#my issue. there are no good grad degrees for my job. and also I wouldn’t enjoy them. so I would have to. pivot careers | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

queernuck · 3 years

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The Cleveland Browns made the playoffs. The Islanders made the Eastern Conference Finals.

And that’s enough for me.

So long, so long I have been living like this, pretending that I want to keep on living, that life feels worthwhile, that I don’t want to kill myself. Suicide is for cowards but ive been chickening out for a whole decade, to the point where getting on the subway was itself something that involved convincing myself not to jump in front of it. I remember once while working in the city, I watched and waited as two trains came in and left, trying to get the energy to jump in front of them. I had decided, if I couldn’t do it by the time a second train came and went, I would go to work and save it for another day. I came very close, my legs tense like a linebacker on 4th & Goal, but I didn’t do it. Maybe it would be better if I had, I would have saved not only myself but a lot of other people a lot of pain and suffering. I’ve been dealing with feeling suicidal for a decade, an entire ten years, and made it through. And for what? I lost a retail job at minimum wage, I’ve seen the Giants go from two-time Super Bowl kingslayers to a team that relied on the Eagles for a playoff berth, I got to see Evangelion only for the final Rebuild film to be infinitely delayed, I have a useless non-degree that allows me to eloquently describe how the Democrats and Republicans alike are driving this stolen land to Fascism while sycophants tell me Vote Blue No Matter Who. I’m so tired, I’m not even the person people think me to be, since if I were, I wouldn’t be in this mess.

My paychecks, as hard-earned as they were, never seemed to be mine in any real sense, and it made me so frustrated that something in me broke at the beginning of this year. I made some mistakes, some very stupid ones, and got myself fired. I took money from and distorted the inventory of my store to get what amounted to pocket money, less than two paychecks. I was tempted because I feel so powerless, so much like nothing I could ever say or do matters, and so I decided to lash out against a place that mattered to me, against people I cared about deeply. Chain stores, corporations, all of those things are not really high on my list of things to care about. Barnes & Noble pushed out local booksellers years ago, an irony not lost on me whenever our own competition with Amazon was made apparent. We were reaping what we had sown. But what always interested on top of this irony was how symbolic these things could be to people, how much we figured into so may memories for so many. The Manga Aisle at Barnes & Noble is a staple of 2006 scene culture, a way that kids without the pocket money to afford the newest volume of Bleach it Naruto could keep up before scams became widely available. How the store was a place where people studying for standardized tests could use the test prep guides to try and get ready for the eugenic ritual of the standardized test. And just how much a chain bookstore became a substitute, socially, for the now-absent local bookstore. We bear the guilt for that, but at the same time we were still selling books, giving people a place to get coffee and sit and read and talk, in ways that libraries may not be able to. We certainly can never replace a library, given just what a library does for people. But we did do a lot of good all the same. Before it closed, some of my fondest memories came when I was the exact sort of annoying teenage customer I grew to hate, hanging out at the Columbus Circle Borders. Working at Barnes & Noble was tiring, dehumanizing, difficult, made me feel like I would never measure up to the authors we sold, the people books were written about, that I was a failure. And I am, as my death shows. But it also made me a part of something I was proud of. And that Above & Beyond pin I earned is in my jacket still, a reminder of something.

That something was shown in so many of the coworkers I had, who were incredible in so many ways. I feel awful for what I did, I genuinely do, because of how it may have hurt people who thought so kindly of me, people who deserve so much good. I wish I had the ability to address each of them individually but this decision was hastily made, and i have a feeling it will show in the things I miss in this note. Audra, your help in finding me a way to use the company policies to my advantage as a worker was something that gave me faith even after having seen the despicable firings and cuts the company went through. Linda, I can’t quite square the circle here given my actions, but I want to say your disappointment broke my heart and that while I will not be the one who shows it, your reassurance that everyone makes mistakes was welcome.

To my (former) fellow booksellers at Store 2216, all of my love and my sincerest apologies. You all have so much good in you, your willingness to listen to my ADHD-fueled rants and to discuss so many things with an incredible frankness was always impressive, in addition to part of what I loved about all of you. I want you all to be happy, and the kinship I felt with you was a vital part of what kept me going. It was tough, as you all know. But at times, it almost felt worth it.

The same is true of my CTY friends: it was a weird, magical place that frankly, a lot of us idealized for far too long and which sk many of us eventually outgrew without being able to let go of. And that was tough, that was something we had a great deal of difficulty understanding, that what helped us once was not always going to be helping us, was not always what we needed. But in eventually finding that, we found solace, we realized how life as a whole functions and just what it is that we can take from places like it.

To my other family, my Cleo family, I know I haven’t been terribly active lately, but I can never, ever thank you enough for the belonging you gave me. I have never felt anywhere as welcoming as Cleo. As warm as Cleo (even as we struggled to pay for the oil bill) was. As kind and understanding. As tolerant. As questioning and inquisitive into what that tolerance meant to us. I am thankful, eternally, for what you all did for me. The incredible experiences I had as a Cleo make me proud of what the organization can represent, and one of my dying wishes is that the organization continues to reach out to marginalized communities on Trinity’s campus. There is much work to be done in making sure abusers cannot hide in our family, but I trust you all to do that work. Tucker Carlson is a Trinity grad and we must embody the opposite of what he stands for, no matter how difficult it may be. I could go on about how this means opposing liberals and Liberalism/Neo—Liberalism due to the truth of tolerance resulting in a Popper-esque Paradox of Tolerance that implies Popper is a worthwhile philosopher, but that’s another issue.

To my friends on that Blue Hellsite, tumblr, you made a continual presence worth it, even with all of the bullshit this place brings. It’s the reason I read so much Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze & Guattari, read Žižek against himself, and so on and so on, and the value of that to me can never be overstated. I learned so much from the ways in which I learned to analyze the world, and that in turn became a huge inspiration for why I should try to do what I could to make the world closer to a place of revolution, one where we could perhaps eke out a living for one another. I loved how much I could be an unrepentant nerd and still love hockey on there, and while the

NHL fans on tumblr are incredibly annoying,

I can deal with that compared to the racism of most hockey fans.

Mom, Dad? I just couldn’t live with you any longer. I’m so sorry.

Grandma, I love you.

And the things I leave behind? Donate what can be donated. Hats, please auction, or at least offer to other HatHeads at a reasonable price. I had some nice ones. As for assorted albums, clothing, and other things, sell them and donate to a Harm Reduction organization, or organizations that advocate for PWUD in a radical fashion. WE DESERVE AUTONOMY!

I am a victim of the War on Drugs. Sobriety was always hellish to me, and I could never take it. I want people to be able to live how they want, to see sobriety and being on drugs as equally valuable states, to see the two as no different from one another.

Abolish all gun laws

End the War on Terror

Decriminalize and legalize all drugs, sobriety is what killed me.

I love all of you.

LET’S GO ISLANDERS!

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sibunaranks · 3 years

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Reasons I believe Peddie live in the UK when they’re married.

So lots of people debate where they live. I’m a no-budge headcanon Uk and here are my reasons why.

1.) Eddie has citizenship in the Uk, Patricia doesn’t.

So the fact Eddie’s dad has always been a legal resident of the UK he automatically as his son get’s citizenship. Basically he has dual citizenship from birth due to this. Patricia on the other hand only has citizenship in the UK. It’s the only country they both can legally stay in with no issues or fuss.

2.) Immigrating is hard and a ton of work.

Patricia would most likely be going for a K-1 or Spousal Visa if she were to try and come to the US. These can be very complicated and hard. They can also have a ton of hurdles. Not only this but they would need capital to move. They’re young, they aren’t rich. Patricia would need to move ALL of her things to a new country and Eddie already has everything important in the UK so it would be a hassle to a degree for him to/not a hassle to stay in the UK.

3.) Patricia wouldn’t be able to work for five months or more.

Spouses have to apply for a work permit. This can take up to seven months. Now these guys are young. They don’t have a lot of money, so one of them not working after already spending tons of money just to move seems impossible. Also if Eddie doesn’t have a job already lined up before moving BOTH of them aren’t working for at least some point which is not good or realistic.

4.) They aren’t rich.

Yes I believe both of their families are “Well off” finically but individually? Straight out of college they are not rich. It costs money to immigrate even in your own country let alone to a new one. It could be considered fiscally irresponsible to move to the US after getting married or before.

5.) Patricia is anti-American, Eddie isn’t anti-UK

I cannot imagine this girl wanting to live in America. She always hates the Americans when they come to the house. She seems to just have something against it and whether it’s a front or not I don’t see her being like “Oh yay let’s live there.” Meanwhile Eddie has adjusted to the UK and seems to enjoy his life there.

6.) Family.

All of Patricia’s family is in the UK. She’d have nobody in the states. She’d be an ocean apart from her parents and her twin sister. Eddie has half of his family in the UK (assuming he has no siblings which the show leads us to believe). No matter where he lives he has the same amount of family where Patricia has all or nothing. He’s also had less time in his life with his dad and his mom could visit easier than Eric could due to his job as headmaster and easier than Patricia’s family due to the fact it’s not just one person it’s three or two at a time unless just Piper came.

7.) Friends.

All of Patricia’s friends are in the UK. All of Eddie’s good friends are in the UK. He has friends in the states sure but is he as close to them as someone such as his Sibuna members? no. I don’t believe so. Patricia would have zero friends in America except for Nina, KT and MAYBE Amber if she stayed but who knows where in the country they’d be? Probably not close like her friends in the UK would be. They’re a friend group so close they’re practically family. It’d be super hard for both of them to just leave them.

8.) Fresh out of college

I know it’s not canon that they both attend college in the UK but it’s also a huge headcanon of mine and most people secure starter jobs before even graduating. If they went into a job they want right away leaving the country and job would make no sense.

9.) Education

If either of them decides to go to school longer than the other (Ik some of you head canon Patricia going into Law which would be 4 extra years) I don’t see the other one moving without the other one. They aren’t splitting up. Would what they learn translate to America (law, or environment or etc.)? And the Job the other one has for the four extra years (or two if grad school) might be a job they don’t wanna leave

10.) Being close to the house

I feel like in the case of an emergency Peddie would not hesitate to come back to Amun and help. They’re practically pros at it. Eddie used to be the Osirion for gods sake. I feel like they and even the other members (like Fabian) would feel a pull to be close enough to the house that they don’t need to cross an ocean if a supernatural Egyptian event occurs that needs their attention.

11.) Eddie understands life in England, Patricia doesn’t understand life in the US

She’d be starting over in a new country, something Eddie had to do and knows how hard it is. Would he wanna put her through that if she doesn’t want or need to herself? And how would she adjust? It could even potentially strain their relationship if not well.

12.) I believe they both like the UK.

While i talked about Eddie not hating the UK before, i don’t believe he just doesn’t hate it I believe he likes it in the UK. Why come back in season 3 if not? Why does he seem happy living there? It has memories for him like going to school, college (my headcanon but also super likely), and also the most likely place he and Patricia get their first place, get engaged and even married. Patricia obviously likes it as she also seems happy in the country and is a born citizen.

#those are my reasons #peddie headcanons #peddie #sibuna #hoa #house of anubis #agree? disagree? why? tell me #I'm not gonna budge tho

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eatsweatrepeat · 3 years

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Life update - nursing

So what has been happening since the last update

Job

So I left uni with a job on a private unit with the local NHS hospital. This unit had been closed since January 2020 and wasn’t open, at least as a private unit, by the time I was due to start. Due to this, I was set to start on a surgical ward that I wasn’t very happy about, nearer the time I was asked if I would like to start on the discharge lounge which was currently occupying the unit. This I jumped at, it’s not a very clinical role, if at all, but was much better than the surgical ward. I started there on 14th November, by 14th December things weren’t looking good and I was asked to pick a ward I would be happy to work on. I picked 3 wards all of which came back as having no space, so I ended up on the surgical ward!

I lasted 3 1/2 months before leaving. It was so busy, was basically surgical plus everything else, and I felt like I was being treated as an experienced nurse rather than an NQN. The staff were lovely but as the ward was so busy there wasn’t time to offer the support I needed. I started looking for a new job around Feb 2021 and secured myself one soon after. I ended up getting a role in a nursing home on nights, 3 nights a week, and much much more money than I was making within the NHS. In fact, I wouldn’t be able to go back as a band 5 as I would drop too much money.

This role had or has its issues. The staff I work with are lovely but some of the residences can be challenging, mainly down to dementia but I am coping very well with these people. There is one resident that is causing staff to leave or agency staff to not return. He is very rude, bad-tempered, argumentative, aggressive, etc, etc. He has recently had assessments with the dementia crisis team & MHA team to possibly section him. I don’t feel he needs that but the home isn’t the right fit for him. Finally, the manager has seen it too and he will now need to go somewhere more appropriate. He basically wants help, but doesn’t want help, calls the staff names, throws things, etc. He was once a very powerful man but now needs help and can’t accept that.

I have been there since April and since July I have felt very at home there, more relaxed and confident in my abilities. I had my first death the other day and it wasn’t as daunting as I thought it would be. I have been offered lots of training, which I wasn’t before.

Poeple say leaving the NHS is a bad move but so far I don’t think so, I am learning skills I wouldn’t in a hospital and if I ever do go back, I’d learn the skills needed then.

University

So I came out of university with a 2:1. I was very impressed with that, I feel that if I’d tried harder in 2nd year I would maybe have gotten a high 2:1 but I’m happy with a 2:1 none the less, it’s what I need for post-grad study.

Last September I started a B.S degree with the University of the People. This is an online US university that caters to students worldwide, who wouldn’t normally be able to afford college/uni or don’t have the qualifications. Each course is $100 and you can get scholarships if needed. There are many however that already have degrees who are changing careers or doing it out of interest. I am doing Health Science previously name Community Public Health. The previous title put me off a few years ago as I felt it wouldn’t cater for me & the UK health system rather the US health system. Also, it is very science based so Health Science is a better fit. There is however an internship at the end and I’m unsure if I’ll be able to do these but I have time to find out.

From October 2021, if I get student finance approved, I will also be started a BSc Sports Science degree with The Open Uni. This I will talk more about if I do start it.

For postgrad, I want to do either clinical trials, public health, or health research, sometime after 2024. I have started to look at degrees and norow done my options.

#education #job #nursing #university

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victoriousscarf · 3 years

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Can I ask about the path you took toward working in public history? I'm in grad school at the moment. (I also have a complicated family situation and the world is kind of a mess so I'm not necessarily expecting an answer that gives some kind of set path I can follow, I'm just curious.)

Ok... So ...

Like I think it's always hard to be in the public history field and be like yeah! You're totally gonna get something! Because of my like cohort when I started grad school I think... 3...no 4 of us have stable employment in the field. One I know of is field adjacent. One left to become an artist, one has never held a job in the field at all, and a lot have either struggled with work or been underemployed. So it's rough and I think the pandemic has made library/museum/archives jobs way harder.

But.

I went to school specifically in a program for archives and records management. That program no longer exists, and most archives jobs want an MLIS anyway. (I've gotten some shady looks from hiring managers not in the field because they're like... It's not an MLIS and I'm like no? Because it was way more specialized?? Like I am super qualified okay I promise). This was... Not a great idea. The more specialized you are, the harder to switch tracks it is. I've been considering going back for a museum degree just for more flexibility because that's honestly the only way to survive in this field. Right now I'm seeing more museum jobs than archives, but my curator friend was insisting it was the other way when she was applying so it's also just luck of the draw.

So I have super specialized education. Pros and cons.

I then took an internship as an interpretive ranger at a national park site. And that was the best thing I ever did for myself. There are several programs that do internships with the NPS, but a lot of them are age specific. The one I did was for 26 and below, so it wouldn't be useful for older folks going back to school but! There's also federal jobs that are either for people still in school (I think it was called pathways back then?) Or some jobs are only open for recent grads. It was paid and they provided housing. A lot of internships don't do that and it's awful and there's been a slow but steady reckoning in the field that unpaid internships are bad and exclusionary to people who don't have any support sytem backing them.

Working for the NPS opened up a lot of doors for me. The federal government is very difficult to break into. It doesn't really matter what the job posting says, if you don't have experience, you probably aren't getting through the questionnaire. (And yes. There are questionnaires. So. Many. Questionnaires). But if you luck into an internship, you learn about the system and you get experience and no matter where you go after that, it's good to have in your pocket in case you need it again.

After that I also lucked out with a partnership program through my old grad program. It is definitely worth checking to see what sort of connections the program might have. Because I got something like 9 months of work that was paid for by my grad program to work in an entirely different state to finish a project for them. Look around, connections really matter in the public history field. If you have the chance to go to a conference, yeet yourself toward it. It's hard to like meet people, but the nice thing is most folks in the field are fucking nerds who are probably socially awkward too. Archives potlucks are hailrious because 89% of the folks have got social anxiety. They all wanna bring a book and sit and read quietly. But the more people you meet, the more connections you make, the better (also Archivists looooove twitter. Ugh. And there's a lot of really good archives/library/museum groups on facebook. I'd recommend them).

The more weird shit you can put on your resume, the better. Saying which parks I worked at (sometimes very famous ones) made me stand out. I also ran a day long academic conference in grad school and was president of a student chapter of a professional organization. It almost killed me, but it stood out in people's minds. One of my co workers did field work in Eygpt, and our supervisor mentions seeing that on her resume all the time. Like that was part of what drew him to it. Again, money is an issue for most people and this is hard to pull off, but weird shit helps you stand out. Emphasis anything cool you've ever done in your whole life. I also did national history day in high school. That meant I was our education specialists favorite person when it came time to help high schoolers on their project. Even if it's too late for you to do that in high school, see if you have a regional competition nearby. Or state even. Volunteer. That's also something that stands out (plus helping wee history nerds can be a treat... When you're not being reminded why high school was so terrible lol).

I also moved to 6 states in... 5 years. And I don't mean neighboring states either I mean I started on the west coast and flung myself all the way to the western side of the Mississippi River. And then North. And then South. And then West again. This is not possible for a lot of people because a) money and b) family. Even with all that moving I was unemployed for 6 or so months in the middle of it. It is hard to be looking for work so constantly and then packing up your life and yeeting yourself to another state /again./

I also have a chronic condition with regularly scheduled flare ups. Moving away from my family for work has sucked, being in pain and having to explain to a new boss I'll have to take some time off every year to like, lay on the floor in pain, sucks. So like. It can be done even WITH stuff like that too.

But I have been incredibly lucky. Because I got a few breaks when I needed one. Because I was in a position to go for what I could take. I also missed certain chances I should have been able to take. That's never a good feeling but it doesn't mean one missed chance or fuck up is the end of the road.

So yeah, as you said, every circumstance is different, every road is different, but I do think hearing a) it can be done and b) different approaches to how it can be done, can really help. Like even if you can't do the same stuff, maybe there's something in there that can help out. Some spark of an idea of something to try.

(I'm also making this public in case it helps anyone else ... I hope that's okay).

(this got long lol. But I was trying to think of like any advice that could help. There's a lot of pathways to get into the field, but volunteering, weird shit on that resume, being willing to go the extra bit, those are probably the most basic take aways anyone could try).

#vs does an ask #vs does a text post #public history

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fractallogic · 4 years

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the prof I’m working on some postdoc applications with has adopted me into her lab 100% and it makes me want to cry

on one hand, it’s AMAZING and I’m being MENTED and it’s a PRODUCTIVE lab and a HAPPY lab and I can share my expertise with others!! it is amazing, my heart is full, and I love that she and I are both certified yoga instructors who are hypermobile and have bullet journals?!

on the other hand (and one that I’m trying not to think about because nothing can be done about it, but it’s still very much there), it makes me wonder what could have been if I’d had this experience in grad school. like undergrad, whatever, it was fine, but my god where would I be if my grad school advisor had actually submitted abstracts to special issues of journals, or if he had applied for and gotten grants, or if he had been like. any degree of a team player in his research. like I was there for SIX YEARS and I have a publication through a lab that wasn’t my advisor (although he would have been if he hadn’t retired, sob) and a single author publication, but literally none with the lab that I was part of for YEARS (and I am not alone in this)?!

I get having different priorities and whatever but man. I wish his priority were Being a Good Mentor and Conscientious Academic instead of Being a Slack-Off White Man Professor (who happens to be one of the few semi-specialists in the subfield that I like and who does research on a great fucking language in the language family that I want to do research on too)

like fuck, if only I was interested in speech perception and phonetics instead of Semitic languages and morphology, because then I would have had this experience in grad school. (incidentally, there’s another paper with ANOTHER lab I was only quasi-associated with, but that’s still in its embryonic stages right now in terms of paper development. there’s a lot of bullet points and question marks in the doc that I think is most up to date.)

I mean I’m delighted to have this experience (and the speech perception/phonetics one in spring 2019) at this specific moment, when I’m unemployed and disenchanted about academia and there’s a fucking pandemic going on—if I was associated with a shitty lab, I absolutely wouldn’t make it through another job cycle. I would do it, but I don’t think I would come out the other side. but with these two, I have—dare I say—hope? fulfillment?? excitement??? and certainly VALIDATION. like my god, a prof with tenure and active grants telling me all my ideas are really cool and interesting and valuable and NECESSARY? WOW

idk, maybe it’s something with speech perception and phonetics, because that’s the thing in common with these labs. it’s surely NOT the fact that they’re also run by two female PIs. no. couldn’t be that. definitely not. it is NOT a gender thing. (yes it is)

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myinnerroomie · 3 years

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Today I want to write for pleasure instead of business. I want my mind to be productive, but I am sick of work. I am sick of all the grad school papers and the stress of getting everything in on time, the stress of applying for this test, and studying for that test. The stress of pretending I care about the Air Force. And for what? I feel as if I am not doing something to better myself, then I am failing. In all aspects of life. And for what? What am I trying to accomplish? What do I want out of life? The answer is everything. More than I’m getting. So I fill the void with military and homework and physical activities. All of which are healthy right? What’s the problem? I can do more. I am so capable. I see that. I know that I’m not meant for this. However, I signed up for it, right? I’ll finish what I signed up for and move on and appreciate what I learned. In the meantime, I feel it necessary to point out that I may be jobless in 2 months, maybe not. The stress of never knowing what is going to happen is real. And I’m sick of it. However, it pays the bills (quite nicely), I’m staying in a condo by the beach (where I’m sitting on the balcony typing), and it’s frankly beautiful weather and I’ll go for a run later. It’s really my fault that I haven’t found a job yet. I should never have relied on reserve like this anyway. I have no fear that I’ll figure something out when the time comes. Actually, life is way better than it really has ever been.

I’m so free (aside from the military which ironically is the thing that saved me). Oooh. Let’s get into my early adulthood. That should be fun. So, embarrassingly enough, until this past year, I have always had a boyfriend. We can get into my childhood later, but it probably stemmed from somewhere back then. I have never thought much of myself. Figured I’d go to community college like everybody else, then I went to a university like everybody else. Majored in a stupid (fun) degree. No real regrets about that though. My self-worth was based on if people liked me, if I felt I looked good. I do regret a lot of the actions of that sad, desperate girl. Nobody understood, and I was good at faking it. I did things that I have never admitted to anybody. I literally could have been diagnosed with the same disorders as the other kids in the behavioral hospital where I worked. Only mine weren’t for attention and I was deeply ashamed, so nobody knew. I educated myself on the consequences of what would happen if I continued on that path, and slowly but surely, I got better. And sadly, I can’t even celebrate that with anyone. Shame, guilt, fear, worthlessness, pain – what I used to always feel. Pride and confusion with all this freedom I have is what I feel now.

I used to think emotions were embarrassing. I knew I hurt all the time, but I was never taught how to deal with it, so I would isolate myself and feel stupid. Actually, that’s what I was taught. Everybody has issues, and I’m not special. Get over it. Why did it hurt so much? Why can’t I get over it? Why am I so miserable? Why am I even alive? Everybody dies anyway. Oh, I know how I can deal with this: weed. Ahh, there so much better. Now all I’m thinking about is how I can’t remember what I’m thinking about. Yeah, I should probably go to class now. Wonder if they’ll know I’m stoned. (turns out that they did). But I was really enjoying class then. Very intrigued with Maslow’s hierarchy of need. Hmm self-actualization. Will I ever know my purpose and get to the point in life where I can fulfill that need??? Nah bro I’m starving… You think everybody is staring at me eating these chips? -- Anyway, this is only the middle of the story. I’m not even going to go back to my first boyfriend. Let’s skip to the second one that cheated on me after 2 years. Looking back now, he’s gross and bigoted. He was mean to me. He lied to me. He cheated. Everything was an ordeal. I just constantly lowered myself and made myself small for him. He, of course, never reciprocated. I wasn’t worth it. Because I never showed any self-worth. One good decision I made was to further my education and move to Hattiesburg for school which he actually made fun of me for doing. Anyway, I remember one time he had just come from the boat or whatever he was doing for work and invited his friend to our apartment. I went to sit on his lap and he pushed me off and laughed. I just went to my room and cried while he spent the night with his friend. That’s not me. I hate I did that. I hate that’s their memory of me. Oh well. I know they still talk shit about me back home. That’s fine and that’s their problem.

Another reoccurring theme with boyfriends is my lack of any other friends and/or support. This takes me to my second boyfriend. I had been single for less than a year, and I met him. It was so much nicer at first. I felt like he cared about me. He was so sweet. Finally, everything was reciprocated to me, and I was happy. I was happy to make him happy. Again, with my screwed up priorities, man. But I had grown up a little. I just had this baseless fear that I would be alone forever. But, I’m not necessarily the victim. I did have this notion that I should be taken care of. I never expected to pay. I expected some sort of money and to pay to go out and about. That didn’t happen with this guy. This honestly helped me become independent. However, over time, he became more and more controlling. He threw me down and hit me in a NOLA hotel and the police were called. He tore up my purse and a jacket. I remember feeling so much stress because he said he was going to leave me there, and I didn’t know how to get home. Nor did I want to tell anybody why I was in that predicament anyway. I thought it was all my fault and apologized and he stayed. How lucky am I? To stay with a guy that hits me and breaks my belongings (He also broke my tent. If I ever went anywhere, he would be calling and obsessed. I couldn’t enjoy anything because I knew there would always be repercussions for having fun. I literally broke out in hives at my friend’s house in Jackson one time because I told him no I wouldn’t come back to his place that night and it gave me so much grief. He said he was going to break up with me if I did not drive back. But I sure enough stayed my ass up there though. It was still embarrassing. He threw a boot at me once because I was mad and didn’t want to sleep in the same room as him. When I told him that hurt and showed him the bruise, he blamed me for acting that way. A few times, I tried to leave to go home, and he would grab me and not let me go. I would be like if you don’t get your hands off me, I have every right to defend myself. So I would straight up try to fist fight him to let go of me. He would laugh. Sounds healthy right? Oh yeah, one time I did not do what he wanted and he threatened to get rid of my cat and locked all the doors to the house so I could not get to MY fucking cat. So I waited until he got home and he just acted like he didn’t care at all about the strife he caused. I think I may have even stayed that night at his house. I hated him but I didn’t know what else to do.

In the middle of all of this, I joined the military. So yeah he came to visit me in Texas for graduation then said this was his vacation and that he was going to do what he wanted. I’m like dude no. I’ve been locked up for weeks. It’s my vacation. Another argument, more crying. You’re a bitch if you stand up for yourself. Okay months go on, we break up in tech school. But I know he has my cat. I also know he has a place to live. Again, my fault. I’m using him cause I don’t really know what else to do. So I live at his house. Then move to out of town. He threatens to leave me again and tells me I’m shitty for moving away. I move back to his place. Back and forth, but he just stays and does whatever the fuck he wants with no consideration for me. Eventually, I just started to dislike him. I can take care of myself. I got another place with a room mate. His presence annoyed me. I thought he was ugly. I think that was mutual, and I was like dude: Let’s end it. It’s miserable. He agreed. Easiest break-up ever. Now did I do dumb things, and normal post-breakup things? Absolutely. Did I still text him a couple times afterwards? Yeahhh. Also, I made out with a 20 year old army kid at a bar. And I also slept with a married man. That was a whole thing. But most of last year, I have just grown.

I have nobody grabbing my arm now. If I want to pack up and go hiking somewhere across the country, I’ll buy a plane ticket and go. If I want to hang out with friends, its fun again. I do not rely on anybody for my self-worth. 2020 was extremely rough for me. I lost my house and all my belongings. My car flooded in a hurricane (and of course I only had liability insurance). It has all worked out anyway. I didn’t even need any of that stuff. Honestly, I never had the worst life. That wasn’t the goal of this. You know, to complain. It’s just that everything has gotten better. Losing everything helps put your life into perspective. I’m so much more appreciative now. I look at what I have accomplished and where I came from. I used to think that everybody was more important than me, and that I needed them to like me and see me as worthy to be around. Well, that has changed completely. I don’t have to like you and you don’t have to like me. That doesn’t make me less of a valuable person. Everybody is not better than me and I have just as much a chance of being successful as everybody else. I’m not a “bitch”. Maybe some folks find me “annoying”, but you’re crazy if you think I will ever make myself small to fit inside anybody’s box that doesn’t like me. I don’t “deserve it” to be living a miserable life. Life is hard. Life is beautiful. It’s all about learning, and that’s what I have done. I win. I’m free. I can do anything. While I do regret some of my past, all this has given me the drive to me who I am today and who I will be tomorrow. Still gotta figure that one out.

#first blog #idk what to tag this as #life #more to come

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heartofsnark · 4 years

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Black Market Wonderland (Chapter Nine): We’re Covered In Lies and That’s Okay

Notes: I’ve given up on maintaining proper consistent schedules for my fics, but I want to attempt to update at least once every other month for each of my series that are going on rn. I always wanna say thanks for some of the replies/comments on my last chapter that were really supportive and awesome about my disaster of a situation with grad school. I struggle to like respond and be a functional human being, but i read everything and love you all.I will be trying to like alternate posting chapters to each series, monthly. So like, April is Tsun, May will be Dahlia, but uhhhhhhhh every time i try to be consistent, it blows up in my face so that's cool.

Word Count: 7,152

Warnings: This one is pretty tame, cursing, some pettiness. I introduce a new OC cause i can’t fucking contain myself.

Missed the last chapter? Link Here!

“Hmmm, I don’t know…”

“Please,” Anais shakes her clenched fists in a begging motion, “please, please, please!”

The day has passed by easily enough, no snags or major confrontations from the idiots in the penthouse. A nice relaxed day of normal work with Anais clinging to her side, as they teach each other languages. It won’t be long before Tsuneko has to return her to her parent’s room for the evening, they’re walking that direction on the VIP floor. All it took was mentioning maybe giving the young girl a present for her to start begging excitedly. Of course, Tsuneko already has the small pompompurin coin purse in her pocket, something she won in a crane game, but doesn’t need.

“Hm, let’s see, maybe we can make it a reward. Do you remember how to sign, ‘hello, my name is Anais’?”

“Yeah, see,” Anais replies with a big grin and signs the greeting, perfectly.

“Here, you’ve more than earned it,” Tsuneko tells her, before handing over the little plush coin purse. Her blue eyes sparkle the second she sees it and she hugs it to her cheek.

“I love it!”

One of Anais’s hands wraps around Tsuneko’s, the other clutches around her gift, as they walk towards the room. The young girl is practically skipping as they near their destination.

“Tsuneko,” a familiar masculine voice calls out, Mr. Bucci.

“Hello, Mr. Bucci,” Tsuneko greets him, Anais hides behind her leg, shy around the strange older man, “Anais, this is Mr. Bucci, he’s a friend of my boss from Italy, why don’t you say hello?”

“Ciao,” Anais murmurs, still a little awkward, but Mr. Bucci gives her a kind smile.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, say, Tsuneko. I’m sorry to be a bother, but would you mind showing me around the hotel? I’d get lost in a paper bag I’m afraid.”

“Ah, I’m showing Anais back to her parent’s room at the moment, but if you could wait for just a moment, I can be with you shortly?” Tsuneko offers, even if the room isn’t far away, she wouldn’t feel comfortable just abandoning Anais on the VIP floor alone.

“I don’t mind at all, go ahead.”

Tsuneko excuses herself and Anais, leading the girl down the hall down to her parent’s room. She has a quick chat with Esme, about when the family is visiting Puroland, as well as the fact that Tsuneko may have days in the coming week where Ichinomiya will ask her to work outside of the hotel. It’s officially the second week of the bet and she’s expecting him to make a full force effort before the end of it, since he doesn’t seem keen on just giving up. She says her goodbyes to the family for the night and returns to Mr. Bucci in the hallway.

“Sorry for the wait, sir,” Tsuneko apologizes as they start to walk towards the elevator.

“It’s no problem at all,” he pauses for a moment, “I’m starting to understand more and more why Eisuke seems so enamored with you. Sweet, cute girl, great cook and good with children.”

“Mr. Bucci,” her stomach churns at the thought of Ichinomiya’s saccharine fake smile, “you’re far too kind, I’m sure Mr. Ichinomiya isn’t quite as fond of me as you think.”

“Nonsense, I’ve seen the way he looks at you.”

“Uh,” she stutters as they reach the elevator, wanting to escape this conversation, “so, do you think you know exactly what you’re looking to do? I’m sure you’re well acquainted with the casino, but there are also museums, theaters, pools, plenty of restaurants with food from all over. There’s actually an Italian restaurant, people say the food is really authentic, but I wouldn’t really know, personally.”

“Actually,” he cuts off her rambling, “I was hoping we could have a chat over dinner. I’m sure Eisuke won’t mind.”

She’s sure he wouldn’t, so long as Tsuneko doesn’t out his bullshit. Her regular rooms are all cleaned for the day, the only thing left on the schedule is cleaning the penthouse. So, it’s not impacting anyone else in the hotel and she tells Ichinomiya she was buttering up Mr. Bucci, he won’t particularly care.

“Yeah, that should be fine.”

It’s an awkward elevator ride to the floor with the restaurants, Tsuneko’s arms are folded behind her back to feign some sort of confidence, despite how badly she wants to run. She can’t say for certain what Mr. Bucci wants with her, perhaps just mining her for information about Ichinomiya, but why would he need her for that. There’s a devilish part of her brain that reminds her this would be a chance to out him, to tell Mr. Bucci all about the little game Ichinomiya is playing.

But she can’t bring herself to do something like that. Ichinomiya is an asshole and all-around garbage excuse for a human being, but his success affects more than just him. If the success of the Tres Spades continues to grow and get more money, the employees continue to prosper and make more money. The Tres Spades isn’t some shitty corporation that pays them minimum wage and no benefits. Tsuneko’s situation is an extreme case, she knows that, despite his piss poor personality, Ichinomiya and the Tres Spades take care of their employees.

Not to mention, another hotel, means more job opportunities for people who may need them. People who were like her when she applied, desperate and needing a source of income, could have an opportunity to do more than survive.

Plus, if the hotel expands across the globe, it can help employees in other ways. She thinks of Chisato and Itsuki, the two are basically engaged, but can’t movee beyond that point if they want to because gay marriage isn’t legal in Japan. Chisato has been with the hotel for years and can’t just move to elsewhere without having a job at least as good lined up. If there were more locations, in places where it’s legal, she could have both. So, if the Tres Spades expands…

As much as she hates to sound like a capitalist, helping Ichinomiya really does have ripple effects that help more people. She has to find a balance of not fucking herself over, but not hurting anyone else in the grand scheme of things.

Tsuneko would message Ichinomiya, to at least let him know why she’ll be late cleaning the penthouse and so he doesn’t suspect she’s going out of her way to ruin things. But the only way she has of contacting him is the pager which is on a speaker and she’s not giving that man her phone number.

They arrive at the Italian restaurant the Tres Spades has and Tsuneko immediately feels out of place. It’s mostly guests here for a nice dinner, dressed to the nines, while she’s in her maid uniform. The mixture of cleaner products and sweat is still heavy on her skin.

They’re shown to a table and Tsuneko is trying not to anxiously bounce or move around in her seat. Mr. Bucci orders wine and she gets water, he seems to be beating around the bush, dragging her discomfort out. Tsuneko forgets what she ordered a moment after she orders it. Mr. Bucci is the dictionary definition of calm, as he takes a sip of his wine, Tsuneko is sick of this.

“What did you want to talk to me about?”

He puts his glass down on the table and gives a small chuckle. Mr. Bucci has never struck her a mean or cruel man, but he’s a mob boss. There are so many dangerous places this conversation could go.

“Cutting right to the chase, are you?”

“My heart can’t handle doing anything else.”

“There’s no need to look so scared, relax, eat.”

She pops an appetizer into her mouth but can’t quite appreciate the taste through her nerves. The attempt seems to appease him to some degree, as he clears his throat to speak again.

“Carolina has become rather infatuated with Eisuke, despite him having feelings for you.”

“I don’t think he-”

“Please, humor me,” he puts his hand up to make her shush, “I know Carolina has been taking things out on you, which isn’t right, but she’s always felt her emotions very intensely. If your and Eisuke’s relationship were to go further, it would crush her, and she’d only get nastier with you.”

Is this entire dinner about warning her away from Ichinomiya for Carolina’s sake? Because that’s not an issue. Tsuneko wouldn’t waste her time fighting over a man she liked, let alone one she’s actively trying to avoid.

“I know it’s asking a lot, but it would be nice if you and Carolina could become friends.”

“Huh?”

“I was hoping from the way he acted last time they met, perhaps he had feelings for her as well, but it can’t be helped. If Carolina could see you as more of a friend, less of a rival, I think it would be good for both of you.”

“Uh,” that’s not what she expected, “if this is all about getting me to make nice with your daughter, I’m not sure there’s much I can do. I’m not exactly the one making it, uh, contentious. And even if I did, I’m not sure if it would make her feel any better about Mr. Ichinomiya.”

“I know my Carolina can be difficult, but I do think it would help for her to have a friend here.”

“I’m not confident that I’m the best choice for that.”

“It would mean a lot to me if you tried, maybe a girl’s day for the two of you could be arranged?”

Tsuneko chews her lip and pokes at her meal, unsure of what to say or do. Her leg bounces beneath the table. Mr. Bucci strikes her as sincere, he genuinely wants the best for his daughter. And Tsuneko can see his point, Carolina doesn't strike her as the type who probably has a lot of female friends. The kind of mentality where Women are competition and men are some sort of prize. Which is exhausting. Both for those around her and surely for her as well.

"If you can get her to agree, I'll be more than happy to spend a day with her."

"Wonderful. I'll let you know when a date is arranged." Mr. Bucci smiles at her and Tsuneko prays Carolina refuses. The meal concludes with Tsuneko trying to hurriedly eat her entree, as to not waste the previously untouched food, and Mr. Bucci insisting on paying.

Her mind wanders as she makes her way to the penthouse, she thinks of what he said, about believing Ichinomiya might have had feelings for Carolina. Everything he does, especially for business, is intentional. Even the smallest gesture calculated. He doesn’t give soft smiles or too long touches by accident.

And while Carolina might be the type to misinterpret signals, her father doesn’t seem as apt to do so. Which, makes her wonder, did he lead Carolina on for the deal? Not that she thinks much of him to begin with, but that’s another layer of gross.

She arrives at the penthouse, seeing a mish mash of familiar and unfamiliar faces. Baba and Kisaki are the only two of the auction managers there, but there’s four women gathered around them. Three she doesn’t know and one, she’s sadly familiar with, the girl who insulted her weight at the event Ichinomiya dragged her to. The women are undoubtedly beautiful, dressed in short seductive dresses. They’re guests, or at least she has to assume so, which sadly means Tsuneko needs to be well behaved. It’s one thing to mouth off to the assholes who bought her, but actual guests of the hotel she has to behave around.

“Hey, princess,” Baba greets her, a woman with long red hair on his left and another with raven black hair on his right. The girl from the event is next to the red head, while another blonde is practically sitting in Kisaki’s lap.

The three unfamiliar women give Tsuneko a quick once over but seem to ultimately decide they don’t care about her presence. While the one she’s met before, maintains a sharp cruel gaze. Unlike the other three, she doesn’t even seem to be fawning over the men, almost bored with this.

“I’m here to clean,” Tsuneko announces with a customer service smile, “would anyone like anything to eat or drink before I start?”

Kisaki and Baba shoots her confused looks, no doubt taken aback by her kind attitude. However, she can’t risk being inappropriate around actual guests.

“Make yourself useful and get us some wine,” the familiar woman pipes in, showing off her empty glass like Tsuneko is too stupid to understand otherwise.

“Of course.”

She gathers the empty glasses and makes her way to the penthouse kitchen area. There’s a bottle of fancy red wine on the counter, from whenever they first served it, so she tops off each glass and brings it out to them.

“So, you let maids up here?” The redhead asks, twirling a crimson lock around her finger.

“Koro’s special,” Kisaki taunts, despite his sugary sweet smile, and she bites her tongue, only sending him a quick pointed glare.

“I’m the penthouse maid, Tomori Tsuneko.”

“I think the dog name suits you more,” the event girl tells her, her eyes sharp. She’s a pretty girl, a shaggy pale blonde bob hair and burnished orange eyes.

“You’re so mean, Kaede,” the blonde on the arm of Kisaki’s chair gushes out, like it’s cute.

“If that’s all, I’ll begin cleaning now.” She at least has a name to attach to the mean girl, though she’s not sure how much that will actually help her.

Tsuneko busies herself with cleaning the lounge, letting the residents become background noise. She manages to catch that Baba is reading the girl’s fortunes with cards. All of them but Kaede, oohing and aweing over it.

“Hey, pretty lady, come over here,” Baba calls over suddenly as Tsuneko is dusting, every fiber of her being wants to tell him to shush and let her clean. But there are guests, actual guests here.

“Is there something you need, sir?” She says instead, hoping the sir will somehow get her point across. Yet, Baba is smiling like a damn idiot.

“Do you wanna have your fortune read?”

There’s an annoyed twitch behind her eye, she is working. She can see Kisaki gremlin smirking out of her peripheral vision. They’re trying to push her buttons.

“I appreciate the offer, but I’m working, sir.”

“Oh, there’s no need to be shy, you know you can always call me Micchy!~”

He winks at her, three girls giggle, but Kaede still shows no signs of being entertained. Instead, her nose wrinkles. A clatter of glass as she smacks her finger into the stem of her wine glass, knocking it from the table.

“Ah!” Tsuneko flusters and rushes, she catches the glass before it shatters, but red wine drenches the front of her uniform. It soaks and chills through the fabric, making it stick to her.

“Couldn’t let you slack off for too long,” Kaede tells her, voice hushed and a mean little smirk pulling at her lips.

The door to the penthouse opens within the next moment, Ichinomiya and Oh entering the lounge. Like moths to a flame, suddenly the four women all flock over to them, abandoning Baba and Kisaki.

“Eisuke, it’s great to see you again!~” Kaede gushes and he narrows his eyes.

“We were waiting for you to get here!”

“I didn’t think we’d actually get a chance to meet the king!”

“You’re even more attractive in person, oh my god!”

“Are you okay?” Baba asks her, suddenly close and in her personal space.

“Yeah, better on me than on the linoleum,” she awkwardly tugs at the wet chest of her uniform, cold drops of wine rolling down her cleavage, that Baba’s eyes seem to follow, “nothing got on your cards?”

“Of all the things for you to be worried about,” Baba looks her in the eyes again and sighs, like he’s dealing with a child.

“I mean, I could also worry about how you two just got ditched for Ichinomiya,” she teases, voice low, as Baba carefully takes the glass from her hand. He’s being, nice.

“We’re used to it by now, some girls will do anything to get close to boss.”

“What’s going on here?” Ichinomiya questions, glaring at the women for a moment, before his eyes land on Tsuneko and her wine-soaked uniform.

“We just thought, it’d be okay for us to come up here and spend some time with you,” Kaede tells him, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.

“I take it, we know who’s to blame for letting you up here,” Oh glares at Baba who just grins.

“What’s wrong for having some beautiful women here?”

“Women who find it necessary to throw wine at my staff.” Ichinomiya narrows his eyes at Kaede, he doesn’t even have to wonder who’s to blame.

“Accidents happen,” Kaede waves it off, “she’ll be fine, why don’t we have a drink, just the two of us?”

“Get out.”

“Huh, don’t be ridiculous-”

“I don’t have time for this, get out, now.”

Slowly and with their heads hanging down, the women leave the penthouse, like they’ve been scolded. Which, she supposes isn’t that far from the truth.

“Ugh, I can still smell their perfume,” He’s not wrong, the smell of expensive perfume still hangs in the air.

“Are you sure you should talk to guests like that?”

“They’re not staying here.”

“What?”

“Those women just hang around in the casino, like flies,” Oh explains.

“God damn it, I was polite for nothing!”

“It was so funny watching you try to behave yourself.” Kisaki snickers.

“Oh shut up, now, if you’ll excuse me,” she says and starts to head to the door, wine making her thighs stick together awkwardly.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Ichinomiya stops her.

“I’m gonna go change then come back to clean, the wine didn’t get on anything else, so don’t worry.”

“You’re going to let guests see you like that?” He narrows his eyes at her, and she looks down at the mess on her uniform, not that she needs to, she can feel it sticking to her.

“Well, it’s not going anywhere on its own.” She flails her arms out, glaring at him, what the hell does he expect?

“I’ll see if Kenzaki can bring you up a change of uniform.”

“Come on, you can get cleaned up in my bathroom and we’ll get your uniform taken care of,” Baba says, placing a hand on the small of her back as he leads her towards his suite, even though she knows where it is, his hand is welcomed warmth against the chill of the spilled wine.

She steps into his bathroom, familiar with the elaborate set up. The sun is just starting to set, shining orange golden light in through the giant window.

“There’s bathrobes for you to change into or you can borrow some clothes from me if you’d like.” He winks, because of course he does.

“I’ll take the bathrobe.”

He gives a melodramatic pout and she pushes him from the bathroom. The door shut behind him, she takes off her shoes and starts to unbutton her uniform. Her eyes dart between the tub and the shower, immaculate. The idea of relaxing back in a hot soapy bath looking at the sunset out the window, sounds so nice. However, reality is a cruel mistress, and she doesn’t have the luxury of taking her time and relaxing. She’s technically on the clock and she’s better off just taking a shorter shower.

There’s a bit of relief from the sticky wine, tacky on her skin, when she lets her uniform drop to the floor and peels off her stockings. The worst of the mess is off her, but it’s well soaked through the layers to her skin. She can even feel the residue on her nipples where it’s dripped down and soaked through her bra. Her underwear joins the pile of clothes and she starts up the shower, steam filling the room.

She leaves a towel over the stall door and steps under the hot water. There’s an array of the hotel provided items with soft clean neutral scents, but she notices a few of Baba’s products as well. They’re all rose and jasmine scented, floral almost romantic scents. Not that different from her own shampoo, but just slightly stronger. Of course, he drinks rose tea and uses rose soap, like the cheesy schmuck he is. Those thoughts don’t stop her from using it. Tsuneko’s muscles relax as she washes the grime from her skin and hair, not just the wine but the sweat of the day so far.

The door creaks as she’s massaging soap into her breasts, she jolts, a slick mess of suds and water in the shower stall makes her feet slip. She just manages to burrow her fingers into the towel before she yelps out, her ass hitting the floor. Pain shoots up her tailbone. The door swings open further.

“Tsuneko!” Baba’s voice jumps an octave as he rushes into the room, whirling around to see her. She scrambles to place the towel, so it covers her chest and groin, though she feels like he probably already got an eyeful in the amount of time it takes her.

“What the hell are you doing?!”

“Are you okay, I heard you yell?”

“Yeah, because you opened the fucking door!”

“Uh, oh,” realization seems to dawn on him, and he covers his eyes before turning his back to her, “I was going to get your clothes, so we can send them to be cleaned.”

“You couldn’t have waited?!”

“The quicker they’re washed the better, you don’t want the stains to set.”

“Just go!”

Baba flusters about for a moment before grabbing her pile of wine-soaked clothes and leaving the bathroom. She heaves out a deep sigh, once she hears the door shut behind him. Tsuneko gets back up on her feet, the towel is completely soaked now, so she tosses it aside. Fearful of another interruption, she finishes up as quickly as possible.

She shuts the shower off and does a quick dry off. They’re probably still sticky, but she goes to grab her underwear, to find they’re not there. Great, so not only has Baba seen her naked, but he knows what kind of underwear she wears. And, she’ll be wearing a bathrobe with nothing underneath, around them all. Lovely.

The bathrobe is clearly meant for an adult man and she doesn’t see any in smaller sizes. It’s soft fluffy white material, she pulls it on, she feels and looks a bit like a marshmallow, but that’s not a complaint. Plus, the excess fabric should make it easier to stay covered. It sags a little low on her shoulders, the sleeves hang over her hands, and the bottom drags across the floor as she leaves the bathroom.

Baba is just outside the bathroom door and she can’t help the pout that pulls at her face, asshole. He’s smirking in response and her fist is connecting with his side in the next moment. He barely flinches at the strike and she can feel the muscle beneath his shirt.

“Pull that kind of shit again and I’ll castrate you.”

“I only had the best of intentions, scouts honor.” He gives a cheesy little smile and scout salute, that she isn’t buying for a second.

“Hmmph.”

She lets out a huffy noise as she fixes her still damp bangs and moves towards her stuff that’s on the side table. Baba must have taken them from her pockets when he got her clothes. There are wine stains on some of her sticky note pads and a bit on her phone case, the phone itself doesn’t feel soaked, however. It’s already been scratched all up, she’s not sure how much more it can handle.

“This is the first time I’ve seen you with your hair down, somehow you just manage to get prettier and prettier.”

She rolls her eyes at his compliment, despite the heat in her cheeks. It’s sweet and she’s sure he’s right, the only one who’s seen her with her hair down fully was Kisaki when he was fixing it for the event. She twirls a still damp lock of her around her finger.

“You never lay off with the cheesy shit, do you?”

“I’m just an honest man.”

“You walked in on me showering and stole my underwear!”

“I was honestly trying to help.”

A heavy sigh escapes her as she puts her phone in the robe pocket and heads to the lounge, hopefully Kenzaki has brought a change of uniform for her. Baba follows after her, Kishi is on one of the couches smoking a cigarette. He managed to miss the chaos, lucky him.

“What the hell?”

“Don’t ask.” She waves him off, dismissing him and his smoke cloud as she takes a seat. Tsuneko is careful to fold her legs in the chair so she stays cocooned and covered in the robe.

“One of Boss’s fangirls got a little testy.”

“There are no spare uniforms in your size, so you’ll have to wait until laundry services washes yours,” Ichinomiya explains to her.

“So, what I’m hearing is I’m getting overtime pay?”

Ichinomiya sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose, but he doesn’t argue with her. At the very least a bit of extra money in her bank account, but now she’s stuck spending time with them. Last time she was actually sat down with them was when Ichinomiya gave her the confidentiality agreement, before she proposed the bet. She can remember just how tense and rigid she was, now she’s curled up in a robe.

She fiddles with the edge of the robes sleeve, suddenly aware of the strangely vulnerable position she’s put herself in with them. Hair damp from the shower and still down, not a smudge of makeup, in nothing but an oversized robe. Something about it all seems cozy, comfortable. She curls her knees in a bit closer at the thought, as if providing a bit more protection.

“Since you’ve got time you want to get your fortune read, now?” Baba offers, smiling.

“Aren’t you a little old to believe in that kind of shit?”

“You wound me and so soon after our special moment together in the shower.”

“Don’t say shit like that!” She reaches out and smacks him with the long sleeves of the robe, it hits his face and he just keeps grinning.

“Don’t tell me you’re into old men, now, Koro.”

“He walked in while I was showering!”

“You really have the worst luck, don’t ya?”

“You’re telling me. Speaking of shitty luck and women who hate me, Mr. Bucci wants me to spend time with Carolina.”

“Does he now?”

“And you actually agreed to that?”

“What was I supposed to do?” She shoots Oh an incredulous look.

“I’m not sure that’s the smartest idea, princess.”

“Mr. Bucci is gonna talk to her about it, best case scenario she refuses and worst case scenario I have to suffer through a day of her snide little insults.”

“Did you forget they’re mafia members?”

“And Carolina is jealous of you.”

“So,” she shrugs at Oh and Baba’s implications, “she’s not gonna do anything crazy.”

“You can’t let your guard down around people like that.”

“What’s that suppose to mean, slacker?”

“Exactly what it sounds like.”

Kishi and Oh are glaring daggers at each other, Oh’s hand starts heading towards where she’s sure his gun is. She tries not to snicker and starts scrolling through her phone again. Ichinomiya clears his throat, stopping the short-lived altercation.

“Make sure you take your pager.”

“Why, so you can badger me when you want coffee?”

“Just do what I say.”

“Just do what I say,” she mocks him, not bothering to look up from her Instagram feed. Chisato posted a cute selfie, that she gets a glimpse of before her phone is pulled from her hand, “hey!”

Kisaki has a hold of her phone, he’s perched himself on the arm of the chair she’s sitting in, his smarmy gremlin grin on his face. She doesn’t need him going through her phone, she’s already had one of them see her practically naked today.

“What are you look- hey,” she grabs her phone and yanks it from his hand, before pushing him off the chair arm. He gives a little yell, before his ass hits the floor.

“Don’t touch my phone.”

He shoots her a disgusted look from the floor and she hears the other men snickering.

“You’re so aggressive,” he says, glaring at her.

“Do you have something on there you don’t want people to see?” Baba asks, smirking.

“What is or isn’t on my phone is none of your concern.”

“You’re not helping yourself.” Ichinomiya isn’t looking up at them, but he’s smirking just the same.

“You’re not wrong.” She sighs, hiding her phone away back in her pocket.

There’s a knock, before Kenzaki steps into the lounge, carrying a laundry bag.

“Tomori’s clothes have been washed.”

She’s already out of her chair and making a beeline for Kenzaki, plucking the laundry bag from his hand and muttering a thanks before heading towards Baba’s bathroom. Tsuneko double, triple, checks that the door is locked before she starts to change back into her uniform. There is absolutely no signs of the wine on her uniform, the laundry services at the hotel are beyond amazing. Once she’s changed and tucked everything back into her uniform pockets, she’s able to get back to work. Cleaning the lounge and suites doesn’t take her much time at all

Tsuneko returns to her dorm later than average, going through her nighttime routine of caring for Kiyo and preparing for that stupid auction. The only thing unique to the whole process at this point is crossing off days until the end of the bet. It’s the final marker of the whole routine now, the last thing she does before she closes her eyes.

The next day at work isn’t quite as entertaining, Anais is enjoying Puroland with her family. Meaning, Tsuneko is left to her own usual routine. The first part of her shift passes by calmly and she gets to go enjoy lunch on time. Sakiko is eating a later lunch, Chisato and Itsuki got their lunch breaks to match up and are having a more romantic venture. So, Tsuneko decides to go out grab a quick bite during her break. Chisato already warned her that the gossip about Tsuneko working in the penthouse is only getting worse, so she’d rather have some distance between herself and her coworkers for a moment.

After filling her stomach with hamburger steak and catching up on Monster Lovers during her solo lunch, she’s headed back to the hotel. There’s a soft breeze blowing through as she reaches the backlot, just as a group of unfamiliar men venture through the back door. What are they doing? It’s always something at this fucking hotel.

“Excuse me, sirs!” She yells out as she starts sprinting after them, whatever reason they’re here, she plans on finding out. They don’t stop or respond out of earshot as she starts into the hotel. A glimpse of their back as they venture down the stairs, down to the basement level, she yells again. No response as they continue towards the sub-basement level, Wonderland.

“Hey!” Her voice jumps up another three octaves as she rushes down the final set of stairs. There are even more unfamiliar men there, a line forming out of Wonderland door. Men shoot her confused looks. It’s all random men of all ages and appearances, though, most don’t seem too pleasant.

She stomps and pushes her way through, all of the men shooting her dirty looks as she elbows her way through the crowd. Finally, she manages to make it into Wonderland. The Hatter is at the table across from one of the men, who have flooded the room. He has a notebook open before him and is scribbling notes, like he’s interviewing them.

“What are your hobbies?”

“Horse races, dog races, poker, pachinko.” Some man tells the Hatter in a gruff voice.

“Oh, so you’re a gambling man then. How much would you say you usually bet at once?”

“Everything I have at the moment.”

“You like high stakes bets then!”

“I borrow money from friends sometimes, tell ‘em I’ll pay them back with interest.”

“Have you paid any of these friends back?”

“Not yet.”

“Alright then. Next, please,” he calls another strange man forward to take the other’s place, “it’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“Hey.”

“I have several questions I’d like to ask you; do you live nearby?”

“About thirty minutes by train, I guess.”

“Yes, that’s a very fine distance; what are your hobbies?”

“Afternoon naps.’

“Pffff,” she scoffs, making both the man and the Hatter looks up at her.

“Alice! Where have you been?” The Hatter shoots her a bright smile, while the man is glaring. He barely looks old enough to drink, so if he’s trying to look scary, it’s not going to work for him.

“I just got back from my lunch break, what is all of this?” She gestures to the crowd of men.

“Isn’t it obvious?”

“Not in the slightest.”

“I’m having auditions for the new March Hare and Dormouse.”

He’s not seriously letting strangers back in here, so soon after being robbed.

“And where exactly did you find these men?”

“I put an advertisement up on the website craigslist.”

“What?” Her eyes grow wide, that’s so dangerous, people have been killed from doing stupid shit like this.

“The online world is dull compared to Wonderland, but it’s very convenient.”

“No way, nope,” she shakes her head emphatically, “you’re not doing this.”

She pulls a chair from the table and climbs to stand on it, drawing attention to herself as well as seeing over the crowd of strangers.

“Alice, what are you doing?”

“Hey,” she calls out, “I’m sorry, but you all need to go! The position is closed, there is no job, sorry for the trouble, you gotta get out of here!”

“Alice!” The Hatter’s yell cuts through the disappointed grumbles of the men, she’s never seen him so angry, “please, do not act selfishly like that!”

“Selfishly!?”

“They all came out to be interviewed and you’re being rude!”

“I’ll show you rude, everybody get the fuck out!” She stomps her foot down on the chair for emphasis.

The Hatter is glaring at her as the men slowly make their way out of Wonderland. She needs to call Kenzaki and let him know, in case any of them get wise ideas about venturing through the hotel and causing trouble. Tsuneko hops down from the chair as the last man meanders out, grumbling under his breath about how good the pay was and she shuts the door behind him.

“Why did you interfere?” The Hatter is glaring with a heavy, childish pout.

“Because that was beyond stupid, that’s why!”

“I must find a new March Hare and Dormouse! You enjoyed yourself, didn’t you?”

“That’s not the point, I don’t give a shit about the hare and mouse!”

“Did you forget how lovely our parties were?” His face falls from anger to sorrow, unable to quite meet her eyes.

“Did you forget that you were robbed like, two days ago?!”

“Of course not!”

“And what, you thought you should just have more strangers here?”

He bites his lip and doesn’t meet her eyes, brow furrowing.

“Do you have any idea how reckless that was? Any of those men could have robbed you or worse! Did you even think about that? Huh, what if I came down here and found you fucking dead, ‘cause you let anyone with a pulse and internet just waltz on in.”

“I-”

“And what about everyone else here? What if one of them decided to go do something to a guest or one of the workers? For fucks sakes, even if those men weren’t bad, what if they found out about the auctions? What do you think Ichinomiya and them would do to keep them quiet?!”

“I-”

“You could have gotten yourself and someone else killed, you can’t do this shit!”

His butt hits the ground with a thump, he’s plopped on the ground and pulled his knees to his chest, hiding his pouting face there. Watching an actual seven-year-old child felt less like babysitting. She sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose, getting her phone from her pocket then punching in Kenzaki’s number.

“Hey, yeah, it’s Tomori. We’ve had an issue in the tearoom with security, everyone is safe, and nothing is taken. But I think it might be good to keep an eye out for any strange characters.”

Kenzaki assures her it’s taken care of and she hangs up, looking over to see the Hatter still hasn’t budged from his new spot on the floor. She sighs, she knows he wants his dream Wonderland tea party, but he can’t sacrifice his own or someone else’s safety for that. Tsuneko chews her lip, the March Hare and Dormouse didn’t do much, other than arrange furniture. She can do that; god knows the pair of them weren’t conversationalists.

Most of her plushies are licensed characters as are most of the ones in her crane games, so they probably won’t work for him. She does a few searches for dormouse and hare plushies, it takes her a few moments to find ones cute enough to add to her cart. Tsuneko sits on the floor next to the Hatter who’s still pouting.

“I just wanted to have our tea parties again,” he mumbles against his knees.

“I know, sweetie, but hey, how about these?” She nudges her phone against his knee, getting his attention. He finally looks up, eyes soft with unshed tears and biting at his lip before looking at the phone.

“Oh…”

“Would that work, having stuffed animals instead?”

“Would you be happy with that?”

“Well, yeah. I mean let’s be honest, the March Hare and Dormouse weren’t exactly shining conversationalists. All I care about is that you’re safe.”

“That’s good then,” he says with a soft smile.

“Okay, I’ll order them and the tea party will be complete before you know it.” She pats her hand on his back, hoping the gesture can convey even just a bit of comfort. He seems to relax under her touch.

The door rattles open and all that comfort is useless as Ichinomiya steps into the room, no doubt Kenzaki informed him of the situation. The Hatter visibly curls into himself as the CEO’s harsh gaze lands on him.

“What happened?” He doesn’t ask for, so much as demand an answer.

“I-” The Hatter stumbles over his words and stalls, that shy soft-spoken boy shining through the façade. She squeezes his shoulder tight.

“There was a little issue, he let in a few strangers…but they’re gone now.’

“You let strangers in, again?”

“Um…”

“I already ripped him a new one. You know why it was wrong, right Mads?”

He nods his head, hat nearly falling over from the force of it.

“And you’re not gonna do it again, right?”

Another nod.

“See, it’s fixed, I just wanted to make sure Kenzaki knew what happened, just in case.”

“I can’t have just anyone coming down here.”

“He knows, he knows.”

“He can talk for himself.”

“Not with you scaring him, he can’t.”

“Is this going to happen again?”

“No, I won’t do it again…” The Hatter mumbles out a response.

“I’m holding you to that.” There’s a subtle threatening edge to his words, like a father threatening to ground his son.

“He knows, go, go,” she tries to shoo him off like a fly, earning a glare, “I’ll make you coffee when I clean the penthouse later.”

“Obviously.” He sneers and gives another stern look towards the Hatter before finally taking his leave.

She spends a few more minutes with the Hatter, ensuring he’s feeling better before she goes back to work. Her shift passes by with her on edge, looking out for any of the men from the Hatter’s auditions. None of them seem to have spread out to the hotel or taken up causing trouble, so she’s able to finish up work with little trouble. Other than a moment of annoyance when she makes Ichinomiya his precious coffee.

“You guys wanna get drinks?” Chisato asks as they’re leaving the locker room.

“You sure that’s a great idea with little miss pervert here?” Sakiko points a thumb in Tsuneko’s direction, a hint of pink in her cheeks.

“I’m not up for it anyway, so don’t worry.” She playfully shoves her as they leave out the back entrance. With the stress of the Hatter’s little auditions, this is the kind of night meant for cozy pajamas and ferret cuddles.

Chisato and Sakiko wave a bye to Tsuneko as they venture off towards the bar, her towards the dorms. Her steps halt, who’s outside the dorms? It’s a younger man, mess of auburn hair and green gold eyes, leaning against the building. A moment passes by before she realizes where she’s seen him before, he was one of the men interviewing with the Hatter. What on earth is he still doing here?

“Hey!” She yells out as she marches over towards the guy.

“You really do yell a lot, don’t you?” He comments, raising an eyebrow at her.

“What are you still doing here? I told you to go home.”

“And why would I do that?”

“’Cause there’s literally no reason for you to be here.”

“What’s the deal with the dude in the basement?” He asks suddenly and it’s like ice water’s been dumped on her. Of course, there had to be one person who stuck it out to ask questions.

“That’s none of your business.”

“Alice, was it?”

“Tsuneko, now go home.”

“I’m Hachirou, look, if I can’t make a buck off of this, I at least wanna know what the hell is going on,” he pleads as she’s opening the door to the complex.

“Go home and stop answering craigslist ads, it’s dangerous.”

With that she disappears into the complex, heading to her own dorm. Once there, she peeks out the window, watching as Hachirou finally takes his leave. She clutches her good luck charm and hopes that will be the end of it, for his sake more than her own.

#kbtbb kissed by the baddest bidder #kbtbb #eisuke ichinomiya #soryu oh #mamoru kishi #mitsunari baba #ota kisaki #rhion hatter #tsuneko tomori #black market wonderland

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problematic-nova · 4 years

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This commentary is a bit different this time. Rather than Sherlock meta, now that everything Oscar did is out of the bag, it's taking a closer look at upper academia, and how something like Sherlock and Oscar could actually play out in real life, because it was another one of the inspirations for this fic. I'm from the US, not the UK, which of course has its differences, most notably in the UK's lack of tenure. But I did talk with some UK academics when outlining this fic, and was assured my reasoning was sound. These stories of abuse come out of UK universities just the same as they do US ones-- professors are just even more protected here than they are there.

(As an aside, none of this is at all meant to scare anybody heading into college or grad school. I was in two different programs, and while my mentor for one was a fucking nightmare, my two mentors for the other were absolute angels. There are plenty of supervisors that do very good work. If you're applying for such positions, what you want to do is talk to students currently in that professor's lab/studio/whatever, alone (I very gleefully sent an entire group of prospective students running from mine), and try and see what you can find out from former students. High numbers of transfers/drop outs are not a good sign. Neither are high numbers of students that graduated, and then left the field entirely.)

For many STEM degrees, your graduate school experience is you, beholden to your supervisory professor (PI), for 4-6 years. To even get into a good graduate program, you will also have needed to have extensive research experience in your undergraduate, underneath one or two other PIs, and you will need good recommendation letters from them as well. Humanities degrees are even more of an apprenticeship model, but that's really what it is-- if you have a competent mentor, and you're a good student who works hard, you'll be all right. If you have a good mentor, the experience can be amazing. If you wind up with a bad mentor, it can be a career-ender.

The problem is, in these fields, you don't have a choice: if you don't have a recommendation letter from your PI, that's it. You won't be hired, or accepted to any future programs. If you wind up with a bad mentor, your only choice is to suck it up, stick it out, somehow get yourself through the program without a competent teacher while still getting their letter, and graduate as quickly as you can.

And bad mentors do, often, look quite a lot like Oscar. The sexual abuse is less common, and even for tenured profs in the US, a sexual relationship with a student is grounds for termination. But everything else that Oscar did in the fic was something I saw profs do in my own time at school: not bothering to show up to meetings with students or other staff, shrugging their own responsibilities off onto their students, demanding they work twelve+ hour days six/seven days a week, sabotaging them to their final committee hearings, and in STEM fields, scooping their data and publishing it out from under them. (I once even saw a PI threaten their post-doc with deportation.) The structure of upper academia unfortunately rewards such behavior: you are guaranteed a slow, steady trickle of young, inexperienced students, who are excruciatingly reliant on your approval, don't have a backup program/plan to fall back on, and are probably lacking in any other professional experience. Most don't realize the appropriate boundaries to set, and even if they do, will be too afraid to try and set them.

What options does a student in such a situation have? Well: not many.

A student can report things to the administration. But the administration is very invested in protecting their respected professor, and not all in protecting their dime-a-dozen, shit-stirring student. This is a report that is also likely tantamount to career suicide: while these reports are technically confidential, like I said above, these programs are pretty close to apprenticeship models. The prof in question is not going to be wondering who made this report, and other professors in the department (whose approval you will need for collaborations and your hearings to defend your research) will hear about it too: they will hear that a student whined about their friend and colleague, in a field where students whining about their colleagues for non-issues, like a deserved failing grade, are very common. And, at least in the US, if your professor is tenured, unless you have something actually illegal to report, your report will amount to /absolutely nothing/.

For example: Sherlock's ulcer story was inspired by my own. I had a different medical condition (and there was no sexual abuse), but all the other details were the same-- I had been doing extra work for my prof that undergrads weren't meant to do, work that she had ‘offered’ to sign me up for because I was ‘so talented’ (read: a doormat) and wouldn't take no for an answer. Later, I was injured over summer, outside of school, and got a doctor's note stating that I couldn't continue that particular work. I showed it to my prof and the dean of the school, and, in writing, established I would not be doing that extra work this semester (which, again, I was not even meant to be doing in the first place). A few weeks later, one day before the drop date (therefore preventing me from withdrawing), my prof went behind my back, signed me up for it anyway, explicitly against multiple school rules, and told me I would just need to withdraw from my other conflicting classes. Classes that she had known about, and knew were requirements for my other degree program. She announced that my doctor was a quack, that she would pay for me to see a massage therapist instead, and proceeded to lie to me when she assuring that she'd arranged matters with the other profs, who would work to accommodate me. They had no idea what I was talking about.

I was in a uniquely protected position, so I did report her to the school, to a very understanding administration, who told me everything that had happened was shockingly inappropriate and unacceptable, and that they were amassing a case against her. As it turned out, they had reports of abuse of power, racism, staggering incompetence, refusal to perform her expected duties, and extremely unprofessional displays from many other affected students. Their stories were just as wild and unbelievable as mine, any one of which would've been enough to get someone fired from a more ordinary job. In the end, she wasn't even reprimanded, and I was told my only option was to stick it out, or drop out of the program and my degree, with one semester left to go. I, very stupidly, chose the former, and as a result of ignoring my doctor's note, still have chronic pain, and ironically enough, now can't even use the degree I made that sacrifice for because of it.

Sherlock would actually be an exception to all of this. When you are /that/ intelligent, and going by the fandom's assumptions, have that much money/all those family connections, you can't really fail badly enough to not be able to get back up. If he'd wanted to find a graduate program that would take him, he could have. But for everyone else, like Victor, what Oscar did to him genuinely was a career-ender. He wouldn't have been able to get hired for any decent position, and he wouldn't have been able to get an acceptance at any other program to try again, after nearly ten years of working towards that degree.

Basically, fuck upper academia with a rusty steak knife.

#sherlock #academia #cw abuse #i can talk for HOURS about this woman istg #as my poor friends can attest to :'D

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ethandigby · 4 years

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『 LANDON LIBOIRON ❙ GENDERQUEER 』 ⟿ looks like ETHAN DIGBY is here for THEIR SECOND year as a VISUAL ART GRAD student. HE is 27 years old & known to be DEDICATED, HONEST, STUBBORN & PESSIMISTIC. They’re living in NOLAND, so if you’re there, watch out for them. ⬳ drew. twenty-two. est. he/him. ethan’s pinterest

trivia:

he really likes white cholate & hot chocolate, often eating handfuls of white chocolate baking discs regardless of the time of day.

visual art major --- tends to stray towards sculptures and installation pieces, though he does have a love for bob ross style landscape pieces. draws a lot of inspiration from older art, and many of his pieces are designed to look worn-out and as though they are missing pieces.

perpetually exhausted --- for all his love of schedules, he has never managed to consistently get enough sleep and though he loves tea, that never seems to have enough of an impact to truly wake him up ---- a.k.a he is a yawn prone little fuck

doesn’t quite believe the local legends, though he doesn’t dismiss them outright either. the statue by wishing tree has, however, made it into several of his works ---- statues seem to have her facial features without him ever meaning to and he will swear to anyone that asks that in sophomore year of his bachelor’s degree he woke up one morning to her face staring at him from amongst the trees on a painting he had been working on. he will hesitantly add that it’s possible that he had just been thinking of her while half asleep, though ethan doesn’t really believe that

currently working as a TA for some of the freshman art classes, as well as overseeing the use of the different art studios from time to time.

doesn’t believe in labels --- and that’s corny as hell, but he just wants to be able to be whoever he is in the moment and has had some harsher reactions when he uses umbrella terms, so he just refuses to label himself. relationship-wise it’s a whole different issue, he floats from one major relationship to another and often times will cycle back to one that’s already gone sour.

has recently started going to a therapist to talk about some of the issues he has processing emotions and his fear of change ---- it’s been helping but he’s still very much on the verge of flight mode and will run away from situations that demand any real sort of emotional input from him on occasion.

personality:

he is cynical, despite a desire to believe the best in people and the world - he has seen too much of the darker side of the world to ever truly believe it ---- this is reflected not only in his interactions with people ( he is open about expressing doubt and disbelief, he won’t believe a word you say, and he overanalyzes promises / invitations / declarations of love ) but also in his art and aesthetic which veers towards the dark and damned, a lot of his work is themed around broken things

stubborn as a mule ---- once he gets an idea in his mind, it can be hard to change his mind with logical arguments though an emotional appeal will have a better chance ---- he’s very set in his ways and struggles with questioning why things are the way they are, insisting that somethings should just be. loathes change and isn’t afraid to express this dislike --- tends to eat the same foods, wear the same clothes, go to the same places ---- despite a childhood dislike of routine, he finds it comforting nowadays, it feels safe.

loyal as all hell, you can hurt him a million times and he will still struggle to walk away and a genuine apology will win him back in an instant. he struggles to cut ties, even with those that he knows aren’t the best for him and has only successfully done so when it is possible for him to do so in a swift and permanent way. in most cases, he will eventually find his way back to those that he knows.

friendly but not overly so --- he has no issue approaching people if he needs something, but he’s not generally one to approach you just to “chat” b/c he’s not big on small talk in general and honestly? he’d never say it but if he doesn’t know you, he doesn’t really give a damn how your day went or how you feel about the weather or current events. if he drinks, he becomes a little more sociable in that matter, but that often drifts into “ethan is going to info-dump about whatever has his interest in the moment and the only way to stop him is to like physically place something in / on his mouth” territory which is a whole different level of awkward.

backstory:

growing up in a household where routine took priority, ethan spent a long time feel stifled by his parent’s demands that everything turned out perfectly ---- the neverending need to do things at just the right time, in just the right way. it was like fitting into a sweater that was just a tad too small, wrong in a way that is hard to explain

it’s in high school that he meets a true kindred spirit in the form of his art teacher ---- he helps ethan to realize his need for freedom and self-expression, and embraces his abilities in a way that he had always been afraid to. it’s a change that his parents are disapproving of, trying to reroute their son’s future to one of the paths that they would have approved of. but for once, he allows himself to rebel.

and after graduation, he leaves. running to new york, where he throws himself into the art scene head first without any real plans. for two years, he works multiple jobs as he cycles through sketchy roommates in his shitty apartment and equally shitty life partners, trying to discover things about himself that he hadn’t known before.

he’s still figuring some of that out, unsure of how to label his gender or his sexuality --- wishing more than anything that he could just be, a desire that he has long held onto since childhood that’s coming back to haunt them at last.

that’s not the only thing that’s caught up with them as of late, the digby’s finally managing to track him down in new york and showing up at his apartment two years after he initially ran off. they came with open minds and a burning desire to see their son do something other than work minimum wage jobs and live in run-down apartments. they were quiet and subdued in a way that they never had been.

it took six months for them to convince him to enroll in college, and he eventually chose to attend radcliffe with an undeclared major. it was far enough from his hometown that his parents couldn’t reasonably drive up too often, but close enough that he could go home if he had wanted. a three-hour drive in the best traffic.

the distance proved to be the right amount --- though his parents certainly seemed to pop up over the first three months with containers of food and worries that their child would have run off, they eventually learned to trust him. and slowly, the wounds healed ---- ethan wouldn’t say that they’re close but they’ve learned to respect each other’s boundaries.

and he’s never seen them more proud than at graduation, except maybe when he told them that he was going to apply to grad school. it wasn’t the path that they had planned for ethan, but they had learned to be enthusiastic about his success, about his dreams and about his art.

doing his master’s degree - it’s been weird. being here is weird for him in general, he still misses new york even though it was a whole different kind of existence ---- he misses the stability of going to work everyday and being completely independent. here, he has to rely on his professors and classmates, he has people that expect him to check in with them and there’s more socialization --- mostly because he’s been trying to do better with that.

connections:

good / bad influence: okay so traditionally, i think these would be separate connections but i think in this case, it’s more convoluted than that. for all of ethan running away from the environment his parents made, he’s very much stuck to those rules and expectations --- i would love for someone to start to break him out of that --- encourage him to party and drink and live life, and it doesn’t all have to be bad, it can be good too. you know, them bringing him to parties and him learning actually valuable lessons from it --- idk open to talking about their potential influence on each other, i think it could be fun

frenemies ( onesided or not ): i think a lot of ethan’s trust issues are a projection mechanism because he knows that in some ways that he can’t be trusted --- so i wld love for someone who they act like best friends when they’re together and then ethan just ... talks smack about them and doesn’t keep their secrets ( and maybe they do the same?? )

exes ( of all types / genders / whatever ): this one, my dear ethan, has gotten around a bit --- maybe they hooked up and now it’s awkward ---- maybe they dated for a while and keep circling back to each other despite knowing that they’re bad for each other ( a la unmiss you by clara mae ) ---- maybe they dated for a while and now they never talk so when they do see each other it’s just ... awkward as hell ---- open to literally anything with this one guys

art buddies: just two pals, palling around --- only prerequisite is that your character has some sort of interest in an art ( writing, theatre, music, film, etc etc ) --- and hey maybe they don’t get along but they put up a united front against the STEM majors who mock their choices in major?

other: open to discussing dormates, coworkers, current love interests and literally anything else that you can think of --- does your character need someone over 21 to buy them alcohol? call ethan. for real tho, hit me up and let’s come up with some stuff!

#radintro #i refuse to make this longer by introducing myself hi i'm drew

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anogete · 5 years

Text

Choosing You Update and FINAL Sneak Peek

I’m going to start on chapter 25 tonight and will have it done tomorrow and maybe part of chapter 26. I’m still pretty sure there will be 29 chapters and maybe an epilogue. I have about 123,000 words so far, which means the fic will probably end up being 150-155,000. My goal is still to have the first draft done by the end of the month. I’ll need a few days after that to my final full-fic edit before I start posting. Tentative date I’d post the first chapter is probably going to be somewhere between August 4th and 8th. The other chapters will follow one per day after that, of course.

The first 20 chapters are beta’d and I’m having a couple lovely people read them so I can get feedback on plot/characterization/structure. I’m trying hard to get this done and to you all soon. I’m exhausted from writing so much.

Also, here is an excerpt from the 5th chapter if you care for a sneak peek...

He took a drink and leaned his head back against the window behind them. “It is, actually. It is a big deal.”

“Well, it would be if you were a jerk, but you’re not. Unless this is all an act.”

Without lifting his head off the glass, he rolled it over so he could look at her. “I gotta be honest with you, Darcy, I’m probably not going to be the easiest person to live with. I haven’t… I haven’t actually lived with anyone since… since I…”

“Got your freedom back?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he agreed, rolling his head back so he was looking up at the sky. “And I wouldn’t say my time with HYDRA was spent living with anyone since I was in a cyro chamber.”

We’ll figure it out,” she told him. She didn’t know what else to say. What did he mean, he wasn’t easy to live with? Did he leave dirty dishes in the sink? Dirty clothes scattered across the bedroom? So did she. “Wait, are you trying to tell me that you snore?”

He chuckled. “Maybe? I honestly don’t know.”

“None of your dates have been allowed to stay long enough to find out?” She regretted saying it as soon as the question left her mouth, but taking it back wasn’t an option, and she actually did want to know what his life was like. Did he sleep around? Was he going to while they pretended to be married and in love? The prospect of him bringing a woman home while she was a room away made Darcy feel sick to her stomach. She had no right to feel that way, though.

“No dates. No women.”

“Men?” she asked.

He chuckled again. “No men.”

“Just me then,” she said, a little surprised that he didn’t seem to be interested in scratching that itch. Unless he’s lying to make you feel better, she told herself.

He closed his eyes. “Just you.”

The way he said those two words stirred up butterflies in her stomach. “Lucky me,” Darcy said, her voice only holding a hint of the teasing that she’d intended to imbue those words with. Instead, it sounded like she was actually happy that he wasn’t going to be fucking around on their fake-ass marriage. God, she must sound so pathetic.

“I don’t know if I’d call you lucky. You gotta deal with me and all my… issues.”

“Oh? You didn’t get the memo about my issues? They are so much worse.”

“How do you figure?” he asked, eyes still closed.

“Well, mostly because I don’t have a good reason for them and you do. Mine are just general neurotic behavior. I think it all goes back to missing those two weeks of school in third grade because I had chickenpox. Missing the times tables fucked up my entire education, causing me to try too hard. Which resulted in me thinking that I needed a graduate degree. Which resulted in my internship with Jane and my life simultaneously getting more awesome and turning into a complete trainwreck at the same time.”

She could see the way he was smiling even though she could only see his profile. “You know, I had the same problem.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” he told her. “Except without the grad school and internship.”

She chuckled and took a sip of her coffee. “Right, right. You had the military and the whole prisoner of war thing with a side of mind-fuck. That’s the worst, dude.”

Bucky rolled his head over to look at her again. His weariness was evident in his eyes and the dark circles beneath them. “You sure you wanna do this, sweetheart?” His voice was soft, barely a whisper.

Darcy swallowed the lump in her throat at the way he was looking at her like nothing else existed and the way he’d called her sweetheart. “I’m sure. Are you sure?”

His smile was broken and sad, but it was still a smile. “No, I’m not sure. But you’re making it easier for me to say yes.”

“Am I?”

“Mmmm,” he agreed, sitting up and taking a drink of his coffee. “Why did you agree before you met me?”

She shrugged. “Seemed like the right thing to do. Plus, Steve said when we did meet that I could back out and no one would be mad about it.”

“You still can. Back out, I mean. You know that right?”

“Yeah,” Darcy said. “I know that. But I’m not going to. Are you?”

Bucky didn’t answer immediately. After a long moment of silence, he said, “We’ll see tomorrow.” She watched him rest his forearms on his knees. The left arm was intimidating because it looked like a weapon that had been attached to his shoulder. He took a drink from his mug. “Would you be mad at me if I backed out?” he asked, eyes on the ground at his feet.

“No,” she said right away. “Why would I be mad?”

“No job, no loan payoff.”

She shook her head. “No, I wouldn’t be mad. That shouldn’t factor into your decision.” Darcy shifted in her seat and crossed one leg over the other. The movement made him glance over in her direction. “Are you still not feeling too excited over… everything else?”

His raised brows told her he wasn’t sure what she was referring to.

“Everything else,” she told him. “People, crowds, responsibilities, people knowing who you are. You know—responsibilities of modern American life or whatever.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, looking at the ground again. “Responsibilities.”

She sat her mug down and leaned back in her chair, looking up at the clear sky filled with stars. “It won’t be so bad. I’ll do the dishes if you clean the bathroom once a week.”

Bucky chuckled. “Oh, yeah?”

“Okay, okay. You drive a hard bargain. I’ll make dinner and do the dishes if you clean the bathroom.”

“Sounds like you don’t like cleaning the bathroom.”

“I don’t. I’ll let the mold have it and hope I don’t get a disease when I shower.”

He sat back in his chair and tilted his head towards the sky just like she’d done. “I’ll clean the bathroom and do the dishes if you cook.”

“Will you fold my laundry, too?”

“You’re pushing it, sweetheart,” he said. She could hear the way he was grinning in the tone of his voice.

#wintershock wip #bucky/darcy #anogete #choosing you #sneak peek of wip #mcu fanfiction

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sojuu · 4 years

Text

i woke up crying.

it was such a weird dream but i can’t help but believe that any dream i’m experiencing is truly reality and i end up facing it with the entirety of my existence, not a part of me knowing or even considering the fact that it’s all in my head. i hate it so much. i woke up crying and as it slowly sunk in that i was really just dreaming, i felt such a huge wave of relief like i used up the last of my shitty luck and somehow escaped into an alternate reality. anyone would think i had just dreamed of someone dying or something exceptionally terrible. but it wasn’t anything like that. just heartbreak. so familiar, yet it hurt, stung, and burned like the first time.

it’s been happening for a few days now and it’s something i’ve experienced before. i think somehow it’s a coping mechanism for my brain, which is always ( why do you do this ) thinking of the worst possible scenario for my heart and is trying to run through these enactments of heartbreak in the worst possible manner like some sick therapy or training that would somehow harden my heart and prepare me for the worst...or the inevitable. i’m not sure. i can’t say it’s ever worked though. i am still as vulnerable and fragile and prone to break down.

______________________________

in my first relationship, as i was saying goodbye to him before getting ready to return home from school before my summer internship, i asked him if this was a break or a break-up. his answer?

“whatever makes it easier.”

he looked sad but smiled anyway, the most gentlest i’d ever seen him throughout the entirety of our relationship, which was, in short, abusive. i ran to my friends’ apartment across the street and cried into their arms. they supported me and we watched moana to help me feel a bit better. i returned to my apartment later with puffy eyes, my heart a bit lightened. but i could slowly feel it sinking back into this bottomless sadness as i realized i wouldn’t see them for a bit. i felt alone and helpless, not knowing how i would deal with this emotional burden. i wanted it gone but i didn’t know how to get rid of it. i’m impatient. “it gets better with time” i didn’t want to hear it.

i went off to my summer internship in a new city. travelling and living alone in a new city is incredibly exciting but nerve-wracking. but i can’t deny that it helped to focus on something other than my broken heart. i arrived a bit earlier to move in and settle down, giving me some time to explore at my leisure. my room was small but the bed was set right up against the window, giving me tons of sunlight and an alright view of the city. i would watch the sun rise from the window many times as i either failed to sleep or woke up crying. for months.

_______________________________

it was the same feeling as back then. i had dreams that i thought were real until i woke up and saw the sun of a new city flood the room and greet me, assuring me it wasn’t real. except...it eventually did become real. i dreamed that he left me for another girl, someone i knew and was acquainted with. they were always close friends but it never bothered me because, well, i liked her too. and i trusted him. or wanted to believe i could. towards the end of the year though, i had suspected something was up because he told me to leave him alone so he could focus on his finals and applying to grad school. so i did, because your future and your career are important. i stopped messaging him and didn’t talk to him or see him for a week. the next time i did see him, he was watching netflix and laughing with her. i was furious. am i the crazy girlfriend? he hadn’t talked to me at all that week and yet, here i found him enjoying himself with someone else. ( wow typing this out, i really do sound like the crazy girlfriend lol. but dam, he was so shitty to me i ain’t about to discredit myself and give him anything rn. sorry but 2017 and 2018 me were wasted on u. i deserved better u misogynistic asshole with anger management issues who can’t even take care of yourself. i didn’t deserve being told to break up with you from your mom, being told racist things, how she didn’t like koreans coupled with him telling me his mom just wanted him to have a nice chinese girlfriend. fuck you. o shit i just got so angry so fast lmao. repressed much lol )

they eventually started dating the following school year. he had apparently sought after her throughout the summer and when the new semester began. and to think he had the audacity to ask me to be friends again after ghosting me the entire

different story. different time.

i can’t say my dreams were realistic in the slightest. they were over-dramatic and honestly would never play out in real life like they do in my head. but nevertheless, i had my heart broken tons of times that summer just from my own imagination. and just now, too.

he’s my second one. we’re in a bit of a weird spot but basically, we’re chillin. we did actually date for like a month at the beginning of the school year but...things happened. he’s been working the same job and living in this city for years and i’m about to graduate. basically, if we end up in the same city, we’ll start dating again. but if not, it’s over.

i’ve been feeling really shaky about all this because i hate not knowing exactly where i stand in his life and where he stands in mine. we’re not dating but we’re not just friends, either. and i truly thought i could have a future with this guy. i still do, to some degree. but i feel like it’s too early to be thinking about stuff like that. i gotta graduate and get a job first lol. and i guess you could say the easiest solution to all this is to just find jobs in the same cities, which is basically what we’re doing right now. but i’m kinda having a mental breakdown about my career, what i actually want to do, my chance of even getting a job with all this shit happening, etc...

wow the more i write the more ridiculous i sound to myself. i think since it’s been like an hour since i woke up, my sad feelings have like dissipated or something lmao. idk. i feel better but also like...disappointed in myself? i think i just need a therapist to be honest. i thought i was over all the shit that happened in my previous relationship but clearly not. my brain is sabotaging itself with this weird dreaming heartbreak training again because that’s just the shitty way it works. but that doesn’t mean those two people in my life are the same. am i exhibiting the same behavior because i see similarities between them or because i just don’t know any other way to cope? because they are definitely very different people. it’s just...they both broke my trust. i guess that’s one similarity. did it involve other people? yeah. another similarity. hmm, maybe i’m not that crazy after all. i always feel like i overthink and overreact. and i do. i honestly do and i can acknowledge that. but typing this out, i can see why my brain would return to the same coping mechanism.

i should just end it. if i’m having thoughts about him like this, if my trust in him isn’t what it used to be, then maybe this just ain’t it...is what i’ve been thinking at the back of my head for a while. but am i giving up on something that could be? relationships are hard to make work, even good ones. they require trust and work both ways, i know that. communication, understanding, sympathy, vulnerability...all those things and even more. and yet, i can’t really ask for any of that right now since we’re not even at that point. we’re not dating. we’re just chillin. friends with benefits? maybe. but there are definitely strings attached since we, uh, did actually date at some point. idk. i can still see a future with this guy but maybe not now maybe in like...a few years? when i figure out a better way of handling myself? when i get a therapist? when the rest of my life is a bit more figured out? when this virus isn’t wrecking my motivation, mental state, grades, productivity, etc.?

idk man

i just wanted to write down what i dreamed but it ended up being a rant anyway.

i dreamed that he showed me a song. it was kinda like a love song? and we sang it together. and then he told me was gonna sing it to another girl and had all these things prepared to confess to her. i was confused. i thought we were dating. i thought we were together? was this a different timeline? we had a hangout place. it was shaped like a huge glass bottle but twisted towards the top. i cried and ran into the glass bottle building and up the twirling staircase and sang the song. he followed me and gave me a hug while i was crying. there’s an abandoned shopping cart outside of the building. i don’t know why. he goes back downstairs and leaves. i am devastated and crying and singing the song. and then i wake up.

i don’t even remember what the song sounded like.

i feel more normal now. i really need to take a shit tho.

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davetheshady · 5 years

Note

may I politely request ⭐dealer's choice director's commentary⭐for pretty much any part of Love is All You Need to Destroy Your Enemies?

Did you mean: infodump about Chapter 5?

We start off in medias res during Pteranodon Attack-Gate from Episode 4: PTA Meeting. Since most of the fic runs parallel to WTNV’s storyline for the first ~two years, the way I narrowed down which events to feature was to read through the transcripts and take note of which ones had Carlos, which ones featured science/magic/time travel-related elements, which ones had weird discrepancies or unsolved details that could be explained by Carlos/science/magic/time travel/all of the above, and which ones I just liked a lot.

Incidentally, Cecil issues a correction that the winged reptiles in question were actually pterodactyls, not pteranodons, which was then promptly forgotten by the showrunners lol.

"—And then Kelly pulled her hamstring while they were doing the Fixing of a Nail position. I'm trying to convince her that she and Joe should do yoga together, I think it would really cut back on minor injuries and also they both look great in yoga pants. Anything new with you, Carlos?"

"Nothing that compares to... hamstring injuries," says Carlos, from his position on top of the Sciencemobile.

"All right," says Kate, adjusting an enormous pair of mirrored aviator shades. "Then describe the Barstow formation."

Since literal character doubling was such an important part of the plot, I had a lot of fun with thematic character doubling, too. Carlos and Kate (and the other grad students) are actually pretty close in age, and here we see her willing to put herself into danger to get the job done while casually chatting with her colleagues. Also, there’s a nice dose of karma for the books in Carlos having to deal with someone else oversharing details about their relationships, compounded by the fact that unlike his all of Kate’s are actually true. (In nicer doubling news: Kate is the one who gets her degree in science, has functional romantic relationships, AND continues to work in Night Vale, which are all eventually Carlos’ hashtag life goals.)

"Maybe it was future you," asks Julie, who does not sound appropriately concerned for the potentially diverted course of the Currents of Time. Or for the potentially diverted course of the already unlinear life of Carlos.

This is the first conversation where she’s ‘Julie’ in his mental narration. I enjoyed having her be hilariously unsympathetic to his concerns here, because her priorities are still very different, but it also sets up a baseline. She doesn’t bother worrying about hypotheticals from the weird shit, but actual hard data (like, Carlos not sleeping and having minor breakdowns in her lab) is what prompts her to share reactions besides SCIENCE! and snark.

His stomach roils at the thought of more time travel. "Some kind of illusion is more likely," he says: some person or creature temporarily assuming his form, probably for sinister purposes. He reluctantly adds those weird doubles from the sandstorm to his list of possible suspects, though his dissolved right in front of him in the middle of next March and there haven't been any sandstorms recently.

oh hey haha what’s that

One of my biggest pet peeves in fiction is when allegedly intelligent characters ignore obvious plot points so the writer can railroad the story in their chosen direction. On the other hand, it is genuinely difficult to avoid spoiling your plot twists if your main character is actively trying to figure them out. I leaned heavily on “the character has all the basic details… along with so much other information they can’t realistically narrow it down”, combined with some red herrings: an obvious one (illusion magic) and hopefully a more convincing one (time travel as the only relevant plot: it's DEFINITELY involved, but its presence is obscuring another facet of the plot altogether).

There's always a risk that astute readers will figure it out, but, like… so? That just means instead of shocking plot twist reveal, they get an “I KNEW IT!” reveal, which is equally satisfying in a different way. As long as the characters have convincing reasons for not figuring it out, it's hopefully still enjoyable to follow along with them as they wander around in the dark.

(And just for clarification: that was Doppel-Carlos crashing the town hall meeting when he and Dr. Raith were testing out time vortices.)

Andre hands him a copy of the Night Vale Daily Journal. “’Look your best to face the void. Smooth-chinned souls are most enjoyed’,” reads Carlos. “‘Burma-Shave.’”

"No, below the ads," says Andre.

1) ‘character reads wrong piece of information in paper’ is a classic goof (“There’s a sale at Penney’s!”) and I found it very amusing to repeatedly attribute it to Carlos, since he’s genuinely trying to locate the important information. Unfortunately for him, he lives in Night Vale and no longer has a filter for “useless nonsense”, because even the nonsense has proven relevant and/or kinda murdery before.

2) Burma-Shave! This was passed down to me as part of our Great American Roadtrip Family Lore (I come from a long line of roadtrippers) and it’s definitely the kind of kitschy 50s detail that fits so well in Night Vale.

"Oh!" says Cecil. "What were you studying?"

"Bioremediation for contaminated pit lakes via sulfur-reducing bacteria," says Carlos truthfully.

Why? Because I edited one of my friends’ papers on it, that’s why. (Birds kept landing on it and dying, which is also a very Night Vale detail.)

When he returns, he finds Cecil standing by the record player with his back against the wall, staring fixedly at Carlos’ vinyl copy of Ixnay on the Hombre.

One of the DF books (I think White Night) had a hilariously high number of characters showing up wearing band t-shirts, and Carlos’ was for The Offspring. (The original file name for this fic was Original Prankster, back when I thought it would be three chapters long.)

“It’s about a wizard stranded in a strange, uncharted desert territory,” [Cactus Judy] says serenely.

Cactus Jane! I decided to make her a recurring character because 1) she’s in a time travel episode (Episode 18: The Traveler), 2) both she and TMITJ had the detail where no one can remember their real name, which seemed significant, and 3) WTNV itself did not have very many recurring female characters at that point. She’s into Shakespeare because I personally knew a lot of relevant Shakespeare quotes, but also as a hint that’s she’s a lot older (and thus a lot more supernatural) than she seems: Shakespeare was a HUGE part of pop culture in the 19th century, particularly in the southwest. Theater companies used to make more money going on tour through states with precious metal mines than they did during their whole season in the big coastal cities, probably because jaded city folks never threw gold nuggets on stage to show their appreciation.

If life is a contest between good and evil, Cecil would be one of the people handing out stickers just for participating.

This is one of my favorite lines.

My plan is fool-proof! It's sheer elegance in its simplicity!

Look, if you enjoyed this fic, WTNV, and/or The Dresden Files, you should probably go watch The Middleman. Yes, I know it’s not streaming, do it anyway. Load up on antivenom and go rent it from your local library.

“Could you [create a time vortex]?""Oh, for sure," says Carlos. "All I'd need would be a couple years to do nothing but work on a highly illegal spell and figure out a way to steal an entire ley-line's worth of power and excise my sense of morality and self-preservation.”

And WHAT are the odds of THAT

It's not that Carlos doesn't like him. It just wouldn't be fair to lead him on when Carlos wouldn't actually—

Well, Carlos wouldn’t mind asking but he doesn’t normally go for—

Okay, Carlos could definitely make an exception for Cecil and—

And—

oh NO he accidentally used logic to make himself admit he has FEELINGS

One of the reasons I love this pairing is that you have Cecil, who is incredibly emotionally open (all the time, on public radio) as a distinct contrast to Carlos, who is so used to putting up a very specific facade that he even does it to himself and then struggles when he doesn't have it to rely on. It creates conflict, but it also means they have very different perspective they can share with each other.

"Did the earth move for you, too?" says Cecil.

"Bwuh?" replies Carlos.

"At the monitoring station," says Cecil, because right, they're talking about science and not about how Carlos may or may not have accidentally developed a tiny, tiny crush on Cecil, who is standing right in front of him and looking extremely interested in what he's saying and will commit his words to memory and lovingly repeat them for all the world, or at least all of Night Vale and anyone else who received the same odd death curse as Carlos, to hear.

"Oh. Hmm – unh," replies Carlos, then shakes his head. Not talking, that's the way to go. That way he won't accidentally say something he doesn't mean, or worse, something he does mean but probably shouldn't say. Cecil can ask him science questions and he can shake his head yes or no, and maybe refer him wordlessly to supplementary materials, and it will all be very professional and—

"Where did you get your shirt?" asks Cecil. "It fits you so well."

"I'll look at my notes and computer models and see if I can figure out what's going on," Carlos blurts out, and practically runs from the room.

One of the reasons I started writing this fic (SEPTEMBER 2013, BABY god I feel old) was because we all knew Carlos was immensely important to Cecil, but had relatively little information about him, and ALL of it was filtered through our unreliable narrator. So… I just kind of ran with that.

But on top of the obvious unreliability of “didn't notice Carlos was a wizard from a different series”, I wanted to do it on the smaller scale, too, and put a different spin on the touchstones of their growing relationship that everyone was already familiar with. So this interaction is now a crisis for both of them, and for dramatically/hilariously different reasons.

“If you’re worried about going native, I’ve got bad news for you, buddy, because you do more chanting than anyone I’ve met.”

Another one of my favorite lines.

“I’ve had to hunt down people I know before, and trust me, it’s not a fun date night!”

Between Molly and fanon interpretations of Cecil, Carlos’ type is apparently 1) weird tattoos, 2) unusually-colored hair, and 3) can kill him

There's a brief hiss from the TV's speakers, and then Cecil says, in a small, forlorn voice, “I don't know if he listens to me, sometimes.”

Carlos puts his head down and laughs bitterly.

I LOVE IRONY

But even though I wanted to subvert the surface meaning, Cecil DOES still have a point. He got a good look at Carlos’ soul when they first met and still fell in love instantly, but Carlos has a difficult time hearing that because at this point he fundamentally does not believe he’s worthy of that kind of love. In order to truly believe Cecil, he also has to start learning to love and accept himself. (It’s very much a work in progress, but nobody’s perfect.) The title isn’t just meant to refer to romantic love – self-love, friendship, familial love, and unconditional love for the humanity of his trash fire town are equally important, because they all support each other.

hmu for more dvd commentary!

#thusjuniperus #love is all you need to destroy your enemies #Welcome to Night Vale #ask dave #the dresden files #fic #writing

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physioblr · 5 years

Text

Hello followers!

Sorry for not making original studyblr content in forever. I should update you on what has happened since Autumn quarter.

Autumn Quarter:

I had a terrible quarter. I managed to have an awful biology professor, the kind of professor that is proud of the fact that his exam distributions look like barf. He also revealed himself to be racist and taught the ecology unit with most settler colonial savior complex imaginable. Oh, and he admitted to 600 students that he failed his grad exams and only got his job as a lecturer because of his father-in-law — he used this story as a sort of failed attempt at ‘you fail and fail and then you become successful someday’ weird inspirational narrative.

I didn’t fail his class by any stretch of the imagination, but it did bring down my cumulative 4.0 GPA.

I also had a disability access coordinator that I didn’t really click with. She has dyscalculia, but had internalized a lot of ableism. She didn’t seem to get why I was doing a STEM degree and thought I was trying to pull a fast one with an accommodation. It was really gross, considering accommodations are my legal right and it was her job to help me make sure professors are following federal law.

I got rather depressed, had panic attacks on the regular, and my ADHD got really bad. I had to realize I had very few tools for dealing with the emotional dysregulation part of ADHD. I was not my best self.

Winter Quarter:

I had a wonderful quarter. Though, I had to study like a professional athlete to get a 4.0. I discovered I loved organic chemistry winter quarter and was really good at helping others understand it. It almost made me want to change my major. My orgo professor was amazing! He was really respectful and chill about my accommodations. Everyone loved him, and our whole class got fairly good grades.

I got assigned a different access coordinator. She seemed nice enough. I didn’t have much contact with her at all because I didn’t need much help getting accommodations implemented.

I also worked on my emotional regulation tools a lot over winter. It took a lot of mindfulness practice and I improved a lot.

Spring Quarter:

I had a terrible and exhausting quarter. My biochem professor was a piece of work. She was really insecure. She pulled a Jeb Bush and asked for praise during lectures, it was so cringe. She was also really ableist. I emailed her to start the ‘interactive process’ regarding my disabilities (as per university policy) before the quarter started. She didn’t reply until my access coordinator and the department made her — her excuse was that her email somehow was broken for over a month. She fought me on accommodations basically every week, wouldn’t listen to directions from my access coordinator, and was just overall insufferable.

It wasn’t just me that had issue with her. The whole class was close to rioting because of how unprofessional and unprepared she was to be head lecturer. I got some tea from the TAs and apparently the head TA went to bat for us about her exams being insane. One TA also told me that the course content was impossible, he had a year to learn it and we only had a quarter.

Despite all her shenanigans, I got a 4.0. I studied 4-6 hours a day. The class distribution was a nightmare. The standard deviation got larger for every exam, and the class average got lower too. It was horrendous. I’m not sure how I got an A.

I have a feeling my access coordinator is going to reassign me in September. I had her help me a lot. So much that although it’s her job, I felt guilty. I would get panic attacks when my biochem professor would challenge an exam accommodation because of her feels . I would also get panic attacks when the professor didn’t email me worksheets in accessible text (and as an extra time for assigned work accommodation) — this made it really difficult for me to participate in group work. So, I had to ask my access coordinator to deal with her. It felt like I was just re-experiencing all ableist teacher trauma if I tried to deal with her.

What I’m up to this summer:

I’m recovering from burnout. By the time Spring finals came around, I was feeling incredibly burned out. All I wanted to do was sleep and laze about. So, I took a few weeks off after finals.

I’m getting swol. My workout routine got sacrificed too often in favor of studying. I got to the point where I felt guilty about it if I wasn’t using quizlet while at the gym. It was unhealthy. Going to the gym is super important and helps lessen my hyperactive symptoms (without cranking up my medication dose). So, this summer I started lifting and doing cardio regularly.

I’m learning R. I’m already kind of familiar with it, but I have forgotten a lot that I learned and I want to go about it more deliberately this time.

I’m volunteering for Extinction Rebellion (rebellion.earth) by making educational and promotional materials. I will share them on here this summer! In case you all don’t already know — we have 10 years until we reach a point of no return on walking back the effects of climate change. Please join an activist group like extinction rebellion in your area! We seriously need more people getting involved if we are going to stop the extinction of our species.

I’m making ADHD & dyscalculia friendly study-guides (I think that is what I have landed on calling them, but if you all have better suggestions let me know!) which is basically material condensed down to something a lot more manageable but a bit less personal than notes. The subjects I’m covering are organic chemistry, general chemistry, biochemistry, biology, and probably statistics. I’m going to be selling them online, and I will definitely link them here if you all are interested!

Due the above, I will be reviving #studycation posts! (:

[Pictured: My university campus, photos taken over several quarters]

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ducklover52 · 5 years

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On the close #WorldMentalHealthDay I wanna say how proud I am of my friends going to therapy and taking care of themselves.

Also how jealous I am.

warning: this is a very long/extremely personal post. if you don’t wanna get into it, basically, I’m proud of you for going, I’m proud of you for trying, I’m jealous of your strength, of finding a good fit and sticking it out to do so. I wish us all the strength we need to ask for help (we’re not weak, but I know that it feels that way, especially when you’re deep in it), the resources to make it work, and the success of finding someone/something that works for you.

I promise, you can stop here. goodnight.

No? Then strap in because this went on tangents I wasn’t even planning on and I’ll admit I even got lost along the way. I think I picked it back up at the end but oof, it took a minute to get there and that transition isn’t good. Okay here we go:

I saw a therapist a few times during my senior year of college. My ex had started seeing one earlier. I had gone with him a couple times and he helped convince me that it was time. I had lost my mom two years earlier. I thought it would help and he said it would.

His guy wouldn't see me/didn't have time to? I don't remember what exactly the issue was. He gave me a number. I called her and we set up an initial meeting, with my ex's help. I never had the "strength" to ask for help by myself. He came with me the first couple times, just to the appointment itself-not into our meeting. I stopped asking him to go with me after a couple weeks. I was over him. I didn’t want to see him at all in my life and I hated associating him with therapy.

I didn't like my therapist. I didn't think she really understood me. I told her about feeling rejected when I didn’t get cast in the last musical of my college career. She basically said oh well. I told her about the stress I was feeling to get my requirements done. She said make a list. I had a list; I’d been checking off my degree audit since freshman year. I didn’t feel any connection. I stopped wanting to share and started feeling judged. I had always been anxious about seeing her to begin with. I stopped seeing her January before I graduated. I had to miss an appointment to go to the regional theatre festival. I never called to reschedule. It wasn’t a good fit.

I met a guy at the festival. We fell fast and hard. We both had issues. He had someone to see/talk to about it. I didn’t. I remember being jealous of having a doctor who prescribed anti-anxiety meds. I also remember him needing substances to assist the meds, or replace them when he couldn’t get his prescription refilled. I didn’t envy that. When I had had enough of being ignored, as he lived 3hrs away and I was the only one willing to make the drive, I started seeing other guys.

Or rather, I started getting really drunk at parties. The “cast party” of my only time stage managing included getting really drunk at the student conductor’s apartment and playing strip spin the bottle. Sorority parties would lead to making out with a sister’s formal date or going home with a guy I’d known since freshman year. I’d talk with them for a week or so before making up shit about not wanting to date an underclassman since I was graduating. Once I actually started dating one of them, after bonding over our parents passing away. I decided he was too good for me, especially after I had gone to visit the theatre guy one night and the next day had to drive straight from Charleston to a Chipotle date and almost ran out of gas getting there. But that was right before finals, so the timing worked for me.

Before graduating, I started rehearsing for my first post-grad show. It was community theatre near my house, my best friends were in charge, and I was just happy to get a production credit and work with my friends. A friend in the cast started making friends and I followed suit. About a month in I was dating one of the leads.We spent almost every day together. We also drank together almost every night, but we were young and didn’t think anything of it. I thought this was it. I had always wanted a showmance and I got it. We talked about our feelings, about his ADHD, how he went to therapy every week. I thought I found someone else I could really connect to. I shared how I’d struggled with my self-image all my life, how I’d tried therapy but didn’t like it, how I wanted to try again but didn’t know where to start. I thought he could help. I thought he could save me.

But three months in and a party with my high school friends tore us apart. I still don’t really know what happened that night but it threw my into a whole new depression. It didn’t help that we had just agreed on a new show to audition for together. And of course we were both cast. And he started dating another cast member. I tried not to care but I was hurt and jealous. And he kept reaching out. He said we could be friends and I was desperate for attention. When I couldn’t see him I acted out by sleeping with a friend.

He acted upset but never really cared. He told me I needed to see and talk someone to help myself move forward in life. Then he’d stop for a day or so before coming back, usually while drinking. And she found out, though it’s not like I tried to hide it (hey girl, how’s it going) cause I was selfish. When she’d had enough she called it quits. I thought maybe we could go back to before. He stopped coming around. My heart was broken all over because their relationship ending didn’t mean ours would start again.

I had gotten on tinder while I was fooling around with him. During that time. I had matched with and started talking to my now bf. I don’t think he was really looking for anything then. We’d go through slow periods where I’d doubt myself and my worth if he didn’t reply. Eventually my bf ended up ghosting me. My ex had given me the contact info for a new therapist. I’d call the number and hang up before I stopped ringing. I’d visit the website and see how much I could do without giving them my info. I was nervous to start again. I didn’t know if I could trust these people, after they guy who showed me to them had given up on me. I never did get into contact with them.

My bf came back into my life about 5 months later. But this time when we started talking we didn’t stop. We finally started dating. When I got moody, I tried to express how I felt and why. He did a good job of expressing his feelings and telling me how much he cared. I hadn’t experienced that in a while that I was feeling so good about us. During this time, my dad was dating someone. She and her two kids moved in over that summer. Shit got complicated. She and her kids destroyed my life. I leaned on my bf as much as I could, but we were long distance. My sister had just gotten engaged and she and her then fiance were doing some premarital counseling. She had had a lot of issues coming from my dad and his then fiance and it led to us all needing to go to a session.

During the one or two we attended, my sister tried to explain how we felt about our dad’s fiancee taking over. They’d ask me to chime in and I wouldn’t be able to speak for myself. I was scared. I was still living with my dad at the time and I couldn’t be honest about what I was feeling or experiencing. I was singled out during these sessions and asked about my mental health history and things I didn’t feel comfortable discussing with or in front of my family. I shut down. I was asked to find my own help or see someone else to discuss these things. And I couldn’t get the attention off me. At the time I felt picked on and judged. Like I did when I first talked to someone in college. I felt discouraged. I was scared.

Since then I’ve been kicked out of the house I grew up in, I’ve fought with my bf about the same topics I don’t even know how many times, and I’ve had a couple of the shittiest years to date, including things that I’m still not quite ready to discuss, even in anonymity on the internet. And through this all, and what I was eventually trying to make my way back to, I’ve known that I should probably be seeing someone. I have friends who are in therapy and I’m jealous. I want the relief that comes with sharing your thoughts and feelings with someone who’s job is to help you make sense of it all. But I’ve never found that. I don’t know what it’s like. I don’t know where to find it and I don’t know where to look. And now I’m off my dad’s insurance and couldn’t even afford it if I did.

I don’t know how to end this, except to again, praise those of you are seeking the help you need/want because good for you, you deserve it! We all do. If you’re not currently seeing a professional but you want to, I wish you nothing but success in finding someone you jive with because I know it’s not just a one and done situation. And to those of you like me who don’t know how to go from here, or how to reach out, or even what you want/need, I wish you clarity to figure it out and resources to try to make it work. I hope we all get what we need and deserve in the end.

#world mental health day #long post #like REALLY long #therapy #idek

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