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weemssapphic · 8 months

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What about Larissa taking the reader to a pumpkin patch and they just have fun all day and get apple cider and pumpkin spice donuts!! And then they get home and put on a horror flic, and the reader swears they aren’t scared but they can’t fool Larissa at all, so she puts something else on? 😋😋I thought it was such a good idea and I would have done something like this myself but you are such a talented writer, I would love to see something like this from you!

A/N: Hello hello! Thank you so so much 🥺 that is very sweet. I thought this would be appropriate for October so I tried to get it done in a timely fashion. I really hope you enjoy 🥺 also... happy Friday the 13th! 👻

we fell in love in october

Larissa Weems x f!reader

Larissa takes you on a sweet autumn date to a pumpkin patch - fluff ensues.

Words: ~2.9k | ao3 link in title

Leaves fell from the tree outside the window, hues of brown, deep red, muted orange coloring the evening sky in their descent. Blown away by a crisp breeze that carried the sounds of students laughing and chatting on their way inside for dinner as the sky slowly turned darker, dusk settling over Nevermore Academy.

The crackling of the fireplace and the clacking of Larissa’s keyboard served as background noise as you lounged on the couch in your girlfriend’s office, engrossed in your copy of Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. You and Larissa had been together for a few months now, and it had turned into an unspoken ritual that you would pop by after work more afternoons than not to keep Larissa company as she finished up her emails, before sharing a glass of wine and some takeout and basking in each other’s company.

Today was no different. Your ears perked up when you heard the tell-tale sound of Larissa’s laptop shutting, and you set your book aside as you heard her footsteps approach. Within moments she came into view, rounding the couch and placing two fingers under your chin to gently lift your head towards hers. Soft, warm lips pressed against your own, and you could feel her smile into the kiss as she soothed her tongue along the seam of your lips. You parted them to allow her to lick gently into your mouth, sighing as her tongue began to dance with yours, every movement languid and loving.

“Hello, darling. Thank you for waiting for me,” she whispered against your lips as the two of you parted for air - you would never tire of her dulcet tones, her voice like music to your ears.

“Hi,” you said with a grin, patting the space next to you. Larissa sat down and you immediately snuggled into her, allowing her to wrap her arms around your waist and rest her chin on your head. “You’re done with work?”

“I’m all yours,” Larissa replied with a chuckle, pressing her lips to your temple - it made you shiver.

“Mmh… Do you think you could be all mine on Friday as well?” You bit your lip, watching Larissa carefully - in spite of her constant reassurance that she enjoyed spending time with you, you still sometimes felt like you were asking a lot. You knew how seriously the principal took her work, but you’d come up with the best date idea and it would be a shame to let the opportunity pass you by.

To your relief, Larissa’s face lit up with a teasing smirk. “I think I could be,” she purred. “Did you have something planned for Friday?”

“Well… This Friday is Friday the 13th… And it’s October! That’s kind of a special occasion. So I was thinking we could maybe go to a pumpkin patch together and have a date-day?” You looked up at Larissa through your lashes with your best pleading pout, watching her lips curl slowly into a soft smile.

“Hmmm,” Larissa hummed, tapping a manicured finger against her chin in thought. “What do you say I work a half-day on Friday and pick you up around noon?”

“Really?” You could feel your limbs start to tingle with excitement. “Can we?”

“Of course,” Larissa said with a chuckle, cupping your cheek. “There’s a little farm near Jericho that has a pumpkin patch around this time of year. I haven’t been but I have heard quite a few students rave about it.”

“Deal,” you said, your words turning into a squeal as Larissa began to pepper your face with kisses, before pressing her lips to yours. You melted into the kiss, as you always did, feeling her warm breath against your lips as she let out a contented sigh.

🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃

Friday morning was spent choosing an outfit - you settled on an orange knit sweater, jeans, and loafers, and took to lounging around as you waited for Larissa to pick you up.

She was, of course, punctual as always - the doorbell rang at 12 on the dot, and you shot up from the couch to answer the door.

Larissa greeted you with a soft, gentle kiss, one hand settling on your hip. “You look beautiful. Are you ready to go, my love?”

Blushing at the compliment, you nodded. “Yep, I just need my keys.” You turned to grab your keys and your bag from the little table next to the door, and allowed Larissa to lead you out to her car with her hand on the small of your back.

🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃

Nothing in your life thus far could compare to the feeling of holding Larissa’s hand in public. Her fingers curled around your own, her warm palm fitting perfectly against yours like a puzzle piece. Today was no different as the two of you ambled hand in hand towards the little farm, only briefly letting go so you could pay for your entry.

“I don’t think I’ve done something like this since I was a teenager.” Larissa sighed wistfully as she looked around, her lips curled up into a soft smile.

“It’s beautiful here,” you breathed, taking in your surroundings.

The highlight of the festival was, of course, the farm’s pumpkin patch - massive orange, white, even green pumpkins nestled amongst bales of hay - resting against the backdrop of a picturesque forest, with leaves turned brown and orange. Across from the pumpkin patch was a corn maze - you could hear the giggles and screams of children flitting between the corn stalks.

“Are we gonna carve pumpkins for Halloween this year?” you asked suddenly.

Larissa’s face broke out into a splitting grin. “I would love that,” she admitted. “Would you like to pick some?”

You nodded eagerly, spending the better part of the next half hour roaming through the pumpkin patch, picking up various pumpkins and handing them off to Larissa for inspection. She watched the entire time with an amused grin on her face, finally helping you settle on not two but four medium-sized, orange pumpkins (one for each of you, and then extras in case you messed up).

After helping you carry the pumpkins to her car, Larissa nudged you and pointed to a small, fenced in area in the distance. “I think they have a petting zoo.”

You could hardly contain the squeal of delight that left your throat at the mere thought, and you dragged Larissa over to the petting zoo.

“Oh, look, you can feed them!” You pointed to the little machines with animal feed, making your way over and purchasing a cupful. The alpacas situated nearest you began to flock around the fence, sticking their head over the top and eyeing you eagerly.

“You wanna try?” you asked, offering the cup to Larissa - she removed her glove and reached out her hand for you to pour a bit of the food in her waiting palm. She stepped up to the fence, glancing nervously in your direction as she stuck out her hand. Her face contorted in surprise as one of the alpacas began to nuzzle her palm, inhaling the feed within seconds.

“It tickles,” she said, quickly retracting her palm as you began to laugh.

“Here, let me try.” You poured some feed in your hand and offered it to a different alpaca, gasping and jumping back a bit. “Shit, you’re right, it does tickle,” you said with a giggle, shaking your hand to get rid of the funny feeling.

“How about we see the goats instead?” you suggested. With a reproachful glance at the alpacas, still gathered around the fence and staring the two of you down, Larissa agreed and followed you to the goat’s pen. There was a little latched door in the fence and you let yourself in, Larissa following behind you - albeit somewhat reluctantly.

The goats could smell the food in your cup and some ambled over immediately. You leant down towards a small goat with a black head and white legs, offering it a handful of feed. It felt much less ticklish than feeding the alpacas, and you handed Larissa the cup so that you could use your other hand to gently pet the goats.

Larissa watched you fondly, holding the cup of feed just out of reach of the eager animals.

“You’re cute, you know that?” she murmured. You looked up, blushing profusely and smiling shyly.

“Give me your hand.” You reached out and Larissa placed her hand in yours, cocking her head and watching with wide, curious eyes as you rested her hand on the goat’s back, holding it as you guided her to stroke its fur.

Larissa’s gaze never left your face, her eyes sparkling with admiration, watching you delight in being able to pet the animals. It wasn’t her favorite pastime in the world, but getting to see you so joyful was more than enough for her to be having a good time.

🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃

“Let’s go sit down for a bit,” Larissa suggested, giving your hand a squeeze before gently tugging you in the direction of a couple of wooden stands in the distance.

You agreed, and the two of you came to a stop in front of a stand selling apple cider.

“Would you like some?” Larissa asked, already reaching for her purse.

“Is that even a question?” you teased.

Larissa paid for your drinks and the two of you took a seat at a wooden picnic table nearby. You took a sip of the warm apple cider, moaning as the taste exploded on your tongue, and Larissa raised an eyebrow at you.

“What? Does that turn you on?” you purred, taking another sip and moaning even louder this time. Larissa laughed and shook her head, a blush creeping up her cheeks.

“Hush and drink up,” she murmured.

Your eyes scanned the area you were sitting in, lighting up as they landed on a donut stand. “Riss, do you want a donut?”

Larissa nodded between sips of apple cider.

“What kind?”

“You pick.”

You ambled over to the donut stand, returning a few minutes later with two pumpkin spice donuts and handing one to your girlfriend, before settling on the bench across from her.

“Of course you would get pumpkin spice,” Larissa teased, chuckling as she accepted the donut from you.

“I don’t appreciate your tone,” you said with a laugh.

Larissa huffed, taking a bite of the donut regardless and letting out a moan of her own - you began to laugh harder and Larissa joined in, her eyes crinkling at the outer edges and her face scrunching up in glee.

The two of you ate in amicable silence, savoring the donuts and each other’s presence and basking in a surprisingly warm fall day.

“Maybe we could go on the hayride before we go home?” you suggested shyly as Larissa placed the last piece of her donut into her mouth. Her eyes went wide and she nodded, her cheeks puffed out with food. You laughed and Larissa’s face turned pink as she swallowed.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing, you’re just very adorable,” you said with a grin, earning you an eye roll and a light, playful slap from your girlfriend. She always said she hated when you called her adorable, but she would blush and smile every single time, so you would keep doing it.

“Call me adorable again and we aren’t going on that hayride,” she mumbled with a soft smile, her eyes sparkling in the low light of the afternoon sun.

Ten minutes later, you were sitting in a wagon with Larissa to your left, the sun slowly beginning its descent in the sky and casting a golden glow over the blonde. Your surroundings were picturesque, but all you could focus on was the stunning woman next to you. It seemed your sentiments were returned, for Larissa’s eyes - flooded with warmth and affection - never left your own. Her right arm was wrapped snugly around your shoulders as her left hand rested on your thigh, her thumb rubbing absentminded circles over your jeans.

“Rissa?”

“Yes, darling?”

“I love you.”

A beaming smile spread across the blonde’s face and she ducked her head, leaning in until her lips were inches away from yours. “I love you, too,” she whispered against your lips, before closing the gap to kiss you. The kiss was soft, and tender - it made your heart flutter and your stomach flip as the last rays of the sun enveloped the two of you in a warm glow.

🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃

“Can we watch a horror movie?” you asked as you stepped through the threshold of Larissa’s apartment after the short drive back from the pumpkin patch. The two of you left the pumpkins outside the door for later.

The blonde raised an eyebrow at you, her expression nothing short of skeptical as she slipped out of her heels and removed her coat. “Are you sure? Don’t you remember what happened the last time we watched a horror movie together?”

“I haven’t the faintest clue what you’re talking about,” you replied airily, kicking off your shoes and tossing your bag on the floor. Of course you knew what she was talking about - you’d gotten so panicked that, during one particularly gruesome jump-scare, you’d thrown the popcorn bowl at the tv. Larissa had found stray pieces of popcorn underneath her couch for weeks after.

“Whatever you want, my dear,” Larissa said with a teasing grin, pressing a kiss to your forehead, before ushering you in the direction of her bedroom. “Let’s get changed first, hmm?”

Being that you spent so much time at Larissa’s, you had a few spare changes of clothes for when you’d spontaneously decide to stay the night - but you still preferred to wear your girlfriend’s clothes whenever possible. They smelled like her, and they were big and soft and somehow just way comfier than your own.

Tonight, you opted for a pair of leggings and an old t-shirt of Larissa’s, while she went for a sage green, silk camisole top and a white cardigan, paired with matching sweatpants. Larissa stepped behind you as you got changed, helping you pull the t-shirt over your head - you shivered as her fingers brushed teasingly down your abdomen, before splaying out over your stomach and pulling you flush against her.

“You’re beautiful,” she whispered softly into your hair, pressing her lips to the crown of your head. You could feel yourself blush and you spun around in her arms, wrapping your own arms around her neck and pulling her in for a languid kiss.

Larissa reached around you, flicking off the light in her bedroom and guiding you back out into the living room, her lips still pressed against yours until the backs of your knees hit the couch.

“Hot chocolate?” she breathed against your lips.

You nodded gratefully, curling up on the couch as Larissa disappeared into the kitchen - returning shortly after with two mugs of hot chocolate.

“Would you like anything else?”

“Nope, thanks.” You accepted one of the mugs - it warmed your hands, and the huge pile of marshmallows on top made you giggle.

Larissa settled beside you, wrapping an arm securely around your shoulders and pulling you into her. “Is The Conjuring alright?” she asked as she began to flick through Netflix.

“Yes! I love Vera Farmiga!”

Larissa chuckled and pressed play, wiggling her hips a bit to get comfy.

You tried to be brave, you really did. But every slight change in the music made your muscles tense, your entire body flinching so bad that you had to place your mug on the coffee table.

“Are you alright, dove?” Larissa whispered, directly into your ear - you hadn’t expected it and you jumped in surprise, your heart pounding viciously. When you turned your head to look at your girlfriend, she was smirking, her eyes twinkling mischievously.

“I’m fine,” you squeaked.

Larissa knew you like she knew the back of her own hand - somehow, she’d been able to read you like a book from day one. She snorted and set her own mug down, pausing the movie and wrapping both arms around your waist. You melted into her touch immediately - warm, comforting, safe. Your heartbeat began to slow and you let out a nervous giggle. “Okay, I’m not fine. But we can keep watching it if you want!”

“Hmm… I think I’d rather you feel comfortable with what we watch.” Larissa pressed her lips to yours, her hands stroking up and down your sides. “How about we put something else on?”

Biting your lip, you nodded and accepted the remote from Larissa. Some dumb, silly comedy like The Heat would be good, you thought.

“Come here,” Larissa murmured, patting her lap. You curled up on the couch, resting your head on her thighs. Her hand immediately settled on your head and began to stroke your hair, her nails lightly scratching at your scalp and making you shiver.

“Sorry,” you whispered timidly, peeking up at Larissa through your lashes.

Larissa looked down at you with a confused smile, brushing a strand of hair off your forehead. “Sorry for what, darling?”

“Suggesting we watch a scary movie and not being able to finish it.” You felt your cheeks flush and hid your face in her lap - then you felt Larissa’s lips on your head. “That’s not something you need to apologize for. I promise.”

You peeked up again to see Larissa beaming lovingly down at you, and you sighed in relief, snuggling closer and allowing her to continue stroking your hair as the two of you watched the movie. The perfect ending to a perfect day.

-> some activities (HELLO, PETTING ZOO, ANYONE?) based super loosely on a fall festival/pumpkin patch I visited in 2019 with my best friend, near Nashville, TN - one of my fondest memories! hmu if you want to see a picture of me with a goat <3

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#larissa weems x reader #larissa weems #larissa x reader #principal weems x reader #principal weems

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baeddel · 2 years

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Strictly speaking music didn't exist in the Middle Ages. People did "musical" activities like singing, playing and dancing but had very specific words for them depending on who was doing it and how and why it was done. The "Musica" of the scholars was an art comparable to Geometry. There was no "music" in itself, it was always bound up in rituals and social settings; martial, ecclesial, courtly, festive etc. An instrument or a melody could belong to a specific place, festival, or social group. Relations were played out ritually by sound. The music of a specific profession might be played in church on a festive day. The trumpets of the nobles would ritually silence other sounds and the work songs or festive music of different groups could intertwine for common tasks. The voices of polyphonic medieval music were not striving to the common task of resolving in a chord. There was no foreground and background of "melody" and "accompaniment", instead they would all coexist harmoniously but to their own means. Often different types of songs would be combined and sung all at once; one voice could be from liturgy, one a secular love song and the third a political satire. Music as an abstraction is a very modern phenomena and lexicons usually give a circular definition of "music". People of the Middle Ages did not engage in music for abstract aesthetic pleasure but for specific tasks (which could of course also be therapeutic). There were no general "musicians" in the modern sense and there was no clear cut line between instrumental musicians and jesters. City pipers could have other, often administrative tasks and troubadours were bound up in intricate courtly rituals. Neither did any musical "compositions" exist as immaterial objects. If music was sometimes written down, the score would not be seen as a finished product but as a practical tool used for a specific performance. Compositions did not become commodities and music was not copyrighted until 750 years after the Western system of notation was invented. Obviously "songs" in the Middle Ages were not organized as 3–7 minute long units arranged with intros and breaks to captivate the attention span of an individual listener. Neither were there any clear distinctions between audience and performer, or even any "stage" or equivalent place in the room from which the music would emanate, possible to capture in two channel stereo. Quite the opposite: church music, for example, would often come from all around, with singers and instrumentalists placed around the room as well as in the upper galleries.

liner notes to In the Ruins of Saint Lars by Vox Vulgaris

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linkemon · 10 months

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Boysband AU headcanons (4nemo) 1

Friendly reminder that English is not my first language. You can check my Masterlists both in English and Polish here.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, 4nemo is a group of anemo boys who started a boysband.

AN: it's very hard to keep up with haiku syllables in English but I'm trying my best to modify my orginal poetry.

When you were left without a job, but with a whole bunch of bills to pay, you decided to look for something new. The offer was quite enigmatic but it matched your qualifications. Attracted by the vision of money, you volunteered. You had to sign a non-disclosure agreement before you were hired and that was a bit of a bummer. Everything became clear when you were accepted as the manager of the not so long ago formed band 4nemo...

Xiao

✧ Quiet and mysterious type of man. At first you thought it was the label that made him look like that but you soon realized that it was not true. Xiao is like that in every way. Naturally, he has a lot of female fans who are attracted to his way of being. You can safely say thanks to your re-search that he has the most fans out of all team members. Not that he really cares because he doesn't like attention very much. At fan meetings, he always fidgets impatiently and wants to get away as fast as possible.

✧ In 4nemo he is a rapper. He's doing pretty well, though not great. Apparently, his mentor was a certain Zhongli. He's one of the few people you see him hanging out with that you initially thought were his family. You're pretty sure whatever his mentor was, he didn't teach him how to rap because the man is very calm and elegant.

✧ Xiao likes to sit quietly with you on the stairs sometimes. It's kind of your ritual. If he's not feeling well, he'll somehow catch you on your way out of the studio. You don't ask what exactly is bothering him because he won't tell you anyway. You stay like that together for a while, talking about various, unimportant things. You even fell asleep on his shoulder once but he didn't reproach you for it. He just woke you up brutally.

Kaedehara Kazuha

✧ His specialty is dancing. Fans say he moves like he has the wind on his side. Perhaps because he trained martial arts in his childhood. He has offered you several times to join him as he practices new routine moves. He's managed to teach you a few things.

✧ He sometimes disappears and no one knows where he is. If he decides to hide, no one from the production will find him. You are one of the few people who are somehow able to locate Kazuha at almost any time. He was surprised himself.

✧ Kazuha likes to wander around the city. Preferably, however, surrounded by nature. Every frame he is allowed to record outside is a win. The same goes for photo sessions. There he seems to be in his environment. There was even a stereotype among the fans that if the music video has Kazuha and nature in the background, it must be a hit.

✧ The boy writes a lot of song lyrics. Most end up in a drawer but he showed you some sketches. On the side, he also writes poetry, saying it helps him. He wrote a haiku for you to thank you for your work for the team:

Bright glow of night light

Flowing the eternal wind

Our biggest support

Venti

✧ He's the best at singing. Still, he also has the ability to play multiple instruments and if only the record label would let him, he would definitely use it on every single hit. All he has to do is satisfy the audience's hunger with covers or short videos showing his skills.

✧ He is the biggest prankster of the four. If there's one thing for sure, it's that every joke comes from Venti. Whether verbal or prank. He recently added a tinted shampoo to Kazuha's bottle and now the boy has red tips left on his hair. He left them for the fans, although you had to convince him a lot. The culprit, of course, ran away for the day.

✧ Venti had several scandals. Mainly related to him being in clubs. Some of them were not known to a wider audience but fans still remember his drunken incident when he sang a hit from the latest album (not yet published at the time) and someone recorded it. Somehow he always gets away with the public and that's probably the only reason he hasn't been fired yet. The label knows fans would probably boycott them.

✧ He loves social media. Even if he's given instructions not to involve you as a manager or limit it in the photos, he does it anyway. He vlogs non-stop. Tomorrow he will definitely post a picture of what he eats for dinner so that everyone will know...

Aether

✧ Group leader. Very attached to his sister, which you noticed almost immediately. It was thanks to her that he even came to the preliminaries before 4nemo was founded. Lumine travels a lot but calls her brother very often. Very often you picked up a phone call from her to let her know there was a rehearsal still going on so she can't talk with her brother now. The boy often misses her and home but he tries to put on a brave face. You comforted him several times because he couldn't handle it.

✧ Modest is the word that defines him. Aether does not take credit for most meritorious achievements. This can be seen, among other things, in his speeches. He also mentioned you there, saying that no one sees your work behind the scenes. You were extremely touched. You have to constantly remind him how important he is because he will always forget about himself.

✧ He supports the whole group. Guys seem to orbit around him and you quickly noticed how he binds them together. He's the one in charge who will make a normal breakfast instead of stuffing himself with anything like Venti, nothing like Xiao or anything quick like Kazuha.

✧ Aether likes to ask what you think about their performances. He is very open to criticism and will definitely try to improve what you tell him at the next show.

#xiao x reader #kazuha x reader #aether x reader #venti x reader #genshin x reader #headcanons #4nemo #boysband au #x reader #genshin impact #xiao #venti #kaedahara kazuha #aether #over teyvat

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staybabblingbaby · 1 month

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SKZ x Coordi (Han Part) a1 d4

[Caution: These are not full fics, or even full parts of fics for some, these are part of my writing progress archive!]

Concept: Reader is a successful makeup artist with a notorious and prolific career and no self awareness. Reader joins JYP as a part of Stray Kids' team and encounters their hazing ritual for new coordis: flirting.

Word Count: 2,190 Notes: Needs Editing for clarity, but I'm otherwise very happy w this part :D Found the pronouns btw! Warnings: None that I know of? Reader has weird self esteem but it's not bad? Reader referred to with She/Her pronouns

Masterlist link :D | Prev Part Link <3 | Next Part Link ;3

That leads you to now, about to come face to face with the group you’ve been assigned for the foreseeable future. You’re very excited, actually, because you’ve been a fan of Stray Kids’ music for a long time. Well, long for you, anyways. You had a tendency to flit between genres and bands as your whims directed and rarely stuck with one band or sound for more than a few months at a time.

Something about Stray Kids’ music just spoke to you, though. If you were having trouble getting motivated or inspired, playing with new techniques with Stray Kids’ discography in the background cured you. You think their music hijacks your brain somehow, honestly. You were excited to work your magic on the people who inspired that magic. Maybe you get some sort of creative feedback loop going and never fall into a slump again. That’d sure be something!

You’re just idling in the dressing room, lanyard with your temporary title of ‘Junior Stylist’ on proud display around your neck. You’ll receive the title you were hired for, ‘Senior Stylist’, when your probationary period was over in 3 months time. Coincidentally, around the time the group was starting the tour you were contracted for. Funny, that.

You’re on location hours before you should see hide nor hair of the artists. You usually are, lending a hand for whatever production is one of the fun parts of your job, honestly, but today it’s just because you need to meet your supervising stylist and other coworkers before the shoot was to begin. You’re not 100% sure what’s happening today, but you know it’s a photoshoot and you know the style of makeup being asked of you. Quite frankly it’s not your job to know much more than that yet.

Soon enough a few other stylists start trickling in, introducing themselves one by one. Some tell you which member they’re assigned to, some only tell you their names, and you make sure each one knows you’re excited to work with them. You’re not quite sure how it happens, but by the time your supervising stylist shows up some minutes later (exactly on time, you note), you’re already fluttering between the stations being set up and carting this, that, and the other, between them while you chat with the other girls. They’re all very nice, you find, and eager to catch you up to speed on how things are run around here.

Your supervising stylist introduces herself as Lee Ji-Won, tells you the two of you would be working with Felix today, and shuffles you over to the appropriate counter to start setting up. You find the space a bit crowded with your addition, but luckily you’re soon directed into action and busy with work away from your new home base.

You find Ji-Won to be a no-nonsense type with a sharp sense of humor and a stern countenance, and a reasonable and pleasant person to work with. You also find out that she’s the head stylist for your team, not just the stylist supervising you. You’re very glad you find this out before you managed to call her supervisor to her face.

Really, you quite enjoy working with Ji-Won already. You almost wish you’d done your apprenticeship under her instead of the giant weirdo you’d landed yourself with in Hollywood. [Your mentor had been a nice guy, affable and wise, but he’d been odd, to put it kindly. Unfortunately for you, you’re fairly certain you wouldn’t have gotten a better education anywhere else. Your fellow Apprentice at the time had wanted to be just like your mentor, and you prayed for the sanity of whatever clients he scrounged up these days.]

Before too long everything is set up and you’re bestowed with praise for helping everything go so smoothly. You put it down to experience and a lot less fumbling than your average apprentice or even an actual junior artist. Nobody argues with you, and soon you’re tailing after Ji-Won to go help the clothing stylists get ready with a few of the other girls.

By the time you’re done with that and heading back to hair and makeup, Stray Kids is on set and the already buzzing set is swarming with activity. You once again admire Ji-Won’s impeccable timing as your group settles in just before the boys are ushered in and immediately beeline for their chairs. You assume they have a usual team and just head for the most familiar stylists, but you can’t be sure.

One thing is for sure, the eight of them are loud. Not in any one way, but as soon as they’d entered the room it was like a cacophony of jokes and laughter and sound had followed them. They seem to brighten up the dressing room with their mere presence and you smile to have seen it. You’ve definitely done makeup in more somber places.

Felix settles into his station with a questioning glance in your direction and Ji-Won sets to work even as she introduces you.

“Yongbok-ah, meet our newest make-up artist,” She introduces you, and you note the familiar address. It’s a good sign that Felix is probably very nice, for someone like Ji-Won to call him so comfortably.

“She’s new to us, but she’s well respected in the industry, so you boys be nice, alright?” You blush and duck your head at the praise, missing the absolutely bug-eyed look Felix shoots you and Ji-Won. Ji-Won catches it, though, and simply glares back at him.

“I’m really not all that, Ji-Won-ssi” you murmur, embarrassed. You rally yourself quickly and give Felix a sheepish smile. “It’s nice to meet you, Felix-ssi. I look forward to working with you.” You finish with a small bow. Felix grins back at you, echoing the greeting, but you’re put to work before much more conversation can take place.

At some point you’re sent from the room to fetch everyone a round of water bottles and other beverages. By the time you come back you can tell something has changed. Bangchan and Lee Know both give you a considering look, and Seungmin on the other side of the room looks downright impressed with you. You’re not sure what you’ve done, but you simply go about distributing the drinks, greeting and being introduced to each Stray Kid in turn as you make your rounds.

Ji-Won is about halfway done with Felix’s look when you return to her side, a hair-stylist eonni going at his head in tandem with her. She doesn’t have anything else for you to do at the moment, so you let yourself idle, examining Ji-Won’s products and handing them to her as needed, studying her techniques. You see her hands shake every now and then, and wonder if she’s eaten enough today.

Felix takes the opportunity to distract you, and you don’t notice Ji-Won’s sigh of relief as your eyes slide off of her.

“So what were you doing before this?” Felix inquires, “Ji-Won doesn’t give out praise so freely, you know.” He teases both you and Ji-Won in one fell swoop. You wonder if it’s the consequence of living with essentially seven brothers for years that one becomes good at teasing multiple targets. You settle for answering the question while ignoring the praise as Ji-Won sends him an intimidating look.

“I did a bit of everything,” You answer truthfully, “I was doing SFX makeup for an indie film that comes out soon right before this, and I was offered for London Fashion Week, but I decided on this instead.” Felix gives you a wide-eyed look before Ji-Won taps his forehead to make him relax his face again.

“Why’d you pick this,” He gestures to the room at large, “Over fashion week?” He questions incredulously. You shrug indifferently at him but answer when you notice Ji-Won giving you a curious look too.

“This seemed more fun,” You answer honestly. Even Ji-Won pauses completely to look at you funny this time, so you elaborate, “What I mean is, I’ve done fashion weeks before. I’ve even done London Fashion Week specifically before. In my opinion, if you’ve been to one you’ve been to them all.” You shrug again, “I’m not really interested in European faces right now, or high-fashion makeup. I know a lot less about Asian faces and the Korean styles of stage makeup.” You explain.

Ji-Won seems to understand you a bit at this point, but Felix still looks a bit lost, so you pivot to the more practical side of things. “Besides, this is a longer and more stable job for me.” You lean onto the counter behind you with your elbows and cross your legs as you continue. You find yourself idly counting Felix’s freckles as they disappear under layers of foundation and color while you speak.

“I’ve been independent for a long time, so the question of a year-long contract at lower pay and a shorter contract at higher pay was a no-brainer for me. It’s easier to live when you know where your next paycheck is coming from.” You can tell by the look on his face that he still doesn't find his daily life more interesting than London Fashion Week, but you just offer him an amused smile. He seems to accept it, Ji-Won finishing with one of his eyes as the conversation closes out.

She turns to you now, palette in hand. “You’re known for mimicking styles pretty well, right?” She questions. At your nod, she hands you the palette and gestures to Felix’s other eye. “Why don’t you do his other eye? We’ll be able to judge your capabilities a bit better if you’re actually doing makeup instead of running all over the place.”

You smile as you move to do as you’re told, jokingly complaining, “It feels like I’m an apprentice all over again!” as you do. Felix meets your eyes almost daringly as you approach and you offer him a small smile in return. The smile fades as you gently turn his head to properly study Ji-Won’s work. You memorize what you can and mentally flip it onto the other eye and get to work.

What you don’t see as you concentrate is some of the other artists pausing what they’re doing to watch you work, Ji-Won in particular scrutinizing every movement of your hand. The Stray Kids who’s artist could afford to pause their work also look over, curious. The fascination only lasts a moment though. They all have work to be doing right now.

A single eye doesn’t take you very long, and soon you’re leaning back to do a final study of your result with a satisfied smile. You were asked to imitate so you’d done as perfect a recreation as you could manage with a different eye. Looking over at Ji-Won for approval you’re met with a satisfied nod.

It doesn’t take Ji-Won much longer to finish up with Felix’s face and you’re left only a moment to admire the look before a manager comes in to corral everyone to their places for the shoot. Ji-Won's preternatural timing deserves to be admired.

Unfortunately for you you don’t get to do much makeup after that, being regulated to doing just about every menial task under the sun. It’s part of being the most junior person on staff, you know, but it’s still terribly boring.

You do get a bit of entertainment in the form of what is, according to one of your sunbaes, a traditional hazing of new SKZ coordis. You’d been following around Han’s dedicated coordi and were helping her fan him and pat the sweat off of his face when he tuned in enough to realize he didn’t recognize you.

It was kind of funny how you could almost read the thoughts off his face as his intrusive thoughts got the better of him. First the eyes on your face trying to place you. Then darting to your lanyard when he doesn’t. Registering the words ‘Junior Stylist’. The split second hesitation as his inhibitions war with his impulsiveness. Then he catches your eyes. Hesitates a moment more. Then winks and blows you a kiss.

The smirk he’d ended his little flirt with widens into a goofy grin as you simply blink in response and the other coordi starts giggling madly. Once you figure out it’s some sort of joke, you remember your sunbae’s warning about their ‘playfulness’ from the other day. You think you finally figured out what she meant.

After all the pieces click together for you, you let your eyes roll almost fondly. You always did enjoy clients who weren’t afraid to joke with you much more than the stuffy over-formal ones. You blow a kiss right back, but with no winking of your own, and get back to patting sweat off of his face. You note the red tinge to the very tips of his ears victoriously. Coordis - 1 SKZ - 0. As it should be.

The shoot ends with no further excitement, and you make your way home feeling over all very positive about your new job.

#Baby Writes #Coordi AU #skz fanfic #skz fic #Stray kids fanfic #skz x reader #stray kids x reader #w.i.p fic #w.i.p

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waitmyturtles · 1 year

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Oh my EFF, where DO I START. Moonlight Chicken, episode 7 thoughts and impressions. But first, a question for the family:

Did any of you notice the filming style slightly change during the condo/living room scene with Jim and Wen (after Jim put on the chicken shirt), and the second scene with Jam and Li Ming, when they’re eating the ginger stir-fry? In both scenes, I noticed that the camera pans were a bit more fast/jerky between characters, and that Jim and Jam (#jimjam) were filmed from the chest up. I wish I knew more about cinematography, but it seemed to me that the other shots throughout the show were wider and taller. I don’t know if this means anything to anyone, but if it does, I would love to hear thoughts on it. I feel like the shooting style gave those scenes some kind of different old-school flavor.

1) JUST GAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH WHY IS THIS SHOW SO GOOD. Sorry for the yelling, but now I know, I KNOW, full-bodied, there is no way one post is enough for each of these episodes, so just expect a whole freaking unspooling over the weekend. ANYWAY. I’ll try to organize the quick thoughts first, then the deep thoughts.

2) Just get First and Khao together again already! They can’t help their chemistry to be ridiculously great. AND HOW GOOD IS FIRST. HOW GOOD IS HE. Just knowing when to fume just slightly, when to pull back for the sake of a scene. AND HOW GOOD IS KHAOTUNG. God. His crying! It took me OUT. Tears over here, streaming tears.

3) Speaking of hearts aching, I cried not only during the funeral scene because of Khao, but because I love this now-repeating motif that Aof uses of bringing a song that’s sung in the show as music for the background of the show, à la Bad Buddy. To think of every step of art to weave into a drama to keep you fully connected -- it’s really beautiful to me.

4) Mark/Leng with his UCLA jacket, what up, Cali, cute cute. (By the way, I’m missing View/Praew. She was incredible in 10 Years Ticket, and I think she could have lent her brilliance to MC. I’m going to add The Shipper to my list for First/Ohm/View.)

5) The continued motif of showing the cast participating in time-honored spiritual rituals. As sad as it sounds, I love funeral scenes and the way a temple brings together a community. Even Wen working at the temple -- it’s very real (at least at the Indian/Asian funerals I saw as a kid) to basically have a lot of the funeral feel like a community get-together.

6) Heart joining Li Ming to hand out drinks at the temple just messed me up. It messed me up good. When the young adults automatically help out at events without being told by their parents. It means a lot in Asian societies.

7) Deeper thoughts. @wen-kexing-apologist hit on this in their BEAUTIFUL POST about the show being centered on parent-child relationships. There’s a lot here in this episode, I may not get to it all.

Here’s how I’d break it down (and this post by @justafriend-ql covers so much so well):

a) Jam comes back after years of not seeing Li Ming b) Li Ming is OBLIGATED, by UNSPOKEN CULTURAL RULES, to continue to respect her as a parent c) Li Ming, clearly, wants fucking none of it d) Li Ming/Fourth EMANATES distaste for what he’s dealing with e) Li Ming STILL has to control himself around his mom who moved him aside to live her life f) He has to ALSO DEAL with his uncle, who (yes, hypocritically) (but also hypothetically) asks him why he’s gay g) So Li Ming has to also deal with his uncle’s internalized homophobia and old-fashioned views on gays in society, which may very well arise in part from his upbringing in rural Isaan h) Jim has to also deal with his sister’s guilt over not having been a mom, and her trying to sort of half-heartedly show up (until the last scene with them, which I think was meant as a symbol that there might be healing happening among the three), and i) Jim beginning to see Li Ming for the adult that he is becoming.

@justafriend-ql covered in their two posts about Li Ming the sheer SIMMERING, the shimmering ANGER that Fourth portrayed, and I felt @wen-kexing-apologist’s pain in my bones when I watched those scenes.

So much of what I am loving about Aof’s work as I enjoy my ride through his oeuvre is this family dissection -- the microscopic examination of the painful aftereffects of holistic filial piety (COUGH Bad Buddy) -- and I can never say enough how important his family art work is to Asian audiences. When I see these scenes of young adults holding themselves back with every iota of their energy to not JUMP KICK their parents when they’re acting stupid -- man, I feel that so hard.

Jam coming back and asking for Li Ming is just lame, and we all know it, and Li Ming knows it. And yet, he is BOUND by CULTURAL PRACTICE -- cultural rules that even JIM REFERENCES -- to need to hold back and respect his mother, because that’s what Thai cultural boundaries demand. So I agree with @justafriend-ql that what Fourth radiated was beyond brilliant. As a viewer, I really want to see Li Ming’s gates open and to see him rage, because my inner child wants to rage right along with him.

But that night scene with Jim and Li Ming, man.

I think this bit of this scene is what ended up helping Jim to relax, and to see Li Ming as an adult.

I am loving how Jim is written. The constant, CONSTANT pull between old values and new. This scene so beautifully depicted Jim in that balancing struggle.

Li Ming is just pulling Jim along to the light of the future, as children/young adults do. Li Ming NEEDS his uncle to see HIMSELF (Jim) in Li Ming. And I think that’s what’s happening, in part, in this scene. Jim sees that Li Ming CAN understand how complicated the world is around him. Jim SEES that Li Ming is a CRITICAL THINKER.

Jim has been a solo parent for so long. He’s worried about his kid. They’re poor. His kid’s gay. Jim’s worried about his kid being poor and gay. Jim expresses it, at first, in an old-fashioned, shouting, angry way. Jim accidentally outs Li Ming to Jam.

And then. The two guys -- the guys -- sit with each other, rest and wash in the process of mourning an important member in the community. Jim tries to hear Li Ming at Li Ming’s level. And Jim finds that he can hear.

And maybe, even, Jim is beginning to learn that he can transcend those old-fashioned values -- those UNSPOKEN CULTURAL RULES that still bind much of Li Ming’s behavior towards his mother -- to be a model for Li Ming, AND TO HIMSELF, to live a hopefully more fulfilling life. (I think that might be what’s happening, in part, with the cancellation of the diner’s lease at the end of the episode -- but the preview for the finale has me wondering if I’m right.)

8) I don’t know how much I have left, but I took these screenshots to also talk about Jim’s internalized homophobia. I think I’ve covered it already in my Li Ming analysis, but come AWN, just look at this SASS BUCKET OVER HERE:

I took these to confirm that Jim was “just being a dad” (ugh) in the moment of him yelling at Li Ming, but I think Jim redeemed himself with that night chat with Li Ming. So I’m just gonna leave these screenshots here BECAUSE COULD WEN/MIX BE ANY MORE SASSY?

I’m already missing these guys. I need Our Skyy 2 REALLY SOON.

I’m gonna need a lot of sleep tonight to manage tomorrow.

#moonlight chicken #moonlight chicken meta #earthmix #firstkhao #earth pirapat #mix sahaphap #first kanaphan #khaotung thanawat #fourth nattawat #gemini norawit #jim x wen #wen x jim #alan x gaipa #gaipa x alan #these tags already existed i have nothing to do with creating them

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oneshortdamnfuse · 9 months

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bro ive never heard a Ghost song in my life. got any recs for their heaviest-sounding songs. ive seen jokes that they aren't actually metal so thats why im asking for their heaviest songs lol or what someone would consider to be heavy for a Ghost song

The thing about Ghost is that their music doesn't neatly fit into one genre, and people probably wouldn't be saying they're not metal if this was 40+ years ago. They'd fit in with many 80s metal bands.

Their debut hit "Ritual" doesn't sound heavy at first, but thirty seconds into the song there's a heavy riff and then it goes back to a groovy tune and then another two minutes it's heavy again.

A lot of people jokingly refer to it as "Scooby Doo Rock" because it IS very campy and over the top. I think Square Hammer instantaneously hits you with that vibe, but it's a great song. Square Hammer is heavy, but it's also fun and upbeat.

Their songs often have a mix of heavy riffs and beautiful melodies, with inspiration clearly taken from 80s stadium metal and even 60s bubblegum pop. They're danceable. You can shake your ass to their songs and that's intentional.

It's also worth noting that the musicians supporting Ghost come from all different backgrounds. Their guitarist, Sodo, has been in heavy metal and death metal bands. However, Aurora, one of their female vocalists, is a pop singer.

I have a general favorite Ghost songs playlist here. Songs on there and the list below are marked with an asterisk*

I would say, though, some of their (subjectively) heavier songs are by album (early to new) are the following. I'd recommend working backwards from their new stuff to old if you're interested in listening to them because their sound is more polished now.

Opus Eponymous (2010)

Elizabeth

Con Clavi Con Dio*

Prime Mover

Genesis

Infestissumam (2013)

Infestissumam

Per Aspera Ad Inferi

Year Zero*

Depth of Satan's Eyes

Meliora (2016)

Spirit

From The Pinnacle To The Pit

Cirice*

Mummy Dust*

Absolution*

Square Hammer*

Prequelle

Rats*

Faith

See The Light*

Witch Image*

Impera

Call Me Little Sunshine*

Hunter's Moon*

Watcher in the Sky*

Twenties*

Respite Of The Spitalfields*

They have a bunch of ballads that I love as well including Darkness At The Heart of My Love.

And! I will always say Sodo didn't bleed all over his guitar while shredding for people to say they're not metal or metal enough. They're just not growling on stage and again, you can shake your ass to a lot of their music lol

#text post #the band ghost

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pjplayground · 9 months

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Tragic Mystery

There's a familial mystery afoot, I can smell it.

Bio: Paperjam is an aspiring thespian in their prime. They spend most of their free time working on stuff for their school's current play. They accentuate this eccentric interest with an eccentric wardrobe to match. Recently, his family moved into an old mansion that's apparently been in the family for generations, and his life is about to get dramatic - how fitting for a theater kid.

Basic Info Full Name: Paperjam Bonrad McFadden Age: 17 Height: 6' Gender Identity: Genderfluid (he/they preferred) Sexual Orientation: Pansexual (preference for masculine people) Medical Issues: Anxiety, Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (PoTS) Can't Leave the House Without: Gum, jacket, beanie, salt shaker key chain, phone, earbuds

Relationships Ink - Father, fairly good Irene - Mother, have conflicting views Undyne - Friend, teases him on the daily Alphys - Friend, they info dump together Burgerpants - Friend, background set buddies Napstablook - New friend, totally does not have a huge crush on them

Miscellaneous Little Facts - The little pins on his hat are little references taken from various spooky/horror movies, can you identity them all? - His favorite flavor of gum to chew is honeydew. - PJ LIVES for salt and vinegar flavored things - especially chips. - They wear a large, old t-shirt for pajamas, and nothing else besides boxers. - When he was a kid, he would take the wax out of candles and mold them into little wax sculptures. He was a weird kid. - The story of Tragic Mystery was inspired by a horror movie called "The Ritual", as well as shows like Gravity Falls as said by Crispy Koala. - PJ's anxiety gives him what he calls an "anxious tummy", making him extremely gassy and his bowels very irritable. Meaning it's not uncommon for him to fart when he's anxious or nervous. - They refuse to eat at any restaurant that doesn't serve some form of chicken tenders and french fries. As they should, honestly. - He has three little pet Cotton Puff Bats named Lock, Shock, and Barrel. - Lock, Shock, and Barrel are fed all sorts of treats by PJ, their favorite being white dragon fruit. - PJ has a mini salt shaker key chain that he carries around on his backpack or belt loop for food emergencies, because he loves salty stuff. - In his closet, he has a pile of old busted up notebooks filled with years of stage play ideas. - He likes listening to music that fits within the umbrella aesthetics of Liminal Spaces and Weird/Dreamcore. - On top of the pins on his hat, he also has a variety of pins that he's collected which he adorns all over his backpack. - PJ plays on an old gaming system - the Cloud Jumper 94 - that his father used to own. He has newer gaming systems but he prefers to play on the old console. - He had a really, really embarrassing goth phase when he was between the ages of 13 and 15. - Due to the severity of his condition on some off days, PJ is a part time wheelchair user. - His mother Irene is a lawyer who believes PJ should work towards a more "sustainable" career. You can imagine how well they get along. - PJ loves horror movies, and doesn't scare easily. - The reason PJ always has gum in his possession is because he concentrates better when doing a minor motor action. - PJ and his friends were all dubbed the weird kids by their peers, so they stuck together. - PJ tries to keep a very collected and aloof demeanor around his friends and everyone else, but that all gets thrown out the window when Napstablook is within ten feet of his sight. - He's very passionate about all forms of art, including painting. But theater is his specialty within the arts. - From PJ's point of view, Blook seems oblivious to his crush on him. Which may or may not be the case... - He stumbled upon his family's potentially dark history by accident while snooping around the new house.

Tragic Mystery was a story created by my friend @thecrispykoala, and may have more content dedicated to it in the near future.

#studentsechoes #reference sheet #tragic mystery #tm pj

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sissytobitch10seconds · 9 months

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One Hell of a Beginning

Fandom: Umbrella Academy Summary: Viktor has to go on a grand quest to tell a man he's had a crush on since his Freshman year of college that he got pregnant after they spent one night together at a party while slightly tipsy. Warnings: Pregnancy, mentions of abortion, trans male pregnancy, and anxiety attacks Word Count: 6,737 Ship(s): Five Hargreeves/Viktor Hargreeves

Archive link!

A/N: So a couple people wanted to see the way that Five reacted to the baby from the first part of this series, so I wrote it! It's very unlikely that I'm going to write anything else in this series because I feel like it'd be the same thing as what I wrote in a couple other fics but with different things going on in the background. I hope that you guys can enjoy this! Stay sissy and bitchy everyone <3

Allison was going to get suspicious the longer that they had to dance around her, Viktor knew that.

Despite that knowledge and him being an overall smart person in general, he kept moving the goalpost to try and avoid completing the plan that he and Klaus had come up with. The note stared him in the face from the homescreen of his phone, constantly reminding him of what he had to do every time he opened up one of his relax-time games or tried to flick through social media between classes.

Classes were almost finished, most professors having already given their finals and graduation nearing. Viktor had finished enough of his work that he had basically nothing to do other than catch up on sleep.

He had wondered over the past couple of weeks how much harder it would have been to keep his secret from his roommate if he didn’t have the excuse of being a college student. He knew that a lot of their hallmates had the same kind of attitude as he did, so he was able to skate under the radar. Sleeping all the time could be blamed on him catching up on the sleep that he had missed while he was studying for finals. Mood swings could be passed off on the anxiety and stress that came with graduating and having to move out into the real world. The vomiting was harder to explain since Viktor made a rule of not drinking more than a single mixed drink even when in his own dorms, but even then he could just wave it off saying that his body was unhappy with their new final-induced diet. Finals were a good excuse for cravings as well since he could say that it was a good way to get his body’s daily nutrients quickly or some other poorly worded excuse.

The only problem was that Allison was smart and had been living with Viktor for four years. She was getting suspicious and he could tell by the way that she continued to try and pry into him whenever he gave her one of those excuses. He usually tried to make sure that he ate three square meals a day even if that happened to be while walking to his next class or around a book about music theory. She knew that he slept for at least five hours a night and supplemented the missed sleep with coffee during finals. She knew that he made sure to eat a balance of junk and healthy foods, something that had been drilled into him by his parents.

The last straw was going to be a combination of the appointment Klaus had just picked him up for and him going to church last Sunday. He usually only went to church when his parents were in town and they weren’t going to be showing up until graduation in two weeks. He had gone because he had felt like it was important to try and access the spirituality that his parents had always promised was there, but he had never felt. It was the same, despite the little life that he was carrying inside of him. He was considering taking Jayme up on their offer to attend the full moon rituals she was holding with her coven just to see if that would help either.

Something about learning that he was pregnant had completely changed how he had looked at the world. The decision to go through with the pregnancy and keep the baby had been another step towards that change, but not as much as the test coming back positive. A part of him deep inside must have known that would be the answer he was going to give when he got the result before even he did. It felt more final than any other decision in his life had. He knew that he would have been able to back out of college if he needed to, or move out of the dorm that he shared with a stranger at the time. There was always something to fall back on or a way to get out of that decision, but not with this one.

Viktor was standing in front of the door to his own apartment, frozen with fear. He knew that what he was going to do next didn’t even involve having to talk about his little secret. The only thing that he had to do was ask for something, he didn’t have to explain it if he didn’t want to. Even after prompting.

Those were Klaus’ words, Viktor would never be brave enough to refuse to give information to Allison when she looked at him with that unsure expression. He always wanted to reassure her that he was okay and validate every decision that he made that she didn’t approve of. She had that kind of motherly tendency about her despite her penchent of making bad decisions herself. The voice mails from her ex-boyfriend from Freshman year were proof enough of that.

“You can do this,” he muttered to himself as he grasped the handle to the door and then walked in.

Allison was sitting on the couch with Raymond, he current boyfriend and an English major. They had a couple of books on the coffee table that they were purposefully ignoring despite the fact that Viktor knew their finals weren’t quite over yet.

“Hey, you’re home,” Allison smiled as she turned to look back at her roommate.

“That I am,” he replied as he closed the door behind him. He was trying to look casual as he shed his jacket and then dumped it on the little counter that they had in their makeshift kitchen. Their dorm was better than a lot of the other ones offered by the university, but it was still shit. He was glad he was going to be graduating and moving into a new apartment before the baby came.

Even just thinking about the fact that in a few months time he was going to have a whole child relying on him for their every need sent a shiver of anxiety up his spine. He always wished that he had kept the jacket on while traversing through his apartment after he remembered that the only remaining physical proof of his pregnancy was tucked into the pocket.

He tried to play it cool as he walked into the living room so that he was standing next to the couch. He awkwardly folded his arms over his chest and stomach, which hadn’t begun to change in a noticeable way but Viktor was still very nervous about. He cleared his throat and then shifted from foot to foot as he asked, “Do you think that you could give me Luther’s number?”

Allison had been half ignoring him the entire time that he was back in their apartment, obviously hoping that he would go to his room or pick up whatever he needed to spend time with Klaus. He was usually out of their dorm when she had her boyfriend over after the time that he had heard them being intimate through the paper thin wall that separated their rooms from each other. When she heard him ask that, her brows immediately flew into her hairline and she turned to look at him, “What?”

“Y-you still have it, right? I know that it would be totally in your right to delete it since what you guys had didn’t even really last that long and was totally weird but I know that you still talk sometimes so I was hoping that you would still have it and would feel comfortable giving it to me,” he rambled. The words were tumbling out of his mouth until they were basically overlapping and on top of each other.

She held up her hand to silence him before he could continue his ramble. While he had been talking she was untangling her legs from Ray’s so that she could stand up and face him properly. “Viktor, I don’t mean what number, I meant why did you want it? You and Luther had about one conversation and it went poorly because he’s a huge himbo. Why do you want his number?”

“I need it,” he said, which was entirely unhelpful. Viktor tried to wrack his mind for excuses that he could give her about why he wanted the number.

It had apparently been too long since her initial ask as she then said, “I know, but why?”

“I’m trying to get some information from him that I really need,” his eyes flickered over to Allison. He knew that if he told her then Ray would hear again quickly, but for some reason his brain was more okay with him hearing through his girlfriend than through his own mouth. Usually it would be the other way around since he had been the subject of several nasty gossip trains when they were in college, so he preferred that people just not talk about him as a whole. However, having to tell everyone that he was one of those people that got pregnant on a one night stand in college wasn’t really something he wanted to have to keep admitting.

“Why don’t I step out for a moment and give you two a second to talk? You can let me know when it’s okay to come back,” Ray said as he got up from the couch. He held Allison’s waist to bring her closer so that he could kiss her cheek.

“Thank you, baby,” she murmured as she brushed her hand over the side of his face.

Viktor’s heart ached as he wished that he could have that kind of relationship with Five. If he had just had the guts to go up and talk to him then he wouldn’t have ended up pregnant at twenty-two with no one to help him raise the kid other than his childhood best friend. Had things gone well, there was the slightest chance that he would have ended up pregnant at twenty-two with the man of his dreams at his side and a pleasant future smiling at them both. Then he wouldn’t have to spend the rest of his life explaining that his child wasn’t an accident, but a surprise that happened earlier in their life than they had intended.

He had spent a lot of time over the past couple of weeks daydreaming instead of continuing on with the plan that he and Klaus had made.

Once the door clicked shut and signified that they were really as alone as they could in the dorm block, Viktor took a deep breath to steady his nerves. His nausea had been playing up since his best friend had sat down next to him in the canteen to let him know that he had to get started on the plan or it was never going to happen. “I’m pregnant, Allison.”

“With Luther’s kid?” she gasped, her eyes widening big enough that they were basically consuming her entire face.

“What? NO!” he shouted immediately. She had been right about him and Luther only having one real interaction with each other. It had been when they were Freshman and Allison was still playing the will-they-won’t-they game with him like she had done with a string of men during that year. They had gotten hostile with each other, which had been the deciding factor for the relationship that it wasn’t going to be happening. Since then they had both changed and settled out so they could chat when they were in a group together in one of their shared classes and didn’t have to glare at each other in the hallways.

Given that their relationship had started off in such a bad place, it only made sense that Allison would be so flabbergasted at the idea of them putting aside their grudge to the point where they could sleep together and Viktor could conceive.

He let out a sigh as he began to pull at the ends of his fingers. “The baby is Five’s, his twin brothers. Five is really fucking antisocial so the only way that I can reach out to him is through his brother because the only person that would have his number doesn’t text people,” he groused.

This hadn’t been his original plan, to go through two different people so that he could get the number he needed. However, when he had asked Lila about it she had just laughed and showed off the conversation that she had through Instagram. Viktor had later learned, while complaining about how much she sucked, through Diego that was the only way she talked with anyone. Apparently her adoptive mother was the only person that had her number so that she could handle the notifications differently and avoid accidentally reading a message she wasn’t prepared to reply to.

Viktor felt a little bit guilty as he remmebered that Diego still wasn’t in the loop. The two of them had been closer than he was with Allison because their interests aligned more and they actually spent quality time together. Viktor considered himself to be friends with Allison, of course, but he and Diego had reached the same level that he had with Klaus. To an extent, he supposed, seeing as Klaus knew about the baby while Diego didn’t.

A couple of months ago, he thought that the most complicated part of his life was going to be the transition from college to his first job.

Allison had apparently come to her senses. She toyed with the end of one of her braids as she asked, “Is that why you’ve been acting so weird?”

“Huh?” he asked, intelligently, since he had been so trapped in his own mind that he had lost their place in the conversation.

“The baby. Is that why you and Klaus have been acting so weird?” she reiterated.

Another wave of guilt. “Yeah, I’m sorry. Originally we didn’t want to tell anyone because I wanted Five to be the first person to know other than Klaus. Klaus was there with me when I took the test which is the only reason that he knows. I was going to tell you eventually…”

“Are you keeping it?” she asked next, her eyes flickering around their tiny dorm room apartment.

“I’m not due until well after we graduate, it’s not like I’ve been keeping this from you for months and months. I found out six weeks ago and I’m barely even at the tale end of my first trimester,” he explained. “I just… I’ve been putting this off for as long as I can and now I can’t anymore. We’re graduating in two weeks and I just got my first ultrasound done so I really need to tell Five so that I can give him the chance to be involved in his kid’s life.”

“Do you think he’s going to want to be?” Allison asked. She grabbed her phone from where it had been resting on top of all the books she wasn’t using to study.

Viktor dropped his head down into one of his hands. His feet were already beginning to ache despite how early he was into his pregnancy. He wanted to pass out and ignore his problems until a much, much later date but if he did that then he would have to answer to his best friend. “I have no idea. I’ve had a crush on him since we were freshman and while he’s absolutely gorgeous and very intelligent, he keeps his personal life so guarded that I didn’t even know Luther was his twin until four months ago.”

She laughed and then handed him her phone, open to the contact that he needed. He pulled out his own phone and then copied the information he needed before he handed it back to her. “Thank you for helping me with this, Allison.”

“Of course. What kind of asshole would I be if I stopped you from getting into contact with your baby daddy?” she laughed as she dropped her phone back down onto the table.

Viktor cringed, “Don’t ever say that to me again.”

Another laugh as she pulled him into a hug. It felt nice to be in the comforting embrace of another one of his friends, confirmed that they didn’t hate him for the slip up in judgment that he had that resulted in a life changing consequence.

Allison kissed the top of his head and then said, “But I am going to be the type of asshole to kick you out of your own apartment. I want my boyfriend back here, so you have to scoot.”

---

Klaus’ dorm was very different from Viktor’s. Instead of being what was essentially a mini-apartment that his mother had helped him pay for, it was a standard cinderblock room. Klaus had managed to drive away every single roommate that he had ever had to the point where the administrators had given up trying to room him with anyone. That meant that he had pushed both of the single beds together and stretched a custom-altered queen-sized sheet over the mattresses to give himself a larger bed. His walls were cluttered with posters and overdue assignments, the ceiling stained from when he had been chain smoking cigarettes when they were sophomores (his mother had gotten so upset at him for it that he had quit almost immediately after she found out). His floor was littered with washed and unwashed laundry, more assignments, and enough baggies of weed to kill a large badger.

The weed was remaining unsmoked this time, though they had shared a joint or two every other time that they had been in his dorm. There wasn’t a lot of research about what marijuana would do to an unborn fetus since it had been criminalized for so long, but Viktor knew that smoking was bad so he assumed that he should just avoid the whole fiasco altogether.

He was spread out on top of Klaus’ bed after shoving the laundry that took up a fourth of it onto the ground. He was sitting with his legs crossed and his back propped up against the pillows with one hand pressed to where his child was steadily growing. He had his phone in the other hand, typing awkwardly with only one thumb.

“This entire thing feels so weird,” he muttered.

“That’s like the thousandth time you’ve said that since it all began. We get it, being pregnant is like totally bonkers,” Klaus teased.

He stopped when Viktor sent him a look, obviously not in the mood for that kind of thing. “Klaus, you know that this is really stressing me out. What if Luther and Five turn out to be total assholes? I know that his relationship with that theoretical physicist undergrad has changed Luther or whatever but we’ve ended up snarling at each other every time that we’ve had a long conversation other than once. Now I’m asking him for his brother’s number because I’m carrying his nibling! That’s fucking insane.”

“You’re right, it is weird. But Luther isn’t an asshole anymore. Sloane really made him change who he was and realize that the world didn’t revolve around him. Five is just weird in general,” Klaus shrugged. “Here, read me what you’ve got so far.”

“I just said: ‘Hey, this is Viktor from Mythology and History. I know we’re not super close but I need a favor and you’re the only person left that I can ask’. Which, I know, is super cryptic and not really the best way to start the conversation but I already sent it,” he grumbled.

“If you already sent it and it’s a text then there’s nothing you can do about it. You’ve just gotta learn to roll with the flow, Vik! Everything is gonna turn out okay in the end, you know that. We’re gonna raise this baby together as the best village a kid could ever ask for regardless of whether or not Five wants to be involved in their life,” he soothed. He had given Viktor that speech throughout the entire process of his pregnancy so far. Every step of their plan had felt like scaling an entire mountain in one go, overwhelming and nearly impossible.

Viktor was glad that he had Klaus by his side because if he hadn’t, he probably wouldn’t have even gotten as far as he had. “I know, thanks,” he grasped his best friend’s hand and gave it a light squeeze. Klaus was laying with his back pressed to the edge of the bedframe and his head tilted backwards so that he could look at Viktor while they were talking. When they weren’t, he was facing forward and doing a rather crude sketch of their teacher for a last-minute assignment he had neglected.

The pregnant musician jumped when his phone sounded to let him know that he had gotten another text. He relayed it to Klaus as he read it, “‘Hey Viktor, Allison let me know that you got my number from her earlier. What did you need?’ Klaus, what do I even say to that? Do I explain why I need his brother’s number or do I just ask for it?”

“Just ask for it. I never give an explanation even after I’ve been prompted to do so,” he smirked.

That got a little laugh out of him, which drained some of the tension from the surrounding room. He sent off the message requesting the other man’s number. Luther sent him a question mark and then the number before asking him what it was about. Viktor tried to assuage any worry or confusion he had by promising that he would explain it later.

He set up the contact for Five with shaking hands before he sent a message eerily similar to the one that he had just sent the other twin. “Here, this is what I have so far: ‘Hey, my name is Viktor. We met at a party a couple of months ago and I need to talk to you about something very important. Do you have a time/place we could meet up?’”

“From a logical stand point that is a very good message, however, I think that it would be a lot funnier if you said that you had something of his,” Klaus grinned.

“The baby is not a possession to be owned,” Viktor bit out immediately afterwards. His own father had tried that when attempting to get custody of Viktor when he was younger, which of course had not passed in the American court of law.

He sent off the message and then collapsed down onto the bed as he waited for a reply. He got one pretty quickly afterwards, simply giving him a dorm block number and a time. “I guess I’m going to be revealing the fact that I’m carrying my long-term crushes baby to him in a week.”

Klaus flipped around and then snatched the phone back from him to look it over. “Man, he didn’t even say hi back. Do you want me to come with you or are you gonna be good?”

“I think that I should be okay to do the whole meeting with just the two of us. Having you there might be awkward. Will you walk me there?” Viktor asked hopefully.

“Of course,” Klaus easily promised.

---

A week before graduation and a week into his second trimester with a pregnancy he had never expected to carry, Viktor and Klaus were wandering down the complicated sidewalks of their college campus to try and find a specific address. The GPS that they were using was very upset that they weren’t on the road, despite the fact that they were not in a car and had to be on the sidewalk. They had been going in relative silence as Viktor rehearsed things that he could say to Five once the time actually came over and over again in his head.

They were finally told that they had arrived at their destination in front of a tall dorm block next to a frat house. It was one of the cleaner frat houses on campus, without the trash littering the yard and generally pleasant looking people milling about in the front. The dorm block itself was nearly twenty stories and painted the same gentle purple as the schools’ overall color scheme. It was well kept on the outside and completely devoid of people coming in and out of it. That wasn’t as rare as it would have been earlier in the year since everyone was so close to graduating that they either wanted to catch up on sleep, had to study, or didn’t even want to be on campus more than they absolutely had to.

Viktor paused and looked to the top floor as if that would somehow help him feel more steady with what he was going to have to do. He had barely slept the night before because he had been so anxious about what the next day would entail.

He snapped out of his thoughts again when Klaus placed a hand on his best friend’s shoulder, “You sure that you’re going to be okay? You know, doing this alone?”

“I don’t think that it’s going to have the same punch if I have someone there while I explain that he knocked me up,” he muttered. He ran a hand through his bangs to try and right them. When he had gotten up earlier that morning they had refused to lay flat, the dark chocolate locks already growing thicker and wilder than they ever had before in his life. His nails had also begun to grow quicker and gotten thicker, which was apparently a symptom of pregnancy no one online bothered to talk about.

Klaus didn’t seem so convinced. He wrapped Viktor up in a hug and while kissing the top of his head said, “If anything gets weird or bad you tell me right away and I’ll force Ben to come and check on you with me.”

Viktor laughed, his troubles melting away in the safety of his best friend’s arms. “You know that I will. You’re going to be the first person after Five to know how it all went down. And if it goes bad you better be prepared to pick up the pieces because I can only manage one person at a time and right now that means baby is my responsibility.”

“I know,” he chuckled as he pressed another kiss to the top of his head. “Now go. Actually tell him or there will be Hell to pay from me!”

The smaller man laughed and waved him off as he began towards the dorm block. He walked through the front door and then to the elevator at the back of the long hallway. There was a bulletin board inside that had a myriad of different declarations, such as when the graduation party was going to be, that someone was offering guitar lessons, when quiet hours were (that one had been scribbled over with a myriad of different colors to give each person their own quiet hours), a petition to make the dorm animal-friendly, and half of an essay that had a large boot print in the middle.

The elevator ride up to the floor that he had been given was slow and wobbly, since nothing in any of the dorm blocks was ever great. The one where Five lived was a little bit cleaner and tidier in the halls than the one where Viktor lived with Allison and leagues better than Klaus’.

The anxiety that he had been fighting with since early in the evening the day before had returned with a vengeance. It was sitting like a massive pit in his stomach, eating away at his insides until all he could feel was nausea. His hands were shaky as he stepped out of the elevator, forced to release the metal bar that had been there to help people stabilize during the jerky movements. His stomach clenched around the single mini-muffin that he had been able to shove into himself for breakfast. His lungs choked on the air that he was breathing and helped spread the anxiety around his body.

He was able to force himself forward so that he was slowly stalking down the hall. He didn’t know if the queasiness roiling in the back of his throat was because of the pregnancy or his anxiety, but he was ignoring it as best he could to focus instead on his mission.

He stopped in front of the door number that he had been given and rose his hand to knock. After he did, he closed his eyes and breathed a few times to calm himself down. The silence stretched on for thirty seconds before the door finally opened, and towards the end of his wait Viktor had begun to suspect that he had been tricked and that wasn’t actually Five’s dorm.

The door opened and Luther was standing in front of him, all at once. That had confirmed that he was at least at a place that could bring him to the man he really needed to talk to. He didn’t want to have to ask Luther for that kind of help again since it would almost definitely involve him explaining the pregnancy to another person before he did it to Five, but that didn’t seem to be the case.

“Uh, sorry, he’s inside. I’ll just step out and give the two of you some privacy,” he said awkwardly. He shuffled past Viktor and out into the hallway. It was odd to have someone with Luther’s bulk and height act like he was the ticking time bomb when Viktor struggled to push five feet tall and had always been awkwardly gangly.

“Thanks,” he gave an uncomfortable smile of his own. Once Luther had gotten fully out of the way, he inched past the slightly-closed door and into the dorm.

The apartment was just as nice on the inside as the block had been on the outside. There was a dining space and a small kitchen that actually had some counter space and a one-burner stovetop. The floor was hardwood, or at least a lookalike, and the walls were painted white with several classy paintings hung tastefully around the space. There were three doors on the wall opposite the kitchen space, one of which was open to reveal a neat little bathroom with chipper white tile along the walls and the floor. The other two doors were shut, though one of them opened to reveal the man that Viktor had spent the last week trying to chase down.

The violinist shut the door behind him so that they had some semblance of privacy while surrounded by strangers that probably had nothing better to do than listen in on their conversation, despite the hallways of the dorm block being mostly empty when Viktor was traveling through them.

“Hey,” he said awkwardly as he walked further into the apartment. He had his hands out in front of himself and was running the edge of his thumb nail over the callouses on the tips of his fingers to try and avoid the impulse to pull out the ultrasound in his pocket to play with that instead.

“Hello,” Five greeted rather tersely. He shut the door to his bedroom behind him and then walked over to the dining table in the center of the room. It was there where couches and chairs, or even bean bags and pillows on the ground, should have been. Viktor guessed that it was more conducive to the kind of studying that a future mathematician was going to have to do.

“I know that this is, uh, awkward and you probably don’t even remember who I am, but,” he paused for a second as he tried to find the right words. In his mind it sounded like was lying because he couldn’t even get through a single sentence without tripping over himself like some kind of child.

What was said next surprised him, to the point where his entire mind lost what he was trying to figure out how to say entirely. “I know who you are,” Five smiled. It looked a little awkward on his face, like he was somehow inherently more suited to scowling, but he was so handsome that Viktor almost swooned on the spot.

“You do?” he felt his face beginning to flush.

“Of course I do,” he nodded. “But I shouldn’t have interrupted you, go on.”

They were sitting down at the dining table at that point, across from each other like what was happening was some sort of strange business transaction instead of the most life-changing news Viktor was ever going to have to tell someone. It felt like a bigger deal than when he had told his mother he was trans.

“So, we met up at a party a while ago. Um, I don’t usually go to parties so I don’t have anything to define it by but we… slept together,” Viktor explained awkwardly. He reached into the pocket of his jacket and then pulled out the ultrasound as he set it down on the table, “I’m pregnant.”

Five was silent as he reached over and picked up the singular piece of paper. He held it to his face, his brow furrowing together and his already surly eyes becoming even more intense as he scrutinized the mess of black and white blobs for something Viktor couldn’t even name.

“I see,” he replied as he sat the photo back down on the table at the half way point between them. All of the joy that he had carried upon seeing Viktor was gone, hidden behind emotions that the violinist couldn’t even dream of reading.

He took the ultrasound back and then began on a nervous spiel that had been trying to force its way out of his mouth the entire time that he was watching Five study their unborn child. “I don’t expect you to be involved at all. I wanted to let you know because you deserve to have a say if you want one, but technically part of that say is deciding that you don’t. I’m not going to get an abortion since this is my body and I get to decide what medical procedures I do and do not want done. But I also thought that you deserved to know that you had a kid running around somewhere in the world even if you don’t want anything to do with us. Which I’m not saying that you will want, because I wouldn’t really want that if I had the kind of career ideas that people say you do. Um, I guess what I’m trying to say is that I wanted you to know that our genetics are going to be running around as a kid but I’m not expecting even child support, so, uh, yeah.”

After he finished speaking, Five sat there for a moment while blinking. His face was still a unreadable mask and his eyes were still storming with thoughts. Viktor wondered, just for a moment, if that was what he always looked like when he was thinking or if it was unique to their situation because of the bomb that Viktor had just dropped on him.

“And you’re sure that the baby is mine?” Five asked, something akin to hope glimmering in the back of his tone.

“I don’t get out that much,” Viktor nodded. “The party thing was a fluke and I made a bunch of decisions I probably should have been more cautious about. So not only does the timing add up, it’s kind of impossible to get pregnant from a guy you slept with six months ago.”

“Right,” Five nodded. He sat back in his chair and then ran his hand through his hair, displacing the locks so that they hung messily down around his forehead.

He shook his head and then looked back up at Viktor, his eyes cleared but his face still contorted with stress. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to insinuate anything about you. I just didn’t realize that this was a thing that could happen to me.”

“I didn’t think that it was something that could happen to me either, I’m usually really careful. But it did,” he shrugged awkwardly.

“I’m not upset about this, by the way. I don’t blame you and I don’t think you’re trying to trap me. I’m willing to help you in any way that you see fit,” Five said. “I can pay you child support, co-parent, have limited custody. Whatever works best for you.”

Viktor fidgeted as he tried to get the words out in a coherent way, despite the jumble of thoughts rushing through his mind. He was still in love with Five the same way that he had been when he was a dumb teenager spotting him across the hall during their orientation. His heart still fluttered at the thought of being near him again and his stomach still flipped at the proximity from even across the table. He was having a baby with someone that he was head over heels in love with, the kind of love that made his heart ache in his chest and his skin feel red hot, but not in the way that he had hoped.

“I want you to be involved in their life, like actually involved. My dad was really absent and it fucked me up. So if you’re going to do this then you really need to do this. You can’t decide that you don’t want to halfway through and then give them abandonment issues,” Viktor said seriously. It was hard to toss away the puppy dog feelings bubbling up in his chest but he had to worry about his child over his own feelings and emotions.

Five barked out a laugh and then looked embarrassed. “I apologize, I wasn’t laughing at you. Child abandonment isn’t something that my mothers would ever allow me to do. Even if I didn’t want to be a parent, which I do, there would be a chance that they would force me into some level of it anyway. Just to make sure that you and the baby would be supported, of course. They respect my bodily autonomy and choices with my life.”

“Okay,” Viktor nodded, feeling suddenly very overwhelmed with the whole ordeal. “So we can talk more about what we want co-parenting to look like in the future, we’ve got another two trimesters to get to before we’re there. And I need a nap.”

“Would you like me to walk you back to your dorm?”

“No, thank you,” he flushed. The idea of being led back to his home was something that he had dreamed about on that fateful night of conception, but this would be a lot different than that. For one, it was the middle of the day. He was also already pregnant with Five’s child and the two of them probably weren’t going to be having any chemistry because of that. “My best friend is waiting outside because he didn’t trust me to not just turn and run. I’ll let you know when the next appointment is if you’d like to join me for that, though.”

“I would love to. And I would also like to request a copy of the ultrasound if at all possible,” Five smiled warmly. It made Viktor’s insides feel gooey and like he was going to melt on the spot.

“I can do that,” Viktor nodded confidently. “I’ll see you later, then.”

“Right, yeah,” he sprang up from the table while nodding. He walked over to the door and then opened it for Viktor, which resulted in them having another awkward set of goodbyes at the front of the dormroom where neither of them were sure what level of a relationship they were on with each other.

Finally, Viktor was back down on the ground floor and texted Klaus to come and get him so they could walk home. He refused to give any details other than the fact that it went well, but forced his best friend to cuddle with him while he napped off the stresses of the day and night before.

#fanfiction #fanfic #writing #ao3 #archive of our own #tua #the umbrella academy #fiktor #five x viktor #viktor x five #viktor hargreeves #five hargreeves #luther hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #raymond chestnut #allison hargreeves #three to start series #one hell of a beginning fic

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the-hornedwitch · 2 months

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Utinam Ne Illum Numquam Conspexissem

Part Four: No Good no Bad, only consequences.

AN: Again, what I write and talk about is strictly my experience, from my perspective. I know what the books say or do not say, they aren't always right. Take what I say with a grain of salt, or what resonates with you.

As I've stated in previous posts, I started noticing media, posts, and music related to Lucifer. The pagan woman in me, took notice. The girl who believed in magic and the gods got excited. So, I did that little makeshift candle ritual, and like I said prior. He showed up. What I haven't talked about, or tried to in the most convoluted way, is how He lingered.

Due to various things, such as memory and perhaps fear of being called crazy, I've held back. A great deal of it has to do with putting my experiences into words. Most of my life, my spiritual experiences were shunned or waved off. Plus, I often question my own sanity, and do not want to come off as one of those nut cases that sees signs and synchronicities in every little thing. That being said, back to Lucifer.

He lingered, I had dreams (which i've talked about before) I often felt like i was being watched, especially at work. He continued to pop up in my algorithm, friends would bring Him up in conversation, I felt compelled to put His sigil on my car. I got sucked into that silly CW turned Netflix show. I started greeting the dawn for no particular reason, other than The Baphomet Codex had said He liked early morning ritual. Fellow satanists on Instagram shared information on Him, and spoke of rituals they'd done. I was enamored. Then He said Hello and I lost my ever loving shit. Which If You've been following my previous posts, is right where I left off last time.

Yes, He said Hello. Gulp Nah, wishful thinking. Yep.

I honestly can't remember much after that, covid happened, we went into lock down, I still did my rituals, my husband and I started hating each other. It's all a blur. I felt myself slipping back into that unhealthy woman I had been years ago. Lots of arguments and rage occurred. I wanted My husband gone and far away from me. When my husband eventually left, I felt some relief and freedom, but my life became very confusing. I started having break downs. I felt awful, and I slowly started to realize, after discussing a few incidents with outside people, (My Therapist, trusted family, and friends) that I had been in a rather toxic and possibly abusive relationship. The last few years flashed across my third eye, like a PowerPoint presentation. All the red flags I had ignored, all the boundaries I let get crossed, the disrespect I let slide. All the while Lucifer sat in the background, legs propped on a desk, (He likes to present human) clicking away at slides. “You have a listing problem Sweetheart” Click “Gave you plenty of opportunities” Click “Shined My light on the subject” Click “But you don't fucking listen do you, little girl?”

He likes to make His point.

As I worked through the emotions, and consequences of my decisions. I sat in the Void and came face to face with all the parts of myself, I resented and hated. He stayed and listened. Pointed out the things I did not want to hear but did so in the most supportive and loving way. As my soul broke, He held me close. Whispered firm words of understanding and support. There came a point, however my rage surfaced, and I lashed out. Shut myself off from Him and refused to listen. My tantrum was answered with a very hard smack from the cosmic belt.

The thing about Lucifer, that I feel many overlook, or do not understand, is His capability, and talent at intervening with the material and mundane world. As other practitioners will share, our Dark Lords have offices. Lord Lucifer, being a Crowned Prince, has reign over many realms and Offices. Being both a Dark Lord, and Angelic Being, His power is immense and profound. His will is simply that, His. He will enact His will as He sees fit, and when He damn well feels like it. He does not answer to the magician or practitioner, you do not command Him. He is the one in “charge.” And there I was, a simple human, whom He had called priestess, having a five-year-old level tantrum. Because I was mad that my life was falling apart, that I wasn't getting what I wanted, as quickly as I wanted. Boo Hoo.

After one intense emotional break down, followed by a "string of this is so unfair". I was searching for a meditation track to calm down. I believe I had looked up binaural beats, which I had gotten into at the time. As I scrolled, I found something that caught my full attention. A hypnosis track, one with His name in the title. So, Click I went. The voice I was introduced to hit all the right notes. (I have an awful attraction to how men speak.) I soon found the Hypnotists page and Patreon. All geared towards various fantasy, with many BDSM themed tones, coupled with meditation tracks. It is rather delightful. I am very familiar with what hypnosis is and isn't.

After a few days, to a week of actively listening. (I binged ok) My meditations with Lucifer changed. His presence became more prominent, there were a few instances I was touched (Sensually, grabbed, and pushed). Trance became easier and easier to fall into, without the assistance of cannabis or alcohol. There were times I would be in the kitchen listening to music doing dishes, and there'd I go, straight into the ether. stuck between a strange half-awake half asleep, and He'd be there. I awoke at night from extremely erotic dreams that left me wanting. I started questioning my reality again, not sure if it was the Hypnotist or Lucifer. I panicked, was very rude to the Hypnotist for not being able to answer my questions and lost myself in the sauce of psychic awakening.

Brain fried, emotions raw and soul torn open, Lord Lucifer stood over me and patiently asked, if I was "done, and have you learned how to behave?" Our relationship continued in that manner for a while. I was pushed to the edge of the void again, and again. Made to look at all the things I hated about myself. (He truly is amazing at alchemy and transmutation.) I'd go between hypnosis and meditation, going deeper within myself as much as I could. There were a few times I lost myself and broke in ways I didn't know where possible. However, Lucifer was there every step, even when I couldn't “feel” or hear Him.

The word surrender frequented my thoughts, meditations, hypnosis, and social media algorithm. (I try not to trust the algorithm, sometimes though) I approached Lucifer during our morning conference, asking why the word continued to present itself. His answer was like everything else He ever tells me. Double meaning laced with undertones. “You're a smart girl, you'll get it”. Yes, He makes you do the work and assigns the most grueling homework at times.

I eventually figured it out and it took moving from my home in California, to Arizona. It gets better, I moved to Arizona, on a “whim” to a man's house, that I had never met, and only talked to for a few months. Crazy, I know. The thing is this man understood. He knew of Lucifer, He knew Lilith, Sammeal, Hekate, Leviathan, and the other Seventy-two Lords of Hell. In ways I had never known anyone outside of myself. We had a connection, that neither of us could really pinpoint or deny. As life on the Left Hand Path proves to me time and time again, nothing ever works out exactly as you plan. It's the nature of this reality, from chaos comes order, and vice versa. There are lessons to learn, and as I said before, Lucifer loves to make His point.

There are behaviors and choices I tend to make in regard to men. Most are not the best choices, nor the healthiest choices. And while my friend is a rather decent man, our initial concept of our "relationship" wasn't what we had anticipated. Plus, Lucifer likes to make a point, and He did so with both of us. Humbled and shock up my friend in his dreams, while making it very fucking clear, WHOM I "Belonged" to. (A story for another time perhaps)

I broke, I cursed Him, yelled at Him, said I hated Him (No you don't sweetheart) “You are the Devil, and I should have never trusted you” Screamed from my soul more than once. Much like before I was taught yet another lesson in regard to respect and gratitude. This time Asmodeus paid me a visit. Still took me time to work through my frustration and anger. Then it all just clicked, like it often does. I had been searching, yearning for something deep and meaningful. I looked for it, behind doors that lead me to heartache and pain. I went into a lifestyle looking for it, gave sacred parts of myself to men who were not worthy of it. Who couldn't comprehend what I was or offered. “Desire leads to surrender; surrender leads to power” yes i know thank you Jared Leto. I surrendered to Lord Lucifer in ways, ancient Priestess did to their Gods. In the way a submissive surrender to their Dom, “Lucifer take the wheel”. I had done this long before realizing it. In ways I hadn't noticed. Through my rituals, my words, my actions, how I honored Him in meditation, how I approached Him in conference. I instinctively gave into Him, followed, and listened (Still working on it). Gave my mind, body and soul to Him. Promised myself to Him, Devoted myself to Him. (As I type this, I continue to have the neatest little synchronicities through the music I have playing.) All the “bad” things that happened were simply the consequences of my actions, or lack of. Yet at the end of it all He was always there, to pick me up, dust me off and set me back on course. His love can come off as cruel, but Their love is beyond our human understanding.

I hid from the title of Priestess; thought I was undeserving of it. thought I was undeserving of His love, attention, and adoration. As I've sat and gone over my experiences these past five years with Him, as I allowed my thoughts and feelings flow into this writing, I've come to accept this. I may not have a church (I do have a discord) or be some high magician with a grand following. I am His Priestess; I see and Love Him for all that He is. Angel, Dark Lord, sadistic asshole, Devil, all of it. Call me crazy, call me a liar, call me delusional, I probably am. At least I accept and know where I stand now. I know who I am.

#left hand path #theistic satanism #witchcraft

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sungpeach · 10 months

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elle singapore september 2023

What do you see as the hallmark of Dior? How do you fit into that as a new ambassador for the brand?

Dior is elegant, but it doesn't fade into the background. I've been lucky enough to discuss the Dior brand with several team members that work diligently to uphold this strong name. I hope to represent the brand with a good image and a love for the fashion.

What’s your first impression of Dioriviera? What do you like most about the scent?

Floral and clean scents speak the deepest to me, so Dioriviera is a lovely scent for me. I would consider it a universal scent; if it isn't for you, it will be for someone you cherish.

What is your relationship with scent? Is it a must-have item for you?

Scent is one of the most important factors in how we recognize one another, and how we store memories. Rather than myself, the human experience with scent is amazing. If I were to speak on myself only, I take this experience in stride. Perfumes and candles are a staple around my home.

How do you choose what to wear for each season — like summer?

Summer has a freedom that I enjoy mixing with scent. Light, energetic scents suit it well. In contrast, in spring, I might want a stronger scent that still feels light, like a cherry blossom blooming.

What are some self-care rituals that you never skip?

Self-care is a foundational element of my life, these days. I've come to an age where I've realized how important it is to prioritize wellness. Making sure I eat enough during a day, drink enough water, cleanse and revitalize my skin each night, these are all important rituals that I try my best to uphold every day. I hope those reading would try to do the same, for their own well-being.

Between your clean model image and mysterious stage image, which do you prefer and why?

I'd like if they could both be part of my dual charm. They are both sides of the full coin that is myself, so I hope to show more of them both in the future.

What else can your fans look forward to from you in 2023?

I'd ask them, let's meet often. The connection I have with my fans is very important for me to uphold. I'll continue to show my best sides to them in this year and the ones beyond. I hope, too, to release more music this year. I have continued to write and dance, so it comes down to timing.

#musing #idk if i should tag this as smth for main but #man writing in capitals is weird #idk why i decided to that for this one

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redflagromance · 10 months

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Short Story Release: Duck Hunt (Maeve Le Fey Story- 8,122 words)

"I won't be making frogs." Maeve slapped the papers onto her end table, next to the lamp. "I appreciate you dropping these off, I really do. But I'm a little offended that you would even add that spell to my library requests unasked." She sniffed. "It's simply not to my tastes, Adelaide."

Adelaide followed her down the entryway, giving a cursory glance at the songbird peeping furiously for his attention in a golden cage.

"It's a classic for a reason." Her old classmate rolled his eyes, as if she was being unreasonable. "How can you call yourself a practitioner if you've never turned someone to a frog?" He turned away from the bird and fiddled with a ceramic on a display shelf. "People are starting to talk, Maeve."

"Why would I need to do that?" Maeve threw her hands up, sighing. "Why do they even care?" She shrugged off her coat and hung it on the hook. “Busy bodies, all.” She shot a disapproving look at the silly red bird beating its wings for attention.

Adelaide turned and shook his head piteously at her. "I suppose that if you don't know, you'll never know. Chin up darling, you have other skills. Eventually people will forget. Maybe you could make a point to show off something soon?" he suggested kindly.

‘They think I can’t do it? How ridiculous.’

Maeve took a deep breath and shook off whatever latent insecurity made her fear peer disapproval. She didn’t have to prove anything to anyone.

"I'm afraid of hyenas," Adelaide said. He was clearly trying to comfort her with some relatable anecdote. "I've been as far back as I can remember." His voice went quiet, his gaze distant. He was seeing some other time and place now.

Maeve tuned him out.

"It's probably just because a pack of hyenas ate my Father," Adelaide muses. "I wasn't old enough to remember, but I was there. The first time I saw The Lion King on Broadway, I lost my mind and killed 34-"

"Adelaide," Maeve interrupted tersely. "I appreciate that you're trying to cheer me up, but I'm not in a headspace for it."

He stopped talking entirely. He gave her a dazed look. He didn't seem entirely present.

She ignored that. "I'll see you tomorrow," Maeve said, hoping he'd take the hint and get out of her living room without their customary cup of coffee. She let out a sigh, because he was being kind. "Thank you for bringing this." She picked the spell details back up. He really did mean well. “I’ll think on what you said, darling. And I’ll see you at the reunion next month.”

Adelaide looked at her long and hard. He let out a sigh. His eyes softened with fondness. "Don't work too hard," he admonished. Then he left in a swirl of smoke. The distinctive aroma of his magic spread out through the room.

She closed her eyes and indulged in a deep, calming breath. Then she opened her eyes and gave the songbird a stern look. It had gone quiet and sullen when Adelaide left. “Don’t think I didn’t see that,” Maeve chided.

It peeped in response.

“So rude,” she muttered, and went to make something for dinner. She gestured sharply upwards with her left hand and the cookbook obligingly lifted to hover above the counter. She hummed and flipped pages, looking for the recipe that she’d chosen yesterday.

Music started for her, a pleasant background to the evening chore of preparing food. She was in a very good mood by the time that she had finished meal preparation, a ritual that soothed the rough edges of an irritating day at work. She plated a serving and put the rest away for her lunch tomorrow.

At said lunchtime Maeve opened the fridge at work anticipating culinary perfection- a particularly exemplary rendition of duck confit and a salad- but all she found was confusion.

“Where is my lunch.” She asked the universe flatly.

The universe didn’t respond, but the nosy man from the advertising department did.

“Oh, wow,” He said, coming up behind her. His hot ham breath was on her neck.

Disgusting.

“Looks like you’re the latest victim of the lunch bandito.” His pronunciation was abominable. Why were white men like this. This interaction was somehow worse than some contemptible peon stealing her lunch.

He was definitely doing his finger-guns thing. She shut the refrigerator door and walked away.

‘Someone is going to pay for this. For my lunch, and especially for Greg talking to me.’

Incensed, she went back to her office and flung herself onto her office chair. She stared at her laptop, musing over her options.

‘How long has this been going on? Greg implied that I wasn’t the first.’

She opened the anonymous HR complaints inbox, noting not for the first time the sheer number of complaints regarding the ply of the company toilet paper (unlikely to be changed).

Maeve would not say that she was particularly given to caring about the concerns of others, but she did like to think that she was competent at her job. She tended to review most suggestions on the same day, so it would have been bizarre to not have known about a, a- what did Greg call them?- a lunch luchador.

The only complaint that she could identify as being plausibly related was from four months ago. Faheema in Client Relations had had her tomato and peanut sauce salad stolen from the break room. Unfortunately, there were no suspects and the complaint had languished there.

‘That can’t be the whole story.’

Maeve leaned back and gently massaged her temples. ‘I should check back at the crime scene, and interview the witnesses.’

The work refrigerator betrayed no new information, save that her expensive glass container wasn’t there.

Neither was it in the sink, or the trash can.

‘The unsub must have taken the evidence with them.’ Maeve took out a tiny pad of paper from her pocket, and wrote ‘careful’ in it.

Of course, lunch was mostly over, so there was no one to interview in the break room.

‘I guess that means I have to go back to my contact.’ She mused. ‘Find other victims and witnesses. Walk the streets.’

She found Greg at his cubicle, drinking stale coffee. His oversized khakis billowed in the air conditioning breeze.

“Mr. Wilson.” She greeted, putting her hands behind her back. “Would you mind if I asked you a few questions?”

He looked up at her, wide eyes filled with something she couldn’t discern. Fear? Hope? Guilt? Surprise at being accosted by an HR attorney?

“That- that would be fine.” He put down his green mug. It said ‘I’d rather be golfing.’

“How can I help you?”

“My lunch.” She stated clearly. “It wasn’t the first to be stolen, was it?”

He coughed.

‘A sign of guilt?’ She eyed him up and down. Greg would be a prime suspect, if contemptibility were a sign of the criminal element. He didn’t seem to be able to afford a full pair of shoes to go with his socks, which would explain his motivations in purloining paninis.

“No, ma’am. It wasn’t. It’s been happening for over six months.” He rolled over to part of his desk, where he removed a legal notepad covered in scribbles. “I think the first one was Niraj,” he gestures a few cubicles over, “but there’s been one almost every work day.”

Maeve did some quick mental math and the answer was appalling.

‘The depths of this unsub’s depravity knows no bounds. That’s over 120 lunches.’

“Why haven’t people been reporting this?”

She could tell from his flinch back that her tone had come out too sharp. Meave compensated with a smile.

Greg gave her a wavering smile in return and ducked eye contact. “No one wanted to bother you,” he said vaguely, with a smarmy grin that made it evident it was a joke at her expense.

Her immediate theory was that the lunch thief had somehow intimidated the cubicle peasants into silence. She dismissed that after a moment- they would have compromised their anonymity if they communicated. No, the answer was much more likely that she had some kind of reputation for being unapproachable.

She got no further with the mystery that day. The incident might have faded if it wasn’t for the fact that when she warily opened the shared refrigerator the next day, her butternut squash risotto with porcini mushrooms and chicken was not in it.

“I am going to take a life,” Maeve said through gritted teeth. She ignored the sudden sound of a chair scraping and someone leaving the room. Someone coughed. She stalked over to the sink to look for her container– there it was, along with yesterday’s. She picked it up and made a sound of disgust. “Neither one of them have been washed.” Her voice came out incredulous. “This- this animal kept the first container in the office, unwashed, for 24 hours?”

She absolutely had to unmask this vile and petty bandit.

Maeve stalked back to her office and wrote up a scathing email. Then she deleted it and wrote another one, addressed to the entire company, with sugary sweet concern for whoever had eaten her lunch. She’d just found out that the sauce in it had been expired, after all, and anyone who ate it should seek medical attention immediately. She hit send and waited.

She did not have the kind of reputation that made people dismiss her as a threat. Whoever had eaten that was probably feeling fear for their life right now. Any minute now, someone would confess, or ask for permission to go to the doctor for a sudden stomachache.

Any minute now.

Minutes dragged on into hours and Maeve had to admit that whoever had robbed her had done something far more insulting than steal from her. They had dismissed her as a threat.

With that poisonous thought in her mind, Maeve found herself tempted to put a little something extra in the next day's lunch.

She refrained after remembering that the pattern indicated that it was likely she would be eating her own lunch tomorrow.

It wasn’t a targeted attack: the thief selected victims randomly.

After making that assessment, it was absolutely infuriating to open the fridge door at lunchtime and discover once again that her lunch was not inside. This time there was, again, no storage container in the sink or garbage.

“It’s in their desk,” Maeve muttered to herself, punching in an order for delivery with unnecessary force. “That little freak has my storage container in their rancid desk.”

They were definitely targeting her now.

…It was legally inadvisable to actively poison her own lunch, as well as a waste of a good container.

‘My only option is surveillance.’

It took a few days for the equipment to arrive and for the mail personnel to deliver it to her desk.

She reviewed the instructions multiple times, and waited for the end of business hours.

As usual, the feral masses fled the building at exactly five. She stalked back to the crime scene with a box of cameras and wires.

She was furiously drilling a hole into the wall when she heard someone call out to her from behind.

“Ma’am.” Someone said, vaguely threatening.

She turned around, one hand on the ladder for balance.

The security guard turned a gruesome shade of pink at the sight of her face. “I’m sorry ma’am, but do you have permission to do this?”

She waved her drill at him. “I’m a lawyer. This is all very above-board, I assure you.” Then Maeve leaned down at him. “I have noticed that you have been remiss in your duties. This lunch thief”, she spat, “has been allowed to run amok in this place for far too long. I am merely putting it right.”

“O-Okay then.”

The guard left in a hurry. No one evidently dared to check into whether she did have the authority or permission to install cameras, which was the first bit of luck Maeve had had all week.

Once they were installed, all she would have to do was watch and wait.

Maeve resentfully checked the recording from the previous day, rewinding and rewatching over and over again to try to catch sight of her container as hands moved in and out of the fridge. But it was no luck- she hadn’t managed to capture any definitive proof. It was difficult to determine at what time the unsub was striking, and there was significant traffic in the break room at all times of day.

She scowled as yet another office worker got their coffee and then stepped back to hang around in the aisle, blocking her view. They seemed unaware of the woman who was obviously waiting for them to move. Her blood pressure rose and she gritted her teeth, fighting her anger.

Why? Why were so many people that way? There was perfectly adequate seating.

Not for the first time, she considered moving her camera. But the only answer was patience. So she set her jaw and admitted that it would take at least one more day.

The options for camera placement had been limited. It would have been ideal to put it three feet from the refrigerator: except that the thief would see it immediately.

The unobtrusive placement she'd settled on had a direct line of sight to the fridge - as long as no one was standing in the way or there wasn't a tall person sitting at a certain table. That should be fine. What kind of lunatic spent their time standing around cluelessly in the walking path?

Apparently, one of the most beloved traditions of office workers was lurking in the walkway clutching their instant coffee. One of them was swaying back and forth on the recording she was watching at the moment. Maeve felt her hand curl into a fist.

She rewatched Angelica sip coffee on the monitor, taking over half an hour for a paid coffee break that she seemed to nurse beyond reason. Good for Angelica, honestly. She wasn't paid enough: Maeve had checked.

‘What I have managed to discover is that a large number of workers are avoiding work in the break room.’

But that wasn’t her concern. Frankly, she didn't give a damn about squeezing productivity out of office workers. She wasn’t one of the managers. Her concern was not with the cubicle jockeys escaping the crushing oppression of open plan offices, but of weightier merit. And she was failing at identifying the culprit.

‘I will find this thief if I have to comb through every inch of this office campus.’ She gripped her own coffee mug tightly. Her coffee was certainly cold by now, but she drank it anyway.

The office grade coffee left a sour aftertaste in her mouth and a film on her tongue. It was even more contemptible cold, but her sorry detective work merited sorry coffee.

She sent the next update, cc'ed to the President and Vice President, as per her habit. She didn't mind that they didn't respond.

Every day, it was the same. She would bring in lunch -unpleasantly textured, overly spicy, bland- the criminal devoured them all. Maeve would find her containers in the sink over the next few days, unwashed.

She considered seeing if DNA was left behind, and trying to see if the culprit could be identified that way.

It did seem likely that the kind of monster that would do this might have DNA on file with the authorities, but she didn't have access to any DNA databases in her capacity as an HR representative.

It made her think about criminal profiling, though. Everyone who'd had food taken was a young woman.

…That meant that he'd been in the room watching people either put their food in or eat it, she realized. In order for there to be a type of victim, the lunches couldn't be randomly selected.

He'd been grocery shopping. Looking at a menu.

And that, Maeve realized, implied free time.

She didn't know what that meant, but it wasn't something she'd forget.

The problem was beginning to interfere with Maeve’s actual work. Stacks of policies up for review were threatening to topple over her desk, erecting skyscraping monuments to corporate thoroughness.

But it was hard to care about that right now. Maeve hadn’t had a proper lunch in three weeks. She was tired of ordering in or waiting until after work. She was also tired of making lunches she was never going to eat, even if they were inedible.

‘I could always just stop bringing in my own lunch.’ She glared at the empty fridge accusingly. It wasn’t like she’d truly expected her lunch to remain. ‘Or I might put a mini fridge in my office.’

But both of those options were intolerable. The lunch thief would just be forcing her to either continue to not eat, eat foods that she did not want to eat, or buy a fucking fridge just to avoid them. And even if she solved the problem for herself, this godforsaken cyst of a person would just steal from someone else.

No. She had to solve it. She could crack this case.

The cameras had identified a few general trends. There was a general group of peons that came in around 10:15 for coffee refills, and then it was consistently busy from 11:00-1:00PM.

‘I’m going to check the fridge at half hour intervals, to see if there’s a pattern as to when the thief strikes.’

The next day, she clutched the steering wheel just a bit too tight on her way in. She wasn't even at work and the tension was ruining her mood. She hit the brakes at a crosswalk, eyes glancing over to check for children among the pedestrians by sheer force of meticulous habit.

There was a gaggle of elementary students laughing in an uneven pack on the left. She kept some attention on them in her peripheral vision as she went through the intersection.

In her rearview mirror she saw the next car come up the block and barrel through the intersection without stopping at the sign. They caught up with her right away and clearly hit the brakes hard, jerking when they slowed suddenly.

She saw the driver lift a hand and gesture at her in irritation, mouth moving as they doubtless raged.

The muscle in her jaw twitched with tension. She glanced at her speedometer to confirm that yes, she was driving at the limit.

So. That asshole was speeding in a school zone and blowing through stop signs.

"You know what I do to men like you?" Maeve asked her empty car, all coiled tension and tightly leashed violence. She flexed her fingers on the steering wheel and considered it: they'd pass her, legally or not, as soon as she gave them the chance.

She could follow them. They wouldn't notice. Anyone who didn't notice stop signs and children in a school zone was too self absorbed to realize they were being followed. It might make her late, but she had flex time. She could just arrive at work later. It wouldn't be the first time.

Maeve was sorely tempted, her blood rising with the thrill of the hunt.

It took real, punishing self control to flick on her turn signal at the normal place. She turned away with only a lingering glance at the bad driver in her rearview mirror.

She had to get to work on time to put her bait in the fridge at the normal time. She was already hunting down one piece of human refuse. Besides, that kind of thing required resources that she hadn't yet freed up.

Her iron self control got her to the break room by 8:00 am. She put the container in the fridge and gave it one last resentful look before she closed the door. It wasn’t even appealing to her anymore. She’d made this food to punish an asshole. It wasn't enough retribution, but it made her feel a little better.

The lunch was fish, cooked in ghost pepper sauce and served with leftover pasta. She'd gotten the fish on sale and then left it in her fridge for two days.

‘Honestly, I hope they eat this. I can’t.’

When she checked the fridge later, it was still there. And at nine, and nine thirty. Perhaps they had some self respect after all.

At ten it was gone. She made a note in her notebook. She hoped it caused vicious indigestion.

The next day, her lunch was gone at ten thirty. It seemed like a general pattern might emerge.

The trend held on Friday- her lunch disappeared sometime between ten and ten thirty.

She went into the weekend feeling victorious. Monday. This would end on Monday. She’d do a stakeout from 9:30 or so, until she caught the thief red handed. She couldn't just camp out in the break room and stare all day; not while catching up on her workload. But she could spare one morning.

It was not to be. At 9:30 on Monday, Maeve found herself staring at the empty space where her lunch (a phoned-in effort of three boiled eggs and a quick pickled salad) ought to have been. It was already gone.

The rest of the week made it clear that there was truly no pattern. This maniac took her lunch anytime from 8:05 (within the amount of time she’d used the break room bathroom on Tuesday), to 11:45.

That tickled at her hind brain. There was something familiar about that… Oh. She'd thought before that the thief must have a lot of leisure time in order to wait in the break room and choose victims. But the times that the food went missing was a clue too. No one who was being managed could just go wandering around the building at any time in the morning. Breaks were staggered to prevent congestion.

That meant that the thief wasn't being managed. The thief might be a manager.

That would narrow things down a lot. She printed off a few pages of company headshots of all managerial staff in the building.

When she took the document with her to the head of security, he got an uncomfortable look on his face. "I don't think that we can send someone to watch the break room for managers," he said in a steady, soothing tone.

"Why not?" Her tone came out sharper than she wanted. Maeve compensated with a little smile.

"Because," he said slowly, "no one will enjoy their breaks if they think that security has been deployed to watch them taking their breaks."

She rolled her eyes and left the security station in a huff. Something had to be done. This couldn't go on.

It was ridiculous and undignified. She'd never been hounded in such a petty way before. The effect that it had on her was surprising.

Her sleep started to suffer. She didn't enjoy cooking as much as she had before. That was infuriating, since she had deliberately cultivated the skillset as part of her routine. Spending a long time cooking quality food had made her feel proud of herself: now she just felt annoyed, constantly bothered by the hovering reminder that someone was toying with her.

She wasn't going to waste gourmet ingredients on live bait for some asshole, so she either had to eat leftovers or adjust all of her recipes for single portions. For weeks, she wasted time making a lunch that she knew she would never eat. It made her shake with a sort of helpless fury in her own home. This person was stealing more than food: it was her time and labor, her peace of mind and some of her dignity.

Maeve could feel her tight grip on her life slipping. It was on the fourth week of this unending nightmare that she realized that she’d nearly missed a meeting while waiting for lunch delivery in the lobby, and she hadn’t even ordered.

‘Enough is enough.’ She slammed a briefcase full of files onto her desk and gritted her teeth. ‘I’m going to find this person and deal with them myself. They're going to regret toying with me.’

The next morning, she packed up her laptop and brought everything to the break room, setting up at the table closest to the fridge.

People edged around her anxiously over the next hour, filling up their coffee mugs quickly and escaping to their cubicles in a way she knew was atypical from her study of the cameras and several office sitcoms. No one lingered foolishly several steps away from the coffee station, blocking the walkway.

She watched and waited for her patience to be rewarded. But no one came. At two in the afternoon, she left.

The next day, she considered her options. The thief had not struck when she had placed herself directly in the break room.

‘Then again, I was visible from the doorway. They probably saw me and chose not to steal. Perhaps they didn't even enter the room. If I want to observe my prey without detection, I should sit further away and decrease suspicion.’

The nature of her job made it very difficult to do in a public setting like the break room, which meant that Maeve was forced to only do reports instead of bringing out private files. She waited and waited, glancing up from her computer every few seconds.

Time drug on, and her nerves were shot. Maeve felt fried, tired, and hungry. She wanted to leave. Patrick from accounting kept trying to make bad puns in her direction. He'd seemed to misinterpret her behavior as an attempt to make friends with the other workers.

Movement by the doorway caught her attention, as someone in an obnoxiously colored jacket shuffled in. They crossed the room, pausing by the coffeepot to leave their mug with a careless clatter before making their way to the fridge.

It caught her attention. It wasn't criminal, but it was a little antisocial and selfish to leave your dirty dishes around.

Her intuition was humming at her. She watched intently as this person opened the fridge and removed a small glass container. She felt a heart-stopping thrill.

It was him.

The thief didn't even pause before turning to refill his dirty mug with coffee. He looked totally unbothered and casual, as if he did this every day. He wasn't in the least bit worried.

‘That’s mine! He's actually holding my food. There's no way to explain that.'

She quickly closed her laptop with a nasty little smile and got up, crossing the room in a graceful lope. She managed to insert herself between the long legged thief and the break room door just as he was about to exit with his coffee and her lunch.

He barely avoided walking directly into her. Instead of looking at her face, he tried to step around her. She side-stepped to block him.

“Hello.” She smiled, poisonly sweet. She was so close to vengeance. “Is that my lunch?”

“Hey.” The man just looked at his phone, and barely addressed her at all. “Nah, it’s mine.” He sounded so casual. He was blowing her off.

“That is clearly my container.” Maeve said sharply. Her tone rose a little. Of course it was hers. She'd paid extra for the customized design on the glass. "That's a ridiculous lie when I actively watched you try to steal my food." She put a hand up for her food. "Here." She waited.

He sighed as he lowered his phone. He lifted the container with the braised duck she’d made last night, and finally made eye contact with her. He stuck out his lower lip in a mocking pout for a moment before he responded. “I don’t see your name on it. That’s one hell of an accusation, miss.”

He was… amused. He was fucking getting off on this power play.

The sheer fucking gall of it stole her breath for a moment. She'd caught him holding her property, and he didn't think she could do anything about it.

‘I made that food. The rest of it is still in my fucking fridge at home. I could fit that duck breast back in like a puzzle piece.’

“Give it back.” She said, low and slow. Anyone could hear the danger in her voice. Even people who had no idea that she was a witch knew she was intimidating.

“Why would I do that? It’s my lunch.” Then he chuckled at her, and walked around her. She was frozen stock still. “You should be careful of who you accuse of things, miss. I’m an important man and you don’t want to get in trouble.”

Her heart rate was through the roof and her whole body was tense with fury. She turned to watch him go, blood thumping in her ears. Had that really happened? She'd caught him in the act and he'd condescended to her? He didn't even glance over his shoulder.

She'd never been dismissed like that. Never.

She had a furious and helpless lightning realization: this was why the other women hadn't complained about the theft. They'd known that they were powerless to stop it. People just had to accept this vile, selfish behavior, because it was coming from someone above them.

'And it's because I'm a woman. He thinks he can do this to me because I'm a woman.'

Well. The unpleasant joke was on him. She wasn't an office worker. She was a lawyer. She'd go over his head. The company owner was a family friend: whatever caché this shitstain had wouldn't outweigh her position and connections.

He was going to regret the way he'd treated the office workers. Even if empathy was beyond him, he'd know that he fucked up by stealing from her.

“I am going to find out who he was," Maeve said to herself, icy cold in the chatter of the break room. He didn’t look familiar. "He's not from this department."

She would know. She'd been studying pictures.

“I think he’s a programmer.” Someone said quietly, and Maeve swiveled her head around in time to see a cubicle worker’s face disappear behind their mug. Whoever it was didn’t matter.

“Does anyone know his name?” She asked. No one met her eyes, but everyone shook their heads.

"He said he's a team lead," someone offered.

People had been watching that confrontation. A few weeks ago, she might have been mortified to be disrespected so publicly. But it wasn't the first time, she realized. That was probably why the complaints had stopped: someone had seen this man steal, and he'd threatened their job the way he'd tried to threaten hers.

She’d start with the website development team. They were only a floor down.

The unfortunate thing about massive streaming businesses is that they have an infestation of programmers. Maeve had to click through hundreds of faces before she found the rat-faced dillhole that had stolen her lunch and lied about it to her face.

“Raymond Atwater, meet your doom.” She whispered in victory at the screen. Evidently he was a team lead for the server security team.

What was obscene was that his team was in an entirely different building. This asshole had gone across campus to steal her lunch.

To be clear, he'd walked out of his office, through the office pool, out into the lobby of his own building, across two parking lots and a decorative garden, through the lobby of her building and up the elevator to the 9th floor, all to steal her fucking lunch. And he'd done that almost every day for 3 and a half weeks. What was wrong with him?

‘Maybe he got caught in his own building.’ She mused, before sending a quick exploratory email to the HR team in his actual building, as well as the HR heads in the buildings closer to it. They might have more information.

She wanted dirt. Filthy dirt. And as much of it as possible.

In the update to the president, she happily included the footage and Raymond's name.

The response from the HR head in Raymond's building was fast, professional, and immediately confirmed that he was a problematic employee.

Maeve frowned at the email, rereading one line in particular.

"Management has been disinterested in pursuing suggested corrective measures for multiple instances of problematic behavior," the rep had written. Maeve glanced back up at the head of the email to jog her memory of the other woman's name, Kimberly Lianson.

"I would recommend a meeting with his head of department, Mr. Patel, and perhaps part of the executive team, since Mr. Atwood's actions have had an impact across the campus."

"I can do that," Maeve murmured to her screen. She sent off an inquiry with the company President's secretary about meeting availability. Most people needed to wait a week or two. But for Maeve, the secretary made time.

Two days later, she met Kimberly Lianson outside the meeting room. The older woman's eyebrows shot up.

"Would you like any help preparing for the meeting?" Maeve said, instead of a greeting.

Kimberly's face relaxed. She smiled. "That would be very helpful, thank you. Could you get the door?" She shifted her burden to the side and shook one hand free so that Maeve could access the key dangling from her wrist and open the door.

She pushed it open and strode in first to find the light switch.

"Thank you so much for putting all this evidence together," Kimberly started. She blew a little strand of sweaty hair off of her face. "I really start to wonder if they'll ever be willing to punish a manager, but I'm hopeful."

Maeve let out a surprised laugh. "He's guilty," she said. "I have him on camera stealing from me, and notes about everything I can see that he stole. The dollar value actually becomes rather substantial."

Kimberly's warm smile became a bit fixed. "Well." She glanced over Maeve's shoulder for a moment. "I think it's an uphill battle, if I'm honest."

Maeve stared. "There's enough complaints against him to wallpaper my office."

Kimberly's lips went thin as she pressed them together. "Yes," she finally said. "He does a very important job and makes the company a lot of money."

That was such bullshit that she couldn't speak for a moment. When she could control herself again, Maeve took a deep breath. "Well, I do a very important job as well," she said. "I'm confident that we can present the facts and get some justice."

Kimberly was obviously not convinced.

Maeve didn't mind. She'd see.

They finished setting up for the meeting and were ready before the head of information and security and the company President arrived, obviously finishing up some funny conversation. The president clapped Mr. Patel on the shoulder before he took in the room, amusement crinkling his eyes.

"I hear that there's a presentation." He took a seat. "About a, uh- somewhat difficult engineer."

Maeve smoothed the front of her skirt as she took a seat. "Yes, Ms. Lianson has a presentation prepared to make things shorter. Thank you so much for coming, Mr. Conway, Mr. Patel."

"Yes, it's about Atwood, isn't it?" Mr. Patel didn't return her greeting. He glanced over at Mr. Conway. "Brilliant man," he explained casually. "Steps on some toes, but he gets results."

"Interesting," Maeve cut him off. "Ms. Lianson, if you wouldn't mind?"

She sat with her fingers folded precisely on her lap as Kimberly listed the types of complaints leveled against Mr. Atwood from his department and others. She had a still image from Maeve's camera of Atwood taking one of Maeve's lunches: and two other photos of him with different lunches. Because apparently he'd been stealing more than one lunch per day.

As Kimberly spoke, Mr. Patel fidgeted, pulling at his collar and fiddling with his cuffs. He tapped at his watch at one point, peering at the second hand. He didn't touch his stapled papers.

Maeve hated him. He obviously didn't care about this.

"When confronted about the theft, Mr. Atwood lied and insinuated that confronting him for the theft would mean retribution." Kimberly seemed resigned.

Maeve felt very tense.

The President was a family friend. He wasn't much more interested in the facts than Atwood's department head was. But that didn't matter. He wasn't going to let someone treat her that way.

When Kimberly wrapped up, Mr. Conway was the first to break the ice. He shifted in his chair and tapped his fingers on the table as he spoke. "Well, what are you expecting to happen?"

"According to company policy, he should be terminated immediately," Maeve answered immediately. "In light of the fact that he's causing disruptions in three different departments with impunity despite being made aware of the unacceptability of his actions, he doesn't meet the standard for employees."

Mr. Patel let out an incredulous scoff. He waved a splayed hand around the room. "Over a few missed salads?" he said incredulously. "Don't you think that's a bit dramatic?"

"It does seem petty," Mr. Conway agreed, shaking his head. "The whole thing- he should write up an apology." He rubbed his hands together as if to wash them of this affair. "He's clearly immature, but no real harm was done.

Maeve stared at him. Making someone apologize is what one does with naughty children.

"This is a case of theft. Theft is a fire-able offense, and the dollar amount Mr. Atwood has stolen from employees is in the thousands."" Kimberly said, a little stiff. "Regardless of what has been stolen, Mr. Atwood has been stealing from other employees for years. This is not to mention the multiple complaints of harassment and creating an unsafe work environment."

"Snacks," Mr. Patel dismissed. He let out a sigh. "I'll increase the budget for snack food in our department so he isn't roving around for food."

"Good man," Mr. Conway said, and stood up cheerfully. "Well, thank you for your time, ladies, keep up the good work." He winked at Maeve. "Your cooking must be something! Your mother would be proud." He left with a little chuckle at his own joke.

Maeve was too furious to speak. If she opened her mouth, actual venom was going to spurt out. She stood dangerously still as the two men left the office.

A sigh from Kimberly broke the spell. "As I said," she started ruefully, "an uphill battle." She gathered up her materials.

She managed a stiff nod.

The older woman looked sympathetic. "I know," Kimberly said. She let out a sigh and rifled a hand through her hair. "That was frustrating. You could always go to the police." She gave Maeve a wry look. "I don't know that it would be much more effective." Then she walked out of the room, balancing the precarious stack of folders that neither Mr. Conway or Mr. Patel had bothered to even open.

She felt like her legs were numb in her expensive shoes. The red bottoms wobbled awkwardly on the carpet as she stood still and tried to process what had just happened.

The shame won out after the door closed behind Kimberly, and she exhaled a painful held breath. At least there was no one in the room to see her like this. Ungainly and unbalanced, Maeve walked to her office in a haze. People walked by her, clutching papers and mugs. She hugged the wall and averted her eyes.

'Maybe they'll do something about it,' she lied to herself. The elevator dinged above her head, but it sounded dull and remote. The lie coiled in the bottom of her stomach like a viper. She carefully stepped into the elevator, mindful that if she acted too out of the ordinary, people would make it the subject of gossip.

She tried again to console herself in the quiet of her office. 'At least he might stop.'

He'd changed buildings after the last few complaints, anyway. It seemed likely he'd move on to a new victim. Then Maeve could hold her head high enough in her building, and pretend that that meeting didn't happen. She could fix it.

Her lunch wasn’t missing the next day. Maeve ate it, thankful for the return to her routine. But it tasted like nothing.

She'd forgotten to season it properly. Maeve ate it mechanically, bite after bite of bland pasta.

Something worse happened in the afternoon.

It started with the little ‘ding’ sound her computer made when an email landed. Maeve put down the files she’d finally started working on, and clicked on the notification.

It opened an entire email from that skunk, Raymond. It started out banal enough.

“I’m sorry”

‘A good start, if a little lackluster in the begging he should be doing.’ She thought sourly, before starting on the rest. The viper in her stomach twisted.

“- if you were offended that I enjoyed your cooking. You are a decent cook, and I thought that the opportunity I provided you for someone else to try your cooking might improve your abilities while providing me with a quick lunch. I am, after all, very busy- I have 50 people under me”

‘No you don’t, you twat, I can see the personnel files. Why are you lying to me?’

“And my time is very valuable. Someday, if you work hard, I’m sure you will understand. As for feedback, I have to say that some of the food was better than others. You make a competent risotto, but you need to work on how you prepare fish. Hopefully you can improve.’

She had to look away from the computer for a long moment. The rage and embarrassment were bubbling up again. She felt nauseous.

“The President said that I needed to send you an email to resolve this misunderstanding. If you have any questions, please let me know. I’ll try to get back to you within a few days, as my schedule allows.

Thanks,

Team Lead Ray”

“You’re not my team lead,” she uttered, feeling petty and filled with bile. “In fact, you’re a fucking loathsome little worm. An utter wretch, a thieving pile of donkey mucus.”

The air in her office began to feel a little claustrophobic from her own malign energy, so Maeve took a second to breathe and lean away from her computer. Her stomach roiled.

“So, they won’t be doing anything about him.” That should have been less surprising after that awful meeting. Maeve would have thought that her history with the President and his family might merit a little more consideration.

At the end of the day, it obviously meant nothing. Or worse, that that doddering twit thought she was a whining child. Whose mother would be 'proud of her cooking'. It made her feel sick.

Something she'd heard yesterday came to mind, unwrapping a painful present of context.

'The President implied he hadn't heard about this before.' she realized. 'I've been sending updates on this for weeks. They… didn't read them. Any of them.'

Maeve’s outlook on her employment really began to shift at that moment.

'They didn't care about my work. And they don't care about my position. About me.'

She took a look at the pile of HR complaints and considered her options.

‘I’m going to ensure that this is the worst mistake they’ve ever made.’

She turned back to the computer screen, still lit up with the offending email.

“And I’m going to start with you," she promised venomously.

Two weeks later, she was waiting on a bench under sun-dappled leaves in the local park. It was earlier in the day than she would have usually been off work, and she was enjoying the chance to relax and commune with nature. The birds were singing, the breeze was blowing, and the sun was shining its beneficence upon her.

She watched the ducks in the pond bobbing in the warm water, while a bird yammered endlessly next to her. Some elderly couples and a young mother were slowly walking around the lake, while some speedwalkers marched around the paths single file. She waited for all the passersby to face the other direction.

A particularly large bird scream in her ear disrupted her sense of peace, and made her ears ring.

“Oh, shut it.” She turned to the bird in the birdcage. It peeped at her, seemingly furious. “I’m about to release you anyway.”

She opened the cage and reached her hand in, delicately lifting the bird out of the door. She whispered something onto the wind, and threw it up into the air.

Its wings outstretched as it reached heavenward, before curling down around it in a shimmering golden light. Within a second, a dazed man in a red running suit was standing in front of the bench. He blinked blearily at her, before swaying. His legs gave out beneath him, and he collapsed on the dirt path.

She left him there.

“Good luck explaining to your sand volleyball friends why you were missing for three months, you ass.” His hand moved, but it was going to take him a while to remember how to use those limbs again. Doubtless someone would report a man collapsed on the running path within a few hours, and the police would return him to his grateful family. Pat would never remember where he’d been, and couldn’t explain his absence. All he’d remember would be the new, bone-shattering aversion to running red lights in a school zone.

The tinny quality of a personal bluetooth speaker heralded her quarry.

As ever, she was well-timed. Just as Pat began to snore into the dirt, a familiar figure jogged around the bend of the lake. His long legs worked lazily, eating up ground in the middle of the path. He barely seemed to register the other people, prompting one of the elderly men to take a doddering leap off of the path, before Ray clipped the side of a stroller with his right thigh.

Maeve watched as the woman tried to tear into him, but Raymond, Team Leader Extraordinaire, seemed very convinced that she had been in his way, being that she wasn’t entirely off the public sidewalk.

He huffed at her, and then left, diverting up to the otherwise abandoned path Maeve was sitting on.

She idly ran her fingertips over the wire frame of the birdcage next to her. The sun had made it almost uncomfortably warm.

Raymond only stopped in front of her when he tripped on Pat’s unconscious body.

“What is that doing there?” He asked, sounding disgusted.

It somehow inspired more contempt for him than she had previously possessed.

‘Anyone remotely decent might wonder if he was alive or okay, you infested carcass.’

“Hello Raymond.” She rose, and stretched out her arms. “Lovely day.”

“Uh, yeah.” He looked at her without any comprehension. This muppet faced buffoon had stolen her lunch for over a month, and didn't know what she looked like outside of the office.

It rankled more than it should.

“Do you happen to have a fever, a cough, or any symptoms that would lead you to believe that you might have the flu or another illness?” She asked, businesslike. Her hands were at the ready.

“Of course not.” He had the audacity to look offended. “And where do you get off asking me that? Who-”

She waved her fingers and concentrated. His long white shirt became wings, and he shrank. And shrank.

In the span of a few moments, a confused white duck was standing on top of Pat’s back. She pulled her waiting phone out and snapped a picture, and sent it to Adelaide with the caption 'Look what I found in the park!'

Then she tilted her head, mentally measuring the waterfowl's dimensions.

“I probably should have made you a songbird.” She sighed, grabbing the duck with both hands. He made a weird sound in response. “I was just thinking of those beautiful ducks on the pond. Now you’re too big for the cage.” She stuffed him in anyway, working with the fresh transformation limpness. It would be more difficult to deal with him later, when he’d figured out how to be a duck. Then again, nothing she’d seen would have led her to believe that Ray was capable of learning.

She shoved the cage into the newspaper-lined backseat of her classy black car, and left the park without a second glance.

NOTE:

This was originally posted on my Patreon, where I am continually writing other character stories for Deplorably Devoted. Check it out here!

#deplorably devoted to you #deplorably devoted #short story #Maeve Le Fey #love interest short story

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