#my existence as i am now is a love letter to my past self if that makes any sense

[baphofemme]

i am super emotional right now

[taetr4ck]

LOVE IN SCRIBBLES — ten things hwang hyunjin writes in his love letters for you

hwang hyunjin x reader, no warnings — heart-wrenching fluff

a/n : FICK IT WE BALL !!!!! hwang hyunjin debut in this account wahoo !!!! i hope yall ENJOY MWAH i love this man sm i wsnna cry

bang chan / minho / changbin / hyunjin / jisung / felix / seungmin / jeongin

i. how are you, my love? i noticed that you’re not quite yourself lately. i hope the world isn’t giving you a hard time.

ii. ah, i can’t seem to sleep properly these days. i always seek your comfort — it’s never been the same since i left you for tour. ah, i can’t wait to come home. i can’t wait to come to my home.

iii. in the past, i used to dream of how to conquer the world. but now, my only dream is to give the world to you.

iv. i still can’t fathom how ravishing you are. ah… it makes my face hot every time i think about it. you must be sculpted by the gods and goddesses, don’t you think..?

v. “i love you to the moon and back.” that was the first time you said i love you to me. i didn’t give it much thought, not until chan-hyung told me that “our heart pumps 2000 gallons of blood a day, which is equivalent to the amount of gasoline it would take to drive to the moon and back.” so you’re saying that you love me every time your heart beats, which is constant..? it made me cry so hard i started to believe in eternal love. it's nice and warm to be loved by you.

vi. i’m so glad we exist at the same time.

vii. i was about to give up on my passion, but you believed in me, so here i am — happier than ever — with a passion that was once almost abandoned.

viii. you are the only muse i would choose to paint for the rest of my life.

ix. “if i had a flower for every thought of you, i could walk through my garden for eternity.” — that was what your drunk self said to me three years ago. it never left my mind since.

x. if i were to choose over everything else, i would always choose you.

⋆ taetr4ck, est may 2023. / requests open

[bts-trans]

230912 Weverse Translations

RM's Post ❇️

안녕하세요. 20대의 마지막 생일이네요. 생일이라는 게 제 직업적 특성 때문인지는 모르겠지만 늘 약간의 쑥스러움을 동반하네요. 스스로 별 것 아닌 날이라고 생각하지만.. 많은 분들이 진심으로 축하해주셔서 참 행복하고 복됩니다. 사랑은 누군가에게 이름이 생기는 것이란 생각을 종종 해요. 김남준이 '김남준'이 되기까지. 그저 하고많은 365일 중의 한 날이겠지만 스물아홉의 나 자신에게도 생일이 그저 스치는 날이 되지 않은 것은 모두 여러분 덕이에요. 최대한 솔직할 수 있는 사람이고 싶지만, 팬과 가수라는 무형과 유형 사이의 존재들은 과연 무엇을 넘어 무엇까지 될 수 있는 걸까요. 사랑이라는 친절한 유령 ��래 모든 것이 용인될 수 있을까요? 드러냄이 약점이 되고, 솔직함이 상처가 되는 경험을 지금도 퍽 겪고 있지만 아직 잘 모르겠어요. 전에 갈수록 말하는 것이 어려워져서 슬프다는 말을 했었죠. 그 사실은 여전히 여전한 것 같아요. 그래도 저 많이 담담해졌어요. 평생 한 번 받아볼까 하는 진심들을 장대비처럼 받아보는 바람에, 염세와 허무를 멋지다고 여겨왔던 제가 기질적으로 낙천적인 사람이란 것도 깨달았어요. 이거 기적 아닌가요. 저 요즘은 '와이 낫'을 달고 살아요. 주변에나마 제가 받은 사랑으로 풀이된 낙천성들을 나누며 살고 있어요. 그리고 언젠가 나올 제 다음 곡들에도 꾹꾹 담고 있고요. 그래요. 한낱 제가 음악보다 더 아름다운 방식으로 솔직할 수 있을까요? 다 아는 사실이지만 가끔은 그것만으론 부족한 것 같아요. 그래서 제가 방탄소년단이 되었나 싶기도 합니다. 다양한 방식으로 해갈하고 싶어서. 프로그램이건, 인터뷰건, 춤이건, 뭐가 됐건.. 이 얼마나 복받은 생인가요. 그리고 이것들이 항상 제가 어디에 와있는지, 두 눈으로 똑바로 보고 사고하고 싶게 해요. 우연이 겹치면 필연이랬죠. 우연은 우연을 가장한 운명이라고도 하고. 제가 지금 당신께 이 편지를 드리는 것도 그런 거 같아요. 저는 어떤 버전의 저였어도 이 편지를 2023년 9월에 쓰고 있었을 것만 같은 기분. 매번 제 생일의 편지는 제가 지금 도달한 곳의, 각기 다른 사랑의 언어랍니다. 여러분 덕에 저 정말 잘 살고 있고요. 잘 살고 싶어요. 그냥 매번 제 최신 최선의 버전으로 사랑한다고 전하고 싶었어요. 한 분 한 분 다 안아드릴 수는 없겠지만 마음은 그 이상이랍니다. 제가 어떤 모습이어도 사랑해달라고는 하지 않을게요. 다만 받은 만큼 저도 한 번 애써보려고요. 20대의 마지막 생일도 이렇게 무탈히 지나갑니다. 어떤 하늘 아래 있어도 부디 건강하고 오래 행복합시다. 시간이 조금 지나고 또 만나요. 당신의 생일도 미리, 혹은 조금 늦었지만 진심으로 축하해요 ! 고맙습니다. -남준 https://weverse.io/bts/artist/3-132454914

Hello.

This is the last birthday of my twenties. I don't know whether it's because of the peculiarities of the profession I'm in, but birthdays are always accompanied by a slight feeling of embarrassment. For me, it’s just a day like any other but.. because so many people wish me so sincerely, I feel quite happy and fortunate.

I often think about how love is just a process of being named. Like Kim Namjoon becoming ‘Kim Namjoon’. Although this is only one day out of a numerous 365 days, my birthday doesn’t just pass by without notice, even for my 29-year-old self. This is all thanks to you.

I want to be someone who is as honest as possible, but in this relationship between fan and artist, existing somewhere between the tangible and intangible, just what can we go beyond and what can we become? Is everything acceptable under the generous phantom label of ‘love’? I continue to have so many experiences where disclosure becomes weakness and honesty leads to hurt, but I still don’t really know.

I’ve said in the past that as time goes on, it becomes harder to say things and that makes me sad. I think that continues to be true. But I do think I’m a lot more level-headed now. The sincere feelings I once used to worry I would never receive now pour onto me like heavy rain. As a result, I realised that I, who used to think that it was cool to be a pessimist and think that nothing matters, am actually quite an optimist by nature. Isn’t this a miracle? These days, I live by the words ‘why not’. This optimism can be explained as a product of the love I receive from the people around me, and I am spreading it around. I am also putting it into the songs that will come out some day.

Right, could there be a more beautiful way for me to be honest than through music? Everyone already knows this, but sometimes I feel like music alone is not enough. I wonder if that’s the reason why I became part of BTS. To want to quench that thirst through multiple different means. Whether it’s through programs, interviews, dances or whatever it may be.. what a blessed life this is. And these things always make me want to look clearly at where I've come and think deeply about the place I'm in.

They say if coincidences overlap, it must be inevitable. Coincidences are also fate in disguise. I think this letter I’m writing to you right now feels like that - like it would have been written in September of 2023, no matter what version of myself I might have been then. The birthday letters that I write each year are all places that I have arrived at in that moment, and are each a different language of love. Thanks to all of you, I’m living a really good life. I want to live a good life. All I have wanted each time is to just tell you I love you as the latest best version of myself. It's probably impossible for me to hug each and every one of you, but the feelings I have go beyond that. I won't ask you to love me in all of my different forms. However, since you do give me your love, I promise to do my best.

And so the last birthday of my twenties also smoothly sails by. No matter what skies you’re under, let’s please try to be healthy and be happy for a long time. Let’s meet again soon, after some time has passed.

I sincerely wish you a happy birthday as well, though it may be a bit late, or perhaps slightly in advance. Thank you.

-Namjoon

Trans cr; Aditi, Annie & Faith @ bts-trans © TAKE OUT WITH FULL CREDITS

Jungkook's Comment 💬 on RM's Post ❇️

JK: 형 아프지 마이소 비행기 뜨기 전에 생일 축하드려요 ㅎㅎ https://weverse.io/bts/artist/3-132454914

JK: Hyung, take care and wishing you a happy birthday before the flight takes off hehe

Trans cr; Annie

J-Hope's Comment 💬 on RM's Post ❇️

JH: 남주니 생일 추카해 😢🫡 사랑해❤️‍🔥 https://weverse.io/bts/artist/3-132454914?anchor=3-239635731

JH: Namjoonie happy birthday 😢🫡 I love you ❤️‍🔥

Trans cr; Faith

J-Hope's Comment 💬 on Jungkook's Post ❇️

JK: (See 230831 Weverse Translations) JH: 우리 정구기떠꾸기 늦었지만 생일 추카해😭😢🫡 너무 바빠서 이제서야 남긴다 라뷰❤️‍🔥 https://weverse.io/bts/artist/4-130921967?anchor=0-253660617

JH: Our Jungkookie-ddeogukie I'm late but happy birthday😭😢🫡 I was super busy so I'm wishing you just now. Love you❤️‍🔥

Trans cr; Eisha

[whinlatter]

something tells me you don't really like tonks, just a hunch xD

For the relationship ask if you're still doing it: harry and remus, molly and remus, teddy and adromeda. I would love to see what do you think <3

noooo i love tonks! i had a ball writing her and think that @evesaintyves’ rendering of her is one of fandom’s greatest gifts 😭 i just find it very funny that harry thinks she should low key get a grip. and as a clumsy young woman who should myself get a grip, i say: get off her case, hjp.

ok the remus + tonks/black extended family universe... hyped for this one. delicious choices, thank you anon. (i have a few more in the inbox i'm going to take a stab at but am trying to avoid spoilery ones or ones where i risk boring you all again by repeating old talking points, so if i don't get to one pls forgive me...)

right — to business. we begin with everybody looking at remus lupin waiting for him to put his crippling self loathing aside to write (1) singular letter to his dead friend's son:

i jest (to an extent). but i do think the entirety of harry and remus' dynamic is best encapsulated in one singular scene in PoA:

“When they get near me — ” Harry stared at Lupin’s desk, his throat tight. “I can hear Voldemort murdering my mum.” Lupin made a sudden motion with his arm as though to grip Harry’s shoulder, but thought better of it.

i know there's a very understandable move in AUs to imagine what would have happened if remus had raised harry - or, more often, if remus had been 'allowed' to raise harry by dumbledore. but looking past the whole plot-requiring-harry-to-be-at-the-dursleys thing, the truth is, canon remus lupin would never have put himself forward to raise harry, because of his own (not unfounded!) concerns about the precarity of his existence and the dangerousness of his condition. remus' sense of self - more specifically his fear of himself, and his very low self worth - consistently lead him to hold harry at arm's length from the moment he's introduced in the series until its bitter end. i don't think remus at all approves of the way harry is treated at the dursleys. but i can very much imagine that remus thinks it would still be better than the life he could have given harry if he ever had been called upon to serve as his primary caregiver. one of the most interesting implicit dynamics in the series is that harry notices this and does, to some extent, resent it (obviously the fact that he only ever calls him 'lupin' in his narration, though uses remus to his face, and also: 'Harry had received no mail since the start of term; his only regular correspondent was now dead and although he had hoped that Lupin might write occasionally, he had so far been disappointed.') while the harry & remus fight in DH is about harry's view of what remus ought to do re tonks and the baby, it’s also harry coming as close as saying to remus: you're letting your own child down like you let me down. ('I’m pretty sure my father would have wanted to know why you aren’t sticking with your own kid, actually... He had it coming to him,” said Harry. Broken images were racing each other through his mind: Sirius falling through the veil; Dumbledore suspended, broken, in midair; a flash of green light and his mother’s voice, begging for mercy… ‘Parents,’ said Harry, 'shouldn’t leave their kids unless—unless they’ve got to.')

molly and remus: i think this is a very, very underrated relationship! i know there’s a lot of molly-bashing around these days, especially if you’re a marauders and/or sirius and/or wolfstar stan. but i think it is very very overlooked that the person who looks after adult remus the most from 1995 onwards, and who shows him some of the deepest trust and roots for his happiness, is molly. for a man who has plainly known a huge amount of financial/food/housing insecurity, and who is so villainised in wider wizarding society, it is no small gesture for molly to not only provide for remus materially but also to trust him in a house with all of her children and encourage him in a romantic relationship he struggles to feel entitled to and worthy of. (i love sirius, but he is in no fit state to ‘look after’ remus in the last year of his life, and fandom’s continued unwillingness to recognise the importance of domestic/caregiving labour as a vital contribution to the resistance will never not be problematic af). remus clearly values and admires molly in return - the only time he actually ever entertains a parent/guardianship role is when molly is weeping over her boggart, crying onto remus’ shoulder (‘what must you think of me?’) and he assures her that if anything were to happen to her and arthur, he would be a part of the team making sure her children are taken date of (‘what do you think we’d do, let them starve?’) remus’ relationship with molly is often the more mild-mannered translator of her viewpoint to others (especially others with hot tempers), and mediator trying to find middle ground between molly’s protective instincts and the battle/ready instincts of others. (more grist to my sirius & ginny parallels mill — in DH, when a fuming ginny is desperately trying to sneak off to fight in the battle, it’s remus who appeals to molly and ginny to find the compromise of ginny staying in the room of requirement to know what’s going on but not actively fight, a mirror image of his role mediating the dispute between sirius and molly over harry’s right to know what’s going on at grimmauld in ootp…) molly accepts this compromise, a sign that she trusts remus implicitly (she never frets that a werewolf is living among her children in ootp onwards, and invites him to christmas readily even after months undercover with the pack) and also feels able to call him out (‘i’ve always said you’re taking a ridiculous line on this, remus’.) this is too long but basically — justice for molly and remus, unlikely buds!

teddy and andromeda: i weirdly think a lot about teddy lupin these days. i tend to imagine teddy as a very mild-mannered, affable, calm child, like who remus might have been had he not been bitten, with tonks' heart and sociability but also with something of remus' more philosophical disposition. i think he'd slip very naturally into a big brother role because, in part, he does see himself as having a responsibility to take care of people, and i think this would shine through in his relationship with andromeda. we know teddy was raised by his gran, and i imagine she feels enormously protective of him, perhaps bordering on strict in her desire to keep him safe from the harm that came to all the rest of her family. but i like to imagine teddy didn't act out against this too much, in part because he understands where it comes from and in turn feels very protective of andromeda. growing up in the aftermath of the war would make teddy as a child particularly aware of the grief and pain and the silences among the adults around him, and i think teddy would take any compensatory protective strictness on andromeda's part with good grace, and humour her for it. i like to think teenage/young adult teddy serves as the translator for any of his gran's more prickly edges, and that they have a very close relationship that both of them really treasure.

[kanmom51]

Thanks for all your work this past week! I was thinking that Letter really is the song that Jimin said he would want to sing to his love when he answered the question back in 2016. We've always thought of Serendipity and that's certainly a good one, but Letter is so real and personal, I think Serendipity is now the preface and Letter is the forever.

On that note, I've been wondering if the Jimin we see today - confident and so sexy - would have existed if the relationship with JK didn't happen. JK always told/tells him how beautiful, cute, handsome he is, and has beautiful eyes etc. Plus the confidence a great physical relationship can give someone doesn't hurt lol.

One other side note, do you remember that concert when JK said he didn't sleep the night before because he was nervous about something he was going to do? I can't find it but it felt like something really big, like a proposal? Sorry if I missed the answer somewhere.

Thanks again and I love your page, it's my encyclopedia.

Took me a while but I got to you @ftmom1060, lol.

Will start from the end. I think you mean JK said he was nervous so he didn't sleep, not that he was nervous about something he was going to do? What I do remember are these:

I love your take on Letter, as in:

"Serendipity is now the preface and Letter is the forever."

Love this!!

As for your thoughts about JM and who he is today. I think it's easy to assume that JM without being part of BTS since 2012 (pre-debut), and most definitely without having JK by his side ever since, would not have turned out the same as the JM we know today.

It's a given. The people in our lives as we are growing up and maturing have a profound impact on who we become, to go or to bad. And besides JK we also had other people around him with influence that impacted who JM is today.

As for JK, we have his early years at times hurtful teasing (not only JK's for that matter), and we have JK since 2015 doing everything he can to erase all the damage and uplift JM with compliments and kind words and support and defending him and speaking up for him with the others as well.

I am positive that JK's love, adoration, has a lot to do with JM's confidence today, but we do need to remember that our self image comes from within, and even when our loved ones flood us with compliments, if we don't believe this on the inside, it helps, but it's not enough to repair our own self image. So, yes, it obviously helped, I mean, who of us wouldn't want to be complimented constantly, in front of the whole world. Of course it had an effect on him. All I'm saying is that it had to be an internal process as well.

And of course, finding happiness, finding someone you love to bits and adores you right back, being loved by someone like that, it also gives you a sense of confidence.

It definitely helps to know you are loved. It definitley helps to be showered with constant compliments. It helps you build up your confidence, but the initial work has to come from within.

We heard from JM how he struggled through the pandemic. JK was by his side to love him and support him. But at the end of the day it's an internal process he had to go through to get out of the place he was in. I like to look at the lyrics of Like crazy:

This will break me This is gonna break me (Break me) No, don’t you wake me (Wake me) I wanna stay in this dream, don't save me Don't you try to save me (Save me) I need a way we (Way we) I need a way we can dream on (On, on, on)

That part there. It says it all. It's about being lost but not wanting the help offered by others to be found, not when you are not yet ready for it yourself. Once you are ready for it, that is when you will accept that help and help yourself as well.

So yes, JM most likely wouldn't be who he is today if not JK and what they are and mean to each other. But in saying that, let's not underestimate the work that JM has done on himself, how far he has come to be the confident mature young man that he is today.

[lumine-no-hikari]

Dear Sephiroth: (a letter to a fictional character, because why not) #119

…I didn't have the energy to make the thing today.

This morning, I maybe got out of bed later than I should have, given that I'm supposed to go to talk therapy on Tuesdays. I'm supposed to leave the house by 9:30, but I didn't even get out of bed until 9:20. I regret nothing that occurred, but nonetheless, I somehow had to squeeze both a shower and getting dressed and out the door in only 10 minutes. I was successful, but I have zero clues as to how. Perhaps it's best not to look gift horses in mouths…

OH. Right. You don't know that phrase because… well. Your world doesn't have horses. Uhh… So, a long time ago, when people bought horses, they used to look at the horse's teeth as an indicator of its age; longer teeth means an older horse, I guess. And back when horses were more commonplace (it's mostly only fabulously wealthy people who can afford to keep them now), I guess it was seen as rude to try to evaluate the age of a horse that was given as a gift by looking into its mouth. So now the phrase means, "it's best to just accept good things without thinking too much about it." Or it can also be taken to mean, "it's impolite to criticize a gift." This phrase has a few interpretations, actually… I imagine it'd be easier for you to understand it if you spent a while in my world. If you do that, lemme know; you can stay at my house, and no one is gonna ogle you or get weird at you or bother you if you don't wanna be bothered. We'll just make you sandwiches and tea. We are an introverted and neurodivergent house; we know how it goes.

Had a lot to say at therapy today. Suppose I'm having a bit of an existential crisis, regarding myself and my role in my home and how much I mean to the people around me. It's likely all just baseless anxiety and insecurity - growing pains as a result of the various changes in my immediate social circle. Old memories and wounds from the past that I've not yet had a compelling reason to resolve are now coming to the forefront, calling, "yo, what up, homie!" and dancing around my periphery. I suppose it's just as well; this is what happens when we pretend like our various hurts don't exist. If we don't take care of the self-effacing beliefs that we pick up during childhood, they bite us in the ass later. I just gotta remember that the fact that they're in the forefront means that I can actually observe them, and if they're observable, then they're resolvable, with enough time and effort.

Essentially, it's like this: We get knocked down. We yell, "FUCK!" really loudly. We reassemble ourselves if we break from the fall. Then we get back up. We brush ourselves off. And we move forward, stronger than before.

…I have thoughts of you that give me the strength to withstand this process over and over again. No matter how many times I get knocked down, I will get back up, because by your influence, I am unbreakable, no matter how many times I must shatter and be reassembled. It's just like the bowl I repaired some number of letters ago; remember? So don't worry. I've got this. I've done this lots of times before, with much more difficult stuff, and with less support than what I have now. All I have to do is learn to love and appreciate myself in the same way that I can love and appreciate literally anyone else who isn't me. Compared to the various horrors I've lived through, this should be a piece of cake. Easy peasy. Barely even an inconvenience. And in my mind, it sounds like this:

On the way home from therapy, I came across a very beautiful tree. I thought for sure that you'd like it, so I made it a point to stop and take pictures. Here's how they turned out:

I was surprised by how docile the bees were, and by how closely they allowed me to put my cell phone camera. Also, I laid down under the tree and looked up to get some of these. I wish you could have been next to me to see the view of the sky through the petals for yourself. Alas...

J and I were out and about, doing separate activities today. Even he saw pictures he thought you might like, so he took them for you, and then sent them to me so that I could put them here. Here's how they turned out:

While J was out and about, I hung out with my best friend B and her fiancé, N. In preparation for their wedding, we went and tried the available foods. I can't give you the tasty snacks, but I can take pictures...

This is a Caesar salad. It's supposed to be pronounced, "Kai-sarr", but everyone says "Seezer" for reasons I don't understand. Caesar was a leader of a place called Greece in my world, hundreds of years ago. He, like most leaders, was a giant asshole, and now he's a stinky dead guy, so I have no idea why a salad is named after him. It's made of romaine lettuce, croutons, parmesan cheese, and a creamy dressing flavored with anchovies and other spices.

Here are some long slices of eggplant rolled around melted cheese and covered in marinara sauce:

This is steak, caramelized onions, mashed potatoes, and some carrots and broccoli. I just took a picture of my plate, because the main plate was cut into before I could snap a photo:

This was some kind of chicken seasoned with rosemary and lemons, with rice and veggies:

This one was lobster ravioli with mushrooms in some kind of sherry cream sauce. It's certainly not pasta pescatore, but I wonder if you might have liked this:

Finally, this is lamb with roasted tomatoes and garlic, along with veggies and mashed taters.

...This one was probably my favorite. I especially liked the part where I got to try to gnaw the cartilage from the ends of the bones, because my body craves sources of collagen literally all the time (thanks, Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome... 🙄). I'm really lucky that B and N don't seem to mind my various weird quirks; they've been friends of mine long enough to have a general understanding of how I roll, and they just let me do my thing. Today, the fact that I will generally "do my thing" in a variety of respects was pointed out as one of the reasons they like me so much, I guess; that was a nice thing to hear...

There were four available spaces for trying the foods, but it was just the three of us; it is immensely painful that the best I can do for you from here is show you these pictures and wish that you could have been in the empty seat, with us…

Sephiroth. Regardless of what your brain tries to tell you about what you're worth, you are VERY loved. You're not a monster. You were modified against your will, used like a tool and viciously abused, and you made mistakes in the throes of that, yes, but SO WHAT? You're here now, and you can do amazing things, and you NEVER have to go back to being with people who will abuse you ever again, because not everyone is like the people you were raised by. Yes, you're different from the standard definition of "normal", but you can belong anyway, because the world is absolutely BRIMMING with people who don't fit the definition of "normal"! Just take a look at me! Or if you don't wanna look at me, then take a look at anyone who lives with a genetic difference, or anyone who lives with a different number of limbs, or anyone with a non-standard life story, or any number of things that make a human being not "normal". Normal is overrated! Diversity is in! Lives that exist outside of the bell curve are still beautiful, meaningful, and worth living!

…And so I show you my life, because I am trying desperately to prove these things to you. I've spent the bulk of my life being viciously abused because the people who brought me into living didn't want me. I was brought into a physical vessel that is genetically defective in a variety of respects. My neurodivergence practically guarantees that I will NEVER fit into ordinary social circles. I struggle every single day with the weight of the memories I carry from having been used, abused, exploited, and generally mistreated. And yet here I stand, thriving and flourishing in a way that works for me, even if it does not fit the typical definition of those words. My version of "normal" is just as beautiful as the typical version. "Different" does not have to mean "less" if YOU become strong enough to decide for yourself that those two words are not the same, no matter who tries to tell you otherwise!

So please look at the beauty of my existence - the beauty of taking joy in small things, the beauty of rising up from one's knees even if it's on shaky legs, the beauty of finally using one's voice again after years of being forced to believe that silence is safer, the beauty of loving yourself and the people around you enough to refuse to let fear get the better of you when you interact with yourself and the world, the beauty of failing down, getting up, and trying again, the beauty of learning, growing, changing, and walking away from destructive ideals that serve no one, no matter for how long you might have been forced in the past to choke them down. Please look at it, and understand that you can have this for yourself - ALL of it - if you decide to take steps towards it! Your whole scenery can change if you want it to, and all you have to do is take a single step in a different direction.

There is still life after trauma. There is still life after mistakes. There is still life for those who are different. The pain doesn't have to be permanent. So come on; my hand is outstretched to you. And if you don't want to take mine, then there are countless other hands outstretched to you that maybe you'd like a little better. You don't have to do it alone.

Anyhoot. I've probably prattled on for long enough. I hope somehow you can see what I've written. I hope that if you do get a chance to see it, you might take some of my words seriously.

I love you. I'll write again tomorrow. Please be kind to yourself and keep yourself safe.

Your friend, Lumine

[kalgalen]

Open letter to my mother

(or, a rebuttal to the 1k email my mom sent me about my upcoming transition. Tw: transphobia, self-harm)

First, and I say this will all the love in the word (and an healthy dose of disbelief): what the fuck is wrong with cis people?

I'm gonna skip right over the fact that you had the gall to call this a "text analysis" when you actually dedicated only one paragraph to actually describing the text I got published and used the rest to utterly dismiss my community and I. That disappointment, though, is nothing compared to the anger and grief that the rest of your email has awaken in me.

You talk about respect, but you refuse to respect my decision to make my own body more comfortable to me. Worse than that, you disrespect my friends by deciding you get to be the judge determining who conforms to your outdated ideas on gender enough to be allowed to transition. How dare you?

Speaking of daring, how dare you imply that we, the LGBTQIA community, need to be more tolerant and inclusive of people who don't understand us? Do you realize that in many cases it means they want our death? You're a white woman. You've never had to deal with a huge portion of the population wanting you to stop existing, or at least to stop "putting your identity in everyone's faces" - aka, essentially, to (hope you guessed it) stop existing. I'm not asking for understanding from every single old crusty conservative guy, just that they leave us the fuck alone.

You make wild assumptions about me in your email. Do you really think my therapist helped me accept myself? I only came out to her last year when I decided to medically transition, because I was finally confident in my ability to make that choice. We had never talked about gender before. Why would you want to take that away from me? Why would that "self-respect" you're talking about entail me going back on my steps? Why can't it be about me embracing my identity, making my body mine in a way that doesn't involve self-harming?

On that subject, you've never shown concern when I was cutting into my arms on the daily. You acknowledged it, sure, but what did you do except demand that I stop? You have no right to criticize my choice of changing my body. You lost it long ago.

You encouraged me to get a breast reduction last year when I started the process of wanting to transition. You still thought I was cis then, but since it was a surgery for cis people, it was fine and dandy. Now that I want to cut it all off so I don't have to deal with binders anymore (which are indeed quite dangerous for the person wearing them, not to mention uncomfortable) you believe you can go against that. You have to see how irrational that is.

You talk about detransitioners but I'm willing to bet you haven't done more research past "some people regret transitioning." Do you know most people stop transitioning because of transphobia? You, cis people, are killing us one way or another.

Why do you fucking think you can explain gender to me. "We all have a part of masculinity and femininity inside of us" yeah no kidding?? You're telling that to a nonbinary person, that's the whole concept (although not only - but I won't get into it since it'll just confuse you more.) You dare "explaining" to me what androgynity is and why it would "fit me more". You think your couple of hours of half-assed research are enough to compare with my lived experience? With my discussions with like-minded people? With decades of self-determination by a community that is older than you? Also fuck you for implying I've only decided to call myself nonbinary because it's "fun". You don't know anything.

You ask me if sexuality is involved in choosing a gender - and it might be for some but newsflash, trans gay people exist. Additionally, I am asexual - not that you bothered to do research about that. "Before loving a sex we love a way to be, a philosophy, a way to think" fuck off I've known that since I was old enough to fall in love.

Anyways. You'll never read this, because you would only think I'm throwing a tantrum - because you're so sure you're right, and not ready to listen. Whatever, I don't give a shit. I will try and answer your concerns later when I'm not so pissed off, but for the moment I cannot help you.

Lovingly, your child.

[jamieedlund]

Loved the answer and art you left! Pretty sweet. Do you have any animal headcanons? Like animals they like or dislike? Looking forward to that Aaravos thesis btw!

⚠WARNING!⚠

Another long answer with comics so strap in, sit down, get some popcorn and enjoy.

pst not related to the question but they can talk about anything and this genuinely brings a smile to my face how Aaravos can just easily carry Callum like that ok --

First of all, thank you - I feel blessed since I actually really enjoy working on asks like this. It’s a good excuse for me to draw them together outside of my thesis. But also this ask has been the only thing I've worked on for the past 4 days... So i really hope you enjoy it because I'm a long long way from finishing my thesis---

When it comes to their relationship, “animal headcanons” probably wouldn’t effect much of the dynamic so I haven’t thought about it much until now for this specific question asdfghjklkl — anything that happens during this ask just kinda exists in my head as I go so fair warning: I am not responsible for any of my brainrot nor is any of this actually canon as far as I know of🤣😂🙏

—And because I’m me this ask gets 13982398290 ugly doodles attached to it

Author's extra note: For the sake of everyone involve, Callum will speak in black letters and white bubbles; Aaravos will speak in white letters and black squiggly bubbles. There's also my narrations sometimes but I think it's pretty easy to tell when it's me speaking ❤. Okay let's go!!!

Callum likes to act weak in front of Aaravos and pretends like he's bad at most things. I think he secretly just wants to be pampered.

And now- for the extra extra brain rot probably relating to animals but also is here because I feel like this is very on brand for the both of them. Enjoy~

Again, this is not canon but it would be hilarious if it’s true, I didn’t bother looking up about these monkeys that’s how much I despise ss4. But if Ray’s pet is just a baby right now that means she’s raising a 100lbs death machine and Cally made the right call to dip with Aaravos. This idea came from a video I watched about some family keeping a chimp as a pet and it literally murdered them all.

Author's note #2: I will always acknowledge that there IS anger and contempt within Aaravos. No amount of sunshine and possitive energy can possibly recover him from those traumas - but this can be navigate in the best way possible when you consider the fact that he is also a known genius, both in normal and emotional intelligence. I think this fantastically synergize with Callum's curiosity but extra kind and understanding self, leading to some very special moments and facial expressions. Something they completely destroyed forever in the show and I will always be angry with that.

Thank you for making it till the end, this was a very long ask despite the question being fairly simple. I love these two character with all of my heart, and as always, I am so blessed to have at least some people here to share my undying passion for them ❤💗💜🏃‍♂️

[awrestlinggirlwholoves80sbands]

Dear fucker Nikki (fanfiction)

A/N: This little letter was born out of nowhere and will probably give you a toothache but it needed to get out. Plus it was Nikki's birthday yestarday, so why not? A huge thanks to @glamourizedcocaine for their wonderful handwriting <3

Dear Nikki,

you are probably wondering who the fuck I am but don’t bother because I don’t exist. Well, I should say I don’t exist yet but I will. See, I’m Nikki from 2023 your 65 years old version and as you can see we didn’t lose our love for making things as complicated and dramatic as we can.

Let’s start with the big question: how in the hell did we get to 65 years old? I’m still wondering about it myself so I can only give you my honest opinion : we pulled our heads out of our ass and someone up there took mercy on us. Does this answer satisfy you? Probably not, but I’m here to explain.

Right now it’s December 11 1987 for you. You are all alone in your Van Nuys house, shooting up under a Christmas tree and wondering why nobody loves you or why did your family abandon you. “Why does living feel so draining?” you used to say or I should say I used to say but I prefer referring to you as a separate being. Loneliness is eating you alive as much as your addiction is destroying your life piece by piece, you know that but you are too scared to admit it. You need help but you don’t know how to ask for it.

Second question: why are you writing to me, your past self? I could say it’s because I’m an egocentric bastard or because I want to leave something to this world but I’d be lying. The simplest answer is that I felt the need to. 

The more complex one is that we live in a fucked up world, where each day everything seems to fall to pieces and the opioids epidemic seems to take more and more lives. It doesn’t matter how much I try to take action because it never seems enough but if I know something that did help that was the book I wrote about our story so maybe this letter will too.

However deep down I know you can read through my bullshit. Even after all these years I still think I can trick people but I end up looking like a child with a mouth covered in sugar who swears he didn’t eat any candy. I didn’t completely lie when I said I’m doing this to help people but I omitted that I’m one of those people.

“What the fuck dude, you just told me we get to be 65 and now you tell me we are still need help?”  

Well, everyone needs a little comfort sometimes even when you know all the tricks to take care of your mental health. I might be an old man but you still live in me, just like the little Nikki who has been hurted by everyone, simply some days I can hear your voices more loudly than others. I know the symptoms all too well : racing heart, general tiredness, the urge to fuck everything up, emotions all over the place. 

So what do I do? Anything you wouldn’t do: allowing myself to feel the emotions instead of bottling them up, relaxing, distract myself and writing this letter. Knowing who I was and how far I’ve come, getting back in contact with you gives me hope for two reasons : reminds me I don’t want to get back to that and empowers me to heal. I thought nobody was there to comfort me so I’m letting myself from the future do it because sometimes it’s easier to be kinder to our younger versions even if they were a piece of work like you.

You’re worth it, just like I am. Even when the world feels like collapsing on itself, we are still worth it. We were worth it when I was you, a junkie, and we are when I’m just an old man playing bass. I just need to repeat it over and over until it becomes a part of me since the human minds are incredibly forgetful when it comes to their importance.

I want to leave you with hope, the same one that helps me going through all the hard times in my life. We made it, we finally got the family we always wanted : Gunner, Storm,  Decker, Frankie and Ruby are all different ages and we love them with our whole heart. Ruby is only 3 now and she gets to receive everything we didn’t, especially since we are more mature compared to the others. I hope I’m a good enough father for them but sure I tried and keep trying my best. What matters is that it’s possible to break the abuse cycle and we are the living proof. 

The band it’s still going after 40 years and after a brief pause we are still touring. So many teenagers love Motley Crue now because they made a movie about us, which allowed me  to tell your story and show people there’s always light at the end of the tunnel.

Thank you Nikki for not giving up on us and coming back that night. Thank you for allowing me to blurt my feelings out in this letter on my birthday, while I’m hidden in my home’s studio while I get to roll a tear and move on. Thanks to all the other Nikki(s) who fell down and got right up because that’s what we do. And lastly thanks to myself for keeping fighting and making sure that future Nikki can enjoy his old age with a lovely family and badass fans.

It will get better for you and for me.

Sincerely yours

An old man you killed 36 years ago or Nikki Sixx.

[pastafossa]

Okay wait

We discussed Jane being able to see threads through the fourth wall so would that mean she’d be able to see the love we hold for her too

Please say yes, she deserves to know how adored she is, even by those she’s never met

OF COURSE SHE CAN!

-x-

"You've learned of the multiverse before. It is an endless array of dimension, some in which we exist, some in which we do not." Wong reached down and tugged up the glittering, rippling mass of threads at his own chest, the colors made from shades that didn't even exist in your reality. The shape of those threads were so thick you could almost see the shape of grins, hear the bark of laughter and eager gasps, letters in a multitude of languages flowing past. "And some... in which we are story."

You rubbed your fingers against your eye, still not quite getting it. "A... a story."

"Yes."

"So these are... what? Threads to... to storytellers?" "Sometimes. But they also connect us to those who hear our stories in other dimensions. Those who enjoy our tales." There was the faintest hint of amusement in his eyes. "The story of Jane Hind, in your case. It seems the tale of the Devil and the Hound has been told somewhere beyond our realm."

You blinked in disbelief at the flowing threads at your chest. Not as many, as thick as Wong's, perhaps, but still... bigger than you expected, burning bright and joyful beneath your fingers. "So it's true. I'm..." "You are a character, yes. And you are not." He shrugged, seemingly unbothered by the revelation that you were, in fact, both real and not.

"So someone's... writing me. What I'm doing right now."

"Potentially. Or you are having a background moment. A moment off camera, perhaps."

"But like... if they get really horny, they could make me-"

"We do our best not to think of that."

"I've fucked Matt a lot." You squinted up at the ceiling, as if you could see the invisible eye watching. "Either this is fanfic, or you, author, are filthy. Then again, maybe you do a fade to black."

"If it helps, think of it less that they are controlling your actions. They are instead a chronicler of your history, creating a documentary. A biography." Wong waved a hand. "Someone in a dimension, somewhere, has managed to tell exactly your story, with a few artistic adjustments here and there. I tell myself this when I am on yet another rewatch of Breaking Bad. Naturally they would show me watching something new."

"But..." You lifted up the threads and shook them. "But these, Wong. What do I-"

"They clearly care about you, and what happens to you. Is that so hard to believe?"

"I am a formerly-murderous, dumpster-diving possum, Wong. I'm still surprised my husband doesn't use a catchpole on me when he finds me feral and scarfing marshmallows out of the Lucky Charms box at two in the morning."

"And if my etsy feed is to be believed, there are plenty of people who adore possums, murderous or not. Possum mugs, possum shirts, pictures of little possums in flower crowns. So be a happy one. Maybe they will put you on a mug, too."

"Ha," you said sarcastically, as he chortled to himself and turned to walk away. "You're hilarious."

"Accept it, Ms. Hind. We're all stories in the end." "You got that from Doctor Who, asshole."

He waved you off, an orange portal appearing for him to step through.

And as he left, you stared down at the threads... and then up.

Over.

Down.

Are they watching right now?

"So... hi." You reached up and scratched your chin thoughtfully. "So, if you're listening and this isn't a fever dream... In truth, I have no idea why you care. I'm a mess, or I feel like one nine times out of ten, which you... likely already know depending on what point of view my story's in and whether my internal monologues are included. But I'm pretty sure Foggy would advocate self-love, so even though I'm still confused... thank you. I'm..." You stared down at the threads. "Thank you. For caring about me and... and Matt, because if you're still here, then I have a feeling you care about him, too. I hope I don't give you too much grief. I hope you know it ends well. We're happy, even if we had to go through a lot of shit to get there."

A realization hit you and you scowled up at the ceiling. "Wait, was that you?"

Silence.

"I know you're up there behind that fourth wall."

A slightly more guilty silence.

"If you're writing this, you could at least give me an apology. One for me and all the people who care. You put them through hell too, making them read all that angst after the building collapse. What the fuck is wrong with you? I deserve compensation for my-"

You suddenly noticed a box of chocolates on the nearby dresser, a box of chocolates that very much hadn't been there before.

"Chocolate? Really?" You crossed your arms. "After what Matt and me went through, we deserve better. Something fun."

A long, thin piece of plastic connected to a series of leather straps suddenly fell from the ceiling.

"Very funny."

Your phone rang, tinkling notes chosen for the Devil.

"Seriously?"

Amused silence.

"Fine. Be that way. But you better show them happy shit after this. They deserve it, and so do me and Matt."

And somehow, the silence felt... agreeable and fond after that, and you reached down one last time to brush against the little bundle of strange new threads at your chest, a strange warmth filling you that almost made your chest hitch a little. There was... almost something a little reassuring about knowing you had people rooting for you and Matt, and hopefully for all your other friends, too.

"Me and all of you, ride or die," you whispered. "Let's do this."

[shuitsuki]

we don't talk much but i really love it when i see u on my dash ^_^ the way u speak is so light and whimsical and airy idk its so pleasant to read and i think smtimes i wanna embody that too. i'm not super into enstars anymore but i like reading your analyses and stuff theyre super interesting!!!

Ah, thank you〜! We probably don’t talk much because of my shyness as much as it is a dual effort but to exist under the same sky is so nice. Funnily enough, I have had so, so, so many people comment on the way I speak and the weird stuff I say (my boyfriend & Noelle have said I just “say things” sometimes & the church seems to think my thought processes in general are unreasonable LOL but I think it’s in a cute way at least. I hope?) on various separate occasions and the way it’s worded always fascinates me since it’s always a little bit different. I don’t mind & kind of even like it, I’m used to being observed and commented on.

I once made a tweet about it stating “My friends & lover tend to be witnesses to my, quote, shakespearean demeanour｡｡｡my form of speech has been commented on by others, referred to as "whimsical", even. My boyfriend frequently likes to point out how weird I am too, lovingly I presume.” I have screenshots of a few instances saved though there have been very many. Why? It simply amuses me! Being perceived appears to have it’s perks.

But, enough of that! I am so touched you’d say that I’m pleasant to read｡｡｡I’m someone who thinks a little too deeply about everything in the world, not just the things he likes, but I am prone to being pretentious in that regard (and very much proud, I shall say! Despite my occasional, negative form of self consciousness at the fact.) I’ve been forcing my mutuals to learn about the things I like this way for years like second-hand smoke and since ansta is my big interest now that I’m older even more so hahaha ｡ﾟ(ﾟ´ω`ﾟ)ﾟ｡ I think I’ve never shut up in the past four years about anything, though, especially as I learn to become less unashamed about the things I love. It’s okay if you don’t ansuta as hard as I do anymore, after all, our feelings for things can be so fleeting, I’m happy to have your company as is.

I don’t like to call them analysis directly, typically, because I don’t like to seem too full of myself or try-hard or fake-deep, but when other people do so it makes me happy in a way, to know my observations are appreciated and seen as interesting and even novel at times (I get so excited or otherwise feel a lot when others point out things I haven’t noticed, so to think I can make others feel the same—!), or at least just nice to read about in the way I put them. I’ve had cases where I have a belief but someone is able to put it into words so well and even add to it and it’s like… wow… kyah. But anyway, it used to be an insecurity, as someone who fears coming off like this:

Speaking of, I’ve kept them mostly to twitter nowadays whether in small or big doses (partly due to my compulsions that kept me away from blogging for a bit, that was a really sad time 🥲) since the exposure of my mind to the masses has become addictive to me, but I’m so happy you’re here and still enjoy them. I’ve even had crazy long letter exchanges in the form of long screenshots of thoughts back and forth with likeminded people and it’s like, omg. It’s probably not healthy to be that hooked so I’ve been trying to reel myself back into the tumblr sphere where it is more for my own sake than anything, but it’s so fun to engage in discussions about anything ever, really!

My friends tell me things like saying I’m well spoken and other nice things I have forgotten yet definitely internalized and it brings a kind of euphoria I can’t explain because it’s something I can’t Help I love that everything in the world means so much to me and I love art and everything in the universe basically except for the things I hate and that hurt me badly and sometimes the things I truly love wound me and that’s fine too. I try my best to convey my feelings because honestly, I don’t necessarily even think in words. It’s more vague abstract feelings and concepts that I have to try to string together 🥹 so to do so successfully makes me happy. SORRY FOR RAMBLING ON SO MUCH ABOUT, well, myself! I don’t mean to be self-absorbed, but aren’t we all living inside our heads? That’s where our brain is.

I think the most important part is to be yourself unapologetically｡｡｡being light and whimsical to mee is fun and comes naturally ♪ sometimes I wish I was just like the sun, and hope I won’t burn anyone. I don’t play these things up or anything. It’s an earnest portrayal, despite the more grotesque aspects I keep hidden. Anyone can embody what they would like to and become their best/most preferred self, if they try, I’m sure! Though it is hard to be so malleable. I want to be truer to myself and better every day｡｡｡there’s also the aspect of, as my best friend Kris said, a few minutes ago, the way the self wills itself to be. I’ve worked hard to shape myself and be comfortable with it, and I’m happy to be loved for it. Thank you to anyone who read.

[halcyoncyrus]

Some words about my recent piece (and the album that inspired it) under the cut.

I designed Cosmo a year ago as a way to explore parts of myself I did not yet understand. I've always had a shaky sense of Identity - even more so over the last few years without having people around who understood me. I used this character to create some distance between myself and whatever I was experiencing.

When I drew the original piece, there was so much about myself I didn't know. So much about myself I was hiding from the world. So much about myself I was ashamed of, had been shamed for, had decided I was better off without. 

The inspiration for it was a song that allowed me to question those parts of myself, to dismantle the walls I'd built. Soft Boys Make The Grade was a song that resonated with me in ways I couldn’t articulate, but after having spent a year listening to the whole album, I can finally put it all in to words.

My Boy is an album that's both self-critical and unapologetically self-forgiving. An admission of guilt and a gentle reminder to accept ourselves in spite of that. An exploration of masculinity (both stereotypical and not) and a love letter to male role models. 

Being trans adds an extra layer of complication to gender roles that I've never fully been able to put into words. The pressure to fit in. The overcompensation. Navigating sharing a space with a group I had grown to fear from my past experiences.This album gave me permission to explore a lot of those feelings. To pick apart my beliefs and let go of my fears.

I am soft. And fragile. And at times a little too intense about my passions and those things don't make me any less of a man. I am allowed to take up space and exist alongside others… without compromising who I am. I am allowed to make mistakes and learn from them 

My brain isn't always kind and some days it feels like I'm back at square one... but now I have proof of a world out there that doesn't just accept people like me, but actively celebrates them. People who are unapologetically themselves and encourage those around them to live their truth too. There is a place out there that doesn't treat me like a burden for taking up space in this world and doesn't treat my passion for life like some weird quirk that needs to be corrected.

This art piece is thank you to My Boy for challenging me to look inwards… but it’s also a celebration of everything I now know I am capable of achieving.

[littlefirefly42]

Love, Maxie

Pairing: Elmax (El x Max)

Summary: When Max's letters stop coming, El realizes she's lost the only person she's ever truly loved

Warnings: Mental Breakdown; Self harm; Su!cide (not graphic); vomiting (not ED related); Hurt no comfort

A/N: I am aware of the irony of finishing a 2000+ word oneshot for myself in less than a week and still not having finished some of y'all's requests. I'm sorry. My only excuse is that I was sad and I needed an outlet. I hope that you enjoy this while you wait I suppose.

~~~

Seven months. That’s how long it had been since Jane Hopper had seen her girlfriend. Trapped in California with not a fraction of a chance that Joyce would let her go back to visit Hawkins, she had been extremely excited when Max had visited the previous June. They had splurged on comics and ice cream, cuddling in El’s bed and reading together. Late at night, they had snuck out the window and onto the roof (with the assistance of El’s powers in Max’s case), and they stared up at the moon and the stars. A strawberry moon, Max had commented once, and El loved her more than she’s ever loved anyone. Now El was sitting alone on the roof, in the same spot, rereading the last letter Max had sent. The date at the top said September 13th, but El had gotten it on November 6th, nearly two months later. 

El,

Hey! I miss you so much! I’m glad you’ve been doing well. How did you do on that summer experience essay? I’m sure it was amazing, the draft you sent me was really good. I’m still not in school, but I’m going back in a few days. I’m not really that nervous, but I miss you so much, and I don’t exactly have a crowd of people lined up to be friends with me. Well, I have Lucas. He’s mostly over the breakup and we’ve hung out a few times this summer, so I think we’re cool now. Mike still hates me though, and Dustin just pretends I don’t exist. Steve makes them all play nice because he’s basically my mom at this point, but to be honest I don’t really hang out with any of them very often anymore. Speaking of moms, I think I might tell mine about us, if it’s okay with you. She didn’t seem too shocked when she saw Steve and Eddie together, so maybe she’d be cool? I’m starting to lose sight in my left eye again, so I’ll have another surgery in a few weeks, but apparently it’s a pretty easy one and I’ll just be in and out. Maybe I’ll tell her right before I go under and see what she says after. Also, I’ve been learning how to do wheelies in my wheelchair, I can’t wait to show you the next time I visit. Write back when you can, and tell Joyce and your brothers I said hi!

Love, Maxie

Maxie. It was the nickname El gave Max after they started dating. Less formal than Maxine, more personal than Max, more affectionate than Mad Max. Seeing it scribbled on the worn paper in her girlfriend’s scrawly, messy, beautiful handwriting made El want to sob. She hadn’t heard from Max since she received this letter. She had written back, some giddy lovesick shit about how excited she was and how much she missed her girlfriend, but there was never a reply. She thought it may have gotten lost in the mail, but three letters and two months later it finally sank in: Max wasn’t writing back. Max wasn’t coming to visit. Max didn’t care.

It was a thought El had been stewing in for the past week and a half, and it was breaking her ribs one by one. Sure, she had missed Max before then. There were nights even before the letters stopped coming that she had felt so incredibly lonely without her fiery, sharp-witted girlfriend that she cried for hours and could still taste the sorrow in the back of her throat the next morning. After November 6th, she felt a twinge of loneliness and disappointment whenever she would sort through the mail and hand Will his letter from Mike. She felt hollow waiting like that. 

But none of it compared to how she felt now, days after she realized that Max wasn’t busy, and her letter had not been lost in the mail. El just wasn’t worth her time anymore.

That hurt. So goddamn much. The setting sun was clouded over, fracturing and distributing the soft light over the horizon, and a few heavy rain drops fell onto the roof. El refolded the letter along its worn, taped creases. She crawled to the edge of the roof and slipped down into her bedroom window, being careful not to land too loudly. She placed the letter along with the others she had from Max.

“Kids! Dinner!” Joyce yelled from downstairs. Good timing too, because El didn’t want to be alone with her thoughts anymore. But as she was opening her door, something stopped her. 

“Coming mom!” Jonathan yelled back. El closed her door and locked it. She didn’t know why, but she felt different. Detached. Her hands shook as she walked back to her desk and picked up the letter.

It made a beautifully violent sound as she tore it. El’s heart pounded, and she grabbed another letter, tearing that one too. Adrenaline seized the girl, grabbing letter after letter and ripping them apart. It was raining harder now, but she didn’t close her window. She couldn’t care less about anything anymore. 

“El, come down here!” She heard Joyce call, but the voice hardly registered. She kept tearing apart letters, and when she finished she went to her book shelf and pulled out all her comic books, throwing them on the floor. Several additions of Wonder Woman, Supergirl, Elektra, and dozens more that Max had introduced her too. El fell to the ground and tore those up too, tears beginning to spill down her cheeks. There was a knock at her door, but she was beyond too far gone to hear it. There was nothing outside this room. Nothing but her and the essence of Max in everything.

Max, huddled in the sheets that El threw off her bed.

Max, commenting on the movie and band posters El tore down.

Max, smirking at the flannel that, when El failed to rip with her bare hands, used her powers.

Max, braiding the soft brown hair that El weeded out from its roots.

Max, tracing the veins on the pale wrist that El scratched until it was red and raw, as if she could scrape away the feeling of being loved by someone and then suddenly and inexplicably being abandoned. 

Max, who abandoned her.

Things were breaking themselves now, shelves collapsing and lamps shattering, a reflection of the carnage in El’s mind. Someone was pounding on the door. Someone else was yelling. But El was unreachable, buried beneath layers of anger and betrayal, everything else was muffled and far away.

Thunder growled lowly outside the open window, and El found herself crawling beneath it. The cold water puddled on the floor shocked her nerves and unearthed a sorrow beneath the fury that El had been ignoring for a long time. She held herself, fingernails digging into her biceps, rain showering down on her, and drowned in the agony that was losing the one person you trusted to never leave. She may have screamed, but she didn’t hear herself. When Jonathan broke the door down with a crowbar, she didn’t flinch.

~~~

The next day, El still refused to speak. Still refused to talk about what happened, despite the best efforts of her family. Joyce had insisted she stay home from school, so she sat at the dining room table and stared through her lunch. Who knew pb&j could be so goddamn patronizing.

 She heard the motor of a truck pulling into the driveway, but she didn’t pay it any mind until Joyce shouted something from her office. Reluctantly, she pulled herself away from one dimly lit room down the hallway to another, leaning silently on the doorway of Joyce’s office.

Joyce was holding a phone with one hand and scribbling aggressively in a notepad with the other, but she shifted the phone to her shoulder when she saw El.

“Honey, would you get the mail please?” She stage-whispered. “I’m waiting on a package and I think it just got delivered.”

El nodded. When she opened the front door there was nothing on the doormat, so she walked down the driveway to the mailbox. It was a cloudless day, and the blinding sun after the previous night’s storm made the air muggy and humid. There were several letters in the mailbox, as well as a newspaper and a folded yellow paper package. She pulled everything out and brought it back inside, tossing the letters and paper carelessly onto the kitchen counter and taking the package to Joyce. 

“Thanks El.” She said, then added “No bills or anything?”

El responded with a simple shrug and walked away before Joyce could add anything more to the skeleton of a conversation. When she returned to the kitchen she began sifting through the letters for anything important, needing something to occupy herself with, to save her from her thoughts. She found nothing notable, two bills, a check, some ads, and- El paused. A stuffed brown envelope from Hawkins, Indiana. At first she dismissed it, with a twinge of heartache, as another letter for Will; But the return address caught her eye. It was Max’s. Suddenly, the walls of the house felt very claustrophobic. El’s heartbeat quickened and dread rooted itself deep in her chest as she slid to the ground. Slowly, with sweaty, shaking hands, she tore the seal and pulled out the first of three papers. It was written on flowery stationary, a cruel beauty to accent the pure repulsiveness of its content.

Dear Ms. Byers,

I hope you and your family are doing well. I heard that Jonathon got his acceptance letter, send him my congrats. I am writing to share some rather distressing information with you. You must excuse the tardiness of this letter, I have been grieving and could not bring myself to write it. However, I feel that it is my moral duty, and my duty as a mother, to inform you that your daughter, Jane, is a homosexual.

El felt her chest tighten. Joyce had known about her and Max for months and didn’t seem to have an issue with the relationship, but from the tone of the letter it was obvious Ms. Mayfield didn’t feel the same. She took a deep breath, letting the fact sink in, before continuing to read.

I’m ashamed to admit that I have known for quite awhile, and only now have I had the strength to tell you. You may remember my daughter, Maxine, who came to visit you in the summer. Maxine was sick as well, and I recommend you immediately seek therapy for Jane. The two were involved in a romantic relationship, the likes of which drove my daughter to suicide several months ago.

Something stopped inside of El. She reread the last sentence three more times, looked away, blinked, and then read it again. But no matter how much she wanted to pretend she was hallucinating, the word was still there and glaring. Suicide.

I know this kind of thing is hard to hear, and you may want to deny it, but from one mother to another I think the best thing for Jane is to accept it and get her professional help. I have photocopied Max’s suicide note and enclosed it with this letter, so that you may understand the severity of the situation. Please address it immediately, before we lose another child.

My best regards to you,

Susan Mayfield

El finished reading the letter and tossed it aside numbly. She pulled out the second paper, an obituary with a picture of a grinning little kid in a yellow bathing suit, missing most of her teeth, ginger hair tangled and wet. El didn’t even bother reading it. She dropped it onto the letter from Max’s mom and pulled out the last paper. It was a slightly crooked photocopy of a lined piece of paper.

El,

I am so sorry. I know my mother will read this first, but I couldn’t care less. You should know I lied to you in my letters. I don’t speak or eat a lot anymore and I don’t leave my room most days. I miss you so much. I don’t have anyone anymore, and all the time I’m just alone with my shitty mind. After you left Hawkins the first time I thought I would be okay, and I was for a while. At least, I was better than I am now. Then you came back and I didn’t even care that the world was ending because I was with you again. And that day in the hospital, when you told me you loved me, I think it was the best moment of my life. I was so ready to give up El, but being with you saved me. When you went back to Cali I didn’t feel that same emptiness as the first time. I missed you so goddamn much, but with the letters and the visit in the summer I felt like I always had something to look forward to, and that something was always you. Nothing else, no one else. Just you. And then it all went to shit again. The guys stuck around a little after everything went down, but eventually they all kind of stopped talking to me. Steve still drives me places and scolds me for not taking my meds and all that, but we’re not really friends you know? Plus, I used to just get ignored at school, but the wheelchair has been an asshole magnet and it’s getting a little intolerable. Anyway, it doesn’t matter really. The point is I just kept feeling worse all the time. And I love you, and for a while that was enough, but eventually it just hurt more, feeling like a shell of myself until the next time I heard from you. I told my mom about us like I said I would, and she broke down and said I needed help and I couldn’t keep writing to you. She’s trying to get me sent to some clinic now, and I just can’t do it anymore. Without you, I’ve got no one. So I’m sorry, really really sorry, that I couldn’t be strong enough for you, because you sure as hell were for me and now I’m leaving you but if there’s a god he knows I don’t have a choice. I love you El, I hope you live the best goddamn life.

Love, Maxie

El’s hands shook as she placed the photocopy gently on top of the other papers. Her heart kept pounding faster and faster, and it made her chest ache. Everything was too large and too close, and yet there was a strange numbness to the overwhelming feeling, like a fight-or-flight response, a reflex. Her body was acting on its own, and her mind was somewhere else. Somewhere far, far away. She lifted herself from the ground, heart still pounding, and made her way dizzily up to her room, leaving the two letters and her girlfriend’s obituary on the kitchen floor. El's room was in the same chaotic disarray it was the previous night, and still she looked around and saw nothing but Max. Everything she had destroyed in her blind rage was Max. And Max was dead. And everything was gone. And El fell down to her knees and threw up, then cried on the hardwood floor for a long time.

[martsonmars]

Hello people! Happy Sunday 💖 it's only 3AM but I'm sad so you get this now.

I haven't written much these past few days because I'm home for the weekend and it's harder for me to write at home, apparently, AND because every time I open the docs of my two “urgent” WIPs I'm filled with existential despair and I close them because I'm obsessed with both ideas and convinced I'm only going to fuck up. I know I can't live up to my own expectations, I know I'm not the kind of writer that would make my heart beat as a reader. I'm not saying I'm not good, and I'm the first who's proud of my stories when they work... It's just that my writer self and my reader self can't make each other happy. Not always. And so when I try to develop these ideas that I'd really be obsessed with as a reader (because yes, I love all the ideas I have but I rarely write the things I truly want to read, I don't know how to explain this), I can't help but think — if any of the writers I admire was writing this, they'd do a better job, I'm not going to live up to that standard. And this is undeniably true to me, external validation can't do anything about it. So yeah. It's hard.

But! I just managed to reorder a little my thoughts for chapter 11 of where I belong (psst I posted chapter 7 yesterday!), so here's a snippet from chapter 10 to celebrate:

Tags and NaNoWriMo under the cut!

Here's a snippet from the longest scene of my original story so far. I'm not making much progress with it (it's the sixth NaNoWriMo day and I have 1800 words, so basically as many as I should've written on the first day alone), and while it's fine (the goal was never to write 50000 words in a month, I knew I couldn't, I just wanted the pressure to focus on this story), I still wish I was making more progress.

Either way, I'm really proud of this scene, so here it goes.

Her smile broadens, and she sets her bag on the floor, sitting down. The skirt hikes up even higher on her thighs. It's basically pornographic. “Thank you. Are you new here?”

If I didn't have any self-control, I'd be snorting. Ugly snorts, coarse laughter, slamming my fist on the table for emphasis.

Am I new here?

I wasn't when we slept in the same dormitory at fourteen and she asked to borrow my nail polish as if her parents couldn't afford to buy her an entire carriage of every polish shade in existence. I wasn't when I helped her with chemistry homework and she spent most of the time making heart eyes at the boys on the other side of the room. I wasn't when her boyfriend sucked the magic out of me and was given a medal for saving the world, while I got an expulsion letter and the gentle reminder that I wasn't welcome anywhere in our country anymore.

Am I new?

“Yes,” I say. “I'm Riz.”

A flicker of interest flashes in her eyes. “Riz.” She says it as if she was tasting it, slow, deliberate. She clicks her tongue. Do I meet her approval, now? “I'm Ophelia.”

I suppose I could make a post about this story if people want to know more about it...

Now tags! Love you all.

@wellbelesbian @urban-sith @tea-brigade @sillyunicorn @mostlymaudlin @facewithoutheart @palimpsessed @otherpeoplesheartachept-2 @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @forabeatofadrum @johnwgrey @fatalfangirl @prettylightsbigcity @whatevertheweather @jbrrring @confused-bi-queer @moodandmist @bookish-bogwitch @letraspal @dragoneggos @captain-aralias @takitalks @excalisbury @shemakesmeforget @starwarned @cutestkilla @ileadacharmedlife @gekkoinapeartree @bazzybelle @bloodiedpixie @stardustasincocaine @aroace-genderfluid-sheep @angelsfalling16 @basiltonbutliketheherb @messofthejess @ivelovedhimthroughworse @nightimedreamersworld @artsyunderstudy @foolofabookwyrm-activated @ionlydrinkhotwater @yellobb @orange-peony @ic3-que3n @whogaveyoupermission @bucketfishy @katmiscellanious @yeonjunenby @erzbethluna @larkral

[idledreams-burninghearts]

I was trying to wait until I no longer work there to post about what I'm experiencing at work but I need to process it. CW: very heavy topic, trauma dumping, childhood trauma, grooming

I haven't written anything about it because I've been paranoid that Boss is following me on here, reading my posts. But oh well, either I'm paranoid and she won't see this. Or I'm not paranoid and I'm warning you, don't read this. I don't think you're in your stage of healing where you could handle this.

Lol, I gotta stop doing that. Not posting my thoughts and experiences in respect of someone else's feelings. I try to write things down privately in a journal or my notes app. I write letters to friends. It's just not the same as posting on here. Posting on here is like saying. I exist. My experience is valid. Gotta heal out of that people pleasing.

This might be out of order, my brain is weird, I will do my best to be coherent.

So the work environment is very triggering for me right now. The group dynamic is triggering childhood trauma of bullying. Where everyone is "nice" to you but they're making fun of you behind your back. (I trust some folk at work but not everyone) This is how some autistic folk experience bullying.

Like I definitely know they talk about me behind my back. I have had mental episodes that everyone is aware of. I'm trying to give them the benefit of the doubt by telling myself they are just concerned. I know I'm not an easy person to talk to. I don't trust very easily. But knowing they're talking about me is definitely triggering this bullying trauma. I just wish they would directly ask me, through text or something, not in person.

I am a very emotional person and I really don't want to be emotional at work. I'm in neurocognitive decline and it's very hard for me to hide it right now. (As far as I'm aware there is no definitive new term for autistic burnout, but the autistic community is trying to leave the term burnout behind because allistic folk do not take it as serious as they should because burnout is a very different experience for them. I am calling it neurocognitive decline.) So I wish people would just talk to me in my preferred format if its something serious. They all know I have a hard time with verbal communication. I have been clear about that. But I've masked too well in the past and was going off scripts so well, they of course, don't take that seriously.

But it's not just that. Boss and I trigger each other. She doesn't want to admit it but I can read people's body language and emotions really well. I can tell when I trigger someone.

I really shouldn't have gone to her birthday gathering. It was pretty weird. So when they talked to me about it they said the theme was coyote ugly. I did the best I could with what I had in my closet. But when I met up with everyone they said that changed it to cowboy/cow themed. I didn't care really because they're almost the same and no one was really dressed to that theme anyways. But I could tell I triggered Boss. Boss really does have a lot of internalized fatphobia. She tries so hard to talk herself up (and rightly so, she is gorgeous) but I can tell she doesn't feel it 100%. Which is sad for me to see. I wish she was more confident in herself.

Didn't help how much the others were complimenting me. I could see she didn't like it. And honestly I didn't like it either. Felt like the bullying love bombing, but even without that, I don't really like when people compliment my appearance.

Like I have pretty privilege. There is no denying it. I know how I look, I love how I look, I have no self confidence issues in regards to how I look. But people really don't like it when you tell them to not compliment your appearance. Whenever I tell people that they react in a few ways.

"Just take the compliment. I'm just being nice." (From people of all genders, whether they're attracted to me or not)

They struggle to find a way to compliment me.

Also didn't help how people at the club were looking at me either. She noticed. She has had a very different experience of the world in that regard. She is fat. And the world has been difficult and cruel to her because of it. I see how the world treats her and people like her. It's not right.

I know I triggered her too when she was struggling to make the schedule and I commented "and they say we're not understaffed" and she snapped at me saying "stop saying that! We're not understaffed!" Friend and M were there and saw it and we all exchanged looks but I didn't say anything because I get that this job is stressing her out. Then a few days later she put up a help wanted sign. No apology for her snapping at me. When I bright this up in the meeting with her and K she said that she doesn't remember that, we're not bringing the others into this, she recognized my experience is valid. But still didn't apologize.

So when she was side-eyeing me all night and when she said "skinny people don't even need to try" in a way where she implied she's talking about me but can deny it (she's done this a couple of times at work too and in the meeting with boss and k, boss tried to say that she was just joking. I can tell the difference between a joke and a jab. Even if I don't find the joke funny I can tell what the intent was. It's in the eyes and the mouth. People think they're hard to read but they're not ) all I could think was. I get it. Of course this is how you feel after the world has treated you the way that it has. So I didn't say anything. No one likes being called out on their behavior, which is one reason why I think no one calls me out on mine (I wish they would, I actually like when people call me out on my behavior, work is weird because I don't want to be emotional at work but they can message me about it)

I realized my mental health, my physical health, was impacting everyone at work. I went to Boss and told her. (This was before the meeting with Boss and K, before I said I don't trust Boss in group chat) Hey I'm in burnout. And she responded. We all are. Which I'm still like, none of us should be. But this is when a switch flipped in my head. She's letting her perception of me get in the way of my well-being. That was a trigger. I'll get to that in a second. This is why I'm no longer using burnout to describe my experience. Why I'm using the term neurocognitive decline.

Took her a month to reduce my schedule down to 3 days. I get it, we had inventory and were short staffed. But it still just felt like she wasn't taking me seriously. She said she researched autistic burnout after I told her through group chat that I didn't trust her but I'm sure it was very cursory. Had to have a meeting with Boss and K where I showed them this tiktok. She mentioned that time she researched it. We talked about demoting me from supervisor to just sales associate which yes I was thankful for that. But it still feels like I'm not being taken seriously.

She was talking about how "we" have to manage our triggers (she was talking about me, she's so passive aggressive) she was talking about how "we wanted to be a communist party" (which was another trigger for me, I'll get to that when I talk about her she's specifically triggering me separate out of the group bullying dynamic) but also talking about "don't look at the emails, that's for management only, that information is not for everyone" and "we all need to help out" (how are you going to talk about being a communist party and needing everyone to help out but also keeping us in the dark about stuff and not sharing information?) But the whole meeting just, felt like what this video is talking about.

The last team meeting she was stressed out. I wasn't looking at her because I was having a hard time masking. So I was faced away and looking kinda up at the ceiling and rocking a little bit. I'm sure she was triggered by that too, I think she thought I was ignoring her. But I was listening, it's easier to listen when I'm not also looking. Another reason I didn't want to look at her was because I'm tired of managing her emotions.

I'm trying to give the benefit of the doubt to her and see that she's trying to ask people for more help in order to help me out but it also feels like she's using that as a way to fire me if I don't do what she says (I did ask for her to fire me in a way that i can collect unemployment, I talk about it a bit further down, I just can't trust her)

I also think she thinks I'm not eating the food she brings to the meetings because I am not being a team player or because I don't like her or something along those lines. No, the food makes me sick. I've been having a hard time eating food because of my neurocognitive decline (mind, body, soul, all connected) and I see how hard it is for her to accommodate me and I'm not gonna force her too. She doesn't have to. She's having a hard time. She can do what she can do. I don't have hard feelings about that.

Another thing that frustrates me is that it feels like she's trying to treat everyone the same when we're not all the same, we're not all capable of doing everything or doing everything the same way and after the meeting I did hear Boss say to M that she feels like the new hires help out more than the older workers and like do you still not get that I'm in neurocognitive decline??? Do you not get that we also know this company doesn't give a shit about us? Where is your communist spirit, I thought we were a communist party?

Another thing she mentioned in that meeting was how we can't call out or go home early for no reason. I know that is referencing me too. I have been calling out and going home early pretty often lately. Because I am in neurocognitive decline. But I think she was upset that a few days prior to this I had left home early. And how I left. I had texted her if I could go home early. She did not reply. I called her from the work phone. She did not answer. I told my ma what time she would be getting into work so she could pick me up when I asked her to go home early. So when Boss got into work she saw my ma was there. When I asked if I could leave she said "yea, your mom is waiting for you already". Like she really doesn't understand what I'm going through if she's thinking I'm going home just because I want to

Anyways. Back to how she mentioned "we need to manage our triggers" and how she was talking about me. And this relates to why I think she's following me on here. So before the meeting (the day before? A few days before?) I had written a post on here about how I noticed I was having a meltdown one a month. I had also written this post after I had talked to HR about a certain light causing migraines and how the District Manager said ALL lights need to remain on and that the company provides ibuprofen. HR backed her up and said it was OSHA and company policy. I tried looking up OSHA regulations and only found "1915.82(a)(1) The employer shall ensure that each work area and walkway is adequately lighted whenever an employee is present." Which doesn't state all lights need to be on, only that it needs to be adequately lit.

But what really made me think that she's following me on here is after I had posted about issues at work and with her but I said she was still like a creative and amazing person (in tags of this post), I don't think she's a bad person (still don't btw, sometimes there are just people you can't have in your life because your issues conflict with each other) and then at work she explained to me her issues with her mom. How she had pretty privilege and other things. And in my head, I'm just like, she read the post and I knew I was triggering issues with her mom (maybe of another person too, childhood "friend" perhaps? If I'm not being paranoid and she is following me I have to think it's for a reason, she might just be trying to protect herself from experiencing the same thing she has before, idk) and this is also what led to me not trusting her besides her not taking me seriously when I said I was in burnout.

So if I'm not paranoid I'm assuming Boss thinks me doing that was me having a meltdown or that I was triggered. Nope. The meltdown referenced in that post had nothing to do with work. I was thinking clearly when I was messaging with HR. That was also me self-regulating. Turns out I'm a PDA autistic. (I prefer Persistent Drive for Autonomy, that feels more correct for me than Pathological Demand Avoidance. And this has also created problems between Boss and I because I have been unintentionally engaging in Equalizing Behavior (I realize after) and allistic don't like that, they need their hierarchy)

Another thing that makes me think she's following me on here is because in the meeting with Boss and K, she said she wasn't micromanaging which was not a word I used in the meeting but I did use it in the tags of the same post

I know I've typed in the tags of a few posts that I wish I could just collect unemployment and then K started talking about her getting unemployment because of her 2nd job and when I said I wished I could get unemployment she very carefully said to talk to Boss about it and that Boss might just be uncomfortable firing a "friend". The whole interaction felt suspicious but I played along and said sure. Talked to Boss about it with K present and Boss was also very careful with her response. Could just be because she's trying to be careful of her position and be careful with me since I said I don't trust her. Like again, I am hoping that I'm paranoid about all of this. But it's so hard for me to trust her right now. Didn't help that in that meeting she said she'd talk to her lawyer friend because I couldn't be fired for insubordination and that we'd come up with a plan. Well, she never talked to me about a plan. And one time I called out for being sick and the next day B texted me asking if I was still feeling unwell and if I would be staying home. I said I was not gonna make it in and she said that she texted Boss to let her know. Then Boss tried to give me a write-up for it because I didn't tell her but I said I didn't because B did and I pulled up the message where she said so and she seemed frustrated (hoping because she was trying to help me but she knows I don't trust her and idk why she won't let me in on her plan. But this has been a huge issue for me working with her too. She thinks she communicates well but she does not, at least not with me. And I mirror communication styles so I know to her it seems like I don't communicate well)

It's also hard to trust her about this because she told employees that write-ups are back for everyone. Like I asked to be fired in a way I could collect unemployment, you didn't need to bring write-ups back for everyone. Why are you continuing to treat us all the same when we're not. And I don't mean treat us all the same as equivalent to treating us equal. Those are two different things for me. Treat us all equal, yes, but we all have different needs and capabilities so don't treat us all the same. She's leaning into the reasons I can't trust her.

This part is what I think I'm being most paranoid about (at least really hoping I'm being paranoid about, it would be extremely fucked up if I'm not being paranoid about it) so when I was confused about my feelings for Mrs Heartstrings (gotta find a new name for her, will just refer to her as Friend, same Friend mentioned earlier) I did kinda tell Boss. I was confused about if she was flirting with me or just being kind and none of my friends that I talked to about it could offer any insight because they have never met her (well, Strawhat Friend did, but very momentarily and no interaction between us) and so one day I asked Boss if she could tell if a person was flirting with me (I showed her a screenshot of a text message that was cropped to remove names) and that the person was married but I wasn't sure if they were poly or not. She asked me where I met her and I froze. She said I didn't have to answer and I didn't. But she's smart. I'm sure she figured it out. But after that it seemed like everyone was talking Friend up. "Friend is so amazing!" was said to me multiple times to the point where I started responding "I know???" And I remember this time where a few coworkers kinda stood around her and said something like "Friend is autistic" and she made a pose and it just seemed very ta-da! And I think I just responded with "I know?" But I thought "I know" "are y'all showing her off?" "What's going on here?" "Sorry I'm not the right kind of autistic" (that last one I thought because I had been saying I'm too autistic for this job so I was hoping it was related to that and not what I was being suspicious about) I really hope I'm being paranoid about this part because even if they tell themselves it was a "joke" it's fucked up and led to me having a spiral. I prefer to spiral just because I'm fucked up and not because someone is messing with me.

Okay. So now to the part where I talk about her triggering me. If I'm not being paranoid and Boss is reading this, you are really gonna want to stop reading at this point. You really aren't in the right place of your healing journey to read this.

So she has called the team meetings "family dinner" and has called us a family, which was extremely triggering for me and not just because that is a corporate tactic to get employees to work harder for them.

She doesn't communicate well, she's been changing a lot of things at work and how we do things which would be fine except she doesn't explain them properly or at all, or will explain it to someone else who will explain it to me but still without the necessary information my autistic brain needs to actually be able to do it. Like this.

One, she never talked to me about this. K did. But it didn't make sense to my autistic brain to print out the shipment manifest in a way that wasted ink and paper because it included a lot of items that weren't actually shipped to us. It has a lot of items with 0 at the end of it. And in the system all you have to do is press one button, twice, to change the format in the system to show the items listed from greatest to least amount of items sent. I printed upcoming shipments like that so it would only be like 2-5 pages long instead of like 10+ pages long. I saved the digital version in the bookmark bar of both internet browsers on the computer. I told K about it and she said no one else would want to do that work and I said no one else has to, y'all can do it your way when you print up the shipment list because I know we're all different. After that is when Boss wrote that in the pass down log. And now that I'm no longer a supervisor, I saw how they are doing the shipment list. They are using what comes in the shipment. Which is exactly how I was prepping it anyways. And she has not apologized because she didn't tell me directly so she has the excuse that she wasn't talking about me. When yes she was.

No explanation for why that way is better. Does not want to communicate about it. She just wants to tell us to do something and she just wants us to do it no questions asked. And so passive aggressive. I know she's talking about me. (Why can't she just talk to me directly. I know I'm hard to talk to. But if it's work related that is very easy to talk about. Just talk to me directly so I can mirror your communication style and I can be direct back.) Very triggering for me. And the next shipment they printed out their way I just could not do it because of my pda profile and because of being triggered and because it just does not make sense to me. I couldn't do it and said as much. (In the meeting with Boss and K and Boss said "we already let you do what you want to do" which was so frustrating for me because what I want to do is my job, but she still doesn't get that I'm in neurocognitive decline and I'm just trying to do what I can do.) Honestly since messaging HR about the OSHA thing it has been a bit easier for me to work because I'm motivated by spite (to the company, not even Boss) now. I want to cause problems for the company but just let them try to fire me without it looking like retaliation. I do my job. I am being nice to people. Trying to talk. It probably doesn't seem enough, I'm wearing a more manageable mask, it's not as upbeat and social and I know because of everything going on they think I'm being upset at them when I really just don't have the energy or capacity. I'm sure some people are taking it personally.

Another thing that triggered me was when she said "I'm always watching" talking about how she looks over the security camera footage. I talked to her about this in the meeting but I'm not sure if she gets it or not because this is what she put in the report she typed up.

Like I'm not triggered by the cameras being there (although I do hate that we live in a surveillance state) I'm triggered by what she said. And she speaks corporate very well. She knows how this is gonna make me look. I'm looking to get out of there anyways so whatever. But then it was funny that after she submitted this she posted in the group chat that management was looking at the cameras more "for some reason"

But she could just be covering her own ass too. In the meeting she said she was taking notes so she could type up the report. Later I had asked for a copy, now I wonder if she actually meant that or if she did that allistic thing where they say things they don't mean. Like how hard is it to say, I'm taking notes so I know what to respond to without interrupting you? I signed it without reading too, but because I wanted the copy for myself and to show friends. I'm sure she thought I wanted it to get her in trouble. Or maybe she still doesn't get it. She's never really been able to listen and understand me. It's just an allistic/autistic communication issue (I need to be more direct again, I stopped as a kid because people really don't like it)

Another way she triggered me was by taking away autonomy. She said that staff can't rearrange the merch without asking for permission from a supervisor or her, the manager. So one day I'm putting product out but there's no space. I have to rearrange the wall. I was a supervisor at the time so I just gave myself permission. She then changed it to where no one could rearrange the wall without asking for her permission.

Another thing she does that triggers me is that she is not clear with her instructions. In a team meeting she said that people were cleaning too slowly so I sped up how I cleaned. Then things weren't being cleaned well enough (like no shit, cleaning is either going to be cleaned fast OR thoroughly. Not both) and that caused a bit of a melt down for me (not in the meeting).

And in the meeting Boss was like "sorry I'm triggering memories of a friend" and I was just like, she wasn't a friend. Like, yes, in the group dynamic it reminds me of childhood bullying. But her on her own, of these things I've just listed.

The person and memories she is triggering is of Ms. A. Ms. A is the reason I look people in the eye and the reason I don't visibly stim. She forced me to look people in the eyes, she forced me to be still. Good kids are neither seen nor heard. I couldn't be visibly autistic. And I don't feel like I can be autistic with Boss. Ms. A forced me to clean her house and look after the younger kids. Boss makes me feel like I have to do more than I'm able to, regardless of my disability and she gives "reasonable accommodations". Ms. A gave no privacy. Boss said she's always watching. Ms. A always said we were family when we weren't, she was our "caregiver", she was paid to take care of us but she didn't. Boss called the team meetings "family dinner" but we're not family. I have a hard time thinking we're all friends. Boss tried to say we're a communist party when she can't even give me the accommodations I need, feels like she's trying to use what she knows about me as a way to get me to comply. Ms. A is the reason I don't like talking about the things I like with people because she used it against me as a form of control. She groomed me (and the other kids) for her father.

So that's why I can't really talk to her directly about this. Like how do you tell someone, "hey your behavior reminds me of my groomer"? And why I couldn't properly vent this out here in case she is seeing my posts. If I'm not paranoid about that... I hope she heeded my warning and didn't read this.

Like, I don't think Boss is grooming me to be sexually assaulted. But it sure does feel like she's grooming me to be a good little employee for corporate. Do as I say no questions asked. No transparency, keeping people out of the loop.

Honestly if I'm not being paranoid and she is following me here that's another trigger that reminds me of my groomer. No privacy.

Like I miss my old manager. When I was promoted I was uncomfortable with the position because I don't like being in a position of power over people but she told me it wasn't a position of power, it was a position of responsibility. And I vibe hard with that. But current Boss. She does not take the same approach. I can't work for her. I need to get out of there. She will never not trigger me as long as I'm working under her.

I also remember a time where Boss and Friend and I were supposed to hang out but I had to cancel because my cat died. I was of course really sad that my cat died, but there was a part of me that was relieved I didn't have to hang out with them because I really felt (and feel) uncomfortable around Boss. Like that's how bad I am doing with all of this. Although I do think I'm doing pretty well at work considering everything I'm going through.

And the possibility of Boss following me on here is why I'm not talking about my latest mental health issue and what I think it is. Because she's not a safe person for me to be autistic around. She is definitely not a safe person for me to be that kind of mentally ill around, especially if I'm working for her.

Like I get its been hard for people to deal with me while I've been in neurocognitive decline (honestly it started once we were bought out). It's not just her that is the issue. I know I'm part of the issue too. But I can't work for her.

I don't want to talk about this at work because there is no space and time to properly communicate this without it seeming like I'm gossiping. And I don't want to turn anyone against her. I don't want to take her community away from her. She needs them. I don't. I have friends.

I am honestly overwhelmed by how many friends I have. I do think I needed to experience this and am kinda grateful for this experience. It really reminded me of who my friends are and which relationships I need to work on. Kinda thinking about having a picnic with friends when I'm not working here anymore and feeling a bit better.

I also know I can be a heavy person because I focus so much on my depression and how much I don't want to be alive. And people don't want to focus on that, they don't want me to focus on that. But I need to. I need to problem solve. I need to figure out why I'm feeling this way. So I can change and grow. Can't do that if I'm ignoring the problem.

But anyways, yea, whether I'm paranoid or not, I can't work here. Either way, the situation is not great. No real accommodations and my neurocognitive decline is not taken seriously.

I feel like writing this up here has already helped me process this a bit and hopefully I can work on it more with this week off. I'm sure there are things that I'm forgetting but this is already really long.

[ssreeder]

guess ;) who’s ;) back ;)

imagine drugging someone to the brink of death and then beating the shit out of them and then being “slightly irritated” about their health condition.

veeeeeeery interesting that quon made the distinction between shen being a prisoner and zuko being a teenager 👀 (or maybe it means nothing idk)

OMG WILL JEE RASU AND TOPH ENCOUNTER ZUKO AND SHEN PLS PLS PLS

fuckinf long feng and the fuckinf dai li and the fucking letters being intercepted you’re so smart sreedie

oh swag general how is not bad WHICH IS WHY IM SO MAD THAT HES BEING OUSTED BY THE DAI LI UGH

loving suki hours everybody <333 (you’re really doing justice to her sreedie)

penis fingers, penis advice T-T

OMG SLAY GENERAL HOW I CANT BELIEVE WE ARE ACTUALLY WITNESSING A COMPETENT MILITARY LEADER OUTSIDE OF THE SWT THIS IS HISTORICAL EVENT SREEDIE

lmao except they actually have TWO dragons in their city right now and zuko is not the one they should be concerned about

oh bestie I am panicking (also right as I read the dai li pov section my sister walked past my room saying “yeehaw” which really ruined the mood)

jee’s heebie jeebie senses are tingling frfr

jee is actually so funny ilh

lol I love them playing happy families on the fly

jee in dad mode to protect the children :3 but also the slave trade is horrific and it sucks that it exists and he has to shield toph from it

well now I have the heebie jeebies something bad is gonna happen to jee

FUCK YEAH ZUKO OHMYGOD JEE

OHMYGODOHMYGOD

OHMYGOOHMTHGOD

jee is the real hero of this story his self control is insane bUT HE ALSO NEEDS TO PUT IROH ON A GODDAMN LEASH JESUS

OMG REHO COMEBACK I love reho

CHANG IS APPROACHING HELL YEAH

pls tell me we get hakoda pov when he arrives omg

I. need to Process this chapter. but like. with a meat grinder bc there’s so much emotional turmoil I’ve gotta smush into manageable pieces.

ANYWAYS LOVE YOU LOTS CANT WAIT FOR THE REUNION SENDING SOUP YOUR WAY TO GIVE YOU THE STRENGTH TO FINISH THE NEXT CHAPTER <33

Quon: *punches a hole in the wall because he mad*

“Wow, this place is a dump - look, there are even holes in the walls.”

Me: introduces decent character

Also me: rips Zuko away from him and give him to the worst character >:) :D

Jee is the MVP of this chapter & everyone should bring him snacks he deserves a break (& not the leg breaking type) (but maybe we can amputate - *gunshots* 1 author dead)