#side note i tried drawing the skull emoji on my notes but it just looked sad except for....you know 💀 this expression

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03/02/24 || Saturday

I think I messed up my previous post (checked and yes I called yesterday Saturday sksksk). Finished two out of three lectures I need to do for a quiz on Monday, and I still have a lot of work. But I am going to go sleep for now and figure out the rest tomorrow (it's 1am 💀).

Day 5/30 of 30-Day New Year Momentum Challenge

What methods do you find best for managing tasks?

Mostly sticky notes. I am not the best at time management and discipline, but I usually keep the deadlines on my notion calendar, and I have a tiny notebook where I scribble all the things I need to do (including academics and grocery lists lol), and finally I use sticky notes for day to day tasks and stick them on the side of my laptop so that I can remember.

Also I like drawing little doodles on my sticky notes haha

[vagrantblvrd]

Slide It to the Right (1/1)

Summary:  Ryan doesn't do social media.

Based off this post. 

AO3

Ryan doesn't do social media. It's just. Why would he? He's arguably one of  the most dangerous people in Los Santos and has been at the top of various wanted lists for several years running. Social media would be a disaster for someone like him, so of course -

“Meg, why,” Ryan says, staring down at his phone and the recently installed app therein.

No answer of course, because Meg left for a job halfway across the world earlier that morning while Ryan was happily asleep, trusting that his occasional partner in crime would never, ever dream of betraying him in such a manner.

There's a part of Ryan tempted to text Meg nothing but sad emojis, but no. He's the Vagabond, and the Vagabond has not yet sunk to such a pathetic level.

Seriously.

If he uninstalls the app, Meg will know, and he cannot allow her this victory. Instead, drags the app's icon from his phone's home screen into the trash. A small act of defiance that gives him momentary peace of mind.

========

They have an system of sorts, the two of them.

They don't ask each other about the nature of the jobs they take, don't pry, but they'll let things...slip, from time to time. Nothing of note really, just enough to know with certainty they jobs they d accept won't result in a conflict of interests. Convenient, really, because it's never been clear which one of them would win in that kind of scenario. (Not that Ryan hasn't considered it, who wouldn't?)

Still.

There's a difference between offhand comments and Meg sending him snapchats of her exploits somewhere in Europe. Spain, maybe, the first week, if background details are anything to go by. Her smile is bright and sharp and vicious, gleam of satisfaction in her eyes that's so very familiar.

It lulls him into a false sense of security, the kind that has him dong a slow blink when he checks his phone and sees someone who is very clearly not Meg.

Slim, tanned skin and a shock of bleached hair to go with a smug smirk that is infuriating in a way Ryan can't quite explain.

Also, a truck that's been forced off the road somewhere between destinations and -

“Why, though?” Ryan asks, because the idiot has a pair of Ray-bans shoved into that abstract piece he calls hair, and another pair riding crooked over gold-framed sunglasses.

To top it off, make the whole thing the epitome of douchiness, it's nighttime.

“Oh my God,” Ryan says, traitorous fingers taking a screenshot because they no longer obey him, have revolted against all common sense. “Oh my God.”

========

The snapchat sticks with Ryan days later. Has him pulling up that screenshot and staring, blank and horrified at himself for not deleting it already, it's such an affront to everything ever.

It stays with him through several phone calls and texts of varying degrees of shadiness, through the drive down to the warehouse district for a meeting with a potential employer and the exceedingly awkward negotiation that follows. From there its a hop, skip, and a jump to the simple little job they want him to do, and fuck it, Ryan's only human after all, right?

========

Right.

So.

There's only one person currently in the know as to Ryan's deep, dark past. The one that haunts him to this very day, visions of tights and cheap plastic prosthetic crimping his ears, and there's no doubt she'll be laughing her black little heart out the moment she sees Ryan's snapchat.

Ryan posing for the camera, working it  for all he's worth with Gucci belts draped around his hips like a Final Fantasy character because apparently he's finally lost his goddamned mind.

Must have, if he's actually looking forward to whatever reaction the idiot in the gold sunglasses has, what his next move will be.

========

The idiot - “Your idiot,” Meg teases, sly and knowing, when she calls him shortly after his brief dalliance in the world of fashion, and Ryan tries not to think to hard on that because no, no, this is just a ridiculously dumb, indulgent thing Ryan is doing because he's an utter moron and nothing, not even living a life of crime in a place like Los Santos has beaten out of him – doesn't disappoint.

Retaliates, if it can be called that, by posting snapchats of him grinning like a lunatic next to a LSPD officer handcuffed to a sporty little car worth quite a pretty penny.

And, really, it's not like Ryan can just let him get away with that, right?

Right.

========

It takes a bit of planning, but luck and fate and the general low hiring standards of the venerated Los Santos police department make it possible for Ryan to orchestrate his next snapchat.

Ryan should probably be worried about this whole thing, the way it has him taking stupid, reckless risks for a brief moment of giddy satisfaction, but it's not like his usual life choices are in an way bordering sane.

Still.

There's being daring, and then there's being completely stupid, which he is because this is so beyond courting danger it's ridiculous.

========

“I should stop,” Ryan tells Meg, knowing full well he won't, because he's an utter moron and this is stupid-fun.

“You should,” Meg says, but there's an edge of mischief in her words. Warm and familiar and as often as it spells trouble for him, he loves it. “But you're not going to, are you.”

Not a question, when she knows him so well.

Ryan grins, because no.

========

There's only one right way to one-up a stolen fire truck, and Ryan does it with flare.

(Ha, puns.)

========

All this time, Ryan's been very careful not to use names, even in that tricky little cavern of his mind because it felt like doing so would ruin this whatever they've been doing. (Oh, he knows exactly who the idiot with the gold-framed sunglasses is. Knows who he works for the same way he knows that very same idiot knows exactly who Ryan is.)

Which, makes no goddamn sense really because it's not as though they've been exchanging letters, really. Just making use of a dumb little bit of technology that allows them to flaunt their criminal exploits to a reckless, dangerous degree.

They have enemies, and Ryan's caught a few sniffing around lately. Trying to use their snapchats to track them down, and while a bullet here, a knife there takes care of things like that, there's only so long their luck can hold out.

========

For some inexplicable reason, it's the fact that the idiot uses the crying cat emoji that sets Ryan in motion.

Has him pulling on his mask and settling his bulletproof vest, checking his guns. Has him ignoring Meg's own text comprised of laughing smiley faces as he races down the streets of Los Santos in his Zentorno.

Fucking Gavin Free��grins up at him as he wrenches the back door of the police car open. Holds his  handcuffed hands up like he thinks Ryan's not there to put a bullet in him to match the one in his arresting officer's head.

“About time,” Gavin says, light and cheerful, as if Ryan's late for a lunch date.

There are sirens in the distance drawing closer and the faint sound of a chopper – because of course, why not a goddamn chopper. There's a dead police officer in the front seat, shattered glass and twisted metal where the car hit the side rail. There's Ryan, skull mask in place as he looks down at this idiot he's been sending snapchats to for weeks on end and how the hell did his life end up like this?

“I don't meant to rush you,” Gavin says, grin faltering as he tries to spot the approaching chopper, “but we're in a bit of a time crunch here.”

Ah, right, Ryan thinks, sighing as he pulls Gavin out of the police car. I'm an idiot.

========

It's hard to get good footage while driving down Chiliad with a police chopper circling overhead directing police cars their way. Somehow, though, it's worth it with Gavin laughing in his ear as the sun goes down behind Chiliad like something out of a fucking movie.

“This is so cinematic!” Gavin yells, leaning into frame to give a victory sign because of course he does. “I'm going to have to do something incredible to top this!”

Ryan doesn't take his eyes off the road – ha, as if the dirt path they're following is anything close to being a road - because that would be suicidal at this point.

Still.

“I'd like to see you try,” Ryan says, and God help him, he actually means it.

Stars Like Forever