#this post is 50 miles long i'm so sorry

[theneighborhoodwatch]

which character do you think is the most sus and why

honestly i think everyone has at least one trait that makes me Wonder about them, so. i'm just gonna list those under the cut instead. i've gone over some of these in more detail in previous speculation posts, but i don't wanna just link to them for the 48545674567456th time, so consider this a spiritual sequel to that old ass conspiracy board i made. any links are to stuff that isn't readily available on the actual website. anyways:

wally:

do i really need to explain this one

okay i'm just gonna pick one of the less obvious things: have you ever noticed that his bio uses present tense the most? like after the little introductory blurb it introduces him as "wally is" as opposed to everyone else's "(x) was"? someone in my discord server pointed that out once and i haven't been able to stop thinking about it.

barnaby:

what little we learn about his relationship to wally from the website is Odd; both of their bios mention not only that they were best friends, but that this was stated Multiple times throughout illustrated pages and the like, as if someone was really desperate to impress upon people that These Two Are Totally Besties, We Swear. you'd think this would be a poor attempt to disguise there being some animosity between the two, but that doesn't seem be the case, either.

other than that, though, barnaby actually seems pretty normal - perhaps deceptively so...

frank:

has a first name that ends in a consonant and a surname that ends in a long "-ee" sound, as opposed to everyone else having a first name that ends in a long "-ee" sound and a surname that ends in a consonant.

is noted to have no canonical backstory; the only other character who falls into this camp is wally.

is an entomologist/lepidopterist (or at least an Enthusiast about those subjects) in a town where the only wildlife present seems to be bugs. this was first mentioned in an ask from 2020, so normally i would hesitate to put this here, but post-website launch concept art never shows there being any non-insect (or at least non-arthropod) wildlife, so i think it is Likely that this still applies.

there are Conveniently little to no notes regarding the construction of his physical puppet - all that the WHRP seems to have been able to confirm is that it did actually have a head-spinning mechanism.

julie:

hails from a cave in what is Explicitly noted to be the same forest that surrounds home; post-website launch concept art definitely seems to allude to there being something in those woods, or at least the general idea of julie wandering "out of bounds."

has the most detailed family background by way of her siblings having actual designs and names. her bio clarifies that they didn't live in Home, but no other characters with family members seem to need this clarification. is the implication that This level of detail for side characters is unheard of? then again, barnaby's mom also has a name and design...

can speak to flowers/plants, which definitely sheds a new light on whatever might be going on in this may 2021 concept art. i've seen a lot of people interpret the title of this piece - "liar!" - as an accusation from julie towards someone else (most commonly frank) but given that that the script linked in the february 2023 audition post establishes that julie is capable of lying about what a plant tells her for her own convenience, albeit in a far more playful context... who's to say that she isn't the liar?

sally:

her puppet is all but outright stated to have required more puppeteers than any other character.

having a character who's a playwright/director and whose house is built to resemble a mini theater in a story that relies so heavily on the fourth wall (or lack thereof) as a source of horror feels like a very... Dangerous combination.

some people have tried to draw parallels between her backstory and that of old testament satan, buuuut i'm not entirely sold on this. it feels a bit too outlandish even for me, considering that any remaining christian imagery seems to have been relegated Solely to wally and/or home.

her introductory blurb seems to have a nod towards poppy? "She’s a fire-cracker who is willing to let her imagination run wild in the name of a new adventure, albeit at the occasional expense of her more cautious neighbors." that aforementioned audition script Also all but outright confirms that this is about poppy, given her and sally's interactions there, i.e. sally trying to get poppy to come out of her shell by casting her as the lead in her next play and Clearly thinking very highly of her, but pushing her past her limits just a bit too far too fast. again, much like julie and lying, it's all in a playful context, but i wonder... sally, are you paying enough attention to your friends?

i could also make a joke about my sally/poppy agenda, but. i will refrain. for now.

poppy:

is the only walk-around puppet to not have a live-hand variant.

her puppet also apparently has no surviving photos of it? or at least not any photos of it in its entire eight feet of glory.

in a similar vein to the possible relationship between sally being a playwright and welcome home fiddling with the fourth wall so much, i feel like poppy being a recluse in a series where one of the Main Themes is supposed to be "what happens when a Home becomes just a House/what it's like to live in a decaying home" is a very convenient setup for horror - one that Excites me as much as it scares me. if something happened to her, i wonder, how long do you think it would take for someone to notice?

eddie:

his theme color, purple, is used very sparingly in his actual design compared to the rest of the cast and their colors - it only shows up on his eyelids and maybe the inside of his bag? even designs like poppy and howdy's make more use of their respective theme colors than eddie's. it being on the eyelids is an interesting choice, too, given the eye motif that's been present throughout so far. eyes are the windows to the soul and all that.

purple also makes an appearance just outside of his post office, in the form of a sprig of lavender with a butterfly on it - and, well. something about purple signifying secrecy/hidden truths, perhaps?

according to this post-website launch concept art, the only two clocks in the entire neighborhood are: A) the street clock between howdy's shop and eddie's post office, and B) the watch upon eddie's wrist. both also seem to share some design elements with him (and maybe sally?) - namely, the eyes.

and of course, his backstory. or rather, the fact that his backstory is so half-assed that it's a running gag that he can't remember his hometown and the most we know about his mom is that she has the same job and She Exists, Probably. like that's fucked up in the context of welcome home, right? we can agree on that?

howdy:

howdy is an adult and yet Not a butterfly. he never actually pupated he just got Bigger. this is never explained or addressed in-universe as far as we are aware.

and also this is in the presence of a lepidopterist, aka a guy who should Definitely be aware of the fact that howdy should have pupated by now. foreshadowing for a future point of contention? a future alliance, even?

howdy. the shipments. where are your shipments coming from howdy.

home:

much like wally, this one is so obvious that i feel stupid for even dedicating a bullet point here. just fucking look at anything on the website talking about or involving them. this house is All Unsettling Trivia.

imagine i am beaming this brian david gilbert clip directly into your brain whenever i discuss their relationship with wally until further notice

like i've said before, i don't think they're evil evil (or at least, not evil without reason) but i do think whatever they and wally have going on is, like, Not Healthy. they have codependent swag imo.

[thesewordsareallihavetogive]

His Longhorn Jersey - Jake "Hangman" Seresin x f!reader

Summary: 1.4k words. At a Texas Longhorns football game, y/n bumps into a stranger and spills beer all over both of them. Good thing the handsome stranger is forgiving and willing to lend y/n his jersey.

Warnings: alcohol, fluff!!!!, she/her reader pronouns

a/n: this was supposed to be like. a couple short paragraphs as an intro for another jake fic i'm writing but then it turned into ✨this✨ and it is now its own independent thing. which is a great thing for everyone bc the other fic is very angsty. enjoy!

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Jake and y/n met at a Longhorns football game. She was in her senior year at the University of Texas when she quite literally bumped into the cocky blonde. He was about to bite out a harsh “watch it” but the words died on his tongue when he caught a glimpse of y/n’s face. He nearly got lost in her kind eyes before she started profusely apologizing.

“I’m so sorry! I wasn’t looking where I was going and-ah hell, I spilled beer on your jeans,” y/n’s mind was running a mile a minute. Her eyes frantically darted around the crowded vendor and food lot outside the stadium, searching for the nearest napkins she could offer the incredibly handsome stranger. She might’ve been more composed and level-headed if she hadn’t walked into a wall of pure muscle.

Jake chuckled, the small stains on his jeans long forgotten before he reached for y/n’s shoulders to steady her frame and racing thoughts. She stopped short at the feel of his calloused hands on her exposed skin, wide eyes peeking up at the stranger through her eyelashes.

“It’s alright, darlin’. I was in your way. How ‘bout we get you out of that shirt?” Jake suggested with a flirty grin. y/n blinked a few times. What the fuck did he just say to her? She was sorry, but not sorry enough to strip on command. Jake saw the confusion turning to disgust on y/n’s face and he quickly backtracked. “Because of the beer! You’ve got beer all over your shirt, sweetheart. You can wear my jersey if you’d like,” he finished, hoping the damage wasn’t already done.

Oh. In her haste, y/n hadn’t even realized she’d spilled beer on herself. A lot of it, actually. The plastic cup still grasped in her hand was almost empty from how much had sloshed on her white shirt. The shirt was quickly becoming see-through from the sticky liquid, garnering side eyes from some nearby fans. Shit. There weren’t enough napkins at the nearby food trucks to soak up the mess she’d made of herself. She really didn’t feel like dropping $50 on an overpriced Longhorns t-shirt either, but she couldn’t possibly accept the man’s jersey.

“I can’t ask you to do that-” y/n trailed off, realizing she didn’t even know his name. Before she could finish, Jake had smoothly pulled his jersey off with one hand. Looking respectfully was becoming increasingly difficult when his white tank top left little to the imagination.

“You’re not asking, darlin’. I’m offering,” Jake’s dimples popped out with his gentle smile. y/n opened and closed her mouth a few times. Was this even real? The determined look in his eyes had her giving in far too quickly.

Jake led her toward a less crowded area of the tailgate lot. In between the cover of several pickup trucks, y/n quickly swapped her ruined game day shirt for Jake’s jersey. The name ‘Seresin’ was embroidered on the back of the jersey. She practically had the Longhorns team roster memorized, so she knew damn well that there was no player named Sersin on the team. Mystery Man Seresin. The man before her must’ve been a serious fan to have a custom jersey made.

“So, Seresin, you got a first name?” y/n asked the taller man with a raised eyebrow.

“Jake Seresin, at your service,” he introduced himself with a wink, holding out his hand to shake. y/n told him her name and his grin grew. 

The pair ditched the respective friends they came with and headed toward the stadium. Jake bought them new beers, refused to let y/n pay, but insisted on carrying both drinks back to their seats, teasing y/n’s clumsiness. Jake was impressed to find y/n knew more about the game and players than he did, often calling out before the refs. By the end of the night, both of their throats were raw from cheering and yelling. While the rest of the fans headed out of the stadium to celebrate Texas’s win, Jake and y/n stayed seated for a while. Conversation between the two flowed easily and endlessly, despite the fact that they’d both lost their voices. It wasn’t until lights started shutting off around them that they realized how late it had gotten.

Jake wasn’t exactly the gentleman his mama raised him to be some days, but for y/n he was ready to pull out all the stops. He walked her to her car and reached to open the driver's door for her before y/n stopped in front of him, turning to rest her hip against the vehicle. Jake mirrored her actions and placed a hand on the hood, leaning over her shorter frame. y/n studied his face for a moment, memorizing his moonlit features. Jake did the same, his eyes gravitating toward y/n’s lips. When they broke out of their shared trance y/n broke eye contact and cleared her throat. With a gentle tug to the hem of Jake’s jersey, y/n looked up to grin at him cheekily.

“You know, I normally make guys buy me dinner first before I start undressing for ‘em,” y/n joked, moving to shed the jersey and return it to Jake. Jake’s free hand planted itself on y/n’s waist, holding the jersey in place and making her eyes snap toward him.

“Keep it, darlin’. You can give it back next time,” he replied with a smirk. y/n wondered how many girls he had charmed before her. She couldn’t even be mad–it was working on her too. She rolled her eyes, but the butterflies in her stomach gave rise to a blush spreading across her face. Even with the minimal light, Jake could see the way her face shifted.

“Next time? That’s a little presumptuous, cowboy,” y/n said pointedly, though she was mostly teasing. Jake nodded. Fair enough.

“Next time,” Jake said definitively. He wordlessly gestured for y/n’s phone and she gave it to him. She had a questionable amount of trust and faith in a man she’d met less than five hours ago. He typed his phone number into her contacts, saving it as “Jake 🍺🍺”. y/n threw her head back in laughter at the clever addition of the beer pints, earning a chuckle from Jake as well. After the laughter faded, she was still left with a lingering smile. When she stepped away from the car, she was careful not to kick her boots against Jake’s. He tutted when y/n tried to reach for the door handle herself; instead, he reached across and held the door open for her.

With the car door serving as a barrier between their seemingly synced bodies now, they were caught in another quiet moment. y/n had half a mind to get in her car and drive off, leaving the man who was five hours short of a stranger in her wake. The other half of her mind had a far better idea though. Before she could think twice, she grabbed Jake by the strap of his tank top, pulling his lips down to meet hers. The kiss was gentle for a split second before Jake’s brain caught up with his body and he leaned in deeper. His fingers ached to pull y/n in by her waist, but he settled for cupping her cheek and the back of her neck in either hand. A breathless minute later they pulled away. y/n took pride in the way Jake’s chest rapidly fell and rose; he took the same pride in her slightly mussed hair and flushed cheeks.

“Next time,” y/n stated in agreement as she got in her car. She rolled the window down and Jake immediately leaned in through it, his face inches from y/n’s once again.

“Next time, darlin’.” He left her with a final peck to her lips that was far too short for y/n’s liking before he patted the roof of y/n’s car and walked away. Right before y/n pulled out of the parking lot, y/n caught a glimpse of her new favorite Longhorn fan pumping his fist in the air with a wide grin as he saddled up into his lifted truck.

a/n: pls lmk what y'all think! this is the first fic i've written in one sitting in a long time and it was v fun :)

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[kwanisms]

Birthday Gifts — h.jisung

» stray kids masterlist «

➮ idol!Jisung × f!reader (feat. one kiss between the reader & Felix) wc: 1.5k summary: Meeting Felix really changed your whole world but with Felix came Jisung who could potentially ruin everything or make it better. It's a 50/50 chance you haven't been willing to take before. But maybe, just maybe, you can make an exception at their shared birthday party. genres/themes/au: fluff, smut; party themes?? It's a house birthday party lol; idol au warnings: adult language, female reader, party setting, reader & Felix share a kiss one time but there's nothing going on between them, sexual content (18+ mdni), see smut warnings under the cut! special tags: @anyamaris & @mint-yooxgi cause of told them about the dream that inspired this. also tagging @yoonguurt cause she's the bestie and always gets a tag 🍄꒰｡•◡•｡꒱🍄 join my taglists: permanent | group Strikethrough means I cannot tag you.  MINORS WILL BE BLACKLISTED & BLOCKED. 

a/n: this is based off a dream I had last night so Happy Birthday to Felix and Han. Yes, I'm posting this even tho I'm officially on hiatus so if you see this, shhh no you didn't. 🤫 thank you for reading and as always, this is a work of fiction and all characters are not reflective of their respective irl counterparts. for entertainment purposes only.

smut warnings: unprotected sex (use condoms and other contraceptives pls), quickie (like it's super fast lmao sorry Ji), use of a singular pet name (baby), he cums inside her and that's about it. Very short and sweet lol

═══════════════════════════════════════════════════════

[21:04]

You knew it was wrong and that you should have told him to stop a long time ago but you just couldn’t bring yourself to say no to Jisung. Not at his birthday party. Granted, he was sharing the day with Felix but it was still his day, too.

“Fuck,�� Jisung grunted from behind you as he buried his face in the crook of your neck. “C’mere,” he gasped, turning you back around to face him, taking your lips in a searing kiss.

That was how it had started. With a kiss.

“I want my birthday present,” Felix announced suddenly, causing you and everyone else to turn and look at him. The others were baffled but you knew exactly what he meant. He’d come up to you at the start of the party, one you had planned so meticulously, and pulled you aside.

You apologized for not getting him a present but he assured you that the party was more than enough but you were adamant. You still wanted to give him a gift. You promised anything he wanted within reason and a cheeky smile had spread across his face.

“Anything I want?” he asked in that deep voice. You nodded firmly.

Meeting Felix had been a happy accident with him running, quite literally, into you at an aquarium in the states when he was touring. He’d tripped over a bump in the carpet and went down, unfortunately taking you with him.

If he hadn’t been so engrossed in the conversation with Changbin and Hyunjin, he might not have tripped at all. A visit to the first aid station and several hundred apologies later, the two of you were thick as thieves, even combining groups to finish walking through the aquarium.

After exchanging contact details, Felix promised to keep in contact as often as he could while you learned everything you could about kpop and a group called Stray Kids.

As fate would have it, the company you worked for had an opportunity to expand its market into South Korea and you jumped at the chance to move to Seoul for the job. You settled into your apartment and job and called Felix as soon as you were able to spare some time and it was like you hadn’t been thousands of miles apart.

You met the rest of his members, befriending them all quite quickly. Through Felix, your friend group exploded and you were soon a regular member of the group. Felix had begged you to plan this party, enlisting the help of Jisung with whom you remained friendly with.

You always kept your distance from Jisung who attributed this to you being shy but in reality, you were so insanely attracted to him that you couldn’t trust yourself to be alone with him. You knew if he made even the slightest move on you, you wouldn’t be able to control yourself and would take whatever he offered you.

“Anything you want,” you promised, smiling as Felix leaned in to whisper in your ear. So when he announced he wanted his gift, looking right at you as everyone turned to face him, you already knew what he wanted.

At the mention of a gift, Jisung had perked up. It was his party too after all. “I want a present, too!” he pouted as a few heads turned in his direction, a couple guests snickering as you glanced at Felix. Your best friend smiled calmly. “You can ask her for one,” he replied. “But you can’t ask for the same gift.”

Jisung rolled his eyes at that but after you crossed the distance and grabbed Felix by the face, pulling him into a kiss, Jisung backpedaled so fast. “Wait, no. I changed my mind,” he croaked as you and Felix parted. “I want the same present.”

His comment earned him a soft smack upside the head from Chris while the rest of the guests chuckled lightheartedly, even Felix joining in. You laughed along with them but you knew deep down if Jisung really wanted something, he went for it.

Felix you could trust yourself to stop kissing. But Jisung? You knew if he kissed you, it would end the same way. With your pants around your ankles and his cock buried in you from behind.

So when he cornered you later after the cake had already been cut and served, pulling you out of the main room into one of the unoccupied bathrooms of the apartment, you knew you were doomed. Any sense you had, left the moment he shut the door, turning the lock.

“Jisung,” you said softly as he moved to stand in front of you. It was meant to be a warning but your voice was too shaky. Luckily, he didn’t notice. “Why can’t I have the same present as Felix?” he demanded. You shut your eyes tightly trying to push him out of your mind.

Just standing so close, he was invading your senses from the heat radiating from his body to the sound of his voice in your ears, drowning out every other sound to the smell of his cologne. You needed to leave this room and fast if you wanted any chance to salvage your strained relationship with him.

“Can we talk about this later?” you asked, trying to push past him for the door but he wasn’t having it. Instead he pinned you against the door. Your breath caught in your throat.

‘One.’

You looked up to meet his heated gaze.

“Why do you always avoid me?” ‘Two.’

“Can we not do this right now? This party is for both you and Felix,” you replied. “Let’s just enjoy the party, please.” Jisung shook his head. “No,” he answered. “Not until you answer me.”

“Okay, fine,” you said, placing your hand on his chest and pushing him away. Jisung accepted this and took a step back. “It’s because I know myself,” you started. “With Felix, I can control myself. I can kiss him easily and then stop.” Jisung said nothing as you continued.

“But with you…” you trailed off. “With you I know I wouldn’t be able to stop.”

Realization dawned on Jisung’s face as you spoke.

“If I kissed you,” you added, meeting his gaze once more. “It would only end one way.”

Jisung closed the distance between you with one step. “And what way is that?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper. Your words failed you as you looked into his eyes, a gaze so intense that it made heat rush to your core looking back at you.

You swallowed the lump in your throat.

“With our pants around our ankles, me bent over that counter, and your cock buried inside me.” ‘Three.’

No sooner than the words had been said did Jisung have you pinned against the door, lips against yours in a rushed and messy kiss. It was soon after he had you pinned against the sink counter, your hands gripping the sides of the vanity as he rutted against you, allowing you to feel his hardening cock through your pants.

Which led to where you were currently.

He’d turned you to face him, lips moving against yours as his hands fumbled with your jeans, unbuttoning and unzipping them before pushing them down along with your panties as you did the same, hurriedly undressing his lower body.

“Up,” he commanded, helping you up onto the counter as he lowered his fingers to your waiting cunt, rubbing through your folds to find you were already pretty wet. Almost pathetically so. It was stupid the effect he had on you. Jisung wasted no time, spitting into his hand and rubbing it along his length before taking himself in his hand to line up with your aching core.

Without another word, he pushed into you, gliding much easier than you expected until he was bottomed out. You whined into his shoulder, clawing at his shirt to hold on for dear life as he started to pound into you mercilessly, hips rocking against yours. You had to bite your bottom lip to keep from making too much noise as the party continued on outside the bathroom.

“Ah shit, baby,” Jisung rasped in your ear as your walls clenched around him. “You gonna cum already?” he whispered, his breath hot against your cheek. You nodded, holding back whimpers and moans as you buried your face in his neck.

It was embarrassing how fast he was able to pull an orgasm out of you, your thighs squeezing around his waist as he helped you ride it out before chasing his own high and emptying his load into you with a shudder and a low groan which he muffled in your shoulder.

It was so quick it made your head spin and as you both came down from your highs and came back to the reality of the situation, Jisung couldn’t help but chuckle, prompting you to pull back and look at him.

“What’s so funny?” you huffed. Jisung shook his head before meeting your gaze.

“You were wrong,” he said simply. You stared at him incredulously.

‘Wrong?’

“How am I wrong?” you asked as he shook his hair out of his eyes.

“Well,” he started. “I didn’t bend you over the counter.”

ⓘ Graphics made by me. Content and support banners made using a template by cafekitsune. I do not allow reposts, translations, or continuations of my works. All writing and graphics are ©️ kwanisms.

[rizzraa]

ᯓ★Jams and Jellies

Chapter 2: Longing for You (part 1)

A/N: Another one, Another one. I've been so lazy trying to write this out, I should've done an outline first. Hope you enjoy chap 2!

Tags: mainly fluff, friends to lovers, post outbreak, yearning and burning, slight age gap (i decided reader is in late 30s, Joel is in early 50s), reader insert, mentions of y/n, cute nicknames, shy n awkward Joel, Joel x f!reader, passionate kissing, touchy touchy Feely (nothing too graphic), small description of reader's body (very vague),

chap 1 // chap 2 (part 2)

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝

"Joel, I-- are.. are you sure this is okay? I mean.. Ellie is my student.. won't this be weird?"

"You worry too much, darling. The kid adores you." He hold your cheek in his hands, gazing longingly in your eyes. Suddenly, you see the immense love he has for you. His eyes are sparkling and glowing, and anytime he looks at you, you see flickers of love and warmth fly by. You turn your head slightly and part your lips, moving towards his face. Joel reciprocates this by pulling your face closer to his.

And then, your lips connect. A burst of colors and waves fill the room as you both slowly and softly kiss.

Holy shit you think, His lips are so amazingly soft. Oh God...

You grab the sides of his face, mushing your faces together, desperate for more. Your kisses get hungrier and hungrier. You explore his tongue with your own, changing the nature of the kiss. Joel is surprised with the sudden change, but immediately follows your pace. You both sit there, sloppily making out. His hands travel from your face to your body, not leaving any curve or cervice untouched. He's so desperate to touch you, feel you. It's clear he likes your ass the most, because he suddenly pulls you on top of him and firmly squeezes both cheeks. You yelp slightly, but it's lost in his mouth. He chuckles and pulls away, both of you gasping for air.

You both lock eyes with each other, and then...

"HEY TEACH---" you hear someone screaming your name, "ARE YA AWAKE???" Your eyes jerk open. You take a moment to finally wake up, heavily breathing. You look around and suddenly you realized--- it was a dream. "Oh fuck.." You whisper. You rest your hand on your chest, trying to calm down. God, was it all really just a dream? It felt so real.

I can't believe I'm already having wet dreams of a man I met ONCE, you admit embarrassingly.

"MISS!!! IT'S SATURDAY!" Shit. You completely forgot that Ellie was coming over today. You rush down the stairs, yelling "I'll be there in a sec, Ellie!" How could you forget? Your mind is running a mile a minute, nonstop thinking about your fantasies about Joel ever since you met him. "Aw, jeez..." You almost miss last step. You take a moment to regain your balance and stare at the front door, hoping that Joel wouldn't be there, yet simultaneously wishing he'd be there next to Ellie.

You take a breath, smooth your hair, and open the door. Ellie is waiting there, greeting you with an energetic smile and.. Joel is standing by the steps, visibly annoyed. You take a quick look and see he's leaning on the rails of the steps, buff arms crossed against his chest, which only makes him look bigger. God, he's handsome. The morning breeze hits you, and you just realized you're only in a flimsy tank-top and way too tight shorts. Joel turns to face you, eyebrows narrowing his eyes, but they quickly separate and rise up to his forehead. He was definitely staring at you. His flushed face was eyeing your body, and he had to turn away when your nipples started peeking through your top. You wrapped yourself in your arms, embarrassed and flushed, yet ecstatic that you managed to catch his attention. You begin nervously. "Oh, uh, sorry-- Ellie, I guess I overslept.." Joel notices your red face when you say that. "Come on in, guys."

"Oh no- I have patrol duty this mornin'" Joel quickly says. He clears his throat, painfully averting his gaze from your almost-bare body. "Y..Y'sure you don't want anything to eat?" You gulped, not wanting to sound to hopeful. "No--" He says sharply. "I'll see you at home Ellie." He briskly turns away and walks down the road.

"Jeez-- I don't know why he's so fucking mad. It's only 10am, I should've came later." Ellie suddenly said. You watch as Joel's figure gets smaller, until he disappears around the corner.

"It's alright Ellie, you're welcome here anytime." You said sweetly. "Now-- let's get this party started! Come on in!" You pulled her in, the both of you giggling and getting started for the day.

===========

Joel Miller's POV

He stood there next to Ellie, getting slightly annoyed that you didn't answer the door the first 500 knocks. He's a very punctual person, he expects every thing to fall into place at times he deems right. So when you don't answer your door at 9:30:00 AM on the dot, he starts getting frustrated. He was also hoping you all could grab some breakfast together, since his morning shift starts at 10am. What good is that now? He grumbles.

"Yer acting like a fucking baby, Joel. Just go if you're gonna act like this, it's embarrassing." Ellie teases

"I ain't acting like a baby, she's the one that gave this time. I'm expectin' her to swing the doors open with a huge smile." He says begrudgingly. He really wanted to see your smile again. It was cute and earnest; the sweet sound of your laughter fluttering his chest. He gets lost in his thoughts about you even if Ellie is banging on the door. After 30 minutes passed, Joel and Ellie were about to head out. He felt a sting in his chest, deeply disappointed that he couldn't see you today. Then he heard your sweet sweet voice filling the spaces of your house. "I'll be there in a sec, Ellie!", he heard you say. His heart started to bang heavy in his chest, and he never felt as light as he did now. Ellie rushes to the front door and Joel awkwardly leans on your railing, quickly crossing his arms to try and calm his pounding heart. He can't believe he's gonna see you again. He's acting like a teenage boy all over again, unreasonably ecstatic that he's gonna see his crush walking in the highway again. He hears the door unlock and then... you're there. Messy hair; clearly a sign indicating you just woke up, puffy lips, and... the straps of your top are slipping off your soft shoulder. Your collarbone protruding out, framing your shoulders and your sweet neck. His eyes travel down and he notices the way your small shorts squeezes your thighs; he's practically salivating at the sight of your pretty and bare legs. He feels the slight wind raise his head and his eyes fall on your breasts, your nipples slightly protruding against the thin fabric. He forced himself to turn away before he continued ogling at your beautiful body. His mind is already forcing him to think of how you'd feel under his hand, how you'd taste. Your soft voice interrupts his lustful thoughts,

"Oh uh, sorry Ellie, I guess I overslept..", Joel notices how your face quickly picking up heat. God she's so cute, Joel thinks.

"Come on in guys."

"Oh no- I have patrol duty this mornin' " He blurts out. Why did you say that? They can fuckin' wait.

"Y..Y'sure you don't want anything to eat?" Your sweet voice intoxicates him, and he has to get out of there before he does something he'll regret.

"No-- I'll see you at home Ellie." He rushes down the road, practically running down the street, and makes a sharp turn in the corner. He runs and runs until he reaches the stables, stopping to catch his breath. "Hey there, you okay?" Tommy, a younger version of Joel, asked. Joel turns to face his brother hating the way his voice shakes when he says "Yes".

"You don't look so hot man, maybe you should sit this one out--"

"No--, M'good I promise. Let's head out."

Tommy peers at him curiously, "Sure boss.."

Joel, Tommy, and other patrolmen go out, scouring the area for any threat. Joel and Tommy pair together and venture out West, paying close attention to their surroundings. Well-- Tommy is paying attention, Joel still can't stop thinking about you, your sweet voice trying to convince him to come inside, your beautiful body shining against the sun's rays--

"Hey Tommy, what d'yknow 'bout that art teacher?" Joel hesitantly asks. Tommy has been nagging him about engaging with the women in Jackson, but Joel didn't have much interest and wished dearly for Tommy to stop. His back is facing his brother, but he can see his lips mischievously curl up.

"Ohhhh, did she catch yer sly eye, brother?" Tommy was never going to let Joel live this down. The older brother turned and gave his brother a deadly stare, but it's not so intimidating when his face is flushing red. "I- M'just curious-- Ellie is at her house today. Jus' wanted to know who she is." Joel said that last part with such softness, it startles Tommy. The mere mention of you sends Joel through his wildest dreams, his heart aching and yearning for you. How long has it been since I felt like this?

"All I know is that she arrived to Jackson a completely different person. When we found her roaming the forest, she looked... scared. Then she started cryin', sayin' something' like 'Oh my God, people!' It was heartbreakin'." Tommy remembered how you fell to your knees, crying and smiling because you found friendly people, you found safety. Him and his wife, Maria, took care of you. They helped you readjust to society. They helped you grow and feel safe. Joel looked at his brother again, realizing how much he's changed, how grown up his little brother got. A twinge of guilt rises in his heart, "How is she-- I mean.., does she get uncomfortable 'round guys?" Joel sputters out. Tommy looked at his brother and said slyly, "Why? You interested or something?" Joel doesn't say anything, he just looks at Tommy with narrowed eyes and bright red cheeks.

"Okay, all I know is that all the eligible bachelors 'round here never got in her pants, cuz she's more friendly then flirty. I don't even think she knows half the time them fellas are hittin' on 'er."

Joel simply says "Let's get this shift over with."

"Eager, aren't we?" Again, Joel doesn't say anything, but his body language betrays him, and he leaves Tommy as he hears a hearty laughter.

=========

Reader's POV

You rest your paintbrush on the table beside you. You step back to take a long look at your painting of your tiny garden. The canvas is tinted with greens and yellows, skillfully stroked to form the grass, plants, and leaves. It's adorned with bright reds, oranges, pinks, and yellows, indicating the fruit and vegetables growing as well as the bright, mellow, midday sun shining down on you and Ellie. You glance at Ellie; she's squatted by your small flowerbed, expertly sketching each petal, each stem, each rock. "It's looking good, Ellie," You walk over to her, casting a shadow over her and her sketchbook.

"Thanks, teach" she turns her neck and smiles at you.

You look over at your garden, noticing your lemons are ripe.

"Hey, want some lemonade?" You piqued.

"Fuck yeah I do, it's fucking blazing out here." Ellie said with a grin. You laugh and start picking out the lemons. Ellie walks over to you and asks, "How do you know if they're ripe?" "Well..." You pick a lemon off of the plant and place it in Ellie's hand "..you give it a squeeze. If it's firm, then it's good." She squeezes it and smiles "This fucker is ripe as hell!" You giggled, and continue "Another way to tell is by the skin. It could be greenish yellow, or completely yellow."

"Where'd you learn that?"

You smile sadly, "I learned it from my.. my mom." She wasn't your real mom, but she was definitely a mother to you. You spent more of your life with her than with your actual mother-- but that's only because of the outbreak. You loved your real mom, but you called her your true mother. She raised you and your brother, taught you both how to survive. Those who can't do, teach.

"She taught me everything I know, she taught me how to live and how to survive. It's crazy how those both are synonymous but mean different things."

"Yeah, it is crazy.. I bet she was amazing." Ellie looked at you with empathy. It wasn't pity, she understood you. You smiled and collected the rest of the lemons. "Yeah.. yeah she really was. Now-- let's go inside and I'll show you how to make her lemonade recipe."

You lead her inside. The floor feels cool underneath your feet. It welcomes you from the scorching sun. You and Ellie spend way too long for a simple lemonade recipe. Your small kitchen wasn't built for 2 people; accidents were bound to happen. You both laugh as sugar and lemon juice spill on the floor, but it ends up tasting decent.

"So, what's your story? How did you end up here-- How did you end up with Joel?" Of course you wanted to know more about your student, but you'd be lying if you didn't ask to learn more about Joel instead.

"Well... long story short, we both ran into each other and saved each others lives." She says quickly

"Pff-- ran into each other??"

"Yeah, we did." Ellie becomes quiet, so you decide to drop the subject. I can't imagine what she has gone through.

You both spend the rest of the afternoon hours talking about favorite music, favorite artists, favorite foods. You show her collections of exquisite knickknacks, rocks, and minerals during your journey of survival. You share some of your fondest memories - memories before the outbreak, with Ellie. She gobbles it up with delight.

"Say, do you wanna go get some lunch outside?" You suggest

"Lunch?? Don't you mean dinner??" You looked at the clock, and it read 6:01. "Wow... I didn't know we were talking for that long!" Ellie laughs, "Yeah, let's go out for some LUNCH."

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝

Hope you enjoyed this chapter! Sorry (not sorry) for dragging this out 😈😈😈

Please lmk what your thoughts, I'm all EARS 🩷

[joshriku]

Hello! do you have any cherik fic recs?

i have . so many. (pukes and cries) this is gonna be long but to start off i'm gonna give you my ultimate faves of like. each iteration. so i can be insane. i won't make summaries bc im bad i will just tell you how insane i am.

general thing that none of these have a sad ending or triggering topics bc im. im . I Like Happiness

-curses that can't be lifted by sotano: see. this is about cherik early comics canon right. when they just met in haifa. AND OOOOOOO GH oGH oghghgOGOH I LOVE LEAVING COMMENTS. I LEAVE LONG COMMENTS. I AM VERY ILL IN THE BRAIN WHEN IT COMES TO LEAVING COMMENTS. BUT I LITERALLY STILL CANT FIGURE OUT WHAT TO SAY IN THIS BC I LOVE IT SO MUCH. LIKE ILL COME AROUND EVENTUALLY OF COURSE. BUT IVE READ IT LIKE 50 TIMES AND ITS SO GOOD ITS SO GOOD IT MAKES ME DERANGED i was reading it yesterday again. as i do. and i had to close the tab bc it made me so unwell. i'm so normal

-afterlife by anna: this fic is so good but for my mental health it's in shambles. You don't get it. i'll be pacing around my room thinking back of scenes in this and im like ALRIGHT. PAUSE TO THROW UP AND CRY. EVER SINCE IVE READ THIS I HAVEN'T BEEN THE SAME DO YOU UNDERSTAND. IT'S POST DAYS OF FUTURE PAST AND THAT MAKES ME SO ILLLLLLL I LOVE DOFP SO BAD AND I LOVE CHARLES IN IT AND im like oh man i need something to make me cry and puke and shit myself and cure my depression im gonna read that fic again. And i do it. and i am cured. after i cry myself out to this i am so normal again

-someplace that is green by mugsandpugs: oh my god. Also bad for my mental health like (pucnhign myself) YOU DONT UNDERSTAND. it's technically x-men evolution but if you know cherik you'll understand it either way so. just. wow. erik can fit so much trauma. I can fit so many emotions. i can be so mentally ill. IREAD IT SO MUCH LIEK THE SLOOOOOWWBWBURRNNNNNNNNN AHH AHH AHH (PUKES AND CRIES) AHH WANDA AND PIETRO. AH. DEAR GOD. U DONT GET IT !!!!!! THE WORLDBUILDIGN!! (curls up and cries)

ok yeah. i'll put under the cut all the other recs i have sorry for being unwell

you should read everything by ao3 user sotano btw. not to be demented or deranged. but they never miss. everything they ever write is so . Oh my god. U dont get it. im ill. i will buy them a house

-tabula rasa by o2doko: the telepathy exploration of this goes so fucking hard

-fair verona by ha_neul: i love gender so much you don't ungerstand trans fics are the world to me they really arre

-tesselation by nekosmuse: oh my god. i mean it's a popular fic so it's probably been read. BUT THE SLAY. GOD. THE WRITING. PUKES AND DIES

-travel advisory by penknife: SORRY FOR RECCING 2003 FICS BUT FLOGOGHGOGOGH THE 2003 PEOPLE GOT IT IN WAYS NOBODY ELSE DIDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD!

-no capes by dedkake: this just hits all the spots of needing lighthearted comedy and keeping the magneto / professor x dynamic i so desperately crave. i love when authors play around with their identities while loosely sticking to canon hehe

-all these miles (just to get back home) by isthiswhatiam: you gotta read everything he posts tbh BUT this one is my personal fav i love post dark phoenix u_u

-in dreams begin responsibility by kass: im telling u the pre 2011 fics go so hard. and for what. My god. uim ill it's so good

-sweet by sadbigchungus: its so good. Do u know how fukcing hard it is to get krakoa cherik content. hard. but this hits all the sweet spots i love it so much it's so good

-a good night's sleep by insertsthmeaningful: Can i just say this author writes so much good fic and i am absolutely obsessed. as well as im obsessed w post assassination in xforce cherik like aoghogogjogghOGGH

-the way it travels in and keeps emitting light by populuxe: it's OGHGOGH i love reading this one. it's so hard to find fics that actually talk about disabilities and this one does it SO well and erik is SO perfect in this fic im sick!!

-a nice boy (the family matters edition) by pocky_slash: i don't wanna talk about how hard i cry when i reread this one i might have family issues of sorts.

-a winter's journey by red: i love old cheirk so mcuh it makes me want to eat my ownf oot

-the trouble with trilbies by obstrinatix: I LOVE. OLD MEN. CHERIK

-& other words by questors: this is so good like the worldbuilding genuinely floors and runs me over until im nothing but an useless dough

-necessary downtime by unforgotten: i . old cherik. Ogjjgjkrlgjlslkfd

-bug on a plate by lindstrom: ANOTHER ONE THAT ACTUALLY DESCRIBES DISABILITIES SUPER WELL AND DOESNT SHY AWAY FROM THEM ITS A HITTTT AND MIDDLE AGED CHERIK JUST HTIS DIFF SORRY

-the last love song and testament of charles f xavier by midrashic: u know what i said about liking afic so much u cant actually bring urself to properly word the comment so youre just waiting and waiting to properly say smth. Yea thats me w this fic too. why's it so fucking good. how am i meant to word my emotions. but hey if i got around to commenting on Afterlife i will to this

-one second and a million miles by madneto: nothing has ever put me through such a slowburn like this fic like it was so insane and crazy i felt like god was slapping me. PLUS. IRENE AND RAVEN ARE IN IT......SLAY!

-bloodbound by ikeracity: u know i didnt care about vampire fics until THIS ONE. WHERE I WAS LIKE. OH. OKAY. THEYRE GOOD ACTUALLY I SEE THE LIGHT IT MAKES SENSE NOW.

-the golden mean by somuchmorethanyouknow: IT'S SO GOOD OK. THE WAY I WISH THIS FIC WAS CANON JSUT BC IT WAS SO GOOD. THE GENOSHA BUILDING OF IT ALL. MY GODDDDDD! I LOVED IT. SO PAINFULLY GOOD. THE WRITING OF CHARLES AND EIRK IS SO EXCEPTIONAL BUT SO IS EVERYONE ELSE IN THE FIC TOO. AH

-make me stay by lynds: well. what can i say. who's to say no to a little telepathy play. sorry for liking bottom erik. as if it's my fault

-before you attempt me (fair warning) by kianspo: i read this one time i was really sad and i shouldnt have because i started crying about never being able to find a love like the one in this fic. anyway it's super good

-everything about it is a love song by pocky_slash: its bad for me. old cherik makes me go through itnso much. i cant believe ill never find love like this

-feels like you're mine by annejumps: Sorry for bottom erik enthusiast. AS IF ITS MY FAULTNTO HAVE SUCH GOOD TASTE

-because it's you that sets the test by equestrianstatue: [DERANGED NOISES] IM LIKEBSO CASUAL ABOUT THIS FIC IM NOT EVEN MENTALLH ILL.

-special studies in mutant topics by populuxe: my ao3 bookmark says "filed under fics i read while having a mental breakdown and saved my mental health" you can bet its so good and sexy and Oghgogngntnntnngng i will have to marry this authors writing style. SUBBING TO THIS AUTHOR ISNT ENOUGH I HAVE TO BUY THEM DINNER IDK

but also the sex thing: this fic ruined my ability to watch dofp. no matter how many times i watch it ill be quoting this fic along to it

thats it. for Now. i actually have more but some of them are just the real popular ones so im like. Yeah youve read it. BUT THE REST MIGHT BE FOR NEXT TIME. I GUESS. SORRY. THIS GOT OUT OF HAND

[illmetkismet]

For the ask game!!

🎨 ⇢ link your favourite piece of fanart and explain why you like it

🪲 ⇢ add 50 words to your current wip and share the paragraph here

❄️ ⇢ what's your dream theme/plot for a fic, and who would write it best?

hiiiiii i'm so sorry it took me so long to answer - my mental health took a little dip, but i'm feeling ok tonight so heeeeere we go!

🎨 ⇢ link your favourite piece of fanart and explain why you like it

i'm gonna go with my fave RE fanart, which is this comic by @nushanchel - it was the piece of art that made me start watching re4r streams and got me into the franchise, that's the kind of grip the emotion in this got me in. i'm a sucker for the melancholy there, for the softness, for the affection. incidentally, looking for this post among my reblogs made me realize i'm a couple days away from the one year mark of getting into RE! happy almost anniversary to me!!!

🪲 ⇢ add 50 words to your current wip and share the paragraph here

sadly, i have zero wips on the go.... but thank you for the encouragement!!

❄️ ⇢ what's your dream theme/plot for a fic, and who would write it best?

i would love a fic that rounds leon out with a look at his childhood, how he grew up, how he made his way to RC. like, i want a leon biopic. would love it if it intersected with a luis biopic. i wanna follow them like two trains that travel miles and miles on their respective tracks and then collide. i want leon to save luis and then i want luis to save leon. as to who would do it best, i have no idea. my ao3 bookmarks are full of talented peeps and honestly it could be someone i've never read anything by. hope to find this fic one day!! so i don't have to write it lol.....

thank u so much for the ask, i loved scrolling thru all the great art i've reblogged and thinking of all the great fic i read 🥰

[flor-de-un-salon-viejo]

guys, I really want to make a long post where I talk frame by frame all the scenes where hobie appears (as if I don't have important things to do) but I've had more than 50 captures and it's going to be a very, very long post so I better go to talk about the things that caught my attention in more than one post probably so

this is not intended to be a 100% detailed analysis or nothing, they are just something I thought when I saw the movie and some observations about things that I have seen in the fandom and that made my head spin. AND, my native language is Spanish and not English, so there may be errors in my writing, so I'm sorry if you don't understand what I'm saying.

First of all, why hasn't anyone mentioned (or at least I haven't seen it yet) that both Hobie and Peter B tell Miles what's wrong with his armpits? Referring to the suit, there are many posts that talk about Hobie as Peter in this movie and being the one who is on his side and encourages him to go his way but it makes me laugh that they thought the same thing when they saw his suit

We can also talk about this scene. I really like it a lot, but there is something that catches my attention.

When they arrive at the building, the first thing we see of him are his legs, which we can see in this reddish tone. Even though red has both good and bad connotations, taking into account that Hobie doesn't seem to like the place, it could indicate that he He is not comfortable but when we change to the picture of his face, not only is he in a faded tone, but the first thing he does when he takes off his mask is to see Miles's reaction as if he were waiting for something to happen and when he answers that it is cool it changes to a calmer look

So why did this happen, why did he seem to care how Miles was going to react? Well, my answer is that I think that Hobie thought that Miles was going to judge him, why? simple hobie even when this is the first time he meets Miles, we know since he appeared that gwen told him about Miles and remember that 1 when Miles met gwen he was in a private school and 2 his dad is a policeman now hobie saw a bit of Miles's personality he is a good boy one that his parents are probably very protective of and if they saw hobie they would forbid him to be around because he could be a bad influence hobie is quite mature and aware of his surroundings he probably thought that Miles would look at him with a bad eye but it's the opposite. Miles being the ray of sunshine that he is, told him that he was cool so he immediately relaxed

Much has been said that he changes color depending on his emotions (I have not seen if it was officially confirmed) but I like how he here changes to a "newspaper" gray when he tries to stop the victory call of pavitr with the rest It also took me a while to realize why Pavitr's reaction is different from the other three. After all, he's only been Spiderman for a short time, so he probably hasn't suffered the consequences of claiming victory before time.

[kdsburneraccount]

What's something about your work that you're dying to talk about?

Ooh this is a very good question! Thought a lot abt it, sorry if the response is very delayed.

I think because I haven't posted fic in like... half a year my desire to overshare on my progress has kind of dried up. But I was recently reminded of this one WIP I had about Odell/Jarvis with the added element about the red string of fate so I'll talk about that (the closest I will get to working on it).

Basically it follows their lives from high school when they first met at some interstate tournament. I'm pretty sure it's all from Odell's POV, not sure why I chose to do that but it was probably because his experiences were more interesting to me at the time to narrate through. They meet and exchange phone numbers, thus establishing a friendship, and a kind of rapport over similar experiences.

(The way I set up red strings of fate is that people are able to see their own strings and who they're tied to, which is usually their soulmate. But they're not perfect and sometimes the strings can break because whoever they were linked to ended up forming a stronger emotional connection to someone else.)

So Odell's string breaks at some point and he's not really sure if it's his own fault, despite having never met whoever it was supposed to be. There's also the fact that his parents are separated and he's being aware of the fact that he might also be into guys, which factors into Odell feeling generally very hesitant about love. Especially because he's going to go to a D1 school on a scholarship, and something like that would be pretty heavily frowned upon. Something something the expectation of male athletes to be masculine and not be burdened by feelings. But Jarvis does make him feel better whenever they hang out, even if they live like 50 miles apart.

But anyways they both end up going to LSU and here is where I basically stopped outlining but it's good. It's just easy to hang out with Jarvis, and Odell may or may not develop feelings? But at the same time it seems like Jarvis has already found his soulmate, so yeah. Unrequited feelings. And they're roommates. I feel like I would've just inserted some moment where they're on the verge of acting on those feelings but. I didn't write that far. Also include the part where Odell practices how to one-hand catch bc that's important of course.

I feel like I would've explored a good amount about how the sudden fame in the NFL gets to Odell, and how Jarvis is there to ground him. But long story short is that a lot of things happen and eventually feelings are discovered and they get together but it takes a very long time. (Unfortunately everything besides the relationship is "canon compliant" in the sense that all the timeline events align so yeah) Uhh I think that their strings somehow become linked bc I was one of those people who didn't know how to subvert expectations. But that happens! Yeah. Nice to ramble abt something I haven't looked at in a while.

[sanguinaryrose]

Miss Shadowsong? - An 8.3k word OC (Sorrel Sunstrider) x canon (Maiev Shadowsong) work.

What started as a short exercise kinda snowballed back in April/June, and I've been heavily procrastinating about posting it anywhere and finally have today. Oops on taking so long, but also meh. Starts off sad, but has a happy ending.

There's some Sindassi (original name for Thalassian) in there that I don't remember what it was but I'm pretty sure it was just sad sapphic noises.

Warnings include: Intoxication (consensual, causes a bout of anxiety, one chapter only, nothing too terribly important happens so feel free to scroll past it)

Chapters divided in the post, but posted all at once so have fun with this big boy.

... Maiev took in every curve of her body, the way her her face crinkled as she smiled while talking to her, the way she had smile lines, small crows feet, the bags under her eyes finally beginning to ease after so long of being stressed and worried...

Sorrel paced idly in front of the warden's cage, hugging herself and biting on her lip as tears threatened to stream down her face, the cold biting her soft, exposed skin. "Oh, it's horrible, Miss Shadowsong." Her captive audience rolled her eyes, "I don't-" "He dropped a mana bomb on a settlement- One that had nothing to do with what that monster did to us." Now that.. That caught Maiev's attention. "He what?" "There were civilians. All I could think was 'that was us, what are you doing, please stop' but I was stuck, in shock and.." Maiev's stomach sank. Were they Night Elves? Her wardens? Was- "And I felt afraid of him. I.. For the first time, felt afraid of my husband."

Sorrel stopped her pacing, idly messing with her hands for several long seconds before she turned to stare the Night Elf in the eyes. "Am I awful? For not stopping him? For feeling this way? For.." She looked down, exhaling sharply. "For being afraid of the man I promised to love?" It was a lot to chew on from a relative stranger, one who mocked your every word initially and one who so casually stood aside and let her husband's troops capture her and steal the victory she had so close straight from her hands. It raised the question- Was she bad? If Maiev had to decide, yes, she was, she was just as bad as Kael, inaction is just as bad as action here, but- "I know what you're thinking. You'd put me to death with him, wouldn't you?"

Maiev didn't respond. Not for disagreeing, mind you, but rather because she would. She would have the prince and his lady put to death for their crimes. "I.. I would too." Sorrel sighed, clutching her staff to her chest. "I'm sorry for burdening you with this." She turned her back, about to leave, only to get tugged back by her cape. "Hey!" She whipped around as much as she could, the caged watcher staring her down through her helm, her clawed gauntlets threatening to shred the cape. "Were they Night Elves." It wasn't a question but a demand, a threat, of if they were, Sorrel may not leave the cold, damp prison Illidan had locked her in. "No." A weight lifted off of Maiev's shoulders, though she did not release the priestess from her clawed grip and instead dragged her closer. "Let go." "No. Come here."

The warden's tone wasn't aggressive, but hushed and somewhat panicked. "Help me out of here, priestess." Sorrel swallowed nothing, her throat feeling particularly dry. "I can take you somewhere safe. Keep you away from the slipping insanity of those around you, keep-" "Maiev." Sorrel's voice was soft, doing her best to keep a steady tone, though the growing unease was likely able to be tasted by anyone in a 50 mile radius. "I can't." She unclipped her cape and turned to the warden, and with fear gripping her arm, trying to pull her away, took the night elf's armored hands in hers. "I.. Don't know why. But I think everyone's wrong here. I think you need to let Illidan go. I think Kael'thas needs to be taken out of power. I think Vashj needs to find a place away from here for her people, and I think Illidan needs to.. To man up. Do what he needs to do, return the temple to Akama and return to Azeroth. This isn't his world. He is but a false prince, just as Kael has become."

As Sorrel spoke, Maiev felt her throat closing, panic bubbling up in her, silently begging her to stay, to get her out, away from Illidan, away- "But I promise, Miss Shadowsong," She withdrew one of her hands from the warden's cage, the warmth and kind touch of another person disappearing nearly being enough to make the warden cry out, begging her to come back, to hold her once more. "I'll come back." In the warden's armored hand, Sorrel put a wrapped bushel of grapes. "Ration these- Carefully I don't know when I can come back next, and I figured you'd.. Go mad without decent food." She wasn't cruel. What Illidan wanted to do was awful and she couldn't keep her mind in tact in letting the warden live only through magic, and even then, only by the skin of her teeth. "I'll bring something different next time. Just.. Don't make anyone angry. Keep your head bowed and mouth shut, as much as it hurts. If I ever stop, assume someone found out or I'm.." She looked at the wall, almost distantly.

She bent down after releasing the warden's hands fully. "I'm sorry." Sorrel waved the warden off as she took the cape into her hands, "I just-" "Don't. I came to you asking an actual question, and you.." She didn't answer. "You gave me an answer- A nonverbal one, but.. I asked for it. Thank you." "No, it wasn't about that. For.." She sighed, unwrapping the grapes, inspecting them to get a change of scenery, if only temporarily. She had to eat them, after all, it was that or.. That or near starvation. "For grabbing you. I.. I'm sorry I scared you." "It's okay. I forgive you." She pat Maiev's shoulder before backing away. "I'm sorry I can't help more."

All of this, it raised the question in Maiev's mind once more, was the priestess bad? Or rather was she trapped in a bad situation, a web of evil people, unable to- "I'll see you soon, Maiev. Just don't make anyone angry."

Sorrel was only as confident as she was to slip to the Warden’s Cage after everyone had fallen asleep, save two select guards, Illidan’s most trusted, Ophelia, who she could easily pay off with high quality Quel’dorei alcohol, and the ever-vigilant Sinira, who Sorrel believed never slept and was also kind enough to keep her mouth shut. That was, unfortunately, the easier of the tasks. She had to sneak away from the progressively more paranoid Kael’thas, one, and two, sneak approximately two hours away- And that was while on the back of the maddened Raven Lord she had tamed whilst traveling to the Black Temple.

She was lucky- Much luckier than most. She was able to hold her confidence in the face of direct opposition, looking a demon in the eyes and saying she's on direct orders from Lord Illidan himself. The ride out took about two hours and the ride back would likely take a bit longer, but it was worth it to talk with someone who was at least somewhat sane, somewhat able to hold a coherent conversation with her.

She'd been sneaking to see Maiev for several weeks now, and she thought that, personally, they'd grown close. She'd consider her an acquaintance. As she stabled the Raven Lord, commanding him to sit, the priestess cast several spells to muffle any conversation Maiev and her had. "Miss Shadowsong?" She quietly called as she walked to the cell. The warden seemed to be asleep, and that was okay. It must be hard to sleep, and she didn't want to bother her if she didn't have to.

Using a simple teleport spell to, well, teleport the fruit of the week (three apples) into the Warden's cell, Sorrel felt more than pleased with them not exploding all over the prison and waking the watcher (and also making her to be an enemy against Illidan in his eyes.) She sat herself down on a nearby rock and rummaged through her bag before getting to work writing in a rune-touched journal in letters that simply did not exist- Something only her eyes could read.

Week 4 of interacting with Miss Shadowsong.

She's become more receptive to my kindness, less hostile as a whole towards me. Should I mention Kael'thas, Lady Vashj or Lord Illidan, she flips and becomes outwardly hostile, giving me short, curt, one word responses.

I've learned she had a partner of sorts ten thousand some-odd years ago who went by 'Sin.' I have reason to believe that 'Sin' is Sinira, due to what Sinira has told me in regards to a partner that she used to have who was 'but a shadow.' Normally, I love riddles, but these two are a bit much.

There was a quiet shift- The warden was just adjusting in her sleep, she supposed. She felt a bit uncomfortable seeing Maiev, even with her back turned, without most of her armor- Especially her helmet. She'd admittedly imagined her to look a fair bit different, and she didn't realize the fluff on the back of her helmet was her actual hair. She was much, much smaller than she'd imagined as well, and her hair was a stark white, just like her own. She'd never really seen a normal Night Elf before this, she'd realized, as she was mainly called in to tend to freshly transformed Demon Hunters, and Kael was careful to keep her away from battlefields, avoiding showing her corpses. She never was 'okay' in seeing corpses she couldn't redeem. She couldn't help but wonder if Maiev thought the same of her, being an outlier. Most Blood Elves by now had green eyes, and even before their reliance on fel, they had blue. She herself was an outlier- White eyes. Reliant on a higher power, rather than a lesser one. As for hair, most were shades of gold, red, and brown, but she had similarly white hair. Taking a small handful of her own hair, she compared it to Maiev's, at a squinty distance. Maiev's hair, it had more bluish undertones. Sorrel’s own hair, on the other hand, had.. A lack thereof.

I'm beginning to wonder if Maiev feels a sense of kinship with me as I do her. Of course, this is likely just projection. When I look at her, I see a sad reflection. Someone I could have easily become should I let rage guide my hands.

Sorrel's right ear swiveled slightly as she picked up on Anzu making disgruntled sounds while she wrote.

As I sit here, looking at Maiev's glaives less than a breath away from me, I wonder if I could protect myself like a Demon Hunter does. Like Maiev had to. I suppose that is what makes us- me, rather, so different from most on this world. I hold my head high regarding the fact that I've not harmed a single being in my life. Those like Illidan, even my husband now, they've had to kill to survive. Even Elves half my age have had to make the heavy call to take a life, but I've yet

"Priestess?" Maiev groaned, groggy and struggling to shake herself out of a deep sleep. "Yes, Miss Shadowsong?" "It is you." "It is." Maiev mumbled something Sorrel couldn't quite pick up before falling back asleep. Something about 'missing her company.' She could only hope her presence could help the watcher get some rest.

to be required to make that decision. I fear who I will become after I am forced to draw my first blood.

The priestess shut her journal momentarily, studying Maiev intently, how her sides rose and fell rhythmically with each breath she took. She never was a fantastic artist, but she wished she'd studied anatomy more. To try and show those she cares about how she sees them. Her words were beautiful, she thought, yes, but few can take their friends and loved ones and turn them into gorgeous paintings to hang upon their wall.

Before she could reopen her journal and get back to writing, Anzu began fussing about something or another. Odd. Anxiety bubbled up in Sorrel. It could so easily be nothing, but just as easily it could be something. She did her best to try and get a read on who it was. It wasn't Illidan or Kael or any Naga, nor was it a demon as she'd convinced them thoroughly (or so she thought) of her being sent by Illidan to keep an eye on Maiev.

She couldn't keep her anxiety down, and it wasn't easing up. Carefully moving into a hiding spot, Sorrel focused her energy onto Anzu, and then into seeing through his eyes.

It was one of the newer Demon Hunters. Sorrel sighed, briefly relieved, seconds before a new sense of dread filled her to her brim. Oh no. She scampered up the ramp out as fast as she could, meeting the freshly blinded hunter halfway, scaring her and her sighted sin'dorei escort. "AGH!" The Night Elf yelped, bounding several feet back like a startled cat. "You! And your bird! Agh!" She pat her chest several times, presumably to soothe the pounding in it. The sin'dorei was significantly less impressed. "I'll wait nearby when this.. Gets settled." She vaguely motioned to.. Well, everything. "What are you doing?" Sorrel questioned, gently turning the hunter towards her, rather than her bird.

"Oh! Um. Lord Illidan sent me to tend to the warden. 'Ensure Maiev does not get any smart ideas.'" She parroted, about to walk past the priestess. Sorrel immediately fell back on her days in school acting. Quirking a brow, Sorrel grabbed her arm and pulled her back. "What? That's-" She tilted her head. "That's odd. I think he's just forgotten he sent me here for the same reason." She thought she sounded sure. "Oh, okay! Oh.. Huh? Wait- He.. Forgot? Is his short term memory not so good anymore?" The blue haired demon hunter questioned, bringing her hand to her face with a head tilt. "Yeah, um.. He's just really stressed recently. Worrying a lot with new recruits and whatnot." "Ohhh.." She replied with a knowing nod. "I get it. Think it's that thing you've been talking about?" She questioned with a point.

"What? Post-Traumatic Stress?" "Yeah, that." "Oh, absolutely. Surviving a war, 10,000 years in a cage, finally being let out, and then going into another war.." She shook her head. "It's rough. Really rough." "Oourrgh. Yeah, that sounds bad. Alright! I'll let him know. Thanks for not chewing me ou-" "Wait! Don't!" Sorrel grabbed the stranger's arm, accidentally gripping a fresh tattoo, "Ow!" "Sorry! Um! Don't, though! Really, it's.." She let go of the hunter. "It's bad if you tell him he was wrong. Kael got into a shouting match with him for about an hour, some time ago." A complete truth, actually. "Just hang around outside the temple for a few hours." "Oh I think I heard the tail end of it. A few days ago, right?" "Yeah. Kael said he gave him the wrong times, Illidan said he didn't, Kael knew he was right, Illidan thought he was right.."

The night elf clicked her tongue, spinning around, about to call out to her companion. "Oh, hey, before I leave, what's your name? I know the voice, but, uh, not the name. Or face. But, I'm getting better with that magic sight!" She shot some gunfingers at Sorrel, a goofy grin on her face. "Oh! It's Sorrel. Sorrel Sunstrider." "Ohh, you must'a been that lady standing besides Kael'thas! It's nice to properly meet you, Sorrel!" "It's nice to meet you too, uhh…" "-more." The hunter interrupted. "More?" "No! Uhh-more. Amoure!" "Ohh! That's a beautiful name, Miss Amoure." "Thanks! Anyway, I'll see ya." Giving Amoure a polite wave off and a soft Sindassi send off, Sorrel returned to her position, unable to shake the frightened expression.

"Priestess?" Maiev spoke up, now fully armored, reaching for a glaive that wasn't there. "What happened?" She certainly worked quick. "It was just a hiccup. Don't worry." She motioned towards the iron maidens, "I put your food in there?" Maiev briefly looked excited, initially going to try the gate, before realizing what she meant. "Magic?" "Yes ma'am." Maiev sighed, unable to mask her disappointment. "I appreciate it. What are they, this time?" She asked, a rhetorical question as she reached into the maiden, pulling out the bundled fruit. "The Botanica is coming along well. Kael'thas has me try every fruit once it's deemed safely edible." Maiev hummed, piercing the flesh of one of the apples with her gauntlet, taking her helmet off to take a bite from the fruit. On instinct, Sorrel looked away. "Sorry-" She swallowed. "Does it bother you seeing people eat?"

"No! No, it isn't that, just.. It feels like I'm seeing someone nude, when I look at you without your armor. When you were asleep, I tried not to look too much. I made sure you were alive, mind you, but." She cleared her throat, uncomfortable. Maiev snorted, going at the apple. "What did you talk about up there?" "Oh, it was just a bit of confusion. A demon hunter came when Illidan sent me." "In that case, why did you look so worried?" "Would you be scared if a volatile, powerful man were to be told he was wrong?" Maiev stopped chewing, thought for a moment, and eventually replied with a simple, "Good point." She'd finished the apple soon enough, and tossed the core in Sorrel's field of vision, the priestess casting a quick spell to all but disintegrate the thing in holy fire.

"You were asleep for some time, so.." She packed her things, keeping an eye on the ramp. "I do need to go earlier than usual." Maiev nodded. "You will come back though. Right?" "Have I missed a meeting yet?" "Right?" "Yes, Miss Shadowsong. I'll be back." She nodded, waving the warden off. "Stay safe." Sorrel whispered over her shoulder with a small, bashful wave, before leaving the warden's sight, a view that never failed to fill the Night Elf with immeasurable dread.

Maiev had been struggling particularly hard to not snap at and lash out at Illidan or his lackeys when they next came to gawk and cackle at her like hyenas. Ophelia especially bothered her, as she'd often run her horns along the bars that kept her trapped. How she wanted to saw all of their horns off. The only solace was her.

Quiet and elegant, full of grace. She was what came to mind when Maiev thought of a priestess. Hearing the familiar sound of Sorrel casting silence spells filled her heart with a sense of excitement and peace. "Priestess?" Maiev called as Sorrel began making her way down the ramp. "I'm here, Miss Shadowsong." If she had a tail, she'd be wagging it like mad. "I am glad to see you, priestess." Sorrel's expression was distant. She looked upset, and as Maiev processed her face, her excitement dropped.

"Priestess Sunstrider..?" Maiev had never used her surname before, and Sorrel sighed on hearing it. Sitting herself down on the rock she used as a seat to spend time with Maiev, the priestess stared blankly at the wall. "Kael'thas said he was done." Momentarily, Maiev got excited. Did that mean Sorrel would be more willing to let her out? To- "We're leaving soon. Something happened, Miss Shadowsong." Sorrel's bad ear was weaker than usual, and her cryptic words weren't helping the growing dread. "Eredar are such vile creatures." Sorrel stared the warden's glaive down. Maiev wished she could get inside the priestess' head, wished she could understand what was going on. "I don't know when or if I can come back, but." Sorrel got up, holding a bag positively stuffed with various fruit, passing it to the warden through the bars. "I enchanted all of these myself. They'll never go bad. I'll try to teleport food to you, but I don't know if I'm strong enough. Tempest Keep is.. So far away."

Maiev's stomach sank, she wanted to vomit, to cry and beg her to stay, to not leave her to the wolves, how helpless she felt in being forced to rely on someone else for her sanity. How positively angry she felt at Sorrel for not releasing her, for not fighting to stay, for- "Please don't leave me here." ..Damnit. Sorrel sighed, crossing her arms. "I.. I wish I could get you out. But I can't. I have three young children to tend to, and in letting you out, I'd be putting a target on Kael and my children's backs."

Maiev reached through the bars and took a small handful of Sorrel's hair in her hands. It was the closest the two had ever been since their first interaction- If Sorrel had stepped any closer, they'd be breathing one another's air. It was the first time Maiev had been able to catch what Sorrel smelled like and in spite of everything, she managed to smell absolutely resplendent. "Are you sure?" Maiev asked, releasing the priestess' hair. "There is nothing that can be done? Y-You are unable to say something to convince Kael'thas to stay? To-" "I'm sorry. I.. There's nothing I can do. He's dead set on getting away." She swallowed around nothing as Sorrel spoke, unable to stop her bottom lip from quivering. "Please don't go." Sorrel took a deep breath. "I'm sorry, Maiev." "Sorrel?" She whispered, trying to will her to stay, to come back and hold her and-

As the priestess retreated she stole one more glance back at the warden, who was freely crying beneath the helmet, though her posture dare not show it. "I'm so sorry. If you get out.. Please come find me at Tempest Keep. It's in the Netherstorm. I won't forget you. Thank you, for.. Listening." She didn't want to linger, Maiev supposed, as she quickly walked up the stairs, recognizing the rhythmic thumping of her mount carrying her away.

Maiev didn't quite recover emotionally from Sorrel leaving. It'd been several weeks, and she kept one fruit in particular. A single peach, it was the closest smell to Sorrel's, and it was the one thing that kept her from losing her mind.

Demon hunters came and went, some joined by their horns, some alone. She overheard plenty of conversations. Most of them went in one ear and out the other, mostly disinteresting to the warden, but one caught her attention. Filled her with dread and made her re-find her voice.

"Did you hear about Tempest Keep?" A hunter asked, making Maiev focus in on the conversation. "Yeah. Heavy stuff. You don't think Lord Illidan is at risk too, do you? And, man, poor Sorrel." Poor Sorrel? "Illidari." She rumbled, the first word spoken in months, something that startled both demon hunters. "So you're not dead!" The larger of the two, a havoc one, she supposed, spoke. The lesser of the two hushed him, approaching Maiev. "What is it, Shadowsong?" Her arms were crossed as her whip-like tail idly lashed. "What of the priestess, Kael'thas' wife?" "..You mean Sorrel? How do you know her?" "We briefly interacted on Azeroth." "..Right." The Illidari turned. "She's around. Illidan keeps her close. Convinced he needs to watch her- Convinced he-"

Maiev's arms shot out from behind the bars of her cell, dragging the demon hunter close by her tail and wing. "You!" Maiev pointed towards the larger Illidari, who was now stanced up, unsure of what to do, mostly. "Tell Illidan to send Sorrel here now or else." "You can't hurt me!" The woman scoffed, about to pull away, quickly eating her words as the watcher switched her grip from her arms to her throat. "Maiev- We can't make him do anyth-" She was interrupted by a warning squeeze, cutting her off.

"Send for the priestess." Maiev repeated, her hands shaking. "Now." "I'll call your bluff." She replied. "I can smell and feel your fear. Sorrel's so deeply against violence, Maiev." The warden's hands were so deeply unsteady now. "It'd be awful for her. After watching her husband die, seeing his corpse, having to see one of her friends near-death at the hands of the Maiev Shadowsong." Maiev let go of the Illidari, snarling obscenities under her breath. The hunter quickly ripped away from her and dashed to the other end of the space. "I'm telling Illidan about this." The larger of the two said, ascending the ramp. The lesser of the two nodded, settling herself on the ramp herself, watching Maiev like a vulture as she began to pace, quick to lose herself in her thoughts.

She would get out of there. Sorrel had asked her to find her, and by Elune she swore she would. Illidan would not crush the one good thing on this forsaken world, the one good thing she had left in her life. She swore it.

Sorrel shook. She was convinced to try smoking some by a few demon hunters while they ate, and she took maybe a hit or two too many. She quickly scurried to her quarters, shutting the door and exhaling a shaky breath as she dispelled any light producing magic, bathing the room in darkness. She didn't even notice the figure standing by the door as she shut it, crawling into her bed and laying flat on her back, her arms stiff at her sides as her chest rose and fell in a way indicating dread or anxiety or some form of unadulterated fear.

Maiev didn't have time to make her presence known before there was a rhythmic knock-knock-knocking at the door. "Sorrel?" "Sinira?" "Are you alright? You ran off pretty quick once it started to hit." Honestly, she wasn't okay. She was freaking out. Sorrel couldn’t muster a proper response, not for several seconds. “Um..” She breathed, slowly bringing a hand to her face. “I will be..?” “Okay, hon, well..” Sinira opened the door, approaching the priestess’ bed slowly. Maiev felt the blood drain from her face. She prayed to Elune, to whatever higher power that this wasn’t actually Sinira. That she didn’t threaten the previous love of her life with death, that she didn’t side with Illidan of all elves, that- “I brought you some cake and water.” Sorrel slowly sat up, her ears pinned back more than they usually were, even when she was upset or stressed. “I just wanted to make sure you got to try some. Also, you.. Really need to drink, especially when panicking.”

Sorrel nodded, unable to find her voice to say ‘thank you’, though she did mouth the words. “You’re more than welcome, High Priestess. I’ll check on you in the morning.” She backed away from Sorrel, and turned to the door and froze. Maiev’s heart might as well have stopped there, and clearly Sinira was shocked with what she was seeing as well. Neither of them moved. They both clearly saw each other. Taking a deep breath, Sinira turned back to Sorrel. “I’m going on an extended hunting trip starting tomorrow. I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

Rather than acknowledge Maiev, Sinira quietly let herself out of the room and quickly walked away from the Priestess’ private quarters. Sorrel picked at the cake with the fork that Sinira had provided, though she found it difficult to find her appetite, even with the munchies driving her forward in even considering eating. She was going to drink though. She remembered clearly how often Kael’thas had to remind her to drink because she’d gotten so terribly fixated on writing or reading. It was something that gave her a sense of comfort, it was simple and comforting and something that reminded her of better times, before everything.

Putting the cake to the side, Sorrel slowly lowered herself onto her side, moving in ‘slow motion’, fearful that should she move too fast, something would break. But even as her anxieties grew higher and higher, she had a bout of inspiration. This was a very similar sensation, it hit her, as to when she’d eaten some special brownies that Fraeja had made, and it also made her realize that this wasn’t the first time she’d gotten too high. She got up, rubbing her arms, briefly pacing about her room, before laying back down. She’d remember it, she promised herself. A letter, she’d write, to Maiev. And Kael and everyone she loved but couldn’t express it to.

Her hands were cold. She was cold and frightened and- “Priestess.” “Yes, Miss Shadowsong?” She replied on instinct, squeezing her eyes shut. It was a dream. A dream, please, just let it be a dream. Just let it be a peaceful dream, giving her the chance to talk to her. “Are you alright?” The bed shifted behind her. “I’m afraid.” “Of what?” Sorrel thought, for several seconds. “Of Illidan.” She spoke after far, far too long. “He hasn’t hurt me. But I fear when I no longer appear as useful to him. When he deems me a threat to his position as the Lord of Outland, if- When he finds out I’m..” She began trembling. “I’m your friend. You can’t protect me from him. Kael’thas can’t protect me from him.” Maiev’s stomach sank. Sorrel had been disheveled before around her, startled and in shock, but never properly afraid.

Maiev put her hand on Sorrel’s shoulder, the priestess letting out a shaky breath. “Before Kael’thas..” She cleared her throat. “Passed away. I began thinking. I don’t want to be called a blood elf. I.. Can’t carry that weight on my shoulders. I love and respect and can’t begin to thank those who fell protecting Silvermoon, but.. What about the innocents? Those whose blood was spilled because they simply happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Their blood, it shouldn’t be worn as a symbol of respect or pride, it should be given a quiet place to rest, a quiet-” She shook her head, getting up and grabbing the cup of water, downing half of it in a few gulps. “A quiet.. Safe rest. Away from the bloodshed. Away from the painful memories of what happened to them.” Sorrel had never been quite so heavy before, and it hurt Maiev to hear her inner thoughts, to hear how her anxiety only worsened since she last saw her. “Well you can’t very well be a night elf.” She replied, flat. It made Sorrel giggle, something that made Maiev’s stomach swell with pride in knowing she had made her smile in such a dark moment, knowing that she had made her giggle even. She wanted to hear it more.

“Of course I can’t. I was thinking of just referring to myself as a high elf. I considered sun elf, but..” She snickered. “It’d be a lonely existence. And a bit on the nose. I wonder if any of Kael’s ancestors thought about calling themselves that.” Was she crying? Sorrel raised a hand to her face and sighed. “I wish we could’ve met on better terms. Maybe if I were born over 10,000 years ago and also was a night elf, I could’ve done something to make a change. Save you from chasing Illidan.” Maiev’s heart broke damn near in two at the sentiment. “You wouldn’t want to do that, Priestess.” Sorrel hummed. “I disagree. I didn’t like seeing you all caged up. You know, the whole location was actually.. Named after you. It was called the Warden’s Cage.”

Maiev frowned. “I wasn’t aware, no.” Sorrel sighed. “It wasn’t right. Two wrongs never make a right. It shouldn’t have been you being punished alongside Illidan. It could’ve been Tyrande. It could’ve been Malfurion. It didn’t have to be you.” The watcher couldn’t find the words to reply. Sorrel waited for several seconds, before continuing. “It could’ve been anyone. It could’ve been split into shifts. You shouldn’t have effectively become his sole babysitter for ten thousand years. Do you know how long that is for someone like me?” Sorrel rolled onto her back, watching the ceiling. “The oldest elf in all of Quel’thalas died recently. Kael’s father, and he was 3,000. That’s considered senior for us. I think he should’ve retired, let Kael become king, but Kael was happier in Dalaran, and he never recalled my prince.”

As Sorrel ran her mouth, Maiev took in her appearance. For the first time, unobscured, up close and personal, Maiev had a chance to study the high elf. She had pure white hair, beautiful, freckle-kissed skin and a gorgeous face. Her personality was just the cherry on top, frankly. “Do you regret anything, Maiev?” The watcher was taken aback by the sudden question, as she was admittedly lost in the tones and hums the priestess made as she talked to herself. “I..” She couldn’t think of anything off of the top of her head that wasn’t related to her anger with tending to Illidan for as long as she did. “I stopped seeing my first betrothed because of Illidan.” Sorrel hummed. “They must’ve been lucky.” “How do you mean?” “Well.. You’re you. You’re a good listener, to start. Even if it’s because you’ve no choice, you still retained what I told you.”

Even if it was just a dream or daydream, it was comforting. It made her anxiety start to subside and gave her the ability to begin drifting off. The two chatted off and on for several hours and not once did Sorrel open her eyes, though towards the end of their discussion, when Sorrel was struggling to form sentences, she rolled onto her side, facing away from the warden. “I’m sure in actuality, it’s just Al’ar in bed with me. But I need to ask-” She yawned, pulling her pillow into her arms. “If you’re real.. Would you hold me? Please? I just.. Can’t sleep alone. Not anymore.”

Maiev knew she’d have a hard couple of days moving forward. This simple act of kindness, even if it was per Sorrel’s request, would be good for both of them, she thought, as she put her arms around the priestess. “Ow.” Sorrel mumbled, shifting away. “Your armor hurts.” “Sorry.” She wasn’t comfortable taking it off- Not so close to Illidan and where an Illidari could hypothetically walk in at any moment. “I’ll do it one day.” Maiev finally spoke, unprompted. “But you need to wait.” “Okay.”

“Promise?” Sorrel pulled her blankets over herself. Snuggling into them, the priestess looked positively at peace. “I promise.” And it, just like coming to find her, was a promise she wouldn’t be quick to break. Especially not to someone who’s shown her such unadulterated kindness, not requesting anything more than a hug and a promise through it all.

Ophelia had all but commanded Sorrel to ‘stay put’ in her room, with her children as soon as Illidan took note of troops from the Alliance and Horde banding together to try and storm the temple. Illidan had sent most of his hunters off on a mission, one to try and secure a demonic ship from what Sorrel could understand. As she sat with her children behind her, crouching while facing them, her body acting as a shield if need be, she kept her head on a constant swivel around her room, especially when the footfalls of no less than 20 men approached her quarters. Her heart might as well have stopped as she felt the surges of magic flowing throughout the temple as Illidan took his final stand, and just as quickly as she had felt it, she felt something worse, something much more frightening.

Nothing. Those footfalls came and went once more. And after so long, one pair of footsteps approached and stopped. Sorrel wrestled her cape off and put it over her children, wielding a tome Kael’thas had once given her in case of an emergency. “Priestess?” A familiar voice called out. She didn’t know what to do. “Miss Shadowsong?” She answered, before the door slowly creaked open.

On the edge of the frame, she saw the familiar gauntlets of Maiev though she dare not believe it to be her until she let herself into the room, several Night Elves awkwardly standing around behind her. “Are you alright?” Sorrel felt tears well up in her eyes. “What did you do, Miss Shadowsong?” Maiev acknowledged the 3 smaller elves and nodded for Sorrel to follow her. “..My children will be alright. Right?” “No harm will come to them, or you.” Sorrel backed towards the children and steadied herself before she faced them. “These nice women will keep you safe. Okay?” She chirped, holding her hands out for a pinky swear. The older of the two linked pinkies wordlessly and huddled closer to one another as she rose to her feet and turned to face Maiev, following the warden through the temple.

Maiev did her best to keep her focused on her, but it was impossible to not acknowledge the carnage as she approached the pinnacle. “Oh.. Oh, Maiev. What did you do?” “This.. Was not my work.” Unfortunately, she silently added. “Heroes of the Horde, Blood Elves, Orcs, Tauren, Undead, they did this.” Sorrel got cold feet as she approached the pinnacle. The scent of blood was thickly hanging in the air and what remained of Illidan’s magic was fleeting.

“His hunters were captured.” Maiev knew the pained expression meant she knew Illidan was no more. “Do I have your blessing to say goodbye? To Illidan, to..” She motioned vaguely. “Yes. But I ask you cast no spells until we return to the Broken Isles.” Sorrel tilted her head. “We?” Maiev rested her hand on Sorrel’s shoulder. “I will not cast a mourning mother away. Your children, are they..” “No. Kael’thas and I never had a chance to..” She cleared her throat. “I was tending to them until I could get them to Silvermoon safely.” Maiev nodded, thinking on what to do in regards to this before softly asking, “Do you want them to come to the Broken Isles with us?” “No, I.. I don’t think it’d be good for them. They need to grow up around Blood Elves. Know where they come from.”

“Give me some time to think, I’ll have to figure out how to get them back safely. Say your goodbyes. You deserve it.” Even if they do not, she thought.

Sorrel took deep breaths as she ascended to the pinnacle. Akama offered her a polite nod, and she returned in kind. The broken had been a voice of reason in her darkest moments and often counseled her when she needed guidance her faith could not provide alone. “I am sorry.” He started, taking in a deep, almost pained sounding breath, though the priestess quickly cut him off. “No, Akama. You did nothing wrong. He was mad. His insanity was destroying a place that should’ve been a safe haven for you and yours, something of beauty. He lied to you. I am sorry you had to tolerate it for so long. If you ever need help in this- All of it, cleansing the temple, cleaning this up, I’ll stay until-” “No, High Priestess. I cannot ask that of you. Thank you for the offer.” Sorrel nodded. “You’re welcome. Thank you for your kindness, Akama.”

Akama said something in Eredun, a kind of ‘you’re welcome and blessings to you’ Sorrel had learned, before taking his leave to spread the news of Illidan’s defeat to his people, leaving the Watchers to clean the mess that Illidan had made. Sorrel didn’t want to see him. But she knew she had to. To close this dark, bloody chapter of her life and try to make a new one.

As she approached Illidan’s crumpled form, all she could focus on was him, she didn’t even initially take note of the Illidari surrounding them. “Oh, Illidan.” She sighed, getting on her knees by his head, stroking his head like a mother to a child who just had a nightmare. “Perhaps now, you’ll find peace.” She leaned forward and rested her head against his. “You don’t need to run or fight anymore. You can rest.”

As she rose to her feet, her stomach sank seeing the trapped faces of those she’d loved, laughed with. None hurt her more than Ophelia, though, her beloved. Her voice was shaky as she approached the night elf, who looked as though she could’ve been sleeping. “Anar.. n'dath a'asto're ethala osa. N'dath osa neph'o ishura lo anar alah anoduna su shar shari'adune. Anoduna su tal anar osa andu tal anu, anoduna su t'ase'mushal. Do ri adore.”

Maiev quirked a brow. She’d never heard most of these words past the last three she uttered. ‘Do ri adore.’ “Why are you-” One of her women put a hand on her arm, shaking her head, cutting the warden off.

As she took in the rest of the Illidari, she recognized many faces. But one was missing- Among all of the men and women she counted, she couldn’t find Sinira. “Maiev?” She wasn’t sure what she was going to say as the warden made her way to her side, uncomfortably hovering a hand over her shoulder. She wanted to tell her about the missing demon hunter. But when she spoke- “I’m ready.” Was all she could muster.

Maiev sighed, pulling Sorrel close. “It may not feel it.” Sorrel started, losing her arms under Maiev’s cloak as she wrapped them around the warden. “But.. I think you’ll find a new hunt soon enough. There is always evil in the world.” She looked up towards the warden, who was staring intently at Illidan’s body. “Your story does not need to end with him, as much as the world seems to want it to. Just like my story will not end with Kael’thas, despite my affiliation with him condemning me to death alongside him.”

The warden nodded, not really processing the priestess’ words, before releasing her. “Go to your children and pack your things. I’ll send watchers to escort you shortly.” Sorrel replied with a quiet ‘okay’ and left the pinnacle, leaving the watcher to her thoughts and Illidan’s body.

It’d been several days since Sorrel had fully settled into her quarters in the Vault of the Wardens after unpacking everything. Maiev had been awkward, initially. Not in the same way she’d been when they first began interacting but in a new way. Sorrel thought she recognized it, but she didn’t want to assume things. Assuming things is why so many awful, awful things had happened in her interpersonal life.

“Miss Shadowsong?” Sorrel cooed from outside of the warden’s private quarters. “Priestess?” Maiev replied. Taking it as the ‘it’s alright to let herself in’ signal, Sorrel sat down on the warden’s bed by her. She was reading, and as much as the Sorrel had wanted to be nosy, it was in Kaldorei. She had never quite understood it, despite the similarities to Quel’dorei. “Did you know that I’m a sin-eater?” Maiev raised a brow, shutting her book. “What?”

Sorrel faked a gasp, “And here I was pouring my heart out to you while you were in that cell! I remembered so much about you, and yet-” She dramatically fell back onto Maiev’s bed, covering her face, “You won’t even remember that? How cruel, Warden Shadows-” “Hey! I’ll have you know you never mentioned that!” Sorrel snickered, pulling herself back up. “I know. I just wanted to see if you knew that.”

Maiev was relieved she was wearing her armor, because her face certainly felt much warmer than usual. Being able to breathe easily so close to Sorrel, to touch her, to- “So, sin-eating is a bit of a ritual of sorts.” “What happens during it? Can you perform it for me?” “No, and I hope to never have to.” Maiev initially felt hurt, before she realized what she’d said entirely. “Wait, why?” “Well, sin eating, I suppose it’s a high elf thing. I was the only priestess willing to become one. So, after someone dies, we get these big feasts set up after the funeral. I approach the body and eat from the feast laid out before them by taking the food over the body- Like,” She put her hand on Maiev’s chest and pushed her onto her back, adjusting to be kneeling at her side. “Like, pretend you’re a body for this, right?” She took Maiev’s book and set it adjacent to her. “I take the food from one side of the body,” She set the book in her lap. “To myself. And eat it. And in doing so,” She helped Maiev sit back up. “I eat their sins. It’s a super spiritual thing.”

Maiev’s brain was shot in being touched so kindly by Sorrel and she was kicking herself for wearing her armor at all- If she’d just been willing to relax without it for just a few moments she’d have been able to feel her in a way she’d never felt her before, in a way she’d been longing for. “Unfortunately, it made most of my people deathly terrified of me. Save the two Sunstriders, their advisors and my family, most of the High Elven society greatly shunned and feared me in day-to-day life.” “Why?” “Well, I didn’t absolve them of their sins, right? I ate them. And, according to our beliefs, as a result, I carry their sins on my shoulders. No one called upon me for weddings- Only funerals. It was a lonely life, but, well, I was always a shy person,”

As Sorrel spoke, Maiev took in every curve of her body, the way her her face crinkled as she smiled while talking to her, the way she had smile lines, small crows feet, the bags under her eyes finally beginning to ease after so long of being stressed and worried, the- “Y’know. Growing up looking so different compared to my peers. It’s a bit tragic, but this isn’t about that.” “I want to hear about it.” “Sure, but after I- Wait. Really?” Sorrel tilted her head, blinking several times and looking up at the watcher like a confused dog, head tilt and all. She perked up a fair bit. “Really?” She repeated. “Of course. Just- Finish talking about sin-eating first.” “Oh, right. So, uh, I only really got called out for funerals. I made sure they were beautifully taken care of- See, I used to have this garden I tended to. Before eating the sins of someone, I’d give them a flower from it.” “What flowers did you grow?” “Oh, jeez, let me.. Think for a second.” As she scrunched her face up to think, Maiev could feel a certain swelling in her heart, one that made her put her hand over her armored chest. It drew Sorrel out of her thoughts. “Are you alright?” “Yes- Just. Continue?” Sorrel watched the warden’s movements carefully for several seconds, and determined she was probably just emotional after everything. Again, trying not to assume anything.

“Well, I grew five types in all sorts of different colors. Lilies, carnations, gladioli, roses and dahlias. It was up to the family to choose a color, but if they didn’t want to, I’d ask the youngest involved to pick their favorite color. I’d also give any kids a flower to try and, y’know, make it not as.. Awful for them.” Maiev nodded, hung up on every word she spoke, every syllable. She was relieved to see Sorrel so comfortable talking to her and just relaxing around her. It made her feel better about everything. It made her feel better about herself.

“So, I’d take them a flower, have them hold it, and eat their sins, offer my condolences to the family, then go home. When I went to train my magic prowess at Dalaran, I took a break from being a Sin-Eater, but those who knew me, they kept their distance. I was okay, though. I had Kael, and I was happy, even if it was well before we were seeing each other.” Sorrel laid down, looking at the warden like she was a shooting star, gorgeous and with a power she would never fully understand. “Your armor is gorgeous, by the way. I’m not sure if I ever said that.” “..Yeah?” Maiev replied, contemplating if she should take it off and be more casual with her friend or not. “Yeah. It’s..” Sorrel looked for the words before settling on a simple, gentler comparison. “Whenever I see your armor in particular, it makes me feel safe. It makes me feel like I can retreat into something and be protected.”

Elune stop her beating heart. Maiev’s face was red under her helmet. She felt hot- Properly hot- And wasn’t sure what to do. She wanted to cool off, but she didn’t want to- “Oh, right, you wanted to hear about my tragic loneliness, right?” “That’s correct.” “Oh, Maiev, you don’t need to be so formal all the time. To me you’re not a warden. You’re a good friend. Especially right now.” She pat Maiev’s leg and Maiev begged Elune to make Sorrel keep her hand there, begged her to- She withdrew it and laid on her side by the watcher. “So.. It’s not really as sad as I make it out to be. Don’t get me wrong, kids are awful, and I stuck out like a sore thumb, so it was especially awful..”

Sorrel and Maiev (mostly Sorrel) talked on and on, well until the moon had risen into the sky, peeking in through the window in Maiev’s quarters. Sorrel watched the moon, now settling into a calm silence with the warden. “Miss Shadowsong?” Sorrel asked. “Priestess?” Maiev replied, taking note of how especially gorgeous Sorrel looked in the moonlight. She looked beautiful in the sunlight, yes, but in the moon she looked like an angel- A proper angel. Her hair reflecting light like a halo, her eyes being moondrops themselves.. “Would you want to come to my room tonight?” She hesitantly put her hand on Maiev’s. “..Spend the night with me?”

Maiev’s mouth went dry. She sat in silence for several seconds, studying Sorrel’s face to see if it was a joke, a lie, a way to humiliate her as she had been before by cruel women and men in her life, but she detected no such thing in Sorrel’s expression, in her words. “Are you sure?” Maiev answered, her voice soft, quiet, filled to the brim with fear of an answer she would not like. “I’m positive. I’d love to share a bed with you, Maiev.”

Thank you for reading this far! Sin eating is a real thing btw it's very cool.

[avaguedoodle]

So, I'm staring down actually finishing what has for so long felt like a sisyphean task. So, we're gonna Post about it here!

It's gotten a bit out of hand since the original tags. But if you're looking for a full scale rewrite of the entirety of VLD with a lot of found family-ing, Adashi being a hot mess, and an unnecessary amount of world building boy have I got the fic for you!11

Who You Travel With (300805 words) by avagueidea Chapters: 50/52 Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Adam/Shiro (Voltron), Keith/Lance (Voltron) Characters: Keith (Voltron), Lance (Voltron), Pidge | Katie Holt, Hunk (Voltron), Shiro (Voltron), Matt Holt, Adam (Voltron), Allura (Voltron), Canon Allura - Character, Lotor (Voltron), Krolia (Voltron), Spattering of both Earth and Alien OCs

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Road Trip, Found Family, Kerberos Mission comes home safe AU, Slowburn AF (I'd say I'm sorry but y'all know I'm not), Paladin Shuffle, Keith isn't expelled AU (though he's trying his best to change that), Road Trip AU!, Part 1: Road Trip, Part 2: Space, Part 3: ???, Alternate Universe Canon Compliant, YES I am rewriting the entirety of Voltron (No I didn't think that fact through) Summary: With the Kerberos Mission arriving home soon, Keith realizes this is his last chance to do something reckless. That's how Keith, Pidge, Hunk, and Lance find themselves stuffed into an ancient, tiny sedan, driving thousands of miles to solve an 18 year old mystery before Common sense (or Shiro) can catch up to them. Little do they know, the answers they find will take them much further from home than any of them were expecting.

Despite being Keith's common sense, Shiro shows he has none as he, Matt, and his ex-fiance end up chasing after the runaways before anyone gets arrested, or worse, expelled!

A story about found family and finding out what's really most important via road trips and ancient intergalactic space wars.

[vriskacircus]

vriska for vriskasweep! also jade and/or terezi if you want to ^_^!!

(I'm bad at remembering exact lines so for 6 ill give you a moment instead)

VRISKA MY GIRL #vriskasweepisrealinourhearts

1: vriska serket is the bisexual murdergirl ever. maybe not the one we need but definitely the one we deserve

2: vrisrezi is the only option. nothing else exists they are everything. they are the blueprint. if girls arent killing each other are they even really in love

3: vriska and egbert. i think their earlier interactions are very sweet and in my soul i think that they should become friends again. also vriska and arquiusprite? she loves that fucker and its hilarious

4: vristav. i love my girl but thats a hard Nope.

5: i think her ears are asymmetrical and it makes her glasses really uncomfortable to wear. also she makes weird noises all the time and it freaks egbert specifically out. everyone else got used to it

6: Vriska vs. (Vriska) is so good to me. recognition of the self (derogatory)

7: i too need to be the center of everything ever or die. also me 🤝 vriska: relating to people really weirdly. i dont know whats wrong with us but it is the same thing

8: everything about how she treats tavros. her other crimes are girlbossing but that shits not cool bestie

9: cinnamon roll, obviously. the Most problematic fave

jade

1: aspec of some kind but idk the specifics and i dont think she does either

2: im a davejade fan sorry do u still love me /lh karkat can come over on thursdays or smth

3: jade and feferi! they should have gotten to talk more i love the weirdgirls (my class is also witch and i believe in witch solidarity)

4: i dont really have one other than like. actually gross and illegal shit but that goes for every character

5: i think she'd be a fantastic singer. get that girl a karaoke machine! dont make bacon within a 50 mile radius she will teleport to you and eat it out of the pan

6: [S]: Cascade is the coolest thing anyone has ever done.

7: she is so so lonely. and a doggirl but in the tragic way.

8: jade has never done anything embarrassing in her life she is the coolest

9: CINNAMON ROLL! THE CINNAMON ROLL...

terepy pipes

1: she is also bisexual i dont make the rules

2: see vriska

3: dave motherfucking strider. on a less canon interactions note i think it should become friends with jane. detective and blind justice? girlboy who makes food and girlthing who loves to taste? theyre made to be besties

4: gamrezi. i also dont like terezi/egbert much but thats more me just not getting the appeal than a visceral negative reaction

5: she/it pronouns and also hoards neos but ive spent too long on this post already so just imagine any set of neopronouns and she probably uses it. she likes to tell everyone she's the pronoun dragon. of course you have teal blood and pronouns.

6: ok i Do have a quote for it. "TH3 PROS3CUT1ON S33S NO CO1N. SH3'S BL1ND, R3M3MB3R?!" she's a little fucked up tbh

7: ok this one was weirdly hard. we both have huge stuffed animal collections though

8: it thinks it looks so fucking cool drawing its own chalk outline to die in. and she's not wrong, but she is Such a fucking nerd.

9: problematic fave but i support womens wrongs

[ahundredlifetime]

Thoughts lately about Elvis

When I think about Elvis - all the time basically - it's not uncommon for me to feel sad at the end. I feel sorry his life ends the way it ended, I feel sorry he only had a short time on this earth, I feel sorry that he was trapped by his obligations, overworked, and I feel sad that now I know how lonely he was.

I'm sure I'm not the only one feeling this way.

I kept thinking what could've been, should've been. I asked myself, where did it all go wrong? But I can't turn back the time, so instead of making myself depressed thinking about it, I made peace with the reality.

When I read books or watch movies about him, the summary that I get is he didn't have much control in his life and career choices. It's all taken care of by the Colonel. This is the part that makes me sad the most. It might be true to some extent, but after some thoughts, I don't think the Colonel could control that much of Elvis' life, if Elvis himself didn't give permission to it.

These sources do give us facts, historically, of what happened in Elvis's real life in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. But what they didn't explicitly tell us - doesn't mean they should be - is how it would actually feel to be in his position.

Elvis saw Colonel as his business partner. You might not like the Colonel - well I don't - but he brought the money in, millions of it. I think the "declines" in the later years of his life is a "side-effect" that both of them weren't anticipated - overworked, depressed, and his health condition got worsen.

We need to put in context how bad the working conditions was for artists in the those years. Singers became actors in Hollywood was the norm, multiple performances in Las Vegas hotels wasn't uncommon. Even though Elvis's Las Vegas schedule was insane compared to other artists, it was less insane back then. You know what I mean? I think the point what I want to make is, if you are in his shoes, back in the day, all of his life and career choices did make sense.

Like Elvis once sang "Walk a mile in my shoes~".

I don't know why I'm writing this post, I think because I'm upset reading reports about him - especially from the past - that makes Elvis looked like he's "not that bright". I guess people from our era have more respects for him (because he's gone, but his tragedy outshines his music and movie career) than the people from his days who made fun of him and criticise him a lot.

I think people should've gave him more credit for maintaining his long 22 years career in entertainment industry, because he was a mastermind in his own right.

After looking from this point of view, I feel less sad, to be honest. Knowing he did it his way. He might had some regrets, but I bet it'd be a few ("my way" reference)

To prove my points:

Since early in his career, he has already read critics to know what people didn't like about him, so he would know what to improve.

and this

Elvis and Bill Belew collaborated to make his iconic jumpsuits come to live.

and many more other references that says Elvis knew what his fans like, what makes girls crazy about him, and he has done some experiments in his tours to see which songs to get the audience excited.

I think that's all for my rant tonight.

[basil-touche]

27, 61, and 57 for the unusual asks!!

27. Do you have a job? What do you do?

I work in a discount shop as a part-time supervisor. Been doing it for about 4 years now (although covid meant I was in and out of isolation for my own safety for about a year so it doesn't quite feel that long). It's pretty decent in regards to it being a retail environment. It's part of a chain but it's in a garden centre a little way out of my hometown and I think that's what makes it better than my last job (which was not great to put it mildly). It just feels a bit more laid back than being on a high street and a lot of the routine maintence is on the GC itself to sort out, so there's less to worry about on that front.

The shop sells a range of items, kids toys & books, books for adults, craft, stationery etc. I also get 25% off most stock as well (sometimes they do 50% off events for staff which is super useful when it comes to present buying or stocking up on art supplies) and I bought a lot of the supplies for craft projects I post on here from work.

It's not a job I want to do forever. Now that I've recovered from my teenage years (those few years were fucking awful) I'm learning to drive (just bought my first car today!) and once I've passed I'm thinking of going back to college. Thinking about what I actually want to do in this life. I'm really into reading atm and have the urge to write as well as recently getting back into art. So history, english and art seem like possible paths to take, but there's no rushing these things.

57. Do you take shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels? 

As a kid I used to get really annoyed with my Mum when she would take shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels we would stay at. I thought she was stealing them. Wasn't until I was older that I learned that hotel staff will just throw away all the bottles, regardless whether or not they had been used. I think it's kinda a legal requirement to keep things sanitary? Kinda like how in resturants, you get given a knife & fork for your meal, they still wash your knife even if you never touched it. Better to be safe than sorry (or sued, I suppose).

So to actually answer the question, yes I do now. It's rather useful to have them for the next time I'm on holiday. And I'd rather not cause unnecessary waste.

61. Have you ever peed in the woods? 

A couple of times, yes. Moreso as a kid. Surprising, when I go on my longer walks in the summer, sometimes travelling 10 miles in a day, I never feel the need to relieve myself. I guess because my body is using all my energy during the hike. I can't actually remember the last time I peed in the woods (and quite honestly, I prefer to use an actual toliet if I can help it).

[jawsofbalmung]

As forewarned promised, my extremely biased culprit/killer ratings based on nothing but physical attractiveness. Disclaimer: I am gay. Also my idea of who is considered a "true culprit" may be a bit weird so bear with me. Spoilers for all ten games!

Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney:

1. Frank Sahwit: 0/10. You are nothing. His case lasts 5 minutes and he is ugly. I am not any more endeared seeing him in aai2.

2. Redd White: 2/10. Only gets a 2 because a friend told me about him a long time ago and I thought he was more of a major character and that he would become a blorbo. I was wrong, but I feel kinda bad for being wrong.

3. Dee Vasquez: 4/10. Woman, but pretty cool. Has the mafia on her side, so that's a plus.

4. Yogi Yanni: -10/10. Gross old man.

5. Manfred von Karma: -50000/10. Fuck you die.

6. Jake Marshall: 5/10. Cowboy if you're into that, but I'm personally not that much.

7. Damon Gant: -1/10. Not as bad of an old man as you could've been.

Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney 2: Justice for All:

1. Richard Wellington: 6.5/10. Pretty boy. Cool ringtone. Could be hotter.

2. Mimi Miney: 4/10. Woman. Not very memorable, but cute anyway.

3. Morgan Fey: 1/10. Old woman.

4. Acro: 6.5/10. Would like him better with his hair down, but he's literally the only aa character in a wheelchair and I like him.

5. Matt Engarde: 8/10. FINALLY a hot villain. Very, very cute before he goes evil, but gets worse when he drops his facade I think tbh.

6. Shelley DeKiller: 2/10. Again could be a worse old man, and I saw cool fanart of him once.

Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney 3: Trials and Tribulations

1. Dahlia Hawthorne: 6/10. Woman, but I love her. If you're into high femmes, that's the one for you.

2. Luke Atmey: 2/10. Looks like Spamton Deltarune.

3. Ron Delite: 7/10. Adorable twink.

4. Fiero Tigre: 4/10. Smh the original is always better than the bootleg.

5. Viola Cadaverini: 4/10. Woman. Really skinny. Not much to say.

6. Godot: 9/10. You KNOW my mans is getting a high score <3

Apollo Justice Ace Attorney:

1. Kristoph Gavin: 9273897/10 AAAAAAA

2. Alita Tiala: 4/10. Another high femme woman.

3. Daryan Crescend: 4/10. Could be hotter if his hair wasn't Like That.

4. Valant Gramarye: 3/10. Could be a hotter old man.

Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth:

1. Jacques Portsman: 3/10. Major Eh vibes from this guy.

2. Cammy Meele: 4/10. Another kinda cute but not that memorable woman.

3. Lance Amano: 5/10. Femme. Not much else to say. I like his hair.

4. Ernest Amano: 0/10. Yeah. Old man.

5. Callisto Yew: 5/10. Another high femme woman, I think her sprites are cute tho.

6. Quercus Alba: -10/10. Gross old man.

Ace Attorney Investigations 2: Prosecutor's Path:

1. Horace Knightley: -100/10. Nasty.

2. Patricia Roland: 3.5/10. Woman. Her fox is the best part of her.

3. Dane Gustavia: 5.5/10. Really cool design but not my type. His song is sick tho.

4. Blaise Debeste: -10000/10. Nasty gross man with a terrible beard. Nasty.

5. Simon Keyes: 8.5/10. LOVE him. I am not immune to a sexy clown. Sorta awkward but cute before, but letting his hair down really did it for me.

Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies:

1. Ted Tonate: -1/10. Gross.

2. Florent L'Belle: 2/10. Ehhh.

3. Aristotle Means: -50/10. He scares me.

4. Bobby Fullbright: 3/10. I want him to be hot so bad. I call him Midbright.

5. Aura Blackquill: 6/10. I like her!! Her hair is stupid tho.

6. Marlon Rimes: 2.5/10. Extremely grossly skinny pre-transformation, weirdly buff post-transformation.

The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures:

1. Jezaille Brett/Asa Shinn: 4/10. I love her swan hat.

2. Magnus McGuilded: -500/10. He makes me SO uncomfortable to look at.

3. Ashley Greydon: 8/10. I like him. Weirdo twink. <3

Ace Attorney: Spirit of Justice:

1. Pees'lubn Andistan'dhin: 2/10. He looks like my stepdad. No thanks.

2. Roger Retinz: 3/10. Robert Downey Jr. That's all I have to say.

3. Tahrust Inmee: 2/10. Sorry not into the skinny bald thing going on. He's a good man tho.

4. Beh'leeb Inmee: 4/10. Plain, but not bad woman.

5. Geiru Toneido: 5/10. The big one. Personally I do not have a bad case of clussy fever, but her design is cute! She reminds me of Pinkie Pie.

6. Ga'ran Sigatar Khura'in: 3/10. Her evil design unnerves me. She's overall just pretty mid of a villain.

7. Pierce Nichody: 9.5/10. Bro.... When he brings out the mask and the scalpel I can't handle it.... I was hoping he would be a villain from the beginning because I knew it would be hot if he was....

The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve:

1. Raiten Menimemo: 7/10. Kind of a twunk. Reblog.

2. William Shamspeare: 2/10. I appreciate the commitment but not for me thanks.

3. Olive Green: 4/10. Woman, but she's cute!

4. Enoch Drebber: 8/10. Auughh.

5. Courtney Sithe: 8/10. Hottest woman. Almost converted me.

6. Seishiro Jigoku: 5.5/10. Could be hotter if he didn't look like hipster Rasputin.

7. Mael Stronghart: 9/10. How did this happen to me. I did not like him before but now I do. What happened.

[medicinemane]

I don't know what you are going through, or how hard you are fighting mentally, but maybe you should seek help rather than posting your impending suicide. Maybe, get off this website, or rather off the Internet in general. You are only making things worse for yourself, by continuing to be here. Seek help. You're saying it might not be a loss, but has anyone actually reached out to you before me? Get help. I'll be praying for you.

Man, I know you're trying to help, but I gotta say this is like the least helpful thing you can say

You know, I'm a big believer in therapy. You know why I'm not in it currently? Cause it's 50 miles to the nearest therapist. Finding someone that does remote appointments that medicaid covers is on my list of things to do, but it's not done yet

You know what I've been doing lately? Trying to get stuff fixed up around my house, improve my situation... much as I may feel awful I try not to stand still cause that's the only way I can change stuff

I'm not meaning to lay into you, but you have no idea how often I hear stuff like this and how much it doesn't help

Like just step back and look at with with me please. I am so isolated that I didn't even feel lockdowns at all, that was just another day for me. You're suggesting that I cut back on tumblr, which is 100% of where I get any socialization at all, when it's not like tumblr's making me miserable, things like isolation and money and the state of things that I'm trying to work on are what's making me miserable

You mean well, but you're making things worse

You know nothing about my situation, you know nothing about why I'm doing how I'm doing or what I'm trying to do about it, and you're trying to tell me to get help... you gonna help me get it? I'd love some, you got an option that doesn't involve 2 hours of travel time plus a tank of gas?

I'm telling you this cause you care, and I'm telling you that you're gonna go to help someone you really care about some day, and if this is the approach you take you're just gonna make things worse

I'm an open book, you can honestly get anything you want out of me. I can tell you most of why I feel like I feel... and listen, that's not your job, I know you've probably got a whole lot on your own plate and you're just trying to help someone you're seeing in passing... but that's not what you're doing

So I really don't mean to sound mean, but you just have no idea how many times I've gotten more or less this exact ask

Feel free to stop by and talk more, hell, if you want to talk about things going on in your life I'd be happy to listen... but this right here is exactly why I have a personal policy of never offering advice unless I'm willing to step in and help see it executed... exactly cause of stuff like this

Also bonus question, what impending suicide?

I've had my belt sitting next to my door and tested it multiple times over the past few months, and like... that's not a good sign, but the fact I've never made any kind of attempt says I'm unlikely to in the near future. Start worrying when I get my hands on a gun, but till then you let me worry about this and if it bothers check in with why I want to blow my brains out

The irony is that being here is one of the few things that's actually making me better. Other than having to see the occasional dumb take from a mutual (and god, news alone'll do way worse), people here are the closet I have to any kind of support system

So I invite you to talk with me more, I invite you to ask any question you want, I'm not mad, just so damn tired of getting stuff like this when... at what point will I be able to just exist in a space while being honest about how I'm feeling? Do I have to totally fix all my mental health solo before I'm worthy of getting any help, or at least some space to be left alone

Sorry for the long reply, but there's just a lot I have to say on this

Hope you have a nice day, stop by if you ever need anything

[copias-thrall]

Cause I'm Young and I'm Here and So Beautiful

A look into the rise and fall of Mary Goore's flash-in-the-pan modeling career.

~12.5K Mary Goore/Reader *drug/alcohol use; mentions of past child abuse; brief homelessness; plot no porn; POV shift*

This fic was inspired by and is very loosely based on Aurelio Voltaire's early days in NYC in the 90s, though I have set it in Boston in the early aughts. 😊

Many thanks to the artists who did commissions for this! 🥰

One Way Streets

Mary stepped off the regional rail and gripped his backpack. He had $72.57 in cash rolled into his socks and a give-em-hell attitude.

When he’d packed his bag the night before, he wasn’t even sure if he’d go through with it, but he couldn’t stand being home anymore. Some of his friends had told him he was crazy.

"Three more months, dude. You got this. Just finish high school, then bounce."

But they didn’t have to live with his dad and the step-monster. Every day was a new indignity. Having them bitch about his music and his style was one thing—that he could have dealt with—but everything else had just kind of…escalated.

Now that the kiddies were older, they’d turned into gremlins. They’d somehow sensed that Mary wasn’t their beloved older brother—he was some sort of half other. They’d stopped questioning why "mom was so mean" to him and had accepted that she was because there was something wrong with Mary. They realized they could be little shits and blame everything on him.

And dad just didn’t care. He’d throw up his hands and say, "I have to live with her"—as if Mary wasn’t in the same boat.

Dad hadn’t stopped her when—in a rage—she’d smashed every single vinyl album Mary had owned because the twins ruined her nice tablecloth. He’d shrugged when she cut all Mary's guitar strings so he couldn’t play "the devil’s music." He’d held Mary back when she took a match and burned all his secret stuff that Mary kept under his bed—action figures, books, guitar mags, journals—in the backyard because he got detention for smoking. He hadn’t said a word when the police showed up after she came at Mary with scissors because he’d dyed his hair black and he’d pushed her away before she could scalp him.

Mary thought for sure he was going to get carted off to jail as she screamed about him terrorizing the family and being afraid he was going to kill her sons in their sleep, but the officers had just looked at her bored and told her being a teenager wasn’t a crime.

So, no: Mary couldn’t wait 3 more months.

He’d scraped together what money he had left from his secret shifts working as a busboy under the table at a local dive downtown, packed his backpack with the essentials, and walked the 5 miles to the train station instead of going to school.

Eighteen was 10 weeks away. He could fudge it for a few months, especially since he could already get away without using his fake ID to get into shows most of the time.

So, to the big city it was.

He shifted his weight and tried to pretend that he belonged here in Boston, but actually facing the busy streets was a lot different from looking at a bird’s-eye view map. He had a printout in his pocket, but he didn’t want to look like a doe-eyed tourist. So he set off down the seemingly labyrinthine streets in the direction he could have sworn was the correct one.

It wasn't.

When he came out a side alley into Faneuil Hall, he almost wondered if he'd gone through a fairy portal, since he was clear on the other side of town. Begrudgingly, he checked his creased map, and set out once more.

And ended up spit out by the State building.

Finding the hostel turned into a fraught adventure, and he got turned around several times more. When he tried to ask for directions, most people pushed past him while one lady shoved $5 at him. He used the cash to buy a hotdog, and it was the vendor who ultimately gave him directions in his thick, Southie accent.

Of course, making it to the hostel ended up being just part one. The rates were almost double what it stated online ("Sorry, honey—that site hasn’t been upgraded since the 90s."), and two nights were practically all his savings. Mary had thought he’d at least have a couple of days to find a job, not 36hrs.

He left the hostel, wondering for the first time if maybe he shouldn’t go back home…but he decided it was a nice day out. Surely there was some place he could hunker down. Just for the night.

What he hadn’t anticipated was the cops at every fucking turn telling him to move along. And any place out of line-of-sight seemed to already be inhabited.

He finally found a place behind some rocks in the Seaport where he didn’t think he’d be murdered in his sleep, curled around his backpack, and drifted off into a fitful sleep.

Mary woke up damp from the dew and the morning sun streaming into his eyes. The birds were creating an awful racket, but Mary guessed it was as good an alarm clock as any.

He ran his fingers through his bird's nest of hair, and he made his way back to the South Station. The men’s room may have smelled like a sewage treatment plant, but at least it was free. He had expected it to be mostly empty at the crack of dawn, but it was full of commuters making that last run to the head before they had to take the train 2hrs out of the city for work.

And it was a sight: a bunch of suits with their fancy lattes washing their hands, and Mary in the corner trying to surreptitiously wipe down with paper towels under his Misfits t-shirt and his shredded jeans. At school, he’d have probably gotten into several altercations by now—no one would have let him just turn into Mary Goore without a fight—but this was Boston, and no one gave him more than a cursory glance.

Just another college kid.

It emboldened Mary to go full-out in the kind of way he had only done when going out to the punk shows downtown at night: kohl all the way around his eyes, and some on his cheekbones; mascara because his lashes are long and thick, and he knows it (his dad had said it made him look hard, and Mary had sneered that maybe that was what he’d been going for. But maybe it had been because he’d liked the way it had made his green eyes pop.); a smear of the step-monster’s fanciest matte lipstick on his full lips; and airplane glue in his hair to give it that lift.

He made a kissy face at himself in the mirror, and headed back out.

It was a nice Spring day—almost boiling in the direct sun—and it tempted Mary to wear only his battle vest, but even he kind of figured applying to jobs half dressed was a mistake.

He walked all over the city, trying not to get lost, looking for any kind of work—dishwasher, busboy, barback—but all he had to show for it was blistered feet and a raging appetite. The only good part of the day was that he noted any restaurant or bakery that looked like it might toss perfectly good food at the end of the day.

He and his friends had become experts at dumpster diving in his podunk town, and he felt confident that he had a good feel for a jackpot. Mary staked out a bakery and was rewarded with a find of "old" bagels. He shoved as many as he could into the nooks and crannies of his backpack before slinking off to the Commons to inhale at least two of them.

Cold, stale dough never tasted so good.

He watched the tourists and the professionals walk by in ones and in groups while he ran his bare feet through the grass. Some laughed with each other as they sauntered down the path while others seemed singularly intent on their ultimate destination. A pack of dogs ran and played with each other as their owners looked on fondly, and nearby the baseball diamond hosted a casual game.

Mary counted his lucky stars that his first week in Boston was April at its kindest—always mild during the day, even when it turned cloudy, and a few times even downright warm. The nights turned chilly, though, and it had Mary in more layers than an onion. If the birds or damp didn't wake him, his butt cramps from being curled in a tight ball all night did.

He spent those days walking around the city proper looking for work. He wasn't adventurous enough to make the leap across the bridges to Cambridge just yet, but his travels gave him a good sense on how the different sections of Boston connected—and showed him potential places to crash at night. He didn't even mind living off day-old garbage food and drinking from bubblers (he'd bought a water for the express purpose of reusing the bottle), but the barren wasteland that seemed to be the job market was beginning to weigh on him.

At home, he could always find a shit job if he was willing to put up with shit hours and ridiculous requests. Here, though, Mary was just one of many desperate people willing to do desperate work.

And he didn’t look particularly trustworthy or reliable.

@dipendancesld

Hashtag WTF

I’m scrolling through Insta on the T, and I’m way down the rabbit hole of hashtags. New content was at a minimum this morning (how can I follow accounts in triple digits and only see the same 4 posts?!), so I’d started with some art tags and ended up where I usually end up—trolling social media for blurry pictures of my boy.

His band has been a local staple for years—or at least that’s what he told me on our first date. I had just moved from New York after a nasty breakup, ready to start fresh, and I’d seen him at a coffee shop hanging posters for his next show in his leather jacket, asymmetrical Metallica crop top, and stomping boots.

Fresh had never looked so good.

Then, a few months back, an online publication had featured his band in the year’s 50 best bands "you’ve never heard of," and now the band's starting to gain traction.

He’s starting to gain traction.

Finding the new online content of him first has become a game the two of us play. We had to stop counting images posted from the popular fan accounts because Mary's now acquaintances with most of them, and I said it was hardly fair to snipe me that way. Mary had pouted—but it was to cover up his grin. So now we troll for the pictures of his latest gig or at his favorite haunts from either his  casual fans or one of his new ones. I even have a whole range of hashtag typos saved if I really want to triumph, since Mary just doesn't have the attention span.

I usually win, though, by virtue of not keeping Rockstar Hours—and because Mary doesn’t have a smartphone. Mary delights in spending the wee hours while I'm sleeping finding new content, and I'll often wake to one he's pulled up on my laptop and a "suck it" sticky note stuck to my monitor.

(But I’m reigning supreme.)

There’s a thirst tag I sometimes comb through (for reasons), and today I’m desperate for that morning serotonin to keep me from dozing off, which is why I stumble across a particularly convincing cosplayer in some…risqué poses and outfits.

The dude is really good, and I have to admit he really does have Mary’s mannerisms down pat. He’s younger and a little skinnier than Mary is now, but his facial expressions are on point. I zoom in to see the contouring technique because he's using one of those filters to make it look old…and that’s when I sense something off. I can’t quite place my finger on it, but usually there’s an uncanny valley to his serious cosplayers, and this dude looks so real. He’s even 100% accurate with the mole placement, which is something I never see.

My heart does a flip-flop.

Is that…actually Mary?

Foundling

Mary's sixth night in the city, it rained. It was more of a brief Spring shower, but it was still enough to soak him and his backpack through. He shivered through the early morning hours until the sun came up, then he made his way to the Commons to lay his belongings—and himself—out into the sun to dry.

By midday, he had a slight sunburn across his nose, but most of his things were dryish—though the food was a soggy lost cause. He cut his losses and decided to buy a sausage from the hotdog vendor, even if that meant he was down to $52.37 in his sock bank.

It was the most amazing thing he'd ever eaten in his entire life (sometimes he still dreams of it), and he gobbled it down as he sat in the grass and watched the show of people pass by.

He could take today off from his job search.

Just another Groundhog Day of rejections.

A gaggle of kids about his age walked past, and he lit up when he saw them: studs and bright hair and cuffs and combat boots. They ran and shrieked and shoved at each other, and Mary had never felt such longing to be a part of something.

Not that nebulous feeling of "my world is out there somewhere," but "my world is right there if I can just get to it."

And he realized maybe he could.

These were his people.

Mary hopped off the bench and approached the boisterous group.

"Uh, hey…guys."

The pack stopped and looked him over, confused but not hostile.

"Oh hey, man" said a girl with green fins and a studded, leather jacket.

"Hey."

I have nowhere to go. Can I go with you?

"Sorry, I forgot your name."

"Oh, you don’t—"

A guy in a tight striped shirt, snake bites, and blue hair interrupted him.

"Shit, were you in my intro into film class last year?"

Mary was a high school dropout.

"Nah, dude. I’m new and shit."

…But he wasn’t stupid.

A curvy white goth with bleached blonde hair and a cream princess dress smiled at him.

"Aww, that’s rough, honey. If you think about it, they really ought to give transfers on-campus housing. It sucks to be so new and away from the action."

Mary nodded. "Yeah. Sucks."

"Well, we’re going to The Pit, wanna come?"

"If you guys don’t mind…"

"Fuck, the more the merrier!"

Mary smiled as they assimilated him into the group. He found out the goth’s name was Vanessa ("But call me Vanity."), green fins was Alexa ("Or Alex. I’m trying it out."), striped shirt was Billy, and the two other punks were Mandi (Manic Panic red) and Aaron (band tee, spiked collar).

No one laughed at him when he introduced himself as Mary or asked him why he had a girl’s name.

They took him onto the T at Charles MGH, and Mary marveled at the setting sun over the Charles River before the train ducked underground to barrel in Cambridge. At Harvard, they ushered him off the train and directly into The Pit, and Mary almost cried when he saw the pit rats there playing hacky sack, strumming guitars, and smoking cloves. Mary watched as his group high-fived, bumped chests, and hugged nearly everyone there before introducing him as if they’d known him for years.

He was shit at hacky sack, but he accepted a round on the guitar and shared a clove with a white girl who had a rat's nest of hair.

"Fuck their beauty stands," she said when she caught Mary staring.

Mary smiled and pointed to his own mess of hair. "Fuck ‘em," he repeated.

She cackled and handed him a brown bag with what he expected to be whiskey, but tasted like turpentine.

She laughed harder at his face as he coughed, and she pounded him on the back.

"Moonshine, dude. Lenny makes it in his bathtub."

"Which one is Lenny," Mary asked as he wiped off his mouth with the back of his hand.

"Oh, he’s not here. He goes to MIT. We have a strict trade agreement—booze for pot. I’m Katie."

Head fuzzy, Mary had made out with her until Aaron tugged on his arm.

"Shit dude, we gotta go before the T closes. You live close to here?"

"Uh…"

"Aww, I think he got into Lenny’s moonshine," said Vanity. "If he’s a transfer, I bet he’s at some shithole in Allston. You in Allston, honey?"

Mary just nodded.

"All right then," said Alex, taking charge. "We’ll put him up tonight. There’s no way he’s gonna make it back to Allston by himself, and I’ll be fucked if I’m trekking out there without a BU party to crash."

Mary wobbled slightly as Alex took his arm in his and led him to the T.

"Ok, we gotta go now or we’ll all be hoofing it."

They took Mary back to their dorm by the Hatch Shell and signed him in as a guest.

"Is this ok?" Mary asked warily—he didn't want to get kicked out in the middle of the night.

Mandi patted him on the back.

"We do it all time. No one really gives a shit. Vegan Mick dropped out 2 semesters ago and they don’t even check for his ID."

That night, Mary slept in the common room on a lumpy couch that was half as long as he was.

It was heaven.

The next morning seemed like the end, and Mary slumped as Vanity to sign him out. For one brief day he'd been a part of something, and now it was back to Mary, party of one. But Vanity took one look at his face and asked if he wanted to get breakfast at the dining hall.

Of course, he wanted to…but he thought of the dwindling cash in sock bank and hesitated. Vanity, bless her, misread his trepidation.

"It's on me, sweetie. I know most transfers don’t opt in. Too expensive when it’s not bundled. No worries, I got a ton of points I don’t use."

Alex and Aaron were already half done with their food when Vanity and he joined them, and they looked on in amusement as Mary ate half the breakfast buffet.

When the subject of classes came up, he shrugged off questions.

"None this morning."

Alex narrowed her eyes at him.

"What year did you say you were?"

"Sophomore."

"Not a freshman?"

Mary shook his head. "I’m not a freshman."

She seemed about to ask another question, so Mary quickly changed the subject.

"I thought I’d spend the day applying for jobs. You guys know of any place that’s hiring?"

"No work study?"

"No."

"What kind of work you looking for?"

"Shit, anything. I’ll sweep the fucking floors."

They bandied about ideas, places for Mary to try, but no one had any leads. Too soon, some unknown gong had them scurrying to get to class.

Mary suddenly panicked.

"Hey, do you guys mind if I spend the night again? I mean…"

"Yeah, sure," said Vanity. "Aaron?"

"Yeah, man. Meet me after class and I'll swipe you in."

It apparently was a time-honored tradition, passed down from upperclassmen to underclassmen, on gaming the guest system. Most kids used it to essentially move their significant others into their dorm rooms, but a handful every year used it to give haven to others who had questionable housing situations.

So, just like that, Mary had a place to rest his bones.

@dilfpassing

A Deeper Look

I’m so intent on scrolling through the comments on the grainy pics—which I'm sure now are actual scans—that I completely miss my stop, and I have to put my phone away so I can wheeze lightly jog my way to where I work as a receptionist at an alternative hair salon.

It’s really important that I start a good hour before we open so I can return any calls left on our voicemail first thing in case I can fit anyone in today. Which means I have to shelve my find for now, much to my irritation.

Mornings are super-busy because apparently there are some people in the world that like getting up with the sun and want everything done by noon. (June Cleaver’s salon lets me get away with a lot—like coming to work in denim short-shorts and ripped tights, free hair colors, and a snarky attitude—but late start times aren’t one of them.) I honestly don’t have room in my brain to obsess about the pictures because I’m too busy answering calls, making coffee, settling accounts, and giving the new customer spiel for the 57th time to a walk-in.

It’s just after midday, when Penny, the shampoo girl, collects my cash for the salon-wide sandwich run, and I finally have a moment to breathe. And obsess.

I take out my phone again, and I have to retrace my steps because of course the app has refreshed, which is why Sonia has the time to look over my shoulder.

"Missing dream boy’s dick so much you gotta spend your lunch hour ogling pics of him on the internet?"

I zoom in on the one of maybe!Mary in his underwear.

"Who does that look like to you?"

Sonia makes a guh sound in her throat and backs away.

"I don’t need to see your intimates!"

"That’s the thing! It’s not mine!"

"Your boy’s nudes get leaked??"

I wave my arms around.

"I don’t freakin’ know! They may not even be him. Fucking. C’mere and help me out!"

Sonia warily creeps back over, and so does Ryan, since all the yelling has attracted him.

The three of us peer over the phone as I scroll through the images again.

By the time Penny comes back with lunch, we’ve gone back and forth on who’s in the images—Mary or a fake—and I haven’t been able to do any actual research. The afternoon rush starts, and I have to table the whole thing again, having made no progress at all.

It isn’t until near-closing, when most of the other stylists have gone home—and it’s only June who does the post-work crowd—that I can really dig into the matter.

A deep dive and a couple of defunct, decade-old forums later, I find that what I took as an aspirational hashtag was actually the name of a zine called "Heroes."

There’s like, zero online trail about it—except for a few other grainy scans of other pages of articles, poetry, concert pictures, and art—but it seemed to be an early aughts missive for local underground culture and color.

It still doesn’t explain why Mary’s in there in various states of undress and poses.

Or why Mary has never said a word about it to me.

Stripped Bare

Mary settled into a sort of routine. He spent most days looking for a job—any job—with his backpack full of food from their dining hall. Most nights he rotated couches on different floors so the RAs didn’t notice that he basically lived there.

He made friends with Vegan Mick for about 5 seconds until Mary had eaten an entire Rotisserie chicken from 7-11 in front of him. Mick had launched into a whole spiel, and Mary had pointed out that Mick's jacket and Docs were made of leather. He’d only meant it as a joke—a callout in answer to a callout, like he'd do with his friends back home—but Vegan Mick had turned purple, then iced Mary out every time he saw him after that.

Oops.

The brief friendship had lasted long enough, however, for Mick to give Mary some tips and tricks of being homeless.

Homeless.

That had been a tough pill to swallow. Until Vegan Mick had put Mary’s situation like that, Mary had just thought of himself between places.

But it was true: he didn’t live anywhere. He skated by on the kindness of his new friends, and he didn’t know how much longer he could keep up the ruse of "transfer student who didn’t like his shithole apartment and was too busy job searching to concentrate on classes."

He still spent a few nights a week finding an out-of-the-way place outside to hunker down in or huddling in with Katie and a few of the other gutter punks under their boxes in the corners of the T stations. He knew they would have been more than happy to make room, anyway, but Mary always emptied his backpack of all the pilfered dining hall food for distribution amongst them.

It honestly wasn't so terrible now that he had friends and a warm place to go on cold or rainy nights, but.

He needed an actual place to live. To afford an actual place to live, he needed a job. To get a job, he needed a place to live.

It seemed like a catch-22, and he began to despair that he’d never get ahead…until Mandi offered him a leg up.

Mary was sitting on the grass in the Commons in the shade, thinking that with summer coming up, maybe he could fudge it until the gang came back in September. There was always Katie and The Pit, and Mary was sure he could chip in somehow.

Mandi sat down next to him.

"I thought that mess of hair was you, Mare."

"Hey, Mandi. What’s kicks?"

"You still looking for a job?"

Mary put his head in his hands and sighed.

"Don’t remind me."

"You over 18?"

Just last week. But Mary hadn’t said, since they thought he was a Sophomore.

"Yeah."

"Wanna be at least 21?"

Mary grinned at her.

"That’s what my fake ID says."

She laughed, a tinkling thing.

"You got anything against strip clubs?"

Mary furrowed his brows at her.

"Uh…what’s the right answer here?"

She shoved him playfully.

"Do you want a job?"

"Yeah?"

"Then say no."

"No. No problems with strip clubs." He squinted at her. "Are they looking for male strippers?"

She laughed again.

"Definitely not." She canted her head at Mary. "I mean, you're very pretty, Mare. I could probably put you on as one of the girls…even with these triple As," she flicked playfully at his nipple, which had him grunting and batting at her, "but I was thinking more behind the scenes."

Mary held up his arm and made a weak muscle.

"I don’t think I’d be much of a bouncer, Mands."

"You said you’d wash dishes, sweep floors and shit, right?"

"Yeah?"

"Well, the club I work at—"

"The club at you what now?"

Mandi gave him a strange look.

"Yeah. The strip club I work at."

Mary’s eyes bugged out.

"As a…waitress?"

"As a stripper, Mary. Duh." At his dumbfounded look she shook her head. "It’s kind of extra credit, as a dance major. I’m going to turn it into my thesis. Plus, I make hella bank."

She swept her arm across the park that made up her college "campus."

"How else do you think I can afford this rock-and-roll lifestyle? Not all of us are here on scholarship or mom and dad’s dime."

She tilted her head at him.

"I thought you’d get it."

When Mary didn't respond, she touched his shoulder.

"Mare. I know you don't go here."

"W-what…? I…"

He looked at her, wide-eyed as the blood drained from his face.

"Hey, it's ok. I'm not gonna tell anybody. Not if you don't want me to."

Mary looked down. "Thanks." He rubbed the back of his neck. "You know that means I've got no address."

Mandi bumped his shoulder and waved his words away.

"A lot of the girls dance. Paddy is used to dorm rooms as addresses. You can use mine."

Mary looked at her, hoping he could convey every ounce of gratitude he was feeling.

She grinned and punched him in the shoulder.

"So, you up for it? Sweeping floors and bussing tables?" She leveled a look at him. "Cleaning up puke?"

Anything.

"Fuck, I’m desperate, Mands. I’ll hold their hair back if it means a paycheck."

"That’s the spirit!"

***

Mary was sure Patrick was part of the mob—or at least in cahoots. The guy had taken one look at Mary’s ID and had said, "But how old are you really?" and Mary had said, "Nineteen."

Patrick had thrown up his hands. "Well, you ain’t gonna be serving alcohol anyway, kid. Your job is to do whatever I tell you. Some asshole breaks a bottle, you clean up the glass so the girls don’t hurt themselves. Some idiot ralphs all over the toilet seat, you scrub the shit out of that fucker. A bachelor party leaves a table a hot mess, you better be out there clearing off the table for the next one, got it?"

Mary had nodded.

"You show up at 5 to help the girls set up the bar. You stay til whenever it takes to close down—but you only get paid 'til 2am—and you get an hour to eat, unpaid. You don’t bother the girls, and," Patrick had leaned in, "you don’t steal from me."

Mary had gulped and nodded emphatically.

Patrick had jabbed a finger at him. "That includes the booze. If I get fucked because some snot-nosed, underage kid is drinking with my good friends Jim and Johnnie, I’m gonna be very put out."

"Got it, sir."

"Don’t call me sir. I’m Paddy to my friends, so you can call me Patrick."

"Yes, Patrick."

Patrick had looked him over.

"You get paid as an independent contractor just like the girls, so you gotta deal with your own taxes, you got that? I’ll start you at $10 an hour."

Mary’s eyes had gone wide. Back home he was lucky to get 5.

"Ten…?"

Patrick had tilted his head again.

"No, you’re right, 12. Do a good job, and I’ll think about raising it to 15."

Mary had to physically stop his jaw from dropping.

"You do weeknights for now so if you fuck up it’s not that much of a problem. If you don’t fuck up and the girls don’t hate you, you can get weekends. Deal?"

Mary had sat up straighter. "Deal." He’d held his hand out, but Patrick had just looked at it until Mary pulled it back into his side.

"Ariel vouched for you, so I’m giving you a shot. Don’t make her regret it."

Mary had shaken his head as Patrick had handed him some forms to fill out.

"Come back at 4 tomorrow with these and we’ll get you started. Now, get out, I got shit to do."

Mary had taken the forms and skedaddled.

Mandi was outside waiting for him, all smiles.

"Did you get it?"

"Yeah, but fuck—your boss is scary."

"Nah, he’s a teddy bear."

***

The job was awful.

The puke was an almost nightly occurrence, and by the end of the first week, little cuts covered Mary’s hands from the broken glass. The customers were loud, rowdy, and acted as if their mother was going to clean up after them.

Mary swore he would never get the beer smell out. It now lived in his soul.

One dude punched Mary and broke his nose for no reason Mary could tell before the bouncers dragged the guy away. The girls gave him some tampons to stop the bleeding, and Mary finished his shift.

Patrick paid Mary in cash at the end of every week with a "It’s your job to report that, not mine," and at the end of the month, Patrick bumped Mary up to $15/hr. He worked 5 days a week because, according to Patrick, "The Lord gave us a day of rest, and you get one day off per week."

Mary never reported a single cent to the IRS.

The girls loved him, and joked that Patrick had gotten them a pet. They showed him winged eyeliner and smokey eyes and how to contour. They guffawed when they watched him try out their shoes like a newborn deer. On slow nights, they tried to show him pole techniques.

He saw the gang less and less because by the time they were getting out of class, he was going into work, and when he was done work, they were crawling into bed. Fortunately, the desk sitters seemed to forget that he wasn’t an on-campus "student" and didn’t even bother signing him in anymore. There were a few sticklers, but Mary found that—while back home he was less than scum—here, he attracted all the right kinds of attention…and a smirk with the right compliment went a long way.

By the time their school year ended, Mary had saved up $1,000 (and he needed to transfer his money out of sock bank and into the ripped lining of his jacket).

Even though they didn't know just how much they'd saved him, Mary showed up on the last day as thanks to help them all move their stuff into family cars or rented trucks. They hugged him goodbye and said to ring them next semester.

Mandi bopped him on the nose and told him to keep his nose clean.

Mary took a sublet in Allston with 2 BU kids and a Berkley grad student. The "room" was a closed-in porch with a sleeping bag left by the last resident—but it was $400 a month until September, utilities included.

At first, Mary didn't know why the gang was so snobby about Allston, but the summer seemed to be one continual party. It didn't matter what day Mary got up, there were always broken beer bottles and stale beer on their front stoop, and the apartment had a designated watering can for washing away the vomit that dripped down from the top porches to their own.

But he took it in stride, and when he wasn’t at the strip club or sleeping, he was partying with the BU kids, or letting the Berkley grad show him better string fingering techniques.

Mary still tried to get out to The Pit with what groceries he could spare, but Katie had moved on with some of the others to do a protest tour with an activist street band that had come through town, and without her or the gang, it made Mary feel lonely.

By the end of the summer, Mary had saved up enough money for first, last, and security. He even had some left over to buy more than ramen and some new clothes. To Mary, it felt like a million dollars. He rented a garden-level apartment in the cheap part of Jamaica Plain for September 1st and spent that entire day with the BU dudes driving around in their rented truck for Allston Christmas’s best furniture finds.

Mary ended up with a mattress that he hoped on a wish and a prayer didn’t have bedbugs, a mismatched set of dishes, plastic drawers that were slightly warped, and a broken futon frame he swore he would fix. Throw in a few sets of slightly used string lights, and Mary’s cave felt downright homey.

When the gang got back, he simply told them he’d dropped out.

"Yeah, I just don’t think college is for me. Music’s my real passion, you know?"

Alex had groaned.

"I knew that Berkley kid was gonna be a bad influence on you."

Mary shrugged.

"My grades were shit anyway. But I’m still around, you know. The strip club’s only a block from campus."

"Because we saw you so much then," deadpanned Billy.

"Hey! Stop piling on Mary," said Vanity. "He’s following his path."

Mary shot her a wide smile.

"Thanks, Vanity."

Patrick finally gave him a little more leeway with his days off, and Mary started taking Saturday night to join the gang in Harvard Square for the shadow cast of Rocky Horror. One of Aaron’s classmates, Amber, was in it, and they all wanted to support her.

Mary felt that something again. That thing that told that this was his place and his people. This eclectic group who got up in front of strangers every week in their underwear for free enthralled Mary.

He and Amber bonded immediately, and Mary began going even without the gang. The cast welcomed him in as an honorary groupie, and Mary's friendship with the gang waned. There was still Mandi to cavort with at the strip club, but now when Mary wasn't there, he was at any one of the Rocky crew's apartments getting high and playing dress up.

"You’ve got such a Look, Mare," sighed Amber. "I’d kill for your cheekbones."

"I’d kill for your tits."

She slapped him playfully. "Don’t be gross."

"No, I’m serious. Someone once put it in my head that I'd be a hot chick."

The girls had giggled and proceeded to dress him up in bras and corsets with cutlets. They added a wig, and the glo-up surprised even Mary.

Still buzzed, they went out for girl’s night and hit up all the bars in Fenway and flirted their way to free shots from the dude bros before batting their falsies at bouncers to let them into the clubs ahead of the line and without the cover.

The cutlets eventually became a nuisance—and soon they were all flapping them about above their heads as they danced—but Mary had loved the feel of the lace and satin corsets against his skin.

When they’d all collapsed in a pile at the end of the night, Mary wondered if they’d tell him where to get some lingerie for himself.

***

By August, Mary was ready to quit the strip club.

He was tired of cut fingers (they were making it hard to play the guitar he’d bought), the drunks, and the sick everywhere. Now that he had a little cushion, he thought maybe he could at least find something with better hours.

Mandi had graduated and was well into a summer internship at Disney in hopes they’d bring her on as a dancer.

Alex had also graduated and moved out to LA to make it as a film editor.

Vanity and Aaron had started dating after finals, and they had moved in together in Cambridgeport for their last year.

Billy had stopped going to classes before dropping out altogether. No one seemed to know what happened, and when they called his home, his mother just said he was unavailable.

There didn’t seem to be much reason to stick around the Grid anymore, and it was a bitch of a commute back to his place if he wasn’t going to hang out with the Rocky crew. He landed a job at a record store that was walking distance to his apartment.

Patrick seemed surprisingly sad to see him go, saying, "Ah, the good ones smart up," and gave him a $500 bonus for not "fucking up."

Tim, one of the older Rocky people, turned out to not live too far from him, and when Mary started hanging out there, so did the party.

Now that Mary was no longer shackled by the strip club’s hours, his world opened a few more degrees. He spent his nights dressing up while he watched the cast rehearse. (When he showed them a move or two he learned from the women at the club, they tried to get him to do a guest star as Frank. But Mary had shaken his head and said that wasn’t the kind of performing he wanted to do.)

When they weren't rehearsing, they dragged Mary to TT The Bear’s, The Middle East, and The Milky Way Lounge for underground shows. They took him to fetish night at ManRay after a trip to Hubba Hubba for pleather and lingerie, and Mary made a lot of new friends.

Sometimes, Mary would show up to work straight off a night out in his club clothes, eyeliner smudged and lipstick smeared. It should have got him fired, but his boss just shrugged.

"I used to keep rockstar hours too."

Mary still wore all his old vestiges—his battle vest and his ripped jeans—it was just that now he sometimes added a corset and heels.

Wherever Katie was now, he hoped she knew he was still fucking their beauty standards.

ry.omen Insta

Answer Me This

I practically vibrate the entire way back to our place. I'm still trying to wring information out of the internet like it's too-wet clothes, but the only thing I accomplish is making myself motion sick on the bus, so I put my phone back in my pocket and breath through my nose.

When I get home, Mary is sprawled across the couch in his pjs with various limbs hanging over sides and edges as he watches some extreme sport show on my laptop.

I wonder if he just got up, but I see the start of dinner on the stove, so I decide not to snark at him.

"Hey," he says without looking up.

I am, however, gonna need some answers on "Heroes."

I gently close the laptop, and he meets my eyes.

"What?"

I climb onto the couch, and Mary’s limbs recede like vines to make room for me as I scroll through my phone to my photo app where I’ve saved screenshots.

"Lucy," I say in a terrible accent, "you have some ‘splaining to do!"

Mary squints at me and takes my phone, his expression morphing into one of surprise.

"Shit, babe. Where’d ya find these??"

"So they are you!"

He chuckles.

"Christ…I haven't thought about these in fucking years."

"Mind telling me what the fuck?" I ask, my hands on my hips.

I'm only half joking.

Mary grimaces at me.

"Ah."

"I'm gonna need more than that, mister."

He rubs the back of his neck.

"Fuck, you know those were hard times for me."

I know about his family, the homelessness. I know he tried out a lot until he found a life that fit. He'd given me the overviews with occasional anecdotes filled with names I never remembered.

But none of them included naughty pictures.

I worm my way under his arm.

"Yeah, I know, Mare."

His hand strokes down my arm.

"I mean, shit. I was kinda an asshole, you know?"

I wrap an arm around his chest.

"You're still kind of an asshole, Goore."

"Thanks."

"No problem."

When he doesn't say more, I poke him hard in the side.

"I’m literally dying here."

He laughs a little.

"Fine. But you gotta remember you asked."

Model Behavior

One day, Mary was walking down the street on his way to drinks with the new friends he'd made the weekend before. It was a good day. He wasn’t hungover as fuck, his makeup was only smudged artfully, and he was pretty sure he was going to get laid.

A guy in a leather jacket and tight jeans maybe a few years older than Mary stopped him on the street.

"Hey, man! I love your style."

Mary batted his eyelashes at him. "Thanks, dude."

"You ever think of dark modeling?"

Mary squinted his eyes at him.

"Dark what now?"

"You know—modeling but like," he gestured up and down Mary’s form, "for dark beauties. Show the world beauty isn’t cookie cutter."

"For like what? A website or some shit?"

The guy dug into his pocket, pulled out a card case, and handed one to Mary.

Heroes Greg Karson, Photographer/Web Design Butera School of Art

Actually, Mary had heard of this. It was a zine about the local happenings around town—concerts, art shows, parties, etc. There was a stack of them next to "Rrriot!" in the record shop. He’d flipped through one occasionally, mostly interested in the band reviews.

"We’re really on the lookout for anyone with the right look. You know, wear stuff you already own."

"So like a street fashion spread?"

"Well, we might do a little more with it, but—you know how it is. Most of the budget goes toward printing costs."

Mary perked up.

"Would I be paid?"

Greg laughed.

"Peanuts, my dude. But yeah. Even if it’s a T token. You interested, then?"

"Hell yeah!"

"Mind if I take a few test shots."

Mary smirked at Greg.

"How do you want me?"

"Just natural."

Putting his hands in his pockets, Mary arched his back and gave Greg his best snotty hipster face.

Greg dug out a digital camera from his carrying case and took a dozen or so pictures of Mary from different angles while telling him to turn this way or that.

Afterwards, the two of them huddled over the camera and scrolled through the shots.

"Aw yeah, this one. I love the attitude. The guys are gonna love it. You have a number where we can reach you?"

Mary gave him the number of the record shop. (His apartment had a phone, but he’d never gotten around to wanting to pay for service.)

Later, he and Amber looked up the Angelfire website on the back of the card. It was one page that contained the mission statement, bios of the creators, and locations to pick up the zine.

"Omigod—you’re gonna become a famous model, Mare!"

"Yeah, right. You know most of it ends up in the trash, right?"

But when Ben called, Mary said he was game. He directed Mary to a co-op in a converted warehouse in Dorchester, and Mary brought his favorite clothes in a borrowed duffle.

A girl in cat pajamas opened the door and pointed at a set of metal stairs with her cereal spoon.

On the second floor, Mary found Greg setting up a makeshift studio. A girl with multiple piercings and yarn dreads leaned against the wall in her black babydoll dress.

Mary sidled up to her.

"You here to model, too?"

She gave him an unimpressed once-over.

"I’m the art director, asshole."

Mary flushed hard as she turned to Greg.

"Couldn’t find one with brains?"

She turned back to Mary.

"I don’t know if you thought this would be a good way to meet chicks or what, dude. But I’m letting you know right now that I’m here on my day off to make sure this adheres to our aesthetic, so if you're not serious, fuck off."

Mary rubbed the back of his neck.

"Shit, sorry. I was expecting a dude named Ben."

She waved her hand in the air as if dispelling Ben.

"The Bens are morons. Good idea, terrible execution. I’m here to make sure we remain true to the idea of 'Heroes,' so don’t fuck up my shoot." She gave him a once over. "Christ. You have any experience?"

Greg turned from where he was testing the white balance.

"Angelique, stop harassing the talent. We get it, you have a degree from RISD."

Angelique snorted.

"As if I don't hear you going on and on about being a professional photographer. 'Hey, lemme shoot your portfolio, baby.' Whatever. As if we're not your only professional credit."

"Hey—you wanted a photographer for peanuts? You got me. You wanted models for peanuts? You got him."

Mary gave her his full snaggle-toothed grin.

"I take T tokens."

Angelique sighed, then pasted on a smile.

"Hi! So happy you’re here!" Her smile drooped. "You got your wardrobe in there?"

"Yeah."

Mary handed her the duffle, and she handed him release forms.

"Here: sign these"

She pawed through his offerings.

"Not bad, not bad." She pulled out a corset and his heeled boots. "We'll keep you in your jeans and have you wear your jacket over your corset. Cool?"

Cool.

The shoot was as professional as a shoot in a warehouse in what Mary was taking to usually be a living room could be. Angelique directed Greg with what she wanted. Greg called out positions and expressions for Mary to pose in.

It was surprisingly hard work, and by the end of a solid hour, his smirking lip was getting tired. Angelique and Greg scrolled through the shots, murmuring to themselves and nodding.

Mary waited—greeting at the other inhabitants as they squeezed by on their way either up or down—until Angelique approached him.

"That’ll do. You mind if we post on our website?"

Mary preened.

"Yeah, that’s kosher."

She handed him a pen and pocket notebook.

"Write down a quick bio."

He scribbled down a quick elevator pitch

Into general skulking and metal \m/

and handed the notebook back to her.

"Great, thanks."

She handed him a $20 bill, her eyes skimming him up and down.

"Next time we should show off those hip bones. Just jeans, I think."

Mary perked up. "Next time?"

"We’ll call you."

***

"Omigod, omigod!"

Amber perched on the record store counter, flipping through "Heroes," as Jon peered over her shoulder.

"Mary…look at you!"

Mary tried to swallow his smug smile.

Failed.

"Yeah. I’m hot shit, ain’t I?"

She bopped him on the nose with the newsprint.

"Don’t be vain."

He showed her his toothy smile.

"I like to think of it as confidence."

"So did Icarus."

Mary snorted and went back to putting prices on the new CDs.

"The camera loves you," said Jon, who was always quiet and reserved as you please…until he put on Frank’s corset and heels.

Mary had tried flirting with him, but Jon always ducked his head and played it off.

"Thanks, man," said Mary, giving him a softer smile.

"So??"

"So what, Amber?"

"Are you gonna do it again?"

Mary shrugged.

"I mean, if they call me, sure."

But he was kind of hoping they would.

When the next issue came out weeks later, Mary stared at the cybergoth on the pages and felt himself deflate. Listlessly, he thumbed through the delicate print, barely skimming the section devoted to the World/Inferno Friendship Society’s set he’d been at the week before.

He set it down with a sigh before he picked up his guitar and plucked out a tune he was trying to coax into a riff.

By the time a Ben called again, Mary had given up the modeling thing as a one-off.

"Hey, dude—thought maybe you guys forgot about me," Mary said in a teasing tone.

The Ben on the other end chuckled.

"It’s like herding cats to get shit out. Nah, dude—we definitely want you to be one of our regulars. You in for next Saturday?"

He was.

***

Over the course of a year, "Heroes" had Mary come out multiple times for shoots. Mainly, Mary wore his own clothes and did his own makeup, but occasionally, Angelique wanted something specific.

"How comfortable are you with boudoir shots?"

"With what?"

"Like a pinup, but more…saucy than sexy."

I'd pose nude if you paid me enough.

(Sure, he was a noodle boy, but he knew he had the goods.)

"Yeah, I’m cool with that."

Angelique brightened at him.

"Great!"

She picked up a set of complicated leather garters and thrust them at him.

"Put these on."

Mary had only ever worn lace garters—mostly out to clubs, but occasionally under his ripped jeans for an extra pop—but he found he liked these even more, liked the way they emphasized his thighs.

"Hey—where’d you get these…?"

(He was already thinking of what he could pair them with for goth night.)

"Local leatherworker. He mostly does pieces for Renn Fairs, but he'll also do custom. I can give you his info."

She led Mary into what was clearly someone's bedroom.

"Don't fuck anything up, or Joye will never let us use this again."

Mary shot her his best shark smile.

"Hey, I only mess up the sheets if someone asks."

Angelique gave him a flat look and called for Greg.

(But when he draped himself over the bed and told Greg to "Paint me like one of your French girls," Mary could have sworn she almost smiled.)

On one memorable occasion, she brought in a guy whose rope bondage demo she watched at a sex convention.

"Put on some of that lingerie and we'll truss you up. You ok with that, Goore?"

Mary ran his fingers over the coils and gave her a wolfish smile.

"You know I'm game for anything."

She gave him a vulpine smile of her own then, and she looked down at him from the height of her platformed boots.

"Good. I thought you should be submissive for once."

Mary had no witty rejoinder for that.

He listened with interest as the guy carefully explained what he was going to do, complete with pictures, and he relaxed easily into the process. (They put bunny ears on him, and it would be much, much later that he got that particular joke. Well played, Angelique.)

The ropes hadn’t let him do much posing, but Mary had kind of liked the constriction, and his thoughts were already on asking Amber to help him create a more versatile version for fetish night.

He’d left that day with a new kink…and the guy’s number.

"Why not just do one big shoot?" he asked another time. "Get it all done in one big bang!"

Angelique held up his garments to eyeball over him.

"Honey, we never even know if there's gonna be a next issue. The Bens spend most of the time arguing. My god you should hear them—Ben bankrolls the whole thing, so he says he should get final say on shit, and Benji wants total artistic control because it was his idea, because 'he's the graphic designer', and because it's his Kinko's employee discount they use."

She gave Mary a curled-lip smile as she tossed a few items at him.

"In the end it's this bitch you're looking at who gets shit done."

Mary began to change (they were long past modesty).

"How'd you get involved?"

"Went to school with Benji."

"Ben too?"

"Neg. The Bens are childhood friends. Ben works some cushy start-up job, so Benji lets him bankroll them both. Rent, utilities—everything. I love Benji to death, but he's a giant mooch."

"Shit, that must be nice."

Angelique shrugged. She stood back to appraise Mary's look.

"It's fucking lame. But it least it gets us fucking paid."

Mary didn't say I'd do this for free. Instead, he struck a pose and said, "I'm just happy for the exposure."

Angelique rolled her eyes and went to fetch Greg.

***

That year and a half would become a nonstop party with Mary as one of the VIPs; he wouldn't say no to anything—be it casual sex, club appearances, or whatever drug the current pretty thing was offering him in the bathroom.

But recognition started slow.

At first, it was customers who would leaf through the zine and recognize Mary.

Then, it was the occasional scenester who’d stop him on the street in JP as he walked about, and Mary would pose for grainy cell phone pics.

Soon, he was being approached at shows and clubs. The first time it happened, Mary was high off his new infamy and ready to please. A woman in a black bandage bra and pleated skirt with bondage straps approached him, and Mary was already thinking of what he could do with those.

"You look like that guy in ‘Heroes’!" she'd shouted to him over the music.

Mary had flashed her a crooked smile and leaned in.

"Maybe I am the guy in ‘Heroes’."

She'd given him an exaggerated once over before sidling closer with hooded eyes.

"I dunno…you're wearing way more clothes."

Mary had pulled his mesh top down by the collar in a tease as he'd curled over her.

"Take me somewhere more private and I’ll let you do a comparison."

She'd compared him all night.

And that was before he and the other "Heroes" models formed their own posse.

The Bens had thrown a BBQ and had invited everyone they'd ever met. There were people packed into their little 2 bedroom in Brighton, spilling down the back stairs, and equally packed into the little square of shared backyard. Ben had taken the 12-pack of 'Gansett beers Mary had brought, then introduced him to the other dark models.

"Now you're all here!" said Ben. He slung his arm around Mary. "Guys, this is Mary. Mary this is Mayhem, Lesley, Lola, and Bryan."

Mayhem was a rivethead, and Mary took to him instantly, but he was wary of the others. Lesley was the cybergoth who'd been in the first issue after him, and Mary still felt a bit salty at them, even though Mary knew by now the Bens rotated the models. Lola, the romantic goth, reminded him enough of Vanity that he felt guilty for losing touch with her and had him projecting a little. Bryan was a metalhead, so: competition.

Mary had thought they'd get along like cats and water, but weed, booze, and "Never Have I Ever" went a long way to creating a shared bond.

And there it was again. That pull. The magnetic force telling him that he'd found the place he was supposed to be. They quickly coalesced into their own pack, calling themselves the "Deathbutantes" (because they always killed it when they debuted for the night).

It had been rare for Mary to miss Friday and Saturday night shenanigans with the Rocky crew, but now, every night was Friday night. There was always a show or a concert or club that one of them knew about—and if they couldn't get lucky with the local color, they'd just go home with each other.

Mayhem taught Mary what Lola jokingly called the "grab a bat" dance, and the two of them cut quite the picture on the dance floors.

Lesley took to Lola, and the two of them could always be counted on for scintillating conversation in dark corners when Mary's limbst needed a break from flailing about.

The clubs weren't really Bryan's scene—take him to a sticky hole in the wall with concrete floors and a stage close enough to feel the sweat from the bands, and he was in heaven—but he liked to come along to hang. He'd drink PBRs, rub Lola's feet when she invariably abandoned her heels for the evening, and argue with Mary about the purity of death metal.

Mayhem and Lola weren't really into live music of the screaming kind, so—while Lesley, Bryan, and Mary bounced off each other in the mosh pits—they'd save a "home" base at one the bartops.

Amber noticed Mary's diminishing presence and stopped by the record shop to call him out.

"So you're not dead! Could've fooled me."

Mary was organizing the albums into order, and he grunted at her.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm a cad. I'll make it up to you."

"You missed game night."

"Sorry. Jethro Tull played some tiny venue in nowhere Mass, and Bryan was salivating. I mean, Jethro Tull. Can you blame me?"

He looked at her, arms out wide in supplication. But she just blinked at him.

"You have no idea who Jethro Tull is, do you?"

"Sorry, dude. But christ, Mare. You should have invited me. I'd've gone. Maybe I would have even liked them. Now you'll never know."

"I could just lend you an album."

"Nope! The moment passed. Too late!"

Mary riffled through the stock and shoved a Jethro Tull CD into her hands.

She tapped it against her thigh.

"So, when do I get to hang?"

"I can get us into 80s night free."

"No, I mean, with your cooler friends. Your 'murder models', or whatever."

"You wanna hang out with the Deathbutantes?"

Amber scrunched her nose.

"That's so fucking pretentious."

Mary kind of liked it.

"Dunno if they're really your scene."

"Oh? And what's my scene?"

"Musical theater on crack."

She mock gasped at him, "Called out!" before smacking him with the CD. "Whatever. You love musical theater on crack."

Mary draped his arm around her shoulders.

"Yeah, I do. But I don't live it, you know? You guys have your niche—and fuck…I love to visit—but it's not mine."

Amber looked up at him, her expression serious.

"So the Dumbutantes are your niche?"

Mary shrugged and went back to shelving.

The Rocky crew had been good to him. They'd taken him under their wing, no questions asked, and helped him realize things about himself. Tim had taken him to the ER when Mary had come down with a serious case of the flu. Matty had taught him the basics of sewing. Gretchen had held him after a bad trip. Omar and he had had many drunken heart-to-hearts about their shitty home lives.

And Amber was his best friend. She'd been his #1 cheerleader for years and had never been afraid to call him out on his shit.

So yeah, he loved the Rocky crew…but they laughed at anyone who took anything too seriously. Mary would show up to game nights in his latest creation—with everyone else in pjs or jeans & hoodies—and they'd tease him about trying to impress the wrong people. He'd try to talk about the newest guitar god he'd been mainlining, and they'd make snoring noises at him.

How could he explain the kinship he felt with the Deathbutantes? That they were as serious about music as he was, that they just…got why he felt the need to dress the way he did to express the way he felt inside on his outside.

Instead, he said, "I'm just trying shit out, Ambs." He quirked his eyebrow at her. "I gotta do something while you guys do your real-person jobs."

(Amber had recently started as a junior marketing assistant at the American Repertory Theater. "Purely mercenary," she'd said. "Maybe it'll give me a leg up during auditions.")

She made a disgruntled scoffing noise in the back of her throat.

"Fuck, don't remind me. I actually gotta go to bed a reasonable hour now."

"Don't worry." Mary winked at her. "I'll keep ya honest."

"That sounds a lot like my head in a toilet, Mare."

"I'll hold your hair back."

She gave him a good-natured shove, and he pretended to cower.

If she wanted to cross pollinate, who was Mary to stand in her way? So, he invited her out the next time the Deathbutantes went to a show, and it went exactly like he thought it would.

They disliked her, and she was equally unimpressed. They thought she was too loud and frenetic, and she thought they had no sense of humor.

"I fucking told you," Mary had snorted as they sat on the curb sharing a clove.

"Shut the fuck up, Mare."

But she'd put her head on his shoulder.

"They make you happy, though. So I guess I approve. Just as long as I don't have to play nice."

Mary still hung out with the Rocky crew—there were still game nights and drug-fueled sex parties and theater games—but the Deathbutantes introduced him to the underground scene. They always seemed to have insider knowledge about the best up-in-coming bands and the secret shows. Theme nights at the goth clubs were always a must, and they rarely missed one. Sometimes, Angelique would crash, and they'd take the commuter rail to Providence to party at Club Hell before collapsing in a sweaty, smeary pile at a friend of a friend's hole in the wall.

As a bit player in the Rocky crew, Mary had been another made-up face in the crowd. As a certified member of the Deathbutantes, Mary became the face.

They all did.

The owners loved them because they bought round after round at the bar, and if word got out that the Deathbutantes were there, their admirers came to spend money as well. The employees loved them because they were fun and talked to them as equals. The clientele loved them because they were pretty young things.

Sometimes, though, Mary wasn't in the mood to party or get laid, so he talked to the DJs instead. He'd buy them rounds and stay past closing to help them pack up while they talked about the history of punk and 80s new wave and nu metal. There was one in particular, Dave, that Mary even considered a friend.

The two of them would sit in the club past closing, sharing a whiskey and talking about life while the bartenders closed down and cashed out. Occasionally, Dave's other friends would be around, and they'd all walk back to his place; he'd fool around spinning in his home studio, and they'd drink box wine as they danced and laughed before Mary would have to sit on the ground in an intoxicated exhaustion, good for only thumbing through Dave's vinyl collection.

Mary was just happy to talk shop with another music aficionado, but Angelique had pointed out that he should leverage his minor clout.

They'd been waiting for Greg to finish setting up, and Mary had been struggle city after a particularly hard night out. It was all he could manage to sit there quietly and hope some god would put him out of his misery.

"You need to get your shit together," Angelique had said out of nowhere.

Mary had cracked a puffy eye and had slowly (as to not bring the nothing in his stomach back up) turned his head to her.

"As if I haven't seen your melted ass on the floor wanting to die."

"Fuck, Mary. You've turned it into an art form."

He'd closed his eyes and given her the finger, but that hadn't stopped her.

"You wanna be a rockstar, boy? You can't just sit on your ass and hope the right person on the right night hears you. You're effervescent and charismatic—heads turn when you walk into a room and not just because of your skinny jeans—but you need more than air, Mary, which is all you are right now."

"Fuck you, Angela."

She'd clapped in front of his face, and she was lucky he didn't Exorcist bile all over her.

"You're a fucking pain in my ass, Goore. I'm doling out the good stuff, try not to bite my hand off, k?"

"All right, all right!"

"You wanna start that band? You wanna get play and amass fans? Well, make that demo you're always droning on about and give it to those DJs you're alway fanboying over. Fucking network, Goore."

At the time, Mary had been too hungover to care, but her advice would sink in…

Eventually.

For the time being, Mary was content. He loved the attention, and it made him feel invincible, made him feel like it was finally His Time. And he was going to make up for every slight, every unfair situation, and every beat down with sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll.

With his newfound nightlife, Mary's day job had become an afterthought. He started sleeping through opening shifts, but with the extra foot traffic Mary brought to the store, his boss seemed resigned to let Mary slide (after a stern talking to and a pay docking).

The shadow cast had started using him as a mascot of sorts, and he was happy to show up on Saturday nights and hype up the waiting line with a pseudo striptease. (Even if it was sometimes to kick off his evening with the Deathbutantes and not hang with the cast after.)

Mary started a band ("auditioning" any and all of the many admirers who said they’d be more than happy to join it), and after a few false starts and a couple of lineup changes, they began working on an EP. (At least, when Mary showed up to rehearsal, they did.)

A Boston Phoenix reporter got wind of the Deathbutantes and called around about doing a story on them. The Bens were excited about the exposure that meant for their zine, and Angelique and Greg were excited about what it could mean for their careers. Mary did a brief interview over the phone where he answered questions about his style and talked about his dream of making his band a household name.

Mary saw his name up in lights, and he was reaching for it, full speed ahead.

But then things turned.

The story fell through at the last minute with no further explanation or contact by the reporter.

His boss finally fired him after Mary showed up too high to function too many times—or not at all.

The shadow cast had a turnover, and suddenly he was old news—a cringey hanger-on.

A trip to the clinic and a round of antibiotics for an STI had him way more wary of who he hooked up with.

"Heroes" lost momentum when imitators popped up and Ben cut off the gravy train.

Angelique moved to NYC for "better opportunities," and the Bens took their brand of counterculture to Portland, OR.

Greg took down the website when he got offered a legit job as an apprentice at a food magazine, and that was that.

The physical zines were cheap things, most ending up papering the sidewalk after trash day or lining the bottom of cages. Without the online presence, did Mary's "modeling career" even exist?

Mary was a little sad to see the era go, but when he woke up in Maine on the hood of some girl's car and only a hazy recollection of how they'd gotten there, he was beginning to see Angelique's point. He needed to get his shit together if he was ever going to become a rockstar. And frankly, he kind of felt like he needed to spend an entire month eating carrots and hydrating.

The 24/7 party had always been an ephemeral thing; it had been sand passing through his hands in a finite amount as he'd tried to hold onto it

He put himself on detox, and waking up sober for the first time in months felt like a revelation. And as it turned out, playing the guitar without badly shaking hands was way, way easier.

He found another job in another music store, and his starter!band was bringing butts into the smaller venues, like Toad.

He still had his old Rocky friends and the Deathbutantes. The club and venue owners still let him in for free, and Dave was always happy to give his demos a spin. By anyone's else's measure, he was steal one of the scene's darlings.

But Mary was beginning to realize that he needed to stop seeing himself as that scared kid who’d arrived in Boston 4 years ago with only a backpack, $72.57 to his name, and void where his family should be.

He needed to stop finding people to please into loving him.

Instead, he needed to live for himself and let them love him for who he was—fuck ups and all.

@slimylayne

Epilogue

"Honestly, that’s probably the reason I even got a band together," he says. "I was still kind of shit at guitar, but people came to see ‘Model Mary’ perform in his underwear."

He shoots me a smirk.

"I’m sure there’re pictures out there of me looking more glam than metal. I kind of played up the whole pinup thing for a while."

"Fuck, I would kill, literally kill to see that."

He pulls me into his lap until I’m straddling him.

"I could open up my underwear drawer and show you right now."

"Goore, you temptress."

I lean down to kiss him, and his hands sneak under my shirt, but I pull away again.

"I kinda thought I knew all your torrid secrets by now. Shit, how come Dave's never needled you about it?"

After 2 years with him, I’m surprised I hadn't even heard a peep from his oldest friend.

Mary snorts.

"Dave would miss shit hanging off his nose. Great dude, amiable as fuck, but he's always had fucking tunnel vision for his music."

I smirk at him.

"Sounds like someone else I know."

Mary pulls a face at me, and I apply kisses to every line until he laughs and bats me away.

"But really, Mare—how come you never told me about your brief career in blue steel?"

He blows out a breath, his hands smoothing up my thighs.

"Fuck. Cuz maybe I was a little embarrassed at how off the rails I was then, ok? Didn't want you to know what I fuck up I was." He takes my hand and kisses my palm. "And even I know it's a shit move to pitch woo at someone by telling them about banging half of Boston."

I make a face at him, and he laughs.

"Yeah, that’s what I thought."

His hands rest on my waist.

"Christ, everything about that year's a bit fuzzy, and it was like 10 years ago. Sometimes it feels like it happened to someone else, honestly. And shit—most of those people aren’t even around anymore. College kids who moved on and 20-somethings that grew up and moved who knows where. I used to watch Amber have—what is it when it’s four people?—and now she lives in bumblefuck Pennsylvania with 3 kids. After she left, I just kinda drifted away from all that."

He shrugs, his eyes downcast.

"I’m sorry, Mare," I say as I smooth his eyebrows.

He shrugs again.

"I mean, we all kinda keep in touch. It's like the only reason I have Facebook."

"When was the last time you even signed into that?"

Mary grins at me.

"Lola's birthday."

"One of the models? What happened with them?"

Mary bites his lip and thinks.

"Mayhem found religion after an OD and kinda ghosted everyone. Lesley followed a girl to New Hampshire. Uh…Lola pursued a PhD for something sciencey involving renewable energy with sugar beets in Idaho, and Bryan moved back to Florida to care for his grandma, who raised him."

Mary leans his head back on the couch and rubs his eyes with the heels of his hands.

"I mean, shit. We were fucking babies back then. Head empty except for a good time and unlimited potential."

I run my fingers through his hair.

"You miss it?"

His eyes pop open to look at me.

"Fuck no. Not for a million dollars. Too many question marks." His eyes glint as he runs his hands down me. "I like what I got going on right here."

I wrap my arms around his shoulders and kiss his forehead. The fucking sap.

Mary picks up my phone and scrolls through the pictures again.

"Fuck. I used to be goddamn adorable, though. Half this shit wouldn’t even fit me anymore."

I squish his little potbelly, and he grunts at me indignantly.

"Do you still have any originals?" I ask.

He shakes his head, his eyes wistful and his smile sad.

"Nah. Got destroyed when my roof collapsed and leaked everywhere. Fuck, landlords are useless. Glad we fucking own now, babe."

He scrolls up, scrolls back down.

"Just these four?"

I nod.

"Yeah. They were the only ones I found—and I did a lot of searching."

"Christ, I think there were at least 10."

I smile ruefully at him. "It’s not gonna be long anyway before they make their way into the popular tags and shit starts coming out of the woodwork."

He tosses my phone onto the table.

"Whatever. Just shows that I’ve always been cool."

And then he’s kissing me again, his hand tangling in my hair.

"You know, I’m your family now, Mare. Just for you."

He brings my hand up and kisses it.

"Fuck, I know that. Why’dja think I put a ring on it?"