#we ended up having to uber which was like $100+ total

[tormiller]

i’m literally so sad about my eras show experience like it was a great concert but so many things went wrong trying to get there and then getting back home was even worse and on top of it all the surprise songs were lame

[phantomrose96]

If anyone wants to know why every tech company in the world right now is clamoring for AI like drowned rats scrabbling to board a ship, I decided to make a post to explain what's happening.

(Disclaimer to start: I'm a software engineer who's been employed full time since 2018. I am not a historian nor an overconfident Youtube essayist, so this post is my working knowledge of what I see around me and the logical bridges between pieces.)

Okay anyway. The explanation starts further back than what's going on now. I'm gonna start with the year 2000. The Dot Com Bubble just spectacularly burst. The model of "we get the users first, we learn how to profit off them later" went out in a no-money-having bang (remember this, it will be relevant later). A lot of money was lost. A lot of people ended up out of a job. A lot of startup companies went under. Investors left with a sour taste in their mouth and, in general, investment in the internet stayed pretty cooled for that decade. This was, in my opinion, very good for the internet as it was an era not suffocating under the grip of mega-corporation oligarchs and was, instead, filled with Club Penguin and I Can Haz Cheezburger websites.

Then around the 2010-2012 years, a few things happened. Interest rates got low, and then lower. Facebook got huge. The iPhone took off. And suddenly there was a huge new potential market of internet users and phone-havers, and the cheap money was available to start backing new tech startup companies trying to hop on this opportunity. Companies like Uber, Netflix, and Amazon either started in this time, or hit their ramp-up in these years by shifting focus to the internet and apps.

Now, every start-up tech company dreaming of being the next big thing has one thing in common: they need to start off by getting themselves massively in debt. Because before you can turn a profit you need to first spend money on employees and spend money on equipment and spend money on data centers and spend money on advertising and spend money on scale and and and

But also, everyone wants to be on the ship for The Next Big Thing that takes off to the moon.

So there is a mutual interest between new tech companies, and venture capitalists who are willing to invest $$$ into said new tech companies. Because if the venture capitalists can identify a prize pig and get in early, that money could come back to them 100-fold or 1,000-fold. In fact it hardly matters if they invest in 10 or 20 total bust projects along the way to find that unicorn.

But also, becoming profitable takes time. And that might mean being in debt for a long long time before that rocket ship takes off to make everyone onboard a gazzilionaire.

But luckily, for tech startup bros and venture capitalists, being in debt in the 2010's was cheap, and it only got cheaper between 2010 and 2020. If people could secure loans for ~3% or 4% annual interest, well then a $100,000 loan only really costs $3,000 of interest a year to keep afloat. And if inflation is higher than that or at least similar, you're still beating the system.

So from 2010 through early 2022, times were good for tech companies. Startups could take off with massive growth, showing massive potential for something, and venture capitalists would throw infinite money at them in the hopes of pegging just one winner who will take off. And supporting the struggling investments or the long-haulers remained pretty cheap to keep funding.

You hear constantly about "Such and such app has 10-bazillion users gained over the last 10 years and has never once been profitable", yet the thing keeps chugging along because the investors backing it aren't stressed about the immediate future, and are still banking on that "eventually" when it learns how to really monetize its users and turn that profit.

The pandemic in 2020 took a magnifying-glass-in-the-sun effect to this, as EVERYTHING was forcibly turned online which pumped a ton of money and workers into tech investment. Simultaneously, money got really REALLY cheap, bottoming out with historic lows for interest rates.

Then the tide changed with the massive inflation that struck late 2021. Because this all-gas no-brakes state of things was also contributing to off-the-rails inflation (along with your standard-fare greedflation and price gouging, given the extremely convenient excuses of pandemic hardships and supply chain issues). The federal reserve whipped out interest rate hikes to try to curb this huge inflation, which is like a fire extinguisher dousing and suffocating your really-cool, actively-on-fire party where everyone else is burning but you're in the pool. And then they did this more, and then more. And the financial climate followed suit. And suddenly money was not cheap anymore, and new loans became expensive, because loans that used to compound at 2% a year are now compounding at 7 or 8% which, in the language of compounding, is a HUGE difference. A $100,000 loan at a 2% interest rate, if not repaid a single cent in 10 years, accrues to $121,899. A $100,000 loan at an 8% interest rate, if not repaid a single cent in 10 years, more than doubles to $215,892.

Now it is scary and risky to throw money at "could eventually be profitable" tech companies. Now investors are watching companies burn through their current funding and, when the companies come back asking for more, investors are tightening their coin purses instead. The bill is coming due. The free money is drying up and companies are under compounding pressure to produce a profit for their waiting investors who are now done waiting.

You get enshittification. You get quality going down and price going up. You get "now that you're a captive audience here, we're forcing ads or we're forcing subscriptions on you." Don't get me wrong, the plan was ALWAYS to monetize the users. It's just that it's come earlier than expected, with way more feet-to-the-fire than these companies were expecting. ESPECIALLY with Wall Street as the other factor in funding (public) companies, where Wall Street exhibits roughly the same temperament as a baby screaming crying upset that it's soiled its own diaper (maybe that's too mean a comparison to babies), and now companies are being put through the wringer for anything LESS than infinite growth that Wall Street demands of them.

Internal to the tech industry, you get MASSIVE wide-spread layoffs. You get an industry that used to be easy to land multiple job offers shriveling up and leaving recent graduates in a desperately awful situation where no company is hiring and the market is flooded with laid-off workers trying to get back on their feet.

Because those coin-purse-clutching investors DO love virtue-signaling efforts from companies that say "See! We're not being frivolous with your money! We only spend on the essentials." And this is true even for MASSIVE, PROFITABLE companies, because those companies' value is based on the Rich Person Feeling Graph (their stock) rather than the literal profit money. A company making a genuine gazillion dollars a year still tears through layoffs and freezes hiring and removes the free batteries from the printer room (totally not speaking from experience, surely) because the investors LOVE when you cut costs and take away employee perks. The "beer on tap, ping pong table in the common area" era of tech is drying up. And we're still unionless.

Never mind that last part.

And then in early 2023, AI (more specifically, Chat-GPT which is OpenAI's Large Language Model creation) tears its way into the tech scene with a meteor's amount of momentum. Here's Microsoft's prize pig, which it invested heavily in and is galivanting around the pig-show with, to the desperate jealousy and rapture of every other tech company and investor wishing it had that pig. And for the first time since the interest rate hikes, investors have dollar signs in their eyes, both venture capital and Wall Street alike. They're willing to restart the hose of money (even with the new risk) because this feels big enough for them to take the risk.

Now all these companies, who were in varying stages of sweating as their bill came due, or wringing their hands as their stock prices tanked, see a single glorious gold-plated rocket up out of here, the likes of which haven't been seen since the free money days. It's their ticket to buy time, and buy investors, and say "see THIS is what will wring money forth, finally, we promise, just let us show you."

To be clear, AI is NOT profitable yet. It's a money-sink. Perhaps a money-black-hole. But everyone in the space is so wowed by it that there is a wide-spread and powerful conviction that it will become profitable and earn its keep. (Let's be real, half of that profit "potential" is the promise of automating away jobs of pesky employees who peskily cost money.) It's a tech-space industrial revolution that will automate away skilled jobs, and getting in on the ground floor is the absolute best thing you can do to get your pie slice's worth.

It's the thing that will win investors back. It's the thing that will get the investment money coming in again (or, get it second-hand if the company can be the PROVIDER of something needed for AI, which other companies with venture-back will pay handsomely for). It's the thing companies are terrified of missing out on, lest it leave them utterly irrelevant in a future where not having AI-integration is like not having a mobile phone app for your company or not having a website.

So I guess to reiterate on my earlier point:

Drowned rats. Swimming to the one ship in sight.

[oldfriendsseniortwittersanctuary]

Should they be at the club: Mobile Suit Gundam '79

Amuro Ray

There is no character that should "be at the club" less than Amuro Ray. There is no way you could keep him in the club for more than 15 minutes. He's waiting outside the entire time, if he hasn't already called an uber. Do not bother.

Sayla Mass

Absolutely, yes. Let this girl tear up the dance floor. Heaven knows she deserves it.

Bright Noa

I am of the firm belief that the only thing that would fix this guy is a life-changing experience in the bathroom of a seedy club, so yes, for the love of God, take this man to the club.

Fraw Bow

If you take her she's going to get roped into being the designated driver, and that's just not fair to her. She does not want to be here. The club is not her natural habitat. Let her go home and catch up on her netflix backlog.

Kai Shiden

God, you know he'll down two virgin daiquiris, say the wrong thing to someone, and get punched the fuck out. Yes, he should be at the club.

Hayato Kobayashi

He'd be quiet for the most of the evening, until at the very end when he says something deeply unpleasant and out of pocket, just dragging the whole mood down. No, he should not be at the club.

Mirai Yashima

Hell yeah. She'd have a grand ol' time, just living it up. And when she gets drunk she'll be That Drunk Girl In the Bathroom. You know the one. She belongs in the club.

Ryu Jose

He's the one making sure everyone's doing all right, not getting into too much trouble, and making sure the people who are way too drunk get home OK. He must be at the club; this is non-negotiable.

Sleggar Law

He'd be a absolute pain in the ass, however he will also be watching over every girl like a hawk. The second he sees someone slip something in her drink or try to cop a feel, he will throw hands. Him being at the club is an unfortunate necessity.

Char Aznable

Contrary to popular belief, no, do not let this man within 100 feet of the club. His latent Causing Problems instinct would go into overdrive, and there's no telling what Problems he would cause by the end of the night.

Lalah Sune

She would just sit... and watch... until at which point she just walks up to a random stranger and says the most off-putting shit you've ever heard. She should be at the club.

Ramba Ral & Crowley Hamon

Moot question, they're already at the club, scouting for a third. They do this every other Saturday.

M'Quve

*insert the lyrics to How Soon Is Now*

Garma Zabi

I mean, he'd be fun enough to be around, I suppose, but you know by the end of the night he's going to hook up with some blond twink that looks suspiciously similar to a Certain Someone We Know and like... don't let him keep hurting himself like this, man.

Icelina Eschonbach

The only way you're getting her in the club is if she's with Garma, and she will watch him pick up that twink and not even register that anything is amiss. That's just sad. Don't take either one to the club, it would just be too hard to watch.

Degwin Zabi

Uh, the spirit is unwilling and the flesh is ever so weak. Probably a bad idea for him to be at the club.

Gihren Zabi

So he wouldn't, but God could you imagine? Ideally the second he starts ranting about Hitler is the second he gets knocked on his ass, but sadly no one would dare to do it. No, he should not be at the club.

Dozle Zabi

Oh yeah, totally. He'd be louder than the music and would not stop bragging, but those stories would be the wildest fucking stories you'd ever heard. He should be at the club for that alone. Also, he could easily be talked into buying everyone a drink.

Kycilia Zabi

She would scare the hoes and the bros. She should be at the club.

Cucuruz Doan

[Redacted]

Miharu Ratokie

She would somehow end the evening lying face down in a pool of her own blood. No one would know how she ended up this way. It is not much a question of whether she should be at the club as it is an inevitability. We cannot help but to repeat the cycles of tragedy.

[kimberlyannharts]

So Darkest Hour is over, the MMPR main series has wrapped, so what do we do now? We......check out the adventures of this team led by a giant polar bear? Sure!

It's Power Rangers Infinity!

= For those who haven't seen the previews: our main character, Lola! She's cute, I like her a lot; even if admittedly BOOM has really been dishing out the Green Ranger girls one after another lately. (As for her last name being Navarro.....put in a pin in that for a second. Unfortunately it doesn't go where you might think it goes.)

= Obviously there's no way to prove it but moments like this kiiiiiind of feel like this was written back when BOOM figured they were finished with the PR license. It's a little too on the nose

= GIRL YOU LOOK SO GOOD

= Though I am a little annoyed because her lines here about looking for Lola for a long time made me think my theory that she was targeting her because she was related to Tyler/Shelby (or Poisandra just THOUGHT she was) was real. Unfortunately Lola's last name being Navarro isn't at all relevant (she targets Lola because she overhears that she writes PR fanfiction, so she wants Lola to make a weak team she can beat, it's a whole thing) so I guess in the end it was just an Easter Egg. I guess it's not too much of a surprise as this is set in "our" world rather than the Dino Charge world, but still, if you were going out of your way to pit a Dino Charge villain against a main character with the same last name as a Dino Charge character, you'd think that was leading up to something

= Group shot of the team! Along with the names, since I kind of skimmed my first reading and didn't retain them kjkdjf

= Also I just noticed Braylee's visor is shaped like a megaphone. That's cute

= Unfortunately the Poisandra Stan Society skipped out on PMC 2024. I totally would have gotten a picture with them otherwise

= Obviously as this is a one-shot book making gags out of the concept of "unlikely character archetypes as Power Rangers" the Infinity team members don't have the most complex personalities, but it's vital for you to know that the Pink Ranger, Penelope Prescott, is a lesbian. Anyway hot bear time

= I literally went into this book thinking the polar bear (Coach Kumo) would end up being a joke one-note "haha is that an ANIMAL as a ranger??" a la Yale but he actually ended up being my favorite character so uh. Yeah. Power Rangers Infinity did the whole "animal ranger" thing better than the main series. Make of that what you will

= And a look at the other teams. And okay, I'm just going to come out and say it; we did canonically have a pirate team in the show. I KNOW THEY DIDN'T DO PIRATE STUFF BUT I DON'T CARE, THEY STILL EXISTED, IT'S NOT AS OUTLANDISH AS THE HOCKEY BEAR UNIVERSE

= I do have to admit, for as much as this book tries to joke about how Poisandra isn't a threat and can't find a team weak enough for her to defeat, they're pretty casually talking about how she's basically committing mass genocide. Like their teams/universes are literally dead. I think that counts as beating them

= Proud of the book for not calling them "Paisley Force"

= your uber is here

= Anyway actual worst part of this book is it implies Poisandra took out Curio too which SHE WOULD NEVER DO!!!!!!! THAT IS HER BESTIE!!!!!!! Sledge getting her this ship is 100% in-character though

= Poisandra has committed mass murder and kidnapping but nothing compares to the evil of committing Lola to the path of customer service

= Still a better Green Ranger reveal than M/tt

= This silly one-shot parody comic sure has a lot of death in it

= speaking of death:

= MORE ONSCREEN DEATH THAN DARKEST HOUR IN THE ONE-SHOT GOOFY PARODY COMIC I'M GOING INSANE

= This is sweet and everything, but it kinda takes me back to how members of this fandom would uhhhh kinda harass the writers and BOOM about including their own ideas in the comic. (And the actors too. Firsthand witness to that at PMC 2024!) So to all up and coming writers and artists: please keep your submissions and pitches to professional settings

= see you, space cowboy...................

[diazfox]

https://www.tumblr.com/diazfox/747945105989779456/lets-all-be-honest-the-fandom-doesnt-care-about

It’s interesting this anon seems to be confused how buck Tommy people are being told they are fetishizing things, because all I keep seeing is Buck Tommy endgamers posting how hot they are. How they want to see them kiss over and over and over. How they keep going and watching the one kiss they did have for the 40th time in a row. Or I see them ranting and raving how Tommy’s so nice and patient with Buck. (which that’s called being a decent human being??) but I’d like to know what they considering his behavior when he made a very pointed comment about closets in front of Eddie and Marisol? Knowing full well Buck wasn’t out to anyone? Or when he just got in an Uber and left Buck there without communicating fully? And never actually apologized to him for it? Just a I didn’t want you to feel pressured. Which again A) communicate that before leaving him in front of a restaurant, and B) How was any of his reaction meant to not make him feel pressured. And not to excuse Buck because his reaction was not good at all during that date but ✨he apologized✨

But the people on the buddie side are posting how they want buddie, the relationship they have seen for 6 years be built from the ground up, the way their foundation has been solidified, the way they are each others best friend, their person, the way they love each other, the way they co parent Chris, the way they are there for each other like no one else, the way it’s been nurtured, the people who want this and to not just settle, because that’s exactly what it would be. Oh we got bi Buck confirmed let’s just settle for the first random person he comes across. Which is insane to me that people are actually ok with. Like He’s been on 1 bad date with Tommy. He’s kissed him once. And he’s known him for, per the show, 2 weeks. 2 weeks vs 6 years of blood, sweat, tears, love, vulnerability, emotional connection, chemistry, family building, trust.

this ate anon, thank you!

the 2 weeks vs 6 years really helps to put things into perspective and i'm glad people like u can see where i'm coming from instead of just screaming at me that i'm being insecure about my ship (what? are we 10 year olds?) and/or being a bucktommy hater and not letting people enjoy things (idk how many more times i'm gonna have to repeat that i hope nothing but the best for bucktommy)

i 100% support the bi rep and everything bucktommy bc its fucking adorable and buck deserves to be pursued, to be flustered and be on the receiving end instead of giving all the time. but let's keep our eye on the ball please? let's not settle for something just bc it's canon or bc it's enough. let's take a moment to reflect deeply about why we want to give so much support to a ship we've known for a grand total of 4 episodes and want an endgame for them when we barely know tommy (and a good part of what we know is alr quite controversial to begin with.)

[sargebutton]

lesbian sargebonhe drabble for me and my three fans

girls under the cut (it’s about 900 words)

i wrote this just about all day after seeing a tt at about 3 am also thank you to my bestie kay for being an enabler(/j)

including: drunk logan, phone sex, sex toys

Logan drops her purse on the ground after getting home from the club. She’ll pick it up tomorrow. She turns quickly to lock the deadbolt, head still a little dizzy. Her tall boots fall into the shoe rack easily, along with her keys on accident.

“Oof,” Logan whispers to herself. Usually, she loves drinking with Jack, Oscar and Liam but… They were all super horny for their partners tonight and alcohol only made their tongues that much looser. Logan shimmies her miniskirt down her legs and throws her mesh shirt over her head and jumps into bed.

Sadly, both of her girlfriends are out of town. Dalton had to have his wedding the same time as Alex’s grandmother’s birthday meaning she had to pick. And she would have loved to have Alex and Lily on her arms but a grandmother only turns 100 once.

Not wanting to upstage Dalton by having two hot girlfriends is also there.

Speaking of… Logan is feeling that usual heat in her stomach. Alcohol does make her horny, it’s one of Lily’s favorite things to tease her for.

Laying on their bed in a bralette and panties and waiting to be fucked is usually one of her favorite hobbies.

Usually…but she’s all alone now.

Logan sighs and throws herself out of bed to grab another beer from the fridge. She absentmindedly rubs her stomach with the door open, eyes flicking through their selection.

A can of margarita ends up in her hand, along with a bottle of water. Alex would be proud of her for being responsible. She cracks open the can, taking a big swig of lime and tequila. Laying back in bed she opens up instagram and nearly instantly regrets it.

So much tan skin on display. Alex, wearing the swim shorts and matching sports bra Logan got her for her birthday. Her long willowy limbs are somehow even more bronzed. Lily is also wearing something Logan bought her which warms her heart.

And between her legs again.

Fuck it.

Logan leans over the side of the bed dizzily. Her nails hook into the box of toys under the bed and she pries the lid open with her last long fingernail. She grabs the first thing she can wrap her hand around and pulls up a small light blue vibe.

Logan gets even hotter thinking about the time Lily held it down on her clit until she squirted everywhere and Alex licked both of them clean.

Fuck it. She slides the vibe into her panties and swipes open the group chat she has with her girlfriends.

***

Lily and Alex are out at the street vendors when the voice memos start coming through.

Usually Logan will send little voice messages during the day but it’s 2 am in London now.

They’re splitting a mango sticky rice when Alex finally looks down at her phone.

“You wanna listen?” Alex asks, pulling her airpods out of the pocket of her shorts. She looks great, totally in her element. Lily can’t wait to pounce on her when they get back to the hotel. She nods.

“I miss y’all.”

Logan’s voice always takes on this syrupy Southern drawl when she’s drunk. Lily thinks it’s adorable.

“Went out with everybody tonight and of course the conversation in the Uber was about sex. I was squeezin’ my thighs together listenin’ to Liam talk about Yuki eatin’ her ass. God I want that to be me. Eat me when you get home, yeah?”

Lily’s breath hitches. Holy shit.

“I got home, so drunk ‘n so horny. And there was no strap at home. Wish y’all were here so bad. I need Alex to brush away my tears while Lily rails me. And I want y’all to switch. I wanna be so ruined just sink down into the mattress all wet and used.”

Alex gasps a little and Lily squeezes her hand.

“I want you so bad. Please come home soon.” Lily can hear her kicking her legs against the bed. She’s clearly a bit distraught. She’s whining like she usually does when she’s close. “Fuck me. We aren’t getting out of bed for at least six hours when you get back.”

“I really wanna tell her she’s being bossy but it’s really hot hearing her be needy like this,” Alex whispers.

“Don’t tease Lex.” Lily slaps her on the arm.

“She would want me to,” Alex says cheekily. “I’m sure she wants a lot of things right now.”

“Someone needs to sit on my face real soon. I’ll be so good I need it so bad darlin’. Fuck I miss your hands. Fuck.”

“You hear that?” Alex smiles, she always knows something Lily doesn’t. Lily shakes her head. “The faint hum of a vibrator.” Alex whispers in her ear and Lily feels it in her clit. She can hear it; slightly buzzing.

“We need to go back to the hotel now,” Lily says, fisting a hand into Alex’s linen shirt.

By the time they stumble into bed, sweaty and naked, Logan is long asleep. It’s okay, they can still do something for her while they wait for her to wake up.

***

Logan wakes with a throbbing in her head and cum dried on her inner thighs.

She also wakes up to two videos and a text reminding her to take some painkillers.

Logan takes the pills with some water, grabs the vibe again, rolls over and presses play on the first video.

[mikestoklassa]

My time at the Zak Bagans Haunted Museum

This ghost hunting episode has compelled me to share my own experience with Zakary Bagary's Spooky Emporium, mostly because I've only shared this story orally and also because I want to flex that I've been somewhere Mike Stoklasa has been. Mayhaps it will inspire one of you to write a Fanfic (gentle persuasion). But truly this is mostly a diaristic blog post for me so that my memory of the Zak Bagan's Haunted Museum never truly slips from my grasp. Facts may not be totally accurate because this is months later and I have a shit memory. Anyways read more if u even care

THE BEGINNING

So my boyfriend and I went to Vegas this past year so that I could see my beloved Vegas Golden Knights <3 Of course that couldn't occupy the whole weekend, and my boyfriend and I aren't gamblers, so we had to find other things to pass the time. When we realized that Zak Bagans' Haunted Museum (which I will refer to as ZBHM) was in Vegas, we had to go. To be honest, by boyfriend and I have only seen a few episodes of Ghost Adventures, but we love spooky stuff and people whose reputations proceed them, so we knew we had to go.

We were staying on the strip, and ZBHM is located more in their downtown, so we had to Uber there. NGL I was expecting some spooky old Victorian house painted in all black, but truly it is just a pretty historic home in a residential neighborhood.

To my shock as a North-easterner, the check in for the museum is outside. So we're greeted by a lovely person who asks if we have tickets. We said we didn't and they told me the wait can be anywhere between 15 minutes and 3 hours, as we'd essentially be hoping that someone who bought tickets didn't show up to their tour. We didn't feel like waiting in the Vegas heat, so said we'd come back. Out of nowhere a man who looked like Guy Fieri if he shaved his head came up to the desk and said we were making the right choice, and to come back tomorrow with tickets. The workers were really nice and let us peruse the gift shop before we left.

My BF and I ended up going to the Mob Museum which was in the neighborhood. It sucked. Don't go.

THE RETURN

That night we purchased tickets for after lunch the next day. They were a whopping $54 dollars each, meaning two tickets was already over $100. There was something called an "RIP Access" ticket, but all I saw was we got to go to a basement and got a shirt and I thought that was dumb as shit so we didn't get it.

So we return the next day and have to wait outside for the next group to enter the house. Most importantly, we're asked to sign wavers stating we WILL not sue Zak if a ghost follows us home. I'd never hold Zak to that, so I gladly signed. Once we're informed we can head inside, I assume the tour is starting but no, we're being led to a lobby with a ticket booth. I thought that was weird, because we already had tickets, but I figured they had to give us badges so they knew we were on the tour. There were pictures of people who had come to ZBHM before, including One Direction's very own Liam Payne. No photography was allowed on the tour, so this is the only photographic proof I went.

So in this lobby, we're basically lined up to a ticket booth where I think we're getting badges. But no, when you get up to the booth, a lovely worker asks if you would like to give Zak Bagans additional money to do the "RIP Access", which includes extra experiences and rooms, as well as free T-shirt at the end. I still think that's dumb as shit, so I say no. But then my BF and I realize we are the ONLY people on the tour who don't have RIP Access, and we don't want to have to stand like dumb dicks outside of certain rooms while everyone else got to go inside, so we let peer pressure get to us. We upgraded for an additional $32 each, meaning now instead of giving Zak Bagan's $108 dollar, we gave him $172. Truly a low point.

THE SPOOKY TOUR BEGINS

So once Zak swindles you out of your money, you're guided out of the lobby, through a yard, and into the museum proper. The first room is truly, deeply, honest, the most censory overload I have ever experienced in my life. Every breath you take will contain 0% oxygen and 100% smoke machine gas. The first room was just an oddities room, filled with haunted items and general cool things that Zak has found along the way. There were human skulls on an old church pew, and as a museum worker myself, I so desperately needed to see the provenance of those. I'm still waiting, Zak. Anyways, our tour guide then proceeds to uncover a machine which is an old Zoltar machine, but instead of a Zoltar animitronic, it's a Zak Bagan animitronic. Then, after each person on this ten person tour gave Zak Bagans $86 dollars each ($860 total), the tour guide asks if anyone would like to "spare a dollar" for the Zak Zoltar machine so Zak may give our tour a fortune. I thought everyone on the tour would feel just as indignant about this as me, but no, people were desperately reaching for their wallets so that they may be the person who blessed our tour with a fortune. I can't remember exacts, but it has something to do with bewaring stairs. Spoiler alert: the fortune did not come back up.

THE GROSS

So from the main room, we enter a haunted doll closet, our first RIP access experience! It was a hall filled with old dolls. I think old dolls are cute not creepy, so this was a pretty lame experience for me. Next we entered a room that looked like a chapel, and we are for the first time greeted to Zak's lovely presence. Zak in a voice over begins to tell us the story of Anneliese Michel, the German woman who underwent a bunch of exorcisms. Now I am very much like Jay, in the sense that ghosts are most interesting to me when they're presented as amorphous fields of energy. I do not care for demon stories, especially when it's obvious that the "demonic person" is just severely mentally ill. So needless to say, I was not about this room. After the voice over, Zak invites RIP ticket holders to the spooky crawlspace tunnel below a mantle holding a chalice the Michel family owned? Idfk. I was NOT crawling through some damn tunnel with someone I don't know's ass in my face, so I declined and walked in the hallway with our tour guide to the next room. My BF went through and said the scariest thing was the idea of the person in front of you farting.

I won't lie, it's about here where my memory gets murky, so I apologize if this is out of order. ("But isn't this just the second room you went in??" Girl idk!!) What I remember next was entering a room with a large bed in it. In the room we are greeted to another voice over from Zak explaining that this bed came from Love Ranch. Zak spends a long time explaining that this is the bed that NBA player Lamar Odom OD'ed and almost died on, and that the Love Ranch owner Dennis Hof died on. I was like "Okay I guess that's a little creepy and sad but is it haunted?" And then Zak on the voice over was like "Oh by the way here's a picture of Hof on the bed with a creepy face in the back that may be a ghost" and then we were PROMPTLY ushered out of the room.

Next we're taken into a room that looks like a medical office. We're told the drawings on the wall and the items in the room belong to Jack Kevorkian, who was a doctor and proponent of euthanasia. The Zak Voice Over spent a lot of time explaining how people would faint in this room after feeling very emotionally overwhelmed. I was like okay....it's the Vegas heat, we've been standing for awhile now, every square inch of this place is nothing buy fog machine smoke, and now we're talking about euthanasia...yeah that'd probably make me pass out. Anyways we go into a room which has Kevorkian's van where the euthanasias were performed. To me, this stuff isn't spooky like at all? IDK I don't know a lot about Kevorkian but from what Zak said he just sounded like a doctor who wanted to give people a chance to go with grace.

So with all of that leaving a bad taste in my mouth, we were taken to a room full of serial killer memorabilia. Personally, I don't like the idea of serial killer's being tortured souls who must stay on this mortal coil as ghosts, but I guess it was better than Zak exploiting the deaths of their victims so whatever. It was a little cool to see the artifacts in the room but honestly now as an adult who understand serial killers aren't complex and fascinating psychos and mostly just guys who hate women, I didn't really feel compelled by this room. There also weren't really any ghost stories in this room. I think Zak just wanted to flex he had a John Wayne Gacy painting.

We were then taken to a room that looked with a barn with a big cauldron in the center. I IMMEDIATELY clocked it as an Ed Gein room. The Zak Voice Over once again comes on to explain a little bit about Ed Gein and how the cauldron in the room is the one Gein used to drain the blood of victims. Again, I'm not into this stuff, but was snapped back into it when Zak explained that on a paranormal investigation of the museum, two English witches were performing a seance in this room and one became possessed by Gein and tried to attack the other. I was so onbroard. Zak please if you're reading this pay those English witches whatever they want to explore your museum more.

THE UPTICK...

So the English witches had me so unbelievably hype and the next point in the tour was so fun. We're taken to this carnival themed room where a man introduces himself and then promptly sticks a drill bit up his nose. He then swallowed a sword and explained he'd been working there for awhile. I asked him how you learn you're good at something like that, and he actually explained the process by which he trains. It was genuinely interesting. Next to him was a caravan which apparently was haunted by a little girl, so the group was split in two to investigate. My group was second, so we had a moment to talk to this guy and ask questions. I am of course annoying so I asked how often Zak is bringing objects to the museum, how he decides where to place them, where does he get them from,etc. I think the guys wanted us to ask if Zak was like cool and nice lol but he played along and answered as best he could. Anyways we went in the caravan next and nothing happened.

...TO THE STEEP DROP

After we departed from nice carnival man, we were made to walk in a hallways with scary clown animatronics, only some of them were real people. I don't hate clowns, but I do not like haunted attractions with real people, so I spent the whole time just staring at the ground. I couldn't tell you what anything looked like.

Then we were in a normal hallway with two doors. Our tour guide informed us that we'd be going to the left, which was the "torture room". I had my fill of human suffering, so I asked if I could wait in the next room. My tour guide was kind enough to let me do so. My BF went in and informed me it was a serial killer who prayed on male sex workers and they had the bed he would torture them on. I did not mind missing it.

The room I waited in was next, and you guessed it, we were greeted to the Zak Voice Over. Zak explained we were in the antechamber for the Dybbuk Box. I was hype, because this is something I definitely know Zak for. All was well until the Zak voice over started explaining to terrifying night Zak had with the Dybbuk Box while investigating with his "friend, Post Malone." Something in me just snapped, I started crying laughing. I thought it was so fucking funny. But you need to understand, everyone else on my tour was SO into this stuff. I didn't want to be the asshole yucking everyone's yum, so I turned to the corner. I then noticed our tour guide looking at me and realized he was assessing if I was crying or not. Not wanting to be used as a story of "a woman who started having an emotional breakdown right outside of the Dybbuk Box room", I pulled it together. We finally entered to see.....the Dybbuk Box behind four giant wooden walls. Apparently Zak had a vision of someone stealing the Box, so he added the walls for good measure. I was whelmed.

After this, my memory gets REALLY murky. I know we went to the basement where the previous owner claims her dad would perform satanic rituals on her. Very sad, but Zak made a point to note that she stopped texting him eventually. Take a hint Zak.

I remember a spooky doll named Peggy, who we were told NOT to disrespect as she was SUPER MEGA HAUNTED. Even Zak apparently wouldn’t go in alone. We entered, and Peggy was just a doll from the 70s with a page boy haircut and a prairie dress. There was a spirit box in the room and we were told we could commune with Peggy. NO ONE spoke for the longest time so eventually I said “…I like your haircut Peggy!” No one laughed and Peggy did not respond.

The most exploitative room undoubtedly, was the celebrity haunted memorabilia room. Inside were such respectful object such as Brandon Lee’s coat from The Crow, which he died in, Paul Walker’s sunglasses, which he died in, Truman Capote’s summer clothes, which he died in, and for some reason, Patrick Swayze’s tooth. Nestled in the corner was an object which I was immediately drawn to, and which I paid the most attention to throughout our time in this room. It was Sharon Tate’s wedding dress. I don’t exactly know how this object was supposed to be haunted, as she didn’t die in it, but my God did I want to deck Zak Bagan’s in his fucking face because something like this genuinely belongs in a real museum and not Zak Bagans’ Misery Porn Tour of Horror.

I also remember being taken to a nautical themed room which had some Titanic objects, but was mostly a Natalie Wood room, as it had items from the boat she was on when she died. Voice Over Zak explained that he was doing a separate paranormal investigation and placed some objects in the room. At the same time, the captain of the ship Natalie died on texted Zak saying, practically verbatim, “OMG!!! All my books just flew off the shelves. It’s Natalie, I know it.” All I could think was, “For the love of God, let this poor woman rest.”

THE END

At this point, the tour was just throwing everything at the wall and seeing what stuck. We went into a room with a rocking chair that supposedly possessed a child. I asked our tour guide what happened to the kid and he was like “Oh the demon left him and he’s fine now.” Oh, good! We went into another room with artifacts from an occultist with a specialization in EVPs. I LOVED this. Again, I love the idea of ghosts being energy who can speak through radio waves. What I didn’t like is Zak being like “Oh by the way, listening to EVPs infected her with demons and she went crazy and wasted away.” I’m sorry, what is it with Zak and demons???

Lastly, of course, was the house from Zak’s wonderful documentary. You’re led a dark room where Zak explains the portal to Hell resided in the basement of a home in…Gary, Indiana. The the walls lifted and from behind a fence you could see some dirt from the basement with a pentagram in it. I’m sorry, how did they transport that? Everyone has to understand they redrew/drew that pentagram in there, right? Anyways, super anticlimactic way to end our tour.

Then of course, exit through the gift shop. I was offered a shirt for buying the RIP access ticket. I declined. My boyfriend did get one, though. Still trying to convince him to do a Mike and Jay Halloween costume with me.

TLDR, the ZBHM had none of the fun campiness of Zak’s personality and was full of human suffering and very little ghosts. I cannot stress enough, though, how awesome all of the employees there are. I truly, TRULY hope that a good portion of the ~$860 Zak is getting form each tour is going to them, because they sell you on it.

Anyways Mike what if we kissed in the Creepy Demonic Crawlspace of the Zak Bagans’ Haunted Museum 😳

[emmadoodle]

giving you permission to talk about therapy tickles more 🙌🏼 what do you think each of dtqk’s reactions would be to it? at what stage do you think they’d start regretting their decision? who would be most teasy?

a situation that i can imagine happening is that gogs would be teasing everyone the whole time, but using the “im filming i can’t!!” whenever they try to convince him to have a turn. except that at one point the massager starts joining in in the argument. and now the situation is one that george can’t say no to because they’re such a lovely person who’s been so kind to them? how could he say no it’s just rude? (drawn from uber story)

and so after throwing teases around all day, george is finally lying down on the massage table, subject to a taste of his own medicine from the 4 other boys in the room

godddddddd literally this is so perfect that’s exactly how I’d picture george’s turn going. and oh my gosh thank you for letting me rant about this more i definitely have more to say akljfhklasfj So here we go the events of a tickle therapy with dtkq!! (this ended up over 1k words wtf...)

First of all, 100% I think they’d make Dream go first. They’d make the excuse that since he’s got the most subscribers he gets the honor of being first. The massage therapist was told beforehand and is totally okay with being filmed and also plays along and tries to coax Dream into going for it akdljfh. You get the choice when laying down whether you want to lie on your front or back and Dream decides on being on his back to prove he isn’t nervous. And we already saw from my post earlier how his turn went. I really really liked your input llama about him constantly trying desperately to turn away from the camera. At some point he gives up and covers his face with his hands which the massager allows since Dream isn’t covering as many spots like this. The therapist focuses mostly on his sides and stomach for the majority of the session, since he seems to be most ticklish there. They switch between poking to scribbling the fingers, and every time the technique changes he jumps. His reactions mostly stem from rocking side to side, to arching his back to try and get away from the feeling. For the sake of time each person only gets about a ten minute turn, which is way too long in Dream’s opinion. But he makes it! 

I imagine since it’s literally their job, these specific massage therapists are extremely good at zeroing in on bad spots. Even on people who aren’t even super ticklish in many places. Because they’re professionals!! And since this is being filmed, and they’re in a pretty fun and relaxed atmosphere, anytime the find a spot, like maybe a specific rib or a place hidden place somewhere else, they’ll verbalize it like, “ooh this is a good spot” or “hey guys watch this” and then all of the sudden the one on the table bursts into cackles before they know what the hell just happened

The first time this ended up happening was with Quackity who was trying his damn hardest to keep still and calm for the massager. And it was working pretty well the first three minutes in! He had decided lie on his stomach more like how a regular massage would go, and he mostly had his head rested on his arms, pretty much just giggling freely and occasionally cussing out his friends anytime one of them through a tease at him. The area the massager found was on the back of only one of his lower ribs, which they noticed since he seemed to be involuntarily flinching a bit more anytime they went there, and quackity likely didn’t even notice he was doing it. “Uh oh, what is that? I think I’ve found something,” the therapist says very deadpan, trying to mess with Q as if something is wrong. “Whahat? What, is everything ok?” “I’m not sure, tell me if you feel this.” And with that they expertly use one finger to drill into the rib, and all of the sudden Quackity is not so calm anymore. He lifts his head away from his arms and arches his back completely, and he’s lifted himself slightly off the table with his elbows, completely in stitches from his laughter. 

After Quackity is done with his turn, he basically forces Karl to go next. Karl was the one who did the majority of the teasing for Q’s turn, and many of the rest of the group agreed in making him go next. He argues as much as he can but he is very much outvoted. He reluctantly lies down on his back and the therapist promises it’ll be okay and they will always stop when they're told to. Once they start, it is obvious to the therapist, the viewers, and pretty much everyone in the room that Karl is the most ticklish person in the group. The second their hands latch onto his sides he is just drowning in frantic laughter. The camera is panning back and forth from Karl to the massager’s reaction, who is also doubled over laughing from the contagious giggles and over the top squirming. There’s not even much teasing anymore for this turn, since everyone is just losing it at how funny everything is. 

Karl’s turn goes by pretty quick, and up next is Sapnap. He has watched a majority of the group go by now, and is super confident that he’s gonna be just fine! He even says so as he lies down on his back. The massager raises an eyebrow, “Is that so? Is that a challenge?” They’ve caught onto the group's sense of humor and have really warmed up to their way of messing around. (I imagine the fandom falls in love with this person after the vlog releases since they were so fun and friendly akldjfhlk) Sapnap kinda clams up like “no no it’s- It’s not a challenge I was just saying haha-” the group is absolutely teasing at this point. “Alright then, I’m gonna start now, are you ready?” “Yes” Sap even puts his arms above his head to prove his point, something no one else has done up to now. “You sure?” “I said yehAHAHA-” He doesn’t even get to finish his sentence as the therapist takes him by surprise. Sap also has a couple specific spots the massager ends up finding. One on his hips and another towards his sternum. After both spots are targeted at the same time, he yells stop, and after all his touch talk he’s the only one that didn’t make it the whole time haha! The therapist admits to him though that they did go a bit harder on him though since he had made such a big deal out of being able to handle it, hence why to bad spots were hit all at once pfft

Finally, as you said llama, George is peer pressured into having his turn. Before he lays down on his stomach, he mentions to the massage therapist that he’s really not that ticklish. Whether or not that’s a lie or not, we have no idea! But, the therapist replies that won’t be a problem at all ^_^. Just as George had said, once they begin, the most reaction he shows is a forced smile tugging at his lips that he’s trying to hide from the camera out of embarrassment, and just a little bit of squirming. The group is now messing around calling him ‘strong gogy’ and trying to coax him into laughing. After a bit of trying many different places, the massager finally finds a spot a little bit underneath his shoulder blades that makes him suddenly choke out a surprised laugh. “Ahhh there we goooo” They zero in on that spot and just like how George laughs when it comes to something funny, the longer they stay in a spot the louder and more frantic his laughter becomes until he’s cackling and asking them to move somewhere else. The therapist goes on to find a couple more places just like this, one on his thigh, and another right between his underarms and top ribs. By the time his turn is over he breathless and red in the face. 

They all thank the massage therapist greatly for allowing them to film and for being so kind to them since they were likely not very similar to many other customers they'd ever had. The therapist says they also had a blast, and the friend group went on their way to film some other places that day for the rest of the meetup vlog. 

[notcolleen]

im gonna take a second to be proud of myself for actually being assertive bc it paid off (literally!!!) and also vent abt family stuff and this is just a giant mess of words lol

[[MORE]]

so i leave for a work trip to oregon tomorrow and as excited as i am, it’s actually the worst timing ever bc 1) my family is having a memorial for my aunt tomorrow and i feel incredibly selfish for not being there and 2) my direct family (brother, middle sister, mom, dad) all have covid or assumed covid and it’s just a chaotic mess at that house rn

and this trip all happened really last minute (i got the email asking if i was interested on the 9th, everything was finalized on the 10th, found out my brother tested positive on the 11th) (i have tested negative every day since then and will test again before i leave) and bc of that/the covid situation i felt bad asking anyone in my family to help out with any logistical barriers (ie pet care while im gone, travel to/from airport, etc)

i finally did ask my oldest sister if she’d be able to watch phoebe and she’s totally fine with that, which is great bc i was literally 2 seconds away from paying someone random online just to avoiding inconveniencing her lol

and i was planning on taking a lyft there and i knew that would be ✨pricey✨ bc it’s 1.5 hrs away so i was just trying to mentally accept the cost of it (bc ultimately it’s worth it for the whole experience of traveling) but my anxiety kinda took off when i looked it up and it was $130 each away 💀

so i sent a text to my dad on wednesday asking if he would be able to drive me back from the airport on the 20th if he did not have covid and was feeling well

and he left me on read 🧚

so after a very frustrating conversation with my mom today (where she called me selfish for not considering the cost of tolls and gas rn) (which i was 100% going to pay if he drove, which i would have told him had he replied back) i ended the phone call in very dramatic tears and was like okay either im paying ~$260 and i can let that anxiety sit with me the whole trip (bc major ~scarcity mindset even with money) (it’s the worst!!!) or i can send an awkward email to the company asking if i could be reimbursed for that expense and hope the best

so i emailed a man named david whom i’ve never met (well first i edited my email until it no longer resembled a “sorry for existing !!! also no worries if not :)))) thank you so much even if not!! :))” monologue) and he responded right back with $400 worth of uber gift cards, no questions asked

and im still just sitting here amazed at how being an assertive adult / asking for things with the mindset of “the worst u can hear is no” can benefit you (also i still have to get used to working for a big company bc before this i worked for a childcare company based out of our towns little church and we were expected to pay for so much out of pocket and this company is just like gift cards all around and it’s so different)

(so now i have moved on to being anxious abt the 1.5 hr uber ride and hoping the driver is okay with literally 0 small talk) (i have more rambling thoughts re: birthdays and family resentment and expectations but this is long enough so goodbye thank u if you read this 😌)

[seijoh-apologist]

stupidly in like with you | miya atsumu

pairing: post-timeskip!miya atsumu x f!reader word count: 14.6k (OOPS LMFAO) genre: friends to lovers, fluff, hurt(?)/comfort, and like a few too many pages of fluffy smut -- third person pov for the most part. NSFW. synopsis: Atsumu and Y/N are good friends, maybe feelings are involved but Y/N isn’t his type. OR Y/N and Atsumu are most definitely in like with each other but for whatever reason aren’t dating.

A/N: hi so this is my first “published” hq fic but like here is this thought that I had and haven’t been able to get it out of my head. it’s mostly edited thanks to my irl friend but bare with my run on sentences and (slightly excessive) use of profanity. any feedback would be appreciated b/c I have more thoughts for other characters and I'd love to share haha. 

To say Y/N was annoyed was an understatement.

Aching feet begged for relief, the sweat-soaked shirt, though cute, had begun to cling to that one fold in her side that made her the slightest bit hyper aware of the “stress weight” she swears she's put on during the holiday season. And the music was absolute shit, shuffling between mash-ups of the Top 100 trending songs and some weird EDM-Indie music that she would pay good money to never hear again.

To put it plainly, she was not in the mood to be out of her home, much less celebrate. But she had agreed to come out, never being able to say no to Sakusa, who silently pleaded with his eyes to take on “babysitting” responsibilities of his teammates for tonight. He had paid for her dinner several times before tonight, claiming that she should save her money - “you should spend your money on getting a better mattress, so we don’t have to hear you complain about it anymore.” - the least she could do was give him a night to himself, away from the chaos that was the rest of the MSBY team.

Besides, it's not like she was asked to stalk them or anything - they were friends after all, so really it was just like she was tagging along for a night of club hopping, taking shots that she didn’t have to pay for, and simply people watching in between trips to the dancefloor. And normally, she’d be enjoying the night - it's just that of all nights to come out and celebrate, it had to be at the end of one of the most stress-inducing, aggravating weeks of her young adult life.

Checking that it was well after one in the morning, she sipped water from her straw, swivelling to face the crowd from her (stolen) seat at the bar, in hopes of catching the attention of someone in her party that could get the hint that they should probably get ready to go. What she did not expect to find, however, was Atsumu, flitting his eyes away from her figure as he leaned down to talk to a pair of girls. It could just be a friendly gesture, asking him if he was who they think he was and him responding but it sent a less than pleasant feeling in her stomach, so she swiveled back, reaching for her phone in the back pocket of her suddenly too tight pants.

“Fuck me,” she huffs out upon seeing that her phone battery has fallen to thirty percent, which would be just delightful when it would be time to call the ubers home. She could now rule out aimlessly scrolling through Twitter for the rest of the night while waiting for her friends.

“Uh.. maybe slip in a ‘please’ and I’m yours.”

Y/N’s eyes all but bugged out her head at the response that came from her left. The voice belongs to a guy, a very cute guy. The kind of cute guy that you see on Instagram explore page before it refreshes so the chances of seeing him again are nonexistent.She sputters out a delayed apology, double-time since she realized that she’s now taken a little too long to respond to him, to which he laughs and shakes his head.

“Don’t worry about it. I should be apologizing for interrupting you, it's just.... You looked a little lonely over here. Mind if I sit with you?”

“Seat’s all yours... but you’re on your own if those people from before come back to reclaim them.” She hums, sliding her phone back into her pocket and shifting her legs slightly in the direction of his seat.

“Scared of a little fight?” He hums, arching a brow before taking a swig of his beer. He has nice hands. Y/N muses to herself as she watches the stranger’s fingers flex slightly around the neck of his beer bottle. She’s always of the mind that a person’s hands say a lot about them.

“Mmm no… just too tired to defend myself, much less a random stranger.” He laughs at that, nodding his head before replying that “most pretty girls don’t openly say they can fight.”

“Oh you’re cheesy, aren’t you? Nobody straight up tells a girl they’re pretty for no real reason.”

“Actually,” Shifting his beer bottle onto the bar, he holds out his hand to her. “My name is not cheesy, it’s -”

“Y/N! There you are!”

The call of her name makes her jump slightly, before she feels the familiar warmth of a hand on her back. The same hand worms its way to her hip, fingers slipping into that soft fold just above her pants, the warmth of his next words being felt just above her ear.  “Where the hell’ve ya been? Was lookin’ all over the place for ya, Bo and Shoyo were worried ya left without us!”

“Been right here, idiot. We lost our original seats so I’d figure you’d come to the bar at some point and I could’ve waved you down.” She shifts slightly, turning her shoulder back towards the cute stranger with an apologetic look in her eye, to which he smiles and opens his mouth to respond until Atsumu cuts him off again, his hand gripping the back of her neck to make her give him her total attention.

“Right well I’m starving - let's get outta here. Kinda craving your infamous drunk noodles, or maybe a McDonald’s on the way home, yeah?”

Y/N nods slightly, turning back towards the stranger to see that he’s already slinking back into the crowd. Once she fully loses him, she shoves her elbow into the blonde’s side, telling him to “shut it” when he throws out a huff of pain.

“Thank you, ‘Tsumu… could’ve had a different ride home but nooooo.. Needed to come in here with all your glory talking about you being starving despite the fact that you can afford a personal chef.” She huffs out and slides off her stool, but he’s not listening. Instead he’s holding her by the shoulders and pushing her through the crowd, excusing the two of them as she continues to rant and rave at him. Once outside, the pair are joined with the rest of the party, who have called a few separate ubers home. “And to top it off, I know you’re not even listening right now - you never listen to me, Miya. I don’t know how your teammates put up with you… how do you put up with this shit, hmm?”

The group of teammates laugh softly and shake their heads, giving answers that “they get paid” to put up with him, and that Miya Atsumu is actually “a decent friend,” a fact that she knows is true but chooses to ignore when convenient for her. Atsumu just shakes his head with a roll of his eyes, pulling her into the direction of their uber for their journey back to his place. She greets the driver and settles into her seat, as Atsumu calls out behind him something or other to someone. The slam of the door and clicking of seatbelts is what fills the silence in the car, music softly playing from the rear speakers, as Atsumu leans his head back against the headrest.

“So I take it yer coming to stay with me for tonight?”

“Hmm.. don’t have much of a choice now, do I?” She teases to which Atsumu slightly pouts, reaching to knuckle at his eyes that suddenly feel a little too heavy. “You owe me the biggest breakfast fathomable tomorrow.”

“Why’s it that I owe you when I paid for your dinner before going out, paid for your drinks tonight, and am letting you sleep in my bed - which is infinitely better than your cheap ass - hey!” He begins his ranting, which would be cut off by a sturdy flick to the forehead and a slight “hush” before he feels her head rest up on his shoulder.

Y/N and Atsumu had been friends for a little while, when she chased him down the middle of the road, claiming to the public that he was a thief, just because he’d grabbed the wrong umbrella on the way out of the restaurant they were both eating in. He’d tried to apologize, but she traded umbrellas and walked back towards the direction of the restaurant. He had chalked it up to nothing really, just a slight mistake and minor inconvenience for the girl. At least until a certain teammate’s birthday dinner, where said stranger was- only this time sitting and chatting with Sakusa Kiyoomi as if they’d been best friends for forever (which in all fairness, Y/N and Kiyoomi had only been friends since college, where they were forced into a friendship by their roommates, who were hooking up with each other and forced the two on double dates). This second meeting was a sign to Atsumu, a sign that for whatever reason this girl was supposed to be in his life, in some capacity or another - but he did royally fuck it up a second time by trying to flirt with Y/N, who laughed and asked if his opening line was really the best he’d had, before hitting him with an opening line that still makes him flush when he thinks about it today.

The ride to Atsumu’s home isn’t long, but it's long enough for the tiredness to seep into Y/N’s bones, who barely misses the quiet way that Atsumu’s fingers have taken home at the base of her neck, massaging gently at the tenseness he feels under the pads of his fingers.

“Someone’s tired… why didn’t you stay home?” He asks as they turn onto his street, letting his fingers fall away from her as he begins to check that they have everything they need. ”’t’s a good thing yer sleeping over at mine... and no couch for you. Your neck is all kinds of tense. It's a miracle you haven’t complained ‘bout it once tonight.”

“Shh.. you’re so loud for what?” She mumbles while trying to stifle a yawn. “So if I’m not supposed to sleep on the couch then where am I supposed to sleep then, boy genius? The floor?”

“No,” Atsumu answers seriously, brow slightly wrinkled as he reaches for his keys in his pocket. “You’ll sleep with me. In my bed. ‘t’s a cooling mattress so you won’t haffta complain that yer too hot.”

“Miya, last time I slept in a bed with you, you nearly suffocated me. Dunno if I really wanna have to deal with trying to roll you onto your back again.”

“Wait a minute! To be fair, my bed was smaller then so there was less room for the both of us.” He begins, opening the door and shutting it before turning the two of them towards the entrance to his apartment building. “Second of all, it was my first time sharing a bed with someone other than ‘Samu so ya shouldn’t blame me for not having proper sleep manners.”

The first steps into Atsumu’s home consists of the pair kicking off their shoes, debating lightly on who was gonna take over the shower first. Y/N slides her feet into the slippers that are specifically her slippers in his home and slinks off towards the kitchen, as Atsumu peels off his shirt and heads towards the shower. It feels comfortable, almost like a routine, as Y/N gathers eggs and two noodle packets to make them a small meal before bed. Moments later, Atsumu is coming out of the shower, towelling off his hair before settling onto the sofa, clicking on the T.V. as Y/N comes in with the two bowls of noodles. A silent agreement is met when they finish that Atsumu would wash the dishes as Y/N showered, taking a shirt from his drawers to sleep in

She hands him a bottle of aspirin, mumbling around the toothbrush to “take two or so help me.” Moments later she joins him in bed, slipping on a pair of socks that are two sizes too big for her before settling under the plush fabric of his comforter. He shifts over closer to her after tossing his phone on the nightstand, seeking out her form in the now dim room for a small cuddle before dozing off. She willingly accepts him too, sliding her body just under his and buries her face in his skin, still warm from the too-hot shower he is prone to taking in the name of muscle relaxation. He hums slightly as their feet tangle together, silently appreciating the way Y/N so freely indulges his need to touch someone after being touch-starved for so long.

Though Y/N isn’t much like him in that sense - doesn’t have this inherent need to cling to someone before bed, or just hold hands at a store, or hands on the shoulder in a crowded room. Sometimes she will, like now with her nose buried in his neck and her hand rubbing up and down the length of his sturdy back. Normally they won’t do this, both just a little too headstrong to dig into the tightening in their chests when the hug for a moment longer than usual; but tonight Y/N is silently congratulating him on winning the game that has had him stressed for weeks. She feels his lips press softly to the top of her head, a mumble of “good night” leaving his lips as she feels his breaths even out as the moments pass.

This is where Y/N wishes she had the power to pull away - blames moments like this on giving her the slightest bit of hope that they could be more than friends.

It's not that she hadn’t thought about it - frankly she’d spent too much time thinking about it. She could do this… with him.. But every thought is put to bed when she thinks back on this one conversation months ago. Granted she didn’t have the full context of the conversation but it's enough to make her heart squeeze when she sees Atsumu flirt with someone, or shake off his hand when she’s had a particularly sensitive day.

It was just another evening where hanging out after him and the rest of the team being away for a week. They’d ordered in food and drinks had been flowing nicely as the comfortable pair had caught up - it was honestly too homey of a setting in hindsight. His phone rang, the white text of “‘Samu” flashed and Y/N took that as a cue to finally get to the restroom.

“Mhm.. made it back early today - no Y/N picked me up.” He’d been mumbling around a handful of chips, the other side of the conversation mute to Y/N’s eavesdropping.. “Oh shut up, she doesn’t mind and it's not as if we’re dating anyway. It’s.. casual and it works for us.”

And she should’ve stepped into her place next to him, cuddled up into her chest and played the role of the blissfully ignorant idiot. But no, she stayed tucked behind the restroom door, blood pumping and heart beating too loud in her ears. It would seem as though Y/N was a glutton for punishment, a minor thing when thinking about putting herself through a moment of pain for a lifetime of pleasure - but the pain that came with Miya Atsumu’s next words would set her off kilter for a while.

“Besides, she’s not really my type. It’d never work out anyway.”

She had no choice really other than to shut the door. Take some extra time in the restroom than necessary - after all she’d just hear the potential love of her life admit to his twin brother that she wasn’t his type. All she could do really was stare at herself in the stupidly bright mirror in his stupid guest bathroom of his stupidly expensive apartment.  God this is so stupid, she thinks to herself while running cold water to press against her cheeks that she feels are heated up. Before she can really tear her own heart to bits though, she hears a quick rapt on the door.

“Y/N ya’right in there? Warned y’bout putting too much hot sauce on your food.”

But that’d been two years ago. It was a little rough after that; Y/N had thrown herself into finding a life post-grad which was a great distraction from the rumors going around that Atsumu had been spotted with some model or actress or something. Besides, Y/N wasn’t really the type to harp on failed romantic interests - all she’d need to do is download whatever relevant dating app for some validation and she’d be able to move on. However nights like tonight, when he looked too good and the little moment was a little too right - she’d still hope. Make a wish to whatever angle number or shooting star or deity above that she’d get tossed a chance to be in love with the stupid setter, because she had already fallen.

“Mm y’right?” She heard him, how could she not when he’s practically suffocating her. She chooses not to answer though, humming affirmatively - to which he huffs and shifts slightly, settling back into unconsciousness.

Maybe she’d blame the train of thoughts for tonight on the fact that she’d been drinking. However, come morning, the seed would bloom a little brighter in her chest when she wakes up to realize that her face is pressed into his side, arms circling his slim waist and one sock lost among their tangled legs.

---

God she hated him. Miya Atsumu was too much of a lot of things - too much of a sore winner, too much of an idiot, too much of a talker, and most of all, too much of a liar.

For the second time in the span of a month, Atsumu had convinced her to come out, despite her desperately wanting to curl up in bed and binge eat away the stress of the week. Only this time it was a charity event, so she would definitely be the bad guy if she said no. It was an event where him and the rest of his team had been roped into a charity dinner - which (gratefully) meant that Sakusa would be around, and they could fuck off to a corner someplace to talk shit about what all the rich wives are wearing and how bad it looks when their husbands are flirting with the wait staff. But Atsumu had promised that they’d leave before the entree was served - swore the entire drive over that “we’ll get you back home in time, grandma” and that he’d even cook for her this time.

But the entree had been whisked off about forty minutes ago, her wine glass had been refilled twice, and she was bored of watching Sakusa look at his watch, waiting for an appropriate time to leave. Atsumu was a few tables away, chatting up some couple, something about wanting to get their information for Osamu’s business. He would laugh a little too loudly at their jokes, gaining attention of those at surrounding tables - which was only mildly irritating as he had now gathered a crowd of people around him, spewing off some story about him getting lost in Russia the first time they played overseas.

She huffs and stands up, chair scraping slightly, gaining the attention of the rest of the  table. All she does is hold up her wine glass in a feeble attempt at an answer of where she’d be waiting at the bar. If I have to be here, the least I could do is drink for free. The bar is empty, surprisingly no one wants to mope around this very nice dinner.

“What can I get you?”

“Mmm.. whiskey highball, please.” She answers to the unnecessarily cute bartender, but the raise of his eyebrows do not go unnoticed.  And fortunately (or unfortunately) she’s got the time to press him. “Surprised?”

“Only a little bit. Noticed you were drinking wine most of the night so the whiskey is a hard switch.”

“So you’ve been watching me?” She muses, smiling as he places the drink in front of her. He smiles and leans forward on the bar slightly, shaking his head and replying.

“It’s almost as if… I’m being paid to make sure people have their drinks.”

“Oh, so it's not because I’m cute?”

“Now I didn’t say that did I? But you know you’re gorgeous; your boyfriend over there must tell you all the time.” He muses, a smirk playing at his lips as he nods behind her. She all but chokes on her drink when she turns around and sees that the direction he nodded in was directly in Atsumu’s vicinity before shaking her head violently. Atsumu was not going to ruin this for her. “Oh so not your boyfriend?”

“Nope.” She says, popping the ‘p’ as she slips the straw past her lips again, eyes taking in his leaning form. He was cute. His hair was on the silver side of blond, tips of his hair black. He was tall and lean, a piercing hanging from his left ear.

“That’s a shame.” And she gives him her name with a flutter of her lashes and a sweet smile. He returns it, preparing her next drink without her even having to ask. And so they talk, first about how the next person who approaches the bar should be cut off, to how pretentious the whole event was. Two drinks in, Y/N finds herself being invited to a show.

“This whole bartending thing is just a way for me to get some extra cash… I’ve got a gig in an hour. I figured if we leave together now, I can get you home to change outta this and into something a little more… concert fitting?”

“O-Oh.. yeah. I just need to go let my friend know…” She trails off, sliding off her barstool before turning to gracefully power walking to her initial seat next to Sakusa. She huffs and she plots herself down in the char next to him, to which he gives her a look of what the fuck. “I don’t have time to catch you up, but the insanely hot bartender is taking me home. As much as I’d love to get out of here with you, I desperately need to get lai-”

“Going somewhere?” Fuck fuck fuck.

“Didn’t you hear her? The hot bartender is taking her home and she needs -”

“Aishhhh shut up.” She turns to look at her curly haired friend, only to see that he’s got this annoying little smile on his face. She deeply exhales and turns back to Atsumu, who looks less than amused about what his friend said. “Listen, you promised me we’d leave two hours ago. Well you lied so nooow I made plans, so if you would kindly move outta my way.”

“No.” She whips her head up at the blonde. No? What the absolute fuck was he going on about telling her no, despite her not asking for his permission. “You’ve been drinking and you don’t even know the guy - how can you trust that he won’t memorize your address then come rob you or something? I promised to take you home, and since you’re ready now we can leave now.”

“Listen Miya, I appreciate the concern but really I’m a big girl. I can handle a night out by myself with a guy - besides I’m not even that drunk. Now, give me my house keys and move out of my way.”

Suddenly, it's like those cheesy western movies where two cowboys are staring each other down, neither willing to be put down by the other. Except it's this 6’2” pro-athlete staring quite literally down at Y/N, who hits the gym only on a blue moon and spends too much time sitting at a desk. Sakusa has to laugh at the two stubborn idiots in front of him; he knows that Atsumu is going to be able to win this little game that they're playing, but silently applauds Y/N for attempting to stick it to him. Moments pass before Atsumu finally sighs, shoving his hands in the pockets of his expensive suit and pulling out her keys - but he doesn’t give them to her.

“What’s his name? If you can tell me his name I’ll give you your keys and let you go.”

“Let me go? Okay, Dad.” She huffs, crossing her arms over her chest, small clutch dangling from her wrist. “I know his name, Atsumu. I may have had a drink or two but I’m not an idiot to be going off with someone who’s name I don’t even know... it’s… uhm.” And she’s done. She hadn’t even bothered to ask his name, doesn’t even remember whether she gave him hers, nor was she smart enough to notice whether he’d been wearing a name tag.  Mentally she’s cursing herself, chancing a glance behind Atsumu’s shoulder to see the hot bartender chatting it up with another girl. Before she can think too much into it, Atsumu sighs deeply, grabbing his suit jacket off the chair next to her and slipping it on his shoulders, a soft “let’s go” leaving his lips as he nods his good-bye to the rest of the table. Y/N chews at the inside of her cheek before grabbing his arm.

“Give me my keys. I’m not going home with you. I want to be alone.”

---

Four days passed - four days of Atsumu borderline harassing Y/N with apologies. Promising to make it up to her. Which is how she finds herself walking into their favorite local sushi restaurant - it's the only one that has self-serving sushi that arrives on a miniature train, and it's also the only place that they go when apologies are to be exchanged. In the handful of years that they’d be friends, Y/N has needed to apologize to Atsumu thrice - two for blowing him off after overhearing the dreaded words and once for saying that maybe Osamu was the better twin. Atsumu on the other hand, had apologized to Y/N many times - so many times in fact that Y/N is sure that he makes up excuses just so they can come eat at this sushi place.

It’s been a long week for Y/N. The Sunday after the charity event, Y/N wakes up with one of the worst headaches of her life - and its due to the fact that she slept like shit hoping that Atsumu made it home safe since he hadn’t texted her he did. Monday she was handed a stack of documents at work that needed to get done before lunch (which didn’t get done). Tuesday morning was dominated by the fact that some idiot on the train to work had spilt a coffee on her, making her wear the most uncomfortable suit jacket, lest she wear a coffee soaked shirt for most of the day. Today, Wednesday, she’d woken up to a box with a pastry outside her door and a cup of coffee with a sticky note on the lid.

Sorry. Let me make it up to you. Train Sushi? 7pm?

Despite the fact that she was most definitely still thinking about why Atsumu acted the way he did - she still went through the mountain of paperwork on her desk with a little smile, knowing that she’d be getting free sushi and an apology. Maybe if she’s lucky, she can convince him that she needs a crepe on the way home.

As she makes her way into the restaurant that evening, she sees him. His dorito-shaped body is stationed at the bar, a cozy brown coat hugging his back, muscles of his arms being squeezed by the sleeves. She can see that he’s got a drink in front of him and she smiles slightly, stepping up towards the bar but stops momentarily. He’s talking to someone - not just someone, a girl. He’s smiling too. Y/N can’t see the stranger’s face, but judging by the way that she has a hand around his biceps and her head tilted, one can only assume that they know each other. Y/N attempts to step backwards, she wants to let him finish his conversation with the woman but she doesn’t know if she can stomach the idea of watching them flirt; but she misses the step, leading her to bump into the hostess who led her to the bar, creating a bit of a scene.

“Y/N! There you are! C’mere.”

She’s buying time by profusely apologizing to the hostess, who honestly is probably just trying to get away. At this point, Y/N has no choice but to walk towards her friend and this mystery woman. The ten steps towards the pair is enough time for Y/N to mentally list off all the things she could have done in the world to warrant some shitty karma that’s hitting her now. Once face to face with Atsumu, she smiles.

“Sorry - long day at work got me all …” Y/N’s words trail off, the hand that’s not death-gripping her purse waves off with her closing thoughts.

“Don’t mind, Wednesday’s are usually your long days. ‘Sides you’re here now - tha’s what matters.” God he’s so dumb. So handsome and so dumb, and god did she miss him. “It’s a good thing you got here a little late, this is Michimiya Yui. I think you two might’ve -”

“No, I don’t think we’ve met! It’s so nice to meet you - he used to talk about you all the time!” The brunette smiles at Y/N, sticking her hand out, which Y/N takes limply, shaking her hand. She’s pretty, Y/N thinks to herself. Her hair is short and she’s wearing some cute leather thigh high boots, her smile is almost paid-for perfect. She’s got this whole brown smoked out eyeliner working for her, which makes Y/N slightly subconscious about her most likely smudged and uneven eyeliner and less-than appealing work pants. Before Y/N can even think of a response to give, Michimiya has her hand back on Atsumu, a pretty smile settling on her lips. It feels like Y/N is watching a trainwreck happening before her eyes. “I was just telling Atsumu that I was back in town and that we should hang out!”

“And I was just explaining to her that I had plans with yo-”

“You should join us!” Idiot. Why am I such a fucking idiot? Atsumu looks over at Y/N with a wild look in his eyes, Michimiya looks like a child who wound up making out with two candies instead of one. “I had a super long day at work today so I’m really only able to eat dinner, but I know Atsumu can stay up for hours so once I leave you two can hang out.”

“Y/N, I thought that -”

“That sounds like a wonderful idea! I just need to tell the wait staff to cancel my to-go order, so excuse me.”

And so the two friends watch the woman walk away from them, making her way towards the to-go order area. Y/N bites at the inside of her cheek, intentionally avoiding Atsumu’s eyes that she feels are pinned on her. She digs out her phone from her purse, texting Sakusa an ominous “next time you see me, please poison me 😑.” As Y/N drags her eyes up Atsumu’s front, she feels the same way she did when she would get scolded by her parents. His eyes are staring at her face, no doubt wanting to press her about why she willingly invited a stranger to eat with them at their restaurant. To pacify him, all she does is hold up her hand, shaking her head.

“It’s fine, Miya. Like you said, Wednesday’s are my long days so I wouldn’t be able to stay out late with you anyway. Besides…” She starts, fixing a smile onto her face. “I think that she might have a little crush on you!” He says nothing, lips pressed in a hard line and a brow arched up at her. “Don’t look at me like that. And save your apology for next time… we have company.”

The rest of the evening goes exactly like Y/N’s worst nightmare. She is quite literally the third-wheel despite the fact that technically Michimiya was supposed to be the third wheel in this little scenario. Y/N has to watch the pretty brunette flirt relentlessly with Atsumu, who seems blissfully oblivious to the fact that for every compliment Michimiya gives Y/N, she gives herself two more. Sakusa is well informed on the situation, receiving texts every five minutes with another dumb thing that was said in front of Y/N’s appatizers. Rarely does someone ever wish for a natural disaster to hit, but in the last thirty minutes of sitting at this table, Y/N has wished for every biblical curse to wreak havoc in her way.

Despite the fact that Michimiya has hijacked every conversation, Atsumu still tries to ask Y/N about her, including her in the conversation as much as possible. But Y/N stopped trying twenty minutes ago, and is now forcing herself to eat the last few pieces of sushi she ordered - normally she’s a stress eater, but Michimiya has rested her hand on Atsumu’s thigh and Y/N has suddenly never felt more sick in her life. Y/N has never once picked up a tab around Atsumu - “please, ‘ve got more money than I know whatta do wit’it” he’d always tell her when she attempted to take up the ticket - but when they finally wave down someone and ask for the check, Y/N drops some cash on the table and collects her things.

“It’s been so nice to meet you, but I think I should really get going. I’ve gotta get to work early tomorrow - I’ll see you this weekend right, Miya?”

“Wait up, I’ll take you home… Yui it’s been really -”

“No no, really it's okay! You stay! I’ll just text you when I get home. Be safe. And again it was so nice to meet you - take care of Atsumu for me.”

“Oh I will!”

Y/N is not a runner but she’s never sprinted away from a situation so fast in her life. The image of Michimiya’s sly little smile at Y/N’s request to take care of her friend makes her feel gross, tears stinging at the back of her eyes and she settles on the train. Y/N can name a handful of times when she’d seen Atsumu around women - but never once had she’d met someone he was romantically involved with and it hurts. The gentle sway of the train does nothing to settle the spinning of her head with images of what Atsumu actually looks for - his actual type. She feels like an idiot; she should have just told Atsumu that they could do a raincheck, or if she was feeling bold, she could’ve told Michimiya to fuck off. The latter seems possible in the version of herself in Y/N’s head, but the reality was that she was too nice. Always wanted to make the people she cares about happy, and Atsumu looked... happy? Besides, Y/N thinks to herself as she exits the train and makes the trek towards her apartment building, if Michimiya Yui was going to be involved with Atsumu, the more exposure she had to her, the better off Y/N would be in accepting that Atsumu would never ever be with Y/N like that.

Once settled in her apartment, she sends off a quick “home. thanks for tonight!” to Atsumu before making her way to the bathroom. A nice warm soak would surely make her feel better, make her forget about what an idiot she is and maybe, just maybe, make her body relax all the love she holds in her heart for the blond away. Her phone pings, twice, but she ignores it. Ten minutes into her pity soak she hears a bang on her door, which only makes her groan and dunk her head under the water. The banging stops, making Y/N think it was just her neighbor or something asking for a favor. What she doesn’t expect is for her to exit the bath twenty minutes later to see Sakusa Kiyoomi sittin on her couch.

“Hello, glad to see you exploiting your spare key access.”

“Miya called me and said you looked like shit earlier. And judging by your texts throughout the evening, I figured you were on the brink of a breakdown.”

And so she was. She spent the rest of the evening talking Kiyoomi through the night, slipping in all the questions she’s had from the past two times that Atsumu had cockblocked her. And bless Kiyoomi for sitting through her tears, sitting cross-legged and drinking tea that he had initially made for her but refused to let her drink once he realized she had already brushed her teeth. It felt almost like she was finally thinking about what her friendship with Miya Atsumu was, what it could and couldn’t be. Every moment painted so clearly about how Y/N felt for her blond friend, but the only thing missing was how said friend felt about her. At 11:30 pm, two hours after Kiyoomi initially arrived at Y/N’s apartment, she pushed Kiyoomi out the door, eyes puffy but heart and head a little clearer than how they were when he arrived.

Despite promising Kiyoomi that she would not think about Atsumu, as Y/N settles into bed, her thoughts can’t help but wonder what it would be like to be with him. She mulls it over as she slides off her socks, deciding that it’d be nice - probably exactly how they are now, plus a title and a little less swatting his hands away when he reaches for her in public. Y/N can’t help it as she thinks about whether they would kiss a lot - they’ve kissed before, neither strangers to cheek kisses as greetings or kisses at the top of their heads when the other is crying into their chest (there was even that very drunk kiss they shared on New Years Eve when their friendship was fresh that both still have warm cheeks about when they think about). Just as she’s about to go down the path of whether Atsumu would spend more nights with her at her cardboard box of an apartment or her at his, Y/N cuts herself off - after all she wasn’t his type. Tonight proved that more than anything, she thinks.

It’s not like Atsumu has never brought anyone around Y/N - there’d been a few that she’d met, though they were mostly over a facetime call and it was mostly just her waving at them before Atsumu ducked away to have a private conversation. It's not like tonight was the first night Y/N had to swallow the bile in her mouth at seeing someone make heart eyes at Atsumu - it's just this time felt different; almost like Y/N was finally having the truth thrusted into her face. But Y/N isn’t mad or hateful of Michimiya, nor Atsumu for that matter - she’d never been the type to hate a girl for having feelings for the person she has feelings for. It’s annoying, sure, but Y/N doesn’t see the point in hating someone for how they feel - however, Y/N does not make the effort to become friends with these girls, or maintain the close friendship with Atsumu for that matter. Is it petty to put a strain on a friendship out of fear of losing said friendship? Absolutely! But Y/N knows she won’t be able to stomach another night like tonight - another night of seeing Atsumu slip so easily from her fingers into the arms of another. And as observant as Atsumu is, he never fully recognizes that Y/N is avoiding him, at least that what she hopes since more often than he’s able to worm himself back into her life.

---

Following the failed apology dinner, Y/N tried her hardest to give herself a few days without the blonde- made easy by the fact that the weekend after the failed apology dinner he’d be out of town for another tournament. It’s not like she was totally avoiding him, she’d responded to his texts and even answered two of his six facetime calls while he was away, she just wanted a little bit of time to wallow in self pity in her apartment, crying over her comfort movies and eating too many bags of hot chips. But once he was back in the same timezone as her, Atsumu made it impossible for Y/N to fully wallow.

It started when he texted her about their favorite crepe place temporarily closing for some reason or other - he’d tried to convince her to ditch work early that day to come, but Y/N declined with a simple text of “i like my job tyvm.” So what did he do? Pick her up in his flashy sports car that day after work (two hours later than usual since she’d figured he’d do something ridiculous like this) and drove her there, where he didn’t bat an eyelash as she ordered double than what she normally would have (a silent fuck you from Y/N but it didn’t matter since she wasn’t actualy hurting his wallet). She’d been able to tide him off for a few days, as she escaped to her hometown for a weekend - but that did little to stop the mirage of texts he’d sent her, describing in great detail this cool hybrid bookstore-game cafe that he found and thinks she’d like. Instead of responding how she actually wanted, she’d just replied with a half-assed “ahh exciting- sounds cute!” (She mentally grants herself ten nice points for erasing her initially text, telling him to take his “fucking girlfriend”). This must have really struck a nerve with him when the following weekend, he’d dragged her out of bed on Sunday morning to take her to said bookstore-game cafe, even spoiling her by secretly buying a book she’d picked up but put back.

Y/N can’t tell if Atsumu is intentionally ignoring the hints she doesn’t want to see him or if he’s really just oblivious. She also can’t tell if the patter of her heart when he drags her out of bed despite her not wanting to see him is a good thing or not. It’s been weeks since she’d third-wheeled with Atsumu and Michimiya, surely Y/N should have been able to take a little bit of pride in the fact that he was literally chasing her down to spend time with her rather than Michimiya - but before she can even swallow that pill Atsumu shows up at her apartment with the trace of a bruise hiding just below his shirt collar. The small mark on his neck makes Y/N convince herself that this would be the time that she needs a full on Atsumu ban.

Said ban never actually happens, though.

Just as proof that this ban doesn’t happen, today Atsumu has decided that Y/N needs to come shopping with him. For the entire day. Cue the montage of Atsumu banging on Y/N’s door at nine in the morning, breakfast pastries and coffee in hand as Y/N answers in all her morning glory, sleep caked up in the outer corner of her eyes and pajamas haphazardly fixed. Words are exchanged as Atsumu pushes her towards the shower, promising to make up her bed and even take out the trash for her (a chore she put off last night because she’d seen too many people smoking by the dumpsters which scared her enough to make her drag up the two bags of back up the five flights of stairs). As Y/N settles at her desk to work on making herself “the hottest person at the market,” Atsumu settles on her bed, talking a mile a minute about all the things he wanted to get at the market and the possible places they could go for lunch in the area. All she can do is hum, wondering silently why he’d chosen to take the trip with her and not his girlfriend - but she wouldn’t complain.

The market was...fulfilling enough. Surprisingly, Y/N was walking towards the food trucks with more bags in her hands than Atsumu, who followed behind her with one print from a vendor that Y/N convinced him would actually look good in his home office. The pair decided that Y/N was better suited to look for a place where they could park themselves to eat, while Atsumu went off to get them lunch. Before Y/N could make a break for the tables though, Atsumu grabbed her face, thumb swiping at her cheek firmly - it took Y/N every ounce of restraint to not whimper at the unprompted affection.

“Wha-”

“Had some of that jam sample from earlier on your face, dummy.”

“Tsk… why didn’t you see it earlier.”

He just smiled softly, letting the warmth of his hand fall from her face before patting her back towards her initial direction. Frankly, she’d been thrown off her rhythm; they’d touched each other before for fucks sake. So why was this one moment of closeness enough to make her chest feel tight? As she weaved through the tables, she can’t help but hold her hand to where his was, almost as if to preserve the warmth that was now gone. She hummed gleefully as she found a table, making her way towards it and setting up camp. As she settles into her chair, fingers deftly texting to Atsumu where she’s stationed, she sees a shadow come across the table.

“Hey, are you gonna use all these chairs?” He’s cute, almost terribly cute - he’s got this pinkish-blonde hair going on top, an almost shy glint in his gray-ish colored eyes, and an almost self-assured smile pulling at his lips. He was also tall, much taller since Y/N was sitting, but she almost doesn’t mind considering the fact that she is most definitely gawking at him. She shakes her head momentarily, both as an answer to his question and a way to clear her head momentarily.

“Thanks! My friend over there is too precious to sit on the curb, apparently.” He smiles at her, eyes squinting and she’s momentarily breathless at just how cute he is when he smiles. His arms move to grab one of the chairs and that's when she decides to speak up, not wanting to quite end the conversation yet.

“Ahh no worries! I know all about having that too precious friend! I only need one other chair so you can take two of these.”

“Oh cool thanks… and hey this might be a little weird but - fuck are you from Miyagi? You look kinda like this one girl from high school but - “

“I am! I went to Aoba Johsai and -”

He clicks his tongue and seems to smile even brighter now. “That’s right - you��re Y/N right? I think you were a year younger than us right, but you always hung out with that one girl in my year who used to smoke behind the boy’s gym…” Y/N nods, a grimace on her face and the back of her neck feeling a little warm with embarrassment. How could she possibly explain that said girl was actually Y/N’s cousin and that she didn’t actually smoke, she’d just smell like it after working at their family restaurant. “Well I’m Makki, by the way. If you remember Matsukawa and Iwaizumi they're over there - they were at Seijoh too.” She nods, leaning slightly to see the two men behind him, both wearing smiles that were just a little too cheeky.

“Yeah yeah, I remember… you also had a particular whiny one with you too, right?” He laughs at that, responding that said whiny one was actually abroad. The two make a little conversation, her giving him some suggestions on places to visit since one of his trio is actually visiting for the weekend. Y/N thinks this is nice - feels like the main character in a movie with the amount of men that have approached her in the past couple weeks. Before she can get too cocky in her ability to pull though, Atsumu walks up to the table, hands full with a tray that seems to be piled with too many little plates.

“There y’are… couldn’t see you from across the way… everything okay?” Atsumu questions, standing to his full height as if sizing up Makki, who seems completely unphased by Atsumu.

“Yeah, was just asking your girlfriend if I could steal these two chairs away before I realized that we knew each other.” The strawberry blonde is definitely unphased by Atsumu, who’s shoulders visibly relax at Makki’s suggestion that the two friends were together. “Well it was nice seeing you, Y/N! Thanks again for the chairs, you all enjoy your meal.”

As Makki walks away, Atsumu settles into his own chair with a smug little smile playing at his lips. Y/N, on the other hand, is chewing at the inside of her cheek as food is placed in front of her. Her blond friend, the observant little shit, notices that she doesn’t immediately tuck into the lunch laid in front of her and nudges her foot with his, muttering a quick “what's wrong.”

“You were blessed with possibly the worst timing in the world, y’know that?”

“What d’ya mean?” He muses, taking in her huffily pulling the lid off her food and stuffing her face with the rice bowl in front of her.. She chews, combing the food on her plate with the plastic fork as a way to stop herself from unleashing all her frustrations.

“You always but in whenever I start getting hit on! Or you stop every chance I have at possibly getting to know someone; you come in here full force and its really not fair. I don’t do it to you, and it's just not fair.” Y/N hates that she probably sounds like a whining child, but she really can’t help it anymore. It’s really not fair that Atsumu flaunts his conquests on the cover of every magazine, but god forbid Y/N talk to a guy. “Its been a while since I’ve had sex, Atsumu, and it’s getting to a point where I’d jump just about anyone’s bones. I - I just think that as my best friend you should be providing me some support, not cockblocking me at every fucking opportunity you get.”

It takes every fiber in his body to not laugh at how ridiculous Y/N is being right now. He licks at his lip, catching whatever food crumbs he could before clearing his throat. “‘M sorry what? You actually wanna hook up with those guys? They seem like the type to just fuck ya n’ then not text you back.”

“And if that’s what I want then so what!? Did you miss the part where I said I’m desperate here?”

“Then..” He takes a swig at his water bottle in front of him, leaning back slightly in his seat and sliding his sunglasses to rest on the top of his head. “If you need it that badly then you can just do it with me. You said anyone so I can -”

She laughs, one that sounds on the brink of delusion. “You’re fucking ridiculous. Yeah okay… Dunno if you remember but you’ve got a girlfriend, Miya.”

“She’s not my girlfriend, Y/N. We’re… not that serious with each other and we’re also open. She knows that..'' He looks smug, and Y/N wants to smack the absolute life out of him. “And I’m being serious, darlin.. I’d rather get you off than see you get your hopes up over some random.”

Y/N squeezes the poor utensil in her hand, choosing to chomp down one of the buns on the table instead of reminding Atsumu that she wasn’t exactly his type. But she lets it go, just squinting at him and shaking her head, mumbling how ridiculous he is before swiping some of his veggies off his plate. How else is she supposed to react to her best friend blatantly telling her that he’d fuck her if she’d ask - she tries to ignore the way that their knees resting on each other under the table makes her heart soar. Before she can form a sentence, something to steer the direction away from her sex life (or lack thereof), Atsumu mumbles around a forkful of food that she’d better hurry since he wants to do another lap of the market before it closes.

---

Atsumu’s offer and that entire conversation is brought up again a few days later; the pair are in Y/N’s apartment this time. She’d asked him and his brother to come over to install some shelves for her, but apparently Osamu was busy. With the shelves installed, Y/N put on a movie to serve as Atsumu’s entertainment whilst she organized her trinkets. She wasn’t really paying attention to the movie, too concerned with trying to see if the shelves were actually level or not when she heard Atsumu laugh behind her, muting the T.V. with a quizzical brow raised.

“Huh? If you don’t like the movie then you can change it… ‘m not payin atten-”

“Oh yeah not paying attention right?” She gives him a hard look as if proving to him that she can’t honestly give him the plot of the movie. “So you’re telling me that its just a coincidence that this movie is about two friends who make a pact to fuck each other? That it's a coincidence that the literal name of the movie is ‘Friends with Benefits”

She rolls her eyes and turns to face him fully, seeing that he’s now sat up on her couch with his elbows resting on his knees. A beat passes before he puts his hands up, almost as if in surrender, before he pushes himself off the couch and towards the kitchen. She watches him as he pulls out a bottle of wine, nodding to the couch as if asking her to take a break. She relents, folding her legs under herself and pulling at a string on the worn sofa, thinking she’d probably try to replace this piece before she renewed her lease. He thrusts the glass to her, settling into the sofa but he makes no move to unmute the T.V., instead inciting some silent battle while they each sip from their respective glasses.

“Y’know you’ve been snappy lately… my offer from the other day still stands, hope y’know tha’.” She scoffs, choosing to take another swig at her wine, which does little to cool the warmth she feels in her throat. He’s not technically wrong - the conversation the other day had made a fog of tension hang over her, making a long lost desire for the blond resurface in her lower abdomen at full force. She’d spent way too much time the other night on Amazon, debating on whether it would be a good idea to get rechargeable batteries for her toy, spent too long watching his mouth move when he’d facetimed her the other night. It's not that Y/N hadn’t hooked up with anyone since knowing Atsumu, it's just that maybe she’d spent a little too much time enjoying how Atsumu met her emotional needs that she had neglected her physical needs.

“What offer?” She’ll be damned to let him in on the fact that she’d done nothing but think about his stupid offer. Refuses to let him know that she wants, no needs, to say yes. So she plays dumb, finger dancing along the lip of her cup, foot swinging anxiously against the floor.

He hums, reaching to put his glass on her beat up coffee table. He leans his elbow on the back of the couch, placing his chin in his hand, giving Y/N his undivided attention. “‘Samu was talking about how his girlfriend has been on his ass lately about every little thing and so I asked him if they’re doin’ okay, y’know physically… didn’t answer me but I figured he’d solved it if he hasn’t mentioned it since. I heard someone say that if yer girl’s acting fussy then y’need to think about if you’ve been fuckin’ her right and well…” Y/N swallows the lump in her throat, stopping the shiver that threatens to rack her body at the idea of Atsumu thinking she’s his girl. “I was bein’ serious the other day. I know ya were mad so it wasn’t the best time to bring it up, but it seemed like the only good thing to say. Besides, ‘m not all that bad in bed, can ring up a few people if y’need a review.”

Y/N doesn’t respond with anything other than a forced huff of laughter, can't respond really. It feels too warm, she’s hoping that maybe this is some fever dream instead of reality. She just plays with her cup absentmindedly, not quite able to look the blond in the eyes despite the fact that his eyes are studying her face as if she holds all the answer to the questions the universe has. Him being bad in bed is the least of her worries, what if she’s bad? God she wants to say yes, maybe she’ll say yes - maybe it’d be good for her to finally get some di-

“Forget it, ‘m sorry. If it makes you uncomfortable then we don’t have to, sweetheart. I just -”

“I’m not uncomfortable.” Oh now she speaks. He looks at her, a wild look fixed on his face, almost as if he doesn’t believe the words that came out of her mouth. “It's just..” She throws her head back, face covered momentarily by some plant leaves. God she didn’t want to actually voice her thoughts but now she has no choice.

“It’s just what? If yer worried about the fuckin part, I can just get you off other ways. Get paid to be good with my hands -”

“Just shut up for once please, you’re ruining it.” He makes a show of zipping his lips, smiling as Y/N squares herself to him, stretching her neck as if she’s preparing for a fight, rather than speaking a coherent sentence.. “It's just that I don’t… dont wanna force you into thinking you have to ‘cos I’m being bitchy to you.. Like it’s not your problem to fix y’know and I just. Besides, don't wanna be the only one enjoying it, want you to like it too and … for fucks sake this is ridiculous. I just dunno I-”

Atsumu’s hand reaches out towards her, fingers stroking her knee in a comforting manner but it’s all but comforting to Y/N, who’s entire leg feels on fire at this small moment of skinship. “Shh, shh, no baby yer not forcing me to do anything. Don’t think that way - I-I wanna do it! I wan’ya to be happy and if this makes you happy then… And i mean if y’need more of a reason then think of it as a way for me to say sorry for cockblockin’ ya all the time.”

Y/N doesn’t say yes, but she also doesn’t outright decline. She can’t think of anything other than how, if she nodded her head, he’d give her everything she’d been wanting. Atsumu and Y/N stare at each other, moments pass and she’s sure that he’s going to take her stillness and silence as a no - but he just moves to grab her wine glass, moving it from her grasp to the table, shifting closer to her in the process. She holds her breath and he brings one of his hands towards her face, palming the side of her jaw in his warm hand, thumb rubbing at the plush skin of her lips. “Can I kiss ya? Maybe tha’s all ya need is a good kiss, yeah?” She nods, his hand moving to pluck at her bottom lip between his thumb and forefinger. “Got really nice lips, don’t you? ‘S so soft and wet, catch myself wanting to touch ‘em allot’' She inhales softly as he leans in, his hand sliding to the side of her neck and he litters soft kisses against her jaw. She whines softly when his mouth nears hers. “Shh, gonna kiss you in a minit.”

All Y/N can do is breath, mouth parted slightly as Atsumu drags his mouth over her face. His hand is so warm and big on her skin; he’s so close in her face that all she can do is inhale and smell him, making her dizzy with building warmth in her belly. They catch each other’s gaze, neither daring to blink away, before he tilts his head, pressing his mouth against hers softly at first. He doesn’t move to kiss her, just holds his lips over hers for a moment, as if giving her time to back away if she wants to; but when she doesn’t, he hums and pulls her head towards his more, lips moving in tandem. His hand slides from her cheek, worming its way towards the nape of her neck as he pulls her to him - he wastes no time in deepening the kiss, licking into her mouth with  fervor. And she lets him, moving into his lap as she relishes in the feeling of his tongue lazily swirling with her own; the new found position allows him to drag his hand down her back soothingly, her own hands sliding around his neck and up into his hair.

She parts with a soft gasp, whether it be for air or out of surprise she can’t tell. He whines momentarily, before nosing his way down towards her neck, pressing butterfly-light kisses at the flesh. She’s wiggling in his arms, and he laughs, the air ticking the soft bend of her collarbone. “Fuck, you’ve been holdin out on me. Tha’ was good right? A good kiss for ya?” All Y/N can do is nod, sliding her hand towards his face in hopes of bringing his lips back to hers. She can feel the smirk on his mouth when she presses their mouths together again, and maybe after she’d bitch him out about it but right now all she wants is to be suffocated by him.

Moments pass, the air filled with soft pants in between kisses and thickening arousal. Atsumu cards his fingers in her hair gently, mouth still against hers, free hand sneaking around Y/N’s front. She whines softly, to which he shushes her softly. “Shh you’re okay… just wanna feel ya.” He soothes her over by indulging her in soft kisses against her lips,   hand pushing up the front of her ratty t-shirt, snaking his hand past the waistband of her shorts into the confines of her (now too tight) underwear. Y/N shudders when he strokes lightly over her clit, before surpassing it completely and going to where a wet spot had been developing on the fabric. Plucking the damp cotton out of the way and letting the tips of two fingers rub over her weeping hole, “Oh.. this for me?”

A small noise crawls out of her throat, a mix between a moan, a whine, and surprise. “Don’t, ‘tsumu. It’s embarrassing..”

“Shh don’t be embarrassed. Just feels good to know I make ya feel good, baby.” Atsumu pulls his fingers from her, smiling when she whines at the loss of contact. But he’s able to soother her before she can get too fussy; one moment Y/N is on top of him, struggling to not rock against his thigh and relieve some of the pressure building up inside of her, the next Atsumu has her flipped over so her back, her body caged between the back of the sofa and his arms. A hand on either side of her head as he bends in, sweeps his tongue at a strip of salty skin just beneath her jaw. He hastily shoves up the shirt she’s wearing, revealing more of her and letting his hands graze over her breasts lightly at first before kneading them. She feels lightheaded while his mouth works on her throat, biting and sucking a bruise at the base of it that makes her gulp. Parting from the skin with a gentle kiss and a small, whispered comment of, “Taste so good, so soft and sweet. Been holding out on me, hmm?”

For the first time ever, Y/N has Atsumu in her arms and has no need to push him away - no, instead she’s holding onto him as if she’d die if he slipped away from her, her hands gripping his broad shoulders before sliding up into his hair as he makes his way down her body. He’s practically praising her - pressing wet, open mouthed kisses on her skin as he moves downwards, fingers making quick work of tugging her bottoms off, helping her kick out of them quickly and clumsily. She knows that Atsumu is not a patient man, but this is a whole other level of impatience. He’s pushing her thighs open, cold fingers squeezing at the soft flesh of her thighs as he scoots down to be at eye-level with the barest part of her, making sure her calves are hooked over his shoulders. Y/N can’t remember a time when she’s ever been in a more vulnerable position, but instead of shying away like her instincts would have her, she finds herself moving to better accommodate the man between her legs. Her eyes catch his caramel colored ones and her breath catches in her throat; he’s staring at her, enamored by her.

“Such a pretty little thing aren’t ya?” he murmurs, lips forming a gentle kiss on her inner thigh but before she can retort he gives one long, gentle swipe of his tongue directly up the middle of her folds. She gasps, face turned away from him and thighs threatening to close, but he shifts his hand to stop her, holding her in place. “Aht… don’t get shy now, lemme get a taste.”

It’s too much when he dives back in, skilled mouth a vicious match for his insatiable need to please. As he strokes his soft, wet tongue deeper and deeper between her slippery folds that part around him willingly. Y/N’s sure she’s moments away from swearing her undying fealty to whatever higher being put this on her plate for today.  Puckering his lips around her clit after stopping just before sucking on her until it was swollen and even greedier for his attention. Dipping his tongue inside of her hole, humming appreciatively against her and only feeding into the whimpering sounds filtering out of her mouth.

Embarrassingly, Y/N feels that she’s nearing her end - despite the shame of admitting that it's coming too fast, she feels the need to tell him anyway. “Hmph… g’na cum,” she chokes out, hoping that he heard her because all she can hear is the blood rushing in her ears. Every sense is suffocated by Atsumu’s presence, and she’s shameless as she lets every pant slip past her lips, feeding into Atsumu’s ego. “‘m so close, I need it. Need you to – to keep going please, ‘Tsumu”

And he does, gets her to the edge of her high before sliding his mouth away from her. The whine that falls past her lips is deafening, eyes opening and seeing that he’s just nuzzling her thigh, lips making light work at marking the soft flesh. “No, no you said… said you’d help.. Please I’m-” she’s hiccuping, tripping over her words numbly as she tries tugging his head back to where she’s most desperate for him.

He hums at her softly, almost patronizingly, as he places a kiss to the skin closest to his mouth. “Don’t cry pretty girl.. Won’t leave you hanging, ‘ts so warm down ‘ere… might have to stay forever, tha’ okay?” He is disgusting, filthy, so sinfully good. And true to his word, he goes back in without another word, only a small smile and his own hum that vibrates through her lower half. When he takes her clit back between his lips, it’s all she needs. Every tense muscle finally seizing to his maximum strain; it’s like she was a string that’d been stretched too far and finally frayed in the middle, snapping. She can hear her heartbeat thumping like a bass in her ears, can feel the way she’s twitching under Atsumu’s relentless movements, and it drowns out her own noises that she’s making.

Moments later, all that can be heard is her bated breathing, head completely empty and eyes heavy, flickering and fluttering with just how light she feels. Atsumu kisses his way back up to be face-to-face with her, making sure to peck gently at the marks he’d littered her skin with. His face is buried in the base of her throat, their arms tangled around each other lazily - Y/N feels too sleepy to protest the way that he’s pressing all his weight onto her; but isn’t too tired to realize that he’s hard when her hips wiggle to accommodate him between her legs, maybe has been the entire time, which confuses her slightly. Why would he be hard over her? She understands her total arousal over him since she bitched him into submission, but him? If anything, him being hard right now just proves, to Y/N at least, that maybe he would get it up with anything. But what if it is for you, her heart wonders briefly.

“‘Tsumu… are you-?”

“Shh, ‘ts alright. Let's get you to bed.” And he moves to slide off her, moving to guide the two of them to her bed, which was a feat on its own considering Y/N’s legs feel like jelly. All he can do is smile at her, taking in her relaxed face and mused hair. He settles her into bed, sliding up next to her and pulling her onto his chest, lips pressed into the crown of her head.  Before Y/N can even think of a way to say thank you, she feels sleep taking over, choosing instead to just indulge (for once) in the pseudo-domestic situation she’s in tonight.

The following morning, Y/N almost doesn’t want to wake up, isn’t ready to come to terms with whatever happened yesterday. Long gone is the lusty drunkenness from last night, but Atsumu...Atsumu is still fully there, lips pursed and arms shoved under the pillow - Y/N holds back the urge to trace her fingers along the lines of his arm. She russells around, hoping that sleep takes over her again so she can justify waking up wrapped around Atsumu - her attempts are futile though when she feels a firm squeeze at her side, cold fingers making her jump slightly.

“Wha’s wrong?”

She mumbles a barely coherent “nothing,” to which Atsumu just hums, snaking his arm over Y/N’s middle and pulling her towards him, chest to chest with his breath fanning over her face. She swears she could die a happy person now. Wants to have every morning be like this, him in her too small bed, squishing themselves together for warmth, just the sheer proximity is enough, she muses to herself. Apparently, Y/N is thinking just a little too loud this morning for Atsumu’s liking because he sighs softly, asking if she’s sure nothing is wrong.

“Mm ‘m fine. Jus’ tryna get comfortable, go back to sleep.”

“Can’t now, all yer wiggling woke me up” And before she can even retort, he shifts slightly, practically forcing his groin on her thigh, to which she squeaks softly. “Jus go back to sleep… too early for breakfast.”

“Bu- Tsumu.. Lemme..” she starts, shyly. She did have this inherent need to pay him back for what happened, and she can only equate his favor with something equally as...pleasurable?...fulfilling? She can’t find the right word but the most equal compensation for sex has to be more sex, right? The sleep in her bones is fully gone now, her hands sliding down his sides slowly, tentatively. “Please...wanna jus’-”

“Don’t have to, can just go to the rest- sh-shit.” He starts, his own hand reaching to stop hers but his movements stutter when she palms at his crotch, giving his bulge a full on grope. She shushes him softly, lips moving to peck his jaw softly as she snakes her hands past the tight confines of his underwear; and though she can’t see much of what is going on she can feel how thick Atsumu is. His hands have shifted slightly, one arm resting behind her and the other cupping her face, their lips tangled in kisses that feel too sweet and far from platonic.

Moments pass, and it's apparent that Y/N is moving much too slowly for Atsumu, him bucking into her hand and his hips rolling in uncalculated and sloppy movements. He whines softly when she pulls her lips off his, both softly gasping for air, but she shushes him, using the most minimal amount of strength to push him onto his back and settles between his massive thighs. By this point, once fully exposed in front of her, he's so hard that the foreskin is already drawn away from the head, tip slick and wet with precum. She’s gentle, wanting to preserve the quietness that comes with waking up at eight in the morning, as she presses a few open mouth kisses at the patch of hair below his belly button.

And it’s all over from here. Y/N ducked herself down, licking from the dip of his balls to his drippy head in one broad swipe. Y/N shudders softly at the whimper she’s able to pull out of the man above her, thinking that it’s probably the best noise she’d ever elicited from a man. Atsumu runs his fingers through her hair as she slides his head into her mouth, fingers deftly scraping at her scalp as she begins sucking. She sucks him like she wants to – like this was the most perfect way to spend every morning, with her blonde, dumb, stupid best friend stuffing her mouth. Both are still hazy with sleep, but that doesn’t stop Y/N from pulling him in deeper, hollowing her cheeks as she begins bobbing her head and moving her hand in tandem to stroke at what can’t fit in her mouth.

His fingers start to tangle in her hair rather than comb through it, his moans filling the room, punctuated with little encouragements that she hums at around him, like, “Tha’s it, there’s my good girl,” and through shaky laughs, “M'gonna cum if you keep doing that, baby.” Eventually, Y/N knows that he must be near his peak, but she pauses, eyes locking with his caramel colored ones, as she pulls her mouth away to let his length just rest on her tongue.

“Fuck yer pretty… so good aren’t ya?” He whisper-groans at her, gripping her hair a little harder when she tilts her head to the side, allow him to shallowly fuck himself between her lips, his thumb tracing the bulge his dick made in her cheek. “Need'a pull off if y'don’t wanna taste, baby… gettin so- fuck- so close.” He gives her hair a slight tug, like he might actually pull her off himself, but she doesn’t allow him; she just shifts her mouth, making light work of wrapping her lips around his tip, sucking greedily with and humming in protest around him. And it’s that that sends him over, twitching in her mouth as he sputters off shaky profanities before she feels shot after shot of white ropes hitting her tongue. Y/N can’t help but stare at him above her, relishing in the fact that this morning she gets to see him shake and shudder because of her.

Y/N pops off him gently, drawing back and humming at the lingering salty taste he’s left on her tongue. She graces the skin of his heaving abdomen with soft, fluttering kisses as she tucks him back into his underwear, before she crawls up his body, legs swinging to straddle his narrow hips. He’s got an arm thrown over his eyes, neck red and he seems almost bashful underneath her (which makes Y/N’s heart swell with adoration at just how him he is). She wiggles softly, folding her hands on his chest and laying her chin on them, waiting for him to say something to her. She blows a laugh through her nose when he finally looks down at her, eyes glimmering and lips pulled in the shyest smile she thinks she’s ever seen on him.

“You… yer good. Too good… just wow.”

---

Suffice to say lots has happened in the week following the pair quite literally eating their hearts out.

Firstly, Atsumu spent nearly every evening at her apartment that week. He waited every single day outside of her office building - her coworkers have taken to telling her how lucky she is that she has a man waiting for her with this whipped look on her face, but she swears up and down (with warm cheeks) that it's not like that. They eat dinner, alternating between picking up something on the way or cooking together - and by cooking, just picture Atsumu cutting vegetables in uneven chunks while Y/N scolds him for not adding enough water to the rice cooker. Normally this could happen: it's not super rare that they visit each other during the week if it's convenient - what is definitely not in the norm is the fact that Atsumu has buried himself between Y/N’s thighs thrice this week. It starts when Y/N looks too stressed on Tuesday evening, that Atsumu pulls her legs over his lap in an attempt to “massage some of the stress away,” which only leads to him manhandling her onto her back, promising to give her something else to cry about besides work.

Secondly, Osamu thought it would be best to alert Y/N that Atsumu had a very awkward conversation with a woman during lunch on Thursday - it was secretly his way of asking her to ask Atsumu what happened because both Y/N and Osamu were terrible gossips who feed off each other. When Y/N asked though, all Atsumu said was that the whole conversation didn’t matter, that the woman (who Y/N learned was actually Michimiya) wanted more than Atsumu was able to give to her. That their lives weren’t in sync or whatever, that they’d eventually manage to be co-workers at best. To say that Y/N wasn’t elated at the news would be a bold-faced lie.

Y/N feels on cloud nine, feels like she doesn’t even need to have a conversation with Atsumu about what their situation is currently. She gets to reap all the benefits of a relationship now, she’s physically taken care of and emotionally spoiled. Only thing she’s actually missing is the title but what's in a word, right?Atsumu wasn’t a natural flirt, always hid compliments behind a harsh delivery - but lately he’s taken to drowning Y/N in compliments, even the corny ones. Y/N expected a post-nut “god yer pretty,” but what occasionally caught her off was when he would open the door for her (normal) and say that “a pretty gal like you should never hafta touch a handle” (not normal). Subconsciously, Y/N feels like he’s only trying to compliment his way into her pants, but she chooses to ignore the way he coos at “just how gorgeous her eyes are” when he makes eye contact with her during a midnight snack.

On the second Thursday following the start of the Y/N-Astumu situationship, Y/N has no choice really other than to ask Atsumu what’s going on with them. They’re at the grocery store by his place (he’d convinced her to take the following day off work and spend the night with him), everything is more than normal when the pair’s conversation gets interrupted by a literal model-esque person, touching Atsumu’s shoulder. Y/N tries to sneak her hand from his arm, but he grasps her hand before she can get too far, looking at the stranger with a less-than-friendly expression.

“Oh Miya! I’m a huge fan, would you mind taking a photo with me?” He indulges his fan, never letting go of Y/N’s hand, even as she steps out of the camera’s focus. The stranger parts with a grateful smile to both Atsumu and Y/N, which feels unnecessary, but Y/N returns anyway. The friends continue their shopping trip before making the trek to Atsumu’s apartment building. Y/N is quiet, in her head about the whole fan interaction that lasted a total of five minutes, but Atsumu says nothing - even stays quiet until the pair are up in his apartment.

“Everything okay? Not bored of me are ya?”

She smiles weakly at him, settling to rest against his kitchen counter. “It’s just… I- nevermind it’s stupid.” She shakes her head, hand waving in front of her as if trying to shoo away the negative cloud above her head. But Atsumu quickly grabs her hand, pulling her into the space between his arms.

“It’s not stupid if ‘s how yer feeling.. What’s up?”

“Okay…” She starts, pushing away from his chest to give herself some literal and mental space. He crosses his arms over his chest, leaning back at the opposite counter to Y/N, who's mirroring his stance except her head is thrown back, eyes searching his ceiling for the right words to come next. “Are you always like… this… with the girls who give you head?” When she looks at him, his head is tilted to the left in confusion, making her huff anxiously. “Okaaay.. you’ve complimented me more in the past three weeks than any other person has in my entire life… is that normal for you to do with the girls hooking up with you or am I the exception? It’s not a big deal.. It’s just that you -”

“I compliment you because you deserve to be complimented, sweetheart… but if it makes you uncomfortable then I can stop.” He cuts in, before he uncrosses his arms, palms gripping at the counter behind him. “As for the whole hooking up part… is that what you want this to be? ‘Cos we can do that, up to you Y/N, I’ll take whatever you’re willing to give -”

“But why? Until three weeks ago I was under the impression that I wasn’t your ‘type’ or whatever so why now are you suddenly on board with taking whatever I give you?”

He laughs, and Y/N wants to cry. Why wasn’t he taking this seriously? Y/N is good at feeling her feelings, but has a hard time clearly expressing those feelings into words.

“Don’t laugh a-”

“Who told you what my type was? If it was ‘Samu or Omi I swear I’ll -”

“You did. You said I wasn’t your type.” He balks, eyes wide and riddled with trying to think about when he said it. “It was forever ago, but you said it. You came back from Germany, I picked you up and ‘Samu had called while I went to the restroom and well.. I overheard you say-”

“Yer an idiot, made an assumption before ya knew the whole truth, baby. I was talking about this photographer that I was kinda seein’ at the time. M’brother asked why if she’d get mad that I chose to see you fresh off the plane instead of her, said it didn’t matter because she wasn’t my type.”

Y/N wishes that the floor of his ridiculously priced apartment would swallow her whole, or that if she pushed the right buttons on his fancy microwave she’d be able to rewind life to five minutes ago when she decided to start this conversation. Frankly, she feels silly and like she shouldn’t say anything else - she knows that her words conveyed a little bit of insecurity that she’s sure Atsumu doesn’t want to have to deal with.

A beat passes before both Y/N and Atsumu open their mouths, but he’s able to get out the words first. “You really thought that you weren’t my type?” Fuck his smug little desbelieving smile.

“Don’t gimme that look - you’re usually spotted around the globe with gorgeous people… ‘s it really wrong of me to assume that I wasn’t your type? Besides,” she starts, arms crossed around her middle while Atsumu takes a tentative step to close the gap between them. “It's not that it matters now since, y’know I know that it's not true.. Just hurt my feelings at the time and well…”

“You were supposed to be the smart one between us, got the college degree ‘n everythin.” He teases, arms reaching to rest on her waist. “For someone so smart you really missed all the signs huh? Why do you think I stepped in every time some guy tried to talk t’ya? Why d’ya think that I tried to take up all your weekend time, don’t get me wrong I love spendin’ time with ya but also didn’t wanna see you goin out with any guys you’d met when I wasn’t around.” By this point he’s got her chin in his hand, ducking his head slightly to make her look at him fully. “And why the hell would I eat you out at every possible opportunity once I’ve been given the okay? Just because I get thrown it all the time by others doesn’t mean that I eat out every -”

“Alright, alright. You can shut up now. I get it, I’m dumb. I just didn’t think -”

“Oh you got tha’ right - didn’t think at all did ya?” She groans, throwing her head back. She’ll never be able to get the image of his smug face out of her head, never going to be able to live down how for once in their years long friendship Atsumu was smarter than her. All he can do though is laugh, pulling her face back down to his and giving her forehead a soft kiss, making her stomach erupt with flutters.

“If you tell anyone about this conversation, I swear to god Miya I’ll-”

“Shh it’s always gotta be a threat with you huh? Why can’t you just admit that you were stupid for once?”

“Not happening.”

“Not even if it means you’re stupidly in like with me”

“No, because I’m not stupidly in like with you… I just adore your stupid self more than I’d ever admit in front of anyone else.”

He laughs, bumping his nose against her with a laugh before kissing her softly. Everything is great, life is great. Y/N loves Atsumu and Atsumu loves her, and she isn’t some sad, movie cliché any longer. She’s got this gorgeous guy who practically worships her, so freely giving himself to her. He pulls away from kissing her for a second, taking a moment to appreciate the way that her eyes are closed happily.

“Just so y’know… I adore you too.” Kiss. “But you are never allowed to call me stupid again… from now on I’m the smart one in this relationship.”

A/N pt2: and so that’s it hehe. thank you sm for reading I hope you enjoyed it. any little comments you have in the tags would be nice to read or yeah. this is my side blog so like hgjdgsh if I respond to you it’s gonna be from my main haha

[sapiowoman28]

Whipped Part 1 - Good in bed

Pairing: Jeno x May

Genre: friends to lovers au, smut, fluff

Warnings: mentions of oral sex (male receiving) do not read if you're a minor in your country.

Lee Jeno had a reputation on campus of being a ladies man. He knew it, but he didn't care. It was always the same thing they all spoke about. How he had his first girlfriend at 14, and broke up with her 4 years later when he turned 18. How the 2nd girl lasted a year, but he left her too. After the 2nd girl, he decided he wouldn't do relationships anymore. All that simply caused people to talk about him even more.

They spoke about his best friend May too. They called her Marvellous May, because she apparently was good in bed. May was quite the character. She had never had a boyfriend before, prefering to love them and leave them. She had no interest beyond hanging around the same guy more than a few times.

The guys? They were whipped. It wasn't uncommon for May to stop seeing someone, only to have the guy try to convince her otherwise by following her around like a sick puppy dog. Jeno had to get involved a couple of times to stop the stalking.

It always amused him. These losers, he and May would laugh. Unsurprisingly they were tagged the Terrible Twosome, infamous for being mean to anyone who messed with them or their friends. For some strange reason, nobody had ever tried suggesting they get together - everyone assumed they had a sibling like relationship because they were so similar.

That was why May was confused when Jeno first brought up the idea of screwing each other one day when they were hanging out at their favourite bar people watching.

"Why suddenly?" she asked, taking a sip of her beer.

"You're not screwing anyone. I'm not screwing anyone. Why not screw each other till we find others?" he shrugged. "Besides, we know and trust each other."

She sat back in her seat, pursing her lips. He wondered if he had crossed the line.

"I'll think about it." she said. He agreed, and the topic didn't come up again for another few months.

It was only at the pool party she threw that May saw Jeno in a different light. May came from an affluent family. Her parents ran a business empire which required them to travel frequently. And when they were out of town, May threw parties.

This one in particular had too many people and too much booze. The police got called in and that ended things. As people left, May noticed the amount of mess she and her housekeeper would have to clear. Thankfully Jeno and Jaemin offered to stay behind to help.

And then it happened. To cool off after cleaning, the boys stripped to their shorts and sat by the pool drinking beer. May froze at the sight of Jeno's sculpted body, mouth slightly opened in shock. Jaemin noticed it immediately.

"Dude, she's checking you out!" he teased Jeno. Jeno smiled but said nothing, giving her a wink. She looked away, not wanting Jaemin to tease any more.

That night, he texted her.

"I think you might wanna hang out at my place tomorrow." he asked.

"I'm meeting the girls at the club but i can do dinner before that."

"I'll order pizza." he said.

And so here he was, sitting on the sofa, with May on her knees, giving him the blowjob of his lifetime. As she swirled her tongue around his head, her brown eyes never once leaving him, he was floored. She let out a giggle before spitting on his cock, then taking him deep in her mouth. He could feel her throat - it was that far back. Suddenly she started humming a tune, and his cock could feel the vibrations. He inhaled sharply.

"Your cock is so yummy, Jeno." she coo-ed. He was in too much of a daze to reply. She continued bobbing on him. He stroked her hair. Had it been another girl he would have tried to fuck her mouth. But he was only too aware this was his best friend. His best friend who was now licking his balls.

He understood now. Those loser guys were real losers. They had gotten hooked on her blowjobs. And they didn't want to go without.

Thankfully he was smarter than that. He, Lee Jeno, was not going to be another one of May's puppy dogs, following her around campus.

He watched her, understanding now, that he had to be careful. He could see May had her game face on. She was loving every minute of this, because she thought she had him under her spell. But under her spell she was not.

"Oh shoot!" he cried out, as he came suddenly. She took every drop of him, smiling sweetly after swallowing, looking like an angel.

"Seriously, Jeno. I thought you'd last longer," she teased.

"Sit on my face," he pleaded. "Let me pay you back."

She looked at her watch. "Er. I gotta go. Or I'm gonna be late and won't hear the end of it from the gals."

She started straightening herself up.

"I can send you to the club." he offered.

"It's ok, Jeno. You look like you need rest. I'll get myself an Uber." she winked. "You don't have to send me out."

He was in a daze as she left. Did she just totally blow his mind out? That was the most amazing oral sex he ever had. He knew he had to meet up with her again to go all the way. He was pretty sure sex with her would be just as good, and couldn't wait for that.

And much as Jeno was sure he wouldn't get hooked, one thing was clear.

Marvellous May had worked her charm, and Lee Jeno was now 100% whipped.

[awake-dearheart]

it took me a couple days but here’s a rundown of things sebastian said during the zoom call with his trainer don saladino and the march challenge group. he was on for an hour and three minutes total. keep in mind this challenge was fitness oriented so most of the questions revolve around that. this will also be LONG.

first of all he had trouble unmuting himself which was hilarious

he had a carboard cutout of the falcon with him which made everyone laugh

he loved being able to support ronald mcdonald house and he was sad they couldn’t go this year. sweet baby

when he was asked what he struggles with in his fitness he immediately said body dysmorphia. like no hesitation. he said he felt like he could stand to be less hard on himself.

he prefers cardio over other kinds of workouts.

he mentioned a role he’s getting ready for that’s “a lot different” but he laughed it off and said he couldn’t talk about it. i’m thinking it might have been tommy lee?

he tries to workout even just a little before he goes to set even when his schedule is crazy.

when he started training he had NO idea what he was doing. it took him a while to get into a routine and figure it out. he credited don with working a lot with him and finding a routine that works for him.

he feels better when he can do something physical every day. he said it really helps him mentally because the two go hand in hand for him.

someone said they were learning romanian and asked him for phrases to learn in romanian he said (in romanian) “oh my GOD why would you do that?” he also said he thinks people learning romanian because of him is “one of the sweetest things.”

he was asked how he balances training to look good vs training to feel good and he said if he’s training to look good he’s never 100% satisfied. training to feel good and setting short term goals has been better for him. 

don praised him for working hard to pivot his focus on the overall vs the day to day. seb said it was a lot harder when he started than it is now.

someone asked him if the workouts or the nutrition was harder and he immediately started talking about pizza and how much he loves a good cheat meal. the chat blew up talking about his cheat day video for men’s health. 

seb asked don his favorite cheat meal and they went on a tangent about burgers and fries and vodka that had us cracking up. seb said he went through a period where he was eating some kind of chocolate every day.

someone asked if he found it mentally difficult to go from one body type to another for roles and he said absolutely. he said if he has a shirtless scene to do then a month before he cuts out ALL sugar. fruits, carbs, everything and he turns into a very irritable person for about two weeks.

he was asked how the pandemic has changed his training and he said of course it has. him and don worked together to create a program for him to do from home with dumbbells and they had to get inventive. he’s been running a lot too.

someone asked the strangest item he’s used for weights and he said he’d go to the grocery store by himself without uber or anything. he tried to do one big shopping trip to last him for a week and half and he’d be laden with bags and it took him an hour and a half to walk home.

he told a story about using a towel and a bar in his house and he said “you probably know it because some “super fans” love to leak my address. so kind. lovely people.” the chat became v enraged.

he’s never had to get in shape on super short notice. marvel usually gives him about a 2 month heads up before he has to shoot things.

someone asked if he was a dog person. he said he loves dogs and he’d love to have one but he travels too much to give one the right kind of attention. he said if he could have a dog he’d have a bulldog or a husky.

he was asked his favorite nyc cheat meal and his first answer was “seeing all of you there” and we all cracked up. his real answer was a pizza place called rubirosa. he specifically likes their white pizza. (who wants to go to new york and get pizza with me?)

who would win in an iso squat challenge? him or don? (iso squats are when you drop into a squat and you hold it. it’s been the most hated exercise throughout the challenge). his face was HORRIFIED when he remembered what they are and he said don would definitely win. “don you have thighs of glory” the group is contemplating making shirts.

he played some sports in school but he wasn’t a super athletic kid. he struggled in school a bit because he had an accent and people were picking on him. it took a long time for his confidence to build.

celebrate victories where you can. he talked about when he posted that shirtless picture from the gym as an example. he said it’s more for motivation and pride in his achievements than about showing off.

he mentioned the documentary “the weight of gold” as something he watched recently. he said it’s a good example of people who are gold medal olympians struggling with the same things as everyone else when it comes to fitness. he comes back several times to not being too hard on yourself. 

he hasn’t lifted any weights in about a month and a half but he’s been running. he’s surprised at the amount of muscle he still has because he thought he’d lose a lot of it.

taking breaks when you’re working on fitness is so important. he says taking a week off sometimes is ok if that’s what you need.

they have talked about pizza at least 5 times at this point (32 minutes in) and it’s HILAROUS honestly.

he hates leg day. he knows how important it is because you need strong legs but he prefers doing arms and chest. “the squats can be so annoying UGH.”

someone asked him his advice for people who are starting an acting career and he laughed and said “quit all social media.” he walked it back and said you have to find a way to quiet the noise. 

this mfer went to theatre camp when he was 15 and he did MUSICALS. we tired to get him to sing. it didn’t work.

“you gotta do you. you cannot lose you as you’re going. and you cannot care what people think.”

he talked about imposter syndrome in terms of getting reviews and stuff. he said when he gets bad reviews it hurts but sometimes when he gets good reviews he can think “oh my god they made a mistake” or “oh my god i have to deliver like this every time.” he said if you’re starting out ask yourself why you want to do this and make sure this is what you want to do day in a day out. make sure when you face rejection and obstacles you have the energy to push you to get back up and say “fuck you i’m doing me.”

recommended the book “the subtle art of not giving a fuck” as something he loves.

“there’s creativity in everything. you don’t have to be a pianist or an actor or a writer. there’s creativity in all functions. as people we’re all creative.”

he went back to instagram for a minute and said to use it for the right things and follow the things that you like or are inspired by. he loves that social media can be used to reach people but you have to filter through the negative stuff.

someone asked the meanest thing don’t ever said during training and he said don’s never been mean but he’s always been inspiring and motivating for him. cute lil bromance moment.

he was asked if it’s harder to get into shape physically for the winter soldier or mentally. he said now it’s more of a head thing than it was in the beginning. the physically part was challenging for him in the beginning because he wanted to feel strong to build his confidence. he felt he couldn’t be bucky without being strong. 

civil war was his real hair but when they started filming it wasn’t long enough so he had extensions. by the end of the shoot it was long enough to cut the extensions out. 

the line between overtraining and not being motivated to train enough is hard for him sometimes. things tend to come all at once or not at all and it can be a struggle. 

he meditates and does some kind of physical activity every day at the start of his day. it makes him able to do the things he needs to do for the rest of the day better.

he thanked everyone for their support of tfaws and “making us look pretty good.” he’s very grateful for the turnout.

don says falcon weird. that’s not important but i wanted to mention it.

running is his go to thing. he feels like it’s a good meditative thing for him.  his go to pandemic workout was 100 pull ups, 100 push ups, 100 sit ups, 100 squats and alternating with running. we all panicked and were like “100 PULL UPS AT ONCE??” and he was like no no no no no no no no space that shit out during the day.

he loves breakfast but he doesn’t eat it at breakfast time. he joked he was going to eat breakfast after the call (which ended at 7PM). he likes anything with eggs and avocado. 

there are still directors he wants to work with that he can’t get to see him for parts. he did three audition tapes, two in person auditions, and a screen test to get bucky.

he just recently learned what “thirst pics” are (he figured out from the chat it’s thirst traps). when someone told him that picture from the gym was a thirst trap he was like “oh great well that sounds terrible.” men’s health didn’t call him until after that pic. he had reached out to them before that but that was the thing that made them call.

“make fun of yourself. you have to not take yourself too seriously.”

they both talked about how being able to do things like this is a privilege. there are always days when seb or don or anyone walks into a gym and doesn’t want to be there.

this is the part that made me emotional as FUCK. he’s had days where he’s gone to set and been like “what the fuck am i doing?” he says every time that happens he thinks “this is the time they’re gonna realize i can’t do this. this is when they’re all gonna know i’ve never been good at this.” he said in those moments you can’t just say “no no no i’m the best.” he said sometimes affirmations work and they can be as simple as “i’m gonna try to have a good day today” and it doesn’t have to be “i have to be the best version of myself.” it can just be “i wanna have a good day today” but on the days when you don’t feel good about things and don’t know what you’re doing he said you have to go there and say “ok i don’t know what the fuck i’m doing. fuck everything.” be in the thing that’s happening to you and give yourself permission to be down for a minute. find a compromise with yourself. if you can’t run the same three miles you’ve run all week and you just don’t want to, maybe you go for a walk instead. (his example not mine i DO NOT run). when he’s been in those moments of defeat accepting it had lead him to things he didn’t plan for and he finds those moments to be gifts in a way. accepting it and saying “today is that day” your body and your mind can start moving into finding other little things to do.

he came back to pizza one more time. i love him.

he recognizes how lucky he is to have the life he has. he says it’s important to pay attention to give a fuck about things and to give a fuck about things that will help other people. 

watching him talk the whole time he seemed so happy and relaxed. he seems like such a light hearted and fun person and he laughed SO much

that’s the end y’all. thanks for sticking around and reading all my hastily typed notes

[incarnateirony]

Do you know if the CW feels any impact from the audience of their shows in countries where they're not a channel? For example in Brazil there's no CW, but some of their shows are on the Warner Channel as well as stuff from other networks.

This one is a little more complicated, I'll start at "nyes".

Here's the thing: at the end of the day, the CW is an empty vessel. It has less than 400 employees, and technically even qualifies as a "small business" resultingly. It is an LLC, meaning it has no stocks, and can not be held accountable on the stock market and the executives there have a series of protections designed to keep them from taking personal hits.

Boycotting the CW is a method to plink the armor of its much larger parents. At the end of the day, the CW--shitty as its ethics, choices and influences are--are mostly beholden to its parent companies.

Does anyone remember when I told people, the second that Wayward was cancelled, that CBS was responsible, despite Wayward being a WB IP? I explicitly mentioned Moonves, and quoted his methodology on properties, ratings, streaming and more? Then dipshits like You Know Who tried to claim they knew better, and that I was crazy/stupid, and then like a month later one of the wayward women said at a M&G that the contractual breakdown was from CBS, and This Guy Named Moonves, and then there was radio silence and the You Know Whos emitted crickets, buried the conversation, and pretended it never happened?

That's because these things are related. They all influence each other, as per my last ask (x).

At the end of the day, the things that happened on, say, Supernatural are you actually being pissed at the WB. You can see the WB's historically failing Studio Responsibility Index on things like LGBT representation here at the GLAAD website. (x)

Just like a lot of the supreme BS attempted-but-massively-failing woke content tends to spew out of CBS trying to appeal to The Young Gays while segregating The Gay Stuff off their prime network that is historically way behind the others. They have no idea how to actually make or handle that content, but slap pride flags and a few Hashtag Fact phrases on content and plug it up the CW's ass to market it to you with more rainbows and a big impressive tally list of gay characters, that the You Know Whos of fandom insist make it a great representation channel, and bury the conversation that most of those are one-off or very minor characters, dead, or worse. They're there to hit a target that's a good talking point. Nothing else. They put a gay in the background of a poster somewhere so That Counts(tm) and look how progressive they are, make sure to attend his funeral next episode.

This may all seem like a huge aside to the initial ask but it's necessary framework to present, in association with the above-linked previous ask, on why holding the CW accountable is important. Because at the end of the day, be it the Nadria Tucker issues with WB/DC and their firing her for racist/sexist reasons; or the erasure of gays on Supernatural to the point there's clearly an order to their related syndication networks where they won't even air 15.09 or 15.18 again much less the finale; or the bullshit attempts at being woke on Walker where they think making ICE prisoners a talking point to launch a white man cop's story as relatable to an ICE officer's struggles is good marketing; to things outside of it, like--as posted by POLOL member Rebarn in the server,

-- these are people actually being mad at choices made by the CBS and WB. The CW is just a vessel to deliver it with minimal accountability and a PR mask people eat up like the gay candy they're trying to sell you even if it's just sugar free beaver anus flavoring.

But because of the size of these giant merged companies, like--trying to tackle WB head on for example is a fools' errand unless everyone pulled their heads out of their asses and ended this "I DO WHAT I WANT" personality and started heavily networking with say, DC fandoms and adjacent to do substantial damage to their franchises far larger. But, again, deferring to the above linked previous ask, if you knock out the CW as a content vehicle, even if it's smaller, you suddenly dent 6, 7, 8, 9 zeroes out of WB/CBS profits because you CAN knock down the CW, and change how they have to peddle their product.

To round full circle to your ask: just because the CW isn't in your country doesn't mean it does no good to boycott the content. Because the profit still goes to the IP holders (CBS, WB), and it's still part of the joint statement, as well as lowers the digital franchiseability of the products they're trying to resell on the market, internationally.

For example you know how internationally Netflix shows a lot of "Netflix originals" that are very obviously not originals, but are instead shows from other sources? That's part of The Rights Game. Initially CW and Netflix had a brokered deal of bulk packaging for a very large, very pretty price to them that helped bankroll them for years. This is also why CBS started shoveling absolute fodder content down the CW's throat that could run on just about negative ratings -- again, I point to the Moonves interview I cited as implication to why Wayward was bumped off the line -- so CBS could run away with the digital profits 100% licensing things in dozens or hundreds of companies. But CBS threw a goddamn hissyfit about merchandising rights when Netflix was like hey if we're gonna source all these shitty shows can we get like 10% of the merch value and CBS threw themselves on the mcdonalds playplace floor kicking and screaming, and then CW lost its legendary netflix deal which made them have to start peddling their content individually.

So if you cut off viewership of this content internationally, its franchiseability tanks, and CW continues to lose a huge part of its bankrolling value both with digital and to its parent companies using it as a vehicle to deliver content to shove into digital venues. The lack of the Netflix deal is why CBS is also wandering around like a pauper to platforms trying to find a home for its content--like convincing WB to host Walker on HBO Max, where I promise it's not going to do well. Most of its audience is beyond streaming age, and I promise no young 20 something is gonna open HBO Max and be like YOU KNOW WHAT I WANT TO WATCH, THIS YEEHAW COP REBOOT WITH JARED PADALECKI SPITTING IN A POT AND PULLING UP HIS PANTS. They're gonna fuckin' turn on Game of Thrones or something. Netflix, hulu, amazon don't fuckin' want it because they see that on the horizon. They're not gonna pay the money CBS wants for it. CBS All Access is for old people and they're too noncommittally fake woke just enough to piss off the Trumpers (points back to point about CBS content/representation way up there). So CBS DOESN'T EVEN WANT IT ON ITS OWN STREAMING PLATFORM.

Walker's housing arrangement on HBO Max is actually an early symptom of CW death throes, and CBS trying to figure out what the hell it's going to do once the CW goes under. It burned its netflix bridge, and soon won't have CW to try to float/sell/farm its content. Streaming apps don't want their content anymore. Their content underperforms.

So yes, absolutely boycott these products internationally. It adds to the weight of what's going on and continues to make CW less and less valuable on the front, continues to damage the actual IP holder parent companies and take their products to their knees, and continues to expediate the decline of it all in one network of fuckery. The same way the CW was a strength for its parents by webbing between them is now a way to drag them into a collective undertow and force bad business results on them all around, essentially inverting its value, expediting the rate at which they decide the CW is a money sink, and making them watch the 0s fly out of their bank account in a way that--say--trying to tackle the WB directly wouldn't accomplish.

CW no longer owns the rights to SPN, hence deleting its YT content. WB does. But WB has been feeling the crunch enough that brand new unopened S14 complete season blurays with specials are being sold under 10 dollars at walmart with 2$ off other movie tickets on the front and still not going off the shelves. That's them even trying to recover costs on releasing them to begin with. The WB tried to put out a mega 15 season uber collectors set giveaway enter by RT and got like, 300 RTs total. They need traction, they're not getting sales, and we're seeing the active results.

Continue to put heat on products that came by way of the CW as a result of their communal meddling being bad for business in any way possible, even after CW is no longer airing it and once the money is going straight into the IP holder parent company pockets. Not only are you then making The Correct People(tm) hurt, you're further devaluing the CW itself and accelerating its heat death which STILL will end up massively dinging the WB/CBS for reasons explained above in ways that kicking the titans in the shins itself wouldn't accomplish.

Hopefully that clarifies.

[postmodernbeing]

Shingeki no Kyojin Headcanons: Paradis Soldiers, drunk edition

Hello, Postmodernbeing here. So, I have been re-reading SnK manga due its 4th and final season. And chapter 123 really inspired me into writing this headcanons. I wrote them thinking in some Morden AU, but I believe that they could easily work for the canon universe. I hope you like this as much as I did. 

IMPORTANT: I kept some canon elements that I read in a few posts from interviews to Isayama. //  For obvious reasons, all the characters are 18+. // I do not own Shingeki no Kyojin. // This post does not exhorts the abuse of harmful substances such as alcohol. // English is not my first language, so I appreciate your patience.

Eren Jaeger

Isayama himself has mentioned that Eren has a high tolerance to alcohol. I'd like to respect that fact (although I'm not 100% sure about that since I read it somewhere around internet). I do imagine that Eren is the friend that ends up taking care of everyone when they're totally wasted, but he also finds the time to have fun and drink because he doesn’t really like watching over every single one of his friends or counting all the shots that they take.

His behavior doesn’t really change a lot when wasted. I picture that he might speak a bit higher than usual due the deafening effect of music and alcohol. Also, he takes a bit of time before replying a question, etc.

Apart from that, do not expect him to dance like crazy over some table. He would agree to some karaoke, though. Or even to compete in a videogame/party game if Jean challenges him enough. Usually, Eren likes to keep his cool and watch everyone have a good time. Eren’s a simple man.

In some AU, he would be the designated driver if no one else offers (cough Armin cough), or in case that all his friends are totally wasted. Eren also makes sure that his pals arrive home safely before turning the engine again (so thoughtful, aw). In case that everyone takes a taxi or some uber, Eren would ask them to send a message to their group chat before going to bed just so he’s sure everyone is safe. Even if he knows some of them will forget or fall asleep immediately after arriving home.

Mikasa Ackerman

This girl rarely gets drunk, let me tell you. And not because she doesn’t drink, she drinks a lot. Mostly because she follows Sasha into all she dares her: beerpong, shots, you name it. Even though, Mikasa prefers traditional beer, she’s into trying new things such as different tastes and alcohol levels (she’s fearless). I do imagine that Mikasa realizes she’s drunk when tries to stand from anywhere she was sitting, rather for going to the kitchen for a glass of water or to the toilet (she knows  drinking water is important in order to keep her body hydrated and avoid hangover).

First thing she notices, besides the dizziness, is her face utterly blushed. She smiles almost immediately, Mikasa is more open with her body language albeit her use of words remains limited. She knows how to stay rational.

She’ll never admit how much she enjoys being invited by Sasha to have some drinks. Mikasa’s happy that she’s able to be her partner in beerpong, even if Sasha makes her lose from time to time. Her favorite game secretly is “Never have I ever…” because all her friends end up sharing too much, or some truly funny anecdotes that feed her little laugh (please, protect smiley Mikasa).

Mikasa has been designated driver only a couple of times since she keeps falling asleep after getting wasted. Nevertheless, she never fails into leaving a good night message to her friends when arriving home. Mikasa thinks that’s the perfect way to thank the squad for the great moments they shared.

Like Eren, she prefers casual reunions or stay-in-home parties. But if she’s noticed that the rest will attend to some bar/club she’d rather be there, protecting them (just a little before passing out too).

Armin Arlert

How do I say this politely? Please, keep him away from alcohol. He gets so drunk, so fast it’s almost funny. Definitely, he starts feeling a bit sleepy because he feels so relaxed. But if Armin keeps drinking sure thing, he’ll start feeling more energetic and perky. He’s the first one that gets into the karaoke thing, although he likes to share stories from the books he reads too, Eren is the one that listens to him with the most attention (and soberness).

Armin also laughs a lot being drunk, you could tell him any nonsense and he’ll burst out laughing. Sometimes he also tries to make jokes but fails funnily enough, he can’t make one coherent sentence. That’s a good sign most of the times, for he’s reaching his limits and his friends cut his consumption (which it’s really not that much).

That’s why it’s common that Armin offers himself as designated driver those nights that he might had a beer or two. He’s very responsible when he acknowledges there won’t be a chance to stay the night (for they are partying at a club or a stranger’s house). Armin is used to take his friends till their front door, he might be small, but he wants to be sure everyone will be alright and safe.

Against all odds, he enjoys a bit more of pubs since he became with time, less aloof than his childhood friends. Although, he’s not that meticulous with the remedies against hangover. Giving him the result of headaches for the next 24 hours at least.

Jean Kirstein

Jean has a higher alcohol tolerance, and he even tries to avoid excess of said substances. However, he always fails colossally 80% of occasions. He’s not precisely awkward or a bad drinker, but it’s definitely hard to keep up with his energy and enthusiasm when he’s drunk. Jean’s not the most responsible drinker neither but he manages to stay rational enough. One could say that he becomes more reckless with what he does and says.

…Such as climbing up a table and dancing like crazy. He would absolutely spend most of the night dancing and he’s not bad actually. The thing is, that his ability comes from the drunk effect rather than actual skill. When there’s no music to be heard, he likes to organize the games with Sasha and Connie. Jean also yells a lot more, and he doesn’t admit it but he runs out of patience faster if his friends aren’t excited to follow the flow of the games (we know he refers to Eren most of the times).

Therewith, he keeps his cool and sincere attitude. His friends know that Jean doesn’t need to be drunk to be open and honest, so they trust in his drunken words too. Which leads us to the next point, Jean loves bigger and more elaborated parties. But only because he knows all his friends could engage in activities that they actually enjoy. From screaming and running to keeping it quiet in a sofa.

He doesn’t worry easily, but if someone asks him to take care of them, he will offer his help without trouble (those are the 20% remaining of occasions in which he doesn’t get that drunk). Jean got the designated driver role only one time, for his friends decided that he sucked at following the GPS and spend too much time taking ‘shortcuts’ every three blocks. It would take the rest of the night trying to get to their homes.

Sasha Braus

Like Jean, Sasha has a medium tolerance to alcoholic beverages, but she tends to mess that up when stuffing her mouth with snacks and junk food. She insists in eating before drinking (and after too), so it’s not unusual to watch her running into the bathroom at the middle of the night because of nausea. To everyone's surprise, she has a wide knowledge of different drinks. From the best wines and its respective cuts of meats, to the strangest (and cheapest) mixtures for the sole purpose of getting wasted.

Even in sober state Sasha isn’t shy at all. So, beware for she’s the mastermind behind the party games. Sasha always promises tranquil reunions but deep down everyone knows shit’s getting down every-single-time. She knows the basic games such as beerpong, “never have I ever”, “truth or dare”, and she has a talent at asking the most awkward questions. But her real potential reveals when she dares her friends into weird and dangerous challenges.

Sasha definitely becomes more direct and energetic. She has let her real accent show a few times before and even if she gets a bit embarrassed she’s too drunk to care (Mikasa is the first one that shuts their mouths if they try to make fun of her, canon of they being the best friends ever, yay).

She loves to dance and sing, making a disaster of the house/club they’re partying at. Connie tries to calm her down before anyone else, but fails because just like her, he’s delighted with the jokes and pranks they pull together. Sasha knows that Connie stays close to her in case she’s feeling more dizzy than usual and she’s forever thankful for that. Lastly, she has never offered herself into that designated driver role, and that’s what her friends are thankful for. So, everything’s reciprocal, one could say.

Connie Springer

Connie has just a bit more of tolerance to alcohol. It’s common that Sasha, Jean, and Connie end up drunk at the same time. They laugh when they realize this. The first signal into Connie’s drunk state is him talking about everything that passes through his mind, from conspiracy theories to the most absurd yet profound questions. And finishes his quasi rational speech with bad jokes, although he doesn’t really need alcohol to tell them.

He promises himself every single time that he’ll take care of Sasha but ends up following her into all her dares and extreme games (some of them almost illegal). Connie is the first person than anyone runs to if they want to throw a bigger party. He feels flattered to this, he’s truly popular and a great company to anyone. Seems obvious at this point, but I'll say it anyway: Connie really enjoys club parties.

I already mentioned that Connie gets along with anything that Sasha comes up with. But Connie himself has a repertoire of anecdotes and pranks. He can recommend you the best pubs and the cheapest (and interesting) clubs. He doesn’t admit it, but this also strokes his ego. Maybe he does have some genius in him, at least for these topics.

Connie is also the most chaotic drunk, all he does (or tries to) is funny. He has the craziest anecdotes. Like that time when his friends found him asking for directions to a public trash can, or that one night when he had a fight with Jean because he didn’t accede to shave his head to match with Connie’s. Or Sasha’s favorite, she’d dared him into smelling Eren’s arse for some bet they had about his smell. Mikasa was not happy.

Sincerely, this boy brings life into the parties if he desires so. Howbeit, he got his friends’ backs if they have a problem with aggressive drunken guys. Connie has jumped into fights just so he protects his friends (Armin, more than anyone else due his big-smart mouth). Truth to be told, Connie fights quite good when drunk. His protective side is a wonder, y’all give him lots of love.

[kidney9-9]

Never Drinking Again - Peter Parker

Anonymous asked:

Peter being super freaked out about being a dad during the end of reader's pregnancy, so she asks Ned to take him out and basically get drunk so that he can relax a little. And they do, Peter is so drunk now that he's just laughing at anything Ned says, until he grabs his phone, that was confiscated by Ned so that he could chill out, Ned is also checking his phone and he sees that he got a lot of voicemails from you saying that you are in labor and that they need to get back right now. And Peter goes back to freaking out lmao

Thank you for sending this in! I hope you enjoy! Please read the warnings. 

Pairing: Peter Parker x Reader [Fluff] Warnings: Drinking and swearing Word Count: 1.1k

When Peter unzipped and zipped the go bag for the pregnancy again today, you sighed angrily. He needed to stop whatever he was doing. He was too worried and stressed about the baby coming, and it was making you stressed and pissed off. You didn’t want him to act so worried when you both were ready for the baby.

He had been checking up on you at least every thirty minutes if you two were apart, and then when you were together, he wouldn’t look away from you. He’d also hold onto your stomach and try to judge what time the baby was coming based on the strengths of the kicks, which you thought was short of insane. He bought everything that would help you out during pregnancy, which you enjoyed but here were also some weird things he bought.

The hat he got you… wasn’t for your head. It was for the baby bump. He even got a stroller for you to sit in, if you felt as though the baby was kicking you too much. It was crazy. He bought you baby food, to try out to see if the baby liked it, and if you threw up, Peter would declare the baby didn’t like it.

Everything he did drove you mad.

You needed the break. You called Ned in the next moment as you glared at Peter, who had no idea how pissed off you were by his actions. When you explained the situation to Ned, he burst out into laughter, howling Peter’s name before clearing his throat and calming down.

“I’ll take him to a bar for the night, try to calm him down.” Ned explained and you sighed gratefully, sitting back comfortably in the chair.

“Thank you so fucking much. How’s 5 sound?” You replied, making the plan instantly.

You kissed Peter goodbye, with a bright smile, just happy to have some alone time. When you sat down, you almost immediately closed your eyes, happy with the silence and how unbothered everything was now.

When Peter and Ned got to the bar, Peter was tugging at his hair anxiously, and bouncing his leg up and down. Ned glanced over to him with furrowed eyebrows, shaking his head, before ordering a few beers. Peter cleared his throat, “I uh, I can’t drink.” He shrugged over to Ned apologetically, still bouncing his leg.

“What, why?” Ned questioned, with a ridiculous look on his head. He didn’t realize how worried Peter could get, but he could see your point of view now, about how annoying it is. It didn’t make sense because you and Peter were the most prepared parents he’s ever known. Everything was taken account for, and he knew that the baby room was completely ready for anything.

“What if Y/n is hurt? That she fell because of the baby. I know her feet get sore sometimes.” Peter rambled, now nibbling down on his fingernails, glancing around the room.

“What the fuck, Peter? Just drink.” Ned sighed out, shaking his head back to Peter. He took a sip of his beer to encourage him, “See! It tastes good too.”

“You don’t have to lie to me, I know that tastes like piss.” Peter shot back with a frown. Ned rolled his eyes, gulping down some more of his drink. It took a minute of silence to step down from his worries to drink some beer.

After a few more drinks, things felt more relaxed. Ned laughed out, “You know, I think you’re a bit of a worrywart.” Peter snorted in his drink, giggling back to him.

“No way. I just want Y/n and the baby to be safe.” He tried to reason, after drinking the rest of the beer. He nodded to himself, feeling a bit looser.

“Let’s get fucking wasted?” Ned suggested, raising his eyebrows back to Peter. He sighed back, still having some sense in him to not do it, but he started to debate with himself.

He bit his lip, scratching his head. If you wanted him to relax, he should, shouldn’t he? But then he thought about you again, and he shook his head, “No. I can’t for Y/n and the baby.”

Ned grumbled, still ordering shots anyway. He turned to Peter afterwards, leaning his head on his hand, “Give me your phone. You’re getting wasted tonight.” Peter hesitantly handed him the phone, and he shoved both his phone and Peter’s in his pocket just as the bartender served the shots.

Peter started to get more drunk, starting to open about random things, and saying shit about other things. He almost fell off his chair a few times from drunken laughing with Ned, who was cheering him on, trying to get him back to the Peter who wasn’t so anxious all the time.

“And then I started eating the ice cream, you know? And some guy looked at me funny and told me I had ice cream on my nose! Can you believe that? I didn’t even have ice cream on my nose, it was on my chin!” Peter rambled, slamming his fists onto the table after chugging some random fruity drink.

Ned snickered loudly, “He was totally checking out your nose.” Peter nodded, laughing even more rowdily, almost coughing at how much he was laughing. After they started to settle down, Ned sighed happily, going to check his phone for the time.

It must have been about three hours, right? Or maybe longer, he couldn’t tell. When he pulled out Peter’s phone, he pushed the home button, glancing up at the time, before looking down when it beeped again.

Fuck…

No way.

Ned dropped the phone in shock, seeing all your messages sent to Peter, how many voicemails you left him. The latest text was of you saying, “GET HERE NOW I’M IN LABOUR”. Ned frantically pulled out his phone too, unlocking it to see that you’ve sent similar messages, all from an hour ago.

“Peter- we got to go.” Ned stumbled, standing up and took his wallet out, slamming a few bills on the table. Peter knitted his eyebrows together blankly, tilting his head in confusion.

“Why?” He mumbled, the alcohol he drank going through his head. Ned yelped out, tossing Peter’s phone back to him, needing him to read it for himself. Peter unlocked the phone with his thumb, not looking down at the notifications for a moment.

When Ned yelled to look, he gazed down and clicked on the messages, seeing he had over 100 texts. “Oh my god.” He breathed out, seeing them all.

Calling ambulance, baby’s coming Felt water broke!! Peter?? Peter Parker where are you?? Ambulance is outside PETER BABY IS COMING SOON GET OVER HERE WE’RE AT THE HOSPITAL I CALLED MAY AND NATASHA THEY’RE HERE WHERE ARE YOU? PETER I SWEAR TO FUCKING-  PETER!

He screamed as loud as he could, shooting up. “Ned! We have to go now!” He shouted, panic rushing through his veins as he thought about you and the baby. Every single day since he knew you were pregnant, he took extra precaution. And now, the day you were giving birth, he did nothing.

He could barely hear Ned muttering about ordering an Uber but he sat back down, feeling too dizzy. “I’m a fucking bad dad already, Ned.” He started to cry, holding his hands over his eyes. Ned gazed back at him, shaking his head.

“No, you’re not. It’s fine, you’re a great parent.” He tried to explain to Peter, but Peter wasn’t listening to any of it, as he cried some more. And Ned sighed, giving up on the fact that Peter would act like this now because he was a dramatic drunk.

A few minutes passed, and Ned had to drag Peter into the Uber car, saying sorry for him. Peter limped over Ned’s lap, sobbing and muttering about how he cursed himself to be a bad dad, and that he should have ordered the green carpet instead of the yellow carpet in the baby room. Peter opened the voicemail, clicking on the most recent one from you.

“Peter, please get here soon! They say I’m a few hours from giving birth now and I want you to be here.” Your voice bled through the phone and Peter started to speak back, thinking he was on the phone with you now, instead of it just being a voicemail.

“Shut up.” Ned demanded, not understanding how you could deal with him when he’s drunk. Peter nodded dully back to Ned, sniffling as he thought about you and the baby, and what’s happening at the hospital. The uber driver stared back at the two for a few seconds weirdly.

When they got inside the hospital, Ned pushed Peter in a wheelchair, knowing he’d stumble and fall over everything. Ned excused Peter’s crying for random things, shrugging it off when someone would stare over to him with concern.

“Excuse me, where’s the baby ward thing?” Ned spoke up, sniffling a bit, still drunk. The lady at the desk frowned back at him slightly before pointing down the hall, nodding over to the ward. Peter cleared his throat and glared back at the lady.

“I’m a horrible dad.” He mumbled to her, and Ned slapped his hand over his mouth, laughing over his repeated words as he pushed him into the ward. He walked past a few rooms, checking the names on the whiteboards hanging up on the doors.

When he finally found yours, he opened it with a huff of air. You were on the bed, and Aunt May was in the corner, holding and rocking the baby slowly. You looked sleepy, as Natasha patted your head softly. Peter stood up from his wheelchair, “Baby?” He asked, slurring a bit from his drinking.

May swung around with one of the most disappointed looks on her face as Natasha glared over to Peter. You hummed quietly, “Baby.” You responded, nodding over to May. She looked back to you with an upsetting expression, knowing you weren’t that upset that Peter wasn’t here because you were the one to send him away.

“Over here. No touching.” May fussed, shaking her head back to Ned and Peter. He nodded dejectedly as Natasha shook her head in disapproval, muttering something in Russian.

“I’m so sorry, I- when we had the shots and then man told me my nose was- ice cream, and I’m such a bad dad, I’m sorry.” Peter stuttered, coughing and worrying about everything. You laughed slightly as he walked towards you, getting on his knees to apologize.

“It’s fine, you probably would have passed out. When I start feeling better, we’ll talk about stuff.” You mumbled back, eyes barely opening.

Natasha shook her head, “I’m going to kick his ass tomorrow.”

[copperdigitalinc]

Growth of Different Fintech Sectors: 2021

FinTech or Financial Technologies is a sector consisting of platform-based financial services and associated products. Several FinTech companies worldwide are shifting their focus to end-to-end financial solutions to automate processes and generate way more revenue. Looking back at the last two years of the pandemic, since 2019, the rise of FinTech has exceeded all expectations.

Today, the global FinTech market is estimated to reach a value of $309.98 billion by 2025. Based on multiple FinTech Venture Capital reports, a total of $254 billion was invested globally into 18,000 startups through Venture Capital funds, which was an exponential increase of 46%. Initial reports again point down to a slowdown in funding levels in the first half of 2020. The same financial investment pattern is observed across different sectors of the fintech industry. In addition, the global fintech market is estimated to $127.66 billion in 2018, with an annual growth rate of 25%.

In this blog, we shall highlight the major factors contributing to such a rise of the FinTech sectors, the sectors gaining immense popularity, and mobilization to cater to the growing needs.

The two key factors contributing to the evolution of FinTech companies are:

The new technologies that fueled innovation in this arena (e.g., artificial intelligence and cyber defenses) are also maturing.

Many funds are invested in the first generation of companies trying to capitalize, reaching the end of their lives. They are thus getting their houses to return money to their investors.

FinTech Sectors Gaining Immense Popularity

Interestingly, only four categories of Fintech stocks make up 73% of the fintech app ecosystem’s top 100 apps. These are, as ranked, Banking, Payments, Crypto and Investing. Several companies are looking for the right FinTech app vendors or partners to get their own apps out in the market. In this section, we shall cover the major sectors of FinTech that attracted investors’ attention in recent years.

Government entities can range widely from regulators, central banks, sovereign wealth funds, and authorities that grant licenses and can actively influence the financial sector.

FinTech companies that provide financial services and their core products: For instance, giants like Uber and Amazon work tirelessly to enhance their dominance in the Financial sector. They have a team of engineers working towards products that are relevant in the same industry.

Professional investors can be categorized based on size (small or large fund), stage (seed, late venture, private equity, etc.), and finally for the source of funds, such as pension funds, strategic investors, family offices, etc.

New, disruptive companies are operating in several different sectors, covering in one of the following sections. These companies often got their start by “unbundling” one of the services provided by an incumbent player.

Mobility: The Future of FinTech Companies

As predicted by several Finance experts, here’s how the future looks for Financial technology sectors. With open banking being available almost anywhere globally, even more challenging times are upon financial institutions. Along with that, the rise of robotics in 2021 is also taking hold of the Fintech world. Several top-notch companies like N26, Monzo, and Abe have already started catering to the huge potential. We don’t expect that artificial intelligence is going to take over traditional banking advisors anytime soon. But still, its inclusion in the industry will help save a lot of workforce resources. This section will cover the taxonomy of emerging categories, adding some insights and examples to each category and some fintech trends.

1. Artificial intelligence and Machine Learning-powered platforms:

These platforms are mostly used to manage business operations and processes. The tools built help in dealing with the complexity of services and managing data-intensive work.  With apps built from AI, organizations can easily analyze data and help in their decision-making activities.

2. Personalized advice Fintech platforms:

The focus here is providing an improved user experience that is scalable. This can happen because simple processes power the improvements, simple decisions to make on the client’s part, simplified reporting, and all presented with a captivating UX/UI design. This approach is mainly used to address processes like wealth management, life insurance, or loan subscription.

3. Lending and crowdfunding platforms:

Another new sector of lending and crowdfunding platforms are marketplaces that help the two sides of the transaction by standardizing the process and assisting with marketing and legal materials. They mostly utilize enhanced strategies powered by data analytics, offering seamless process steps between subscription, data collection, and analysis. Many developing lending platforms aim to simplify the process and reduce the lending time (from loan application to disbursement).

4. Blockchain:

Another major category of apps is around contracts with features like identity management and onboarding processes. One good thing about this category is that no major player has emerged in this category yet, so there are many potentials.

Read more about the latest FinTech trends here.

In conclusion, Financial technologies or the FinTech sector is likely to be all the more popular in the coming decade, considering the change in consumer behavior. So, if you intend to make the most of the situation by launching your fintech app in the market, feel free to consult our experts today.