#the result and i wanted to break this quiz in half. 'what is life when you can't know someone for longer than the night lasts? you left

[deadrlngers]

— OCS AND TRAGIC HORROR TROPES.

i was tagged by @florbelles @henrytlney @denerims @jillvalcntines @devilbrakers @indorilnerevarine @swordcoasts @nuclearstorms to take this quiz for my ocs, thank you all soso much!!!

tagging: i'm pretty sure this made the rounds already jsfkjfkd so i'm not directly tagging anyone but if you see this and want to give it a shot just say i tagged you!! <3

THE FINAL GIRL

the final girl comes out the other end of trauma alive- or, they were supposed to. honestly, you're not so sure you're really alive anymore. you saw the same hurt take those you were closest to while everyone paraded your bruises as bravery, as strength, as if you're the hero. and it hurts. you're tired and you don't want to have to be brave anymore. whatever you went through, it changed so much of who you were that you're still getting used to the person you see in the mirror. you didn't have a say in any of it, but you're here now, and that's gotta count for something. you'll make it count for something. but first, you need to let yourself find rest.

FRANKENSTEIN'S MONSTER

this plight is the simplest of them all: you did not ask for this. you were never given a choice. no part of yourself feels human, just a collection of traits you've picked up from mirroring anyone you could, even the people you meet through a television screen. it's alienating to live that way- yet someone has called you the alienating one. maybe too many people to count. maybe they treated you so uncomfortably inhuman that it's all you can understand now, or you've dug yourself into such a deep hole in an attempt to keep safe that you can't remember a person living in the home of your body at all. being alive is confusing and painful and lonely and loud but living is all there is to being human- you're already there. just take air into your lungs and breathe. close your eyes and picture a beautiful sky. you made that. you painted that yourself.

THE VAMPIRE

it is the loneliest day of a vampire's life, the first time they look into a mirror and see their reflection missing. drinking blood sucks too, don't get me wrong, but as a vampire you had to learn to hide from the sunlight, from your family, all your friends, because you were unavoidably different now and you didn't know how to explain that to them in a way they would understand. you could get stranger's blood in bursts, but what is life when you can't know someone for longer than the night lasts? you left everything behind because it was easier than trying to tell them. i just hope you know you're not the only vampire out there, and that there exist people who will understand your situation without a word. they'll sit with you in the dark for as long as you'll need them to.

[handsome-edvard]

OC insights • Patron Saints

Take this quiz as your OC and share the results. I took it as my OC Afzal. He got…. 🥁

✨patron saint of bones✨

“

patron saint of frameworks. of structures. of solidity. patron saint of things that break. patron saint of things that are left behind. the bones survive long after the body, the building: what is there left for them, when the rest has gone? what do bones do, with nothing to hold around them? who holds the bones?

”

Snippets below cut (all mine):

⚜️The musculature that once made up Afzal heft was cut in half, leaving him lanky and gaunt — skin, bones, and tribal tattoos.

The crowd following Afzal through upper Viper’s Pit was growing. They screamed and sobbed under the partial sun, lowering to their knees and raising their arms in worship, chanting religious hymns relegated to funerals or, in this case, miracles.

“It is Al Azir,” a priestly man in pale robes yelled upfront, his bulging eyes set upon Afzal as he pointed frantically. “Al Azir the Risen, in the body of our lord: Afzal Afzalah!”

~

“Sun and rain.” Afzal smiled partly. The goddess’ presence meant he was dreaming. “Which ancestor does this celebrate?”

“Al Azir Afzalah,” Sonanga replied. “Are you familiar with him?”

“Al Azir the Risen, who was believed dead twice, was witnessed to have survived three fatal injuries and was resuscitated four times from poisoning. Aye,” Afzal settled his attention beyond Sonanga, “my lord father beat his preposterous life story to my memory.”

The man lowered to one knee and poured a cup. “It is a hot day, my saint lord,” he said reverently. “Just drawn this fresh from the well.”

“Thank you.” Afzal gave the man a grateful nod and drank. “How is the mood of the people?”

“Well, my lord,” said the man, “and we are grateful daily for your return.”

“Indeed, my return hath stirred the hearts of many. What sentiments on the brewing war?”

The man smiled grimly, the wrinkles across his tan face deepening. “With Al Azir on our side, my lord, we the people fear nothing. The soldiers shall take heart.”

~

Ser Ridwan turned his head toward Afzal. “The afternoon guard has been dispatched. I could come with you now, if you’d like.”

“In a bit, cousin,” Afzal said. “I want some time to breathe. There is no training for being taken for a revived saint and I must say, the perpetual staring takes getting used to.”

“Now you know what it’s like to be me.”

Afzal grinned at his handsome cousin. A warm breeze caressed his face. “Well, you never were very modest. Besides, the women who fawn over you are wasting their time.”

“Now, my brother is different.” Jibr’il Angel set his dark grey eyes upon Afzal. “The Lord of Viper’s Pit is a man of action. Listen to the ballads they sing of him. Was it not him who vowed to rid Mouzares of its deadly plague?”

“Aye,” the knights chorused proudly.

“Was it not him traveling to the most wretched parts of our kingdom, facing death itself and entering the mouth of hell, for his people to live free of dark magic?”

“Aye.”

“And was it not him,” Jibr’il Angel preached to the point his voice rose, “who was deemed and declared dead in the North, taken by the elements and the creatures of the night, who returned — en chair et en os! — like Al Azir the Risen?”

“Aye!”

[luimagines]

Chain Love Language Headcanons

Masterlist

Self explanatory people!

This time I’ll dive a bit into what love languages the chain will be most inclined to exhibit to their loved ones.

First ones are the ones I personally headcanon and the second are the second result of taking this quiz in their stead.

Let’s go down the list!

Hyrule

I’ve talked about this already, multiple times actually, but oh well.

His biggest way to show his love for others is through Physical Touch.

Whether it’s a hand on the shoulder or an arm around you or hugs or hand holding- you name it- he’ll do it.

The next biggest thing would probably be Quality Time.

He doesn’t have a lot of friends and he has low enough confidence to almost expect to be brushed aside and forgotten- sometimes he tries to let it happen on purpose. 

So take the time to listen to him and include him on things and be close to him.

He appreciates it when someone takes the time to pay attention to him and wants to do something with him even if it’s as simple as checking out an old cave or what shined in the distance.

Be his travel buddy, yeah?

Twilight

Twilights would be Acts of Service.

He likes to feel helpful and useful and knows that there’s a lot that he’s capable of doing so he might as well be the one to do it.

He doesn’t want the people he cares about to work too hard or struggle so he offers his assistance whenever he can. (Watch for this, he can be prone to double book himself and take on more than he can chew).

The next biggest thing would probably be Quality Time.

It’s special for him when he can be with someone he cares about and do something or nothing and just exist next to each other.

He like to listen to people when they talk about things and when they listen to him in return just because they want to- even if neither of you know or care about wat the other person is talking about.

Or even if you get to do something together, anything.

Fishing, horse back riding, strolling through Kakariko Village, hiking- just spend time with him.

Four

Four’s love language would be Acts of Service as well.

He’s a man who always has to have his hands moving. He’s always doing something- he always has to be productive- he has to always be making something.

So he’s quick to put himself to work so that the people he cares about don’t have much to worry about. His brain works too fast for him to keep up with some stuff and he naturally shoulders a lot of work anyway. And if someone helps him out with a project he was struggling with of with the chores around the house that he wasn’t to attend to?

Well he’s bound to repay you tenfold.

He doesn’t make the rules just abides by them.

The next biggest thing would probably be Gift Giving/Receiving.

If this boy receives gifts of any kind he’s going to treasure them forever.

It’s going to go on display (if it can).

and since he’s always on the move with his projects, he’s going to constantly be making things for his friends and loved ones. Small things, big things, things they need to work with or repairing their tools and so on- or just getting them new ones all together- you name it.

Legend

Legend’s love language I think would fit best under Quality Time.

He doesn’t have a lot of friends, he doesn’t have a lot of family.

His whole life has been making connections and losing them either through circumstance or through the passage of time- his life has been nothing but goodbyes.

He cherishes the moments he gets to spend with the people he cares about.

Please spend time with him.

His second would probably be Words of Affirmation.

Similarly with the first one, he’s used to being on a deadline, a set amount of time he can spend with a person and he’s tired of getting to the end and looking back and wishing he could have said something different and or told them something else.

He’s quiet when he tells others that he cares about them- he’s got a large pride that keep him from screaming from the rooftops, but he appreciates it when he’s told that people care about him.

He gets in his head that he’s not good enough, that people don’t care and he’s going to be on his own time and time again.

Please tell him you love him and care about him.

He doesn’t have any one to tell him that they’re proud of him.

If he says that he cares about you, he means it.

Wild

Wild’s love language would probably be Words of Affirmation.

A lot of people write him as being the quietest of the group but hear me out.

He still communicates and he’s loves so much, and he’s not going to be silenced anymore in what he thinks either through sign or his voice.

He’ll tell others he loves then, cares about them, that he’d do anything for them and he’d tell them often.

It means more to him if others tell him something of equal of greater value.

He didn’t get to hear a lot of praise and acceptance growing up and even less so when he joined the guard. It was always things he was expected to do and he had to do it without complaint.

Let him know you care.

His second love language would probably be Quality Time.

He’s spent a lot of time on his adventure alone.

And he wants to share the so much of the world he got to experience with the people he cares about. 

He’s lost a lot of people close to him as well and he doesn’t want to take anyone else’s time on earth for granted. It once seemed like they would be around him forever, but now?

He wants to do everything and see everything and he wants to show you as well.

Even if it’s a simply as horseback riding together or just chilling out as it rains- or he goes to catch frogs in the river, he just wants to spend time with the people he cares about, he happens to have a lot of it now so he wants to put it to good use.

Time

Time’s love language would be Receiving/Giving Gifts.

He didn’t get a lot of things for himself as a child and the things that were given to him were of high importance.

It was ingrained in him to cherish and protect the things given to him with his life if need be. He’s more appreciative of the little things though when people give him a small gift that reminded them of him.

Smaller gifts over one large is more his speed.

He doesn’t need much to be happy but he likes giving things to others as a way of showing his love and hoping that they’ll cherish them as much as he cherishes the things he receives.

His second love language would probably be Acts of Service.

He’s always felt the need to be useful and there’s little that he can do.

Besides his time and energy is another way to give someone a gift right?

Even if it’s not the physical sense where he would have close to nothing to actually give you, he might as well give his strength and body and power to those he loves, to protect them, to make sure they’re safe and warm and never needing anything- so that they’re never without.

Don’t let him over work himself because he will.

Warrior

Warrior’s love language would be Act of Service.

He has a weird relationship with it though.

Because it’s always with underlying feeling of still not being enough- there’s more for him to do, everyone is relying on him and he can’t fail his loved ones so he has to give it his all in everything.

He doesn’t even realize he’s doing it more than have the time so you’re going to have to tell him to calm down. He just everyone he loves to be safe and happy and healthy and it ends up running him ragged half the time.

That being said, his second love language is Words of Affirmation.

Because he’s working so hard for the people he loves, he would rather hear that they’re proud of him and that they love him. 

He’s quick to sprout pet names and sweet nothings to his lover and he wants them to know that he cares about them so this guy doesn’t shut up about his love ever.

He’d leave a note for them to find their work place to let them know that he cares about them.

And he tells them daily. 

He’s quick to tell people how much he appreciates them and how important they are to him.

He knows it keeps people going and he never wants to see his loved ones give up.

Wind

Wind’s love language would be Physical Touch.

He’s always hugging someone or holding onto their arms or their hands, it’s just how he like to be close to people.

His sister tends to grab onto his hand at random intervals so he’s used to it and even grows into doing it to other people.

It’s how he shows that he feels safe with people and how he wants to keep those he cares about within reach in case he ever needs to protect them.

His second love language would be Quality Time.

There’s not a whole of people out on the sea and he’s spend a good portion of his adventures traveling alone and even then, it’s just him, his grandma and his sister.

With everyone going out to do their own thing, it’s hard to find someone who will take the time to do things with him so he appreciate any and every bit of attention he can get from other people.

Sky

Sky’s love language would be Receiving/Giving Gifts.

People on Skyloft are not shy about showing affection for one another.

Handholding and hugs and just telling people you’re important to them are all common place.

It’s not a big deal.

But Sky like to go the extra step beyond to give the people he cares about a small token of his love, so that even when he’s not around to say it, or show it, it’s a little reminder that he cares about them.

And yes, this implies he’d little love notes around for his love to find just because he wants to.

His second love language would be Quality Time.

He just likes being around people and it’s the time when he can tell and show people that he care about them.

It’s the time where he can say he cares and hug the people he cares about- they don’t even have to be doing anything- for all they could be doing is going flying together as the sun sets- he lives for the little moments.

Definitely the kind of guy to be up in the kitchen at 3 am, slow dancing with his lover as they take a break from making cookies.

[fruitcoops]

Would love to see a wired autocomplete interview with coops! 🥰

Anon, did you read my mind? These two have such chaotic energy when they’re given an outlet and it was a true pleasure to write it. Dorcas is exhausted. Sweater Weather credit goes to @lumosinlove!

“Wait, I want to pull the tab,” Remus said, tugging on the edge of the cardboard lightly as Sirius tried to hold it out of his reach without falling off his chair.

“I get to read it out loud for you and then we switch!” Sirius protested, smacking him gently on the head with it. The resulting bonk noise made them both break down laughing.

“You guys know we’re rolling, right?” Dorcas asked as she gathered a stack of cards in her lap, looking highly amused.

“Really?”

“Yeah.” She turned to the camera with a bright smile. “Welcome back to Lion Pride, hockey fans! I’m Dorcas Meadowes and I’m here today with Sirius Black and Remus Lupin to answer some of the internet’s most pressing questions. How are you two feeling?”

“Terrified,” Sirius said.

“The internet is like the Twilight Zone,” Remus agreed. “Who goes first?”

“Sirius, you’ve got a card already. Take it away.”

He cleared his throat and grabbed the edge of the first pull tab, ripping it off slowly. “That is so satisfying, woah. How tall is Remus Lupin?”

“I am five foot eleven and a half.”

“That half inch comes from your sneakers and you know it.”

“It does not!”

Sirius just smiled and removed the next paper slip. “What language does Remus Lupin speak?”

“I speak English and a little bit of French. Tried to learn Spanish in high school, but failed miserably.”

“I love the wording on this one,” Sirius said as he turned the board toward the camera. “Remus Lupin Green Bay Packers.”

“Dammit, now everyone knows my full name,” Remus sighed. “Uh, the Packers are cool.”

“I think people were wondering if you ever played on the team,” Dorcas said.

Remus raised an eyebrow. “Do I look like a football player to you?”

“Next question!” Sirius ripped the tab off and took a good section of the paper above with it. There was a beat of stunned silence. “I am…so sorry.”

Behind the camera, Marlene burst out laughing, along with most of the camera crew. “It’s fine, keep reading.”

“Okay, um…” Sirius squinted at the partially torn-off question. “Remus Lupin name meaning.”

Remus groaned. “I hate this question. Yes, it does mean Wolf Wolf. Yes, my dad’s name also means Wolf Wolf. Yes, my mother’s maiden name is Howell. I’m aware of the endless puns.”

“Don’t you mean a-were?” Sirius asked as a slow grin spread across his face. Remus grabbed the card and bonked him over the head with it.

“Remus, your turn.” Dorcas handed him a poster board and took the blank one.

“I’m going to be careful with this one, unlike somebody,” he teased, kissing Sirius on the cheek. “Is Sirius Black…related to Pascal Dumais?”

“In all the ways that matter, yes.”

Remus grinned when he read the next one. “Is Sirius Black missing a tooth?”

“No!” Sirius gave the camera an offended look. “I have all my teeth, thank you very much.”

“Is Sirius Black mean?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Reporters don’t like you very much.”

“The feeling is mutual. I love the fans though, most of them are so sweet.”

“Oh, I like this one. Is Sirius Black married?” Remus rested his chin on the top of the card and batted his eyelashes, making Sirius laugh.

“Almost! Ask me again in July.” Remus set the card on the floor and Dorcas passed Sirius a new one. “Does Remus Lupin wear glasses?”

“Nope.”

“Does Remus Lupin—I have never said your name so many times in one sitting, my god—does Remus Lupin have siblings?”

“Yup.”

“Does Remus Lupin—”

“Can you elaborate?” Dorcas asked with a laugh. “How many siblings? Names? Ages?”

Remus turned to the camera. “I have one brother named Julian and he’s ten years old. He likes piggyback rides, ice cream, and hockey.”

“Much better. Take it away, Cap.”

“Does Remus Lupin have allergies?”

Remus frowned in confusion. “Why do people want to know that? Uh, yeah, I’m allergic to some pollens. Spring is hell.”

“How many of these do we have?” Sirius asked as he tossed the board over his shoulder and crossed his legs.

“Quite a few! Loops, you’re up.”

“Where is Sirius Black from?”

“Canada.”

“Where does Sirius Black live?”

“The Lions ice rink. I set up a tent in the middle of the goal posts every night so that I’m never late to practice.”

“Sirius Black gay.”

Sirius paused. “I think we’re missing a couple words in there.”

“That’s literally all it says,” Remus laughed, moving it to show him. “Sirius Black gay. I don’t know, honey, Sirius Black gay?”

“Sirius Black very gay,” he confirmed. “Sirius Black thinks people need to have better grammar.”

“Is Sirius Black’s hair naturally curly?”

“No, I use a curling iron every morning to do each individual curl,” he said. “It takes me seven hours and thirteen minutes, and I use a full can of hairspray.”

Remus scooted over so Dorcas could hand him a new card. “He keeps a stopwatch and tries to beat his personal record every time.”

Sirius pulled the first tab away and immediately started laughing too hard to speak.

“What does it say? You can’t just leave me hanging!” Sirius turned the board around and Remus leaned down to read it. “Is Remus Lupin hockey? Yes. I am the entire sport of hockey condensed into one being. I’m coming for basketball next. Thanks for asking!”

It took a few seconds for Sirius to get his breath back. “What is Remus Lupin—”

“I thought we just answered that.”

“—what is Remus Lupin zodiac sign?”

Remus paused. “Is that the thing Pots was talking about the other day? With the quiz?”

“That was love languages.”

“Your zodiac sign depends on your birthday,” Marlene called. “When were you born?”

“March 10th.”

“You’re a Pisces.”

“I’m a Pisces!” he said brightly to the camera. “No idea what that means, but it sounds cool.”

“It means you’re two fish.” She laughed as Remus sucked his cheeks in for a fish face. “Very nice.”

“Thank you.”

Sirius was especially careful as he pulled the paper slip off the next question. “What is Remus Lupin first job?”

“The grammar of these questions is killing me. Um, I worked in the university bookstore during college.”

“On the list of ‘things that don’t surprise anyone’,” Dorcas joked.

“Did Remus Lupin go to college?”

Remus gave the camera a look. “First of all, I have a medical degree. Second of all, did people completely forget about the whole ‘about to be drafted right out of college’ thing? It was a grand total of four years ago! Google it!”

“That’s what they did,” Sirius pointed out, gesturing to the board.

“True.”

“Last one for this card: how old is Remus Lupin?”

Remus thought for a moment. “Y’know, I kind of lost track after the first few centuries. My turn…what is Sirius Black real name?”

Sirius glanced at the camera. “It’s Sirius Black? Is this a trick question?”

“There are people out there who think that’s a fake name,” Dorcas said.

“Um, okay. Yeah, my real name is Sirius Black, my brother is Regulus, my dad is Orion, and I have cousins named Andromeda and Bellatrix.”

“What’s your uncle’s name again?” Remus asked.

“Which one? Cygnus? Phineas Nigellus? Arcturus?” At Dorcas’ surprised look, he laughed. “Oh, I could go all day long with this. That’s the tea on old French families with weird-ass naming traditions.”

“This next one is similar: Sirius Black middle name?”

“Orion.”

“Fun fact: the first time I saw your full name, Moody had written it and I thought it said ‘onion’.” Remus laughed as Sirius’ jaw fell open. “Those three seconds were a highlight of my life. Alright, what’s next…what color are Sirius Black’s eyes?”

“Blue.”

Remus shook his head. “They’re gray, almost silver.”

“Basically blue.”

“There’s nothing basic about you, babe.” Remus slid the board onto the floor and passed Sirius a new one. “Hit me with your best shot.”

“Is Remus Lupin Canadian?”

“I wish.”

“Is Remus Lupin left-handed?”

“No, but a lot of people seem to think that I am.”

“Is—” Sirius cut off with a snort. “Is Remus Lupin scrappy?”

“Are you fucking with me?” Remus asked, leaning over. “Is that actually what it says?”

“Yep.”

“Scrappy? Really?” He shook his head, lost for words. “I mean, I guess. Nobody’s ever called me scrappy before.”

“I don’t like this last one. How much is Remus Lupin worth?” Sirius wrapped an arm around his shoulders and kissed his temple. “You’re priceless.”

“I’m worth at least half a PB & J, but only if you use the good peanut butter. If you use the shitty Skippy stuff, hand over the whole sandwich. My turn! Does Sirius Black have piercings?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.”

“Does Sirius Black have an Instagram?”

“I do. Sblack12, if you want to see pictures of my friends’ kids and this cutie.”

“Is Sirius Black Australian?”

“Fuck off. I’m French Canadian, how the hell did anyone think I was Australian?”

“Sirius Black birthday.”

“I have one.”

“What is it?” Marlene asked. “I’ll tell you your zodiac sign.”

Sirius rolled his eyes. “November 3rd.”

“Scorpio bitch.”

“Hey!”

“On the bright side, Scorpios and Pisces are super compatible.”

“What a relief, I was really banking on our astrology compatibility,” Remus said drily.

Dorcas handed Sirius a fresh board. “First up: can Remus Lupin sing?”

“Eh.”

“The correct answer is yes. What is Remus Lupin like in real life?”

“I’m horrible. I kick every puppy I see and carry one of those sticky hands from arcades to steal candy from children.” A smile twitched at the edges of his mouth and Sirius’ cheeks turned pink from suppressing his laughter. “Like Spiderman, but evil.”

“What happened to Remus Lupin after college?”

“What didn’t happen to Remus Lupin after college?” he laughed, leaning back in his seat. “These past couple years have been bonkers fucking yonkers. I became a PT, got a secret boyfriend, and now I’m engaged and an NHL player. There were, like, three seasons of character development squished into eighteen months.”

“Alright, last one. Why Remus Lupin kissed Sirius Black?”

“Because he’s hot and nice. Also, because he’s my fiancé.”

“Is that the criteria for kisses?” Sirius asked. “I just have to be hot and nice?”

“Pretty much. You’ve got both boxes permanently checked.”

“Final card,” Dorcas warned as she handed it to him. “Make it count.”

Remus cleared his throat. “How does Sirius Black work out?”

“I rollerskate and hula hoop for six hours a day simultaneously.”

“How old is Sirius Black?”

“Ageless.”

“How did Sirius Black meet Remus Lupin?”

“Fun story, actually. You know the movie Ocean’s Eleven?”

“Are Sirius Black and James Potter—”

“Dating.”

“—still friends.”

“Damn, I thought I had that one.” He did a double take. “Still friends? What happened? I saw him an hour ago, tops.”

“You might have to google it,” Remus suggested as he slid the board across the floor. “That’s it!”

“Way to go, guys,” Dorcas laughed. “I know literally nothing new about you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sirius said as the two high-fived. “We were completely honest the whole time.”

She faced the camera with a poorly-hidden smile. “Thanks for joining us today, Lions, and remember to like and subscribe for more content!”

[ferret-not-microwave]

Les Amis Modern AU: What They Wish Others Believed About Them (Part 4)

[I kind of wrote this in response to some general trends in characterising the Amis. There are some stereotypes which I'm not quite comfortable with.]

[So much delay. Sorry.]

Joly:

• Really, really wishes that people don't laugh at him for his anxiety issues. He is truly terrified of getting infected with some disease or the other, and even more terrified of spreading it to Joly and Chetta. It doesn't help that he is one of the most sincere students of the lot, and spends a lot of time reading medical journals, which feed into his panic. He feels safe wearing masks, using rubbing alcohol (or wearing gloves), and having a bag full of basic first aid supplies, and gets embarrassed if anyone judges him for it. Also, he doesn't like it if "concerned" people ask him whether he had a past history of debilitating disease or something, he doesn't want to discuss it at all, okay? -_-

• When Joly fusses about illness in the Musain, it is him letting his guard down. He has to actively rein in his anxiety to function in the hospital, and gets super exhausted from hiding it. His tells in the hospital are are wide eyes behind his protective goggles and a compulsive toying with the wristband of his gloves. He's one of the most courageous individuals ever because of what he faces on a regular basis. He hopes that he might get some reassurance from the Amis to stop his spiralling thoughts, and he mostly gets it.

• Joly definitely has a wild side, and is more than his anxious, serious self. If there's one who can one-up Courf's cheesy pick-up lines, it is Joly. With a eyebrow quirk that leaves everyone giggly and blushing. If there's one who can set a Karaoke stage on fire (not literally, that would be R), it's Joly. If there's one who can down shots to match Bahorel, it's Joly. The one who is the most eager to go skinny dipping? Joly. The one who is, oddly, the most eager to break a pinata? Joly. Joly is more than a "quiet science nerd who checks his tongue in the mirror all the time".

• Joly and Ferre INSIST that they do not talk about random medical trivia all the time. Honestly, their shared interests involve Jane Austen and massive amounts of gossip with tea, along with Doctor Who, Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF TEA, IN EVERY SENSE OF THE WORD.

• There are days he wants to tackle people like an angry Pikachu. But real life is tough, and not everyone has the privilege of confronting people. But he really, really can do without people casting aspersions on his poly relationship with Bossuet and 'Chetta ALL THE TIME. He has been confronted as an "opportunist" in Pride walks, faced with people's pitying look to Bossuet or 'Chetta as though he is stringing them both along or "sharing" 'Chetta with Bossuet, cheered on and slapped on the back by straight cismen for "knowing how to have fun", and once directly asked if he's the one who will marry 'Chetta. He goes into panic often, and for the longest time thought himself a really awful person.

• Beware a Joly in a farmer's market. Not because of haggling, but because some people ALWAYS assume that he's amazing at math while he actually fumbles at the cash counter. Similarly, he hates it if people crack shady jokes about him being a Marie Kondo around him (just because he likes neatness AND MARIE KONDO THANK YOU VERY MUCH). And no, he doesn't like rice all the time.

• Please give back the Tupperwares. Unlike popular opinion, Joly won't chase you down for his Tupperware like some do, and isn't particularly possessive about them. That doesn't mean that he can replace misplaced Tupperwares for all eternity, please. ;_; (Same goes for the beeswax food wraps and dino bandages, c'mon peeps don't help yourself to them indiscriminately ;_;).

• Apart from his baggy sweatshirt and dinosaur pajamas aesthetic, he also has a dress shirt and pleated pants collection that would probably leave Jay Gatsby jealous AF.

Bossuet:

• Is really self-conscious about his receding hairline. He had taken to shaving his head to make it look cool, because he's really uncomfortable with weird jokes about his age and baldness. Shaving heads is pretty high-maintenance at times, and he's slowly opening up to let the hair grow back on the sides of the head for the heck of it. He used to have a large collection of hats too, which he still uses occasionally, but now it is just a fashion accessory, not a way to hide. He likes scarves as well.

• He used to flinch and swallow his discomfort when people would touch his scalp without permission, now he firmly brushes off their hands with a light scowl.

• Similarly, he hates it when people actively try to compare him to Joly. He hates being considered less successful, a "third wheel" to Joly and 'Chetta and someone who can be taken less seriously. This doesn't mean he is jealous or angry with Joly at all though.

• He feels really, really angry when Joly sometimes breaks down in front of him and 'Chetta when confronted with comments on their relationship. He can and will stonewall anyone who hurts either of them.

• Bossuet understands Joly's anxiety because he faces anxiety as well. He often gets nightmares of his "bad luck" turning batshit Final-Destination-esque and resulting in horrible accidents to Joly, 'Chetta amd the rest of the Amis. He knows the "bad luck" jokes are good humouring, but it wears him down a lot in exam/interview/work meeting weeks and leaves him third and fourth guessing himself. He had also entered a bout of depression because the "bad luck" jokes had convinced himself that he can't progress in life because what's the use. It took a lot of work and, oddly, a super niche article from the Amis blog detailing research on how some societies actively ostracize people for being "unlucky" and how it is linked to major societal oppression, to help him.

• Bossuet loves having a heart of gold. Sometimes some people tell him not to be so nice ("what if that person has cheated you off money with a sob story?"). He refuses, because he cherishes being nice and knows his limits. He sometimes worries if he's being stupid, like when the great "attendance-by-proxy" disaster happens. But Marius' broad and grateful smile, "hi, how are you doing?" texts every morning, and monthly batch of AMAZING chocolate cookies makes it worth it.

• Bossuet's accidents do lead to some happy accidents. He stumbled on a whole new recipe of gooey brownies by accident. An amazing combination of dark chocolate and red chilli peppers (maybe not so weird in retrospect)? By accident. He fell upon Courfe's sandcastle once, but it resulted in a rare hermit crab crawling out. Courfe gave a treat at the new brunch place he was saving up for, because apparently that hermit crab had made Ferre all starry-eyed and happier than he had been in weeks. And as for the rest pf the accidents? Nothing that duct tape , 'Chetta, Joly and occasionally Feuilly can't help with. In all, his accidents are always smallish, and never monumental.

• Bossuet can put 'Chetta and Ferre to shame with his eyebrow raising (at least occasionally? Hehe?). He does that a lot when people ask him if he has put water on fire or has fallen into wells. "Like bruh? I don't go anywhere close to wells, I love sidewalks and what's with everyone asking me about the kitchen being on fire?" He also does that a lot to piners (R, Ep, Courfe, 'Parnasse).

• Bossuet is one of Enj's closest friends in Law School (apart from Courfe), because Law classes and shared optional papers. Duh. They often have long discussions which are super pleasant, fluffy, yet sensible because of his really sensitive optimism. Bossuet's unorthodox insights make their way into Enj's notes for ABC meetings, and he credits him always. Similarly Enj bails him out with attendance issues. Bossuet often calmly advices him about R. Since Joly has a similar relationship with Ferre, Bossuet and Joly sometimes help Enj and Ferre sort out lingering grievances between them, or plain hear them out. Enj and Bossuet have Froyo days.

Musichetta:

• Loves, loves, LOVES books. Has no idea why people think nerds come in a kind of stereotype only ("I don't look like you", she complains to Joly and Ferre one day, "but I can defeat you two in a Jane Austen quiz WTF!" They agree emphatically, and Ferre adds "and maybe Jehan too. Maybe".). She is a massive sucker for Comic-Cons and hates men who try to prove otherwise. -_- She loves libraries as much as she loves bars.

• Has no idea why people think she's super bitchy or about to eat them up. Many people plain run when she so much as looks at them while doing a shift as a barista in the Musain. Or ask for "the nicer barista" (Cosette?). When she breathes a sigh of relief when someone treats her nice, she also braces herself for self-righteous "saviours". "Are you sure you are doing okay with those men?" "They are using you!". If she poured milk all over a client's trousers because of such a comment not-so-accidentally, no one needs to know. ;)

• Sometimes, she feels drained out. Having to support both her partners anxiety can leave her down too. They are amazing people, who love her a lot, and know that she needs her recharge time. Often Bossuet takes over in caring for Joly and vice-versa. 'Chetta has a small arrangement with Courfe on those days. If he has free time, the two of them go for an amazing, super relaxing spa session. Bahorel is back-up spa partner. The two of them know not to ask questions, but let her unwind her thoughts and air them out.

• 'Chetta joined Les Amis L'ABC much later. One of her pet peeves were when Joly or Bossuet would go to protests which could easily turn violent because of right wing trolls and the police swarming the city. Specifically, when they went without more than a word or two to her. She would get worried sick, particularly if they couldn't pick up the phone within half an hour of the protest ending, and would cry alone because she didn't want to come off as needy and one of those people who do not support their cause.

• She finally broke down before them after Bossuet had a small concussion. They were really shamefaced at having not thought about her feelings, and their apologies ran for hours. While Joly promised to regularly give her updates, Bossuet asked her to join the ABC if she is comfortable with it. It took time for her to accept that she was being in the group because of the cause and not because she wanted to helicopter-mom Joly and Bossuet, but when the next protest happened, she realised that she was in a place she always wanted to be in.

• The Amis thought that she was a member anyway. She would holler at

• 'Chetta hates it when people think that it's Joly or Bossuet who end up lavishing gifts on her all the time. True, they do, but she does it too. She's a sucker for thoughtful gift giving, and she spoils the Amis A LOT OF TIMES. She can scour the Earth for ideal gifts for her boys, and she often takes care of a stray bill or two, as much as she humanely can. She doesn't play a one-upping battle of gifts though, she just loves a lot.

• She is really self conscious about her small hands and tiny feet. Which seem to her too small in comparison with the rest of her body. Sometimes she used to wear really fluffy mittens in winter to hide how small her hands her. Not so much now. :)

•She confided to Jehan that she didn't like people romanticizing her small hands and feet because she thought they were putting unrealistic standards of the "frail beauty" on her when she was anything but. She said this after she heard R chortle about how Joly had introduced her as having tiny hands and feet. The discussion ended in her gaping and then crying out of laughter because (according to Jehan) apparently Joly was really drunk when he first talked to the Amis about her, and had also said something like "she has fortune-teller eyes, yannow! Ask Bossuet! And her dimples! Marius, you booby, you pool noodle, I know how you feel like when you met Cosette!"

Apparently Bahorel had replied with "you need new pants" and then started laughing like no tomorrow. Bossuet, not so drunk (because he was late to the party), had taken the sensible route and shown the Amis the picture the three of them took after their first date.

• Seriously, she knows zilch about tarot cards or natal charts.

[hanamakkiss]

Drive you home

 Terushima Yuuji x reader

summary: Terushima sends a cute girl home from the bar

(mild) driving after drinking (pls don’t do this)

inspired by the song Crash my Car by COIN

You can crash my car tonight Go out wasting all my time and money I love the way you're breaking my heart And I can't stand to see you leaving lonely

I'll drive you home at the end of the night I'll drive you home at the end of the night

He noticed you immediately when he walked in. How could he not, when you were sitting there, in all your somber beauty. Oh how badly he wanted to sidle over and buy you a drink, make you smile- wait a second, somber? 

The image of you right now strongly contradicted what he knew of you from the lectures you shared. You were normally bright and smiley, surrounded by your friends who all seemed to enjoy your company as much as you enjoy theirs. The few times he had eye-contact with you resulted in a smile from you that made his whole day. 

Pushed along to an empty table, he couldn’t help glancing back at your lonely figure. 

“Whatcha staring at, Teru?” Futamata nods in the direction he was facing.

He whips his head back, “I’m not staring at anyon-, thing” he catches his slip-up, barely.

Bobata turns,”Oh,” he nudges Terushima’s shoulder with a grin, “you mean the girl you’ve been crushing on all sophomore year?”

“I haven’t been crushing on anyone,” he huffs, “she’s just cute, is all.”

“Yea and she looks like she’s about to cry.” he freezes, trying to turn as discreetly as possible while his friends laugh at his expense. You’re looking even worse than before, with your face in your hands and chest rising and falling slowly.

He pushes away from the table, “Sorry guys, y’all mind if I just-” he tilts his head to your direction. 

“Yea yea, we know the drill, loverboy needs to comfort his lady,” Bobata waves him off, smirking worse than before, “try to be nice to her tonight, she looks like she needs it.” he scowled in response.

“I’m not trying to get into her pants,” he says, to a round of laughter and more scowling on his end, “not tonight, anyway.” he muttered under his breath. He stuffs his hands into his pockets while walking over to you.

Schooling his face into a pleasant grin, he sits next to you at the bar. “Hey pretty girl, can I buy you a drink?”

You start, looking up in surprise, wondering how someone had the audacity to interrupt you while you were crying alone to hit on- Oh, it’s that cute boy from that lecture, sociology, was it? You can’t remember.

His smile widens at your silence, “It’s me, Terushima Yuuji, we share a lecture yea? Never had the pleasure of knowing your name.”

You continue to stare. Unfazed, he hits you with a “I know I’ve got a face blessed by the gods, but at the rate you’re staring, you’re gonna make me blush.” 

Shocked (for the second time in 5 minutes) at his boldness, you couldn’t help but let out a short laugh. You heard about him being insufferable, but you hadn’t expected it to be this insufferable. 

You think you see his eyes soften at your laughter, but it might have just been your imagination, you continue on and tell him your name. 

“Hmm, a pretty name for a pretty girl,” he nods, as if praising your parents for the good foresight. You find yourself laughing (for the second time in 5 minutes) at his antics. His eyes sparkle at the sound (it must be a trick of the light.) He orders drinks for the both of you.

“To what pleasure do I owe this meeting?” you quiz him, a small smile playing on your lips.

He falters, looking slightly unsure of himself, “I... wanted to know why you looked so sad,” his eyes dart to the drink in your hand as the bartender hands you another. “and if I could make your night better.” the grin is back.

Once again, this cute blond boy, has rendered you speechless, and you briefly wonder if he was just trying to gain something from you in your vulnerable state. But the earnest look in his eyes that you think you see tells you otherwise. You take a chance.

Taking a deep breath, you begin. “My boy- ex-boyfriend just broke up with me,” looking down, you don’t see the way his composure lapses for a moment. Ah, he thinks, that explains the crying.

“He told me that he just,” your see your hands shake, “just didn’t care about me anymore, that I was too loud, too cheerful, too much,” even your breath was shaky now.

“I mean, I kind of knew it was coming, I just... didn’t expect him to be so cruel about it, you know?” you down your drink and reach for the one Terushima bought you. He nods in agreement, you don’t see the way his grip tightens on his glass.

“I don’t blame him, even though I know I should,”  another sip, “but we’ve been together for so long, I kinda expected him to know to let me down gently, you know?” you feel like you’re just begging for validation now. Luckily, Terushima gives it to you.

“But I guess I should’ve known he wasn’t the type of guy to take my feelings into consideration,” you continue, “he always did prize logic over emotions,” your laugh this time is bitter.

A moment passes before Terushima tentatively places his hands on yours, gauging your reaction. When you didn’t push him off, he tightens his grip slightly. “I can’t really... help you much there,” you look up, “but what I can give you is a fun night to take your mind off it for a while?” he looks unsure, “Only if you want to, of course,” he rushes to add.

You take a moment to study him. His expression falters under your scrutiny. You remember the rumours you heard about him. About how he’s a heartbreaker and about all the girls he left crying in his wake. You compare those rumours to the unsure looking young adult in front of you, you compare it to the way his hands hold yours so delicately, and you compare it to the earnest look you see in his eyes again.

“Okay,” you take the chance. 

His face splits into an impossible grin and the next few hours go by in a blur. He orders drink after drink for you and the two of you are talking wildly about the stupidest of theories. From fantasy soccer rules to which celebrities are actually aliens, you’re pretty sure the bar’s other patrons were getting annoyed. When you finally move on to dance at the bar’s dancing tiny area, everything is perfect.

You were having arguably one of the best nights of your life, but Terushima? Not so much. How could he when he knows that in your mind, it’s not him you’re seeing. Your eyes see through him, even as you’re dancing together, it’s not him you’re with. You’ve proven it multiple times by calling him the wrong name, at which he grimaces slightly but doesn’t correct you (this night wasn’t for him, anyway.) But when you look up at him and smile brightly, he thinks he wouldn’t mind getting called the wrong name for the rest of his life.

At the end of the night, you’re in his car, jamming out to tunes you barely know the words to while he drives to your apartment. He looks over at you and thinks what a stupid guy your ex was to dump you, and how lucky he was to have even experienced your love. Then he laughs when you bump your head on the dashboard.

He sends you up to your apartment door. He stuffs his hands into his pockets while watching you fumble to fit the key into your keyhole. You succeed, turning to give him a triumphant grin. He flashes you a thumbs up, half thinking about how this would probably be the last time he gets to talk to you. The academic year had just ended anyway, and the lecture module you shared was over. You two would probably not cross paths as often. Just as you were about to close the door and he turns to leave, you call out to him.

He’s a little ashamed of how fast he turned back, “yea?”

“Te-terushima, was it?” a nod, “do...do you wanna exchange numbers...?” your already red face deepens in shade. 

He can’t help but smile through your ramblings about how it was presumptuous of you to even assume he wanted to keep in contact with you and cuts you off by handing you his phone, indicating you to do the same. You enter your number and call it, earning a surprise glance from him. 

“Just in case I keyed in the wrong number, you know?” you grimace, “we had a lot of drinks,” but now that you think about it, you can’t seem to recall him ordering any drinks for himself...

He laughs at your realisation, “Don’t worry about it, you can always treat me a meal. So,” he pauses, “I’ll text you tomorrow...?” he lets the question hang in the air.

“Yea, that... that would be nice.” you wonder how much more you can flush.

You say your goodbyes and he turns to leave (once again).

“Oh!” he looks back, “um... thank you, for everything. Ihadagreattimetonightseeyouagain” you manage to sputter out before basically slamming the door in his face.

When Terushima drove home that night, he just knows that if Bobata saw his expression , he would’ve dubbed it “lovesick idiot”, and he really wouldn’t have minded.

Not when it was you he had in mind.

[phroyd]

Rest In Peace, Alex! - Phroyd

Alex Trebek, who became known to generations of television viewers as the quintessential quizmaster, bringing an air of bookish politesse to the garish coli­seum of game shows as the longtime host of “Jeopardy!,” died Nov. 8 at 80.

The official “Jeopardy!” Twitter account announced the death without further details.

Mr. Trebek had suffered a series of health reversals in recent years, including two heart attacks and brain surgery, and was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2019. He continued to host new episodes of his show until production was suspended in March because of the coronavirus pandemic, and then filmed socially distanced episodes that began airing Sept. 14.

For more than three decades, Mr. Trebek was a daily presence in millions of households, earning near-rabid loyalty for the intellectual challenge of his show, in which questions were presented as answers and answers were delivered in the form of questions. By the time of his death, “Jeopardy!” was one of the most popular and longest-lasting programs of its kind in TV history.

Mr. Trebek, the self-made son of a hotel chef, had no sequined co-presenter to match Vanna White on host Pat Sajak’s “Wheel of Fortune.” His show neither attracted nor allowed histrionics, no galloping, shrieking contestants such as those summoned to “Come on down!” on “The Price Is Right” with Bob Barker. Even the “Jeopardy!” theme song, one of the most recognizable jingles on television, was restrained in its dainty dings.

There was no “hot seat” like the chair for contestants on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” with Regis Philbin — a show that “Jeopardy!” purists disdained for its elementary subject matter and inflated prize money.

On “Jeopardy!” there were only questions and answers — or rather, answers and then questions — leavened by the briefest of banter before Mr. Trebek directed his three contestants back to business.

He became known, a reporter for the New Republic magazine once observed, for his “crisp enunciation, acrobatic inflections [and] hammy dignity” as he primly — and with precise pronunciation — relayed clues in categories such as “European Cuisine,” “U.S. Geography,” “Ballet and Opera,” “Potent Potables” and “Potpourri.”

“The folding type of this cooling device became accepted in China during the Ming dynasty,” Mr. Trebek might declaim, as competitors raced to buzz in with the reply, “What is a fan?”

“Jeopardy!” was the creation of singer and talk-show host Merv Griffin, whose TV empire also included “Wheel of Fortune” and “Dance Fever.” His wife, Julann Griffin, proposed the show’s conceit. If players provided questions instead of answers, she said, then “Jeopardy!” would be safe from the high-profile cheating scandals that plagued TV quiz shows in the 1950s.

The Griffin brainchild aired on NBC from 1964 to 1975, then returned as “The All New Jeopardy!” from 1978 to 1979, both times with the stately actor Art Fleming as host. Mr. Trebek took over when the show was revived in syndication in 1984, also serving during his first several seasons as producer.

Much like his program, Mr. Trebek indulged in few frills. He favored conservative suits. When he shaved his signature mustache in 2001 — “on a whim,” he said — his viewership erupted in titillation.

The most exuberant flourish about the show might have been the exclamation mark in the title. Mr. Trebek, for his part, emitted few if any exclamations as he led contestants through the first round of clues; then a second, higher-stakes round dubbed “Double Jeopardy!”; and then “Final Jeopardy!,” in which players could wager all or some of their earnings on a single stumper.

“My job,” he told the Associated Press in 2012, “is to provide the atmosphere and assistance to the contestants to get them to perform at their very best. And if I’m successful doing that, I will be perceived as a nice guy and the audience will think of me as being a bit of a star. But not if I try to steal the limelight! The stars of ‘Jeopardy!’ are the material and the contestants.”

(Perhaps the show’s greatest stars were Ken Jennings, who reigned over the grid for 74 shows in 2004, claiming $2.5 million in winnings, and Watson, the IBM computer that defeated Jennings and another champion, Brad Rutter, in 2011.)

Fans who attended tapings of the show received a rare insight into Mr. Trebek’s dry humor when he held forth with them during commercial breaks, cutting up about how he didn’t “like spending time with stupid people,” which resulted in his having “very few friends.” He often regaled the crowd with tales of his DIY home-improvement projects.

He said his breakfast consisted of a Snickers and Diet Pepsi, or a Milky Way and Diet Coke. And he was not always as staid as he might have seemed, once tearing his Achilles’ tendon when he chased a burglar from his hotel room in 2011.

But to most “Jeopardy!” viewers, Mr. Trebek was akin to a neighbor they saw every day without becoming intimately acquainted. In a tribute to Mr. Trebek after his cancer diagnosis was announced, Jennings affectionately described him as “a riddle wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a Perry Ellis suit.” One of the few clues to his past was his slight Canadian accent.

George Alexander Trebek was born in Sudbury, Ontario, on July 22, 1940. His father was a Ukrainian immigrant, and his mother was French Canadian. In a memoir published in July, “The Answer Is . . . Reflections on My Life,” Mr. Trebek described a childhood marked by poverty and illness, including a painful form of rheumatism that he developed after falling into a frozen lake at age 7.

Mr. Trebek said that he considered becoming a priest but did not enjoy his experimentation with a vow of silence. “I was a very good student, but leaned more toward show business than anything else because I had a way of entertaining the class,” he told the Toronto Star. “I wasn’t the class clown, but always prominent — even when I was quiet.”

He said he was nearly expelled from boarding school and then dropped out of a military college after three days because he did not wish to subject himself to a buzz cut.

Mr. Trebek began working at the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. while studying philosophy at the University of Ottawa, where he graduated in 1961. As a broadcaster for radio and television, he delivered coverage in English and French, reported on news, weather and sports, and hosted “Reach for the Top,” a popular teen quiz show.

In 1973, Mr. Trebek came to the United States as host of “The Wizard of Odds,” a short-lived game show created by fellow Canadian Alan Thicke.

“It was canceled on a Friday, and I was disappointed, of course,” Mr. Trebek once said on “The Dan Patrick Show,” a sports talk program. “It was replaced the following Monday by a show called ‘High Rollers,’ which I also hosted. . . . After two and a half years, it was canceled, and it was replaced by another show which I hosted. So I have the either great honor or dubious honor of having replaced myself on three different occasions.”

Mr. Trebek, who became a U.S. citizen in 1998, also hosted shows including “Double Dare,” “The $128,000 Question” and “Battlestars.” He subbed for Chuck Woolery, Sajak’s predecessor on “Wheel of Fortune,” bringing him to the attention of Griffin. For a period Mr. Trebek hosted “Classic Concentration” and “To Tell the Truth” while also presiding over “Jeopardy!,” where he reportedly commanded $10 million a year.

As “Jeopardy!” host, Mr. Trebek participated in national contestant searches and shepherded the first teen, senior and celebrity tournaments. He also contributed clues, drawing from his knowledge in such arcane fields as oil drilling and bullfighting. He personally reviewed all clues before taping a show and claimed that he could answer about 65 percent of them correctly. If he judged one too difficult, he asked writers not to use it.

“I’ll say, ‘Nobody’s going to get this,’ ” he told the New York Times in a 2020 interview. “And they usually take my suggestions, because I view myself as every man.”

By the time Mr. Trebek completed 30 years as host, “Jeopardy!” reached 25 million viewers a week. His Emmys included a lifetime achievement award, and, in 2013, he ranked No. 8 in a Reader’s Digest poll of the most trusted people in America. Jimmy Carter, the highest-ranking president on the list, arrived at No. 24.

A ubiquitous presence in pop culture, Mr. Trebek appeared in the “Got milk?” advertising campaign, in films including “White Men Can’t Jump” (1992) and on television shows including “The Simpsons” and “The X-Files.” In a memorable episode of “Cheers,” Mr. Trebek welcomed as a contestant the postal carrier Cliff Clavin (John Ratzenberger), the sitcom’s most undesirable bachelor, in a round of “Jeopardy!” with categories including “beer,” “mothers and sons” and “celibacy.”

Mr. Trebek was spoofed on “Second City Television,” the Canadian TV sketch show, and “Saturday Night Live,” with comedian Will Ferrell, as his impersonator, barely containing his contempt for dimwitted contestants on “Celebrity Jeopardy!”

“I’ll take ‘Swords’ for $400,” Sean Connery, portrayed by Darrell Hammond, intoned in a Scottish accent when the category of clues was in fact “ ‘S’ Words.”

Mr. Trebek’s first marriage, to Elaine Callei, ended in divorce. In 1990, he married Jean Currivan. A complete list of survivors was not immediately available.

Little changed about “Jeopardy!” as the years wore on for the show, for Mr. Trebek and for fans. Newfangled topics, such as twerking, were occasionally introduced. Over time, contestants revealed themselves to be more familiar with Dan Brown, author of “The Da Vinci Code,” than with the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the New Republic noted. And Mr. Trebek was called upon to learn to rap to read certain clues.

But mainly the show stayed “comfortable, like an old pair of shoes,” Mr. Trebek once said. In its constancy, it became all the more comforting for the legions of fans who turned to “Jeopardy!” for its promise of clear right and wrong answers in a world where the matter of what is true was increasingly subjected to partisan debate.

“There’s a certain comfort that comes from knowing a fact,” Mr. Trebek told the Times in July. “The sun is up in the sky. There’s nothing you can say that’s going to change that. You can’t say, ‘The sun’s not up there, there’s no sky.’ There is reality, and there’s nothing wrong with accepting reality. It’s when you try to distort reality, to maneuver it into accommodating your particular point of view, your particular bigotry, your particular whatever — that’s when you run into problems.”

Phroyd

[missbrunettebarbie]

Questiong my secodary and the effects of mysoging during my childhood

Or how I figured out I am a Snake/Lion whose secondary is very, very burnt and has a Badger secondary model I really enjoy but can feel suffocating sometimes.

For the longest time I was sure I am a Snake/Lion. The Snake part is easy. Before discovering sortinghatchats, I thought everyone was some sort of Snake primary deep down. I was raised in a loyalist-heavy culture and my primary was always encouraged.

However, my Badger secondary is another story. I always suspected my secondary may be a wee bit burned so I never managed to figure it out before the sorting quiz came out. And on that quiz I got Badger secondary. It didn't feel right at first, but it didn't feel wrong either. Pottermore also sorted me as a Hufflepuff, so I figured it picked up on the Badger secondary. There are a lot of Badger secondary things I do: working hard, taking care of people and playing peacemaker is something I've always done. Something I am very good at. But I don't enjoy it. Not. At. All.

I like shortcuts! A lot. I like being frank with people. I hate being polite when well I want to do is rant and scream. I like rules, but I really enjoys breaking them when I can.

This does sound a lot like a Lion secondary, doesn't it? Except, I always thought I didn't fit the other aspects of the Lion secondary.

"I am not good at improvisions", I tell myself because my whole life someone told me I am slow-witted and narrow-minded and sometimes even stupid. And it's true. Or at least, it is now. Because I heard this so many times, I started to believe it. The few rimes when I am fast at thinking on my feet are mostly a result of my (weak) Snake secondary model (also developed as a response to abuse and trauma).

Yesterday, I had to sacrifice my true feelings in order to play nice with someone because I might need them later. And I hated it so much I had a breakdown for two hours. Which made me think that I might not be a Badger after all. I am 90% I am Lion, but my secondary was burned to a crisp because everyone (and I do mean every single family member who raised me) kept telling me it was wrong. It was bad. "You are a girl, you need to mind your manners. To be polite. To smile. You can't be overemotional. You'll get nowhere in life." Men can scream and threaten all they want, but the women need to be patient, to take care what they say and when they say. Don't upset your dad! Don't upset your grandpa! Be nice to ypur aunt and uncle! Never argue with a teacher, they are always right. Keep your mouth shut around your elders!

Basically my entire childhood, my secondary was slowly burned by the well-intentioned, but very wrong teachings of my family.

Ever since then I tried every model. A Snake model created for my dad and sometimes my teachers that I suck at using. A Bird model created after my mom's scary Bird secondary that I could never truly access to its full potenatial. And finally, a Badger model after my grandma's secondary that I could use easily, that was pretty effective for a decade and a half now.

But the best I felt was always when I could tell everyone exactly what was on my mind. When I stood by my decision even when my entire class hated me (it happened more than once xD). When I stood up for those I felt were wronged.

All of these make me think I am Lion secondary that burned very young and very badly because Lion secondaries aren't acceptable in the society I grew up nor in my family. Especially not if you are a girl.

P. S. One of the reasons I started to question my secondary is because I never really loooved/stanned a Badger secondary character yet. In fact, the characters I find most admirable and who I really envy are the Lions secondary. Unsurprising, my most beloved character ever is a Snake/Lion and so is my favourite OC who also happens to be my power fantasy.

[wolfpawn]

The History Books Forgot About Us and the Bible Didn’t Mention Us

Summary - While reading a detailed summary of Tom Hiddleston's past lovers, his first one finds herself reminiscing. Based on the song “Samson” By Regina Spektor, lyrics are at the bottom. 

She didn’t know why she did it. Usually, she avoided any mention of him, it was easier that way. But this one time, she did and it still hurt to see those gorgeous blue eyes looking back at her. He had become far more distinguished and bespoke, not the floppy-haired goof she fell in love with. She flicked through the words, the names of many beautiful and famous women and pictures to boot sprawled on the page in front of her, there was even two or three names of people that were not famous, his long arm around them, both canoodling together. She looked as the dates went back to the mid-2000s, then stopped. No mention of her. She never thought there would be and would not like to be known to the world, but it hurt too. She had existed, she was part of his life, for three and a half years, they were together, happy and in love, now, she was nothing. Biting her lips together, she looked at the box on her wardrobe. Getting up from her seat, she walked over and got out the decently sized container and opened it. It was covered in dust. She put it on there when she moved in four years previously and never put anything on it, so dust settled over time, something there was a slight irony in. She brought it to the bed and wiped off the dust before gently opening it. 

The contents were just as she had left them. Their years of not being used or touched meant they were in good condition. In part, she was glad it was before the more computerised era, when photographs still were more popular. She smiled at the fuzziness of a lot of the pictures, taken by drunk students on college nights out, some at family events, two even were attempts at selfies before they were even called such but there was one common theme to them. They were of her and Tom. 

They met in Cambridge on a quiz night. She and her friends had arranged it to pay for a society trip. It was in the closest bar off-campus and a lot of other students went for something to do. Cambridge had a lot of students wanting to show their knowledge over a pint, it meant everyone and everyone was there. She was in charge of collecting the answers between rounds. There were guys everywhere, from sports teams to the quieter societies. She was collecting the answer sheets when her fingers touched those of the guy handing her the page. There was a spark before she ever looked at him through their touch. She had been already looking to the next table in hopes of getting them to ready their sheet, but the tingle up her hand made her turn to see the most gorgeous blue eyes she ever bore witness to. His auburn curls bounced as his head moved and his smile was beaming. It startled her. ‘Oi, Hiddles, let the lady get on with her job, she won’t like you if you tease her too much’ one of his friends, Mark, she would later learn had jested. Tom let go of the card with a soft sorry before looking, less than subtly at her, his eyes showing his approval of what he was looking at. For the rest of the night, the pair eyed one another any time they were within view of one another, their friends urging them both to talk to the other. When he approached her at the end of the quiz, chosen from his table to collect their second prize, his friends urging him to do so. 

“Your prize.” She handed him the £50 voucher for the local off-licence.

“Thank…” He read the voucher. “That’s an interesting prize.”

“We’re students. The only thing more valuable than booze is books.” She joked back, unable to stop herself blushing as his voice made her feel more lightheaded than she would care to emit. 

“I...well, that’s true yes.” He chuckled. His laugh was different but she liked it. “I can hardly argue that when I am half sloshed. Listen, I don’t mean to sound rude and you can tell me to toss off if I am being a twat but…” He watched as she added another piece of paper to his voucher before walking off. 

From their vantage point, her friends informed her that the guy she had been oogling all night had taken her number smiling.

It was not long before the texts started, Tom Hiddleston, commonly called ‘Hiddles’ by his friends. Studying classics, Eton educated, sweet, a bookworm and an avid lover of theatre. It was no surprise he was on the DramSoc team. They met, not for drinks, which startled her slightly, but for lunch. He stated he wanted to get to speak with her more and the college bar was loud and busy. He also wanted to be sober, to not make a twat of himself, he later informed her. 

Before long, they were officially dating. He spent considerable time in her apartment and her in his. Their friends, though two different groups, got used to seeing them together. They rarely got home at weekends, but when they got home for Easter holidays, they spent so much time texting and talking, it was clear to their families they were smitten. She was Tom’s first. First girlfriend, first time, not his first kiss though, but at nineteen, that was hardly surprising. 

Summer came and they forewent going back to their families and went and found an apartment that they shared with Mark, his girlfriend and Sam, another girl from her course. They juggled shifts in different small jobs to pay to stay there, their parents helping with the rent. For the rest of their time in college, they always were seen together outside of college-related activities. When she needed to go to France for six weeks for her course, they missed each other no end. After four weeks, the loneliness became too much and he surprised her by coming over. She remembered him walking up behind her in the street and terrifying her. Sam told him where they were staying and where they would so he could surprise her. That, Sam told her, was revealed years later by Tom in an interview. He never mentioned her name but he did mention it was his first girlfriend. She didn’t know what to think about that. 

After college, they moved into a small dingy apartment together in London. It was tiny and less than perfect but it was their first place that was just theirs. They spent most of their time there but also wandered into the countryside for some time in silence and calm. There they lay on blankets and looked at the night’s sky, stars glistening above them. 

When Tom applied to RADA, he sat looking at his computer, wondering if it was the right thing to do. She told him it was right for him, she pushed him to follow his dream to go on stage and help him to prepare to speak to his stoic father on his less than approved choice of further education. She did everything she could to help him all through it. The night before he was due to start college, he got in late from his waiting shift and cursed that the barbers were closed when he finished. She took his hair and cut his curls a little just to neaten them. Tom was topless, a slice of toast in his mouth as she did it with a pair of scissors entirely unsuited to the task. When he turned his head for a moment at the sound of a bang from a neighbouring apartment, he caused her to snip a long curl too short. For a moment, the pair stared silently at the curl before they both erupted in giggles. It was not possible to see the short strands in the mess of curls. In jest, she took the snipped curl and placed it in a small plastic bag that housed a spare button in one of her jackets. Tom, who had a polaroid camera as a result of a joke present, took a snap of the two of them. She taped the hair and the date to the back of the photo. ‘Wait and see, this will be worth a fortune someday. You are going to be as big as Branagh or Stewart, I know it.’ She meant it fully. She knew he was something special, that was why she pushed him so much. Tom brought her to him and kissed her. For the rest of the night, they were in one another’s arms, small whispers of love and copious kisses swapped between them. 

But life started to show them that perhaps they were not meant for the same things. Tom got a few small parts in productions. He was starting to get attention from other girls. She knew she could trust him but she also knew that it hurt her more than she could admit to see him pretend to be close to other women. It started to play on her slightly. When the auditions started, she pushed him to go, then secretly wished he would not get certain ones. Looking at herself in the mirror one day, she realised it was hurting too much. There was never a chance she would ask Tom not to continue to pursue his dream. Her problem was hers. It took another week but she finally spoke to Tom. She knew she had to ensure he never thought he was at fault. Seeing his eyes show his emotion as she spoke the words she wished she did not have to say broke her heart all the more. They both cried that night. He begged her to not leave but she knew she had to. He pleaded with her to tell him what he could do to change it but she said more and more that it wasn’t him, it was her. She tried to break down her hangups, but she couldn’t. Tom asked that they just spend one last weekend as a couple. They did. In one another’s arms, she swore it was not him, that she wanted him to wow the world with his talent. 

Moving out her things crushed her. Tom was busy with college so he was not there for the worst of it. Some of her favourite moments they shared, she put carefully into a box to bring her. The box she was looking into sadly at that moment. The polaroid in her hand. On the back, the curl still there. 

She tried to find happiness through time after. She dated multiple men but 99% of them never got past the first date. No one could fault her for trying, but the longest lasted only four months. No one mentioned it anymore. She had tried but no man ever made her feel like Tom did. Her career was good, she spent her life going around the world, translating for all sorts of things. She had seen everywhere she ever wanted to see, though some places came with a pang of sadness having previously been there or planned to go there with Tom. She wished sometimes that they had stayed in touch but she needed the clean break. She wanted to show him the places she went but she didn’t have the means to contact him again. She regretted that now. 

Placing the box back on the wardrobe, she knew the day would come that she would need to get rid of that box but she couldn’t, not yet. Maybe someday. She looked at the article again. The extensive dating history of Tom Hiddleston, from confirmed girlfriends to rumoured flings and hookups, all of them listed, many worthy of a photograph. But nothing of her. 

She glanced over the words of the article, all filled with an adoration of this English Gentleman, polite, respectful, handsome. This wasn’t news to her, she knew it from the start. The hoards of adoring fans who loved him without falter were mentioned. 

But she loved him first. 

Samson Lyrics 

Lyrics You are my sweetest downfall I loved you first, I loved you first Beneath the sheets of paper lies my truth I have to go, I have to go Your hair was long when we first met Samson went back to bed Not much hair left on his head He ate a slice of Wonder Bread And went right back to bed And the history books forgot about us And the Bible didn't mention us And the Bible didn't mention us, not even once You are my sweetest downfall I loved you first, I loved you first Beneath the stars came fallin' on our heads But they're just old light, they're just old light Your hair was long when we first met Samson came to my bed Told me that my hair was red Told me I was beautiful And came into my bed Oh, I cut his hair myself one night A pair of dull scissors in the yellow light And he told me that I'd done alright And kissed me 'til the mornin' light, the mornin' light And he kissed me 'til the mornin' light Samson went back to bed Not much hair left on his head He ate a slice of Wonder Bread And went right back to bed Oh, we couldn't bring the columns down Yeah, we couldn't destroy a single one And the history books forgot about us And the Bible didn't mention us, not even once You are my sweetest downfall I loved you first

[ythmir-writes]

may I request soft + lucifer?

fandom: Obey Me!

feat: Lucifer

no warnings!

A/N: and thank you for requesting him! my first Obey Me fic is for my bestest boi, so i am v happy ﾟ*｡(･∀･)ﾟ*｡

Soft

Lucifer entered the study and was not surprised to find Kita poring over their mountain of notes, muttering something under their breath. From the way their forefinger was repeatedly going over a line, it seemed they were intent to memorize a certain passage before turning the page.

He closed the door and kept his gaze on them as they continued to mutter, closing their eyes as their fingers began tapping on the table to help with some rhythm or other. Twice, they blew out a breath in frustration. And then they nearly swore, grabbed the book in both hands and looked for all intents and purposes, as if they were scolding it for being utterly confusing and hard to remember.

Lucifer nodded to himself. This was good.

He was pleased to see that Kita was taking the RAD midterms very seriously and he took satisfaction in knowing that they had taken his warnings of torture and hellfire, should they fail, to heart. Everyone should take his warnings to heart; it would save him all the trouble.

But as Kita carried on, Lucifer found that he was somewhat displeased all the same.

Kita had not noticed Lucifer enter study, nor did they turn their head to where he stood, continuing only to stare at the book in front of them.

Lucifer had half a mind to call out to them. How long had it been since they started studying now? Perhaps it would be best for them to pause and take a break?

But he hesitated, remaining by the door with Kita’s name and the words he wanted to say only half-formed on his tongue. Because reaching out would mean distracting Kita from what he had told them to do. He disliked the idea of pulling them away from what looked like a good flow in their work, and consequently opening himself to the possibility that he would be used as an excuse to discontinue any studying.

Besides, did he not himself disliked the idea of being interrupted whenever he was busy? Did he not go to great pains to make sure none of his brothers would make a mess when he needed to concentrate?

And yet.

It would seem that Lucifer disliked the idea of remaining unnoticed more.

So what exactly was he hesitating for? Surely, it was only a matter of calling Kita’s attention now, wasn’t it?

Lucifer took a deep breath, slightly unnerved that his thoughts would wander about before he could make a decision – but before he could even call to Kita, they had startled, turned their head, and looked at him.

“Oh, Lucifer.” Kita said, putting down the book. “I didn’t notice you there.”

“Yes.” Lucifer said, tone even, biting down the words you didn’t as he collected himself and ignored how now he was certain he very much disliked what he had just experienced and heard. But there was no sense in letting Kita know, much less any sense in allowing his mind to drag the issue further.

“I happened to pass by and saw the lights were open. You’re hard at work.”

“Yeah.” Kita repressed a sigh. “I’m in a bit of a rut, though. Hell has extensive history and I am trying very hard to memorize these names but it’s all just…” They trailed off, made a face that was almost one of distaste.

Lucifer waited for them to continue, using the silence to bridge the gap between them. When Kita only angled their head at him, Lucifer shook his in understanding.

“It bored you, didn’t it?”

“Not exactly…”

Lucifer almost snorted. “Trying to lie to a Demon, now?”

“Okay, fine.” Kita raised their hands. “But I was not bored, you know, exactly. I just felt it was all very monotonous.”

Lucifer quirked a brow.

Kita continued at his prompting. “I had thought that Hell’s rulers would have had more experiences that involved war and killing. You know, backstabbing and drama and mayhem! Instead, Hell’s history has been nothing but boring procedure and inheritance and deciding if a cousin or two could rule some lower province!”

“We are Demons.” Lucifer said. “Not uncultured savages.”

“I didn’t say that and you know I don’t mean it that way.” Kita rolled their eyes in mock exasperation, waved their hand at the book. “But this is all just so uninspiring and plain. If I wanted to know about Diavolo’s lineage and how much pedigree he has, I should be reading it from a very fancy and very elaborate Family Book. Not a book entitled History of Hell: In-depth Analysis of Important Historical Events.”

“That’s fair.” Lucifer chuckled. He’d had the same thoughts with the class then. “You better make extra effort then. I’ve heard that test is particularly tricky.”

Kita groaned into their hands.

“And you better not fail.” Lucifer reminded them.

“Sure. Your murderous pep talk last night at the House is a great motivator. Keeps replaying in my head how anything that will tarnish the name of the Great Lord Diavolo deserves only pain.” But Kita did not sound enthused.

“Punishment is the best motivator.”

Kita lifted their face from their hands. “Must it always be about punishment –”

“We are literally in Hell.”

“ – can’t I simply want to be a good exchange student and make you proud?”

Lucifer raised a brow and snipped away the tendrils of warmth that threatened to wrap around what little remained of his heart. He could not help but repeat what Kita had just said in disbelief. “You want me to be proud of you?”

“Humans can be very competitive!” Kita hurriedly added as they rubbed the back of their neck. An attempt, Lucifer noted, to hide the blush they usually had on that spot. “Can’t lose to Demons – even if they are the Lords of Hell – Luke won’t let me hear the end of it if I got less marks than Mammon or Asmo.”

Right. Right, of course. It would not have anything to do with him.

And yet.

And yet.

Lucifer nodded. “Then do your best to make sure the little chihuahua won’t have anything to bark about.”

Kita averted their gaze. “Right.”

Silence lingered between them; Kita looking down at their book, hands still on their neck, Lucifer still standing and not quite knowing how to carry on with the conversation.

He should go. He should leave Kita to their studies, as was his original intention. He shouldn’t take more time than he already did from their schedule and he shouldn’t say anything further that would only prove to be distractions for the two of them. Idle conversation that would most likely lead to nothing unproductive. Besides, they would need a lot of time memorizing all the names –

“Well, then –”

“Lucifer, look – ”

They started to speak at the same time, stopped at the same time, and stared at each other waiting for the other one to start again.

“You go.” Kita then said.

“No, you continue.” Lucifer said, placing emphasis on his next words. “I insist.”

Kita seemed to recognize the tone he used as the one that brooked no argument. They took a deep breath, hesitating at first, before very slowly patting the book in front of them. “Can you help me with this?”

“What?”

“I mean – if you’re not too busy, of course.”

Lucifer stared at them as they continued to ramble, continued to explain that they knew Lucifer was also studying for exams on top of council duties but that he did tell all of them to study well – and they were trying, all the brothers have sworn off any shenanigans for two days – but they also know he’d aced this test before and Kita was, quite frankly, completely at a loss so if he could help them and maybe quiz them so they could retain the names more, that would be immensely helpful and they would be forever grateful.

“And,” Kita continued, nearly out of breath, “if you have any nuggets of wisdom now is the right opportunity to maybe share.”

Lucifer knew he could count the times when prizes had been so deliberately placed in front of him for the taking with little effort, knew he’d not even reach the count of three, knew that all he needed to do at the moment was to pluck the gem laid out before him and take it for what it was: a golden opportunity best taken advantage of while it lasted.

These moments were far and few in-between; life had never really been kind to him.

But he could not help but be a fool – a prideful fool – who distrusted anything he did not schemed for or forcibly took. “What it’s in it for me?”

“What?” Kita looked genuinely bewildered.

“What do you offer in exchange for my help?” Lucifer leaned on the table, wanting nothing more than to take back what he said and yet couldn’t. Or wouldn’t. “My help comes at a cost.”

“Cost? I’m just asking for – oh. Oh.” Kita clasped their hands together, eyes brightening.

And again, this took Lucifer by surprise. He had expected them to sulk, or retract their plea, or at least be annoyed at him. Kita had come from genuine need for results – a result he had demanded of them – and here he was demanding something from them again. If Lucifer were in Kita’s position, he would not hesitate to turn the offer down. Violently. Part of him had even prepared for the possibility that Kita would be angry.

But they were not. Far from it.

How was it so easy for them to take him by surprise?

“Of course! Because Demons will never do anything without this weird give-me- your-soul-in-exchange-for-a-wish thing, huh?” Kita laughed.

Lucifer found himself staring at them again. “Not your soul – ”

“I know, I know.” Kita waived their hand, stopping him mid-sentence. A rare thing – how many times had they interrupted him in the five minutes since this conversation started? “I’m a treasured exchange student, my soul isn’t up for grabs, blah blah blah.”

Kita looked at him with a determined glint in their eyes now, and the warmth that Lucifer had turned away earlier came back with a vengeance and with no intention of going away.

“First though, if I do pass the test than that means I won’t be suffering any tortuous punishment.” Kita said. “And you have to treat me to Devildom’s best ice cream.”

“It’s a little too late to change the terms to our first agreement but, all right.” Lucifer agreed. “As for my terms –”

Kita interrupted him for the umpteenth time. “If I score lower than Mammon, I’ll treat you to ice cream.”

“How utterly dull.” He scoffed. “If you score lower than any of my brothers, you will have to treat me to something from the human world that I have not yet tasted.”

“What?!” They gasped. “That’s impossible!”

“I think it’s only fair. Since it is in my interest that you pass this test with flying colors, it is only common sense that I put in such parameters to this new agreement. Besides, I’m the one rendering service, shouldn’t I be the one who gets to say my price?”

“Well, yeah…” Kita chewed on her lip. “But hang on, does this mean your reward is to actually see me pass the test?”

“Do not misunderstand. I expect all of my efforts to bear nothing but the best fruit and as such your passing is but the natural course. However, in the unlikely event that you do fail, then my reward is the execution of your punishment and the pleasure of something novel from the human world.”

Kita slowly nodded. “I was expecting something else, really.”

Lucifer raised both brows, curious.

But Kita only shook their head. “But more importantly, do you seriously think I can top Satan’s score?”

“Of course.” Lucifer answered, taking the empty seat beside them. “I am the one tutoring you, am I not?”

Kita grinned widely at that. “You should not let Satan hear that.”

“I have all the confidence in my skills and all the faith in yours.”

“Whatever.” Kita’s hands went to their neck again. “But all right. Deal. I can practically taste my ice cream already.”

Lucifer took out his personal pen, flipped open the book to where Kita was last reading. “Now, I want you to look at these names and tell me what stands out to you the most.”

It was only when Lucifer was sure Kita was immersed again on their textbook did Lucifer allow himself the softest of smiles. Something that he knew he never believed he could do.

Lucifer did not count how many hours passed as he and Kita went over dates, places, names that were too familiar, too weird, and too closely spelled to be any different from all the others. He did not count how much snack they both consumed or how much coffee Kita managed to guzzle in-between bathroom breaks. Nor did Lucifer count how many times he had sensed his brothers peaking at them from the door, with him bracing himself for any interruption. But none of them entered – if only in their respect for Kita and what they wanted to accomplish.

But Lucifer did count the times Kita was close enough that their arms brushed against each other, and the times Kita would lean over to where he was point at the map and he could smell their perfume. Lucifer counted the times Kita smiled triumphantly at having recalled something faster, the times they rubbed their cheeks in frustration, and the times they laughed at his comments on about Devildom history.

He counted. And each one, he tucked inside that warmth spreading in him, making him feel a lot of things he would not bother counting or saying out loud.

35/182

[katefiction]

Breaking Up

by katefiction (Maria) / 2012

Will parked up outside Kate’s Chelsea flat. A couple of hours earlier she’d text him, ‘can you come over, we need to talk x’, it said. Just one ‘x’ at the end, Will had thought, she must be angry. So he hadn’t called her for two days, it wasn’t a big deal.

Will let himself into the flat. Kate had given him a key when she moved there. He walked through the hall and into the kitchen, where Kate was standing boiling the kettle.

‘You want one?’ She asked.

‘What, no “hello”? I haven’t spoken to you in two days!’, Will replied, laughing.

‘And whose fault is that?’ She mumbled back.

Will opened his mouth to retort, but thought better of annoying her further, so simply replied ‘Yeh, a tea would be nice’.

They settled into the living room once the tea was made. There had been no kiss or hug, and Will was beginning to wonder what was going on.

‘I think we should break up’, Kate said as soon as they sat down.

‘What?’ Will said, in shock,

‘Don’t act so surprised, you knew this was coming’ Kate replied softly.

‘Don’t be ridiculous, Kate. What’s going on?’ Will touched her leg to try to comfort her, but she shifted in her seat.

Kate’s eyes began to well up. She had told herself not to cry, that this was the right thing to do.

‘I’m…I’m just not happy’ She said.

‘Well we can sort that out, what can I do? Is it the stuff with my family? I thought you were ok with waiting to get engaged?’ The words rushed out of William’s mouth.

‘I dont want to get engaged!’ Kate said, angrily. ‘And it’s not your family, Will, it’s you’ She said, a tear falling down her cheek. Will was silent, he thought they were happy together.

‘You don’t care about my life, not really’ Kate said, back in control of her emotions. ‘Just let me speak Will’, she said as Will tried to deny her accusation.

‘Take last week’ she said. ‘You called me at work to ask me to meet you in the afternoon, and I was working that day’.

‘I didn’t know you were working, did I?!’ Will yelled, angry that she was making a big deal of that.

‘That’s the whole point Will! You don’t have a CLUE about my life or schedule, or which days I’m working! I know every single detail of your schedule, and you can’t even be bothered to ask me about mine!’

She was on a roll now.

‘I come to your stupid polo matches that I’m not even interested in, just because I know I’ll never see you otherwise. I take an interest in every part of your life. But YOU, no YOU are far to busy to call me, or text me, or ask me how I am!’

‘That’s not true, Kate, you knew this would be hard. I do my best’ He said, teeth gritted.

Kate stood up and took a breath turning from him. She had pictures of the two of them all over the living room. On holidays, with friends, at home. Pictures everywhere. She realised she’d have to take them all down.

‘I’m moving back home’ She admitted finally. She was dreading telling him that she’d quit her job and was moving back to Berkshire to work for the family. It would mean they’d be even further away.

‘And you didn’t think to talk to me about this?’ Will said, furious now.

‘We’re living separate lives anyway’ She whispered.

‘Fine.’ Will slammed the mug of tea onto the coffee table and stormed out of the flat.

***

Kate sat in the middle of her bedroom, clothes spread out all around her in messy piles. She sat staring at the wall.

‘Kate, what the…?’ Kate jumped as her mother walked in. ‘Did you just empty the contents of your suitcases all over the floor?’ Carole said, shaking her head at the mess.

It had been two weeks since Kate had told William that she was moving back to Bucklebury. In that time, she had been living in a daze, going back and forth to London, emptying her things from her Chelsea flat; and working her notice at Jigsaw.

Kate shrugged, not really taking in what her mother had said. Carole knelt beside her daughter. ’Look, I know you’re hurting, but you need to pick yourself up.’

‘How?’ Kate chocked on the word, her eyes filling with tears.

Carole stroked Kate’s hair from her face, ‘Well we can start with this room’, she smiled, ‘and then tomorrow , you can start work at the office.’

‘I guess I should keep busy’, Kate agreed, her voice coming back.

‘Exactly – now how about we start with throwing this old thing out’, Carole said, holding up a large purple polo shirt.

‘No!’, Kate grabbed the shirt. She may have been ready to start putting herself back together, but she wasn’t ready to throw Will’s polo shirt out. She decided her mother didn’t need to know who’s shirt it was just yet.

                                               *****

The next morning, Kate pulled on a pair of jeans and a shirt, and pulled her hair back. She couldn’t be bothered with make up today. In fact, she hadn’t been bothered about making any effort with her looks since leaving Will.

She walked into the kitchen where her dad was sitting at the breakfast bar, ‘oh, you’re up early’, he said, folding his newspaper in half and tucking it under his arm.

‘Yeh, I’m going to work’, she replied eyeing up the newspaper. ‘Dad, why are you hiding that paper under your arm?’

‘Urmmm, no reason’ He was a terrible liar.

Kate raised her eyebrow.

‘Ok, it’s just a stupid story about you’ he said ‘it’s nothing to worry about’.

Kate sighed, she still wasn’t used to the media attention. ‘What does it say Dad, just tell me.’

‘Well news of the break up is out, they’re claiming it was William who ended things’ Michael said nervously.

Kate closed her eyes. ‘You know what Dad, starting today, I’m not gonna read this stuff’, she said, resolve strong in her voice. ‘I don’t want to see any of it’. She grabbed the paper from under his arm and threw it into the recycling.

                                          ******

Kate spent the next week working at Party Pieces. On the outside, she seemed to be coping. She was sticking to her promise to herself not to read any stories about her or Will. But on the inside, she was suffering. Will hadn’t been in contact since that day he stormed out of the flat. She had text him telling him that she was sorry about how it had happened and saying she hoped they could be friends, but she’d had no reply.

At night she had often spent the early hours sobbing, while clutching that polo shirt. His smell had long since left it, but it still comforted her.

                                              ***

‘You know, he’s probably missing you just as much’, he friend Alice told her over the phone one evening.

‘Why, what have you heard?’, Kate said, trying to sound casual.

Alice giggled, ‘nothing, babe, I haven’t heard anything! Listen, did you get your invite to Sam’s party thing tomorrow?’ She said, changing the subject.

‘Yehhh’ Kate replied.

‘Well he was wondering if you were coming’

‘Of course not! William’s going to be there!’ Kate said indignantly.

‘But you’re missing him right?’ Alice replied, ‘Don’t you want to see him?’

‘Yes, of course I do, but he clearly doesn’t want to see me. I think it really hurt him, splitting the way we did.’

‘Ok, but you need to get out of that house!’ Alice teased. Kate had become somewhat of a recluse.

‘For your information, I’m going out to the pub tonight’, she said with mock pride.

‘With who?’

‘Urm, my parents’, she said twirling her hair.

‘For….?’ Alice enquired.

‘A pub quiz’, Kate said sheepishly.

Alice laughed, ‘you really are living on the edge, aren’t you?’

                                *****

It seemed the whole of Bucklebury was at the pub that night and Kate found that with the support of her friends and neighbours, she was enjoying herself for the first time in weeks.

‘Ok! Question four!’ the quiz master boomed, ‘who is currently second in line to the British throne?’

Kate’s face flushed and her parents looked round at her, worried at her reaction. She gave them a reluctant smile, and wrote down ‘Prince William’.

                               ***

At home that night as Mike and Carole complained to each other about the pub’s insensitive choice of question, Kate went straight to her room.

She realised it had been two and a half weeks since she had vowed to not read any press stories, and she had decided that it was long enough. She had neither read, or heard anything from friends about what William had been doing. She was so used to knowing his schedule that this was hard to deal with.

Sitting on her bed, she loaded up her laptop, and clicked into Google News. For the second time that night, she wrote ‘Prince William’, and hit the search button.

The first result hit her like a punch in the gut. The headline ‘Wills’ night with mystery blonde’ blared out at her. She clicked on the result leading her to the Sun website, which showed pictures of William dancing with a blonde girl in a club, his hands all over her. The byline read: ‘all thoughts of Kate Middleton disappear as Wills declares “I’m free!”’

Kate slammed the lid down, her heart was racing. ‘How could I be so stupid?’ she thought, ‘did I actually believe he was missing me?’ Holding the tears back, she thought of herself telling Alice how she believed William was hurting. She felt like a fool, and her anger began to rise.

There she was hiding away, barely dressing up for work, wondering if she had done the right thing, when William was out partying, and letting everyone believe that HE broke it off. She was no fool, but he was making her look like one.

She paced the room, furious now, before finally picking up the phone and punching in the contact. The call was answered in seconds, and Kate didn’t hesitate,

‘Alice? I’ve changed my mind. I’m going to that party.’

***

ate stood in front of the mirror and inspected her outfit. With her decision to go to the party being so last minute, it was the best she could do.

‘You out to break some hearts tonight?’ Alice said, strolling into the bedroom.

The purple knit dress an a scooped neckline and went to her knees. She topped it off with a black cropped jacket. ’It’ll do’ Kate retorted.

‘And I suppose your choice has nothing to do with Will being there tonight to enjoy it?’ Alice laughed.

‘William won’t be enjoying anything’, Kate snapped back.

Since calling Alice that night after discovering pictures online of Will dancing with a mystery blond, she had travelled to Oxfordshire from Bucklebury, and landed on Alice’s doorstep. But her anger had not subsided.

She applied the finishing touches to her make up, and with Alice, left for the party, knowing that she would have to face Will for the first time in weeks.

                                                ***

Thirty minutes later, and Alice had pulled up onto the make shift car park in a field on the Upton Viva estate, where Sam’s party was being held inside the manor. As Kate jumped out of the car, her heel sunk into five centremetres of mud.

‘Great! Just great!’ She grumbled.

‘It’s just a bit of mud, Kate!’ Alice teased.

‘I’ll remind you of that when you’re about to see your ex and are trying to look composed!’ she huffed.

Alice helped to pull her out of the mud. ‘You’ll be fine, babe. He won’t know what’s hit him’, she reassured her.

They walked up to the house where the party had already started. The ground floor hall was full of colour and sound, and a variety of Sam’s friends. Kate instinctivly began to scan the room for any sign of Will, when Sam jumped into her eyeline, ’You came!’ he said, bouncing towards her and giving her a peck on each cheek ‘you both look shhhplendid’.

He was clearly drunk, but Kate was delighted to see him and reconnect with those friends that had had to choose between her and Will after the break up. The truth was, most of them chose Will.

‘He’s in the living room’ Sam said with a wink, noticing her scanning the room again.

‘Thanks’ she blushed, as he bounced off to greet another guest. She hoped to God she didn’t look desperate as she felt.

‘I’m gonna get some food’ she told Alice, pointing to the kitchen.

‘Alright, I’ll be around if you need anything…Oh, and Kate…chin up’, she said, giving her a warm smile

As she walked to the kitchen, she glanced into the large living room, where loud music was blaring. There in the corner of the room, was Will, chatting to two of his friends. He looked up, and for a brief second,caught her eye, before she looked away, and rushed down the hall.

Kate hurried into the kitchen, which had food to choose from on every surface. She was breathing hard, trying to compose herself. Reaching for a bread stick, she took a deep breath.

‘I didn’t know you were coming tonight’, a voice said behind her. She whipped around, and saw Will standing just behind her.

‘Try not to look so disappointed’ She said, turning her back to him again. She felt him move in even closer.

‘Kate, don’t be like that, can we go somewhere and talk?’

‘About what?’ She said, aggressively dipping the bread stick in a dip.

‘About…everything’ Will said.

‘I have nothing to say’ Kate said, lying through her teeth. She moved to the left to try to get past him, but he stepped in front of her. She went right, and he did the same again.

‘Will, move!’

‘No.’

Kate was in no mood for games and pushed him to the side with her arm and walked out of the kitchen.

Entering the living room where Will had just been, she busied herself by greeting some friends. She found a spot to hide away in the corner, next to Will’s friend, Tom.

‘You looked like you’ve seen a ghost’ Tom noted.

‘Not quite’ Kate smiled ‘But thanks, good to know I look like crap!’

‘Oh, shush! Come on, you need to blow off some steam’, he said as he stood up, reaching his hand out to her. Kate took his hand and they made their way to the centre of the room to dance. The music was loud and fast. Kate had no idea what it was, but being twirled around the dance floor did the trick of relaxing her. Tom dipped her backwards and Kate let out a raucous laugh, just as William re-entered the room. He stopped in his tracks, darting his eyes between Tom and Kate.

‘What the hell are you playing at?’ Will snarled at Tom.

‘Just a dance mate’ Tom replied, patting him on the back. William shoved Tom backwards in return.

‘William!’ Kate shouted, pushing William away from Tom and staring him dead in the eyes. ‘Apologise. Now.’

William’s chest rose and fell sharply, trying to calm down, but he kept silent. Kate pushed through the crowd of people that were watching and hurried out of the house. Once out on the front lawn, she pulled her phone from her jacket pocket;

‘I need to go. Waiting by the car x’ she typed, and sent the message to Alice. She began walking to the car, squinting in the dark to find it, when she heard footsteps behind her.

‘Kate!’ William called as he jogged up behind her. ‘Wait, where are you going?!’

She carried on walking.

‘Would you stop and be mature about this?’, he called, catching up to her. Kate stopped suddenly, span around and crashed into William full on.

’Me be mature?!’ she screamed at him, ‘ME!?’

’Alright, I’m sorry, it just got to me’ Will said, relieved that she had stopped.

Kate laughed, ‘And I suppose pictures of you touching up that girl all over the internet is fine, is it?’

Will’s face dropped, ‘It’s not what it looked like’

’Don’t take me for an idiot, William. I have been stuck in my house, not going out. Not saying a word to anyone. For you! I thought I might get an ounce of respect in return!’

’YOU broke up with ME, remember?’ Will said, suddenly angry. ‘I should be the one who’s pissed off.’

Will may have been angry, but Kate was furious now. ‘You let the world believe that you ended things, then you go out to celebrate your new single life. What, was that your revenge?!’

Will rubbed his forehead ‘Look, I was trying to protect you, the media would leave you in peace eventually if they thought I broke it off.’

’What are you saying?’ Kate asked, dreading what was coming.

’I had it leaked that I dumped you’ he answered, staring at the ground.

’You did what?’ She whispered.

’I did it for you’

’Bullshit! You did it for yourself and your image. You couldn’t care less about what happens to me!’

’Of course I do’ he said, reaching out to hold her arm, but Kate snatched it away.

’Don’t you dare touch me! If you cared, you would have answered my texts, you would have checked to see if I was ok, you would have warned me about those pictures! But you did nothing! It just goes to show I made the right decision’

’Don’t say that’ Will pleaded. ‘I’ve missed you, Kate, we can deal with this’

’It’s too late’, she said, her anger turning into sadness. She looked him in the eyes. ‘I need someone I can trust, who will be there for me no matter what’

’I can. I will’ Will said.

’It’s over, Will’ she said with more certainty than she’d felt in months, and turned around to walk away. As she took a step into the mud, he heel once again plunged through the earth.

’Let me help’ Will said immediately, trying to pull her out, but she resisted;

’I can do it by myself!’ she said pulling away forcefully. As she did, she lost her balance and fell side first into the mud.

Just as Will extended his hand to help her up, Alice came running up behind him.

‘What is going on!? What have you done to her’ she said, aiming her anger at William.

‘Nothing! She fell’

‘It’s fine Alice, it was my stupid heel again’ she said as she accepted Alice’s hand and stood up, mud covering her dress. ‘I got your text, do you need some time?’ Alice said, glancing between them.

‘No, we’re done here’ Kate was looking straight at Will.

‘You sure?’ Alice asked.

‘Certain’ Kate said, fixing her gaze on William. ‘I’m done.’

With that, covered in mud, she turned around, and finally walked away, leaving William standing alone in the dark.

[apocalypsewriters]

Summary: Another one of my OCs tries to comfort Anabella. Does it go well? You'll have to read and see. A couple of things to note! This is set in the Fusion AU (explanation here). Fera is an empath and also has pathokinesis that primarily comes into play when she's overwhelmed, it's not something she controls; she only deals in negative emotions, so life is kinda tough. She is the sunshine I referred to in the tags the other day.

"Bella?"

"Oh, hey Fera." Anabella hastily wiped the tears from her cheeks. She was sitting on a plush mini sofa in the back corner of the library. She took an obvious, shaky breath, trying to compose herself enough to be presentable to others. Hatred from breaking down oozed from her. Fera, who had felt the concentration of the potent emotions from half the library away cocked her head, trying to get a better read on the distressed girl in front of her.

"You're not okay. But you will be," Fera's statement was decisive, as strange as it was.

Bella's forehead crinkled as she considered the brighter girl's words, "Excuse me?"

Fera shrugged, "I'm an empath that helps the school counselor. I know these things, even if I don't want to sometimes."

“Huh. How has your day been?” clearly in uncomfortable territory, Bella attempted to redirect the conversation.

Fera recognized what she was doing, but decided to play along, "Pretty good. We got some seeds that came in for gardening club, and I had a quiz that I think I did okay on. What about you?"

Bella swallowed before replying, carefully monitoring her tone, "Good enough. I had some spare time in study hall to work on a side project that I submitted to a local expo last week for approval." Her voice was low with scattered pauses as she attempted to regain control.

"Have you gotten the results back yet?" sensing she was nearing a part of the issue by emotional surges, she pushed on.

"Yes," Bella's voice was small and thick with unshed tears. She cleared her throat, composing herself again. "I found out about an hour ago. I didn't make it."

"Are you okay with that?" Fera prodded.

Bella's voice shook, "I'm fine." She grew angry at her lack of control.

Fera hid a smirk. As awful as it was, and as unpleasant as it was to battle someone else's inner turmoil, she found some satisfaction in helping people with their problems. Like weeding out a garden, so the nicer plants could grow. "I'll repeat what I said earlier: it's okay not to be okay. And eventually the un okayness will pass." Bella wrinkled her nose at the grammatic fault.

"And you're sure?" Bella's skepticism of Fera was palpable as she eyed her.

"Pretty sure," Fera shrugged again. "Statistically, you know it's true. And I've seen it myself. You'll feel better eventually."

Bella mumbled incoherently against her knees, which were pulled against her chest.

Fera squished in beside her, resting a comforting hand on Bella's back. She silently grimaced as she sensed the broken ball's emotions turn for the worse. Her hand rose and fell on the back beneath her palm.

Bella snapped up, throwing Fera's arm back. "But what if I'm never going to feel better?! People keep saying I will be, but I'm not okay. I don't have a social life -" She cut off Fera as her mouth opened to protest, "It's faked. Any success you see is because of study. No one else studies to talk to their peers. NO ONE SAYS PEERS IN A CASUAL ENVIRONMENT!!” Her fury died down the minute it started, like a raging waterfall collapsing into a slow-moving trickle. “I just… I wish I was normal.” She collapsed into Fera’s embrace, her shoulders shaking with silent tears. Fera ran her fingers through the chestnut brown ringlets cascading just past the jacket-clad shoulders.

Fera started reciting a version of the words she’d heard so many times sitting in, or sitting in on a counselor session, “It’s okay not to be okay. But it’s also okay to ask for help.” A fresh wave of melancholy washed over her as Bella heaved a choked up sigh. “It’s okay to not be perfect, and no one will hate you for that. Talk to one of us before you have another breakdown like this, okay?” She felt the flow of fear and anxiety slow. Going with a hunch, she continued with her soft words, “Repressing your emotions isn’t helpful.” Nothing. The deep well of emotions coming from Bella disappeared. The void was disconcerting. She could almost feel the rumble of deep, uncontrolled discontentment. “It may seem helpful in the moment, but it’s not healthy.” A flash of melancholy broke though, quieted almost immediately. Slowly, Bella rose. Her eyes were still puffy with tears, but she had an expression of measured calm on her face.

“Thank you,” she said simply. “I’ll try to keep that in mind.” Her voice was rough from the tears, and she felt her emotional wall slipping, but she pushed past, denying it. Her footsteps echoed through the nearly empty library as she walked towards the exit. As the sun hit her, she almost believed the calm and content façade she kept up. Almost. She’d have to talk to Fera again. Sometime. Someday when she had time to dedicate to more trivial things in life, like emotions. Someday.

[mental-health-advice]

Idk if it’s right to self-diagnose yourself with Depression, but I’ve noticed that the last year and a half has been a complete landslide to the nether in terms of my mental health for no good reason. And I took a interactive quiz, (a quiz made by psychology professionals, and is affiliated with a verified and certified mental health centre, so this isn’t some buzz feed quiz I happened upon, a mental health hotline lead me to it) and it came back with results that were basically multiple suicide help hotlines, so I figured that I needed help. I had been asking my parents (I’m a minor so I can’t really get therapy for myself hence why I chose free online therapy) for therapy for a very long time, they’ve never downright refused but it’s always been a vague “we’ll see”

Yesterday on a whimsy I told a friend of mine for the first time that I might be depressed, and I cried a lot because she made me realise that the very few quite honestly trivial, things that still brought joy in my life were just coping mechanisms, and what I thought was me being lazy or irresponsible or neglectful was just my mental health capsizing. So I was convinced that I do need immediate therapy, but today morning when I told my mother I needed help, and that I may or may not be chronically depressed for the last year and a half, her first and immediate reaction was no you aren’t and then she started stating all the reasons why I am not depressed and honestly most of them made sense, IK I can’t get real therapy anytime soon, but I hate how I feel guilty for thinking that I was depressed and that I’m just some attention seeking moody person, because that’s how my mother made me feel, and I’m not trying to vilify her, I love her with all my heart, but honestly she’s made me more confused than I want to be. So please can you help me I. Someway, maybe if you could link me to free online therapy? Or a definitive way for me to be diagnosed professionally without my parents interference, because I honestly don’t know what to do just that I want to stop feeling the way I do. I’m at a very important part of my life this one single year basically makes or breaks my future, and I need to fix myself quickly so that I can get back on track and pick up the pace I lost. I can’t afford to waste anymore time. So I’m desperate, your help and council is greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time.

Hey there,

We don’t usually recommend that people self-diagnose themselves but I do understand how difficult it may be for you to get help and support for your possible depression and overall mental health. I am so sorry that you are now really confused about whether you are depressed or not but I want to gently let you know that with or without a proper diagnosis, the diagnosis does not make you who you are as a person. It simply just puts a label on how you are feeling and the symptoms you have which makes it easier for health professionals to know how they may be able to more specifically help you.

With saying all this, I am so proud of you for seeking help and support from a helpline. I know it’s not always easy but you are showing your strength and motivation to wanting to better yourself and this is amazing so well done and good for you!

Other than the web counselling links we have I do not know of any other online therapy but I do encourage you to check out our link which you can access by clicking here. I also want to let you know that if you are able to see your local or family doctor/ GP then they will be able to assess you and diagnose you appropriately. If you’re able to see your doctor then they will also be able to talk to your Mum along with you or on your behalf in regards to getting further help and support that you may be needing as well if you would like this. Alternatively if you are at school and have a school nurse or counsellor then you can access help and support from them as well. Talking to a favourite teacher you trust and feel comfortable with may also be an option for you too. Sometimes you don’t always need to see a mental health professional to get your life back on track but rather have someone you can talk to and talk through things with. Just something else to keep in mind!

I hope that this has been helpful and I wish you all the best for this year and in the future! I’m thinking of you!

Take care,

Lauren

[rex101111]

🎬 with sorikai :3

(okay technically a high school romcom but close enough :P)

Riku was used to his friends catching him by surprise, it was simply in their nature to defy common sense and do something either utterly reckless, ridiculous, or just plain stupid.

Oh alright, that last one was mostly Sora, but Kairi was no stranger to doing something boneheaded and justifying it after the fact with the excuse of “I thought it was a good idea!” while the results of her blunder burned around her.

(Kairi isn’t allowed to use the Bunsen burner in chemistry class anymore and Riku will never let her live it down, but that is neither here nor there.)

Point is, he’s used to being on the back foot and having to pick up the pace when his two best friends in the whole world decide to do something utterly manic.

Thing was, they usually did so separately, which usually meant he had the other to act as a back up brain cell to hopefully negate the incoming damage. 

The key word there would be, of course, “Usually.” Sometimes, all the stars would align in the sky, shake hands, and unanimously decree that it was “Fuck Riku Around O’clock” and both Sora and Kairi would have their own uniquely stupid idea pop in their head, leaving Riku to fight a two front war he was destined to lose.

(Riku will never look at a meat loaf the same way again. And he, to this day, has no earthly idea what Kairi did to make Professor Eraqus’s hair puke green for a week and not get expelled for it, he suspects puppy dog eyes were involved.)

But even those calamities did not compare to those thankfully rare moments where they would both have the same stupid idea at the same time. Riku still shuddered at the memory of them being teamed up into a trio in that “egg babysitting” assignment.

(The egg, named Chirithy, was, thank the lord, perfectly alright by the end of the week. Riku’s sanity, his room, his dignity, and most of his clothes, were not.)

Point was, Riku was well used to being the “reasonable one”, the one who actually had at least half a clue and keep his friends from going too far.

And last week, the stars decided it was high time for another rousing lighting round of “Fuck Riku Around O’clock and so it was that, a few days before Valentine’s day, both Sora and Kairi had the exact same idea pop into their heads, and they both wanted Riku’s help with it.

Secretly.

Privately.

Riku is beginning to wonder why he still bleaches his hair because it would probably turn grey on its own with friends like his.  

The idea they both had, unknown to the other person, was to make homemade chocolate for Valentine’s to give to the other person. They did so because they both had the biggest crushes on each other, and they both had, through some convoluted happenings fit for a JRPG plot, no damn idea the other person liked them.

This lack of knowledge had been going on since they were all twelve, and Riku was absolutely sick of this high school romcom nonsense. He’s been watching these two bozos tap dance around each other for literal years and was making every effort to fix that since he figured it out before the both of them.

(Of course, he did that after having his own little crisis of identity when he figured out that he liked both of them, quite a bit actually, and was able to push his own feelings down in favor of making his friends happy. Their happiness was more important, their happiness was possible, and so they needed to figure their shit out so Riku could finish properly burying his own steaming pile and move on with his life.)

The problem, well, one of about a dozen problems, was that neither of them was exactly the best when it came to making any kind of food.

Sora had all the grace and consideration of a hungover elephant when it came to making food, if he intended to make use of an egg it was an inevitability that the fragile shell will implode almost as soon as he lays his fingers on it. The less said about the time he tried to juggle those damn pepper shakers the better.

And Kairi? Oh, Kairi was hopeless. Her head had a tendency to run ahead of her and pull her towards all sort of bizarre ingredients to add to the chocolate, melons and chilly peppers and celery being the least of her suggestions to worry Riku on a primal level.

It was a weary few days, Riku having to juggle with helping each of his friends without the other catching wise, running himself ragged in the process. It was a mercy that there wasn’t a pop quiz during those few days before Valentine’s, because Riku was sure he would have fallen asleep on the pencil.

It would be worth it though, he was sure of it, there was no way to misinterpret a homemade Valentine’s day chocolate, there was no way that the message would go over their thick heads.

They would get together, they would be in love, and Riku would be happy for them, happy to stand with them as they lived their lives together. 

Finally, he could move on.

…or, at least, that’s what he thought would happen.

That was a mistake.

He thinking that he could predict what his friends would do…he should have known they were very, very good at surprising him.

This time, they did it by coming to him during lunch break, big, goofy grins on their faces, and giving him a big pile of chocolate, exclaiming as one, “Riku! Will you be our Valentine?”

Riku blinked.

He looked at the chocolate, messy and mismatched and lumpy but genuine, wrapped in a plastic bag with a sticky note on the front, the words “YOU’RE IN OUT HEART VALENTINE” made with two colors of glitter pens were very hard to miss.

He looked at his friends, smiling down at him with those same dopey, lovesick grins he saw them direct at each other more times than he can count. Kairi’s right hand and Sora’s left were intertwined between them, while their free hands were displaying the chocolate with a flourish.

He blinked again, his brain a spinning record on a player with a bouncing needle, the tune skipping and repeating because none of this made any sense.

“You…” He started, voice faint, pointing at the two, “you were supposed to give chocolate to each other…” He looked between his two friends, their bright grins beginning to get on his nerves (and not making him blush be quiet), “so you would both know how you felt about each other.”

“We did give our chocolate to each other!” Sora chirped happily, pecking Kairi on the cheek and gaining himself a cute giggle from the girl in response, “though we actually confessed to each other a little while before we came to you for help,” he smiled wider, ignoring Riku’s jaw nearly dropping through the floor,  “thanks again for the help with that Riku!”

“A little while…?” He mumbled, spine straightening at the implication, “what do you mean a while-”

“And now!” Kairi jumped in before he could finish, “we’re giving you chocolate! So you know how we feel about you!” They both blushed when she finished, Kairi twirling a lock of hair between her fingers and Sora scratching his chin with a peppy smile. “It’s been a long time coming honestly, right?”

“Yeah!” Sora chuckled quietly, grinning at him with all of his teeth, “we’ve both been trying to confess to you for a while and…well, what better time than today?”

(Why were they so cute. That wasn’t fair. Whoever decided that was fair deserved a write up.)

“About…me?” The gears in his head were beginning to shed a few flecks of rust and starting to move a half inch at a time, “how you two feel…about…me?”

The two looked at each other with soft smiles, and then turned those smiles at him again, and his heart was starting to pick up on the atmosphere and was pounding in his ears.

“You two…like…me?” 

“Yeah!”

“A bunch.”

Riku blinked again, because he was sure if his eyes got any wider they would tumble out of his dumbfounded head.

“…Seriously?”

Kairi’s smile faltered for a moment, “oh come on Riku, me and Sora have been trying to clue you in all week!” She stopped and looked at Sora, “you were trying to drop some hints at him right?”

“All the time!” Sora defended, “but he was so focused on the baking he wasn’t paying attention.”

(A vague memory of Sora asking Riku to help him with cleaning his shirt after he spilled whipped cream over it popped into Riku’s head and he never felt more victimized by his goal oriented mindset.)

“How about you?”

“Licking spoons and commenting on how hot it was, no reaction at all!”

(Another memory came, this time of Riku snatching a spoon from Kairi as he saw her tongue leave her mouth, and he never felt more jealous of a piece of silverware in his entire life.)

Kairi sighed, “Who would’ve thought Riku would be so oblivious huh?”

Sora nodded, not noticing Riku snapping into a agitated stance, “Yeah! He’s usually so smart about most things, but I guess matters of the heart just kinda fly over his head-”

“Are you kidding?” The two stopped and looked at him, blinking owlishly, “I spend years, literal years, going along with your crazy schemes, cleaning up your messes, and still finding time to try and play matchmaker for you two so you could stop dancing around your feelings, and you’re telling me I’m the oblivious one!?”

Kairi and Sora blinked at him.

Then blinked at each other.

And then went back to looking at him. Sora first, “You…you did?”

Then Kairi, “you were trying to…get us together?”

Before he could yell that yes you morons and I’m pretty sure it had aged me two decades from the stress the two threw themselves at him in a lung crushing hug, kissing his cheeks and singing his praises.

He was in love with a couple of idiots.

And they were, miracles never cease, in love with him.

…ah, well, who said life and love were ever simple?  

“…Happy Valentine’s day you two.”

[louistomlinsoncouk]

He became a bona-fide teen pop superstar as part of One Direction, then suffered unthinkable personal loss. Louis Tomlinson talks to Guy Kelly about fame, family and what comes next.

Louis Tomlinson took part in an online video recently, in which he was tasked with answering the internet’s most-searched questions about him. It was fairly tame, as you might expect of a pop quiz thrown at a pop star. ‘How do you pronounce Louis Tomlinson?’ the first read. There’s an interesting answer to that, actually, but we’ll come to it. ‘How old is Louis Tomlinson?’ was the second. He’s 28. And then came the third. ‘How is Louis Tomlinson?’

In the video, the man himself looks a little bewildered, dismissing the query as ‘random’ before moving on. But underneath, in the YouTube comments – one of the few nooks of the internet where love and goodwill still thrives – a fan repeated it. ‘“How is Louis Tomlinson,”’ they wrote, ‘the only question that matters.’ More than 7,000 people ‘liked’ it.

Given all Tomlinson’s been through in the past four years, it seems reasonable to ask. In 2016, the band he’d been in man and boy, One Direction, went on an indefinite hiatus after six years. Since being welded together by Simon Cowell on The X Factor in 2010, ‘1D’ had enjoyed perhaps the most stratospheric rise in music (five platinum albums, four world tours) since The Beatles. It hadn’t been Tomlinson’s decision to break up the band, and he wasn’t – still isn’t – particularly happy about it.

In December of that year, his beloved mother, Johannah Deakin, died a few months after being diagnosed with leukaemia. She was 43. Tomlinson pressed on with his nascent solo career, but unimaginable tragedy struck again. In March 2019, his 18-year-old half-sister, Félicité, was found unconscious at her flat in London and couldn’t be revived. An inquest later found she had died of an accidental drug overdose. Again, he buckled down, looked after his remaining siblings, and committed himself to finishing his debut album.

Settling down with Tomlinson in the corner of a west London photo studio, then, it seems as good a place as any to start: how is he?

‘I’m good, mate, I’m feeling good,’ he says, spreading his arms across a sofa. After wearing a series of high-end outfits for our photo shoot (‘I never feel super-comfortable on shoots; I’ve got one f—king pose – moody’), he’s in a black ’90s-inspired collared jumper, black trousers and black trainers.

He pushes his fringe to one side. The Doncaster accent, which softened in his 1D days, is back to pure, unfettered South Yorks. It’s all ‘in t’band’, ‘I didn’t know owt’, and swearing like a navvy. He’s honest, funny, and if his feet were planted any more firmly on the ground he’d be unable to walk.

I tell him about the YouTube comment, which seems to reflect the genuine care his fans have for him.

‘Ah, yeah I know, they’re considerate, they are. We’ve got a special, interesting bond. They’ve grown up with me – and I’ve been through some personal stuff and they’ve always been there for me.’

Tomlinson’s album, Walls, has been a long time coming. Immediately after One Direction split, he released a couple of singles – dance-y pop collaborations – which were fine, but not what he wanted to make. Halfway through writing Walls he realised, ‘If I’m chasing radio with every song I write, I’m not going to be doing this job for very long.’

So he relaxed, and the result is a mix of strong, melody-driven pop of the kind One Direction mastered, and what Tomlinson is really into, namely guitar-driven indie and Britpop. Some songs for the fans; some nodding to the future.

‘It’s a five-album plan. There’s bits where I’ve been almost selfish, and bits where I’ve been respectful to the fan base and what they love listening to,’ he says. ‘Then the next will be a step closer to the stuff I want to make. But I’ve got to earn my stripes.’

The dominant theme, I say, appears to be resilience. On the single Don’t Let It Break Your Heart, he advises, ‘Even when it hurts like hell / Oh, whatever tears you apart / Don’t let it break your heart.’ On the rousing title track (which features a writing credit for Noel Gallagher, who gave his blessing for a chorus strikingly similar to an Oasis tune), he sings, ‘These high walls that broke my soul / I watched all come falling down.’

It could be to do with grief, professional struggles, or his relationship. He nods.

‘Yeah, I write very autobiographically and had so much going on in my head, but in the struggle I’m trying to paint the message that you’re always left with a choice: to see the glass half-full or half-empty. It’s showing there’s hope.’

Some songwriters have found grief productive, others paralysing. Tomlinson was the former. One track on Walls is the previously released Two of Us, a beautiful, simple song written about his mum (‘You’ll never know how much I miss you / The day that they took you, I wish it was me instead’).

‘What’s amazing about this job is that regardless of the situation, you get something positive at the end of it. That’s obviously an emotionally heavy song for me, but fans have come up to me in floods of tears and talked about how it’s helped in their own tragedy. It’s incredible. From the dark, you can give hope.’

For the first three years of his life, Tomlinson was raised alone by Johannah, who split from his father, Troy Austin, when he was a baby. They lived above a launderette in Doncaster, where his mother worked multiple jobs, principally as a midwife, before she married Mark Tomlinson, a van salesman who became Louis’s stepfather. The three moved into a two-up, two-down, which was soon filled with half-sisters: Lottie, now 21, Félicité, then twins Daisy and Phoebe, now 16.

‘It was mad. They’re manic, young girls…’ he says. ‘Mum and Mark had a decent income but they couldn’t spread it around [a family of] seven. At times things were really good, you’d get 20 quid in a birthday card, but others were really difficult. I remember the electricity meter – you’d get five quid on the house as an emergency when you couldn’t top it up. Sometimes it’d be a gamble when it’d run out…’

Tomlinson wasn’t particularly academic – ‘though I’m not daft or owt’ – but loved school. There, he joined a band at 16 and found he was OK at singing, so he applied to audition for The X Factor. He failed, twice, but succeeded on the third try, in 2010, performing a fairly terrible (he admits it) version of Plain White T’s Hey There Delilah.

A few months later, at the ‘bootcamp’ stage, Cowell had the idea of creating a band comprised of Tomlinson and four other solo boys: Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan and Liam Payne. They were to be called One Direction. Tomlinson, who’d been intimidated by the standard of other vocalists in the competition, ‘bit their hand off’ at the offer. ‘I was like, “This is my ticket.”’

The show came just after his second run at the first year of his A levels. He’d failed the first time, with UUE in psychology, PE and English, which his mum had ‘absolutely ripped [his] head off’ for. The second time he’d gone one better, UEE. So he lied, telling her he got a smattering of Ds, and came up with a plan.

‘I waited until after the X Factor final, when we were all sat around drinking champagne, and told her, “By the way, I bulls—tted you on those results. I failed again, but hopefully we’ll be all right now…”’ he laughs. ‘She was fine. I picked my moment well.’

One Direction came third in the final, losing to runner-up Rebecca Ferguson and winner Matt Cardle, a former painter-decorator who now performs in the West End. But it was always felt that the group would go furthest, not least because Cowell was such a supporter (all the other boys have now left his record label, Syco, but because ‘loyalty is the biggest thing’ for Tomlinson, he’s stayed).

Eighteen when the group started, Tomlinson was the oldest member (the others were 16 and 17), ‘just allowed to drink, just allowed to drive’, but suddenly everything in his life was controlled.

‘You’re ready to be reckless and stupid, but then I was in the band and couldn’t ever act like that, especially not publicly,’ he says. They went on their first headline concert tour in 2011, and soon had fans surrounding their hotels overnight, wherever in the world they went. Naturally, they embraced partying.

‘There was a good 18 months where I was going out all the time. The press love to write about that as if it’s this chaotic thing, and at times it was, but it’s also an escape. Once you have a couple of drinks down you in a club, you’re just someone in the club, part of everyone else, and not everyone is looking at you.’

Even when he was away, he kept in contact with his mum by phone – or in person, when she could join him – as much as possible. The two were impossibly close: she had access to his emails; he told her when he lost his virginity; she knew about his finances.

‘One thing I’ve learnt since losing her is that any decision, even if I knew the answer, I’d call her,’ he says. ‘I didn’t realise how reliant I’d become on her. That was the hardest thing for me, understanding that living life after meant making decisions on my own. I thought I’d always have a sounding board. There was a different level of credibility with my mum, because I idolised her.’

Styles has recently joked that One Direction were ‘grown in test tubes’ by Cowell, but Tomlinson insists that part of their appeal lay in the fact that they all had their own personalities and talents, which weren’t forced on them. Still, it took him years to know where he fitted. Styles was cool, a heart-throb. Malik was moody and mysterious. Horan was cute and Irish. Payne was whatever Payne was. But Tomlinson wasn’t sure.

‘You’ve got to be dead cocky in Doncaster to survive – it’s either that or be picked on. So I used to walk around with a chip on my shoulder. But I’d always been the funny guy, centre of attention, so I never struggled to make mates,’ he says. ‘It was weird suddenly being in a situation where one or two members are constantly in a better position. It took me a while to understand my strengths. I was the oldest and it wasn’t until the third album when I made it my mission to write the most.’

He succeeded: Tomlinson’s writing credit appears on 39 of the 96 songs One Direction recorded, four more than Payne and dozens more than the rest. But it was intense. There were times when he considered quitting the band, if only to allow him to escape the attention, but he likens that to children running away from home. ‘By the time you get halfway down the street you regret it and go back…’

‘Directioners’ were ‘fanatical’ about the boys, to a frequently absurd degree. And not every encounter was surreally funny. The year after the hiatus began, in 2017, Tomlinson and Calder were involved in a scuffle with paparazzi and fans at the airport in LA. Fists possibly flew, and Tomlinson was arrested, only for no further action to be taken. The fans now are still loyal, still ardent, but they’ve matured with him.

What kept him grounded, as the money rolled in (I have heard that each of the boys amassed a £40 million fortune from the band, and that collectively they still earn around £38,000 a week from royalties, merchandise and so on) and the fans bayed, was keeping friends from Doncaster around. When I arrived at today’s photo shoot, Tomlinson was busy doing his singular pose at one end of the room, while at the other, near the free pastries, a young redheaded bloke in a tracksuit lurked, scrolling through his phone.

He introduced himself as Oli, Tomlinson’s ‘mate from Donny’, who has spent the better part of a decade travelling the world with his pop-star friend, and seems to operate as a walking comfort blanket. They live together when Tomlinson’s in LA.

They also live together when he’s in London. I imagine there’s space for house guests wherever he is, though: it has been reported that he put his Hollywood Hills mansion on the market last year for $6.995 million, and the previous year valued another property in California at $13.999 million, after apparently renting it out for $40,000 per month.

‘I’m hoping to do a bit of work with Louis’s tour manager this year,’ Oli says, cheerfully. I later discover he’s so ever-present with Tomlinson that he even has his own fan accounts on social media.

‘I remember bringing a mate out for our first US tour. He called from his hotel with his mind blown by being able to pick up a phone and they’d just bring you food,’ Tomlinson says. ‘I go back to Donny and hear heavy s—t – struggles with jobs, money, family, health. That humbles me, and gives me a better emotional intelligence.’

He reckons ‘eight out of 10 people have an ulterior motive’ when they meet him. Luckily he can tell if someone’s a pre-fame friend. His name is pronounced ‘Loo-ee’, but he wasn’t keen on it as a child, so had mates, like Oli, pronounce it ‘Lewis’, which they still do. Unfortunately Cowell guessed at ‘Loo-ee’ on The X Factor, so that was that for the stage name.

By 2015, some members of One Direction felt an itch to break off – or just have a break – and try their own thing. Malik had gone in March, and while a full split seemed inevitable, Tomlinson was still caught off-guard.

‘I was f—king fuming at first. We were working really hard – people [namely, Payne] have said overworked, but we weren’t overworked, that’s just what happens when you’re a band that size, though I understand. I thought I’d mentally prepared myself for a break, but it hit me hard.’

He was finally feeling comfortable in the band, and hadn’t thought about a solo career.

‘About a week after, I sat there thinking, “Strike while the iron’s hot,” but I wasn’t ready. I was bitter and angry, I didn’t know why we couldn’t just carry on. But now, even though I don’t fully understand everyone’s individual reasons, I respect them.’

They’re ostensibly all still mates, despite going in radically different musical directions, though some are closer than others. Tomlinson seems to mention Horan with most affection, and the pair performed at the same event in Mexico in November, titillating 1D fans by sound-checking together with one of the band’s old songs.

If it was up to you, I ask, would the group still be going? He considers this for a moment.

‘It if was up to me, yeah. I’d maybe have said, “Let’s have a year off.” But yeah, probably. I’m sure there’s a better analogy out there but it’s a bit like [shutting down] Coca-Cola. You don’t say, “Right, let’s hang the boots up on that,” because it’s a massive thing.’

Afterwards he muddled around for a bit, including releasing those early singles – one of which he performed on The X Factor, rigid with grief, just days after his mum’s death. Then he returned to the show last year as a judge, alongside Cowell, Robbie Williams and Williams’s wife, Ayda Field.

Did he get on with Robbie? He smiles, arching an eyebrow. ‘Why do you ask?’ Well, he came out of a boy band, went solo…

‘Oh, yeah, he was all right. He’s a good man, we were just different from each other. Certain moments I thought, “F—king hell, Robbie, just sit down for five minutes, I’ve got something to say.” I love his missus though, Ayda, she’s sound.’

Tomlinson liked mentoring, and during our conversation it becomes clear he’s fuelled by responsibility. He was the oldest sibling in his house, and although Mark Tomlinson and Johannah’s second husband (after divorcing Mark in 2011, she married Dan Deakin in 2014; they had twins Ernest and Doris) are still around, he became a paternal figure after she died. He’s particularly involved in the lives of Daisy and Phoebe, to whom he’s ‘a kind of second parent’.

‘Without being too soppy, I like looking after people, it’s cool. At the moment I’m stressing trying to convince Daisy and Phoebe to go to sixth form. They’ve been to private school near Donny, and it’s proper expensive. I’m paying for it thinking they’re staying on, but now they don’t want to go. I told them education is important. I’m like, “You’re 16, you haven’t got a f—king idea what the real world is,”’ he says.

‘What’s difficult about those two is they’ve only known the 1D craziness. They’ve grown up in this elitist way, which is very different from my upbringing and Lottie’s, and the values my mum taught us.’

He gives a ‘kids, eh?’ sigh. ‘Consistency is the big thing. I’m trying to get better at being in their heads enough so they think, “I wonder if Louis thinks this is a good idea?”’

Lottie lives in Hackney, east London. When she was a teenager, Tomlinson got her a job assisting One Direction’s make-up artist, and within a few years she’d become a ridiculously popular Instagrammer (currently with 3.4 million followers, still 10 million shy of Louis). Her big brother told her Instagram’s fine, but she must ‘become a proper businesswoman’ in case the bubble bursts. In 2018 she launched Tanologist, a successful fake-tan brand.

‘I’m so proud of her. She’s just been in Australia, where she’s stocked in Melbourne’s version of Boots!’ Tomlinson says, beaming.

Félicité, known to the family as Fizz, was also a budding Instagrammer. After her death last March, a post-mortem revealed ‘toxic’ levels of anti-anxiety and pain medications, as well as cocaine, in her blood. Six months later, an inquest heard that she had visited her GP in August 2018 and ‘gave a history of recreational drug use… on a consistent basis since the death of her mother’. She had taken overdoses and been admitted to a rehabilitation clinic.

Tomlinson hesitates to say anything was ‘easier’, comparing the deaths of Félicité and his mum, as ‘both felt very individual, and hit me with a big impact… but I think dealing with the family, how I can be there for them, that was a lot easier the second time because the first time I was grieving and didn’t know what to say. As time went on I grew to understand what to say to my sisters.’

Prioritising the feelings of your sisters in the immediate aftermath is understandable, I say, but I wonder if anyone took care of you. He looks surprised.

‘No, but friends and family, my best mate… I feel their support but I get most out of doing stuff for other people. I don’t say that to sound like a good guy, it’s genuinely what gives me strength.’

Did you ever consider grief therapy?

‘Nah, a lot of people recommended it but I’m a little bit old-fashioned when it comes to therapy. I’m sure it’s incredible, but I thought I’d be all right, and I have been till now.’ One of his many tattoos consists of the words ‘It Is What It Is’ across his chest. ‘I know the things I’ve been upset about in my life are s—t, but I can’t change them, so you have to make the best of what you’ve got.’

Tomlinson gives his own big smile. Our time’s nearly up, and he’d like a cigarette. After all you’ve been through, I tell him, people would have understood if you’d called it a day. You could have lived off royalties, enjoyed a quiet life.

‘Definitely, definitely. But do you know what? It didn’t cross my mind once. I somehow have an inability to worry, and just get on with things,’ he says, shrugging. ‘It’s definitely made me stronger. I’ve gone through every emotion, and I’m just f—king excited now.’

I think we have an answer. How is Louis Tomlinson? Hopefully, he’ll be just fine.

Walls is released on 31 January

[elceeu2morrow]

By Guy Kelly 17 JANUARY 2020 • 8:00PM

He became a bona-fide teen pop superstar as part of One Direction, then suffered unthinkable personal loss. Louis Tomlinson talks to Guy Kelly about fame, family and what comes next.

Louis Tomlinson took part in an online video recently, in which he was tasked with answering the internet’s most-searched questions about him. It was fairly tame, as you might expect of a pop quiz thrown at a pop star. ‘How do you pronounce Louis Tomlinson?’ the first read. There’s an interesting answer to that, actually, but we’ll come to it. ‘How old is Louis Tomlinson?’ was the second. He’s 28. And then came the third. ‘How is Louis Tomlinson?’

In the video, the man himself looks a little bewildered, dismissing the query as ‘random’ before moving on. But underneath, in the YouTube comments – one of the few nooks of the internet where love and goodwill still thrives – a fan repeated it. ‘“How is Louis Tomlinson,”’ they wrote, ‘the only question that matters.’ More than 7,000 people ‘liked’ it.

Given all Tomlinson’s been through in the past four years, it seems reasonable to ask. In 2016, the band he’d been in man and boy, One Direction, went on an indefinite hiatus after six years. Since being welded together by Simon Cowell on The X Factor in 2010, ‘1D’ had enjoyed perhaps the most stratospheric rise in music (five platinum albums, four world tours) since The Beatles. It hadn’t been Tomlinson’s decision to break up the band, and he wasn’t – still isn’t – particularly happy about it.

[complete article below the cut]

In December of that year, his beloved mother, Johannah Deakin, died a few months after being diagnosed with leukaemia. She was 43. Tomlinson pressed on with his nascent solo career, but unimaginable tragedy struck again. In March 2019, his 18-year-old half-sister, Félicité, was found unconscious at her flat in London and couldn’t be revived. An inquest later found she had died of an accidental drug overdose. Again, he buckled down, looked after his remaining siblings, and committed himself to finishing his debut album.

Settling down with Tomlinson in the corner of a west London photo studio, then, it seems as good a place as any to start: how is he?

‘I’m good, mate, I’m feeling good,’ he says, spreading his arms across a sofa. After wearing a series of high-end outfits for our photo shoot (‘I never feel super-comfortable on shoots; I’ve got one f—king pose – moody’), he’s in a black ’90s-inspired collared jumper, black trousers and black trainers.

He pushes his fringe to one side. The Doncaster accent, which softened in his 1D days, is back to pure, unfettered South Yorks. It’s all ‘in t’band’, ‘I didn’t know owt’, and swearing like a navvy. He’s honest, funny, and if his feet were planted any more firmly on the ground he’d be unable to walk.

I tell him about the YouTube comment, which seems to reflect the genuine care his fans have for him.

‘Ah, yeah I know, they’re considerate, they are. We’ve got a special, interesting bond. They’ve grown up with me – and I’ve been through some personal stuff and they’ve always been there for me.’

Tomlinson’s album, Walls, has been a long time coming. Immediately after One Direction split, he released a couple of singles – dance-y pop collaborations – which were fine, but not what he wanted to make. Halfway through writing Walls he realised, ‘If I’m chasing radio with every song I write, I’m not going to be doing this job for very long.’

So he relaxed, and the result is a mix of strong, melody-driven pop of the kind One Direction mastered, and what Tomlinson is really into, namely guitar-driven indie and Britpop. Some songs for the fans; some nodding to the future.

‘It’s a five-album plan. There’s bits where I’ve been almost selfish, and bits where I’ve been respectful to the fan base and what they love listening to,’ he says. ‘Then the next will be a step closer to the stuff I want to make. But I’ve got to earn my stripes.’

The dominant theme, I say, appears to be resilience. On the single Don’t Let It Break Your Heart, he advises, ‘Even when it hurts like hell / Oh, whatever tears you apart / Don’t let it break your heart.’ On the rousing title track (which features a writing credit for Noel Gallagher, who gave his blessing for a chorus strikingly similar to an Oasis tune), he sings, ‘These high walls that broke my soul / I watched all come falling down.’

It could be to do with grief, professional struggles, or his relationship – he’s happily with his girlfriend, 27-year-old fashion blogger Eleanor Calder, but they’ve been on and off over the years. He nods.

‘Yeah, I write very autobiographically and had so much going on in my head, but in the struggle I’m trying to paint the message that you’re always left with a choice: to see the glass half-full or half-empty. It’s showing there’s hope.’

Some songwriters have found grief productive, others paralysing. Tomlinson was the former. One track on Walls is the previously released Two of Us, a beautiful, simple song written about his mum (‘You’ll never know how much I miss you / The day that they took you, I wish it was me instead’).

‘What’s amazing about this job is that regardless of the situation, you get something positive at the end of it. That’s obviously an emotionally heavy song for me, but fans have come up to me in floods of tears and talked about how it’s helped in their own tragedy. It’s incredible. From the dark, you can give hope.’

For the first three years of his life, Tomlinson was raised alone by Johannah, who split from his father, Troy Austin, when he was a baby. They lived above a launderette in Doncaster, where his mother worked multiple jobs, principally as a midwife, before she married Mark Tomlinson, a van salesman who became Louis’s stepfather. The three moved into a two-up, two-down, which was soon filled with half-sisters: Lottie, now 21, Félicité, then twins Daisy and Phoebe, now 16.

‘It was mad. They’re manic, young girls…’ he says. ‘Mum and Mark had a decent income but they couldn’t spread it around [a family of] seven. At times things were really good, you’d get 20 quid in a birthday card, but others were really difficult. I remember the electricity meter – you’d get five quid on the house as an emergency when you couldn’t top it up. Sometimes it’d be a gamble when it’d run out…’

Tomlinson wasn’t particularly academic – ‘though I’m not daft or owt’ – but loved school. There, he joined a band at 16 and found he was OK at singing, so he applied to audition for The X Factor. He failed, twice, but succeeded on the third try, in 2010, performing a fairly terrible (he admits it) version of Plain White T’s Hey There Delilah.

A few months later, at the ‘bootcamp’ stage, Cowell had the idea of creating a band comprised of Tomlinson and four other solo boys: Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan and Liam Payne. They were to be called One Direction. Tomlinson, who’d been intimidated by the standard of other vocalists in the competition, ‘bit their hand off’ at the offer. ‘I was like, “This is my ticket.”’

The show came just after his second run at the first year of his A levels. He’d failed the first time, with UUE in psychology, PE and English, which his mum had ‘absolutely ripped [his] head off’ for. The second time he’d gone one better, UEE. So he lied, telling her he got a smattering of Ds, and came up with a plan.

‘I waited until after the X Factor final, when we were all sat around drinking champagne, and told her, “By the way, I bulls—tted you on those results. I failed again, but hopefully we’ll be all right now…”’ he laughs. ‘She was fine. I picked my moment well.’

One Direction came third in the final, losing to runner-up Rebecca Ferguson and winner Matt Cardle, a former painter-decorator who now performs in the West End. But it was always felt that the group would go furthest, not least because Cowell was such a supporter (all the other boys have now left his record label, Syco, but because ‘loyalty is the biggest thing’ for Tomlinson, he’s stayed).

Eighteen when the group started, Tomlinson was the oldest member (the others were 16 and 17), ‘just allowed to drink, just allowed to drive’, but suddenly everything in his life was controlled.

‘You’re ready to be reckless and stupid, but then I was in the band and couldn’t ever act like that, especially not publicly,’ he says. They went on their first headline concert tour in 2011, and soon had fans surrounding their hotels overnight, wherever in the world they went. Naturally, they embraced partying.

‘There was a good 18 months where I was going out all the time. The press love to write about that as if it’s this chaotic thing, and at times it was, but it’s also an escape. Once you have a couple of drinks down you in a club, you’re just someone in the club, part of everyone else, and not everyone is looking at you.’

Even when he was away, he kept in contact with his mum by phone – or in person, when she could join him – as much as possible. The two were impossibly close: she had access to his emails; he told her when he lost his virginity; she knew about his finances.

‘One thing I’ve learnt since losing her is that any decision, even if I knew the answer, I’d call her,’ he says. ‘I didn’t realise how reliant I’d become on her. That was the hardest thing for me, understanding that living life after meant making decisions on my own. I thought I’d always have a sounding board. There was a different level of credibility with my mum, because I idolised her.’

Styles has recently joked that One Direction were ‘grown in test tubes’ by Cowell, but Tomlinson insists that part of their appeal lay in the fact that they all had their own personalities and talents, which weren’t forced on them. Still, it took him years to know where he fitted. Styles was cool, a heart-throb. Malik was moody and mysterious. Horan was cute and Irish. Payne was whatever Payne was. But Tomlinson wasn’t sure.

‘You’ve got to be dead cocky in Doncaster to survive – it’s either that or be picked on. So I used to walk around with a chip on my shoulder. But I’d always been the funny guy, centre of attention, so I never struggled to make mates,’ he says. ‘It was weird suddenly being in a situation where one or two members are constantly in a better position. It took me a while to understand my strengths. I was the oldest and it wasn’t until the third album when I made it my mission to write the most.’

He succeeded: Tomlinson’s writing credit appears on 39 of the 96 songs One Direction recorded, four more than Payne and dozens more than the rest. But it was intense. There were times when he considered quitting the band, if only to allow him to escape the attention, but he likens that to children running away from home. ‘By the time you get halfway down the street you regret it and go back…’

‘Directioners’ were ‘fanatical’ about the boys, to a frequently absurd degree. And not every encounter was surreally funny. The year after the hiatus began, in 2017, Tomlinson and Calder were involved in a scuffle with paparazzi and fans at the airport in LA. Fists possibly flew, and Tomlinson was arrested, only for no further action to be taken. The fans now are still loyal, still ardent, but they’ve matured with him.

What kept him grounded, as the money rolled in (I have heard that each of the boys amassed a £40 million fortune from the band, and that collectively they still earn around £38,000 a week from royalties, merchandise and so on) and the fans bayed, was keeping friends from Doncaster around. When I arrived at today’s photo shoot, Tomlinson was busy doing his singular pose at one end of the room, while at the other, near the free pastries, a young redheaded bloke in a tracksuit lurked, scrolling through his phone.

He introduced himself as Oli, Tomlinson’s ‘mate from Donny’, who has spent the better part of a decade travelling the world with his pop-star friend, and seems to operate as a walking comfort blanket. They live together when Tomlinson’s in LA, where he has a three-year-old son, Freddie, from a short relationship with stylist Briana Jungwirth.

They also live together when he’s in London, along with Calder, to whom it was recently reported that Tomlinson is engaged (his representatives denied the rumour). I imagine there’s space for house guests wherever he is, though: it has been reported that he put his Hollywood Hills mansion on the market last year for $6.995 million, and the previous year valued another property in California at $13.999 million, after apparently renting it out for $40,000 per month.

‘I’m hoping to do a bit of work with Louis’s tour manager this year,’ Oli says, cheerfully. I later discover he’s so ever-present with Tomlinson that he even has his own fan accounts on social media.

‘I remember bringing a mate out for our first US tour. He called from his hotel with his mind blown by being able to pick up a phone and they’d just bring you food,’ Tomlinson says. ‘I go back to Donny and hear heavy s—t – struggles with jobs, money, family, health. That humbles me, and gives me a better emotional intelligence.’

He reckons ‘eight out of 10 people have an ulterior motive’ when they meet him. Luckily he can tell if someone’s a pre-fame friend. His name is pronounced ‘Loo-ee’, but he wasn’t keen on it as a child, so had mates, like Oli, pronounce it ‘Lewis’, which they still do. Unfortunately Cowell guessed at ‘Loo-ee’ on The X Factor, so that was that for the stage name.

By 2015, some members of One Direction felt an itch to break off – or just have a break – and try their own thing. Malik had gone in March, and while a full split seemed inevitable, Tomlinson was still caught off-guard.

‘I was f—king fuming at first. We were working really hard – people [namely, Payne] have said overworked, but we weren’t overworked, that’s just what happens when you’re a band that size, though I understand. I thought I’d mentally prepared myself for a break, but it hit me hard.’

He was finally feeling comfortable in the band, and hadn’t thought about a solo career.

‘About a week after, I sat there thinking, “Strike while the iron’s hot,” but I wasn’t ready. I was bitter and angry, I didn’t know why we couldn’t just carry on. But now, even though I don’t fully understand everyone’s individual reasons, I respect them.’

They’re ostensibly all still mates, despite going in radically different musical directions, though some are closer than others. Tomlinson seems to mention Horan with most affection, and the pair performed at the same event in Mexico in November, titillating 1D fans by sound-checking together with one of the band’s old songs.

If it was up to you, I ask, would the group still be going? He considers this for a moment.

‘It if was up to me, yeah. I’d maybe have said, “Let’s have a year off.” But yeah, probably. I’m sure there’s a better analogy out there but it’s a bit like [shutting down] Coca-Cola. You don’t say, “Right, let’s hang the boots up on that,” because it’s a massive thing.’

Afterwards he muddled around for a bit, including releasing those early singles – one of which he performed on The X Factor, rigid with grief, just days after his mum’s death. Then he returned to the show last year as a judge, alongside Cowell, Robbie Williams and Williams’s wife, Ayda Field.

Did he get on with Robbie? He smiles, arching an eyebrow. ‘Why do you ask?’ Well, he came out of a boy band, went solo…

‘Oh, yeah, he was all right. He’s a good man, we were just different from each other. Certain moments I thought, “F—king hell, Robbie, just sit down for five minutes, I’ve got something to say.” I love his missus though, Ayda, she’s sound.’

Tomlinson liked mentoring, and during our conversation it becomes clear he’s fuelled by responsibility. He was the oldest sibling in his house, and although Mark Tomlinson and Johannah’s second husband (after divorcing Mark in 2011, she married Dan Deakin in 2014; they had twins Ernest and Doris) are still around, he became a paternal figure after she died. He’s particularly involved in the lives of Daisy and Phoebe, to whom he’s ‘a kind of second parent’.

‘Without being too soppy, I like looking after people, it’s cool. At the moment I’m stressing trying to convince Daisy and Phoebe to go to sixth form. They’ve been to private school near Donny, and it’s proper expensive. I’m paying for it thinking they’re staying on, but now they don’t want to go. I told them education is important. I’m like, “You’re 16, you haven’t got a f—king idea what the real world is,”’ he says.

‘What’s difficult about those two is they’ve only known the 1D craziness. They’ve grown up in this elitist way, which is very different from my upbringing and Lottie’s, and the values my mum taught us.’

He gives a ‘kids, eh?’ sigh. ‘Consistency is the big thing. I’m trying to get better at being in their heads enough so they think, “I wonder if Louis thinks this is a good idea?”’

Lottie lives in Hackney, east London. When she was a teenager, Tomlinson got her a job assisting One Direction’s make-up artist, and within a few years she’d become a ridiculously popular Instagrammer (currently with 3.4 million followers, still 10 million shy of Louis). Her big brother told her Instagram’s fine, but she must ‘become a proper businesswoman’ in case the bubble bursts. In 2018 she launched Tanologist, a successful fake-tan brand.

‘I’m so proud of her. She’s just been in Australia, where she’s stocked in Melbourne’s version of Boots!’ Tomlinson says, beaming.

Félicité, known to the family as Fizz, was also a budding Instagrammer. After her death last March, a post-mortem revealed ‘toxic’ levels of anti-anxiety and pain medications, as well as cocaine, in her blood. Six months later, an inquest heard that she had visited her GP in August 2018 and ‘gave a history of recreational drug use… on a consistent basis since the death of her mother’. She had taken overdoses and been admitted to a rehabilitation clinic.

Tomlinson hesitates to say anything was ‘easier’, comparing the deaths of Félicité and his mum, as ‘both felt very individual, and hit me with a big impact… but I think dealing with the family, how I can be there for them, that was a lot easier the second time because the first time I was grieving and didn’t know what to say. As time went on I grew to understand what to say to my sisters.’

Prioritising the feelings of your sisters in the immediate aftermath is understandable, I say, but I wonder if anyone took care of you. He looks surprised.

‘No, but friends and family, my best mate, my girlfriend, my son… I feel their support but I get most out of doing stuff for other people. I don’t say that to sound like a good guy, it’s genuinely what gives me strength.’

Did you ever consider grief therapy?

‘Nah, a lot of people recommended it but I’m a little bit old-fashioned when it comes to therapy. I’m sure it’s incredible, but I thought I’d be all right, and I have been till now.’ One of his many tattoos consists of the words ‘It Is What It Is’ across his chest. ‘I know the things I’ve been upset about in my life are s—t, but I can’t change them, so you have to make the best of what you’ve got.’

What he’s got is an album to launch, a world tour to prep for and, immediately, a flight to catch. He and Oli are off to see Freddie. ‘When I’m working I definitely don’t see him enough,’ Tomlinson says, ‘but he looks just like me, which is cool. I’m excited to see his big smile.’

Tomlinson gives his own big smile. Our time’s nearly up, and he’d like a cigarette. After all you’ve been through, I tell him, people would have understood if you’d called it a day. You could have lived off royalties, enjoyed a quiet life with Calder, Freddie, your sisters.

‘Definitely, definitely. But do you know what? It didn’t cross my mind once. I somehow have an inability to worry, and just get on with things,’ he says, shrugging. ‘It’s definitely made me stronger. I’ve gone through every emotion, and I’m just f—king excited now.’

I think we have an answer. How is Louis Tomlinson? Hopefully, he’ll be just fine.

Walls is released on 31 January