s weak groans, muffled by the leather strap held loosely in his mouth. 

“Giiki. Ruri. Hold him tight. You must be strong now to prevent further suffering for the young master. Do you understand?” The doctor glances between the servants sternly, and they both give him a nod. “Very good.”

Wasting no more time, Asa inserts the tool into the wound and clamps onto the buried arrowhead. 

Kosuke stiffens, eyes snapping wide in panic. He lets loose a series of terrible guttural cries through the strap clenched tight between his teeth. His colour turns ashen as the arrowhead is forced through his flesh, carving a path into his shoulder. Blood bursts and bubbles from the exit incision, painting his front red. 

And then the arrowhead catches on something. Something hard. And Kosuke’s visions turns white. The gut-churning agony takes on a ruthless edge. It feels like a white-hot blade digging into his flesh, searing him from the inside out. The pain is excruciating, gnawing, impossible to bear. 

Kosuke screams and strains away from the pain, delirious, desperate. The pain chases him, hounds after him, and stubbornly churns forth its furious attack. He’s dimly aware of Giiki calling his name and forcing him upright, causing another mind-numbing burst of agony. 

He sobs loudly. Pleads incoherently. The leather strap slips from his mouth. Saliva tinged pink with blood rolls down his chin. 

But the doctor remains stoic, pushing the arrowhead in deeper, inch by excruciating inch. 

By the time it’s halfway forced out of the front incision, Kosuke is unable to make a single sound. He simply sags in Giiki’s grasp, shaking and dripping sweat. His breath comes ragged and scorched, and there’s an unhealthy flush upon his otherwise ashen face.

“Hurts…” Kosuke whimpers, tears cascading down his cheeks. “Giiki…hurts…”

The manservant’s heart twists. While Asa pauses in the procedure to reposition himself, Giiki frees a hand to gently wipe those fever-flushed cheeks clear of tears. “Physician Asa has almost finished, young master,” he says, softly. “You are bearing the pain so well. This servant is in deep admiration of you.”

“Just a little more, young master,” Ruri encourages, keeping a strong grip upon the lord’s trembling legs. Her eyes shine with tears. “Endure for a little longer and you can rest.”

A hopeless sob breaks from Kosuke’s bruise-bitten lips. His reprieve is short-lived. 

This time, the doctor uses the clamp to pull the arrowhead out from the front. Due to the shape, it tears the wound wider with every merciless tug. This pain is too unbearable for the delirious lord, and his weak cry stutters before he slips into oblivion. 

Asa moves quickly, yanking the rest of the arrowhead out in one fluid motion. A spray of blood splatters his clothes, but he pays no mind. He hurries to disinfect and suture the wound while his patient remains unconscious.

After the last stitch has been made, Kosuke is bandaged and allowed to rest. 

Giiki cradles the lord’s limp form as he sets him down upon the bed. He stares for a moment at that pinched, feverish face, and then goes to wring out the cloth in the basin. 

Ruri speaks with Asa in low, urgent tones, while Giiki dutifully wipes down his young master’s trembling form. He removes the blood and sweat from Kosuke’s clammy skin, until he’s finally clean and dry. 

When Giiki wrings out the cloth (a grimace at how red the water’s become), he feels a light tug on his shirt. He looks over to see Kosuke gazing up at him with bleary eyes. Despite the recent bathing, tiny beads of sweat glimmers upon his brow like morning dew.

Those pale lips move. Mouths something only Giiki can understand. 

Years of abuse and vitriol are instantly forgotten by this servant, whose affections for his foul-tempered lord had been quietly cultivated in the background. So of course, faced with a rare display of vulnerability from this malcontent, Giiki gives a subtle nod and sits at his young master's side like a dutiful dog. 

Reassured, Kosuke drifts. His hand remains latched onto his Giiki's shirt, however. Obstinate, even in sleep.

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[ddarker-dreams]

Fallen From Grace. Yan Giorno x Reader [COMM]

Giorno has given you too many gifts to count.

This benevolent act serves multiple purposes, culminating towards the goal of making your time here better. He doesn’t shy away from the reality of what he’s doing to you, the extent of your loneliness after being displaced. Forcing himself to remember this bitter truth keeps him from getting complacent, striving to make your experience all the better. 

No detail is to be overlooked. In what little free time Giorno has, he molds your surroundings to your liking. The meals that are planned for you consist of high nutritional value, often rotating your favorites with only the best ingredients and chefs to prepare them. Your wardrobe is full of outfits tailored to your measurements and tastes. Rare and ethereal flowers span across the master bedroom you share with Giorno, him creating them with the purpose of soothing you. 

For all this effort, Giorno never has an expectation for your gratitude. He doesn’t believe he deserves it, having stolen you from your normal life. He’s the reason for the tear soaked pillows, the restless nights and detached demeanor you’ve adopted. Whether it’s to ease the guilt that suffocates his heart, or to see your eyes light up for only a moment, Giorno tends to you. 

This custom, handmade journal is one he gave you at the start of your time here. With you receiving limited human interaction, Giorno found it important for you to have a way to express your thoughts. While you were initially antagonistic towards him about the journal, you began to use it. He lets you hide it from him, letting you believe it’s out of his reach for peace of mind. 

Ironic as it may sound, Giorno respected you by never laying a finger on it. The overwhelming temptation of learning his beloved’s most inner thoughts isn’t lost on him. He could read it and place it back to its original spot without you being none the wiser. For months, he made a point in refusing this alluring idea. 

That is, until this very second. 

Sitting on his dark mahogany desk, is the journal that contains your private thoughts and experiences. Giorno’s eyelids flutter shut, a soft sigh leaving his lips. Leaning further into his chair, he gives more thought to the situation. The forbidden fruit lays before him, ready to give knowledge he shouldn’t have. 

There’s a grander reason for this dilemma. When spending time with you, Giorno is keen to pick up every nuance of your behavior. It’s a trait of his that has followed him since childhood. Every twitch of your mouth or hesitation in your voice paints a larger picture. He’s capable of reading you, knowing your thoughts before you even know them yourself. This often works out in his favor. 

But lately, when he speaks to you, something feels different. In a way that doesn’t make sense. You still hold apparent dislike for him, but you avoid eye contact less. There’s a sense of underlying assurance, like you’re privy to information that he isn’t. It gets under his skin, eating him from the inside out. 

No longer do you threaten him with bitter words, detailing your resentment towards him. You seem content to sit in his presence, talking casually about what you’ve done that day and asking him the same. He won’t lie and say he doesn’t like the development. But his gut tells him there’s a malicious intent laced in your new behavior. 

What are you hiding from him? 

The realm of possibilities is few and far between, and Giorno considers every possibility. None of his theories placate a voice in his head, a gnawing that something is very wrong. Talking to you and asking questions laced with hidden agendas has led to no discoveries, options growing limited to discover the truth.

Running his fingertips over the spine of your journal, he gingerly opens to the first page. It’s a dirty feeling to be doing this, invading your privacy behind your back. He’s done worse for the sake of your well being, the justification spurring him to continue on to the next page. It contains your first entry. 

“I didn’t want to write this. Putting the words into paper almost feels like I’m accepting the reality of what’s happening to me, this parody of a life. I don’t have much else to do to pass the time. 

Even my hobbies bring me little joy, knowing who set them up for me like a doll in a dollhouse. Focusing is another thing entirely. How can I focus knowing I’m always being monitored to some degree? Even as I write this, I wonder who’s watching me. 

In the past, when I felt anxious, I’d write. And well… anxiety is the heartbeat of my life now. Everyday I wake up, more numb than the last. All I look forward to is when I’ll sleep next. At least then I don’t have to feel anything, I can just exist without trying. There’s nothing else for me to say.”

He knew this wasn’t going to be easy. Giorno’s lips curl down into a frown, his eyebrows furrowing and stomach dropping. Seeing the depths of your pain so tangible, in your own words, kills a piece of his soul. It’d be an insult to you to waver now, he thinks, resolve staying firm. Not wanting to invade your privacy more than necessary, he skims through more entries in hopes of finding any leads on your current behavior.

“It’s already been three months since I’ve begun living here, if you can even call it that. I’ve gotten better at spotting the guards. I like to think of it as a little game. They’re good, I give them that. But when you have nothing to do, living in a house with no noise, it grows easier to listen. To notice things I wouldn’t have before. 

Maybe I’m going stir crazy. I don’t like knowing how I’m being monitored, but I’ve grown accustomed to it. I hate to admit how he was right , when he said I’d grow accommodated to this with time. I don’t want to. I don’t want to learn to live like this. But I can’t stop it. Resisting the inevitable is a pointless waste of energy, which I hardly have anymore.” 

Giorno picks up on your lack of mentioning him by name. In most of your entries, you avoid even insinuating to his existence when possible. It’s a cold sensation, knowing who he loves most omits him at every chance. He understands -- it’s what he deserves after putting you through this isolation -- yet the complex hurt remains prevalent. Every word stingers more than the last.

He soldiers on, searching through more entries. 

“I wonder if they’re allowed to talk to me. When I call out to the occasional shadow, or creak in a room beside me, there’s no response. But I know they’re here, I’ve seen him giving them orders in the past when I pretend to sleep. It’s always in hushed whispers, as if anything they say could surprise me. 

I just want to talk to someone. Someone that isn’t him. Someone that doesn’t avoid my gaze like everyone else here. It makes me feel like I’m a disgusting sight to behold, even though I know why they look away. The guilt from witnessing what they do, outweighed by their longing for money. I hate it. It makes me hate them. At least look at me, like I’m a human. 

They’re spineless cowards. All of them. Disgusting subhumans that take a paycheck over my suffering. I hate them so much, almost more than I hate him.” 

Giorno freezes, noticing small crinkles in the paper towards the end of this entry. Signs that you must’ve been crying, he deduces. God. He wants to tell himself that it’s worse than he thought, but that’d be a lie. All along he’s been aware of the great extents of your suffering, all pointing back to him. 

Running a hand through his hair, loose from its normal styling, Giorno wonders if he should stop now. Every word is like a nail in the coffin of his heart, paining him in more ways he thought possible. Making difficult decisions has come as second nature to him, so he preserves on. 

“Yesterday was my birthday. What a shitty thing to realize. I got a lot of things. More than I ever had gotten before. More offline games, clothes, perfume, shoes, jewelry, and even a painting. By the looks of it I think it’s rare, but who gives a fuck. 

An interesting development occurred. One of my guards, if that’s what you’d even call them, approached me. He had just gotten off the phone, and informed me that my plans for the day were going to be different. Apparently the big boss got held up at work, so he wouldn’t be joining me for dinner.

Am I supposed to be upset about that? Well, I certainly wasn’t. Who cares. Seeing him would just make me feel worse. I hate how out of control I feel like he’s around. I almost find myself forgetting about all he’s done, when he speaks to me so calmly. Just thinking about it makes me feel dirty, like I should shower. 

I didn’t see a point in responding at first. But eventually, I spoke up before the guard could leave. I asked him why he was okay with this, what he sees everyday. He didn’t offer a response. But I noticed something. His breath hitched, I’m sure of it. 

Maybe there is another human being in this pseudo-prison after all.” 

A painful reminder of the past. It did hurt him at the time to have to miss out on an important day with you, even though Giorno was self aware to know his presence brought you little comfort. There had been emergency phone calls over an attack from former Passione members, retaliating for losing drug related income. 

The timing of it was awful, just thinking back to it reminds Giorno of the impatience he felt then. Hours were spent personally dealing with cleaning up what had happened, meaning he wasn’t able to see you as was originally planned. Orders were given back home to inform you of this change, though it’s now evident it impacted Giorno more than you. 

The last section piques his interest. You felt you had noticed guilt in one of the guards? The pool of men that Giorno had carefully sifted through are no strangers to witnessing barbaric acts. Such is the life of a gangster. In your state of heightened emotions, there’s a possibility you could’ve imagined it. 

The journal goads him to continue, unraveling the mysteries of your heart.

“I’ve gotten better at spotting the guards.

I can’t believe something like this is exciting to me, but it is these days. It’s kinda funny in a pathetic way, watching as they shrink back when I spot them. The guard from before is the one I recognize the most. I pretended to be hurt, and he came out of the shadows to check on me. 

I guess he wasn’t expecting me to turn around looking fine after my acting, because he didn’t leave right away. Before he got the chance, I asked what his name is. He sighed, probably relieved that he wouldn’t have to report to his boss about me being harmed. He said his name is Marco. 

At that point, it was my turn to be surprised. I guess he was too, given the slip up. I must confess, it felt nice talking to someone. It’s been so long since I’ve heard another person’s voice. He went to walk away soon after, but I stopped him. It’s not like they can use force to get rid of me, so why the hell not? 

I told him I was bored and wanted someone to talk to. And, for some reason… he stayed.” 

Giorno rereads this passage multiple times, scrutinizing it. So you managed to speak to one of the guards he assigned to watch over you? When he was recruiting within Passione for the position, he made expectations explicitly clear. They were not to interact with you unless an emergency calls for it. And if they felt the situation called for it, they needed to report it back to Giorno. 

Your safety is paramount in his eyes. Regardless of this being a minor grievance, this guard will be punished accordingly for breaking the rules Giorno set. All of them were put in place knowing that if you grew connected to someone and they you, possibilities of insubordination would blossom. 

The dates on the pages are getting closer to the current day, not many more entries left. 

“Marco and I have been speaking more frequently.

He gave me a rough idea of the conditions in which we can talk, only in certain blind spots and times where other guards aren’t around as often. I wish it wasn’t so complicated. In our rushed conversations, I’ve learned more about him. I didn’t really think I would get all that invested in this person, since he’s stood by and watched my situation for a while now.

But now it makes a bit more sense. He told me that his little sister is unwell, having to practically live in a hospital room. That this dirty job is the only one that can cover the full expenses, and that without it she wouldn’t last. I can’t say that I forgive him entirely yet, but… I guess I can sympathize. I wish there was more I could do to help. 

Her name is Lucia. One of the times we talked Marco told me she’s the strongest person he knows, staying dedicated to her studies despite having waning strength. She’s a few years younger than me, but I think we’d have gotten along well. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to leave this place, but I wish I could meet her one day. 

Having him to talk to is nice.” 

Ah... so that’s what it is then.

Unpleasant emotions rise within, feelings that Giorno long thought were gone. Times before when you were speaking freely with your friends, laughing among them and living your life to the fullest. Those times were he wanted nothing more than to join you, to have you by his side and share in the experience. His position shot down any hopes of that, the possibility of endangering you deterring him. 

It was a painful time. Knowing that what he wanted was close and yet so painfully far, just out of his reach. Giorno wanted you to look at him like that, mirth in your eyes and a smile on your lips. To enjoy outings to the movies like you did with your friends, to have inside jokes and memories to fondly look back on. 

Envy doesn’t begin to describe the hideous feeling that permeates within him. Giorno’s grasp on your journal feels weaker, fingers shaking as he flips to the next page. Predator-like intent shines on his visage, emerald eyes narrowed and grip tightening. Not typically one to dwell on what could’ve been, it’s rare Giorno would feel like this. He makes the most out of every situation, his resolve unwavering and sights set on a single goal. 

You throw all of it into a loop, his normal composure a long forgotten memory. 

“Today I played a game of checkers with Marco. 

I think he was letting me win, but it was fun nonetheless. Apparently one of the normal guards was tending to business elsewhere, so we had more time together. He’s kind, kinder than I would’ve ever expected. When we’re together I just forget about everything other than the present moment. 

For once, I don’t feel like a prisoner all on my lonesome. I don’t notice the heavy ring on my finger, the suffocating air of this villa that I despise. It’s just us, cracking jokes and learning about one another. It’s what I look forward to the most, what I hold onto even when Marco isn’t around. It makes me feel human again. Like I’m not [First] Giovanna, but entirely myself.

Smiling comes a lot more naturally these days. I can even find myself stomaching his presence easier, though I still don’t like when he’s around. As long as he doesn’t find out about Marco and I, I feel like I can get through this. Everyday I change the location of this journal, within the expanses of this mansion. 

I still wish there was more I could do to help Lucia. I suggested giving Marco some of this stupid jewelry to pawn off, but he said it’s too risky. It’s surreal to know even pawnshops in Italy are fiercely loyal to Passione’s Don, and would be too hesitant to purchase his wife’s jewelry in fear of retaliation. 

Having all this wealth surround me feels like a waste when I know there’s someone who could actually use it. As much as I don’t like the thought, maybe I could convince Giorno to help Marco somehow. I have a few ideas but they’re probably all too risky. He does always tell me, ‘If you ever want anything in this world, tell me.’ 

I want to help Lucia. I want to help Marco, who I’ve found myself caring for. 

I’ve never asked Giorno for anything really. I don’t know how to propose it without making him suspicious--” 

Giorno can’t stand to read it anymore. 

Closing the book and placing it down, he steeples his fingers together. It takes a great deal of effort to frustrate him, normal composure melting away. Is it betrayal? Hurt? Jealousy? Everything wraps around his person, the air in his office feeling thick. Loosening the tie around his neck, he takes a much needed deep breath. 

A flash of your smile from earlier this evening at dinner comes to mind. You called him by his name, maintaining eye contact and asking about his day. Lulled into a false sense of security, wanting to believe nothing more than the farce unfolding before him. Of course you didn’t love him back. He was a fool to have deluded himself into believing that. 

At his fingertips is his phone. With a single phone call, he could command the world to fall. To have this guard who failed him tortured in the worst ways imaginable, experiencing hell on earth. Or to even join Passione’s former boss in a never ending cycle of death, that stretches the lengths of eternity. 

So many possibilities. Yet none of them would soothe the agony of his heart. Completely and utterly alone once more, like his earlier days. Requited love was all but an illusion, a fog that has now been lifted. 

Giorno purses his lips, considering. Fingers drum against his desk, the sound reverberating across the empty room. Grabbing a hold of his phone, he calls upon someone who could help him deal with this traitor appropriately. A message must be sent, he thinks, that will set the tone within the organization. It will hurt you to lose this newfound companion, but it’s a sacrifice he is willing to make. It’s not like you need to know the details either. 

The phone rings. Once, twice. Before his second in command on the other line picks up. 

“Yo, Giorno? You’re calling pretty late,” Mista’s voice is chipper as ever, the distant sound of music playing in the background. “Everything alright?” 

Getting up from his chair, he walks over to the window that overlooks his garden. His beloved wife walks among the paths, bending down and inspecting a rose. Giorno remembers when he turned an object into that very flower, how your dull eyes lit up at the awe inspiring sight. 

This is ultimately all for you, he reminds himself.

“Yes, everything is fine. Are you free at the moment? I have a job for you.”

[imagines-hoarder]

The Devil in the Dark- Dark!Steve Rogers

Warning: smut, murder, abuse, gaslighting, swearing, drug and alcohol abuse

Word Count: 6,400

Summary: 70s AU; When a handsome stranger rolls into town, you get caught up in being the center of his attention. You could never expect how falling in love with him would change your life forever.

Masterlist

*I don’t think I’m pleased by what I’ve created, and honestly no one asked for what I am unleashing. This is my first dip into the marvel universe and probably the darkest thing I have ever written so be warned; this is not for the faint of heart. For those of you who can get through all 6,000 words, I’d love to get your feedback. This may only be the beginning. xoxox*

The room has become muggy and sweat clung to your neck as you pawed the velvet sofa. Everything had felt fuzzy at the edges after you smoked a joint in one of the shady rooms upstairs. After a couple more shots, you hit the dance floor and everything else in the last 30 minutes had been a blur. Now you sat watching everyone laugh and feign geniality without your rose-tinted lenses. You were at a party that you should have been ashamed of. Cigarettes, booze, and coke had awoken something sinful in the partygoers and after getting your own fill, you just preferred to watch.

Mel had tried to sell it to you earlier that evening as something else entirely: “It’s just gonna be a small thing, okay? Brian wants to see everyone again before we go back to A-State.” She had called just after your mother and her boyfriend departed for their first barstools of the night. She knew better than to call any earlier.

“Last time I checked, Brian doesn’t really do small gigs. Remember when he put on your birthday party last year and invited all his buddies? I'm pretty sure his scrawny friend was the one who puked in your fish tank,” you responded, twirling the landline cord around your finger and picking at a slice of leftover pizza. “You know I'm coming anyway. It’s gonna get really quiet around here in a couple of weeks when you go back to school.”

“Not if you come with me,” she said with a singsong tone.

“That’s why I’m staying here in the first place.” The pizza didn’t sound too appealing as your stomach turned sour. “If I wash and style a couple more heads, I should have enough money to join you and the meatheads for the Spring semester. Then we can get hammered every weekend together… just like old times.” You find comfort from her laughter on the other end.

You had spent the last couple minutes recalling the last time you saw Mel before you started people watching from the sidelines. You're pretty sure she was the one who rolled your joint, sitting wasted on Brian’s lap. When your eyes ached from staring at crowded bodies, you laid your head back and shut your eyes, letting the beat of the music ground you.

It couldn’t have taken more than a moment for the couch to sink under the weight of another person. “You alright over here?” It was a dude; no doubt he thought you were passed out or an easy lay.

You rolled your head to get a good look at him, and it was like the Big Man himself had decided to serve you sex on legs, carrying a Miller Light and smelling like cigarettes. He wasn’t from around here and wasn’t in college, that much you could tell; no guy fresh from adolescence could grow a beard like his. He wore a button-down that was half open and exposed how warm he was as a bead of sweat trickled down his neck. You had been so ready to tell him to fuck off until you met that pretty blue gaze. You must have looked like some creep undressing him with your eyes.

“I’m steller. You probably think I’m a burnout that can’t control myself,” you shouted to him, though he was close enough to hear you just fine.

“Well, I never said that.” His low laugh sounded like music. “I saw you come from upstairs. Wanted to make sure you weren't choking on vomit.” 

“That would make a fun story. Instead, I’m just people watching.” You turned your attention back to the bodies getting hot and heavy on a makeshift dance floor and hoped he wouldn’t notice the red blooming in your cheeks.

“I think that can be fun, especially when everyone around you is a stranger.” It was clear he wasn’t from Arkansas. His voice was as smooth as butter but lacked the draw everyone else in the room had. 

When you looked back at him, he was still looking at you. You extended your hand and he took it into his own for a firm shake before letting it far to the couch. You introduced yourself and smiled when you were able to restrain your nerves. “Now we’re not strangers to each other.” He returned the gesture and gave you a smile so dazzling it nearly sobered you.

“Name’s Steve.” He gave the room a passive glance-over without ever indicating he spotted another familiar face. “I’m not from around here. Just met a guy in town today and he told me I should stop by; he said he was the host.”

“Brian?” He gave you a nod but you’re sure he couldn’t recall what he looked like. “Yeah I know him; we grew up together. I’m actually really close with his girlfriend, Mel.” You knew he was listening but didn’t want to lose his attention to small talk. “And I know you’re not from around here, Steve.”

“Yeah?”

“I’m a townie, born and raised. I would have noticed a man like you if you were kicking around any earlier than now.”

He rewarded you with another smile, stained with allure. “I’m just passing through Arkansas and thought I would stay the night. I’ve never even driven through Arkansas; kind of one of those places you forget is on the map.”

“How do you think I feel? I’m living in this unremarkable town in a forgettable state.” He joined you in laughing as the music became white noise. You pulled your legs under your body as you leaned in closer to him. You quickly realized you must have looked so young and so enamored; no stupid. You couldn’t move now but he didn’t seem to mind.

“You know, I like your style. You’re a beauty with a mouth on you.”

“Do you want to see what else my mouth can do.” It fell from your lips before you could stop it. You quickly looked away from him in hopes of returning to the conversation you were pursuing before you ruined it. His gaze burned into your face before he got up. You could have scolded yourself for how soon you played your cards. Before you could blame the substances in your system for your poor behavior, he stood in front of you trying to regain your attention.

When you looked up, his head jerked toward the door. “You wanna smoke outside?” Something about the question made you tense. You could use some fresh air and thought Steve could make good company, but you didn’t want him to think you’d be an easy lay he could fuck around the corner; you were sure that was the impression your lewd comment left. He must have sensed your reluctance. “We can stay here if you want but I can barely hear you over the music, doll. Promise I won’t try anything on ya,” he disclosed.

Maybe it was a bad idea, but you decided to go anyways. He offered you his hand as he detached you from the velveteen sofa. Before you were even out the door, he was pulling a have-full carton of cigarettes from his pocket and wedged one between his lips. No one else was outside, but you could hear the muffled rhythm of a Donna Summers tune starting up by the time you settled at the edge of the house. After supplying you with a cigarette of your own and drawing close to light it, you reached a comfortable silence that let you take your drags in peace.

“So why California,” you asked. You supposed his brusque appearance could sell magazines or movie tickets. “Trying to catch your big break in Hollywood?”

“Nah, just need a fresh start. I’ve been living in the cold all my life, just wanted a fresh start somewhere warm, you know?”

You give him an affirming nod. “The weather’s not too one this end of the country, I guess. Where are you coming from anyways?”

He just chuckled it off with an air of skepticism. “You sure ask a lot of questions.” 

“Well we aren’t strangers anymore, right? We’re sharing a smoke, having a laugh...” 

He just shrugged, deflecting the question in the process. “Maybe I wanna know more about you.”

“There’s not much to know about me.”

“Well, I don't believe that for a second.” You roll your eyes and lean against the brick wall, listening but refusing to give him the pleasure of seeing you blush. “You’re young, you're beautiful… girls like you aren’t born to both start and end in nowhere Arkansas.” 

''I want to, but not all of us have the luxury of up and moving to California, Stevie.” When you looked over to him, he had a look that you hoped wasn’t pity. “Plus, I’m earning my Associates Degree at Arkansas State. I’ve got one more year of being tied to this place.”

“Stevie... Gosh, I haven’t been called that since I was a kid.” You smirk at him, taking his change in the subject as an olive branch. The air became quiet again, but you were thankful there was no ill-ease. You just closed your eyes and inhaled the last of the smoke warming your lungs. Maybe if you stood in the moment a little longer, you could convince yourself this handsome man was real once you sobered up.

All too soon, you had put out the cigarette butt under your shoe and took it as a sign to start walking back home. It had to be past four a.m. and it looked like the moon would make its departure sometime soon. “Well it was a real pleasure for you to meet me Stevie, but I should start moving before it gets any later.” You pushed yourself off of the wall and tucked your hands in the pockets of your jumper dress. “I hope you find what you’re looking for in California.”

He threw his butt out into some nearby rocks before stepping a little closer to you “Come on doll, let me drive you home. It’s late and everyone else is wasted out of their mind. Plus, I don’t think Brian even knows I was here; he just invited me cause I helped him jump his car this morning.” He was too nice to be true, but you didn’t think your mind was capable of creating something as beautiful as him. Maybe you wouldn’t mind it so much if he stuck his rough hands up your dress after all. He’d be gone in a day anyways.

“You know, young women aren’t supposed to take rides from strangers, right?” You started to walk down the driveway and tried to restrain your smugness as you heard his heavy footsteps trail behind you.

With the extra height he had on you, he caught up in no time, carefully tugging at your arm so you looked back at him. Your arm rubbed against his chest and you now knew for sure that he had more than just a pretty face on him. “I thought you said we weren’t strangers,” he retaliated. He didn’t seem like the type of man to take no for an answer, but you weren’t hoping to put up too much of a fight. As you looked at him in the moment, you saw him look you over and his cornflower blue eyes held a look that said there was something he desired about you too.

He let you pull away from him as you decided to make your final impulsive decision of the night. “Alright hotshot, which ride is yours?”

You had him drop you off a couple houses away when he drove into your neighborhood. It wasn’t that you didn’t want to invite him inside for a beer and a ‘farewell gift’, but you were sure that your mom and Pierce were already passed out and drained any bottles that were left in the fridge on their way in. Still, you spent a couple minutes steaming up the windows in his car as he slowly pushed up your dress.

You pushed at his chest and pulled down your dress when you thought the neighbors would start getting suspicious of the unfamiliar ‘73 Chevelle Malibu with the clouded windows outside their house. “Look, Steve, I gotta go. Drive safe.” You tugged at the door handle but he stopped you before you could get out, pulling you back into an attack of fervent kisses. “Steve!”

“Look, I’m staying at that Motel Court on Birchwood, Room 174. I want you to call me in the morning.”

“I thought you were just passing through...” You groaned as you pushed at his wandering hands again, trying to keep from giving him the pleasure of making you breathless.

“I am, but we can get breakfast or something? Shit, you’ll probably be passed out until noon so it’ll be lunch.” He finally let you pull away and you could see how his hair sat rugged from your needy gripping, a winded look splayed across his face. He looked around for an old receipt and pen and scribbled the name and room number of the motel on the back. He buried the sheet in your palm and you hesitated before accepting it. You reached for the handle again and he didn’t stop you as you stepped onto the sidewalk, only leaning over the seat and throwing you a wink. “You’ll call me, won’t you?”

You leaned into the frame so you could get one more look at his pretty face. “I’ll be up by 11… I’ll catch ya later.” You shut the door before anything else could be said and dragged yourself home.

After talking and teasing him at Kitty’s Diner the next morning, you let Steve take you back to his room where you got hot and heavy the rest of the day. You caught a case of Deja Vu when he dropped you off in the early hours of the morning again. You couldn’t hide your amusement when he said he planned to stay in town. “Just a little bit longer,” he professed. Steve had his arm around you as he pulled you towards him, almost tugging you into his seat. He wouldn’t say it but you had understood that he was enjoying himself too much to leave at the moment.

You spent the next five days in his motel room between your shifts at work, enjoying his body between listening to his stories and sharing your own. Mel had needed so much time to pack her life up for her return to college that you didn’t think she even took note of your absence around her place. You didn’t mind it though. He had been busy telling you about all the national parks he had stopped for and the best foods he’d tasted at 24-hour diners across the country. You’d mention your job at the beauty parlor down the street and your hope to travel cross-country yourself. He made even the bad parts of being on the road sound like an escape from your reality. You would talk about Led Zeppelin and Fleetwood Mac and write down music recommendations to keep an ear out for on the radio. One day he pulled out a little book and a set of pencils as you laid naked and fatigued in the tangled sheets. He kept looking up at you as he scratched into the page. After keeping his head buried in the book for half an hour, he joined you on the bed and showed you the drawing he was working on. It was you in all your bare glory. After your face had run hot and asked if you could keep it, he didn’t hesitate to kiss his way down to your wanting body. He was over six years your elder, and it was clear that he had prior experience with female anatomy, not that you minded. 

He was a man of passion in many ways. Between finding new reasons to hold you a little closer to him, he would talk about his favorite novels and the literary techniques of authors like Kurt Vonnegut. He knew so much about a world that you had barely seen, and it would have been difficult for any ordinary woman to resist the combination of his charm, good looks, and intelligence.

Every hour you spent with him only further suspended your disbelief that he was truly living in your presence. You were happy that he spoke toy you on Brian’s rundown couch that first night, and after a week of finding entertainment in one another, you help him pack up the trunk of his car with what little he had traveled with. Even though you were enamored, you weren’t stupid; he had been sweet on you, but you were sure he had a trail of women he must have left behind before crossing every state border. How could a man like him not? It made your chest tighten more than you cared to admit. A week after the party, he was dropping you off for the final time.

His lips worked slowly against your neck as you sat back in the passenger seat, enjoy the last moments of his attention before he became nothing more than a memory, “I’m sure that you’ll have a new gal by the time you get to California, but will you give me a ring when you’ve settled anyways,” you moaned into his ear.

Steve pulled his head back to get a clear look at you as if he’d sobered from his lustful haze. He relaxed back into his seat and ran his hand through his messy mop with a heavy sigh. You were sure you’d killed the moment before he spoke up. “What would you say if I wanted you to come with me?”

“What?”

“I wasn’t messing around when I said you deserved better than Arkansas. You were born here but you don’t have to spend your whole life here.” Your mind was moving rapidly but you could barely focus on a single thought. “I think I’m in love with you. If you can come to California, you can keep doing hair, you can finish your degree, anything you want.” By the time he finished, only silence sat between you and he fidgeted with his keys. He waited for your response and only got more nervous when you didn’t have one. “Shit, I shouldn’t have said anything, doll. I’m s-”

“I’ll come with you,” you said. 

The words took a minute to settle before he could laugh out a sigh of relief. “Yeah?”

“Yeah, Stevie. I… I think I love you too. I wanna go with you.”

He pulled you back against him and toyed with the ends of your hair. “God, you’ve made me the happiest man alive, baby. I don’t think I could have left without you.”

“And I wouldn’t want you to.” You kissed at his beard and stroked his cheek. “I need to start packing if we’re leaving in the morning.”

“Do you want me to pick you up tomorrow?”

“No, just... Just give me 15 minutes and I’ll be fine. I can go back to the room with you and we’ll be good to go in the morning.” You knew there wasn’t much to be gathered in your room. Just some clothes for warmer weather and books. You’d grab your cosmetology kit, some family photos, and some cash that you’d hid before your mom could notice in her drunken stupor. There wasn’t much worth salvaging from your current way of living. “I’ll call Mel later and tell her I’m leaving. She can tell the salon that I won’t be in for my shifts next week.”

“I can wait out here for you unless you need help.”

“No, just sit here and I’ll be back soon.” You kissed him one more time before exiting the car, walking with haste to get into the house.

When you walked inside, only the T.V. lit up the front room and it was if every step you took awoke the house. You were quick to pack your bag once you reached your room, grabbing for things that you decided were necessary in the heat of the moment. Once you cleared through your desk and closet, you pulled at a loose floorboard and grabbed the wad of bills you’d been saving for your semester tuition. Once you emptied your smugglers hold of some photos worth saving, you replaced the floorboard as if nothing were ever there.

“And what the fuck do you think you’re doing?” You nearly jumped out of your skin as you caught a look at the figure in your door frame.

“Didn’t know you were home yet. Thought you and Pierce were still out for the night.”

“When I come home I expect you to be here. Do you know what goddamn time is?” Your mother was not and never had been a happy drunk, and when her boyfriend would come around it only made things worse. She started to walk towards you as you stood from your crouched position, hiding the cash and photographs from her sight.

“I was with Melissa. She’s going back to school this week and I wanted to say goodbye to her.”

“Don’t you lie to me,” she seethed. You knew this would not be the easy getaway you had wanted. “You were probably out whoring around again.”

“I’m not going to let you talk to me like that. I just told you where I was,” you challenged. You walked to your bed and filed away the contraband into your bag knowing that it was the last of the important items you could grab before leaving.

“You probably think you’ve been real clever coming in after we’re every night, but I’ve fucking noticed. You’ve never been all that smart.” She had stumbled into your room and the smell of whiskey was so strong it made your nose burn. 

You weren’t able to offer her a retort or a farewell before you heard more footsteps from down the hall. “What seems to be the problem here,” Pierce said. Drunk. They were both always drunk.

“Little Miss thinks that she can just whore herself out and then come home without consequences,” your mother announced.

“Don’t worry, I’m leaving anyway.” You grabbed your bag and made an effort to quickly escape the room, pushing past Pierce in the doorway.

“Don’t you walk away from us, bitch!” Pierce’s shouting became incoherent hollers and you sped towards the living room, but you could hear her footsteps behind you.

By the time you could see the front door, you felt a tug on your hair so strong it nearly pulled you to the floor with a shriek. “You think you’re just gonna leave and move on, huh?” Your head throbbed as she raged in your ear. “You’re nothing and you’re worth nothing. Once you’re not useful for whoring anymore, you’ll end up in a ditch on the side of the road.”

You punched her in the face before she could see it coming, something you had only thought about doing to her in your wildest dreams, and it was enough to throw her to the floor. You took the chance to grab your bag and run outside without a care for your dignity or the grace of your departure. You could hear her screams from down the street and you knew that at any second, the neighbors would be looking to see what had happened.

You slammed the car door as soon as your foot was inside, startling Steve. “What the hell hap-”

“Just drive, Steve!” You all but shouted as your mom stepped onto the front lawn with blood dribbling down her chin. He didn’t need any further explanation as he put his foot on the pedal. Your mother was still screaming, that much you could hear, but her slurs were muffled as you flew past the house.

You hadn’t noticed a smudge of your mom’s blood on your knuckles until you got back to the room and you spent the next 10 minutes trying to scrub away the ghostly red specks. You couldn’t stand the feeling of it. Steve stood in the doorways with his arms across his chest the entire time. He didn’t look too thrilled about how everything played out but didn’t say anything about it.

“My mom and her boyfriend were home and fucking wasted. I didn’t even know until she came in screaming at me, calling me a whore and stuff.” He walked up to you as you dried your hands on an off-white towel. “Sad to say that’s not really an unusual encounter.”

“Are you gonna be okay, doll?” He looked concerned, maybe even a little angry for you, but the furrow of his brow did little to extinguish your distress. You just wanted him slightly closer and you held faith that he could obliterate the memory of this night.

“I’m fine... I just think that the sooner we get out of here, the better.”

“We’ll be gone before the sun even rises. Let's just get a couple hours of sleep and then we’ll be on the road.” He drew you nearer to him and you nodded as you looked past through him. “This will all be behind us in a couple of hours.”

He bent down for a kiss and you readily gave into him. In so little time he had made you feel alive. He made you feel wanted. You had so little in the world — your mom was a drunk and your father had long hit the road; you were low on friends and even lower on funds — and now you had even less. You were about to take any sense of stability that was left in your life and chuck it out the window in the morning. But it didn’t matter because even one more day with Steve would make you feel more alive and more loved than you had known in your entire life.

His mouth became eager and he pulled you even closer, working his way to your chest and down your stomach as his hand wandered up your skirt. Before you could think of touching him, he had you lifted over his shoulder with a squeal. He said nothing as he moved smoothly across the room and dropped you on the bed, casting himself over you. You tried to caress him, but he quickly pinned your hands under his and he sucked at your neck. You had transformed into a puddle of moans in no time.

“Please Stevie,” you choked out. You ground your hips against his jeans but the friction wasn’t enough.

“Please what, doll?” He reached between your legs and knew he could feel how wet you were. “You’re gonna have to use your words for me, baby.”

“Please… I need you inside of me.” You squirmed in hopes to pull your hand from his grip but it was pointless. You think he got harder just feeling you struggle under him.

“That's all you had to say,” he whispered in your ear and gave you a carnal kiss against the lobe. He shifted his weight to sit up as he pulled his shirt over his head. You didn’t have more than a moment you gawk at him before he was roughly pushing your skirt over your hips. All it took was him unzipping his jeans and he drove his cock all the way inside of you. You couldn’t find a sound to make as all of the wind was knocked from your lungs.

By the time you could find your voice, he was thrusting into you at a savage pace. You cried out in complete ecstasy and he held you down; your brain felt like it was turning to mush. He growled for you to open your eyes so he could so much you loved his cock and he looked back at you with something that could only be described as darkness. It was immoral and wicked, but you couldn’t find the will to care as the man above you grabbed you like he owned you and fucked you to oblivion.

He hissed as you came around him the first time but you knew he was not done with you. He didn’t let up on his strokes until he was mirroring your moans and he never looked away from your flustered face. One of his hands began loosely circling your throat as you clenched around him again and you could feel him throb as he came inside of you. With a grunt, he pulled out and let his hot cum escape your body onto the sheets. He let his weight fall to the bed without ever letting go, and you laid on his chest in post-coital bliss. If you could choose one moment in your life to relive, you were sure it would be this one, time and time again.

“Glad to know you can keep up,” you choked out jokingly. You felt his chest vibrate with laughter as he pressed his lips to your forehead.

“Always, doll. We’re only getting started.” 

A heavy knock on the door had broken the silence. Steve cursed under his breath as he zipped up his pants, and he placed you back on the bed. He took his time walking to the door but it was clear that the person on the other side was growing inpatient. He looked through the peephole and cursed again before turning away. He unconsciously ground his death with his furrowed brow.

“Who is it,” you asked, trying to keep your fear at bay.

He pointed at you with a stern look and a firmer tone. “Stay right there. Don’t say anything.” Before you could ask him what was happening, he undid the chain door lock and pulled it ajar, just enough to let the unwanted visitor see his face. “What do you want, man?”

“Where the fuck is she?” Pierce. It was Pierce and you could tell he was still drunk.

“Look, I don’t know what fucking drugs your own, but if you start beating on my door again I’m gonna beat your face in,” Steve fumed. Your jaw dropped as you listened in on the conversation; you’d never heard him talk light that before. He was always the type to open the door for you and smother you with pet names. He tried to close the door but you jumped at the sound of it slamming into the wall as Pierce threw all his weight onto it. He was bursting into the room before Steve could catch him and your blood ran cold as he saw you on the bed.

“Your mother's right. You’re just some lying, ungrateful whore.” His grip on your shoulder was sudden and he threw you to the floor. Your vision was spotty but you had other things you needed to worry about. “Only God knows how bad she’s gonna beat you for busting her nose like that.”

You heard a loud crack as Steve’s fist met Pierce’s face and you grabbed at the bed, trying to gain your footing. Everything was still a little blurred at the edges, but you could see as Pierce pulled Steve to the floor with him. As they threw punches and swore for each other's misfortune, you could only clearly make out the dark blood dripping from Pierce’s mouth onto Steve as he gained an edge over him, swinging at his face a couple more times. 

You looked around the room for something, anything to make them stop, but Steve had already taken most things to the car. You could hear Steve grunt as Pierce attempted to bash his face in. He had only tried to help you and now he was paying for it. That’s when you saw it. A butterfly knife sitting on the side table next to the cigarette dish and Steve’s wallet. You didn’t hesitate to grab it and before you could even understand the consequences of your actions, you plunged the blade between Pierce’s shoulder blades. 

He dropped to the floor without hesitation as he howled in pain. “You fucking bitch!” He sounded like a wounded dog as he sprawled on the floor, and you could only watch with wide eyes. God, what had you done...

Steve pulled himself from the floor and every breath he took was heavier than the last. He had missed most of his opponent’s drunken punches, but his lip was busted and he was rattled by the brawl. He looked crazed, and as he rose to his full stature, he moved to stand over Pierce who could do nothing but cry out in the fetal position. The knife was still wedged in his back.

You ran to Steve and cried as you tugged on his arm. “Steve, I don’t… I don’t know how he found us,” you choked out between heavy tears. “He must have seen the car.”

Steve said nothing. He didn’t even look at you, and that’s what scared you the most. His neck and back were tense and your touch wouldn’t be enough to soothe him. In erratic movement, Steve reached down and pulled the knife from between Pierce’s shoulder blade with a grunt. You gasped as Pierce choked out a sob. He shook in pain, blood puddling onto the carpet under him.

It was like a nightmare. Steve crouched over Pierce, looking into the old drunk’s soul as he squeezed the knife in his hands. You wish you had done something, wish you had said anything. With hasty slash and a depraved glower, Steve slit Pierce’s throat and you couldn’t turn fast enough to not see it.

Blood. Blood poured out Pierce’s wound like a broken fire hose, pooling at your feet while it splattered on Steve’s face and chest. For only a moment, Pierce sounded like he was choking, and then there was no more. No more cries, no more movement. It was just you and Steve standing over a corpse. Everything felt frozen in time as the room reached an eerie stillness that could be described only as insidious.

Steve was the first to move. He stumbled to the bathroom and threw the knife in the sink, letting the faucet run until the steaming water cleansed the weapon of blood. He bent over the sink and he watched it with morbid fascination.

You stumbled towards him, knowing that you couldn’t look at the body on the floor or you’d lose the last ounce of your sanity. It was only when Steve looked at you over his shoulder, the craze in his stare having vanished, that bile rose in your throat. You bent over the toilet and released everything you had ate during the day and maybe a little more. You could hear the sink faucet still running but Steve moved to your side. 

“Doll-”

“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, Stevie,” you sobbed. His arm wrapped around your waist as his forehead fell to you back. Exactly where you stabbed Pierce. You flinched at the thought and Steve pulled back.

“Listen to me, okay?” He pulled you away from the toilet and directed you to look at him. There was blood all over his hands and on his torso. “Everything is fine.”

“He’s fucking dead.”

“I know, baby. But we had to do it”

“How are we gonna-”

“You don’t need to worry about that alright?” You nodded but it was a lie. You could do nothing but worry. “You’re gonna get in the shower. I’ll join you in just a second, but you’ve got blood all over your legs and I need you to get cleaned up right now.” You looked towards the ground and noticed that your feet were painted red; a trail of bloody footsteps led into the bathroom. “I need you to tell me you can do that for me.”

You took a breath in and tried to control the cry building in your throat. “I can do that.” You began taking off your clothes, looking for any bloodstains on the fabric only to be surprised when you saw none. You felt like you were covered in blood; there must have been a spot hiding somewhere. Steve had left the room when the saw you step inside the porcelain tub and you tried not to think about what he was doing in the other room. You let the lukewarm water run down your head and trickle down to your feet as you closed your eyes, willing you consciousness to hold on just a little bit longer.

Steve returned to the bathroom faster than you thought he would and was quick to strip his jeans and boxers. You could hear the curtain slide open as he joined behind you, pushing himself under the stream alongside you. He kissed at your shoulders and cheeks, as to tell you he had taken care of everything, and he scrubbed the crimson from his chest. You could only watch with a haunted expression as it all disappear down the drain. He turned off the water after he scrubbed both of your bodies to a level of cleanliness that you probably hadn’t reached in months. You threw on the clothes you had stepped out to close to the present and you felt dirty all over again. Steve must have retrieved his shirt from the bedroom earlier because he now looked like the version of himself from an hour back when he had nothing on his mind but loving you. Your sandals sat in the corner of the bathroom for you to toe on. When you fastened them both on at the heels, he opened the bathroom and your eyes snapped shut. You couldn’t see it again.

“You don’t need to look,” he whispered to you. “I’ve got everything in the car already. I just need you to take my hand and we’ll never be back here again.” You could want nothing more right now.

You felt for his hand and his calloused fingers wove between yours. He tugged you out of the bathroom and you could feel him navigate you through the mess you had both created. The irony stench of blood crowded your sense and you wished more than anything that you could protect him from having to see the sins that had been committed on this night. The layout of the room would be drilled in your mind forever and you were sure he wouldn’t forget either. Only when you heard him shut the room door behind you could you find the will to open your eyes but you never let go of his hand.

He put you in the car and got in on the driver's side, but he said nothing as he started the car and pulled out of the motel parking lot. You could feel it; the body was still in that room, soaking up a pool of blood. As you watched the hazy lights on the town dim in the dreary night, you got on the highway and knew that you would never see Arkansas again.

[serialbydesign]

Defining Psychopathy

Psychopathy, often confused with sociopathy, is an anti-social personality disorder. Both mental health conditions are characterized by:

Need for violence.

Disregard for social norms, conventions, and laws.

Lack of remorse & guilt.

Deceitful nature.

However, sociopaths usually are emotionally unstable and tend to act on compulsion, lacking patience and planning. Psychopaths are attentive to details, calculated, and plan every action they intend to pursue – be it legal or illegal. Therefore, they leave few clues and take fewer risks. Over time, multiple conceptions of psychopathy developed – most of which overlap, but some contradict others.

Just like sociopathy, psychopathy can be caused by genetic and environmental factors. This means children can inherit it from the parents but also develop it during the lifetime after abuse, emotional shock, or living in an unsuitable environment. But one can also acquire psychopathy after a traumatic brain injury. It has been discovered that the prefrontal cortex is responsible for our social behavior and acquired psychopathy is often linked to trauma in this area.

Another prevalent theory states that psychopathy is genetically inherited and can be triggered by environmental factors, while sociopathy is only developed throughout life. No matter which theory we follow, Dexter Morgan is much closer to being a psychopath than a sociopath. However, he does struggle with keeping his Dark Passenger under control at times.

Dexter Morgan, The Psychopath 

Dexter Morgan is a forensic expert, but he most frequently calls himself a blood spatter analyst. Even though he commits horrendous crimes throughout the show, we root for him and find bits of ourselves in his narratives. We see how he evolves from a cold-blooded serial killer to a cold-blooded serial killer who cares about some of those around him. The personal way in which he narrates his experiences further increase the connection we feel with this character. He often contemplates on aspects of the day-to-day life using first person pronouns in plural forms, which works on our subconscious. This is one of the many techniques used by real-life psychopaths, and Dexter Morgan proves again and again that they work.

“They make it look so easy, connecting with another human being, it’s like no one told them it’s the hardest thing in the world.” – Dexter Season 5 episode 12, “The Big One”

Dexter’s sense of righteousness instilled by his adoptive father fires up conflicted feelings on his morality. On the one side, he murders people in cold blood and enjoys it. But on the other, he gets rid of “bad seeds” the justice system could not charge. Ultimately, he is saving lives while satisfying his dark passenger, being a modern vigilante.

“We all make rules for ourselves. It’s these rules that help define who we are. So when we break those rules we risk losing ourselves and becoming something unknown.” – Dexter Season 7 Finale, “Let’s Give the Boy a Hand”

These, together with his continuous struggle to control his urges and do as little damage as possible to society, make us all feel sympathy for Dexter. Because we know the terrible things that happened to him, we understand what caused this behavior. But would he feel the same about us?

The Profile of Dexter Morgan

Dexter Morgan is persuasive, intelligent, deceitful, and a psychopath.

He killed well over 100 people (at least 134 documented cases) and shows no remorse about this – in fact, he believes he benefits society. Moreover, he likes to take trophies – a single drop of blood from each of his victims, carefully placed on a glass slide. Dexter has a ritual that is full of meaning for each of his victim’s crimes and likes to confront them and let them know he knows what they did. He feels empowered by this, he feels he finally has control.

Dexter is neat, sometimes compulsive, and likes to keep order in his life. He always plans his actions and waits for the best and safest time to make a move. This is what differentiates himself from a sociopath. He likes being and working by himself because using his “mask” is tiring. But even though he has an anti-social behavior, his social skills are way above average.

“People fake a lot of human interactions, but I feel like I’ve faked them all and I fake them very well. And that’s my burden, I guess.”

Dexter Morgan can be best psychoanalyzed using Freud’s structural model of the psychic apparatus which defines three dimensions of the mind:

The id represents our uncoordinated instincts, with a focus on pleasure and desire. The id is often associated with evil, lust, sin, and the like. The super-ego is the moralizing element, responsible for assimilating social norms and behaviors. It’s the virtuous, pure, and wholesome dimension. The ego, a realistic and rational influence on our thought process, usually mediates these two antagonizing elements.

Even though most individuals naturally balance these three dimensions, Dexter Morgan struggles do so. He spent all his life observing those around him and trying to mimic their behavior, knowing he will never act like them naturally.

Dexter’s Id

After the age of 6 years old, most individuals suppress their id and manage to focus their mental and emotional energy towards following social norms. But Dexter was not able to do so and, as a consequence, his id rules his life. Even as a child, Dexter enjoyed killing animals. In fact, taking a life is the only thing that makes Dexter feel alive. Sex does not interest Dexter, which we can also blame on the trauma he suffered as a child at a critical age for his (among others) psychosexual development.

Dexter’s Super-Ego

Dexter refers to the people surrounding him as humans, feeling detached from his own humanity. There is plenty of evidence throughout the show that demonstrate Dexter has a seriously underdeveloped super-ego if any. His adoptive father, Harry, created an artificial super-ego dimension in his mind through a few strict guidelines. However, Dexter’s subconscious never adopted them as its own and, as a result, he sometimes struggles to follow them.

Dexter does not understand religion. The only higher power he knew was his adoptive father, who also created the code. He has difficulties in developing real relationships of any nature with those around him but has gotten very good at faking them.

Dexter’s Ego

Instead of balancing out the 2 other dimensions, Dexter uses his ego to hide them from society. He goes above and beyond to hide his true self. He fights the recurrent feeling of emptiness that can only be relieved by killing.

How Dexter Morgan Came to Be a Psychopath

There are a few theories about how Dexter became what he is, but they all rely on the emotional and psychological trauma he suffered as a child.

Dexter saw his mother brutally murdered when he was only 6 years old and sat in a shipping container in a pool of her (and others’) blood for 2 days. This affected his emotional development and understanding of social norms, which he has difficulties adapting to.

Dexter understands he is a disturbed individual. But even though admitting the problem is often times the first step to resolving it, psychopathy has no cure (yet). There are no pills, vaccines, or therapies that erase traumatizing memories from our subconscious, induce empathy, or warm up a murderer’s blood.

But Dexter lacked a mother figure during his most important years, even before she was murdered. He was deprived of the warmth, closeness, and affection only a mother-son relationship would provide. Even though loving, his mother was not as present in his life as she should have been – and neither was his father. They were both addicted to drugs and involved themselves with dangerous figures, which ultimately lead to their demise. Even though a loving, caring family took him in at the age of 6, the damage was already done.

“I was there. I saw my mother’s death. A buried memory, forgotten all these years. They climbed inside me that day. And it’s been with me ever since. My dark passenger.” – Dexter Season 1 Episode 11 “Truth Be Told”

Moreover, his need for power and control were overindulged in a try to create a warm environment for the troubled child. But this only increased the distance between Dexter and humanity, between an impressionable child and his remorse and guilt.

Dexter Morgan & His Dark Passenger

Most of the time, Dexter Morgan is able to suppress his passenger. But it still needs to be let out from time to time, and when it does, Dexter refers to the process as the Dark Passenger “taking over”. He already knows that it will get out one way or the other, so he doesn’t try to fight it. In fact, Dexter finds comfort and acceptance in his Dark Passenger, the only entity that accepts him for who he is.

“I love Halloween. The one time of year when everyone wears a mask… not just me. People think it’s fun to pretend you’re a monster. Me, I spend my life pretending I’m not. Brother, friend, boyfriend – all part of my costume collection. Some people might call me a fraud. Let’s see if it will fit. I prefer to think of myself as a master of disguise.” – Dexter Season 1, Episode 4

Dexter manages to separate and balance out his natural self and the façade brilliantly. He is seen as a loving son, brother and as a reliable and helpful coworker.

The Code of Harry

Harry was more than just Dexter’s adoptive father. Together with Aaron and Deb, he was his family in the most real sense of the word.

“If I were capable of love, how I would have loved Harry.”

Since they could not stop Dexter’s urge to take life away, Harry decided to channel it. Therefore, Harry developed a code together with his therapist in which he confided about Dexter’s condition. As his father put it, the code focuses on survival and doing as little wrong to the world as possible. Dexter needs to be sure he kills the right person and to have proof for his deeds. But above all, he needs to never, ever risk having collateral victims.

Even though frustrating and rage-inducing at times, Dexter abides by the Code of Harry. However, he does take advantage of technicalities to satisfy his dark passenger at times, racing with the police and even hiding evidence in order to punish criminals himself even with his friends’ and coworker’s career on the line.

“Without the Code of Harry, I’m sure I would have committed a senseless murder in my youth. Just to watch the blood flow.” – Dexter Season 1 Episode 3, “Popping Cherry”

The Morality of Dexter

Yes, Dexter Morgan is brutal, ruthless, and cruel. Ever since Harry Morgan took him in, Dexter made efforts to comply with social norms. Even though he pretended for decades, he makes efforts to preserve appearances every day. None of the behaviors he adopted for so many years got under his skin, none of them come naturally even after all this time.

But this doesn’t mean Dexter Morgan is stone-hearted or completely devoid of feelings. After all, he does feel anger, hate, and affection and admits that he needs the people in his life. He realizes how scared he is of losing his family. 

Even though supposedly rudimentary, some of these feelings scare and intimidate Dexter Morgan because he doesn’t know how to handle them.

[lipliquor8]

Peptides Advantages - Do They Assist You?

Dbal Kinds, Crazybulk Bewertung

Content

Ostarine And Also Ligandrol Improve Muscle Mass Tissue In An Ovariectomized Rat Model.

Modern Technology.

Firm Overview For Sarms Ventures Limited (.

Tumour.

Individuals commonly have feelings of regret and disgust at their lack of control during and also after binge consuming, which can strengthen that cycle of adverse emotions, limitation and binge eating again. Individuals with binge eating disorder eat big amounts of food over a brief time period.

This not only leads to raised muscle mass development but likewise results in muscular tissue retention and also the formation of new muscle mass cells. This SARM was originally created to help patients struggling with muscular tissue loss, however it's mainly used by bodybuilders to avoid muscular tissue losing. GHSRs are also discovered in the areas of the brain that regulate appetite, state of mind, pleasure, memory, biological rhythms, cognitive features, as well as memory. When you take Ibutamoren, you'll not only lose fat and construct muscle mass but will additionally feel far better and more sharp, improving your fitness efficiency. A big part of this factor is how Ligandrol boosts your energy.

Ostarine And Also Ligandrol Enhance Muscle Mass Tissue In An Ovariectomized Rat Version.

You'll have the ability to exercise for longer and also can maintain extra extreme training sessions, which will certainly result in some major muscle gains. is just one of the most effective muscle-building SARMs on the marketplace. It only takes a few weeks for Ligandrol to work, even after a solitary cycle. Bodybuilders will certainly additionally experience other advantages when making use of Ostarine, such as enhanced bone density and also faster recovery time. Bodybuilding offers lots of physical benefits and can improve your body. When S.A.R.Ms bind to the receptor they demonstrate anabolic and hypertrophic task in both muscle mass and also bone.

People may find it difficult to stop throughout a binge even if they wish to. Some people with binge eating condition have defined really feeling detached from what they're doing throughout a binge, or even having a hard time to keep in mind what they've eaten afterwards. The majority of people suggest that the product is carried out only as soon as every 4 weeks, dbal types.

Innovation.

Makers have to test each product in independent research laboratories, which must offer their consent for sporting activities supplements to show up on the market. Without it, customers might question the accuracy and also safety of the item and deny it. Some SARMs had actually been tested years prior to they were accepted for use. Although costliness is a family member term, the majority of customers will agree that the costs of SARMs are high.

Unlike people with bulimia, they don't normally follow this by eliminating the food via, for instance, throwing up, though occasionally they could quickly in between binges. BED is not regarding selecting to eat huge portions, nor are individuals that struggle with it just "overindulging"-- much from being pleasurable, binges are really distressing, frequently including a much bigger quantity of food than a person would wish to eat.

Company Review For Sarms Business Restricted (.

In addition, cycle assistance lowers the chance you'll experience any side effects. Numerous PCT supplements have natural vitamins, minerals, and also natural herbs such as ashwagandha remove, Tribulus Terrestris essence, Rhodiola Rosea remove, vitamin E, and also saw palmetto extract. These active ingredients will certainly stabilize hormonal agents while boosting body structure and your total feeling of wellness. Yet there are specific supplements that bodybuilders and anyone taking SARMs should make use of. Supplements contain vitamins, minerals, fats, amino acids, and other valuable components. People take supplements for even more reasons than fitness benefits. Supplements consist of vital vitamins, minerals, and also other substances that enhance your wellness.

Does Vitaminhoppe sell SARMs?

SARMs are drugs and they are not dietary supplements. Using the internet one can easily find SARMs for sale. The bigger retail stores like GNC and Vitamin Shoppe do not carry them, but the smaller independently owned supplement stores are notorious for distributing SARMs.

While BCAAs are vital to muscle mass gain, it is suggested you take BCAAs with protein supplements, specifically whey protein. BCAAs promote muscle healthy protein synthesis, which is the procedure of structure muscle. It's likewise stated that BCAAs reduce muscular tissue damages in addition to the length and also severity of delayed beginning muscle discomfort, urging body builders to raise extra. Premium cycle support supplements include ingredients such as grape seed essence, Tribulus Terrestris remove, vitamin E, N-Acetyl-I-Cysteine, saw palmetto extract, celery seed extract, as well as hawthorn berry. Cycle assistance protects important bodily features, such as cardiovascular, liver, prostate, and cholesterol health as well as also sustains your blood pressure.

Tumor.

Binges may be planned like a routine and can involve the person buying "special" binge foods, or they may be more spontaneous. People might go to severe sizes to accessibility food-- for instance, eating food that has actually been gotten rid of or swiping food. several BPC157 Italy eating normally occurs in private, though the person may eat routine dishes outside their binges. People with binge eating disorder may likewise limit their diet regimen or place in specific policies around food-- this can additionally lead to them binge consuming due to appetite as well as feelings of deprivation.

It is worth keeping in mind that Cardarine itself was originally suggested as a way to deal with obesity.

SARM-type mass tablet computers from this group allow to shed fat cells without losing muscle cells.

SARMs for weight decrease as well as support in constructing a brand-new one include Ibutamoren, Cardarine and also Endurobol.

Usually when I quit with my steroids, my stamina minimizes as well as I am slimming down.

SARMs were actually uncovered by accident in the 90s when cancer cells researcher James Dalton recognized the particle andarine, or S-4, which came to be the first-ever SARM.

I got it for myself, not as much to be obtaining mass yet essentially for after steroid cycle.

This would be similar to a SARMS triple stack that is generally ran with Ostarine, other than there is an opportunity of even more dimension being put on while reducing. An excellent dose for this approach would certainly be 3-5 mg a day for 8 weeks. LGD has shown one of the most capacity of any type of SARM to place on size that can be taken into consideration a mass. boosts, and have had a considerable increase in calorie intake. An advise dosage for this kind of goal would be 5-10 mg day for 8 weeks. If you disable this cookie, we will certainly not be able to conserve your choices. This indicates that each time you visit this internet site you will need to enable or disable cookies once again.

Types Of Bonds In Biological Molecules.

Being uncertain of any one of the above can indicate that you shouldn't be taking efficiency enhancers just yet-- this is since your body still has the ability to boost normally. Only when you can not improve any longer would I suggest considering taking efficiency enhancers. Value that efficiency boosters will not make you buff on their own. As your body reacts, you may really feel an absence of appetite, but this should not place you off from staying with your diet plan. The very best SARMs offer for sale included clear and thorough guidelines.

How long should you take Mk 677?

Previous studies in humans demonstrated that daily oral administration of MK-677 in healthy older adults,8 GH-deficient adults9 for 4 weeks, and GH-deficient children10 for 7 days increased serum GH, IGF-I, and IGF binding protein (IGFBP)-3 concentrations.

A significantly greater intramuscular fat content of the quadriceps femoris muscular tissue was observed in the OVX+LG 4 team compared to the Non-OVX team. In OVX rats, the fat content of the muscle did not differ from that in the various other teams. All rats obtained a soy-free rodent diet regimen (ssniff Spezial Diät GmbH, Soest, Germany) throughout the experiment. OS and LG were provided with the soy-free diet plan (ssniff Spezial Diät GmbH).

Strictly Necessary Cookie ought to be enabled at all times to make sure that we can save your choices for cookie setups. It indicates that purchasers have proper defense when purchasing sporting activities supplements, both online and offline. Authorities are responding really promptly and also capturing fraudsters offering phony SARMs.

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" width="304px" alt="Peptides advantages"/>

The gastrocnemius muscular tissue, soleus muscle, as well as longissimus muscular tissue were removed. The GM and SM were considered and all muscular tissues were frozen in fluid nitrogen and kept at − 80 ° C until further analyses. Either left or right muscles were used arbitrarily in either histological or enzyme evaluations. In Experiment II, intramuscular fat material was identified in the quadriceps femoris muscular tissue in Non-OVX, OVX, as well as OVX+LG 4 teams.

information BPC157 Australia remaining food in the cage was considered weekly to determine the typical daily food intake of a rat by separating these information by days in between the considering and also number of rats in a cage. The ordinary day-to-day dosage of OS and LG was calculated based on the everyday food intake and the mean BW in the cage on the particular week. After 13 weeks post-OVX, all animals were euthanized under CO2 anesthetic. Blood serum was accumulated for further evaluation of creatine kinase as a marker of muscle damages.

CRN updates guidelines on SARMs, caffeine - NutraIngredients-usa.com

CRN updates guidelines on SARMs, caffeine.

Posted: Mon, 09 Jul 2018 07:00:00 GMT [source]

If you haven't received any kind of, part three has been made to aid you get the most out of your cycle. Perfect for those that do not take pleasure in having a healthy level of testosterone. I really dropped weight no toughness obtains no anything essentially. My diet is actually far better than its ever been training is great as well. It will radiate more-so if ran in conjunction with SARMS S-4 and Cardarine (GW ).

Nonetheless, they are still related to venous thromboembolism and also stroke. C4 (commonly known as pre-workout) delivers an increase of high levels of caffeine and various other active ingredients to boost endurance, energy, as well as efficiency. It's excellent for body builders of all levels, but you ought to adhere to dosing guidelines meticulously.

OS as well as LG are still being investigated in clinical tests, and neither have actually been authorized as therapies to this point. There are no studies reporting in vivo effects of OS and also LG on postmenopausal muscle framework and metabolism. The goal of the here and now study was to explore the effect of OS and LG on the muscle cells of ovariectomized rats as the typical model for postmenopausal problems. The OS effect on bone cells and animal design as a component of Experiment I has been recently published. Hormone replacement treatment in postmenopausal females is connected with extreme side effects, such as an enhanced danger of coronary heart problem, breast cancer, stroke, and venous thromboembolism. Nonetheless, it is still the most efficient therapy for postmenopausal signs and for very carefully selected ladies, advantages can surpass threats. Selective estrogen receptor modulators have useful results on the musculoskeletal system like estrogen, they have less adverse events on breasts and the uterus.

[gnicfit]

Checking In

Hi everyone (no one, really, I think I have like 2.5 followers, but whatever).

I’ve had this blog sitting here empty for a pretty long time and just now decided to start using in an attempt to find a better way to hold myself accountable. So, since I’m going to start using it, I figure I might as well do a little intro. I’m Garrett. I’m 27, but I’ll be 28 next week (yikes). I grew up in Georgia, where I went to college and graduated with a BA in Political Science and Philosophy (and a future husband, too). I moved to Louisiana, where I went to law school and got my J.D./D.C.L. During my 1st year of law school that “future husband” joined the Navy and also became my actual husband. He bounced around to wherever the Navy wanted him while I did my law school thing. I graduated in 2017, and moved to Washington State, where he was stationed and where we still are now. He’s still in the Navy and I’m a practicing attorney.

As far as my fitness background goes... I was always an athletic kid. I rode horses competitively through middle school and high school and in to college. I was super active, never sitting still. In college, that changed. I became a lot more sedentary, at really poorly, drank a LOT, and was put on antidepressants. I gained about ... 25-30lbs. Between freshman and sophomore year, I lost all of that weight, but I did it by exercising and tracking calories really obsessively - I was only eating about 1,200 calories a day. I got down to around 125lbs, which is what I’ve always considered to be a “healthy” weight for me. During law school I was pretty damn sedentary, but I didn’t eat much, because I have a tendency not to eat when I’m stressed (and I was stressed all the time in law school). I went back on antidepressants (around the same time my left for boot camp), but a different kind of drug, and ended up getting down to 115lbs or so. I would go for runs a few days a week, which I really enjoyed, and I would go to the gym once in a blue moon. After graduating and moving, I flailed around a lot. I had a really hard time adjusting to not being a student anymore. John was in and out a lot with different deployments and detachments. I struggled. I would go for runs on a pretty regular basis, but I hated the base gym. It’s so small and claustrophobic, I really couldn’t get past my anxiety to work out in there.

Around July/August of 2019, I joined a gym out in town and started lifting weights on the regular and, honestly, I fell in love with it. I’ve been soaking up all the information I possibly can. I actually just recently decided to start classes to become a Certified Fitness Trainer and a Certified Nutrition Coach. The stay home order we’re under has thrown things for a bit of a loop as far as my own programming, but I’m settling in to a new routine, finally. I weighed myself last night and I’m pretty far up on the scale - basically back to that post-Freshman 15 weight. A lack of consistency and discipline has really been why I haven’t been progressing like I want to, so ... I decided to start keeping myself accountable here. Once COVID things have calmed down, I plan on hiring a nutrition coach to work with myself, and my husband and I are in the process of building out our home gym, sooooooo I feel like things are looking good for me.

Anyway, if you read all this - thanks for sticking around. I’m kind of ... chatty. I think its the attorney in me.

Glad you’re here.

Garrett

[1000roughdrafts]

5 and 6 ✨

Ooh these are fun ones! Sorry for taking so long with this

5- Do you believe in ghosts and supernatural things?

I absolutely do! 100%, hands down, no question about it.

6- Have you ever experienced anything supernatural?

Ohhh boy, have I! I honestly don’t know what story to choose. I’ve dealt with ghosts, I’ve dealt with a Trickster, I have a spirit guide, I’ve experienced time shifts or glitches in time, I’ve astrally projected, and seriously felt (my bf witnessed) that I slipped into another dimension momentarily though that could have just been another weird projection.

Let me just say, I have been dealing with (for lack of a better word) the paranormal since I was young. It’s always just been normal to me (lols) and a huge reason I am so drawn to the show Supernatural, and unlike my skittish boyfriend, this shit gets me pumped up.

The most thrilling(?) story, just off the top of my head is probably how I met Ron (Trickster/Attachment).(and this got longer than I expected so I added an insert)

So, okay, I’m really really gonna try and keep this short and if anyone wants to know more I’ll delve deeper, but bottom line is that a couple friends of mine live about 15-20 minutes out of town, right? They own a good 2.5-3 acres of land, but behind their property is just the states forest. And I live in Oregon, okay? So trees are everywhere.

When they bought the place, there was a little, mini travel trailer sitting on it, and I wish I had pictures of it for you, but this trailer looked like it exploded from the inside out. So we all kind of just thought, you know, this is out in the middle of nowhere, we have found a few pipes for the kind of smoking that is definitelyyyyy not legal in Oregon, if you know what I mean. And inside the trailer, aside from glass shards everywhere, was just a stove, a sink, a sleeping bag on the bed, more mini, camper stoves and a huge monitor for a desktop computer. So we assumed, drug cook gone bad turned explosion, but that was just, of course, a theory.

I was wasted when I went out there for the first time, so my already hightened senses were through the roof but I was also vulnerable as heck. The second I laid eyes on it, different emotions started to swelter in me. I detach myself from the group (psa-never leave your group) and went to the other side to wrap my hand through the window, and link it around the frame of the door (both open) and the second I did this, literally the best way I can describe it is every emotion I have ever felt in my entire life flowed through me in a matter of half a second, and I fell to the ground, cutting my hand and arm in the process, bleeding and crying everywhere. A single piece of glass stuck in my hand and I, being stupid, kept it as a keepsake, cause why not right? Psh.

I ended up seeing him one night in person and then in a picture (that ended up turning all black?) and it scared the ever living shit out of me. He was like a mix between a short slender man and a skeleton. Like, imagine that, and the skeleton face had huge, iris-less black eyes, high cheek bones, broken and missing teeth. It looked like he had skin, but instead of the mannyyy layers a human would have, he had like 2. I don’t do the terror justice.

So a few weeks go by and everything is fine and normal, but then strange things started happening at home, but i didn’t make the connection until years later. My roommate, R, slept in the living room to be colder at night, and above where he slept on the wall was the fire alarm. He said for 2 or 3 nights in a row, in the middle of the night, that thing would speak in a low, and deep male voice but he couldn’t understand what it was saying. So he took it off the wall, it did it again. We took the batteries out, it did it again.

I was, and still am, really into chakra/healing stones, so I spent hours researching what the best stones to use would be, (for example: Jade works great for the heart chakra, so I put it where the batteries would go, Soladite-throat chakra, placed it where the speaker section is on the alarm) cleansed them, meditated on them and then placed them all on the alarm over night with it by my bed. Essentially my plan was the cleanse the alarm and like, rebirth it? I guess? Idk I was scared and didn’t know much, but after a couple of nights it worked, he gave up, but that was the first sign.

Fast forward like 2.5 years of depression and suicidal thoughts/tendencies, when it became clear to me that he didn’t need my help and was actually depleting my energy, I tried to get rid of him and that’s when he dropped the “I need you, help me cross over” face and actually showed how evil he was.

Some nights, when I felt his energy around me I would just squirt holy water I bought from a church in Nevada (lol) in the general direction that I felt him and hope it went away. Some nights I was genuinely terrified to go into my room, (I didn’t know he was attached to me at the time) and would drive around town until the sun came up.

He’s growled at me, at my sister, at our friends. He made us all feel so uncomfortable when we were home alone that I genuinely did not want to be alive anymore.

Trigger warning: unwanted, physical touches

Imagine what it would feel like if someone placed their hand an inch above your arm, or just place your hand over your other hand without touching them and glide the hovering hand up to your elbow. You can still feel it, the energy? One night, trying to lay down and go to bed, I felt that, starting at my ankles and by the time it reached just above my thigh I realized what was going on and muttered something about it not having permission to touch me, and to leave at once.

Ya girl still jumped the heck out of bed though and slept on the floor of her sisters room.

This is pretty long now, sorry, I just haven’t shared that story with practically anyone and saw the chance. There is soooo much more I could say but I’ll end it with this; I am not one to fear ghosts or the unknown and I recognize that communication between human and the average ghost can actually be really wholesome. I think of it as just two people talking with a veil between, but when you cross over into the evil stuff (demons, tricksters, etc.) that’s like meeting a serial killer on the internet and asking them to meet you alone in a dark alley. That shit is terrifying.

[imnotcrazyidontthink]

I am so grateful to have artist + mental health activist Kate Elizabeth share her story on the blog today. Her story has really touched me and I hope it can do the same for you - Leon Else

Hello, I’m Kate Elisabeth. I’m a non-binary pansexual, which is a fancy way of saying I’m hella queer. I’m also an illustrator who fancies cartoons, and I’m also a mental health activist!

My experience with mental health goes a little deeper than just receiving a diagnosis and treatment. 

When I was 12 years old I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease called Hashimotos, where my immune system attacks my thyroid. I now need to take hormone replacements to make up for what my thyroid is lacking. After the diagnosis my parents assumed all of my apparent mental stress was a direct correlation to my autoimmune disease, rather than it being a separate Illness that needed its own attention. While it is true that Hashimotos can cause psychosis, the psychosis goes away once the thyroid is being treated. Mine stayed with me, like an unwanted roommate. 

I grew up in a dysfunctional household filled with marital issues and my parents having their own suppressed trauma and stress. My dad worked hard, and had worked hard his whole life. He depended on my mom to be able to take care of us when he was at work. She often did, and often did it quite well. But I think there were things she was unprepared to deal with, and she struggled to communicate this to her partner. 

My earliest memory of anxiety is when I was 6 years old, and I was unable to write a handful of thank you notes addressed to the students in my class. I remember feeling paralyzed by this sense of responsibility and I was so afraid of writing the wrong words. After all, I was 6 years old and didn’t have much experience writing anything at all. To be fair, my parents were unable to recognize this as anxiety because I don’t think they recognized their own for many, many years. Instead of asking me why I was stressed out, my mother criticized my inability to write the notes myself. She ended up doing it for me, and that was the first time I remember feeling like I had failed, and like I didn’t measure up. Moments like those throughout my childhood would have a direct correlation to the severe anxiety and depression that would develop later on.

 I remember I started hallucinating in fourth grade, and it would happen frequently when I was around 13. In fourth grade I remember visually hallucinating malformations on people’s faces or their body parts. I was probably 10 at this time and had no idea how to explain this to someone, so I went to the nurses office and told them I felt sick. I did that a lot during school, looking for reasons to go home sick so I could avoid seeing or hearing anything I didn’t want to see or hear.

 I began to isolate myself from family and friends as the years went on, and my parents attributed this to teen angst. I felt myself disconnecting from the world around me and I eventually lost my sense of self. By the time I was 16 I was on my third year of highschool and failing, while just doing the bare minimum to advance. I had no desire or will to live, and developed anorexia and other suicidal behaviors. 

When I was 17, I saw a psychiatrist and told him about my visual and auditory hallucinations, and he explained that I have schizophrenia, which is a grossly misunderstood form of psychosis. Unfortunately, his treatment methods got me nowhere, and I was briefly dependent on adderall. My parents stopped taking me to therapy, and I actually can’t say for sure what their reasons for that may have been, since there was always a persistent lack of communication.

 I graduated high school with mostly Ds, because my teachers all knew I was struggling and not receiving adequate treatment. It seemed like everyone besides my parents could realize that I needed intensive care and help.

During middle school, and into my junior year of high school, my main motivation for getting out of bed was artwork. I became known to everyone as the artist and that was the only facet of my identity. I would go to therapy for a few years on and off, but it was always me complaining about my parents, so no real progress on my mental health was made. I was under the impression that life was an illusion, and I had no way of being absolutely sure that the people around me were even real. Schizophrenia changes your perception of reality, and can cause delusional states of mind. It dulls your ability to feel strong emotions, and it can cause severe detachment from your sense of self. I legitimately felt like I was empty, and I couldn’t possibly imagine a brighter future.

 I became increasingly paranoid that people were lying to me about everything, and I had trust issues. I would spend weeks isolating myself in my room, accumulating piles of dirty dishes, trash, dirty clothes, etc. I was essentially living in my own misery. My mom often helped me clean my room, but became frustrated that I couldn’t keep it clean, There were times where she tried to not make me feel guilty, but I felt the guilt anyway. I remember always feeling like I had no control over anything.

When I was 18, I was raped repeatedly for two months by someone who I assumed I could trust. I was unable to leave my situation out of fear, denial, coercion, manipulation, and gaslighting. I started to smoke marijuana heavily during that time as a means of escapism. I was only able to leave that situation because he hit me over the head with a pair of drum sticks, and he was arrested and charged with domestic violence. 

I now have a restraining order against him. I also have a tattoo on my chest that he gave me without my consent, because I was under the influence of drugs. I remember standing in front of a mirror shirtless, then I remember being on a table getting tattooed. I don’t remember agreeing to getting anything tattooed. When it was over I tried to justify it and convince myself that I wanted this to happen. He treated me like a carnival prize that he had won, and he would objectify me to anyone who encountered us. He would tell me to take off my shirt and show people the tattoo that he gave me. I felt like a billboard for his own twisted personal brand of self aggrandizement. 

My mental health at the time was poor, even without the effects of drugs. I felt like what was happening to me was meant to happen as a means of punishment for not cleaning my room, not doing better in school, or whatever reason I could think of to explain cause of the abuse. I smoked weed every day for a year and a half to cope with everything. I’m 20 years old now, and I’ll be 21 on October 13th. It has taken me two and a half years to fully accept that it wasn’t my fault, and that blaming myself isn’t the answer. I couldn’t even talk about the sexual assault verbally without breaking down in tears until earlier this year.

That experience made me realize that life is not a delusion. Additionally, that I am in fact vulnerable to the same dangers as everyone else. I am not exempt from experiencing the impact of other people’s decisions.

This all made me reflect on my own life and the decisions I was making, as well as the people in my life. It has given me the motivation to take control over my college education, my career, and my art. I still suffer daily from all of my health issues, mental or otherwise, and the trauma of what I lived through. Although, what is different now is that I have a self awareness that could only have been gained from walking through Hell and coming out the other end alive. I also had to make a decision: I could either run away from my problems and ignore them, or I could actually get to know myself and figure out how to overcome these obstacles. 

This is a constant choice that I make every day. I can’t erase what happened to me, I can’t magically make my Hashimotos disappear, and I can’t cure my schizophrenia, but I can make the decision to try and live my best life despite it all. I strongly encourage all of you to do the same thing. I’m in school majoring in psychology now, and I am going to become a doctor in the field of psychiatry. I’m also still making art and I often enjoy it and find great pleasure in it. Having a creative outlet is so fundamental for your mental health. There’s an entire field of study for it, and it’s called art therapy.

If you’re depressed, have anxiety, OCD, or a broken leg, just know that positive things can and will happen when you make the conscious decision to help yourself. People will only understand that their depression or anxiety or mental illness can receive treatment if we educate and spread awareness. Suicide is an increasing epidemic because people are afraid to ask for help or talk about their feelings.

I encourage every one of you to understand the significance of mental health and why it’s morally ethical to assist those who need our help. If someone you know is suffering from depression or mental illness, or they’ve experienced a traumatic event, reach out to them and suggest they seek professional help and treatment.

There is hope, it gets better, and you are not alone.

Kate Elizabeth xo

[simplyshelbs16xoxo]

‘Something’s Wrong with Molly’ Chapter 1: the hurt

I finally finished this fic I wanted to write for @colonialfire24 where Sherlock is frantically trying deduce why Molly’s having a bad day.

I wanna put a mild trigger warning, as it mentions depression. I wanted to explore that side of things more, mainly because I keep going in out of bouts of depression, myself, and after all that happened in S4, I’m sure everyone in the show is feeling that way.

Also, I plan to write an epilogue for this, which you will find on the ao3 version :)

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               “Hello Sherlock. Is this urgent, cause I’m not having a good day.”

               Sherlock frantically looked for any physical signs on the video feed that could’ve contributed to Molly’s bad day. What was wrong? What made his Molly so sad? Her current mood would make this harder than ever. He didn’t want to hurt her, but here he was, ready to plunge the knife into her beautiful, loving heart, beating the sweetest melody. She looked a bit bloated—menstrual cycle perhaps, but there was something more. Her eyes looked haunted, as if she had seen something she wished could be unseen.

               “Molly, I just want you to do something very easy for me, and not ask why.” He knew this would be far from easy. Sherlock knew her well, and he knew she’d fight him on this request. It was at this moment, he knew the stakes. If he drew these words forcefully from her pretty pink lips, she would never speak to him again. It was a risk he was willing to take to save her life.

               “Oh, God,” she scoffed. “Is this one of your stupid games?”

               “No, it’s not a game. I… need you to help me.” Cat. Toby isn’t meowing. There’s no sign of him anywhere. Oh God, she must have needed him to be put down today. She had mentioned her cat taking ill a couple of days ago.

               “I’m not at the lab,” she replied curtly. I know you’re not, he wanted to say. He took notice of the dark circles beneath her eyes; lack of sleep was evident.

               “It’s not about that.”

               “Well, quickly, then.”

               Sherlock blinked rapidly, unable to form the words he needed. He knew time was running out, but was unable to find a way to save her from the turmoil he was about to put her through.

               Molly sighed in annoyance. “Sherlock? What is it? What do you want?”

               You, he thought. The tick-tocking in Moriarty’s voice made him feel queasy, knowing the end result of this exchange was going to be heartbreaking for both of them. Getting his thoughts together, he spoke clearly and calmly. “Molly, please, without asking why, just say these words.”

               The corner of her mouth lifted up in a small smile, clearly intrigued by his request. “What words?”

               Here goes nothing. “I. Love. You.” Sherlock hoped his clinical tone would help the situation. It obviously had the opposite effect, he realized, watching her smile drop as she pulled the mobile away from her ear, thumb hovering over the ‘end call’ button.

               “Leave me alone.” Her voice was sharp, and rightly so.

               Feeling the panic settle in, Sherlock raised his voice, speaking frantically. “Molly, no, please, no, don’t hang up!  Do not hang up!” His eyes moved over the screen, as if trying to find the answer to the universe within her flat’s kitchen; within Molly, herself. Eurus’s voice over the intercom reminded him to be calm, or else…well, he would never let it come to that. If the only way to save her was to have her hate him, then so be it.

               “Why are you doing this to me? Why are you making fun of me!?”

               Sherlock realized then what was wrong with Molly. A string of events led to the state she was in now. He remembered the bottle of migraine pills she had begun carrying around with her not long after Mary’s death. He then spiraled into a drug-addled state, nearly killing himself in the process, and then nearly being killed by Culverton Smith. She recently put Toby down, and the anniversary of her father’s death was fast-approaching. The fatigue, and loss of interest were the most obvious signs. She didn’t appear to have been eating much either, though her bloated state covered that up for the regular mind, but Sherlock saw right through her.

               Molly Hooper, carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders, was in a state of depression, and this phone call wasn’t going to make things any better. Sherlock silently prayed to a God he didn’t believe in. “Please, I swear, you just have to listen to me.”

               “Softer, Sherlock,” Eurus reminded him.

               “Molly,” he began in a cheerier tone, “this is for a case. It’s…it’s a sort of experiment.” The moment those words left his lips, he knew they were a bit not good.

               “I’m not an experiment, Sherlock.” Despite her physical shakiness, her tone was firm.

               His eyes widened in panic. “No, I know you’re not an experiment. You’re my friend. We’re friends. But…please, just…say those words for me.” His voice broke, a result of his emotions knocking hard against his usual detached demeanor. He could swear he heard both of their hearts cracking open at the pained look on her face.

               “Please, don’t do this,” she begged him. “Just…just…don’t do it.”

               “It’s very important. I can’t say why, but I promise you it is.” He could hear the emotions he unleashed creep into every word he said. Could she? Sherlock hoped so.

               “I can’t say that. I can’t…say that to you.” She sounded calmer, but not enough to understand there was more to this call. Come on, Molly, you’re so brilliant; why can’t you understand the gravity of this situation? Don’t you know me at all?

               “Of course you can. Why can’t you?” Sherlock felt he was going to lose it right there.

               “You know why,” she insisted.

               I do? Surely, I would’ve known why. She hates me; that’s the only possible reason. “No, I don’t know why,” he pressed.

               Molly sighed, sniffling, wiping a hand across her nose. “Of course you do.”

               God, please, give us strength. It was all he could think in that moment. The tick-tocks were driving him insane. “Please, just say it.” He swears he’s never said the word ‘please’ so much in his life.

               “I can’t. Not to you.” Molly refused to budge on the subject.

               “Why?”

               Her voice breaking, she replied, “Because…because it’s true.” A few rapid breaths, and she was speaking again. “Because…it’s…true, Sherlock.” Molly was crying now, unable to hold back the tears that had welled up in her eyes. “It’s always been true.” It was practically whispered, but he heard her loud and clear.

               Sherlock allowed himself a moment of happiness in a split second, before slipping back into his detached façade. “Well, if it’s true, just say it anyway.”

               Molly laughed in disbelief. “You bastard.”

               “Say it anyway,” Sherlock spoke firmly.

               “You say it. Go on. You say it first,” she challenged him.

               Shock was written all over his face. “What?”

               “Say it,” she demanded. “Say it like you mean it.” Her voice softened, as if she hadn’t meant to be so firm with him at first.

               Sherlock takes a breath, and closes his eyes after Eurus warned him he only had thirty seconds left.  “I…” he began hesitantly. “I…I love you.” He braved another look at the screen, and noticed the small smile that appeared on her face. His mind palace brought up all of the crucial memories of their friendship in the speed it took to have your life flash before your eyes. In Sherlock’s case, his life was flashing before his eyes. Molly was everything to him; all these years he was falling in love without even realizing it until this very moment. “I love you.” His voice was soft, brimming with epiphanies and possibility.

              ��Molly closed her eyes for a moment, and brought the phone down to look at the screen once more. Please don’t hang up, Molly.

               “Molly?” he felt the panic rise in him all over again. “Molly, please.”

               Her lips were nearly touching the phone as she finally spoke, “I love you.” And then it was over. The last nail in the proverbial coffin, twisted within both their hearts, shattering their friendship into pieces. Sherlock swore he could feel it embedded deep within him. And although he was well aware that she wouldn’t speak to him again after this, he still found himself thanking God that she was safe.

[loxxxlay]

Whumptober ~ October 1st ~ Stabbed

Summary:  Loki tries to endure the brutality of his peers on his own, but Thor is determined to save him.

Tags/Warnings:  Gen, ThorLoki, Pre-Thor, Bullying, Blood, Loki's utter lack of self-preservation, brotherly feels

Author’s Note:  if I’m gonna do whumptober shamelessly, then I’m going to fall to fandom stereotypes shamelessly lmao. Enjoy this pre-Thor adolescent bullshit for the day:

(for mobile users, yes, there is a read more cut)

[Read on Ao3]

Loki didn’t catch the face of who did it. The shock overloaded his mind, and he fell to instinct: arms shielding his face, shoulders hunched in, and eyes clenched shut. Every muscle in his body tensed and braced for impact.

Once, he’d thought to fight back. But fights were an invitation for carelessness, and Loki always lost besides. Maybe they’d throw a punch to his eye or his nose, and Thor, seeing the purplish swelling later, would demand the names of Loki’s tormentors. And then the next day, it’d be worse. A never-ending cycle of revenge and revenge pinning him ever in the middle.

Not fighting—defending—was damage control.

Layered clothes could hide the bruises to his arms and torso, and an untroubled smirk would deny any revealing search. It had become his own way of fighting, his own way of spiting them—going on in life uninterrupted and seemingly unaffected. And Thor’s smiles had returned, often and relaxed, in his unknowing.

Loki thought of Thor’s smile in order to get through it now.

When it ended, when the drunken laughter followed fading footsteps, Loki found himself huddled in a ball on the floor. They’d left before he’d had time to catalog their faces and note which people to avoid on the training grounds tomorrow. He was alone. He could only catalog his pain.

Someone had struck the side of his head—which would be hard to hide but not impossible if he rested his hair correctly. His entire body—arms, legs, shoulders, chest—ached. Not the worst. Not the best either.

He moved to stand, and that was when his nerves released a shrieking howl of alarm.

Loki stumbled onto all fours and then onto his side on the floor. At the left side of his stomach, blood pooled through a torn opening in his shirt.

One of them had stabbed him. One of them had stabbed him.

His vision swirled, and Loki was sure that he was dying, dying, dying—until he heard the grating gasps of panic failing to fill his lungs.

Loki breathed in to a count of five and out to a count of seven. His mind raced with fear and hate and why why why do they do this , and it took too many breaths to calm himself.

Slowly, Loki clung to a single lucid thought until everything else waned into background noise. He had to get to his room. He had to tend to himself.

Standing didn’t work. His legs refused to hold weight.

Instead, Loki crawled between library shelves and cringed as his chest slid along the wooden floorboards. There would be blood, he knew. But if he could just make it to his room—bandage it up and sleep for a couple hours—then maybe he could come back and clean it before everyone woke up. Thor, or worse Odin and Frigga, would never have to know.

It took minutes to reach the door to the hallway. His room was several meters more yet.

His elbows gave out, and he let his cheek press against chilly stone of the hallway. The wound to his stomach was starting to feel hot, a fiery rage whose tendrils jolted in waves through the bones in his body. A cacophony of his nerves singing their complaints.

Loki pulled himself another meter forward. A second.

The doorway jabbed against his side and he choked at the pain. White nothing plagued his senses for long minutes, and when he blinked through the fog, the edges of his vision remained dark and blurry. His hand was pressed to his stomach, covered in red. Suddenly he felt very dizzy.

Rest , he thought. Just rest your eyes for a moment. You have the whole night to get there.

Loki closed his eyes.

He lurched awake to someone’s hand on his shoulder. Instinct had his legs curled to his chest and his arms shielding his face—before the twist in his gut reminded him of the knife wound. Loki choked on something metallic, and it dribbled from the corner of his mouth. Was it them, he thought dully, come to finish the job?

“Loki?” hissed a horrified voice.

No. It was worse.

“Loki, please—answer me—are you—” Thor broke off with a choked cry. “Guards? Somebody! Help!”

Gasping, Loki reached to clutch at Thor’s wrist. “No,” he croaked, “no please.”

Thor’s eyes flickered with raw relief at his voice. “No? No what?”

“No guards,” Loki said.

“Then the healers. I’ll summon Lady Eir.”

A shudder ran down Loki’s spine. “No! I don’t want—Father and Mother will—”

Thor blinked at him in disbelief. “Loki. You’re bleeding. You’ve lost so much—”

“I just need to get to my room.” Loki’s lungs filled with an unbearable urge to cough, and he tried to cover his mouth, but it hurt to move his arm. A clump of expelled blood crept down his chin. He was so cold. So tired. “Just help me get there,” Loki said. “It’s not as bad as it looks, I swear. Please.”

Thor’s eyes were wide as he stared at Loki. He held time suspended, while Loki waited for him to decide one way or another. To doom him or help him.

At last, Thor’s face hardened with determination. “Okay,” he said.

Loki sighed, relieved.

“Here,” Thor said as he bent to slip an arm around Loki’s waist. “Let me help you up.”

Each step was like a shard of ice piercing his gut. He was dependent utterly on the support of Thor’s shoulder and Thor’s grip around his waist. His free hand was pressed to the wound over the makeshift bandage Thor had made out of the end of his tunic. It was already soaked with blood.

Strangely, Loki felt detached from the pain. It was there, but he could think and he could see (noting the way the edges of his vision blurred and how his ankles twisted with each step) and he could even breathe, though each breath rattled in his chest.

“Who did it?” Thor had asked, and Loki was debating answering.

It would hurt to speak. It would make him cough.

Thor seemed to accept that Loki wouldn’t answer. “I thought they had stopped,” he whispered. “I thought . . . You didn’t seem . . . Have you really been hiding it from me?”

Loki swallowed another metallic lump in the back of his throat. Pain stabbed through his skull in time with his pulse.

“I don’t know why you defend them,” Thor said. “Why you won't tell me. Father would have them executed for what they did to you tonight, and I—if I could catch them, I’d—”

At this, Loki’s will for silence broke. “That’s exactly why I won’t tell you.”

Thor’s jaw snapped shut and he paused their pace. His eyes were on Loki’s face, but Loki didn’t bother looking back. Rather, he focused on the road ahead—eager for the hallway to transform into his carpeted floor and soft mattress, where he could tend himself and rest. (And be rid of Thor’s smothering company.)

After a moment, Thor started them forward again. “So you’d have these sick sadists running amok? Free to attack you again?”

“That’s not the point,” Loki snapped. The speed of his comment had his heart pounding and his lungs gaping. He coughed, inhaled in short bursts, and exhaled, until air returned to him.

“Then what is the point?’ Thor asked when Loki's breathing evened.

“You wouldn't understand.”

“Try me.”

Loki pressed his hand into his stomach harder, grounding himself, steeling himself. The blood clotted thick in his throat, threatening to choke him.“I can’t—have you or Father—fighting everyone for me,” he said between sudden gurgled coughs. “You don’t—you don’t understand—what it’s like—”

He expected Thor to rebel against this, but he simply sounded scared. “Loki, shh.” He had paused again to readjust his hold on Loki’s waist. “Stop talking. I think you’re making it worse.”

“You stop talking,” Loki hissed, even as the dullness spread to the center his vision. Thor’s face became a blob of yellow. The pain drifted further away. “When you—fight for me—you’re making me look weak. You make me look vulnerable.”

“I only want to protect you,” Thor said.

His voice sounded as though it were wading through glass. Loki blinked, slow and heavy. “I don’t want your protection. I want to protect myself ,” he said, low and fierce, but he had a feeling it sounded soft and muted. Urgently he wanted to sleep again. His feet were trudging through mud, or maybe dragging across something, and his knees felt too loose to stand.

Thor’s voice waded in and out. “Loki . . . almost there . . . awake.”

Loki’s legs stopped working and he careened towards the floor.

Instead of crashing into it, he found himself cradled in Thor’s arms and staring at the ceiling. The murals there were not the murals that hung in the hallway to his room. Thor had lied to him.

“No,” he breathed. He struggled, but he couldn’t dislodge himself from Thor’s grip—or maybe he was struggling against his own immobility. He couldn’t tell. “No. Please. I don’t want them to know.”

Thor’s jaw was clenched, grim and determined. “I’m not going to let you get yourself killed.”

He heard the words, but they didn’t make sense. Loki struggled one last time. “No,” he said, before unconsciousness overtook him.

He woke in the healer’s room, tired, aching, and feverish. His chest was bandaged with white gauze, and he could feel the tingling aftertaste of a healing stone’s magic. Something else had been injected into his veins, because while he felt no pain, his vision struggled to focus on any specific point. The warm light was blurred and surreal. Everything looked fuzzy

To the side of the bed, Loki heard someone breathing. Thor was sitting there with a steely glare and his arms folded tight.

Loki rolled his eyes. Here, drugged and comfortable, the events of the night felt like a distant, hilarious memory—one to which Thor had reacted drastically out of proportion. (And now Odin and Frigga would know. It was a thought that nibbled at the back of his mind, even if his current state of mind masked all panic.)

“Are you content to sit there hating me,” Loki said, his throat rather sore, “or do you have something to say?”

Thor didn’t so much as flinch. “You would have died,” he said. “If I had taken you to your room. If I hadn’t found you. You would have died.”

“I doubt that—”

“Lady Eir said so herself.”

Though still disbelieving, Loki went quiet for a moment. “Then she told them? Father and Mother?”

At that, Thor’s resolve faded. He ducked his head and shuffled his feet. “No,” he said, quiet. “I asked her to at least wait for you to wake. Once she tended to you, you weren’t in any danger, so she agreed to my request.”

Loki blinked. “You asked her to keep it a secret?”

“Yes.” Thor fiddled with his belt. “I still don’t understand, but I was listening to what you said.”

Loki twisted his head away and picked at his sleeve—because he refused to acknowledge this small moment of care Thor had given him. If he acknowledged it now, then it would forgive all the times Thor hadn’t listened—and he was bitter that it had taken getting stabbed to give Thor pause.

“I wish you’d tell me who it was,” Thor said. “I know you feel differently, but they don’t deserve to get away with it.”

Loki stared at the golden glow of the ceiling instead of Thor’s face. “I don’t know who did it,” he murmured. Out of the corner of his eye, he could catch a glimpse of Thor’s mouth snapping shut, and his eyes softening with worry. A wave of guilt rolled down Loki’s spine. “I didn’t see their faces. It always happens so fast.”

A melancholic weight of silence pressed upon their chests.

Loki broke it first. “I stopped telling you because I was tired of—of seeing you look at me like that.”

“Like what?” Thor asked.

Loki waved a weak hand towards his face—his clenched teeth and wide, worried eyes. “Like I’m weak,” he said.

Thor shook his head. “That’s not what I think.”

Loki scoffed.

“It's not,” Thor repeated hotly. “I don’t like the thought that anyone would try to hurt you. I . . . worry about you.”

“Yes. That.” Loki shifted his gaze to the ceiling. The drug was calling for him to slip asleep again, but Thor was listening to him, actually listening, and chances like this didn’t come often. He pressed his lips together and curled his hands into shaky fists. “I stopped telling you so that I wouldn’t be troubling you anymore. So that you would stop worrying.”

Thor blew out a breath, slow and uneven, and Loki resisted the urge to meet his gaze. “Do you know how I found you?” he asked.

Loki shook his head.

“Every night,” Thor said, “I sit by my door, and I listen for your footsteps. I make sure you get back to your room safely. That you’re not limping—or crying—or . . . being chased.” He paused. “So when you didn’t show up tonight, I knew. I knew what had happened. So I went to look for you.”

Loki’s throat ached with something that was not blood. He forced himself to swallow.

“Loki, I never stopped worrying for you,” Thor said. “I never will stop worrying for you. You’re my brother. It’s my duty and my greatest wish to protect you. It’s Father’s, too. And Mother’s.”

Loki sealed his lips shut as his nails dug into his palms.

“If you don’t want to tell me who does it, then that is your right, but I won’t let you censor my love for you. Will you allow me that much, at least?”

Shaking, Loki shifted onto his side to meet his brother’s earnest gaze. “Alright,” he said.

Thor’s face lit up with a small smile, and Loki had never realized that worrying and smiling didn’t have to be exclusive. His eyes stung with tears that he no longer had to hide, and Thor stood to embrace him in a way that Loki didn’t have to feel ashamed of. He clung to his older brother’s waist and pressed his nose to his older brother’s chest.

“Now sleep,” Thor said after letting go. “I won’t tell Lady Eir that you woke.”

Loki murmured a thank you and closed his eyes. Maybe tomorrow would be more of the same, more of the desperation to have his feelings heard and for his family to listen. But tonight and today, Thor’s comfort was enough.

[jbeshir]

Why I Think Rationalist Self-Help Is Broken

So I was asked, fairly reasonably, after in my previous post I said I thought I might have had a narrow escape from a self-reinforcing set of bad approaches to mental health and executive functioning issues, what approaches I was thinking of, exactly.

This is a list of approaches I think are wrong, and the consensus around them in the self-help parts of the rationalist community (e.g. all the praxis/gnosis type channels I’ve encountered on rat!Discord) is a big part of why I no longer frequent those spaces and now consider myself rat!adjacent, centrally an EA, and more likely to pursue skeptic communities or other communities to try to find ones whose flaws I am happier living with, rather than expanding engagement with rationalist communities. Although I insist, as an unrepentant Yudkowskian, the rationalist community moved away from me and not visa versa.

If you’re a rationalist with “post rationalist” leanings who doesn’t want to read a list of reasons why I think you suck right now, I recommend not expanding this post; I’m going to try to be as polite as I can about it all and stuff, but at the end of the day the topic of the post is the topic of the post.

So, the approaches I think are bad, some with particular justification and some just by correlation to the rest.

Drug addiction/recreational drugs as coping mechanism. A bit ago I commented “alcoholism is cool so long as you swap out the drug”, sardonically, and someone responded to say that actually, they endorsed that, so this is an actual point of disagreement.

I think the primary problem with using incapacitating recreational drugs as a balm within your coping mechanism is that it provides an extremely good avenue for escapism, which is a really tempting way to buy a balm for today at the cost of tomorrow. Additionally, I think it readily leads to a thing where people can’t function sober because their coping strategy is unavailable, and can’t function high because, well, they’re high. And yet there is a lot of “oh, you feel bad? Let me help you get some weed”. Arguments about handling existing addicts aside, this is I think probably one of the ways people move into a rationalist cluster and then decline because of “helpful” peers sharing their escapism.

I miss straight-edge LW-rationality where my willingness to countenance alcohol put me at the questionable end of the spectrum.

A bunch of stuff tied up in the assumption that normal friendship and relationships are impossible for many people in the community and therefore people should be grateful to have friends and relationships at all. This particularly leads to the idea of the whole “catgirl” thing where you can apply any kind of costs to the people around you so long as you’re a catgirl for them, because both they and you assume that they can’t get friends anywhere else.

This is not actually true! Being friends with people who are... a bit high maintenance is great, but you shouldn’t do it out of the feeling that they are the only people who will be friends with you. It’s not true. and people shouldn’t feel like they can be as high maintenance as they want so long as they play catgirl.

When I got over this, approximately concurrent with me starting therapy and reinforced by an increase in RL socialisation they encouraged at the time, I flipped out a little and quit most of the circles I was in for a bit. I don’t need to be friends with people who borrow hundreds of pounds from me and have no shame about not paying it back to have friends, and any interactions with people who think I do are going to involve them taking liberties. I’m back in parts I like now, but without the previous “I need to cling to this community” feel.

Most stuff involved in thinking about social status and auras, and social reality, more likely if it promises to be looking at social reality for “real” when everyone else isn’t. These things are real, but... the only way I can really put the issue is... “wow, autistics are really bad at distinguishing between good and bad social models”. If the models pick up on one dynamic that a naive model doesn’t, they’re adopted without question, no matter what other cases they get wrong. And boy, do they get things wrong.

“Sometimes an impression of a person having an effective aura picks up on evidence that you would consciously miss about them being competent” => “The halo effect isn’t a bias anymore, it’s actually the correct way you should be approaching your decisions, your feels of a person’s aura is a better assessment of their competence than any assessments you might make away from those feels”, is every rationalist talking about how their in person interactions indicate a person actually has brilliant models despite everything they ever wrote being evaluated as awful when actually analysed blind. And it is frustrating as hell.

Auras and social reality offer a tempting opportunity to be the holders of a cynical secret, but taking that opportunity in no way requires people to actually adopt better models, and since the matter is complex enough that adopting better models is genuinely hard, that generally doesn’t happen. More common is brazen self-justification; the more you describe the rest of the world as sucking and focus on that the less your flaws show up relatively. The more you talk about your version of social reality, the less you have to pay attention to actual reality.

(I vaguely associate this stuff with Vassar’s group? But by now it’s the default.)

Trying to invent their own novel forms of therapy instead of (rather than as well as) going to actual therapists.

I think trying to execute therapy without being a therapist would be fair enough just because therapists are expensive, but some effort to actually be aware of what therapy generally entails rather than just sticking the name “therapy” on any series of actions you think is helpful would be good.

Hypnosis for mental health assistance and anything involved in exploiting suggestibility. This is mostly correlational- I observe a very strong correlation between cultivating suggestibility and a tendency to lack direction and an internal moral sense. But I also observe a lot of enthusiasm and no results, which is sufficient in itself to be dubious of it as a strategy.

Internal Family Systems; there’s a definite thing of temporarily disassociating to regain functionality temporarily I’ve seen people do which... I guess worked for them, I don’t want to recommend it but I can’t discourage it either.

But reifying things you are conflicted over into multiple personalities seems in the many cases I’ve seen it to let you keep both sides of the conflict, and I think that’s often not a good idea. The part of your thinking which is saying “actually, I don’t want to have this trait” should not be satisfied by being split off into a different personality unit than the trait.

I’m not sure it is something that can’t work to actually make progress in internal conflict, but I don’t think it looks like it is working the way I see it tried. I hear actual therapists touch on the concept, but I’d assign a probability of 80% that they do it different in a substantive manner.

I think peer support centred around validation has a tendency to validate behaving toxically. This isn’t rationalist exclusive, but is a problem with its self-improvement channels.

Separated out so you can more easily say you hate this bit while agreeing the above is bad: I also think it has a tendency to validate inaction. You don’t need to do X because Y. It’s okay to spend your time high because Z anyway. As a throwaway thing from a friend to a friend, well, there are worse crimes than bending epistemology while being supportive. As a culture, gets a bit crab bucket-y.

Part of the problem, I think, is that these traits tend to overlap and seem to reinforce each other. Once you get into some you get a bunch of the rest, and then you can’t update out because of the mutual reinforcement. The stuff you hear against your weed habit? Clearly just people manipulated by state propaganda trying to increase their own social standing. The stuff you hear against social power? It definitely seems to help in whatever hypnotic/suggestibility stuff you’re playing with. Why go to a therapist when they don’t understand social reality? And such. I never particularly bought into any of them, and am quite glad I did not.

I’ll mention messing with self-identity as something which is more good than bad. It doesn’t work, I think, if you detach yourself from reality enough that you can sustain a positive self-identity without actually... being positive, which is a problem that exists. It’s often done very poorly. But it’s still better than the way people readily self-identify as negative things by default. People are at least aware that negative identity is much more self-fulfilling than positive, and if you let something negative in there that wasn’t definitely true by accident then it will tend to become true.

Also, while I now no longer agree with the part of it based on IFS, I like the rest of the Luminosity sequence as a “soft sequence”, based on novel ideas, which I think is good for self-improvement; it focuses on self-observation to gain a more accurate self-model, and I think this largely works and is positive.

(On the Hammertime sequence in particular, I’ve not read it yet.)

[thetripreport]

My First Time Doing Salvia Divinorum

Hannah Hirou

-

I was nervous to do salvia because of all the things I had heard about it--

stories filled with terror but also ones with strange fantastic hallucinations. A few people I had talked to said they greatly enjoyed it and had wonderful experiences which left me optimistic. One friend denoted a silly experience where upon closer examination of stationary objects he observed the fabric of his reality to consist of millions of tiny people with hands interlocked, all dancing in place. 

-

These vivid hallucinations were what piqued my curiosity. At the very least I wanted to know why some said Salvia was awful. I thought, how awful could it be? After all, salvia is a notoriously brief experience which left me with some solace that I would be able to overcome even the worst of trips. Time, to me, is always a factor of concern regarding psychedelic so drugs with shorter lifespans have always attracted me.  

-

The day to try salvia came rather abruptly when my two other housemates said they were going to buy some and smoke it to which I expressed my interest in participating as the drug seemed to find itself conveniently in my proximity. So there we sat on a red shag rug, legs crossed in our living room; my housemates Emily Sally and I in a circle in front of the couches with our other housemate Melody sitting on the couch as a trip sitter. 

-

We packed a large bowl and I went first taking a little hit before handing it around. None of us felt much so we passed it around again. At this point the three of us felt a little high as one does when smoking weed. We decided we were doing it wrong and that we needed to hold the smoke in for longer so I took another hit of the bowl holding it in as I passed it to Emily. Sally, remembering the horror of her first trip, decided that she did not want anymore so Emily took the bong and proceeded to take a sizable dose. I decided that I wanted to take more too so I snapped the bowl and took a decently large inhale of smoke which required me to suppress the urge to violently cough. 

|

Immediately I felt terrible. 

|

I was suddenly overwhelmed with confusion. I had absolutely no concept of where we were or what we were doing. I felt as though I had either just woken from a dream or entered a dream, experiencing the same dreamlike notions of visions that contained vague narrative sense. 

-

My brain struggled to propose scenarios to rationalize what was going on. I knew we had all done a drug but I forgot what it was and I forgot what it was I should expect. Surely, something had gone wrong because I felt absolutely insane, insane in the sense that there was a complete breakdown between visual processes and thought. I looked at Emily and Sally and they were covered by a colorful half yin-yang pattern that was quasi fractal-like in appearance. The blue of the carpet that consisted of the majority of the living room besides the red shag rug made me feel like I was in a setting similar to the krusty krab in Spongebob for some reason. I didn’t register mentally that I was in the krusty krab. At the time it just was, nor did I think about spongebob, it all came as a detached observation in my state of confusion. I asked Melody what was going on and suddenly again I felt a re-found terror of not knowing what we were doing there AT ALL. 

|

I tried to remember, but I forgot everything. I felt as though I was very far away, as though I had been stretched back across the room separated from the rest in some distant alternative reality. 

|

In my mind I saw my body being contorted like a photoshop image into the shape of a spiral, limbs stretching and folding. I asked what we were doing repeatedly along with what I had just done, trying to figure out what was happening to me. Was it normal to feel like this I wondered? I felt dread and anxiety. I had reached a breaking point and  started to freak out. I decided I did not like this feeling of dysphoria that saturated my physical body and every facet of my unhinged psyche. 

-

How long will this last, I asked? I wanted it to be over so badly. The nerves in my skin felt electrified with prickling irritation. I suddenly felt as though I had somewhere to be, as though there were so many things that I needed to do but lacked the knowledge as to what exactly that something was. I wanted to run out of the house. I stood up and Emily said she felt the same. We wanted to run, let’s run let’s go I said, let's go to the christmas party (I had planned to go to this after my salvia trip) but really I was just saying this as an excuse to escape and run away. Then I decided we should not do that and to have some self control. At this point I knew we were on salvia. I felt trapped and anxious like I had so much adrenaline and nothing to do with it. Nothing could soothe me. I started to scream. I thought I was going insane. Nothing made sense. 

-

I was on a ship, the fireplace looked like a giant clam in my peripheral. I felt oscillations in the intensity of the drug as I came down from the peak, but the intensity rose again and again…. it felt like torture. The peak in and out of the high felt similar to being held underwaves before surfacing for air. 

|

Was it never going to end? I thought there could be no way my brain could ever return to normal, that I had abused my fragile brain chemistry and that sanity itself was an ungraspable thin layer of oil that had once been sitting on top of a layer of water

|

I envisioned the oil and the water layered upon each other and contained in some object but the object had been shaken and my sanity broke apart into a million little oil droplets forever separated from each other by the water, chaos in a million orientations never to regain their former order nor would they to rise to the surface to reform that infirm layer as salvia would not permit it.

-

I told my friends to take me to the hospital, I needed help or else I would never recover. I thought because I had taken my adderall for my ADHD that I had transgressed by combining the two and the salvia would stay in my brain. I thought that all the anxiety I felt triggered a manic episode or something. I thought that maybe the hospital could help me. I trusted the doctors. I don’t trust these people I thought; they don’t understand my brain chemistry. Then I imagined the cold white lights and scratchy sheets and decided that was an awful idea. I screamed something about how no one liked me...I don’t remember why. 

-

Why had I taken my baseline pysche for granted? I got the feeling that I had experienced this feeling on other drugs and that I should never do them again for fear of something like this happening. I thought what if I took LSD and this is what happened for 12 hours. I ran to my room but I thought it felt small so I ran back into the living room and laid face down in a starfish splay and took deep breaths then flipped over and chanted into a pillow. I don't like this. I don't like this. I don't like this. I felt a surge of nausea which added to my horror, those damned kappa receptors I thought. Fuck this. 

-

I began to feel some relief, but like a wave the terrible feeling crashed down on me again. No texture felt acceptable; the air suddenly felt too dry and cold, the carpet and my clothes all felt so scratchy even soft things felt miserable. It felt that day and night had been combined and that this must be purgatory. I searched my memory for someone who could comfort me… my friends, my family, but all of it felt wrong. I didn’t want to hear someone’s disappointed voice on facetime through my cold metal laptop. I wouldn’t be able to hear them I thought, they would be too far away. My brain imagined calling someone and that if I got closer to the computer that the voice on the other side would only get further from me and would be separated by infinite distance. Finally I opened a can of hard seltzer and began to drink it desperately to calm my nerves. 

|

Within a couple minutes relief hugged me and I laid on the floor suddenly exhausted as I started to return to normal. I still felt a little high but it was warm and sweet,  laced with afterglow.  

|

After I was in such a giggly elevated mood because I was so relieved to be back to normal. I was beaming at the fact that I had returned to my baseline and had not been lost forever in that insane world devoid of joy and filled with anxiety.

-

For the rest of the night I was ridiculously happy and joyous due to the fact that I was myself again. I felt as one does when waking up from some sort of terrible nightmare. Salvia allowed me to appreciate normalcy and the baseline state of my psyche that I had never considered as something to not take for granted. I also found that it was an extremely abstract experience which has helped with my creativity. To this day I do not regret my decision and believe that it was a very beneficial informative experience but not for the faint of heart. However, would I do it again? Highly unlikely. 

[countdownto65]

Empathy for Self

What is the nemesis of shame? Empathy.

What is the root of most of your shame? Attention seeking, codependentcy and sexual misconduct.

Empathy. You were the oldest in the family fighting for parental attention against two babies.

You hit puberty early. This was a 2 fold problem. You started getting attention furthering the tight shirts but in turn Everyone in 4th grade started calling you a ho. You had never even kissed a boy. You were not a ho and kids are fucking mean.

But you know who else’s attention you got by having boobs, dressing in body suits and seeking attention at 11 years old? A fucking pedophile. While your behavior made you an easy target, NO ONE DESERVES TO BE SEXUALLY EXPLOITED AT 12, 13, 14, OR 15 YEARS OLD. Did you fuckin get that? No matter what your actions it was not your fault they targeted you. Even if you agreed to it at 13, 14, 15 you can leave that self blame right here bc that was their bad NOT YOURS. This is where you learned sex = attention, power, control. They would buy you stuff, get you high and drunk, make you feel like the best person they know all (not explicitly stated) for sexual behavior. I learned a skewed view on relationships and appropriate sexual behavior in adult married behavior. I learned to emotionally detach from sex. I learned to over ride the “this shit ain’t right” feeling you get in your chest when you are uncomfortable in a situation. All of these things are what set your boundaries and your very left field view of what kind of attention makes you feel worthwild. This was not your fault and sometimes life has shitty things happen that effect our outlook forever.

So it sure was easy to sleep with boyfriends, I mean you “loved” them, they were always older, sex was something that didn’t come from everybody so with my sexual skills I learned from the pedophiles I was the best gf a 16 year old could have. And bc I could so easily separate sex from emotion (as a conditioned response to molestation) and it was a way to get boys I liked to notice me, I gave it up easily. Not necessarily sex, but sexual acts. It was one way I felt power and control. Boys treated me special on the surface bc I was pretty with tight clothes…but I failed to realize the power was momentary at the cost of respect. Both self respect and respect of everyone else. This was when my first experience with the fuck and run type of dude came in. The first time I cared. After that I didn’t at least I told myself I didn't but This was when I began codependency. They didn’t always fuck and run. I was good at getting boys to stick around for a while. I was a serial dater. I had to have a significant other to feel worth so I had too many boyfriends. Always one on hand one on the backburner. This was you reaching out for real connection, something you felt had been missing both with your parents, your abusers and your random sexual encounters. When I had a bf I was faithful. I know that sounds fucked up bc I just said I had a backburner but I was never sleeping with this other guy. I just friend zoned him knowing he liked me so I could establish my safety net. So one day at 17 Ieft home, went to a house party, hooked up with the guy who’s house it was (Matt) and that was the start of my first adult relationship. I loved him from the bottom of my toes but he often cheated on me and I never left him for it. It was at this time that I severed my relationship with my abusers. I was old enough to at least have an inkling something wasn’t right, plus now I considered it cheating and I didn’t cheat on him. He started selling drugs. We both got into cocaine. It was easy bc I dated the dopeman.

Then he went to prison. I continued the relationship with him but continued to date/sleep with men while he was away. This was when I caught an std and began stripping on weekends. This is still caused by poor boundaries and a skewed idea of sex and power… Set in motion by sexual abuse. By now I had slowed way down on cocaine but had a huge weed and alcohol habit. I worked at a catholic preschool during the week but stripped to pay for my substances on Sat nights. This set off a little bit of the uncomfortable double life feeling but I pushed it down. I also hustled people for substances. Although I never slept with anyone for money or drugs. But I def made them think I might so they would get me high. Never felt bad either bc if your a dude willing to be got you deserved to get hustled…that was my mindset. I also saw stripping as a hustle. Hustle to me means fuck with a lame walk with a limp. I mean if your gonna be thirsty I’ll take your money. This is probably when I acquired my mindset that most dudes were creeps and out to get me. I realize now that by appearing easy I was literally attracting creeps but at the time I enjoyed the attention and the feeling of superiority and has a huge sample of men to confirm my bias.

Every now and then though I got tricked out of my hard exterior and caught feelings. This is my deep emotional need for connection, to feel worth while. This is where I met my daughters father. He was a giant red flag but problem with bad boundaries and emotional regulation is if I liked you I would ignore red flags and become overly obsessed with you. This has continued to be a problem throughout adulthood.

Anyways I dated Tony until He went to prison, then Matt got out of prison until we broke up, then Tony got out of prison and we has Olivia. Then Tony went back to prison and I met Jason, I left Jason when Tony got out of prison but when Tony and I broke up I went back to Jason and we had Leah. Are you seeing the boomerang effect of codependentcy and back burner relationships. One stable relationship was not enough.

I wanted Jason to be different. To be a family but unfortunately Jason turned out to be very abusive mentally, physically and emotionally. He was an alcoholic and a mean one. But for some reason I loved him and let him stomp on me over and over. He took my confidence. He took my pride. He took my soul. I tried to break up with him 30 times he would say no and just wouldn’t leave. I was faithful to him until I moved out into subsidised housing. But even then I didn’t have multiple men just one man that to this day I love. This guy put up with being #2 for 2 years on and off. Maybe he knew I loved him, maybe he knew that I was stuck with Jason, maybe he knew I needed to feel wanted and worthy. During this I felt guilty and shameful. I eventually bought a house and moved Jason in. That is when this other guy got a new gf and left me alone. It was like mourning a breakup that I couldn’t tell anyone. Eventually I legally evicted Jason and this left me with a self worth and connection black hole.

I acted out for a minute on my usual single m.o.. Then an old friend from middle school came in. He was different then others in that he was genuinely nice and cared for my well being. Unfortunately he also came with a huge dose of depression leading to at the time an inability to keep a job or help with housework. But I stayed with him on and off for the next few years bc I loved him for his emotional support and that he made me feel worthy. Plus it was safe. As a woman in her 30s, I am at the point that if I’m in a relationship I don’t cheat or scope out new guys or have a backburner. It kept me emotionally reeled in. But bc of my trust issues, bc of my lack of feeling worthy, bc of my resentment for him watching me struggle, and bc of my need for excitement or passion (see drama) I couldn’t be with him forever. Even after he got better and held a job and helped my brain short circuits and told me that our lack of connection was insurmountable. I broke his heart and he did nothing wrong. I am just still searching for that lasting “in love” connection that I am not sure exists. I harbor huge guilt here. Both for his feelings and for what could be wrong with me that I left what I said I wanted. That maybe my brain will never let me really love. My only empathy here is that I am working on my shit and all I can do is that.

Every time in my adult life when I have been unhappy in a relationship I’ve left instead of fixing. I have searched out attention through suggestive facebook posts or selfies or sexting. I have been emotionally raw towards men. I had a shitty attitude toward relationships. Anytime that I was single or had freedom I either had a fuck buddy that I didn’t feel anything for or sometimes I would make a strong connection and go all in. I would rush it sexually (again not necessarily full sex but messing around for sure) and more times then not I get played. Within 2 weeks after they no longer answer my texts or calls. This is the shit adult shame is built from. How can you be so blind and stupid? Why can’t you be stable and happy? But here is where I need an empathy piece. Your sexuality was already not healthy then Jason stripped you of any self worth. He often told you no one could ever love me bc I was such a low down terrible person, a piece of shit mother, a whore. Six years of that and you begin to believe it. So if a man comes along and sells you a dream of being loveable its hard not to want with all your heart to believe them. And sexuality is my only tool I know for reeling them in. But when things get too serious I start getting scared of being broken or having to work on things that historically haven’t worked or old scars become obsessions.

I am at a point in my life now that I want to change but Tbh I don’t know how. I want to regain respect for myself and I would like to change peoples opinion of me or better yet not care. This has sent me into a major mental health crisis. I want to know how to reel it in and gain respect while still being true to myself. I still yearn for spark, sex and connection but I want to do it healthily. I want to take the emotional polarization and shame out of sex. Instead of not caring at all or being a crazy obsessive smothering weirdo and throwing myself at someone then feeling like an idiot for falling so hard. So maybe dates in public, counting actions over words and putting time in between the spark and the sex.

I am still struggling with what to do about social media. I mean I need to chill on the provocative selfies, attention seeking posts, and entertaining anyone that messages me… but I still like to be noticed. I want to post selfies and I think dirty memes are funny. Anyway this is long. I am still figuring shit out. And I can’t just look at empathy without taking inventory of what I could have done differently. But this post is empathy and it did help take off a small piece of that shame.

(*when I say act out sexually I don't mean I've had hundreds of partners but rather I have been quick to sexually experiment but I have also developed a "stop point". Don't get it too twisted.)

[lady-stardust7-blog]

The Oldest Game: Chapter 5

Summary: On his way home from work, Gold runs into a lady of the night called Lacey. He finds himself drawn to her, and soon realises that he can’t stop thinking about the young woman on the street corner, and the web of secrets she has spun.

[1] [2] [3] [4]

[read it on Ao3]

Chapter Five: Falling

Gold longed for the nights he’d had prior to meeting Lacey - back when he could put his head on his pillow, fall asleep within ten minutes, and wake up refreshed and ready for the day eight hours later. Alas, those nights were seemingly long gone. Last night had been particularly bad - he’d barely slept at all, tossing and turning as the memory of Lacey’s lips on his intruded his thoughts over and over again. He felt tortured with the taste of what could have been if the circumstances had been different. He’d slowly witnessed the sun take over the night sky behind his curtains, until eventually he gave up and got out of bed.

He repeated his actions from the previous morning, making Lacey breakfast and a hot beverage before even considering what he wanted to eat himself. He knocked on her door, listening carefully for a reply… but there wasn’t one. He knocked a little louder this time, and called her name, but once again it was fruitless. He opened the door slowly, and took a peek through the crack, opening it completely when he processed that she wasn’t in the room at all.

He put down the tray on the dresser and walked to the bathroom, the living room, the whole house, but she was nowhere to be seen. He rushed back to her bedroom and opened the drawers, noticing that her clothes were still inside. That was a relief, to some extent. She couldn’t have run away, so to speak. Perhaps she’d just left for a morning walk, or gone to visit a friend. It was probably nothing to worry about. Somehow, repeating that to himself didn’t stop him from worrying at all.

Despite the severe lack of sleep and the fact that his mind was elsewhere, Gold decided to go to work anyway. If he was to worry at home, he may as well worry at work, where he could attempt to make himself productive. Upon opening the shop, however, he was immediately hit with how empty it felt. Yesterday, when Lacey had come to work with him, it had been different. There was something that made him look at every object as if it was new and full of wonder. Telling her the meaning behind each one somehow made it feel like he was seeing it for the first time too. Today, it felt the complete opposite. There was a horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he couldn’t care less about any of his stock.

He tried busying himself but he knew from the start that today was going to be a long day. He was in the middle of feeling sorry for himself when Regina Mills walked into his shop. He looked up at her but didn’t address her, hoping she’d get the hint that he wasn’t in the mood for whatever it was she wanted from him, and leave before any unnecessary time was wasted. If she did get the hint, she didn’t care.

“Gold,” she greeted. “I thought I’d come and check on you. The rest of the town seem to believe you’ve finally lost it.”

He wasn’t sure if he imagined it, but she seemed to take a certain element of glee in saying that. Of course she did. Anything to give her the upper ground.

“And what would give them that idea?” he humoured her.

“The recent company that you’ve kept. Really, Gold? Hookers? You spend all of your time locked away, avoiding everybody, and now you’ve got a young woman in toe. Lacey, is it? It’s been a bit of a cause for concern,” she said.

If he hadn’t felt so detached and lost, he would have argued it wasn’t like that. Unfortunately for Regina, he really did not care what the townspeople had to say about him, and he wasn’t about to tell her anything. He just felt tired.

“I fail to see how that’s anybody’s concern.”

“So it’s true, then?” She raised her eyebrows at him, although whatever surprise she was feigning wasn’t working. She didn’t look surprised in the slightest. “Really, Gold. I always imagined you with somebody who had a little more… class.”

“It’s especially not any of your concern.”

“She is pretty,” she mused, completely ignoring him. “Although, I suppose they’ve got to be, to be successful in that line of work.”

He knew her game - knew that she was trying to get a reaction out of him. For what, he wasn’t sure. But he didn’t rise to it, and wouldn’t allow her to intimidate him. So, he ignored it instead, looking back down to his inventory sheet.

“Anyway, I just dropped by to let you know that people are talking. If you’re not careful, that ‘fearsome’ reputation you’ve built up will be knocked down. And wouldn’t that be a shame?”

“Yes, well, if that’s all, I really do have more pressing things to attend to.”

“It’ll especially be in shatters when the scene she caused late last night gets around.”

Gold would have sighed if she wasn’t stood in front of him, but he didn’t want to give her that pleasure. She waited for him to ask about it, to finally give her the power in the situation. And reluctantly, Gold gave it to her.

“What scene?” he asked, warily.

“You haven’t heard?” she asked, not bothering to hide a smug smile. Gold glared at her, loathing the fact that he was waiting on her every word. “Graham got a call to The Rabbit Hole at closing time. Apparently, one of the regulars had taken something she shouldn’t have… was getting aggressive, falling all over the place and projectile vomiting. Whenever anybody got close to her she lashed out and got violent, until eventually she passed out and got whisked away to hospital. I went to visit earlier, she really is quite a mess. Dr. Whale tells me that she’s had two seizures overnight. You do know how to pick them, don’t you?”

“And why would you know about all of this? How does it benefit you, concerning yourself with a prostitute who has a drug problem?” he asked, suspiciously. He knew Regina, and she never acted out of compassion or benevolence.

“I simply like to know what’s going on my town,” she said with a superficial smile, before she turned her back and left.

For a few minutes, Gold remained rooted to the spot, his feed glued to the floor. He felt a heavy feeling of dread inside his body as Regina’s words sunk in. He realised he was hyperventilating slightly and attempted to force himself to calm down as he picked up his coat and bolted out the door to his car.

The drivers ahead of him never seemed so slow. He tried to think about something else to stop himself from panicking, but how could he when Lacey was hospitalised? His mind drifted back to his encounter with Regina. There was something in her tone that he particularly disliked. It was almost as if she knew more than she was letting on, or as if she knew something about Lacey that he didn’t. He shook his head. He was probably being paranoid in his state of distress, but he’d be sure to investigate it later - after he knew Lacey was okay.

He entered the hospital and demanded to know where Lacey was. The frightened receptionist immediately searched the system and stuttered out “beech ward” and said something else, but Gold was already halfway down the corridor.

Once he was outside her ward, he stood outside the door. He reached out to the door handle and noticed how much his hand was shaking. He frowned at it, as if willing himself to stop it, but he remained jittery. He closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths before he took the plunge and forced himself to open the door.

He looked around and found himself faced with six hospital beds, four of which were occupied by people in varying states. A sleeping man was closest to his left, and a young girl who looked no older than sixteen was surrounded by a small family on his right. The third bed had curtains wrapped around it and finally his eyes rested on Lacey.

Her head was turned away from him, and he thought she might be asleep until he got a closer look. She wasn’t asleep, just looking out the window. Wordlessly, he took a seat beside her. She was wearing an oxygen mask and had a few tubes on her wrist, but judging from her expression when she saw him, she was completely responsive. She looked like hell, mind - heavy bags under her eyes and a ghostly pale complexion, but she was conscious. At that reassuring fact, Gold let out a much-needed sigh of relief.

For a few moments they simply looked at each other, having a silent conversation through their stubborn expressions.

“Can you… talk?” he asked, weakly. He’d never been in this situation before and wasn’t sure about the protocol, but she lifted off the mask.

“I can breathe too, not that they trust me to do that by myself…” she replied, moodily. Gold nodded, feeling more reassured by the minute, and took a look around. By the end of her bed was a clipboard and he made to reach it, looking at her for permission. She waved her hand and mumbled a “whatever” so he unhooked it and took a look, figuring that he’d get clearer answers from the sheet of paper than he would from asking her.

After a long stretched out silence as he read, Gold looked back up to her. She lay with the expression of a teenager about to get a lecture from a parent, staring stubbornly at the ceiling and waiting for what was to come.

“A ‘crack cocaine overdose’?” he read. She rolled her eyes.

“Go on then,” she replied.

“What?”

“Tell me I behaved recklessly and need to learn to be more responsible, that I’m terrible at making life choices and need to find some other purpose like some meaningless job. I’ve heard it all before, so try your best and maybe you’ll be the one to finally convince me to change my pathetic ways,” she said, sarcastically. “Oh, and don’t forget the ‘if you carry on like this you’ll end up killing yourself!’ line. That seems to be a favourite.”

“I’m not here to admonish you, Lacey.”

There was another silence.

“You didn’t…” he began, unsure of his footing. “You didn’t do this because of… what happened last night, did you?”

She scoffed and rolled her eyes, which made him regret asking it in the first place.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” she said, dryly.

Gold sighed, feeling out of his depth. In the background, he heard the mother crying to the young girl he’d seen coming in. He heard her begging, “please try, for us” and through the stoic expression the girl was wearing, she looked as frightened as a sheep caught between a pack of wolves. He saw her lip quiver and she shook her head, and her mother let out a loud sob.

“She got brought in this morning,” Lacey whispered, following his gaze. “She tried overdosing but they pumped her stomach, and now she’s refusing to eat. They’ve been like this for hours.”

Gold knew through the glimpse of the emotion on the girl’s face that they’d get through to her, that the emotionless exterior she was feigning would soon diminish. He looked at Lacey and knew the little girl inside her wasn’t too deep down, either. He took a few deep breaths before he built up the courage to say what he did next. He looked down at his hands and felt his throat already tightening.

“I said to you, that I didn’t have a family,” he began. She turned to look at him, wondering where this was leading. “That… wasn’t always true. I once had a little boy. His name was Baedon.” He felt his heart break at the mention of his name but he knew he had to continue. Lacey remained silent. “That car accident that I told you about… the one that broke my ankle. My son was also in the car and… I lost him.”

Lacey opened and closed her mouth a few times, unsure of what to say. She settled with a quiet, “I’m sorry.”

“Not as sorry as I am. I woke up in hospital after the accident - this same hospital, in fact. They told me he had already gone. Had done on impact. I could experience that broken ankle and my three broken ribs a thousand times… but it still wouldn’t come close to the pain of losing my boy. He was only fourteen, a whole life for us to spend together. But he’s gone, and it’s my fault.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” she interrupted.

“No, Lacey. It was. I was speeding on an icey road. It was my fault. A moment of reckless judgement and a lifetime snatched away. A broken ankle wasn’t enough. I refused to do physiotherapy and that’s why it never healed right, but it’s still more than I deserve.”

He felt a tear fall from his eye and he quickly wiped it away. He hadn’t mentioned it since they had buried his son in the ground, and although he thought of Bae every day, bringing the memory of the crash to surface was still too raw for him.

“Why are you telling me this?” asked Lacey, softly. He looked up at her, looking at him with hooded eyes filled with sympathy. He swallowed, dislodging the lump that had been stuck in his throat, and cleared his voice.

“Because, Lacey,” he said. “I’ve just told you the most personal thing about myself. Now it’s time for you to let me in, too.”

[silentfcknhill]

hey I've seen you reblog stuff about drugs and stuff and I just wanted to ask what narcatics were you into? random and blunt question but just curous. I'm having a hard time lately... drinking but I'm trying to quit with with it now and just started weed. I just feel like it's neve gonna be better, you know? shit I so okay for so long and then it all goes to fucking hell again. I'm sorry for unloading like this....

It’s okay, I hope you don’t mind if I ramble a long-ass answer. I was mainly addicted to drugs that were not traditionally considered addictive physically, just psychologically. My main drugs of choice were weed, acid, mushrooms and occasionally molly. I never had a huge problem with alcohol, as in I didn’t drink often but when I did I went way overboard and would often mix drugs that would make me very ill. Weed was okay for me at first before I went overboard and was spending hundreds a month, and I am not completely anti-weed like some people in NA, but I think there are people who can and can’t handle it mentally. I can’t. If you have mental health issues, especially anxiety (though I’ve seen some people it can help their anxiety), paranoia, dissociation, derealization or hallucinations/problems with reality to begin with, it is like playing with fire. I’m not saying you should panic, everyone has different reactions, but I could never smoke again after the bad acid trips and ego deaths I’ve had. Too many flashbacks. And I got serotonin syndrome a lot. I quit using 17 months ago and I’m still dealing with effects like visual fractals, a new worldview and mood problems. 

For about a year I was suicidal and having panic attacks every day, and I had to work double shifts while crying and vomiting (quiting was not an option because we are too poor and I did not want to be homeless again, especially in that condition). It takes a while for your brain to recover and learn to produce it’s own serotonin after smoking weed every day for two years, so there is a major depression that occurs when you get clean. I lost my appetite for a couple months, and also couldn’t sleep on my own. Drugs were basically my go-to for every minor inconvenience, so learning to be a person again and deal with problems directly was difficult. I became extremely paranoid while detoxing. I also lost all interest in everything, I experienced no joy and only dread, terror and depression. My obsessions such as movies and music were no longer enough to enjoy, I needed to experience them on absurd amounts of psychedelics and meditate on them and see them from weird perspectives to appreciate them. I have started gaining back my appreciation for the little things in life again by now. 

The hardest part for me was coming to terms with the fact that I will never be the same as I was before ever again, and now I just have to adjust. It sucks that I was a teenager while this was happening, and my brain was still developing, so now it became a part of my youth and shaped my personality a lot. But I try to think of it positively, because now I have a new chance to become a better person, I have a fresh start and not many people can have a second chance after fucking up and having no common sense. I am lucky to have not gotten into any legal trouble, though a lot of relationships were destroyed, I really deserved it. I am not trying to self-pity, but it is a fact that I have suffered beyond words and been to hell (I’m not religious but to me hell is a psychological state of torment and existential darkness and lack of reality), but I have also grown as a person and become exponentially more self-aware, empathetic, introspective and accepting of my defects. 

I know exactly what you mean when you say you feel it will never get better. When you’re in darkness it effects your whole perception and sense of reality and colors every area of life. We lose our memory of anything good ever. Kind of like a Dementor from harry Potter has sucked out our soul, which Dementors incidentally were written by JK Rowling as an analogy of her depression (Sorry for random reference, I am a fan of Harry Potter). But we are both still young, well I am and I assume you are as well as I don’t know many elderly people on Tumblr, and time changes things. Time doesn’t heal, but it does give you the opportunity to heal and grow. Nothing will ever magically heal, we will always be addicts, but you will have good days, and some very good days and memories, and those are worth riding through the bad to get to. It is very difficult to keep perspective, but I spent a couple years of my life on drugs. I have 70 years left ahead of me, best case scenario. This is not the end at all. 

I have seen people successfully drink and smoke and not become upset or addicted, but I have Asperger’s and BPD and I was foolish to ignore the sensitivities and chances I was taking and I put my trust into the wrong influences and people. I have developed my own coping mechanisms throughout my life, because addiction was obviously not the first and only trauma I’ve been through, I’ve been having issues since being a toddler basically including emotional violent abuse from the time I was born, sexual assault, personal deaths, bullying, self-harm and mental illness, having parents who are mentally ill and unstable and dealing with their suicide threats as a child, divorce, homelessness, murderers in the family, robbery, knife attacks, being a therapist to my mother, trying to stay objective as she described to me her post-partum depression involving demons telling her to throw me off a balcony and molest me, multiple suicide attempts of my own including a horrendous overdose, multiple hospitalizations, medications, dating a man in his 40’s as a young teen, being cheated on twice, coming to grips with my LGBT identity, and much more. I grew up in a fantasy world, always acting and playing pretend even to this day, I live my life through the eyes of my favorite characters, even while alone. AT this point it is very easy for me to detach from my emotions and reality and observe my own suffering as though I was a character in a movie or something. This is also why I have a decent tolerance to pain. I just view it as an experience, a memory. Time is really an illusion, so when I am hurt, I just remember that in a few hours it will be like nothing ever happened. 

Also, the one most important message I took from NA is probably the simplest, and most people don’t give it a second thought because it’s just a cliche to them, but when you really meditate on it and practice it, you realize how incredibly true and helpful it is: “One day at a time.” And that motto is a principle, not have to take it literally. I know for a lot of people, myself included, it can be more like one minute at a time, but you really gotta try to keep priorities in sight and self-care when need be. Sometimes there is nothing you can do to help yourself but go to sleep all day. It is fine to do that. I have trained myself to fall asleep relatively quickly using deep, controlled stomach breathing and and stims and mental focus patterns such as waterfalls, space travel, etc, movement that stays constant and is relaxing. Music helps too, but only without lyrics. There are a lot of sound pieces on youtube and stuff made for relaxing, like the sound of rain, or nature like the ocean or amazon. Whatever suits you. It is handy to have an off button like a computer sometimes. You just shut down and reboot. 

I’m not saying it is healthy to be avoidant, and I definitely have shut down and become very robotic as of late, but it is highly preferable to the alternative for me until when/if I learn better skills. You will hopefully feel better when you wake up, whether it was physical anxiety or mental or both. Plus, scientifically, sleep and dreaming is when our brains process information and memories, so we may come to familiarize ourselves with unknown fears or stresses while we sleep and wake up more able to deal with them rationally without the fight or flight. One day at a time ties in to a concept we call “the triangle of self-obsession”, and it relates to how living in the past causes resentments, focusing on negatives in the present causes anger, and fear stems from living in the future. One day at a time, take shit as it comes and don’t cross bridges before you get to them. of course, planning still is good but we must be flexible and not place our whole mental state on something that hasn’t happened yet. Anger roots back to fear, fear roots back to lack of control, and once we accept that we really cannot control everything and be omnipresent and all-knowing puppetmasters, we become more humble. 

I myself have come to terms with the fact that I am very narcissistic. I never thought I was, due to low self-esteem, but it only recently occurred to me that being narcissism is usually just a symptom of low self-esteem anyways, and it is just expressed differently. Some people build massive egos and brag. For me, my narcissism forms through being self-centered and selfishly focused on my own problems. Some people focus daily on distinguishing whether they are living and acting on their own will or their higher power’s will, and adjusting their behavior accordingly, because living on our own will is what got us in this position in the first place. I don’t really have a higher power in the traditional sense at this point, but it is still good to be mindful that I am not the center of everything, and that even though I claim to be open-minded, I am still just as judgmental and hypocritical as anyone else, I just express and experience it in different ways. Anyways, long tangent, no one cares, I will shut up now. I am kind of a basketcase, but if you need to talk, you can message or dm me anytime.