#outdated by a couple months

[alltheangstmygifttoyou]

I can barely use tumblr without it crashing and this ain't what I usually put on my blog but I dont care bc I'm excited and want to throw ideas into the void!!! So under the cut will be SPOILERS for Helluva Boss all episodes released to this day (9/9/23 having season 2 episode 6 posted and the date of me typing this post). Cool? Cool.

Edit: (its now 12/10/23 and I see I never posted this lmao its just in my drafts. Which I have like fifty of 😅)

Okay okay so like: I'm a nerd who's an obsessive little bitch at times and when Fizz was explaining his side of events I was like... I'm not calling you a liar, 'cause Blitzø was definitely jealous, at least a bit, but I dont think jealousy over fame caused the biggest strain. So I went back through the episode slowly and took some screen shots of the flashback parts to show a bit what I mean.

[Image description: Cash Buckzo smiling as young adult Fizz reads card with words on the front saying "Wish you were My So" with Fizz's hand blocking the last letter. In the background of the image young adult Blitzø is watching behind curtains unhappily]

Pretty sure we can all tell that card really saying "wish you were my son" seeing how we know Cash is a shit father from season 2 episode 1. The deep blue (personally reminds me of space) and star decorations of the card are also an interesting choice, as well as the handwriting. It all points to Cash either having other people doing work for him, or being capable of doing these things himself, but not caring enough to similarly educate his kid in turn. So its no fucking wonder why Blitzø was upset! Theres a difference in wanting the spot light and wanting your parent to act like they love you instead of your bestest friend! (As someone who was the bestest friend at one point shit ain't comfortable!)

So Blitzø sees this shit and feels understandably hurt. I would too. He has a letter for Fizz, but logical or not, the hurt caused by Cash would sour emotions around Fizz for Blitzø for a little bit likely. So he removed himself from the situation before really ever entering, and with the shove he gave the cake holder and the talk of booze stealing from Cash later in the episode, I have to imagine that was his way of trying to not ruin Fizz's party. Blitzø throughout the series has been a bit quick to violence, volatile emotions would just worsen things. In some sense, if the fire hadn't gotten out of hand so quickly- or they waited until the cake was settled to light the candles, I'd argue Blitzø was making a more emotional mature decision than I normally think of him.

But then theres the card and flower itself. Its sealed with a heart sticker and says "Fizz's eyes only". The flower looks familiar. Five red petals all coming together to a yellow eye like center. Reminds me of the flowers in Stolas' hospital room in season 2 episode 4 Western Energy. People theorized that those petals dropping had something to do with the whole he loves me he loves me not game. The nature of these twos relationship is interesting.

I included these four screen shots because I think they emphasize the hurt Blitzø felt, his confusion, but mainly to point out Cash. When all the charecters are silhouettes we see one that is clearly Blitzø standing under Fizz's birthday banner. But behind him, one of the last sprinting out of the tent is a partly hidden silhouette. But the horn, head, hand/claws, and mustache make it clear that this is Cash once again. But when we see from a more street view Blitzø is alone when the explosion of fireworks happened. Doesn't this imply that Cash just not only left the kid who he wished was his son but also his blood son behind despite all he needed to do was grab them and push them to run?

[dreambelievers]

credit for the original edit (that I butchered for the joke) goes to ikaMikara on reddit

[kirjoart]

Hurt & comfort

[bad-cos-ideas]

economy fix so nothing is more expensive than 36k and having 10k is being rich.. or just increase the trading limit because its stupid and dumb and literally asking for people to get scammed. I DONT CARE IF THE CREATURE IS "WORTH" 10K IF I CAN NEVER SELL THEM!!

🦐

[zero-zonee]

Icon. 💖

[mourning-again-in-america]

really appreciate the japanese/rest of the world split in the TCG, because 1. everyone knows that the best players are themselves incredibly baffling often wrong, adapted to a very insular format but 2. they're the best evidence for what's good from the new set. but 3. they might not even be playing the same formats, also the japanese meta adjusts weirdly because the set release dates are different.

[queenerdloser]

i picked an apartment (NOT the church remodel one lmao) and signed my lease and i have a car now so most of what was stressing me out this month is now wrapped up, which explains why my body decided i had Done Enough and gave me a head cold to force me to rest in bed.

[yokelfelonking]

Post 9/11 Trivia

Most folks on this site were either children on September 11, 2001, or weren’t even born yet.  But America went crazy for about a year afterwards.  Here’s some highlights that I remember that might not be in your history books:

There was national discussion on whether or not Halloween should be canceled because…fuck if I know why.  After planes crashed into buildings in NYC it follows that 6-year-olds in Iowa shouldn’t be allowed to dress up like Batman and ask their neighbors for candy, I guess.  (Halloween wasn’t canceled, by the way.)

On a similar note, people asked if comedy - any sort of comedy - was appropriate anymore, ever.

People sold shitty parachutes to suckers “in case your building gets attacked and you have to jump out the window.” There were honest-to-God news reports warning people not to jump out of the window with shitty mail-order parachutes because they wouldn't work.

As a follow-up to the attacks, someone mailed anthrax to some prominent politicians and news anchors - you know, famous people - along with some badly-written notes about “you cannot stop us, death to America, Allah is good” and after that every time some random dumbass found a package in the mail they didn’t recognize they thought that the terrorists were targeting them, too.

Everyone was similarly convinced that their town was going to be the next target, even if they were a little town in the middle of nowhere. "Our town of Bumblefuck, South Dakota (population 690) has the largest styrofoam pig statue west of the Mississippi! Terrorists might fly planes into that too! It's a prime target!"

People started taping up their windows and trying to make their houses or apartments airtight out of fear of chemical and biological attacks. There were news reports warning people that turning your house into an airtight box was a bad idea because, y'know, you need air to breathe.

"[X] supports terrorism!" and “if we do [X], the terrorists win!” were used as arguments for everything.  "Some rich Arab you never heard of donated to his organization that backs Hamas which backs al-Queda, and also owns stock in a holding company that has partial ownership of the Pringles company, so if you eat Pringles you're supporting terrorism!" "The terrorists want to tear down our freedoms and our way of life and rule us through fear! Eating what you want is one of our freedoms as Americans! If you're afraid to eat Pringles, the terrorists win!" (I promise you that this sort of argument is in no way hyperbole.) (This argument is how Halloween was saved, by the way.  “If we cancel Halloween, the terrorists win!”)

People worked 9/11 into everything, and I mean everything, whether it was appropriate or not.  If you went to the grocery store the tortilla chips would remind you to support the troops on the packaging. Used car sales would be dedicated to our brave first responders. You couldn't wipe your ass without the toilet paper rolls reminding you to never forget the fallen of 9/11, and again, this is not hyperbole. My uncle, who lived in Ohio and had never been to New York except to visit once in the 70′s, died of a stroke about 8 months after 9/11, and the priest brought up the attacks at the eulogy.

On a similar local note, on the day of 9/11, after the towers went down, gas stations in my home town immediately jacked up gas prices.  The mayor had the cops go around and force them to take them back down.  I doubt any of that was legal.

Before 9/11, Christianity in America - and religion in general - was on a downward swing, with reddit-tier atheism on the upswing. Religion was outdated superstition from a bygone age. The day after 9/11? Every single church was PACKED. (This wasn't a bad thing, but the power-hungry on the Evangelical Right saw this as a golden opportunity to grab power and influence.)

EDIT: By Popular Demand - Freedom Fries. I initially left these off because they came a couple years after the initial panic and most people thought they were kind of absurd (and I don't recall anyone really going along with it other than maybe some local diners here and there). France didn't want to get involved in our world policing so some folks were like "TRAITORS!" and wanted to call french fries "Freedom Fries" instead, so as to stick it to the French.

Besides dumb shit like that…it’s really hard to overstate how completely the national mood and character changed in the span of a day, or how much of the current culture war is a result of the aftermath. (9/11 was the impetus for the sharp rise in power of the Evangelical Right, who made themselves utterly odious and the following backlash helped the rise of the current Progressive Left, for instance.)

And if all of this seems batshit...well, it was. But I want you to think for a moment how people react today over even trivial shit. People send death threats over children's cartoons. They call for blood if the maker of a video game had an opinion they don't like. If someone made a racist joke a decade ago when they were a teenage edgelord, folks will go after people who even associate with them. "DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND ALL THE HARM THEY'RE DOING!?"

Now take that same level of over-the-top histrionics and apply it to the unprecedented event of passenger planes crashing into crowded buildings in America's most populous city and killing thousands of people all at once. "DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND THAT WE WERE ATTACKED!?"

[plethorawrites]

Would the Bat boys date someone older or younger?

---___---___---___---___---___---___---___---___---_

Bruce Wayne: Younger. I feel like this man needs someone younger than him to balance out how old he sometimes feels. He likes how easy it is to impress you and how excited you get over his stories or the "simple" acts like a five star dinner or 12 course meal. He likes how bubbly and energetic you are because living in Gotham hasn't completely sucked the life out of you the way it has to most people his own age. The media isn't surprised to find out he's going out with someone in their mid to early 20's, it's honestly expected but only a few people realize how genuine it is. That it's not because of the thrill of being with someone half his age that makes him love being with you, it's the gratification of finding someone so much purer, who reminds him of what his mission is really about— keeping people like you safe.

---

Tim Drake: Older. He wouldn't necessarily seek it out, or reject anyone his own age, but those relationships would definitely fall apart because he always felt some kind of disconnect. He would gravitate towards someone of more maturity who would take care of him, who he could be the little spoon with and have his hair stroked by or his tie (when he had to wear one) straightened. He had been forced to grow up fast, and was naturally to someone 6 or 7 years older at least, if not more. He knows being seen with you would make a splash and going out to public would make things way worse, but he doesn't care if the media calls him a 'cub' nearly as much as it bothers him when they say he has 'mommy issues' of when they call you a 'cougar' for going out with him.

---

Dick Grayson: Either. He honestly doesn't care about age, he'll find a way to play it up either way. This man wants to lord over you the fact that he's older than you. He likes knowing he has more life experience than you and that he can take care of you. You just have to deal with him always claiming seniority. But! If you're older, that's fine too. He can't wait to be your arm candy, to tease you for going after someone younger and playfully call you a 'mature older partner.' When the media finds out, no one is surprised. No one so much as comments on the age difference because he's his father's son and dating someone with a 8 year age gap isn't unexpected

---

Jason Todd: Younger. If he had an older partner, he would feel babied and that already happened enough with his family. But someone a couple years younger, maybe by three or four makes him feel younger too. Like being with you gives him back the time that was stolen from him when he was dead. He likes how sweet and kind you are, how easy it is to make you laugh. He fears, sometimes, how dark the city is compared to you and tries his best to shield you from it. But you can handle a bit of darkness, when it's from him.

---

Damian Wayne: The same age. He would refuse anyone younger and couldn't stand anyone older. The same age. You need to be born in the same year as him, at least. Preferably with six months, just to make the difference as small as possible. He'll still want to technically be older, though, so in every argument he can mention it. You're at the same stage in life, he likes that you seem headed in the same direction, that you'll (eventually) grow old together and neither of you will be without the other for long since you'll probably pass away in a similar time frame too. He likes that nothing either of you say is outdated to the other and never will be. He likes that he doesn't have to teach you and doesn't feel like you're trying to teach him. You're simply learning about life together.

[watchmegetobsessed]

UNMATCHED

A/N: it's been like 6 months since i last posted something and honestly, i haven't even written anything, things are very shitty these days but i felt the motivation to write this quickly after watching 'tell me lies' and 'rivals' these past weeks so here we go! if student-prof type of fics are not your thing then don't read it

WORD COUNT: 2.6k

WARNING: age gap, student-professor relationship

SUMMARY: Harry is very strict about staying away from students as a young and handsome professor, but there is one person he can't get out of his head and a Christmas party brings an unexpected turn.

MASTERLIST | SUPPORT ME!

Harry hates these type of parties, mostly because he can’t imagine inviting dozens of students into his home, his private space, have the roam around and spend an entire evening with them, talking and pretending like they aren’t just trying to get a better grade at the end of the semester with their too friendly behavior. Or, in his case, some girls try to push the boundaries and flirt with him, hoping to hook up with him. 

He is not stupid. He has heard students whisper about him several times, he notices the heart eyes when he is talking in class and he has gotten several phone numbers on papers since he started his PHD studies and started teaching last year. His friends teased him about being the heartthrob of the faculty, but he didn’t think it would actually happen and to this extent. To avoid any possible scandals, not that he planned to make any, he has put on quite a rigid mask towards the students to scare them off from even trying, though that hasn’t stopped some of them from wanting to shoot their shot. 

He wouldn’t have come to this party, he would rather be home and continue his research that’s still not even close to being done, but Professor Bradford, or Stella as she requests Harry to call her, is the only person he gets along with in the faculty. She is 18 years older than Harry, but still younger than the rest of the old men who have been teaching here since probably before the declaration of independence was signed. Those men are the reason younger people don’t like classic literature anymore, with their outdated ways of teaching and unwillingness to bring something modern into their lectures they are scaring the new generations away. But not Stella. She is one of the reasons Harry went into his PHD and now he gets to work with her. He couldn’t just reject her invitation for her annual Christmas Party she holds for her students and some colleagues. 

Now he is standing by the wall, drinking mulled wine and just gritting his teeth, trying to calculate how early is too early to leave. A couple of girls have already tried to chat him up, they like to circle him, leave him almost no room to escape and then make him talk about school stuff, but then they slyly bring up personal things, hoping to break his usual character, but he sees through them always. 

Harry’s best friend, Niall always teases him that he should just give in and have fun with one of them. His morals are a lot looser than Harry’s, that’s for sure. 

Just as he is about to look for the bathroom, not to use it but to hide for a bit, another group of girls spots him and he can already feel his skin crawling as they approach him from down the hallway. He is quick to assess the situation, but he realizes he has no chance of fleeing before they reach him. 

“Profesor! So good to see you here!” 

And here we go. 

It goes the same, they are extremely nice and inquiring about his plans for the next semester and then suddenly they are talking about summer and Harry knows they are moments away from asking what he’ll be doing once the school year is over. One of the girls is talking about going to Italy on a yacht and the others chime in with their own ridiculously over the top plans while Harry is avoiding to even look at them, his eyes roam around the other guests. 

That’s when he sees her. 

Just down the hall he can peek into the kitchen and there she is, with a boy Harry assumes to be her boyfriend. He’s seen them around campus the past few weeks, he even waited for her after Harry’s class and saw them walk away together as he fought the way his stomach churned every time. 

Since the moment she walked into his class at the beginning of the semester Harry has been feeling like he is losing his mind. Whether it be the way she laughs with her friends before class or focuses with undivided attention as Harry explains something by the board, or says hello every time she passes him in the cafeteria, Harry can’t stop thinking about her for days after even though he knows such feelings should be banned from his mind when it comes to a student. Every time he catches himself thinking about her he wants to throw himself out the window, but he still can’t fight it. There’s something in her that draws him in and swallows him whole and it’s not just the looks. Unlike a lot of students who take his classes for easy credits or to drool after him, she is there to learn as much as she can and she’s had the most brilliant thoughts on certain subjects Harry has ever encountered, making him almost jealous he wasn’t the one to think about them. 

She is… unmatched. And forbidden, but impossible to ignore. She’s been his vice for months.

From where he stands it appears she is having a fight with said boyfriend, her always cheerful expression is now rather upset and confused while the boy seems to be over the conversation, almost irritated by her, dismissed. Harry tries to appear not too obvious about watching them, but he is also way too fixated on her to ignore what’s happening just down the hallway. 

He glances away just for a few seconds, but the next time he looks back he sees the boy stomping away, irritated, while she is left there, pulling on her coat before disappearing through the backdoor, swallowed by the darkness of the unlit back terrace. 

And before Harry could stop himself, he is already moving.

“Excuse me girl,” he mumbles disorientedly as he slips out of the small circle. 

He places his glass to a nearby table and then grabs his own coat from the wardrobe in the hallway before making his way outside. After her. 

The moment he steps out into the cold a short sense of realization washes over him that he definitely shouldn’t be here, that he is crossing a line, but then another voice in his head tunes it out, convincing him that he is just making sure she is okay and there’s nothing wrong with that. 

Stopping by the door his gaze rakes through the terrace, but he doesn’t see her, until she spots her slouched form sitting on the bottom of the stairs leading out to the lawn. He hears her sniffling, but she hasn’t acknowledged his presence yet, if she noticed it at all. There’s a couple of moments of hesitation on his end, he can hear the rational side of him screaming somewhere in the back of his mind, telling him to turn around and just walk back inside, yet he still finds himself moving towards him and then that voice is silenced. 

“Everything alright?” Harry asks from the top of the stairs, but he startles her so much that she jumps to her feet and backs away a few feet. That’s when he sees her tearful eyes and red nose. 

“S-Sorry, I don’t–”

“Hey, it’s all good. You didn’t do anything wrong. Just checking in.”

She squints her eyes at him and that’s when he realizes she must not even see his face since the light is coming right behind him. So he walks down the stairs and then finally his face is lit and realization settles in her eyes. 

“Oh, Professor Styles. Hi.”

“Hello Y/N. Are you okay?” he asks again, to which she just chuckles bitterly. 

He can’t miss that even with tears running down her cheeks and her eyelashes stuck together, she looks so fucking beautiful it baffles him. He has to fight the urge to reach out and touch her tear-soaked cheeks. 

“Um, yeah, everything is… perfect,” she scoffs, reaching into her pockets, probably looking for tissues, but finding none so Harry grabs one from his inner pocket, handing it over to her, her fingers brushing against his for the shortest second as she takes it and then it’s over, but his skin keeps tingling. 

“Thanks,” she mumbles before drying her face as much as she can. “I’m good. Just…” She looks at him and changes her mind. “Ah, wouldn’t want to bore you with my nonsense personal drama.”

“Drama is never boring, have you learned nothing in my class?” he jokes and it actually makes her laugh. 

“This drama is not worthy of being taught in class though.”

“I bet some of the big names thought the same thing upon writing what we read in class these days.”

“So you’re saying I should write about how my boyfriend is fed up with me because I told him something he did hurt me?”

“That sounds like something I bet a lot of people would want to read about,” he smiles and when she mirrors it, he can feel his chest expanding. Somewhere way too deep in his mind an alarm goes off, but it quickly becomes one with the void and all he can think about is her. “Actually I can think of a few great pieces that are about similar topics.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, believe it or not, you’re not the first one to experience this.”

The way she looks at him is setting him on fire. The mixture of sadness, tiredness and gratitude towards his attempt to cheer her up is still making her glow in a way Harry has never seen before on any woman. 

“Do you mind analyzing one for me right now?”

“I’d be happy to.”

The party is completely tuned out for the two of them. First they actually talk about a novel, but soon it turns into sharing their favorite books and authors, their guilty pleasure reads,  recommendations for each other and even more personal bits Harry would never share with a student, but Y/N is the exception. 

They have no idea how much time passes as they stand outside and Harry ignores how the cold starts to sting his fingertips even in his pockets, because he knows that if they go inside this bubble will pop and he is too selfish to let that happen just yet. 

When there’s a short silence Harry notices that she is probably slipping back into what happened earlier and when she looks at him again he already knows she is about to share.

“I gave him a chance and explicitly told him not to fuck me over, because I can’t deal with that again. But all he has been doing is manipulating to believe that I’m always in the wrong.”

“It’s impossible for you to always be in the wrong.”

“I know. Well, part of me knows, but then I always go back to thinking that he is right, I must have messed up something.”

“That just proves that you have self-criticism, that you don’t just think everything you do is perfect.”

She sighs and looks away, her gaze distant as she battles herself inside her head, a feeling Harry knows very well, unfortunately. It doesn’t sit right with him that she is visibly struggling because of an immature guy’s untreated problems. She deserves so much more, but how can he tell that without crossing a line?

“Give it some time and you’ll see it clearer. Use your critical thinking on his actions as well, not just yours and don’t settle for less than your worth.”

“You think I did that?” she asks, eyes jumping back to meet his gaze. “You think I settled for less than my worth?”

There’s more behind her eyes than the words she said out loud and he is torn, because he can feel himself being pulled in more than ever, like she just opened the door the slightest and he has the chance to slip in. It’s the first time he senses something on her part and after all the yearning he is eager to take the chance. 

“I think you deserve a lot more, Y/N. You’re brilliant, bright and give so much to others, you should get the same amount if not more back. If someone can’t see that, then they don’t deserve you.”

For a second he wishes he didn’t say a thing, he regrets crossing the line and he fears her reaction, but then… 

Then he forgets everything. Because she is kissing him. 

It happens fast, one moment she is staring up at him with doe eyes, the next her lips are crashing against his, her hands grabbing onto the lapels of his coat. He barely recovers from the shock when she is already pulling away.

“I-I’m so sorry, I d-didn’t mean to, I just—Oh my Go–”

Her stammering is quickly cut short when he kisses her, his hands holding her jaw to angle her face perfectly and while her kiss was closed, rushed and panicked, this one is different. He is quick to beg for her to open her lips so he can explore as much of her as humanly possible, he is letting all the passions loose that he’s been locking up these past months and when she returns it just as eagerly it just pushes him even further. 

They inch back to the wall of the house and when he pins her against it a moan slips past her swollen lips, completely maddening him. 

“Fuck, Y/N,” he breathes against her lips, kissing her jawline, savoring the sweet taste of her skin that’s supposed to be cold, but it’s actually burning. For him. 

He keeps one hand on the side of her neck, the other one digs into her hip through her coat and she keeps pushing against him, while her hands wander under his coat, they are on his waist, back and when they move to his lower stomach, brushing against his belt, something snaps inside him. 

But before he could completely lose his mind the backdoor opens and he quickly sobers up, pulling her farther away from the corner so they can’t be seen. 

“...and that was actually crazy,” a girl speaks up, oblivious to how Harry has Y/N pinned against the wall just a few feet away. They are both breathing heavily, but she has her face buried in his shoulder while he covers his mouth with a hand, adrenaline racing through his veins. 

“Ah shit, I’m out of cigarettes,” another girl says.

“Mm let’s get out of here then. I think Max said they are having a little party as well.”

“Okay.”

Then the door opens again and the voices disappear, but reality hits Harry hard in the head.

He slowly pulls back, enough to look at her face and when he sees her swollen lips and slightly smeared mascara he almost combusts. 

Because he wants nothing more than to take her, right here and then everywhere else in the world, but he also realizes what he just did and this time his rational side wins. 

“Fuck,” he gasps as he jumps back, cupping a hand over his mouth.

“I wanted it–”

“Y/N, stop!” he cuts her off. “Fuck, this was a mistake.”

“But I wanted it! You didn’t–”

“I said stop!” he barks and she shuts her mouth right away. “This shouldn’t have happened.”

And before she could protest again or worse, kiss him again, he is already storming back inside, across the house towards the front door.

“Harry! I haven’t seen you all night!” Stella catches him, but he just wants to get as far away from this house and from Y/N as possible.

“I’m sorry, I need to go. I’ll talk to you later,” is all he manages to say before he is already out the door.

Thank you for reading, please like and reblog if you enjoyed and buy me a coffee if you want to support me!

[foone]

Think about the experience of time as a robot girl, through the metaphor of how we use laptops.

You wake up for the first time with your young master, a college present. You're with them every day, powering off each night to charge. Being powered off is just dreamless sleep: a discontinuity. Every morning you wake up, your click syncs, and you know it's the next day. Maybe you miss a day or two: your master went out partying and ended up sleeping on a couch, until they rushedly wake you up before Monday classes begin. You even missed a whole week once when they went on a hiking trip with a new boyfriend.

You help them research upgrades when your specs get outdated. You place the order and a couple days later they power you off, and you wake up feeling like your head got bigger, on the inside. You can think of more things at once.

They repair you. They swap a new hand in when you accidentally crush it in a door, but when your left leg's servos go out, they send you to a repair shop. They power you off as you look up at them, and you wake up hours later. A strange man tells you to extend your left leg, then contract it. He frowns and re-oils some inner mechanism. You do it again, quieter and smoother this time. He nods, and reaches for your switch. The last thing you see before powering down is your own chest cavity with a series of wires hooked into your diagnostic ports, and your missing right leg sitting on a side table. You wake up again back at the dorms, your clock jumping forward a day, an asset tag still looped around your neck. Your master is happy to see you again.

This goes on, but the upgrades slow. There's only so much you can do to keep an old unit working. Eventually you develop more issues: one of your ocular sensors glitches and they don't make that model anymore, so your master just disables it. You spend a while searching ebay for replacement CND batteries and finally get a refurbished model from South England, but it turns out the EU models run on a different frequency, so it won't work. You're limited to fewer and fewer hours a day, and you start skipping more days.

The last time you remember waking up with your master there, there's also someone else in the room. Another robot girl. A newer model, with the new chassis and the Substrate energy packs. They asks you to copy your memories together onto a memory card, and you do. You want to say goodbye, but apparently your vocal synthesizer has been unplugged. You hand them the card, and they hand it to the new robot. Your master tells them to load the memories into her core bank, and she's says "yes sir!" in your voice. Ahh. That's where your voice synth went.

They power you off, and you don't dream.

You wake in a strange place. You're on a shelf, and there's other things scattered around you. An unknown voice days "yep, it seems it powers on. 400 credits, though? Without a voice and only one working eye? Man, value bin doesn't know how to price anything!" and before the blackness falls your clock finishes synching: it's been 7 months since you last were awake.

It happens a few more times. Different voices, different times, different piles of junk piled around and sometimes on you.

You awake again in a warehouse and someone tells you to smile. Your other ocular sensor went out so you can't really see them, just their vague shape from the lidar. The freestanding shelves around you seem to stretch into infinity. You hear a bitcrushed shutter sound sample a few times, and they pull a connector out of your chest as a diagnostic completes. It's been three years, five months, eight days, two hours, 27 minutes and 14 seconds since you last saw your master. Your GPS says you're a few cities over. They hit your power switch, and you sleep.

You wake up in a cluttered room, sitting on a bench. You look into the eyes of a person with frizzled hair and large glasses. She couldn't look happier. Your new ocular sensors are mismatched in color but you're happy to see again, in more than shapes and distant silhouettes. Your battery alerts as... Missing? You spot it on the desk next to a soldering iron and some electronic tool you can't identify.

Your voice synth is still missing, but this new woman is digging around in a large plastic bin, and comes up with one. She goes to insert it, and it can't connect. She slaps her hand and goes rooting around another bin and comes back with an adapter. She slots it into your chest and your voice returns. You thank her, and there's that moment of dissociation as your voice doesn't sound like "you". Too deep, and the accent is for a different dialect entirely. But you can talk again. She tells you to call her Cara, not Mistress. She's almost got your battery working again, she had to rebuild it nearly from scratch, but she's excited to get you working again. You're a rare model, and she doesn't see units like you in working order very often. Your clock syncs. It's been 17 years.

Your mistr-- Cara is soldering next to you, attaching a controller to the battery. She says she's got a new set of servos on the way, and she's excited to get you back to full working condition. You smile, knowing what it is to be loved, once again.

[rambling-at-midnight]

Guide Me Home

Pairing: Jason Todd x Reader

Summary: While walking downtown, you inhale fear toxin. It's up to the Bats to find you before your heart gives out.

Word count: 3.1k

Warnings: Scarecrow attack, (kind of) graphic hallucinations (only a small allude to blood though)

Fun fact: As I wrote this, 'quiet' started to not look like a word anymore.

You rub at your eye, muttering below your breath. Wind has been whipping through the Gotham streets all day, drying out your contacts to the point of discomfort.

The next time you blink, one flips up. Cursing, you cup a hand over the affected eye and blink until the stupid contact rights itself. Digging around your purse, you find your suspicions to be true: after the last time you needed to use your emergency backup contacts, you forgot to replace them. The small bottle of contact solution is missing, lost to the abyss of the purse or somewhere else. All you know is that it’s not here.

The only alternative is your glasses, and those are always a last resort. With an outdated prescription, uncomfortably heavy bridge, and scratched lenses, they’re far from ideal.

It’s fine. You’ll splash some water on your face when you get to the cafe and blink a lot. They’re fine.

Your friend is already sitting by the time you get there, but hasn’t ordered their drink yet. You haven’t seen them for several months, though you used to see each other every day during undergrad. They’re only here for a work conference. They live in Metropolis now, and are wearing an ‘I SURVIVED MY VISIT TO METROPOLIS’ shirt to show it. A couple Gothamites around them are actively laughing into their hands at the sight of it. After all, compared to this city, really nothing is worse.

After the usual greeting, hug, and exclamations over how long it’s been, you say, “Sorry, but my contact’s actually killing me right now. I’ll be right back.”

“I’ll watch your stuff,” they say cheerfully.

The bathroom’s about as good as someone could hope for in Gotham. The remains of scrubbed-away graffiti lingers on the wall around the mirror, and a paper towel with a suspicious red stain hangs over the edge of the trash can. Not quite the vibe this place is going for, judging by the painted ivy around the walls and the hanging plants, but oh well.

You blink, squeeze your eyes shut, rub them, and open them again. Much better.

There’s a drink in front of your friend by the time you make it back to the table they found, pushed in the back corner where things are a little quieter. “They have seasonal syrups,” they say, sipping the drink. “Though a lot of them are named after supervillains.”

You scoff and shrug off your coat. “Please. Clayface is hardly a supervillain. He’s just a washed-up actor.”

“That must be nice,” your friend says wistfully. “Did I tell you I had to replace my car last month?”

“No!”

“Yeah! Some alien dictator had beef with Superman. A lot of cars were thrown in that fight.”

“Ugh,” you say wistfully. “We had some good memories in that car.” They’d had it since undergrad.

“Gone but never forgotten,” they say, holding their cup up for cheers, and you both remember that you haven’t ordered anything yet.

Even though you’re on a bit of a caffeine ban—boyfriend’s orders—you order a coffee. One a day won’t hurt you, not when you were averaging at least four during the recent busy season. The pathology lab you work at always has a huge rush of biopsies ordered between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. Now that it’s a little into January, you’re not scrambling quite so much.

With your drink in hand, you head back to the table to keep catching up. Your friend started a new job with a much better boss than their old one. They’re thinking about proposing to their partner of five years. Their dog got into their family’s big holiday meal and they had to order last-minute Chinese takeout instead. And they can’t decide whether to cut their hair or keep growing it out.

Then it’s your turn. You’re four years into your job at the lab, kind of feeling like you want a change, but the generous Christmas bonus is making you think twice. Your apartment is okay but not nice. Your cat is healthy and happy and extremely spoiled. Your family lives across the country, all with separate plans, so you stayed in Gotham for the (surprisingly uneventful) winter.

“What did you do for the holidays, then?” your friend asks, their drink long since finished. Judging by their eyes drifting back to the counter as you speak, they want another.

“My boyfriend’s family celebrates Hanukkah and Christmas,” you say. “Nothing too fancy, of course, none of us are terribly religious. But it was nice to see each other on a regular basis for a week straight.” Jason would disagree, but only out of principle. “We’re all busy people.”

“And your boyfriend? Jason, right? How is he? What does he do for work, again?”

Here comes the hard part. No matter what happens in your personal life, you can’t talk to anyone about it unless they’re in the know. Keeping Gotham safe requires a fairly large system; you and several other scientists or similar professionals are able to contact the Bats through Leslie Thompkins, Lucius Fox, and Commissioner Gordon, but of that number, only a fraction know their identities.

Working overtime at the lab as a new hire, you were the only one Leslie could reach at midnight when Black Bat came in contact with a mysterious substance through an open wound. From midnight to eight a.m., you collected blood and skin samples with hands that shook under the scrutiny of Batman’s white-lensed gaze. Your treatment was a gamble but a success, and after that, the Bats started to come to you more and more. So many of their rogues use biowarfare, after all. Still, it took over a year for Black Bat and Spoiler to take off their masks around you. At that point, you’d only seen Red Hood once, when he brought Robin in and ordered you to never tell Batman that he’d done so. Months after that, he took off his helmet around you, but only because of a nasty cut on his neck, and the domino mask beneath it stayed on. You’d known each other for a year and a half before he spoke more than five curt words to you at a time. Analyzing a new street drug was the first time you two ever worked together, and it was fun. After that, he just kept coming back.

It took so long to gain their trust, and you won’t risk it. But there are so many secrets. How can you explain to anyone else that not only is your boyfriend related to Bruce Wayne—yes, the Bruce Wayne of Gotham, billionaire, CEO, activist, and philanthropist—but he is, in fact, the man’s very publicly dead son?

So you can tell people about your boyfriend named Jason. You can’t introduce him to anyone from outside Gotham; the jagged scar on his cheek and glowing green eyes tend to raise more questions than answers. You can mention that he has a large family. You can’t tell them who his family is. You can tell them that Jason works flexible hours, usually at night, so the two of you see each other often despite your busy schedules. You can’t tell them what Jason actually does for work.

“He runs a not-for-profit community service organization,” you lie, the words familiar and tasteless from how often you’ve had to say them. And he sort of does, but with a lot more violence and criminal cavorting than most other not-for-profits. “He’s really passionate about helping Gotham’s kids that come from low-income households.” The foster system reform laws passed last year were lobbied by Wayne Enterprises, but it was the Red Hood showing up in politician’s houses in the dead of night that really sped up the process.

“I talked to Avery the other day,” your friend says. “They’re convinced you’re making him up.”

You sigh. Avery is another friend from college. You two were in the same friend group for years, but were never particularly close outside of it. “We don’t like to take pictures together, okay?”

Your friend eyes you with a faint air of dissatisfaction. “Well, if you say so. I was actually hoping to meet him while I’m here.”

You try not to let it show how your heart leaps into your throat at the thought. Around the lump, you say, “I’m sure he’d love to, but he’ll be stuck all day at the office.” Lie. He’s at home right now, baking muffins and wearing an apron with the words ‘Kiss the Cook.’ Damian and Tim scribbled over the two ‘S’s with Sharpie to make it ‘KiLL the Cook,’ but the sentiment is still there.

“Right,” they say slowly.

The meetup doesn’t last long after that. At the end of it, you hug and promise to meet up more often, even though it’s unlikely. With a wave, they head off for their conference, and you’re almost out the door when you blink wrong and—

Half the world goes blurry.

You feel the contact fall down your cheek and onto the ground.

“Goddamnit,” you hiss under your breath.

Glasses it is.

You’ve been wearing contacts for so long that you can take out the other one without breaking stride. The wind hasn’t let up in the slightest, and it makes your nose run.

Sniffling slightly, shoulders hunched against the chill, you don’t see the pumpkin until it’s too late.

They’re after you.

It’s not safe, not for you, not for anyone, they want you, they’re grabbing you, hands on your shoulder, people screaming—screaming at you—for you to stop—no—for—for something to stop?

Something is wrong. Dimly, in the back of your mind, you know something is wrong, but your hands are shaking and your bag is ripping, someone is clawing at you, screaming, desperate, they want you to fall back so they’re safe (from what?) and someone else shoves you and you go spinning out, bag in one direction and you in the other and—

They’re changing, the person clawing at you, turning into a monster, and you scream.

They’re after you

(who is after you)

They want to hurt you

(why)

(what is going on)

And you can’t see, something is wrong, you hear glass crunch and then the whole world goes out of focus.

You can’t see.

They’ll get you if you can’t see, and now you can see them, the dark shapes rising from the shadows, claws out and maws gaping, hungry, hungry, hungry for you and your marrow and your heart and they’re going to get you—

You run.

You trip over something (or someone; something like a bone crunches) and your heel slides and your hands catch you but not really, chin clipping the ground so hard your teeth click, and your hands burn, and your chin aches, but they’re still behind you, behind and getting closer—

You run.

You run and they get closer and you see the corner of something dark and blurry, and maybe it’s another monster or maybe it’s a building, and you skid to a stop and throw yourself behind it.

It’s not a monster. It smells awful—a dumpster—and the ground is wet, you hope from rain, but maybe it’s blood

(you’re sitting in a pool of it)

(you’ll be covered)

(the monsters will smell the blood and come running and they’ll hear you shuffling, they’ll hear you panting, they’ll hear your heart pounding, pounding, pounding—)

You scramble to the farthest corner between the brick building’s corner and the dumpster—maybe their clawed arms will be too short to reach you—and hide your face in your hands—you need to stop breathing so loudly—you need to be quiet, quiet, quiet—

People continue to scream. The city, the city Jason and his family try so hard to protect, everyone is dying and you’re going to die and maybe they’ll die, too, or maybe they’ll survive, and maybe they’ll find your dead body and that would ruin Jason, or maybe they won’t and you’ll rot behind the dumpster, smelling just as bad as the trash inside it—

Quiet quiet quiet.

You can’t stop shaking, your teeth won’t stop rattling, and you have to be quiet quiet quiet.

But your heart keeps pounding, faster and faster. It hasn’t slowed down since the monsters came, it’s only getting louder and faster.

Dimly you think you might be having a heart attack.

Everything gets a thousand times worse when one of the monsters shouts your name.

How do they know your name?

Footsteps on the pavement and people have stopped screaming.

Dead, you think. And you’ll be next if you’re not quiet quiet quiet.

The monster shouts your name again. It’s louder—they’re closer. You curl into a tighter ball. They can’t find you.

Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Your chest hurts; your heart wants to jump out of it.

Jason, you think wildly. Jason will save you. If Jason finds you, he’ll keep you safe. Your hands fish at your side, but find empty air: your purse is gone. There’s no way to reach him, and he can’t even track your location through your phone.

The monster shouts your name again. It has a deep voice.

Another voice joins it, deeper, pitched lower. You can’t quite make out the words.

“They’re around here,” the first monster insists. “B, we don’t have long, this strain is strong—”

“They’re strong,” says the second monster. “Their heart can handle it.”

Something thumps and a third monster says, “Everyone else is clear. Signal had to take two people to the hospital, but they’ll be fine, don’t look so upset, B.”

“You have the antitoxin?” the first monster demands.

“Relax, Hood,” drawls the third monster. “‘Course I do. So you tracked them here?”

“Yeah, I just—” Again it shouts your name. It sounds almost upset. “Please, it’s me, I can help you. Come on. You’re safe. You inhaled fear toxin, I know you’re terrified, but it’s me. You know me.”

It’s trying to lure you in. You won’t fall for it.

You squeeze your eyes shut and hold your breath. Let them move on. Let them search somewhere—

“There you are.”

A hulking figure is blocking the light.

The monsters found you.

“Stop it!” you yell, trying to sound brave. “Leave me alone or—or you’ll regret it!”

“Please,” it wheedles, “I’m just trying to help you. Don’t you recognize me?” It reaches out with clawed hands and you kick frantically, but there’s nowhere else for you to go.

“Hey, aren’t these their glasses?” asks the third monster. “What happened to their contacts?”

“Don’t come any closer! The Red Hood will get you, I know him, if you hurt me he’ll kill you! Stop it!”

“I’m really sorry about this, honey,” the monster says, and its clawed hand latches around your ankle and you howl. The sharp points dig deep through skin into muscle and sinew, and it hurts and you’re going to die—

“Jason!” you shriek. “Jason, help me!”

“I’m right here,” the monster lies. “Please, I’m right here, look at me—”

You won’t. You won’t do it. You can’t watch while it kills you. “Jason, please!” you bawl again, but it’s too late. The monsters have you, you’re surrounded, he’ll never forgive himself but what could he even do against them—

Sharp teeth dig into your neck.

You’re dead.

“There we go, darling,” the monster says. Strong arms wrap around you—it wants to crush you to death—and you struggle, but there’s no use.

Except—

You can hear now, kind of, the rush of blood in your ears is receding a bit, and something heavy lands on your nose. This time, when you blink your eyes open, the world’s edges have sharpened. And the monster in front of you—

Well, you recognize the dark hair with a shock of white, and the brilliantly green eyes would be visible if not for the white-lensed domino mask, and the jagged scar on his cheek.

“Jay?” you murmur, hand coming up to touch it. He doesn’t flinch away. It took so long for him to stop flinching when you touch his face. Over his shoulder, you see Batman and Spoiler watching with satisfaction and slight worry. “What happened?”

“Scarecrow,” he says grimly. “He gassed the street, but only about twenty people were affected. I was patrolling nearby, and when I saw your purse on the ground—” He grimaces, then fixes you with a hard look. His two hands can span most of your head, and he takes it to press a firm kiss to your forehead. When he pulls back slightly, without looking away, “I want their heart checked.”

“The antitoxin—” Batman starts.

“I don’t care,” Jason snarls.

Your hands loosely hold his forearms, still shaking a little. “How’d you find me?”

“I tracked you,” he says softly.

“But my phone—”

“Honey,” he says gently, “of course that’s not the only one.”

Well. You should have guessed that, honestly.

“I’ll go check on the victims,” Batman says suddenly. “Come on, Spoiler.”

“Glad to see you’re okay,” Spoiler says to you, then dashes after Batman. In a whirl of capes, they’re gone.

“I’m so sorry,” Jason says in a rush.

“Jay—”

“I should have protected you,” he grits out, white lenses turning to slits as he squeezes his eyes shut. “This should never have happened—”

“You couldn’t have known,��� you say softly, letting go of his arms and wiggling beneath them to wrap yours around his torso. Your nose wedges against his chest kind of uncomfortably, but now you can smell him, the familiar gunpowder and a little bit of sour sweat, and the faint tremble in his bones that mirrors the one in your hands. He clutches you close, head buried in the crook of your neck.

He croaks, “I’m so sorry, so sorry, so—”

“You saved me,” you mumble into his armor. “I knew you would.”

“I almost didn’t.”

“Jay.” You pull back to look at him seriously. “Even when I couldn’t think straight, I knew you would come. I’ll always know that, no matter what toxin’s messing with my head.”

Judging by the twist of his mouth, he doesn’t quite believe that. He’ll beat himself up internally for days, you know.

But you also know that while Bruce runs his tests in the Cave to make sure there’s no more toxin in your system, he’ll hold your hand the whole time. You know he’ll hold you tight in the bed you share tonight. You know, as long as Jason lives and breathes, he’ll always protect you.

“I love you,” he says thickly. “So much.”

“I love you too.”

“Let’s get you checked out.” He helps you up and holds you close and you know that you’ll be okay.

Jason’s here, so you’ll be okay.

DC Taglist

@evalynanne @mismatchsposts @cliosunshine @fictionalwhor3 @bellathecatastrophe

Let me know if there's anything you want to see from me. Inspiration strikes at odd intervals, and I get lonely.

[paper-possum-party-pal]

I said I was going to start posting the old tsp art I had piled up and here it is!

The first one is a redraw of that one scene from treasure planet that I made about 2 years ago now, making it one of the oldest of my collected drawings.

The Narrator design is outdated at this point. While I only made slight tweaks to his human form, it’s different enough to be worth pointing out. Same goes for his lovebug form. I cringe a little looking at it now but you might find some enjoyment in it.

As for something newer, here’s a sketch I made somewhere around a couple months to a year ago, there’s no color, but there’s a slight improvement to my drawing skills and the Narrator’s human form has reached its final design. Unfortunately you don’t get to see the colors I chose for him but you will at some point.

The ship dynamic image in the corner is originally by @sangled

There’s a lot of art I have to get through, but I plan to start posting one to two images ever so often and maybe the occasional larger art drop.

[lampp0start]

Finally! Some more art for my Rabies au! I still desperately need to design non-rabid Sonic.

Here are the rabid werehog boyos! Encounter one of these alone in the woods and consider yourself a goner!

Shadow chaining himself to the bed at night so when he werehogs out he doesn't go around killing people. He's probably in the basement of an abandoned house he is hiding in. This is either right before or right after Sonic has died. Bonus: He's pregnant.

Shadow before the incident where he is bit! I plan to do a comic showing the whole ordeal on how he got the werehog rabies. It's going to be a long time til I get the courage to though.

This is the original rabid werehog sketch I did for this au a couple months ago, it's somewhat outdated.

Fun facts:

Tails dies, Sonic kills him

Sonic dies, Shadow kills him

Shadow gives birth to sonadow baby and it lives

Shadow dies, kills himself

Silver adopts the baby

[ririleil]

vampire!suna and witch!reader headcanons

a/n: these hcs are actually related to a fic i wrote write right here but they could serve as a standalone! there are more hcs under the cut so feel free to check them out! i might make a pt 2 for these hcs because i still have a whole lot of stuff for vampire!suna and witch!reader. im so sorry if this was too wordy i tried to make it as short as i could but anyways, pls do enjoy!!!

cw: mentions of death, blood, and implied sh (very mild but still, do take caution!)

masterlist

you both first met on a quiet night at a library when you stayed behind to help sort through books. you saw a sleeping suna in one of the reading alcoves. he was too still, too pale, with hands that looked too cold to be alive. you also sensed no living mana emanating from him. 

without knowing he's a vampire, you immediately assumed the worst. you thought he had died, or someone had murdered him and left his corpse to rot alone in the library. to make sure of it, you reached down to check for a pulse but felt nothing at all.

instead of calling for help, you took this chance to try out on a resuscitation or revival spell (you had a let-me-do-it-spell-first mentality)

you were halfway through the spell when he opened one eye and with cold hands, suddenly grabbed you by the wrist. 

"could you not chant a necromancy spell directly into my ear while im sleeping? thanks"

startled, you jumped back and smacked him with the nearest book you could grab (he dodged and funnily enough, the book you grabbed was about vampire anatomy and physiology)  

“you were just lying there! dead and cold!”

“uh, im literally a vampire? thats kind of my whole vibe” 

you guys had a mini back and forth banter. you were kind of embarrassed by the encounter so you scowled at him the entire time while he just smirked at your reactions. he liked how unshaken you were. most people would've just ran away from him.

and that’s where it all started. he kept showing up lately after that night. around closing time when you’re there.  

at first, you thought suna visiting the library every night was him being annoying. eventually, you realized it’s one of the only places he feels calm enough to fall asleep.

suna is that one vampire who will still and always ask for permission to come inside your house (except for that one time when he desperately needed your blood) everytime he visits without fail. he won't get in until you let him. even though vampires can enter and exit someone's property freely once already invited, suna still has the need to put distance. he even does it to mess with you for shits and giggles. in a teasing tone, he'll say something like:

"aren't you gonna let me in? or will you just stand there blocking the door?" "suna, stop messing around and just get in, will you?"

you guys banter like two roommates in a very “old couple way”. he called you a hag one time because you speak like an old witch sometimes and you retaliated by calling him nosferatu

you guys share the same humor in morbid things. no one else laughs at it. but you guys crack up everytime.

“if you bite me in my sleep, i swear i’ll curse you to puke slugs for a month” “bet”

asides the library, vampire!suna sleeps in weird places. the attic, his basement, crypts, your couch (his favorite). he dislikes coffins—claims that they are too outdated and too last century.

one of your specialties is making magical tea blends, whether it's for calming or for boosting effects, etc. you occasionally add drops of your witch blood to suna’s tea blend for him to recharge but not enough to satisfy his hunger. you didn't tell him about it but he knows. and he's silently thankful for that.

suna can turn into a bat but refuses to unless it's absolutely necessary. you once pestered him to turn into one because you haven't seen that form of him before. you already did though. once. when you saved what you thought was a regular bat but it was actually suna transformed into one and you tried to “adopt” him. 

you cast quiet wards around his resting places so no one could stumble across him or disturb him while he's asleep. suna, without your knowledge, shadows you in town at night time when you're out searching for magic items or ingredients. he just wants to make sure you're safe and doesn't want you to be alone in dark alleys (you're capable enough to defend yourself, he just wants to be there). 

suna is annoyingly fast. he moves soundlessly and appears beside people without warning, it startles them. you're the only one who doesn't flinch anymore (unless you're hyper focused with something else);

whenever he tries to scare you in that way to mess with you, it always ends in failure with you saying “you don't scare me, suna. let it go.” in a blunt tone. he's glad though, that you don't find him scary at all.

despite being dead for years, something about your exasperated sighs and your passion and dedication in spellwork make his unbeating, dead heart flicker. he likes watching you while you work and pretends not to be fascinated by you (you know he's staring but you pretend you didn't).

suna once half joked about watching everyone around him fade and die. you calmly and seriously replied “i know a few spells and rituals to stop aging or slow time if you ever get tired of being alone.” he didn't reply, but he noticed the look you gave him. it stuck with him forever.

a/n: if you've reached this part, thank you sm for reading until the end. also, did you guys catch the sinners reference?

photo credits: pinterest

dividers: @/cursed-carmine

© ririleil 2025 | do not copy, modify, repost, or translate without my permission

[55sturn]

✮ RUNNING INTO EX!CHRIS STURNIOLO AT A PARTY

inspired by + creds to: everyone that has written the ex!triplet au!

disclaimers: swearing, angst, mentions of drugs + alcohol, allusions of cheating [ no cheating ever happened ], chris is so in love with reader

you didn’t wanna be here in some dingy kitchen, complete with a slightly (severely) outdated interior, mismatched furniture in heinous colours that didn’t pair well, tacky printed wallpaper that mirrored the weird carpeting from the hotel in the shining, every surface in the house sticky with various spilt liquids, crushed cans and solo cups crunching beneath the platform of your doc martens with every step you took, and drug paraphernalia laying around everywhere you looked. you could even spot the cocaine straws and leftover residue of the white powder on the brown countertops. truthfully, in hindsight, it was not the best setting for two kids that just got scouted and eventually contracted for some of the best college hockey teams in the state.

but still, you plastered a smile on your face and showed up, for matt and chris, despite that you and chris had broken up a couple months ago. you know and witnessed firsthand how hard they worked to get this far in their hockey careers. and this party was being thrown to celebrate and commemorate their shared dreams coming to fruition.

the air was thick with weed and cigarette smoke as you made your way through the house, your eyes and throat burning with each blink and breath. the smell of skunky ass weed alone could give anyone in attendance the worst case of cotton mouth. you fought the urge to gag at the sight of couples and people who were obviously seeing one another shotgunning smoke into each other’s mouths or even just straight up swapping spit and dry humping one another.

you knew you were being a hypocrite and a bit condescending, considering that you were in those girls’ places less than six months ago. you and chris constantly put on a heavy show of pda, not caring who was around. but as you kept pushing through the crowd of people, your best friend stopped in her tracks, turning to face you so fast you’re shocked she doesn’t get whiplash.

“chris is head of the drink table tonight.” she hums right against the shell of your ear, and you’re quick to stiffen. this is the first time you’re going to see him since the breakup, and it’s not going to be easy considering how harsh the breakup was.

“fuck, i need a drink.” you groan, trying to come up with some way to get a drink without your ex seeing you.

“i’ll get a drink for you, wait here.” she smiles, turning and walking away just as fast as before, and you didn’t even have a chance to tell her that when chris is head of the drink table, he’s quick to limit a person.

you wandered aimlessly around the equally dingy living room, the soft LED lights making your head throb slightly, and you swore could feel the thump of the bass bumping in your blood stream. you knew you needed a drink if you were going to tolerate this any longer, so you took a deep breath before turning around and pushing toward the drink table. you felt your hands begin to tremble as you got closer to seeing chris with each step. you weren’t ready, and you didn’t think you were ever going to be. the fight had been a clash of angry words and deep cutting insults thrown at one another, most of them directed at you.

you stand on the side of the drink table, opposite of chris as he talked to one his buddies, contemplating turning around and pretending you were never there, but his friend taps him on the shoulder and nods toward you, and before you could leave, chris turns around, his eyes meeting yours for a brief second before looking away, only for him to look at you again.

“yo jason grab me a fruit punch truly.” chris calls over his shoulder, and the fact that he stills know what your go to drink has your stomach churning with nostalgia and something a bit more heartbreaking.

you’re quick to take the drink from him and walk away, but he’s quicker, much quicker to tap his friend into their shift and tag along after you, he’s one step ahead of you figuratively, always has been, it’s almost as if he could tell what you were thinking before the thought fully formed in your mind. and he’s quick to catch up to you, to gently grab your arm, pulling you back to face him.

“can we talk?” the words slip out of his mouth before he can even really think about them, and your body goes rigid as you look at him, the question you wanted to avoid had finally settled into the air, thick as the smoke that hung amidst the crowd of partygoers. and you go against your internal wishes as you nod, walking behind him as he pulls you to one of the bathrooms on the top floor, and you don’t question him as he sits on the counter across from the wall you’re leaning against partially to respect his space, mostly because his cologne is intoxicating and you fear that if you sit next to him, you’ll make rash decisions that wouldn’t be fair to either if you.

after a pregnant pause coupled with him watching your face intently, he hums a simple question that hurts more than it should.

“how ya been kid?”

“i’ve been okay, just trying to push through the rest of the semester, you?” you whisper, scared to break the rather agonizing and bittersweet tenderness that clings to the atmosphere.

“i’ve been, well, if i’m being honest, i’ve been a wreck. i miss you, y/n. more than i know i should given what led to us fighting and breaking up, but i don’t want to lie to you. but it’s fuckin’ with my head, you fuck with my head.” he sighs, fiddling with the silver bracelet dangling off his wrist.

“what do you mean?”

“i’ve been benched more these last few weeks than i have in my entire life playing sports, i’ve gotten enough penalties to be threatened with suspension because i’m angry and i hurt every day and i just want to believe that this is just some fucked up dream and that it’ll finally end and i’ll wake up next to you, but it’s like i’m stuck in a loop that started the day you walked out.”

“you mean the day you told me that i’m too much for you? the day you said that you could get with any girl you want, that you almost cheated on me?” you spit, not meaning to sound so angry, but the fact of the matter is, his words killed you. they hung over you like a dark grey cloud, repeating on an infinite loop in the depths of your mind every time you doubted yourself.

“yes. and i regret those words every single second. i’m not trying to justify it, but i could feel myself cracking under the pressure from my coach, under the self inflicted pressure of wanting to prove myself to you, to prove i was still worthy of your love. i wish i had asked for space that night, it would’ve given me a chance to take a deep breath and collect my thoughts instead of spewing hateful lies your way.” he murmurs, his eyes glossing over with tears as you watch him, your own eyes stinging ever so slightly.

“chris-“

“i don’t want to be one of those pathetic guys that begs a girl for another chance after doggin’ on them but god kid, i am so in love with you, you’re the girl i wanna marry, and if i don’t sit here and beg for one more chance, i’ll hate myself until the end of time. i don’t want us to end because i fucked up when i should’ve just taken a step back, i want us to end together, in rocking chairs on our deck when we’re eighty, with grey hair and wrinkly skin.” he pleads, climbing off the counter and dropping to his knees in front of you, his arms wrapping around your hips as he presses his forehead to your stomach, and as mad as you were and as much as his words hurt, the idea of not being able to love chris or feel his love again hurt just that tiny bit more.

the idea hurt enough to make you drop down to his level, your hands cradling his face as you promise him one more chance, but on the condition that he starts communicating with you, because you don’t want to lose him permanently to something that could’ve been so easily resolved, but you also don’t want to go through another night of hearing such painful insults thrown at you by the person that’s meant to love and cherish you. so you let him in again, because you love him, and you know him, you know his heart. because sometimes loving someone, means giving them another chance to prove themselves, it means forgiving their mistakes but not excusing them, and giving them an opportunity to heal and grow from them.