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pearblossommina · 1 year

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ToG Read-A-Long, Tower of Dawn, day 3

Ch 11

This chapter’s kinda flirty

“To ride - even if he could not walk, riding ..."

Aw yeah ride around on a horse! Therapy horse! Aw yeah!

"Another massage today?"

Please, he nearly added. His muscles already ached from his exercising, and moving so much between bed and sofa and chair and bath - ”

Why didn’t he just ASK for a massage lol

It can be part of the treatment

Massage therapy

Chaol just ASK lol

Ch 12

No pain no gain, right, Chaol! Uh, ok. Let’s get healed.

And a sexy flight with a prince.

Is this book gonna be about Nesryn and Chaol falling out of love and getting with these other characters?

Ch 13

Owie! My heart. So this echo of dark valg power sitting at the top of Chaol’s spine really means to put up an effort.

I get the feeling through the tea drinking scene, Chaol wants to take care of somebody, and doesn’t like being cared for. Which is a little hard, especially with Yrene’s role as his healer, and his role as her patient.

And then right after we get a little scene with the way Yrene treats him juxtaposed to the way Nesryn treats him. He likes to do things himself, he doesn’t like being lifted into bed, and she’s not being sensitive to that. I do get the feeling that they’re going to break up. Which sucks but. They’re both already kind of actively flirting with someone else.

Nesryn talking about her dead mom. I think if magic existed and could do such amazing things like curing cancer, it’s hard to believe it would ever be forbidden. This is a different side of magic, compared to the aggressive firepower we’ve seen on display from characters like Aelin. So the King’s command to suppress all magic in Ardarlan and kill anyone with any heritage or ties to be able to use it, makes sense coming from a position of fear. But why wasn’t an exception made for healers? Like they might be able to cure cancer. Anyone can get sick. What if the King himself had taken ill? Or someone in his family? There’s no healers on the continent, he MADE SURE, and the only ones left are fighting infection and disease with willow bark and herbs. Like what kind of actual asshole do you have to be to make life worse for everybody, just so you can control all the magic, and let everyone else suffer and die.

I’m glad that guy’s dead, he fucking sucks.

Ch 14

"And what about you, then? How about we make a deal: you tell me all your deep, dark secrets, Yrene Towers, and I'll tell you mine.”

That is not the way therapy works, Chaol.

Nice try, though. If you want to get to know her, just say, hey, I think you’re cute and I’d like to get to know you

“He'd been sinking and drowning since.

Long before his spine.

He wasn't certain if he'd even tried to swim. Not since that sword had gone into the river. Not since he'd left Dorian in that room with his father and told his friend -- his brother - that he loved him, and knew it was good-bye. He'd... left. In every sense of the word.”

Hey hey hey it’s ok Chaol - everything’s better now - Dorian is better now. Like. You are a hero. Did you forget? Yes, Chaol - you are the one who saved him. You saved him, Chaol.

He sent you here because he wants to see you get better. And you cannot get better if you keep dwelling on this dark shit.

You left him because you had to.

You saved him, because you never stopped believing that he was still in there, and that you and all your friends could fight for a better world.

And you did! And you were amazing! The world is better now!

It’s not done yet, but we’ll get there someday.

Chaol. Please get started on your therapy.

Ch 15

“It took Yrene a few heartbeats to reorder the room, the dynamic with Nesryn now in it. Yrene was not the primary ... person. She was the help, the secondary ... whatever.”

Lol oh my god this is amazing

Yrene - did you forget Chaol has a girlfriend?

Stop flirting with your patients - you’re so unprofessional!

(I’m so here for this messy love triangle)

(I think messy love triangles are my favorite trope)

Pretty real, pretty raw emotions. Oh, my heart goes out to Chaol.

Ch 16

“I let him take on his father and face the consequences, and I fled."

She watched him in silence. "He is fine now, though.”

"I don't know. He is free - he is alive. But is he fine? He suffered. Greatly. In ways I can't begin to...." His throat tightened to the point of pain. "It should have been me. I had always planned for it to be me instead."

He IS fine now!

He has ALL OF HIS FRIENDS with him, and things are getting better everyday!!

He’s got a girlfriend too!!! They had kinky sex on a boat!!!!

Chaol - you’re gonna be so happy when you see him again!!!!! When you see how happy and healthy and horny Dorian is!!!!!! Stop beating yourself up, I can’t take this, lol, my heart, my HEART

Phew at least we had a breakthrough and he can wiggle his toes!!!!!!!!!

This book, omg. I did not expect to feel so torn up inside about Chaol and the journey he went through. I guess if you really lay it out and stop and think about how much fucking adventure there’s been? There really hasn’t been time for anyone to process any of the deeply traumatic shit that’s been going on.

I did not expect, by any means, Chaol to be the one to start this self-introspective emotional healing journey. Damn boy. Are you ok??? Are you gonna be ok???? Blink twice if you need to be held and told it’s all gonna be ok.

#tog read along 2023 #tower of dawn

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chronocidalrage · 2 years

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Dexter Holland’s Favorite Subject

SELF ESTEEM I think most of my bad days are just low self-esteem days. Days when I feel challenged beyond my limits. Days when I’m not getting the validation that could offset it, all that shit. Just believe in yourself more and relax, do what makes sense to you. Your opinion on yourself matters WAY more than anyone else’s!

UNCOMFORTABLE I’m super uncomfortable again today and I don’t know why. Nothing feels good. Nothing feels right.

I think I’m annoyed that I’m kinda dreading Christmas. I don’t want to feel alone again but I know that I will. I know I’ll feel let down by Mom and Scott. I know I’ll feel alone. I used to love Christmas so much. What the fuck. It’s not fair. But I can’t have it. It’s gone. Christmas as I knew and loved it is gone. Every year I should gift myself a good Christmas.

I'm also annoyed by how useless I feel at work. But I don’t care enough to make myself less useless. I have to really start learning. Figuring shit out. It’s fine to fuck up but then I should figure out HOW/WHY I fucked up. Don’t do it for the "man," do it for yourself, your anxiety, and eventual confidence.

I feel fat, but movies and junk food are all that really feel good to me. But I have to stop. I have to eat better and exercise and feel good. I’d be so much more comfortable going out there and doing things. Living my life.

I miss Atom. I think I’d like to see Atom. I’d feel better if I saw him. I could be the complete loser I am and feel totally loved. Not gonna happen though. Oh well lol.

I think I’d feel at least a little better if I were making cool shit. Start making shit then! Write. Draw some sketches for the comic idea.

I guess it’s pretty obvious what happened to me today: other people. I had days of avoidance and then I got crashed into other people right away: picking up Susie from the airport, going to work for hours for no good reason, being around Susie all day today (which is great but causes some of my dumb issues to rise because I obsess over her opinion of me).

I think I’m just uncomfortable because of other people. Their opinions of me. What they expect. How little I can expect from them (no one to see Die Hard 2 with this weekend even if I wanted to go, no word from Brendan or Ryan about seeing Violent Night over the previous weekend, expecting the least from my family, Susie seeming fine to the point that I feel so pathetic in comparison to her).

Yeah. This is an “other people” spiral. I think the cure for this stuff is focusing on myself, whatever that means.

Yeah this is the result of me getting a break from the expectations of (and having my own expectations of) other people. I had a nice break for days and then I had to go back to caring about what other people wanted and having to be disappointed by other people not coming through for me. I feel like this when I’m hyper focused on others and can’t see myself through the chaos. I have no real self esteem and my opinion of myself is based entirely on the opinion of others. Most of the foundation of my self esteem was based around the fact that the greatest guy on earth insisted that I was actually the greatest guy on earth. That took a serious hit in recent years. That’s one of the reasons I was so upset when Atom started falling apart. If he’s not perfect, then what does that do to my self esteem? If his judgment isn’t perfect, could he be wrong about me? I guess the secret is to trust myself to know when something is worth accepting or rejecting. I’m not good at that. I always want a co-signer.

I’m always trying to keep track of things. I need to think of EVERYTHING, every possible variable. And my need to do that can get overwhelming easily. Just let shit go? Just "be"?

It’s weird, I can almost feel the difference in my body when I just relax. When I stop caring so much, my body feels lighter.

TOUGH SHIT It’s really hard for me to not think of myself as having already peaked.

How does one enjoy working on something with people if they don’t seem to enjoy it as much? How am I supposed to feel from a normal healthy confident human standard?

What would normal self esteem look like? How does one just believe in themselves?

I sang in front of my singing teacher tonight. It was the first time I comfortably(ish) sang a song in front of another human being in probably 12 or more years. I did okay. My read was that she was being too nice. But she may have actually been proud of me for getting more comfortable in comparison to when I started taking lessons.

It’s weird but I really do look at everything like Susie is above me. That’s how I interpret everything she says and does. As if everything she says and does is the result of her knowing that I'm beneath her. If you imagine two equals running into these minor frustrations, they seem a lot less painful.

But that’s the thing, in the time we’ve been together my opinion of myself has gotten worse and worse and my opinion of her has gotten better and better.

REMEMBER SHE DOESN’T LOOK DOWN ON YOU. SHE WOULDN’T BE HERE IF SHE DID.

The problem is that I love and idolize perfection. My heroes were always perfect. Fictional people. People I could never know in real life and therefore could always remain perfect in my mind. I see good as “perfect and inhuman and always in control.”

Why do I like Batman? He’s perfect. Minus his trauma, he is perfect. His trauma allows me to relate to him on an emotional level but otherwise envy his complete lack of flaws. I saw Atom as perfect. Perfect was good, and I was far from perfect so therefore I was not good.

I think that’s why the night is hard for me. I’m alone with my imperfection. It’s so loud at night and I want it drowned out. I think that for me, love is being treated like I’m perfect. Being made to feel perfect. Because that’s how Atom made me feel. Everything I did or said was good. I felt perfect and since I love perfection, that made me feel loved.

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luveline · 3 years

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in the morning, afternoon and night [Fred Weasley x Reader]

tags: reader-insert, hurt/comfort, self esteem issues, low self esteem, reader has acne, sad reader, insecure reader

pairing: Fred Weasley x Reader

word count: 1.8k

You glared at your reflection.

You'd think with such amazing magical medicine available, some witch or wizard would've invented a cure for acne, or at least a spell that covered it up.

You'd struggled with it since your third year. The muggle doctor you'd seen with your mother had suggested it was hormonal, and would calm down as you got older.

That was years ago.

It shouldn't have been a big deal. It wasn't, really. It wasn't usually very painful, though it was itchy as a stinging nettle and twice as unsightly. A large part of you knew it wasn't your fault, that acne was something that simply affected people at different times in their lives. You'd tried topicals and changing your diet, you'd tried losing weight and exercising and dermaplaning and everything they suggested in your mams fashion magazines.

Nothing worked.

Tears welled in your eyes and you sniffed them back, blinking rapidly.

It might've been silly, but it honestly made you want to hide away. You'd skipped dinner without really thinking, finding your way into the girls bathroom you inhabited now. You straightened your tie and robes, dusting down the sides. You leaned forward again, dabbing under your eyes with your sleeve.

The last thing you wanted was for anyone to know you'd been crying, because then someone might ask why. You didn't want to talk about it, ever.

If Fred saw you like this...

You and Fred Weasley had been almost dating for a few weeks now. Almost, because you hadn't talked about the whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing yet.

It had been years of thinking he was the fittest boy in Gryffindor (besides George) and months of meeting his gaze in the corridors and catching his eye over dinner. Gradually it had become something more; he started carrying your books between classes and opening doors, touching your arms and your hair and your face.

You cringed at the memory. He had been so caring, moving to wipe an eyelash from the skin under your eye. You'd violently flinched from his hand, afraid he might feel the bumpy texture of your skin, feel the acne beneath your makeup. He'd been apologetic and a little confused, filling you with guilt. You hadn't been able to find a way to tell him it wasn't him, it was you. Of course you wanted him to touch you, the thought of him cradling your face had been the subject of many dizzy daydreams, but you just couldn't tell him this one thing.

It was your deepest insecurity.

The stress had only made it worse. Redness was easy to cover with muggle make up and even some wizarding tricks you'd learned over the years, but there wasn't a way to smooth your skin, and the acne was textured.

It was depressing. You didn't want to use that word, it felt ungrateful to compare your skin issues to something so severe, but it made you miserable.

You but down on your quivering lip, pushing away from the mirror unhappily and opening the bathroom door, a frown on your face.

"Y/N!" a familiar voice said.

You jumped, startled but unsurprised. Fred had a talent of always knowing where you were. You'd find it creepy if he wasn't so endearing.

"Fred," you said, plastering a smile over your frown. "I was just coming to find you."

"What a coincidence, ma chérie, I was doing the same."

"Well," you began, easily sidling into his space, "you found me."

"Yes, I did," Fred hummed, wrapping his arms behind your neck, grinning.

He took a long look at your face, his forehead creased. "What's wrong?"

"Nothings wrong, Fred."

He moved his hands to your shoulders, looking down into your face searchingly. "Have you been crying?" he asked.

You shook your head, lying without thinking. "Something in my eye,"

"Both of them?"

You stepped backwards. He let go of your shoulders accordingly.

"Y/N?"

"It's really nothing," you said through a forced laugh.

He frowned at you for a few seconds more and his face cleared. "Alright," he said slowly, rolling the words in his mouth, "if you say so, doll."

You opened like a blooming flower at the pet name, your whole face softening. You smiled, hoping he understood that the smile meant, oh I just so adore you, Fred Weasley.

He threaded his fingers through yours, dragging you down the corridor beside him and waxing poetic about their newest lot of Peruvian darkness powder as you went.

It got so bad you couldn't go to class.

Okay, so you definitely could've gone to class, but the thought of leaving your curtained bed was enough to make you sick with anxiety, so worried that everyone would see you - see your face.

NEWTs were coming fast and hard. Everyone who wanted to be anyone was working hard studying their asses of, on top of Professor Umbridge's million new rules you had to abide by, including her newest life-ruining rule: Boys and girl are not to be within 5 inches of each other.

What a joke. You struggled through classes, wrote essays so long your hand burned at night and now you weren't allowed to sit next to your almost boyfriend at lunch? It was miserable. It was making you miserable, and now you may as well have sharpied on your forehead how equipped your body was to deal with it.

Fucking badly.

You groaned to yourself, rolling on your side to face the wall. You were at your wits end. It felt endlessly unfair that the thing that was stressing you out most was getting worse from stress.

Your stomach growled hungrily.

You threw your arm over your eyes in defeat, eyes finally filling with tears. You felt so hopeless. There was nothing to be done except keep up your routine until the flare up was over, or until your mothers next 'miracle cure' popped into existence.

The tears felt too hot against your sore skin. You couldn't help but sob quietly to yourself in self-pity.

A knock sounded at the door. You gasped, wiping the tears away in panic.

"Y/N?" It was Alicia. "Are you alright? Can I come in?"

"Yes," you managed. "Yes, of course. It's your room too, after all."

The door clicked open. Alicia appeared, tanned skin completely clear and glowing, though each perfect feature was marred with empathy. "Fred's been begging every girl in the common room to come fetch you, but I told him to leave you be."

"Thank you," you said.

You cleared your throat. Alicia moved her weight from foot to foot, twisting her hands.

"I- Y/N. I won't pretend to know how it feels, but I promise you, Fred won't care. He's beside himself worrying that you're bedridden and dying or-" she laughed to herself, "or that you're still mad at him for the itching powder. What I mean is... he's a good guy, and you're upset. Maybe you should tell him what's wrong. He won't care."

You sniffed. "I know," you admitted, feeling the weight of her shifting the bed. "I know he's a great guy. I just wouldn't blame him if he, if he didn't like me anymore. If he found it ugly. I would understand it, and I think that makes it worse," you choked on your words, heat building behind your eyes.

"Oh, Y/N," Alicia said, placing a tentative but comforting hand on your shoulder.

You lay in quiet, listening to your own ragged breathing.

"I'll go talk to him," Alicia said.

"No! I mean, no. Thank you, but no. I... I'll speak to him myself."

Alicia nodded, rubbing your arm kindly.

The sound of the door clicking shut behind her finally spurred you into sitting up. You dressed in a hurry, chucking a wool jumper over last nights pyjamas.

He wouldn't care, would he? You cringed. Yes, he definitely would. Whatever was between you would stop. He'd have the grace to let you down slowly, drawing away his affections. He was a polite guy, he'd probably even say the whole spiel of "it's not you, it's me". But he would, eventually.

Well, you figured. Let it be quick. Like ripping off a bandaid.

You tread lightly down the steps, hoping to see him before he saw you.

Of course, when the slightest groan on the bottom step sounded, his lovely face whipped to meet yours. He smiled in relief, but it was mixed with something else. Disgust, your brain supplied nastily. He was disgusted. He rose to his feet, smiling smiling smiling. But something in his eyes was different, now.

"Y/N," he said.

"Hi," you said.

"Hi yourself, beautiful. Where've you been all day?"

"I'm... sick. Bad cold," you settled on.

He raised an eyebrow. "You sound okay," he said, not unkindly.

"I..." you looked down at your hands.

A siren was sounding in your head. You didn't think Fred had seen you without make up for the last 3 years. Fight or flight was leaning heavily towards flight.

"Well, are you hungry?"

You shook your head.

"Are you sure? You haven't eaten all day. You need something in your system if you're gonna fight this cold."

"I'm not actually sick, Fred," you admitted under your breath.

"I know."

You looked up. He was still smiling kindly. It was infuriating.

"Look," you said finally, rushed and all at once, "if you don't want to- if you're grossed out. Then it's fine, I'll understand if you don't want to see me anymore."

Fred was stricken.

"I know it's - ugly."

"Ugly? Nothing about you is ugly."

"Fred, my face-"

"No, listen to me, Y/N. It's not ugly. It's not gross. You're not any of those things, are you kidding?" he said, grabbing your hands. "You're beautiful. All the time, in the morning, afternoon and night. You're beautiful in charms and transfiguration and care of magical creatures. You were beautiful yesterday and you're beautiful today and you'll be even more so tomorrow." He stopped suddenly, looking down at your joined hands. His cheeks had turned bright red.

"Smooth, Freddie," came George's voice, from the sofa behind them.

"Shove OFF," exclaimed Fred, growing more red by the second. Heat filled your own cheeks.

"It's skin, Y/N. That's all it is."

"Okay," you said tightly, trying not to cry.

Fred breathed out, his hair shifting in response. His corded arms pulled you tight to his chest. You breathed him in. He smelled sweet and rough, like burning caramel.

He thought you were beautiful.

You smiled into his shirt.

<3<3<3

tag list: @msmimimerton

if you’d like to be added to a tag list, please ask ! for in general or for specific characters, i don’t mind

#fred wealsey fic #fred weasly x reader #fred weasley #harry potter imagine #fred Weasley imagine #fred Weasley x reader #reader insert #reader has acne #reader is an unreliable narrator #reader x fred Weasley #fred Weasley fanfic #fred Weasley fluff #hurt/comfort #Fred weasley x reader

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dp-marvel94 · 3 years

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Face to Face - chapter 44

Summary: When Danny went through the ghost catcher, he expected to be cured of the ghostliness that had haunted him since the accident, not to wake up on the lab floor with his parents saying he’d been overshadowed but everything’s back to normal now. But why does Danny Fenton cry himself to sleep to then dream of flying? Why does Phantom, the ghost who was supposedly possessing Danny remember a life that wasn’t his? Most of all, why do both the human and the ghost feel that something vital is missing, in their very soul? Or: Trying to cure himself of his powers one month after the accident, Danny accidentally splits himself but neither his ghost nor his human half know that that is what they did

First -> Last -> Next

Word Count: 4,603

Also on AO3 and Fanfiction.net

After a break, Phantom flew the obstacle course a few more times. He flipped onto his back and waved at the humans below as he flew through the hoops backwards. He dove down, just before hitting the wall, and slunk through the objects on the floor again.

“Oh! I almost forgot!” Dad suddenly exclaimed.

Ghost Danny started slowing, looking over.

The man grabbed something from one of the lab tables, waving it around. “The speed gun.” He waved the ghostly version of his son on. “Keep going, Danno! Keep going!”

Phantom grinned at the words. So his dad wanted to see speed, huh? He pushed himself to go faster. If he could turn without slowing, could phase without hesitating… And he was dashing through the obstacles, the lab almost blurring around him. His breath quickened with effort. But he pushed himself harder, strained his flexibility, his agility. It was just him and the course. Just the pulsing of his core, the distant beating of his heart.

Soon, his chest was heaving, his core tensing with repeated bouts of intangibility. Phantom slowed to a stop. “How was… how was that?” He panted.

“You got up to 50 miles per hour!” Dad grinned.

The ghost boy deflated. “Fifty? I thought I was faster than that.”

“Danny, that’s really fast.” Sam commented with wide eyes. “Average jogging speed is like… 7 miles per hours. And the fastest sprint for a human is…” She pulled out her phone, presumably to look it up.

Fenton beat her to it. “27.8 miles per hour is Usain Bolt’s record.” He looked up at his ghost and his voice rang with pride. “That’s almost twice as fast. That’s amazing.”

“Plus, this was in an enclosed space while flying through an obstacle course.” Mom added. “I’m sure if you were in an open area and just flying straight, it’d measure much faster.”

Phantom’s disappointed expression dissolved. “Yeah. You guys are right. I guess I did good.”

“You did great.” Dad agreed, enthusiastically. He gripped the speed gun in his hands and glanced at the stairs. “If you want, we can go to the backyard to measure again.”

Ghost Danny landed on the floor. “Nah. Another day. I’ve had enough flying for now.”

Fenton looked at him skeptically for a moment before chuckling. “Didn’t figure I’d hear that today.”

“It’s alright. My core’s kinda tense from all the exercise.” Phantom walked over to him, putting an arm around his human’s shoulders. “Just you wait. I’ll probably be itching for more by the morning.” He shrugged, looking to his parents. “I had a really good time. Thanks for letting us do this.”

Mom nodded. “Of course. Like I said, I’m happy we did. Even if you got hurt….” She glanced to the bandage on Fenton’s arm and then to Phantom’s or rather… the unmarred suit covering the bandage.

Ghost Danny looked at his arm. “Yeah. That was… interesting.” His nose wrinkled. Truthfully, he wasn’t that weirded out now but… he had questions. How exactly did his suit repairing itself work? Why had he been able to feel it? Still… those could wait for later. He glanced at the lab clock. “It’s about dinner time, isn’t it? Anybody hungry?”

Fenton’s stomach rumbled. “That’s a yes.”

That earned a chuckle from the other humans. With that, the group went upstairs. They ordered takeout and watched a movie before Sam and Tucker went home.

The younger teens laid on the floor in front of the TV in a pile of blankets and pillows. Phantom lounged with Fenton to his right and Sam at his left, while Tucker laid on the other side of Fenton. Blobby nestled on his back, right between his shoulder blades, and purred softly. Ghost Danny smiled, putting his head down on his arms and listening to the soft conversations around him. It really had been a great day.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sunday was working on homework and relaxing. Uneventful, peaceful. Mom and Dad took the day off, not working down in the lab. The nights were peaceful as well. Phantom stargazed with his new pet. The little blob did wander off on occasion but Ghost Danny didn’t worry, having realized he could sense the ghost, even if it was out of eyeshoot. And when it did leave his side, for the most part, it would seek out Fenton anyway. Blobby was content splitting time between the two Dannys, that was… until Monday morning.

“You have to stay here, with me.” Phantom held the ghost to his chest. Blobby whined, wiggling away. It flew back to Fenton but…

“I’ve got to go to school. You can’t come with me.” He handed the wayward blob back to his ghost half.

Ghost Danny patted the small ghost between the eyes. “I know. I know. I don’t want him to leave either. But Fenton has to go to school. He’ll be back soon though.” He kissed Blobby’s ‘head’. “And you’ll have me all to yourself, huh?”

The blob purred at the affection. Human Danny gave it scritches, right under the eyes. “Yeah, I’d much rather stay here but I gotta go. Be good, Blobby.”

The human left through the front door with a wave. Jazz came after giving Phantom and the blob an amused look. The parents smiled at the interaction as well, before going down to the lab.

A few hours later, Ghost Danny was scrolling through his phone and idly petting Blobby, when the Fenton adults came up for lunch. Turning his head at the sight, he floated off the couch and into the kitchen.

“How does chicken salad sound?” Mom said, looking through the fridge.

“Sounds great.” Dad replied, going through the pantry.

The woman closed the appliance, looking to the side. “Hi Danny.” Her eyes flickered over him, before moving to the couch. The corner of her mouth turned up. “How’s Blobby?”

The boy looked back at the small ghost, which was still snuggling into one of the pillows. “Happy. It’s been purring a lot.”

Mom nodded, starting to make the sandwiches for the other adult and herself. A few minutes later, both parents sat down with their lunches. Phantom joined them.

“How’s your arm?” Dad looked up, after a few bites.

The ghost looked down, gently touching the spot. “A lot better.” The cotton pad crinkled slightly under his fingers. “Fenton and I changed out each other’s bandages last night. It looked almost healed.”

“Can we take a look at it?” Mom asked, frowning slightly. Phantom reached up to his collar, preparing to unzip his suit. “After we finish eating.” She clarified, stopping the movement.

Ghost Danny gave a nod. “Yeah. After.”

After about fifteen minutes, the adults finished lunch. “Go ahead.” Mom motioned him to continue.

Like earlier, the boy unzipped the suit, shrugging off one sleeve. Gently, he pulled off the tape and lifted the gauze from the injury.

Both parents’ eyes widened. “You said almost healed. But I wasn’t expecting this.” Dad said, surprised.

Phantom looked down at the scrape. Or rather, what used to be a scrape but now was newly healed, light green skin. He shrugged, a little embarrassed. “Yeah, it’s… uh… pretty much better now. I heal a lot faster than I used to, I guess.”

“Faster indeed.” Mom mused softly. She reached forward. “May I?” The boy nodded and she gently touched his shoulder. “Does it hurt any?”

“Nope.” Phantom shook his head.

“And the other you, is it healing this fast on him too?” She asked.

“I think so.” Ghost Danny frowned thoughtfully. “Both our scrapes looked the same last night, except…uhh…the colors.” Both had been scabbed over, the skin around starting to peel and itch, as if the scab was close to coming off. “‘Cause my skin’s kinda green, ya know. But Fenton’s more pink.” His cheeks darkened in a green blush, still kinda embarrassed. “We didn’t think to check this morning. Sorry.”

“It’s alright. No need to be embarrassed about any of this.” Dad patted his other shoulder, before giving a thoughtful hum. “You just keep surprising us, Danno.”

Mom gave a similar hum. “We do keep learning new things. Still…” She shook her head, giving him a small smile. “I’m glad you’re healing quickly.”

“Me too.” Phantom agreed as he started pressing the gauze pad back over the area.

“You shouldn’t need to keep that covered anymore. Unless the suit is bothering the new skin.” The woman said.

“Nah.” Ghost Danny pulled off the rest of the tape. “It shouldn’t bother me.” He balled up the dressing and threw it into the trash can. The wad landed perfectly. “Yes! Three points.” He fist pumped.

The adults smiled fondly. Dad balled up his own trash, sticking his tongue out slightly, and giving his own throw. The man missed, of course.

Meanwhile, Phantom put his arm back in his sleeve and re-zipped the suit. “Yeah, It’s fine.” He rolled his shoulder, flexing his upper arm experimentally. “I can barely even feel the hazmat.”

“Oh. Talking about that, I had a question.” Dad asked from where he stood up to retrieve his trash. “On Saturday, you said your suit fixed itself after you cut it?”

Ghost Danny lowered his arm, frowning slightly. “Yeah, I did.”

“How’d it do that?” The man asked, eyes wide and curious.

“Well… It was kinda weird.” Phantom bit his lip, describing what happened. How the suit had melded back together, neon green, like ectoplasm, welling in the cut before it darkened.

Dad tapped his chin, thoughtfully. “Could you feel it, when your suit fixed itself?”

Ghost Danny blinked. “Uh… actually yes? It was kinda tingly. And…wet? I guess?”

Mom hummed, just as thoughtful. “Did you feel when your suit was initially cut?”

Phantom’s brow furrowed. “Yeah? I mean… I definitely felt my arm get scraped through the suit.”

The adults looked at each other, expression shifting. The two of them had an idea, didn’t they?

“No, son. I think your Mom meant…. You felt your skin getting scraped but… did you feel when the suit itself got cut?”

The boy looked between the two adults, still confused. But…were they asking what he thought they might be-

“Was there… some type of sensation, from the suit itself being damaged?” Mom asked.

And…. they were asking that. “I don’t…” His nose wrinkled. There was a slight impulse to dismiss the question. Him being able to physically feel his suit as if it was his skin was… ridiculous but… he’d felt it when it healed itself. “I don’t know? I can’t tell… Maybe?”

The woman nodded, understanding. “You probably wouldn’t be able to tell. You did scrape your skin and cut your suit at the same time.”

Phantom tried to remember. They’d been a sudden pain but… his skin and his suit… with the two so close together he couldn’t tell. “Yeah.” He replied mildly.

“Do you want to find out?” Dad asked.

Ghost Danny blinked. “What?”

“No. We don’t mean physically injuring you. We’ve seen that before and uh… we don’t want to see it again.” Mom clarified, holding her hands out defensively. “We could try out a few things, to see if we can figure out how your suit healing itself works. If you want to.”

Phantom looked between the two. Both looked curious and eager. And he didn’t want to admit it… but he was curious too. “Alright. Yeah. I wanna know what’s up with this.” He shrugged.

The ghost floated off his seat and started down the basement stairs with both of his parents. “So where do we start?” He asked, once they were all standing beside one of the lab tables.

“Let’s start with some observations.” Mom grabbed a notebook, jotting down a few words. “May your father and I look at one of your gloves?”

“Sure.” Phantom nodded, taking off one of the gloves and offering it to his parents.

The woman gently grasped it, turning the object around in her hands. “This doesn’t feel anything like hazmat.” She moved it up and down in the air, switching between hands. “It’s much lighter. Jack…” She handed the glove over to him.

The man hummed. “Definitely lighter… and it feels cool to the touch.” He pressed gently, watching the way the material gave under his finger. “It gives more than hazmat does. Moves like one of those nitrile gloves but… feels thicker? Maybe like… a thin… knitted glove? But it’s completely smooth.” His brow furrowed. “It’s hard to describe.”

Ghost Danny nodded, agreeing with the assessment. “Like I said, I can barely feel it. It feels like it’s… molded to me or… something.”

Dad nodded. “Are you feeling anything when I’m touching it?”

Phantom shook his head. “No.”

The man handed it back to the other adult who asked. “Do you mind if I put it on?”

The ghost shrugged. “Sure.” Mom slipped her hand inside and…. Ghost Danny shivered, a violent full body shake ravaging his body. “Okay. No. Maybe don’t do that.”

The woman quickly pulled off the glove. “What is it?”

“It felt like someone… uh…” Phantom bit his lip, mind catching up with the express. “You know how when you randomly get a full body shiver, people say someone walked over their grave…” There was a pause, both parents suddenly looking very worried. “Yeah, it felt like that.”

Mom blinked, lips pursing. “We will not do that again then. But just touching it on the outside…?”

“That’s fine.” The boy waved her off. “And I’m still not feeling anything.”

His parents both wore thoughtful looks. Worry flickered across Dad’s face. “Would it be okay if we tried to cut it again?”

Phantom bit his lip. “Maybe? I don’t know.” He wanted to see what would happen but the possibility of it causing him pain….

“How about this?” Mom placed his glove down on the table, reaching for a pair of scissors. “I’ll cut off a tiny stripe from the bottom here.” She pointed to the wrist of the glove. “If it hurts at all, tell me and we��ll stop.”

“I will.” Phantom nodded.

The woman sat down, cutting a tiny strip with her brow furrowed in intense concentration. The ghost boy braced himself. And… he blinked. “Yeah, Okay. I’m still not feeling anything there.”

Mom let out a breath. “That’s a relief.” She let the white strip fall to the table and…

“What the hell.” Ghost Danny’s eyes widened as the piece of fabric darkened, taking on a green color, and… melted.

Both adults blinked, startled. Then… “Language.” Mom rebuked mildly.

“Sorry.” The boy apologized. “But… what just happened?” He floated forward, his ungloved hand wavering over the piece of fabric. “I mean, that was-” A brief shiver passed over the limb, the hairs on the back of his hand rising. “What the… I can feel something.” He just blinked, trying to process.

“What is it?” Dad asked gently.

“It’s like….” Phantom frowned down at the limb, eyes flickering to the glove beneath. “There’s this ache…” He traced the base of his bare wrist with his other, gloved hand. “Or… no, not an ache. It doesn’t hurt. But… something feels… different. And it’s… far away but… not like Fenton’s far away. It’s… I don’t know how to describe it.”

Mom frowned. Tentatively, she reached for his glove. One of her fingers brushed the tips of the empty fingers. And… Ghost Danny’s own fingers curled in response.

“Okay. I… think I felt that.” The boy bit his lip, closing his eyes. “Mom, can you do that again?” His hairs stood on end again, fingers twitching. “It’s.. yeah, there’s something. It’s like…” He pinched his eyes closed, trying to think. “Getting your hair cut? Like… you can’t actually feel your hair so getting it cut doesn’t hurt but… you can still feel that someone’s doing something to it?” He opened his eyes. “I’m probably not making any sense.”

Mom placed her hand on the table. “No sweetie, don’t discount yourself. You’re trying your best.”

Phantom frowned. “Still… being able to feel my clothes like this is so weird.”

Tentatively, he picked up the glove and slipped it onto his hand. With the half-inch wide sliver gone, the glove was no longer flush with the edge of his sleeve but…. The boy’s eyes widened as a familiar cold, tingly feeling rose in his wrist. It passed up, just above his skin. And… okay, okay, he was definitely feeling his glove. The sensation centered on the edge of the glove and…. It felt wet, like…. When he was squeezing through a tight space and felt like he was more water than anything solid. Green sprung up, seeping from the side and below. It joined the existing part of his glove, weaving together and lightening until it was white. And… he blinked, his glove was whole and intact as if it had never been cut.

Phantom looked up. “So… that just happened. My suit fixed itself again.” His core tensed slightly and he rubbed the spot, nose wrinkling. “It feels like I just shot a few ectoblasts? But I didn’t so….” He looked at his glove. “What the heck is going on with my hazmat suit?”

There was a pause, the family members looking at each other. Then Mom said. “It’s not a hazmat suit.”

Ghost Danny blinked. “What do you mean it’s not a hazmat suit? It looks just like the custom suit you guys made me. I mean, the portal changed the colors but it should be the same.” His voice pitched up in whining confusion.

“No. It’s okay.” The woman shook her head, waving her hands at the ghost. “It just looks like your hazmat suit but it’s not. I think… it’s a part of your ghost form.”

Phantom furrowed his brow, confused. “What?”

Dad snapped his fingers. “It makes perfect sense. You can feel it, physically feel it if you’re close to it. It’ll repair itself if it’s touching you.”

“But the glove…” He pointed at the spot of ectoplasm on the table. “It melted.”

“If we looked at that sample under the microscope, I bet it would match your other samples.” Mom added, as if that explained his protest. “In fact, you should try to reabsorb it.”

“But…” The ghost trailed off. This was adding up to a picture. A very strange picture but…. The suit didn’t feel like hazmat at all. It was fitted perfectly to him, moving with him like a second skin. He could feel it, as if it was a dim memory of his own hand. It repaired, healed, itself. Someone else wearing it sent chills down his spine. And… he’d told Fenton, something about wearing it felt so right. “It’s a part of my ghost form.” Phantom stared at his gloves, his stomach flopping. “Like… it’s a part of my body.”

“Basically… yes.” Mom tapped her chin. “After your glove fixed itself, you said it felt like shooting ectoblasts. That must be because you were using your own energy to heal your suit, like you would any other injury.”

“Any other injury…..” Ghost Danny blinked. “But… I can take my suit off?”

“It’s not completely analogous to human biology, Danny.” Mom said with an understanding smile. “You’ve said it yourself. Ghosts work differently.”

“Yeah.” Dad chuckled, pointing. “You know how snakes shed their skin? It’s like that except you can put yours back on!”

Phantom looked up, blinking rapidly. He could put his back on, Dad said, like a snake. His hazmat suit, his clothes… he could put them back on, like a shed snake skin. The boy shook his head. Well… he had compared himself to a sea serpent on Saturday. “I guess I’m a snake boy, then.” He quipped with a half-smile.

“Snake boy?” His father laughed, scoping him out of the air. “HaHa. Exactly!”

And that’s what he gets for being mostly impervious to gravity. Ghost Danny tried to wiggle away, letting gravity drag him down. But Dad barely reacted. The boy sighed, giving up. Either the man was insanely strong or he still weighed next to nothing as a ghost. Likely both. “Dad!” He complained with his own chuckle. Dad just ruffled his hair, so enthusiastically that it was pretty much a noogie.

Mom pinched one of his cheeks. “Well, you do have a tail instead of legs a good amount of the time.”

And the world was turning upside down. Mom and Dad were the ones joking about this and he was the one still trying to sort it out. Earlier, barely a week ago, a discovery like this would have had them averting each other’s eyes, uneasy and uncomfortable. It would have ended with hurt feelings, tears, and arguments. But now…

Phantom reformed his tail as Dad let go of him. He pulled both of his parents into a hug, letting the appendage stretch to wrap around both of them. “Thank you.” He murmured. “For not making a big deal out of this.”

For not making him feel like a freak, he meant. For helping him sort this out. For not just accepting his ghostliness but…embracing it.

The parents squeezed him harder. And Phantom was happy. He loved them so much and all of this was going so well but… there was a pang in his core. If only Fenton had been here too…

The group pulled part. Mom and Dad didn’t say anything else, just giving him loving looks. The ghost floated over to the little spot of ectoplasm, left from when Mom had cut his glove. He placed a finger in the spill. And… the glove was a second skin, a part of his body, made of the same ectoplasm as the rest of him. He should be able to absorb this ectoplasm through it. Phantom focused, pulling the ectoplasm back. That little spot of cold flowed back into him, like one of his ectoblasts reabsorbed before he shot it.

Ghost Danny lifted his hand, surveying his unstained fingers. “So it worked.” He shook his head. “Man. Still… how did the portal manage to do this to my hazmat suit?” The question was thrown out hypothetically, no answer really expected but…

“Danny, sweetie.” There was a bemused lithe to Mom’s voice. “Do you still think that’s literally the same hazmat suit we made for you?”

The boy looked between her and the glove. That tone…. “I… uhh… I kinda thought it was.” He blushed, suddenly embarrassed. “It’s not, is it?”

The woman shook her head. “No, no. It’s not. It looks basically the same, though the colors are inverted. But it’s completely made of your ectoplasm.”

Phantom at once felt very dumb. “Yeah. Of course. That makes more sense.” And that was probably why it took him so long to realize that the hazmat suit wasn’t exactly a hazmat suit. “But uh…. Why does it look like my hazmat suit though?”

The more amused expressions waned. “It’s probably because that’s what you were wearing during your accident.” Mom answered.

“Oh.” The boy looked down. He did remember that, donning his custom white and black suit. His core clinched at the memory, the uncomfortable feeling of stuffing his jeans into the spandex, the way the high collar rubbed at his neck. It was not pleasant to wear in the least. And yet… there was a hint of sadness. Surveying himself in the mirror in the white and black, colored like a space suit. And turning away to explore the unknown… he could almost envision himself as the astronaut he’d wanted to be since he was four. “What ended up happening to that suit?”

A heavy silence fell and Phantom tensed. Maybe he shouldn’t have asked. They had been having such a good time. Things had been going so well but he missed something obvious and just had to make everyone sad again and-

“The paramedics had to cut it off of you.” Mom said, quietly. Too quietly. “You were wearing it when I found you in the basement. It was so dirty. There were…” Her voice cracked with emotion. “There were these horrible burns on the left arm. It looked almost… almost black.” She wiped his watering eyes.

There was a pause. Phantom didn’t look up, his shoulders ripe with tension. He saw it in a flash. His own hand, the fingers curled painfully, his glove half melted, a blackened scar running up the white hazmat of his arm.

“How much do you remember about your accident?” His father asked, surprisingly softly.

Everything, Phantom could have said. He remembered a thousand painful details in the privacy of his own mind but…he wanted to lie and say he didn’t remember. That would… that would be better, right? That would worry them less. He could lie and say he didn’t remember. They’d both sigh in relief and drop it but…

“I… I remember everything but… it’s not a good… a good memory.” He shivered at the words. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Danny…” Mom started, expression earnest and pleading.

The ghost shook his head. “I know I should talk about it.” And he should. He should. He could trust them. They’d been over this, how he could talk to them about anything. And…they’d already seen and accepted so much. He knew they loved him and could help him. “But I’m… I’m not ready.”

There was a pause. Then… “Have you and Fenton talked about it?” Mom asked.

His cheeks darkened, turning green. “No. We… we haven’t. We’ve… barely even thought about it.”

Dad gently took his hand. “Do that then. Talk about it with your other half. And…” He squeezed. “We’ll be here when you’re ready to talk to us, okay?”

Mom took his other hand. “Don’t push it down, sweetie. Please. Let us help you when you’re ready.”

Phantom’s eyes fixed down, his core swelling with a cacophony of emotions. They weren’t…they weren’t pushing him. They were giving him time and space and understanding. And he felt guilty. He should push forward and talk about it but… he and Fenton needed to be on the same page for that. They needed to deal with this in their own mind, heart, and core first.

“We won’t.” Phantom finally said, letting himself relax. “We learned our lesson there.”

They had learned their lesson about pushing things down, about avoiding feelings. He and Fenton would not make that mistake again. He’d talk to his human about this once he got back from school. They’d talk about this and start dealing with it. Another step towards healing, towards getting better, towards figuring out how to be Danny again.

#Danny Phantom #my fic #Face To Face #Double Danny #Split Danny

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rumblelibrary · 3 years

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The Diary of Doctor Laszlo Kreizler

Chapter 1

Synopsis: Alienist’s notes are private, sometimes gruesome, secrets of others and of himself.Those pages belongs to secrecy and decadence, have a glimpse to this world made of drafts, notes, accidents and reflections. Or maybe it is you the only person that should ever reach for it.

While you read this imagine Laszlo mostly at the end of his day, scraping the ideas and the thoughts, adjusting previous notes with additions, closing the day behind himself with a couple of sentences while sitting in his evening robe, a good glass of whiskey and his glasses bridged almost at the tip of his nose. Or maybe imagine yourself, you sneaky thing, reach for it from a far shelf.

Word count: 3k

Warnings: listen, this is the set of ideas and confessions of a man living in the 1890’s. Most of them will be outdated, rough, even deprecating in some analysis of the roles of men, women and social status, religion, etc.So be prepared, my point is to make Laszlo reflect upon those topics, but to be as faithful as I can to his time. Mention of death, mutilation, self harm and a minor depiction of a fight. Psychologically troubled young children ahead! Author’s note: I am a nerd for a good Victorian novel and a sexy Alienist.I have always been charmed by Laszlo’s mind and inner conflicts. So I took the chance and tried to have a run into that rollercoaster. The story is placed between season 1 and season 2.

Diary belonging to Dr. Laszlo Kreizler. This is a professional book of annotations over medical treatments of an alienist toward his patients. Do not disclose and send it back to the address if found: Kreizler’s Institute, xxxxxx, New York City (NY) L.K.

Samuel Griswold Goodrich, Illustrated Natural History of the Animal Kingdom (c1859). Contributed for digitization by University Library, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Schiller in his “Die Weltweisen” wrote: So long as philosophy keeps together the structure of the Universe so long does it maintain the world’s machinery by hunger and love. From the philosopher point of view sexual life takes a subordinate position in human’s life, from recent studies pushed by European philosophers, everything is about sexuality and its development. I like to think of the experience of being an alienist as the process of Queen Penelope that, while waiting for her husband Ulysses return, undoes her craftwork every night. I undo the fabulous constructs of people’s beliefs to go back to the rough sketch that stands at the beginning of their loss, their complex, their pain. Maybe that’s why working with children is so motivating and fascinating. They can be saved and yet, I am well aware, some of those sketches already traced in their young lives equal to scars that not even the most advanced theories could cure. But I can sooth them. I can prevent them the torment, the anguish, the recollection at night of those monsters. I feel like a poet would be a better alienist than a philosopher, but I have got no poetry nor philosophy in my veins, but the cold experience of the razor blade judgment of Life itself.

Today I observed a fight among the children at the Institute. Age range between 10 and 12. Boys. The fight was over the possession of a side of the playground, the territory of a pack of youngsters formed under the name of Steven. Peculiar lad, coming from a military background finds comfort in replicating the schemes he lived in his family. He takes the role of the Father/Captain of the team and subjects children that come from a similar background story, but do not posses his same attitude to the command. All quiet on the front, until the space he declared is own spot got affected by the presence of others. Intruders. I knowingly let the events unfold to see how Steven would react to his challenged authority. His reaction was, at first, worded, a sketch, a stage-play of an action he witnessed over and over, and he knew the part so well that some of the contending kids lowered their stance against him. Among considering to mildly intervene into this pyramid scheme of authority, another boy, Jan, calls himself on the role of the educator and hero of the masses and proceeds to unfold a wild and well assessed punch on the newly declared dictator face. Balance is established again. No need for me to arbitrate, once more the laws of nature seem to apply to children as in a state of nature.

Meet John Moore over lunch. His job at the newspaper is picking up, he is charmed by the spirits and the wits that he finds in his shared office with all the other writers. He mentions many, goes on and on over qualities and troubles, gossips and tendencies, and even little scandals here and there. To be aware of all those details gives me no interest, but to see a dear friend so invested clearly gives me something to pick up. To consider also the amount of details and the way he describes this or that member of the journal, I can do a small exercise of analysis. It is almost too easy because John is painfully genuine, even some of the kids at the institute would beat him hands down in a battle of lies. The more he likes somebody, the more he goes on about all the details and the characteristics, often letting aside the physical appearance. When he doesn’t like somebody he has a couple of adjectives for the wits and around four or five for the physical aspects that usually indulge on some repulsive idiosyncrasies. John is a man that painfully fits in the storyline of The Picture of Dorian Gray: to him physical beauty is spiritual beauty and, of course, the other way around. This part of him surely intrigues me, makes me want to tease more from him. But, as a friend, it concerns me as John is way too prone to purposelessly decide that somebody with good eyes is also a good human being, which is a very romantic and admirably naive way of judging matters. I noticed some names that keep repeating in his narration. I dread that it is synonymous of a soon encounter from my side with the objects of his admiration. Fetiches, I dare to say, that I will have to annihilate before they sediment into his mind, perpetuating a narration that soon sees John being mislead by others.

Reserved: Tickets for the Eroica, Symphony n. 3 by Ludwig van Beethoven. Thursday evening.

Note on the show: the first movement lacked the pathos needed to begin with, I am not sure that the guest orchestra really managed to portray the wider emotional ground needed to withstand the whole representation. As the evening progressed there were some outstanding performances by the cellists. Still not approving the choice of reprising the early quick finale movement against the lengthy set of variations and fugue that we are used to in presence of the Eroica. Underwhelming the performance of the horn and oboe, vital in the comprehension of the genius of Beethoven.

Niki is a new addition of the Institute, quite old for the standards. He is already 16, he will leave when summer ends to some expensive college his family meant him to stay. His parents expect me to make him “normal” in the time we are allowed together. He is Austrian and I let him act it out like I don’t understand German for the first week of hist stay until today. I believe I hit his pride, which is good, in the moment I answered back to one of his sneaky comments. Now he knows. He is not safe from me, he doesn’t like it. The young man has a tendency to danger, risky tasks and edgy situations. In his mother’s own words “Niki is not afraid of anything”. The phrase didn’t raise any excitement in the father, rather some sort of painful acceptance that is role as the alpha male of the house is probably not only being challenged, but already diminished, if not abolished. I have taken in consideration that Niki will break himself a bone or two in the process of the therapy, probably out of the spite of boredom or rebellion. It took him less than few days to turn himself into an outcast among the outcasts, which only drives me closer to analyse the complexity of his narcissistic wall of self defence. I gave him a physical challenge to lift a certain weight, he is a pretty skinny one, he didn’t like the challenge, but I am sure he will take it. He is a brainy guy, he hates to be questioned on unfamiliar ground. He won’t sleep at night thinking about it. A challenge, in this first phase, can only bring me closer to the ease of his pains. To continue the observation.

It is a sad privilege of medicine, in particular the one I practice, to be able to witness the weaknesses of the human nature and the reverse side of life. Nevertheless, I oblige this same privilege of the study as life moves into shades of darkness. To be aware of it gives more solace to my soul than to be victim of patiently waiting for the inevitable unfolding of the events. To be able to understand more about psychology would bring more comfort and elevation to any human being, the times might not be there yet, but eventually something will move into the direction of a more wholesome approach.

Dinner meeting with Sara Howard, at the restaurant Jardin Des Cygnes, 7 pm sharp. Do not expect to reach the dessert. Do not know if John will be participating due to undeniable tension among the two and the fatal despise of John over French cuisine.

The case that Sara unfolded tonight to my ears feels more and more like pulled out from some gothic book or from the mind of a Roman historian that needed to justify the godly origins of an Emperor. One killing, apparently random, a very constructed iconography over the body. Signs and insults, shapes and drawings. Is this a work of art? Does the killer wants his victim to be his Mona Lisa? His David? I am charmed and destabilised. If this was a murder like any other, then why to spend so much time into it? Based on the description the act of killing itself was quick: a sharp cut over the throat, almost like not wanting to ruin too much the surface to use as base for, what? I keep rerunning those symbols over and over as Sara described them to me, my mind is flooded with the designs of greek philosophers that needed to explain themselves why the sky is above our head and never collapses on us. Hilarious how, no matter the science advancement, in the mind of many the sky stands inevitably overt their shoulders, suffocates them, brings them to a death of the soul and not of the body. Is all this graphic charade indeed only a form to scream for attention? To stress the eyes of an unaware viewer? It seems ridiculously elaborate, a scream for attention would be quick, it would be like guided by instinct, not reasoning, craftwork. Any man with a knife can paint in blood red the walls of a room and that’s asking for attention. That is the primal howl: look at me! I am here! But this one. I don’t know yet.

Spent the early morning reading anew my copy of The Metamorphosis by Ovid. Didn’t touch it in a long time and I got bedazzled by the world of terrible sensuality, anger and selfishness of those gods and mortals. I think back at all the deviances and weaknesses of human kind and I try to relate it to all of those humanoid figures. Niki would be a minotaur, the lonesome son left in the labyrinth and his strive for success is his bull’s head. Or maybe a centaur, because of his wits and strategic thinking. I might keep up the process, maybe this is the way to understand my patients better, to understand the killer better. Must remember not to romanticise it. Greek gods were probably the first form of self indulging of a society that needed gods to be forgiving and allowing favours and punishments, but only in exchange of sacrifices. But the sacrifice never comes from the God’s will, but from the will of the man that perpetuates the act of killing. To sacrifice someone or something is the sadistic response to a lack of love deeply inherited in human mind that becomes neurotic. Is the killer giving the God of his own neurosis a body to feast upon?

I talked with Jan this morning. The young boy is about 10, but he acts like a full grown adult. I could easily asses that’s the reason why he could challenge Steven in that fight. Two children mimicking adults situations they know too well. Jan is son of an industrial man, but he is also son of the dialectics of the industrial revolution. He sounds like he swallowed some of those books about working class rights and communism, probably pushed by a resentful surrounding (mother?uncle? the midwife?) over the social role of his father. As much as incredibly smart and lectured, Jan lost most of his early occasions in life by spending a considerable amount of time using his fists. The anger ever present in the young boy always surprises me, he seems to be holding a power, a strength of a full grown man in those tiny arms. Nevertheless, he is already the tallest of the group. He is surely an idealist, which makes him also tragically fragile. His strength mixed with his heart of gold can make him the best of the heroes or the worst of the villains. He apologised for the fight, he specified how he didn’t like the sound of Steven’s voice, more than the sound, the level of pitch. I can’t stand somebody shouting orders, I just don’t listen anymore. He is so mature even about his own feelings, almost a gentleman in his chivalry toward the weaker children, honest with his open heart and resentful against any form of injustice. I am not spared by his ways, he would come at me whenever he feels like I was being partial over some of the kids, his sense of justice blinds him and transform a perfectly balanced boy into a ranging animal.

Ordered book, to be delivered around tomorrow evening: Introduction à la méthode de Léonard de Vinci by Paul Valéry. Suddenly feeling myself as a gross ignorant in art themes. I always regarded myself aware of the artistic personalities and tendencies of present and past, but this new amount of perceptions over the human figure and the human body leads me to document myself more. I could ask John for advice, but he wouldn’t take things at matter that seriously. I can almost hear him say how I can make gruesome a pleasant topic such as art. I should probably wait to see the body to push any further aesthetic study, but I find myself not being able to stop. I reckon, I can allow myself a vice or two.

Today I saw the body of the killed man, courtesy of the Isaacson's. To be fair, I had underestimated it. In Sara’s descriptions, probably due to her more analytic mind, all the charm of the representation got lost in favour of a less cryptic and reasonable understanding of the act. Sara got what some alienists will call a masculine mind, which I don’t perfectly agree on. If I apply that same approach John would be a very feminine mind, all wrapped up in romanticising even the ugliest. I guess that dividing the world in “fragile and gentle” and “strong and powerful” is just easier to explain the fluctuation of something that doesn’t need a real name or a category like human inclinations on thoughts. I got a feverish sense of patience by looking at the body. Each symbol traced with sapient slowness, dense of the time that the killer spent with the body. That is a work of hours, he had time and meaning. He had resources and was able to spend not less than the time he needed to reach, a vision? An ideal? A message? Is it the message meant to be understood? Am I supposed to unravel it or it is maybe just the way the killer communicates within himself? And if I do decifrate the code, will that bring me closer to him? Or to his next victim?

Reminder: ask John to replicate all the symbols on the bodies in the correct measure and order. It might be needed some hard convincing. Addition: scheduled meeting, his house, 3 pm.

It wasn’t a day like any other when I met you. Or maybe it was, and that’s why I got so struck by it and now I am here playing it over and over through what my memory clung on so desperately. In my own experience, life was often similar to swimming in a lake. Those rich, dense lakes in the north of (illegible cancelled word) were my father used to bring us during summer. I still feel the pull, the draw down toward the abyss. It ashamed me, in a way, the fear that such a simple feeling aroused in my young mind, unaware nevertheless, that such a feeling would follow me through all my existence. It was a prophecy and, like most of the prophecies, was a riddle. I cradle in my heart the charm of those days, the mindless happiness. The foolish feeling of freedom. Little I knew that freedom would be taken away from me that soon, that the body that used to navigate me over the dense waters, helping me to fight the haul toward the unknown, would become my own cage. That day. Today. The day where I met you, the day I was afloat. The child gasping for air felt the wrench become a gentle push and now he is floating on his back over the scary waters of reality and malice. It gave me relief and it gave me terror, because since that very moment I knew that I would never be able to move on from the sight of you. From the feeling of your eyes lingering on me. From the smile you so easily shone upon me. From the whiff of imported perfume that hit me when you turned on side exploding that swan like neck. And nothing, not even my stern look, could dim that wave of hope that your sole presence washed over me. The abyss roars, calls me to a home of damnation and terror and curses my name and yet you repeated that hell-bound name of mine after me and I felt safe.

John told me so much about you, it feels like I have always known you.

The rope is gone from my neck, the guillotine won’t fall on me, I am spared, I am free.

I have read your latest article, I am thrilled to help with the case.

I am in disbelief.

Your voice.

Dr. Kreizler

How dare you? How dare you to come into my life, to appear, like a vision, mystical, in a way I despised at University when all those theology students talked about the divine. In this very moment I can’t recollect much of what you said, something about the case, about going with John at the obituary. It feels confusing, I feel overstimulated, my memory fails me, I am not sure anymore. I write these few lines and it is passed the hour of the witches and I wish, I demand, to never see you again, because life should never grant hope to a condemned man.

#dr laszlo kreizler #dr laszlo kreizler imagine #dr laszlo kreizler x reader #dr laszlo kreizler x you #laszlo kreizler #laszlo kreizler headcanons #laszlo kreizler x reader #the alienist fanfic #victorian age #v writes #the diary of doctor laszlo kreizler

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meimae · 4 years

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Language Learning Through Immersion: One Year Japanese Update

11/03/2021

I did it, you guys! I’ve successfully reached my very first year of Japanese language immersion! I honestly thought that I would have given up by now, but this really has been a fun and ultimately rewarding endeavor.

Studying the language has been at the back of my mind for years since elementary school, I just never really knew how to go about it before, and I always thought that I could learn it in a classroom setting someday. That someday for me was in two elective courses in university, and while those were fun as well, it did not give me the same gains that I have achieved in this past year.

It’s probably easier to quantify learning a language in a classroom setting, especially when going through a program to earn a language degree. Learning through immersion, however, I had to really consider what my goals should be on my own. Eventually, I stumbled upon an article saying that for an English speaker, Japanese was exceptionally difficult to learn and that at least 2,200 hours must be spent with the language to reach a certain level of proficiency. So I said to myself, “well okay internet, if you say so!”, and set that as my long term goal going forward.

Spoiler Alert: I did not hit that goal in my first year. I am not crazy and will never listen to Japanese in my sleep regardless of what Khatzumoto (the creator of All Japanese All the Time) says.

I did, however, hit a total 1,226.65 active immersion hours in my first year, so I guess I’m still a bit nuts. That is 874.96 hours of active listening and 351.69 reading hours. I also did 270.59 hours of passive listening, also known as the time in the very beginning of my immersion where I was using Japanese subtitles (therefore not really concentrating on listening alone). That’s a cumulative 1,497.24 hours spent with Japanese. That’s more than halfway towards my goal!

To further break that down for curious animanga fans out there, that’s 973 episodes from 109 anime, 765 episodes from 33 dramas, 7 movies, and 967 chapters from 107 volumes of manga (21 series). Here’s my anilist and mydramalist to see what I’ve read/watched.

During all this, I was also doing my daily Anki reps and now I have a 530 day SRS streak (includes the time prior starting immersion and only doing RTK and some vocabulary cards) and a total 8,857 sentence cards. I’ve been averaging 406 cards daily (because I’m trying to cure my leeches) and I spend about an hour per day doing reps and learning new cards. I don’t really track my time on Anki, but I do have a set timer that goes off after 1-1:30 hours.

What I haven’t touched upon at all is output. I have not gone out of my way to find a tutor or a language partner. There’s still plenty of input out there to immerse in before I even consider outputting.

Graphs, stats, and more thoughts:

Here's my current card count in my main deck (minus the cards in my new/learning queue and leeches I've been relearning which are in separate decks):

That one day in 2019 where I did not do my cards because I was seriously doubting whether I can actually stick with language learning this time around will forever haunt and inspire me to keep going everyday.

Workflow and Tips

You might be wondering, how do I have a lot of time? I started this whole endeavor in the middle of a pandemic, which eliminated the option of me going to a language school, and a slew of other things I were considering doing last year became impossible (and if anything, very scary to do in a pandemic). All I can say is that, things work out eventually if it is His will, and if I can learn a skill before everything properly settles back down again, then why not?

I wake up at 5 in the morning everyday to either do my Anki reps or read until the time when I need to get up and I listen to compressed audio throughout the day. The biggest tip is to switch the time you spend watching/reading in your native language to your target language instead. Listen to a podcast during your commute, watch an episode during lunch break, read before going to bed, do your Anki reps in the bathroom if you have to.

But, if you’re feeling burnt out, there is no reason for you to not take a break! I have been watching a lot of Among Us streams before bed, and I chat with my friends from time to time. Language learning is not a race.

More Stats

Here are a couple of grids of the kanji characters that I have encountered at least once in my immersion and how well I have answered them in my vocabulary/sentence cards.

It's interesting that after almost 9000 words, I have yet to encounter every single character from the Remembering the Kanji 1 (RTK 1) book by James Heisig, which teaches you the most common use characters that are part of the 常用漢字. Which brings me to the question, was writing down every single character being taught in RTK worth it every time it came up in my reviews for the first 3-ish months I was reviewing them? Maybe, maybe not. It certainly removed my anxiety whenever looking at blocks of text in Japanese, but the longer I think about it, the more I feel I should have switched to Recognition RTK earlier. Still, being able to write in proper stroke order is cool I guess, and it also helps me when looking things up in the dictionary.

Here’s the same grid but in JLPT order:

I clearly need to grind those N2 and N1 level cards! Speaking of which, I have apparently almost covered every single character that could possibly appear in the JLPT (except for the N1 which I have only covered half of) in just a year's time. If the JLPT word frequency lists I’m using are accurate, I have about 2,000 words more to go to to cover most vocabulary that could appear in the test. This makes the "10,000 sentences/words to fluency" argument a reasonable milestone to aim for for Japanese learners if said aim is only to pass the test. That said, 10,000 words is just that, a milestone. It's more akin to a comfortable level of comprehension, but not my own concept of fluency which is being able to read with ease, speak articulately, and write comfortably.

READING IMMERSION GRAPHS

My biggest motivation for tracking my stats is for the purpose of seeing whether my reading speed is improving over time. Reading speed is also easier to measure than listening comprehension which is kind of subjective, so I had a lot of fun making these. What I found is that for the first volume or chapter of whatever it is I’m reading, I always take the time to get used to the writing style of the author. My speed really improves whenever I keep reading the same topic over and over again. On the other hand and quite obviously, looking up many new words in a row and trying to parse sentences slows me down.

Manga: Reading Speed Progression per Volume

I clearly love ちはやふる and I am not ashamed to admit it.

I need to start reading longer manga. When I do, I’ll probably split this graph into less than and greater than 20 volumes. Imagine if I start reading something ridiculously long as 名探偵コナン or ワンピース, these graphs will start breaching the bounds of time and space.

Novels: Time Spent Reading per Chapter

#neverforget the time I read chapter six of Norwegian Wood for 9 hours when it took me less than half that time in English RIP. Also, my interest in Kitchen plummeted LOL. Still planning to finish it don’t worry.

I also need to start branching away from manga and start reading more novels and light novels, too just so I can make more pretty graphs.

Visual Novels: Time Spent Reading and Daily Word Count

Also known as images that clearly show that I’ve already spent several days only reading the prologue of Island. I’m not sweating. 切那 needs to stop using words I don’t know in succession. More thoughts on this VN far into the future.

Thoughts on Immersion

I can’t really say anything else other that that it works for me, and needless to say if you’re considering this method, remember that the SRS is your friend but immersion should be your one true love.

Prior to all this, I couldn’t even read a sample paragraph from Genki without being confused to my very soul. Yes, I know, it’s embarrassing, but that’s the truth. I was way more scared of failing my Japanese classes than my actual thesis for my bachelors degree, I kid you not. I would quite literally spend all my free time in university trying to understand grammar, memorize vocabulary, and answer my workbook exercises with little to no success.

I tried so hard to get all the grammar “formulas” into my head for 1.5 years and it only brought me more confusion. I’m never going back to traditional classroom study for language learning, but I will still refer to grammar books when I need to, and not because I feel like I need to answer 4783342 different workbook exercises like my life depended on it.

I still can’t believe it, but with immersion this statement is actually true to a point, don’t try shadowing anime/or calling your boss anime language slurs, use your common sense:

study anime to understand Japanese > study Japanese to understand anime

Future Goals/Plans

2,200 immersion hours was my initial goal, but honestly I feel like that number could be much higher. There’s still a lot of stuff I don’t understand (news, politics, sciences, etc.), so I’ll make attempts to cover more of those things in my immersion.

I’ll continue reading more, because that’s a natural SRS in itself. Try to read longer manga, more novels, visual novels, and light novels, and maybe news articles.

I’ll try to mine as much “JLPT vocab” as I can before making any attempts at taking the JLPT. I noticed that a lot of the words I know don’t appear in the JLPT word lists as much, even though they appear a lot in media/daily conversation.

Continue mining all words I don’t know because all words are useful anyway. There is no such thing as useless words. I never really understood mining only “interesting words” or words that “pop up” in your immersion. As I said in my previous blog post, 美人局 is an interesting word and I certainly caught it being said in my immersion, but in the three languages I know, I wouldn’t know when I would be able to use such a word, as compared to something like ジャガイモ which is a significantly less interesting word, but is certainly useful to know.

I have managed to talk up a storm, but if you have any questions regarding my process or recommendations for new immersion material, please feel free to send an ask/reply to this post. I love hearing about other people’s language learning/immersion journeys.

See you on my next post!

#language learning #japanese language #language acquisition #study blog #langblr #studyblr #graphs #language immersion #japanese #visual novels #manga #novels #anime #dramas #movies #youtube #podcasts

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ashbrea381writings · 3 years

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Flying Blind: Chapter 2, Meeting the Bats

“Bunnyx? Should I be concerned?” Ladybug asked, turning to look at the person behind her. Bunnyx was obviously a good five or so years older than the rest of the team, and Batman would have shrugged it off if it weren’t for the next words from Bunnyx’s mouth.

“Nah, I wanted to be at this meeting since current me wasn’t.” Bunnyx pulled up a chair and flipped it backwards to sit on it that way. “To explain, Batman, I can’t tell them too much or the timeline would become unstable, and that really isn’t good. I help where I can and where they are going astray from the correct timeline.”

“Who is to say the correct timeline?” Robin asked. “Couldn’t you nudge it into a more favorable outcome?”

“Not without disappearing. Back to the Future style.” Bunnyx commented bitterly. “Been there, almost disappeared, it sucked. But I can tell you this, LB, it’s okay to trust them with the info you’ve got so far. They’re very helpful.”

“Thanks Bunnyx. Sticking around?” Ladybug asked, handing them a plate with some pastries.

“For the best pastries in Paris for free? Yes, for sure.” Bunnyx started laughing as they took the plate and took a few steps back. “I’m probably gonna let you all strategize without me though, I just wanted to hear the convo I missed the first time ‘round.”

“Oh please, you know they would feed every one of you guys for free if you asked. Unless you’ve had a falling out in the future I don’t currently know about?” Ladybug teased, loosening up more than she had so far.

“Nah, but at the point I’m at, I’m trying not to drain them, you have no idea how much time travel makes you hungry.” Bunnyx chuckled. “Besides, with the rest of these guys stopping by constantly, I’m surprised they even manage to make any money.”

Ladybug shook her head but didn’t comment, turning back to Batman and sighing. “We also have a friend who cannot always help out in battle for civilian reasons. That is Tempest, who has the ability to transform into three different forms; lightning, air, and water.”

“And you’re all about the same age?” Batman asked, his frown deepening.

“More or less, within about a year and a half from oldest to youngest.” Chat confirmed as Ladybug nodded. “We try not to advertise our real ages for both identity reasons, and to try and control just how many people don’t want us doing this due to our ages.”

“And you have no mentor? No Adult to pull you out if things get rough?” Batman’s voice was incredulous, and he sat up even straighter in his seat.

“Unless you count Bunnyx who jumps back from the future now and then to check in.” Chat joked, poking said hero in the ribs.

“Watch it, Kitty-Cat, I can and will send my younger self something embarrassing about you.” Bunnyx slapped his hand away, but sounded bored.

“Who gave you your powers then? You said before that you got your abilities from items?” Robin asked, leaning forward and bracing his arms on the table.

“Like I said, he gave up his memories to protect more of the artifacts.” Ladybug sighed, “The items in question are individually called the Miraculous. There is a box that I have custody of that usually holds them. I won’t say how many there are. Right now I’m letting each person here use one, Chat and I were picked by the former Guardian. When Hawkmoth found out the identity of the former Guardian, he attempted to find out our identities too and wanted to steal the box for himself.” Ladybug stood and began to pace slightly in the little room there was. “During the battle, Chat and I were able to retrieve the contents, and the former Guardian transferred his title to me. The magic of the Miraculous wiped his memories to keep the secrets of the Miraculous from ever being taken from him.”

“So not only are you a superhero as a teenager, but you guard a set of ancient artifacts that each hold incredible power?!” Batman stood abruptly. “If there is some sort of title involved, who gave that title to your mentor?”

“People who are a combination of long gone or not welcome here due to antiquated ways.” Ladybug snapped harshly. “Do not presume to know what is going on with us. Age does not mean wisdom, just that you assume you know what is best for other people.”

Batman took a step back and sighed. “I am angry on your behalf that you were put under this amount of pressure.” He took a moment to calm himself and shook his head. “Am I correct to assume that Hawkmoth is of a similar age to me?”

Ladybug studied Batman for a few moments, sharing glances with a few of the other teammates who all made some sort of gesture or facial expression that they understood among themselves. “Roughly, yes, we cannot be precise but I would judge you and him to be within 3 or so years of each other.”

“What other information do you have? We might be able to help figure him out.”

“It will be difficult, the magic of the Miraculous makes it difficult to pinpoint an identity, and tends to make you want to drop the search. Although, there are some exceptions. Rena figured Carapace out after meeting him in the mask twice.” Ladybug pointed out. At that comment, Rena chuckled and elbowed a blushing Carapace.

“Not fair, LB, you know why it was that easy for her to figure me out.” Carapace muttered, pulling his hood lower over his face.

“My point is, maybe someone with an outside perspective would be able to push past it.” Ladybug shook her head at her friends. “Here, this has everything we’ve observed about Hawkmoth, and information that will help you to identify him more easily. Some of that information covers Miraculous holders in general from our own observations about ourselves. Don’t look into our identities with this, just Hawkmoth.”

“What kind of information?” Batman asked, taking the flash drive.

“How much of a height difference we have when we transform, how much things like hair and eye color change, Chat is an exception for the eyes part.” Chat gave a bow as Ladybug said his name. “It also has Hawkmoth’s approximate measurements from what I’ve been able to figure out the few times we’ve seen him in person. He’s a very tall, slender man.”

Batman handed the flash drive to Robin, who plugged it into a screen on his glove, asking quietly, “Hmmm, how accurate are these measurements and how did you get them?”

“I’m good at sizing people, there’s a civilian reason for it that I won’t name. I could probably give you yours if you wanted.” Ladybug chuckled.

“She’s nearly dead-on, actually, I’ve seen it in action.” Chat added, smirking. “Like that time she figured out who was who at a costume party.”

“That was one time and it was a bet, King Monkey should have known better than to challenge me, he’s known me for years.” Ladybug sniffed. “Besides, it was a good team-building exercise for me to identify you guys in the crowd while you switched costumes.”

“Team building exercise?” Batman seemed unconvinced.

“We’d only just decided that we all needed to know who each other were. So we went to a big costume party with several quick change outfits and tried to identify each other so we’d always know who was who even if we switched Miraculi.” Ladybug explained.

“You all know each other as civilians?” Robin asked, looking shocked.

“After what happened with the former Guardian, I was rather… Stressed and didn’t have a way to tell anyone why it was so bad, so I confided in Rena, and she basically told me that it was time we all knew each other. She’d known Carapace from the start and he found out about her shortly after, so it was something that just made sense. We coordinate better now and know what’s going on in each other’s lives and can adjust for it.” Ladybug shrugged. “We know if one of us is sick, or busy, or can’t get away from civilian life long enough to handle Akuma’s now. We’re more coordinated in our plans and can cover for each other both as heroes and civilians.”

“Do your families know you’re all doing this?” Batman asked quietly, seeming to think about the situation.

“One of us has parents that know, I won’t say who.” Ladybug crossed her arms and stared the Bat down.

“And what do they think?”

Chat chucked, “They’ve basically adopted everyone who wasn’t their kid already and told everyone to stop by anytime. They also keep an eye on the news and give excuses for the one that’s their kid to make sure they get to be at Akuma fights when they’re needed for it.”

“They also offered to patch us up if there’s ever an injury that the Cure doesn’t fix. We haven’t run into that problem yet though.” Honey Bee added, making a gesture like she would start touching up her manicure before being stopped short by her gloves. “By the way, Bug, you need to teach us how to adjust our suits manually, you said there was a way.”

“That’s an entire Saturday on it’s own, Bee, save it for the next girl’s day.” Ladybug waved her off casually. “Now, I’m sure you guys have what you need to start the investigation with you?”

“Yes, we’ll keep you posted.” Batman held out a comm unit to Ladybug. “The batteries last three days, if it takes longer than that I can meet you here to switch out. It’s also undetectable while you’re wearing it and muting it and turning it on and off is intuitive.”

“MmmmHmmm, I’m willing to bet it’s also a tracker. Pegasus, take a look?” She passed the device to said hero and he plugged it into a small tablet he pulled out of a pocket.

“There is the ability for it to track movements, but that was disabled before I even touched it.” Pegasus handed it and Ladybug tucked it into her ear, testing the settings a bit before leaving it muted but on.

“I know how important secret identities are, the tracker is only in there because it’s the same type as what Robin uses and I’d rather not have him injured somewhere and not be able to get ahold of him.”

“I still don’t like the tracker either, B.” Robin muttered, causing the Miraculous holders to chuckle.

“We can track each other when we’re suited up.” Ladybug swept a hand around the group. “It’s useful to know when each other is on the way or where someone is when you need to meet up.”

“Anyway, we all have places to be, so we’ll check in once and a while through LB to see how it’s going.” Chat said, cleaning off the table and tucking the dishes back into the baskets they came from. “Bee, here’s yours, I think you’ll be missed sooner.” He passed one off the Honeybee who promptly zipped away on her top, waving as she passed over the building. “LB, delicious as always, I need to convince them to teach me their ways.” He sighed, handing Ladybug a basket.

“Don’t be shy, if you ask I’m sure they’d show you. They don’t have anyone willing to take over when they retire, and it might be good for you to have a job like a normal person.” She laughed, taking the larger basket and setting it on the ground before wiping down the table with a cloth she’d pulled out.

“Don’t think I won’t… Next time I’m home alone for the weekend, I’m there.” He laughed and collapsed the table after she wiped it. One by one, the other Miraculous holders put away the chairs and helped Chat wrangle the table into it’s storage shed.

“How often do you guys do this?” Robin asked, watching as the other heroes took off in separate directions.

“As often as we have the time and can get away from our civilian lives. Since we all know each other, it isn’t as hard as it was.” Ladybug shrugged, ruffling Chat’s hair.

“We keep it to a reasonable amount of time and not everyone is always able to make it, but it’s always a nice way to get in some bonding time with the team.” Chat added, pushing Ladybug’s hand off of him. “We’re basically family to each other at this point, so we don’t see a reason why we shouldn’t spend time together. I gotta run, it’s almost time for my next thing.” He sighed and launched himself up with his stick, waving at them and running across the rooftops.

“We’ll be in contact, and I’ll be listening on the comm.” Ladybug pointed to her ear where the device was invisible to any who didn’t know it was there.

With that, the rest of the remaining heroes left, leaving Batman and Robin in a closed-off alley with a beautiful garden and a small shed. “Want me to check what else is in the shed?” Robin asked after making sure his comm was muted.

“No, there was nowhere to hide anything, it’s only big enough for the stuff that’s in there and they left it open the whole time we were talking.” Batman sighed and looked at the sky that was going pink with dusk. “Let’s get to the hotel.”

#mgi trope tussle #maribat #dickinette #dc #miraculous fanworks #soulmate

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cafeinthemoon · 4 years

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Shisui with S/O who’s afraid of fire 🔥

So when anon requested this, at first I thought I wouldn’t be able to write these hcs because I never felt connected with Shisui as much as I do with other Uchihas and that’s why he wasn’t on my list of characters, but the idea was so interesting that I had to give it a try. I had so much fun writing for Shisui that I’ll include him on my list!

I tried to get a better understanding of his personality and undertones to write these hcs and this is the result. I hope you enjoy it, anon, and thanks for trusting me with this XD

P. S.: I ended up not including Kagami, but I can write something for him in the future 😉

Fandom: Naruto | Shisui Uchiha

Warnings: pyrophobia, past trauma, mentions of injuries caused by fire, anxiety

Symbols: 💗 | ◻ | ▶

Shisui is a guy with many qualities: he’s smart, gentle and composed as no other

He’s a good listener, non judgmental and someone who always has the best solutions. Seriously, this boy is a dream coming true 😆

He’s the kind of boyfriend who’s also your best friend, to whom you can reach out and talk whenever you need to

So you never understood why you hid this secret from him for so long

The case is that after surviving a domestic accident in your childhood that became a fire and left you with large burn marks, you developed a paralyzing fear of fire

The marks affected the way you feel about your body, especially when you became a teenager

You had anxiety crisis everytime you saw signs or sources of fire near you, whether they were small candles or a jutsu. From time to time you had nightmares about fire and people screaming

This condition followed you during your time in the Academy, where you met Shisui

Now that you think of this, this fear of yours was a logical reason to stay away from any Uchiha… But this didn’t happen with Shisui

Maybe he noticed you were a bit insecure or thought you were just shy, so he just came and became your friend, never questioning you why you act that way or anything else

As time passed, you opened up to him often and somehow managed to make him do the same to you. This is how everything started

But you never told him anything about the accident, the marks or the trauma

Things got complicated when you started going out in missions

When performed by experienced shinobi, Katon techniques are effective as no other, so they were used when necessary, and you couldn’t blame your partners or Shisui for this

But you always managed to stay away from them during these moments

During your friendship time, Shisui never pointd this out. But your refusal to participate whenever fire was involved didn’t go unnoticed by him when you started dating

One time when you both were taking the day off, you met at a calm place chosen by him

It was when with all the delicacy he could, he questioned you about it

At first you tried to deny it and change the subject, as an automatic reaction, but Shisui calmed you down, saying that he wasn’t going to force you to speak if you don’t feel prepared, nor he was going to mock you or look down on you because of this

He then explained that whatever have happened to you, your experience was valid, and if it was valid to you, it was to him as well

You ended up saying that you had something you’ve been wanting to tell him but you haven’t the courage until then, and that you were feeling guilty for keeping this secret from him

You started explaining that it all began when you were just a kid, with an accident that left marks on your body and caused you nightmares for years after

You heard people scream at the distance, and felt when someone took you in their arms before you passed out

You only knew exactly what happened when you woke up in the hospital and your parents told the whole story to you

You were saved by a ninja, a friend of your family that had even more burn marks than you

Time didn’t ease the impression of the accident: you still remembered the heat on your skin, the dark smoke blinding your eyes, entering your throat while you were gasping for air

So whenever you saw fire, smoke or anything that reminded you of that day, you would panic

As someone who had fire as a primary part of his nature, Shisui found it difficult to imagine how it must be to have that type of fear

What he could understand was the feelings you had about it and how it affected the way you saw yourself and lived your life until then

He immediately started to think of ways to help you to deal with your fear, and maybe one day overcome it

If depended on him, he would have looked for help among your mutual friends, but you wanted to keep it between you two, at least for now

He agreed and made you some specific questions, like how close you were currently able to be from a fire source before an anxiety crisis took over you or how proficient you were with Suiton

When you asked what he was going to do with this information, he smiled and blinked at you, saying he’sforming a plan

He didn’t ask you to trust him: you would do it with your life

The first measure took by Shisui was to work on your self confidence

He always knew you had some trouble to accept compliments and were self conscious about your appearance. Now that he knew the reasons, he wanted you to feel comfortable with your body

So he suggested that you wore clothes with shorter sleeves when you were alone with him, so that you’d become used to have someon’s eyes on you

You were shy about it, but decided to do as he said

Shisui would hold you in his arms, even kissing your marks, and telling you specific things he found beautiful in you

You repeated this exercise everyday until you started to accept yourself and feel prepared to use short sleeves in front of other people, first your closest friends, then strangers

At the same time, you trained your Suiton and evading techniques to be used during your missions

The second step was to manage your anxiety when you see fire or signs of it

Shisui asked your permission to use his Genjutsu abilities with you. His plan as to make you see smoke or flames at a safe distance, but without experiencing the sensations provoked by them

It was a risky measure, and he explained all the necessary details to you and told you that he could stop the technique at the first sign of an attack

You were afraid, of course, but now you had your confidence building up, and so your courage, so that you said yes

You sat on a calm place, in front of each other, and Shisui held your hands. When you said you were ready, he activated his Mangekyo

The first time you did this experiment, it didn’t last one minute. Once you saw a thin column of smoke miles away, you screamed and Shisui stopped the technique

You were breathing fast and had your eyes widened. He hugged you tight, whispering comforting words until you calmed down

However, when he asked you if you wanted to try it again, you said yes

You then did it every single day, for months, and the time of your experience grew from some seconds to minutes

You also started following his recommendations and using the evading tactics and Suiton jutsu to counteract what he saw in the Genjutsu. You did this until reacting became automatic to you: as Shisui explained, the faster you moved yourself, least were the chances of fear to take over you

Even now, you keep training to overcome your fear of fire. You still have anxiety symptoms when you see fire, but the nightmares happen less often, you’re confident to show your skin and you no longer stay paralyzed in the Genjutsu

The exercises also helped you improve in your missions, and other shinobi noticed that

Despite being realistic about the aspects where you need to improve, Shisui always points out your progress and encourages you, saying that if you keep the pace you have now you will achieve the cure 😌

#naruto headcanons #shisui #shisui uchiha #shisui headcanons #shisui x you #shisui x reader #uchihas

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klance-fics · 3 years

Note

Fluffy short fics??? Please :)

I've been recently been getting into more fluff myself! all these are under 7K i hope that's short enough vsdjbwjs

bench press me

“The hell are you doing?” Keith grumbles out, body mid-push up. There’s a snicker behind him, too close to his ears, though Keith can’t really understand what would be so amusing about this. Then again, he’s not really sure why Lance is lying on him while he’s doing push ups either. Other than to be, of course, annoying.

“Nothing.” Lance finally says. Keith hears the grin in his voice, which only proves to irritate him a little more. ‘Nothing’ his ass. “Continue with what you’re doing, Mr. ‘I’m-Too-Good-For-Socialization’.”

(Lance, as always, tries to annoy Keith by making his exercise harder. It doesn’t work. At all.)

In English, Please

Lance thinks he can get away with flirting with Keith if it's in Spanish. Lance thinks if he says the words angrily enough no one will catch on to the ruse. Lance thinks his secret crush is safe. Lance, my friends, is very...very wrong.

tell me again, do you love me?

If it were anybody else, Lance would think they’re messing with him for fun.

But Keith is Keith, straight-forward and guileless. If he’s touching Lance more, it’s only because he’s gotten more comfortable. And on one hand, that’s great, that’s—Lance feels very honored. His heart is doing backflips and aerial stunts and everything. On the other, this is really not helping with his raging crush.

His breaking point turns out to be when Keith, exhausted after a day of subspace meetings, drops his head onto Lance’s shoulder and sighs.

It’s a sigh that says, now I’m comfortable, that admits, I’m recharging, that practically screams, you help.

Hands in his pockets, he lets Lance bear his weight as if he trusts Lance to handle it. Great. That’s just—how dare he. How dare he be so vulnerable with Lance? Who does that?

It’s so enraging that Lance just blurts out, “I’m going to need you to stop doing this before I fall in love with you even more, asshole.”

Keith freezes.

Or, five times Lance acknowledges his feelings for Keith and one time Keith reciprocates.

wish that i could take you to the stars

“The love of your life?” Keith whispers eventually. His eyes are round with shock.

Yeah, Lance thinks detachedly. You’re the love of my life. You’re it for me. Everything I see and do is painted in red because of you.

❀.*｡･ﾟ

Or, Lance's body is covered in red roses and he pretends not to know what they mean, until he can't keep pretending anymore.

so what are you waiting for

Lance swallows. He tries to refocus his attention on the slight prickling of his wound instead of the proximity of Keith’s face.

“Y’know. The suit. It doesn’t look like you ever get out of it. What do you wear to bed when you’re at the base, anyway? Some purple Marmorian jammies with little blades printed on them?”

Keith pulls a face. “What does my outfit when I go to bed there have to do with anything?”

“Holy quiznak!” Lance barks out a laugh. “You totally go to sleep in the suit, don’t you?”

“What? No—I—Lance, shut up!”

Lance and Keith’s guide for how to cure insomnia

Keith has always had trouble sleeping, but never told anyone. When they fall asleep together after a mission by chance, Lance finds out and offers to share his bed to help Keith fall asleep. However, sleeping together every night has unforeseen side-effects for both of them.

Billy Ray is my boyfriend

It was moments like these that made Lance forget about his fears of telling everyone about his boyfriend. It was moments like these that he wanted to whip out his camera and share the love of his life with the world.

---

Five times Keith accidentally shows up in the background of YouTube videos and the one time is face is revealed.

The Art of Hellions

Lance’s daughter seems pretty intent on terrorizing her art classroom, and Lance has no choice but to apologize to the hot art teacher. As many times as it takes.

Dorks

Inspired by a post on Tumblr!

Lance is the only one listening to the current presentation, and oh boy is it something to listen to. The kid has been rambling on about aliens for ten minutes and he is trying so hard not to laugh. So hard. Turns out the kid didn't even think Lance was paying attention, so when he finds out Lance was he books it. Like, as fast it takes Lance to turn his head, that kid was gone.

Keith wants to die. The Hot Guy in his bio class was actually listening to him talk about aliens. That's it. He's done. Kill him now.

Poor Shiro is just trying to keep his little brother sane.

#klance #klance fic rec #fluff #lance mcclain #keith kogane #canon compliant #modern universe #short

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mendesblurb · 4 years

Text

We’re the lucky ones

Shawn Mendes x female reader

Warning: ANGST & fluff , maybe grammar error and maybe some punctuation errors.

GIF credits to owner and maker @sarakan3an16

Lucky the word you would use to describe your relationship with Shawn. Lucky enough to experience this type of love, lucky that you were able to make it through long distance and you felt like the luckiest girl to be able to marry him.

When you first started dating Shawn you knew that your life will never be the same again, and then you took a huge leap of faith when you agreed to marry the guy.

Shawn tried his best to always be there for you but you knew what you signed up for when you married an international pop star.

You were used the to the idea of coming home to an empty house after work and late night FaceTime calls with him became something you looked forward too before going to bed.

This morning you woke up with another nausea and your muscles feel weak. to be honest you’ve been experiencing it for a couple of weeks now. You also noticed that your hands also constantly tremble.

With a busy schedule that your boss demands you thought maybe it was just your body telling you that you need more sleep.

After the nausea passes you head to the sink and begin brushing your teeth. You were too caught up thinking about work related stuff when the sound of bing startled you from your thoughts.

It was a reminder telling you that today you had to do your annual medical checkup at the hospital.

Quickly getting dressed you head to the hospital and after completing the lists of test they said to wait a couple of weeks to get your results.

A couple of weeks passed and the hospital called to tell you that your results were ready and they referred you to a couple of specialists who will explain your results.

The doctors explained that your results were okay except for the doctor who explained that your family had a long history of bad diseases.

This wasn’t a new news to you as a few years ago your own mother got diagnosed with an ovarian cancer and fortunately enough she survived it. This was the reason why you tried to live a healthy life, exercise regularly and signed up for annual medical checkups.

It was safe to say that you did everything right but ever since you got your promotion at work, you find it difficult to sleep more than 5 hours each day.

Every FaceTime calls Shawn would remind you to get enough sleep and you nodded and tried your best to follow his advice but most of the time it was impossible to put down your laptop.

You asked yourself repeatedly how did you find yourself here waiting for an neurologist that the previous doctor referred you to. Soon the nurse called you and you entered the room

“Have a seat Mrs Mendes.” The doctor said and obliged.

As you were sitting across from the doctor. Lucky, was no longer your favourite phrase as the doctor explained the reason why you had been feeling all these symptoms.

You felt your heart stopped for a second as you hear your diagnosis and your vision became blurry and you couldn’t hear anything the doctor was conveying.

“Now there are treatments option available though symptoms can never fully go away.” The doctor explained

“How deadly is it?” You asked

“Mrs Mendes it will somehow shorten your life span.” He explained again

“Okay, Doctor.” You said while trying to hold back your tears

Later before Driving home you stopped at a pharmacy to buy all the medicine prescribed by the doctor.

A few days later Shawn finally came home from his tour and you couldn’t be more excited but you didn’t know how to tell him the news.

When he came home you tried to give an impression that everything was fine even though you can’t seem to finish your food and when Shawn asked you brushed it off by saying you clearly need more sleep.

Shawn find it suspicious but he didn’t want to say anything because he thought whatever was bothering you, he will eventually found out when you’re ready to tell him.

After dinner you just cuddled in the couch and watch Netflix and when it was midnight you both begin getting ready for bed.

As you were brushing of your teeth at the bathroom, Shawn saw that your hands were trembling and you simply just said it was another symptom you experienced due to the lack of sleep.

That night felt like any other night Shawn laid next to you on his back, an arm wrapped around you with your head rested against his chest. His breathing was slow and steady, he had fallen asleep already.

You hadn’t managed to fall asleep yet, you thought that the timing will never be right for you to break the news to him.

An hour or so pass by and you find yourself still unable to sleep and suddenly you felt thirsty so you decided to grab a glass of water from the kitchen.

Didn’t want to wake Shawn up, you quietly exited the room and head to the kitchen.

Grabbing the cup located at the top shelf and you head towards the sink but before you could do that your hands begin trembling again and you dropped the cup. God all you feel was useless at this point, you couldn’t even grabbed a cup without breaking it and the worst part is it was the cup that Shawn’s mother gave you guys as a housewarming gift.

...........Meanwhile at the room........

The sound of glass shattering woke Shawn up from his sleep.

He brushed off his sleepy eyes a s his hands reached out to your side of bed but it was empty, so he got up and went to search for you.

He’d found you sitting on the kitchen floor with your back against the lower shelf .It had been where you just couldn’t pretend to be strong anymore and you just broke down as your tears begin to fall. Your eyes were puffy and your chin was trembling.

Seeing his wife in this condition just broke his heart and what happened, he asked himself because she was fine during dinner and the only thing Shawn noticed was how thin she looked since the last time he saw her and he noticed that she didn’t finish her food too. He mentioned the changes he saw and she just brushed it off.

Shawn decided to sit next to you and you lean into his hug. You were balling your eyes out until Shawn broke the silence,” baby what happened?” He asked.

“I broke the cup your mom gave me.” You replied while still sobbing

“Baby, it’s okay we can always buy another one or if it will make you feel better I can even fix it.” He said while rubbing your back trying to calm you down.

“I need to tell you something.” You said as you looked him in the eyes

“Okay.” He replied calmly while reaching out to hold your hand

You told him that last week the doctor diagnosed you with Parkinson’s and that even though treatment options were available, they told you that you can never be totally cured from it.

Shawn was shocked and a tear dropped to his cheek as he heard that the love of his life had to go through this. He wasn’t mad at her that he just found out about the news, he was mad at himself for not being able to accompany her that day at the hospital.

Shawn was sad but he knew he had to be strong for her now and he said,” baby I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you that day but I vow to be there for you starting now.”

“Shawn, it’s okay... I knew what I signed up for when I said yes.” You said

“Baby you know what I signed up for when I said yes?” He asked

“Tell me.” You replied

“I promise to be there for you in sickness and in health, so allow me to take care you baby because I love you.” He said

“I love you too.” You replied

from that moment on Shawn make sure you were taking your medications and he was there at every checkup.

He was there for you and in that moment you felt lucky again because God had allowed you to have Shawn by your side in times when you needed him the most.

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fly-like-a-phoenix · 3 years

Text

House of Lust (part 2)

Abbé de Coulmier x reader.

Summary: Five years has passed since the events of Quills. The Abbé de Coulmier is released of prision by a misterious event. And he will know again those feelings he never thought will meet again: love... and lust.

Warnings: mentions of violence.

The Abbé du Maupas was right. The judge freed him a few days later after he knew his parents will save him from the asylum.

The audience with the judge was short. He had to walk again to the trial's chamber, dressing only black pants, a pair of boats and a white shirt, both hands in chains.

He sitted next to his lawyer, a tall man with red hair. He didn't know him. In fact, he didn't even know his name. The man presented his case as a mistake. He was condemned five years ago for a crime he didn't commit.

A famous case a the moment, the judge remembered. The Marquis de Sade was a very well known name in the whole Europe. And being his killer wasn't something hidden.

The judge finally accepted he was innocent. He was just administrating the sacrament of the extreme unction to a dying Marquis when he swallowed the Holly Cross that François presented him to kiss as symbol.

He just wanted to save his soul before he died moments later, because he couldn't do it while the Marquis was alive. Who would know the Marquis would be committing suicide, killing himself with the cross?

The principal witness was Valcour. He testified against Roger-Collard. He was actually out the Marquis' cell when all that happened, and he finally said everything he heard at the time.

The other witness was the Abbé du Maupas himself, who used to talk with him while he was in the cell. The Abbé said he was a good man, and didn't deserve to be in there, caged as an animal. In fact, he added that François should get his title again.

In less than an hour, François was free. He was out the building, touching his own wrists, still feeling the metal of the handcuffs scratching his soft skin. The lawyer, Maupas and Valcour were with him.

Was he really cured? Did he really deserved to be an Abbé again? Did he really changed after five years? Maybe he never changed. Maybe he was a little dog to Roger-Collard.

His world started to fall down when the horrific alienist doctor came to Charenton. The Marquis was publishing with Madeline's help behind his back, yes. But the doctor was the one who started to torture the pacients and the one who collapsed all the inmates activities: the theatre, the watercolor exercises, the games.

He mock at him when he defended her while she was being punished for helping the Marquis. He was the one who let Madeline die, closing the door, not letting her the chance to escape from Bouchon, his murderer. And he was actually the one who asked him to punish the Marquis by cutting off his tongue.

Roger-Collard was the real Demon. He still wanted revenge. But he will never see his face again. At least, he wanted to give him a good punch in the middle of his eyes for what he did to Madeline. He missed her a lot.

When he decided he would dedicate hiw own life, flesh and soul to God, he never thought his heart would follow the beautiful chambermaid that worked in the asylum.

When she confessed her love to him, he closed his eyes. He remembered so damn well how he rejected her that night. He was taking her away from the Marquis. She asked him to stay in the asylum. She said she loved him.

Those certain feelings he didn't want to show to her... Those feelings he thought incited people to act in a bad way... Those feelings betrayed him at that moment. He kissed her.

The feeling of her mouth, her lips, her tongue. It was all a real paradise. And when she pressed her body to him, he stepped away a few inches, a "no" escaping from his lips.

She thought she was doing him wrong. Actually, he had a hard on just for kissing the girl. He said he loved her as a child of God. She misunderstood this. And left by his petition, crying. When he got out the room, decided to bring her back, she was gone.

He cried that night, his head spining for those kisses as if he just tasted the most powerful drug. He desired her. And that was his chance. A few more kisses, and Madeline surely would took his shirt off and push him to the bed.

She had a lot of control of her feelings. He didn't. And when he went to apologize, she said "don't came closer, God's watching" or something like that. She died being angry with him. And that was hurting him so much since then.

"Abbé de Coulmier" he heard while thinking in Madeline. It was her voice. "Abbé de Coulmier" the voice reprised.

"Abbé de Coulmier." Said the lawyer. It was him calling. And François came back to reality.

"I'm not an Abbé anymore, monsieur. I'm just François." He answered, with a low, shy voice that wasn't common in him.

"If you say that, Ab---François. But now you have the chance to be that man again, you know?"

"How?" The confusion ran through his all body. The Pope himself, or that was what he heard once, decided to retire his title from him. He was not longer a servant of the Lord.

The lawyer took a paper, a letter, from his jacket. François look around. People were walking in those beautiful streets. But Valcour and the Abbé du Maupas were not there.

"Take it." The lawyer said, giving him the letter. "It's very important. You have to read it, Abbé."

François exhaled hot breath. He was a little cold, only his shirt protecting him from the easy wind. "Where are the other men?" He asked. "Where are Valcour and Maupas?"

"Oh, they just left. They couldn't leave Charenton too much time."

"Oh, I see. I just wanted to thank them for saving me, that's all".

"Well, you can do it. Write them a letter, or go seeing them."

"But I don't have any money. I don't even have more decent clothes than these."

"That's why you gotta read the letter, Abbé." He said, handing him his own jacket.

The lawyer turn around. When he was just about to leave, François approach to him, and touched his shoulder. They shook hands for the first time.

"Good luck, François." He said, putting his hat on.

"I don't even know your name!" He said while seeing the man leaving.

"Donatien!" He answered, more and more invisible into the mist.

François was thinking. That Donatien guy was very different to another Donatien he knew once, the Marquis himself. The voices in his head had stopped after he left Charenton. But now, all his being was telling him to read the paper.

He put on his new jacket, feeling better against the cold. And he walk a few meters, sitting in the steps of a house. He opened the envelope. And started to read.

François.

You are most important to us that you think. But the real thing, my son, it's that we can't see you again. Not for now, at least. We're in Spain. We had to run, because some jacobins still wanted to kill us.

I don't know what you think, but your father and I love you, my boy. And we want you to be free, and happy, as you've always been. That's what we contacted some friends of us. They'll help you to get out from Charenton.

You have to go to the address that's at the end of this letter. They are the people who hired the lawyer. They'll give you assistance of all kind and a roof. I hope you trust them as we do, my boy. We miss you so much.

With love, Anaïs and Clément de Coulmier.

P.S: Go to Villa d'Évreux. They must receive you well there. In the envelope you will find money to pay the trip. Go find a carriage that can take you.

Those were the first words he had read from his parents in, at least, ten years. Just a few lines, and every memory from his childhood came to him, making him shed some tears over the ink lines. He really missed them, more than God at least.

He started to walk, asking to the owners of the carriages if they knew that Villa d'Évreux. One of them did. And he took him to the ride.

Some women looked at him in a devilish way. Not bad, just desire in their faces. He never thought he was hot or handsome at least. He never thought any girl could feel something for him. But damn, he was so wrong!

Every girl in the asylum felt like a melting mess while he walked the corridors. Madeline was the epitome of that. And he used to wear his sacred clothes at that time! What could he expect while walking in Paris with such a normal look?

François look behind the little window. Paris changed a lot since he walk those streets the last time. It just seemed so much more civilized, so much more clean and calm.

Maybe he wasn't now just the only person in the world that hasn't succumbed yet to every spasm of lust and evil, noteven when all that bad happened. That was, at least, what he thought. But he wasn't right at all. Not with the people he was going to meet.

Tagging: @darknessisafriend @five-miles-over @yukis-writing @thegirlwho @jokerflecker @missrockabilly99 @luperugorria99 @lyoongx @weirdflecksbutok @skaravir @stardancerluv @sgtsavoytruffle @ohcarlesmycarles @beautifulyoungprospect @stellargirlie @sophiefleck @the-queen-of-things @joaqz-phoenix @ajokerfangirl

Let me know If you want to be tagged!

#abbe de coulmier #abbe thirst squad #quills #joaquin phoenix #marquis de sade #joaquin phoenix x reader #abbe de coulmier x reader

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watchmegetobsessed · 3 years

Note

I just have a lot of pressure on my chest and I just need to rent a little bit but you don’t have to share this…

I was always a chubby kid but I never really cared about it. And by chubby I dont mean like extra overweight I was just wearing clothes a size or two bigger than I was supposed to when I was 7-8 years old. When I turned 10-11, a lot of people where telling me that I lost a lot of weight. Which was true but I still wasn’t skinny I was just average weight for my height and age back then. Some people (the irrelevant ones) would still tell me that I needed to loose a little more weight. I then got my period when I was 11 and usually when girls get their periods, we gain a little bit of weight And I just kept gaining it. But I was gaining fat in my abdomen/tummy area the most. Like not gonna lie sometimes I look pregnant. Now here’s the thing, i was born in Canada and my parents are from Bangladesh, and if there’s one thing you need to know is that South Asians are VERY VERY VERY judgemental. Specially towards girls. So my mom has been body shaming me since I was 13 basically. (I’m 19 now) These are some of the things she says to me: “look how pretty she looks in that dress, you can never look that pretty the way that you’ve been gaining weight” “no guy is going to marry a fat girl like you” “look at your cousin, she’s beautiful she’s smart, gorgeous… don’t you wanna be pretty like her” “baby you HAVE TO loose weight or else there’s no way a guy is gonna fall in love with you” “people like to see slim fit girls not the one like you” “you’re intelligent, respectful but yore just not skinny enough that’s the only problem really everything else is fine” these are just a few of what I have to hear every single day. I don’t/never have eaten that much…I just don’t get hungry. It’s not that I’ve been skipping meals or anything like that but I just don’t get hungry. I’ve also been exercising a lot for about 2-3 years now and I’m still not getting the results that I want. So ik this whole post is a bit personal but y’all don’t know who I am so it’s cool 😆 but my periods are irregular so I have to take pills to have my periods every month and control my acne. Now I’ve been on the pill for about 4 years now and it was just a few days ago that I found out that I had PCOS. (Polycystic ovary syndrome) and one of the symptoms/side effects is that it’s harder to loose weight and also that you gain the more weight in the abdomen area. There isn’t really a cure you just have live with it. So all of this to just say that you shouldn’t judge someone’s body just because you think they’re fat. You never know what’s going on in their lives so you should just focus on your health instead of others. Idk if it’s long and not coney I just tried to put a lot of details some that might be unnecessary but this is my story.

Btw, my mom is still blaming me for being fat and having PCOS. She’s saying that I should try even more to loose weight now. How do I tell her that no matter how hard I try it might take the rest of my life to be able to loose weight?

Again I’m sorry that this is super long and not harry related.

oh hun, i felt everyword you wrote bc i went through a very similar experience growing up!! i was overweight almost my whole life too and literally the same way you wrote, mostly on my tummy. i was never bullied in school, not even one bad comment from my school mates but i got all the shit at home. my parents and my brother loved to call me nicknames that they found funny but they were extremely upsetting to me, like "fatty" or "big tummy" and stuff like that and they made me feel so bad and i couldn't speak up for myself, i was very shy in middle school and i didn't say a word just kept it all inside. they always commented on whenever i was eating and not even when i ate a lot but when i just literally had dinner or something, i felt uncomfortable eating with them present and i still avoid eating with my dad at 25... there was one comment that's still stuck with me, my mom was making this hungarian meetball thingies one time and i took one just to taste it and my dad commented on me eating again of course and i got mad so i said "yeah, maybe i should just stop eating at all" and he replied with "yes that could be asolution" and i still hear him say that to me to this day whenever i feel guilty for eating. 3 years ago i had a health situation too and i lost a lot of weight very fast and it's very likely that my condition affected my weight too and how i couldn't get rid of fat for a long time and i think seeing me go through that made them realize how badly they treated this topic all my life, they don't comment on my weight anymore but the ones they made in the past will def stay with me for the rest of my life.

i wish i could give you advise about how to deal with it, but im still figuring it out myself, it made me very hurt that i had to be hospitalized and lose weight in a very short time to make them realize that there could be so much more going on that they don't know about... i wish you strength and the only thing i can tell you is that you have the right to stand up for yourself and tell them how you feel and if they still choose to bully you, then no one will blame you if you choose to distance yourself from them. your mental health is just as important as your physical!!

#tw eating #tw weight gain #tw weight #tw body shaming

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fleckcmscott · 4 years

Text

Pre-Show

Summary: It’s a big night for Arthur. Y/N helps him prepare.

Warnings: Swearing, Smut

Words: 3,387

A/N: Instead of this being a request, this was a scenario I came up with while writing The Find. My brain wouldn’t let go of it. (Though, funnily enough, @sweet-nothings04 requested something similar a couple days ago!) I hope you guys enjoy!

If you have any thoughts or questions, please comment, feel free to message me, or send me an ask. Requests for Arthur and WWH are open!

The mild, local fame Arthur had gotten after being on Live! with Murray Franklin had been a boost to his ego. And, if Y/N was being honest, confounding to her. She'd assumed he'd continue to be an object of ridicule, the way he had been since that terrible video of his first stand-up had become public. (The humiliation and anger that had radiated from him as they'd stood together in Penny's hospital room, and his withdrawal from her afterward, remained fresh in Y/N's mind.) But she had never been so happy to be wrong.

Only a couple of assholes had approached them on the street. Of the small number of people who said hello, most were neutral, simply amused at having run into a person they'd seen on television. A few were kind. As the months rolled on, the resulting increase in clubs letting him sign-up for sets offered opportunities to hone his craft. She was glad for him, delighted to see how those moments bolstered his self-confidence, helped him let out the instinctual elegance that was too often concealed by reservation.

Though she did have slight concerns. Many of his jokes were sweet, especially ones he directed towards her. But most were therapeutic, about matters closest to his heart. They helped him understand the world around him, in his own way. There was a tendency to treat Arthur like a novelty act, whereas he took his comedy seriously. Would that happen when he performed at amateur hour at the Smile Factory tomorrow night?

She didn't bring the possibility up to him. They'd been a pair long enough for him to know what she was pondering. And she never wanted him to think she didn't believe in him. She did, always. Wholeheartedly. Even if she didn’t always get his humor. And she would sit that audience, give him applause, and laugh at every punchline. Provide the attention he craved and support he coveted. Her love for him and his quirky shtick made that a pleasure to do.

Arthur's deep voice, occasionally halting, other times confident, drifted through the ajar bedroom door. She grinned, standing next to the couch while she ironed creases into his maroon trousers. It was routine for him to rehearse his timing in front of the vanity mirror. Try out his facial expressions to make sure he didn't look "too strange."

The first time she'd seen him do it, he'd blushed and turned away from her, lines tight on his face. But the awkwardness had dwindled as she'd explained she had to prepare for her job, too. That even with all her years of experience, she had to practice testifying if she was going to a big hearing. The effort he put into perfecting his routine meant he cared, and she admired his discipline.

When she heard him enter the living room some minutes later, she glanced over her shoulder. "All ready to break a leg tomorrow?"

"Or an ankle." She giggled at his retort and turned to give him his freshly pressed shirt. The green of his eyes glinted, meeting hers. "I can do this. I know how to handle an iron."

She put her hands on her hips and cocked her head. He'd gotten better at letting her take care of him, but she felt he did more than his fair share. "You know how to handle a lot of things." She wrapped her arms around his slender waist. "This is the first time you've headlined a show. Focus on your act. Besides." A peck to his chin. "We must be in the honeymoon phase, because I enjoy doing this for you. I loathed ironing my ex's ties."

His palm went to the small of her back, lips on the shell of her ear. "Don't honeymoons last a week?"

God, he smelled good. He hadn't smoked since getting out of the shower. She nuzzled the crook of his neck for more of his masculine, spicy scent. "It's been a year and a half..." Her fingers sneaked under the hem of his gray thermal shirt. The warmth of his skin went straight to her center. "And you still drive me crazy."

A muffled laugh as he stopped her caress of his belly. "Sorry, I can't cure you yet." Then he patted her bottom and headed towards his desk. "Something just came to me. If I figure it out, you'll hear it tomorrow."

~~~~~

The dressing room was quite small, maybe eight by eight feet. But Arthur didn't mind. It had everything he needed. Incandescent light from the corner floor lamp made the wall's brown paneling cozy instead of cheap. The metal table was sturdy, the mirror on it sufficient to make sure his hair was in place. If the worn, wooden chair had had arms, it would have been more comfortable. But he wasn't there to lounge, anyway. He was there to work.

Pogo's was still his favorite club to perform at. The people there knew him, were aware of his condition. Not having to constantly explain it was a relief. They seemed to like him better, too, now that he ordered more than tap water. True, he hadn't been able to get paying gigs (though he had been allowed to split the covers on a Tuesday or Thursday night now and then). If he kept refining his material, however, he was certain he'd get there.

Skepticism had been his first response to the call from the Smile Factory. Having not slept well for nearly a week, he'd suspected it was either his imaginings or an elaborate prank at his expense. He'd waved Y/N over and they'd listened to the phone together. Yes, she confirmed. They really had gotten his contact information from Pogo's. A manager had gone to open-mic night and recognized him from Murray Franklin. An amateur block was a couple weeks away, and they wanted him to open it. They liked his oddball factor. They'd even stick his name on the chalkboard sign on the sidewalk.

Arthur had accepted the invitation quickly. It had taken a few seconds for him to put the phone in its cradle. Then he laughed in excitement and held Y/N so tightly he nearly spun her around the kitchen. She'd been happy. But her need to protect him was clear in her posture. He'd tried to put a stop to that quickly. "I want this. People are noticing me. I can't wait for my big break forever."

"You're right," she'd said, nodding. He'd run the back of his fingers over her cheek, her pretty gaze glittering at him. "I can't wait to hear whatever you come up with."

Her words echoed as he read his notebook. Opening a show was new for him. He'd picked out what he thought were his best jokes. A mix of ones which had gotten rare guffaws from audiences, and ones Y/N said she loved. There were new quips, too. He'd done everything he could think of to prepare. But stage fright roamed as deep as his bones.

Nervousness happened prior to every performance. Arthur had habits to deal with it. He'd scribble in his journal, draw winding circles over and over, sometimes until his pen gave out. He'd worry its pages while re-reading his material. (His memorization had gotten better, but he still needed the book for support.) The breathing exercises, in through the nose, holding, then out through the mouth, relieved some of his laughter and his anxiety. Visualizing success was supposed to help. So, as he sat waiting, smoking and sipping seltzer, he attempted to see himself with his arms out and the crowd cheering.

The knock at the door gave him a slight startle, broke him out of his fantasy. He checked the wall clock. He was scheduled to go on in twenty minutes. The emcee likely wanted to check-in and ensure Arthur would be ready on time, let him know how packed the place was. Better to prevent any hitches. "Come in."

Not even his anxiousness could stop his toothy smile upon seeing Y/N enter the room. She didn't usually visit him backstage, not wanting to interrupt him. But he was happy she'd chosen to tonight. "Hey," he said, turning in his chair. "I tried to pick a good table for you." He appreciated her feminine silhouette, the contours of her breasts accentuated by her collared, lilac sweater. Curves shapely in the A-line, pleated skirt she wore, ending just below her knees. Her black kitten heels. She must have come straight from work.

After a pause she stepped forward. "Patricia's guarding our drinks." He averted his eyes, made a soft sound, and studied the back of her hand as he grasped it. She'd brought her friend to his sets once or twice. The first time he’d spotted them, he'd frozen for a split second. Would her faith in him, enough to invite someone along, always be staggering? It was one of the many kindnesses that confirmed how important he was to her, that filled him with gladness.

She kissed the spot between his brows. "I had to tell the emcee I was Mrs. Fleck before he'd say where their big star was."

Outside of his flights of fancy, he'd never truly thought of himself as a “big star.” Or a “big deal.” Or a big “stand-up.” But he’d hoped for all three, aspired to fulfill his purpose in life. To make people laugh, even on days he himself couldn't. And if Y/N said it, it must be true. At least tonight.

Yet, just when the corner of his lips quirked, his back tightened against unexpected pressure forming in his torso. This was an important night. Whoever walked past the club's sign could see Arthur Fleck would be performing. Sure, he was getting more at ease in the spotlight, cackling only sporadically instead of every time he got started. But he knew there was a chance he'd screw up. Maybe he'd never get to do another set. Maybe he wouldn't even be permitted to come in and make notes. Maybe they'd decide he wasn't funny.

He winced at the negative stream of thought. That wouldn't do any good, especially not now - he was about to make a debut. Scoffing, he took a drag off his cigarette, stamped it out in the ashtray on the metal table, and rested his cheek on the heel of his palm.

Y/N's gentle touch drifted to his shoulders and his eyelids shut. He let her guide him to rest against the back of the chair. "Let me unwind you," she purred. The tips of her nimble fingers kneaded him. The circular motions in the notches above his collarbones ached at first, but started to tingle as he felt his muscles loosen. "Did you figure out that new joke last night?"

"Yeah," he breathed. "I changed my opening." The press of her thumbs to either side of his spine released a knot he hadn't been aware of and he groaned. "'Hello. It's good to be here. Thank you for the invitation.'" His gaze caught hers in the mirror. Combined with her massage, her prettiness made it hard to recall what he'd written. "'When I was younger, I never wanted to go running. I was afraid I'd run out of money.'"

Shivers went through him at the glide of her hands on the nape of his neck. "That's a good start." She moved to stand in front of him and his legs fell open. "You're going to be great. But-" she bent to fasten their mouths together. "You still seem to have some jitters." Her palms smoothed down his chest and he twitched, huffing as she knelt before him. "I think I can help."

It took a moment for him to process what she was doing. He gulped, watching her crumple the bottom of his vest and untuck his shirt. As her fingertips went to his fly, he grabbed her wrist, stiffening and snorting awkwardly. "Y/N." He tried to straighten but was halted by damp kisses to his stomach. "They're going to come get me any minute. I-"

"This won't take long." Mischief twinkled in her eyes. "And I locked the door."

This was entirely inappropriate. He should be telling her to get off the floor. To stop groping at him. To save it for their bed, their sofa, wherever. They were in public; this was something private. Her volume would definitely give them away. But the slight pressure of her unzipping his pants and his growing erection made him squint and roll his pelvis forward. In seconds he was lifting his hips to help her lower his trousers and briefs to his calves.

Her look was eager as she gripped his hard-on, her pink tongue peeking out as she smiled at him. The first lick along his length, the first sweep over the dark red tip of his shaft drove him to clutch his seat. The warm, wet contact caused his breath to shudder. Her lips enclosed him wickedly, and he had to stifle a moan at the sight of her working him. Of her taking him in almost entirely. At the determined expression she had while she sought to bring him off.

Mouth falling open, he tilted his head back, the pace of his thrusts increasing. She was alternating between enthusiastic laving and ardent sucks on the head. It was a struggle to control himself, and he bucked up, digging his fingers into her scalp. She whined around him, gripped his thigh, ran her nails through the hair on it the way she knew sent electricity through him. The tightening of his abdomen increased with her every stroke. He was so close...

Then a pounding at the door. "Ten minute warning!"

"Shit," Arthur gasped. He grasped her arm to pull her up. She started to fall into him but caught herself on his shoulders and straddled his lap. Absorbed with the urgency to be inside her, he hurriedly lifted her skirt to pull her panties away. What he discovered caused him to blink at her in surprise instead. "Where's your underwear?"

With a grin, she steadied herself and reached to press him to her slick folds. "In my bra," she breathed, sinking onto him. When her hips were flush with his, his groan matched her whimper. "I knew they'd just be a nuisance." She raked her hands through his locks and kissed him, hard. "I've been horny all day." She ground herself on his public bone and inhaled sharply.

The embrace he returned was fierce, fingers splayed on her back. She adjusted the angle of her body, allowed him to enter her more deeply, until he was completely embedded. The hot, tight slide of her walls went straight to his brain. His eyes darted from where they were joined to her face.

Her brows were drawn together, cheeks pink, lips parted as her undulations quickened. The beauty she held when she lost herself like this could rival that on the cover of any check-out magazine. Grunting, he braced his feet on the floor for leverage and bucked up into her. As he brushed his thumb against her swollen clit, she let out a short wail. He squeezed her thigh, chuckling. "Shh..."

"Sorry," she whispered. She smiled, the cadence of her ruts quickening. "You just-" Another short moan. "You feel amazing."

He nuzzled at her temple. "Y/N..." Her mouth opened against his and his tongue plunged into it. There was a hint of the cocktail she must have ordered before visiting, as well as his own musk. Normally, he didn't find the latter pleasant. But he found her so seductive, riding him like she was, he couldn't bring himself to care.

The rising pitch of her whimpers betrayed how close she was to going over the edge. Faster and faster, he skimmed her sensitive nub, her limbs rigged and trembling. As her pulses began to clutch his cock, he angled their kiss to swallow her strangled cry. She clung to him, holding herself upright, fisting his waistcoat and shuddering.

Somehow, she kept moving.

He was trying to catch his breath, to concentrate on keeping quiet, knowing there were people just outside the door. But the delicious friction was overwhelming, the clench of her threatening to undo him immediately. She was egging him on, her voice husky in his ear and pleading, "Come on, Arthur." He pressed his lips to her neck to conceal his cries, pleasure scorching through him as he surged into her one last time. Her thrusts ceased only when he cupped the swell of her ass, locking her in place as he poured himself inside her.

Their coupling had left him a little muddleheaded, but he knew he didn't a lot of time to recover. His gaze raised to find her glowing, and he felt himself fall in love with her again. Her kiss was swift as she disentangled herself and shakily stood. There were tissues on the table - she wiped herself off with one and handed him another. With a giggle, she took a third and dabbed at the sheen of sweat on his brow.

Her examination of her skirt prompted him to go over his trousers. He was relieved nothing had gotten on them. Once she'd straightened his collar, combed his loose curls back behind his ears, she got out her simple pair of cotton panties and slipped them on. "I'll see you after the show," she whispered, pecking him sweetly.

He watched her retreating form in the mirror until she shut the door firmly behind her. Standing to tuck his shirt in, he laughed softly. They'd really ruined her ironing job. But, he considered as he smoothed the bottom of his vest, it had been worth it. Being with her was always worth it. With a happy sigh, he grabbed his journal, steeled himself with a couple deep breaths, and repeated his opening to himself one last time before leaving the room.

~~~~~

Y/N patted her face with the damp paper towel in the restroom. Her cheeks were unbearably warm, her hair a mess. Carefully, she sniffed at her sweater. Good. It smelled like perfume, not sex. How did Arthur, who had been remarkably timid when they'd first met, become the one person who could inspire her to be so brazen? Whatever the answer, she loved it. Once she freshened up, was satisfied no one would be able to tell what had transpired, she headed back to her seat.

The club was nice, a bit more modern than Pogo's. While the lighting was low, the color scheme was a mix of black, grey, and silver. Arthur's maroon suit would be a pop of color against the painted brick wall at the back of the stage. The place was smaller overall, the space for the audience about two-thirds of what Arthur was used to. It was fairly crowded, though, and the groups that were there seemed to be having a nice time.

Patricia's eyes held suspicion when Y/N finally sat down at the black table for two at the back. "Where the hell have you been?"

"I was just wishing Arthur good luck." Y/N sipped at her Tequila Sunrise nonchalantly. It was the drink she always ordered at his shows. Her legs crossed under the table and she swung her foot back and forth.

"You were gone almost twenty minutes." Patricia nudged her arm. "How much luck did he need?"

"An abundance." Her friend's smirk was impossible to miss, even as Y/N focused on her cocktail glass. Patricia was onto her. Of course. "Sorry. I didn't mean to ditch you," she said. "I'll cover your tab." Patricia’s response was to grab the drink menu.

When the lights dimmed, Y/N straightened with anticipation. Arthur came out, notebook in hand, and gave a little wave. Standing in front of the mic, he surveyed the crowd, as always, and nodded at Y/N when he spotted her. She admired his wrinkled outfit, his mostly slicked back hair, the lingering blush on his sharp cheekbones. Everyone else in this room probably assumed his color was due to nerves. But she knew what it was a remnant of. Savoring the secret held between them, she pressed her legs together and smiled.

~~~~~

Tag list (Let me know if you want to be added!): @harmonioussolve @howdylilflower @sweet-nothings04 @stephieraptorr @rommies @fallenstarsabyss @gruffle1 @octopus-plasma @tsukiakarinobara @arthur-flecks-lovely-smile @another-day-in-chuckletown @hhandley80

#arthur fleck #arthur fleck fanfic #arthur fleck x reader #arthur fleck x female reader #arthur fleck x ofc #arthur fleck smut #joker 2019 #watchwhathappens

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mandelene · 4 years

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PLEASE.... give us more asthmatic Matthew!!! I love seeing family dote over him ;^;

Okay, I’ve tortured Matthew some more. 😅 I HOPE YOU’RE ALL HAPPY NOW. Poor Matthew lmao. He didn’t deserve this.

Breathtaking Word count: 1504

Gym class is the bane of his existence and always has been. For years, Matthew has been suffering through "physical education," and he doesn't feel as though he's learned anything in all of that time except how to despise his gym teachers. He has track this marking period, which means non-stop running for thirty-minutes with the rest of his class. Although he has presented his teacher with a doctor’s note stating he has asthma and needs to be given breaks when needed, his teacher this term isn’t too keen on giving him those breaks. Ms. Johnson seems to be convinced that Matthew’s exaggerating and told him during last class she has “plenty of other students who have asthma and they’re all fine with running.”

He’s tried to get out of gym class entirely, but Dad has repeatedly told him no. “Just try your best, love, and rest when you need to. It’s important that you still try to exercise with your classmates.”

And so, Matthew suffers in silence because he doesn’t want his teacher to give him a bad grade if he stops too many times — it would ruin his GPA. Even when his lungs burn and he can feel himself wheezing, he pushes onward. Ms. Johnson insists that asthma isn’t an excuse and that he must finish his laps even if he has to stop to use his inhaler. Even if the rest of the class has already finished long before him, Ms. Johnson will wait for him to walk his laps before she lets up and he can go to his next class.

Twice already, Matthew has shown up to his history class in tears, exhausted from running on the track. Alfred tells him he should go to Dad or Papa because Ms. Johnson is being too strict, but Matthew doesn’t want his parents to worry. He doesn’t want them going out of their way and taking time out of their busy schedules to talk to Ms. Johnson. He’s also afraid that if his parents say something to her (as they most certainly would) that she’ll use it as fuel to pick on him even more.

But one Monday, everything comes crashing down.

He’s having an off day — his allergies were bothering him this morning, so his lungs are already irritated. He starts the run with the rest of the class, but by the fourth lap, he feels himself gasping for breath and mucus starts filling his chest and throat. He stops for just a second to take his inhaler and keeps going, but then, the wheezing starts. He tries to continue at a gentle jog, but his chest tightens mercilessly, and he feels as though he’s going to faint.

And then, he falls to his knees.

“Mattie!” Alfred shouts, breaking away from the rest of the class and bolting over to him. “You okay, dude?”

“N-No,” Matthew mumbles back, and he can’t stop the sob that escapes his throat. He’s fourteen — that’s too old to be crying over an asthma attack, but he can’t help it. Everything hurts, and he can feel the stares of all of his classmates on his back. It’s humiliating. He wants to disappear.

Ms. Johnson comes over as well, and Matthew really wants to disappear. She puts a hand on his shoulder, looks at Alfred, and says, “Take him to the nurse’s office.”

Alfred doesn’t need to be told twice. He helps Matthew up and walks him away from the track and back into the school building. “It’s gonna be okay, Mattie. You’ve got your inhaler with you, right…? Good.”

Tears rush freely down Matthew’s face now, and Alfred does his best to try to cheer him up as they walk down the hallway.

“I guess you could say this was a real breathtaking experience, huh?” his brother tries to joke.

“N-Not helping.”

“Sorry. You wanna take some more puffs of your inhaler? You’re still breathing weird.”

Matthew coughs against the thick mucus now lining his airways and whispers, “I hate myself.”

“Don’t say that. Papa or Dad will come to pick you up and you’ll feel a lot better. Come on, almost there,” Alfred says before stepping ahead of him to open the door to the nurse’s office. “This is your stop, bro. Nurse Cathy’s real nice. She helped me when I started puking after drinking some bad cafeteria milk.”

“Gross.”

Nurse Cathy has him sit in a chair and takes his vitals. As Alfred suspected, she says she’s going to call his parents, and then, she sends Alfred back to class, much to his brother’s chagrin.

Papa is the one who arrives, and he immediately strokes a hand through Matthew’s hair and looks him over, visibly shaken. “My poor cher. I’ll take you straight to your father’s office so he can have a look at you, okay? I’ve already called him — he’s very concerned.”

Oh, no. That’s exactly what he didn’t want.

But there’s no sense in arguing now because Matthew has clearly already lost this battle. Papa signs him out, escorts him to the car, and rushes him downtown. It’s not that serious. He’s pretty sure he’ll be fine, but that doesn’t stop Papa from fretting and saying things like, “My heart just about stopped when I heard you collapsed during class!”

“I didn’t collapse —” Matthew tries to explain. His knees buckled beneath him but he didn’t fully pass out and lose consciousness, so it doesn’t count.

Having a doctor for a dad has its pros and cons. One of the massive cons is being fussed over like he’s dying as soon as something’s wrong with him. The minute the receptionist at the front desk sees him, she tells him which exam room to go to, and he walks in with Papa on his heels.

He sits himself on the exam table, and barely five minutes go by before Dad invites himself in and says in a hurried breath, “Matthew, what happened?”

“I was running in gym class and had an asthma attack.”

“I heard you collapsed.”

“I didn’t. Not really. I fell to my knees but —”

“My goodness,” Dad remarks before putting on his stethoscope and placing the cold diaphragm on Matthew’s chest with one hand and bracing his back with the other. “Breathe deeply.”

“I’m feeling better now…”

“Shh.”

Matthew sighs, and Dad moves his stethoscope to his back, still listening. It isn’t worth all of this fussing! Sure, he had a minor incident and was upset, but now that he’s had some time to sit and rest and he took his inhaler, he’s okay, and he doesn’t want everyone to make such a scene. Dad should go back and tend to people who actually need his help.

“You’re wheezing a little. I’ll give you a nebulizer treatment. I also want to check your blood pressure since you collapsed. Then, we’ll do a spirometry test.”

“I didn’t collapse,” Matthew weakly protests again, but no one is listening to him anymore.

Dad puts some albuterol into a nebulizer, puts a mask over Matthew’s nose and mouth, and turns the nebulizer on. “I’ll be back in a few minutes, okay?”

“I’m fine,” he replies, voice muffled.

“Yes, yes, you’re always fine,” Dad huffs before squeezing his shoulder reassuringly and pressing a worried kiss against his forehead. “I’m going to have a word with this gym teacher of yours — this is absolutely unacceptable. My child shouldn’t be collapsing!”

“I didn’t colla —”

“Did you ask for a break?” Papa cuts in.

“Well, no…I don’t like asking for breaks because the teacher…She tells me to stop exaggerating…”

“Exaggerating?” Dad asks in disbelief. “Why didn’t you say anything sooner? Oh, now I’m going to have to speak to her in person to have this sorted.”

“Dad, no…”

“I’ll handle this. Don’t you worry about a thing. She’s never going to give you a hard time again,” Dad vows before stepping out of the exam room for a moment.

Matthew hunches his shoulders and wearily breathes in the vapor from the nebulizer. He appreciates that his parents care so much, but he also hates making them go out of their way for him. This is not his first asthma attack, and it definitely won’t be his last. He knows how to care for himself.

“When we get home, I’ll give you some of the tarte Tatin I baked today — dessert can cure just about anything,” Papa says with a wink.

Matthew’s pretty sure that isn’t true, nor is it evidence-based practice, but he simply nods his head and goes along with it.

And when Dad returns a couple of minutes later, fusses over him some more, and deems him okay to continue about his day, Matthew accepts the hug he gives him and manages his first genuine smile of the day, finally giving in to their hysterics. They’re too good to him.

“Thanks, guys. I love you.” “We love you more,” Papa and Dad say in unison.

#hetalia #aph canada #aph america #aph england #aph france #aph face family #asthmatic matthew #drabbles

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