#the name thing - me keeping my immigrant english name because my parents gave it to me - too true bestie

[toffeelemon]

what does it mean to be an immigrant gay kid (simon pov) 

(ft. trans simon??? because if i’m projecting why not go all the way)

look. simon loves being Gay. he has never once felt ashamed, or resentful of this part of himself. it’s not like being gay is his entire personality, but he loves following Gay Culture. getting in on all the memes, watching all the films with representation, following stockholm pride as if he would ever go as a bjarstad teen. but - he can’t help but feel that the ‘community’ he’s seeking out is so White. it’s not like there aren’t poc at pride - but the pop culture around it all seemed so one dimensional. the pop music. the drag. nothing wrong with pop music, simon is a benevolent music lover, but - he imagines eventually going to a gay club, and hearing nothing but White preppy music, and honestly, it doesn’t sound like a good time. he feels torn, like he has to pick between his gay side and latino side

it’s no surprise to himself that his best friends ended up being rosh and ayub. and simon is so grateful for them. at marieberg, there has always been an invisible divide between the white kids and the ones who are not. the side that simon belongs to is not just latino kids - it’s also south asians, arabs, black kids. thrown together with the single connecting factor that they’re kinda outcasts. but somehow there’s an exaggerated toxic masculinity - the defensive need to lash out, protect yourself from this society that isn’t very kind on them, perhaps. simon hates it. everyone knows that simon is gay, and no one cares enough to be mean about it - he has played nice with some white soft-boys before. (and by that he means, kissing at parties.) but in the end, they return to their relative worlds, because simon is not one of them, and they would never want to cross over to simon’s world either

with rosh and ayub, simon is comfortable. he can just be. he doesn’t have to be man enough or unthreateningly white enough. they understand each other and each other’s strict parents or unavailable parents, and they could just make fun of straight people and white people without having to worry about the fragility of these people’s feelings, as if they don’t casually hurt minorities on a daily basis. ayub and rosh taught simon how to be queer more than the internet has ever taught him. they are living proof that there’s more than one way to be queer (and trans), and simon can be someone else other than an androgynous white twink who’s conventionally pretty

simon loves his mum. and he knows that linda loves him. and yet - trying to come out (as trans) has weighed on him so much, him trying so hard to find the right words in spanish and then wondering, fuck, are there even all these expansive words to describe gender in spanish, or is he slowly losing his roots the more he embraces his queer-trans side? of course he is going to talk about it with his mum in spanish, because these are the matters of the heart, so why does it feel so foreign and so heavy on his tongue when he tries to say, “mama, i’m a boy”? he ended up saying something cringey about being born in wrong bodies, which was definitely not what he meant to say anyway, because bodies have no gender and he has an exciting new world beyond the cisnormative that he is dying to show the woman he loves the most, but those outdated clunky words are the ones linda would understand, so he started with those

it was important to simon that linda takes part in choosing his new name. simon knows that his deadname was what it was because it was a familiar name to both swedes and his hispanic family - and as much as his deadname crawls up his skin uncomfortably, abandoning it felt like giving away something precious that his mum had gifted him, a part of his heritage. linda gave him a few options, all slightly biblical because she’s catholic by convention - simon fondly rolls his eyes at the biblical references - and they settled on simon. he loves his name, and knowing that linda chose it also feel like a tangible piece of reassurance and acceptance that simon could carry with him every day

simon isn’t That brave. he tasked linda with the job of telling the extended family, who they hardly see anyway, so if worst comes to worst and they’re transphobic? simon would just have to forget about the annual christmas gatherings where half a dozen families scramble from different corners of europe, converging at his cousins’ in copenhagen into a colourful chaotic mess. (he’ll survive. he will. even though it already feels lonely out here in the middle of nowhere sweden, and he has no one to speak spanish to but his family, and the cashier at that one corner shop) but the reception was less bad than he thought - although simon suspects linda hid the worse from him - and abuelita simply sent him a short email (an email! what a woman) that says she liked the name simon, and asked him does this mean he would get a girlfriend soon. simon was hysterical reading it - but he loves abuelita. glad to know that she loves him back in her own way

masculinity is a strange thing to emulate. it doesn’t help that simon doesn’t exactly have good role models. he thinks about his uncles, the traditional Man of the House - and decides to start there. he’s always been protective of his mum - jumping into banal arguments in the supermarket queue when the swedish language fails her, being used to calling the bank people and the tax people for his mum because bureaucracy language is designed to gatekeep, and simon might as well put his elite education to use. it makes him worry about the bills and the house even more. and now that he’s the Man of the House - he wants to step up to protect his family, his mum and his sister. linda told him to look after his sister, so he did 

linda worked so hard to give them the best education they could afford, jumping so many hoops and pulling so many favours to get them into hillerska. waking up an hour early to prepare breakfast ever since they had to get up earlier and travel further to school. it took so much effort to get into hillerska - so simon had no heart to tell his mum that everything isn’t exactly peachy at this bullshit elite school. he smiles through his teeth and pretends that he doesn’t have no friends. that august doesn’t make casual jabs at rowing practice like “stop running like girls - oh sorry, sosse”, as if he’s really sorry. that the third years don’t make fun of his singing voice - as if there isn’t variation between cis teen boys anyway. that he isn’t totally invisible because he’ll never be one of the boys, but he’s not a girl either, and anyway it doesn’t matter, because he isn’t white or rich, and he’ll always be an outsider. he’s a big boy, he can endure it - linda doesn’t need to know

and simon works hard at school. really hard. because his mum just wants the best for them and he can’t be a disappointment. he already has the world on his fingertips - so what’s his excuse for getting a C in maths? wille well-meaningly tried to tell him that the system isn’t fair anyway, because the grades will always favour you if you’re rich and white and your parents are friends with the headmaster, but simon panicked and all he could hear was that he’s not doing all he can to excel, to be good enough

wille - wille isn’t scared of simon, even when simon bares his teeth and proclaims to burn down the monarchy. he doesn’t look down on him either. it’s what drawn simon initially - if wille could see past simon beyond being a poor immigrant kid, maybe simon could let his guard down and give this skinny white boy a chance?

wille is so good. almost too good. simon doesn’t have a grudge against dating white people like rosh does (white girls, *hiss*), and it’s really unavoidable that most boys he kisses end up being white, because they are in the middle of nowhere sweden. but wille is something else - ayub can’t help but laugh. simon really picked the richest, whitest guy out there, and he’s not even sure if he likes boys. (the internalised demon in simon almost whispers - and you’re not even a real boy.) simon is over that phase in his life, doubting whether he’s good enough or not, but - this is the prince. he has the right to feel a little nervous. (wille is so much more than just being the prince)

wille keeps exceeding his expectations. (or maybe simon just has really low expectations.) simon wasn’t sure how to feel about how wille feels about his dorky, working class friends - simon’s not ashamed of his friends, never, but he’s afraid of how wille would react, being confronted with people so unfamiliar to him. because, as much as he hates it, he cares about this particular white boy’s feelings and opinions. but wille is cute and makes an effort, almost more nervous to impress than vice versa - and simon is not in love. he’s not

and then wille goes out of his way to include linda, to make her feel comfortable, and simon’s fierce protectiveness and defensiveness morphs into something else at the back of his heart, pitter-pattering. he’s ridiculous. how could a boy get him so whipped?

wille called him low. because simon tried to protect himself and accidentally fucked up and fuck, he’s a drug dealer now, what a cliché. and he’s angry, he’s so angry, because wille didn’t say it, but all simon hears is that he’s working class and he’s latino and he’s poor and he’s a barely passing boy, and he’ll always be pit against harsher standards. he can’t be less than perfect - mistakes are only allowed for rich white kids who can buy their way out of them. and it takes only one mistake for wille to turn on him right away. how could simon be so blind? and here he was, looking right past all the times wille had hurt him. in the end wille is like the others - self absorbed and self-important. simon should have known better. maybe they should have both kept to their own worlds. simon surely doesn’t want the prince’s world

and then it all comes crashing down, and bad becomes worse. because simon has been waiting to change his legal gender once he turns 18, and now his biggest insecurities are aired nationally for everyone to see. because the prince is getting off with a boy? but no, it’s actually a girl, haha. and everyone is keen to see who is this fucked up, poor and brown and sexually deviant thing that somehow corrupted the prince. simon passes most of the time, he hasn’t been misgendered for so long - and now he can’t escape it, it’s everywhere, blaring words on screens and magazine covers and his chest feels tight, even worse than usual. he is usually very strong mentally - Man of the House and all that - but one dark night, the only thing holding him together is the cursed thought if anything happened to him, the headlines would still be misgendering him, and simon is nothing but a spiteful creature. that is not a legacy he wants to leave behind. and linda. he would never break his mother’s heart like that

wille finally makes a public appearance, and simon has no tears left to cry. and he hates himself, he really does, to still be so soft on wille when the world has been so harsh against simon - but wille using he/him pronouns to refer to simon, not even bothering to mention him by name, still felt like a lifeline. simon wishes he could ask for more, and he hates himself for his impossibly low standards, but he still appreciated the bare human decency

he asks nothing of wille, but at least wille gave him a little shred of dignity back

[nutellaneedsanap]

Almost a Dream

Jason awoke with a start, the senses he honed as a street kid warning him that something was wrong. It wasn’t a noticeable shift, something a more normal person wouldn’t notice, but to a person with his training it was glaringly obvious. The slight shift of the blankets, the dip of the bed…a quick peek confirmed what he already knew. There was someone else in his bed. The blue-eyed boy kept his eyes lightly shut, feeling the warm body next to him shift ever-so-slightly. Discreetly, he opened his eyes and peered at the figure that appeared next to him, gauging her threat level. 

She was a smaller girl with blueish-black hair, likely of asian-descent, and a wiry-muscular frame not unlike Dick’s. Deciding that she was asleep, (therefore not much of an immediate threat), Jason went to move, planning on getting Bruce. He had only just begun to sit up when she pounced.

She gave no warning before lunging forward, giving Jason’s throat a quick jab that left him gasping for air. Taking advantage of the moment it took for him to catch his breath, the girl grasped his hair at the root and brought his head down on her knee. A telltale crack sounded throughout the room and internally, Jason groaned. 

“Ahhh, Alfie’s not gonna be too happy about that.” His voice had a slight lisp, another sign pointing towards a broken nose. His assailant scrambled to get off the bed and backed towards the balcony, her hands quickly touching her ear lobes. She did not seem to like what she found, her face quickly settling into a scowl.

“I don't know who you are or what you want from me,” she began, settling into a (rather good) fighting stance. “And I don't care. I will be leaving and you will not stop me.”

Jason looked at her, grasping his nose that had begun to leak a small trail of blood.

“What the hell?” He wasn’t screaming but he sure wasn’t whispering. 

“I’m not exactly sure how you do things in France, but I'm pretty sure most parents teach their children to not break into someone’s house, sleep next to them like a weirdo, and then break their nose!” 

There was a chance that the bluenette couldn’t understand him(there was no shortage of immigrants in Gotham), but Jason hadn’t learned more than basic French yet. Technically, learning the more common languages was a part of his training as Robin, but he had kind of forgone those specific lessons. And why would he put in all that time and effort learning French when he could be reading more books from the Manor’s library?

She blinked at him. “What do you mean, I broke in? I apologize but sir, you are not pretty enough to pretend to be so stupid.”

The black-haired boy blinked right back. He may not know French but he does know an insult when he hears one, so he fires one back. “Well fuck you too.” 

The girl scrutinized him, her expression screaming “Is that the best you can do?”

“Oh? You want to go? Fine. My middle finger salutes you and your assholeishness. Calling you an idiot would be an insult to those who truly worked hard for the title.” 

She stuck her tongue out at him. 

“There is a special place in hell for you, ya know that?”

The girl cocked an eyebrow. “I’m aware there is a special place in hell for me, it's called a throne. And those are bold words for someone who literally kidnapped me, but go off I guess.” 

It didn’t take much more for the pair to dissolve into a screaming match, the bluenette yelling in French and what he thought was Cantoneese and Jason using more than a few of the Spanish phrases he had picked up from his dad and other folks on the street. Jason was in the middle of one of his more strongly worded combinations when the door slammed open, Bruce and Alfred standing in the doorway.

The both of them took a moment to examine the situation, Alfred accessing Jason for injuries while Bruce switched on the Batglare™. “Who are you, and how did you get here?” 

The poor girl looked exasperated. 

“I don’t know how I got here!! Last thing I remember was collapsing into bed and the next thing I know I wake up to the face of this,” she pointed at Jason, “creep who doesn’t even have the decency to talk to me! I keep on asking him how I got here and why he took me but he just won’t answer. He’s pretending that he doesn’t know French, but who in Paris doesn’t know French?!? I  mean, sure, there are immigrants, but who the hell would immigrate to Paris nowadays? What with Hawkmoth akkumatizing people day and night.” 

She paused before flopping down on the floor, dejected. “Today was supposed to be perfect, the day I finally got my soul mark and got one step closer to finding my soulmate, but no, I just had to get kidnapped the night before my 16th birthday!” She put her face in her hands and her shoulders began to shake slightly. 

Jason looked from the girl back to Alfred and Bruce. “Is she?” he mouthed, thoroughly bewildered. Bruce exactly as Jason felt, while Alfred’s face was twisted into something that resembled pity and understanding. 

“Master Bruce, may I have a moment with you?” Bruce sighed and turned to leave. Not wanting to be left alone with the now sobbing girl, Jason followed.

Alfred handed Jason a handkerchief for his nose before he began. “Masters, this young girl has been through quite the ordeal and I will not have either of you using your vigilante intimidation tactics on her, understood?” 

He waited until he got a nod from the two of them before continuing. “Good. You know, Master Jason, I read a very interesting book recently about Kate Goodwill and her studies on soulmates. And before you ask, Master Bruce, I do have somewhere I am going with this. The book was absolutely fascinating, the theories, the experiments, simply everything. However, the one thing that stood out to me the most was Dr. Goodwill’s research on the different types of soul bonds, specifically the one that she and her wife shared. Her research was kick-started because no one had heard of their type of soulbond before and it had caused quite the panic for both the young girls and their families.” He paused, making eye contact with Jason. “Their soulbond caused the younger of the pair to teleport into their soulmate’s bed in the middle of the night on their sixteenth birthday.”

•••

Marinette was not having a good day. First, Mlle. Bustier assigned her to work with Lila, Lila of all people, for the end of the semester project in summer school (which she was attending due to her absences as Ladybug and Lila was attending because she was constantly absent for “charity work”), then in the middle of the night, Hawkmoth sends out 1 and ½ akumas (long story), and now she wakes up to find that she was kidnapped by a psycho in her sleep? What the actual FUCK?!?! Where was Tikki’s luck when she needed it?

And ok, sure, she wasn’t necessarily proud of how she handled the situation, but she was under a lot of stress, ok! She woke up in a random kid’s bed with no earrings and no Tikki. And yeah, she probably could have done without antagonizing the boy, but it was so easy and fun to get him riled up! How was she to know that the yelling would bring scarier other people? Ok yeah scratch that she probably should have figured that out herself (I mean the boy obviously had money so it makes sense that he’d have more people around his house) but in her defense she was like, really tired.

She glanced at the closed door that the men had just exited, wiping a few stray tears from her face. 

“If only I had Kaliki,” she mused. 

But no matter. She already had the beginnings of an escape plan forming in her head. I’ll just need a handkerchief, a piece of twine, and maybe a hairpin to pick the lock on the balcony door, but then how would I get out of the property? A house with a room like this must have crazy security measures… She went on like this for a couple of minutes, formulating her plan before she checked out the window. Three stories up...could normal civilian Marinette survive that jump? I would transform, I still have my earrings, but without Tikki I can’t... She went on like this, thinking of different plans and contingencies. The bluenette was so lost in her head that she almost didn’t notice when the three re-entered the room.

“Miss,” the older man who looked like a butler began. “I deeply apologize for the earlier behaviour of Master Jason.” He gestured to the now apprehensive boy who gave her a little wave. “He has not yet learned French and had no way to comprehend the situation. I was able to hear both sides of the story, and I believe that there has been a large misunderstanding. You were under the impression that Master Jason kidnapped you, correct?” Marinette nodded, more than a little confused. “Master Jason was under the impression that you had snuck into his bedroom in the middle of the night.”

“So what are you suggesting, someone put me here without either of us knowing?” I swear to all things holy if this man accuses me of lying…

“I am getting there, Miss. I assume you are familiar with the soulmate story of Dr. Kate Goodwill?” Marinette nodded yet again. 

The man took a deep breath. “I believe this is a similar situation, and that the two of you are soulmates..”

Her jaw dropped. “You mean I...we...what? N-no way.” 

She racked her hands through her hair. She... she wouldn’t overlook something like that, right? You were supposed to feel a sense of belonging the first time you met your soulmate and she...had kind of felt that. The more she thought about it, the more it made sense. From a logical standpoint, it would explain so much! Why he spoke English, why Tikki wasn’t with her, why her earrings weren’t on… Her face turned crimson as she realized the full implications of the statement. She turned to face the newly named Jason.

“Oh Kwami I’m so sorry Jason! I didn’t mean to, I swear, I was just so surprised and kind of scared and oh Kwami, the first time I met my soulmate I broke his nose and called him every name that I knew,” she smacked herself on the head. “Only you Mari. Oh gosh I totally understand if you never want to talk to me again I’m probably the worst soulmate in existence I just-” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the two adults leaving the room.

“You can speak English?” Jason exclaimed, looking equal parts amused and exasperated. “You spent this whole time yelling at me in French and Cantoneese and you can speak English? So much of this could have been avoided if you had just talked to me!”

Marinette gave a nervous chuckle. “Uhhhhh, surprise?” 

At his incredulous look, she rushed to elaborate. “Well I thought we were still in Paris and no one has immigrated to Paris in literally two years so I thought that you knew French and the choice to speak English was conscious? Like maybe it was some weird interrogation tactic or something? I don’t know, I was just confused.”

“You thought I kidnapped you?” He whistled through his teeth. “Yeah, I can see why you reacted the way you did. No worries though, my nose isn’t too horribly fractured and I probably would have done the same thing.” They both chuckled. 

He has a nice smile, Mari noted. (She wouldn’t know until much later, but Jason thought the same about her laugh.)

“I think we should start over.” Marinette held out her hand. 

“Hi, I’m Marinette Dupain-Cheng. I live in Paris, France, today is my birthday, and I think I’m your soulmate.”

Jason smirked, holding out his hand. “Hello Marinette Dupain-Cheng. I’m Jason Todd-Wayne and I think you are my soulmate too,”

They shook, and that was that.

The End.

Bonus:

Jason: You know, Ethiopia can wait for one more day.

Marinette: It can wait FOREVER.

Bonus 2:

Alfred: Would you like to stay for dinner?

Jason: Would you like to stay forever?

[brilliant-poses]

Night of the Coyotes

When Dutch Van Der Linde first began to expand his gang, a group of bounty hunters rose to stop a lot of gangs from becoming too big and powerful. The bounty hunters were a successful group, but the Van Der Linde’s and the O’Driscoll’s kept avoiding the rope. You are apart of the bounty hunting group, the Coyotes. You and your older sister, Pride, have been in the group since you were children. Now, you’re faced with the challenges of hunting down each member. When things get out of hand, do you stay loyal or decide a different life?

Chapter 2 - The Town of Blackwater

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“We should ask everyone, not just one person, Pride.” You reminded, beginning to kick the dirt at your feet and move towards the grass, where the others were camping. There was a lot of talk around the camp, mostly because everyone had heard the Van der Linde gang were near. Every bounty hunter in the family wanted to catch them. For some, it was a personal reason, while the thrill of the hunt persuaded them to go after the gang. There were a few different women who worked in the gang, some being close friends of Vivian’s while others joined later on. Pride sighed and walked towards the cooking tent. A chubby woman hummed loudly, beginning to cut meat into bits and preparing it with seasonings.

“Alina! You need anythin’ from Blackwater?” Pride called, causing the woman to yell in surprise.

“Oh, you scared me, Pride! You silly girly! Yes, I do! Give me a moment!” She said with her heavy accent, wiping her hands off and going towards a journal to write down a list. Alina Kruger was basically the one who kept women alive. She was a German immigrant, traveling here when she was about twenty and managing to keep herself afloat, thanks to a bakery business she worked for. She joined the family when Vivian had suggest she come with them, tell her it would be adventure and cooking, two things Alina said she wanted in life. Alina had platinum blonde hair and crystal blue eyes, her eyes were round with joy and she looked so innocent. Her cheeks were always pink and her smile was absolutely wonderful. Her hair was normally tied back in two braids, her saying it was a normal German style.

“Here you go!” She said and handed the list to you.

“Thanks, Alina.” You smiled as she giggled lightly.

“Thank you! I did not want to go into town today, I have much to do!” She said and patted your head before shooing you two out so she could continue to cook. Pride as about to go towards her horse before you grabbed her braid.

“That’s not everyone, Pride.” You reminded, tugging her over towards some more tents, causing her to cuss and hiss in pain. You let her go once you’re sure she’s not going run towards her horse. You glanced around and saw a few of your sisters. Virginia Ross, Mary Mantle, and Yolanda Romero. As you stepped closer, you can see the details of what they’re doing get better.

Virginia was from New York, she was from a rather rich family, but she gave that up when her daddy tried to make her marry someone. She told him she wanted to do whatever she wanted, saying she didn’t need money. Virginia had only been with you for a few months, but she was a good member. She had dark brown hair and vibrant green eyes, she was a rather cute individual. Mary, on the other hand, was a cold blooded individual. Her parents were murdered by robbers and now hunts for the hell of it. She’s a little younger than you, most of the hunters were, but she did what she needed to. She had pale skin and dark blonde hair, her eyes a dark brown. She had a large scar that ran across her cheek and a few others over her body. She was a force to be reckoned with. Yolanda was a mystery. She was fun and always had stories of Mexico, but never spoke about why she wanted to be a bounty hunter. You all enjoyed her, with her dark skin and dark, black hair. Her eyes were actually a lighter brown, which made her emotions show. She was probably the best hunter you had, besides Pride.

“Hey girls, you need anything?” You asked with a smile, looking towards them. The girls glanced up, stopping their weapon cleaning to think for a moment.

“Gun oil.” Mary said after a moment, going back to cleaning. You quickly wrote this down on the paper that Alina gave you.

“Get us some more ammo too! My shotgun is getting low.” Virginia said, her northern accent punctuating every word. You glanced towards Yolanda after you wrote ‘ammo’ down, noticing her grin.

“What do you want, Yola?” You asked, the Hispanic woman letting out a loud sigh as she thought.

“Oh! If you find a tambourine, get that. I love tambourines.” She smiled again, making Pride roll her eyes.

“Is that essential for your hunts?”

“Well, we make noises like coyotes, so yeah. It’s to make noises!”

“You’re the reason I go solo.” Pride said and flicked her nose, causing Virginia to giggle.

“A tambourine… We’ll see if we can find one.” You said, causing Yolanda to let out a yell of excitement. You and Pride nodded them goodbye and went towards the tent closest to the entrance of the camp.

“Zotova! Liu! The fuck y’all want from Blackwater?” Pride yelled, forcing you to hit her and shush her. Zotova didn’t even look up from her writing.

“Four journals, three pencils, and hand these out.” The Russian said in her broken English, handing you a few papers with their bounty hunting on it.

“Put them in stores and sheriff’s office.” She said, leaning back to take off her small glasses. Zotova Stanislavovna was the person who helped bring in the money. She was in charge of receiving bounties and giving them to Vivian. She did her job well, but being a Russian immigrant, she couldn’t speak the best English. Some of you had to be there to help her explain herself. She had only been in America for about a year, but everything was falling into place for her. She had blonde hair and brown eyes, who wears glasses a lot of the time.

“I don’t want anything.” Liu said, smiling towards you two. Liu Shun was another hunter, an expert animal hunter, as well. She was the best at long distance shots and tracking. She was a Chinese immigrant, who’s parents worked tirelessly on the railroad. When her parents were killed in an accident, due to the horrible conditions they faced, Liu found your family and requested to help make things right for people like her. She had a good mission, but you were concerned on how people would view her. She had short, her black hair and brown eyes.

“Isabella doesn’t need anything, does she?” Pride asked, referring to the woman who took care of the horses.

“No, she’s fine. She hasn’t mentioned anything.” Zotova said, waving them off. You and Pride nodded, walking towards your horses to see the red head taking care of the animals. Isabella was the kindest soul you had, orphaned at a young age, she’s been in the gang with you and Pride for a long time. She and Brigit was close, the Irish woman who was close to Vivian. The two red heads bonded over their love for horses. You and Pride mounted your horses, not noticing Isabella walking away to grab more hay. She was quiet, so it wasn’t the most surprising thing that she did. She was sweet, but very to herself.

“You ready, Peppercorn?” You asked, patting the Gypsy Cob. He was the best horse you had, the black and white painted horse was the most loyal horse you could ever have. Pride’s horse was a large, white and brown Shire named Sunshine. She named her that since she’s the most hot tempered horse in the entire camp. You mounted Peppercorn, listening to him pant lightly in excitement. Your spurs jabbed into his side and you began to ride off next to Pride. Blackwater wasn’t too far away.

══════════════════

“I can’t believe we’re having to be maids and get shit.” Pride said as she let Sunshine trot in the street. You were sighing lightly, rubbing your face when she complained.

“Come on, Pride. Let’s just get the stuff. Let’s go to the general store.” You offered, listening to her grumble lightly. You and Pride hitched your horses outside the general store, heading inside after you got off the horses. You opened the door, hearing the bell ring and the store clerk greeting you.

“Welcome, ladies!” He greeted, causing you to nod in a greeting. You began to gather the few things that Zotova wanted.

“Pride, go get what Alina wanted from the butcher. I’m going to go get the ammo and gun oil.” You said as you paid for the items, handing him the paper for your bounty hunter family.

“Hang this up.” You said softly and left with Pride. When you were putting the items in your saddle bag, Pride whistled towards you. You looked towards her and saw them. Arthur Morgan and Hosea Matthews.

“Good morning, ladies.” Hosea greeted, knowing exactly who you two are.

“It was.” Pride hissed, glaring towards Morgan, who scoffed.

“We heard you boys were here. We were trying to find you.” You offered Hosea, who chuckled lightly.

“Yeah, we figured. You ladies are very good at what you do.” He said, causing you to nod.

“Y’all are too, for criminals.” You said as Hosea laughed.

“Well, I can’t argue with that.” He said, gently hitting Arthur to make him stop glaring at Pride.

“We’re just here to gather supplies. You gonna try to get us?” He asked, causing you to shake your head. You hit Pride after a moment, seeing her reaching towards her gun.

“We’re here for supplies too. It would be stupid to start shit in the middle of the street. We’ll come for y’all soon.” You explained, causing him to nod.

“Thank ya, ladies. You have a good day now.” He offered and waved slightly. When they trotted past you, you heard Arthur and Pride exchange words.

“Heartless bitch.”

“Tiny dick Morgan.” With that, Pride took the list and stomped towards the butcher while you went towards the gunsmith. You were going to have to tell Vivian about this, but you weren’t going to pursue them. Not yet. It would be dumb to. Pride was hot headed and wanted to kill Arthur Morgan so bad that it consumed her. You were her calm, her reason. You had to show her that the time would come. As you entered the gunsmith’s shop, you knew it was going to be a long day.

[bestie-enthusiast]

Chapter 1: Prologue

This is the Prologue to my PTA! Dad! Zemo fanfiction. It is the second of 11 chapters.

The Previous Chapter is for Character Introductions, if you want a more gentle introduction into this au, go check it out.

Fic summary: After the untimely death of both his wife and father due to a bombing, Baron Helmut Zemo takes his son and immigrates to America. He does not expect to find a family nor a romantic partner, and he especially does not expect to find the ability to heal. To grieve.

And yet, here we are.

This is a story about connections, growing, healing and mourning the past while still appreciating the future and all it has to offer.

Lenght: 1428 Words

If this interests you, keep reading!

“Are you ready, Carl?” Zemo asked his son, using their native tongue. He wanted his son to grow up knowing the history of their family, despite the fact that their country had been wiped off the map in all ways but physical. Carl was already fluent in Sokovian of course, as well as English and French, but he did not want his son to get rusty just because they were no longer living in Sokovia.

“Yes, papa!” His son responded excitedly, standing impatiently at the door while his father put his shoes on. He was starting at his new, American, school today. Even though he was sad to leave his home and old school, his new home was very big and exciting, and papa had told him that his new school would be “just fine.”

“Alright, come now schatz.” His father opened the door and gently took his hand. Carl eagerly skipped along the sidewalk as they walked to his new school. He was wearing his new clothes, and papa had said he looked like a gentleman. His papa was also wearing new clothes, he had a fancy coat with fur.

They eventually made it to his new school and Carl paused, looking at his father with uncertainty.

“Do not worry, my liebling. It is only for some hours and then you can come home.” His father reassured him, and Carl warily stepped into the school grounds. He continued walking, eventually finding a group of children playing hopscotch. They let him join, and soon enough he had entirely forgotten about his nervousness.

Zemo stared at his son, smiling slightly with relief when Carl found some children to play with. He was glad that Carl was able to find some children to join. The two children looked like brothers.

“Are you new to the neighborhood?” He heard someone ask beside him. He looked over, seeing a snarky faced woman. She had clearly dyed her hair a horrible blonde, and had a rather obvious fake tan.

“Ah, yes. We have just recently moved here.” He replied with a smile. It was difficult to take his eyes off of his son, but it would be more polite to look at the woman while they conversed, so he managed. He noticed her assessing his outfit and his smile grew a little more tense.

“Are you the one that bought that great big house over… oh whats the street name…” Zemo’s smile grew strained but he reluctantly prattled off the name. “Oh yes that's it! Me and my husband had been planning on buying it, you know but-” Zemo tuned her out, still politely nodding and making eye contact, but not really processing what she was saying.

“Carol!” Another voice shouted out, this time a kind looking woman. She bore a resemblance to the two boys his son was playing with, so perhaps she was their mother. Either way, she earned some respect from him, after all she was getting him out of this dreadfully boorish conversation.

The lady who he had been talking to scoffed under her breath, making him frown. How horribly impolite. “What do you want, Sarah?” She asked rudely, scowling deeply at the other women. Zemo was confused, this other lady, named Sarah apparently, appeared very kind.

“I just wanted to let you know that Hunter is throwing another fit.” Sarah responded, her once sweet smile turning a more sickly sweet, the smile of a woman who knew she had won. The rude woman, Carol, stomped off in a huff, over in the direction where a crying child was throwing themself around on the ground. Zemo grimaced slightly, some people should not have children. He turned to Sarah, giving her a slight smile.

“Hello,” He greeted, eyes flickering over to Carl briefly. He was still playing with the two boys. They had moved onto a different game, he noticed.

“Hey! Sorry about the intrusion, not that you looked like you were enjoying the conversation much.” Zemo let out a little chuckle, that was accurate.

“It is water under the bridge. You are correct, I was not all that interested in what she had to say. I apologise if this is impolite, but are those two boys yours?” He asked, pointing at the brothers that appeared to be teaching Carl some sort of game.

“Yeah, they are. Is that your kid with them then?” She asked back, and Zemo nodded. Carl seemed to be having fun, that was all that mattered. The loud bell suddenly rang, making him flinch slightly. He could see Carl jump in surprise, but he got over it quickly and rushed into line with his new friends.

“That’s a rather loud bell.” He commented quietly, waving to Carl as he went inside. There was a rather attractive man holding one of the doors open for the kids. That was one of the teachers, if he was remembering correctly. Mr. Barnes, although he went by Mr. Bucky, or more simply Bucky. Zemo licked his lips slightly, missing the beginning of Sarah’s reply.

“-get used to it. But considering how old your kid is, I’m assuming you’re not from around here?” Zemo shook his head, both in response and to clear it.

“Ah, no. My son and I recently immigrated from Sokovia.” He explained, watching as the last of the children trailed into the building. He took a deep breath and turned back to Sarah, who was already looking at him with a peculiar expression on her face.

“Sokovia?”

“Sokovia. It is a small European country located close to Serbia.” Sarah nodded and held out her hand. He gave it a firm shake, and gave her another small smile.

“Well, it was certainly nice meeting you, Mister…”

“Zemo. And you as well Miss...:”

“Wilson.” She obliged with a laugh, waving him goodbye as she started to walk down the sidewalk. Zemo spent a moment longer looking at the school, before starting his own walk home. He lived a fair distance away from the school, close enough that he could still walk with Carl on days with kind weather. On other days with worse weather? Well Oeznik could drive them.

As soon as he arrived home he jumped into his work day. Many things around the estate needed sorting out, and he was also sorting out all of his income and income sources. The day went by very quickly, and soon enough he was telling Oeznik to prepare the car so that he could pick Carl up. He flawlessly parked along the sidewalk and began the short walk over to the school.

The school day had yet to end, but he had spotted Sarah, so he made his way over to wait with her.

“Hello again, Ms. Wilson.” He greeted, giving her a slight smile.

Sarah looked at him and smiled back, hers much brighter than his. “Well, hello stranger.” She joked, hiding her smile when he once again flinched at the loud bell.

“It is so unnecessarily loud,” he complained under his breath. Sharon laughed and turned towards the school, prompting Zemo to do so as well. It took him a moment, but he soon located Carl, who was also with Sharon’s two sons. He waved and Carl waved back, weaving through the students and parents milling around. Zemo bent down and scooped him up, giving him a tight hug before setting him back down. He could see Sarah looking at him out of the corner of her eye as she greeted her own two kids.

“You really love him, huh?” She said quietly, looking at Carl as he gestured wildly in the conversation he had started with Sarah’s two boys.

“He is my everything.” Zemo replied, just as quietly, staring at his precious son. He suddenly cleared his throat, startling Sarah slightly. He would not start to cry like some of the other parents, he was a baron, nothing more, nothing less. “I will be seeing you tomorrow, yes Ms. Wilson?” He asked.

“Yes of course, and you can just call me Sarah.” She replied, giving him a soft smile. He returned it and gently rubbed Carl’s back, telling him it was time to go. Carl eagerly followed him to the car. It wasn’t the most fancy or expensive car he owned by far, but it was luxurious and comfortable. Once he had made sure that Carl was safely buckled, and started to drive home.

Carl told him all about his day, and for the first time in a long while, Zemo allowed himself to completely relax.

Tagging: @morganbritton132 (who provided the idea for this fic) and @i-ll-be-the-moon (who is very nice and wanted to read it <3)

[kittybellestark]

Ok, talking about what you said about Sebastian and Romania, I just want to say that I am from Romania, and the situation is not so bad. Maybe it was then, but that was 30+ years ago, things have changed. I know it was hard for him because he was a kid and it was totally different in America. But, I must say, it becomes annoying ... he was not the only child who lived that period, many of them did not go anywhere and have a decent and beautiful life in Romania. Yes, there is a lot of corruption but other than that, is a normal and free country.

Hi, I’m not trying to invalidate Romanians or what Romania is currently like. I just want to push people to educate themselves especially when I see comments like I summarized in the previous post which romanticize the trauma that Sebastian Stan went through. And I’m only speaking about him now because of the interview he gave the other day talking about his experiences with Alexander and about Romania then and now and the discourse that has come from that. (Calling Seb a bad boy because he had to steal as a child, etc)

Yeah, so my points about Sebastian Stan and the interview is more about the reaction to him sharing his trauma. He spoke very openly about the trauma he had from his time in Romania and immigrating, and we see now that he is very very proud of his nationality.

But I still stand to the fact that no one should be romanticizing that trauma because he is famous. I don’t want to discount the experience people have had growing up and living in Romania.

Yes it was 30 years ago, but that’s still fairly recently in the gran scheme of things. Romania is still working through the effects of being under communism which we see in other countries such as Poland (where my grandparents had to leave the country due to similar issues).

In the interview, which I linking in my post, Sebastian and Alexander talk about how there are many people who stayed in Romania and had very happy lives.

So many people have romanticized what he had to go through. And that shouldn’t happen. Doesn’t matter whether his trauma was 30 years ago or not.

I’m in no way trying to say in my previous post that Romania is a poor country, with civil unrest where communism is still happening. But it is important to recognize that the recent history of Romania, and how that affects today.

I’m a second generation Canadian, but because of the trauma’s that my grand parents went through (living through wwii, being in a communist country, being forced onto a boat the make it to Canada to get refuge), my brother and I never learnt Polish traditions, or how to speak Polish. We couldn’t get our EU passports because our grandma wouldn’t get the paper work we needed to try and keep us safe. We’d have people make fun of our last names and my brothers first name (because they aren’t English names), Holocaust jokes were regularly, people have refused to accept service from me at my previous job because I looked to Polish (I’m 22). Obviously I’m not an immigrant, and the Polish experience vs the Romanian experience aren’t then same. But I’ve grown up listening to stories of what it was like to try and fit in and hiding apart of yourself, and being told if I ever traveled to certain places to give a fake last name if I’m asked. But there is trauma that my grandparents have experienced this is going to be similar to Sebastian’s, but if talk about my grandma’s experience people just won’t care bc they don’t have a connection.

And we see Poland (and many other Easter European countries) heading back towards authoritarian governments, which is only being escalated due to covid.

Obviously this isn’t everyone’s experience. I don’t want to say it is, but acknowledging history of other countries and understanding not to romanticize a persons trauma shouldn’t be a difficult thing or something I should have to say.

But yeah basically, romanticizing trauma is horrible. Being fans of Sebastian Stan we shouldn’t invalidate his experiences and his pain because others didn’t have the same experiences. If we’re going to be talking about Sebastians experiences we need to continue to educate ourselves in was happening back then. And we need to understand what is happening now. Eastern European countries aren’t in the greatest place politically. It sucks that people who don’t have a connection to these countries don’t understand what has happened or is currently happening in Romania or Poland or the rest or Eastern Europe. And it’s unfortunate that a lot of people will choose to not make the active decisions to educate themselves if I doesn’t affect them personally or a celebrity they love (in this case Sebastian Stan) lived through it.

My point is we shouldn’t take someone’s trauma and make it into an idea we have of Sebastian or any other celebrity. Everyone should keep an open mind about the immigrant experience and shouldn’t make mindless jokes about what that person went through.

People (specifically America/Canada) often don’t consider Eastern European people’s experience when they’re forced to move away for their safety because there’s a lack of education about it. None of these countries are brought up in history after WWII.

Anyways I hope that makes sense it’s like 2am so my thought process isn’t really all there. I’m sorry if I got things wrong but I just think these are really important things that need to be discussed and people need to educate themselves on and be more sensitive to it. I really don’t mean to invalidate your experiences, I just see that people are invalidating others experiences and that’s not cool. So sorry if I overstepped and got these things wrong

[csykora]

After ‘84, Igor felt the pieces were beginning to fall off the Red Machine. 

He hated being called a robot as much as he hated being called a soldier. He didn’t know what the world wanted the Green Unit to do on the ice or off it, how they had to behave, before someone would believe they had feelings. On the worst days they were too tired and numb to feel anything else.  

When he’d met Bobby Clarke, who he thought looked like a hockey angel with a blond halo and no teeth, Bobby commented about the Soviet presence in Afghanistan. Igor didn’t know how to say that he’d definitely never been allowed to go to Afghanistan, and under the uniform he didn’t deserve to be a soldier, for good or bad. The national team was a tool of the Soviet government: at the same time it was a comfort for ordinary people in cold little apartments in mining towns where the players grew up and also a prop in the illusions that kept everything how it was. 

The illusion went skin deep: every time they left Russia, Igor was issued a snappy winter coat and brand-name Western clothes, so no one would think the Soviets looked poor.

[A black and white photo of the Green Unit posing, smiling except for Igor, in matching windbreakers with saddle shoulders and bold stripes. This was a hot look, about 10 years before the Soviet Union Costuming Department thought it was a hot look]

Underneath the coat or the beautiful red sweater, everything was a mess. At one point, at a tournament in Canada, a Canadian player would hit Igor from behind. It wouldn’t have been so bad, except the Soviet management hadn’t provided enough hockey pads. Igor was wearing a partial set he’d borrowed from a high school team that played in the host arena earlier that day. (Across Europe and Canada I bet there are grown men, still hockey fans now, who have no idea they once owned game-worn gear from the world’s top scorers. To Igor’s fans those pieces might be worth as much as he ever earned in his CSKA career.) He would play the rest of that tournament with broken ribs.

The only outsider he’d met who seemed to understand, however briefly, was their friend Vanya. Asked what it was like playing against those Russian robots, Wayne said, 

“Robots don’t hurt when they lose.”

By June 1985, Slava was recovering from that knee injury that had sidelined him for half the last season. He and his little brother Tolya, now a CSKA rookie, drove back for the start of training. Their car was hit, and Tolya was killed. Slava thought about leaving that season, but their parents told him to keep going, and just try to live for two people.

In November, the players at Arkhangel heard a rumor: someone had written an article, in a Soviet paper, that criticized the hockey program. Anything that wasn’t awe was criticism. Someone got their hands on a copy, and Igor, Vova, Sergei, and Slava huddled around their usual table that evening, hiding each other as they read it in turns. Igor reread it twice. He’d read Canadian and American papers that dragged the Soviet system, but never something like this, that got it--almost--right. It didn’t have all the details to understand the illusion--how they trained, how Tikhonov acted behind Arkhangel’s walls--but it guessed some.

Glasnost was beginning, a long rustling cracking thaw opening new streams of information and communication like Igor had dreamed. The Canucks drafted him that year, and then Vova. The Devils had dibsed Slava and Lyosha a few years before, and the Flames wanted Sergei. There was a place for them, waiting, if they could ever get to the NHL. But there wouldn’t be any thaw in Arkhangel as long as Tikhonov ruled it.

The ’85 World Championships were held in Prague, and ’86 in Moscow. Igor played both, and nothing else. For two years, no one saw him outside the Soviet Union. 

In December of ‘85, CSKA was supposed to tour North America. Igor was dressed and ready. Then he heard his passport, which he had used a hundred times before, had run into problems. Coach told him not to worry, but to stay behind in Russia and--how convenient--keep training for the championships in Moscow. Igor woke up at three in the morning to watch the games he was supposed to be playing. He learned that Canadian journalists were asking about him: apparently, he had tonsillitis. Igor wasn’t entirely sure where his tonsils were. 

Two months later CSKA played in Sweden. Strange, how his tonsils still weren’t better, and his passport was still missing. Two nights before they were set to leave Tikhonov called him into the office, in front of the team, and told him so. But the next evening Tretiak, now a more senior officer, came out to visit the barracks. He hugged Igor and promised him he would do what he could to get the passport by the time they were supposed to leave the next morning. Igor went to bed hoping. At 4:30 AM the coaches woke him just to tell him the passport wasn’t there yet, so the team really would be leaving without him. 

The third time it happened, he was told to go back to the passport office to file everything all over again--maybe he had fucked up his passport. He didn’t bother. Taking away travel had been one thing. But doing it in front of the team, in front of the Green Unit, so that he knew that they knew that he had let them down somehow, broke his heart. 

He was still allowed to play inside the Soviet Union. As long as he was with CSKA, the other Greens treated him the same as always. If they had known how bad things were going to get, Igor thought they would have done more sooner, but he knew that they didn’t understand what was happening. In between games, he spent his days in office buildings, being grilled about suspicious activities like listening to rock music, calling his mom too often, or kissing Canadians. 

“I was at fault all around. That I gladly gave interviews to journalists. That I liked the NHL...that I like rock music. That the living standard there impressed me. All this was raked up into a pile. I was the enemy. Because, you see, if I liked the American way of life, then in general I was an American by heart. All of this they said about me.

By nature, I am clearly a Russian. I do not like everything in America. It cannot be that somewhere is as in a fairytale, and somewhere else is total darkness.

Particularly, it seemed, my [friendliness] offended the preservers of government secrets….I also knew a little English. Therefore I had the possibility to rub elbows with whomever I might come in contact: hockey players, journalists and even immigrants. And, they assumed, to each of them I could give important information--everyone getting an equal share, no doubt, in order to be fair.”

He couldn’t talk to his friends from other countries, or his Russian friends either when they traveled without him. On the street outside between the rink and the party offices, none of his former fans would speak to him, except to ask or tell him their opinion if he really was a traitor.

He was wanted everywhere but home. Obviously, no other country believed that a 25 year-old athlete who had been the best in the world six months before had been brought down by tonsillitis multiple times in a row. There’s only so many tonsils a person can have. Obviously, every other country thought Igor must want to defect, the one thing he did not want and couldn’t convince anyone of. So each host on the international hockey circuit was bouncing on their toes, first Canada, then Sweden and so on, thinking maybe the Soviet Union would slip up and let him come to their tournament, he'd defect, and then they’d get to keep him. Obviously, the Soviets noticed that, and squeezed tighter.

Each time the team left on tour, he was told to spend his time alone training harder and hope. If he was good enough, maybe he’d make the next tournament. His body, always a battle-ground with Coach Tikhonov, became a hostage situation. The more Tikhonov told him to train, the less he ate. Eventually he was eating mostly fruit, and restricting his water intake. 

He stopped pretending to defer to anyone.  He used to be the sober one between his hot-head wingers, and now he egged every fight on. Sometimes he faked an American accent, calling Coach “Tikhonoff” the way American broadcasters had at the '81 Olympics.

One day at the rink he bumped into figure skater Lena Batanova, who “knew nothing about hockey and could not have cared less.” She had been through worse training than he had growing up, only to win two World Championships, and then be slighted from a third. They understood each other without having to say anything.

[Igor washing dishes in their Moscow apartment, turning to glance at Lena pressing up him.]

That summer he stayed up late talking with his friends, and realized he wanted to marry Lena. He asked her the next morning, and she said yes. Behind Igor’s back, Slava, Vova, Sergei, and Lyosha went to Coach Tikhonov’s office, and told him that they would play every other day of the year if they had to, but they would be going to Igor’s wedding. Coach wouldn’t allow the three days for a traditional Russian wedding, but he had to give Igor one.

Waking up the morning after the wedding, Igor checked the mail and found a summons to appear before the Central Committee of the Communist Party. His friends, who I imagine lying hungover on his and Lena’s new couch and floor, rushed for their unused books to help him study up on Communist doctrine, in case he got quizzed. This is presumably when Lena woke up, realized she’d married a whole line of hockey players for their one communal brain cell, and rolled back over. Igor reported the next morning, probably with flashcards Vova had made for him in his pocket.

The Party officials congratulated him on getting married and gave him the wedding gift they were sure no one else would have gotten: his passport. We have to guess the logic here, if there was one. It’s possible the Party thought he wouldn’t risk his wife, or that two years had just been enough to realize the team wasn’t working without him. 

But he was allowed to go to Canada for the Calgary Cup before the end of ‘86, and everyone had questions about his two years of tonsillitis. Igor, for the first time in his life, didn’t talk. But that just left the hockey world to gossip. Two months later it was announced he’d be in Quebec City for another tournament, and right before they arrived a Quebec newspaper printed a version of the night out with Gretzky--with quotes, they claimed, from Wayne. This time the tournament organizers called someone from every team up for a pregame presser. I imagine Igor shrugging at his KGB handlers and sliding away to the stage: nothing could stop him talking now.

Except the Canadian journalists. They wanted to interview Team Canada first. Igor stewed, and then looked up to see an oncoming Wayne. Someone had asked him about the alleged quotes in the article, which Igor had snagged a copy of to read the second they let him loose in Canada. Apparently Wayne hadn’t. 

“‘Believe me, Igor,’” Igor remembers Wayne blurting out. “‘I didn’t say what was printed in the paper. I’ll tell them it didn’t happen! But what is your position now?’”

“‘Do not worry,” Igor promised him. “‘Now, everything is okay.’”

“Oh, awesome,” (I’m assuming again) Wayne said. “So do you want to come over later and hang out in my mom’s basement?!”

“If the KGB pulls a gun, then call me.” --Wayne Gretzky

Weirdly, I’ve never seen this inspirational quote cross-stitched on someone’s wall. 

The next Canada Cup was held in August ‘87 in Hamilton, Ontario, which is like, basically next door to Wayne’s parents’ house. So the afternoon before the first game, Wayne sent his dad Walter to the hotel where the Soviet team was staying. Walter asked in Ukrainian if he could chat with Igor, who had to come down to the hotel lobby to meet him, since visitors were absolutely not allowed to wander up to players’ rooms. Walter invited his son’s friend over for dinner. Igor cut eyes at the KGB agent in the corner, and said he had to go upstairs and ask Coach. Tikhonov said no before Igor started talking.

Igor came back downstairs and apologized to Walter, who thought hard for a minute. He told Igor to ask what if the whole Green Unit went to Wayne’s house for team bonding? Coach Tikhonov considered, and said no, and Igor went back to Walter. 

Walter hitched up his suspenders, and announced to the KGB that he would talk go to Coach Tikhonov now.

He told Tikhonov he would be honored if Coach came to dinner at his house that evening, and if Coach felt like it, he might bring the boys over too. Tikhonov said he’d love to. 

Tikhonov, Igor, Vova, Sergei, Slava, Lyosha, and a KGB operative spent a delightful half hour packed in a car together driving to the Gretzkys' house, where Walter and Phyllis were throwing a cookout. Walter and some of his local buddies had barbecue and corn on the cob on the grill, and Phyllis had quizzed her son about his Moscow trip before throwing up her hands in despair and making a big batch of her mother’s Polish dumplings and sausage.

Nothing makes me happier than the image of Wayne Gretzky, beaming from ear to ear, handing famously fussy little Igor Larionov a piece of barbecued corn on the cob. Igor had to explain that yes, they had corn in Russia, but they ate it on a plate and not like squirrels. Walter offered him a beer, and Igor looked to Coach Tikhonov before saying no. Tikhonov allowed the players to have a soda.

Wayne started asking him how everything had been since the last time they hung out, and didn’t get why his friend wouldn’t talk to him at first. Igor might answer one question, and then act like he didn’t understand. Sergei and Vova really didn’t speak English, and kept elbowing Igor to explain what was going on and why Wayne was smiling at them like that, but Igor was still pretending he only spoke Russian and hesitated to translate for them. Finally Wayne realized Igor was clamming up every time Tikhonov got within earshot.

Wayne went to Walter to change the game plan. Walter would use his Ukrainian to ask Coach Tikhonov about his many amazing accomplishments, while Wayne told the whole party he wanted to show the other boys his medals, which were all down in the basement. Unfortunately the Gretzky family’s basement was very small, and housed Wayne’s many, many medals, so only two people could possibly fit down there at a time: one Gretzky, and one Russian. Tikhonov thought about it, decided he didn’t care about someone else’s medals, and gave the okay.

 Just in case, Wayne deputized his dad’s buddy Charlie, who did not speak Russian or anything like it but was somebody’s dad from suburban Ontario, to chat up the KGB agent.

So Wayne began to escort the Green Unit, one by one, down to his family’s basement. At the bottom of the stairs, he handed them a beer. The two of them chugged their beers together, trying not to take suspiciously long or laugh too loud, and then ran back up to change out for the next boy.

Nothing happened that night. It didn’t change anything, except that Tikhonov never found out. The Greens had been able to get one over on him, because they didn’t have to do it alone.

Main

Next>>

[perpetuitys]

AAAA hello everyone i’m peep and this is my independent n impulsive vampire bb michel !! also sorry for being Mad late i’ve been moving/flying for the past couple days but i’m finally settled in and super super excited to rp with you all :~) but Yes this is michel he has an attachment to the sea ...... he’s curious abt everything ..... can be very sarcastic at times .... and more found below !! also def hit me up to plot on discord <3 @uwfmintro​

STATISTICS  

FULL NAME:  michel de la rue NICKNAME(S): michel’s fine AGE:  twenty-five GENDER + PRONOUNS:  cis male + he/him ORIENTATION:  bisexual ZODIAC:  sagittarius sun, libra moon BIRTHDAY: december 3rd, 1802 PLACE OF BIRTH: paris, france OCCUPATION(S):  bartender, helps with the liberation TRAITS: (+) open-minded, honest, adventurous, curious, independent  / (-) turbulent, careless, irresponsible, impulsive, dogmatic

BIOGRAPHY

the following biography page contains the following: death, grief, suicidal ideation.

read at your own risk.  

HUMAN

it was eleven years later and new york was just starting to feel like his home. michel still hated speaking english and the permanent odor was sort of annoying, but he felt like he had a purpose that wasn’t dependent on war. fatigued by the aftermath of the french revolution and disappointed in the end of napoleon’s reign, the de la rue’s left their mother country when michel was fourteen in hopes of creating something new and fresh, devoid of any monarchial rule. his family lived a fairly simple life that was dedicated to running their bakery in brooklyn.

this simple life began to feel quite exhilarating as he found himself falling more and more in love with a newly-immigrated family friend at twenty. ever since meeting colette lyon (which of course was at the bakery — where else) he couldn’t think of anything else. the two remained inseparable into their marriage, too, where the two decided to momentarily elope to the beach despite his parents’ wishes. both colette and michel had a fascination with the sea, perhaps symbolizing the voyage that connected their childhood with their newfound adulthood. this fixation grew as he decided to leave his  family in favor of becoming a fisherman running his own shop at the local fish market (also against his parents’ wishes). and as their family grew to include two children, he believes it truly was the best financial decision he’s ever made (which he was well-aware there weren’t many).

but honestly, michel’s favorite thing about new york had to be the selection of taverns. the routine of waking up early, going out to fish, spending his entire day trying to sell his catches at the market, and coming home to two rowdy toddlers proved to exhaust the brunette both physically and emotionally by the time he was twenty-four. so, it wasn’t a surprise to often see him spending most of his evenings during the week at the local bar, making several short-term friends who also wanted to make the most of their night. however one night felt different as michel became what was most likely the most intoxicated he has ever been with a room with equally intoxicated men who decided that receiving fists hurt good and fighting felt fun. he was too drunk to process the chilled air (perhaps that hurt good, too), but something felt wrong as the men continued beating on him. leaving him bleeding out in the early winter air, it very quickly dawned on him that there would be no more life for him to live. no more colette. or his family and their quaint bakery. never see his children get married. as he made peace with this reality, in his last moments he thought about the sea.

VAMPIRE

everything felt bright and intense as he gasped his first breath of immortality. focusing his attention on how fast his senses were heightening and the excruciating bloodlust, it took a moment for him to realize his bougie surroundings. confused, capricious, and super fucking hungry, aleksander was there to guide him into this new underground world.

which honestly terrified the fuck out of michel. as his senses began to settle, his heart sank to his feet thinking about his death — the stupidity, carelessness and impulsivity causing an eternal separation to the life he worked hard to achieve. he grew depressed and the intense bloodlust that he wasn’t able to get a grasp on wasn’t doing much to uplift him. he depended on the older vampire emotionally as transitioning into a life completely vacant of his family was very challenging as he witnessed the rest of their lives at a distance. this often resulted in michel coming to him, very depressed as he questioned his vampirism, with aleksander always finding a way to lift his spirits and remind him of his purpose. because he saw it in michel that night before he died at the tavern. he saw the charm and how he could make anyone in the room feel like his best friend. he knew that once this cloudiness of despair and self-loathing blows over that a magnetic charisma would lie underneath. something he can use.

so, aleksander stayed beside him. reassured him. and ultimately invited him into his home to live as he would adopt him as a son, passing down his millennia of knowledge on to him and sowing seeds that he hoped to one day reap. luckily, the stages of grief passed away quickly throughout the coming months as michel realized the potential in this unfortunate situation. firstly, he has never seen so much opulence in his life. he heard stories of it, though mostly negative ones as they were all passed down from the french revolution, but now this was able to be his reality. and he was pretty fond of his newfound speed and strength. now at least it was guaranteed he wouldn’t die from another drunken bar fight.

but as he was increasingly noticing the positives of living in the mansion, the negatives began to bother him. or as others call them: helena. you see, with his human siblings, he didn’t have the problem of trust as they all grew up together and shared blood. but it wasn’t long after moving in that michel realized just how necessary the blood relation would be and how significant the corvinus name is in their world. and perhaps another large part of the problem was they didn’t truly see him as a sibling at all. truthfully, the condescension stung at the beginning and resulted in michel spending most days keeping to himself and reading the literature that occupied the walls.

as decades passed and michel was sure colette and the kids had most likely passed too, he found himself integrating back into human society by the end of the nineteenth century. which he surprisingly felt more relieved than disheartened by, as he’d finally be able to get more separation from his older sibling, but perhaps it could also be one of the signs of vampire cynicism creeping in. because, oh boy, did it creep in. the first couple decades of the twentieth century were probably most notably some of the sloppiest years michel had. he began transitioning from blood bags (the mansion always had them on deck) to feeding directly from humans and while he knew never to bite the neck, he felt it hard to resist biting elsewhere. and found it hard to resist in general, often accidentally killing a few people in the process.

however, once magdelena was born, he found himself becoming interested in the family again and decided to clean up his careless feeding act. as she grew older, he became quite fond of her presence and protective, because she sort of reminded him of his own son and daughter who he had left behind. in a way, it felt very cathartic to (practically) raise her; like he was writing a wrong and filling the void that the act of no longer being a father created. being there for her and caring for her gave him a purpose that he lacked up until that point (which probably explains his tendency to overfeed). he came around the house more, helping her as she developed into her vampirism and taught her all the things aleksander had taught him. minus the shitty values. when he would pop back into society, he spent it educating himself on new ideas and theories that inhabited both human and supernatural spheres, mostly out of curiosity and his love for learning if anything. during this time, he also eventually met others of his vampire kind as well as lycans, though more clandestine. many of which soon became his closest friends.

and that’s why he was fairly devastated to know about aleksander’s plans. his stomach twisted knowing that someone who once raised him could be capable of such cruelty. it sickened him — and he let him know it. which, in turn, earned him expulsion from his home of two centuries. maybe some saw it coming — how michel was often distanced from the start — but it still hurt the vampire nonetheless. he lost connection to his first family and it hurt like a bitch to lose it to another, regardless how he felt about them individually. especially to leave behind magdelena, who he felt attached to since her childhood. but he hoped that this would send a statement throughout their underground world. that they should not turn their eyes away from injustices no matter who it’s coming from. he needed to get the vampires to care about this issue and needed to do something to bring awareness and a call to action. so, in comparison, present-day michel is much less gloomy and blindly naive than early-day michel, luckily. although he still feels guilty and a tinge of regret for his association to aleksander, he finds that offering any resources he can in the fight for the liberation is his best way of coping with it.

[opheliaoblonskya]

hello hello hello everyone! i’m coco, this is my baby ophelia, and we’re both extremely happy to be part of the group!!! this is ophelia’s official intro post so feel free to check under the cut for more info on them! @westmerestarters​

MAJOR TW FOR DEPRESSION AND SUICIDE

agender, goes by they/them pronouns, first discovered non binary identities a few years ago and went from “huh, that’s neat” to “it me” within a few months lmao

their father was originally from the soviet union, grew up poor, immigrated to the states, and made it big as a writer. poetry, essays, plays, short stories, and even full on novels, anton oblonsky was a literary darling, and married cleo harris, a celebrity stylist, rather young. after barely two years of marriage, ophelia was born. they were to be anton’s only child.

while both of ophelia’s parents doted on them, they were the apple of their father’s eye in particular. he spoiled ophelia rotten, showering them with things he could’ve never dreamed of having as a child, but now with his lucrative writing career at his side, he was able to fully provide for his family, so much so that cleo was able to quit her job.

naturally, ophelia adored their father for how much he spoiled and openly adored them, and never feared hearing the word ‘no’ from anton. cleo often had to step in to be the disciplinarian in the family, which created some tension between her and her overly indulged child, but for the most part, the oblonsky family home was a happy one.

this would fall apart when ophelia was only five.

understandably, cleo was growing tired of having to be the ‘bad guy parent’, and had grown to resent how easy going and frivolous anton was. this of course caused arguments, and whenever ophelia stepped in and it was clear that they had heard it, anton would try to remedy the situation by showering them with more gifts, which in turn lead to more arguments. it was like a cycle, and cleo was determined to put an end to it. she filed for divorce.

during the proceedings, the two agreed on shared custody of ophelia. they would spend one week with anton, and the other with cleo. of course, ophelia much preferred being with their father, who’s spoiling had gone into maximum overdrive as a way to make up for the divorce. cleo was nowhere near as indulgent, and the young ophelia grew to resent their mother, blaming her for the falling apart of the family and their father’s misery.

just months after ophelia’s sixth birthday, which had of course been a truly lavish affair, the divorce was finalized. by then ophelia was getting therapy, to help cope with the change, and despite the therapist’s best efforts, ophelia still laid the blame squarely at their mother’s feet. but the worst was still yet to come.

when ophelia was seven, during the week they were with anton, he woke them up, told them they had the day off school because he had called in, and that they were going to do whatever ophelia wanted. of course, they were utterly ecstatic, and the day was spent devouring ice cream and candy of all kinds, watching cartoons, and playing games. it truly was the best day of ophelia’s life.

but it would quickly become the worst.

anton told ophelia to play outside for a bit, while he cleaned up. still bouncing off the walls from the massive amount of sugar consumption, ophelia happily ran around in the yard, playing on the brand new play set that anton had bought just for that day. they were so preoccupied, that they almost didn’t hear the loud bang that came from inside.

they tried to get inside, but all of the doors were locked, and no matter how loudly they yelled, they were getting no response from anton. confused, and getting a little scared, ophelia went to the neighbor’s, and asked them for help. the neighbor’s called, but when they got response they called the police instead.

the rest of the day is a blur, perhaps an attempt of ophelia’s mind to shield them from it all. but one thing they remember clear as day is the body of their father, lying in a pool of his own blood, in the middle of the living room. they had managed to sneak past the police, wanting to see what was happening. and of course, they got their wish.

the death was ruled a suicide, thanks to the presence of a long letter that anton had left behind in his study. cleo was contacted immediately and rushed to her child’s side, weeping profusely. the last year of her marriage to anton had been tense, but she never doubted for a second that he was a good man who loved her and ophelia. and now he was gone.

ophelia was different after that. now in their mother’s care, they had become quiet, withdrawn, and despite how tense and strained their relationship with their mother had been before, they were now terrified of being separated from cleo. they got another therapist, one that specialized in helping grieving children, but it was very slow going. at the reading of the will, it had been revealed that anton had left everything, his wealth, his properties, even the rights to his numerous literary works, which at the time of his death was just shy of a hundred, to ophelia. it turned out that he had made the change the day before his death, and that half of his fortune, which included ongoing royalties, would be used for ophelia’s education and other parts of their care, a type of posthumous child support, while the rest would be put in a trust fund.

of the things that had been left to ophelia, what caught their attention the most, was their father’s journals. he would spend hours scribbling away in them, and no one, not even his precious ophelia, had been permitted to read them. they desperately wanted to do so now, but cleo got to them first, and had them placed in a safety deposit box, away from ophelia. this resulted in a screaming match, a tearful ophelia demanding to have what remained of their father’s essence, and cleo insisting that they were too young to see what was in those books, and that when they were older they could read them, but not now.

as time wore on, ophelia remained ever devoted to their father and his memory, lashing out at anyone who would dare besmirch his name and/or work. when cleo remarried, to anton’s lawyer no less, ophelia reacted very negatively, threatening to sabotage the wedding if they were made to go. they were made to go, but were under heavy surveillance by the bridesmaids (ophelia had been made the maid of honor, which made their stomach roil), and aside from having a generally negative attitude, did no harm to the event.

when ophelia’s first half sibling was born, they were determined to remain indifferent, if not totally icy and aloof, towards the child. it wasnt until after they had laid eyes on the newborn, that they felt their heart soften. in a hospital bathroom, ophelia cried for the first time since their father’s funeral. they were 12 years old.

with extensive therapy and family counselling, ophelia found themself able to let go of their previous animosity towards their mother. they began to see and understand why cleo was so frustrated with anton, and wrote an immense letter of apology to their mother. they were also fiercely protective of their half siblings, and thoroughly adored them.

but of course, there was still a hole that had been left behind by anton’s death. and part of the way they chose to cope was by consuming all of their father’s work. they would pour over his writing, studying it all endlessly. if there was an english assignment of some sort, then you can be sure that ophelia would write about something their father wrote. it wasn’t long before they too started to dream of becoming a writer.

after ophelia graduated, they were finally permitted to read the journals that their father wrote in and kept. after talking extensively with ophelia’s therapists, cleo finally opened that old safety deposit box, and gave ophelia everything they had dreamed of. they devoted every waking moment to reading those journals, desperate to further understand their father. and one of the first steps they took was going to russia.

they had of course heard many stories from their father about russia, and most of anton’s work was either set in russia, featured russian characters, or at least had russia in the background in some way. but of course the russia he had been most familiar with was the one of the soviet era, and even after a number of trips back, the shadow of the soviet union still clung to him and his work, and ophelia was determined to see modern day russia for themself.

they followed their father’s steps, hunting down every place mentioned or alluded to in his writings, trying to understand and feel what their father understood and felt about the place. it also inspired them to start journaling, chronicling their time in russia and the steps they were taking to understand the man their father was.

while in russia, they came up to the part in the journals where anton started to talk about his divorce and depression. he waxed lyrical about the intense, deep, gut wrenching misery that plagued him, and how the only way he could keep it at bay was by caring for ophelia. but as they started to grow up, he started to panic and worry more and more. his own father took his life when he was very young, and his mother never remarried. how was he supposed to know how to be a father from that point on? he had tried to give ophelia everything she could ever want, materially and emotionally, but there was still a part of him that felt that it would never be enough, because he had never seen what he was supposed to do next. the anxiety strangled him to the point where sometimes he felt like he couldn’t breathe.

his last entry was on the day before he died. “if nothing else, ophelia will know how much i love her.”

ophelia spent a week indoors, grieving their father all over again, and finally seeing why their mother had been so adamant in keeping these journals away from them. no child would be equipped to deal with everything that had been written in those notebooks, least of all one that had been as vulnerable as ophelia had been at the time.

when they returned home, they hugged their mother and cried.

another thing they did after they returned was go to college. despite his literary success, ophelia’s father never went to college, with his formal education stopping when he was 14 so that he could work and support his ailing mother. he would go on to teach himself, but the world of academia always gripped his imagination, and ophelia was determined to do what their father couldnt.

double majoring in english lit and russian lit, minoring in journalism, and applying with their mother’s new married name to avoid any awkwardness, ophelia dedicated themself to studying and writing, wanting to create the ‘perfect debut novel’. during this time they remained secretive about their father’s identity, particularly after they started to study his work in class. they would go on to get a masters in all of their subjects, and get a job at the new york times.

while in new york, ophelia was contacted by an established, and well-respected broadway producer and director, who wanted to adapt one of their father’s plays for broadway, but needed ophelia’s permission to do so. intrigued, ophelia agreed, provided that they be involved every step of the way. they were going to make sure that their father’s work was going to be well represented.

after countless long days going from the office to broadway then home, ophelia saw their father’s first ever play, which also happened to be the one that was the least adapted and staged for whatever reason, on broadway. it was set in a town called westmere, a place that ophelia’s father had mentioned in his journals, but that they had never gotten around to visiting. but after opening night, they knew that would change. once the play had it’s full run, ophelia resigned from their job, packed up, and went to westmere, to see what it was about the town that had so entranced their father.

and there you have it! didnt expect to write that much but oh well dfjignfdifjnfdij feel free to dm if you want to plot something!!!

[browneyedmissy]

JV: Childhood Part II

Summary: Her brother was off at college. She had to take care of her siblings. When her schoolwork struggles as a result, she made a friend who only made things more complicated.

Part one here

Author's Note: I actually had this written up already and was supposed to be part of the first half but I somehow wrote too much and Tumblr wouldn't let me post it all at once.

High school took a sharp turn for her.

Without Avi, Jackie was taking care of her siblings more while her parents were at work. She would walk directly from her school when the bell rang to her siblings' schools and then make them a snack when they got home. She was able to start her homework a bit before dinner and she would work some more afterwards to keep up.

There were days where she found herself deeply envious of her classmates. Most of them were involved in clubs after school and sometimes she longed for the normalcy. But that feeling was squelched when she got to school and saw her siblings run up to her with bright eyes and full of love.

She found a deep level of interest in biology and was able to keep up until her junior year when the workload she had in addition to her responsibilities at home began to take a toll on her.

When her parents came home and she wanted to mention something to them about taking less responsibility, she stopped when she saw the weariness in their eyes. She had watched what it was like for them as Indian immigrants who spoke perfect English but with a heavy accent to live in the United States. Sometimes while they were out, the people they interacted would not understand them and she would see her mother hesitate just a fraction of a second and before her mother could turn to her, Jackie would step up.

They had tried for years to open up the store they had back up but after all of the costs, even their combined salary had made it hard to save for what they needed to start it up again.

"We're lucky we have you, beta." Her mother had said with a murmur, smoothing the top of her head.

She would nod and feel the burning of guilt she had of being a normal high school student.

Her grades started slipping and when she saw the C on her math examination, she felt her cheeks burn especially when she noticed that her classmates on either side of her had gotten a B+ and an A-. She suddenly felt like she was an imposter, masquerading as a smart person and that someone was going to come in and kick her out of class at any moment.

"How did you learn how to do those word problems?" Jackie asked the classmate on the left. What was her name again?

"My mom has been helping me. I didn't get them at first and I know most of our classmates have tutors. I can help you after school, if you'd like." She said with a smile.

"I have to take care of my siblings." Jackie said with a grimace.

"Dev and Anika, right? My mom's one of the teachers in the elementary school and Dev was one of her students last year."

She blinked at the girl. How did she know that when this was the first time Jackie had talked to her? "Uhh yeah, I…"

"You don't know my name, do you?" The girl quirked an eyebrow at her. "We've been in classes together since freshman year."

Jackie had the decency to feel embarrassed as she shook her head.

"Alexa Chan." She laughed good naturedly and stuck out her hand. Jackie shook it.

"Jackie Varma."

Alexa gave her a grin. "I know. How about I come home with you and we can work on the homework together?"

-

Her siblings adored Alexa.

The first thing she did when she met them at the school was bend at the knees a little so that she could look them straight in the eye when she shook their hand. Dev's eyes had widened a little and he puffed up his chest as if he was full grown. When Ani asked if she was coming over, Alexa had nodded, telling her that she needed to tell her mom first.

Their eyes had been wide as saucers when they figured out who her mom was.

They had gone to school the next day to tell everyone who would listen that Mrs. Chan's daughter was friends with their sister and she was over at their house.

Her parents liked her as well. She was extended a dinner invitation often and her parents were happy she had found a friend who was smart and capable.

Alexa started coming over twice a week when she didn't have swim practice to help Jackie with math. In return, Jackie helped her memorize her science flashcards.

Alexa wanted to be an engineer, Jackie learned. She was good at math because her mother had taught her how to understand it since she was a kid and she liked looking for patterns. She was an only child so she liked being around her mother's students and around her siblings.

And she was so pretty. Jackie couldn't help but notice her soft her hair looked and how kind and genuine her smile was. Sometimes at night, she had dreams where they were walking down the street, holding hands and no one did a double take when she leaned over and pressed a kiss on Alexa's lips.

She shook her head. Alexa was the only friend she had made in years and she couldn't jeopardize it over a crush.

It wasn't as if she hadn't had crushes before. But she kept her feelings close to her chest, especially when she realized that she might like girls as well. Or prefer girls. The sexuality thing freaked her out because the last thing she needed was for people to stare at her for being Indian and gay.

"Hey, do you want to come watch me swim on Friday? I'm going to be swimming with the varsity team." Alexa said excitedly.

"Yeah, Avi just came home so I can ask him to watch my siblings."

"Ooh yay!" Alexa gave Jackie a hug and pulled back with a horrified expression. "Sorry, I don't think I've ever hugged you before."

Jackie felt her cheeks burning. "We're good."

-

"Avi, I need you to watch Dev and Anika after school on Friday." Jackie said as she got home that day, her two siblings in tow. "My friend is competing in a swim meet."

Avi raised an eyebrow as he looked at her. "You have a friend, behan?"

"Haha." She rolled her eyes. Her brother stared at her before his face broke into a grin.

"You look happy, Jaks." He observed. "Is this friend actually a friend or do you have a paramour, little sister?"

"My friend's name is Alexa." She said, avoiding the subject.

He didn't skip a beat. "She can be your paramour too."

Jackie blinked as she looked at her brother whose face had become very serious.

"I-" She glanced at their siblings who were out of earshot coloring at the table. "I might like her Avi. But she's also the first friend I've made in a long time."

"If you're willing to let her in, then it might be worth exploring."

-

Jackie took a seat in the bleachers, a book perched on her lap and sunglasses on. She could see the girls warming up on the other side of the pool and Alexa grinned and waved when she saw her. She said something to her teammates and walked over her direction and Jackie felt her heart pounding.

"You came! I'm so excited, Coach says I might have a chance at winning first for the butterfly heat." Alexa said brightly. "I'm up against one of the best swimmers, but I've been training hard."

"Good luck." Jackie offered a smile. Alexa offered one in return before heading back to her team.

The swim meet began and Jackie watched as people swam back and forth in the pool. Her eyes were trained to follow Alexa when she swam, the graceful arch of her legs as she jumped off the block and the way her arms moved through the water effortlessly.

Finally, it was time for the event that Alexa was most excited about. As she stepped up to the block, Jackie felt her heart pounding.

"You got this Alexa!" She shouted. Alexa looked up in surprise and smiled back before getting refocused on the pool.

Her opponent pulled ahead of her the first two laps but Jackie noticed she wasn't keeping up the quick pace. Alexa on the other hand had paced herself and was closing ranks. The last lap they were swimming in tandem and as they reached the wall, Alexa pulled slightly ahead and-

"The winner of the heat is Alexa Chan, by 0.02 seconds!"

"Yes!" Jackie shouted in triumph. She ignored the glances she got from the people around her as she ran over to Alexa who threw her arms out for a hug, her eyes bright.

And as Alexa threw her arms around her, without thinking, Jackie pressed her lips against hers. They were soft and she smelled a little like chlorine as she moved her hands to tangle into Alexa's hair-

Jackie didn't notice the stares until she pulled away from Alexa who had a surprised but pleased look on her face. She pulled back and glanced around as people turned and whispered and suddenly, she felt like she was back in 5th grade, introducing herself to her classmates as Jackie Varma.

"Jackie-"

Without giving her a chance to say anything else Jackie turned and fled.

-

She threw herself into her bedroom, rushing past Avi as she reached home. She ignored him calling her name and she threw herself into her bed facedown.

There was a knock on the door.

"Go away."

"Jaks, your friend Alexa called my phone and wants to speak to you."

"I'm not here."

There was a moment of hesitation before Avi said something Jackie couldn't quite make out.

"Okay, I told her you would call later. Can I come in now?"

"Fine." She said muffled into her pillows.

Her brother opened the door.

"What happened?" He asked, leaning against the doorframe.

"Nothing you would understand."

"Behan, I think I of all people would understand."

"No, you won't! You don't live at home anymore, Ani! You don't know what I'm going through and it's easy when you don't have to be around people who know and judge you anymore!"

A terse silence passed. "Do you hate me for leaving? I had to. You'll understand one day. I don't know what you're going through with your friend Alexa, but-"

"I don't want to talk about it! I'm already stared at because we're Indian and I kept my head down through that. I want people to stop staring at me and why can't I just be normal?"

Her voice broke on a sob. Avi sighed and walked over to put a hand on her head.

"Jackie…"

"Don't touch me!" Jackie jumped back and glared at her brother. "Just leave! You're going back to school soon anyways, just- go."

-

She kept her head down for the next few days. Avi had gone back to school and things were sort of back to normal. Alexa had tried to talk to her during class, find her at lunch and after school but Jackie had just stayed silent, staring at the board until Alexa had given up.

Jackie sighed. She missed her best friend but already there were rumors going around the school. They were nosy and Jackie wanted them out of her face.

"You've been avoiding me." Jackie had opened the door to see Alexa standing in front later that day. "Can we talk?"

"Shouldn't you be at swim practice?"

"So you can try to avoid me again? I knew you were keeping track of my schedule. I skipped it. I figured this was kinda important."

"Alexa!" Dev said excitedly when he heard her voice. He moved past Jackie to grab her hand and pull her into the kitchen. "I made a drawing of you and sissy."

Her mouth twitched as she saw the colored drawing. She held it up and Jackie saw two girls, holding hands. Jackie felt her chest tighten.

"Why are they holding hands, Dev?" Jackie choked out.

"They're best friends and they love each other." He said as if it was the most obvious answer in the world.

"I-"

"Dev, can you take Ani to the backyard for a bit so your sister and I can talk?" Alexa said softly. "Thank you for the drawing."

He nodded and took Ani outside. When the door closed, she turned back to Jackie.

"Alexa, when I kissed you…" Jackie stammered.

"I wasn't expecting it." Alexa interrupted with a smile. "But I didn't not like it. But you just ran off before I could say anything."

Jackie stared at the girl in front of her.

"I do like you." Alexa said with a shrug. "I don't know what my sexuality is. Still figuring that out. But I do know that you're smart and pretty and my best friend. And I liked kissing you."

"People saw me kiss you." Jackie's face paled.

"Let them talk."

"How are you so casual about this?" Jackie said weakly. "People are going to stare at us. It'll be just like when I was in 5th grade-"

"Jackie. People are going to talk and stare no matter what. We're different from them. Not just because of that kiss but because we're not white."

Jackie felt nausea coming back up. "I can't have people stare. I won't have it. I can't be seen with you."

Her friend blinked and gave her a sad look.

"Okay. I'm not going to fight you on this, Jackie. I know you better than to try that. I'll keep my distance. But… let me know if you need anything."

As Alexa closed the door, Jackie could feel her heart shattering.

-

Her grades dipped again afterwards. Alexa had been a huge help with her siblings and it was hard to concentrate, especially in math when she still sat next to her.

She started feeling angry. She was angry that she was in charge of her siblings in the first place which led her to meeting Alexa.

She was angry at herself for being a coward and not being able to take people staring at her.

"Jackie, I want to talk to you." Her science teacher stopped her one day after class. Jackie dropped her bag on the ground with a huff. "Is everything okay? Your grades are dropping in my class."

"Yup. Fine. Can I go now?"

"Jackie."

"I don't know what you want me to say Ms. Torres. I have to take care of my siblings after school because the program only lasts until 3:30 for them. My parents can't afford to put them anywhere so I have to help out. So why should I give a damn?” Jackie said angrily. “I can't do anything about it, my siblings need me. And people stare at me because I'm different but I can't do anything about it!"

“You’ve been dealt a crappy hand.” Her teacher said with a critical eye before gesturing at a desk in front of her. Jackie gave a huff before sitting down at the desk and crossing her arms. “It sucks that what you want and what your parents want for you is not the same because that puts you at a disadvantage especially against all of your classmates whose parents can do things like afford tutors and know how to get their classmates into college.”

“It’s not fair.”

The words left her mouth before she could swallow them down to join resentment buried deep down in her heart.

“I know.”

Jackie uncrossed her arms, feeling herself deflate. All the anger that she felt mixed with the exhaustion and sadness that she had felt ever since she had realized how much the world hated her when she was nine and she was left just feeling tired.

“Neither of my parents went to college and they both worked full time jobs. And I was expected to take care of my siblings on top of going to school especially as I got older. I did well enough until I got to junior high and all of my classmates started doing things like going to camp and getting tutors to help them get ahead. All of a sudden, I was the Latina girl who was struggling to compete because they had all these advantages.”

"Exactly. If it's not fair, why should I try?"

Ms. Torres observed her quietly for a moment. "Your brother said the same thing."

"Avi?"

"He was one of my first students. He gave me trouble most of the year and then he and I talked just like you did. He told me that you were going to go do advanced classes in junior high and he felt like he missed out on his chance because he had to take care of you and your siblings."

"I didn't know."

"Because he cared about you and Dev and Anika more than anyone. And he got himself together when he realized he wanted to make sure you did more with your life."

Jackie brought her sleeve to her face and it came back wet.

-

"Behan?"

"Hey, Avi. I miss you. And I'm sorry."

He gave a chuckle over the phone. "I wish I had recorded that so I could play it back to you whenever I needed it."

"I kissed Alexa. I might be gay. I don't know. I don't want to label it right now."

"And you don't have to. You do not have to tell anyone, unless you want to, Jaks."

"I want to go to college." Her voice trembled. "I want to be a doctor. I love science and I'm good at it."

"You go do that then." He said firmly.

"Dev and Anika-"

"Will be fine. Mom and Dad will figure it out. You need to make sure you take care of you too."

"Okay. I love you, bhai."

[hobi-gang]

community | knj/ot7

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲 – an unlikely group of people at a Greendale Community College form an unlikely Spanish study group. One thing Kim Namjoon wants to know about the standoffish girl from Spanish class is; "What's her deal?".

𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞 – pure crack, humor, community college au, angst if you squint, they’re all 100% stupid

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 – knj x reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭 – 9.5k

𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 – mentions of aspergers, mentions of past drug abuse, namjoon is a bit of a dick oops, smoking (cigarettes)

𝐚/𝐧 – this is like... a straight up copy of the pilot to the tv show ‘community’, but i desperately wanted to see bts in that hilarious enivornment. i do not own the show ‘community’ nor do i own bts. this is just straight up crack. mcthank you.

"What is 'community college'?" A voice blared through the speakers around the quad, causing many students to pause and look at Dean Bang on his small podium with his microphone at the center of the busy square, the stupidly bright sun shining a light on him and all his khaki and white button-up glory. "Oh, wait, that's... That's the wrong card, let me start over."

After an awkward moment had passed and Dean Bang had properly sorted his notes, he spoke up into the microphone again, "Okay, good morning! Many of you are halfway through your first week here at Greendale Community College and as your dean, I thought I'd share some thoughts of wisdom and inspiration," he smiles then continues, "What is 'community college'? I know most of you have heard that it's loser college for remedial teens."

At the mention of remedial teens, Jeon Jungkook, a young boy with dark brown hair and jock attire, stopped scanning the campus map for his English class and looked around himself to find the source of the voice behind the speakers, tugging on his Letterman jacket nervously.

"They say it's for 20-something dropouts."

____ looked up from her Spanish study book and her eyes fell on the Dean and his pathetically small podium, rolling her eyes at him and feeling somewhat attacked and embarrassed by his accurate but harmful words.

"Or middle-aged divorcees."

Kim Seokjin, a tall and straight-back young man with kind eyes, plump lips, and short brown hair stops reading the pamphlet in his hand given to him by a member of the Chess Club that passed him by, looking around to find who's voice was blaring from the quad speakers. I'm not middle-aged... am I? he asked himself thoughtfully.

"And old people keeping their minds active as they circle the drain of eternity."

Min Yoongi's ears perked up at the mention of that, sitting up on the bench that he was slowly falling asleep on. His light violet hair making him stand out, he pulled his hoodie over his head so only his face was visible through the opening, scowling at the words 'old people', being reminded of how often he gets called a grandpa by his classmates for his somewhat lazy demeanor. I'm not middle-aged... am I? he asked himself thoughtfully.

"That's what you've heard, however," the Dean grins excitedly, "I wish you luck!" He thrusts his arm into the air in a victory pose.

He looks around at the small number of students that had bothered to stay in the quad in front of his small podium, looking at them expectantly before realizing and looking at his cue cards, "Oh, okay. Uh-oh. There's actually more to this speech. Can you all look around your immediate areas," He asks the students awkwardly, "There's a middle card missing, I actually really wanted to finish that properly-"

"I'm actually fully Korean, the son of immigrants. My parents are U.S citizens now, but they're not threats to national security. A lot of people wanna know that because my dad has an angry energy but he's not angry at America, he's just angry at my mom for leaving him. Although she did leave him because he was angry and he was angry because she wasn't. My name's Taehyung by the way."

"Well, Taehyung," Namjoon says wearily, glancing next to him at the younger, slightly shorter boy with ridiculously bright blue hair and a boxy smile following him like an eager puppy around the quad, he shakes his hand, "It was nice to know you and then meet you, in that order," he says to him with raised brows, "Now, about that question that I asked?"

"Oh, it was," Taehyung checks his watch, "11:05 when you asked-"

"Taehyung," Namjoon says abruptly, raising his hand to stop the younger boy from walking beside him, nodding towards the young girl across the quad with her face stuffed in a book. "What's the deal with the hot girl from Spanish class?"

"I only talked to her once when she borrowed a pencil," Taehyung says monotonously which makes Namjoon deflate a bit but he is quickly impressed by what the younger boy says next.

"But her name's ____, she's 23, birthday in September. She has two older sisters and one of them teaches a dance class that I might wanna lookup. Oh, and she thinks she's gonna fail tomorrow's Spanish test so she really needs to focus and she's sorry if that makes her seem cold," Taehyung finishes his gesturing and his confident spewing of words, looking up at the older, pink-haired boy with no indication of emotion.

Namjoon's mouth hangs agape for a moment, "Holy crap, Taehyung," he says in awe, "I see your value now." He pats Taehyung on the shoulder and gives him a meaningful look before he turns to walk into the school, leaving the younger boy behind.

"That's the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me!" Taehyung shouts to his older classmate as he's walking away, his finger pointed in the air as if for exclamation.

"Kim Namjoon, genius at law!"

"You gotta stop saying that, Lee Hyun... I'm kidding, keep going," Namjoon grins widely, closing the door behind him and stepping forward into his former client's cramped office to shake his hand across his wide, messy desk littered with papers and tools of all sorts.

"So," Hyun leans his arms atop the slew of papers on his desk and tilts his head slightly to look up at his much taller friend, "Tell me. What is my lawyer doing here?"

"Actually, I'm... a student now," Namjoon says with a timid smile, taking a seat on the couch of Hyun's office.

Hyun raises his eyebrows in surprise, "Well, that can't be an inspiring story."

"I'm gonna be honest with you, I'm in a bit of a kerfuffle... The state bar has suspended my license and they found out that my college degree was... less than legitimate." Namjoon confesses with as much confidence as he could muster, finding it difficult to spill the beans to his former client turned friend.

"I thought you had a degree from Columbia?" Hyun questions him, brows knit in confusion.

"Now I have to get one from America," Namjoon chuckles then sighs longingly, "And it can't be an email attachment."

"Well, you've picked a fine school," Hyun smiles, leaning back in his office chair with his arms crossed behind his head.

Namjoon snaps his fingers and agrees, "Yes! And I'm hoping that our friendship will yield certain advantages. You're the psychology professor, y'know, so I could really do with some academic guidance, maybe some moral support and... every answer to every test for every one of the classes that I'm taking this semester," Namjoon pulls a piece of paper from the breast pocket of his sport's jacket. "This is my schedule-" "Okay, Namjoon, just by asking that you are insulting the very integrity of this entire institution," Hyun chastises his friend, abruptly standing up which mildly alarms Namjoon but he is surprised to see Hyun grabbing a cane next to his desk and knocking on the window behind him. Through the open blinds and dirty windows, Namjoon can see the shape of a person that appeared to be urinating on a garbage skip. "Oi! Not a bathroom. Not. A. Bathroom." Hyun shouts out the window and then he scowls when the assailant quickly tucks their business away and runs off.

Namjoon exhaled noisily through his nose, "Hyun, you seemed less into integrity the day I convinced a dozen of your peers that when you made that U-turn on the freeway and tried to order hot wings from the emergency call box that your only real crime was loving America." He said with the hope that Hyun was finally going to turn over for him and help him cheat his way through college.

A moment passed and Hyun sighed, "I'll look into it."

"Thank you," Namjoon immediately took to his feet and reached over his friend's desk to shake his hand one last time. "Hyun, you are a good man." he smiled, going to the door.

Hyun rolled his eyes, "Namjoon, are you familiar with the adage 'cheaters never prosper'?"

The taller of the two scoffed and opened the door, "No, and if I wanted to learn something, I wouldn't have come to community college."

Hyun sighed and gave his friend a concerned look before waving him out of his office.

Namjoon found himself wandering the maze-like corridors of the school and ultimately ended up in the cafeteria. After purchasing a bottle of water and a suspiciously cheap packet of apple slices, Namjoon was lucky to spot a familiar head of soft brown hair. Walking over quietly, he steps closer to the girl from his Spanish class and spoke to her with an expression of surprise, "Oh, hey, Spanish?"

"Don't hit on me, okay?" the brown-haired girl answered with an annoyed tone, too engrossed in her work to even look up at the person speaking to her.

"I... wouldn't dream of it," he saved face, chuckling nervously. "I just wanted to let you know about... my Spanish study group!"

At the mention of a Spanish study group, she finally looked up and couldn't hold back the snicker bubbling inside of her at the prospect of who was standing right in front of her. Though his ego was a little hurt, he put on his charming smile paired with his signature dimples, almost as if he were modeling for her.

"Woah, the guy sitting in the back of class playing on his phone all day has a Spanish study group?" she gasps with faux excitement, raising a brow of suspicion at him. "Can I sign up twice?"

"Ha-ha," he precedes, "I'm taking the class for an easy credit, I'm actually a board-certified Spanish tutor," he says in a matter of factly manner to sound as convincing as possible.

"Can you say that in Spanish?" the brunette girl quickly responded.

Namjoon was stumped for a second but said the first few Spanish sentences that first came to his head. "Duermo tarde español, una hora más, no rasque mi coche," he said as smoothly as possible with a smirk. He didn't know it, but what he actually said was "I sleep late Spanish, one more hour, do not scratch my car," and he was praying that she didn't know either.

The look she was giving him was making him nervous, it was as if she knew he was lying and he was just about to tell her that he was lying until she slammed her book shut and leaned closer to him with wide, desperate eyes. "I really need help with Spanish," she confessed in a low voice.

"Yeah, I was willing to bet," Namjoon chuckled, extending his hand to her as a sign of goodwill. "I'm Namjoon by the way, or... Jefe," he smiled as she took his larger hand in her much smaller one. The comparison alone made his heart just a little bit more tender.

"The, uh, group meets in the library at four."

"I'm ____, and thanks." She smiles up at him, letting go of their handshake. She gathers her things and shoves them into her well-used canvas side bag and she stood up to leave.

"You're gonna be there, right?" he asks her and she just smirks at him one last time before turning her back on him and walking away.

"Un poquito más!" he shouted after her. "That means 'see you there'!"

Nope. It really meant 'a little more', but he could care less as long as she believed that he was right.

Namjoon sat alone at an eight-seater table in one of the library's study rooms, repeating the phrase for 'good afternoon' to himself in solitary, the library's population lowering as the minutes went by.

"Buenos tardes, buenos tardes, buenos tardes..." he repeated under his breath while tapping his pencil against the table, making sure he was right. With such a simple phrase, he couldn't get it wrong otherwise the hot girl from Spanish class would finally figure him out and he just can't let that happen.

"Hey," she enters the study room with a cheeky grin, her heavy bag slapping against her hip as she walked.

"Buenos tardes!" he says to her with pride, immediately straightening his posture and giving himself an internal high-five for getting it right, "Welcome to my Spanish study... uh, group. I've got the whole table."

"You've got the whole room," she adds with raised brows, taking the seat closest to him.

Namjoon digs around in his pocket for a piece of paper and he brings forth a crumpled chess club pamphlet that he remembers getting from the quad earlier that day. He flattens out the paper as best as he can before thrusting it towards her on the table along with his pencil. "Here's the, uh, contact sheet. Just put your number down there," he asks her and she snickers before accepting his pencil and jotting down her number.

Namjoon pretends to look around the room and out the doors to the rest of the library with exasperation, "Man, where's the rest of the group? They must be running late... But you and I can get acquainted in the meantime."

She finishes her jotting and puts the pencil on top of the paper before pushing it back towards Namjoon, "You might have noticed earlier in the cafeteria, I'm not that great at small talk."

"That's actually kinda great, I like big talk. What's your deal?" he smirks, leaning an elbow onto the table and raising his brows at her.

"That's not small talk?" she tilts her head to the side with a tight smile.

"What's your deal and is God dead?" he quickly adds to his previous question to make it fit her requirements.

She inwardly scoffs and lays her hands flat onto the table, "Okay, you wanna know my deal?" she asks him and he nods in response, "My deal is, above all else, honesty."

"Honesty..." Namjoon repeats, biting his cheek nervously.

"Yeah, if you're honest with me, I will like you. If you lie to me, I will never talk to you again. That's my deal."

With it all laid out in front of him, he felt compelled to tell her the truth. Sure, he may have lied to her before but he won't just lie to her now that she had just asked the truth of him so... He'd give her the truth. Well, an incomplete truth. It wasn't entirely lying but it wasn't entirely telling the truth either. It was a gray area, and as much as he liked this girl in front of him, he also liked having a smidge of integrity.

From the first day, he saw her in Spanish class and his attention was mostly on her throughout the entirety of each lesson. He'd look above the screen of his phone to watch her soft brown shoulder-length hair moving against her slender neck, he'd observe how her back was always straight and her shoulders were always pulled back. He also observed her unique and incredible fashion. He liked the bold, solid-colored sweaters and t-shirts and her high-waisted, wide-leg pants paired with stylish shoes of all kinds, all of it just made her hard to ignore, though she always carried the same, tattered canvas bag. Her sense of style clearly indicated that she preferred comfort over the other hundred pleasantries that women's fashion often offered, such as heels and skinny jeans. He liked that about her.

Today, her bright orange shirt and beige high-waisted, wide-leg pants only managed to highlight her feminine features more, making his focus and his breathing stray by just the smallest bit. The smallest. He didn't want to admit just how breathtaking she was, and she tended to take his breath away a lot without even trying and that's what was driving him to do whatever it took to keep her there in that study room with him, within reason of course.

"That's a pretty good deal," he told her honestly, irony aside.

"So," she crossed her arms over her chest, "what's your deal?"

"My deal?" Namjoon repeated, and she nodded in return.

The incomplete truth.

"I..." he looked at her and gulped, "I would, um, I would have to say... Uh, honesty. Because... I, uh, would say anything to get what I want and I-I want you to... To like me," for the first time since he had known her, and that hasn't exactly been a long time, he looked away in embarrassment and didn't look back up at her until she spoke up.

With a reluctant hmph, she says "That was a very honest answer. Okay, I like you now." And that makes his eyes widen in surprise.

"Really? Wow, you're easy," he says with disbelief, his heart slowing down just an ebb.

"Hey, guys!" someone spoke up behind Namjoon, making him turn in his chair to see that familiar head of bright blue.

The young brunette squealed with joy, "Taehyung in the house! Woo, yeah!" waving the blue-haired boy over excitedly.

"Woo!" Namjoon unenthusiastically whoops, brows knit in confusion watching as the boy grabbed a chair from the corner of the room and bringing it over to the table. "Woo! Woo-why?" he laughs confusedly.

Taehyung places his chair in the middle of both of their chairs, seating himself between the brunette girl and Namjoon. "Oh, ____ invited me! Is that cool?" he smiled, looking at the older boy with an oblivious smile.

"I can't think of a single logical reason why not!" Namjoon says through gritted teeth, a faux smile gracing his features. His eyes fall on the sheet of paper on the table, he immediately thrusts it towards the blue-haired boy, urging him to put his information on the paper.

"Cool... Cool, cool, cool," Taehyung murmured to himself as he slowly wrote his number down onto the paper. "This is kind of like Breakfast Club, huh?" Taehyung quips randomly.

"We are in a library," the brunette girl points out, patting Taehyung on the knee. Namjoon spotted that gesture out of the corner of his eye and felt the jealousy growing in his chest. Jealousy aside, he looks at Taehyung's number on the paper and he pulls his phone out, drafting a text to send to the blue-haired boy seated between him and the girl of his dreams.

"Yeah, I'm sure we've all got an issue balled up deep inside us that would make us cry if we talked about it," Taehyung says to his peers nonchalantly, but the worry etched on the brunette girl's features were all too serious.

She places a hand on his forearm and earnestly asks him, "Do you have something balled up inside of you?"

Taehyung looks up to the ceiling as if in thought and he responds, "Well, I do have a little doozy in the chamber if thing's get a little emotional."

Suddenly, Taehyung's phone pings and Namjoon puts his phone away, looking at the blue-haired boy expectantly, watching as the boy brings his phone out from his pocket and his eyebrows are raised in surprise, "Ooh, it's a text message! Let's give this bad boy a read," he says cheerily.

Namjoon panics, realizing that if he reads the text aloud, then the brunette girl sitting across from him would find out that it was him. "Oh, Taehyung," Namjoon says nervously, "I think it might be private."

"I've never gotten one of these before," Taehyung continues, ignoring the older boy's urgencies. Namjoon would've felt a little bit of pity in his chest at the sound of how sad that sentence actually was if it weren't for the fact that he was very close to being exposed.

"Say you have to pee, I need to talk to you." The blue-haired boy reads aloud with a confused tone. "Say you have to pee," he repeats, holding his phone screen towards the brunette girl so she could read it and she looked just as confused as he did. Her confusion quickly turned to suspicion, looking at the two boys sitting next to her.

"That is weird," she commented. "What does that even mean?" Taehyung questions both of them and Namjoon quickly shrugged.

"I don't know man, that sounds strange. Do you even have to pee?" Namjoon asks and Taehyung shakes his head 'no'.

"Hmm," Namjoon murmurs, "I'm stumped, that sounds very creepy."

"That makes two of us," Taehyung concurs with a shrug. In the corner of his eye, Namjoon can see the brunette girl eyeing him and he knows that she knows that it was him.

Namjoon's phone chimes and he looks to make sure that it wasn't Taehyung messaging him back and further making him fall into a pit of mortification. He reads the text that was sent to him and realizes it's Lee Hyun, his former client and now his possible conspirator and hero.

'con-4-s-8-tion on football field now!!! - Hyun"

"What's that?" The brunette girl asks him and he is brought out of his bubble.

"Does it say 'you have to pee'?" Taehyung asks.

"Oh, no, it's just someone with an impossibly bad grasp on abbreviations. I've gotta step out for a bit," he says, getting out of his chair and shoving his phone into his pocket, "I'll be back in like five minutes but, uh, go ahead and start studying verbs... In, uh, Spanish," he concludes, waving to his peers before stepping out of the study room.

Once he's out of ear-shot, the brunette girl smiles and nudges Taehyung on the knee, "What's your read on that guy, Taehyung?"

Taehyung looks at her and tilts his head to the side, appearing as though he were analyzing her.

"You look like my interpretation of God," he says randomly, making her raise a brow in confusion.

"Ethnically ambiguous," he adds, and she forms an 'o' with her mouth and nods at his words.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the school, Namjoon's light jogging has turned into a brisk walk as he finally spots his friend standing at the edge of the school's football field, the football team on the field practicing on a variety of equipment in the heat.

"Suppose I say to you 'it's possible to get those test answers'?" Hyun says aloud once he realizes Namjoon is next to him.

"I would say 'go with that' and 'you could've put that in a text'," Namjoon responds frustratedly. "I'm asking you if you know the difference between right and wrong," Hyun eggs on.

"I discovered at a very early age that if I talk long enough, I can make anything right and wrong. So, either I'm God or truth is relative. In either case, booyah."

"Oh, interesting! It's just that the average person finds it difficult to say 'booyah' to moral relativism."

"Hyun, you don't have to play the shrink to protect your pride. I accept. You're chicken," Namjoon smirks at his friend, expecting a reaction that came faster than he anticipated.

"I'm a professor, you can't talk to me that way!" Hyun huffs loudly.

"A six-year-old girl could talk to you that way!" Namjoon retorts with a scoff, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Yeah, because that would be adorable!" Hyun thrusts his arms into the air in exclamation.

"No, because you're a five-year-old girl and there's a pecking order!" Namjoon bites back.

"Fine, I'll do it!" Hyun argues back with his hands flapping about.

"Thank you," Namjoon smiles, patting Hyun on the shoulder before walking away and leaving Hyun to stand in the field by himself with a look of shock etched into his face.

Namjoon found himself getting closer to the entrance of the library study room and began reciting his prepared excuse aloud from memory, "You guys aren't going to believe this but the rest of the study group-"

The words were snatched right out of his mouth when he finally came to the doorway and found that all but 2 seats were full. 2 empty seats remaining for him and... for the brunette girl from Spanish class.

"Is here..." Namjoon finishes under his breath, looking at each of the new faces in the room, except they weren't very new. He recognized them from somewhere, he just couldn't pinpoint where.

"Are you the 'board-certified' tutor?" One of the new faces asked, his light violet hair peeking out from beneath his hoodie and both hands tucked into his pocket, a bored expression on his face.

"That means you'll do my homework, right?" A rather young boy with a letterman jacket spoke arrogantly, a cheeky grin on his face and his hand already extending out towards Namjoon, a thin stack of papers gripped between his fingers.

"I'll need to call my babysitter if we're gonna be staying later than 10," Another young man spoke up from the table, his proper attitude shining with his posture and articulate words, his plump lips pulled into a gentle smile.

"What board certifies a tutor?" A rather small and slender boy speaks up from the side of the table, his eyes examining Namjoon beneath his clementine bangs with a speculative gaze, both arms crossed over his chest tightly.

"Aren't you the guy that plays games on their phone in the back of the class?" A giddy boy chirps from the other side of the table, his round cheeks and light brown, gleaming eyes drawing his attention.

Namjoon raised his brows at the group of rather attractive young men gathered at the table. His gaze falls on Taehyung's bright blue head. "Where's ____?"

"Not sure, but I invited more people from Spanish class. Is that cool?" Taehyung says. Ah, so that's where he can recognize them from.

"That's the... coolest," Namjoon manages to squeeze out from between his teeth with as enthusiastic a tone as possible, trying his best to hide his frustration. Taehyung gives the older man a thumbs up and a smile. "I'm gonna go to the bathroom," Namjoon begins to say, collecting his things that he had left on the table previously, "and I'm gonna bring my jacket, wallet and my keys with me... In case there's a fire."

Namjoon tucks his items in his arms and leaves the study room.

Exiting the library, Namjoon bumped into someone and almost chastised them until he realized who it is.

"Busted," she says with a smirk, making Namjoon's heart pound in his chest. "Uh, listen-"

"Now you know. I'm a smoker," she says shamefully, lifting a lit cigarette into view and putting it back down to her side so the smoke doesn't get in their way.

"Yeah, but... They're filtered so that makes them safe," his chest rumbles with a chuckle, making her smile after she had made quite the admission.

"You ready to get started? Looks like the rest of your group showed up," she asks him, teasing him with a gentle bump of her shoe on his shin.

Namjoon hisses in faux pain and laughs, "Yeah, that's not my group. I think maybe Taehyung took out an ad on Craigslist," he says with uncertainty, "and I was trained never to say this but... I think that group may be untutorable."

"Oh really?" she says in a sing-song fashion, only egging him on.

"So, why don't you and I study verbs over-"

"Dinner?" she says in an attempt to finish his sentence.

"Or, uh, drinks..." he shrugs carelessly.

"I think we should actually prioritize here and study first and then go to dinner," she offers, "And if they really prove to be untutorable, we'll slip out early."

Discarding her finished cigarette butt to the ground and stomping out the heat with her chunky sole, she slipped into the library and the look she gave him before slinking away behind the closing door made Namjoon bite his cheek to contain his excitement. "Oh they'll be untutorable, alright," he says to himself, his minding already running with ideas on how to make or ruin the fastest study session in history.

Namjoon wanders into the study room and finds everyone in their seats, looking up at him with anticipation. He finds himself at the head of the table and he musters up the energy to try and turn this night into a disaster or into the fastest study session anyone has ever seen.

"All right," he begins with a tight smile, "Look at this group, ready to study all night."

"Well, I can stay at least till ten," The proper young man says amongst the quiet murmurs coming from around the table.

"But," Namjoon interjects, "Who studies with strangers, right? My name is Namjoon."

"Namjoon, it's a pleasure. My name is Min Yoongi," the man at the end of the table stands up to reach over the table at an attempt to shake Namjoon's hand, "And yes that is Min as in Min's Mics," Yoongi stops his reach for the handshake, making Namjoon awkwardly slink back into his chair, "The award-winning microphone production company."

"I was just about to ask..." Namjoon bumped his eyebrows up in annoyance.

"I'm also a toastmaster, so perhaps I should do the introductions!" Yoongi insists with a lazy grin.

"Definitely!" Namjoon encourages, already sensing that Yoongi's loose and unbothered energy was bound to mess things up in the room.

Yoongi claps his hands again and immediately gestures to the brunette sitting beside Namjoon, "You already know ____,"

The brunette girl immediately corrects him and Namjoon can't help but snicker at the incredibly fast screw-up.

"Hockey sock," Yoongi points toward the boy sitting to Namjoon's right side.

"It's Hoseok," the brown-haired boy spoke up, pausing his sketching to correct the man at the other end of the table with an amused look.

"Tater tot."

"My name is Taehyung," the blue-haired boy chided.

"Junk food."

The boy sitting beside Yoongi gave him a look of confusion, "I literally just told you my name like four minutes ago, dude, it's Jungkook."

Yoongi then gestures to the orange-haired person on the other side of the table, "That's Prince Jam."

"Jimin," the young boy narrowed his eyes at the self-proclaimed toastmaster.

"And finally, this is Seokjin," Yoongi smiled gently, staring for just a second too long at the man sitting right next to him.

"Is that even close?" Namjoon asks the supposed 'Seokjin', and he receives a timid nod in return, the young man squirming uncomfortably under Yoongi's continued gaze.

"Can you teach us how to say curse words in Spanish?" Hoseok asks, tapping his pencil against the table. "Unfortunately, no," Namjoon answers with a sigh.

"How do I become board-certified? And I actually agree with Jimin, what board certifies a tutor?" Hoseok persists, Jimin agreeing with his questions with a curt nod.

"That's actually a really great question. Next?" Namjoon smiles innocently, turning his attention elsewhere to avoid any more questions about his faux tutoring origins.

"Yeah, well, I'd like to know why I had to find out about this group on accident," Jimin sits up, raising his chin in a show of confidence.

Taehyung's brows are knit in anticipation, "Oh this is getting way more like Breakfast Club now."

"There's breakfast?" Yoongi asks confusedly.

"Okay, um, maybe we should-" the brunette girl began to speak up in an attempt to break the tension.

"You know," Namjoon interrupts her and he receives a glare in return, "I've been a part of a lot of study groups that fell apart because of unresolved tension. Shouldn't we address Jimin's concern? Did we not invite him?"

"Oh, Jimin, honey, it's not behind your back. We just didn't want to-" Seokjin tries to comfort the younger boy sitting next to him but is immediately interrupted. The brunette girl was starting to notice that interrupting each other was becoming a trend, and she didn't like it at all.

"Can we stop with the 'honeys' and the 'sweeties'? Being younger does not make me inferior, if anything, your age indicates that you made bad life decisions!" Jimin responds sharply, almost shaking with equal amounts of nervousness and irritation.

Seokjin inhales quickly and starts shaking his head, making noises of disagreement, as though he were trying to hold back the hurtful words that wanted to slip off his tongue by instinct.

"Seokjin has a reply to that," Namjoon says, making the brunette girl's head snap in his direction, utterly confused as to why he would try to stoke the flames of this argument.

Everyone around the table except for the brunette girl murmurs their agreements, seeing Seokjin narrow his eyes at the smaller, younger boy sitting beside him. "Okay, okay. I'm sure... I've made s-some bad life decisions, I am a single, divorced father of two after all but maybe Jimin's life decisions will be better! But I think he needs to decide whether he wants to be considered a child or an adult because children get pity but not respect, and adults, they get respect! They also get the back of their heads grabbed and their faces pushed through jukeboxes!" Seokjin quickly says at the end of his sentence, his eyes wide, fierce and full of unsubtle rage.

"Why don't we try learning 'jukebox" in Spanish?' The brunette girl speaks up, trying to divert everyone's attention but it doesn't appear to work.

"What are you doing? Are you seriously falling asleep right now?" Seokjin says aloud, everyone's eyes falling upon the purple-haired Yoongi at the end of the table, who is dozing off on the spot.

Jungkook snorts, "Really, grandpa?" he says jokingly to his older classmate, Hoseok unable to hold in his laughter at the teasing going on in front of him.

"Hey. I am a prominent business leader and a highly sought-after dinner guest and I will not be made fun of by some- some teenage boy," Yoongi responds with a sloppy snarl.

"Well, this teenage boy is a quarterback and a prom king," Jungkook retorts, adding a flourish to his argument with a tug of his collar.

Jimin scoffs amusedly, "You're not prom king anymore, Jungkook. This isn't Riverside High."

"How'd you know I went there?" Jungkook asks Jimin with a confused expression.

The orange-haired boy's smile falters from his face but he straightens his back nonetheless, "Because you're still wearing your stupid letter jacket, and more importantly... I sat behind you in Algebra!" Jimin scans Jungkook's face for any sign of realization and he feels a bit better once he sees it flash across Jungkook's features, but his stomach drops with what he hears next.

"Wait, aren't you the guy that got hooked on pills and dropped out? You're little Jammy Jimin," Jungkook laughs, clapping his hands and doubling over.

Jimin gasps, "Oh yeah? And you're a stupid jock who lost his scholarship by dislocating both shoulders in a keg stand!"

"Keg flip! They are very hard to pull off! No-" Jungkook corrects him, then everyone erupts into overlapping arguments. As everyone begins shouting at each other, the brunette girl's face is that of a witness to absolute horror, especially once she sees Namjoon looking at all the drama unfold with an amused look. Suddenly, Taehyung slams his hand down on the table, garnering everyone's attention and effectively shutting them up.

"You know what I got for Christmas? It was a banner year at the Bender family. I got a carton of cigarettes. The old man grabbed me. He said, 'Hey, smoke up, Johnny.'," Taehyung says animatedly, "No, dad! What about you?" he ends with one last shout, leaning back in his chair, the satisfied smile on his face indicating that he had completed his bit.

"Well, that actually was from Breakfast Club," Namjoon points out and everyone finally understands what Taehyung was talking about, their mouths forming 'o's.

"Nobody puts Baby in the corner," Taehyung murmurs again. "Dirty Dancing," Namjoon responds and he receives a smile and an excited 'yeah' from the blue-haired boy in return.

In the midst of everyone looking at each other with confused expressions, Namjooon's phone buzzes once again and sees that someone is trying to call him.

Namjoon answers his phone and is greeted by Hyun talking in a deep, unusually gravelly voice. "It's Professor Lee Hyun, come to the parking lot now."

"What's wrong with your voice?" Namjoon scrunches his nose at the unpleasant sound coming through the receiver. "I'm... disguising it." Namjoon was about to smugly inform his friend that there was no point in trying to disguise his voice if he was going to tell him his name in the first place, but Hyun hung up on him before he had the chance.

Tucking his phone back into his pocket, he announces to the group that he is leaving for a bit, "but while I'm gone, you guys need to hash this stuff out. No stone unturned... Go!" he declares, quickly escaping once more. Before he even laid a step outside the study room, he could already hear the sounds of their bickering - a sign of their very close and very eventual turmoil and his very inevitable date with the hot brunette from Spanish class.

As soon as Namjoon stepped outside the school gates, he spotted Lee Hyun in a comically small blue smart car right in the front of the school. After managing to squeeze his gangly limbs into the passenger seat, he slammed the car door shut and reached out for the large and thick manila folder that was resting in his much smaller friend's hands.

"Every answer to every test in your curriculum this semester," Lee Hyun said proudly. "I knew you could do it, buddy. Thank you," Namjoon sighed thankfully but Hyun was snatching the folder away before he managed to grab a hold of it. "Woah there, cowboy. What do I get out of all this?"

"Uh, the satisfaction of being even?" Namjoon says as if it's the most obvious thing that there was. "Even, fairness, right, wrong, there is no God, booyah, booyah," Hyun listed off in an annoying tone that made Namjoon cringe.

"What do you want from me?" Namjoon asked reluctantly.

"Your Lexus."

"My car? For a semester's worth of answers?" Namjoon scoffed in disbelief.

"Will it be just a semester though, Namjoon? Won't you be taking the easy way out for the next four years? I want payment in advance. I want leather seats with built-in butt warmers," Hyun grinned mischievously.

"What am I supposed to drive?" Namjoon asks through gritted teeth, "You should take this car! It's good for the earth," Hyun smiled at him.

"So is wiping your butt with a leaf but it's not how a man gets around!" Namjoon shouted in frustration. Hyun visibly deflated, shoulders slumped and manila folder waiting patiently for the taking from the palm of his hand. Namjoon eyed the folder in his friend's hand and weighed the options in his head. With a groan, Namjoon snatched the folder out of his hand and hopped out of the impossibly cramped blue smart car as quickly as possible.

____ spots Namjoon weaving through the library entrance and she darts out of the study room to leave the arguing mess of a study group to confront its creator. "It is a disaster in there!"

"Yeah, untutorable. Do you like Thai food? I love Thai food."

"Wait, so... This is a game to you?" the young brunette girl asked with arms crossed over her chest and resting her weight on her right leg. "You put a group of human beings into a state of emotional shambles just for a shot at getting in my pants?"

"Why can't you see that for the compliment that it is?" Namjoon stressed.

"Unbelievable," she sneered, clenching her fists against her chest in anger. Namjoon didn't mean to look at her chest at that time, it was just where her hands were and the sight of them clenching and unclenching somehow made his heart race. It wasn't fear or disbelief, but he couldn't quite pinpoint what the emotion was. As he noticed that her brown eyes were intensely watching him, he quickly averted his gaze and pretended to submit to her to see what she wanted and if he felt like he was bothered enough to keep jumping through these high hoops for her.

"What do you want me to do?" he asks her, tilting his head to look down at her. "Oh, maybe one decent thing you can do is go in there and clean up your mess," she tells him, looking at him expectantly.

Namjoon pursed his lips and looked into the "Okay, if I do that, then dinner... Right?" he questions her with a perked brow.

The young brunette's mouth hung agape in disbelief and she laughed quietly, her eyes unable to leave the sight of the unbelievable man she'd ever seen. As selfish and egotistical as he was, there was an underlying part of her that felt flattered by his drive and want for her. It was a very small part and the group's needs very clearly trumped that.

"Yeah, fine, whatever," she said with a shrug, stepping back into the study room. "As if there's a dinner on earth that can make me forget that you are a shallow douchebag."

Watching her walk away was something he had the pleasure of doing a handful of times already, and each time felt better than the last but this time, he couldn't quite find the appeal when she was very clearly mad at him. "Oh, you are gonna eat those words when you see my new car!" His face falls when he remembers the trade he had just made with the psychology professor just moments ago.

"Alright, everybody!" Namjoon shouted above everyone else, slamming his Spanish textbook onto the table, everyone's attention now on him. "I wanna say something. Everybody, sit down." "You don't have to yell," Seokjin muttered under his breath, situating himself back into his chair, the others following suit.

"You know what makes humans different from other animals?" Namjoon asks rhetorically, but Jungkook immediately answers, "Feet."

"No, no. Come on, beers have feet," Yoongi said smugly but by the look on Seokjin and Jimin's faces, it was clear he was wrong.

Namjoon quickly put them back on topic, "We are the only species on earth that observes 'Shark Week'. Sharks don't even observe 'Shark Week' but we do, for the same reason I can pick up this pencil, tell you it's name is Steve and go like this," Namjoon picks up his pencil from the table and snaps it in half, earning a quiet chorus of gasps and pained groans.

"And part of you dies just a little bit on the inside because people can connect with anything. We can sympathize with pencils, we can forgive a shark and we can give Ben Affleck an Academy Award for screenwriting."

Yoongi cringes at the mention of Ben Affleck and Taehyung agrees with him, everyone at the table nodding their agreements.

"People can find the good in just about anything but themselves. Look at me, it's clear to all of you that I am awesome but I can never admit that because that would make me an ass but what I can do is see what makes Jimin awesome," everyone turns to look at Jimin who is fighting the rush of blood that is desperate to get to his cheeks and the pull of a smile against his lips, "Jimin is driven. We need driven people or the lights go out and the ice-cream melts," Namjoon says.

"And Yoongi. We need guys like Yoongi. This guy has wisdom to offer," Yoongi scrunches his nose. "Is this part of the grandpa joke? Come on-"

"We should listen to him sometime! We wouldn't regret it. And Seokjin," Namjoon gestures to Seokjin with a pointed finger, "Seokjin has earned our respect. Not as a husband, not as a father, but as a man. And don't test him on that because the thing about the jukebox was way too specific to be improvised," Seokjin's eyes widened a little bit at Namjoon's speculation but he gave no indication as to whether he thinks Namjoon had stumbled upon the truth or not.

"And Hoseok, the guy that keeps asking questions. We need intuitive people like that, we need people that keep asking questions otherwise people we will never find the answers, Hoseok is the answer," he points at Hoseok who is giving him a shy smile in return.

"And Jungkook. Who cares if Jungkook thinks he's all that? Maybe he is," Jungkook looked nervous from the moment Namjoon started giving his opinions on each of the group members but a small smile fell on his face after hearing the caring words that the older boy had for him.

"And Taehyung. Taehyung is a shaman. You ask him to pass the salt, he gives you a bowl of soup. Because you know what? Soup is better. Taehyung is better. You are all better than you think you are, you are just designed not to believe it when you hear it from yourself," Namjoon tells them, his gestures becoming wilder to continue to be engaging as his speech went on.

"Soup?" Yoongi says confusedly.

"Turn to the person next to you," Namjoon tells them. He watches as Jimin turns to Seokjin, Yoongi turns to Jungkook, Taehyung turns to Hoseok, as the young brunette girl turns to him and looks up at him with her wide, gleaming eyes.

"I want you to extend to the person the same compassion that you extend to sharks, pencils and Ben Affleck. I want you to say to that person 'I forgive you'."

He watches Jimin, Seokjin, Taehyung, and Hoseok express their forgiveness to each other, inwardly smiling to himself at the warming sight but his attention is piqued when he sees that Yoongi is being reluctant.

"I forgive you," Jungkook says to his partner earnestly. Yoongi rolls his eyes and calls him a little twerp. "Yoongi," Namjoon urges, "I'd like you to say 'I forgive you'."

Yoongi exhales slowly through his nose, his features tense as he quickly and quietly mumbles out an "I forgive you" to Jungkook who grins in return.

"You've just stopped being a study group, you have become something unstoppable. I hereby pronounce you a community," Namjoon proclaims proudly.

Seokjin awe's, "Oh, that's nice," he shares with a gentle smile, joining the rest of the people on the table in applauding Namjoon for his powerful speech.

"This isn't like Breakfast Club anymore, now it's like Stripes or Meatballs, anything with Bill Murray really," Taehyung adds with a pointed finger. "I agree with Taehyung here, tonight has been very special. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a dinner engagement with ____," Namjoon says, looking down at the brunette girl with a grin and an extended hand.

She looks up to him sweetly before saying, "I lied. Thanks for calming everyone down but since you're not a Spanish tutor, just a lying creep who purposely upset everyone in an attempt to get with me, I'd appreciate it if you left and stopped wasting all of our time."

Namjoon quickly digested his shock and muttered out, "Fine, and I'm happy to report that one of the benefits of being a lying creep is having all the answers to tomorrow's test," he gestures to the thick manila folder on the table in front of him. "And I'm happy to share them with anyone who's time I've wasted more than they've wasted mine," his eyes glance over to the young brunette beside him, noting the way she is glaring at him with, somehow, adorably flared nostrils.

"Uh, Namjoon. If you have all the answers, why the hell did you start this study group?" Yoongi asks with an appropriate amount of confusion.

"I don't have a study group, I made it up," Namjoon stated frankly.

Jimin's brows knit in dejection, a small but noticeable pout becoming more obvious as his bottom lip starts to tremble just by the slightest, "But... What about your speech?"

"I made it up! That's what I do, I make things up and I got paid a lot of money to do it before I came to this school shaped toilet, I was a lawyer."

Everybody moans and groans at the mention of the fact that Namjoon was a lawyer, eyes rolling and noses scrunching.

"I thought you were Bill Murray in any of his films, but you're more like Michael Douglas in any of his films," Taehyung tells Namjoon with the same monotonous tone he'd been using all day, though this time it seemed to be tinged with a bit of disappointment.

"Oh yeah? Well, you have Asperger's." Namjoon says bluntly before gathering his things in his arms and slamming the study room door behind him. The young brunette girl's gaze falls to the vacant spot at the doorway left by his vacuous presence, horrified at his change in attitude. There wasn't a doubt in her mind that this dude was sketchy, from the moment she laid her eyes on him at the back of Spanish class, sitting uninterestedly in each lesson with his phone in his hand paying attention to nobody, not even the teacher which she considered to be quite the feat since the Spanish teacher was... an inconceivable character, to say the least.

What was scary was that she had also doubted that he was telling the truth about his deal with her earlier. Maybe he really is honest. The real difficulty in this was deciding whether that was a good thing or not.

"Did he just say 'ass burger'?" Jungkook snorted, slapping the table.

"It's a serious disorder," Jimin tells Jungkook, "It really is," Seokjin concurs, becoming upset that Jungkook, and now Yoongi, appear to be making fun of the name.

"If it's so serious, why don't they call it 'professional burger'?" Yoongi wheezes, lightly slapping Jungkook on the arm as they quietly laugh with each other.

Taehyung didn't seem to mind one bit. If he did, he didn't show it which helped to settle the brunette girl's worries by a smidge.

Namjoon stepped outside the library building with a huff, exasperated from being in such a draining situation. In the back of his mind, he couldn't believe that he had done what he did to these strangers. Well, they were his classmates and that made it worse, him realizing that he would have to see these people again in the future. Pushing those thoughts to the very darkest depths of his mind, he inhaled the cold air of the outside, staying under the light of the library veranda so he could actually get a good look at those papers that Hyun had given him. At least one good thing came out of this day, or so he thought.

Opening the seal at the top of the large manila, he proceeded to pull out a thick pile of papers, the first of which appeared to be blank. Namjoon's heart began to race as he flipped through the hundreds of papers in his hands to find that they were all blank on both sides except for the last paper which had the word 'booyah' written in all caps in Sharpie.

"Hyun," Namjoon growled under his breath, shoving the papers back into the manila folder angrily and making his way to the professor's office.

There sat Hyun with his feet crossed on top of his desk, leaning back in his office chair and sipping on a glass of brandy when Namjoon slammed his office door open.

"Okay, now before you say anything, I want you to think about the gift you've been given," Hyun hummed happily, raising his glass to Namjoon leaning against his office doorway.

"An excuse to punch a pathetic professor at a community college?" Namjoon tilts his head with a far too serious expression.

Hyun coughs, "Erm, no, not that. An important lesson, my friend. You see, the tools you acquired to survive out there will not help you here at Greendale. What you have here my friend is a second chance at an honest life."

"Give me my keys," Namjoon demands from him, clearly ignoring his friend's pitiful attempt to teach him a lesson about integrity, honesty or what have you.

"W-what? No, I have to keep your car for the lesson- Okay, don't hit me!" Hyun shrieks and tosses the car keys to Namjoon once he begins to storm over to his friend's desk with rage-filled eyes.

Namjoon walks away quickly, desperate to be anywhere but at that school at the moment. "Are we cool!?" Hyun shouts out the door as soon as he's gone, pausing for a moment to wait for a response. When he gets nothing in return, he just shrugs and sips his brandy, "We cool.".

"I like you, Namjoon," Yoongi says to the younger man as he spots him walking briskly past the entrance to the library, "You remind me of myself when I was your age."

Namjoon pauses and sighs, hanging his head low at the prospect of being similar to this older and, from what he's seen so far, a horribly awkward but entitled individual. "I deserve that."

He walks up the stairs to sit next to the older boy, seating himself one step down on the stairs so they were equal in height. "Y'know, I've been called grandpa nine times now? I mean, there are literal grandpas here on campus but even they don't called grandpa. They get called by their first names, like normal grandpas. Sometimes I think I'm doing something wrong."

Namjoon put his hand on Yoongi's shoulder and said to him, "Maybe it's because of the way you act. You fall asleep everywhere, you always ask the most random questions and you scowl at everyone and you say stuff like 'when I was your age' to people that aren't that much younger than you. You've gotta stop doing that, man."

Yoongi sighed, "I've never looked at it that way..."

"Hey guys," Hoseok spoke up, coming up from behind them.

"Oh, hey," Namjoon said to him. "Aren't you guys supposed to be studying right now?"

Jungkook emerged from around the corner and shrugged, "It kinda got boring after you left," he admitted. Following him out of the entrance of the library was the rest of the group, Seokjin, Taehyung, Jimin and the brunette girl.

"Shouldn't you be rolling around on a bed covered in test answers," the brunette girl smirked down at him, her hands holding the strap of her bag.

"I don't have any of the answers," he said with a tight smile, abandoning the manila folder on to the steps below him, "I'm just gonna fail the test."

"If you just study for like an hour, it's not that hard," Hoseok told him, "Yeah," Jungkook agreed. "You seem pretty smart, you have a sports coat," Jungkook told him, gesturing to Namjoon's jacket.

"Well, the funny thing about being smart is that you can get through most of life without ever having to do any work. So, uh, I'm not really... Sure how to do that," Namjoon confessed with solace, hanging his head low.

Behind him, the group began silently gesturing to each other. Jimin mouthed to the brunette girl, "Please? he's so sad." In return, the brunette girl mimed, pointing at Namjoon and then putting a finger in her mouth and pretend-puking. Seokjin expressed saddened shock, clasping his hands together as if he were begging the brunette girl into agreeing with them.

Taehyung looked at the scene with confusion and he spoke up, "What's going on? Can you guys hear me right now? Am I deaf, can you guys hear me talking? Can you guys hear me talking right now?" the group all said "Yes" in response. "Ah, okay, good," Taehyung said, giving them a thumbs up.

"Y'know what? Namjoon, we actually didn't get that far without you so if you wanna come back inside..." the brunette girl said to him.

"Really?" Namjoon asked with an uncertain tone.

"Well, it is your study group." The brunette girl said with a lopsided grin, turning around and stepping back into the library.

"Come on, let's study," Seokjin said to him sweetly, following the brunette girl back into the building. "Sounds good," Yoongi replied, patting Namjoon on the shoulder and going back inside with Hoseok, Jungkook, and Jimin trailing behind him.

"I'm sorry I called you Michael Douglas and I see your value now," Taehyung said to him, stepping past Namjoon and entering the library.

"Well, that's the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me," Namjoon said to himself, pushing himself off the steps and walking back into the library to join the unlikely group that he had just created, a group that he somehow feels he will be close with. Sure, they had gotten off to a rocky and deceitful start, but he can tell that some of them are already warming up to each other despite having argued for hours both in and out of his absence. That's gotta say something.

Perhaps it's saying that they really are a community now.

[richincolor]

Author Interview with Mayra Cuevas

Today we will get to know CNN producer and debut author Mayra Cuevas. Her book SALTY, BITTER, SWEET releases today.

Seventeen-year-old aspiring chef Isabella Fields’ family life has fallen apart after the death of her Cuban abuela and the divorce of her parents. She moves in with her dad and his new wife in France, where Isabella feels like an outsider in her father’s new life, studiously avoiding the awkward, “Why did you cheat on Mom?” conversation.

The upside of Isabella’s world being turned upside down? Her father’s house is located only 30 minutes away from the restaurant of world-famous Chef Pascal Grattard, who runs a prestigious and competitive international kitchen apprenticeship. The prize job at Chef Grattard’s renowned restaurant also represents a transformative opportunity for Isabella, who is desperate to get her life back in order.

But how can Isabella expect to hold it together when she’s at the bottom of her class at the apprenticeship, her new stepmom is pregnant, she misses her abuela dearly, and a mysterious new guy and his albino dog fall into her life?

Crystal: Mayra, thanks so much for taking the time to answer a few questions about your writing life and your debut novel SALTY, BITTER, SWEET. What does writing mean to you and when did you begin to consider yourself a writer?

Mayra: It was in the eighth grade. I was really into Julia de Burgos’ poetry back then and only beginning to understand the healing power of the written word. Julia’s work inspired me to write my own poems, as a way to cope with some difficulties at home. After many tries, I wrote a poem that I thought was pretty good — about how your feelings can be like a storm. My English teacher at the time, Mr. Antonio Colorado, was this super encouraging person. He knew I loved books and always lent me new titles to read and pushed me to work harder on my poetry. I gave him a copy of the poem I had written and he asked me if he could read it in class. I agreed, under the condition that he did not reveal my name. I mean, it was eighth grade, I didn’t want this to be the end of my social life. But when he read it, everyone went quiet and listened. And something magical happened, I felt connected to everyone in the room. In that moment, my words mattered and I felt seen for probably the first time. And what was even more amazing, after he read the poem, there was a discussion and people were talking about my words and how it affected them. I’ll never forget it.

Crystal: How has your career as a journalist prepared you for writing young adult novels? Was it a fairly smooth transition?

Mayra: No! (laughs hysterically) I *thought* it would be a smooth transition! But boy was I wrong. When I started writing fiction back in 2012 I remember thinking, ‘Oh I’ve been a professional journalist for over ten years, how hard can it be to write a novel?’ Well, as it turns out, writing a novel is very hard. And getting published is even harder. But there are two skills that transferred from journalism into publishing: 1) resilience and 2) working with editors.

Years of getting my story pitches rejected prepared me for the soul-crushing rejection I faced in the publishing world. My first manuscript was rejected by 200 agents! And somehow I managed to keep going.    

My news background also prepared me to work with editors. I had lots of practice getting my news stories edited, nitpicked and pulled apart — that’s just the nature of the news business. And it’s no different in publishing.

Crystal: I’m guessing you’ve spent quite a bit of time in kitchens. What are some of your most interesting cooking experiences or other memorable moments around food?

Mayra: I’m a total foodie so when it came time to research Salty, Bitter, Sweet I went all out!

I reached out to the amazing Carla Tomasko, the pastry chef at Bacchanalia, one of Atlanta’s top restaurants. She agreed to serve as my guide through the workings of a real high-end kitchen. She also shared her story of working as a woman in a male-dominated environment and as an immigrant from Ecuador. She also recounted how her Latin roots helped shape her craft.

The time I spent in Bacchanalia’s kitchen was amazing! I got to see how the executive chefs prepared the day’s menu, how they selected ingredients and crafted the most exquisite dishes. All the while, I was taking copious notes of every detail I could use to make Isa’s journey as authentic as possible. I think it paid off because it seems to be everyone’s favorite part of the book!

Crystal: What do you love most about your characters Isa and Diego?

Mayra: They are two young people who are going through their own private pain — as we all do. At first, Isa sees him as a threat to the delicate balance of her new life. And in a way she is right to feel threatened, because Diego has arrived to upend everything she thought she wanted. In turn, Isa will help Diego make peace with his own life decisions.  

Yes, there are some romantic moments, but it’s mostly about meeting someone who sees you for the first time and loves you in spite of all the broken bits.

Crystal: Though some things in Isa’s life seem to have some relationship to parts of your own life, were there things you needed to research as you wrote your way through this story?

Mayra: There were two main veins of research: the world of haute cuisine and the multiple locations where the book is set — six cities in total.

For the kitchen research, I interviewed and spent time with two amazing female chefs: Carla Tomasko, the pastry chef at Bacchanalia, one of Atlanta’s top restaurants, and Daniella Fitzgerald, who spends her days cooking for rich folks in yachts. She had some hilarious stories!

I also read memoirs like 32 Yolks: From My Mother’s Table to Working the Line by Veronica Chambers and Eric Ripert, and watched documentaries like Pressure Cooker and Three Stars.  

For the travel research I watched a million YouTube videos and read as many travel blogs. I also engaged an all-things-France expert to make sure every detail of Isa’s journey through Lyon was authentic.

Crystal: Are any of your favorite foods mentioned in the story? Can you tell us about one or two?

Mayra: Like Isa and her abuela Lala I enjoy bridging my two worlds by making Spanish flan and All-American apple pie — my husband’s favorite.

The flan recipe belongs to my Venezuelan friend Paula. I love that recipe because it’s been handed down through generations and it survived a political revolution.

Crystal: Have there been any big surprises along the road to publication?

Mayra: The most amazing surprise was being invited to join Las Musas, a Latina authors collective. These women are incredibly talented, supportive and generous. The founders did a wonderful job of creating a space where we can uplift each other and our work, share important news, and have each other’s back. I love these women and I’m humbled and proud to be part of this community.  

Crystal: Are there any current YA books that you wish had existed when you were younger?

Mayra: All of the books from Las Musas!

Crystal: *Hurries off to visit the webpage for Las Musas* That looks like a wonderful group! Can you tell us anything about your current projects or your writing plans for the future?

Mayra: My short story Resilient will be published as part of the anthology FORESHADOW: The Magic of Reading & Writing YA (Algonquin Young Readers). I’m also co-writing a novel with Atlanta author Marie Marquardt, which can be best described as a feminist unicorn.

Crystal: Thanks again for your willingness to share your time and even your recipe with us! We wish you all the best with your debut.

Born and raised in Puerto Rico, Mayra Cuevas is a professional journalist and fiction writer who prefers love stories with a happy ending. Her debut novel, SALTY, BITTER, SWEET, launched March 3 with HarperCollins/Blink. Her debut fiction short story was selected by best-selling author Becky Albertalli to appear in the Foreshadow serial anthology Issue 04 in April 2019. She is currently a special projects producer and writer for CNN. She keeps her sanity by practicing Buddhist meditation and serving on the Board of Directors of Kadampa Meditation Center Georgia. She lives with her husband, also a CNN journalist, and their cat, in the charming town of Norcross, Georgia. She is also the step-mom to two amazing young men who provide plenty of inspiration for her stories. You can visit her online at mayracuevas.com.

[deepestdarkestsickestpartsofu]

Introduction

We met in spring of 2017. He changed my life forever, in a way that I will never be able to explain. What I would want you to understand before reading this, is how much love has taken charge of my feelings and impulses. 

I loved him, I love him. 

Nothing he did will ever change that.

At this point I bet you may be wondering who I am. Right... I guess I should introduce myself. My name is Nadir, a 25 year old man that is attracted to other men, but that’s not the most significant part in the story. I grew up in a quiet conservative town in Michigan, with a small population of less than 5,000 people. My mother is pretty old schooled and forced me to stay in school until I graduated. That meant no ‘girlfriends’, no sleepovers, no working. I always had the desire to help her monetarily by getting a job and at least pay the house bills. However she would constantly say to me to just focus on my studies and that would be what would help us in the long run.

My parents are originally from Israel. My mother grew up as Catholic, which was not the usual back then and my father grew up Jewish. They became less religious when they decided to move to the United States, which is where they had my siblings and I. They both lived here as immigrants and I didn’t understand what that meant when I was a child, I just thought we were like any other family living in the US. My father unfortunately passed away from a heart attack when I was 8 years old and it affected me in ways you couldn’t possibly imagine. During his wake, I didn’t cry. It was all so surreal and I felt like he would wake up randomly and claim that everything was a joke. He had a great sense of humor and always managed to make people smile, however his death wasn’t a joke. Once it was time to bury him, I cried as hard as I could since I knew I wouldn’t see him ever again. After that, my mother worked as hard as she could to give my siblings and I what we needed. She could barely afford to pay for the mortgage on the house until my older brothers started working and helping her out with as much as they could. My mother worked two jobs daily to make sure we had food on our table, clothes and a good education. 

It would hurt me to see her stress about providing for us, so eventually I managed to get a scholarship at San Francisco State University. Being the youngest of 4 children gave me a bit of an advantage to enjoy ‘the beauty of freedom’ as we know it now, and not have to struggle about being gay in the 70′s, not that it’s any different now. I mean there are hate crimes all over, shootings that keep getting more common by the minute and discrimination which is still pretty big now. That is one of the reasons why I decided not to come out to my mother, nor anyone in town for that matter. I was already struggling with self-acceptance and I didn’t want to be a burden to my mother. During my senior year of High School I managed to convince my mother to let me work to save up for essential stuff. I began working at a pharmacy and little by little saved up enough money to leave town and follow my dreams in a career I wanted. I wasn’t certain of what my major would be, however it needed to be in the art field. Whether it would be acting, directing, drawing or video editing. I decided to go with the flow and see what would appeal my interest. I wanted to be able to afford a place in ‘The City’, so working at that little pharmacy helped me save up & I also had a job secured so I would be able to help my mother with her expenses from afar. 

It took me a few months but right before spring classes started, I booked the first plane to San Francisco without looking back. My siblings showed up with my mother to the airport. Elijah, the oldest, was a bit of a role model growing up. He got married at 22, had 2 children and joined the police force. Amir, the second to oldest, was always a jokester which he definitely got from my father,  and had a bit of a ‘bad boy’ complex, which is quite the opposite of Elijah. He never got married, which my mother never agreed with, however he did have 3 kids, all with different women. Last but not least, my sister Hadassah, she was only 3 years older than me and I guess you could say we were the closest. Both of us would take care of my mom as much as possible and help her around the house as much as it was possible. She decided to stay in a community college to be closer to my mother and to help her financially as much as she possibly could. I hugged everyone goodbye, but when I got to my mother I couldn’t hold it in much longer. Tears started pouring down my face as I hugged her, but managed to remind her that this wasn’t a goodbye, but a ‘see you later’. I wish I could’ve come out to her, but I was afraid it would devastate her and we might lose the relationship we had built. As cliche as it sounds, she is my best friend, the person I trust the most in this world. I was considering staying as I hugged her. She pulled away and put our foreheads together. 

“You’ll be fine... You’ve got this! And remember einayim sheli, you’re stronger than you think! I’ll be supporting you from afar! Nothing you could do would ever disappoint me”.

“I love you mom. Don’t worry, I’ll send money your way and I’ll be back during the holidays!”

“You better, my dear! Now go, don’t want you to miss your flight”, she said as she hugged me once again.

Her words gave me enough courage to pick up my stuff and board the plane. I turned back once more before heading to the ramp and saw my siblings & her waving at me. Hadassah was hugging my mother and even though she was trying to stay as strong as possible, I saw tears rolling down her face. She noticed that I saw them and immediately wiped them off with a smile. I always admired how strong of a woman she is. She truly is a role model and someone I look up to as to how to live my life. However, I’ve never been as strong so I couldn’t hold back and started crying as I boarded the plane. 

The flight felt eternal and having anxiety didn’t help at all. I quit medication a few months before leaving since I didn’t think I would need it… Boy, was I wrong. I managed to calm myself down by working on some sketches I’ve been doing on my drawing paper pad. Next thing I knew, I was arriving in San Francisco, California; Population: 883,305, well... I guess now it’s 883,306 residents. I wasn’t necessarily going into San Francisco completely helpless, I was moving in with my best friend. I met Marcia in elementary school. Her father Sebastiao works for the government, and that’s as much as I know about him. That and the fact that he had to move to San Francisco due to a “really good job opportunity”.  Her father is originally from Brazil & his wife, Mayra is Mexican-American. Marcia grew up and learned all three languages, English, Spanish & Portuguese so she was able to fit in easier in “The Bay Area” when they left our little town. We would spend hours on the phone after she moved and she would tell me about San Francisco and how she thought I’d love it. She was honestly afraid to be one of those kids whose parents have to move regularly because of their jobs, but lucky for her, she didn’t have to do that. She set up a high bar for me arriving in San Fran and when I did... Well, let’s just say she didn’t disappoint. Her dad bought her an apartment and she was willing to share it with me at no cost, but I already had plans of helping her out with utilities & give her some extra cash to thank her for sharing her apartment with me. She shared her apartment with two puppies, Chuy & Elena, two small pomeranians whom she considered her children since she wasn’t planning on having any kids. When I told her I had gotten a scholarship to SF State, she immediately suggested I should move in with her. I wasn’t too sure of that idea, but it honestly was the best option I had so far.

I finally get my luggage and sit in the lobby to wait for her. I look around and see a lot of people meeting up with their loved one, whether it is their lover, or family. “You just left your family back there. You won’t even make it here nor achieve anything you had your mind set to. This is truly a bad idea. Why are you even doing here? You’re an idiot for leaving! All for some stupid experiment you want to try? Bullshit!”. I close my eyes and take another deep breath. I then feel my phone vibrate with the following text message:

“I see you!”

I looked up and saw her smile. She hadn’t grown much, stood about 5′6, black, curly shoulder-length hair, light skinned, with dorky glasses. People always claimed she was a weirdo, but who am I to judge? I was a bit taller than her, stood about 6′1, a bit of scruff on my face, brown semi clean-cut hair. I was always the weird kid at school, so we managed to click from the very beginning. She was the first person to talk to me in elementary school, and that meant the world to me. I was always a bit of an introvert, however she helped me come out of my shell little by little and when she left, I fell back into it. 

“Marcia! Babe! I’m so happy to see you!”

I ran to her and hugged her. It felt like yesterday that I had said goodbye to her at the airport. 

“Honeeeeey! Ugh, I’m soooo glad to see you! You smell soooo good! Don’t tell me you’re still into buying or should I say, collecting colognes?”

“Guilty!”

“Well then, you just might like what I have for you at home! Let me help you with your bags! I can’t wait for you to FINALLY meet Chuy & Elena! They’re going to LOVE you! My tia is still pretty mad that I named Elena after her, but she should take it as a compliment! It just means I love her! I mean, dogs are your most loyal companions... Not that she was ever loyal to my uncle, but still! I’m telling you, my little Elena is NOTHING like her!” 

I looked at her in disbelief. She still had that smile and a gleam in her eye. She had always had that hopeful gleam in her eye... Something I had lost a long time ago. 

I hated it.

“I’ll kill if I have to, but I’ll regain that hope again, just wait”

[purplesurveys]

842

have you ever violated school dress code? My Catholic school had us on a very tight leash and we’d have to be crazy to dare to break the dress code over there. My university doesn’t have a dress code though and anyone entering the campus can dress up any way they want, which I’ve always been grateful for. if you are listening to music, is the singer male/female? They are five dudes. what, if anything, do you give up for Lent? I never observed Lent; and as much of a religious fanatic my mother is, I’m glad she never forced me to fast or abstain from something I liked. what phrase leads your mind directly to the gutter? 69, even though it’s childish. when you feel like giving up, how do you convince yourself not to? I just tell myself that things will get better because that seems to be the pattern all the time with me, which is a really good thing.

what are your opinions on immigration? I don’t know much about the issues and its intricacies but as an Asian, I really admire fellow Asians who don’t speak a word of English, end up in the States or somewhere similar and build themselves a better life there. It’s fucking metal. would you tell an actual immigrant your views? Sure, if the topic is raised. what was the subject of the last list you made? There was a tweet asking people to list down which YouTubers practically ~raised them~ growing up, so I joined in the fun and gave my own names. If I remember correctly I listed down Pewdiepie, Smosh, Grace Helbig, Hannah Hart, and the entire Brit crew. do you ever get nervous before interviews/important meetings? Only if it’s supposed to be crucial. Like I imagine I’d be sweating bullets for my first job interview. who pays for the majority of your belongings? My parents. would you ever willingly shop in a thrift store? Of course. There are always some great finds in them. what is the most that you would ever spend on an outfit? Assuming I’m earning my own money, I’m willing to spend around ₱5000 to ₱10,000 on a top or bottom but I can widen my wallet a lot more if we’re talking shoes, because I like them more haha. is there anything you do that just outrages your parents? I know my mom hates it whenever she pulls us for online mass and I visibly grumble. I don’t know if my dad is annoyed with anything I do; and if he feels that way he’ll tell me. I respect him a lot more so if that’s the case, I’ll actually stop whatever it is I’m doing. when was the last time you were embarrassed in public? Probably when I was brought to the hospital a month ago and the nurse was explaining to me how to take a urine test.  have you ever won an award you were actually proud of? If Latin honors count, then yes. That was my only goal when I started college, and I reached it, so I’m allowing myself to be proud of, well, myself. the importance of education, rate it from 1-10, 10 as most important? 12. --- explain your choice to rate it as such? It’s different when you come from a third-world country. Education is realistically your only way out. what is the coolest science experiment you've ever done? I liked the ones that we did that involved chemicals and powders. are you experiencing difficulties with any friends right now? Not really. There’s a chance JM has been irritated with me because I always turn really grumpy when he messages me about work stuff, but if he is, at this point I don’t really care anymore because I’ve been detached from org work for a while now. I busted my ass for the org for three years so I think I’m entitled to feel detached now haha. how do you deal with a fight between yourself and a friend? I haven’t been in an argument with one of them in a while but I would prefer to talk it out. when you apologize to someone after a fight, how do you go about saying that you are sorry? I apologize and I mention the thing I did that they were hurt by, so that they feel acknowledged. In the end, I tell them that I’ll be better and if there’s anything I can do to make them feel better or to make the situation better, that they shouldn’t hesitate to let me know. have you ever played around with "dry ice"? No. Isn’t that dangerous lol? do you think parents are responsible for the actions of their children? For the most part, yes. But I know there are still some instances where parents can try and try to be understanding and be the best influences, but their kids will still end up going down the wrong path. There isn’t one answer to this, I think. should the military draft take both men AND women? why/why not? I don’t know, it’s a little complicated. I’m definitely all about equality and providing the same opportunities for men and women, but I know there’s a lot of issues on sexual harassment and assault in the military that have yet to be fixed. Until that’s ironed out and I hear change taking place, it seems a little shady to randomly pick out women to join the military.  when was the last time that you corrected someone? My mom had a grammatical error in her Facebook post from yesterday so I told her what the right word to use was. when was the last time you were corrected? I set the table for breakfast today and apparently it wasn’t enough for my mom, who liked her plate to be set in a certain way. when did you last say "i told you so"? Maybe when Kate told me she had broken up with the guy she was having a thing with, lol. is there any celebrity you like to "keep up with"? Not really. I think I’m over that phase now. I’ll check up my faves from time to time, but otherwise I don’t feel the need to read daily updates on them anymore. celebrity gossip: YAY or BOO? Yay if it has substance or if it’s controversial, like a celebrity being exposed for sexual harassment; boo if it’s something stupid like “Kendall Jenner spotted eating pasta today.” what is the most life-changing book you have read? I haven’t encountered it yet. have you had a negative impact on anyone's life? I would say so. I wasn’t always the nicest kid; and I also did a shitty job handling my friendship with Sofie when we were off to college. has anyone had a negative impact on yours? who/why? Yeah. Some relatives, some teachers who didn’t know how to act like teachers, and some people I distinctly remember that bullied me when I was a kid. how will you know when you are ready to get married? I guess when I’m no longer nervous thinking about it and when I’m already 100% sure that I’m independent and capable of looking out for myself. I don’t wanna be married and still be slightly dependent on my parents, which is what a lot of young Filipino married couples end up doing. how much time have you spent contemplating your own death? A very, very good amount. is there a joke that you just can't stand? Ones that you just can’t defend and are just simply offensive, like slavery or poverty. I’ve seen a few shows where they’d refer to the Philippines being poor or being a source of child labor for laughs, and they’ve never been funny to me. have you ever read any self-help books? No, I don’t really trust those lol since they’re usually written by people from other countries who most likely have different experiences and perspectives. If I need some help I’d rather figure it out myself and hear from people that I trust, like my friends. what's your take on the obesity problem in america? It’s a serious problem, obviously. I don’t know much about it other than the fact that Americans are crazy about their fast food and that their serving sizes are ginormous. I really hope they find more ways to address it. what is something you used to love, but now greatly dislike? Journalism. what is something you used to dislike, but now like? Chicken curry, and I think spicy food in general haha. when/if you become a parent, what will you do differently, compared to how your parents raised you? I’ll be more involved. I’ll compliment them more, not invalidate their feelings, and I’ll let them talk when I do something that upsets them, and I’ll apologize to them for it.

do you equate spanking with physical abuse? would you spank a child? The way Filipino parents do it, yeah especially. They don’t just do it with their hands - spanking kids here usually involve slippers and belts. My mom forbade anyone to spank me and my siblings, but nonetheless I watched it happen to my cousins and that alone was traumatic enough for me. How much more for them?

The thing is that it can’t be assumed that kids are able to process why they’re being punished, so I think that any physical punishment to them will just drive them away from their parents, which to me makes it physical abuse. I would never spank my own kids. what's the most ridiculous thing you've done this week? Skipping out the rest of my shower because a moth came into the bathroom and started flying around me lmaoooo eugh. --- did you regret it/love it/hate it/want to do it again/etc? I fucking hated it. if your bf/gf wanted to wait until marriage for sex, would you be willing? Yes. Sex honestly isn’t really a big deal to me. when you look at the sunset, what do you think about/feel? I don’t really think when I look at the sunset. I just admire how pretty it looks and savor the quick few seconds of the sun going down. is there someone you wish you could trust/you wish was trustworthy? No? I don’t wait on people to be trustworthy, if that’s what you mean. I’m grateful for the people who are already around me that I can trust. is there anyone that you no longer want in you life? who/why? There are times I wish I could get rid of my mom so that I don’t get yelled at as much anymore and so that I don’t have anyone watching my every move so much so that I’m cautious to walk around in my own house.

how has your outlook on life changed in the past few years? I’m a lot happier and more stable this time around. I’m glad I stayed around to see the change happen. have you ever walked out of a boring movie (in theaters)? Absolutely not. Even if the movie was bad, I’d watch it through the end. Ticket prices are not to be fucked with lol. how open are you with people you know online? ...What do you think? what do you think of athletes that take steroids? Idk about other sports but that’s a big fuck no in wrestling, after it’s led to addiction, overdoses, and a lot of deaths especially in the 80s and 90s. if a celebrity is involved in scandal after scandal, is that likely to affect how you view him/her & his/her work? Depends on the scandal. I don’t mind when nudes or videos get leaked because honestly, the leakers are the assholes in that situation. But if the scandal is something like people speaking out to accuse a celebrity of racism, abuse, or harassment, then I can very much turn against that person. what is one celebrity that you have zero respect for? Amber Heard. have you ever driven under the influence of alcohol/drugs? Just slightly tipsy, but I’ve always made sure that I’m super super super aware of my surroundings in those times. I won’t drive – and I know my friends won’t allow me to – if I was even just a little dizzy. I’m always the first to start sobering up when I go out to drink because I’m usually the only one with a car and thus responsible for bringing my friends home. are you overly attached to your material possessions? For the most part, yeah. have you ever ridiculed anyone for their clothing choices? Not to their faces. living in poverty: what do you think it'd be like? I already live in a country wallowing in it. My family isn’t poor, but I see poverty on a daily basis nonetheless. No documentary or article can best explain it to anyone who has never lived in a poverty-stricken country. Pretty insensitive question btw. what is one "diet" that you think is just utterly worthless? I’m not familiar with any of them. what advice would you give someone that is uncomfortable with his or her body/appearance? I prefer not to give advice because some people don’t wanna hear it and just wanna hear reassurances and boosters. That said, I’ll just keep encouraging them and telling them that they look really good in their outfit and just making them feel valid and seen. what advice would you give someone about to start high school? Don’t be scared to make mistakes and while you should always study hard and do your best, don’t take everything seriously. It’s high school and won’t matter on your professional resume.   what foreign food are you NOT interested in trying? Uhhhh this question makes no sense to me ahahaha I’m always down to try anything. what foreign country do you believe is misunderstood? I can’t speak for other countries but I know mine is pretty misunderstood. I’ve read countless testimonies of Filipinos getting condescendingly told “You speak good English for a Filipino” by white Americans, not knowing that their country conquered mine for 40ish years. That’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to misconceptons about my country and its people.    have you ever felt entirely unwanted and alone? Of course. in your eyes, which is worse: rape or murder? Both are equally bad and disgusting but I’ll have to go with rape, because 1) the victim has to live with the trauma and fear for the rest of their life, 2) victims are usually too scared to speak out for fear of being judged or not being believed, and 3) victim-blaming is still a big problem today. do you understand/read shakespeare? No. When we took up Shakespeare in high school I bought the No Fear versions. would you feel comfortable living with someone that owned a gun? No. do you know anyone that lives in a foreign country? Tons.

[marissapugliese]

Paper 3

Life and Wedding Rituals

The culture of my family is Italian. My mother’s parents were born and raised in Sicily, Italy while my father's parents were born and raised in Calabria, Italy. My mother has two sisters who were both born in Italy as well. My mother was the first and last child that was born in America. My father and his younger brother were both born in America as well. Both my mother and father are the first generation of Italian-American in their families. Both of my parents' first languages were italian, and second english. They were both raised with an Italian mentality. The mentality of italians is to put family life over everything. You are to always stay loyal to your family, and remain close. Italian was both of their first languages as children and learned English as well. My parents were grown up with similar traditional beliefs, values, and lifestyles that stemmed from their parents (my nonni), and generations prior.

My mother and father met in their mid twenties, in Brooklyn where they both have lived all their lives. They were introduced to each other by mutual friends. My grandparents were pleased with both my mother and fathers and their choice to get married. They both came from families that had followed similar italian lifestyles. Although my family did have a preference that my parents get married to a person with the same culture, it was not required. Today my parents have the same preferences for me. I am more attracted to italian men in regards to getting romantically involved with. I tend to look for a partner who has grown up with the same traditional values as myself. Arranged marriages in Italy are no longer practiced for most families. Recently as I was having a conversation with my nonna she had told me that her parents brothers and sisters did end up in incestral marriages with their first or second cousins. We had this conversation when my third cousin Francesco was immigrating to America with his family. My nonna went on and on in conversation about how handsome he was and was speaking to her granddaughters with the intention of potentially setting us up. We all looked at her as if she was absolutely insane but incestory was something that was normal in Italy years and years ago but is something that sounds so absurd today. My mother’s sisters and father's brother had also been able to marry who they wanted, and it just so happened they had come from an italian cultured background as well. It just so happens that you sway to what you know. A couple years ago my cousin Frankie who was twenty-one at the time got his girlfriend pregnant. Both of the families including my cousin and his girlfriend agreed to keep the baby which turned out to be babies (twins). They were both brought up in families that were extremely faithful. In my family and the catholic religion it is traditional to get married before having sex (which has faded away over generations) and having children. Basically, the couple was together for 5 years prior to this happening but decided to have a shotgun wedding before the babies had arrived. It made their family members happy and it felt like the right thing to do morally. When my parents got married their lives and resources had merged together. After years of being in a relationship and in marriage, they shared a house, a bank account, level of their education. Many people in marriages do not share everything with their partner. Especially in today's society many keep separate accounts or any other independent resources they may have. My mother and father share almost everything, unlike their best friends who keep their money and spend separately.

My mother and father were treated as family on each of their sides. My mother refers to my dad's mother as mama, and his father papa, and vice versa. They are both extremely close to their inlaws, and both sets of my grandparents are close to each other as well. My nonno on both my mother and father's side were extremely close and had passed away a day after each other in the same year. My nonnas are still alive today and enjoy each other's company in and out of the family kitchen. My nonna rosa who is my father's mother is extremely close to my mother's side as a whole as well. My parents, and their siblings have raised myself, my brother, and my cousins in the same traditional way they had grown up. As I stated earlier, my mothers and fathers family are both from Italy but come from different towns or cities. My aunts and uncles share the same situation. Although there are different parts of italy, most lifestyles are similar. Italian values include spending lots of time with family, religion and maintaining Catholic traditions, and pleasurable meals prepared with dedication and most importantly love. As a child I was always surrounded by family, and was fortunate for that. Unfortunately, my dad's brother and his family live in Long Island so we only see them a few times a year. Most of my family on my maternal side live in the same neighborhood as me, one across the street on the same block, and one a couple blocks away. The rest do not live far maybe 10-20 minutes away. Since we all live so close we tend to see each other often. My maternal cousins and I even attended some of the same schools. I don’t consider them to be my cousins. I consider them to be brothers and sisters to myself. My mother and her cousins are extremely close and were raised on the same block which allowed them to have a sister or brother relationship with them as well. I refer to most of my mother's cousins as aunt or uncle because of the close relationship. Their children who are technically my second cousins are just as closed to myself as my first cousins are to me as well.

I do believe other cultures are close with their families as well, but the Italians idolize this in their families. Another important value in my italian family is religion. Almost ninety percent of Italians are catholic. My family is included in that ninety percent. Traditionally a good catholic would be one who goes to church weekly, prays, receives sacraments, respects others, follows the ten commandments, and has faith. Today it is extremely difficult to get to church every week so my immediate family tends to attend on religious holidays. Italian families tend to share an early dinner once a week with their families which catholicism is still provided in a moral structure. There are many patron saint days that Italian families celebrate. A popular saint day for Italians is on March 19th, Saint Joseph's day. A feast takes place in Italy that honors Joseph, husband to the Virgin Mary and earthly father to Jesus. It is also the day in which Italy celebrates Father's Day. And if your name is Joseph or Josephine, you will also be celebrating your “onomastico.” Since my family is living here in America, there is a traditional pastry we get every year on Saint Joseph's day. Italian tables are filled with fig dishes, including fig cookies, zeppoles, or sfinge dough fritters covered with powdered sugar as well. We celebrate with pastries because Saint Joseph is also referred to the saint of pastries. Every Sunday my family makes it a point to gather for an early evening dinner that is also a tradition in Italy. My grandparents made sure it was essential no matter how busy the family got.. There are three portions of this dinner, antipasto, primo corso, and secondo corso. Antipasto always comes first and most of the time involves fresh bread, bruschetta, olives, soppressata, and some cheese. The primo corso which means first course comes out a few minutes after which consists of usually pasta with fresh tomato sauce, or can be soup or stew. The secondo corso which means second course is usually meat, usually chicken cutlets on a usual Sunday. During this dinner we spend quality time laughing and lots of yelling. By yelling I mean speaking to one another. As Italians we spend to speak out loud. Till this day my family, aunts, uncles, cousins, and now my cousins children all join together for meals on Sunday filled with lots of food. The social life of italians revolves around eating, and celebrating. The love of food conforms to the traditional vision of an italian family.

The role of being a female in an Italian family has shifted as new generations come. It is still expected for women to take on household chores. Those chores include cleaning, cooking, laundry, and taking care of their children. Years back the women in these families were not expected to work or even learn how to drive. All labored work was saved for the men. My mom is the youngest of her two sisters and I believe that is when this shift happened in their family particularly. My two aunts are stay at home mothers and do not drive. My mother at a young age was working and continued working years after she gave birth to my brother and I. She still manages to work, clean, do the laundry, cook, and do whatever we ask her to do. She does it all well. The Italian women cater to their families and tend to put them first. Some would say we tend to be spoiled growing up.

The way others are brought up in their cultures are individualized for each family. For my family specifically due to our italian heritage the main important things are food, family, and our religion. These three things are what has shaped my family and the morals we have.

Glossary Items:

Nonni: Italian for Grandparents

Nonna: Grandma

Nonno: Grandpa

Calabria: town in Southern Italy

Sicily: town in Southern Italy

Onomastico: Name Day in Italian

Catholic: Religion

Virgin Mary: Mother figure of Catholic Religion

Jesus: Son and Savior of Catholic Religion

Primo Corso: First Course

Seconde Corso: Second Course

[letmyotpsbecanon]

Venting

This isn't written to or for anyone in particular. I’m at a point in my life where I just don't know who to talk to or HOW to talk to about how i'm feelings. The truth is, things have been hitting one after another and I’ve been taking all the blows like they’re nothing. I feel like I had a legitimate break yesterday.

I went to the emergency room on my birthday on on May 10th of 2019 for a severe UTI. It’s embarrassing but this uti almost gave me a double kidney infection after having lasted for two weeks. I’ve never went to the emergency room for anything. I was urinating blood, through my urinary tract, not period blood. My sides started hurting so badly that I couldn't even lift my legs up onto a couch or my bed without lifting them up with my hands. My stomach was pulsating from the pain. A few weeks later I get a $1,700 bill in the mail and was told by my insurance that this was not categorized as a “true emergency”.

My mom had to move back to my country due to some legal issues we have been facing for 14 years. She will be going back and forth until all the legal issues are dealt with. My grandfather passed away October 25, 2005 and left his entire property to my mother. For some reason, she is still having issues getting the house under her name as the courts feel it necessary to give a portion of this to her half brother, whom I’ve only met once in my entire life. He did not even show up to his funeral but he feels entitled to a peice of the property. He attempted to sell his part and got an outside member involved as that man paid money believing he was getting the entire property. Her lawyer turned his back on her when she told him she would like more money as payment for the house if she were to sell it to him, than an apartment he was offering her.

On September 5th of 2019 I went to a gastroenterologist as I was pooping blood. At first I considered it being hemorrhoids but I have never had any issues with that before. I was pooping blood for 4 days. When I went to my appointment she saw my colon was bloody and informed me of abnormal test results. After a follow up she informed me that the test results came back clear and that the bleeding may have been caused by chemicals used in our food. I now currently  have $4,000 in accumulated hospital bills. PLEASE WATCH WHAT YOU ARE CONSUMING!!

My father, who is the superintendent of the building we live in, received notice of his termination to be on January 15th of 2020. He was planning on retiring in June. They then proceeded to terminate his position on October 21st and told him we had to vacate the apartment by November 1st, giving us only a little over 10 days to find a place to live. We don’t really have anywhere to go. And like many others, we struggle financially. I’ve been considering selling prints of my paintings and even doing custom painted magnets on 2x2 canvases to sell for some extra money.

My family and I moved to the USA as refugees, and I have noticed that many employers think they can take advantage of my immigrant parents as their English is spoken with heavy accents. This is very infuriating but I’m thankful for their hard work. They put three children through college who are now here to provide legal and emotional support.

I am a case manager for formerly homeless and mentally ill people. My job is difficult, mentally, because I have to help these people who are so affected by their mental health and previous traumas prior to, during and post homelessness. I was planning on going to get my masters and become a licensed social worker beginning in the spring semester of 2020, but now that will have to be put off.

I keep telling myself that there is worse out there. That this isn't that big of a deal or that I’m strong enough to handle. My body cant produce the energy to even cry anymore. I know I have to, I know it’s all bottling up. I don't talk about my feelings with people until i’ve already processed them. Now i think the way I am handling all these scenarios is through anger. I find myself becoming violent and destructive of my personal belongings. I guess I wrote this to get this off of my chest. If you actually read all of this, thanks for reading my sorrow and despair!

[zamancollective]

Stories of Life as a Jewish Gymnast in Iran

By Jamie Aftalion

Testimonies by Angel Assil Aftalion

Before my mother and her family fled Iran, she spent her years in Tehran as a competitive female gymnast. Her team was the first Iranian gymnastics group to qualify for the Pan-Asian games and they performed for the Shah’s White Revolutionary Ceremony. This collection of photos and recently-collected testimonies explores her experiences as a Jewish competitive athlete tasked with balancing her passion and her identity. 

“I started gymnastics when I was in first grade, after making aliyah (immigrating to Israel) from Tehran. A girl in our building was taking gymnastics classes, and after every session she would come back and teach me what she learned. Actually- she would meet me in the miklat (missile shelter) and that’s where she would teach me.”

“My dad was a soldier and an athlete, and it was very important to him that his kids were devoted to a sport, so he signed me up for gymnastics lessons [in Israel]. After we moved back to Tehran about 2 years later, I started to compete on a team at the Amjadyeh Gymnastics Federation.”

“Gymnastics gave me a sense of home. Everyone there had one priority in common; we were very goal oriented. I learned that in order to achieve something real, I would have to spend time, energy, pain… I think it was the first thing that taught me real commitment.”

“There was a couple- a husband and a wife- that worked as janitors in the gym and took care of the club and the bathrooms. They would bring tea for us sometimes... a really sweet couple who were nice to everyone. One time they asked me my name and I told them, ‘Angel Assil’. They asked what kind of name that is, because it didn’t sound like a common Iranian name, and I told them it was Jewish. They just said ‘No no no, that’s not possible. You’re such a nice girl, there’s no way you can be Jewish. We won’t call you that anymore.’ The couple insisted on calling me Fatemeh. They kept telling me, ‘You must be adopted, there’s no way such a nice person could be Jewish. That’s not your name.’Honestly, they were the nicest people otherwise. So I just told them, ‘You can call me whatever you want.’”

“Nine out of ten girls on my team were from very impoverished areas. Their parents were generally minimally educated and had never met a Jewish person in their lives. I would have conversations with them, and they asked me if it’s true that Jews use blood in their matzah and if it’s true that Moses had horns. I was really young but I remember just saying..’I don’t think he had horns?’ They all really were good friends and kind people, but they had parents that were very ignorant about Jews and advised their kids to stay away from us.” 

“One time I went over to one of my very good friend Shaheen’s house for tea. When her parents found out that I wasn’t Muslim and I was Jewish, they literally would not touch my teacup. They picked it up with a napkin, so I asked, ‘Are you going to throw that away?’ and her mother said yes, so I just asked to keep it. It was really pretty, so why not? I’m a Jew, what can I say!”

“Shaheen told me later that I was the first Jewish person her mother had ever met.”” 

“After the Revolution began, they started having us (the girl’s team) only use the gym when the boys were gone. Religious Muslim administrators would come to our practices and have us wear head scarves and long sleeves, even during practice sessions when the boys weren’t around. I thought it was kind of annoying but I knew it would be best to not say too much about it. I just wanted to be able to practice.”

“When we left Iran, I had to leave behind all my friends, everyone I knew. Whatever country we were in waiting to come to the US, I would just go to whatever gymnastics club was around. It gave me a home. My first job in Los Angeles was as a gymnastics teacher—I could barely speak English but I knew that’s what I wanted to do. I memorized the sentence ‘I teach gymnastics. Are you hiring?’ and started calling gyms around the city. With the first one to say yes, I immediately hung up and went there because I didn’t know any more English- I just wanted to show them I could do it.”